Hmmm…that title could apply to more than this – live your life emboldening your choices.

So, the RULES are: Bold your choice…

1. Coca Cola, Pepsi, Sprite, Mountain Dew, Dr. Pepper? None of the above. I’m a tea and scotch kinda girl.
2. Cats, dogs, horses, lizards, or hamsters? And tiny pigs.
3. TV, cinema, computer, iPod, gaming console? and BOOKS!
4. Rock, rap, pop, metal, or punk?
5. Black, white, blue, red, or green?
6. Salad, hamburger, ice cream, chips, fruit? and Nutella.
7. Kindergarten, elementary, junior high, high school, college(university)?
8. United States, Canada, Australia, France, England, or Ireland? and JAMAICA!
9. Swimming, fishing, tanning, theme parks, or camping? skydiving
10. Snowball fights, snowmen, snow angels, or sledding?
11. English, math, science, history or art?
12. Gummy worms, lollipops, chocolate bars, or cotton candy?
13. Xbox 360, Gamecube, Super Nintendo, Handheld?
14. Facebook, Xanga, Tumblr, YouTube, or Google? and Twitter
15. Cute guys, tough guys, smart guys, hot guys? mmm Nerds!
16. Flats, heels, Uggs, flip flops or skater shoes? Cons
17. Early morning, early afternoon, late afternoon, evening? NIGHT!
18. Bathroom, living room, bedroom, kitchen, or attic?
19. Face-to-face, home phone, instant messenger, cell phone? webcam
20. Skinny jeans, flared jeans, capris, shorts, or skirts? and Dresses
21. T-shirt, hoodies, tank top, tube top, or halter top?
22. McDonald’s, Wendy’s, KFC, Burger King, or Dairy Queen? home cooked food and sushi
23. Car, airplane, train, boat, walking? yes.
24. Coffee, tea, water, milk, or soda? and alcohol
25. Drama, comedy, horror, action/adventure, or thriller? and foreign, indie and especially anything French.

Feel free to steal, but I really would love to know your answers too! :o)

photo by Sarah Gardner

That’s a contented sigh, by the way. I’ve been absent, but only because living my life demands my presence. Not to imply my newly retitled blog of love isn’t an important part of my life. Absolutement mes cheries! I really have yet to incorporate writing (on demand, through theme) as a part of my daily menu. Sigh.

Why are sighs so comforting? This whispery exhalation of breath, sent out with emotion that is somehow refreshing and surrendering at once. These illustrations by Sophie Griotto make me sigh. Note: I edited the first one for a wallpaper for my iPhone.

On said website, also see: Xette Cyrille Gouyette Pierette et Sarah Wilkins {those are my other favourites}

all by artist Leonid Afremov >> aren’t they simply amazing? Living in such a picture would be…whimsifantastiful.*

*whimsifantastiful   n. origin: Are’s head  whim zi fahn tahs tee full  whimsical, romantic, fantasy, fantasy, wonderful + any other adjectives of the like.

If you have an apple and I have an apple and we exchange these apples then you and I will still each have one apple. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange these ideas, then each of us will have two ideas.

-George Bernard Shaw

- – -

So many people walk around with a meaningless life. They seem half-asleep, even when they’re busy doing things they think are important. This is because they’re chasing the wrong things. The way you get meaning into your life is to devote yourself to loving others, devote yourself to your community around you, and devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning.

-Tuesdays With Morrie

- – -

Decide that you want it more than you are afraid of it.

-Bill Cosby

- – -

We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospection.

-Anaïs Nin

- – -

If we listened to our intellect we’d never have a love affair. We’d never have a friendship. We’d never go in business because we’d be cynical: “It’s gonna go wrong.” Or “She’s going to hurt me.” Or, “I’ve had a couple of bad love affairs, so therefore …” Well, that’s nonsense. You’re going to miss life. You’ve got to jump off the cliff all the time and build your wings on the way down.

-Ray Bradbury

- – -

Is your life safe? The word safe is both an adjective and a noun. As an adjective it means “being free from danger.” As a noun it’s “an enclosed storage container with a lock on it.” If you’re living the adjective, you’re living the noun.

-Steve Pavlina

- – -

she’s painted every toe a different colour and wears three different perfumes: one behind each ear and a drop on each wrist. always wears hope sewn to the lace on her brassiere. collects words, hoards words, eats words, cooks with words, hangs words in the shower, frames words, writes them on the bottom of her shoes, hides them between her pillows, plants them in the herb garden, writes them upside down, sews them into the thread of her skin. repeats a lie 30 times in her head before she means it. uses tea bag strings as bookmarks, uses tea bags three times, uses a teaspoon of chocolate powder in her teapot. has lists of lists. prefers warm above everything else. uses rain as the ultimate excuse. calls crying rain. cries at breakfast. wants to be kissed for being smart.

is she silly? she’s silly, isn’t she? she can hum the word silly…it sounds like Benny and the Jets.

Our union is like this: You feel cold, so I reach for a blanket to cover our shivering feet.
A hunger comes into your body, so I run to my garden and start digging potatoes.
You asked for a few words of comfort and guidance, and I quickly kneel by your side offering you a whole book as a gift.
You ache with loneliness one night so much you weep, and I say here is a rope, tie it around me, I will be your companion for life.

-Hafiz

How you treat yourself teaches people how to treat you.

I cannot exist without you. I am forgetful of everything but seeing you again. My life seems to stop there, I see no further. You have absorb’d me. I have a sensation at the present moment as though I were dissolving. I have been astonished that men could die martyrs for religion… I have shudder’d at it… I shudder no more. I could be martyr’d for my religion: Love is my religion. I could die for that. I could die for you. My creed is love, and you are its only tenet. You have ravish’d me away by a power I cannot resist.

a love letter from John Keats to Fanny Brawne.

Bright Star was no less than five stars.

1. I must live somewhere beautiful. I must open the windows and see something break-taking (besides myself) so that even if the rain falls and the fog settles, literally and metaphorically speaking, it still makes the day exceptional.

2. That said, inside must also make me smile with glee. Have you seen the TJMaxx commercial where the girl comes home gleeful because of how amazing her house looks? Bright walls…exquisite, vintage pieces…vignettes thoughtfully highlighting my personality: that’s ideal. Can you imagine the magnificence I’d cook up in this kitchen?

3. Be strong. Strength of body (dance!) and strength of mind (5 languages and a volume of memorised Neruda). Learn to bend and breathe and meditate so that graceful, glide-y movement is second nature and actually looks natural. And that of my tongue: graceful and natural.

4. Get portraits done. Okay, get a portrait done. I really like the idea of this one. A girl with a million balloons. Definitely a portrait every year.

5. Have the most exquisite, favourite, collected things: teapots and teacups, shoes (always invest in the quality shoes!), journals, men (*ahem*), battle scars and love letters.

6. Altruism and charity are also musts. In high school I volunteered every summer with a day camp for autistic children and those are some of my best memories. Reading out loud to kids at the public library (and a costume party afterwards) and lunch dates with funny old people…or cranky old people. But they have to eat too. :-)

- – - – -

I think that covers most of everything, for now. I have to leave it a bit flexible, but I know these are for sure necessary. At least it’s a start.

with love,

are

“Or perhaps it is that time doesn’t heal wounds at all, perhaps that is the biggest lie of them all, and instead what happens is that each wound penetrates the body deeper and deeper until one day you find that the sheer geography of your bones – the angle of your hips, the sharpness of your shoulders, as well as the luster of your eyes, the texture of your skin, the openness of your smile has collapsed under the weight of your griefs.”
— Thrity Umrigar

“I did not lose myself all at once. I rubbed out my face over the years washing away my pain, the same way carvings on stone are worn down by water.”
- Amy Tan

“The best revenge is living well without you.”
— Joyce Carol Oates

…I have a new entire relationship in one paragraph coming soon. One good thing about all of this is: inspiration.

This blog used to have diary purpose. I should have been able to come here and speak the words of my heart without apprehension. It’s evolved (or maybe devolved) into this prententious little homage to the blogs I enjoy reading. But that isn’t how I write. More importantly, not how I live.

For someone with such specific life terms, I’ve been compromising myself a lot lately. A compromise in the interest of maintaining balance. This is the Libra in me. We’re so diplomatic and justice-driven, whatever it takes to be thoroughly equal (read: communist), we’ll do it. Yeah, new game plan. I’ve stopped being myself so that I’d have certain things in my life…thing is, I get that thing ONCE a month. If that. What was, I thought, a relationship requirement has become a ridiculous justification for: compromising myself. Stop being charming for a bed partner once a month? Stop meeting new people for someone to go to the movies with me? But here’s the big joke, the irony: I prefer sleeping in the bed by myself. And I love going to the movies alone. And all those romantic things? If I waited for someone else to do them, they’d never get done. I’ll I surprise myself with trips to the masseuse, surprise dinners with champagne, candlelit showers and new dresses!

I’m beginning to forget why I need a relationship in my life. Especially since they require so much compromise. Especially since they are hardly ever truly satisfying. Especially since I assume the role I hate (the accommodating, compromising girlfriend) and no one has yet to stop me. I’m looking for different and this, my heart, isn’t it.

The love story segment of this story is over.