PORTRAITS OF THE COSMICALLY INSIGNIFICANT

Pictures of people and things, and of course your regular existential crisis courtesy of your favorite angsty adolescent (half kidding).

This year I wrote less. I know I keep saying that, but this time, I say it with a proud undertone. Ever since I learned how to write, I never really stopped. It didn't matter if I or others thought I wasn't any good; this was something I knew I loved with all of me. Writing wasn't a hobby - it was a vice. Sad? Write. Pissed off? Write. Happy? Write. I couldn't imagine my life, myself, without it. Bukowski said it best: take a writer away from his typewriter and all you have left is the sickness which started him typing in the beginning, and to think that I spent an entire year writing almost nothing... what kind of self-rut was I in to let myself suffer like that? No one knows me better than my words do, and like all failed lovers, we are now strangers.

That's not a bad thing, however. It's no secret that I am indeed a stereotypical Teen Girl Who Is Fueled By Pseudo-Sadness™ (and a proud one at that - who has the audacity to actually use and cultivate teenage angst to build a platform? Apparently I do), and recently I've noticed that all I've ever published are sad/angry writing, and who wants to read that? Why did I think complaining about how shitty life can be was an effective way to impact people, which was my goal when I started this blog in the first place? I am full of love and life and light but when I sit down, pen in hand, I turn into this, this whiny, pathetic excuse for a writer who can never seem to find the right words and is miserable because of it. I don't want to be that. I wanted to evolve.

You know that quote, if you want to kill yourself, kill what you don't like? That's what I did - for the first time, I fucking shut up. I let the world move without me; everyone else was creating and I was their audience. I listened, not because I wanted to be inspired, or because I wanted to compare; I listened because I wanted to. I thought I would be nothing without writing, but I am too surrounded by art and beauty to be empty. It made me happy sure, but there's also a certain kind of joy you only find in the colorful stories of others, in putting on someone else's shoes and discovering that there is a world so much bigger than you, a world you have been blatantly ignoring while trying to make words shiny enough to make a difference. There is a comfort in being small and insignificant, and right now comfort is all I crave.

So come and tell me about that time you laughed so hard milk came out of your nose, or why you love your favorite movie. Show me songs you know all the words to but never sing in public, or we can stay quiet and admire the constant hum of an earth that is constantly moving. I've accepted that the world is dynamic and I am no longer trying to keep up with it; instead I will let it take me wherever, and I will be admiring the view from there.

Here's to being small and listening, finally.