Falling Down

Wasn't going to post today.


Nothing to say.


OK, nothing GOOD to say.


It has been one of those days ...

too much pain, too much sick, just too much ... too much

so - no writing for me. Not safe. What would I say?

Things went from bad to worse as I was trying to distract myself from the pain. I got in my Adobe Photoshop Lightroom program to see if I had imported last months photos. This is that program ...

you know

the one I spent HOUR UPON HOUR tagging, labeling my photos.

It comes up and I notice that I have exactly 57,980 photos in Lightroom ...

... right as it crashes and burns before my eyes.

Like I said, it has been one of those days ... so I start it again. Lightroom has a photo selected, a bouquet of pink roses:

I want all my photos and there is a 'filter' on listing: 'logan' and 'flower' as the sorting parameters. I remember I was looking for a set of photos of some beautiful purple flowers outside a pizza joint in Logan, Utah - Frederico's Pizza.

Had been there one summer up to Bear Lake with a jaunt down to Logan - to see the old home, take pictures of Dr. Pierces Prescription barn ... the usual - and a lunch with the extended family at Frederico's. I had loved the photos and wanted to maybe use it as the wallpaper for my brand spanking new iTouch.

Strange, I thought. The pink roses were in a Marriott in Prague, nowhere NEAR Logan or Frederico's pizza.

I shrugged my shoulders and hit 'text' the indicator that I wanted to change the text in the filter.

And Lightroom crashes and burns ... again.

I discover that it ALWAYS crashes and burns when I go to use the filter.

NICE - I have 57,980 photos all in one place and I can LOOK AT THEM, but I cannot search them based on all the tags I so painstakingly labeled them with.

It is at this point I decide I need a diversion, because things were getting ... dark ... cloudier ... ugly.

I decide I am going to write today. I saw a friend of mine mentioned in Facebook that today is the National Day on Writing.

So ... what to write, what to write?

Sitting there glowering at Lightroom not working I decided to close my eyes, with my mouse firmly resting on the scroll bar, scroll a bit, veer over into the grid of photos and randomly pick one

...and write about the subject, whatever came to mind based on the photo.

Seemed a challenge

...Closed my eyes, scrolled a bit, veered my mouse over and clicked. Opened my eyes and saw:

And the first words that came to mind were: 'Falling Down'.

"No", I said out loud ... anything ... anything but that.

So I cheated and tried again:

Closed my eyes, scrolled, clicked, opened my eyes and said out loud: "Shit":

Also out loud "A freaking water FALL? Are you kidding me?"

One more try ....

Eyes closed, scroll, click, eyes open and "Damn"

"WHAT IS IT WITH WATERFALLS?"
OK, so I like water falls, but not so much that my 57,980 photos had 2/3 of its subjects as waterfalls.

Fine.

******************************

FALLING DOWN

Depression to me is like falling down the Rabbit Hole. I will be walking along, trip and suddenly I am falling, falling, falling - down, down ... deeper and deeper to another world. A world I despise, I world I don't belong in, a world upon which I feel I stumble upon by accident and NEVER feel as if I should be there.

It is gray, cold, dreary, lifeless, energy sapping and just not a great place to be.

I look around, wondering how to get out? Surely this is a mistake! I don't belong here - I have a wonderful life full of photos, and color, and children and the most perfect husband in the world, I DO NOT BELONG HERE.

And I see the hole I fell down. There is blue sky at the top - a long, long, very long way up a very long black hole.

How to get back up there? To my wonderful life, and wonderful house, and wonderful family and ... even wonderful dog?

The sides are slippery smooth and it is a moot point - the opening in the top of the dark, cloudy ceiling is yards and yards up with nary a ladder in sight. In fact there is NOTHING in sight. No trees, no bushes, no animals, no people, nothing. Just dark, gray ... land. A fence or two, but really nothing. And then it hits me - there is something else:

PAIN

Lots, and lots of pain. For some reason in this bleak and dreary land I can't control the pain in my body like I can on any given 'normal' day. I try,

try not to think about it

read a book

do some housework

but no, I am stuck - in a land without books and without a house or even work to do in a house - just me and the pain.

Sleep eludes me, I get sick from lack of sleep

this does not help

.
.
.

and this is where I find myself today. With my software not working, having been in too much pain for two nights to sleep, and just at my wits end with this pain, this unrelenting, unforgiving, punishing pain. In a sea of dark, gray, dreary days ...

And I realize

I've gotta get out of here!

Now!

There has to be a way!

But in my head I know, there is only one way - at least the only way I know of



and that is



TIME

Sometimes I am lost for just a few hours, most times it is days and then there was that time that was years but we don't think back to then, now do we?

So I sigh, and turn back to my computer.

I reinstall my software and click on 'repair'

I cross my fingers and start it up again. And sure enough, when I go to 'text' and enter a search parameter I get the

'Message of Death':

"A problem caused the program to stop working correctly. Windows will close the program and notify you if a solution is available."

"No!" I yell

And then I wonder - if Windows does figure this out, how are they going to 'notify me'? Angels from on high? A guy at the door? WHAT?

And I wander the bleak gray landscape some more, without even my photos bringing color into my psyche ... even a little.

Then a little voice says - 'Why not reboot? What can it hurt?' And I say - 'You know, you are right'. I hit the reboot button and limp off to walk out some very painful knees and hips.

I come back and there is a tiny little message flashing:

"Adobe Update Ready"

Hmmmmm, I think - you know, it is called ADOBE Photoshop Lightroom - why not update what ever the hell it wants you to update?

So I click on the little blinking message and all hell breaks loose. Backups, and registry updates, and registry deletions and copies and more backups and more copies and more mucking about with the registry. I get a sinking feeling. But there is a titch of Pollyanna still in there somewhere and I click on the Lightroom icon.

It comes up.

I hold my breath. I click 'text'. Still OK. No crashing. I enter 'logan' and 'flower' (the accursed combo just to make sure) and sure enough - Lightroom finds every photo I ever took in Logan of a flower (or flowers) and sitting there in all it's glory is my purple flower:

Which brings a little color into my day! Maybe not tons, maybe not enough to find that light at the end of the tunnel, but it is a start! It just might point me in the right direction

... Right?

"Failure is not falling down, but refusing to get back up" - Chinese Proverb