Altered Horizons 66

Altered Horizons 66 Robin Botie of Ithaca, New York, Photoshops fabricated landscape in her efforts to deal with depression and cope with loss.

Being reflective was never one of my talents. Rarely would I look back at things said or done, examining actions and motives, realities versus perceptions. Not my own, nor another’s.

And now, stepping into the role of grief group facilitator, I am having to develop my skills at reflective listening, responding to the thoughts and feelings I sense from the communications of another, so that the speaker feels heard and understood.

Focus on the other person’s message and feelings. Don’t make judgments. Don’t offer advice or my own perspective, I remind myself. But I’m kinda like an old upended tree trunk, absorbing the wet and warmth, and impervious to almost everything else around.

In Photoshop I turned the reflection of trees and clouds in my pond upside down for this fabricated landscape. Definitely not paying respectful attention to what lay before me.

 

Altered Horizons 66

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Altered Horizons 65

Altered Horizons 65 Robin Botie of Ithaca, New York, photoshops fabricated landscapes to deal with depression and cope with loss.

Being fully present. Listening. Reflecting. That is my job now, as a grief facilitator. I recognize that the griever’s pain is theirs, is necessary, is beautiful, is now. It is not forever.

Giving the grieving ones the dignity of experiencing their own pain, I must be a respectful witness to that pain, not a participant. Not a sponge. Not a healer or fixer.

Just being there is everything.

The ragged bark of a tree I upended in Photoshop and the still pond reflecting the deep sky. Combining these two images, I was reminded of sitting with a person in the throes of heartbreaking loss.

 

Altered Horizons 65

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Altered Horizons 64

Altered Horizons 64 Robin botie of Ithaca, New York, photoshops fabricated landscapes in dealing with depression and coping with change and loss.

No one could quite identify the huge tree at the far end of my property. It was surrounded by the thickest thicket and wetland scrub so we could only view it, its top, from a distance. For years I’d wanted to mow up to that tree but the land was too swampy to get anywhere near with a mower. Also, the field was riddled with the downed trunks of huge trees, cut when I built my house at the turn of the century.

In the middle of the heatwave and dry spell, the landscapers agreed to try clearing the field. It was one of those days when I hardly dared to go outside for fear of being fried. But the landscapers called to me, they’d reached the tree. (Although the bulldozer had half sunk in the still-wet land.)

It was a shagbark hickory. My favorite for photo-shopping fabricated landscapes. Snaking around behind the tree was a small murky creek. And under the tree’s canopy were two rocks, large enough to sit on. I greeted the shagbark like I was meeting a long-lost loved one.

 

Altered Horizons 64

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Altered Horizons 63

Altered Horizons 63 Robin Botie of Ithaca, New York, photoshops fabricated landscapes in dealing with depression and coping with change.

Not all landscapes are calming scenes. Last week I combined contrasting textures to create a peaceful effect, but this week I chose two different scratchy textures to highlight the tension. This kinda reflects my rough week of dealing with the heat, loss of the internet and then power, my dog falling and failing, and the television breaking. Nothing earth-shattering. But it all added up to an uncomfortable edginess.

The foreground of this fabricated landscape is a pile of dried grasses that I tinted blue in Photoshop, and the sky is the negative image of a Shagbark Hickory tree trunk laid on its side and turned bluish as well.

 

Altered Horizons 63

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Altered Horizons 62

Altered Horizons 62 Robin Botie of Ithaca, New York, photoshops fabricated landscapes during the heatwave to distract herself from loneliness and depression.

The reflection of the sun on my pond always teases me to photograph its sparkling, sometimes blinding, beauty. The problem is I usually over-expose the whole picture just trying to capture, on film, the beautiful patterns the sun makes on the rippled water. So here I inverted the image into its negative in Photoshop, turning the bright whites into black. Then I changed the colors from the blue-greens of the water to a pale pink sky. Enthralled with contrasting textures, I condensed a large heap of dried grasses into the land for this fabricated landscape.

Shut up in the house during the hottest days of the heatwave, I find creating landscapes in Photoshop to be a great distraction from loneliness and depression.

 

Altered Horizons 62

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Altered Horizons 61

Altered Horizons 61 Robin Botie of Ithaca, New York, photoshops fabricated landscapes in dealing with depression and coping with loss.

Another combination of algae and peony. In Photoshop there’s this great command that allows you to change the hue, intensity, and lightness of the colors in your photograph. There was something so satisfying about turning my pink peony and greenish algae into a fabricated landscape of blue twilight. I like to imagine walking in the dusty blue valley as a pale blue moon rises.

Altered Horizons 61

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