Adrenaline.

I'm not sure why I torture myself like this; this nagging, tremor on my lips as I shut off the light, this persistent need to pull the covers tighter and tighter, up to my neck and over my eyes. I think I'm addicted to being a nervous wreck.

Horror films. Not really the bloody, gory kind..but more the kind that make me believe in the psychology of it all. The kind of horror that's all in my head. That's the kind that really gets my blood rushing, pulsing. It's the kind that makes me want to rip my hair out in frustration, and crawl under ten blankets with someone who will hold my hand.

So, as I sit here typing this...I'm stalling. I'm stalling, and stalling, and stalling because I don't want to turn off my desk light. I should probably shut my closet door because who knows what will crawl (shuddddder) out of it once I turn off the light. My roommate went home for the weekend...which is never a good thing after a night of weird, psychological scream-fests.

Stalling. How long can I possibly stall before my eyes droop and my fingers go numb and I think of any other crazy bull to write? .... Okay.

Okay, I'll turn out the lights. Now. Now.


... Now.

Once Upon a Street

I'm head over heels with Jack Savoretti's voice; that sweet, wistful voice. It's laced with serenity, the kind that makes me want to fall fast asleep in a field of wildflowers.

Marriage 101, right?

People fall out of love all the time. It's like this contagious disease (yes, I just compared falling out of love to a disease. A contagious one, at that). Its become the norm, it seems, which I find to be extremely depressing.

Want my conclusions? Married couples stop holding hands after a while. They stop stealing glances at each other from across the dinner table (instead they yell at their kids to sit up straight and eat your potatoes!) They stop going on dates, stop surprising each other, stop caring. Or so it seems.

Maybe I just have skewed, biased perception of what a marriage looks like, but I have to lay this on the table. I don't want a marriage that looks like that.

I was talking to some friends tonight over heaps of spaghetti and from-scratch chocolate chip cookies, and I've come to some serious conclusions about my future. I don't (and sure as hell won't) end up with a dud marriage. (I know, I know, you're thinking well goodness, girl! One step at a time...don't you have to find a guy first? Hmmm?) Yeah, yeah...that's just part of the equation...but I'm stepping up on my soapbox tonight. Just let me talk.

I want the kind of marriage that brings laughter all of the time. I want to sit back on the couch at night and cuddle just because. I want to go on surprise dates, and travel to crazy places, and tell secrets at 3AM because isn't that what best friends do?

I want to be secure, but not so comfortable that everything seems dull. It's got be be this constant haze of underlying excitement, because I think when that passionate spark goes out, so does the light in married couples' eyes. I've seen the dullness. I don't think I can handle that dullness.

I want to argue and then make-up. I'm not asking for perfection or too much at all. I'm just thinking that if marriage is the ultimate step, the final step of a relationship....why spend it with someone that doesn't do all of these things with you? Why venture 10, 20, 50 years with someone who doesn't always rock your boat, make you smile? It's not a complicated task. It's about keeping the light in your eyes after life seems to crash and burn with every complicated, minute struggle.

Whew. I'm glad I figured all of this out now. I feel ten steps ahead of the game. And it is a game, you know.

A bit morbid, I suppose.

I've always had a fascination with fortune tellers, with mystics who believe they know the future, with palm readers and tarot cards and horoscopes. It's kind of terrible really, this fascination. I used to read my horoscope every day during high school years, just to see if anything would come true.

Funny though. I never act upon my fascination. It goes against everything I put my faith in, but it's there, nonetheless.

Often I wonder what the next day will hold. I wonder if my dreams will come true, if luck will find me when I pocket that heads-up penny on the sidewalk. Don't we, as humans, desire to know our fate, the outcome of our tomorrows, our next ten or twenty years? Don't we want to believe in the fates coming together to stitch our every second, every minute? I think we do, deep down, but I know that it's this terrifying thing to admit.

If you could know when, down to the very second, your death would take place - would you live life any differently? Would you challenge your beliefs? Would you defend yourself, stand up for anything and everything? Would you be bold in every action, every word that comes from timid lips?

I don't know. I don't know if I would change everything or not. All I know is that I'm living a surprise. I'm here and tomorrow is not guaranteed, and next year is not certain, and I don't know where I'll be, who I'll be in ten years.

But I think that as curious a person as I am, and as much as I would love to go have my palm read, my secrets and future revealed...there is a part of me who lives for the surprise in every day. I live for the not-knowing aspect of tomorrow. I wake up every morning anxious, not because I'm dreading the day, but because I might meet someone new, or stumble upon an adventure waiting to happen.

Although, as a writer of fiction, there is that God role that seeps through every word my characters say. Sure, I am creating an entire world, a world where anything goes and the people I create dote on my every move, but there is still that element of surprise. My own writing always comes as a shock, especially when I'm writing stories. I don't know how the end will turn out. I don't know where my characters will end up. I just write, I just live, and whatever happens happens, for better or for worse.

Lord, let me live until I die -- Will Rogers

Outlook.

Sometimes you're the bug.

Sometimes you're the windshield.

50k.

We're three days into classes and I'm already behind.

I think I'm gonna run this race with my shoes off, hair flapping crazily in the breeze. No shortcuts, no water breaks, just air, air, air, and the occasional fan shouting "you can do it, you can do it!"

I am so not a runner.

Open Arms.

A lot of the time, people leave.

But sometimes, if you are really lucky, people come back.

People come back and you get to sit on a pretty pink bed and eat clementines (that aren't cookies) and watch the moon slither through the trees like silk.

Sometimes, people come back.