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My dad died when I was 2. Couple years later, my mom tried dating. I don't remember the guy, just that he was a cab driver. Don't know what happened, but they didn't work out, and she didn't see anyone again until after I was off to college.

My wife and I split when our son was 5. Kept things civil; we both wanted the best for him, not to have co-parents at each other's throats. He spent a little over half the weekends with her, and rest of the time with me. She dated; I didn't.

jackholt

I didn't really have the energy for relationships. I struggled with health and fatigue problems. Still do. I am not often "lonely" per se. My ADHD is good for creativity, inspiration, and keeping me busy and mentally active. I have a rich inner life. But right now I feel notable alone, and wishing I had an emotional support human here physically, to help me do a thing that gives me undue (but understandable, given my trauma history) anxiety.

I'm a deer in the headlights. I just need to go do the thing.

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Hi friends! I haven't been here in a while. I've spent most of my time on Threads lately, which is *almost* as unhinged as Tumblr if you curate your feed appropriately. I'm @ jackholt over there.

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55 years and a few days ago, a 15-year-old Catholic girl gave birth in Arizona to a baby boy. She handed him over to her aunt and uncle, and returned to Canada, with her pregnancy now a family secret. The adoption was not spoken of to the boy until over 30 years later, when his adoptive parents had both passed away. The boy was me, of course.

The couple had had a miscarriage two years earlier. My father doted on me, but he died of cancer when I was two. I have no memories of him other than old home movies, now long lost, and stories my mother told. She clearly adored him, and I learned to idolize him without ever really knowing that much about him. I idealized him. But I credit those feelings with shaping who I am as a father to my son. I wanted to be for him all that I had never had.

My mother slipped into alcoholism, and I suffered complex trauma from it. When she passed away 24 years ago to the day as I post this, I mourned more for the loss of the relationship with my half-brother (from her previous marriage) than I did for her. He was the one who told me the family secret, then cut himself off from the rest of the family, myself included.

I tell myself, "It wasn't as bad as others had it." (But I hear a lot of trauma survivors say that.) I wasn't beaten. I wasn't materially deprived. She was different when drinking than when not, though, and I didn't know that was what was going on until I was 14. By then I had already internalized that the words "I love you" coming from her did not mean safety or comfort or anything worth trusting, really.

Which brings me to this: When I was 17, I had a dream and woke up thinking I was going to die at 24. In the dream it was around Valentine's Day because, of course, symbolism: I felt I wasn't lovable. I had enough self esteem that I couldn't accept 24, so I thought surely it must have been 34 instead. I went through years and years feeling like I'd never live past 34. When I did, I started to think I wouldn't make it past 42, then 44, then 54.

Again, a thing I've heard is that people who grow up with trauma like that, where they don't feel loved, or loved enough, often feel like they're going to die young. I did not hear this until I was well past 34. It is oddly comforting that I am not the only one. I've done a fair bit of therapy along the way. EMDR for PTSD was surprisingly helpful. But the middle of February is coming, and it's still fraught.

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Euripides (Tr. Anne Carson) / @wholeheartedsuggestions / Jenny Slate / Euripides again

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Gonna resurrect the Stargate fandom 2023 who’s with me

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Tweet from Joseph Fasano: "An 8th-grade student of @MrsHult wrote this poem using one of my poetry prompts, and I just cannot get over that second line. ❤️ Emily, I hope the world sees your poem."

Poem in image:

Angels

Let the fears be short. Let the funerals be beautiful. Let every memory inside me find its way to the heart and walk carefully, slowly toward this world. I have a story I have never told: Once, when I was alone, I looked up at the sky and saw shadows of my family and I knew I was a girl made of angels. I am still a girl made of angels. -- Emily, grade 8

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i hate it when i cant even write a poem about something because its too obvious. like in the airbnb i was at i guess it used to be a kids room cause you could see the imprint of one little glow in the dark star that had been missed and painted over in landlord white. like that's a poem already what's the point

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Interview cat

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How to build THE CUBE

I got this reply about my product photography light cube.

@nimrella and all other interested parties, I can definitely help you with that.

THE CUBE Ingredient List

The actual cube

2 Identical lights

Black plexiglass

A roll of gray seamless paper

The links above would probably be the cheapest ingredients that would allow you to get a similar shot as below.

These are *suggested* ingredients. If you have two desk lamps, you could get identical LED bulbs. You can get bigger plexiglass if you need it. You can try white plexiglass or even a mirror. I also like using things like a wooden cutting board as a base. You can also get different colored seamless paper for the background. Colored poster board works okay too, but the seamless paper allows for a nice transition from base to background.

Some tips for using THE CUBE.

First you'll want to cut the seamless paper to size and then place it in the cube so it has a gentle curve. As stated, this will give you a gradual transition from the base to the background. You can set object directly on the gray paper and get a nice effect. Or you can use the plexiglass trick like above for a cool reflection shot.

If you use the plexiglass, place it as far forward in the cube as you can and elevate it a bit with a book or something. This will help with background separation.

You want to put lights on either side. You can play with positions and brightness to taste. You can make one light brighter than the other or just use them full blast. The brighter you set the lights, the lower the ISO on your camera, the cleaner the noise will be. It will also help to take photos in a darker area so only the photo lights are contributing to the image. But if they are bright enough lights, that won't matter as much—they will overpower any ambient light.

If your phone has a decent telephoto lens, that will help you avoid distorting the object. But on my phone, the tele lens gets oversharpened to death. So I use the main camera and take the photo from a bit farther away and then crop in.

Basically, the closer you get with a wide angle lens, the more pronounced the distortion is.

This distortion is actually caused by distance rather than the focal length. With a wider lens you have to get much closer to get the object the same size in the frame. So if you keep the object in the center of the frame and back up a bit, it won't get distorted. You'll have to crop later, and you'll lose some resolution, but it should still be good enough for displaying on the web.

One thing you might also notice is the hotspots from the lights on the background. I'm afraid that is one of the disadvantages of the cube. You can try to block that with some black card or just try to position the lights so the hotspots are out of frame. If I were in a studio, I would have my background several feet behind the object to prevent this.

In any case, once you have everything set up, you can basically flip on the lights, and take a picture. Easy peasy.

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Annual post

Thank you for the reminder, Janet

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I don't want to make ““doctor’s appointments””and ““schedule a follow up.”” I want to be coaxed gently into a crate and taken to the vet.

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Veni vidi conveni consedi

I came I saw I fits I sits

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reblog to take the person you reblogged from to the aquarium

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