Month: April 2019

Little siblings

I never had little siblings, younger brothers or sisters… I was the baby of many, and by a bit.

My eldest sister would be mistaken as my mother whenever we would go out places… eleven and a half years difference can do that.

And so, I grew up learning loads of things not to do, loads of mistakes not to bother making, because at least one of my older siblings did that thing, made that mistake, and I learned the result long before I might have considered doing any of it myself.

Therefore, I’ve always struggled to understand what it could be like, having your younger sister in grammar school or still in high school… going to their terrible school performances or sports games… my siblings were all older by a good amount, so their performances and games were always awesome to me – in my child mind, they could have been pro compared to my own performances or games at the same time.

Tonight, I ran into two old classmates who were attending the art show of their little sister… and it reminded me that people actually do that, come back to the high school because of the younger sibling… I’d forgotten.

I’d thought people only really returned to visit for themselves, see old teachers and new buildings… that sort of thing… or to work there.

As I pondered how odd that idea feels, I suddenly recalled that I actually can relate a little bit.

You see, it’s almost like I have a borrowed younger sister.

My best friend lives in England, but her youngest sister lives in Houston, and she’s in high school right now.

Though I mostly am at the school for work purposes, I occasionally arrange my schedule around seeing her or spending time with her.

For the art show tonight, I had already planned to attend it, because it is always amazing.

However, I also knew that she would be performing in it, and so made sure to arrange accordingly to be there when she performed.

I always record her performance, and send it to her sister, who, naturally, is too far to make the trip for a short little performance every time.

So, in a way, I have a borrowed little sister: my best friend’s little sister.

It’s not exactly the same as her being my real sister, because I’d have attended loads more of her events and such…, but it has enough similarities for me to be able, ever so slightly, to relate to those who have younger siblings.

You know what I mean?

Post-a-day 2019

Wowzer

I started today with lots and lots and lots of tears… and a decent amount of snot, too….

And then, as though I had just ended a long-term dating relationship, I finished crying, cleaned myself up, and spent the day with my mom, my eyelids weary and, ever so slightly, burning…. every mirror glance made it look as though I had just been crying, though I hadn’t cried since hours earlier…

I felt a heavy weight had lifted away from me, one I had very much grown accustomed to being ‘normal’… and the ghost of a weight still lingers, as though my emotional and psychological muscles are gushing back to normal size, the blood finally flowing through much more freely again, oxygen reaching the muscles fully, at last… and a certain sense of nervousness at what is to come from this openness, this space that had been so large and so occupied (and heavy) for so long…

And I can feel how much my everybody wants this rest that tonight has to offer me in this big and cozy bed at my mom’s house… I cannot quite imagine what tomorrow will bring, but I can sense that there will be a sort of ‘other side’ I will reach, come morning…

Although, this dog that just began barking next door… could be a problem here… when the neighbors first got him, months ago, he barked all night long for days… and I slept almost not at all, until the dog went hoarse from the barking, and I couldn’t hear it anymore……… oh, goodie(!) – he’s stopped.

Anyway, I await happily the person I will be not only free but able to be tomorrow.

Thank you, God, for today.

It was terrifying.

And I think I’ve been working toward it for quite some time now…

So, it is nice to have it somewhat handled, at last.

Thank you. 🙂

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Photography

Well, today was crazy for photography for me!

First, it turns out that the owner of this awesome dance studio in town and I work out at the same gym… so, I actually met him a few weeks ago, but just didn’t know about the studio until this morning.

And the dance studio part came up, because we were talking about photography, since he’d brought his camera to class this morning, and was letting people look through them on the camera after class… I asked him about the lens, since I knew it took something expensive to get photos on that setting.

He asked if I was a photographer, and I told him that, as of last week, I sure am… and he asked about my background in photography, and then he told me about the photos he tends to do, and showed me some of them on his website.

They were awesome and fun and really neat portraits, and I totally loved and was inspired by them.

He said to get in touch, so I can come by his studio sometime, which is nearby… ‘Oh? What kind of studio is it?’… ‘I actually own a dance studio, and it’s in there.’… ‘Uh…, what dance studio?’…

I could hardly believe when he said the name of the studio – super excitement!

So now, it looks like I’ll have the chance to intern with him a bit on the photography he does, which will include getting to visit the studio and likely some spectacular dancers do their stuff for shoots from time to time!

At the social the gym had later on today, he and his wife and their baby were in attendance, and he introduced us, and brought up the idea of my doing some photography with them and working with them some, saying also that his wife does really wonderful photography, too, that is different from his own.

She, too, told me that we could do some shoots together, and even mentioned an upcoming one (but she verified that I was connected with her husband on Facebook, which I am, as of our conversation after the workout this morning, so that she would be able to get in touch with me so we could talk).

!!!!!!

Totally awesome and exciting, especially considering how I just recently started discussing how I’d like to go ahead and do some interning with a different style of photographer from the wedding photographer with whom I’ve interned this past year.

And now, it seems, I have that opportunity!

I knew the gym was the perfect place for me to be (Yes, I say that to myself every time it gets really hard in a workout and I feel like crying). 😛

So….(!) then I went to help out a photographer with some commercial work he’s doing for a sort of hotel in town.

At the end of that, which was a rather fun time, we were treated by the hotel liaison to almost-filthy-expensive dinners in their restaurant, at which point, the liaison recruits me to do some fun and creative photos of a few things for their social media…

… They don’t currently have money in the budget for photography for social media, so she was about to start looking for an art student or photo intern to do the photo…, but, since I was there with this photographer, she would love for me to take it on myself to take the photos.

(!)

And then she said that, while they can’t give money, since there’s no budget for it, they can do some trading with me… nights at the hotel, or meals at the restaurant, or something else like that.

(!!!)

And my photographer said for me to go for it, so I am!

I said that I’m doing it, and here I seem to be, actually doing it… and the world is lining up so that I can do it more and more.(!)

I’m just really excited about photography tonight… yay!

I don’t know what will come of this all, and that’s okay with me… the point is that I am incredibly grateful for its all having happened today, and for the experience of such enjoyment today. 🙂

Good day… good day… and so much else was really good about today, too… really good day today. 🙂

Post-a-day 2019

A lifestyle, I suppose

Last week, I was talking about how I am suddenly covered in scrapes and bruises…, and that I attribute their origination, though each specific one unknown, generally to CrossFit.

Tonight, my friend, which started with me a few weeks ago, messaged me and the showed me how she is much in the same boat:

I’m literally scuffed and bruised all over.. this is my life now

The coach, after class tonight, said to me, without his knowing about my friend’s message to me, that pain and struggle and small injury are all regular parts of doing these workouts – it’s a lifestyle, he said.

And so, I guess it is…

Tonight was hard… really hard…, and not entirely for physical effort.

The certain muscles that were being used intensely for one part of the workout really, really wiped me out mentally and emotionally – I was balling my eyes out ugly every time I found myself in the midst of that piece of the workout.

The pain and gain and bruises may be part of the lifestyle, but I am very much looking forward to having let go all that is left of this stuff that drags me down emotionally… I want to be wonderfully fit physically, and, in my case, that includes and requires I be wonderfully fit psychologically and emotionally, too.

All of these are parts of this lifestyle I am willing and wanting to follow… bruises and scrapes included (though I imagine they will come in lesser frequency the better I become at all of this stuff!). 😛

Post-a-day 2019

Photo boss

Okay, maybe “photo boss” is a bit much, but it sure sounds intense, and in the right kind of way… ;P

Anyway, so I did the senior portraits for someone the other week – remember that?

(Maybe not, but let’s continue as though you do.)

Using the money from that, I invested in a new lens I’d wanted for a while (which has a high likelihood of earning me menu for a certain kind of photography rather soon, consistently), and in a second memory card that will be extremely useful as I do more and more photo sessions, and in an external hard drive exclusively for photos (since they take up loads of space, now that I’m doing the RAW files and all).

And – possibly the best part – I still have a bit of the money to spare, even after buying myself a huge tank of gas for the truck (the vehicle a family friend has lent me, so that I can go longer distances reliably, instead of only short distances, and unreliable so).

Isn’t that great?

Oh(!).

Of course, the photos turned out totally awesome – I’m super proud!

So, yeah… I’m really happy about these steps I’m taking.

It really makes a difference to declare that I am doing this. 🙂

Post-a-day 2019

Mandatory yoga and rest

I’ve done my first day of mandatory abstainment from the gym and stretchy yoga instead… and everything still hurts.

The plan was today and Friday off and yoga-ed…, but are two days in a row better…, or even enough…?

So, now, I must determine if my bodily exhaustion is genuine overworking, or if it is a bit of laziness and/or fear regarding returning to the gym.

At the warm yoga class this afternoon, I struggled with just about anything that used muscles beyond merely standing straight upright… which was almost everything – my muscles were just so tired.

It has me wonder if I needn’t take tomorrow off, too… and possibly Friday, even, if they don’t improve much by tomorrow night…

I for sure am going Saturday – that encourages me.

But I’m also mentally tired, and kind of want to take a break, anyway… taking the next two days off still would have me at doing three classes in the week… my self-esteem struggles with this idea, of course, because 1)it wants me to do better (in this case more) than most other people, and 2)how will my body get awesome results if I don’t put awesome effort into the exercise program?

As my mother mentioned, there is rather the matter of wearing myself out, as well as managing enough protein for so much of this type of exercise… I really need to check how much protein is important to have each day with these – I could be severely under-nourished, despite my increase in protein intake recently… an extra ten grams doesn’t necessarily compensate for an hour of pain and gain, plus biking to get there and back.

I don’t know…

I guess I’ll just see how I awaken in the morning, and go from there.

Separately, but related, my bruises are all over and do look quite terrible at this point… perhaps that can be reason enough to take an extra day of pause from the workouts – I’ll only earn more of them, if I’m tired too soon in the workout. :/

Well, we’ll see mañana, I suppose.

Post-a-day 2019

Photography

I made an actual account and page tonight for my photography… someone asked me today, if I had an Instagram account for it, and so I made one…

I haven’t put any photos on it yet, but I did create it… and that’s already a big step for me. 😛

So, we’ll see how this goes, now, shall we?

The next step, I guess, is figuring out what photos to put on the account, and then to put them there already!

Sounds so easy…

Only slightly terrifying, of course…

Post-a-day 2019

Pity party

Some days, I think I’ve just got to go ahead and pity myself… not so much as a big deal or anything, saying how sad this and what a poor, poor dear I am…, but as a short and sweet, compact little pity party.

We talk about how part of facing our fears is being able first to name them… and I think my little spells of depression can relate much to that idea.

I always acknowledge that I feel I am sucking at life…, but I don’t ever really list it out, say it all out loud.

Tonight, I kind of did in a phone call to my mom… sure, she had some not-so-uplifting, but true things to say, and that didn’t help much in the moment, but it was a good reminder for now.

However, by stating all these things where I felt like I was totally sucking at life, it was like putting a name and face to my current sources of this panicky depressive state from this past week and weekend.

‘This sucks and this sucks, and I feel this way because of this, which totally sucks…., and I feel like a total crap woman because of this, and a total failure in this part of my life, because of this…, etc.’

And I cried a little as I said them, though not lots.

And, now, I feel significant improvement… almost good.

I think I was resisting feeling miserable, because I was ashamed of the circumstances in the first place, and disappointed in my being upset in the second…. and by declaring each upset, without getting all dramatic and angry or anything, by just stating what each piece was, I was able to being letting it all go, letting it all let go of me…

I didn’t tell everything to my mom, so not everything is freed, but everything I told her is mostly totally over for me now.

(There’s one final piece to my weekend stress, and I’m not quite ready to let it go, so I’ll reevaluate it in the morning, if I even still remember it, and I suspect things will go very well after that point.)

So, it seems to me* that this little miniature version of a pity party, in which I say out loud all of the sucky things going on for me in life at the moment, is actually a practical and beneficial means of letting it all go and moving forward with empowerment.

Who’da thunk that a pity party ever would be the answer to truly good things in life? 😛

Maybe that’s why we started them in the first place… we just tend to have a little (read ‘a lot of’) trouble with keeping our words simple and not intensely and immensely dramatic…

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*Dagny would be furious, I know! 😛

Missing Context Clues

“I don’t think it needs the liquid… I think it needs the skin smashed across it.”

“Then smash the skin across it… I’ll go get the tray…”

And, yet again, my mother and I are able to crack up at our own conversations… it happened many times today…, especially when we kept returning to the blueberry-dyed eggs that ended up looking, as I called them, like they were covered in dinosaur boogers… which, I suppose, is another story for another day.

For now, I leave you with little context, and instead give you our thoughts about a lack of context. ;P

You see, we regularly laugh at our own conversations, my mother and I, not necessarily because the conversation itself is funny – though it sometimes and sometimes often is – but because we consider how it would sound to a passer-by, someone hearing it out of context or without the visual guidance of what is currently in front of us… imagine a person standing on the other side of a doorway, hearing our conversation passively…, or someone on the other end of a phone, overhearing things, but seeing nothing…, and you can imagine how absurd that person must find what he or she hears from a great deal of our conversations.

Just the other day, we were discussing how ‘he wouldn’t necessarily look fat, because it depends on whose hand it is…’

Our topic of discussion is clear as day to just about everyone, right?

Oh, wait… it’s just clear for me. 😛

So, that’s what we do oftentimes with our conversations – we realize how crazy they could and likely would sound out of context… and then we laugh a bunch, because it is totally laugh-worthy. 😛

Post-a-day 2019

an open book

I shared a lot tonight.  It almost scares me, because it was open honesty about something that has never been open to the public, something about which I had been for so long ashamed… yet part of me, now, wants to go ahead and share it openly, not anonymously, with the world.  I am not yet ready for that – I don’t know that I want the people who know me to see me so differently as they necessarily would by learning about it all.  No matter how much I can see that it all was not my fault, it doesn’t change the fact that I am still embarrassed at being, I guess one could say, duped.

You know what I mean?  I could have done so much better, despite the odds’ being so much against me… I just didn’t.

And something about that still feels a bit disappointing, though I do not blame myself, anymore.

Post-a-day 2019