Snow

(Yes, this is weird. I enjoy snow though.)

   

 Snow is love. It is wonderful, blissful, peaceful. It is God’s acceptance of this world. I don’t

 mean God as the Christian God necessarily. I mean God as in life, this universe, whether if

has an omnipotent force or not. The universe loves all that is within itself. It is capable of fashioning things we can only dream of. No matter how large or small, young or old, kind or hateful you think our universe is, it doesn’t care. Unconditional love is a thing people pretend to have, and this isn’t bad. Imitation is a form of flattery. You can love or hate snow, but it will always love you. It is cold, fast, and it can be frightening. People have died in the snow. But it means no harm. When you were a child, undoubtedly you picked at a scab or bit your fingernails or picked your nose or something of the sort. You didn’t understand that this didn’t help anything. Snow doesn’t understand either. Snow is a child. Snow is the child of the world. It means no harm. In it’s true form you can see that it is a child. It is beautiful and capable of something many people forget they are capable of - unconditional love. A young child loves it’s mother in a deep way, no matter what the circumstance. Anybody is capable of this, but so many people forget it. There is no set meaning in life, and you can do whatever you want. But most likely, if you do something harmful to others they will retaliate. Whether or not you meant to do it is not important to them. But snow doesn’t mind. You can yell at snow, you can stomp on it, you can even melt it, but it does not care. It loves you unconditionally, and there is nothing you can do to keep it from feeling this way. Like a child’s affection for it’s mother. And in the end, all that really matters is love. You may worry about other things, you may be concerned with finished college or getting a job or beating a game or making money or a trillion other things, but in the end, none of those matter. It’s the unconditional love that matters. 

Thank you, reader, and have a lovely December Solstice, no matter who or what you are.

Art - Summer-Fall 2013

All of this art was done in 2013, primarily in the late summer or fall (after school started). More art to come! Possibly at the end of the year I will upload my portfolio that I've been making in my Digital Photography class.

A Final Look Back

Photo taken and manipulated by me. I personally didn't care much for this one, but if I look at it for a while I find myself captured by it. 

Warehouse 56

Photo taken and manipulated by me. Subtle changes to the original, and it has the vibe I was looking for.

Keyboardtropolis

I got bored in class and we do have lots of keyboards. Simple, but I think it has a very likable look to it. Then again, I tend to both like and be ashamed of my art simultaneously.

The Moon Virus

Photograph taken by myself and modified a few weeks later in Photoshop. It may look cool at first, but when I study it more I like it less and less. It looks rather awkward.

Blue Fearless

Just a remake of my Fearless drawing. I added some grid-like things on the side for added effect.

 Desktop

I use this for my desktop. The original picture was awesome, and you should totally check out the dude who took it's website. It is some really cool photography and astronomy. Original picture:

http://www.miguelclaro.com/wp/?portfolio_category=twilight-dawn-and-dusk

Glowbeams

Took the original picture myself. A simple Photoshop edit, but it looks cool-ish maybe.

 Lamp Glow

Was messing around with my Lamplight creation and thought this was worth putting on the website.

 Lamplight

Original picture taken by myself. Transformations of color and hue and shade and stuff intended to make it look surreal. 

 Sunbeams

Alterations to original picture apparent, same original picture as Glowbeams though. Barely any increase to saturation and contrast. The original photo was quite a sight to see.

 Sunrise

I personally don't care much for this one, it looks awkward and pixel-y. However, when I look at the things I did well with it I find myself liking it slightly more. Overall not perfect, but I think it could be worse.

 Temple of the Moon

I might have uploaded this on my older pictures post, but since this is a more recent endeavor I wanted to include it in my newer art list. More of a graphic design project than digital photography (despite the class I'm taking being digital photography) but I figure I used filters from Photoshop and shapes from Illustrator in an original manner.

Autumn

This one is mainly just an experiment and a warm up (no pun intended) project, getting associated with the more advanced Photoshop features and applying more simple techniques to create an appealing photograph.

True Light Amid the Dark

Photo taken and modified by myself using Photoshop. I'm not sure if this is the final form of it as I was tempted to edit it in various manners when manipulating it in Photoshop, but we'll see.

The Most Powerful Tool

    Communication. It is what brings us together and what tears governments apart. If we had no form of communication, think of what we could accomplish. The truth is that there is very little we can do alone, and being together is only possible thru communication. Sure, animals can communicate. Look at termites! They've build structures taller than basketball players by working together. Even if their form of communication seems primal and strange to us, you must admit that the work they do together is phenomenal. Communication means progress, advancement, and the better we communicate the more effectively we grow.

    Twenty-five hundred years ago, the only form of communication was thru speech and maybe the occasional writing to keep history. Fifteen-hundred years ago, there was little difference other than the spread of the Bible. Five-hundred years ago it was virtually the same, though more people were literate and able to send and receive letters. One hundred-fifty years ago, Americans were using telegrams in the Civil War to relay information to generals within the hour of them being sent. People could now know what is going on within an hour. A hundred years ago we were developing the system of "calling" someone, where you could speak to them from miles away. Fifty years ago, we were watching the news, something that had to be read on a paper you had to catch from a newsboy, and that didn't exist in Caesar's time. And now, today, we send messages instantly. Not recorded, not thought out often, just our thoughts put onto YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Reddit, Emails, Text messages, facetimes, group calls, the list goes on and on.

     The speed of communication that allows us to send and receive messages and information seconds after they've been composed is incredible. Somebody could literally start reading this post (not like anybody does right now) one second after I hit "publish". It is incredible, and you must realize how much the mass communication helps universal progress (well, one may ask what universal progress is, how do we know we are advancing, and is that advancement right? I'll answer that later perhaps :) and the lives that have been saved by the communication. Just over two centuries ago, in America, 1812, a large battle was fought, many people died. However, that battle actually happened after the United States and Britain declared peace. The reason why people still fought that battle was because of slow communication. Letters signaling peace wouldn't arrive for days, if not weeks or even months! Today you can send a text and your friend gets it seconds after you send it. Back then, scientists, philosophers, and scholars couldn't really collaborate the way they can today. The best way was after months of planning, meet each other in one location for a period of time. Now people could spend twenty years across seas from each other and still communicate their newest findings to each other almost as if in a regular conversation.

     If you've seen the movie Gravity, you've seen what it is like not to have instant communication. We've come to rely on it, and much as it may seem a bad thing to rely on such a hypothetically and metaphorically thin thread, it benefits us very greatly. We can achieve great and amazing things due to this. So next time you send a text message, think about how much quicker it is than it would've been had you been forced to send a letter - that would've traveled on horseback mind you, not a mail truck. Also, a little contemplation, would you spend more time with individual text messages if they took three weeks to arrive at your recipient? Six weeks to get their response, mind you.

    So I communicate to you, reader, in a timely manner, to have a splendid day.

Appreciation

When one has something, they tend to treat it as ordinary. But when they lose it or don't have it, that thing suddenly becomes far more valuable. This is common and natural. However, I think it is necessary to appreciate things when they are there and dismiss it when they aren't. It makes you realize how good your life is. Think, if you could eat as much as you want, wouldn't your
life be great? Well, yes, but not for most people who eat as much as they want. Think, if you have as much money as you'll ever possibly need, won't your life just be perfect? Not for most people with that much money... Seeing a pattern yet? Things tend not to be as great as you expect. But I digress. Anyways, despite the difficulty in attempting to appreciate the things you have, you may end up liking your life more. Sure, you slept poorly, your coffee maker didn't work, and you forgot to walk the dog, but look on the other side. You have a bed! You ate a meal! You have enough money to afford a dog! Also, when you lose something, don't piss and moan to get it back. If there's no reasonable way to get it back, then just be happy you had it in the first place. When you get something, appreciate it. Always. If not for the thing itself, appreciate it for the gesture from the person or thing you got it from.

I know, short post, but thank you very much for reading and have a nice day.

A Peek Inside

     This is just a little peak inside my mind. Here's a glimpse of me, the two forces, whatever you may call them, (good vs evil, chaos vs order, love vs hate, whatever) that debate each other, on many a fine day.

     "Why worry about school? Why even go to school? All it does is rip more holes in the fabric of your emotions, spirituality, and ability to function. You'd be better of without it. What is the worst that can happen? You could be knocked out and taken to school, which really isn't that big of a deal. But there's just so much work. It is so heavy. Why carry it? You aren't being forced to. Who cares if you're lazy or not? Why should it matter to you? Anything for the pain, the mental pain, to go away. It would be a relief, escaping from reality. To get away from everything that you are hurt by. Need is based on a goal, but you have no good goals in life. Sure, you may want to be a physicist or a programmer or a writer or an engineer or whatever, but there's no motivation toward those. You just picked those things because they are fun and you excel at them. But there's no motivation. Even as you write this here, the endless struggle between work and laziness continue. But is a lack of motivation lazy? Your parents can get you to do an activity, but even they, despite them being close and amazing family members, can barely get you to do a short-term activity. How are you supposed to make it thru school? Why even bother making it thru school? It is four whole years. That is 1460.964 days. That is 126227289.6 seconds. And that's just high school. That doesn't include college at all. And yet, you somehow have set the goal for yourself to graduate from college with a Masters or higher? It is ridiculous that you imagine yourself becoming and important scientific figure for the world when you are barely motivated enough to go to school. You will never achieve anything great in the world of science. In computer programming, you might actually have a chance if you were willing to work on doing it, but somehow whenever you want to do "computer programming", it circles back to playing some game on the computer. And statistically speaking you won't become a successful writer. So why even bother trying?"

     At or before this point, the other side of me chooses to reply, "Why not? You don't want to do this, but other people want you to do it. Is your judgement superior to everyone else's? How so?" Also, sometimes the thought process of, "This will make you happy. It requires work, but you'll be happy in the end. Being happy is good. You like being happy. So do it so you can feel happy."

     Or, occassionally, on days like today, I need a bit of a reminder from my parents. Thank you very much. 

_________________________________________________________________________________

Even if I can get the motivation to simply do a single activity, it becomes so much harder if that activity requires effort. (This may be expanded upon later, but I can't expand upon this topic right now right now.)

     So do your best to not have a terrible day, in fact, have a terrific day, thank you very much for reading.


     (Note: I was feeling like everything in that huge block of text the morning of writing this, but I didn't finish writing it completely until the afternoon. Originally I was planning on ending it at that paragraph, but I'm a bit more cheery at the time of writing this note (later in the day) which is certainly a thing I am thankful for.) 

Online Counseling?

     Like it or not, things change. All you can do is decide whether or not to accept the changes that occur.

     Today and in the past, I have seemingly changed a person's mind on the internet. While of course the internet isn't exactly reliable, it has seemingly happened.

     I recall one day I was playing a game of Guns of Icarus when a teammate and I had a real conflict. I said something on the lines of, "I just want myself and everyone else to have a good time. You are perfectly allowed to have fun, or not have fun," and continued to talk about having a good time and that the conflict was rather silly. At the end of the game he apologized for his behavior and acted exceptionally kindly, as if I had brightened up that person's day. Even if for whatever reason they were faking the whole thing, it appeared to me as if I had influenced them to have a better day. 

     Another time, I was conversing with a chatty and relatively pair of "trolls" in a Minecraft game, when one of them said something like, "I don't really care what I'm doing." I responded by telling that individual that there are a million better things to do than troll a Minecraft minigame. The other one asked me if I was their mother, but the first one seemed somewhat unsure, and was typing things in like he was questioning the reasoning behind them trolling in the first place. After spouting out some of my beliefs and common advice that I believe are helpful things to say, in the chat I read, "Brother (Note: they had said earlier on that they were siblings) , stop!" from the second one. This leads me to believe that the one stopped trolling, at least for a moment.

Needed another text breaker! Some bubble-esque things I whipped together in Photoshop.

     Though my intention all along was to keep them from trolling, it was staggering to see one of them get it, even if it was for a mere moment. I play counselor because I find it entertaining, but when I legitimately make a person do something because of it, it gets scary. In fact, it's downright terrifying that I may have just changed the way a person's brain works even if it was just the slightest bit, and over a chat on the internet. The possibility that I just influenced a person's entire life with mere words. No matter how slim of a chance it was that I legitimately did influence them, it is still frightening. The power of words is immense, even in an anonymous location. I know it is relatively minor, the thought that I just MIGHT have influenced a person's life, but my crazy brain amplifies it into me playing god. The one in a million chance that I may have affected a person's life is, again, staggering. I'm repeating myself so much because it is what is running thru my head. That "what if". 

     Have I really changed a person's perception of the world? Even if it was for a mere day, or hour, or a sliver of a second. The way a person thinks is what shapes their beliefs, which shapes their actions, which shapes their reality. The idea that I could have led a person to do something, to change a person's reality, is mind boggling. I can't imagine what it must be like to be a YouTuber who legitimately has shaped a person's life, or a million people's lives. This kind of goes back to my hopes/expectations thing, I HOPE that I will make a person's life better when I say that, but I don't EXPECT it by any means.

     Anyways, have a nice day (if you do solely because I said so, I might faint! :)