Beautiful, Beautiful, Beautiful

Today was SUCH a beautiful day. Well, it was really just an extension of a really wonderful night, into today. Last night my sister and I dressed up as fairies (she was a vampire-bitten fairy, and I was just a pretty fairy) and went to an awesome raw food pot-luck and then partied with about 5 other people, 2 of whom we'd just met, well into the night. We sat by a fire and played the guitar and sang and told real scary stories and laughed and hugged and....oh it was just wonderful!! And then today, we woke up in the late morning, looking up to the beautiful bubble-like lights strung across my sister's ceiling and all of her amazing plants that make her tiny place so full of life and green. The air was perfect and warm, and it was so beautiful to wake up next to my awesome sister and just pounce on and cuddle with each other for a while :) We made hot cereal and sat out on her porch and just soaked in the beauty of her magical garden---

I have to take one second to pause and try to describe my sister's garden. She lives on a normal street in Sugarhouse with cute little houses all around, but hers you enter by way of an old, creaky wooden gate in a wooden fence which hides her house from the rest of the street. Inside the gate there are aspen trees and pine trees and a willow tree that are so alive and climbing higher and higher each day. There is a small fountain on the side of the path leading up to the house from the gate and its gentle trickle is so pleasant and makes the whole place seem like an oasis of quiet and tranquility. Now that it's fall, leaves and pine needles carpet the ground and the air is moist and smells of rain. Mmmm it's just breathtaking, and my attempt to describe its beauty doesn't even come close to doing it justice.  --

Back to breakfast :) So we sat on the steps at the head of the path through the front yard and listened to the birds and breathed in the fragrance of the coming rain. We ate our apple, oat, and raisin cereal out of these thick, deep pottery bowls, which just made the food even better. Wow....what a beautiful morning.

We then took quite the adventurous walk through the woods that are just a jaunt up the street from her house! I couldn't believe such a beautiful place could exist right in the middle of all these houses. It reminded me starkly of Robert Frost's poem that goes "Two roads diverged in a yellow wood;" the whole wood was filled with trees that had bright yellow leaves and the ground was thick with the fallen gold. In my tall black boots and my red pea coat I felt like quite the fall adventurer! We ran and kicked our way through the leaves and admired the little stream winding its way through the wood. I could literally spend all day there and never get bored or want to leave. It was a dream.

Then came the best part of all: I DYED MY HAIR RED!!!!! (pictures soon to come) It was sooooo fun doing that with my sister, who is so ready to take part in any new adventure and she was so great and supportive in this first time experience for me. Neither of us had even dyed hair before and she was so brave to just get her hands goopy and slather it all on. It was so fun, and it turned out sooooo great!! I am deeply, deeply in love with this red hair; I think it was the color I was always meant to have. So now begins my "red butterfly phase." I've been in the white one for quite some time and now I am ready for some fire and some sass!

The rest of the evening passed quite relaxingly in going to see our oldest sister and her daughter, whom we took Trick-or-Treating for a little while and then we made soup and just spent some good time together.

I love my family so much. I really couldn't have asked for a better Halloween. Hooray!!

Beautiful Butterfly

As I have previously mentioned, right now I am in what I'm calling my "butterfly phase" and it is beautiful. Over the summer, the concept came to me in the form of real butterflies; I dreamed about them, I saw them everywhere, and even a couple books I read by chance had a lot to do with butterflies. I took it as an omen that that was the beginning of my "butterfly phase" and started taking notice of the ways in which I was changing. The most obvious is of course that I was leaving for college, which entailed so many changes I couldn't think of them all. I'd been in my safe chrysalis at home, and now I was to emerge into a world I saw with new eyes, with new wings to carry  me into my new life.

A few days ago, my mom sent me an email, telling me she'd been going through some papers and found a copy of a poem she wrote for me when I turned 17. It's called Mariposa, which means "butterfly" in Spanish. It said a lot about my life when I was 17 and it says even more about the woman I am now and expresses beautifully all the things I feel about my "butterfly phase."

Mariposa

Soft sweep of white wings,

Gentle sparkle through the blue,

I see now that it is you.

There was a woman in the chrysalis . . .

. . . I see her now.

Content in her wrapping, she sifted.

Nourishment, in gentle swaths,

Seeped in through seams in mind and skin.

In the center, pliant strength coursed like a joyous sap.

Eyes of a doe, filled with wisdom ~

Grace of a willow, cut loose and swirling ~

Sacred whiteness of a mother forming.

I see her now.

Wings filled and pulsing . . .

A world of love awaiting.

Sunday Thoughts

This is one of my very favorite pictures of Christ; it embodies everything I most deeply feel about Him: that he is loving and tender, and always has a hand extended down to us to lift us up out of the raging rivers of sorrow or fear or temptation.

I have felt Christ particularly close to me in the past couple of weeks as I've been thinking about a lesson we had in church a couple weeks ago that I haven't been able to get out of my head. I don't even remember what the lesson was about, but the teacher was talking about the love of Christ and how He will wipe away our tears. She asked us to think about a time we've wiped tears off of someone else's face, even if it was just a baby, and how that felt. We talked about what an intimate, tender gesture that is, to be so close to someone physically when they are in some kind of pain. I couldn't help then to imagine Christ physically wiping tears off of my face....it brought me to tears right there in the lesson just thinking about it. I'd heard the phrase "Christ will wipe away every tear" but I had never actually imagined what it would feel like to have Him touch my face and look into my eyes and with that look and tender touch bring me peace. That feeling has stuck with me in the weeks since, and I've been wanting to tell people about it, so this seemed the appropriate time and place.

I know that Christ is always there to comfort us and lift us up when we fall into dangerous waters. All we have to do is reach up, and take His hand.

Learning to Dance In the Rain

"Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass. It's about learning to dance in the rain." This is one of my favorite quotes. I LOVE to dance in the rain. If you ask my mom, she'll tell you that you know I'm happy when I have someone who'll dance in the rain with me--that's the sign of a true friend. Some of my best poems, best kisses, best moments in general have happened in/because of the rain. 

There's something so peaceful in the sound of the drops hitting the window panes. Something ethereal in the air as the whole world turns gray. Something in the rain makes me pensive and quiet, and it's kind of nice not to really talk to anyone, just be alone with my thoughts. 

A couple weeks ago it rained so hard--I couldn't believe it! And I had to walk 11 blocks home from the grocery store, so I had a gallon of milk in my backpack and two bags of groceries I was carrying. Oh, and no jacket. The rain literally felt like buckets of water being poured over my head again and again, it was crazy! When I finally got home, I looked like I'd jumped into a swimming pool with all my clothes on. For some reason, being rain-wet seems much wetter than shower-wet; I have no idea why that is. Maybe it's all the water your clothes hold, it makes you feel heavy and saturated with the water....Anyway, it was an adventure :) 

Here's a poem about rain that I wrote when I was 14, visiting New York with my dad:

Mushrooms in New York

The rain pours
Steadily
On the busy streets of Manhattan.
From the 13th floor of one
Of many
Skyscrapers, I watch
Two-legged mushrooms
Scurry about
In the rain.
Their bubble tops are
Colored,
The legs all look
The same.
These funny little
Two-legged mushrooms
That I watch from the
13th floor

Me

I eat sandwiches, burgers, cookies and all other such finger/hand-eaten foods upside-down.

I am a procrastinator--and I mean if you think you procrastinate, I promise I'm worse. 

I think letters are the most beautiful form of any communication. 

I am an avid admirer of art, particularly artsy photography. 

I'm not super girly, but I do love pretty perfume bottles and flowers, and I consider myself fairly good at decorating tastefully. 

I almost always have music playing, which makes me the most thankful person for the invention of portable music players, especially iPods. I will say, however, that sharing a room with someone who has very distinctly different taste in music than myself has taught me incredible tolerance and ability to not have music playing while getting ready if she's still asleep. 

I would rather read or dance than almost anything else. 

I like being around people, but I value my alone time very much. I prefer more intimate one-on-one time with people I hang out with, it's easier to connect that way. 

I'm good at talking to strangers. 

I LOVE babies....and weddings :) 

I love talking on the phone; sometimes it's easier than being in person because I can do other things while I'm talking without feeling like I'm being rude--I like my hands to be busy no matter what I'm doing. 

On that note, I love to knit. I knit my first sweater this year and I'm super excited to wear it this fall/winter!! 

I have a major scarf fetish. I don't even know how many scarves I own, but I love every single one of them and wear them as often as possible. 

I love snuggling--which extends to hugs, kisses, holding hands etc. I'm very physically affectionate.

I am a chocolate lover. My dad would always bring me chocolate from his business trips, even if it was just the chocolate left on his pillow in a hotel. I have treasured that little gesture from him so much--that he knows that little piece of chocolate will make me happy and let me know that he loves me. 

I appreciate slow movies. It obviously depends on the movie, but if it's worth it, I can sit through a slow one. I'm also the kind of girl that likes action movies, so the boys are safe with any movie with me, I'm easy to please ;)

Taking walks is very calming to me. I like both going alone and with someone else, but I kind of max out on one other person. 

I have a very special connection to trees. If I could be anything, I'd be one of the dancing trees in the Chronicles of Narnia.

I have very vivid, colorful dreams.

I write poetry as often as possible, and will, in the very near future, publish a book of poetry!

I love my blog!! And I love getting comments, so please do!

Sunday Thoughts

It's been an interesting week.

My emotions have been all over the place, and I'm not really sure how to express them in the right way. I'm missing home for the first time...mostly my mom. I miss her hugs and just having her around. Seeing my aunt, who looks like my mom, has made me miss her even more. I miss Matt, my best friend in the entire world. I need his solidity and his bubbly love. 

On the other hand, this week has been full of social activity and it just flew by!! We had a huge party for all 3 of my roommates, who all have birthdays in October, and my cousin had her mission farewell today, so I saw a lot of family.

....overall, a roller-coaster week.

Holding Hands

I am a person that feeds off of physical affection. It's definitely one of my languages of love, the other being verbal affection/quality time. But specifically, I love holding hands. It's the thing that never fails to give me that "butterflies in my stomach" feeling, no matter how many times we've done it before. The best thing about holding hands is that it's a way to be intimate that's safe, quiet, and...beautiful. Looking down and seeing your fingers intertwined with someone else's, that moment when you can't tell whose hands are whose....that's the moment you know it's something special.

I miss holding hands so much...

D.A.N.C.E.

I want to be a dance therapist. I've known since I was a little girl that I wanted to be in some kind of therapy, and I've always loved dance--it's always come very naturally to my body. And in the last year I found that putting the two together would be the perfect career path for me.

I was talking tonight with my dad and I was telling him about my latest development for my dance therapy idea: couples therapy/marriage therapy in dance. I think the idea was always in the back of my mind but I was never sure how to manifest it or make it a reality. But that's what this blog is all about, the reality of my imagination!

The reason partnered dance therapy is so perfect is because you're connecting to someone on every level of attraction, or even just every level of connection you can have with another person. You're connecting mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually, intellectually, creatively... It's amazing! I knew I wanted to do dance therapy in the first place because of what dancing with a parter did to my own life. I was going through a major depression and the only thing that kept me sane was dancing with my partner Matt. I knew I had that outlet with him where I was safe and beautiful and creative, I had someone close to me who understood me on all those levels. And it saved my life.

Dance is something that allows you to create this organic light, and it's especially beautiful when you get to make that with another person. Dancing has changed my life, and continues to change me as I move through my butterfly phase :) I love every minute of it.

White

I've decided that white is my color. Well, color is the wrong word since all colors come from the breaking of white. In any case, I've found that I look best in white. It makes me feel elegant and somehow older. Plus, wedding dresses are white, and wedding dresses are something I kind of obsess over. Sometimes I go wedding dress shopping just for fun, to get ideas for what I eventually want.

White is...beautiful. So is black. I find myself wearing a lot of black too. I guess at the heart of things I'm a neutral color girl. That's kind of how my life is, I see things very plainly, the world is fairly black and white. But color is necessary. For example, I'm dying my hair red in a couple weeks!! This is a super drastic move for me, but I have been feeling the need for some drastic change. My whole life has been turned inside out and upside down, but it's finally facing the right way. I'm calling it my butterfly phase.

So there's my schpeal on white/color!

A Bit of Poetry

I wrote this the other night, and it pretty well sums up my philosophy on love. I am a lover of many things, so love is a prevalent subject in my poetry.

What is Love?

There are some things you cannot describe
With words:
Hearing a baby laugh.
Knowing there's someone listening
When you pray.
Reading the words "I miss you" written in
His hand.
Standing still in the
Rain.
A mother's hug.
The first time his hand slips into yours.

So many moments,
Indescribable feelings...

But there is one word for
All of it.

Love

Love is
Undefined
Unhindered
Unreserved

Indescribable

Feeling

Finally Blogging!!

I often think things that I wish I could tell someone, but it seems to come out better in my thoughts or in writing, so I've been wanting to start a blog, and now I have!! I'm exceptionally excited to share my thoughts and feelings and poetry etc with anyone who wants to see inside my head a little.

Welcome to the Reality of Imagination!!