i had abandoned so many things before you came

i adore the way he makes me think. i love his random ensights. i admire his passion for life.
there we stood, centre of the crowd, everyone engulfed in their seperate congregations. we hadn't said a word for several moments. simply stood.
"my family is coming over tomorrow. i'm not sure why..." shrug. hands stuffed in front pockets.
"oh?" quirked eyebrows in interest.
"oh! i remember why! i think they're all coming in to meet my brother's fiancé."
"that's cute." grin.
"yeah" two beats of silence.
"i guess the reason my parents weren't at the choir concert was because my grandfather was in the hospital for something..." for some reason, i don't feel awkward or revealing telling him this.
"really?" surprised, yet concerned.
"yeah. they won't tell me what for though. i asked and my mum just said i didn't want to know."
"perhaps she thought you'd be scared or something?" perplexed expression.
"i dunno, maybe. but i guess he's out and fine now." shrug.
"well, that's good." head nod.
"yeah." two beats of silence.
"i really want to learn compassion. like, i always hear things and i go, 'aw, that's bad' but i never feel it, you know?" motions hand over his heart.
"yeah, i do. i agree. i'll see someone upset or something and i always want to console them somehow, or give them a hug. but i don't want to seem intrusive or like i'm into their business." i realise that my statement hardly relates to his but he smiles and goes along with it.
"yeah, i was reading my Bible the other day and i read a scripture where Jesus saw a woman carrying the body of her dead son and his heart went out to her. and i wonder, what does that even mean, to give your heart out? my heart goes out to you..." he acts out the short story with his hands and makes a bewildered visage as he finishes his conclusive inquiries.
i simply shake my head in response, gawking a bit.
"empathy?" he purses his lips in suggestion.
"intense sympathy?" i offer.
"possibly." shrug.
"it's something to ponder."
"yeah."
we're interuppted by someone leaving. we never come back to the subject. but i did ponder.

compassion is tricky. it is selfless. it is difficult unless your heart is larger than your gut. to give your heart out to someone is to drop all your own troubles and priorities to understand someone else for a moment. to reach out and offer an ear or a shoulder for as long as they need. to let someone share the burden. you give them your heart so they can spill some of the pain unto it and lessen the weight so it doesn't completely engulf theirs.
i almost picture a heart-shaped bowl filled with water, or tears, and you offer your own, not so full, and they pour some of their liquid to yours so theirs isn't so heavy.

i pray to be only yours
i know now you're my only hope

 isn't it funny when you find old things like notes, pictures, journal entries, and you begin to miss people and wonder why you ever let things get so bad?
when CJ was giving a presentation the other day in english, i looked at him. i mean really looked at him. and i have one of those moments where you start remembering all the good times you had those years ago. and even though it was more than eighteen months previous, it nigh feels like last week. and you want to throw them that grin you used to toss back and forth, and give them the hug you used to embrace when one of you was upset, or giggle at that inside joke that made no sense to anyone but the pair of you.
but you can't. because you're strangers now. and you don't even know their favourite colour, or what they did last weekend, or about their terrible breakup any longer.
and the moment changes and now you're mourning the forsaken relationship and pondering exactly what happened for things to turn out the way they did. and shifting the blame around, and remembering what you learned from the person, and forgetting all the new people in your life that make you who you are now, rather than who you were then.
then it shifts once again. and you begin to compare all the different people you've been that were all once named, "yourself". and you pick out all the pros and cons of each character and decide you want to change again into the epitome of all the positives and wipe out all the flaws.
but you can't. because a person, the human personality, doesn't alter on command, but through experiances.
and then it all clicks. and you don't miss that person as much any more. becasue you aren't those same two people, those friends, any longer. and you flash them that awkward smile that fills the void of everything you don't know how to say. and then you move on. because you have to.

-------------

so i get those exilerating goosebumps when he touches my hand. i can't beat down a grin when he calls my name or gestures my way. i can't hide a blush when he asks to sit beside me or invites me somewhere. and i can't help but gaze as we part and walk away.
it's a terrifying game, infatuation. it knocks down your cool composure. it boosts your fears and self-doubt. it slows your wit. it makes you feel awkward and irksome with every move you make, every word you say. but never out of place. because no matter what happens, or how disasterous you think the situation may be...you always feel at home, there beside him. that's why you can't pull yourself away. that's why you crash and burn. and that's why you keep trying.
is it strange that i talk to myself in second person almost all the time?

i'll keep running ahead of the race
to hope i put a sparkle in your eye

you know how people have that filter that seperates what one thinks and what one says...and how certain people claim not to have one because they say everything that's on their mind? well, i think i have a couple extra layers in mine, that i'd like to be rid of. but only around specific people. sometimes i say too much, and sometimes i say too little. but with those i speak too little around, i spend so much time thinking of what i want to say, that the moment passes by and i end up not saying anything at all. and then, i walk away, thinking of all the things i could have said, cursing myself.

nate invited me to start going to church with him. he even said he'd give me rides, since i'm at school for rehearsal til six on wednesdays, so it's close. i told him how he had inspired me to get back into such things, but i didn't go to church or anything because my family wasn't religious. so, he said he would take me to his. wish me good luck in asking my parents, though. they'll think i'm only going because of a boy. and in a way, it is. but it's not for him. it's because of my inspiration from him. and they won't believe me when i add that i made myself a prayer journal where i've been writing letters to God and that i've been reading a chapter of the Bible every night because i actually never have read any of it, but the short stories the teachers would tell us in sunday school when i was a toddler. it's just a plus that nate would be there and giving me rides. heh.

i just think you're wonderful.
and i adore you.

you know how girls always want to be the one to "change the bad boy"?

well, i feel as if it's reversed for me. i feel untamed, wild, stray. and then i look at this boy, i stand beside him, i listen to him speak. and he makes me want to be a better person. it's as if he's my inspiration to be good. when i'm around him, i just want to be kind and pure and happy. and his smile is brilliant, like when the evening is stormy and you wake up the next morning to the bright, shining sun and everything else melts away. and you're just so happy to be alive and where you are right then and there.

he even makes me want to reexplore things i thought i had shunned and shut the door on. like religion. and purity. and a benevolent human nature. i feel as if my eyes have been stapled shut, wandering in darkness, and he... he looks my way, and they are opened.

ay me.