you'd make a nighttime of the day so it'd suit the mood of your song

Maybe it's because I'm used to being broken and seeing broken things that I never complain when the ice machine is on the fritz or the air conditioner isn't quite cold enough. Maybe it's because I love the numbness that I find it easy to shut my eyes for three second intervals while I drive, a little dare for myself. I've been internally screaming for months and before I reached the boiling point, I let my car drift across lanes, regaining control just before disaster struck. The roads are silent and lonely at two in the morning, perfect for escapism. I want it to stay this fuzzy time forever, always have the perfect wind of a summer night to spill my secrets into.

via *

Ps. Sorry I've been gone; it's been rough goings.

challenges

I feel bled dry of words. All of the pretty words that usually swim in my head seem to have drowned or have gotten out of the pool in my thoughts. I have this horrible habit of stopping writing when I feel like what I am writing is crap. I know it's a process. I know it will not be Gatsby on the first draft. I know that this is a challenge to get words on paper so I can move forward from there. But I feel dried out and like I'm sabotaging myself.

Writing a novel is hard. It's tedious and draining. Not every word is beautiful, not all the dialogue is clean. I never understood when authors said it took them years to get a novel ready for publication and that by the time they got to their final draft so much had changed. But now I do. John Green said that in his first draft of Looking for Alaska, there was not even a hint of Pudge's obsession with last words. THIS IS A CENTRAL THEME IN THE BOOK. I couldn't imagine the book without it. How far that book came. How far mine will come.

It's amazing. Even when I feel bled dry of them, I find my solace in words. I write out my frustrations. I read books for more. I listen to music, engraining the lyrics on my skin. I want to talk to people. Watch words form on their lips. Trace them against their skin.

I guess I'm a writer after all.

messy mind

When I love something,

                                            I take sever ownership of it.

Like I have some deeper

                                                          Understanding and love of this thing.

When really

It's just different.

Except my favorite song. That's mine.

Mine

mine

Mime

Some days I feel less like a person,

more like a mime.

Going through the motions,                                                                       

Vastly unnoticed,

slightly creepy

ever watching.

Watching

watching

Waiting

Waiting for change,

                              dreading its arrival.

Ever feel like you 

                             sabotage yourself?

I do.

I slow myself down

                                     so change won't come.

Come

come

Came

Change has already

                         come and gone

And I'm fine.

                                      I survived. I flourished.

Flourished

flourished

Flounder

What if this is the time

                                I flounder and fail?

Don't think that way.

Believe

Hope

Blah blah.

BLAH.

I take ownership of things,

                           get competitive.

Volatile.

Stifled and stilted.

Stiff and sly.

I see people with similar

                             passions, dreams.

They inspire me,

                        intimidate me.

Drive me. 

There's enough success for two.

Good vibes to them=

                                good luck for me.

Sharing is caring,

                            it's first grade.

After all,

                                it's all first grade.

via Tumblr   

Spreading Venom Vs. Ellen Degeneres: A Treatise on Stress

It's been the strangest week, hasn't it? Anyone else feel that way? And the storm clouds in the sky over Utah have matched the metaphysical storm clouds that have settled in over the mountaintops in my brain. This week I've just felt... bleak? Melancholy? Like I'm running on empty?

Hormonal is probably the best word. 

via Tumblr

My mind has been a mess this week. Little things set me off, stress is piling up, and I feel like I'm crumbling under it all. I feel alone and isolated and misunderstood. I hate weeks like this because when I feel this crappy I always end up feeling more crappy BECAUSE of how unjustifiably miserable I am. I am a healthy, young, successful, generally happy personage living in American in 2013. I am fine. But why do I feel like such a depressive teenager? Super huge thanks hormones and stress. Super. Huge. Thanks.

Yesterday was sort of the cherry on top of my week of hormone hemorrhage. My schedule for yesterday was this: 

• Wake up at 6 AM (also known as the ass crack of dawn) to help with a charity yard sale for my school from 7-11:30. 
• Leave said yard sale early to go to work for 800 years from 12-7:30.
• Breathe at some point during the long day.

I knew that yesterday was going to be stressful. It was one of those days that because of how long you know it will be and how stressed you've been all week about it, your entire week is destroyed by it in anticipation. That was yesterday. But then it took a turn for the worst. 

I got sick. So sick. I felt like death sick. I drove around putting up yard sale signs for an hour, went back to the sale to help set up and within an hour, my stomach was twisting and clenching and punching itself. I tried to stay helpful and I put up a fight about staying to help but they sent me home.

I crawled in to bed hoping to feel better before I had to leave for work, but to no avail. I called out sick and slept the unrestful sleep of the ill all morning. When I woke up my stomach still felt anxious and my brain felt even worse. 

There's this thing called muscle memory. Once your body has done something for a long enough time period, it can be done without conscious effort. Like dancing. You learn the basic positions of ballet and after enough time they are engrained within your muscles. 

I believe that there is also emotional muscle memory. That something can happen to you that your mind remembers so vividly, that are so tattooed onto your heart that on the anniversary of that thing, your heart can hurt just like it did the year before. Yesterday was one of those days. Yesterday was an important day to me a year ago. A year ago I was so so so sad and so miserable. I was in constant pain and going through a huge trauma. But yesterday last year was sort of a beacon in the stormy sea, a day that gave last year hope. 

I think my body remembered that and freaked itself out. My emotions threw up all over my brain and made my body throw up. It got overwhelmed by the stresses of this year AND the stresses of last year. 

I have felt venom pooling in my veins all week long, almost like my body was anticipating this day. A guy I work with came up to me randomly on Tuesday night and attacked my romantic life. He told me I'd be alone for a while and that I'd be hurt really badly in another relationship before I find happiness. Part 1: You aren't allowed to say stuff like that to me unless you are my best friend. Part 2: NEVER say this to a girl who is already so scared to date and love again. It doesn't help. 

That comment, coupled with the hormones, coupled with the emotional memory recall has led to quite the build up of bioburden and venom trapped in my little body. I've been trying not to let it spread into my every day life and put me in to an emotional coma. For a second there I was losing that battle. 

Stress and overrunning emotions leaves you with two options: you can hold up a white flag of surrender and let them overtake you. OR you can find a way to defeat the stress. Wanna know the best weapon? 

Ellen Degeneres.

When I was feeling myself getting even more lost in my own head, filling with venom, I sat staring at my computer screen, pulled up to YouTube. A video recommended to me was an Ellen clip from her talk show. I watched the clip and found myself inexplicably smiling. Without knowing it, two hours had passed and my belly ached from laughing so hard and my cheeks were sore from smiling so hard.  

This is a good place to start your journey. 

She is so funny and so positive. I have the tendency to let stress spread all throughout my body and demolish me. I'm a hopeful person but if I have a painful memory that is persisting in my head, it doesn't matter how hard I try, I can't seem to remain optimistic. But Ellen brings back some optimism to my life. She makes me laugh. It like her videos are sucking out rattlesnake venom and I can feel the stress slowly leaving my body. It's pretty amazing. (I also enjoy how there is always one comment on her youtube videos that say the same thing about falling into the Ellen Video Vortex for hours without knowing what happened.) 

The next time you feel yourself being bitten by the stress bug, or a ghost from your past sneaks back onto your Facebook feed, take a break to laugh. Take the Degeneres drug and degenerate that stress. (NAILED THAT TAGLINE) 

Stay lovely. <3

Hump Day Jams

Well I am back into the swing of school! Kind of. I'm almost done and it's so hard to motivate, you know? And this week has been a whirlwind of stuff to deal with. Almost done with school, helping with a yard sale on Saturday, work for the next four days straight, MOVING is finally figured out hopefully!

Adult life, am I right?

The world keeps going and going and going and I feel like I'm stuck standing here watching it twirl around me. Like I'm standing in the center of a globe while everything just keeps spinning out of control.

This has been one of my favorite songs for years and years. It's called The World Spins Madly On by The Weepies, one of the best bands ever. They are so soft and perfect for cold winter nights and for summer nights where you need soft sounds to relax you. I need that this week when my world is spinning madly on. And this video is gorgeous, definitely my favorite video on youtube. It's gorgeous.

I hope your week is going great and that this song can calm any stormy seas out there.

Via Tumblr

A Bazooka in my Chest

So. I have finally torn my eyes away from Grey's Anatomy long enough to post something that's been pulling on my brain for weeks. More like... with help from Grey's Anatomy I finally have a metaphor that suits what I've been feeling for weeks.

Remember that episode of Grey's where the paramedic has her hand in a guys chest and then they find out that there is live ammunition just waiting to explode inside of him? Then Meredith goes and is the best human alive ever by placing her hand inside his chest when the paramedic freaks out. (Real quick... remember when that paramedic was Christina Ricci? What even...?) This episode had me crying like a child. Granted, I have cried about 95% of the time while watching Grey's. I can't with this show. I can't with life. It's all too much.

Image Via greys.wikia.com

I'm moving to Salt Lake in one month. One month. Not only that but in one month, I'm starting a new job, leaving an old job, leaving home, leaving my dogs, leaving school. All of this is awesome. All of it is exciting and I'm thrilled about it. I've been aching to move into Salt Lake since I came home from Cedar City a year ago. So why all this anxiety?

It's like high school graduation. You spend three years knowing it's coming and even in the last month of your senior year, it doesn't feel real. Then the next thing you know, you're standing in front of your mirror in your cap and gown.

That's what all this feels like. I've known it was coming and I've fought so hard for it to come. But now it's here and I'm so scared. I'm scared of leaving familiarity and jumping into a new world. More than living in the city, I'm afraid of starting a new job. I've trained for dental assisting for a year now and I'm good. I'm really good but I'm still learning. I now get to jump into an internship and continue to learn and then I'm working. I know they don't expect me to be perfect but what if I don't live up to the expectations? What if I'm not ready or capable?

And I have to relearn to live on my own again. I lived in Cedar by myself for two years and loved it. I loved the independence and the freedom to be an adult. But I've gotten used to coming home to the house I grew up in. I've gotten used to my old bedroom. I love the way it smells and I love my dogs being here with me. Now I get to live in a new house with new people in a city I've never lived in. I love Salt Lake and I've experience it a bit, but living there will be different.

I'm scared of not making friends in Salt Lake. I have some friends there but what if I'm not a city person? What if Salt Lake hates me and the people there don't like me? I'm afraid of being alone and unliked.

I've never been one to be afraid of change. I embrace change and I smile and work through it. So why am I so afraid this time? I'm just so tired. It's anew kind of adult tired. Stress tired. I am constantly in school and working and when I have any free time I just want to lay in bed and cherish my last days in that room. And rest my body in hopes that my mind will let itself rest. But it won't. It's on a constant loop of worries and things I have to get done before I move.

I just want to be ready. I want to move slowly and steady enough to embrace this new chapter while not missing anything of my old chapter. I want to slowly remove the bazooka in my chest cavity before the worry eats me up. Any advice as to how I can do this, let a girl know. I'm sick of feeling like I'm in limbo. I don't want the anxiety to overshadow the excitement and possibility anymore.

This was super rambly but I think my brain needed to purge. YAY PURGE BRAIN.

Also.. If you don't already. Watch Grey's Anatomy. It will change your world. K. Bye.

Image via Tumblr

Thanks Sam

Frodo: I can't do this, Sam.

Sam: I know. It's all wrong. By right we shouldn't even be here. But we are. It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger, they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something.

Frodo: What are we holding onto, Sam? 

Sam: That there's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo... and it's worth fighting for. 

Thank you, Sam. Your words are always the greatest comfort. 

Image via Tumblr