suicidal feet

+ source

at the beginning of october, i started my new job; working at whole foods. it's amazing, the best place i've ever worked in my life. but also, the most painful. not being used to being on my feet ALL THE TIME, has made mine hurt incredibly bad. i honestly would not be surprised if my feet looked up at me and said 'see ya!', decapitated themselves and then walked as far away from me as they could. there's blisters, puss and swollenness, oh my! and i'm so thankful to have a boss that gave me next week practically off; to rest those wounded soldiers at the bottom of my body and perhaps in that time, my new work shoes (that the company orders for you and are non-slip & apparently way more comfortable.) will have come in.

but don't let it be believed that i don't love my job and want to work there as much as possible. because it's just a brilliant place to be, with so many smiling and unique faces. one of the reasons i have always loved whole foods.

diversity is something i've always wanted more of in my life, because it's just not ever been there. so many cultures and people, in general, inspire me and give me inspiration. one of the girls in customer service, has quite a few tattoos and piercings. i LOVE that. i think that that is one of the epitomes of beauty. just the natural unique-ness someone has and it being natural, not trying to be different. (cause there are so many people who strive to be. but that's a different blog post entirely.)

there's a young man in specialty that goes by his initials, but has one of the most wonderful names, ever. it's french and even though he has no accent, it wouldn't surprise me if his parents were first generation french immigrants.

there are several other people working there that have such unique looks, personalities and culture backgrounds, it's crazy. natural red hair, super tall and quirky, scruffy beard & could be mistaken for a mumford and sons band member, two older ladies with brilliant white-gray hair & happy dispositions, one of the admins who is never in a bad mood and says the funniest things you'll ever hear & a pretty smile for days, ETC ETC. the list can go on, and i would if it was possible to describe everyone.

honestly, my feet hurt HELLA bad. (yes, i just said hella.) and i wish that the customers who are considerate, funny, sweet and interesting were more than few and far between as they have been lately. but you know what? i look at it in this way:

if at my job, if i get to speak for a good five minutes to a wonderful older irish woman, telling my how much i'll love it when i'll go and speaking about the store and travel in general. my feet can decapitate themselves, anytime.

note: in no way or sound of mind possibility would i ever cut off my feet or wish them to.

repeat the sounding joy

there are some films that touch your heart and just MOVE your soul emmensely, you have to watch it again, immediately. i don't know how to explain it, but there are just those certain films that move and restore you and you need to get the effect again, just to lock in that power and amazement. the first time i saw 'the family stone' was not in a theater or on dvd, but on tv, about two years ago. it played at about nine o'clock and then again at eleven thirty. how do i remember this? because it's a film, a story, that stuck and i remember the moment in time i witnessed it for the first time. i got lucky that night, in that a film i knew i had to see again, NOW, was replaying right afterwards the first showing. it must sound weird, what i'm telling you, but really, it does make a difference to see certain films a second time, immediately after the first view.

so run down to your nearest target and purchase this film for a mere five dollars and watch it a couple times, on a rainy afternoon. let it sink in, keep the characters and moments in the room with you for some time. this movie doesn't change your life, it gets your beloved ones in your life, in perspective as well as yourself.

are you living to the full extent of your being?

are you with the right person?

do you really love that person?

what is your relationship like with your family as a whole?

do you like it or want to change it and become more connected?

who are you?

what do you really need and want?

i love this movie, more and more with every single view of it's moving story. get a good couple viewings in for yourself to see what each of these images mean and feel like; you will be moved, touched and swept away by the simple beauty of it all.

- L

who's generation?

who are the people who know you best?

who are those whom you feel closest to?

who do you feel most yourself around?

these people we surround ourselves with and can be most natural and comfortable around, who are they and where did the relationship form from?

and what's the age difference?

while i adore letter writing and every little piece of love and joy it brings into my life, literally every day; the internet and modern forms of communication also allow my soul to connect and find brilliant people whom i would most likely, probably never meet if it wasn't for things like: TWITTER, facebook, BLOGGING, email, texting, skype, and yes, even good ol' myspace.

example number one - two weeks ago i 'met' miss paige baker; through of all things twitter, facebook and blogging. yes, all three. i added her (on twitter) through the other lauren because i was told she was one of the 'most adorable people she'd ever met', haha. and truly, she is! then came facebook which through i found her wonderful blog. little did i know, she'd been following my blog before we met and had a button of my header on her main page! (i was instantly flattered and thankful and sent her an email telling her so.) insanely wonderful how people enter our lives, no? and the ways they have already been in and around them.

but anyway - last week while skimming my twitter page something caught my eye:

vpbakerDear ms. @fancybiscuit, I'm 16 but don't tell. My youngest friend is 21 and my best friend is 29. I think I was born too late. Why?

i have felt this way, way too many times, my whole life. and since i was sixteen, for the last four years i'd felt this way even stronger. some people say they think they should have been born in a different time or era, but i believe i was born too late. you see, most of my friends/aquaintances are and have been in their twenties, thirties and forties; few my own age or younger.

how does that happen? how do a few of us get into that position of really only relating or finding common ground with those a few or several years older than us?

often i've been told it's because i'm an 'old soul' or that i have more of the same interests as people 5, 10, 15 years older than myself. don't ask me though, i'm unsure myself as to why it is that i get on better with those a deal older than my age but here's some of paige's thoughts on the matter:

"I think I get along better/have more common ground with people 5-15 years older than myself because I've found that we think the same way. For a long time I struggled to find friends because befriending people above my age seemed just nearly out of the question. I remember in grade school having a hard time when everyone else liked the spice girls and I liked bob dylan.

So is not to say it's not a tricky way to maintain friendships. There are definitely thinks that will always be different between ages, for example, one of my best friends has four kids and my best friend is pregnant with her first. I know my way around a nursery and I know how to take care of kids and do often. But the fact remains: I'm not a mom. Until (/if) I am we will never have that commonality and there is some separation there. In the grand scheme of things though--everyone will have differences in friendships; I just have a different set. I am glad to have the friends I have."

i can completely relate on the front of what people listen to. the whole matter that people of my generation tend to lean on the side of hip hop, rap and mainstream pop while i grab inspiration from a number of indie artists and those before my birth year is really odd and interesting to me. why we've put this thought in 'today's generation's' heads that THIS is what they should think and do by those who sing or speak so to them is ridiculous. not saying i prefer innocence over truth and knowledge, but what ever happened to just singing about loving someone and it not be that kind of love? or singing a song about an octopus's garden or peace in the world? peace and love to the (majority of) 12-18 age group is something said on a t-shirt or how you end a conversation, not what it truly means and what the world and individual people need.

lennon and mccartney mend my broken heart when i'm at my loneliest and broken. joan jett, not miley cyrus, taught me that you don't have to be tamed and that women shouldn't stand aside, led to believe it's 'a man's world'. al green will be played at my wedding day because he's one of few that i feel really capture passion. i really, honestly love michael jackson because he was such an unbelievable and amazing artist; i listen to his music when my mind needs to be flooded with memories - not because his work is good to dance to.

like paige said, i'm grateful and glad to have the friends and relationships i do; and always happy when a new brilliant one enters my life unexpectedly, stronger than i thought it would become. it is kind of odd in the fact that some of my closest relationships are with people older and older than myself.

micaela, is only six years older than myself and has become one of the closest friends i've ever had and have currently. i would trust her with anything and she is one of only two people whom i can carry a phone conversation on with beyond twenty minutes. our lives could not be any more different, yet we click and get on extremely well. oh, and we've only known each other for six months. but! more on caela later in the week, because she deserves a post all her own.

carol is a friend i made through a youth group; she was the youth director and is in her early forties. there have been few and far between people to see me when i loose it and carol is one of even fewer to call me on it when i'm wrong. i think when you have a person like that in your life, it's good to keep them constant.

without even noticing it, carol and i have become really good friends and she's the only person i see movies with; subconsciously and because there's never anyone reliable enough to make plans with (locally) and keep me on track of time and when i need to leave my house, haha. (i have a real terrible habit of being late without even knowing so.) the beautiful thing about our relationship is that i tend to never notice the age difference or the fact that carol is only so many years younger than my own parents, never. that is a great thing for me because with quite a few relationships i was constantly reminded of age differences and would over-think way too many things. going both ways, she never treats me as a child or like some friends i used to have who were older would, and therefore thought they were better because of the knowledge and years they had over me. she's a true friend and most likely because of being an 'adult' always calls me back, makes plans, actually cares about me like i do her and i don't ever see our friendship out of my life.

lovelies, i have re-written this piece WAY too many times and could go on further if i needed to, but i feel you get the jist of what i am saying, no? and i want to throw it out there for you to answer some of the hidden questions up there. what ages do your friends vary? are you close in age to your closest ones? what draws you to a person and creates the relationship? this is a subject i'm really interested in (obviously) and value your answers and opnions on not only those questions but any other topics regarding friends, ages and common ground between those your soul grows closest to.

lovelovelove,
- L

my photography [part 2]

hey everyone, over the past few days there's been some family issues going on therefore less time has been spent preparing posts and whatnot. and last night i got locked out of my house - with the water running - for an hour and a half, so that tired me out and i would up falling asleep WHILE writing some letters and watching HIMYM just from all the physical and emotional exhaustion i had; pretty rare for me to fall asleep period, let alone watching a funny show and responding to letters. otherwise, this post would have been up last night. ANYWAY, thank you to micaela, paige, april and diana for helping me out and the prayers last night, thank you, thank you, thank you.

well! i was trying to figure out what i should post about first (what was supposed to be week, but turned into the weekend) and realized it'd been awhile since my fist post about my photography. so i began to make a list of possibilities of what type of photos to post about and finally decided on a project that's close to my heart and have recently gotten back into - the love + 100 strangers photo project. basically the concept - founded by the wonderful lauren - is:

'snapshots of 100 strangers, captioned with their first and middle name, age, and their definition of love. (definition of love being dictionary format, a short story, a phrase, life experience, or whatever defines love best for them.)'

so far i've got around 30 people and i hope to go to miami sometime this month and capture more amazing 'love strangers'. it's so incredibly hard to narrow it down, but here are some of my favorites:

"love is knowing everything about a person. knowing their deepest, darkest secrets and being aware of every flaw but still thinking they're the most wonderful person in the entire world and wanting to be with them anyway. really though, love is much too big to be captured and defined in a few words, but i think that's pretty close."

16/100 Megan Lane

Age: 18

From: Norcross, GA

"love is feeling completely comfortable with someone, being able to share everything and be open. showing them that you care."

8/100 Tierra Alesia

Age: 17

From: Rochester, NY

"love is something you give and get from the heart. some are ones you give yourself to."

21/100 Bradley Nelson

Age:21

From: I live on tour.

"love is a shared frenzy of color, adrenaline, and euphoria."

26/100 Fillippa Johanna

Age: 19

From: Sweden

"love is happy, excited."

24/100 Alissa Patricia

Age: 7

From: Naples, FL

"love is unconditional appreciation and understanding."

29/100 Erick

Age: 24

From: Born in NYC, toughened in Miami.

"love is awesome!"

28/100 Samantha

Age: 24

From: Miami, FL

"love is unconditional devotion, companionship."

17/100 Laura Marie

Age: 20

From: St. Petersburg, FL

"love is loving someone for everything they are, even the 'bad' stuff."

22/100 Laura Kaitlin

Age: 17

From: Fort Lauderdale, FL

"love is...not sure. comfort. acceptance. music and beer are both comforting and accepting of me."

27/100 Benjamin Patrick

Age: 32

From: Boston, MA

"love is teddybears and puppies."

14/100 Lisa S.

Age: 5

From: Tampa, FL

"i think that love has become over-rated in today's society. love is a term used very loosely nowadays and it's almost like it doesn't exist. the unconditional love that God has for us is the only true love i can find lately."

9/100 T.J.

Age: 14

From: Naples, FL

"love is when everybody is happy and you want to be together."

30/100 Arriel LeAnn

Age: 17

From: Missouri

"love is an unconditional feeling for someone that cannot make anything feel more important than that feeling."

7/100 Stephanie Ellen

Age: 17

From: Rochester, NY

"love is caring about someone no matter what they do."

1/100 Jordan Andrew

Age: 19

From: Naples, FL

if you'd like to view more photos you can take a look at -

lauren's set

my set

the flickr group

SO! tell me lovely readers - what is your definition of love? what does love mean or feel like to you? let me know!

- L

Love Bomb!

to me, there aren't enough words to describe how AMAZING this project is. everything, all of it is so wonderful. this project is already changing lives and it's only been (officially) active for about two weeks.

the objective? change an individual's life with something as simple as comments. you know how people in the blogging world say or tell their readers how much they mean to them? it's definitely true and sometimes just one little sentance in a comment can change your day or week around. but what would happen if not only one encouraging or loving comment from a total stranger appeared on your recent post, but about two hundred did?

your life would change.

you would have been love bombed.

"Love Bomb is a project of ItStartsWith.Us. Once a week we come together to drop hundreds of love bombs (in the form of blog comments) for those who need it most. Subscribe via email on our Tumblr (dropalovebomb.tumblr.com) or follow us on Twitter, and join us in our missions. It only takes 5 minutes a week! "

here are just a couple testimonies of recent love bomb missions to show you how this project really does change your life and help you to realize how many genuine, good people are actually out there:

"I received a HUGE outpouring of love & support today from the @dropalovebomb team, and it literally could NOT have come at a better time." - Laura

"This is just a very quick post to acknowledge and thank everyone, both who I know and who I don’t, who made the effort to reach out and encourage me particularly this difficult week...Needless to say, I am completely blown away."- Sienna

one of my good friends, lauren, who wansn't superwoman-like enough, took charge of this project in the beginning of july and here is her mission statement from 'ItStartsWith.Us':

'The concept is simple. We change the lives of those desperately needing hope, love, care, & encouragement – together, once a week, for five minutes.

We are all busy, I know this. But the next time someone asks you what you’re doing with your life, I bet your answer isn’t “cleaning up,” “going grocery shopping” or “sitting at a desk.” I know that all of you want something More.

A homeless man asked me a couple days ago what my life objective was, and without hesitation I replied, “to love people.” It’s taken me a long time to get here. To the place where that is my default answer, where it comes naturally. Yes I want to get married, yes I want to live where I want to live, there are activities and careers that I dream about. But what do I want to do with my life? Love people.

And it’s a genuine fight to fit what you’re doing with your life into your daily routine.

This is why I’m pouring a good chunk of every day into Love Bomb, and why I am the new Team Leader for the project. I want to help you fit what you truly care about into your daily or weekly routine.

I want to see all of you grow into the place where you are content to simply respond, “I want to love people” when you are asked what you’re doing with your life.

Come on guys, you are bloggers. This is what we do. We comment to show our love.'

(if you want to see how since july 1st, lovebomb has changed lauren herself, read her recent blog post.)

please lovely followers and friends, sign up to be a part of the lovebomb team and change peoples' lives. it only takes a few minutes out of your week; and while loving on someone else who truly needs it, you feel your heart and soul get a little bit warmer.

YES! i want to be a lovebomber!

who i am in this moment

+

this moment in time i am...

smiling

tired

sincere

hurting

worried

interested

sick

loving.


a week can go by without even making a sound and here i am with teeth hurting ridiculously bad, interested in where this insane life is taking me, sick from aunt flow's visit, loving the new amazing people i met over the weekend, worried about a fellow blogger and dear friend, tired of working on stuff for my shop even though i'm extremely excited about it's opening and smiling at the thought of what i could make this summer become.

tell me, who are you in this moment?

my very first polaroids, taken over the weekend -








- L

let's go love!

sending out millions of mason jars filled with love and hugs to everyone and anyone who's shown me love and compassion, especially over the last few days. YOU. ARE. AMAZING.

- L