642 Things To Write About: The Blog Edition

A writer's revenge on writer's block.

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Prompt #4: How You Feel About Love These Days

I recently read Mindy Kaling's book, Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me (And Other Concerns), and found what she had to say about great marriages pretty enlightening.

Now, I know this post is supposed to tackle how I feel about love and not marriage, but bear with me. In Kaling's book, the author writes that one of the reasons her parents have such a great marriage is because "they are pals." Meaning they get along and have enough common interests/passions that they are able to spend ample amounts of time together and have a great time doing so. That's not to say that her parents are best friends, they are not, but they are pals. Her parents don't do everything together, it's damn near impossible to find someone like that, but they do enjoy the time that they spend together talking about the things they both really love. 

That's sort of how I've been feeling about love these days, at least love between couples anyway. I don't think love truly has a shot at lasting if there isn't a solid friendship, and that's becoming more apparent to me every day. 

I've been in a relationship with my fiance for almost seven years now, and some of the most treasured moments I've had with him are when we're just sitting on the couch, talking. He's not a writer, and he doesn't read the same books I do. Hell, he doesn't even like some of my favorite shows, which are less than a handful, really. But even so, we have a ton of other things in common, which makes it easy for us to get along. We talk to each other like pals, we respect each other like pals, and we care about each other like pals. And I can't help but think that this is a big reason why our love for each other hasn't died the way most marriages in America have. 

It makes sense, right? How can you claim to be in love with someone if you can't get along with that person? That's not to say that I don't ever not get along with my fiance. Like most couples, we've had our disagreements, that is a fact, but because we're such good friends, I think that we handle any type of heated debate with a lot more ease than if we weren't really good friends at all. Think about it, would you be just as hard on a friend for losing your favorite (enter most loved possession here) than someone you barely knew or didn't really like? Probably not, and that's because you more than likely have a solid friendship with that person, and wouldn't want to jeopardize it over a lost item.  

People misunderstand love to be a lot of things, but I think love is subjective, and it is unique to each person that shares such feelings with someone, but that feeling won't last if you can't have a good friendship in addition to your romantic feelings for each other. 

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Prompt #3: What You Were Doing This Time Last Year

This time last year, I was getting ready to start my last year of graduate school. I was working as a secretary during the day, and most likely looking over the syllabi for whatever classes I had that evening on the work computer...and lunch, I was always thinking about lunch at that job. 

It was the first time I was taking three classes, I only took two classes for the first two semesters. I remember feeling excited, mostly because I got to leave work two hours early, but I was also pretty nervous about the class all of the grad students dubbed five-eighty-five.

Once a week, after my health reporting class, a very nice, but peculiar Korean communications professor, would talk about communication theory for almost three hours. The class sat in a circle, much like in elementary school. We all had our laptops open for the entire class, pretending to take notes, and don't get me wrong, sometimes we did, but most of the time, we were either complaining about the class via social networks or working on projects for our other classes. 

The five-eighty-five class ended at about ten p.m. and seeing as to how I lived and worked about seventy miles away from campus, I had somewhat of a long drive back home. Though I was tired after my evening classes, I enjoyed the drives back home. It was the one time during the day where I didn't really think about anything and just drove. Every drive was different. I would listen to music, or Loveline, and even some podcasts. My favorite spot to drive through at night was the tunnel that was the continuation of the 210-E freeway. The repetition of the lights in the tunnel gave me this quiet feeling, my ears would feel plugged-up and gently pop as soon as I was out of the tunnel, and would feel relieved. Relieved of what exactly, I am not quite sure, but it was a good feeling. I came home to a dark, quiet apartment, rejuvenated, and ready to take on the next day. 

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Prompt #2: Describe Yourself in Third-Person

She’s not tall, but she is tall for a girl. Her hair is dark brown and curly, but she often defies the laws of nature and kills her curls with a hot, flat, hair straightening iron. Only the closest to her know this dirty little secret, and the closer ones have actually seen what she refers to as “lifeless curls.”

She is the youngest of three and is the only one who inherited her mother’s pale, fair skin—her father’s dominant brown skin was passed on to her other siblings. Her first crush was a green-eyed, freckled boy in her preschool class named Jimmy. She was three, and now at the age of twenty-six, has a hard time trying to remember his face or why she ever liked him in the first place.

Her first bike was pink, as many of her things were in her early childhood, but quickly learned to detest the color just before her teens. She reads, a lot. It’s her favorite me time activity. She feels productive when she reads, she likes to learn, and reading is the only time when she doesn’t feel guilty about not writing. Writing is one of the hardest things she’s ever had to do, but it’s also the only thing she wants to do—a love and hate relationship she’s learned to accept.

At times she can be quiet and tends not to voice her opinions in front of large groups, confrontation is not her most favorite thing in the world.

She’s a medium-sized kind of girl, whatever that means. She’s not big or small, though she often feels like she is on the brink of becoming morbidly obese (you can blame the Victoria Secret model ads for that). Putting on make-up is something she’s never learned how to do nor is she interested in ever learning.

Her name is Spanish for Bethlehem, a name that has been mispronounced by teachers since the first grade. She’s fallen out of friendships with a lot of people, and on occasion, wonders how those people are doing. At times, she is confident, or at least, pretends to be. She is learning how to change this because in her mind, self confidence is key when it comes to conquering life’s unannounced events. She doesn’t know how life will turn out, but she is trying to figure it out. Her experience is vast, yet she still has a lot to learn, but that’s okay.

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Prompt #1: What Can Happen In A Second?

You can fall, you can laugh, you can cry, you can stumble. You can itch, you can scratch, you can lose a fighting match. You can spill, you can fumble, you can hear your stomach grumble. You can sleep, you can crawl, you can give your mom a call. You can win, you can lose, you can tighten a loose noose. You can sing, you can dance, you can give someone a chance. You can crash, you can die, you can tell a dirty lie. You can dash, take a nap, you can sit on someone's lap. You can stutter, you can mumble, you can make somebody wonder. You can scream, you can dream, you can eat a bowl filled with ice cream. You can kiss, you can miss, you can fall into an abyss. You can climb, you can slip, you can cancel plans for a trip. You can cheat, you can steal, or you can give someone a meal. You can start it, you can end it, you can break it, or you can fix it. You can ache, you can make, you can even procreate. You can fight, feel a fright, you can use all of your might. You can love, you can hate, you can tell someone you aren't straight. You can point, disappoint, you smash all of your joints. You can learn, you can earn, you can burn, you can churn. You can write, lose a kite, you can draw or break the law. You can break, lose your faith, you can begin, and you can finish.