Hopes and Dreams

I've stopped dreaming about my wedding.

A few years ago, I'd get on pintrest and it would be all I though about. I obsessed over details and looked at rings and dresses galore. But it seems to not matter as much now. (Besides, the more hoping I do now, the more stress and freakout I'll be prone to when the time comes anyway.)

It's not like I don't want one. I do. It will be a beautiful day and I can't wait. I know vaguely what I want it to look like, I know the type of dress I want to have. When the time comes, I'm going to get excited about planning it and making it what I've wanted since I was a little girl. But honestly, I don't care so much about it right now.

Instead, I've started dreaming about a relationship. Maybe that's not much better, but in the grand scheme of things, the relationship is what matters anyway, not the wedding, right?

Maybe it's because I've never had a serious relationship (heck, I've never had a relationship, period, unless you count the time I went to a movie with a guy I had zero interest in, which i don't.) But I find myself thinking about what he'll be like.

I find myself dreaming of the times he will hold my hand or kiss my forehead or say he love me. I dream of spending Saturday mornings at coffee shops, afternoons in the park. I think of wandering around a bookshop with him, talking of nothing and everything. I dream that he'll be my best friend. I dream of sitting in silence with him and being completly comfortable. I dream lying on the couch, watching re-runs of my favorite TV shows, reading books out loud in the twilight. I think of making food with him and drinking tea on rainy days and coming up behind him and wrapping my arms around his waist. I dream of the way he'll smell, the color of his eyes, the way his hair might fall over his forehead. I dream of dancing with him, at a swing dance party with friends or late at night as the shadows grow long. I dream of traveling the world together, climbing mountains and skiing down them, exploring forests and falling asleep in tents.

And then perhpas I think I'm dreaming too much, now I've jinxed myself. I'll think of the way he might propose, or even of how we'll meet, and remind myself I want it to be a surprise.

But I can't help myself, and I don't know why.

I don't have a witty way to end this, any thoughts or lessons on how to move past it. I don't have a cure for myself. But maybe, one day soon, I won't have to.

On Writing [poetry]: a poem

I thought it would be easy

To sit down and pour my

Thoughts

And feelings

Onto the page

Like pouring milk into a

Cereal bowl for breakfast

No, instead

I had to tear my skin away

From my bones so I could

Rip out my tangled veins

And somehow try

To organize the chaos

Into words

                                      ~C.R. Sutton

     

Demons Inside

I wish to go back

To the days where monsters hid

In the closet instead of

Under my skin

When they only threatened to

Come out from under the bed

Rather than from inside

My bones

Because terror only struck at night

In the darkness

Back then, And now,

Nightlights can’t keep the

Demons away when

They are already

Inside of me

                    ~C.R.Sutton

"Writing is Easy."

 
"There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed."

In one of my college classes this year, we were having a discussion about if art, literature, and music would be important in a post-apocalyptic world. Somewhere along the way, this quote by Hemingway came up, and the student was trying to make the point that writing was easy. "Anyone can do it, it's not that difficult. Even Hemingway said it was 'easy'!" (He quoted the whole thing, blood and all).

Now, maybe I'm interpreting Hemingway wrong, I didn't know the guy and to be fair I haven't studied him a lot. But I think he was trying to make a semi-sarcastic point here (or else not so semi). It would be something completely different if he'd said something along the lines of "Writing is easy, all you do is sit down at the typewriter and sweat," or "Writing is easy, all you do is sit down at the typewriter and cry."

If this were the quote, I think most people would instantly argue, "That means it's not easy! It's hard work to sweat, to cry, etc." And this is true. But it can also not be. If it's really hot outside, it's pretty easy to sweat. If you're really sad or frustrated, it's really easy to cry. Both are fairly easy in the right circumstances, and not altogether difficult in less than ideal ones.What's more, these are both natural reactions to life, physical or emotional. They happen often. They are a means of coping. If that was all writing was, it could certainly be considered "easy."

However, that's not all writing is. Think about the quote. Sitting down and bleeding.
Bleeding is not natural or normal in any circumstance, unless you have been injured in some way. Something that doesn't normally come out under natural circumstances suddenly is. To sit down and start bleeding means you would have to physically cut yourself open (or maybe punch yourself in the nose).

That's what writing is. That's what I think Hemingway meant. In order to write, you have to sit yourself down and cut yourself open (not literally). It's not easy. It's hard. Harder than perhaps anything else. But it is essential. For if you do cut yourself, if you do wound yourself (and humans as a whole are pretty wounded creatures, one could argue), bleeding is often helpful. If you scrape your knee, blood is there to wash out the dirt. If you cut yourself, blood clots at the sight of the wound so it can heal. if there was no blood to clot, there would be no chance of healing.

So perhaps bleeding isn't easy, but it is necessary.

Hemingway's statement is a bit of an oxymoron. (idk. That's just what I think. )