Fish in the Sea (Or, Why I Like Aquariums)

Coney Island Beach back in the day.

I enjoy aquariums. The vast amount of water in large, transparent tanks transfix the eyes. I can watch stingrays all day. I anthropomorphize their bellies — don't you think they look like smiling faces? In New York — at Coney Island — there is a modest aquarium. I was excited when I found the moray eel hanging out behind a fake coral. Aquatic creatures! It's comforting to fantasize about life in water. One of my favorite Disney animations is The Sword in the Stone*— the boy Arthur turns into a squiggly little fish — then a squirrel — but it is the fish scene I liked the most. Wouldn't life be so much agiler under the waves? Well, when a garfish isn't chasing you.

Arthur (as a fish) being chased by a garfish 
in Disney's The Sword and the Stone (1963)

Family Photograph of Mom Skipping Rope in Chicago

Pamela Roselli skips rope in Chicago, Illinois (circa 1997)

Throwback to a family vacation in 1997 where we walked the streets of Chicago - and my mom decided to jump rope with some kids.

We were walking the streets of Chicago back in 1997 or something like that and Mom decided to play jump rope with the neighborhood kids. Great memory.

We had driven a car to Chicago from New Orleans. We wanted to go to a Cubs game and to see the Chicago Art Institute.

We walked a lot in Chicago which is why I like this photograph. I wonder who those kids are? Do they remember this moment? Mom looks young and energetic, waiting for her time to jump rope. The boy with the hoodie is trained on his game and the girl in the sky blue dress is counting time.

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Recollections: College Visitations back in 1998

At Centenary College in Shreveport, Louisiana circa 1998

Throwback to that time in High School when I visited Centenary College in Shreveport, Louisiana, on a college visit.
I visited Centenary College in Shreveport, Louisiana, when I was a Senior in High School. Mom drove me. We spoke to the professors in the Liberal Arts department, and I asked them questions about their philosophy program.

I did not enroll in the school - I ended up becoming a seminary student at Saint Joseph Seminary in Saint Benedict, Louisiana.

However, Centenary symbolizes the trajectory I could have taken if I had chosen to stake out my own way as a college student on my own terms.

Travel Diary: Crossing the Delaware

Crossing the Delaware River over the Delaware Memorial Bridge

Traveling from D.C. to New York on a Summer day in 2017, I took a photograph of the Delaware Memorial Bridge - and wrote this illuminating post.

I'm wishing everyone peace and solace on this Sunday in Ordinary Time.

Summer in Perdido Key: Belly Beach Parade

A beachgoer in Perdido Key, Florida Summer 2017

I'm addicted to this filter I used to take the above photograph. On my mobile phone - via the Facebook app - I upload random photos to "my story." My friends over at Snapchat were made famous with this kind of ephemera-generating technology - so I guess Facebook has jumped on the bandwagon to compete. And I think Instagram has a similar feature.

Eating a Beignet in New Orleans: Classic Portrait Photography

A photo of a cousin’s friend eating a beignet at the Café du Monde in the old casino building in New Orleans’s City Park.

I was home for the Summer. We went to the Café du Monde in City Park 🌃. A kid eats a beignet with glee. One rule when eating a New Orleans-style powdered fried cake - always eat it with glee.

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Throwback Thursday: Family Vacation Photograph from A July Summer of 1984 Trip to Destin, Florida

My Brother (to the right) and I in Destin, Florida circa July 1984

Somewhere in the 1980s, my parents made me wear floaties as I learned to swim. Read more about it right here, on my writer's blog Stones of Erasmus!

It's funny how memory works. You think you remember it just as it happened. It ain't so. For example, I remember sitting on a hotel bed in Florida eating Pringles with my younger brother - wearing floaties.

That's pretty much how it went down for the "Roselli - July 1984" beach vacation. Except I was eating Planters brand cocktail peanuts - and that's my older brother in the photograph, not my younger sibling. And look. He's attempting to give me bunny ears. I'm clueless.

Mom says we jumped on the bed. But there's no photograph of that.

And no one can confirm it's Destin. But I don't care. I'd like to think that there's a six-year old me floating in some beachside pool in Destin - the State-of-everlasting-beach-vacations, Florida.

And ohhhh. I found the floaties. And look at me chomping on those Sour Cream and Onion Ruffles brand potato chips.

Wear Your Floaties!

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Transcript of a Dream (from Beijing)

In my dreams, I heard the thumping of feet and I thought it was the sound of my feckless roommate thumping towards the bathroom to puke but it wasn't my roommate thumping.

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Video Post: Feeding Ducks in Robertsdale, Alabama

Ducks hang out in a parking lot in Robertsdale, Alabama

Off of US Highway 90, my mother Pamela, my older brother Bradford, and I stopped at an old, dilapidated building with a sign out front that read "Interdenominational Church." We fed the ducks. Greig (that's me) conducted an interview.

- Posted on BlogPress

Location:Robertsdale, Alabama

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Take a Ride on the Nanjing Metro: A Photograph of "Happy" & "Forlorn"

A photographic selfie of that time Amira Booth-Soifer and Greig Roselli navigated the Nanjing metro system.

Without a guide, we navigated Nanjing's subterranean transport system.

Amira and Greig on the Nanjing metro (ca. 2017)

Logo for the Nanjing Metro

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Summer Travel Attire — From Brooklyn to Raleigh

A photograph of me in Raleigh evidences how I basically wore the same t-shirt all Summer long.

I've been traveling this Summer dressed like how I look in the above photograph. I made it to Raleigh, North Carolina after a long trek by train from New York. I'm wearing the tee of my school — I am a teacher (but you would know that if you read my blog often.

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The Man is Lightheaded

We put our hands in the air.

And no. I didn't photoshop out his face. The shot came out this way.

Electric lightbulb dance factory!

Location: Charlotte, North Carolina

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That Time I Arrived in Beijing to Begin a Six City Tour of China

Grill work from a door 

in the Forbidden City in Beijing.

In the Summer of 2017, we took a month-long tour of China. Here is the first post of that journey:

I feel relieved and at peace today.

It's been four days since we landed in La Guardia after a twenty-one day, six-city tour of China.

Coming home on the Sunday before the Fourth of July, we first landed in Detroit, went through
immigration retrieved our luggage and grabbed our connecting flight home.

Monday was the Fourth of July. You'd think I
would've been journey-weary; but, I scooped up
whatever energy I had left and watched Macy's fireworks on the East River with my age-old buddy Anthony Charles who was in town for work.

I hadn't sorted through all the photographs we'd taken, ticket stubs, leftover RMB notes, and select tchotchkes bought and packed, but sitting in the park before the fireworks started, I told Tony about our trip.

Self-Portrait at the Simatai Portion of the Great Wall of China: Photo Post

It was friggin' hot that day ... just saying (at the Great Wall at Simatai in China).

Squinting at the Great Wall of China 🇨🇳.
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#asia #nature #china #simatai #thegreatwall #beijing#instatravel #travelling #travel # #chinatravel #사마대장성#travelgram #traveltheworld #만리장성 #thegreatwallofchina#greatwallofchina #visitchina #heilongjiang #greatwall#travelphotography #trip #chinadestinations via stonesoferasmus.com

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Photo: I Wish I Were the Camera's Eye

A straphanger is focused on his phone as he waits for a subway train in New York City

I wish I were the camera's eye. I would watch the world the way a film camera surveys its filmic world.

I would be a rare film, one that danced when it surveyed the world, but rarely seen, not distributed like a Hollywood classic.

I am a fan of the long take. Maybe it is because I admire the way some filmmakers are able to capture a moment for as long as it can last.

I'd be the eye on a Max Ophul's film-watching Madame wind a staircase. Or, I'd be the eye in Raiders of the Lost Ark, inventorying lost treasures.

I imagine the camera's eye is lonely and I'll admit I don't agree well with loneliness - who does? - but every once in a while I just want to zoom out and take on what the philosophers call "The God's Eye View."

I'd catch myself in a frame shot - kind of like what happens when I dream. I see myself in the corner of my eye. It's me. In my own dream.

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Location: Brooklyn, NY
Photo Credit: Greig Roselli

Boy Dancing on Mardi Gras in New Orleans: Street Scene

I went home for Mardi Gras. I recorded a boy dancing in the street before the parades started. 

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A post shared by Greig Roselli (@greigroselli)

Slow motion video of a boy dancing in the street before a Mardi Gras Parade on St. Charles Avenue in New Orleans, Louisiana. @mardigrasnola.
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#boy #igersneworleans #mardigras #slowmotionvideo🎥#protectthedeck #louisiana #photography #louisianalife#nolaevents #sashayaway #travel #neworleans #nola #music#premiumnonskid #charleston #fishthedifference via stonesoferasmus.com

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Canadian Geese Family in Philadelphia's Schuylkill River Park

Goose Mother and Her Babies, © 2016 Greig Roselli

I was walking along the banks of the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia and I came upon a goose mother and her yellow-haired babies.

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"Mug Shot Book" at the Philadelphia History Museum

#6774 Daniel Mason, Larceny

At the Philadelphia History Museum, you can view objects that reflect the city's history. Of all the objects on display, I found the "mug shot book" interesting. Dated from the 1900s, the book is an orderly visual compendium of criminals arrested in the city of brotherly love. For example, check out Daniel Mason (#6774), a well-dressed convicted thief (ca. the 1900s).

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Photograph: Spring Day in Philadelphia

"Around Panama Street, I Wouldn't Wonder."

A photograph in Philadelphia of decorative Crabapple trees that line the street with their purple petals.

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Photograph: "Somewhere in San Francisco in 2008"

San Francisco 2008 (Somewhere Along the Cable Car Line)

Taking a photograph from the San Francisco cable car, the streets look slanted. It's queer how in San Francisco you can stand up straight and still appear to be tilting sideways.

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