Quote from tonight's episode: "Guns and liquor. What could go wrong?"

I was going to put a video up. But apparently, I need to learn how to work this...
To sum it up:
I hate today. Today is the 6 year anniversary of my dog's death.
I had a callback today.
Z Nation is on in... now.
I'm getting fall for the first time in nine years.
I turn 19 in less than two weeks.
And I want people to talk to me.

I'm on Twitter (@brookeaharding), Facebook (Brooke Harding), Instagram (sort of), and Tumblr (just-a-little-fangirl-love)

Send me something, anything, tell me about your day, about your dreams. Why you read this. Anything. Something. Ooh, and tell me what country you're from too.

Some clever something but I'm not sure what fits this...

As soon as I get the video up on my computer, I'll be putting up a video for today, not an actual post.
Also, I will get my post for Z Nation up eventually. It will only cover the first five episodes because [spoilers spoilers spoilers].

But, here! Have a picture from Z Nation!!!

Addy and Mack

Glorious.

I've been really hesitant to put another post up because this is my fiftieth one. That's kind of a big number to me. I dunno.
But I wish I could just transfer my emotions right now to all of you because there is no way that I'll be able to explain them well.
I'm excited. And terrified. And thrilled. And worried. And anticipating. And ready. So, so ready.

You can read about it in more detail on my other blog, Journey to Who: An American Actress. But I've landed my first acting role. Which I suppose is a momentous enough occasion to have it feature on my fiftieth post on here, the blog that started it all. I named my Tumblr after this blog, after all. This blog is the sum of my dreams and thoughts even when I can't admit them to other people and represents my secrets. The desire to soar freely, unfettered by the chains of the world. The exhilaration of doing something other people could only dream of. Freedom and joy, the two things I want most in this world. The night is my world and it is at night when others are filled with fear of the unknown that I most want my dreams, indeed when my dreaming is the most intense. Fear has no place in my life. Uncertainty is there only because I struggle with confidence (which is admittedly a bizarre thing for someone as proud as I am). The bird isn't afraid of the branch breaking beneath its weight; it trusts in its own ability to fly. And I do trust in my abilities in the moment.

I am Brooke Amber Harding. I am the sum of my ancestors and my own actions. I am the past, present, and future at once because of where I came from, what I am, and the infinite possibilities of where my line will go. I know where I'm from. I know some of what my ancestors had to do so that I would end up being where I am now. I'm a contradiction and I wouldn't change a single thing about me. It's taken me nearly five years to be comfortable in my skin. I've finally accepted the fact that I have a fairly large bosom and that's taken me...nearly eight years for that. I can be female and it is nothing to be ashamed of. I've finally let myself dream rather than just resignation over my role that I was supposed to play being female and LDS. It's okay for me to be my own person. It's okay for me to love even though I know that I'm the kind that will mate for life and that terrifies me. I know that I can find someone who will love me with all the imperfections that I love too because they keep me human. I'm not perfect and I've finally accepted that I don't have to be. We've always been taught in the LDS church to strive for perfection knowing that we cannot make it. And I tried to be perfect which resulted in me being less than acceptably imperfect. As long as I try to be the best I can be, that's all anyone can ask and what I think was what I was actually supposed to learn. I've learned to love myself, all of me. I won't ask for any more from my mate but I will ask for freedom to be true to my heart, which does not lie in being fettered. I will willingly submit as long as there is nothing forcing me to do so. It will be my choice. My story has been one of freedom suddenly restricted and at the faintest hint of freedom again, everything in me strains for it. Fiercely proud and independent, I want to see the depths of humanity, the good and the bad. There are no lukewarm feelings with me. They are either there with all the power of a hurricane or completely absent. This is me. I am an introverted dreamer and an extroverted doer and I exist as both.

But I'm not alone on my journey and I wouldn't want to be. I want to share my journey and my feelings with the people I care about. And people care about me. I've been blessed. And I hope that I've blessed others' lives.
But I won't apologize for being who I am, not when I'm finally comfortable with her.
It's been three years since this blog was started. And I've never been more amazed with how my life has gone. From a sophomore in high school to a freshman in college and hopefully beyond, you guys have been with me and hopefully you'll be with me in the future because even though I don't know who many of you are, I count you as my friends. Not my best friends because that place is incredibly difficult to reach. But you're my friends regardless and that means I care about you. Seriously, I'm totally cool with just chatting if you want to. Leave me a comment or something and tell me about your day. Because I honestly really do want to hear about it.

Ooh, ummm, here's a car. It's pretty. And you can look up that stats if you want.

But the really funny thing about this car, (Ferrari 458) is there's a recall for it right now because people are getting locked in the trunk and the only time the mechanism releases is when the car's in motion. Please keep in mind that the trunk is in the front of the car and do you see how much ground clearance that car has? I don't even want to know how people found that out nor do I want to know who got in trouble at Ferrari for this. Heehee.

I turn 19 in just over a month. That is terrifying. And I don't think I'll ever get over this adding years thing. And I'm either getting married in the next two years or I won't be getting married until I'm like thirty because that's how it works in my family. 

I feel like I come across as bossy and insensitive when in reality it hurts me when other people are in pain and I have to do whatever I can to make them feel better.

I'm very action-oriented. Actions definitely speak louder than words to me. Which, in retrospect, is why I never believe guys when they tell me they love me. Because their actions haven't told me so and so therefore their words must be lies. Ir's either a problem or it isn't. Not sure which right now.

Anyway, I am going to go do...I don't know. So have a fabulous day.

Ooh, I forgot to mention. Here's the link for Glorious by David Archuleta. Oh, my gosh. It's so beautiful. Watch it. Love it. It's so beautiful. And he's got dimples. It's not even fair.

Sociology, WHAT?

I really love my sociology class. It's absolutely fascinating, besides the fact that I don't think like most of the people in my class which could be the result of having a comparatively liberal upbringing and having lived in Las Vegas, AKA Sin City. But, whatever. I knew I wouldn't completely fit in here.

But the really fascinating thing is that technically, my life has been set up in such a way (and I'm sure it's not because my parents did it on purpose) that I have the highest chance possible to succeed at whatever I do. Both my parents are college educated, which gives me a plus. My parents are married, even though my mom was unmarried when she gave birth but she had a college degree and she was working, another plus with a small minus. I was raised as an only child even though I have siblings, plus. My family is middle-class, plus. And these aren't even counting the effect that where I was living has made a difference in my upbringing. So, really, from a sociologist's viewpoint, it would be fascinating to see how I end up and how my life plays out. I only wish I could study me but since I'm actually invested in this, there would be a significant bias and in any study, one should limit the bias exposure.
But really, It would be interesting to see. And who knows. Maybe someone is studying me right now without my knowledge.

Passion and Love

There are people in the world who want the type of love that is like an old friend, comfortable and familiar, warm and soft. It's perfectly understandable and I see many of my friends finding a love like that. And it makes me a little envious, I'm not ashamed to admit that. And in so many books, that's what the love is and it makes me smile because it's cute and sweet and what these people and characters deserve and I don't begrudge them that because that's what they want and need, even if I don't understand.
Because I never truly identified with those stories. I identify with the passionate loves, the once in a lifetime loves. The loves where loss of one is beyond devastating for the partner who has been left behind. Where instead of the warm glow of love, it's the fire and heat of emotion without name which is to love what grief is to sadness. I want to be scorched by the flames of eternal passion, to have the scars from that heat seared into my bared soul, to have my entire being purified and tempered like steel out of a refiner's fire.
I understand that I may live my entire life without finding what I want and while that is one of the most depressing thoughts of my life, I need someone whose passion for life rivals my own because I don't want to burn my partner up in the heat of my emotions. When I feel an emotion, it is an all-consuming arrow straight to the center of my being. Grief, most frequently felt for fictional characters and animals, tears my heart apart and I don't recover. I cover it and bury it but the scars still live and are tender if pressed. It's the only thing that allows me to empathize the emotion when I should be feeling it and am not, though others are. I feel joy the same way, shining out of the depths of my soul like some ancient beacon of light.
We are all different and how we feel emotions differs too. But it is a lonely thought that I will watch friends fall in love and remain on the outside because I have not the ability to feel the tenderer side of love for people, despite the deeper valleys between in a relationship of passion. Passion is, indeed, the only word I can use to describe that emotion without name. It exists but...

"We loved with a love that was more than love." ~Edgar Allan Pow

That exemplifies what I want. And I'm willing to wait an eternity to find it.

My life has been explained...

You guys! Sorry, I'm about to go on a rant about sociology, my major and easily the most fascinating class I've ever taken in my entire lifetime. But I promise, it's worth it.
Okay, so basically, I just had the reason for so much about me explained. In an hour. No trickery, no jiggery pokery. Because STUDIES.

Anyway, so basically what we talked about today was socialization, which is basically the process by which we internalize the norms, beliefs, and rules of the society we live in. Boring, right? WRONG! Everything about our lives is dictated by socialization, this sort of brainwashing effect that happened to us and is still happening to us now. Right now. This very moment. For like 99% of the population it starts from birth (don't quote me on that statistic). There's this whole big learning about the self vs. other that I'm not going to get into even though it's pretty vital. But basically we learn the social rules and things for various situations and we learn to apply them more generally as we internalize more and more (ex: naivety of a small town vs "street ed" of a big city) so that eventually we can function in this world without the help of others. Social anxiety, as far as I can tell, stems from a lack of rules for given situations. And it's super comforting because that's normal. That is a normal, human trait. Some people experience it worse than others and others can't cope with it as well as others. But it is normal, even though we usually don't understand why we feel anxious. I always did. Not to make myself sound special or whatnot, but I've always had a high sensitivity for societal rules. So I understood why I had anxiety in various situations that were out of my control. But I always thought something was wrong with me because of it. Nope. In that aspect, there is nothing wrong with me. And that was good because while I embrace my individuality or weirdness, I also have this internal strain to follow those rules. Causes conflict, which is another thing we discussed.
But SES (socioeconomic status) plays a HUGE role in socialization. And here's where I got the understanding that explained. Okay, so we have socialization, right? Well, based on your SES, different expectations are placed on you. Middle class children (and up, technically) are basically groomed to inhabit roughly the same sphere of influence as their parents and the parents fill their childrens' free time with formal activities whereas working class parents give their children more "free" time. And here's where it gets interesting. For me, anyway. Because of the circles that I was in because of tennis, I've learned how to interact and mimic people who are in a higher class than I am. (Unless they're sprung on me by surprise (ex: Michael Welch at Comic Con this past weekend) then I have difficulty speaking and crap because I'm trying to exist in two classes at once and it's incredibly difficult for me to do that). There are telltale signs that I'm from a middle class family, but I also have upper class influences because of my father and tennis. My father was resocialized to have an upper class attitude and that's been passed down to me by socialization. Story time!!! So basically, I got the freedom of "free" time of working class (ex: my childhood up until I moved to Vegas, I was pretty much left alone and to my own devices except at school) at which point, my mother (as we were transitioning from working/middle to middle/upper) decided to put me in tennis as what my textbook would call a formal activity. Tennis governed my life because that's what my mother wanted me to do. She still wants me to do it professionally, but that isn't what's in my heart of hearts. Tennis had me involved with the rich kids so I learned to move with them and I can totally handle people who think they're better than everyone else now. It helped that IB also had that mentality, which I will confess I've always had that with my intelligence but everything else, I've been painfully aware of where my social standing in comparison to everyone else. But I also have, as my mother would call it, champagne tastes. Which means that technically the formula for upward mobility is in place for me, which is weird. I can see myself mingling with the elites of society but I can also see myself out in a pasture or out in a barn mucking out stalls. It's weird thinking of myself as a study subject. But it also explains why I want to do what I want to do. Like my entire life has been explained to me. I have these particular dreams because of the circumstances with which I was brought up and the interests that I was allowed to develop. It's incredible to be able to have something like that explained so simply. It's incredible.

FRIENDS!!!

Still haven't found anyone who is a best friend material, but I do have to, possibly three, that have that potential. Three of my classes are covered (one in Chem, one in Soc, and one in History). They're really cool and I think I can mold the Soc and History ones into being complete and total fangirls. One of them already is, technically, but doesn't watch much Doctor Who. The other has the right personality but I don't think she's watched any of the holy three so I'll have to introduce her. Which means I'll have to rewatch them. Such a shame. What? Just totally quoted a video game right there. I'm such a nerd, I know. The third one... I'm cautious BECAUSE I'm at BYU which has a ridiculously high marriage rate and I don't want to get married any time soon because...no. Plus, expect the guys to want to get married. And he's a guy, so...

But the really funny part of all of this is my theatre class is actually where I'm starting to get to know the most people. Which means that I'm getting this field of support that I desperately need right now. So thank you Savannah, Michaela, Morgan, and Tammy. Shout out to y'all. You're awesome! And it's okay for me there. Y'all didn't laugh or anything when I said that I had little to no experience in theatre. Thank you. You're helping me love the class that I am easily the most cautious about but the one I'd already decided to love.