Samsara

This is the kind of movie that makes you want to hold viewing parties. Everyone needs to watch this. <333

Punam Bean (our wedding photographer) has posted a sneak peek of our engagement session photos on her blog!

This is awesome because a) people can see our pretty pictures, and b) she LINKED TO MY WEB SERIAL.

I've already had 25 unique views since she posted it!

She's, like, an amazing NYC photographer with a following. Maybe... she knows... an agent or two? ;D

I can dream!

On Friday, March 19, Jared and I will celebrate the 6 month anniversary of our "match." It's funny, this meeting-online thing- when do we celebrate an anniversary? On September 19th, the day we were matched, and the day that came to me the year before in a vision? On October 3rd, when we officially met, and knew we were in love but didn't dare admit it? On the 10th, when we shared our first kiss? On the 11th, when we became "official?" Or on the 16th, when we said "I love you"? Or maybe on the 25th, when we decided to get married? We've settled on the 19th simply because of the import of my vision, but maybe we should just celebrate them all :)

It's amazing to think that we've only been together for six months (4 of those months we've been planning our wedding). We are soul mates. It is difficult to imagine the lives we lived before meeting. It's hard to understand that we haven't known each other since birth. There may be details we don't know about each other, but we know each other's heart, inside and out.

It's strange, still, no matter how right and good it feels, to think about all that's happened. Finding your soul mate. Planning a wedding. Moving in. Our lives are entwined now, and I've never had that before. I've had long term committed relationships, but there was always a part of me that was separate from my partner. With Jared, it's different. I realized a long time ago that I love him more than anything else in the world. Maybe that makes me soft, or a hopeless romantic, or selfish, even. But it's true, and I can't change it. I may have a hundred dreams in my lifetime that I hope to achieve, and maybe I will, but Jared is my dream-come-true every waking moment, and I realize and relish that more and more each day. It's astounding how the Universe can deliver to you what you have forgotten you asked for, and what you didn't even know you would want.

So I'm making a nice dinner this Friday, and weather permitting we're going to go on a very long walk, just like the day we first met. But this time we'll be discussing paint-chips for our new apartment, and what we want on our wedding invitations. How strange a thing, this "time..."

Also, I think this is the first time I've ever used "loved" for my mood on LJ :)

I have given up on trying to reach 50k. That's not to say I won't, but I'm not stressing over it. I can't. I was, and it was hurting me even more. If need be, I will be the example that it is okay to fail at NaNo, and I shall fail gracefully.

Some reasons behind my decision: I was not excited about the novel I'd chosen to write, and excitement, above all else, at least at the outset, is essential to ploughing through a first draft. It's all one has sometimes to make up for a lack of characters and plot. So, I've scrapped the novel, and I'm doing something experimental, which I'll discuss in a moment. Also, due to illness, stress related to finances, and my unavailable weekends (from now until Spring :) and now the addition of an editing assignment that was supposed to be done by now, but due to some bitchy underhandedness I was unable to contribute to a group project and now have to do it alone- this on top of all the other final assignments for the semester, it would be irresponsible of me and unkind of me to push myself to finish a novel, too. Not to mention, while all this is going on I feel terrible about not getting to write TPaL, and I'm afraid I'm becoming too distant from its essence. Tonight I'm going to write a few chapters in that, and then work on the new NaNo novel.

The New NaNo Novel: As you may have noticed recently, I have found my soul mate and I am madly in love. When I say soul mate, I'm not using the term lightly- there have been so many strange signs and experiences, and dreams that we've had, and sheer, undeniable intuition... I have no doubt that Jared and I have spent many lives together. So, being all twitterpated and having such a clear knowledge of some of these past lives in my brain, I'm going to write them out. It's all based on the second time we met, we were lying down, cuddling, and he looked at me and asked with all sincerety: "Where do I know you from?" I had a dream later that week that he asked me that, and I told him the story of one of our lives together. It's coming out fairly experimental- there's no over-arching plot so far, just a series of anecdotes with poetry sprinkled here and there, and it's written in first/second person with alternating narrators, signified by font change.

I'm not so much excited about this new idea as I am forcefully drawn to it. I don't know if i'll reach 50k, but that's fine. I just want to finish it in time for Jared's birthday (December 27th). It'll be the first writing gift I've ever given, but more importantly, been inspired to give.

In other news, TPaL will be published as a serial in Buffalo Tales Magazine for the next year! I signed the contract and got the check, and I almost cried. $150 dollars. I know that's really not much per issue, but it doesn't matter- I told her I'd let her publish it for free. Besides, money issues have abounded lately. All that aside, a three figure check and an official contract does so much to make a person feel like a bona fide writer, as in one whose career is in writing. I've needed a boost lately to get me back on my feet of positive thinking, and this helps. I also need to actually write every day.

Leto seems to be doing better. We found a hair ball yesterday, I'm hoping it was his and that he was just trying to get that up all this time (he's such a little guy I wouldn't be surprised if he had a hard time with it). So, all in all, things are looking up! Plus, I get to see Jared again Friday night - Sunday night, and next weekend he has Friday off, so I'll be going out there Thursday night for a 3 day weekend, and the week after that is thanksgiving, so we get 4 days together! Woo hoo!

I was feeling like such a lame-o recently for being so whiny about missing him (in my head) during the week, but I finally realized why it's okay: in life, when you grow and expand and improve, it hurts to be cut off from those things that you've become. I was happy single, in the perspective I was living... but now I have so much more, a mind-blowing gift that, until I received it, I had no idea was absolutely and already an essential part of who I am. I can't go back- you can never go back. So, yeah, it sucks that we're so far away, but that's okay, too. It's okay that we miss each other like crazy, because no matter how much we miss each other the love that we're experiencing is so much more powerful that we can't even be unhappy about it. Besides, it could be much worse- I'm so grateful that we at least have every weekend together.

Okay, I'm done for today. Maybe gonna nap before class while my laundry finishes up.

Another late night entry, despite the fact that an hour ago (actually from 5pm on) I was exhausted, and now am suddenly awake.

I have been thinking a lot lately about Boys. You know, not just the gender, but the idea of them in my life. I haz none :p Not that that's a bad thing. I'm so busy with my writing that I hardly have time for anything else, and soon I'll be adding full time school and part time work to that schedule, plus belly dance on weekends if I have anything to say about it. But, the idea of boyfriends has come up repeatedly in psychic readings (apparently I have an admirer that I don't even know?! But he's not stalking me... hmm... confirmed by two separate mediums!), and thus in conversation, and (lo!) in my dreams. And yet... I have no great desire to be in a relationship right now. I'm feeling far too selfish and absorbed in my storytelling to make time for dates.

But, something occurred to me today. Last night I dreamed (among other strange things) about being set up to meet a guy, and because I liked him I intentionally avoided interacting with him. Symbolism much? Am I afraid of another relationship? No. But I've decided that I'm done with dating. The next person I do "date," I want to be The One.

It's Love that I'm slightly preoccupied with, I think. I write characters that have the most beautiful love for one another; I shamelessly adore books that have wonderful love stories at the heart. I am, by nature (believe it or not), a very loving person. I am fiercely loyal, and that is why it has been so difficult for me, in the past, to end relationships that I really knew were not going to succeed.

So, I want love. The type of intimate love that comes from a partner in crime/life. But I don't want a boyfriend. How do I reconcile this? I don't really know. I've been getting a lot of "love" lately (praise for my writing, mostly) and I am intensely grateful for it. I find myself, again and again, in amazement of the sincere friendships I share with certain people, and the wonderful relationships I have with my parents and, to a degree, my older brothers. But there is something different about a "lover's" love (besides the physical stuff :P).

I'm just babbling really (it's late and I've been known to get loopy at these hours). I suppose I'm hashing out what I want, sorting through the contrast to launch new desires. It's important to know what you want, and just now I figured it out: I don't want a boyfriend. I want a partner. And I think that's really what's been holding me back from meeting him: I've only ever had boyfriends and mutual infatuations, so how can I imagine the bliss of a perfect union?

Well, easily. I write about it, don't I?

Awesome practice #4: write out a scenario involving perfect love between yourself and your soulmate. At the very least, it will fill you will joy just to daydream about it :)

Ah, livejournal. I could have written that in a notebook, but announcing it to the world makes it all the more powerful.