All photographs this week taken within my home in case you hadn’t noticed. Over the last year I have spent a gob smacking, eye watering, jaw dropping, nose shattering (ok u get the gist) amount of time indoors. Like 99%. And within these walls I have been able to do very little physically or mentally so the bulk of that gargantuan piece of time pie has been spent staring into space. Major Babycakes to ground control…check the sofa, stereo on…
The only thing I’ve been able to do to pass the time is listen to music. I would be dead without music. My constant companion. My mood regulator. My daily joy injection. There are some people with my condition who can’t even listen to music because they are too sound sensitive so I am truly grateful and something I never take for granted.
Once you have been housebound for an extended period of time you never take anything for granted again..and being stuck inside this comfy prison I find myself more with gratitude for the things I have than disappointment for the things I don’t. It’s warm. It’s comfortable, I have high ceilings, I have good food and there is no chance of being shivved. I also have an amazing warden (with benefits).
A very close friend of mine is going thru extreme cancer treatment at the moment and is also full of gratitude for what she has as oppose to just focussing on the relentless shit show she is dealing with. We share a similar outlook and this is not a coincidence. The more you suffer the more you to appreciate life. The more you endure the hard shit the more you can enjoy the good shit. Unless you start a pity party for yourself. That’s the only thing you cannot do. So the hardships everyone is desperate to avoid will actually bring them what they are endlesssly seeking..true happiness which is happiness that does not require anything other than what you already have.
When everything is taken away from you, careers, friendships, pursuits, lifestyle choices..all the things you think made you you, you would think you would somehow cease to exist, or that you will be a less of a person but when they are all removed you are still you. In fact, you are more you because you realise that all these externals are not the things that define you. Without anything you are already everything you need to be. I feel more me now than I ever did and I require no outside validation to prove it.
This perspective is priceless. Would i have chosen to have four years of my life taken up with a chronic debilitating illness with a barrage of symptoms day and night to get it? Of course not, im not a fucking masochist! However i now choose to focus on what it has given me rather than what it has taken away. Eckhart Tolle in the Power of now (which am currently audiobooking) states with every moment “act like you choose it” and I love that. It stops you being a victim. It empowers you.
Don’t get me wrong, its been a fucking slog. And there were days when I thought I would lose my mind. And yet here I still am. I still exist. Nothing can take that away from me..well apart from death obviously..that’s a given..but until then Major Babycakes is chuffed to be alive, sitting on a rock floating in space around a giant fireball in an area so vast it apparently has no end. And the stars look very different today…
All shots this week taken within a 300 foot radius of my home and the only connection between these people is their geographical proximity to me. I am blessed as I have amazing characters living on my doorstep. Not literally obvs, they wouldn’t all fit on but it means that even covering the small distance I am currently capable of means that I will invariably see someone who I think is worth photographing. And bear in mind I see many more than I actually take pictures of but aren’t always able to get the shot.
A lot of times I think that I should maybe just leave these people to go about their day but then I see an incredible characterful face or some visual configuration that I just can’t let it go and feel compelled to capture them. To what purpose? I don’t really know. I guess I’m just an aficionado on the human form in all of its incarnations and like a butterfly collector I want to somehow preserve their magnificence.
And without these great local folk in my immediacy I wouldn’t have much to put in this blog so that’s a touch. So please bear with whilst I have this terrain restricted service..hoping for some greater capacity soon…
I can’t relax because I don’t know what expection is..even if it’s good.
All photographs taken this week of abandoned objects were within a 100 yards or so of my flat. I am currently in a rehab program for people with long covid/cfs and they talk about how important it is to stay within your ‘3ft world’. This is to encourage you to just focus on the step in front you. Don’t look too far forward, don’t look too far back, don’t look at what other people are doing, just concentrate on where you’re at in the present moment and what you can do now. I have found this very helpful. It keeps me on the task at hand. It stops me comparing myself to others, or indeed to my former self. And it generates a level of acceptance crucial for coping with a reduced existence. Although I do believe everyone could benefit from staying in their 3 foot world. It annihilates the regret of the past and evaporates the anxiety surrounding the future.
I used to take photographs all over London. I could visit multiple postcodes in a single day but currently I am confined to the block that I live on. But rather than lament what is not, I now focus on what is. I look for beauty and wonder within my 3 foot world. Or rather my 300 foot world which is my currently doable walking distance.
So even though my terrain is small I get very excited when I find something I want to photograph. It might not seem worth photographing to most people but it has ignited a flame in my imagination and that is all I need to work..
I have fortunately always been fixated with abandoned objects and there are always plenty of those on offer on my local streets…I just always think that this is not what their creator intended for them. I think of all the meetings that would’ve happened to discuss their style and structure, presentation and promotion, never imagining the one day it would just become discarded rubbish. Ultimately that is obviously how all things end, even the very greatest of things but scattered as litter on the street was not meant to be where they were viewed, or rather ignored. No-one pays them any attention. except for me. I see their former beauty. I see their former glory. By Photographing them I give them a modicum of meaning at the very moment when they have none. I’m just nice like that…
Someone adorned this tree with beaded necklaces all over it..they’ve been there for months now and no-one has taken them. People clearly respected this random guerilla art installation. It makes me smile every time I walk past it. I would love to know who and why but at the same time I kinda love the mystery. Explanations can be so limiting but the imagination is infinite.
All photographs this week are taken of people I encountered within a 100 yards of my home. When you are mostly housebound you are starved of human contact. It is a very solitary existence but I am incredibly lucky as know a lot of the people on my street to say hello to and some to have a lil stop and chat with.
And so even though I was often only able to get to the end of the road and back I would more times than not see someone I could interact with, even in the smallest of ways. Didn’t have to be long. Didn’t have to be meaningful but it meant a lot to me. And it was great just to hear someone’s voice that wasn’t my own. My experience has meant that I have become very comfortable talking to myself but its a poor substitute for an actual dialogue with another human being. And it’s also a little disconcerting.
So these brief encounters with my neighbours became my lifeline and am truly grateful for I think I would have gone a little insane without them. Obviously fessing up to talking to myself all the time doesn’t really lend much support to that theory but there you go.
In a recent study on loneliness they discovered that it wasn’t just our strong relations with immediate family and close friends that mattered to our well being but also what they called our weak connections. These are small interactions you have with neighbours, passersby, local store workers and park people if you have a dog and apparently they are as vital as we are social animals who need to feel part of a group. They might seem slight but they make a big difference.
For me they were a godsend because I was not well enough to have people visit for the most part and I also couldn’t really handle talking for more than a couple of minutes. And weirdly being alone for vast quantities of time hasn’t made me less social, it has made me even more so. I always enjoyed talking to people but I would now literally chat to anyone because I have been so deprived. I obviously had Mrs B who I could never have got thru this without her but invariably by the time she got home I was toast and couldn’t even talk so am so thankful for my weak connections as they gave me strength when I needed it the most…
The top photo is Phil who lives two doors down from us and he is a lovely man who is always pottering around on the street so see him more than most so was always appreciative of our lil chats on the stoop as was often the only contact I had. And for the record the other people this week I do not know and did not speak to. They were merely passing. As was I.
So much for pictures only to ease meself in..I was just excited to be back :)
