Let's talk about me.

 Who am I?

Well I suppose that depends on who wants to know. To my brother, I'm his twerp kid sister. To my sister, I'm a role model (though not a good one). To my parents, I'm growing up to fast. To my friends, I'm snappy and sarcastic. To my best friends, I'm a listener and confidante. To Nerdfightaria, I'm just another person made of awesome. To my favorite author, I'm an awesome person who bought all of his books (and shares them with everyone I know). To the world, I'm just a nondescript teenage girl that has absolutely no idea what she's doing with the life she's been given.
But the real question is who am I to me? Who do I see when I look into a mirror and study the reflection? I suppose you could say I see what everyone else sees. They see a short, plump girl of barely five feet. They see long brown hair that has a mind of it's own. They see the pimply bumps that coat my face. They see a big smile that isn't always smiling. They see my eyes of two different colors. But what do they see when they look into my eyes?
I suppose you could look at my deep map, which I created specifically for the purpose of answering that question, but we'll get to that later. I 'm not done talking about me! I don't generally have a captive audience, and when I do, I'm to scared to say what I think. But armed with hopefully nonjudgmental readers, and the shield of the internet, I'll just suck it up and keep going.

Somewhere I read that we aren't made up of ourselves so much as we are made up of every book we've read, every movie we've watched, every word we've heard. Basically everything in the world shapes us more than we think. It's true. Each time I read a book, it's like I just found a piece of myself. It's like a tiny missing fragment of my being was just put into place. It's amazing to say the least! Needless to say, whoever said that wasn't wrong. I mean, I think they may have exaggerated a tad bit, but it's pretty true. 

"I believe now that we are greater than the sum of our parts. If you take Alaska's genetic code and you add her life experiences and the relationships she had with people, and then you take the size and shape of her body, you do not get her. There is something else entirely. There is a part of her greater than the sum of her knowable parts. And that part has to go somewhere, because it cannot be destroyed." -John Green, Looking for Alaska

That is just one of the many, many beautiful quotes that John Green has blessed the world with that say more than I'd ever be able to. I think that quote, especially the part in color, describes me, and everyone in the world, better than I'll ever be able to. We have to admit that we are much bigger than the sum of our parts. That the quotes we've heard and the people we've loved do not make up who we are.

My deep map. It's deep because of the water, get it?

In case you can't see it very well, I'll describe my aforementioned deep map for you. Here we've got one of the best scenes in the universe, a fishing pond. It's all very symbolic, because I'm a very deep person and all, but there are literally so many minute details that I could never explain them all to you, so I'll just cover the basics. The water is full of things that I could potentially do with the rest of my life. I am the fishing pole, the line is my choices, the dock is Aurora, the hills are my challenges, and the sun is the positive things I want to absorb in life. The dock is covered with things that mean something to me or represent me in some way. The path represents my friends and family, and how they all try and influence me to go their way, but, as you can see, I chose to step off of their path and go fishing. It's quite poetic, really. How I try so incredibly hard to go against what people want me to do and forge my own path, casting my line into the vast unknown. (I'm absolutely drenched in sarcasm today, but there is a nugget of truth to every word I've typed thus far.)

But speaking of family, I'd better talk about that too! You see, I have this cute little list of things I'm supposed to include in my blog, so I shall. I probably sound pretty angst-y, but I'm not. Not today anyhow. I'm just trying to make sure that this post all about me isn't prim and proper, because that's the last way I'd want to be remembered. Anywho, let us continue.

My beloved star. Incidentally, my beloved pickup is sitting there too!

So I live in this house that's been in my family for years and years (see this previous post to learn all about that) and my grandma once lived here with her parents and siblings. As it turns out, my grandma's dad was a tinkerer, much like my own father, and he liked to build stuff. There's a huge windmill (actually, it's just an average sized windmill, but it's pretty big compared to my house) and it actually used to pump their water and all that ancient stuff. Well when they got a new-fangled water pump, they didn't need the windmill. So instead of tearing it down like everyone else, he built a huge star to go where the blades used to be! Isn't that just nifty? I'm going to pretend you agree, because if you don't, you're wrong. When my dad inherited the house he kept this star. It's a landmark of sorts -to me if no one else, and whenever someone needs directions to my house in the middle of nowhere, I just tell them to look for the star. It's even easier from Thanksgiving to New Year's Eve, because it's lit up with a few hundred light bulbs! Well my grandma obviously doesn't live there anymore, so she wanted a piece of it in town at her house. How does one mange that? Make a mini-star. She has this five foot replica of the star that sits in front of her house from Thanksgiving to New Year's Eve, though hers doesn't light up. It's covered in silver tinsel instead. We even have little ones that are covered in tinsel to put out at the graves of our family members; my grandma's really good about decorating each headstone in our family for every occasion. Which brings me to my next bulleted item on my list. A song from my life soundtrack.

How was that a smooth segue, you ask? Because the specific song I intend to share with you will always be tied to my grandpa's death.

The Impossible by Joe Nicols

Unfortunately, I can't post the essay I wrote about this song. I mean, I could, but it'd make this post twice as long. Lets be honest, it's already too long to read the whole thing. I suppose I'll just summarize it. My grandpa was pretty much everything to me. Whenever I was hurt, it was he I cried out for, not my parents. But he got sick several times and in several ways. In the end, there was nothing I could do but love him and pray to every god in existence to let me have just one more day. But alas, my numbered days ran out. My cousin picked me up the day of the visitation and played this song, and for the first time, I realized how true it was. It was the most painful time of my life, and this song will always bring a tear to my eyes, but the most beautiful feeling is when I can listen to it and smile rather than cry, because my grandpa was an amazing man, loved by many and respected by many more, and I get to live my life knowing I will always carry his undying love with me.

Oh I can't just end it like that. Happy endings are cute and all, but life doesn't have happy endings!

How should I wrap this up then? With this.

Rub some bacon on it, a song by Rhett & Link. That's a good way to fix anything, including a bad ending to a blog.

Note: The pictures of me were taken by Jenny Elge, not I.