OK I have not written in a very long time...Well a long time for me anyhow. Maybe it is because I have so much to say I am afraid it will all come exploding out of me and I will not know how to control it. It has been one of THOSE weeks. In Kabbalah, and no not the Madonna cultish trendy type stuff, but the real stuff that the mystics teach, it is said the universe was built with 10 dimensions called the Tree of Life. The world as we know it is four of them condensed into our reality, and the rest is an alternate reality, or soul, heaven, spirit etc. etc. How did these condense? Funny how four thousand years ago these Kabbalists came up with a theory similar to the big bang, something like we rejected the light of God in a multiple dimension place where there was pure light (absence of darkness) and a "big bang" occurred and there we have our universe. Why did we reject this?? Because having "light" all the time was like wining a game knowing you will always win, or having all the money in the world that you did not earn. You need an opponent to play the game and we needed darkness. This sounds hokey, inject science and it sounds rather real. In science this is called the superstring theory. Where the remaining six dimensions cracked down to something smaller than an atom.

More science, this is going somewhere I think. A supernova. A star that creates nuclear fusion which causes an unstable core which then collapses upon itself causing an explosion so great it causes a supernova. Or something like that. The Supernova is one of the most beautiful things the universe has to offer, and it has to die upon itself before it gets there.

The Universe has always been this way, sheer beauty, a happy accident. One slight change of psychics and none of this would have happened. The wrong formula and all this cosmic beauty would not be here. But, in that beauty, lies the magic seed that everyone fails to realize made it all possible. Darkness. Whether we put it into spiritual metaphor and say light had to accept darkness for the big bang to happen or go the common sense science route and say that for a star to become a supernova it has to essentially almost die first the fact remains that for the universe to live it has to accept it's dark side.

So what does this mean for us?
We have to accept our dark sides too. Everyone has darkness, and in order to really live and be beautiful, be confident, be comfortable in one's own skin, we have to accept it.

This past week has been about darkness, for me, my family, and my friends. Most of it has been about accepting the darkness we already have inside us.

It all started with a lost makeup bag. The snowball grew from there.
Last week, at the festival, I left my makeup bag in the hotel room, only I did not know this until the following Thursday. Being finals week, I did not pay much attention to grooming for I did not go out at all since the festival and I never wear any makeup to school. Thursday morning, before my last final, I went to grab an eye liner I was going to return that day out of the makeup bag and that is when I noticed it was gone. This was the moment it all went downhill, plunging into darkness. It may not seem like a big deal now, but the chain reaction caused an explosion. An hour later, plagued by the thought that my irresponsibility once again cost me hundreds of dollars, in actuality cost me an A in a class. I missed three questions I knew the answers to and as a result received an 89% in the class. It was only 10:00 AM.
I got home and things were looking up as I got my acceptance letter for London and proceeded to call my grandfather for tell him. What followed was the fight of all fights which ended in me telling my grandfather he acts like a robot and has no emotions. At three, I had training and because I gained a half a pound I was pissy with my trainer for the hour and snapped at him when I left. By five all I wanted to do was sleep. I felt evil and guilty and just wanted to hide.

Friday - Was I supposed to have fun or be sad? It was the anniversary of mat's death yet I was seeing Prince that night. Prince, one of the best live artists of all time and yet Matt made me think a little bit. I was worried about a fucking makeup bag. I was calling my Grandpa a robot. I was loosing interest in love but the lack of desire made me happier. I am not talking about romantic love, rather the desire for the possession of anything or anyone to love at all. It has been two years now. Prince was amazing.

See, I do have a dark side, it lives in me and it is what makes us human. The universe would not exist without this dark side for without it there would not be any competition to grow. It would be like winning the game all the time and knowing it. Thursday is selfishness. Friday is possession. Saturday I saw some dark in others.

I went to the Primus concert with all the boys. It was me, Shaun, my brother and some other friends. There are times when my brother and I were younger when he would act mean to me in front of his friends to try to be "cool", I just never knew he would do it at the age of 25. He acted like such an asshole to me. At the time I did not know what to think of it. I could not be mad because it was so out of the ordinary it did not make any sense. Sometimes when people do things you know that something is just wrong. I knew right then something was wrong with my brother. I just saw it, felt it, read it.

It can be my greatest gift or my greatest curse that I can read people like I can read books, but right then I saw my brothers dark side with perfect clarity. My brother never had shown weakness in his life. While, I had been the free spirit child, he had been the stable one to rely on. I knew though, he always felt insecure about his lack of social skills with people, especially since I had such good social skills, as a result he overcompensated with other skills.

See when people are insecure about people they most often act in the opposite manner. It is a common paradox of relationships. Sit still and friends come to you. Chase an they go away. If one is insecure, they usually act mean to push one away before they can be pushed away. Sometimes people even judge before they can be judged. I am not just talking about my brother, but so many relationships, platonic or otherwise. What darkness did I see on Saturday in others? Judgment. Insecurity. Jealousy.

So by now I was thinking that somewhere it had to get better. Somewhere down the line it had to turn into the "supernova" and I was going to look back at the chaos like they do in the movies and know why I am the way I am and why things happen the way they happen. Well I would, but it would not be the result I would expect and more chaos would blindside me before that would happen.

Sunday - a relatively calm day except I fell in love with Mr. Marriott because he found my makeup bag. I also found out that in no way could I ever learn to parallel park as I almost popped two tires trying to do so.

Monday - Monday I went to the beach with Brandon. We went to the "alternative" beach in Laguna and basically just spent the day laying out. Not much happened during the day except I learned a simple yet valuable lesson...Ask and ye shall receive, long story.

After the beach we met up with my parents, Ethan and Amy at CPK for dinner and things became a little clearer as to why Ethan had been acting the way he had been acting. It was as though a black cloud had parked itself above my brother's head and was intending a long term residence. I recognized the signs right away. I had been down that road before. Somehow, my brother has fallen into the dark black hole of depression.

Call it the social skill trigger. Call it the fright over grad school. Call it whatever. The truth is, one thing can snow ball into a million things and once the depression starts, a word can make it worse. He barely said a word at dinner and in the parking lot Amy took me aside and gave me a look of knowing and of understanding. She had empathy pain in her eyes and asked me if I had any suggestions.

What is there to do? I am the flighty one. My brother is the solid rock. He is the one I turn to and now he is freaking out and turning to me for help and I am afraid to admit that I am afraid I will make things worse if I don't help. Fear is the darkest emotion.

The star starts to collapse because the particles on top are heavier than the core, or something like that. I could feel the weight on my shoulders. I have never seen my brother so sad and the words keep running through my head, "What if there is nothing I can do to help"?

Tuesday - I get a call from Lauren and her friend Paul got hit and run by a car last night. He was thrown 120 feet and they are not sure he is going to wake up. There is massive brain damage and body damage and if he does wake up his mental capacity will be pretty much nil. Shock waves pulse threw my body. I listen while Lauren cries and I have her read me the press release so I can have all the information. This is Paul. Paul is 24 years of age. Tuesday morning I was worried about my job and how much I did not like it. My mind was racing and now I was just numb. I was numb to pain and numb to the feeling of wanting.

Madonna was on Thursday and The Shins was on Friday. Madonna put on a near perfect show. The Shins were awesome and it was good to see my brother smiling. It was a break in the sadness for him, a glimmer of light. That is what music does, makes things fun.

Saturday I hung with the girls and Sunday I went to Franz Ferdinand, yup the fifth concert in a week. It was almost overwhelming. Ethan was depressed again but Franz got him to crack a smile or two. I danced the whole concert amidst my friends and family and the week came to a close.

I went to bed that night exhausted but I could not sleep. I talked of a supernova but it had not happened yet. The big bang that comes after the darkness and despair that makes everything beautiful was nowhere to be seen. Ethan was still depressed, I still saw fighting, and faults were out in the open with everyone I knew, including me.
That was when it all hit me that we HAVE to have our dark sides. We can't exist without them just as the universe could not have been made without light and dark.
If I do not have my moments of selfishness I would not feel the triumph of learning how to be selfless. A pure saint could never know happiness, it would be knowing they were winning the game every time they were playing it.

Little glimmers of light proved to me this week that a big bang is on the horizon. My mother dancing at Madonna. A small smile spreading across my brother's face while he is crawling through the darkest tunnel. Me, having a date night with my mom and not fighting with her. Me, not weighing myself for 5 days. Small steps yes, but signs that maybe something big is coming.

Shaun won me a stuffed animal at Denny's last night after Franz Ferdinand. It is either a Horse or a Donkey. I named it Clover.....for good luck.