still thinking about love

let's just say that love and relationships have been on my mind in recent days.

okay, let's just say that love and relationships have been on my mind in recent years. who am i trying to kid?

but the conversations around these parts have focused even more on the nuances and challenges of love within the past week or so, which means there is even more opportunity for me to reflect on such matters. here are some of my observations, some of which i knew before but have just hit home again:

it's all about the timing. this is true whether you are currently between relationships, currently in a relationship, or have never been in a relationship. sometimes people are totally right for each other, but the timing just isn't right yet. sometimes all the stars need to align in just the right order for you to find the one person who will make you completely and incandescently happy for eternity--right place, right time, right version of yourself.

communication is key. i, for the most part, am terrified of confrontation. last week i was going to ask someone a question, not even about me, that would have put both of us in kind of an awkward situation depending on the answer, and i was paralyzed by anxiety. that stuff freaks me out. but, in order for relationships to be healthy, you have to address hard issues or things that just plain bug you. i know from experience that bottling things up and letting them fester never leads to a good outcome. in fact, it often leads to hurt feelings or, at the worst, broken/ruined relationships, which isn't really the legacy i want to be leaving. so, it's important to buck up and face the issues head on. we blow things out of proportion in our minds; they are almost never as severe as we have built them up to be. open discussion of feelings and perceptions, though difficult, is absolutely necessary.

some guys give insightful, useful advice about love and relationships. some guys don't. maybe this says more about me and the kind of guy i want to end up with (meaning, maybe the guys who give the most insightful advice are the ones i should be focusing my attentions on...). but i'm learning how valuable it can be to have guy friends who take these sorts of things seriously and who genuinely care about making things a little easier for girls. i mean, i feel the same way about guys--it's hard enough to find someone you can be with forever without factoring in that we think about things in completely different ways. we might as well help each other out!

we're probably all a little bit screwed up. we could all probably use some good heart-to-hearts about our feelings and insecurities and anxieties every so often. this might even include some tears. or many, many tears.

the more i think about it, the more it makes sense to date your friends. i've never believed in the limiting influence of the friend zone, and i discredit it even more now. why wouldn't you want to marry somebody with whom you already know you want to be on a daily basis? someone who is cool enough to go with you to a haunted insane asylum on friday the 13th (this is purely hypothetical...)? someone who knew you better than anyone else before you added the pressure of a romantic relationship? date your friends--if you don't marry one of them, you're not going to be friends with them for long anyway. you don't hang out with people of the opposite sex once you're married, because that's not cool. why risk your eternal relationship for one that might not last another year anyway?

you gotta have faith. enough said.

and, finally, even though love hurts, love bites, love is cruel, love is worth it. what's not worth it is being afraid to get hurt and so not taking risks and not being patient and not trusting in THE PLAN and not being happy.

that's what i think anyway.

happy first day of spring!

it is officially spring, officially the time when winter should be over and making way for warmer weather and beautiful blooms and singing birds. spring weather is peeking through today in provo, so i am hopeful that it will make more of an appearance in the days to come.

happy spring!

driving music

i recently embarked on two nine hour car trips, to and from arizona, and we were in the car a lot to get to our various exciting destinations. during these drives, we were mostly listening to one of our ipods, though the long stretches of musical enjoyment were sometimes punctuated by talking (though, since i was in the back the whole time, i couldn't hear the talking up front. they maybe got a little tired of my pleas to speak up or turn the music down so i could be included in the conversation (maybe the point was that they didn't want me in the conversation... nope, couldn't be. i am a superb conversationalist. i think.)).

anyway. since i got home i've been looking up the bands jesse introduced us to and remembering how much i love the stuff i already knew. here are some of the standouts, the songs i'm still thinking about and listening to, with a more complete playlist at the end.

jimmy eat world-jimmy eat world
i was just saying to meredith how i needed to listen to this album again. the whole thing is so good. i couldn't believe i remembered all the words.

keane-hopes and fears
this album came on at around 10pm on the drive down as we were leaving page and making our way through northern arizona. i was singing almost at the top of my voice out into the darkened void. it's another album i own and love but have not listened to in years. i forgot how good it is.

miracle fortress-five roses and was i the wave?
jesse and james both claim that miracle fortress is perfect driving music, and i agree to the point that i want to listen more closely to both of these albums. i couldn't find the song i wanted on playlist.com, so here's the video.

lcd soundsystem-particularly "dance yrself clean"
we listened to this on the way to bahama buck's, and i knew we were in store for something awesome when the boys up front paused the song when cassidy was on the phone. i have probably listened to this song seven or eight times since saturday, which is saying a lot since it is nine minutes long. i may or may not dance around my room every time i hear it.

noah and the whale-particularly "L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N."
the trip wouldn't have been complete with a little noah and the whale.

celine dion-"it's all coming back to me now"
falling into you was one of the first albums i ever owned, and this song is a staple in our apartment whenever we want to be dramatic and sing our little hearts out, but it's been years since i listened to the complete extended version. and singing it in the car, everyone except james, was pretty epic.

so there you have it. a sampling of our arizona soundtrack.

(just as an fyi: at least one song on this playlist has some colorful language. i couldn't find an edited version. and i haven't listened to all of these tracks from playlist.com all the way through, so hopefully weird stuff doesn't happen. but just be forewarned.)

back from hiatus

i've been in arizona for the past week out adventuring and basking in the delightful sun instead of blogging. i'll get back to that soon.

but for today. this amazing letter was exactly what i needed today.

i think about love a lot, clearly.

From the iPad lab

I decided that, since I don't get to use iPads everyday, I might as well post on my blog using one. So here I am. And it's capitalizing things I don't normally capitalize, so that's a little annoying. But generally, I feel pretty cool right now, typing on my iPad, answering student questions about research, trying not to think about how much stuff I have to do in the next few days. I think this little escapade is nearly over, but I might be back later today. I feel the need to write. Signing off from the iPad lab. Over and out.

the best kind of sunday

there are two kinds of sundays, in my experience. first, there are those sundays where you wake up and everything is covered in snow, even though snow has been forecast for weeks and nothing has happened. of course, snow will fall on the one day you walk around in precarious footwear and a dress. and you also know that the consequences of this massive snowfall will be around for days, if not weeks, forcing you to take baby steps around campus in order to avoid a slip on the ice (one of your most dreaded occasions).

but second, and most importantly, there are those glorious sundays where the sun is shining and the breeze is gently wafting and you come home from church and keep your front door open all afternoon and you go sit on a blanket in the beaming sun and stick your too-white legs out from under your skirt and then lay on the lawn of the library with your friends and later play games and laugh and laugh.

yesterday was one of those sundays. i can't wait for spring.

artful fences

every day for the past two years i have walked past this lovely fence at the complex across the street from us.

{insert picture of beautiful wrought iron fence with upside down hearts kind of like this, but not exactly}

i was searching searching searching for a picture of this fence to do it justice because it's so beautiful. in the afternoon, when the sun shines at the right angle, the sidewalk is patterned with shadow hearts. and every time i seem those perfect shadow hearts, i think how badly i want to capture that simple beauty so i can see it all the time. 

yesterday, i walked by the elms, and these fences were laying on the grass, dismantled and forlorn. and i was/am incredibly sad. because what if i will never get the opportunity to see those beautiful hearts again or take more pictures when the sunlight is just perfect? so i'm hoping and hoping that these fences, which bring me such joy on a fairly regular basis, are just down temporarily and will be back up soon.

here's to hope.