What do you do when a tall, dark and extremely handsome young man keeps coming into your life like a sweet nightmare. One that makes your heart race like his touch, but has your skin crawling under his evanescent body language. There's a disconnect between either a want and a need or a longing and a fear.

Speak the same tongue I ask, because right now your eyes are whispering breaths of promise, breaths of hope- while your feet dance a distant step away from this place. Your eyes are soft and calm amidst a face of definite angularity. A humor so contagious it masks the hardened shadow of pain. And an embrace terribly gentle that the nature of your passion is washed away by its warmth.

I often fall asleep with the hope that this nightmare will go away. That the beast it feeds on will be nullified. But without my nightmare, without my tears, there would be no longing. There would be no fight. His eyes are a rich with compassion and his heart is full of selflessness. And although he may not see me for what I would like, he's still my sweet nightmare.

The dew basked in the morning sun and its gentle rays. The grass burned a lushes emerald of shelter. The morning was bright extravagantly modest, but lovely. Wrapped in a blanket made of fleece I stepped out onto the porch, my coffee rich in hand. I gazed out onto the lake as a single wave rushed to the walls shore; and as the movement subsided I took a deep breath. I am here. There is nothing I can change. Nothing I can fix.

The morning stands open and the sky lets out a gasp of. My day begins now. So as my mug sits still in my interlaced hands, I sigh heavily, reach around to the blanket that hits the floor behind me and walk back into my life.

One fine day we will all grow old. For some, that old, comes sooner rather than later - stolen in an instant like the sweetness from an empty cookie car. For others, their skin will have wrinkled with the age of wisdom and anger. Fallen from its tight placement years ago, to a drooping painting of skin and lackless muscle. One fine day we will all grow old. In that day, I hope I will have caused laughter in the lives of many, tears in the eyes of few and a shadow that lasts years past my day. I want my parents to be proud of who they've raised; to take the lessons they've given me and instill them in my own life, my own children. I want to have made a name for myself somewhere where it means something. A place like the house I build from wood, with shutters of security and a design of balance. It will be a present to my children - a scrapbook to their souls. Their stories will be written in the cracks of the floor panes. Secrets will have swept sweetly out the cracks in the windows. Family dinners will be the place of fights, but also the place of forgiveness.

One fine day we will all grow old. But one fine day I'll be ready.

Because when I wake up in your arms, the sun warming my face like a spring afternoon, I know there is no place I’d rather be. As my lips trace the sure lines of yours as if they are etched directly into my memory, there is no doubt this is home. I don't ask for much. Shelter for my deepest thoughts and trust built on the reality that you hold my secrets in your hands. When it rains at night and the air smells a sort of wonderful sweetness, I want to fall asleep in the arms of someone I love. When it's cold outside and snow's covered the hardened ground, I want to sit in front of a fireplace blanketed by the warmth of a friend and good drink. When I've had a bad day, when I don't feel like talking, I want silence in the form of companionship. When the autumn air is crisp, the leaves are falling and shadows hang heavy in the afternoon sun, I want to walk holding hands discussing life or discussing nothing at all.

I want to love in the wake of the morning and in the darkness of my sleep. I don't ask for much, really, I only ask for a love I believe in.

So I've started what I hope to be my first novel. Ambitious. I know. But if not for ambitions people would not create and invent and fix wonderful things. Will it ever be a published novel? i don't know. But it will be my novel. And that's all that matters to me. Therefore, below you will find the beginnings of my ambitions.

THE ONE

Introduction

For all one knows it was the way the lights gently glistened through their snow covered bodies or how her hand felt nestled in his tweed coat pocket. Whatever it was though, Lily had come to wonder if she would ever find "The One." You know, the heart stopping, butterfly giving, man; with shiny blue eyes, rich brown hair, and a ravishing face. And I suppose defined jaw line and all, because if we're going for the gold, he better have it all. But maybe that was Lily's problem. She had fabricated this image, this story, when she was just a little girl, that at 28 it was so deeply ingrained she couldn't seem to shake it.

Benjamin was none of those. Not that he wasn't handsome. Lily likes to say he has "character." And it isn't that she isn't attracted to him (according to her, the sex was too good for that). Besides, he made a decent amount of money. Not in the way of extravagence, but enough to live above the simple comforts. Ben was sweet too. Honestly. He was everything you could ask for: a family man, ready to settle down, annoyingly attentive, had impeccible taste....you get where I'm going with this. Nevertheless - Lily was convinced he was not "The One."

Chapter 1

Ever since I was young I told myself I wouldn't settle. Not in my education, not in love, and definently not in life. It wasn't that I thought I was singularly special or that I deserved more than anyone else. I was just particular. Particular about the life I wanted, what I wanted to do with it and where I wanted to be at certain moments within it. Not to mention I befittinely blame the long list of fairytale movies and novels that increasingly stacked up the walls in my room since the age of three for my pathetic notion of love. In those books every "I" was dotted with a heart and every "T" crossed with an arrow. Those authors were asking for trouble - and a generation of women waiting for their Knight in Shining Armor, restlessly.

He was to be handsome, charming, and attentive. His eyes would sparkle when he gazed at you. He would crave you every moment of the day, leaving it virtually unbearable to be away. And most importantly, he would be able to give you everything you wanted - ever. Yadda, yadda, yadda. Well after years of dating multiple men, with many different approaches to a relationship, not one has fit the bill. He was either strikingly beautiful, but missing a personality. Like talking to your dog (although I must admit I do that and sometimes Dmitri was a better conversationalist). Or he wasn't all a girl could ask for in the way of looks, but he made me laugh and I was hardly ever bored. The worst though were the ones that had it all. I mean the ones whose skin glowed in the night light, his bodyirresitable, charm to knock you off yoru chair, a heart and personality so full you'd think he'd explode, and an undying need to please you whenever, with whatever. What he didn't know, was that although he thought he was doing all the pleasing, in bed he was the farthest from it. The sex was unbearable. It was awkard and lust-lacking (I fake it pretty well). Not to mention you'd think a guy of his size could toss ya around a little bit; but no, never even tried. And for awhile I let it slide, because come on, he had it ALL. I thought I could teach him. Direct him. I was wrong. And so, I continued on my journey to find my fariy tale.

Chapter 2

It was early evening on a biting November day. I had just finished my proposal and sat, people watching, at my favorite coffee shop in town. SaDi's was my place. Every since I moved to Boston it's been my go to: rich mahogany built in book shelves, low mellow lighting and an aroma that could calm a hurricane to a still ocean. It acts as the place where I feel at home, while remembering that nothing is home like the Midwest. Anyway, as I sat there watching men and women saunter in and out of my space, imagining what their lives were like, a young man traipsed through the door. His cheeks were red - bitten by the cold we were experiencing - and his hair wind blown into a surprisingly attractive arrangement. He scanned the room as if looking for someone before finding his way to the counter where he stared unknowingly at the drink menu. Lost in thought or lost in general, he was still a pleasure to look at.

Our stores are splattered with self-help products, magazines and diet supplements. Noise crowds our days about being someone other than who we are. Remove the birthmark that glides across the crescent of your cheek bone, because it defines who you are and we don't like it. Lose ten pounds from your belly alone with this amazing tasteless diet, in which we claim you can eat whatever you want as long as it doesn't have sugar, carbs or flavor. Mask your insecurities with Dr. Tit's amazingly real, fake breasts; 100% guarantee that never again will a man forget what he's looking at, but you will always remember why you wasted money on the shadowing of one insecurity by another.

The nation we live in asks us to define ourselves by the strengths we have, all while projecting a corrupt definition of what "freedom of will" really is. We breathe air tainted with money and success and exhale ourselves in return. Our roads are paved with gold, but that gold's been stolen by your neighbor.

dress me up or dress me down, but our nation will say neither is correct

I know far too little about politics and the go-arounds of the political beast, so although this post may dive into questions many often ask about our government and the shadow they cast on our society, it is in fact a reflection on my experiences in a Special Education program. Nevertheless, writing is to be taken in and out of context, so do with it what you please

Although our nation's proclamations follow a line of tolerance and diversity, we live in a world of conformity built on narrow-mindedness. Our faces remain painted in the wake of each sunrise and our shadows sleep silently beside us in our beds. Thoughts and ideas that find their way outside the constraints of our government and social media sink beneath the soil. Voices remain unheard - silenced by our drive to Americanize a nation of a hardened melting pot. Languages of all types slice through our open air, only to leave the acceptance of one. Where then we do reap the benefits of the freedom we sow? When do we really get to sing the praises of our free nation?

And so she says her souls been taken; by a ghost of nights long passed. He held her by the shoulders she said and took it from her back. And as she watched it slip away, she asked the ghost his name. He told her that he didn't know, but now they were the same. For with each breath he stole from her, the more alive it turned. Then finally he faced her, and said with no concern:

I've taken all that you posses and it shall never be returned.

Welcome to a place where mistakes are made, fears are expressed, dreams are dreamt and stories are told. I created Ancora Imparo as a place where I can come at the end of the day to write about the world we question, craft the worlds we hope for and empty my thoughts through the expression of language. I welcome you to share my world, but I don't ask it of you. This place is for me - perhaps it will be a place for you too...