Tuesday, October 8, 2013

"I See Nothing as Promising as the View from a Ferris Wheel"

~ E.B. White

My last name used to be Mueller, which we pronounced Muller but everyone else on the planet mispronounced as Mew-ler or Miller. I looked forward to taking Tom's last name when we got married because as much as I loved my parents and extended Mueller family, I'd grown sick and tired of spelling and correcting people's pronunciation of my last name.

Turns out no one can spell Ferris either, even when I say, "Ferris, like the wheel".

Speaking of Ferris Wheels, yes, Tom (and therefore Will and Hallie as well) are distantly related to George Ferris, the inventor of the Ferris Wheel. George didn't have children of his own, but his siblings did and Tom is George's great, great, great, great, great nephew. Being related to the inventor of the Ferris Wheel is a great claim to fame, but I'll tell you what, the connection does us absolutely no good at amusement parks...we've never gotten on a Ferris Wheel for free.

My love for and fascination with Ferris Wheels began long before I met Tom and joined the Ferris family, and changing my last name 10 years ago gave me the only excuse I needed to start collecting and decorating my home with Ferris Wheel photos and prints and three-dimensional Ferris Wheels.

Most of the Ferris Wheel art throughout our house was shot, drawn, painted, or created by professionals, and as an embryonic photographer, I continue my quest to take a Ferris Wheel photo that could find a home (and not look out of place) in my collection. Last month's county fair provided me with a perfect opportunity to capture a few Ferris Wheel shots, and while none of these meet my criteria for framing, they're still a lovely connection to my Ferris family.


Interesting, Tom barely notices the 10 or so Ferris Wheels that grace our walls and sit on our shelves, and I know this to also be the case with one of Tom's Ferris cousins, who barely notices as his wife obsesses over and decorates with Ferris Wheels just as I do. They just don't appreciate their connection to George...

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