Today, is hard.  And everything in it.  Waking up, getting dressed, varied sorts of pains, a long day and night and weekend ahead, and hardest of all- finding out that I hurt someone I love and being afraid wondering if trust can be rebuilt and things return, but knowing I don't deserve for them to do so.  And feeling so sad knowing I caused something even more sad in a dear one.  And my eyes keep getting moist.  Forgiveness feels a deep and lovely gift, but makes me toss and turn somewhere in the pit of my stomach because it is not fair and I find it so hard to accept it.

All my world seems fragile.  Sadness, inconvenience, pain, all around in the lives of family, friends, households.  And here is me, edge-teetering with something of a wind blowing me around and making my dress catch on things I haven't the energy to exert in order to dislodge myself.  I know it isn't forever, but it is right now and I am tired all the way all the way to exhaustion.  There will be no others stepping in- they won't or can't- and there may even be some who need to take their departure and I feel anxious and yet too tired to plan ahead.

My workload seems to increase everyday, which is even worse since nights are shorter and days are longer.  Rest and peace are unreachable, let alone obtainable. 

And eyes flutter closed at inopportune times of day.

polaroid with 600 film:  in the edge | © kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved  



21/29 | Twenty-Nine Days Challenge



I keep thinking about things that are for my future self- my post-wedding self- to push forward at the right time.  And the things on which I am supposed to be focusing my attention, are falling away in drafts -- thoughts never fully formed.  I am tired of focused thought.  Disjointed thoughts skipping from ideas and colors to images and music... these are the things that are present for me lately. 

However, time is slip-slipping by and the time between now and then is being used up.  There is so much to be done between now and September and I need to focus on planning.  It is just that I would much rather spend any rare moments Jason and I do have together, simply being together, and without having to bring out The Binder, work on projects, and fry our brains with every last detail.

My Twenty-Nine Days Challenge is coming to a close and I really do see how it has helped me out with providing short respites during my days.  Yet at the same time, it has been a bit distracting {albeit, in a lovely way} and it is time to get down to {wedding} business.

But for now, a daydream...

polaroid: another home - green oak ranch, vista ca|  © kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

brushes with death and life

11/29 | Twenty-Nine Days Challenge

I hope for hope and pray for prayers and dream for unforgotten dreams to brighten even the darkest of corners and feed color through smallest crevices, so the dust-oh-the-dust can bounce around in the light and make something beautiful even, even there.  Let the movement be for better and never ever for worse.

And then coming home to someone you love who has been away, or maybe you have been away, for so evenly long, feels like brushes with life instead of death.

{polaroid:  let us reside in lifegiving places}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

07/29 | Twenty-Nine Days Challenge

Someday, I want to write a novel just to see if I can. 

I sat eating delicious tilapia, broccoli, and an overstuffed baked potato, and told my dear friend, Ryan Lucchesi, about my ideas. We have rightfully reunited after two long years of not seeing each other, 'cept for one random encounter for a brief ten minutes somewhere in 2011 {which we both say, doesn't even count}.  And then we shared a lovely bread pudding in butter-rum sauce and Ryan, being Ryan, told me that I should write and pretty much, that I will write.  He always makes me smile and feel empowered.

In the past, I have made several beginnings, but with school or work or both at the same time, I never have found the time to make any solid progress.  But, someday, I would like to write pictures and try to be clever with words like all those brilliant authors I admire... and just see.

I received the book that Stephen Bobbett recommended to me years ago- a book of writing exercises that helped with beginnings.  So, that will be a nice.  And post-wedding, I feel quite sure that aside from being so incredibly happy to be living with Jason, I will also have many dream-lined goals to pursue.  And that is happy, too.

{polaroid 600:  the lovely mundane - azusa, ca}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

patterns in the sea and unknown goodbyes

06/29  | Twenty-Nine Days Challenge

Hair full of static, lists trailing bullet points, and a meeting thrown in just for kicks.  Things are less strained than they were last week {though no less busy} and I am aiming for focus to get a lot done before more comes my way.

A short fifteen-minute break lands me in Nihon, somehow.  Miyajima Island, actually.  And I am daydreaming about delightful wind, ferry rides, floating tori, graceful dear relaxing in any shade they can find, hiking along green trails shared with monkeys, aqua-blue waters, and patterns in the sea.

  

Why is it, that every time I come back from a foreign country, I know that I did not appreciate it neraly enough?  Even this most recent trip {in 2009} feels that way as I look back on pictures...

...Especially when I think of Keech and how this trip was the last time I spent with him before his death this past October, and I had no idea at the time.  I couldn't have known.  He couldn't have known.  The diagnosis had not yet come.

It brings a sure sadness and I feel that even though these were lovely experiences and memories of sailing towards floating tori and climbing green green mountains, they cannot erase the deep sense of regret and knowledge that I was so near to Keech- in his very part of the world, so very far from my own- and yet I still wasted some of the precious time when I could have been saying unknown goodbyes and painting even more beautiful last-time memories.

I am truly grateful that I saw him one last time before he started to leave us.  I just wish I were wiser then and had valued every moment more.

{polaroid 600:  with patterns in the sea - miyajima island, nihon}

missing Polaroids

01/29 | Twenty-Nine Days Challenge

Today, I am thinking about Polaroids

and how much I miss them.

 

I know, I know, and yes, I am so thankful to Impossible Film Project for all that they are doing.  Truly truly, I am.  But I can't help but miss the classic Polaroid 600 film, its familiarity, and all the fun we had together capturing moments in little white boxes.

{canon powershot - photo by brittany m. taylor}

rememory

Fog by Carl Sandburg

The fog comes

on little cat feet.

It sits looking

over harbor and city

on silent haunches

and then moves on.

This morning came with fog and it was welcome.  I walked across campus and everything from the neck up was shrouded in a layer of mist.  A subtle, sweet flavor in every inhale and cold, gentle tingles in my eyes with every blink.  Whenever fog arrives, I remember the poem Stephanie showed to me when we were children.  Its impression has stuck around a good fifteen years or so since, and I was reluctant to go inside and start my work day, knowing that it would be gone by the time I returned.

 

 

{polaroid: dividing the sky}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

teeter totter

i hope june gloom returns and

postpones summer for a while.

{polaroid : allowance - kirkland, wa}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

oh deary

 

Some slightly disconcerting news and more appointments with my eye doctor to come.  Hopefully, nothing serious- hopefully, something fixable.  I think, "warped cornea" and "a lot of scratches", sounds worse than it may be.  Since I am taking my cues from her and she did not express any sense of impending doom, I am going to simply do what she says and go back tomorrow morning after my "cornea has relaxed" (no contacts tonight) and get a second round of tests done for her to get a better idea of my current state of eyesight.

She said that I may need be prescribed some intermediary (yes, I think that term applies) soft lenses (never done that before) in the hopes of finding out if I can get back to the OrthoK program (I hope, I hope).  If I can get back to that program, new lenses will need to be designed as my old ones are not longer effective and are scratching and warping my corneas (ugh).  So, more follow-up appointments so she can retest my eyes and find a more accurate perscription once the cornea has relaxed more.

So blurriness continues for a while longer.  But I don't have glaucoma or macular degeneration, so at least that's dandy.

{polaroid :  oh deary, miyajima island - japan}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

memorary

sometimes, it's time to let friends fade away.

even if you love them, still.

and it can be a different kind of beautiful, the memorary sort.

{polaroid :  a place for breathing - kirkland, wa}
© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

of promisory sort

 

i don't suppose

its heavenly

to rest upon the likes of us

and fester in our brewing state

forgetting to regurgitate

the thoughts we're holding back

 from you

remorseful when

its past the time

to let old scars be plucked clear off

and muster up courageous speech

resenting every darkened leech

when bleeding first began

to stain

perchance there be

a melody

that reaches us, within our minds

with notes of promissory sort

resist the urge to scream, "abort!"

and opt, instead, for love

in truth

{polaroid : and bathing in our filth}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

just for a little while

i want to find a big black pool

and slip away, unseen for a while

and resurface again

once things have settled

down, down in my head



{polaroid : endescend}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

facing

exquisitely, as if enough

to hold us here in limbo state

may has colored things in a different hue.  a sad shade like a lonely blue or leftover creme.  or, maybe its the circumstance-and-all-around that makes may alter its tint.

ironically, i'm reading hector and the search for happiness.



{polaroid : facing the wrong way}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

homebody

can i be you today, scarlet?

i'll even catch a bug

(that's how much i want to be home)

{polaroid on impossible film : orange chorus}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

the sixth of May

and the snooze button
and mary janes
and chocolate cherrios turning my 2% to chocolate milk
and blurry eyes all day long
and morning traffic even on friday
and lunch plans
and book group reading
and parenting a parent
and a strawberry banana smoothie future
and tomorrow dedicated to us

{polaroid : from and this where i leave you series}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

safe keeping

Things that make me feel safe.

1  Wearing the color black
2   Sierra Madre
3   Hearing rain outside
4   Twinkle lights
5  Avonlea re-runs
6  Christmas music
7  The company of a cat
8  Quilts and Carmichael
9  Lovelies who don't mind

{polaroid : carmichael}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

slipping bobby pins and tea grown cold

1. slipping bobby pins

2. typing

3. blurred eyes

4. tea grown cold

5. remembering

{polaroid : lonely spaces}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

sweep awayaway

I long for uninterrupted sleep, where the sun stays away and dreams lull rather than raise.  For an ink pen and water colours in my hand to form fleurets on paper.material.life.  For whispers that say positive things all the livelongday.  To jump up and down until my teeth hurt or my breath fails and then lay on my back in the middle of the floor and look up at a ceiling fan until my heart slows down and my breath becomes a steady rhythm keeping time to the music in my head.  For friends who stay or last.  For inspiration that comes from the mundanely beautiful, like so many things I respect.  And to sweep away the remnants that disclose the same-olds and hindrances from what I have chosen and keep reminding me that there is much more.  For harmony to tingle and charm and alarm my senses to stay awake and take it all in, but in ebbs and flows, a little at a time.  For living in a living way.

 {canon 30d : living in a living way}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

A day for the Irish and the rest of us

Happy St. Patrick's Day.  I appreciate the added green in my day.

My heart is still in Japan, so here is the greenery, and all its peaceful vibrancy, of Japan...

And if you would like to help this breathtaking land filled with its wonderful people, visit:  Here

{polaroid:  to nihon, with love}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved

Japan and love and a way to help

I went home from work on Friday because I kept crying and my heart was pounding so fast with each minute ticking by in such slowed motion as I waited to hear from beloveds in Japan. I could not focus and could not stop crying, thinking about it all, and so I went home.

Since Friday, I have been among the fortunate to discover that my Aunt Eileen and all of my friends are safe so far.  Such relief and thanksgiving.  Yet, that same relief causes me a sadness for those who have not found the same and instead, have received heartbreaking news.

My dear friend, Haruna, is safe for the time being.  However, she lives 100 miles away from where the Fukushima nuclear plant exploded.  Many people have been evacuated due to the radiation leak scare, but Haruna and her family have not been notified to leave.  They have been experiencing numerous aftershocks and on Saturday, she said they came every few minutes.  They have been told to expect another 7.0 in the next two days, which is a larger quake than our 6.7 California Northridge in 1994.  Fortunately, the Japanese architecture is withstanding the quakes.  It is the tsunami ravaged areas that are suffering most.

Stephanie's friend, Joey Millard, has traveled up to Sendai with several members of his house church and is doing all he can to help.  He took with him $1000 worth of food and supplies and cooking stoves, but these resources are already depleting as the need is so great.  It is freezing cold in Sendai and the survivors are without heat, water, food, sewage, and electricity.  Joey's most recent message said,

"Made it to sendai. Dropped off a few thousand dollars worth of food and supplies. Hope we can find more ways to help....Just visited a nursing home...heart breaking... not much food, all the patients on one floor, no power, no sewage, no heat for cooking. Was able to give themsome cooking stoves. Still so much more need! @ prefectrual gov building in sendai. Hundreds stranded sleeping on the floor. No food. Need volunteers. Need food. Gov can't do anything for these ppl. Need help. we r scrambling to find food, even to buy. international aid starting but priority saving, not feeding."

If you would like to donate to Joey's work in Sendai, please contact me and I can connect you with their ministry website where you can contribute.  He and his brothers are missionaries in Japan and were groomsmen in Stephanie and Andrew's wedding in Aioi.  They are such giving, serving individuals and what we give to them, they will give to those who need it. 

{polaroid: another home: aioi, nihon}

© kimberly k taylor, all rights reserved