I start teaching tomorrow. It feels like it’s starting to fit. I’m glad to have regular activity and work that consumes me in a GOOD WAY.
I put up the poem that Heidi wrote for me. And then tonight I was listening to Char Beck’s CD. They both reminded me of when I could write. I would get these mental pictures, or just inspiration from my surroundings. I’ve lost so many of my metal pictures. They would be so vivid and they would be representative (representational, whatever) of how I felt. Or the writing made me feel. There was emotion attached to the scenes and the thoughts. Now it’s just thoughts, just rambling, intuitive, pseudo intellectual thoughts that come with the semi/barely educated. It’s like I’ve turned it all off when I turned off my emotions, because I was tired of crying. Or did I really turn it off? Am I trying to convince myself that I can turn it all off as a barrier, a toughness. To think is good, to not be controlled or consumed by your emotions is a good thing, but where does your intellect make room to feel. To engage, in a non-cerebral fashion. Where’s the excitement and passion for things of yore (Good word Michelle. Doomo)?
So I had this picture of me walking down the road from the school to my flat. I do sometimes still get a sense that I’m in something poetic but I can’t attach the emotions to it, there’s no meaning to it and no words. It’s still what I’m drawn to as I think of many of my photographs. They’re stories. Stories of friendship, companionship, love, separation that I’m trying to capture and to tell, maybe just to tell to myself, maybe something that can be told to others. So the poet does still reside in me, it’s maybe just chosen a different medium for a while.
There's these old buildings that I pass by everyday. I like to question what’s in all those homes. There’s just so many of them and although there’s always lots of bikes parked on the "street" (for a lack of a better word for the spot with all the shops under the awnings), there doesn’t seem to be enough people around for all those flats. And they look old too, so I want to know how old they are, and were they around in the war? What have they seen, what earthquakes have they withstood. There must be so many stories in all those walls. It’s intriguing to me. I want to see in. Blasted frosted windows. But that's all I have to say about that.
