Things I Miss

1) Three days ago. 2) Being around a bunch of people i feel 100% comfortable around

3) Jager shots

4) The beach. 5) Caleb

6) Rico

I wish i could turn back time.

Summer as of now.

Andrew is in Dallas today. Why does the city of Dallas feel the need to haunt me? First Caleb, now Andrew. Maybe everyone could just stop touring and come move to Richmond with me? Or maybe I could just stop falling for guys in bands the tour for a majority of the year.
These past two weeks have been amazing. I've had experiences of a lifetime and have met a few people I will never forget, specific shout ours to Caleb Turman and Ricardo Garcia. Whether you're in Richmond or Virginia Beach I will always be here for jager shots and running around the beach half naked making memories I will never forget. Huge shout out to Lindsey for hooking me up with crucial partying with some of my favorite bands from when I was in high school. If you fall in love with a fearless band I will hook you up in heartbeat.

I move to Richmond in 8 days and I couldn't be more excited to get out of Virginia Beach. This has been the worst/best summer I've had for so many different reasons. I can't wait for this semester to kick off and really see what Fearless has to offer me. Not to mention living with Allison & Liz will be amazing.

Sorry I've sucked at updating, but I highly doubt too many of you give to much of a shit to read this anyway. I'll leave you with a picture and an "I miss you" because I really do. You said some of the sweetest things anyone has ever said to me and I can't wait to go to Dallas to visit you and I can't wait for you to come back and visit me.

Miss you lots, and I hope that you too "stay amazing". See you soon.

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she's beautiful.

Emily and I ventured north to Richmond to try and find somewhere to live. We found an amazing apartment and I can't wait to get up there and restart my life. There's only one problem that I can't bring myself to fully admit to. I'm just really good at hiding things; and I'd much rather listen to other people's problems, I want to try to fix how they're hurting. In reality, I'm the one the that's hurting and needs fixing.

I'm a complete hypocrite with the advice I give. I wish I would listen to myself the way others listen to me. I've got no clever antidotes for my issues. The best that I can do is leave it alone. You've had an apology in your mailbox since the day I gave in. I think it's strange that when you find the words to say there is absolutely no reply.

I've got those rolled back eyes while you tell me I'm like your backpack caught on a chain link fence. The howls and moans pour from the black and I feel like I'm staring into a sea full of your blank faces looking directly back at me. You're aggressively mediocre in every single way I can possibly imagine. If this isn't what you pictured then you're probably right, I'm clamouring for attention and continue voicing my useless opinions, one day maybe someone will listen.

It's hard when you realize the only thing you have ever loved or has ever loved you is passing you by. I've got to get away and move on. It's time for the final goodbye.

ECU & Sweet Escapes.

Driving home from ECU I was a head full of noise. Forced to process some everyday business disaster in the midst of what I'd intended to be a peaceful slipping away; A quiet departure from the brutal, beautiful capital of my endlessly expanding homeland. I felt myself disengage. With my thumb to the red button, my pre-drive beverage in hand, and the routine safety belt check nearly completed, my ipod emerged. Discretion is key in moments like this. You know what you need; you need songs. You know how quickly those songs can be taken from you if you aren't realistic about the potential dangers of rigid skipping tracks while driving. You also know how good it feels when a taxiing car transforms into a metal miracle as you, eyes closed, sit, scoring the soundtrack of your great escape. It's these moments that inspired everyday people to create moving pictures and sprawling canvases and symphonies. It's these moments where you, being entirely present for however brief a time, IS in fact, art. With the right Lens, Melody, Paint Brush, Math equation it could be defined and reproduced for all of humanity to understand. How perfect that my cautiously adorned headphones lead me not to hassle, but instead to "Us and Them". A track, that to me, largely defines the overriding theme of Pink Floyd's, Dark Side of the Moon album. Somehow, it manages to speak equally to the malaise of a morning interrupted as it does to the general state of the human condition. (At least some human's condition, I'm guessing). This is the stuff of real art and real music. Dissection. Exploration. Pop music with teeth, an experiment in human behavior and sound. What a fulfilling listen. Drifting off into the daytime, so far from my self-appointed capital, just a slingshot to the future.

Twitter & "Tweeting."

I'm using this update to rant about twitter because one day someone will be envious when they look back and see that I was proud to say that anyone who uses twitter is a fucking idiot.

I'm going to start "tweeting" myself because obviously I'm a god damn celebrity and it's the current train to throw myself on to. That was complete sarcasm incase anyone didn't catch the cynicism in the previous statement.

If someone honestly is craving the details of your life minute by minute you shouldn't be flattered. You should be filing a police report because I'm almost positive that someone following your every movement, minute by minute, is considered a stalker.

Essentially, I'm passionately begging all of you "tweeters" to pull your heads out of your asses and get over yourself. The universe doesn't care that you just took your contacts out or that you just ate a cheeseburger.

Well, I feel better.

Homesick.

Pride and joy and greed and sex, that's what makes our town the best. Pride and joy and dirty dreams and still surviving on the street; and look at me, I'm in tatters. I've been battered, what does it matter? To live in this town you must be tough! You got rats on the west side and bed bugs uptown. What a mess. This town's in tatters, I've been shattered. My brain's been battered, splattered all over Manhattan. 

Richmond, VA

As of today, May 20th, 2009, Virginia Commonwealth University has accepted me into their school of business. This is and probably will be one of the best days of my life.

I love Richmond because the people there are real, and people of this kind are something I can't find in Virginia Beach.

 At the news of my acceptance, the missing piece of my puzzle lit the roses on fire. As far as I know, there are no real mistakes. I think he secretly wishes he were in wonderland, just as I do... and lately I truly believe I am. Maybe real life and fantasy have found synergy in my so called life... or maybe I'm just better off than I previously realized.

Drawing.

A drawing I did based around Alice and Wonderland. I probably never will escape wonderland, and I'm not the last bit perturbed by the thought of it.

Scorpio

My ability to reflect my astrological sign to a tee is actually beginning to fuck with my head. Everything that the sign of the scorpio embodies seems to be myself in a nutshell. 

Scorpios do know what they want, and they won't go out and grab it at the wrong moment. They simply sit back, watch, and then get it only when the moment is just right. This apparent patience is simply their powerful skills at strategy at work. Scorpios are known for their intensity. They are determined folk that absolutely throw themselves into whatever they do but getting them to commit to something is rarely an easy task. In fact, it's better not to even try to "get them" to do anything.

The darker side of life intrigues them, and they're always ready to investigate. Scorpios simply never give up. They have tremendous staying power. They're not in the slightest intimidated by anybody or anything. Confrontations are not a problem. In fact, talk to any Scorpio about their lives, and you'll probably be in awe at all they've gone through. Trauma seems to follow them wherever they go. When Scorpio learns optimism, instead of expecting the worst, they'll find that they possess amazing regenerative powers -- the power to heal, create, and transform.

I need to get out of my house, I need to start being happy, and I need to learn optimism.

Cause these nights

i think maybe that i miss you in my living room

but we have much room, does anybody need that room?

because we all need a little more room to live.

When you're out there and you're single, and you're just kind of a satellite doing your thing and running around, not necessarily romantically speaking, but just in general, and not being accountable to another human being, you can kind of go on tangents that you may not be allowed to go on so much when you're shacked up or something to that effect. That said, I have a pretty decent ex-boyfriend who's pretty accepting of the fact that I'm sort of partially out of my mind. Part of what I've learned in the past couple years, and from the past year especially is to try and maintain that edge, to keep moving forward and not get too comfortable in any one spot. But you know everything in life, all the good things and the bad things, come with their own set of challenges. I think a lot of people wouldn't say it, but I think that's what a lot of us worry about. I think it's sort of the weaker person who feels the need to completely destroy their relationships and their lives on a regular basis to be inspired. And I'm trying desperately not to be that person, because I was that person, and no one likes that person.

You don't have to see me this way

because this way I'm okay.

oh love, when does this twisting end?

all I want to do is look at you and know I'm okay.

I'm walking backwards and looking down.

As is to my typical norm, I'm currently to high to try to call it a day.

It's chronic tunnel vision I'm suffering from,

and the only thing at the end of the tunnel is you.

I've got you to propel me, but I still need so much.

I still do love you, I always will love you, but I can't deal anymore.

Falling back down the rabbit hole. Fuck my life.

This is the only lonely picture

Waiting on my floor, littering my shore. This is the last true burning letter given to a girl,

written by a boy living in a world created to destroy.

Quadfest was amazing. I feel summer tingling from the tips of fingers to the tips of my toes.

I have escaped wonderland, but I am positive I will eventually return. Maybe summer will

become a new strange version of wonderland. This seems like a hard concept to grasp because

wonderland is always strange. It's a place to escape, so why do I feel the need to fall down

a rabbit hole one day, but crave real sunlight within twenty-four hours?

I have so much to learn about myself. Optimism is the only way to persevere and I have proven

to myself that my persistence will pay off in the long run.

Celebrate

Happy holidays everyone!

A Grin Without A Cat

"..it's the most curious  thing I have seen in all my life."

It's common rationality, so please just ask me for my answer. I will always measure my phrases, and I will do so while tipping the scales of reality. I learned my lesson, it is cold to sing songs to a troubled heart.

Today, someone stopped me mid-conversation and said "Ashley, stop and look around you." I would normally pay no attention, but lately I have exceptionally curious. People are falling to pieces. They expect me to believe that it doesn't mean they're despondent. Truth is stranger than fiction, but in my portrait of a landscape their heartache is completely out of place.

It's like the Walrus said, "the time has come, to talk of many things." So why now can we talk about shoes and ships- and sealing wax, and cabbages and kings? I will forever be awed and inspired by the mystery of things, but it is learning how to live a life with out being distracted by these prominent mysteries that I can not do.

For now, I'm painting my life in yellows and greens, and my dreams are filled with conversations taking place between myself and the Walrus. Conversations asking why the sea is boiling hot, and questioning whether pigs have wings. The yellows and greens are masking the greys quite remarkably, there is no grey in wonderland.

I'm overwhelmed with thoughts of fantasy, and the last thing I crave is reality. It's probably just my heart hallucinating. It's been known to take a monster and turn it into something so alluring, so divine.

Why be exposed to the bitter taste of reality, when fantasy is placed before you, sweet as sugar?

I would prefer to stay in my wonderland. If you need me; fall down the hole and listen to the curious grin without a cat. You will find me drinking tea with the Mad Hatter, longing to talk to that damn Walrus.

And I Thought To Myself

"How can so much good

Exist in such a tiny heart

Despite of all the pain she's in

She never falls apart

And if she doesn't last the length of seven songs

She dries her tears on her best friend's sleeves and dances right along"

I'd like to know where some people think they get all their power to control other people's lives. I suppose it was my fault for making the mistake of not helping a friend before this had a chance to start; maybe I should have seen where it was going to end up. I won't let other people be dragged into something that they don't deserve to be dragged into. I've never been a fighter, but now I feel like I'm going to have to stand my ground on something I believe in. Discontent, leave me now.

You were probably right about me when you called me Rogue. 

She was the one that sucked the life and power out of everything and everyone she touched. I guess that said a lot, and the funny thing is; I'm drawn to that idea. I'm probably the closest thing to a walking disaster as they come. 

Things that could have been prevented if they happened two seconds too late, feelings that could have been avoided, I guess it's all fate. 

On another note:

I don't have long blonde hair, but I'd live in my underwear for you. You can't spell confusion with an A, but you can spell anomoly. I'll still be your Konstantine. Promise me I won't crash.

If we don't have much room to live, how come I can't reach you?

I Get High Just From Breathing

For all of those of you who devise a complicated picture of the glitter of 5th Avenue commingling with the slums of the Bronx, here for you is a picture of my old home in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn. And that is the the car of the current maladroit owners who can't seem to discover just where their stars fit into a constellation in the galaxy of New York.

But really, what is life more than a giant constellation? We spend our entire lives trying to pinpoint the exact location where not only will our stars fit, but where they will shine the brightest. How does anyone know where their luminosity is blazing to the extent that someone recognizes it? It isn't possible until the star has lent themselves to all spots that it could possibly belong to.

I love being home and seeing familiar faces that I had been seeing in my sleep. My deepest desire was to go home, but was afraid of what could be lost. I indulged, and what i was previously afraid of losing what could be lost, and it was lost. It was lost, but I'm doing just fine.

Don't let it go to your head.

I keep smelling summer.
Little wisps of warm breeze that sweep in the window making me restless and longing. 

Please, come soon. Take my worries away, take me back to days spent on the sand until the sun starts to go down, nights stumbling across the yard barefoot and falling asleep on trampolines. I need it so badly.

On another note, I realized another thing; I find it much easier to grasp at the concept of emotion if you look at it like this: it's the wax you peel off the tips of your fingers after you stick them into the hot wax of a candle. Then it flakes off everywhere into little unbearable pieces. That's how I feel about emotion, I have jars and jars of little uncontrollable pieces of colored wax, and all I need to do is figure out how to melt them back. I am finding this not only true with the opposite sex, but along with family and loved ones.

Under the rough surface worn by all the earth around it in the mines, there's something really worth a second glance, and I have concluded that everything deserves a second look, or in this case another opportunity.

Drunk Like Bible Times

This weekend the "group" of kids I previously partied with in high school got reunited once again, so I indulged it; let it drag on in a sort of hazy last stand, to find myself here on a Monday apropos, the just-barely-cold of Virginia Beach stirring my penchant for all things new. It is from this place where I wonder if everything I have been doing has already been done. How often does anyone really stand up and ask the hard questions? “Is this where I should be? Am I inspired? Do I do what I do because I need to, want to and love to, or because I don’t know what else to do? And where would I begin even if I should?” These are the questions lining the tiny squares of my new calendar and already I’m five days behind.

The promise of any year can hang on wind or clang like church bells depending entirely upon whose listening and how hard. And isn’t that really the point? Are we listening? Is it possible that all the right roads are paved with an earnest set of ears? Maybe so. I have been lucky in this life, that I have found myself inside moments of blistering peace. These times can be riddled with unanswered questions, but rarely are they questions of trajectory. It is inside these moments where purpose and action collide and that which is not easy at least seems meaningful. Today though, like hope I am hanging on a breeze searching for a church bell. This is not a fact I lament, but simply a fact.

This is a place I know well, but one that changes with each new day. On long nights here I go digging through the sands for the bones and tools of a culture I have lost. A culture that is never far in days but is light years gone when searched out with the fingertips. What a strange truth for a person who works with their hands. Still, if peace does not howl on this, at least it whispers. It may be a distant sound but for now it I will rest my tired fingers.

You only burn my bridges.

I'm currently accepting applications for my future boyfriend.

Qualifications: If the applicant does not fall under any of the following categories, the applicant need not apply.

1. You are Andrew McMahon.

2. You are a vampire/have been attacked by Lord Voldemort.

3. You are in a band or can play some musical instrument (preferably the piano.)

4. You have large quantities of tattoos and/or piercings of the lip, septum, and/or eyebrow.

My expectations are completely realistic. SINGLE FOR LIFE.

Ashley in Wonderland

i give myself very good advice, but i very seldom follow it

that explains the trouble that i'm always in

"be patient" is very good advice, but the waiting makes me curious.

and i'd love the change should something strange begin

will i ever learn to do the things i should?

When you're deepest desire is to get as far away as possible, it is imperative to consider what could be lost.

Happy

Emily's coming back to the beach for the weekend. Matt's coming home from ECU. I'm stoked. I hope everyone enjoys their weekends.

While you run around like JFK

It is pointless to sit around waiting for someone who is nothing beyond a tragedy in the making.

Still, part of me wants to believe that some things are unwavering, especially as it relates to the demise of fear. Like all good things, as well as bad things, though I suppose there is only fluctuation. Sometimes grand and identifiable, other times ebbing without perception to even the most informed observer. That which is bitter may one day be sweet and that which is sweet may too one day forever change. It is the willingness to acknowledge that change and how it is handled, I suppose, that defines the authenticity of any one life.

I am going to try to update this more. It's always stimulating to see what I was doing this time one year ago, to see how much has changed and to see how much I have grown.

I'm amazed, then I let go.

Little minds let little games burn big old dreams with little flames

and you don't think I understand

Little holes in parachutes won't leave you falling

If they do, it's because you want to land.