same-same

 Pictures left and below are of a carpet and bus shelter.
Looking at them together I see how my eye was drawn to the rectangular patterns.
Looking at my closet this week I noticed the plethora of black and white stripes.
I have a hard time wearing patterns that are not symmetrical, or clothes don't match--I saw a girl at the bus stop yesterday in black pants and a blue top and I could hardly stand looking at her. How did she go about her day like that? My shrink gave me homework  once, where I was to wear an outfit to work that I knew *did not* match, to see how my co-workers would react. No one said anything, of course, which proved--honestly, I'm not sure what it proved, other than being a soul-crushing exercise in realizing that no one really sees you.
Think about that. You can never see someone as you once did. As you first did, when you were strangers.

a fountain of eyes

It's funny, I took this picture sitting around in a rental car waiting to pick up my fella. Picmonkey boyeee, I am having fun with it. A friend commented that I should release an album. Right?! Except...I can't sing.
Good news ahead, another story about to greet the public. More to come!

seen somewhere by someone (me)

skrawl

I'm having fun playing with Picmonkey to edit photos. This was a chalk graffiti drawing on a utility pole with about a half dozen effects. Kid in a candy store and such.
*
I had a scare this week.
What does that mean? It's skirting what I mean to say, which is that I got scared this week. Seriously frightened, in my apartment, alone, in the middle of the night. I took steps the next day to be safer and I dug up the weapon my sisters got me a few years ago.
My friends have similar fears, I found, in conversations since. One, who just moved into a house, has thoughts of how easy it would be for an intruder to get in. We talked, laughingly serious, about buying baseball bats.
Another, at home alone some nights with a child, worries some, and props a bottle up by the door as an early warning system.
We all walk around juggling fear and bravery and strategies inside us, I guess. Not so far removed from our ancestors, huddled around the fire for warmth and safety, fingers twitching near a trusty stick, just in case.

road trippin

In my travels last week, I drove nearly 900 miles. Most of the driving was on Interstate 70, a well-engineered four-lane highway (and then some, closer to Denver). I fueled up on bubble gum and coffee and once I set the cruise control, did not tap the brakes for hours. The radio options out on the plains are interesting: all I found were turn-or-burn preachers, the ag report, or country music stations. It was good thinking time.
Tumbleweeds blew across the highway, rolling, hesitating, then sweeping on. The sky seemed bigger, without the Northwest's abundance of hills and mountains and trees. Another good bit of driving I did over county highways, well-maintained and nearly empty of traffic other than farm trucks and other beefy vehicles. I took my time, in no hurry and enjoying time with my grandmother and the late fall sunshine.
Streets near where my aunt and uncle live seemed unusually wide--were they designed for storm runoff? Bigger vehicles? But, there were hardly any cars!

On a brisk morning run I came across a flattened tumbleweed and snapped a photo for a possible future tattoo.

sammyisgood

Pictures snapped mostly by my niece on a tour of campus residence halls. All I added was filters.
#sammyisgood.

the newest

variations

Wack

This time of year people get a little wacky.
Bunches of my friends are busy buying stuff, sending cards, baking and cooking, sitting on santa's lap and making perfect moments.
Others are ignoring the holidays and simply going about their business, having Festivus parties and trying to wait the whole thing out at the local watering hole.
I don't know what makes sense, honestly, other than to keep on with I've been trying to do: doing the things I love, having fun, and letting the extra stuff sort itself out. I took this picture on a good night recently, roaming around Belltown on a frigid night with a friend, taking photos, drinking beer and having the time of our lives.

Meh

This wall has interested me for a long time. You can peep it along 8th and Olive in Seattle.
On one side of the street are luxury apartments and an upscale restaurant. On the other side it's a much grittier scene, a bodega and grim studios, with possibly the world's grossest Greyhound station only steps away.
Such intriguing duality.
A clue to how a person--yes okay me--could be both sane and thoughtless, charmless and charmant, all at once.

Beaucoup shiny

My nighttime rambles took me past China Harbor not long ago. Take a peep at BusySmartyPants:Tumblr tomorrow for more tasty shots.
You know me, I love the shine, the sparkle, the dazzle.
Taking pictures in the dark is a furtive kind of pleasure.
You don't know if what you have will turn out.
As with most things in life.
*
Do what you're doing, get what you're getting. Got this unshaven gem from a friend earlier this week, when I was low.

aitch 2 oh

See the sea: cross posting with BusySmartyPants Tumblr.

Leaves

Fall in Seattle is gorgeous.
I know you're thinking, what could be attractive about drippy gray days, where the streetlights glow all day like giant night lights, and you feel the damp chill deep in your sinuses?
I have one word for you: leaves.
You have to love a thing that is named for its behavior. In the fall, a leaf--well--it leaves.
Seattle's silvery gray autumn light makes the changing leaves light up, illuminates them as though each one is a little lamp. The leaves on the tree outside my window are a riot of golds and yellows and peaches. At dusk, they become a sunburst of light against the surrounding gray-green cedars. Our maples turn a deep ruby red, as intense as pomegranate seeds, or aged port.
This morning as I was out walking the dog in the cold dark mist, I spotted this leaf, a brilliant yellow, bedazzled with raindrops, plastered against the sequiny black pavement.