Category: judgment

Photo a Week Challenge; PINK 2/14/19

I can be so judgmental sometimes….

Like Nancy says in her challenge for us this week, I’m also not much of a girly girl. And unlike Nancy, for whom pink  “is never my first choice of color for anything”, in days passed, I actively disliked and avoided PINK.

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But I am cursed (yes, and blessed) with the drive to find a lesson in anything I “actively dislike”.

I wrote about PINK once before.

Some one gave me a gift…a polar fleece vest…in the ugliest color…bright fuchsia?! Not a color I would ever choose or wear…too fake looking….I didn’t even like people who wore this color. AND, didn’t the person who gave me this ugly thing, know that pink is way too “girly” for me? I put it in the closet…way in the back…

A couple of years later, I am on a Spring walk with my camera, in search of new flowers. I come across a stunning flower, the brightest color for miles around (or so it seems). I have these thoughts, “there are so many colors in Nature that we just have not been able to duplicate. We don’t even have names for some of the colors we see in a sunset or a flower. This flower is a spectacular color!! I wish I had something to wear in this color…”

I pick just a blossom leaf or two to take home. I put them in my pocket.

That same week I am doing a closet downsizing for a Goodwill run and find the never worn, long-forgotten ugly pink vest tucked way in the back…..and then I remember those bright colored petals!

 

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Can you see the petal??

I blushed about the same color!

Needless to say, it has become one of my favorite things to wear. I even got socks, a scarf and shoes with a stripe in the same color!

Now I’m wondering if I owe my gift-giver an apology…….

 

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So I had to get to the bottom of this. Why such a strong reaction? It’s just a color, right?

Way too long a story (including a couple of years of hard-core therapy) later, I traced my prejudice back to a relatively off-handed comment from my Aunt. I had run away from home at 15 and ended up living with her in high school. She sewed these beautiful clothes for me, whole outfits for daily and church wear, as well as various Prom-type formal dresses. Always in hues of pink.

My favorite color is blue, since very early childhood, and my Aunt knew this so one day, I asked her to make me some thing BLUE. Her response, the casual remark I mentioned above? She said, “No, pink is better. Then the boys will all think you are still a virgin….”

I was shocked and protested, apparently way too much, because it was a disagreement we were still having when she was on her death bed. She never believed me and I never forgave her for that.

Still painfully ironic today because no budding young Flower Child, Hippie-Chick, California Girl in the 1960’s ever successfully fought harder to “save herself for marriage” than I did.

Talk about swimming against the tide of the sexual norms of those days!

So when I finally became more “enlightened” by the late 60’s and early 70’s, apparently I buried the reason for, but still held on to the active dislike of all things PINK!

Aren’t you glad you asked??

Oh wait, you didn’t…another bright pink blush here…

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I have since fully embraced PINK in all its hues and tones, in nature, as well as in my decorating choices.

 

Here’s an example, if you feel inspired to read more about it. I wrote it to anchor the gratitude I have come to feel for my ancestors (especially my Aunt) and all their powerfully feminine (and PINK) influences in my life.

https://chosenperspectives.com/2017/05/24/heritage-for-wpc-5-17-17/

 

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Faded photo from 1965…outfit all pink, including the shoes!

Thanks for reading and I really love comments, especially when my vulnerable, pink insides are kinda hanging out there for all to see….

 

https://nadiamerrillphotography.wordpress.com/2019/02/14/a-photo-a-week-challenge-pink/

heart break….

FIRST, here is a music video to play, softly, in the background as you scroll down to read this. ALL the words are not quite right but the sentiment of the chorus is perfect.

 

I walk up and down my long, dead end street (the equivalent of about three city blocks) 2 or 3 times, every day, all year round. Not very far for an athlete but a good number of steps for me.

I love my neighborhood. And I love to take pictures of the things I see.

I have a favorite tree…

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Looking East at sunset
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Looking West
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When she undresses in the Fall, she blankets the entire neighborhood with her clothes.

This tree is huge, old, lush and glorious. I love to stand under her when it’s pouring down rain. You can stay completely dry and the sound of those heavy drops smacking her leaves and then bouncing off is amazing!

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My neighborhood is changing so much these days. One by one, the older homes are being flattened, in order to be replaced with huge and mostly beautiful new houses.

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My son grew up (part time) in the “yellow house”, two doors away. They had a pool, and a kid exactly his age. For a time, when the neighborhood was full of young, single Mom’s, we would babysit each other’s kids and on Friday nights, we Mom’s would have a “progressive” relaxation evening. We’d go from one house to the next, to the next, for snacks, and wine. Among us, we had an outdoor Sauna, a hot tub, a pool and we’d finish at my house on my deck. I had the best view of the sunset.

Other great families have lived in the yellow house too over the years, but…..it has been the next one to bite the dust.

What a back ho and dozer can do to a home on purpose, in just 2 days, is exactly the same thing we see on the news, someone living in Tornado Alley, whose home gets flattened in minutes.

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Yellow House…….. gone…

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Looks just like what’s left after a tornado

 

I get this, intellectually, but I have so much judgment about it…the waste, the destruction of usable space, and the loss of history. At least, this builder is big into recycling, re-purposing, and replanting. He (and the owners) saved as many bushes and plants as possible and offered them to the neighbors.

But to me, personally, what is way more painful, is murder of the trees. I know that’s a dramatic (and controversial) way to say it, but what else can you call killing a huge living thing that’s been here since before you were born??

I’ve written about this before…kind of like eulogies, but I think each one of these ancient stately beings deserves at least that much when they are taken down.

https://chosenperspectives.com/2016/10/05/tree-daily-prompt-from-chosenperspectives-10-5-16/

 

There is a young, mystery ecologist on the street and I’m just sure she wrote this sign the day the heavy equipment showed up at the yellow house…and she pinned it to my favorite tree.

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but they didn’t….

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So disrespectful of her remains…

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I will miss her so much, and I am committed to working on understanding the perceived necessity of her demise.

This may be all that’s left of her…

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But THIS is how I will remember her!

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my beautiful favorite tree…THIS is how I will remember her…

After the Queen interlude, see if you can put yourself all the way in the following short video…so you can meet my friend. Volume UP! (You may have to scroll up and down while viewing to see the whole thing.)

 

 

 

VJWC (VJ’s Weekly Challenge) 10/22/18- theme River

Here’s my entry for VJ’s weekly challenge, River. Her’s is great and worth a visit!

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #20: River

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I ran away from home when I was just a kid…I mean, a LONG way from home.

Left my beaches and my ocean in San Diego, and headed east in search of peace.

Ended up in Natchez, Mississippi, and lived with relatives I thought could save me.

I guess they did, but not how I had hoped they would.

I lived in Natchez throughout high school, learned very hard lessons about education, religion, music, politics, and friends.

Left there in search of my adult home, and for people less confusing. In the deep South, they were, and still can be, the most warm, open, loving, giving people you will ever meet…and some are also historically and genetically predisposed to be filled with hate and prejudices. Dual Realities.

But that river. She really gets under your skin and draws you back and back and back again. And I’m glad she does because without her pull, I never would have ended up with the love of my life, James. Natchez was his San Diego.

So we go to visit as often as we can. Ol Black Water, indeed. (sound track for your visit to THE River.

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James is home here

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a 3 brothers reunion at the River

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Water_(song)

V.J.’s Weekly Challenge #20: River

Suspicious Radiator! Story Two from Epic Road Trip (in reverse order)

Bright and early on the day before we were to leave Natchez, Mississippi for home, we took the Toyota van in for an oil change and return-road-trip check up. We expected this to be a quick, hour long process as we were booked solid with last minute wedding preparations for my cousin’s nuptials and reception that evening.

After some time waiting they came and told us we needed a new radiator, that this one was shot and that it was leaking coolant everywhere. News to us as we had seen no leaks and had had no problems. They showed us the huge puddle of coolant under the car and the supposed damage to the radiator.

There’s a saying that applies to men, about certain body parts being held in such a way as to trap said man.

I don’t know what the comparable saying is for women…”they had me by the ovaries“???

But anyway, clearly the radiator was NOW hemorrhaging fluid so we had to agree to a new one…which they of course, had in stock, right? So they said anyway. After waiting a few more hours of crucial wedding errand time, they finally informed us that the new radiator had to come from Vicksburg, a mere hour and 25 minutes away. So they gave us a loaner car.

Right up until their closing time, which coincided exactly with the wedding start time, they still had not received the new radiator. This was no small deal. We had to make the trip from Mississippi back home to Washington to arrive on a very specific date. This delay could mean the difference between safe driving each day of our 4 day trip, with a nice sleep over in a motel…or driving straight through, pretending we were in our 20’s when we could actually pull off that sort of thing!

It all worked out but was definitely touch and go, and very stressful.

Even though it felt like we were in a hidden camera episode of 20/20 or 60 minutes, busting unethical mechanics who break your stuff and then make you pay, it was hard to be mad at the place since during the waiting time, the service manager approached me in a panic having just found a tiny feathered intruder that had knocked itself out flying against the huge windows in the waiting room. She asked if I could help her by holding it for a minute. (Did I have a SIGN on my forehead or something? The number one thing on my Bucket list?? “Hold a Hummingbird!”)

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She mixed up sugar water  in her hand.

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When we finally had to go, I put the little guy in a box and set it outside in the sunshine. Sure enough, fortified by rest and homemade nectar, the tiny intruder flew up, up and away! I can still feel those tiny feet in my hand.

Kinda balanced things out, you know?

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