Warrior Blue

by Kelsey Kingsley

Yet pictures are nothing but memories. Fragments of time captured to be stuck in a frame or an album, to spark joy or nostalgia or cause an indescribable surge of pain.

"The great ones never get anywhere living on modesty,"

If I believed in a heaven, I could've been convinced that she'd fallen, an angel with fractured wings.

Life was all just a pile of accidents and coincidences that sometimes made sense and at other times, total chaos.

"Not only is he unburdened by the harsh reality of the world around him, but he has the gift of honest intuition and a brother who obviously adores him. That is the very definition of lucky,

"Your words are your heart, and it's broken, but it's not ugly. You're not ugly."

"You're guarded, and abrasive, and way too hard on yourself. But you're not an asshole."

And when we were naked, I found that beneath all the black and pastels, we weren't very different. In nothing but our skin, we were both simply human, a lesson I was long overdue in learning, and even though my skin was significantly more decorated than hers, it felt the same.

“Part of taking care of someone, is making sure you take care of yourself, and that includes your own happiness.

every life, every day, should be celebrated. It’s all precious and sacred.”

“You don’t have to condone the actions of your children to maintain that unconditional love.”

“Because there are certain things in our lives—certain people—that are just supposed to be there. We don’t choose them, or what they’ll mean to us; they’re just a part of who we are.”

“You fight hard and love even harder, and that’s what I want. I want you.”

In the beginning, we are born in our purest form. We then become ourselves during the stage between caterpillar to butterfly, so colorful and full of beautiful possibility, and we believe, with the blindest of hope, that we’ll be perfect forever. That time is endless. That there is a multitude of chances, of opportunities. Until one day, the reality of mortality settles in deep and dark, and we suddenly become aware of how limited we are. It is all so black and white. There is no grey. We live and we die, and there’s nothing more to it than that.