True Story

A bird flew in the house where I was working and got caught in between the blinds.

The owner of the house tried using a trash bag, then a towel to catch it and set it free.

I suggested using a broom to guide it out, 

but as much as this bird wanted to get out, it was mostly scared by all the commotion of us chasing it around. I got so frustrated after a while and then for whatever reason, I imagined myself as the bird. Confused, afraid, just trying to get out and go on with my life. 

Almost in an instant after this realization, I said to her, "all living creatures are always looking for the light. Let's close the blinds and doors but leave one window open and leave it alone, in time, it'll find his way out and fly away."

And eventually it did.

Life doesn't have to be so complicated.
 If we take the time to stop & think, sometimes the simplest of things are the best solutions. 

random word spilleage

I'm the kind of person who believes in the power of silence.
 I think that sometimes things are so far beyond anything one can say to be able to describe. We just have to close our eyes and feel.

As much as I love the sounds of the city, where you don't even have to leave your house to feel like you're at a party or in a street full of strangers with more lights flashing before you than you can handle, I also love the sound of nature and the peace and silence of just being. 
Watching all the trees & bushes and flowers dancing to the rhythm of the wind while birds fly by is like a full on Broadway production of the beauty of life. Then all the other animals around come into the chorus and the sun or the clouds make their entrance for the grand finale and your mind is just blown. 

I've thought about what I would do if I was stranded on a deserted island with nothing but my clothes and I think I would drive myself crazy. Not out of desperation for wanting to be rescued but more out of the joy I'd find in being there.
 I would spend hours looking for the perfect spot to lay down and watch the time pass me by. I would probably write a novel on the way a tree branch moves, the sounds it makes, what it makes me feel, the way it looks, the smells invading my lungs while I watch it, the flow of the wind and how it graces my body as it passes through me and what it makes me feel as it does so... 
I'm sure no one would read it past page two if I ever got rescued and it was published cause it would be the biggest book written on five minutes of watching a tree branch while laying on the ground.
They'd put me in a home and maybe make me watch MTV all day to burn some of my brain cells and kill my imagination for good just so I would stop describing why I take joy in such little random things, like the sound of my keyboard as I'm typing this. It's like a melody in a sense. 

Someone once said to me that our thoughts and feelings can be traitors, 
but if we disconnect our thoughts from our feelings, 
we will actually feel and know what's true.

moving along

With no worry about how long it would take me to get to my car I parked nearly five miles away the previous night, I hit the road on another walking adventure. 

I normally choose the recreation path but today I was determined to make it there walking along the beach. 

Workout clothes on, water bottles filled, iPod fully charged and nothing else to do the rest of the day. The first mile or so kept me wondering if I should've taken the bus instead, but the second I got to see and smell the ocean, I knew I'd made the right choice. Head phones on, music filling my ears; one minute it was a song that described my life and the next it was something that made my sadness worse and the next it was something that gave me hope or made me want to fly. 

The way that every grain of sand felt on my bare feet as my toes sunk into it with every step I took. The way the wind gently caressed my brown hair and made it grace my face as I tried to sweep it away behind my ears. At one point I lost all my thoughts and the music became more like a soft background sound in the movie of my life. I met and pet about a dozen dogs along the way, I talked to people I'd normally ignore, I saw runners and kids and surfers.

 Halfway on my way, I turned to look back and shed a few tears when I saw the people I had just passed in the distance, but nobody walking behind me. I took off my headphones for a minute so I could hear the ocean and it gave me a sense of peace. I closed my eyes, stretched my arms out, aimed my face at the vastness of the blue sky illuminated by the sun and decorated by the white trail of the plane going by, the sound of birds flying above me and the waves crashing on the shore. 

It was kind of a reminder that people & things come and go, but you can find beauty in letting go and keep going forward with your head up... Headphones back on, I lost my thoughts again and the joy of feeling that crisp blue endless water, the sand and the wind on my face, made me realize once again that all of our every day problems are nothing compared to the size of the world we breathe in. 

I danced around to the next song, skipped and jumped around like a fool and I didn't care who was watching me (even got a compliment on my dancing from the couple sitting by the stairs who had been watching me and enjoyed my freak show.)

On another Saturday night, I would probably call up everyone to see what they were doing and maybe go out and pretend to cure my sorrows with a cocktail or five; today, I'm going to spend it home alone watching at least three chick flicks I promised myself I would never watch, box of tissues in hand.

Part of the joy of being alive is experiencing pain. My favorite saying is that nothing ever goes away until it teaches us what we need to learn. Today I learned a little bit to let it go.

Don't give up on your willingness to be happy no matter what. These days were meant for us to live, to run wild and be free... Enjoy the little things :)

Inspiration Called

I have an incredible gift of dancing to an entirely different beat than everyone else around me... I have been accused of dancing to commercials and ring tones. I have been told to bring my own fence to live shows. 

Yesterday I heard so much great live music on the streets of Pacific Grove and felt an incredible need to dance.. Move like an idiot. Wave my arms around like some stoned hippie at Woodstock. Jump. Bop and pop to every beat. Drum my fingers on my legs and try to follow each instrument as if I knew the song the band was playing.

I tried to make the cutest little blonde haired boy with amazing blue eyes dance with me and he not only didn't care for me or try to dance, but he looked at my feet and then looked up at me with this "crazy lady" stare while his parents looked on with this "yay!" face waiting for him to try to dance with me; or they could have just been enjoying the music for all I know... 

I jumped in the crowd of female dancers at the Latin stage with my blue Guatemalan satchel hanging from left to right shoulder that was filled with random things (including four wine glasses I had bought earlier) and danced. I ran into a lot of old friends and new friends, and although I didn't talk to any of them for more than a few minutes, it was good to see them and what they're doing with in their lives.  

There's a saying that goes something like "never look back unless you're planning to go there."

This morning I woke up feeling so blah and uninspired. I went through old photos and watched this video again. 

Travel back to my dance beginnings in 2005 when I had the biggest insecurities, the smallest waist, the perfect shade of brown skin and the biggest inability to let go on the dance floor and just enjoy the music and be free. Come back to today. Inspiration called.  :)