Hello God, It is me...

 The other day I read an article about a phone booth at the Burning Man event in Nevada that had a sign out that said talk to God. The person wrote that people were waiting in line. Reading that it instantly brought tears to my eyes. What would I say? The first thing that came to mind is how is mom? I continued reading the article and the person wrote that he had serious questions for God. Like is the Bible truly Your words? I have thought about that before. Back in the day when it was being written not many people could read or write. Scholars and Monks. Maybe one of them sat down one night with a pen and vellum (they didn't have paper) and wrote a story about the time of Jesus and the creation of the world. So, I find that a valid question. My other thought is do you talk or do you listen. Do I want to tell God what is bothering me today? In theory he already knows so then maybe I should just listen to what he/she has to tell me. Maybe Jeanne, you don't need to worry so much about things. Somethings are going to happen and worrying or not is not going to change the outcome. Seems like really good advice.

The more I read I found that people are lined up to talk to God in a phone booth but in this day there are less and less going to church. So do people feel that a phone booth is just as likely a place to talk to God as any. One thing I have said about myself for quite sometime is that I am not religious but I am faithful. I believe there is a God. I don't even know if believe is the right word. I know there is a God. There has to be. No matter your belief in how the world started weather Adam & Eve or a big bang. All the creatures of the world and the stars and planets. There had to be a power that created it all be it in 7 days or in an instant. Imagine all the things in my body that it takes to type these words. My brain thinks them, sends a message to my fingers which know where the keys are in the dark to type them and my eyes are able to read them on the screen and back to my brain that understands that my words can be understood. 

As I read the first article, I kept thinking who is God. A shrink, a priest, someone with some ability to council. Someone who knows who has had one too many and who is very serious in their purpose or pursuit of God. 

The second article I read was different. I learned that not only can you wait in line to talk to God from the phone booth that when you pick up the receiver that a light shines straight up to the heavens. There is also a place not far away that there is another phone and if you find that phone. You can be God. Now, I feel that we are unstable ground and the more I read the more I knew that this could be a person calling asking God for prayers for a mother or child that is sick but it also could be a person crying for help. This such situation happened to the person who was God. The person said something about thinking about doing something they had tried before but not been successful at. My first thought was Lord Help him he is talking suicide. I am not sure if the person on the phone was thinking that instantly. They asked will doing this thing make you happy and the person in the phone booth said yes. The person playing God said, you should do what makes you happy. I don't think that is totally true number one. Suicide is a long term solution to a short term problem and you don't know that the thing that will make one person happy will not hurt another. How could you imagine death could make you happy. See, now Jeanne is thinking I don't like this. I don't like it at all. The more I read of the second article the more I learned that not only is there the God person on the phone there are others sitting around listening to a speaker able to hear the person on the phone in the  confessional of a phone booth as well as the God person's responses. Since all stories don't have happy endings. That year at Burning Man someone did commit suicide. I don't know if it was the person in the phone booth or not. I learned that the person playing God felt strongly enough they weren't sure if they would return or ever play God again. Back in their real life they took a class at work and the person giving the class was talking about such a situation and said, if someone is talking like that you have to ask directly "Are you thinking about suicide." Even reading the words seemed harsh to me but if the person is truly thinking that way they need help from someone who isn't playing God. Someone who has real experience with dealing with whatever the underlying issues are that has gotten this person to this place.

During this pandemic I know that some people find solace in being home. Feeling safe. Others feel isolated. I am going to say I have felt both. I am not and never have thought of suicide. Just to be clear for those that are worrying about me taking this line of thought this far in the middle of the night. I want to live and I want to be happy and have no interest in hurting myself or others. I said once in a post that my pendulum of happiness is just weighted to the sad side sometimes. The last few days I have felt that weight. I don't know if it is literally the extra pounds of being home all the time. I have thought about it and other than going to work I thought I was home a lot before. But being at home all the time at first I thought this gives me time to be productive at home. That time I would be driving to and from work. I could clean something, sort something, throw out something. That feeling didn't last long. Then my drive home as Brian called it I would lay down and read my book and decompress from work for 30 minutes and then do whatever it is I do. Cook dinner, wash dishes, take out the trash, do laundry. You know all those things. 

I really never liked the idea of working at home. I felt like there would be no separation. I had to walk past my work computer to get to this one to write this post. I have to push the chair out of the way to open our front door if someone comes over. On the other hand taking a shower and putting on a pair of shorts and a shirt and walking across the house is a nice commute. Not wearing shoes is an excellent benefit which out weighs jeans day which our company doesn't do anyway. So there are plusses and minuses. 

Yesterday however I really could have used being around other people. I was in a worrying state. Monkey brain they like to call it. When your brain just jumps from one thing to another. I used a breathing exercise and I reached out to a friend at work through instant message instead of walking over to her desk on my break and crying and telling her I hate that I worry. But luckily she was able to make me laugh through an instant message. And for a few moments we talked about unrelated things and my mind got back to where I needed it to be and I was able to continue on with my day. And made it. 

I think part of my problem is Social Media the constant bombing of the left and right telling me why they believe what they believe and why Mo or Jo should be President. The news of all these hurricanes battering the Gulf coast. This pandemic we have been living through. So here I am at 6am. My thought was I wanted to get to the part where I asked God if the library in heaven was as big as the sky and can I read any book and when I am done come back and get another. Can I spend my day floating on a cloud next to an ocean or a swimming pool. I know everyone talks about the food but I just need to know there is peace.

 I really just don't want to worry. Thanks for listening God. 

Drinks are on me

 All right. So I couldn't think of anything to write but it is nearly 6am on a Saturday morning and I am up staring at a blank page. I instantly play a game of solitaire on the computer to hope that I will stop thinking and go back to bed but when that doesn't work I go to a creative writing website with writing prompt ideas. I read through the list as though it is a check list. Done that. No, not that. No, not tonight. Maybe. Then I see the subject. Drinks on me. I can do that. I have a story that I don't think I have told here before.

When I was about 23 years old I took a job as a portrait photographer in Kmart. I didn't work directly for Kmart I worked for another company that provided the service in the store. I know it isn't exactly fashion photography somedays it was more like shooting for National Geographic. I think we had a week of training. Learning how to set up and break down the studio. How to load the camera with a 100 ft roll of film in a dark bag. Well if you know what Mary Tyler Moore's hair looked like back in the 1970's then you can feel your way through getting the film set. It was a mobile studio and you would be in a particular area for a long weekend like Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Then home a few days and back at it in another city. Making your way around the state.

On Wednesday I would leave the house with the studio packed into my car and would head to where ever we were for that week. Every six weeks or so you would be back in the same area. I think the first week I was out I was in Fort Lauderdale. And for example there may be 6 or 8 Kmart stores in that area so there would be that many photographers. I remember this guy that I trained with his name was Jeff. He was a few years older than me and had been doing the job for a year or so. He helped me set up the studio and showed me the tricks to get a kid to smile that was crying or how to pose a family. These were the days of film and negatives and there was no showing them the image or even seeing it for myself other than through the lens of the camera. 

In the evening photographers would stay at the same place they stay every time they were in that area. We stayed as a group and usually got a better rate. Most were mom and pop places as I recall. Jeff explained that some of the people shared rooms to cut back on their expenses basically so you can keep more of the per diem we got. I think we got $30 per day for our room and maybe $15 for food per day. So if you didn't spend the $30 per night on your own room and you only spent $10 that left you $20 extra dollars a night. That first week I think I wasn't so sure about sharing a room with others. I think I shared with another girl on the road. But since Jeff and I were fast friends. The next week I was sharing a room with 3 other total strangers and spending way less money on my room with more money to spend.

 I quickly learned that that extra money was drinking money. Each night after a hard 9 hours taking kid and family pictures we would all go somewhere and get dinner and then of course there was a bar that they frequented. We would all hang out and drink until the wee hours of the night and then back to the room to crash until we had to get up and do it again the next morning. After a few days I was getting the handle on the schedule and after a few weeks I had my small circle of friends that I hung out with and shared a room with and drank with. Jeff had a friend much younger even younger than me Tadd. Tadd was an over the top kind of guy but they were both great fun to be with. Tadd liked to sing and he loved singing Whitney Houston. Granted this is 1990s so everyone loved Whitney Houston. I can not remember a specific song buy I can picture him arms spread and belting out some ballad of hers as though it was his own. One night while sitting at the bar drinking. Jeff and I came up with a game. We would choose semi randomly a person at the bar that we didn't know and buy them drinks. The bartender couldn't tell the person who was buying the drinks for them and we would continue to buy drinks for this person until we were ready to leave and then tell them it was us. 

I don't know if this sounds as fun as it was. It was a endeavor in people watching. How does the person react? Do they get mad? Some did. If they are with other people what are they doing. The whole time they are looking around the bar trying to figure out who was buying them drinks. And the whole time the bartender knows his tip depends on him keeping our secret. 

Now I didn't last at this job very long. As much as I love taking pictures I prefer nature to families. The saying goes never work with kids or animals. I am not sure if that saying has anything to do with photography but after doing the job for a while you get it. Which I guess is why as young people we would go out each night drinking. Almost every memory I have from those 6 or 8 weeks that I did that job I remember the people I worked with like Tadd and Jeff and the fun we had going out in the evening. Telling our stories of the day. The kid that I caught about to fall off the poser from more than 6 feet away, that had two parents with their hands on the child as they fell. The family of 12 that would barely fit within the space of the backdrop. Trying to arrange them so I could see them all in the shot. I do remember one child by name Abigail. I only remember because she said her name about 100 times and to her it was a three syllable name Ab-i-gail.

We definitely had favorite bars. When we were in Dothan, Alabama one week and Panama City, Florida the next. The bar in Dothan was so much fun that we drove the hour and a half each way just to go to the same bar two weeks in a row.  Another place we went was in Douglas, Georgia and it was cold out and the bar was outside and we were freezing doing shots of Jagermeister. Most who know me would not believe that I would be doing shots of anything but back in the day with these guys I would not blink an eye at a shot of tequila either. 

As it got closer to Christmas the company needed more people up north and I drove my Mustang loaded down with my photo studio on my own to Pennsylvania and then on to New Jersey. I know it was for the money and the adventure. I can remember me getting up there and getting out of the car freezing in shorts that I was comfortable in when I got in the car in Florida. I stayed with a friend of mine that lived in New Jersey for that week to save money. I am pretty sure I quit after that week. Instead of like 50 sittings in a week I was doing that every day. People lined up to get their kids Christmas pictures. It was pure insanity. 

It has been more than 30 years since those days. I have not seen or heard from either of them in that long as well. Don't even recall their last names but the memories from that time are with me forever. I think it is a lesson in life. Some moments last a lifetime and sometimes the memories do. I would not trade the time I did that job for anything. I needed a change in my life and I did it in an unimaginable way.  Cheers.