There's an image of me in my mind: I'm sitting on a blanket on the grass on a warm, cloudless day. The wind stirs the grass and the air around me and carries the sound of the waves of the lake lapping up against the shore to my thirsty ears. I drink in the sound, breathing deeply, letting the warmth of the sun beat down on me, the soft wind cool my brow. Maybe I'm humming. Maybe a small thread of some untold story fragments its way through my thoughts, eager for a chance to survive, to be brought to life by the fingers of the storyteller. Maybe I'm just sleeping, or replaying a cinematic dream of a memory: a remnant of a ghost whispering of springs past.

When I think of myself, this is what I see. A master, quiet on the bank of the shore in search of her lost craft, missing the way it felt to have the earth cradle her.

I looked at a picture of myself today and found that once I glanced, I couldn't take my eyes away. Something about the composition, the lighting, the perspective, the glint in my eye, the curve of my hand; all of it hit me with such a tremendous feeling of beauty that I felt proud that I had managed, in my random bouts of photo-taking, managed to capture such a fantastic image of myself.

Turning away from my computer, I held my arm out in front of me and inspected it carefully, bending inward and out, stretching the hand, curving it under; I examined every line and curved it made as I twisted it through the air and I realized that I've finally learned to see the beauty in myself, and these small things: Taking a great picture, appreciating my arm; were just the catalysts to this revelation.

Maybe it's a silly thing to be excited about, but I feel like accepting oneself is the greatest struggle any person can undertake and knowing that I do love myself and how my life is unfolding just fills me with a very profound sense of peace and happiness.

I think that sometimes it's nice to share these moments with others so a little bit of my glow can spread to them.

Here's to the Nights...

I've spent the better part of my evening today sitting out on my balcony letting the world pass me by. I read a book for awhile, which re-awoke within me my love of everything magical and fantastical. It's a book I've read many times and never grow tired of, as well as its three successors.
Then I wrote for awhile, which is something I haven't done for quite some time.
Have you ever experienced what it feels like to lose sight of your passion for the one thing in life that you truly love? That's been my predicament with my writing for well over a few years now. I have a talent that I love, and love to nurture, but never the desire like I used to, and I miss it. I miss spending countless hours locked away inside the world created by words and imaginings.
I miss the magic and exhilaration I used to feel when I was writing.
I think what's happened to me, is that my words have all become stuck in my head, and only threaten to come out at moments when I'm not in a position to write them down. Then when I sit down to write, I don't feel any motivation or inspiration. It's sort of like I've lost one of my best friends, and she only ever calls when I can't answer my phone, so I'm left with a lot of messages that I can't seem to respond to.
I wrote a letter to Alec today. For those of you who don't know, he was the third boy I've ever loved in my life, but the one whose loss sticks with me most poignantly, like a really really good book gone horribly wrong. I think it's because he's the first boy I've ever loved when I was mature enough to really understand what love is and feel its loss so heavily.
I know that I will love again. I hope that I'll find a boy who will love me back, and then get to experience what that feels like, which is why I wrote the letter today. I'll probably never get the closure from Alec that I need to really let go of everything that has happened between us, but I can't let him stand in my way anymore. I refuse to let what he did to me stand in the way of my finding something bigger than myself in this world.
Maybe someday if I ever see him again I'll let him read it, along with all of the other scribblings I made to him and about him in my battle to cope with my heart break. I'll probably always go through phases of forgetting and remembering, but I won't let it weigh me down. There's too much to be excited about in all of the little things in life to let anything take away from the enjoyment in living every day.
It also sits very heavily as I write this, that as I decide to live for everything in this world that there is to live for, someone very close to me is saying her last goodbyes and, most likely nervously, accepting the inevitable end that every road comes to. My mom's oldest sister is dying of pancreatic cancer, and with her a small light is going to go out in the world. My best friend Lizzie described it to me most accurately: It's hard to imagine what things are going to be like when someone who was so staple in so many stories of my life just won't be there anymore. The last time I got to see her was Christmas, and I feel that some part of me will always regret not having the chance to say goodbye.
I hope that her passing will leave something beautiful behind; that her time here will have had a profound effect on enough lives to make the world a better place. Even if it's just in a small way. I hope that her passing is painless, although I'm old enough to know that this road has been a very painful one for her, both physically and emotionally. I hope that, when it's my turn to go, I can bow out with the same grace that she seems to be exhibiting.
Mostly, though, I hope beyond all hope that there really is a Heaven or Elysian or Nirvana so that I can sleep with the knowledge that her beautiful soul has passed on to a place brighter and more beautiful than any of us can imagine.
And so I hope that this goodbye, is enough to give me closure for both cases. That I can move on from what my life could have been with Alec, and meet someone and fall in love again without the weight of his loss in my heart, and that I can accept that even if I'm not there to see someone pass, not there to share in the heartbreak and loss, not there to say goodbye, that they know and understand how much I love them and wish them the best in whatever afterlife awaits.