-ANGELICA SHELTON BELANOV / UNDER THE BLOOD RED MOON (MINA HEPSEN)
“She was grown up; she was twenty-nine! It was only recently that she’d been walking home from the hairdresser’s, feeling gorgeous, and a gaggle of teenage girls walked by, and the sound of their strident giggles made her send a message back through time to her fourteen-year-old self: “Don’t worry, it all works out. You get a personality, you get a job, you work out what to do with your hair, and you get a boy who thinks you’re beautiful.” She’d felt so together, as if all the teenage angst and the failed relationships before Nick had all been part of a perfectly acceptable plan that was leading to this moment, when she would be twenty-nine years old and everything would finally be just as it should be.” -ALICE LOVE / WHAT ALICE FORGOT (LIANE MORIARTY) Now I'm just waiting on the boy who thinks I'm beautiful. He'll make me laugh. He'll talk to me, tell me everything about his day, and then ask me about mine. He'll act like he's tough when he's out with his friends, but then at the mention of my name, he'll be kind and sweet. He'll hold me close and tell me he loves me, and I'll hold him just as tight and remind myself how lucky I am, but then, so will he. We'll both be so appreciative that we could love someone as much as we love each other, and we'll always believe that we love each other more than the other, but then secretly, we'll know the truth. He might keep his feelings to himself, most of the time, but when things get crazy, he'll let himself be vulnerable in front of me. And no matter how many times we fight or we walk away, he'll still hold me when I'm crying. He'll tell me everything will be okay, because he really believes it will be. He'll have conviction and certainty. And so will I. I'll know and understand him, just like he will me. He'll trust me and understand me. He'll be proud of me, and he'll tell me when he knows I need to hear it. He'll let me be myself, and he'll stand by in group of people watching me tell a story or hear my conversation and smile so wide that other people will notice. Our life together will be easy because we love each other easy. We'll fight like other couples, but it will be as simple as a couple of hours apart or in separate rooms, and then a quick hug and an apology, and maybe even a compromise. We'll work together, because in the end, we'll know that we can get through it. And after a long day at work, we'll both come home to the solace that is our place and each other, and we'll do the dishes together, or make dinner, or order in. We'll relax in each other's arms and watch something new on TV. And we'll get ready for bed, we'll lay down together, hear the soft sounds of breathing, and we'll say good night and say "I love you" only to wake up the next morning with one of us touching the other. Rolling over in our sleep and not even knowing it. A hand over the chest, or a leg draped over a hip. “Love to my way of thinking, is the emotion one feels when they meet someone who makes them be what they want to be. We feel love toward someone who shows us the light, who pushes us to become what we have always wanted to become but may have never realized. We love the person who makes us love ourselves.” -ANGELICA SHELTON BELANOV / UNDER THE BLOOD RED MOON (MINA HEPSEN)
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I've been surrounded by people all of my life. Family. Friends. Friends of friends. A part of me has never really known what it feels like to be truly and utterly alone; and yet, there are so many moments in my life that I can look back on, where I told myself I was feeling just that. I used to call it my nothingness. I always imagined what it would look like if the word could actually take a physical form; and in my mind, the image of an empty and dark room always came into view. The smell always reminded me of my old bedroom when it was stripped down to nothing but bare walls and bare floors. Shallow ceilings, a grungy light blue coloring to the walls with cracks in every corner. And me standing in the center of it. Not as a first person view, but my consciousness seeing myself as I believe I truly am. No emotion, no expression. Although, knowing myself, when I look at my own face, I would probably call a blank expression contentedness. Content to be in my nothingness, to accept it, to understand it. Nothingness; it was a type of emptiness that I just dealt with over the years. I believe that I am content with it because it was easier to make peace with something so deep and dark inside my own mind; to me, fighting against it means fighting your own self, it means pushing away when in reality, your own darkness and your light should be the main things in this world you ever truly understand. And by accepting them, you accept yourself. My understanding, my acceptance is my strength. Two weeks ago, my coworker - a very good friend, a smart and talented guy - died in his sleep. He was 42 years old. One day I saw him and the next, we were told that he was gone, and it didn't seem real; like someone was lying to us, like it was some cruel joke that none of us really got. The knowledge of him being gone hasn't changed the fact that I literally struggle to believe it. It's so strange to come to work every day and not see him there. I haven't had the heart to take down his time card. He started this season with us, I keep thinking that we should at least pretend he could finish it too. Some days, when I clock in and I see his time card, I forget that he's never coming back. It's like he's out sick or he took another day off of work to help his father. It just doesn't feel like the world has lost him completely, that we've lost him completely. I get a hard reminder when I sit down at my office desk and see the receipt sitting on my clipboard because I'm not really sure how to file it away. The memo from the check stub that says "Donation to Heath's Funeral" hits me randomly over the course of the day. And then when I look at my jam packed schedule hanging on my office wall, Wednesday, May 3rd stands out with green marker "Heath's Funeral". He would have been with us to the end of all this. And it would have been grand. You would think these little things, these notes hanging around our place of work would set in some kind of realization, the proof that tells you its real, that he is really gone. It doesn't. He doesn't feel gone. He was so alive the last time I saw him, which was only the morning before. It's only made life that much more fragile in my mind. Some would say he died because it was just his time, others would say that he died because he was a smoker and didn't take care of himself - To be snuffed out like that; to know that if you go to sleep, you may never wake up; it's not me I would worry about, I imagine dying in your sleep would be the nicest way to go, you wouldn't even be aware of what was happening, you would just stay within your dream forever. It would be all the people that would mourn my passing, just like we are all mourning now. All the things you would have liked to say to me or not say to me, all the things you would have done differently if you had known that my time was almost up. Then I imagine all the things I would want to say before I was swept away into darkness without the finality of a goodbye, without the closure of an "I love you". I would tell my family to be strong, every person in our family has strong hearts and they know that even though I wouldn't be there, that they could still hold strong together. I would tell them how much I would miss them and that I know they would miss me too. I would tell my mom how precious she is to me and that her heart is the reason behind all the happiness I ever felt in my life. I would tell my daddy that he is the greatest man on this earth and that he should never give up on his dreams, that I am so, so proud of him for every thing he has ever accomplished and for being my best friend, my confidant when I needed him most. I would tell my brothers how grateful I am for them; that without all three of them, I would not have had the strength, the confidence, or the passion to get through all my hard days - they always made everything better in my life. I would tell my friends to come together, stay strong, remember how much I love them and that I know how much they love me. I promise I'm okay and where ever you believe I am, I'm happy. I know I will be wishing you were all there with me, to laugh with me, to help me through, but after all this time, I finally have to get some damn independence! Makes sense that would only happen in death. <3 To life, to the living, to death, and to the dead. Here I am, in the heart of Disney World, the place where dreams come true; where the imagination is infinite and the possibilities are endless. On the monorail to Epcot, I am hoping to find that happiness that only this place can give me. This trip is my first solo adventure into what has changed my life all those years ago. Alone, and surrounded by parents and their children, newlyweds, and retirees all looking for something; excitement pursuing the unknown or searching for an old feeling, a once brilliant flame that may have extinguished years before and may just need to be kindled back to life.
"If you can dream it, you can do it." Truer words were never spoken. I truly believe in that concept. It follows the same principles as "if you put your mind to it" or "strength through adversity" - Disney just liked to keep everything at a child's reach which is why he was so beloved by all young and old. His brilliance and his ability to bring joy to the lives of many shines so brightly here at Disney World that it is difficult not to appreciate every bit of genius that has been put into all of it. My solo journey has been everything I wanted it to be, scratch that, everything I needed it to be. For my second day on this vacation, I am in a place of peace, understanding, and nostalgia. It is only 2:37pm but I would say that today has been a good day, a day that I will remember always. |
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