Being A Mother
Some of the things I fear, as a mother:
- that Clare will never know how much I love her with all my heart and soul;
- that any kind of harm befalls unto her, physically, mentally, emotionally;
- that I am not the perfect mum for her;
- that she will be left alone to heal when I am not around.
What I can do right now, in my power, is to continue loving her as much as I can, protect her a fiercely as I can and equip her with all the life skills as I can.
Fatal Flaw
One should never mistake my deep respect for others as subservience and servitude.
in·sid·i·ous
It feels like I’ve been waiting so long to meet this word – insidious. I’ve been using this one simple word to describe almost everything of late. It has been that missing word that perfectly describes what I am trying to say without saying too much.
Insidious (from dictionary.com)
- intended to entrap or beguile: an insidious plan.
- stealthily treacherous or deceitful: an insidious enemy.
- operating or proceeding in an inconspicuous or seemingly harmless way but actually with grave effect: an insidious disease.
It is not a secret that I am one who is quick to make judgement over someone or something. I can confidently say that I am right most of the time. Often I struggle with being the only who who has arrived at that judgement, with many left behind wondering what planet I just hopped off from and what the hell I am going on about. When everyone finally catches up with me, often what I predicted would happen, would have happened which leaves me in an even more frustrated state of ‘I told you so’s.
There are many insidious people around me. I sniff them out rather quickly. I weed them out by declaring exactly how I feel about them (usually in layman terms such as “I do not like so-and-so because I just do not have a good feeling”) but often get accused of being either unreasonable, or just being plain stupid. So I wait alone. Not always a fun place to be in. Even less fun when the insidiousness come into fruition and implodes. Not fun at all when I have to fix the aftermath.
But I am learning a lot these days. [a] I do not necessarily have to fix the aftermath, hence, I shouldn’t get angry, hence, better for my health; [b] I might have to learn to re-package how I denounce insidious people, perhaps from now on, actually using the term ‘insidious’ to describe them; [c] I cut insidious people off, usually, permanently. I really don’t have the time lah! I can barely finish reading a book, and I quite enjoy doing that or stabbing my eyes out, rather than dealing with insidious people, however mild they seem on the surface.
How nice would it be, though, if I don’t actually have to wait for people to catch on to insidiousness … there would be far less bullshit in this world.
Randoms
Been exercising my shutter finger more lately. I miss photography and all my camera gear, to be honest. I miss taking them out, giving them a good clean, working all the equipment to get the best shots, then uploading them to my Mac to edit. Seeing the results of my hard work is always fulfilling. Just some randoms ahead: [a] the other day, the moon was in its full glory and shining super bright, so I thought it would be fun to take a shot over the city; [b] saw a disgusting bug in my garden today. Had to pull out the Canon 5DMKII for this shot because the iPhone was having problems focussing on its fuzzy body; [c] since I had the camera out, took a couple of portraits of my super cute dog, Jaws!
Edit to add: Did some research with Clare, who was very curious to find out what caterpillar it was that we saw. It is a dasychira dorsipennata and will develop into this (hideous) sharp-lined tussock moth, it looks like someone attached a pair of wings onto a furry spider. YUCK. Still get the heebie jeebies just looking at it.
Saturday Morning Documentary
It’s been a while since I’ve been alone with my thoughts. Which then puts me in a quiet enough space to observe the things around me and take pictures. I carry my precious Leica X2 around with me everyday, but it hardly gets used these days. I spent a large part of this morning looking at my beautiful daughter sleeping, and decided that I should do a photo series of her on a Saturday morning — going to ballet.
She has a newfound love for ballet. A few weeks ago, she decided that she didn’t want to go anymore and seemed quite fearful of her teacher, and was also stressed out from having to take her exam. (She told me, in between dramatic sobs.) While I try not to overload her with activities, and I would like to give her a choice to develop her passion for them, this wasn’t something I was going to let up easily.
I know she likes dancing. I know she likes ballet. And sometimes, a little bit of hardship and discipline will not hurt a child in teaching them to excel. So I stuck to my guns and convinced her to just sit for the exam, which gave her new found confidence. Her teacher has also eased off being so strict and has started praising Clare a little more, which I think is great.
Clare now looks forward to ballet again. She even got her outfit prepared last night and bounded to class this morning with no fuss at all!
The photos below chronicle our first half of Saturday. All photos taken on the Leica X2 and edited on the iPad. There are some limitations with editing on the iPad, such as losing details blown out in highlights. Was trying to fix the last photo of Dinky which looks like she has a glowing bum, but there is only so much Filterstorm can do.
Lucky Me
I will never tire of this view. And it serves as a constant reminder of how lucky I am.
Life.
Life, in general, has been interesting. I’ve been sick, then getting well, then getting sick, for an extended period of time. And I haven’t had a moment to catch my breath and just enjoy the peacefulness of home life. Was adult life always meant to be this crazy?
Leica M
Feel like doing something crazy today like buying this new camera and a few accompanying lenses. I’ll take mine in black, please. (And no, this is not an April Fool’s joke.)
Food Pre-constructed
Mum’s roast chicken.
Food Pre-constructed
Steamed fish. Shot with the Leica X2 and edited on the iPad using Filterstorm.
