my week in a nutshell

landlord drama > i really was supposed to go to the office on tuesday, but decided to go wednesday since tuesday was a busy day and the other days previous fell on Labor Day. An angry landlord ruined those plans. I tried to collect money I was owed and pay. I had to have $270 by 10pm or I would be out of a home. I got the money as you might guess. In the middle of that, though, I ended up talking to my mom about some things along with the rest of my family. They all spoke to me in turn, saying that I should have come to them with the issue and that much sooner than I did.

This I can understand. "We're here for each other..." they said.

At the same time, I know that they all have their own struggles; I don't want to include them if I don't absolutely have to. I didn't want to. I'm just being stubborn and trying to do this on my own. It's being an adult; you make mistakes, life is a bitch sometimes, and you pay for that or deal with that or whatever.

In the middle of this, my mom throws out an interesting set of statements and questions. She reminds me that I have all these people I hang out with and have at the house. I'm always with them. I give them rides and take them to different places and all this. Of all of these people (and this includes the people I live with), 100% of them knew I was struggling.

100% of them knew I was unemployed.

100% probably had a good idea that I might not make rent.

0% of them stepped in to so much as say, "I'll help you out for now and you can get back to me later..."

Just me left to fend for myself with no job and no income to speak of. To say the least, this is troubling. Not having to find the money, but the words that my mom said. "Outside of this family, no one loves you or cares about you or what happens to you." I want to fight that belief with all of my heart, but looking around tells me that there may be truth to her words I don't even want to deal with.

That will be its own adventure in reevaluating things. I don't want to. Not now. I want to believe that someone is thinking of me even if they aren't in a position to help me. One thing she said that is especially poignant was "friends are there for you without having to be asked." If that's the case then....

tired of being broke > I'm looking for money and jobs and this and that and it never ends. Not having a job for so long has fucked up so much it will easily take me a month of having a good paying job and three months at an average one to catch everything up. I'm so tired of trying, but if I don't I'll have no water, electricity, food or home. I'm really doing everything I can. I'm making websites (like this one and this one) to get money while I'm looking for jobs. The hardest part is always having to try to stay ahead of myself and get everything paid on time. This is frustrating.

more about me > I have all these little things I'm having fun with. Some more than others. Dani and I are becoming... I think closer is the correct word, but then I'm not sure (as I'm not with most things around that). It is what it is and I am enjoying it without a thought to what it will be in the future. I have no set plans accept to just continue to move toward what interests me (as I am sure Dani will do the same). Finally got a little prepaid phone, but it's only for emergencies. I want to use it a lot more, but that in in time I guess.

finally > i have pictures to post and commentary for each... almost. Summarily, at someone's request (and my own oddly intense desire to do so), I took pictures of myself. For my own odd reasons, I took pictures at odd angles to my own. Some came out well. I took those, cropped them a bit, then branded them and now they are ready to post.

This one was a bit fun. Just propped the camera on me and snapped a shot. Three gradient layers and a few dark letters later (Segoe UI I think and Arial Black if you like the typography). Dani commented that my bellybutton looks like an eye. I think the part of this picture where the belt buckle lies is eye-shaped. Funny. I titled this (and the others in this series) GONELOOPY for a few reasons. On the surface, because of my pant and belt loops. These are also out of character shots for me to share with anyone. At the same time, I like the direction this may take.

Some of the photos I took today were in black and white as I was wearing a fair bit of white today during these shots and my skin tone makes a nice grey. I also avoided taking pictures of my face although pictures of my mouth were okay (lends itself to mystery and imagination). I almost wanted to keep the red tones in the necklace, but meh.

This one bothered me for a while. I really didn't know what to do with that. I had a mattress in the shot since I was lying on the bed and decided to take this shot with my shirt open thinking, "Well, it's nice and has a semi-seductive feel..." but the mattress without the sheet made it look horrible and it was even worse to try to take another picture, so blah. I just went to photoshop and added a great deal of white light and contrast to the picture to help everything and age the look of the picture a bit. It helped immensely.

This one I took about five shots to get. Not a whole face shot, but definitely the mouth (for the sake of mystery). That is working pretty well for me right now.

This was another one with the shirt on that I liked, re-colored a little, and kept. Now I need to pick one of these for my new dAID icon. Votes are welcome.