Young, Forever

I wanna stay forever young and in love.

Is that so much to ask for? To live with the hope of tomorrow bright in my eyes and the steady thump-thump in my heart. I want to do everything and believe I can. Make friends like wishes and collect memories like fireflies in the jars. I want to watch each one of them glow bright as I hold them in my hands.

It's not about your past experiences and where you've been. It's about where you're going and each step of your feet.

Do you really want to live forever?

-jrd

Mixed Media

I usually don't go off about the media much, but this is going to be more of a "one and done" kind of post. These are all my issues with media and their coverage and treatment of certain subjects. I'm probably going to piss a few people off but, they don't have to read this if they don't want to.

I've never fully understood why we, as a culture, can justify paying millions of dollars to people who throw around a ball every week and sometimes not even doing that, sometimes just sitting on the bench. Honestly? You're going to give hundreds of thousands of dollars to someone who does the exact same thing as some of the kids in my high school do while there are people starving out on the street? The same salary that these people spend on fancy cars and nice houses and fucking designer baseball hats can save thousands of people, feeding them for a while, giving them shelter from the cold. It disgusts me that we can allow this and even feed into it.

It's a typical story: teen idol gets shipped off to rehab for various issues and yet they still get seen by the media as some kind of messed up role model. Okay... what? Honestly, do people really think that this happens in real life? People in rehab don't get treated like celebrities so why should celebrities still get treated as such when they become people in rehab. It may seem harsh, but the old saying "if you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen" still applies to life. If you can't handle all the pressures of being a celebrity, which you should realize when you're getting into it already, you should get out of the game. Don't turn to drugs and drinking as your basic life support, it doesn't work for regular people and it's not going to work for you. And toting yourself off to rehab and making some big deal about it is definitely a mature thing to do. Say you're taking some personal time off and check yourself in to the most remote rehab clinic you can find. I don't care about your partying and drug use, don't flaunt it.

There are families that adopt 6 kids from third world countries and give them the life they couldn't have had any other way. Where are the TV shows about them? Seems like the easiest way to get a reality TV show is to irresponsibly pop out a few dozen kids and trail them along like they're your newest car or something. I'm all for large families, I want one myself, but there is a limit. Nadya Suleman, aka Octomom, actively chose to have all 6 embryos implanted, even after having 6 kids already. The Duggar family has 19 kids already and are still leaving their future child count "up to God." Okay, for one thing, your most recent child almost died from a premature birth. If that was anyone else, they would take it as a sign that they should stop. It's absolutely irresponsible because they don't have the disposable income to raise 19 kids. Without their show and publicity, they would most likely be in poverty or struggling. I still never understand why we can put them up on a pedestal, saying that this is okay and a good family model for other people.

Make your own decisions in life, use common sense, and don't make a fool of yourself. I'm never sure why people always forget these things.

-jrd

Molds

I'm not going to sit here and pretend that I am the most unpredictable person on the planet. I try and surprise as people as much as I can, but that's not always possible. But one thing I tend to pride myself on is not fitting into molds that society tells me I should slide into perfectly.

Between the party girls of Jersey Shore and the squeaky clean Miss Taylor Swift, there isn't a niche for girls like me. I'm the type of girl that can, with the proper food in my stomach, drink like a champ and will dance on tables without a care in the world. I hate passive-aggressive behavior and will get into a fight, and end it, if one of my friends needs backing up. I stick up for what I believe in and am not afraid to piss people off. I'm not afraid of messing around with people, to a limit. I love passionately and live hard.

But I don't fuck around. I don't sleep around without some form, no matter how small, of commitment. I don't flash my tits for anyone who asks. I don't trash talk my friends. I love laying in parks and watching the stars or the clouds. I love to take shopping trips to the local produce store. I can party in a large crowd but I love just sitting and talking to people, one on one.

My views on sexual and romantic attraction are such a contradiction because I'm the girl that wants to be slammed against a wall in the dimly lit hallway of some club or venue and the girl that wants to stay up late, kissing on a couch, watching Disney movies. I want the dirty, crazy heat of sex and the soft passion of romance.

All the romance novels say I should want a bad boy, someone that will ravish me out of my mind, but those boys tend to drive hearts as well as teenagers. They drive fast and hard, but end up crashing them into a wall, walking away to the new one waiting in the driveway. I've dated and loved boys like these and have hardened myself and my heart because of that. But, even with my track record, it's more like a broken record because I tend to repeat my mistakes.

But I can never deal with a total nice guy. I've had that once before and it's like taking home a lost puppy. It's cute when you first take it home, but when you can't get a second alone, it gets to be a burden. I can't stand when guys think you can't do anything for yourself. Thank you very much, but I have two working arms- I can open a door by myself. Being treated to dinner every once in a while is nice, but when I'm not allowed to pay for anything, that's when it gets to be a bit demeaning. I need someone who will break the mold and be an asshole on occasion, but also knows how to treat a girl.

I can break a mold, now I just need the same.

-jrd

Safety

I'm never sure why people always frown upon teenagers buying condoms. I mean, with all the teen pregnancies going around, you'd think adults would be a little more encouraging. I went to Walgreens to buy condoms for this weekend and got glares from 1/2 the employees. Honestly? You're being reproachful because I'm being a responsible teenager and buying condoms for myself? I sometimes just don't understand society these days.

I don't really have a problem with teenagers having sex, as long as they're smart about it and use protection. I've made that mistake once and I'm sure as hell not making it again. But that's a different story for a different blog.

In other news, I'm obnoxiously stoked for my trip to Chicago this weekend. I can't wait to hang out with new people and spend the day with some of my favorite guys.

-jrd

Real Talk, Real Friends

"I encourage you to remember to always take a step back from it all and just breathe. It's really hard for me when things pile up like that and I feel stuck in the situation and forget that there is always something else coming my way and that I'm not really stuck you know? Tomorrow will always come and there are always people there for you to talk to if you feel like you're going crazy."

My friend Chad told me this today in midst of my mild emotional breakdown today. I've been feeling very suffocated and stressed by everything in my town and today everything broke. I threw up almost immediately when I got home and spent the next hour absolutely sobbing my eyes out. I haven't cried that much in months. I put what happened on Facebook and, not even a minute later, I had someone asking if I was okay. He doesn't even live in my town. 5 minutes later, my friend in Canada asked if I was okay, followed by my sister in Minneapolis.

Chad messaged me asking if everything was okay. That just absolutely broke me. We've met a few times, spoke a couple, and I've seen him play with his former band three times. The fact that he cared enough to take time out of his day to see if I was all right meant more to me than he'll realize. Only one of my friends that I see on a daily basis bothered to ask if I was fine. I'm starting to realize who my real friends are and I'm starting to realize what I need to do about that. Care about your friends, that's all you need to do. They'll thank you, even if they don't say it out loud.

-jrd

Restless Souls

So, sitting here on my bedroom floor, next to my unmade bed, a mug of peppermint tea, two dollars, and a homemade coupon for one lap dance, I sometimes worry about my path on life. I have religious books I pretend to read, projects left unstarted, and songs still unlearned. I want to take life one step at a time but I often feel like I'm tripping over my own feet, with no one left to catch me.

It's not that I have no one to trust. You have my trust until you lose it. I just feel like, if I'm going to fall and hurt myself, I might as well be the one to blame. I've relied on myself for most of my life, through countless tragedies that have left me broken and scarred, with hope for tomorrow, and a sometimes worryingly bright outlook on life. The world is a beautiful place and I sometimes forget to remember it, left in a dizzyingly alcoholic fog somewhere, looking at the stars.

We all fall under the same night sky, sometimes into our own beds, sometimes into someone else's. But we judge life choices, from the people we love, to the people that love us. And sometimes it isn't love, sometimes it's the fine line in between the lust of skin and touching and the creeping tendrils of the heart. I'm never sure which I want more, having had both, and I'll stick with my past and present experiences and say I'll take the in between stage, no matter how caustic it may be.

Regretting my life choice as I do sometimes, I would much rather make my mistakes over again, if I had the chance, than fix everything that went wrong. Even if it has left me with my unmade bed, my tea, my two dollars, and a lap dance. Life goes on.

-jrd

Status Quo

I feel like, maybe behind my back and never to my face, a few of my friends think I'm shallow by the people I date or find my heart going to. I've dated a (now former) manager of a band, fell for a bassist in a successful band, and am uncertain relationship-type courtship with a singer of a somewhat known band. I sometimes feel like someone might think that I'm just "dating into the scene" or trying to or whatever. I'm really not. I can't help who I like and it just so happens that all these guys that are music related share the same interests and ambitions I do. I don't date to date into scenes, I date because of heart.

Jan was never someone I really planned on dating. He used to manage a band I'm friends with (they've since fired him) and we had a lot in common and he liked me. I threw caution to the wind and said, "Hey, why not?" He treated me like an absolute princess for the first month or so we were dating. Towards the last few weeks, not so much. I ended up finding out months later from the singer of the band he used to manage that he had not only told them that he was single, but he had also cheated on me twice within a week of seeing me.

I fell for Joey's sweet talk. Along with many other girls. I learned my lesson and am stronger now.

I'm not sure what Josh and I are but I kind of like that. He's definitely flirty with me, which I absolutely love, but he also texts me these pretty important things, things he doesn't tell anyone else. He kissed me in front of other people and I'm staying with him over the weekend in November if everything works out. It's hard though because he lives 3 1/2 hours away and I don't get to see him as much as I'd like to. I'm not sure what this is, but I'm happy with it. Hopefully things get a little more serious when I get to Chicago.

Maybe I'm just a sucker for love.

But I think third time's the charm.

-jrd