I don’t like the reflection in the mirror anymore.
I don’t like seeing how deeply those dark circles are burned into my skin.
The creases go on for ages.
My little reminders of why I don’t sleep at night.
I don’t want to remember so I don’t look into the mirror as often.
My Neverland-escape cannot save me anymore. I still find excuses to mourn in a completely fictional world.

(The Image Above is NOT my own)

When one really begins to look at their life from a different perspective a person can really come to realize how much of it was wrong. Wrong decisions, wrong perceptive, wrong motives...

I wonder sometimes if I could go back if I could make my past better. Maybe if I had just an hour to return to the past to repay the ones that I care for by making better choices than the ones I've made...could my life also possibly benefit? There has to be some reason why human's have no resources or authority to turn back time. If we could all have redoes I can't say that the would would be a better place. As Ben Parker, Peter Parker's uncle once said, "with great power comes great responsibility".

If a scientist or historian was to do an in depth study of my life they would find torn pages and stained memories. My story hasn't been kept in perfect condition. I can only hope to clean up what I can and move on. The world is cold and starved, no, deprived of love. Through that lack of love that many people's lives have fed on our world has become a dark place to live. Generation after generation has taught their children and decedents to learn to live without. What a sad race we are.

Recently I have stumbled upon reading for the second time. I read to escape. I want to live in those worlds where there is hardship and adventure without the threat of real reality. Call me a coward but I prefer my stories over my life sometimes. Life doesn't have to be hard for one to seek another story than their own. I've always heard "we want what we can't have". I just want to be free. On occasion I'll admit that moral obligation binds me. I don't just choose to allow myself to be obligated, I am bound as a responsible human being.
When all you want to do is be a child responsibility sucks.
I truly believe that Neverland would suit me best.

"Wait for me, lost boys, I'm coming home!"



Here is a shoot that I did on the beach with a 35mm film Camera and 400 color film. ( I did edit these shots on photoshop)

My testimony isn’t a heart-wrenching story of a lost girl coming into herself and reaching her full potential by overcoming her past addictions. My testimony is of a girl with a great life and an even greater God watching over her. It took me a little while to realize that He wanted a REAL relationship with ME. There aren’t many days that I think about living a different life than my own. I’ve never wanted to be someone else. I’ve never coveted any person’s life, belongings, or relationships. But I can’t help but think that some of this blinded me to what God needed from me. So I am going to tell you a little story and keep in mind that it is neither dramatic nor predictable.

As a child I was brought up in a home where there was no heartache, loss, depression, or hardship. I had a near perfect childhood. I have exceptional parents that sheltered me and took care of all of my physical, emotional and spiritual needs. What was I to want for other than the wants and needs that only a child should desire? I had innocent dreams, and pure intentions and a wonderful home to live in. As I grew up I had very few extreme experiences. I didn’t live on the edge. I was a cautious, courteous, and careful child. To this day I have never broken a bone or gone to a party. You could say that caution and security go hand in hand in my life. It wasn’t just fear that kept me from experiencing the things of this world but it was also maturity. I matured mentally much quicker from being home schooled vs. being introduced to a public school setting. I had a wider vocabulary than most my age by the time I reached my thirteenth year. I never completely understood why my peers insisted on wasting their lives glued to a television instead of investing their time in books and play. This all of course was credited to God and my parents in my later years. I caught much of what I learned and much of what I caught was what separated me from a lot of kids my age. Godly principals were instilled in my life as for as long as I can remember.

At a young age, I accepted the Jesus as my Lord and Savior on my way to school one day. Evidently I wasn’t mature enough as a person to fully understand what the commitment that I had made meant. It wasn’t until I was sixteen that I perceived what God so desperately desired from me. Even with that understanding I never chose to strike up a real relationship with Him. Because my life had never been extreme, I didn’t know how to have an extreme relationship with the Lord.

At the beginning of last year, I actually started receiving a taste of the blessings that God had in store for my future. I began to find an injustice in receiving the blessings and not reciprocating to the One who created me. God used a close friend of mine to open my eyes to the burning passion that my God has for me. There was a passion for my heavenly Father welling inside of me that became uncontrollable to a certain degree. Through that close friend, I was taught how to release my passion in a righteous way and truly show God how much He meant to me in my life. As I continued to seek God in this exceptional manner, I quickly began to mature in my worship, my relationship with God, my devotion and my character. I’ve learned that it isn’t right to just accept yourself and your as is. We should always be advancing and maturing in God and in our relationships around us. I’ve done a complete 180 and now I desire the future that God has for me instead of my own. For as long as I can remember, I’ve never wanted any part in this world. I’ve always strived to separate myself from it. But for the longest time, my goals and my desires were of this world instead of what God had intended for me. Now, I can walk with confidence acknowledging that I am on the correct path and that I am willing to do everything within my power to follow Christ in the most profound way possible.

I believe my duty, as a bondservant of Christ, is to touch our dying world in a way that no one ever has before and heal broken hearts through God. I have a fiery and desperate ambition to radically impact the world and awaken it to its almighty creator. I have talents and gifts that God has placed within me that only need the training to expand and reach the world in an undiscovered and provocative way. God has called us as leaders to be followers and before I can be a leader, I need to follow and serve. How else can one expect to identify with a fallen world if one cannot learn to serve it?

Labels: 24/7, God, honestly, love, passion, reality, testimony, the world

A few of the pictures that I took while on vacation.

Alright.

This past week I went across the state to stay in a condo with my family for spring break. That's right, this is how we inexperienced florida dwellers vacation.
One must question the sanity of our journey across florida in search of beach, sun and relaxation.

My family and I take up residence in a small suburban home on the gulf (for those of you who don't know where exactly I am located in the sunshine state). Did I also mention that we also live only 15 to 20 minutes away from a public beach?
For some reason the coast is mildly more attractive than the gulf side. Yeah, so we drive two and a half hours around this time of year in search of a suitable beach to meet all of our vacationing needs (of course we don't take into account that florida pretty much is one large beach in itself). Because we have needs too despite our current location in a state where snow birds come to suffocate us and old people come to die. That's right.
But hey, we have Disney World! Silly California and their Disney Land. Laaaame.

Florida, the skin cancer and Speedo state or at least that's how they should advertise for this glorious spit of land.
With our never ending population of distasteful palm trees(that don't actually provide any shade at all like certain commercials may suggest) and our strange seasons purely dedicated to scientifically altered insects, we are all the rave during certain winter and summer months.
I could elaborate more on those special insects of ours, love bugs, which aren't lovely or even loving in the least but that would take away from your googling experience. So run along now. Go google away and trust me when I say that your mouth will drop. Florida isn't quite as perfect as you northerners might imagine. Just take a look at the image above. See the little black things on the walls and the door? Those my dear readers are the little creatures that Floridians have not come to love but to loathe.


Rant over.


Sort of.


Anyways, back to the story. We drove to the condo, blah, blah, blah... the drive was too long..yada yada yada..
Ah yes!
Fourth Paragraph. So, as some may know, I am fair skinned. As some may not know I am extremely prone to sun burn. I have red and olive undertones in my skin that work(plot) against me.
Firstly, the olive undertones, when exposed to UV rays create a nice "healthy" looking glow to my skin. Also known as a tan for those of you that care. Problem one, I hate tanning and I hate tans. I don't like looking as if I've just walked out of an oven set on broil (my bread likes to turn a nice little goldeny brown color when I decide to toast it in the oven). I like my skin as is. FLeshy and pallid. I am not toast
Secondly, the red undertones when exposed to UV rays cause my flesh to burn and redden (heh, hence the RED undertones). Problem two, I may be a little odd but I don't like to lie under the sun for hours in a skimpy top and bottom doing absolutely nothing except apply tanning lotion to my skin when needed.
No wait. I take that back. Occasionally you are allowed the luxury of rolling onto your back. Gotta keep it even.
Weird right? How terrible of me not to partake in the wondrous ritual of risking skin cancer(not to mention a good nights sleep) and wasting a perfectly good day lying around getting fat. Yes, I believe that when you're not active then you are no better than her.

This is how I see all of you people that find tanning attractive. bah!

I guarantee that I have offended quite a few people by now so I've decided to place in the tag list below the words "bias idiot who shall most likely be stoned to death". You may look for it at the end of this post.

All of Fourth Paragraph was written to say that when I did spend time at the beach it was spent under multiple layers of spf 30 (because we didn't have 75), a hoodie, a very large beach umbrella, and two towels.
I rather enjoyed that day. One of the only days that we were there with nice weather.
We stayed a week and 4 days out of that week were spent inside. "Why?", might you ask. Or instead you might say, "That is ridiculous, Kayla, especially if you were hiding from the sun".
Well stop it.
I was not hiding from the sun. I was hiding from more than a couple of horrendous storms. There were at least 3 tornado watches while we were there which ruined any chance that we had at watching a good television program all of the way through. Stupid weather channel. I mean who really wants to be forced to watch a weather warning when its clearly storming outside?

TORNADO WARNING TORNADO WARNING TORNADO WARNING TORNADO WARNING


end.

Labels: beach, bias idiot who shall most likely be stoned to death, florida, glorious, love bugs, skin cancer, sunshine

“unroutine” isn’t a word.

1. I woke up at 10:45. No matter my intention of waking right at 8 or 11 or even 1 o’clock I always find myself up 45 minutes after the time intended. I give up. I will not succumb to using an irritating alarm clock that will only do what my mother could do herself. Yes, I am still a baby. This is all to say that I awoke at 10:45 on the dot.

2. I crawl from my bed at 11. Crawl is the verb I use and crawl shall be the verb of choosing. (Reminiscent of a Monty Python and the Holy Grail quote) I can seriously apply every line in that movie to real life situations. It is glorious!)

3. I stumble into the bathroom and then out. I forgot where I was going and decided to make a stop in the bath room for a short moment. Don’t ask me why. That’s a better question for my unconscious self.

4. I make my way to the stairs and took them down.

5. Once in the kitchen, only after I’ve dragged my body across the floor of the living room, I stand in the middle of the room for long moments of time just listening. You see, when my stomach growls I know that it is, in fact, time for food. If I listen closely enough I can actually hear it cursing profanely at me. On occasion it makes a small part of me feel satisfied to starve it for 12 hours straight. Then I feel guilty after. I of course, take into account that it also likes to embarrass me in public in Art History class. So the punishment is just. My stomach is a near completely separate entity and I must treat it accordingly.

6. I throw open the pantry doors searching with blood shot eyes for nourishment. At this point in the game my stomach has entirely taken me over and I act as my stomach feels.” Take the foods” that is what it says to me.

7. Once I find my cereal of choice I go to the cupboard and pick a certain deep red bowl and pull it out. I poise myself over the bowl to poor the cereal. At this point you can only guess what such a treacherous thing happens next. The cereal fell into the bowl.

8. I slip open a drawer and search for a spoon with a perfect luster and shape. Most always I find it. If I don’t I go hungry. Correction, my stomach goes hungry. You can only imagine what it says to me then.

9. The milk is next. I go for the milk. I did go for the milk. I went for it, really. I was bound and determined to have my frosted flakes that morning. Why do all mornings that start off well have to end so tragically?

10. There was no milk.


11. There was an image in my head of where the milk should be but as I reached for it my hands came up empty. Recounting this story has forced my stomach into a depression. Now, this italicized piece of my journal is null.

12. After I realized that there really was no milk in the house and using half and half in my cereal shouldn’t be an option, I sulked.

13. Sitting watching my bowl of cereal for 10 minutes was fun. It mocked me.

14. It called me names. Nasty ones.

15. It screamed at me, reminding me of my mother’s neglect. She didn’t buy me milk. No milk + no cereal = no breakfast multiplied by two subtracted from the sum of 8 and 94 and divided by the fact that my stomach was going to recreate itself in the form of a large heifer and run me over…until death. All of this said with out the help of a single italicized word. Six hundred and twenty seven points.


Six hundred and twenty seven points plus every numbered odd point I made times five.
Heh.

Labels: alarm clocks, blog, cereal, Kayla Danielle, milk, morning, stomachs, unroutine, waking up