STAIRWAY TO LIFE

We grind and keep going.  We ignore our own needs while taking care of those needs of others and somewhere along the way we forget who we are.  We get financially drained from trying to make it all work …for everyone else …but not ourselves..so in the end.  Everyone else is comfortable and doing ok while you are suffering and doing without.  Sadly, the ones you helped the most doesn’t even care that you have sacraficed for them.

Then you do have those that are very grateful for what you do.  They appreciate you and if they could help you in return, they simply would.  And then, just when you think it can’t get any worse for you and while you are at your lowest point, mentally, physically and financially, all the hands come out and since others are going through similar things, they need you to take care of your debt you have with them.  You want to and you have every intention of doing so.  You know how it feels to be in need.  You understand how if feels to have bills to pay and no way to pay them so you start tapping the possibilities in your mind.  I have done it.  I have thought …who owes me since I helped them?  I realized that I probably asked those people at the wrong time as well. When is the right time?  Is there a right time?  Then you realize that you are not the only one suffering and if that person could pay you back they would. Oddly, everyone I owe is on the same wavelength or something because several have asked me in the last few weeks and I know some hate to ask.

It’s the same old scenario of like attracts like.   We find ourselves surrounded by friends, family and co workers that simply don’t have enough at the end week or maybe in my case the end of the day to make ends meet.  I have to take the hits in my case.  I have to let people stay upset with me for not being able to take care of my debts to them.  It’s not all about money.  It’s favors and other things also,  but even then, I simply don’t have the energy reserve to fullfil those obligations either.  Nothing I can do about it at the moment.

I’m sure there are other people like me out there in this world.  You are in financial recovery….or mental recovery from life’s curve balls…or emotional recovery from someone totally using you and betraying you.  I’m in recovery in all areas except subtance abuse recovery.  I never had to fight that battle like so many in this world are doing right now.  If I had turned to drugs and alcohol, I would not be here on this earth right now because I know I would not have survived that.  I would have overdosed or run my health down so quick that I would have just given up.

I am not here to whine and complain though.  I know life is tough for a lot of people right now.  I know that on this Christmas Day, someone else out there has it better than me and someone has it worse than me.  I also know that for some of us, like me, Christmas is not such a wonderful holiday and as much as I want to enjoy it and get in the spirit, I just don’t have it in me.  I have people who feel I am the worst person in the world for owing them money.  My adult children have distanced themselves from me although probably not intentially and I can’t even find the time to enjoy any family time with my siblings, grandson, children or friends, simply because I continue to stay in survival mode.

I asked myself…why is that when I woke up this morning?  Why does it seem that at this moment, I am getting the bad end of the stick, when everyone else is cozy in their homes and yes things might be a little difficult for them at the moment, but at least they have a roof over their head and in most cases someone to be there for them.  I have a big family, but I do not have that moral support and I get overlooked and misunderstood no matter how people that know me want to view it.  Why is that?  One reason is because I never stood my ground on my self respect.  I backed down from every situation to avoid conflict and rarely shared what my needs were.  I have literally been taking care of someone else’s situation all my life and then doing things that don’t benefit me to catch up and recover from that.  Those were my choices.  I chose to step in and help.  I made decisions, good and bad, on my own, thinking I knew the best way.  A lot of times, I do know the best way, not because I think I know it all but because I have experienced a lot.  At the end of the day, no one in my circle really cares how my day was or what I am going through.

That is my own fault to certain degree as well.  I rarely open up.  I take care of my problems on my own with no help.  My intentions are good, despite my failed attempts, but as they say, the road to hell was paved with good intentions.  So true.  I have missed the steps to the stairway of life.  I have skipped to the top, fell back down several times, brushed myself off and got back up.  I have walked my journey completely by myself and when I choose to do something, I am determined to do it.

I have three battles right now.  My mom is in the last stages of liver cancer, my teenage son goes to school that is out of district and I have fell into owning and operating a cat rescue all on my own.  I go out and I ask for help and I get praise and pats on the back for doing what I do.  I understand…they are my battles.  My sisters and I all tag team the caregiving duties for our mom and unless you have experienced it, you don’t understand how emotionally hard it is to watch your loved one slowly go away.  It sucks.  They are suffering and you see it on a daily basis and others sympathize with you but they don’t know how it truly feels unless they have done the same.  Depression is a constant visitor and some days it’s hard for us to hold our heads up, but we do.

I fight hard to keep my son in the school that he is attending.  Why?  Because I know my potential and some of my potential wasn’t realized in school because we lived in poverty and I was at different schools sometimes 3 times a school year.  So, I gave up and quit early but later went back when I could.  No one was there to fight that battle for me as a child.  I understand that my parents did the best they could with what they had.  It was just luck of the draw for me.  But for my youngest son,  I have fought the battle for him because I see his potential and I am not about to let him flounder like I did.

My cat rescue is struggling. I get bags of cat food sometimes and some kind souls donate money here and there but it’s not nearly enough.  People tell me to just give up and send them to the humane society. They think I am crazy for continuing on, but what they don’t know is that sometimes rescuing animals is the only thing that saves me.  Sometimes they are the only thing I have and if I ever get to the point where they might go hungry then I would do what’s best for them.  But they are happy and well cared for.  I get accused of spending loads of money on them and others think that is a part of the reason of my financial stress.  It is not.  The cost’s are minimal compared to the mountain of debts that I have incurred.

And yes a lot of that debt I have incurred was for the sake of keeping a situation going for others that I really couldn’t handle.  Again I made my own decisions and I am not blaming those people for my decisions.  I am not blaming anyone but myself.  I get overlooked so much because I don’t use my voice.  Now at this point in my life, I don’t really care who gets upset with me for not doing what they think I should or for debt that they think I should pay to them right now.  It’s simply bad timing for me. I should pay it and I want to pay it, but if I do not get serious about my own well being and my own financial situation, I will not be able to repay debts, take care of my three major responsibilities or reach a level of stability on that stairway to life.  At the end of the day, no one cares what I am doing but me.  I don’t expect others to care and when they do care, I will embrace that.  I care about them and me.

What others don’t realize is that at the end of the day, I could be at a few different places.  My life circumstances dictate my living arrangements.  I work a lot, but a lot of my income goes to the costs of being instable and floating around from place to place.  I sleep on a cot at my mom’s when I stay there.  I sleep on a recliner at my friend’s house when I am needing to be there to be closer in distance to my son to get him to school.  She only lives about 15 miles away from him.  My jobs are in people’s homes so I’m not just in one city or place all the time.  I cover a lot of distance just to make a day in my life work.  It’s hard when you float around from place to place and if you look at the income I bring in sometimes, you would see that I should be able to afford a place on my own and the reality is, I could if I would stop doing what others wanted and needed and focused on myself.  I have chosen that path of doing more than I can.  Making promises that I can’t keep.  Letting exes push me into more and and more responsibility that I really can’t handle efficiently, but yet they know I will find a way and I do.

So, if I miss some steps on this stairway of life and I owe you a debt, forgive me for taking care of myself first from here on out.  Forgive me for even owing you because I don’t enjoy owing the debt to you or anyone and whoever you are….you are not the only one.  I have no real place to lay my head.  My things are scattered at different places.  I have no one to really talk to at the end of the day.  When everyone around me is cozy in their own spaces, I am feeling like an intruder invading someone else’s space and feeling like a robot doing things to pacify to earn my keep so to speak.  It’s not a good feeling to be around all that despite the fact that I am not on the streets.  I am grateful for those who let me couch surf.  I have lived as roommates with others and for their own reasons they displace me because they need to be alone in their own space for whatever reason.  Some have used me financially for their own benefit and when they no longer needed that financial help, I got kicked to the curb.  I am a quiet person and respect other people’s lifestyles and spaces so I know in most cases I wasn’t doing anything to warrant getting kicked out.  In some cases, I could not pay, so I do understand that one.

I am not one to give up though.  I will find my place and I will take care of myself and I will have to let others misunderstand and resent me for taking care of myself first, but now it is a necessity and I encourage anyone who has been going through similar things to do the same.  Climb those steps until you get where you need to be and if you owe people, when asked about the debt, let them know the truth of your situation.  I have a bad habit of making promises and not being able to follow through because there is not enough to go around.  I know I am not the only one.  I am here to encourage you to focus on yourself and let go of people getting mad at you.  I will be spending my Christmas break developing a recovery plan to get myself up out of this 10 year journey of survival mode and I will be letting all those involved know that as soon as I reach a level of stability, I will take care of those debts.  Appearances are deceiving and when I reach some level of success with my business, it seems that I am loaded with income.  I am not.  I have merely made enough to pay things that need my immediate attention in order to survive, but when I get above water with a realistic financial plan then I can repay debts after all my needs are addressed.

I love everyone in my life and I am sorry if any of them are holding resentment towards me for not paying my debts earlier, but you simply only see what’s going with my life on the surface.  You don’t see the intricate details of what it takes to keep going right now and it is up to me to change my circumstances and if I continue ot dish out what I make without taking care of my own needs, then my health is going to deteriorate and then I will not be able to physically take care of anyone’s debts that I owe.

I need space and time to be with my mom without the stress of people needing me to pay or do something.  I need space and time to get my son on a level with school to where I am not the sole provider of getting him there.  I need space and time to find others that are passionate about my animal rescue cause to delegate duties to them and pass the torch so to speak.  I need time and space to make myself a better person so that I can repay my debts and live a decent and normal life.  I currently do not have the resources to do anything but the bare minimum right now, but I will work it out.  Hate me or love me…I will love you anyway.  Don’t crucify me for wanting to better my life.  Don’t crucify me for needing to be in a better position.

With Love to All, Sherry.

 

Spun

I stumbled, I fell

I have a story to tell

I bled through the pain

finding shimmer in the rain

I danced with a silver tongued devil

on a hot summer night

He stole my soul

ultimately, I won the fight

I blossomed, I bloomed

Into my truth

Fell down from the air

and grounded my roots

Darkness prevailed

centered by a circle of love

I said to myself

“What are you thinking of?’

I reclused and I spun

creating with fun

And out came a soul, a Beautiful One!

 

written by Sherry Short September 2012

It’s All About Me

Stop and smell the roses, they say.  Don’t take life so serious, they say.  That’s kind of hard to do when life has other plans in store for you.  I want to rest.  I want to take time to smell the roses and laugh a little more.  I want to not work so hard and live a little better.  I want to get out of rat race of the trap of working in circles and place my feet on solid ground.  How do you do that though?

Do you simply stop the wheel and jump off like our furry little rodents?  Is it really that simple?  When it comes down to life, it really is all about me.  It’s about me and how I perceive things.  It’s about me and how I react to circumstances.  It’s about me when it’s up to me to make a change of attitude. It’s about me when I just want to be a little selfish sometimes and not do anything for anyone but myself, which I rarely do. 

I’m stopping the wheel….I’m jumping off and I’m going to walk around a bit and only jump back on another wheel and learn a new circle with a new scenery.  I’m getting rid of what isn’t working and taking steps to create what does work for me.  It doesn’t have to work for anyone else, but me.

Silent Reflections

This place in the photo is where I need to be right now.  But who has the money or time to get there?  Not me at this moment in my life.  Oh what I would give to be able to feel the wooden planks of the that walkway speckled by the grainy feel of sand particles beneath my bare feet as I walked in wonder towards that beautiful ocean.  I know I would sit there for hours, feeling the gentle breeze on my wet cheeks from the tears of silent reflections of life.  I would immensely enjoy the smell of the fresh air and salty taste of the ocean’s residue on my tongue to match the saltiness of my tears. 

These 3am mornings are few and far between for me, but lately, I have been restless, contemplating the meaning of life while trying to understand how cruelty in this world still exists.  I wonder how I keep finding the will and strength to rescue animals.  How I keep loving others on a deeper level than they will ever understand or I will ever show.  Not tooting my own horn here in how great I am…because I am not.  I have been a fuck up in life many times over.  I have hurt those I love, but not intentionally.  Most of all, I have squandered my potential to the point where I don’t even know if my potential really exists anymore.  Now I am faced with trying my best at every endeavor or project that crosses my path and failing miserably.

The good news is, I keep rescuing…I keep loving deeply and I keep trying to let my potential shine.  I could write an interesting book on my life and reveal the shit I’ve put myself and others through, but what good would that do?  It wouldn’t cure my mom from cancer, it wouldn’t cure my lifelong struggle with instability and homelessness and it wouldn’t cure the cruelty in this world.  I don’t live in the past anymore.  I find myself reflecting on the past, but I don’t live there.  Instead, perhaps, I should write a book about a new reality. 

About me sitting on that beach with my mom sitting there beside me, both of us enjoying the moment and the beauty of wonder looking at that big ol’ ocean God created. Paying no mind to the misunderstandings of our past and just reveling in the feelings of being connected as mother and daughter.  And when we were finished with our walk and moment, we would walk back up to a quaint little beach house where the rest of our loved friends and family were waiting on us to get back so that we could share a simple breakfast of wholesome food.  Why is that too much to ask for these days?  It shouldn’t be so I ask myself, how do I get us there?

To be continued. …..

Four Sixteen (Knocking On Heaven’s Door)

The above photo is just some of the items I make for therapy more than anything.  I take tin food cans, re-paper them and use them for pencil holders or make candles out of them.   I also create mosaics out colored pencil and paper like in the photo below.  I haven’t decided what I would like to do with those yet but will decide soon.  If you look closely at the first one and study it, you will find the body of a peacock with shards of fire color like feathers of a phoenix.

My most effective form of therapy is writing and I love making or embellishing my own journals.  I have filled pages and pages of my heartaches, emotions, happy moments, letters to God, letters to others that I never sent, hopes, dreams, aspirations, successful projects, failed projects and creative fictional writing.

That being said, just so you know a little more about my creative side, you might understand the rest of this post in my need to share my emotions about a day in my life that changed me.  That day was April 16, 2018..thus the title of this post, “Four Sixteen.”

It started out fairly normal.  I had just dropped off my son at his high school and headed out to do my daily driving of rideshares to earn an income.  I have been taking a hiatus from my regular job as a house painter due to my life being unpredictable at the moment.  The night before, I had dropped off two of my cats in my rescue at the emergency animal vet because they contracted a virus that caused them the get the cat flu.  It is deadly when they stop eating and all the other cats had started showing signs so I was in a battle.  I had been nursing them and going over to the rescue house more frequently to make sure they were ok.  I was already exhausted from the constant worry that I might lose one and the continuous care they required.  Shortly after I was on my way that morning, my youngest sister called.

The call was her telling me that our other sister had to take Mom to the ER the night before but she was home at the time of the call.   Our mother was diagnosed with liver cancer in July of last year.  So her pain had elevated and up until that point she had been doing surprisingly well in managing her disease.  She was on a low dose painkiller and had declined chemo and radiation treatments given that her percentage was low with the type of cancer she had.  The call itself was not discerning as we are prepared for those ER visits given what she has.

The discerning part was that my mom was referred to hospice for her pain management.  Something happens to you when the reality of calling hospice hits you.  It’s like you fight from the moment of diagnosis to beat cancer and hope for a miracle so that hospice never has to come into play.  The moment hospice arrives, as a daughter or another family member I’m sure, you are deflated…if only for a moment.  I got mildly depressed because the week before me and two of my sisters had taken our mom to Colorado to get her some good quality CBD oil as well as see my daughter who lives there.  The trip gave us hope.  There is my mom with three of her granddaughters posing in front of the beautiful mountains of the Garden of the Gods.  Such a beautiful moment for us.  That place is breathtaking and I do plan on going back to hike it at some point. We drove through it since my mom wasn’t physically up to a hike.

So that day, Four Sixteen…I went to my mom’s house,  called my brother who lives over two hours away and we all (four girls and 1 boy) spent time with her while waiting on hospice’s initial visit.  We all had a good day overall, but it was emotionally draining.  I remember allowing the tears to flow freely as I was driving to her house and taking my time so that I could hold it together when I got there so as not to stress her out or make her sad.  So hospice encouraged us that some people do graduate from hospice but their focus is comfort and talking to mom about things like if she is in too much pain does she want morphine until it’s over or does she want to stay as alert as possible until the very end etc, etc. ..does she want a DNR..so many final questions.  It was one of the hardest conversations I ever had to sit through.

Near the end of the day and closer to bed time, I stopped by my best friend’s house just to rest for a bit and I walked in on her mother holding a cold, wet kitten in her hands and asking me, “what do I do?”  My brain was pure mush at that point and for a moment I was disheartened to deal with another situation where death was involved or could be involved.  I had been dealing with it the night before with my cat rescue, then most of the day facing the potential beginning of the end of losing my mother and now a smal little soul barely clinging to life.  It was a newborn that a stray cat had on one of the coldest and wet nights of our early spring.  I really thought the poor little thing was already gone, but the moment I saw a little movement, the rescuer in me kicked in to full gear of giving my best friend’s mom and her directions on what to do.  All three of us tag teamed the whole litter of eight little newborn kittens warming them up by placing them on our chests and alternating placing them on a warm heating pad.  The mother cat didn’t know what to do as they were clearly dying.  They were cold as ice and barely moving.  One by one their tiny meows told us they were coming back.  We saved all of them but one who must have passed before we found it. After we were confident they were warm enough, put them back with the mother cat and she took over from there.  They are a week old and doing very well.

So I will never forget Four Sixteen.  My mom is still doing good and we cherish our time more than anything now and my rescue cats made it through and are all doing well. I am so grateful for that day in a way because it changed me to focus on slowing down and enjoying the moments more than the rat race we get trapped into.  Of course the bills are getting behind but you know what, I will have plenty of time to get them caught up.  They are not going anywhere.  So I’m doing less work and spending more time doing what I love and being with those I love. 

Let It Be the Silver Tree

Let up life  and let me be.  Give me peace and let me live a life of harmony. I love the light that flows through my veins, but the darkness insists on enhancing the pain.  How many hits do I have to take to be able to put my stake …in a piece of the world that belongs to me?

I do love, I love love, I am love and I rescue souls in need, but the true question is….who is going to rescue me?  The Silver Tree?

Fragile Hearts

I was walking a river beach one beautiful day this summer and stumbled upon these leaves that are a perfect heart shape.  They reminded me of how easily our hearts can be stepped on and crushed in one second.  Of course some of us are more sensitive than others, but whether we push things down or express them to someone, the risk of getting heart broken is always a threat.  I realized a lot this summer when it comes to matters of the heart and communication.  Those were my life lessons for sure as I look back on the memories and events that took place.

These matters of the heart are a touchy subject for some simply because they are not aware of what they are truly feeling.  We tend to suppress emotions that feel uncomfortable so far down that we don’t feel them anymore.  We stay silent and don’t let others know that they are hurting our feelings in some way.  Did you ever stop to think that perhaps the person hurting your feelings is not aware that they are?  Don’t assume they just know because it’s common knowledge.  Sometimes people truly don’t know so it’s up to you to tell them in the nicest way possible.  We are so wrapped up in our own egos sometimes that we are blind to the pain we can cause others. 

I am one of those sensitive people with a fragile heart that hides behind a mask of pride.  I break my own heart sometimes by misunderstandings or falling for someone who doesn’t feel the same for me.  This doesn’t just apply to romantic relationships.  My heart can get broken by anyone who treats me with disrespect or assumes my intentions were bad when they weren’t.  I’ve been through it a thousand times it seems.  I know most of us have. 

It’s okay to tell people how you truly feel and just because you are feeling that particular emotion at that moment doesn’t mean your feelings can’t change.  You have to tell people you love them even if they don’t feel the same.  You have to let people know you care if you do.  Don’t just assume they should know.  Communication is key in keeping harmony between us, whether it’s friends, family, significant other, business relations etc.  Don’t let people who are important to you slip away quietly into the background because you are afraid to say something.  We don’t have to feel the same about each other.  It’s ok to not love someone if you don’t feel it.  And if you are not sure what it is you are experiencing,  then don’t be afraid to say,  “I don’t know right now.”

Just say the truth as you are experiencing it right at this moment.   Your truth doesn’t have to be someone else’s truth. People are in your life for a reason and worst thing to do is cut them off or push them to the side like they don’t matter.  I have been guilty of doing this, haven’t most of us?  I have been misunderstood and have misunderstood others, but I am no longer afraid to tell them how I feel or how it affected me.  When I misunderstand someone, I want to know.  Don’t just assume I should know.  I may be crazy busy trying to get things done that I am not aware of how I make you feel. 

Let’s talk instead of walking away.

Boonesboro

The House Whisperer

Real estate and architecture photography has been a couple of my favorite areas to photograph.  I still consider myself an amateur, but I can naturally highlight a homes best features with ease.  If there was such a thing called the house whisperer, I would be it. 

As I walk up to a place, whether I’m just out exploring, scoping out a new project or taking professional photos, I can almost hear the voices of the past calling me to come see their work.  The house itself tells me a story of what once was, good or bad.  Weird I know, but I do get vibes when I walk in a house.  I’m not sure what those vibes are, but I can feel the energies that surround the house from the past and the present.  My gift as a project manager is to see it’s future.  I have that ability to see through the pain and neglect of it’s past that led it to it’s present state.

The house in the photo above is not one of my painting projects, but I admire this well thought out color scheme, using classic colors with a touch of modern design on a traditional style home.  The tiled walkway and iron gate caught my attention along with the red door and charcoal exterior.  I can’t remember what this house looked liked before, but the beauty and boldness caught my eye.  It’s going to be opening up as a business in the near future and I will post more about it as time goes by, but I thought I would share someone else’s vision through the eye of my lens.

This past painting season had me painting a lot of front doors and I discovered something about myself that I didn’t know was there before.  I absolutely love transforming the curb appeal of a home through a simple repaint of a front door.  My next favorite thing is painting the area of the outside that is the feature or accent of the house.  It’s different for every house.  Sometimes the garage doors and sometimes it’s a comfy front porch.  It all depends on angles and what one sees at first glance of the home.  Sometimes it’s the front door itself.

I’m working on my 2016 portfolio of the projects I was involved in and this year’s theme was definitely about curb appeal.  I have decided to add front doors under my specialty services blanket outlining the different options of beautifying front doors which include simple repaint color changes and the beauty of a gel stained door.

Follow my blog for more to come!

Photography Pages

 

I’ve reorganized my pages to reflect the places I explore.  Take some time to enjoy a few places through my eyes.  I can find something to explore right out the front door sometimes.

Silver Creek

Four Mile

Herndon House