my brain is a well oiled machine. that never forgets.

i have the cunning ability to make you forget me. (or rather, forgive me.) and in intervals, you do forget me. forget my existence. forget what I'm like.
but not for long. it never falters.
it takes a smile. a comment. and my existence comes back all too soon. it stings you in the most absurd of places, like under your foot. where it won't kill you. but it'll drive you nuts. and then. I'm back.
but not for long.
and i don't blame you. I'd want to forget me, too. But only momentarily.
you swat at me. telling me to go away. only before you completely forget me. you're asking for more.
me and you. we'll never learn. and we'll keep trying to forget.

good memory is a bitch.

regression.

As a woman, I should know better. I should know that I'm not the cure all to your problems. I should know that you'll always be you. And no matter how charming or funny or beautiful you may think i am... that won't change you.

As a girl, with what now seems to be a beating heart, I can't help but be illogical. To think that what we have is different. That what we have is DIFFERENT. And that you'll realize that I really am that charming. And that you won't be able to live without me.

As a woman. I think with my head.
As a girl. The heart is the center of thought.

I can't meet in between. I'm purely a girl right now.

A rant.

I've noticed lately that a lot of people around me are preoccupied with minuscule problems and too focused on themselves to notice what's really going on in the world. We all have problems. Every single one of us, but (I know it may sound corny) there is so much life to live and there is so much more to life than what we are facing, individually. There's a really big picture that we don't always see or care about.

If we could just stop and think outside of ourselves for a little bit, we would realize that there is so much beauty in life. In simple, everyday things. Simple things that are bigger than us and our problems.

There are people suffering real pain. Real gut wrenching pain. The kind of sadness that doesn't let you live, doesn't let you move, doesn't let you think things will ever get better. And sometimes we have these tiny problems, bumps in the road, that are nothing. We obsess and obsess. It's human nature, I know, and we all do it. I am glad for every tough experience I've ever gone through. I think it's made me strong and it's made me realize that worse things could always happen.

I was in the car with my friend the other day and a really sad topic came up. And it made me realize that we focus so much on negativity that sometimes it eats at us until it's all we see.

So, in essence, my rant is about people and their problems and the way it consumes them and how they don't see anything but themselves.

My cousin was diagnosed with cancer as a baby. She had to have her eye removed (I can't tell you exact terminology, science has never been my forte). She had a stay at the Ronald McDonald Children's House (which is a really wonderful organization). I would go visit her and I would also get to see some of the other kids. It was not an easy experience. Every time I would go visit I would end up in the bathroom crying (getting teary eyed thinking about it now). I slowly started to notice that while I was in the bathroom crying, these kids weren't shedding tears. These kids, with, for the most part, shortened life spans, were sitting around, playing, laughing and joking while I was in the bathroom crying, hiding from them so they wouldn't see me feeling bad for them.

I remember the pain my cousin went through during chemo.
I remember how sad my family was. I remember seeing sadness in my mother like i had never seen before.
I remember time going by so slowly and just hoping that from one day to the next day things wouldn't take a change for the worst.
My cousin is 13 now.

On a car ride with my friend the other day we started talking about what a monster cancer really is. It totally drains your body and your spirit. It consumes you and and those around you.
It's true sadness. It makes no room for pettiness.

My friend's uncle recently passed away from cancer. From what my friend tells me about him, I just know he was the kind of man that was full of life and passionate about it. Never missing a beat. Talented, smart and caring. She says he was not ready to die. He wanted to live.

...Which leads me to my point (because sometimes I ramble on and on). Life, good and bad, is ours for the living. We can be petty, childish, obsessive over things that in the large scope of things don't matter OR we can take the bad with the good.
We can focus or energy on other things. Positive things. And we can learn to be survivors.

Aurora Borealis

At night, on the beach, you look out into the ocean and you have no clue where the ocean meets the sky. Until you look at the lights on the boat and all of a sudden you see the line come into focus and you know exactly where everything meets.
Those damned boats.
And you say that if the boats are really bothering me you'll go into the ocean and get rid of them. A romantic gesture, close to impossible.
And we're perfect strangers but at the very moment you get me. And i get you. And i dig my heels into the sand. And i draw on the sand. Stupid pictures.
Those damned boats.
I notice that tonight the sky is clear and you can see the stars up above. I start to talk about Alaska and the Aurora Borealis.
You smile.
i ask you if you know what that is.
And you do. And then i smile. We're all smiles you and me. And everything would be perfect if it just wasn't for those damned boats with their damned lights ruining everything.

i want nothing.

and.it's.fucking.scary.

you pour yourself over me, like the sun through the blinds.

you want to throw up

you walk on the sidewalk. avoiding the cracks. you're a little ocd that way. you notice the writing on the walls. play with your hair. you think you really need a haircut. you feel the tips of your hair. they feel dry. split end-y. you shake your head. you smell the smell coming from the dumpster behind the italian restaurant. you scrunch your nose. you notice the man on the bike looking at you as you do that. you look away. you avoid eye contact at all costs. you see the little crossing man telling you to hurry so you can cross the street. you do a little jog. you see a man digging through the garbage. his hair was once dreaded but you notice that now it's all matted together to look like just two thick dreads. he's looking through the garbage. in the middle of broad daylight. you see him and you can't stop staring. you forget about the cracks on the sidewalk and your hair. you forget. he finds a starbucks cup. jackpot. he opens it and drinks from it. you seriously want to throw up. you hold it in. barely. you feel like gagging. you walk by him and he doesn't even notice. he's so happy about his starbucks. you wonder how long it's been in that garbage. you fight the urge to throw up. you walk to your car. put your monthly decal on the window and head back to your office. you catch up to him. he's walking in front of you. the air is not working in your favor. it's going against you and you're catching his stench. he occasionally stops and talks to himself. you realize you have no problems, except the urge to throw up.