staying awake.

so, you know when you look out the window of your car while waiting at a stop light and you see a few McDonald's bags, an assortment of plastic bottles, cigarette cartons, and the occasional sock or bra? it always seems to collect in the same places on the highway, right as you're getting off the exit, and have to wait at a stop light. "oh! great idea! i've got a bunch of random trash in my car. i know. i'll chuck it out the window. sweet. my car is so much cleaner now." i really wonder about these people, and until a couple days ago, i'd never really witnessed one of these roadside villains, but they piss me off, nonetheless. so, i'm driving home from my friend's rehearsal dinner, almost home, and a car stops in front of me to drop someone off (taking their sweet time, i might add). a small, heavily tattooed guy in a wife beater steps out of the pimped out '82 oldsmobile (at least that's what it looked like), winks at me, and tosses his half full mountain dew bottle onto the tree lawn (okay, i've used the word tree lawn before, and most people don't know what it is. i think this might be a phrase use strictly by clevelanders. i guess tree lawn sounds a little bit cooler than "that patch of grass between the sidewalk and the road," and let's be honest, cleveland needs something to feel cool about. but i digress).

so, getting back to the story, the little tattooed man deliberately litters, and the strength of my reaction surprised me (what i'm saying is, it usually takes a lot to get me angry). i was completely disgusted. and in complete honesty, i felt like stopping my car, picking up the mountain dew bottle, and chucking it at his "Stacy Forever" tattoo, because i'm sure he had one. but i didn't. i just felt angry and went home. (what i should have done was stop and pick up his bottle and recycle it. i'm not often the brightest bulb). once i got home i kind of started thinking about this man and why his litter pissed me off so much. i truly do care about our earth, and i want to take care of it, even though i know i don't always do the greatest job...but i think the crux of the issue for me is how little we think we matter, and i think that this mentality leads us all toward living our lives unconsciously.

i find myself doing this all the time. i'm not really experiencing what is here in this moment. maybe it is in these times that we completely lose our connection with our own significance and contribution toward the global community. i often say i go running to clear my head, but most of the time, i'm just filling it with more worries and over-analysis of some relationship gone wrong, thinking of all the instances i've probably messed something up or worrying that maybe i don't really know myself at all. i'm pretty sure that might be the emotional equivalent of throwing an empty can of fresca into oncoming traffic. i'm not sure. i would rather notice how beautiful all the green is around me or look someone in the eye as i pass and say hello. sometimes i just feel really selfish.

i always tell myself, "feel it, and let go. feel it, and let go." i guess the letting go is just a little bit more difficult than i thought. all of this takes so much work, and sometimes it's just too overwhelming to face the work head on. i have a lot to work on.

i guess i'd like to be awake for even more of my life. my best friend courtney just got married this weekend, and the one thing she said several times that really stuck with me is that she just wanted to feel connected to what was going on- to not feel as if she was floating through the day, but absorbing the beauty of it. i could imagine that would be really difficult at a wedding, when managing all of the details at times seems to overshadow the significance of the event. but at the end of the day, there was a lot of love in that room we all shared together, celebrating the union of two people who are dear to me and everyone else there. stripped down, it all came down to that, i think.

so, whether it's throwing trash out the window, or the moments i miss simply because i'm caught up in myself, i'd like to at least be more aware. i'd like to simplify things. i'd like to be living consciously, and i think i'm going to start working on that a little bit harder.