On New Love.

This seems to be a theme with these blog lately. I take months off posting something. Then I come back here with a long-winded way of saying, "hey I'm still alive. Shit has changed. All is good. Whatever."

Since the last time I was here, there really has been a lot that has changed. The drama overtaking my life back in February is a thing of the past (save the chapter it still has in my book). While I don't regret any of the events that happened last winter - they helped me grow immensely - I wish I would have moved on faster than I did. I wish I had more foresight. Hey, you live and you learn. I used to say I wasn't one to kiss and tell, but fuck it. I kissed someone (and may have done a lot more with them) and it fucked me up emotionally. It took me months to figure out what I'd done "wrong," come to find out that I didn't do anything wrong to begin with. I just did something a bit stupid. 

But enough of that. 

We've moved on.

Just before New Years last winter, I said that the only "big change" I'd accept in my life this year was falling in love. While it wasn't the love I expected, it's the love I deserve. 

I won't go too much into it, since we are still kind of on the down-low for a couple of reasons, but I'm happy. I'm excited. He treats me the way I know I should be treated, and I love him to pieces. 

I've been in love once before, back when I was still young and had very little experience with relationships and knowing how you're supposed to be treated. Now that I look back on it, I don't quite know why I stayed in that relationship as long as I did. Maybe it was because I didn't like change. But I've experienced so much in the last two years since moving to the city that I can see a red flag coming from a mile away. 

Nowhere to be found with this one.

It's a tad serendipitous, this new love. When was the last time you saw me use that word? Never. I never use that word. But there really isn't any other word to describe what has happened in the last five months. 

I'll stop talking now, if I keep going much longer I'll spill more beans than I'd like. 

But again, this is one of those posts where I tell the few of you that actually read this thing that I'm alive. 

I'm alive. I'm over it. And I'm happy.

(Untitled)

A lot has happened.

It's October 29th, and in three days, I will be technically homeless. My lease is up at the end of October and I won't go into too many details about why I'm leaving, but basically this apartment situation has been a hell on earth. I realized this recently when I remembered that all of the fun that I have had this summer and fall so far has been when I've escaped my apartment.

But it's been a learning experience.

Amidst all the craziness that has been the last month, I've learned who my real friends are, and I've learned that I have a huge group of people in Seattle that loves me enough to offer me up their couch. I just have to keep looking at the positives, and I'll keep my head above water.

It turns out that I've had health insurance all along, I've got a decent job offer for after the holidays, and for the first time in a year, no one is at risk of dying. Well, that's because they're already dead, but at least it's just mourning and relief rather than anxiety and uncertainty.

But the biggest positive that's coming out of this is that I'm getting out of the negativity that was this apartment. And this apartment is going to make a great chapter in my book. For real. It's gonna be such an insane chapter. And this pending homelessness will come with more learning experiences as well.

The only reason there is this uncertainty about my living situation is that my parents' house went on the market yesterday. Almost every sign of our lives are wiped from the house, and it's been one of the hardest things I've ever had to deal with. So there's not even the option of moving home until I find my own place, because home is no longer my home.

I did go check out this great one-bedroom apartment less than a mile from my current apartment, and it's PERFECT. I met with the woman living there, and got my application in to the landlord. Now we wait. WE WAIT.

So that's what's been going on. I'm going to go write a love letter to my house and wallow.

Changing of the Seasons || life lately

I, for one, am so fucking glad that September is over. I won't divulge into too much, but there has been a lot of health issues with my family this month that I want September to just go away forever. And Fall is here finally, so out come the sweaters and pumpkin everything. Let's all just give a warm welcome to October. I started in on a new book, put away my Summer wardrobe and dug out all the chunky sweaters, and my favorite shows are back on TV. Everything is going to be okay.

Thoughts on "No Cameras Allowed"

I'm really intrigued to see the No Cameras Allowed movie, honestly. 

At first when I saw the trailer I was just intensely jealous of this guy's circumstances like, "BRO YOU GOT TO LIVE MY DREAM, LIKE FUCK YOU." 

 But then I realized what irked me so much about the trailer. 

First of all, the documentary is being distributed by MTV. So there's one red flag. There's no way that MTV is involved in this without exploiting James Marcus Haney's story and talent. And he has talent. I'm not denying that. He's a great photographer and a great filmmaker (he's directed a few music videos since he started cheating the system). 

But why did MTV choose to tell this story? This guy's unbelievable and one-in-a-million story? They could have chosen to tell the story of the average concert photographer that does it the old-fashioned-non-cheat-your-way-into-Coachella way. It seems like they did it for their own gain, to make the music industry look like this fantasy land where everything works out all the time and there's not a fuckton of fine print and legal shit and labels don't rob artists out of most of the money they deserve. MTV is using this guy to overshadow all that.

The biggest problem I have is that young people are going to get a false idea of what the life of a concert photographer is like. For every James Marcus Haney there are hundreds of people working their asses off and NOT getting asked to come on tour with Mumford and Sons. I'm not saying that what I do and what my friends do isn't awesome and that I don't love the perks of being a music photographer, but it's still hard work and there are a lot of hoops you have to jump through to get the proper credentials. And most of us don't get paid. We do it because we love it and we want to support the artists around us.

Young people are going to think that it's so easy to get into these festivals with fake wristbands and become friends with famous people, and eventually become famous themselves.

Also I don't buy the story 100% because of continuity issues in the trailer. He was carrying around a film camera but the video footage he got was super HD DSLR quality. At all the festivals I've shot and attended, you need extra permission to shoot video, let alone shooting from the damn stage. Granted, I've taken a couple stealthy shots with my 7D in the past, but he had a damn Super 8 camera, and that ain't stealthy at all. You can't sneak those in under your jacket or in your pocket.

I am still going to see the film out of curiosity when it airs on MTV, but I still feel a bit icky about MTV's involvement at all.

What are your thoughts on the trailer? I know some people in LA saw it when they had a college screening tour, so if you have, please let me know if I'm completely out of line. I'm skeptical, but I want to be open-minded.

All the more reason I want to make my own documentary about touring with an indie band. Just gotta get the guys all on board.

The Girl with the Camera

I had a conversation with a friend recently, one that made me come to many realizations - but one particularly sticks out to me. It's something that's been subconscious for years, but it took a 3-hour drunk conversation for me to finally say it aloud to myself. 

I photograph because I have to. I photograph because I physically need to do it. I photograph because without my camera at a show I feel like I'm missing a limb. I used to feel naked without my camera, mainly because I had the self-confidence of a teenage boy at his first makeout party. I hid behind the guy, let him speak for himself - either in starting a conversation with someone or giving me an excuse to not to talk to someone because I was "working." And yes I refer to my camera as a "he." His name is Sebastian.

It's not like that anymore. My photography has become part of me, in the same way that songs become part of a musician. I'm not defined by my photos, but rather, I define my photos.

I used to call myself a writer, which I still do, but now after doing this for close to 5 years, I think I can call myself an artist. That's a thing, right? It's weird hearing my own voice say "artist" when referring to myself. Mainly because I've spent so much of my life respecting and admiring other artists' work that I can't fathom putting myself in the same category. 

That 3-hour drunken conversation wasn't necessarily the only thing that knocked this into focus, but rather it was the last push. Recently I've had everyone from close college friends to local musicians say to my face, "Your photos are awesome. You're awesome." Nothing feels better than when people you admire give you that same admiration back. Or even better yet, when they give you genuine friendship back.

Like I said before, I've been doing this for almost five years, and I've always felt like I fit into this local music scene somehow, but I've never really felt like I belonged. Granted, the only place I've ever really felt wholeheartedly like I belonged was in student journalism, both in high school and college, but when I found local music, I knew where I wanted to belong.

And it wasn't until so recently when I met the guys from Ravenna Woods that I felt that genuine reciprocated friendship, that I was more than the girl with the camera. I've never felt more welcomed by a group of guys before that I can't thank you all enough for making me feel so good about my work, and about myself. 

This fall will mark my 5-year anniversary of photographing live music, and I'm thinking it's about time I put together a show. A gallery. My portfolio is big enough so I've got plenty of stuff to choose from to print. I have spent so much time loving what I do, and I just want to be able to share it all with everyone. I love what I do so deeply that I cannot physically not do it. I do it because I love it and it makes me feel good and not because I'm trying to impress anyone. If anything, I'm trying to impress my younger self. 

Like, "Hey 19-year-old Abby, I know life sucks right now with your crazy disease and your stupid college and horrible roommate, but guess what? You're going to spend the next 5 years of your life falling head over heels with the Seattle music scene. And you're going to get that whole love affair on camera."

I guess there should be a moral to this story - that would make sense. 

Do what you love because you have to. Whether it's music or writing or science or social work or teaching or photography - do it because you can't do anything else. Love what you love just because you love it, and nothing else.

And that's what I finally realized at 2 a.m. after a couple of beers.

On the single life

I realized yesterday that it was March 5th. For most people, that day doesn't mean anything, unless of course they were like, born on that day...but for me, March 5th represents one year of being a single adult.

Granted, I spent statistically most of my life as a single person, but 3/5/13 marked the end of my first long term relationship (two years), and while it ended in a confusing way, I'm eternally grateful for all the things I got to experience while in that relationship. I learned a lot about myself, and what I want and don't want in a partner. We're still friends, so it's not a toxic relationship, thankfully.

At the time of the breakup, I was a freaking wreck. I actually did an outfit shoot that day, so in a weird way that blog post is the start of my new adult life - as a single lady.

This blog is a great way to see the progression I've gone through this year, both in the way I carry myself and the way my stance and style has changed. I'm not the same person I was a year ago. I'm much more comfortable in my skin, much more up front about what I want, and much more relaxed. A lot of things can be attributed to those changes: my job at Lush, my loyal YouTube subscribers, the constant influx of new people I meet at shows, and the year of me time.

Before I started dating Andy, I was just about as inexperienced in life as one could get. The only thing I'd ever done that most people my age hadn't was end up in the hospital for nine days with a rare auto-immune disorder that could have killed me. But other than that, nadda. I was still in college, I had just been shooting shows for a little over a year, and I was in this weird limbo where I didn't know what I was doing with my life but my best friend was pregnant.

Now that I've experienced so much as an adult, I feel like I'm a more interesting person. I've grown up. And I like it. I like the person that I've transformed into over the last year. And while I'm quite anxious to start dating again (moreso lately because of a recent crush that has gone absolutely nowhere), I'm glad I've spent the last year totally and relentlessly single. Life has been less complicated, less cluttered.

While it's been lonely at times, I've had so much more clarity. And that's a good thing to have that much time to yourself before even thinking about getting into another relationship. But now I'm ready. I'm ready to start dating. I don't necessarily know how to go about doing that, since my first "boyfriend" from college basically just told me that he liked me and we hung out for three months and that was it. And Andy wooed me with a YouTube song, so nothing about my relationships up until now have been normal. I guess it makes life more interesting, when nothing is normal. When nothing starts out normal, and nothing finishes normal.

We'll see how 2014 goes. I'm just hoping I meet someone at a show. It's so much easier if the person you dig actually likes doing the same stuff as you.

Words on Words

I've been writing my whole life, since I can remember. When I was 7, my best friend got Harriet the Spy for her birthday and from then on we carried around notebooks and wrote everything down. The last time I ran into her, which was a couple of years ago, she asks me, "You're still writing?"

"Well yeah."

It's in my blood. My mother tried to write a book when she was my age, and she's always loved writing, so I think that's where it comes from.

 Lately I haven't written as much, maybe because my creativity has taken different forms, through video, photography, what have you. But I miss the written word. I haven't read a new book since Mockingjay. Really. That was the last book I read. That's horrific. My bookworm friends would be stoning me right now if they knew that I haven't read a new book in over a year. That could be why I haven't written anything either. 

It took me buying a completely new notebook to want to sit down and write something. A completely fresh, empty, new notebook waiting to be filled. 

Last weekend I attended a show with my friend Raven. A friend of mine, Gabe Much was playing a album release/going away party at Q Cafe, and I didn't want to miss the last chance to see him before he went to Europe for 6 months for his studies. At the show, we not only saw a few amazing songwriters, but also a couple spoken word poets that blew me away. I sat there in awe of these kids' talent, and as I drove home I found myself wanting so badly to write something down. 

I want to write. Whether it be a script for a video, a short story, a poem, or just incoherent thoughts, I want to write them down. I've lived so much of my life online in the last couple of years, that there isn't a lot of what I've written down that is only mine. That could be my downfall. I haven't written anything that gets to permeate within my own self before being released to the world. All the thoughts I have just gets released instantly to Tumblr, or Twitter, or to this here blog.

I've made myself a new promise - I'm going to take the rest of this year to write for myself. It doesn't mean that I'm going to stop writing here, but I don't need to post everything. Everything I write isn't good enough to release to the world, and I need to take the time to craft something beautiful, and not just spit it right out. Songwriters don't perform songs as they write them. They take the time to polish them and make them beautiful. Having so many songwriters for friends makes me feel inadequate very often, and I want to make something that I'm happy with. I don't want to just be proud of myself, but I want my friends to be proud of me, too.

So that's what I'm going to do. This pretty little notebook will soon be filled with poems, thoughts, journalings, doodles, whatever the hell I want to put it in, because I can do what I want. It will be for my eyes. And my eyes only. And that's okay.

One Year YouTubeversary

Yes I made that word up.

No judgement.

I realized early this week that I've spent a year on YouTube as Abb3rz07 (previously known at Abberz07). Granted, I had my old channel for three years, but this channel felt like a new start. I've stuck to a schedule, I've built a relatively large (7,071 subscribers) following, and I've made a lot of friends because of this. It's crazy knowing that over 7 thousand people have clicked that button after seeing my face. It's just weird. For all my friends that aren't on YouTube, when I tell them that I have 7 thousand subscribers, they think it's the coolest thing ever. I mean, I guess it is pretty cool. I've gotten a bunch of people come into work and recognize me at Lush (my second day at work, even). That's my favorite thing ever, when people come up to me that know me from the internet. 

Mary Lambert told me earlier this month that she recognized my face from Twitter when I met her at a show. I came up to her and told her how much I loved her music and appreciated her as an artist blah blah blah and she goes, "You're Abby, right?" And I froze. And I realized, this is going to continuously happen if I keep gaining subscribers. This is part of my life now. And it's weird and awesome and exciting and unknown and I'm so happy that I feel at home with the YouTube community. I've gotten a bunch of people with Big Frame and Wonderly actually tell me, "You should totally move to L.A.!" I know the perks of living in L.A. I do know that most of YouTube has migrated there and collaborations and working with YouTube and the network directly is really simple when you live in L.A. But it's also Hollywood. It's a thousand miles away from Seattle and it's hot and the traffic is even worse than Seattle and it's just not Seattle. I've thought about going to L.A. for a couple months for a trial run and to make connections. But then I think about everything I love about Seattle and I'm like, "nahh."

This got on a tangent. But what I basically wanted to say is that I'm so thankful for YouTube and all it's brought me, especially this last year. I love you all for sticking with me and being the best subscribers and followers and you're amazing. There are only a few more hours to enter my giveaway in honor of said anniversary, so go to the video above and leave a comment!

Boobs

As you all have seen by now, Angelina Jolie was a guest writer for the New York Times yesterday, where she revealed that she had a preventative double mastectomy because of a gene that makes her 87% likely to get breast cancer. I won't run down the whole article because if you haven't read it, you can read it here.

I've always been a fan of Angelina and her choices. While not necessarily helpful in any way, I appreciate her and Brad Pitt's decision to not get married until gays have the universal right. She's always been someone who has been incredibly open about her life and her family. This reveal has been met with a lot of discussion, mostly positive responses from mothers and other women. When I read her article and saw what people were saying on Facebook, it warmed my heart. I didn't have to un-friend anyone because of any disgusting remarks. Trust me, it's happened before.

But I recently came across these tweets, and a bunch of other responses from mostly males, and it repulsed me. Utterly disgusting that people would belittle a woman who literally cut off both her breasts for reasons none other than medical and for her family's sake. Utterly disgusting that they would bare her down to just a pair of tits, and now that she didn't have them anymore - she's worthless.

This is why I call myself a feminist. This is why I'm not afraid of the stigma that comes with the term "feminism." I'm more afraid of the fact that this belittling mindset isn't shamed more than that of feminism.

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I have my own immune system issues that require medication and treatments that I can barely afford, so I know what it's like to have a rare fucked up thing in my body. My family doesn't have a history of breast cancer, but we do have a history of pancreatic cancer. Trust me, if there was some sort of preventative surgery for that son-of-a-bitch, my mom would have already taken it. I know what it's like to have a family member get diagnosed with a cancer that is literally a death sentence. What would have been my grandmother's 82nd birthday is coming up next month, and she died 11 years ago, of pancreatic cancer. Mother's Day is still a sad day for my mom, even 11 years later. We know how much it sucks. 

Angelina has made a difficult, but smart decision to do this so that her kids don't have to go through what she did. She has put her family before her own vanity, and that should be encouraged, not torn down by misogynist dickwads.

Seeing responses from men saying that now that Angelina cut off her boobs, "Brad pitt is gunna be fucking the nanny," it makes me sad for them, and sad for the women in their lives and sad for the people that don't see how terrible that is. It makes me sad that misogyny isn't more recognized outside of the internet realm and more looked down upon in the real world. I just hope that these disgusting reactions to Angelina's brave decision and confession makes it obvious to the rest of the world that sexism and misogyny isn't just something you see in old advertisements from the '50s and on Mad Men.

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I've had large breasts ever since I hit puberty. I never needed a training bra. I jumped from no bra to underwire within a year, and at my largest I was a 40DDD. It's big. It's painful. It's expensive. And sometimes it's humiliating. When I was in high school at my largest I thought of getting a breast reduction. When I was buying prom dresses I had to consider if I could wear a legitimate bra with it, and I still think about that now when daydreaming about my wedding in the far off future. I have big boobs. Now I'm between a 36 and 38DD, and I like my boobs. I've grown to accept them, but if I ever needed to make a decision to lose them for my own health, I would do it. 

What I'm trying to get at is that I love my body and my large breasts and they're apart of me, but if I didn't have them they wouldn't make me feel any less of a woman. Losing them wouldn't decrease my value as a woman or as a person. And it shouldn't make anyone feel that way, because they made a conscious decision to put their health or family over their vanity. This is the same problem I have with the "Save the Ta-Tas" campaign. While it has good intentions, the message is misguided. It makes the disease about the breasts, not the person that they're attached to. 

They're literally just appendages of fat attached to the chest. That's it. The size of your boobs ≠ how much value you have as a woman.