Kristin's Photography Korner

2012-06-19T15:17:00.001-07:00

Building my business is a slow process and it seems like nothing makes a difference at times.
I have my name out there now with my business cards, and I can see that people are coming to my sites-

bluevargas.photoshop.com
kristinsphotographykorner.blospot.com
flikr.com/kristinkny

The going may be slow, but I know that in the long run, it will pay off. I'm going to add a few photos while I am on here.

2012-06-06T18:43:00.000-07:00

As you can imagine, having your own business can be very daunting and sometimes frustrating. At times, I feel like throwing up my hands and giving up. Why would I give up my passion over small obstacles though? From advertising and costs, to lack of leads, I get caught up in what I seem to not be able to manage instead of the images I can create with my minds eye. I've actually found a couple helpful sites on advertising and how to build your website so it can be seen. I will have a detailed list later on, but here is my favorite that definitely needs to be checked out! I've Tried That By going through this entire site, I have saved a lot of money, and have made some in return!

I am getting back into shooting, and have set up an online gallery (besides this site) that can be used as a gallery, and also to upload and do basic edits through Photoshop. I'll be adding the link here after I have everything posted. So for now, I am going to end this here and I look forward to adding my best images!

2011-12-01T10:05:00.001-08:00

Poetry, Poetry, Poetry!

2011-11-28T14:08:00.000-08:00

Here are a plethora of old poems that I wanted to share with ya'll!

I feel as though my world has crashed down on me
I'm suffocating.
Our lives have taken a turn for the worst,
and I don't know how I am going to survive.
I've given you absolutely everything that I have.
I have given you my heart, soul and have loved you
With every breath that I have.
I'm so sorry that I have done you wrong in the past.
I'm sorry that I couldn't be as perfect to you as you
were to me.
I would give everything to be with you once last time.
You were so adamant about seeing me one last time,
but now.... now you just want to run away.
I wish you well when you deploy.
I pray that nothing ba falls in your path.
I hope that you remember everything that we have
shared, and that you smile because you love me.
you said that you still love me.... for now.
How can you just fall out of love with me,
for something that I didn't even do????
You have torn me to pieces,
and I don't know where to go from here.
I thought that you were going to be my husband,
and I gave you not just the past 10 months, but
my entire future.
You are my SOULMATE and I can't go on without you.
Yes.... I can.
I can live without you.
I can continue to breath.
Yet, I am so empty.
I'm a shell of a person.
Only slightly reminiscent of who I used to be.
Do you remember dancing with me in the living room
after we hung the Christmas tree lights?
Do you remember the last night we spent together?
Holding each other after dancing at Wild Country?
There was no one else in that room but me and you.
There will never be anyone else for me; I know this.
I have been waiting for you my entire life.
If there was anything that I could do to save this,
I would.
I can only wait and pray that you come back to me.
I love you with all of my heart and soul.
What is left of it, at least.
You are strong enough to break my will.
You are strong enough to break my heart.
Please come back to me, baby.
I love you.

I've everything yet happiness eludes me

I've a car
Yet nowhere to go.
I've a bed
Yet it doesn't warrant sleep.
I've a family
Yet cannot reach out and touch them.
I've two jobs
Yet no money.
I've language
Yet no words to express my hurt.
I've food
Yet I hunger.
I've religion
Yet cannot encounter God.
I've a boyfriend
Yet we argue like foes.
I've sadness
Yet am inept at shedding tears.
I've music
Yet no melody.
I've freedom
Yet am bound by chains.
I've pain
Yet no relief.
I've a pen
Yet no power to write.
I've a phone
Yet no calls to answer.
I've an empty chair
Yet no companion.
I've a camera
Yet nothing to capture.
I've a pencil and paper
Yet no memory to draw from.
I've emptiness
Yet no sustenance.
I've friends
Yet no conversation.
I've wakefulness
Yet I continue to sleep.
I've showered
Yet remain dirty.
I've a jacket
Yet remain cold.
I've everything,
Yet happiness eludes me.

Kristin Kitchen

Sociology 6

11/21/2008

The fall of a Country

Military vehicles patrol the streets, and not one child can be found playing outside. It's the year 2028 and so much has changed in the past 20 years. The only children found on the street are the ones forced to become adults before they even hit puberty: those cast out by the fallen foster care system. The government and economy of America has crashed, coming to a standstill, like a rushing bull hitting a concrete wall. Very few children remain protected by the system, the programs only surviving on the donations of citizens fleeing the country. America is still at war, and has been since March of 2003. Many elements have been affected by the changes over the years in respect to foster care including: education, health care, government, non-profits, poverty, war, unemployment, and population. The year is 2028, a conservative Republican is in office as president, and the nation is in a recession.

It all started in 2008 with the coming of President Barack Obama. The nation had never had such a young president, and even more important, one that was a minority. Those two characteristics played into America falling apart. Obama, having to clean up the mess left by Bush, made the wrong choices as commander in chief, and sent the war spiraling out of control. Not only did troops deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan, but to Iran, Georgia, Korea, and China, as each nation turned as one against America. Citizens were not safe outside of the home anymore, as invading armies landed on shores on each coast. Gas began to soar over $8.00 a gallon, and without means to pay for it, Americans had to quit their jobs, and strive to live off of what meager savings they had.

Where was all the government funding? In the war. It cost money to send troops to war, to supply them with food and weapons, and to bring their bodies back in caskets covered in the American flag. Funds are drilled into health care to fix all of the troops coming home with missing body parts, or faces needing complete reconstruction. Because each penny within reach of the government was placed toward the war, there was nothing left to support other causes, namely Foster Care for children. As the war progressed, it got worse and the system deteriorated rapidly. By the end of Obama's first term in office, there were still a few social programs available.

At the beginning of his second term, Obama decided to try a different strategy, and have the American people support the war effort through deception, using the foundation of democracy to manipulate the citizens of America. Just as propaganda was used in WWII, "The war to end all wars", that influenced the soft minds of Americans, so was it utilized during the later four years in office. The new billboards seen on freeways and boulevards all over the country depicted the average American personally handing a check over to a G.I. Joe. The war was brought home to them, and they were able to finally have a personal part in the home front. This led to millions of American dollars thrown into nuclear weapons, created at the Livermore Lab in Livermore, CA, which eventually became a terrorist target.

During the two presidential terms of Obama, education took many cuts, and children lost the ability to go to after school activities, and extra curricular activities were cut. Without anything positive to do after school, many youths turned to drugs and alcohol, crime following behind in close pursuit. How this affected foster care is that these children were alienated even further at school, and withdrew. There was no one to turn to for help in funding education, and some of the children just gave up. Confidence is largely built through performing arts, and without it, children that already do not feel wanted are not able to built the much needed confidence that would sustain them through life's hard moments. Because education is paid by the government, there wouldn't be enough money to pay teachers, and class size would increase per teacher. Students would learn less than they would if they had a government like it used to be before Obama got elected. Not only would education for students be at a minimum, but no one had money to put their children in child care, so preschool no longer existed. Under this president, children grew up with less knowledge and had more interest in getting their smarts off the streets.

In the year 2016 a new president was elected. At this time congress decided to make the term of presidency increase to three four-year terms. This new president is the current one (in the year 2028), a conservative republican, who had the hopes and aspirations to clean up America and get the country out of war with so many countries. He wanted to abolish the economic slavery that had plagued the citizens throughout the past eight years. His plan was simple (or so it seemed to the people of America when they decided to elect him over another democrat): take the troops from all the countries and bring them home from war, creating more funds to bring the country out of the depression that had set in, and get the children off the streets and back into homes with parents where they are supposed to be.

In contrast, this is what happened: the country set further into depression, reminiscent of the Great Depression. Extreme poverty and unemployment attacked people of every race, in every city and state in America. Gas prices soared because of the conflicts with other countries where the government acquired oil. Homes went into foreclosure and homelessness was ubiquitous. There were no funds whatsoever for social programs, and the wards of the foster care system were released to the streets, and most were left for dead. Most resorted to stealing or begging to survive, making up a large percentage of the increase in the crime rate. Adults could not afford to feed their families, and those that were still employed, lost their jobs, and the average family was forced into poverty. Only those that still had fortunes from better times had any money left, although they were not considered to be in the middle class margin, as far as financial status was concerned. Entire families took to begging on the streets, and if one came from another country and was on the outside looking in, it would have looked more to them a form of anarchy, then a democracy. The people had no say in anything that happened because the country had fallen so low. Now that the previous president had made so many foes, there were not that many countries allied with America that would even want to come to their aid.

If one had walked these streets during the years of 2016 and 2028, they would likely be mugged by gangs of staving children or even murdered. A healthcare system ceased to exist, and those that were gravely ill just stopped breathing. There were longer hospitals or clinics, just abandoned building thought to be haunted, covered in graffiti. The medical professionals that once worked there tried to administer aid when needed, but without supplies, there wasn't much that they could do. The children cast out of the foster care system had no one to take care of them, no one to tell them that it was Chicken Pox and not Tuberculosis, and most died from common illnesses that modern medicine in better times would have cured with little to no side effects.

Programs like the Red Cross no longer existed because the lack of money, and there was not much that they could have done if there had been any money. One of the jobs of the Red Cross is to fly families home (especially military personnel) when a loved one dies, but being that airports no longer operated, there was little that a non-profit organization as such could accomplish for the people. A major way that this conservative government in an economic recession affected not-for-profit organizations is that there ceased to be anywhere that women could get birth control and the population was affected by this catastrophe. Women were having children on street corners, and leaving them for dead, or in dark allies where they could trade them for fresh water or a bite to eat. People resorted to cannibalism, mostly of their babies, as those in China did in the early 2000s. Because there were longer people to collect the dead, they permeated the streets, the bacteria contaminating those that dared to eat the corpses.

The foster care system was deeply affected by this conservative government in an economic recession, more so than it would have been in any other form of government. In the year 2028 there ceased to be a system, as the country plunged into anarchy. The children that had been in this system were thrown out onto the streets, being assets that were too expensive to be cared for by the state. War has taken the biggest toll. The promiscuity of military vehicles prevail daily in America. The country no longer has the ability to fight off invading armies, and the country has become invaded and is being taken over by those that want to retaliate against the government. The citizens of America hide where they can after dark, and gunfire kills day and night, a fusillade of bullets that rid the once safe haven that people have said goodbye to long ago. In fact, yesterday the president and the vice president were both assassinated making a public speech on the steps of the white house, which is not covered with graffiti, and as dangerous to venture out of as any other place is. As the country becomes reminiscent of dark video games, it is every man for himself. The only way out is to die.

Flying Scalpels
I woke up sweating
breathing in the scent of the operating room
pristine cleanliness
wrapped packages of surgical pieces strewn about...
it was just a dream.
I was back on the table,
face down like a drowning carcass
the buzz of a saw ricochetting in my head;
"She's awake,"
God, the pain!
Lightening flashed through me
a fuscillade of knives
piercing my flesh to no avail.
Give me something, PLEASE!
The smell of Ketamine hits my nostrils,
that metallic taste washes my throat
and I begin to drift through my own blood system.
A complete disregard for the big note scralled
on my chart: No Ketamine.
I travel past white blood cells,
still aware of the voices of nurses and doctors,
the sweet melody of classical music
playing in my head;
haunting every minute I'm the waking dead.
Scalpels touch me,
I feel their blades contort my scarred skin
bursting open my body
and I scream!
no sound escapes me and I panic...
I'm fighting my body,
the drugs overwhelming me and I lose the battle.
Oh, PLEASE stop killing me!
I can't take any more!
My useless body lies still on the cold,
unrelenting table,
my mind conscious of every heartless wrench of flesh
they pull from my body.
It's as if they are attempting to extract my heart
through my ass...
I begin to laugh hysterically to myself,
yet my facial features change none,
my breathing calm,
skin clammy, matching everything else in this dungeon.
Lord, let them realize I can feel it all,
take me away from this pain!
My defense mechanism does not kick in,
I do not go where to rabbit escapes to
before being eaten by the wolf
as I had so many times in the place
I call hell: physical therapy.
I remember the whir pool,
the jets throwing water inside my open wound
my mom holding my hand as I cry,
howling at the top of my lungs....

I can't finish this poem; it's too painful.
This is really what happened to me during one of my surgeries. They didn't give me enough drugs to sustain me through the whole procedure.
10 YEARS of unbearable pain....
This is the way I cope.

Been 10 years since I've seen you
and now you're living where I want to be,
Texas is a prison,
Please come rescue me.
Juvinille poems,
The Growing Pains theme song was the shit,
You drink Heineken and I'm with the Bud Lite clan,
when I was a kid you stuck me in a bucket.
the end.

The Pain that Plagues my Body

they cut me
like its nothing
and here I bleed
it falls like the tears
that cascade from my eyes
they don't care.
I can't sit up straight
nor drive like everyone else
and try to hold back from crying.
I want to be held
yet don't want to be touched
sitting here in my army sweatshirt
like its a shield against this evil
that plagues my body.
tape that leaves my skin red and raw
like packaged meat
that's all I am to the doctors.
when will there be a day without pain?
when will I be normal?
I can't stand the drainage
this hate wells inside me
and I sit in solitude
and wonder where it ends.
my sister changes my gauze
and I cry.

Follow You

Suffocating
just breathe.
I smell it,
that sweet aroma of freedom.
trying to get up
walk
run
and trip.
get up again.
the smoke clears,
light.
bright, heavenly light
that disipates the darkness.
brand new,
all behind you.
and it's all I need,
just to follow you

I don't Care

I spin in circles
and you don't even know
you don't know how I fall apart
I sink...
I failed.
I didn't care from the start.
tonight will be the night that I don't care
don't make me change my mind
I don't want to live to see another day
without breathing...
breathing in you.
I write words that don't make sense
talk is cheap
and you don't understand.

So Hallow

Why does it feel like I'm drowning
Falling down
I can't breathe
and there's nothing I can do about this
body squirming
lacking air
and you look down at me
and smile,
reach out a hand but it's three iches too far,
I'm done.
My eyes cloud
my lungs shutter
can no longer see lucidly
And there go your cold eyes
piercing mine,
like a fuscillade of arrows.
A thousand pictures flash before my eyes
and they aren't of my life in whole,
only my life with you;
images like movie scenes
while the surface of the water becomes
further and further from me and my body
sinks, my limbs no longer moving,
eyes just staring into yours,
so hallow.
I can't help but only see the times you
made me cry,
leaving me a sobbing wreck on the bed,
begging you not to leave
and then too, you laughed.
The water turns green, you're 15 feet above,
and I no longer see you.
All I see is green.

I miss you

I'm waiting for when it's a little more simple.
I hate saying goodbye, and
it's just going to get harder and harder.
I wrapped my arms around your pillow last night,
filling my senses with you.
When you're home I even smell you in my dreams
and you comfort me,
your sweet breath on my forehead.
I miss you.
Depressing love songs piss me off
because they're filled with the longing I feel.
Has it only been a few days?
And next time even longer,
and then a year.
What will I do?
I try not to think about how much it will hurt
after being with you almost every day for almost a year by then...
I have no doubt that we'll make it through,
what we have no one can break,
but...
right now I'm preparing myself to start the
process of missing you.
I miss you.
I love you.

365 Days Without You

This slight wind whispers
at my ear
carrying the uncertanties future has in store.
a year without you.
12 months of wondering
praying
hoping
that you will come back to me.
more or less than 365 days
that I wont wake up next to you,
or feel you pinch me while I try to sleep.
Over 8760 hours without your arms
around me,
keeping me safe.
52 weeks of staying up late at night
waiting to see you get online,
sleeping with my laptop open on the bed,
waiting for that IM.
dozens of hand cramps from writing letters daily:
how are you, baby?
are you safe?
Chruch services, heads bowed;
pray for our troops in harms' way.
Not just then, but while driving also-
holding my frog in my hand, crying as I pray for you:
God, please keep him safe, put your protective arms around him.
525600 minutes of pure hell-
not just for me, but you.
Will you be facing danger every single day?
Will you be scared?
or will you be brave, and rush into battle,
knowing that you are fighting with the Lord's light surrounding you,
fearless...
I'm scared.
I'm afraid for you.
And I will be so alone without you,
my best friend.
So now we count down the days to nothing, and then count down the days
to being together again.
365 days.
365 days without you.

Poetry Slam of sorts

I shouldn't care but I do
and this is how
with my hand across your face
like you care
and no one laughs.
I've got what I've got
but what there was...
well, I've got to say, it was good.
And here I go rampaging about my sorrows
when I just wrote,
wrote with my heart on my sleeve
talking 'bout how we bitch and moan
when there are more IMPORTANT things.
I wrote a senator yesterday,
about a specific SPC MIA.
I won't hear a thing.
Or, if I DO, it'll be
"We're doing everything we can"
and you're everything ain't good enough.
Yet, as I even write these things,
I crack my knuckles because I'm mad
not about politics
or the military
or even my life here in Texas.
I'm thinking about California.
Everything has changed
you changed
I changed
and I want to hate you and I can't...
it's broken open and bleeding
blood on the ground around this couch
running onto the table,
staining my carpet crimson
and I'm still stuck.
between past and present and what
I want for the future,
the future so obscure that I question
if I have one.
One full of rage and nothingness,
or will I write once again,
I'm proud.
I'm proud of myself
and sit here with not blood pouring out of me
but tears of joy
ones that illustrate just how far I've come
and I've finally arrived.
I don't want to hurt today
or tomorrow
about the things I once had and can't change.
It's over
and I'm gone
and yet, why do I still care?
I keep changing the music
looking for something...
something that will calm me down
while at the same time spits the words
out of my fingers and onto the keyboard
like a fuscillade of knives that cut
cut what, I'm not sure
but what when there are shreds on something
other than my heart,
well then,
my work is done.
Done like so many things
like the lives that were meant to continue
but were chopped down
mowed down like little blades of grass in an open field...
Hatred.
yeah, that's what it is now,
now it's about politics.
No longer about me.
Or maybe it is, and I don't realize it.
A letter
A package
and that's only what some of you do.
Betrayal.
That's fine
cuz they don't do it for God, home, and country.
they do it for each other,
so it's okay that you've forgotten them,
because they never thought of you in the first place.
Politics?
Probably not.
Just mad
mad at society
and our government
and pretty much everything else.
Just reflections on my own life tho.
How sad.
Reflections...
Just reflections.

National Veteran's Cemetary, Capitola, Mojo's and more!

2011-11-28T13:52:00.000-08:00

I took most of these at the National Veteran's Cemetery outside of Killeen, TX

I drew my own praying hands, which took a long time to produce. This is my best drawing to date.

These are of my buddy Tony at Mojo's in Fremont, CA

Capitola, CA

"Three Pairs", 2007

"Steps in the Sand", circa 2001, where I got the name of my photography business from!!

So I think that's enough photos for tonight....now how about some poetry??

Randomness

2011-11-26T13:16:00.000-08:00

I just converted raw images and wanted to put them on here. This is what I have. These are some of the smaller ones that you can't view as larger in the previous post. Hope that this helps!

2011-10-05T14:58:00.001-07:00

Anatomy of My Addiction

2011-10-03T12:02:00.000-07:00

It leaves such a sour taste
Makes me bite my tongue
I hate it
I despise myself.
Destruction
Deception
Diabolical
So maniacal in manner
Yet, I miss it,
My best friend
Comfort and escape.
Isolated
Alone
Checked out
Lost in my own misery
Swimming in an obscurity of random
Burning buildings
Without a route to flee.
Caged in
Behind the bars of my own prison
Freedom lost.
What have I done?
I look around.
How did I get here?
this mirror
Reflection of a stranger
Eyes I no longer recognize
Deep pools of shame and regret,
Aged and empty.
It's me...
This is the
Anatomy of my addiction.

Back to the basics...

2011-10-03T11:51:00.000-07:00

This may sound strange, but I have just started shooting again, and I actually forgot how to do a lot of the things I learned! I will post what I did this weekend probably sometime at the end of this week, but its not breath-taking; that's for sure. A step at a time, right? I am taking photography courses again, so I am excited about that!

2011-07-12T05:48:00.001-07:00

These were just two pics I quickly snapped at Skaneateles Lake

2011-07-12T05:47:00.001-07:00

2011-06-24T09:41:00.003-07:00

The Sunflower

2011-06-24T09:41:00.001-07:00

I had been driving down the road and had to stop to shoot this. I had never seen an entire field of sunflowers and what made it even better was the fact that they were on the dying side. I do have to admit though, this was taken with my old phone! My plan for tonight is to take a drive somewhere, anywhere. As long as I have my camera, I am sure that I will find what I am looking for. That's usually the way it works. I am planning on driving towards Cambridge this weekend to capture the beauty along the road. The last time I was there, I only had my IPhone and that just wasn't working! So we will see what I come up with.

Time to get out there and shoot!

2011-06-24T09:37:00.000-07:00

It seems as though years have passed in between when I started this and today, and still I have not added anything. I will, though. It makes it really hard when all I do is work. All I ever do is work. But at least now, I have found another person to go shoot with, so that could be interesting. I definitely would enjoy someone to crtique my work so I can use the positive critizism to become stronger.

Had a dream in such vivid color

2011-03-15T05:46:00.000-07:00

Last night I dreamed of being a painter, and I turned the world into my mural. It was absolutely amazing. Somehow, I knew it was a dream, yet at the same time I did not want it to end! I was thinking about an internship I will be doing soon, and it got me to thinking about painting. How would you express yourself, what sort of paints would you use?

2011-03-11T07:57:00.000-08:00

This is a collage I created after doing a wedding with Ted Salamone with Imaginare Photography.

This is a friend from California I used as a frequent subject.

First Post

2011-03-11T07:48:00.001-08:00

Here's the first blog, and there will likely be one every few days. I have created this page to further myself as a photographer and to put my photos and thoughts up for all to see. Will anyone see it? Who knows. Here's to the unknown......