Star pills

Recently I started following a 365 photo idea for the day. I get so bored of pics of me, so I decided I could apply some of the ideas to my documenting pics. Today's was a set/4 of a kind. I just so happen to take 4 key pills for pain & muscle relief (along with a denizen of other vitamins, maintenance meds, etc). As I put them out they looked a bit like planets & moons, & I'm obsessed with anything solar related. I did some photo manipulating & dreaming of my pain pills orbiting my brain, trying to figure out what part of me needed them most. Green moon? Off you go to the left jaw...it's locking up & the TMJ is kicking in. Long oval white? Orbit & dissolve some over the left hip then go directly & release in the left sciatic nerve. Purple moon? Ok, top layer goes to the pinched nerve. 2nd layer? Neck ASAP. 3rd layer right side sciatic nerve, & stay through the 7th layer. Go then & rest on the spinal tap site. White meteor? Go full force & crash directly into the brain's pain center. As usual it is misfiring. If only I had a little space ship & I could go & fight myself inside my own head, & fix me with a light saber.

 

 

 

This morning...#HAWMC WEGO day 12

Today we are to start with the given sentence & just free write. 'This morning I looked in the mirror' & immediately looked away. It's funny. I've been documenting my illnesses for almost 5 years now, & most of the pics are self portraits. I don't mind looking at them...even though they are me they aren't. They're the subject of documenting fibromyalgia & how it looks, acts, is. Taking pics & opening myself up to something so vulnerable is a project-a coping mechanism, just like blogging & a pic a day is-it might seem vain but it's a far cry from that. I used to photograph my overseas living, travels, & when I became housebound I had to turn the camera on myself to face what I was becoming. It was a way to learn to live with this new, foreign me in a distant way. Taking it as a project kept it from becoming too personal at first. I was looking at a disease. I hate seeing myself. I hate looking into a mirror. There are days I purposely don't look in a mirror for days, yet I see myself in photo manipulating pics daily. I'm sure it will continue to stay that way, though I know it's not totally healthy. Just trying to make it minute to hour to day to week to month is hard enough.

 

 

Finished reading my 2nd book!

Thanks to my kindle & the ability to read again because of ridiculous 'handicaps' I've finished my 2nd book in many years. It was a far cry from my 1st, Agatha Christie, but every bit as wonderful. Being able to get lost in books again has been so fun. People lose & gain all sorts of things with any longterm illness, & among things like living with my parents, not being allowed to drive, not able to cook much, buy my own groceries, get a normal haircut, wear makeup, & a million other things-small & huge-they add up to a level of grief that's humbling & humiliating.

I finished the first book of The Hunger Games & loved it-yes I'm 41 but her struggles to survive resonated with me in a way that's hard to explain. I watch & now read a lot of gritty things, & a lot of that is because I try & take mental lessons on survival from each story. For some it might be depressing-for me it's training. This pic is a photograph put through 2 apps & I call it the Teardrop Nebula. I think Katniss from the Hunger Games would love it & hate it-hating the emotion of tears & being weak, loving the clouds & stars out hunting in District 12.

 

I'm now reading (& halfway through) The Snowman & a tiny bit through book one of Game of Thrones. One a cracked detective in Norway, & the other a magical mystical world of epic fantasy. They too will be on my survival training guides ;)

 

Sliced life

As many of my fellow sickities or those who know me know I often talk about the old me & this new me. More precisely, as it's been 5+ years, I think I should call it the now me. Today was a pretty decent day-no horrific stress dreams, pain more bearable for the first time in days, watching Justified & Southland & being amazed by such talent & incredible writing-dad finding my favorite veggie Lean Cuisine tofu strips & veggies in a tomato curry sauce, etc. Still though, I woke with a sense of doom. Seeing pics of friends & family on spring break trips thrilled me but made me long for the days of teaching ESL. One spring break I had 2 out of my 13 adult students in Little Rock who didn't have plans, so I took those 2 guys with me everywhere...out for drinks, the movies, anything-as seeing them so happy for their classmates going off on adventures yet sad to be left behind & alone crushed my heart for them. We had a blast, just doing normal things but getting to know them better-Ronaldo from Brazil, & BK from South Korea. BK opened up so much, & Ronaldo & I loved it as he & I were already good friends but seeing BK coming out of his shell was so liberating.

 

Today out in the garage, grabbing a club soda (or magic water as I lovingly refer to it) I saw some of my overseas things & student's gifts in a box, & it was the epitome of bittersweet. I don't know if I will ever fit the slices of my lives together well, but at least I can say on most days I try.

 

 

Did I tell you? Do you know?

I gasp as I have my mouth covered. Covered from my parents hearing me-as I hold my gasp in the palm of my hands, I suck in for air to be met with salty, wet palmed skin meeting my mouth. Dad has gotten me beer as my spinal shots, morphine lacking relief has failed. A last ditched begged effort for pity & relief. Did they hear me? Did I stifle enough? I try so hard as beer is as expensive as medicine that has yet to find me a hiding place.

 

He has bought me full-on Budweiser. The Czech original, corrupted by greedy Americans. I listen to William Fitzsimmons, & the loved Julia Stone on his gorgeous album. On my iPad, I can see it as orbiting planets & moons as far from the original album as I am with relief on the app 'planetery'. I watch as my songs orbit moons. Did I ever tell you how I love space? Did I ever tell you the 'Budvar/Busweiser' story? How many key things did I forget to tell you, as I thought we had all the time in the world? Will you hear this song & know why it makes me cry? I hope I did, or that you find it in my SOS emails. You're so smart-& knew me so well...but did I know it all myself at the time? Will you figure it out? As you travel our world, will you figure it out from my missing pieces?

 

I hope you think of me as I was, as the current has too many tears to stifle. So many tears yet to find.

 

 

Constellation me

After luckily winning an iTunes gift card from a contest the makers of the fantastic Star Walk (& Solar Walk & Geo Walk) I was inspired to buy the photo app, Poly, so I could make constellations of me & my life. Here are a few examples...thanks Star Walk!