beatings of my heart

Beat, beat, beat, beat goes my heart. It's steady and I am glad. I am also glad I ate a mango today. It's sweet and delicious and good for me too. I remember not liking mangos very much when I was younger. They were too grainy I thought; I didn't like how their yellow threads got stuck in my teeth when I tried to eat them. My cousin Hans brought some when we were camping one summer. He had just returned from two years in the Peace Corps in Jamaica. I don't know anything about his time in Jamaica. He brought back Rasta-colored jewellery and a fondness for tropical fruit. How easily it seems our material culture incorporates foreign goods, but can it as easily understand the rhythms of life that surround the mango tree under which a jewellery-making Rasta man sits? I think that must be where the imagination comes in...if we put our minds to it, we can see Jamaica, the mango tree, the Rasta man and his jewellery too. Maybe we can even hear the music he listens to and see the people who pass him by. It might be tough, but we must try. Literature can help us with this; it takes us to wonderful far-off places where everything seems so different and yet, somehow, amazingly tangible, even understandable. I think I could tell good stories if I put my mind to it and set my heart on it. I love reading stories, I love writing and I want to share. I really do. You might not believe me because you probably haven't seen me write much of anything beyond papers for school in a while. I always have the same excuse: I am afraid. I am sorry I even wrote that now because I am truly, utterly tired of this excuse. I don't think it even makes sense anymore. I am a capable, talented woman who loves the world and is excited and inspired by all its possibilities. This woman can see the strengths in others, so why doesn't she admit that she can see the strength in herself as well? Because she certainly does. She does. She does. She does. Very soon she will forget the cruel phrase 'fear of failure' was ever coined. :)