final thoughts.

this is my final post. i just feel as if these thoughts need to return to paper. i have recently started writing in my journal again, one i made by hand this time. truth be told it feels a bit like going home safe and private. we started this blog a little over a year ago Bee and i, and during this time i have learned so much about myself, but so very much has happened and so much has changed that it just doesn't feel the same anymore. we didn't really have high expectations for this blog, nor did we ever expect to have followers, but i think we gave it a fair go. i can't speak for Bee, but i am deeply thankful for the few of you who spent time with this blog. it truly means a lot to me.

Bee has another blog you should all be following. ask her about it.

as for me i am going to disconnect for awhile. i need to spend some time on myself. my new life plan is to let things go. 

 hope all is forever well, good night, and always with love.

Carli.

tree stories

 sometimes i feel like the tree that gets cut down to make a book that never gets read. it just sits alone in the back of some dusty forlorn bookshop, tables etched deep with coffee rings and carved initials. grown from the forest floor without notice. notched, cut deep, and dropped, chipped, cut, drenched with water, screened, dried, printed, sold, and forgotten. home forever in a quiet room, yellowing against a back drop of fake stories and fading ink. this is not a book you would want to read, but might have been a tree you would have climbed.

Carli.

winter ghosts.

last night i dreamed about a foggy morning in some deep forgotten forest. it started in a bed. my toes were cold, but the blankets felt so amazing tucked over my shoulders. i stayed there for a bit shaking the sleep from my mind, then i stood to get out of the bed. I slid my feet gingerly across the creaky floorboards, slipped a small latch on a wooden screen door and watched it bounce against the peeling white skin of the door. i can already smell the rich soil drenched by the previous nights rain, it isn't cold but a slight fog clings to the deep green trees and the porch pops a bit as i step onto it, behind me the screen door swings shut with a thatching thud, one of my favorite sounds. i feel the moisture on my skin, my chest rises and falls under a thin shirt, the buttons leaving a cool tingling trail. somewhere music begins to play it is distant and swaying. my barefeet sink into wet soil as i walk out across a wobbling meadow the tips of wet grass sliding over my bare legs, all around me tambourines and quiet guitar, a soft humming voice, and wet grass. as i reach the edge of the clearing the sun breaks just above the treeline. the world itself turns to gold, and just like that i am awake. my toes are cold, but the blankets feel amazing tucked over my shoulders, and this song was playing.

JBM "Winter Ghosts"

 

Carli.

simple.

I have been listening to the moondoggies almost nonstop since last night. i am almost nostalgic to the point that i feel like i am home. i am at that point in my life when i have just had enough. i want to simplify things. breathe mountain air, watch a dripping line lay out across a glacial silted creek, paint in my garage with the smell of fresh soil and stale coffee, drink beer barefoot in the dirt, throw sticks for dogs, take off for whatever might be out there, but mostly i just want to be me. chalk this all up to just another bad day, and forget about it. i have incredible people in my life who have carried me this far, but it is my turn now, and i figure the best way to say thank you is to find my way. 

i just want all of you to know how much i love you. 

Carli.

not ever.

it would be so much easier if every morning i didn't wake up wishing i could just slip away. take my typewriter and whatever paper i could find and just slip away. far enough that i would forget everyone and they would forget me. i imagine it is pretty quiet at the ends of the earth quiet enough that i could just stop acting, doing, being, feeling.  

 imagine miles along some frozen ocean, nothing but the sound of your own whistle. no memories, words with multiple meanings, and absolutely no more pain. no more broken hearts. just fog, sea spray, and emptiness. charcoal gray sand, endless turquoise, and nothing but fading white.

what if the world would stop spinning just long enough for you to breathe it out. if there was a place you could run that would truly take you away. a place to hide your broken heart long enough to lose yourself.

i think the reason that this doesn't exist is because we all need to hurt. we all need to fight to heal ourselves. even if that means waking up everyday to cry in the shower. we have to heal until our hearts are ready to beat again.

when i truly think about it i am not really sure i could run away, even if the promise was that i would never hurt like this again. because, what if it is true? what if love really does exist, and what if i missed my chance? i couldn't run away knowing that. not ever. 

Carli.

I'm about ready

I think I am about ready to head out. I love this town and the people I have met, but I'm too comfortable with the way things are that I do not feel the need to deal with present and past issues. Fall, winter and spring are probably the hardest to handle in Laramie and it consumes the majority of our year. I've lost friends and then gained them right back. What a feeling!
Friends are my most valued people. They are my family away from my family. They keep me grounded and sane when we're all going insane from the cold and wind. (THE WIND!) These people are who make me laugh and smile. They understand and react to things better than I can at times. I couldn't ask for better people in my life.

The sun is shining more and my heart has picked up two beats. I'm ready for some change and more sun. I need sun and warm. Being cold through and through is exhausting. Putting on shorts because the clock across the street says "47 degrees" on it, is a delusion, because during the summer, I would be freezing at those temperatures. My legs, my arms, my body needs to be free from heavy coat and woolen socks!  I am itching like most for that summer air, summer sun and summer fun. Ready to run around without shoes and sing at the top of my lungs for I am free. Ready to travel by bike, by car, by plane, to see friends I haven't seen in years. Ready to feel that warm red glow through my eyelids and to lay in the sun for hours without anything to do. Ready to go to drive in movies with my boyfriend, my love, my friend.  He is the best.
This is another summer I cannot wait for. I will be starting my twenty fifth year this year, but being twenty-four years old is not quite so bad. I think this might be my year, but who knows! Summer Summer Summer!

I'm ready.

Love.
B.

milky-coffee.

 what would it take to wake up in a hazy afternoon, barefoot in some summer field, cutoff shorts and a dog trailing behind me? this is all i want right now. enough that i would bypass these next few months just to live this moment. hands outstretched barely dragging across the tops of fresh bluegrass, painted toes stretching deep into rain soaked soil, and the sun ah the sun warm and just bright enough to make you squint your eyes.

summer time. 

it is so far away, and yet my body yearns for the simplicity. the welcomed loneliness, bent corners on borrowed books, white wine and peach tea, thunderstorms and warm crashing light. i need it. bicycles and bluegrass, honeysuckle and orange blossoms, lilac sweet and mystical. why can't it be here? shooting stars, campfires, the wooden snap of hinged screen doors, fresh garden herbs, lemonade carafes, blueberry pancakes, rosy finches. oh why can't it be here...

yea... i know i live in laramie and i am just pouting. guess i will settle for milky-coffee and four more months wishing i were someplace else. bundle up there is a lot more to come.

grumble grumble grumble.

Carli.

We are all earth-shakers you just have to believe it.

this may sound strange, but it feels as if every once in awhile we are given a chance to try again. i am not truly sure that you can completely mask heartbreak with opportunity. the pain exists simultaneously with the potential a strange alchemy of dreams waking up, but i truly believe in embracing everything including the hurt as a way to learn, change, and grow.

i know that together is the way people are supposed to be, but it is no mistake that alone is the way we are meant to start out. it is time for me to be alone. i have made a list of all my expectations out of life. not a bucket list, more of a guideline. on the top of the list is to stop searching. i have everything i need in the person i am. i am starting to think maybe even believe that your one great love needs to be yourself. i need to love myself as i have loved others "without adjustment" as i seem to recall.

 

it is the year of the tiger, and i am finally ready to  be a tiger.

  

Carli.

another random rambling from b.

As much as I feel I should be in the studio creating all the time, like my fellow residents, I remind myself, don't push something if it's not ready. I have 6 things going on, I think they might be complete, with a few exceptions. But a constant reminder needs to be put in place, calm down and it'll come. I do not need to be constantly creating, as much as my brain tells me I'm slacking, being lazy. I am here and I am working.

While I've been away, I've been making line drawings, sewing canvas (this is quite satisfying yet frustrating), and using pastels. Things I normally never do. I miss my 3-D forms, but that part of me has broken off. When someone pushes you so far, and no longer sees you as being viable, you stop creating. I no longer want to be associated with that. Even when things are looking good for you, they look down at you like you're scum, when you used to be their prized possession. So nice.

The politics behind school really dictates who and how you are right outside school. How do you break that binding rope? You get into a residency and do what you want. 

I am very lucky to be here, and am enjoying the people and skies surrounding me.

Come on let it snow and snow.

I'll be back soon, cannot wait to be home again.

love,

b.

a death of sorts.

i am not sure why i am telling you this. perhaps it is because i am certain nobody actually reads this, or maybe it is because i desperately need someone to talk to beyond my journal. i don't know. what i do know is that things are not alright. my dreams are wrecked with images of my teeth crumbling in my mouth, packs of wild dogs, and strangers. i am losing all of the people i love, and can hardly make the effort to hold on even though ending up alone is my worst fear of all.

in december of last year my dad suffered a stroke, and i still don't think i have accepted it. death has taken my friends and family, but it has always seemed far away. seeing the fear of death in my fathers eyes shook me to my core, and has kept shaking me ever since. now every voicemail i receive causes me such primordial fear that i can hardly get myself to press send. when i first arrived at the hospital i met my mom in the hallway. she had tears in her eyes when she asked me what she would do without him, and i couldn't answer. what would i do without him? within a few hours of my arrival feeling had returned to his hands and the tips of his fingers. what a beautiful miracle that he would come out of the experience virtually unscathed, and to find out that he is perfectly healthy.

why did this become my nightmare. where my fear of spiders, bad guys, and semi trucks used to be is now an extraordinary fear of aging and death. this fear has come upon me with such a frightening force that i have been crippled by it. i rarely leave my apartment. i have rituals now, touching all the knobs on my oven to ensure they are off, unplugging everything, leaving my apartment, and going back in to check everything again. i am saving voicemails for fear that i will never hear the voices again. i am absolutely losing it.

but i have a plan.

i am trying to heal. i went home yesterday to spend the night with my parents. we drank wine, watched movies, laughed and shared stories. my dad is absolutely alive, and better than before. he is truly living, in fact, they are off to Andros island in the bahamas this thursday. think bikes, bonefishing, and beer. so why am i so afraid? i should see this as a good thing, and early on i did. 

my plan is simple. be happy. 

the journey is what will be difficult, but it starts tomorrow at 6 am. yoga. and then metalsmithing a place where i feel completely at home. i intend to spend more time there. working on my craft and loosening up my spirit. for the next two days i am going to be immersed in making a book. a place where i have fully explored my fear of death and age, and have conquered with a bit of british rebellion and a lot of metaphor. tonight i am going to repair a pair of broken butterfly wings i feel it is important for some reason. i am also close to having everything in my home organized, all the old is boxed up to go to charity. no more chaos. i found a mouse that needs a home. his name is stuart and he is living at the fort collins humane society. i think we need each other. as for me. everything will be okay. with a little bit of time and a little bit of effort everything will turn out okay. i have so much love to give.

as i said before, and i think i finally understand it. the universe shakes everything.

good night, and always with love.

Carli. 

night time

While sitting in my studio, listening to Harry Potter on tape, I heard this crying out.

Several coyotes are outside howling at the moon. 

It's intense.

Oh, the strange things that come out at night..other than me.

love,

b.

forgot some things at home.

Here's to blogging everywhere I blog now. (Check out: champagnesparklesandbmoney.tumblr.com) I post more there. But for right now I'd rather write here.

I'm out in the wilderness with 7 strangers, one giant studio to myself, and a tiny dorm room. I have no cellphone service for the next two weeks. Thank goodness I have the internet, or researching and getting photos of things would be difficult. 

Today, I drew my friend, Krina's eyes. It was a fast quick drawing, but I think it went well.

I forgot my camera plug in, so no updates on photos, unless I point my computer at something...which would just be weird.

Oh, I'm coming back with a baby deer. If Audrey can do it, so can I. So GET READY!

I left my toothpaste at home, but thankfully I'm residing at a resort that has EVERYTHING including a full size basketball court. So toothpaste is at hand.

They expect me to go on hikes here when it's freezing outside and there's snow everywhere. Yes, I know I'm from Wyoming...but yeah right. I like to be warm as much as possible. So we'll see if I actually take a walk anywhere other than to the common area or my studio which is all in a five foot radius of my living quarters.

I've been listening to Bon Iver's newest album on repeat for the last 4 hours. So you guys should check that out. It really adheres to the mood around here. Chill, quiet and quite gloomy.

So here's my first post in forever and maybe my first post on the many things to come in the next two weeks. But if I were you, I'd check out tumblr. I use that more often and post things for my friends. Love you all and miss you already.

love.

b.

singing this... loud... all day. nonstop.

i am going to wear the outfit the blonde is in for halloween, and i officially cannot wait!!!

Carli.

this year.

as all of you probably know this december my dad suffered a stroke. he wasn't at risk for a stroke. he is only 54 and last summer he hiked 100 miles completing the Highline Trail in just 8 days. it was a mystery that eventually led the doctors to suspect a hole in his heart. they were right. it is hard to imagine, my dad, who has always been this pillar of strength, sort of the glue that holds my family together having something like this, but it doesn't change who he is. if anything he is stronger than ever and more determined to live the life he wants.

so here i am almost a month later looking back on the year and this is without a doubt the most important lesson i have learned. it is really easy to get caught up in the schism of people, school, responsibility, and day to day life that holds people back. this year i am going to resist that. i am going to spend more time cultivating the relationships that matter, spending equal time with those that i love, i want to stop caring about those who seek only to hurt me, and i am going to spend some time outside taking pictures, hiking, and trying to find my place in the world.

life is too short, and really it doesn't need to be taken that seriously.