Category: Stories

My mom and I were talking on the phone this afternoon. I was in the car driving to provide photojournalistic cover for one of the local activist organizations staging a sit-in to support a local business under fire from the Republican Party for the owner’s public support of the Black Lives Matter movement.

She told me to be safe, as a mother is required to do. And I do prepare my equipment and mind when I grab my camera to go into these increasingly volatile environments. I also reminded her that it was my duty to use my talent to contribute to others who need it. It’s all of our responsibility, frankly, to find within us that thing we do well and apply it to serve the greater communal and societal good. Not for compensation, but because it’s the right thing to do.

My parents raised me to think of others. They modeled the behavior for the man I’ve become. From something as simple as volunteering for school functions or coaching sports teams, to taking a scared kid in when he knocks on the door in the middle of the night holding his dad’s pistol that he took away to protect his mother.

Thinking of others isn’t something you think about. It’s just something you do.

Anywho, here are a couple of images from this afternoon.

Episode 2 of the future Emmy-nominated “Pint of View,” wherein Eric Norlin and I drink a(nother) beer, discuss the explosion of content, and offer up some recommendations on what to add to your Netflix and Substack queues.

It’s a rare Sunday morning when Eric Norlin and I aren’t engaged in heady philosphical debate. Fingers furiously tapping away in chat windows swaying each other to the merits of our individual point of view.  It’s an exercise of critical thought. A way to check our personal assumptions – and have the cross-checked. Often, at least from my side, it’s the argumentative equivalent to getting smashed into the boards by the burliest Canadian NHL defensemen (even though Eric lives just over Canada’s southern border).

These are enjoyable, invigorating conversations historically conducted over coffee and kept to ourselves. Except Eric and I also enjoy and are invigorated by craft beer. IYou know where this is going.

Below is the first episode — the worldwide premiere — of the future Emmy-nominated video podcast series, “Pint of View.” Or, as Eric and I refer to it, “Mike and Eric Drink a Beer and Argue About Stuff.” In epsidode one, we tee up the debate about the future of the Covid-19 work from home shift. We’re still working out the audio visual kinks, but figured we’d follow the old startup adage of ship it and iterate as we go.

Because time is now measured in ounces. Cheers.

I have trouble understanding what makes a person fly a flag or put a bumper sticker on their car in support of a political candidate. If you believe in democracy, you should believe that whoever is elected, regardless of the party they are from, represents all Americans — the rich and the poor, the healthy and the sick, the educated and the unedcuated, those who voted for him or her and those who didn’t.

Sadly, this is not the America we live in today. America in 2020 is a bifurcated nation clinging to the thinnest of fibers holding our democratic republic together. The chasm that splits the American populace runs deeper and darker than mere politics. It is an increasingly sharp gap splitting those who believe in an America for all and those who believe in an America for some.

That American bifurcation was evident this afternoon in Doylestown, Pa. Those on the side of equality gathered at the four corners of State and Main in the center of town, brandishing signs and chants in support of women’s rights, Black Lives Matter, science, and democracy. A small gathering formed near the old county courthouse, wielding signs and familiar red baseball hats that have become synonymous with a political party hell-bent on ripping basic human rights from their fellow citizens and destroying democracy from within. This smaller contingent awaited a caravan of vehicles rallying in support of the president* and candidate they worship.

And that’s where my troubled understanding of the current state of politics starts. Those gathered in the center of town weren’t there to chant for a candidate, though a few did hold signs with the candidate’s name on them. They were there in support of the rights and lives of others. Those at the courthouse and in the caravan chanted for their candidate like he was the return of Christ, giant flags waving out of their sunroofs and truck beds as if it was a Super Bowl celebration parade.

I captured a few images from the events. I’ve chosen to only include the images from the gathering in the center of town. My role as a photographer is to capture a glimpse of the world around me, to freeze moments in time for future generations. But with that comes an ethical obligation not to exploit those who have become detached from reality and lack the cognitive ability to understand their vulnerablity in falling prey to a sociopathic cult leader.

I should be in Portland, Maine, this week. Like I have been every October for the past nine years. I should have been on a boat in the middle of Casco Bay last night watching the sun set over the edge of the Atlantic Ocean. I should have been gathering with friends old and new at Honey Paw and Novare Res for amazing food and drink.

I should be at Monktoberfest.

But Covid.

America’s sad, disheartening, and infuriating lack of response to this global pandemic wiped out every event on the calendar. Some will come back. Monktoberfest will be one of them. Of that I am confident. Because it has to. It serves a vital role as a spark for important discussions by smarter people than me on tough, raw issues that the technology industry — and society itself — seeks better understanding.

I’ve been lucky, privileged, and honored to attend Monktoberfest each year. While I didn’t intentionally set out to chronicle its evolution, I inevitably seemed to always have a camera with me. Shocker, I know. So, with a few extra minutes of time on my hands last night that should have been spent making bad late night decisions over ridiculously good craft beer in a dark bar, I instead whipped up a little slideshow of a few of the images I captured during my annual sojourns to Portland. I hope you enjoy them.

The sea turtle munched coral 10 feet below me. I had kicked my way into the channel where the reef separated. The calm surface of the water betrayed the omnipresent current heading out to the dark blue of the Pacific.

Located on north shore of the Hawaiian island of Kauai, Tunnels Beach is recognized as one of the best snorkeling spots the island. Palm trees line the shore of the crescent shaped bay, dense jungle and sharp mountain peaks paint the landscape behind them. Tunnels gets its name from the lava tubes that form the underwater caverns just offshore.

Oh yeah, it’s also the surf break where a 14-foot-long tiger shark ripped the left arm off of 13-year old Bethany Hamilton in 2003. Yes, that Bethany Hamilton. The one who’s story Hollywood made the movie “Soul Surfer” about. Two years before I flippered out to roughly the same spot.

Jenn and I were in Kauai for our ten year wedding anniversary. I cashed in airline miles earned over years of business travel to fly first class to the island. Jenn’s cousins, John and Amanda, gifted us their two bedroom condo at the edge of a bluff overlooking the ocean in Princeville.

We fully explored the island in our rented Jeep. We hiked Waimea Canyon. Took a sunset catamaran cruise along the Na Pali Coast. Took a short hike on the Kalalau Trail to Hanakāpīʻai Beach. Entered the Waikanaloa Wet Cave. Took surfing lessons with a local at Kealia Beach. Cooled off with copious amounts of shave ice. And took an epic tour of the island from above.

Jenn reserved our tour with Jack Harter Helicopters. Based on research I did before we left, I was adamant that we reserve a helicopter without doors, knowing this once in a lifetime opportunity to capture this magnificent island from above would be muddied by the plexiglass of the larger tour helicopters.

Which meant taking my first ever helicopter ride in a Hughes 500. Just me, Jenn, the pilot, and a lone backpacker along for the ride. I strapped into the five point harness. Thousands of dollars of camera equipment wrapped tightly around my wrist. Half an ass cheek hanging over the edge of the doorless aircraft out into the void.

Headsets on, the pilot gave the thumbs up and took off, the nose of the helicopter pointed to the ground as we left the solid confines of earth. Up we went. My fear subsided, despite the thousands of feet of empty air between my right ass cheek and terra firma. We banked sharply and flew into collapsed cone of an ancient volcano, the helicopter’s blades slicing frighteningly close to the Jurassic-looking walls. The pilot pointed the nose down, we picked up some speed, he banked again, and we shot out over the Na Pali coastline.

As we came around the island, I noticed the reef. It was where we snorkeled days before. I trained my camera on the blues and greens and shot away. No sharks to be seen from above.

Doylestown has been home to famous musicians for over a century. Legends like Oscar Hammerstein, Pink, Broadway stars like Jenny Lee Stern and Justin Guarini, Blues hall of fame band Little Red Rooster, and White House, Kennedy Center and late night television regular Eric Mintel. One Direction’s Zane Malik recorded cuts from his debut album here. The Weeknd has been sighted around town. And Doylestown’s favorite son, Tim Stack, crooned a Hammerstein ditty from “Oklahoma!” in an Emmy-worthy episode of “Son of the Beach.”

It’s a small town in Pennsylvania dotted with small stages. Places like Puck, Maxwell’s on Main, Chamber’s, and Villa Capri. And Siren Records, a vinyl respite in a digital world.

Joe Montone is a long time employee at the record store. He calls himself a community advocate who transforms audiences through live music, but those of us in town and the surrounding area know him as the person who makes the music happen.

Pre-vinyl, he reached deep into a decade of working with artists, labels and agents across a jukebox of genres, to create the popular Craft Culture series for Maxwell’s on Main, producing more than 500 live music and special events for the venue. He was also the brainchild of the venue’s Double Take Thursday series, where local musical acts performed whole sides of famous albums in competition.

Creating the scene in a town like this would be enough for just about anyone. But Joe is also an artist and performer. We shot this image during an evening shoot in my makeshift home office studio. The photographs served as the backdrop for a poster promoting his “Holy Heat Thunder” classic country show at his old haunt. And then it was back to his advocate roots, organizing and hosting a new evening event at the Michener Art Museum complete with interactive gallery tours and musical performances he curated.

You can read more about Joe in this terrific profile in JumpPhilly.

I caught a glimpse of the B&M Baked Bean factory as the bus rolled north toward Augusta. Dormant memories awoke. Memories of a summer family trip to Maine when my dad’s job as a forman at Thatcher Glass — which made the jars B&M’s beans went inside — required him to spend a week on site. The bean factory didn’t leave an impression on me, or so I thought. What did was the putrid smell of paper recycling and outbound tide.

Growing up in New Jersey, the closest we ever got to a rocky shoreline was a Belmar jetty.

It was decades before I visited Maine again. For the past nine years, I’ve traveled to Portland for an annual gathering of craft beer loving technologists. Most years I fly up the Atlantic coast from Philadelphia, taking off from Philly in the late afternoon and watching the most glorious sunsets out of the left side of the small plane’s window as we descend into the Portland jetport.

One year I decided to drive up the coast. I timed the drive so I had time to stop along the way and capture the landscape on camera. My ultimate destination was Portland Head Light. And I timed it to arrive at sunset. I’m proud to say that my calculations were correct, though with very few precious minutes of light to spare.

But that’s not this image.

This photograph is from the next morning. When you have a subject as amazing and iconic as this, and when Mother Nature decides to play nice, you capture all the frames and angles you can.

I arrived just before sunrise and claimed my spot on the cliff just south of the point. Tripod set, I dialed in my exposure and waited. Mother Nature did not dissapoint. The air was frigid, but the rising sun brought with it a welcome kiss of warmth.

I smiled as the good light faded into bright morning sun. Packing up my equipment, I hiked back to my car. Maybe next year I’ll bring my family in the hope of instilling memories to awaken when they get older.