one day, at the swap meet

I am an amateur photographer. I take pics with little thought, just what looks good to me. I'm learning to edit photos with my software and want to learn more about composition and use it when taking pics. I've taken photo classes way back in the day when we actually used film, manually used aperture and shutter settings to achieve different effects, developed our own film with smelly chemicals, and exposed out images onto photo paper in a dark room. I want to learn to be a great photographer

sub·mis·sive: inclined or ready to submit; unresistingly or humbly obedient

I find that a lot of my friends are still angry with my ex. Well, yeah I get that, but more angry than I am. But the reality is, I'm over it. It's old to be so angry. OK, well sometimes he pisses me off, but the amount of time that I really deal with him, it's hardly worth the energy.
Take this birthday party I'm having. I told one of my friends, "R is going to be there", she said, "WHY? How does he know about the party? You told him?" I knew this would be her reaction, and I'd rather she have it now than at the party. So to make it easier for me, I'd rather she know up front because I don't want to deal with drama at a 7 year old's birthday party. Last year when I had my younger son's birthday party he said "is dad gonna come?" How could I not invite him after that? Why would I deny my son his dad? This year, neither of my sons asked, but my ex asked if I was doing anything, so I told him. I wasn't gonna lie, and you know why? Because my son is so excited for his party I didn't want my ex to find out by way of the kids and put them in that position. Like they are supposed to hide things from dad. That's not teaching them anything positive. So yeah, I told him and said he was welcome to come. I can deal with it for a few hours in my day. And his sisters are going to be there and they just love the kids. Actually they don't even talk to their brother, my ex. They would rather visit the kids at my house. They never ask him if they can visit the kids on his weekends. So I have buffers.

I wonder though if my friends think I'm too submissive. The fact is, you get what you give. If I'm clam, he's calm. If I react, he reacts. I found during the divorce process that it's easy to remain quite and calm. Ummm, ok it was hard, but became easier with time. I'm an emotional person and can react to things quickly, so my new demeanor was a new thing to him. It caught him off guard and in most cases I found that this passive aggressive person he had become talked a lot. The less I said, the more he talked. The once quick to respond person I was didn't give into that anymore. So the arguing and bickering over the settlement stopped. And it made life easier. This is something I learned about in therapy. When my therapist told me that I needed to stop arguing back and just take the time to process before reacting by saying things like, "ok, I'll think about it" or "ok, I'll get back to you on that" I didn't want to because then I would be submissive and I didn't want to be submissive. She said "honey, you're already submissive." It was true. How did I not realize that? I had held back a lot because I let hurtful word get the best of me and it just broke my confidence and spirit. But now dealing with each other is much easier, even though we don't always agree or see eye to eye. Now why couldn't we do this and stay married? Because I think therapy helped me a lot and together maybe we could have, but he refused therapy. Just because we are civil to each other now doesn't mean we can co-exist. I have to deal with this guy for the rest of my life, so I'll do what I need to do to make it go smoothly for me and the boys.
I think we're all submissive to a degree. And who cares. Just make sure you use it the right way.

I like music. Lots of music

Driving in the car one day my mother says "I'm always surprised by your choice of music. I always expect you to be listening to something loud and crazy"...I had on Mumford and Sons at the time. I agree, there was a time that all my music was "loud and crazy". I guess I've toned it down in my old age, to a degree. I mean, come on, I used to listen to the Sex Pistols for Christ's sake. My own mother knows this is not my typical music. But I have to admit, I've gotten exposed to a lot of different music over time and I like it. Sure, Jason Mraz sounds nothing like Kurt Cobain, but even I don't think everything I listen to has to have that same raw aggressiveness that the early 90's had. Or the electric drum beats of the 80's. I've think I've been overexposing myself to new music. Almost like a challenge for me to like it... new music. Like it was wrong of me to still have Depeche Mode or Duran Duran on my iPod. Then one day I realized, why can't I still listen to all my old fav's? Heck, my mom and cousins still listen to "oldies", so why can't I listen to my "oldies". Those were some of the best times I had. Sleeping out all night in front of the record store before they started that whole wristband bullshit! FIRST COME FIRST SERVE! It was an amazing experience. I didn't do drugs or drink, I just liked being there. Me, my friend Viv and a hundred other crazy people out there for one goal, floor seats. In the morning my dad would come to the record store with chorizo burritos and hot chocolate for me and Viv. I felt so special, but it was probably an excuse to make sure we were ok. I don't blame him if it was, but I didn't think of it that way. My parents would always take us to these concerts and I mean all over the place. Man I lived for those concerts. The first concert was Rick Springfield at the Great Western Form. We were 15 years old and from then on it was concert after concert. Depeche Mode at the Rosebowl, Social Distortion at the Paladium, The Ramons at the Reseda Country Club, B-52's at Irving Medows. I even made my way on stage at an OMD concert and did the famous 80's dance with the singer before being escorted out by security. Once I started to drive, there was nowhere I wouldn't go. A few of my friends and I even went up to San Francisco for a Tibetan Freedom concert at Golden Gate Park where Rage Against the Machine, Smashing Pumpkins, and Red Hot Chili Peppers played, to name a few. Ahhhh, music festival. Been to plenty of those, including the first Coachella Festival, Weenie Roasts, and Lollapaloozas. Yup, those were some fun times, which is why I still connect so much with those bands and those songs. I don't dislike all new music, but I'm very selective about it. I mean, I really have to like it. So blending my music is not a crime, like I made it out to be in my own head. I've got my old stand by's back on the iPod and I still love going to concerts. Old bands and new, I'm there.

If this is what it was all for, then I'm OK with it

I was sitting at my desk this morning at work when a dear friend of mine came to me in tears. She feared her sister's cancer was back because she had developed a rash in the same place where she had radiation therapy years ago. This happens to me a lot. When every someone gets cancer or know someone who has or had cancer, they feel compelled to come to me. I'm not sure if they are seeking answers, comfort or both. I'm not complaining; it's actually an honor that they feel comfortable to be so vulnerable with me. That my own experience with cancer makes it easy for them to come to me with question or just a shoulder to cry on. My diagnosis of Hodgkin's Lymphoma was way back on Nov 13, 2001 and after 7 months of chemo, here I am. I remember the last day of my chemo was the same day another person at my work was diagnosed with Lymphoma. Ever since then people will come to me about their own cancer experience.
My friend's sister has been on a rough road. On top of her own cancer experience several years ago, her son was born with a heart defect and has had numerous surgeries. He is right now dealing with some non-cancerous tumors in his head near his brain. He's had nerve damage in his face and may never regain feeling. This family has been thru so much, and my friend has been keeping me posted about her nephew. But today she reached her breaking point. I told her that her sister has been under so much stress, and maybe it was stress related. Or perhaps it was just a long term side affect of the radiation she had. I said, at least we can be thankful that this didn't happen while her nephew was still in the hospital. He was just released last week, and they were all home now. It would have been hard for the family to have both the son and the mom in the hospital at the same time. Not to mention, she would not have been able to be with him in the hospital, or maybe even be able to bring him home herself. I told her to put the thought of the cancer coming back out of her head for now until we know what this is and gave her a hug. And then, after lunch, she got the good news. Not cancer! Her sister developed cellulitis, a potentially serious bacterial skin infection that usually starts in the lower leg, but luckily she acted fast and sought treatment early enough. They are going to keep her in the hospital for a couple of days so they can keep an eye on it and give her antibiotics thru IV. I told my friend, her sister will get the to rest she needed now; she agreed. It's easy to take care of all around you, that you forget to take care of yourself. Things happen for a reason and although I'm not a religious person, I do believe that God doesn't give you more than you can handle, no matter what the outcome is. When I left work my friend was so happy again. Happy that here sister was not going down the cancer road again and was going to be fine. I'm glad she let me be there for her