running (snapshot)

It always hurts at the beginning, there has never been a day where feet and pavement meet and pain is absent. Pain is always there. I start off with an easy run, but the impact made on concrete from flesh and bone is anything but easy. I begin the solitary run up South 1st street, with baby steps I'm able to keep my body moving. Pain is absent only sparingly, occassionally my surroundings catch me off guard and I forget about the pain. Deep breaths, in through the nose, out through the mouth, open my eyes, drink in the intoxicating beauty. See the low hanging branches which signify the beginning, the KB home flags billowing black and yellow colors in the breeze, taunting you to come nearer. Smell the awful stench of sewer when I come over the bridge, picking up my pace to hurridly pass the zone. Listen to what nature has to say, hear the birds singing their early songs, the gurgling brook, the passing cars. Feel the wind in my hair, the drops of sweat falling from my face, cooling my hot body. Arms outstretched I pretend I'm flying on eagle's wings, swoop swoop. I don't care what the people inside their cars might think of me, whether my actions seem childish to them or not. It feels great to let myself go, flying forward. Spin around like a ballerina, stare up at the pure blue sky. I smile knowing life has been good to me. Twenty minutes have come and gone, I'm at the gas station and the 1.5 miles have passed me by, time to turn around and head back. It's always easier running back, I tend to pick up my pace just a little, knowing W. Charles Akins High School is waiting for me with a hot steamy shower in the girls locker room. COWS! Brown and black, big and small, they make me smile when I run past. To make running fun for me I wave at the cars coming my way. Most of the time they wave back, I make sure and give them plenty of wave time so I know who is just being plain rude when they ignore my hand waving wildly back and forth at them. I hope it makes them happy, because I know I'm happy when I run, and life is too short to be sad. WOOHOO! I see them KB flags now!

"You can do it Joanna, you've done it before, and you can do it again."

Yeah, that's right. These 3 miles are nothin'! Another WOOHOO! I see my low hanging branches, the bus stop is just out of sight, I take long gazelle like strides up the bridge. YES! I did it! I feel like raising my hands in victory, but I'm too tired by that time. So, I settle with stretching out my worn muscles and walking back to the locker room. Mmmmmm, that water feels good against my skin, I sigh contendly, washing away the sweat and nasties that cling to me. Short and sweet, I'm done in 15 minutes. Blow dry my hair with the hand driers, 'cuz I'm fly like that, and try and pull off looking cute for the day. It only works sometimes :), but I don't mind, I can't be perfectly gorgeous all the time. All I can be is me, and I'm happy with who that is.

friendship (looping)

Life's journey's sometimes leaves us strewn across the road, naked without anything in the world to comfort and clothe us. At times like these it is oftentimes our friends who see us at our worst, reach out a hand, and put us back on our feet. They throw a robe around our shoulders and give us a comforting smile and life moves on. Friends sacrifice so much for one another, time, space, even living their own lives to see the other content. True friends come together like peanut butter and jelly, opposites attracting either crunchy or smooth, mixed with sweet succulence that blend to form a mixture heaven sent. I'd say a true friendship is quite like marriage, together as one you eventually find the other and when you do, promises are made to be there until the very end through thick and thin, 'till death do us part. When we are at our very worst, at the bottom of a deep dark terrifying pit, the other is there like a shining beacon of light igniting the flame of hope within our very souls. You become lifted out of the gloom and suffering and onto angels wings, we fly together through the heavens, admist the clouds, hand in hand. Without friends in this world we would all be walking corpses with no beacon of light to guide us along the way, with no reason at all for living, zombies with no purpose, with glazed eyes and cold hearts.

My plans for '06-'07

Hmmm, let's see, I'm just a kid who loves to read. Plain and simple, I love fantasy, comedy, action, sci-fi, anything that's a good read you'll find in my hands. However, I am taking a creative writing class and I'm hoping that one of these days I'll be able to write something good, and actually finish it. See, that's my problem, I oftentimes just give up on my thoughts, this year I'd like to write a little bit of everything and finish the majority of 'em.

Of course, it would be nice if I had my work published, I've submitted my work to my local school literary magazing called Word but nothing I've written has ever been published, I guess one of my goals is to have one of my pieces of writing actually published in Word.

As a writer I think I like to type more than writing with actual pen and paper, the feel of the click-clack and the easiness of deleting a mistake with just one key instead of labouriously erasing and getting that black smudge on my paper... well, it's just easier for me. Humor is a style of writing I'd like to master, I'd rather make people laugh than cry.

Well, duh. Of course the tree will make a sound, just this morning I was in the girls restroom and I the water hose that was on the trashcan fell to the ground, making slipping, sliding, crinkling, thunking noises as it went down. If I wasn't there it would still have made all those noises, just like a tree, even though nobody's around to here the tree it will make a sound.

Welcome to my blog!

And so it begins, I have taken my first tentative steps, and like a small child I am prone to falling, I stumble, I crawl on hands and knees, but I get back up, and I keep on going. With a smile on my face, determination in my eyes, and an iron will, I refuse to let myself give up. Soldiers never quit. And I am a soldier! I might not look it, but the passion is there, the love to serve this country. I will be the energizer bunny, and I will keep going, and going, and going. Nothing can stop me now, no force of nature, no doubt of my peers, NOTHING! I won't let up, I refuse with all my heart and soul to let myself stop now. I've made it this far, and I know I'm doing something right, because I have my Father by my side.

Lord, show me the way, help me in my endeavors in life, please Lord, you know how bad I want this. More than anything I've ever wanted in the entirity of my sixteen years of living. Dreams can come true, and with your help Lord impossible is nothing.


"'Impossible' is a big word thrown around by small men and women who find it easier to live in the world they've been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary" - Muhammad Ali.