I Know What I Want

And this is what it looks like:

The urgency to maintain superficial layers falls away when you realize how much they change day to day. You're fatter/skinnier than you were yesterday. You hate life one day, and love it the next. You control everything, and then Fate snaps its fingers, and everything slips through yours. Sometimes the future is so certain, and when it becomes the present, you welcome it as you would an expected guest. More often is the occasion when the future is far, far away, and it feels as though it will never be reconciled with that which is called Present.

On the surface, in the world of tangible things, a person like me gets lost processing and sorting and interpreting and reacting. I used to believe that I was just indecisive. I believed I would never truly figure out what I wanted out of life. And then Valentine's Day rolled around.

His eyes were energetic and handsome. They flicked from one feature on my face to the next; in his mind, he was putting together the pieces of a picture puzzle before even touching the pieces. A glimmer, a subtle expression, and he had all the pieces except one:

“Apronkid, what are you thinking? You look like you wanna say something.”

Ever feel like there's so much going on in your mind and in your heart that you're really not thinking or feeling anything at all? I opened my mouth to answer, and I couldn't think or feel a thing...

“Um... I don't know what I'm thinking...”

He leaned in close to me with a knowing look...

“Yeah you do. You know exactly what you want. Just say it!”

I honestly don't remember what I said after that. I remember feeling tragically lost, and feeling upset that I felt nothing for this man. A good, fun date? Yes. But it left me with a lot of questions.

Thoughtful moments since that date have been spent sifting through all the superficial layers of the Everyday, and I find that underneath it all, I really do know what I want.

There is beauty to be found on the surface. Aesthetic charm is something to be celebrated and sought after. But without ideas, without a fertile mind, there isn't a body on Earth that can persuade me to love. Nothing is left if imagination is shut down and denied. Such a gilded husk is a sad, miserable thing.

For the external mirrors the internal in some ways doesn't it? Especially the eyes; they soften with kindness, sparkle with humor, and dim with fear. Personality bleeds through into the human form, both in its being and in its animation. When the internal mechanisms fire and spark and the cogs turn and prompt a human to live, that's where I find beauty.

I want Beauty. I don't want to be beautiful in the physical sense (at least, not obsessively so), nor am I fantasizing of some super attractive man sweeping me off my feet (although some days, that would be nice; I do a lot of walking in Provo). What I want are meaningful ideas, genuine and sincere motives, and good friends to share them with. What I want is that life which is worth living without hesitation or reservation. In Beauty I find truth, and in the truth, I write my music fluidly and with poetic meaning, and the colors of my life bloom naturally.

As romantic and as ideal as my dreamworld maybe, it's something I fight for furiously. I won't give up my idea of Beauty, because it is what I am. In the past, I have so thoroughly convinced myself to settle for less than what I want, and I feel that I have indeed paid for it with the currency of Time and Pain.

And now, I know exactly what I'm thinking, and I'm not ashamed of it. I'm not ashamed to admit that I have no desire to have a sexual relationship. I'm not ashamed to admit that I do rely on a higher power for order and peace. I'm not ashamed to accept the uncertainty of the future, and I'm not ashamed to admit how little I've thought of myself in the past. I'm not ashamed, now, to love myself.

Things change every day... And you know what maybe what I want will change. Life is crazy, and I'm happy to try and be better. But this is who I am for Now. 

“For every beauty there is an eye somewhere to see it. For every truth there is an ear somewhere to hear it. For every love there is a heart somewhere to receive it.”

---Ivan Panin