One of the great things about having a teenager is that I feel like I am cool-adjacent which is almost as good as being cool at my age. (I’m suspicious of 50-year-olds who are too cool.) I have learned all kinds of things that I would be hopelessly ignorant of without her – like the… Read More Everybody Needs A Walk -up Song
I thought this post would be easier to write. I realize that no matter how carefully chosen, my words will likely be inadequate. It is ironic since I have entitled this “Nothing Left Unsaid”, and yet, surely, there will be something left unsaid. I went to a celebration of life this week for a truly… Read More Nothing Left Unsaid
I am not a gambler. In fact, the betting window would be closed and the race long over before I even identified all of the variables or made my first graph. The horses would have died of old age before I analyzed all of the data. It’s not that I can’t make a decision quickly.… Read More The Gamble
Despite sitting at one of those back-bending cafeteria tables, I found myself completed enthralled listening to a coach talk about his athletes this week. He spoke with such heart about the journey the team took together to win the state championship. He talked about each athlete’s strengths and contributions to the team. He talked about… Read More What the Best Coaches Know
As I was driving home from work tonight, Corey Hart’s Never Surrender came on. You probably will only know this song if you were embroiled in teenage angst or young adult drama in the mid-1980s. It was the theme song for that. I remember it because I recorded it on cassette tape and sent it… Read More Do It For A Friend
My daughter missed her dentist appointment this week. In general, she is a very responsible teenager. I only bring it up because every time I hear the word dentist, I can’t help but run my tongue over the edge of my top right front tooth. You see, I have a chip in my top right… Read More Don’t Cry Over a Chipped Tooth
My first was Charlie. You always have a soft spot in your heart for your first. He was a blonde who had the subtlest hints of caramel. I loved running my fingers through his hair. He was short, a bit overweight and not at all athletic but he made up for that in enthusiasm. He… Read More First Love
I had a very rocky start to my Tuesday morning. Keep in mind, I am a morning person. I jump out of bed no matter how early it is and greet my dogs (I even named one of my dogs Buttercup just so I could say “What’s up Buttercup?” every morning- that’s how happy I… Read More Get Some Perspective
I am going to preface this post with “No children were harmed in the making of the story” (well not permanently anyway). If you were a child of the 1970s or before, you will appreciate this story. If you are a Gen Xer or a Millennial, there is a chance you might be horrified- at… Read More There’s Something About Sticking with It
I was sitting at Finaghty’s Irish Pub the night before we were to celebrate the life of my father. I was with my husband and daughter and surrounded by my sisters, most of their families and my stepmom. Family had been arriving from out of town and were still trickling in. We are not a… Read More Don’t Miss the Joy in Grief
Over the course of this week, as we prepare to celebrate my dad’s life, we have all been poring over pictures. And I remember so much of what I forgot. And I see things I didn’t know but they are so obvious to me now. We know our family members because we have these long… Read More Looking at Life Through the Keyhole
I was sitting on a plastic couch in a hospital waiting room sobbing in that heart wrenching way you do when you are racked with grief. I had just finished making those difficult phone calls to friends and family, when one of my sisters sat down beside me. She put her arm around me as… Read More Lean In
I think at the end of a life, it is the little things you remember most. The seemingly inconsequential moments become indelibly written on our minds and hearts. Oh sure, every relationship has big moments. There are marriages and births, graduations and new homes. And every relationship has good times and challenging ones – even… Read More It’s the Little Things
A couple of years ago, all of my sisters descended upon the eldest’s home in the sweltering heat of mid-July in Arizona. We came to sort through boxes of pictures my mother had kept. Though I offered to collect and digitize them for all of us, I am grateful for my eldest sister’s wisdom in… Read More Like Looking in the Mirror
Before the digital age of photography, we printed our pictures and mounted them in albums. We had wedding albums, graduation albums, christening albums and vacation albums. We made scrapbooks chronicling every detail of our child’s life (I only got to age three and it took nine albums, so I entered a 12-step scrapbook recovery program… Read More Picture Books
I think people fall into one of two categories naturally. Oh sure, people can change. People can even change back and forth. But we all have a fall back type we are most comfortable with. I think people are either hunters or gatherers. I’m not talking about actually hunting (although I am not opposed if… Read More Seeing the River for the Rocks
Last night I went to my favorite Christmas party. I have been attending this party for 26 years, though it has been going on for much longer than that. In those years, I have missed it twice: once when my daughter was only three weeks old and once when that same daughter got sick (on… Read More Growing A Family
I am a very competitive person. Now, I know what you are thinking. You’ve heard that before usually from someone who is really nice and says it with a slightly self-deprecating laugh as if they are trying to warn you that Mr. Hyde’s appearance is imminent. So, no. I am competitive like one of those… Read More Redefining the Win
I have lived in the shadow of the Cascades for most of my life. Slogging through traffic on a clear day, I am struck by the deep blues of the sky framing Mount Baker in the distance. Shadows across the white peak shimmering in glacial blue. Snow dusting the foothills and highlighting the rocky crags.… Read More Living in the Shadow of the Mountain
I love school. I love it so much in fact I have spent 42 years of my life in school and another 6 supporting schools so far. Basically, I was 4 the last time a whole year went by and I was not in school. When I was a babysitter, I even used to hold… Read More So Much to Learn, So Little Time
On the walls in my office hang three signed limited edition Judi Rideout prints, one signed limited edition Jon Van Zyle print and an original watercolor by an artist who shares my last name. Guess which one I love the most. If you guessed the water color on construction paper, double matted in peach and… Read More A Gift
Last weekend, I found myself once again standing in the middle of a bridge at dawn. My youngest sister was in town for the Thanksgiving holiday and I took her up to see the Eagles on the Skagit river. There was a brief misunderstanding wherein she thought we were going to see Joe Walsh at… Read More Standing in the Middle of a Bridge
When I was a little girl, my father gave me a copy of Marguerite Henry’s All About Horses. He worked for a publishing company and loved books so it wasn’t unusual for me to get one for my birthday or Christmas. I loved this book. In fact, it is sitting on my own daughter’s bookshelf… Read More It Really is the Thought That Counts
Twenty-nine years ago, I was a student teacher in my home town. As you can imagine, I was so enthusiastic. I vibrated with idealism. I waltzed into my first Biology class ready to dazzle them with my knowledge, certain that I would hold their attention easily for 55 minutes. It was science after all. Who… Read More Gratitude: It’s not just for Thanksgiving
I think this is my very favorite picture and that is saying a lot given the sheer volume of my collection. I didn’t take this picture but when I look at it I truly wish I had met the man who did. When I look at it, I wish I could give him one of… Read More Love in Black and White
I think in just about every situation we can learn something. It has been my experience that it’s usually something we need to learn right when it is time to learn it. It is not always something we want to learn. It has also been my experience unfortunately that the universe is ready when it’s… Read More Live Your Passion
When I was a kid, my dad gave me Masterpiece for my birthday. It was a board game in the mid 1970’s much like Monopoly except that players bought and sold artwork in an auction. I don’t remember playing the game even one time. But I remember the game. I remember the cards. Each had… Read More The Eye of the Beholder
I’ve always wished that I could be one of those women who goes through life with nothing more than their cell phone in their back pocket ensconced in one of those really cute Kate Spade cases with a sleeve for their drivers license and debit card. A quick swipe of mascara and lip gloss, hair… Read More Lighten Up!
Last Sunday morning at 0530, I found myself next to an empty field on the outskirts of Concrete, Washington. No, I was not deposited there after an alien abduction. Also I am too old to pull an all-nighter (debauchery-filled or otherwise) so I was not in the clothes I wore the day before, if you… Read More A Different Light
I like really old stuff. I have so much antique glassware my husband recently told me he thought we might have to fortify the foundation of our house. Hyperbole not withstanding, I have a lot. I like drinking out of glasses my grandparents drank out of. I like eating off of plates that were used… Read More Picture Meaningful
Confession time. I was a science major. There, I said it. It’s out. What a relief! Does that mean I am not also an artist? Well frankly, I sure thought so. In fact, I could make you a chart quantifying my non-artistic characteristics. (My friends are shaking their collective heads right now both in exasperation… Read More Confessions of a Closet Artist
I am a morning person. I love the stillness of the morning. I love the way the groggy silence envelops me. Everything slows down. Without the noise that fills every other space in the rest of my day, I can see so much more clearly. I can hear my own voice so much more loudly.… Read More Seeing in Silence
When my daughter started rowing four years ago, I had a lot to learn. And of course, the ink wasn’t even dry on the check for rowing camp before I was grabbing my camera and heading for the shore. Needless to say that even shooting wildlife, I was used to a much slower subjects. Everything is… Read More Learn… to Let Go
I’d like to tell you that I’m one of those photographers who gets a brilliant idea for a shoot and then instinctively knows all of the right camera settings, the perfect location, and just the right camera angle to pull it off in one shot. I imagine this hypothetical artist getting up before the crack… Read More Don’t Be Afraid To Fail
One Sunday morning – ok practically the middle of the night- I convinced my husband to accompany me on a quest to shoot the sunrise over the Port of Everett. I knew the exact spot. I had glimpsed in passing these abandoned pilings of piers unused for decades. They had an almost romantic quality. I… Read More Open to the Unexpected
If you’re old as I am, you probably remember buying film. Film was a relationship. Film was like giving up the lease on your apartment and moving in with your boyfriend. You committed. You committed to black-and-white or color. You committed to speed. You committed to brand. You loaded it into your camera and unless… Read More The Digital Experiment
We are bombarded with images. Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook deliver cute, scary, heartwarming, devastating, lush, and stark to our mental doorsteps every day. Don’t get me wrong, I love a photographic documentary of a puppy raised with a lion cub who become lifelong friends as much as the next person. I just think that we… Read More Ordinary Magic
I suppose like all photographers I began very young. My first memory was of my dad lying on the ground in Volunteer Park in Seattle shooting up and to an awkward angle as brilliantly colored cyclist raced wildly around the corner on the knife-blade edges of racing slicks. I was fascinated and I was hooked.… Read More Connecting Through Images
Catherine Matthews 