Who's That?

This is wrong. 

As I looked I to the mirror I could see the lines around my eyes - deep creases from dehydration and years of stress. This life has not been kind to me. But it's not the lines I feel are wrong. Those are all earned. 

This isn't me. This isn't my face or my body. I'm trapped inside a strangers body and there's nothing I can do about it. I look I to the mirror and I have no idea who that person is. I know who I am, but the face in the mirror? She's a stranger. She always has been. 

My family is not my family. My face is not my face. Even my hands are borrowed from someone else - someone who's meant to be in this body. Someone who fits. I don't fit. 

I have no idea what I would look like if I were in the correct form, but I do know this isn't it. I do know that this isn't who I'm meant to be. I just don't know why I ended up here or how I got here. 

And I'm lost. 

I'm trapped within a stranger and there's no way out until the end of all things.

Sin and Repentance

Through some weird fluke, my blog about being kidnapped, raped, tortured and nearly sold into human trafficking has become a hugely popular post on Pinterest.  It's everywhere, earmarked with the same $20 you see here.  Almost anywhere you see this scan on Pinterest, it will point you straight back to my blog.  

That story is NOT SAFE FOR WORK.  It's also NOT SAFE FOR CHILDREN OR CHURCH.

It's a dark story about a horrible past filled with hideous monsters and forgotten children.  If you're interested, I'll post a link at the bottom.  Be warned, it's not for the weak.

The standard description I've found from people blindly sharing this blog on Pinterest like mindless sheep is as follows:

Such a good object lesson about repentance and sin - 20 dollar bill still has the same value even when wrinkled or marked on...our value never changes in the eyes of our Heavenly Father. The atonement allows us to repair damage and become clean. We must trust in the Lord and see ourselves as our Heavenly Father does.

My own standard response is simple enough:

I was glad to have readers, but I felt it was severely false advertising. Now that I know you had not read it before hand it makes more sense. I believe the original pin-er used the $20 from part one as the object lesson somehow but I was entirely lost on that idea. The $20 was not symbolic, it was just a catalyst. Try reading the story. It's about rape and human trafficking.

But I got this in response.

I pinned this days before reading it, as I do with a lot of things. I thought there were some significance between the $20 bill and forgiveness. I had absolutely no idea it would be a story of rape and torture. So therefore you are wrong! I am not part of the problem. Ignorance is what I'm thinking you are part of.

Now, I'm fairly new to Pinterest.  In fact, I only joined the site in order to try to stop the spread of this particular story before too many children got their hands on it.  I'm left with two HUGE questions...

• #1.  Is it standard practice for people to post things WITHOUT reading them or even looking at them first?  I put a disclaimer on that particular blog in order to END the trend.
• #2.  Is she blind, or did she not see that mirror standing in front of her face when she started pointing fingers at me?  I'm the ignorant one, while she's perfectly innocent as she sends children and church attendees to a blog post about rape, having them believe it's about sin and repentance?

So, as is my usual fashion, I responded.

Point one finger at me, you have three pointed back at you. You actually share stuff without even bothering to LOOK at it. You point KIDS to a story of rape and torture and human trafficking. And call me what you will. If I can live through that, I promise your words will have ZERO impact on me.

It's MY blog. I enjoy having readers. What I do NOT enjoy is having THOUSANDS of hateful emails sent to me over the course of a couple DAYS because someone (like you) thinks this is a CHURCH story. I've gotten more hate mail than Merle Dixon! That's far more of a pain than you pretending to NOT point in the mirror.

And since it's finally down (6:05pm on 11-12-14) I'd say this blog post was a success.  Thank you!

To read the original story,  Visit This Link

Photography and Me

Almost every detail I learned about photography has been because I stood in front of the camera for so long. But I've learned a LOT recently just by standing there and pressing the button. I'm still in front of the thing, but - hey - it works.


Guess what I'm saying is that I ain't no dummy. If I wanna figure something out, I usually do. It only took my ten years to get the courage to REALLY try, but I've finally got it. 

Always wanted to learn how to be a photographer....

Man's Vanity

Vanity Has a Face. 

I went to the hotel gym tonight. It's rare that I'm ever joined by anyone, but tonight was different. Tonight I was joined by two people - two men - at different times. 

These two did NOT know one another, and yet there was an instant competition between them. There were two mirrors and a myriad of weights. I'll let you guess what took place after that. 

I was in the treadmill, going for one hour at 3.5mph (I'm working my way up to running). In that time, these two chased one another around the gym, kind of like a "follow the leader" game, each trying to out-do one another with reps, all the while admiring their groaning and strained reflections in the mirror. 

I can understand watching the mirror to make sure you're keeping good form, but when you're making expressions that make me believe you're the unholy offspring of Sly Stalone and Arnold Schwarzenegger, something needs to change. 

There was more spit on the mirror than remained in their mouths. If I hadn't watched it all happen, I wouldn't have believed it, and I probably would have believed someone had decided to make out with the mirror. Yes, there was that much slobber on it. 

Vanity has a face, and it's making a HORRIBLE grimace as the hernia forms. Vanity, thy name is GYM-MAN! 

Yes. They're laughing. 

Art by Allen

This incredible piece of photo manipulation is one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Not in that it's an image of me, but in that it shows who I see MYSELF to be - the scared girl, fading off into the background, disappearing into oblivian - all while taking it in stride. 

I can feel my world fading away... I can taste the air turning sour around me... and yet I know that it's useless to stand and fight against it. I've been fighting this oblivian all my life only to continue facing it year after year. 

So here I am, fading away to a distant memory of people I thought would always be there. I'm already gone from their lives - they've been staring at a blank brick wall for months. 

Incredible art, Allen. Thank you. 

And please comment with a link to your work. People should be able to see it all. 

You made me cry. I love it. Thank you. 

Forgotten Girl

I've never been one of the "popular" people, rarely garnering an invitation as a child to a birthday party.  I was shunned for most of my school life, hardly ever making an appearance at school dances, and if I did, usually alone.  I'm not ugly and I'm not antisocial - but I'm not the 'average' girl.  I never have been. 

What does this mean?

I don't dress the way other people dress.  I have my own sense of fashion, mostly contrived of multiple styles, including those of Audrey Hepburn, Shirley Manson and the country life.  It's a very strange combination, I admit.  But it's MY style.  Too often today we see people who dress exactly like some star or celebrity.  The masses line up to purchase not just A little black dress, but THE little black dress with gray piping that was seen on Ashley Tisdale last week, or whomever they're following these days. 

I don't do the things other people do.  I was born an old soul.  I watch old 1940's films when I'm feeling low for a pick-me-up.  I don't drink to excess and I never really have been into that sort of thing.  In fact, I can't stand being around drunk people.  I don't do drugs of ANY sort and don't tolerate those who do.  Peer pressure doesn't exist to me.

I don't watch or say or think what other people seem to think everyone should.  I'm my own person.  In the end, this means I'm very much alone.

I have VERY few friends, and the list diminishes exponentially as I write this, since I seclude myself away from the heartbreak and torment I feel when I'm around a bunch of people who couldn't give two shakes for me.  I thought I had friends, and maybe I still do (some of them) but when so, so, so many have just faded away into their own lives, forgetting I even exist, or that I once thought of them as my BEST friend, it becomes increasingly difficult to imagine a time when I had so many friends I couldn't see them all in a month if I tried.

I've been very much alone for a very long time, but since my best friends have become nothing more than the occasional acquaintance these days, there are fewer people to talk to.  Fewer hugs in my world.  Fewer messages of kindness.  Fewer human interactions.

There's one person in my world I see regularly.  One.  There's no "girls night out" for me.  There's no "salon day" or a "let's go for a walk in the park today" friends.  There's no "lets hang out a the beach" anymore.  There's not even a "wanna grab lunch" girl time for me.  There's one person in my life.  ONE.  The rest of the world moved on without me.  The rest of the world doesn't need me.  The rest of the world forgot I exist.

I was recently told I was remarkable to have lived through what I've gone through and keep smiling.  Well, here's a surprise.  It's not all smiles.  It's sadness and depression and avoidance and loneliness and doubt and a pathetic freaking mess.  That's who I am when the door is closed and I'm the only one home.  That's the REAL me.  That's the "me" that gave up.  That's the "Me" nobody gets to see.  That's the forgotten girl.

That's what I have become.  The Forgotten Girl.

Apocalyptic Kindness

From a dream...








Darkness loomed over me in the hallway.  I'd been leaning against the wall, but my strength was beginning fail me finally. It had been too long, to many days, too little sleep.  I was amazed I had survived this long.  I had no idea how I would keep going.

The world had gone to Hell outside, and somehow I found myself standing in the hallway of an ex-boyfriends home.  It was all but abandoned now.  The home once teeming with life and people felt empty; abandoned.  Tears burst from my eyes and silent sobs shook my aching, tired body.  With my back against the wall dividing the hallway from the kitchen, I began to slide.  Slowly at first, my knees finally buckled and I collapsed in a heap on the cold hardwood floor, hugging my knees.

I thought about all the people who had died already as I stared at the wood grain in the floor.  I wondered if I would ever again see anyone I knew, or even if I would survive another week.  The world was ugly now, people had progressed past killing one another for water into killing one another just to have less competition for survival in the world.  I stared at the mud on my shoes and ankles as I asked myself over and over in my mind why it was I had decided to come to this particular location.  I knew I wouldn't be welcome there.  I knew they would have turned me away if they hadn't been gone already.  At one time, I had adopted them as though they were my own family.  But that was long ago.  I was a stranger to them now - another bit of competition for survival.  I was another obstacle, another easy target.  I meant nothing to my ex, and I was pretty positive I would mean nothing to the rest of the family.  Just another mouth to feed.

But the door had been open and I knew the family was long gone.  They had packed up their RV's with the dogs and survival supplies and were gone.  They were probably hundreds of miles away by now, avoiding the main roads, searching for isolation, escaping the madness.  They were doing what I knew I should have done weeks ago.  They had gotten out.  And with them disappeared my last inkling of hope that I would survive that night. 

I hadn't seen my ex's nephew in a few years, but without looking, I knew it was him.  He always towered over everyone at well over 6' tall, and yet he walked with a quiet grace so rare in the noise of the world.  His heart was just as tender as his steps, and as he crouched low to put a kind hand on my shoulder, I realized I hadn't known another human's touch in months. 

I had no friends or family.  I had nobody in the world I could rely on but myself.  The only souls I'd known any form of love from were my furry companions - two cats I lived with before everything went to Hell.  But here was Jeff, offering a hand of friendship, a touch of compassion and caring in this world where such things had completely disappeared.

I leaned back against the wall, not wanting to look him in the eyes.  The relief I felt at knowing there was still kindness and life in this world was too much to keep in.  In a maddening moment of great depression and exaltation, I burst into fat cries of joy and sorrow.  My lips curled back in a childlike grimace filled with the confusion and pain that came with emotional outbursts.  He put his arm around me, I collapsed my head into his shoulder and sobbed great, increasing, hulking, massive sobs.  And Jeff, my former boyfriends nephew, did nothing but hold my shoulders and let me cry.