Call Me Naive

To Tommaso de’Cavalieri

With your fair eyes a charming light I see,
For which my own blind eyes would peer in vain;
Stayed by your feet the burden I sustain
Which my lame feet find all too strong for me;

Wingless upon your pinions forth I fly;
Heavenward your spirit stirreth me to strain;
E’en as you will I blush and blanch again,
Freeze in the sun, burn ‘neath a frosty sky.

Your will includes and is the lord of mine;
Life to my thoughts within your heart is given;
My words begin to breathe upon your breath:

Like to the moon am I, that cannot shine
Alone; for lo! our eyes see nought in heaven
Save what the living sun illumineth.

-Michaelangelo Buonarroti



Take a second, and just try to take in the poem. Michaelangelo, the painter of the Sistine Chaple, the artist who created The David, one of the most influential people in the entire history of the world, wrote this poem. He, being so talented, is saying, he is nothing without the person whom he loves. "My words begin to breath upon your breath." Can one ever comprehend the amount of love, adoration, and hopelessness that he was feeling? I read it, and just sigh, having never experienced this for myself. All I can do is wait for it. Love is not some tangible thing that anyone can just find. Love is a movement, a warm breeze that finds you...



Far From Kingdoms

Far from Kingdoms
how steady is the room!
Come, breath close with me
so I may discover the sweetness
of many imperfections, some missing
tooth, some extra wrinkle, and your body
worn out slightly by carelessness.

-Patrizia Cavalli



Love is finding beauty in the imperfections. I love this poem. I feel like a voyeur watching some incredibly personal moment. That it what love should be. Not divorces, not affairs, not an obligation. Love should be constant, everlasting, and pure.



How odd is it that there is only one word for love in English? We use the same word to say "I love you" to our spouses and the same word to say "I love that t-shirt." It's nonsensical. The Italians and the Spanish, to name a couple have many words for it, usually pertaining to physical love (lust) and spiritual love. I think we got it wrong. There are so many different levels of love, how does just one word do an entire range of emotion justice?



I've been told, "Just because you haven't experienced the Hollywood romance kind of love, doesn't mean you've never been in love." This is a concept that is very hard for me to grasp. I've always been the romance movie queen. From "An Affair to Remember," to "Pride and Prejudice," I've always known love as it is portayed in those films. Having never had an example of a functional, loving couple growing up, I found my solace and my hope in movies like these. I cling to them like night clings to the moon, hoping that love isn't just toleration, but something completely life altering and irreversible. I don't know if this image is accurate anymore. If what this person said is true, then I have been in love. I have definitely been close, at least. But at the same time, I have to hope and I have to dream that love like in those movies and poems is what it's supposed to be like. It may be unrealistic, but if I don't believe in it, then what is there to look forward to in life? A spouse that puts up with me? No...Even if it means I have to die alone, like Jane Austen, I will never settle for any sort of love that doesn't make me feel like Elizabeth Bennet.

Eleven

"What they don't understand about birthdays and what they never tell you is that when you're eleven, you're also ten, and nine, and eight, and seven, and six, and five, and four, and three, and two, and one. And when you wake up on your eleventh birthday you expect to feel eleven, but you don't. You open your eyes and everything's just like yesterday, only it's today. And you don't feel eleven at all. You feel like you're still ten. And you are --underneath the year that makes you eleven.

Like some days you might say something stupid, and that's the part of you that's still ten. Or maybe some days you might need to sit on your mama's lap because you're scared, and that's the part of you that's five. And maybe one day when you're all grown up maybe you will need to cry like if you're three, and that's okay. That's what I tell Mama when she's sad and needs to cry. Maybe she's feeling three.

Because the way you grow old is kind of like an onion or like the rings inside a tree trunk or like my little wooden dolls that fit one inside the other, each year inside the next one. That's how being eleven years old is. "

-Sandra Cisneros (Eleven)

As my birthday approaches, it couldn't have been more appropriate to read this. It's strange the way things line up, how a teacher who knows nothing about me could assign this passage, or a poem by Pablo Neruda, and have it fit into my heart so precisely. I'm growing older. I look at my pictures from my party this weekend, and realize that I have come full circle. I know my purpose, I know myself, and having discovered this new found knowledge, I can be happy with just being me. A whole new slew of confidence washes over me and my heart swells with the love I have from my friends, my family, my savior, and oddly enough, myself. I will be turning twenty, but also will still be nineteen, and twelve, and five. Now I realize, you don't just become twenty, you build up your heart, mind, and soul, to fill a cup that contains all the other pieces of you. So as I become a decade older, and hopefully wiser, I aspire to make that cup overflow with the new knowledge I've obtained, and with the new experiences that I've been a part of.

Just Friends

Just friends is a common phrase used by the opposite sex to establish that a relationship is purely platonic. What they don't realize is that hearing it sucks. Basically, I am the girl who is always the best friend, and never the girlfriend. I'm beginning to accept this, and as a result, I am taking my good friend Sondi's sage advise and going on a sabbatical from men. I'm taking a break from dating for a while. I need to take it easy and enjoy being single while I still can. Julie and I were discussing this the other night, and we came to the conclusion that all we really can do is enjoy the time we have at this point in our lives and try to become the best us we can be. This is one of the reasons I'm taking a piano class, and I joined choir, I'm going to ward activities and trying to be more extroverted. I'm trying to pay off my debt too, which is coming along pretty well.

School started today, and as much as I was dreading it, I'm so glad it started again. I love my piano class. I feel like I can just melt back into it. It makes me feel more fulfilled to be learning something new and different.

I realized tonight, when I was feeling a little down that despite everything, I really feel a big change coming on in my life. Who I am is changing, who i'm friends with is changing. A lot of things in my life are coming to a turning point and I can feel the wind passing through and bringing on things I've been waiting for in my life. It makes me think of the Holiday and the Santa Anas that pass through California.

I guess we'll just see what lays ahead for me in this life...

Hero of the month: Jessica Hatton

Before I get into my big schpeal(Is that how you spell it?) I'll just start off with a quick summary of New Years. I made it back to Utah in one piece, despite forever hating JFK. So New Years Eve, we had a giant party at my house, and everything was smashing. Tons of people came, we laughed, we danced, and we kissed. Haha. For the first time ever, I got a New Years kiss. Huge progress for myself I might add! Anyways, I would just like to talk about a "date" with a certain gentleman I had the other night. Gentleman doesn't ever begin to describe him though...He was the most cordial and chivalrous man I've ever met. Yes, I can confidently say that. It made me realize, even if things don't ever go anywhere with him, there are a lot of qualities that he has that I am definitely looking for.

So yesterday, in the horrible snow that we have been berated with, my bald tires wouldn't stop, and I collided with the cement wall in the parking lot at work. My bumper was on the verge of falling off, my blinkers stopped working, and I was scared out of my mind. Of course, feeling very stressed about this, I unloaded all of it on Alex and Jessica (we were school book shopping later that night). Jessica took a look at my car and tried to assess the damage, then this morning had me bring my car in to her work. We found out that I had no oil left, and needed more break fluid as well. I was ridiculously stressed, but she told me to relax and said that she would take care of it.

She went above and beyond anything I could have expected. She found two free tires for the front of my car, to replace the bald ones, and she took the best two of the old four and put them on the back. She then gave me a free oil change, free break fluid, cleaned my air filter, and put new windshield washer fluid in. After this, she grabbed some zip ties and "sewed" my bumper back on, repaired my blinker, and sent me on my way. Wilma (my car) now has a stitched up mouth, which has lead Jessica and I to rename her Sally (As in the Nightmare Before Christmas). :)

I would just like to say how truly blessed I am. When I hit that wall last night, I couldn't help but think, "why does this kind of stuff always happen to me?" Now I know that it was just a way of reminding me how much the Lord cares. He sent me spectacular friends that would remind me that I'm not alone in anything. He always is there for me, and shows me incredible grace by sending me these people in my life. I am so completely in awe of his love for me, and I can see that his prescence is always there in everything I do.