What Is Beauty?

Looking beyond the colored veil.
You can see the flicker, the shimmer.
The music is there, hiding.
It jumps, excited and overjoyed.
You need but open your mouth,
Open your soul, and let it free.

Looking beyond the awkward limbs,
You can see the graceful flow.
Movement and elegance,
Grow through the muscles,
Out the tips of your fingers and toes.
Close your eyes and dance.

Looking beyond the rustic tools,
See the painting as it can be.
Paint and paper can be so much more,
It is there, just reveal it as Michelangelo did;
Chip away at the marble until you find
The beauty of creativity in front of you.



What is beauty? Is it art, is it music, is it performance?

I can see beauty in most things if I look hard enough.
In the cliche things; music, a painting, a sunset, dance.
In the less admired things; people, books, speech, words.
In the things left behind; equations, mistakes, anger, a smile.

So again I ask, what is beauty?

The Poet

The poet drew the line in the sand;
Connecting it to another.
She knew where it began
But not where it was to end.

And so she followed the line,
Searching for the other.
She went through heat,
Through snow and weather violent.

The end never seemed to come,
Her dimming hopes having enough.
With feet so tired, eyes so weary,
How could the gentle poet go on?

So she sank; in spirit, in body,
Her knees hitting sand so rough.
Head falling, hanging in defeat;
And in her despair, the poet missed the gleam.

Sex: A Reply, A Metaphor and A Ramble

So, Will... It's come time for a reply.

Sex.... What is it? Is it daunting? Is it... beautiful? Is it necessary?
A question I often ask myself, just to see where I am in life, is "Is the relationship making the sex or is the sex making the relationship?"
While it doesn't always need to be taken strictly in those terms (A more open translation being "Is the cake making the icing or is the icing making the cake?"), it helps me realize what is going on around. What is

And for me... Sex is just that. Icing. I don't NEED it. In fact, without cake, I get sick of icing really fast. But on the flip side.... Cake can get a bit boring without icing from time to time, right?

Well maybe you just haven't gotten the kind of cake you need.

Ok, Manda... I get it. You need a balance, right?
Wrong.

Some people can sit down and eat a whole damn tub of icing, fuck the cake. Who needs cake when you've got sugary, amazing icing in front of you?

Some people can sit and eat a cake as is. No extra toppings. They don't need the outside sugar, just what's inside. Who needs icing when you've got moist, delicious cake?

.....And some people get stomach aches from all the sugar. And some peoples' mouths get dry after too much cake.


What is the point of all this obvious, semi-metaphorical rambling, Will?

It's this: Everyone's taste is different. No one is wrong. No one is right. Not when it comes to this basic act. If you leave out all the moral and ethical problems introduced later by humans and their ever-loving need to make things complicated, that's what you get. Variety. The spice of life. The difference between each and every one of us. My brain patterns, just as unique as fingerprints and retinal scans, revealing my thoughts being different from her, her, him and you.

So maybe not everyone wants the icing and maybe not everyone's a fan of cake.

Who cares? You have your body. I have mine. They have theirs.


So, in the end, does it matter; their view?

It doesn't to me. But then... I'm still mixing my batter.

Introspectiveness Sucks

So... today I had a conversation with my mother. We talked about relationships, love and what people need, in general, to be happy with another person.


And it got me thinking or, more specifically, worrying.

I wonder if I'm too picky in what I look for in a person.

I want to laugh, to cry, to argue, to be agreed with, to be given space, to be held, to drive them up a wall, to be loved, to feel hands in my hair, to feel fingers in mine.

I want to be awkwardly comfortable. I want to them to be maturely childish. Cynically hopeful.

I want an impossible balance.

I used to think that love was enough. I've learned differently.

I don't know if what I want is so.... hard to find. I don't know if my standards are too high.

I'm worried they are... but I'm also afraid of compromising and settling for something less than actual happiness.

And then I worry... What if I find them or found them.. and I just am not/was not what they wanted.

What if my balance doesn't mesh with theirs?

I know it fits my personality, but I really don't want to be the crazy lady with all the cats. I don't want to be "Aunt Amanda" forever... I want to be "Mom" someday.

I know humans, by nature, fear loneliness. We are social creatures. I know my thoughts are normal... I also know that sometimes people like me end up just like I am afraid to. Alone.



The poet knelt in the sand,
Her eyes on the grains as they slipped away.
And she knew, feeling the softness contrast
The coarseness she knew could be,
That her fears were validated
By the simplicity of regret.



Have a good weekend, friends.

-Manda

Overwhelming Calm

It’s funny how when I was lost, alone and down
I was constantly surrounded, always in a crowd.
I felt alone in the arms of the many I called love
I felt alone in the company of the ones I relied on

But here I am, fresh faced and adorned in cheery outlook
New, revived… And alone.
Sure, the company is still around
Just a small reach and I can touch, feel, breathe in another

But for the first time since I first cried “Out, damned spot! out, I say!”
I feel a calming wave inside my mind
I feel at ease
I feel myself, in all my faults and charms, alone

So here I stare, seeing what I’ve become
Beautiful, victorious, myself
So here I am, floating on the edge of past and future
Scared, enthralled, compelled

Isn’t it a beautiful irony
That you cannot be happy in another’s company
Until you are at ease and satisfied
In your own?

Wow… rambly poetry for the win. I just wanted to add a little note crediting my friend mr_engineer on flickr for letting me use his beautiful photograph. It is, of course, used with full permission!

I took a look at this picture… and got overwhelmed with thoughts.. which exploded above… Maybe I’ll write on it again.


Be well!

-Manda

Returning As Something New

HI! Miss me, folks!?!

Let’s get back in the swing of things with a loverly angsty poem from your own resident Manda!


Just Ask

Ask me again, why I won't sing you my song.
Ask me again, what I think went wrong.
The answer will change.
Isn't it strange,
That there are so many don'ts?
But I know the problem is all of my won’ts.

Ask me why I walk away
Ask me what I want to say
My eyes should reveal
What my mouth must conceal
I’ve lost my fight with my heart
And it has no will to start



Something a little more cheery, why don’t we? ^_^

FRESH

It’s like someone opened a window, let the breeze roll in
It’s like someone opened my heart, let the love begin
It’s like someone took my hand, and told me I was good
It’s like someone looked in my eyes and finally understood

No more hiding under blankets or living under guilt
No more stifling my laughter and balancing on stilts
No more living day to day in horror and fear
No more relying on the hate, the fake smile and the tears

Who am I?
Fuck if I know

Who am I?
I’m just starting to grow

Who am I?
I am your love, your friend

Who am I?
I’m the one who made it to the end.




There are two poems for your reading pleasure...

It feels good to be back!

Do What You Want 'Cause A Pirate is Free

I have on my computer many files in which I would be dishonest in referring to as... legal. Movies, television, music, all these things and more sit on my hard drive. I'm a geek, media is my forte. But then I'm also poor, and the Star Trek: The Next Generation DVD set still runs about three hundred and twenty dollars. It's a conundrum, if I had the money I would be more than willing to purchase it, but I don't. So am I so wrong in simply finding it online?

Well, yes.

I find it interesting how the internet culture, and even mainstream culture has vilified the RIAA and MPAA, who are technically the good guys in this little fight for rights. Here we have the people responsible for producing a product and putting it out to market, and another group of people come by and steal that product... How did the thieves become the good guys? Why are so many people rooting for pirates, why are so many people able to become pirates without any moral dilemma?

It's because the MPAA and RIAA make themselves such easy villains. Here we have two groups of people so willing to punish everyone for the crimes of a few. Vaguely legal DRMs install themselves on your computer without your knowledge, many of these programs are harmful and difficult to remove from your system. Movies in the Theaters have anti-piracy commercials stating how wrong stealing movies is to a group of people who just paid for that movie. DVDs as well have these anti-piracy commercials, unskippable, which never reaches the actual pirates as any decent bootlegger can simply remove that trailer without effort. Both companies severely skew the numbers and state that piracy is hurting the industry a lot more than it is. They sue people for thousands of dollars and throw them in jail for months if not years, and for what? A couple MP3s?

So what is the solution? How can these people in the moral right, stop looking like such villains to us? It's pretty simple, all they need to do is embrace digital distribution. By investing in technology that will help keep their products protected, cut down the price from hard copy distribution, and encourage a system that's easy to use and nearly instant, more people will be willing to purchase this media. The forefront of technology and media is changing rapidly, these people are fighting an archaic battle using intimidation and unfair punishment. By easing back and instead trying to develop new technology instead of protecting the old, their standing in the public eye will greatly shift.

In the end, though, there will always be piracy, and they need to accept that. Most all retailers have what they call a Shrink Quota, an amount of theft they accept and account for. Sure they try to actively keep theft down, but they also know it's impossible to stop. The industry is not losing the money they claim, and the artists are not going broke from piracy. What the companies need to do is simply back off a tiny bit, and continue making the things we actually want to spend money on.

Yo ho.

Love Cliches

I wrote this a while ago.. I can't find the will to write today.. Vote in the comments if I deserve a punishment.


Cliché ideals of love:
Sweaty palms
Racing hearts
Perfect harmony
Finishing each others sentences
Constant happiness
Fixed flaws

Real love:
Uncontrolled laughter
Knowing what you’re going to say but saying something different just to make the other person laugh because you’re a freak and they like it ^_^
Acceptance, love and reassurance that flaws are not only ok, but beautiful
Inside jokes
Fights, rubbing each other the wrong way and being able to accept it as part of life, fix it and move on
Knowing what makes each other tic
Knowing what makes each other smile
Knowing what makes each other cry
Knowing what makes each other crazy
Not knowing why you’re smiling
Not knowing why you’re crazy
Not knowing why you’re laughing
Learning, every day, how to make it work



Fuck clichés, I think we’ll be fine without them.

Confusing Realities

Tangled in the vines
You think about all you've done
Tangled in the vines
You whisper a prayer for all you could do

Tangled
Webbed
Trapped

Trapped without hope
You wish for redemption
Trapped without dreams
You lose connection

Once you're there
You're lost forever
You're drifting away
You've gone to a world of ends


Or a beginning.

Harmonious Disposition

Each interaction
Each event
Each brush of the shoulders
Or kiss of the lips

Each opportunity
Each idea
Each meeting of the eye
or conversation

Everything.. Everyone... is a chance to learn.
About each other.... about yourself.

Don't let the opportunities slip away because of fear
Don't let the past cloud your present
Don't let your future dictate your actions

Cautiousness and curiosity must be balanced
You cannot use either excessively
They must find harmony

Without that delicate dance
There is no merit to the past
No present entanglements worth having
And no future to attend to

Bad, bad girl

So some of you might have noticed that I uh… Didn’t exactly post on time yesterday. In fact, I didn’t post at all yesterday.

And most of you know what this means. That it’s time for me to be punished.

Will’s decided the following punishment will be suitable. I have to write every day until the end of the week, that’s 5 days, punishing not only me but giving him some time off. And while I dislike this punishment greatly due to the week it currently is (you right bastard) I am going to do it because I, unlike William, am a woman of my word. Not that… William... is a woman… Moving along.

Will, since I’m posting ALONE this week, I expect you to bloody comment like every other reader. Deal with it.

So here’s my first punishment post.



All my life, I have always been early.

Early for church, early for school, early for parties, early for everything.

This is mostly my father’s fault. He hates being late. He hates being 5 minutes early. He hates being 10 minutes early. 15 or more. Always.

So all my life, always being early, I’ve always been the first to everything, the one that shows up when things aren’t quite ready, the awkward one who just waits for everyone else.

It’s enough to give a girl a complex!

So I’m more apathetic about time now, for the most part.

Ok that’s a lie. I’m not at all apathetic. Ask my family and friends.

“Guys we have to go, the movie is in an hour and it’s a 20 minute drive!”

“Dad, hurry up, I have to be there at 1.”
“Manda, it’s 11.”



So yeah. I was a bad girl. I promise to be more careful. After I slay William.


Leave suggestions for my 5 day punishment!


-Manda

Poetry and made up words

Never put your faith in a stranger
They will steadfastly let you down
Without realizing the danger
Oblivious to your loss of ground.

Never put your faith in a lover
For they wield a power untaught
Once the words surround you
The damage can never be unwrought






So I was writing the shitty poem above you hoping to get inspired to write something when I stumbled upon a realization. As much as I love words and all their glory, I make up a fuckload of them.

Example: Unwrought.... Not a word. You all know what I mean when I said it. But it's REALLY not a word.

The more I think the more I realize I do this more often than not. I take a real word and add things to it. A prefix here, a suffix there. A completely non-realistic word there.

And then I realized something else... No WONDER people hate talking to me so much. Half of what I said... isn't a real language. Ha!

My friends have always said I have Mandaisms

And I just thought it was my phrasing but.. blast it all, I just have my own damn language again.

Lovely.




So now that I know
How I ruin my fav'rite
Language, yay me.

Intermission

The excitement of something beginning
The loss of something established
Battling, endlessly caught

You wish to see the new
You wish to keep the old
You can't. You have to choose

But while you choose
While you make that awful break
While you change

Know that you are not alone
That the world wont stop spinning
And that this is just the very beginning.

The Flower and The Girl

Brightly, the flower bloomed
Etching the feelings of love
Of needing into the girl’s soul

Softly, the flower sang
Songs of memories past
And the journey ahead

Gently, the flower touched
Its petals soft, luring the girl
Giving warmth and comfort

Quickly, the flower stung
Thorns embedded deep into flesh
Drawing precious blood

Tightly, the flower gripped
Draining the girl dry
Leaving her nothing to depend on

Sadly, the girl died
Embraced by the flower
Forever locked in deception.

Cynical Life

Have you ever watched kids play at the park? Complete strangers yet all it takes is the mutual love of a red slide to create a bond of friendship. What changes when you become an adult? And is it really for the better? As human beings grow older we grow more complex but we seem to take this as we must block out more and more people in order to "know" ourselves. I've always thought the meaning of life is knowledge. How can you accumulate knowledge with any sort of importance without collecting friends, neighbors and the masses to share and be with? What happens as we age that makes us want to block more and more people out?

Is the distrust of people that we grow, that cynicism, usefully, needed, important? Or maybe it's just modern paranoia? Would it be better to go to that childlike innocence?

Why do we learn such distrust, even with people who have never hurt us and would logically have no inclination to hurt us?

I understand, life throws us curve balls left and right, making it harder to trust, making it harder to accept people like we did back in the park, back when things were as simple as "I like her because she shares the big red slide".

I guess, what I'm trying to say is... I wish I was less cynical, but I do not know if that is a good thing or not.

Poem That Makes No Sense

Temptation is so sweet
Laying on my tongue
Delaying my retreat
Reaching in so firm

Wandering through the plain
The empty seas of home
I hear an idle strain
I hear a subtle tone

Following the sound
I journey here and there
My footsteps on the ground
The only partner shared

And to the empty echoes
I find myself so deep
In the tempered deco
I lay my head to sleep

The noise now forgotten
Like hill and vale and tree
I am now begotten
In my land of dream

Lost

The poetry within my heart is dampened
By the whisper of your voice in my ear
Endless calls of can’ts, don’ts, won’ts
Everything is caught shadow, nothing is clear

Wandering breathlessly through a mountain
Lost and aimless without a guide
Trying to lose your voice, your presence
But you’ve left me nowhere to hide

Echoes in my mind
Torn bits of my heart
Rejecting all that’s kind
I don’t want to be a part of this anymore

Let me go.
Let me live.
You’ve taken everything
I HAVE NOTHING LEFT TO GIVE.

Rant of Indignation

In this society, people have expectations of you.

Grow up. Get married. Spawn like crazy.

And when those expectations are not met to a T, some people get a bit... huffy.

People are all about political correctness these days and yet they continue to assume that women should find a partner to be complete and that men need to horse around for a few years before settling down. Just a little slice of bullshit, if you ask me.

Women do not need a partner, whether a man, another woman, hermaphrodite or any other gender assignment role (or lack thereof), to be complete. And no, don't EVEN say "yeah, that's what cats are for" you ignorant, idiotic PRAT. The double standard of society is overwhelming to me as I start to experience it.

I can say I want to go out and have a good time without any sort of commitment being involved. People automatically assume that only sluts, whores or idiots go out and have a one night stand. Darling, I hate to break it to you but you're just a bit upset because you can't get any of the aforementioned types of women to go home with you, let alone a respectable one that just wants a bit of a rough and tumble.

I know. I can't stick to a topic to save my life. That's why I RANT not write amazing opinion pieces like my partner (I mean, holy crap did you READ yesterdays post?).


Anyway.

Point: Let me find myself before I find someone else.

And don't get pissy when I "find" a few other people on the way.


Every day is a
New chance to learn a little
Something about you

-M

Manda is touchy about her family

What makes someone family? Is it the blood running through their veins or the way they make you feel when you're around them?

I have great family and I'll admit, not all of them happen to share the same blood as me. But a lot of them do. I have a large and insane family.

I have grandmothers galore who are different as the seasons, a brother who just has to follow his own path, a soon to be sister-in-law who I'm learning more and more about, a father who is an unknown superhero, a mother who can seriously do anything she puts her mind on whether a piece of art or finishing that long road she's followed for years. I have best friends as different as the sun and moon, an aunt and uncle who are worlds of their own, little cousins who are like nephews to me who I get to watch grow into someone new everyday and a sister-cousin who is just as good a best friend if not better and just as insane.

My family grows each time I sit down and listen to someone's problems without judging them, each time someone sits down and lets me cry on their shoulder.

Even within the family I already have, I rediscover them day to day.

For example my sister, Christina. I've known Christina all my life but only recently did I start to know Stina. Stina- the person, the mother, the wife, the daughter, the granddaughter, the softy for animals, the horror movie buff, the uncertain, the shy, the worried, the phenomenal.

How I managed to be around her for so long without realizing how special this woman was just shows how asleep I was before.

Then there is Will, my other blogger half. He's my family. He's seen me at my highest high, my lowest low, and my complete and utter midpoint.
He knows me probably better than I know my own damn self. Sure, he has no blood relation to me and I wouldn't even have met him if it wasn't for a trick of fate and Joss Whedon's powerful pull. He's been there for me when I felt so alone. Do don't you DARE tell me he it not my family.

Family is a wonderful thing, don't limit it. let your family grow. Let your family be just as big as you can.

Because, darling, there's never enough love in this fucked up world.


-Manda


PS... Just so see if I get any replies... Here are some questions for you to comment on.

How do you define family?
How large is your family?
Who is your closest family member?

Introductions Post

We are two friends on a mission to write every other day to expand our writing potential while helping each other.



Manda is an idiosyncratic nerd who likes to use big words just to piss off the people around her. She writes mostly poetry with the occasional rant thrown in. She identifies herself as a cynically romantic fool. The bossy one.





Will is an over-analytical geek. An anti-Social social-observer, he considers himself intellectual and overly-opinionated. He writes mostly opinion pieces, never pulling any punches and being honest to a fault. The sarcastic one.