It's his fault. He got me all hopped up on rights and responsibilities. He got my synaptic gears moving, spinning out in wide circles around the clusterfuck known as HUMAN RIGHTS, so kindly direct your comments (appreciative or otherwise, using your carefully-selected words wisely) to him. Thank you.
In case your thinkbox has gone a little dusty on this particular matter (as had mine, don't worry, we're all friends here), according to that gang of dope smokin' hippies and their insane notion of a universal declaration of human rights [Adopted and proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly resolution 217 A (III) of 10 December 1948] we human-types should idealistically be able to count on a few, yanno, sorta basic givens.
Well get a load of this... Those krazy '40s era kids surmised that we as in everyone should have 30! Thirty is not a few. Thirty is 26 more than four; thirty is one more than 29. Thirty is quite a lot! If nothing else good happens in your life, they dreamily asserted while walking together buddy system style, we each can rest well knowing we each get full 9/10ths of the law possession of 30 you-can-count-on-its. That's the good news.
It goes slightly less well after this part.
Focus your looking balls on this: every now and again, and albeit usually in an admirably sneaky way, someone steals the cookie from the cookie jar. Sometimes the clever thief (and sometimes his cronies; good thieves need to have a solid support system, you know) tiptoes in and changes and rearranges the room so when it shows up on the pages of Highlights you initially won't be sure what's different between the first picture and the second one even if you have that niggling feeling that they're not the one single image, duplicated.
If you think civil liberties are merely words ~ fluff used as political nonactive ingredient filler for the Six O'clock Evening News when they can't find enough local tragedies to fill their 21 minute show well why don't you give a look-see? Check em out below. And don't think you aren't already missing the ones that have been erased with the bespittled corner of a napkin right off the whiteboard. It's just a little like that Highlights image: so close but not exactly the same.
Article 1. All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Article 2. Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.
Article 3. Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.
Article 4. No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.
Article 5. No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
Article 6. Everyone has the right to recognition everywhere as a person before the law.
Article 7. All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.
Article 8. Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.
Article 9. No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.
Article 10. Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.
Article 11. (1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence. (2) No one shall be held guilty of any penal offence on account of any act or omission which did not constitute a penal offence, under national or international law, at the time when it was committed. Nor shall a heavier penalty be imposed than the one that was applicable at the time the penal offence was committed.
Article 12. No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.
Article 13. (1) Everyone has the right to freedom of movement and residence within the borders of each state. (2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.
Article 14. (1) Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution. (2) This right may not be invoked in the case of prosecutions genuinely arising from non-political crimes or from acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
Article 15. (1) Everyone has the right to a nationality. (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.
Article 16. (1) Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution. (2) Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses. (3) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.
Article 17. (1) Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others. (2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.
Article 18. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.
Article 19. Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.
Article 20. (1) Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association. (2) No one may be compelled to belong to an association.
Article 21. (1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives. (2) Everyone has the right of equal access to public service in his country. (3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.
Article 22. Everyone, as a member of society, has the right to social security and is entitled to realization, through national effort and international co-operation and in accordance with the organization and resources of each State, of the economic, social and cultural rights indispensable for his dignity and the free development of his personality.
Article 23. (1) Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment. (2) Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work. (3) Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection. (4) Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.
Article 24. Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay.
Article 25. (1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control. (2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.
Article 26. (1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit. (2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. It shall promote understanding, tolerance and friendship among all nations, racial or religious groups, and shall further the activities of the United Nations for the maintenance of peace. (3) Parents have a prior right to choose the kind of education that shall be given to their children.
Article 27. (1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits. (2) Everyone has the right to the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which he is the author.
Article 28. Everyone is entitled to a social and international order in which the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration can be fully realized.
Article 29. (1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible. (2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society. (3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.
Article 30. Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein.
Standing in the laundry, naked as the autumn day is golden, pulling out clothes downy fresh and cuddling warm from their recently completed dryer cycle, pressing clean cotton against my goosebumpled belly and wondering while I shiver who else might be feeling this same sensation at this same moment.
done, made, or conducted without the knowledge of others: secret negotiations.
2.
kept from the knowledge of any but the initiated or privileged: a secret password.
3.
faithful or cautious in keeping confidential matters confidential; close-mouthed; reticent.
4.
designed or working to escape notice, knowledge, or observation: a secret drawer; the secret police.
5.
secluded, sheltered, or withdrawn: a secret hiding place.
6.
beyond ordinary human understanding; esoteric.
7.
(of information, a document, etc.)
a.
bearing the classification secret.
b.
limited to persons authorized to use information documents, etc., so classified.
–noun
8.
something that is or is kept secret, hidden, or concealed.
9.
a mystery: the secrets of nature.
10.
a reason or explanation not immediately or generally apparent.
11.
a method, formula, plan, etc., known only to the initiated or the few: the secret of happiness; a trade secret.
12.
a classification assigned to information, a document, etc., considered less vital to security than top-secret but more vital than confidential, and limiting its use to persons who have been cleared, as by various government agencies, as trustworthy to handle such material. Compare classification (def. 5).
13.
(initial capital letter)Liturgy. a variable prayer in the Roman and other Latin liturgies, said inaudibly by the celebrant after the offertory and immediately before the preface.
—Idiom
14.
in secret, unknown to others; in private; secretly: A resistance movement was already being organized in secret.
[Origin: 1350–1400; ME secrette < OF secret < L sēcrētus hidden, orig. ptp. of sēcernere to secern]
ref1: sharing. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1). Retrieved October 04, 2006, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/sharing.
ref2: secret. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.0.1). Retrieved October 04, 2006, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/secret.
May I introduce you to my newest crush-y crusader for mental health ... Liz Spikol. She's a U-Tube-er (don't hold it against her - you get to see her cool glasses!) and in this episode of her vblog she talks about the trouble with ECT.
If I was bobble jesus and my hands were pressed together in reverent prayer, I bet it'd be because I'd be praying hard for antacids.
And then I'd turn my little plastic head to my left and to my right, and then I would probably wonder where the heck my sneaky bobble disciples had snuck off to. Especially that Judas; I'm not sure I'm comfortable with that fella.
And then I'd try to find a piece of tiny paper and a pen so I could write myself a bobble note to remind myself later to do a full background search on these kind but slightly off guys who have devoted themselves to following me around.
When I was a very young girl, my maternal grandparents had a storybook which contained this story. I loved reading that particular one, loved looking at the images during my frequent pauses while I was still learning my way around the words. It wasn't unti many years later that I came to understand how folktales are culturally shaped, and I learned that my childhood version of The Three Little Pigs had English roots. A re-read today takes me many years back into my much larger, much smaller, everything really can be possible world where a very practical and forward-thinking pig can triumph.
There was an old sow with three little pigs, and as she had not enough to keep them, she sent them out to seek their fortune. The first that went off met a man with a bundle of straw, and said to him, "Please, man, give me that straw to build me a house." Which the man did, and the little pig built a house with it.
Presently came along a wolf, and knocked at the door, and said, "Little pig, little pig, let me come in."
To which the pig answered, "No, no, by the hair of my chiny chin chin."
The wolf then answered to that, "Then I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow your house in." So he huffed, and he puffed, and he blew his house in, and ate up the little pig.
The second little pig met a man with a bundle of furze [sticks], and said, "Please, man, give me that furze to build a house." Which the man did, and the pig built his house.
Then along came the wolf, and said, "Little pig, little pig, let me come in."
"No, no, by the hair of my chiny chin chin."
"Then I'll puff, and I'll huff, and I'll blow your house in." So he huffed, and he puffed, and he puffed, and he huffed, and at last he blew the house down, and he ate up the little pig.
The third little pig met a man with a load of bricks, and said, "Please, man, give me those bricks to build a house with." So the man gave him the bricks, and he built his house with them.
So the wolf came, as he did to the other little pigs, and said, "Little pig, little pig, let me come in."
"No, no, by the hair of my chiny chin chin."
"Then I'll huff, and I'll puff, and I'll blow your house in."
Well, he huffed, and he puffed, and he huffed and he puffed, and he puffed and huffed; but he could not get the house down. When he found that he could not, with all his huffing and puffing, blow the house down, he said, "Little pig, I know where there is a nice field of turnips."
"Where?" said the little pig.
"Oh, in Mr. Smith's home field, and if you will be ready tomorrow morning I will call for you, and we will go together and get some for dinner."
"Very well," said the little pig, "I will be ready. What time do you mean to go?"
"Oh, at six o'clock."
Well, the little pig got up at five, and got the turnips before the wolf came (which he did about six) and who said, "Little pig, are you ready?"
The little pig said, "Ready! I have been and come back again, and got a nice potful for dinner."
The wolf felt very angry at this, but thought that he would be up to the little pig somehow or other, so he said, "Little pig, I know where there is a nice apple tree."
"Where?" said the pig.
"Down at Merry Garden," replied the wolf, "and if you will not deceive me I will come for you, at five o'clock tomorrow and get some apples."
Well, the little pig bustled up the next morning at four o'clock, and went off for the apples, hoping to get back before the wolf came; but he had further to go, and had to climb the tree, so that just as he was coming down from it, he saw the wolf coming, which, as you may suppose, frightened him very much.
When the wolf came up he said, "Little pig, what! Are you here before me? Are they nice apples?"
"Yes, very," said the little pig. "I will throw you down one." And he threw it so far, that, while the wolf was gone to pick it up, the little pig jumped down and ran home.
The next day the wolf came again, and said to the little pig, "Little pig, there is a fair at Shanklin this afternoon. Will you go?"
"Oh yes," said the pig, "I will go. What time shall you be ready?"
"At three," said the wolf. So the little pig went off before the time as usual, and got to the fair, and bought a butter churn, which he was going home with, when he saw the wolf coming. Then he could not tell what to do. So he got into the churn to hide, and by so doing turned it around, and it rolled down the hill with the pig in it, which frightened the wolf so much, that he ran home without going to the fair. He went to the pig's house, and told him how frightened he had been by a great round thing which came down the hill past him.
Then the little pig said, "Ha, I frightened you, then. I had been to the fair and bought a butter churn, and when I saw you, I got into it, and rolled down the hill."
Then the wolf was very angry indeed, and declared he would eat up the little pig, and that he would get down the chimney after him. When the little pig saw what he was about, he hung on the pot full of water, and made up a blazing fire, and, just as the wolf was coming down, took off the cover, and in fell the wolf; so the little pig put on the cover again in an instant, boiled him up, and ate him for supper, and lived happily ever afterwards.
“Some authority on parenting once said, "Hold them very close and then let them go." This is the hardest truth for a father to learn: that his children are continuously growing up and moving away from him (until, of course, they move back in).” -- Bill Cosby
All because of a turn of phrase I heard on the radio I did a web search for the station’s call letters Leading to the radio station’s website Leading to a play list Of today’s spoken word line-up, Including the performance of Looking at Each Other by the author Which contained the articulation I had been searching for The words that had hit me squarely tickling the soft tingling places inside me As they rolled off the tongue of an older female speaker with a strong knowing voice ‘It is lovely to finally meet you Muriel’, I coo.
All because of Muriel Rukeyser I searched poetry collections, author’s guides, college library websites Needing to have her full text now Not later, no. Not in the future, but Now.
I searched my city’s library website, desperate and determined using all the search terms I could think of: woman, Muriel, lesbian, “yes our breasts looked at one another”, “spoken word poet performance”, “I’m desperate and shaking, can you just do this for me once without my help?”. I used the words that led me to a list of four published books and their call numbers in my city’s public library system, including which location, the X marking the spot, the treasure chest holding this poem.
Please, Muriel. I need you. I beg of you. Let me know you. Be my knowing, my known.
All because of a spoken word performance on the radio I placed shoes on my bare feet I drove eagerly toward she who knew me Toward she whom I knew Toward that which was home.
Because of a turn of phrase by Muriel Rukeyser I discovered the $97.73 in library fines on books reported as lost, charged against my library card no wonder my sister had stayed away kept her bibliophilic distance from that place for so long. Now I understand her excitement to be back though she must have forgotten these, my charges or she would not have shared her delight
Because of my wildly ambitious and covetously animalistic needing, I put 20 cents into the library’s photocopying machine with shaking hands please, Be My Valentine. I did not check to see that the poem printed correctly from both pages. I was afraid of being caught out afraid of being seen illicitly enraptured with a dead woman’s ghostly whisperings:
Yes, we were looking at each other Yes, we knew each other very well Yes, we had made love with each other many times … Yes, bread and flowers were on the table Yes, it was beginning in each Yes, the beating became very delicate
Yes yes yes Yes Yes
Because of finding what I hadn’t even known was missing I did not photocopy the last lines of Muriel’s poem Two, possibly four lines on page 474 Announcing the Fait de Complété and yet I do not need them To know.
In June an old friend of my younger brother was in town filming a movie and he asked if I'd be willing to shoot stills to document their process. Sure! Great experience for me and the opportunity to be a small part of something interesting. Today I'm tooting on my little bent up rusty horn because I am done. It took me far too long and there were all sorts of weirdnesses along the way, but I am SO DONE!
Watch for 'The Captain and Me' this fall, especially if you have Independent Film Festivals near you. Very very funny short b&w silent picture. I'm nearly positive you'll enjoy it.
If you happen to stop by while you're sipping coffee or while you're trying to burn through a few minutes between one activity and another (don't worry, I'm not hurt; I do the same thing myself) you might have some newly developed concerns that you may be losing your mind because you swear the look of this page seems to have changed a little since the last time you were here.
I can't professionally speak to the losing your mind part. Off the top of my head what I can say is this: all those 12-step programs say that the first step in tackling an issue is admitting you have the problem in the first place so, pal, you've either got no problem or you've already jockeyed along to step #2 without ever having even realized it. Way to go! You're well on your way to complete recovery!
The site changes, however, are real. I've switched my blogger account over to the new beta version of blogger despite -no, in the face of, yes! In the face of the fact that everything in me tells me that switching early on in such projects tends to bring a generous dose of frustration. I had been looking around for new/different templates the past few weeks anyway and the timing just happened to work in such a way that I'm willing to give Google a chance to prove they have whatever it takes to continue to make my blogging experience a contented one.
Total aside here, but doesn't it seem just the slightest bit incestuous, this relationship between Google and Blogger? Internet relationships are much like the stereotypical view of Southern U.S. backhills familial relationships, I guess. But just because "everybody knows they all breed together" doesn't mean that when you find out that your friend is one of "them" it isn't just the slightest littlest tiniest bit creepy. Even though it's just a stereotype.
In somewhat more subdued tones to two years ago's bazillionairessfest, this year's celebrating is expected to be somewhat less tawdry an affair with only ten cases of Kristal instead of the usual 50 ...
Three little wet girls try very hard to pay attention to the pretty lieutenant govenor lady up front as she talks in grownupspeak about big scary ugly things for which three little girls should not - as three little girls - have to concern themselves.
Helpful hint #G881w9bQW for computer users with a scrollwheel mouse: with one finger holding down the CTRL key on your keyboard, simultaneously roll the scrollwheel in whatever direction will make the web text on your screen easier on your peepers. You're welcome.
Finished. I’m finally finished.
I was hired to photograph a wedding earlier this summer, a wedding that seems to have taken place what seems like anywhere between four and seventeen years ago. At the time I accepted the request I hadn’t the first clue what chaos would break out beginning that very day.
It was the call from one of my sisters that started the ball rolling. Her manfriend who cannot hold his liquor had pushed beyond the pale this time, battering her and ripping his own home apart. It was time to get out permanently, for real, no going back. Time stopped for the following three days while we worked out where she and my niece would go to live temporarily, while she drove back to the place where their final argument began to try to recover her purse and cell phone (which she did eventually recover from between branches of a tree). During those three days I obtained boxes, newsprint paper and packing tape; we figured out during phone calls between five or six numbers when and where to rent a moving truck and how to pay for it, and between the two of us we divvied up the rooms of his house (for which there was a restraining order preventing him from entering) to hastily pack their material lives away in search of a safer refuge.
My sister made arrangements during those three days with our other family members; if nothing else she wanted to have her five year old looked lovingly after and help her life stay as close to normal as possible. Enlisting the help of our brother-in-law, we had her life packed into a seventeen foot U-Haul trailer and a Toyota Camry wagon. The stuff headed for storage in a garage; the loved ones headed for our sister and brother-in-law’s up north, and we moved all her plants and flowers into my garden. And it was during those three days when I began to understand a little more about myself and just how deeply I love my so beautiful so strong so frail siblings.
Well, yeah, so that was three days – where’d the rest of the summer go? There were sibs + family living with sibs + family, which inevitably leads to one sort of misunderstanding or another for which a good deal of time is spent listening, hearing, sharing. There was my own child who was working and socializing who, yet without his drivers license, needed the services of the momtaxi. And when my child got around to getting serious about getting his license that began a rash of activity that took on its own life (he got it). There was my partner being her pretty great self, trying to figure out how this weird collection of related people relate (well, and tick), attempting to be patient and trying to get more time alone with me than she probably preferred. There was my partner’s mother’s 10-day visit, which I ashamedly admit I skirted through as much as possible, but not because my someday mother-out-law is a beast, no! She’s a lovely woman! It was because there were ‘personal stuff’ things that had been bothering me but I hadn’t raised the issues with those whom I probably should have. I think it was because I distance myself in anger out of respect, some kind of warped exercise in self-discipline, and perhaps out of some fear of what I may say or do if I get within biting distance. At any rate, some of that time was spent frustrated by, or to, others.
Some of the time was spent trying to relax from being tense from worry for my family, worry for my personal relationships, and worry that my kid will never be responsible for himself. I found the best therapy with J&L – specifically, in their garden. J. is the gardener while L. is the appreciator of all-things-J.-grows and I hired on as Official Weed Puller. J&L live out in the country (as in soybean field in the backyard, looking out on a cornfield from the front yard country) and their lot is actually two house lots. They have gradually filled the empty half with fruit-bearing trees and vines: three or four different raspberries, blueberries, gooseberries (I think that’s what they are), kiwi, cherry, plum, apple. The front and side yards are filled with perennials and barrels for flowery annuals. They constructed raised beds (three very very long parallel beds, five triangles arranged in a pie shape and two rectangles for strawberries) in their backyard, into which, with the exception of the strawberry rectangles, go all the garden vegetables and herbs. There are MANY areas that required weeding.
When the conditions are perfect, when the soil is just moist enough, when the weed is healthy but not too healthy, when the sun is present but not beating me into a gelatinous puddle, when the wind is freeform dancing around me stopping every few seconds to pause and kiss me, when my head is not exploding but just nearly too full of noise and information – when all of those conditions exist and I get a good handhold on a weed beginning with my index finger, coiling my thumb around it softly, the rest of my fingers digesting the tall or leggy bits – and then I give the TUG and the entire mass of webby root system comes grudgingly from the ground with a rrrrripping. Oh, if that’s not ecstasy!
It was while in the garden with J. this summer when I lit upon the ugly explanation behind why I get such a thrill from weeding. Really, it’s not pretty so you might want to plug your ears if you don’t want to hear a potentially nasty secret about me. Fine. Don’t blame me if you can’t sleep tonight; it’s your nightmare.
While I have pulled my own hair hard enough to do it, I do not recall ever having pulled another person’s hair hard enough to tear any out by the roots. From my own experience (on my own head) I know the following:
It takes some strength to accomplish.
One must hold on tightly.
One must mean to rip hair out. There’s nothing accidental about it.
It hurts.
There is a ripping noise as the hair shaft is yanked from the scalp.
After considering various options I settled on the one that felt most accurate: I like weed pulling because of the force, the sound, and that analogous hair-ripping thing. I get to channel my energetic negativity into weed pulling. I can essentially rip people’s hair out without harming (ha, quite literally) one hair on anyone’s head and do it in a garden-responsible, socially sanctioned way. There you go. Happy now? Sleep well (with your head well covered under a babushka and two stocking caps. For good measure).
And when I wasn’t seeking refuge in the Garden of Violence I was attending concerts and weddings, making sorry attempts at decluttering my home, trying to maintain regular correspondence with friends near and far, trying to do the regular things one does in everyday life and doing a ‘hey, can you help us out?’ week-long photo shoot for a friend who was filming a movie in town. I produced well over 1500 shots from that gig in addition to the ~800 from the wedding. That’s a lot. And given that the film was shot during nighttimes only and the backyard wedding was held under a yellowish-white tent (and with two cameras) that meant a lot of digital images in need of work.
In addition to learning this summer that I have a penchant for indirect violence, I reinforced my suspicion that – not counting the times I’m manic – I cannot multitask. I can’t multitask and I can’t work with frequent interruptions. Man, I’ve got a lot to update on my resume. Given a four hour window of time after my son is dropped at work I’d take two or three phone calls, do the dishes, feed the cats, growl at the pile of laundry, smoke, work on two or three photos, grab a bite, take another call, take a pee break, work on another photo, put the laundry in the machine … and it was time to pick up the kid from work. I guess I need more time to focus and concentrate than I previously thought. I got little done that I really wanted to accomplish, not unlike taking a squirt gun to a house fire then wondering why the flames feel so hot and look so large.
My partner, bless her heart, tried to help me. In part because her reputation is important to her (she had taken some of the wedding photos and had been part of making the connection for the job) and in part because she just likes to help, she began asking how the photos were coming because the days were beginning to drag on yet I had nothing in absolutely completed form to give the bride and groom. I read her question as doubt in my ability and responded in a Garden of Violence way. She wanted to help but there really wasn’t a way she could without some knowledge of PS-CS2. My snarky suggestion was that she sit and watch if she wanted to help. Yeah, nice move McBrainiac. Then one day a magical fire got lit.
I don’t know why, I don’t know from where it came, I don’t have any way of explaining it but finally I put nearly everything but the photo work indefinitely on the back burner. I told my child that he would have to really work on asking me for rides more than ten minutes in advance of when he wanted one and I explained why. I told my friends about the fire so when they called to ask me over to play we were much more careful about talking about what kind of time I actually could afford to spend playing (or if I could). I bowed out of potential activities and cancelled some which had already been scheduled. I resisted many of my partner’s requests for time together (though I’m not sure if this choice was for the better yet), staying at my home instead of hers so as to have constant PS-CS2 access and digital file time. I significantly reduced the amount of time spent talking on the telephone with sibs too. Finally left with only myself, the monitor flicker and a coffee pot I started ripping through the digital images like nobody’s business. Even after sister and niece came to live with me for a couple of weeks (upon my insistence, after I learned that they’d spent a night at the manfriend’s home) I still miraculously managed to go go go. The five year old resented me for getting dibbs on the computer but as long as she was also given computer time to play games at Cbeebies, Cartoon Network, PBSkids, and NickJr., it was all good.
Having my sister living with us was a gift. It was the kind of gift that comes unexpectedly, all wrapped and boxed so you don’t know until you read the fine print that the new toy requires batteries which are available but not until tomorrow because who’s gonna pay $5.42 for a 2-pak of double-As at 11:20 at night? My niece, perhaps imbuing the tension in everyone else through the surface of her skin, misbehaved for her mother, who was smack dab in the middle of obtaining:
a job
permanent housing
borrowed funds to support herself for just a little while longer
another U-Haul
all things required to enroll the child in kindergarten within weeks, like
official copy of her birth certificate
appointment for and subsequent doctor visit
school supplies
clothing
after-school child care arrangements
their possessions back from two different locations
détente with the child’s immature and selfish father
My sister and I sat outside late at nights, smoking too much and talking smart. We laughed into breathlessness about things so inappropriate I will not mention them here. You’re already headed for a rough night with the hair pulling revelation, why push it further by knowing the terrible things two parents fantasize about doing to their own young? There’s some truth to that old chestnut ‘misery loves company’, there really is. I mean, if one misery at least has a sense of humor and identifies another misery with a funny bone it’s totally true. But if one misery is a dried-up apricot and the other is an orange left in the fruit bin too long? I don’t have much hope for either of them. We guffawed over the heiress life of my jobless homeless sister who, at one point, was buying the groceries for us because she had more cash than did I. After my niece got to know my neighbor’s three visiting granddaughters (who called her ‘that girl’ and whom were addressed as ‘the girls’… so much for those formal introductions we made) and had rolled her entire self in a mud puddle so the Mud Monster could be terrorizing the People of the Village, my sister and I pretreated and laundered niece’s dress three times before sis decided it had simply become a “play dress”. We jeered back at all the rotten dogs yapping at our heels.
My parents always moved one or several of us kids out of our beds when company came to visit during the years of my childhood. I did learn respect because of this choice, but I also felt an awful lot like my needs didn’t matter so much as the old people who smelled funny and who I didn’t know who were putting their funny smells and noises all over my stuff. So as a gesture of understanding and good will to my own child (who undoubtedly doesn’t even know to appreciate it) I give up my bed before I consider asking him to give his up. For the past few weeks this has meant that my sister and my niece have been sleeping in my bed and I’ve been collapsing in a heap on the couch in the living room each night. My sister would try to argue me into a swap almost every night but considering all the things I have been unable to give her, if there was one thing I did have to give her it was a soft comfy place to sleep and I wasn’t going to be swayed if it took stapling myself to the couch to ensure that exactly that would happen.
During each of the little battles my sister waged against each item on her ‘to do’ list I noticed that she started seeming more like herself, more like the old feisty sister I knew the years before she’d moved into the Barbie Country Dream House, quit her previous job and had begun relying on the iffy temperament and wallet of her ex. Yay, she’s coming back! She’s coming back!, I’d think to myself. She got the cooking job she’d sought – a good one, with benefits and everything. She found a townhouse apartment within blocks of her daughter’s new school and within a five minute drive of the new job. Last Friday my son, my brother, my sister, my niece and I U-Hauled their possessions into the new place, sister took niece to her first partial day of kindergarten. Meanwhile I drove the rental truck back to the lot with a full tank and a wish that none of us have to see the inside of another orange and white cab for a long time.
And the wedding photos are finished. The bride and groom have been generous and extremely laid-back, not audibly worried about ‘where are my pictures?!’ in the face of my rather rubbery and extended deadline. I figured the least I could do was to get 4x6 reprints for them of the finals so they have some small additional ‘thank you’ for their patience. I’m heading out to pick the prints up now and I’m very much looking forward to handing over my work.
... the goofy little brother type kids will play dress-up with their stuffed animals' clothes and the family pet.
(this, according to my 12 yr old neighbor kid Kimberly, who is overseeing her two younger brothers while dad is at work and mom is having her tonsils removed)
krɪt
