Staying connected NOT through social media
[W]hile I was away recently in Provence I was traveling without Kevin (horror) due to some client editing deadlines happening back in New York. It’s not often that we are apart considering all the work we create is together and we are married. Recently Canon sent us their new PIXMA MG7120 Wireless Inkjet All-in-One Printer and I thought, now THIS could be a way to make it fun being away from each other. Why? Because it’s in the cloud, which means I could (via their PIXMA Printing Solutions application) send surprise images from my iPhone to print out on photo paper throughout the day showing him what I was up to (translation: what he was missing out on).
It was a really thrilling way to keep in touch and at times felt a sweet and old fashioned, like sending postcards… instantly. When I first started sending him images I would totally ruin the surprise by texting him, “DID YOU GET MY PRINT?!!” so I had to learn to play it cool. Kevin loved waking up in the morning discovering what I had done that day that was not shared online, not on Instagram, and was just between us. When I returned from the south of France he had them all pinned up on the refrigerator and we got to walk through them all one by one, recounting all the moments he missed but could still feel a part of. What do you do to feel connected when you are away from loved ones?…
*Sidenote – since being back in New York, I’ve put the printer to good use printing Instagrams from family members, scanning images I find as inspiration out in the tactile world and printing them for my mood boards, and even taking a photo with a friend while we were out to dinner, and when we arrived back at the studio for a nightcap giving it to her as a momento. Of course this printer has a million bells and whistles but for starters… this was really fun.
ALSO, because of the magical cloud capabilities, you can print photos straight from Facebook & Twitter or sites like Dropbox & Picasa…and when you’re taking as many photos as I do, it’s nice to know you can get them printed no matter where you’ve stored the files!
Below, the images displayed on our studio refrigerator when I arrived home:
Below are some of the sets I sent. Each time I sent a photo, I would also write a letter to him in my journal describing what was happening, or just to say “I love you”… which went over a lot better than “Please water the plants.” and send a pic of that to print as well to tell the story before the memories could begin to fade.
