57/365 Pool Party!

57/365 Pool Party!, a photo by Darcy89 on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
Lol, it is terrible that the one part of o-week I have been looking forward to most has been the pool party. And it did not dissapoint :) I secured my blow up dohnut and floated the afternoon away hehehe…

In other o-week news, I joined so many uni groups that I can't recall them all exactly and will have to sort through the pile of paperwork I have to remember. All part of my new plan to be social! (Which is already becoming a little daunting, all I wanted to do today was curl up with a good book, but I persisted!!!)

Lets see… what else do I remember? Hmmm, photography club - check!… No idea what they do as of yet but I'm in. I believe there was Greek society, which I joined upon the basis of their free food at parties (say what you want about the Greeks but you won't find me passing up their food). There was a mechanical bull (I beat a few guys but was told later in the day that its cheating of you pole dance... unfair afvantage or something) and a JUMPING CASTLE!!! (PS how DO kids manage to jump on those things for hours??? 5 minutes and I needed a time out)

I may or may not have I got caught up in a debate with a leader in the on campus socialist group… not that I had a clue what I was saying but to be fair he wasn't making his point very well either… I believe I may recall telling him something along the lines of "For your future reference you really need to work on your recruiting spiel, because if I didn't already half believe in some of the things you were saying here you would have just completely alienated me and you're not really fulfilling your goal if all you ever do is preach to the choir"… oops… was that a bit harsh? He was just SO fundamentalist, so idealistic and had no concept of the complexities involved in his utopian proposal…. anyway, I could rant for hours about what he said (not that I agree or disagree on all accounts I just wish he had put more thought into his views rather than spitting what seemed to be other peoples gospel right back at me)… but I should really just leave it there. I bought their $4 magazine, I'll read it and weigh up the effort required to go back for round two later.

On a happier note there was a quidditch game by the lake… lol :D and… (oh god I cannot believe I am going to admit this…) I kind-of, sort-of might have… put my name down for competitive cheerleading tryouts.

*cough cough* What?! I thought it would be fun to get back into the acrobatic side of things (and OKAY, maybe I thought the uniform was cute)… but alas, I read the info they emailed and the time commitment is unfortunately out of my league. Will have to find another way to achieve the same result. *ehem… :S*

As I said, there was more but it was a long day and the details got lost after I finally got to class.

Here's to seeing what happens for the rest of the week. ;-)

Much love,
D.

56/365… not so pretty feet

56/365… not so pretty feet, a photo by Darcy89 on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
This is what happens when you go to work in ridiculous shoes forgetting that you have uni classes in the evening and will thereofre be walking k's all over campus… oops.

55/365 Headshot

55/365 Headshot, a photo by Darcy89 on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
Today was a long day, and it was only at the end of it that I remembered
a) SHIT! I haven't taken a photo yet and
b) CRAP! I forgot to charge the dead batteries… ie we are running on vapours here people

Nevertheless I kind of like the simplicity of this shot and am glad I took it for whatever it is. And in the end I had just enough battery power left over to take a few beautiful shots of mum for her blogging :D Job well done if I do say so myself :-P

P.S. A friend has recently told me that I have become quite adept at subtly (or not so subtly) giving myself compliments in public forums… LOL! What do you think?

54/365 Raining on the roof

54/365 Raining on the roof, a photo by Darcy89 on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
Eek! Getting so behind on my photo posting :S… okay so three days isn't so bad in the scheme of things but its a bad habit to be getting into especially for someone like me who has a tendency to get overwhelmed at the thought of a project if it is left idle for too long…

Today was muggy and hot! and then it rained and became even more so. But when it rained so long I just wanted to get out there and so here you have me enjoying the rain post climbing over the balcony and jumping the small gap to reach the porch roof :D

Forgot to change the white balance but then decided I actually liked the blue tones. In the evening it was my best friends birthday dinner and afterwards spontaneous kareoke, which if you knew her you'd know must have meant a ridicuolous amount of peer pressure… this girl DOES NOT sing in public, but what else were we to do when we were told we werent allowed to spontaneously play lazer tag because we were in heels??? The followed the worst rain I have ever had the disfortune to drive through… yup I was THAT person on the road driving at 40km/h in an 80 zone (that I would usually drive 90 through)… in my defence the roads drain so badly and the rain was falling so quicklet that it was impossible to tell where the puddles (oceans) were on the road… very treacherous.

Anywho, thats my little diary entry for the day :)

53/365 Freaky hands

53/365 Freaky hands, a photo by Darcy89 on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
A result of my boredom/fidgeting/doodlings during an "Introduction to University" lecture I mistakenly attended yesterday… in hindsight it probably would have benefited all (myself included) if I had gracefullt excused myself :-S… anywho we live and learn. Doodlings courtesy of the liquid eyeliner I discovered in my bag (don't ak how it got there because I have no idea either) and a pink felt tipped pen. Then of course once my artwork was complete I had to make a record of it :) Reminds me that I wanted to get some henna work done for some "one day in the future" planned photos… Should really get around to that.

52/365 Pensive window thing

52/365 Pensive window thing, a photo by Darcy89 on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
Have been rather unmotivated this week… not assisted by the fact I cannot find my remote anywhere and so am playing around with the self timer… and I thought focusing with the remote was frustrating… :S

51/365 Lazy

51/365 Lazy, a photo by Darcy89 on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
Okay so we are going to get back to "real" photos soon. That after all was the whole point of this project in the first place… I just felt so tired today that chilling on the couch and reading (read napping) just seemed like a much more appealing option!

Back to work tomorrow!… hopefully… :)

Much Love,
D.

P.S. Sorry guys, I have been forgetting to post to the blog so we will have a bit of a backlog clean out tonight...

50/365 What just happened?

Something happened today and it honestly left me quite baffled so I figured I would tell you a story and then you can tell me what you think.

It is the end of my work day and I am walking the 300 or so meters from my workplace to my car to drive home, I am wearing the pink playsuit you see in todays picture with a pair of flat shoes so it is relatively casual but appropriate for the work I was doing today. In front of me about 10 meters away is a woman of between 50-60 years walking in my direction. I do not know this woman, have never walked past her on this little journey of mine before and there is no reason for us to treat each other any different to any other pair of strangers who pass each other on the same footpath. I look up, we make eye contact, I smile as I am want to do and she doesn't respond. She sticks to her side of the footpath and I to mine and so I assume that we will just pass each other with no further communication occurring. Then, in that fraction of a second when two people who are walking in opposite directions actually pass each other she pipes up glances pointedly at my thigh and in a tone I can only describe as disgust says:

"Well. Thats a substantial bruise"

And continues walking! I am sorry, look, I know that I am currently in possession of a pretty impressive bruise on my right thigh (see this picture for evidence although it is substantially less visible now) but I just do not know what would possess someone to say something like that. I do not know what the purpose was. I was flabbergasted and embarrassed not least of all because  A) I hadn't noticed that my bruise was on display today and B) I fail to see why my bruise would be any of her business.

The only method I can think to accurately describe the way I felt in that moment is the feeling of shock, guilt, shame or self-consciousness one feels when you're a woman, minding your own business and you walk past some random guy who feels the need to shout "nice rack" or something of the like when you have just reached the point where you have your back turned to them. Only this was so much worse! I can deal with boys and men being dickheads. When a guy does this it has nothing to do with expressing an appreciation for the aesthetics walking by and everything to do with control and asserting their authority and ownership of everything in their physical area. A sort of animalistic territory claim if you will, that is designed to make the other party feel small, self conscious and weak. As this kind of behaviour has been an unfortunate component of my reality ever since puberty I have come to expect it, I know it has nothing to do with me and everything to do with them, their own insecurities and impulse control issues and so have developed defences that protect me from their effects and, if I feel the need, an arsenal of one liners to throw back in my own attack.

But this… I have no protection for this.

For arguments sake let us play a little game and list the possible reasons I might have for being in possession of a giant bruise on my inner thigh and then consider the various responses one might have expected me to have to this woman's comments were they the case…

1) I am a pole dancer and have been learning a new move and so as usually happens have developed bruising in the areas of my skin that are not used to such exertions.
Okay so this one might be true, maybe through some psychic ability she knew I got my bruises from pole dancing and this was her attempt at vocalising her disapproval and making me feel small. Well goal achieved! But let us try something more realistic shall we?

2) I fell really hard and landed in an exceptionally awkward position and this resulted in bruising.

3) I am in some kind of abusive relationship and this is the latest in a string of many physical manifestations of this abuse

4) I have leukaemia and my bone marrow is no longer producing enough platelets and so I am bleeding into my skin

5) I am interested in some form of BDSM and had an exceptionally orgasmic scene on the weekend that left me with bruising all down my inner thigh.

Just in case I have missed something, can someone PLEASE tell me in which one of these situations would this woman's demeaning sneer in reference to my bruising without engaging in further conversation but just walking away have produced any outcome other than the self-conscious disempowerment I mentioned above? Under what circumstances could this comment have been productive?

I like to think the best of people and so I spent the entire car trip home trying to determine a possible positive motivation for her comment and subsequent actions but I have since discovered that I am not capable of doing so. Which leads me to think that her purpose must have been to belittle or demean me and then my next question is WHY?! What possible benefit would she get from doing such a thing to a complete and total stranger? Did she want to start a fight? Was she having a bad day and wanted to drag someone else down with her? Did she just forget to put on her social courtesies filter today and so was vocalising any random thought that came into her mouth?

Anyway, I get home after all this and find myself with a great feeling of unease. I just can't relax, I can't sit within myself and feel calm and although nothing is really happening physically I feel out of control and am aware of this sense of extreme disconnect between my 'being' and my body (this brings back faint memories of a discussion about the mind-body cartesian split but more on that another day). As a general rule I tend to be quite centred within myself, my body and my senses and so I find this feeling of disconnect to be rather distressing. I need to do something to centre myself, I need to reassert my sense of ownership and control over my body and I guess this is where today's photo comes in.

Whenever I am feeling uncentered or disconnected in this manner I find that the best way to reconnect with myself is to get out and do something physically demanding. Now due to its association with todays incident I didn't feel like pole dancing would help and as it was quite warm today, the sun was strong and I didn't want to get burnt, a run wasn't high on my agenda either. I seriously considerhed jumping up and down on my bed while playing music really loudly but made the unfortunate mistake of telling mother about this idea before it was immediately shut down. So barani's (no handed cartwheels) it was! It has been oh about 5 years since I last attempted a barani however after about 15 minutes and a few stacked landings on the grass I got the hang of it back ;-) and then because I am technically allergic to grass and my skin was all itchy and red, a strip and a quick swim ensued and then all was right with the world :-).

Anyway, thats all for today.
Much love,
D.

49/365 Back to school...

Honestly this photo just seemed appropriate today, although I am currently wishing I had taken more time setting up the focus :( But alas I was more than half asleep at this hour of the morning so oops!

Today was my official enrolment day at uni. That means that I had to take all the prep work I have done so far, turn up to campus and pitch my plan to an academic advisor who would then… give me academic advice. It was also my first opportunity to interact with other students.

Now in case I haven't mentioned it before I'll say it now: Hi my name is Darcy and I am an introvert.

This does not mean that I am socially inept nor that I cower in the face of public speaking. What it does mean is that being in the presence of people I don't know very well (and sometimes even those I do) taxes my energy resources and at some point I have a choice to A) get grumpy, short tempered and aggressive or B) find some way to get some alone time to recharge the batteries. It also means that since I am so comfortable in my own company and the company of my close friends, I rarely feel the need to socialise outside of my inner circle. This in turn means that although I have perfectly passable social skills, I get very anxious in new social situations where I don't have an anchor and where I fear the possibly of making a faux par - imposing my person on someone who does not wish for the attention or being outright rejected for reasons unknown.

But I am in a pretty good place right now - confidence wise - and I have heard that the more you face your fears the less power they have over you. So today was all about facing the fears. I walked in with my head held high, my smiley personable face on and made it my aim to talk to anyone I happened to come across.

(Let me just emphasise here that this is a BIG DEAL for me… I DO NOT as a general rule go up and introduce myself to people I do not know and have no purpose for introducing myself i.e. introducing myself at work and to clients is easy because I have a purpose, but this, this is very different)

You know what? As a result I had an awesome day :D Don't get me wrong, I got home at 4:30pm or something like that and promptly passed out from exhaustion, but it was absolutely worth it even if I never speak to any of these people again :D

All it took was a bit of conscious decision making and the willingness to read social cue, have an interest in what people had to say and keep asking questions until something clicked!

I helped one girl navigate the inns and outs of the structure of her degree so she could choose her first year subjects. I encouraged another to be a rebel and sneak around the line that the rest of us sheep were trying to pass through (current students were guarding the entrance but I noticed there was a simple gap on the edge that no one was paying attention too… didn't feel the need to use it myself but sure let other people know about it… :P). I spoke to an older woman about why she has chosen to go back to uni and complete a second degree and another younger woman who has been studying by correspondence for the last 4 years but decided it was time for some face to face learning. I chatted up the coffee guy at the cafe, you know, just in case I decide to start drinking caffeinated drinks after all this time. And finally, after collecting my free pizza (hey I am a student now I am allowed to be cheap!) I was faced with the choice… do I sit at that empty table over there or find someone else sitting by themselves and introduce myself. I chose the latter and found myself with 2 new American exchange student friends to spend the rest of the day exploring campus with.

Classes don't start until next week and the next orientation even isn't until Friday so I have a few days to re-charge… but I am pretty awesome, if I do say so myself :-P


Academic advising and enrollment at Uni :)
I helped a girl sneak in before her allocated time... Should I be proud of that little rebellion?

The food court... which has a Boost juice bar for which my bff is no longer talking to me...

Did you know we have a school mascot?... I didn't until today when I was lining up to get my student card and completely distracted by my multitasking and setting up my Uni email address on my iPad. When I looked up there was this ridiculously buff (like I thought it was fake muscle until I looked closer) half naked dude in a kilt standing next to me... :S

Destruction of property?... I don't technically know if we were allowed to be climbing on this structure but I saw it across the green and just HAD to do it. My new exchange friends were only happy to oblige and no one told us to get off so I might try it again one day :)

And thats all she wrote!

Much love,

D.

48/365 Would you talk to me if...

I wore this outfit out in public?...

Forgive me if this sounds shallow but today (or at least part of today) was all about first impressions. Or rather it was all about deciding upon an outfit to wear on my first day at a new University. As I mentioned in photo 43/365 it frustrates me that people make snap judgements about others based on the bare minimum of information and fail to acknowledge the complexities inherent in peoples humanity. However, sometimes I just have to deal with the fact that it is part of the real world whilst I can choose whether or not I play the game, the game is being played regardless of my decision and so I am disadvantaged if I choose to ignore it.

I am relatively lucky in this regard; being female, on the shorter side of average height, having curly hair and a cute smile has its advantages in terms of managing not to intimidate people. I find that as long as I am willing to make eye contact with people and smile I can pretty much get away with murder. It does however mean that I can have a tendency to appear much younger than my true age and strangers sometimes think they can take advantage of that.

So the aim of tomorrows outfit is thus:
1. NOT make me look like a 17 year old school leaver
2. Engender respect as I will be meeting with academic advisors
3. Not be so "corporate" that it intimidates the other 17-18 year old school leavers... they will be my class mates after all and I would like to make a few friends.
4. Still be "me"

Do you think I achieved my aims with this outfit?! Would you talk to me if I wore this to my first day of uni?

I am joking of course, the necessity of this task frustrates me so it was almost inevitable that at some point I would feel the impulse to put on the most inappropriate outfit I own (short of lingerie or nothing of course). Call it a sanity safety measure if you will :)

On another note, I have actually worn this outfit in public... twice! Once was the weekend after Halloween, my girlfriends and I drove into town for a charity party hosted by one of my pole dancing friends (FYI pole dancers know how to dress up so a good costume is a must, I went as the Queen of hearts). On this night I was proposed to by a young man across the square on behalf of himself and his two friends. He even went so far as to get down on one knee and beg me! All were polite and good looking so I said yes... and then ran away as fast as I could, but I suppose you could because I didn't know what else to do... so you could say that I am in fact engaged :-S. The other outing was not at a time of year where it is appropriate to be in costume out in public. I had been invited to a friends "Pirates of the Caribbean" party but didn't know anyone else attending so put on my big girl hat and caught public transport into town in full costume... I think I made a few people happy... if I do say so myself :-P

Oops... check out those bruises! No wonder my GP thinks I am in an abusive relationship :S

47/365 The Piano

I have never lived in a house without a piano. And whilst I don't play (unless you count a one handed version of the Simpsons theme song as playing) to live in a house without a piano feels like it would somehow change the very essence of "home."

Music was a very big part of household life growing up; mum played guitar and sang, dad piano, my sister the trumpet for a little while although she's the real singer these days and as for myself, I played the clarinet and saxophone (although the sax didn't last long as I have baby hands and couldn't reach the low notes). These days my poor clarinet spends more time acting as my door stop to the garage than it does making music and the pianos no longer get played as regularly as they used too but still, to hear a piano played immediately takes me back to lazy summer days spent lying on the red carpeted floor of the one air conditioned room in our old fibre house, listening to dad playing themes from Bach to Joshua Kadison and soundtracks from Disney to The Piano and Chariots of Fire.

There is something very sensual about a grand (or baby grand) piano, something which although I am not old enough to say from experience, I am sure existed since long before the movie Pretty Woman. So of course I just felt that no red dress collection would be complete without the introduction of the piano.

Todays outtake occurred just as I was walking downstairs to the library (where the baby grand lives) and I kind of like it so its going up ;-)

Much love,

D.

46/365 My Spidey Friend

This little guy has been hanging around my house for about a week now. He mostly liked to hang about up high near the ceiling in the void above the stairs. He was quiet and kept to himself so I didn't really mind and started walking passed saying "hi" and generally thinking of him as my little spidey pet on the ceiling.

But today he broke the rules and so I had to let him go :(

We had a deal you see, he stays out of my general living area and eats all sorts of other insects and I let him stay but noooooooooo that wasn't enough for this little guy, or so I discovered this morning when I woke up to find him hanging out in his new home on the computer room wall. So bye bye spidey, out you go, I shall trap you under a glass and leave you outside for the rest of your life! It turned out to be a really good use of the parents invitations to what I now refer to as "parent teacher evening" at uni... much better than its intended use anyway.

I hate to admit it, but the joke was on me :( See the glass above? It was actually my favourite breakfast smoothie glass, and after set him free outside spider decided to claim it for his own and wouldn't leave :( Hopefully he is home by morning...

Anyway, on another note, I had to laugh about something today. You know how I ranted a few days ago about the "parent teacher evening"? Well today was a "lots of work but not much brain power necessary" day at work and on those days I like to listen to various podcasts that have the potential to either entertain me, educate me or both! It just so happens that today I decided to randomly scroll through my backlog of "Conversations with Richard Fidler" and just so happened to click on his conversation with Psychology Today editor Hara Estroff Marano. Now my suspect opinions about that publication aside she just so happened to be talking about "modern attitudes to parenting mean anxious mums and dads are crowding out the unsupervised play that kids used to enjoy" and more specifically about the effect this has on them once they reach university levels of education...

It is not the first time something like this - where I learn about or think about something new only to turn the TV or radio on and hear an interview or documentary about that exact issue... funny how the world works like that, just thought I'd share.

Exhibit (A): Guarding his new territory :(

Much love,

D.

45/365 Under the tracks

Took my camera out on a whim for my nightly walk to do some test shots of some locations I routinely walk by. Figures that one of them would end up besting the other image I had already made for the day. My brain decided to go on holidays today, which is nice for a change, maybe it will be quiet long enough so I can get some sleep!

Much love,

D.

44/365 Treating myself

Don't you just love it when you get home from a ridiculously long drive home; one of those long drives where you get so angry in the car you seriously consider turning off the engine in the middle if the harbour tunnel and stomping your way home because at least that would be faster! Only to discover that there is leftover crepe batter and strawberries in the fridge, Nutella in the cupboard and fresh bananas on the kitchen bench. Because although you decided at the ripe old age of 8 - and even announced to the world - that you are not religious, your mother still reminds you when its Shrive Tuesday so at least you have an excuse to make pancakes. Only this year you were too sick to eat them all in one sitting... Yeah, me too! :-D

On another note however, I get home only to find a pamphlet from my new university addressed to "the parents of new students" inviting them to what can only be described as the universities version of a parent teacher night.... I am actually so shocked I don't know what to do with this information... I just keep seeing bright green flashing words floating across my vision *DOES NOT COMPUTE. DOES NOT COMPUTE*... When is there a clearer line indicating in a child's life that they must now take responsibility for their own education if not at the end of high school and the beginning of university? I just don't get it.

And on top of that I AM A MATURE AGED STUDENT!!!

Much love,
D.

43/365 Colour me in

43/365 Colour me in, a photo by Darcy89 on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
I had this whole idea, this plan for todays description but now that I am sitting here in front of my keyboard I don't feel like being reflective... damn. Ahh well, here goes nothing

43 days ago when I started this project - no make that 50 because I was thinking about it since at least Christmas - I didn't really have a plan for it. I had no theme in mind and no purpose for completion except to give myself a creative outlet and hopefully flex and strengthen my photography muscle at the same time. I chose to make it an exercise in self-portraits for no other reason than that I am the only subject I always have on hand and the only one reliably patient enough to put up with myself... Since then however it had become increasingly apparent to me that there is an ongoing theme forming - it's me!

Okay, that sounds silly I know but please, allow me to explain.

In case you haven't been clued in by my constant soliloquy's in the description of almost every photo I publish, I do a lot of thinking - many would say too much - about this that and everything, mostly things other people in my life don't even think to question. In my opinion life is complicated, people are complicated and I find lately that I am unreasonably frustrated by many people's insistence of the contrary.

One example of this might be in our boundless ability to judge others; their intelligence, their ability to succeed, their scruples, their 'worthiness' and respectability all based upon the tiny snapshot of their lives that we ourselves have been made privy too. The internet itself of course creates the perfect storm for us to use this to our advantage, to conceal and reveal only the parts of us we wish to be seen and so to create the ideal person we wish to be. And who is to say which version is the more truthful?

In real life however we rarely have such control with the ways in which we are edited in the minds of others. First impressions count right? They set the scene for all future interactions with another human being.

I guess you could say that this project is my rebellion, my rejection of those superficial assumptions, this oversimplification of complexity. Take any photo in this set and in it you will find a self portrait that is an open and honest representation of the person I am. But the portrait is simple and two dimensional. You would be remiss to judge me by any individual portrait you see here. I have been asked since the beginning who I am, am I a girl with her teddy bear who likes to jump in puddles and run through sprinklers with her socks on? Or am I the woman in the red dress dancing on a pole and swimming naked in the backyard pool?

I reject the notion that a single photo could ever have the potential to reveal the depth and breadth of a person's being or the insight to reveal the contradictions inherent in their emotional nature. However, a collection of images may in fact be able to do just that. And so that shall be my description of this project. To build from snapshots in two dimensions a multifaceted, three diminutional whole. Not every photo need make a statement, just as not every moment in time need define you but each photo reveals a part of the person so that when taken as a whole one might see more than just the girl with her teddy or the woman emerging naked from a swimming pool.

42/365 I dare you.

Because it makes sense that when one is feeling sick and feverish that one should spend and hour jumping in and out of the backyard pool trying to take a photo... lucky the neighbours can't see over our fence.

Not actually my personal official 365 photo for today but the safest version and the one my mother is most comfortable with me posting on a public forum... :)

But you know I am going too anyway... so here it is!

Not much to say. There are some things I love about having a private pool in my backyard and this has to be one of them. Having said that I certainly got my work out today, my remote shutter release doesn't reach all the way to the end of the pool so it was 12s timer to the rescue - click, dive, swing for my life and try to look like I am casually, gracefully getting out of the water... lol! The many mis-timed and stumbling shots are very funny but we only post the shots that work right?

Take a look at the other shots from the day and let me know if you find the light in the background to be distracting. I like it but not 100% certain.

:)

Much love,

D.

41/365 Colour!

Some of my girl friends and I did the Sydney Swiss Color Run today... 5km of running (aka walking) interspersed with 5 colour stations where volunteers douse you with pigmented powder. It was so much fun! Except we were all so sleep deprived (who leaves the house to go running at 6:30 in the morning... that shit should just be illegal!) that our mantra became - start early, finish early, nap early.

Here is what we looked like before...

And here is what we looked like after...

Anyway, as you can see... there was a lot of colour, smiles and happiness going around and I am not sure my skin will ever be a normal natural human colour again :-S. Oh and no matter how many colour stations I ran through, I never seemed to learn the lesson... keep your mouth shut and don't breathe!

40/365 All work and no play today…

40/365 All work and no play today…, a photo by Darcy89 on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
I am going crazy!!! Uni hasn't even started and it's taking over my life! Someone remind me why I thought it was a good idea to return for a second undergraduate degree?!?!?!

Spent 12 hours today wading through paperwork, what subjects do I want to do? Right, what are the pre-requisits? Oh but wait I could get recognition for prior learning for that! F*%K, I was supposed to have that paperwork done by the 31st of January?! :-S But I didn't know I needed it yet… ahhhhh!!!!!!!!!

So, yeah… a bit all over the place today but I think I have almost everything sorted for official enrolement on Tuesday… but I spent 12 hours doing it… most people just tuen up on the day and ask for advice from the academics… now that would have been a disaster.

As a result this isn't really an anything shot today. Its a CRAP I haven't taken a photo yet and don't have time to set it up so I'll just take a shot of my bed full of paperwork day. Hope you understand.

39/365 Red

Bit of a hectic day today, didn't have much time to organise a shot but wanted to take my red dress out for a spin again… Really liked the idea of the mirror shot but just couldn't get it working today to my satisfaction so will at it to the list of attempt agains…

I found todays photo to be quite striking but Honestly I just didn't know what to do with it in processing… my knowlege of photoshop is really quite basic and I want to work on that but… any suggestions?

P.S. I also hate the yellow background but it is the colour of my walls and I didn't have time to sort that out, so, yeah… lots of excuses today

Much love,
D.

38/365 Submerged

My attempt at producing something "abstract" for this weeks 365: 2013 edition theme. I got a little impatient (and cold) in the water, not to mention I feared for the life of my camera (even though mum had kindly agreed to "guard" it from any misfortunes... so its different to how I had envisaged but not altogether unusable.

No philosophical musings from me today. I was so tired I fell asleep mid afternoon and missed my pole class!!! :'( Not good *humph*

Much love,

D.

37/365 Peering over

Not much planning went into todays photos. It was my last visit to the outdoor cinema for the summer (no summer is ending :'( !!!) and it was just me, a camera and a tripod in some seriously harsh afternoon sun playing in the botanical gardens while I waited for the rest of my party to arrive post work. So that was fun :-)

Check out some of the rejects below.

Found some random flowers someone discarded in the grass... so I put them to good use :-)

because its fun...

Please forgive the dodgy photoshop work... I was just trying to get a slightly different look at a Sydney icon

D.

36/365 Because we all feel sad sometimes and its okay to cry...

Something happened today, and its not a big deal, no one died, everything is okay, but it made me sad enough that I cried. And thats okay. What amused me though was the little voice inside my head that said, "you should photograph this emotion, you should use it in the 365 project" even though by that point in time I had a perfectly good shoot planned and had no intention of sharing the intimate details of this ongoing source of woe. What I do want to talk about is emotions and sadness in general.

I have an interesting relationship with emotions, I choose to feel them rather than block them out or rationalise them away. So if they are getting particularly overwhelming and I feel the need to cry, well I allow myself the release of crying; and conversely if they imbue me with the urge to jump up and down, run on the spot wave my hands in the air and do 20 star-jumps like a crazy woman... well I do that too, whatever works really, within reason.

I used to feel guilty whenever I was sad, I'd try to ignore it, block it out, overcompensate in public but all that resulted in was a build up of emotional pressure and myself a walking time bomb about to explode in the face of some random undeserving innocent.

Crying is my emergency release valve and since I have come to turns with the presence of the occasional sadness in my life I no longer feel guilty when I let it out. Am I making any sense?

Emotions exist, they happen, I don't know, something scientific is going on, some neurones sending messages to various parts of your body - release the butterflies! and fire the adrenaline! - I am not up to date on the physiological details, just enough for it to make sense. But you can't control them. Wait, I don't want to get into trouble with any CBT therapists out there but even then, its all about controlling your thought patterns to influence your feelings... so the emotions are still there right?

Somehow, for me at least though, accepting their inevitability, acknowledging their cyclical and transient nature, allowing myself to feel them, to experience their depths and then to be capable of analysing their origins means that they ultimately lose their power over me. I feel them but I am not controlled by them.

Okay so I am sad, my mind and body tells me this is so, but there is nothing wrong with that and even this too shall pass.

So I am all zen about this whole thing right? But it must also be said that emotions, especially so called "negative" emotions affect people other than the person directly experiencing them. In my experience "negative" emotions make other people uncomfortable, and because they feel uncomfortable they are constantly trying to "make it better" to "solve the issue". We're all so obsessed with being happy that we are not prepared to just sit with a feeling that is anything else. Anger, conflict, anxiety, jealousy, confusion, angst, even boredom become feelings to avoid but , in reality, they are a part of life and accepting their existence takes away their power.

So these days, when I am experiencing an emotion and I feel the need to cry I ask for what I want. Whether that be sitting alone with the emotion, calling a friend and saying "hey I'm feeling a little vulnerable at the moment and I really need to cry, do you think you could let me do that whilst you talk about something, anything so I don't feel so alone?" or like when my parents broke up a few years ago and all my friends wanted to talk about how I was feeling and untangle the web of thoughts running through my head and I just said "look guys, I really just need a safe place to cry and feel loved right now, do you think we could all just sit on the couch, put on a crappy movie with lots go buff half naked guys and you could all hug me laugh and make silly jokes while I cry?" (side note,: they totally did)

***

1. Sit in front of the camera having set up the tripod and lighting and found the remote you haphazardly disposed of after yesterday's photo adventures. Your feeling sad right now but the immediacy of the emotion has been overwhelmed by the practicalities involved with setting up for a photo-shoot.

2a. Laugh for a little while as you become more and more aware of the absurdity of this situation... Are you seriously considering using your own emotions, the ups and downs of your everyday life as fodder for a silly little 365 project?

2b.Allow the laughter to settle into tears and sobs because even though this photography assignment has momentarily distracted you, you are in fact still very sad and haven't finished crying yet.

3. Take a deep breath and look into the lens. Yes you are going to do this, it makes sense because while it started out as an exercise in photography (and still is that as well) it has turned into more of a creative representation of all of the aspects of your person - the creative, the fun, the silly, the physical, the dreamer the joy... but it won't be complete without something to represent the sadness too. 

Press the remote shutter release - 1, 2, 3 *click!*

4. Phone buzzes, its an email from one of your close friends, she doesn't know it yet but she's said just exactly what you needed to hear. Laugh because it feels good and it feels right. Smile at the camera and take one last picture, the tears are drying now and you can feel a genuine smile coming on. Your still sad, but your also happy and in this moment feeling especially loved and that deserves to be seen too.

***

And I think thats enough from me for one day.
Much love,
D.

35/365 Jump in my car

This is what happens when I wake up one morning and say to myself - I wonder what would happen if?... and now I know.

Didn't really have an overall vision for today, which didn't help with artistic decisions like - I don't know - shutter speed etc and so to that extent I am neither happy nor sad with the outcome just... "okay cool, moving along."

The most noteworthy part of this shoot was probably the set-up (pictured below) which involved lowering the passenger seat, balancing my tripod in some strange position in the back seat and securing/stabilising it with 2 old pairs of stockings attached to whatever I could find to attach them to really...

So, I'll just sit with it for a while until I decide what, if anything I might do with it.

Amusing side note: Imagine my surprise when I get home from dinner this evening only to discover this similar image by Goose.. in my contacts "recent photo" stream. LOL!

Anyway, thats me for today.
Much love,
D.