Awww!! :D

So its a typical aimless school night and I'm avoiding work by reading the "My Life is Average" posts. If these are not the cutest things I have read in a while I really do not know what is:

Today, I attended a co-worker's wedding. A little boy who looked about 6 was coming down the aisle and he took two steps, stopped, and turned to the crowd (alternating between bride's side and groom's side), put his hands up like claws, and roared. Step, step, ROAR, step step, ROAR, all the way down the aisle. The crowd was near tears from laughing so hard by the time he reached the pulpit. The little boy, however, was getting more and more distressed from all the laughing and was almost crying. When asked what he was doing, he sniffed and said, "I was being the Ring Bear." MLIA

Last year, I gave my boyfriend a home-made voucher-book for his birthday with things like "Good for one kiss" and "Good for one back rub", but I left the three last pages blank so he could fill them in himself. Today, he turned in the last voucher with the words "Good for one accepted proposal" on it. Nick, I love you. MLIA.

:D

Love Quotables - From the Fly Guy.

Scenario: Me, 8:30pm, random school night, tired of reading Coetzee's Foe and not really wanting to commit to a House episode because I want to get back to reading soon (though this "short" break takes up just as much time). I surf over to read what The Fly Guy's been thinking and I came across his Love Quotables… and I thought I'd share the ones that I liked.

People love others not for who they are, but for how they make them feel.
~ Irwin Federman ~

“When you are in love, you can’t fall asleep because reality is better than your dreams.”
~ Dr Seuss ~

“To love a person is to learn the song that is in their heart,
And to sing it to them when they have forgotten.”
~ Anonymous ~

No man is truly married
until he understands
every word his wife is NOT saying.
~ Anonymous ~

True love cannot be found where it truly does not exist,
Nor can it be hidden where it truly does.
~ Anonymous ~

I sought for Love
But Love ran away from me.
I sought my Soul
But my Soul I couldn’t see.
Then I sought You,
And I found all three.
~ Unknown Author ~

Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength,
While loving someone deeply gives you courage.
~ La0 Tzu ~

Love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image… otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.
~ Anonymous ~

The best love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds. And that’s what you’ve given me. That’s what I’d hoped to give you forever.”
~ Noah to Allie (The Notebook) ~

“I wish I could be your teardrops. What more could anyone ask for than to be conceived in your heart, born in your eyes, live on your cheeks, and die on your lips.”
~ Anonymous ~

Immature love says, “I love you because I need you.” Mature love says, “I need you because I love you.”
~ Erich Fromm ~

“The more I get to know you, the more my heart aches to find new ways to express its devotion to you”
~ Unknown Author~

Update: (This is from a bookmark I have.)

"Nothing is more practical than finding God, that is, than falling in love in a quite absolute, final way. What You are in love with, what seizes you imagination, will affect everything. It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning, what you do with your evenings, how you spend your weekends, what you read, who you know, what breaks your hearts, and what amazes you with joy and gratitude. Fall in love, Stay in love, And it will decide…Everything."
~ Pedro Arrupe, SJ ~

Underneath these Clothes…

Naked I stood in the shower last night. With my eyes closed and my forehead on my arm against the wall, I stood, naked in the shower. Baring my all, tired of hiding beneath these clothing of lies and deceit. Tired of carrying the weight of these clothes on my shoulders and having them clinging to my skin and not letting me go. I try to take off these lies but they keep getting caught at my ankles, at my neck, around my wrists REFUSING TO LET ME GO!!

Leave me alone.

Naked I stood in the shower as I centered the high-pressured stream of water on the top my head trying, hoping, longing for the battle of thoughts of excuses of lies and of shame will be washed out or at least made clean. I asked for my forgiveness to come in the form of that stream of water I let bang on my head and run through my hair and on my skin. Slowly I turned up the heat. If I cannot washed these lies out I will BLOODY BOIL THEM OUT!!!!

Leave me alone.

Naked I stood in the shower, letting the stream of water carry the tears that streamed from my eyes to run over my heart

Forgive me.

Naked I stood in the shower. Never so hard has shampoo been kneaded into my scalp as I am trying to get the lies cleaned from the inside out. Never so hard, intentionally, has my skin been scraped as though trying to scoop out the disgusting deceit from my pores and flick the excuses from underneath my fingernails.

I finally turned off the shower and the water drip drip dripped from my hair, off my breasts and my fingertips, down my thighs and into the drain. I see it all wash away.

…But then after I'm dry again simply to remain in society's favour I open those drawers and put on those clothes once more to cover up my now clean nakedness.

Maybe I just need to throw those clothes in the shower too.

Please, forgive me…

Mmmmm…

Over and over again I find myself listening to this.
Her emotion bleeds into her words, and these words wrap themselves around you so tightly that they seep slowly into the crevices of your mind and immediately you KNOW whose lips you want to be giving that longing sideways stare… ;) Enjoy

I Want to Kiss You



I want to kiss you. Shadow you jaw like against touch. Touch you scent of musk, Saltwater and sea foam clean. Want to kiss you near God. Amongst strangers, I dare either to stop me. Keep me. Want to kiss you bitter. Tired of Waiting, wondering. Want to kiss you empty. Steady as forever. Small as favour. Maybe kiss your curve where shoulder meets neck or silk of throat. Perhaps rough of chin, inside elbows, wrists, then rest, smooth of chest. Back, hip to hip. Dip of belly. Want to hold you, entwined like vows. Palm against palm. Fingers laced and waiting. I want to kiss you unbroken, before too many hearts snap like dried and dead things. This longing, like fire, like hunger, like nothing before or since. Just one small solitary kiss. No questions. No worries. No words. Just a kiss. Quiet. Quick. Subtle. Silent. It'll probably speak volumes.

- Bassey Ikpi.

Slacker

Yet again it is one of those days when you randomly look about on the internet for interesting things to do and read about and you come across these people who are doing things with their lives and you may be a junior in college with a great financial aid package and so many blessings but still feel like you are a "do-nothing slacker"!!!!!

Gracious and all these people, doings things and getting ahead are ALWAYS, younger than you.
And you look around and ask, what kkrraaaaaaa am I doing with my life??

Oh my psych prof actually used "WTF" in explaining something in class. Haha. Must be another of those things about growing up, the professors know and have come to terms with you've been there and said that.

Ironic how I feel as though my college houses some of the most IMMATURE people ever. Argh. And I thought this was a thing of high school and I was moving forward. Boy was I WRONG!!!
Sigh.
Ah well.

FALL BREAK!!! …finally.

Wedded Bliss

So this all started about a year ago…
I was at work joyfully being aimless (yes, my boss knows, hehe) when this woman (…hmmm another point. ok maybe more than a year ago) comes up to me and says she would need to have her username changed because she had gotten married over the summer. And considering her request that meant she was at most a college senior.
I FREAKED OUT! (Well after I had directed her to the appropriate personnel of course)

It had not occurred to me till right then and there that I was growing up…fast.
I remember the days when whenever I heard that someone was getting married it was one of my parents' friends or some older person. But now, it was the people around me, people my age who were getting married.
And suddenly everyone was getting married, it was as though my eyes-are-closed-to-all-things-marriage-related bubble burst. People my age who I knew directly or through others were making that life long commitment to be with someone the rest of their lives.
THAT'S A HUGE-NORMOUS COMMITMENT.
My roommates can attest to the shock I was in for the following week.

And from that point I started noticing all sorts of other things. My to-do lists did not only include deadlines for getting various class projects done but also:
going to the supermarket to get things I needed,
making sure that my bank account would allow me to get those things,
would I have time to make something to eat and still get these things done,
being roped into various projects that are totally nonacademic,
paying big bills every month
GARGANTUAN RESPONSIBILITIES
and the list goes on.

And there were other more interesting things like tall glasses of hot chocolates that I noticed and had always and will always notice but… it hit just how much I noticed them and how I was not alone in noticing and going mmmmm with eyes closed and big smiles. (Lardy, that night was a shocker. lol) and how this place that I am in has a big lack of them. grr.

But anyways, when did this all happen???
Where did the times I was content with a book and cuddling Benjie in bed go?
Where did the times when I did not worry about bills and when I was getting paid go?
Where did the times when 24 hrs in the day was MORE than enough go to class, eat, sleep, get homework done and still have time over to be aimless and bug my mother (who was 6 feet and not 6092 miles away) go?

ARGH!!!!
And coming back to that other point, did you notice when people started calling you "woman" (or "man")?? I didn't really, when suddenly it was obviously only my parents would call me girl (or some bug-eyed, frog-tongued weirdo on university avenue… forgive me). It was either lady or woman, never girl. And all around me my friends gladly claimed the title. and my roommate would always mock-scold me starting with, "Look here woman!"

Anyways, what got me thinking about all this (other than the bill that I know is waiting for me) at work last week I found out one of my co-workers had gotten engaged last year (forgive me for only just noticing the ring eh) and then the entire office launched into a discussion on financial aid and how getting married in college screws it all up and something something jazz jazz.
Knowing me it stuck in my head but… and here comes the best part.
That night I dreamt I had gotten married. Surprise surprise. But the funny thing was it actually was surprising because in my dream I remember looking down at my ring and I was happy… when I say happy, I mean HAPPY. It wasn't the jumping about, throwing your air and dancing in circles excitedly with your closest girlfriends but the kinda happy that I guess if I were in a movie someone would go "You are glowing."

…Now as to who the guy I got married to was…

…
……
………
…………
………
……
…

Let's all wait patiently to find out k! :)

XOXO, K.D.

I AM My Hair.

WOOOO!!! I just had my hair did!! And its fly!! (No, literally, you should see the Minnesota ice air blowing it into my face and blinding me. Silly thing. ;) )
A couple hours ago I couldn't even get my big toothed afro comb through the thing and now I can wrap it even!!! (Can you tell how excited about it I am??? :D)

So anyways, there is this thing going on in my school where girls left, right, center, above and below (trust we scots to go there too) are cutting their hair. And I don't mean the short bob like Mandy Moore oooo, I mean short like Solange! (One even has a Cassie. She might have changed her mind half way? Idk) Their excuse: "My hair is too straight!"
To think the ones whom Africans looked to and began to perm their hair are actually sick of it now and want curly hair!!! We humans are NEVER satisfied with what we have, are we? ARGH!

My hair is permed, but Lord knows this thing is only "straight" for the first 2 weeks after a perm and then its back to the frizz. And I'm looking on as head after head is shaved thinking nnooooo and I realise just how much I love my hair and how like it I can be.
Before my hair was permed I never did it myself. I couldn't. It was long and thick with tight curls that created knots like they were holding on to each other for dear life! I remember my mother would ran a comb which started with 14 teeth through my hair and it'd come back with 10 because those bonds were that tight. On one hand, we both were stubborn without give, on the other we linked strands/hands and refused to let go. I look at my life and the close friends I have to whom I'm holding on to like my curly strands would hold on to each other.

Then I got a perm. Probably because people who had to deal with doing my hair couldn't anymore. I know I couldn't (When I was left to wash my own hair I had to do it in sections…funny). We are both now changed, newly formed in new ways and trying new things.
But most of all, we do not forget our roots. They spring back up, thick, curly and AFRICAN! Intertwined to link strands yet again. Yes, I am mixed and my skin pays some homage to my European side but we are talking hair and I was born and raised and still grow African.

You can take the girl and her hair outta Africa but not the African outta the girl OR her hair!!

As much as I would llooovveee to my full head of knotted hair back, I know I can't shave my head. eish!! There is a reason hair is there to cover the head. haha. Besides I like the fact I can comb my own hair now (sometimes). ;)

NOTE: I repeatedly said Africa because this kpenkpeshi hair is not only in Ghana. But I would like to say here: I'M A PROUD BLACK STAR (with cream) OF GHANA!!! WWOOOOO!!!!

Oh, Happy Independence Day Naija! :)

Because I lived…

That caption says, "A hundred years from now, it will not matter what my bank account was, the sort of house I lived in or the kind of car I drove… but the world may be different because I was important in the life of child."

So again, I was at the chiropractor today waiting to get my STEM therapy (some vibrating back massage thingy the function/purpose of which I still do not understand despite the numerous questions) and a troublesome shelf had been replaced with this framed poster (diff. picture tho, but same words).

This semester I managed to sneak into a leadership class meant for freshman by pulling a few of the strings I found over the summer through my job. I did this because in December back home I'm helping plan and facilitate a leadership program for JSS (junior high school) students and I thought this would be the "easiest" (30 pg readings and all) way to get first hand information on some things I could bring to the program. But more importantly it was because I felt if I did nothing else with my life I want another person's life to be significantly better because I lived. And this is what I told the class when we had to share our dreams.

In response to this, another student in the class commented on how attainable that goal was. And it was at the point that I actually realized how true that is. I do not need to wait for a specific avenue or a specific person on even this leadership program (though that is like my baby right now) but I can reach the people right here right now.

Despite the caption, I cannot honestly say that significantly changing a life is my highest priority right now not with the 200+ pages I have to read by tomorrow, but it gets a high score on the list. Either way this is speaks to my passions and what I have found I want to do with myself and how I'm going to do that (especially the "significantly" bit). But for now I'm going to start with the little insignificant ways I know how.

So I'm off to go give someone a hug, and draw a smile and make their lives better… even if its just slightly, remember little drops of water…
:)