Burnt Toast

Could you be more in awe of the shape I am taking?

Shedding a fist full of blubber and feeling less inclined towards peanut butter was never my idea of what a woman's constitution would be.  It used to be straight straight straight; my hips, my knuckles, my eyelashes.  Now it's spilling out, soft and loose and curves and tremors and kinks within kinks.  Each day is a new eureka to poke and prod and sigh about.  Rarities to nurture and purities to forget.

Methuselah, at age 969, exasperated and blasé and calm to a fault, waits by the oven for toast.

It blackens with a crunch, and Methuselah, at age 969, crunched and blackened himself, takes a mouthful.

Map My Digression

Ella, born with blonde in her hair and a strong jaw, takes the bus to school. 

She walks to the bus stop using her swollen feet, and makes her usual comments about the weather to the benches.  They are typically good listeners, or at least they are polite enough to pretend.  Either way, the sky is purple and she misses her mother because of it.

The bus driver is early, so he takes a few moments to make a phone call.  He's probably calling his girlfriend because he is listening to You Make My Dreams by Hall and Oats on the radio and lets the passengers put their feet on the seats.

A few people get on at the stop next to Walmart.  One woman doesn’t have enough change to ride, and a man with cigar lips behind her lends her a handful of change.  She was short a dime because she decided to buy a snickers bar last minute. 

Ella, afraid of everything and wary of small talk, tenses up when he sits next to her.

A couple gets on at the third stop and their legs twist together like licorice.  Ella, who has never held someone’s hand, looks away uneasily.

The man, calling himself Mr. Brown, tells Ella of a secret, “Once it’s on, you won’t want to turn it off.”

No one gets off the bus at the fifth stop.

Ella, raised by strict parents with good standards, eats an apple.

She runs through her list of chores for the day.  Buy milk, take the Christmas decorations down, read the seventh chapter from the Humanities textbook, clean out the fridge, take a nap.  She thinks about calling her mom.  She decides she’ll do it later in the week.

Mr. Brown gives his seat to a pregnant woman who gets on at the next stop.

Ella, who saves $30 from each of her paychecks but he doesn't know what for, coughs.

A family gets on the bus at the stop by the University, and Ella gets off.

And Mr. Brown waves goodbye, and Ella thinks of her term paper, and the pregnant woman puts her purse on the floor and sighs, and the couple with licorice legs have licorice arms too, and Mr. Brown watches and wishes his wife would talk to him more.

And Ella, born with a weak back and blonde in her hair, goes to school.

At Least

Back in Utah and single still and curious as ever and unaligned... I've been trying to write for a while now.

What is it this time, you ask?  It's Hunter.  It's Avery Taylor.  It's Jesus.  It's finding Katrina and then saying goodbye to Katrina, and then sitting at home a lot.  It's my new roommates.  It's Brittni having a boyfriend and not wanting to hang out with me all the time like we did in 7th grade, and also me not wanting to hang out all the time like we did in 7th grade.  It's not having any new ideas and being okay with not making movies and no female forum speakers and a lot of people being smarter than me and forgetting who directed Being John Malkovich and looking stupid in front of him for it. 

I've gotten caught up in another high school drama and it makes life all sparkly and exotic and I'm wondering how long it's going to last.  I've almost shed my bumbling and achingly dull 16 year old persona and am embracing being the bumbling and insipid 20 year old that I guess I always knew I was.  Still tripping over my drooping socks and telling my palms not to sweat, but I at least have a bag with foxes on it and that's cool sometimes.  

No, I haven't changed much.  

And yet I'm so different that I don't even know what to say about myself anymore.  I don't recognize myself.  I don't sing very often.  

I do, however, know a lot of fun facts about Disney World, though.  So there's that.

But here's the deal: things are happening in a way that is desirable and confusing and upsetting and HORRIBLE and WONDERFUL and I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING and it feels good to have something so exciting again.  It's glamorous, and we are glamorous, and we are giggly and we are secretive and we are fools for it.  We are damn fools and I'm so incredibly content with it all.  And I weep for the day when it ends, as we all know it will.  

But until then, I am going to let my heart race a little bit and I'm going to be late to class and I'm going to write 17 draft texts before sending the "right" one and I'm going to analyze conversations with Avery and hate myself because it feels good to be passionate and it feels wrong to run away.

I'm done running away from myself.

I guess I don't have much else to say now besides this: I've made a string of good decisions and one bad one and my ligaments are tearing and I'm happy.

At least I have that.

Goodbai Utah

Sorry for the long post.  If you don't want to read the whole thing, this is the summary:
This summer sucked but also didn't.  I love my friends.  I'm moving to Florida to work at Disney World.  I'm going to keep writing but probably not often.  Goodbye, I love you.

If you're reading this, I am already gone.  My summer ends a little bit earlier than I wanted it to this year.

I'm moving to Florida.

I'm going to work at Disney World.  I'm going to be stuck in a store.  I'm going to be hot and tired.  I'm going to be on my own.  I'm going to be a "real" adult.  I'm going to probably not blog very much.  I'm going to go out and make myself feel uncomfortable so other people don't think I'm depressed.  I'm doing this for myself, because I worry about my sanity.  I'm going because I want to.  And because I don't want to.  And because it's Disney World.  And because it's Florida.  And because someday there will come a time when I can't just pick up and move across the country and I don't want that day to come too soon.

I'm writing this because I'm almost 20 years old and I don't know how to fold a fitted sheet or do my own taxes, and those seem like things I should be able to do on my own by now.

I guess I'll figure it out.

I'm also saying goodbye to the people that I miss most.  Our legacies are written on the floorboards of the attic.  They'll be forgotten in the fire.  We'll be dust in a matter of seconds.  But I love you all.  And if I never see any of you again, thanks for being golden.

This summer was long and dull.  I worked full time.  I saw friends when I could.  I did something horrible.  And I didn't exercise at all.  I made out.  I became a new person, and somehow stayed exactly the same.  I watched a lot of TV.  And I ate a lot of food.

But it had its moments.  When Jonah and I blew all our money doing pointless things and then complained about blowing all our money on pointless things.  When Aubrey and I sat on her roof and watched the entire valley light up.  When Austin held me and told me about how he fell in love with a girl who vanished one day.  When we went to Fong's and didn't talk at all.  When Sarah showed me her movie collection.  When Aubrey and I both got food poisoning and spent a whole weekend in bed because of it.  When Shay and I drank pink milk and talked about preschool and being sorry.

And as the construction workers tear down the Haunted Forest and start building that car dealership, I'm waving goodbye to him and wishing him a great semester, and it just feels so over.

And just like that, the only place we've ever had all to ourselves belongs to someone else.

These days are gone, and they are golden.  They are wrapped in tin foil and packaged nicely in yearbooks and H.A.G.S. and Facebook posts that we thought were oh so clever.  These days are finally finally over.  And I will miss Austin's old man sense of humor and his folk music.  I will miss Aubrey's giant notebook full of songs we wanted to learn.  I will miss Cosette's awkward way of cheering me up.  I will miss the way Lex could figure out your whole deal in five minutes.  I will miss Creative Writing.  I will miss Michael who is now a douche even though I DISCOVERED HIM.  I will miss Griffin Kerr's blog.  I will miss Brynn's blog too.  I will miss that brown couch in Jonah's basement.   I will miss Baylee's awesome fashion sense and sassy comebacks.  I will miss Jeff's girl problems.  I will miss Asher's ease.  I will miss Lauren's conversation.  I will miss playing music.  And writing music.  And I will miss the optimistic, innocent, and ambitious girl I was.

I will miss it all.  Until one day I won't anymore.  

Life is unpredictable.  Even when you have a plane ticket and an appointment.  Even when the email gives you clear instructions on what to do when you arrive.  We are experiments.  We are fearful and blind and passionate.  We are each broken in our own beautiful way, and we are strong because of it.  We are love, and we are war, and we are hunger.  We are children.  And I love you, and all that you think you are or hope to be or will be someday.  Because you are you, and I am me, and we are one.

I don't know what I'm doing or where I'm going, but I think I'll be alright.

Don't forget me.

Karma Was Here

Give me something I can put my faith in.

Give me a distraction.

Give me attention.

I'm going to be so different.  I will be better, stronger, more grown up.  Maybe a better friend.  And a better lover.  Or a better fighter.  I will be brave.  I will be confident.  I will.

Night after night and day after day, I look to the wrong person when I loose my way.

Oh you are a little girl.  Pretending to be things you see.  Asking what things you can take.  Well you'll scream and you'll fight with it, fake and desire for it, but you will never ever be happy.

Give me something I can feel right about.

Give me a reason to grow old.

Give me pride in myself and for the things that I have done.

But take away the shame and take away the fear.  And take away the person I don't want to be anymore.  And take away my hands and my eyes, so I can learn to rely on God.

Give me a reason to come back.

I'm starting to forget why.

My World In Youtube Videos

I tried to write something that sums up everything, and just couldn't.

Why I want to go into film:

I used to want to be a writer.  And I quickly realized that no matter how hard I try, I would never be satisfied with anything I ever wrote.  I'm always missing something.  It never is as effective or provocative or interesting or beautiful or emotional as I want it to be.

But there's something special about words and music and pictures and when you put them all together, it says more to me than any epic could.

I sometimes spend weeks and months writing, and it never makes me feel the way I want it to.

These videos are everything I have always failed to communicate.  

They are everything to me.

If you watch all of these videos from start to finish, I'm pretty sure you will transcend.

A Gasoline Pump Is Not A Toy

Once,  I was a poor creature who looked to the sun for direction.

I lived on sugar and lived for the summer.  There was never enough time in the day.  There was always another adventure.  I waited for no one.  I wanted for nothing.  Except to run and to hide and to live forever as a bird would.  

Once, I was a frail girl who hated her nose.

I spoke to many people, but never said things that mattered.  I pretended and wished my days away.  I waited for things to end.  I wanted for too much.  Yet, I achieved nothing but mediocrity and intense disappointment. 

Once, I was a peculiar child who laughed at herself.

I went out at night and worked in the day.  I used my money for things that didn't matter and wasted gasoline.  I waited for the future.  I wanted for the past.  I left a lot of things behind in boxes, and still had too much to lug around with me.  

At any given moment, there are thousands of processes going on in just my right arm.  

There are synapses and nerves and blood cells and bone, and I can't even feel it.

You're going to live an entire life and still end up with only three words on your tombstone.

Tell me, can you feel it?