Your task: Think --> Respond

Think of three photos you would like to see me try to capture.
Tell me your ideas.

Then. And then. then.

Watch and wait.

Sheriff, Judge and Jury

The judge adjusted her pigtails while the jury remains hopelessly deadlocked between the bustier and the chainsaw accessorization.

Tonight's bla-- uhm, credit goes directly to Bakerina in gladness for these past 20 minutes during which I have not accomplished the anticipated evening dish-doing or paper shredding. Nothing else happened either, which could be either a cosmic coincidence or (more likely) a testament to the power of mindfully ignoring what can be put off when one cannot bear to figure out what is supposed to come next.

My alter-ego image shall appear in the coming days, unless someone permits the jury to call it hung and they all disburse for lunch. Then? Alter-ego better run like a scaredy cat cuz that thar is the sound of trouble a'brewin.

Sunday, Bloody Sunday

McBeth.

With my faulty gynocological system it is never clear what is going to happen or when it is going to happen. My family herstory has left all my female siblings (and perhaps some of the long-dead women too) with a colorful variety of 'IT'S NOT WORKING' symptoms, growths and scares.

After three weeks of waiting and wondering, the gears started up. Like a lumbering behemoth just woke from a dead sleep the system attempts to reestablish itself, taking me along for the ride.

Yesterday I bled through handfuls of tampons, sanitary pads, two sets of underwear and two pairs of pants. Before bedtime I resignedly cleaned up the last surprise attack. Left my shirt on and stepped into the shower ~ essentially to hose down my lower half with the hope that I could be clean and dry for a few sleeping hours. Ha! I woke to another bloody mess ... sheets, pjs, underwear ... right though everything, again.

This amazing capability, this natural world gift I've been given to grow and bear children is, hmm, how to say it... it's overkill. Really. It has served me well and it's been greatly appreciated but right now I wouldn't mind having also been given a switch to flip at the time I was done bearing my live young to turn the bloodworks off at will.

It was because I was curious about exactly what shedule my body thinks it should be on that I went through old calendars and archives, searching for the few, the proud, the actual cycles.

Lesse... In 2000 there was January (noted as 'overdue'), November (the last week), December (started the first week, just having finished the Nov. cycle).

I haven't found complete 2001 information so those details remain sketchy, but onward and upward to 2002: June (I bled for a full month), July (my notes indicated PMS symptoms but no flow). That's about it for that year.

Then 2003 rolled around: February, May, June (at the time I made a note I'd been bleeding for three weeks), September (noted as a superflow making it impossible to leave the house). Aah, what a year.

And then we rang in New Year's Day 2004: January (emotionally whacked, no bleeding at the time I made notes), July, and here we are in October (yep, definitely another gusher).

Next step is to take this information I've gathered, go back to the doc (again), explain that I want thus-and-so tests run, see what happens.

My body is not unlike my vehicle - if I'm hearing a rattle or hum when I'm driving my car I have the full attention of my mechanic when I drive Scarletta up onto the lift and say 'it's not working'. I think I should be able to get the same service on my body from the body fix-it folks.

Can't bring myself to make that appointment just yet. Maybe after waking up and checking to see if I have a renewed source of income transferred to my bank account. Maybe then.

It's not so black and white

McBeth.

Last year I began noticing significant changes in my skin, the texture and sensitivity of my casing, and the obvious wrinkles that seem to be so comfortably settling in whereever they feel like settling in.

This past year I have been attitudinally strident about permitting gravity and age to claim me. I can't wrap my head around these subtle alterations in what I have always assumed was me. It is upsetting. It is me - I am me - changing before my own eyes but the action is not of me, it is all about me.

I will be 39 next month and, while I have never been partial to Big Year Markers (puhleeze, got better things to do with my idleness like .. um, well like OTHER stuff), this one is not going to slip by unnoticed, not by me.