Desire

Pressing into you,

I whisper for you to slide

Down that slippery slope

Into the abyss of breeze that flows

Between us two.

And stay with me.

Just stay there for a moment and let me feel.

Let me hold you where I want you.

I take your hand, or rather

You take mine and weave

Your fingers through my own.

And I haven’t been so free and so secure.

And we begin the dance,

The one of to and fro

Where you take control and sway me

Where you wish, and I oblige.

We twirl and we turn

Towards the inside and the out,

My back to your front

Then face to face once more

No walls, no floors no ceiling

To contain.

It is only me and you

Breathless and fatigued

Yet always willing to dine

Upon our flesh

And drink until we’re drunk

With the other’s soul…

Until there is nothing further to consume

Or create but life itself.

Reality Check List

1. Skip over the "fun" parts of the to do list which include looking into vacationing in Montreal and looking into skydiving)

2. Look into revised 2-4 semester course plan

3. Map next two weeks' schedule and appointments out

4. Adhere to being busy

5. "Put it there" that I am easily conquering all my tasks with pleasure & am EXTREMELY productive.

6. Accept that any "life" outside of work and study (and working out) is temporarily non-existent.

The Ideal Man List

Eyes I could swim in

Lips I could drink, nibble

A smile that makes me do the same

A laugh I could listen to on repeat

A voice that could talk me to sleep & whisper me awake

Eyebrows that hook me

Hands that are available to hold any time I wish

Arms that are always more than happy to hold me

Brushes the small of my back and I feel it everywhere

Someone who loves to be creative

In art

In life

In bed.

Is sensual, passionate

Gives me "back tickles" (my favorite thing, quite possibly in the entire world)

Feels deeply and shows it freely

Is irresistible

Finds me to be irresistible.

Is a man’s man who knows life is enhanced by a girl he could love

Is loyal

Loves children & knows he wants to have them

Is charming

Opens doors & closes them after me

Writes me notes

Buys me flowers just because

Calls me cutesy nick names

Is sentimental

Gets me

Opens me to new interests

Is physically active

Is a dreamer

Loves the outdoors

Likes snow sports

And is willing, if he is better than I am, to be patient and watch me wipe out 800 times on one hill.

Loves dogs, cats, and most other animals

Saves me from spiders

I feel like he's my superhero

Is patient

Is kind

Is friendly and outgoing in most any situation

Sensitive and accepting of other people’s reality

In decision making

In belief

An optimist who believes he and I can do anything—especially together.

Loves the world and wants to travel it (particularly with me by his side)

Finds meaning in everything in life.

Takes care of himself.

Loves food, loves to cook.

Likes coffee

Likes chocolate

Loves meat

Would eat a rocky mountain oyster just to say he did.

Loves that I am a chameleon and change my looks frequently

Loves that I am mommy-wired and could be completely happy to be a stay-at-home mother and home-maker but also have other creative ambitions that I intend to follow.

Loves the universe and takes hints from its timing, energy, feelings, and persistence.

Sees the good in people

Loves and appreciates my naivety

Is my best friend

The relationship comes with ease

I adore his family; he adores mine

He adores his own family.

Feels that my mother being my best friend is a plus

Has his favorite sports teams and doesn’t mind if I steal them for my own

Likes to have his woman by his side in team garb at sporting events

Is his own person

Has his own interests and knows it is important to have alone time with his friends from time to time.

Wants quality from life

Knows this doesn’t have to mean the finest things, but the finest experiences

Travel

Adventure

Love

A family

Isn’t too set in any of his ways

Likes change

Likes to be silly and knows the importance of occasional child-like playfulness

Willingness to roll down a hill

Scream on roller-coasters

Make funny faces

Have an imagination

Laughs appreciatively even in quiet situations

Would sing karaoke even if he sang horribly

Loves Disneyland & amusement parks

Plays games (of the entertainment variety)

Is always up for an adventure, even if it means getting lost

Appreciates a good sunset

Appreciates a romantic picnic

Is spontaneous

Knows where he wants to go in life and is on his way there

Balances me out

I balance him

Is quite fearless, ready to conquer anything

Says what he thinks when he is thinking it

Doesn’t kiss on the first date

When he does go in for it, there are fireworks

Has a wide variety of interests

Dances, and likes it, even if he is terrible at it

Makes me laugh

I am so happy around him my cheeks get sore from the grinning

Believes in traditional gender roles in a relationship

Knows that emotional give and take is the key to success in a relationship

Knows he wants to get married someday

Likes to be the provider

Receives compliments well

Likes receiving sentimental gifts

Loves to be touched

Is a happy person

Is available when I want and/ or need him to be

Communicates with me daily, even if far from one another

Looks phenomenally sexy in a pair of sweat pants and a tee shirt

Wears flip-flops

Loves to spoon (and assumes the role of the big spoon)

Communicates the desires he is almost too shy to say

Makes me think in new ways

Inspires me

Finds astrology, tarot, psychics, paranormal activity interesting

Loves my quirks

I am a sanctuary for him, a place where he can rest his weary head, where he doesn't have to be at his best...where he can be as ridiculous, goofy and unfiltered as he wants to be

The only man in my life with the authority to keep me on my toes and in line.

Extremely ethical

School Time Rant

I don't know why it is that I am so protective over my teachers. Not all of them, just some of them. But most of them this semester. I may get frustrated at one thing or another with them from here to there, but usually it is due to my own short-comings in the class.

What truly irks me is when I am in a class full of students who complain non-stop about a professor who they feel doesn't teach anything and yet sit in the class talking, texting, passing notes, studying other subjects, having conversations about what they're going to do together this weekend, drawing on the tables and in notebooks.

When did college become elementary school? Didn't we all learn not to draw on ourselves or the desks in the first grade? No! Kindergarden, actually!

This happens in every single class that I am in and it causes me to wonder what happened to humanity?

In film, granted the teacher has no structure in his class at the moment, but he is looking for "do-ers". People who have a natural drive to succeed. You need that in the industry and I think that it is an important thing to learn. I have my own difficulty in the class due to the lack of structure, but that is on me. My professor suggested texts, some of which I did not buy. I could have learned a lot had I purchased them. It is not my professor's fault that I did not, and thus hit a lazy spot in class where I claim I don't know where to go with producing my film. The thing is that you just get out there and do it. What are we waiting for?

In algebra I am surrounded by a class of people who I feel are, for the most part, the equivalent of prepubescent fifth graders. They talk during class and complain when the professor doesn't speak loudly enough for them to hear over their own conversations about their children who are in jail. Other students slow down the class by asking questions at the end of a semester in Algebra class which have to do with how she got a negative number--something that was learned in the beginning of the class and should have been a review for the person if they entered the class anyway. The professor is criticized, even talked back to in class, and she is 80 years old, and when paid attention to, a very easily comprehendable person.

In Geology, I seat myself at a table where a kid that I clicked with immediately sits and I'm finding I will have to sit elsewhere. The kids at that table behave as high school students, because most of them are not too far from being out. But what is the point of being enrolled in and attending a class in which you are going to refuse to listen, and then because of your refusal to listen to lectures in class, get Cs or Ds on exams with the rest of the class who behaves the same as you, demand a curve, which the professor stated in her syllabus that she does not do, and threaten to go to the Dean should the cycle be repeated. And is it really necessary to make comments, during class, when the teacher can most definitely hear what you are saying, about the repeated phrases and speech patterns that the professor has and giggle?

What has happened to people taking responsibility for their own actions? Does anybody do that anymore? Is anyone honest enough with themselves to be honest with everyone else and say, and really mean "it's not you, it's me"?

Perhaps it's that I've taken a long break from school and am appreciative that I am able to reap the benefits of financial aid to put me in the classes which give me knowledge on the subjects that I am curious about.

Perhaps it is that I am an optimist almost to the point of being flawed, that I will find at least some aspect of even the worst class to be interested in that causes me to want to listen, to respect my teachers for their knowledge in a class which I may or may not have a deep interest in.

Perhaps it is the way that i was brought up, and perhaps the way that others were not, that I learned to respect my elders and people in a position of authority despite whether or not I agree or disagree with their methods of teaching or their points of view.

The point is that I am disappointed not in the quality of professors that I have at my school but in the quality and quantity of students that are permitted to waste the underpaid time of those who do make an effort to teach a group which has, apparently, no real interest in learning.

These days, more and more, I am realizing just how disappointing our educational system is in America. And it's heart breaking. Because education is the key to a nation's growth and survival. If our citizens are not learning, or willing to learn, or put in an effort to learn and take responsibility for themselves, how can we, as a nation, be expected to take responsibility for it, find creative solutions to our problems and learn from our nation's past mistakes?

This is a problem. And it shouldn't be.

Treasure Hunting

I am a lover.

The more that I go through life the more that I realize this. I didn't come to this Earth as someone who was meant for a hug now and then, or a deep conversation with someone over coffee once a month. I was born the child who wanted to be in someones arms all the time and can't get enough physical affection, hugs, kisses, cuddling in bed and analyzing of life. It's all my thing and I cherish those moments when they do happen. And as for deep conversation, if no one is around, I will have one with myself. But I do prefer a partner to sit and analyze the depths of life with me.

I am the girl whose attraction meter breaks every time she is with someone new (and those things are not easy to repair, let me tell you). I see a man I like, heart and body, and suddenly I find myself passing by men that I KNOW I would find attractive on a normal basis but nothing happens. I see, and I pass by. Not a thought of "look at this gorgeous guy" in my mind, but only an almost undetectable noticing. Like I said, my meter breaks. It gets stuck on the one person. Stuck. STUCK STUCK STUCK! And it stays that way for quite some time.

I am not the get over it girl. And if I've liked a soul, I mostly like them forever. Even the ones I wish I didn't like anything about, my mind drifts back to whatever positive I can find in them and it clings there. Like it's my only rope to survival.

The truth is that I love my fellow human beings. I try to find and see so much good in people that I trick myself into ignoring the tell-tale signs of the not-so-good-for-me ones. The surface can be very obviously flawed and I'll still excavate the hell out of someone for that shiny little artifact in them. Maybe sometimes it's just the persons eyes. Other times there's a little piece of their heart that I find... and sometimes they don't want to keep it. Maybe a sense of humor, and a lot of times there is so much good in people that I just want to put the entire soul into my pocket and carry them around forever.

I have a hard time letting go of those ones. But so many times people enter and exit your life. Sometimes with words, sometimes not. Sometimes they leave you those artifacts you excavated, other times they snag them and take them with them and all you can do is remember. But the point is that I must keep them in a log book or something, because if you've touched my life, I remember you. And chances are that in one way or another, I loved you:

The one girl who moved so much that my mom and I asked her to live with us for a couple months in the summer, and after that I don't remember seeing her but once again. I still look for her online, hoping I can find a way to be in touch.

The guy I thought was my dad for several years of my life. He said some terrible things during that last phone conversation, but I still have such affection for him. I still see that gem somewhere in him and have to remind myself not to call him my father.

His wife. I still remember looking at her for the first time in person and wanting to be her, she was so beautiful. And for a while she was kind. I still hold on to that.

And then there's the boys. Ah, how I gather little trinkets from them.

There was that cute little boy on the playground when I was 4. I remember very clearly chasing him around during the playground kissing game. I got him. I still have the souvenir memory of his blushing cheeks and my sense of accomplishment. I believe this is where my struggle with chase vs. be chased came around. The chase certainly is fun!

The boy on the beach, a wave coming on the shore, his holding my hand and that little kiss on the mouth in his blue children's swim trunks and my blue and white checkered one piece with the stomach and back cut outs. He got a ninja turtle "tatted" on his face that day. I got a mermaid on my arm. Too cute. I learned from him never to lose your tender playfulness.

Derrick and his sensitivity and patience in taking a personality test in a book over two hours of time when we could have been making out. His eyes were so gorgeous it was a flaw. He taught me that pretty isn't the only thing that counts. Chemistry is key.

Brett. The man who told me he'd been with a man and wasn't sure he wouldn't try again as he was sucking my "cherry toes", making me laugh, and giving me up-side-down kisses that are like "pineapple up-side-down cake--strange but irresistibly sweet". Friends didn't work out so well, but years later I see the part of him I liked the most is still there. He talks to every living thing from energy to plants. It makes me smile. I'm glad he's married to an apparently amazing woman. However brief his appearance in my life, he really made an impact spiritually, and helped me indirectly in writing an entire chapter in my life.

Brian who on the very first, but somehow not the last date came right out and spilled his guts from wanting to sleep with me to all of his drama with his last ex and his sobriety. I got a few free Starbucks out of this, a dance, some confidence and some entertaining stories. His treasure was already on the surface: his vulnerability. Heart on his sleeve. Good for him for being so brave. I appreciated his disclosure and took that to heart. To this day I always try to remind myself to let it all hang out on a first date. Nothing to hide.

Marcus who told me from the start he was an "asshole" sometimes, and who I insisted was not. Marcus taught me that men are complex creatures, and that they will tell you, pretty much on the first date, what they are, and what they aren't. And in following encounters they will prove it to you. Marcus taught me the importance of listening and decoding a man. An art that I am sure takes a lifetime to master.

Ken, my dear ex fiance. Had either one of us been a little less smart, we'd likely be married and miserable today. Two years later, I find that from him I learned, most importantly, to go with your gut instinct. Next, the importance of it never getting old to take pleasure in holding hands in just the right way, cuddling in long lines at Disneyland and taking goofy photos. It is important to feel that a man could be a woman's super hero and save her from the world. That when you leave the house in anger at midnight for the first and only time it is a rather important display that he follow you down the street and not simply let you go. Same goes in the reverse situation. I learned that it is important for a woman like me to maintain my independence in any relationship and still be able to provide for myself in one way or another. That it is important for both parties to not only say that they want 100% communication, but to also give it willingly, even if it's scary to do so; and that travel and adventure, to some, is not as important as it is to another. While one person can wait 'til they're 60 and retired to see the world, another knows that 60 years on Earth is not guaranteed and you'd better live it up while you can.

Time has passed, and I have been excavating the treasures within myself. Making sure that I have not buried any too deep to easily bring to the surface.

Along the way I stumbled upon--or rather someone stumbled upon me. We spoke. And I learned another lesson. When busy and talking to someone, stay busy. Don't re-arrange life to accommodate someone. If it is meant to be, life will rearrange itself. If you move things around, you can lose your original path a bit and this can be unnerving. Don't go to the high board and give your best, most disciplined dive into the waters below. Instead, run from the side of the pool and cannon ball. In time there will be the opportunity to give it your best and go for the gold in diving. But it is essential to first play and get to know the waters.

A Place to Lay

In the woods

against a tree.

In the snow.

Rolling in the hay.

On the roof of a car

in the middle of a field

in the rain.

In the silence.

Or in the state of laughing loud.

On a blanket in the sand

along uninhabited beach.

In a cave.

In the open, looking at the stars.

At the river

on a boulder by the stream.

In the trunk of a Redwood.

In a boat rocking gently on the sea.

In a hammock

in some exotic rainforest

on a humid day

just after a 20 mile hike to and from

the most beautiful waterfall

that someone’s ever seen.

On the floor of a simple mountain cottage

with no air conditioning

on a warm summer day

with the windows blowing in a gentle breeze.

In a child’s tree house.

And just for kicks

A counter or an empty desk, a table.

Or in a corner up against the wall.

Or up against the washing machine

in the noisy laundry room.

In the water of some Jacuzzi

or some other source; a shower, or a bath

Or anything, really.

Maybe tied up to the chair.

But definitely up against a tree

in the woods

And all those other places…

Places to lay with someone.

Love, Dream, Scrabble

I have this thing of taking a scrabble letter holder and placing it on my desk.

Whatever it is that I want to draw into my life, I find the correct letter tiles to spell it out and keep it in front of me as I work and do my homework, write creatively etc.

I finally removed the last tiles which sat upon the holder after they had lived there for a long period of time, and had allowed just one to remain, planning on building up to assembling the word I now had in mind, making sure that I really wanted it.

This is a shift, as normally I decide that I want something and I pounce on it with every ounce that I’ve got in me. This whole concept of something gradual is not natural and rather foreign to me. But it felt nice none the less. All of it. The word I was building up felt nice. The idea. The waiting.

A change occurred, and last night, as soon as I fell asleep in the moments just following my head hitting the pillow, I dreamed about those letters. My hands were submersed in a deep tub of scrabble tiles. I felt their silky smoothness, their cool temperature; heard the deep rumbling sound that they made as I moved my hands through them in circles, causing them to scrub against the deep container in which they sat. Eventually I brought my hands from the depths of the tubs and to the surface, fingering and picking through the letters, a clickity ticking sound as they fell upon one another in that superficial upper layer.

It didn’t feel natural. It didn’t feel good. A superficial surface-skimming just didn’t seem adequate for anything I’d like to draw into my life.

And I’m not really sure what it all means, besides that ultimately I am searching for something and it feels better to search deeper within than to only touch the surface of a dream; but I spent the extra time taking handfuls of tiles from the middle of the bin rather than from the top, slowly acquiring the letters for my word.

In reality, my tile holder remains with only one letter tile on my desk. Within the day, the current tile will probably no longer be there, and instead, four letters will take its place. “L”, “O”, “V”, “E”. Because after two years away from it, I just want to jump into the open seas of those letters and get carried away in its current. And not worry about finding my way back to the solid land I came from.

The Big Fish

I often travelled down to the river to do some scouting, observing the fish in the streaming, flowing water as they pass me by. I like the looks of this one; I dislike the looks of another. And from that point we usually go forward. This is when I gather my finest lures (the less attractive of them tucked away in my tackle box, hidden from view) and place them on the line and cast off, hoping one of the fish I like takes hold. This is when a fisher-person throws out the line and reels it in, reels it in, little by little. It’s this tricky little game of stringing them on.

And me, well I personally never was very good at this game. I didn’t have the discipline or the trickery in me, frankly. And in truth, I was never looking to devour my fish, but for a sort of best friend from it. Because of this, I would receive only a couple of nibbles here and there -- a pitiful amount, really, because I was choosey -- and would place the fish in a bowl, almost always realizing within a conversation or two that this was not the fish for me. I would toss them back, and wave goodbye, sad to lose a former friend.

Then one day, when I was not down at the stream, I heard it beckoning me. It called me to visit, so I answered, and approached. And as I did, my eyes grazed on two beautiful fish, one the color of sunlight and the other the color of night swimming slowly, gracefully around in circles. Mouth to tail, mouth to tail, as if a string had attached the two. For a moment I stood gazing at this remarkably different scene. I couldn’t remember having been so taken by a fish before, and as I found myself watching the two, I saw them merge into one. Large coy-like scales of that beautiful yellow and that mysterious black freckling his outer coating. And he was still circling. Gorgeous.

I sat myself down and relaxed as the fish began to swim my way. Without a lure, without a hook, without a string, he approached me with his beauty, and spoke to me as if we had known each other a little while, calling me nick names that I warmed to more quickly than the ones that any other friend had given me before. Names like “darlin” and “kid” were said to be all mine. Like he’d read my mind.

As usual, reality would call, and it was time to leave the stream for something like work, a meal or something of the like. A day here and there interrupted our small talk and correspondence, and I never felt the need to use that invisible line to call him near to me. The fish always approached. He was friendly, comforting.

Some day along the timeline, something happened, which I can’t quite put my finger on and when I would come to sit on the banks of the river, with my tackle box wide open, all of my lures displayed; the shiny, the dull, the mushy, the tattered old ones, the new and even the dark ones buried deepest in the box easily accessible, he would be gone.

Though I had them readily available, instead of the lures, I would toss pebbles into the waters, hoping it would bring him around, not wanting to use the same tricks that I used on the others before. More and more I was realizing that this fish really was something different. And I wasn’t going to let this be one of those stories of “the Big Fish” that got away.

So I sat tossing pebbles into the water as he, I presume, was off traveling to work upstream, doing what a fish does for a living, enjoying the changing of the currents and the subtle differences of what it brings. Because that is what fish like is change flowing over them, through them, and a little bit of a challenge. It’s got to be hard to stay in one place, I understand, when you’re used to floating from one thing to another. And that was fine with me. Except that I missed the conversation.

He would come back Fridays and visit for a bit. A little conversation here and there. A new question which almost always made me think even more that there was a big possibility of us truly being the best of friends, as opposite a woman and a fish could be. But they say that opposites attract and for me this was certainly the case.

So there I sit on the banks, throwing pebbles into the waters every so often during the week just in case he is around. And on Fridays I sit with butterflies in my tummy wondering if I will get a visit from my alluring friend and most of all thinking of ways that I can grow fins and gills and allow myself to fully jump in.