for God's sake, turn around

Is it a good sign or a bad sign that I'm back to watching for certain names to pop up on the friendslist? I'll leave that as a philosophical exercise while I decide.

And, as expected, my brain has started playing back Certain Moments of memory in dreams. Because my brain hates me. Times like this, I really mislike the way I'm wired.

Anyway.

So here's a morbid bit of irony for you, but I have to fill in a bit of history first.

go placidly amid the noise and waste
and remember what comfort there may be in owning a piece thereof
avoid quiet and passive persons, unless you are in need of sleep

I've never been a great photographer, in any world. It's been a minor passion, but never a vocation. I have Flickr, I have Instagram, I have three different digital cameras (although two of them no longer work well, and the third is starting to get some odd hitches now and again, so I should just toss all three and upgrade to an actually better working single one).

rotate your tires.
speak glowingly of those greater than yourself,
and heed well their advice, even though they be turkeys.

Sometimes, I even remember to take one of them out with me when I venture into the world, though I'm sorry to say, I've taken far more images on my cell phone than with the actual cameras I own. That's somewhat disquieting.

know what to kiss, and when.
consider that two wrongs never make a right, but that three do.
wherever possible, put people on hold.

But that brings us to SL. See, in RL, I was never a tripod person so much. So while I take relatively few pictures, almost none of them are of me. (None of the three cameras have timers, either, so...there's that.) But in SL? In SL I have a fully independent, 360° camera that can work both from a fixed position and in motion.

be comforted that in the face of all aridity and disillusionment,
and despite the changing fortunes of time,
there is always a big future in computer maintenance.

And, to that end, I've taken a lot of pictures in SL. Portraits (because the one model who's always around is me), effects, scenery, game glitches, general oddity, even a few videos. And, me being me, quite a number of them are, shall we say, adult in nature.

remember the Pueblo.
strive at all times to bend, fold, spindle, and mutilate.
know yourself.
if you need help, call the FBI.

Now, I'm not Jeffree Star, I don't take pictures for the blackmail potential. That is vile and beneath not only me, but anyone I've shared with. That is so very far from the point of having those images in the first place.

exercise caution in your daily affairs,
especially with those persons closest to you -
that lemon on your left, for instance.
be assured that a walk through the ocean of most souls
would scarcely get your feet wet.

So why do I have them? Memories, mainly. Words are good, and flashbacks are lovely--well, most of the time--but there's just something about a photograph...The power of the image transcends, in short.

fall not in love therefore. It will stick to your face.

GODS, you're not kidding...

Which brings us, in typical roundabout fashion, to that other bruised heart. (Remember the past week? Yeah, that fellow.) For some reason, while we were sharing with each other, I took relatively few pictures. I couldn't even tell you why. (And let's be clear here--I don't mean I have 100 of this guy, and 450 of that guy, and 566 of that girl...no no no. I don't keep a lot of the very personal pictures. But even among the small collections I have, pictures of that particular gentleman? I just don't have many.)

gracefully surrender the things of youth: birds, clean air, tuna, Taiwan.
and let not the sands of time get in your lunch.
hire people with hooks.
for a good time, call 606-4311. Ask for Ken.

Save for...the last time we were together. (Ah, now you're seeing the morbid irony. Yes.) I have a scant few pictures of a small, small handful of other times, but I have about six or eight from that time.

take heart in the bedeepening gloom
that your dog is finally getting enough cheese.
and reflect that whatever fortune may be your lot,
it could only be worse in Milwaukee.

And...the normal pattern is, or has been, to wait a few days, then cull through the raws, pick out the best angles, and ditch the rest. Because after all, they're just for me. They're never going to go into galleries or posters or on the Marketplace. Right?

And it's not like there won't be other times...right? Right?

Right...

you are a fluke of the universe.
you have no right to be here.
and whether you can hear it or not,
the universe is laughing behind your back.

Except...I know when I took those shots. I know--now--it was the last time. The last time there will be. And...I keep catching them when going through other images, and clicking one or two, and then closing them again, because I'm still far too close to everything to even begin to evaluate.

therefore, make peace with your god,
whatever you perceive him to be - hoary thunderer, or cosmic muffin.
with all its hopes, dreams, promises, and urban renewal,
the world continues to deteriorate.
give up!

I am sincerely torn between packaging those up in a zip file to be dealt with much, much later, and doing my usual cull-and-edit bit, but...there are no second chances. And the question in the forefront of the brain is, should I keep everything because it was the last time? Should I treat those shots as any other encounter? Am I ever going to have a 'hah, yeah, I remember that' moment from these shots, or will they always carry that slight flinching ache?

I honestly couldn't tell you, right now. But it is another question to ponder.

(The lyrics, so to speak, since it's mostly a spoken-world piece save for the chorus, are from National Lampoon's "Deteriorata", which was narrated by Christopher Guest.)