The Light In Demos

Writing on here feels almost like a desecration of what I have written previously. Stored on this little website is what I would describe as Em in amber. Captured just as I was and how I thought and the things I felt. Documentation of the human experience is such a saturated field that I do not believe I have much to contribute; however, I try anyways. Mostly because I believe that when I seek to gain the Avatar state that I'll have a head start on clearing my chakras.

Continuing to write here also feels like a clean middle finger jab at my sophomore honors English writing class in university. Shame on you, Deirdre. Making me feel that my writing was adolescent and boy centered. OF COURSE IT WAS I WAS 19. But, what I had hoped for -- a bit of a writing mentor-ship because it was something that I loved -- didn't happen because that is all you said. I wonder where my life would be now had I actually pursued that with you and become a writer. Where would I be now... I continue to love writing. That is apparent by my shelves and shelves of notebooks that only become more expansive each year.

I find it interesting how, as I experience life more and more, my experiences render me more and more speechless and without words to describe them. Oh, how can I possibly get down all of these things in my heart that are wanting to explode out?! I want to write about the genuine excitement I feel when I see the sun on the barley that sways in the most perfect breeze as birds sing and the whole sky is dancing watercolor madness. The little small and ordinary leaps of the heart as you catch the glimpse of a Maybe person and you fall in love a little bit more with the world. The flow of ink to paper as you write exactly what you mean in parsimonious terms. The thrill of inspiration as you find you have been on the path you've always dreamed of but thought was far away. The perfect song playing as you settle into a bath. Electricity flowing in your veins as you set out on a highway for something new or something old, but something.

There is so much that I want to be and so much that I am not. But I am so much more the person I have dreamt of becoming since I was a child, that I can take peace in that. And know that in five years, I'll look back and realize that I've become what I wanted at this age. I'm going to keep writing. Maybe not on here. But, I will. I promise.

Little Thing

"This life is a little thing."

Hello, Old Friend. Just two days ago I felt the kind of agitation of spirit that I used to get before I wrote. It was the kind of thing that would happen and I'd sit down at the computer and words would flow. I used to be able to write beautiful things. Now I'm older. And I haven't written for a very long time. The words get stuck and I am afraid of them. But here I am again.

I'm a writer. I don't know why I deny it. Not that I am good or anything, far from it. But instead of talking things out, instead of musing, instead of doing a lot of things, I find that writing is what helps me. It is what calms me. It allows me to see myself the way I've always dreamed of. I am more than myself when I write.

I don't write about much. No stories, anecdotes, scenes, adventures. Just life. I write about life and how I go through it and how it goes through me. So if anyone out there reads this, great. Everyone who used to read this probably has new emails and new things that they are doing and I am so happy for them. I am back though. I am here to write again and I think it'll help me with a lot of things. Thinking that someone out there has seen this.

Maybe you're a bot in Russia. Idk. but here I am.

B.S.U.R.

Maybe it is the stars, maybe it is me using this as an avoidance strategy when my room needs to be cleaned, or maybe it is the Edge of Tomorrow (entirely appropriate given what time it is)...whatever the reason I am here, and let it be known that I make awesome decisions after midnight.

Something I was doing a few months ago was chasing after the ghosts of tire-tracks I once knew; tire-tracks that were born of a small sense of adventure and pride, with a heaping teaspoon of hormones. I kept wanting to go back to that night when we were doing doughnuts outside that building, trying to see how black we could make the ground. Maybe if I went back to that night I could make you not hate me, make everything that followed not as frightening, I could have spoken my mind, and I could have been confident in making my mark instead of caring who was watching and what they thought. Just a few months ago, I would have gone over to that spot and stared at the asphalt until I was convinced I saw the mark of those tires and heard them screeching on the pavement. I only went back once. Once was enough to know that the mark wasn't there, we weren't the only two to drive that spot and constant traffic had eradicated our mark from that section of road.

I was left with this hollow feeling that I had hoped my pilgrimage would fill but instead it only increased depth. For a moment, I heard J. Gatsby pushing me to try to repeat the past. To reclaim those lost moments and make them what they should have been: filled with life, chances, and feeling. But I knew I couldn't go back; couldn't repeat the past. Try as I might, nothing was anything like what it could have been. Just recently have I come to realize that it is okay. It is okay that nothing quite turned out the way it could have; the past doesn't asked to be apologized for, only to be owned. To learn from your mistakes is the greatest tool to prevent other hollow pilgrimages.

//

The title of this post, B.S.U.R., is the first song on side B of this James Taylor record I have, and consequently it is played more than most because side B is just better. Anyways, I've been trying to come up with a blogpost for a while and all the drafts I have come up with have this sort of idea floating around it, hence B.S.U.R..

//

As I finish up this bag of Cinnamini Crunch, I realize that there is little I can add to this post. However, I would like to ask a question of everyone reading this: which way do you fold your origami crane? The answer could be instructions, but I'd like it to be something more than that. Answer this question in prosaic text with your eyes closed. Or just link me to wikihow. Anyways. It is late and I'm calling it a night.

All of My Days

Here I am once again, sorry it has taken so long. Although, really I don't know who that apology goes to; I think it goes more to me than any of you who are reading it. Time has gotten away from me and I haven't had the wonderfully cathartic experience of inscribing my deepest, strangest, and most dear thoughts in any medium in a long, long time. But I might actually get something posted tonight.

I have found this incredibly perfect song: Wolves and the Ravens. "I am easy to inspire, there is little I require...I wasn't yours and you weren't mine, though I've wished from time to time we had found a common ground...through the never-ending maze where the way is seldom clear, there is no map or compass near, I drive a ship I cannot steer..." I love that. It suits the night, the moment, and who I feel I am right now.

The last few months have been really hard for me (I will be as in keeping with my honesty policy on this blog as I can). Coming back from India to a place I haven't really lived since high school was not an easy transition, although I am coming to realize that it was the transition I needed to make. Change is not always easy; I used to think it was for me. I was determined to be different, to embrace every single kind of change. I've since realized that changing of yourself is more difficult that I had ever imagined. After getting back I realized that in order to become the person I wanted to be, I was going to have to start from scratch in a sense. Before India, I had never been honest to myself or with others; there were moments and phases, yes! However, I did not consistently act in accordance with who I was or who I am so I decided to change that. I've been working on it a lot, although many of you can't tell; I am loving how it feels. I can interact in an authentic way because I am being true to the divine spark within me and leaving out anything that makes me feel like less. That was the best detox I think I could have ever done. With that honesty has come sadness, heartache, many nights spent crying because of frustration at myself wondering why I couldn't just take the easy road. I, I have taken the one less traveled by. Looking back on the last little while, I don't think that my conscience would have allowed me to act in any other way; I have always had this need to know who I am and what I am doing and to always be true to that. The hardest thing is that I've been learning how to be a person again, I've rebuilt Emily from the ground up and she has been learning to crawl and walk and talk again and it was hard; it is hard. And it will continue to be hard until the day it stops. But I have learned so much, I couldn't go back now.

I am so grateful for those who have stuck with me in patience through this hard time, and been there to listen and such when I needed it. I have learned just by being around you, thank you!

There will be more to come soon. I am hoping that I can post more often now, fingers crossed! But it is mostly for my own sanity.

Just a little reminder that I feel keenly and is echoed in V for Vendetta:

But what I hope most of all is that you understand what I mean when I tell you that even though I do not know you, and even though I may never meet you, laugh with you, cry with you, or kiss you. I love you. With all my heart, I love you.

I salute that strength of human spirit within you that you may have forgotten about. I honor the divinity that fills your eyes when you talk or listen or smile. I give thanks for the good which you do and do not know about. I pray that you may love you as none other than yourself. Every day is the beginning of your adventure; each and every day you have the choice to become who you want to be, even if that growth is painful. I pray you have the courage to make those decisions and the fortitude to carry them out. I pray that I may be as strong as you one day.

Find peace with the world and your place in it.

Now is the time to come alive. Heaven knows I am doing my best.

Flowers in Your Hair

The night is alive tonight, the hot air is buzzing with summer satisfaction. Everyone knows that this is it, this is our youth, this is when we make the stories we tell later on. Everything becomes desperate and rushed because we don't want to waste this, we know our time is limited. tick, tick, tick. You think you'll live forever, yet you know that you only have tomorrow. It creates a frenzied fanaticism and zeal for life that will carry us on through our golden years. if we forget to light the fire now, then we know that there will be nothing but cold ashes later on.

so we burn and burn in the hopes that we don't become one of those pilot lights that softly 'pops'. We want the world to know we were here, to be singed a little from its connection with us. we want others to have our scorch marks on them because it will let us know that we honestly lived, that we made an impact on someone and that they will never forget us.

life is full of forgotten moments. or those that are only half-remembered.

                                                                                             

so let's dream. let's allow ourselves to be vulnerable and more susceptible to burn. In dreams we drop our fronts, our masks, our offensive line. it is what stands between us and everyone else. that way we keep a part of ourselves just for us so that no one can hurt us completely. I am working on that, and it would help if everyone else was working with me. so if you read this, pay it forward and experiment by being vulnerable three times in the next little while. Inspiring other people to be vulnerable is just a possible side effect of this experiment. but I will do what I can to follow this.

That is all I have for tonight. Until next time.

Let's Tessellate

Dreams can turn from caterpillars to butterflies faster than you can blink. If you're lucky you can see the transformation. Too many people look away and suddenly se them as a butterfly. When you miss the actual transformation, then you are unable to recognize the butterfly for what it is.

I'm lucky enough to get to see it change in the cocoon, I know that it is growing wings and becoming colorful and rich even though I can't see it exactly like that.

Someday my dreams will reach into the stars in the way that I know they are meant to. My wings long to feel the moonlight on them and coast on the cool breeze. I dream of a midnight in Washington, beyond the rain clouds and above the Puget sound.

I apologize because I am like the moon: I am waxing poetic. However, I only have so much poetry and prose in me because I haven't practiced very much. But I am hoping that all changes.

I'm hoping to start writing more. This is all I have tonight.

∆Triangles are my favorite shape

Three points where two lines meet.

Toe to toe, back to back, let's go

My love it's very late.

'Til morning comes, let's tessellate.∆

Little Black Rain Cloud

I've never been the kind of person to ever be an Eeyore, but if you were to ask me what I am right now, I'd have to say, "I'm a little black rain cloud, of course."

There are many, MANY choice things I would like to say right now. Some of it pertains to quite a bit of sass I have been receiving from people as of late. I just don't appreciate it when I do not give any reason to deserve it. Granted, sometimes I do but this is not one of those times. All I did was ask a simple question and you just gave me more sass than the little spoiled cheerleader that cheered my brother 3rd grade football team, that may not sound like much but you never knew her. I haven't said two words to you all week, excuse me. AND WHO KEEPS EATING MY FOOD?!? Okay, I shouldn't rant blog because that gets me in trouble. I'm just a wee bit fed up with some things. So in order to diffuse some of this frustration so that I can find some cathartic state, I'll do something kind of like what I did before, I'll use pictures to describe what I'm thinking and such. That helps me to think on multiple planes at once; this multilateral thinking helps me to find some sense of clarity.

 This picture reminds me of the time when I found clarity on the top of a building under construction here in town. I technically wasn't supposed to be there and somehow I ended up there again. The building was the tabernacle and, for those of you who don't know, it is under construction. I went there once and some people already knew that. But no one knows that I went back simply because I found that state of construction incredible. This building is all brick, the inside is gutted and empty, and the spaces where the windows used to be allow for the moon to shine through onto the floor unfiltered. The effect is pure, unencumbered grandeur. It was stunning. It was all I could do not to dance across that dirt floor, that floor was somehow more precious and elegant to me than any polished marble floor ever could be. Somehow it was more sacred because of the way the light touched it, moonlight doesn't have the same effect on stone. I climbed to the top of the scaffolding and could just look. I saw a building that allowed me to feel connected to the earth, that is rare. Laying down and looking up at the stars with the spires of the building as a frame was absolutely incredible.

This is my favorite painting. I just came across it again, and realized just how much I love it. Just look at it, HOW PERFECT IS IT?! This is what I want. Or part of what I want. Brace yourself because all anyone ever talks to me about is relationships and any overheard conversation is about relationships SO it is obviously something that through association has been on my mind. But, anyways. This is what I want. Someone who will dance with me while barefoot on a beach. Most people would say that is fine when it's a sunny day. No. Give me rain, give me something like this that forces you to throw away all that you hold up in the sun. If you think that a beach is prettiest in the sun, then you have never seen one in the rain. It is my favorite place in the world at the moment I am there. I wouldn't go anywhere else. Although, that could just be my personality. I have a friend who told me this weekend, "Emily, you said you could be happy there but you could be happy anywhere! Whatever you do you will love it because you find something to love about everything!" Yup. I guess I just like to find a way to dwell in everything I do. (it's a philosophical term that is pretty cool, you should look it up)

Again, on the relationship strain. I have issues where I am incredibly cynical when it comes to my own relationships and such and I am a hopeless romantic whenever anyone else is concerned. Today I had a friend tell me that he is so excited to get married, and I never have been, honestly. I've never met anyone who makes me want to think differently. I see happy people and I believe that it is possible, a happy marriage is completely possible! But, it's one of those things where "that is nice for you but it just isn't for me". And that sounds really depressing, but that is just the way it is for me. If you don't like it, then stop reading. My self-worth is not founded on relationships, I'm too much of a lone reed for that to be. While sometimes I would like to put that trust in other people, I find that I am a better listener than talker. I enjoy listening more than talking. Everyone else has a more interesting story than mine, I can always learn from their point of view and I love it! Anywho, back on track about the picture. I want to someday find someone who would love a place like this just as much as I would. It is perfect. But I can't picture that person, so I enjoy it on my own. There is a quote that fits this: my alone is so good, I'll only have you if you're sweeter than my solitude. Yup.

GUYS. I'm going to INDIA this fall. My life has been tied to India for as long as I can remember, and my dream of going is finally coming true and I honestly can't believe it at all. I am going to study meditation! I just cannot get over how incredible this is. I had no idea a month ago that this was even possible and now I am finally passionate about things again. I am finding purpose in life and in everything: friendships, school, work, etc. I am no longer comfortably numb. I am excited and I feel things once again. While it sucks to an extent, I am alive. I'll be finding out what my red rubber ball is and I can find something that I am passionate enough about to do the rest of my life. Life has so much in store for me that I don't know, I can't wait to find out what will happen!

It has honestly been too long since I was excited about things. I can think again, I feel like me, and I am able to find joy in the little things. I don't care if I sound naive  because I know where I am and I know where I stand and how I think and if that is naivety then I embrace it will everything I have. Bring me life, bring me sorrow, bring me experience and I will show you truth and peace and the pure and incandescent joy that experience brings. I can show you how to become absolutely human.

These next ones are just pictures that I liked and felt applied to my life in some way or another. If you wonder how they do...then just add a comment about it and I can tell you.