“Lucky" Photographer...

I’ll never be a professional photographer. I just don’t have it in me to walk up to total strangers and ask if I can take pictures. It’s even more unnerving when that stranger is a St. Petersburg Police Officer outside of the headquarters in downtown. But that’s what I did. “Hi. I have a photo assignment, can I take some pictures of your car?” "Do you have a class assignment?” Well, not really for a class, but it was an assignment, if only from myself.  

That’s how I found myself in the dirt parking lot with all the off duty police cruisers on Tuesday morning.

Honestly, the officer was very nice, and since she needed to test her lights anyway, she turned them on for me. “It works better at night,” she said. Makes me think she’d had this request before. 

I still did everything wrong. My camera was still set up for the previous shoot. Wrong shutter, wrong aperture. Bad light, bad exposure, really nervous. All my classic mistakes. And trying to capture flashing lights is harder then it looks. I think I only got one shot with both lights lit. But that’s what I had. Maybe a little post-processing could save it.

Make that a lot of post-processing. I cropped the picture a little, changed the exposure level some. Then started playing with filters. I settled on one called “Oil Paint”. Oil Paint smoothed a lot of the gritty dirt on the car roof, as well as the mount for the light bar. The trees in the background warped a little becoming somewhat surreal. The picture is for Edward’s poem Remember.  The quality is somewhat dream like, the way memories sometimes are. The only other adjustment was to tone down some blown out spots in the red light. Not the best way to do it, but in this case I was able to take a bad shot and turn it into something kind cool.

I consider myself to be more of a “lucky" photographer. I’m trying to change that. I’m trying to be more prepared when I go out for a shoot. Trying to get the angles and framing right the first time, as well as the lighting. But I don’t think I’ll ever get past the part where I have to ask people about taking pictures. I’m just not that extroverted. Maybe that, too, will come with practice, but I don’t think so.

Read Edward's poem "Remember" here.  

Drawing on Memories...

Felicia - May 96

I sketched Felicia the day she died. I wanted to set in my mind an image of her, one I would never forget. I had started a day or two before. We had called the vet to say it was time. Felicia’s coloring made her difficult to draw. How do you draw black, and still give it texture and depth? She was restless those last days so it was hard to get her to sit still. She wouldn't hold still long enough to draw her, but i wanted to try anyway. I started with the sketch of her facing left, got the outline done and most of her coloring’s outlined before she moved. But then I did something I don’t normally do. When she settled again, I started a second sketch on the same page, outlining her form and coloring again as quickly as I could. For the next hour or so, as she shifted from one position to the next I simply switched from one sketch to the other, the first blending into the second, until both and each were finished. In the end, the two sketches portray both sides of her face, and both sides of her personality that day, one brighter and more attentive and the other pained and lost in thought.

 I’ve always found that if I really want to look at something, I should draw it. In college, during an assignment to collect shells and identify them, I drew each of them. It gives you a different perspective. It forces you to really look at something. This is the only drawing of mine we have on display in the house. I had it framed for Edward in the year after her death and it hangs in the front hall. Some 21 years later, I’m still proud of it, and still amazed that it came out the way it did, in form and in composition, and most importantly, in spirit and likeness.  I still miss you, little one. Peace.

Read Edward's Poem and Essay about Felicia: 
  Poem: https://noddfa-imaginings-fiction.blogspot.com/2017/05/felicia.html
  Essay: https://noddfa-imaginings.blogspot.com/2017/05/beltane-2017-felicia.html

Blind as a... Possum

  The other morning, as I was leaving for work, I was standing at the end of the driveway. I usually walk out and stand for a few moments, to greet the morning, dark or light, and look at the sky in the quite at the beginning of the day. Most of the neighbors are still getting ready for work and there is little activity at this end of the block. But that morning, in the pre-dawn light, I spotted something moving in the yard across the street. At first I thought it was one of the neighborhood stay cats, but the white face soon resolved itself into a young possum.  

  He (or perhaps she) nosed his way through the grass along side the house then turned towards the street. Possum are notoriously nearsighted. This little guy being no exception. As I stood quietly watching (and watching out for cars on the street) the possum continued snuffling in my directions.   

  When he reached the street he paused, then continued across. I hadn’t moved since I spotted him, especially once he turned my way. By the time he reached my side, he was only 3 feet away. I could have reached out and touched him. Just as he started to pass, he froze. Up until that point I had been down wind. What possums lack in eye sight, the make up for in sense of smell. He looked right at me, sniffing the wind, trying to decide if I was just a tree with a bad smell or something more threatening.

  He decided on the latter and took off towards the house behind me. My first thought was that he would run into the open garage and I would end up trying to chase the poor guy out without waking up Edward. He quickly changed course, however, and headed through the front yard, disappearing along the side of the house, headed for the back yard and the park beyond that.  

  Most possums I’ve encountered have been injured or sick. This little guy was neither, just out looking for one last morning snack for settling in for the day to come. Living so close to one of the largest county parks means we get the occasional wildlife encounter, be they snakes, alligators, raccoons or possums. That early morning encounter made my day. And as far as whose-sight-was-better-in-the-dim-light question, I think I won that contest. When it comes to ‘blindness’, it’s not bats that the old cliche should by talking about.

Walsingham River

  When I left for work this morning I went out to try and read the rain gauge, but I was having trouble seeing where the water line was. I wanted to check it because the rain woke me up at 5:15. It was coming down hard, very hard, and that lasted for more then 30 minutes.

  So took off my socks, grabbed my water shoes, rolled up my pants and went wading. Rain like that usually floods the side yards and often the front yard too. This morning there was standing water in the back yard, too. (More then 60 minutes later Edward said it was still flooded.)  I usually call the yard Lake Morgan at times like these.

  I couldn't see the water line becuase the water was over the top of the measurable area of the gauge. It’s a five inch gauge. I had to dump some out into a container, then dump out the 5 inches it could measure and pour the rest back in to get it measured accurately.  It had six inches this morning. I had dumped that gauge before dark last night. I didn’t figure it would fill again, but I knew we were expecting more.

  The rainfall rate reached between 2.5-3 inches an hour before dawn. Most of the rain in that gauge was from 4 am as it just kept raining harder and harder.

  The grand total in our gauge.  11 inches in about 30 hours from Tropical Storm Colin.

  Thank the powers-that-be we 1) live on a “hill” (55 ft above sea level) (this is Pinellas County, that's high), 2) Florida has sandy soil that drains, 3) I live on said sandy soil and 4) my neighborhood drains well.  I can’t say the same for other places in the area.  The phone went off at 6:10 with a flash flood warning right after I got up.  

  Driving in wasn’t too bad, though it was raining pretty good.  It faked me out since it had let up at the house. I drove into heavier showers. The retaining ponds in the area are overflowing.

  And this is the ditch behind the house, otherwise known as "Walsingham River” when we get rain like this. That much rain makes for an impressive show.  We’re pretty sure the far side is lower then our side. We’ve never seen it get to the top, though we have seen it higher then this. And that's down about 12 inches from where is was right before dawn. The ditch is at least half again deep as that small tree is high, if not deeper. It’s a lot of water.

  It’s still raining in St Petersburg, though it’s stopped at the house, for the moment. This line of showers is moving south slowly. So it may keep up for a while yet. We’ve already gotten our monthly allotment of rain for June. And it’s only the 7th. Hopefully we can retain some of this water for drier spells later in the year, long after the Walsingham River has returned to normal levels.

Picture Taking...

Neither Edward nor I own a bicycle. So that presented a challenge for an illustration for Edward's poem “Laughter”, until I remembered that several people in the office ride to work each day. Maybe I could just borrow one. 

Who did I ask if I could borrow their bicycle?  My boss, Nathaniel. 

Being the good sport he is, it was not a problem, even though I felt I needed to explain why. Edward is a writer, I reminded him, I take pictures to illustrate his pieces. 

I had to wait for the sun to come out, as it was cloudy all morning, but in the afternoon the sky broke. It was better light, even though I took the picture in the shade. The colors were brighter than if it had remained overcast. 

I like the contrast between the orange of the frame and the green of the grass. Several of the pictures took advantage of the bicycle's frame elements, brightly crossing the image in diagonal slashes, as well as the curve of the wheel, all design elements talked about in  the photography courses. Focus shifted from the gears to the frame in different pictures, one third up the picture frame, or one third down.

This wasn’t the first time I’ve taken pictures at work for Edward’s writing. But now I am sure that a number of the people think I’m wholly crazy. Why else would I be sitting in the grass in the courtyard, camera in hand, leaning in close to the spokes of a borrowed bicycle lying on the ground.  

You can read "Laughter" here on Edward's Fiction Blog.

Signals

 Spring returns each year and I am lost
 There is no cold to punctuate each turn
 The leaves do not always fall

 Yet there are signals that the seasons are changing
 Signals that answer to a subtler call
 As the sun returns to the sky

 It is to these that I must look to find my way
 They are more attuned then I to the rhythms around us
 Where they lead I must follow

 The greater world around us speaks in quite changes
 We have only to listen to that voice
 And find peace in those quieter calls

It's time to turn off the mute button.

  This will be hard to read. But it’s time. I have been silent too long.  And now, that silence has hurt the person I care most about in this world. My husband, Edward.

  To those in my family who don’t know about this, I’m sorry you have to hear it this way. To those of you who know, you are as guilty of the injustice of this act as I am. Time has not healed it for me. The have been no repercussions.

  When I was in high school, my college age brother decided that for some reason it would be OK to have sex with his sister.  One night, when my parents weren’t home, he came into my room and into my bed.  When he first came to my door I told him to go away.  He didn’t.  

  And I didn't tell anyone what happened.

  Why tell now?  Because I should have said something 38 years ago, because I should have said something 35, 30, 25, 20, 15, 10, 5, 1 years ago.  Because I shouldn't have let my family be more important than my life, my mental health and my husband. Yes, because my silence has now put my marriage in jeopardy.  And this will be the first of many steps to save that marriage. If you think my motivations are selfish, they are in part. To say I’m sorry to the one I love for my silence. I'm sorry for letting you be the blast shield. For not standing up for you. For letting you do all the heavy lifting. For lying to myself that I could have both, that everything would be OK. For not listening to you all these years. For putting that fantasy in front of you. 

  But it’s more then that. To stay silent now, when I should have spoken up so long ago, is to just keep doing what I’ve done all along. To make no changes. To let someone else speak for me. It’s cost him dearly. The world, what’s left of my blood relatives, friends, and others may not like me after this. May not ever want to talk to me again. So be it. It's time to turn off the mute button. It’s time to make a change. If it costs me, so be it. 

  What my brother did was called digital rape. That’s what the professionals call it. I told them all the details. Yes, I’ve been to see a councilor. I will spare you those details here. I only went to counseling after Edward insisted, because he couldn’t help me any more. I fought him on this. He was right. I was wrong. All these years, I let Edward get angry for me. That has to stop. I have to get angry for myself for once and forever.   

  Before you think this is a he said/she said incident, my brother admitted he did it. To my councilor. To my parents. To his wife. To his kids, I’ve been told. But not my sister’s kids. It’s time they heard it. They should have heard it when I told my sister. She asked me not to tell them. Why? I don’t know. I tell myself now that they were minors at the time. In truth, I didn’t want to tell them either. I didn’t want to ruin their view of their uncle. I told myself I was shielding them, but I was really shielding him. My niece has a daughter of her own now. It’s time she knew.  

  I confronted my brother in 1996. He said he was sorry. Then things got worse. He said he would make reparations, a donation to a woman’s shelter, spend time helping other victims, among other things. My sister-in-law did some soul searching, found God, and forgave him. Then they decided that they couldn’t do anything as reparations. It would hurt their kids. I didn't ask for much. That’s why I don’t know if they did in fact tell them. They broke their word before, how do I know they really did tell their children, never mind what “truth" they told them if they did.

  We wrote letters, my brother and I, and some emails. We tried to work things out. Then he asked me, “Why did you let me into your bedroom?” I didn't let you in, you came in.  Why was I ever put in that position? Why the fuck was I in a position to even have to say no, go away, in the first place?  In what world is it OK to have sex with your sister?  Why did no one but Edward ever ask those questions? Perhaps because I didn't tell anyone else. Now I am. I still have that letter. 

  After that, I stopped talking to my brother. And then he cut me off from his kids. I couldn’t have a relationship with them if I didn’t have a relationship with him. So be it. I lost two of my nieces and a nephew that day.  

  “… just hit the mute button and pretend eliminating discomfort is the same as effecting actual change.”  - Edward Schlosser (June 2015)

  So what’s changed since I told my family. Nothing much. Everyone cried, everyone soul searched. Beyond that I can’t say. My parents wanted us to work it out. They didn’t want to get in the middle. They didn’t want to risk loosing touch with their grandchildren. Because he would cut them off, too. And I guess their grandchildren were more important to them than a daughter who choose not to have children.  

 "If you choose not to decide you still have made a choice." - Rush (Freewill)

  I am guilty as well. I let them do that. I didn’t say me or him. I didn’t say make him do something. That there should be repercussions for his acts. Maybe if they had threatened to not see his children he would have done the right thing.  Maybe if I had insisted, they would have made him keep his word to me. Maybe I would not be where I am now.  Maybe they would have still chosen him over me.  

 But I do know this. My parents and my sister and her husband, who likely doesn’t know, are all vacationing with my brother and his kids this week in North Carolina.  

  And I am twisting in the wind. The black sheep. The bad child. Ostracized form the rest of the family. Because it’s easier to talk to him and pretend everything is OK then be reminded of it by seeing me. And I have let them do it. I have let them hurt me over and over again. And worse, I have let them hurt Edward. And I have hurt Edward because of my inaction. And that may not be forgivable. 

  

  After all this time later, here I sit, still struggling with it. Every time a news story about some priest, some politician, some Christian reality TV star who assaulted someone hits the airwaves, I go back there. And then the world says, oh, he didn’t mean it. He’s sorry. He never did it again. He was young and didn’t know better. Or just plain, he didn’t do that, he never would, until the second victim comes forward. 

  My brother knew better. And so did they. And if they were truly, truly sorry and ashamed, they would have taken action before they were found out. They would have come forward themselves and started doing the things that weren’t easy, that would cost them something, anything. I didn’t ask a lot. No more then admission to Disneyworld. But that would have been taking away from his kids. 

  Oh, he went to a counselor, too, I’m told. And he was depressed about what happened, but only after the news got out. I guess that was penance enough for everyone else. On with life, chip chip, stiff upper lip and all that. God forgave him. God abandoned me, if He ever existed.

  I didn’t start this. I didn’t go into his room, he came into mine. I didn’t go to his bed, he came to mine. He is three years older then I am, and out weighed me by more then hundred pounds. Up to that point in my life, I trusted him. He was my big brother. I looked up to him.  And yet, it has become my fault that I have not gotten over it. It’s my fault that I have not forgiven him. My fault that we are a splintered family. I am the one who is paying for it. And worse, Edward is paying as well.  

  I will pay no more.  We. Will. Pay. No. More.

  I have been silent because I didn’t want to cause pain to my family.  Instead, I hurt Edward.

  That stops here.

  I have been silent because I was afraid people would blame me. I was afraid people would shun me, wouldn't like me, and believe that I was to blame, because you know, I’m female and boys will be boys. That I was somehow to blame.

  That stops here.

  I have been silent because I did not want to hurt my family. I don’t mean to hurt them here, but the truth is, I’m hurting. This isn’t about lashing out. It’s about speaking out. I have been silent too long. 

  The silence stops here.

  Guilty as charged. I have made no changes. I change that now.

  To Edward, you have been right all along. I have been a coward. This is something I should have done a long time ago.  

  He is Mark Monroe.  I am Karen Monroe Morgan.

  Why didn’t you say no? 

   I did.  You didn’t listen.

  It’s time to turn off the mute button.