i called this reflection...

life hasn't been very easy for me from the very first day of the first grade .
no bills, no real responsibilities .. sure, but people had some real harsh things to say .

i cried tears as a newborn baby, as a toddler, as a child, as an adolescent, as an angst teen, and now as a woman .
i've suffered many losses, many friendships too unmeaningful to save, too many promises made and left broken .

plenty of late night dreams of awakening to a father's warm embrace, harsh realizations of waking up empty handed .
one too many encounters with demons in disguises painting beautiful pictures only to leave me jam packed in a corner, stranded .

every ongoing step i take with caution .
no room for error, no time for mistakes in fulfilling what this world deems as perfection .

looking out to the world from inside protective barriers with only room for one .
wondering if all of these things were planned for me when realizing who i've become .

and with all i've had to go through, i'm still here, still believing there can be some good in this world .
giving my all to people who whimsically decide to ignore the heart i've layed at their feet and not say a word to me anymore .

no more .

i often find myself a victim to probably the two most annoying words ever.. " what if? " i see no good coming from that mere question. every time these words cross my mind, i start thinking of things i have no business thinking about. i have kept so many thoughts and feelings to myself out of fear.. what exactly am i afraid of? i could probably go on for pages upon pages answering that question. i've come to realize that i have to stop bottling things up before i explode and cause more harm than good. i can't keep carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders. i'm only one person.. a fragile one at that. most of the time, when i'm off in a corner not saying a word is when i have the most to say.

i'm a small woman with a big heart. it gets heavy at times. it's heavy right now. i wear my heart on my sleeve, you can tell everything i'm feeling by my facial expressions. no matter how hard i try, i can't be all dark and mysterious. that's not me. i can't pretend that i don't care about something and/or someone when i do. i can't find it in me to be mean to a person when a person is mean to me without going back and apologizing. doesn't really matter if i did anything wrong in the first place. i swear if i could make all of the people in the world the happiest people they could ever be, i would do it in a heartbeat, even if it was at the expense of my very own happiness.

when i tell you that i miss you and you say nothing in response, the first thing i tell myself is that i shouldn't have said it. " you're doing too much, rinelis.. take a few steps back. " but if i miss you, why wouldn't i want to tell you? maybe i feel too much, too fast but rather than sit in a dark room and shed unnecessary tears over what could possibly be wrong with me, i have to grow up and realize that this is who i am.. and this is how i'll always be. my feelings are intense.. my love is and always will be unconditional. i forgive easily, shed tears frequently. i'm confident in God.. enough to know He made no mistake in creating me.

and so.. if you're to get anything from what it is i wrote today, understand that just because someone doesn't react to something you say and/or do they way you had hoped they would, have the confidence in yourself to know you did what you felt was best, said what you wanted to say and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. always give a person the benefit of the doubt because you would want him or her to do the same for you. you never know what a person is going through, what he or she is thinking, where he or she has been, what he or she has seen, so on and so forth. there will come a time where that person will think of you and what you may have said and/or done for them. they'll appreciate you for it whether they say something to you about it or not and if they ever come back to you, welcome them with open arms. you always have the power to save a life.

if i could turn back the hands of time..

time. crazy thing to write about huh? i've come to realize that 'crazy' is my second most favorite word because i use it to describe almost every damn thing. random realization aside, i'm sure we've all seen constant movies, tv shows, etc. based on this subject.. whether it be focused on the creation and use of time machines, a boy with a fully developed, grown man's body at the age of ten, or a man who ages backwards. to me, time is of the essence and one of the most powerful things in this world. it builds nations and destroys them. you could miss things in a blink of an eye and once time is gone, it's gone for good. when your time is up, it's up.. there's no going back. there's no going back to that person who you knew loved you more than you could ever possibly imagine but you ignored because you were too wrapped up in being single, sexy, and free. that time where you may have lied to your parents, ended up doing something you weren't supposed to, and went through more distress than happiness.

it's funny being a cancerian woman. i'm emotional, shy, reserved, the works. i spent most of my life in tears and regret.. that feeling where i knew in my heart i should have taken more risks and done a lot more things i wanted but was too afraid to. i tend to look to the past way more than any person should which has caused me a lot of strife but is something i'm repairing each and every day. i can't go back in time and talk to all of the people i wish i would have. i can't go back and stick up for myself when all my peers did was pick on me. i can't put back that keychain i stole from dots and take back those nights where my conscience slowly ate away at me until i finally broke down and told my mother what i had done. i can't keep wasting time being stuck in the past either. every day that i learn to let go of all of my insecurities, brings me more and more happiness. time has taken me through a rocky journey of passing and failing classes, smiling and frowning over crushes, gaining and losing friends, pledging to an amazing sorority, and finally.. time has lead me to this particular person, filled with so much passion for life and all things that make it wondrous.

time is exciting to me again. i find myself fighting epic battles with my sleep because i don't want any time to go to waste in finding out more and more about you. the time i spend talking to you, i want to slow down. the time i spend away from you, i want to speed up. where's my fast forward button? i want to obliterate this distance between us. i'm slowly letting go of all of those regrets i gained over my entire twenty years of life; not just saying i have no regrets because it brought me to where i am today, made me who i am today, but actually believing it.. actually believing it has made me and continues to make me into a better person and lead me to you. whether we flourish into the best of friends or the best of lovers is completely unknown to me but regardless of where time takes us, i know it only leads to bigger, better, brighter, and beautiful things. so i'll look back to today and the days prior with an exceptionally large smile on my face, hold my head up, and prepare for the goodness that tomorrow brings. a future with the most diverse, crazy, and sometimes irritating yet equally phenomenal friendships. a future with prosperity, success, and triumph. the chance to hold your hand as if it'll be the last thing i ever do.. a future with you.

live. laugh. LOVE.

love .. what a subject. i don't really know how to even start this. i want to say that love's a funny thing to me so i guess i will. it makes me laugh. i've always been a caring person, probably too caring for my own good most times, and i've always been a strong advocate for this precious little four letter word. i feel as though when it comes to love, a person can never come half-assed (excuse my french). love, to me, can never be just a half way thing. i'm sure you've experienced how ridiculously hurtful it is to love someone and not have him or her love you in return. i have and it isn't a nice feeling to have, probably the worst after that gruesome feeling i get when i come home and find out someone has ate that last piece of pizza i've been looking forward to eating all day. when i find myself brave enough to take that plunge, i expect that person to take it with me.. no ifs, ands, or buts about it. when i find myself that deep in love, the last thing on my mind is the thought of that person not feeling the same way. i mean.. we've both been on that journey leading towards it together. life isn't perfect, people aren't perfect. there's always that time where someone chews my heart out and spits it back out at me.

my mom sat me down once and while i'm not sure how we even got to the topic of broken hearts, i'm glad it had somehow come up. she took a piece of notebook paper and held it out in front of me. this is how the rest of the conversation went:

mom: "when you break a person's heart, it's like balling up this piece of paper.."
[she balls it up in her hand]
mom: "over time, all of the pain tends to fade little by little.."
[she slowly smooths out the entire piece of paper]
mom: "but no matter what, it is never, ever the same."
[she puts emphasis on the fact that the piece of paper, even if it's no longer balled up, is and will always stay wrinkled]

i told this story to a friend of mine and he said "i'll iron it" and i kindly pointed out that "the iron burns." if i'm ever careful about anything, it's tending to a person's heart. i've had my broken quite a few times and i vowed to try my hardest not to bring that feeling onto another person. when it comes to love, i've learned that i, first and foremost, MUST be patient. love is something that you can never rush. it's scary and what do people do when they're scared.. or MOST people do (:D)? they run and hide! personally, i'm at the point in my life where i don't want to get into a relationship with someone i don't see myself marrying. sure, i'm only twenty and i have a lot more to learn but i don't see the point of being with someone i wouldn't want to marry. relationships, serious ones, last for years. patience; i have to take time out to really get to know a person inside and out. i have to learn all of their good and bad qualities. i'm very cautious and careful, if i can help it, i don't let the bad outweigh the good and if they do, that person's not the right one for me. i won't let myself fall for the whole "i love you but i don't want to ruin our friendship." to me, there's no such thing. if you love me, you'll take that next step with me. you won't take it if you really just don't love me "in that way." trust and loyalty are two very, very important things to me when it comes to friendships and most importantly in relationships. i used to not believe in long distance relationships but i'm older, more mature, etc. etc. if i truly love someone, distance is nothing but a speed bump. getting over it is slow but i still get over it and continue on my merry way, that way to a better relationship.. back into the arms of the person i've invested good time into, who doesn't complete me but compliments me, who i let call me retarded, ridiculous, and random (because i am), who grows each and every day just as i do, who makes mistakes but undoubtedly always holds my best interest at heart because i hold his best interest at heart as well. a man who doesn't compare me to other females because he understands no two people are ever the same and if there was ever anything to compare to, he shouldn't be with me but with her.

i could go on but i have to find somewhere to stop. i can always find another day to continue, find another way of expressing my feelings on love and relationships. i tried to stay as far away from using "you" as possible because i understand that not everyone will agree with what i have to say, not everyone will have gone through what i have and in the end, everyone will form and/or has already formed their own unique definition of l o v e. if i've somehow made an impact on you from writing this, i go to sleep happy. if i've helped you, my mission has been accomplished.. if i've touched you, you have blessed me. it's a blessing to know i've touched a person, made him or her feel good, put a smile on his or her face, the works. smile, it's contagious :).