A Quote I Love But I Can't Put Right On Facebook Because I'm Not In 7th Grade Anymore

And yes, I did find it on Pinterest. Bite me.

"This is why once you've traveled for the first time all you want to do is leave again. They call it the travel bug but really it's the effort to return to a place where you are surrounded by people who speak the same language as you. Not English or Spanish or Mandarin or Portuguese but that language where others know what it's like to leave. change. grow. experience. learn. then go home again and feel more lost in your hometown than you did in the most foreign place you visited. This is the hardest part about traveling and it's the very reason why we all run away again."

If you can't tell, I kinda, sorta, wanna go back to Europe.

THAT'S ALL FOR TODAY, FOLKS.


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A Love Letter To My Ever Growing Belly

My dearest belly,

With every shower, with every outfit change, with every tagged picture on Instagram, I see you growing. I watch you grow and wonder if you'll ever stop. I wonder if this is the female body I dreamed for when I was 101 pounds. When I wanted to grow up so fast and wanted my body to follow suit.

I wonder what it will be like the next time I allow a man to see you in your full glory. For a second I wonder what he'll think but then I remember it is a privilege for him to see you at all. One he shouldn't take for granted by having any sort of opinions. I remember if he does express negative opinions about you, I will be showing him the door. 

I think about you getting larger as my life goes on. I feel so many emotions through you. My anxiety feels like it's eating you. Lust feels like I've let critters lose in you. Mourning feels like I'm rid of you. You are the first sign that I am feeling these things. I thank you for being honest with me when I was unable to be honest to myself. I pray you continue to show me how I really feel. 

I think of how you are meant to house my children someday. I think of how much larger you could become while growing my carbon copy. I'm sorry if you wanted to do that, I will not be producing a carbon copy. You will be empty of children for all of your days, if I have any say in the matter. I'm sorry because I know you yearn to have them. 

But I will still use you to hold the children I raise. Children from another woman's belly. I will rest them on my hips, their legs will brush up against you and I hope you will still feel the excitement my heart will feel. The commitment to their wellbeing in my brain will hopefully give you a sense of purpose.

As I grow older, I hope to write more letters to you like this. Thanking you for being a part of me. Thanking you for nourishing me daily. Promising to never hate you, abuse you, or go on horrible diets to shrink you. I ask that in return you remain good to me. If you can help it. Digest my food, weather through my periods. I ask that you keep doing these two things. 

With that request, I bid you farewell. JK you're right here no matter what. You will certainly be here on this turkey day, where I will full you to your brim, and then some. Thank you. I love you. Keep growing the way you feel fit. 

Sincerely,

Sydney

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Modern Love Podcast

Tonight, I was walking into my apartment with a dear friend. We were talking about podcasts while we ascended and descended the many stairs to my apartment (you'd have to see it to understand). I mentioned that I'm currently listening to a podcast called Modern Love. Not originally a podcast, Modern Love is a reader submitted column in the New York Times. For 13 years people have been writing essays about their marriages, divorces, almost lovers, abortions, births and manic pixie dream girls. The podcast features actors reading these essays, followed by updates on the writer's life after the essay was published. It's food for my optimistic soul. I was telling all of this to Laura then right as we approached my front door, I said a sentence that I haven't stopped thinking about since. A sentence that would NEVER have come out of my mouth for the last 6 years. A sentence that warmed my chest as it escaped my painted lips. A sentence that is not new or revolutionary to the world, but only to me.

I said, "I don't have a love life right now so it's really good to..." blah blah blah. "I don't have a love life right now."

This sentence was said with the most respect for myself I have ever had. Most of my days, when I mention being single it would be more passive and more self deprecating. More like, "Since nobody is trying to get in this." I would hurt to say those words. Even mentioning I didn't have a suitor or men chasing after me shook my self worth. It seemed to be one of the plates I was always spinning. Crushing on men, going on dates with men, falling in love with men; these were always in my queue. My love life was my life. How I was doing with that, was how I was doing period. It was exhausting.

When I said the sentence above, I didn't lower my eyes or try to say it in a funny voice. I just said it. I just meant it. My love life does not have a stake in my emotions and how I spend my time right now. It just doesn't. Don't get me wrong, I think about men daily. I think about improvisers I would love to smooch but can't because, well, they're improvisers , co-workers whose sleeves show off their rowers arms, The Birthday Boys sketch group (every hour). I think about these men. But I don't long for these men. I don't change the way I speak to them. I don't change the way I act to please them. I don't change my volume while talking to my friends to get their attention. I just live within the moments I spend with them. It's no longer predatory. It's just real. Honest. Bravely being me without PRAYING someone falls in love with it.

I don't have a love life right now. I'm spending my life loving me with no guarantee a man will too and it still feels pretty damn good.

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Dear 18 year old me,

Dear 18 year old me,

What's Up? Ha. Well I already know what's up. I lived through it. So yes, you will live through this. You're sexually active now. Cool! Congrats. I guess. It's such a huge thing for you right now. It's changing your idea of who you are every second since it started. You now think, "If I'm not going to be virgin until marriage, I must lean into being a whore." These are evil thoughts and will lead you to make some horrible decisions. These thought will also lead you to believe that the way men treat you during sex is justified and just the way sex works. You've been taught in church so many wonderful things but the one down fall, as you are coming to realize, is how a healthy sexual relationship feels. You've been taught over and over about the consequences of having sex before marriage. That's really all you've been taught. So your brain has resigned to thinking that because you're having sex, all the bad parts are supposed to be happening.

Remember the first time when you were bleeding down your leg? Remember when you pushed on his shoulder and he didn't stop? Remember when you thought, "He doesn't care if I'm uncomfortable. This is what sex is." Well, just so you know in the coming years, the fear in that story will fade from you entirely. You will tell that story as one of your best stand up routines. It will become your coping mechanism. It has a very good punchline. Probably a hundred of people over 5 years will laugh at your red handed joke. You will laugh at the red handed joke. The man in the red handed joke will tell you he remembers what kind of burrito he had in his coat pocket that night but because he was so drunk, he can't remember your naked body up against the shower faucet bleeding, cold and on the verge of tears. He will become a dear friend. I still hold him as a dear friend despite all of this.

Then one day, 5 years later, sexual assault will become a daily topic. You will post a "Me too" status (you'll understand in 2017/Harvey Weinstein is a sexual predator and so is our president but I'm not going to ruin the fun surprise of who that is). You will regret that because you feel like you haven't really been through that. Your motivation for posting that comes from another experience where you went to a prominent Cincinnati comedian’s apartment to hook up, didn't, told him you were going to sleep on his couch, then woke up later to his naked body on top of you begging for a blowjob. You'll do it because you're afraid of him for reasons you can't explain. You will never call that anything because you were lucky enough to move to Chicago the next week. You’ll only bring this up to two friends and one of them will tell an entire room of comedians that this man raped you. You will never trust that person ever again. You will never talk about it to anyone again.

A week after the "Me Too" status, you'll remember the actual story from your first time I told above. The fear and the loneliness and the pain you felt. You'll realize you will never call it anything other than an unfortunate first time.  18 year old you believed when you have sex before marriage, you are supposed to be uncomfortable, hurt and you deserve what's coming. 23 year old you can't change her story now. After all, it gave her 5 years of great stand up material.

So moving forward with your sexual life know that you have the right to say "No" or "Stop" or "I would like you to use protection" or "I'm uncomfortable with that specific sex act." or "I don't want to have sex anymore." You have the RIGHT to say no in a hundred different ways even if he’s begging you. You won't for many years. For that, I am so sorry.

I love you, enjoy the rest of college and spoiler alert Donald Trump has the nuclear codes now.

Warmly,
23 year old me

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