Beauty in America (and everywhere else) & Giving Thanks

I went to the bookstore last weekend with my mom.

Sometimes i find bookstores really overwhelming.

It's like there are all these things that i need to read. So many things to learn, or look at or try to understand i usually end up freaking out because there are at least 10 books that i absolutely must get now- aka they are going to change my life or they are just fascinating or they are about something i have never even considered before, etc etc etc. And then i end up feeling helpless because there are so many things that i want to read and know and experience that i can't possibly do it all and i am just so in love with everything that i am at a loss for any kind of containment. 

i might have asked my mom to get this for me for Hannukah :)

Guess where we ended up going right after the bookstore?!

hot tea for a chilly day

Sarabeths. 
mmm. Favorite bakery ever.
Hence why i'm so excited that i am going to have the cookbook soon and perhaps i will make some delicious concoctions from it. 

chocolate dipped butter cookie. mmm.

my favorite cookie ever, aka the "cloud cookie".

My rant at the beginning of this post did have a point to it.

I'm not just going to leave you with some senseless ramblings about bookstores, don't worry, i'm not that scatterbrained. (i hope)

That bookstore experience is 100% true to my real life. I always feel so overwhelmed because there are so many things that i want to do or learn or see. Reminds me of a previous post i wrote about the possibilities of saturdays, in particular.

couldn't decide, had to try both the soups. Ended up eating both for dinner.

 It also reminds me of a quotation from one of my all-time favorite movies, American Beauty. 

"...there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once, and it's too much. My heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst."

needed to hop on the bandwagon and join the pumpkin fad

pumpkin and chocolate. who knew?

 Amanda wrote a post recently where she mentioned this kind of phenomenon. 

This feeling of having so much to take in.

And it's definitely flying around recently, especially with all the Thanksgiving posts that are infiltrating my reader, everyone seems to have so many things to say and appreciate, how can we possibly keep track of it all?

delectable. ate one of these for breakfast every day this week.

 I love so many things. 

Sometimes there is just so much in life that i want to be a part of, and i just have no idea where to start. Maybe that's just a blessing of being young. I also feel like it might have something to do with the time that I feel i've lost to the eating disorder, all the days that i let go by when i was just stuck in a different universe of weight and food and calories while the world was outside spinning and definitely not waiting for me to wake up.

I guess i kind of feel like I just woke up and am just re-entering the world and life and it's only now that i'm finally seeing all these things that just  make me so excited and thrilled and scared that i won't have enough time to love and appreciate all of them. 

adorable necklace charms that say things on them like "no regrets" "inner peace" "a good nights sleep"

 Sometimes i feel that way about blogs, too. Sometimes with Twitter and Facebook and Tumblr and blogs i just feel like there's too much going on that i can't possibly appreciate and understand and filter all of it in order to really get a grasp on what's happening with the world. I am following close to 100 blogs right now and i find more every day that i love and that intrigue me and sometimes i get so overwhelmed trying to keep up with everything and everyone. Whether it's new science information about eating disorders & mental illness or new insightful posts or just new foodie or art pictures, etc, sometimes i just feel my brain go into over-load and i feel paralyzed and i can't take it all in.

i'm thankful for the 2nd grade girl who is little, naive and loved enough to write this.
i hope she never has to feel otherwise.

 that, my friends, is my long-winded explanation for why i haven't posted/updated in a while & a description of my current state in the blogosphere, as an overwhelmed reader and lover of anything and anyone.

it's also my way of recognizing thanksgiving and all it means to me.

i used that American Beauty quote in my "eaters' agreement", which was something that they made us write at my treatment center for our "graduation" ceremony, and it was basically our promise +description for ourselves and everyone else of how we would take care of ourselves. 

Here is the rest of the quotation...

"I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me, but it's hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once, and it's too much. My heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst.And then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold on to it. And then it flows through me like rain. And I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life. You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. But don't worry, you will someday." 

I hope you all had a lovely thanksgiving. 

Thank you so much to everyone who read or commented on my poem from before. I'm glad to be back. :)

xo

rose

use your words & eat your food

DON'T eat your words and use your food. k?


I wanted to say thank you to everyone who commented on my last post. Your words helped me more than you know. 
I've hopped back on the recovery bandwagon and am feeling much better because of it.
I'll post more later, after i go out to dinner & hopefully write my religion essay but i wanted to share this poem that i wrote with all of you. 
I had to write a poem based on Allen Ginsberg's Howl for Carl Solomon for my english class.
If you haven't read it, Howl is a great poem. Ginsberg writes about the suffering he experienced and it speaks to the "outcasts" of American society (those who are more focused on love and meaning in life, rather than material "success") and he does it beautifully. We had to write a poem "to someone who understands" (you). I wrote to to a dear friend of mine who i met in treatment. I changed the name for the sake of her privacy, but i thought you all might appreciate it.

Whisper

For Sarah Halper

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by hunger,

Fakeness, lonesome, searching for something beautiful.

Abandoned and unloved, they paint their mouths shut with silence.

Whispery silhouettes run down the sidewalks of insanity,

And stop to glare at grotesque fun-house mirror projections

Of fat and tired limbs,

Glistening with the sweat of hate.

Shells of women who sit on concrete

Smoking endless cigarettes, burning up their lungs

As payback for continuing to swallow air

Organs stubbornly gripping to life

Even when a fragile heart patters like early rain

It beats at the wrong

Moments.

They damn their stupid hearts

For beating at all.

They drink whole pots of coffee

Black liquor, free of sins.

Poured into sad paper cups

During early hours of black mornings

When the rest of the population

Finds solace in quiet minds, minds that

Have not forgotten how to rest, to dream.

Sleepless with self-loathing and malnutrition

They grip fire-hot mugs

Blue-boned fingers, numb and cold

Sipping freedom liquid.

Girls who spend all the seconds

Of melancholy

Photographing mental x-rays

Of beauty beyond their grasp.

Who look at dirt and see holiness,

God and redemption incarnate, sad skeletons.

Twenty thirty and forty-somethings

Trapped in the pain of adolescence

Who never found their way out

Of uncertainty and un-belonging.

Stuck in a sea of mental agony

Riding waves of want

Trampled by harsh, un-caring waters

Hitting the ocean floor over and over again

Choking on salt, gasping for breath

They flail their arms in vain

And No-one sees them drowning.

They hunger for love and affection

Skip lunch, dine on crackers and wine.

Or gorge themselves on cakes of saints,

Stuff themselves to the gills with counterfeit care.

The rumble of their bellies, the pangs in bed at night

Fails to make loneliness seem less Encompassing.

Sarah, I’m with you at midnight

When the crack of light dawns on your kitchen floor

And all before you, you see breads and soups and chocolate

The beginnings and end of your love.

I’m with you in Colorado,

When you play houseguest as your Norwegian father

A connoisseur of disaster

Offers you the finest cheeses,

Not knowing that all you wanted was a second glance.

I’m with you when you read my words

And your mind insists they don’t apply to you

That nobody knows you, that you are not one of us.

I’m with you in Los Angeles

Where hippies disguise themselves as buddahs

And bow down to vegan, soul-less gods,

Chanting the words that will save you.

I’m with you in Santa Monica

Where you hide from yourself

And look to better women of the past

Who might teach you how not to need, not to be so much.

I’m with you inside heavy- closed doors,

When you cry salty tears,

Asking anyone to make you less.

I’m with you in Agoura Hills

Where hypocrisy and beauty made us sick to our stomachs

And we were terrified, tranquilized, frozen in time.

What is beauty? You will ask.

Beauty is the warmth of your cheek

As you embrace my shaking body.

Beauty is the flash of your teeth when you laugh.

It’s the crackle of the fire near my chilled feet.

Beauty eludes us, dear Sarah,

In our search for something unconditional.

It’s a receding horizon, a firefly we’ll never catch.

A glow we can only see in front of us

Never to be held, contained within a see-through jar.

If beauty is love

And love is food

Well then, we are screwed, you say.

I bite my tongue before I suggest

That perhaps, you should come for supper.

Hi, I'm Rose and I'm an insomniac

this is really getting ridiculous.

I don't know which is worse: my insomnia or my procrastination?

Ugh. Okay so for my english class we read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn over the summer. (Not a book that i'm particularly fond of- but we are now reading The Great Gatsby which i love- F. Scott Fitzgerald is such a beautiful writer)

We have to write a personal essay on "an adventure that you have recently been on" to conclude our Huck Finn segment. I decided that I would write about my recovery, considering this last year has definitely been an adventure, and it's something I care about- and my personal essays are always better when I actually give a s*** about the material (aren't everybody's? Sorry, you'll have to excuse me. Note the title of this post.)  Being me, I decided I wouldn't start the essay until tonight. Maybe "decided" is too generous of a word...let's say just say "figured". Tonight rolled around and I was busy being dumb and doing nothing until 7 o'clock when I opened my computer and started writing. Very slowly. With multiple study breaks. It's probably better described as: Would you care for any studying with your break? 

Sorry bad joke. Again, note above parentheses. 

So yeah. Basically, I've written two pages of very awful, raw writing and have a long way to go along with a couple other homework assignments that I haven't done and it looks like my recently acquired inability to sleep might just come in handy tonight, unfortunately. 

Just decided i'd drop by here as a final good-bye to the internet until I finish my goddamn essay!

If it turns out at all well, i'll definitely post it here in case anyone wants to read :)

xo

rose

The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save
the only life you could save. 

 

~ Mary Oliver ~