Latitude and Longitude

There are a few ways to look at this. There are a lot of things I could say and excuses I could make, but the longitude and latitude of it is that I wasn't who you were expecting me to be, nor were you what I was expecting.  Expectations are a funny thing. I don't know why humans expect anything anymore because it rarely happens the way we expect. It's like we feel entitled to good things, or something. Are we? Because I'm a human, does that give me the right to expect that you would be a certain way and give me certain things to make me happy? It's not selfish, really, because I tried to give you what I hoped would make you feel pleasant, and so I expected (there's that word again) the same. Well it's not that you didn't meet expectations, it's just we weren't taking the same test. You see, you were in Albania and I'm over here in Ohio. They're the same level, but there is an unexpected dichotomy of an ocean to pass. Well, thank goodness for modern transportation. You fly out half-way, and I'll come meet you in the air. We'll jump out an land on our feet on an island in the middle of that ocean I didn't like and eat bananas. It might be paradise.

The Human Library Card

This summer is like a borrowed book. It's like the book you let me borrow, actually. I only have it for a brief time, I knew that from the outset.
I still took it though, knowing that I have to give it back eventually, that it can't be mine forever; not tangibly, anyway.
I can still take the letters off the page and churn them into my mind, so that what I can't hold in the physical, I can hold in my mind.... convert it into plasma, energy, synapsis, so that it lasts forever.
See, this book, "The World's Greatest Salesman".... It's inspiring, right? Well, you are inspiring too.
See? This summer is like a borrowed book.
See, this book, "The World's Greatest Salesman".... It's deep, right? Well, you are profound.
See? This summer is like a borrowed book.
See, when you gave me that book, you gave me a little part of yourself you didn't know about.
See, those underlined words you forgot were there was a little chink of yourself that I got to taste.
See? You are the book, and I borrowed you for a summer.
But don't worry. I will give you back in the fall.

I need friends. And I need hipster glasses. The two aren't wholly unrelated. I lost my glasses, so I need new hipster ones. I got three jobs so I lost a lot of time, but hopefully, that doesn't mean I lost friends. I know that doesn't mean I lost friends, because they come into my work and hand me back a bit of the time I lost. They brush the dust of the pavement off of it, because that is where I dropped it. They understandingly say, "Here. Here's some time. It's not new, but we know you are trying. We are going to make fun of you anyway, though. Because we know you will laugh, and we'll laugh too." Here's the catch. They don't say that out loud. I still hear it, though. That means we are friends.
They come into my work, wearing a baseball cap and a candy-circus dress.  They write notes on blank receipts and yellow sticky-notes. I'm covered in tape and laughing til I cry. I lost my glasses, and I lost a lot of time. My friends gave me back some time..... Maybe they can get me some new hipster glasses?

Yellow roses people

The world loves yellow roses. Because
They are pretty
They stand out, but they are still common; they aren't too surprising.
They are eye-catching
They smell nice... We can't forget that they smell nice.

So, the world loves the yellow roses people. Because
They are pretty
They stand out, but they still fit in; they aren't too surprising.
They are eye-catching
They smell nice.... We can't forget that they smell nice.

Sometimes what a girl needs is a pretty dress and a really great pair of shoes to go with it.

Branches

There is a tree; a tall oak tree. The branches twist and snake over and around each other as they reach outward. The roots run deep. This tree does not have leaves.
It has a sun, though.
And a moon.
And stars.
 Hanging from it's branches is the circus,
 a ferris wheel,
a friend
and a red front door.
There is a toppled suitcase, it's contents traipsing down through the branches of the tall oak tree. It's roots run deep. From the branches there hangs a lemon,
 a sailboat,
a pumpkin
and a bike.
There is music that hangs from the tree and there are balloons. There is also a girl in this tree. Maybe she is important, maybe she is not. You have to search to find her. Does that make her important? There are possibilities on the branches of the tall oak tree. You just need to pluck one off. There is life at the ends of the branches of this tree.

String and Clay

I work at the dry cleaners and that is where I met you, because you work there too. You weren't what I was expecting to fall in love with. You have a charm. You don't know you do. Well, you know you're charming but you are charming not in the way that you think you are charming. And it's not the 1950's-lettermans-jacket charming. It's your very own brand, like Tide, or PF Flyers. But those are my brands. Your brand is the brand where you tell me your plans, your problems, and you wear your imperfections on your sleeve. I wish I could do that. And you show me knew things that you know, and I don't. I love to learn though. I like to think about what you tell me. I especially remember the day where the store was slow, and we weren't busy.  It was just me and you and there were no Audreys and    Danielles or Carlys to get in the way. I liked it, but it was a bit scary for me, and maybe boring for you. But that's why it was scary for me. To be in the dry cleaners with just you and me, with not much to do, I don't want you to be bored of me. I want to be interesting. I want to be the maze that you want to discover. I want you to uncover my soul piece by piece until you uncover the entire painting. I want you to think it's beautiful. Like the Sistine Chapel.  They say we create ourselves. I want you to think I am a Michael Angelo with my own spirit. I think that's why I remember that thursday at the dry cleaners. It's because it was my first chance to show you a lesser-known part of me, and to see if you liked it. I choked though. So instead we cut out Roxberry banners from their flyers, and then we took those knives and cut up cardboard boxes. I built houses out of the pieces you had already sliced in thirds. You chuckled at me, and teased me a little. So I threw the pieces away. "Too young..." I muttered in my head regretfully, "too young." You never knew that, though. And you went on and told me about the world and what it needed and how you were going to change a bit of it.  Well, you changed me. I am now in a state of recreation, where what I was has eroded because you showed me a different walk of life, but I can't accept your walk of life either. Not now, anyway. So I am in a period of recreation where I am taking bits and pieces of clay and string and forming something that I am not sure what it is yet. God knows. But He's not telling me everything about it. He just gives me hints and lets me discover the rest. It's a restless game of riddles we play. Restless because he gives me straight answers and I confuse them myself and solve them again only to find that what God said in the first place was right all along. But I wanted the experience so I took the tiles an made a rubix cube and solved it again. I can't even solve a real rubix cube. Only metaphorical ones. I'm in the middle of one right now and you are one of the sides. I don't know which color yet, but it's still up for grabs, I guess. You told me your favorite color was deep purple. There's not that color on a rubix cube. You'll have to choose a different color or not be on there at all, I suppose. Maybe you are the tricky extra color, the joke square that someone put on so that I could never solve the rubix cube. Do I want to take it off, though? Do I mind if this puzzle gets solved? Maybe not. Maybe that's why I write in a notebook now, and why I kept the Roxberry banners we cut out.