the sanctity of friendship

I love the feeling of seeing old friends that you haven't seen in years and the minute you meet it's as though no time has passed.  The connection is still there.  You can laugh, cry, and giggle your butts off about the most ridiculous thing and you both are still there, still connected, still the same way you remembered.

Life does a good job of robbing us from one another.  Maybe I picture it completely wrong, but our jobs, families, bills, errands, all the things that qualify us to be "adults" will rob us from the relationships we cherish the most if we aren't careful.  Sooner then we realize it will be 4 years and you'll finally find time to meet up with a friend who at one point you couldn't go a single day without talking to. 

I don't know how to find the balance of guarding those relationships though.  If each doesn't have it in mind to protect them then they can disintigrate faster then we would have ever anticipated. 

Regardless, I'm thankful for those whom I can still call up who I don't see every day and cry my heart out if need be and they are right there will me.  They know where I've come from.  They don't judge they just love me through it.  Those are true friends, and I can only hope that in turn I can be that for them, if they let me.

Winter is quickly aproaching.  You can feel the crisp air in your lungs the minute you step outside.  I've already mentally prepared myself for the day when I wake up to a winter wonderland... that lasts forever in these parts.  I don't anticipate winter like some.  I do however, like to join the many others who romanticize the idea. You know, the cold winter evening.  You and your significant other snowed in.  The power is out.  All that you've got is each other and a warm fire where you sit holding one another on the bear rug wrapped in blankets to keep warm.... you know that kind of idea.  Ya.... kind of like the "baby it's cold outside" sort of thing.  The funny thing is I don't even have a fire place.

Another year is quickly coming to an end.  I don't know where the months have gone.  I've once again been ambushed by the calender.  It's perplexing to think that I have nothing to really show of this year.  Well I guess I soon will.  Some closure seems to be in the near future.  I'm not really sure how to begin processing that.  I feel as though I already have but maybe I really haven't?  I'm ready for it whether I know what those words entale or not.  As one door closes another door opens.........right?

I think I'm growing.  I still feel myself changing and developing.  I know I'm not the same person that I was at the beginning of this year.  I hope to always be changing and growing.  I dread the day that habit and ritual encompass me and I'm left with nothing but a stagnant mindset and nothing that I'm passionate about. 

I asked him what he wanted to be when he was growing up. 
He awkwardly changed the subject. 
I offered up, "Well, I wanted to be a ballerina." 
He smiled.
I told him that those dreams were shattered when the kids started to make fun of me.
He looked at me shyly with hesitation and spoke in a quiet voice.
"I didn't want to be anything growing up."
I persisited, "not even a firefighter or police officer?"
He looked with even more fear in his eyes as he offered,
"I didn't want to be anything because I didn't have a chance.  I just wanted to get out of the abuse and the poverty and grow up."
He paused, "that must not sound that cool."
I looked at him, with tears in my eyes, "that's the best dream that I've ever heard of."

Here's an exert from Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert that really hits home and explains me to a "T":

I have a history of making decisions very quickly about men.  I have always fallen in love fast without measuring risks.  I have a tendency not only to see the best in everyone, but to assume that everyone is emotionally capable of reaching his highest potential.  I have fallen in love more times than I care to count with the highest potential of a man, rather than with the man himself, and then I have hung on to the relationship for a long time (sometimes far too long) waiting for the man to ascend to his own greatness.  Many times in romance I have been a victim of my own optimism.    (pg. 285)

Profound words escape my mind as I sit here trying to grasp what it is exactly I'm looking to articulate.  I guess the weight of trying to juggle a balance between good and evil is becoming tiresome.  I'm starting to lack focus and my discernment has seen better days.  I've gone from making wise long term plans to surviving day by day unable to figure out where exactly my next solid step will be taken.  Maybe living in uncertainty is in fact a way of punishing myself for where life has taken me.  I never expected to be here.  I never expected to have everything on the line but yet feel like it doesn't matter.  I've lost my passion.  I've misplaced my drive.  This inward battle is going to ruin me.