This is what it feels like to be far away.  This is what it feels like to miss you.  This is what it feels like to slowly forget pieces of you.  This is how I cope when I am not near you.

Why is it that we can not store up moments and touches with people?  We hug and walk away and in an instant the sensation of the hug fades.  We try to remember what it was like to be close, but we can only remember the physical location.  Our brains are incapable of holding on to a tactile memory. 

I wish I could kiss you a thousand times so that when I leave I can still feel your kisses on my lips.  I wish I could touch you enough that when you are far away I still feel your skin.  I wish I could hold on to the memories of you, the feelings that being in your presence brings to me, when you are no where to be seen.  

I wish I could remember you.  Because when you are away, I never feel near you.  

Your luck is so much better than mine.

I am hungry and there is no food around.  That’s the only way to not eat, when the food isn’t there.  Because when food is around me, I am going to eat it.  So if you wanted the last chip or piece of chicken, don’t think I am getting full any time soon.  But when food isn’t around and I am hungry, I see that it weighs out in my head.  I say to myself, “this is for all the times that you ate when I [stomach] was not hungry.  You should feel this feeling and remember it so you can know later, this is what hunger is.”  Its a good little exercise because it never lasts longer than an hour and then I find a way to put food on the table.  On my table.  All for me.

My dad told me that he is supposed to eat like the children in Africa for a week to see what its like (as suggested by the pastor at church).  I think that would be a good idea for him.  Mainly because he goes to church and is rather devoted, so I figure if you are going to put in that much time, might as well go all the way.  Cause whats the point of going if you are only going to take away some of the suggested material?  I guess some is better than nothing, but then again, nothing is pretty cool too.

Lys and I will always weigh the same.  No matter what we eat, when we eat it, or how much we work out.  Its always the same.  So we see it as a blessing and a curse in disguise.  A few nights ago I ate 1/2 a large pizza and I woke up the next day weighing a pound less than my steady number.  The next day I ate a salad and I got on the scale - back to where I started.  There is no science to this method, there is just no way to really gain or lose the weight.

My dad said that he is cutting out salads completely.  Supposedly he ate a salad for dinner and gained weight the next day, so he’s done.  They aren’t good for you according to him.  I told him that’s a good way to look it.  He said he’s just dealing with the facts.     

So just deal with the facts.  And love your rusty car that always finds a way to fix itself. 

I am discontented with the theme of my wordpress. If only I knew how to design websites, format html code, and edit in photoshop then maybe I would have a cool wordpress… and a job. I have been searching for a job for 3 months. And in those 3 months I have lived in 3 different states. I flew halfway across the country to find what I wanted, but I didn’t find it there. Maybe I am just discontented with life in general.

The thing about it is, when you look back on 3 months in your life when you are not in school and you don’t have a job, you would hope that your time was well spent. To everyone else it seems like you have been on vacation and you have all this free time to do anything. You have no responsibility and nothing holding you back. But the truth is that these last 3 months were not like that at all.

Everyday consisted of searching and reformatting and searching and learning and changing and searching. There has not been a day that I am not disgusted by the look at my computer after staring at it for 10 hours straight. And I haven’t done any of the things you think would be a good use of time. Sure I read a few books, spent some time with friends, met some new friends, discovered a new city, but all of this doesn’t fill the hours among hours that were so graciously “given” to me.

And when I look back now (knowing that looking back does nothing in pursuit of the future) I think to myself, “Wow! In those 3 months instead of insanely looking for a job perhaps you could have done something to aid me in being able to obtain a job.” I could have volunteered, I could have coordinated events for people, I could have learned more about excel spreadsheets and html code, I could have studied the Associated Press Stylebook for writing, I could have been halfway to mastering a foreign language.

Pero, I do not speak any other languages than English, I have not acquired any new talents, and I have no idea how to make my wordpress do what I want it to do. Instead the time has forced me into unpleasant introspection with myself. Endless hours staring at my soul in the mirror. I understand that I am strong, but this process is wearing me thin (and yet not literally thin - fortunately I still have an appetite when times are rough!) There has to be some answer as to why this process has been so hard on me. There has to be some eureka! moment where I understand and all the knowledge from my past sufferings comes to me at once. There has to be a reason, because frantly - everything happens for a reason. So for that reason, I am waiting….still waiting… still…

Still… perhaps that my answer. Maybe I have been given the grace of time in the most ungracious of ways to teach me to be still. To teach me to not worry what the world thinks. To teach me to stay focused on my goal. To purposely take opportunities away so that I do not settle. To allow me to realize that time is never wasted if you are striving toward a dream. To help me see that all the nights I spent searching and crying and waiting will be worth it. To enlighten me to the fact that the prize will only be appreciated if I climbed mountains to reach it.

So in the meantime when things are STILL unknown, that is how I will be. Unconcerned about the “loss” of opportunity of 3 months, but instead looking at time in a new light.

It has been a long time that I have walked through this path of darkness by myself not knowing where to turn or what to do, constantly wondering where the light was. But more and more each day I am learning that it was here, it has always been here, in the stillness of myself.
-JLC
(I’ll meet you in Chicago)

“But in the end it’s only a passing thing, the shadow, even darkness must pass. A new day will come and when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer.” - Sam’s Speech, J.R.R Tolkien

Testing… testing…

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so far i only have this site to have a monopoly over the angeljacey domain….