Dear Autumn,

You are the sexiest of all the seasons. When you come around, I drop everything and give myself to you wholly. I will be your mistress, and I will love you even on the darkest and greyest of days. I will lay in the grass and stare up at the nakedest of trees, thinking only of you.

I will never call you fall, only autumn. Fall is so pedestrian, and the way I feel about you is deep and serious and sophisticated. You are the season in which I was born, and I am saturated by you.

It’s my understanding that many people love summer, and prefer it to you. What are they thinking? No afternoon in the hot sun on the beach or beside the pool compares to a hike in an autumn wood or curling up under a fleece blanket beside a crackling fireplace. Who needs the bright colors of summer when they can have the curl of yellow, fiery red, or savory, scrumptious orange? I’d even take your crunchy browns over that summer gleam. I need to tell you that summer doesn’t hold a candle to you, especially for a northern girl who, like me, finds herself living south of the Mason-Dixon line. Spending the summer running from one air conditioned space to another is not my idea of a good time. I loathe air conditioning, and loathe summer all the more for making it necessary. Summer is the most painful of seasons.

Photo: Shari Altman

So, every year I wait for you. Beginning in September, when I’ve had all I can take of humid, sweaty, melty days, I check the weather report religiously, waiting for your arrival. I trust that you will rescue me, and every year, without fail, you do. It’s always later than I would hope, usually mid-October, a good month or so after the calendar touts your arrival and long after you’ve swept through my old stomping grounds.

My family calls to tell me that it’s forty degrees when I’m still melting in eighty degree heat. Forty degrees may be cold, but I get jealous. I long for you. I want more than anything to pull down my box of sweaters and wear them all in your name. I want to walk outside and feel my cheeks flush at a passing breeze. I want you with me forever.

Though I am grateful to have you, I know that for now I don’t have you fully. Not here, where I currently call home. Where I live is subtropical, and you don’t venture that far south. Instead you blow kisses in my direction, enough to drop the temperatures a bit, but you prefer the north. You change the colors of their leaves, keep them swaddled in wool scarves and turtlenecks, and encourage the ample stocking of firewood. I don’t begrudge you this. After all, I decided to move away. What I didn’t realize is that I was leaving you. I took you for granted for so many years, and now that I yearn for you and want you back, I can’t have you. And you know it.

This morning, I went for a walk looking for evidence of you. The sky was grey, swelling with the onset of a storm. The wind gusted and whipped my hair across my face. I saw block after block of green leaves on trees that refuse to admit that summer is over and it’s time to let go.

But then I turned a corner and saw it – just a glimpse. A swirl of brown leaves on the sidewalk peppered with tiny red rebellious leaves, ones that have embraced you, ones that I love. I thought about chasing after them and catching as many little red leaves as I could, but I didn’t want to go overboard. Lord knows who would’ve seen me on the side of the road stuffing leaves into my shirt like a crazed game show contestant or a scarecrow.

I’m not quite that crazy. Instead, my mother-in-law has promised to wax leaves from the north and send them to me soon. Autumn, it’s not soon enough – I want them now.

You are so much more than cool temperatures and changing leaves. You are a season, a time frame. You are September, October, and November. You are the beginning of the school year and the ushering in of the holidays. You are apples and pumpkins, hayrides, and corn mazes. You are my reason to wear corduroy.

This is a love that will surely endure the test of time.

When my husband and I gear up for baseball playoffs and football Sundays, I know you are close. He spends hours in the kitchen making chili and I make apple crisp and pumpkin bread. It’s all we eat for weeks at a time. We drink pumpkin spice coffee in the mornings and pumpkin ale at night. We savor you.

Autumn, without you, my life would be incomplete. You are the scarf around my neck, the cool air tickling my nose. I love you unapologetically, forever and ever.

I bought the camera in the autumn of my junior year of college. I had enrolled in a photography class, partly because I wanted to give it a try and partly because I was toying with the idea of taking on studio art as a minor. This was before the rash of digital photography, when digital cameras were still bulky and could hold a floppy disk. My photography class was all 35mm. What I remember from that class is vague: always scratching the negatives when I developed them, spending hours in the dark room, self-portraits of my feet and shots of an ex-boyfriend. I don’t remember learning technique or how to see creatively. I shot photos for one semester, and only shot one more roll the following summer before putting my camera away.

A year ago I asked my father if I could have the camera back. It wasn’t until this summer that it finally made its way to me with one roll of expired film. My husband, daughter, and I were in upstate New York for an extended vacation to see family, and I shot through the roll in three days. After each photograph I pulled the camera away from me to see what it looked like, a habit I’ve acquired with my DSLR, only to be reminded that this type of photography was not immediate. I had to wait. I had to take my time, adjust the camera and the focus carefully, and wait until the entire roll was exposed to take it to be developed.

I can’t say exactly what made me want to shoot film again, except that I knew I wanted to be a better photographer. In the duration of my marriage I had accumulated a hand-me-down point-and-shoot and eventually upgraded to a DSLR. I had committed to completing the 365 project and was shooting photos every day. Eventually I got brave enough to put my DSLR in manual mode and learned how to compose a creative photograph, mostly by trial and error. My photos were improving merely by the daily habit, but I still hungered to get better. Shooting digital had given me the skills and the passion, but I wanted to shoot film because I knew I couldn’t cheat. Instead of the limitless frames I could shoot with my digital camera, I would have to carefully consider each shot with my film camera.

I thought I knew what I was in for when I started shooting film, but I had no idea. Every roll I shoot fills me with excitement, anticipation, and often a bit of doubt. It’s an exercise in patience but also in self-kindness, since I tend to be perfectionist and set unreasonably high standards for myself. Photography helps me to capture that sense of wonder and experimentation that small children find commonplace. They try new things just to see what will happen; I do the same with my camera. What would happen if I point my camera at the sun? What would this brilliant red look like? Or blue, or green? What if I focus on the background when my inclination is to focus on the foreground?

Of course, these are questions I ask myself when shooting my digital camera, too, though the sense of play is different for one critical reason: delayed gratification. When I shoot my digital camera, I end up taking the same shot twenty times or more, making small adjustments with each frame. Often the best shot is the first, but because I have the opportunity for a do-over, I take it. Film gives me a chance to play with the knowledge that each photo is a risk and all I can do is trust what I know and go for it. Sometimes it can feel like a guessing game, but because I can’t see the photo the camera just produced, I have make a decision and trust it was the right one. Sometimes it is; sometimes it isn’t. That shooting film enhances my sense of play enables me to find joy even in my mistakes, even in the questions that arise to which I have no answer, even in an entire roll that may have to be tossed away.

What I love most about film is how gritty it is. The prints can sometimes be a bit grainy—especially if, like me, you don’t have a lot of money to spend on fancy, good-quality film—or they can be soft like a watercolor painting. Colors are vibrant and sometimes unexpectedly so. In an age where we can not only take digital photos but can then manipulate them with photo editing software, film is pure and raw. A film print simply is what it is.

Marilyn Chandler McIntyre, in her book Caring for Words in a Culture of Lies, writes, “Beauty and peace are things to be learned and protected, because we see all too much evidence around us that they can be lost.” Photography, in whatever capacity, is a way to preserve that beauty and peace in the moments of our lives. To pick up a camera and shoot a photograph is among the sacred tasks we can perform. For me film photography is the best way to delight in beauty and creation and experience moments of gratitude for this life. I will never stop shooting my digital camera, but I don’t expect to ever put down my film camera. Instead I expect to marvel at every newly developed roll of film, because this is the world as I see it.

This article originally appeared on the Art House America Blog. All photos are by Lindsay Crandall.

It had been more than a year since the BP oil spill. Last summer we didn’t go to the beach at all. My husband Adam got a part-time job doing EMS standby for those working to clean up the shores. He said time and again that it wasn’t that bad where we lived in Alabama, but we were still grateful for the extra income.

In late October, we finally took our daughter Lily to the beach at Dauphin Island. It was off-season and barely a soul could be seen. Still, there were no tar balls and we had little concern. We played in the sand and swam. Adam tried to catch crabs with his bare hands. Mullet jumped nearby. Everything seemed all right.

I made a bucket list of things to do before we moved. On it was one last visit to our southern beach. We arrived early, long before the heat set in, and found a quiet place to build a sand castle and walk Lily along the water’s edge. We knew we wouldn’t see these waters for a long time; we probably won’t live so close to the water again. But the Gulf will always be there and the beaches are just as beautiful as they’ve ever been.

Note: these photos were taken with a Holga 120 camera.

A few evenings ago I stood in the bathroom, brushing my teeth. Everyone already in bed tucked in for the night, I didn’t even bother to flip on the light. I just kept reciting to myself the beginning of Wendell Berry’s “How to Be a Poet”: Make a place to sit down./Sit down. Be quiet.

Quiet is an abundant and scary place. It has become scarier now that we’ve settled on a moving date, now that the “someday” of our move is very quickly becoming now. When it’s quiet, I start thinking about all the things left to do. Panic sets in. I start worrying about what Adam will do for employment, what city we’ll end up in, how we’ll stock up on blankets and winter coats. I go to the quiet in short bursts, until I can’t stand it anymore, and then I back away.

Because we knew our time in Alabama was temporary, Adam and I always treated it that way. We knew someday we would leave and it would be easier if we didn’t plant roots that would soon need digging up. On paper this makes sense, but it has left a gaping hole in our southern life. Now as we prepare to leave, I realize that we are actually leaving very little behind. Our relationships are proving to be flimsy and our entanglements easy to untie. Already people have let us go, and we haven’t left yet. But this is our doing, the harvest of a temporary life.

What surprises me most is how sad I’ve felt about moving. It occurred to me after a recent trip to New Orleans Zoo that I may never visit New Orleans again. I might never drive through Mississippi and see the “Welcome to Alabama the Beautiful” sign again. Adam and I made a bucket list of things to do before we move, and I’ve lamented over the things we didn’t do enough.

When we moved away from New York, we knew we’d be back to visit family and friends. But I’m not so sure about Alabama. I’m getting ready to leave and never come back.

In a few days, we will celebrate Lily’s second birthday. We have no plans for a party; the move is just too close. Instead we’ll celebrate like we did on the day of her birth—just the three of us. No visitors, no guests. Just us. When we get to New York, we’ll celebrate again, this time with family and friends who we’ve been far from for far too long.

In the meantime, we’ll keep crossing things off our to do list and enjoy these last days in our first home. This was our first big adventure together, and Alabama will always be special to us. But it’s time to start compiling a list of things to do when we get to New York: see a favorite band with a friend, go to a poetry reading, swim in Lake Ontario, take Adam to New York City for the first time. This time we’ll pack everything we own in a U-Haul, along with the dog, cat, and two year-old who have joined our family, and make the long drive north, back to where this all started and to where it will start again.

Photo by Lindsay Crandall.

This is all thanks to Free the Hops, a grassroots non-profit whose primary goal was to bring high quality craft beer to the state of Alabama. In May 2009, after years of lobbying, legislation was passed to raise the alcohol limit on beer in the state from 6 percent to 13.9 percent by volume. For beer lovers in Alabama, this was good news.

Adam and I always enjoyed our beer, but our exposure had been limited. Since the early days our marriage we have been partial to Yuengling. It was our standby beer, reasonably priced, and we seldom deviated from it. When we did it was for something like Blue Moon or Sam Adams.

For the nine months previous to the Free the Hops legislation we drank very little beer as we awaited the birth of our daughter, then drank barely any in the following six months. To say that we were out of the loop was an understatement, not just in the beer world but in general. Having a newborn will do that to you.

Just in time for us to get back to our regular drinking habits, a new pizza joint moved in downtown and with it came a rush of new-to-Alabama beers. We met friends there for pizza one evening and walked out quite fond of a few new brews: for Adam, St. Bernardus Abt 12 and for me, Magic Hat #9. Soon after we found of another pizza joint with a healthy sampling of beer around the corner from our new home (a dangerous thing to have nearby) and made it our mission to try any craft beers we could. The only problem? We couldn’t find most of them at the store. So we drank our trusty standard at home and often ventured out to one of these pizzerias for a brew. Even with a little person in tow, we became regulars.

Photo by Lindsay Crandall.

Adam started reading up on different types of beer, and in turn educated me on differing beer styles. When we went out, we didn’t just guzzle our drinks; we paid attention to their flavors and determined which we most enjoyed. Adam prefers beer rich in hops or dark and malty. I like hops, too, but also enjoy any beer made with wheat. Good things to know when making the great leap of faith that is trying a new beer.

Eventually local markets started carrying more craft beer and some offer a “create your own six pack” option or sample packs. When we’re feeling adventurous and have a few extra bucks in our pockets, we try something new in the comfort of our own home. Still we often find ourselves at the local watering hole on days when the pricey craft beers are half off. We sample new pints and revisit favorites. For us, this is part of the good life.

Adam’s Top 5 Beers

Sam Adams Winter Lager

Abita Andygator

Dogfish Head 90 Minute Ale

Sweetwater IPA

Bell’s Two Hearted Ale

Lindsay’s Top 5 Beers

Magic Hat #9

Hoegaarden

Great Divide Titan

Avery White Rascal

Lazy Magnolia Indian Summer

That is, until the beginning of 2010, the year of jounaling fearlessly.

Photo by Lindsay Crandall.

The trouble I always had with journaling arose from two things: perfectionism and navel gazing. My particular brand of perfectionism dictated that I always write in my best handwriting, in perfectly straight lines, and in perfectly correct English. Especially in a fancy notebook, the contents would have to match the container and the fear that I wasn’t good enough or smart enough or fancy enough always loomed over me. I had admired a roommate in college who unapologetically scribbled into her journal. I asked her if she ever felt like she had to get it right before she put the words on paper to which she said matter-of-factly, no. I was confounded.

Navel gazing, the other problem I had with journaling, had less to do with personal hang-ups than simply becoming bored with the daily goings-on that often seemed too tedious to warrant recording. Perhaps my future self would like to read about all the things I did (and to an extent I think this more and more true), but the process of getting these things down on the page seemed both self-important and dull.

Earlier this year, a friend had written on her blog about keeping a homemaking notebook, a place where she could collect quotes, daily activities, ideas, and to-do lists. It was mostly a commonplace book, not a place to record deep thoughts, not a place that would require a lock and key. In spite of being journaling averse, I was still attracted to keeping a journal, and I liked my friend’s low-key approach. Armed with a gift card from Christmas, I went to the bookstore. I bought a large hardbound sketchbook, light blue with birds perched on the front. I took it home, dated the first page, and wrote two quotes I had scribbled on scraps of paper from a book I had just finished reading. I drew a few flowers in the corner. I promised myself I would write again the next day. Then I did.

Photo by Lindsay Crandall.

This time was different from all my previous unsuccessful attempts. This time I allowed myself to be disorderly, to rebel against that terrible beast of perfectionism. And I allowed myself to not have to write about me. I purposely set out to only keep track of quotes I came across and lists of things to do. That didn’t last long. Five pages in I wrote a short paragraph trying to make sense of what was happening in my interior life. Several pages later I ended up pouring my heart out, not because I wanted to keep track of those thoughts in a diary I’d later look back on, but because as a writer the way for me to best process things is to write them down, especially when I feel clogged up with what I call mental clutter. Mostly I wrote out passages from books, drew sketches, and made lists of future projects.

This journaling became a daily habit and later in the year I started keeping another journal, one full of what Julia Cameron in The Artist’s Way calls “morning pages.” Simply put, it was a daily three-page brain dump that I kept in a one subject spiral-bound notebook. This journal was, as poet Luci Shaw writes in her essay “The Writer’s Notebook,” a place where I could “[name] the confusion of the mind and heart . . . to make it seem more manageable.” Shaw goes on to say, “Though we are often moving too fast to notice it, there is in each of us a profound need to be still, to be alone, to reflect, to meditate, to contemplate, to wait, to reach a kind of bone-deep honesty with our own souls.” In the midst of keeping two journals I found that bone-deep honesty, not in recounting the moments of my days but by exploring the undercurrents in my daily living, the threads that tied the whole thing together.

I sat down recently and read through both journals. It was scary at first, until I started seeing patterns emerge: wanting to take my writing more seriously, wanting to live a creative life, wanting to find healing and restoration in some of the tender areas of my life. W.H. Auden famously asked, “How can I know what I think until I see what I say?” I have never found that to be truer than I do now. Keeping a journal has become invaluable to me because as Henri Nouwen writes in Reflections on a Theological Education:

“Writing is a process in which we discover what lives in us. The writing itself reveals what is alive. The deepest satisfaction of writing is precisely that it opens up new spaces within us of which we were not aware before we started to write. To write is to embark on a journey whose final destination we do not know.”

Photo by Lindsay Crandall. Chili by Adam Crandall.

Now I know football is about as middle America as it gets and that I’ve already lost some of you just by mentioning the f-word. Some of you feel about football in general the way I feel about the SEC – I just don’t give a flip and I wish it would go away. That’s okay. Football Sunday isn’t so much about the football as it is about togetherness. For me, Football Sunday is family time, a day we set aside to be together and somewhere in the background the television is tuned into the game. It was this way when I was a kid and now that I’m married with a kid of my own, it’s this way at my house.

Football Sunday: How to Do It

1. Five minutes before kickoff, crack open a good fall beer. Sam Adams Octoberfest or something similar will do just fine. (No need to get too fancy, but whatever you do, stay away from Miller Lite.)

2. Eat in front of the TV. A sandwich or a hearty bowl of chili (see below) will do just fine, though snacks are almost always necessary. Tortilla chips with cheese is a good choice. Feeling extravagant? Have a baguette with a good soft cheese. (Another reason to stay away from Miller Lite.)

3. Watch the game.

4. Or not. It is perfectly acceptable to read, knit, or nap as long as you are within earshot of the TV. It’s togetherness we’re after here.

5. If it’s cold enough, build a fire. But only if you have a functioning fireplace.

6. Keep drinking beer. No need to be excessive, but a cold beer in hand is a crucial component in the magic of Football Sunday.

Optional: Go to church in the morning, preferably as early as possible so as not to miss the lengthy pre-game show with Terry, Howie, Jimmy, and the rest of the gang.

Adam’s Awesome Chili

We make chili weekly during the cold months. It’s a simple recipe that makes enough for plenty of leftovers or can feed a crowd.

Ingredients

2 whole bell peppers

1-3 jalapeno peppers (depending on how hot you want it)

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 medium white onion

1 28 oz can crushed tomatoes

1 14 oz can each: refried beans, pinto beans, kidney beans, garbanzo beans, whole kernel corn and diced tomatoes

12 oz beer

2 tbsp. vegetable oil

2 tbsp. chili powder

1 tbsp. cumin

Optional: If you like your chili meaty, you can add 1 lb. of ground beef, pork, or the like.

1. Chop peppers, onion and garlic. Add to oil in large 5-quart pot and sauté for 5 minutes. If adding meat, do so now and sauté until meat is thoroughly cooked.

2. While vegetables sauté, open all canned food and drain.

3. Add crushed and diced tomatoes and refried beans. Stir until well-blended.

4. Add beans, corn, beer and spices. Reduce heat to low and cook for at least 30 minutes, preferably several hours.

5. Serve to your favorite football fanatics (and those who barely tolerate the sport) with shredded cheddar cheese, sour cream, and tortilla chips. Enjoy!

The interior life is a fascinating thing. No one else can see it. No one knows what’s going on in there. But each of us carries our own private interior life around with us. We know it well, though others know of us only what we present.

As Jesus pointed out the seven woes of the Pharisees, he said, “First clean the inside of the cup, and then the outside also will be clean” (Matthew 23:26). Take care of your interior life. Clean it, care for it. Your exterior life will reflect it. Maintain your motorcycle and maintain yourself.

It seems pretty basic: slow down, pay attention, be present in each moment, live with intention. With cultural shifts toward intentional living, such as the slow food movement and the revitalization of homesteading, it seems as if the maintenance of the interior life should be easy, or at least easier.

But, of course, life gets busy and often chaotic. I have to remind myself to embrace the chaos. I try to pause and reflect, sometimes to no avail. Without a break, a Sabbath, or a moment to exhale, the chaos can easily leave the inside of my cup tarnished and maybe even a little cracked.

It’s a question of how we nurture ourselves.

I don’t mean to imply that the spiritual disciplines of prayer, meditation, and reading the Scriptures are not necessary to the maintenance of the interior life. Indeed, they are critical. But doing them doesn’t automatically mean that we won’t feel depleted or that we don’t need rest.

It also doesn’t mean that we make enough space in our lives to play and imagine and create. For me, that’s when the nurturing comes in. It may seem childish and silly, but finding ways to create and play always seems to replenish my interior life.

Recently, I started reading through Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. The book is a sort of creative self-therapy. Every day you hand-write three pages of whatever comes to mind. The writing is merely a brain dump — stream of consciousness, no filter — in order to clear your mind to allow your creativity to flow. In addition to these three pages, Cameron suggests you take yourself on an artist date once a week, a specific time when you go do something fun alone. It need not be artistic, per se — just an opportunity for your “artist child” to play. Each chapter has specific tasks to be completed throughout the week, in addition to the daily writing and artist dates, that serve to break down the things that can produce creative blocks.

One of the main principles is that creativity is a spiritual experience. When we create something, we join with God, the Great Creator.

Call it genius or creative energy or the Holy Spirit, the force that moves through us as we create moves because we are made in his image. We create because he made us creative. Whether we write, paint, swing a hammer, or design skyscrapers, we partner with God in creation.

As I work through The Artist’s Way, something interesting is happening. I feel lighter, freer, and generally happier. The exercises feel more like play and less like work, and every week I look forward to what might come next.

I’ve always been a creative type. I write and dabble in photography and doodle a lot. The Artist’s Way is right up my alley. It might not be for you, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t creative. I tend to agree with Madeleine L’Engle who, in her book Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art, writes, “Unless we are creators we are not fully alive. . . . Creativity is a way of living life, no matter our vocation or how we earn our living. Creativity is not limited to the arts.”

For me, being creative is essential to the maintenance of my motorcycle, the cleaning of my cup, and the care for my interior life. For you it may be different. But each of us has to find the right way to nurture and care for ourselves. Our interior lives, our motorcycles, should run as well as possible.

Poetry is best read aloud!

That poetry is not a larger part of our cultural conversation is not entirely surprising. Poetry has gotten a bad rap as something to be picked apart and analyzed rather than enjoyed for its beauty. We’ve been taught to probe poems, criticize them, and kick them around a bit, and we’ve been taught that all this poetry dissection is somehow good for us. But analysis is cumbersome and steals the joy of poetry. Rather than scrutinizing poems to death, we should be enjoying them.

W.S. Merwin, recently selected as U.S. Poet Laureate, has something to say about “Why Some People Do Not Read Poetry”:

Because they already know that it means
stopping and without stopping they know that
beyond stopping it will mean listening
listening without hearing and maybe
then hearing without hearing and what would
they hear then what good would it be to them
like some small animal crossing the road
suddenly there but not seeming to move
at night and they are late and may be on
the wrong road over the mountain with all
the others asleep and not hitting it
that time as though forgetting it again

I suggest you take a moment to read the poem again, this time out loud. Don’t feel silly; poetry is an aural art. The poem kinda rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it? There’s a lot of music here, especially in the beginning. And not to minimize the importance of the poem, but hearing the words read out loud almost trumps the need to look for meaning. This poem just sounds good. (Of course, its meaning is also poignant for this essay.)

One of the tricks that I’ve learned when it comes to poetry is that it really isn’t about analysis. Not many poets sit down to pen a poem because they hope that someone somewhere down the line will take the time to read and reread their poem dozens of times in order to interpret (or misinterpret) every nuance and meaning. That’s not the point.

Many of us, if not all, were introduced to poetry in an academic setting. It was probably sometime in grade school when rhyming was still considered cool. Just getting the rhymes was the fun part. And being silly helped, too (remember Shel Silverstein?). Later on, though the writing of poetry was still creative and often fun, the reading of poetry was equated with pretension, cryptic symbolism, and men who lived a long, long time ago. Poetry units were something to survive, not something to enjoy.

My poetic education began when I started filling my journals with poems, an occupation that kept my teenage self locked in my room for hours each night. From there I dipped my toe in the pool of postmodern and contemporary poetry, mostly with books from the library. My high school literary education avoided twentieth century poetry at all costs while the novel, of course, was revered.

When I got to graduate school where I majored in creative writing with an emphasis in poetry, it was full-on immersion. And I loved it. Though analysis was still the goal, it was a different kind, emphasizing both craft and historical context. We wrote poetry, read it, memorized it, and recited it. Poetry readings were a dietary staple. The shift away from understanding poems purely in an academic sense came as I heard more poetry read and recited. It was transformational.

The thing about hearing a poem read out loud is that there isn’t time to break the poem apart into deeper meaning. What you have are sounds and phrases and images that hopefully resonate with your soul. A well-crafted poem should make you feel. This is why poetry is good for you. It’s like eating a delicious meal or spending time with a loved one or praying – you should always walk away from it renewed.

Wallace Stevens wrote, “The purpose of poetry is to contribute to man’s happiness.” Dana Gioia adds, “Aesthetic pleasure needs no justification, because a life without such pleasure is not one worth living.” Pleasure, happiness, beauty – these are the reasons to love poems and to listen to poems.

Of course, live poetry readings are the best place to hear poetry. Nothing beats hearing a poet standing before you read her own poem, or recite someone else’s from memory. But if you find yourself living where readings are seldom held, there are plenty of recordings to listen to online. The Poetry Foundation’s podcasts are a great place to start. Look further on the web site for more poets reading poems. YouTube is also a good place to look, if you’re willing to sift through what’s there. Two other sources I recommend are The Caedmon Poetry Collection: A Century of Poets Reading Their Work, a collection of audio CDs, and Poetry Speaks, which includes both audio and printed versions of the poems.

The key is to turn off your critical mind and simply enjoy whatever poems you read or hear, for that, after all, is what the poet has always hoped for you.

But I do have a smartphone. I am steering through the new millennium with a phone that that is “smart,” though never as smart as when I’m using it. And smart as I am, I know a bit of magic when I see it. Magic that was once only available via toy camera. Magic in the form of an app that takes Polaroids. Sort of.

I don’t have an iPhone, but that’s where it started. At my daughter’s first birthday, I tinkered with Hipstamatic on a friend’s iPhone. Hipstamatic is an app that takes digital photos that look analog, like those from Polaroid and toy cameras. I spent the late moments of the party with a phone in front of my face, carefully framing and snapping photos, and then ooh-ing and ahh-ing at the results.

To be honest, I was in my own little world, and it was great. Though I’m an amateur photographer, I take it pretty seriously. But something about that little phone app brought me a different kind of joy, a new kind of satisfaction that I wasn’t used to. So I downloaded FX Camera, a comparable app for my Droid, and thus began the obsession with snapping camera-phone Polaroids.

Concurrent to ’Roid Week on Flickr, I gave my DSLR the week off and took my daily photos with my phone. A lot of photos. Probably more than I should admit. I couldn’t stop pulling my phone out and snapping fake Polaroids – of a street sign, of my daughter, of a football practice at the school around the corner. They look aged and worn. Heck, they just look cool.

I know it’s not the same as using a real Polaroid camera. There’s no whizzing, no waiting, no holding the corner and flapping the developing shot. But I am an adult who doesn’t have a Polaroid camera. And though that could change at any time, the amount of delight I’ve gotten from this silly little smartphone app is worth its weight in instant film.