Save The Invisible

There are times when you watch something, hear something, read something, and it immediately takes precedent and opens your eyes like they have never been open before. You immediately stop whatever you are doing and start taking action. You realize that not only the future but the present is on the line.

When you hear about the hell that Joseph Kony is spreading on this earth, you immediately realize your problems are of really no importance in comparison to what is going on. I had always heard of Invisible Children in high school and had heard a little of what was going on in Africa will child soldiers. I wish I would have really payed attention. I know I could only do so much but at least I could have done something. However, this time I am not just going to listen and give my sympathies. I will be damned if this man roams free, abducting young children and forcing them into the hells of prostitution and war. THIS NEEDS TO END NOW!!!

I don't know how we can go on saying we are trying to live good lives and be good people when we just sit idle while children are being killed and being forced to kill every day. We need to speak up and let congress know that we are not a people of just our own interest. If we take pride in proclaiming we are the greatest country in the world, why do we just sit and bicker over jobs and taxes while children, let me repeat, CHILDREN! are being victimized, kidnapped, raped, sold, forced to kill, and killed every single day. It our duty to make sure every child is cared for and protected.

I may just sit with my thoughts on many of the trivial things my privileged life has to offer.

I WILL NOT JUST GIVE MY IDEA ABOUT THIS!

THIS IDEA HAS BEEN AN IDEA FOR TOO LONG!

THIS IDEA NEEDS TO BECOME REALITY!

My voice will not know rest until Joseph Kony is the most famous person in the world, sitting in a prison cell and there are no invisible children.

Save the Invisible, Save the World

Aaron

Please click on these links to find out how to get involved:

www.kony2012.com

Donate to the CAUSE

I just don't understand these things.

So here I am. I promise more writings, more thoughts. They are just scattered in oblivions unknown to me. Sometimes I wish I could write about nothing of substance, but who am I to assume my writings mean anything to anyone else but myself. A bold assumption indeed. Keep to myself and I will be safe but I never got anywhere by playing it safe. Safety is my biggest vice it seems, or at least the desire for it.

Valentines Day is upon us once again. The one day to celebrate success to those received the prize promised and to remind everyone else of the constant failure love has to offer. We drug ourselves with all these love stories and we start thinking irrationally. As if one day could change it. One day to turn it all around and for everyone to realize they are in love. Irrational. Unacceptable. I just don't understand these things. Maybe they are not for me to understand. Someday? Sometimes I think never.

I hate to think such cynical thoughts. I feel like I am just turning into a bitter prick. 'Oh son, why are you so bitter? Life has been good to you, I'd hate for you to throw away all your hope away just because of the fickle things life has to offer, like love and romance.'

Life has been good to me. I see some people struggle so much more than me and yet are so content with what they have, with who they have. I feel guilty for my desires sometimes when I see everything that has unfolded in my favor. So why do I yearn for something that is completely out of my control? My greatest bet is my humanity. I am just a man, nothing incredible. I was born with inherant weakness and yearnings.

And then I realize the bigger scope. I come to discover my plans are just planned out mistakes. What am I ever to do? Someone restrain me from jumping into the future, for the future is the cliff which I must avoid at the moment.

"But then, my knees give under me. My head feels weak and suddenly it is clear to see it's not them but me, who has lost my self identity. As I hide behind these books I read, while scribbling my poetry, like art could save a wretch like me, with some ideal ideology that no one can hope to achieve" - Bright Eyes

And there are some things which I just don't understand at the moment, and all I can hope is that through success and failures it will all become clear. Yet, I use trite expressions to hide in the meantime, since I am so insecure about the answers I don't know. But then I realize something, 'I don't know' is perfectly acceptable answer sometimes. And so this time, all I have to say is 'I don't know'.

Waiting on answers,

Little Lion Man

Just a house on sand.

It happens again and again. I run mental sprints all day long, occupying my mind with thoughts that seem to make entrance too early. I start to worry yet again, oh that vice that I have. May it be damned with the rest of my sins. I start seeking reassurance and in the process spread the disruption of peace. I set off a chain reaction of thoughts that I never intended too. And even worse, it begins in minds other than my own. What can it all mean? Why do I waste energy on such non sense. Why do I bother trying to make non sense into normalcy? Then I remember the most valuable feedback I have ever received ' You talk too much '.

Then I walk into my apt and feel the weight of my thoughts on my chest. The sighs become more frequent and you wonder why you are thinking and worrying so much. Nothing is even necessarily wrong, but the thoughts keep running circles in your head and your convince yourself you are just jaded and hope may not apply to you in this situation, or any for that matter. Then you start kicking yourself for letting yourself get back to this frame of thought where you seem to ignore everything good that has ever happened to you and focus on only what if's and could-of-beens.

And then you see a friend, his look of distress ten times darker and discouraged. You immediately realize that your problem isn't even enough to be considered a problem. A concern, but not a problem. You ask if he wants to talk. He says he can't. Later on that night as we lay in our beds in that little room he opens up about the despair he is feeling. He asks why God doesn't care? Why this? Why him?

You just sit and you wonder how you can give him the answers he wants. You know that God is real and that whatever my friend is experiencing God is aware of. But I have been in the same spot, where no answer can satisfy. I was in the exact place he is just eight months earlier, where I was sure God had forgotten and didn't care about an insignificant sinner such as myself.

I made it through though. I worked and worked and pleaded and prayed. I know things get better. I have seen it through to the other side and know I will many times over. And then when you think back on this you realize that I have had just as many experiences that things work out to the experiences where things didn't turn out in good favor with my expectations. The choice is up to me? What am I to believe in? Hope or tragedy? It is entirely my choice, nothing about it is left up to chance. It all rests in me.

So you just have to turn to your friend and tell him 'Look, I can't tell why. All I know is things will get better. I know they do. I am living proof they do.'

And then I think of how I have let my foundation turn into sand. And I have been building a house on fickel ground which can only betray me in the end. Maybe I need to stop before I get so far ahead and think of where I really want to claim my spot of earth. My life depends on it.

And then I realize I need to understand that just as much as he does. So I just remind myself 'Aaron, you talk too much.'

Listening, hearing, understanding,

Little Lion Man

So my words will never burn.

I've been told I spend too much time trying to not act the part. I have been told I put more effort into making sure I am not a stereotype that I don't have enough left over to become someone. I make sense of it in hours and minutes. I make my odds with chance and fate. And people ask me how I have it so figured out. They can't see that I don't.

Some people get caught up in trying to fit in. I think I have gotten caught up in going against the grain, in securing the fact that I am not those people as so desire not to be. To be true to myself. But it's hard when you spend so much time focusing on what not to be that you forget to be yourself. Maybe the time might be better spent figuring out who I am instead of who I am not.

I often wonder what people's impressions of me are from across a room. I wonder if they mistake my shyness and timid glances for something else. Yes, it's true that I do not like parties filled with people I do not know from strangers. It doesn't mean that I am not open to conversation. I am just not much for small talk. I joke. I laugh, maybe too much and over things that people do not find funny. But I don't care for the fluff. I want to know you, not your technique.

Maybe there isn't any impressions. Maybe I just don't make impressions. I am just a glance over, overlooked and counted out. I deserve it though. I often I am labeling and judging inside my mind and bones. It's sad. It's not right. It's true. In ways, I am no better than the self righteous artist or the beautiful people. I go around judging to justify my own insecurities. It's pathetic. How much I limit my vision due to fear of myself and others. I am more blind than I like to admit or give credit for.

Yet, I still buy into it. I say I don't believe in it but I have bought into it. Apathy is the name of the game. I go around proclaiming the scam that it is and how I don't care for it. You would think if I didn't care I could just leave it alone. I just lie to save face. It really does bother me. I feel like I am being denied my fair chance to show who I really am. The whole system is working against me and limiting me and not letting me thrive. That all I have to offer is being written off as replaceable and mundane. I don't blame them for doing so, but it's all I really have to offer. Maybe I don't posses the intangibles, whatever they decide those are.

Yet, I still fake the apathy. I care though and the insecurities are there. Over the superficial things that we are told not to worry about. About if I wear the right clothes, if I am skinny or fit enough to be around certain types of people. If I am something they want. Yes, some things will always be there in the back of my mind, even if I tell you they are not. I just act like I don't care so I don't show my secrets on my face.

And maybe I will spend more time figuring out who I am rather than who I am not. And then I won't need any approval but my own.

These are mid night thoughts.

3 A.M. ,

Little Lion Man

Dumbed down and numbed by time and age.

You know, sometimes I get sick of everyone and mostly myself talking about love. Some days I want to say that love is all the matters, others I want to scream out it's all a lie and we should fend for ourselves. At times, I feel complete in my yearning for companionship, other times I feel weak for wanting something that seems to evade me with great tact. And at other times, I think I have just lost faith in it. The whole idea has become so foreign, so distant, like something long ago in the past that you once believed in but you grew out of it.

And so I think back to how much I used to want it, yearn for it, desire it. Maybe I still do but I just keep talking myself out of it or just distract myself with selfish interest. Either way, it is a dilemma. I want it but it seems to evade me and when it comes to me I run from it. What I want scares me the most. Maybe I am just too stubborn for wanting it my way. Maybe my way doesn't exist.

Other times I just can't figure or convince myself of the possibility. How do you connect with someone to that level. There are people who are constantly in relationships. I wonder how it is that they make that connection. I feel like I have made that deep and binding connection maybe once or twice, ever. And even then, the connection didn't last. So what am I to make of it? Who knows.

Maybe it is has just been so long since even the potential of this alleged connection has even arisen in my mind. It seems like too many winters have come and gone since the last time I even could put someone in that picture. I used to be so sure of it in my youth, and I spent desperate misguided hours trying to find it. Where did that longing go? Has it been destroyed by doubt? Has it been drowned out by modern thought?

"My memory no longer allows me the luxury of remembering such frivolous times" - Kristen Warwick

Some people tell me you just have to be this or that. They tell me what women really want and what will attract and sweep them off their feet. Yet sometimes I think we are all just animal instincts. It all comes down to some physical attraction. It's a sad fact of reality and looks matter more than we like to admit. Maybe it's a sign that I feel so totally uncomfortable around those crowds known as 'beautiful people'. Maybe it's just a crap shoot. You roll the dice and you just try your chances. Maybe love is just some trivial game of chance. And no one is ever the complete. There will always be someone who is more attractive, more successful, greater, taller, smarter.

But they tell you it will eventually work out, and you just put your faith in someone else's hope for yourself. They tell you to keep trying and just keep asking around. I see where they are coming from but I have to trivialize something so sacred as the idea of love and combine it with the law of average. But maybe that's what we will all end up in the end, average love. We are rarely get everything we want.

I don't mean to sound like a pessimist. I am really not trying to extinguish the flames some people have worked so hard to create. They have probably made sense of something that I still can not wrap my understanding around and make my own. Maybe that have suffered enough doubt to see through to the reward. Who knows. I am just trying to understand that's all. I am just asking questions. But they are questions to myself that I am trying my best to answer in my own time. Yet, I will keep asking friends who have seem to have found the needle in the haystack. They found someone that answered the question. I ask them how they knew it was that luminous intangible thing known as love. And they all say the something "I don't know, I just somehow knew". So I realize that no one can answer this question for me. So questions must suffice for now.

It still occupies my midnight thoughts and occasionally I trail off in thought from a lyric, story, or even a mere glimpse into my past when I was so sure of what was to come and more importantly who was to come.

Yet, just like my friend keen, I am completely infatuated with the idea. But that is all it is for now, an idea. Maybe one day, it will be more than just a midnight thought.

From that small corner of eternity,

Little Lion Man

This town seems hardly worth the time.

Another weekend, another party. I am growing really tired of this town, maybe it's the scene, maybe it's the people, maybe it's just me. I guess it just depends on who I feel like blaming and what my conscious will let me get away with.

I never want to complain. I don't think like writing just for criticism. Yet, we all complain. Some of it is never vocal, yet my complaints too often escape past my teeth by manipulating me into thinking I am just speaking my mind. I have a good life, I really do. I consider myself more than blessed to have the family and friends that I do have. But I have my pet peeves and I know the places where I feel in my element and the ones where I feel completely out of place.

I went to some dessert party. It was in south Provo in a really ritzy neighborhood full of Provo all-stars, summer sales MVPs, and future pinnacle wives. I felt uncomfortable just walking into the place. Anyone who was above 5% body fat was looked at suspiciously. Every girl looked the same, every guy looked the same. I should have known better walking in wearing a plaid shirt and my moccasins. The place was way too crowded and the perfume and cologne made me feel like I was in Macys. We stayed for five minutes and then left. My friend tried to talk to a girl, she just looked at him and then walked away. Apparently we didn't have the 'it' factor, whatever it is.

"All the hours that you've been sitting at your vanity. May they carry you far from your misery" - Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley River Band

Provo. I like to call it the Mormon L.A. sometimes. It's eating away at me. I feel out of place more often than not. It's not that I wish to be involved in whatever other people are doing. I just wish for real conversation and real people, which is becoming harder to come across with each passing weekend. Yet, I feel stuck. I am so far into school here and all my friends are here, but they are all moving on to greener pastures of life. So am I, but I want out of here.

You know, I am beginning to wonder if everything that has been a waste. Maybe the ideal and whatever is good is dying with my generation. It seems like we have been so caught up scenes and fads and trying to establish our collective identity that the philosophy of being an individual has died out. Maybe I am just looking in the wrong places or maybe the vanity seeks me out. I can't tell. But I do feel like so much is wasted on my generation. So much is pinned on the clothes, the make up. We have been taught form very young ages to walk around with a mask on. Our generation is the first generation where it is weird to strike up a conversation with someone. We have to be facebook friends first or there has to be selfish interest. Rarely is there conversation just for the sake of good conversation and getting to know someone. It's all become about intentions, which are often misread and are even more often selfish.

Everyone keeps telling me I need to put myself out there, I need to talk to more people, more specifically girls. Every long lost friend will inevitably ask me about my love life. I tell them I date here and there. I try to talk to a girl when I see an opportunity. Truth is, the older I get the harder it is to find the connection, the spark, the 'it' factor. I see some people who are in love or at least confess to be and I can't comprehend it. Of all the people in the world, of all the little quirks and your preferences, not to mention being comfortable enough to share yourself, how did you two make the connection? What made this one different? Sometimes I wonder if I am just lost on the whole thing, will my over analytical mind ever let things take its course. Time will tell I guess.

But I do know where it will not be found. It won't be found in a scene, in some fashion, in a trend, in the masses. It will be found in a individual, who knows who she is and doesn't make excuses for it. Who in genuinely concerned for others well being as well as her own. Who has her own view and knows what she wants and sticks to it. She is going to be an individual, a complete individual.

And I will continue to try and stay true to who I am. And not get caught up in the fads, the parties, the people, the noise of the world.

Playin' the Harmonica,

Little Lion Man

The shins say it the best abstractly...

Another semester, more excuses.

Spring semester starts on Monday. Back to the grind. I am taking math 1010 again (I know, pathetic but true). I was going through all my old word docs on my comp, trying to get rid of all the papers I hope to never see again. Yet I came upon my favorite paper I ever wrote. It wasn't for some English class, it wasn't profound. However, I enjoyed writing it. Auto-biography you might think? No, it was a paper as to why my math assignments were late. I thought I would share it, just because I feel like laughing. Here it is. *Disclaimer* I wrote this in the fall of 2010 which explains the outdated sports references.

My excuses for Not Turning in my Test Corrections

It has been a tough go this semester for me. As I write this paper I hope you will laugh and cry with me as I tell you of the last few weeks of my life, telling of all the triumphs, failures and frustrations along the way. After all is said and done I hope you will graciously accept my reason as to why my test corrections were late and give me the credit you feel I deserve.

First off, can we just touch on how bad BYU football is this year? I don’t know if you are a BYU fan but I have been a BYU fan since conception. And in all of my 23 years and 9 months (counting time spent in my mother’s womb) I have never seen a BYU team that sucks as bad as this one. Our receivers can’t even catch the most elementary of passes. It is the equivelant of having an engineer that doesn’t know his multiplication tables. It’s pathetic. I think I can come up for a mathematical formula for why BYU sucks. Crappy receivers is represented by x and Robert Anae is y, with Harvey Unga being represented by z. The equation goes something like this: (-4x^3)+y(-z^2)=BYU’s terrible offense this year.

Then there is the Minnesota Twins. The Twins are my baseball team for two reasons. One is that my mom grew up in Minneapolis and my whole family roots for the Twins. The other is that the twins won the World Series in 1987, which also happens to be the year I was born. I was born in August and the Twins won the World Series that fall. Now, I am not saying that they won that year because of my grand entrance into this world, but it could have been a factor. It is a very controversial theory that ranks up there along with the Makaveli theory that suggests deceased rapper 2pac is still alive.

Well the Twins did great this year, clinching their division and having home field advantage in the playoffs. But the Yankees came in and man handled them as they have done over the last seven years. It was a traumatic experience to say the least. I am currently seeing a therapist on campus to help relieve my post traumatic stress symptoms from that loss.

There is the Jazz though, they are my whole numbers in a world full of non-simplified fractions. They had an awesome pre season but looked really rusty in their first two regular season games but sure enough they came through on the road against Oklahoma City. They did to Oklahoma what I did to the mid-term, they freaking stomped all over OKC and dominated the whole game, kind of like how I was kicking a** and taking names when I took the mid-term. I dominated that test hands down, putting in a brilliant performance that would have made the weekly top ten of sports center if they counted test performance. What I did to that test is what Cliff Lee did against the Yankees in game 3 of the American League Championship series. Overall, you have to admit that my performance on that test was simply brilliant.

I know that a lot of this has nothing to do with why my test corrections didn’t get turned in and in all honesty, I just forgot to do them. I have been too busy dominating mid terms and tests. I know you get the typical cliché excuses of “Oh, I thought it was extra credit.” Or “I didn’t know it was due today.” Or “Sorry Ms. Hill, but the Cowboys lost again this weekend putting them at 1-6 so I spent all of Sunday night drowning my sorrows with Jack Daniels.” I’m not that kind of guy.

In all seriousness though I have been working insane hours and doing school full time as well. I worked 80 hours in nine days late last month. With that on top of school, it has been hard to get around to all of my assignments. I do however feel I have been doing great in this class. If I had to convert my performance in this class into a batting average, I’d say I’m batting at a solid .435 right now. I have done every test review, done every assignment on mymathlab, and scored no lower than an 82 on my tests. This is my breakout season in my math career, putting up numbers that would shock most of my past math teachers. If there is a most improved player award given in this class, I seriously see myself getting the most first place votes. But I’m not in it for the attention or the glory; I do it for the love of the game. Simply put, there is nothing more pleasurable than dominating test after test, week in and week out. They say that these kinds of performances are what seperates competitors from champions; and I am here to prove I am a champion.

But I’m not going to shoot a hundred percent from the field, even during my breakout season. I’m sure Albert Einstein missed a test correction or two in his day, just like how Michael Jordan didn’t make every shot and how A-Rod got caught looking on the third strike that ended the Yankees season and sent the Rangers to the World Series. All super stars have come up short like I have with not turning in test corrections, but when my student number is retired and hangs from the rafters of the math department, people are going to remember the 99 I got on the mid-term, not the test corrections I forgot to turn in.

Sittin' by my lonesome in the light.

Finally back to life. It was good to spend a few days removed from everything and just relax and refuel for the next semester. Life sometimes is best left unattended for a while. Made a few resolutions and am starting to put one foot in front of another. Ambitious goals. Big plans, small expectations. I like the sound of that.

It felt good to come back to life after taking a break. I feel ready to take on challenges and eager to find and make opportunity. Yet, I find myself coming home to my thoughts. It will be nice to one day have someone to come home to, to have someone call home.

I have this corner of the earth that I can call my own. It is a small corner of a shared room on the second floor apartment building. This space is mine and mine alone. The walls are there to hear my thoughts and no one else's and I often stay up at night scribbling the incessant ponderings that set the landscape for the coming night's dreams and nightmares. In this corner I am my most kind supporter and my harshest critic, depending on the minute and what thought has taken place. I sit and stare and just wish sometimes that this ceiling will talk back.

I seem to keep coming back to this idea of home. I want it, I feel I have it at times, but I know it isn't complete yet. It can't be, there is only me in the picture. I come home at night to just this corner of the world. I come home to only my thoughts waiting for me. That's all I have for the moment. My thoughts.

And it suits me for now. It's not that I don't have a good life. I do. I don't want anyone else's life but my own. I am happy. Life is good. However, I don't ever want to be complacent. My life is good, I do believe it can be enriched though, refined.

And I know there have been many things that haven't worked out. I made my mistakes and continue to stumble in my humanity, but I hope I am at least stumbling forward.

Truth be told, the hopeless romantic I so many times repress and disregard gets the best of me when the quiet of the night is too significant to take. It comes when I come home to an empty apt, the roommates busy with life. It hits when I am reading a book and something profound rises from the page and I wish there was someone I could share this thought with, to discuss with, to internalize with. Maybe it hits the most when I come home after a long vacation and I am so excited to go home and see someone, the only problem is that I don't know who that someone is yet. All I know is the anticipation and excitement.

So goes hope. I hope for the complete picture that is missing from the night stand. One day I will come home to someone, or maybe my own family. The kids running around, I hope they will be excited for dad to be coming home from what seemed like the longest day at work. And I will go up and wrap my arms around my wife and ask how her day was. And then she will proceed to ask me to set the table, which I will do so gladly, because the highlight of my day will be sitting down and asking all the kids about their day. Then a little while after dinner the kids will go to bed and it will just be me and her. Maybe we will watch a favorite show or just talk. In our own little corner of the world, that is just ours and no one else's. You see I don't want some romance, I just want a complete life that's all

But for now, I am by my lonesome in the light and I am ok with that. The picture is a process and while some days it may not seem like it, it is slowly developing. So I continue to live my life to the fullest I know how and continue to make my own story. So when those dinner table discussions I can tell start it off by saying "Did I ever tell you the time your dad... "

At the dinner table,

The future of whoever I am supposed to be.

2012 - Feeling Ambitious

So it's finally here, 2012. The year the world is supposed to end. It's waited all of time to get here and it's finally here. And with all the resolutions and resolving going on, I think I am falling into the trend once again of planning for this next year to be the best. The year where the dreams become your reality and your troubles a distant dream. I do it every year, and every year I come up short some where. That being said, I do have big plans for this year. Here are a few things on the agenda just to give you an idea

• Start my own business. Pretty ambitious right? Truth is I am sick of jumping around from menial jobs while I scrimp through school. And since I don't have the necessary degree and haven't meet the certain requirements to fully start the career I want yet, I am taking the reigns and going to start doing things differently, where I am more in control of my circumstances. And if I fail, at least I will know that I tried.
• Live the healthiest life I know how. And I don't just mean putting in the hours in at the gym. I am talking complete and total health: physical, mental, emotional, spiritual. Over this last year I have realized that health isn't just a number on a scale or a picture. It's a state of being.
• Be myself 100% of the time and not be embarrassed about it.
• Push myself to find talents and refine the talents I think I have
• Attend the temple once a week.
• Try to have a better attitude about things that I don't currently have a good attitude about (cough*dating*cough)
• Leave behind the past, live in present, and let the future come in it's own time.
• Get back to Texas once, if not once then twice!
• Road trip through the south and experience southern hospitality
• Stand on the coast of the great Atlantic and the Pacific waters.
• Watch the sun rise from above the valley floor.
• Share my story
• Expand myself
• Pray daily
• Read the good books.
• Appreciate
• Create
• Love
• Be loved
• Practice the guitar and harmonica
• Write a song
• Not let fear control my decisions
• Embrace change and opportunity

And finally, I will keep moving in spite of setback and temporary failures. I am just gonna try and give it a 110% all year. This year feels different, because I am not afraid to fail. I just want to give it all I have and see what happens.

2012. Big plans, big ambitions. 100 chances for failure? Or a 100 chances for success?

I am going to give it a shot just to find out.

Resolved,

Little Lion Man

Another great one...

KEEN- If It's the Beaches

Today we have Keen from kristenwarwick.com. She is an absolutely amazing writer! I basically read every one of her blog posts like they are hot off the press. She should be published and I won't be the least surprised if she is one day in the not so distant future. She is good. Keen, I turn it over to you.

there is a reason why artists so often sing about love. both happy and sad.

both found and forgotten.

because love is something everyone gets. love is something people will unfailingly purchase on the i-tunes store and buy on the-now-brilliant-google-music (seriously--yet another reason to love google--as if g-mail, google docs, google +, and g-calendar weren’t enough).

why? because love is the one thing that no one can deny.

and sure, you’ve got to talented enough to put it to some catchy chords with some kick-a lyrics and a great lead guitar.

the music is the main dessert.

and the lyrics are the cherry on top.

take this song for example. if its the beaches by the avett brothers.

love them. great music. they have that raw, folk-rock sound that i wonder how anyone can pass up. their lyrics always seem to grab at the sensitive, already bruised areas of my heart

just like billy corgan from the smashing pumpkins. the guy is a freakin’ poet-magician-man. sometimes, on really dark days, if i want to magnify a heartbroken feeling i am experiencing, i turn the ol’ i-pod to ‘mayonaise’ and let my boy billy do the talking. he’s such an emotional weirdo. but really, i don’t know if it’s the drugs or what, but he seems to get it.

this song, ‘if it’s the beaches’ does just that.

it is basically a plea. a plea of desperation. in hopes of continuing with a struggling relationship.

raise you’re hand if you’ve been here before? yeah, i think we all have.

on one end or the other.

personally, i’ve been both the culprit and the victim. i’ve done the fighting. i’ve let down my pride, putting everything and more on the line. complete vulnerability (and honestly--i wouldn’t recommend this--ever--but props to those who do) offering to give that other person just about anything they desired. whether it was the beaches or the mountains bending rivers...i would have found a way.

whew.

and then--sadly--i’ve also been the bad guy.

the one that hurts the other. and then leaves them to figure out a way through their tears and aching gut.

i hate being that.

truly, if there is one thing i hate in this world--it is that.

it’s an odd thing, isn’t it? that we can become so close to someone and want it so badly, and yet still find ourselves standing amongst the remains of a shattered relationship.

in fact, i have a dear friend.

a person who was very close to me at a time. who recently experienced a most devastating heartache.

he lost a merciless fight. offering everything he could in hopes of salvaging a relationship.

finding himself with a head--once held high with enthusiasm for life--now dropped in heaviness of a lost and painful cause.

yuck-y.

it seriously gives me the heebie-jeebies just thinking about it. i start thinking to hard and i begin re-living the sleepless nights of tear-stained pillow cases and vivid nightmares. wondering why your story couldn’t end like the ones you grew up reading in nancy drew books and the babysitters’ club.

i mean, they are poorly written books but still. you can’t help but wonder.

you ask yourself. again and again. why?

trying to figure what you did wrong. wishing you could go back. wishing that you could change. just like in this song.

just like my friend has recently experienced, it can be devastating. and at times. relationships will end.

however, this song is interesting because the lyrics don’t necessarily lead you to believe that this struggling-slightly-imbalanced relationship ends.

the last two lines go something like this.

while i go gas up the truck, pack the old love letters up. we will read them when we forget why we left here.

curious, eh?

the ending of this song is what i love and hate most about it. all at the same time.

because in a way--this is simple and beautiful. bringing the reality of an ongoing effort to keep a relationship progressing. happy. and loving.

and in that same way--it captures a reality that haunts me on a daily basis. that though love itself is a perfect thing, relationships and human beings are not.

and even the most seemingly perfect of relationships have their trials.

because the fact of the matter is--one day you will forget why you are where you are and possibly question who you are with. you will need to pull out those old love letters. take a nice breather. and then get back up and keep on fighting.

you’ll do what it takes.

because that’s what we do.

when all is said and done...

yeah, relationships don’t always work out. no matter how hard you fight it. people will disagree. lose interest. lose hope. feel lost. whatever.

you’ll wish you could go back and change. but it won’t matter.

it will suck.

but then. there are sometimes that relationships will work.

and though the fight to keep that love-a-growin’ will never stop. and yes, you can tattoo that one on your forearm.

in the end. it’s worth all the beaches that this pretty-little-world has to offer.

and that darling, is a reality i most definitely believe in.

Incredible Keen. And if it's the beaches you want, I know one day you will have them.

GENTRI LEE - Featherstone

Two guest posts in a row. I feel legit. I actually have blog friends. This time Gentri Lee will be gracing us with her wonderful taste in music. She also is a pro blogger. Anyone visiting from Gentri's blog, I am sorry it is not as cool as Gentri's. I am trying. Anyways, without further ado, here is Gentri Lee.

Hello Aaron's blog!

My name is Gentri and I blog over at Gentri Lee. My blog is about... well, me. I usually write about my adventures with daily life, adventures with not so daily life, fashion, and sometimes I throw in crafts and recipes (success or fail).

I also love to post about what inspires me. Whether that be something someone else posted about, someone else's blog in general, spiritual inspiration, or even musical...

Aaron asked me to share a song that I'm loving at the moment and why I love it. Well, I know he just shared this one, but it's my current favorite. AND let's be honest- I'm the reason Aaron knows about it. haha! So first, have a listen (and take a look). Because it may just change your life.


Amazing right?! I love this song so much. It makes me feel like anything is possible, like adventure could be waiting around every corner. I am already picturing my next road trip with this song blaring through my speakers. haha!

I LOVE music and get so excited when I find a new artist that I can't get enough of. So tell me, what's a song or artist you're loving right now??

Thank you so much for reading! I'd love for you to stop by my blog anytime and say hi! Meeting new blog friends is one of my favorite things. And thank you Aaron for letting me guest post!

Love,
Gentri

Thank you Gentri Lee, for your amazing taste in music and being you!

EMMA K. - Weighty Ghost

I am very honored to have the wonderful and youthful Emma K. guest posting. She owns the title of the very first guest post on this blog. Please follow here over at her blog prettymuchalmost.

Take it away Emma K.

Hello, readers of this here blog. My name is Emma and I'm from the blog Follow Me to Happiness. It's a quaint little place if you care to stop by sometime. As for me, I'm an English major who loves baking, Jane Austen, and a good BBC period drama. I'm just trying to figure out life one moment at a time. Seeing as I feel like Aaron has much more experience than me in this thing called life, I feel very honored to be posting today.

Aaron threw me the idea of guest posting a while ago, and I decided it would be something new and exciting, so I eagerly awaited the assignment. Then he sent me a FB message telling me that he thought it would be cool if I listened to a song then wrote about what I think it's saying about life and I stopped in my tracks. Maybe I couldn't do this. But then I began listening to the song he sent over and reading over all the lyrics, and I decided I would give it a stab in the dark. So here is that stab.

The song is Weighty Ghost by Wintersleep. I had never heard to song before, but when I pulled it up, I instantly fell in love; then I really listened to the lyrics and I got a bit confused. Then I listened again, read again, repeated this about five times, stared at my computer, told Aaron I was working on the post, stared at my computer, listened again, and really began writing. Let's just say it took a long time for me to decide what this song meant to me.

As I listened to the song, I realized it was a perfect song for those days in life, when you just... well, you just can't really understand what has been going on with you lately. Here's an example from my life- it happened on Monday. I was on Facebook and noticed that a boy was on. The thing is, this wasn't just like a boy who I could chat and be like, "Hey Chum! How ya doing this fine winter day?! ;)" First off, I don't use wink faces. Second, this boy was a boy I had really hurt and so it was hard for me to talk to him, but it was also hard (much harder I know) for him to start talking to me. As I stared at his name on the screen, I realized, that I wasn't the same person I used to be. It was one of those moments when I just felt like posting as my status, "Has anybody seen the Emma who really cares about everyone and just wants to make people happy? She apparently became a ghost."

I feel that's exactly what the song means. It's about waking up and realizing the person you were is gone, for good or for bad. And sometimes, like the last verse says, we just want to be left alone with our body and the ghost of ourselves gone. And sometimes, we just want that ghost to come back home to us.

I'm realizing more and more that it's ok to have our ghost gone for a little while. It's ok to be wandering around figuring out what we need, on our own, with no one's surgery and messy fixing of things. It's ok to say, where is that person that I used to know? Because if there's anything that I've learned in life, it's that it's ok to be wrong, and to not know where you going, and to figure it all out. It's ok to be lost for a little bit, because eventually, you and your ghost will reunite in a way that's much better for both of you. And that's what life is about, improving.

Love always,

Ems

Thank you Emma K. I hope everyone is now looking for their ghost.

Aching for my heart like some tin man.

I am excited for the guest posts this week from some of my blogger friends Gentri Lee, Keen, and Emma K. I wanted to experiment with something so I asked each of them to write about a song that they are diggin' as of late. I thought I would start off the series of guest post with my own thoughts on a song.

Stable Song - Gregory Alan Isakov

I have to thank Keen for introducing me to the great Gregory Alan Isakov. He is truly brilliant. The first time I heard this song it took me to a place, I can't tell if that place was somewhere in the past or somewhere in the future. I just remember the place, that's all.

It was under a tree somewhere out in the countryside. There was a barn in the distance. It was a mild June day. I was sitting under this tree with some girl, who it was I do not know, your guess is as good as mine. I knew her though in this place. We had memories and futures together. Age wasn't important. Time didn't exist under this tree. It was just us. It consumed everything.

The song ended too quickly and I realized reality again. I was back to where I was when the song started, sitting the library with no progress on my math homework and realizing I had been staring out the window for ten minutes. All I had was this place.

You know, music has a way of taking you places you never could of imagined by yourself. This song is the perfect example for me. Who knows what it will mean to me a year, two years, ten from now? For now, it's sitting under a tree with her, who consumes my periphery when I close my eyes and hear this song. I don't know who she is. I don't even know what she looks like. I see her somehow though.

And maybe this will be a song that will foretell something about my future or explain something about my past. I don't know. I do think though that it is showing me something that I truly want. Someday, I hope I find her, whoever she is. And when I do, our songs will be just like prayers.

And so in the meantime...

"Come down, come down. Sweet Reverence. Unto my simple house and ring... and ring." - Gregory Alan Isakov

Under a tree,

A romanced mumbler.

Big things

Good things coming this week. Hope you all enjoy... Mysteries. They keep me awake. I hope they sing you to sleep. Don't let me become too wrapped up in myself. Stop the things I am becoming. Help. Help me make sense of non sense. Oh I look forward to the words which will come this week.

Anticipate!

EXPECT!!!

wisdom....

Christmas in Watauga

Yes, this is the obligatory holiday post. The one about the joys and lows of the Christmas season and after standing in line forever at a Target in Hillsboro, Oregon, all I can think is about how ready I am for every store to return to norm.

I was reminded of my favorite Christmas tonight as we had the missionaries over for desert and a Christmas message (if you are wondering what I am talking about with the whole missionary business click HERE). It was that kind of Christmas where you remember everything about the day. From the moment you wake up to the moment your head hits the pillow. I remember it so clearly.

I was a full time missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I was serving in the Fort Worth Texas area, but for the specifics of the story, I was living in a small apt in North Richland Hills and serving the Watauga Ward. My comp was Elder Bunch (I called him Badunkabunch for kicks). The night before we had pulled our mattresses out into the front room to sleep by our 2.5 or 3 foot tall Christmas tree. Our families had so lovingly sent us present via the U.S. postal service. I got a sweet Volcom tie from my brother, it was nice. The best present was that we got to call home. I remember that phone call home. I found out she had a boyfriend which would explain the stoppage of letters. Kind of a bummer to find out on Christmas, could of ruined it. But it didn't, that's how good of Christmas this was.

We headed to the park to meet up with the rest of the zone for a great Christmas lunch/dinner. We played football. I did mighty fine for being the QB. I kept throwin' up prayers to Elder Scott (I could have been a foreshadowing of Tim Tebow, just sayin'). We laughed and enjoyed each other and all the good things of season because our purpose that season was to only preach about the good things.

I keep on thinking of why that Christmas was so great. Nothing magnificent happened. It was simple. Maybe that is what made it so great. I wasn't distracted about what to get everyone, what to ask for, what to expect, what I should be feeling. No, that year it was all gone. There was zero time to think about myself and the greatest desire I had to was to see other people happy. To realize the reason for the season. To just serve. To give. That's all I wanted that Christmas.

We get so caught up in the good intentions of Christmas, oo caught up in the festivities and the celebration that we forget that the whole reason for the occasion is to remind us of the One who gave us everything, including life. And when I try to align my desire for the season with the reason for the season, Christmas takes on something totally different than lights and carols. Something other than department stores and home made cookies. It becomes this state of mind. The kind I wish I always had, even in July. The state of mind where my desire is the happiness of others.

And so when Christmas rolls around and things seem to be turning out like this...

If you start to realize that true happiness is never really about you. Christmas becomes simple. And even when you have to run two miles through airport terminals and board your plane soaked in sweat just trying to get home in one piece, when you eat too much holiday junk, when all the lights won't turn on on the Christmas tree, when you find out that the girl you are in love with has a boyfriend and you are a thousand miles away in the Lonestar State plugging away day in and day out to try and do what you feel is right in your heart. Yes, even after all that stuff happens. Christmas can't be beat.

Signing Christmas cards anonymously,

The mild and stumbling saint

It was like this at one time.

This video takes me back to the neighborhood days.

I personally believed I grew up in the best neighborhood in the world. We had our little gang and it was expected that once everyone got home from school, we headed outside to play football or pretend we were in the Army. We even had our own chain of command (if you must know, I was the Colonel). Life was simple back then, peacefully simple. Yet we all wanted to grow up. We wanted to be like the big kids. We wanted to feel cool, we wanted the world.

Well, we grew up. We still are growing up. We moved away, all went down our own path. We all found our personal vices. I stayed up thinking about all the things that ruined us. Drugs, sex, ego, alcohol, pride. Maybe if we knew what awaited us in our older years, maybe we would have wanted to keep that bubble in tact just a little bit longer.

The one good thing is that we still are that little gang from the neighborhood. We look out for each other and check in. And as we are getting married and starting families, I hope my kids view their childhood like I viewed mine. I hope it's like the song posted. I hope it's remembered like paper kites.

Laughing,

The little boy inside me.

P.S. Thanks to Gentri Lee for directing me to this amazing music video. She is also a pro blogger. No joke, half the world follows her blog. Check out what all the buzz is about HERE.

Come this time next year.

Just finished finals. Procrastination was a consistent theme over the past couple of weeks but I didn't let it get the best of me, for the most part anyways. After staying up intermittently writing a paper and drifting off to good tunes, I finished my paper and let my eyes give into the temptation of sleep, rest, rejuvenation. It wasn't enough. I laid there thinking of what awaiting me in mere hours. The dawn came early than expected. I wandered through the day dazed yet focused. Only to come home and collapse from exhaustion. My twin bed in the corner welcomes me with open arms. And considering all this craziness of the last couple weeks, I'd do it over again a million times rather than be where I was this time last year.

I can't really describe what happened other than the house of cards I had built in my head collapsed. The lights just went out. I just lost it. My days soon became a nightmare to go through. Fear gripped my body like a plague. I dropped out of life. Day became night and night became day to me. The only time I could calm down was in the quiet of the middle of the night, when the whole world was asleep. I would just sit and enjoy the fact that my mind had slowed down and that I could just breath. I went home for Christmas but I was a wreck. I couldn't enjoy anything about the holiday season. I was broken. A scratched record on repeat. I died for a little while. Whatever good was in my life had disappeared and I turned into a ghost. An aimless, starving, searching, worrying, lamenting ghost.

Every day sounded like this...

At this time last year I was certain that this misery was here to stay. This was the hand I was dealt. Some people having the blessing of living a happy and blessed life. Others are given the trial to suffer and have faith that there is some purpose in it. I was certain I was the latter. It was just my lot. Happiness wasn't was God had in mind for me, He had something else and I had no say in the matter.

You know it's weird some of the peculiar things you remember during certain times in your life. Last December I specifically remember just standing in the shower and staring at the tile wall for what seemed like hours. I would just sit there and think of every possible terrible thing that could happen in life. I would obsess over disaster all day. I woke up exhausted and went to bed exhausted from a mental obstacle course that I would run through over and over again during the day. I also remember the glimpse moments of relief, when the surge of darkness would subside and I could be in the moment. Like going to a trailblazers game with my family, doing a puzzle of Christmas eve, or just knowing that even if everything were to collapse all around me, my family would still be there.

The process was long one, it took months. Those months felt like decades. I had to learn to cope with pain. Not physical pain, but mental, emotional, and spiritual pain. I had to learn to accept it. I had lessons that I needed to learn, truth I needed to experience. Most of all, I had to learn to be grateful for that pain. I needed refinement.

And I learned some important things about God in the process. Some very personal things about me and Him and our relationship. I learned where I stood with Him. I learned what He is really like. All the false ideas I had were erased by His voice. And I started to realize that the grass still grows in the spring, the sun rises even when it's cloudy, and that whatever happens, things work out.

I sit here and am grateful for the fact that this Christmas, I can actually enjoy Christmas. I can laugh without having to worry about it. And that is the best present I can have this year. It's a good Christmas already.

Because every day sounds like this...

And come this time next year, I am gonna appreciate where I'm at. I am not going to put expectations on the future. I'm just gonna let it be.

Letting go,

Little Lion Man

Forever Mirrors.

I had an experience Tuesday morning. It was one of those experience where I saw my life was one whole, not a past, present, and future. Not a book with chapters, but for one moment, maybe two, I was able to see the picture of what my life was and was to become. It was quiet, intense, quick, sacred.

Your future becomes a very real when you are shown what the future beholds for you. I saw my future right in front of me, everyone who was to become my future, well mostly everybody. As I peered just for a moment into the door that someone forgot to shut called the future, everything changed. It looked... familiar. Like I knew what was in the room awaiting me in time. I knew the people in there. I knew what they would be to me, what I would be to them. And for that brief few minutes I saw the whole picture in it's entirety. I had seen it before, somewhere. I just forgot what it looked like.

"If the world could remain within a frame like a painting on a wall, then I think we would see the beauty. Then we would stand staring in awe at our still lives posed, like a bowl of oranges. Like a story told by the fault lines and the soil" - Bright Eyes

It was sobering and exciting, heavy and relieving. It made me patient and anxious all at once. I wanted to cry and laugh. But I just sat there and took it all in and tried not to make it more or less than what it really was. I just appreciated it for its own unique nature.

Then the questions came. Is it all just wishful thinking? Is this some hypnosis brought on by years of wishful thinking and unfulfilled desires. Is this from God or something of my own device? Am I fabricating my own experiences? These questions always come after I experience something profound, something hopeful.

And so I asked someone in who's wisdom I trusted. And he answers me this, "What does it matter if it's from God or from your own desires? If you desire good things, then it doesn't matter. That is when you know your will is aligned with God." And then I realized when I was looking in the forever mirrors, I was looking into the heart of God as well as my own. What I wanted is what God intended for me. And I didn't have to question if it was really what I wanted. because there wasn't an option anymore. It wasn't about me anymore. It was about everyone before, here, and to come. It was about everyone except me.

It's about her.

It's about my kids.

It's about my brothers.

It's about my sister.

My Father.

My Mother.

Because I was made to be with them.

That was God's intention all along.

So I kept on walking Tuesday, going about what would be known as just another day. Except I walked a little faster, because for a minute or so that morning, I realized what was before me. I wanted to get there, because I knew what is awaiting me is home.

And so I find myself walking.

And hoping that I find that home sooner than later.

Home bound,

A postcard from the present to the future.

Sometimes Monday Happens.

I wake up before the sun is up and head off to work. My car is dead. It's ok though, I have my room mates truck, which is pretty nice. So I roll around in a truck that is not mine pretending that I am cool and I may have more than a few dollars to my name. It's not true. I am on my way to clean and vacuum the country club, the early morning crew. We are usually done and gone by the time the rich old men show up for breakfast and to talk golf. I put in my ear buds and wander off in my mind as I vacuum crumbs from last night's five course meal.

I am done and I head to class. Good things. I ace my quiz (which was not hard) but I ace it anyways. Then get out of class early. I enjoy laughing with friends in the hallway. I then see another friend and decide to hit up lunch. Supreme personal pan pizza from pizza hut. We talk about the usual thing for a single mormon in their mid twenties. Dating. We complain and lament about the same old things, give answers we have given thousands of times before. We end up passing the blame on somebody else, laugh, and enjoy the fact that we have once again let ourselves off the hook.

Sitting in my required philosophy class. The teacher is rambling on about some issue I really don't bother to know about. I hate generals. They make school almost unbearable. A six page paper on Friday, then a final on Monday. Just cramming my mind with issues that don't have any real solutions. I have no power to change it, or at least I don't desire to have the power to change certain things... yet.

The cold is starting to make it hard to breath. I come home to an empty apt. It's on cold days like this I wish I had a Mrs. to come home to, just for the company, just for the love. It will come in time. I have patience that something will work out. I make blueberry pancakes just for the sake of eating something warm. I make the batter thin so they come out like crepes. I feel like I have a special talent for making these pancakes just right. I work on this blog and go fishing for compliments. I enjoy some conversation in the vastness of the internet. I find common ground with strangers. I find common ground with myself. It's a beautiful thing to behold. People can surprise you by their generousity in sharing their thoughts. It's one of the most unselfish things I believe we can share, ourselves.

I am starting to stress. Worrying gets the best of me as I wonder how to accomplish what everyone expects of me and even more, what I expect of myself. Too much, and the Monday night football game is a snoozer. Two losing teams, two reasons not to watch. I put in a movie to make me think. Garden State it is. It's been too long since I have viewed such fine cinema. One line sticks out.

"I'm fine with being unimpressive. I sleep better." - Garden State

I get up to switch my laundry out and it gives. My achilles heel, which happens to be my right knee. I have no clue what happens but it buckles and I fall to the ground like a sack of bricks. My body is giving out long before it is supposed to. I roll around on the ground, wondering how in the world my knee gave out just walking.The pain is so bad I feel like I might vomit but what do I do instead? I laugh. Because it's Monday, my car is dead, I am a janitor, finals are gonna kill me, my knee is swelling up, and I realized I was due for a bad day sometime. Mondays happen.

TGIT (Thank Goodness it's Tuesday)

To a better Tuesday,

A hopeful gimp

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