Wednesday, July 09, 2008

Fun! (and Scary!)

(stay tuned for the credits. I am having [surprise! surprise!] technical difficulties.)

Oh, big fun. I always get so nervous the first time I try some new technology, and then I muddle around in it and fiddle with it and try to figure enough of it out to actually make it work. I don't even know if this will actually work until I post it. How exciting.

It's two firsts... well, actually three if you stay tuned and let me tell you about what else I did.

My first first is that this is the first time I have done a meme and posted it on my blog. It's my fear of jumping in to the big wide world, my chicken High School kid who is afraid to sit with the cool kids at the lunch table. I wasn't invited to do the meme, but I saw it over at Leah's Blog, and at Blue Poppy and finally said, hey, that looks like fun, so I invited myself in.

This is how the meme goes:

Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr search.
Using only the first page, choose an image.
Copy and paste each of the URL’s into the mosaic maker over at FD's image maker.

The questions:
What is your first name?
What is your favorite food?
What high school did you attend?
What is your favorite color?
Who is your celebrity crush?
Favorite drink?
Dream vacation?
Favorite dessert?
What do you want to be when you grow up?
What do you love most in life?
One word to describe you.
Your Flickr name

I agree with Blue Poppy that it's great fun. And it really is like a kind of poetic portrait without words.

My second first is that I went ahead and tried to make this mosaic. Oh, technology. I have had so much trouble with photos. Well, actually, in addition to making this mosaic, I tried to upload some photos to Flickr, (something that was actually on my to do list) and that didn't work... do you see what I'm saying? I think the files are too big, but anyway, I didn't need my own photos for this project, I just needed to play with Flickr, and I think the more I get used to Flickr, the more I will not be afraid, when I finally make my way to posting photos.

The third first was actually something that I did yesterday. Late at night as I was browsing blogs and links, I stumbled upon something new and scary. It just so happened I was watching a horror movie (Evil Dead, if you're wondering) and I needed the distraction of the internet to keep the creeps at bay. But what I found was even scarier than fiction. It was this. I was almost forced to join in when I found out that she had taken up her own challenge again that very night, just hours before I had found her. It was her beautiful badge that made me click it. The challenge is to do something brave every day. As I read about her project I kept thinking that it was a cool idea, but I wasn't really in the place to take it on, I mean, it's not brave to change diapers, but as I kept reading, I thought maybe it was the perfect project to get me out of my diaperland domestic rut.

I want to get out into the world and do the things that are important to me... which also happen to make me scared out of my skin. I don't know how brave I was to keep my scaredy challenges to something over the web, where I don't really have to face my true fears of getting out into the world, but you know, small steps really do get us where we want to go, often more so than the huge dives into the unknown without and safety wires.

Let's see if being brave actually does change my life.

(With all the new technologies and games I'm playing with, this post took about ten times longer than it usually takes me. And I have had to go back in and edit a half a dozen times. I'm not even done, yet. New things are hard. I'm a little scared of my oafishness here.)

6 comments:

Liz Stone Abraham said...

How pathetic but I'm afraid to sign up for the Be Brave thing because I'm pretty sure that I won't be able to do one brave thing a day. It takes me weeks, months to do anything outside of my normal routine. Good for you, though, Brave One.

Rowena said...

Liz, I will be honest, the only reason I didn't make excuses for myself and talk my way out of it was because she had just reaffirmed her goal that night, right before I found her. It was too big of a coincidence. And I am also keenly aware of how I will probably flake out or lose impetus on the challenge, so that's not really the point. The point is not to stick perfectly to somebody else's challenge rules, but to build up the habit of NOT running away from what I am scared of, which I do... all the time. So I had to do it. Even today, though, I didn't do the thing that is really scaring me. I did three other things, though, so it's still a success.

Rowena said...

I just wanted to tell you what the answers to my meme questions were, because, well, that's part of the fun. The images are in order, left to right, like reading a book.

1. rowena-- I didn't know there was a place in Oregon named after me. I'm so flattered.
2. Pizza. Food of the Gods.
3. Blue
4. Johnny Depp, baby. And he just keeps getting better. I liked that this image looked so natural, and I am naturally lazy so like beds.
5. Coffee. Beverage of the gods. I almost went with margarita, but was glad I stuck with my daily love.
6. Writer's Retreat. Nothing exotic, just lovely creation and time to work.
7. Chocolate. Come on folks. Be serious.
8. Novelist. I could have added how I want to do speaking engagements and teach, but I thought I'd keep it simple.
9. My family. Just because.
10. creative. I just am, can't help it.
11. mamacita. I tried to make it my full name, but there was nothing so I shortened it. rosymamacita was not there. Probably because I was unable to upload any photos because I am Flickr deficient.

Unknown said...

I loved this!! I did it and plan on posting it soon! So much fun! Thanks for this great idea.

Jessie said...

rowena, i'm so glad that you decided to join in on the be brave journey. i'm glad because now i've found your blog and it's wonderful! i love the mosaic you've created and there are a few images that i am especially drawn to.

yes, so anyway...i look forward to reading about your adventurous journey outside of diaperland...although i'm sure there are probably a few dirty diapers that will count for your scary thing of the day! :)-

Rowena said...

Thank you for the welcome. I feel very enveloped in courage.

And it's interesting about the poop. Before you are a parent, you think, oh god, poopy diapers, I could never, it's so horrible.

But then the baby comes, and it's gross, sure, but you get used to it, because there's no one else to change the poo.

And then, it just isn't scary anymore. Even the blueberry poos (yikes) Even the toddler poos that clog the toilet. Even the exploding poos.

That's why the be brave challenge is a good one. Because getting in the habit of being brave and doing it anyway, for even the little things means that jumping in to the really huge, scary things doesn't seem so scary anymore.

Or maybe being SCARED isn't what's so scary anymore. I have a post on "Fighting Gachnar" which is a fear demon from Buffy the Vampire Slayer which talks to this.
http://warriorgirl.blogspot.com/2008/06/fighting-gachnar.html

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