Smile Like You Mean It

It is at this point I admit that I honestly did everything I could to make things work with my former second. Now I admit, I had something to do with the break up. I was blinded by NRE with a new partner, and all of his faults were amplified. Being possessive, being jealous, all of that served to push me away. But if I hadn't started another relationship, would he have been as jealous? Would he have been as possessive? Did I push him away?


I know, without a doubt, that the relationship is over. It has been a long month realizing this, and at the same time, getting closer to another. I am not replacing D with A, I realize this now. I have always loved people individually. Now it is a matter of moving on. And A, I am sorry that I spent so much time obsessing over it while with you. <3

Unconditional

"I'll give you countless amounts of outright acceptance if you want it
I will give you encouragement to choose the path that you want if you need it
You can speak of anger and doubts your fears and freak outs and I'll hold it
You can share your so-called shame filled accounts of times in your life and I won't judge it
(and there are no strings attached to it)"

The above song, to me, is the best example of unconditional love. What is unconditional love? To me, it is love that is not self serving, love that puts others above itself because it loves them more than it loves itself. According to wikipedia, Unconditional love is a term that means to love someone regardless of the loved one's qualities or actions. The paradigm of unconditional love is a mother's love for her newborn.

Unconditional love is often used to describe the love in an idealized romantic relationship. It may sometimes also be used to describe love between family members, comrades in arms and between others in highly committed relationships.

Not everyone in a relationship will achieve this selfless sense of love, and moreso, in order to love someone else unconditionally, you have to love your SELF unconditionally.

There are 7 stages of love. Not every relationship will hit those 7 stages, and relationships can stop at any place along the list. You can pretty much describe every relationship this way, as everyone will be somewhere in one of those stages.

These are the seven stages of love:

ATTRACTION -
Attraction can be defined as something, which is more than friendship and is a step towards getting ready for a relationship. Now attraction is of two types:

a. Physical Attraction - happens when your body reacts to another person. Heart rate increases; temperature rises, palms get sweaty; stomach flutters; throat tightens; etc. This is what will tell you that you are ready for the first contact and also whether you are comfortable in the company of the other person.

b. Emotional Attraction - develops next if the circumstances are right. After being drawn to a person physically, you then begin to come closer. If you find you have things in common -- hobbies, ideologies, career, education, or some other common ground -- then an emotional attraction starts to form. Sometimes an emotional attraction can occur even when a physical attraction does not. And in this case, the bond will be stronger between the two who connect, since no preconceived notions based on physical appearance has occurred.

INTIMACY
Intimacy is something, which a person experiences when you learn to trust and believe your lover. It is a close association with another person of the deepest nature. You share you thoughts, feelings, and dreams. You feel free to discuss everything with this person and you are absolutely comfortable in his company. Thus intimacy develops gradually. If you can't establish intimacy with your partner, your relationship may work for a while, but is unlikely to endure throughout the years. Intimacy is actually the path to a true, healthy and beautiful relationship.

PASSION
The third stage is passion, which basically means a desire for another person, which has grown to an intensity that can't be ignored. This is often where an emotional relationship turns into a physical relationship. The passion stage is very important. For from here you will understand the true meaning and nature of your relationship. If there is no passion then its best to let go but if there is passion in your relationship then it is time to go on to the next stage.

ROMANCE
Romance is the essence of a relationship. Without romance your love life will not exist. Romance is the true identity of your love. It brings out your true self and helps you be a better lover, husband and partner. Romance is a celebration of the life you live as part of a couple. It springs naturally and originates from within your heart. It makes you do things that you possibly couldn't have imagined to do otherwise. It shows you who you are and reminds you of the role you play in a relationship. Romance is not responsibility but it is caring about your responsibilities towards your lover and partner. Romance is the appreciation of two people who are celebrating the lucky coincidence that they found each other.

COMMITMENT
The last stage is commitment. This is when you know that you want to spend your whole life with this person you love and you can do anything for him. It is when your whole world just revolves round your lover and you take a pledge to remain true to your mate throughout good and bad times, be by his side whenever he needs you.

Each of the relationships I am in, whether it be with my husband, my oso, or my cicisbeo, are in a different part of this scale above. And yet, I care about them all above myself. I keep going back to love, and I feel like if I do that, people are going to think that this post is in the same vein as "methinks thou dost protest too much" but, really, I need to say these things, and either I say them to my mother in law, who already thinks I'm crazy, or I say them to my partners who have already heard them many many times. So with that, I hope I have given you something else to think about. I will leave you with what is probably my favorite scripture. It is from 1Corr. 13:4-8:

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.

Airplanes

"Can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars?
I could really use a wish right now, wish right now, wish right now" --B.o.B. ft Hayley Williams, Airplanes

Many people are familiar with the concept of wishing on a star, that if you make a wish on a shooting star, it will come true. No one quite knows where this superstition comes from, whether it is the beauty and relative rarity of shooting stars, or humanity's eternal fascination to the heavens, or if it is the likeness of shooting stars to an angel, so thinking of a wish on a shooting star as offering up a prayer.

I have wished on a star often enough in my youth, to wish for one boy or another to like me, to pass my algebra final, that my parents would stop fighting and screaming at each other. Silly wishes, things that really don't matter much in the long run. Recently, I've been making some late night treks into the desert area north of the city that I live in, and on those treks, I take a new friend with me. We've been spending time together getting to know each other, just laying in the back of his truck cuddling and chatting and looking at the stars that you can't see well enough within the city limits. One of these last times we went out there, the above song was playing on the radio and we saw something that may or may not have been a shooting star. Hell, it could have been an airplane for all we know, but it was that moment, and without saying anything, we both looked up and made a silent wish.

New relationships are fragile like infants, and need careful nurturing. Really, all relationships need careful nurturing. But there comes a time when you get comfortable with your partner and you stop trying as hard. This is my promise now, that I will keep trying.

Airplanes

Cool The Engines

"Now I like takin' off
Don't like burnin' out
Every time you turn it on
Makes me want to shout

We keep getting hotter
Movin' way too fast
If we don't slow this fire down
We're not gonna last

Song of the day brought to you by a conversation or six I was having with one of my lovers. Despite taking this relationship slower than I ever have, apparently we've been going faster than some would like to see.

While on the one hand, I can see where they are coming from, and I don't want this to be a huge hot burning bonfire that burns out too quickly, I also don't want this to just be a candle flame, either (although candles are fun for other things).

Im happy with the speed my relationship has been going, but for the sake of my sanity (lest one of my partners throw a wrench into things) I will slow down. I feel like my sanity (what little there is of it) is balanced on a tripod, and it would be a simple matter of kicking one of those legs outwards to destroy the tenuous hold I have on it.

Really, what I would like to do is shout at the top of my lungs announcing to the world how much I love this man... And I have, in the car on the way back from a trip out into the desert... At 1am, in the middle of nowhere, no one can hear what you scream in the dark... #justsayin

Boston's Cool The Engines

A note about Easter and Ostara

Ostara was 10 days ago, so I missed dyeing eggs with my kidlet. We dyed yarn, instead.

Most kids I know think of Easter as a day of chocolate bunnies and boiled eggs. Many of them get dragged along to church, and a number of them even know the story of Jesus being resurrected. But when push comes to shove, I'm pretty sure that if you ask a kid about Easter, they're gonna go back to eggs and bunnies.

Most of the things we think of as Easter symbols (eggs, flowers, bunnies, chicks) are actually from Ostara (even the name was snagged from "Oestre" which was a germanic goddess of springtime). Ostara is a celebration of rebirth and new life, so it does fit in spendedly with the themes of Resurrection, but they are not the same thing. One celebrates seasons and cycles, the other celebrates Christ's sacrifice for the eternal salvation of humankind. I don't want to mix them up.

So we separate the two separately.

On Ostara, we celebrate springtime and new life. We dye eggs, make egg/bird/bunny shaped sugar cookies, do spring cleaning, and have a big dinner with spring greens, eggs, poultry, or lamb. We may also get some seasonal candies to share with the family, but we don't have baskets or sneaky bunnies or any of that.



Then, on Easter, we celebrate Christ and the resurrection. No eggs or bunnies. We make a dinner of fish and honey because that's what Christ ate with the apostles, We also make resurrection rolls which are a family favorite.

A note about Ostara and Easter. Easter's date is actually based on Ostara, because Easter (which is dated off Passover), always falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after Equinox. This year, the full moon fell one day before Equinox, so the two holidays ended up being a full month apart. Last year they were only a day apart.

Most of this post came verbatim from my friend Jenni, her blog is Mindful Serenity

Chains That Bind (A2A Flash Fic Challenge)

Here we go, your prompts today are:
Adjectives: Hostile, Woebegone
Nouns: Lemons, A Bull Fight, Chains

Megan stared out the window as the city bus rolled through her Harlem neighborhood. Her mind replayed the conversation earlier with the hostile gangsta she had been shacking up with for longer than she cared to remember.

"What kind of stupid ho ya be? Learn yer mutha-fuckin' place, bitch" was the least of the insults hurled in her direction like the Corell dishware also smashed on the floor at her feet. An outsider might have suggested that this wasn't a healthy relationship, that Megan should get out, that there is help available, but what that outsider wouldn't see is that her love is beyond dysfunction. Megan put her headphones on and pressed play on her walkman, losing herself in Eminem's droning rap and Rhianon's lyrics.

"...just gonna stand there and watch me burn... it's all right, because I like the way it hurts... Just gonna stand there and here me cry... It's all right because I like the way you lie"

The bus pulled up to her stop after quite awhile, and she deboarded and made her way to the costume shop she worked at when she could get away from Marcus, unlocked the door, slipped inside, and locked the door behind her. She went into the office and began to count out her drawer for the morning, when a hand-written note caught her attention. "You're MINE" were scrawled across the bottom of the note in Marcus' messy handwriting. A quiet tear rolled down her face as she crumpled the note and put it in her pocket. No way was she going to let her woebegone mood ruin her work performance, and her boss didn't need to know there were problems in her life. After all, everyone had problems.



Megan sucked in her thoughts, gathered herself, and went about opening the store. When life gives you lemons, you get to make lemonade, although her lemonade needed a lot more sugar.

Work was uneventful, and as she raced for the bus, she prayed she would arrive home before Marcus, afraid of the bull-fight that would ensue if she didn't. As it was, her bus arrived, and getting off the bus and into their 5th floor walk-up put her home a scant 15 minutes before him.

She was able to sweep up the broken glass from this mornings tirade, and straighten up some of the furniture before he appeared behind her, his voice startling her with his apologies. Before she could do anymore than turn around, he had her crushed to his chest in a passionate embrace, hands everywhere, hurriedly ripping her pants from her body, and lifting her onto the counter to penetrate her deeply, emotionally, completely.

It was over too quickly, and he helped her down off the counter. She proceeded to make dinner, cleared it away afterwards, and waited for him to pass out for the night in their bed they shared. She stayed awake for hours, wondering when she would have the courage to break free, with the last wish before sleep overtook her that she wouldn't wake up this time.

Luscious (Flash Fic Challenge)

Nouns: Boy Scouts, Six-Pack, Jack Nicholson
Adjectives: Friendly and Luscious

Megan hurried to finish dusting the shelves of the costume shop she worked at as a sales floor supervisor, knowing that the sooner she finished the closing chores, the sooner she could get out of there, and hopefully stop off at her friendly, local liquor store before catching the bus and heading home. She gave the shelves one last flick of her feather duster, tossed it on the counter, grabbed her purse, and hurried out the door, locking it behind her.

The weather was a perfect 85 degrees, a perfect summer evening, and she put a little bounce in her step as she made her way to the liquor store. She picked up a six-pack of Cherry Coke, and a fifth of Captain Morgan spiced rum, and headed to the cash register. The clerk, who looked like a younger version of Jack Nicholson, was delicious, and she licked her lips discreetly.

When it was her turn, she placed her purchases on the counter without looking him in the eye, afraid he would be able to read her thoughts and see just what naughty tortures she had in store for him.

"That will be $18.67, miss." He said, without missing a beat. Megan looked up, making the mistake of meeting his deep blue eyes, and pressed a $20 dollar bill into his waiting hand. He bagged her groceries and counted $1.33 back into her soft hand.

Megan pocketed the change, and blushed at the contact, trying hard to gather her composure enough to get her bag of soda and rum into her backpack, and make her way to the bus stop outside.

Sitting down on the cool cement bench at the bus stop gave her just enough of an anchor to calm her back down. At least until the adorable little missionaries came walking by, looking as innocent and sweet-faced as boy scouts, and almost as delicious as the store clerk. Somehow, they caught her eye as she was fanning herself and stopped to chat.

"Hi. Have you heard of the true church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints?"
Megan was flustered, but managed to stammer out an answer in the affirmative.
"We're spreading the news of His church and His testimony to everyone who hasn't heard it yet. Do you have time to talk?" They asked, almost in perfect unison.
"Actually, it's been a really rough day, and tonight's not looking to be any less weird, so I really don't." Megan stammered.
"It looks like you're waiting for the bus, do you mind if we wait with you?"
"Well, you're pretty hot. Wanna come home and learn how to sin?" She said with a sly grin, looking at the cuter of the two. The missionaries looked at each other nervously and made a hasty exit, stammering something about needing to spread the word. They were scarcely out of sight when the bus came chugging along on it's usual predestined route.

Megan searched her pocket for the $1.25 she needed to board the bus, and slipped the transfer slip the driver exchanged with her into her pocket, making her way to the long seat in the back of the bus when who should board the bus after her but the delicious looking clerk from the liquor store. He sat down next to her on the back seat and extended his hand in greeting.

When she took his hand, he said, "Hi. I'm Mikey. Do you come here often?"
Megan blushed and stammered out an affirmative, something about this being the closest bus stop to her work, and looked away, trying to stare without seeming to stare.

He chuckled, and somehow that seemed to break the tension, and without much else, soon they were chatting as if they had known each other for years and always been friends. So much so that Mikey missed his stop, and ended up getting off the bus with Megan like a creepy stalker. Megan was a bit distracted, just chatting with her new found friend, and didn't think too much of his choice of bus stop.

Before they realized it, they had arrived at the front door of her apartment, which she unlocked and let him inside. She went into the kitchen, unloaded the six-pack of soda and the rum, and got down 2 glasses from the cabinet. She began to mix up rum and Cherry Coke, a little stronger than normal and handed him a glass. She kicked off her shoes, and settled down on one side of the couch with her drink. Before she knew it, she had slid over on the couch into Mikey's lap and was kissing him with great abandon.

His hands slipped along her back, and lower, lifting her shirt up and off her back, and then were undoing the hooks in her bra to release her luscious breasts from their holders. He leaned her back onto the couch, crawling over her to kiss her more, before fishing a Trojan out of the pocket of his jeans. Megan closed her eyes as he covered her with his body, and prayed that maybe this time she wouldn't wake up.

Super Easy Bath Scrubby

Im not charging for this pattern, because honestly, anyone with a metric crap-ton of leftover Lily's Sugar and Cream yarn could have figured this out...

That being said, please do not copy my pattern, but share the link. Thanks.

As I said, I came up with this pattern while newly unemployed, and had nothing better to do, and a LOT of sugar and cream cotton yarn to stare at... It's very simple, and gauge is not important in the slightest. I did mine with size 8 needles, because it's what I had on hand.

Abbreviations: CO= Cast On, KFB= Knit into the Front and Back of stitch (increasing), K2Tog= Knit 2 together, SSK= Slip, Slip, Knit (alternatively, you can knit 2 together through the back loops, if it is easier for you)

CO 3 stitches.
KFB, K1, KFB
Knit next row
*K1, KFB, Knit to 2 stitches from end, KFB, K1
Knit next row*

Repeat between stars until the bath scrubby is as wide as you want it (this is the center.

*K1, SSK, Knit to last 3 stitches, K2Tog, K1
Knit next Row*

Repeat between stars until 3 stitches remain. Switch to Double pointed needles and work i-cord for 4-6 inches. Bind off, and bend back around to the top of the scrubby, and securely stitch in.

These are VERY fast to knit, and if you have the leftover cotton yarn that I do, you can have a large stash of these knit and ready to go with a bar of homemade soap as a last minute birthday or hostess gift.