Routine is the killer.
I kind of knew that before. I said back in June that part of my problem with photography lately is that I’m stuck in a bit of a pattern right now: I go to the same places over and over, at roughly the same time of day, travelling the same routes. I’m not seeing anything new, and that’s made it hard to see photographs I haven’t already taken.
But this week confirmed it. I finally broke out of that pattern and did something a little bit different, and started feeling inspired again. (‘Started’ being the key word, there.)
It wasn’t much—just exploring downtown Dartmouth properly for the first time in about ten years—but it was something new. New-ish. It’s the neighbourhood where I grew up, and I’ve passed through dozens of times in the past few years, but never on foot, and never with a camera.
But it was enough drive home the fact that I really need to get out of this routine I’ve built for myself.
I’m not sure how to do that. I’ve only got so much ‘free’ time, and I have to divide that between both writing and photography. (And writing, frustratingly enough, relies on a certain amount of routine.) But I’m thinking about it, and I’m going to figure out how to make it happen. I have to.
(Project366 runs from 23 January 2019 through 23 January 2020. I’ll posting to Instagram daily, and rounding up the photos here every ten days.)
Reghan Skerry 