Everyone keeps telling me this year will be my golden year--the best year of my life--because I just turned 18 on the 18th. And in the week it's been since my "golden year" began, I already see what's so golden about it.
My free public schooling is over in June, I'll begin paying my way through my life come September. Things are changing. And I didn't realize until word reached me that Jason Mraz--my idol, my dream, my foundation for opinion--is engaged, that more than the price and atmosphere of school is changing; I can't expect things with Mraz to be the same, should the marriage actually last (which, in all honesty, I'm praying it will). How soon until he stops touring? How soon until he stops recording? How soon until he hangs up his guitar in retirement, only to take it down for the delight of his children? From what I know of the man, he'll forsake all he's built-up in fame to raise a couple of kids; he wants a family more than anything. I'm going to have to accept that change, I'm going to have to get used to the fact that someday relatively soon I won't be able to YouTube his new touring adventures or hear a new live track.
How ironic that the other, more closely related aspect of my life bid farewell to the old on the same day "she said yes" to Jason. I sat there Thursday evening watching the final performance of the final show at Rodger's Memorial Theatre. The next time I see a show it'll be in a new seat, staring at a new stage with new carpet and new acoustics and...
All the basic aspects of my life--everything I've ever known and believed on--are changing. And they all decided to change after my "golden" birthday.
Therefore, I have come to the conclusion that this golden year is not to be taken the way I'd initially hoped; thus far it is a precedent for change. It is to be a time for accepting all the change in my life; a time to take all I've known and all that has made me who I am, shift among them and keep the better parts, turning the rest into fond memories to share in a rocking chair by a dying fire.
I have to choose a new artist to serenade me with new music when Mraz stops for good, I have to familiarize myself with the drive to Centerpoint Legacy Theatre, and I have to decide if I want to drive my potential to Ceder City or bus it to Virginia. I need to embrace the beauty my golden year is providing, and truly play it for all it's worth.
I believe I'll be different after this year. I find myself looking not with sorrow on the empty theatre, engaged musician, and pathetic bank account; but with a note of adventure, and a thick icing of contentment keeping me together. I find I'm excited in a way I've never been to receive my diploma and leave; and, oddly, it was as if the only thing keeping me from falling into myself was my lenient arm on Mraz. And now that he's cut me free, I can take all this ground and build a mountain.
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Sunday, November 14, 2010
My Dream Role
I've never gotten to know a character as well as I did Mrs. Lottie Child in Gershwin's Crazy For You. I think that's why it hurt so much knowing I'd never return to her lines, I'd never return to her costumes, I'd never return to her voice and mannerisms. She was the first character I truly got to know, and the first (I believe) I 100 percent acted in place of.
I've always developed a character, but I've always thought about what would get a laugh, what would make the most sense. I never once thought "What would _____ do?" I never made my character a person. I only ever made a voice, made a laugh, and made a means by which they delivered their lines and stood while onstage.
Erin was showing me the various walks of all of her characters from the Bountiful High stage, and I remember thinking "Lottie doesn't have a walk."
Or so I thought. I believe because I put so much effort into finding Lottie, her walk just came about, and I shocked myself many a time as I walked backstage alone in one of her costumes, walking the walk I was sure I hadn't developed.
But it was her. It was Lottie.
I have a very fond place in my heart for her, though she, to some degree, is the villain of the show. She is definitely one character I have loved the most. And I believe all my thanks should go to Jerome Rockwood and his book.
Rockwood taught me what I already knew, but he put it in words that changed the message. He taught me to justify my actions, to have a purpose on stage. He taught me that you couldn't get on stage a "play an emotion", you had to have some inner reason for that emotion. In real life you don't just become angry. There is a reason, if you look deep enough, for your anger. You need that on stage.
He taught me not the play the cliches. He taught me to find original material, not to mimic what I'd seen done a thousand times.
And if I stole the show being Lottie, as people have told me I have stolen the show in the past, I stole it this time with sincere originality. I stole it with a firmly developed character, not my ability to think how certain things would work with the crowd.
Opening night was a thrill when I dug myself so deep into Lottie's character that when I tried to remember my first line prior to going onstage (a simple "Yes, Bobby?") I couldn't for the life of me remember any of my lines. But I knew myself well enough to know that they'd come, and it was interesting to realize I'd forgotten them because Lottie wouldn't have planned a whole conversation in her head. It would have just come out, perhaps more bluntly than required.
Several shows later I came onstage with too much Erica. And Lottie did something Erica thought was funny. And Erica laughed. On stage. I hated myself for it, but that just drove the spike deeper for me to have a fabulous closing night.
I'm not going to say closing night was the single greatest performance I ever gave, no. That title belongs to opening night, a performance I wholeheartedly agree would not have been even an ounce as good if it twere not for the interceding of a certain Higher Power. And I believe He did it then so I could see, for the first time, how to properly play Lottie, because in every rehearsal prior I had had her general mass, but I had to skeleton to contain it.
So I would like to bid goodbye to Lottie. I would like to say farewell to the part that gave me all I need to act on stage. I would like to deeply thank the heartless woman who brought my talent meaning, and I'd like to thank my God for giving me the chance.
I've always developed a character, but I've always thought about what would get a laugh, what would make the most sense. I never once thought "What would _____ do?" I never made my character a person. I only ever made a voice, made a laugh, and made a means by which they delivered their lines and stood while onstage.
Erin was showing me the various walks of all of her characters from the Bountiful High stage, and I remember thinking "Lottie doesn't have a walk."
Or so I thought. I believe because I put so much effort into finding Lottie, her walk just came about, and I shocked myself many a time as I walked backstage alone in one of her costumes, walking the walk I was sure I hadn't developed.
But it was her. It was Lottie.
I have a very fond place in my heart for her, though she, to some degree, is the villain of the show. She is definitely one character I have loved the most. And I believe all my thanks should go to Jerome Rockwood and his book.
Rockwood taught me what I already knew, but he put it in words that changed the message. He taught me to justify my actions, to have a purpose on stage. He taught me that you couldn't get on stage a "play an emotion", you had to have some inner reason for that emotion. In real life you don't just become angry. There is a reason, if you look deep enough, for your anger. You need that on stage.
He taught me not the play the cliches. He taught me to find original material, not to mimic what I'd seen done a thousand times.
And if I stole the show being Lottie, as people have told me I have stolen the show in the past, I stole it this time with sincere originality. I stole it with a firmly developed character, not my ability to think how certain things would work with the crowd.
Opening night was a thrill when I dug myself so deep into Lottie's character that when I tried to remember my first line prior to going onstage (a simple "Yes, Bobby?") I couldn't for the life of me remember any of my lines. But I knew myself well enough to know that they'd come, and it was interesting to realize I'd forgotten them because Lottie wouldn't have planned a whole conversation in her head. It would have just come out, perhaps more bluntly than required.
Several shows later I came onstage with too much Erica. And Lottie did something Erica thought was funny. And Erica laughed. On stage. I hated myself for it, but that just drove the spike deeper for me to have a fabulous closing night.
I'm not going to say closing night was the single greatest performance I ever gave, no. That title belongs to opening night, a performance I wholeheartedly agree would not have been even an ounce as good if it twere not for the interceding of a certain Higher Power. And I believe He did it then so I could see, for the first time, how to properly play Lottie, because in every rehearsal prior I had had her general mass, but I had to skeleton to contain it.
So I would like to bid goodbye to Lottie. I would like to say farewell to the part that gave me all I need to act on stage. I would like to deeply thank the heartless woman who brought my talent meaning, and I'd like to thank my God for giving me the chance.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Lou Lou Letdown
I started this week at the top of the endless staircase in Super Mario 64. I tripped, I rolled, I bashed my head against the wall a few times, and I landed, spread-eagle, in a pool of blood and bitter tears. Who would have thought a week with only three school days could hurt my heart and tear ducts so much?
Forgive me if I'm not too eloquent, I just don't have the energy this evening.
It started Wednesday in AP Lit. We were getting back our timed writings from the time before, and yours truly--having received a 6 on the past two--was rather looking forward to this new score for the fridge. And, reminiscent perhaps of the monologue from A Chorus Line I used to audition for Musical two years ago, they gave me a 3.
I blinked back childish tears and wished in vain for Mrs. Drake to stop hissing her T's about the essay. I wanted to wad it up and leave the room. I couldn't stand something I'm so good at, something I'm so proud of, ending so wretchedly.
By the end of that day I was in Musical, a wondrous place of happy forgetfulness that normally makes me wish my life was on stage and only onstage, because life their is so much more fulfilling to me. But I stood on stage for my longest scene of the three I'm in, and my character wouldn't come. I couldn't even locate her voice enough to fake it. I felt myself shut down and began rambling off my lines so I stop embarrassing myself, get off stage, and rub myself raw in search of my hiding character. I exited not even delivering my final line, ready to go pout in the back of the room, when Angela beckoned me over.
"You need to make that bigger. Even that last line. Make it big. There are no small parts."
And it slipped through me like poison. I felt the sludge of my worthlessness; that I'd preformed so shoddily was one thing, but that Angela had to confront me about it, telling me to fix it, perhaps even entertaining the fancy that this was how I intended to play that part, was death to my heart in and of itself.
I have something I commonly refer to as "The Guilt", which results from my do-gooder nature in wrong-doer circumstances. I tend to dwell on the instant that brought "The Guilt" and replay how it should have gone over and over again until the wound has heeled, I've forgiven myself, and "The Guilt" has subsided. The average case lasts about two months, depending on the severity of the mistake, and how often my daily life reminds me of it.
I explained to Angela that I intended to do the part big and bold, but I could not find my character in that instance. I stood and began walking away from her, promising fervently it would be better next time, tears biting my pathetic eyes.
And today. Today was fine. Today was, actually, stupendous, until I came home in an elated manner to happily hug my mother who wouldn't hug me back. She told me she was disappointed I had done what a cousin of mine usually is scoffed at for. Then they proceeded to tell me how much I really should have stayed at my aunts wedding. How much fun my cousins had dancing, and how much fun I would have had with them. How we never see Sydney and it would have been a good idea to stay, if not for my newly wedded aunt, but for my Floridian cousin. How no one left the reception until after ten thirty, and how when it comes to family, things like that should be considered over meager friends surprise parties.
I went through half a box of tissues, sitting there in a ball on the couch, already replaying over and over images contrived from my imagination of me and my dear cousins hopping about the dim lit ballroom. I saw the DJ in the corner, I saw my aunt in her wedding dress, but as I blew my nose and whipped my eyes "The Guilt" slowly subsided. I kept the biting pain in the back of my conscience, the knowledge that, though my subconscious attitude had been "I'll stay longer at the next one", there would be no "next one" no one that close to me would get married with those same guests their and have that same dance party.
But the wound was scabbing over and I gave my father a hug before turning into a tear-free bed.
"And I could have had a daddy-daughter dance with you." He said.
I am a wretched being! I am the worst scum to have ever cursed this planet. I... I cry for nothing because it is all my fault. I cry for nothing because it was my selfish, worldly decision to go. Did I have fun with my friends? Yes, I made memories I won't soon replace.
But did I miss a reason to smile at the yearly Christmas Eve gathering, the Easter shindig, my own future wedding?!
Yes. I'm afraid I terribly did.
And "The Guilt" has me believing no amount of somber repentance will meand the wholes in the hearts I've ripped. If only I'd consider the after affect to my actions before my actions!
Forgive me if I'm not too eloquent, I just don't have the energy this evening.
It started Wednesday in AP Lit. We were getting back our timed writings from the time before, and yours truly--having received a 6 on the past two--was rather looking forward to this new score for the fridge. And, reminiscent perhaps of the monologue from A Chorus Line I used to audition for Musical two years ago, they gave me a 3.
I blinked back childish tears and wished in vain for Mrs. Drake to stop hissing her T's about the essay. I wanted to wad it up and leave the room. I couldn't stand something I'm so good at, something I'm so proud of, ending so wretchedly.
By the end of that day I was in Musical, a wondrous place of happy forgetfulness that normally makes me wish my life was on stage and only onstage, because life their is so much more fulfilling to me. But I stood on stage for my longest scene of the three I'm in, and my character wouldn't come. I couldn't even locate her voice enough to fake it. I felt myself shut down and began rambling off my lines so I stop embarrassing myself, get off stage, and rub myself raw in search of my hiding character. I exited not even delivering my final line, ready to go pout in the back of the room, when Angela beckoned me over.
"You need to make that bigger. Even that last line. Make it big. There are no small parts."
And it slipped through me like poison. I felt the sludge of my worthlessness; that I'd preformed so shoddily was one thing, but that Angela had to confront me about it, telling me to fix it, perhaps even entertaining the fancy that this was how I intended to play that part, was death to my heart in and of itself.
I have something I commonly refer to as "The Guilt", which results from my do-gooder nature in wrong-doer circumstances. I tend to dwell on the instant that brought "The Guilt" and replay how it should have gone over and over again until the wound has heeled, I've forgiven myself, and "The Guilt" has subsided. The average case lasts about two months, depending on the severity of the mistake, and how often my daily life reminds me of it.
I explained to Angela that I intended to do the part big and bold, but I could not find my character in that instance. I stood and began walking away from her, promising fervently it would be better next time, tears biting my pathetic eyes.
And today. Today was fine. Today was, actually, stupendous, until I came home in an elated manner to happily hug my mother who wouldn't hug me back. She told me she was disappointed I had done what a cousin of mine usually is scoffed at for. Then they proceeded to tell me how much I really should have stayed at my aunts wedding. How much fun my cousins had dancing, and how much fun I would have had with them. How we never see Sydney and it would have been a good idea to stay, if not for my newly wedded aunt, but for my Floridian cousin. How no one left the reception until after ten thirty, and how when it comes to family, things like that should be considered over meager friends surprise parties.
I went through half a box of tissues, sitting there in a ball on the couch, already replaying over and over images contrived from my imagination of me and my dear cousins hopping about the dim lit ballroom. I saw the DJ in the corner, I saw my aunt in her wedding dress, but as I blew my nose and whipped my eyes "The Guilt" slowly subsided. I kept the biting pain in the back of my conscience, the knowledge that, though my subconscious attitude had been "I'll stay longer at the next one", there would be no "next one" no one that close to me would get married with those same guests their and have that same dance party.
But the wound was scabbing over and I gave my father a hug before turning into a tear-free bed.
"And I could have had a daddy-daughter dance with you." He said.
I am a wretched being! I am the worst scum to have ever cursed this planet. I... I cry for nothing because it is all my fault. I cry for nothing because it was my selfish, worldly decision to go. Did I have fun with my friends? Yes, I made memories I won't soon replace.
But did I miss a reason to smile at the yearly Christmas Eve gathering, the Easter shindig, my own future wedding?!
Yes. I'm afraid I terribly did.
And "The Guilt" has me believing no amount of somber repentance will meand the wholes in the hearts I've ripped. If only I'd consider the after affect to my actions before my actions!
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
The Audience We Captivate is Already Ours
Ugh. Senior projects.
As they'd say in the 80's- "gag me with a spoon."
But... label me crazy, I'm not annoyed by this ridiculous, school wide joke. Yes, at first I begrudgingly bemoaned with the rest of my classmates, probably solely because my classmates were groaning first. But as last year's seniors were putting on their projects it just came to me. I knew what I was going to do my report on. I knew who I'd interview, how I'd contact him. Heck, I even figured out how to do my service hours. So while my fellow graduating class is rolling their eyes and looking for spoons, I'm grinning and saying "Let's do this."
The moment I asked Eric if I could interview him, outside his local theatre OBT (Off Broadway Theatre), having just joined his improv group onstage for an audience participation game where he said in front of Bountifillians and Salt Lakians alike that we go way back, Eric asked me why.
I told him he was a director, and that's the career I'm going to research.
You want to know what he said? (Forgive me, those who will be reading my senior project paper, though I doubt you're following this lowly blog, I will most likely use this exact scenario in my project as well.)
"Well yeah. But not really. I do everything. Stage craft, tech, playwright, actor... You name it I do it."
I admit, at the time, I was mildly dumbfounded. He'd cut me off my course. He'd almost made it seem like what I was asking him was completely pointless.
Thankfully I persisted.
I've been spending every Tuesday afternoon for the past month or so now "helping" with the acting classes (taught by Eric) at Rodger's Memorial Theatre. The first two weeks I felt like a complete waste of space. For two hours a week I sat and pushed play on the CD player approximately two times per Tuesday. I also spotted lines for missing people.
But, never fear, Eric scourged up some things for me to do the next week. Boy did I feel productive writing down what songs were what track on the CD.
But the next week, it's safe to say, changed my life. Literally.
Eric left the room for a moment, and I snappishly made the rowdy kids get back to rehearsing, saying that "Just because Eric's out of the room doesn't mean rehearsals over." I'm sorry to say that I believe the minorly bratty tone I subconsciously used that day has affected the way those kids see me. So the twenty of twenty-five that don't know me from previous shows seem to think I'm some bipolar lose cannon. Sigh.
I expected to keep them on track for five to ten minutes, then Eric would stride into the room and say in his booming, actor's voice, to run that scene from the top.
Well, five minutes turned to ten, and ten to fifteen, and it dawned on me that I was the teacher. That I was the one holding the reigns of this rehearsal.
I moved my way to the front of the room, pillaged script in hand, and began conducting rehearsal with a knowing air--though I've never attempted to instruct someone how to act in my life. Not saying that the need hasn't been exceptionally over-powering in some instances, but all in all I've never let my acting experience escape my own head.
By the time I'd settled into that strange position Eric strode through the room.
"Great going, guys!"
And he was gone.
Minutes later he'd pass by again.
"Thanks." He'd pat me on the knee as he briskly left the room.
And I truly don't know what it was. I really don't know why that day was so substantially different than every other day I'd "helped" there, or from any other acting class/rehearsal I've attended. But I left that place knowing that this is really what I want to do. It's always been a "Yeah. Uh huh. I'll get a teaching degree in theatre in college and see if I ever end up actually using it." "Yeah. Uh huh. Teaching theatre could be fun."
And today, just a few hours ago, I was sitting by myself in the dark, eye-straining tech booth running the sound and actually touching a sound board; writing notes on things the kids should fix or pay better attention to. I've been saying that, today, I was "Livin' the dream," doing what I've seen so many directors do for me, but finally being on the other side of it.
And while performing is phenomenal, there's something about being behind it that lifts me all the more. I know this is what I should be. I know this is what I should do.
How great it feels to know that yes, this will be my future. How great it is to dream of me and that future husband of mine setting up our own little theatre in some Podunk, artless town. How great it is to have a dream, an ambition. A goal. I never realized how terribly I was lacking one.
But I have it now. And it's all thanks to senior projects.
As they'd say in the 80's- "gag me with a spoon."
But... label me crazy, I'm not annoyed by this ridiculous, school wide joke. Yes, at first I begrudgingly bemoaned with the rest of my classmates, probably solely because my classmates were groaning first. But as last year's seniors were putting on their projects it just came to me. I knew what I was going to do my report on. I knew who I'd interview, how I'd contact him. Heck, I even figured out how to do my service hours. So while my fellow graduating class is rolling their eyes and looking for spoons, I'm grinning and saying "Let's do this."
The moment I asked Eric if I could interview him, outside his local theatre OBT (Off Broadway Theatre), having just joined his improv group onstage for an audience participation game where he said in front of Bountifillians and Salt Lakians alike that we go way back, Eric asked me why.
I told him he was a director, and that's the career I'm going to research.
You want to know what he said? (Forgive me, those who will be reading my senior project paper, though I doubt you're following this lowly blog, I will most likely use this exact scenario in my project as well.)
"Well yeah. But not really. I do everything. Stage craft, tech, playwright, actor... You name it I do it."
I admit, at the time, I was mildly dumbfounded. He'd cut me off my course. He'd almost made it seem like what I was asking him was completely pointless.
Thankfully I persisted.
I've been spending every Tuesday afternoon for the past month or so now "helping" with the acting classes (taught by Eric) at Rodger's Memorial Theatre. The first two weeks I felt like a complete waste of space. For two hours a week I sat and pushed play on the CD player approximately two times per Tuesday. I also spotted lines for missing people.
But, never fear, Eric scourged up some things for me to do the next week. Boy did I feel productive writing down what songs were what track on the CD.
But the next week, it's safe to say, changed my life. Literally.
Eric left the room for a moment, and I snappishly made the rowdy kids get back to rehearsing, saying that "Just because Eric's out of the room doesn't mean rehearsals over." I'm sorry to say that I believe the minorly bratty tone I subconsciously used that day has affected the way those kids see me. So the twenty of twenty-five that don't know me from previous shows seem to think I'm some bipolar lose cannon. Sigh.
I expected to keep them on track for five to ten minutes, then Eric would stride into the room and say in his booming, actor's voice, to run that scene from the top.
Well, five minutes turned to ten, and ten to fifteen, and it dawned on me that I was the teacher. That I was the one holding the reigns of this rehearsal.
I moved my way to the front of the room, pillaged script in hand, and began conducting rehearsal with a knowing air--though I've never attempted to instruct someone how to act in my life. Not saying that the need hasn't been exceptionally over-powering in some instances, but all in all I've never let my acting experience escape my own head.
By the time I'd settled into that strange position Eric strode through the room.
"Great going, guys!"
And he was gone.
Minutes later he'd pass by again.
"Thanks." He'd pat me on the knee as he briskly left the room.
And I truly don't know what it was. I really don't know why that day was so substantially different than every other day I'd "helped" there, or from any other acting class/rehearsal I've attended. But I left that place knowing that this is really what I want to do. It's always been a "Yeah. Uh huh. I'll get a teaching degree in theatre in college and see if I ever end up actually using it." "Yeah. Uh huh. Teaching theatre could be fun."
And today, just a few hours ago, I was sitting by myself in the dark, eye-straining tech booth running the sound and actually touching a sound board; writing notes on things the kids should fix or pay better attention to. I've been saying that, today, I was "Livin' the dream," doing what I've seen so many directors do for me, but finally being on the other side of it.
And while performing is phenomenal, there's something about being behind it that lifts me all the more. I know this is what I should be. I know this is what I should do.
How great it feels to know that yes, this will be my future. How great it is to dream of me and that future husband of mine setting up our own little theatre in some Podunk, artless town. How great it is to have a dream, an ambition. A goal. I never realized how terribly I was lacking one.
But I have it now. And it's all thanks to senior projects.
Friday, July 9, 2010
I Wish the Real World Would Just Stop Hassling Me
My dad's retired. He likes to sit in his lazy boy and watch discussions on politics because, frankly, he believes every day is taking us one step closer to the second coming.
They said something and my mom started freaking out.
"It's coming." Dad said. I regretted not listening. Those shows are on so often I tend to force them into background sound that rarely reaches me. At least when I'm preoccupied.
"What does that mean?" I asked, referring to the statement I'd missed.
"It means our standard of living is going to go down."
It's the age old cliche, "Life's not fair." I know I should understand this, having heard it on every sitcom I've ever viewed, but I can't help but be indignant. Soon I'll be a high school graduate. Soon I'll be off to college, off to the real world. I can see me entering a career, I can see me trying to start a family. I can see me trying to give my children all they deserve. I can see me trying to give me all I deserve. And it's not fair. Why I can't have the America I had when I was a kid, day-dreaming of growing up to become a veterinarian or a doctor? Why can't I have the America my parents had when they brought me into this world? Why can't I have the America they wrote of in the Constitution? Why has Karma picked my generation for its dumping ground?
A girl I work with once told me how her mom would always let them go visit relatives out of state when they were younger. She said it was because her mother wanted them to know what the real world was like. To quote her exactly, she said it was because "Utah is some protective bubble." She didn't want her children to grow up naive and in the dark.
Perhaps when Brigham Young said this was the place, he didn't mean it for the pioneers with their covered wagons. Perhaps he meant it for me, for you, for anyone who wants that America we grew up proud of. Perhaps this was the place to establish a protective bubble from the real world.
Because perhaps the real world would get rather terrible.
Perhaps the real world is rather terrible.
But what do I know? I'm a gullible resident of the bubble who doesn't even listen to transmissions from the real world.
They said something and my mom started freaking out.
"It's coming." Dad said. I regretted not listening. Those shows are on so often I tend to force them into background sound that rarely reaches me. At least when I'm preoccupied.
"What does that mean?" I asked, referring to the statement I'd missed.
"It means our standard of living is going to go down."
It's the age old cliche, "Life's not fair." I know I should understand this, having heard it on every sitcom I've ever viewed, but I can't help but be indignant. Soon I'll be a high school graduate. Soon I'll be off to college, off to the real world. I can see me entering a career, I can see me trying to start a family. I can see me trying to give my children all they deserve. I can see me trying to give me all I deserve. And it's not fair. Why I can't have the America I had when I was a kid, day-dreaming of growing up to become a veterinarian or a doctor? Why can't I have the America my parents had when they brought me into this world? Why can't I have the America they wrote of in the Constitution? Why has Karma picked my generation for its dumping ground?
A girl I work with once told me how her mom would always let them go visit relatives out of state when they were younger. She said it was because her mother wanted them to know what the real world was like. To quote her exactly, she said it was because "Utah is some protective bubble." She didn't want her children to grow up naive and in the dark.
Perhaps when Brigham Young said this was the place, he didn't mean it for the pioneers with their covered wagons. Perhaps he meant it for me, for you, for anyone who wants that America we grew up proud of. Perhaps this was the place to establish a protective bubble from the real world.
Because perhaps the real world would get rather terrible.
Perhaps the real world is rather terrible.
But what do I know? I'm a gullible resident of the bubble who doesn't even listen to transmissions from the real world.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Horses Bred With Star Laced Wings
I've had a lot of strange dreams lately. But the most common of all my dreams are the ones that show what you don't want to see. The ones that keep taking you by the hand and saying, "Dear. You still want this. Dear, you're not done yet."
Last night an old crush and I were talking. In my dream. And according to this dream the part of him being an "old" crush is utterly, wholeheartedly untrue. According to this dream, and my wiser subconscious, he's a current crush, a current love, dare I say. And we were talking.
And it felt so good, after chasing him down in my dreams for weeks, after seeing his image in my dreams for weeks, it felt so good to talk it away; to say my opinion, to hear him say his; to see through his eyes while he saw through mine. It felt so good to make it alright.
Perhaps this was spurred by the book I'm currently reading, Impossible (by Nancy Werlin), and the passage last night where Lucy had to confirm that Zach would stay her friend, that Zach would always be her friend.
Then I dreamed me and this crush were talking, like friends, and we even said that we both wanted to be friends, in spite of how I felt for him in the past (though, of course, my dream made me remember it's a current "feel" not a "felt", little does he know). And it just felt so good.
I love those kind of dreams, though I hate that they make me see the truth of who I am and what I'm dealing with. But I love the dreams that lock me so deeply in dreamland that I want to stay. I want to try to sleep till four in the afternoon with a full bladder because the dream is so...
Is so...
Is so much better.
I once heard someone say that they'd heard dreams were our reality, and, as Jason Mraz puts it, "this life is but a dream." (song: Live High). I told them jokingly back,
"I hope so, because the Dream Me has met Jason Mraz at least six times."
But what I tell myself is,
"I hope so, because things are so much simpler, so much prettier there."
In dreams I can be myself, perhaps that's because I create the world I dream I'm in. I wish I could speak to my subconscious, she's much brighter than I'll ever be.
But it's nice to know she'll keep speaking to me. She'll keep sending me dreams.
Whether I like the message or not.
Last night an old crush and I were talking. In my dream. And according to this dream the part of him being an "old" crush is utterly, wholeheartedly untrue. According to this dream, and my wiser subconscious, he's a current crush, a current love, dare I say. And we were talking.
And it felt so good, after chasing him down in my dreams for weeks, after seeing his image in my dreams for weeks, it felt so good to talk it away; to say my opinion, to hear him say his; to see through his eyes while he saw through mine. It felt so good to make it alright.
Perhaps this was spurred by the book I'm currently reading, Impossible (by Nancy Werlin), and the passage last night where Lucy had to confirm that Zach would stay her friend, that Zach would always be her friend.
Then I dreamed me and this crush were talking, like friends, and we even said that we both wanted to be friends, in spite of how I felt for him in the past (though, of course, my dream made me remember it's a current "feel" not a "felt", little does he know). And it just felt so good.
I love those kind of dreams, though I hate that they make me see the truth of who I am and what I'm dealing with. But I love the dreams that lock me so deeply in dreamland that I want to stay. I want to try to sleep till four in the afternoon with a full bladder because the dream is so...
Is so...
Is so much better.
I once heard someone say that they'd heard dreams were our reality, and, as Jason Mraz puts it, "this life is but a dream." (song: Live High). I told them jokingly back,
"I hope so, because the Dream Me has met Jason Mraz at least six times."
But what I tell myself is,
"I hope so, because things are so much simpler, so much prettier there."
In dreams I can be myself, perhaps that's because I create the world I dream I'm in. I wish I could speak to my subconscious, she's much brighter than I'll ever be.
But it's nice to know she'll keep speaking to me. She'll keep sending me dreams.
Whether I like the message or not.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Whenever We Pretend It's Summer
Well folks, it's that time of year again: Summer. It didn't really hit me until today as I sat in Lizz's car and grumbled to myself about the patch of sun burning my right arm into oblivion. And as I drove home from school with my Daphne Willis CD at the questionable volume 12, I found I have hope for this summer. It's almost like the fact that I'm being "rushed" into this summer vacation, due to the fact of bizarre wintertime weather, will somehow allow me to channel the adrenaline that usually accompanies summer breaks into productive somethings. Usually I burn out said adrenaline by the last day of school, and the "dog days" of summer become nothing more than that.
But I have the motivation this year. I pretty much have to. I mean, after all, this is the last summer.
What shall I accomplish on this my final summer of careless freedom? So glad you inquired. Here is my list. My "Bucket List", if you will:
But I have the motivation this year. I pretty much have to. I mean, after all, this is the last summer.
What shall I accomplish on this my final summer of careless freedom? So glad you inquired. Here is my list. My "Bucket List", if you will:
- wake up at no later than 9:00 am each day (so I actually have some "summer days" instead of just those "summer nights" (kudos if you caught the musical pun))
- establish a habit of practicing piano and voice lessons nearly everyday
- read all the books on my bookshelf that haven't been read (I'm thinking of starting with "A Summer to Die". I don't know why. It just somehow seems relevant.)
- finally write that soon-to-be best selling novel (Cris Wooding published his first book at age 19. I gotta beat him.)
- get a smokin' tan
- get a smokin' bod
- get a smokin' man (hey, that inadvertently rhymed)
- read the Book of Mormon (We started yesterday as a Young Womens. So far I'm behind.)
- finish all, if not most, of my Personal Progress (yes, I am indeed a procrastinator)
- fix that horrible dent en mi coche (translation: fix that horrible dent in my car)
- compose accompaniment for one of my songs (I secretly want to try Battle of the Bands next year. And when that doesn't work at least I'll have something for Choir Semester Projects.)
- hit the gym with Erin. Maybe Lexi too (this kinda goes hand in hand with "get a smokin' bod")
- watch a movie with Lexi every Tuesday night (so far on the list: Muppets in Space, Back to the Future, Oliver and Company...)
- beat Zombies Vs. Plants (must... hear... tricycle song... *twitch*)
- figure out who's on my top five Hottest Celebrities (so far on the list: Jason Mraz, the young Michael J. Fox, and that dude that plays Steve in All About Steve)
- create a computer virus
Okay, that last one's total BS, but I felt I had to end it nicely somehow. And to me, "nice" can only be achieved by a homemade gift. Such as a computer virus.
Well, that is all I have to say here. I wanted to leave you a video of the Daphne Willis hit that has, for the time being, become my Summer Anthem. But, alas, that's the trouble with fresh, unheard artists. Their youtube video base is severely lacking.
Sometimes I forget how lucky I am that there are pathetic fans who video my singer of choice.
Mraz stalkers, Unite!
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Here, Have Some Stress
"Ow." I thought as I tripped over the sprinkler head that dark, Fourth of July evening, landing to my knees on the sidewalk.
"You alright?" Grandma asked as I stood and brushed myself off.
"Yeah." I said, running back into Aunt Janet's house. I'd needed the bathroom, not a face plant.
I was washing my hands when I looked down at my legs. Low and behold, there was a circle of raw skin, signifying the classic scraped knee. I was surprised to see it there; I felt totally fine, it didn't even hurt.
Immediately I was struck with intense pain.
Fast forward nine years.
"Hey girl," Ashley said, walking around my car after lunch. "What happened to your car?"
"What?" I asked, shocked, expecting some scratch mark from Hades.
I rounded my back bumper.
No worries, there's no scratch.
I couldn't believe myself. The only time I could figure this happening was the day before.
I'd been driving around for a day without noticing my baby was hurt.
I've always considered the MrazMobile as an extension of my arm. Its name suggests it's a boy, but I'm so in tune with it it just has to be a girl. I can't make up my mind, so I only ever call it by its name: MrazMobile.
I could not believe I hadn't seen, I hadn't felt that epic dent. I couldn't believe a part of me could be injured so terribly and not have demanded I know so. How could I have been so dumb? How could I not have walked around my car, at least once that day? Why didn't I move my car at lunch, or even after school?
I'm so protective of it, you think I would have at least scoped it out once I got outside. But I didn't. I left it in harms way and out of my mind until someone pointed it out.
And like the Fourth of July, somethings just don't hurt until we see them. And once they're noticed, they absolutely kill.
"You alright?" Grandma asked as I stood and brushed myself off.
"Yeah." I said, running back into Aunt Janet's house. I'd needed the bathroom, not a face plant.
I was washing my hands when I looked down at my legs. Low and behold, there was a circle of raw skin, signifying the classic scraped knee. I was surprised to see it there; I felt totally fine, it didn't even hurt.
Immediately I was struck with intense pain.
Fast forward nine years.
"Hey girl," Ashley said, walking around my car after lunch. "What happened to your car?"
"What?" I asked, shocked, expecting some scratch mark from Hades.
I rounded my back bumper.
No worries, there's no scratch.
I couldn't believe myself. The only time I could figure this happening was the day before.
I'd been driving around for a day without noticing my baby was hurt.
I've always considered the MrazMobile as an extension of my arm. Its name suggests it's a boy, but I'm so in tune with it it just has to be a girl. I can't make up my mind, so I only ever call it by its name: MrazMobile.
I could not believe I hadn't seen, I hadn't felt that epic dent. I couldn't believe a part of me could be injured so terribly and not have demanded I know so. How could I have been so dumb? How could I not have walked around my car, at least once that day? Why didn't I move my car at lunch, or even after school?
I'm so protective of it, you think I would have at least scoped it out once I got outside. But I didn't. I left it in harms way and out of my mind until someone pointed it out.
And like the Fourth of July, somethings just don't hurt until we see them. And once they're noticed, they absolutely kill.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
See me through his eyes
Perfect is in the perspective.
I used to be happy I was me, because then I didn't have to look at myself everyday.
I was imperfect.
I used to clam up and look awkwardly away near those random faces in my classes, because I didn't feel adult enough to actually speak.
My words were imperfect.
I used to sit and wonder why I wasn't thin like them because, let's face it, I wasn't thin like them.
My body was imperfect.
But now there's people saying
"You're just gorgeous"
"You're so cute"
"You're so funny"
"You're so thin"
"You have the perfect body"
The perfect body?
That's something that has escaped me since elementary...the perfect body... Me? Perfect? Me? Thin?
We got to talking Sunday in church about ura and omote, which are (if I'm remembering correctly) Japanese philosophical terms which simply mean "the internal view of self" (ura), and "the outside world or the way it's viewed" (omote). And out teacher asked,
"Which is more real?"
And the boy next to me responded, "Most people would say it's omote, but I disagree. The ura changes the omote."
We see the world in a different light. Each of us. Why? Because we each have our own ura, our own view of ourselves, and our view of selves affects our view of the world.
So why can they call me perfect and thin? Why can they tell me what I am sure I am not?
Their ura is not mine. Their omote is not mine.
Perfect is in the perspective.
Perhaps we should just change ours.
I used to be happy I was me, because then I didn't have to look at myself everyday.
I was imperfect.
I used to clam up and look awkwardly away near those random faces in my classes, because I didn't feel adult enough to actually speak.
My words were imperfect.
I used to sit and wonder why I wasn't thin like them because, let's face it, I wasn't thin like them.
My body was imperfect.
But now there's people saying
"You're just gorgeous"
"You're so cute"
"You're so funny"
"You're so thin"
"You have the perfect body"
The perfect body?
That's something that has escaped me since elementary...the perfect body... Me? Perfect? Me? Thin?
We got to talking Sunday in church about ura and omote, which are (if I'm remembering correctly) Japanese philosophical terms which simply mean "the internal view of self" (ura), and "the outside world or the way it's viewed" (omote). And out teacher asked,
"Which is more real?"
And the boy next to me responded, "Most people would say it's omote, but I disagree. The ura changes the omote."
We see the world in a different light. Each of us. Why? Because we each have our own ura, our own view of ourselves, and our view of selves affects our view of the world.
So why can they call me perfect and thin? Why can they tell me what I am sure I am not?
Their ura is not mine. Their omote is not mine.
Perfect is in the perspective.
Perhaps we should just change ours.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Better
I should have learned to never look up Jason Mraz youtube videos. Because this is one song I'll be singing for the next year and, as you may or may not be able to tell based on Jason's scrawny figure, over-sized clothes, and baseball hat, that this song will not be appearing on the next album.
Not even the next live album.
It's only getting better...
Books... Are so perfect. Even the books based on "Unfortunate Events" are perfect. Sometimes I look out the window at the summer green leaves on that tree and listen to this man sing and I ponder. If I was a book, what would be perfect that isn't right now? What would be "better"?
Is it a lack of motivation on my part? If I was flooring it, pedal to the metal, would I not have to sit and wonder? Would I know? Not saying I'm not satisfied with my life, no no. But on days like today: warm, sunny days with summer calling and Mraz singing... I get thinking. Jason Mraz followed some invisible drive inside him, something that kept pushing/pulling him on, and he found his way, scrawny and clad in over-sized clothes, to play his heart strings in Java Joe's, and from there the world. He found that perfect place common in books.
He found his "better".
And when I hear him sing on days like this, in moments like this, I feel like I'm tasting my "better". That feeling in my heart, in my soul even, is testament to that "better" that's waiting out there for me. I can feel fate at my door, but I'm unable to answer it yet. I know it's there, when Mraz sings I can feel it, but I can't come yet. I can't get "better" yet.
But I know it gets better. It only gets better.
I just don't know when or where my "better"'s coming.
It's just there. Waiting.
Well, I'm waiting for it too.
Maybe it's better this way.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Free Falling
I love snowglobes. I love to run my hands over the glass, to feel the cool smoothness of perfection. I love to peer at the innocent scene inside, that perfect little world, that little piece of happy. I love to gingerly pick it up and turn it over, every nerve on end praying I don't loose my grip. I love to quickly set it right, before my luck runs out and I drop it. I love to watch the snow fall, wondering what it's made of, and what it would feel like outside its watered dome.
I have my own snowglobe. I don't touch it much. The ciaos of snow is nice, but it's not worth the risk of shattering the glass. I keep it on my shelf. It's surrounded by other happy nik-knacks and random sentimental pictures. I keep it safe and upright. I keep it from falling.
She has a snowglobe too. I suppose if she could she'd glue it down; though, knowing her, she might shake it often, just for the reaction: just to watch the snow fall down. She likes ciaos. Or, this is possibly more accurate, she likes to pretend there's ciaos. She likes the brief fall of snow, and the instant peace and true calm that comes as it settles. Yes, she likes to shake the globe, she likes to make it snow; but she'd never drop it. Never.
But she doesn't work her own snowglobe. Its shelf isn't in her room. It's called her globe but it's not hers to shake.
And it's not hers to drop.
She stood there for a moment, watching them turn the globe on it's back, watching the snow start to fall. The plastic snow didn't make her smile. The stormy ciaos didn't bring thrill. They've done this before, many a time before, and though she'd shake the globe herself, the vision of them doing so is nauseating, not invigorating.
She watched them plunge her perfect world in snow.
And, in an unspoken agreement, they slowly relaxed their fingers.
It fell slowly to the ground, a moment where things truly stop and go in slow-motion. A moment where, if you were conscious enough, you could reach out and stop it from happening. But you never realize you could have caught it until it's already hit and time is regular once more.
She watched it fall.
She watched perfection break, perfection shatter, perfection flow in a microscopic river.
She saw her globe in pieces, her happiness broken on the floor.
And nothing is ever as captivating when mended with tape.
I have my own snowglobe. I don't touch it much. The ciaos of snow is nice, but it's not worth the risk of shattering the glass. I keep it on my shelf. It's surrounded by other happy nik-knacks and random sentimental pictures. I keep it safe and upright. I keep it from falling.
She has a snowglobe too. I suppose if she could she'd glue it down; though, knowing her, she might shake it often, just for the reaction: just to watch the snow fall down. She likes ciaos. Or, this is possibly more accurate, she likes to pretend there's ciaos. She likes the brief fall of snow, and the instant peace and true calm that comes as it settles. Yes, she likes to shake the globe, she likes to make it snow; but she'd never drop it. Never.
But she doesn't work her own snowglobe. Its shelf isn't in her room. It's called her globe but it's not hers to shake.
And it's not hers to drop.
She stood there for a moment, watching them turn the globe on it's back, watching the snow start to fall. The plastic snow didn't make her smile. The stormy ciaos didn't bring thrill. They've done this before, many a time before, and though she'd shake the globe herself, the vision of them doing so is nauseating, not invigorating.
She watched them plunge her perfect world in snow.
And, in an unspoken agreement, they slowly relaxed their fingers.
It fell slowly to the ground, a moment where things truly stop and go in slow-motion. A moment where, if you were conscious enough, you could reach out and stop it from happening. But you never realize you could have caught it until it's already hit and time is regular once more.
She watched it fall.
She watched perfection break, perfection shatter, perfection flow in a microscopic river.
She saw her globe in pieces, her happiness broken on the floor.
And nothing is ever as captivating when mended with tape.
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Hold Your Own
Have you ever had a hangnail? On your thumb, ring finger, wherever. And in an attempt to free yourself from the annoyance of free, flailing skin, you made the horrible mistake of ripping it off? But, of course, hangnail's aren't like blades of grass you pull with ease from the dirt. I mean, sure, you can get lucky occasionally, but for the most part they rip much deeper into the skin. And they hurt.
Have you ever had an open sore from a hangnail? On your thumb, ring finger, wherever. And in an attempt to free yourself from the annoyance of constant pain, you made the horrible mistake of applying Hydrogen Peroxide? It's supposed to help your wounds heal, correct? Then, don't mind me asking, why does it never work? All that happens to me is intense stinging for a ridiculously short amount of time. But, depending on the severity of the sore, it's enough to bring you to your knees.
A hangnail, whether you try to fix it with Hydrogen Peroxide or simply let it be, can bother you all day; it can be a boulder thrown upon your sinking boat. A hangnail. Really?
I sat in Chemistry today, and two boys were throwing a small, foamy ball back and forth across the room. One of them happened to be sitting behind me. The ball happened to hit me in the back of the neck.
"Can you get me that ball?" The moron behind me asked, each syllable of his simple question laced with the apparent tone of his superiority.
"No." I said bitterly. "You can get it yourself."
In the past I would have hesitated and given in, leaning far out of my way (possibly exposing the room to my underpants), and delivering the ball into his smirking grasp. Not today.
"Miss Sensitive." He muttered as he got the ball himself.
I'm usually very collected, very calm, very slow to anger. I'm usually the one laughing as friends fight back their embittered fists; but at that moment, if it wouldn't have lead me to look like an utter fool and (for lack of a better word) deuce, I would have turned around and beat him down with raging words he's too dim to understand.
But I didn't.
And that hangnail's been stinging all day.
Have you ever had an open sore from a hangnail? On your thumb, ring finger, wherever. And in an attempt to free yourself from the annoyance of constant pain, you made the horrible mistake of applying Hydrogen Peroxide? It's supposed to help your wounds heal, correct? Then, don't mind me asking, why does it never work? All that happens to me is intense stinging for a ridiculously short amount of time. But, depending on the severity of the sore, it's enough to bring you to your knees.
A hangnail, whether you try to fix it with Hydrogen Peroxide or simply let it be, can bother you all day; it can be a boulder thrown upon your sinking boat. A hangnail. Really?
I sat in Chemistry today, and two boys were throwing a small, foamy ball back and forth across the room. One of them happened to be sitting behind me. The ball happened to hit me in the back of the neck.
"Can you get me that ball?" The moron behind me asked, each syllable of his simple question laced with the apparent tone of his superiority.
"No." I said bitterly. "You can get it yourself."
In the past I would have hesitated and given in, leaning far out of my way (possibly exposing the room to my underpants), and delivering the ball into his smirking grasp. Not today.
"Miss Sensitive." He muttered as he got the ball himself.
I'm usually very collected, very calm, very slow to anger. I'm usually the one laughing as friends fight back their embittered fists; but at that moment, if it wouldn't have lead me to look like an utter fool and (for lack of a better word) deuce, I would have turned around and beat him down with raging words he's too dim to understand.
But I didn't.
And that hangnail's been stinging all day.
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Music, Magic, and McFly
There are things I'm missing. And it just hurts me. It digs into my heart and twirls around like some epic screw until I'm aching all over; aching so much I feel I could simply melt with anxiety through the floor and six feet under. And you want to know what hurts me the most? Music. Music I don't have access to. Songs unavailable through anything but the glory of youtube.
Here are several songs I'm dying over; dying because they aren't mine. And frankly, they probably never will be.
Collapsible Plans, Jason Mraz
This song has been a long time favorite of mine, and in spite of his use of uncalled for cuss words I can't help but want to jump into the video with him and be the little girl that runs up and stars adoringly at his image until she sheepishly runs away. I absolutely adore this song.
Bad Habit, Varsity Fanclub
Of all the boyband songs I've ever heard, this is the only one that will eat at me through the rest of my days. This song is the theme music that plays through my head nearly every other day, and I'm sure this apparent thrust would be quenched if I owned the song via iTunes.
Breakdown More, Eric Hutchinson
Ever since I made a Pandora account this song as been eating away at my soul. I absolutely love Eric Hutchinson, but of all his incredibly delicious songs, this is by far the most tantalizing. You watched the video, right? How could you not hear that song-those words-and not be hooked like a crack addict? Please try to understand my pain.
Well, I wanted to go out with a big Back to the Future video, but all BTTF related videos were against being posted. So instead enjoy this picture as your favorite quote floats repetitively through your mind. Don't have any? Here's one of mine:
"There's that word again. Heavy. Why is everything so heavy in the future? Is there a problem with Earth's gravitational pull?"
Here are several songs I'm dying over; dying because they aren't mine. And frankly, they probably never will be.
Collapsible Plans, Jason Mraz
This song has been a long time favorite of mine, and in spite of his use of uncalled for cuss words I can't help but want to jump into the video with him and be the little girl that runs up and stars adoringly at his image until she sheepishly runs away. I absolutely adore this song.
Bad Habit, Varsity Fanclub
Of all the boyband songs I've ever heard, this is the only one that will eat at me through the rest of my days. This song is the theme music that plays through my head nearly every other day, and I'm sure this apparent thrust would be quenched if I owned the song via iTunes.
Breakdown More, Eric Hutchinson
Ever since I made a Pandora account this song as been eating away at my soul. I absolutely love Eric Hutchinson, but of all his incredibly delicious songs, this is by far the most tantalizing. You watched the video, right? How could you not hear that song-those words-and not be hooked like a crack addict? Please try to understand my pain.
Well, I wanted to go out with a big Back to the Future video, but all BTTF related videos were against being posted. So instead enjoy this picture as your favorite quote floats repetitively through your mind. Don't have any? Here's one of mine:
"There's that word again. Heavy. Why is everything so heavy in the future? Is there a problem with Earth's gravitational pull?"
Peace-Erica
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Love and Hate
I'm a respecter of artists. But to me, and artist is not the type that puts his mind to a canvas with acrylics or lays on his back on scaffolding and beautifies the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. In my dictionary an artist is a musician, a singer/songwriter, because, in their own individual way, singer/songwriters and artists both do the same thing. They put their minds into something tangible and worth feeling, whether that be a canvas of acrylics or an acoustic jam.
An artist that's recently grabbed my attention is Daphne Willis. If I was skilled enough I'd post a video of her. We'll see what this link does.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K9_CvhcHFsw
The thing I love about Daphne is her folk type sound, her thought-provoking lyrics (the likes of which I haven't run into since the early Mraz days, and my quite Dawn Mitschele phase), and her image. I love how she doesn't make the effort to, well, make an effort. (First impression wise, she kinda reminds me of The Queen of Hearts from Disney's animated version of Alice in Wonderland. But she's not a grouch.) Granted, a little effort and she'd be quite a beauty, but she keeps her look organic and natural, just like her sound.
Kudos to Daphne. She's bumped herself up the my top five favorites. And, by the looks of things, that may just be where she's staying.
As Daphne would say: FOWSH.
I still have no idea what that means...
An artist that's recently grabbed my attention is Daphne Willis. If I was skilled enough I'd post a video of her. We'll see what this link does.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K9_CvhcHFsw
The thing I love about Daphne is her folk type sound, her thought-provoking lyrics (the likes of which I haven't run into since the early Mraz days, and my quite Dawn Mitschele phase), and her image. I love how she doesn't make the effort to, well, make an effort. (First impression wise, she kinda reminds me of The Queen of Hearts from Disney's animated version of Alice in Wonderland. But she's not a grouch.) Granted, a little effort and she'd be quite a beauty, but she keeps her look organic and natural, just like her sound.
Kudos to Daphne. She's bumped herself up the my top five favorites. And, by the looks of things, that may just be where she's staying.
As Daphne would say: FOWSH.
I still have no idea what that means...
Friday, April 2, 2010
A Little Fall of Rain
"Well. Here we are."
The rain is pouring and the bus isn't coming. Lucky for me there's a shotty roof covering the bench. I sit and think over the humidity and how my hair will poof up. You're sitting next to me.
I really want that bus to come.
Or time to slow and the rain to fall forever. Because it's just you and me here, for now. And I like just you and me.
I can't look at you, though it's all I'm dying to do. I just want to watch you forever, to soak you all in. I haven't felt this way since...
But I won't think about that. I shouldn't. Because remembering those days will make this all seem alright. This sitting just out of the rain with you, this falling into love with you.
And it's not alright. It's not okay.
I know what you are outside of this covered bus stop. I know how you are. But I still can't help but inch closer to you, still can't help but want to rest my head on your shoulder. And I think you can see it.
Even when it was "gone" you could see it. You'd speak to me and taunt me with it. And I thought you a fool. Well, look at me. I'm the fool. I still love you. If it's possible to do so. Can I even say "still"? Did I ever "love" you to begin with?
I scuff my kicks on the cement, thinking of how it would look if the pavement here were wet. Cars drive past and you say something.
I don't even know what it is, but I know I wont respond right. I never do. You always catch me off guard. That, or around you I'm so far on guard that I can't find my voice, my thoughts, or even my breath.
And I just want you to see what I see.
What I see in myself that you miss because I clam up around you; what I see in you when you're across the room, forgetting I exist. I want you to see that and love it the way I do. I want you to love me the way I do.
And you do. You do love me. When it's just us, on this rain-free, covered bus stop bench. But this, sadly, is the only place you'll ever love me. Right here, right now, and tomorrow night when I bring myself back here as I drift to sleep, my heart breaking because it's not going to come again.
You know it, and I know it. When the bus comes you're gone. When the rain stops, you're gone. And both things are completely inevitable.
And in the end I'll sit here, my hair full of volume from the humidity and my heart laying crinkled in my lap. I don't blame you. I really don't. I don't believe you're being cruel.
God made you what you are. But I'm not blaming Him either.
I'm complimenting Him, commending Him.
And blaming myself for wishing on rainbows.
Rainbows that leave, like you, with the rain.
The rain is pouring and the bus isn't coming. Lucky for me there's a shotty roof covering the bench. I sit and think over the humidity and how my hair will poof up. You're sitting next to me.
I really want that bus to come.
Or time to slow and the rain to fall forever. Because it's just you and me here, for now. And I like just you and me.
I can't look at you, though it's all I'm dying to do. I just want to watch you forever, to soak you all in. I haven't felt this way since...
But I won't think about that. I shouldn't. Because remembering those days will make this all seem alright. This sitting just out of the rain with you, this falling into love with you.
And it's not alright. It's not okay.
I know what you are outside of this covered bus stop. I know how you are. But I still can't help but inch closer to you, still can't help but want to rest my head on your shoulder. And I think you can see it.
Even when it was "gone" you could see it. You'd speak to me and taunt me with it. And I thought you a fool. Well, look at me. I'm the fool. I still love you. If it's possible to do so. Can I even say "still"? Did I ever "love" you to begin with?
I scuff my kicks on the cement, thinking of how it would look if the pavement here were wet. Cars drive past and you say something.
I don't even know what it is, but I know I wont respond right. I never do. You always catch me off guard. That, or around you I'm so far on guard that I can't find my voice, my thoughts, or even my breath.
And I just want you to see what I see.
What I see in myself that you miss because I clam up around you; what I see in you when you're across the room, forgetting I exist. I want you to see that and love it the way I do. I want you to love me the way I do.
And you do. You do love me. When it's just us, on this rain-free, covered bus stop bench. But this, sadly, is the only place you'll ever love me. Right here, right now, and tomorrow night when I bring myself back here as I drift to sleep, my heart breaking because it's not going to come again.
You know it, and I know it. When the bus comes you're gone. When the rain stops, you're gone. And both things are completely inevitable.
And in the end I'll sit here, my hair full of volume from the humidity and my heart laying crinkled in my lap. I don't blame you. I really don't. I don't believe you're being cruel.
God made you what you are. But I'm not blaming Him either.
I'm complimenting Him, commending Him.
And blaming myself for wishing on rainbows.
Rainbows that leave, like you, with the rain.
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Heart of Glass
"Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got till it's gone?"
-Big Yellow Taxi, Counting Crows
"It's not having what you want. It's wanting what you've got."
-Soak Up the Sun, Sheryl Crow
"In a world where what we want is only what we want until it's ours."
-Calling All Angels, Train
What if what we want is only what we want once we don't want it anymore?
I don't know what it is with me. But this veil has been removed from my eyes. He's not the same person, but I almost like him all the more for it. I found him attractive before and now... Now I'd be content to stare at a picture bearing his face for hours, when before photos were shudder inducing.
But I've said it before and I'll say it again: If we were the only two people on the planet, I'd be with him. Because then there'd be no other girls for him to get distracted by. It would just be the two of us. And one-on-one he was always fine.
"Maybe if we both lived in a different world. Then it would be all good and Baby, I could be your girl. But I can't 'cuz we dont."
-Womanizer, Britney Spears
I think I tend to love unconditionally too much. And too soon. And I can't get past the thought that maybe no one after this moment will love me. So I keep hoping the boy who holds my heart at this moment will love me, so all this emotion and childish belief in fate can mean something. But, of course, it doesn't happen that way.
Listen to me! I sound like a thirty-year-old single woman who's lost her hope in humanity and ever finding that one special person.
Helllllooo! You're not even an "adult" yet!
Work today brought great insight to me, and I don't think my coworker even intended to do so. She was April Fools joking a boy through texts saying one of the missionaries she writes had sent her a ring and wants to marry her. She hasn't ever talked to this missionary other than letters and emails and such. She kept asking me for lines to feed her friend after his questions and arguements. One such argument was, "Look at how young you are! You can't get married now." She asked me what to say next.
"Say.. 'What if this is my one shot at love, and I say no?'"
As she happily turned away to type it I realized I, in a way, was speaking for myself. I'm so worried "the one" will slip away that I get myself caught up in having "the one" come right now. And, of course, when "the one" is merely destined to be a friend, I'm broken.
Call me vain, but I often feel that there are guys who totally dig me. Who are totally into me. I'm like their Sun. But that all ends rather shortly. One day I see in their eyes the crave for my attention, and the next... Kuputs. And I can't help but ask myself, "What am I missing to keep them around? Why do they always change their minds?" And even worse, "Why can't I ever be them, seamlessly falling in and out of love, no jagged corners, no rough and sudden drops...?"
I just remembered something I wrote the other day. Let me type it:
(Writen March 18. Origionally.)
Things aren't set in stone.
What's your purpose? What's your motive? Why am I what always is left behind?
Is it a right of passage? Am I just another rung on the ladder, and to get where you're going you can't skip me? Do I have to be used?
I'm certain I can't keep being drained this way. I was full, once. He took most that away. And now you? I'm feeling empty again.
Perhaps next time there'll be nothing left to take.
Perhaps next time I'll have nothing left to give.
And I tried oh so hard not to give to who wouldn't take.
But I guess that's just me being me again. I guess that's just me being over-optomistic.
Never again, I could vow, never again. But to what avail? What good did this pledge do me the last time around?
So I guess I shouldn't look anymore. I guess I shouldn't hope. And if you, or him, or any other man finally desides to chase me, finally desides that I'm a prize, well, that's when I'll be content.
That's when I'll have to be content.
Because apparently this isn't up to me, and apparently I have absolutely no say.
As of now I'm done, and should you change your mind, great, but don't be surprised if I don't seem the same.
By the time we're on speaking terms again I will have beat myself up and struggled with my heart too much to be the same.
I'm sorry I'm wrecking this for us.
I'm sorry you're too blind to see it happen.
And I'm sorry I'm not what's wanted.
Daddy once said, "Someday some boy will think you're the prettiest thing." Or something like that.
I wish I could get in my head that "someday" isn't today. Or tomorrow.
And by the looks of things, not next week.
-Big Yellow Taxi, Counting Crows
"It's not having what you want. It's wanting what you've got."
-Soak Up the Sun, Sheryl Crow
"In a world where what we want is only what we want until it's ours."
-Calling All Angels, Train
What if what we want is only what we want once we don't want it anymore?
I don't know what it is with me. But this veil has been removed from my eyes. He's not the same person, but I almost like him all the more for it. I found him attractive before and now... Now I'd be content to stare at a picture bearing his face for hours, when before photos were shudder inducing.
But I've said it before and I'll say it again: If we were the only two people on the planet, I'd be with him. Because then there'd be no other girls for him to get distracted by. It would just be the two of us. And one-on-one he was always fine.
"Maybe if we both lived in a different world. Then it would be all good and Baby, I could be your girl. But I can't 'cuz we dont."
-Womanizer, Britney Spears
I think I tend to love unconditionally too much. And too soon. And I can't get past the thought that maybe no one after this moment will love me. So I keep hoping the boy who holds my heart at this moment will love me, so all this emotion and childish belief in fate can mean something. But, of course, it doesn't happen that way.
Listen to me! I sound like a thirty-year-old single woman who's lost her hope in humanity and ever finding that one special person.
Helllllooo! You're not even an "adult" yet!
Work today brought great insight to me, and I don't think my coworker even intended to do so. She was April Fools joking a boy through texts saying one of the missionaries she writes had sent her a ring and wants to marry her. She hasn't ever talked to this missionary other than letters and emails and such. She kept asking me for lines to feed her friend after his questions and arguements. One such argument was, "Look at how young you are! You can't get married now." She asked me what to say next.
"Say.. 'What if this is my one shot at love, and I say no?'"
As she happily turned away to type it I realized I, in a way, was speaking for myself. I'm so worried "the one" will slip away that I get myself caught up in having "the one" come right now. And, of course, when "the one" is merely destined to be a friend, I'm broken.
Call me vain, but I often feel that there are guys who totally dig me. Who are totally into me. I'm like their Sun. But that all ends rather shortly. One day I see in their eyes the crave for my attention, and the next... Kuputs. And I can't help but ask myself, "What am I missing to keep them around? Why do they always change their minds?" And even worse, "Why can't I ever be them, seamlessly falling in and out of love, no jagged corners, no rough and sudden drops...?"
I just remembered something I wrote the other day. Let me type it:
(Writen March 18. Origionally.)
Things aren't set in stone.
What's your purpose? What's your motive? Why am I what always is left behind?
Is it a right of passage? Am I just another rung on the ladder, and to get where you're going you can't skip me? Do I have to be used?
I'm certain I can't keep being drained this way. I was full, once. He took most that away. And now you? I'm feeling empty again.
Perhaps next time there'll be nothing left to take.
Perhaps next time I'll have nothing left to give.
And I tried oh so hard not to give to who wouldn't take.
But I guess that's just me being me again. I guess that's just me being over-optomistic.
Never again, I could vow, never again. But to what avail? What good did this pledge do me the last time around?
So I guess I shouldn't look anymore. I guess I shouldn't hope. And if you, or him, or any other man finally desides to chase me, finally desides that I'm a prize, well, that's when I'll be content.
That's when I'll have to be content.
Because apparently this isn't up to me, and apparently I have absolutely no say.
As of now I'm done, and should you change your mind, great, but don't be surprised if I don't seem the same.
By the time we're on speaking terms again I will have beat myself up and struggled with my heart too much to be the same.
I'm sorry I'm wrecking this for us.
I'm sorry you're too blind to see it happen.
And I'm sorry I'm not what's wanted.
Daddy once said, "Someday some boy will think you're the prettiest thing." Or something like that.
I wish I could get in my head that "someday" isn't today. Or tomorrow.
And by the looks of things, not next week.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Swimming in my pool of blood.
[Here's a couple things I've thought about today. They have a similar theme, so I feel justified posting them together. The first is to a boy I've only said one sentence to in my life, and the second is to a very close friend. Enjoy.]
Critical
I'll sit here in silence, don't be bothered by me. Keep calling that girl a "troll". You're cool-and you know it, so just talk, talk away. Your ego's too big not to show.
Oh yes, she's not perfect, and neither is she, but have you looked in the mirror of late? Your finger keeps pointing, your words, they keep taunting-you're ugly. Stop calling them names.
When one finger points, there are three pointing back; back at you, boy, right there in your face. So make fun of her voice, or that other girl's words. You're just mad you don't have half their grace.
If I could tune out one voice in this loud, loud world, right now I'd have it be yours. I'm much better off missing your negative air and the arrogance with which you choke.
Tearing me down
I've never been one to rudely joke. What I pretend, I become. I've tried not to be rude. Therefore, I don't joke that way; or I don't try to on a regular basis. Habit becomes you, after all.
I suppose I believe everyone else should be this way. I suppose, because what I pretend I become, that everyone else must become rude with their own rude jokes. It's only natural.
What's funny to some inadvertently stabs me. And I can't bring myself to rip the knife out and hand it back as I bleed.
I just let it pierce me.
With each breath it hurts, and I can't stand to focus on the pain because that only makes it worse. I become more agonized if I remember the knife. So I ignore it.
And I bleed.
So thank you, best friend, for stabbing me again. Thank you for your two knifes today. You, like them all, suppose I'm "adult" enough-hard hearted enough-to let the knives glance off. Unfortunately, I'm not as careless as you. I'm not as desensitized.
Thus, I bleed.
And I'd return the knife, but I'm sure you don't need another.
"And it kind of hurts when the kind of words you say kind of turn themselves into blades. Kind and courteous is a life I've heard..."
-Beautiful Mess, Jason Mraz
Critical
I'll sit here in silence, don't be bothered by me. Keep calling that girl a "troll". You're cool-and you know it, so just talk, talk away. Your ego's too big not to show.
Oh yes, she's not perfect, and neither is she, but have you looked in the mirror of late? Your finger keeps pointing, your words, they keep taunting-you're ugly. Stop calling them names.
When one finger points, there are three pointing back; back at you, boy, right there in your face. So make fun of her voice, or that other girl's words. You're just mad you don't have half their grace.
If I could tune out one voice in this loud, loud world, right now I'd have it be yours. I'm much better off missing your negative air and the arrogance with which you choke.
Tearing me down
I've never been one to rudely joke. What I pretend, I become. I've tried not to be rude. Therefore, I don't joke that way; or I don't try to on a regular basis. Habit becomes you, after all.
I suppose I believe everyone else should be this way. I suppose, because what I pretend I become, that everyone else must become rude with their own rude jokes. It's only natural.
What's funny to some inadvertently stabs me. And I can't bring myself to rip the knife out and hand it back as I bleed.
I just let it pierce me.
With each breath it hurts, and I can't stand to focus on the pain because that only makes it worse. I become more agonized if I remember the knife. So I ignore it.
And I bleed.
So thank you, best friend, for stabbing me again. Thank you for your two knifes today. You, like them all, suppose I'm "adult" enough-hard hearted enough-to let the knives glance off. Unfortunately, I'm not as careless as you. I'm not as desensitized.
Thus, I bleed.
And I'd return the knife, but I'm sure you don't need another.
"And it kind of hurts when the kind of words you say kind of turn themselves into blades. Kind and courteous is a life I've heard..."
-Beautiful Mess, Jason Mraz
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Never Know
Oh. It's you. I didn't recognize you for a moment. Yeah, I suppose my hair's changed since we last saw each other as well. You look like your ten-year-old self with your hair like that. Maybe even your five-year-old self. I remember you best as a five-year-old.
Don't judge me with this tennis racket in my hand. I've never been a sports person like you. I simply wanted to see if I could still hit a tennis ball the way I could two years ago. So far it's a no. You don't remember I had that phase, do you? I suppose not, it was very short lived. But I see you're still good with the soccer ball. I see you've acted on that God given talent. I see the ball obeys your command like a puppet; I envy you for that. You're really good. It's too bad we can't talk about this.
I've noticed you're wearing a necklace. That's interesting. Just a chain, though, nothing girly; and I must say it adds to your personality. If I knew your personality. I can see now your face has matured. Your baby fat's gone. Mine is too, if you didn't notice. I wonder if you see the five-year-old me standing here, the way I see yours. I wonder if you're putting the pieces of my past looks together with time and trying to make them equal what you see. Like I am you.
I see you're looking at me. I see we keep "missing" eye contact: I look, you've been looking and look away at that moment; and vice-versa. How does your voice sound? I heard you a while back; it had deeped. Is it the same, or has it gone deeper yet? I suppose I could ask, or you could say something to show me, but there are two conversations happening across our paths. Let's not disrupt them by speaking. You can keep wondering about me, and I'll keep wondering about you.
How does it feel, cousin? How does it feel to you to look at me? How does it feel not knowing the hobbies of my life, the name of my best friend, my middle name, or even something as simple as what makes me laugh? How does it feel not knowing what type of humor I have? I don't know more about you than I do your brother. Or your sister. Or your sister. Or your sister. I know your first name, sometimes I even forget your last-is it really the same as my own? I know you play soccer. Apparently you play it well. And for Davis? So you go to Davis High? That's news to me.
Let's be frank, Derrick, if that is how you spell your name. Let's be frank with the fact that I don't know you; you don't know me. I'm seventeen, you're seventeen, and our birthdays are 29 days apart.
We're strangers and we should be best friends.
So why won't either of us say "Hello"?
Don't judge me with this tennis racket in my hand. I've never been a sports person like you. I simply wanted to see if I could still hit a tennis ball the way I could two years ago. So far it's a no. You don't remember I had that phase, do you? I suppose not, it was very short lived. But I see you're still good with the soccer ball. I see you've acted on that God given talent. I see the ball obeys your command like a puppet; I envy you for that. You're really good. It's too bad we can't talk about this.
I've noticed you're wearing a necklace. That's interesting. Just a chain, though, nothing girly; and I must say it adds to your personality. If I knew your personality. I can see now your face has matured. Your baby fat's gone. Mine is too, if you didn't notice. I wonder if you see the five-year-old me standing here, the way I see yours. I wonder if you're putting the pieces of my past looks together with time and trying to make them equal what you see. Like I am you.
I see you're looking at me. I see we keep "missing" eye contact: I look, you've been looking and look away at that moment; and vice-versa. How does your voice sound? I heard you a while back; it had deeped. Is it the same, or has it gone deeper yet? I suppose I could ask, or you could say something to show me, but there are two conversations happening across our paths. Let's not disrupt them by speaking. You can keep wondering about me, and I'll keep wondering about you.
How does it feel, cousin? How does it feel to you to look at me? How does it feel not knowing the hobbies of my life, the name of my best friend, my middle name, or even something as simple as what makes me laugh? How does it feel not knowing what type of humor I have? I don't know more about you than I do your brother. Or your sister. Or your sister. Or your sister. I know your first name, sometimes I even forget your last-is it really the same as my own? I know you play soccer. Apparently you play it well. And for Davis? So you go to Davis High? That's news to me.
Let's be frank, Derrick, if that is how you spell your name. Let's be frank with the fact that I don't know you; you don't know me. I'm seventeen, you're seventeen, and our birthdays are 29 days apart.
We're strangers and we should be best friends.
So why won't either of us say "Hello"?
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
If We Were a Movie...
If my life was a movie, or a novel, or any form of pre-scripted happening, this is what would have happened:
-I would have gotten into any show at Rodger's I auditioned for (not saying all of them at all, but at least one).
-I would have never had to buy a shirt larger than a medium.
-I wouldn't have been late for school approximately 24 times this term.
-I would have gotten rid of front bangs five years sooner than I actually did.
-I'd fall "in love" with someone who was actually interested back, instead of someone who was 1) oblivious, 2) a flirtatious player with no heart, 3) just another potential "guy friend".
-I'd have the talent to compose music to go with my lyrics.
-That "D" would have never appeared on 9th grade's report card. Nor the "C" or "C+" from third term...
-My car battery wouldn't have died today.
-I would have never scraped my leg up falling off my scooter.
-I'd probably have a boyfriend by now.
-I wouldn't be utterly disturbed by the simple subject of human anatomy.
-I'd be able to write more than three chapters on any of my various book ideas...
And I think that's why I want to write. Because I can make these things and more happen, or not happen. If I write, I hold the pen, the plot, and the outcome of the story. I can bend everything every which way and make life a thousand times simpler.
I really could.
Though, looking back over my list (which would go on and on and on...) I see that my definition of having a life like a movie is having a life that's perfect. Which, of course, isn't so. Anyone who's seen What's Eating Gilbert Grape or Titanic would know that.
Then again, Titanic is based on a true story. So, in a sense, those lives were in fact a movie...
I guess I'm just expecting the celestial playwrights of my life to look down upon me and say, "Alright, Erica. I think it's about time you get something you've been waiting for. Here. Have a boyfriend."
They can give me something else too, but at present moment I'm leaning toward boyfriend. But, as Liz Phair sang to me today over the fuzzy radio at work:
"Isn't this the best part of waking up-Finding someone else you can't get enough of? Someone who wants to be with you too."
-Why Can't I, Liz Phair
I suppose my celestial playwrights just haven't allowed me to cross paths with that person that "wants to be with [me] too." I've found people I want to be with, but I guess love has to be a mutual agreement.
Let the sun set. And let's start another day alone.
-I would have gotten into any show at Rodger's I auditioned for (not saying all of them at all, but at least one).
-I would have never had to buy a shirt larger than a medium.
-I wouldn't have been late for school approximately 24 times this term.
-I would have gotten rid of front bangs five years sooner than I actually did.
-I'd fall "in love" with someone who was actually interested back, instead of someone who was 1) oblivious, 2) a flirtatious player with no heart, 3) just another potential "guy friend".
-I'd have the talent to compose music to go with my lyrics.
-That "D" would have never appeared on 9th grade's report card. Nor the "C" or "C+" from third term...
-My car battery wouldn't have died today.
-I would have never scraped my leg up falling off my scooter.
-I'd probably have a boyfriend by now.
-I wouldn't be utterly disturbed by the simple subject of human anatomy.
-I'd be able to write more than three chapters on any of my various book ideas...
And I think that's why I want to write. Because I can make these things and more happen, or not happen. If I write, I hold the pen, the plot, and the outcome of the story. I can bend everything every which way and make life a thousand times simpler.
I really could.
Though, looking back over my list (which would go on and on and on...) I see that my definition of having a life like a movie is having a life that's perfect. Which, of course, isn't so. Anyone who's seen What's Eating Gilbert Grape or Titanic would know that.
Then again, Titanic is based on a true story. So, in a sense, those lives were in fact a movie...
I guess I'm just expecting the celestial playwrights of my life to look down upon me and say, "Alright, Erica. I think it's about time you get something you've been waiting for. Here. Have a boyfriend."
They can give me something else too, but at present moment I'm leaning toward boyfriend. But, as Liz Phair sang to me today over the fuzzy radio at work:
"Isn't this the best part of waking up-Finding someone else you can't get enough of? Someone who wants to be with you too."
-Why Can't I, Liz Phair
I suppose my celestial playwrights just haven't allowed me to cross paths with that person that "wants to be with [me] too." I've found people I want to be with, but I guess love has to be a mutual agreement.
Let the sun set. And let's start another day alone.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Climb Every Mountain
Flat Mountain Dew tastes like melted Slurpee. If said Slurpee was of the Mountain Dew variety.
I bought a rather large Mountain Dew last Wednesday, hoping it would clear me of my obscene headache prior to my choir concert. I think it worked. Moderately. I only ended up drinking a few sips that day, which, if you know me, is an extremely remarkable feat. I'm known to drinking my complete beverage in one sitting, usually within the time span of one to six minutes.
Let's just say road trips are interesting. If you catch my drift.
Nonetheless, I kept the flat Mountain Dew sitting on the floor of my room, and have proceeded to sip when I feel so inclined. It is doing anything beneficial any longer? The answer is no. But still I drink.
Don't we all tend to do the unnecessary? Don't we all tend to "drink" our "flat Mountain Dews" just because we can? There are plenty of other, more healthy and safe, beverages I could consume, but still I look past my water and on to the Dew. Why?
I think the unneeded tend to be more pleasurable. I often call it "easily distracted". For example, I could be getting ready to hit the hay right about now, and I do love my sleep, but instead I'm blogging; which is in fact a grand past-time, but is it really as necessary right now as sleep would be?
And I answer you no.
I don't reckon I'd have this problem if I quit surrounding myself with flat Mountain Dews that must be swallowed before being tossed out. Maybe if I didn't promise my attention span to other pointless areas, I'd be on task.
And well rested.
I bought a rather large Mountain Dew last Wednesday, hoping it would clear me of my obscene headache prior to my choir concert. I think it worked. Moderately. I only ended up drinking a few sips that day, which, if you know me, is an extremely remarkable feat. I'm known to drinking my complete beverage in one sitting, usually within the time span of one to six minutes.
Let's just say road trips are interesting. If you catch my drift.
Nonetheless, I kept the flat Mountain Dew sitting on the floor of my room, and have proceeded to sip when I feel so inclined. It is doing anything beneficial any longer? The answer is no. But still I drink.
Don't we all tend to do the unnecessary? Don't we all tend to "drink" our "flat Mountain Dews" just because we can? There are plenty of other, more healthy and safe, beverages I could consume, but still I look past my water and on to the Dew. Why?
I think the unneeded tend to be more pleasurable. I often call it "easily distracted". For example, I could be getting ready to hit the hay right about now, and I do love my sleep, but instead I'm blogging; which is in fact a grand past-time, but is it really as necessary right now as sleep would be?
And I answer you no.
I don't reckon I'd have this problem if I quit surrounding myself with flat Mountain Dews that must be swallowed before being tossed out. Maybe if I didn't promise my attention span to other pointless areas, I'd be on task.
And well rested.
Monday, March 22, 2010
All we are, we are.
I sit at the bar in the diner. It's a quiet place off the road to Nowhere; the road is gravel, the signs are hanging by a thread and faded with the past century. The floor is wood, the bar is wood, the wobbly stool I'm perched on is metal. I swing my foot against the wooden bar, facing the faded mirror behind it.
The door peels open with a faint tingling bell. The bell sounds dead and falling.
She takes a seat next to me. Her eyes are brown, her hair is brown, and her jacket is over-sized and navy. She leans her elbows on the bar and stares at the rustic wood. Her sneakers are Converse.
Her sneakers were Converse.
I turn lightly back to my chipped tea cup full of flat water. I stare at it, pensive, like her.
The waitress comes past. She speaks the the brunette, and though I'm eavesdropping I don't catch specifics. I glance back her way once the waitress is gone. I see a light in her somewhere, faintly-faintly-glowing behind her tired eyes and distracted air. She digs in her pocked and pulls out a dented cigarette. I watch her light it, secretly fascinated by the ritual.
She takes a drag then aims the smoke to the mirror across the bar. That faded, extinct mirror.
She takes another drag.
"What are you running from?" I ask her, glancing for a moment to my cup, as if the water within it could make this conversation alright.
She lets out the smoke. I feel the essence of tobacco climb into my mouth and murderously down my throat. I feel my lungs dying as it sticks.
"I'm not running from anything." She says, her eyes still locked on the mirror, as far away as she was the moment she came in.
"Are you sure?" I ask her, again looking self-consciously to my cup. "You seem like you're... lost."
Her eyes peel from the glass and turn to me. I raise my head to meet them. She's not wearing make-up; she's lovely enough to go without. I envy her for a moment. She takes another drag.
"I stopped for a pit-stop." She explains on the exhale. "Just because I'm here doesn't mean I'm running from something. Maybe I'm running to something. Did you think of that?"
She watches me as I change my focal point to a place beyond her head. "We all come from somewhere. If you left that somewhere and are running for somewhere else, I assume you're running away from that other somewhere."
She just looks at me, absorbing my idiotic statement.
"Plus, you don't look like you're out for a vacation. Or on a trip to visit grandma."
Her eyes faze out again, examining the open space behind mine. She takes a drag and pulls herself back to focus. "Alright. I guess I agree." She pauses and looks at the cigarette. "I had everything figured out. I knew where I was going when, and how I was getting there." She turns back to face the mirror, her eyes glassy again, but this time with light, not the muddled darkness of before. "I had a plan-a road map. I had a map, and I had my bike. And I knew where I was going. But there was a fork in the road. There was a choice I hadn't made before, and I had to make it at that moment; there was no stopping to deliberate, there was no driving back to grade school memories and finding the predetermined answer. It was then and there, and that moment.
"And I took the wrong road. I felt like I'd stabbed in the dark it was so wrong. And it's always so much harder to go back than it is to move forward, so I kept moving forward. I kept..." She glanced at me, then the cigarette in her hand. "I kept running."
I watch her in silence, the ashes on the cigarette falling to the bar top, neither of us taking much note, neither of us pondering if somehow they'd catch the bar on fire. Both of us just watch it, and think.
I remember how I got to the road to Nowhere. I remember my own sense of that sinking feeling of failure, I remember that need to run. I don't tell her that, of course. I felt that perhaps I was here at this bar and that moment for the sole purpose of helping her to find how to crush that butt in the ash tray and turn back home. I felt I was to help her learn that what she was running from was really what she needed.
"How 'bout you?" She asks me. I jerk awake from my ash-filled stupor. "What are you running from?"
I gaze back at the ashes. "I guess I'm running from the past. I guess I'm... I'm sick of who I was back there." I found my fingers in the ashes, drawing my story. "At the time, I thought everything about me was perfect, incredible, flawless. But then I realized it wasn't. I realized I hated myself. And that scared me. I changed the way I did a lot of things. I kept hoping I'd find that place where I was happy in myself, but I never did. My happiest moments where when I wasn't me. When I got to truly become someone else and be them, for however long it may be, was when my heart soared the most. And I hated how all those characters I took seemed to not exist, and all the flawless realities I had as them weren't available when I was my true self.
"So I guess I'm running from myself, really. I guess I'm running from me."
She places the remainder of the cigarette on the plate my tea cup rests on.
"Sounds like you need that." She says, pulling another from her pocket. "I wouldn't start with a new one for my first time anyway." She lights it and smokes it, eyeing me.
I pick up the cigarette.
It's warm. And inviting. I hold it awkwardly in my hand, not knowing what to do with it. I bring it slowly to my lips, I can feel it brush them gently. My heart is pounding. Excited, right? Thrilled, right? Ready? Is that it?
I let out my breath and open my mouth. "And I took the wrong road. I felt like I'd stabbed in the dark it was so wrong. And it's always so much harder to go back than it is to move forward..." Her voice echoes in my head and I pull the cigarette from my lips.
She smiles, but her eyes are still sad and empty behind it. "I thought you wouldn't know me." She says, taking another drag on her cigarette. "I thought my eyes and hair would throw you off."
"More than that is different." I say, setting my cigarette back on the bar. "All of you is like another person."
"Well, that's what I wanted, wasn't it? I wanted to be another person. So I did."
"How long have you been on this road?" I ask her as she pulls a wadded dollar from her jacket.
"Too long." She straightens the bill on the edge of the bar and looks me square in the eye.
"It's about time I left."
I slowly stand from the stool as she places the dollar under my cup. "I miss the days I'd drink this." She says, glancing in. She picks up the discarded butt. "I miss the days I did a lot of those things."
I back slowly toward the door.
"Will I... Will I see you again?"
She turns back to me.
"Only if you make the mistake of finding me. I'll be here, at this bar, with this cigarette. And I don't plan on ever having to share."
I nod, understanding. I open the door, with a weak tingling of bells, and head out to the gravel road. I don't look back.
The road to Nowhere is merely a road from somewhere. I stopped there once on a road to somewhere else. But I made the wrong choice there, a stab in the dark, and I ran from that somewhere to somewhere else, but it only ever was the same place.
I've learned that if you take the road to Nowhere, and you stop at the diner just off it, chances are you'll stumble upon the you that's been there before, the you that made the wrong choice before. And that experienced you will offer you the same wrong choice they accepted.
Will you say no to yourself?
I get on my bike and turn it toward the street, hoping to never see myself like that again.
The door peels open with a faint tingling bell. The bell sounds dead and falling.
She takes a seat next to me. Her eyes are brown, her hair is brown, and her jacket is over-sized and navy. She leans her elbows on the bar and stares at the rustic wood. Her sneakers are Converse.
Her sneakers were Converse.
I turn lightly back to my chipped tea cup full of flat water. I stare at it, pensive, like her.
The waitress comes past. She speaks the the brunette, and though I'm eavesdropping I don't catch specifics. I glance back her way once the waitress is gone. I see a light in her somewhere, faintly-faintly-glowing behind her tired eyes and distracted air. She digs in her pocked and pulls out a dented cigarette. I watch her light it, secretly fascinated by the ritual.
She takes a drag then aims the smoke to the mirror across the bar. That faded, extinct mirror.
She takes another drag.
"What are you running from?" I ask her, glancing for a moment to my cup, as if the water within it could make this conversation alright.
She lets out the smoke. I feel the essence of tobacco climb into my mouth and murderously down my throat. I feel my lungs dying as it sticks.
"I'm not running from anything." She says, her eyes still locked on the mirror, as far away as she was the moment she came in.
"Are you sure?" I ask her, again looking self-consciously to my cup. "You seem like you're... lost."
Her eyes peel from the glass and turn to me. I raise my head to meet them. She's not wearing make-up; she's lovely enough to go without. I envy her for a moment. She takes another drag.
"I stopped for a pit-stop." She explains on the exhale. "Just because I'm here doesn't mean I'm running from something. Maybe I'm running to something. Did you think of that?"
She watches me as I change my focal point to a place beyond her head. "We all come from somewhere. If you left that somewhere and are running for somewhere else, I assume you're running away from that other somewhere."
She just looks at me, absorbing my idiotic statement.
"Plus, you don't look like you're out for a vacation. Or on a trip to visit grandma."
Her eyes faze out again, examining the open space behind mine. She takes a drag and pulls herself back to focus. "Alright. I guess I agree." She pauses and looks at the cigarette. "I had everything figured out. I knew where I was going when, and how I was getting there." She turns back to face the mirror, her eyes glassy again, but this time with light, not the muddled darkness of before. "I had a plan-a road map. I had a map, and I had my bike. And I knew where I was going. But there was a fork in the road. There was a choice I hadn't made before, and I had to make it at that moment; there was no stopping to deliberate, there was no driving back to grade school memories and finding the predetermined answer. It was then and there, and that moment.
"And I took the wrong road. I felt like I'd stabbed in the dark it was so wrong. And it's always so much harder to go back than it is to move forward, so I kept moving forward. I kept..." She glanced at me, then the cigarette in her hand. "I kept running."
I watch her in silence, the ashes on the cigarette falling to the bar top, neither of us taking much note, neither of us pondering if somehow they'd catch the bar on fire. Both of us just watch it, and think.
I remember how I got to the road to Nowhere. I remember my own sense of that sinking feeling of failure, I remember that need to run. I don't tell her that, of course. I felt that perhaps I was here at this bar and that moment for the sole purpose of helping her to find how to crush that butt in the ash tray and turn back home. I felt I was to help her learn that what she was running from was really what she needed.
"How 'bout you?" She asks me. I jerk awake from my ash-filled stupor. "What are you running from?"
I gaze back at the ashes. "I guess I'm running from the past. I guess I'm... I'm sick of who I was back there." I found my fingers in the ashes, drawing my story. "At the time, I thought everything about me was perfect, incredible, flawless. But then I realized it wasn't. I realized I hated myself. And that scared me. I changed the way I did a lot of things. I kept hoping I'd find that place where I was happy in myself, but I never did. My happiest moments where when I wasn't me. When I got to truly become someone else and be them, for however long it may be, was when my heart soared the most. And I hated how all those characters I took seemed to not exist, and all the flawless realities I had as them weren't available when I was my true self.
"So I guess I'm running from myself, really. I guess I'm running from me."
She places the remainder of the cigarette on the plate my tea cup rests on.
"Sounds like you need that." She says, pulling another from her pocket. "I wouldn't start with a new one for my first time anyway." She lights it and smokes it, eyeing me.
I pick up the cigarette.
It's warm. And inviting. I hold it awkwardly in my hand, not knowing what to do with it. I bring it slowly to my lips, I can feel it brush them gently. My heart is pounding. Excited, right? Thrilled, right? Ready? Is that it?
I let out my breath and open my mouth. "And I took the wrong road. I felt like I'd stabbed in the dark it was so wrong. And it's always so much harder to go back than it is to move forward..." Her voice echoes in my head and I pull the cigarette from my lips.
She smiles, but her eyes are still sad and empty behind it. "I thought you wouldn't know me." She says, taking another drag on her cigarette. "I thought my eyes and hair would throw you off."
"More than that is different." I say, setting my cigarette back on the bar. "All of you is like another person."
"Well, that's what I wanted, wasn't it? I wanted to be another person. So I did."
"How long have you been on this road?" I ask her as she pulls a wadded dollar from her jacket.
"Too long." She straightens the bill on the edge of the bar and looks me square in the eye.
"It's about time I left."
I slowly stand from the stool as she places the dollar under my cup. "I miss the days I'd drink this." She says, glancing in. She picks up the discarded butt. "I miss the days I did a lot of those things."
I back slowly toward the door.
"Will I... Will I see you again?"
She turns back to me.
"Only if you make the mistake of finding me. I'll be here, at this bar, with this cigarette. And I don't plan on ever having to share."
I nod, understanding. I open the door, with a weak tingling of bells, and head out to the gravel road. I don't look back.
The road to Nowhere is merely a road from somewhere. I stopped there once on a road to somewhere else. But I made the wrong choice there, a stab in the dark, and I ran from that somewhere to somewhere else, but it only ever was the same place.
I've learned that if you take the road to Nowhere, and you stop at the diner just off it, chances are you'll stumble upon the you that's been there before, the you that made the wrong choice before. And that experienced you will offer you the same wrong choice they accepted.
Will you say no to yourself?
I get on my bike and turn it toward the street, hoping to never see myself like that again.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Falling Apart
I don't know what I want to say. I knew I blew it. I knew it wasn't happening. People can say all they want through common courtesy that they thought I did well; we all know I didn't.
For once I'd like to be able to show that I have the talent I apparently have. People tell me I can act, people tell me I'm great. Then why doesn't my resume say so? Why don't I have a list of leads that say without speaking that I have skill?
I know I'm not a singer, and I wouldn't mind so much if all the world around me, all the people I interact with, weren't either. I don't want to "face the music", I want to forget this ever happened. I don't want to live all of next year thinking, "Maybe if I'd just practiced a little more. Maybe if I hadn't wasted my life. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Maybe."
If only, if only, the woodpecker cried...
Hand me the box of tissues, and pass me the water and Advil, because this headache and this heartache aren't going away too soon.
"Every so often we long to steal/ to the land of what might have been.
But that doesn't soften the ache we feel/ when reality sets back in...
Don't wish./ Don't start./ Wishing only wounds the heart."
-I'm Not That Girl, Wicked
It's like my grandmother once said, "If only desire was enough." If only talent had nothing to do with it. Then you could have it; then you'd be alright.
I'll be okay, eventually. I feel my heart stitching itself back together already. But you can't bleed for less than a day and expose your wound to salt and expect it not to sting. Sadly, tomorrow I'll be surrounded by salt; there's nothing I can do about it.
But I'll do what I always do and break down inside. You won't see it, you won't know, but that salt is stinging and it's stinging hard. And come tomorrow night as I lay staring at the ceiling, that salt will visit me again as water pools down my cheek.
I can accept it and agree, here on my own, but with the eyes of my peers I'm certain I'll feel moronic.
Perhaps I'll invest in a Dunce hat.
But we can cross out "Dunce" and write "Failure."
For once I'd like to be able to show that I have the talent I apparently have. People tell me I can act, people tell me I'm great. Then why doesn't my resume say so? Why don't I have a list of leads that say without speaking that I have skill?
I know I'm not a singer, and I wouldn't mind so much if all the world around me, all the people I interact with, weren't either. I don't want to "face the music", I want to forget this ever happened. I don't want to live all of next year thinking, "Maybe if I'd just practiced a little more. Maybe if I hadn't wasted my life. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Maybe."
If only, if only, the woodpecker cried...
Hand me the box of tissues, and pass me the water and Advil, because this headache and this heartache aren't going away too soon.
"Every so often we long to steal/ to the land of what might have been.
But that doesn't soften the ache we feel/ when reality sets back in...
Don't wish./ Don't start./ Wishing only wounds the heart."
-I'm Not That Girl, Wicked
It's like my grandmother once said, "If only desire was enough." If only talent had nothing to do with it. Then you could have it; then you'd be alright.
I'll be okay, eventually. I feel my heart stitching itself back together already. But you can't bleed for less than a day and expose your wound to salt and expect it not to sting. Sadly, tomorrow I'll be surrounded by salt; there's nothing I can do about it.
But I'll do what I always do and break down inside. You won't see it, you won't know, but that salt is stinging and it's stinging hard. And come tomorrow night as I lay staring at the ceiling, that salt will visit me again as water pools down my cheek.
I can accept it and agree, here on my own, but with the eyes of my peers I'm certain I'll feel moronic.
Perhaps I'll invest in a Dunce hat.
But we can cross out "Dunce" and write "Failure."
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
St. Patrick's Day Slums
I have that feeling again. But frankly, I'm not surprised. I've felt it coming on for some time now, but I pushed it aside. What kept me going? Hope?
The inklings of foreshadowing tapped me on a regular basis, but Hope just took my hand and lead me away with a smile. "It'll be alright." Hope said. "Just wait. It'll be alright. Trust me."
Well I watched today. I stood there and watched. One, two, three. Four. With each hug; it didn't hurt, on the contrary, I felt utterly fine. His arms were the broom, and each time they enveloped her, the dirt of my emotions was swept out the door of my heart. Silently. Painlessly. Hope glanced at me with mild concern.
I looked slowly down. "That's okay." I sighed, releasing the last from my system. "I can see it now. I'd always assumed..." I shrugged, melancholy. Hope and I turned, that feeling filling me again, that feeling of getting over. That feeling of moving on. But it wasn't as consuming and painful as the first time. It was more of a peace: a peace that I was wrong once again, and that my efforts had been fruitless, in vain, all for naught, and any other classic phrase of the type.
It's time to quit thinking. It's time to quit wishing. It's time to start living, start being, and start letting Fate hold my hand and lead me away, not Hope. Though Hope, Hope is a grand companion, but both Hope and I are blind, and we focus too much on the fuzzy. We take note too much on the absent. We live too much for the dead.
"Goodbye my almost lover./ Goodbye my hopeless dream.
I'm trying not to think about you;/ can't you just let me be?
So long my luckless moment,/ my back is turned on you.
Should have known you'd bring me heartache.
Almost lovers always do."
-Almost Lover, A Fine Frenzy
And I'm not bitter, I'm utterly content, as odd as it seems. I should have known; correction, I did know, all along. But sometimes it's much, much nicer to smile and pretend that I don't see. It's much, much nicer to be the ingenue for once. Once.
Today was not my time. And I pray I can prove Murphy's Law right.
I pray the time I don't think I've found the one, I find the one.
We'll see. Fate and I will see.
The inklings of foreshadowing tapped me on a regular basis, but Hope just took my hand and lead me away with a smile. "It'll be alright." Hope said. "Just wait. It'll be alright. Trust me."
Well I watched today. I stood there and watched. One, two, three. Four. With each hug; it didn't hurt, on the contrary, I felt utterly fine. His arms were the broom, and each time they enveloped her, the dirt of my emotions was swept out the door of my heart. Silently. Painlessly. Hope glanced at me with mild concern.
I looked slowly down. "That's okay." I sighed, releasing the last from my system. "I can see it now. I'd always assumed..." I shrugged, melancholy. Hope and I turned, that feeling filling me again, that feeling of getting over. That feeling of moving on. But it wasn't as consuming and painful as the first time. It was more of a peace: a peace that I was wrong once again, and that my efforts had been fruitless, in vain, all for naught, and any other classic phrase of the type.
It's time to quit thinking. It's time to quit wishing. It's time to start living, start being, and start letting Fate hold my hand and lead me away, not Hope. Though Hope, Hope is a grand companion, but both Hope and I are blind, and we focus too much on the fuzzy. We take note too much on the absent. We live too much for the dead.
"Goodbye my almost lover./ Goodbye my hopeless dream.
I'm trying not to think about you;/ can't you just let me be?
So long my luckless moment,/ my back is turned on you.
Should have known you'd bring me heartache.
Almost lovers always do."
-Almost Lover, A Fine Frenzy
And I'm not bitter, I'm utterly content, as odd as it seems. I should have known; correction, I did know, all along. But sometimes it's much, much nicer to smile and pretend that I don't see. It's much, much nicer to be the ingenue for once. Once.
Today was not my time. And I pray I can prove Murphy's Law right.
I pray the time I don't think I've found the one, I find the one.
We'll see. Fate and I will see.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
It's just a room, Tony.
Dear James/Jimmy or Neil/Tony:
You are an amazing actor. I knew from the moment I saw you you would be spectacular. I see now I was right. And that accent... I don't know why, but something about hearing you switch from American to that seamless Irish accent just made me tumble over into love with you.
I could watch your scene all day. Three times was not nearly enough.
And you and your friend spoke to me? Smiling and sincere. You said we were good, my friend and I; said you loved our scene. When we loved you. I'd freeze time to speak with you for ages, either of you. I'd kill for your presence, or so it seems. If I could replay today, I would, just to help myself not be so awkward.
I know nothing will come of this, but tell me that for today, at least, you want me as much as I want you.
"You're beautiful./ You're beautiful./ You're beautiful,/ it's true.
I saw your face/ in a crowded place,/ now I don't know what to do.
I will never be with you."
-Beautiful, James Blunt
I suppose I'd forgotten until today how many hot boys there truly were in the world. And that was just at Region Drama!
You are an amazing actor. I knew from the moment I saw you you would be spectacular. I see now I was right. And that accent... I don't know why, but something about hearing you switch from American to that seamless Irish accent just made me tumble over into love with you.
I could watch your scene all day. Three times was not nearly enough.
And you and your friend spoke to me? Smiling and sincere. You said we were good, my friend and I; said you loved our scene. When we loved you. I'd freeze time to speak with you for ages, either of you. I'd kill for your presence, or so it seems. If I could replay today, I would, just to help myself not be so awkward.
I know nothing will come of this, but tell me that for today, at least, you want me as much as I want you.
"You're beautiful./ You're beautiful./ You're beautiful,/ it's true.
I saw your face/ in a crowded place,/ now I don't know what to do.
I will never be with you."
-Beautiful, James Blunt
I suppose I'd forgotten until today how many hot boys there truly were in the world. And that was just at Region Drama!
Monday, March 15, 2010
If that's not Love, then what is?
The thought came to me today, and it lead me here.
Who created love? Do we commend him for it?
I certainly would.
And by "love", I mostly mean the word. Who created it? Who gave it its meaning, who pumped it so full of power that it's said regularly, but sparsely enough to be special? Who made it so important and consuming that I hear it every time I turn on the radio?
Was he like me? Did he stew with every lull in his day and drift off on that feeling, so much so that he finally named it? Did he live every moment just for the next? How full was his heart and his spirit? How much did he yearn for that person? Why did he yearn for that person? Could he even explain it? Is that love?
Who created love?
And when can I shake his hand? Because I, for lack of a better word, love his work.
And I'd love to have more of it.
Who created love? Do we commend him for it?
I certainly would.
And by "love", I mostly mean the word. Who created it? Who gave it its meaning, who pumped it so full of power that it's said regularly, but sparsely enough to be special? Who made it so important and consuming that I hear it every time I turn on the radio?
Was he like me? Did he stew with every lull in his day and drift off on that feeling, so much so that he finally named it? Did he live every moment just for the next? How full was his heart and his spirit? How much did he yearn for that person? Why did he yearn for that person? Could he even explain it? Is that love?
Who created love?
And when can I shake his hand? Because I, for lack of a better word, love his work.
And I'd love to have more of it.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Tomorrow's Just a Song Away
Life is no longer simple.
I can no longer not to my homework and still pass with flying colors.
I can no longer not clean my room and be happy with the clutter.
I can no longer just listen to Jason Mraz.
I know. I felt the world stop too. I'm sorry Mraz, but the time had to come. The stars knew it, the Earth knew it, my friends and acquaintances knew it. But you and I were oblivious, caught up in our immense love for each other.
No, no. You will not now, nor will you ever, fall from slot number one on my list of Favorite Artists. No no. You will not now, nor will you ever, cease to be the theme of my vehicle.
You just might have to share the room on my iPod.
Of late I've adopted a few new artists into my music library. I think I've subconsciously been rather feminist; my most recent additions being female and all.
Here is a list of those I've added, and those I've yet to add (but I eagerly await they day they join me):
My Favorite Highway
Ingrid Michaelson
Diane Birch
Dawn Mitschele
The Gibbons
Owl City
Matchbox Twenty
Jack Johnson
Two Spot Gobi
Thomas Fiss
Peter Cincotti*
Gin Blossoms
Deep Blue Something*
Frou Frou*
The Weepies*
Mikey Wax*
Newton Falkner*
Chester French*
Lenka*
Tyler Hilton**
A Fine Frenzy**
(Those with the * I have yet to purchase/fully listen to and enjoy. Those with the ** I just fell in love with prior to writing this blog, and will most likely purchase them first.)
As you can tell, times are indeed no longer simpler. The warbling of one to two artists can no longer suffice my crave and all-consuming need of excellent music. Now, to go about procuring these gems...
Dear Easter Bunny...
I can no longer not to my homework and still pass with flying colors.
I can no longer not clean my room and be happy with the clutter.
I can no longer just listen to Jason Mraz.
I know. I felt the world stop too. I'm sorry Mraz, but the time had to come. The stars knew it, the Earth knew it, my friends and acquaintances knew it. But you and I were oblivious, caught up in our immense love for each other.
No, no. You will not now, nor will you ever, fall from slot number one on my list of Favorite Artists. No no. You will not now, nor will you ever, cease to be the theme of my vehicle.
You just might have to share the room on my iPod.
Of late I've adopted a few new artists into my music library. I think I've subconsciously been rather feminist; my most recent additions being female and all.
Here is a list of those I've added, and those I've yet to add (but I eagerly await they day they join me):
My Favorite Highway
Ingrid Michaelson
Diane Birch
Dawn Mitschele
The Gibbons
Owl City
Matchbox Twenty
Jack Johnson
Two Spot Gobi
Thomas Fiss
Peter Cincotti*
Gin Blossoms
Deep Blue Something*
Frou Frou*
The Weepies*
Mikey Wax*
Newton Falkner*
Chester French*
Lenka*
Tyler Hilton**
A Fine Frenzy**
(Those with the * I have yet to purchase/fully listen to and enjoy. Those with the ** I just fell in love with prior to writing this blog, and will most likely purchase them first.)
As you can tell, times are indeed no longer simpler. The warbling of one to two artists can no longer suffice my crave and all-consuming need of excellent music. Now, to go about procuring these gems...
Dear Easter Bunny...
Monday, March 8, 2010
Behind These Hazel Eyes
I sat on the floor with my school lunch. I pondered it silently.
I don't really want to eat this, I thought, procrastinating that first fatal bite.
I was pulled partially from my thoughts when I vaguely recognized a voice. It pricked its way delicately through the clouded walls of my mind. I grew attentive to it; subconsciously I turned to the source.
And there he stood, his eyes reaching out to me through his current conversation. The world dropped for the two of us as our eyes met. His were opened, pleading, sending me a message only mine could read. "Why did you go?" They asked me, "Please come back. I miss you." They insisted. "I really cared for you." And perhaps I saw for but a moment, "I love you."
I turned away, again without conscious thought, hoping one of these days his eyes will take the time to read mine; they tell him, as they have for quite some time now, that I'm not believing his anymore.
I don't really want to eat this, I thought, procrastinating that first fatal bite.
I was pulled partially from my thoughts when I vaguely recognized a voice. It pricked its way delicately through the clouded walls of my mind. I grew attentive to it; subconsciously I turned to the source.
And there he stood, his eyes reaching out to me through his current conversation. The world dropped for the two of us as our eyes met. His were opened, pleading, sending me a message only mine could read. "Why did you go?" They asked me, "Please come back. I miss you." They insisted. "I really cared for you." And perhaps I saw for but a moment, "I love you."
I turned away, again without conscious thought, hoping one of these days his eyes will take the time to read mine; they tell him, as they have for quite some time now, that I'm not believing his anymore.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
What can I say? What can I do to make you love me?
I lay in bed at night and think. And there's one theme that's been drifting me to sleep since Friday. I roll to my side and press the soft blanket against my cheek and smile. This "idea" is so pleasing to me because I know it's not all in my head. I know these day-dreams and fantasies aren't the extent of happiness I'll feel.
Because I'm not dreaming, under this lime green quilt; I'm remembering. And I adore it.
But I haven't grown up. No, no I haven't. I thought I'd learned from past experiences that this is how it works; not this, this . But I can't do it. I can't.
I'm caught up in him, everything about him; and what kills me the most is I saw it today. I saw it returned. I saw in his eyes what must be in mine. And, Heaven help me, I nearly ignored it. He stood there,waiting for me to speak, and I sat there, waiting desperately to do so. I kept looking to those around me, willing them within my heart to say something to him; he needs someone to say something! It never occurred to me that I could speak. It never occurred to me that I could start this conversation we both craved. This conversation we both awkwardly lingered around.
But I couldn't do it. I couldn't.
And he left.
And it hit me slowly, like I was laying in the road and someone gently backed their car over me: with each step he took the farther under I went, until I found myself unable to breath.
What did I just do?
I've spent my life hanging in my heart for a specific boy to look my way. I've gone through a line of them, yes, it hasn't been the same boy all this time; but I've reacted in the same manner each and every time.
I "love" him. He tries to be friends, as all good boys do. I assume he feels the same way I do. I do nothing to win over his heart: I don't flirt, I don't joke, I want that relationship; and he wants it too right? So why wont he act?
The next step leads to the boy pulling out of my life. And I hardly, if never, end up speaking to them again.
And this one time it was different. It is different; Oh, let me slip into death this very night if it's all past-tense. Let this game still play! -I was choking on his departure, not because he was going away from me, across the room; but because, at that moment, I knew he saw no reason not to go away from this forever. If he feels, in his heart, somewhere, the way I do now, and he doesn't feel I feel it... Why would he stay?
Why should he stay?
I'm caving in upon myself, and have been since about eleven o'clock. I can't let him go so simply. I don't even know what it is about him, what it could possibly be that the mere thought of it leaving is crushing me so much. I need this day to end and tomorrow to begin. I need to find him and talk like today never happened. Find him and say the millions of things that should have been said the moment before he turned away.
This relationship can't just be cute, silent faces from across the room. And it's my fault that, as of now, that's all it has been.
Oh please, please don't give up on me yet! My coldness is a lapse in judgement, a lapse in consciousness. I'm sorry if I hurt you. I'm sorry if you read my stupidity as lack of interest; how could it possibly be? You see the way I look at you. It's like your Ora is the Earth, and my attention is the moon, and try as I might I just can't pull away from you. Believe me, I've tried. And I've failed horribly. And if you'll just let me climb over this self-imposed stumbling block, I'm sure neither of us will ever have to pull away. I don't ever want to. And I want you to know. So I smile at what you say and do, even when it's not funny.
It's because it's coming from you that I smile.
Please keep smiling back.
Because I'm not dreaming, under this lime green quilt; I'm remembering. And I adore it.
But I haven't grown up. No, no I haven't. I thought I'd learned from past experiences that this is how it works; not this, this . But I can't do it. I can't.
I'm caught up in him, everything about him; and what kills me the most is I saw it today. I saw it returned. I saw in his eyes what must be in mine. And, Heaven help me, I nearly ignored it. He stood there,waiting for me to speak, and I sat there, waiting desperately to do so. I kept looking to those around me, willing them within my heart to say something to him; he needs someone to say something! It never occurred to me that I could speak. It never occurred to me that I could start this conversation we both craved. This conversation we both awkwardly lingered around.
But I couldn't do it. I couldn't.
And he left.
And it hit me slowly, like I was laying in the road and someone gently backed their car over me: with each step he took the farther under I went, until I found myself unable to breath.
What did I just do?
I've spent my life hanging in my heart for a specific boy to look my way. I've gone through a line of them, yes, it hasn't been the same boy all this time; but I've reacted in the same manner each and every time.
I "love" him. He tries to be friends, as all good boys do. I assume he feels the same way I do. I do nothing to win over his heart: I don't flirt, I don't joke, I want that relationship; and he wants it too right? So why wont he act?
The next step leads to the boy pulling out of my life. And I hardly, if never, end up speaking to them again.
And this one time it was different. It is different; Oh, let me slip into death this very night if it's all past-tense. Let this game still play! -I was choking on his departure, not because he was going away from me, across the room; but because, at that moment, I knew he saw no reason not to go away from this forever. If he feels, in his heart, somewhere, the way I do now, and he doesn't feel I feel it... Why would he stay?
Why should he stay?
I'm caving in upon myself, and have been since about eleven o'clock. I can't let him go so simply. I don't even know what it is about him, what it could possibly be that the mere thought of it leaving is crushing me so much. I need this day to end and tomorrow to begin. I need to find him and talk like today never happened. Find him and say the millions of things that should have been said the moment before he turned away.
This relationship can't just be cute, silent faces from across the room. And it's my fault that, as of now, that's all it has been.
Oh please, please don't give up on me yet! My coldness is a lapse in judgement, a lapse in consciousness. I'm sorry if I hurt you. I'm sorry if you read my stupidity as lack of interest; how could it possibly be? You see the way I look at you. It's like your Ora is the Earth, and my attention is the moon, and try as I might I just can't pull away from you. Believe me, I've tried. And I've failed horribly. And if you'll just let me climb over this self-imposed stumbling block, I'm sure neither of us will ever have to pull away. I don't ever want to. And I want you to know. So I smile at what you say and do, even when it's not funny.
It's because it's coming from you that I smile.
Please keep smiling back.
Monday, March 1, 2010
A Poem a Day...
I think my research assignment is getting to me. This keeps running through my head, so now I shall curse you in the manner I have been cursed. If you would, please direct your attention to Langston Hughes:
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore-
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over-
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
This made me remember the Onion poem. Please don't ask me how. Or why.
"Song to Onions" Ray Blount, Jr.
They improve everything, pork chops to soup,
And not only that but each onion's a group.
Peel back the skin, delve into tissue
And see how an onion has been blessed with an issue.
Every layer produces an ovum:
You think you've got three then you find you've got fovum.
Onion on on-
Ion on onion the run,
Each but the smallest one some onion's mother:
And onion comprises a half-dozen other.
In sum then an onion you could say is less
Than the sum of its parts.
But then I like things that more are than profess-
In food and in the arts.
Things pungent, not tony.
I'll take Damon Runyon
Over Antonioni-
Who if an i wanders becoms Anti-onion.
I'm anti-baloney.
Although a boloney sandwich would
Right now, with onions, be right good.
And so would sliced onions,
Cewed with cheese.
Or onions chopped and sprinkled
Over black-eyed peas:
Black-eyed,
grey-gravied,
absorbent of essences,
eaton on New Year's Eve
peas.
How this man was published, I'll never know. But I commend every moment of it.
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore-
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over-
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
This made me remember the Onion poem. Please don't ask me how. Or why.
"Song to Onions" Ray Blount, Jr.
They improve everything, pork chops to soup,
And not only that but each onion's a group.
Peel back the skin, delve into tissue
And see how an onion has been blessed with an issue.
Every layer produces an ovum:
You think you've got three then you find you've got fovum.
Onion on on-
Ion on onion the run,
Each but the smallest one some onion's mother:
And onion comprises a half-dozen other.
In sum then an onion you could say is less
Than the sum of its parts.
But then I like things that more are than profess-
In food and in the arts.
Things pungent, not tony.
I'll take Damon Runyon
Over Antonioni-
Who if an i wanders becoms Anti-onion.
I'm anti-baloney.
Although a boloney sandwich would
Right now, with onions, be right good.
And so would sliced onions,
Cewed with cheese.
Or onions chopped and sprinkled
Over black-eyed peas:
Black-eyed,
grey-gravied,
absorbent of essences,
eaton on New Year's Eve
peas.
How this man was published, I'll never know. But I commend every moment of it.
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Springtime; a Ring a Ding a Dingtime. Birds sing-ing. Sweet lovers love... The Spring!
The trouble with the rearranging of the room is the mess that follows. Because, naturally, I couldn't just move my bed, bookcase, dresser, desk, and the like without having to purge the closet of unneeded clothes and stuble upon many a random object which my inner PackRat is utterly unwilling to toss.
Junior year has been a change for me. I became myself over the course of this year. Though, yes, I've always been myself, but I think I reached that destination to the fullest extent this year. So far.
I no longer stay in my shell until I warm up to people; I'm perfectly content, now, being my bizarre, obseen self right off the bat. People probably wish I wasn't. But I am.
Not to mentoin I'm pretty now. Not saying that to fall back into my recently escaped Bifu land, but truthfully, looking at pictures of me just last year, I've blossomed.
Thank you orthodonist.
And nature.
So naturally I must attend to my surroundings and dispell all those things that keep me linked to the me of the past. She was a good, lovely, spunky little gal, but her term is up. It's time to remember her in pictures and humorous journal entries; not every corner of my room.
So, oddly, I am able to admit I've caught the spring cleaning bug.
And perhaps that's part of this newfound me. Perhaps, and I'm not carving this in stone, perhaps I like to clean.
Or perhaps I like adventure.
And that pile of miscellaneous is my grandest adventure to date.
Junior year has been a change for me. I became myself over the course of this year. Though, yes, I've always been myself, but I think I reached that destination to the fullest extent this year. So far.
I no longer stay in my shell until I warm up to people; I'm perfectly content, now, being my bizarre, obseen self right off the bat. People probably wish I wasn't. But I am.
Not to mentoin I'm pretty now. Not saying that to fall back into my recently escaped Bifu land, but truthfully, looking at pictures of me just last year, I've blossomed.
Thank you orthodonist.
And nature.
So naturally I must attend to my surroundings and dispell all those things that keep me linked to the me of the past. She was a good, lovely, spunky little gal, but her term is up. It's time to remember her in pictures and humorous journal entries; not every corner of my room.
So, oddly, I am able to admit I've caught the spring cleaning bug.
And perhaps that's part of this newfound me. Perhaps, and I'm not carving this in stone, perhaps I like to clean.
Or perhaps I like adventure.
And that pile of miscellaneous is my grandest adventure to date.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Today's Atmosphere: Cloud Nine
I like Pop Tarts.
This is how I feel about them:
I fear-Darling
The machine ate the tape.
I fear-sweet thing,
That the hour's growing late.
You hold the door-forever,
And I'm forever away.
But your door's not mine;
Oh, your door's not mine.
I have gone-too far
Into my own head.
And now I'm-stuck hard
'Cuz I can't get enough of it;
Enough of you-this time,
Though this time just won't quit
A minute hand.
The longest minute hand.
And I don't want to swim
At the speed of light
If you're stuck where you are.
And I don't want to race
With gods and angels alike
If you're just a distant star.
Darling, I know
It-is-strange
For me to love
You-this-way,
But there's something that you've just got to know:
Life ends-where you end.
Love goes-where you go.
I look-with longing
At what's not too far away.
And I know-what's coming;
What will change and what must stay.
Kill this pointless space-between us,
Or it will be the death of me.
Suffocated air.
Just suffocated air.
And I don't want to swim
At the speed of light
If you'r stuck where you are.
And I don't want to race
With gods and angels alike
If you're just a distant star.
Darling, I know
It-is-strange
For me to love
You-this-way,
But there's something that you've just got to know:
Life ends-where you end.
Love goes-where you go.
And it seems to me-to be simpler
When it flows across-the room.
My heart couldn't be much emptier,
Knowing it's not part of-you.
These gaps aren't made to stay there,
But they aren't filling too.
Let me slit my throat and lie-down.
Let this blood
Bleed me through...
'Cuz I don't want to swim
At the speed of light
If you're stuck where you are.
And I don't want to race
With gods and angels alike
If you're just a distant star.
Darling, I know
It-is-strange
For me to love
You-this-way,
But there's something that you've just got to know:
Life ends-where you end.
Love goes-where you go.
Baby this life-will end;
And this heart will beat.
And this blood will flow
Red, through the streets.
It will stain your shoes,
And bleed right through
To the core;
Please know I couldn't love this more.
The best part of swimming
At the speed of light
Is getting where you are.
And I'd race
With gods and angels alike
If I could win one blessed star.
Darling, I know
It-is-strange
For me to love
You-this-way,
But there's something I'm surprised you don't know:
Life ends-where you end.
Love goes-as far as you go.
I'll go
Wherever you-go.
May our toasters all be working, and may our Pop Tarts be well worth the wait.
-Erica
This is how I feel about them:
I fear-Darling
The machine ate the tape.
I fear-sweet thing,
That the hour's growing late.
You hold the door-forever,
And I'm forever away.
But your door's not mine;
Oh, your door's not mine.
I have gone-too far
Into my own head.
And now I'm-stuck hard
'Cuz I can't get enough of it;
Enough of you-this time,
Though this time just won't quit
A minute hand.
The longest minute hand.
And I don't want to swim
At the speed of light
If you're stuck where you are.
And I don't want to race
With gods and angels alike
If you're just a distant star.
Darling, I know
It-is-strange
For me to love
You-this-way,
But there's something that you've just got to know:
Life ends-where you end.
Love goes-where you go.
I look-with longing
At what's not too far away.
And I know-what's coming;
What will change and what must stay.
Kill this pointless space-between us,
Or it will be the death of me.
Suffocated air.
Just suffocated air.
And I don't want to swim
At the speed of light
If you'r stuck where you are.
And I don't want to race
With gods and angels alike
If you're just a distant star.
Darling, I know
It-is-strange
For me to love
You-this-way,
But there's something that you've just got to know:
Life ends-where you end.
Love goes-where you go.
And it seems to me-to be simpler
When it flows across-the room.
My heart couldn't be much emptier,
Knowing it's not part of-you.
These gaps aren't made to stay there,
But they aren't filling too.
Let me slit my throat and lie-down.
Let this blood
Bleed me through...
'Cuz I don't want to swim
At the speed of light
If you're stuck where you are.
And I don't want to race
With gods and angels alike
If you're just a distant star.
Darling, I know
It-is-strange
For me to love
You-this-way,
But there's something that you've just got to know:
Life ends-where you end.
Love goes-where you go.
Baby this life-will end;
And this heart will beat.
And this blood will flow
Red, through the streets.
It will stain your shoes,
And bleed right through
To the core;
Please know I couldn't love this more.
The best part of swimming
At the speed of light
Is getting where you are.
And I'd race
With gods and angels alike
If I could win one blessed star.
Darling, I know
It-is-strange
For me to love
You-this-way,
But there's something I'm surprised you don't know:
Life ends-where you end.
Love goes-as far as you go.
I'll go
Wherever you-go.
May our toasters all be working, and may our Pop Tarts be well worth the wait.
-Erica
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Pardon My Rambling
Today's mood: Frustraited.
I'm frustraited with him, with myself, with this homework, with the setting sun, with etc etc etc...
I have this twinge inside me, this nagging pinch that's driving me mad. What does it want? What doesn't it want? It wants him to be with me, it wants me to have never fallen behind in homework, but mostly it wants to create.
I have books and ideas that flow through my head, I have characters and places and stories to be read. But I just cannont write them, the words just don't come; and I'm stuck in this limbo with a pie on my thumb. I can't eat, I can't sleep because I'm too incomplete. And I need to record this, not just for me, but for them. For the world, for all those in it, so they too may drown the sorrow with an ounce of benefit.
I want to punch something. I don't know what it is. Perhaps I'll take a walk. I need to do something. This pent-up frustration is driving me mad.
I'm frustraited with him, with myself, with this homework, with the setting sun, with etc etc etc...
I have this twinge inside me, this nagging pinch that's driving me mad. What does it want? What doesn't it want? It wants him to be with me, it wants me to have never fallen behind in homework, but mostly it wants to create.
I have books and ideas that flow through my head, I have characters and places and stories to be read. But I just cannont write them, the words just don't come; and I'm stuck in this limbo with a pie on my thumb. I can't eat, I can't sleep because I'm too incomplete. And I need to record this, not just for me, but for them. For the world, for all those in it, so they too may drown the sorrow with an ounce of benefit.
I want to punch something. I don't know what it is. Perhaps I'll take a walk. I need to do something. This pent-up frustration is driving me mad.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
What You See's Not What You Get
[Author's note: I originally attempted to write this in my short-story notebook, but I hit too many distractions and it wasn't as even as I'd hoped. Here I shall attempt to rewrite it the way it should have been written to begin with.]
I brush my bangs back, unaware the mirror I'm looking in isn't the crystal reflection I've seen my life through.
The faded, smoky, jewel-encrusted mirror shows eyes of a goddess, the most fabulous blond hair, and a smile that could blow a hole straight through a mountain.
"Who wouldn't want you?" I ask myself with a smile.
I turn from the mirror.
This place isn't my bathroom. I've somehow come to stand in a large, endless room with vaulted ceilings littered with dangling decorations. The room is sepia and foggy. The lights are dim; vague, orange smudges sporadically glowing along the walls.
I stop in minor awe. This place is lovely. I begin to wonder how I came to be here, when I notice the masses of people hidden in the dark. They smile at me and beacon me come. There are smiles and compliments and glistening, gorgeous eyes...
And I want to be one of them. They float along with perfection, and their alluring smiles cause me to crave that same perfection. I look in the jeweled mirror and sense I'm nearly there. With a face like this I should be accepted in immediately.
But all the while, a feeling burns in the back of my being. It's uncomfortable and leads me to fidget, but with each approving smile it escalates. I take this adrenaline for happiness and continue on my way.
With each word I speak and each word returned I feel that rush. This must be what acceptance feels like, what confidence feels like. This must be what I've been missing.
I dress before the bejeweled mirror each day. I paint my face to perfection. How is this shirt? Does it hug my curves? How do I look from the side?
And they smile at me with their porcelain eyes, and this feeling grows higher. But with it grows the crave for more. I'm not one of them yet; I must do all I can to make it so.
I'm leaving my old friends behind. In between the alluring smiles and flashy compliments I miss them. I see them down there, outside this window. But this feeling within me won't allow me to visit. If I leave this place, all I've worked for is gone.
I can't have that.
But I'm still nudged with discomfort, though I'm positively unsure why.
I lay there in bed, growing anxious for the coming day. I know what I'm wearing and how I'll do my hair. I can't wait to hear their remarks! I can't wait to see their smiles! I...
Something hits me. A freight train of knowledge collides with my brain.
I slip from under the covers, barefoot, to the ground. I make my way to the window and peer outside. It's dark from here. All I can see is the distant, distant ground below. Looking out, there is no horizon; no mountains, no trees.
"It's just a stormy night." I tell myself. Nonetheless, I lean farther out, examining the blackened fog.
Something small chips from the cement windowsill beneath my fingers and drops slowly to the ground outside. I watch it land to the dirt at the base of the building.
But the base...
I recoil back in shock. I run to the jeweled mirror, willing it not to be so. But it is. The mirror is black, and all but a few jewels have crumbled from the frame.
I reach a reluctant hand out and rub away at the black.
My eyes are dark and quiet, lined and painted in a desperate attempt to bring the life and light back to them. My hair is greasy and frayed and coming undone.
I don't try smiling.
They watch me as I gather my things and wrap them in my jacket. That strange twinge within me finally feels at peace.
"Why are you leaving?" One asks as I head slowly for the door.
I turn back and explain.
"The Devil is sly, but his vanity is slyer."
I looked in car windows and smiled at myself. It's nice to know you're pretty, it's a great confidence booster when you're having an off day. But I looked one too many times. I commented on myself one too many times.
And with each glance, with each compliment I gave myself, I became more and more consumed by the great and spacious building. It was so subtle and minor that I didn't even realize it was there. I don't remember looking longingly over, I don't remember timidly climbing the stairs, I don't remember pressing open the door.
It was all in the looking glass. Day by day it grew blacker and blacker, jeweled only to keep the appeal. I continued to look, and it continued to change.
I gave up the place I'd held before for something newer and, for the moment, better. I'd finally found my lot in life.
"You look pretty today, Erica."
The compliment was answered with a, "Thanks!"
But it somehow became an implied, "I know."
I must keep my eyes open, and keep aware of my surroundings. I must ensure the mirror won't lead me back there. Because, after all, it wasn't much of a choice. You don't choose to enter the great and spacious building.
It enters you.
It becomes you.
It controls you.
I will no longer be a slave to the world, I will no longer look pleasingly at the secular things.
I smile to my goddess's eyes as I brush through my hair.
"Pretty as always." I smile.
I use my finger to buff away the black, smoky smudge slowly encroaching the glass.
I brush my bangs back, unaware the mirror I'm looking in isn't the crystal reflection I've seen my life through.
The faded, smoky, jewel-encrusted mirror shows eyes of a goddess, the most fabulous blond hair, and a smile that could blow a hole straight through a mountain.
"Who wouldn't want you?" I ask myself with a smile.
I turn from the mirror.
This place isn't my bathroom. I've somehow come to stand in a large, endless room with vaulted ceilings littered with dangling decorations. The room is sepia and foggy. The lights are dim; vague, orange smudges sporadically glowing along the walls.
I stop in minor awe. This place is lovely. I begin to wonder how I came to be here, when I notice the masses of people hidden in the dark. They smile at me and beacon me come. There are smiles and compliments and glistening, gorgeous eyes...
And I want to be one of them. They float along with perfection, and their alluring smiles cause me to crave that same perfection. I look in the jeweled mirror and sense I'm nearly there. With a face like this I should be accepted in immediately.
But all the while, a feeling burns in the back of my being. It's uncomfortable and leads me to fidget, but with each approving smile it escalates. I take this adrenaline for happiness and continue on my way.
With each word I speak and each word returned I feel that rush. This must be what acceptance feels like, what confidence feels like. This must be what I've been missing.
I dress before the bejeweled mirror each day. I paint my face to perfection. How is this shirt? Does it hug my curves? How do I look from the side?
And they smile at me with their porcelain eyes, and this feeling grows higher. But with it grows the crave for more. I'm not one of them yet; I must do all I can to make it so.
I'm leaving my old friends behind. In between the alluring smiles and flashy compliments I miss them. I see them down there, outside this window. But this feeling within me won't allow me to visit. If I leave this place, all I've worked for is gone.
I can't have that.
But I'm still nudged with discomfort, though I'm positively unsure why.
I lay there in bed, growing anxious for the coming day. I know what I'm wearing and how I'll do my hair. I can't wait to hear their remarks! I can't wait to see their smiles! I...
Something hits me. A freight train of knowledge collides with my brain.
I slip from under the covers, barefoot, to the ground. I make my way to the window and peer outside. It's dark from here. All I can see is the distant, distant ground below. Looking out, there is no horizon; no mountains, no trees.
"It's just a stormy night." I tell myself. Nonetheless, I lean farther out, examining the blackened fog.
Something small chips from the cement windowsill beneath my fingers and drops slowly to the ground outside. I watch it land to the dirt at the base of the building.
But the base...
I recoil back in shock. I run to the jeweled mirror, willing it not to be so. But it is. The mirror is black, and all but a few jewels have crumbled from the frame.
I reach a reluctant hand out and rub away at the black.
My eyes are dark and quiet, lined and painted in a desperate attempt to bring the life and light back to them. My hair is greasy and frayed and coming undone.
I don't try smiling.
They watch me as I gather my things and wrap them in my jacket. That strange twinge within me finally feels at peace.
"Why are you leaving?" One asks as I head slowly for the door.
I turn back and explain.
"The Devil is sly, but his vanity is slyer."
I looked in car windows and smiled at myself. It's nice to know you're pretty, it's a great confidence booster when you're having an off day. But I looked one too many times. I commented on myself one too many times.
And with each glance, with each compliment I gave myself, I became more and more consumed by the great and spacious building. It was so subtle and minor that I didn't even realize it was there. I don't remember looking longingly over, I don't remember timidly climbing the stairs, I don't remember pressing open the door.
It was all in the looking glass. Day by day it grew blacker and blacker, jeweled only to keep the appeal. I continued to look, and it continued to change.
I gave up the place I'd held before for something newer and, for the moment, better. I'd finally found my lot in life.
"You look pretty today, Erica."
The compliment was answered with a, "Thanks!"
But it somehow became an implied, "I know."
I must keep my eyes open, and keep aware of my surroundings. I must ensure the mirror won't lead me back there. Because, after all, it wasn't much of a choice. You don't choose to enter the great and spacious building.
It enters you.
It becomes you.
It controls you.
I will no longer be a slave to the world, I will no longer look pleasingly at the secular things.
I smile to my goddess's eyes as I brush through my hair.
"Pretty as always." I smile.
I use my finger to buff away the black, smoky smudge slowly encroaching the glass.
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