Sad and Beautiful World (Original Blog 2004-2008)

"...someday I'll make it mine"

It’s almost 1am and I got 5 hours of sleep last night. I had to finish up some freelance work that of course I put off really working on until Sunday night.

I just couldn’t leave that last post up another day as the main entry. It’s a bit heavy, I guess. I enjoyed the comments a lot, though. I was surprised at how much people wanted to say; about what it brought up in each of you.

The reason I got only 5 hours of sleep last night is because Pete and I were binging out on the 4^th season of Six Feet Under and then were joking and laughing, among other things, until 4am. Then Cecily phoned at 9am to ask me to meet her in the ER near her house to help out with the baby while Charlie had tests done. Thankfully, they were able to rule out the really bad things they were worried about, but of course still left him with a “we don’t really know what the problem was.” He’s going to his primary doc tomorrow and the kiddo and I will go watch Tori while he is there.

So I joined this Flickr group called 365 Days—everyone is doing it, yo—and I’m fascinated with it already. I resisted joining at first because it was such a commitment to make: taking a self-portrait every day for a year. I’ve only done three days so far, and I am already enthralled. I love looking at how others choose to show themselves and the creative ways in which they make it interesting.

The most meat of the fascination is this: Why do we hate seeing images of ourselves so much? How do we change that?

Part of what is disturbing—or maybe just unsettling—is that we go through life almost exclusively looking at our faces in mirrors. We see the reverse of what everyone else sees. When we look at a photograph of ourselves (unless taken in a mirror, of course) we see what everyone else sees, and it is startling. It is very much like hearing one’s own voice on an answering machine. Don’t you cringe when you hear it, thinking “Is that what I sound like?” We all do! Just like we all make negative comments about photos of ourselves—and while women are often more ‘vocal’ about it, I think that inner voice of criticism is in all of us.

In thinking about the idea of 365 days, I have been thinking about getting used to seeing myself, about learning to see me as others might, and loving what I see. And by ‘loving’ I don’t mean to imply total narcissism. I do mean to imply acceptance. But mostly? Love.

Want to join me?

Pathetic Attempts

I hate my camera. I shouldn't say that, because it is not my camera but rather, my father's 'compact' camera. His older camera. I am allowed to use it, and I am grateful. It just doesn't do what I want a camera to do, and until I have money to burn and can get the camera I want, I am entirely sincere when I say 'it's not me, it's the camera'.

Part of my problem is I wait until 9:30pm the night before to begin thinking about the theme. Old habits of procrastination die hard, let me tell you.

Here are two tries at this week's Self Portrait Day theme, "Strange Reflection (not in a mirror)"--and go visit SPD, because now they change the pictures every day--6 new faces each day to go visit and explore!

Attempt 1: In a ladle, unfocused

Attempt 2: In the television screen

Why is everything so reddish? Why can you not see me very well? Why can't I write a post about anything interesting lately?

I plan on working on that last one tomorrow.

Draw Your Own SPD

Morning! I've skipped the past several Self Portrait Days (there's a few folks who think up variations on the them since the original SPD launched by Mihow).

Last night I found out it was "Draw Your Own." I did not have time last night (I found out kinda late) to sit and draw, so this morning I have created a masterpiece in Paint on my computer. So this was done with my mouse as the tool, people. Be impressed. I did it in about 20 minutes.

Go check out the new batch of folks at Self Portrait Day and send a note to Michelle and Toby to let them know how cool it is.

SPD funky duds?

Okay, so I'm perpetually out of the loop. But I saw today on Amanda's site that the theme for this week's Self Portrait is "Funky Duds." While I did not have time to prepare, I did already have a picture I thought could work:

SPD/Does this remind you of porn?

So tonight I found out that the Self Portrait Day THEME is “at work” (and this is really for those of us who either were on the SPD site or are waiting to be on it and just want to play every Thursday on variations of it cause it’s FUN. You can join in too). Since I found out so late (but thank you Amanda B!), I am no longer at work. Plus I didn’t have a camera at work anyway! But I am a creative person, and because all I really do is sit at a desk looking at photographs and clicking on my mouse and reading blogs, and because I am so miserable at said job these days, I have recreated some images that might be commonly seen while watching me work. This is a reenactment! I also went to visit a possible wedding photographer, though it was one of these big studio companies, so I had my doubts. You can read more about this below my lovely photos...click to enlarge!   

Monkey Kills, Monkey Suicidal, Monkey Cries.

The photographer was not a photographer...it was pretty much what I expected in some ways, and not in others. This is a major business, this place, and they have these tiny satellite offices all over the area. This guy was set up in a small room off the lobby of the Holiday Inn nearby. Of course, Cecily accompanied me.

The guy was trained to sell a certain way, and it may be effective with some people, but not so much with Cec and me. This guy would not waver from his script, and it was annoying! Even with the amount of comments we were making, he would smile, but stick to the script every single time. Even when Cecily asked me if the diffused 'glow' effect on one portrait reminded me of porn.

He did this thing where he was trying to show us 'worst case' scenarios that could happen if we used a 'regular' photographer and then explain how they had back up plans for these situations. But he got 'in character' as the anonymous photographer by first asking us what would we do if our lame photographer we got from some other place called 15 minutes before he was due saying, "I'm stuck on the highway, there's an overturned tractor-trailer. I don’t know when I'll get there!”

Cec gave an answer, and the guy kept talking like this imaginary photographer. He wanted to finish the role-play. We GET IT, dimwit, can you stop now?? No! He kept at it. He had a fucking script to follow.

Truthfully, he was a nice enough guy, but I had to tell him "I'll think about it" and get the heck out of there. We got to see some hilarious photos of some weddings circa 1982, however, and had fun commenting on everyone's clothes, expressions, etc., because we can be that cruel. We need a photographer I can first of all actually MEET IN PERSON, and secondly, one who has some character.