Never Again

Forgiveness says that I should give you one more try
But it's too late, it's over now

I am hurt. There's a part of me that's broken and I don't know how to fix it. I have these wonderful days, where life seems so perfect and I don't know how I could be happier. But right now, I just feel hurt. I would probably say I feel empty, except it's impossible to feel "empty" with all this pain inside of you.

So, this isn't entertaining. Far from it. But I didn't promise entertaining all the time, I promised real. This is as real as it gets. Real, deep, physically sickening, numbing pain.

The one person that I trusted, more than anything, to never make me feel this way.. the only person I ever let my guard down entirely with.. is the reason for this. What's worse is that I wish I could hate you and I can't. I am powerless against feeling anything but wanting, needing you. That, I hate. You, I wish with every fiber of my being that I could hate.

This will get better. It'll go away, I know. But right now it's real, it's tearing me into pieces. And even though I know I'll cry tonight.. then wake up tomorrow and already begin to move forward, right now I feel weak. I feel sick, I feel helpless, I feel pathetic. Never again.

Sadness has me at the end of the line
Helpless, watched you break this heart of mine
And loneliness only wants you back here with me
Common sense knows that you're not good enough for me
And all you had to do
Was apologize, and mean it

But you didn't say you're sorry
I don't understand
You don't care that you hurt me
...
My heart may never mend
And you'll never get to love me.. again

Mood: FUCK. YOU.

----------

Less than ten minutes after posting this.. I already feel better. I guess sometimes you just need to, finally, get things out. Music has a lot to do with it too.. this song fits a little better.

Cause goodbyes are like a roulette wheel
You never know where they're gonna land
First you're spinning, then you're standing still
Left holding a losing hand
But one day you're gonna find someone
And right away you'll know it's true
That all of your seeking's done
It's just a part of the passing through
Right there in that moment you'll finally understand
That I was better as a memory than as your man
Better as a memory than as your man

Updated Mood: Calm

What the..

I'm at a loss for words.

I really don't even know why I try with some people. I think it's time to seriously start evaluating some of the relationships, mainly "friend"ships, in my life. I've done way too much for my friends to be at this point right now.

I'll add more when I'm less pissed.

Two thumbs down? Turn it around!

Critics. Ugh. It seems that, no matter what you're doing, there will always be critics in your life. Even if you're doing something good. Someone will always find something to bitch about. Well, I have one thing to say: BITCH ON. You're not gonna slow this girl down, no sir :)

Lately I've been noticing a lot of changes in myself. The biggest one, and by far my favorite, is this newfound confidence and self assurance I have. Not that was ever really lacking confidence altogether, but combined with my increased "I don't care what you think, I'm gonna do what I want" attitude, I feel pretty badass right about now. I'm independent, fairly content, and making things happen for myself. I've come a long way in the last year.. and I'm not ashamed to say that I'm proud of myself. I think I might even pat myself on the back now. That felt good :)

The other night, for my inspiration board, I was looking for good quotes. And I found some pretty good ones:

"Why should we live with such hurry and waste of life? We are determined to be starved before we are hungry."

"It is true that I have had heartache and tragedy in my life. These are things none of us avoids. Suffering is the price of being alive."

"When I hear somebody sigh, "Life is hard," I am always tempted to ask, 'Compared to what?'"

I love quotes that really make you think. So, now, what I'm thinking is.. what is life all about? I guess the answer is different according to everyone. But this blog is about me :) So here's my answer..

To me, life is about joy. What do I mean by joy? Well, I have a very good, very smart friend that actually put into words exactly how I feel.. (Thank you, Amelia :) Hope you don't mind me using this!)

I've been happy before. I've known exactly what was making me happy, and the minute that the cause of my happiness went away, so did the feeling. This. This is different. Joy is not conditional. It's not a feeling. It's a state of being. It's peace. It's the knowledge of knowing that no matter what happens, you have amazing constants in your life that will not leave you or forsake you.

I agree completely, joy is not the same as being happy. For me, that's what life is about, finding joy, finding peace. I guess where and how you find that is different for everyone too. In my case.. I have found my joy, my peace, in finally being comfortable in my own skin. I can honestly say that I wake up every morning and I'm happy to be alive. I'm happy to be me, to have the things I do, and live the life I live. I have bad days and countless moments of imperfection. And I also have days where I exceed even my own expectations of myself and push myself to do better, be better.. and succeed. I am blessed.

I am perfectly imperfect. Unusually unusual. There will always be someone prettier, smarter, skinnier, more accomplished, braver, whatever.. than me. But there will never, in the whole world, be another me. No one can be the strong, stubborn, at times over-emotional, giving, loving, confident, over analyzing, flawed mess that is me.

To me, that's what life is about. Knowing who I am, loving who I am, finding joy.. in who I am. Please, critics, bitch on :)

Last chance thrift stores, I lay my soul to rest
I will always be second place at best

Mood: OVERjoyed :)
Listening to: Jon Black - This Is Not the Answer
(I don't know where else to find it, but I'm looking)
http://downloads.whoisjonblack.com/track/this-is-not-the-answer

You can't get lost if you don't know where you're going

I miss Charleston. It's strange how you can miss a place so much, but I really do. I miss the beaches, I miss downtown, I even miss the ridiculously rainy days. At the end of last year I was so excited to move back. I had it all planned out. How I would save money, when I would look for places.. it was gonna be great. Then life happened. Which was not so great. I'm still planning on moving back, eventually. But it's almost depressing to think that I should already be there. I guess everything happens for a reason, though. There has to still be something for me here.

I think I need something to keep me busy, well busy when I'm not busy. A new project. One that's not a boy for a change. I need something that makes me feel.. alive, as weird as it sounds. Ideas?

I've been thinking a lot about volunteering. The only thing I've been lacking is time. But with this (hopefully) new job I should have a little more time. Or at least be less stressed and tired all the time. Anyway, I think helping someone else would really end up helping me in a lot of ways.

I have way too much on my mind right now..

"Introducing Me"

I love this song. It's silly and catchy, it makes me smile. It also reminds me of someone now.. which makes me smile even more: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qt11Lg4MJ9I

It's 4 a/m and I'm still awake (thank you, Captain Obvious). Oddly, I'm not very tired. I'm watching an old episode of The Hills. The episode where Lauren finally goes to Paris, meets a boy in a band, and rides around Paris at night on his motorcycle. In a ball gown, by the way. He drops her off in front of her hotel, blows her a kiss, winks, and then he's gone. Why can't I go to Paris, meet a hot guy, have a great night, and then say goodbye? Hello! MTV! I'm here and I'm ready for the world to watch my life unfold! Some girls just have all the luck.

I have decided that I hate mystery shows. Because the narrators always have creepy ass voices. I know bad things happen in the world. I can watch the most bloody, graphic movies over and over again. But those shows, where even the guy's voice sounds scary, I can't watch. Especially not alone, at 4 in the morning. I guess it's either infomercials or sleep. Or more blogging about the lack of craziness in my life.

I miss Vegas. I wanted to blog about it but, much like my "old life", I can't remember enough of it. I did find a message to my cousin, telling her about it:

We were just standing in the club, innocent & sweet.. minding our OWN business.. when this guy comes up to us in the club & says "you girls wanna come do shots with us in VIP?" Well, of course Heather Drunkpants does, so off we go. We end up drinking jack with a SMALL splash of coke, getting sufficiently FUCKED UP in about ten minutes. We finished the jack & then a bottle of vodka. Since the guys in RokVegas wouldn't even let us go to the bathroom alone we decided to venture our drunk asses down the casino & up the escalator to Coyote Ugly.

Making new friends at ROKVEGAS

On the way, we got distracted by cops in uniforms & HAD to get a picture with them. Then we were approached by people asking "did you guys just come from there (RokVegas)?" That is when I heard the Australian accent & fell in love before I even saw his face. 3 new friends + us went to Coyote Ugly, where we drank more.. then I proceeded to hold a pep rally in the bathroom" (in a stall by myself yelling "If you're as fucked up as me let me hear you say HELL YEAH".. people actually caught on & started yelling, "HELL YEAH!")

And new friends at Coyote Ugly

We stumbled back up the escalator to Coyote Ugly where, I think, I drank more. And finally left. I don't remember if the bar looked anything like the movie, because I don't remember anything about it except that the DJ Khaled song "All I Do Is Win" came on.. and I apparently made up a new dance that involved throwing my hands up in the air and shaking my boobs at people when he says, "Everytime I step up in the building, everybody hands go UP.. & they stay there"

More drinks at Coyote Ugly

I don't remember the cab ride TO Treasure Island (Australian aka Matt's hotel) Amanda projectile vomited into a trash can (& apparently on her own shoe) then passed out. I just remember standing at the edge of the bed, watching Amanda. I could tell by her face that she was about to be sick and didn't know what to do about it. She was sitting up, extremely straight, on the edge of the bed, with a trash can at her feet. And suddenly, without moving at all, she started to throw up. Not actually in the trash can but in the direction of the trash can. It was definitely not a funny moment, but for some reason I was so amused and remember thinking, "Aren't you even gonna TRY to make it in the can? At least lean over.."

(JUST FOR FUTURE REFERENCES.. if you even THINK you're going to be doing the walk of shame.. plan the exits out the night before) Since it wasn't our hotel, and we hadn't been there yet, we had no idea where the exits were. We had to walk THROUGH the freakin Treasure Island casino, looking for a way out, in our clothes from the night before (me with hair matted to my head like I hadn't showered in 3 days, still wearing heels) & catch a cab back to our hotel. Hungover cab rides in Vegas are horrible. We might as well have been riding a mechanical bull back to our hotel.

Safely back at our hotel: New York, New York

Eventually, we made it safely back to our hotel. Amanda decides to throw up some more (in a trash can.. right next to the door of the hotel. Luckily for her, these were tall trash cans and she didn't even have to bother leaning over). As this is happening, we're approached by a guy with an accent.. & the conversation went as follows:

Guy: What you doing?
Me: ...having a rough morning
Guy: You need to.. uhh.. call someone?
Me: No, this is our hotel, we're going to our room
Guy: I go with you
Me: Umm, no
Guy: You come to my room

We ended up just walking away and later coming to the conclusion that, based on our outfits from the night before, he probably thought we were hookers. What a proud moment. After finally making it back to our own room, Amanda throws up some more, we eat and sleep the rest of the day away. Somehow, I managed to not get sick one time in Vegas. Which makes no sense given how much I drank. Maybe Vegas has magical powers for my body/liver. Meaning only one thing.. I need to go back and SOON.

I know I'm growing up or whatever.. but I hope I don't ever get old. I hope I never forget how to be young and crazy. I hope I never stop having pep rallies in bathroom stalls. I need crazy in my life. I'm so good at it :)

Crafty Kathy

If you're looking for an entertaining post, I'm gonna go ahead and warn you, this is not it. After the first paragraph it's pretty much directed at anyone on my level of nerd. My advice would be check back when you see a new post with a bitchy title.. or read on, but you've been warned :)

Today wasn't an extremely productive day. I got an invite to play "sloshball" and actually thought about it. Apparently it's like baseball. Except you buy a keg and you play with a wiffle ball. You run with your full cup of beer and have to finish it by the time you make it home. So, basically, it's nothing like baseball. Man, sometimes I love living in a college town. I didn't end up going though. Probably for the best. Tomorrow will also be 2 WEEKS SOBER for this kid and I'm not sure drunken running is anything I need to be remotely involved in. I have a mini adventure planned for tomorrow, so I figured I'd get some things done that I've been putting off.

I finally got around to making my "inspiration board". What is an inspiration board? Exactly what it sounds like. A board that you put newspaper clippings, pictures, ideas on.. really anything that, well, inspires you. When I first decided to do it, I figured I'd just buy a plain cork board and put up some motivational quotes and pictures of design ideas I wanted to try in my apartment. But when I actually got around to doing it, I decided I wanted to do it a little differently. Partly because I like to put my own twist on things and partly because I decided I'd put it in my bedroom and I wanted it to kinda double as art.

I was really excited when I found these:

It's still cork, but in squares instead of just a plain board. When I bought them I thought they were about an inch and a half thick. So I decided to buy 2 and put them side by side, then if I wanted more later I'd just buy more. Imagine my surprise when I opened the package to find that it wasn't just one piece, but 4 thin pieces of cork (even though it says, right on the FRONT of the package, 4 pack.. sometimes I think these blonde moments will never end..) Needless to say, I was pretty excited. Except that now I have 8 pieces and I really only want 4. Anyway, they even come with these little adhesive strips to put them up on the wall. All for like 6 bucks at Walmart! If you're a design/decorating nerd like me, you understand my excitement. I put some music on, sat down with a stack of magazines and some scissors, and went to work!

I decided to make each one for something different. One for work schedules, important reminders, and to-do lists, one for design ideas and new things I wanna try, another for quotes, sayings, and books I'd like to read, and the last one for random sketches and ideas. I realize I'm easily amused, but I 'm really excited that I started this. Hopefully it'll lead to more productive free time. It's also good that it's in my bedroom since I'm still looking for pieces of bedroom furniture/art. I can put pictures up, next to the paint color on my wall, and decide over a few days if I think something will look good in my room. I'm not totally done yet but they're up and it's a start :)

I didn't make any progress in the "crazy" department today. But I did accomplish something I've been wanting to do and manage to entertain myself for a while. Besides, there's always tonight for crazy :)

Legacy

I don't mind if you've got something nice to say about me

And I enjoy an accolade like the rest

And you can take my picture and hang it in a gallery

Of all the Who's Who's and So-and-So's

That used to be the best at such and such

It wouldn't matter much

I won't lie, it feels alright to see your name in lights

We all need an "Atta boy" or "Atta girl"

But in the end I'd like to hang my hat on more besides

The temporary trappings of this world

I want to leave a legacy

(Legacy by Nichole Nordeman)

I love this song. Especially this particular part. Because this is really how I feel right now. For such a long time I based my life plan on what everyone around me happened to be doing with theirs. Now I'm just living my life for ME. I still have a million things I want to do with my life, and I have no doubt that I'll do them all, but I don't wanna just work to get there.. I wanna really live too while I'm on my way to all my goals, hopes, and dreams.

I think everyone, in some way, desires to be something great. I don't really care if I'm rich and famous, or everyone in the world knows my name. But I want to be remembered by the people close to me as someone who changed their lives for the better. I don't want to just work everyday for money and material things. I want my efforts to really go toward helping people, making life better for others. There are very few people that I've ever talked to, in great detail, about my plans for the future. One of those plans involves disabled children. More specifically a charity, or organization, dedicated to raising awareness and money for research and new technology to make their lives easier, happier, and healthier.

I was very close to someone who, after a car accident, is now paralyzed. He does everything possible to live a totally normal life and, for the most part, I think he does. Even though I spent a lot of time with him and saw who he was, as a person, instead of a person in a wheelchair.. there were moments when I was completely in awe of him. He wasn't just determined, to have a normal life and be happy, but he was a strong person. He didn't have self pity and feel bad about his situation. He took it for what it was and decided that life goes on. As someone who didn't always look at the "bright side" of things, he was an inspiration to me. At times, it was frustrating even to be around because it puts things in perspective and almost makes you feel guilty for focusing so much on your "problems". But I feel blessed to have had that influence in my life because now instead of immediately seeing the negative side to things, I focus much more on the positive, and how lucky I am to lead a happy, healthy life, regardless of anything else. I used to, and still do, admire him in so many ways. Mostly because, then, I didn't know how it felt to be a strong person. I never stopped to look at the bigger picture and realize that, yes, terrible things can happen but life will still go on. I had been through much less difficult situations before and thought to myself, "Why me? God, why can't you just help me.. this hurts and I don't wanna live anymore"

That's the thing about difficult situations. They can make you feel completely broken, helpless, and defeated. Or.. you can choose to not get discouraged. You can come to the realization that something awful has happened to you but that there is still so much more worth living for. Which is why I want to help those children. If someone could accidentally put things in perspective that way for me, imagine what intentional acts of reassurance and positivity could do for those kids. If someone, even just one person, in their lives can keep reassuring them that there is something to live for, that they can still make their dreams come true, regardless of their situations, and make them happy.. that would be my legacy.