Rock of Love.

On a recent drive from the East-side to the West-side of the state, Darcy and I stopped to stretch our legs at Vantage, a popular viewpoint along on the Columbia River in central Washington. "Come onnn" Darcy yelled as she blazed her own trail over small boulders and through patches of yellow weeds trying to get as close to the cliffs edge as possible. She had just gotten a new camera with a special fish-eye lens and couldn't wait to capture the river, the rolling hills in the background, and the late afternoon sun that when combined, made for the perfect shot.

"You go ahead" I whispered back, trying to muster up enough energy for my tired legs to take me even ten feet from the car. It had been a long weekend at home, one of those that just wipes you completely of everything. My voice was gone, my entire body was sore, and my normally large eyes were nothing but tiny slits desperately straining to remain open as I was the co-pilot and the only other passenger in the car. As Darcy ventured off to get her shot, I drug my feet through the dust and kicked a few rocks around, stretching my arms and legs wondering when I would ever feel normal again. I was seriously contemplating what I would have to do to get my hands on an IV of Gatorade when I came across a large rock that caught my eye. There, in white bubble letters were the words "Wade & Heidi 2009".

As I stood there staring at these simple words, ignoring the unbelievably gorgeous view directly in front of me, I was taken back to the summer of 2007 and a part of my life that now seems worlds and worlds away.

It was a hot summer day in the park. We were hand in hand, walking through the rose gardens licking ice cream cones that were quickly melting down our other hands. As we sat on a bench finishing the last of our cool treats, he looked from me to a nearby pine tree. Pulling out the mini pocket-knife that he always carried in case of minor emergencies (which usually always resulted from my clumsiness) he said eagerly, "Should we?"

"Absolutely" was my response and a minute later he was carving our initials inside a perfectly symmetrical heart on the side of the mighty tree. Twenty minutes later, he was still working away, chipping at the bark, and wishing out loud for a larger knife. Almost as if on cue, an old man passed by us. Walking at a slow pace, he looked up and smiled when he realized what was happening. "Do you two perhaps need a little help?" he said as he pulled a bigger and much sharper knife from the depths of his pocket. Wanting to accomplish this feat on his own, my boyfriend at the time kept carving away with his own tool, only to give in five minutes later and accept help from the old man who occupied the bench next to us, taking a front row seat to our little show.

"You know this means forever right?" he said quietly as the heart was nearing its finish a few minutes later. As I whirled around, startled by his bold statement and scared as the implications of this very public yet somewhat intimate display of our young love started to sink in, the wise old man smiled at the two of us, so naive and so clearly inexperienced in the game of love and he repeated "This marking will be here for years to come. It will weather the rain, the sun, the snow, it will stand the test of time. It will be forever."

Two summers later I found myself in a new city, living a much different life when a text came through to my phone. I lost my breath for a second as I opened it only to find a picture of that old pine tree and the perfectly crafted heart with our initials carved on the inside. The caption read "It's still here". And though our breakup had been a difficult one after two years of long distance and the tough final realization that our love would not survive, and though I was dating someone new at the time, I couldn't help but be taken back to that summer afternoon in the park. My thoughts drifted to the old man, to a simpler life, and to forever.

Since that summer, I have come to realize that forever is quite a long time. My nineteen-year-old self would have been quick to say that our love then could survive any storm and last any test of time. Now four years wiser, I still can't grasp the concept fully, but I do know that forever is so much more complicated than I once thought it was.

"Ready to go?" Darcy asked as I snapped back into reality and found her standing next to me. "I guess" I said slowly, dreading the second half of the car ride. As I turned and stared at the rock one last time I wondered what Wade and Heidi were doing at that exact moment. I wondered if their love had survived 2009 and if it continues to grow stronger in 2010. I also found myself questioning whether anyone has spotted our heart in the park and wondered about our love and whether it lasted.

As we continued the drive, I thought about the rock and the couple, and as we crossed the mighty Columbia River I couldn't help but wish for a few things. I wished years of happiness for Wade and Heidi. I wished them a beautiful house full of beautiful children and a beautiful life together. I wished them forever. And as the sun began to set, casting its golden rays across the road before us, I wished for myself. I selfishly wished that the next time I carve my name beside another's on an old pine tree or write it somewhere on a rock, that it really will weather the rain, the sun, the snow, that it will stand the test of time, and most of all, that it will be truly mean forever.

A Market Morning

Rites of Passage.

"You're Insane" my mom gasped as she read over my flight itinerary. "Brutal" Taylor replied when I ran through my weekend plans for the hundredth time. "You are not going to be a real person when you get back to Seattle" Madison empathized Wednesday night as I was packing my bags and triple checking my To-Do and To-Pack lists.

Real person I am not as I find myself five days later, once again at my favorite coffee shop in the city. This time surrounded by water bottles, used tissues, and Emergen-C packets, all testaments to one of the busiest, craziest, and greatest weekends that I have had in a very long time. As I run through the weekends events in my head, the flights, the friends, and the copious amounts of alcohol I consumed, I can't help but think that the sickness that is currently fogging my head and filling my nose is totally one hundred percent worth it. It was all worth it.

It wasn't long after my flight touched down in Austin, Texas on Thursday afternoon that I was cursing Seattle's name for not preparing my abnormally white skin for the Southern summer sun and the 90% humidity that hit me like a brick as I stepped off the plane. It was about five minutes later that I found myself in the airport bar, Corona in one hand, and my dear friend Casey's hand in the other. We talked, laughed, and reminisced as we anxiously awaited more of our friends' arrivals in Austin for a weekend we had all been looking forward to for months. Later that night I looked around the table as 18 of my favorite girls sat down for happy hour and I couldn't help but smile. Though it may have been a year since we were all together, and though our lives have taken us in different directions, to different cities and down different paths, there we were, as if no time had passed at all.

As I stood to make a toast a short while later, emotion overcame me when I realized that this was the first of many of its kind. The first of many college reunions, many wild weekends, and the first one of us to jump head first into love, into life, and into forever. "To Casey" I gushed, holding my glass of wine high. "To her happiness, to her love, and to sending her off right."

Well, "sending her off right" turned out to be an understatement, as we took the term bachelorette party to a whole new level, ravaging our way through Austin's bars, restaurants, and of course, infamous taco stands. At some point between vodka/pickle juice shots and quite the run in with a mechanical bull on the first night, I looked at Casey as she was dancing around the bar (twenty minutes before she retired for the night... at roughly eleven pm) and realized that i've never seen her happier.

"I'm ready" she told me the next morning over a breakfast taco and a coffee. I had just finished telling her how far away from marriage I am, how terrified I am of pregnant women, and how I am still learning how to take care of myself, let alone another person, when she looked at me and said "When you know, you just know and then you just go for it." And while I couldn't be more excited for her, I couldn't have been more thankful that I was not the one wearing the white veil all weekend.

4:30 am came way too soon on Saturday morning as I crept out of the hotel room, leaving behind two of my sleeping roommates and best friends from college. My mind was all over the place as I struggled to keep my eyes open in the airport security line, running on only an hour of sleep. Finding my seat on the plane, I closed my eyes and thanked God that I made my flight. "I can do this" I encouraged myself, right before falling asleep. Four hours later I woke up in Washington.

"You're crazy" Darcy said as she picked me up from the airport in our home town, making fun of my mismatched outfit and terribly dirty hair. I'm not too sure what I said in response, as it most likely wasn't English. But four hours, a long nap, and a thirty minute shower later, I was back in the game, ready to go. Driving through Idaho, (the fourth state I had been in that day) I laughed out loud as I received a few indecipherable texts from the bachelorette party which was still raging on in a boat somewhere on Lake Austin. Though I was sad to leave Texas and unsatisfied with the short amount of time I spent with the girls, those feelings disappeared as I stepped out of the car and into the arms of my best friend from high school.

"Thank you so much for coming" Nicole sighed. And we walked arm and arm toward the cabin, the backyard and the place where her older brother was getting married an hour later. The scenery took my breath away as I signed the guest book, hugging old friends and near-family members. Sitting in the front row next to her family, the family I practically lived with throughout high school, trying to cure my hangover with a cold IPA, and the sun reflecting off the lake, I could not have been happier with my decision to attend the bachelorette party and the wedding. And once again I was overcome with emotion as her brother, my brother walked down the aisle arm and arm with his parents. "Where has the time gone?" I thought to myself as I wiped tears from my face, cursing under my breath for leaving my sunglasses in the car. The ceremony continued on and continued to be absolutely, undeniably, incredible. I found myself making eye contact with my dear friend Nicole midway through the ceremony, and as she mouthed to me "thank you, I love you" once again, I knew I had never been in a more perfect place.

Many tears, many glasses of red wine, a few stuffed mushrooms, and a double chocolate cake shot later, I found myself on the dance floor. As "Brown Eyed Girl" played and one of the groomsmen did the ever-so-popular "shopping cart" move next to me, the rain started to fall. Slowly at first, and then in huge drops, causing the band to unplug and sending many people running for shelter in the cabin. Somewhere in the madness I ended up in the bed of a red truck dancing with the grooms father as the rain pelted me, soaking my pink dress and melting away the last of the make-up that my tears had missed earlier. Fast forward an hour, a dance party in the kitchen, and more red wine (that I really didn't need), and I was in the red truck once again. This time, hand in hand with the owner of the truck who was one of the groom's good friends from college. Nicole was in the back seat with his roommate, and the four of us were toasting. Toasting to the newlyweds, to the fact that we are still all single, and to the country music that was blaring from the speakers of the red truck, keeping everyone in the cabin and in the tents a few yards away awake.

In the morning while I gathered my belongings, my shoes that had gone missing midway through the reception, and embarrassingly tried to explain to everyone in the lake cabin that the neon pink "party" sweat pants I was wearing, were a result of a glitch in my "To-Pack" list, I spotted the newly married couple as they emerged from their master suite hand-in-hand. "They were ready." I thought to myself. "They just knew". And on the drive back across the state to the west side and to my bed (which had never sounded better), I thought a lot about the weekends events. I thought about the future bachelorette parties, the weddings, the children, and I thought about the passing of time. As I sat in silence, trying to imagine my own bachelorette party, my wedding, my kids (eek!), I realized that i've got time. Time to be young, time to do insane things like fly across the country and back in 36 hours, time to find myself in a big red truck in the pouring rain, cuddling with a perfect stranger, and time to run myself into the ground, not caring about consequences or the repercussions on my tired body. I've got So much time.

And though I may not be a real person right now, tomorrow is a new day, and with it comes more time, the hope of a clearer head and less runny nose, and the notion that it is all, always worth it.

Skeletons in Our Closets.

Recently I found myself driving East. For me, the hustle and bustle of the big city is sometimes just too much and a break from the noise is exactly what I need to regain my sanity. East is my home and spending a weekend surrounded by family and old friends, in the comfort of the house I grew up in, is often what it takes to ground me, to remind me of who I once was, who I am now, and how far I've come.

Of course, any time spent in the place I lived for eighteen years of my life is subject to walks down memory lane, both good and bad. And as I made my way closer to home, driving past the wheat fields and rolling hills of central Washington, I thought to myself "I really hope I don't run into anyone I don't want to see this weekend."

Fast forward three days, a regrettable late night texting conversation with one ex and an unavoidable run in with another, I was eating my own words on the drive back to the West side. When you're from a smaller town, situations like this are inevitable, unavoidable, and just down right frustrating. But even with that notion in mind, nothing could really have prepared me for the night I spotted an old flame from high school, who clearly is aging much better than I am. As I desperately looked around for a hiding place, realizing my best option was to seek refuge in an "intense" texting conversation (with myself) on my phone, he approached me with a smile on his face and a sparkle in his eye. The moment he hugged me, opened his mouth and said "Always good to see you" I remembered why I had fallen for this All-American boy five years ago, and the moment my heart began to melt for him all over again he said, "I want you to meet my girlfriend..."

Sometime during the five minute conversation I had with the happy couple, I checked out. She was smiling and talking about how they met and I was thinking back to the time when I was the girl riding shotgun in his old truck. And the memories of him and I as teenagers out on some old country road, watching the stars on a mattress in the bed of his truck became fresh in my mind once again while driving back to the city. "Thank sweet baby Jesus I don't have to deal with awkward run ins in Seattle" I thought. And once again, I spoke too soon.

Last Friday night we found ourselves sitting at a table in a popular bar, attempting to accomplish our summer goal of "mingling" more in the city. After a few rounds of vodka tonics and one too many jokes about our bartender who eerily resembled Russell Brand, Madison spotted an ex of her own, looking exceptionally good (because they always do when you can't have them) from across the bar. Though she ultimately broke his heart, and most likely his confidence after recently making out with his best friend, Madison made her way back to our table after a twenty minute conversation to inform us that he has a new girlfriend. And regardless of the fact that sometimes he dresses like a 45 year old soccer dad and the fact that she is the one who ended things, I understood where she was coming from when she sat down and said "I need a shot."

As I stood to order Madison a stiff one, I looked to my right only to see a reflection in the window that made me want twelve shots of my own. Waltzing through the door, with an entourage of his "boys" was my first and only "date" in the city thus far. Our eyes met and he waved in the most awkward of ways, as I tried to bury my face and attention in my phone once again, trying to hide the fact that I looked like I had just seen the ghost of Christmas past. To this day, I really can't pinpoint what makes things most awkward between us. Maybe he is still annoyed with me because I was thirty-five minutes late to our date on account of getting totally lost downtown, or maybe it is the fact that the week after we had dinner, I found out he had been dating someone else for four months. Whatever it is, it is there. And the awkwardness is great enough to cut with a knife or better yet, cause me to down a bottle of Absolut Vodka. Or three.

"Well this night cannot get any more uncomfortable" I whispered to the girls as they shook their heads in agreement. Thirty minutes later it was Darcy who was hiding her face as her ex-boyfriend entered the bar hand in hand with his on-again off-again girlfriend. "Looks like they're back together" Darcy mumbled, as she finished her drink and flagged down Russell Brand for another.

Although I am fully aware that this seems like the plot of a twisted romance horror film rather than our actual lives, this was our reality on Friday night and a harsh one at that. After debating whether or not we should try our luck elsewhere and leave the cesspool of old heartbreaks and relationships gone wrong behind us, we decided to accept the circumstances and rage on. It really is amazing what can happen when four girls turn the back room of a packed bar into a place with an atmosphere comparable to that of a college spring break. It wasn't Costa Rica 2009, but taking body shots off a Lebanese man named Felix sure felt right. Anything to avoid interaction with the situations at hand.

The next morning as we recalled the previous nights events and tried to figure out what in God's name we did to deserve such awful karma, I realized that though we are still semi-new to this city, and the dating scene here, we sure as hell have already made our mark. And though this city is big, much bigger than the place where I grew up, this world is small. And I will definitely take that into consideration next time I think I can avoid an awkward run in, no matter what city I'm in.

Happily Unsatisfied.

Today as I placed an order at my favorite coffee shop hidden deep within the city, my barista was talking to a co-worker about his band and how they were beginning to go their separate ways. "We just don't see eye to eye creatively anymore" he said. "where they want to go and where I want to go are two very different places, and even though they're my best friends, I have to follow my heart. I just have to."

His co-worker nodded and gave him words of sympathy, understanding, and encouragement while I stood at the coffee bar staring at the different varieties of artificial sugar, trying to pretend like the choice between Splenda and Equal was a tough one and trying even harder to pretend that I wasn't eavesdropping on the conversation. And as I began to feel sorry for the poor barista who seemed visibly upset by the break up, my mind wandered to something a dear friend said to me last week.

"Don't ever be satisfied" he said. "That way life will always get better".

At the time, his words took my breath. And as powerful as they were then, I didn't realize how much I would think about his statement and how many different ways I would apply this concept to my life, to other's lives in the days after and even now. For the past week the words have been marinating in my mind, simmering to the perfect temperature, and though I think it will take an eternity or at least a life well lived before I can totally grasp their meaning, I believe that I can finally apply this idea to my present day life.

Satisfaction is a funny thing, in that it is defined as the fulfillment of one's needs or wants. After staring at this definition in Webster's online dictionary for a good thirty minutes, it clicked. Life will always get better if I never allow myself to be fully satisfied. If I never allow myself to want and need things that are easily attainable and if I keep striving for new and great things. And though this is a hard thing to do, it is possible because of the sole fact that my needs and wants are always changing.

In elementary school, I thought I would be satisfied with the latest Barbie doll, that is until a newer, way hotter and inevitably skinnier one came out a month later. In middle school, I thought satisfaction would come when I got contacts to replace my glasses, which were unfortunately immediately followed by a full set of braces and headgear, shattering my self-esteem and my chances of finally taking a decently normal year book picture. In high school, I thought I could achieve satisfaction if I dated, or more importantly was "seen" with an older, more-experienced, and popular athlete, until he left me high and dry for a girl his own age, who could legally drive, amongst other things. Satisfaction in college consisted of having good friends, good beers, and a dirty house on the beach. Plain and simple. And though my needs were fulfilled in college, looking back, my wants for myself were far from attained, if even recognized.

I guess that is the beauty of coming across this new way of looking at life in this moment. As I think back through the years and the many different things it took to make me happy during each phase of my life, I can see that as I changed, so did my wants and needs. Now, as I am much older and hopefully wiser, this idea of not achieving satisfaction makes so much more sense. As I look forward on my life, I have no idea where I will end up, who I will end up with and what will end up ultimately making me happy. And though I am okay with the unknown, I am certain of the fact that from here on out, I will still strive for satisfaction and fulfillment, yet I will always keep them out of my reach, setting new goals for myself, new adventures, and creating new ways of thinking. That way things will only continue to get better. Life will always get better.

And when he said with sadness in his voice, "tall, non-fat, extra hot latte" and I could finally make Splenda my artificial sugar of choice, I turned and smiled at the barista. Because though he may be leaving his friends and his band, and though he might be scared of the future and the unknown, at least he is taking the risk, striving for more and not allowing himself to be satisfied with something that isn't right anymore. While pondering this thought and walking to a table in the corner, something in my cup caught my eye. As I turned around and stared at the barista not knowing whether to cry or laugh, he said with a smile "Have a good day". And for me, his smile was enough. Enough to ignore the fact that he had so skillfully created a perfectly, terrifying skull in the foam of my extra- hot latte. "Life is always getting better" I thought to myself as I headed to my nook in the corner, laughing all the way.

Rookies of the Year.

I've decided that graduating college without a serious boyfriend is quite the double-sided sword. On one hand, after graduation, I had the ability to roam free around the world for six months with no one to hold me back and no one to check in with each night (besides my mother who bought a blackberry for the sole purpose of bbm-ing me at all times with no regard for the nine hour time difference and the fact that her afternoons were my middle of the nights). Having no outside influence on where I was going in life the day I left San Diego, enabled me to move to Germany, travel Europe, and finally move to Seattle, flirting my way across the globe, talking, dancing and laughing with anyone I pleased, no matter the age difference or language barrier. This freedom allowed me to capture the attention of Simon the Italian high fashion model, Daniel the aspiring British soccer player, and Paul my German house brother. And though the latter one I could have probably done without, I was unattached, independent, and totally loving every second of my life as a single American woman abroad.

The other side of the sword however, and the one that recently has been stabbing me repeatedly in the eyeballs, is the fact that now settled in Seattle, I have absolutely no idea where and how I am supposed to find young, eligible, single, men here in America. Without the frat parties and the super late nights pretending to do homework in the library during college, where does a girl like me have to go to make eyes with someone? This question alone makes me miss my days across the ocean. There was just something effortless about my time in Europe. Maybe it was the way my heels sounded while walking the cobble stone streets under the moonlight, or maybe there truly was something in that wine that I drank far too often. Whatever it was, it was good, it was romantic, and it was simple. If only that European effortlessness could translate to Cascadian English, the official dialect here in the Pacific Northwest. My life would be so much easier.

I recently read an article in a local magazine boasting that Seattle is ranked as one of the top five US cities to meet singles. "Looks like I'm in the right place" I thought instantly. Then I read on.

The magazine continued that on average, a thirty year old in Seattle must meet at least five hundred people in the city before they find one person that they are compatible with. FIVE HUNDRED??? Well I'm no thirty year old, and I'm definitely not a mathematician, but I am quick enough to figure out that based on that fact alone, one would have to literally never stay home and always be out on the town. Bars, coffee shops, restaurants, parks, I mean honestly, it just sounds completely exhausting.

Thus, my next point, and the clincher in all of this. In a place that claims to have over 300,000 singles within twenty miles of the city limits, there really can't be that many places for the few good men out there to hide. Unless of course, they never leave the comfort of their own homes, which I am not exactly ruling out. This summer Darcy, Madison, and myself have embarked on a mission to seek out the places that these singles frequent in attempt to increase our own odds of finding compatibility in this city by hitting the streets of Seattle and getting the hell out of our apartment.

So far, this mission has really taken us to new heights. Bleacher seats to be exact. And after attending a few games, we now have the Seattle Mariner's scene down to a science. Club Safeco, as we like to call it can be broken down as such: Cover for bleacher seats = ten dollars, One 12 oz domestic beer = eight dollars, one hot dog with ketchup = nine dollars (and the additional deep regret in the morning), watching attractive males in the beer garden heckle our home team which has one of the worst records in the American League = priceless. And though we have yet to actually get a date out of the guys we have met in the beer garden, or even a drink for that matter, at least we're putting ourselves out there. And just as the mariners are beginning to pick up their game, so are we.

From Mariner's games to intentions of joining a co-Ed intramural flag football team, our wheels are turning. They have to be, as I would really like to dull the side of the sword that keeps jabbing me, constantly reminding me that though I may be free, I am single and I only have seven more years before my odds really go down the drain here in this city. This summer we will be venturing off our red couch and making ourselves available, more accessible. Maybe we'll meet new friends, new people to flirt with, or maybe we'll just have fun together. Whatever the case, I'm determined to find Seattle's romantic cobble stone streets and a good glass of wine to match.

Last night at an hour far too late for us to be awake, or at least far too late for us to be awake at home, Darcy stated something so true, so cheesy, and so the anthem of our summer. She said in total seriousness paired with maybe a bit of deliriousness, "The more mingling, the more jingling" and after quite a bit of contemplation and laughter, I have decided that this is right on. However, hopefully for me, that jingling on my phone will come from a tall, dark, American man, rather than my mom. On the late night. Sending me endless emoticons.