A weekend of lust, love and missing pieces

I am feeling really bad, hurt and broken...

Tonight I shot in a strip club, sorry gentlemans club.

And it made me feel so down, I'm not sure why, the gig was from someone who I met at a networking event a while back, she had some performancers doing some Ariel as well as some fire/pole dancing. But as I was shooting for the club I also got some other images while I was there.

Me being me I asked each girl before I took any images and while I'm not shocked most didn't want any images I did feel a little funny as a performer myself it's a little funny not wanting images. As I waited for images to show themselfs I would catch the eyes of the girls, they would smile and walk towards me, then they would remember my face or see the camera and then there face would drop and they would walk by.

I don't know why this should effict me but it's something I'm not used to, it's like they saw me as something amazing till they worked out I was not a punter. This was not the case with some of the girls... Some talked cod shit like most randoms do in normal clubs and were mostly really nice people but I could not shake the idea of how they saw me. Me being a man, I know it sounds silly but I'm not used to women seeing me as such.

I saw how they work with the guys and how the guys would take them, talk with them and touch them in a way I through was not allowed in these kinds of club, nothing really bad just I had always through that clubs like this always had a hands off policy.

When I left the club I popped into a fast food place and was around the normally 2am drunks and party goers and I just felt a little more shit than normal, thinking that I was going home to an empty house and got me thinking what am I doing with my life... What do I have to show? 

I work hard every day and push myself to do new and exciting things but this (and with my other job) has really got me feeling  a like shit. I fear I will die a loney man, alone with only my cats to miss me - then again they will pass a long time before I do so that's even more depressing.

Tomorrow I shoot another club, then I'm shooting a couple the following day that are about to be married, I guess this is a weekend of love, lust and missing pieces.

To This Day

Yester I came across a video on facebook, A video about bullying and growing up different from the norm - As I had such an up bringing I was really touched and it almost give a tear to my eyes.

I wanna share this to everyone, the bullied how think its hard, to the kid that has to live every day as an up hill battle and to the bully to make them see just what there words can really do to someone!

Maybe this will open some minds, maybe it will support a hurt mind... Just know that love comes from inside and that you can always pick yourself up. It does end and you will be stronger for it!

Be Strong - Be Better - Be You!

A Crying Rock

Life is really starting to get me down, Everything gets on top of you and you fight to keep it all together.

I have always been a rock for my friends and family, staying strong for everyone else's sake but when your feeling weak and need a hand... who is there for the rock? People offer hands here and there but they have there own shit they need to sort out or to have help with. I always wanna help them before I help myself. They mean more to me then I do to myself.  I dont want to be that burden on my friends even if I am there rock... I dont wanna have to lean on them the same way... Yes its one sided but I just cant work both ways on this.

Everyone has issues, even a rock needs time to cry sometimes and this rock is feeling the presser from everything and everyone. Issues of the heart and the head, issues of family and friends, issues of life and work.

Call this what you want but I need to sort this myself as I can only rely on one thing in this world and thats me! everyone leaves me at some point, my life has showen this to be true and I am the only one that is going to be there every second of every day.

Skinny will follow me to the grave and back to the life stream. I am thankful for that - he keeps me company.

Lost in Lightroom

The other week I tried to back up last years catalog for my images... 

2012 was the 1st FULL year that I had my canon camera. I only shoot using RAW (The highest quitily me camera can take) but the trouble with shooting RAW is that each image is around 25mb. When you take it into acount that I should around 100 images when im on one of my walks, about 400 when I cover an event and somewhere in the 700 mark for a shoot - It all mounts up.

I tend to wait till I'm back home before I delete any images and sometimes I only delete the ones that are really bad. I tend keep the ones that just dont do it for me. Thinking that they would do it later.

My trouble today is this... There are 2 people I have the most pics of, One is my cat Jinx and the other is Fluff... I am having no trouble deleting images of my cat but when it comes to fluff I just cant seem to do it. There are alot that will never see the light of day and she herself would want me to delete them. But now I'm here doing it, I find it hard. I might never get to get that shot again, That silly just woke up in the morning with hair all over the place - that small smile in a coffee shop and most of all that look in her eyes when she was looking at me through the camera.

I guess I should just get over this... or just buy A bigger hard drive but I just felt I wanted to share my feelings on this, I want to have the chance to shoot her again in all the different moments that have nothing to do with photography. Iwill work this out I guess

Lost in the Woods

With enough words and friends telling you something... can you believe a lie? I mean can you really start to believe in something that seems so real but is only a massive head fuck?

A friend of mine once pushes her girlfriend into the arms of another man to find out how he felt about her, to see if he really loved her... At the time i though this was crazy, Now I'm not so sure

Today I was having a chat with someone and the image of them with someone else made me feel ill. Did i really trick myself into feeling like i was not in love, did I lie to myself within my own un-happiness?

With me having a lot of my own space of late I have been thinking a lot about myself, where I am in my life and what I want from it. When I really think hard about it I know where I want to be but is that the right place. Am I thinking about the wrong thing or just looking back at my mistakes.

I guess I will find out and one way or the other pay for my mistakes and the things I have done wrong... But in the end, Will I be happy?

A New Me?

Of late I have been thinking alot (I know shocker) 

I feel like I have lost myself in all the fun Ii have been having of late, Losing who I was and becoming something that I am not. I have been looking over old pics and videos from my past... I became the person I wanted to be and now i find myself lost in my own soul.

This needs to change - I was a well rounded person before, people liked me and had respect for me. Now I find myself being looked at differently from the people I trusted and loved. The people that have know me for a long time talk different to me and I am left to wounder what it is.

Am I that different? Have I changed so much? I dont know but I dont like it... Who am I again, what do i stand for and what should I aim for to get something back that I think I might have lost.

This year was meant for fun but fun not taken at the expense of others - that was the rule and I think in that I have taken something from myself - This is my new goal for this year... To make myself better To push myself in all fields and to become the man some used to see me as.

2013 Skinny is going to be a little more through full then 2012 skinny and that going to start with taking better care of myself

Happy Birthday Lewis!

Today is the 21st of January... This is a day that's both happy and sad for me, Today would have been my brothers 33rd birthday.

Some of you might know the tattoo on my neck. A lot of people have asked what the letters stand for... L.R.E... Well its stands for Lewis Ronald Elliott. It was my 1st tattoo and maybe in a funny way my favort one. It was for my brother that Fluff got me in Sweden.

My brother was an amazing guy - He was a pain in the arss. could be the vane of your life or the most level headed person you would have ever met.

See the funny thing is I was not ment to know him, Born with a hole in the heart the doctors only gave him 3 years to live, 5 if he was really lucky. Well one thing my brother did well was never listen to anyone!

He pasted his 5th birthday, became mine and my other brothers dad when he was 11 as we were put into care, finished school, went to college - Worked and also had a son of his own.

5 years pff he lived pass his 25th! By then he was getting weak and spent so much time in hospital that I saw im on almost a daily basics (As my flat was only 5mins walk)

He knew he was going to die along time before he did, He came to terms with it better then most of us around him - I think that is why he had such an amazing out look on life, Enjoy yourself he would tell me, Make sure you have lived your life before its time for you to go. He knew at the time I was out partying a lot but also knew that I would pass that point in my life. 

I look up some nights to see his star, and every time I smile, knowing that he still sees me and see's just what I have become. I hope I am still doing you proud of me

Love you bro, Happy birthday

The Western Block

ok thats it.... AMERICA YOU ARE NOW "officially" THE MOST STUPID COUNTRY IN THE WORLD!!

What the fuck is wrong with you people!! If i have to hear that guns are not the problem I will go mental.

Ok the skinny of it, They wanna arm teachers to protect if a crazy person goes on a shooting rampage at a school, and I quote "The best way to stop a bad person with a gun, is a good person with a gun". Really? REALLY? 

You think that having MORE guns is a good idea, you think that just having the schools with kids and teens full of guns and ammo is a good idea, What is it with white people and guns in America?

Yep, that about covers it! Thank you guys from South Park (hitting the nail as normal) Just follow everyone else in the world that has some idea of what GUN CONTROL is - as in having control over firearms!

Now I used to believe that this was such a small part of te US that believes that this is ok, but the fact is this has not changed, I have seen so many of these new shows in my short life time and im in the UK, So im guessing I am missing even more of these shootings...

In that short Video they say 2 times that the "ONLY WAY..." yet they dont even bring up not having firearms is "A WAY" or by stopping people getting hold of gun is "A WAY" or as Chris Rock said "MAKE THE BULLETS $1000" that way they really do something wrong and there would no longer be a bystander as I would cost so much to reload the fucking thing!

Sort your fucking country out mate or someone else is going to do it for you, like the UN or China cos there going to be kicking your ass soon enough and your just going to be the new USSR, once great now just the Western Block!

Age is Nothing But A number

Tonight I was chatting with a friend online and the subject of age came up.

Both me and this friend are in the same year at school so we are 1984/85 babies... Of late I have been getting alot of stick from my older friends about hanging around people younger then myself. They group I hang in is made up for 4 people, one is 31 the others are 16 and 17 and myself being 28(just turned). See I dont know why but some of my friends are so fixated on numbers and age they forget that there is a person behind the numbers and just cos they are young does not mean that they are stupid or even immature.

Now for the better part of the last 10 years of my life I have always been around people older than myself, even my girlfriend is nearly 3 years older then I. All 3 of my best friends are older, one by only a few months, the other about the same as my brother and the 3rd is a few more years on that.

I bring this up now as from this chat with my friend tonight I have come to terms with the fact that my friends giving me stick with the age gap are looking at it from there point of view... ie the view of a teenager from someone in there 30s. Now - A 30 year old looking at this sees it different to a 27 year old would. 30 is one of the BIG numbers that you judge your life by so anyone looking at this is someone half there age. 

Now I have never really seen age as nothing my a block of time that means next to nothing, I know people in the 40s that ack younger than a 15 year old and then I know 16 year olds that you would find it hard to tell apart from someone in the mid 20s.

Long and the short of it... being mature does not come for an amount of time you have spend on this earth, it comes from what you have done with the time you have had.  

Thanks for the chat tonight my kitty friend, its really open my mind to how this subject has been such a pain in my arss

A through on the Old Year as The New comes in

Sometimes in life you have to brake something to make it better... Stronger and able to do the things that it never througt it could. Giving it the push it needs to make it without all the extra crap of having a pojkvän to mix things up. 

My life has had such a turn around in the last few months that its hard to keep a handle on it sometimes. Friends found and lost, Diets changing and times to find out who I am.

Big things have changed with the small things and my anchor has shifted in the sand, My family worry about me, my Fluff is un-happy and sometimes I forget what day of the week it is. My friends have been great to me of late with alot of surport and kind words. TheSex has shown his heart and been a great shoulder when I have needed it, ThePixie has chatted with me till the wee small hours to work out the depths of my troubled mind and ThePeace has been just that! A carmimg  entity for my soul.

Its funny that I used to have one person that did all of this for me, my soul mate who knew me through and through. Someone who could almost read my mind and know what I was feeling without a word said. It makes me sad to think that she is not happy. She has all the things that she wanted in her life now but me, Maybe I was a bigger part of her heart then she lead me to believe. A Shame this side did not show in the mindle when it was needed most but then I know I was probably just as bad, if not worse.

But we cant go backwards, Take the things we learned and use them now in this new form of our lives, I have so many good memories and alot of them will stay with me till my dieing day.

I miss you alot Ylva! dont think for a second that I dont! 

We will meet again, dont know how when and in what form but I have a feeling this is not the last of Skilva! weather that be as friends or plant life. pusspuss

Something to Remember!

Every blog starts as a blank cavers .. And then you fill it with colour, red in passion, pink for love and black for hurt, of late my blogs have been very dark and black with some flashes of red and pink.

This have not just been my blogs but my life of late as well, bits of love and passion mixed with a hole lot of deep thinking and emo thoughts.

I do feel like  have been jumping from one thing to another, from one extrema to the other and it is starting to wan on me now. Today I think I just sorted out one thing in my life, not that its finished but I think it is now understood what is happening from the rest of this year.

If that is a good thing or not is something to be decided later but as she said 

"We cant make decisions yet so - let us not!"

Something will return in time and me being me it will take me in full, but I right now dont wish for it as I want some time by myself, time to heal and time to love myself again before giving it to another. Time is a great healer and I want to give it its chance to work! Thought can be as powerfull as any message platform out there, Thats something to remember!

I remember the good times, and they will paint over the black, They always do!

Black is never Grey

The black hole I was in just got that bit darker and deeper, The news of late came to the ears of the one who needed to hear it, and the ending that I hoped to avoid has come.

I feel that this is a hole I'm never going to come up from and at times I hope never to, Life is flitting and never ending, no peace at the end, not blackness to engulf me. Life just keeps on living and I know when I am gone my soul is just going to be spat back out in a new life-form.

 Promises I cant make are just that, broken promises. 

Be strong and fight for the life you want, make it happen with everything in your soul and I know that in the end, I will hear about it.

4ife

To set the flames

In the next few days I have to make a big decision and I'm not sure what it will mean, this could be the end of something big but I feel that it needs to be done.

Why does life throw these things at us, Thing that you know are big things and not really giving us a chose. Life is never easy and we have to live with it, Will my life turn out the way I wish or will it just become a deep dark place that is going to form a hole I will never be able to dig myself out from? 

To let it burn or to add petrol to it to make sure something new and beautiful comes from the ashes 

Could this still be?

Funny what a day can bring. 

I had a nice long chat today with someone very close to my heart today, Talking with her really does calm's my sole and helps me see things that I sometimes cant sort it out myself... 

I think that there is some big changes going to be happening in the next few months and an old plan that I longed for might still have a chance in happening. Feelings are a funny thing and head fucks are really going to drive us crazy.

I know to you guys this is not going to make any seance what so ever BUT this is more for myself.

The meaning of life

To work this out you have to find its opposite, Death!

Yes this is going to be one of them Deep and meaningful blogs.

Now I believe in balance in all things, night and day, cold and hot, yen and yuan or life and death. There is balance in everything and when it comes to feeling alive, you tend be be near death. There is a saying that I heard a long time ago that said "There is no point living if you cant feel alive" and I have tried to adopt this as my motto.

I might only be 27 but I have seen and lived through some amazing times, both bad and good. Someone very close to me died at a young age and even though I miss him every day his life tough me a very big life lesson. Everything comes to an end but its about enjoying it while you have it. Now this person was told he would not live long but got 4 times the amount of life that he was given, yet he did almost everything he wish.

Now this is just my belief and to a Christian this might sound mad but I believe that when you die, you energy or life force goes back into a big melting pot with all of your life's lessons energy and feelings to give energy to more life. This is both a Gian and Buddhist view, but when you find enlightenment then your soul itself will end, making true death - as in really dead, No heaven or fields full of my loved ones but a peace or nothingness.

Cold? Not really. If you think about it I will see my loved ones all around me, there energy in other items or people around me. In my heart and soul with thoughts and feelings that guide me in my day to day life.

To me the meaning of life is death as the meaning of death is life. I do not fear death as I dont fear life. Balance is the key to everything and everything is the key to balance.

Sucker Punch (A Year On)

Hidden Symbolism

Sucker Punch is one hell of a movie. Its screen play and director Zack Snyder made an great looking film with some amazing set pieces that lived up to the trailer for this film. That being said if you look beyond the the action and titillation you end up with a very deep film. Now if you have not watched it I would say to check it out, No really! Buy it, Rent it, just watch it!

Me and Fluff saw it at the iMax in London last year and are still talking about it now. This film could be used as a case study with with its use of effect and composition to all of the hints and double meanings placed with-in its frames. Most will just come out of it with the images of girls in hot outfits, or an over whelming idea of a computer games cut scenes action with a light weight story. This is a simplistic view in my opinion.

Freedom or detachment 

Now I love films to have many layers as I think about everything in a film, not only what's in the film but what they chose to keep out. What mind set the director is in or what hidden meaning are placed within the movie. I do feel that many people just did not understand what was told with this story. Its not just empty action and CGI, this film has depth and meaning for those who wish to look.

Sucker Punch really can take you as deep as the rabbit hole goes... There are many articles online that can take you throught the looking glass but I am not going to take you there with this blog, Such an article will take me a long time to write. I am not going to push you down that way of thinking, just watch and make up your own mind as both me and Fluff still have many things to say about what I personally think is one amazing mind fucking film.

Sucker Punch in more ways then one!

Bob & Me

Ok this is going to be one of them "deep and meaningful" blogs but I feel I have to share a video I have just seen.

A book to read!

Some of you might not know me very well and some might have know me for years but I really hate bully's!

Of late I have called out a few of my friends about racist comments or sexist views. With some I took it as people just trying to be cool and to get a point across, other's I see as just being silly and saying something that they have herd someone else say. 

I have been making it a point of my life to re-educate some people that I feel should know better, While some I have just called out on being a biggit! Just because our grandparent said something does not mean its ok for us to, Just because its not show that it has upset someone does not make it fine. Were talking about sex, race or what ever it is that you think makes us different from each other... Drop all this shit as were not different, everyone of us is the same, every life form has the right to be happy and safe.

My case in point for many of my friends is the term "Gay", meaning something bad, Now I know where this comes from as well calling something queer once meant it was not the norm, but after a while queer  was used as a diss to gay people. I am so sick of people calling something gay when its implie that its wrong or bad, We are speaking English here people and I believe that we should start doing that again. Read some books and pick up where the words come from! The Etymologicon is one that I would check out.

Every so often you find someone that feels the same about something that you do but its rare to find someone that feels that they should stand up within there own circles of friends and family to say something right and fair. My Girlfriend has asked me why I like this guy so much and I think this might help her to understand. The fact that I believe as he does that everyone should have there say but at the same time call out some "free speech" as the hateful comments that they are.

Now the video that started this blog is from MovieBob, A man living in the U.S who like me cant stand a bully. He has a blog, Youtube channel and also does Game/Movie themed shows on the escapistmagazine.com showing some of the great and the worst we as a race have to offer!

    

The Escapist : The Big Picture : Not Okay

Now some of you might have a problem with what I am saying and I welcome you to give me your comments  but like I say about the trolls all over YouTube... Just because you can say it, does not mean you should!

the magic BUT!!

BUT!

A funny word, a word with almost magic powers. A word that can make almost anything happen.

It seems that you can be so hard lined about a subject and never move from that point still something comes into the fre and that word comes along.

Like how someone who will fight for women's right and equality BUT find it ok to watch Victoria's Secrets Fashion show because its different.

Then there is always the "I'm not a raciest... BUT". Why does this word have some much power to just change a person into something else.

Anyways, just something that came into my head tonight.

A Video I wish to share

This is a funny blog to post but tonight I have been thinking and feeling very much that there is something very wrong with the world. I have my eyes open and am awake to see what it happening around me. The promises made and then forgotten, The hope of my childhood was that every one was equal no matter of colour, sex or class.

There are things happening in the world that I think are so impotent and then I flick on the news and not a peep of info about it. With Russia trying to pass an anti-gay bill to America trying to copyright the web. The 1st step to suffering is fear, The 1st sign is to take the freedoms away!

I have seen the ways in witch things have changed, In my life time and with everything that has happened to me. Something needs to change before we end up going backwards instead of forwards. Riots, Protests and the stamp out of free speech and this is all within 3 months!

Thank you to the people that have talked to me, Opened my ears and my eyes to the world that THEY wish stay hidden to everyone! Wake up and see it for yourself before we cant stand up any more. Stop watching the x factor and being part of the dumber fife masses, take an interest in what's happening in the world, we live in a world with unlimited information. We have no reason to not be aware and no excuse not to know.

Thank You:

Ylva, Karl, Emma, Eric, Lewis and Ian and to the men that have guided me through my life to do the right thing and not just the easy one, John Bruce and Bill

Steve Jobs RIP

Today we feel the loss of one of the greatest men in the would of tech.

Steve Jobs passed away today surrounded by his family after a long team illness that has seen him taken to the side from Apples main front man.

No matter how you feel about Apple, You have to give this man the respect he deserve. This is one of the men that have fought Microsoft and won, He has giving us a view computers dont have to be ugyl, That A phone can do alot more then just send texts.

You will be missed Steve Jobs

‎"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life." Steve Jobs 2005