Photo Files, '07-'10

I haven't forgotten that I'm in a different country and I keep going places and taking pictures and needing to tell people about it. It's just that after a while I get very bored of writing about it. So I thought I'd go ahead and write about something I actually wanted to write about. I promise I will get to the others--but honestly, I'm not really all that fussed about doing it promptly anymore. It'll eventually all be caught up, and then life will be awesome. I may be forty by then, but hey, whatever works. So: current post.

"A good snapshot stops a moment from running away."

--Eudora Welty

I went through my photo files this past week. A snarly, jumbled mess they were, too--not because I usually keep them that way, but because after my computer crashed this summer, the files never went back to the state of organization they'd previously enjoyed, and I never had time to straighten them out. Enter study abroad, and plenty of time to look at things online, sit around my room doing nothing, and travel and then put off writing about it, and other such bad habits. The good thing about this half procrastination, half stress over not knowing what to do with myself (or my life...or next semester...or my suitcase. Hey, don't laugh, I lose sleep over this stuff) is that I do get a lot of lists made and files organized.

Because that's what I do when I feel like things are not quite right. Or when I feel overwhelmed, either one. I make lists and organize things. Every single piece of paper I've received since August has been put in chronological order, and, well, here's a list of things I've made lists about.

1. ALL of my different usernames for the million different things I'm signed up for online.
2. Sewing projects to do sometime, knitting projects to do sometime, random craft projects to do sometime. These are further categorized into things to try sooner, things to try eventually, things to make for me, things to make for other people, things I could try to sell, etc.
3. Every single card/letter/piece of mail I've received since getting here, the date I received it, whether or not a response was mandatory or preferable or unnecessary, and whether or not I've sent one yet.
4. Every object I brought with me. Every single one. From dental floss to every pair of earrings to the particular edition of every single magazine as well as the bags themselves. Further itemized into what I wore, what I carried on, and what was in my suitcase.
5. Every object I've bought here. Even postcards. And where I bought them, how much they cost, and how much that cost is in US dollars. I figure this will be convenient when I have to fill out a declaration form on the plane on the way home.
6. Every item that I will be taking home, split into what I can wear, what will go into the first carry on, what will go into the second carry on, and what will go into the suitcase.
7. Every item I brought or bought that I will NOT be taking home, divided into what can be recycled, sold, given back to the school, and trashed.
8. Everything I will probably be purchasing during the rest of the semester.
9. Potential school schedules for next semester. A lot of them.
10. Things I do not like about England.
11. Things I do like about England.
12. Things I want to do/make/eat when I get home.
13. Things I want to still do while I'm here.
14. A complete budget for the entire semester and a basic financial outline for next semester as well.
15. Goals in life. This includes things like "own a home" and "learn to cook healthy food" and "get married" as well as "own a dishwasher" and "visit Harry Potter World in Florida."
16. Things I need my life to contain. This includes money, structure, and family members.
17. Things that have gone wrong this year.
18. Things that have gone right this year. The other list is longer, but some years are just like that.
19. Shopping lists. About forty-five of them.
20. To-do lists. About a billion of them. Everywhere.
21. Presents to buy or make for people, and how I should package each one.
22. Different ways to wear my hair that look good and don't require a hairdryer, curling iron, straightener, or any products. Because I don't have any of it here, and don't own half of it at home either.
23. Things to have in a kitchen. This includes both supplies (because really, there should be ziplock bags, dishtowels, and measuring spoons in every kitchen) and ingredients (there should always be mustard and butter and rice around, for instance). This list was born out of a desire to one day own a properly-equipped kitchen in a country where the oven is in degrees fahrenheit and the cupboards contain more than pasta and bullion cubes.
24. Trip itineraries. Very, very, very detailed trip itineraries. Trip itineraries titled things like "Travelling Guide for December 10-11, 2010: Norwich House to Brighton Bus Station to London Heathrow Central Bus Station to London Heathrow Terminal Three to American Airlines Flight 115 to JFK Terminal Eight to American Eagle Flight 3695 to Norfolk Arrivals to Norfolk Baggage Claim to Greeting Family to Supper Out to Home." That's the title, not the itinerary. Which include things like taxi phone numbers, the names of every stop along the way to Heathrow so I know not to get off at those ones, directions from the Central Bus Station to Terminal Three, what to do while waiting for the flights, what to do while on the planes, what questions I should be asking, what documentation I should have on me, and where I think we should get supper when I get to my family.
25. Lists I need to make. Because otherwise I might forget, and then I might run out of lists to write one day, and be forced into doing something that is productive or self-destructive or something.

I'm not kidding or being over dramatic. These lists exist, and I could provide photographic evidence, except that would be boring.

In case you were curious, I have very small, reasonably neat handwriting, I keep the majority of my textbooks, and I have about 45,000 lists stuck in different notebooks and on different pieces of paper, and I hate throwing them away. I like spelling out numbers. I am intimidated by the phone and beginning to be intimidated by my email. And I'm developing a wrinkle between my eyebrows.

Slight OCD tendencies? Psh. Habits befitting a sixty-year-old librarian? Psh.

Ok, well, maybe. But this post isn't actually supposed to be about that. It's about the files I've been going through.

Like this one.

I have a lot of sunset photos. There must be more pretty evenings at home than I remember. Sunsets aren't so common here, but the light is pretty in the afternoons.

Of course there are a lot of this type of picture:

Blurry and bad.

Also, an uncommonly high number of this sort of picture:

Apparently I'm a huge dork and every time my mom puts the camera on me, I act ridiculous.

(In that particular picture, I think it was allowed, though--it was my birthday.)

There are lots of doll photos like this.

I don't really do anything with these pics, but the dolls are so pretty I have to take the pictures.

I have simply TONS of this sort of photo:

Also known as the "Carson has no idea that you're behind him taking a picture of him reading Cosmo aloud to you and Kate, and Kate is intently listening to the story about twenty flirting techniques and ignoring the camera" photograph. Another version of this type of photo involves the back of people's heads as I walk behind them. I must walk in the back of groups a lot, because I have hundreds of these.

Lots of these, too:

Various craft projects I complete at school and need to share with my mother. Or projects whose colors are so pretty that I decide I just HAVE to capture it in photographic form. These little felt roses were beauties, and pretty easy. I gave one to everybody in my immediate family, and none of the boys told me I was crazy. If that doesn't show that my brothers and father are well-raised males, I don't know what does.

The Eagle Scout badges, maybe, and the grades and manners. But I think the roses are a nicer concrete example.

(I'm very proud of my family.)

This type of picture is akin to the dorky Katherine picture a few up--it's the dorky brother picture.

You would not believe how many of these I have. David's a bigger goof than I am.

Feet pictures. I don't know what it is. Maybe it's because it's hard to take pictures of myself in public, but other people start giving me weird looks after I take seventeen pictures of them. Maybe it's because I want to take pictures but am trying to just give people the impression that I'm looking through the review section on the camera, so it's naturally pointed at my feet. Maybe I just really like my toenails, or have a partiality for metallic toenail polish. Maybe it's because I danced for fifteen years and have a very strong appreciation for my feet. Maybe I'm trying to see how my jeans look with my shoes when there's not a full-length mirror. Maybe it's the way I try to prove that I exist, since I tend to be the person taking the photos and thus am not usually in them.

I don't really know. But what I do know is that I have a picture of my own feet in nearly every single album on my computer. That's dozens and dozens of feet pictures. It's almost creepy.

I find these sometimes.

Lovely pictures of things that immediately make me want it to be Christmas, or summer, or New Year's, or the Fourth of July, or Thanksgiving. In this particular case, it's obviously Christmas.

Along with feet pictures, this is how else I show up in my computer files.

There are an alarming number of these, actually. I apparently really love my fingernails.

But really, don't they look nice in that picture? Somebody should be appreciating them. Who cares if it's myself?

I like it when I turn up some of these in a messy file.

Hello, Elon. You're beautiful at Christmas. I'll miss the twinkling lights on the trees and the luminaries this year. See you in January.

I found a lot of these pictures, too.

Otherwise known as "Katherine doesn't have a second mirror to look at the back of her hair, but she wants to know if it looks okay or not without having to go ask somebody who could possibly lie about it anyway, so she takes about ten pictures of the back of her head, because it's really hard to focus on the back of your head when your arms are behind and above you and you can't see the little screen." In this particular photo, I'm not sure why I was concerned about the back of my hair since you can see in the mirror that I obviously haven't bothered to even put in my contacts and thus don't seem to be concerned about overall appearance, but who knows. I might've had a reason. Or else maybe I was bored of homework and had a pile of bobby pins.

Anyway.

I particularly like it when certain things turn up. Like this.

When I was in high school, Photoshop and I were very chummy. I think I was actually pretty decent with it--or maybe I was just braver with the idea that I could take photos and make some sort of art with it. This was one of my very favorite collages, made from pictures of one of the little girls I babysat for eight years (and consider practically family) and pictures from the road we both live on. I remember the pictures, and I remember the day most of them were taken, which was warm and sunny and happy. The song in the background is "Fields of Gold," which I believe was first sung by Sting. The version I've always listened to is by Eva Cassidy, though, and back in high school I used to sit on my floor in the dark after I was supposed to be asleep and listen to it on repeat. Eva Cassidy has a truly beautiful voice. "Fields of Gold" is still one of my favorites--although it took a long time before I realized that it's not just a slightly melancholy song; it's a sad one.

That little girl is nearly eleven now, by the way. She was about seven in those pictures. I wrote her and her older sister letters today.

I found this, too.

In fact, I found two versions. But I think I like the green one better.

This next one was for my brother before I went to college, but I don't think I ever gave it to him. And now it's three years later, and he's applying to colleges.

We're cute siblings, David and I. We like to dance and to drive around singing off-key for no reason. And by that I mean that the driving is for no reason; the off-key singing is because carrying a tune is not a talent found in my immediate family. But we all like to sing anyway, so sing we do.

Totally forgot this one below existed--I did it for a photography class project in my senior year, I think. Whether or not I got an A is anyone's guess, but my money is on yes. And it's pretty obvious that I was feeling nostalgic when I dumped out all those photos around my feet to take a foot picture. (Yep, a foot picture. I need to mention here that I don't like anybody else's feet. Just mine.) Additional nostalgia provided by my little brother, holding up a piece of paper with lyrics from "Good Riddance."

I think I was born nostalgic.

I particularly love that picture in the Polaroid frame all the way to the left--Kayla and Olivia pretending to tango in Venice. It's really, really hard to believe that that was three years ago. I haven't seen some of the people in these pictures in literally years. Makes me feel old. And I'm only twenty!

And sometimes I find things like this collage below. Then I have to close my door and stare at it for a long time.

I miss this home. And this home isn't exactly the same as the one to which I'll return in December...but no matter what, it holds my Mama, and my Daddy, and my brothers, and a mailbox labeled 3849. I can't wait to see all of the above.

I love it.

Well, the pictures are all tidy now. Next organizing project: Document files. Project after that: iTunes playlists. They could use revamping, and "Happy3," "I Like" and "End of Freshman Year GAH" could probably be renamed to something making more sense.

Oh, and I just read sixty pages of Rousseau, so the first person to tell me that I'm procrastinating is in so much trouble.