something more

why ingrid michaelson is amazing

scared shitless

i have no idea what i'm doing

i'm in seminary, i work in the retail department of a corporation that i can't actually write the name down of on the internet due to their privacy policy, i feel like i've sold my soul by working in said retail position since i am fervently against the US' consumer capitalist society that i live in, i'm moving in with my girlfriend of 3 years in 6 weeks, we are thinking about getting an animal (most likely a small dog), i could keep going but i don't want to

i'm eating goldfish. they are good.

i'm scared shitless and confident in my ignorance of the future at the same time.

i have so many emotions and no words to express them. really no way to express them. i'm ok tho, i've been here in the past and at those times i needed to do things that were somewhat self-destructive and right now i don't need to. but what i would love to do right now is throw some eggs at some plywood at the beach...but i can't. instead i will listen to this on repeat:

post-(blank) life

ever have one of those moments where everything that's happened in the last (x-amount of time) seems to just click and point you somewhere? the moment may or may not be life-changing, only the future will tell.

four things happened to me in the last 48-hours that dropped one of those moments on me.

1-i went to a therapist with the intent of a serious "relationship" for the first time in a little over 5 years. while there i got some affirmations that i REALLY needed regarding my relationship, my life's ambitions, and my feelings towards my family

2-i become a professional grade 8 referee. i passed the test and got my badge and can now earn money and climb the career ladder to becoming a world-class referee.

3-i watched "catch me if you can" with my best friend.

4-r shared some personal struggles with me that really opened my eyes.

looked at separately these things don't seem like they should have some sort of life-changing kick to them. but for me when thrown together...and i'll even go so far as to say...in that order, they did. it feels like i finally feel "grown-up." college is over, this is life, i am now a part of it. i can't really explain what exactly i figured out or what exactly i need to do or what exactly this all means.

things i do know:
1-i need to stop living off of everyone else and live off of myself. life isn't handed to you, you have to take it for yourself. if i want something, i need to work for it and attain it myself.

2-as much as i enjoy simple things and taking the easy way out i need to keep pushing myself to attain the best that i can. i need to set the bar higher. i need put the fire under myself, no once will.

3-i need to let others take care of themselves. i am not superman (or superwoman). i can be there for support but i can't be there to take over and make everything better. i can prop people up and i can keep them going, but i can't kick all the people's asses that have hurt them and i can't put their life back together for them.

as i've said this may or may not be a life-changing, but i'm personally hoping and trying to make this at least a turning point. i'm laying another stone down on my path and i'm stepping onto it.

the friend

so i'm back home from oregon...and my, oh my has the last week been....well i don't even know what to call it. crazy isn't right, busy isn't fully true, weird is definitely not the word, but normal is far from right as well. so yea it's been a week.

thursday, i parted from a and my beloved car. it was very weird to watch my car drive away with someone else driving. like legit weird. and then i went and sat in this cute coffee/tea shop across from the hostel a and i stayed in. i had my duffel bag with me but i wasn't a sore thumb cuz there were some people with big backpacks. the world cup games hadn't started yet so i sat at a chair by the window and set up my computer to blog. then a lady who was sitting right in front of the tv got up and i thought about snatching the seat but i noticed she had left her really nice leather jacket so i left my stuff and ran to catch her. a lady outside said it was real cool of me to do that. but i was just glad to be nice. then i sat awhile trying to blog but nothing came to me. then r called and said to come outside so i packed up and gathered to head outside. r and her mom and a cousin picked me up, then we dropped the cousin off and visited some family friends. i knew that to them i was "a friend" but little did i know that the rest of my week would be that way.

r and i went to powell's for the afternoon and she told me there to that the family we'd be seeing later i was just a friend as well. i was relatively ok with that cuz it was just a few hours. powell's was relatively fun even though it was my third time there in three days. then we went and had dinner with her family. it was a great evening, especially since the lakers won the nba finals (i am NOT a lakers fan, just less of a celtics fan). then we drove to the family friend's house we were staying at. r and i had a good "reunion" there and shared a bed that night. the next morning we slept in and went into town (a rinky-dink town) and had lunch, i knew that it would be a bad idea to do anything "couply" so i didn't but i had quite an amusement with the stares at ME since i was VERY androgynously dressed that day. =)

then we went back to the house and it was there that r told me that the family we were staying with (whom i already could tell was God-fearing by all the crosses and lord's prayers) would not take kindly to us so i was just a friend, and that when we got to her father's side of the family (oh yea! i met up with r in oregon cuz her distant father passed and she wanted me there as emotional support at his 'celebration') she didn't know what they'd think so i would be just the friend again. well i was very surprised to learn all this. i mean i really hadn't expected to be in the closet the whole time. and on top of that, try and explain to people why in the world YOU'VE decided to come 700 miles to be with a friend from college who is in oregon (and originally from hawaii) for her father's funeral. i mean i told the truth, i had road-tripped up with another friend and it just so happened that r was also here and since HI is really far we decided to meet up. luckily no one asked but they had that glimmer of "well why didn't you just get lunch? why are you HERE?" but i for sure felt it. the family we were with that night, one of them straight up said "well that's a really crazy coincidence!" but in a condescending tone as if i was lying to her. which i mean technically i was but not really.

anyway, i was really hurt, and not by r. i was hurt by having to go back into the closet. it was REALLY hard. i mean it's one thing to be in the closet about yourself, and even your relationship when your s-o isn't around, but it is a whole other thing to be in the closet about yourself AND your relationship while you are right next to your s-o and in the company of many heterosexual couples, especially when there really isn't a reason for you to even be there in the first place so everyone is scrutinizing you. i mean i COULD have come out myself and not been out about mine and r's relationship but because i had no other reason to be there than as her s-o, it would have pretty much outed r for sure. it was pretty much torture. and extremely emotionally tolling.

luckily we only spent two nights where i had to be completely in the closet. the last three nights we stayed in a house that already knew about r and i so i had a sanctuary. when we were with r's father's family i was "the friend," though i'm pretty sure at last a few people knew that was a lie, but at the end of the day i could myself.

overall the trip was really nice. it was a good break from the depression that i felt myself falling into after i graduated. and now i feel like i have a renewed sense of myself and my life. i dearly miss r, and am pissed that no one has invented a bridge to hawaii. but for now i am content with my life. next step: get a job...AHAHAHAHAHAHA

(not) a part of portland

so as already stated, i'm in portland. still enjoying it, though the weather is not nearly as cheery as i'd like it to be, but i guess that's expected this far north...over the 45 parallel (aka half-way between the equator and the north pole). i'm also enjoying all the beautiful dogs. note that i added beautiful and didn't just say all the dogs. portlandians (i made that up, hope it's right) have tons of dogs!!! they are everywhere and i LOVE it...but on top of that they are truly more beautiful as a general population than anywhere else i've been. i want to steal at least 20 dogs a day cuz they are all so cute!!

a (my old friend) and i have just been putzing around portland, riding the free streetcars and max lightrails all over and just generally taking the city in but not spending too much money (well i'm now up to $60 at powell's but what can i say). one thing, besides the beautiful dogs, that we notice a lot is how the same everyone is here. i mean everyone is an "individual" and they are different than most everywhere else, but because they are all different, they are all the same. it's kind of weird and annoying at the same time. and because of it, i kinda stand out. the general dress here is a mix between punk, grunge, artsy, and outdoorsy. even the people in business attire have some sort of grunge or outdoor element to them. and well i don't fit that. a kinda does cuz she is sorta punk artsy, but i'm...well i'm t-shirt n jeans/guys shorts and a simple zip hoodie. not to say that i don't fit into any one of the above categories, but generally since i also wear brightish shirts, i stand out a bit. and i don't really mind but what is most weird is that i fit in enough that it's not obvious that i'm from out of town. i almost wish that it was obvious that i'm not from here, but i don't think it is. but really it doesn't matter, just observations.

i found this great book (one of many!) at powell's called "out of the closet and nothing to wear" by leslea newman (she's the one who wrote "heather has two mommies"). it's a pretty easy read and i finished it in a total of about 4 hours tops. it is written from leslea's perspective and is about general life experiences with her wife, flash, in a femme/butch relationship. and although r and my relationship isn't very femme/butch at all, it just kinda made me want to be r's "butch." like obviously i shouldn't be butch if i'm not, but it was just so cute and all and i am the more butch one in our relationship, and yea it was just a cute quip i wanted to share with the world.

now i'm reading "self-made man" by norah vincent. it's super insightful and i'm really enjoying it!

ok the end.

roadtrip

so im currently in portland, oregon. an old friend and i decided to roadtrip up here about a year ago and we did it!!! it's a pretty sweet town, well i guess city, and powell's books is mind-blowingly awesome!! but having been here less than 24 hours i don't have much more to say about it. ok well the hostel is pretty cool, much better than the backpacker's i stayed in when i traveled in south africa. but yea, that's all.

i haven't posted in awhile but i just noticed that awhile back, maybe a month, i had some ideas and so i started a draft. of the three bullets in the draft i only remember what i wanted to post for one of them. i was watching the discovery channel and a commercial for the new season or a new special or whatever of plant earth was on. the commercial was pretty much advertising that this time around they'd have more "extreme" animals with more "extreme" behaviors that were way more "extreme" than the ones previously on planet earth. and it made me wonder "who determines what 'extreme' is? and what is it compared to?"

the only reasonable explanation i could come up with was that the behaviors are extreme as compared to human behaviors and other "normal" behaviors already exhibited by animals that we see all the time. and this made me wonder, why is that humans and their behaviors are "normal"? well, of course, it is because we always compare things to what we know, which in this case is our own behavior and the behaviors already established by other animals that we consider "normal." obviously the frogs that have super long tongues, or can change color, or whatever it is that made them "extreme" don't consider their behavior extreme, for them it is normal...but then again, do they even think about? that's a whole other topic so i won't go there. but really, why is that humans always consider themselves superior? why can't we just be in equal harmony? i mean how do we know that if those frogs weren't alive that we too wouldn't be around? i highly doubt that's true, but in such a case, if we were dependent on those frogs wouldn't they be superior? but it doesn't really matter. i just wish that we didn't need to feel superior to nature, or even to other humans, i wish that we could just except each other's uniqueness and celebrate it. why couldn't that commercial have marketed the "extreme" behaviors as "unique" behaviors? or some synonym of that? just my crazy thoughts.

sort of along those lines, i've noticed how some humans judge others but what they do or don't do, or by what they do or don't think or feel or eat or wear or react or really any verb. and i'm not going to try and lie and say that i don't do cuz i do. but one thing that has really caught my eye is how some people judge others by their literature and philosophical trends and whether or not they are "trendy" per today's apparent standards. for example, some close friends have a huge issue with the usage of some words that they feel are socially unjust and want to eradicate from the world. and i'm not just talking about the n-word or the r-word or the f-word. i'm talking about words like b!#*h, f*!k, and cripple. now please don't take me the wrong way, i do believe that there are situations in which ALL of the above words should not be used. but the latter words, and even some of the former words, i feel that when in company who KNOWS the context of the way you are using it and that you don't mean harm, the words are perfectly fine to be used. but said friends feel that they should NEVER be used because the use of them puts down the people who the words are meant to be harmful. and just my thinking that there MAY be contexts in which the words COULD be used has them judging me, i don't even need to USE the words to be judged. in general i consider myself i pretty socially (and environmentally) just person, but because my personal philosophy does not align with theirs, i am not good enough and i am judged. these people are still my friends, but i can feel that i am not considered as "good" or "moral" or "upstanding" as they are. which to me makes them less upstanding, since they feel the need to judge me. i mean shouldn't we all be working together here? does it really matter if i feel that i can use the word b!#*h in certain contexts when it comes to how i fight for queer rights? or for a better government?

the thing that really gets me is that said friends LOVE lady gaga, like LOVE lady gaga, and feel that she stands for social progression and sticking to "the man" but last time i checked lady gaga loves the b-word...so aren't they being slightly hypocritical? hmmm...

overdue

i don't know why but "if we ever met again" by timbaland ft. katy perry is STUCK IN MY HEAD!!! well i guess only when lady gaga and beyonce's "telephone" isn't! I don't hate it, it's just getting annoying. the funny thing is that neither of them are particularly amazing songs...and timbaland's video isn't really amazing, though i do find it interesting that katy perry has perfect teeth on top and very unperfect teeth on the bottom (see 2:13-14ish). "telephone" i think is an UH-MAZE-ING video!!! it's soooo NOT a music video!!! love it! and i also love that it's the sequel to the video for "paparazzi." i think that's a really interesting move in the music video realm. check the videos out for yourself at the bottom of this post.

i promise music videos were NOT what was going to be the meat of this post. i've actually been thinking about this post since mid-february, and i keep "encountering" it. i don't know if i'm the only one this happens to or not, i really hope not, but i hope you understand what i'm talking about. i call it "the perfect day." and it is honestly more a realization in the moment than feeling amazing for a whole day. the time that really inspired this post was, as i said, mid-february (which is usually pretty cloudy and cool even in southern california) and was a VERY nice day. it was like the taste of spring before the real first day of spring. i had for some reason gotten out of my internship early enough to walk to a burger stand kiddy corner from a corner of campus. i hadn't been to the stand in about two years and i ordered a turkey burger combo. i walked back to campus, picked up a copy of the school newspaper and climbed into the amphitheater surrounding the fountain at the center of campus. i pulled out my ipod ( i was in an ingrid michaleson mood =) ) and began eating leisurely. i had texted r and she was going to meet me and we were going to walk to class together. while i was waiting for her i took a bit of my burger and looked around the amphitheater at all the smiling, laughing, dancing, eating, reading, walking, happy people. the sun was warm on my skin, one of my favorite songs was playing, the fountain was jumping, my burger was amazing and i just smiled. it was perfect. and in that moment i left my body and floated about ten feet up and just took everything in, let it fill me up and was content. i was able to be in that blissful state for a couple of minutes, but something brought me back down and i returned to living. it was still perfect but i no longer controlled how i felt the emotions. and since then i KEEP having those moments. it doesn't matter all the stress i'm under with school and money and family and my dogs being sick, it doesn't matter in these moments. i guess the best way to say it is that i'm living in the moment. and it really is the best.

i've also become whole. that sounds so weird! lol. but i have. my gender identity, gender expression, sexual identity and life in general have finally completely aligned and i finally feel like a whole complete person like i wrote in all of me. since then i have also stopped feeling like "a lesbian" or seeing r as "the woman i love." i feel more and more like i am me, which you can describe using adjectives such as lesbian, soccer player, student, environmentalist, peace-lover, girl, etc. and i know look at r as "the person i love." my sexuality is no longer what defines me, but is a part of the integrated whole.

the above realization made me begin to question the use of "i'm a lesbian" as opposed to "i'm lesbian." i mean i'm not super huge on the grammar and the technicalities of literature and writing, but there has GOT to be something there, and this is what i see. in the first phrase lesbian is a noun and in the second an adjective. in the first phrase lesbian is used as a defining word and in the second as a describing word. in the first phrase lesbian is used singularly and in the second is open to being more than one. for me the first phrase is where i was: singularly defined using a noun, and the second phrase is where i am now: many adjectives integrated into me leaving me open for community. it isn't groundbreaking, but is a distinction i am going to start making for myself.

In the deepest hour of the night, confess to yourself that you would die if you were forbidden to write. And look deep into your heart where it spreads its roots, the answer, and ask yourself, must I write? -Rainer Maria Rilke

"if we ever meet again" by timbaland featuring katy perry


"telephone" by lady gaga featuring beyonce (clean version)


"paparazzi"

the problem with peace

so i was surfing the internet and found this article about a mennonite college playing the national anthem for the first time ever during a recent baseball game. i was intrigued as to why the mennonites have a problem with the national anthem so i followed a link in the article to this page. i read the whole thing and found it very interesting. as a professed lover of peace (though i do have a small place in my heart for the UFC, boxing, brawling, wrestling and sparring) i was particularly intrigued because i had never thought about how the US flag and anthem were conceived (both during war). and then i read this: "Many nations broke off from the British empire over the years, and they all have basic freedom of religion and speech--Canada, Australia, India. None of these nations fought a war against England. Only the U. S. found that necessary." and it really made me think. i mean WOW, soooooo true!!!! i mean technically canada is still headed by the queen of england (learned that during the olympics opening ceremonies. see for yourself here though i'm not sure which video it is exactly) but really that doesn't make that big of a difference. the point is MAYBE i'm in the wrong country. we were based on war, are much too socially conservative for my taste, have way too much wrong with us, and our government STILL can't do anything. don't get me wrong, i DO love the US in the same way that i love my hometown even though i was only there for less than 2 years.

i can't change where i'm from, but i can change where i'm headed. and i think maybe i should.

we all have our own demons

my bff is in italy till may. today we were IMing and she said she had an epiphany: that she wasn't actively participating in her life. she said that people always saying living is 90% showing up and the other 10% is taking action, well she's only been doing the first 90%. and she was really distraught over this epiphany. she asked how i live my life, what actions i take. i told her there is no magic action, all you need is passion. and you must act on it. she has passion. she has a passion for italy, hence she went there. but all she's done is go to class, the cookie cutter tours and sit in her apartment. she is missing out cuz she isn't acting on her passion. she said she was too afraid to act. i told her that we all have that fear, but that we all have to take fear by the horns and throw it aside so that we can take action on our passion. i think i got through to her, and i think tomorrow is going to be a better day for her.

not acting is her demon. mine is the fear of not being happy in the long run. hence i've always looked for things that would make me happy in the future instead of in the present. but i finally threw that bull aside and applied to graduate school where i'll be happy now. it wasn't the path i was expecting but i'm happy with it: master in theological studies here i come!

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us, it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.
—Marianne Williamson

remember

"The gunfire around us makes it hard to hear. But the human voice is different from other sounds. It can be heard over noises that bury everything else. Even when it is not shouting. Even if it's just a whisper. Even the lowest whisper can be heard - over armies - when it's telling the truth."
-The Interpreter