Stemming between the lines of two realities, I grow tired. Every step is slow, slippery, and abrasive in the way that only living in reality and following a dream can be.

I am not there yet. In ways (many) I am grateful.

There is no turning back.

There is: The world that is.....The tedium of words that I haven't created. That are in no way creative. The moments of scrounging like a scavenger for solitude in my own home. Whatever that is. The many hours spent observing the oil and gas industry and it's employees, and subsequent hours spent alone. or at least "virtually so."

or is there?

Because my fingers scrape the line of dreams. Can almost press through the membrane. Can see memories that I haven't yet lived through.

There is also: Enough. Enough time to work and play. to dream. Enough love. laughter with friends over anything. a couple kindreds living remotely close to me.

hearts know no distance. and dreams reside inside each heart beat no mater how much it aches to break through the barrier of now and later.

There isn't time. Except that it lives in my mind. And if I must live within it, I die a little outside of it all.

The question is which part dies. I'd like to to resemble the place where the ego resides.....

Sometimes everything isn't a joke. I'd rather not tip the corners of my lips into a smile to pacify the masses with pretense.

I think, therefore bliss isn't the aim of my existence.

I'm aiming a little closer to the truth, or at least honesty....Even if the truth makes everyone uncomfortable.

Here's a little honesty: too many people are too comfortable, walk around with comfortable minds, don't mind telling lies or being lied to.

These are ideas I just don't buy. Don't care to. So, if I'm not smiling, don't tell me to.

Comfort too often gives way to complacency, to the displacement of passion---or anything that
is expressed in any way that's true.

So, yes--I'm not always smiling. Does it bother you?

i shaved petals from the flower
--stripped away all but the essentials.
the senses awaken to the smell.
the mind dizzies itself imagining
what wasn't left.

these dreams fall to places i can't name. what once was here no longer
remains.

there is only this day.
a small moment
in the shape of hope
held loosely in hands that
seem to float
a mile behind my cares.

i cannot be reached from here.
at least that much isn't only
ethereal.

there are years that pass. and moments when i catch the comfort that comes
from knowing time can be
real.

There is silence and there is sound. One exists because of the other, but they do not co-exist.
                                         *                                 *                                    *
Balance depends on the relationship between them.
                                        *                                 *                                     *
When my relationship is balanced between them, there is peace
               
           
                *                        *                        *                    *                        *                        *
There is silence and there is song. Music is the conversation of silence and sound when they are in love.

Sometimes I think that when I am grateful enough, when I remember the purpose of life is to love it, I dance through life as if it were a dream.

I feel a little as though I'm flying.

This is what is real. All else is an illusion created by my the ego.
            *                           *                        *                        *                     *                          *

There is silence and there is sound. If the ego is left unchecked, there will only be loud sounds. In these times I feel poisoned with the neverending noise---the unecessary nagging of the Nevers. The Nevers are not real, but they can scream. The nevers are fears that shout from the rooftops of hell.

And this would be terrifying. But.....There is not just noise.
   
                   *                                                          *                                                   *
There is silence and there is sound. And there is the music they create when they are in love.

I've never been one to get angry. I can count on my fingers the times that I have been angry---really angry. i get frustrated. disillusioned. sad. hopeless. but generally, i don't get angry.

this year, i have felt more anger than i have ever felt before. i'm not sure how to feel about this. it doesn't make me more angry. i feel a little regret. anger seems like the one emotion that's not permissable. and if it is, then definately actions out of anger aren't permissable.

it's pretty simple to feel compassion for those who are sad, frustrated, hopeless. our hearts go out to those who do. but anger is seperate. an emotion that is different from any other. it doesn't prompt compassion quite as easily as it does judgement----if not anger (toward the angry).

for me, i'm finding out that anger is consuming. i haven't yet figured out how to control it completely. i swore in the hall at school after the veteran's day assembly. the disrespect and inappropriate actions of my students prompted this. but i allowed it, without meaning to.

is this normal? it's certainly not something i consider to be right.

i'd like to not acknowledge anger as real, but.....

and so....

i'd like to hear from you. maybe our anger can bring us together instead of isolate. maybe compassion for the angry can become more common...

The girl who is as luminous as the moon moved from the ocean to a place foreign and new.

No more breeze to tease her dreams into being. No more front porches, languid in southern humidity. No more music, the embodiment of sound surrounding her growing spirit.

The girl who is luminous as the moon moved to the smallest town in the world. It was anything but open as the ocean. One didn't need signs to read such things. There were small glimmers of hope, but nothing so satiating as dreams. No ocean breezes whispering in her ear at night. Not even a sound from the stars spoke as she spilled her light into the darkness of such times.

And then...

She picked up and moved again. The girl who is luminous as the moon moved from the smallest town in the world (which was too tired to mind), to the city that tries to immitate the sun. It's a losing game. But in all the brightness, she can't sleep; and so has taken to dreaming again.

It's this brightness that seeps under your skin. It may very well be her voice with the words " you can."  When one star re-awakens the light is there whether you realize it or not. Hope is incandescent.

What darkness has disappeared then?

Where were you when you awakened?

When you let the light in?

I can't get this life out of my head. Either of them---the one I dream of and the one I'm living. I'm all to aware of being here now.

But music takes me away. For this I am grateful.

I lose myself completely inside this song. Did today. For half an hour driving out of town aimlessly.

In my imagination I'm still driving. If you're ever restless, maybe we can meet for coffee. In the lucidity of our dreams.

Here:

Listen. Dream. Repeat.

THE RULES:
===================
1. Link to the person's blog who tagged you: Stella Luna, and Maze

2. Post these rules on your blog.

3. List seven random and/or weird facts about yourself.

4. Tag seven random [?] people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.

5. Let each person know that they have been tagged by posting a comment on their blog.
   (except I like the shout out notification that I got better)
___________________________________________________________________________

Okay, the randomness begins:

1. After reading Everything is Illuminated, rather than keeping a book of the types of sadness like Brod---I started a book of the different types of happiness. It includes such entries as: The happiness of sleeping in clean sheets. The happiness of unattachment. The happiness of complete attachment, the happiness of longing --of achingly beautiful, albeit unsatiated, desires. The happiness of music from another room, that you can sing in time to when you no longer hear it....etc, etc.

2. I color code my closet via rainbow, and darks to light within a color. But this will become easier because another random fact is that I've decided to only buy clothes from now on that are blue, brown and white because I like them best.

3. Ever since I heard the phrase "You are what you eat" (as a little girl) I quit eating certain animal crackers. I will not eat: goats, hippos, donkeys, camels, or elephants.

4. I think I miss the music the most....Growing up, I don't think I went a day in my life without singing in my family. We(my mom, sister, brother, and me---and sometimes my dad) sang every where we drove. In the shower. Randomly throughout the house. When I went to college this was no longer acceptable. I miss singing terribly.

5. My first world was: OWL. (not mom, dad, etc.)

6. I hated reading until my Junior year of high school. My love for books and stories developed slowly. By my senior year, I often ditched classes to sit in an out of the way hallway and read books.

7. Sometimes, when I'm very sad and don't want to be sad, I jump up and down 10 times. It's something my mom used to make me do when I was little, when I was upset. Try it the next time you are sad and don't want to be sad. You start thinking: this is so stupid, there's no way.... (but by the fourth or fifth jump you feel so ridiculous frowing and jumping you start to laugh) And by the time you finish jumping, even your mood is elevated.

And now I tag....whoever reads this blog, as well as the people who I "shout out" to. If you post your randomness (and haven't already, let me know) I love randomness!