these are the ways to love yourself (forgive yourself).

forgive yourself the golfish laden tote. forgive yourself the full trash bag by the door. six flights of stairs, out the building, and around the corner is further to go than it was before. so let the trash sit there a little longer and forgive yourself this. forgive the mess and forgive the dischord it invites. forgive the feeling of discomfort in your now home and reconcile that you're almost there, almost out. but not yet. forgive yourself the days still to go.

forgive the days you lug around the camera and then can't be bothered to pull it out. forgive the mornings you shower only to climb back into bed, altering the ritual. forgive yourself for sometimes forgetting breakfast. or not making the bed. and forgive the anger you feel. the sense of betrayal. feel it. own it. that'll be the only way it'll shift and change and move on. forgive the loss of one-time-friends. people get older. they grow up and they change and they move and priorities shift and sometimes they move on without you. and that's okay.

forgive yourself the awareness of that which you don't know and know you don't know and know you want to know. this is not a bad thing.

none of it is a bad thing. life keeps going. more slowly than you might like, but it keeps going.

women in advertising.

i'm gonna tell you a secret. i often look at the blogs of other women and think: i wish i could be more like them. i wish i could post more photos. i wish i could just present the happy image of myself. i wish i always looked good and put-together and vibrant.

and then, i remember that that's only part of their truth. the truth they wish to share. and i don't begrudge them that, not at all. it is everyone's right to put into their space that which they want to.

and thank goodness for that.

while it's often that truth that i wish to share, it's not the truth i know how to share. and probably, even if i was able, i'd get bored of it in no time.

i sometimes wish i didn't post stuff like this--stuff that seems more soapbox than anything else. but then, a part of me reals and goes, yeah soapbox but... still deserving of a platform--still needing to be heard. still important. 


and because this is my space, and because i want to remember what i was thinking and feeling and being shaped by in my twenties, i am gonna post soapbox stuff. and write about goldfish filled purses. and not post pictures for months at a time because i'm feeling not terribly pretty. it's all a work in progress. nothing's perfect. no one's perfect. and no one blog, no one post, no one essay, or even collection of writings is the whole truth.

a wasteland.

you should see the bottom of my purse right now. for anyone who thinks i have my life together--or ever, at any point in time, had my life together--you should see the bottom of my purse. goldfish. cracked and smashed and week-old, forgotten goldfish. of the cheddar persuasion--you know, the kind eight year olds eat?  yes, week-old goldfish that i haven't had the energy or time to take care of just sitting there, mucking up my purse and everything in it.

muck feels like a good word for my life right now.

stuck in the muck. the mud. (actually, i got a few other choice words for it, but i'll refrain).

tom, i'm in it right now, i said this morning when i saw him.

you are?

yes, look, i said pulling out my purse and brandishing its contents like a...like a something. i don't know.

life made manifest in the form of a littered purse.

you should see my room. my apartment.

shambles.

tom took a good look at it, looked at me, you know everyone should have some weeks when the bottom of their purse is little more than littered goldfish.

i sure as hell hope he's right. he usually is.

...

The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself. | Anna Quindlen

i believe...

i believe in tufted velvet couches. so much so, that i want one. or two. i believe in texas-sized thunder storms. absolute downpours. dark skies and the refuge it requires. i believe in hours set aside for reading. in coffee shops. at lunch counters. during  three month european excursions. i believe in european excursions. i believe in a finding a home. building a home. needing a home. i believe in latte bowls and latte makers and stacked plates and tousled beds. i believe in fault lines and cracks and the space between. i believe in the steady breaths and silence of sleep. restorative and whole. i believe in moving trucks and packed boxes and the cleanse that a move invites.