I may not be a NaNoWriMo kind of girl, but I think I can be a NaBloPoMo kind of girl. Wish me luck. I’m scared.

Anyone else willing to take the challenge?

To say that I had a rough weekend would be an understatement.

Ugh. I have no idea where this all came from. It’s so weird, I’ll be going along doing just fine, feeling good, life is happy… and then blammo! I blink and suddenly I feel like crap. I almost deleted that post I wrote late Saturday night because it was just too out there. That was me at my most vulnerable and insecure, and I winced when I read it again today. I left it up because, unfortunately, I do have those thoughts and feelings more than I would like to admit. It’s a part of me right now, and it sucks.

My photo for the third week of SPC’s “imperfection” series ties in really well with my last post. It’s me, looking in the mirror, feeling hopeless. Disliking the face I see looking back at me. Disliking the person who lives underneath the skin. Feeling broody and dark and unhappy. Not every day is like this, not even most. But when those days do come, they just knock me out. I don’t want to have those days anymore. There’s some imperfection for you.

More self portraits here.

Not doing so well tonight.

The other day, I was trying to explain to my friend the reason I enjoy photography. I said that looking at life through the viewfinder of my camera enables me to see the world in a different way. I suppose that when life gets too overwhelming, too frightening, too difficult, too muddy, I can always find something beautiful with my camera that makes everything seem worth it. I can’t ever seem to clean my toilets on a regular basis and my kids won’t stop yelling, but look at the way that ladybug is perched so gently on the tip of the blade of grass. It is so perfect in it’s beautiful simplicity, and it centers me.

I also told him that I use photography to show other people the way that I see the world. I can really relate to the things Misha wrote about beauty in her last post. She said, “I am so good at loving people. Trust me. No one person can walk by me slow without me immediately seeing something beautiful in them.” I feel like I know how to do that, as well. I tried to express that in this post awhile back, but I think I came off less eloquent than Misha, and more “obsessive/stalker” like. What I was trying to say then, is that I notice things. And the things that I notice are sometimes obscure, sometimes strange, but I find beauty in them. And I want to share that. So I try to photograph it. And tonight I realized that capturing a picture of something beautiful comforts me. Because it makes me feel like I can’t be all that messed up if I can create something as beautiful as this.

Unfortunately, I just realized that Van Gogh created some of the most beautiful art out there, and then he went on to cut off his ear.

Crap.

ANYWAY, what I am trying to say here is that through photography (and writing and painting and other random things I create) I search for beauty in the world that I feel a lack of within myself. I see it everywhere but in me. I spent an entire therapy session last week bawling about the horrible things I say to myself when I look in the mirror. I am so tired of it all. I am so tired of feeling ugly and worthless and undesirable. Tired of feeling less-than and clumsy and awkward. I don’t know how to fix this. I don’t know if I’m going to publish this post. I just had to get it out.

Ok, let’s lighten things up a bit, shall we? Have a look at this!

Aww! So cute! This will also lift your spirits:

Aren’t rainbows beautiful? And here, have a little of this:

Yummy! Oooh, have a little of this:

That’s what I’m talking about, baby. There! Aren’t we all feeling much better now?

Seriously though, posting those poems was an intensely healing experience, and I thank you for humoring me. Knowing that I have this place to process all my junk is a great comfort. I am so grateful for all of you wonderful people who care enough to read all the crap I spew out. Thank you all.

Blue Skies

The skies are gray
And the rain falls in sync
With my teardrops.
The clouds imitate my heart
And their sorrow drips through the cracks,
Raining down on my life.
Bending from the weight of despair,
Flowers bow their heads and
Let their petals fall,
As my dreams have already fallen.
I watch my hopes wash away
In the flow of sadness, and
I think about the way things would have been.
SHOULD have been.
Where are my blue skies?

(What is all this?)