The Merits of Being in Love (in 17th Century Virginia)

I love the song, "If I Never Knew You" from the special edition of Pocahontas. Absolutely, completely love this song. It's about being glad you know someone, and love them, even if it doesn't work out. But I think it's about more than just love, it's about life - being grateful that you've lived the life you have, even if it's not what you thought you wanted.

John Smith tells her that loving her showed him a different side of love, something I completely agree with. Being in a relationship is a completely different way of living, thinking for two, rather than one. It provides a different perspective on life, something we can't really understand until we've met someone for whom we would see the world differently.

Pocahontas tells him, "I thought our love would be so beautiful, somehow we'd make the whole world bright. I never knew that fear and hate could be so strong." That's another thing I feel strongly about, hate on love. As someone who is rather liberal, and has always been in love with love, I have to admit that I don't understand the opinion of hating love. That there is any kind of love that is "wrong."

I thought our love would be so beautiful...

This is something that's coming up again now, and I want to talk about it as much as I can because I have friends I care about, and that there would be laws that would make them second class citizens because of who and how they love baffles me. Absolutely floors me. I freely admit that I don't know all the politics about it, but I think that's also the point - it's about love, not politics. It's just about love. I don't get it. And I don't know if I want to understand. I just want to love, and be loved. I think that's something we can all agree on. Or should agree on.


There's one last thing about this song, something I'm not sure I really understand.

If I never felt this love...

Pocahontas: "It would have been better if we'd never met. None of this would have happened."

John Smith: "Pocahontas, look at me. I'd rather die tomorrow than live a hundred years without knowing you."

This happens right at the beginning of the scene. While John is tied up for the murder of Kocoum.
John's telling her he wouldn't change a minute of their time together. Which is romantic and cute and all that, but Kocoum is still dead, and it's a shitty situation, but he's dead because of them. And I think they know it. I think that brings up another idea about love: being selfish. Sometimes it's a good thing, and in John Smith's words, can't think of any examples right now...


Their love might have been beautiful, but it still got someone killed. Love is never black and white, plain and simple. It's tricky and elusive and should be worth being blind and selfish. I think. I don't know. I do, however, think that it's something everyone should get to experience for themselves, regardless of orientation.

Keep on Loving

- AJ

Love is Not At Random

Just last night, I heard this line in my head, completely out of nowhere.
"I refuse to believe that this is what you want."

Now, this happens quite often to me, getting movie or television quotes or song lyrics stuck in my head, usually just a line or two, but when you string them all together, I think it means something. Some way my subconscious tells me about how I've been feeling and with a commentary on it. Kind of like the way a dream can make you rethink something in your waking life.

So, naturally as part of the online generation, I googled the line to see what it was from.
And I got nothing.
So I did some more googling and I found this line, and it just seemed too perfect for words: "I'm sorry, I refuse to believe that love is at random." - Charlotte York

That's what this week is about. Love.
Because I've wanted to talk about it for a while, but I never know how.
Because it's always something I want to talk about, no matter what.
Because that's who I am, and I love that most about myself, how I love.

I love completely, generally unconditionally, with all my heart, and until it kills me. Even though I love this most about myself, I am not always like this. Sometimes I feel I love too much, and I feel like it does kill me. I begin to doubt myself, and how I live and mostly how I love. But time passes, and I heal, just as I always do, as everyone does, and I go back to my place of peace and love.

I also travel a lot. I feel like it's not all that much, but it is. Probably. I can't even being to count the number of plane rides I've taken, the number of cities I've visited, the sheer uncountable number of people I have met and befriended over my last 21 years. Strangely, the number of people I've seen, and the number of places I've seen them, doesn't even begin to come close to the number of people on this Earth. So logically, there is a greater chance that I have not met most of the people I could possibly be happy with in my life. (This is based off the idea that I, and everyone, can be happy with a handful of people, not just one, or The One.) And statistically, that's true, and based on probability, and everything else I can learn in all of my math classes, it's completely true.

But that's not what I believe, no matter how much of a mathematician I feel like I may be.
Because more than anything, student, writer, child, sister, I am a lover. A lover of love. And I don't believe that love is at random. I think love makes us better people, but people change, and our needs change. What you needed from a companion in high school and college are different from what you need as an adult with a job and a family.

Love is big and magnificent, and more than I can hope to talk about all at once. But I'll end with another quote, this time from Helen Keller, "I believe in the immorality of the soul because I have within me immortal longings."

And of course, just like usual, I figure out where the line came from. Just as I've figured everything else out. But the line itself was never the point.

Quotes on Living

I think today is a quotes day on here.
This is kind of what I've been thinking about recently. And like I always believe, other people have been thinking these thoughts a lot longer than I have. Which is actually a really great thought - it means I'm not alone.

I want a guy that isn't like me and stuck in his head and writer-y, but understands me perfectly when I'm exactly like that.
I barely know what I want to do with my life, and I don't know everything that I don't want to do forever.
Life both incredibly excites, and absolutely terrifies me.

I'm just starting to realise (again) that I feel all of this, but it's okay, and good. I'm 21. I'm not supposed to have all the answers yet. And if I did, life would be so very dull.
Life is so complicated and complex and massive. I think I (and maybe everyone too) just need to chill - it all works out in the end.

"It was one of the best days of my life. A day during which I lived my life, and didn't think about my life at all." - Jonathan Safran Foer

You will find that it is necessary to let things go simply for the reason that they are heavy.

So this is my life. And I want you to know that I am both happy and sad and I'm still trying to figure out how that can be. -  The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life. - J.K. Rowling

You were given this life because you were strong enough to live it.

I do/pin bunches of stuff like this on my Pinterest. Check it out if you're interested.

Have a good week!

The Stars and the Moon (Part 3)

   Audrey is in Hollywood. And she loves it. She loves the glamour of being a successful actress. She loves the heat, and the sunshine. She loves everything about it.

   But some days she feels a little lonely. So on the weekends, her and half a dozen of her closest girl friends go out to the bars and clubs to find love, if only just for the night.

   And then one night, something different happens. She finds a man, a beautiful man, with a beautiful smile and he can't take his eyes off of her. She sidles up to him and lets him buy her a drink, something sweet and purple. After a minute or two of half-shouted meaningless conversation, she takes the last step between them and presses her full lips against his. She can feel his smile and it drives her. She breaks away, breathless, and watches his face pulse with exctasy. After a moment she hooks her finger in the collar of his pretty button down shirt and drags him to the dance floor. 

   The next morning, she wakes up in his bed, happy and calm after a night's deep sleep. She stretches out, cat-like, taking up as much of the bed as she can, rousing him. He groans and raises his head.

   "Morning, Gorgeous." He has a british accent. She didn't notice that last night.

   Audrey pulls the sheet up, covering herself coyly. "Hey there." They smile at each other. "How did you sleep?"

   He turns over onto his back and pulls her on top of  him. He studies her golden green eyes a minute. "Really good." He smiles, "Yeah. Really good." She leans in to kiss him, her thick black hair obscuring his face.

   A few months later, Audrey and David, that was his name, David, are still seeing each other. He takes her out on dates to expensive restaurants and fancy shows. He hires a private jet to fly them away when they both get sick of the city. Like the spur of the moment trip to Italy. And Greece. And they had to stop over in Nice on the way back because David had a villa there that he needed to check in on. There were only going to stay a few nights, but the party there just kind of happened.

   Sometimes, when he wants to surprise her, he buys her things. She rarely asks for these things, but she always accepts them because they are exactly what she would have asked for if she had thought to ask for such things. Like the fur coat. It's light colored, snowy, to set off her dark hair, and it's made to look like snow foxen, but she would never have accepted it if it was real. She thinks. Or the car. That was really a sensible gift, hers had almost been falling apart, so it really did need replacing. Sort of. With a brand new Audi A4. But the townhouse was just sweet. It was their place. That he owned. But he let her decorate, which really made it theirs.

   But now it's a trip on the yacht. They dodn't really know where they are going, but she has just finished a shoot, so she took some time off and they're ending up in Spain. Or near Spain. And on one beautiful, clear night when they can see so many stars they can't breathe, David gets down on one knee and he asks, "My darling. Will you marry me."

   Audrey doesn't even have to think about this. "Okay!" 

   He stands up and pulls her into a hug and twirls her around. He sets her down and kisses her full on the mouth, beaming with pride of his new wife-to-be. Stealthily, he steps away for a minute while Audrey is admiring her new, shiny diamond ring and grabs a bottle of champagne. He pops the cork and pours two glasses. Holding one out to her he says, "To us."

   They cheers and drink. Neither can taker their eyes off the other. David sets down his glass and asks, "Where to next?" 

   Audrey thinks this over a minute. She peers at him from behind her golden bubbles and says, "Bejing," with a coy smile.

   David smiles back at her. "Sounds perfect." He walks over to her and puts her glass down, pressing her against the side of the boat and kissing her, wrapping his arms around her back, pulling her to him tightly.

   And the years go by with an unmatched level of superfluous splendor. Audrey and David want for nothing. 

   And it never changes. And it never grows.

   One day, Audrey wakes in a king sized bed with egyptian cotton sheets wearing a silk teddy and turns to her beautiful, rich husband. But he isn't lying next to her. She is alone in her extravagance.

Which was just as well, because on this morning, a morning like almost every other, she does not feel alone. And that is different. Last night she dreamt of the men she had met in her life, of two in particular, two men that had promised her many things, adventure and passion and knowledge and hope and strength, and all the things she had been sure she didn't want. Or that she would figure out on her own. She dreamt of the men who could not have promised her a yacht, or trips around the world, or the bed she was currently occupying alone. She thinks of all this and her eyes started to water for all that she had given up on dreaming of.

   But right then, David walks in to the room. Audrey looked up as the door opened, trying to wipe at her eyes so he would not see. But he went straight to the bathroom, and didn't glance her way. As the door shut behind him again, she put her head in her hands and let herself sob as she had never allowed herself before. In between sobs she managed to choke out, "I'll never have the moon."

   And Audrey knew that was the one thing she had always truly needed.

The Stars and The Moon (Part 2)

Audrey is stopped at a gas station.
She's not entirely sure where she is anymore. She's been driving from Middle-of-Nowhere, Pennsylvania to Hollywood for the past week. Just driving and driving and driving, and when she can't drive anymore, she pulls over to the nearest shitty motel, gets the best room, available or not, and stays the night. She never meets anyone when she does this, not even the sad looking gentlemen that give her the keys to the rooms. These are just temporary stops, and these people don't matter. Not when she's on her way somewhere so much bigger.
She drives an old, beautifully kept up '65 Mustang, although it's now less convertible than it used to be. But Audrey doesn't like driving with the top down, it messes up her hair.

With a grumble and a sputter and a spurt, a beat up old Harley pulls into the gas station with Audrey, right into the other side of her pump. She glares at the bike and the man straddling it, clad in an equally beat up leather jacket - bikes make too much noise.
But this man doesn't look the way she think's he'll look. He's not overweight with a solid beer gut hanging out, under the leather, he actually looks pretty fit. And when he pulls off his helmet and his sunglasses, he might not be as clean shaven as Audrey usually likes her men, but his scruff adds something to his piercing blue eyes. The eyes that have caught her gaze. And hold it. And just when Audrey feels like she can't hold a gaze that intense anymore, he winks at her and turns away. She shakes her head, trying to rid the feeling of being analyzed and grabs her purse out of her car. She turns back to the pump... and stops. There's no credit card slot. Audrey looks around at the other pumps - everything is old fashioned. She takes her keys and locks the car, heading into the mini-mart.

Audrey walks inside and waits in line behind a family of five. Or is it seven? The two rowdy kids "hiding" in the ice cream section seem like they fit. She taps her foot in impatience.
   "Anxious to get back on the road?" a voice behind her said. A nice voice, soft but deep, not too scratchy. She turns around to face Motorcycle Man. She crosses her arms across her chest.
   "Yeah. And? I don't want to be stuck in god-knows-where." She turns back around.
   "Enid."
She turns around again, already frowning. "My name's Audrey, but thanks." She gives him a quizzical look and moves to turn again.
   "Well, it is lovely to meet you, Audrey, but I was telling you where you are. Place's called Enid."
   "Oh. Stellar."
   "You weren't looking to end up here, were you?" The motorcycle man asks. He is completely aware of how seriously Audrey's shutting him down.
   "I'm not here at all..." She turns around to face him. He smiles another breath-taking smile. But she doesn't huff or try to break eye contact. She chews her words a minute before she says them. "I'm just passing through. Headed to Hollywood."
   "You looking to be a big fancy actress?" He shifts his weight, and it brings him closer to her. She doesn't step back.
   "Of course I am. I've got everything I need." She flips her hair over her shoulder and smiles a heartbreaking smile right at him. He's pleased, but generally unfazed. Audrey hopes it will sink in, but it doesn't.
   "NEXT!" Audrey turns around to see the cashier yelling at her. The family of five to seven has left. Possibly a while ago. She smiles at the cashier, but doesn't say anything, and finishes her transaction quickly.

Outside, Audrey is getting back in her car when Motorcycle man leans into her window. She jumps at the sudden closeness.
   "Yes?" She tries to frown at the impossible blue eyes.
   "Would you be interested in taking a ride with me?"
Audrey thinks for a minute, and the minute stretches on, and on, until it isn't just a minute anymore, but something larger and too impossible to be real. She feels everything that could have been in that minute that wasn't a minute.
   She hears herself ask his name, and he would tell her it was Timothy, like the Greek word for "cherished." She will tell him that's interesting and, after some grudging, that she likes it. She sees herself agree to a ride with him, step out of her car and would expertly straddle a motorized beast she is unfamiliar with and ride off with the man named Timothy. She sees the times of fun and lazy days and weeks she would spend with him, if she says yes.
   But she also thinks of the life she's already driving to, the one she has planned and perfected. This life she has dreamed of for years and has worked toward relentlessly.
   She sees what she thinks will be, if she were to say yes to this man with the piercing blue eyes. They will ride off together, and it would be happy, for a time, but as she always had, she will get restless again, demand more than her partner can give her, and leave another painful wake behind her as she storms out again.
   So at the end of the minute that isn't a minute, she says, "I don't even know your name."
   Without hesitation, he sticks his hand inside her car. Audrey takes it. "My name's Timothy, like the Greek word for cherished." But Audrey notices that, despite the heat of the day, his hand isn't sweaty, or dry, or calloused, but it's just right. She feels an intense shiver of recognition and drops his hand. "Nice to meet you. I really must be heading out."
   "Wait." Timothy says, "Not even for a day? Not even an hour?"
Audrey thinks, but slowly starts to shake her head no. "I have a life I need to be living."
   Now Timothy sticks his whole head in the car, right next to Audrey's. She barely has space to move away from him. "But you don't understand. I could give you stars, and the moon, and the open highway, and a river beneath your feet. I'll give you days full of dreams if you travel my way and a summer you can't repeat." He's breathing on Audrey, but it feels nice, like a familiar scent. They are absurdly close for two almost complete strangers. "I could give you night full of passion and days of adventure, no strings, just warm summer rain."
   But no matter the inexplicable closeness, she doesn't know this man, so as he looks into her eyes, full of hope and promise, all she says is, "You know, I'd rather have champagne."
   He pulls his head out of the car as she starts it, and just as he's clear, Audrey and her Mustang flee off toward the California sunset.

Thanks for reading!

The Stars and The Moon (Part 1)

Audrey and Jet lay together on the bank of a river. They have a blanket out underneath them and that is all. Their clothes trail a path to the river, some had been flung father off, toward the trees. But now Audrey lays her head against his chest, an arm trailed across his chest. Jet's hand traces nonsense patterns onto her olive skin.
"It's so warm." Audrey lifts her head, peering down at him.
Jet props his head up with his free hand and gazes back. "That's what blue skies will do for you."
She smiles, lighting up her face with peace. "I wish it was always like this."
"It can be," he says as he smoothes a dried piece of hair back on her head. The water dried it stiff and it flips right back into place, just between her green-golden eyes.
She laughs at him. "It could never be like this. Not always."
"And why not?"
"Because this is fantasy, this isn't real life." She sits up, and ties her half-dried hair into a messy bun.
"Why do you think this is not real? You are really here, right now, with me." He props himself up on an elbow and reaches over to her, tracing a hand from her shoulder down to her curvy waist, pulling her back down to him.
She brushes his hand away.
"What does it matter that I'm here now? What about tomorrow? And the next day? Let alone next week or next year. You have no future."
He finally sits up, crossing a leg beneath himself. "I don't need a future. I have the present, right now, and that's what matters. How I spend it, and who I spend it with. I'd like that to be you." He tries to turn her toward up, but again, she ignores this.
She stands up without looking at him. "I need more than that." She walks off, pulling on her clothes as she finds them.
Jet sits defiantly on the blanket. "You want assurance, you don't need it. Be open to this, to life, to what it has to offer."
She pulls her shirt over her head but it gets stuck on the bun. She struggles for a minute and the shirt slips down past her face. Jet smiles, but she just fumes. "I know what this life has to offer me, and it's a lot better than some stupid picnic out in the middle of nowhere!" Her words echo in the silence of the woods.
"I want a plan. Something solid... Something you can't give me." After a moment, she grabs her shoes and walks back up the dirt path. Jet huffs and gets dressed, pulling on his jeans and rolling the rest into the picnic blanket. He hurries after her.

Audrey tries the handle on the car. It's locked. She stands for a minute, looking around, unsure. She hears Jet coming up the path and turns to walk back up to the street.
Jet comes out of the trees and sees her walking up the small hill. He drops the blanket on the hood of his car and runs toward her. He grabs her arm and she pulls away, walking quickly. He runs in front of her, grabbing her shoulders.
"I'll give you... I'll give you the stars. And the moon. I'll give you a soul, to guide you. I'll give you a promise, a promise that I'll never leave." He reaches up and traces the line of her jaw. He smiles and drops his hand. "I'll give you hope." He runs his fingers through her hand and squeezes. "Hope to bring out all the life inside you. And a strength that will help you grow. I'll give you truth, and a future that's... twenty times better than any... Hollywood plot."
She looks him in the eye and pulls her hand away, instead resting it on top of his heart, his smooth, warm skin beneath her painted fingernails. Audrey shakes her head and says, "I'd rather have a yacht." She walks past him, trailing her hand across his chest as she leaves.
He stands, unmoving. A sadness comes over his eyes and he turns. But she's already gone.

Thanks for reading!