I don't get this whole finding friends in college thing. I really don't. This is where you're supposed to make all the friends you'll invite to your wedding, right? I've made one friend I am certain I will invite to my wedding. Just one. After almost 3 full years. So where's the whole bridal party that I'm supposedly going to find in college? My mom's bridesmaids were her closest sorority sisters. And one high school friend. My high school friends talk about their group of college friends like they'll be lifelong friends and all be in each other's weddings and be important to each other forever. Bleh. I detest even thinking about being invited to a wedding of one of my peers, let alone the logistics of one I'm involved in. So let's be clear. I'm not saying I need to be all 27 Dresses about a bridal party, but I really feel like I'm missing out on a majorly important college experience with the lifelong friend thing here.
Straight up, I have 4 friends I would die for. I can't say that yet for anyone I've met in college. I can't point to my group of friends in college and say, "These are people I will stick with my whole life." All my other close friends, including those 4, have a group they can say that for. I can't figure out what it is that I'm missing. I've done all the right things. I've been friends with all my roommates. I've joined clubs and done sports, but no friends really came from that. I have groups of people I talk to in each of my majors/minors. I have groups I party with. I know people. But I'm not amazingly close to any of them.
Maybe I've just already made my lifelong friends. The people I know will stick by my side my whole life are people I met in (or prior to) high school. I'm not quite there yet with any of my college friends. I feel like I should be, especially with a few of them. Maybe the issue is that I have high standards for close friends. I'm easy to get to know, easy to call a friend, but it's a whole different story if I call you a close friend. Once you're a close friend, a lifelong friend, I have all these expectations that we'll stay in touch and that I can call you up when shit goes down and that there won't be limits to what we talk about.
I don't mind that my college friends aren't my lifelong friends, but I do want some of them to be. I guess it just takes a lot of time for me to get to that point with people. That's okay, I suppose, it just makes me feel like there's something wrong with me that I'm not there yet. I love my college friends, but I want to make sure I don't forget about them after graduation. There's not really a way to ensure that though is there?
3.31.2011
3.23.2011
Only in College...
Can you come to an English class, reeking of alcohol and still have more intelligent things to say than most of the class. Oh, don't worry, not me. I'm just making an observation. I adore these humanities classes, and hate them at the same time. Mostly b/c the smell is making me wish it were Spring Break already. I swear it's some sort of fruity rum this guy was tossing back.
Well, that and the fact that I'm driving myself insane. You can always tell that something is wrong if I start cleaning. And I not only cleaned Milo's cage tonight, but my entire room and started doing crazy laundry and reorganizing my closet and some of the kitchen. Multiple tests in one week stinks. It's more than that, but I really don't feel like getting into it when I should be studying.
But! After my test it's just planning for Colorado! Which means hair cut, car wash, oil change, brake system flush, alignment check (which will be "Oh hey this part on your front axel is messed up. Let's fix it for a grand even though it drives straight and nothing is bowed out." So long as nothing's changed from that, we're good) annnnd new windshield wipers. I think that's it. I'll vacuum and add wiper fluid too. I suppose my care shouldn't be all about my car. I'll pack too. Gotta get the Wii together. XD
Oh, and hey ladies, on most cars you should be able to do everything but the alignment check yourself (and even that you can do an unofficial test - does it drive straight when you put your wheel straight?). I can't b/c my car is stupid and requires a special $40 tool from the company to change the oil and won't let you flush the brakes unless it's in the air. Retarded car, not letting me show off. But! See, there's these things that cars have called manuals and they have instructions on how to do everything including: change a tire, change oil, flush the brakes. You can change your headlights too! Or see how long it takes your dad to do it, get frustrated when he doesn't listen to you, take the bulb from him and do it yourself in 30 seconds. So don't be a man and read the instructions! It'll make you sexier.
Well, that and the fact that I'm driving myself insane. You can always tell that something is wrong if I start cleaning. And I not only cleaned Milo's cage tonight, but my entire room and started doing crazy laundry and reorganizing my closet and some of the kitchen. Multiple tests in one week stinks. It's more than that, but I really don't feel like getting into it when I should be studying.
But! After my test it's just planning for Colorado! Which means hair cut, car wash, oil change, brake system flush, alignment check (which will be "Oh hey this part on your front axel is messed up. Let's fix it for a grand even though it drives straight and nothing is bowed out." So long as nothing's changed from that, we're good) annnnd new windshield wipers. I think that's it. I'll vacuum and add wiper fluid too. I suppose my care shouldn't be all about my car. I'll pack too. Gotta get the Wii together. XD
Oh, and hey ladies, on most cars you should be able to do everything but the alignment check yourself (and even that you can do an unofficial test - does it drive straight when you put your wheel straight?). I can't b/c my car is stupid and requires a special $40 tool from the company to change the oil and won't let you flush the brakes unless it's in the air. Retarded car, not letting me show off. But! See, there's these things that cars have called manuals and they have instructions on how to do everything including: change a tire, change oil, flush the brakes. You can change your headlights too! Or see how long it takes your dad to do it, get frustrated when he doesn't listen to you, take the bulb from him and do it yourself in 30 seconds. So don't be a man and read the instructions! It'll make you sexier.
3.22.2011
Question 4: Burnt Out
My mom and I took a cruise to Alaska over the summer. It was a more formal cruising style and for dinner we were assigned dining partners. Our first dining partner was a 65+ retired man who spent his time travelling around the western hemisphere with various companions. I kid you not. The one this year (well, the last 2 years) was a 40-something home economics teacher from Texas. They were a hoot.
But this lady, goodness…she should not be allowed back into the classroom. She called her former students “gnats.” She told me I should never go into teaching, especially not high school. That I’d never change or impact these kids lives. I had to stop myself from laughing. I wanted to tell her that if she really thought that she never made an impact, positive or negative, on her student’s lives then she was surely delusional. During dinner, this woman got up to use the bathroom. My mom leaned over and whispered (not that she would have needed to, the man already had 2 bottles of wine so he wasn’t much occupied with us) that she was clearly burnt out and needed to get out of the school. She probably was impacting her students negatively. I shouldn't let her get to me.
Last week in my education preparation class we started talking about teachers and stress. How new teacher stress is different from normal teacher stress. How 40% of education grads will get a job and won't hold it for 3 years before leaving the field permanently. It's over 60% for after 5. And maybe it's that they changed career paths, maybe it's that they are now married with kids, maybe they died of being over-stressed. Regardless. They're gone from being a formal educator for good.
I'm concerned about becoming one of those statistics. I helped out one hour last Monday and then on an all day field trip and I thought to myself that I simply couldn't stand it. On Wednesday I felt ill, so I told my teacher I wouldn't be coming in. I probably could have, but I was so relieved to just have an excuse to not go in, even just for that hour. I actually did get worse as the day went on, so I ended up not going to volunteering later, but I had been dreading that since waking up in the morning. If there were any doubt in my mind about being a high school educator, this would have knocked the questions out of me. I can't deal with people who are younger than 14 for days on end. I simply can't deal with it. I'm not certain I'll be able to deal with 14 year olds every day, but hopefully I'll serve my time and then get the Honors track kiddos, or higher power willing, the college bound AP students.
So I'm starting to focus on how I can prevent burn out. They say it's because of a lot of stress, so you have to know how to balance your work life and your home life. Try not to bring grading home with you, get it all done at school. Go in early and stay late and deal with all your students' problems (b/c you're their awesome teacher, you have to be there for them 24/7), but don't let that flow into your home. It seems contradictory to me, so I'm ignoring that. I'm going to find an outside place to relieve stress. I'm also hoping to incorporate exercise into this.
I've been researching yoga studios in the city and there's a few different options. Unfortunately, yoga isn't exactly an inexpensive thing to pick up, so I'm starting with a few community classes on the weekends after break. We'll see where things go from there. This is kinda my only idea for stress relief so far. I'm trying to think of what I do when I get angry or need to get away. I go driving on random roads, I eat a lot of ice cream, I roller blade, I spend time with dogs. This semester it's been mostly the ice cream. I'd do the roller blading more if the trails around here were paved and not gravel. I can volunteer at the local humane society, but I need to get my future job in order. I know most of the roads around the city by now and, as I said, cutting back on the ice cream. So! Yoga! What do you guys think? Will I completely fail at this or will it actually do some good?
But this lady, goodness…she should not be allowed back into the classroom. She called her former students “gnats.” She told me I should never go into teaching, especially not high school. That I’d never change or impact these kids lives. I had to stop myself from laughing. I wanted to tell her that if she really thought that she never made an impact, positive or negative, on her student’s lives then she was surely delusional. During dinner, this woman got up to use the bathroom. My mom leaned over and whispered (not that she would have needed to, the man already had 2 bottles of wine so he wasn’t much occupied with us) that she was clearly burnt out and needed to get out of the school. She probably was impacting her students negatively. I shouldn't let her get to me.
Last week in my education preparation class we started talking about teachers and stress. How new teacher stress is different from normal teacher stress. How 40% of education grads will get a job and won't hold it for 3 years before leaving the field permanently. It's over 60% for after 5. And maybe it's that they changed career paths, maybe it's that they are now married with kids, maybe they died of being over-stressed. Regardless. They're gone from being a formal educator for good.
I'm concerned about becoming one of those statistics. I helped out one hour last Monday and then on an all day field trip and I thought to myself that I simply couldn't stand it. On Wednesday I felt ill, so I told my teacher I wouldn't be coming in. I probably could have, but I was so relieved to just have an excuse to not go in, even just for that hour. I actually did get worse as the day went on, so I ended up not going to volunteering later, but I had been dreading that since waking up in the morning. If there were any doubt in my mind about being a high school educator, this would have knocked the questions out of me. I can't deal with people who are younger than 14 for days on end. I simply can't deal with it. I'm not certain I'll be able to deal with 14 year olds every day, but hopefully I'll serve my time and then get the Honors track kiddos, or higher power willing, the college bound AP students.
So I'm starting to focus on how I can prevent burn out. They say it's because of a lot of stress, so you have to know how to balance your work life and your home life. Try not to bring grading home with you, get it all done at school. Go in early and stay late and deal with all your students' problems (b/c you're their awesome teacher, you have to be there for them 24/7), but don't let that flow into your home. It seems contradictory to me, so I'm ignoring that. I'm going to find an outside place to relieve stress. I'm also hoping to incorporate exercise into this.
I've been researching yoga studios in the city and there's a few different options. Unfortunately, yoga isn't exactly an inexpensive thing to pick up, so I'm starting with a few community classes on the weekends after break. We'll see where things go from there. This is kinda my only idea for stress relief so far. I'm trying to think of what I do when I get angry or need to get away. I go driving on random roads, I eat a lot of ice cream, I roller blade, I spend time with dogs. This semester it's been mostly the ice cream. I'd do the roller blading more if the trails around here were paved and not gravel. I can volunteer at the local humane society, but I need to get my future job in order. I know most of the roads around the city by now and, as I said, cutting back on the ice cream. So! Yoga! What do you guys think? Will I completely fail at this or will it actually do some good?
3.16.2011
Kids of a certain age
B's comment was in passing, but it really struck me. I was talking about the field trip I helped out on earlier today and the behavior of the kids. He said he was so glad he'd never be that age again.
I agreed immediately, but after thinking about it I'm not so sure. So I started thinking about all the field trips I took in middle and early high school. All the notes I passed with J between classes. All the freaking epic 7th grade Core moments. All the crushes, some passing quicker than others, one lasting far far too long. Even though I am glad I'm not going to be that age again, there's certainly a nostalgia for it. And perhaps even a sense of missed experiences.
I feel like J and I should have documented our notes. I feel like I should have become closer to C sooner and started doing cartoon sketches with her. I feel like I should have gotten into DeviantArt more and explored photography and writing at the same time. I feel like I should have been bolder around guys at the race track. Good god, that would have caused mayhem. It's not that I regret not doing any of this, I just feel like that age is sort of incomplete. I wasn't the one to start a bus wide attempt to make truckers laugh. I wasn't the one to run around on a field trip with my friends, linking arms as we ran station to station.
It took a lot of control not to laugh when a kid made a joke with a swear word in it and instead shout out "Hey, language!" Maybe I'm not ready to be a teacher yet. I still relate to these kids too much, see too much of how I act when I'm around my closest friends in each of them. In one sense I hope two years changes that, but the general feeling is that I'm dreading that. I'm not ready to grow up. I'm not ready to leave "that age" behind. I never want to stop having fun with my friends without needing alcohol. I never want to forget what it's like to sit on cement and eat lunch outside. I never want to stop enjoying life the way I did when I was younger.
I agreed immediately, but after thinking about it I'm not so sure. So I started thinking about all the field trips I took in middle and early high school. All the notes I passed with J between classes. All the freaking epic 7th grade Core moments. All the crushes, some passing quicker than others, one lasting far far too long. Even though I am glad I'm not going to be that age again, there's certainly a nostalgia for it. And perhaps even a sense of missed experiences.
I feel like J and I should have documented our notes. I feel like I should have become closer to C sooner and started doing cartoon sketches with her. I feel like I should have gotten into DeviantArt more and explored photography and writing at the same time. I feel like I should have been bolder around guys at the race track. Good god, that would have caused mayhem. It's not that I regret not doing any of this, I just feel like that age is sort of incomplete. I wasn't the one to start a bus wide attempt to make truckers laugh. I wasn't the one to run around on a field trip with my friends, linking arms as we ran station to station.
It took a lot of control not to laugh when a kid made a joke with a swear word in it and instead shout out "Hey, language!" Maybe I'm not ready to be a teacher yet. I still relate to these kids too much, see too much of how I act when I'm around my closest friends in each of them. In one sense I hope two years changes that, but the general feeling is that I'm dreading that. I'm not ready to grow up. I'm not ready to leave "that age" behind. I never want to stop having fun with my friends without needing alcohol. I never want to forget what it's like to sit on cement and eat lunch outside. I never want to stop enjoying life the way I did when I was younger.
3.10.2011
'Spress Yo'self!
"We but half express ourselves, and are ashamed of that divine idea which each of us represents." - Emerson, Self-Reliance
I suspect most of you have stumbled across that line before in a high school literature course. It seems to really sink in with me finally. I've been thinking a lot lately about how to express myself and dealing with general negative emotions, specifically anger and sadness. And then J has this bloody brilliant post about flying off the handle on someone and how her anger scared her. So I'm going to take time to take these thoughts that have been swirling in my head for half a year and put them down.
There's different stages to my anger. The first is just scratching the surface, and it's usually resolved in 5 minutes b/c I'll have calmed down and forgotten why I was angry in the first place. The second is if you actually irritate me. And when most people turn away from confrontation, I seek it out. I want to argue until things are worked out. I hate walking away from someone when I'm angry. We both know we're upset so why hide it? It seems cowardly and like you don't respect me enough to think we'll still be friends after this is resolved. Isn't the whole point for this to be resolved? So let's get to it, and fast. About halfway through arguing, I forget what we started arguing about. And about the same time I calm down and rationally think about what was said and come to some conclusion where we're no longer mad at each other and everything is good. Just don't breech that topic again for a week-ish. I'm fine with how I handle this. It's not a perfect way of getting angry, but it works for me.
But when I get really angry, that's when it gets bad. My anger has never scared me. Ever. But I'm not ignorant enough to believe it has never scared anyone else. It's not that I enjoy getting angry, but there is a certain thrill to it. You hit that point when you get so angry that you start to shake and maybe even cry and you don't know how to evaluate these emotions, how to understand them, quantify them, express them. My "super anger" needs to be expressed in some more effective way. It's not that I shouldn't express myself (Emerson would be so disappointed if I suggested that) nor am I ashamed of how my anger currently manifests itself. I just know it's not good! See, when I get really angry, I get aggressive. I flirt with being verbally abusive. I spew random hurtful insults just because I can. I turn into this irrational being with these huuuuge blinders that block any counterpoint, any attempt to find some middle ground. That's not...anything positive. At all.
So how do I address that this needs to change without changing who I am? It seems to me that I wouldn't be fully expressing myself then. I would be shamed into silence. I would be limiting myself. And that is more or less precisely what I am trying to avoid. I feel like I just need to stop being as much of a bitch when I get angry. I should just stop being petty when arguing and then everything would be okay. I haven't been really super angry in a while and don't plan on getting that angry any time soon, but I'll let you know how it goes.
I'm quite the opposite with sadness. I hide that away under lock and key. No one is allowed to know I'm sad. Recently, my boyfriend and I were cuddling (I know, cue the ewwws) and he randomly asked if I was okay. I said yeah, but truth is I was hit with a wave of sadness about 30 minutes earlier while doing homework. There was absolutely no reason for me to be sad and I'd managed to hide it thus far so why ruin a perfectly good snuggle session by saying that I was mildly sad without any idea as to why? But just like I dislike when people turn away from anger, I bet he at least somewhat dislikes that I didn't let him know I felt sad. So that's making me feel guilty and a bit sad, but hell will freeze over before I let on to that in person.
I don't know why I feel so differently about sadness than anger. If anything, I should think that anger should never be expressed because it was so severely punished when shown as a kid...and my parents never ever argued in front of my brother or I. But sadness was okay. Being sad was fine. I just stopped showing it somewhere along the line. Maybe it was a sort of backfire or rebellion to how I was brought up. I don't know. I don't know! I want to express these emotions honestly and freely, but without making a freaking scene. I feel like I've never expressed negative emotions in a good way. Ever. And it's about damn time I learn how to do that. We all gotta grow up sometime, right?
I suspect most of you have stumbled across that line before in a high school literature course. It seems to really sink in with me finally. I've been thinking a lot lately about how to express myself and dealing with general negative emotions, specifically anger and sadness. And then J has this bloody brilliant post about flying off the handle on someone and how her anger scared her. So I'm going to take time to take these thoughts that have been swirling in my head for half a year and put them down.
There's different stages to my anger. The first is just scratching the surface, and it's usually resolved in 5 minutes b/c I'll have calmed down and forgotten why I was angry in the first place. The second is if you actually irritate me. And when most people turn away from confrontation, I seek it out. I want to argue until things are worked out. I hate walking away from someone when I'm angry. We both know we're upset so why hide it? It seems cowardly and like you don't respect me enough to think we'll still be friends after this is resolved. Isn't the whole point for this to be resolved? So let's get to it, and fast. About halfway through arguing, I forget what we started arguing about. And about the same time I calm down and rationally think about what was said and come to some conclusion where we're no longer mad at each other and everything is good. Just don't breech that topic again for a week-ish. I'm fine with how I handle this. It's not a perfect way of getting angry, but it works for me.
But when I get really angry, that's when it gets bad. My anger has never scared me. Ever. But I'm not ignorant enough to believe it has never scared anyone else. It's not that I enjoy getting angry, but there is a certain thrill to it. You hit that point when you get so angry that you start to shake and maybe even cry and you don't know how to evaluate these emotions, how to understand them, quantify them, express them. My "super anger" needs to be expressed in some more effective way. It's not that I shouldn't express myself (Emerson would be so disappointed if I suggested that) nor am I ashamed of how my anger currently manifests itself. I just know it's not good! See, when I get really angry, I get aggressive. I flirt with being verbally abusive. I spew random hurtful insults just because I can. I turn into this irrational being with these huuuuge blinders that block any counterpoint, any attempt to find some middle ground. That's not...anything positive. At all.
So how do I address that this needs to change without changing who I am? It seems to me that I wouldn't be fully expressing myself then. I would be shamed into silence. I would be limiting myself. And that is more or less precisely what I am trying to avoid. I feel like I just need to stop being as much of a bitch when I get angry. I should just stop being petty when arguing and then everything would be okay. I haven't been really super angry in a while and don't plan on getting that angry any time soon, but I'll let you know how it goes.
I'm quite the opposite with sadness. I hide that away under lock and key. No one is allowed to know I'm sad. Recently, my boyfriend and I were cuddling (I know, cue the ewwws) and he randomly asked if I was okay. I said yeah, but truth is I was hit with a wave of sadness about 30 minutes earlier while doing homework. There was absolutely no reason for me to be sad and I'd managed to hide it thus far so why ruin a perfectly good snuggle session by saying that I was mildly sad without any idea as to why? But just like I dislike when people turn away from anger, I bet he at least somewhat dislikes that I didn't let him know I felt sad. So that's making me feel guilty and a bit sad, but hell will freeze over before I let on to that in person.
I don't know why I feel so differently about sadness than anger. If anything, I should think that anger should never be expressed because it was so severely punished when shown as a kid...and my parents never ever argued in front of my brother or I. But sadness was okay. Being sad was fine. I just stopped showing it somewhere along the line. Maybe it was a sort of backfire or rebellion to how I was brought up. I don't know. I don't know! I want to express these emotions honestly and freely, but without making a freaking scene. I feel like I've never expressed negative emotions in a good way. Ever. And it's about damn time I learn how to do that. We all gotta grow up sometime, right?
3.07.2011
[insert Jaws theme here]
I grew up in a city that only had one national level sports team. I'm really not sure I would care had I not. But for as long as I can remember, I was taught to love hockey, love the Sharks, and hate the Ducks and the Flames. It's not like we were hurting for national level teams in the area. Two cities both about an hour north each had national baseball and football teams. The opposite sides of the bay were always in conflict with each other. But it seemed so far removed from the technology centered environment. How did the violent sport of hockey fit in any better then?
Somehow it worked. Even back in middle school drama class, when we were asked to portray a common occurrence without words, we sat down to watch a Sharks v. Kings game. And 90% of the class got it immediately. I can walk around campus during hockey season and I'll see someone with a shirt or keychain or hat of another team in our division and I'll high five them (or make some crack about they shouldn't bother trying to dethrone the team that's won the division so many years in a row, depending on the mood). It's like being a hockey fan is immediate membership to a secret club, and maybe that's what all the nerds loved about it. So hipster, liking something that's not cool. And it's considered foreign! Even better!
I'm not sure what it is exactly, but I have never bled the colors of any of my schools. It's always been teal and black. And now that it's getting to the last month of the season I am starting to hit my panic mode. It's not that the Sharks are doing poorly - they've actually quite turned it around since the mid-season slump. It's just what I do. This is when I start listening to every single game and start yelling at my computer and wearing my Sharks shirt on important game days. It doesn't quite fit with anything else I do, just like the Sharks themselves don't quite fit with anything else in their city. Yet a beloved part of the city they are, so yell I shall.
Somehow it worked. Even back in middle school drama class, when we were asked to portray a common occurrence without words, we sat down to watch a Sharks v. Kings game. And 90% of the class got it immediately. I can walk around campus during hockey season and I'll see someone with a shirt or keychain or hat of another team in our division and I'll high five them (or make some crack about they shouldn't bother trying to dethrone the team that's won the division so many years in a row, depending on the mood). It's like being a hockey fan is immediate membership to a secret club, and maybe that's what all the nerds loved about it. So hipster, liking something that's not cool. And it's considered foreign! Even better!
I'm not sure what it is exactly, but I have never bled the colors of any of my schools. It's always been teal and black. And now that it's getting to the last month of the season I am starting to hit my panic mode. It's not that the Sharks are doing poorly - they've actually quite turned it around since the mid-season slump. It's just what I do. This is when I start listening to every single game and start yelling at my computer and wearing my Sharks shirt on important game days. It doesn't quite fit with anything else I do, just like the Sharks themselves don't quite fit with anything else in their city. Yet a beloved part of the city they are, so yell I shall.
3.03.2011
Random Consmogglation
A few things fairly quickly here:
Remember last year at my service learning volunteer place I made dinner for 20 kiddos in about 20 minutes and it turned out pretty well? Well I made dinner again. And deboned two chickens. Guys, I don't even cook chicken breasts when they've been all nicely cut and cleaned and packaged. But there were chickens and they'd been boiled and now they needed to be deboned. And there I was. So...now I know how to debone chickens. It's really not as difficult as you might think.
This morning I was on the bus, listening to Rush rather loudly b/c I didn't sleep much the night before. I had Yyz (come on, it's on Guitar Hero guys, you've heard it) on and was rocking out and the guy next to me taps my shoulder. "Look, I love Rush, but I'm seeing buttons here. Can you change the song?" Annnnd that just made my morning.
This morning I also went to get Starbucks on campus. There was a line of at least 10 sorority girls ahead of me. B says they are notorious for ordering skinny vanilla lattes, so I text him making a joke that it's the invasion of the skinny vanilla lattes. 3 of the 5 girls ahead of me order skinny vanilla lattes. The other two order lite versions of various chilled drinks. Good god, I hate it when I'm right. Then I come along (having just started to play Rush b/c this place needed some nerding-up) and order a delicious fatty java chip thinger and get a few looks from the nike-sport short clad crowd. A: one. Latte invaders: zip.
And if you all could just do me a solid and skip to 8 minutes on this video and think of the most perfect spring day and I think you have a good sense of how I feel right now. J, new thing for us to do together. Just an idea. XP
Remember last year at my service learning volunteer place I made dinner for 20 kiddos in about 20 minutes and it turned out pretty well? Well I made dinner again. And deboned two chickens. Guys, I don't even cook chicken breasts when they've been all nicely cut and cleaned and packaged. But there were chickens and they'd been boiled and now they needed to be deboned. And there I was. So...now I know how to debone chickens. It's really not as difficult as you might think.
This morning I was on the bus, listening to Rush rather loudly b/c I didn't sleep much the night before. I had Yyz (come on, it's on Guitar Hero guys, you've heard it) on and was rocking out and the guy next to me taps my shoulder. "Look, I love Rush, but I'm seeing buttons here. Can you change the song?" Annnnd that just made my morning.
This morning I also went to get Starbucks on campus. There was a line of at least 10 sorority girls ahead of me. B says they are notorious for ordering skinny vanilla lattes, so I text him making a joke that it's the invasion of the skinny vanilla lattes. 3 of the 5 girls ahead of me order skinny vanilla lattes. The other two order lite versions of various chilled drinks. Good god, I hate it when I'm right. Then I come along (having just started to play Rush b/c this place needed some nerding-up) and order a delicious fatty java chip thinger and get a few looks from the nike-sport short clad crowd. A: one. Latte invaders: zip.
And if you all could just do me a solid and skip to 8 minutes on this video and think of the most perfect spring day and I think you have a good sense of how I feel right now. J, new thing for us to do together. Just an idea. XP
3.01.2011
Defriended
It's a strange thing for someone like me to deal with losing a friend. I mean, yeah, sometimes it happens. But it's not supposed to happen like this.
I know I wrote on here that I'd never speak to K again. But that was then. He and I became friends and over this winter break we were super close, but drifted a bit at the start of the school year. When I went home this weekend, I had dinner with him and his 3 roommates. And watched the two latest episodes of Chuck. And talked about my relationship. And when I left, I felt confident he and I were still awesome friends.
Then it's the next morning and I'm on Facebook and I don't see any posts from him, which is weird b/c he chronically posts. So I go check his page. And I can't see his wall. Oh, hey, I've been defriended. So I shoot him an email asking why. I know it's not a mistake that I've been defriended and it's okay, I'll put up with the minor insult, just tell me why. I get "Good bye" in return and when I send a "What? No! Why?" his way, I receive notification that I've been blocked and my emails will go straight to the trash. Oh. Do I dare even try the phone? I send the same message via text. No reply after 4 hours. I call him. One ring, then voicemail.
I honestly have no clue how to handle this. The logical part of my brain is winning and I haven't done anything, but the angry part is telling me to drive to his college and demand he explain himself. Or at least contact his military-to-be roommate and get him to kick K's butt. Another part thinks this will blow over in a week and it'll all be okay. But my fear is that it won't. Regardless of how the romantic relationship wound up, this kid was my closest friend in Indiana for four years and I'm not one to just give up on a friend, even if all signs are saying to. J can attest to this. You can tell me not to be friends with you and I just won't care. If I say we're friends then we're friends, damn it. I don't care if you like it or not.
But there is really so little I can do in this case. That's the part that's driving me the most insane. Not the not knowing why. Not the timing. Not the supposed reasoning. The fact that I am powerless to change this is what's upsetting me. I am powerless to help my friend.
I know I wrote on here that I'd never speak to K again. But that was then. He and I became friends and over this winter break we were super close, but drifted a bit at the start of the school year. When I went home this weekend, I had dinner with him and his 3 roommates. And watched the two latest episodes of Chuck. And talked about my relationship. And when I left, I felt confident he and I were still awesome friends.
Then it's the next morning and I'm on Facebook and I don't see any posts from him, which is weird b/c he chronically posts. So I go check his page. And I can't see his wall. Oh, hey, I've been defriended. So I shoot him an email asking why. I know it's not a mistake that I've been defriended and it's okay, I'll put up with the minor insult, just tell me why. I get "Good bye" in return and when I send a "What? No! Why?" his way, I receive notification that I've been blocked and my emails will go straight to the trash. Oh. Do I dare even try the phone? I send the same message via text. No reply after 4 hours. I call him. One ring, then voicemail.
I honestly have no clue how to handle this. The logical part of my brain is winning and I haven't done anything, but the angry part is telling me to drive to his college and demand he explain himself. Or at least contact his military-to-be roommate and get him to kick K's butt. Another part thinks this will blow over in a week and it'll all be okay. But my fear is that it won't. Regardless of how the romantic relationship wound up, this kid was my closest friend in Indiana for four years and I'm not one to just give up on a friend, even if all signs are saying to. J can attest to this. You can tell me not to be friends with you and I just won't care. If I say we're friends then we're friends, damn it. I don't care if you like it or not.
But there is really so little I can do in this case. That's the part that's driving me the most insane. Not the not knowing why. Not the timing. Not the supposed reasoning. The fact that I am powerless to change this is what's upsetting me. I am powerless to help my friend.
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