vantage point
August 2025.
Being alive gives you the option to develop or cultivate a Vantage Point.
Becoming a photographer, a storyteller, an artist, gives you no option. It’s an order.
Metaphorically speaking, my Vantage Point time travels lawlessly particularly when seeing the past in pictures. And when such pictures show the naïveté of youth, loved ones now departed, or former homes in the cities that drove my personal growth, melancholy sets in and an evocative symphony follows.
Blame or bless my Celtic ancestry for the wistful side of my character, it stands tall and unapologetic like an Irish headstone.
Judge me for the times I blinded my Vantage Point with the blind spots of a fortifying past.
Redeem me for the bold move it took to break the chains that bring change.
Nashville, Tennessee, Y’all.
The Athens of the South.
Read on. It gets twang.
It took Music Capital to lift the tone arm of my broken record and stop the longing with a panoramic view clasp.
I can explain.
After the passing of my father in Spain, I decided to leave Miami and my life as I knew it, and moved to Nashville where my sister and extended family live, to honor the legacy of togetherness my immigrant parents nurtured in my sister and me.
Suffice to say that of all the world cities I’ve lived and worked which have been plenty, my love for 305 and its ocean was so genuine I stayed there the longest, even if my feelings for the city went unrequited in varying degrees of rollercoaster angst trouncing knockouts.
The Celt in me persevered. I owe Miami my version of Roosevelt’s Man in the Arena.
Fast forward to now. Perspective follows.
Interior styling my new home studio in Nashville, I ran into an old picture of my former Miami balcony atop a 34th floor in a posh Brickell skyscraper. The image showcased a fierce storm fast approaching, the kind of sky I love to photograph – a drapery of ethereal mist and dense indigo-gray clouds powerfully shadowing every skyscraper spire in sight.
Captured by an illusory memory, I sat in my kitchen bar, frozen in the past, bringing back all the years that balcony witnessed, myself unearthing the heavy burden of gone.
Unannounced, Madame Melancholy settled in, her violinists collectively fine tuning to an orchestra I know well. Yet this time the orchestra failed to ensemble, a symphony of silence reigned over my head as it turned sideways.
Nashville, Stompin’ Grounds.
My eyes detached from the 4 x 6 balcony picture to face a reality check that gives the term a Presidential Pardon. I opened up to a real-time panoramic view courtesy of the unobstructed 10-foot-tall windows of my living room.
Size matters.
Vantage Point.
My eyes traveled with upstroke wings atop my grand view of Green Hills – the residential, placid, and serene neighborhood located south of downtown Nashville.
It’s home, Sweetheart.
Instead of wishful, I felt grand. Instead of past, I feel present. Instead of afraid, I felt freed.
Channeling my beloved butterflies thru my windows, I felt my life flying high over an ocean of welcoming oaks, maples, and tulip poplars, the kaleidoscope of greens, the dignity of midwestern trees.
Every sunset, this view is crowned by the Great Smoky Mountains in a celestial horizon nested by the ancient Appalachian Plains – serene, undulating, inviting, reserved. I get lost in awe as they speak to my like art does. I see it as an exquisite Japanese Sansui, an art form that reflects a deep reverence for nature, aiming to evoke calm and contemplation.
And as in every master artwork, no two are ever the same.
Moving was my catalyst to moving on.
People don’t change, but we can correct a worn-out course and refuse settling. I did.
So much, that a quote I treasure comes to mind from my go-to opinion columnist from The Times, Maureen Dowd: “The minute you settle for less than you deserve, you get even less that you settled for.”
Bless the Celts for keeping me unsettled enough to make my move.
I feared leaving the ocean, now the birds sing there are many yet to swim.
I feared leaving my beloved art gallery, now my purpose glows with my mentors, colleagues, and collectors.
I feared leaving the familiar, now my family is here.
Come to the Edge seems fitting, a poem about courage symbolized by birds by Guillaume Apollinaire. I relied on it to gather strength prior to my transatlantic moves in my early 20s.
“Come to the edge,” he said.
“We can’t, we’re afraid!” they responded.
“Come to the edge,” he said.
“We can’t. We will fall” they responded.
“Come to the edge,” he said.
And so they came. And he pushed them.
And they flew.
As I read my words, it turns out I never left. Like the Apollinaire birds, I flew.
Just like Dad.
And as I write on my solid oak wood desk right across the glorious views ahead of me, my eyelashes flutter to a picture of Dad, taken by me, of all places in Miami and from my old balcony.
It’s a closeup where you can tell he is looking at the horizon.
Vantage Point.
His was always stellar – His vision for his daughters manifesting here and now.
I can feel him nodding in joy whispering a life quote meant for us:
“May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.” Edward Abbey
Nashville, Bless your Heart.