Tag: flowers

Yelly Writes

When I get there…bygones!

Yelly

“Wisdom tells us that the best time for silence is when we are mad or upset.”
– John Patrick Hickey, Oops Did I Really Post That?

 

I am working on a very important project.

I am working on ME.  I thought I was over this thing, but like a masochist out for pain, I still needle the emotional scab and allow the pain (and all the negative emotions that go with it: anger, annoyance, impatience, self-doubt, pettiness, you get the idea).  I repeatedly told myself to draw a line.  I told myself that I wasn’t going to let this overtake my life.  But it was still there, like an irritating mosquito buzzing, hovering in the background.

In the end, I came to the conclusion that I was going about this whole thing the wrong way.  I was telling myself that I shouldn’t let myself get angry; I shouldn’t give in to the negativity; that the high road was to let this go.  But in going into denial about how I felt was negating myself.  I was, basically, telling myself I was wrong.  I was invalidating my own opinions.  Granted, it wasn’t the healthiest of situations, and sometimes you just want to just get on with your life.  But I wasn’t moving on.

I have allowed myself to be angry.  I have allowed myself to feel the hurt.  I have actually said to myself, “Well, I didn’t draw first blood, so it’s okay to feel offended and violated!”  I have actually allowed my inner mean girl, my inner Regina George to come to the fore.  I am allowed to lash out.  If only verbally and if only to myself and the bathroom mirror.

I will continue write things out, because I process things better when I write things down.  I think the trick is to allow myself to feel my feelings.  Because they’re mine.  One can immerse in the feelings, but it is important to remember that it’s not healthy to stay submerged in these feelings until one goes emotionally pruney.  I think I’ve been able to express my feelings enough.  Maybe I will try to not talk about it (fat chance of that happening as when I am angry, I keep wanting to talk about it!  Silence and keeping schtumm when angry is still something I need to learn.).

I know one day I will be able to say the immortal words of Richard Fish in Ally McBeal: “Bygones” and mean it.  Until then, I will keep on keeping and keep on healing.

Yelly Snaps

Wallpaper photos: pink flower

Yelly

I’m quite pleased with the photos that I’m taking.

This is one of my favourite photos and I’m using it as my Samsung tablet wallpaper.  It’s a close up macro photo (I’m just spewing out photography terms and I don’t even know if I’m using them properly!  Ha!) of a bunch of pink flowers that I saw at Colchester Zoo.

Nothing earth shattering just me giving myself a pat on the back!

pink flower

Yelly Writes

Old thinking

Yelly

Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes.
Don’t resist them – that only creates sorrow.
Let reality be reality.
Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.
Lao Tzu

IMG_2896

Sometimes the old quotes grab you.  They made a lot of sense in the old days.  They make sense now.  There is a certain timelessness in true wisdom and true insight.

Yelly Snaps

Visiting secret gardens in Harwich

Yelly

I am brown.  Very brown.  Brown as a coconut!

Alan and I traipsed around Old Harwich yesterday in the sunshine, peeking into people’s gardens.  Now, before you sound the alarm and think any improper thoughts, we were paid for the privilege!  Harwich gardeners come together every year and open their lovely gardens to the public so they can raise money for chosen charities and this year, because we’re learning to use our cameras (properly), Alan suggested going on the tour to see the gardens and take photos.

I took over 200 photos and deleted over half of them, choosing my favourites and best shots.

Passion flower

I’ve never seen so many passion fruit vines!  Most of the gardens that we visited on the tour had passion fruit vines that seemed to be well-established and seemed to thrive!  It made me smile seeing the vines because once, a long time ago, when our house in Manila was a small two-bedroom bungalow, our garage wall was covered by a huge passion fruit vine.  Who knew passion fruit would take to Harwich that well?

Sunken Garden

I think this was one of my favourites.  Mostly because it was such an interesting garden.  You had to go down several steps.  They called it the Sunken Garden.  The name of the garden made me smile because it reminded me of my days at uni when I was at the Diliman campus of the University of the Philippines.  There was an oval area behind the main library in the campus called the Sunken Garden (I learned during my first week at uni that the “garden” actually sank a few millimeters a year!).

Knitted poppies

This garden made me giggle.  This was the garden hiding behind the Swan Gallery.  The lady who owns the gallery runs arts and crafts classes and apparently, her knitting group were busy knitting the various flowers and creatures found around the garden.  There were poppies, bees, flowers, and bunting.  There was even a knitted owl hiding in one of the perches!

Cherries

One of the gardens had this lovely cherry tree in a huge pot and the branches were heavily laden with red jewel-like fruit!  Who knew you could do that?  Well, I did, at least in theory.  But this cherry tree was thriving.  It must have looked amazing when the blossoms were in bloom!

I think we’re doing the tour again next year (with me armed with SPF2000 sunblock).  There are so many things to discover in Old Harwich.  If you’re in this neck of the woods, next year, watch out for the Harwich Secret Gardens tour.  Everyone is lovely and flowers and the plants are interesting!

Yelly Snaps

Depth of field

Yelly

I’ve always loved taking snapshots.  It’s always a joy when you point and shoot a camera and you capture the nicest scenes.  Lately though, I’ve been trying to take photos properly.  I’ve been learning techniques on a bridge camera, not quite a DSLR but a good enough one to practice the photography techniques on.  Mind you, I’ve got a long way to go because I constantly confuse what the AV mode does (something about the aperture) and TV mode (which controls the shutter speed).

One of the exercises was depth of field.  Now I can’t, for the life of me, explain properly what depth of field is so I’ll use Cambridge In Colour’s definition: “[It] refers to the range of distance that appears acceptably sharp. It varies depending on camera type, aperture and focusing distance, although print size and viewing distance can also influence our perception of depth of field.”

I think I managed to show depth of field successfully on the rose and everything else in the distance is blurry.

The Rose and the Treadwheel Crane

I love photographing birds and I seem to have a gazillion photos of seagulls now, courtesy of Harwich Pier.  I do love this photo of this huge seagull with the Port of Felixstowe in the background.

Seagull

More snapshots to come though.  I’ve got a lot to learn!

Yelly Writes

Cheer-me-upper

Yelly

I love flowers!  Every time I walk past a flower stall, I walk away with a smile.  Flowers are the best cheer me uppers ever.

I got flowers today from my colleagues at work.  I feel very appreciated and the flowers have cheered me up a lot.  I have been wandering around the flat like a lost soul with a thumping headache and a very sore, very painful hand.  Getting the flowers helped and am smiling again 🙂

Flowers from work