I’ve been misplacing my anger. Instead of taking it out on my notebook, I’ve been battling in other ways. Instead of letting my boiling blood fuel my pen, I’ve been taking it out on everything else or trying to hold it in.

I can’t do that. I have to embrace my anger and utilize it. 

I don’t believe in “this too shall pass” because the only way to get through something is to push yourself. Perhaps if I believed in God, I would let the outside world guide me - but that’s a false sense of security. Because the world will only guide you to where you will end up naturally - six feet underground. I can’t just let the world lead me to death because as long as I’m breathing, I’m going to reach for something. Complacency and faith are one in the same and I refuse to live lifeless in my body before the earth claims me permanently. 

The only thing we can do is fight. Fight for justice, for freedom, for liberty, equality and for the fucking choice to fight.

I’m tired of sitting still while the wrong people fight the right battles. Or worse, the right people fight the wrong battles. My hands are going to eventually freeze up and all I will have left is my voice. When that is gone, I will be dead. Until then, I have to use every chance that I’ve got to fight the good fight.

that all these years, teetering on the idea of God, Christianity and religion, I’ve turned to churches and friends of mine who are believers to help me in my faith. For as long as I can remember, since I’ve known what The Bible was, I’ve turned towards religion to help me understand…to answer my questions and guide me to solid faith. However, if you would have asked me a few months ago what I believed, I would have said that I wasn’t sure. After 26 years of confusion and an actual will to accept the religion, my questions were never answered. No believer, no church, no person, no book, no band, no music, nothing could send me walking into faith. And now, 50 pages into the book “The Good Atheist” by Dan Barker and I can proclaim myself, with whole heart, an Atheist. I know now, 100%, that I do not believe in a God nor do I believe that religion is helpful in any circumstance.

I can’t even begin to illustrate how liberating my new enlightenment has made me feel. 

Because if God made Man to serve him and God made woman to support and serve her husband (who is busy serving God instead of his loving wife), then I get the short end of the stick.

Well I won’t have the short end of the stick. I’ll throw that shit back. I have ALL THE FUCKING STICKS I WANT. And seriously…how freeing is that?? 

We’d learn how to say “no.”

We’d embrace our needs. Whether those were purely our own or the need to fulfill another’s.

We’d kiss more. Hold hands more.

What we wouldn’t do is run out to buy the next fucking iPhone. We wouldn’t care about shoes, video games and definitely not about student loans. We wouldn’t waste our money on television sets or SUVs. We’d give it away-simply hand out hundred dollar bills to anyone living on the street. We’d drink our favorite beer or wine, gather around our friends and sing “Don’t Stop Believin’” at the top of our lungs. Maybe we’d graffiti the city. Maybe we would fill an empty pool with tapioca balls and toss ourselves in. Perhaps we’d run naked, straight into the ocean, Lake Michigan or the creek in your neighbor’s back yard and make love in the filthy water.

Maybe we would live like we were nineteen again and know that the only guarantee of permanency is death.

Lately, I’ve been entranced with the reality. I’ve never been afraid of death, but instead found peace in the idea that when one door closes, another must open. However, this last year or so, I’ve been absolutely terrified of it. I would like to say that it’s just the thought of losing others that keeps me awake at night, but even the idea of my own death leaves me trembling.

All I keep asking myself is: if I were to die tomorrow, have I accomplished everything that I’ve dreamt up? Have I showed my friends and family how much I truly love them? Have I inspired anyone to reach beyond their fears and dive into a life that they’ve always desired? Have I spoken enough about the things that I love and stood strongly enough for the changes that I believe the world needs to see? Have I done anything for humanity or had all of my endeavors been in vain?

But mostly, was I happy or did I spend my life in misery, trying to please everyone else?

And then, if that weren’t enough to send my heart into shock, there is a haunting vision of losing anyone close to me. I can’t even put into words how deeply horrified I am of this. Because, the fact is, death follows and stalks our every move. Everything could change in an instant.

Everything could change in an instant and one day, it will.

Tonight, I’m going to make the best black bean soup I’ve eve made. I’m going to hug my dogs longer. I’ll sing sweeter and scream louder at band practice and prepare for what could be our last show ever. I’m going to unplug my husband’s computer afterwards so he cannot spend one more minute slaving away at work instead of locking lips with me.

Because death is throwing a party and you never know when you’ll receive your invitation.