A great big THANK YOU to the Ja
sarevic family who invited me into the
ir home to photograph their sweet young family. Two of the most beautifully photogenic people I’ve ever seen and an adorable baby girl who is a supermodel in training. I wish you a long and happy marriage and a healthy and joyful family. Thanks again for letting me share a few moments of your life.
The Jasarevic family photos!
Filed under muse photography
We are all related.
Charles Darwin believed that the involuntary expressions of man were directly influenced by his various emotions and sensations. He believed that these expressions grew and evolved by means of natural selection from the expressions and behaviours of animals. He also believed that these expressions, through photographs, would be understood and wordlessly explained by any eyes that looked upon it. He tested this theory by taking photographs of the expressions of people showing various emotions and then taking those photos to small villages (with limited outside contact) and asked those villagers to guess the emotion of the person in the photograph. Every villager guessed correctly – without hesitation.
Emotions are primal. We understand them when we see them in the faces of people we love, and even those we don’t, just like in the animal kingdom, as Darwin had proven. Something that is inately human, is our preference to ignore most of these emotions. We ignore the expressions we see that are filled with rage and look away from faces twisted with grief. We see all of these expressions for a reason, they are built into our design with a purpose. No matter what language or race you are, you will always find understanding – even if it is not acknowledged through words.
I can’t count how many people have said to me that they never know what to say to someone who seems inconsolable. If we are all related through expression, perhaps words aren’t what you need.
What would compassion look like on your face?
-uberscribbler
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Filed under muse photography, projects & events
Extreme Spirit
I’m a thirty-something, a later-on-down-the-road thirty-something, but a thirty-something nonetheless. OK, so I used to be a thirty-something, now I’m a forty-something AND a liar.
Much like you, I’m a very busy person. I am pulled in a plethora of directions by a multitude of people each and every day that I get out of bed. Which, incidentally, is when it all begins. A single day has a month’s worth of activity packed into it and lasts, seemingly, about 20 minutes. I pass strangers on the road, in the coffee shop, and while I’m about my usual business and occasionally I will see one that seems to be … smiling. How is it possible that they have time for smiling? And what are they smiling about? I’m confused, haunted and tormented by their smiles. But ultimately, I want what they have. It’s some sort of ‘oomph’ that sets them apart from the struggling, the downtrodden and the doomed.
Perhaps I just need to rearrange my furniture to be in line with my “chi”, or maybe its much more, like I should be seeing a new age herbalist that will begin with concocting special ‘smiling’ recipes for me that contain eye of Newt and molecules from the Dea Sea, and then I’ll be wrapped from head to toe with spirit blessed rice parchment that will have been painlessly pieced together by nearly extinct rain forest pixies, who will then squeeze their magic tears into my eye sockets each night before I fall into deep slumber.
I may look into that, I believe meeting a pixie would make me slightly giddy, and I haven’t been giddy since I was a twenty-something. However, I believe the truth behind these smiles is less about fairytale elixirs and more about their resolve. Their spirits are uncrushable. Each day is an adventure and their curious minds leave nothing undiscovered. They are life enthusiasts and their grit for adventure extends far beyond the norm. Their passion and vigor can be very contagious and after a little more than a brief encounter with one you find yourself on their mailing lists for dog sledding in Alaska and mountain hiking on Mt. Kilimanjaro. You know these people.
Maybe we should strive to live our lives with just a flicker or a hint of that ‘oomph’. I, for one, am going to stop scowling at the smiling people and instead remind myself to find the adventure for myself that seems to have found them. Something fun, something extraordinary, something good for my health and spirit, and something that will make strangers scowl at me.
I’m not much of a team player, I have problems with sharing, control and authority… and I lie, so traditional team sports are out. I’m far too buff as it is <cough> for free weights, and I bore easily with mindless repetition.
But… I do know a guy who could set me up for a week in a yurt with a magical chanting goat (I’m on his mailing list) and he claims you just haven’t lived until you’ve sung with a Bovidae.
Look, I’m smiling already.
-uberscribbler
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Filed under creative non-fiction, non-fiction
Photography Exhibit Postponed
A great big Thank YOU to everyone who has been involved with the Understanding Meets Hope Photography Project! It has taken considerable courage for the subjects to come forward, welcome me into their homes, and have conversations with me regarding their disease, treatment and their emotional health along the way. Some moments of the conversations have been harder than others, and at those moments these people have selflessly allowed me to photograph their feelings in order to capture some “truths” about what a diagnosis with cancer (or any life threatening disease) can mean when not covered up with humour and bravery. To Mike, Mark, Peggyanne and Beth… words don’t seem adequate enough to express what my heart holds for you. I came to your homes to take your photograph …and left with far more.
I believe in this project and sometimes underestimate its importance… even if just to me. I may have also underestimated the amount of time that should be invested and given to people considering this project for themselves. Since there is no rush, l have recently decided to postpone the exhibit date in order to find a few more subjects for the final display. In the end I want to be comfortable knowing that I did everything I could to get the word out and offer the opportunity to everyone.
Keep checking back for a new Exhibit date! …and thanks for being along for the ride.
~uberscribbler
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Filed under muse photography
The Conquering Ego
When the chips are down, asking for help can be risky business. There are some folks, however, who are all too comfortable leaning on others; they are altogether an entirely different story. For must of us though, asking for help is like making a deal with the devil. It means admitting that we are not the rugged, problem solving individuals that society expects us to be. Once we ask for it, we surrender our control; we become weak, needy and incompetent. We have a tendency to act as though it’s a complete and total character deficiency, as if we are letting our guards down to somehow invite hurt and embarrassment in. God forbid our request for help is used against us. We worry about what will be expected of us in return. What price must we pay for this help since modern civilization has adopted a reciprocal relationship system (tit-for-tat) so that we don’t feel indebted to those who answered our call? There is also the fear that we may present our request to the wrong individual and then suffer with a lifelong hovering and patronizing relationship.
Help me. How can two little words (three if you’re polite about it) have so much drama attached to it? And where did the drama come from? Deep down inside us – in one of our special places – lies an insidious beast that operates solely and inconspicuously on preventing our humility from being nurtured. This beast is Egocentricity. This egocentric thinking keeps us wrapped up in our own definition of a thing, even if it may be false. Most individuals, especially those that genuinely love us, want to help us and more importantly have a need to help us. They derive a pleasure, a personal satisfaction, and a (perhaps fleeting) sense of purpose to something outside themselves – when helping others.
People ask me for help all the time, and I give it… freely. I also know that I don’t judge those that ask me for help, nor do I condemn them to my egocentric thinking. On the contrary, I credit their strength and courage to recognize their limits as well as their willingness to stretch outside themselves to push past what they know – into what they don’t know. And sometimes this means requesting help. How can I consider this to be a strength in others and yet a weakness in myself?
In order for me to even the playing field, I need to let my ego know that I can not be identified on the basis of my achievements – or lack thereof. It should also learn that I have no need to always be right, (even though I do really like to be) and that I am superior only to my former self. I will not concern myself with what others think of me, even if their opinions are valued and loved. Life is not a game to be won, nor to divide it’s participants into groups of winners and losers based on our own egocentrically driven ideals.
Trust, not control, will determine my course. Faith in another, not certainty of outcome, will be my guide. We can’t always know/be/do everything, sometimes we will need help, even if it is just a safe place to express that we can’t always know/be/do everything. I will apply this understanding to myself and I will be better at asking for help, more direct in my approach and with less consideration to my unfaultering ego.
The choice is mine. Now it’s time for a chat with my pride…
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Filed under creative non-fiction, non-fiction
Be Brave… if you feel like it.
Pfizer Canada Inc. has a new campaign. It’s called “more than medication” and it intends to be instructional on improving your health and wellness beyond just the use of medication. It’s a brilliant philosophy; one I wish I’d come up with myself! The site offers a plethora of interactive tools, informative articles and everyday tips that are prepared and presented by an Advisory Board of doctors who are considered leaders in their chosen fields, and on behalf of Pfizer.
You may have seen the commercial for this campaign on TV; with the teenage boy who paints the “Be Brave” graffiti outside the small girl’s bedroom. It’s a very touching sentiment and truth be told I get a lump in my throat each time I think of his gesture toward her.
As touching as it is, I also feel some bitterness about the message painted. We are led to believe that this little girl is quite ill, possibly terminal, and we are telling her to BE BRAVE. Not asking – commanding. Basically, buck up little beaver, suck it up and put on your happy face because it’s much too difficult for us to deal with if you’re sad or afraid. It’ll just be harder on everyone, so it’s better if it’s just harder on you. (That’s not Webster’s definition but its close) So we force a cloak of courage over her and we throw this little girl into battle as a warrior. Does she always have to be brave? Are you always brave? Is it even healthy to always be brave and courageous? By toting this jargon over and over again to the ill or downtrodden we imply that to have fear or show sadness is cowardice and weak. It is implied because we have all learned some associations to our emotions – some are good (positive) and some are bad (negative).
Really they just are what they are… emotions. We determine what we consider good or bad or acceptable or unacceptable. There is no great Emotions God in the sky dictating that we treat some emotions with open arms and that we turn our backs in disregard to others. Granted that some are fun to feel while others are not so much fun, but that doesn’t mean they are bad; or not worth having. We need to stop deciding for other people what is acceptable for them to feel and what we are willing to tolerate from them.
These associations have been around a lot longer than us, and there are plenty more unconscious associations that we make every day. Why does it matter? Each day that you go about your unconscious life you may be unaffected by these associations, but be sure that you affect other people, and sometimes in devastating ways that you aren’t even aware of.
I think I will write to Pfizer and suggest they change the words “Be Brave” into “Today I will be brave for you” or “We’re here” or “You’re loved” or something that doesn’t require our egos dumping a burden of guilt on someone who just might not feel so brave today. It’s OK to be afraid sometimes, let’s tell her that.
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Filed under creative non-fiction, non-fiction, projects & events
A woman with no nose.
As a young girl, I would hang around in my grandfather’s workshop daydreaming the hours away. Above his bench there was a small black cast iron plate that read “I once complained that I had no shoes… until I met a man with no feet”. Even as a young girl that resonated with me. My grandfather and his bench have been gone for 30 years, but that simple quote still plays in my head.
The other day I stood patiently in line for the cashier at the corner Dollar Stop. An old woman in front of me (moving impossibly slow) had far too many packages and bags for her cane to allow, and not near enough nimbleness of fingers to find her wallet and count out her total in coins, which I knew to be inevitability. With her back to me, I passed the time imagining her haggard features and the events of her life that led her to this moment in time where she now stood before me and my ultimate freedom from the store.
In one quick second the old woman lost her wallet to the floor and the coins bounced and rolled in all directions. Instinctively I dropped to the floor to begin the task of retrieval. I quickly gathered her entire payment into the palm of my hand and gently extended my hand to the woman …whose back was still facing me. She turned slowly and deliberately, (only later did I consider it a mustering of courage) and the old woman looked me in the face with the gentle eyes of a long lived life.
There was a white surgical bandage running the length of her face, starting at forehead space between her eyes and stopping just short of her thin and chapped lips. More startling than the presence of this white bandage was the absence of the bump from her nose. The bandage was neatly placed, without wrinkle, and placed as smoothly against her skin as it would have been upon a tabletop. I could hear the insensitive gasps of shoppers behind me and I squared my shoulders to block them from her view. I kept my eyes locked on hers and with a genuine smile I took her small hand and placed her coins into them. Her hesitancy broke my heart and in the same moment I suggested that if she was interested in throwing her money away that she might give me a moment to prepare a bag for catching it. With this small joke the cashier giggled and the old woman smiled and spoke to me for the first time; an offer of thanks and an explanation of age for her clumsy nature. With that, the old woman was gone and I was left with my silent curiosities and a total abandonment of my earlier impatience.
On the ride home the old woman dominated my thoughts. Again I considered the events of her life that had led her to this moment. The courage and strength she must wear out of the safety of her home like a coat and the sheer pleasure of a simple outing to the Dollar Stop. This was a teachable moment for me.
What I take for granted can sometimes be as obvious as the nose on my face.
~uberscribbler
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Filed under creative non-fiction, non-fiction
This bridge is for you.
I’ve been asked recently, by more than one individual, why I’m doing this project. The answer to that runs much deeper than a one or two sentence reply. I do aspire to help people, to be available to them in whatever capacity they need from me, and to educate on the simple cleverness of just being. However the full truth runs deeper still. It’s who I am, it’s who I’ve always been. I’m a traveller… an explorer of humanity and mortality.
When my father was a young man on the cusp of his adult life, he came across a poem written by Will Allen Dromgoole. This poem opened in him the truth of who he was and who he wanted to be. Like my father, I am a bridge builder.
An old man, going a lone highway,
Came at the evening, cold and gray,
To a chasm, vast and deep and wide,
Through which was flowing a sullen tide.
The old man crossed in the twilight dim;
The sullen stream had no fears for him;
But he turned when safe on the other side
And built a bridge to span the tide.
“Old man,” said a fellow pilgrim near,
“You are wasting strength with building here;
Your journey will end with the ending day;
You never again must pass this way;
You have crossed the chasm, deep and wide-
Why build you the bridge at the eventide?”
The builder lifted his old gray head:
“Good friend, in the path I have come,” he said,
“There followeth after me today
A youth whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm that has been naught to me
To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be.
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building the bridge for him.”
~Will Allen Dromgoole
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Filed under creative non-fiction, non-fiction
AM900 CHML Talk Radio Interview
I will be having a 5 minute chat radio interview tomorrow afternoon with Jamie West from AM900 CHML on his “Health Matters” program from 12-1pm.
Tune in at 12:10pm and have a listen!
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Filed under Interviews, muse photography, projects & events, Radio
Muse Photography on Cable14 Coffee Break TODAY!
The interview with Mike Fortune from Cable14 will be airing today at about 25 minutes after most hours and again on the 9th at about 5 minutes before most hours. The producer will be dubbing me a copy and I hope to have that feed onto the website for those of you without basic cable services. Special thank you to the Associate Producer, Kathleen Foster, for all her sincerity and warmth.
This weekend I’ll be taping a feature segment with Cable14 for their LINKED show! Stay tuned for airing details.
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Filed under Interviews, muse photography, projects & events, Television
UberScribbler 