American Dream

First let me start out by saying that the 4th of July is my favorite holiday. When I was growing up, we didn't have time for holidays. We were to busy dealing with lies, deceit, abuse and addiction. After I moved in with my mother there were no more christmas trees, no thanksgiving dinners, and definitely no fireworks. My first real holiday experience might seem mediocre to most people. It was July 4th 2009 and it was my first day in my new apartment, and away from my old life. Two years ago on Independence day I finally got my own independence; however, it wasn't the normal "I'm turned 18 so I can be a tool" independence. It was my first day free of all the bad. All the hell I had been through was finally over. It was (at that point) the best day of my life.
That brings me to last 4th of July. It was the first 4th Brad and I had spent together and it was amazing. We had only been together two short months; nevertheless, I had never felt so 'put together' in my life. It sounds like a movie scene but we spent the afternoon at the park laying in the grass, like we were the only two people in the world. As the sun went down we watched the fireworks together and thats when I knew I was going to be spending every 4th for the rest of my life with him.
So here I am, only four days until my favorite holiday of the year. It's crazy how much things can change in just one year. How even though people's looks have stayed the same, after just 365 days we can look at them so differently. When I was younger and my life was in so much chaos, I used to sit and look up at the sky and wonder "Where will my life be in 6 months? Where will I be? Is it selfish to even think I'll make it that long?" Now here I am, two years of looking up at the same sky and not having to ask that question. Two years and I can say I am on my way to getting what I want. I'm with the guy I am going to spend the rest of my life with. The man I will have a family with. I am making for myself all of the things I never had. Stability, family, comfort, and now I know that if I am being strong for something, it's not because I have no choice, it's because its something I believe in. Now I'm being strong so that I will have the things in life I deserve, not so that I can carry the weight of other peoples failures. The 4th of July isn't just fireworks and hotdogs to me. It's a reminder that I'm strong enough to do anything. That I'll be damned if I'll let anything get in the way of what I want. That every 4th I'll lay under the same fireworks, with the same man that I love, living the American dream that I'm creating for myself. Don't spend your life trying to find yourself, spend it creating yourself.

A vultures' eye view of mid-day road kill

This is not my typical kind of blog. I'm not writing to exaggerate some debilitating disaster that has presented itself in my ever-so-spontaneous life. No, I'm writing because for the first time everything in my life (or at least the majority of things) is good. When I say good, I don't mean they're not bad, which is normally how I would categorize things to a passing neighbor, or to an old friend at lunch. For the first time in as long as i can remember I am truly happy. Its normally not 12 hours before I get lost in thought or in some melancholy song that dips my subconscious back into the depths of the dark part of my mind. A part that so few people know about, and even fewer truly understand. However, in the present day, that is not the case, its been days that I haven't visited that dark place. I've actually thought about those problems and been at peace with what's happened to me. I'm not holding grudges, or feeling resentment or bitterness. Honestly, I'm the happiest I've ever been, and I'm ridiculously in love with the man I plan to spend the rest of my life with. Its like a 1950's poster in my head right now. I don't want what I'm about to say give the impression that I'm not, and haven't always been thankful for what I have. I know exactly how lucky I am for the people in my life. I hope they know how much I appreciate them, and how indescribably thankful I am that they are in my life. Which brings up the underlying motive behind my writing; don't get me wrong I am happy, and that's what scares the hell out of me. When the bottom is falling out of everything at least you know what your problems are; however, in my newly found exhilaration I also find something I'm not used to feeling, and that is unsure. I have this underlying fear that not only am I only happy based on my own ignorance of a problem or lie I just haven't discovered yet; but, that I'm afraid that if I let myself be happy, if only for a minute, then I'll be mortified that the wool has been being pulled over my eyes the whole time. Don't be mistaken, I am not one who is easily fooled or predicted. I know what's going on around me weather the people trying to keep me in the dark like it or not. Which is why now that I have no reason to suspect the people around me, I feel I can only suspect myself. I feel like I'm at a crossroads. On one hand if I wave my suspicions off as just not being used to things going well in my life, then what happens when chaos strikes once again and it turns out I was wrong all along. I'm not afraid of being happy, I'm afraid of being fooled. The only thing worse than a problem is a problem you didn't see coming. So how do I let my guard down, how do I shake the feeling that everything is going to fall apart, that I need to keep walking on eggshells. If I trust and I'm wrong, will that be worse than not trusting to begin with? There have been more than a few times in my life, especially in my younger years, that all I have been left with is my dignity. So what happens when I let go of feeling like the bottom is going to fall out at any second and then it does? If I trust the people around me and I get hurt, It'll just undo all the progress I've made with myself; however, If I don't then maybe all hope is lost to begin with. I want so much to believe that this amazing stage of my life will last forever, that exhaling really is letting go. It's like holding a grenade with no pin in it, that was given to you by someone you love. Do you trust them it wont explode? Even if past experience has taught you that you can't?Do the words "trust me, it wont happen again" ever really mean anything? If I let my guard down, and I get hurt... I really don't know if I can do that again. How do you trust something you know is programmed to hurt you? "I've changed" is an even bigger lie than "I'm fine." I just don't know if I can go back to believing one and telling the other.

Montana, you can't save everyone

Brad and I, we have our problems, just as everyone else does, but in some way i feel like finding him was the universe's way of offering some type of compensation for the past. But lately, we've hit a rough patch. Demons from his past and the horrid holidays have put a tention between us that sometimes i wonder if im the only one thats feeling it. its mostly when he doesnt think im paying attention that i see this look on his face, a look that breaks my heart. a look like there is a pain inside of him that not even i can remedy. I wish i could just reach into his mind and remove all the pain. I often feel like there is something he's not telling me. I wish i could get him to understand that there is no one in this world who loves him like i do. sometimes i think he gets it. but he forgets. i see him, rubbing his forehead, pretending to be lost in some apocalyptic movie when really deep down, i can feel that he's trapped inside his head, somewhere deep down that i may never get to see. I know i've been there before, where you let your mind wonder so far deep down if feels like you've got perceptual tunnel vision into yourself. But to see someone else, someone i love, drowned in his own thoughts of past events it breaks my heart. I've often been told by people "montana you can't save everyone" and my reply is always "why not". I can see now he is going through something bigger than the normal 'rough patch' between couples. although i do not understand it, There are some things in this world i will never understand. Things that, i will never come close to understanding, and things i do not wish to understand. However with brad, i will never stop trying to understand. when i met brad he was on the brink of control. i could almost smell it. i've never seen someone on such a pivital point. and as the second i realized he was a teetering between himself and his demons, i also realized something else, I realized i loved him. There is something about watching him stand outside in the sunlight that makes my existence worth it. Something about they way he puts his hands on my face that melts me. I feel like when im with him im at the right place, at the right time, and something about his beauty, not only physical, that makes me want to be a better person. If there ever were proof of a higher being or a deity, it would be in his aura, or in the way that just the fact that he exists makes me feel. So to see something i hold in such regard, sit at the edge of the bed when he doesn't know i've awakened and hold his head in his hands scares me. I can admit im not the perfect significant other. I have my flaws as does everyone else, but to see him the way he's been these past few weeks is probably the most humbling thing i've experienced. So no, i might not be able to save the world; but, I refuse to not try. I've never believed in soulmates or fate, but what i do believe in is that there is something in that man's smile and his presence that i will not give up on. he has become so much of apart of myself that i dont think it would be possible even if i were to try to let go. I just hope, that this is not a one sided battle. I hope he knows how much i really do love him. and how much i would give to not see that bottomless gaze in his eyes. Hopefully one day he will learn to trust me, because he's one of the very few people that actually can. I can honestly say there is nothing, i wouldn't do for him. nothing i couldn't accept or understand if he needed me too. Since the day we met i knew he was going to be apart of my future. That i am right here, right now, for him. not myself.

Willowing October

this is a story I'm writing. Its still in progress. Enjoy.

She walked along the tattered trail as the thorns from the lush bushes slit her skin. Anastasia stared forward with an outlying gaze as the malice trickled through her veins and threatened to consume her. Barefoot she slipped through the tousled woods as her naked and threadbare feet benevolently swept against the cold October ground. She slowed as she came into the narrow aperture in the trees where she stepped quietly to the tattered corpse of the beaten and barley breathing young man she had bound to a aged willow tree just days before. She ran her elegant fingers through his hair arching his head back and as she put the edge of the ridged blade to his throat, she leaned to his ear and delicately whispered “This sorrow’s heavenly, it strikes where it doth love; but sleep will find you soon, beneath the shining stars, lay the with thy gleaming moon. ” He drew in his last breath as she pressed the blade into his skin and with one poised motion, let it sashay across his throat. She arose slowly as his limp body lay delicately against the willow tree. She took a step back and observed him lying with a bittersweet glaze of crimson silk slowly soaking his frayed white shirt. It was then that the images of their past came seeping into her mind only to fill her with the same malice she had felt walking through the forest. Anastasia’s porcelain white skin rose as the chills of the night crept upon her. She turned to the path and started to walk away glancing only momentarily back to the Willow.
His name was Craven Alexander, the next in line to inherit his family’s fortune and in the public eye he was poised, charismatic and compassionate but behind closed doors he was astringent, arrogant and narcissistic. No matter what Alexander was or pretended to be one thing never changed, he got whatever and whoever he wanted, and he wanted Anastasia Chambers. It was that day that would forever haunt her, forever contravene her soul and refuse to be forgotten that he gave the order to his servants to have her dragged from her home and brought to him in the middle of the night against her will.
Anastasia stops walking, closes her eyes and tries to shake off the memories of being carted from her bed, hands tied and gagged as she was taken from her home. Her last feelings of a perfect life shattered in that moment. She tries gathering her thoughts but the images are pushing, they keep pouring into her mind, refusing to be forgotten. She remembers every detail about that night. The way Craven smirked at her when they brought her through the door, they way the room smelled, the ticking of the clock, the way he sat there calmly staring at her as she kneel on here knees in front of him, and the way his mere smirk made her feel desecrated and exposed. All the noble traits she had always believed he possessed vanished. “That’s enough” she says out loud as if to banish the memories with the shear spike in her voice….