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In my night off, I found myself perusing online upcoming movies as I have been lately.
And, I think I have found one I have been waiting to see for a long time. Stop Loss
Stop-loss, in the United States military, is the involuntary extension of a service member's enlistment contract in order to retain them beyond the normal end term of service (ETS) or the ceasing of a permanent change of station (PCS) move for a member still in military service.
It's about the Iraq war, and a soldier's contract being extended after he comes home from a deployment. I think the Iraq war part will hit home, especially since Wayne has been over there. It's an Army movie and he's not Army, but still... the whole emotion is there.
It's coming out March 28th and I'm counting down.
Like my usual morning routine, I was watching the Today show this morning and line spoken caught my ear. January 31st, the last day of January. This month, the first of 2008, is already coming to an end. I'm young, but life is moving fast.
January 31st. Hmmm. How many of my resolutions have I already slacked on? How big of a routine am I in already with life, and have I done anything to spark it up? Well... I'm writing everyday. Maybe not always in here, but I am writing. That's a first. Yoga... eh, it's coming a long. I think it'll take me years to become good at it. And running. Yes, I have found that again;, however it is inside some (blast this polar weather) but I'm still running.
I don't have much to say this morning (I'm tired again) but I'm just reflective. Life moves whether we move or not. Before we know it, it'll move past us. It's hard to believe that January 31st is here, but let's go with it. Do something different or crazy today. Don't schedule it, just do it.
I can't sleep.
It's 1 am. The Strange wind is howling outside my window. My stove makes odd whining noises. And no matter how long I lay in my bed with my eyes closed and the covers wrapped around me, I can't get my neck comfortable on the pillow and I have random song lyrics running through my head.
It's going to be an early morning. And I have an interview.
I wish I could sleep.
Occasionally I have to remind myself that I'm a runner. Today feels like one of those mornings.
Winter is dead; when I step outside no matter how many layers I'm wearing, the cold immediately sinks to my bones and I feel like I'm a frozen mess. I want the ocean and the sun, even if it is a little breezy. Needless to say, I haven't set one running foot outside in the past two months. I think Winter is killing my soul.
I'm down from running 6 days a week, to maybe 4, and those are on the treadmill at a very low mileage. Which makes it worse. Half the time I'm at the gym I don't even run because the treadmill is just plain evil; I do other cardio but it just isn't fulfilling. It's so substituting to a real run. Instead, I wear my old race shirts some days, and pretend like I'm the runner I was before Winter hit.
I know I'm a runner, it's just when I can't run, I feel like a part of me is missing. My soul feels dismembered. If I was brave enough I'd layer up and run outside, but I can't get past the bitterness that freezes my muscles. That's when I feel like I'm not the runner, when all the courage I have normally out there pacing, is gone because of a little obstacle.
Life is like that sometimes... substituting. Everybody goes through phases and hard times, and the person we really are gets put to the side and a substitute comes in to deal with whatever is happening. Sometimes we put on a fake smile, pretend to be happy, or just don't talk about things and try to figure it out ourself. We let this substitute person walk through the day and figure out everything. Our mind is hazy because it isn't really us thinking. When really the whole time, our real self is still inside.
I'll admit, until it warms up some, I still can't set foot outside for my normal morning run. It's just too cold, not hard, just cold. I'll continue to face the treadmill until spring hits, but I'm not going to be the substitute runner. I AM a runner, whether it's outside or inside. The hard has hit, so I just have to hit back harder. Pull out the runner who hunkers down and hides because I have to face a little obstacle. As a runner, I have courage, a destiny, to run. Why let the substitute have all the fun?
Grande White Chocolate Mocha with a shot of peppermint. Skim milk. No whip. On some occasions when I feel like a cup of coffee after noon, add decaf to my order. Predictably. I can walk into any Starbucks coffee shop and not even have to think about what I want to drink. I just order it with the thought that every ingredient is always going to be there; I don’t ever have to worry about getting something different, or risking a cup that I can’t stand because it isn’t sweet enough. Every time I drink this coffee, I open the lid, breathe in the sweet aroma, and watch the foam swirl; suddenly I am lost in a memory. Somehow one small cup of coffee rouses up one moment in my life with such clarity that I’m in that place once again. I take a sip of my coffee and I think back to one moment, a small coffee shop inside an airport bustling with people, only a few months ago that still today makes me wake up to the chalky sunrise, and take a step without any predictability. We sat in a coffee shop at the Jacksonville airport, me with my signature drink and him with a regular mocha. Goodbye was coming soon. I cannot remember the age in which I learned to say goodbye, but I do remember my mother telling me to “wave goodbye” like it was a happy thing. Here I am this cute, baby blonde girl with tiny blue eyes that see the world as my playground, barely toddling along, squeezing my tiny fingers into my palm waving goodbye to my family as if it is just something to shrug off. They’d laugh and think it was so adorable. Next thing I knew, I’m sitting in an airport coffee shop, twenty-one years old saying goodbye to my Marine fiancé, now knowing the world wasn’t my playground, and not really knowing if I’d see his face again in a year. When I was that baby blonde, a minute or two seemed like an eternity away from someone, and now, a year might as well make or break my life. Sitting in that coffee shop I wasn’t that tiny toddler and this goodbye wasn’t adorable. It was huge and impending and left too much unpredictability hanging in the air. Goodbye is one of the hardest words in the English language. It seems that no matter how many times you say it or in what situation, a bye is never good. I saw a picture that weekend of a couple standing in a train station, kissing. The engine behind them was steaming, ready to depart, and the couple themselves were standing under a clock. It was almost as if time itself was counting down each passing second until they had to go their separate way. I remember sitting there at the airport at a table perfect for two, our arms stretched across the surface and fingers entwined. I couldn’t watch him because I knew the tears would fall. I let the wonderful fact that I was in an airport full of people keep myself from crying and watched everyone else around me. I saw families waiting with friends or loved ones who were departing; couples saying goodbye to their lovers; kids running around their moms and dads hugging Grandma and Granddad goodbye. I saw so many people embracing and thought to myself how a hug is the last feeling I will have of him before we turn away and say goodbye; something which would have to last me eight or nine months. Maybe a year. I watched the security line grow as more people prepared to leave and knew my time was growing in itself. I thought of the couple from the picture and realized the airport was my train station, the security line was my clock; both counting down until that one fated goodbye. I turned back to look at Wayne and upon seeing his face, knew it was time to go. The way we had been sitting at the table, the gate exit was located right behind him and I had the chance to glimpse a few people welcoming those whom they were waiting for. It was beautiful to watch the lingering moments before someone arrived. I watched a girl in her young twenties; short brown hair, wire-rimmed glasses, and wearing an orange sundress suddenly break into a smile which spread across her entire face when he was still yards away in the hall. I saw them as lovers embrace with a passion of moments gone bye, and caress each other’s face. He pulled back from the hug, looked into her eyes, and kissed her. Kissed her as if he had waited his whole life to kiss her. To have gone through such an era of time alone and now here they were, in living flesh, in each others’ arms. I watched a myriad of tears fall down her face, but every single one was a capture of the new moments to come for them. I swear I heard a movie soundtrack score in the background, music rising to its climax as their lips touched. This young couple weren’t the only ones being reunited, but I had found part of myself in this girl, and I realized that though I was saying goodbye to my own love, this embrace they shared would be something I had to look forward too. A goodbye, though predictable from the time I met Wayne, was only bringing a chance at one more hello in our life. He left me at the security gate that night as he always does. After one last embrace he turned and said goodbye. That’s all I’d have of him: the feel of his arms wrapped around my middle, the scent of his cologne on my collar, the small but immensely passionate kiss on my forehead.. For one chance or another that night I stood and watched him walk away. Watched him turn his back on me, walk through the crowd of people, pass the doorways, and out into the city. Watching someone walk away from you really gives the goodbye an opportunity to sink in. I felt a few tears escape my eyelids. But it also let me believe there would be another day when he walked towards me. There was. Seven months later I stood at Ft. Stewart with a million different emotions in me, waiting for his bus to pull up after a very long and tedious deployment to Iraq. While he was gone it had felt as if we were living a year apart, but now we were in the same time and place again. I’d been on base for over three hours and finally the news came that his platoon was pulling through the gates. I felt like the little baby blond again. The world was my playground and I was waiting for my best friend to join me in a new adventure. As I anxiously tried to stay still waiting for him, I realized this was a moment in which I got to say hello. Not goodbye but hello. It was the same hello I had waited for since I had watched him walk away from me. Seeing him get off the bus after seven months of eternity threw every goodbye out of my system. It gave me a reason to breathe again. It gave me a chance for another goodbye another day, but I knew I would embrace that. Each new sunrise brings goodbyes of some kind, but we cannot let life pass us just because of one goodbye. We cannot let time tick us into sadness but instead we should be thinking about what the goodbye is bringing. One more hello. One more chance to say I love you, one more chance to live a memory, one new embrace. One more chance to take a step forward and see what the world is bringing us. Next time I find a seat in an airport coffee shop, I’ll swirl my white chocolate peppermint mocha, skim milk, no whip, and smile at the predictably of one more goodbye. Because one day, I won’t ever have to say goodbye again. Life can be predictable sometimes, but each chalky sunrise I wake up too, I know he’s back home waking up to that same morning.
So, my last post was a little ridiculous. I know. I was in a mood, tired, bored, frustrated, but that's life sometimes.
I am in a dilemma. And I just want to first admit, that though my posts on here have been few and far between lately, my writing has increased. My New Year's resolution for this year was to write everyday, either in my journal or on here... and so far, I've made it into the journal everyday. And it hasn't been just little short sentences of writing, but some poems, some novel ideas, some actual journaling. It just seems easier to write there during the day since I don't always have my computer with me. BUT, I am seriously going to give this blogging thing another try. I quite enjoy it, even though I think I only have about three readers, all of which I know. (Love you guys!)
Back to my dilemma. I'm in a writing workshop again this semester. (And I love it even though I've only had one class and it's only a one day a week class.) It's Creative Nonfiction, something completely new to me. Turns out I have my first creative essay due on Tuesday and I have NO IDEA what to write about. I mean, the options are so hard. I can write about ANYTHING I absolutely want too. It has to be truth, but creatively. You don't tell a writer to write about whatever they want for a graded essay, you just don't. But... it's kind of an adventure. I get to sit down and just type, write about something in my life and make is something worth reading. So, my mind has been going since Tuesday and will continue to go until I sit down this weekend to write. I'm hoping to post it on here.
Time for a new go around with my writing. I think I'm going to like this.
Now, it's off to bed. Quite early for me but I'm exhausted.
Enjoy life my audience and never, never miss out on the beauty. It might be your bestseller one day.
