Thanksgiving

This thanksgiving was a new experience for me and it did not feel like Thanksgiving. It wasn't that I didn't have fun or I didn't completely overload on food but it was different. We, first of all ate at a restaurant (Golden Corral) and the food was good and there was plenty of it for all of the 21 people I knew and approximately 300 people I did not know. It seems that this year everyone decided to become lazy and go out to eat. Maybe that is the problem, when people become lazy they do not work or exercise, that exercise creates endorphynns and endorphyns make you happy and give you energy. The lack of energy could have been the difference for the adults but it was not the case for the kids. My cousins Ryann and Abbie were the people I spent the most time with, Abbie is 4 and Ryann is 5. They like me, although the first many times I asked Abbie she said that she didn't know. Finally she said yes that she did in fact love me. That was the good part of thanksgiving: My family. Though thanksgiving this year was different It was still one of the best because my family was together. Over this almost a week in Idaho I have nearly forgotten how to act around people who I am not related to. Thanksgiving is a holiday that can be celebrated in many different ways and though it will not feel the same at first soon you will realize that you can be thankful anywhere, whether in your grandma's house or at the local buffet.

Bookstore

When given the choice between a library and a bookstore, no matter how little money I have, I will inevitably choose the bookstore. There is something about the combined smells of coffee and new books that makes my head happy. Libraries are fine but they are lacking the smells and comfort of the bookstore. Libraries for example tend to make you feel like you need to be quiet and leave as soon as you have chosen a book, but a bookstore provides you with music, cream frappucinos, and comfortable places to sit, read and observe. There definitely are many things to observe in bookstores; in the coffee shop for example you can watch the slightly punkified teenagers perform what they think to be the most rebellious job available in Utah. The sheer thought of selling coffee is enough to make many Utah mothers cringe. In order to fit the rebellious coffee shop worker stereotype they feel that they must have their hair in many lengths and even more colors all on the same head. As fun as they are to observe it is also interesting to see which people look at which books. Who are the chefs, historians, and Elvis lovers of the world and which people are reading the comic books or the oh so intense romance novels and are they really reading or are the trying to find out who you are by what you are reading? In the movie "You've Got Mail" Tom Hanks explains how the owners lure people in with cheap books and overpriced but perfectly aromatic cappuccinos, and it most definitely has worked on me. I hate to think of myself as a mindless consumer but I break the number one book reading rule "Don't judge a book by its cover." That has always been my ideal way of choosing books I want to read: if the cover looks interesting the book probably will be too. And it has hardly ever failed me. There have been a few times where I have ventured to read books with covers that absolutely bored me, and for the most part the book followed suit. If the author did not care enough to make a nice cover he probably did not write it very well either. I seem to have veered slightly from my original topic so in conclusion: This was an analytical blog written on why I personally prefer bookstores to libraries, I apologize to any librarians I may have wounded emotionally in the process of writing this, It was merely a childish but fact based analysis on my own opinion of libraries and it did not reflect any bad thoughts towards librarians specifically. Thanks for reading and please continue to do so.
The Turquoise Tiger

Why I Swim

Swimming is a sport that is difficult tiring and at times painful. It is also a sport that I am not particularly amazing at, nevertheless I continue to go through practice every week day trying to improve myself. I often find myself thinking about why I go through with the taxing practices when I can see everyone else getting better than I can ever seem to get. When my thoughts come to this I get discouraged and angry at myself for not being good enough. Then I remember the feeling I get when I let myself become a part of the water, the euphoria of having my bad day washed away, my worries forgotten, and all becoming right with the world, if only for the time I spend in the water. I also remember the adrenaline that accompanies swim meets and the thrill I get when I have swam my best time. My times may not be the best out of everyone but each time is the best for me. The feeling I have, down in the depths of my stomach and quite possibly in my soul, every time I get up on the blocks to swim is irreplaceable and consuming. What it really comes down to is that I love to swim, I love the connection between me and the water, and I love the freedom the water gives my mind. When I swim only my body is occupied with the strokes, my brain is free to roam and to discover and solve the mysteries of my life. The water around me becomes an outlet for my anger, each stroke tearing away the pain until I am completely and blissfully myself, no longer just a mass of confused emotion, but me, just me. That is why I swim, That is why anyone should do anything. Not because they feel they need to or they have no choice, but because when they do it they find a part of themselves that was lost or that they had forgotten long before.
People of course have obligations, things they must do despite any effort to get out of it. Life is not perfect and no person can love everything they do (if you happen to be a counterexample for this thought please comment and tell me how you do it.) My plan is to do my best to find everything I love and allow those things to become more than the things I must do. Life is for loving and laughing and though the tears will inevitably come the laughter can overcome. It is each persons duty to find the things, or maybe just one thing, that gives them bliss, that makes them forget about how big the bad may seem. When you have found the good you can overcome the bad no matter how huge and invincible it may seem. Maybe this is a bit of an over-dramatic reason to jump in a pool and move my arms and legs repeatedly but it works for me and that is going to have to be enough.

Analization, I don't do it on purpose

Recently I have began to actually think when I am watching movies, reading books, or just hanging out. This is not something I am proud of but it is true. Gone are the days when I just took things as they came, now I actually care about what is going on around me. I suppose this has happened because I have been awakened to the fact that life and movies are made with a purpose. Cinderella Man for example was not just made to make me cry it was in fact made to show me how people had to live and how anyone can do anything they want to with their lives. Analyzing is actually very fun and as much as I hate to admit it, I find myself doing it more and more every day. I might be analyzing because I really like the warm fuzzy feeling I get when I find something out for myself or maybe it is just because I have no life. Not that it really matters why ( I guess it does matter why, since why questions are the only thing behind the success of analyzation) I am analyzing, the point is that I am. Now that my Eyes are open it would be really hard to go back to sleep, so I won't. I analyze because I can that should be enough of a reason for you.