On The Mothership

The heart I wear is not purple Too many families, spouses, and mothers Lose sons and daughters in combat For unidentified cause For senseless killing, Self-sacrifice for the self The war drafts en masse We all fight the same enemy And too many brothers and sisters Lost in combat. People don’t like to talk about It Newspapers try to glorify It Undermining those who have been through It Nobody chooses to go into the trench And nobody is willing to go into the trench voluntarily, To save their brother. Those who desert think it’s the easy way out But nobody likes to talk about how they treat you when you do Some place the blame on the enemy Others speak in hush tones of abandoning the fight People don’t like to talk about suicide I didn’t ask to go to war Yet I was drafted, all the same Sent to the trenches There I sat holding breath Knowing the enemy waited at ground level Waited to put me six feet under Waited to force my hand in aid I waited in the ...

This year has been an extraordinary year, with extreme highs and lows, pain and difficulties, love and happiness. I want to take a while to recap each month and recount some of the highlights of this year, as well as some of the low points. January: Came in with a bang. A month in which I was still working on finding my footing as a person, as most of the year has been. I started the month off in Raleigh, fulfilling one of my goals of trying new things. I went roller-blading and visited the NC Museum of Art. This was also the month I started really getting into David Byrne and the Talking Heads -- musical and philosophical influences that would help shape the rest of my year. Kicked off the second semester at Pfeiffer University. A challenging semester, but I managed to make it through without too many hiccups. The semester in which I took the digital photography class offered at the university -- a class that would help shape me as a photographer and give me the roots to really s...