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conversation turns to cricket. sharp pain in the pit of my stomach.

art of the snapshot - self portrait

self portrait
Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

first day of photography course. teacher enthuses. thoughts swirl around. introductions are made. artwork is produced. i could have made it better. the teacher agreed. i make a note to not be lazy. if i can improve it, i should.

pollard

pollard
Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

one of the funniest words (to me, at least!), pollarding trees produces one of the scariest trees (to me, again)

going through the streets at the back of tate britain, from the 88 bus, i feel like i did all those years ago when entering the ghost train at the fun fair. the bus/cart slowly moves into the scary streets/tunnel. from all sides ghosts/pollarded trees extend extremities/spider webs/branches to touch you lightly on the shoulder. claustrophobic, heart thumping, half crazed with terror, you really want them to touch you nonetheless, so you can come out, a nonchalant smile in your face, and, hiding your trembling hands, tell your friends that it was nothing.

my friend who is in love

she travels the world to meet her lover. who travels the world to meet her. when she comes back from her travels, a little smile is constantly on her face. she's like a child, open, joyful, playful. time passes and she becomes impatient. he's on his way. when he arrives, she disappears. when he leaves, she reappears, the little smile back on. and so it goes. until the next time.

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ronan keating by the thames, short and sweet.

time to think

these are the best things about updating your CV:

• you realise that you’ve done a lot of cool stuff
• you see that what you’re doing is still quite cool
• but you also find out that, yup, you’re hot property and you can get any job you want!

See more progress on: update my CV

a few of my favourite things

breakfast fare

• crunchy cereal with nuts and dried fruit, big dollop of greek yoghurt
• grainy bread toast with honey
• coffeeeee

lunch time menu

• mozzarella, avocado, rocket and tomato salad...all-time classic
• spinach, grilled chicken (tikka pre-cooked from sainsburys'...shame on me, but it's all flo-flo's fault) and sun-dried tomato salad
• pitta bread, taramasalata or humous, lettuce...maybe cherry tomato
• sushi. not home made,...yet
• grainy bread sandwich: blue cheese and spinach, pate and tomato

dinner time

• fresh filled pasta with a steamed green vegetable (broccoli and curly kale work best, i was skeptical, but shirls made me addicted to this) or roasted tomato (kuu azul, what a genious)
• roasted vegetables: onion, parsnips or swede or sweetpotato, potato, leeks, bay leaf (another shirls special)
• fish pie with lots of prawns
• baked potato with mushroom and blue cheese topping
• chilli con carne
• frankfurters (a shared addiction with tim p) with scrambled egg

snack of the day

• dried figs
• banananananana
• mango slices

weekend

i lie on the floor, feeling the hardness underneath me. my mind goes blank, it doesn't. i feel waves of loneliness, fear, pain. my arms are stiff, talking to me. telling me: you've had enough. stop now. stop.

when i was younger i used to spend a lot of time thinking about dreams, about how you could live more than one life, about spirituality, about fate, about the possibility of other worlds, about connections made without effort, about finding one soul to match your own, about princes and horses, about being a hero, about changing, about you.

someone will tell me, i know, that i ask too much of things, that it is all so much more simple than i make it, that my arms will stop hurting, that i have been stupid, that i haven't learnt a thing, that it's never too late or too early, that all things...

i watched my pregnant friends, beautiful, heavy, strong. i listened to my friend who's in love. i talked to my dancing friend. i hope i can really be with them.

i'm in and out and myself and not myself anymore. i am strong and weak and vulnerable and hurtful.

i am alive, asleep, in a corner, nursing a headache, cursing my noisy head. hungry.

bifurcation

bifurcation
Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

insterestingly, although the path seems to split into two, both routes end up taking you straight to the same place.


of course, you can always get off the path and see where that will take you.

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baby football. grown-up football. mini-cricket. learning to side a bike. running couples. sleepy dogs. clapham common.

timelessness@work

i have no time. i have no time. i have no time. please leave me alone. please don't email me, phone me, text me, come to my desk. please don't expect me to finish it all, and talk to you, and meet with them, and write to her, and phone him up. please, please give me time, please.

smoke

fills your nostrils, makes you choke, burns your eyes.
reminds you of barbeques, asados, guy fawkes' nights.
sticks to your clothes, swirls into every corner, blurs all edges.
blends into this foggy, cloudy day in london town.

carrousel

carrousel
Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

when you're little, you think: what would happen if these horses suddenly decide to go their own way? if they lose it? if the buckle? if they start racing towards the plains? if they take me away?

life, but not as we know it

some animals are sensitive to changes in the weather, come rain they fly away into their nests, come winter they burrow deep into their underground lairs. others are sensitive to time passing, 19 years waiting and they hatch for just one day. yet others are sensitive to food supply, adjusting their metabolis to the availability or otherwise of water, grass, prey.

the animals in this home are sensitive to emotional adjustments. they lie dormant in the recesses under the floorboards in times of relative calm. but the second the giant is faced with turmoil or distress, then they wake up, all energy, to race across the house, nibble at leftovers, peek from underneath doorways and generally make it all much, much worse to deal with.

cantankerous

just about the only subject line which would make me open what is obviously just more spam. very clever. works in very subtle sub-conscious levels. still, didn't make me rush to buy some more viagra. hey-ho.

wheels

cycling along a rainy path, eyesight blurred with raindrops and mist, right, left, right, left, circle, circles hypnotised yourself, mind wandered and all the rest with it. fary-tale crashed against very real railing -- enclosures? prisons? manicured gardens? slow motion the world tilts up to meet shoulder, arm, side, leg, the bycicle rushes to meet world encountering resistance from other shoulder, arm, side, leg. wedged between the ground and the mechanics, memories of childhood prompt tears, floods, cries. mum will come and make it better. but instead men rush to, and humour must come to the rescue, ego hurt, nothing to worry about, run along, leave me with my world and my bycicle. once on the ground, i can't go any further. i would stay here forever, but there's rain and dust and i have to keep going.

aftermath

sometimes people confuse strength with bravery. the stronger people can be cowardly, the bravest weak. sometimes a strong, brave person can be weak and cowardly, it happens. and when it happens it's a shock to the very foundations of their core. and like a nuclear explosion, the fallout will hurt everything around for miles.

i never knew when it would happen. it just did. now i need to look around and see what i can rescue. what's still lying around breathing. and pick it up and nurture it back to life.

sorry.

mirror mirror

mirror mirror
Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

look up, a huge mirror stares at you. round as a plate, white as an elephant's tusk. shining its light on all things true and false, beautiful and ugly.

memories ping. a smile flickers by like a springtime butterfly.

look down, the same old road you walk down every day. it hurts your knees but comforts your soul.

look forward, where else?

images

girl sits in a corner of the table. listens, watches, gets lost inside her head, snapping away, storing, archiving, analysing. one day all that watching will come in handy, all that thinking will come out somehow.

fun-filled-frilliness

ana
Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

sometimes life goes on roller-coaster mode, and everything happens at once.

one day you're having a drink with a friend you ran across on the street, the next you're flying to italy to play the part of maria sharapova at another friend's birthday party. next thing you know, you're back in london, and off to the pub for yet more birthday celebrations. monday rolls in and it's off to the theatre, via a nice walk with bagel and brownie included for added east-end flavour. dance and words borrowed from your life float around your head, and you get to the next day and it's time to become a secret agent and deliver (another!) birthday boy to the appointed location, win at bowling, discover your average drops as soon as you start taking pictures, and set off again to meet friend fresh from bristol, for tapas, wine and coffee.

off to bed, back to work, where will it all end...

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i love my world

action

the caveman saw her in the distance. there were others, but she was the one.
the caveman chose his stick carefully. not too thick, not too thin.
he approached the group casually, but purposefully.
she saw him coming.
he came up to her and fixed her eyes in his eyes.
he raised the stick and said: i've booked the cottage, rented the car. you're coming with me.
and she was left in no doubt about the whys, the whens or the wheres.

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pete doherty, pale, in the back of a cab. but his mate is cuter.

wrinkle!

wrinkle!
Originally uploaded by ladelentes.

the end had come! wrinkles are taking over!

that's it. i'm not smiling anymore for the rest of the year...

spring has come

or maybe i just feel chirpy because i'm a very very very mean person...

ji ji ji

ran across cyclist from a while ago.

he's had an allergic reaction that's spotted his face, a bad case of ingrowing beard, he's lost a lot of weight, his hair is dirty, his mobile phone was stolen and he's about to lose his job.

now, of course, i'm concerned and i ask after him, what medicine he's taking, if he's feeling better, and all that.

but if external dialogue is all florence nightingale, internal monologue is all wicked witch of hell.

"a-haaaa", i have to contain myself from exclaiming, "that's what happens when you decide not to call back a powerful southamerican sorceress, ha ha ha ha ha!!!!"

and the moral of the tale? obviously, i'm seriously disturbed. but you knew that already, didn't you?

romance and cigarettes

sometimes, people do stupid things. and sometimes, people do amazing things. and all the time, people are just people.

i know it's very corny, but what the hell, if you don't like it: buzz off!

suspiro

because i'm bored
because i don't feel very happy
because i sometimes get breathless just because
because i need to hear myself
because i can't quite believe that i could be so... i don't know

sunday

spent indoors, cursing computers, admiring useless mp3 player, marvelling at the incompatibility of my many devices, wondering what it all means.