(6hours later and much frustration later with the loss of all the images twice over)
I am here now with the list of photography forums and sites where nearly all my photogrpahy online can be found
pogo, coffee and me
It's the beginning of central website for all my various acivites in photography. Be patient with me as it involves a very steep learning curve for the Ultimate UnTechie.
Many bad things have happened to me over the last few years which devastated my life. In 2000, my landlord with two of his friends attacked me in the flat and although I escaped to the street, they changed the locks on the door and I was locked out on a Friday night. In the time I ws locked out, they systematically went through my personal belongings and stole everything of value that I had: wine, eyeglases, legal documents, computer, etc-- and I can't begin to tell you how hard it is to find a lawyer on Saturday morning in Prague in order to get a court order to break a door down or the expense in moving on demand. After that I was attacked twice more in the next two months. The first time was on the eve of my birthday, February 10th 2006 as I was coming home and in that attack, I lost my new passport, and all the income of the month and much more. I went three months without identification. In the following March I was attacked the third time, but run down by a substantial car--
...and that was just the beginning of serious hardship for me because I really lost much more than money. If you've ever been systematically tracked and stalked, then you kow the amount of terror I lived in for a long time. And my poor beautiful cat was the next victim because he was shot at night, in the dark and came home at 4am in agony. I took hiim to the vet who discovered he had a bullet lodged in his fur over his heart... and sorry that made things much worse for me and I retreated into silence from the world.
And things went from bad to worse because I fractured my shoulders and couldn't afford medical care and so I just lived in agony for months on end. It was over 9 months before I could raise my right arm to my mouth and a little longer before I could put my hand into a coat poclet Now my right arm is significantly shorter than my left as a result of the injury. This makes typing very difficult an sometimes agonizingly painful. It's an overlapping fracture that can be felt with my fingers. aggravated by overwork it can cause intense agony.
I came to Gather with writing travel articles and testing them to create a newsletter for a Kodak franchise. The man walked out on me with nonpayment after months of work. Settig up a major community newsletter with restaurant reviews, short trips, travel articles and business profiles and photo contests is much work. He said that my imges weren't worth payment and wanted All Rights to my writing and photography without paring for them. Before you set up a newsletter, you need a backlog of issues so once it is started it continues on schedule... I popped up many articles here on Gather that were the models for this newsletter, but each one of them cost me many hours in time and travel. In return he walked out with nonpayemnt.
In addition to all that writing and pictures and business interviews, I had all the internet work with uploading the articles, images, and pictures for photo contests--about 30pp of work every two weeks. It's very easy, anyone can tell you that if you're a native speaker it doesn't take any brains to do that kind of work.
He walked out in September and it made me very angry because I worked hard at the things I did. It made me so angry that I started submitting my pictures to photo contests where the average photographer has a Canon D80 or Canon Rebel XT, the Corvettes and Lamborghinis of photography and I came along with my cranky Lada and competed with them. It was also my first camera--
I took a picture of the day and then another and another. I have some 50 picture of the day awards now and a couple picture of the months that came from competions with people who are very serious photographers and equipped with serious cameras and appendages.
I want to be able to take care of myself. I would like to have health insurance againg and take car of myself and go to a doctor when I am in pain. I'd like to have basic things and stabilize my life and this is what a camera means to me. With a camera I could sell my images off to stockphoto or set up my own shopfront with Shutterfly or wherever and repay my debts.
I didn't create the poverty I live in-- I only survived the horrific catastrophes and hardships that overcame me and escaped from my attackers. have you ever been shoved between the platform and the train. It might look scary on a James Bond movie when a person gets wedged between the doors and the train and platform, but I can tell you that it was months before I could sleep and even now, I sleep with a light on at times.
What happens in a James Bond movie or thriller isn't the same when it happens to you. I wasn't really so bouncy when the car threw me across the street. I didn't rebound so well with broken ribs on both sides of my body; but since I was desperately poor, the desperate poor work under any conditions and so I dragged myself into teaching English the next day for 12 straight hours of merciless agony.
I can't do this any more-- my body can't handle it and I ahve CFS. It got so I was writing gibberish on the blackboard and the students enjoyed ridiculing me. It's pretty traumatic when you can't remember your parents' name or where they were born and the US Embassy did not offer any asistance ...
So the last 6years have been only been a struggle of constant pain and search for survival.
And now I can't even pay the rent.
There's a portfolio of images over at Picasa--
but I put together 20 frames after many, many hours of sweaty work for Valentines Day.
Picasa Valentine's Folder
The images are now loaded in my Picasa account. The full-zed frames are available.
I hope to buy a camera to sell my images where they belong into the Stock Photo / Commercial photography market.
Just a few weeks ago it was finally possible to have Paypal in Czech Republic after years of working on the internet with nonpayment. Oftentimes the bank fees for small cheques from writing markets and internet work cost more than the cheque itself. Internet can be very expensive in Europe and until very lately difficult to access in Czech Republic without paying a fortune in internet cafes or fees for international dial-up.
I have CFS and in that time I lived with both shoulders fractured without any kind of medical care. Let's say it was agony.
At Picasa you wll also find the complete listing of all the picture awards I've taken since October 2006 and the folder of Butterflies. I think there are only 160 bugs and butterflies in it--or something like that.
It's not the Big Folder of Butterflies, but there's enough there to look at. A new folder of Still Life is being added.
The link is in the top of each image for the picasa valentine folder
Picasa Valentine's Folder
thanks for reading and listening...
pogomcl @ gmail.com
[ It's now the 5th time I've watched this article vanish after cutting paragraphs and after 4hours of trying to access Gather Inc Saturday morning 24 February 2007. You have to be crazy to want to write anything serious on this Gather site because the servers jsut don't load the pages and articles like this get flagged. Better if you loaded nothing but bad images and recycled plagiarized writing.
My apologies that the images have again disappeared, but I haven't any more patience for this site or reloading images into an article that loses it's title and content and images on a regular basis.
My apologies also if the images are duplicated because all I have are file numbers--and the system can't be trusted. The site has serious issues and I have been inside this article since 12:30 am this morning with a three hours snooze break, only to return and find an empty article shell hanging this morning. Well over 8hours has been wasted on this one page, watching it disappear, the images vanish or trying to copy it back in when an empty template repeated occured. I only tried to comply with the demand of Gather inc to revise the article within 24hours or the ultimatum of removal of the offending article.
okay the 6th effort--but the servers just leave you hanging in white space. ]
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Comments: 58
and it took longer than 6hours to post this article and 3-5 complaints to Gaather Inc with enclosed coding. So I really have a bad time with this site and the [pages don't open, the images disappear and the advertising is everwhere.
" Mary, omg girl! You are a gifted and talented photographer, have you tried to have your own show? Sell on ebay? If I were rich, I would buy it all!!!!'
it's a nice thought, but if these images are not technically good enough to sell for stock, they could never be good enough for a show. The camera itself is faulty and the images aer only 4MP max which is only sufficient for cards or mugs, but not wall art. In addition, have you ever thought of the xpense involved with setting up a gallery or show? You're talking serious money that goes into a couple thousand dollars at the cheapest-- the ent of the hall/ room, the promotion itself can run into thousands of dollars-- and I haven't even a proper camera
and let's not talk about the support system like the computer which is on its 4th reincarnation and 4th hard drive in 4years--
and no back-up, either. This is life on the edge or rather under the fringe.
mary - life isn't fair, and yet you've had more troubles than anyone i've ever met. it is super crazy, isn't it?? your photography is so beautiful - i hope that you can truly make a living from it. you know, you're always in my thoughts!! HUGS.
you're one of the kindest persons I know and thank you so much for all your kind thoughts and encouragement
Lori received and replied already-- but I went to bed about 2am and have been sitting here at the computer nonstop for more than 3days around the clock. my shoulders are in agony from yesterday's Battle of the Gather Inc and I collected gobs of code and serrver errors which I can guarantee that Gather Inc will ignore...
and so I must go out because I have a new problem between Paypal and Czech banks-- that has to be resolved by a legal advisor at the bank. And as i am now in pain again, i need to go out and see the sun after so many days of very intense all round clock work.
yesterday I loaded over 60 images onto the net, but Saturday, I think I loaded over 890-- and I am just working relentless ly around the clock if you think I am also processing and taking over 200 iages a day and often as many as 600 or more and then submitting to over 19 contests a day to develop a portfolio.
and really it is much, much harder than writing for literary journals I think becasue so much is dependent on technical equipment that I haven't got.
and tracking all these frames is tons of paperwork.
I lived on the ragged edge of poverty as a teenager but I never had to go through the physical pain and attacks. I can't even imagine the emotional anguish. You are a talented photographer and I hope this skill and your hard work help you get out of the pit you're in.
I do believe in the power of prayer, and I will keep you in mine! Take Care.
I want you to know that I love you, respect your art which is wonderful and respect you as a soul friend on the path.
You are in my thoughts
love and light to you
Modest Needs
AidPage
Digital Charity
Prague social services
I hope that things turn around for you- you seem like such a nice person, and you're a very talented photographer.
Your photographs are exquisitely beautiful both in colors and form. It is even sadder that the world treats the people talented in arts and letters so callously.
I am grateful to Mariana T. for guiding me here.
Mary, I respect the art in you and understand your anger at a world that doesn't reward love and talent. I will not sleep tonight after reading this. I will be thinking about a way to help. Just for the hell of it, try to pray. Forget religion and just talk to god.
it's not anger at a world, but despair at watching my life repeatedly destroyed by forces outside my control and knowing that the people who preach christianity and platitudes at me are tryuly basically indifferent and inhumane.
there's been many times when I've debated about writing about these ordeals, but the truth is that they are very traumatic and I can't think or talk about such things without wasting a day in tears an shaking as a result of the terrible disaster and hardships that overcame me and the vey frequent and inhumane response I got from people who considered themselves to be religious or christian or humane. They wee simply inhumane and often brutally rude as well as negligent.
and in erality, I hve worked very hard all my life, but been cheated of payment or suffered nonpayment-- but how anyone could expect me to work with the terrible physical injuries I suffered, I really don't know. But this si the way of priests and religious to preach at people and tell them that god helps those who help themselves and if you are crying because you are in physical agony because your shoulder is fractured and you have no medical care for it and cannot move the arm or do things in a normal way-- then you are just feeling sorry for yourself.
and as for God, he's not there. I think he's hidden, but in reality, people are supposed to help other people and not rely on God for miracles and this is how perverted Christianity is. A priest or minister will preach at a person and tell the person he doesn't have faith because if he had faith his shoulder would be miraculously healed-- or that the person is only feeling sorry for himself when suffering a major concussion that is bleeding into te brain and really the person needs to just go back to work and stop feelign sorry for himself.
for over 2years I never opened the boxes that were oved out of the falt becasue when I opened them, I kept finding more things stolen--and the trauma was really too much for me, so I just stacked everythhing and tried to blank my mind of everything. But there comes a day when the pain is just too much and there is nothing left.
were it not for Miroslav Sekera, I doubt that i would have ever sung again in my whole life after losing my profession as a singer.
I just try to deny my own existence and all the agony and pain within it.
photography ws just silent singing and the only way I had to find and create some beauty in a world that was totally shattered and destroyed by forces outside of me.
I'm crying and so I must stop.
My right arm is now about 4cm shorter than my left as a result of a very bad fracture that nearly penetrated the skin. It took more than two years before I could do basic things with it and 8months before I could raise the arm to feed myself and almost a year befoe I was able to comb my hair.
and during all this time of pain-- I just let peole say want they wanted to say about me and I tried to bury all the pain and ignore it. very hard to do if you suffer a bad fracture.
as for the landlord and his friends0-- I ws so soberminded at the time that when I wescaped to the street I ttok down the license plate numbers of both cars-- the locksmiths and the landlords-- when they came out the big thug of the landord attacked me again. he jumped on me and pounded my head into the street and stole the binder out of my hands that held my legal documents and took my passport.
and those legal documents were all I had to prove my existence... and had the opy of all my living permits and house contracts-- so there was nothing.
I called desperately fr ejlp to mroe than 36people and nobody came. Finally someone came an hour later and told me that I was lying until i took her to the door where my cat was howling frantically for me.
They even tried to kill my cat by trying to stick him in my oven--
okay-- tell me is this so easy to forget? And when i went to the Czech police, it was obviously set up becaeu they erfused to take a statement from me until after 4am in the morning and then mispelled my name on the documents-- and if your name is not spelt correctly, it's not you. And so they told me that I was lying and I didn't live ther and it didn't happen because I ahd no copy of the flat contract on me-- although when the the landlord sped off in the car they threw my passport back onto the street. My passport wasn't important because the legal document were what they needed
and besides such people could kill me any time they wanted-- in CZ you must register where you live and so i was tracked and stalked for m,any many months and suffered two ore attacks after than-- and my cat tortured to death in the end.
And the people about me just wrthdrew... they really showled lttle or no sympathy and i had basically nowhere to go
and so i became silent becaue people jkept telling me that I was lying or making up a story...
but really it happened and many bad thing happened afterwards...
How many peole do you know who after the hve been run down by a car will struggle to work in 24hours with broken ribs and severe contusions and concussions?
and so I'm sorry because I am crying again.
Being as you were kind enough to post this one a group of mine, I'm featuring it on Our Neighborhood as maybe there, someone will have some help or answers for you.
Gentle Hugs,
Marilyn
1.Flow
2.Law
3.Chaos
4.Aum
Sometimes a woman remembering herself as a person of power is attacked in this way: either she gives up, or she manages to find incredible strength deep within. If she finds this strength, she has also gained, through her terrrible suffering, the compassion she needs in order to help other suffering human beings.
Initiation into Love can be very painful. You have shown yourself to be wealthy in several virtues related to Love.
Though I'm poor in money, I'm wealthy in faith - the energy system I use to believe in others, to assist their self-belief until they are better and can do it for themselves.
I'm using my faith in your case, to add to your deepest self-knowing. You have survived journeys into the Shadow, and you are bringing back your Lost Treasures. I believe in your power of self-healing and in your ability to create art that can help many others along their way.
"In Prague do you have the equivalent of the Samaritans? I realise that you feel desperate and so are pushing yourself to do more than you reasonably can but that is counter-productive. Let go. Let those tears come. Do nothing. What may seem to you to be a waste of time will be restorative and enable you to gain more strength. "
tears do nothing and do not ease pain and only bring ridicule and abuse from others.
and in Gather, just go and check the "highest rated" articles and images to see what reaches the top and recognition-- virtual world is no different than reality in this respect.
Thank-you Marilyn, but now it takes 30minutes at lest just to open the pages at Gather--would that they would do something about their servers rather than their advertising.
sorry my hands are very spastic as a result of nerve damage over the years and many head injuries and spine injuries, and Gather Inc has incompetent servers and does not provide a preview for edditing and I can't sopend an hour each time round waiting for a page to open
I am here
pogomcl @gmail.com
and sorry 2-4hours each day just waiting on gather pages to open is real stress and wasted time.
I sometimes think of writing about these things and exposing the incredible insensitivity and negligence of the people about me, and in particular those whom I went to for help and their cold and often brutal responses -- as a result I have very little respect for chrisitianity and for religiousity.
and I despise catholic priests who an get up on Sunday and preach about compassion but show little of it themselves to those in need.
ditto for other religious leaders as well.
KEO:" I am so sorry this is happening to you, Mary. Your photos are so beautiful. Are people buying them? I certainly hope so!!!"
More importantly KEO-- are you buying them? at least you have Gather points to spend. We outside of the US don't even get that from this site. The sentiments though are appreciated.
Ms Huspek
looks like a Czech name to me-- thank-yuou for your thoughts
Vicky D
thankk-you for all your support and kindness
Mikaila-- like the spelling of your very beautiful name
thank-you for the good thoughts-- they say that darkness makes the light visible and without darkness there is no light, but unfortunately I do not find much comfort in that.
pogomcl
http://app-pogomcl-1.aidpage.com/
My main advice is to immediately stop the negative thoughts and comments. Find something in your life to be grateful for, as you do, more will come to you. Don't give energy to what you have that is bad, or what you don't want. Expect and believe in the good and that youwill have beyond your wildest dreams. If you can believe it, you'll receive it so please stop believing in the wrong and find the good.
Blessings,
Mary Mc
thanks for the kind thoughts MBM
and thanks for the blessing Rox
and as for forgetting blah-blah-- well sorry, I lived with enough denial for six years that I think that it finally time when I should be able to write and speak about it-- it's totally wrong to force someone to suffer so much pain in silence and tell them, "don't worry, be happy..."
and if you hadn't noticed, my images, no matter how good they are, never land in the highest rankied. that's for Gather ego-cults and I have my friendly driver-by 1-ranker to keep me on the bottom. It's very stupid because pointsw are worthless in EU, but all the sam,e, I rarely ever enter the top 100. Gather is all about points and cliques and mutual admuiration sociieties, but not about quality...
and tell me, who needs the news regurgitated and plagiarized for the 20th time when they can pick up a newspaper and read it himself?
not me...
Lisa, it's because of all the bad things that happened to me and not because I don't work. So I really don't appreciate Little Miss moralizer coming along on this page to be rude to me. She needs a good kick in the butt to the gutter to find out about the hardships of life. And down there, maybe somebody will acciddentally fall over her and add a few bruises to her ego.
Is just hard after a while to survive after being beaten down so many times--
is all. working on setting up photo galleries and then i can sell some of the pictures off and that will be good enough for me in the future.
Mary what do you expect out of Gather ? We certainly are not a community with huge pockets of money , at least not any of the people I know on here .
It has been said you catch more flies with sugar than with vinegar .
I've got a Candace and Wendy here to preach at me, but I doubt if either could endure the amount of hardship I've suffered and obviously neither of them would help a neighbor in need or bend over to say something kind. It's okay-- such people exist everywhere in the world and they are happy when the neighbor's dog is run over.
and about the only thing I do is put up a picture once or twice a week because the Gather Inc is so impossible to use and mostly inaccessible. I gave up writing here long ago because it wasn't worth the stress or the effort opr the type of unpleasantness I collected.
I collect drive-by ones and suchlike on the photography simply because the top of the photography is controlled by a few people-- and besides Gather points are worth nothing outside the US and so it doesn't really matter.
I won't get bogged down in the details of how that affected the next 43 years of my life . But believe when I tell you I know how to be compassionate ! I have lived in substandard housing , been malnourished, been abused in more ways than one. I have had sorrow in my life, tragedies, suffered ill health. I spent months in a dark room trying to deal with life at times. I stood in a food bank line, had food baskets delivered to my door, shopped at the Salvation army , picked furniture off the curb . By North American standards I am way down the poverty line. And Mary I own 2 cats and a dog. I cry for days when we lose a cat - we have lost several in the past few years .
And you've more support in all your social services than what I've had in all my life-- somehow you just don't make much sense to me. but never mind-- lifwe doesn't make sense either.
not crazy about dogs and would never allow one on or in my bed, 4 or 2legged doesn't matter. dogs belong outside preferably.
and I can understand crying over an animal since my cat was tortured to death-- was really hellish if you want to ask me, but actually you seem to be a bit callous and certainly I didn't invite you to rant on my pages. I didn't cross the line--yo did. you came here