Jeremiah Tolbert

From my last set of RMNP pho­tos for the fore­see­able future. With no job, even with gas prices as low as they are, I can’t keep tak­ing trips. It costs me a quar­ter of a tank each time I drive there and back, unfortunately.

Which is too bad, because I was finally start­ing to get the hang of it. And my tele­con­verter arrives this week. I should prob­a­bly send it back and get back my money but…

It’s snow­ing today, which makes me sad. Big fat flakes are coat­ing every­thing already. And the for­cast calls for half a foot over the next cou­ple of days. I couldn’t have got­ten laid off while it was in the 60s and 70s, could I? Hurumph.

I think this is a good action shot. Bad light­ing, bad angle, bad back­ground. My wildlife work leaves a lot to be desired.

I’ve been read­ing National Geographic. That’s where I’ve set the bar. So far, my stuff is shit com­pared to that.

1. It doesn’t get any eas­ier the sec­ond time. This is my sec­ond lay­off in six months.  I told myself, once I had secured my most recent job, that I had been through the worst that could hap­pen and sur­vived it.  It was like a badge of honor at that point.  I thought that if I had to do this again, I would han­dle it much bet­ter because I would know.  But each lay­off hap­pens under unique cir­cum­stances.  I didn’t count on being job­less in the worst econ­omy since the Great Depression.
2. How hard you work and how impor­tant you feel doesn’t mat­ter.   It doesn’t mat­ter if you think you are immune because Project X, Y, and Z relies on your crit­i­cal skills.  It doesn’t mat­ter if you’re a hard worker, or the most skilled at some­thing, or any of that.  Your com­pany isn’t mak­ing money and you’re a bur­den to it, so it cuts you loose.  Your ser­vice, your ded­i­ca­tion, just doesn’t come into play.
3. Trust your first instincts.   After the first round of lay­offs, I had a feel­ing that I couldn’t shake, even all the way up until a cou­ple of weeks ago.  I was sure I was going to lose my job at any moment, that a lay­off was com­ing.  Teammates and bosses assured me that wasn’t the case.  Ultimately, their instincts were wrong and mine were right.  After the first round, I should have pol­ished my resume and got­ten to work look­ing for a new posi­tion imme­di­ately.  I should have lis­tened to myself and antic­i­pated the worst–moved back home to live with my par­ents, and dra­mat­i­cally reduced our expenses.
4. No mat­ter how many peo­ple tell you it’s not your fault, that it’s hap­pen­ing to lots of other people–it doesn’t help.  Especially if you have a ten­dency to ques­tion your self-​​esteem as much as I do, this kind of event will make you ques­tion your worth as a per­son.  Thoughts like “If I was truly any good at what I do, I would have been hired by a com­pany that wouldn’t be suf­fer­ing” will run through your head.
5. I’ve lost hope in the new White House admin­is­tra­tion.   I was lis­ten­ing to the radio early this morn­ing.  I can’t sleep very well right now so I was dri­ving to the park to try and take pic­tures.  I real­ized that I am no longer thrilled at the win of the Democrats.  All signs point to busi­ness as usual.  A lot of money is going to get handed out and peo­ple like you and me won’t see a dime of it.  Look at Merill Lynch.

I’m tak­ing the week­end to try and come to terms with this.  I’m mak­ing a list of the belong­ings that I can sell to raise our sav­ings buffer as much as pos­si­ble.  If any­one is inter­ested in an xBox 360, a Nintendo Wii, drop me an email.  I’m grow­ing more cer­tain I am going to sell off all of my cam­era equip­ment.  My cam­era body alone is worth more than a month’s rent.  When I think about it and try to deter­mine if I could use that body to make that much money even over a six month period, I know the answer is no.  So I sup­pose now more than ever, it’s time to put aside child­ish things.  Maybe one day I can buy another cam­era and pur­sue my dream again.  Right now, the cold real­i­ties make dreams an impossibility.

Good news if you’re look­ing for a CSS/​HTML/​Javascript Web Guy with keen pho­tog­ra­phy skills and a decent eye for design! I was laid off just now from my pre­vi­ous employer, so I am free to enter­tain job oppor­tu­ni­ties in the form of full time work and free­lance projects. I’m fast, I’m tal­ented, and I’m hun­gry, so con­tact me with the con­tact form if you are inter­ested in receiv­ing esti­mates for projects or my resume.

Yep, that lit­tle white speck is the moon. I think I shot this at 28mm equiv, so the moon was barely big­ger than a star. This one’s not the best HDR, as evi­denced by the weird light­ing around the tree’s branches. I am not sure what I was really going for on this one. This one’s a fail­ure for the most part–I wasn’t super con­fi­dent in the shot’s idea in the first place, but I thought I would try it an see. I keep it around to remind me that I need to always be tak­ing shots for which I am not con­fi­dent. Otherwise, I’ll never dis­cover any­thing new.