Healthy Geeky Addictions

I took the film I shot yesterday into Wolf for developing and most of it came out well. I may have a film-advancing issue with this camera though as three of the frames look as if they have been double-exposed and washed out. I'm not sure what happened, but something didn't work right. However, the camera has the ability to work correctly as the other frames came out perfectly. I talked to a guy as PSU here in Nashville today and he said to just work more film through it and see what happens because the camera has been sitting for a while and it could just be stiff and need some use to fix it. Fortunately, if it does have an issue, it looks like they might be able to recalibrate it for me. They are the only people in town who still deal in old cameras. Dury's used to, but they are almost completely digital and didn't have one single roll of 120 film. I think the guy told me when I bought some in 2008 that they were phasing it out. I guess it's just a sign of the times. Thank God for the Internets because I know I can find it there.

I knew there was one roll I took in Ireland that was completely ruined and I found out which one that was today. I think I dropped the Diana and the back came off, so everything was bleached out. There wasn't a single image on the roll. I'm glad to have found it because now I don't have to keep processing them and wondering if they are completely unsalvageable. 

My friend and I are going out on a photodate on Friday and I am so excited. I think we are just going to do it old-school and drive around and see what we find. I'm tempted to go out in the next couple of hours and take some pictures here in Old Hickory. There are definitely enough weird and quirky things to photograph in this neighbourhood. This photography thing is turning into a full-fledged addiction, but at least it's a healthier one than most. I'm just happy to feel creative again!

I am so excited for next week when I can pick up my CDs and post some of what I have been talking about here. I am hoping the prints look as good as the negatives do because sometimes negatives can be misleading. However, I think I have enough to post a few fairly decent pictures. There is one Diana image I am especially curious about. It is an accidental (happy) double exposure of Ballybunion Beach. There is a huge silhouette on the frame of the castle and inside that silhouette sits a landscape view of the castle and cliffs. It's totally accidental and I have absolutely no idea how it happened, but I am hoping the actual image is as promising as the negative. I promise, next week, if it is, I'll post it.

Instant Gratification

Two good things happened today. Here's the first:

I decided to look in my attic for various photo accessories I thought I had remembered putting up there, and my search was more than fruitful. I had completely forgotten I had another Zeiss. This one is a mid-fifties folding 35mm rangefinder, so I am spending tonight googling and figuring out what it can do. It seems I have a vintage camera for every situation. This one allows you to slip a flash right on top, and it will apparently work with a modern strobe flash, so it might be better for indoor situations. There are many complicated knobs and levers and I haven't quite figured out what they all do yet, but I plan to as I go along.  I think my dad's friend gave me this camera, and I honestly have never used it, but God bless the Internets, because you can find instructions for anything.

The second good thing that happened: I took a few rolls of film into my friend at Wolf Camera. I took these rolls of 120 a year and a half ago in Ireland, on the vacation on which my Grandad died. I have some pictures from the day he died. My friend and I just had to get out of the house, so we went down to the coast and tried to find the windmills we could see from the top of the hill. Our search was successful and we took many pictures of them.

I took some pictures with a digital camera, but I also shot some with my Diana. I wasn't entirely sure what I was doing, so I didn't have much confidence in the pictures I took. I thought there would be too many light leaks, double exposures (although those can sometimes produce happy accidents), and missed frames to make the film worth processing. But I gathered up my courage and finally took some of the film in for processing. My friend eased my mind by saying she would just run it through to see if there were viable images on the film before I committed to having them scanned to CD or printed. It turned out that each of the rolls had viable looking pictures. Some even merit a lot of promise, so I sent them for scanning. I can't scan film myself, at least not with the kind of results a lab can produce, so I have to wait about a week for the CDs to come back. Damn waiting in a world where I am used to instant gratification. I love shooting film, and I still haven't made the leap fully into digital, but I deplore the waiting. Give it to me NOW!

I shot a roll of film today with the Zeiss TLR. I used my light meter, so I am more confident about my expected results. As I have said in past blogs, over the past few years, I have experienced a creative lull, and with that, a diminished confidence in both my creative ability and technical control. Today, I took things slowly, metered, made sure everything was in the right place, and only then cocked the shutter. I like this approach and the limited number of exposures on 120 films lends itself well to such a contrived approach. I may drop the film off tomorrow because I'm so curious how it came out. I have to drive all the way downtown to get it processed, but my excitement may get the best of me anyway. I felt in control of the camera today for the first time in years. All that know-how came back, and my "eye" began to see things in that special photographer's way.

It's been three weeks. No contact. No explanation. I'm trying to find the best ways to deal with it I know how. Crying, not eating, smoking, and going out to bars with friends hasn't helped. I hope something more constructive will help. I am still feeling completely gouged out and empty on the inside, completely devoid of the answers I need, but I am hoping that time will provide them. In the meantime, I hope for better things in other facets of my life, and I hope that the creative urge will continue to burn. It's been such a long time since I have felt it and I wanted it to come back so desperately. I am sorry it has taken me getting my heart broken to give it the push it needed.

Vintage TLR

I own this camera. My dad bought it for me at an antique store in downtown San Antonio, right across the street from The Alamo about ten years ago. Today, at work, our computer system went down, so I spent most of the day researching how to use this camera because it has been so long since I have even attempted. I've figured out what most of the levers and dials do, and I may have figured out its history, although the information on the Internet is either unreliable or in German, or both. It was made somewhere between 1939 and 1951. Some posts say it is the 1930s model, others say it is the 1950s. To me, it looks more like 1940s or '50s. Even so, it's a sixty-year old camera that appears to be in good working order. 

I've figured out how to attach a flash - I even have a flash that will work just fine - and I think I am going to take some indoor smokey bar pictures using a flash and an open shutter speed, just for kicks. It will take a lot of experimentation to get that sort of thing right, but I've been wanting to perfect it for years. I also have a tripod (and a tripod shoe - somewhere) and a cable release, so if I can find all of this stuff, I might be up for some night shots later on this week. I found my lovely, expensive light meter yesterday, so I shouldn't have any problems with exposure, even though this camera doesn't have a built-in light meter. It does have a rather cute chart on the side telling what the exposures should be from "May to August from 9 - 15 o'clock" in the Northern Hemisphere. It gives examples of exposure combinations for persons, landscapes and streets. For "streets," the camera makers even go to the trouble of specifying "narrow" or "ample squares." With my mostly expired 160 speed film, I will be sure to look for ample squares.

So tomorrow, I am going to buy some batteries and take some test shots, and see how they come out. I have a friend at Wolf Camera who can process 120 film for me, so I shouldn't have too long of a wait to see how they come out. I'm not expecting anything phenomenal for the first few rolls I take, as I am ridiculously rusty and clumsy-fingered, and I'm dealing with equipment not entirely familiar to me. I haven't really given this little camera a real chance in all the years I have had it, but I have seen some amazing links online to pictures taken with them. Even using modern film, the photographs have a dreamy, mid-century look to them, while still retaining a sharpness not possible with a plastic camera. 

Tomorrow, at some point, I have to venture into my attic to see what I can fish out. I know there are a couple of other old cameras upstairs that might be worth investigating. I have some ideas where I want to start content-wise, so I'll just head in the right direction and start shooting. I hear the weather is supposed to cooperate for the next couple of days. 

Well folks, it is 8:15 at night, and I am exhausted. I tried to go to bed early last night, as I was about to pass out tired, but I stayed up past the window of opportunity and then couldn't sleep. It's the equivalent of my Friday night and I will probably spend it in bed, possibly watching something on Netflix.

Stay, With the Demons You Drown

I went out on Friday night. I finally got my car back (it has been out of commission for over a week while my dad waited for the part for the air-conditioning compressor) and I was so excited about being mobile on my own terms again. I went to the new Yazoo Brewery to meet some friends, and some new people I hadn't met before. The new place is nice, even though it doesn't quite have the same crumbling-factory cool factor, but I think it will settle into itself eventually. I ran into some friends of friends and things were going quite well, although I still didn't really feel myself again. After the one beer (and a tiny freebie), I started to feel hungry, which as you probably know these days, is somewhat of an event. We decided to go to Broadway Brewhouse. Back at Yazoo, this drunk hippyish guy decided to latch onto me and came to BBH with us. He was really getting on my nerves after a while, although before he was quite as hammered, he could at least hold an interesting conversation. He came and sat down at our table with us. There were only two friends there I actually knew, and before I got my food, I started to feel overwhelmed. The place started getting busier and busier and it felt like all my emotions were crashing down on me. Post food, when my other friend got there, I started to lose it. I started ranting about what had happened and how I was sick of people telling me what I should feel or that I shouldn't feel, or that I should get over it. He said, quite rightly, that I felt like my feelings were being invalidated, and that if I wasn't upset, he would worry more about me right now. Still, I knew I had to get out of there as quickly as possible. The waitress took forever with the check and I ended up losing it and sobbing on his shoulder before I could make my escape.

I felt awful at the time because I felt like I had failed in my attempt to go out, distract myself, and try to have fun. Last night, as a contrast, I decided, after work, to go to Trader Joe's and the nice wine store and stock up on, yes, you guessed it: wine, chicken and bread. I drank enough wine to kill a small horse and managed to eat something, and talked on the phone and tried once again, to make sense of everything. The same friend whose shoulder I cried on suggested that I find a way to distract myself that didn't involve drinking, smoking, or general wallowing. He was so nice about it, that the idea did in fact creep into my head and stay there. It must have hibernated overnight.

This morning, I woke up hungry and ate a meager but serviceable breakfast, and it felt like something inside me had changed, although I didn't quite know what yet. When I got to work this morning, I put my hot water in the microwave to get it boiling for tea as usual, took it out and spilled the boiling water all over my hand. I spent the first half of the day trying to type with a big wad of paper towels and ice wrapped around it. Still I worked, and the breakfast and tea made me feel better.

Sometime this afternoon, an epiphany of sorts hit me, and I'm not sure quite how or why my attitude changed. I have been productive in applying for jobs, but that hasn't distracted me quite effectively enough. I decided I need something that will both get me out of the house, but not require me to be around booze or people, take my time, and get my creative juices flowing. 

I have been bitching about being poor and lusting over the Nikon D60 and other digital SLRs. Well, right now, I can't afford one, but I do have many interesting and quirky medium format film cameras that I can use to work out my demons over the next couple of weeks. I haven't felt a need to be creative in a long time, and it seems that trauma and emotional upheaval cause that need to appear. Tomorrow I am taking a camera with me to work, and I would like to use the best part of the evening, just before it gets dark, to take some pictures and see where it goes. I think the plastic cameras might be the best medium anyway, because they take away control and make a photographer go with chance and emotion. I have been so frightened of taking pictures because I told myself for years I wasn't any good and then I told myself after years of not doing it, that I wouldn't be as good now as I was ten years ago. I think that's absolute rubbish. I just have to give myself a chance to dust off the cobwebs and get the creative juices flowing and that's what I plan to do. I am almost relieved to have this need inside to create and work at something that has given me so much pleasure, and was once a passion of mine. It seems like I haven't felt that way in a long time, and if this is a side-effect of everything I've been through in the past couple of months, then it's a very welcome one. When one door closes, another one opens. I must remember my own advice to a friend who was getting a divorce a few months ago: "The universe will provide."

Exorcising the Demons

Renewal

So, today I was stuck at home, apart from a short walk to the Piggly Wiggly, which was, I hate to admit, to buy a Vitamin Water and a pack of Camel Crush. The weather outside was beautiful, and I spent much of it sunning myself outside on my front porch, in between bouts of coordinating recommendation letters, CV, and cleaning and laundry.

I spent much of the day on the phone, to people who I talk to often, and to some people I don't. I had a long long talk today with an ex-boyfriend and once great love, who knows me well enough and has been through enough with me and since me to give me an excellent perspective on my current situation. It's good to hear from someone who has been in a relationship with you and loved you how you will recover and what you deserve in life. I can't quite articulate what makes that different from talking to just friends, but it's something about the shared intimacy and knowledge of how you are within that particular realm of relationships that no one else really has. He told me some things about myself that others haven't really picked up on and I am grateful for his bluntness (which has been at times a double-edged sword).

A very good friendship of mine has suffered a mutual neglect on behalf of both parties since her move up north, but today we talked like friends who haven't skipped a beat. It was good to hear a familiar, yet missed voice, especially one so feisty and sunny. I know she too is going through difficulties, so it was good to talk, rant, and catch up.

Tonight I was talking to my pseudo-sister, who doesn't read my blog, but that's not really her bag exactly. We talk all the time, and she is going through a heart-wrenching separation because her boyfriend has gone to South America to make money. She feels as though money is the mistress, and she has been abandoned for its siren call. I feel like crap, and I'm struggling to deal with what happened, so it is good to talk to others and hear what they are going through.

I haven't written the particulars of what happened after the breakup. I didn't really get an explanation apart from "we don't work as a couple," which to me seems like a lame cop-out excuse, almost like the famous post-it note breakup from Sex and the City. I guess he chose to deliver that verbal post-it note in person and that makes him feel better about himself - nothing like getting dumped in your own living room. It's a cop out because we did work, on many many levels, but I'm not going to get into that. He also apparently didn't take it lightly.

Flash forward. Three days later: I am devastated, driving home from my parents' house, where I had just collapsed in a crying fit on their kitchen floor; I'm smoking in the car, which I don't normally do,and remembering I had told my friend I would go out with her that night. Every bone in my body wanted not to, to just go home, get under the covers and make it all go away. But, I called her back, still crying and still a mess. She said, "oh honey, he's not worth it." "Yes, yes he is," I said. She then revealed to me that on the dating website she had recently joined, he had come up the day before as her top match. Two days. I drank a Guinness that night at an Irish bar, and it slowly sank into my body, my body that hadn't eaten for close to three days. It's taken a little longer for reality to start to sink in.

I don't want to date anyone. The thought makes me feel ill, but I have a friend who says that in times like this, you should do something that makes you feel uncomfortable every day. I had a profile on the aforementioned dating website, and going on there to see for my own eyes meant reactivating it, and once I did, I couldn't deactivate it for a week. Well today I got sick of seeing him come up as a match for me, especially since I've tried to hide him and it doesn't take, so I decided to try searching another site, just to see if it was the same set of dufusses (sp?) on there, and sure enough, up he comes again. I got angry because it said he was active during the last 30 days, which could mean after, or perhaps before we broke up.I want to give him the benefit of the doubt, but you know, I did that for a couple of months and I'm a little tired of that approach.

So those of you who know me know I have this weirdo mystical astrology loving, tarot card reading side. I was angry and emotional and decided to do a reading, just out of anger and a need for some clarity, whether imagined or real. Sometimes you just need a touchstone.

Here's what it said. We're going with traditional Celtic Cross reading, which if you're curious, you can find an explanation of the layout here.

My card: 4 of wands - marriage, party, celebration of things well done
Crossing: Wheel of Fortune - letting the world turn, achieving balance between love and hate
Subconscious: The Star - a time of healing and hope, things will start to go right
Conscious: The 2 of Cups - love, union - the Romeo and Juliet card
Recent Past: Queen of Wands - getting what you want, finding your true nature (I am a redheaded Aries, so this is my card)
Near Future: Ten of Pentacles - the good life, financial security and a sense of happy well-being
Present Situation: King of Pentacles - man involved with money, steady, fastidious, or acting that way
Surrounding: Magician - someone using power, good or evil, getting in tune with your own powers, can mean trickery and secrets
Hopes and Fears: Judgement - change and renewal, reaping the seeds of your actions, a resurrection of sorts
Outcome: The Tower - sudden and forced change, something will happen to force me out of stagnation, usually it will cause chaos and trauma, but it is usually for the best, the stripping down of old and outworn structures.

I do readings fairly often, and I regularly do them for other people, but I did this one is such a state of emotion and I was really passionate about it, that it came out as feeling somehow profound and right and I should pay attention, plus the cards I got seemed right and seemed to be telling me something. They are all very powerful, not messing around cards. The Tower card is seen as the most frightening card in the deck, but I am relieved to get it because I feel in such a state of stagnation, on such a mental merry-go-round, that I really need something to force some change in my life.

Now, when that happens, remind me I said that.

Well, goodnight, I must go to bed because I have to get up in five and a half hours, even though these days I am almost never tired enough.

Quotes from Persuasion

You can always trust Jane Austin to say it so succinctly. Here are some quotes from her last and darkest novel, Persuasion, from its sensible and quiet heroine, Ann Elliott:

"Once there were no two hearts so open, no feelings so in harmony, but now we are strangers, worse than strangers; it is perpetual estrangement."

"The one claim I shall make for my own sex is that we love longest, when all hope is gone"

"Time is a great healer, or so at least I am told."

Feeling Good

The job search is proving fruitful. I have two recommendation letters in hand, and promises of at least three more, so I am sitting in good shape. It feels good to have accomplished something today. And to those of you who said I burnt my bridges, I say, my bridges are in very good operational state, thank you very much, and the flow of traffic is steady. That's bitchy, but I just have to get it out there. The two recommendations I have so far are probably more glowing than I think I deserve, and I am grateful to my former professors for helping me out so quickly. Two of the jobs were just posted the other day and have a deadline of March 31st, so it doesn't give me much time to get it all together, considering getting recommendations is usually like herding cats, and went disastrously the last time I attempted it. However I have asked many more people than I need, so I should have the basics covered.

Still can't eat anything, but I think today that's because I am excited about the prospect of finding a new job. I should perhaps think about doing that soon before I make myself sick from too much tea drinking.

Better Day

Today was a little better. I'm getting there, although tonight I'm exhausted and ready to go to bed. Friends said I looked more like myself again, like the spark is coming back, and it is, bit by bit. Same story tonight though with the food - came home, ate chicken, now I feel sick. I'm sure that will change eventually and I will enjoy food again.

I'm sure I must have to go through this for a reason, that there is a meaning to finding such happiness and losing it inexplicably and suddenly. What that meaning is, right now, I don't have a clue, but I have to believe it leads to better things. I have to believe that. If I don't, I will just cry, and I don't want any more of that going on tonight.

Thank God for Pandora. I can't listen to anything on my itunes. I can't even look at itunes right now, so Pandora is the only thing that I don't have to think about, but will play (mostly) music that is just pure me, and that is what I need right now. I have to be thankful for the little things: Pandora, cat curled up on feet, two confirmed recommendation letters, and hopefully more to come, a job well done today, and more to do tomorrow, good friends and family who are working diligently to stitch me back up again.

Tomorrow is laundry and cleaning the hell out of the house. I think it will do me good. I can't go anywhere because I don't have a car, so I have to stay here and get things done, but at least I don't have to go to work.

On another note, maybe things are going right in the world because healthcare reform passed today. I'm glad. I hope it will save some lives, and soon. Working in healthcare has clued me in even more to the sad realization of the price arbitrarily put on people's health, well-being, and even lives. It really does sicken me and I hope to be out of it soon. I can go to bed happy about that.

Bad day

Apparently that's what I get when I get near a computer and still have the ability to type drunk. Today has been a pretty awful day. Nothing bad has happened, but I have been in a rotten, inconsolable mood all day. I've tried to dispel it with no success. I need something else to focus on, but I don't have anything. I lie - I can distract myself by applying for jobs there's actually a good chance I can get, and I think that will be my focus tomorrow. Today is just a wash. I basically came home, ate chicken, and cried. I was actually hungry - that's happened occasionally during the past two weeks - but I'm not eating habitually, so when I do, it makes me feel nauseous, and my stomach is not the most sane of creatures at the best of times. However, my skinnier jeans fit, quite well now, and I guess I'm on my way to the much skinnier 2006 jeans, which I have of course, kept. Peeking silver lining.

My car is still dead too, so I have a week or so of essentially being stranded at my house, which is good for the cat, but terrible for me. Well maybe not. I've tried to go out this week and distract myself. I went to Flying Saucer's trivia night, and I even ventured out for a Guinness on St. Patrick's, although that was a mistake because I just had a rotten time.

Tomorrow night's plan of action is to ask for recommendation letters for three jobs I'm applying for, fill out the applications, and sort out my CV so it looks as good as the resume I did last week. I'm quite proud of my resume now. On Tuesday, it looks like I will be stuck here, so I plan to clean the house, listen to music loudly, and sort out my head. I was supposed to have an appointment with the head of graduate studies, but I have to postpone because I have no way to get out there. I guess I just have to listen to my mother and place distractions in my head, even if it doesn't seem like they will actually distract me. At least they will fill the time and prevent my mind from racing around in circles.

Anyway, I'll quit moaning, take some IB Profen PM, knock myself out, and get up and go to work tomorrow. One foot in front of the other. I think about What About Bob: "baby steps to the car."

It's been a year since I've posted on this blog. Am I resurrecting something that's already dead? If so, perhaps that's a theme in my life. Perhaps I am an emotional Frankenstein's monster. You knew it was the monster and not Frankenstein himself, right?

Well that's what you get when you can drink a litre bottle of Gruner Vetleiner and still be conscious. I have to work tomorrow too.

This used to be my Myspace blog. Do you remember Myspace? I remember that it was what the Facebook is now. I wonder what the new Facebook will be. In truth, I'm really sick of it all right now, but I need an outlet to write something, as my friends either are, or soon will be, sick of dealing with me.

I just went through a break-up, and to use cricket terminology, it's knocked me for six. Considering the large amount of wine I have drank and the food I haven't eaten for the past two weeks, I don't want to get into it. I could, but anyone who cares is tired of hearing about it, perhaps even me. I just need to listen to more Snow Patrol, smoke more cigarettes I shouldn't, drink some more Guinness, and eat more chicken and bread, which are the only things that don't taste like cardboard right now. I'm writing this to try to make sense of the whole thing, but even in a drunken state, it doesn't seem like a worthy endevour.

I should just go to bed and go to sleep. I have to get up and work a pointless job tomorrow, so I should be responsible against the odds. Last week I took two days off for a stomach virus. I think I had one, but it could have just been heartache, as I still feel the same and I can't eat. My friends are trying to feed me and I am not interested.