I am not perfect

"You are not perfect.
You are not absolute, in fact, sometimes you are a liability. You are a cup of tea, warm, with honey or milk and fingers wrapped loosely around a white china cup that will certainly grow cold if you spend too much time laughing and not enough sipping. You are like the greyest sky with no sun in sight, but still bursting full of opportunities. You are a pile of hair too tired to be anything else but loose that morning and lovely nonetheless. You are summer, or maybe spring, because summer is awfully bright and insistent and spring is a gentler season. You are a collapsed lung on your bad days, but let me point out that you could make it to the top of Everest on your best days. You are fingers stained with blackberry juice and dirt smudged across your forehead. You are clumsy, tripping over everything always, even your words. You are not very poetic, but somehow you seem to capture the moon in half your smile anyway, but only if the right person is looking, so maybe you're not poetic all of the time, only some of it. You are flawed, simple as that, flawed. You are a piece of sea glass, once you could cut to the quick, and now you're just smooth from the hours and days and years of waves that never give up. You are broken in some places, and sweetheart let me tell you, I can see the cracks because they spill over when you think I'm not looking. You are a mess, even on what seems like the least tragic of days, you still drag around everything you shouldn't. You are the one passed by, the neighbor girl unnoticed for years, the boy in the background, the secret savior. You are vulnerable, telling everyone you don't wear your heart on your sleeve while all this time it's been written in the crease of your elbow, and that's obvious too, just so you know. You are replaceable, not to all, but to many. You are forgotten, a name that a face can't be put to. You are deliberately late. You are inconsiderate and rash and oftentimes undeniably mean. You are good intentions misunderstood. You are that lonely kid always at the table by himself. You are nonsensical. You are a box that arrived two weeks too late in the post, yet somehow you're just as special to open up anyway. You are not giving enough. You are frail. You are a piece of pine, and dang it all you wish you were olive wood because it's so much more foreign and wondrous. You are plain. You are someone he could walk away from if he chose to. You are the single bad grade that ruins the year. You are like an argument that hides in a pocket of thoughts that she'll never forget. You are trivial. You are unimportant. You are snow, but not the light, airy stuff that just fell and everyone loves, no, you're the slush that is laying there uselessly on day three and after it rained. You are in the gutter some days. You are lost. You are a basket that was woven with crooked corners and no one knows quite what to do with you. You are a mountain, and sometimes you're in the way. You are a blue knit scarf that looks absolutely lovely, but see, you could almost wrap around twice, but you didn't quite make it and so you're rarely worn. You are just a friend. You are walked all over again and again and again, and you let it happen. You are a run in the best pair of black nylons she ever had. You are like gelato, but sometimes you melt a little too quickly. You are unhelpful at times. You are not worth the effort on a daily basis. You are unfair. You really aren't all that wonderful.
You are not perfect. But that's okay.
You don't have to be."

Weekend.

The house is slightly quiet in the absence of my sister and her husband's departure this morning. I feel the pressure of not knowing what day it is all the time just a little now. It's easier to keep track when you have other people to remind you.
I love slowness.
I'm realizing that more and more as I age in my youth and step hesitantly into adulthood. I like moving slow. I prefer it. I'm comfortable in it. And I'm learning that I will be satisfied with it when someone turns to me and says, let's slow down together. Let's slow way down. It's the simpler things that I'm tempted to indulge in as they entice me. Walking. Drip coffee. Three hour long dinners. Warm knits. Mornings. Porcelain tea pots. Linen.  All that, and more.
I am becoming me.
And the best thing is, I know someone somewhere else is too, becoming them. And we'll meet one day, and turn to one another and say, you? You learned who you are already? Well isn't that just perfect. 
And it will be.
Slow, and perfect. In a human way.

My brother-in-law turned twenty-two today. We celebrated with peach breakfast cake and blue candles lit twice.

Dear jars of sand, you are mine. Love, that one girl.

Dear Fleur.
My life is perfect right now.

I don't have to get my mole removed off my back,

and,

I AM GOING TO THE BEACH TOMORROW.

Love,
Bella.

Church.

Dear Fleur.
My heart feels so beautiful this morning.
I had a dream last night.
I think it was the best dream I've ever had.

I was running really fast. Wearing a dress. A guy was chasing me. And I was afraid. And I had a really bad headache from running so hard.
I didn't know where to go.
But then suddenly, there was this church. A church I'd never seen before. And I ran in through the front doors, and the guy behind me didn't follow me. He was scared to go into the building.
When I ran through the doors, I realized I didn't know any of the people. I interrupted their little Bible Study.
They were singing.
The Preacher is the one who is clearest in my mind. I remember he was a younger man. Around 26 years old probably. He was tall. He had chocolate coloured hair. And warm brown eyes. And a nice nose. I remember liking his nose. And he was dressed casually. Jeans. A tee shirt. And he didn't have shoes on. I remember that too. No shoes. I remember he walked over to me, and I looked down at myself, and I saw that my dress was dirty. I was dirty. My head was hurting. And I was crying. Because I was still afraid. I started saying "I'm sorry. I'm sorry." over and over again. But he wasn't listening to me. Instead, he took his arms and wrapped them around me. And laid his head on top of mine. And said very clearly, "It's okay. You're safe."
And my headache was gone. And my heart in my dream filled up with something gorgeous pouring into my soul. It filled with love. God's love.
And the Preacher took my hand in his and led me to a wooden chair. And I sat down and started singing.
I knew all the songs.

(via)

I've been having a lot of dreams lately.
Nice dreams.
Call me crazy, but I like it. I like it a lot.

Love from Bell.

Peonies.

Dear Fleur.
•
She was upset of sorts. It had accumulated throughout the day and bottled up inside her chest. Too many short stories. Too little tea. Busyness. Having to do laundry. Wanting her bicycle to be fixed. And now this. This completely amazing man. And the words he wrote.
"I almost wish we were butterflies and liv'd but three summer days---three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty common years could ever contain."
It was almost maddening.
So what did she do? She screamed in her pillow of course. And her two sisters never even paused their conversation a few feet from her. They didn't even look at her. They just let her scream. And suddenly it didn't matter anymore. Because they understood. And they didn't think she was crazy. She was just...her. Herself. And in that minute, she was mad that John Keats was dead.
But they were fine with that.
'Thank heavens for sisters,' she thought. And went to join their conversation about dresses.
•
Right this second I'm sitting on a hard chair wearing a little dress Ria made and a green shirt. There are some twigs in my hair. And I'm tempted to go make myself some chai tea. We're headed to the Church to do a little interview. Today is cold. And I think it tastes like plums picked straight off the tree. I've been working on a lovely little short story. It's actually upsetting me though. I can't decide which guy to choose. And they're both perfect in their own way. One literally is perfect actually. Maybe too perfect. But does she deserve someone who's not perfect?
I JUST DON'T KNOW.
The part I love the best so far:
A bathtub filled with peonies.
What girl wouldn't fall in love with that?
I guess I'll just have to play it by ear. Write it by ear really. Can you do that? Just wait for the story to figure out its own outcome? Maybe one of these minutes, in the quiet on the kitchen floor, his name will be whispered in my ear. And I'll know she's supposed to love him, and, well, not him.
Why did I make two boys?
I'm ridiculous. More screaming into my pillow is in order. But first, walking to the Church for an interview.
Love from Bella.