Tift Merritt - Broken

Off Slaying Dragons

You know that feeling? When you're just waiting. Waiting for the next ten minutes to pass, the next 60 seconds- for that elusive moment when day becomes night.  Waiting to get home, into your room, close the door, fall into bed, and just let everything out that you kept in all day? Tell yourself you never have to get up again and lull yourself into sedation by your own heavy breath muffled into the pillow and the smell of your own shampooed hair. Let your smile slowly wash off your face and begin to lose the numbness you hid yourself in.

That feeling of both relief and desperation. Nothing is wrong here. But nothing is right either. And you are so tired. Tired of everything, tired of nothing. And you just want.. Just want someone to be there and tell you it's all going to be okay.  You're so tired of telling yourself it's going to be okay.

But no one is going to be there. And you know that, again, you have to be strong... For yourself because no one can fix you. No one can fix what has happened to you, what is happening to you, what will happen to you.

You are waiting and you know you are waiting for nothing.
No one will take the leap and fall with you. 
No one is at the bottom waiting to catch you.
You are so fucking tired of waiting.

Tired of having to be the one that fixes yourself and everyone else when shit hits the fan again. So tired of being strong. Your shoulder blades like wings just crumbling under the weight of the world that can only be trusted to be handled by you.

And for just once, for just one day, one night, one moment, you want it to be easy. To be simple, to be helped, to be saved. For someone to crawl in next to you, and not add pressure but take it away- with each breath the load lightens and the touch of their skin against yours eases the very negative energy out of your body into theirs because this once, they will take it on for you.

But you know that is a mirage, it won't happen, there is no dark knight on the horizon and as a matter of fact there is no white prince either. It's you and your rose petal soft skin and the thorns you have grown of cynicism decorated along handsome walls to protect the parts of you soft enough to still be punctured with a fairytale. 

But you are still hoping, and praying, and still breathing with the very wish of it. That someday these breaths won't be wasted on everyone but yourself.

There is no happily ever after,  it can never be the castle at the end of the story that is yours after you slay the dragon.  The dragons are real and you will slay them- The happiness is the journey and your choice to make it.

I kissed a frog and I liked it.

Flashback after a quick rewind and I will drop a few lines of the bits of straw I can pick from my brain. What my head told my heart and what my heart kicked into my head. Build a nest and curl up tightly waiting for the starlight to guide me, the rainbows to enlighten me, and the sound of crisp leaves to dance to.

The taste of La Folie crisp from New Belgium Brewery hanging on your bottom lip with the lingering ache of deep laughter and the sway of hula hoops whisping on your hips and whispers of the wind and bluejays frolicking in your ear. The trees tell you their secrets and you tell them to the stars but root them deep in the dark terra firma. Dancing among the grass until it trips you up, and fall splashing through the thresh down a hill where green fades to long strands of gold and the silken strands stay left in your hair like a crown mother nature made just to frame your honeysuckle face and your knees are skinned and your nails full of dirt and you know there is nothing better than this. Nothing better than this life, this gift of the present.

"Guess I should have saw him coming, it still took me by surprise. A different man a different place but the same look in his eyes...
His words won't mean a thing, when your waiting on a king, why settle for the jack of hearts. He kept me safe and sorry. I just had to take the leap, but in candlelight it's hard to see that the waters not that deep... "- Sarah Darling- Jack of Hearts

I read once
"Sometimes, I want to climb trees. But I don't, it's not what grown ups do."
Climb a tree love- there is no age limit to the scent of sticky sap in your hair and the way light filters through branches full of green rustling in the wind. Be it oak or pine the smell is incomparable and fills a heart with joy that many do not find after childhood. The clean air and the imagination of being Peter Pan with Tink's magic pixie dust leading the Lost boys. Is that why we are so unhappy, why we laugh so much less than the typical 6 year old at our "adult" age. There is a difference between growing up and growing old. Age gracefully. Take my hand and reach out for this branch- the sky is calling you- remember when we learned to talk to the leaves. Don't stop climbing until you reach the sun. There's something about climbing branch after branch getting scraped elbows and breathing hard- closer and closer to the sky. Like the possibilities are endless and we don't need to just keep our feet planted on the ground. Remember to keep your head in the clouds as well- the sun on your face and the world smiling with you.


Somewhere along the way, their personality shifted just enough; altered their life path a tiny hair out of the way of their soulmate’s. That one thing that happened to you, it changed you just enough to make you unlovable. At some point on the graph that is your life, your lines will cross and after that it’s nothing and no one.- Inevitability by elusivefrown.com

Cutting out paper snowflakes to decorate our windows where the sun beat inside everyday boiling us from the inside with a world full of cold shoulders and lukewarm handholding. Rain came home and sadness flooded from the bathroom stall regardless. Such seasons overwhelmed us, overcame us, and drowned us with fingers slipping out from in between each other, no longer being able to hold on against such a torrent slick, with blood pumping to the surface hanging on for one more minute, hold your breath, can we make it for two. Kiss me quick, it will soon be over and I don't want to forget your face. Chills even two years later, looking at those paper snowflakes, sitting in my coffee table drawer, made with such love, just looking at them and remembering the fathomless depths of your lost eyes that I barely pulled myself out of in time. I am so glad you taught yourself how to climb.




Scarf Assassin is here, choose your fate. Shall it be the wool or the cashmere? Your hot breath laughing clouds into the air as you continually took my breath away and I hid it so well. Your eyes shown with the sun dancing gold upon their expresso brown. Had to be expresso, no other color quite defines the caffeine high one gets just looking at you when your eyes flash like sun on the river. Full of pure excitement and enjoyment of the fulfillment of the moment. When your body exudes such passion and fights with life and your mouth dances with the expression of the many worlds inside of you I was so blessed to adventure in. You are a friend I wear proudly, one I am proud to call my own and you truly have a heart of the finest gold. I will always regret and appreciate what we have experienced in our lives as well as be glad I have learned so much with you and so much from you that I shall let you live... for now...



More for later-- Sorry for the randomness if it offends you- I only have my friend Michelles laptop and feel I have no choice but to choose what idea's come to me first as I sift through old memories and have some form of enlightenment- I can't wait to have my own computer again!
WOO(T)

The Story

Not able to write a full blog post since I'm traveling-- Enjoy

Ian Axel - This Is the New Year

Thank you for understanding.

"Ignorance is Bliss. And yet every day I set out to learn and to experience the world in a new light. Why would I do this if it will only make me unhappy?

I do it because even when I was ignorant I could tell there was something I lacked, something others had, even if it was only in stories. I knew it the same way a woman who had never drank would be parched of thirst yet not know water. I am immersing myself now in this sea of life and learning. A mermaid of knowledge and truths.

Knowledge and understanding underpin appreciation and enjoyment of lifes' astounding and incomparable breath taking beauty.  I will never choose to return to ignorance because that would rob me of all I have become and all I have seen. Of all that I have won. 

I pine for growth and to stumble and scrape my knees on paths unknown. I yearn for new pleasures and new pain. For new faces and ideas that do not correspond exactly with my own. For conversation that instigates connection and new understanding. It is such a beautiful life if you can only open your eyes.

Or baby steps and try out a few games of Peek-a-Boo"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-EMjTXvHPU

Tik-Tok

Please know there are much better things in life than being liked or being cautious. Than being bitter or scared or self-conscious. Go love someone just because. Fall in and out of love. Don't keep your heart tied up in a box, let it roam free and acquire scrapes and bruises if that is the path you have laid out before you. You will get badly bruised and perhaps will feel as though your heart is breaking. You will break. It's beautiful and it's alive.  You will always heal even if you don't want to. The heart heals with time and does not stop ticking even when smashed to bits with all of the cogs torn asunder.

There are the most fantastic, beautiful things, places, and people out there.  I promise.

It is up to you to find them. Don't be late.

I’ve decided that I no longer want to have a hierarchy of value between my friendships and my love relationships: They’re both crucial, irreplaceable in my life, and I don't need to listen to anyone who wants me to choose between any of them. Not only that, but I’ve stopped classifying things as “love” or “friendship” according to arbitrary superficial details-the feelings I share with certain friends are so intimate, so beautiful, that it’s ridiculous that I don’t call them lovers just because we don’t sleep together.  It’s absurd that sex should be the dividing line between our relationships, between which one take precedence, between who we play with, live with, sleep with, who we take care of first, who we die with at last.

I can file this too

I can close my eyes, but my skin creeps with life dancing up and down my arms.  My head spins with ideas and my heart lifts with feeling, how can I nap?  My mind can be spun out in a thousand different directions analyzing everything.  What my eyes sift into my brain, what my hands sift into my heart and yet, I can easily file away pain.  Nothing that has hurt me has been lost.  I can still feel the burn vividly and the scars stand out sewn onto my sleeve only for me to see, I feel them every second of every day.  My cataloguing system in this case, is impeccable.  

Can't forget the way you cradled me

In paler days, full of grays and blacks and blues;  I sought you out beneath the waves.  As your lips begin to brush across my shoulder blades and your fingers comb my mermaids hair, my eyes began to blur and stars appeared.

Dark and elusive with a touch that was both sweet and cold.  I escaped being your lover that evening to catch my breath and wondered if that would always be something I would regret.

In my childish innocence I had learned I could be relieved of this weight I carry with your kiss.

Don't leave me here.

http://xkcd.com/433/

Here's To Us, La! 

Los Angeles, the big city.  Coming from a place like Circle, MT to Fort Collins, CO- Well even that was a bit of a culture shock although I had traveled to every state on the west side of the U.S. wholesaling for 3 years prior to the move.

Circle, Mt (http://www.circle-montana.com/circle.html) is the farming community where I grew up mainly- From the age of 5 until around 12-13 I believe.  A place where my adopted mom recently reminded me had articles in the newspaper such as "So and so family had the So and so family over for dinner. Their cousin So and So was visiting. They served Such and Such for dinner. A good time was had by all."  I'll never forget the smell of the air first thing in the morning, especially when our 20 some lilac bushes were in bloom. The feel of the wind in my hair as I coasted down a favored sandy hill nearby with the wheat fields rushing past and my toes out in the air. The never ending exploring to do on the acres and acres of land and just.... the safety of it all.  It was a great place to grow up.  Could I live there now? Well yes, but I certainly do not want to.

Fort Collins, the people and the mountains, that is what I miss the most.  I know, I know. You irate CA people can tell me up and down these are mountains- I'm prepared to eventually get harassed over this comment- but these are not my mountains.  There is no Poudre river here a half hour drive with hiking trails and many great places to go cliff jumping, go tubing, bbq, get lost in the wild peace of it all and not worry about locking your car door.  No Horsetooth Resevoir, nor falls, nor moonlight hikes.  No smiling people wherever you go.  Making eye contact will engage a friendly conversation- even if it's just your local Mugs barista.  Silly new college hoodlums flooding the roads 1-2 times and all of the "locals" complaining they do not know how to drive.  Old town, beloved old town, I will always miss the random dance parties and the hodge podge of people who all come out for an evening of fun.

But LA, I find I fit in here. I look out off the back patio and check out the skyscrapers and I do not feel small. Perhaps it has something to do with my ability to adapt well. Perhaps I am just growing and thus need a larger place to rest my head at night. (Insert Big Ego joke here) I have yet to explore you but I have discovered you. I find you beautiful in your own way and I am enjoying our budding friendship.

When you look back on your life, it looks as though it were a plot, but when you are into it, it's a mess: just one surprise after another. Then, later, you see it was perfect.

Schopenhauer

And if the words you said to me, actually meant something.

Maybe we wouldn't be standing where we are today.

READING! Fuck you Reality.

You can't make the same mistake twice. The second time it's a choice.

“My mother sat me down and said, ...you are beautiful to me but must know that you are beautiful for yourself. You should also be aware that true beauty is in the eye of the beholder, which means that how beautiful you are to other people is always going to be subjective to who is looking at you at that time, and since you will always be looking at yourself first, you should find your own beauty and feel good about who you are.” She went on to tell me that I needed to take the time to identify those things that I found to be beautiful about myself but also celebrate what I thought was weird or unusual because those were the special things that God had given to me that made me different from everybody else. I learned how to appreciate, embrace, and enhance those special things so that they would shine rather than be hidden...We learned to love and identify with what made us uniquely beautiful.”

BeNeca Ward  (born 1976);

My Secret Dream- Not so secret now I suppose

Everyone thinks I take pictures because I love it. Because I'm vain. Because I want to show off. Because I'm a camera whore. Because I want to model

I really take them because I'm afraid.

Afraid I won't remember any of this

Afraid I'll forget who I was at this point in time.

Afraid I'll be forgotten.

I'm afraid I'll forget who I was with you in my life.

Afraid you will forget me


To remind me of who I was, who I am, who I want to be.

I look at that photo and see my smile and know at that moment I was thinking about you. I was smiling about you. In that moment you had made blissful. That moment caught forever. When I was happy with you.. When we were happy together. Even if what's left in that photo is all we'll ever have.

Caught in the glow

I understand first with my heart, and only then do I rationalize what I know intuitively. Is this why my emotions are always being pulled back in forth. Or is either my head or heart just a bad judge of character? Learning to know when to say no seems to be my lifetime project and yet I never know if I have made the right choice until it is too late. I am continuously fooled by those whom I deem to be honest and trustworthy. Yet there are many who have been true.

I fight hard for stability, for the strength and balance of some sort of purpose in my life, and I struggle with deeply hidden insecurities that most of you have never seen. Nor ever will for they live deep in the shadows and have for longer than I can remember.

I fight for others in things in which I cannot stand up for myself in. I see life through rose colored glasses but do I really, when often I wonder if I am only fooling myself?

I am no leader but I have been your guide, confidante, and friend. I can see the light in you that you may believe has been snuffed out or never even been kindled and I know how to make it burn brightly again. I see what is inside you. What you even hide from yourself at times and sometimes that may scare you. Like shining a bright light in the dark, it takes some time for your eyes to dilate and get used to being caught in the glow.

I'm tougher than you think, and smarter, and I see what you think of me even though you keep it wrapped in smiles. I see the harsh judgments and smile because you can't see beyond what you are looking to find. To look beneath the surface scares you and that saddens my heart, for your life can never truly know any depth if you are to afraid of causing ripples.

Close your eyes until it goes away

May 12,2008
Broke down and layed it on the floorboards, the truth seeping through the seams. Found myself, turned around and she was gone. I saw a glimpse of her in the mirror the other day, caught that old look in my eye.

That gleam used to be around alot more often then once in a while, but the jagged edges tore most of it away. It's in caverns and crevices and hides from the light. I don't even look for me myself anymore. I don't want to know what I would find.

I wrote this several years ago

We are all a combined effort of all those who have touched our lives- You are a a puzzle piece of who I am- and I hope I to you as well.

I am the first to bail on a relationships unfortunately- which is definitely not something I am proud of- But I have learned a thing or two that I stand by and I hope it helps to some degree- I've found that if I feel my significant other is not the right one for me than I in turn am not the right one for them- It can't be just half and half- if one is not a match than neither is the other- And I get out of the relationship because not only am I cheating them from the right person but I am cheating myself as well- And I will put myself first which usually also puts those I care about first as well.

If as life has grown and your pieces no longer match that just means you must follow the beautiful path to continue puzzling out who you have become and who you will be. Is it terrifying- yes. Is it lonely- to some degree but I have learned to find the beauty in getting to know myself (I hope you either already know or will re-find all the beautiful intricate details that fully make up who you are- Being alone doesn't mean being lonely) Does it seem hopeless-perhaps in the beginning. Will it be worthwhile- without a doubt: absolutely.

Life is at your doorstep every morning with it's arms stretched out to you full of new possibilities and miracles. I have a friend who helps me remember this, we text each other at least once a day with something beautiful we might not have otherwise noticed- frost etching on the windowpane- a dandelion struggling through the cracks in a sidewalk- the way freshly sanded wood smells- New leafs on the tree outside our front door- making a child smile- I encourage you to seek these things out as well- if only just to enrich your own life :)

You must forge your path to happiness- You have but one life to live- live it to the fullest- but most importantly live it for yourself- no one else will do it for you.

This year I'm still under construction

This past year, although not over, has been an amazing rollercoaster of a ride.  Although what year isn't-

There was the year my sister and I went on the Tilt-a-whirl over 15 times in a row

The year I discovered dandelion chains and making swinging songs

There was the year I learned how to make friendship bracelets and that promises can be broken much more easily than kept.  

There was the year I discovered Firestix Ice-cream.  Now that was a good year.

This year I've tried to learn not to sweat the small stuff as much.  I've worked on letting down some of my walls and learned alot about myself.  Most of which was all there just waiting to be taken off the shelf and rediscovered.  I have delved into the dark secret parts of myself that I was afraid to look at before- It's not always pretty for any of us is it?  I have conquered a lot of fears and I have vanquished some difficult demons although I have yet to see how far that rabbit hole goes.  I have worked on surrounding myself with the best people I can find-  and letting loose those whose life plans do not mesh with mine.  I have opened my eyes and not only discovered the beauty in seeing the best in people around me but that there is so much beauty just in everything around me.  This notebook next to my computer today has a handwritten note from close friends- who after spending a Saturday afternoon with me talking and drawing and loving life- Spent the whole of the next day cleaning my place while I was off snowboarding and left a note that says We <3 You on :) laying on my laptop where I was sure to find it.  I have rows of bottles of wine all shared with dear friends who each have very special roles in my life.  My life would be significantly at a loss without each and every one of you.  Even down to my postman who always smiles one of those real smiles when I see him out and he gives me the mail.  You know the kind I'm talking about-- Where the eyes crinkle you feel like a ray of sun just hit you.

There are hundreds of photo's taken this year but nothing compares with the film in my brain.  The Hiking trips, Wake boarding, The Swimming pool, Lakes, Tubing down the river, Bbq's, Rope swinging, Bike rides, Tour de Fat, Crunching through leaves, Hot springs, Road trips, Camping at the Cabin, Four Wheeling, S'mores, Board Games, Pastry Hunting, Dance Parties, Snow Boarding, Chopping Firewood, Moving parties, Nerf gun fights, Long drives, Star Gazing, Baking alone and with friends, Fighting over who get's to lick the spoon (usually ended in using a couple spoons!), Breakfasts (BACON!), Getting to know you.  Yes You.  

I've met many wonderful people this year and I've stayed friends with many old ones as well.  The best part of this year has been getting to know each and everyone of you.  Learning about you, sharing smiles with you, loving you and caring for you, sharing in your successes and your downfalls.  To each of you I thank you for this.  I hope next year only brings more of the same.

This year my resolution was to find strength within myself and not look to others for it.  To become more comfortable with myself and opening up to those I know as well as those I do not know yet.  I have endeavored to grow in every opportunity that I have been so blessed to have.  I have still a long way to go but I am not stopping here.  

Each of you have grown to know at the very least bits and pieces of me.  For those of you who do or do not know-- Thank you for being a part of this with me.  Every day requires strength for me to keep going.   To carry on and continue stepping forward.  

To be reminded there is light at the end of the tunnel.  To remember to stop and smell the roses and crunch in the leaves.  That the smallest things sometimes take up the biggest part of our hearts.  That a thoughtless word or words can create a lifetime of hurt.  To remember that all work and no play leaves Jane a dull girl.  To remember to put myself first.  That nothing hits the spot quite like a spot of tea.  That I really do have the strenth, that I really can hold it together, that the show must and will go on.  To know that we all have masks but we don't always have to use them.  This is a very small sampling of what I have learned from you and I do know I am so lucky to know each one of you.

I have stabilized my friendship and watered them to the best of my care available to me.  I have put down new roots with other people in hopes of growing friendships with them as well.  The choice to have you as a friend has not come lightly.  I want you to be a part of my life.  I want to be a part of yours.

I am not sure as what my resolution will be in the new year but I do know that I will continue to resolve to be the best person I can be.  For myself as well as for you.  

Please bear with me as I am still under construction. :) <3

You're finally left with whatever you've been willing to give

“I like women who haven’t lived with too many men.

I don’t expect virginity but I simply prefer women

Who haven’t been rubbed raw by experience.

There is a quality about women who choose

men sparingly:

it appears in their walk

in their eyes

in their laughter and in their

gentle hearts.

Women who have had too many men

seem to choose the next one

out of revenge rather than with

feeling.

When you play the field selfishly everything

works against you:

one can’t insist on love or

demand affection.

You’re finally left with whatever

You have been willing to give

Which often is:

Nothing.

Some woman are delicate things

Some women are delicious and

Wonderous.

If you want to piss on the sun

Go ahead

But please leave them

Alone.”

-Charles Bukowski

One of the best things I've read in awhile

You Should Date An Illiterate Girl

JAN. 19, 2011 

By CHARLES WARNKE 

Date a girl who doesn’t read. Find her in the weary squalor of a Midwestern bar. Find her in the smoke, drunken sweat, and varicolored light of an upscale nightclub. Wherever you find her, find her smiling. Make sure that it lingers when the people that are talking to her look away. Engage her with unsentimental trivialities. Use pick-up lines and laugh inwardly. Take her outside when the night overstays its welcome. Ignore the palpable weight of fatigue. Kiss her in the rain under the weak glow of a streetlamp because you’ve seen it in film. Remark at its lack of significance. Take her to your apartment. Dispatch with making love. Fuck her.

Let the anxious contract you’ve unwittingly written evolve slowly and uncomfortably into a relationship. Find shared interests and common ground like sushi, and folk music. Build an impenetrable bastion upon that ground. Make it sacred. Retreat into it every time the air gets stale, or the evenings get long. Talk about nothing of significance. Do little thinking. 


Let the months pass unnoticed. Ask her to move in. Let her decorate. Get into fights about inconsequential things like how the fucking shower curtain needs to be closed so that it doesn’t fucking collect mold. Let a year pass unnoticed. Begin to notice.

Figure that you should probably get married because you will have wasted a lot of time otherwise. Take her to dinner on the forty-fifth floor at a restaurant far beyond your means. Make sure there is a beautiful view of the city. Sheepishly ask a waiter to bring her a glass of champagne with a modest ring in it. When she notices, propose to her with all of the enthusiasm and sincerity you can muster. Do not be overly concerned if you feel your heart leap through a pane of sheet glass. For that matter, do not be overly concerned if you cannot feel it at all. If there is applause, let it stagnate. If she cries, smile as if you’ve never been happier. If she doesn’t, smile all the same.

Let the years pass unnoticed. Get a career, not a job. Buy a house. Have two striking children. Try to raise them well. Fail, frequently. Lapse into a bored indifference. Lapse into an indifferent sadness. Have a mid-life crisis. Grow old. Wonder at your lack of achievement. Feel sometimes contented, but mostly vacant and ethereal. Feel, during walks, as if you might never return, or as if you might blow away on the wind. Contract a terminal illness. Die, but only after you observe that the girl who didn’t read never made your heart oscillate with any significant passion, that no one will write the story of your lives, and that she will die, too, with only a mild and tempered regret that nothing ever came of her capacity to love.

Do those things, god damnit, because nothing sucks worse than a girl who reads. Do it, I say, because a life in purgatory is better than a life in hell. Do it, because a girl who reads possesses a vocabulary that can describe that amorphous discontent as a life unfulfilled—a vocabulary that parses the innate beauty of the world and makes it an accessible necessity instead of an alien wonder. A girl who reads lays claim to a vocabulary that distinguishes between the specious and soulless rhetoric of someone who cannot love her, and the inarticulate desperation of someone who loves her too much. A vocabulary, god damnit, that makes my vacuous sophistry a cheap trick.

Do it, because a girl who reads understands syntax. Literature has taught her that moments of tenderness come in sporadic but knowable intervals. A girl who reads knows that life is not planar; she knows, and rightly demands, that the ebb comes along with the flow of disappointment. A girl who has read up on her syntax senses the irregular pauses—the hesitation of breath—endemic to a lie. A girl who reads perceives the difference between a parenthetical moment of anger and the entrenched habits of someone whose bitter cynicism will run on, run on well past any point of reason, or purpose, run on far after she has packed a suitcase and said a reluctant goodbye and she has decided that I am an ellipsis and not a period and run on and run on. Syntax that knows the rhythm and cadence of a life well lived.

Date a girl who doesn’t read because the girl who reads knows the importance of plot. She can trace out the demarcations of a prologue and the sharp ridges of a climax. She feels them in her skin. The girl who reads will be patient with an intermission and expedite a denouement. But of all things, the girl who reads knows most the ineluctable significance of an end. She is comfortable with them. She has bid farewell to a thousand heroes with only a twinge of sadness.

Don’t date a girl who reads because girls who read are the storytellers. You with the Joyce, you with the Nabokov, you with the Woolf. You there in the library, on the platform of the metro, you in the corner of the café, you in the window of your room. You, who make my life so god damned difficult. The girl who reads has spun out the account of her life and it is bursting with meaning. She insists that her narratives are rich, her supporting cast colorful, and her typeface bold. You, the girl who reads, make me want to be everything that I am not. But I am weak and I will fail you, because you have dreamed, properly, of someone who is better than I am. You will not accept the life that I told of at the beginning of this piece. You will accept nothing less than passion, and perfection, and a life worthy of being storied. So out with you, girl who reads. Take the next southbound train and take your Hemingway with you. I hate you. I really, really, really hate you.