memories and gas money

Less than 24 hours notice for a road trip is a good thing, in my opinion. The likelihood of it actually taking place increases exponentially. 3 days in California + 1 day driving between the beach and Orem = 4 days of expensive gas and good times. The company was quality, the rooms were free, the sand was hot, and some guy hammered a nail into his nose and pulled it out with pliers to try and earn tips on Huntington Beach; all key factors to a successful beach trip. The only downside to this whole adventure was that I don't speak Spanish, but that's a story for a different time.

You know a road trip is successful when it makes some memories. I will now always remember that TK Burgers is super tasty and so were the 50 buffalo wings that we ordered at Wings 'n Things. Sunscreen should only be applied after the sunburn is already on your shoulders and beach volleyball should definitely be taken less seriously than it is. Also, a mouth full of salt water tastes much better when you realize that its 48 degrees and raining in Utah. And sometimes a blind guitarist will allow your friend to play his own song on a small stage set up in the Irvine Spectrum Shopping Center. Sometimes that might inspire you to take your own guitar playing a little more seriously, and your ability to see a little less for granted. Oh, and I'll for sure remember that driving 45 minutes out of the way to try and find gas that is 2 cents cheaper is a huge waste of time, but I already knew that.

my thoughts at 30x

I don't like to write these things down, but I do it anyway. Maybe its therapeutic, but I have my doubts. This pen is like a leech draining my thoughts onto paper. And by the time four lines of what I think or feel is scribbled unevenly across college-ruled lines, my thought breaks and my feelings ebb away.

I wish I didn't have to use something to write with. So much gets lost in translation as my thoughts run down the back of my neck, across my right shoulder, and down my arm to the tips of my fingers that hold this dollar-store pen. Wouldn't it be nice to feel and think and have those thoughts, as they were meant to be, just appear on the page? But that doesn't happen.

I worry that by the time my thoughts have reached the crevice of my elbow that they are no longer my own. They have been diluted so thoroughly that they barely exist anymore--like homeopathy at 30x. They become catered to the ones that might someday read my thoughts and feelings. I can't explain it. Maybe my pure, undiluted thoughts would be harmful or fatal if swallowed, and my subconscious knows that. Maybe that's why they change as they run their course from cortex to cuticle.

I want to tell you what I really think and feel without it killing you. Things would be much easier if you could just read my mind; if you could get to those thoughts before I have time to put them down on paper and ruin them. I wonder what you would think of me. I worry about what you would know of me.

I'm convinced that you wouldn't love me if you knew everything. Only God can know everything and still love. But for some reason I still want you to know. You can love so much and you don't know it yet. But not enough.

I don't like to write these things down. It isn't honest. The effort is, but the result isn't. The ends betray my means.

the way of all the earth

Sometimes I wonder if there is a cyber-graveyard for forgotten blogs. If there is, I imagine it looks something like the Arlington National Cemetery, except instead of little white headstones there are thousands and thousands of little orange Blogger icons. It would contrast nicely with the green grass in the summer and they might even look like some sort of flower if you squint your eyes from a distance.
Anyways, my blog almost joined those nameless ranks of forgotten blogs. It took an iron lung to keep it going for as long as I was away, but I elected not to pull the plug just yet. Not that anyone cares anyways. Anyways...