The Beatles - Strawberry Fields Forever
A piece about my “emotionless” childhood. Filled with excerpts from my childhood journal (that expresses no emotions at all!).
A reject

Just playing around with graph paper and impact on photoshop

I think everything structured in life makes it fulfilling if everything is balanced.

Work: It gives a sense of accomplishment, a sense of being productive and brings on rewards (assuming that the job of the individual is one that he or she enjoys).

When we are restraint with time:
- we do not take time for granted

- we make use of our time
- we enjoy every moment we can

- we value the weekends much more

When time is at an abundance:
- we procrastinate on projects & goals
- we do not value time with others as much (since we can delay or see them anytime)
- the overall value of time (including mood) decreases

People’s “work” (whether their own personal projects or a job) keeps them in tuned. I think this is pretty similar the Proust’s views on life. If we did not have death, many people would be unmotivated to complete many things in their life and so on.

If you knew that you only had a week to live, how many things would you try to accomplish and how much more would you value those minutes with people who are special in your life?

… because I love this stuff!!!

Today I’m at a better stage in life, after I realize how my mindset and situations were like since I hit that awkward stage of 15…

At 15, I was the shy, quiet, reserved kid. I didn’t have any issues with high school or friends - it was all perfectly fine. I did have issues with myself however and a lot of resentment towards my family. At 15, I didn’t know what was going on with my family, or the fact that it was breaking apart and it seemed like the norm since it’s always been such a strange dynamic for so many years. I think I was trying to make a change, since I was controlled by my parents in many ways, I wanted to break out of it. I searched for control in the not-so-greatest ways - through food. I don’t remember exactly how it all started, but I do remember slowly decreasing the amount of food that was being eaten daily. First, skip breakfast. Next, skip lunch. Next, partially finish dinners. The main sense of control I felt was my weight. Losing weight was never driven by wanting to look skinny because I was already thin to begin with, so it never became a motivator. As less food came into my body, my weight kept dropping til the lowest point, which was around 94.

I think I kind of gave a hint to my family that I was having food issues, maybe subconsciously trying to cry out for the sense of caring, nurturing I never really had while growing up - of course that never happened.

One day, out of the blue. I came to my senses, I realized that what I was doing was very unhealthy and the damage was already showing with my thinning hair. So, I stopped. Simple as that? But the problem didn’t really go away…

Age 16 came. Grade 12, loved it. Socially fulfilling, growing up, a sense of direction in life, a small connection with my family growing, a high of my life I’ve never had… Turned 17, a new stage of life begins…

First year university, a fresh new beginning, not being tied down by my usual expectations as the shy, quiet, kid. Came out of the box as a new more outgoing confident person… I think. Little did I know this year would lead to a bulk of confusion, depression and another new beginning.

Being able to get into the University of Toronto was already an accomplishment, I felt excited, nerdy and ambitious. 2 months after, I hated school, I lost a direction as to where I was going, I didn’t know what would make me happy in life… sciences wasn’t my passion… Winter comes. Questions of my sexuality arose, which didn’t help either. I struggled between trying to gear my life towards a relationship with a guy that I thought I fell in love with. It wasn’t any ordinary guy. In fact, I’ve known him for over 10 years. We started getting closer, but then I had to move to University. I kept in contact with him still, we talked… a lot… almost daily. He would actually be the first person to understand me and relate to my feelings. An emotional connection formed, I thought I fell in love with him, he made me smile with his random textes, he allowed me to think outside of my horribly negative mindset and twisted it into something positive. So I realized he filled a part of my void. I thought to myself - is he the one? But wait, I’m not attracted to guys, there was no physical attraction and I think everything was purely based on that special emotional connection I’ve never had with anyone in my life, even to this day.

Having that potential sense of love did not solve my problems. I spiraled downwards as I start deeply contemplating about what happened to me throughout my childhood, how unfair and abnormal it was and why I deserved it. I was told that I never grieved as a child and have been bottling everything up til this point, that’s why there was such a greater impact now.

I was not logical, I can’t even make sense of it now, but I did have the urge to end my life. There were painkillers on the kitchen table, I had the cold, lightly took 6 hoping something would happen but no, it didn’t.

I became more and more careless, a direct way of showing that I wanted to die. I would walk home in the dark at night, ipod on, paying no attention at all for my safety. One day, it did the trick. I got hit by a car, head on while walking past an intersection. My body slowly flew towards the hood of the car, then bounced to the ground, arms first. The car was still moving and I remembered having a feel of wishing it to drive all the way through… but the impact was not that bad since it literally stopped an inch away from my body, and the driver did slow down. From my fall, all I had was a pretty bruised up leg that hurt to walk on. Nothing was broken.

Drowning myself in more deep contemplation did not help. I reached the point where my hubby could not help me anymore with his talks. I had an argument with my father, which lead to my childhood and how it fucked me up. So I had a trigger of all the memories that did occur, my heart started racing, I could feel a blood rush and I was yelling endlessly at father til the point I lost my breath. I’ve never had such a high and rush in my life. I had the strongest urge to just kill myself. I kept screaming at my father, “I am going to kill myself” over and over and over. Father called cops, cops came… I decided to move out.

So a year moved out. The summer, a more positive light came, space from my parents allowed me to think things through logically. I understood everything and closed the past.

A year moved out… I gained a definite direction in life, found out what my passions are, a positive mindset and most importantly, found the love of my life - poopy

It was unexpected, to felt a complete 360 degree change this year. Unexpected for my life to change once I fell in love with my girlfriend, it was very rocky and slow. I can’t emphasize on how rocky it was. I honestly don’t know why I’m in love with her, it doesn’t make sense but she makes me smile and feel warm inside She is one of the best things that has happened to me in my life <3

With the realization of my past and misinterpretations from my parent’s actions along with the sense of love and affection from my girlfriend… I would say, the issue was solved. And looking back at the past few years, I’m not seeking happiness because it’s already here more than what I expected, and definitely more to come once I start a new beginning at OCAD.

My girlfriend’s graduate show display @ OCAD
High Park Polaroids
First Nikon D40 test shot!

Scraps, scraps, scraps. I’m going to redo the first piece on awesome new graph paper that I found at Above Ground (that art store beside OCAD).

I’m going to get a Nikon D40 sometime today. Being able to take decent photographs with SLRs would be something very useful to understand but I don’t think it’s my creative outlet. I’m probably going to try to learn as many technical things as possible (by self, maybe a workshop? Not sure!). It’ll be very useful for creating “rough” mock-ups of concepts (that require photographs), my blogs (especially for my Queen West Love Blog) and more!

After reading reviews about the Nikon D40 and Nikon D60, apparently the differences between the two are not significantly enough to pay more money for the latest Nikon version… Some reviews even state that the D60 is a downgrade from the D40! I really don’t know a lot about SLRs so hopefully my choice is okay..

I just completed the blog design for my new Queen West Love Project:

It looks really plain, but the point of the layout is to keep it simplistic enough for the photographs to stand out.

I have so many things to add to this blog which I will this week (polaroids, photos, etc, etc)

What have I been busy with?

My art & design blog. My goal is to update it around 3 times every day or so. This is one of my art & design blogs that I will be starting up for my social media network. There’s another one I started but it’s too new to post about ;).

I am also starting a Queen West blog next week, which will have a unique concept I’ll post about it once everything has been settled down. I’ll need to visit Queen West with a camera… a camera.. yes..