A Simple Kind of Life

The other day I was reading the latest Life Learning magazine. I came upon this article near the end that looked rather boring at first glance—nothing too exciting declaring how freestyle unschooling is so beneficial or anything. But I decided to read it, because I needed something to read, and I had read the rest of the magazine, and I did not want to get up and get something else to read. But the first paragraph immediately drew me in, describing my thoughts exactly. The article is “The Therapy Fund” by Nathanael Schildbach, second heading reading, “The Importance of Place”:

“…When I was a kid, I lived in a relatively new development in Oregon in a town that was rapidly expanding, growing newer by the minute. My frame of reference was things I could remember as a child that were no longer there because they had been replaced by houses or strip malls, and it felt like everything was so new that it had no weight to it. No meaning. It felt like a fake place, planned and manufactured, regardless of how young or old it was. And it seemed like everyone was so focused on moving ‘forward’ that no one bothered to spend much time figuring out where it and we had all come from and, by extension, where the heck we were all going.”

He goes on to compare this “forward” movement—literally—with that of education these days (which I also agree with…that’s another entry), but I would like to stop right there at the end of that paragraph. For those of us that live in the Cary-Apex-Raleigh-Fuquay-Holly Springs-Wake Forest-ish area, doesn’t that just about describe where our cities are? Always concentrated on moving forward, tearing down those meaningless trees in light of something much, much better—town homes, Jared’s Jewelers, or the umpteenth Super Target/and/or/ Wal-Mart shopping center. Yes, you see, the goal of the Triangle area is to make sure that from every Wal-Mart you stand directly outside of, you are sure to clearly see the front signs of at least one other Wal-Mart, like the emergency button stands on State’s campus.

I am tired of all this industrialization. It makes me sick to my stomach. The only good thing to come out of it is TAC. Everything else is garbage to me. Unnecessary. Busy work for all those Mexicans (I’m not being racist; just stating the truth!).

I don’t know why they keep building houses and apartments and town homes here. I wouldn’t want to live in any of them. I prefer the simple life. I just want to go away and live in the country in a big, old farm house; towering oak trees; green, lush, rolling hills; nature, animals and humans all united in a beautiful paradise-like setting. Sure, farm work is romanticized to some degree—isn’t everything? Otherwise, people would be perfectly happy where they were and never give a second thought to living anywhere else. But, seriously. There are things I used to do and appreciated doing that now I cannot do anymore. Simple things—I used to explore in the woods behind our house. Now there are none, and our yard is so terrible and intolerably sunny and boring. On top of that, I have absolutely no privacy outside anymore. There are neighbors everywhere. At least they’re nice. And maybe I’m just self-consciously self-centered or something, but I would like to be able to go outside and lay on in the grass and not feel like people can watch everything I’m doing. I’d rather have some little somewhere where I can be completely alone, or have only my family be able to see me.

If I go in the front yard, people are always driving by, there are people constantly pulling into the next door neighbors’ driveways, and lately there have been construction people across the street re-doing things like roofs and siding and digging sewer-things. In the backyard there is no shade, and we have neighbors living behind us in a very white house that towers above all our little homey houses which were here FIRST, and then the next-door neighbors and…I feel like I can’t turn my back anywhere if I relax on the trampoline…I can’t do ANYTHING ANYWHERE without feeling exposed!!!

It just seems like the town of Cary (NOT CITY [lol]) has something against preserving nature. It loves to destroy God-made beauty and put in the place of it annoying living-places that I’m sure we cannot possibly have enough people moving into from other lands, and annoying shopping-places that I am sure we could not have possibly lived with anything further from all those new places that we live—we might have starved. As if one bloody city needs five million grocery store options, and twenty seven hundred cell phone stores. Whatever happened to going to town, where the market or general store was, buying a few things, and then coming home to eat off the fruit of our labor? What’s wrong with that?

Ugh. I’m just gonna get more riled up. I’ve said my say, now what have you to?

~Jessica

Compromise or Contingent?

I have rendered myself a very confused person. I cannot seem to get my thoughts straight anymore, and I am left wondering which thoughts are really mine and which ones are from the brain of that “Other Me.”

I believe there is a three-way war inside of me. There are the things my brain wants, the things my heart wants, and desires that come from some strange, unknown source which I’d rather just get rid of. My heart says I’ve fallen in love, my brain says that’s utterly ridiculous, and the foreign desires say that if it is love, surely said FDs (foreign desires) would be quite satisfied in areas of emotional and physical intimacy. My brain says to ignore these things now as they only will mess things up later, my heart starts to agree with the FD that emotional intimacy would be kind of nice, and the FDs start some strange rant about how everything’s really okay, as long as I stand my ground at certain points. My brain, for a moment, starts justifying what the FD says for a moment, and then snaps back into being brain-ish, my heart says, “Oh, just listen to music, that will make you feel better,” and happily flutters away as romantic music plays, and the FDs begin to imagine all possible ways things could “go about.” My brain says, “Let’s listen to ‘Love Song’ by Sarah Bareilles (SP?!?!?).” My heart says, “Gee, that’s not very romantic.” The FDs quickly conjure up some fantasy of me singing the song and him loving me anyway. My brain tells the FDs to back off, my heart crosses its eyes in frustration, the FDs go talk to my cross-eyed heart and tell it everything is okay. My heart wants to side with my brain, but also agrees with the FDs, and so my brain and the FDs have a giant dispute over ownership of my heart. My heart, on the other hand, would like to just think for itself, thank you very much, but apparently it really can’t. It’s got to either be all-sensible or all-stupid, it seems. Why can’t it be somewhere in the middle, on its own ground, thinking its own thoughts and—

LOOK OUT!! FLYING UTENSILS!!—

Anyway, nothing has calmed down yet. And somehow I, another separate entity, am left wondering how the actual object of my affection figures into all of this. No matter, I suppose. I should deal with myselves first.

I am just afraid. I mean, I am afraid of things not turning out like they should. I have my ideas of how people should go about having a relationship—but it doesn’t always work like that, does it? If it did, pious, courting-only missionaries would be the only people married these days. Not everyone has to be like a romantic story from an Elizabeth Elliot book. That’s not to say that she doesn’t have good points about romance or anything.

I just don’t want to get ahead of myself. But I think by not wanting to I actually am, in a sense. I come up with all these “rules” that potential suitors must follow. Things like, “he has to ask my dad before even revealing his feelings to me” and “I won’t let him touch me till we’re married” and “I don’t want to get into a relationship till I am 25.” Those are just the few I can think of right now. There are more, but there are so many and most of them are so completely ridiculous…like, “our relationship must consist of him visiting me after work and us talking for an hour over ice cream” or something like that.

It all comes down to that whole romantic ideals thing again. My “rules” and “ideas” about how all guy-girl relationships should be are just more sets of romantic ideals. I hear stories about how other people did the Godly relationship thing, and I think that it can only work out that way, so I should only do it that way, and if life seems to be going differently, I should grab it and set it down on the path of the “better” way. I idealize the perfect relationship.

First of all, no relationship is perfect. Someone is going to get hurt. Even if that hurt gets patched up, it still hurts. It still happened. But you know what? Accidents happen. They are basically unavoidable.

I don’t want to compromise myself. I am afraid of doing so. But what am I compromising? A “perfect” relationship? Well, then, I suppose I’ll end up an old maid.

I just know that God wouldn’t let me get into something like that that he didn’t think I couldn’t be strong in. I worry about weaknesses, but He keeps me strong. I am probably weaker in the imagination than in real life anyway.

Well, we’ll see.

~Jessica

It Still Beats

It occured to me a few moments ago while I stood at the piano trying to play "Bad Day" with part of a banana hanging out of my mouth that perhaps I should post another poem on here. I wrote it sometime near the end of last summer, but somehow it describes kinda how I feel even now, but in a different way than it did when I wrote it...if you know what I mean. Anyway, here it is...


IT STILL BEATS

A love not returned
A blow to the heart
Paralyzed with dread
Hopes for something else

Lives inside a bubble
Wanting what is not
Believing nonexistence
Is the key to life


Found one day it would find love
One day it would live
If only it were patient
And took the time to give

But that lonely heart it
Could find nothing more
Than its petty brokenness
That it seemed to store


A deep void inside
Begging to be filled
A thirst for revival
Parched with need for faith

Somehow it still beats
Wanting a new future
At the mercy of emotion
Worshipping the god of Pain


Sought out its lonely figure
Looking inside itself
Finding nothing of worth
Forever no avail

The selfish, bitter heart it
Cowered when the light shone
Didn’t know it was something
To help it find its way home

A single lightning bolt
Could bring it down right now
And somehow it would still beat
Though shriveled up inside

A vacancy there is
I hear the door closing
Forevermore cut off
But it still beats

I'm Sorry...!!!

Well, you see, I had a bit of a weak moment today at some point, and thus...well...um...I don't know how to say this...I just watched a certain movie by the certain title of:

*cough* Sense and Sensibility... *cough* *sputter* *faked heart attack*

I couldn't help myself. I'm at a sleepover. It was part of the plan. If you refer to my two blogs ago blog about romantic ideals, I may have said something around the lines of trying not to watch movies like that anymore. And to that I say, "The diet starts tomorrow!"

Today I went to the zoo with Michelle, Elizabeth, Elayna, and two new friends, Emily and Jaime. Last night I spent the night at Michelle & Elizabeth's house after Bible Study, then we left early this morning. After our long tour of the zoo (where we took many exciting pictures which I will attempt to post up here later), we ran to the grocery store and improvised a lovely Italian dinner of tomato, spinach, and basil tortellini in Alfredo sauce with sides of steamed asparagus and Macaroni Grill-style bread complete with olive oil with pepper in it. For dessert we had lemon pound cake and french vanilla ice cream. We ate at one of the new friend's house, and afterwards spent a long while looking for her ferret, whom we found in its cage like it should be. That was interesting. I think it would be fun to have a ferret run around the house all the time, except I think my family would kick it all around in their careless wanderings. I used to let my chinchila run around the house before he figured out that he could hide in humanly inaccessable places--

MICHELLE!!!! *Jessica groans as Michelle sighs and decides to pick a different song to play AGAIN*

Quote of the day: "Michelle, you cannot run away from B minor forever." ~Me...heh heh

Well, I must go be sleepoverish. We're considering climbing up on the roof, eating left over pound cake, and playing rock paper scissors with a monkey we kidnapped from the zoo.

~Jessica

Since I'm Feeling Opinionated...

....I will express some of my opinions right now:

I think...

1. "Little" Fugue in G Minor by J. S. Bach should be TSO-afied.

2. We should all go back to the old days where girls were ladies and guys were gentlemen

3. Summer is the best season

4. Orchids are the best flower to give a girl, because they are really interesting and last longer than roses

5. Anything tastes better when had with a Vault

6. Spring break is awesome

7. The two best bands in the world are Van Halen and the Foo Fighters

8. There are other ways of learning besides classrooms and text books

9. There are other ways of becoming specialized in something besides majoring in it for college

10. Water sports are better than any other sports

11. Emotional intimacy should be saved till engagement; physical intimacy (kissing and beyond) should be saved till after the wedding vows

12. Dating is pointless unless both parties are seriously aiming for marriage, and wanting to see if the other person is possibly the one whom God has chosen for them--why just do it for fun, or why do it just to be with someone, when you can go out with other friends casually, or share your deepest thoughts with close friends of the same sex?

13. Dating while in highschool is time-consuming and emotion-consuming, so why do it when you really should be concentrated on school? Also, refer yourself to #12

14. Green is the best color--Happy Saint Patrick's Day, by the way!

15. One shouldn't be asked to refrain from buying green things unless it is vital to one's health or making too big of a dent in the cash supply

16. It is perfectly fine to have green be one's favorite color but somehow end up always buying blue things anyway--it's not going to hurt anything or anyone...unless that person wants to keep up a "green is my favorite color" reputation or something.

17. It is also perfectly okay for someone whose favorite color is green but who usually buys blue things to suddenly turn around and buy something green, as, again, it doesn't hinder anybody, unless that person wants to keep up his or her (to be *groan* bloody politically correct) reputation of liking green but always buying blue things

18. It is okay for someone to write a blog entry justifying everything that someone does

19. It is not okay for someone to have a blog, be a really good blogger in that they are pleasant to read, and then not ever post anything

20. It is not okay for bloggers to post posts so sparsely that every post is only an explanation about why they have not posted in a while

21. It is fine for friends of those bloggers to complain about them in a teasing way on their own blogs, which they update quite frequently, thankyouverymuch

22. Being politically correct is SO overrated. I cannot STAND IT but now I get points taken off my paper if I am not politically correct or something like that...something around the lines of "pronoun-antecedent aggrement"...yeah, yeah, yeah.

23. Femenism is also overrated. I think it's ridiculous. I wish it would go away. That's why most of the female population votes for Hilary anyways. Not because she'll make a good president, but because she's a girl. A role model for strong women in the community or some BS like that. I'm sorry about being so borderline-expletive here, but it's true!!! Even when I was little and had no clue what femenism was, it bothered me. It was the theme that ran through all that American Girl doll stuff, and I just thought it was so annoying, so I ignored it and played with my dolls.

24. Capitalization and punctuation should be enforced around here

25. No Shakespeare should be translated into IM-lingo to make it easier for our dumbed-down culture to read

26. I'm hungry.

27. It's time for lunch

28. ???

29. Sorry, I just want to end on an even and round number...

30. Ah.

Well, thank you for listening to my ramblings...if you made it this far, that is. Feel free to add anything to them...agree or disagree, I don't mind. Goodbye!

~Jessica

Romantic Ideals

I know this is a long entry (as usual). Please bear with me, as I have something important to address. Well, I think it’s important, anyway.

I’ve been meaning to blog for a while and I haven’t. But that’s a good thing. A couple of days ago I just got really frustrated, and I was going to blog about that frustration, but now things have cooled down on my part and I’m seeing the other side of it—the unfortunate cause of my discontentedness.

You see, I was going to blog about how I think every guy on the planet should be like Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice, and how, not meaning to be a diva, I get quite frustrated when I constantly encounter “men” these days who aren’t chivalrous, or who are but only when their friends are not present to…what? Ridicule them? Is it silly, then, to be a gentleman? I hope not. My rant which was scheduled to be written was much more heated than this little summary, and I really don’t think it’s best that I get into it.

However, I will talk about my thoughts about why I have been sulking in misery for the past…well, ever since Monday or so. The whole speculation that every man in this world should be like Mr. Darcy is derived from lust, I guess you could say. Most guys lust about sex a lot, right? Girls really aren’t so partial to those types of thoughts, but they do have emotional lusts. Our lusts usually involve romance, the type of which that is usually idealized in our lovely chick-flicks we love to watch. I am surely making a generalization, but it is true that in most cases, women love to watch and read romance. It gives us little butterflies inside our stomachs, makes our hearts flutter, makes us sigh about “how sweet” it all is and…as a result…makes us severely discontent.

This is not to say men are not romantic. However, if anybody out there wants some tips on winning ladies over, just read or watch some Jane Austin stuff, and then do what the guys in the movies/books do! It’s really that simple. You see, when men try to write romance, it just doesn’t give girls butterflies. So, in Nicholas Nickleby, Nicholas falls in love with Madeline Bray and…well, somehow they are very shy and get set up by the twins and everything falls into place and perhaps they have one philosophical discussion. Never once during that whole book did I react in the ways I described earlier as the ways women respond to romanticism. Wherefore, while Charles Dickens was romantic enough to include the part where Nicholas courts a girl, he was not romantic enough to write it romantically.

Jane Austen, on the other hand, is very skilled at making sure that a woman’s heart is most certainly palpitating nearly the entirety of a novel, or movie of her novel(s). Why is she? Because, like most women, she idealizes romance. Women have this strange little skill of analyzing situations involving lovers (either themselves or other people which they pretend are themselves), and imagine millions of possibilities of directions that the relationship could go, and the most romantic way for it to get there. I suppose guys don’t really do that, which is sad…but completely OKAY [!!!] because I’ve stopped complaining about guys and how uncivilized and inconsiderate they can be! Anyhooness (just for the record, they can be magnificent and wonderful as well), if guys thought the same way as girls, we’d all probably blow up or something because we’d all think the same thing, and then we’d all be the same and so really, why would we all need to be here? So we’d all blow up and leave one person all alone to…well, enough right now about all my many theories about how everyone will blow up, and what will happen directly thereafter.

Girls and women and ladies, when they idealize romance, wish for it to happen to them. Hence the fantasizing about how romantic encounters might progress (even if those girls know *gulp* quite well that they are not supposed to be thinking about boys or going out with them right now…). This makes them very discontent, and then they don’t realize it when real love stares them right in the face. Like Anne in Anne of Green Gables. She read all the time about nights and fair maidens and the like, and always had her fantasies of a tall, dark, handsome, and possibly rich knight in shining armor to come to Green Gables in a valiant manner and ask her to marry him, and then they would go live in his castle, where she would roam the grounds all day reading and writing. Gosh darn it, don’t we all want that? Anyway, when Gilbert proposes for the first time, she refuses him, saying they cannot possibly be more than friends. Gilbert’s not…well, refer to the description of Anne’s ideal earlier in this paragraph. He’s just not. But Anne finally comes to her senses and they get married and live happily ever after.

Even that’s fiction, and an idealized view of romance. OH BOTHERATION. O spite!

So it seems as if these fictional accounts of romance are forever stuck in my brain, ready for me to refer myself to if I ever want to construct my own ideal love story. Hooray (*waves wilted party favor around in the air*). I just think it’s so sweet (yes, here we go again with the sighing) that Mr. Darcy loved Elizabeth like he does, and still loved her even though she seemed to hate him, and then she started to love him, and then in the new version she goes outside in the beautiful English countryside and stands on the bridge, and it is dawn and she sees Mr. Darcy walking through the wet green grass as the sun begins to pour a couple rays over the layer of mist, and as the beautiful music that lets you know that this is the big romantic scene plays, Mr. Darcy’s long coat flaps behind him in the early morning breeze like a cape, and his shirt is unbuttoned at the top so he is just the vision of the perfect romantic suitor! And, even though he knows they are entirely alone, he stays at a respectful distance and explains and apologizes and re-declares his love and proposes again in the sweetest way where you just get tears in your eyes as he struggles over his timidity and says, “I love…love…I love you, and never wish to be parted from you from this day forward.” You start trembling with excitement because THIS IS IT!!! SHE’S GOING TO SAY YES!!! And then she walks over to him and they don’t even kiss, but instead just stand there as she warms his hands in his and they stare deep into one another’s eyes and you know they both cannot be thinking anything except how happy they are, and the sun spills through between them in what I think it is a really cool shot…*BIG SIGH* Oh-My-Goodness, it is just the most tempting thing to think that falling in love is always like that, and that in order for it to be truly romantic the scenery and costumes has to be exactly as it is in that movie (not the boring black-and-white garden like in the old one), etc, etc, etc.

Well, it’s not. And that’s not to say that falling in love isn’t extremely wonderful, because God made love and romance for a reason. But not everyone, as a matter-of-fact, no one, gets to be a character in a Jane Austen book (unless they are an actor, but that doesn’t count). It is hard not to give into fantasies, because it is not only hindering to the soul, but a very big waste of time. Anyway, God will bring about my own beautiful romance (that He’s written for me already!) when the time is right (please—at least not until after I graduate highschool—can’t…hold…one…more…thing!! *collapses as she realizes that she’s working on a blog instead of working on school*), and I should not even bother myself, distract myself, or anything-else myself with romantic notions till that time is here. Does that mean holding off on my indulgence in romantic movies and books? Possibly. I do enjoy other things, you know. It’s not as if I will be at a real loss. Especially at a loss of things to do. Speaking of which, I really must go now…ta ta!

~Jessica

Huzzah!

VICTORY is MINE, I tell you!! I have TRIUMPHED over ALL!!! I will now RULE the Universe and everyone shall love me and DESPAIR!!

Truth is, I got my license. *waves miniature British Columbian flag* I seriously thought I would die beforehand, die during test, and/or die sometime afterwards, out of shock of a) not passing, b) passing or c) passing but then pulling a "Nicholas" and getting in an accident the day afterwards. Fortunately, I did not do anything before a, b, or c, nor did I do a, b, or c. I got my license yesterday afternoon, and this morning I drove myself to Wake Tech. THAT was WEIRD, to tell you the truth. But, to stay with the theme of the blog, quite liberating. I even tried a new way of getting home that I had never gone before. I talked to myself the whole way, and then concluded to myself that my parents had better let me start listening to music in the car pretty soon, or I might be rendered insane, by those people who render other people, because of talking to myself too much.

All I can say is that I am happy that by the grace of God (I was praying very hard) I did NOT have to do my driving test with that grumpy lady I had a brush-up with. You see, my dad went to go get some dollars from the bank down the street because we had none (not enough, anyhow), and once he left, the line decided to move very quickly, and I walked up to the lady as I was the next in line, and I said dad would be right back. She looked at me like I was some crazy teenager trying to get her license all by herself (wow...mind reader!), and told me that dad had to be there to sign some insurance form something-or-other, and that until he showed up, I had to go sit over in the uncomfortable green chairs next to the coffing girls in their skinny jeans and Gucci sunglasses and highlights. So I TRIED hard not to glare back and was antsy the whole time as I waited for dad to get back, and that's when I began praying and my prayers were answered when SHE LEFT!!! She took another victim to go driving, and my dad and I (when he got back) were finally summoned by the really nice 60-ish guy who had given me the sign test oh-fifteen-hundred-million years ago. To my complete astonishment, I passed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Whoopdie-doo.

Well, you may throw flowers if you wish.

~Jessica

Trust

So here’s my two cents on the matter of the teenage mid-life crisis. Allie and Lizzie have had their say on the subject, and I guess it’s only fitting that, since I fit right into that whole Spectrum of Major Confusion, I should devote an entire blog entry to something more interesting than the tragic metaphorical death of my love of the song in the previous entry.

Not that it should be a competition to see who is the most confused about life, but if it was, I’d come out on top. At least SOME people know they have gotten into a college and SOME people know what they want to do, but I certainly have not applied anywhere, nor have I chosen what I wish to spend the next four or five years of my life fully devoted to studying, without the knowledge of that studying even leading up to a way of making money or not.

Sure, life’s not all about making money. But money really does make things easier. Well, you might argue, life’s not all about things being easy. But enough with the guilt trip already! You know exactly what I mean. I’d like to be a wife and mother someday, but until I get married or incase I don’t, I will need some sort of way to support myself other than working at MacDonald’s (not my highest ambition, I’m sorry to say). It won’t pay the bills in the long run.

So...I should turn something I love doing into a way of making money. After all, practically everything I love doing could be making me a ton of cash. Gosh darn it! Why am I broke, then? Well, because I am Jessica, that’s why.

I love animals, why not become an animal trainer? I love reading and talking about what I read, why not become a book critic? I love writing, why not become an author? I love writing music, why not become a composer or a songwriter? (NOT THE SAME THING.) I love acting, why not become an actress? I love singing, why not become a singer? I like hiking and exploring, why not become an expeditionist? I love swimming, why not become an Olympian? (Simple—because I’m about 5 or 6 seconds off a qualifying time and that just doesn’t cut it.)

The answer to all those questions is that someone out there says I must pick one and stick with it. How could I possibly do EVERYTHING????? Well, please, somebody tell me I can, because I cannot seem to come to a decision.

So, I was brainstorming. I could become a really good animal trainer in such high demand that only really really rich people can afford to have me come in and perform miraculous wonders, so that I would only be needed a few times a year for a large sum. Then, I can spend the rest of the year doing other things: in the summer I can take trips to the Amazon, and write fictional accounts of my adventures there. Then, I can take the gazzlion dollars from my dog training plus my best-selling novel and go to a resort in the Bahamas, where I will read lots of books and write about them critically if I feel like it. I wouldn’t need the money, I guess, but I might as well. Then I would take a trip to Broadway, and accidentally end up singing and dancing in the street because I would be so happy about finally going, and some talent agent would discover me and land me a part in “Singing in the Rain” or something. After I do that for a while, I’ll probably get bored, so I’d probably fly to CA and collaborate with some famous pop star on their songs. Then I’ll get caught up in all the Hollywood rush and accidentally compose a lovely theme for the next biggest fantasy film before auditioning for American Idol and winning. All that time I would be swimming vigorously, and enter in some random Master’s race and place in the Olympics, and then do that for a while, before I begin the whole process over again!!

*sigh*

Well, I’ll cross my fingers and hope for the best.

Okay, no, not really. I need to get down on my knees and pray for the best. God’s best. I just cannot seem to bring myself to look past my Great Wall of the Leaning Tower of China-Pisa (a wonderful tourist destination, curiously located on the border of Syria and Turkey) of all the million things I want, in order to see what God wants for me. And for anyone who seriously doubts that I need any supernatural power’s opinion on my life’s choices, I’d like to say that if the verdict was left to me, it would end up a very big disaster, don’t you think? Everything I try to do without God’s help ends up somewhat disastrous. From things to do with not wanting to obey my parents and Wait-2-Date (that sounds like a cool corporation I should start) to…well…like that time I was angry at somebody and ran off into the Henderson’s woods and got lost. IT WAS A LONG TIME AGO, OKAY?? I wouldn’t listen to God; he was clearly saying to me, “just go back into the woods [as I had found I was stranded by some strange street somewhere] and I will guide you back.” I didn’t want to, because I had seen a very large orange-red dog which could have potentially been a coyote. So I walked up and down the road, trying to find some familiar landmark or something…but to no avail. Finally I listened, and wasn’t really watching where I was going, and somehow I ended up by the fence at the end of the pasture, and was quite overjoyed. Though the situation was very…embarrassing…shall we say, I always think back to it to remind myself that my way is no where close to the right way. And if God wills me, I will head blindly into danger, doing his bidding. Perhaps I will not see the end of the road for years to come, and may wonder how everything might work itself out, but the straight and clear shot isn’t always the best.

So…God might be telling me something to do with Appalachian State…double major! I would have never considered it—I’m not good enough, I’ll never survive, blah blah blah. And how will I make money with a double major degree in Creative Writing and Musical Composition? Am I really musical enough to DO a music major, or am a deceiving myself? How could I possibly walk blindly into college without knowing that breaking into a career in either area is guaranteed? Simple—stay grounded, listen to God.

It’s all so very frustrating. It’s like typing on a laptop when you’re used to those old keyboards where you have to press in the keys really hard and they are much wider spaced. I don’t really know why, I just wanted to say that.

Anyway, I hope this makes someone think about something, whatever it is, like, how to spell the word for those flat French hats, why you shouldn’t keep cows in the kitchen, who unleashed that tornado in your room anyways, or whatever else comes to mind. Until next time I post a depressing poem, God bless!

~Jessica

This song didn't remain the same

So...about a year ago, I started writing this great song on the guitar that (in my opinion) sounded wonderful. The lyrics meant something, the tune was borderline celtic (basically, anyway) and it made me happy! I never finished the lyrics, though, until a couple months ago, when I was very depressed about something and the depression was sort of connected to the happiness I had felt earlier when I wrote the first part of the song, so I thought it was only fitting that I continue the song with this sort of depressing conclusion. Not a resolution, a conclusion. It's the lyrical version of Medeival -style classical music.

The problem is, while the beat went along with the rest of the song, the words didn't. I mean, the meter was fine, but how can a happy-go-lucky-semi-celtic song go with such bloody sad lyrics? So, in essence, the song failed itself, and I have a feeling it will never repair. So, I present:

THE RAINFOREST

Hollow eruptions
Are heard in the rainforest
Faint and distant

Silky gold fabrics
Ripple in the wind
Cool and comforting

Love’s a collision
Playing across the mirror of danger
The morning revelation
Is the bedspread of shadow
A game of delicacy

I’ll see you in
The rainforest
And my song is sung to you

Lost in
The dream world
Our rainforest

(if this song decided to one day be a full song and didn’t get messed up in the adding-on process, this would be a perfect opportunity for an instrumental section, with a flute or penny whistle playing the bridge and verse melody against the background of all other previously participating instruments)
(this instrumental part SHOULD be quite long, not for length’s sake [because it has no need to be very long], but because the break between writing the part of the song above this “instrumental break” and the proceeding “lyrics”, if you will, is 9 or 10 months…)

Reality
Not a place that was meant for me
When I remember
She’s the one you truly love
A silent cry-don’t leave me please!

You leave me now
You’ve taken my heart with you
I gave it away

I don’t know how
I just know
I’ll miss you

I look on with dread
It’s not like this in my dreams
I can’t feel love anymore

Hate and resentment fill my head
This is not how life seems
I’ll die on the rainforest floor…

~Jessica