Verbal self-portrait

View #1: Yesterday there was a home video from 2001 playing on my father’s TV. In the video, there was a group of people taking a tour of the offices of The Bulletin, Bend’s local newspaper. The videocamera was most often focused on three things: the rolls of paper and computers and desks of the building itself; a gangly, blonde little white boy who showed every tooth in his mouth when he smiled; and an equally blonde and white girl who wore a hot pink bow in her hair. Several times the video would show the small hand of said blonde white girl shooting up in the air to ask a question in a chirpy, endlessly curious voice. The hand is connected to an arm which is clothed in a pink sweatshirt that is unnecessarily covered with small hearts. The sweatshirt covers a body that is topped by a head completely covered with freckles, and on the front of the head is a face that is almost entirely composed of two very blue, very wide eyes, and a large mouth that is seldom shut.

View #2: Several times in the last day or so, I have been tagged in those “If you open this, you take it. Answer “Yes” or “No” and be completely honest. Don’t explain ANYTHING.” notes. I’ve read every single one that my friends have written, but I have not yet written one of my own. I’ve started several times, then realized that I would just as soon not finish. It dawned on me that the people who I want to know the answers to the important questions, already do know them. And the rest of the questions don’t matter all that much.
Still, I enjoy random facts as much as the next guy (or girl), so I decided to mention a few of my own:
-I read myself to sleep.
-Recently, I’ve started to not hate math.
-I do hate fruit flavored cereal.
-When I was little, I almost always had a huge bow in my hair.
-I’ve ridden a bike on a beach. It was lovely.
-The smell of campfire always makes me feel like I’m 5 years old.
-I love antique stores.
-Thumbelina is one of my favorite movies.
-I love children’s books, especially the Bearenstein Bears books.
-A few years ago I tried to start collecting snowglobes... I now have 5. (I’m not that good at collecting things.)
-I argue that “Ocean” is a color.
-I never ever throw out that color/black alignment page that a printer prints when you put a new cartridge in.

Sometimes I have trouble consolidating those two views of myself. In my mind, I’m still that awkward 9 year old in a pink sweatshirt who can’t stop asking questions. Yet when I look in the mirror, I see a (hopefully) less awkward college girl who has a mind of her own and still asks a lot of questions, but has some answers as well.
It’s like I’m an old soul in an 18 year olds’ body with the thought process of an elementary school kid and the sarcasm of a weathered political satirist.
And I’m okay with it.
What’s interesting, though, is what happens when I start listening to what other people think I am.
Now, anyone can rant all day long about how “What other people say doesn’t define me!” or “I don’t care what anyone thinks!” or “I do what I want, what other people say doesn’t matter!”
But, in a way, what someone thinks of you does matter. Because their perception of you is who you are to them. So, in a way, you are what people think you are.
That’s to be taken with a grain of salt, but it’s an idea that I haven’t been able to get out of my head for the past few days.
And the question I keep asking myself is: “Do I like the person I am?” and “Do I like the person other people think I am?” And, perhaps most importantly, “Are those two people the same?”
I don’t have whole answers to those questions yet. But I’m looking for them.

If you and I had coffee today, this is what would have happened.

After I had tripped in, late and breathless, I would sit there with my coffee and smile at you. Hopefully you would smile back. I would ask you how you’re doing, you would answer with (insert typical answer here) and then ask how I’m doing. I would get a look on my face that resembled something between a grimace and a smirk, and I would tilt my head, and this is what I would say.
“I’ve been thinking - if I were some sort of goddess, and I had complete control over everything, my life wouldn’t be the way it is right now. That seems painfully obvious, but - think about it.
If I could choose the people that I would be friends with, the situations I would be in, the events I would experience - they would all be completely different than the friends and situations and events currently in my life.
But I’m no goddess-”
You would snort with laughter at this point.
“-and I can’t control what happens in my life. All I can do is control my reactions and my attitude.”
Now you would lean back in your chair, because you can tell that I’m going to take you on a trip with me through my thought process, and that’s always an adventure.
“I’ve been in a really reflective mood the past few days. Part of me is surprised that I’m still a fairly sane person, after the insanity of the past year. There were times I thought I would just stop functioning. I don’t know if I told you about that.”
You would slowly shake your head, and try to catch my eye, but I would be looking out the window.
“But you know what? I wouldn’t change any of it. I learned a lot about myself through all that happened. I learned how easy it is to become someone I don’t like, and I learned what really matters to me. I learned how amazing it feels to be genuine.”q
Here I pause, and we sit there with our coffee, and we are silent. It’s one of those moments that feels surreal, because you have stopped and life has continued on around you.
“Sometimes the memories hit me so hard that I can’t move and can’t think, I’m filled with what I never told anyone and I ache for things I shouldn’t have said. Still - I wouldn’t change it, even if I could.”
I sit up straighter now, and put both hands around my coffee cup.
“So, in my mind, I’ve been going over the story of my life so far.  And then I start thinking about my life right now.
Like I said earlier - I can’t control what’s happening. I don’t know what tomorrow is going to bring, heck, I don’t even know what’s going to happen in the next 10 minutes. But I’m learning to accept that.
I’m an optimist by nature, I continually look forward and up for what’s coming next. That’s usually a good thing. And when I look up, I see beautiful things like the sky and the tops of trees - but I can unintentionally avoid meeting the eyes of the people around me. Looking forward is essential to knowing where I’m headed, but so is looking backward at what I’ve come through.
Another thing - I ask a ton of questions. Usually that’s a good thing, too. But I realized that sometimes I get so busy and noisy with all my questioning that I completely miss the answers that are right in front of me. I’m so bad at being quiet and just paying attention.”
Now you smile knowingly at me, because you have experienced firsthand my ability to question absolutely everything, and my tendency to be loud.
“And I’ve been thinking about all this, and I thought ‘What do I do now?’ And I realized that the answer was ‘Be quiet.’
So that’s what I’m doing. One thing that I’m trying: on Tuesday, February 16th, I turned off the stereo in my car. I’m not totally sure when I’m going to turn it on. This timing happened to coincide with Lent, but that’s not the reason I’m doing it.
I needed to find a time, every day, that I could just listen. A lot of the time I end up singing jazz standards, or acoustic love songs, but a lot of the time I just drive in silence. Surprisingly, I like it. I like all the extra time I have to think.
Another thing - I’m focusing on is trying to swallow my questions and be grateful for the answers that I do have.
Also, I’m working on accepting things they way they are, at this moment, instead of always waiting for something else. Sure, I still have hopes - but I’m working on enjoying things without having unrealistic expectations. ‘Expect nothing, appreciate everything,’ that sort of thing.
And, maybe most importantly - I’m listening to what I hear. My friends say some AMAZING things -”
You nod graciously.
“ -I don’t appreciate that enough.”
Then I apologize for rambling on for so long, and you say no, it’s alright. Then I ask about your day and what’s going on in your life, because it matters to me.
After we’ve said everything on our hearts, we throw away our coffee cups, say bye to the baristas (at least I do) and walk our separate ways down the street.
And as I leave, I think “Man - I’m so glad I know (insert your name here). I’m glad I got to have coffee with (insert your name again), I needed that.”

Cleaning my room and life philosophy.

I cleaned my room today.
Now, my usual definition of “clean” means that roughly 70% of my floor is visible, I can find the sweater I’m looking for in under five minutes, and that I can close my closet doors without breaking a sweat. But today, when I say that I cleaned, I mean that I dusted, I vacuumed, I tidied up, and I organized. For once, clean means clean.
As I began the laborious task, my brother Caleb walked into my room.
“This room looks really messy. It makes me want to cry.”
I attempted to defend myself. “I’m working on it!!!” but he just walked out, laughing.
I kept on anyway, and finished some time later.
My parents were absolutely ecstatic. In typical Dad-fashion, when my father walked by, he gasped “Jaz!!! when did you get a floor?!?!” and my mother clasped her hands in rapture and exclaimed “thank you! oh thank you! It’s so lovely! Why don’t you keep it like this all the time?!”
Depending on how well you know me, the fact that I’m such a disorganized person at home may surprise you. It’s true that I keep my notes and school assignments in order, and I’m OCD like you wouldn’t believe when it comes to kitchens, but my room is a different matter entirely.
The truth is, I’m a pack rat, in the most random and haphazard sense of the word.
While I was cleaning today, I found dozens of receipts for beads and shampoo and cups of coffee that I’d just never thrown away. I found a decades-old Monopoly game that I bought at a garage sale at least 3 years ago because I liked the classic design of the money and playing pieces. I found vintage greeting cards that have never been written in, and magazines I’d never gotten around to reading.
Sure, there are also the things that normal girls save, like movie ticket stubs and notes from friends. Plenty of people keep paraphernalia like that around for a while, I just can’t bring myself to get rid of any of it. Which is why I have every single birthday card I’ve gotten since I was eight.
There’s this pair of puffy polyester plastic-heeled boots that I got at Goodwill, back when I thought I could pull off dressing like a hipster. I wore them once. That was freshman year, I believe.
I found a canvas that I had started painting months ago. I was going to make it into my best multi-media piece yet, but it still holds only paint.
I have mix CD’s from middle school that are covered with doodles of hearts and flowers that have titles like “Jazmin’s favorite songs everrrrrrrrrr” and “LOVE!!!!!!!!” There are used books that I bought because I liked the cover but I’ve never read, and there are dozens of index cards scribbled with citations for Writing 123.
And everywhere, absolutely everywhere, there is paper. I have countless handouts from church, schedules of studies and articles on people like Rob Bell and copies of song lyrics. Sad and short-lived attempts at poetry haunt half full notebooks. My to-do lists from last term and last year are still hanging out in my desk drawers. The backs of envelopes are the keepers of questions I never found answers to, and gum wrappers have become tiny airplanes.
It’s pretty safe to say that I have a hard time ever throwing anything away.
Now, the question is, why the heck do I still have all that stuff, and why am I writing about it?
I do have an explanation, of sorts.
If I’ve ever forgotten to call you back, or give someone in my family a message for you, or bring you something, or - heaven forbid - I forgot your name, you know that I’ve got a pretty terrible memory.
But I think that life is actually something worth remembering. That’s how we learn, isn’t it? Looking back at past conversations and experiences give us knowledge to move forward. Remembering who we were helps us establish who we are, and who we want to be.
I want to enjoy my life, but I also want to remember WHY I enjoyed it.
And so, that is why I write, that is why I save things. I want to have stories to tell. I want to carry the wisdom that I’ve earned the hard way with me. I want to remember what made me smile, the relationships I loved, the times I failed and was rescued, and the mundane moments that turned into something beautiful.
Everything that I save has a story. For instance, I saved those puffy boots because I loved the story that goes along with them. The one time I wore them was to youth group, back in high school. My friend Tiffany decided they were awesome, and got our other friends to say that they agreed the boots were awesome.
Those boots were not awesome when I put them on. But they became awesome, because of my friends.
I love that story. It’s not about the boots, though. That story is about Tif and I, and about the kind of relationship we had back then. It makes me smile, every single time I think about it. And so, I kept the boots.
I’ve got hundreds of stories that I could tell, all because of the “junk” I’ve gathered and watched over for all these years. Those stories aren’t even exclusively about my close friends - if you’re a part of my life, even at all, I have a story I could tell about you. And if I have a story to tell about you, that means I care about you.
The most beautiful thing about stories, to me, is that the whole story is never about only one person. Even if the person in a story lives alone in a forest and eats only berries and tree bark, at some point, that person had parents. There’s always someone else involved in a story. We need each other.
If I were to attempt to tell “my” story, I would soon have to admit that, in truth, it’s OUR story. It’s our story because, at some point, my story and your story collided. There was a scene, or maybe an entire chapter, that unfolded the same way for both of us, we just tell that story with different voices.
And I guess that’s what this is rambling has been, a written celebration of the idea that i have a story and you have a story and that, for some reason, they ran into each other and neither story has been the same since.