Today I took my 731st photo; for those of you paying attention that means I've now taken a photo every day for the past two years. As far as I can remember that's the longest I've ever truly committed to anything in my life, even my high school education; it's a great accomplishment for myself, and hopefully will get my parents to stop saying I never finish what I start.

I'd like to take some time, though, and share with you the enjoyable and difficult aspects of participating in a project this involving.

When I started this site back in April of 2007 I did it for a few reasons; for one I wanted to start using my camera more, especially outside of the "Auto" settings (it should be noted I still shoot in "Auto" ninety-percent of the time, but I'm terribly difficult to motivate). The other reason, which ironically was last on my original list of reasons but is the one that has kept me going strong, is the desire to document my life in a way that writing in a diary never could.

Have you ever read someone's diary, or I guess I should say "blog" and "LiveJournal" these days, and really tried to figure out what they're all about? It's practically impossible; you end up scrolling through the first pages at a slow rate, taking in every word and genuinely attempting to understand their perspective on life. By page three or four, though, you've started skimming for keywords, or maybe even just browsing until you see an image.

You see, that old cliche about a photo being worth a thousand words is entirely true. I never believed it before and figured it was just a saying like any other, but now I understand it. When I look back at my photos I can honestly tell you everything you want to know about that moment in time, and sometimes even the entire day. Don't believe me? Well that's fine, but for the fun of it all I just asked a close friend of mine to pick a random date between today and my first post. He chose May 4th, 2007.

On that day exactly two years and two days ago I was living with my parents back in Florida. My friend Mollie and I had gone out shopping to find her a dress that she was going to wear to our mutual friend Lauren's wedding (coincidentally Lauren is the person who started this project with me the month before). After three days of looking we found this gorgeous red dress and decided it was too beautiful to not use in a photoshoot; we hooked up some lights, put a table cloth on the wall of the garage, and shot for an hour. It was incredibly warm as Florida usually is, hovering around the mid-80s, and after being cooped up in the garage we opened the door for a quick smoke break.

How do I remember all of that? By looking at one single photo from that moment.

It's so incredible to be able to feel the breeze or hear the sounds of a day that occurred so far in the past; it's even more amazing looking at an entire year and browsing through the moments that make up a life. That's not to say it's been an easy ride though.

I can't even begin to describe how many times I've either entirely forgotten to take a photo or failed to capture the moment that really, truly defined my day. There's nothing more frustrating, and nothing more that kills your motivation, than to have an incredible experience and realize just moments afterwards that you didn't take a single photo of the event. It's heartbreaking, even. For me I tend to get into a slump for the next few days after something like that occurs; sometimes it lasts even longer, determined by the time it takes to snap a picture of another incredible experience.

Embarking on a project that requires action every single day will always have its up and downs; the times you get a photo of you and the love of your life in front of a setting sun will make you cherish the project, but an entire week of pictures taken in your office will surely get you down. The trick in those moments of blandness and lack of variety is to go back through your history and look at other photos; look at them and realize that one single photo brings you back in time.

You might not realize it this very moment, but today doesn't have to be lost.