On this side of the new year I have been making the attempt of being better about gifts. In the past, my keenness in simply remembering birthdays and sending a nice, personal message is as far as my gift-giving abilities have gone. Pathetic, I know - believe me, it renders me distraught thinking about it now. Thus it comes as a surprise to no one that I possess very little talent in selecting and gifting the much sought after "perfect present." I wish it was an inherent characteristic of mine to somehow glean that what you desperately want most is an ornate birdhouse for your lawn; for those of you who have no trouble with this, I envy you.
It has been difficult and stressful thus far planning ahead, calculating shipping speeds, and penny pinching, all before I even order a blasted gift, but it has also produced within me good feelings once it's all said and done and the gift is in the hands of the intended recipient. I can't deny that giving gifts feels awesome. However, I have found out very quickly that the talent was not lying dormant and it is not something I can cultivate. Still, I will sally forth.
The main problem is I never know where to start. My relationship with the individual in question could boast several years of inseparability and enough wacky stories to fill countless journals, and I would still know diddly-squat what to gift them. That is, unless they told me.
Pragmatism is basically my middle name; in every possible realm of my life I try to be practical. If it's useless, it's not worth keeping around (this principle counts for people, too). Therefore I have come to the conclusion that marrying pragmatism and gift-giving might very well save me armfuls of stress down the road. The only hesitation is that it's a little bizarre in certain cases and it's going to take some getting used to. But this is what it comes down to: when your birthday is approaching and I ask you what you want or need, I do not care if the first thought that jumps to mind is your nearly empty bottle of body wash in the shower or the fact that your printer is almost out of ink. If that is what will help you most, then so be it. I would much rather buy you your favorite body wash or an ink cartridge than a gift that might look pretty but has absolutely no real function, like a pillow with Jensen Ackles's face on it (sorry, Kylie - it was funnier more than anything, and I didn't know what else to do!). BUT I can't achieve this pragmatic-gift marriage if you don't tell me what you need. I'll buy you laundry detergent, brake fluid for your car, notebooks, a new case for your phone, air fresheners, a better welcome mat, a set of screwdrivers - I don't care!
SO the next time I ask you what you want or need for your birthday, and I promise I will ask you - rarely will a gift ever just show up on your doorstep out of nowhere - please please please don't hesitate to tell me that it's about time for you to buy your hamster some new food anyway. If there isn't something you want, I almost guarantee there is something you need or could at least use. Dish soap? Alcohol? Fertilizer? As long as it's within a reasonable price range, consider it done. Let me help you in a more fulfilling way and simultaneously satisfy this plague of pragmatism that has infiltrated my life. Help me transform this plague into a cheerful practice. Giving better gifts begins with you.
Monday, June 20, 2016
Monday, March 28, 2016
Addressing Skepticism
My most recent relationship status has caused quite a buzz. Mostly excited and supportive responses thankfully, but I know there are skeptics among you. I do not blame you for this as a reaction. From the outside looking in, I believe it is warranted. Therefore I decided to give a brief window into what it’s like from the inside looking out. Allow me to jump right in.
Let me make something clear from the outset: we don’t “complete” each other; it’s insulting to the other person to claim that until now, me without him or him without me we were incomplete, unfinished and the only way to be complete is to invite each other into our lives in an intimate way. That’s silly. The idea of “soul mates” is far from a biblical concept – it’s a romantically pressured one perpetuated by society. To all you single guys and gals, I’m sorry – it’s an impossible standard to achieve, and one many believe in.
While we don’t endorse the soul mate concept, we do have our ways of describing the rapid depth of our connection. So far the best (and still unworthy) explanation I’ve conjured up is that he and I have recognized pieces of our own souls in each other; we have discovered a divine similarity between us. Personally I think Joseph portrayed it best when he said, “We are almost analogous to male and female permutations of the same soul.”
These claims have provided the vehicle for us to transcend time itself. This experience has been incomparably ethereal. Between meeting Joseph on the 4th of March and my day trip to Baltimore to see him about a week later felt like a lifetime. It has been three weeks since we met, and from then till now has also felt a lifetime long. We have compacted a larger span of time into a smaller temporal container. Time is, like many things, relative. Our three weeks are nowhere near the same as yours. We understand each other on a level that has never existed before due to its impossibility.
We transcended time, and continue to. I have never thought so clear or felt my mind so broad and challenged by anything, let alone a single individual. It may seem as if we’ve hurried into things, but there has been absolutely no rush. From the outside looking in, the pace is breakneck, but that’s the nature of our organic timeline. It’s like in algebra – when you know all the rules of the equation you solve it quickly, almost automatically, especially compared to when you were first getting acquainted with how every variable fit together. We’ve learned the rules, and this is the product of our combined equations.
When I was younger and beginning to grasp the gravity of finding God's best for me, I often asked my parents to describe how it felt for them to get to know each other, and when they decided that they wanted to be together forever. This is a common question with an indescribable answer, and the common clichéd and useless-at-the-time response is typically, “you just know. When you find the right person, you just know it,” or “you feel as if on top of the world!” Being the way that I am, this always frustrated me; I wanted a checklist, or a litmus test or something. Rules to rely on. This feeling of “just knowing” seemed improbable and impossible. What if I didn't realize it? What if I somehow missed it? It all became complicated and worrisome. I was incredibly skeptical of it.
Until now.
Now I understand completely what they meant. Because I feel it. The indescribable feeling is in me. I “just know.”
And I am so achingly certain of it that I would stake my life on it.
It’s insane, I know. But having previous romantic pursuits to compare to throws this in stark contrast when placed next to all the others. It has far surpassed even the wildest expectations I could imagine.
Neither of us went to EPA intending to meet anyone in this way, and yet here we are. We were not searching, and yet we found. We are swaddled in God’s divinity, cradled in His palms, and I have never been so certain of something in my life. (Yes, it even rivals my certainty concerning my passions for creative writing.)
I wrote in my post from 2013 “Infernal Love Triangle Devices” that I was confident when God brought my future husband into the picture, the man He had hand-selected for me, I would know it. To quote the post exactly, “…I’m very particular about the qualities and lifestyle choices of the man I will marry in the future. … I, someone who always tries to have the lowest of expectations, am expecting a lot of the man for me. This makes it very easy for me to believe that once I find him, it won’t be long before I know he’s the one. God knows what I’m looking for and what I need, so once I’ve recognized all that, it will be obvious.” Such confidence!
I know my expectations, standards, and requirements were tricky for any one mortal to score high on altogether. But I had finally seriously entrusted the worry about my future husband to God, surrendering the last thread I was white-knuckling. It did not need to be my responsibility to hunt for this man. If I truly believed all things were possible, God would have me covered. Obedience and trust were the only things expected of me. So I relinquished my human need to control, folded my hands in my lap, and made peace about waiting patiently for God to move. I had done my part, and He would certainly do His.
The fruits were almost instant. God is faithful, y’all. His promises are far from empty.
Earlier in the week leading up to EPA I did a lot of praying and ultimately let go of this obsession with stepping in front of God and arranging my future as if I knew better than him. (I don’t deserve his unflinching forgiveness.) Then, mere days later, enter Lightning Boy (aka Joseph). Unbelievable.
I’ve always been skeptical of “just knowing.” Now I truly understand. It’s the closest thing to enlightenment, to Heaven, on this side of death.
Let me make something clear from the outset: we don’t “complete” each other; it’s insulting to the other person to claim that until now, me without him or him without me we were incomplete, unfinished and the only way to be complete is to invite each other into our lives in an intimate way. That’s silly. The idea of “soul mates” is far from a biblical concept – it’s a romantically pressured one perpetuated by society. To all you single guys and gals, I’m sorry – it’s an impossible standard to achieve, and one many believe in.
While we don’t endorse the soul mate concept, we do have our ways of describing the rapid depth of our connection. So far the best (and still unworthy) explanation I’ve conjured up is that he and I have recognized pieces of our own souls in each other; we have discovered a divine similarity between us. Personally I think Joseph portrayed it best when he said, “We are almost analogous to male and female permutations of the same soul.”
These claims have provided the vehicle for us to transcend time itself. This experience has been incomparably ethereal. Between meeting Joseph on the 4th of March and my day trip to Baltimore to see him about a week later felt like a lifetime. It has been three weeks since we met, and from then till now has also felt a lifetime long. We have compacted a larger span of time into a smaller temporal container. Time is, like many things, relative. Our three weeks are nowhere near the same as yours. We understand each other on a level that has never existed before due to its impossibility.
We transcended time, and continue to. I have never thought so clear or felt my mind so broad and challenged by anything, let alone a single individual. It may seem as if we’ve hurried into things, but there has been absolutely no rush. From the outside looking in, the pace is breakneck, but that’s the nature of our organic timeline. It’s like in algebra – when you know all the rules of the equation you solve it quickly, almost automatically, especially compared to when you were first getting acquainted with how every variable fit together. We’ve learned the rules, and this is the product of our combined equations.
When I was younger and beginning to grasp the gravity of finding God's best for me, I often asked my parents to describe how it felt for them to get to know each other, and when they decided that they wanted to be together forever. This is a common question with an indescribable answer, and the common clichéd and useless-at-the-time response is typically, “you just know. When you find the right person, you just know it,” or “you feel as if on top of the world!” Being the way that I am, this always frustrated me; I wanted a checklist, or a litmus test or something. Rules to rely on. This feeling of “just knowing” seemed improbable and impossible. What if I didn't realize it? What if I somehow missed it? It all became complicated and worrisome. I was incredibly skeptical of it.
Until now.
Now I understand completely what they meant. Because I feel it. The indescribable feeling is in me. I “just know.”
And I am so achingly certain of it that I would stake my life on it.
It’s insane, I know. But having previous romantic pursuits to compare to throws this in stark contrast when placed next to all the others. It has far surpassed even the wildest expectations I could imagine.
Neither of us went to EPA intending to meet anyone in this way, and yet here we are. We were not searching, and yet we found. We are swaddled in God’s divinity, cradled in His palms, and I have never been so certain of something in my life. (Yes, it even rivals my certainty concerning my passions for creative writing.)
I wrote in my post from 2013 “Infernal Love Triangle Devices” that I was confident when God brought my future husband into the picture, the man He had hand-selected for me, I would know it. To quote the post exactly, “…I’m very particular about the qualities and lifestyle choices of the man I will marry in the future. … I, someone who always tries to have the lowest of expectations, am expecting a lot of the man for me. This makes it very easy for me to believe that once I find him, it won’t be long before I know he’s the one. God knows what I’m looking for and what I need, so once I’ve recognized all that, it will be obvious.” Such confidence!
I know my expectations, standards, and requirements were tricky for any one mortal to score high on altogether. But I had finally seriously entrusted the worry about my future husband to God, surrendering the last thread I was white-knuckling. It did not need to be my responsibility to hunt for this man. If I truly believed all things were possible, God would have me covered. Obedience and trust were the only things expected of me. So I relinquished my human need to control, folded my hands in my lap, and made peace about waiting patiently for God to move. I had done my part, and He would certainly do His.
The fruits were almost instant. God is faithful, y’all. His promises are far from empty.
Earlier in the week leading up to EPA I did a lot of praying and ultimately let go of this obsession with stepping in front of God and arranging my future as if I knew better than him. (I don’t deserve his unflinching forgiveness.) Then, mere days later, enter Lightning Boy (aka Joseph). Unbelievable.
I’ve always been skeptical of “just knowing.” Now I truly understand. It’s the closest thing to enlightenment, to Heaven, on this side of death.
Wednesday, March 23, 2016
Crazy Little Thing
For Joseph. The poet in me is no longer starving for inspiration.
Enter Lightning Boy, I
I was running for cover when you struck me.
Unexpected whip crack flashed my retinas, constricting pupils, and rang in the echoless open field. Heart stuttering, knees sloppy, my back kissed damp earth. You opened a door in the churning sky and walked to me on a path of illumination, offering a healing hand that blossomed open to show me forever. No conditions; just a bouquet of love and peace and rationality served on a blessed silver platter.
Enter Lightning Boy, II
I, the toiling
mathematician; you
the chalk dust
burrowing in fingerprint
ridges – together
we harness genius,
the blackboard
of our calloused hands,
and drive toward
the indecipherable
equation of affection.
After numerous cold years
stinking of sweat
mingled and hollowed,
these hallowed
walls of our minds churned
and finally
the variables click into place,
numbers flash together
like old friends.
Saturday, February 6, 2016
Control
This week has been all over the place, and not always in a good
way. While I try to consistently approach things knowing that I have nothing at
all to complain about, there was a moment, a text, Thursday evening that
knocked the wind right out of my sails. I was hanging out with a group of
friends and it was so noticeable that my best friend pulled me aside and asked
if everything was okay. She could read it plainly on my face.
Yes, everything is honestly fine; some potential fun plans that I had been looking forward to since last Saturday changed drastically, and now my weekend is completely, utterly free. Harry Potter movie marathon, anyone? (No joke. I have them stacked by the TV, ready.)
This isn’t the end of the world. I know this. Though as a planner, big last minute changes rock my world, leaving me reeling, so it took some time for me to come back to my center of balance. I fell asleep unhappy Thursday eve.
In waking up yesterday morning, I told myself that it wasn’t the end of the world, truly. I’d had a bad moment, but I would not let that define my week. So I put on my gym clothes and smiled, pouring out those grimy thoughts along with the sweaty exertion of exercise.
My message today is this: you have the power to determine how you feel. We all have bad days - it’s okay. It’s part of being human. But those bad days have absolutely not control over your mindset. Whenever you get thrown, pick up however many pieces have shattered at your feet, tell yourself it’s okay, and strut through the rest of the day or week like the majestic peacock you are. Your mindset matters, so make it positive.
I leave you with a poem I wrote on a particularly rough day years ago and serves only as a reminder of how far I’ve come.
Ta~
Yes, everything is honestly fine; some potential fun plans that I had been looking forward to since last Saturday changed drastically, and now my weekend is completely, utterly free. Harry Potter movie marathon, anyone? (No joke. I have them stacked by the TV, ready.)
This isn’t the end of the world. I know this. Though as a planner, big last minute changes rock my world, leaving me reeling, so it took some time for me to come back to my center of balance. I fell asleep unhappy Thursday eve.
In waking up yesterday morning, I told myself that it wasn’t the end of the world, truly. I’d had a bad moment, but I would not let that define my week. So I put on my gym clothes and smiled, pouring out those grimy thoughts along with the sweaty exertion of exercise.
My message today is this: you have the power to determine how you feel. We all have bad days - it’s okay. It’s part of being human. But those bad days have absolutely not control over your mindset. Whenever you get thrown, pick up however many pieces have shattered at your feet, tell yourself it’s okay, and strut through the rest of the day or week like the majestic peacock you are. Your mindset matters, so make it positive.
I leave you with a poem I wrote on a particularly rough day years ago and serves only as a reminder of how far I’ve come.
Ta~
I
wish
I could choke
on stars
and implode
until there’s nothing left
just so
someone
could make
a wish.
wish
I could choke
on stars
and implode
until there’s nothing left
just so
someone
could make
a wish.
V
Monday, February 1, 2016
2016 - One Month Down!
Friends! Long time no see! If
you'll refer back to the very first post I made in 2016 (Welcome
to 2016), I had quite a list of goals to achieve this year. Here I find
myself already in the month of February, and nearing the end of my first full
month back at college. Just as a side-note, there was a "100 days
party" thrown for all graduating seniors last Thursday night. A week
later, there are only 93 days left. Time is such a slippery thing, though I'm
trying to take each day as it comes and suck all that I can out of it.
Anyway, if you'll recall, my personal goals in no particular order for 2016 were these:
Anyway, if you'll recall, my personal goals in no particular order for 2016 were these:
- lifting weights 3 times a week
- eating healthy (no coffee, much less sugars, less dairy, more veggies and red meats, and no processed junk if I can help it)
- doing Lumosity daily
- Duolingo (in Spanish) daily
- reading the bible and journaling every morning
- Praise Jar slip daily
I'll use updates here as a way of
keeping myself accountable, although so far I've done a great job keeping up on
my own. All of the above are habits that I began at the end of September 2015
(aside from the Praise Jar), took me about a month or so to solidify, and have
made it an overall goal of 2016 to maintain. So far, I have not missed a single
gym day since January 1st (and I've added an hour of yoga twice a week!), have
been eating tremendously healthy (following the close of the "holiday
diet," of course), and since mid-December I've only missed two days of bible
reading/journaling. I also haven't missed a single slip for my Praise Jar! As
for Lumosity and Duolingo, well...I kept that up for the first week or so back
at school and then fell off the wagon. My first two weeks at school were
bizarre mainly because I had to maintain this routine in a totally different
environment and Lumosity and Duolingo were throwing things off too much.
However, my balance has returned, and I plan to toss them into the mix once
more now that I've gathered my wits.
Seeing as it is the final semester of my undergraduate career, people give me funny looks when I tell them this is the easiest/best semester ever for me. All of my classes are Tuesday/Thursdays, I work three days out of the week, and have three day weekends every weekend. With this newfound balance and routine, I am doing very, very well. Spiritually, mentally, physically, emotionally...I have never felt this good. I'm seeing definition in my body like I never have before, feeling and seeing the effects of reading God's Word daily in my life, and my stomach has never been happier. Just to make things even crazier, I'm sleeping a consistent average of nine hours per night with a bedtime of roughly 10pm and an alarm set for 7:30am! How many "college kids" can say that with a smile?!
Shifting my circadian rhythm has also been a huge improvement. In several years I have struggled to fall asleep before midnight and wake up before 9am. It was ridiculous and frustrating. There was a season where I was getting up at 5am every day to babysit for twelve hours (sometimes more) and then could not fall asleep until midnight. Five hours later, I had to be awake. It was maddening and I couldn't figure out what the problem was. My sleep schedule wouldn't shift. This has been a struggle for years. Until 2016. Still not sure how, exactly, I got my circadian rhythm to finally shift, but I'm clinging to it!
I made it a point to include "emotionally" in the list above, too, because I have struggled with true, soul-shining happiness in the past. Freshman year I was the type of person who romanticized cynicism and maybe faked seeing silver linings, but never believed in them myself. I was hyper-critical of myself as well as the people around me. I didn't make many friends here at college because I told myself I didn't need them. Over the years I have made a gradual change, but this last semester saw the most drastic of it. I now have the "problem" of having so many people ask me if I want to get dinner that I either have to turn someone down or mold friend groups together. I have group chats with people where we talk daily about all manner of things. Friends are stopping to chat with me while I have lunch.
Mercedes, one of the only real friends I made Freshman year (somehow), recently saw me interact with other friends while we had lunch together and was amazed. Later she said to me, "don't take this the wrong way, but I have never seen you talk to anyone like that here." She has taken note of my slow slide down the spectrum from introvert to extrovert. I now consider myself more of an ambivert than anything, which means I now enjoy the company of others in addition to solitude.
In short, friends, I am the happiest I have ever been. I operate daily on the combination of God's promises and positivity. I treat myself with respect, accept my faults and mistakes, and continue on knowing that life is a constant process of betterment. I filter my thoughts, pray constantly, and smile often. I've never been so content in my existence, never been able to love myself so fully, and never felt so great being on my own.
Thank you to those that have encouraged, put up with, and guided me over the last several years. I of course had to reach this point naturally and on my own, but a few pokes and prods always help. 2016 is shaping up to be the best year yet and I'm confident I can keep it that way.
Love,
V
Seeing as it is the final semester of my undergraduate career, people give me funny looks when I tell them this is the easiest/best semester ever for me. All of my classes are Tuesday/Thursdays, I work three days out of the week, and have three day weekends every weekend. With this newfound balance and routine, I am doing very, very well. Spiritually, mentally, physically, emotionally...I have never felt this good. I'm seeing definition in my body like I never have before, feeling and seeing the effects of reading God's Word daily in my life, and my stomach has never been happier. Just to make things even crazier, I'm sleeping a consistent average of nine hours per night with a bedtime of roughly 10pm and an alarm set for 7:30am! How many "college kids" can say that with a smile?!
Shifting my circadian rhythm has also been a huge improvement. In several years I have struggled to fall asleep before midnight and wake up before 9am. It was ridiculous and frustrating. There was a season where I was getting up at 5am every day to babysit for twelve hours (sometimes more) and then could not fall asleep until midnight. Five hours later, I had to be awake. It was maddening and I couldn't figure out what the problem was. My sleep schedule wouldn't shift. This has been a struggle for years. Until 2016. Still not sure how, exactly, I got my circadian rhythm to finally shift, but I'm clinging to it!
I made it a point to include "emotionally" in the list above, too, because I have struggled with true, soul-shining happiness in the past. Freshman year I was the type of person who romanticized cynicism and maybe faked seeing silver linings, but never believed in them myself. I was hyper-critical of myself as well as the people around me. I didn't make many friends here at college because I told myself I didn't need them. Over the years I have made a gradual change, but this last semester saw the most drastic of it. I now have the "problem" of having so many people ask me if I want to get dinner that I either have to turn someone down or mold friend groups together. I have group chats with people where we talk daily about all manner of things. Friends are stopping to chat with me while I have lunch.
Mercedes, one of the only real friends I made Freshman year (somehow), recently saw me interact with other friends while we had lunch together and was amazed. Later she said to me, "don't take this the wrong way, but I have never seen you talk to anyone like that here." She has taken note of my slow slide down the spectrum from introvert to extrovert. I now consider myself more of an ambivert than anything, which means I now enjoy the company of others in addition to solitude.
In short, friends, I am the happiest I have ever been. I operate daily on the combination of God's promises and positivity. I treat myself with respect, accept my faults and mistakes, and continue on knowing that life is a constant process of betterment. I filter my thoughts, pray constantly, and smile often. I've never been so content in my existence, never been able to love myself so fully, and never felt so great being on my own.
Thank you to those that have encouraged, put up with, and guided me over the last several years. I of course had to reach this point naturally and on my own, but a few pokes and prods always help. 2016 is shaping up to be the best year yet and I'm confident I can keep it that way.
Love,
V
Saturday, January 16, 2016
Time as a Construct
I have never been able to fully
grasp time as a concept. It’s the thread that holds everything together, and
yet it’s something I can totally forget about for large periods of time. I’ve
gone through moments in my life wishing for entire years to pass
instantaneously due to some emotional desire, not caring what each individual
day might bring - I wanted to fast forward and jump past all the experiences I
would have had, only to get to that “ultimate” one. That’s idiotic. How could I
be so heedless of time and its wonders? How could I not realize the same sixty
seconds, or sixty minutes, could be spent in so many different ways? Perceived
differently? Agonized over and forgot about? When I’m doing a plank hold for
one whole minute during my workouts, it feels like the longest minute of my
entire life. Later in the same day, five or even ten whole minutes could pass
in the wink of an eye and feel more like a couple seconds than ten minutes.
Relativity, I’ve found, is the best way to begin explaining time. Time is very dependent on what’s going on inside and around you at that very moment. If I watch the clock and listen to the tocks, time slows to its normal pace, somewhat reminiscent of the Weeping Angels in Doctor Who - if you look at them, they are frozen as statues, but if you blink or look away, they move freely, and very very quickly. Losing track of time is easy to do, friends, and I urge you to take on the challenge I have presented to myself in these past few months. Take each day as its own separate entity. Don’t be like the me of the past, always counting down to the next weekend, the next break, to summertime fun with family and friends. Look forward to each day, and suck all that you possibly can out of it. Be mindful of your time, as it is limited, though as a younger human being it might not seem like it. Just last spring, I came home from a psychology class dealing with mental illness, and we had just wrapped up the chapter dealing with latent illnesses - ones that surface in later years of existence. I was overcome with this crushing emotion of fear and anxiety about the mortality of my family. I am not afraid of death for myself, and in fact welcome it, but thinking about the eventual decay of my parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles, mentally and physically…well, it was not pretty, and I was torn to pieces.
I came to terms with it and pasted myself back together, waiting for time to come weave the splintered fragments closed again.
Time, then, is not merely a construct. Time is many things. It is a healer, a mourner, a comforter, a teacher - more often than not preaching tough love and resilience. Time is willing to be your friend, your guide, an invaluable asset in your life, if only you’d stop and take a moment to say hello and keep it wrapped around your little finger.
Therefore I leave you with a warning and an encouragement via poetry, though it’s very much unlike my normal style. Enjoy, friends. This coming week we will all be back to the collegiate grindstone.
Chance Execution
Relativity, I’ve found, is the best way to begin explaining time. Time is very dependent on what’s going on inside and around you at that very moment. If I watch the clock and listen to the tocks, time slows to its normal pace, somewhat reminiscent of the Weeping Angels in Doctor Who - if you look at them, they are frozen as statues, but if you blink or look away, they move freely, and very very quickly. Losing track of time is easy to do, friends, and I urge you to take on the challenge I have presented to myself in these past few months. Take each day as its own separate entity. Don’t be like the me of the past, always counting down to the next weekend, the next break, to summertime fun with family and friends. Look forward to each day, and suck all that you possibly can out of it. Be mindful of your time, as it is limited, though as a younger human being it might not seem like it. Just last spring, I came home from a psychology class dealing with mental illness, and we had just wrapped up the chapter dealing with latent illnesses - ones that surface in later years of existence. I was overcome with this crushing emotion of fear and anxiety about the mortality of my family. I am not afraid of death for myself, and in fact welcome it, but thinking about the eventual decay of my parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles, mentally and physically…well, it was not pretty, and I was torn to pieces.
I came to terms with it and pasted myself back together, waiting for time to come weave the splintered fragments closed again.
Time, then, is not merely a construct. Time is many things. It is a healer, a mourner, a comforter, a teacher - more often than not preaching tough love and resilience. Time is willing to be your friend, your guide, an invaluable asset in your life, if only you’d stop and take a moment to say hello and keep it wrapped around your little finger.
Therefore I leave you with a warning and an encouragement via poetry, though it’s very much unlike my normal style. Enjoy, friends. This coming week we will all be back to the collegiate grindstone.
Chance Execution
Execute yourself beneath thought.
Feel your destruction galvanize
wrongly placid thoughts, shove askew naivety
past the earthquake memory’s afterthought.
Taste reaction boiling everything ivory because of her
over an experience of failed love.
Accept freedom - love ferociously despite her!
rather than pushing yourself down,
launching into her abandoned friends,
opinions she the exquisite nerve
under skin placed alluringly warm
regarding romantic language, during your everything
and nothing.
No surrender. Resistance shouldn’t prove difficult
back against gossip knots whispering down your spine.
Treatment via punishment:
skirting other years
near to days, near to weeks,
time poking among your sidewalk thoughts,
frail theories now keenly harden,
dreamt during the tranquil night.
Feel your destruction galvanize
wrongly placid thoughts, shove askew naivety
past the earthquake memory’s afterthought.
Taste reaction boiling everything ivory because of her
over an experience of failed love.
Accept freedom - love ferociously despite her!
rather than pushing yourself down,
launching into her abandoned friends,
opinions she the exquisite nerve
under skin placed alluringly warm
regarding romantic language, during your everything
and nothing.
No surrender. Resistance shouldn’t prove difficult
back against gossip knots whispering down your spine.
Treatment via punishment:
skirting other years
near to days, near to weeks,
time poking among your sidewalk thoughts,
frail theories now keenly harden,
dreamt during the tranquil night.
Fight me with words.
Fight me with belligerent phrases -
upward, worthwhile phrases, tested for
warlike pollution, for warlike shame
beyond rage’s armament inside needles
after goodbye. Pierce the harmony chuckle
behind somebody’s animal eyes, beside somebody’s memory face,
until the poison from operation
spreads, pathetic
despite a stranger’s stride toward sugar song
unless a prison traps the fingers
in silver, below all light.
Cagey within a jealous box
beneath an agonizing name –
charismatically persuasive; offensive and vivacious.
All apologies she’s accepting now,
worming through your blended brain. Relinquish her, until
after her rhythms decompose one another,
all pictures and records
through the regret around accidental versus deliberate.
Walk away. This war is no longer yours to lie down for.
Fight me with belligerent phrases -
upward, worthwhile phrases, tested for
warlike pollution, for warlike shame
beyond rage’s armament inside needles
after goodbye. Pierce the harmony chuckle
behind somebody’s animal eyes, beside somebody’s memory face,
until the poison from operation
spreads, pathetic
despite a stranger’s stride toward sugar song
unless a prison traps the fingers
in silver, below all light.
Cagey within a jealous box
beneath an agonizing name –
charismatically persuasive; offensive and vivacious.
All apologies she’s accepting now,
worming through your blended brain. Relinquish her, until
after her rhythms decompose one another,
all pictures and records
through the regret around accidental versus deliberate.
Walk away. This war is no longer yours to lie down for.
~V
Thursday, January 7, 2016
Orchard
Orchard
My heart is an orchard, with soft,
loamy soil to dig your fingers
into. Each tree has a name, and
each name has roots, some longer than
others, some younger still. A couple
trees have been selected for
execution, roots and all yanked
from the earth, my heart. These pits,
these
empty spaces eventually
get filled again with dirt, and a
sapling is planted anew. A mark
is always left, however; some
rooted veins remain.
---
Friends. It's been a while. I apologize - life grows busier with each day.
This poem was prompted by an event that occurred a little over a year ago that rocked my world. This was my analogy for the results. Some rare poetry for you today.
Enjoy!
V
V
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