You have to experience Ache
to heal the infection
the cuts that clear the pain away

Without the staying out late
hair soaking wet kind of fun
Maybe that infection would be gone

The dark contrast
makes happy seem much more
But seriously who wants boring.

Bring on the pain

a deep solitude that strips the soul of the protective rubber.
Exposing the wiring risking the chance of electrocution
of the senses.
Don't flood me with emotion.

brisk feeling
matches the briskness flooding in
a relief
from the closeness of heat
the proximity that encroaches on your privacy
that exposes you to the elements
now I can once again separate the outside
and somehow draw closer to those nearby
no longer afraid of what they might see
of how close they could get
because the cold hides the truth in a veil
and the brisk feeling makes me comfortable

Kristie

Today was impeccable. Let me go forth and describe. There are things in life that cannot possibly make you any happier. Like Spring rain in Autumn; showers that drizzle on and off, hard and soft, dark and light. The combination that defies odds but blooms nevertheless as winter approaches. So to celebrate I took the long way home with the windows rolled down as spring mixed with autumn just as winter approached, which is ironically like new life that cares not of boundaries and perceived normals. It's should be an escape from reality. This situation is perfectly tangible. Defying odds.

Song of the moment.
To every thing, turn, turn, turn
There is a season, turn, turn, turn
And a time to every purpose under heaven
A time to be born, a time to die
A time to plant, a time to reap
A time to kill, a time to heal
A time to laugh, a time to weep

To everything, turn, turn, turn
There is a season, turn, turn, turn
And a time to every purpose under heaven
A time to build up, a time to break down
A time to dance, a time to mourn
A time to cast away stones
A time to gather stones together

To everything, turn, turn, turn
There is a season, turn, turn, turn
And a time to every purpose under heaven
A time of love, a time of hate
A time of war, a time of peace
A time you may embrace
A time to refrain from embracing

To everything, turn, turn, turn
There is a season, turn, turn, turn
And a time to every purpose under heaven
A time to gain, a time to lose
A time to rend, a time to sew
A time to love, a time to hate
A time for peace, I swear it's not too late

I am thouroughly dissappointed in a person I had until today looked up to. She accused me of doing something purposefully just to break a rule. And that as the only reason. I thought that the respect that I give her is at least returned halfway. But apparently it is not. Maybe I will write more later, but for now I will just fume.

Today the epiphany occurred. If you read that as the epiphany, congratulations, you passed your middle school reading classes I am sure.

Summary of epiphany:
Moderate Political Views (which are my own, not pressed upon me by my upbringing)
No children until 30
Live in large city, not small town

Revelations change you each time. The effects are small and lasting. Gradually they morph into a completely different person, changed from the beginning, but not painful steps. Instead the change is performed in a graceful and fluid, well paced motion. The problem results when we reflect on the past and compare. The difference is dissonance that creates rifts in our happiness. The rifts are filled with regrets of changes and decisions. But when boiled down can be analyzed and resolved as follows....

In life we make decisions. We may experience a curiousity of whether things would have been better if done another way. The truth is, that each individual is capable of analyzing the choices in front of them in any situation. I am a firm believer that you choose the most appealing to you the first time, and thus the most appealing, and highly desirable route becomes your choice. If you were decisive enough to make the choice the first time, then the odds are likely that you are in the best place at the best time and are having the best possible outcome in comparison to what else could be happening. If you didn't arrive at a situation or station in life through any decisions, then you cannot regret. So the loophole is negated. You made the decision and are ultimately in the best suited...and curiousity killed the cat.


New Show of the day: NIP TUCK

I saw this on another journal...obviously it applies during my own lifetime.
1. What was the first car your family had?
A Club Wagon (the big vans)

2. What was the name of your first pet and why?
"She dog" obviously it was a girl, and it was named by my mom a couple years before I was born. She and her brother, "He dog" were my parents. He Dog died before my life.

3. What did you want to be when you grew up?
3rd Grade: Physicist
4th Grade: Physics major + being a Doctor
8th Grade: Physics major + decided the Doctor was anesthesiologist
10th Grade: Chemistry major + Anesthesiologist


4. What was the name of your elementary school?
Primary: Sallie Zetterower
Secondary: Julia P. Bryant

5. Who was your first best friend?
-not applicable-

6. Are you still friends today, and if not, what happened?
-not applicable-

7. What was your favorite board game?
Chutes and Ladders

8. Did you play house or other make believe games?
Yes all the time.

9. Were you a Dungeons and Dragons geek?
No, but at 16 I saw the movie with my boyfriend that was.

10. Did you sleep with stuffed animals as a kid?
I did. I must confess that.

11. Do you still sleep with stuffed animals?
No.

12. Who was the first person you looked up to when you were younger?
Besides my parents obviously, Mother Teresa and Rachel Carson.

13. Who was your favorite relative?
Um........dont know.

14. Were you short or tall in elementary school?
Tall

15. Were you teased in school?
Not so much about the height or anything. It was all teasing about
grades. I had perfect grades until 11th grade. And I finally got a B, so there I said it, I was a dork.

16. What was the name of your favorite teacher?
Mrs. Smith, she taught QUEST

17. What was the name of your least favorite teacher?
Mrs. Harden, a black lady who couldn't speak English correctly. Ironically she taught English.

18. What was your best subject in school?
Math and Science

19. What was your worst subject in school?
Worst, I thought was writing/english (the grades didn't really reflect that)

20. Did you do well in Physical Education?
Yes.

21. Were you clumsy when you were younger?
Never

22. Who was your favorite band as a kid?
Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel

23. What was your favorite movie as a kid?
Courage Mountain

24. Did your parents read to you?
Yes

25. Did you have a favorite book?
Mom and Dad Reading: Miss Suzy by Miriam Young and Arnold Lobel
Later: The Missing Gator of Gumbo Limbo by Jean Craighead George

26. What was your favorite restaurant as a kid?
Shoney's - You have to be from Statesboro to realize the importance of Shoney at the time.

27. What TV or movie star did you have a crush on?
Never had a crush on anyone.

28. Do you now wonder what you were thinking?
No.

29. Who was your first crush in school?
Um... J. Brannen and Adam Martin

30. As a child, what kind of car did you want when you grew up?
A seagreen Chevy Z71 through at least 5th or 6th grade.

31. Did your parents spank you?
Once.

32. Did your parents fight a lot when you were a kid?
Yes.

33. Did your parents get divorced or stay married?
Stayed married.

34. If they got divorced, how old were you when it happened?
-not applicable-

35. Did you ever run away from home?
no

36. How old were you when/if you first got glasses?
never had glasses

37. Did you need braces or a retainer?
yes both. 7th grade - 8th grade after summer.

38. If you're male, how old were you when you had your first wet dream?
-not applicable-

39. Both sexes when did you start shaving?
8th grade

40. Girls when did you start wearing a bra?
6th grade

41. What was your first kiss like?
Um... should i remember that

42. What did you do on your first date?
Um...don't remember this either, but this was with a guy named Jeff. Around homecoming time.

43. How old were you when you first drank?
21. yeah thats right...TWENTY ONE.

44. Where was your first house?
I haven't owned a house yet, so the first one I remember of my parents was in Statesboro in Ramble Woods.

Three days before October the 6th
I remembered that he was only 3 days away
And then the time would be 5 years
Surviving without him
Seemingly impossible but accomplished
And then on the twelth of October
I remembered that I forgot to remember on the 6th
I cried.
I forgot him on his day, his last day.
And I realized my bereavement period is over.
I can move on.
I may have loved and lost
but I can love again and again and again.
Kristie Collins 10/26/05

This is the inspiration of my name in case this isn't actually on here somewhere....

"Patterns"

I walk down the garden paths,
And all the daffodils
Are blowing, and the bright blue squills.
I walk down the patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
With my powdered hair and jewelled fan,
I too am a rare
Pattern. As I wander down
The garden paths.


My dress is richly figured,
And the train
Makes a pink and silver stain
On the gravel, and the thrift
Of the borders.
Just a plate of current fashion,
Tripping by in high-heeled, ribboned shoes.
Not a softness anywhere about me,
Only whalebone and brocade.
And I sink on a seat in the shade
Of a lime tree. For my passion
Wars against the stiff brocade.
The daffodils and squills
Flutter in the breeze
As they please.
And I weep;
For the lime-tree is in blossom
And one small flower has dropped upon my bosom.


And the plashing of waterdrops
In the marble fountain
Comes down the garden-paths.
The dripping never stops.
Underneath my stiffened gown
Is the softness of a woman bathing in a marble basin,
A basin in the midst of hedges grown
So thick, she cannot see her lover hiding,
But she guesses he is near,
And the sliding of the water
Seems the stroking of a dear
Hand upon her.
What is Summer in a fine brocaded gown!
I should like to see it lying in a heap upon the ground.
All the pink and silver crumpled up on the ground.


I would be the pink and silver as I ran along the paths,
And he would stumble after,
Bewildered by my laughter.
I should see the sun flashing from his sword-hilt and the buckles
on his shoes.
I would choose
To lead him in a maze along the patterned paths,
A bright and laughing maze for my heavy-booted lover,
Till he caught me in the shade,
And the buttons of his waistcoat bruised my body as he clasped me,
Aching, melting, unafraid.
With the shadows of the leaves and the sundrops,
And the plopping of the waterdrops,
All about us in the open afternoon --
I am very like to swoon
With the weight of this brocade,
For the sun sifts through the shade.


Underneath the fallen blossom
In my bosom,
Is a letter I have hid.
It was brought to me this morning by a rider from the Duke.
"Madam, we regret to inform you that Lord Hartwell
Died in action Thursday se'nnight."
As I read it in the white, morning sunlight,
The letters squirmed like snakes.
"Any answer, Madam," said my footman.
"No," I told him.
"See that the messenger takes some refreshment.
No, no answer."
And I walked into the garden,
Up and down the patterned paths,
In my stiff, correct brocade.
The blue and yellow flowers stood up proudly in the sun,
Each one.
I stood upright too,
Held rigid to the pattern
By the stiffness of my gown.
Up and down I walked,
Up and down.


In a month he would have been my husband.
In a month, here, underneath this lime,
We would have broke the pattern;
He for me, and I for him,
He as Colonel, I as Lady,
On this shady seat.
He had a whim
That sunlight carried blessing.
And I answered, "It shall be as you have said."
Now he is dead.


In Summer and in Winter I shall walk
Up and down
The patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
The squills and daffodils
Will give place to pillared roses, and to asters, and to snow.
I shall go
Up and down,
In my gown.
Gorgeously arrayed,
Boned and stayed.
And the softness of my body will be guarded from embrace
By each button, hook, and lace.
For the man who should loose me is dead,
Fighting with the Duke in Flanders,
In a pattern called a war.
Christ! What are patterns for?

- Amy Lowell

FALLLLLLLLL BREAAAAAAAAAAAKKKKKKK!!!! Need I say more?

It's thrilling love, that gives me butterflies.
It is an escape from the harsh reality.
It is my passion to run. to run away.

I am living in a floating equilibrium. Neither up nor down is truly a direction. It's like those $3000 plane rides for a moment of weightlessness. Ironically, mentally feeling the same way is free for me. It's an artistic and mental free form that's boundaries do not exist. My thoughts wander, my focuses are brief and fleeting to other places. I am satiated with a empty fullness. I have responsive behavior, often spontaneous. It's as living is in autopilot.
So fly.

It has been a long time and rightfully so. I am tired. very tired. While being around my sorority is fun it also makes me wonder. Sometimes I feel like a fly on the wall. No one really sees me. No one really cares. I can deal. On the other hand the summer was impressively satisfying. I spent a lot of time with guys. And frankly now that all the other girls are on campus spendin time with the guys, I sorta feel left out. I was a matter of convenience during the summer time. And now have been replaced. They are much prettier and skinnier and fun loving than I. No wonder the guys would rather hand out with them. Dang laziness and it's acheived potential of keeping me overweight. well what I consider overweight. School wise: I have interesting classes, enough said. Peace out for now.

Back in the day there was this girl who was raised to be an ecologically sensed individual with tom-boyish habits and a passion for nearly everything. I was born to two hippies who ironically were slowly trying to settle into the so-called "normal" way of life. My father played in a "rock-n-roll" band that consumed most nights and weekends. The parental units attended Georgia Southern University at the beginning of the 70s decade. In a freak occurance....one of my mom's friends kept telling her about this guy she thought my mom would like.....who played and sang in a band. So they got to know each other and soon were engaged. Unfotunately not everything is as smooth as butter; mom's catholic/methodist South Carolinian family looked down on my father's smalltown Southern baptist parentless upbringing and playing in a rock band didn't help. Even with this negative influence they married at 21 and 20 on June 20, 1972 outside, at my dad's aunt's house, where he wore a pair of brown pants and cream colored blazer and she wore a pepto-bismol pink dress that was as short as his jacket. (way to go mom!) 10.5 years passed before they had me. From the start I was forever clung to my parents. I had the classic farah fossett hair that feathered out. I was taught to love nature, to recycle, to love animals....I was the growing up as the child every hippy-couple wanted. By the time I reached elementary school, I persuaded my mom to quit wearing make-up, I wrote papers on the environment and read books (fictional and non fictional) about the ecosystem and ecologists. I was weird. really weird. I was a very loving child. And then somewhere in there I changed. Around 6th grade or so, I finally wanted to fit in, to be popular. And so I tried to wear fashionable things and I chopped my long blonde hair off in 7th grade. Slowley exiting the hippy child, nature lover. By highschool, I was not as happy as I used to be, but I was on my way to becoming someone totally different. At 16 my best guy friend took a bullet to hit head (shot by hisself). And I rebounded from his loss into a 7th month totally consuming relationship that ended horribly through lots and lots of lies on my boyfriend's part. Then I had to face losing him and my friends suicide - since i had never faced the whole ordeal. My senior year I was sad for the most part and very alone. So now I bypass those sad feelings. I pretend enough to convince myself that I too am happy. But to tell the truth all I want to do is go back to 1990 and live again. Live again as the environmentally aware and the nature loving kid that I was. Too bad we all have to grow up.

Due to a technical failure my sole creativity has been postponed and will resume at a later date. Suggested topics are: Whiskey River and the great sport of Tennis.

In the latest news: Not only is Whiskey River the country themed club at the edge of Macon, there is also a website that hosts beautiful poetry that can be felt within the soul. Check it out at www.whiskeyriver.blogspot.com It is by far a very impressive sight.

In the tennis world, it appears to a friend named Trey that Andre Agassi is now a member of the most recent Fear Factor. What has the sport world come to? Is it not enough that Anna Kornakova is known for her body and not her game, that Serena is required by her agent to get shorter tennis dresses. We have really taken over the wrong facet if that is what tennis is about. I seem to be amazingly deft at tennis. Because I lack the skills really necessary to play it allows me very frequently to outsmart my opponent. My body and racket face one way....the ball is drawn in the other direction. P-h-enomenal!!! Friends and I, we have had a great time playing tennis in the past couple of weeks.

Signing out. All you ladies and gentlemen have a wonderful evening.

So this week I was a workaholic.  It occurs to me that the money I can make in a 12 hour shift with a wage of 6 bucks an hour comes roughly to $72.  That’s just enough to pay for 3 $24 meals and not have anything left. Impressive.  Last night was the end of my nerves.  I cannot take being toyed with.  If someone is going to want me to be serious about our potential relationship they need to not get gun-shy or mad at me when I may not completely understand.  Inconsiderate people.  Sometimes you just have to let things happen. 

 

Last week was, for the first time in my life, me time.  More appropriately it was a critical cornerstone for me relying on my own decisions.  I finally grasped the fact that I cannot have predetermined expectations for things.  I must, instead, come to firm realization that things will happen how they are supposed to happen and until they do happen that my decision need to be based on me, not based on a future that I expect to happen.  Point said.

 

I am now a management psych. major.  I will graduate from Mercer.  I will work for 3 years hopefully at a management consulting firm that I will have interned with my senior year at the great MU.  Later I will either attend GT or UGA to get a MBA in management consulting or something of the sorts.  And you know what?  To tell myself all this and to make those plans, and not worry about what others are thinking of me not being a doctor, environmentalist, or a teacher, or an interior designer – IT FEELS GOOD. really good.  It feels like I suddenly have made my own decision and if I am disappointing someone then I apologize.  I have not put a family into the equation or a husband for that matter.  If I find someone by then it will work if it’s going to work, no sense in me worrying about it right now. 

 

I will return once again to the blessed homeland.  Unfortunately the wicked witch of Florida, conveniently known as my Aunt Linda, will be staying at my otherwise friendly abode.  I believe I will need to fumigate my room once she leaves.  I hope she didn’t kill my cat.

 

It’s highly likely at this point in time that I may collapse.  I am worn out, mentally confused, and still going full force.  I plan on passing out on Friday and waking back up Sunday. What a waste of a weekend.  In reality none of that will happen.  Instead I will wake up tomorrow at 7:00 am hit the University Center at 8:00 am.  Check to make sure I don’t have to do orientation, pack a suitcase for the weekend, drive down a secluded road into the wilderness (otherwise known as I-16), and then eat boiled peanuts to my hearts content. and peace.  Peace is always in south rural Georgia.  Lots of stars and very little noise, make the stars brighter and the still quiet noises louder.  It’s life abundant.  Something that I need at this present moment is just that.  I need to feel the love radiating off the southern asphalt roads in the noonday heat, the cool comfort of the 100 degree shade.  It’s odd when life throws you those elements and you are all the more happy.  While here in Macon, I dread each day.  I wake up and I don’t have time to see the sunrise, or even stop to hear the birds.  I get home from work after the sunset and too early to hear the owls (2 or 3 live nearby).  I am consumed in the elements urbania.  All I want is a little house in the country on the river with some horses and dogs.  Maybe then I will finally reach my potential. 

i seem to lose my inspiration when i am in a good mood. It's as if the smiles deplete my brain cells. I cannot devote the time to keep this journal up and to my ever hectic life at the same time. i thought this morning that i could escape my past, but it comes back to me in undetermined amplitude. sometimes it is largescale, and at other times it is in small tolerable doses. one small half cup serving is all i received today. And you know what? I can actually handle it. I didn't die and I came out still rather happy. Being productive here in mactown teaches me that I can accomplish many things, when i am either bored or stressed. Bored is what i have been, but I am making money being bored, so I am not complaining. Today i learned what they do at cheerleading camps they do "courtney says" it's like simon says, but this one head cheerleader was giving the instructions with courtney says do this thing, or that thing, and then do this and people always messed up....i about died laughing. though I have to admit.......when i realized i was in the same arena as them i stiffled my laughter and kept on walking towards the elevator where i could hide myself and giggle....no actually gaffaw. in the elevator. gaffawing. gaffawing my heart out. no that's a little exaggerated, but you get the point. i realized today how much i miss the internet, so this weekend, or next week, i am definitely talking to cox digital cable and fast access internet and seeing what i will have to give....arm...leg....first born child....and i can have my internet back. I also hope the people at the embroidery place iron my panels of fabric before monogramming them.........the fabric needs it. the summer has been uneventful yet full......not much time left in my schedule.......but things seem to mosey on by....

interesting. Very interesting. I have this strange curiosity about people, about who they are, what they think, why they do things. I like to be able to conjure up the reasons people are who they are. Granted, I don't automatically internalize their problems as my mother does, claiming "oh heavens, he is such an inconsiderate person" etc. I like to think that the things that have happened in their life have shaped them but not made them a lesser person. My tendency is to attribute their decisions to some external factors. For instance, a angered man in the car next to us yelled at the older woman in front of him. Many would assume this man was of impatient character. On the other hand, I counter that maybe the man earlier was on his day off and called into work, not a happy circumstance mind you, therefore, he is on the edge, and a slow elderly driver is not what he needs in front of his vehicle. Or a middle aged female and male sit next to each other in a sparkling cherry red BMW Z4 brand new. Internalize the problem and of course they are going through their midlife crisis, externalize it, maybe they have always liked sportscars, it's new because they just traded in the other one.

I like people, not necessarily being with them all the time, but knowing them, studying them from afar like a species yet completely discovered and understood by humans. Ironically, humans are not understood and completely discovered yet by others. We are amazingly so complex in thought that we are able to manipulate others and diguise our true thoughts. We are able to be moral, or immoral on any whim and at any notice. We are not characteristically angry but neither are we characteristically passive.

My brother's intelligence astounds me. I wish I had his insight, his logic, his keen memory. I think at one point in time I may have been on the road to developing these attributes, but soon afterwards was led astray by life and have never returned. The other day he asked such an odd question to my father. Are we at the top of the food chain? See my brother in a cunning display already new his own answer to this question, but merely asked it to see what our father thought. Dad looked at him and goes is this a trick? Jason ignores his question and proceeds, yes we are, but only with the technology that we have developed. Alone and single, we are above few things on the food chain. Later Jason and I were walking down the dirt road to our house after walking with the dog. We brought up the subject from earlier and we discussed how ironic it is for humans to have such an overwhelmingly complete combination of senses that set us at a high level. But individually we have not the keenest eyesight, or olfactory, or taste, or touch, or hearing. We are not excellent in any, but combined we are an excellent creature. Though these alone would not have gotten us very far in life, functionally speaking (not considering the brain) we have the advantage of standing on 2 feet, but lack dexterity on all 4 we have opposable thumbs, but then again the range of eyesight and developed perepheral eyesight is limited. We can easily survive on vegetables and small animals that we might be able to catch after practice and break in our hands. However, few animals are within our prey range if we had not the complex mind that ties our senses together to form such an impeccable body. Our brain had helped us develop technology that can kill the largest animal easily from long range. We climbed the rung to the top of the food chain due to the advanced being of our mind.

My point is not that we are supreme but that how often we take our minds for granted. We are not perfect, but our most important thing is our thought process, our reasoning, our logic. We cannot survive without it. Why trash it as many of us do? Hm. That was not my point at the beginning, oddly enough though it does make sense, why waste your intellect?

Kristie Collins