my beliefs about belief

The stories we believe the most are the ones we've been able to imagine the best. Those are the ones that actually have power to change the way we live, individually and as a community. It is what one believes that instructs reality, not the other way around. Like when Henry Plantaganet saves England with a handful of words.

I believe this.

confessions.

oh the torture. i return to my words like a dog to its vomit. i read and reread and reread until they're burned into my skull like ants under a magnifying glass are burned to the sidewalk.

bottles and the color of emotion

i wish i could bottle all my emotions--those times i've experienced them the most strongly and purely--in jars and stick them on a shelf. that way i could see what color they were, and at any given moment, i could pull one down and compare it to the color inside me.

"what am i feeling right now?!?...am i happy? am i in love? am i jaded? let's look through my bottles...

"HAPPINESS: june 4, 2003: upon waking up to a breeze carrying the air off the honeysuckle plant outside my window into my room."

"DREAD: march 10, 2009: nightmare about my students, followed by having to go to school to teach all day lessons which i had not yet prepared."

"MISSING: august 5, 2007: sitting on the ferry after saying goodbye to vaiola and to jimmy. the hole in my soul."

"LOVE: february 14, 2005; july 28, 2008; may 6, 2009"

.....this one looks about the same hue as my insides. perhaps a little more vibrant, but that can happen when these things sit in bottles for a long time, memories fermenting like wine till their robustness nearly bursts the bottle. but look! it really is love/happiness/excitement! not just desire/selfishness/jealousy masquerading as shimmerypink-love or summeryellow-happiness or lightning-excitement. [because all those counterfeit feelings are double-hued. in the dark, jealousy's hue comes awfully close to the pink of love. but in the light, they all show a disgusting grayish.]

oskar schell understands. "what if the water that came out of the shower was treated with a chemical that responded to a combination of things, like your heart beat, and your body temperature, and your brain waves, so that your skin changed color according to your mood?...there are so many times hen you know you're feeling a lot of something, but you don't know what the something is. Am I frustrated? Am I actually just panicky? and that confusion changes your mood, it becomes your mood, and you become a confused, gray person. but with the special water, you could look at your orange hands and think, I'm happy! That whole time I was actually happy! What a relief!" (--extremely loud and incredibly close, jonathan safran foer, 163. brilliance in book form.)

home

wind from the sea.andrew wyeth*

*i saw this at the national gallery of art in dc and audibly gasped.  some art stabs you to the center, and some lifts away and you can see.

lalalalalala

i ate an entire bowl of cereal with my eyes closed this morning to prove to myself that if i ever go blind, it'll be okay.

this weekend i am most likely going to die in a flashflood. if that doesn't kill me, the threepointfive hour ride down to zions in a 15pass. van will for sure. good thing there are ho-made pies and smores or else i just might not make it.

something lost

my six year old sister slept over last night and suddenly i remembered what it was like to make decisions based on eenie-meenie-mynie-mo. i went to campus tonight to return some books and thought about my first few years there, when you just picked someone you liked and dated them for a while. when every day was an adventure in meeting new people and learning new things and thinking up unprecedented ridiculousnesses with which to stay up till 3am.

somewhere along the way i turned into an adult, with a furrowed brow and concerns about money and my future and time management and turning too much into my parents and still remaining true to myself.

i brought back a stack of my journals from home today, in the hopes that there are still sparkles left in the pages with which i can learn how to see the world new again.

no one should eat cold pizza.

period.

i am launching a worldwide campaign to stop people.