Sadness is usually always selfish but that doesn't make the rusty acrid aftertaste any easier to spit out. The knowledge that your life is not what you dreamed it would be, that no matter how happy you are you have failed in some big way from becoming the person and doing the things you always wanted to do is a secret you cannot always keep even from yourself. A life does not have to be bad to be a disappointment when under the microscope. The key of course is to keep the microscope far away from the examination table and giggles and fulfillment are bound to result. I am, after all, happy. Really truly genuinely deep in my bones I laugh all the time life is wonderful brand of happy. I am excited about school, about becoming a physical therapist, about my housing accommodations, about my new hair highlights and about the delicious pasta I made a few days ago. I seek out and take all the opportunities to laugh each day that I can but still... if I am honest with myself my life is still void of the things I want (and have always wanted) more than anything. Being a sister is amazing but I have always always wanted to be a mother. The affection of a parent is both essential and beloved but sometimes I wonder if I will ever know the other kind of love also...

Sometimes I wonder when I will become the main character of my own life. When will my dreams come true? When will it be my turn if not for the spotlight at least for the happily ever after? I mean, don't the Flounders and Charlotte Lucases and Gimlees and Neville Longbottoms eventually get rewarded for their hard work and friendship and determination? Where is their happy ending? Is it their destiny to help others reach theirs without ever finding their own? Where is the justice in that? Surly their stories are real even if they are unsung, right? I mean, being an extra doesn't mean you are a nobody. Being a supporting role surly doesn't mean that is all you are god for, does it? And if the happily ever after never comes along, if Prince Charming gets lost or finds someone else or fate never cooperates and you never catch that big brake or you give it all you have and still somehow fail in your quest then what? Do you make up an almost happily ever after and improvise for life without the fairy tale ending? Can you consider your life a success if you reached all your dreams except for the ones absolutely most important to you? How does one mourn the death of their deepest desire?

Tears taste funny when you are too proud to let them fall. Especially when you hold them in against yourself cause no one else cares. They are more snotty that way, somehow. More salty. Almost like the liquid evaporates a little bit and leaves the remaining goopy dregs just a little bit more minerally than they would be if they just came out right. Instead when they do come they burn a little like acid and shame because they've been stewing for too long. They look funny too--too round, too real somehow. If a tear falls and no one is there to wipe it what is its purpose? What are tears even for--they don't make anything better. Surely if it was just for washing eyes than a good sweat or dust storm would bring them about, not a sudden bout of lost purpose and hopelessness. Why is it that a good cry feels so miserable? What is good about it anyway? What an insipid phrase.

I heard once that God blessed the Brother of Jared with air immediately but made him work for the light. The speaker observed that when there is a true life-depending need, that God will not make us wait to receive it. However, when the need is really just a convenience that seems indispensable to us that it may cost us quite a bit more in sweat, blood, work, effort, and even tears. As a single girl it seems like everything is air, but I suppose much of it is really just light. And the encouraging thing is that after the Brother of Jared brought Jehovah rocks, his faith was strong enough that even his odd and probably insufficient offering was enough to allow God to take care of the rest. It's not really air, I can work and wait.

Also, I know of course I am not going to die tomorrow. I know I am plenty young and should not be speaking so morbidly of burying my deepest desires or balling my eyes out. (Which I do not, by the way). Still, sometimes even the strongest feel a little down, don't they? Sometimes people lose hope in each other. Sometimes... maybe often... we lose hope in ourselves. Hope can be a fickle friend when we aren't' careful. Very fickle indeed. Still, as long as there is hope there is happiness and dreams can be kept alive on a very scanty portion when that is all available. Tonight, therefor, I feed my dreams on leftovers and hope that later I have a more befitting feast for them. If not, though, somehow I think it will all be alright. Dreams, unlike sorrow, are rarely completely selfish and therefor quite a bit harder to kill.

The Overstimulating Sensations of a 28 Hour Car Ride

Yup, you read that right. Twenty Eight Hours. It sounds even longer when you read it in longhand. Somehow I always romanticize it in my head before we actually go. Eating out for every meal, the being together and talking and playing, listening to my favorite songs or a book on tape, and enjoying the general spledor of the great outdoors always seems so exciting and inviting somehow before the trip actually begins. Unfortunately, by the end, those ideals have usually discintegrated somewhat. The hamburger for every meal turns into a constipation concoction in my stomach gurgling with gas and oozing with extremely awkward sensations. I am reminded of the stinkpots in Yellowstone we drove to see one year. Being together becomes more of a sentence than a treat, especially as the conversation leads closer and closer to bickering over which side of the seat line one's hand is lying or whose unmentionable (caused of course by the diet of grease and salt) is filling the car with stink. I always end up hating what once was my favorite song by the end of the trip and the endless drone of the reader proves more hypnotic than stimmulationg as I strive to stay awake and not leave us all as souveniers splattered accross the road. Even the general outdoor majesty turns tired and endless. Especially in Texas with no mountains, rivers, or anything at all to break up the monotomy of sky and prarie, the landscape can seem absolutely eternal. This of course makes me even more proud to be a Texan, but does not change the fact that driving through my beloved state is very nearly unbearable.

And that's just the contrastof what I expect to what I get. THat doesn't even begin on th smells of the thing. Six to eight human bodies cramped in the same twelve by six feet (or whatever it is) for that amount of time doesn't exactly smell good, especially when you add in the grease and salt. You know you smell bad when you smell yourself. You know you are grimy when the scum on your teeth and oil on your face are about the same thckness. When you taste your own breath... well, you get the idea.

But now it's over. An absolutely fabulous week in Idaho on Grandpa's ranch with hourses, ATVs, the rodeo, and all the fishing I could want (which, between you and me is a lot). We got home safely after the ride refered to above at around 9 this morning then I slept grumpily till noon then went to church. Today was actually quite an adventure with broken toes, near death experiences, and worship service as well. Sounds a bit like a movie, doesn't it. All in all a good Sunday.