love is like a cigarette...

oh that first ignition of warmth

embers free the begging smoke

indescribable, blissful delicacy

but then comes the first detachment

a thumb nail jostles the unwanted

the smolder crawls near

finally, the grasp of devastation

its heat no longer assures

a collision of filter and foot end it all.

now you will repeat to nourish that obsession

i want to get lost in the back roads of the city with you

i don't know why i wait so long to blog. actually, i do. i kind of hate the idea of blogging. it's so cliche and 21st century-esque. i'm not a big fan of those two things... but yet, here i am. your own walking paradox.

onto other things. i don't even know what other things to "blog" about. i know what i want to say and how to put it well, i just don't know if i can. there are numerous reasons why i'm holding back:

1. because i don't know who actually reads this, or who will happen to fall upon it. what if one of his good friends reads it? what if he is extremely bored one day and decides to read it? would it make him happy or would it creep him out that i'm writing about him?

2. i'm not sure i'm ready to admit what i feel. it seems as if once something is written down, it becomes permanent. it is no longer an idea or a light hearted text that will eventually erase itself from both phones. i mean, i could easily push delete on this post but if i post then why would i want to delete it? if i finally decide to let it all out, then it's out. taking it back would be pointless and cowardly.

3. maybe it's all fake. maybe the twist of my stomach is just old feelings resurfacing. maybe it's this insane desire to want love. or maybe i'm just so afraid and so full of doubt that i feed myself these crazy lies. can physical longing be faked? it's easy to convince your brain, for the most part, that you care about this person. but can the butterflies and the difficulty breathing be faked? probably... we watch people fake love in movies. one of my favorite depictions of love is james mcavoy in becoming jane. he has that slight shake of his hand as he goes to kiss her. it seems as if that love isn't faked but then again it doesn't last all day, but simply a scene in a 2 hour movie. and what about me? i have no audience but myself. my stomach goes crazy when i think about the things he said or when i "happen to stumble" upon his profile.

i guess i can write a bit about him... first of all, let's make this clear. i don't think i love him. i think there is that potential there but i don't feel it now. i do think he is the most attractive person i know. i don't mean hottest or the most buff. but instead, all around he dominates... the way he holds himself, the way he smokes his cigarette, the way that he scrunches his nose when he wants me to laugh with him, the way the sides of his top lip curls into his teeth when he's really laughing, the way he sometimes he looks at me out of the corner of his eyes accompanied by a slight grin as if to speak to me silently. i am so attracted to him. i am enamored by him.

aside from the fact that i have no idea how he feels, the worst part is that i can picture it all happening so beautifully. i can see us walking hand in hand with him through the city, the mountains, the park, the great salt lake, anywhere. i can see us sitting on top of the salt lake library admist the snow and just admiring the beauty of it all. i can see us sitting in a car screaming along with the music over the roar of the freeway and driving until we can't drive anymore. i can see us finally ending up on the east coast, running around in the atlantic and being completely enamored with each other. i can see all of the silly, precious pictures that we would take.

what does this mean? it's vivid. it's there. but what if it can't happen because of the past? will this simply be a story that was never told? i don't want that. i want this story to be lived out. i want it to be disgustingly romantic but void of cheap cliches. i want deep, true, passionate love. and i want it with him. and the fact that i want it with him will probably make it so it doesn't happen. life seems to turn out that way. but despite all my concerns before, this is how i feel and i honestly don't care if it turns out that the world knows, if admitting them makes me weaker and more vulnerable, or if it turns out that the feelings weren't as extreme as my stomach was portraying. i want him. i want him to pull me in and just hug me while i rest my head in his chest. i want to wake up next to his smile after a long day at work that results in a nap at his place. that's all i want. not fancy dates... just comfort. the comfort of knowing that in his arms i'm safe and that i can just be me. i planned to end this a few sentences ago, but yet here i am. going on and on. why am i completely enamored and why did it happen so quickly? because of the past? i don't know. but here's another guy, getting a blog post devoted to him. what does this make me...? i don't know. but i will say this "outta sight. outta mind"... i definitely think that this relevant and true in this situation.

well, goodbye for another few months, probably. i will end on this quote:

“have you ever been in love? horrible isn't it? it makes you so vulnerable. it opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. you build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life...you give them a piece of you. they didn't ask for it. they did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore. love takes hostages. it gets inside you. it eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like 'maybe we should be just friends' turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. it hurts. not just in the imagination. not just in the mind. it's a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. i hate love.” -neil gaiman

lovely.

so i've been trying to write a good post for a while now. i don't want to say something that isn't at least somewhat worthwhile like my last post. those are rare for me (actually a post in general is rare for me, it seems). a lot of things have been going on in my life. specifically things with love. it's occurring in all aspects. i watch my friend who is in love with my best friend but she wants nothing. i watch my friend like this guy who has a girlfriend. she let him know and now i'm watching him struggle to figure out the kind of love he wants. i watch my friends that don't have anyone realize how lonely they are. and then they struggle with the thought of soul mates or just being with someone one day. then here i am trying to figure out my own love situation.

i thought that possibly by writing out all my thoughts on love i'd come to some divine conclusion as to why we all suffer through this stuff. but i did not succeed. maybe some country music will generate some thought... but not really. i just feel like we're all stuck in this constant cycle. this cycle of liking someone that doesn't like us back. or that they do but it won't work for whatever reason. it's not fair. we grew up with this thought that against all odds, you'll end up with the person that means most to you. maybe this will happen. i don't know. i have to constantly remind myself that i'm nineteen years old and have a long time to figure all this out and encounter this seemingly unattainable love. it all just sucks.

i want to be with him. i want him to want to be with me. but even when i text him i know he doesn't think about that. doesn't believe that i want it so bad. but it's there. he's there. always. if he's not at the forefront of my mind, he's hanging out in the back waiting for an opportunity to come out and be thought about fully again. this isn't fair either. but really, i'm doing it to myself. i'm blogging about him, texting him, talking to about him to my friends. i'm not even trying. why? i don't know. maybe because i feel that little piece of hope. that hope won't let me let him go. maybe hope is the evil of all things. people say they hate love, but maybe they really just hate hope. hope is what makes it so they won't let go of that love. and why do we hope? because we are selfish, egotistical beings. we think that maybe there will be something inside of us that will make them want to change everything. we think that with one word, one action they will realize that the love had been there all along. even as much as people are insecure and don't think they're worth something. we do know that there is something good about us. something that will make someone, someday want to hold us in their arms for all time. we have to long for that or we would never be able to go on.

it says in the Bible when God is telling eve her curse that she will have a desire for her husband. this is an interesting fact to me. it's obvious that we were meant for love. and since it's a part of the curse/punishment, then maybe we're meant to suffer through it and someday it'll work out. i don't know. these are just all my current ramblings on love.

i'll leave you with this thought:

plato believed that we were all made with 4 legs, 4 arms and 2 faces. zeus was afraid of our ability to over power him so he separated us and sent us to earth. in that we all are constantly searching for our soul mates--our other half.

i don't know if i believe in soul mates. but this is interesting. ha.

quizzes and newsletters

well, i brought back the facebook. who knew that you could bring social networking sites back from the dead? anyway, i was working today. i wasn't really working, but i was hanging out and was pretty bored and decided to take random stupid quizzes online. this was one of them:

Dr. Seuss Personality Test

Courtney took the Dr. Seuss Personality Test quiz and the result is Cat in the Hat

You like to mix things up and keep everything fresh. You are funny, sarcastic, witty and energetic. You enjoy spending time with your family and have an insatiable thirst for knowledge.


whoever made this, is a smart cookie. pretty much describes me exactly. so facebook is back in my life. and it's fine. i mean, i'm still addicted but for some reason i'm alright with that. whatevs man. haha.

school is lame as always and i don't really have anything profound to say about it... just that i'm stuck in this rut that i never dreamed i be in. i can't wait to live somewhere crazy and out there. i cannot wait. speaking of which, took a quiz for that too:

Dublin

You love the beautiful green nature that Ireland has to offer you. The outskirts of this city is a peaceful place to live, where you can look out over endless rolling green hills. Also, you like cold weather during the winter! You should move to Ireland!

yep, someday. me and dublin. we're gonna have great times. facebook quizzes might be a waste of time to some, but i love them. i mean, i already knew i should live overseas, but it's so much more assuring when some weird facebook quiz agrees with you...ha. but really. makes me happy that it got it right.



in other news, us mail roomers made a newsletter and it's fantastic. very satirical, sarcastic and mean. but hey, that's who we are. my life is fun sometimes. hahah. i'm the co-editor, which means i can put it in my resume someday. yesss! i'm going to try to figure out a link for it one of these days. anyway. i'm out. no philosophy and insights today :)

too late

i feel like most things in my life happen "too late." becoming good friends, admitting love. it's always too late.

cherish, my best friend is an example of this. we were kind of good friends in high school, but it wasn't until the summer before i left we became really really close. i mean, we have a great relationship. we're great friends, but it would have been nice to spend years getting to know her face to face rather than over texts, calls and facebook chat. i just hate that i realize how great people are in the most inopportune time. it's just not cool. same thing happened with emily. i didn't know how great she was until these last two weeks. why didn't we hang out until this year? why do i only have a semester left to build our friendship into something that will last forever?

this also happens with males. i admit my "love" for a guy when he's hundreds of miles away, rather than when i felt it right away. and then another guy and i finally admitted that we've had feelings for each other for quite a while. but now he has a girlfriend that he's living with, and should marry someday. why did we wait so long? we have all these excuses as to why, but we should have just said it rather than hide it. it's just super lame.

i know God has His timing, and that everything happens when it does for a reason--it's just frustrating knowing i couldn't open myself up enough to embrace all God has for me. this is in all aspects. like with cherish. her and i complete each other. she has what i don't and i have what she doesn't. why didn't i realize this in high school? why couldn't i just tell the guys i've fallen for them that i like them at that moment? what is holding me back where i just feel like i can't open myself up? i think it all boils down to the trust issues that everyone seems to have...

it's kind of interesting, because today we were talking about the fall of adam and eve and how they lost parts of the perfection that God had given them. i feel like this is also with trust. like adam and eve had perfect trust, and with the fall they (we) lost this. i have no Biblical basis to this. it's just what i think. i mean adam and eve did have it perfect. so part of that would have to be trust, i think.

plato said that there are two worlds. the world of becoming and the world of being. he said the world of being is where everything is perfect and becoming is the world we are in now. i don't feel like all of his philosophical views were correct, but i do kind of agree with it in the way of emotions. God has the perfect love, trust, etc. we can't acquire that until we go to heaven. so maybe we're forever doomed to not have complete trust in people. i know that people will fail and will give you every reason to distrust them. but why i can't i trust people until they give me a reason not to trust them? and even when they give me a reason, why can't i forgive them? why i am i so quick to hate and lack trust in others? why? i just wish there was some way to fix that because i feel like it's kind of a jerk thing to do. and totally not something Christ would do. i dunno. it just sucks.

and to tie it all up, i'm going to say that i hate that everything happens too late. it really just straight up pisses me off.

dear life, why do you change and suck so much?

Tonight was one of the best nights of my life. Jordann, my best friend here at CCU, bought me a ticket to see Wicked for my birthday. She is the best friend ever. The show was phenomenal! I can't even put into words how great it was. I also can't articulate how appreciative I am of Jordann. Not just because of the ticket of course, she lets me vents to her, vents to me. She's just all around amazing. Seeing the show made me miss acting so much. Sometimes I wish I could just return to high school and do all of that again. It truly was an amazing time. Could you imagine being in Wicked... oh my gosh! That would be... wow. Amazing

Through the amazingness of the play, I really thought about God. I thought about how he gifted people with such wonderful talents. The woman who played Elpheba was amazing. You should have heard her voice. While I was in awe of the actors and actresses, I also stood in awe of God. How does He make something so great and pure? I don't know. It was just really an amazing experience for me, God wise, which is kind of crazy if you think about it. It's been a while since I've had a real experience with God where I just feel overwhelmed by his greatness and tonight I did. I cried at the end of play because of the ability he put in these people to sing and act and the talent he gave Gregory MacGuire to write such an original story. But then I came home...

I applied to go on mission trips with CCU this summer. There was one specific one where you backpack across Europe and just talk to people about life and what that life entails. Another one was a focus on the Muslim community in England. I really wanted to go on the backpacking one. So much. But, I didn't get picked for that one. I got picked for England. I know all of the responses like "God must have a different plan for you," "God knows what He's doing." I know all of that stuff, but just once I wanted to get something I wanted badly. I mean, I do get things I want but I feel like whenever it is a question of my character and who I am and how I can fit into somewhere, I don't get it. I just feel so down. It just gets old... I know all those things like God's plan is bigger than mine but why is my plan and what I want always so different from his? How is it that some people can get what they want no matter what? Are they so holy that they know what God's will is for them? Does God lead them in the way where he wants them? Why do I have to be so disappointed? Why? I just want to know why... I want to know...

And I hate that I went from standing in awe of God's creation and what He's done with people to feeling like this. I hate it so much, but I can't help it. I just don't know what to do. I don't know how to pray about whether or not I should go on a trip at all. I don't know how I can come to God with an open heart, because right now my heart is closed and I don't want to hear what God has to say about the matter. I just wanted, just for once to be able to do something I really really wanted. I wanted it so much... I just don't get it. Why, God? Why? Seriously... I am so tired of the stupid answers like it's His will. I'm just so done with the stupid Christian responses. But that's a rant for another time. I just want to know why... it is just so old and typical.
Sorry for all of the repetition. It was purely a stream of consciousness, rant type blog. That is all...

husbands.

Day two of no Facebook. I never thought something so frivolous would be so hard. I'm happy I'm doing it, don't get me wrong. I just get bored. I want to see what people are up to. My first repercussion of not having one happened today; I wasn't able to find out that Fake Blake has a girlfriend now. The second one was not seeing pictures my roommate, Trayce, uploaded. But until I don't feel the need and want of a Facebook I'm not going back. That might be never. I kind of feel like I'm a better person for not doing it. Not necessarily better than others, just better than I was before. People can do what they want with it and be as obsessed and fake as they want (not that everyone is fake). I'm just done with it, perhaps permanently, I don't know. Hopefully this will be my last post that begins with Facebook, because now that I'm obsessing with not having one, Facebook is still controlling me. Will it ever end?

Onto better things, perhaps: I realized the beauty that is SNL in the past couple of days, especially Weekend Update. That stuff is pure genius. I want to marry Seth Meyers. Genius. That quirky little smile. Definitely my future husband.

That is all.

Just kidding, it isn't. I'm tired of what women have become in the world. Perhaps, I'm becoming a feminist. I don't know. I just know that something has happened that has warped the meaning of what a woman is--we're resorting back to the Republican Mother, at least Christians are. The other day my roommates and I were talking about purity. Jenni brought up this technique to encourage purity, which was for the dad to give his daughter a bracelet with jewels on it to represent each step taken with a boy. Each time the girl does something with a boy, like hold his hand, kiss him she has to give her father a jewel. Is that really all we are? Are we only what we can offer our future husband? So what if a girl has sex? People make mistakes. A woman is so much more than her purity. I hope that my husband decides to marry me because he loves my strong will and laugh, not because I'm a virgin.

And in that, why do we, as women, define ourselves in having a guy? It's like that is all that matters in the world: falling in love, getting married and having children. I want something more than that. I want to be secure in myself. I want to be able to write. I want to be able to go to a coffee shop, sit and listen to some Death Cab without feeling the need to be with a guy. I know it's a desire that God has put inside of us, and that's ok. I want to fall in love as much as the next girl. But I don't want it to define what I do in life. I don't want it to be all I do in life. I don't want my husband to be the bread winner while I sit at home and accumulate cellulite while watching my offspring run around chasing after the dog. I want to travel. I want to try new things. I want to have freedom. I want to do so much more than be the housewife. Perhaps I get so annoyed with the women that want this because I know there's more than this. My mom has a desire to do missions, but she can't because of her family. I know she loves us and wouldn't trade us for anything, but I also know she would love to be a missionary. I want to do that stuff before I decide to reside in surburbia with every other good Christian woman in the United States. I just want something more.

I'm tired of the norms. I hate that I'm at school. I want to be doing something crazy. I'm going to stay in school because I know that's the right thing to do so I can eventually do what I want to do. But once I get out of here, I'm going to go do what I want and no one can stop me and the first person that does will be out of my life. I don't know, there's just so much more out there than what's easiest to grab. I want the challenge. I want the excitement and someday I'm going to get it, and I cannot wait.

My life quote: "Break out of that rut and jump feet first into something crazier and deeper than ever before."

I'm living my life like that. Husband or no husband. Bring it on world. (Don't worry, I'm sure Seth Meyers would love to take that journey with me and he has a lot of money.)