Happy Sunday! Anne Sandler from Slow Shutter Speed is the host for this week’s Lens-Artists Photo Challenge and she has presented a very interesting subject. How does it feel to be abandoned?

I don’t have many photos on this subject matter but I do know what is like to feel abandoned and being an empath, I can feel it on inanimate objects, too, believe it or not.

I’ve often felt abandoned as a child when my mom suddenly left to settle in the US and left me in China to be taken care of by relatives. She had not discussed with anyone before she left. She just made the last-minute decision to stay in the U.S.

My relatives – maternal siblings and paternal siblings – at the time, they flavored male over female. So being a girl, I was always second best behind my male cousins. They got picked up first at school while I waited in the pouring rain. They got candy and soda while I got nothing. You get the picture.

I used to envy my cousins because they got the best of everything but I no longer envy them. Because their parents bought them the best of everything and gave them what they wanted, they don’t have the motivation I have to be independent so I can get what I want for myself when I’m able.

But because of what I went through in life and being an empath, I can sometimes feel or imagine the inanimate object’s emotion strongly. Like these pair of old boats abandoned and left to rust and/or rot.

What about fruit? It falls from the tree and people automatically would assume it’s ruined. No one would even touch a slightly bruised fruit, at least not my mom nor my aunt. Last night, my aunt found a bruised orange, my mom said, “throw it into the trash.” How would that orange feel?

Lastly, I want to share this picture I shot when I was in the UK 2 years ago. I saw this dog looking out the window of a house, its expression was of longing. It made me wonder whether it was feeling longing to get out of the house or whether it was feeling a sense of abandonment because its owner left it at home to go to work as opposed to staying home to play with the dog?