ken zirkel

Today we had a birthday party for E, and W’s sister and family came for a visit. After the party we went to Waterfire Providence.

Son got the Lego Space Shuttle for his birthday.

We met up with friends at the Sandwich boardwalk and had some fun. See some photos.

Wyoming and Yellowstone National P ark; Salt Lake City

Day 1: Wed 6/23/10: PVD to SLC to Rock Springs, WY:

Flew all morning via Southwest, arrived in SLC around 10 AM. Called Acess RV to pick us up at the airport and we were introduced to our 23-foot motorhome, which was to be our home for the next 10 days. It was fully equipped with bathroom, heating, refrigerator, propane stove, generator, air conditioner, microwave oven, television and DVD player, and three sleeping areas (one master bed, one bed above the driving compartment, one living area that converted to a bed at night).
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Daughter plays the flute and Son plays the clarinet in this rendition of “Good King Wenceslas”, arranged by Daughter.

Good King Wenceslas duet from Kenneth Zirkel on Vimeo.

Daughter was given a place of honor during the fifth grade promotion ceremonies today. She played a solo performance of the Star Spangled Banner on her flute.

Star Spangled banner from Kenneth Zirkel on Vimeo.

Unfortunately, I was late on the video, and didn’t have a tripod.

The Wife ordered a delivery of mulch, and Son thought it was just the thing for jumping into.

It’s time to set up the pool again …

So, my father died last week, and I wanted to put together a photo gallery of photos of him. Digital was easy, I have everything keyworded, and a few minutes of searching came up with all my photos of him, as well as my “picks” of him, thanks to my photo organizing software. I have zillions of photos, but finding them is actually relatively easy to do.

Going back in time a bit, I have hundreds of 4×6 prints taken by my mom, maybe thousands of prints of her travels, most of which are meaningless to me. I’ve already thrown out a bunch, but I keep one or two boxes as a momento, and none of these have negs anywhere.

Going back a little further, I have boxes of my negatives from 1987 to 2002 or so. Plus several boxes of 4×6 prints. Lots of photos of all kinds of things that seemed important or artistic at the time, but very little organization to it, very little of it is labeled.

Going back a little further, I find the photo albums I’ve inherited from my parents. Mom used those “magnetic” albums for everything from the 60s and 70s, which means the photos are stuck to the albums. At least these are mostly organized and labelled, and I mostly have the “good” picks. None of these have any negatives, either.

Going back still further, my dad did shoot some slides in the 50s and 60s, many of which are mildewed and faded (again, digital technology to the rescue, thank goodness), they are mostly labeled and were arranged in their projector trays, since I have now scanned them they are a disorganized mess.

Going back further in time, I have a precious few childhood photos of my dad that are just gorgeous black and white, neatly arranged in sturdy archival albums (unfortunately not labeled). Very few photos from this time period (1930-1950), and each of these is a precious heirloom. I’m lucky enough to have some photos going back to the late 1890′s, and the further back you go the more formal and rare the photo appears to be.

I don’t have much of a point, I guess, except to observe that photography went from being a rare and precious thing, to being an explosion of quantity over quality. Thank goodness for digital technology to help tame all that. And thank goodness for the ability of digital technology to help me share photos via Flickr.com and geni.com.

Oh, and I still have several 8mm film reels, which I haven’t even viewed yet.

Dad passed away yesterday. Wendy and I were by his side at the nursing home. He went quickly and peacefully.

He wasn’t the easiest guy to get close to. I returned the sentiment, and spent a lot of my life distancing myself from him, or resenting him for one thing or another. But after my son was diagnosed with Asperger’s, I started to understand him a lot better. Dad was never diagnosed with it (he was born before Dr. Asperger even gave it a name), but I have no doubt that my father had Asperger Syndrome, too.

I tried to collect some photos of him for a tribute gallery, but they were hard to come by. Dad was usually the guy behind the camera, rarely in front of it. That’s something we shared: a love of photography. He introduced me to the hobby, gave me my first camera, my first darkroom lessons. I suppose his antique Canon FT-b is my most prized possession of his, along with his hundreds of photographs and his 8mm movies.

Here are some photos to remember him by.