"I Know That You Probably Don't Even Want to Look at Me!"

My "entry" in Vanessa's Caption Contest .. C'mon inside to view it! I know you probably want to!

Apparently Vanessa (Vanilla Thunder)'s second caption contest was inspired by my own DIY contests that I've run in the past, where I would offer a picture to caption, and you had to include a verbal prompt somewhere in the text. For her contest, she had picked the photo I used (of course!) and the line, “I know you probably don’t even want to look at me…” and I thought it'd be a fun exercise.

But I wanted to take up the challenge a notch, so I limited myself to 25 minutes or less for the entire creation of the caption .. ie from the moment I snagged the picture to when I saved it so I could send it to Vanessa, it was less than a half hour. Why not? I usually self-edit the story on the fly anyway, so the fact I had no idea what it was going to be about anyway wasn't going to stop me anyway.

My first assumption, which might not be true, but it seemed like it to me, was that she was up on a porch of some sort, and that it was a few floors up, like in a motel setting. Maybe each room had it's own patio that overlooked some sort of scenery. That is why she's there, but I just needed to tell the story of why someone probably didn't even want to look at her while she was there on the hotel room's deck.

And from there, I just started writing out a monologue of sorts, since that would be much easier to write out, instead of a give and take dialog, where I try to use two different voices. And when I get to monologuing, I default end up in evil scientist / Bond villain mode! And from there, I was getting her to justify her actions, and confessed what she did and why. Relieve herself of whatever lingering guilt she had, and got ready to move on and live the rest of her life. It's part of that, "we are all victims really," mentality that makes for good shift-blaming. "hey YOU were going to do it, so I pre-emptively stopped you!"

And I do think it works as a caption on its own. Could it have been better if I worked at it more, as opposed to just taking the picture and squeezing out whatever juice I could in a set time frame? Perhaps, but I might not have paid much attention to the picture if it hadn't been offered as a challenge. And, the fun part for me was to find the story behind the image that was there, lurking underneath. I think that every picture has a underlying reason for being. Perhaps, more so to the viewer than the person that is pictured in it, or to the photographer themselves. 

If there is one thing to take out of this post, it's that I'd love for each of you to invest a bit of imagination into everything you see. Think about it's context, what happened before, and what comes next. That's usually how I end each blog's ramblings, asking what YOU see, and what strikes you when confronted with it.

And that was what was so enjoyable about Vanessa's caption challenge, and every DIY challenge that I have created here. I get to see how others see things; their perceptions, their values and beliefs, filtered through their own life Perhaps that is another reason why I love doing this blog so much. That feedback, and exchange of our realities, in real time. Thanks for letting me into your lives, and for accepting mine at face value!