I've been creating a lot more art (making fractals and editing my photos), sharing it on flickr and deviantart and tumblr; it feels AMAZING to be sharing my creations again. I've also been making mix CDs for people which is a big damn deal because instead of starting a creative project, doing a few and then getting burnt out, I actually finished the first set and offered to add people to the list! The second set isn't done yet but I am motivated to do it still. And I've been sending out postcards to scold my homophobic ex-church and to show love to my friends. And I actually reached out to new people on LJ in an effort to build a home here again (hi people!). It's weird to have an active friends list all of a sudden, even weirder that it's all strangers. I think the last time I added new people had to have been at least two years ago. I hope at least some of these new connections turn into friendships because I know that is what will most help me to write. And while I am enjoying making visual art, I need to be writing. I need it because it is my memory, my sense of self.

I wish I had a better memory but if I didn't have livejournal and photos, I would remember so little of my life. It's like my memory is 2D and I have to see something flat for it to be saved in my mind -- I can't even remember people's faces unless I have seen a photo of them and then I only remember the photo. I find that pretty tragic because I love faces so much. And it's worse when someone is not okay with me taking photos -- I'll respect that but it means they don't exist as a visual in my mind. Photos taken by someone else will work, but they feel like borrowed memories, like a memory of seeing someone through a window while I stand outside.

Anyway, this creativity is so wonderful to me, I hold it like a kitten to my chest. It's such a relief because it has been so long since I had the energy to do this. There were five months last year -- including four in a row -- when I took NO PHOTOS AT ALL. More than a month where I take no photos is dangerous, because I have to be intensely depressed for that to happen. I look back and feel sad for myself, lost thing that I was. Also I think that I need to live alone for as long as possible, because it's so freeing to be able to just go spend a day alone if I need to, and no one questions it or gets hurt by it, that's just the default. I have so much more energy when it isn't being spent on daily managing of other people's feelings, and since I am currently not at all good at resisting the pull to do that, I need to avoid situations of temptation.