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I am an only child and what that really means is that I spent a great deal of time learning how to exist in the world both alone and lonely. Unlike many kids today who grow up with constant entertainment through the internet screens, I had to learn to use my imagination to fill my extra time. It also meant that I had to get used to having strong feelings and have no place for them outside of myself.
For many years when I was a kid, I really wanted to have as many friends as possible and be the popular one at school. But, I soon realized I had developed opinions that were very different from most kids at school. For instance, I hated Barbie (still do!) and I thought Vanilla Ice was.a thief and that Freddie Mercury (though dying of AIDS at the time) should make him rue the day he ever stepped in front of a microphone. (Most of my friends were developing dance routines to "Ice Ice Baby". So yeah...). For the record, I still detest the person and the song.
You can try to make friends and influence people but if you're a person like me, you tend to think you've given up something genuine about yourself that way. Eventually, you realize you are better off alone.
Then, Cinchel came along and I really couldn't believe it was possible to have this kind of connection with another human. I know some would rather be solitary forever but, for me, the thought of losing him is devastating.
Still, after Trump won the election recently, maybe my old solitary child need for space reappeared. Basically, even if you surround yourself with well meaning people, you can still never escape your own self. I had friends and family calling but I just wanted to be away from everything, especially my own head space. And, when you work in a public sphere and you have to function and not fall apart and succumb to hysterical crying all day, it is exhausting to say the least. I realize we all do this to some extent unless you're the human on the street corner literally screaming non stop until someone attacks or arrests you. There is a persistent sense in my mind, though, that there are a great deal of people who are disinterested and don't connect the impact of choices or lack of choices. Maybe they end up happier or not....I'm not really sure. No one can ever truly know what is like to be another human being.
In any case, when you reach a certain level of depression, you don't even want people around you who you care for deeply because you don't want them to have to witness you at your worst, even when they are willing. It is likely that, as in that expression "You contain multitudes" that we are not so simple as we appear on the surface. There are quite a few complex layers of human consciousness to contend with and they might not all agree with each other.
Today is Thanksgiving in America, which is nice that we have one day designated to be grateful for others while the other 364 days we are competitive, bitter, and spiteful. Well, I try not to be this way. But, you see it with extreme capitalism that these systems drive us to the point of being different selves and ones I wouldn't want to have even a basic conversation with.
Let's be thankful for those humans who have seen our true selves and still choose to share some of their time on Earth with us. We can be thankful for solitude too..for quiet moments and presence within moments without the world weighing on us.
I don't define myself by other people but I doubt I would still exist in this reality as a living breathing entity without certain people.
I hope you find peace today.
**All photos are copyrighted. **
Most of my fellow foamer friends think this thing is hideous and won't shoot a train if it's on it. I'm in the other camp and think its kind of awesome with its mis match of eras. What camp are you in?
While waiting around for some window trains to pass I grabbed this clean roster shot of PW 4001 a GE B40-8 blt. Jun. 1988 as NYSW 4004. It is the trailing unit on Providence and Worcester freight DAWO (Davisville to Worcester) which runs under the cover of darkness and is the only freight train that normally operates on this stretch of the busy Northeast Corridor. The prior night's southbound WODA crew ran out of time and was unable to make the trip back north, so they tied their train down here just railroad west of the US Route 1 overpass. It was brought to Worcester later in the day by Valley Falls based PR-3 once they are done with their regular customer work.
I wasn't able to wait around for that to happen but did catch a few trains passing them as they sat on Main 4 just west of Malcolm interlocking at MP 169.9 on Amtrak's New Haven Line main.
North Kingstown, Rhode Island
Friday May 16, 2025
CSXT 4579 leads an engine-heavy UP MCHNP passed the BN caboose placed by the wrong railroad in Fremont, NE.
Prairie blazing star (Liatris pycnostachya) blooms in profusion in a high quality longleaf pine savanna in Newton County, Texas.
This is another image taken on private land in the Pineywoods of east Texas. In stark contrast with the imperiled forest I posted yesterday, these woods are protected through legal agreements with nonprofit conservation partners and are managed to maintain exceptionally high quality habitat. I use the term “woods” lightly for this longleaf pine savanna, as, despite the trees, places like this are more prairie than forest. This site is rich in prairie genera like Schizachyrium, Andropogon, Eryngium, Silphium, and so on. This savanna received a growing season burn this year, which is typical of the fire regime under which the community evolved, and contrary to the cool season burns that primarily occur today due to a variety of non-ecological reasons. The results were spectacular, and Liatris pycnostachya in particular seemed to respond.
CSX (SBD) GP40 6773 (reportedly built as SCL 1619) is parked at the company shops backlot in Waycross, GA. If only the Seaboard logo was on that yellow nose.
This unit allegedly went to Point Comfort and Northern, then New Orleans Public Belt, now works for Nebraska Central, proving they don't make them like they used to.
April 7, 2009
I made a trip out to the "ranch" to see if our two favorite horses were still in residence. Happily they were still there plus Red Pony's mother. All the snow in the background is now gone. I made the trip to Omaha yesterday morning and had to back detour thirty miles as the normal bridge crossing the Red River was completely under water, the rail on the sides was not even visisble. I will be here in Omaha for the rest of the week.
In this section / there must be at least / 53 identities /on the outside / not be be discerned / one from another.
Back from a recent lease to Arkefly, this Skyservice 757, C-FLOX, still wears the TUI logo on the tail.
BCE47142 *LG71DXA* seen at Ham working on route 65 towards Kingston.
Back when photographing the new BCE buses on the 65, there was a number of them that had been diverted to this route instead of their allocated routes. BCE47142 is ordered for the 125.
The registration plate at the time BCE47142 had been carrying was LG71DXA, which is the plate for BCE47143. BCE47142 has since of photograph been corrected to LG71DWZ.
This former Reading Company XLj boxcar was in its second career for Delaware & Hudson at Binghamton, NY in 1997.
Well folks, it's the time of year to show photos from the annual Fort Lauderdale Air Show. Here we have the Blue Angels' C-130 support plane "Fat Albert" dropping parachutists at the opening. Flying nearby is the acrobatic aircraft flown by Aaron Aern.
Although painted to represent a USAAC OA-10 Catalina based in Halesworth, Suffolk in WW2, this is actually an ex Canadian example which served the RCAF as '11005'.
The original 433915 aircraft operated out of Halesworth airfield in the role of air sea rescue during 1945 and on 30th March that year after landing to provide help to of all things another stricken flying boat the aircraft lost use of one engine. With high seas that meant she was stuck just a few miles off the Dutch coast. Whilst bobbing around on the surf on the first night a pair of ME210's strafed the Catalina to such an extent that she was listing and no longer airworthy. Four days later after enduring constant seasickness and regular immersion in freezing sea water the crew were rescued by a launch sent out from Great Yarmouth. A second launch then destroyed and sank the Catalina rather than have her fall into enemy hands.
For the above reasons the preservation society chose to adopt the identity of the sunken sister aircraft. The preserved aircraft is now based at Duxford with Catalina Aircraft Ltd.
Photographed at Boulmer during a walk from Craster to Alnmouth last week.
This is a photo of a wall mask made by Karen Schlick that explores the shamanic layers of personal psychology.
Here's one for my buddy Cody who enjoys patched locomotives.
CN 332 is seen passing by Powerline Road in Brantford Ontario with CN 2036 leading the way. 2036 is one of the many ex UP C40-8's that CN has purchased in the last few years. Third out in this consist is a NREX switcher for Dofasco in Hamilton.
There was a good handful of these that ran around in CN patch and a couple lead...this would be my only one leading.
45627 'Sierra Leone' (aka 45699 'Galatea' with 45562 cab--side numbering) works hard away from its Clitheroe station stop near Rimington, the 1Z52 08:09 Lancaster to Carlisle 'Pendle Dalesman' charter on Tuesday 10th August 2021.
© Gordon Edgar - All rights reserved. Please do not use my images without my explicit permission
Don't be afraid to take off your mask and show your true character. Life's best when we're not playing with others!
Light in its purest form, is truth.
Truth is an elusive servant of what seems right;
a perpetual quest within the mind,
to reach beyond the self.
Perhaps it is the mind's churning
which ignites that wondrous universal balance
that empowers light to cut through the darkness.