I Think I'm Gonna Like It Here

"To a superior race of being the pretensions of mankind to extraordinary sanctity and virtue must seem... ridiculous."
-William Hazlitt

Here are just a few things I will miss (not) about Provo. That is, when the blessed day that I extricate myself finally arrives...

1) V-necks and skinny jeans. On grown-ass men. How do they... nevermind. I don't even want to think about how they accommodate themselves into the geometry of the skinny jean. And enough with the man-cleave. Your poor dads.

2) Guys who don't know their shit's weak. Basically, almost every guy being "That" guy.

3) Sword and Quill club at BYU.

4) Snow

5) Snow

6) Snow

7) No legit Mexican restaurants, except for La Casita. But that's in Springville, so... Noted.

8) Girls who wear Nikes with every every every outfit. I.e.: BYU Sweatshirt, BYU sweatpants, Nikes; floral 90's blouse, jeans, Nikes; Lacy bottom-trimmed camisole, White V-Neck T-Shirt, jean skirt, Nikes. Gruesome.

9) The filth that is commonly referred to as Fry Sauce. AKA pink mayo. Can we not?

10) No Dunkin' Donuts! WTF.

11) The tweaker girls that work at Crest on 9th (I will however, miss the Crest gas stations themselves. Gems.)

12) Utah drivers. And this is from me, who took three tries to get licensed in the great state of CA.

13) P.P.D. aka Provo Police. Really? You take your job THAT seriously?

14) The weirdo rapist creepy As that talk to themselves riding the 832 and only have four teeth.

15) "Could care less"

16) Hipsters* (*see #1 and #28 for more information)

17) Being afraid to visit the Sev because of being mobbed by All-Stars. FYI: You're 39. You mayyyy want to think about making some life choices. (Related: #24)

18) The unbelievably relentless toolishness of University Towing- who is solely responsible for my fear of parking anywhere in the U.S. that is not my driveway.

19) Snow

20) The sheer audacity of Utah breds referring to Utah lake as "The Beach." For real?

21) No beach.

22) Utah Dating on Demand. Classic.

23) Shandies. You know who you are.

24) The most prolific trend/epidemic being douche-baggery- any and all forms. (Related: #28)

25) Snow

26) Having to break for DEER. Go. Back. To the mountain. Before I have my brother shoot your face.

27) The unparalleled ineptness of the natives- which can probably be attributed to delayed aftermath of polygamy. Mabes. Haha. I'm sorry, so because you "don't work in produce", does that mean that you are physically unable or forbidden to retrieve me a box from the warehouse, or that you are mentally unable/therefore forbidden to retrieve me a box from the warehouse? Ah. Sorry. Didn't mean to give you an aneurysm by assuming you knew how to... cerebrate.

28) Oh! The slaughtering of anything and everything sacredly legit. Like, let me see... music for instance. Let me run through the tragical process with you:

-Step 1: "Exhibit A" (i.e. a song, a band, a clothing item, a movie, or, most recently, a restaurant, etc.) reaps "dope" status in California.
-Step 2: Rumor of "Exhibit A" makes it's way to Utah, sometimes months or even years later.
-Step Threeve: A Mormo gets wind of "Exhibit A" and smothers it.
-Step 4: Said Mormo then proliferates "Exhibit A"'s exposure by bearing their testimony about it. As everyone knows, once one Mormo gets ahold of something they like, it's only a matter of time before it's a Mormon Sensation. Thus leading directly to...
-Step 5: The whole Mormo population smothering and strangling and raping and pillaging and annihilating and pulverizing and stripping the legitimacy out of once sacred "Exhibit A".
-Step 6: "Exhibit A" has now become and will forever remain... just one of the many, many components of douchebaggery.
And so ends the once sacredly legit status of "Exhibit A". We will miss you. R.I.P.

29er) Having to drive forty minutes for a semi-satisfying shopping experience. So not ideal.

30) Snow

31) BYU couples. You're gross.

Thanks P-Town. It's been real. Peace and Love.

A Thing Called Love

"You know what's wrong with you?" -Audrey
"What?" -Cary
" [Enraptured sigh, slow batting of eyelashes] Nothing." -Audrey
- Charade

So try as I may to front, I cannot betray the true romanticism that lurks and simmers deep within my soul. I cannot say where this deep-seeded enamoration for enamoration began, but all I know is, it is there, and it is so much a part of me that denying it would be like denying the existence of my very own beating heart or pathetically asthmatic, ever-struggling lungs. On my dresser in a little frame is the William Shakespeare quote: "To thine own self be true." I see this six-syllabled B-slap-in-the-face every morning when I'm getting ready for the day and each morning renew my vow to follow it's quiet little imploration to embrace all that is Brittany. For someone as vitriolic as I can be, it is truly extraordinary that my heart can beat for anything lovely. Oh, but it does. And I'm not ashamed to admit that sometimes I find myself utterly intoxicated with the idea of that four-letter word we refer to as L-O-V-E.

Ever since I was little, I've been intrigued with the idea of falling in love, and that little fire of intrigue has not lost it's flame as I've grown into womanhood. Indeed, it's probably only burned more keenly. I think the underlying cause for this fascination lies in the sheer fact that I've never truly been in love. Not the kind that I've imagined about anyway. I love my parents, I love my sibs, I love cameos, I love Pepsi, and I've definitely been in incomplete-and-emotionally-draining-like with various people, but I've never, ever had the penetrating kind of romance that I've imagined about. So all I have to go off of are the resplendent enrapturations of others who have experienced what I've only devotedly wondered about- whether in music, or movies, or literature. {DISCLAIMER: I am WELL aware that all the aforementioned musings about love are merely contrived and artful attestions to appeal to the part within all of us that relishes in such- which is why we go see chick flicks in the first place... Anyway.} So, in the abysmal bleakness that is this season (Dear Utah, I hate you. Love, B.), I have nothing better to do than eat (another thing that I  four-letter-word) and blog about stuff that I know nothing about. In all my endless hours of filmage, reading, and hours and hours and hours of audiologically drinking-in my iTunes, I have compiled countless quotes about that little thing called Love that all describe, to some extent, why it is truly "all we need" (to quote them Beatles). In essence, each of these "testimonials" have played a part in constructing my admittedly whimsical ideal of what it means to be in love. I thought about categorizing them, since I'm an organize-aholic, and came up with the following categories:
-Bravery
-Submission to the throws of love
-Exquisite happiness
-Relinquishing of sensicalities
-The willingly possessed, belonging to one another
- Forever kind of love, eachother's beginning and end... aka On and on and on kinda love

But then I decided to forgo the categorization of something that really is probably very uncategorizable. So here they are. Try your best to fight off the nausea and if at all possible, refrain from the compelling desire to roll your eyes. For however ridiculous and impossible and whimsical these ideas may be, you can't deny that deep down, you wish they were true.

“Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more.”
- erika jong

"The fishermen know that the sea is dangerous and the storm terrible, but they have never found these dangers sufficient reason for remaining ashore."
-vincent Van gogh
(He had his heartbroken time after time... And he STILL had the balls to give it away again and again.)

"Widen your heart scope."
- the killers

"When you're too in love to let it go...But if you never try you'll never know... Just what you're worth."
-coldplay

“I will have poetry in my life. And adventure. And love. Love, above all. Not the artful postures of love, but the love that overthrows life. Un-biddable, ungovernable like a
riot in the heart and nothing to be done come ruin or rapture. Love as there has never been in a play. I will have love …”
-shakespeare in love

“I'm looking for love. Real love. Ridiculous, inconvenient, consuming, can't-live-without-each-other love.”

-carrie bradshaw

"open up my arms and fall...

Losing all control
Every dream inside my soul
... Kiss me
On that midnight street,
Sweep me off my feet
Singing ain't this life so sweet."
-david gray

"Take my hand, take my whole life too. For I can't help falling in love with you."

-The One, The Only

"You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love, I love, I love you. I never wish to be parted from you from this day on."
-mr. darcy

"You're the sweetest little woman I ever had."

-the rolling stones

"...completely, perfectly, and incandescently happy."
-eliza bennett

"A woman should be kissed and often, and by someone who knows how."
-rhett butler

"...something so like perfect happiness, that it could bear no other name..."
-Pride and Prejudice


"Lovers don't finally meet somewhere...
they're in each other all along."
-rumi

"...my highest ideal of earthly bliss."
-my girl, anne shirley

"...sweetest and best of all creatures, faultless in spite of all her faults..."

- mr. knightley

"I love you every way there is to love a man."
-nancy turner

"You got somethin' I want plenty of."
-Bob Dylan

"Each time you happen to me all over again."
-The Age of Innocence

"Too much of a good thing can be wonderful."

-mae west

And, correspondingly, maybe my favorite quote of all time:

"Nothing is too wonderful to be true."

-william faderly

"There is nothing more truly artistic than to love people."
-vincent Van gogh

"Love is a portion of the soul itself."

- victor hugo

"Let us be in love; let's do 'old and gray'".

-the killers

"Remember today, for it is the beginning of always. Today marks the start of a brave new future filled with all your dreams can hold. Think truly to the future and make all those dreams come true."

-dante alighieri

"The only way to know ourselves is to go too far."
- Jason Cruz

"So it's not gonna be easy. It's gonna be really hard. We're gonna have to work at this every day, but I want to do that because I want you. I want all of you, for ever, you and me, every day."

- noah calhoun

"I found a thrill to press my cheek to. "
-etta james

"And if you'll let me, I will keep you here inside the stars. I will love the sound of my sheets- oh, you have moved beneath them."
-rickie lee jones

"You touch me- I hear the sound of mandolins; you kiss me- with your kiss my life begins. You're spring to me; all things to me. You're life itself. Like a leaf clings to a tree, oh my darling- cling to me."
-Nina Simone

"'Sometimes' is never quite enough."
- alanis morissette

"Did you walk for the fear of love? Or, don't you believe enough? Well I'll cover us both- you can leave that to me."
-imogen heap

"Don't you know that I belong arm in arm with you, baby?"

-regina spektor

"I'd like to be the first white hair upon your head, your cherry pie, your daily bread. I'll cook for free, i'll make your bed...I'd like to be the owner of the zipper on your jeans... The beginning, the end, and everything in between. And be your slave, and be your queen."

-shakira

"No love, no glory." - damien rice

"She is loveliness itself."
-mr. knightley

"Wherever you're goin', i'm goin' your way."
- moonriver

"At your feet."

- marius to cosette, Les Miserables

 "Oh but if I had the stars from the darkest night, and the diamonds from the deepest ocean, I'd forsake them all for  your sweet kiss, for that's all I'm wishin' to be ownin'."
-Bob Dylan

"Moi je t'offrirai

Des perles de pluie

Venues de pays

Oþ il ne pleut pas

Je creuserai la terre

Jusqu'apr

Pour couvrir ton corps

D'or et de lumi

Je ferai un domaine

Oþ l'amour sera roi

Oþ l'amour sera loi

Oþ tu seras reine

ne me quitte pas"

-Nina Simone
(No, I don't speak the French. Howev, I am so intoxicated by this song, "Ne Me Quitte Pas", which, in English means, "Do Not Leave Me", that I Google translated the lyrics and this verse of the song was particularly lovely. It says something like, 'I will cover your body in gold and light... blah blah blah... Love is King and you are the Queen... Do not leave me.' Enchanting, right?)

"I believe in kissing- kissing a lot."
-Audrey Hepburn

Peace and L-O-V-E.