Slow Motion

I think I've mentioned a restless feeling that I've had for the last several months. I'm trying hard to accept it for what it is. Change is coming, change is necessary, change is inevitable.

Go with it.
Accept it.
Embrace it.

But there are some days when I feel like I'm slogging through the same old stuff. My same old stuff. I'm tired of the same old stuff. But change is scary too. Change means moving. Change means action. So here I am, wanting it, knowing I need it, but still not knowing exactly what "it" is. So I stay put instead of really looking inside to figure "it" out.

Hence the title of this post. Slow motion has been my M.O. for a long time. You can see by the look on my face in this photo that slow motion is not working anymore. But that doesn't mean I have to start running either. Maybe just start taking bigger steps.

So this tortoise isn't quite ready be a hare, but the race isn't over yet, is it?

Birthdays make me blue

My two kids have birthdays just over two weeks apart. Now that they are older, their birthdays really just make me blue. How can so much time have gone by so quickly? How can I have kids who are turning 19 and 21? What have I accomplished in these years? Me, me, me. Their birthdays are all about me, after all! (I promise I'm kidding. Sort of.)

Anyway, my baby turns 19 tomorrow, and my first-born is having that milestone 21st birthday in a few weeks. So I'm going to be blue for a little while here. It's life, I guess.

But I was thinking about it while driving around today feeling blue. I was feeling like I needed a little something to help me feel rooted as that whole blueness thing makes me feel a bit adrift. And while wandering a Metropark today I came across this path just dimpled with roots. Well. If that isn't a sign I don't know what is.

It's really not about me. They are their own people now, and I've done my job. I'm here to support, to champion, to lift when they need it, but their lives are their own. And I think I'm going to be okay, too. I'll get past myself and celebrate these milestones with my babies, who are decidedly not my babies anymore.

I'm a Mom

I have given birth to three children. I feel very strongly about my role as a mother. I haven't always done the right thing, I have made mistakes. But I've also done a lot of good things. My kids feel loved, they have confidence, they know they can be independent but that my husband and I are there to support them. I used to feel guilt or remorse about my wrongdoings or things I haven't done but a few years ago I decided that guilt serves no purpose. That what did matter was how I moved forward, that I offered compassion to not only my children but myself. It's made a world of difference in my relationship with them. In my relationship to myself. And the world. So here in this photo I stand behind my son, my youngest child. But I still show myself, because while I think the most important role in my life is to be their mother, I'm still there. I'm still here. I am a mother, but I'm still Jane.

I have read about something called microchimerism, a condition in which women harbor cells that originated in their children even decades after birth. I find that fascinating and beautiful. How have those cells shaped me as a person, as a woman? Have they made me more creative, more loving? How will they continue to shape me as my children grow and move beyond their lives here at home?

It's said you keep parts of loved ones in your heart even after they leave this world. How wonderful it is to know that with my children it's true in the physical as well as emotional sense.

See the Light

As Lisa mentioned on her blog post we went on a photo tour of the Ohio State Reformatory yesterday and since I hadn't done my self-portrait yet for the week I decided to try shooting myself while we we at the former prison. Normally I am very self-conscious about taking posed photos of myself in public, but it wasn't very crowded in the warden's quarters and my friends were all there so I decided to go for it here.

It's the dreaded full body shot again and as I look at this picture I think all the same negative things about myself. I'm heavy, I have a strange look on my face, my hair is messy. Blah, blah. I almost didn't choose this one. I almost went for one where my figure is a blurry, ghostly image. But that's not me, that's not a self-portrait. That's more hiding.

I like this one as a photograph. The light behind me from the windows illuminating my head and shoulders is dramatic and lovely. There's a nice balance here. The sepia tone gives it a soft, gentle quality.

One of my friends once told me they sense a certain light or glow about me, they can see it and they wished that I could see it too. I like to think it looks like this. I like to think that someday I will be able to see the light in myself too.

Locked up

So today I went on a pretty awesome tour of a no-longer-used prison called Mansfield Reformatory. The movie Shawshank Redemption was filmed there, or, at least some of it was filmed there. Jane went, too, as well as a some of our other photographer friends.

I hoped to be able to get my self-portrait for the week while I was here, and there were some decent opportunities for sure. I tried a couple of different shots, too, but ended up really liking this one. This little mirror was affixed to the wall above a high shelf and below some wiring and light sockets on the back wall of a cell. I had to stand on my tip-toes for my face to be reflected in the mirror, and it wasn't easy to hold still for a nearly 4-second exposure.

There was a metal bunk in this cell, too, and the light from the windows in front of the six-story wall of cells was beautiful, although it illuminated some pretty awful realities of what life would have been like here for inmates.

The cells were tiny, there was rust and dust and flotsam and forgotton books and the paint was sloughing off in sheets in some places. It was fantastic. And I am so tired I can barely write, so goodnight.

Revealing While Trying to Hide

I have been avoiding doing a full body shot for this project. The reason is simple. I am fat. I am not comfortable with my size. I often equate my self-worth with my weight. I judge myself harshly and criticize myself endlessly.

I look at other women my size or bigger and I think, they are beautiful. I honestly believe that. Women are simply glorious in all shapes and sizes. Goddesses, in fact.

But I look at myself and I think you are too big, you look terrible, what is wrong with you?

Harsh? Yes.

Correct? No.

I know that I have value, that I am worthy. That my damn size doesn't matter in comparison to all the other things that I am. But still, look at me trying to hide in the grass. Refusing to look at the camera. Hands in pockets. Getting poked by dried sticks. Hoping against hope that somehow I will find something to like in this photograph when I upload it.

I had decided after I took this that I wasn't going to use any shots from this set, they are not exposed well. The composition could be better, etc. Then I studied this one more closely. Those light flares are pretty and the grass is so golden and shiny and I looked at my face and I saw a look of ease and contentment on it. Because it's getting warmer and Spring is coming and I was in a lovely place with my son and my friend nearby. You know what? That's what matters. That's what counts.

I think my heart is starting to really believe that and it shows on my face. My brain is going to catch up to that soon. I know it.

There was sunshine today

I'm just going to admit it and say this weekend has been pretty lousy, culminating with an especially lousy today, lousy for a whole lot of reasons I'd just rather forget about right now. I went to the marsh in hopes of clearing the fog out of my brain and lifting my mood, and I wasn't disappointed. I even got hot enough to take my coat off here and keep it unzipped for most of my trek. I wish I'd brought my snowshoes though, because in some places the snow was knee-deep.

But I'll let this photo stand for a moment of sunshine in an otherwise difficult week. Here's hoping the week ahead is more cheerful and photographically imaginative.

What Do I See?

For this week's shoot, I spent the good part of Tuesday afternoon looking at myself in the mirror. I'll be honest and say that I didn't really have a clear concept of what I was going for, no hidden meanings or deep thoughts. Me looking in the mirror. Some days you just have to accept that there is no grand idea.

I chose this one because there is a little smile on my face. It appears that I'm accepting what I see in that mirror. Maybe even liking what I see? Some days that's true. More so since starting this project.

It might not be a photograph that started off with a grand idea, but it turns out to be one that means something anyway.