it just got real magical.

yesterday, i was cold in my short-sleeved shirt. this morning, i wore 2 layers and shivered slightly. fall is upon us, that sweet ghost has fallen asleep and has begun to dream in colours of golden, browns, reds and orange flames.

i've spent the day with elliott, which has been magical in itself. he's such a fun/sweet/amazing boy and so cute, you pretty much give up before you try having adorable children of your own. his mind is a treasure trove... and i love the way his parents create the most amazing environment for this 3 year old to explore and thrive... they don't shut him down. you look at this kid and he's an explosion of life... it makes you wonder what would happen if all children were loved and nurtured in this way. i love watching the way children's minds work. the way they see things. the little things they notice. the songs they can listen to over and over. it's like the purest form of life without all the crap we accumulate as we grow. i love that this little family is so vibrant without even trying. they're teeming with passion to the point that their lives seem like effortless art. no striving. just standing. it's not always great weather. in fact sometimes there are floods, but they just are these trees, deeply rooted, thriving and flourishing. not perfect... but it's so good.

where is my mind?

i'm a little bit antsy about the job situation. let's be honest. but, hopefully good news will make my phone ring, er vibrate before the day is out... tomorrow at the latest. limbo is annoying.
but then, limbo makes for adventure. so let's just rest in the tension. no sense in wasting perfectly magical autumn days because i'm too busy being stressed out for no good reason in my head. lonnng. i was talking to my friend andy the other day, and he was saying that when he moved to france this summer to teach surfing/run his surf tour business... (the dream he's had for ages coming together finally!), he too felt so unsettled for the first couple of weeks. even though it was everything he'd ever wanted, it's that change factor. and he kept asking himself 'what am i doing?!" it's so encouraging to know that my emotions running wild and feeling just weird is okay. i'm feeling a bit insecure too. but it's all shadows on the wall. it's just that weird guy named fear from my dream stalking me. and i can shake in my bed all night and never get sleep, because i believe that those shadows are witches and ill-tempered men with hats or komodo dragons; or i can realise the truth: that they are simply tree branches, eves and overhangs and other random things upon which the light outside is playing, and that i have an incredible imagination. (i could also fill my mind with english grammar rules so i don't have anymore wretched run-on sentences like that. eeesh!)

i feel bad for the redundancy, but it is what's going on. and it feels better to get it out.

thing is, i don't have control over the way people respond to me or the way things go, to a point. but i do have control over my thoughts. to "take every thought captive," so to speak. it is up to me to make note of all these thoughts that come in and immediately weed through them. it's kind of like getting the mail. you don't have control of what's in your inbox or your mailbox, but you can control what you let sit in your home. what pieces of information you read over and over. you can let everything pile up and clutter your mind and then later have the chore of sifting through the relevant and junk mail, or you can immediately dispose of the junk mail. delete the spam and keep the relevant articles in their right place.

a mind is a terrible thing to waste... especially on worry and fears.
when i was young, i learned this bible verse :
"Summing it all up, friends, I'd say you'll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies."

it just got real magical.

photos by tim walker.

démaquillant

you know those times where you come home from being someplace or doing something with certain people, and you get ready to shut down and head to bed... and you take your makeup off or get out of that fancy dress or release the skinny jeans or kick off the shoes or... whatever that looks like. and some nights you're extra exhausted and analysing the role you've just played. the performance you've just made for everyone.

then there are times when you come home exhausted, because you're just plain tired and you've had a good time. but your heart feels so full, because you were yourself completely.

tonight was one of those nights.

my heart is on the brink of exploding with thanksgiving to be surrounded by a good group of girls in this town who i am able to be myself with...

and being around them, makes me realise i'm wonderful just the way i am. the focus is on making light of everything else. the focus is on laughing and being random. the focus is on one another, rather than walking around with a compact mirror honing in my blemishes and imperfections. the focus is just us being who we are and enjoying life and the company we're keeping.

so i would just like to say to the girls and to the boys i've lifted up on some ridiculous and highly inappropriate pedestal... to the ones i give undue authority to cause me to pass judgement on myself... i'm sorry. it's not my job to worry so very much about the way you perceive me. it isn't my life purpose to gain your acceptance. 'words of affirmation' is definitely one of my love languages, but i'm sorry that sometimes i rely on your doling out of affirmation or withholding to define my worth. that's a whole lot of pressure. i'm sorry i over-analyse everything you say and am unable to hear your heart. i'm sorry i've been so self-obsessed that i can't even see what you're about. this is silly. unfortunately, these things take a bit of time. but i'm going to do my very best to just be... be here now. be myself. stop hiding, stop creating someone else... and just enjoy you. enjoy the day. and be enjoyed.

i want to give you the space to be who you are and the room to become.

i want you to be able to respond the way you want to. which means you may even decide you don't want my heart. and that scares me, sometimes... but i don't want to allow fear to cripple me and keep me hidden and unable to love.

i want to love you better.

one day at a time.

love.

me

cheer up sleepy jean, oh what can it mean?

i have the craziest/scariest/weirdest dreams sometimes. i'll not call them nightmares exactly, because i usually wake from them with the strangest sense of calm and clarity... immediately beginning to understand the metaphors in much of them. quite often, these dreams are a way of organizing the puzzle pieces in my brain and heart that i've not been able to sort through.

i'm also in dire need of breakfast/brunch/lunch coupled with the fact that i'm pretty positive i'm allergic to smoke and am suffering the after-affects of being in a smokey room last night. (albeit having a grand time in that smokey room)

one dream involved my being followed around by a very weird man... an old man with a particular older european car that i think i've seen in photo shoots. i'll say that he was a bit of a hannibal lector which is frightening enough on its own... and i knew he wanted to kill me, even though he never aggressively did anything but just follow me around and show up in places i wished he wouldn't. i woke up with this realisation that i'm afraid of the past repeating itself in quite a few different ways. after all of this progress and growth, i still get scared that love and good things will be outrun by some unhappy tragedy in every season.

but instead of falling into despair, i feel like it's just a friendly reminder. sort of like an alarm going off that trust levels are getting low. "NiTasha, you know where this gets you... you've let go of this fear motivation..." Just a gentle reminder that fear will do nothing but eat me alive and hinder everything i do. i needed that.

a little lesson from pop music.

"I'm gonna love you like I've never been hurt before. I'm gonna love you like I'm indestructible."

This is the new theme for this new season.

This is my heart's desire. To love like this.

"What rhymes with 'glass'?" "Alas." "Alas! Of course!"

I arrived in Nashville on Friday night. It is now Wednesday… and everything feels like a surreal dream. Like I'm part of some surrealist painting… and I'm not sure what everything means.

I need a job. And quite frankly, I want a job. One can't go from being a work-a-holic to jobless and be just fine with it, now can they? Besides, there are bills to pay… mouths to feed and aint nothing in this world for free. Except at Whole Foods. The other night, Emilia and I went there and ended up receiving a free piece of chocolate annnnnd a free slice of vegetarian pizza. Sweet hands of victory.

I live in a super cute house in east nashville and my room is finally done. I think the thing is, that there are 3 main pieces of furniture in it… and those 3 pieces are new. And there is nothing familiar about it, but the accents. And so, somehow, I feel like this is someone else's room. Or a cozy space that I'm occupying. But it's yet to sink in that it is MY room… I still feel like i'm on a weird vacation.

I like things like being able to go to a coffee shop and randomly run into friendly faces. Pretty faces and handsome faces. But, nonetheless, faces I've seen on my computer screen and would like to hang out with more often. And now, I can. I like when people say things like, "welcome home." It's the same excited/comfortable feeling that happens when you fly back from a foreign country, and see the "welcome home" signs for the US citizen/US residents. No matter how sad you were to leave the place you just were… there's something to that phrase… 'welcome home'. Obviously. I've typed it 3 times in this paragraph.

It's ever so nice to wake up to sweet messages in the morning… followed by an onslaught of banter and play fighting. I have a new playmate/long-distance companion/friend, and I assure you that I'm not sure how I would've made it through the first few days of this transition to Nashville without him. FACT. It's also nice to have some of your best girl friends within a 5 mile radius. I can't even handle the loveliness of that. I'm thankful.

There are a couple of things that remain so very confusing. and waiting on the job? I'm so bad at waiting.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch… I will say that everything feels new. Scary. Exciting. That whole 'what have I gotten myself into' question repeating itself like a broken record…

which reminds me of listening to old records on my great-grandparents record player in their basement in Alexandria, Virginia. The smell of the basement… how scared I was of certain parts without the lights on. The copy of the mona lisa on top of a file cabinet… the old clothes… uniforms and dresses… the lionel train set… so many things come swarming back to me. I sometimes wish I could just make a bunch of money and buy that house back and leave it in our family for generations to come.

Oh wait. I am the generations to come… weird.

Annnnnd I'm tired and far too thoughtful for my own good. I'll leave this little fruit salad of thoughts as is… and get to sleep. And if I'm very lucky, I'll wake up to sweet messages again to get the day started before embarking upon another day of job searching.