Procrastinating

Again.
I hate packing.
Grrrrr.
Tomorrow I leave again.
Destination fundraising dinner.
Then Rosemount and his house with the big kitchen.
His new house is amazing but I don't know how to get there.
And it's far away.
More far away than he was before.
And before I can see him I have to drive.
Before I can drive I have to pack.
And I hate packing.
Hate is a strong word.
And I hate packing.

My Superhero Wears Rhinestone Tights

Her ability to be resilient amazes me. She has the strength to continue pursuing her goals even when faced with obstacles that defeat those around her.
She's processing, and tonight I heard the laugh that I missed so much. It's always came naturally to her.
How blessed I am to be surrounded by amazing people.
You can't crush her spirit so don't even try.

Ordinary People

Girl Im in love with you
This ain't the honeymoon
Past the infatuation phase
Right in the thick of love
At times we get sick of love
It seems like we argue everyday

I know I misbehaved
And you made your mistakes
And we both got room left to grow
And though love sometimes hurts
I still put you first
And we'll make this thing work
But I think we should take it slow

We're just ordinary people
We don't know which way to go
Cuz we're ordinary people
Maybe we should take it slow

This ain't a movie no
No fairy tale conclusion ya'll
It gets more confusing everyday
Sometimes it's heaven sent
We head back to hell again
We kiss and we make up on the way

I hang up you call
We rise and we fall
And we feel just like walking away
But as our love advances
We take second chances
Though it's not a fantasy I
Still want you to stay

I heard this for the first time on the way to the cities last week. Every line seemed to describe exactly what I was feeling - what we'd been through. Missing the spark of things being new but finding comfort in the security of someone who knows you inside and out. Realizing that relationships have stages and each has its benefits and that it's only a waste of time to wish to go backwards.
Seeing friends enter in to new relationships makes me want it to be a year ago. I would leave him random notes and make him dinner. Today I was getting food in the union and I looked to see if he was sitting at 'his table'. I knew he wouldn't be, but a little part of me wanted to see him there, reading the paper, just waiting to distract me. Those were the days when we couldn't spend enough time together. Even if we just did homework, it was comforting to be in the same room. Everything was new and it made me feel alive. I still have that feeling sometimes, like when we have conversations that go on forever or when he laughs - not the routine laugh, but the joyful one - that one that not many people see. For the most part the newness is gone, replaced by a security and unconditional support and a comfort that comes from knowing it's not infatuation - that our beginning has lead us here.

An Up

Yesterday was an up - not one that would be followed by a down, but one that leads to a series of ups. It was not pefect, which made it even better.
I walked off the plane and he greeted me with a hug and Starbucks - my favorite.
He ran all my errands with me and was patient. We had good conversation and I felt comfortable, like it used to be. He held my hand and kissed my forehead. This morning he made me lunch and left me a note hidden in the sandwhich wrapper. He would have made breakfast but there were no eggs. He drove me to my interview and picked me up, then took me to lunch at the biggest salad bar ever.
He was the Brandon I fell in love with and I was the Julie I've been so desperately trying to get back. He took care of me and I didn't need him to and it was simple, just like it used to be.

Unpacked

I spent the hour after I got home unpacking. I don't know why - 48 hours from now I will be gone again. It's still comforting to be living out of a room, not a suitcase, even if it's just for a day.
Friends - I miss you when I'm gone. I don't know what's going on with any of you and it's sad :( We have a lot of catching up to do...I don't feel like I've fully experienced things until I've processed them with you.

Things are hazy today. Amy is physically okay - that was a huge relief.
But it doesn't make that feeling in the pit of my stomach go away. I remember watching Columbine on a TV in our high school bandroom. People were crying and upset - I couldn't understand what the big deal was - yeah it was sad, but it was far away. School shootings since then have brought up similar emotions. It's the same report, the same shots of students and teachers comforting one another, the same sirens. This time it was different. It was the same shots, the same report, but this time it was at home. This time I was connected to people there. This time it's right before I will be in my own classroom. This time I can't shake the feeling that this is supposed to tell me something. I don't know what it is, but I can't stop thinking about it. "Does this make you not want to be in education?" Brandon asked.
"No," I immediately replied. It doesn't, but there's a feeling in my head that wasn't there before...almost a need to go now. A need to make a difference now, because I've been reminded just how short life can be.
It hit a little too close to home and it just keeps hitting - I keep thinking about Amy and what she's going through and want so badly to be the one that is there for her, even though I know she's surrounded by people who understand what she's going through much more than I do. My need to comfort her is selfish, but it's there all the same.
3 more hours and I'll be ready to leave - to drive...think...and be at Brandon's. Today it's what I need - his arms around me...then time with my family. Time to process...

Sometimes stuff hits a little too close to home. I just want her to call and tell me she's okay. I know she's not. Even if she's physically okay she's too invested to walk away with no wounds. I can give hugs and wipe away tears...listen and give support. All I need is for the phone to ring and her voice to be on the other end.

Back in Bemidji for 2 days. Had coffee with Amy last night...man did I miss her. Phone conversations are not the same as Caribou conversations, and I was in need of a Caribou conversation. We talked about boys and life and all that had happened in the last week. She prepared me for my interview and listened as I sorted out my future.
Today was thesis case study interviews, work, homework, and laundry.
Tomorrow will be more work, Senate, class, packing, and leaving again.
Wednesday will be home - WAHOO! The closer it is to tomorrow the worse I feel for leaving. I should be here for Senate, for work, for classes...but I really do not care. Something is drawing me home and I can't wait to be there. Everything here will either work out or it won't and the world will not cease to turn just because I leave for 5 days.
Monday will be a return to the cities, Tuesday my Teach for America interview, a quick lobby visit to Skoe, Sailor, Ruud and Moe, then back here for night class.
The drive to the cities is becoming something I despise. It's long and boring and lonely and full of too much 'in circles' thinking. All of this running only makes me more restless and focused on the time I will not make the drive back to Bemidji because my time here will be over.

Blast from the Past

Remember this?

"I will no longer sleep with men...I have met a cow."
Kamran

"Kamran, don't leave me!"
Bill

"He talked like a 12 year old girl with a voice that cracks. That's sexy!"
Bill

Oh how I love my friends...

A week from now I will be hanging out with one of my favorite people in the entire world.
She doesn't say a lot and when she needs something she grunts. If I don't listen she'll cry, and if I still don't listen she'll cry louder.
She doesn't like vegetables much and usually spits them out when I try to feed them to her.
She doesn't like to cuddle and puts everything she can find into her mouth.
Her favorite toy is a noisy fish that wakes me up at least four times a night, much to her amusement.
Everything takes ten times longer to do when she is around and the dog is terrified of her...but man, you should hear her laugh, or the way she breathes when she sleeps. If you did she'd be one of your favorite people too.

The transition from relationship back to a friendship that we never really had is hard and filled with grey. Sometimes it's easy to be his friend. Other times all I want to do is curl up against his chest and hear his heart beat. He's worse at it than I am, and his desire to hold my hand is stronger than our desire to walk away from the parts of our relationship that are hard.
Being away made me remember how badly I do not want to stay here. I've had a great 4 years here and met incredible people that will remain in my life forever, but my plan was not to stay, period.
His plan isn't to stay here, but it's not to go where I am going, and it took him a year to tell me that. I don't think that either one of us would ever be happy living the other person's dream, and I'm not willing to sacrifice. There are people that share my passions and my dreams. He is not one of them. He is an incredible person who could do amazing things if he would only learn to see in himself the things that I see in him.
I don't know if it's over...I don't know if it will ever be over...but it's changing because neither one of us can live like this any more. I'm going to go chase my dreams and pray that he will too.

So What

Who's gonna give a shit
Who's gonna take the call 
When you find out that the road ahead is painted on a wall
And you're turned up to top volume
And you're just sitting there in pause
With your feral little secret 
Scratching at you with its claws
And you're trying hard to figure out 
Just exactly how you feel
Before you end up parked and sobbing
Forehead on the steering wheel

Who are you now
And who were you then
That you thought somehow 
You could just pretend
That you could figure it all out
The mathematics of regret
So it takes two beers to remember now
And five to forget
That I loved you so
Yeah, I loved you, so what

How many times undone
Can one person be
As they're careening through the facade
Of their favorite fantasy
You just close your eyes slowly
Like you're waiting for a kiss
And hope some lowly little power
Will pull you out of this
But none comes at first
And little comes at all
And when inspiration finally hits you
It barely even breaks your fall

Who were you then 
And who are you 
Now that you can't pretend
That you can figure it all out
Subtract out the impact
And the fall is all you get
So it takes two beers to remember now
And three more to forget
That I loved you so
Yeah, I loved you, so what
I loved you
So what

Ani DiFranco

We had a good conversation tonight. We talked about relationships and dreams and what we wanted. He's always been someone who silently understood me, but who wasn't comfortable with 'deep' conversations.
"How'd we get so serious?" he would always say.
"I don't know," I'd reply, and we'd move on to another topic.
Tonight it was different. "It's gonna be okay," he said. And that was it - no bridge to the more comfortable topic, just a look that told me he knew what was going on inside of my head.
He inspires me to be the person I was before this - independent...a dreamer. I admire him for bringing out a side of me I sometimes feel I've lost.
Confusion sets in and once again I'm left wishing I knew where all of this was going to go.

Where We Are Now

"It's a blessing to feel like you're doing the right thing, even if that relief ebbs as often as it flows."
Lindsi

It hasn't. I was thinking about that today. I went through this week with no tears and no insecurities about our relationship. We made a decision together. I could look into his eyes and know that he meant what he said. I haven't doubted since, not even a little bit. We have something, and while neither one of us know now if it will last forever, walking away would be a cop out. I do still love him, and I do still want to be in a relationship with him. I just don't want it to be so freaking hard, but walking away is not the answer. Communication, honesty, and understanding - that's the answer, or at least a start. Inhale...exhale...everything is going to be okay.

Done

Yea.
Now all I have to do is get us to the cities and sit on a bus for 24 hours. Everything that could go wrong either will or won't, but this time tomorrow it will not matter because the only thing I have to do is hang out with fun people and eat my yummy organic snacks.
Yea.
Next stop: Washington D.C.

I Hate Packing

If my mom was here this never would have happened. But she's not, and here I am, 8 hours before I need to get up for a 30 hour trip, and I haven't even started packing.
It's something I've always hated - figuring out what you'll need for a week and a half. Trying on clothes to make sure you still look okay in them even though you just wore them a week ago, then folding them neatly so that they don't get wrinkled, then strategically placing it in a suitcase so that it all fits. I usually don't forget things, but always feel like I do, thus worry about it the whole way. I get to where ever I'm going and by the time I'm completely unpacked, it's time to pack again.
Instead of just packing, I call my sister and talk to her about how I hate packing. Then Jake calls. "You packed yet?" he asks.
"Haven't even started," I reply.
If I would have started when I got home I would be done now. But I didn't and I still haven't. Ggrrrr.
I hate packing.

I didn't need him today. I wanted him, but didn't need him. It feels healthy, and it made me ask myself when I started needing him, because that's not fair to either one of us.
Today I felt good - like I could focus on me and my life while he focused on his, because we both knew that somewhere in the me's is an us.
I came home and my room smelled like him, like he'd been here all day, just waiting for me to walk in. Maybe it's my sheets, or the carpet where he laid his clothes, or the fact that my cd player keeps rotating to David Grey...maybe it's just my memory, but suddenly it's less me and more us and something tells me it's gonna be hard to sleep without him tonight.

"When we deem our social destiny entirely self-directed and our personal lives self-made, we lose any sense of participating in a collective myth larger than ourselves."
The Fourth Turning

I saw him today. It'd been almost a month. "How've you been?" he asked with a smile and tired eyes.
"Good!" I told him. Remembering all that had happened in the last month, I changed my mind and told him what he already knew. "Alright," I confessed. "I've been alright."
"Yeah?" he said with a playful punch on the arm. "We should hang out some time."
"For sure," I said. Our conversations always end like that - with the vow to spend time together. We rarely do, and I'm sure this time won't be different, but it's more comforting than saying goodbye. Something has always been there with us, and I'm not sure I want to know what it is, but seeing him today was good.

I know we've talked about being good friends
So we've been real careful of the signals we've sent
But all of your glances they came and they went to my head
And I'm not about to throw words to the wind
When I said "I love you" that's what I meant
And I plan to show you if it takes me the rest of my life
Blessid Union of Souls

Take two steps away from this
And remember what you started with

I don't know if we'll be okay and I don't know if we'll end up together, but if we don't it's not because we didn't try.

A night with friends before a big weekend has left me too inspired to sleep.

Dear Lindsi,

Your paper about Toby made me cry for the entire first half of the day. I couldn't look at you in the union today, knowing that I so desperately wanted what you had, but not feeling jealous at all, just happy for you and anxious for when we too would get to have a face to face conversation.
As much as I tried I couldn't stop the tears, and as I walked out the doors in the union I hoped no one would notice.
For the second half of the day I thought. Did I love him or the idea of him? I wanted so desperately to love the idea of him - I don't. I love him. He's always late and he loves junk food. He handles crises by shutting out the entire world, and is distant when I need him to be open. We are not what I pictured in my 'Cinderella story'...but we're more.
All afternoon I felt like I had made the wrong decision by walking away and as hard as I tried I couldn't stop thinking about it. Admitting that love isn't always easy and that relationships take incredible amounts of work is just as difficult as walking away. I don't know that we have it in us to do the work or if the pain we've been through can ever be forgotten, but I feel like we have a choice, and that we're making it together. So thanks :)
Julie

I Don't Care What It Means

We had an amazing conversation tonight.
We laughed and joked. Talked about what had happened not just in the last four days, but the last year. Neither one of us cried or raised our voice. Instead we listened - truly, unselfishly listened - for the first time in a while.
I don't know what it means, and right now I don't care, because for an hour I had my friend back.

Finally

Something good...
I got an interview!

Ugh

Today it hurts again...like any progress I've made in the last two days doesn't matter. I miss him, and don't think he misses me, which makes me miss him even more.
I don't know if the person I fell in love with even exists anymore, and if feels like my heart is continually breaking.
Time for class...and meetings...then more meetings...then class.
Just let me make it through the day without tears...