Thank God.
For a minute today, and oh did I get to practice acceptance, I thought that I wasn’t going to be able to get the shot, but I did.
I did.
The shot I’m referring to is the professional photograph that the producers of People Who Usually Don’t Lecture requested.
They want a photograph for publicity purposes.
Eek.
Publicity.
Scary and kind of cool all at the same time.
I sent them a photo I had taken of myself mid-summer, but they requested I send them a photograph that wasn’t taken on my phone.
Sigh.
I’m pretty damn good at taking a selfie, I’m not sure what that implies about me, narcissist, vain, self-involved, maybe, but I do know my angles when it comes to taking my own photo.
I usually take a lot and from certain angles.
I know my best side.
But fuck.
When it’s someone else taking my picture I’m horrible.
Weird ass smile, wrinkled forehead, strange faces, odd ball angles, I manage to look much heavier than I am, I have no clue what to look at where to focus and I’m goofy.
Thank goodness for my dear friend who took time out of her very busy day to help me.
At first I felt like it just wasn’t going to happen, she had a lot going on and I felt a tad guilty about asking her to spend time doing something pro bono, but she told me to get my butt to her studio in the Mission and we got the job done.
I sprung for lunch and got take out from FarmHouse.
And I must say, slight aside, fucking good food.
Really good.
I was impressed.
And I just had the Tom Kha Soup with chicken and some brown rice, but fuck, it was delicious and might be the best Tom Kha I’ve had in the city.
I will be going back, if the soup was that freaking good I’m sure the rest of the food is.
Plus I really liked the decor and it had a warm, vibrant feeling to it.
Anyway.
I picked up lunch and we got a chance to connect and I gave her the down low on life and school and all the things.
So good to reconnect.
And to get the shot.
Yes.
A lot of them were absolute duds.
Not her fault, nope, me and my self-conscious posing.
But we got there and I’m super happy with the resulting photograph.
I’m not sure how many she took, but probably close to a 100 frames.
Which we narrowed down to 16 shots, then six and finally two.
I sent the two off to the producers and I’m done.
Well.
With this part of the process anyway.
I still, obviously, have to do the lecture, but the photograph was a stress that I wasn’t expecting.
Gratefully my friends studio is close to my internship, I wasn’t on my scooter today with the rain, no thank you, and I didn’t have to travel far from her spot to where I needed to be next.
I had a bunch of time in between the photo shoot and my client, so I popped into a cafe and did two hours of reading. I finished my Jungian Dream Work reading for the semester and got a good bit into my Transpersonal reading.
That felt great.
And I had done a good hour of homework before I headed out the door to do the photo shoot.
I finished almost all my CBT reading, which is good as I have a webinar I have to attend on Sunday.
I also finished all my reading for my Drug and Alcohol class.
So for Jungian Dream Work and for Drug and Alcohol I could actually start writing the final papers for the class if I wanted to.
That also is a nice feeling.
I feel like I won’t start the writing for that yet, I want to focus on getting the rest of my reading done for my other classes and finishing the online components for the classes that have that requirement.
There’s still so much to do, but having made a big jump into the material today, I feel like I will be able to address all the reading by the end of the weekend.
Even with seeing three clients tomorrow and having to go in before my group supervision on Saturday to do a rehearsal for the People Who Usually Don’t Lecture folks.
It will be the first rehearsal with all the people who are speaking.
There are seven of us.
I’m super curious.
I know one of the participants, it was his story that had a bit of our relationship in it that piqued the producers into wanting to meet with me.
It will be great to see him and hear his piece.
I’ve read a good bit of it, it’s a great piece.
I’m certain that the caliber of speakers is going to be quite high.
I have rehearsed my piece once a night since writing it.
I don’t want to let down the producers.
And, well, it’s a fun thing to be participating in, and it’s not school related or work related or client related.
Although.
Ha.
I do talk about all those things in my lecture–work, school, my internship–just with a much different slant than I typically think about my life.
It’s my story and I know it really well, but they, the producers, had me sharpen certain things and I’m eager to do the work to be polished and participate in the project.
It feels like an honor to have been included.
I don’t want to let anyone down.
So it was really with much gratitude and happiness that the photo turned out so well.
Super grateful.
Super excited.
And ready to focus on the next thing in front of me.
Lots of life, lots of school work, and no little love.
So much love.
Grateful to focus on that too.
Beyond my ability to write about it.
But something I read earlier really summed it up, so perhaps I will end on a little quote from my Jungian Dream Work class reading.
“I falter before the task of finding the language which might adequately express the incalculable paradoxes of love.”
C. G. Jung
Auntiebubba 