Quote

"What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul?" - Jesus Christ

Sick People and Fire

So the other night my sister and I were sitting on the couch watching a movie when we started to hear this loud honking sound. Originally I thought it was someone in the parking lot who was drunk and waiting for friends to get out to the car. I waited for the sound to stop, but it didn't. My sister, being braver than myself, walked over to the door and looked outside. The next thing I heard was "the cars are on fire!"

I answered the only logical way a person can respond to such a statement ("what?") only to hear again, "the cars are on fire," this time with a slight tinge of fear. By this point, I had reached the door as well (there is only so much curiosity a person can stand, lets face it...we're all cats in that department). I looked outside and there it was, the most terrifying thing I have ever seen.

The carport outside of our apartment complex was, indeed, on fire. The loud honking sound we had heard was coming not from a drunk driver, but from the first car to burst into flame. The middle of the carport was one mass of orange flames. The heat from the fire swirled into our apartment, licking our faces. Naturally, my initial response to all of this was "oh my gosh the cars are on fire!"

My next, more rational response, was to stand lost in the living room thinking painstakingly through what we needed to grab before running to the nearest exit facing away from the fire. I grabbed my keys, my jacket, and my cat. My sister, the one with the logic skills, yanked the closet door back and heaved the cat carrier from beneath the pile of blankets it supported. "Put the cats in the carrier."

Within seconds, Oliver (that's my cat) was being stuffed into the cat carrier while my sister raced through the apartment searching for her cat. When both cats were stuffed into the carrier (which wasn't easy considering the loud popping sound coming from the fire) we both raced out french doors, through the porch, and out onto the lawn behind our apartment complex.

We marched to the beat of the popping cars across the lawn only to find that we were fenced in all the way around. We jumped the fence and stood in shock and awe as we watched our new car (Georgie) burn to the ground along with every other car in the carport. In the time it took us to walk around (all of 3 minutes) the entire carport was popping. We heard the splash of glass as the windows burst from the heat and pressure. the fronts of the cars were jumping off the ground as the heat and flame reached the gas tank.

Standing a safe distance away now, I was finally able to register the smell. The fumes from the gas mingled with the scent of flame. The smoke from the carport made a scent almost like that of a campfire. Black smoke filled the air, blocking out the giant harvest moon that was glaring down on the scene.

Then, the most amazing thing happened. Neighbors began to pour out from every house and apartment complex within a block of the fire. I met people I had never met before. We stood together and watched as the fire licked the inside of the stairwell of our apartments. We watched the firefighters spraying the unrelenting fire with fire retardant and water. And right there, in the middle of all of this, on the phone with my mom (repeating over and over again "it's just so loud") I had an epiphany.

I looked up to see the silhouette of two high school aged kids cuddling against the backdrop of the bright orange fire. Yes, cuddling. Making googly eyes and holding one another while I watched the fire get closer and closer to my home. Can you guess what my epiphany was yet? That's right...people are sick. Even though everyone stood out there on the freezing street corner with me, none of them were there to commiserate. They were there to watch someone else get the shit end of the stick.

Now, I'm not the kind of person to judge others. In fact, I usually get along great with others. Hey, I'm the girl who repeats the obvious, stubbornly sticks to her opinions, and refuses to grow up (case and point...I went to Walmart the other day just to buy one of those blow up balls for two-year-olds not for a gift, but for myself. That's it; that was my list). Being this kind of a person really doesn't leave me with a whole lot of room to judge, but seriously, cuddling? Wow.

Luckily, we were one of the few people to have full coverage on our new used car (the responsible party carried no insurance on their vehicle, not even liability), the fire department put the fire out before our home burned down and we were allowed to go back inside, cats and all. As I took a nice, long, warm shower that night, I realized that people truly are sick; at the same time, it was nice to have someone there. Even if it was a cuddling teenage couple. And even though I jump at the sound of car horns and sirens now, at least I have a dry place to sleep. I suppose this must have been what Molier meant when he said God was a comedian playing to an audience too afraid to laugh.

Last One...

This is actually the view from the ground looking up through the treetops. I really like the effect the fog and dark had on the way it looks, though.

The Octapus Tree

To The Lighthouse

Welcome to the Oregon Coast...

This is from one of my favorite beaches on the Oregon Coast...Twin Rocks. I love it here...it's not crowded and it's beautiful.

The Blahs

I've got 'em. Tired, worn out, flirting with the line between feeling so-so and not feeling well...fun, fun.

Useful: YES...Social: NO

Everywhere I go it seems like people are talking about how great technology is. Walk into about any room anywhere and someone is probably on the computer or a cell phone, ipod, or some other technological device. I have to admit that I do enjoy being able to keep this blog and express my thoughts and technology certainly is valuable. Having said that, I can't say I'm ok with the idea of technology replacing face-to-face communication as the norm for social relationships today. Technology seems to take away from that one-on-one experience we all take for granted. I get so frustrated when I try to talk to someone and they are too busy texting to look at me. If I wanted an experience like that, I'd turn around and talk to the wall. Even for the people texting, the communication simply isn't the same. It's easy to spew junk to a computer or phone, but over half of communication comes from facial expressions or tone of voice or body language or a million other tiny little signals we pick up on when we are in the same room as another person. Technology is great, but at the core we are still social creatures. Social: living or disposed to live in companionship with others or in a community, rather than in isolation. It seems to me that you need more than words to have companionship; talk is cheap, so tell me again how sitting alone typing on the computer is social...

Demotivation

So I was checking out one of my friends' favorite websites, despair.com, when it hit me out of nowhere. I love this stuff. There is something about the pure honesty in depressing statements like, "Failure: When your best just isn't good enough" and "Dysfunction: The only consistent feature of all of your dissatisfying relationships is you" that makes an impact. Maybe it's the fact that for a brief moment, we feel like we are not being patronized. Sure, we all need motivation, and I am one of the first people to feel thankful for inspirational words of wisdom, but the hard truth is that failure is a very real part of life. Often times, we want to believe that if we just give our best it will be enough, and it may be most of the time. The rest of the time, though, it isn't. We all have those moments when we come to see that the result of all of our hard work, our best so to speak, is just short of the cut off line. It sucks, it hurts, but shit happens. The best part of failure: you learn. You learn to laugh about it. So even though we don't celebrate how crappy we may feel, we have the choice to walk away laughing rather than crying. Life will throw you down, but you have to get back up and realize that failure, like success, is temporary.

Inspiration's opposite...

You know what they say...every action has an opposite and equal reaction. :D

Inspiration

Bucket List

Most of us have tons of things we want to accomplish before we die, but we rarely take the time to recognize what they are. For this reason, I have decided to write my very own bucket list. Yes, this was inspired partly by the movie, but it has also been on my "to do" list for a long time (long before the movie came out). Anyways, these are just a few items I want to be sure to add.

In no particular order:

Visit the Eiffel Tower
Go sailing
Find my life's passion
Change someone's life for the better
Write a book

Live Like You Were Dying

He said: "I was in my early forties,
"With a lot of life before me,
"An' a moment came that stopped me on a dime.
"I spent most of the next days,
"Looking at the x-rays,
"An' talking 'bout the options an' talkin’ ‘bout sweet time."
I asked him when it sank in,
That this might really be the real end?
How’s it hit you when you get that kind of news?
Man whatcha do?

An' he said: "I went sky diving, I went rocky mountain climbing,
"I went two point seven seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu.
"And I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter,
"And I gave forgiveness I'd been denying."
An' he said: "Some day, I hope you get the chance,
"To live like you were dyin'."

He said "I was finally the husband,
"That most the time I wasn’t.
"An' I became a friend a friend would like to have.
"And all of a sudden goin' fishin’,
"Wasn’t such an imposition,
"And I went three times that year I lost my Dad.
"Well, I finally read the Good Book,
"And I took a good long hard look,
"At what I'd do if I could do it all again,
"And then:

"I went sky diving, I went rocky mountain climbing,
"I went two point seven seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu.
"And I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter,
"And I gave forgiveness I'd been denying."
An' he said: "Some day, I hope you get the chance,
"To live like you were dyin'."

Like tomorrow was a gift,
And you got eternity,
To think about what you’d do with it.
An' what did you do with it?
An' what can I do with it?
An' what would I do with it?

"Sky diving, I went rocky mountain climbing,
"I went two point seven seconds on a bull named Fu Man Chu.
"And then I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter,
"And I watched Blue Eagle as it was flyin'."
An' he said: "Some day, I hope you get the chance,
"To live like you were dyin'."

"To live like you were dyin'."
"To live like you were dyin'."
"To live like you were dyin'."
"To live like you were dyin'."

First Step

Lao Tzu once said, "A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step." This is the first blog I have started voluntarily. I don't exactly plan to go a thousand miles, but every once in a while I do get the urge to put my thoughts down in black and white. I suppose this is my answer to that desire, and my post today my first step.