At the bottom of Everything

So I've gotten in this strange habit where as soon as I write a blog post I will think of a bunch more random junk that I feel like writing about and then like ten minutes later I will post another one.  Tres lame, I know.

I was just organizing the chaotic collection of photos that have accumulated on my laptop during the past couple years.  I know I write about travelling a lot, but that's because it's one of the few things I am passionate about.  I'm not one of those people that has a hobby that they devote all their time to.  I literally work to travel and live a little bit of life in between here and there.  One of my favorite parts about travelling is the airports.  Kind of strange, I know.  There is something I very much appreciate about the awkward lag time at the gate.  No matter how long you have, you feel rushed-- and yet you are just killing time.  People will talk about being all alone in a sea of people.  I seldom feel that way, but the airport is the perfect example.  For some reason everyone feels the need to look important and it's as though wherever they are going is the be all and end all of life as we know it.  All airports are so different and yet they all have this interesting feeling of emptyness about them.   There are few things I like more than getting a latte and people watching while I wait for them to call my flight.

By the way, if you were waiting for me to get to it... this airport appreciation session doesn't really have a point.  

I have certain little rituals that I have crafted quite beautifully when it comes to my travel experience.  For example, while I wait for them to call the flights I like to listen to "Hello, I'm Delaware" by city and colour because it talks about "there goes my life with every departing flight"... and there is something identifyable about the fact that I am wasting my life that way too.  Then, when I'm on the plane... usually right after we've taken off I pop in Bright Eyes "At the bottom of Everything." You might recall that this is the song with the schpeel in the beginning about the plane crashing. It's comforting.  Then I like to flip through the emergency landing pamphlet and laugh about the scene in Fight Club where Brad Pitt talks about the smiling expressions on the people's faces despite the fact that their plane is crashing.  Then, to finish off the flight I usually listen to "Comin home" by city and colour.  I just realized how ridiculously specific this is, but I actually do it every time.  Give it a try sometime.  You might not seek as much comfort in Connor Oberst describing a plane crash as I do, but you never know.

I kind of hate people that just blog about things they like and random junk I don't care about, but .... I just did it.  So my sincere apologies for wasting for my own narrsistical purposes.  But now you have some insight into my well crafted art of the flying experience.

Just me

A rainy day in Kirkland

Once again I just returned from Seattle. It was wonderful. The west coast is truly a beautiful place.  The people think more and the coffee's better.  But that is completely irrelevant.

Lately I've been thinking quite a bit about lonliness. And not in the "poor me, I'm so lonely" kind of way. I've kind of been appreciating it.  For the most part I have always thought of myself as the furthest possible thing from an introvert.  I used to love being with people all the time -- the more people the better. People, people, people.  

This week all my roommates went away for reading week and it's just me and my fluffy maltese left in the house.  The first night was awful. I was so scared couldn't sleep and I had to text a friend until I got so tired I passed out, phone in hand.  But as the days go on and I wake up and go to sleep in an empty house I am begining to appreciate having to deal with myself.  I don't know how we think we know ourselves.  When your constantly surrounded by people and music and tv and everything else you can kind of forget what you're like to be with.  It's like... I knew myself in the sense that I knew how I reacted to being with other people, but that seems to be only one aspect of it.  When it's just me... hanging out with myself, I can realize what I'm really like without everyone else's influence.


The other day a friend of mine posted that "loneliness is underrated." I think it's kind of true. I kind of like to be lonely sometimes.

Insomnia. And thoughts that don't make sense

I can't sleep. Maybe because I am too busy thinking. That's why people shouldn't think. Insomnia is a direct result. I hope this blog doesn't get you thinking. It probably won't.  

I am going to be really lame here and reference another social networking site while blogging. Ew. At least I am still not using Twitter, so I think we're in the clear.  You may have noticed that facebook changed the layout of how you view photos. You, like me, may have also noticed that it is ridiculously annoying.  We got new tills at work this week. They are touch screen and all fancy like.  I hated the old tills because they only worked like half the time, but I hate the new tills even more because they are...new.  Then, while thinking about how much I hate all these new earth shattering changes that are being thrust upon me, I realized that I don't like change much at all. Funny.


Maybe no one likes change much at all. Maybe that's why the rich keep getting richer and the poor keep getting poorer. Maybe that's McDonalds has to spend months shoving propaganda down our throats that 'change is good' so that the general public wouldn't be outraged when they changed their nuggets from dark meat to white.  Maybe that's why I still work at second cup or why I don't like meeting new people.  Perhaps it's why people love to be a 'regular.'  Or why women have a hernia when grey hair appears.  Perhaps it is why people will stay in abusive relationships before risking venturing out on their own.


The thing I don't understand is that hating change so clearly seems to go against nature and everything our bodies are designed to do.  Take the seasons for example.  What would happen if they didn't change? Or our bodies... if our hair never grew or our skin never replaced itself... 
(you may notice that I am leaving these questions open ended... it's not because I am deep, but more so too lazy to think up a conclusion) 


When closing, it is key to link your explanation back to your thesis so as to make a strong point.

So why do we fight change? Why do we love being so dang comfortable?   I don't know, but it's probably the root of all evil or something.

Blogger's block

So when I started this blog I really liked it because I pretty was sure no one read it.  I could really be honest with myself and didn't have to worry about my punctuation or if I was being theologically correct. It was just me, raw... honest, me being layed out on a page in size ten times new roman.  Now, I know that most people start a blog so that people will follow them and read it and be inspired or something. That is, afterall, the point.  But ... as people have approached me and mentioned that they read my blog I suddenly feel at a complete loss for words.  All of a sudden everthing I say will not be good enough compared to the more eliquent 'bloggers' out there.  So that's why I haven't written.

Then I realized, I go through much of life like this... selling myself short.  Most of the friends I have now I have had since I was a child.   To them, I am Hilary-- Hilary who doesn't read, and listens to the top 40, is overly sarcastic and has a bit of a gossiping problem.  That 'Hilary' will never do anything extrodinary or say anything that changes someone's life.  I don't blame my friends for this, I blame the fact that my insecurities prohibit me from stepping outside of the rut I have created for myself among this group of people.  I hate to quote gossip girl (ever) because let's be honest, the show is a guilty pleasure.  However, I was watching the other day and right as two of the main character's are about to rekindle their long anticipated romance,  Blair says: " I have to be Blair Waldorf before I can be Chuck Bass' girlfriend." As much as I metaphorically throw up in my mouth a little everytime I hear 'shoot for the stars', or 'don't let anyone stop you from achieving your dreams' I guess I am tired of only being who people think I am.  

Here comes the God made you special speech... 
But seriously.
God didn't make the Hilary who lives in someone's shadow. He didn't count every hair on my head so I could never do anything.  I really don't know what I'm saying here, but... I think I'm being called to do more. I think we all are.  It's just way too easy not to.

Looking foreward instead of back

Once again, we find another year coming to a close. This time last year I was in Seattle, surrounded by friends- and now I find myself on a bus half way to Calgary, with New Years festivities awaiting me on the other side.  I have a strange... policy, you could say.  I won't be at home for New Years.  So despite the fact that I was working tonight, I decided it was still necessary to hop on a bus and switch cities for the evening.  This year has brought about a lot of change, to say that least.  In hindsight, I think it was a year of testing.  When I ventured to Seattle one year ago, I remember feeling like I was barely keeping my head above water.  Drowning in schoolwork and emotion from failed relationships, I wasn't exactly at my peak.  So naturally, I ran from my problems.  I felt as though I had to go to Seattle, I had to get a breath of fresh air and momentarily shove away the discontenment of my life at home.  It was a good breather, but a week of vacation doesn't make everything go away.  When I came home everything was the same.   Not to say I have some terrible life, but I just couldn't see the goodness in it anymore. I couldn't see the goodness in anything.  Despite my lack of enthusiasm, I finished out the year at school.  

This year I went on five vacations.  I saw the world from the top of London and drank a pint of Guiness from the Brewery.  I kissed the Blarney stone and saw Temper Trap at the Showbox.  I watched the Stampeede in the rain and I met my first single serving friend.  I dragged myself and my backpack from Seattle to Portland to Vancouver to Calgary back to Seattle, then to Hamilton to Montreal followed by London to Dublin to Minneapolis and back to Calgary.  I think this says two things. One, I love to travel. I will starve if it means I can travel. And two, I don't like to face my problems.  When I get sick of life, I buy a plane ticket.  Some people gamble, and some people drink - I plan a trip.  I think it's probably unhealthy. Maybe one day I will change it.  There's something about breathing new air, meeting new people, seeing new scenery that beats any kind of high out there in my opinion.  When I step off a plane, I get this rush of emotion that makes me forget that anything else matters.  It's like having the world at your fingertips with nothing stopping you- you are where you want to be and you can do whatever you want.  

Now, as I sit on this coach with the bright lights whizzing by, I can't help but wonder what next year will bring.  Will the trials of this year lead up to something life changing? Will I see more heartache and dissapointment? Or, as what seems most likely... nothing will really change all that much.  I will go on being me; having ups and downs and for the most part hanging in there. I like how Death Cab puts it... "So this is the New Year, I don't feel any different." Just because the number at the end of the date changed, doesn't mean anything else did.

Epilogue: Once again this year I have decided not predetermine self disapointment by making New Years resolutions that I know I won't keep. So I didn't. I hope that in 2011 I will be true to myself and I don't expect any more.

Ireland

I suppose I never wrote about Ireland. With all the business of Christmas and Dan's death I've hardly had time to reflect on my trip at all. In the two weeks that I motored through Ireland, I thought it was an absolutely lovely country.  It has beautiful quiet country side, intersting history, busy cities and some of the most fun people you will ever meet.  I found the Ireland-ers quite a funny bunch, one guy from Dublin admitted that they just like to complain-they don't really care what it's about but they like to have something to complain about.  The finance minister seemed to be the flavour of the week. Appearently he is nearly as bad as the devil himself.  I'm not sure I came to any great revelations while I lugged my backpack from train to plane to train around the country, but I did learn that you see the rawness of people pretty quickly while you're travelling.  Not as a bad thing necessarily, but it's weird. It's almost like some sort of survival instinct kicks in and everyone's personalities are multiplied by 10.  Those little things that you could ignore about people are suddenly blaringly obvious when you go to sleep in the bed beside theirs and then wake up 8 hours later staring them in the face.  Everyone's slightly annoying habits are suddenly the baine of your existance and you wonder how you will ever talk to them again when your home.  But really it's not so bad, once you get home and have a few days to breathe, you realize that you were probably equally annoying yourself and remember times where you decided that you were much more worthy of the train seat then them, or the time that that you decided you should infact not have to have the top bunk.  Travelling around with these guy friends made me wonder if this was at all like marriage.  When you can choose to see people it's always great, because it's on your timetable - you see them when you are feeling sociable and looking nice and wanting to interact.  But it's a little different when they are just there. All the time.  Maybe it's different when you're madly in love with someone, but I just think maybe that's why so many people say that the first few years of marriage can be tough. When you look gross, they are there. When you're tired, they are there.  When you want to sleep, they want to read and when you want to stay in, they want to go out.

  I think that somewhat relates to having a servant's attitude.  I have an easy enough time putting in an hour or two of volunteer work when I've schedualed it into my week, made time for it, etc, etc.  But when i'm late to my appointment and then suddenly someone that i'm not all that fond of asks for an hour of my time to help them out with this or that, suddenly the whole put others first thing kind of hits the back burner.  Travelling with people wasn't like my neatly schedualed 2 hours each Wednesday night, it was all the time. It was when I was tired and grumpy and wanted me time and didn't want to ever see another human again.  I think maybe that's what Jesus was talking about.  Serving people is easy when you plan for it, but living a life devoted to being 2nd isn't quite as easily lived out.

Dan Edler

This last week has been busy, to say the least. In the last 5-ish days... I have been in 4 different countries, gone back to work, been to a wedding of a close friend, and also been to the funeral of a close friend.  I've been grieving, celebrating, reconnecting with old friends, and also meeting new ones.  I suppose this post, though, isn't about me. Sure, my week has been crazy... but that's not the point. The point is Dan Edler. I think his infectionious affect on people deserves to be recognized one more time.  One last pitiful ode to show the huge impact that boy had on my life in the 8 years I knew him.  I think it would be fair to say that Dan was the first boy to break my heart.  I was pretty sure he was the most beautiful man to walk the earth at age 13, and through many msn chats I began to grow an assurity that we were soul mates.  Of course, like always happens, we grew up.  My childhood crush was put behind me and we developed what I still consider a beautiful friendship.  I still don't know what good will come from his death, I don't know that I ever will.  There is something just completely wrong about watching your 19 year-old friends carry their friend out of a church in a coffin.  Knowing that someone's death wasn't an accident or "the right time" or the result of some overwhelming cancer adds a whole other element to the grieving process. There is nothing more natural to do than blame yourself.  Everyone says "don't blame yourself", and no matter how many times they say it... it's all you want to do. Because maybe, just maybe if you can spin the situation some way and make it your fault... then he didn't really have a problem, and he didn't really chose to take his own life. And somehow, in a strange way... it is comforting to put it all on yourself.  There is something warming about thinking that if only you had said this instead of that or been here instead of there, he would be alive. It's like a good pain... like picking off a scab that was bothering you, it hurts but in a nice way.  But at the end of the day, no matter how many scenarios you can come up with that make the situation depend on you... he's gone. And he's not coming back.  

Moving on... part 2 of the tragity nobody signed up for.  When I think of moving on from my friendship with Dan, it seems like the most horrible idea.  Just box up all your memories and put them in a special compartment in your brain in which you shove in the corner and don't open ever again so that you can go on and live a normal life as though that person never affected you at all.  I hate the thought.  But, at the same time I am reminded of that scene in one of the Narnia books. (The magicians nephew, I think). The Lion tears into his hard exterior, and starts pulling off his scales, and it hurts so bad but it's the only way he can be free.  I guess maybe that's the point of moving on.  Not pushing someone out of mind, but finding meaning beyond their death, if that makes sense. Seeing their death realistically and then waking up the next morning and facing life without them anyways.

I don't think I have anything figured out yet. All I know is... I miss my friend.