Rising

As you may have noticed I have my up days and my down days.
Today is a "I-really-don't-care" day. I am sick and tired of spending all my time in gut-wrenching worry (it actually feels like it's wrenching your stomach! Odd!) and crying about something I cannot control.
I'm done.
I'm done listening to the negative.
I'm done listening to the doubters (often times including myself)
I've had enough. You can only spend so much time hitting your head in a corner before you have to turn around and see that there's a whole room behind you. I'm sick of the corner. The room is looking pretty nice.
I'm done being scared of something I'm not in control of.
Enough is ENOUGH!
All through yesterday doubts kept trying to peck their way into my mind. I wouldn't allow them in. Same thing today. I woke up feeling almost empty and feeling complete apathy for fear. Send me to Minas Morgul, I'd tap dance in front of orcs and not blink. I just don't care. And it should be noted that the only official dance class I took was when I was maybe three and I sat in the corner for most of it.
Also I want to share some edited pictures I took of myself (I don't think you can tell that they're selfies! (self portraits)) and don't worry. I don't agree with naughty pictures. I'd burn my crazy expensive camera before I  even considered taking one. If you do, it's your choice. Don't rat on me.

Funny story, before I took these pictures, I had no idea what my profile looked like. Everyone used to tell me I had a pixie nose, I now believe them. I think I should dress up as a pixie for Halloween. I can be as mischievous as them. Don't believe me? Read chapter fifteen in Twisted. ;)

This is the original photo. It is called Img_3889. Super name, am I right? I can never find old photos unless I give them an original name. img_3889 doesn't cut it for me. I can never remember it.

 I call this picture Darkness My Soul (I was feeling dramatic yesterday) because I played with the hue and saturation of the picture it blows out the light in the back ground leaving me looking much paler than I actually am. And no my hair does not have highlights, that light streak you see is a bunch of white hairs I call my unicorn hairs. In this picture I look like a ghost.
If you go Google wraith (I'd suggest going by wraith, fantasy otherwise you'll get some weird things) the original meaning is ghost. I took the Lord of the Rings and some of my own research approach and came up with the idea that a wraith is a person who lost their souls to darkness becoming a ghost.
And what is a ghost? It is what remains behind after a body dies (metaphorically speaking) so the darkened ghost of a person is a wraith.
Thereby, Darkness My Soul is the screaming of a soul for relief from darkness.

 This is called Help Me. Most of the color is gone. It reminds me of a scene in my book where the Secret Keeper's living self (who he was before he fell into darkness) felt as though he were encroached in darkness and only a spark of light remained.

 This is called Hello There. I played with the effects and darkened everything leaving this picture with a harsh light. It's like the awakening of the soul to a remembrance of all there was in life. I love the way the shadows look in this one and the light across my face, almost as if there were an angelic presence urging me to leave the darkness behind and look up.

 I played with the color filters. For those of you who don't know much about cameras (me two months ago :D) cameras pick up light, red, blue, and green light. When you play with a light filter you can make an image look too green, too red, and too blue. I like the way my hair looks in this.

 This is where I played with the levels. My hair is naturally that red (oh sigh) unless it's been bleached by the sun or shampoo. You can clearly see the unicorn hairs in this one. Believe it or not, these pictures were taking in the morning (about 11:00 AM Mountain Daylight Time, something like that) I hung a black photography cloth in front of my closet and used light coming from the hallway. It took like 20 pictures to get this one. I love the deep shadows. Pictures like this are my favorite, they speak to me. I discovered recently that pictures like music bring up something within my soul. The beauty is sometimes lost, but the meaning is still there. The overall name for all these pictures is Bring Me to Life, like the song by Evanscene.

 This is Loss of My Soul. Same picture as before, but if you look closely I used a tool to darken my lips and the visible eyelid. It appears as if I am about to turn away from the light instead of look to it. I've learned so much this year from studying horses with my violin teacher. Body language can mean so much. This position looks defeated. Like a hard fought fight that was lost in the end. I think it says "I give up." or "Save me."

This final one is a girl looking towards the lights on a bridge. Black and white added the effect I wanted to grab. It has a haunted feel and reminds me of how I've felt before. A dark spot among bright lights, wanting to join them, but feeling unable to get there on my own. In color a lot of the dark spots are washed out and it looks too yellow. In black and white the effect is ghostlike. I want to be there.

Have any soul pictures (what I call the ones above)? If they're clean please share them with me. Leave me a link to your blog or Facebook and I'll be sure to comment. I love this kind of photography and I want to see what other people have done so I can know how to improve mine.