6.29.2009

relationship question.


i'd love to be in a relationship. i can say that now, for the first time in my life. but if im going to do it, to jump down that rabbit hole and make that huge commitment, i have to feel an equal force coming from the other side. i dont expect it to be a fairy tale, or perfect, but i do expect to be adored. i just do. is that bad? i dont think so.

i want to know that the person im with likes me. a lot. i dont want to spend 1/2 my time questioning it. i dont deserve that, no one does. because when someone likes you...when theyre crazy about you...they cant keep their hands off of you. they want you. they want to spend lots of time with you. they dont get sick of you at the drop of a hat or constantly annoyed with you. they dont need breaks. they just open their heart back at yours and allow themselves to fall. they dont apologize for wanting to be around you as much as possible. and they dont leave you feeling like youre walking on eggshells.

youll fight, youll have disagreements and youll prob even spend some time questioning the relationship at the start. but deep down, you know whether something is worth going for. it doesnt need to be analyzed, its right there on the tip of your heart. youre either feeling it or youre not. listen to that voice, and then commit to its choice. being lonely is not an excuse for using someone. even if you really, really want to like them. not fair.

and, i guess, my friends that this is the bottom line.

lacey + baby!

looking into the past.


[see more.]

amazing titles/company.


[thanks, L!]

makes me insanely happy.


[criterion pics.]

aint it the truth.

6.28.2009

beach trip.


was decent. relaxing. frustrating. great weather. good food. awesome trip to willmington! and hopefully will be back in october. great convo with Josh, hopefully L is visiting in a month or so. great to see sally do improv, to chat with tracey again and to be back at my own home.

btw, im keeping score! who knows what for.
me: 5
you: 1 (that i asked for)

say what you will, but...

6.21.2009

if only...


we can get to a place where we arent always unintentionally hurting each others feelings. both sensitive, in totally different ways. i guess the question of compatibility is still there, but im fight it. i think they are too. i cant tell sometimes. sometimes i think its supposed to work, other times i think theyre just tired of being lonely. thats the worst feeling.

6.13.2009

my own fairy tale. SWEET.



It is said in the place where I live the soil is made of our people. People who toiled, sweat, cried, and screamed all bled into the ground and made us who we are today.

My father warned me never to enter the woods alone.

I gave him my satchel and shoes as he asked me, then I shed my clothes as he advised me to do. "Wear this," he said, and he shed his own skin. It fell off in a pile on the soil floor looking like a tablecloth used in my home. When I clothed myself in his skin I no longer smelled like my home or the valley. Instead I became like the men on the mountain. I smelled distinctly foreign. I thanked the man and watched as he dressed himself in my own clothes. He said he would wear them until new skin grew on his back.

Without my father I stood on two rotten feet inundated with fear.

I told myself not to look back, don’t look back. I looked down at my feet and watched them as they carried me away, slowly, slowly, farther and farther away from my home. They trudged onward like the two front paws of a sad, whimpering puppy who’s been left in the cold for a night. I did not turn back once, I kept my head forward, my eyes down, knowing my journey away from home had begun.

I pulled the needle out of where it would cause harm, and happy that I did so.

Then the bird came down beside me, and thanked me graciously for my good work. In return, she left two feathers attached to my heels to replace the leather-bottomed shoes I lost. "They will take you where you want to go, and you no longer will fear the people the live in the ground."

When the people of the soil touched my feet they fell back into the ground with shrieks and cries. Now I could reach the top of the mountain without fear of falling down.

The man who killed my father stood on the open ground with an army of people waiting to rise from the earth. He brandished a blade in his hand and struck it towards the sun.

Through the blind frenzy of earth and shadows I plunged my dagger into the creature's heart and watched as it melted into rain.

After all this time away, it seemed a mirage in a desert of hopelessness. My disbelief vanished when I saw my mother appear at the door of our small, cramped home of decaying wood. Home, I was finally home.

My feet, wearing their newfound bottomed shoes, pressed gently across the soils as not to wake the men clamoring upwards. But I still felt a shadow trail at my footsteps that did not feel like my own. As I walked faster the shadow moved behind me as well, sometimes touching my bare skin with sodden ground.

In an attempt to lose my pursuer I took hold of the tall silver needle in my pocket and threw it to the ground, watching it form a wall of iron thread and knots.

Before I entered my home my brothers came out, and, thinking I was a peddler, asked how much the jade I carried was worth.

"And who are you boy?" Mother asked me. Her weak eyes did not recognize my much-changed face and form. I told her I was her son but she did not believe me. "If you are the son that left so many days ago, and if you are the one who brought back this jade figure of father, then you are the one who will be able to restore him to his normal shape." She flicked her wrist and flung the jade piece at me.

Without hesitance I lifted my pant legs began to dance in father's leather bottomed shoes. The soles breezed across the floor, cutting the mist with rhythmic motions. I then turned the ring on my finger and watched my father rise, soil shedding from his skin. His shaved face and clean hands stood against the paling crowd. This impressed the people who stood before me, as did the fact that my tongue did not bleed from the needle it held.

I was offered a place in the palace, but I could not accept. I wanted to be with the mountain; I felt it move under my skin as I knew part of me was in the mountain too.

[http://www.brown.edu/Courses/FR0133/Fairytale_Generator/gen.html]

6.11.2009

fave comment of the day.


"I laughed and laughed over this. Then I told my Mom and she laughed about it. Loren is something, I can tell. She and I would be big buddies I am sure."

um, NO.

october road. yes.

6.04.2009

i am...

Enneagram
free enneagram test


The Intense, Cerebral Type:
Perceptive, Innovative, Secretive, and Isolated


Type Five in Brief
Fives are alert, insightful, and curious. They are able to concentrate and focus on developing complex ideas and skills. Independent, innovative, and inventive, they can also become preoccupied with their thoughts and imaginary constructs. They become detached, yet high-strung and intense. They typically have problems with eccentricity, nihilism, and isolation. At their Best: visionary pioneers, often ahead of their time, and able to see the world in an entirely new way.

Basic Fear: Being useless, helpless, or incapable
Basic Desire: To be capable and competent
Enneagram Five with a Four-Wing: "The Iconoclast"
Enneagram Five with a Six-Wing: "The Problem Solver"
Key Motivations: Want to possess knowledge, to understand the environment, to have everything figured out as a way of defending the self from threats from the environment.

Examples: Albert Einstein, Stephen Hawking, Bill Gates, Georgia O'Keefe, Stanley Kubrick, John Lennon, Lily Tomlin, Gary Larson, Laurie Anderson, Merce Cunningham, Meredith Monk, James Joyce, Björk, Susan Sontag, Emily Dickinson, Agatha Christie, Ursula K. LeGuin, Jane Goodall, Glenn Gould, John Cage, Bobby Fischer, Tim Burton, David Lynch, Stephen King, Clive Barker, Trent Reznor, Friedrich Nietzsche, Vincent Van Gogh, Kurt Cobain, Jodie Foster, and "Fox Mulder" (X Files).

Type Five Overview
We have named personality type Five The Investigator because, more than any other type, Fives want to find out why things are the way they are. They want to understand how the world works, whether it is the cosmos, the microscopic world, the animal, vegetable, or mineral kingdoms—or the inner world of their imaginations. They are always searching, asking questions, and delving into things in depth. They do not accept received opinions and doctrines, feeling a strong need to test the truth of most assumptions for themselves.

Full:
Behind Fives’ relentless pursuit of knowledge are deep insecurities about their ability to function successfully in the world. Fives feel that they do not have an ability to do things as well as others. But rather than engage directly with activities that might bolster their confidence, Fives “take a step back” into their minds where they feel more capable. Their belief is that from the safety of their minds they will eventually figure out how to do things—and one day rejoin the world.

Fives spend a lot of time observing and contemplating—listening to the sounds of wind or of a synthesizer, or taking notes on the activities in an anthill in their back yard. As they immerse themselves in their observations, they begin to internalize their knowledge and gain a feeling of self-confidence. They can then go out and play a piece on the synthesizer or tell people what they know about ants. They may also stumble across exciting new information or make new creative combinations (playing a piece of music based on recordings of wind and water). When they get verification of their observations and hypotheses, or see that others understand their work, it is a confirmation of their competency, and this fulfills their Basic Desire. (“You know what you are talking about.”)

Knowledge, understanding, and insight are thus highly valued by Fives, because their identity is built around “having ideas” and being someone who has something unusual and insightful to say. For this reason, Fives are not interested in exploring what is already familiar and well-established; rather, their attention is drawn to the unusual, the overlooked, the secret, the occult, the bizarre, the fantastic, the “unthinkable.” Investigating "unknown territory"—knowing something that others do not know, or creating something that no one has ever experienced—allows Fives to have a niche for themselves that no one else occupies. They believe that developing this niche is the best way that they can attain independence and confidence.

Thus, for their own security and self-esteem, Fives need to have at least one area in which they have a degree of expertise that will allow them to feel capable and connected with the world. Fives think, “I am going to find something that I can do really well, and then I will be able to meet the challenges of life. But I can’t have other things distracting me or getting in the way.” They therefore develop an intense focus on whatever they can master and feel secure about. It may be the world of mathematics, or the world of rock and roll, or classical music, or car mechanics, or horror and science fiction, or a world entirely created in their imagination. Not all Fives are scholars or Ph.Ds. But, depending on their intelligence and the resources available to them, they focus intensely on mastering something that has captured their interest.

For better or worse, the areas that Fives explore do not depend on social validation; indeed, if others agree with their ideas too readily, Fives tend to fear that their ideas might be too conventional. History is full of famous Fives who overturned accepted ways of understanding or doing things (Darwin, Einstein, Nietzshce). Many more Fives, however, have become lost in the Byzantine complexities of their own thought processes, becoming merely eccentric and socially isolated.

The intense focus of Fives can thus lead to remarkable discoveries and innovations, but when the personality is more fixated, it can also create self-defeating problems. This is because their focus of attention unwittingly serves to distract them from their most pressing practical problems. Whatever the sources of their anxieties may be—relationships, lack of physical strength, inability to gain employment, and so forth—average Fives tend not to deal with these issues. Rather, they find something else to do that will make them feel more competent. The irony is that no matter what degree of mastery they develop in their area of expertise, this cannot solve their more basic insecurities about functioning in the world. For example, as a marine biologist, a Five could learn everything there is to know about a type of shellfish, but if her fear is that she is never going to be able to run her own household adequately, she will not have solved her underlying anxiety.

Dealing directly with physical matters can feel extremely daunting for Fives. Henry is a life scientist working in a major medical research lab:

“Since I was a child, I have shied away from sports and strenuous physical activity whenever possible. I was never able to climb the ropes in gym class, stopped participating in sports as soon as it was feasible, and the smell of a gymnasium still makes me uncomfortable. At the same time, I have always had a very active mental life. I learned to read at the age of three, and in school I was always one of the smartest kids in academic subjects.”

Thus, much of their time gets spent "collecting" and developing ideas and skills they believe will make them feel confident and prepared. They want to retain everything that they have learned and “carry it around in their heads.” The problem is that while they are engrossed in this process, they are not interacting with others or even increasing many other practical and social skills. They devote more and more time to collecting and attending to their collections, less to anything related to their real needs.

Thus, the challenge to Fives is to understand that they can pursue whatever questions or problems spark their imaginations and maintain relationships, take proper care of themselves, and do all of the things that are the hallmarks of a healthy life.