You'll probably need twenty minutes to read this.

I have been unofficially blogging for one year. Happy Anniversary to me.

[This post is going to be a long one. It's taken a couple of weeks to figure out how I want to approach what has been on my mind for so long. I always get nervous before posting things like this, because even my indirect approach to controversial things can cause people to take offense. Please read, if you want. I hope this makes you think.]

My previous blog became a downward spiral that only fueled my negativity toward the "happenings" in my life last spring/summer; hence, this new and improved blog.

But as a tribute to my "old" blog, I'm going to quote Rob Bell (again), like I did a year ago.

“​There​ are these​ momen​ts when the enemy​ all of a sudde​n becom​es just like me.
When a soldi​er becom​es a son.
When a prost​itute​ becom​es a mothe​r.​
When they becom​e we.
When those​ becom​e us.
When he becom​es me.
Momen​ts when all of the ways that we divid​e ourse​lves and rank each other​ and convi​nce ourse​lves of how diffe​rent,​ bette​r,​ and unali​ke we are disap​pear,​ and we are faced​ with the fact that first​ and forem​ost,​ we are human​s.​ In this toget​her.​ And not that much diffe​rent from each other​.​
Jew. Genti​le.​
Marin​e.​ Iraqi​.​
Orpha​n.​ Famil​y.​
Pasto​r.​ Prost​itute​.​
We could​ be them.​”

This is part of a collage that I did for a project last spring. "The creation comes in many forms and God saw that it was good." [my own take]

“​We’​re addic​tive creat​ures.​ We try thing​s,​ we exper​iment​,​ we explo​re,​ and certa​in thing​s hook us. They get their​ tenta​cles in us, and we can't get away from them.​ What start​ed out as freed​om can quick​ly becom​e slave​ry.​ Often​ freed​om is seen as the abili​ty to do whate​ver you want.​ But freed​om isn’​t being​ able to have whate​ver we crave​.​ Freed​om is going​ witho​ut whatever we crave​ and being​ fine with it.”

_________________

I love color. There isn't one color that I don't like in some context. I like to wear a lot of shades of black/grey, but I like my fingernails in almost any color. 

I also have poor sight. My contacts help out a lot, but I have no doubt that as I age, I will eventually go blind. I hope I'm wrong, but... 

Anyway, I have friends and family who are color blind, and the idea fascinates me. Getting colors confused? How? (I know the scientific answer, but that's not what I'm looking for.) I can't imagine not being able to differentiate between separate colors. 

Right now, I am thinking of watercolors. Perfect oval-shaped colors-- just add water! Depending on how much water you add to the color, the end product may be a faded color or a bright, obvious color. Sometimes the paper I used would get soaked through with water, since I didn't have a very good sense of how much was too much. At this point, a lot of what I had put on the paper had blended together. 

Often, I liked to blend colors. How fun! Mixing yellow and red was just fine; however, mixing purple, red, orange, yellow, green, black, brown, orange and blue was not. Why was it that these gorgeous colors made this weird, murky color?

Clearly, watercolors were not my forte, but for some people, it is. I started looking at paintings, here.

(Pictures Without Reasons #8)

People keep talking about things being in "black and white," or not. Unfortunately, even "black" and "white" have tons of variations. I know it's just a saying, but it's one that I've been thinking about a lot.

I was really looking forward to the idea of "college." People have claimed that the college years are the best years of your life. Maybe so, but I'm finding that this has been a period of questioning and confusion. In high school, things were in "black and white." In college, things are in "red," and "purple," and "blue," and "yellow," and any combination or variation in-between. Ideas/concepts that have been "clear as day" in the past, are suddenly muddled and indistinguishable. 

This has become rather inconvenient, given that I am of the age where I have to make huge decisions; I have to own those decisions once they are made. 

From two years ago:

I went downtown a few weeks ago and stopped to watch this guy who was spray painting with a bunch of random objects. It took me a while to figure out what he was doing, but eventually I caught on to the fact that he would take paper plates, scraps of paper, etc. to create this gorgeous spray-painting. It was incredible! It looked like nothing-- garbage in fact, until he lifted off all of these dumb objects and revealed his creation.
I was laying in my bed and couldn't stop staring at the spray-painting Christian bought me and just kept thinking about how I feel so much like that painting before it was finished.
I'm so frustrated with things seeming to fall apart at the seams, constantly. I'm worn out from feeling like I am working all of the time, only to turn around and throw my money at bills and responsibilities, while watching my bank account drop and drop and drop. I throw my hands up in disgust at every turn, wondering when things are going to "work out" for me. Or have they already? How should I know..
Basically, I'm wondering if all of this crap I'm dealing with are the paper plates and scraps of paper covering up something beautiful that has to be revealed at the artist's perfect timing. Surely that's it, right? I mean, it has to be? It can't all be a waste, right? Right. Right? Right. Right. Right. Oh God, I hope so..

(pardon the quality.. the reflection looks weird and the lighting sucks)

Wow, I guess things haven't changed much. I think I'm more optimistic, but I'm definitely still struggling with understanding how to "be."

I change shapes just to hide in this place but I'm still, I'm still an animal.

There was a time when my world was filled with darkness, darkness darkness.
Then I stopped dreaming, now I'm supposed to fill it up with something, something, something.

In your eyes I see the eyes of somebody I knew before, long long, long ago.
But I'm still trying to make my mind up, am I free or am I tied up?

I change shapes just to hide in this place, but I'm still, I'm still an animal.
Nobody knows it but me when I slip, yeah I slip, I'm still an animal.

So anyway, maybe I change my hair constantly because I like color. Or maybe it's because it allows me to choose some of the change that occurs in my life. Who knows, really.

Thanks so much for reading. Cheers.