liked or admired?

"cherish your solitude. take trains by yourself to places you have never been. sleep alone under the stars. learn how to drive a stick shift. go so far away that you stop being afraid of not coming back. say no whenever you don't want to do something. say yes if your instincts are strong, even if everyone around you disagrees. decide whether you want to be liked or admired. decide if fitting in is more important than finding out what you're doing here. believe in kissing."

state of this union

ever get into one of those moods where you're like, why is the world just sooooooo......like this? like, it's no matter how hopeful i get about the future, it all just implodes; to use pres. obama's poorly delivered analogy - something about airplanes and engines and crashing back down to earth.

i felt good watching the state of the union address. certainly, i am not naive enough to think that everything the president said is going to magically change our country for the better, but i have the spring of youthful hope on my side; god forbid i ever lose that or i'm done. i look at his speech like a pep rally; "look guys, this is what i want to do and i need your help. we're going to have to work together and it's not going to be easy but i believe that we can do it!" and then we all go out into the world to do the things that we are passionate about, to help each other out, to reach our goals and put this country back where it needs to be.

instead, immediately following the president's call to UNITE (god forbid; the union unites??), are skeptical political analysts giving reason after reason about why nothing he said could possibly work. WHY?? why can we not just say, YES it's time to move forward. enough of this bullshit; it's time to get off of our asses and make 2011 this country's bitch lover. we can do it. so why so much resistance?

and i can't even get into how much it frustrates me that i can't express these ideas to my own parents; my own FAMILY. i was raised to believe in one very narrow, single-minded view of the world and everything that exists, both inside of it and out. it's something that i struggle with every day because all the lessons i was taught as a child are so engrained in my head that the line between what i believe and what i think i believe and what i'm not sure if i believe and what i know i don't believe but i can't get out of my head are tangled together in the web that we're apparently calling becoming an adult.

it's gross, and all i can say is i hope i never grow up. not that i never grow up. that i never grow old. that i never lose the wonder and positivity of a child, that i can take into my adult life. the positivity and hopefulness that so many adults leave behind when the struggles of "real life" bring them down and they forget to get back up.

i don't want to grow up. this is MY world, MY union.. MY never never land. x

ain't no reason

ok. so two things. seemingly unrelated. although, that's never really the case.

1. my roommate and i (oh, and her 10 year old son. also my roommate) have finally gotten cable. i mean, i've only been living here for like 4 months. whatever. this is what i have observed.

i don't know it's just because i am used to growing up in a household with the tv constantly blaring, but our house finally feels like a home. and it's the TV. seriously. i am baffled by this, but not really.

my childhood memories consist of many nights spent cozied around the television. background noise. bonding over completely made up story lines that have little to actually do with real life.

IT'S RIDICULOUS. i am so angry that i feel this way. but seriously, the tv has changed this household. and shit, not much can make this roommate of a 50 year old personal trainer and her primary-school aged child can make my life feel normal. but TELEVISION. that's what does it. i'm disgusted.

2. i had a pre-trial arraignment at the courthouse the other day. and as i was sitting, waiting to be rescheduled AGAIN, i watched as the county deputy moseyed in with two incarcerated people of kerr county. they were full on jumpsuit and shackled around the waist, behind the back; everything.

and i don't know if it's just me, but all i could think was HOW. SAD. how sad that our judicial system just sucks SO BAD. i mean, don't get me wrong. i understand that there are people in the world who do bad things. it is unsafe for them to just be wandering around the face of planet earth with the rest of us, perfect as we are, because of their actions.

brett dennen says it best; "prison walls still standing tall/some things never change at all/keep on building prisons gonna fill them all/keep on building bombs gonna drop them all."

it's SO TRUE. nothing is done with incarcerated people to ensure they stay out of jail. well, i shouldn't nothing. but not ENOUGH. not the RIGHT THINGS. people labeled as "at risk" or "criminal" are going to live up to those labels. there is a difference between helping people; changing people, and just keeping them from killing each other.

it sucks and i don't know how to change it.

there's only one way i know how to help this situation. working at the shelter for me, loving kids who, out of the womb have been labeled at risk because of the shitty shitty living situations they've been born into. ALL I CAN DO is be there for them now. while they're young. show them that there is another way. I PRAY TO GOD and whoever else is out there, whatever you call him or her or it, that's it's enough. for one person.

because one person is all it takes. one person can change the world.

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." MLK

hey, cupcake

i have come to the conclusion that i am a sucker for a man who is passionate about his hair care products. or is passionate about cupcakes. here's the thing: PASSION. even if it's something as seemingly trivial as the shampoo you put in your hair (hey man, at least you shower).

because passion transcends, and translates into every other part of your life. you get where i'm going with this...

some guys are passionate about sports. that's fine. it's just typical. i was having a conversation about sports with a male yesterday, when i came to the hysterical realization that i knew more about the topic than he did. i mean, you lose the playoffs you're out. no Superbowl for you. i thought this was common knowledge. but HE asked ME that question. and i knew the answer. i am far more intrigued with men who have more to offer to a conversation than their fantasy football team's stats.

anyway, i digress... this same male, a few weeks back whilst in the midst of a chill sesh, joined his sister in an HEATED argument as to why i had to get this certain type of hair care line they were using. it wasn't so much of an argument, since there was no arguing, as them persuading me that this was the best shit EVER for hair.

one may wonder why i was so into a guy...a STRAIGHT male...who was so passionate about his hair care. but that's just it. he was passionate. which means if he can get passionate about something as mundane as shampoo...

yesterday i was chilling with a friend, when we got to talking about some cupcakes we were looking forward to grinding. whist we were munching away ever so heavenly, her boyfriend came home. he took one bite of the cupcake, which was probably a day or so old at this point, and went on a RAMPAGE about the quality of the cupcakes we were eating.

now, it may or may not matter to the story that the cupcakes are from the bakery my friend and i work at. we don't make the cupcakes, only sell them. however, the woman who does make the cupcakes is a world-renown pastry chef and therefore the pastries, i.e. cupcakes, are relatively high priced. not that they are not high-quality cupcakes, but these were high-quality + day old so not exactly at their peak of performance any longer.

anyway, my friend, i sense, has the same idea about passionate people as i do, whether she knows it or not. she, herself, is a passionate person, which is why i think we are friends as well.

passion is transcendent. it is important. and sometimes it's the only thing left but if you have PASSION...honey.

consider yourself lucky. x

2011?

isn't it interesting that when it comes time to celebrate the end of one year and the beginning of the next- new beginnings and resolutions- we do exactly what we will to quit doing come morning; drinking, drugs, sex and rock n roll. blacking out before the clock even strikes midnight, and waking up in a strange house, and strange bed, stranger...

it is...painfully ironic that nothing will ever change. that we are stuck in a cycle of wishing and wondering what life could be like without those gaping black holes of time in our lives, but there is no willingness to ever let it burn.