you're the closest to heaven that i'll ever be
Whenever I'm cleaning up my friends list there are always a handful of names, journals of those who are no longer here, that I pass untouched. I pause, reminisce, and move on. These are the names of people that I've befriended, of those that have befriended me. People who made an impression or impact on my time here, however great or small. People I want to remember. Sometimes I sit and I think about these people, these friends, and I realize that I keep them there because of some inability inside of me to let them go, to let go of the past. To me, as long as those names are there, I can't lose those ties that I had to those people. They're still a part of me, even if that part is only a tiny blue arrow.
Sometimes I think that there's an entire world between the person I think I am and who I've become. I once wanted to gather a handful of random appearances I'd made and watch them one after the other, but I couldn't bring myself to do it because I knew that each appearance would show a radical difference, however small, in my personality from the one before it. Whether I play it cool or ham it up, I'm always catering to an audience. But it's not just a television audience or to people at home or a sold-out crowd. Isn't life kind of like that? Doesn't everyone sort of fit a certain image for each situation that presents itself? If I take a good look at my life, I could never be more content with every person and every thing that I surround myself with. But looking at myself, I'm not always satisfied with me. Isn't it strange how that works? I'm constantly reaching for an ideal self that I'm never going to achieve. I expect more of myself than I'll ever expect of anyone else and I'm constantly frustrated by my own inability to be both everything that I want to be and to realize that I can't realistically be those things, my own personal ideals of perfection.
I've been skydiving only once in my life. It was an exhilarating and exciting and new experience. It was me against the world and I felt like, in that single moment between solidity beneath my feet and free falling, I could conquer anything. Wade made that jump with me, the first of many we'd make together, and we felt invincible. Untouchable. Nothing was greater than us and the ways that we loved each other. We were young and fresh faced and innocent and rushed, hurried like time was at our heels waiting to swallow us whole. There was an underlying drive beneath our infatuated euphoria to take things in leaps and bounds instead of reasonable steps. I was in over my head long before I recognized it and when I did there wasn't time to take a step back. We'd burned up all of our time and it was all or nothing for the rest of our lives. I've been married once before and I hope to be married again. Someday. I rushed into almost every aspect of my last relationship, and that doesn't mean that I never loved Wade or that what we had doesn't matter. If anything, my time with Wade taught me that love is not a race against time. My future is James and I don't want it to be anywhere or anyone else. He and I will get married someday and have our electric masquerading as white picket fence and horde of Cambodian children named after Jewish holidays. Someday. We aren't in a hurry. I'm happier than I think I've ever been and that's more than enough for me.
Not quite a John Rzeznik Update (tm), but not all of us can be as cool as that ;)
Sometimes I think that there's an entire world between the person I think I am and who I've become. I once wanted to gather a handful of random appearances I'd made and watch them one after the other, but I couldn't bring myself to do it because I knew that each appearance would show a radical difference, however small, in my personality from the one before it. Whether I play it cool or ham it up, I'm always catering to an audience. But it's not just a television audience or to people at home or a sold-out crowd. Isn't life kind of like that? Doesn't everyone sort of fit a certain image for each situation that presents itself? If I take a good look at my life, I could never be more content with every person and every thing that I surround myself with. But looking at myself, I'm not always satisfied with me. Isn't it strange how that works? I'm constantly reaching for an ideal self that I'm never going to achieve. I expect more of myself than I'll ever expect of anyone else and I'm constantly frustrated by my own inability to be both everything that I want to be and to realize that I can't realistically be those things, my own personal ideals of perfection.
I've been skydiving only once in my life. It was an exhilarating and exciting and new experience. It was me against the world and I felt like, in that single moment between solidity beneath my feet and free falling, I could conquer anything. Wade made that jump with me, the first of many we'd make together, and we felt invincible. Untouchable. Nothing was greater than us and the ways that we loved each other. We were young and fresh faced and innocent and rushed, hurried like time was at our heels waiting to swallow us whole. There was an underlying drive beneath our infatuated euphoria to take things in leaps and bounds instead of reasonable steps. I was in over my head long before I recognized it and when I did there wasn't time to take a step back. We'd burned up all of our time and it was all or nothing for the rest of our lives. I've been married once before and I hope to be married again. Someday. I rushed into almost every aspect of my last relationship, and that doesn't mean that I never loved Wade or that what we had doesn't matter. If anything, my time with Wade taught me that love is not a race against time. My future is James and I don't want it to be anywhere or anyone else. He and I will get married someday and have our electric masquerading as white picket fence and horde of Cambodian children named after Jewish holidays. Someday. We aren't in a hurry. I'm happier than I think I've ever been and that's more than enough for me.
Not quite a John Rzeznik Update (tm), but not all of us can be as cool as that ;)