What I Must

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

DNF

“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.

Caught in a Compromising Position

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.

my moleskine and me

I’m a girl who loves nice things. Sometimes, they’re normal girl things: shoes, dangly earrings, overpriced handbags… And sometimes, they’re undoubtedly nerdy: iPod hacks, new processors and moleskines. Today, I brag about my moleskine(s). A girl can’t have too many! Well, this girl can’t…

These are my handmade cahiers. My [unfinished] idea log made from a Cinnamon Toast Crunch box and my airmail cahier. I made them both by hand…I especially love the airmail notebook.

And now, my shining star:

-

I added a button to the cover as an excellent pen holder…and total cuteness!

My solution to cover the thread on the inner cover was to create a cascading inside of paint cards. I love the colours and especially, the names. Like Gypsy Queen and Courentyne Gold! The cover has evolved.

-

I also brown paper packaged up some composition notebooks

that hold all the gritty note taking and “un-serious” doodling.

-

So, a few weeks before my birthday, Bright Star releases. It’s the love story of the 3-year romance John Keats had with Fanny Brawne. I already know I’ll cry…*spoiler alert:* he dies.

-

Yeah, so be careful what you wish for. I want a room full of peonies and tiny tea roses for my birthday.

And Disney movies.

flat champagne

In a month, I turn 23 and I feel the only thing I’ve done is successfully jump out of a plane without dying or wetting myself on camera and manage to screw up one more person’s life.

Champagne for me for being consistent. I am as hard to kill as a cockroach and can efficiently f*ck up with love. Key word: efficiently…in one year or less.

Q et A

Oh have I been severly slacking on a serious/substantial  blog post! Shame on me, I know. Between getting prepped and staying prepped for classes and etc. and trying to keep my perspective above the water level in the glass, my poor s&i easily takes the back burner. But that doesn’t mean I’m not always composing half drafts in my head. Every Friday morning (like this one), I lay in bed an extra 15 minutes and read through the posts of Danielle LaPorte’s white hot truth. I n s p i r i n g! Everytime!

So, this past Friday, before I got up to make blueberry pancakes for Big, I read an interview she held with Chris Guillebeau and absolutely loved the questions she asked. They are thoughtful, funny, and forces something I think the majority of us lack: conviction. I guess, since I’ve been thoroughly enjoying my Modern Western Political Thought class, questions of morality and my stance have been crossing my plate more and more and it’s time I found a few spaces to fill.

Head first:

To what are you positively attracted? Innocent things that are pure of nature (organic, authentic, and sincere). There’s something truly moving about watching an artist (of whatever forte) imbibing themselves with the power of their muse – the feeling of totally clearing the mind and falling into the act of the art. Pouring the whole of my energy and power into my voice, into my limbs…and the hardest, into my words. Sometimes writing can be too sheer a vessel to hold one’s passion. {Poetry is the art of using words charged with their utmost meaning. – Dana Gioia}

What do you know to  be true…unquestionably beyond doubt? Love is it. In love, there is kindness, faith, the benefit of the doubt, willing sacrifice, trust, hope and really, the whole of life. Being loved gives you strength and loving someone gives you courage (my posthumous mentor, Lao Tzu). To be loved for who I am and in spite of it? And all the things love can do? Well, that’s it right there. Love is it. Oh, and I love quotes. And poetry. And chocolate.

What is the dumbest thing that you used to believe in? My self-worth was determined by how I fit up against the “perfect woman” standard. She is everything, for everyone and if I faltered even a bit (didn’t shave my legs or “had a headache”), my stock would plummet. I spent my adolescence trying to rise above this and maybe it will cause relationships this point forward to suffer (because of this warped concept of “best”), but I be my best self and love well and that’s my formula for success.

What question are you currently living? How many lifetimes can you live in this one? Women like Elizabeth Taylor (with her 8 marriages and 7 husbands) and Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire (the perfect example of trendsetter and major political influence) truly inspire me – all that living in just one life. And in one fantastic quote: “Legend tells of a legendary warrior whose kung fu skills were the stuff of legend.” {Kung Fu Panda}

What do you believe that you didn’t believe before? What changed your mind? There’s more than one way to live life. I grew up Christian and with the teachings of the road to Calvary and the gift of salvation through rebirth as a repentant sinner through Jesus Christ and since Western religion tends to be the standard on this side of the planet, you grow up knowing what’s expected of you and how to achieve a life of purpose. But if everyone is living life this way, where are the differences?

What do you know the most about? Well, myself. I know the most about myself.  I should not talk so much about myself if there were anybody else whom I knew as well. Unfortunately, I am confined to this theme by the
narrowness of my experience. (Thoreau). But I know a bit about the things I’ve fallen in love with too: the lines of the Eiffel Tower; the sound of the pen on the new page; the feel of a pair of strong, tender hands on the back of my head while his lips whisper something to the surface of mine; the smell of chocolate spread melting into slightly tinged toast; the first bite into an apple that always reminds me of the first time I ever bit into an apple. The people who love me and who I love. These are the things I know.

What did you want to be when you grow up? Et maintenant (and now)? I was precocious as a little girl. I always knew I wanted to write and I’ve always loved words – I taught myself how to write cursive! I wanted to be a lawyer, then a nurse, and I wanted to sing. I put on plays at home; hung up sheets and wrote up programs and menus and dress codes and then expected everyone to show up, decked out and ready to be entertained. In fact, I was a lot like Briony in Atonement (minus the life-altering lie). Now I want to be a cemetery-owner, a lighthouse keeper, chocolaterie owner…

What’s the relationship between your life and music? The last song I ever want to hear is The Flower Duet from Lakmé. I miss singing more than I need breathing. I listen to Indian music when I cook – and when I say “listen,” I mean blast at full volume. However, I hardly ever listen to my iPod.

Where do you think love hides? Love doesn’t hide. It’s out there in the open, rather obvious and blatant, ready for us all to find. And I don’t necessarily mean just a person, but love is actually all around.

— and a little less serious:

A
- Available: no. I’m happily taken.
- Age: 22 years
- Annoyance: selfishness
- Animal: monkey
B
- Beer: Heineken
- Birthdays: October 10, 1986
- Best Friend: Big
- Blind or Deaf: neither. not speaking that into existence.
- Best weather: rain and powercuts ;-)
- Been in Love: sigh…oh yes. In love.
- Believe in Magic?: ^ love is magic.
- Believe in Santa: him name mommy. and boyfriend.

C
- Candy: CHOCOLATE!!!
- Color: green
- Chocolate/vanilla: ummm…maybe you missed it? CHOCOLATE!!!
- Chinese/Mexican Food: self-made Chinese
- Cake or pie: chocolate? both.
- Continent to visit: Europe
- Cheese: PepperJack

D

- Day or Night: Night
- Dancing in the rain: Oh yeah!

E
- Eyes: Brown
- Ever failed a class: Negative, but I did make a D once

F
- First thoughts waking up: ohhhhhhhhhh got to Pee! -or- damn, it’s 2 [pm] already?
- Food: sushi, rice porridge and CHOCOLATE!

G
- Greatest fear: lizards.
- Goals: afford a simple, comfortable life, adopt some babies and torment my best friend for life.
- Gum: nay. mints. I do not mindlessly chew like a cow and his cud. (and Big hates it)
- Get along with your parents: oh yes. love them terribly (gee, what an odd adverb choice)

H
- Hair Color: naturally dark chocolate, currently fading black
- Height: 5′6′
- Happy: under certain, yet broad circumstances
- Holiday: Christmas
- How do you want to die: very old

I
- Ice Cream: nay. Gelato.
- Instrument: my voice

J
- Jewelry: my Eiffel Tower necklace and my Tiffany Blue coral earrings
- Job: student and owner of SheRhytswell paperie

K
- Kids: no thank you. not yet.
- Kickboxing or karate: yoga.
- Keep a journal: all over the damn place. my arms too. make them, keep them, hoard them.

L
- Love: is it.
- Laughed so hard you cried: oh yes, all the time. Thanks to Big.

M
- Milk flavor: organic 2% or raw milk
- Movies: foreign
- Motion sickness: only when I read in the car
- McD’s or BK: don’t curse at me. I eat only real food.

N
- Number: 10

O
- One wish: a forgotten [HUGE] European inheritance (along the lines of a villa or a piece of land/vineyard or a bookstore)

P
- Pepsi/Coke: neither
- Perfect Pizza: margheritta, completely handmade by me

Q
- Question: What’s next?

R
- Reality T.V.: ANTM ['Merica's Next Top Mogel]
- Radio Station: last.fm
- Roll your tongue in a circle: no. *shudder*
- Ring size: 5.5 – 6

S
- Song: The Flower Duet de Lakmé
- Shoe size: 7.5 – 8
- Salad Dressing: olive oil
- Sushi: my favourite. Everything at Ru-San’s and Spicy Brown Rice Shrimp Inari from Whole Foods
- Strawberries/Blueberries: Strawberries [oragnic] and Blueberries [organic] – I could never choose

T
- Tattoos: Content ready, location pending, Big is a wuss. [so, no. not yet]
- Time for bed: between 3 – 5 a.m.

U
- Unpredictable: changes

V
- Vacation spot(s): Egypt, Paris, Jamaica or…bed

W
- Weakness: anything chocolate
- Which one of your friends acts the most like you? Willeby…or Tami
- Worst feeling: being sleepy. Is there anything worse?
- Worst Weather: unbearable heat.

X
- X-Rays: CAT Scan

Y
- Year it is now: 09 is mighty fine.
- Yellow: is one of my favourite colours.

Z
- Zoo animal: monkeys

–

There! I made an EXTRA long effort for you. I hope it wasn’t too much to read. I’ll add more pictures in the next few posts. You know what I’d love though? If you’d copy and paste the ABCs and answer them in your comments. I’d love it a lot!

As always, cheers!

x.

that’s it!

sh*t, more sh*t and everything sh*t and the end result will be…stars. I’m excited. Universe, bring it on! My favourite thing about the night are the stars.