Tara Shain
Having been told at a tender young age that I had been found under a cabbage leaf, I spent a great deal of time in my formative years digging in the garden in search of other children. Though dedicated to my search, I had plenty of time to enjoy the other great adventures that a childhood in rural Nebraska offered; I was catching snakes, digging in the trash heap, and flipping cow patties in search of toads...
My glasses were presented to me at the age of four. Not realizing that wearing them was NOT an option, I often lost them... in the snow. As I approached my teens my parents soothed me with assurances that glasses made me look intellectual. As far as I was concerned that was just another way of saying "big nerd," and they were right, I was. When I graduated from high school I packed up my big, yellow, four-door Ford Granada and headed south.
I attended the University of North Texas part-time where I earned a BFA in photography and tended bar nights. When I graduated I landed a job that had absolutely nothing to do with my degree in a print house in Dallas, although they did seem duly impressed about the art thing. I was soon transferred to Atlanta, where I gladly spent a couple of years before finding myself in sunny Florida, where it rains more than anywhere else I've ever lived. There I studied graphic design and French when I suddenly got a wild hair to actually go to France to learn the language, which I promptly did. I had always wanted to live "somewhere else" and France was definitely "somewhere else." I spent nearly a year in a little town just outside of Nice and fell in love... with the landscape.
My studies over, I contemplated returning to the States and thought "what the heck" and, well, here I am, "somewhere else" again.
That pretty much brings me up to date. I'm still a big nerd and oddly enough, people still tell me from time to time that my glasses make me look like an intellectual. And, I'm still not entirely convinced that's a good thing...
My glasses were presented to me at the age of four. Not realizing that wearing them was NOT an option, I often lost them... in the snow. As I approached my teens my parents soothed me with assurances that glasses made me look intellectual. As far as I was concerned that was just another way of saying "big nerd," and they were right, I was. When I graduated from high school I packed up my big, yellow, four-door Ford Granada and headed south.
I attended the University of North Texas part-time where I earned a BFA in photography and tended bar nights. When I graduated I landed a job that had absolutely nothing to do with my degree in a print house in Dallas, although they did seem duly impressed about the art thing. I was soon transferred to Atlanta, where I gladly spent a couple of years before finding myself in sunny Florida, where it rains more than anywhere else I've ever lived. There I studied graphic design and French when I suddenly got a wild hair to actually go to France to learn the language, which I promptly did. I had always wanted to live "somewhere else" and France was definitely "somewhere else." I spent nearly a year in a little town just outside of Nice and fell in love... with the landscape.
My studies over, I contemplated returning to the States and thought "what the heck" and, well, here I am, "somewhere else" again.
That pretty much brings me up to date. I'm still a big nerd and oddly enough, people still tell me from time to time that my glasses make me look like an intellectual. And, I'm still not entirely convinced that's a good thing...