You can’t go through life without knowing this song. You’re welcome.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PCkvCPvDXk
Thank you, Meghan Trainor.
Love & value yourself. We absolutely must.
XOXO,
Stef
ETA: I’m getting a ton of weird click-throughs so I decided to remove the embedded vid and replace with a link.
For I am human,
She said, with sadness.
Hands twisting hands,
Confused, mad mess.
What do I know of this?
Tumbling, falling blindly;
Is it a swing and miss?
Broken, hands hang idly.
I was slow, she said,
I was unsure, scared.
It took time, she said,
With a push, I dared.
You’re human too;
Mistakes are made.
Forgive in lieu,
Of anger & pain.
But I need love, she said,
And you are a true man.
Attention, touch, she said,
For I am just human.
Some of the things he writes make me weak and soppy and hopeful. No matter what, I don’t think I’ll ever stop being a romantic.
I think this is from Moulin Rouge, but I didn’t realize it until I was trying to attribute the quote that was in my mind and looked it up:
The greatest thing you’ll learn is to love and be loved in return.
With love,
Stef
Hemingway. HEMINGWAY. A man of unfettered passion. He lived his life fully, he wrote from his vast experiences; he dominated his life.
I was having a conversation with a friend last night about the poetry I write. I generally don’t share it because it is often intensely personal. I write it when I’m feeling strongly. I write it from experience or longing. I write it when I HAVE TO GET IT OUT.
Hemingway has a quote, “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” To which I say YES. YES.
I write from my heart. It’s not going to always make sense to somebody else. Sometimes it barely makes sense to me – these mutterings that sometimes only resemble coherent sentences – but they are the words that cascade from my heart, tripping through my brain and down through my finger tips.
I want to live my life and feel every moment and then I want to write about it. Fully. I don’t want to apologize for the things I felt. I don’t want to hide what I felt and not be honest. I want to say this is what I did and, dammit, this is how it felt! And I’d do it again. Or I wouldn’t, because it hurt too damn much, but at least I felt something. I didn’t hide away and forget to live my life. I want to love and be loved. I want to feel and experience and when I’m 90 I want to say, boy, I can’t believe I did that but it sure was fun!
I’m so practical. I’m so inhibited, most of the time. But I’m also such a romantic and I can be very creative – but I bury it. Because.
Because . . . why? I’m scared. Of doing the wrong thing. Of hurting others. I’m scared of judgement & condemnation.
I want to live without apology. Without guilt. Without worry. I want to LIVE. Why should I apologize for wanting to make the most of my life? To celebrate life? To love, to dance, to kiss. To have Wednesday afternoon dance parties with my sons. To have midnight walks with friends. To have adventures. Why should I apologize for that?
Hemingway. I want to be Hemingway.
With love,
Stef
As with most people of my generation, I spend a good portion of my day online. Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, Instagram – they are my daily companions. Not my only companions, of course, but my early morning, late night, midday break companions.
As I cruise around these sites I often find bits if inspiration. Lovely pictures, amazing words, things that I want to remember & feel for a long time to come. I generally save these to my phone to look at & weed through later, and I thought I’d share some of these with you:
The older I get the more I see that life is about the moments. I’m having one right now and I love it. I’m sitting in my darkened office looking out the window. It’s an overcast day but that suits me fine. I’m listening to Train, “Marry Me.” This has the same effect on me as listening to Taylor Swift’s “Love Story.” I get all gooey and warm inside and revert back to that 16 year old girl waiting for the fabled Prince Charming on his white horse. This makes me think of a flurry of pop culture-ish quotes:
Charlotte from Sex & the City:
I’ve been dating since I was fifteen! I’m exhausted! Where is he?
Faith Hill, “This Kiss”:
All I wanted was a white knight with a good heart, soft touch, fast horse
I think, ladies, that those of us that have been married for more than a couple years know that there is no white knight to come in and save the day. Life isn’t about being rescued, and if you are depending on a man to save you, support you, and buy you bon-bons you are on a collision course with reality and will soon be landing smack on your face.
I don’t know what I expected marriage to be like when I got married at 25, but it wasn’t a white knight to make it all better. I expected a partnership and equal division of labor (being somewhat of a feminist, if you want to use that term) with a lot of love. (Picture: vacuuming and dusting together, gardening together, folding laundry – together). I was in love in a way I hadn’t been before. It was a powerful meeting of the minds (and other things) and it happened very, very fast. We finished each others thoughts. We were different enough that we complemented each other; we were alike enough that we often enjoyed the same things. When people ask, “how did you know” the answer was, and is, always, “We just knew.“
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| July 14, 2000 |
Next month is 12 years since we started dating. I’m still in love – but it has changed so much. We have grown together. We still love some of the same things and we both still have our own separate passions. I think I lost myself for awhile but for the past few years I’ve been fighting to get myself back. To remember again what *I* like – flavors, scents, music, things to do and read, etc. I lost myself from being a mom & wife, but as I get to know myself again I think that only makes our marriage stronger. He likes my strong & sassy side. (Sometimes more than others).
We still argue and bicker and get our feelings hurt. But I don’t think it’s like it used to be; we aren’t so self-righteous now. We’ve been through some things now and, for me at least, I see that nothing is ever black & white.
It’s all about the moments.
I took today off from work. This morning I pulled on a jacket and shoes over my PJ’s to drive my oldest to school while the hubby drove our youngest (they go to separate schools due to the Autism thing). I had just pulled into the garage and was turning my car off when my cell phone rang.
The hubby, “did you go straight home?”
Me, “yes, I’m in my PJ’s.”
Hubby, “I’m going to get you some Starbucks since, you know, it’s a special day. Do you want cold or hot?”
Me, “hot please.”
That’s MY white knight.
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| Feb 13, 2011 |
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| November 2006 |
