Robin Dodd Photography

What is your deeply buried gift? Don’t think it’s not down there. It is. Something is going to help it rise to the surface. When I was a child, I dreamt of going to Hollywood and making movies. I remember specifically knowing what it must feel like to do that very thing, although I was in the middle of a rural ranchette in Texas. I carried around a video recorder the size of carry on luggage, which attached to a giant news station style camera, and I made movies. I can think of three or four different films that were lost forever in the 80’s. I remember shooting portraits of my cats sitting alongside cowboy hats, with a little 110 camera, and writing story after story and reading book after book. Talking into an old recorder with an English accent, singing at the top of my lungs as I played the piano. These are the snapshots of my childhood forty years ago. When I graduated from the theatre department at Baylor University, I was not ready emotionally and did...

Remember the simplicity of going on a road trip. You sat in the back seat and looked out the window. You had the copy of Flowers in the Attic, that you "borrowed" from your cousin, the last time you were over there, for when your dad took over the radio and made you listen to the Willie Nelson Red Headed Stranger cassette the whole way. You rolled down the window because it was Texas in the spring time and the air was already warm. Your mom packed ranch Doritos and  Dr. Pepper, and your dad said "Don't drink it too fast" , I'm not stopping every five minutes. Sometimes you played slug bug, or I spy. Eventually you got where you were going in one piece and the pretend misery was over, because deep down it brought a special thrill to be going on an adventure, even if it was just to your grandmother's house.

Because you can't hand down a CD to the next generation. - Sue Bryce Ain't that the truth...

They say a digital file loses it's value year after year because we forget what's stored on our hard drives, flash drives and CD's. Do we still use those? I am making an album of the girls to send to Africa and I came across my picasa web album where I have stored years and years of photos.  I thought it would be fun to have a post featuring some of the families I have been so lucky to meet and know. I might do this next week too! Throw it back.. Just kidding..

      It's been so long since I've been a regular blogger. I still write. I write on my fiction. I write my intentions down most days, and journal when I can. Mostly I drive down Winton Road in Cincinnati, or Estes Road in Nashville.  I listen to podcasts when I feed the horses on the farm and I sometimes drink red wine when I think about how badly I want the house to sell.  The other day there was a guest speaker on one of my favorite podcasts talking about purposeful uncomfortableness . Something he creates for himself, and his family. He was currently creating it by having recently moved his all five of them from a farm in Vermont to Singapore, where they were all learning Mandarin.  On a lesser scale, I'm sure people might think we were familiar with this type of thing.. and it didn't dawn on me until I heard the man say it. This is one of those years for us. Like 2011.. 2011 was tricky but I learned..        I've begun to mark my...

First of all, I cannot believe that I didn't get a beautiful shot of all three girls between  last Friday and Monday when we had this incredible snow because someone, I won't mention any names caught a  man cold, no it wasn't Carlos..and it was a bit distracting. Ha! So I turn to Mariama as she's about to head to Nashville with Shawn and remember.. Last January we took our annual Sunflower photographs on the bridge crossing from Newport Kentucky to downtown Cincinnati, the blue one. I need to learn the name since as of May we will be full time residents of Ohio. What? T hen I get so excited that I force Holly and Grace to dress up after Grace's five hour practice.  Thanks Mom.  I wanted to share with y'all and now I must take to my bed like a good southern gal and nurse MY cold.. Thanks Shine! Ha! P.S. I am seeking dancers for fine art portraiture for my portfolio. My studio  will open in the Cincinnati area this May....

Dear Daughters. I was raised in the 70's, the figure it out yourself generation, learned to drive a stick shift when I was eleven, watched hours of television a week, and drank Boones Farm Strawberry Wine from the bottle when I was seventeen out in the cow pasture parties of Texas. I made straight A's went to a great college, made a lot of mistakes along the way, but am happy to say, I think I turned out pretty good.  However. Now that I am  helping raise you, I feel the need to over communicate my every wish, desire, fear, hope, dream, life lesson, Mike Brady speech, boy talk, learning to drive speech, dating lecture, who's dating before they're 30 speech?, let's watch a TED talk, then meditate and so on... What caused this? How much Natural Calm can a mom drink?  I mean, you don't want to go to a Cheap Trick concert with a boy who drives a Fiero, you've never let a foul word escape your lovely lips,  one out of three of you barely know how to ta...