i like my men like i like my coffee: puerto rican!
gold star for first person who can identify what movie that quote is from (use the comments feature, people, it's there for a reason!).

i've been really into whiney boy music lately: gavin degraw, rufus wainwright, the shins. that sucks! guys need to fucking suck it up and be men. dammit. kidding, of course. i'm so not about machismo/patriarchy/male-domination/gender roles. but whining is really the last straw.

sometimes i see movies about artists/musicians/geniuses and i can't figure out how they are married and have children. how do these people have the time to cultivate a relationship and spend time with their families when their lives are so absorbed by their work? regan pointed out that people are just attracted to people who are intensely driven by something. i can definitely understand that; i think i've been there. but how do you separate the artist from the man? is it possible to do that? are they two different beings? can you stop yourself from falling into the trap of loving the artist instead of the man?

i guess it starts when you're young: you have crushes on celebrities, boy bands, teen tv stars. and then when you grow up a little, you want to find heroes. and then you actually start to meet heroes: people who are your age who are doing truly remarkable things. and they've got that thing, that fire inside, for lack of a better cliche. they're the most, the best, The (fill in the blank) that you've ever met. and you can't help but admire them.

maybe there's more than that. maybe there's that attraction, whether immediate or accumulated over time. you engage in passionate conversation, you see the spark in the person's eyes when discussing their life obsession, their voice elevates, they gesture with emotion. you see the flicker of worry on their face, unsure if they have overwhelmed you with things that they are immersed in at all moments of the day. you share your own ideas, passions, what makes you angry, what makes you laugh, your ambitions.

and there's this awesome moment that is difficult to catch, but so precious if you can notice it. you see the person integrating you into their schema of the world. you see them processing you as a whole person, bit by bit. of course they don't realize you are doing the exact same thing as well. but you are doing it too. and at that moment, you know there's going to be a lot more than this.