Where to go from here?

After weeks of an overwhelmingly indifferent attitude and a consistent roller coaster ride of serotonin fueling my emotions, I am so deeply in need of a journey. Not the kind of journey that takes you on a tropical themed cruise to Alaska (complete with hula dancing polar bears), but rather, I want to step out through this murky vapid trance-like fog, into a world of lush effervescent mountains and overwhelmingly high thrills.
No more will I be satisfied with serendipitous hikes through flower breeding countryside, no...I need to run pellmell through sheets of rain, ever thirsty for the adventure that will meet me on the other side. I am longing for a place, for a person, a community, to call home.
I am not searching for a vacation, I am searching for the land where my heart can finally rest.
Somewhere that knows I love strong wind, fresh uncut paths, and the bright smell of cut mint.
A place/person/thought/love that knows that I am only as strong as any tree that can be broken by my gait, and as prone to curiosity as young ducks are to falling on their heads.
I need a home that can see through my deep mistrust and ever so broken heart.
But where? Where is my home? Does one find this mindset in the damp uncharted forests of countries longed to walk? Or has the place always existed, in the shadows of my heart?
I doubt that.
Never before have I needed someone to know me. Not in a silly understanding kind of way, but in the way that feels my heart for blowing dandelion's petals and cupping hot drier lint...and that when nothing else will cheer me up, a John Cusack movie probably will. There's something about the security in a home that knows you will always love tomato soup, power berries, plantains, and pomegranates (although not necessarily together).
Maybe my home is in Madagascar, or maybe that's just where my life begins, but either way, I'm still longing to go...
until next time...to Madagascar! & to home.

Madagascar Ellie has h@x

However, her selection of music is quite fine.

She listens to great tracks

By a favorite band of mine.

When she listens to the cave

People start to dance

Mumford and Sons gave

Music fancy pants! <--(awesome)

I love the guitar

And the banjo is tight

Mandolins can go far

And folk music sounds right.

So next time you're in the mood

For some alty, folksy stuff

Call up this cool dude

Cause one guitar is enough!


The end.

Mumford & Sons

uuuugghghghghghghg I love them.


The Cave


It's empty in the valley of your heart
The sun, it rises slowly as you walk
Away from all the fears
And all the faults you've left behind

The harvest left no food for you to eat
You cannibal, you meat-eater, you see
But I have seen the same
I know the shame in your defeat

But I will hold on hope
And I won't let you choke
On the noose around your neck

And I'll find strength in pain
And I will change my ways
I'll know my name as it's called again

Cause I have other things to fill my time
You take what is yours and I'll take mine
Now let me at the truth
Which will refresh my broken mind

So tie me to a post and block my ears
I can see widows and orphans through my tears
I know my call despite my faults
And despite my growing fears

But I will hold on hope
And I won't let you choke
On the noose around your neck

And I'll find strength in pain
And I will change my ways
I'll know my name as it's called again

So come out of your cave walking on your hands
And see the world hanging upside down
You can understand dependence
When you know the maker's hand

So make your siren's call
And sing all you want
I will not hear what you have to say

Cause I need freedom now
And I need to know how
To live my life as it's meant to be

And I will hold on hope
And I won't let you choke
On the noose around your neck

And I'll find strength in pain
And I will change my ways
I'll know my name as it's called again

My Latest Adventures

have been journeys of the heart.

I have not been far from home in the past months, but rather, I spend my days drifting in and out of my own numb consciousness, while invading the lives of numerous others.
Working for DCFS has been one of the best and worst experiences I have ever felt.
I have never felt more joy than watching a family reunite, and never more pain than telling a person that they are not an adequate enough human being to care for a child.
Nothing is more confusing than a parent looking straight into your eyes and telling you they would do anything to get their child back, while you review their positive drug test results or look at pictures of bruises they inflicted during a psychotic break.

I just keep thinking this can't be what I was made for.  and this can't be the life they were created to live.

Then again, my consistent prayer is, "Lord, break my heart for what breaks Your's".
Well, my heart has never been more shattered.

December

Okay, so let's be honest, I am not the best at blogging. I probably never will be.
I mean, I am devoted to you 5 readers eagerly awaiting my spaced posts, but maybe it's time you start reading some other blogs too:
The Daily Green
Jon Huckins
& Where do I put the paper?

I've been quite a few places this fall, none of them far, but many foreign.
Most foreign? Los Angeles Skid Row.
Least foreign? Hollister, CA: Current Location

Since we are being honest, I hate being home. I feel useless and bored more times than not, and when I am void of those emotions I feel angry and helpless. I feel trapped in a spiritless house of no ambition. I feel bad for having dreams and aspirations and the desire to fulfill the world, when the time spent in these walls by others is consumed with unending hours of television and video games. There just has to be more to life than this.

It just gets me thinking, how many other houses are like mine? How many places are filled with able, wonderful people who lack the motivation to pry themselves from their selfish activities and apply that time to a greater cause? How many problems would be solved?

And there is no Christmas.
I know I hate Christmas.
but I still want it to be Christmas. I want just one piece of decor. I want this house to have thought about a tree or lights or pie. I want something other than selfishness.

Time Flies

It seems like only yesterday that Mr. McDaniel and I were embarking on the mushy journey of mutual like together. But low and behold, we have reached our half year point, and took to celebrating it in the right sort of way.

Step 1: Wake up early
Step 2: Watch the sunrise
Step 3: Errands
Step 4: Starbucks & a leisurely stroll around Balboa Island
Step 5: Ferry Ride
Step 6: Picture taking on an empty beach
Step 7: Borders book reading
Step 8: Lucille's BBQ

Now on to an afternoon filled with HW and a nice nap!
Thanks for an adventure today Mr. McD.

I am not cool

My whole life I have been followed by the sense that although I am in no way an underwhelming person, I have never been someone to look twice at, physically, mentally, or spiritually.
I was always that loud kid with the above average grades and mediocre looks that scored major kudos with the teachers, and frustrated distant stares from classmates and colleagues.
But when I reached college, I felt different. I finally thought I could dress for the weather, hair in a loose pony, and speak my heart without feeling like an outcast for knowing the answers.
I don't get invited to parties. I get asked out to study dates and paper writing soirees.

I am not cool.
I never have been.

It befuddles me to think that I am just now coming to the realization that the only reason people like me is for the personal gain they seek. It hurts to think I don't get second glances because I wear baggy jeans and flip flops to class. I guess there are two things I want: selflessness and sincerity. College may be all about gain, but I spend a majority of my days trying to save someone else. The least the universe could do would be to try and save me. [Maybe I'm not savable.]

What kind of gain could an ultra-creative all knowing and powerful God want with someone who is full of so little uniqueness that she begins to resemble the herd of people she walks through? I am not different or creative enough to change anything, I am not beautiful enough to get anyone's attention, so I might as well stop trying. I keep waiting for Him to use me, but instead I repeatedly feel like I was stood up at prom by an out-of-league date.

I am not cool.

I used to want to be a book, filled with pages of adventure and stories that could change the world.
But now I feel like a magazine, overstuffed with worthless knowledge that does little more than collect the dust of collective brokenness, created by our consumeristic society.

I am constantly shaken by the feeling of absolute misplacement. I do not belong.
This is not my home. I do not have a home. I do not have a safe place. I do not have a haven.
I am a jackdaw, the frighteningly large Middle Eastern crow that dwells in solitude and travels constantly, lost in a desert of unfamiliarity.

No matter how badly I want to fix everything in the world with my smiles and good heart, I can't. But Martin Luther King Jr could, and Mother Theresa did...

I am not cool.

Letter to A Stranger

Dear S, 

I have always wanted to meet you; to walk right up and say, “Hi, I’m Lizzy. I see you here quite often, care to catch a spot of tea with me?”

But no, that’s much too forward, and even more formal, so instead we share head tilted glances across the crowded shop, until one of us ventures to smile and wave.

Like old friends. That’s what we are, isn’t it? We are two old souls milling about caffeine fueled Southern California like it is our eternal resting place.

Well I don’t know about you, S, but before long I’m going to blow this joint and hop me on the next train outa picture town. Maybe I’ll go somewhere by the sea, where the foam can rise up and carelessly wrap every inch of my body in thousands of tiny pieces of glass. That’d be lovely, to be covered so completely in something that was once translucent, but now envelopes the lines and flaws that years of earthly life can give you. 

You know what I think S? I think that in another life, you and I could be dear friends. We could ride motorcycles through winding mountain trails, your manly long hair streaming from beneath a short black helmet, while I struggle to remember which hands reduces the speed. Or follow a ghostly pirate map to a distant country, only to learn it was upside down the entire time. 

I’d like to get to know you, to be brave enough to venture into unknown conversation, to ask you what you draw while sitting in Starbucks before seven in the morning. But I know I never will, and we shall always be strangers. 

-L

Letter to My Dreams

Dear D,

I am waiting for you. Please don’t let me down. 

There is such graceful beauty in unknown. So much potential is what is yet to come. 

But you aren’t real, and it’s up to me to bring you to life. I am so scared that I will never live up to potential I have set for myself, D. But I am no longer a child, and I know that wishing on stars and frosted confectionaries do nothing more than spread germs and false hope. 

I’m up for the challenge.

-L

Letters #3 & #4

Dear Bloggers,

I’m a chicken, a big fluffy delicious chicken. 

and what I mean by that is, blog world, I have spent the last 3 days mulling over what to put in a letter to my parents and little sister.

It’s not that I have nothing to write, it’s that I have everything to write. Enough to fill a thousand parcel pages with more volatile emotion than I knew I could possess. But there are too many secrets, too much pain, and not enough reward to give me enough courage to write what I actually feel to your open eyes.

So I’m playing foul, and skipping these two letters, because I would never want someone to see that painfully honest side of me, especially them. 

-L