At the moment, apart from things to stop this house decaying further around me, I want only two things – both are impossible for me to have…..one forever and the other for the foreseeable future. At the weekend, I got to sample the one I can’t have for the foreseeable – I got to hold and play with a 5D belonging to my Dad.

The other is more-simple, yet infinitely more difficult to achieve. Time. I would so love to have more of it. I heard a story on the radio the other day about how Argos (UK catalogue store) had commissioned a survey among women and the gist of it was that most of them would rather have another hour in the day than any luxury. I so relate to that.

Today, numb with tiredness, I switched off my work PC after exactly eight working hours for the first time in ages and dashed out into the garden, where I’d spotted a photo opportunity, while I’d been pacing up and down talking to a client earlier. I had my camera in my greasy mitt, kitted up with a macro lens, with a lensbaby and a starburst filter in my other hand. I was determined to grab myself a great shot of what I’d seen.

Somehow though, the shot eluded me…..that’s the way the cookie crumbles unfortunately. Sometimes, what my eye sees as an amazing shot just doesn’t work out on a photo. That’s what happened to me today.

This shot was a completely unplanned one. I was looking at the bark of a dead tree as a potential subject and pulled a chunk of it off. I got a big surprise to realise that it was infested with woodlice. When I was trying to photograph them, they were all dashing around looking for cracks and crevices to squish themselves in away from the light and predators.

Then things all started to go horribly wrong.

My precious camera, that has seen me through thick and thin, despite my total lack of respect for its undoubted fragility is dying. The review screen has ceased to function. This means I can’t look at pics in camera, but more importantly (because let’s face it, in the days of film I wouldn’t have been able to do that anyway) I can’t reset it or look at the menu or change anything that can’t be changed with the buttons and dials on camera. I cannot deny this is probably totally my fault because I have used and abused it every day for two years but I am distraught. I have taken many thousands of photos with it – sometimes hundreds in a day.

I have loved my camera to death – now it looks as though that is literal. I adore its features and the wonderful, provocative, authoritative ‘thunk’ of the mirror locking up as the shutter releases. I never realised how much I ached for that when I had my G3. It is truly a sexy event and one charged with excitement as you lose sight of your subject for a few moments while the shot is captured and then you get the static charge as you see the results of your labours.

The camera owes me nothing. I owe it a debt of gratitude that it’s hard to articulate. It revitalised my interest in photography, fired my imagination and captured my heart. I love my 10D. The love marks on it shine out with honour and pride.

David says I don’t deserve the 10D for two reasons – the first is my inability to look after it and the second is my inadequacy at handling a camera of its magnitude. I may not be able to get the best from every last corner of its ability but it sure has got the best of mine.

I can’t afford a 5D, even if I could, I could never justify spending the money when our home has to be our priority. I can’t even afford/justify a 30D.

UPDATE: DM has fiddled with it and managed to get it back….for now….. but who knows for how long. I need to wrap it in cotton wool. I need to pray to the great God of cameras in the sky and ask him to help it to hobble along for another year. I need to kiss it and stroke it and generally give it all of the tlc I can muster. Whimper, whimper, fret, fret, worry, worry. I wonder if spit will make it worse because I’ve just given it a hard snog? Sloppy kisses are my thing tonight but all for my 10D…..not for DM today. I LOVE my 10D with a passion….but the passion has been too ardent and too all-consuming. My sweet, sexy, wonderful love-machine is dying.

I can’t bear the thought of being without a camera…..and I KNOW DM won’t let me use his because he sees me as an abuser.

What will I do? How will I cope? I think it may be time to consider selling my body as well as my possessions and my soul (only joking Mum and anyway who’d ever consider buying it). FYI I have been selling my soul by the pound to the company I work for and the life I lead as a corporate whore for as long as I can remember and I have been selling my possessions recently to ease the financial burden of moving house. Walking in my shoes tonight signs off desperate, distraught and fearful.

An ambitious wannabe was stabbing me in the back last year