Christmas Images

Originally uploaded by dr.coop

A few months ago I was visiting my mother and I noticed this picture frame on a bookshelf in her living room. I thought it odd that there was not a picture in the frame and was curious as to what one would frame instead of a picture. Well, you can imagine how surprised I was that the frame held a precious letter I had written to my grandparents when I was home from college. Apparently when my grandmother died, she still had this letter I had written her. My aunt who was charged with taking care of her possessions saved it and brought it out to AZ for my mom. My mom then framed it, and there it sits today.

It just goes to show that if there is a will, there is a way. I couldn’t find any paper in the house to write my letter on, so I used a paper towel. I still think this story would be better if I had used toilet paper, but oh well. I always wrote my grandparents when they were alive, no matter where I was or what I was doing. They were a big part of my life.

I’m not known for my patience when playing with new Web 2.0 technologies. If I can’t figure it out within 5 minutes or within 5 minutes you’ve already pissed me off because of wonky behavior, I’m out of there. Heck, there are over 60 tools listed. I’ll just try another. I started with Joggle. After about 15 minutes and a mild hissy fit, I gave up. There’s a reason why “Dominoe” is the only story listed there. I’ll be nice and leave it at that. Next was ImageLoop. This site left me pining for more. I was able to produce a slideshow, but only after taking forever long to get an account. Kept saying my username was taken. I am the only “soul4real” so gimme my account! Had to settle for something else. All that trouble only to discover ImageLoop is just a basic slide show creation tool. So I load up pics from Flickr just so I can make a slide show like I could have made on Flickr. Nope. Not impressed.

So I decided that maybe I was in the wrong genre of storytelling tools. Maybe I should get out of the Slide show tools if I’m not impressed with slide show tools. Good idea. Timeline tools? Nah. Mixer tools? Now that sounds fun. Unfortunately I lost my focus on the first one and wandered off task. While I was checking out Vuvox, it reminded me of Shwup, yeah, yeah, I know – strange ass names. I just clicked over for a second, honest, to check something out. Thirty minutes later, Vuvox and “helping a brotha out” was forgotten, and I ended up with this.

So the point of the story is, I don’t really have anything to share with @cogdog, but I sure had fun playing last night.

I came out when I was 28. That was in 1993. Yes, I was a late bloomer – very confused in my youth to say the least. But anyway, this is not about that. When I came out I fell in what I thought was love for the first time in my life. It was simply amazing. Little did I know then that I was only in love with the idea of being in love with a woman instead of being in love with that first woman. Sad but true. I got my little heart broken anyway.

There was this band back then that I really loved, and they were called Soul for Real. And one song in particular really touched me. It was Candy Rain.

Soul for Real is a R&B group from Wheatley Heights, NY that experienced significant popularity during the 1990s, made up of brothers Andre, Brian, Christopher, and Jason Dalyrimple. Something of an urban 1990s version of the Jackson 5 crossed with Boyz II Men and Jodeci, the act has specialized in “hip-hop soul” numbers such as “Candy Rain” and “Every Little Thing I Do” (U.S. number 1 hit), both hit singles from their 1995 LP Candy Rain (Wikipedia).

In my sadness, I listened to that song non-stop. You can hear the song here or watch the video below. I loved this song because the words meant so much to me. It had a catchy chorus and the first verse went like this:

Have you ever loved someone
So much you thought you’d die?
Giving so much of yourself
It seems the only way
Tell me what you want, and I
And I will give it to you
‘Cause you are

OMG. I am cracking myself up with this. I was so pathetic. Here’s some more:

My love
Did you ever dream that it could be so right
I never thought that I would find
All that I need in life
All I want, all I need now I know
I know I found it in you
I found it in you
’cause you are

Well, she didn’t feel the same way, and all I had was the song. So I made my email and IM names soul4real to keep the memory alive. Gosh, I’m so glad I’m having to recall all of this because if it were a daily memory I might have to just smack myself. I’m all grown up now and realize how silly I was back then, but I still continue my online identity as soul4real. Every social networking site I sign up for has soul4real as my username, and now you ALL know why. It has been 13 years and still going. Enjoy the video: