She

Today, somewhere in the middle of the day, it struck her: she loved him with a fire and a clarity she's never thought she could feel for someone. Sure, 20% of what she was feeling had a logical explanation: he was handsome. Incredibly handsome. But that's not what she saw as a priority of her feelings towards him. He was kind. He was funny, witty and intelligent. She loved how he teased her. But there was something more about him. Something beyond her power of understanding. Beyond her control. And this was what made her both happy and scared. Both intrigued and afraid. He was seducing her soul from afar. He was different. He was like this mystery offered to her to decipher, bit by bit, which she both hated and loved altogether. She had been feeling both in and out of control. And that had been what had made her act all crazy.

All this, up until this summer afternoon, as she was making coffee, when it dawned on her: he was her love and she had to take care of him. Not out of selfish motives, but because of whatever reason this Universe brought this lovely being into her life.

She knew she loved him so profoundly as if her entire being had met his entire being millions of years ago, when they were only tiny atoms of energy, colliding in a cosmic dance, and now they had to meet again to complete it. She was reading his words on love on a paper, and silent tears came strolling down her face: he was silently teaching her what love is, and she felt so unworthy of being part of his life, since he probably had no idea whatsoever of her feelings for him. And boy had she acted strange at times! 

She read his words out loud and felt goosebumps all over: whatever he said there, that's exactly how she felt for him. The feeling was too powerful for her to bear. She covered her face with her hands and sighed deeply. She knew right then and there exactly what she was feeling for him: the deepest most profound kind of love she had ever felt. That she was going to love him forever, and smile whenever she'll think about him; she knew it with a certainty she had never had in her life up to that point and it was all new to her. And she also knew she was not infatuated with him. That it was just love. Pure honest most probably unrequitted love. But for the first time in her life, she honestly didn't care. For it was too profound and beautiful and selfless. She realized right then and there that she became better since she's known him. That he had, slowly, but surely [even though possibly unintentionally] turned her into a better version of herself. She felt grateful and blessed. 

And for the first time in her life, she promised herself that, no matter what this life has in store for her, no matter how many times she'll cry and feel alone and unwanted, and miserable, she won't wait for him to send her that imaginary tight hug. She won't stay in front of the computer, hoping he'll be around, "catching" her every time she 'falls', every time when something hurts her heart. She won't take it to heart when he voluntarily or involuntarily breaks her heart. Because, ultimately, this is HER love, not necessarily also his. 

He'll meet someone else, if he hasn't already, and he'll feel the need to talk to someone, and she will be there, holding his hand through all of the happiness or pain, because Love means Selflessness. 

And it won't hurt her anymore. No. She'll be all alone in that love and it will scare her like hell at first, but she'll get used to it. It will complete her. She will be the best version of herself, ready to conquer the world and bring even the tiniest contribution, because she envisions this Universe and even though she might not know how it's been made, she at least figures LOVE had to be involved in the process. 

The very same kind of selfless love she's now beginning to understand and be a part of. 

She hasn't met this guy for no reason. He crossed her path with a purpose. Whether he's a lesson or something else, he's touched her entire being with his inner beauty and she can't help but feeling like she's now part of his soul, even if only insignificantly. She will be there for him and act like a sister or best friend and she won't feel like she has to pretend. She'll shape and mold her being according to him. And she'll make sure that he gets to be happy, even though it's not with her. Simply because she loves all those tiny particles that make him who he is. She will not fail him. She will be his guiding light.

She loves. Him :)

Restlessness

There's a certain confusion

I keep feeling inside

Almost as if

My heart were an illusion

And I were not alive

Almost as if

You were not even real

Close to madness,

Don’t even know what I feel.

There’s a certain sadness

Living in my heart

Knowing

We’re two perfect strangers

Breathing miles apart

Loving

This strange feeling

That you might feel the same

Having

To accept that prob’ly

I’m foolish, even lame

Feeling

This soul’s in so much danger

This time, no help from above

Being

Happy and sad, hopeful and mad

Being … in love !?!

© Katie Ross

Mind, Heart and Soul

There's a certain violence
Of the mind,
Sitting here in silence
Feeling blind...

Yet, a certain peace
Of the heart
Perhaps even bliss.
Love is Art.

And a happiness
Of the soul,
Where, in loneliness,
One's still whole.

© Katie Ross, April 25th 2014

Catalina

My name is Catalina, but every friend who knows me since I was little, and knows how in love I've been with English in general calls me Katie. Or simply Kate. It was my English teacher who first called me that way. He tried to find an English name for each and every one of his class. He said that it was simple in my case. Catalina just sounded like Katherine or Katelynn/Katie to him. I guess if one translated Catalina into something [other than its latin meaning] it would very much sound like Katelynn.

I was born on September 22nd 1984. At the exact time [hours and minutes] summer turned to fall. Astronomically speaking. And when I say this, I mean the Autumn Equinox. Fate? Probably. I guess my life is just like the changing of seasons, constantly transforming. Is it good, is it bad? I do not know. All I know is I'm moving on, along with the constant moving of the Solar System and our Galaxy's wandering through space.

I lost my father on November 23rd 1984 out of a medical error. It is never easy for me to talk about it, hence I will not do it now. I do not have any memories of him. Although when I look at his pictures, I feel like I've known him for a lifetime or more. As strangely as it may sound, I miss him, even if I didn't know him. I am so glad he had wanted a daughter so badly just before my mom got pregnant with me, and his wish came true. I hope I can carry on his legacy forever. Before he died, he said I'm his little writer. My hobbies are singing and writing. But I still don't feel I'm good enough at any of them.

I've lost a dad, but Universe sent me another one. He's been raising me since the age of 2. Been the best father one could ever be. He's taught me how to read and write before the age of 4, he's taught me so many lessons of life, he's talked a lot to me, and told me the most embarassing stuff, he's been so open and direct about many things, and some could have considered him too blunt, but the things he's taught me, later proved as being of utmost help in my life.

It's funny how people who didn't know my life story and that my real dad had died, whenever they met my family, they'd always say how well I resemble my [whom they didn't actually know was my] step dad as far as the personality is concerned. I would just look in my dad's eyes and he'd look in mine, and I could feel the emotion in his heart. Yes, I am sure he didn't mean to turn me into a copy of his, but it's inevitable that when you're raised by a certain person, you tend to become like them, especially when their influence is a good one.

I have been blessed with a mother who has sacrificed everything to see her children happy. All those sleepless nights...I hope they've finally paid off. I owe her my life and everything. I owe her my passion for singing. She makes sure she remembers me that everytime she used to rock me to sleep at night, just about when she thought I'd fallen asleep, I'd shout from the top of my lungs: "Mommy! Sing the song about the ducklings and the little frogs again!" And she did. And so many other songs, and I would sing along with her, until I'd fianally fall asleep smiling. When she used to wake me up in the mornings for breakfast and prepare me to go to school, she'd make up all these songs meant to wake me up and wish me a wonderful day, and to this very day I don't know how on Earth could she make all those rhymes as she was going along with the singing. 

I am honored to have a brother who fights for human rights, who hasn't been changed by money, who is devoted to his community. Oddly [or not] he's ended up exactly as my dad had "predicted" just before he closed his eyes for the last time and gave his last breath, on that bloody hospital bed, on a cold autumn morning. My brother is a man of substance and I must say I am proud of him and his children.

My family is far from being perfect. We've had our share of misunderstandings and boy were they quite a few thoughout time. But we've somehow always managed to see past those differences. Maybe because I also sometimes talk a lot, which usually isn't a good thing, but by communicating with them and being honest and sometimes blunt too, I've mananged to make them understand I may never be the perfect daughter, I am only human, I make mistakes too. I might never meet all their expectations, just as I am sure they haven't met all their parents' expectations, and still they got along with their parents, and life went on. Mistakes or not, I'm still gonna love them, honor and respect them for the rest of my life. And I'll never forget what I've learned from them, in particular accepting and respecting others for who they are, and I'll apply all that I can take from what they've taught me in my life. But I'm not perfect, neither are they. No one is.

I wish I'd be more mature about certain things. I wish I told my heart to take it slowly and stop worrying about every minor silly thing. Stop blooming everytime someone is nice to it - you never know who has which agenda. But also not overreact and think everyone who's not as open as its owner would like them to be, automatically has a hidden agenda. I wish I were more confident. I wish I could finally let go of what has hurt me for so long. I wish I could have the strength I need to start anew and admit and accept all the feelings I have inside. Without any fear. I wish I took the next flight and go wherever it might take me and start it all over. No regrets. No worries. I wish I found the love that I've been searching for all of my life. LOVE. Just simple plain LOVE. With flaws and all. Imperfect, true love. But when I go to bed at night, to know that the man I'm lying next to is the one I was meant to be with. And that he's happy with me. As simple as that. That we've met in this life because we simply have to share our lives together, along with all the happiness, the joy, the challenges and the struggles it brings . That at the end of the day, he's my soulmate, my friend, even if we sometimes fight, even if he doesn't understand me at times, even though I am angry at the moment and involuntarily hurt him, even if he doesn't speak to me for 1 whole day. Even if he says something that he doesn't mean and hurts me. But that, at the end of the day, he's still the man I kiss, I caress and shower with love. He's still the man I'm raising children with, he's still the one I can talk to about everything, the one I put all my trust into, the kind of guy I can grow old with. My better half.

I wish...

Katie's many thoughts

As much as I wanna stay away from the computer, something happens everytime. Either it's the companies I'm collaborating with, sending me some more work, or it's my cousin calling me to say she's posted some wonderful pics of her baby daughter on Facebook, I do what I do and... I'm always there. Which is not what I had wanted. 

I took a break from Twitter. I haven't been there in the last two days. And I miss being there.

I love my friends. They [and I mean each and every single one of them] give me hope when my days look low. Their feelings are so beautiful and sincere. I am lucky to have met them.  But it's precisely because I love them so much that I needed this break. It's hard to explain, but sometimes, a lil' break is what one needs in order to straighten some things out.

Unfortunately, this seems quite impossible, since I'm present on Facebook, and I know I have to do something about it. I want my life for the next couple of days to look as follows:

- Katie taking long walks in the park, watching nature's beauty and breathing fresh air in

- Katie listening to lots of music, meditating about her life, her dreams, what she has accomplished so far, what she failed at achieving 

- Katie making a list of all the things she regrets having and/or not having done and understanding regretting them is not a good thing

- Katie understanding the importance of living in the present, the importance of kindness and of love

- Katie learning to accept she can't please everyone, learning to accept she might love and not be loved in return, but it's all good, and life is still beautiful, worth smiling every minute of it

- Katie being herself, but trying not to hurt anyone while being herself

- Katie volunteering again. She needs that, it makes her feel like she has a role on Earth, like she too can bring a contribution 

- Katie changing her view on life and changing the things that hurt her in her current life. No more fear. Just do it.

- Katie... being.

From heart to Heart...

If I could take your pain away,
I'd do that in a heartbeat,
And just like blooming trees in May
You'd shine so bright and so sweet!

If I could be there where you are...
(I'd fly across the highest mountain),
I'd tell your heartache to go far,
And let your sorrow be forgotten!

If I could hug you tight one time,
Just feel we need no words at all
My heart will tell you "Please forgive me!
I'll never hurt you anymore!"




© Katie Ross, February 3rd 2014

All we need is...

As corny as it sounds, I won't put "love" on top of the list. Why? Because I've just realized that in order to be able to give and receive love, one needs to feel a certain kind of PEACE. ☼ An inner serenity. That feeling of freedom in being oneself. When you can finally be at peace with yourself. That's when you can give and receive love with all your heart.

I lost a friend today. Not literally lost, thank God. He's alive and well, but his heart is aching. Someone whom he thought of as his friend betrayed him, lied to him and hurt him in the most horrifying way possible. How? By being obsessed with him, by stalking him and harassing him and his friends, lying about them, to the point where he decided to withdraw from anyone and anything just to find some peace of mind. 

Which leads me to what you thought I was going to talk about [and now I will talk about]: LOVE. ♥

You know...I'm not too old as to think I'm entitled to give advice, share opinions and thoughts from my own experience, but not too young not to. I had my share of pain, just like any other human being on the face of the earth. But what I took from every experience was each time, a simple lesson, which later proved to be of utmost importance in my life and extremely helpful at times. It would take me hundreds if not thousands of pages to describe each one of my experiences and the lessons I've learned from them. I might not even remember them all. I mean I'm sure I forgot a lot of the experiences I've been through so far. But the lessons have stayed with me throughout time. And I guess, that's what's important. If you neglect the fact that there's a lesson after each one of your experiences, be they pleasant or sad, and you don't care to learn it, then you're as good as dead. Dead inside, that is. What's the use of a walking robot, then?  I ask you. Isn't the purpose of this life to be as alive as possible, as present in your own life as you can be  and not become a  walking robot, eventually dying inside? At least that's what motivational speakers tell us. And so far, I haven't heard one "follower" complain.

I do wanna share a simple lesson I've learned. I might feel ashamed to share it [and actually I am] but I will share it nonetheless. Because if there's even a single human being who can use my experience and the lesson I've learned to help himself have a better life [and not hurt other people in reaching this goal], then I've reached my purpose.

I wanna tell you about the time when LOVE to me meant none other than walking hand-in-hand with my boyfriend. A kiss on the cheek, or even one on the mouth, but not even a French one. [Ok, maybe a French one once in a while.] An innocent teenage love, you might say. Only that there was something which turned it into something else called selfish love. Which isn't really love. Actually, that's no love at all. Its name is rather Jealousy or Possessiveness. The feeling that you OWN a person, that he belongs to you and only you,  therefore that person is at your disposal. 

I did that... To my shame, I did that to someone and I am still not able to forgive myself to this very day. It wasn't what you'd call jealousy: I wasn't stalking him to see who he meets, where and when and most importantly why. Nope. It was worse: I felt I had the right to know what he did, when, where and why, like the poor guy had to explain every second of his life to me. And the worse part? He was telling me everything and I didn't believe him. That, my friends, is the breef portrayal of a creepy, awful, possessive person. I got better throughout our time together, he made me understand I was wrong, but it took him such a long time to convince me I had been hurting his feelings, that by the time I understood what was the root of all this problem, we had already broken up.

I knew I messed everything up with my crazy behavior. I knew it and it broke my heart that I've broken his heart more than the idea of us having just broken up did. I was a mess, but at least I figured out, piece by piece, what made me act like such a lunatic. It was lying within me. It was my low self -esteem. I'd always felt I wasn't good enough for anyone, so why would this relationship make it any better? So I was taking it out on him: I needed something to make me feel like I have my own rights, you know? Like I can be good at something, too. And I chose it in the worse and most rude way possible: thinking I'm the boss of someone. That he owns me explanations all the time. That he needs to tell me why the heck he can't see me today, which doesn't normally sound necessarily bad, unless asking your loved one to give you all the details of why he can't see you today, including what he'll do later if he still won't see you anyway [No wonder the poor guy tried to protect himself from me]. Until one day he poured his heart out to me and I got to see so much anger, confusion, madness and even hate there, that I was left speechless. I was shocked! He was breaking up with me, possibly finding another girl, and there was nothing I could do about it. It was at the point of no return. 

So, bruised and battered, I gathered my broken pieces together and I tried to draw a conclusion from all this. That took a while, but I ended up having learned... a life lesson. And that, my friends, is that I hadn't known how to love up to that point and it was high time I opened my heart, soul and mind to fully understanding and experiencing the most wonderful feeling in the world. Understand that loving is not owning. To love is to trust. And feel free and have a happy heart, safe in the knowledge that your loved one knows that "feeling free" doesn't mean you're in search of other hearts, and that you know he feels the same way too. That everything is out there, spoken and when it's like that, there's no need for thousands of explanations and finding excuses. 

I've learned that, even if he finds another girl, I don't have to take it out on her or him [and thankfully, I didn't]. 

And there were so many more lessons I've been given to learn...

Life suddenly becomes so beautiful when you let your mind accept the possibility that someone may not like you as much as you like them, and it's ok to hurt, but you have to move on. I mean, after all, aren't you curious to see what life has in store for you? You never know, in your quest to learning all lessons life has to offer, you might even meet your soulmate. Yep, when you least expect it. Wouldn't it be horrifying to get old and die without having at least tried to open your mind to this possibility? 

Every experience brings a lesson along. A lesson given by God/Universe/Nature to make us grow spiritually and find our inner light. Discover who we are and what is our role here. When we'll no longer frown at the idea that we're here to learn and evolve spiritually, we'll live a better life, where our hearts will always sing a joyful song. 

Which brings me to my last subject for today: MUSIC. ♫ No matter how much I'd write about that, I would never feel that's enough. To sum it up, I just feel my life would make no sense without this infinity of tonalities, sounds, rhythms, beats and notes. Am I wrong to think that even you, my friend, feel the same way? :) I guess I'm not. Everyone loves music. Of course, someone loves a certain kind of tonality and rhythm, some other loves a totally different one. But that's just question of taste, as they say. To me, it's more like a question of how much you identify with a certain kind of tonality, beat, sound. If it "strikes a chord" in you, to put it musically. If it touches your heart in such an unexplainable way, that you wish you'd invented that combination of sounds and beats. If it speaks to your soul in magical ways. 

To me, Music and Love are directly connected. Real music is made out of love. Whether out of love for a specific human being, or out of love for the entire humanity and the nature. Anything outside of that is not music to my ears, for it disturbs the heart, it annoys the mind and it destroys the soul. Why? Because it doesn't bring peace to any of them. [But that's just me.]

You see...in the end, it all boils down to LOVE, PEACE AND MUSIC.


If you're not at peace with yourself and the human beings around you, if you're always mad, constantly seeking revenge and enjoying hurting others, then you don't let love install into your heart, soul and mind. If you don't have love, you can't hear the music of your heart, and most certainly can't feel the music of other people's hearts, so you cannot enjoy the beauty and the magic of life.

Yeah, the magic of life. Don't miss it.






*DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the pictures above. All the rights belong to their respectful owners.

That little voice inside

She knew she didn't know how to handle the language that well... so, she made a habit of observing what her friends tweeted to one another, and chose not to write anything back, for fear of not making a complete fool out of herself. Often there were jokes told, and God! how she wanted to reply with a joke which she was sure would have made her friends burst into laughter! Or at least she hoped so. Yet she was sitting there numb, eyes fixed on the desktop computer, wishing so badly she had been born in an English-speaking country! It didn't even matter to her that just a few months ago, she was in a neighbor-country translating for the FDA, and they didn't complain. Nope... she was staring at her Twitter page, as if she was frozen in time, convinced that her English knowledge equals ZERO and that nothing she'd say would make sense anyway. 

The thing is she's always had a problem when it came to self-esteem. And that problem dated from way back when she was a teenager. All the success she's had in her extra-curricular activities -whether singing at the Children's Club and the Church choir or participating at some school competition seemed to annoy her classmates, which never hesitated in making her feel unwanted and uncool, and never missed a chance to humiliate her for the most childish reasons. When in fact she was hardly the nerd type. She would only have greater marks at her favorite subjects.  She was just an ordinary student. But today, she was still feeling the same pain inside like it was 1996, on that warm day of spring when she was in her 7th grade, just after having won that 1st prize at the National Human Rights Competition, held in the southern part of the country. She'd made her school (located on the opposite part of the country)  famous, yet she had no expectations, and absolutely no idea of what she'd had done for the school. Of course, teachers congratulated her and someone wrote some article in the local newspaper, but it wasn't until later on, sometime in 2003, that she found out there was a photo of herself in the school's hallway, just as you enter the school. To her, none of this attention really mattered. She was just a child with a dream. And winning that prize changed nothing in her heart, she was still as sociable and friendly as she'd been before the whole contest thing. Only this time, everyone around her changed. And not for the better. Whether the change took the form of friends who would smile in her face, but tell lies to others behind her back, or children seeking to befriend her so that she could help them with the homework and then forget she ever existed, the change happened nonetheless. And it made her wish she hadn't participated in that freaking contest in the first place. :( She would've helped them with the homework anyway, as she had done so many times before. But her heart could not take in all that rancour. 

[...]

 So she took this pain and had some more added on top of it in high school, then in college, up to later on at work, and she carried all this amount of pain throughout the years, thinking she's never good enough for this world, that nothing she will say or do will ever even be necessary to this Planet. That all the love she has to spread is unimportant and definitely not welcome. Hence, a great amount of low self-esteem. The ever present need to apologize for every minor thing she feels might bother or upset people. The need to feel accepted before making a decision and embarking on a journey towards whatever it is that she has in mind to do with her life.

Fortunately, experience along with some wonderful people, life, fate and even herself came up with answers, and as time went by, things took a favourable turn. But she's still not completely healed. She needs to learn more. She needs to take action. She needs to stop taking every silly little thing to heart. She needs to stop waiting for the fairytale life, the fairytale love, the fairytale friends. And she definitely needs to stop staring incontrollably at this Twitter page. She needs to stop worrying and let the tiny voice inside her head do the talking for her, at least this one time. [...]

'So go on girl, write whatever joke's coming through your mind. As long as it's not obscene. LOL. Just write like the wind, as Stephanie would say. :) Don't worry about the consequences. The worst kind of loss is losing your true self. Which you know you don't want to do. And stop asking yourself what they would say. You're not in 7th grade anymore. This is different. In the best way kind of different. You might not have the best English out there, but they got it so far, so I guess it's ok. This is Bean's family, no reason to worry.'

Guess it wouldn't hurt if she listened to the tiny lil' voice in her head from time to time.

Confusion

An unexpected feeling 

Growing in my heart...

But I need to stop dreaming

Before I fall apart.

Causing pain to my friends

Has never been my fun...

So this is where it all ends,

Before it has begun.