Floyd's First Name

I don't like my last name. Not because it sounds weird, or that it's spelled funny, or that it reminds me of my dad. But because it makes me think of my Dad's dad. I can't say that it reminds me of him, because I never met him, but it reminds me of the fact that he never gave me the chance. He never gave half of his grand-kids the chance, and I'm afraid to ask why. I'm afraid to know why life could be so bad that you could give it up, when the alternative is spending time with people who are as great as Dad and Auntie Judy and Auntie Barbie and Kishka. What could have been so bad that you needed to leave this world, with them in it, for another, without them. There were so many stories I've never heard, so many memories of you that could be there, but aren't. I am too ashamed and afraid to ask why, but I still want to know. I'm still curious as to how and why you are no longer with us; I am still curious as to your full name. But I know you are never mentioned by it, never talked about by name or thought about with fondness out loud, and so I don't know why you deserve my dad's last name; because although you had it first, he deserves it, and you, you gave it away to a better man.

Gemini Baby

I love the month of June. It is, without a doubt, the best month to have a birthday. It is six months away from Christmas both ways, the temperatures are warm but not too warm, and there is that smell in the air that no one can mistake for anything but a sign that summer is coming. So I am perfectly happy to be a Gemini baby, and yet sometimes, I'm not.

I should start of with the fact that I believe in some parts of the zodiac. I believe that there are some trends in personality depending on when you were born, what planets were in power and when you parents were down to get dirty nine months before; however, the zodiac is a bit too eerily specific for me, and that I think is the reason I don't trust it.

For example, Gemini's are supposed to be talkative. If you know me, there was never a truer word spoken about my personality/character type. But then it gets more specific; multiple sites say I like to talk because it furthers my relationships and need for information...don't most people want to do that, Gemini or not? Don't get me wrong, I know people who would rather glue their mouths shut if they had to talk as much as I do, but i'm pretty sure they still want to further their relationships with some of the people they know, and gather more information about...anything.

So zodiac websites generalize. We knew some of it had to be fluff. But what if some of it isn't, and they really know my in's and out's. To name a few freaky coincidences, I think of myself as fickle, restless, with an unsatisfying lack of follow-through and generally nervous and flighty. I think I am incredibly adaptable and quick-thinking but also impulsive and indesicive. I don't know if I actually am all of these things, but I have been told I portray these qualities at least once and I fear I am a combination of all of them.

Something I know is that I judge people by the way they treat me, and not by how they act around others or looking at their deeper qualities. I never like being bored or having too much down time, and I never like anyone but my closes friends and relatives to know I am stressed or moody. I always want to be happy...But who doesn't?

The last thing I will mention is this paragraph from the second link below. I haven't dated in awhile so I don't know if this is still true, but from what I have experienced in my history, it rang true before.

What it's like to date a Gemini Woman:

The Gemini woman is truly enchanting. However, dating her might feel more like a friendship then a real relationship due to her casual nature. This is not necessarily a disadvantage, for the casual man who shy's away from overly romantic emotions, she is the perfect woman. Since she is the astrology sign of the duality, she offers quite the challenge. One one hand, she needs to be nurtured, loved and catered to and on the other hand, she needs stimulation and novelty. She is very demanding and if you do not provide what she wants, she will be off onto the next adventure pretty quickly. To keep her interested is a challenge, not completely impossible so she is the perfect woman for the man who likes stimulation and a challenge. She needs a partner with a quick mind, she tends to poke and prod at the emotions and the minds of those who are mentally slower then her, make sure you can keep up to her wit or you will briskly be left behind. She is prone to keeping men on a string, not completely heartlessly, she is evaluating if the man is worth her attention and her time she has no time to waste with a dull man. Once you have her approval, she can easily become jealous. The reason for her is jealousy is that if she is going to open up to a man, when she rarely completely opens up to anyone, she does not want to risk her being deceived or hurt. If you are with a Gemini woman and she becomes jealous, you are on the right track to true love! Gemini women are so exciting that they are worth the effort, you will remember her forever!

How To Attract Gemini:

Love to talk, that is the first rule about impressing a Gemini. Be knowledgeable about that you talk about too because Gemini are intelligent and have lots of knowledge about many things. If you are an expert on a certain topic, teach them about it, you will impress them because this know-it-all sign is does not usually know fine details about a lot of things, they are too busy to bother to learn. Speak your mind, engage them in a friendly debate but never be too conservative, they find this dull. Be honest and loyal to a Gemini, once they have had their trust broken they usually will never get it back again. Gemini are easy to date, they will do any activity anywhere. Just have fun, like you would with a friends because that's what Gemini are, a great friend.

Is it too vague? Too specific? Does it fit you, whatever your zodiac sign? Let me know, I'd love to find out how I embody a Gemini Baby.


http://www.astrology.com/gemini-sun-sign-zodiac-signs/2-d-d-66941
http://zodiac-signs-astrology.com/zodiac-signs/gemini.htm
http://www.astrology.com.au/astrology/12-signs-of-the-zodiac/gemini.html

"What If..."

What if I could dance. The scariest thing I have ever thought of, aside from losing the people I love in my life, is not being able to live out my dreams. One of the biggest dreams I have for as long as I can remember was that I wanted to be able to dance, and I wanted to do it well. I imagine myself on my high school stages, on picnic table at camp, in front of people who have judged me or before an audience with someone in it whom i was desperate to impress. When i listen to songs my mind wanders, especially in the car, about what my body and self image would look like if I could put on sweatpants and a t-shirt and dance my problems away. I am always taller, sexier, more impressive and graceful and majestic, higher than everyone else, working my way into their heads by saying "look, this is what she can do, don't I wish I could to that too?"

A lot of that is manipulated by society; dancers are skinnier, reasonably tall, and have unmatched grace and beauty. I'm not saying I want to be pencil thin or have a flat chest, but dancing is one thing I have always wanted and never gotten. Even when I wrote my college essay, saying how I danced in my own way because I choreographed other people, and how that makes me a dancer, that was a lie; the only thing that made me was self conscious, watching other people flaunt the one physical talent I have always wanted. I am not ok with teaching people how to move, how to look beautiful, because that is what I want for me, and each time I think about it I die a little more inside knowing it will never happen. I never danced at my school prom. I will never have a first dance at my wedding. I won't know the feeling of being sexy during a tango or a salsa or dancing in my underwear listening to music in my room. But all of those images flow into my dreams right before I fall asleep, and the last thought that goes through my head simply questions "what if...?"

What I Wore Today

Imagine a day cool enough
to be fall, warm enough
to still have wisps of summer
entangled in your body

I wore smooth silky pants
Black and flowing appearance
but soft and gentle to protect
the goose bump-layered skin

I aimed to be content
sneakers tied neatly
over pink-toed socks
make of thick cotton

Known as a waffle shirt
a stripped pallet of grey
and lilac wrapped me in
a gentle knitted warmth

Last, to cap my outfit off
a baseball hat protected
the soothing heat from
vanishing into thin air

So as that day in fall
cool enough for fall
clothes reminded me
of the heat of summer

Five Guys I Find Attractive

I honestly don't know who to pick. Not because I don't think any guys are attractive, but because when I think guys are attractive it is then and there in that moment that I want to bang their brains out. But does it have to be sexually attractive? Can't I want them for their brains, or smile, or sense of humor? I'm just going to go with the list of people I could consider loving, deciding this by how lucky and happy I would feel waking up in the morning and seeing them next to me (I know it's cheesy, but think about it, what's a better deciding factor than relying on your guilty conscience).

(I'm debating on putting names up, because on the one hand, I want you to know exactly who it is, but at the same time if any of them ever saw this I'd be a goner)

(this attraction is the one exception, and I would prefer not to wake up next to him in the morning)
This is the story of boy meets girl, and boy and girl have a whirlwind romance. But be forewarned, this story is not a love story; it is not a love story because boy doesn't love girl and girl only lusts after boy, because at that time it is the only thing girl knows how to do. So boy uses girl and girl follows along, and before you know it girl is hooked on a ship that wont stop sinking. Eventually she is saved and surfaces with a new outlook on life, one she picked up from being on rock bottom, and an acceptance for the fact that not everything in love is what it seems. She knows now the difference between love and lust and will feel forever guilty of thinking of these moments again, but can't help the fact that she will forever find his deadly charms attractive, no matter how much pain they caused her. Such is her fatal flaw.

There was this one kid, in middle school and high school, who drove me absolutely crazy. He was what kept me going all summer long, in the sense that there was no one else around but him, the only flower among weeds. But oh did he have thorns. He was pretentious and obnoxious and so incredibly cocky sometimes I wondered why his head didn't just explode he was so full of ego. But I think his (overly) confident attitude is what drove me to like him; he would never let anyone tell him what to do, and he never took life seriously. And man, he had the greatest smile and hair, damn. He refused to call me Kings, in fact he always always called me Kingsley Floyd (he struggled with the middle names), but he did it, I think, to tease me, because it was such an easy thing to tease me about. He will be forever associated in my mind with the cocky, tall, and egotistical handsome pictures that I see in other guys.

So then we have the skater boy. He was also in high school, but a bit later on, and I started to like him purely for the fact that he was a mystery. He was in one of my English classes, and he wrote like a man with an air that he knew stories the world had never heard before. He had hair that fell over his face and bright eyes that could see right through you. I have a feeling he never saw me though. He was too popular, with his skateboard propped against the wall and his chin resting in his hands, staring into the space that creative writing provided. My heart stopped every time he even glanced in my vicinity, and i quickly looked away. But I got the feeling he would have never known unless I hadn't told him, and even then it didn't make much difference, but it was that puzzling mystery about the whole situation that made me finding him even more attractive. 

Next up is the dreamer; "the what if, one day, you and I got together, I know we could make it work." I have honestly no idea if I could ever love him romantically again, I only know that I did once but I will never know if those feelings were mutual. What I mean when I say we could make it work is that we could love each other and sleep together and wake up in the morning still friends and still reminiscing of the night before and not feel anything but the thrill that it will happen again. He is sexy and attractive and I feel like I could tell him anything, but the tenderness that could go along with all those things might never appear between us. I don't think we could ever be in love, just mutual respect and acceptance. He will always be mine, he just might never belong to me.


Finally, there's you. I want to marry you: I want to watch you wake up in the morning, and as you read yourself to sleep at night, I want to know you're there. I swear on nothing but the truth that you are the one I have always loved, the one that I picture myself with in ten, fifteen, twenty years time; as long as it happens someday, I will wait till then. You are frustrating and annoying and you drive me to nothing but madness, and I think that is part of the reason I can never be mad at you. I know nothing in my soul but love and forgiveness of you. You surprise me everyday and for that I can only be grateful that I am never bored with you. I like to say your name; I like it when you say mine. But there is nothing I like more than seeing your face every time I have given up hope because I know at that moment you love me, and probably always will.

My Body

In 6th grade, I was unbearably uncomfortable with my body. I thought I looked ugly, misshapen, with a back that reminded me of monsters in children's stories and a long pale face that smiled grimly to frame bright blue braces. I had long brown hair that was nothing extraordinary, and my failing eyes required glasses which i thought completed the look of an old spinster with funky teeth. But the next year I got a scooter and I felt more confident with myself. I thought it made me a better person, less self conscious, more free to focus on my personality towards people and less on how my back affected my looks. But then people started commenting on how I walked less. My aid at school told me I waddled like a penguin, that I didn't smile and that I shouldn't laugh the way I did; she said it threw people off and pushed them away. So I stopped laughing, I stopped smiling and I stopped walking in front of people I thought would judge me. And again i became more aware of what I looked like and what people thought of me. I couldn't understand why something so coveted as boobs and good teeth made me feel so awful and caused so much pain. But I moved that year, and my braces came off. I stopped getting a kick in my confidence every time I went to school. I became more independent, and I found activities I loved and people that I could relate to, and wasn't afraid to bring home. I was still self conscious, but much less so than before.
Camp helped a great deal with that. Texas told me it was OK to roll instead of walk, and that there were other people like me who were comfortable with who they were, even at waist height, and didn't care what their mode of transportation was. The first year I worked at Pine Tree let me know that I could hold a job I loved and that I could be good at it, I could be independent and I could work with other people.
College was a different story, and what started off as nerves turned out to be paranioa. I was afraid of being rejected, being alone, being homesick, and failing myself and my family. Towards the end of the year I just fell apart, because so many medical problems happened at once and I just couldn't keep up. But then I got my boob job, and no matter how against I am towards plastic surgery, I have never felt more confident in my own self. I never knew how much my boobs dragged me down, and I never knew how much my self image affected my everyday life. C's are so much better than D's and a butt that is bigger is better than no butt at all. I like myself a little bit more now, and even though you can never stop improving, I'm now at that point where I can be proud of the body I have.