Its official....im back in texas, my homeland. After drivin with the windows down for 2 days, eatin french toast with bob and elaine: my moms best friend that lives in denver, and claimin the earth just beneath the border, i am here. Its an adjustment. I have a new life. I have new friends. I have a new home and a new room. A new Job. I am new. Renewal within myself is evolving everywhere. I cant help but think: this is actually happening. I am going on a mission to china. I cannot avoid it, nor do i want to. As i look back on my life in this familiar place, i realize what i have come from. I remember high school, bumpin around with the bums and sneakin out in the middle of the night. I visualize freshman year of college, eatin pizza on sunday and cursin up a strom, just to be rebellious. I re-live my revolutions and the release of my rage for the shortcomings in my life. I recall my tears and my prayers. I realize the beginnings of my humanity, and my desire to be a conduit. I am growing....always reaching for God. I am trying not to be afraid anymore. My pride is spent and i send love out into the universe fearlessly. More often than not i dont get it back. Its still worth it. My heart is growing....let me take your pain. But i cant...only Christ can do that. I still want to try. I am not perfect, nor do i want to be. Satan is real...he works from the inside out. Last week i wanted to leave for lunch without clocking out. My mind often tells me that i am worthless. On the way to work i turned the radio off to contemplate my life. I contemplated so hard that i missed my exit and got mixed up in the mix master. I was late for work (cue your shock) and got back on going the wrong direction. I cursed to myself.....WHERES THE D*** i15 WHEN YOU NEED IT? Yeah its not here. Someday soon ill have to face that. He won that small victory. crap. oh well...whatev.

from the london book:
Its all happening so fast. My life is a speeding train and im not sure where its headed. One thing is certain-ive been given a second chance. Touched by God and ive gotta believe that he has a purpose for my life. So why am i filled with self doubt? Plagued by demons-both real and imaginary. Frightened by the challenges ahead and haunted by the ghosts of my past. Goes God know what i am? Do i? Am i an angel or a monster? And why cant i see the difference?
This apprehension is the child of Evil personified, and i can overcome.
I will break free with my resilience. My reverence. THEN shall the shackles fall.
Love will tread out the fire of anger.
And from the ash i will rise,
and plant a tree of peace.

i hate my new job. i sit behind that desk ALLLL DAYYYYYY and i just go nuts. my boss' name is amy. shes a skinny young little blonde woman with no family and probably no friends. Shes kinda funny sometimes and talks/giggles to herself. i can tell that she wishes she could be a nice person all the time. but she beasts at will man. And she works late every night. today she called me in and beasted and made me stay late till all this crap was done. i was at work till 8:30. and she was still there. this cannot go on. i will re claim my life....soon. im only gonna work for like 2 weeks so i can have money to go to tennessee and to take to oh i dunno, china. i wrote about amy today in my journ while i was angstin for asia....

"this job is killing my soul!!!!!! ive never hated a job so much. probably because i know what its like to have my soul completely fulfilled-everyday, for the last 6 months. my brain feels dull. the numbers and directions thrown at me bounce off into information mess on the floor. my reaction time is slow and my reception is weak. im trying to remember when that happened? Im at my desk trying to pay attention but my foot keeps tapping and i just want to get up and dance on my desk, write, call, text, websurf, talk to whomeever i can discover..just whatev. am i lazy? maybe-probably. i just want to love my soul. i couldnt care less about this spreadsheet. i just want to ask my boss...how are you complacent with your life being stressed out and grumpy with only numbers and letters and the ding of your microsoft outlook to keep you warm at night? Why dont you have a lovie or a friend to want to go home to? i know why you work late honey...you havent fooled me. i wrote that book. And your success can only hide you from your dark truth for a few seasons. Its raining outside but you cant feel it...its raining in your heart Allthetime. how did you get this way? what was it like amy when you went to china to talk busness and make deals? did you even let yourself enjoy it. AMY-LOOK AT ME! I STAND AT YOUR DESK EVERYDAY WHILE YOU BEAST! who are you?"

sometimes i wonder that if i had a super power, what i would have. Flying would be sweet...if you think about it thats probably bat mans main power, and he does alot of good with that. I wouldnt want to hear people's thoughts....that would just be a bad idea for any of us. Seeing the future would just make us end up changing it...so that wouldnt even work. Tonight i was driving over to the minihouse. the needle kept dipping below E and i didnt even care. I just wanted it to run out of gas because maybe that would make time stop....make my life stop. Even for a moment so that i could make everything stop and just be silent for me. and watch the people frozen in time, being human. then they wouldnt see me crying or look at me driving alone, and i could just re live moments when i wasnt until i was ready to hit play again. I keep going forward going forward going forward. sometimes its just terrifying. and in that moment i just wanted the remote to my life. i wanted to stop it from happening, or rewind it, or just pause it or something. Maybe like sliding down the glace on timp and rocks are coming...a big one already hurt and cut my leg all up. I just dont feel like any more for awile, GO GO GADGET PAUSE. I dont want to limp down the mountain when i cant walk any more. Let my scraped leg heal PLEASE! i cant stop going down ward....or upward. or just whatever way im going these days. i may be a noun and an adjective and a verb all in one, but im not a DVR. And the car didnt run out of gas. it kept going, like my life. tick tick tick....minute by minute. the rest of my life goes by, and still approaches. i dont really feel like a hero or anything....but maybe i can be to someone and then it will be worth it.

I am: a beautifully strong woman.
I think: about the present more than the past or the future. I get really distracted by what is happening with me NOW. I want you to be present tense in my life so that all of me can be with you.
I know: i am following my fate.
I want: the world to be a more loving place, and i want to be a part of it
I dislike: the coldness in me. and being alone.
I miss: lyndsishea brown
I fear: hurting others with my words.
I feel: the ora of my love and the love of my family.
I smell: orange-orange Popsicle!!!
I crave: my deepest fulfillment. i search it out relentlessly. And it seems that i will go to the ends of the earth to find it...but its probably in my back yard.
I cry: usually because i am mad and its my best outlet. But lately Ive cried because i am sad or scared. But not the painful kind. Just the temporary kind that goes away after you cry it out.
I usually: am going going going. But lately i just chill and eat alot, blog, and hang out with my best friend. Im going to try to get going again, but just one going. not 3.
I search: for love in my life. I don't really care who you are, just love me please. and love me unconditionally. Ill love you back, i promise.
I wonder: what will become of my life. and what it will be like in china. But lately i just wonder what life will be like after china.
I love: ice cream, and eating it with people who are closest to me. I love warm weather and rolling around with people i love! I love my soul and my self discovery.
I always: second guess myself. i hate that.
I worry: that i will be forgotten.
I am not: a hateful person in any way. or a house cleaner. just sayin.
I believe: that people can change their hearts and lives if they really want it bad enough.
I dance: ALL THE TIME. and yes its like no ones watching cause it probably resembles a fish out of water but i don't care. i like my groove.
I sing: in the car. but mostly just with anyone i can get to sing with me. angsty angst stuff is the best. singing together is way more powerful than alone.
I write: everything i think. i don't edit because i don't want my words to have holes in them. and i write to make myself more vulnerable, and so that others can really know me.
I win: at owning the most jewelry. Most of its hand made. by me.
I lose: My mind all t he time lately because i am so emotional! i also lose just about everything that i own on a regular basis. i have 3 sets of car keys and multiple cell phones just waiting as back up because of this.
I wish: Sister Ogletree would write me back.
I don't understand: tons of things about how the universe works. but i just try to forget about that stuff because i feel like i do understand everything that is substantial to my life. Like where i came from and where i am going, and stuff relative to that.
I can usually be found: At the connection on the couch not sleeping, but now ill just be in Texas not sleeping.
I am scared: of sucking at Cantonese. of losing my voice forever. of someone hurting my younger sisters.

So long sweet summer

It is COLD. i had to pull out my sweater and mittens and still i am COLD COLD COLD. What ever happened to seasons? It went from summer to winter in 3.54 seconds. BOO. Im headed for texas though....so whatev. Sorry everyone im still sympathetic to you all...im just sayin. Winter should not exist in my opinion. Its frigid and icy and BROWN like my hair. not very me, but i have to endure it, just like my hair. VERY LONG and ill tempered like my hair on bad days. In my world it wouldnt ever be winter. We would have another season where everything would just turn to ice cream instead so that we could still appreciate summer, but eat lots and lots of peanut butter cup in the mean time. And the plasma center would turn to ice cream too...vanilla bean throwup none the less, but ice cream still. And everyone would eat it ALL and then it would be dead. I think id be ok with that.

In the ongoing search for self there are days when we learn something genuinely new. something uncovered...hidden that we never knew was there. Something that surprises us. And on that day of self discovery the question remains-what kind of person are we? Does the hero or the villian inside of us win the day?

I dyed my hair brown, and i feel like a different person. for some reason changing hair color makes a huge difference in the way we feel about ourselves. I didn't do it as part of any huge revolution or anything. Im just not a natural blonde, and i don't want to have to deal with my hair on my mission. But when i turn and look into the mirror, I'm not myself some days. I feel like less of me and more of the stormy me. I startle because another woman stares at me intensely.....emily? you are still in there right? My emotions feel more heightened. Like i want to scream at the top of my lungs, laugh until it hurts, or cry my eyes out instead of just goin with the flow. 2 Days ago i woke up and didn't want to get out of bed....things within me are all turned upside down and around. I think it might be because i almost died the other day. Luckily i know in my brain that hair doesn't really matter all that much. The color of it does not make me eligible for possession of the raging woman inside of me. The piece of my fathers temper that i have worked so hard to escape from through hours and hours of therapy and lost friendships and tears.

Last week on Thursday i almost died at the plasma centre. I'm done donating when this crotchety old lady comes over to unhook me, and as she lifts up my tube to let my remaining blood flow back into my veins, she dumps pure anticoagulant into me, and all of a sudden my body starts to spaz. Within 10 seconds all of my muscles are constricted. I cant breathe and my chest starts to hurt more and More and MORE....i must be having a heart attack. about 6 or 7 people are crowding around me asking me rapid fire questions....OK people cant you see that i cant breathe, much less speak. I lose control of my body and it feels like its riving, trying to get air. Eventually it starts to pass, and i can breathe regularly, and see, and feel my limbs. This lady tries to tell me that i had a reaction to the a.c. because i didn't eat enough calcium, but eventually we get the truth out of them: the old lady with short dyed hair messed up. And what i felt was the beginnings of cardiac arrest. Ive felt a little under the weather since then. And all of this made me realize that my body is so precious. i need it to work for me, and i have to treat it with the utmost respect. But instead i aided in giving it undue trauma. Never again body will this happen. That day i decided to swear off sugar for awhile to show my body extra love. but then that night there was BYU ice cream so i decided that an exception was needed. Somehow there is ALWAYS BYU ice cream...so much for that idea. I'm trying to exercise more too, but my body always tells me that it would rather sleep. so I'm just respecting its wishes i think. wheW.....

Today is Monday, and it is 2:43pm in the afternoon. In 48hrs i will be on the road to discovery, to love, to life #1. I cannot deny that i am sad and overwhelmed. But i am also ready. Awhile ago i started to feel the natural pull of gravity pulling me back towards my fate: the lone star state and my realization that my life will never be the same. I realized that the pull had begun, and that when it was time for me to go, i would just know. That time came about a week ago. The earth's axis is pulling me, pulling me, pulling me away from here. The home in which i have both loved and loathed through grounding my roots, which crack the surface fighting all of the other roots and rocks that litter the soil. And once those roots passed the hazardous terrain, they plunged downward gripping the earths core, thus allowing my love to push upward to my surface and explode from my limbs. My love, that is rooted so deeply for this place still exists, but is severed from myself. Away i go, but not forever. I still worry, what will become of me? Of the life that i have built for myself? It hasn't been easy...i have fought for this life and these friends and this disposition. Some days my life just feels so hard, even though it is so blessed. I fight against my anger. I fight against my seemingly endless loneliness. I fight against being forgotten. I try to forget about myself and get lost in what is my life: i cannot change it. Nor do i want to. I look around and pieces of me are everywhere....i cannot collect them. Pieces that i have willingly given to people, and never gotten back. Pieces that i have left to remember my past and my self discovery are left on benches and trees and swimming pools....they help me remember the person that i was. The woman that was hard and cold, and empty. I'm becoming the woman predicted: gentle and loving, strong in my testimony. My heart can still be whole; giving pieces of it away has not left it injured. It has regrown and replaced each piece, growing stronger. Funny how that happens.

I was afraid for the pieces of me that I'm leaving behind, but the biggest part not connected to my body is coming with me. She will remain a part of me, in the seat that has usually been empty, for 2 2hours of dashboard confessional, mountains, and open roads of self discovery. The chunk of my soul protected by the body with matching colored hair and all of the kindness that any of us knew existed. That stays up with me late into the night and holds me why i cry. The woman that shares with me her bunk bed, her food, her life, her love, her soul. When shes gone I'm not sure who will hold me while i mourn her. I hope that i still know who i am without her...im afriad i might be a little confused for a while. This woman has been there for the majority of the last 2 months of my life. But then i know that i will be ok, and i am just thankful. Thank you God for this gift of womanly love when i needed her most. You knew that we belong together. And even though it seems unfair that we have to face the distance soon, i realize that life is glorious because we are in our 20s and not our 50s. Life is ahead of us and i know it will bring us together; not rip us apart. I often forget myself because i am so fulfilled with this woman, my best friend. And i remember that her piece of soul will lie within me, protected, until we meet again. I love you Lyndsi Shea Brown. I have never had as good a friend as you.

Just the other day im doin crunches at the gym, tryin to multi task with my dad on the phone. He always likes to talk....alot. And im tellin him about how everything in my life is working perfect all the time...a vital sign that things are aligned in my life. And he says "EM...you have led a charmed life...everything always seems to go right for you." and im thinking.....NO, it really DOESNT. Like when you guys made my life heck growing up....that wasnt very fun. But then later on while im thinking, i realize that its true! Things just always work out, i never get sick, i always have amazing friends and support from my family. My life is so blessed. Sometimes i turn my mind to the people of less developed countries like in africa and south america. Do we ever feel guilty about the card that we were delt in our lives? Why do i feel like my life is so hard because my car breaks down, or when i get ketchup on my favorite shirt? there are people living without enough money for food or clothes, or even without a home. The natural reaction is to jump back and think that none of that is my problem. But is that REALLY true? Since god decided to put us in the promised land of America: the free and the brave; one of the wealthiest countries in the world that is blessed by great Christian faith as a whole because Christ himself walked on our ground. God gave us charmed lives....so the people with the crappier hand aren't our concern? I renounce this idea. We are all people. The point of our lives is other people. We function in relationships, families, communities, and smaller groupings within the world. Without each other, we cease to exist.

I'm just a normal girl that sank when I fell overboard
My ship would leave the country, but I'd rather swim ashore
Without a life vest I'd be stuck again, wish I was much more masculine
Maybe then I could learn to swim like 'fourteen miles away'.
Now floating up and down I spin, colliding into sound
Like whales beneath me diving down, I'm sinking to the bottom of my...
Everything that freaks me out. The lighthouse beam has just run out.
I'm cold as cold as cold can be....be

I want to swim away but don't know how
Sometimes it feels just like I'm falling in the ocean.
Let the waves up take me down
Let the hurricane set in motion... yeah
Let the rain of what I feel right now come down
Let the rain come down.

Where is the coastguard, I keep looking each direction
For a spotlight, give me something
I need something for protection.
Maybe flotsam junk will do just fine; the jetsam sunk, I'm left behind.
I'm treading for my life believe me
How can I keep up this breathing?
Not knowing how to think...I scream aloud, begin to sink
My legs and arms are broken down with envy for the solid ground.
I'm reaching for the life within me
How can one man stop his ending. I thought of just your face...
Relaxed, and floated into space.

workin for plaz dollaz

the other day i was at the "bio medical" lab on center street, where i sell my plasma for play money. Im sittin in the chair with a mondo needle up my arm when the lady comes up next to my machine and says "this thing is acting SKETCH" as i sit there hooked up to it. Man, i was having doubts before, but now i just feel so good about this hookie thing that sucks my blood out of me and spins it up. Its clunking and making serious noises. She calls for some other equally legit guy to come and fix it, and he walks up and starts BANGING ON THE SIDE OF IT, and then walks away. wow.....the things we do for money.

im going to go ahead and dedicate this post to this boy that i sometimes love...he'll probably never read this. He probably WILL invite me over to his house for conference tomorrow only to ignore me and pretend like we never rolled around in the grass, or cried in each others arms, or like he never gave me that bruise on my neck. uh huh. AND he'll probably try to set me up with his friend just so that he can try to distract me from distracting him from distracting me from my oh so recent trip to Asia. i dont really know. DUDE..as hannah would say "smatchoo"??? (whats the matter with you?)

Truth be told....it doesnt really matter. I dont know if you ever really loved me....i sure hope so. But this is me officially making my heart let you go. I renounce you and the un-erasable strings that keep me hanging in a permanent free fall of your wake. I allow myself to forget you because i dont think about me in terms of you, or you in terms of us anymore. Because im tired of being humored, and when i come back i deserve someone who gives a crap. So here's what you've been wanting. I release you....all in the name of China.

couple days ago i went to the gym to do my usual elyptical, and on the way i realize: there is about to be YOGA. Im all over that....inner asia here i come. Ive done it before, but not while i was trying to be asian. So i go and we bent around in all kinds of crazy poses, and listened to lulling music of the orient. Im feeling my soul nod in agreeance...we are content. I get to fly in a nose dive down to my toes, and bend myself in half as i clear my mind of litter. I balance my foot in the crevice of my opposite knee and focus all of my energy on one point in front of me.... my thoughts zero in on what i am feeling. I kinda fall over a lot but thats ok, because im self discovering. And suddenly i relize...i have inner asia. ACTUAL legit inner asia...not made up asia day crap where im trying to be positive about my soon trip to china that im freaking out about. I love yoga....i LOVE INNER PEACE. I love the sincerity of the asian culture and the appreciation of meditation and beauty. And i loved it before all the crazyness. I HAVE INNER ASIA!!! IT IS IN ME!!!!! cant believe that it took so long to discover.

School is currently in full bloom. here's my schedule...it varies from day to day.
10am: wake up
10:45: leave apartment
11:45-2:00: deal with annoying rich lady while cleaning her house
3:00: Revolutionize my facebook for the day
5:00-6:30: wait in line to donate plasma only to be told that my temp is too low....DANG.
6:45: Give up and go spend more money instead eating sweet sweet food at Red Robin
8:45: Chill at home and watch "Shes the man" while making my sis belated birthday gifts.
10:00p: raid the ice cream
11:00p: revolutionize my blog

and thats about where i am now. These days lots of girls say that they are restless and wish they could go some where. I really wish i could just stay in one place. Guess you want what you cant have.

Dear Brittany,

2 nights ago you came to me in a dream….probably don’t remember doing that do you? In my dream, I was at the airport waiting for you, and all of a sudden there you were. You had cut all of your hair off….like chin length short. And not a stylish cut either…just brown hair chopped at your jawline. And you were very calm and quiet…you didn’t say anything to me. You just walked toward me and deliberately wrapped your arms around me. You hugged me for several minutes…. I really needed that hug. It was almost real….i could still remember the warmth of it after I woke up. And after you pulled away your eyes were blank and empty, as if you didn’t know what to say to me, or to anyone. And you walked away from me and I followed you into the nearest store where you went straight for the Oreos, and you told me that you had been wanting them FOR-EV-ER. So we got you some Oreos and you were still pretty awkward after that, but at least you were happy. I think that a lot of this dream was my subconscious fears coming out because I have your pic that you sent me, and your hair is way long. And you are just as vibrant and beautiful as ever! I dunno maybe im scared of coming back and being all blank and empty and not having anything to say to anyone….even though I KNOW I wont be like that. It was so good to see you though, even if it was only in a dream.

ps: i miss you.