Spring brings on the blues...

Spring is here and with it, it should bring about new beginnings. A freshness to life! Awe! All of these things and more. Yea, hardly! I am in a funk. A major funk. For those of you that don't know, I suffer from depression.

I have suffered with depression for nearly all my life. My brain is junk when it comes to happy-feel-good juices a flowin' and right now it's drip dryin' in there. It all started when I missed an appointment to see my doc. So they decided to withhold my meds and force me to go to group therapy. I just have to say one thing first about group therapy. I was the only sane one in the whole room! WTF is that all about! Another thing, I was the only one that had never been arrested or incarcerated. Talk about scary. Why the heck did they put ME in THAT group therapy?

So after about the fourth day of no meds, me bitching and screaming at everything including the walls, I broke down and called my doc and told her to get me meds ASAP. I told her I was on the verge of being homicidal and suicidal. Of course I wasn't (nor have I ever been) that far gone, but it definately got them moving on getting my script. I seriously contemplated walking into the clinic with my hair messy and my makeup smeared, just to prove the point of not taking my crazy meds away. But I don't think it would have had much affect, considering the "peers" in group!

Let me just, explain why I was in such a frenzy for my crazy meds. The first day without was ok. I was fine, normal. No uncontrollable weeping, no bouts of anger. No sitting in the bedroom thinking my life is the pits. Come the second day, all hell breaks lose and I was a neurotic mess. Nothing fits right, nothing feels right. I was seriously having Doomsday scenarios running through my head. CW hated me. No one wanted to talk to me. I can't blame them, it was a sad pity party on my behalf. Every conversation was basically this :

phone rings

"WHAT!?"

"Umm, hello to you too. What's going on?"

"MY LIFE IS SHITTY AND THERE IS NOTHING I CAN DO ABOUT IT!!!"

silence

"I HATE PEOPLE!"

click

Do I blame them, hell no. I would react in the same manner. What can I say, I admit I was crazola! The third day, was even worse. I didn't want to get out of bed and I definately did not want to tend to things that needed tending. I wanted to wallow in my stupid self pity and my idiotic internal ravings, ok some where definately external, but for the most part I kept my crazed mouth shut so as to not completely freak myself out!

After I get my script for my meds, I tried to make a beeline to the pharmacy. I was super pumped about getting my crazy lady dope and sat there thinking about how things would be so much better. Until I found out that for a measely eight little pills they were going to charge me a whopping $40 bucks. Umm, hello! Crazy lady right here!? DO NOT tell a fragile woman that her crazy lady dope costs $40 bucks!

I went home in a far less happy place than I was when I thought I was gonna get my feel good pills. I moped around the house, pouting, screaming and raising all kinds of hell because nothing was to my satisfaction. Mostly the dissatisfaction was with myself. As I was shoving crap around in my wreck of a house ( I don't do housework when I am in a funk, yea yea yea, I know it makes you feel worse but who cares, I didn't ) and low and behold I find a bottle of crazy lady pills! Oh joy! Be still my beating heart! SAVE! Now don't ask me how or why those pills were where they were but they were. I was on cloud nine! I was about to get my fix and be normal!

I took my pills and two days later I was fixed. Functioning and no psycho babble oozing from my lips. It just goes to show, that I cannot go back to how I was. I really for a long time tried to trick myself into believing that I could be a functioning person with depression. I didn't need meds. Pfftt!!! Oh yes I DO! If I was anything like I was the last few days I should have been taking meds since birth! Me functioning with depression is like saying a crackhead can function with their addiction. That isn't a really well thought out statement. Crackheads don't function!

I am still having some of the Doomsday thoughts. I have been super excited about photography for so long and its just gotten to the point that I feel like its all fruitless. Why am I trying to do something I love so much, something I have talent in, just to be skipped over for the next Dick or Jane who wields a camera. I guess art isn't really about talent or creativeness anymore. It's all about who you know. Pfffttt... sorry but if you wanna pay money for crappy work go for it. Who am I to stop you!? But needless to say, its been a thought in the back of my head that I am just not cut out for the cutthroat world of photography. Especially portraiture photography. Apparently anyone who owns a camera nowadays is a photographer. They don't have to be good. They can edit the hell out of some photos and turn people green and SHABAM! photography!

UGH! It just puts me in a funk thinking about it. No don't get me wrong.....they have some PHENOMENAL photographers out there, and I am in no way trying to compete with these people. I am not even close to being able to compete with these people. I just pisses me off that out of all the people claiming to be photographers, I am the one that gets skipped over when it comes to making money! UGH!

I have people contact me at least once a week about wanting to get some photos done. Of course I get super excited. A chance for me to do what I love!! I then tell them my prices and thats where it ends. Now I have done my research. I have looked at the local photographers and those not so local. I have looked at the photographers that are making a living and those that aren't. I have compared my work to phenomenal photographers and some not so phenomenal photographers. My prices are fair, especially considering the amount of work I put into them. My work is beautiful, to myself and to a few people who love what I do. But that's about as far as it goes. PEOPLE!! I don't work for free! I am sure you wouldn't be going to work for no money! I won't do the same. This world isn't free sweeties! You want a frappucino, you gotta pay for it. Same for my work. Just remember next time you are looking for a photographer, base it on talent and artistic ability before you judge it based on the price tag. Because you get what you pay for! It's like designer handbags. You gotta pay money for the good stuff! You pay $50 bucks for a Dooney and Bourke you are more likely getting a Booney and Dourke. Same for photography!

Anyway enough of my ranting. I just had to spill it all out somewhere. Not too many people to talk to about your pitifulness at 3:40 in the morning. So I leave it all here. Not that I imagine many people will be reading this, it might be too candid. But who cares? Right people judge you no matter what. Might as well put it all out there ..