A Ripple in the Pond...
I have been invited to participate in what I believe is an incredibly important project, Project Nightlight is an organization that empowers kids to report abuse. They mentor and educate abused children in foster care and are trying to spread national awareness about child abuse.
I will be donating services, prints, and coupons to their silent auction and have offered my time mentoring kids in my area.
After looking for some time for a domestic violence shelter to donate my services to and being rejected time and again for insurance reasons, I am very very very excited about being given this opportunity to help.
It is interesting how I wanted to help battered wives...got pregnant and two weeks later get a random call from this organization asking me to help with abused kids.
It is a travesty how many children quietly suffer at the hands of the ones they love, most of them not knowing that what hurts is wrong. The saddest part is that some of these children don't grow up able to function in life; instead, devout of the tools they need to cope with their past, they buckle under it and succumb to a downward self depricating spiral of self loathing, addiction and in many cases, early death. If we can do something, anything, to throw a pebble in the great pond, who knows how far the ripple will travel...the important thing is that you stepped up and threw in that pebble. I want to be one of those people doing something instead of just talking about it.
www.projectnightlight.org
Do something. If not for this cause, for one that means something to you.
Knocked the fuck up yo
So yeah, I am pregnant. Not planned but thrilled nonetheless. I thought I was done having kids, thought my son would be an only child and I would only have to suffer the horrors of pregnancy and childbirth once. Alas, that is not my fate. I am eight weeks and have been feeling like holy hell for all 8 of them. I knew immediately I was pregnant eventhough the first two tests came out negative. Aside from the morning sickness that spans from waking to sleep, I have this lovely creepy skin crawly feeling, mood swings, heightened sensitivity and am constantly tired. I already am not fitting into my clothes and had to go maternity shopping. Who the fuck makes these clothes? Somehow I will find a way to make them cool and yeah I looked online and while couture ultra low rise washed denim jeans are cool looking, I am not paying $250 for them. Old Navy Maternity is my not so fashionable friend. Oh and the acne and burping. Not only do I get to get fat again, I get to have zits and belch. I won't have to worry about fears of sex during pregnancy because at this rate, Sean finding me attractive is as likely as him parting the Red Sea. But alas, in another 7 months, this baby will be out of my body and I can enjoy him/her. Don;'t get me wrong...I value and appreciate this baby more than anything but truth be told...being pregnant sucks.
I feel like I suddenly went into some weird social exile as no one calls or emails anymore wanting to get together. Suddenly, I am an alien that people don't understand. Thank God for Sean. I am lucky enough to have a man who adores me and is very understanding of my condition. He rocks but alas, I am going fucking stir crazy. So I turn to my art.
For the last few months I have been working on my Retrotica book and I am burnt out on it. I love the project but I am tired of shooting the same thing and I needed to get back into my art. Free from direction or purpose. Just let it take shape. That is what the last several pieces have been about. Freeing myself from a self imposed label. I do not want to be a pinup photographer or a fetish photographer. I despise all of the hype and scene that comes with either of those labels. I just want to be an artist. I am getting back to my core as an artist. The dark air is sexy to me. It is romantic. Weird things are intensely romantic to me like telling Sean we are doomed to be together and a lyric in a song that says "I come up only to pull you under". Makes my heart warm.
I decided I am going to shoot every single girl on the books on green screen, just one set on chromakey so I can revisit them later and create so I don't pigeonhole myself into one thing again. I need diversity to maintain inspiration.
That makes me soul happy.
