Can you hear me now? Good.

When I speak of silence, I
speak of life. You have let
go of legacy. Your silence
exists in pixelated part-
time solace.

Listen.

Stop.

Listen again.

Leave your virtual lives
for the moment, let go
of the pulsing vibrations
that connect you to the
noise. Learn to recognize
the noise as it is.

In the web of trees where
the Platte River and
Missouri River valleys
collide, I found it. A
deafening silence that
spread out for miles.
It starts out almost too
quiet to notice, but once
you do, the cacophony
of stillness rocks you.
Feel the discomfort; you've
never been there before.

Absorb it.

This silence is dying. It
doesn't exist anymore in
the places where people
live. It's stifled by the
hum, by the visual and
spiritual and physical
noise of the everyday.

You'll miss it once it's gone.

Separating the awkwardly feminine from the possibly Canadian...

If things don't change soon, I won't be able to fall sleep without the distant spills of thunder and light flooding the room momentarily as lightening chains fill the sky. I like the rain and the way it smells like breathing. I like the way the fringes of my jeans get wet as I trudge across the sidewalk. And I like the silence. Most people don't understand silence anymore. It's early. This solstice brings the hope of something new. Summer has always been kind to me.

This rain, this heat, this sweat that beads above my eyes, it keeps the corners of my mouth turned upright. Give me an apple and a backpack and stream full of snails. Give me grass stains and skinned knees and sweet-smelling grass. Give me crisped skin and water bottles and John Denver in the background. Give me summer, the way I know it but newer.

I'd like to ask a stranger to dance, if I only knew how. Instead, I'll just ask for story or a heartache or a tale I can keep telling. This season is the time for reckless mistakes, for abandon, for life.

K to the C

I used to be Daddy's girl.

Hunting for morel mushrooms. Fishing in the Nemaha River. Driving the golf cart as he played nine holes. Watching a football game, beer in his hand, root beer in mine. Washing his truck in the driveway as he followed, rewashing everything I touched.

Thanks Dad, even though I'm not a little girl anymore, I always kind of will be.

Thanks for teaching me how to remove a tick, that I should be extra careful when walking through nettles, how to worm a hook, that hitting the sidewalk with the weed-whacker ruins the blade. Thanks for letting me watch Highlander and wrestling, get dirty, ride my bike down grassy hills before I knew how to stop. And even though you hide money around the house and watch paranormal investigation shows and love Huey Lewis and the News, I still think you're pretty cool.

All Secrets Sleep in Winter Cloths

Ch-ch-ch-changes!

I finished my homework for tomorrow at 5 p.m. today. Now I can go out with friends tonight and not feel guilty about being there. I can also go to sleep when I get home and not stay up late and be tired at school tomorrow. Look how grown up I am!

I do need to clean my room though. I guess some things never change.

Look what you did...

You little jerk.

I going to go to sleep early tonight. It's heavy here. I can feel miles of delusion piling onto my shoulders. And the nighttime, summer air is weightless. Things stop making sense when I start thinking sensibly.

The cobbled paths, the strange atmosphere, the people... I'm starting to love it all. And I'm trying to rationalize everything else in my life. And it grounds me. But I was not made to be rational or reasonable or planted. I'm like the fluff of a cottonwood. I'm meant to wander, to roam, to defy reason and longing, to be steady, reliable, free from misinterpretation. This heart wades restlessly, waiting to be used to its fullest potential. Where is my potential? I am made for love - senseless, restless, reckless, unselfish love.

I'm a writer of words, a lover of souls and creator of destinies. Come here. Walk with me to buy coffee, one cream, two sugars. Sit uncomfortably close and listen as I spill myself to you. Come unhinged. Let go of you and me. Walk with me in silence. Stop. Don't do anything. Become one with your nothingness.

Every day I resist the urge to let completely go. I want to know everyone's life story - the past, the present, the in betweens and even the parts not written. I want to know that you don't enjoy crayons, that you eat ice cream with a fork, that your favorite color is goldenrod, that you prefer green vegetables, that you're afraid of backseats. And I'll tell you how I used to spend weeks of summer in a tent in my neighbor's back yard, how I can't stand the sound of popping knuckles, how I think that my life is not really meant for me, how I love cashews, how I prefer Michael Jackson to Alan Jackson and Johnny Cash to both.

Tonight I sleep. I'll make sense tomorrow.

BP Cares

Right now, in the Gulf of Mexico, arguably the largest man-made environmental disaster is raging. I don't know if people don't understand the extent of the oil spill. I don't know if it's just too difficult for many people to talk about. I don't know if people don't care. I just don't know. And for the last almost TWO MONTHS I've felt helpless... hopeless about it. But I have to do something, anything about it.

Below are a list of sites that I've found about the spill. There are millions of sites that talk about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill that started April 20th. These are ones that I've found especially interesting. The Deepwater Horizon rig, operated by British Petroleum, exploded April 20th, and I in no way mean to forget the tragedy of the workers that died in the explosion. That in itself is devastating. The disaster that has followed that tragedy cannot be ignored.

Every day unimaginable amounts of oil are leaking into the ocean. The spill is so big you can see it from space. And just looking at video footage and photographs and listening to people who are there talk about it, you can tell that something is horribly wrong. And I want to know more. I want to see more pictures. I want to understand better what's going on. It alarms me how hard I have to work to actually find information that says specifics about what is the current situation in the Gulf of Mexico. Perhaps, no one knows. But, perhaps, no ones talking. I don't mean to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but the silence scares me most.

If you're feeling helpless, as I did, please take some time to explore your options. Write a letter to your senator. Donate money. Volunteer to help. At the very least, spread the word. Oh, and I don't know how effective it will be, but I'm not going to any BP gas stations. In fact, I'm buying as little gas as possible.

Check out photos and statistics of the massive destruction taking place on the wildlife and ecosystem in the gulf coast.

And, if you're like me, you might just need some comic relief, just to make it not hurt so much.

• http://www.didbpfixthatleakyet.com/
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AAa0gd7ClM&feature=player_embedded
• https://twitter.com/BPGlobalPR 

(If you have any other information that you think I (or anyone else) might be interested in, please share it.) 

Please don't stop the music...

• January Wedding - The Avett Brothers
• Birds - Kate Nash
• Raindrops - Regina Spektor
• Real Love - The Beatles
• Lovers' Waltz - A.A. Bondy
• 1,2,3,4 - Plain White T's

Have I made a list like this before? I almost feel like I have.

For British Eyes Only

I've been afraid for so long now, it's hard to nail down what exactly I'm afraid of. But, the truth is, I'm terrified. And I'm tired. And I'm so, so tired of being afraid. Yesterday it all kind of just came crashing down on me. I can't count the number of times I was on the verge of tears yesterday, the number of times that verge became a reality. Everything that has been building up since the beginning of May, it fell apart. My time at UNL is over. My time (for now) at camp is over. And the worst part is, they're so close. I can almost touch them. And that's just going to be a hard reality for me to face for a while. Somewhere in my chaos-driven head I've connected the friendships that I've formed at those places with the places themselves; but it's more than just a connection - it's like a fusion. And that's just not true. My friendships aren't dependent on those locations. They're dependent on people, dependent on me.

To quote someone special, "I'm tired of being afraid of silly things." This time in my life should not be scary. It should be exhilarating, breath-taking, endlessly beautiful... everything. And this fear that I have... the irrational and beating fear of change... it's silly. And I'm tired of it.

God takes the foolish things about this world to confound the wise.

Please grant me wisdom.

My Hair is Wet

• Five bananas sit on my desk. 
• My window view is a football field. 
• I bumped my head... hard. 
• It's strange to have a roommate again. 
• Not bad, just strange. 
• I would have stopped being antisocial tonight if I hadn't had a paper due. 
• But I finished my paper. :-) 
• I rather miss Lincoln. 
• I rather like Omaha more than I expected. 
• I love my friends, like a million. 
• No more lists for a while after this.
• I plomise. (That's like a promise I don't have to keep.)

Kiwi Tissue Box

"We are all a little weird, and life's a little weird; and when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall in mutual weirdness and call it love."

There is no "Lindsey" in "team."

• I have a crush on the outdoors at dusk. 
• I drink copious amounts of water. 
• I could eat avocados always. 
• Today is better. 
• I would like to give a shout out to Miss Nif for mein Alpenmilchcreme Milka. 
• I prefer Gerber daisies and pearls, thank you. 
• I aspire to cook with the grace of a mother. 
• I wasn't that impressed by the metal slides at the park downtown. 
• I was impressed by the breeze and kids laughing. 
• I'd rather have roughage than lettuce.
• A pluot is not a plum.

Light a candle for me at the grotto...

Tonight I should be surrounded
by a roaring silence and a warm
breeze. Tonight I should not be
bothered by the hum of interstate
traffic and air conditioning. A few
of my parts are still walking around,
laughingly afraid on a gravel path
through the trees. They shouldn't
be there. They're making it worse

My face is wet.

If you stop at the bottom of the
hill between East and Main, before
the light of the barn, you will
finally be able to understand the
blankness, the sky, the heart-pounding
quiet. These etches on my mind will
keep me awake a few more nights
until I get over what feels like is
missing or at least start to forget.

I know this feeling, like one of losing
a friend, like losing yourself.

Tonight I am only this pen and
this word and this longing.

Call me Mr. Flintstone...

I'm a chewy vitamin. (I think that's how the song goes.)


I'm kind of in a funk right now. This transition is hard, a lot harder than I expected. But I'm going to start giving it a much better effort.

Give me a little while. Okay?