Life of a Dreamer

It's like the colors have extra meaning, and the things that everyone else thinks are important just aren't. It's whirling from one subject to another, sometimes faster than is socially acceptable. It's doing things because you thought about them or wanted to rather than because of society or fashion. It's being different, and not quite understanding anyone else, though it seems they all understand each other. It's like being trapped in the world of your own mind and enjoying it. It's being so scatterbrained that sometimes you get lost in your thoughts and miss something going on around you - a joke, or someone talks to you, and you feel bad asking them to repeat themselves, but you didn't hear because your mind was on who-knows-what, something like why the sky is blue, or about birds flying south, or the physics of Doctor Who, or that one thing that happened last week, whether wonderful or regrettable. It's being an idealist and wondering constantly about the future, whether destiny exists or it's a choice, and not being able to decide which you prefer. It's knowing that your dreaming is the cause of your heartbreak, that your blind faith leads you down the wrong roads all too easily because you can't believe the worst. Because you think you can make it better but you can't. It's somehow still dreaming after everything, imagining your future when you can't fall asleep. Wondering what your husband will be like, what you'll name your kids, how you'll raise them. It's believing that life can be beautiful even when horrible things happen, even when tragedy strikes. It's believing in God because you know He is the only reason that you're still alive, because a world like this beats down dreamers, it crushes them beneath the weight of its expectations, its logic, its "realism." But what is real after all? Isn't our reality two parts a construction of our own minds and one part what everyone else thinks? We make our own lives, but it's hard when you're a dreamer. That one part that rests in reality, it looms so large, and you are made to believe from a young age that somehow the part where others live is so much more important than the other two, and sometimes we dreamers lose to that part, and the two parts that are ours to make wither into dark shadowy places, and our dreaming turns against us. That same imagination that once saw a bright future now sees only the worst of tragedies, only heartbreak and sorrow. It sees the shadow before the sun, the darkness, and the weaknesses, every flaw in this inner world that once was so bright. And it's possible to come back, I've done it. More than once. Every time night falls on the inner world, the dreamer must sit and wait for the daylight. Because if they wait long enough it does come. Because the light from the other part, the "reality" slips over and reminds us that the world is beautiful once more. And God smiles down and blesses us, with something to lift us up and remind us that there is hope. So we find hope and faith and place them in the sky once more, to be the sunlight to our lonely hearts and the truth to our saddened souls, and the core of our brain and ideology. That's what it's like to be a dreamer, two parts inner world, sometimes bright, sometimes dark, and one part reality. And it's hard to tell the difference.

Five Words

I recently read this post over at the blog of my friends' RA, and decided to take the challenge. It was to describe yourself using only five words. So here goes!

Confident
Insecure
Believer
Dreamer
Constant

Okay, that's the simple part. Kind of.

I think I'll analyze/explain them now.

Feel free to stop reading. I won't be offended, promise.

This is a funny exercise, because I'm pretty sure the words would change, depending on the day. The experiences of my day have shaped how I think of myself this evening.

CONFIDENT: I am confident in who I am. I am confident in my with as a person and secure in the life I live. I am where I am supposed to be, and doing my best to be all I can. And in the end, there's no call to ask for more than someone's best, am I right?

INSECURE: Even though I'm mostly secure in who I am, there always gonna be something. My legs, my nose, my inherent desirability (as mentioned in the last post) and even sometimes doubts about the confidence that I have. That's part of being human, but it's enough of a struggle for me that it makes my list of words.

BELIEVER: I have so much faith, okay, religious and otherwise. In everything. I believe the best of everything. I believe in God and His gospel. I believe in my friends and in certain kinds of magic. I believe in miracles and in joy.

DREAMER: Constantly. I live in my dreams, through my dreams. I write them, I draw them, I remember them, I create them. I dream of fiction and of my future. I dream a lot of things.

CONSTANT: I don't change who I am. I try to be trustworthy, to be kind and sure, to be a rock when the world is roiling around us in a mass of sin and hurt and pain. If there's something you can count on, it's that I'll always be a friend. No matter what. No matter what I feel for you, what our past is, what you feel for me, whatever. You need a friend, I'll be there. Constant. I'll give my best to be the kind of friend that I want to have.

The end! If you got this far, then you are awesome. Have one free hug, to be redeemed next time you see me!