Monday, December 20, 2010

The Power of Can't



Five years ago last month I had a massive, nasty stroke, my right half wouldn’t respond, I couldn’t think clearly and emotionally I was devastate. I spent almost a week in ICU and when I reached the general floor I thought what now. No one believed I’d be going anywhere but to a nursing care facility for the rest of my life, if I managed to survive the next few days. I on the other hand, not being privy to the general opinion, was living my life one day at a time, never thinking for a minute that I get anything but better. Each morning and evening I told myself today I’m better than I was yesterday, stronger and more connected. Every task I attempted, very call I made where I got the persons on the other end of the line to help me was another step towards my goal even if I couldn’t see where I really was.

I never let myself use the word can’t, I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t use my right side and I couldn’t think clearly yet. But never did I utter the word can’t, it’s a self-fulfilling word, though. I never thought I’d never walk, never use my right hand, never be able to type or to tie my shoes. Never touch a women, or hold her near. Never again be able to take an image I’d love, never have to think well can I. I knew I couldn’t do thing’s as I used to for now, I knew that I had a long, long road to go before I could/would do those things again. Sure I got frustrated, down for what I’d have to learn to do again. When you use the word can’t, then you give in to what’s affecting you, then in a short a time you surely can’t.

I tried to channel all the people I knew and admired, those who through no fault of their own had fallen. I remembered a friend who had a really bad accident, lost her sense of self, who she was and what she did to make up that complicated self that was so uniquely her. How she had to wear a patch over her good eye so the one that was hurt would slowly get better. Learn how to ask for help without seeming needy or somehow lesser. How I hurt for her seeing the struggles she had, what she couldn’t do and her fear that she never would again. How grateful she was to be treated as normal as I could without trying to wrap her up in bubble wrap.

Or watching as my father began that long slide into a compassionate old man instead of the son of a bitch I knew as a child. I could see the writing on the wall and was preparing for that myself. Not that I learned the compassionate part, I love the son of a bitch in me who wasn’t ready to give up yet. But at fifty seven I heard those whispery wings of old age descending upon me. I was lucky enough to be getting ready, making those step to transition to a time when I could no longer keep the pace I did. And then bang..., in the morning went I awoke I was already there in my future, unprepared and truly having to start over from square one.

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Anxiety


Washed the anti-anxiety medication from my system, for two weeks one tablet every other day, then two week of a half a tablet every other day till I was clean. Now I’m emoting as me, music gets to me, a good video gets to me, the class-less neighbors get to me, and friends I care about can get to me. But at least it’s me again and not some drugged person viewing my life as it unfold around me. I’ve been on medication since my stroke happened five year ago this month. Blood pressure meds, cholesterol meds, and a sleep aid. Five pills in the morning, four pills in the evening and four more before bedtime. Now one less.

I know it doesn’t sound like much, but at least my emotion are getting to be mine regardless of the stroke. I had some real problems when out for a walk, when smells would hit me and when just being me. Sitting in a restaurant I felt like I was about to die, rapid heart rate and the shaky hands and body. I though about getting out of there, but doubted could on my own power. Thought about EMS getting me out, but too much drama and embarrassment to be worth the trouble and expense. So shut my eyes and find a happy place, breath deeply until all the noise around me sounded like a bee hive of activity. Slowly, ever so slowly my heartbeat returned to normal. From the buzzing beehive thoughts of contentment, peace at last. When I returned people looked away, but I didn’t care, I’d managed to contain myself. I was almost me, but not if you get my meaning. If you’ve ever had an anxiety attack you know exactly what I was feeling, if not count yourself lucky.

Anyway two weeks now clean and basically happy, content. Trying to write again (see enclosed) and I feel almost like normal whatever that is or was. Just go with the flow when I feel emotions coming over me. It too shall pass, just trying to feel like me again, trying to be me again. Heard from a friend from my past who told me it had taken her eight to ten years to even begin to recover from her accident. The same friend who I’d thought about in the hospital when my stroke hit. I patterned so much of my recovery around the advice I’d given her. Then I was her with my brain neatly cleaved in half, with the right side of my body not responding to commands. Now I knew just what she felt, how lost she was and how mournful of her life pre-accident. Little grain of truth and hope I’d given her, not realizing how she was beginning to learn to walk again, not realizing how she couldn’t read. Oh well, just one of life big lessons, how to get back all that you’ve lost in the tenuous state of being and not being.

What a long and tortuous way to learn the value of life.

*********************************************


A tidal wash of emotion rakes over me,
tears, rage and happiness;
all emotions in-between.
Awash in feeling long suppressed, long deigned...,
drugged into the background of me.
Years since I felt as me, reacting as me I am me but not quite.
Washed from my mooring, adrift on the sea...,
home port a distant view
with twinkling lights and the sounds of me.
Adrift through the fog listening,
still straining for the sounds of home.

Friday, October 22, 2010

The Year in Review


Well I’ve certainly come a long ways from last year, thanks to hard work and patients. In 2009 my business finally collapsed, just nothing coming in, I admitted that the life I had enjoyed was over. I hadn’t even pickup a camera in over a year and I was scrounging for any mean of support I could find. I’d have robbed banks if I was able to run fast enough to get away, and my right leg was a defiant no go. So I turned to the only weapon I could count on, my brain.

I call my friend network to find out what was available, how could I work out a spot for me. As luck would have it I found a friend who was in need of help restarting a business after a messy divorce. He was down to being a one man shop with only one client left but he wasn’t ready to give up yet. The only catch was it didn’t pay much but if I helped him to recover it might pay more. So at this point it’s still paying not too much, but I can pay my bills, I’m working on catching up on my rent and I have a couple of bucks to tide me over. We’ve got two clients for next year and a third just need to be sold on our services. So all in all I’m not doing so bad, the economy is improving slowly, but it beats being out on the street. So far I haven’t been able to afford to pick up that camera yet, but I’m hoping that next year will be better.

I’ve been encouraged enough to play around with PS, just sort of doodling and seeing what work and what doesn’t, what’s pleasing to the eye and what isn’t. I’m also playing around with some printing idea, off the wall kind of stuff. That with some shooting idea, poses I’d like to try and see which work and which don’t. Have to find a model who’s willing to play and create and is willing to do it for trade if I can sell the idea. I’m sort of back to being a starving artist concept for real this time, not that I wasn’t before, but now I mean it. Of course the best model’s are being paid for there work and most of the new ones want something for they’re time and effort. So do I really, but it just not there right now, and to get there I still need to call on some of my friends.

That’s the good thing about being well known in this business, having friends that you can call on for help and advice. I’m starting to finally make some headway on that score. I’m starting to feel better and more positive about where I am going. I feel like myself again, I can work and not at cutting yards or greeting someone at Wallmart. I’m finally getting myself back, getting my nerve back and being who I was again..., slower granted but it me again. I always liked myself, now I’m beginning to feel like myself again. Making friends and talking again off the cuff again like I always did. You never value something till you lose it.

Monday, April 26, 2010

Gamer


I was reading Jane McGonigals blog, she is the famous gamer who writes games to empower young people to think of ways to change the global makeup of today’s problems. I’m oversimplifying her intent in the interest of space, but you can read about her here. I myself am not very interested in games, a friend of mine has an opportunity to get involved in gaming, and I’m doing some research for her. I read with great interest how in 2009 McGonigals suffered a serious concussion that left her unable to carry on with her work or her life. Feeling of hopelessness, anxiety and depression exacerbated her symptom, and left her feeling even more anxious and depressed. It turn into a vicious cycle that made it harder for her brain to heal itself. She needed a way to say “I am having the hardest time of my life, and I really need you to help me.” So she invented a healthcare game and enlisted her family and friends to play, thereby helping her to recover faster.

When I had my stroke in 2005 I was just dazed for the next two years, I didn’t know where to turn or who to turn to. I needed a longer term plan, one that relied on therapist and my friend to assist me, but deciding how to possibly get better was left in my hands. I had already decided that getting back to as normal a life as possible was my best option. When I could research stroke on the web there was painfully little information, and the hospitals were just deciding to make strokes a major issue. Even my doctor had little help to give me beyond therapy and medication. Each new achievement of mine was greeted with great amazement that I could reach that level of return, and I was soon discharged as having reach a plateau where I was capability of fending for myself.

When I began my recovery I didn’t know what to do, a friend had given me some money to tide me over so I invested in the best computer I could afford. I was interested in continuing with my photography, maybe a return to the field somehow. Or maybe I could start a business on the net, but for the present I could relearn my typing skills, I could do research on my condition and my interest. I figured that in the same way I exercised my body, I had to exercise my mind, build on its strengths and overcome its weakness. So I started out just a few hours a day, typing a few short emails, and play with some of my programs, I even attended a class in Photoshop Essentials to give me some exposure to learning again. Having been a voracious reader, I started with popular books and worked my way up to the classics, like “For Whom the Bell Tolls”. I was even convinced to start this blog, training myself to think and to organize my thought into readable prose. Now some might disagree with me on the readable point, my numbers reflect that, but that doesn’t matter to me. I write for myself and a few good virtual friends, I write for anybody who find me and finds my points of view valid.
I’ve come a long way in the last five years, I have longer still to go, a whole lifetime left to make things normal for me. I’ve managed to get my life in some semblance of order and continue the struggle. But I find I have more peace with myself, more happiness than I ever found before. Yeah there are things I’d change, who wouldn’t. I’ve come a long way, I attend a group session for fellow stroke sufferers and share the lessons I’ve learned. I have a new appreciation for friends now, I’ve learned to value them much more. I’ve gotten past my absolute fear of my future, I’m willing to live one day to its fullest, not count on another till its here. In the end that’s all we can, or should make of our lives. One day at a time.

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Walk


Had my walking dream again, the one where I take huge strides like I’m walking on air. Impossible in my previous reality and even harder now. I still drag my foot a little, not so you can see it but it shows up in the tip of my right shoe. Of course I’m very lucky to be able to walk at all, thinking about that the other day as my friend Cathy and I went for a stroll. When I first was able to walk around the hospital, I had to learn to look around me and not just at my feet. It was so tough to learn how to walk again after my stroke. I learned to tune everything out and just concentrate on getting my feet to move in a certain way, direction I think its called. Then there the whole hip roll thing, coordinating the legs to move and the muscles to feel the step and then to get the other foot into place, all while trying to keep your balance, and oh yeah, you’ve got to watch out for cars as well.

We were walking in a nature preserve so watching out for cars wasn’t necessary, watching out for birds and flowers was. The “trail” was a well defined concrete sidewalk that was handicapped accessible so everybody could enjoy going for a walk in nature. At one point I was looking up in the trees instead of watching my feet, marveling at how good it felt. I know for those of you who live in the north woods somewhere, you scoff at the idea of a concrete sidewalk as natural, and I agree. But I loved being out in the fresh air, watching birds, and the flowers just waiting to be found. It’s a lovely time of year, all the trees a wearing a new coat of bright green leaves and there are wildflower’s of all different color and hue, Indian Paintbrush, Bluebonnets, Evening Primrose, and Yucca too, all in reds and blue and white and yellow, just glorious colors. Acres and acre of colorful flowers good for bees and butterflies and all manner of other creatures, both winged and footed. My friend thought she spotted a fox out for a midday stroll too, but it was just a shade too quick in spotting us and returned to the bushes where it could hide.

It got warm very quickly, temperatures are in the eighties, but the sun is getting much closer this time of year. In another few months time the land and any flowers will be baked within an inch of it life. So too will we, but for now we are enjoying Mother Natures gift to us all for making it through the tough winter of our lives.

Monday, March 8, 2010

Starting Over



I was talking with a friend of mine, reminding him of how we used to talk about the possibilities of going back in time and starting over with what we know now. Wouldn’t that be wonderful, a dream come true, and then it happened to the both of us; much more severely in his case. He was hit by a truck, and left for dead along side the road in the early morning hours, while I was still copping with the effects of my stroke. Like Lin says, you have to be real careful of what you wish for. My friend is slowly returning to normal after having to learn everything over again including how to walk. He still can’t seem to get his leg to work right, but he’s trying.

Me I’ve got a lazy side as they say, I drag my right foot, not so you notice but enough so that the toe of my shoe is wearing faster the my left one. My hand and arm have swept so many glasses and dishes of the counter that I’ve lost count, and I still find it hard to get my head around concepts and ideas. Now how much of this is age related and how much is stroke related I have no clue, I’m learning to just deal with the issues as best I can. But I find it fascinating just the same, the brain is really a most interesting subject. The brain is very plastic, it can and will heal itself given time, and the right treatment. So much of that return is determined by the state of mind, and your will to survive. I know that sound funny, but it’s true, based on how much you loved that life you had, and how much struggle you are willing to put in to get it back. Also how much you have to lose if you don’t, like kids and a husband or wife.

My therapist tells me that family helps, be that blood or the family that you’ve gather around you over the course of life. But I feel it that state of mind that counts the most, at least in my case it did. My psychologist friend tells a story of this older man who’d had a stroke and wouldn’t wipe himself after going to the bathroom. He had the mental and the physical where with all but chose not to, he wanted his wife to do it for him. State of mind is a funny thing, I saw lots of men who welcomed that return to childhood rather than a return to the life they had. Me I couldn’t even stand to have someone hover over watching me while I took a shower.

But that is life as they say, watch out what you wish for because you’re liable to get your dreams good or bad. Kind of like that Monkey’s Paw story I read long ago. You do get the wish you dream of, but life has some funny twists to it and you have to learn to go with those flows, good or bad. So it pays to keep the good thought in your head and heart. Easier said than done, I still have my bad days, but on the whole I like my state of mind. Not any easier to live with, but the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Chaos Behind My Eyes



I’ve always been accused of having such a calm easy going demeanor, nothing could be further from the truth. People just can’t see life from my side of the eyes I look upon the world. True I project what I want them to see and feel while I try to figure out where we’re going photographically. But I am trying to get a feel for the magic of what is hopefully about to happen, giving that chemistry time and space to happen in. Whether in my tiny little apartment studio, or in a vacant house, or farm, or even some field somewhere magic works best when it is unrushed.

I’m often asked by a model what I’m shooting, and if it’s a head shot why are they are nude, that question usually come from the uniformed. I smile and say that I’m studying the way their bodies moves, but it’s so much more. It’s the angles I’m looking at, the way the light plays over the curves, and I’m giving them time to relax and get comfortable with me and themselves so that their bodies move naturally. I don’t usually see a lot of tension in them, after all they agreed to pose nude in the first place, but it takes time for that comfort to grow, and for them to become unaware of me or my camera. It take time for them to grow comfortable enough that they start talking about life, love and their body’s quirks. It take them time to grow comfortable we me, to trust me with their lives as well as their bodies.

My friend Dave has the right idea, getting to know each other for a day or two, go camping in the forest primeval, or just have them around for dinner and a fire, get to know each other as work-mates but as friend also. It pays to have an understanding wife or soul-mate, it helps to have a place way out in the middle of nowhere. But the rest of us have to do the best we can with what we have, and you can build that bond, but you can’t rush it. That bring us back to that chaos I was talking about, remember that.

So much of the chaos comes from knowing I have a lot to make happen in the time allotted me, plus I have to be right on with the technical stuff as well to get the results I want so that final print will turn out the way I want. It’s that terror, that absolute panic that I live to master, to get under control, that delicate dance I must do on the edge of a sword to get the results I want. I love real film, the unpredictably of the medium, any other way seems like cheating to me. I love the terror of it quite the way I love getting to know my models, to tell them they have a nice little tush when really, I mean it.



Dave

Sunday, February 7, 2010

Mea Culpa


Where to begin, first I apologize to all who missed me. I took a break from writing, and concentrated on home and hearth. My health is fine, and my sprites are as well. I’ve been going to group sessions for my stroke, passing on the information I have for people in the same position I was a few years ago. It’s kinda hard on me, being on the same floor I was, walking down the same hallways, but I’m so much better now. I’ve seen the people I’m trying to reach listening to me, taking some comfort from the things I share. The staff too seems to be happy I’m there to give their patients some hope for their future. Each month it’s a new group I interact with, sometimes there’s a hold over, or family members comes back to find help, to get some answers. I try my damnest to be honest as I can, and warn about the pitfalls as well. In the end I guess that’s all I can do to make life easier, to shed some light where everything seems so dark.

I’m making friends with the physiologists, he sometimes share his own personal pain in his life as well. It’s an easy group, almost like talking with family, but better somehow. I guess it’s because I get to go home afterward's , and don’t have to see them till the next month. But it so nice to be able to share things with them, I tell the patients that so lucky to have the services of the physiologist were as I had to figure this out all on my own. I had my stroke too early to get this help, it wasn’t until last year that they figured out that stroke was so debilitating, and that there was good money to be made as well. Funny how the profit motive comes into play, I can’t say that my hands are clean either. I have an idea for a book on my experiences, I’m looking to find out what questions get asked the most. Mea culpa indeed..., but I really can’t see making much money on my project, enough to cover the cost of printing. Fame doesn’t interest me, I’ve seen first hand how much it cost you personally. One loses a lot of their freedom, you are always on your guard in case you say or do the wrong thing when people are watching.

So as I say, life goes on, and I’m lucky to be a part of it. Obviously I didn’t really want to die, and I didn’t but there I was stuck with a mind that had betrayed me. I’ve gone though a lot to get back to almost were I was to begin with so I guess I have a story to tell as well as a life to live. I’ll update as the sprite wills, don’t hold me to a date certain. Life has taken a turn for the better now and I mean to enjoy it, as well as the people who love me.

Saturday, January 23, 2010

I'm Well

For all those out there who were worried, I apologize. Just been caught up with life and keeping home and hearth together. I will update soon, promise.