Week 9: Techie ME (Member Photos)
Technology is complicated. It allows us to do things we could never do before, but it also frustrates and isolates us at times. I think the members of this project did a great job of portraying both sides of technology with their images and words this week. As always, I am so thankful for each woman who is making the time for this project.
If you would like to join The ME Project, jump in at any time, by heading over to our private Facebook page and asking to join. The more women I can get in front of the frame this year, the happier I will be! Feel free to share this post, (and any others) with the creative people in your life, so they can be inspired by these amazingly talented women.
Jenny Parker - I have a complete love-hate relationship with technology. I'm the girl that does not have a smart phone (in fact, my phone died 3 weeks ago, and I've yet to replace it). I take real books to wait at the doctor's office, and I hate how little I know about how computers work. But I do love having my ipad at the gym to read photography tutorials, and I love that I can google any question that pops into my brain and boom! There is the answer less than a second later...or too many different answers or the internet is so slow that it takes forever to load the page (which forever happens right at naptime so I only get 1/2 the stuff done on my to-do list before booger gets up). So yes, a love-hate relationship for sure. I pretty much curse my computer at least once a day, and I look just like this.
Jennifer Podesta - I am a tech fanatic. Must have all the gadgets!
Kortney Fox - My poor husband is just one of those people that does not get along with technology and electronic devices. He has managed to give my iPad a virus, cause the speakers on our computer to malfunction, make my laptop go completely black, the list goes on. Thankfully, I have enough knowledge to be able to correct whatever issues he unintentionally creates. Sometimes I feel like I am a Super Hero defending my devices from his Evil Electronic Vibes! Look out!
Emily Ingalls - I'm not a techie person. My husband is an engineer in the computer industry, so anything techie falls on him. However, I love listening to music. In the car, I jam to the radio. At home, I turn music on my house more than the actual TV. When I'm working out, I need the hard rhythms and motivation of music driving me to push myself beyond my limits. With my music app downloaded onto my phone, my phone and music go with me everywhere.
Elena Pendell - A little iPad fun in a blanket fort... because that's about as technologically savvy as I get.
Jennifer L. Bruce - Techie me: listening to my low-tech vinyl copy of Thriller (yes, original release!) on my high-tech record player I got for Christmas. It's basic, but you can convert to digital using the USB in back. Yes, that is my remote in my dancing hand.
Cai Vail - I have a complicated relationship with technology (as I’m sure most of us over 25 or so do); the tools and creativity it allows us is awe-inspiring and boundless, yet too often it keeps us from enjoying the natural world and real-life social interaction. I was once someone who, with stubborn pride, would boast that I didn’t have a computer or smart phone or Facebook account. I stopped doing photography for almost a decade because I refused to learn digital out of bitterness for what it had done to the film photography industry. I missed out on years of illustration jobs because I refused to use digital media and preferred pen and watercolor on paper. All of that seems very foolish to me now, though I have definitely lost something in my life with the amount of time I spend in front of a screen. I was inspired to do this gif, something I’ve definitely never done before, by the ‘glitch paintings’ a painter friend of mine does. We transmit our images and identities via digital information, bounced from satellites in space, accessible by strangers and machines in nearly every corner of the planet. In doing so, surely we are creating an untrue portrait of ourselves, a ‘self’ consumed and regurgitated missing pieces or context, invariably flawed and incomplete.
Kristina Forbes - So I'm not very techie, but I am pretty dorky. Here's my techie picture inspired by Aeon Flux and Bill from Gravity Falls, all juxtaposed against a natural, non technical, background.
Briar Marie - In my previous life I was an engineer, so you'd think I'd be predisposed to technology. But the truth is that I approach new technology like a grouchy old man: "It was fine the way it was, why are we trying to ruin something that was already working perfect well!" I never wanted a smartphone. But then they were able to access my calendar... I never wanted a tablet, but then I was able to read my recipe book on it and search for keywords... And I DEFINITELY never wanted something to replace my beloved books. The beautiful bindings. The feel of the paper. My collection of bookmarks. But then they made it actually look like paper...in a format that I could obtain instantly. And truthfully even that was sad because I love going to bookstores...but then I had kids. So here I am reading on my Kindle with a cup of coffee while the sun warms my face. I guess I'll take it.
Loren Haar - I need to make a rule: no checking email or texting or making phone calls while my kids are awake. Why? Because Techie me is the me that is too preoccupied. Well okay, not the entire time they are awake, but I do need to set boundaries. I always have my iPhone with me, and it's too easy to just take it out and get involved in something on it. This week I tried to capture a sense of my children waiting for me to give them my undivided attention. I think my son's expression with me texting in the background says it all.
