The Way You Should Love Someone 

By RYAN O’CONNELL

Love someone the second you get out of bed because it’s the hardest time to do so. The spell you built together all morning is broken and now you can decide whether or not you hate them. They are so vulnerable laying there with their little naked body under the covers, giving you hopeful stares. You could destroy them with a single glance if you wanted to. Please don’t though. Please choose to love them.

Love someone when they’re drunk and it looks like their face is melting and they’re stuffing food in their mouth, sauce dripping down the sides. Your body will recoil because you’ll think for a split second that you fell in love with an animal instead of an actual human being. They are so unattractive in that moment, so pathetic, so lost, like a loveless ape, but I want you to love them regardless because you know this isn’t who they really are and because it only takes three glasses of wine for a beautiful person to become ugly and that shouldn’t be enough to leave you cold. When you carry their heavy lifeless body to bed, look at them when they fall asleep and try to remember the person you adore. Please choose to love them.

Love someone when they’re insufferable, when they hate their job and hate their friends and seem to hate everything in their life except for you. You might lose respect for them, you might look at them as if they’re weak and can’t stand on their own two feet, but I want you to try to push those thoughts out of your brain because the fact is that this happens. People get stuck in their life and they look around and only see one thing that makes sense to them. It doesn’t make them weak or co-dependent, it just makes them human. Don’t fault them for things that are largely out of their control, don’t have your attraction hinge on how great their life seems to be going. Choose to love them.

Choose to love them when they say your least favorite word, choose to love them when they have a day when they need you more than usual, choose to love them when they smell like shit, choose to love them when they aren’t well, when they aren’t the able-bodied picture of beauty they were when they met you because people never stay the way you want them to. You should know that.

Growing up, I thought falling in love was just something people did to distract themselves from dying. It was like getting a tattoo; having a boyfriend or a girlfriend was a way of branding yourself and letting people know that you were valued and that you were important. There was something inside of you that made you better than the average person.

Now I know that, in many ways, I was right from the very beginning. But the kind of love I understood when I was younger is not necessarily the “correct” kind of love. That kind of love is paper-thin and it will wash away. However, every time you choose to love someone despite the bullshit, you are making it stronger, you are painting a fuller picture. By choosing to love, you are accepting the flaws and ugliness that comes along with something beautiful. You are understanding just how life works.

Fuck you Pixar :’(

So many nights have washed over me like hands of fate, call from far beyond any eternity in my dreams, that flows over me with gentle intent to join with what you know. Oh gods, you know how much we need each other that we scream and melt with tenderness.

Such a fine line we walk when we lose the difference between two worlds, that can hurt, that can heal in one breath. It could all be different but we never know for sure, as we scream “Fuck love!”, as we come.. come… Come for me to that bitter end. Please come back.

I love my friends because they are:
Intelligent, funny, beautiful, clever, artistic, happy, sad, brilliant, outgoing, introverted, depressed, excitable…

You’ll notice I didn’t use words like:
Skinny, fat, hairy, hot, ugly, gay, straight, bi, trans, blonde, brunette, black, white, mixed..

Some of them I’m sure would identify with some of these, and some of them I do myself.  But they’re not examples of how people should be described, they’re only examples of other peoples insecurities projected onto them out of fear and ignorance..

My friends are who they are in their hearts and minds, and I simply don’t care about aynthing else unless they’re trying to use it to hurt me or sway me.  But they wouldn’t do that…

Because we RESPECT each other.

Just wanted to share this picture of me and my boy Simon (left).
This was taken yesterday at Soundwave music festival, straight after Biohazard finished their set.

I met Simon on my 30th birthday and instantly loved the guy.  He and his ever so lovely counterpart Liz I’ve known for about 3 years I think and it just feels like forever, in that best possible way.  They’re both fun, caring, honest and loyal people and I love them dearly.

Simon, like myself is an old school metalhead.  We share very similar tastes and yesterday was really the first time we’ve totally let loose together at a show…
Front row and center for a band we both love, insane slam dancing and circle pit action happening right behind us!

I won’t tell every detail but basically we took advantage of every second to scream the lyrics, jump around, headbang and generally rock the fuck out with some of our heroes smiling down at our efforts and even capturing us on video.

Now I’ve seen Simes go off a little bit at shows before, but never like this.  After the chaos I could just look at my friend and tell how much fun it really was; his smile wider than I’ve ever seen, clothes drenched in sweat, out of breath, energy drained… and to my delight, presenting his fist clenched around Danny Schuler’s drum stick!  It was like a perfect moment in time just for us and I’ll never forget it.

Simey, I love you man and truly consider you my brother.  I’m so blessed to have you and Liz in my life, not only because I can’t see my own family very often but also because you have brought me so much joy and love regardless of how much of a bipolar buzz-kill I can be from time to time.  And I’m so glad we got to share this experience together.  I hope we have many more!

If you’re going to talk music with me and especially about a band I’m into, you should be prepared to sit for at least 30 minutes to hear my thoughts on their sound, their entire history, an analysis of their whole discography, pinpointing key moments of style change and/or progression, what I think they’re trying to say, and how their songs make me feel.

Music is interesting, important, vital and something I’m extremely passionate about.

whoeverthisisyeah:

This is how you make me feel!

Yep.

Noone can help who they love, and who the hell are we to judge?