merry christmas to all.

Today is Christmas.

Or technically, yesterday was. I’m starting this at sixteen minutes past midnight, all safely locked away in my mess of a bedroom while the rest of the house lies in comfortable, silent sleep. I need to be more timely in my updates.

But back to my original point. Merry Christmas to those of you that celebrate it. I had a rather enjoyable day. Started out at 8:30 with present-opening. Then my family and I made the trek down to Montgomery to celebrate with my dad’s side of the family.

What I love about my family is how huge it is. My dad is one of six kids, and so on big holidays my grandmother’s tiny little house with one bathroom is filled to capacity with lots of loud, happy, talkative relatives who always need to catch up with everyone. On Christmas it’s especially fun, because that’s when literally all 30+ of us pile into that cramped little living room with two couches to open presents and it’s just a free-for-all. My life is so structured, it’s nice to just have someone yell “1-2-3 GO” and let the room turn into a mad celebration of wrapping paper and boxes. This year we added marshmallow guns.

So I guess I need to recount what I received: an old Polaroid instant camera with film, the complete works of William Shakespeare (minus the histories, but who reads those anyway?), the complete works of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger, The Importance of Being Earnest, and the complete three seasons of one of my all-time favorite shows Slings & Arrows. Then some sweaters. Nice sweaters, too.

Reflecting on that list I realize just how many books I now own. I should’ve noticed how large of a pile they’ve made at the foot of my bed. Very sizeable indeed. I fully plan on carting all of them back to Oglethorpe, even though I’ve run out of space on my bookshelf. Oh well.

I wish the holiday feeling would last forever. Not the holiday itself, just the feeling. Makes it easier to block out the things you dread to think about.

I’m getting into vague territory. Apologies.

I just don’t want life to be so complicated, to have my relationships shaded with grey. The world would be so much easier in black and white. But instead it’s blinding technicolor. I suppose I’ll just have to put on my big girl panties and deal with it like they say.

Them again. Why can’t they solve my problems? Because they just like to sit around and dictate to everyone else.

I hate to end on such a cynical note. My thoughts tend to be cynical and sarcastic no matter how happy I may be, and right now I would consider myself very content. I had a merry Christmas. I have lovely memories of my entire family watching me breakdance in an old lady costume on the TV. I have lovely text messages from my friends I can smile about. I have the Christmas spirit to spill over into this afternoon when I celebrate with my mom’s side of the family. Decidedly more tame, but just as fun. I love Christmas.

not a creature was stirring.

I should be asleep right now. It feels strange to be up so late on Christmas Eve. Two years ago I would have been forced into bed even if I wasn’t sleepy…now my parents have stopped the whole Santa charade and have let me be.

I blame this rush of insomnia on the cookies I baked today and the hours of Jane Austen I processed. Church at noon. Pride and Prejudice. More Pride and Prejudice. Becoming Jane. Cookie-baking. Dinner-eating. Present-wrapping. Book-reading. Book-finishing. Sitting.

I did accomplish something on my rather atypical Christmas Eve. I finished the book I started way back in September, The Year of Living Biblically. Interesting stuff, but I won’t elaborate for fear it will sound zealous or something. But worth reading even if you’re not religious at all. It took me so long to finish, but I do have an excuse – I was tackling Homer and Dickens at the same time, and essays on them take precedence over reading I actually enjoy. Not that I don’t enjoy classic literature…

So what next on my to-read agenda? I guess it will depend. I’ve got some interesting reading ahead of me in my Modern Lit class next semester. I’m anticipating Don Quixote. But beyond that, I guess it will depend on the books I receive for Christmas and how long I can stay away from the bookstore. The bookstore is such a dangerous place for me, I will just grab and buy a book I think sounds interesting even if I’m simultaneously engulfed in three other ones. That’s my bad habit.

But anyways, Merry Christmas to all of you reading this. All three of you, you silent stalkers. :P

you know, they call them killer whales.

I hate avoiding things. I’m the kind of person who likes to tackle issues head-on. Yet here I find myself running away and deflecting questions. Keeping silent. Holding it in. It feels strange. I’m not sure it’s healthy. There are only so many places I can vent my frustrations to before they all come to a head, right? And then, it’s worse. That’s what they tell you.

Oh them. Them and their wisdom. I should listen to them more often.

Don’t you just hate when the good mood is ruined? That happened tonight. Another instance of people trying to pry where they are not welcome. When will they learn that when they delve too deep it only serves to shut them out more?

Enough of that. This was not meant for rants.

It’s just…I find myself afraid to face things now where I wasn’t before. Maybe that’s because my life was never messy before. It is now. That’s a strange thing for me. I’m not sure how to deal with it.

But besides all that, my most overwhelming feeling is that of boredom. Going to college in a big city makes me realize how little there is to do back here in a modestly large one.

My mood today:

I found this today as I was just perusing the internet in my boredom. I thought it  was funny, I guess. Reminded me of my failed attempt to read Naked Lunch when I was in 10th grade, I just got really confused trying to slog through it and my English teacher saw it one day on my desk and told me I was too young to read it. She was right.

She was also most likely on drugs.

Maybe I should try again, then follow up with some more beatnik literature. You know, go through a beatnik period. I tried to organize something like that this summer as I compiled a list of books I wanted to read. There got to be so many I had to separate them into categories: Southern writers, absurdist literature, etc. It seems to make more sense, to read each category and move on to the next one. But I add books to the list faster than I can read them, so I don’t know how well that would work out.

Wait. Yes I do. Not very well at all.

But Christmas is in four days, which is something to look forward to.

a product of wasted time.

I finished a journal the other day. It tends to be a monumental occasion when I finish a journal. It’s like starting a new chapter, or shedding my skin that’s been a part of me for so long. It’s like discarding an old friend after you’ve grown so close, painful. But also necessary. Like they know too much about you and you need to distance yourself.

I have complicated relationships with inanimate objects, if you can’t tell.

I could try to recall how many journals I’ve accumulated, but I lost count after I stopped labeling them. I think it just started out one day as I attempted to write my great fantasy story and then eventually grew bored with it and branched out into other writing. One day I’ll just sit and read through them all and rediscover myself as I grew up. I know my writing will have changed and matured as I did. And it will be interesting to see what I wrote about and the memories they trigger. There are just some instances where I love looking back at the past – they don’t occur very often. Not that I don’t like my past or have anything against it, I just guess I prefer the present or something similarly cliche and alliterative.

Boredom gives you more time to think. How potentially dangerous. I should be doing something productive with all this time I’m wasting, like wrapping Christmas presents, or actually buying them. I only have four days left, though technically I have until mid-January to scrounge them together.

I love how I use the word ‘scrounge.’

My immediate next thought was on on how strange it sounds in my head. Say it out loud. Now.

So forget the actual tangent I was going to go on. Thinking about it makes me feel like I am a horrible person. Which I’m not.

I hope.

Oh boredom. Darn you.

“I have a joke. A squirrel goes up to a tree and says ‘I forgot to store acorns for the winter and now I am dead.’ It’s funny because the squirrel gets dead.” I love UP, for the record. And my friends.

A Long Absence

It’s been months. I turn my computer on every day and I think that I should possibly update this blog, but then that is immediately followed by the thought to leave it until tomorrow. Now I find myself in December, without a word since September. Shame on me.

I could give the excuse that I’ve been too busy to sit down and offer up the Reader’s Digest version of my life at Oglethorpe thus far, but that would be a lie. As full as my schedule is, I have time to breathe, to take naps, to just sit in a room with my friends and just chill without the need to do something else. Occasionally, I’ll even get myself a meal. But now that I am home I have no excuses, and since my pride won’t allow me to give up on this blog, here I am. I know what my New Year’s Resolution will be.

But on to the synopsis, which could really be summed up in one word: change. I’ve changed a lot. It’s to be expected when I pack myself up and ship off to a small liberal arts college nobody has ever heard of. And generally, I like the person I’ve become. I love where I am. I love what I’m doing. I love the people I’m with. I’m lucky I found the perfect fit. It is a place where I can truly be myself and not feel like I have to suppress certain aspects of my personality to please certain people. That is truly a blessing.

When I compare my short college experience to the one I had in high school, I notice the stark difference. I notice the tepid high school friendships where I felt like I didn’t quite fit in and I tried too hard. I notice the lack of motivation I had for my schoolwork and how I buried myself in extracurriculars because that’s where I felt most comfortable. I notice how reserved I was, how quiet around most people I became because I was just so different; not that they knew. But at Oglethorpe, I not only have a close group of friends I can share everything with, but I have lots of friends from different areas which mix together. It’s one of those wonderful instances where I never have to worry about sitting alone at meal times because there is always someone to sit with. I’m actually in classes I want to be in, classes that interest me and make me want to learn and to read more. But not only can I throw myself into theatre and choir and my writing like I used to, I also am involved in a sorority, something I never thought I would do.

That was a rather general and simplified overview of my experience thus far. My brain is fuzzy from catching up on all the sleep I lost over the semester. It’s nice to sit in bed and just vegetate sometimes. I’ve been spending my day reminiscing on the past four months and learning the words to Savage Garden’s “I Want You.” Which was a success, if you were wondering.

And now, for a more specific synopsis:

Polishing the turtle. No more going to sleep earlier than midnight. Museum. Movie parties in various dorm rooms. Joining Sigma. Frat parties every weekend. UNO. “I’m hiding cigarettes in my lungs.” Singleness. Finding my group of best friends. Road ramblin’. Chalking in a park. Skip-Bo in McDonald’s. Sigma Retreat. The public debate over which SEC team should win. One-Act Play Festival. Big Sister. Halloween. Naked Shakespeare. Singers Concert. Boxer Rebellion. Initiation! Trader Joe’s. Joshua Radin with sisters and the Swedish Fish. Super Trivia @ Dave and Buster’s. Jingle Ball. Choephorii. Moon Over Buffalo road trip. Pong-along. Thanksgiving Break. Chi Phi Beddy Byes. Dead Day’s Eve. Seamen. Boar’s Head. Baking cookies at 2 in the morning. JSJ. Karaoke. Going through the McDonald’s Drive-Thru backwards. Playwriting Final. Ice Skating. French Final. Birmingham.

Most likely none of that will make sense. But remembering all of it makes me smile. It reminds me of home.

Ah, College

I've only just realized how neglectful I have been to this blog. Strange how college does that to you...I arrived here only last week and have been busy with something every day since then. When I was in high school I always imagined college students had ample amounts of time on their hands to spend how they liked. Now I see that the time spent in class is prioritized in a number of different ways: sleeping, eating, studying, socializing. For the most part, that seems to be the correct order of importance. I find it so funny. The noise outside my door is always in flux depending on the time of day. But I can handle it.

And I suppose I am expected to elaborate on what life is like on this little Oglethorpe campus. I'm going to say that I love it. The nervous anticipation before I arrived had cast a little doubt on my decision to attend, but now I'm happy to say that I am now comfortably settled in with plenty of new friends and am having lots of fun. That sounded like a postcard letter, didn't it?

So I guess I'll start from the beginning:

Orientation was extremely exhausting. We woke up at 7 and got back to the dorms at 11. Our days were full of cemetery clean-ups, dance parties, ice breakers, and lots of awkward moments. But I enjoyed it. I met a lot of people, made some new friends, and played some really hilarious rounds of Catchphrase...I realize I'm over-generalizing, but bear in mind, I have an entire week of college to get through. :)

Monday marked the start of classes. I found out the hard way that French 101 is complete immersion. Heh, but I think I'll trek through because I know I do not want to study Spanish again. I was probably one of the only freshman in the class, so it was on top of that extremely intimidating. I think I will enjoy my 18th and 19th Century Lit class even though it's starting out a little slow, the class is only around nine or so people. And my playwriting class is really funny. It reminded me of how much I missed having theatre people in my life and how I can't wait to stop being that quiet little freshman in the corner.

I had my first college nap. I think that's worth noting. Ha.

On Thursday a couple of friends and I decided to attend a Sorority Recruitment function. It meant free ice cream, so why not? I met a lot of girls from all three of Oglethorpe's sororities, all of whom were nice, inviting, and extremely talkative. I know they're supposed to be that way for potential recruits/pledges/sisters, but it convinced to me to at the least go through Formal Recruitment. That's an exciting possibility.

And the most important new detail of my new Oglethorpe life is that I was cast in the first show of the season! I'm starting where I left off last year: on the stage. We had our first read-through, and the show is hilarious. I'm so excited to start rehearsing for the show at the end of September.

Otherwise, I've been spending my time in good company. I've watched more horror movies in the past few days than I have before in my entire life. And I've seen what a real Frat Party is like...but we won't go into that too much. But now another movie party calls. Bien nuit, mis amis!

Don't you like my French rhyming skills?

Note: If it wasn't already obvious, this post took my four days to complete. I will try to get better at this.

How do they eat?

I have been so productive today. I wrote myself a To-Do List…

…and then proceeded to doodle all around it as my mom and I sat on the couch watching the recorded episodes of my mom’s regular soaps and eating leftover pizza. I think it turned out very pretty, don’t you? I also think I deserve to loaf around during my last week being at home; it’s nice to just sit around with my family and do nothing more than just enjoy each other’s company. In a week that will no longer be the norm. It’s so strange to think about that.

My mom was watching me as I drew and she asked me what I was thinking about and I told her I wasn’t thinking about anything. Doodling is that way, I guess. In a way, it comes from the subconscious…and I guess my subconscious is full of linear forms broken up by circles and dots. It’s a spontaneous mess of lines and curves. Spontaneous. Suck it Andy Warhol.

Aside from my productive venture into list-making, today I went cake-tasting with my future sister-in-law. Case and point: best cake I ever had. Now I feel like a pig. And old. I feel so old, my brother is getting married. I feel so old, children don’t know who N*SYNC and the Backstreet Boys anymore. I feel so old, I was born almost twenty years ago.

And I know I really have no room to talk. Commence the scoffing. I deserve it.

I’m hoping my rye sense of humor translates onto this computer screens. I’ve been told my posts depress. I’m hoping to change that. Maybe I’ll add an emoticon to clarify. :)

EDIT:

I found out today the theatre schedule for OU. It only makes me more excited to get there.

I only see in shades of grey.

So here I sit, typing by the light of the lamp in my bathroom because I am so considerate at 1:15 in the morning and don’t want to disturb the cat that has taken over my bed by turning on the light. I believe she senses the eminence of my departure and therefore feels comfortable to lay where she pleases. Recently, it has been my pillow space.

That is how I am explaining my being up this late. It’s either that or admitting the number of Dr. Peppers I drank today (two; I’m cutting back). There isn’t anything I can do about it now, so I go back to what I always do when I’m this late and write. I don’t feel like grabbing the pen and my journal, so I neglect it for tonight and reach for my laptop because I feel this blog isn’t updated with as much frequency as I had intended when I first started.

I’m rambling. I should probably do this update right.

Sunday was my eighteenth birthday. Nothing too terribly exciting. Spent the day with my family and the boyfriend, nothing much to tell. I did have a very delicious Oreo cake though. Yummy. Can you tell the reality of turning eighteen hasn’t hit me yet? (So-called)Important things never really hit me as I experience them, they tend to slowly seep in for me to realize much much later. Good thing? Bad thing? Or nothing at all.

Yeah. We’ll go with that.

I feel like I’m starting this countdown a little late: eight more days until I leave for Oglethorpe. I probably should have started this in June? Oh well.

Believe me, I am excited, I just need to stop blogging in the early morning hours after I spend my night watching Star Wars on Spike and discovering that episodes of My So-Called Life are on Hulu. Waste of time? I think not. Bad for display of human emotions? I think so.

I suppose I will do a more convincing job of relaying of the excitement and anticipation I feel about finally going to college at a later date and more convenient time of the day.

I should kick the cat out of the bed and get some sleep. Expect me to update more often.

A Midsummer Night’s Musings

Ah, July. It seems that my summer of limbo is passing by so fast.

Only two weeks ago I was running around Charleston with four of my friends in celebration of our new-found freedom. Now I sit at home every day and prepare.

Prepare for what, exactly? In less than two months I will be arriving on a college campus with (almost) everything I own in tow. Slowly, my living room accumulates more and more stuff. The imminence of college lies heavy on my house.

Not to say that this is a particularly somber time…I am very excited. It’s just knowing that I will soon be experiencing entirely new and different things that makes me restless and anxious for it.

But I feel mostly that I’m preparing to leave. My father and I finally have some time to spend together and I am reminded of how well we get along and how much I am going to miss our sarcastic repartees across the dinner table that drive my mother to roll her eyes and groan her displeasure.

For some reason I don’t feel I can communicate all of these feelings effectively. They all come out so flat and the words get all jumbled up somewhere in between my brain and my fingers. None of it is transferring well here. It must be connected to this recent dry spell in my writing, but nobody wants to hear about that.

I have to be ambitious. Words don’t write themselves.

You can tell it’s getting rather late and my mind is wandering this way and that, seamlessly flowing from one thought to the next.

I should probably stop now. Hehe.

Summer Insomnia

It is currently 1:38 in the morning, according to the alarm clock on my bedside table.

Ah, my mistake. It is now 1:39.

My room is the only one still emitting light and noise. Everyone else has gone to sleep and for some strange reason my body still doesn’t feel the pull of exhaustion. It is inevitable I will force myself to lie down in the dark around 2:30 and wake up sometime around 12:45. And it is rare that I can find anything productive to do with myself in any case…there is a to-do list staring at me on my mirror and so far I’ve only managed to cross one thing off of it. There are still many pressing things that need to be resolved in a timely manner, but I can’t seem to muster the will to accomplish any of them. Summer seems only to exacerbate my laziness. So being the hypocrite I am, I will just continue to wax on everything that needs to be done. I am, however, proud that I managed to rearrange my room all by myself the other day.

It’s a start at least.

I was talking to Bryan the other afternoon about blogging, and I confessed that I was thinking about starting one. He encouraged me to do it, and so here I am. I don’t know what I plan to accomplish with it or what exactly I mean to talk about that anyone would have an interest in, but we’ll see how this goes.

It occurs to me that my current case of sloth is a by-product of boredom. Boredom, apparently, is dangerous for a creative mind. Perhaps I need to do something with myself, seeing that my half-hearted job hunt has proved fruitless. I still have an empty canvas in the corner, maybe I should paint something. I tried drawing from magazine advertisements earlier, but in the end I made Gisele look demonic, but I’ll blame that on the fact that I only had colored pencils at hand. Or the fact that I can’t draw.

Yeah, let’s go with the colored pencils.

I must confess: it doesn’t feel any different, being a high school graduate. In fact, it didn’t feel especially special being a high school senior either. All my expectation ended in disappointment, I suppose. The summer before I go off to college is starting out like any other summer, except for the fact that all of my friends are scrounging together beach trips with more earnestness than they would otherwise. But perhaps I’m being too cynical. Perhaps it will hit me when I step on the Oglethorpe campus next fall that these friends -most of whom I’ve grown up in some form or another- will not be around anymore. Even now though, the thought really doesn’t scare me all that much. Consult me again come September.

So change is coming. I know it. I expect it. And I just hope it doesn’t hit me square in the face when it does. Because I want to be ready for it.