Getting FUNKy.

So Joanna came over to pick me up today and I was in a funk. Like a bitter at the whole world funk. And well Jo pointed out that I really have never written a “bitter” post before… so here goes…

In this world, we are surrounded by so many different people. Millions of people. Everyday we pass hundreds of total strangers on the street who leave no mark on us.  But then there is that one. That one person who sparks a feeling inside of you. Good or bad or happy or shocking or angry.

Is it proximity? Is it just happenstance that someone walks into your life? That this particular someone stirs up that emotion inside of you? And what about when this someone is gone? When you decide it’s just better to write them out of your story but you cannot get them out of your mind to save your life.  It reminds me of gravity. How two objects have a certain pull on one another. (And really do we even know why gravity works?? I mean I guess SOMEONE knows…)

Geez Louis I just have a million questions today. Like how even from miles away someone can still make you so angry or make you miss them. That shouldn’t even be allowed to happen. How can I be sitting on my couch this morning watching Grey’s and drinking my cup of coffee and then all of a sudden be in this dang funk? How can a Kenny Chesney song overwhelm me with emotion in the middle of my shower? How can a 20 year old girl’s relationship problems make me want to punch a random stranger in the face?

Ugh. And what are feelings anyway. What is love? What is hate? What is anger? Where do they come from? Now as the science-y person that I am I assume/half-know they come from hormones and things in your brain. But, it seems so much more than that. How smells and sounds and sights stir up something so strong inside of me. How just a single memory can make you burst into tears.

Now I know what you are thinking… and I am sure half of you stopped reading this after the first emo paragraph… but for those of you still with me, you might think: what has gotten into happy life-your-life-to-the-fullest girl we know so well? And sorry this normal pick-me-up blog has turned down this dark and stormy path. Maybe it’s this intense thunderstorm happening behind me right now. But everyone gets in a funk every once in a while and everyone deserves to write a bitter blog post every now and then (although I admit this may have been better kept in my own journal locked away from all you judgy-mcjudgersons.)

But it just feels good to rant. (And there is that word “feel” again…) It feels good to get all these bad emotions out there… like I just word vomited my funk right out of me. So thanks for listening, and if you ever need a good rant, feel free. Go ahead. Let it out. Because it feels good to feel bad sometimes. 

Liv

PS Alanis is just the icing on the top of this rant sundae. Dare you to scream this at the top of your lungs. Seriously, DO IT.

The human "experience"

MEREDITH: [narrating] "The early bird catches the worm; a stitch in time saves nine. He who hesitates is lost. We can't pretend we haven't been told. We've all heard the proverbs, heard the philosophers, heard our grandparents warning us about wasted time, heard the damn poets urging us to ‘seize the day'. Still sometimes we have to see for ourselves. We have to make our own mistakes. We have to learn our own lessons. We have to sweep today's possibility under tomorrow's rug until we can't anymore, until we finally understand for ourselves like Benjamin Franklin meant. That knowing is better than wondering, that waking is better than sleeping. And that even the biggest failure, even the worst most intractable mistake beats the hell out of never trying." -(Grey's Anatomy Season 1, Episode 6)

***

Why did I think I was too cool for Grey's Anatomy before this point? Because I regret this decision immensely, and am now currently obsessed. Hence the quote above.... just bear with me for a bit though because it really touches on something that I have been rolling around in my head now for a while...

 Think about this for a minute: have you ever felt an emotion so intensely that you feel it in the tips of your fingers, the tip of your nose? Emotion just consuming your entire body, filling you all the way up, until you feel ready to pop? Ever been that passionate about something, loved so deeply, laughed so hard, been so alive??! 

This weekend someone told me that I live my life "at volume 100" and we laughed a little about how intense I can be sometimes... but when I replied with "why not??! What is the point of living any less than that... I mean why not experience every moment? Because you never know if you are going to be around for tomorrow. You never know if you'll get another chance to live this one moment, have this experience, feel this alive." And the car went silent. It was such an "Olivia" thing to say, but still, they all knew it was TOO true. Roll your eyes all you want- but you know you want to live at volume 100, too. 

And while Meredith Grey is clearly fictional (although I wish McDreamy wasn't, haha!!), her message rings so true in my head and it is so everything I have been trying to do with my life recently. I want to FEEL, I want to DO, I want to BE. Because this is my one chance to get this life right (and who knows what is waiting for us on the other side.) Live, really live, while you can. If there is music, I am going to dance and if there are people, I am going to laugh. 

But through it all I am going to FEEL, I am going to DO, and I am going to BE. 

And geez, it's not just about feeling happiness, because in this human experience there is going to be pain and there is going to be hurt. Why do you think it is called the human "experience??" Dip your hands into everything and gain as much of it as you can. Expose your heart to the world and let it be touched by those around you, for better or for worse. It's like this song I heard the other day that I am in love with currently by the Lumineers (go look them up really...) called "Stubborn Love" where they sing "it's better to feel pain, than nothing at all, the opposite of love's indifference." Pain is not the opposite of love but rather a different form of it. To be hurt is to love, because if there was no love, no connection to another, then, well, there would just be nothing. And that's what should worry us: that nothingness. Not pain. Not hurt. Because to be hurt is to know that we loved and were loved. To be connected to another and to this life. In the end it is passion or it is nothing at all. 

I cannot imagine living a life of nothingness. Of passing pleasantries. Of could've beens or regrets. I want passion more than I have ever wanted anything in my entire life. I want to be around others who love life with everything they have. Who live so hard that it shoots straight out their fingertips and into my outstretched hand. Even if it means crying at bars and making fools of ourselves dancing to Aretha Franklin alone on the dance floor. Even if it means exposing my tender heart to the elements, not knowing if it will bask in the sunshine or endure the craziest hurricane this side of the Mississippi. But knowing that either way, I will have no regrets because I TRIED. 

And I don't regret living my life all the way turned up. I mean, it does get pretty intense sometimes, but geez, I feel more alive now than I ever have before. I never want to just do "enough"or be "enough" again. You will find me living at the edge of this human experience for the rest of my life. Always pushing my boundaries. Going further than I ever thought possible. Loving and laughing harder. Learning more. Being more. Experiencing more. 

So here is your typical "Olivia" send off: get out there and FEEL and DO and BE. Never settle. Let regrets be a thing of your past. And let your life get a little messy every once in a while for the sake of experience. For the sake of growth. For the sake of passion. For the sake of living life turned all the way up. 

Liv

When we were young, Oh Oh, we did enough
When it got cold, Ooh Ooh, we bundled up
I cant be told, Ah Ah It cant be done

It‘s better to feel pain, than nothing at all
The opposite of love‘s indifference
Pay attention now, I‘m standing on your porch screaming out
And I wont leave until you come downstairs- "Stubborn Love" The Lumineers

Bloom.

So I'm back home for a bit, like home home, in good ol Bristol.  And yesterday I got to see some friends who have been there for me forever. It's funny how sometimes you lose touch but end up picking right back up where you left off. And how it feels so good to be around people who have known you basically your whole life. Who have been a part of you growing up, who grew up alongside you...

Now, I always joke that our group of friends is the one that is going to get the heck out of Bristol and make something of ourselves.  And we are. Some of us are moving on to graduate degrees, while others are out there trying to pursue lifelong dreams. But we always have home to come back to, and it feels good to know that I can pick up the phone and call any one of them, even years from now, and talk like there is neither time nor space between us. 

I cried a little today reading this sweet sweet note one of these friends, Franny, gave me yesterday. And among the many words was the mention of our kindergarten graduation "motto"... "bloom where you're planted."  She likes to think of it not in a "stay put where are are planted" kind of way, but more in a "plant your roots firmly and then bloom so big and beautifully, stretching those petals and leaves as far as you can while soaking up all that delicious sun" kind of way. And so do I. Mmmm and that second choice just sounds amazing to me.  There is just so much sun for us to soak up, and just so much of the world for us to explore. 

But it all starts with our roots, and without these we cannot grow tall or beautiful. We must keep them nourished and planted on solid ground. Taking good care of these precious lifelong relationships that at so dear to us, realizing how much they contribute to who we are today and the value of their steady presence. Keeping them in mind as we become the next generation of people who will change the world. (I can hear it now... "wait??? They grew up in Bristol, TOO??!!?") haha...

Can you believe it's been five years since we graduated high school??I don't even want to count the years since that kindergarten graduation day. We have all grown so much and bloomed so big.  Geez, I cannot wait to see what this next chapter holds for all of us.  Hold on tight y'all and grip those roots firmly because we are here to bring beauty and life and sunshine to this tired and sometimes gloomy world. LET'S DO THIS!

Liv