7/20/-7/27/25: Little Rock-Hot Springs
GETTING OVER IT
I would first like to acknowledge an achievement I cannot share alone. 600 followers on Instagram! How awesome is that? I am so blessed to be sharing my journey with so many other people. It truly is an amazing thing... more amazing, however, is the fact that I've garnered such an amazing community through daily posts. I've hit over 100 days of consecutive posting.
At one point the time 'nearing' achievement was mentioned in passing of my struggle with procrastination. This follower count is more than a number. It's significant of the personal growth I've found throughout the year. Every milestone was shared with more and more people and I hope to keep going.
Little Rock
So here we are – this week in Little Rock, AR. This is where I spent the most amount of time with my older brother. I think we had nearly 2 years together here. Probably less than that, but with some traumas come memory issues... I definitely caught a little bit of that.
Anyways – there aren't a lot of places in Arkansas left for me to visit. I thought that before I ended my travels in this state, I should go back to my beginnings. I reached out and asked if there was any way we could meet up and grab lunch or something adjacent. At this point, it has been years since last we had seen one another, so I was super excited at the chance.
Unfortunately, I did catch them on a weekend where they had decided to head to a water park a few states away. Shucks. I was kind of bent over that.
I was so bent over it, in fact, that I nearly had a whole meltdown over the whole ordeal. In a time where I needed as much support as possible, it seemed as though life was going on without me and leaving me in the dust. Of course I know that's not true. There was just something else for me to find in Central Arkansas.
We started the trip off with my favourite pastime – Facebook Marketplace. The whole reason I started this trip was a lens. There was a fantastic deal on a 70-200 bundled with an 18-55 and 75-250(?). It was a long drive, I hadn't gotten a lot of sleep this week, and I wanted to fall asleep every half hour or so.
It took me about 5 hours to reach the destination, pulling over every time I felt too sleepy to take a half hour nap. We made it though! The seller was very kind and made things super quick for me. I couldn't have been more thankful for that. Usually people want to try and chat me up, but to be honest, I'm not entirely extroverted.
I have these moments where I am outspoken and extremely loud, so one would assume extroversion is my go-to mood. This is actually social anxiety!
Earlier in life this showed as an extremely bashful and reserved personality style, but later developed to be more attention-seeking. Many people may be confused; how can being louder and more self-centered in public be a form of social anxiety? It's just a distraction for my brain.
If I create a situation in which people are given a reason to look at me, or give someone the ingredients to believe I'm weird, I'll be less bothered by the looks or comments than if they had come naturally.
I've since resolved this... in a way. I don't make a lot of louder noises or comments anymore for a number of reasons and tend to deal with the looks and the giggles, comments and remarks on my own raw feelings.
To get back to the story though, after I had picked these lenses up, I decided that since I had both an 18-55 and a 75-250 already, I would sell the older ones and keep the newer ones as they were in better condition.
SOOOO I went to my favourite camera store ever! They have multiple locations throughout the United States, so I thought it would be breezy. Turns out they write checks after buying items, and they would have had to mail it. Well. If you've been around for a moment you would already know why this is problematic. For those who haven't been around, I live in my car!
So I sighed, smiled and nodded, and ran to the filter section to procure some new glass for... well, the new glass. I was torn between my new lover, the CPL, and a VND. I decided that the 70-200 would be more for portraiture and street shots than anything, so I leaned into the VND. I regretted that no less than 2 hours after the fact. Typical.
Well the task was completed. I got my lens, got the filters, and was now out of things to do. It was mid-afternoon and very soon the sun would start dipping back into the horizon. I figured that since it had been a couple weeks since I got out and about, I would get myself a hotel room for the night and just get out of the heat.
I used this room to take a shower privately by myself rather than in a gym. That was really nice! Something about a locked door separating me and myself from others and theirs always makes for a better shower.
After that, it was back to work. I cleaned all of my lenses as quickly as I could, packed it all back up, and headed out. It was a night out on the town!
Nothing too exciting happened. I was honestly kind of disappointed. Kind of is an understatement actually. The city I had memories of was gone. Replaced by a feeling of unfamiliarity I wasn't ready to understand.
I walked the streets for about 2 hours, taking photos mainly of the buildings, and giving street photography a whirl. To be honest, I don't understand how people fall in love with this genre of photography. I felt wildly uncomfortable photographing individuals just going about their day.
It did feel good to get out of my comfort zone though, and remain in situations that may have invited ill-advised luck into my bubble. I didn't stay out too late as I was, after all, in one of the most dangerous cities in the state. Being that I was alone and quite small carrying hundreds of dollars in camera equipment, I decided an early night was the best course of action.
I did feel safe enough though. I've always traveled alone and never really had an issue... but better to be safe than sorry.
I resigned to the hotel and enjoyed the company of the Cold Case show. I personally do not really enjoy these types of entertainment – I have too many questions, too many "Why didn't you see this blatantly obvious clue to the case in front of you?"
The Girl though? That's her thing. Still getting over her, I threw on what made me comfortable, and what made me think of her. It became clear to me the week previous that she wouldn't be reaching out anytime soon. This made me a little depressed and kind of threw a wrench into the outlook I'd spent some time building around the situation.
So the next morning I hiked up a mountain with 45lbs of gear on me.
Pinnacle Mountain
Pinnacle Mountain was the main attraction of the next day. I decided it was high time that I tested the new rig for my phone to start creating reels. I think that this visit was successful both in getting my mind off of the girl and figuring out what I could do with the phone and how I would structure future posts.
(Writing this on my gaming laptop. I swear to you the thing sounded like a 747 taking off and the moment I took my headphones off to ensure it's not about to overheat... it stopped cooling itself off. Tech is already gaslighting us. The end is nigh.)
I figured out on this trip some constraints the equipment had. My phone was quick to overheat in an environment that was far too hot for me to really enjoy the endeavor of the mountain. This probably won't be a permanent issue, and I do think that there are fixes if it is, but there was one issue that worsened throughout the trek.
I have already climbed a few precarious areas of Colorado in the setup without the metal phone cage... but with the addition of it I realized I needed to find a different way of attaching it to my backpack. Problem with that is I really ended up liking the jank way the phone was angled while I was recording myself, so now I have to find a solution to satiate the safety requirements (camera not slipping out of its holstered position as that would shift my weight and potentially send me off a cliff), as well as aesthetic requirements I found on this hike.
Luckily though, I did make it out alive. When I got back to the mountain base I decided to make a quick update reel on the situation. The reel was effective at one thing: yap. I really feel like the reels taken in my car are my least favourite type of content to push.
I feel like I talk too much and can't fit everything into that single minute. I don't like the way I look doing them either, which is kind of funny because the angle that I like to record in the outdoors is much closer and intimate than that of the position in the car. We'll see how that shakes out.
Hot Springs
What else would I have done after this mountaineering expedition? Visit a national park. Hot Springs, AR – one of the first nationally protected cities to be recognized as a park. This is a city full of history, a vibrant bar and eatery presence, and a wonderful place to relax and enjoy the southern culture of Arkansas with young ones. It really is a special place.
Walking these streets I recognized a few spots I'd visited with my adoptive family on vacation. I remembered the time we took old timey photos and I rolled my eyes back into my head. They decided to Photoshop brown eyes back in, and what would you know – that was actually framed at the top of the stair landing. I'd giggle at that every time I passed it.
I remembered walking these streets why it was that I loved traveling. You get the quiet moments to reflect and learn about the things happening to you during those car rides, train rides, plane rides, whatever.
When you get to where you're going though? Things change. They change as you walk the streets reforming yourself. Reforming the way you react to certain things around you. Of course I had a big camera out so I was catching looks.
I later realized, after hearing a gal say I looked kind of cute (b@$h. KIND OF?!?*), that it wasn't always just the camera that people were looking at. It's because they'd never seen someone like me before. Of everyone walking those streets I was the only one who was alone. Focused. On the edge of enjoying my time and instead being too "busy" to.
I then had a thought. "They could be looking at me for any number of reasons, and why should it matter to me if all they're doing is looking?"
The clarifying factor for me on this trip though, was that they couldn't look me in the eyes. Who could say why? I'd like to think the RBF was working overtime. Maybe it was the depth of the pain I carry in my face.
All I could think about was the fact that I was there alone. Not with the girl. The girl who in January of this year said she would have liked to go with me. I went alone to confront the memories we may have created there. The things that I was already thinking of doing over there in January.
So I did. I replaced every moment that could have been with the moments that were. I made memories that exist to take the spot of those that I wanted to exist and accepted that they would not.
In doing so I wandered over to a restaurant called the Brickhouse. I'd rate it a solid 4/10. Food took forever to come out, some employees working there had no uniform so you didn't know who to talk to in order to be seated, food was a solid 6 at best... the one saving grace was the service was alright. The waiter was nice enough and recommended a decent whiskey to take my edge off a bit.
That it did. There were a couple of gals behind me who had wayyyyy too much to drink already and one of them had started to get into that sobby attitude talking about a boy. Her friend wasn't really having it – I'm sure she'd heard about this guy a million times already.
What she said to her friend infuriated me though:
"You have got to just stop thinking about him. Get over it."
Girl. Let me tell you something. Not thinking about food won't make you less hungry. Your body still wants to eat. You distract yourself to numb the pain instead of confronting it? It's going to eat at you one day. You'll come crashing down. I stopped thinking. You are literally doing the same exact thing. At that point I felt kind of sorry for her. And then myself. Feel your feelings. Let them run their course. I'd decided I'd cried over it enough though.
So I did what I thought I couldn't. I blocked her Instagram. Removed her completely. I stopped mulling over the fact that she wasn't around anymore, believing that if she were to come back it wouldn't be because of anything I did or said any longer. I accepted that she wasn't there. I made the best of situations where she wasn't.
Closing
I accepted that I may never get to hear her again. See her smile again. I accepted that if that were the fact, there would be better things for me out there. I accepted that I was getting over it.
That was a weird feeling. I thought this girl was the one. I was questioning it now. Well... for a few moments I was questioning it. I was then reassured when contemplating just how many individuals turned my head in the time we'd been separated.
Sure. I was getting over it but I wasn't getting over her. I have no issue with letting her live life or living my own. The fact that the feelings I have for her started to burn even more told me I was right to wait for her.
So I will. Who's to say where doing that will take me in the coming months. Maybe I'm wasting my time. Until we find out, I'll keep my intuition close.
This trip showed me I was still capable. That the future still had things open for me. That I could get over the pain. That I could still keep her close in my heart and move on when I'd decided to.
For now though, I'll accept getting over the pain and keep the hopes of her coming back alive. I don't expect it, but I do hope for it.
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