Predictable Love Stories

I saw New Moon for the second time today! (TEAM JACOB <3) I went with Kathleen (my eighteen-year-old cousin) and Lizzy (my thirteen-year-old sister). Lizzy liked it okay, but it was kind of intense for her and she had trouble following the story. *shrug-sigh* Kathleen really liked it.

It was good the second time, but SOO infinitely much better the first. There's nothing like seeing a good movie for the first time. All the lines hit you, and you don't know what's going to happen next. Jacob's line that almost made me bawl the first time didn't bring tears to my eyes this time around. Still, it was good. I don't really want to see it again for a while, but it was good.

Keeping with the theme of love stories, I'd like to talk about something I've been thinking about lately: predictability in romances.

Let's face it: you can pretty much tell who will end up with whom ten minutes into a movie, or four chapters into a book. The average girl and the new guy. The new girl and the bad boy. The rocker and the ballet dancer. The human and the vampire :) We still like the stories and movies, but we often sigh at how obvious the outcome is.

One of my personal goals is to write an unpredictable romance. But then I got to thinking...

That would kind of suck.

I mean, we all clamber for some surprises, and surprises are great, but wouldn't you feel bummed if the main character suddenly ditched the crowd favorite went with the underdog? Some of you scream "NO!". But think about it. Some characters were just obviously meant to be together, and you'd be ticked off it the plot messed that up.

Star Wars: Han Solo and Leia. JUST KIDDING, Leia decides to marry Lando Calrissian instead.
Twilight: Edward and Bella. Edward changes his mind and ends up with Jane Volturi.
Cinderella: Cinderella and Prince Charming. Prince Charming ditches Cinderella and marries Drusilla.
You've Got Mail: Kathleen Kelly and Joe Fox. Kathleen decides that Joe's not for her and sticks with Frank.

...wouldn't all that kind of SUCK?

Of course, there are some movies that don't end like we expect them to (Casablanca, Gone With the Wind) and they're still good and famous. But we do feel sort of bummed after seeing them for the first time.

I guess my point is, we complain about predictability, but if anyone ever really writes or films a completely unpredictable story, you leave the theater with a curled lip muttering about how crappy it was.

I think we as humans like predictability, whether we like to admit it or not.

So, my challenge to write an unpredictable love story just got that much more challenging:

Write an unpredictable love story that people LIKE.

:)

(INSERT STRONG ADJECTIVE) DREAM. READ.

I know it's "50 Word Friday", but I...it's a holiday? Lol, I gotta say more than 50 words.

But I'll put the poem, of course :)

It might be funny.
It might be wise.
A comment about living,
Or someone’s demise.

It might be scary. Or even something gross.
Maybe something personal
Or something quite morose.

My posts are typically long;
Your eyes soon float away.
So once a week for you,
here’s 50 WORD FRIDAY

(count 'em, it's 50 words XD)

Basically, I woke up from a HORRIBLE dream, went shopping with my cousins, ate potato soup, and watched a REALLY good movie: "The Hunchback of Notre Dame". Wow, that is such a deep and symbolic kid's movie! I was really impressed and I couldn't stop watching. It's definitely a new favorite!! I actually might like it better than my three-year favorite, Aladin...

So, I know you want to hear about my awful dream. No? Well, stop reading right here, then 'cause I'm gonna tell you :P

The dream I'm about to tell you is vivid, thought-provoking, personal and other stuff. I'd love it if you read it, it's something I felt like sharing.

Some of you may know that I love nightmares. The thrill, the excitement, the ability to have terrifying, near-death experiences and wake up perfectly safe! I love it!

I did not love this nightmare.

It incorporated everything I'm afraid of, and some things I didn't know I feared. You know what I'm most afraid of, right? Forgetting, losing people I love,being helpless and (lol) guys screaming. Imagine a dream with all of that.

You don't have to imagine long because I'm going to tell you.

I don't remember how the dream started, or what led up to the part I remember. I was in a boarding school "ruled" by an evil group of people who were plotting something horrible. At the heart of the evil was a lady. She was a mix between Helga from the Sweet Life of Zach and Cody, Michelle Pfeiffer and that evil lady in the newest Indiana Jones. She was most like the last.

I don't remember, or maybe I never knew, what the "evil thing" was that the school board was planning. I do remember that I began to tell my closest friends that there was danger. I told them about it, and about what we had to do. We formed a secret alliance against the evil school board. Before long, my small circle of girl friends began to include some of my closer guy friends as well. We never did anything, but it felt good to know that I had friends who knew the "truth".

It wasn't long before we were found out. I don't remember how it happened, but I remember the evil lady, let's call her the Queen, discovered me, and only me. She tried to make me tell her who I had confided in. I refused, but she tried to get it out of me through horrible methods that I don't quite remember. I never told her, but she found out somehow anyway.

She shoved me and the other girls into one car and the boys in another and started driving us somewhere. I've never experienced fear like that before. It wasn't a brave fear at all. I can't say that I would have saved my friends if I'd had the chance. I'd had some terrible things happen to me at that point, and heard of even worse. The fear wasn't a feeling, it was something stronger, something in my brain and in my blood. Something that was pounding me, not just lurking in the back of my mind. It was an ever-present terror.

The cars stopped at the edge of a cliff. The Queen got out and went over to the boys' car. That driver got out and they consulted. Then the boys were drug out.

Up until now, I've played it more or less cool. I've at least tried to be calm and witty (think Max from "Maximum Ride") even when I was screaming inside. This was my breaking point. I'm getting chills all over again just thinking about it. I saw the boys, looking scared and...just scared. I knew it was my fault they were here, in trouble, and I also knew I didn't have the courage to do anything. I started crying.

Daniel was suddenly in the car with us, watching me. I knew he was there, but it was almost like he wasn't. I didn't acknowledge him, but it might have been because I was sobbing too hard.

There were five boys that I had gotten in trouble: Josh (the Nice Guy from my class), Ben (the Dare Devil from my class), Taylor (Brain Half), and Taylor's younger brother, Matthew. One of them was put on this catapult thing, and flung off the cliff into the water! I screamed. One after the other, the boys were flung over the cliff and into the water. I was screaming and going crazy. My friends were dying before my eyes, because of ME.

I watched the boys struggling in the water. Then, Taylor suddenly stood up. "Hey, we're on land!" he shouted. He even snickered. The water was only a few feet deep.

The Queen seemed upset at this, and ordered the boys brought back into their car. They would have to be disposed of in some other way.

The Queen got back in our car, and whatever momentary relief I had experienced was gone. She was going to kill us, kill us all, and not by drowning apparently. Something worse. I didn't want to die, but knowing she'd have something incredibly painful in mind made the fear almost suffocating.

"Do you remember your friend Rochelle?" the Queen asked as we drove. (Yeah, you, Rochelle. Freaky, right? *shudder*) Rochelle was a girl that had been at the boarding school with me, one of my closest friends that I had told the "truth" to. I felt my heart stop. Rochelle. Oh my gosh.

I had actually forgotten her. My closest friend, I had forgotten her.

"Yes," I breathed, terrified of where the conversation was going. "I remember her. Wh...what did you do to her?"

The Queen smirked. "I beat her up."

I swallowed hard. "And then you sent her back home?"

The Queen's lip curled. "When I was finished with her, there wasn't enough of her left to send."

My blood ran cold. Being beaten to death. Can you all imagine that? That fate was never on my list of most horrible ways to die until the Queen said that. Beaten to death. Fists pounding you, feet kicking you, maybe even knives used. You're bleeding and hurting, someone striking you over and over in the same places. It's just pain, pain and helplessness wrapped in terror and begging for mercy.

"No!" I cried, leaning up in my seat in the car. "Wh...how are you going to kill me?"

The Queen smiled. "I'm not going to tell you."

Up until that point, I hadn't really thought I would die. I've never been concerned with dying. I've never thought I would until I was ready. I'm part of a story, I always thought.

People don't die in the middle of their own stories.

But they do.

Do you realize how horrible that realization was for me? Like a punch in the stomach, all the sudden death was very real to me. I stopped figuring I'd get saved, I started really contemplating death. I stopped assuming I could talk my way out of things. I stopped hoping.

I know this is going to sound sexist, ESPECIALLY coming from me, but I never, ever thought I could fear a woman that much. I've never been more afraid of anyone or anything in the world than I was of the Queen at that moment. I never thought a woman could scare me. I always thought I could take them out as easy as anything. I'm definitely not a weakling.

But I realized it's not muscle that can be the most frightening, it's power. Muscles are a FORM of power, but it's power that scares us all. We fear those who have more power than we do, more power over US than we do.

That's what fear IS, you guys. It's when something is controlling us more than we are controlling ourselves.

"Please tell me!" I begged of the Queen, clasping my hands. "Please tell me how you're going to kill me!"

The Queen laughed, enjoying my helplessness as she drove us down the road. "I will not tell you."

"Please, I'm begging!" I cried, my eyes wide with fear. "Please, please!"

All the sudden, I attacked. I grabbed her neck and started pressing. I learned in seventh grade that if you rub some artery in a person's neck, they'll pass out. I rubbed hard, but she didn't pass out, she just talked into her watching, calling for back up!

New fear seized me. The Queen was too powerful! Even if I could defeat her, there were more men on the way! I couldn't run from them, and I sure as heck couldn't fight them all off!

I threw my weight against the Queen, wrestling. The car swerved and ran off the road. I was barely harming the Queen at all. The car stopped by the side of the road and the Queen opened the door. I was still grappling with her and we both fell out the door.

I tried everything I could remember. I kicked her in the side, I jabbed at her windpipe, trying to collapse it or something. She laughed. She was laughing at me!

"You get all these silly tricks from the experts," she chuckled. "But we only tell you what we want you to know. None of those self-defense tricks really work."

None of them work? That was all I could take. I stopped fighting. I was completely defeated. There wasn't even a chance of being rescued by some guy friend--I had made darn sure of that, getting them all carted off somewhere else!

I was powerless.

I was defenseless.

I was alone.

And then I woke up.

Deep stuff right there, y'all. I was only a dream, but very helpful in analyzing myself. My deepest fears were pulled to the surface, my reactions in different situations revealed, my courage and wit tested.

I sort of failed.

And I now realize I CAN die. People DO die in the middle of their stories.

Life is not a novel, Kendra. Life is real.

At any rate, every bit as real as Death.

Control

Thanks for following, Eruanna!!!
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So, I'm trying to decide if I want to ditch the schedule thing. I dunno. I made a poll about it, so if you want, you can vote about it. For today, at least, I'm going to skip Advice Day and just post something I've been thinking about:

Control.

It might be like this for everyone, but I've been thinking a lot about how I am deep down, what I want deep down, how I feel deep down, and you know what it all comes down to? Control. I like to be in control; I hate it when I am not.

Think about my top three fears. What do I say they are?

#1: Losing people close to me
#2: Disease
#3: Change

What do those three things all revolve around? Me not being in control.

Remember how I said that episode of Alias freaked me out a couple of days ago? Because it was about a creepy insane asylum?

As I laid in bed that night, I tried to figure out why it scared me. (That's another control-freak-y thing about myself. There is a reason for everything, and I have to know what it is.)

I was kind of disgusted with myself. Kendra: not afraid of blood or needles or death or panic, but freaked out by people with mental problems?? Not only is it a bit embarassing, it's mean! I felt horrible as I realized that I didn't want to be around or think about people who were crazy (really crazy, not the fun kind of crazy). It was judgmental and wrong, but the deep-seated terror remained.

I thought about it for a while. Why does that scare me? What about crazy people is so terrifying and unsettling to me? Other people I know don't have a problem with this. I decided to take it one step at a time.

Crazy people are not masters of their own minds. That freaks me out. But why?

Crazy people see, hear, and feel things that are not there, that are not real. Freaky again. But why?

Crazy people see, hear and feel things that I cannot see, hear or feel. Now we're getting somewhere. It bothers me that they experience things that I don't. Why does that bother me?

If I can't see it, I can't stop it. Ah, getting even farther! But what they see doesn't bother me, so why should I care that I can't see it? I'm not this amazing person who only wants to see imaginary things to help the person.

Back to the people not being able to control their own minds. No matter how much I DO NOT see what they see, crazy people still see/hear/feel things that aren't there, and I cannot convince them otherwise. Big AH-HA moment.

What is so terrifying to me about crazy people?

I cannot persuade crazy people.

Yeah. Wow.

I feel like I can usually convince people of what I want, but crazy people don't appeal to reason, to logic. Reason, truth, and logic mean nothing to them. They believe what they see, and I can't see what they see, so I can't use it to persuade them.

Basically, it circles back to Control. I like control. When I'm not in control, I freak out. I can't persuade (control) crazy people, and it scares me.

I can't control when I lose people. That scares me.
I can't control disease. That scares me.
I can't control change. That scares me.

When it all comes down to it, my life is just about control. Either I have it, and I'm using it, or I don't have it, and I'm trying to gain it.

I believe this is why I have such a hard time with my faith. God is in control, not me, and that's hard for me.

What is your life all about? As complex as people are, I'm beginning to think that deep down, we're simpler than I thought.

Philosophical Questions

Okay. Forget book-bot. Not workin' for me anymore. I'm just gonna blog about life now. :D

Okaaaay. Don't know what to say. Which isn't usually a problem for me in person. I tend to talk a LOT.

Okay, for lack of a better thing to do right now, I'm going to do a fill-out thingie about myself. Wait, wait, wait! Before you scroll back up, this isn't a typical fill-out. We're studying philosophy, and well, I love it!! So, here's a philosophical fill out! :)

1. Prove you are alive. "I think therefore I am." --Rene Descartes

2. Where do your thoughts come from? This is definitely a tough one. Technically, my head. But what goes on in there to make me think what I think?? My thoughts can come from myself, or they can be God influenced.

3. Who or what influences you the most in life? My parents, my friends, what I hear in music, what I read, God occasionally (I'm trying to get better at that). Number one would have to be...a tie between my parents and friends. VERY close second is what I read. I love to read. Books affect me a lot.

4. Do you think about WHY you do what you do, or do you just do what everyone else does? I definitely think about WHY. It's a big problem for me. I analyze things to death :)

5. What do you want to accomplish in life? I definitely want to get a book published!! And have a family. Become a stronger Christian. Become a lawyer.

6. Do you think you know more than most people, or less? More than a lot of kids my age, less than some. It's hard to say. Most people on Earth are older than I am, so they obviously know more than I do. For a person my age, though, I would say I'm fairly up-there. I hope you don't think I'll all stuck up, though, lol!

7. Are you confident that you can discern the truth? I sure hope so. But who can really know the truth in some matters until judgement day?

Well, that was me in about seven questions :) Hope you're not asleep on the keyboard :)