No, nay, never!

There's this boy from London I'm utterly captivated by.
A boy back home I'm sanely in love with.
And a boy in DC that I would quite like to get to know better.
Really, lovely, you don't need to set me up with your friends. I'm quite taken enough.

"Don't you have a boyfriend?" He asks, wrinkling his eyebrows. A look of surprise, disbelief, crosses his face, and I take it as a compliment.
"You look different... Older! You looked 18 when I got here, now you look 20. You've gained weight. But in the good places! Your chest is bigger and you look more... fleshed out. It looks good on you."
I laughed, and laughed, and laughed.

The silk of my "little black dress" slides down my legs as I shift and it makes me shiver a little. I like the feel of it along my sides, as unused to it as I am.
"That's your catching a man dress, you look amazing in that." She grins at me suggestively and I laugh. Partially from the wine, partially because I just don't know what to say.

You may be right, I may be crazy.

Sitting here, listening to the Scattergories buzzer and watching the people I've known for all of three months (or two weeks) bent over these cards, I realized that I'm happy.
I love this place. I love these people. I love the experiences I'm having and the things I'm learning.
I love the half hour walk to the Starbucks and bakery every day after work. I love curling up on the papazan to read. I love getting coerced into going exploring in DC. I love getting randomly invited to go somewhere. I love how beautiful this place is. I love the cider in the glass next to me, making my head a little fuzzy.
I'm so happy here.

...But it might just be a lunatic you're looking for.

You find that she is positively practicing the craft of the wise

I think, on occasion, that I know why I'm constantly so focused on all that is good and shiny in this world. I think I know why all the bad things fall by the way-side of my brain. I think I know why I feel so tired so often. I think I know why I don't let people get too close.
Put gently? Alaska has a high rate of sexual abuse.
I spent four years counciling rape victims. Four years of holding sobbing girls and one winter of stroking a boy's head while he clung to my leg and begged me not to leave him alone. Four years of finding out what it feels like when your heart breaks. On top of coming to terms with thirteen years and three instances of "well, at least I didn't get raped".
I tend to attribute my borderline manic personality to my need to get away from that. Four years of dealing with the after-effects of some of the most deplorable human actions (and one winter spent with the most broken person I've ever known) has left me hopelessly drained, with an appreciation for all the wonderful things life has to offer.
In my more cynical moments, I wonder if it's post traumatic stress disorder that wipes my memory of everything that isn't sunshine and puppies. I have to stop and focus if I want to remember ANY thing that didn't make me smile. My memory starts to get fuzzy after even a few hours. It's like my mind just... deletes things after a while. I hate it until I consider what would happen if my mind didn't.
I'll take sunflowers and rainstorms over freshman year and the apartment ANY day. At least I can say that I've learned from everything.

I don't know. I think of everything as fair game for conversation and I don't keep secrets about my life, but I'm hesitating before hitting "publish post".
I don't trust easily any more and this is a glimpse into my inner workings that I don't afford many people at all. Yet I'm seriously considering placing on the web for anyone to stumble across.
At the same time? I want to record this theory somewhere I can find it again so I can look over it, build on it or tear it down as false.
And I know from past experience that if I just save it to my hard drive the next time I see it I'll call myself a dumbass and delete it.

And I'm an accident waiting to happen

Some times I wonder why I do the things I do, think the way I think. I'm like a small child, perpetually fascinated by the world around her. The sun shining in the morning is a source of endless pleasure for me and a simple breeze can make me smile for hours. I bounce from one thing to another, constantly smiling and always curious.
It can be so frustrating, feeling like I can't focus on anything but the positive. The world isn't all puppies and sunshine. Yet, so often, that's all I can see in my twelve-year-old world.
Then I have days like today, where I buy flowers for a friend and some guy on the street smiles at me and comments "you never buy -me- flowers any more."
"I'm sorry," I replied softly around my smile, "work really picked up and I just didn't have time." He stares in shock at the flower I lay down next to him as I flounce out the door.
Some days... I really like being a little kid. Because little kids can get away with things like that.

My belief in karma is, I think, different from other peoples. I was discussing it with a friend and he said some things that, as per always, got me thinking.
I don't believe in karmatic I-owe-you's. If you wrong someone, you wrong them. There is no "if I fuck them over now but buy them flowers later, it'll cancel out". You can't balance doing that to someone.
It also doesn't work to pull "I'll do all this nice stuff to this person so I can back-stab them later".
To me, karma isn't that specific.
It swings both ways, so to say. Good karma is gained by doing good things*, and results in good things happening to you**. Bad karma is gained by doing bad things ***, and results in bad things happening to you.
It's that simple to me. Karma doesn't care who you're good or bad to or on what scale. If you donate a billion dollar house to an orphanage you're on the same page as if you'd bought flowers for a friend.

*- Good is such a subjective term, no? In this case, "good" means something that makes someone happy.
**- This is more difficult than it sounds for people like me, because I can find the good in everything. Even cutting my hand open. ;)
***- Bad is a subjective term, as well. In this case, it's something that makes someone upset or hurts them.

I think... that I'm very lucky to have the people in my life that I do. I learn something new from each of them regularly, even if it's something as simple as the fact that I can still love people deeply.
Or that there are people out there who love me, too.

Found out the hospital staff were asking after me.
I didn't realize I could leave such an impression while out of my mind on blood loss or while unable to talk. I guess I'm more awesome than I think.
Or something.