Random Acts of Mind by Dones

A bit of explanation: My friend James made an off-hand remark on a really good blog post about gas conservation that he shot 22 rolls of (I assume 35mm) film on his recent trip to Europe. First, I say, well done, James! Not only on the trip to Europe, but on taking that many shots in maybe a two-week period! The first time I went to Germany in the 90s for 8 weeks I took 13 rolls (though they were 36-exposure rolls, if that makes a difference). My dad chided me for not getting more pictures of myself in the foreign locations. The second time (another 8 weeks) I took about 8 rolls I think. Now if I were going to Rome and Ireland and Paris that would have admittedly skyrocketed to much more, but for James we’re still talking approximately a roll and a half a day!

Second, I commented to James that since the remainder of his post was about saving money & the environment by conserving gasoline, wouldn’t switching to a digital camera accomplish that as well? First you’ve got the cost of film, the weight and space of transporting 22 rolls of chemically-treated plastic, then the cost and time lag of developing, again using nasty chemicals to develop and print all your photos. James responded that he’s not going to end up going digital anytime soon without an infusion of donations. And thus, my response to him…which has naturally led into a discussion that I thought would interest more than just James.

James: I do feel your pain. My digital camera was $5 plus tax after using $75 in Target gift cards from our baby shower. We figured it would be justified given the amount of pictures we planned to take of the little one (mission accomplished).

Before we deecided on this one I was shopping the $200-$300 models and trying to figure out where the money would come from, but I’m glad we ’settled’ for the inexpensive one. It’s a nearly-bottom-of-the-line 6.2 megapixel Kodak Easyshare, and it works great & I think it takes great snapshots. Nothing special compared to a DSLR, but with it I take the best-looking pictures I ever have, and that’s enough for me.

At 6.2 megapixels per photo, a 1GB memory card (an extra $20 or so, one-time purchase) holds roughly 600 photos. (25 rolls of 24 exp film, or 16 2/3 rolls of 36 exp film). For an extended time away from home (or a computer), based on my photographic ability I’d equate 600 ‘keepers’ to at least 900-1200 shots on film, because I can instantly preview and delete any that I muck up, or where someone’s eyes or closed, or the exposure or flash is wrong, or I just didn’t like the composition…paying for film & developing for wasted shots was a killer for me; maybe you’re better/luckier and it would only equate to 100 wasted shots out of every 600 keepers…but what’s the film/developing cost of those wasted shots?

For the sake of easy math, let’s assume that in maxing out your memory card with 600 keepers you delete 112 bad shots…that’s 4 rolls of 24 exposures each. Let’s also assume you didn’t have any connections or discounts on either film or developing, and we’ll leave high-volume discounts out of this as much as possible. A quick Google search later, I find that Walgreens has a 4-pack of 200 ISO film for $5.99. That’s $6 down the drain already. What’s the cheapest place to get photos developed? When they were around, K-Mart used to be the cheapest, but at this point for budget developing I’d go to Walgreens or the local equivalent. I can’t find pricing for developing outside of one-hour processing ($3.99/roll with coupon) so let’s be generous and say it’s 5 cents a print with free doubles. That’s still $5.60 for all the photos that were printed and processed unnecessarily, for a total of $11.59 wasted per 600 keepers (keeping in mind that for me it’d be three times as much waste as in the example), and we’re starting to talk about real money. For someone who is either well-traveled or an otherwise prolific photographer, $100 initial hardware investment doesn’t look so bad. And that’s just the waste we’re talking about, not even the regular costs of film & processing when your photos are not digital. This year with a new baby son and a new nephew I’ll easily shoot 2000 keepers (meaning the ones I don’t delete), and even being generous to myself and assuming only 400 wasted shots, that’s 100 rolls this year. That’s $149 for film and $120 for processing that I’m saving! Yeah, it’s worth it for me to shoot digital pics.

Additionally, I don’t print out most of my photos, but post them to the web for sharing with family & friends. This means I share the cost of making any prints with the people that actually want a hard copy, and save the toner, paper, money, etc by not printing a copy for people who just wanted to see the pictures once or twice. That means I also don’t have to scan any photos (a time consuming process), though if I remember correctly some photo processors will include a CD-Rom of your photos, either free or for a nominal fee.

So good digital cameras need to be neither expensive. Now if (speaking to the population in general) you’re looking at a digital SLR, well, I understand…there are only so many items I can justify spending a multiple of my monthly salary on…but the overall cost benefits of the digital format would go a long way toward it paying for itself, I think. If you’re a DSLR photographer, you’re going to be taking a LOT of higher-res photos, and potentially making a little side business out of your photography. Or else it’s a hobby that brings you a lot of joy.

Okay, James, you probably don’t need to read any more because here’s where I really go off into my rant… 

A point-and-shoot camera has little value to such a person, then, because it doesn’t provide as much control over exposure, focus, etc. While the cost of a DSLR is high, then, I would argue that the comparative cost is reduced because of personal preference. For example, if you are going to buy a laptop but you’ve already decided you’re getting a Mac, you look at the $1099 price tag for the Macbook compared to other (expensive) items in the Apple line, but pay no mind to the $500 Dell laptops that are on the market because you’ve ruled them out; they have little value to you so you consider them not worth the plastic they’re built with. In the case of a DSLR photogapher, I think that in your valuation of the $2000 Canon DSLR you’re considering, you subconsciously subtract out the few hundred dollars that a medium-priced point-and-shot camera costs. This makes the DSLR an even better deal in your mind. I had a former boss that I watched perform this little mental trick on himself. Now of course this is all moot if you don’t have the money in the first place. But in my experience this sort of contemplation of the desired purchase helps justify the sacrifices we must make in order to save up the money to make said purchase.

Well, I apologize for this discussion bleeding into the theoretical, but good ol’ Dones was in the mood to ramble, I guess. James, I think you should sell some of your biodiesel (if that’s even legal) and save the proceeds towards a digital camera of your choosing. You could also probably get some money by selling your current camera as well.

Happy Father’s Day!
Originally uploaded by metamorphilia.

Feeding time just happened to come during the sermon.

Alas! when it rains it pours, and our 10-month-old corgi has taken ill. I won’t regale you with the details: sufficed to say that she’s got diarrhea, and it’s not pleasant for anyone involved. She has been like this since Thursday, and she hasn’t eaten since (at least) Friday, so we’re going to have to bring her somewhere to get checked out on Sunday. I don’t think we can stand to wait until Monday, even though we can’t afford after-hours vet care. Please pray for us & our puppy. In other news, we have one cat spoken for, and are looking for a good home for our other indoor/outdoor, super soft tortoise-shell kitty.

You’d think a 25-year-old pickup could withstand a sudden loss of oil pressure, instead of welding its own motor together. Oh, well, I was able to find the owner of some repair shop to buy it off of me as a project. It ran pretty well (before it died), just needs a new engine. Since we aren’t exactly overflowing with cash at the moment (or in the foreseeable future), we decided to let it be someone else’s project.

Dead Truck
Originally uploaded by metamorphilia.

Good thing this video of my wife & I didn’t come out on the internet until after the adoption was finalized!

As smooth as the actual hearings went to terminate the birth father’s parental rights and finalize our adoption, it sure was a crazy day. We got to the Leavenworth County Courthouse at 1pm as directed (since our adoption attorney is based in Leavenworth, this was the most expedient place to take care of the court matters), and found out our cases were on the docket for 1:30. Then when our attorney arrived, she told us that the judge wasn’t there! Unfortunately his wife has been very ill, and he was at the hospital with her. We’ll certainly keep her in our prayers. We started going through our options (including waiting for another day, which we certainly didn’t want!) when we were told that the judge was on his way to the courthouse. Okay, better late than never, so we got a late lunch and waited for our time in court. Once the judge arrived and it was our turn, we found out the attorney we hired to represent the birth father in absentia was in another trial! Oh, no! Well, it wasn’t all that bad, we were just delayed for another half hour or so, making us an hour late for our own open house party this evening. But the main purpose of our day was accomplished, and now we have officially been named Joshua’s parents as far as the state is concerned, and the name on his birth certificate gets changed now from ‘Baby Boy’ to ‘Joshua Arden Salsbury’! We know we’ve been Josh’s parents in practice since the day he was born, but now no one else has a potential claim to him! He’s all ours! As wild as our journey has been, today we met another couple who were finalizing their third adoption, this time of a beautiful little girl who was born 2 days after Joshua…they are a military family stationed in Leavenworth, but as soon as their hearing was over they were driving their kids to their new home in Washington State!! Can you imagine moving cross-country on the day of your adoption proceeding?? We feel blessed we only had to move to Gardner!

Our hearing was actually the shortest part of the day! The courtroom was cleared for our case due to the birth parents’ privacy, and we brought Joshua in and sat next to our attorney, who proceeded with the first case, which was the termination of the birth father’s parental rights. The judge came in and talked a little about his wife’s condition, and proceeded matter-of-factly through this first case. As Joshua’s daddy, it felt especially poignant that the birth father is out of the picture, so I was in effect the only man to claim this child as his own. But we weren’t really part of that case; it was just the prerequisite for us to continue to our second case to finalize our adoption of Joshua. First Jessie got sworn in and went to the witness stand as she was holding baby Joshua in her arms to provide testimony including her name, address, and then she answered questions from our attorney like: How has the placement gone so far (wonderful), Has Joshua been taken to a doctor to see if he has any health issues (he doesn’t-the doctor says he’s perfect), Do you understand this adoption is irrevocable (we sure hope so), and one last one: What name do you want him to be called by? Jessie was struck by this question, and she broke down crying (in a good way) when she tried to say his name. I think it was a surprise to her that she’d be the one first putting his name on the record. Plus it was a six-week delay of sorts of how she would have told the hospital his name for his birth certificate if we had been the ones giving birth. Well, my wife was very brave and she collected herself to say his full name, and then it was my turn. I got the easy part: name, date of birth, I was asked again how the placement went, did I have anything to add to Jessie’s testimony. My wife says I was eloquent but all I can remember saying was that every minute of being Josh’s parents has been such a joy, and even when he’s crying for a bottle we just couldn’t be more thrilled to be his parents. And that was it. I went back to my seat and was holding Josh’s hand as his mom was holding him tight, and the judge said that the adoption was granted. It was as if a great weight lifted off of us as we both realized that now no one can take away from us the fact that we’re Joshua’s parents. Once again, it’s not as if we ever weren’t Josh’s parents in our hearts and as far as he’s been concerned; but there’s something to be said for ceremony. Having a judge declare that as far as the State of Kansas is concerned, we might as well have given birth to Josh ourselves…that’s a great thing that boils all of our sense of parenthood into one moment that confirms he is ours.

Why ‘Gotcha’ Day? One of the blogs Jessie likes to read is by an adoptive mother who always celebrates her child’s adoption finalization day every year on an even plane with his birthday. It’s pretty important because it’s the day we can look back and say ‘We gotcha!’ and just celebrate becoming a family. I’m not sure how often we’ll throw a big party like we did today, but I know Josh’s mommy and I will look back on today as a big deal.

A Place To Rest Our Heads
Originally uploaded by metamorphilia.

We did it! All moved out - 22 years of my living in Lawrence & about 60 years of my direct family having a Lawrence address have come to an end. This new place is the only place I have to hang my hat, but it’s a long way (and a lot of hard work) away from feeling like home. An extra special thanks/bowing at the feet of my brother who provided critical assistance at the eleventh hour. Drew, you are a gentleman & a scholar, my knight in shining armor, & the best brother I could have ever dreamed of or hoped for. We love you!

The First of Many
Originally uploaded by metamorphilia.

And so begins the great move…

First of all, the season finale of The Office last night was absolutely brilliant. I think that as an episode, this was better than the Jim & Pam cliffhanger a couple seasons ago. I can’t wait for fall!

But the actual purpose of this post is to point out one time where the jackass boss Michael Scott, played by Steve Carell, wasn’t such a jackass for once. He finds out his ex-girlfriend got in vitro fertilization from some high-class sperm bank while they were dating, instead of trying to conceive his child. Morality aside, I find his response very poignant in my own life as an adoptive father:

“My whole life, I have known two things: I love sex, and I want to have kids. And, I always thought that those two things would go hand-in-hand. But now, I think it might be one or the other.”

In order to get to the point where I can love my month-old son unconditionally as my own, I had to mourn the loss of a biological child: one that looks like me & my wife, one that shares our genes and direct ancestry. Now that I’ve come through that process, I can’t imagine it any other way than to adopt. I also can’t imagine a son that could look more like my wife and me in so many ways, that already takes after us at times, and one whom I love so dearly that I rush home from work just to see how much he’s grown and developed in the last 8 hours. If this is even the most infinitesimal fraction of the love God feels for me as His adopted son, well… well, that just leaves me speechless.

Okay, both realtors on the purchase of our new house have definitely been earning their keep: they’ve been working non-stop to convince the lender that the appraisal’s too low, and everyone’s guardedly optimistic. So I guess I will be, too.

Thankfully, the seller is going to be out this weekend and will let us begin moving Monday.  Our selling realtor in Lawrence got us until 9pm Wednesday to be out, so while it’s about a week less than I’d like to have for moving, it’ll do. Our current house just won’t be clean when we leave, which isn’t how I want to leave it, but I did mow the lawn real well.

If anyone wants to help us a) pack over the weekend, or b) move early next week, please get in touch with us.