and i'm sure this is true, that we each possess the materials necessary for creating something extraordinary, the experience necessary for an incredible story, but not all of us are creators, not all of us are makers. artists are the craftsmen who can put it all together.

and i still have hope of finding something once lost

I don't usually write things as they are. I usually write as they should be, or how I wish they would be. Thus I feel safe when I write. I can be as free as only my wishful thinking is capable of, and not feel like I am being silly. My feet don't hurt as much anymore. They did, when I was young, though. I was always buying pretty little shoes that didn't fit quite right. I know this idea may seem juvenile now, but back then I felt that I understood something, the moment I stopped buying pretty shoes because I felt ridiculous in them, because the cost of beauty was no longer worth the effort. I would see women on the public bus, older women, working women, and I would wonder if any of them were loved, if they were cherished by another, if they knew it, if they were alone, if they were scared of being alone, if their bones were tired, if their smiles would give me more insight into any of these thoughts. And my judgment of them had always rested on this simple idea of beauty, this idea that if a woman wasn't striving, then she wasn't worth anyone's affection - maybe that's who God is. I've been told that that's who he is, someone who doesn't require you to strive, someone who will give you affection because he made you into who you are. But that was never enough validation for me. I have always wanted to be admired for my efforts, not my lack of them. Sometimes I think my emotions are threadbare and as old as I am, I am still a fish trying to breathe on land, a small child who thinks she knows something, if not everything. I saw a man on the bus, with a head shaved down to the scalp, wearing a striped sweater, one that you can't find anywhere except on a person who has lived through a past greater than most young people these days. And he had rested his left elbow on the seat next to him, his hand stretched out before him, and he was looking down at it, flexing the muscles on his hand, gripping his fingers and then relaxing them, and then he did something even more astonishing. He took his right hand and began stroking the other with it, feeling the bones, the fingernails, clasping it, unclasping it. He was treating his left hand like he had never seen it before, like it was a separate entity, something he hadn't used everyday. And I thought, maybe that is what heaven is, a place where everything you had becomes familiar with is made new, where things are genuinely reintroduced, like when you're first born, except you are equipped with enough complexity that you can actually appreciate the novelty of new things.

"those who say a second is faster than a decade has not lived my life"

  I squandered my youth through my fear of being alone. It was a pressing fear, one that loomed over most of my choices as a young woman. I was afraid of being ugly. More specifically, I was afraid of being unwanted. What I need to tell you is this: I have made love to many men. I remember being a young woman and coming to that realization on a warm winter night. I had hosted a dinner party for a few friends and as they filed out, one by one, taking the comfort of company with them, as I slowly closed the door and locked the latch, I experienced a solid moment of utter loneliness, complete solitude. And suddenly everywhere I turned held a memory, an echo of something that had been, that was not anymore. I saw faces of past lovers in every space, heard their whispers and felt their kisses. My home was not mine any longer, it was theirs too, a shared space, and I wish it all meant something, that I thought more of myself, enough to want to take it all back. I have been touched, felt, caressed, and kissed, by many hands and many lips. But I feel nothing. There are those who wish they could store their emotions into tidy little jars and shelve them somewhere high. I wish I could take my jars and smash them on the floor, walk, run, and stomp on the broken glass until my feet bled so much that I felt something. Anything. 

   When I was a young girl my mother gave me a doll. It was a darling little thing, with a porcelain neck and face, skin the color of soft china. Her hair was a subtle gold, like the air of a young summer, and oh how I loved stroking it. I named her after myself and made her a dress out of the fabric from a dress I had once worn. My mother had given me the doll because work called her away and she thought I could use a companion in her absence. When my mother was gone I would sneak into her room and spread my mother's red lipstick across my little doll's 

lips, smear eyeshadow across her cheeks and give it a glittery glow. And one night my mother

came home early. She heated up some food she had brought me and asked me to come into her room when I was done eating. I couldn't eat a bite. I remember that feeling of guilt very distinctly. That I had done something wrong. I went into my mother's room that night filled with dread and said nothing as she sat me down on her chair, the one in front of her small mirror. She began applying rouge on my cheeks, lipstick the color of red candle wax on my lips. And I didn't ask her why she was doing it; she softly told me what each tube and brush was for. Then she used them on my face. This was heaven, I thought. And I still refer to that moment of understanding to define what heaven might be like. And I understood then that she must have known what I had been doing all that time, and her reaction to it was so much more beautiful than what my young concept of beauty could have imagined. The possibility of beauty became so real to me after that gesture - and I still hope that I will never cease to be surprised by beautiful gestures. I do dearly hope that I will always be surprised at how beautiful people can be, that my definition of beauty will always have room for growth. 

"If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only ways I know it. Is there any other way?"

- young Emily Dickinson

the halfway mark

There was a time when I didn't have to write my name down before I forgot what it was. When I didn't have to write down where I was and what I was doing. I carry around a small notebook with me now, my name, address, phone number, so I know that it is me. That I am still here, though I don't really know what that means anymore. If I were to write you the story of my life, I would tell you to choose one thing. Give yourself over to it. Completely. Don't waste your youth. Love your body. Love yourself. Dream big and whittle down your doubts. Absorb everything and run everywhere. This is the culmination of everything I have been trying to tell you all these years: when I was a young girl I met a boy who gave me everything. And one day, he gave me a box wrapped with a big yellow bow and when I opened it, I found nothing inside. You see, his definition of love was reaching a silent understanding. So darling, this is the point of everything: if I were to give you an empty box, I would tell you exactly what was inside.

some things i read last night:

But were it told to me, Today,
That I might have the Sky
For mine, I tell you that my Heart
Would split, for size of me
emily dickinson

She had fallen in love so many times that she began to suspect she was not falling in love at all, but doing something much more ordinary.
jonathan safran foer





buy bon iver on vinyl and listen to mandy's book recommendations and this is what happens:

i threw up my sorrows
for the hope of being fooled
drank down your joys
for the sake of being loved

rule #1: do not talk about the eating group.

good friends, good food, good wine, not so good aftereffects. all in all, the eating group keeps me sane. love you guys.