The Best Sentence I've Read In A Long Time

"not sure what'll happen- i'm just taking baby steps along the lines of my passions.." - Paul Kelly

My friend and I were chatting via Facebook and when talking about his future, this was his response. I got so excited...I love people who express my thoughts with amazing words. I have no idea where life is leading me right now. I'm a woman without a plan, which is how I usually operate. It's like body surfing. Riding the waves with nothing underneath you, at the mercy of where the wave take you. I learned to body surf from my older sister's boyfriend when I was about 12 years old. We were at Huntington Beach, way out in the water and Allen said, "Just ride. Don't panic and you'll have a blast." I'm treading water, becoming exhausted and then all of a sudden a wave comes, Allen yells "Paddle" and I do. I think I weighed about 80 pounds then and the wave was awesome. I rode the top for a while but when it crashed, so did I. Deep, dark and no air whatsoever. I started to panic then remembered, "Just ride. Don't panic." Once I loosened up, I came back to the surface, gulped air, staggered to the beach where Allen picked me up and threw me around like a rag doll. After catching my breath, Allen and I swam back out to unknown depths waiting for the next wave to carry us back in.
I remember the terror, the thrill, the adrenaline. It seems that body surfing defines my life. No plan, no idea where the wave the will carry me or how dark and deep I'll go prior to gulping air and re-gaining my footing.
I don't have a plan, but I have passion. I'm dedicated to social justice, equality for all humanity and fully dedicated to education and relationship as the tools for transformation. "Baby steps along the lines my passion" not knowing where the line ends.

Relationship

Relate: to have a connection. This is the root of relationship: to have some sort of connection. Maybe our relationship is through work - the connection being a common goal. Perhaps our relationship is through activism - the connection being outrage and/or passion regarding a certain circumstance. Maybe we're friends - friends share many different levels of intimacy. Some of my friends would never crawl into bed to console me, but Myles would/has. Last night I heard a therapist talk about healing people who live in war zones and experience trauma on an ongoing basis. Music to my ears was when he said two extremely profound things: healing happens through relationship; and secondly, the best possible thing we can do for people in crisis is to live among them normally. To live normally when all about is chaos. What a gift!!! To share a cup of tea with the homeless ladies as if we're not surrounded by crack and needles and predators. My life includes relationships of many different kinds including friends, kids, my parents, my co-workers, homeless folks, mentally ill folks, activists of every nature, academics who love the sound of their own voices. Each of these relationships contribute to my wholeness. I share parts of me with each of them, all of me with none of them.
My life is changed because I relate to you. I am enhanced by you even if our encounter was brief.
Relationships that go beyond the casual require time and commitment. I cannot get to know you through a phone. I cannot share intimacy through e-mail. Maybe others can, I cannot. I am tactile, I require all my senses to be involved. When I'm funny I want to see you laugh. When I cry I want to see the compassion reflected. When you share new knowledge with me, I want you to see the lights in my eyes. Relationship that goes beyond the mundane takes sacrifice. It means adjusting the flow of your life and my life in order to make time and space for one another. When it really matters, we do that.
There are people who say they want a relationship and yet no sacrfice is made. No space opened up to allow for more. One of my favorite sayings, "What you do speaks so loudly I can't hear what you're saying." My translation: stop talking and start doing. We need one another as humans. Perhaps there is no god, no supreme being out there when we cry for help. What there is for sure is human energy mixing with nature energy and when we have passion, compassion, and love mixing with the powers of the earth, there must be nothing we can't accomplish.
Let's relate to one another in ways that matter and make sense.

I Know Who I Am

Some of you who read this may think you know me, others for sure don't know me but have some sort of internet curiosity. Those who do know me, think they know me so well - others just want to know parts of me. Here's what I'm willing to share about what I know about me:
I'm super funny because I'm super smart. Wit implies the ability to think fast and respond in ways people don't expect.
I care WAY too much about other people. I worry about things that I have no control over.
Sex is a great stress reliever. Sex is about my body, love is about my mind and heart making a commitment to somebody. I love my kids, I love my friends, I love the homeless, mentally ill people I work with. I don't have sex with any of those people - sex and love have little or nothing to do with each other. Sex comes and goes, love lasts even when the times are hard. (No pun intended but that is funny.)
Lines are for crossing. They are put there by society in order to let you know when you've gone too far by their standards. My standards are mine. You can't see my lines because I change them all the time. They're adjustable.
I am not patient. If you want to see me, that means see me - don't say you're going to and then make me wait. I bore easily and if you can't keep me interested, I'll move on to the next item/person/topic that captures my interest.
I come off as a bad ass, but in reality I'm the softest, kindest, most nurturing person you'll meet. I am a strong feminist who believes my strength as a female can be found in the gentleness of my touch, the meal I cook for you and the crease in your slacks as well as my ability to advocate for those who can't advocate for themselves, break up a fight or fight like a man when necessary.

Some things I'd like to do:
Become fluent in Spanish.
Teach college (which is becoming a reality very soon!)
Hike the Grand Canyon
Spend lots of time on the back seat of a motorcycle.
Write work that gets published.

Think you know me now? This is just the parts I'm willing to share.

The Sweetest Distraction

My arms ache, my thighs are tight, my bed's in disarray,
my thoughts continually getting carried away.

Leaving me fully satisfied and insatiably curious.
Is this real? Are you serious?

Your strong control
singing to my soul.

I want to blow up your phone
begging you to come home.

What Possesses My Mind When I'm Alone

1. Being Alone
2. The Dark
3. Failing - or maybe that's my comfort zone and what I fear is success.
4. That my mom was right.
5. That I'll never get it right.
6. Never being able to make the changes I want to make.
7. That I won't/don't have the courage to keep going.
8. I'm scared to death of the light that love shines on my life.
9. Or maybe I'm afraid that I don't have a clue what love is.
10. That I seperated from the one person who actually knows me.
11. That I'd rather die than keep living this life.
12. I want a do over.
13. Buying a greyhound ticket to nowhere and becoming someone else.
14. I wonder what happened to my mom when she died.
15. Am I really doing my best or is there something more?
16. I'm not nearly as harsh as I let the world perceive me to be.
17. Is there some spiritual being out there that if I just connected with I wouldn't feel so lost?
18. Mexcian food.
19. What would I be right now if I had never married Lyle? Or if I had stayed married to Lyle?
20. Why do I waste so fucking much time pondering, repeatedly, things I cannot change?

Boundaries

"Boundaries don't keep other people out. They fence you in. Life is messy. That's how we're made. So, you can waste your life drawing lines. Or you can live your life crossing them."