The Next-to-Last Post
As 2024 winds down, progress is made and a promise is kept
At the start of 2024, I finally left the basement.
That’s where my “office” — i.e. my desktop computer and things crammed into drawers — had been since we moved to Alexandria in 2018. The space worked reasonably well, but since the pandemic I had become distracted, bored, and socially isolated. The frequent trips to various coffee shops and libraries in our immediate area were no longer breaking up the monotony, and since 2020, I hadn’t traveled as much as I did in the “BC” (before COVID) era.
As 2023 ended, my wife suggested I find another place for my business. Jill also works mostly from home and having me in the basement all the time was not good for either of us, so with her support and encouragement, I found a co-working space only a few blocks from our house.
It’s nice to have the chit-chat you get in an office without the management responsibilities or workplace politics. And, given that many of the people are also former basement dwellers who felt a similar need to get out of the house, it’s also nice to have something in common with a group of mostly strangers.
The problem was I didn’t have much work for large chunks of 2024. At one point, I likened freelance writing and photography in this day and age to climate change. Everything just feels more extreme.
The landscape has changed post-Covid, not necessarily for the better. One client cut its publications entirely, while another reduced frequency amid other cuts. Conferences and meetings are bread and butter work for me, but two of the nonprofits I work for no longer travel with photographers, which was a loss to make up. It’s proven to be a scramble.
In October and November, the work was constant, if not overwhelming, then I got sick. Since Thanksgiving, I’ve been fighting pneumonia and related physical things that come from having an infection that invaded my body like something out of a bad sci-fi film.
As 2024 comes to its own conclusion, I’m slowly on the mend and starting to look ahead to 2025. Overall, amid uncertainty, I feel blessed. I can’t really complain.
Post #99
This is my 99th and next-to-last post for the year. Number 100, which arrives on Saturday, is the final edition of the “52 Weeks” series.
I wish I could say 100 posts was part of some master plan, but it wasn’t. I started the year wanting to showcase more of my photography, and two-thirds of this year’s posts have done just that.
It's been three years since I started experimenting with the Substack platform, which gives you the option of posting for free or having a paid subscription model. While the numbers have never been mind blowing, I’ve seen slow but steady growth, and now have almost 500 people who’ve opted in to receive my writing and photos.
Like many creatives, I started “Our Reality Show” 15 years ago as a way to process life events — the name comes from a time when my wife and I were parenting four children who lived in three states — and share my thoughts and my work. At a time when writing and photography — my chosen professions of more than 40 years — have been devalued in many people’s eyes, it’s a nice boost to the ego and an incentive to keep going when you receive outside support.
Over time, I’ve become increasingly disgruntled and distraught by the direction that much of social media has taken and find myself moving away from and minimizing my presence on those platforms. Here, the best part is that I know the people who have opted in are receiving my posts, either via email or the Substack app. It’s not an advertising driven algorithm that requires you to pay to reach your followers, even though Substack urges creators to turn on paid subscriptions so it can take a cut.
Adding the option of a paid model was something I struggled with, in part because I’m interested in reaching the broadest possible audience. But this year, I decided to experiment and see who would support my work financially.
The caveat is no strings are attached. Everything here is and will remain free to read; a “paid” subscriber, in my view, is someone who feels my work is worth supporting monetarily and has the means to do so.
A Promise Kept
I pledged at the start of the year to give 25 percent of the subscription revenue to a deserving nonprofit, and I fulfilled that promise last week by donating $250 to Metropolitan School of the Arts (MSA), a nonprofit performing arts studio based in Alexandria, Va.
Now marking its 25th year, MSA is where my children received much of their dance and theatre training. Our family has been affiliated with the studio for 22 of its 25 years and for the past 11, I have served as one of MSA’s photographers.
What I have always appreciated about MSA is its emphasis on training and performance. It has never been a competition studio, but one that is focused on helping young dancers, singers, and actors develop their skills and their love of the craft. The instructors’ focus is on building better humans as well as performers, and their track record is successful on both fronts.
That was in evidence this past Saturday, when MSA presented “The Alumni Project” in honor of its silver anniversary. Two performances by 10 alumni were held in the studio’s Black Box Theatre. The shows were co-directed by alum Sam Cornbrooks and our daughter Emma, with Ben also helping to emcee. In addition to the live performances, videos from another dozen alumni, the majority of whom are out of town or out of the country working professionally in the arts, were shown.
Fortunately, I felt good enough to photograph the dress rehearsal, and Jill and I stayed for the first show. It was a treat to visit with people we hadn’t seen in years, and a reminder of the legacy the studio has built over its two-plus decades. I am honored to have chronicled a small part of it, and I’m thankful to the subscribers whose support allowed me to make a small donation to continue that legacy.
I hope you all have a blessed holiday season. Come back on Saturday to check out the last “52 Weeks” of 2024 and stick around for more in 2025. Your support means the world to me.
Here are a few photos from Saturday’s event.
Thanks for sharing the ups and downs of your recent professional life, Glenn. Things inevitably change and though not necessarily for the better there may be new opportunities (at least that's what "they" say). But I especially hear and identify with your perspective on the social media world. Instagram was so promising at the outset but now...probably the last place a photographer can get engagement these days. Lastly, that image of the young woman on the stage reaching for the sky is beautifully poetic. As photographers we write with light but we also convey emotions with our images, something that photograph expresses wonderfully.