The requirement that Go-Co students attend chapel has been something I've loved and hated about this school. For the better part of three years I bitched and moaned about going, and often with good reason - it was boring, the worship was horrible and fake (how could required worship be authentic?), and the speakers were too conservative for me to relate to.
Oh, we would have the occasional gem: Norm Jones would perform a dramatic monologue or a preacher from an urban church would come shake us up a little bit. But until this year, chapel was something I habitually resented. Sometimes I would try to get something out of it, spiritually or intellectually, but I would almost always walk away frustrated. I came to think of myself not as a Christian but as an agnostic.
I'm not saying things have gotten tons better. My faith is still a fragile thing. But, for the first time in four years, I was actually starting to get something out of going to chapel. Perhaps the number of "Christian life and worship" credits I'd earned didn't reflect that, but I was going twice a week ready to engage (as well as attending Sunday night candlelight worship, which doesn't offer credit), and that was a huge step for me.
Then, halfway through the semester, I had five extra chapel credits tacked onto my requirements, pushing me up to 35 for the semester. Between my night shifts at the writing center, my afternoon classes, and my internship, I literally could not attend afternoon and evening events. I counted, and there were not enough morning chapels left in the semester for me to fulfill the requirement.
They don't stop you from graduating if you don't make all your chapels. As a part-time student next semester, my record will be cleared anyway. But it was the principle of the thing. I asked for a reduction in chapel requirements and was refused.
Suddenly what little motivation I had to attend was replaced by the same familiar resentment that kept me from God over the past few years. The expectation that I, a Christian teetering on the brink of faith, should have to make better than perfect chapel attendance for the rest of the semester was absurd. I determined that the chapel office was run by a slew of heartless bureaucrats with no concept of the Christian concept of mercy.
I almost decided to boycott and start having my own private worship time. After all, the idea of Christian life and worship is to bring you into communion with God, and I could do that just as well on my own. I thought, who the hell are the bureaucrats to tell me whether my Christian life and worship is sufficient? Are they saying I'm only good enough for God if I'm good enough for them? But we are not trying to please men, but God! He is the only one who should be attaching a value to my Christian life and worship.
Well, today I completed my 35th chapel of the semester. I am done. I don't know how I managed it; maybe it was the Thursday night movie screening that I only went to because Skipping Stone had a hand in its production, or the debate on human suffering, or the visiting author whose discourse I had to attend for my writing class. Regardless, I did it, and I think that the victory is as pleasing to God as it is to the chapel office. I at least know that I feel better rounded and spiritually stimulated than I have in past years.
Put that in your censer and smoke it.
Peace, love and truffles,
Miss Rex
Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts
Billy Madison learned the most important thing in high school
How to BS.
I had never seen Billy Madison until a couple of weeks ago, and that was on purpose. Let me tell you, after it was over I really sympathized with the guy who said "everybody in this room is now dumber for having listened to you."
But Billy Madison learned the most important thing you can learn in high school. It's sad but true: The ability to BS will get you through just about anything in life, or at least the rest of your schooling. I have my theories that it will get you far in the corporate world too, but I have yet to personally test this theory, and I think I will find it easier to be passionate in that world, so perhaps BS will be less necessary than it has been for the past 16 years of my life.
The tragic truth is, students don't have time to be sincere and thoughtful. Even if we had no other work/family/friend/etc. obligations, coursework alone would leave us with too little time for sincerity and thought. So, we get really good at sounding thoughtful as we crank out paper after paper, sometimes spending as little as a single afternoon on a major 8-ish page paper.
I've had teachers throughout the years tell me that it doesn't matter what point you argue as long as you back it up with evidence. By these standards, Billy's blathering about a lost puppy being a symbol for society gets top marks.
And so will my twelve-pager for Communication Theories. Rawr!
Peace, love, and finals,
Miss Rex
I had never seen Billy Madison until a couple of weeks ago, and that was on purpose. Let me tell you, after it was over I really sympathized with the guy who said "everybody in this room is now dumber for having listened to you."
But Billy Madison learned the most important thing you can learn in high school. It's sad but true: The ability to BS will get you through just about anything in life, or at least the rest of your schooling. I have my theories that it will get you far in the corporate world too, but I have yet to personally test this theory, and I think I will find it easier to be passionate in that world, so perhaps BS will be less necessary than it has been for the past 16 years of my life.
The tragic truth is, students don't have time to be sincere and thoughtful. Even if we had no other work/family/friend/etc. obligations, coursework alone would leave us with too little time for sincerity and thought. So, we get really good at sounding thoughtful as we crank out paper after paper, sometimes spending as little as a single afternoon on a major 8-ish page paper.
I've had teachers throughout the years tell me that it doesn't matter what point you argue as long as you back it up with evidence. By these standards, Billy's blathering about a lost puppy being a symbol for society gets top marks.
And so will my twelve-pager for Communication Theories. Rawr!
Peace, love, and finals,
Miss Rex
Things my mother doesn't understand
My mom and I have a great relationship. We're very open - I really do tell her most of what goes on in my life. I enjoy her company, she enjoys mine, and I value her advice, sometimes a little more than it's really wise to value a single person's input. But then I get a night like this and all I can really say is WTF?
I spent the first three weeks of my summer (excluding the time I was abroad) mostly bored out of my skull, to the point that mom was sick to death of me complaining about how bored I was and actually nagged me to get the heck out of the house. If there's one sure-fire way to get me out of the house, it's nagging, especially about how I ought to socialize.
The functioning and etiquette of college-aged social circles is #1 on the list of things my mother doesn't understand. Texting someone I've barely hung out with day after day asking to do stuff seems anti-etiquette to me, regardless of whether her theory that he's romantically interested holds any water.
On Wednesday my friend Bear, who I met through Ravin a few years ago, and who she in turn met at school in Ohio, came to visit. After a bizarre twist of events that ended with him not being allowed to stay at her house the first few nights, we put him up Wednesday and Thursday, and as good friends are wont to do I have hung out with him and Ravin and sometimes The Pantsless One (TPO) pretty much non-stop since Bear got here.
I should mention that Bear doesn't sleep more than four hours on a good night, so I stayed up late keeping him company the two nights he was here. This was not an act of pity on my part. The great thing about Bear is he puts me at ease so that Suppressed Me can show her face, and that's something special.
This brings me to item #2 on the list of things my mother doesn't understand: Teens/twenty-somethings' sleeping patterns, or lack thereof. I believe that, as people who are biologically alive, the most vital thing for us to do is to "live deep and suck out all the marrow of life" at whatever hour that marrow is there for the sucking, even if the hour is late or the place is far. I'm flexible; late hours and far places don't bother me, and if it gets too late or too far, I'd sleep just about anywhere.
I have friends who are early to bed and early to rise. I have friends who play all night, then sleep until the sun sets. I have friends who seem not to sleep at all. They are all dear to my heart and I will do everything I can to savor the marrow with them, especially friends like Bear, who I see twice a year if I'm lucky.
Obviously this is not exactly how my mother sees things. Sleeping in one's own bed at night seems to be very important to her. Oh, I can get away with a night or two a week at Ravin or TPO's house, but sleep away more than one consecutive night and I can feel the bad vibes beginning to pulse. Staying up late with people is irresponsible.
While yes, it may look that way, I'll point out that I have never been late for work, never missed a class, and have gotten straight As since I got to college because I know how to balance my time. No, I don't always make the best decision. Some days I'm so tired I can barely stay awake through chapel. But I am aware of my obligations and take them into account, and when it's summer and I have none, I don't worry too much.
Speaking of responsibility, driving long distances is also irresponsible, regardless of whether I am personally at the wheel and regardless of whether the car is likely to break down (though I'll concede that with Derry this is very likely).
Point #3: Distance is not an issue when it comes to doing something or seeing someone you love. Music is my passion. Driving two hours to a concert is more than reasonable. It's liberating. It actually gives me a little bit of an adrenaline rush. This is all the better when the bands I'm seeing are my friends, like Kiros and Adam Ezra Group, because it becomes not just about the music but about friends (see #2).
Mom says driving far away is ridiculous; don't my friends and I have any common sense? I get this even more when we drive ALL OVER the south shore in one car, which is convenient for no one because we live in an equilateral triangle of 35-minute sides, but it is fun for everyone because we're best friends and we're together and to us that's more important than gas money, car mileage or drive time.
Last night Bear and I slept at TPO's house. Ravin was supposed to as well until she found out around 11:30 PM that she had to be home early for a violin lesson. Then I woke up at 8:45 to a text from XL saying that he was at my house, which I totally wasn't expecting at such an early hour, and my mother was displeased that I had invited XL only to have him hang out with me and Bear all day as opposed to just me.
I have this memory (maybe real, maybe hallucinated) of a conversation with XL that went, "We have a friend in town so you'll probably be hanging out with all of us if that's cool," followed by something like, "yeah, I'd love to meet your friends" in response. But frankly it was none of my mother’s business to be concerned about it anyway.
Tonight Ravin, TPO, Bear and I went to see Toy Story 3 (WHICH I'll add was hysterically clever, surprising, touching, and featured a Totoro plush toy) and we were going to go swim at Ravin's after, except my mother insisted I come home.
I tried to argue my way out of sleeping at home tonight, since from tomorrow night onward I'll have to actually be responsible because I'm starting work, but no dice - it's father's day tomorrow, among other reasons that ranged from semi-legitimate to completely random. To be honest I was pissed. We were all hyper and having so much fun. We picked up our friend The Italian, who was drunk and therefore hilarious. But I had to leave, and it just didn't seem fair.
When I got home I found out the reason I needed to be there first thing in the morning on father's day is that I am supposed to help make breakfast for my dad. I think that's sweet. If I'd been told that to begin with I would have been so much more compliant! Disappointed, yes, but not angry. Instead I feel like this:
On a side note, I’m starting the process of making sure all the people mentioned in my blog get code names. Sorry if things get confusing ^_^
Peace, love, and residual Chocolixir/Mountain Dew/favorite people high,
Miss Rex
I spent the first three weeks of my summer (excluding the time I was abroad) mostly bored out of my skull, to the point that mom was sick to death of me complaining about how bored I was and actually nagged me to get the heck out of the house. If there's one sure-fire way to get me out of the house, it's nagging, especially about how I ought to socialize.
The functioning and etiquette of college-aged social circles is #1 on the list of things my mother doesn't understand. Texting someone I've barely hung out with day after day asking to do stuff seems anti-etiquette to me, regardless of whether her theory that he's romantically interested holds any water.
On Wednesday my friend Bear, who I met through Ravin a few years ago, and who she in turn met at school in Ohio, came to visit. After a bizarre twist of events that ended with him not being allowed to stay at her house the first few nights, we put him up Wednesday and Thursday, and as good friends are wont to do I have hung out with him and Ravin and sometimes The Pantsless One (TPO) pretty much non-stop since Bear got here.
I should mention that Bear doesn't sleep more than four hours on a good night, so I stayed up late keeping him company the two nights he was here. This was not an act of pity on my part. The great thing about Bear is he puts me at ease so that Suppressed Me can show her face, and that's something special.
This brings me to item #2 on the list of things my mother doesn't understand: Teens/twenty-somethings' sleeping patterns, or lack thereof. I believe that, as people who are biologically alive, the most vital thing for us to do is to "live deep and suck out all the marrow of life" at whatever hour that marrow is there for the sucking, even if the hour is late or the place is far. I'm flexible; late hours and far places don't bother me, and if it gets too late or too far, I'd sleep just about anywhere.
I have friends who are early to bed and early to rise. I have friends who play all night, then sleep until the sun sets. I have friends who seem not to sleep at all. They are all dear to my heart and I will do everything I can to savor the marrow with them, especially friends like Bear, who I see twice a year if I'm lucky.
Obviously this is not exactly how my mother sees things. Sleeping in one's own bed at night seems to be very important to her. Oh, I can get away with a night or two a week at Ravin or TPO's house, but sleep away more than one consecutive night and I can feel the bad vibes beginning to pulse. Staying up late with people is irresponsible.
While yes, it may look that way, I'll point out that I have never been late for work, never missed a class, and have gotten straight As since I got to college because I know how to balance my time. No, I don't always make the best decision. Some days I'm so tired I can barely stay awake through chapel. But I am aware of my obligations and take them into account, and when it's summer and I have none, I don't worry too much.
Speaking of responsibility, driving long distances is also irresponsible, regardless of whether I am personally at the wheel and regardless of whether the car is likely to break down (though I'll concede that with Derry this is very likely).
Point #3: Distance is not an issue when it comes to doing something or seeing someone you love. Music is my passion. Driving two hours to a concert is more than reasonable. It's liberating. It actually gives me a little bit of an adrenaline rush. This is all the better when the bands I'm seeing are my friends, like Kiros and Adam Ezra Group, because it becomes not just about the music but about friends (see #2).
Mom says driving far away is ridiculous; don't my friends and I have any common sense? I get this even more when we drive ALL OVER the south shore in one car, which is convenient for no one because we live in an equilateral triangle of 35-minute sides, but it is fun for everyone because we're best friends and we're together and to us that's more important than gas money, car mileage or drive time.
Last night Bear and I slept at TPO's house. Ravin was supposed to as well until she found out around 11:30 PM that she had to be home early for a violin lesson. Then I woke up at 8:45 to a text from XL saying that he was at my house, which I totally wasn't expecting at such an early hour, and my mother was displeased that I had invited XL only to have him hang out with me and Bear all day as opposed to just me.
I have this memory (maybe real, maybe hallucinated) of a conversation with XL that went, "We have a friend in town so you'll probably be hanging out with all of us if that's cool," followed by something like, "yeah, I'd love to meet your friends" in response. But frankly it was none of my mother’s business to be concerned about it anyway.
Tonight Ravin, TPO, Bear and I went to see Toy Story 3 (WHICH I'll add was hysterically clever, surprising, touching, and featured a Totoro plush toy) and we were going to go swim at Ravin's after, except my mother insisted I come home.
I tried to argue my way out of sleeping at home tonight, since from tomorrow night onward I'll have to actually be responsible because I'm starting work, but no dice - it's father's day tomorrow, among other reasons that ranged from semi-legitimate to completely random. To be honest I was pissed. We were all hyper and having so much fun. We picked up our friend The Italian, who was drunk and therefore hilarious. But I had to leave, and it just didn't seem fair.
When I got home I found out the reason I needed to be there first thing in the morning on father's day is that I am supposed to help make breakfast for my dad. I think that's sweet. If I'd been told that to begin with I would have been so much more compliant! Disappointed, yes, but not angry. Instead I feel like this:
On a side note, I’m starting the process of making sure all the people mentioned in my blog get code names. Sorry if things get confusing ^_^
Peace, love, and residual Chocolixir/Mountain Dew/favorite people high,
Miss Rex
Narcissism.me
Have you heard of formspring.me? Of course you have, you good little social networker, you. It's the new Twitter, the grandchild of the 200-question MySpace bulletin survey. ANYONE CAN ASK YOU ANYTHING, AND YOU'LL LOVE IT.
EVERYONE will ask you bazillions of questions, because EVERYONE wants to know the deep dark secrets of quirky, fabulous YOU, and you will get social networker's high telling them all the TMI they never wanted to know about quirky fabulous you. To the umpteenth degree. Am I right or am I right?
Problem. As much as quirky fabulous narcissistic you loves telling un-quirky un-fabulous everyone-else about YOU, well, everyone else would much rather be telling YOU how quirky and fabulous THEY are. It's all one big cry for attention. And look, I get it; we all love the feeling of eyes on us, we all want to be loved, we all want to feel like others find us interesting and unique. I want that, too. But frankly they don't give a damn about your deep dark secrets.
At least this is the theory behind why I don't have a formspring. It seems like people are always using their Facebook statuses to beg their friends to ask them questions on formspring.me, and that is just sad. Sorry if you do this, but when I see that on my news feed, I think, "This is stupid." I always want to ask a question because I feel bad that they have been so unsuccessful in their ventures of narcissism that they need to go on Facebook to ask people to ask them questions, but I can never think of anything interesting or creative to say.
I was never too good at truth or dare, either.
But I was always good at those 200-question MySpace surveys (probably because they were all about quirky fabulous ME), which makes formspring sound like it COULD be fun. I just... can't be okay with further fueling said narcissism. I mean, I guess it's narcissistic to blog, too, as if anyone should care what I have to say, but at least a blog is a legitimate way to get your name out there en route to authordom.
I also have a problem with the anonymity factor. Some small interactive feature might redeem this Me machine, but you don't even know who's asking you these (sometimes highly personal/inappropriate) questions. Yeah, sometimes that affects the answer; but it should, shouldn't it? In a normal, healthy, face-to-face conversation it would.
I guess it also comes down to the fact that I don't expect anyone would be very interested in asking me anything anyway, and I think that would just be depressing.
EVERYONE will ask you bazillions of questions, because EVERYONE wants to know the deep dark secrets of quirky, fabulous YOU, and you will get social networker's high telling them all the TMI they never wanted to know about quirky fabulous you. To the umpteenth degree. Am I right or am I right?
Problem. As much as quirky fabulous narcissistic you loves telling un-quirky un-fabulous everyone-else about YOU, well, everyone else would much rather be telling YOU how quirky and fabulous THEY are. It's all one big cry for attention. And look, I get it; we all love the feeling of eyes on us, we all want to be loved, we all want to feel like others find us interesting and unique. I want that, too. But frankly they don't give a damn about your deep dark secrets.
At least this is the theory behind why I don't have a formspring. It seems like people are always using their Facebook statuses to beg their friends to ask them questions on formspring.me, and that is just sad. Sorry if you do this, but when I see that on my news feed, I think, "This is stupid." I always want to ask a question because I feel bad that they have been so unsuccessful in their ventures of narcissism that they need to go on Facebook to ask people to ask them questions, but I can never think of anything interesting or creative to say.
I was never too good at truth or dare, either.
But I was always good at those 200-question MySpace surveys (probably because they were all about quirky fabulous ME), which makes formspring sound like it COULD be fun. I just... can't be okay with further fueling said narcissism. I mean, I guess it's narcissistic to blog, too, as if anyone should care what I have to say, but at least a blog is a legitimate way to get your name out there en route to authordom.
I also have a problem with the anonymity factor. Some small interactive feature might redeem this Me machine, but you don't even know who's asking you these (sometimes highly personal/inappropriate) questions. Yeah, sometimes that affects the answer; but it should, shouldn't it? In a normal, healthy, face-to-face conversation it would.
I guess it also comes down to the fact that I don't expect anyone would be very interested in asking me anything anyway, and I think that would just be depressing.
In which the lamb overtakes the lion (at least for now)
What a fabulous week it's been! Sunny and 60º+ since Wednesday! Let's take a look at the highlights, shall we?
10. Eating ice cream makes sense again!
9. The grass is not white. The sky is not white. Everything feels less dead.
8. I can walk outside in just a sweatshirt without feeling compelled to curl up in fetal position.
7. Birds! Birds singing, birds flying around, yes, even birds pooping on the quad!
6. Grass. Smells. Amazing.
5. Peepers!! I can't even tell you how many winter nights I lulled myself to sleep just imagining their incessant cheep-cheeping, and now they're here!
4. BEAAAACHHH! Salty air, warm dunes, and best of all, SANDY FEET!
3. Ultimate Frisbee. If you don't know what it is, watch this.
2. Going barefoot everywhere!
1. People! Everyone's outside and sun-drunk, which makes finding things to do a no-brainer. Nobody wants to do work when it's like this. People simply don't go to classes. I was lucky to have my only class canceled today... and nothing can top the moment of epiphany when I realized it was canceled.
I must say my hopes were not high on Monday when my GPS took me on a wild goose chase through Medford in the pouring rain. After telling me to turn left at a No Left Turn sign, which it does at least once a trip (that or directing me down one way streets... the wrong way), it decided that the best route to the building I needed to get to was to go around 3.5 sides of a block, amounting to over a mile of walking in the wind and rain with an already-mangled umbrella. I was late for the interview I was conducting, looked like crap when I got there, and was so cold that once I got inside my nose started leaking, just to add to the embarrassment. BUT, the interview was way fun, and the article got picked up by TWO sections of the Boston Globe regionals.
And then the sun came out (hence my sudden Disapparation after I promised to post this week)! I spent a lot of time at the beach IN SPITE OF THE GODDAMN WIND and played my first game of ultimate frisbee in way-too-many-months. Can you say glorious?
But today was the best yet. I ran into a friend I hadn't hung out with since he helped me make a 30-second PSA for fair trade coffee last spring. I joined him and his friends for lunch on the grassy space outside of Lane, and then a few of us went out into the woods to take pictures. For a change, I was not the one wielding the camera (mine happens to be broken).
The trails were still quite messy from the rain on Monday (and the entire month preceding Monday). The two guys who were there went barefoot, and since I hadn't felt like going back to Ferrin for my galoshes, I did the same. It was delightfully icky! Playing in the mud was never something I did as a child. I was very clean. We do have a rainy season swamp behind our house where my friends and I used to play, but the point of the game was always to build bridges over the muck or find ways around it. Falling in always sucked. So at first I was quite displeased with my choice of footwear, but I quickly learned that mud is incredible. End of story.
On the way back, one of the boys caught a garter snake (note, I have no qualms about using the word "boys" for these twenty-year-old men; they were certainly acting as such, and that is not a negative statement). It was adorable! (The snake, that is. Not the boys.) I was so excited to pet it because earlier this semester I was going to get a pet snake before I found out you have to keep them in freaking climate-controlled terrariums. But the poor little guy was scared and did that smelly musk thing, and it made him feel all slimy. Ick.
All of the above have conspired to make me an incredibly happy person this week. And also a rather sunburnt and very tired one. But we have one sunny day left before the lion cows the lamb back into submission, and I shall not let a moment go to waste!
Peace, love and step-rock-step,
Miss Rex
10. Eating ice cream makes sense again!
9. The grass is not white. The sky is not white. Everything feels less dead.
8. I can walk outside in just a sweatshirt without feeling compelled to curl up in fetal position.
7. Birds! Birds singing, birds flying around, yes, even birds pooping on the quad!
6. Grass. Smells. Amazing.
5. Peepers!! I can't even tell you how many winter nights I lulled myself to sleep just imagining their incessant cheep-cheeping, and now they're here!
4. BEAAAACHHH! Salty air, warm dunes, and best of all, SANDY FEET!
3. Ultimate Frisbee. If you don't know what it is, watch this.
2. Going barefoot everywhere!
1. People! Everyone's outside and sun-drunk, which makes finding things to do a no-brainer. Nobody wants to do work when it's like this. People simply don't go to classes. I was lucky to have my only class canceled today... and nothing can top the moment of epiphany when I realized it was canceled.
I must say my hopes were not high on Monday when my GPS took me on a wild goose chase through Medford in the pouring rain. After telling me to turn left at a No Left Turn sign, which it does at least once a trip (that or directing me down one way streets... the wrong way), it decided that the best route to the building I needed to get to was to go around 3.5 sides of a block, amounting to over a mile of walking in the wind and rain with an already-mangled umbrella. I was late for the interview I was conducting, looked like crap when I got there, and was so cold that once I got inside my nose started leaking, just to add to the embarrassment. BUT, the interview was way fun, and the article got picked up by TWO sections of the Boston Globe regionals.
And then the sun came out (hence my sudden Disapparation after I promised to post this week)! I spent a lot of time at the beach IN SPITE OF THE GODDAMN WIND and played my first game of ultimate frisbee in way-too-many-months. Can you say glorious?
But today was the best yet. I ran into a friend I hadn't hung out with since he helped me make a 30-second PSA for fair trade coffee last spring. I joined him and his friends for lunch on the grassy space outside of Lane, and then a few of us went out into the woods to take pictures. For a change, I was not the one wielding the camera (mine happens to be broken).
The trails were still quite messy from the rain on Monday (and the entire month preceding Monday). The two guys who were there went barefoot, and since I hadn't felt like going back to Ferrin for my galoshes, I did the same. It was delightfully icky! Playing in the mud was never something I did as a child. I was very clean. We do have a rainy season swamp behind our house where my friends and I used to play, but the point of the game was always to build bridges over the muck or find ways around it. Falling in always sucked. So at first I was quite displeased with my choice of footwear, but I quickly learned that mud is incredible. End of story.
On the way back, one of the boys caught a garter snake (note, I have no qualms about using the word "boys" for these twenty-year-old men; they were certainly acting as such, and that is not a negative statement). It was adorable! (The snake, that is. Not the boys.) I was so excited to pet it because earlier this semester I was going to get a pet snake before I found out you have to keep them in freaking climate-controlled terrariums. But the poor little guy was scared and did that smelly musk thing, and it made him feel all slimy. Ick.
All of the above have conspired to make me an incredibly happy person this week. And also a rather sunburnt and very tired one. But we have one sunny day left before the lion cows the lamb back into submission, and I shall not let a moment go to waste!
Peace, love and step-rock-step,
Miss Rex
525,600 minutes
Resolutions:
From 2009:
1. "Sleep when you’re dead." And save Facebook for later, too.
2. Suffer for my art… and finish the first draft of “Before the Empty Moon.”
3. Get the female equivalent of balls to tell people what I’m really thinking.
4. Be able to support my sponsored child AND my concert addiction.
5. Take a road trip.
6. Play a show.
7. Meet William Beckett.
Well, two out of seven ain't bad....
Oh, who am I kidding? That's utterly shameful. I must make a greater effort this year/set more attainable goals. Ones that I can control a little more than meeting Mr. Tall-and-sexy Beckett. But then what does one resolve? Most people resolve to stop being lazy and go to the gym, but I already do that. Or they resolve to stop eating so much crap and lose weight. I guess I could use a little work on the not eating crap bit; maybe actually being a vegetarian would be a good resolution.
But those things are all restrictions. Wouldn't resolving to accomplish something be a more positive use of my efforts?
Yes. Yes it would. But I can't resolve to finish my book; with school in the way, that will never happen. So I've gone back to my Bucket List for inspiration and chosen a few items that would be manageable this year even with school throwing a wrench in everything.
1. Read. For my own enjoyment.
2. Learn the constellations.
3. Write at least once a week! And it must be something substantial; Claymore reviews and Scatterday posts don't count anymore! They're just a lazy way of saying I've produced something, but it's not exactly productive if it's not something you'll show off to publishers or employers. I love this blog, and I love you all, but I must confess that it has not been the writing "workout" I intended it to be. I'm getting writer's flab.
4. Do something that scares me.
5. Pray.
And now, a few life lessons from the past 525,600 minutes! I've changed a ton this year, and a lot of it isn't stuff I can articulate or it's too specific to be universalized as "life lessons." I've learned about relationships, religion, and just... life in general. But anyway, here is my attempt.
On relationships:
1. Long distance relationships suck. For EVERYONE, including people who aren't actually part of the relationship. Even close-by-long-distance relationships are tough.
2. Boys (and jobs) are better when you can enjoy the benefits of more than one at a time, or at least it seems that way when finally set free from a long relationship you sort of grew to hate in its dying months. (Oh, and having multiple jobs is always a good idea if you're addicted to concerts ^_^)
3.
I have a magnet on my fridge that says this, and for two years I have blatantly laughed at it. Clearly, I said, this statement was engineered by some horny teenager looking for excuses to get some. "Lies from the pit of hell," I said (or something to that effect).
I'm not saying spooning necessarily leads to forking. It does not, and (in my experience) has not. But it absolutely can. Easily.
All I'm saying is, if you don't want to use your cutlery, keep it separate.
4. It’s something special to feel like you’re a better human being when you’re around a certain person, but it’s really exceptional to act like one for that person in his or her absence.
On life in general:
1. "People sometimes say that the way things happen in the movies is unreal, but actually it’s the way things happen to you in life that’s unreal. The movies make emotions look so strong and real, whereas when things really do happen to you, it’s like watching television — you don’t feel anything." — Andy Warhol
2. I CAN dance without arrows! The key, if you are as challenged as I thought I was, is confidence. If you look comfortable, like you know what you're doing, people will just assume you DO know what you're doing. Don't try too hard. Dancing is a natural movement of the body.
If you're worried, bring glow sticks.
3. You can drink irresponsibly responsibly (at least this is what Auntie Debbie and I agreed upon). If you PLAN on getting trashed, fine, whatever; you should also PLAN to give someone who won't be drinking your keys and PLAN to stay put until you're not trashed. I don't understand why this is hard to understand for some people.
4. A home is a gift from God, and like any gift it is meant to be shared.
5. Stop making promises! It's way too hard to keep them unless you really mean them, and when you break your word, you cheapen it. Have your word be the highest insurance of your intentions.
On religion:
Religion sucks. I've always had a problem being associated with a denomination, but I think that was mostly my hatred of labels. It's a bit more personal now.
People say the word "Christian" with such disdain, and you just know: they think you're delusional, stupid, simple or misguided, they think you're judgmental, they don't want to trust you and they expect to be rejected by you. That is the opposite of what a Christian is supposed to be, according to the Bible. If this is what people are going to think about me when they hear I'm a Christian then count me out.
God isn't about rules and rituals. He doesn't live inside of a church or chapel. He doesn't want a bunch of lemmings trailing after him unthinkingly or he wouldn't have given us brains. I think it necessarily comes down to who God is to you, because who can be right? Who has the right to say they know what's going on and everybody else in the world is wrong? It's sheer arrogance and creates conflict. I'm not saying everybody's right and anything goes, but I sure as hell can't tell you which ones are wrong.
Maybe everyone is a little bit right. Maybe we're all dead wrong. I for one cannot look at the world and think it all just fell into place. For me there had to be someone there first, and the fact that he's here and I'm here means I owe him some allegiance. What kind and to what extent I'm still figuring out. I don't know how, or if, I should talk to him. I don't know if I should trust the Bible (or any other text for that matter). I don't know if it's fair for me to ask things of him since I'm not doing much for him on my end.
All I know is this: Love. Drawing lines between people, when we all comprise the same essence, is destructive. It's not love. Killing someone in the name of Jesus Christ or Allah or anybody else disregards the sanctity of life. It's a failure to love. Turning away gay people or looking down on different races or saying that someone raised in a culture that practices, say, Buddhism or animism is unwelcome at your church - those are failures to love. We have failed. And we fail and fail again. We have got to love each other or we'll never make it. What else is there to live for but love?
This is beginning to sound like godly anarchy, which I'm not even sure is possible... but it sounds nice.
At first I was disoriented, scared and upset that my adolescent faith was disappearing, but I've come to see that faith must be dynamic. It's too easy otherwise. Too formulaic. If it’s static, it’s stunted; it’s a small child that won’t grow up. It’s fearful. It’s a sapling with but one trunk, one branch, one direction. So much potential, so little purpose; it’s trimmed back time and again when what it needs is to grow, to change, to branch out into a million different places and hope that, maybe, one of those million places will touch the sky, and even if they don't....
They reached for it with every power in their grasp.
Happy New Year.
Miss Rex
From 2009:
1. "Sleep when you’re dead." And save Facebook for later, too.
2. Suffer for my art… and finish the first draft of “Before the Empty Moon.”
3. Get the female equivalent of balls to tell people what I’m really thinking.
4. Be able to support my sponsored child AND my concert addiction.
5. Take a road trip.
6. Play a show.
7. Meet William Beckett.
Well, two out of seven ain't bad....
Oh, who am I kidding? That's utterly shameful. I must make a greater effort this year/set more attainable goals. Ones that I can control a little more than meeting Mr. Tall-and-sexy Beckett. But then what does one resolve? Most people resolve to stop being lazy and go to the gym, but I already do that. Or they resolve to stop eating so much crap and lose weight. I guess I could use a little work on the not eating crap bit; maybe actually being a vegetarian would be a good resolution.
But those things are all restrictions. Wouldn't resolving to accomplish something be a more positive use of my efforts?
Yes. Yes it would. But I can't resolve to finish my book; with school in the way, that will never happen. So I've gone back to my Bucket List for inspiration and chosen a few items that would be manageable this year even with school throwing a wrench in everything.
1. Read. For my own enjoyment.
2. Learn the constellations.
3. Write at least once a week! And it must be something substantial; Claymore reviews and Scatterday posts don't count anymore! They're just a lazy way of saying I've produced something, but it's not exactly productive if it's not something you'll show off to publishers or employers. I love this blog, and I love you all, but I must confess that it has not been the writing "workout" I intended it to be. I'm getting writer's flab.
4. Do something that scares me.
5. Pray.
And now, a few life lessons from the past 525,600 minutes! I've changed a ton this year, and a lot of it isn't stuff I can articulate or it's too specific to be universalized as "life lessons." I've learned about relationships, religion, and just... life in general. But anyway, here is my attempt.
On relationships:
1. Long distance relationships suck. For EVERYONE, including people who aren't actually part of the relationship. Even close-by-long-distance relationships are tough.
2. Boys (and jobs) are better when you can enjoy the benefits of more than one at a time, or at least it seems that way when finally set free from a long relationship you sort of grew to hate in its dying months. (Oh, and having multiple jobs is always a good idea if you're addicted to concerts ^_^)
3.
I have a magnet on my fridge that says this, and for two years I have blatantly laughed at it. Clearly, I said, this statement was engineered by some horny teenager looking for excuses to get some. "Lies from the pit of hell," I said (or something to that effect).I'm not saying spooning necessarily leads to forking. It does not, and (in my experience) has not. But it absolutely can. Easily.
All I'm saying is, if you don't want to use your cutlery, keep it separate.
4. It’s something special to feel like you’re a better human being when you’re around a certain person, but it’s really exceptional to act like one for that person in his or her absence.
On life in general:
1. "People sometimes say that the way things happen in the movies is unreal, but actually it’s the way things happen to you in life that’s unreal. The movies make emotions look so strong and real, whereas when things really do happen to you, it’s like watching television — you don’t feel anything." — Andy Warhol
2. I CAN dance without arrows! The key, if you are as challenged as I thought I was, is confidence. If you look comfortable, like you know what you're doing, people will just assume you DO know what you're doing. Don't try too hard. Dancing is a natural movement of the body.
If you're worried, bring glow sticks.
3. You can drink irresponsibly responsibly (at least this is what Auntie Debbie and I agreed upon). If you PLAN on getting trashed, fine, whatever; you should also PLAN to give someone who won't be drinking your keys and PLAN to stay put until you're not trashed. I don't understand why this is hard to understand for some people.
4. A home is a gift from God, and like any gift it is meant to be shared.
5. Stop making promises! It's way too hard to keep them unless you really mean them, and when you break your word, you cheapen it. Have your word be the highest insurance of your intentions.
On religion:
Religion sucks. I've always had a problem being associated with a denomination, but I think that was mostly my hatred of labels. It's a bit more personal now.
People say the word "Christian" with such disdain, and you just know: they think you're delusional, stupid, simple or misguided, they think you're judgmental, they don't want to trust you and they expect to be rejected by you. That is the opposite of what a Christian is supposed to be, according to the Bible. If this is what people are going to think about me when they hear I'm a Christian then count me out.
God isn't about rules and rituals. He doesn't live inside of a church or chapel. He doesn't want a bunch of lemmings trailing after him unthinkingly or he wouldn't have given us brains. I think it necessarily comes down to who God is to you, because who can be right? Who has the right to say they know what's going on and everybody else in the world is wrong? It's sheer arrogance and creates conflict. I'm not saying everybody's right and anything goes, but I sure as hell can't tell you which ones are wrong.
Maybe everyone is a little bit right. Maybe we're all dead wrong. I for one cannot look at the world and think it all just fell into place. For me there had to be someone there first, and the fact that he's here and I'm here means I owe him some allegiance. What kind and to what extent I'm still figuring out. I don't know how, or if, I should talk to him. I don't know if I should trust the Bible (or any other text for that matter). I don't know if it's fair for me to ask things of him since I'm not doing much for him on my end.
All I know is this: Love. Drawing lines between people, when we all comprise the same essence, is destructive. It's not love. Killing someone in the name of Jesus Christ or Allah or anybody else disregards the sanctity of life. It's a failure to love. Turning away gay people or looking down on different races or saying that someone raised in a culture that practices, say, Buddhism or animism is unwelcome at your church - those are failures to love. We have failed. And we fail and fail again. We have got to love each other or we'll never make it. What else is there to live for but love?
This is beginning to sound like godly anarchy, which I'm not even sure is possible... but it sounds nice.
At first I was disoriented, scared and upset that my adolescent faith was disappearing, but I've come to see that faith must be dynamic. It's too easy otherwise. Too formulaic. If it’s static, it’s stunted; it’s a small child that won’t grow up. It’s fearful. It’s a sapling with but one trunk, one branch, one direction. So much potential, so little purpose; it’s trimmed back time and again when what it needs is to grow, to change, to branch out into a million different places and hope that, maybe, one of those million places will touch the sky, and even if they don't....
They reached for it with every power in their grasp.
Happy New Year.
Miss Rex
Can Barack Obama save Christmas?
Time flies like an arrow (but fruit flies like a banana). I can't believe it's been a week and a half since I posted anything. It's that time of year: deadlines are crouching tigers/hidden dragons licking their chops at the prospect of a nice juicy comm arts major, the quad is a minefield of goose poop, and free time is harder to come by than a holographic Charizard card.
And it's getting cold.
Not THAT cold, mind you; most native New Englanders are gushing over how mild it's been. But I'm loading up on quilts; I can't make it through the day without oatmeal for breakfast, soup for lunch and Claymore Drink of the Week for dinner. I am positively dreading winter and it hasn't even snowed yet. It hasn't even been close to cold enough to snow. I'm usually not this miserable until February.
I wish I could say looking forward to Christmas is making things better, but I'm already sick of Christmas. I started finding holiday decor in stores well over a month ago while searching for my Cruella De Vil costume, and they've been playing the music in stores way too much for my liking.
Me getting sick of Christmas shouldn't be possible, period - especially not before Thanksgiving even gets here. It is my favorite season. You know I get all gaga over the lights and I become this uber-cheery version of my already-cheerful self and do nice things just because it's nice to be nice, and I throw on some Deck the Halls, Bruise Your Hand (Relient K) in the car so I can sing along or just laugh because Relient K is oh so silly.
It's just so wrong that we must celebrate this holiday for two whole months. It diminishes the magic of December to stock the shelves with red and green lights in the middle of October.
America should have a mass screening of Elmo Saves Christmas. Never seen it? Elmo loves Christmas so much that he wishes every day could be Christmas, but when his wish comes true, he sees that the holiday is nothing special when it happens every day.
THIS IS WHAT'S HAPPENING TO AMERICA, PEOPLE. Our demand for instant gratification has gotten so bad we can't even wait 365 days for a holiday to happen again. THIS IS WHY OUR COUNTRY IS GOING DOWN THE TUBES. There needs to be a law against this insanity. You hear me, Barack? You can do it, yes you can.
If you don't........
...........the magic of Christmas will be lost forever!
And it's getting cold.
Not THAT cold, mind you; most native New Englanders are gushing over how mild it's been. But I'm loading up on quilts; I can't make it through the day without oatmeal for breakfast, soup for lunch and Claymore Drink of the Week for dinner. I am positively dreading winter and it hasn't even snowed yet. It hasn't even been close to cold enough to snow. I'm usually not this miserable until February.
I wish I could say looking forward to Christmas is making things better, but I'm already sick of Christmas. I started finding holiday decor in stores well over a month ago while searching for my Cruella De Vil costume, and they've been playing the music in stores way too much for my liking.
Me getting sick of Christmas shouldn't be possible, period - especially not before Thanksgiving even gets here. It is my favorite season. You know I get all gaga over the lights and I become this uber-cheery version of my already-cheerful self and do nice things just because it's nice to be nice, and I throw on some Deck the Halls, Bruise Your Hand (Relient K) in the car so I can sing along or just laugh because Relient K is oh so silly.
It's just so wrong that we must celebrate this holiday for two whole months. It diminishes the magic of December to stock the shelves with red and green lights in the middle of October.
America should have a mass screening of Elmo Saves Christmas. Never seen it? Elmo loves Christmas so much that he wishes every day could be Christmas, but when his wish comes true, he sees that the holiday is nothing special when it happens every day.
THIS IS WHAT'S HAPPENING TO AMERICA, PEOPLE. Our demand for instant gratification has gotten so bad we can't even wait 365 days for a holiday to happen again. THIS IS WHY OUR COUNTRY IS GOING DOWN THE TUBES. There needs to be a law against this insanity. You hear me, Barack? You can do it, yes you can.
If you don't........
...........the magic of Christmas will be lost forever!
Just in case Mommy is a pedophile
A recent report from UK news source the Daily Mail says two playgrounds have banned parents from entering the premises with their children. This was done to protect the children, aged 5-15 years, from potential pedophiles. The children will play instead with strangers called "play rangers," who have been okayed by the Criminal Records Bureau.
I don't know about anyone else, but as for me, when I have kids I'm sure not sending them off to play with, or under the care of, grown-ups neither I nor they have ever met, regardless of what some bureau says about them. From what I've seen, being a mom or dad to a kid as young as five is like being a mother bear defending her cubs. It's the parents' duty and honor to care for the children. In their eyes, one else will ever do as good a job as they would do themselves.
I babysit regularly, and it's my policy to be actively involved in what the kids are doing. This is an ideal anyone who works with children should strive for. Rather than plunking them down in front of the television, engage their imaginations. Challenge them to be creative. Encourage them to be active. All of this is done by example. From my experience, kids will entertain themselves with or without my help, but at their age we can have such a huge impact on who they become, how they see the world, their attitudes and values. It's far better to be involved, and this involvement is a privilege to be enjoyed by parents or caretakers selected by the parents, not strangers. Entrusting a child's lifelong identity to a supervisor with a non-parental connection to her charges seems utterly counterintuitive.
There are smaller-scale problems with this policy, too. What happens when the kid gets a boo boo? If the UK is anything like America, mom and dad will be filing lawsuits against negligent "play rangers" or attentive ones who simply had too many charges to watch. Again, this is from observation only, but parents generally seem determined to place the blame for harm that comes to their "baby" on anyone but themselves. And in this case, anyone but themselves deserves the blame.
And what happens if the child has separation anxiety or is afraid of strangers? He just doesn't get to play? I'm over-simplifying here, since of course there are other playgrounds where parents could bring their shy children. However, if this rule expands to cover other playgrounds, an exclusive environment is the only possible outcome, making it close to impossible for less socially apt children to find a niche with their peers. We've all seen how quick kids are to exclude each other without adults' help; please, let's not make this problem any worse.
Critics say the policy is "Orwellian." I can't think of a better descriptor myself. England, skim the contents of Mr. Orwell's 1984 and you'll find that this really isn't somewhere you want to go.
I don't know about anyone else, but as for me, when I have kids I'm sure not sending them off to play with, or under the care of, grown-ups neither I nor they have ever met, regardless of what some bureau says about them. From what I've seen, being a mom or dad to a kid as young as five is like being a mother bear defending her cubs. It's the parents' duty and honor to care for the children. In their eyes, one else will ever do as good a job as they would do themselves.
I babysit regularly, and it's my policy to be actively involved in what the kids are doing. This is an ideal anyone who works with children should strive for. Rather than plunking them down in front of the television, engage their imaginations. Challenge them to be creative. Encourage them to be active. All of this is done by example. From my experience, kids will entertain themselves with or without my help, but at their age we can have such a huge impact on who they become, how they see the world, their attitudes and values. It's far better to be involved, and this involvement is a privilege to be enjoyed by parents or caretakers selected by the parents, not strangers. Entrusting a child's lifelong identity to a supervisor with a non-parental connection to her charges seems utterly counterintuitive.
There are smaller-scale problems with this policy, too. What happens when the kid gets a boo boo? If the UK is anything like America, mom and dad will be filing lawsuits against negligent "play rangers" or attentive ones who simply had too many charges to watch. Again, this is from observation only, but parents generally seem determined to place the blame for harm that comes to their "baby" on anyone but themselves. And in this case, anyone but themselves deserves the blame.
And what happens if the child has separation anxiety or is afraid of strangers? He just doesn't get to play? I'm over-simplifying here, since of course there are other playgrounds where parents could bring their shy children. However, if this rule expands to cover other playgrounds, an exclusive environment is the only possible outcome, making it close to impossible for less socially apt children to find a niche with their peers. We've all seen how quick kids are to exclude each other without adults' help; please, let's not make this problem any worse.
Critics say the policy is "Orwellian." I can't think of a better descriptor myself. England, skim the contents of Mr. Orwell's 1984 and you'll find that this really isn't somewhere you want to go.
Scatterday
I have been extraordinarily unproductive and unmotivated these past few days. Jesus eats my life.
...I mean the compy, not the Christ.
-------------------
We know what a weeaboo is...
...and we know what a Pikablu is (this is what Pokemon fans called the second generation Pokemon Marill before the name Marill was announced in the States).
But I bet you ain't ever seen one of these:
---------------------
I hate things like electric toothbrushes and GPSes because they encourage us to be lazy and stupid. These "conveniences" do everything our brains and bodies used to do themselves. The GPS eradicates our ability to solve problems in a common-sensical way. Can you read a sign? Then you should be able to find your way home. I'll forgive you if you live in or around Boston and Cambridge. I never go there without a human GPS to guide me out.
The digital clock has all but undone my knowledge of how to read an analog clock. I can still do it if I look at the thing for a minute. But then I always have to double check it against the digital clock on the stove. Even the cell phone, which I couldn't possibly do without, is a vehicle of stupidification. You know I never learned Creep's phone number? I never had to dial it. Not once. He sent the first text message, I saved the number, and I never had to worry about it again.
I think the only reason I'm not a bumbling oaf is because I'm in school and my classes don't allow me to be. I fear what transformation shall take place when I graduate.
-------------------
Miss Stephanie Faris from Steph in the City gave me the Love Ya award this week! Thanks Steph! I love you, too.
I'm going to pass this one on to the quirky Kitty Lascurain at abellevie! Abellevie! is a savory stew of wit and whimsy. Kitty, if you were looking for a new tagline, I think I might have just come up with it....
-------------------
Me: My nose itches.
The Addict: Then cut it off. That's probably in the Qur'an or something.
Me: The doctor said I should put Head and Shoulders shampoo on it. At this point I feel like I'd need to put it all over my body....
Mnomanoms: So it'd be head, shoulders, knees AND toes!
The Addict: Guys, some things just... don't have lips.
-------------------
Consensus: 99 out of 100 people should not have mustaches. The other one is a bandit, a guru or a Frenchman. Or Earl Hickey. Note that the 1/100 does not play an instrument. He certainly does not write heartfelt lyrics. If someone does these things, he should not have a mustache.
-------------------
For years I've been telling myself to stop liking Fall Out Boy. I've come to the conclusion that this cannot be done.
...I mean the compy, not the Christ.
-------------------
We know what a weeaboo is...
...and we know what a Pikablu is (this is what Pokemon fans called the second generation Pokemon Marill before the name Marill was announced in the States).
But I bet you ain't ever seen one of these:
---------------------
I hate things like electric toothbrushes and GPSes because they encourage us to be lazy and stupid. These "conveniences" do everything our brains and bodies used to do themselves. The GPS eradicates our ability to solve problems in a common-sensical way. Can you read a sign? Then you should be able to find your way home. I'll forgive you if you live in or around Boston and Cambridge. I never go there without a human GPS to guide me out.
The digital clock has all but undone my knowledge of how to read an analog clock. I can still do it if I look at the thing for a minute. But then I always have to double check it against the digital clock on the stove. Even the cell phone, which I couldn't possibly do without, is a vehicle of stupidification. You know I never learned Creep's phone number? I never had to dial it. Not once. He sent the first text message, I saved the number, and I never had to worry about it again.
I think the only reason I'm not a bumbling oaf is because I'm in school and my classes don't allow me to be. I fear what transformation shall take place when I graduate.
-------------------
Miss Stephanie Faris from Steph in the City gave me the Love Ya award this week! Thanks Steph! I love you, too.
I'm going to pass this one on to the quirky Kitty Lascurain at abellevie! Abellevie! is a savory stew of wit and whimsy. Kitty, if you were looking for a new tagline, I think I might have just come up with it....
-------------------
Me: My nose itches.
The Addict: Then cut it off. That's probably in the Qur'an or something.
Me: The doctor said I should put Head and Shoulders shampoo on it. At this point I feel like I'd need to put it all over my body....
Mnomanoms: So it'd be head, shoulders, knees AND toes!
The Addict: Guys, some things just... don't have lips.
-------------------
Consensus: 99 out of 100 people should not have mustaches. The other one is a bandit, a guru or a Frenchman. Or Earl Hickey. Note that the 1/100 does not play an instrument. He certainly does not write heartfelt lyrics. If someone does these things, he should not have a mustache.
-------------------
For years I've been telling myself to stop liking Fall Out Boy. I've come to the conclusion that this cannot be done.
Catharsis, or A Breakup Tale
I guess I'm obliged to try and get some of this out in writing, though I hardly know where to begin. If you're looking for something silly and whimsical, I suggest you wait for my Scatterday post tomorrow afternoon. This post is anything but. See title.
These past ten months with Boyfriend have been full of peaks and valleys. I remember going back to school after the first time we kissed, ecstatic to tell Schneckleface all about it and the *DATE* we were going on soon!
There were so many firsts for both of us, and for the most part they were exciting firsts that brought me great joy. First time I ever slept over a guy's house. First time I went behind my parents' backs (for the record, that one was more exciting than joyful). First time I'd ever thought I could stick with someone forever, and wanted to. First time I ever planned on it. Among other firsts that brought confusion and even guilt for this quasi-conservatively raised Christian young lady - but let's not think about that just yet. First, a tribute to the things that made me smile... that still make me smile, and will no matter what.
Our first month together disappeared in a flurry of snowflakes and Christmas lights, which somehow seemed brighter than they had in years past. He was so worried about my present, worried he'd offend me since I was "very religious" and he, well, wasn't. For all that, he did a fine job. He even made it to church a couple times. He was so worried I would cheat on him that first month, and I was so glad I wasn't that person, so glad I wasn't bringing more pain into his life when he'd been through so much already (but it's none of my business to go into detail here). He always made sure to tell me how beautiful I looked that day, and I melted every time.
January: I dragged him to a ska show. He teased me about it but didn't complain (even when I got a bloody nose before ever jumping into the action).
February: I got a little adventurous in the kitchen, trying to bake the perfect Valentine's day gift (which involved way more red food dye than I ever should have fed him).
March: We took a long walk in the woods with every intention of getting hopelessly lost. The only thing I actually lost was my phone. It happened during a snowball fight, which I confess to instigating. Eventually we found both the phone and our way home.
April: I made it through the semester alive - quite a feat with the amount of pressure I was under - all thanks to him.
May: We took a road trip to New York to see Mae, another band he didn't care about at all, and get their scratch and sniff EP. It became a two-day tour of the city that never sleeps. We went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and had dinner with his godmother, who was one cool chica.
June: Our friends came home and much revelry ensued. All nighters. Rock Band. Mike's hard lemonade. Aaand the landmark 6-month anniversary, at which point I was more in love than I'd ever been.
July: His brother Dick took us on a spontaneous late-night road trip to New Hampshire for fireworks, which we set off on the beach on the fourth. I've never nearly died so many times in one night. By that statement, I meant the night of the fourth, but looking back I think I may have nearly died more times on the road trip.
August: I made and promoted the heck out of that video for that scholarship contest with a little help and a lot of support from him.
September: Not much to report, since I was back at school and he was home. We made plans to go to Sacramento for his music video premiere at the Sacramento Horror Film Festival. I was so proud! Oh, and that high school kid raising money door-to-door caught us hooking up in the hallway. Most embarrassing (but hilarious) moment EVER.
October: Well, here we are. Ten months and a break-up later. There are two things I won't say.
1. I won't say I wish I never met him. These are the things that make us who we are. The things that teach us what we need, what we want, what we can live without.
2. I won't say I wasn't in love. It would be a shameless lie.
I will say that it was time to move on. It had been some while since I'd felt the way I felt in June, when I convinced myself I was ready to give him that last piece of me that I had been saving - my virginity. But by the time I got on birth control, I was starting to notice the things I wanted that weren't there and decided not to give it up. Now I'm glad I held out.
I didn't want the darkness and fear he thrived on - the movies he watched, the movies he made, the heavy metal music and the image that went with it. It is my nature to love light and hope and beauty. I love the details that make this world so special. I love the care that God puts into them. Those weren't things he appreciated.
I wanted romance, poetry and love songs. I wanted him to bring me flowers for no reason. I wanted travels and beach days (which he disliked because of the way sand felt on his skin). I wanted adventures and asymmetry (which he couldn't stand, at least not in architecture).
I wanted to be challenged intellectually, spiritually, physically; instead I was only challenged sexually. He never forced me to do anything, yet I always had the sense that I was keeping from him the one thing that would make him happiest. For that I was, and am, sorry; or at least about the pain it caused.
I wanted him to act right around a lady, even when he was with the guys. I was sick of the rude humor and rude language, sick of the way he talked about other races and religions (even if it was only in jest, for to every joke there is a grain of truth).
I wanted to see him quit buying (or, as I saw it, wasting) time and go somewhere he really wanted to go, knowing good things were waiting to happen.
I told him that - that good things were waiting to happen - and in the end, even I couldn't stay his "good thing" forever.
I look at all that stuff I want and think, that's a lot to ask of one person. No one in the world can offer all that. No, but someone can offer some of it. From the beginning I wondered why I was so in love with someone who didn't fit a single one of my criteria, and you know what? It was a good fit. That's all I can say. I was happy, he was happy, and it worked - until now.
About a month ago I started living excuse to excuse. I was constantly relieved to find reasons to stay at school instead of coming back to be with him, because I hated it when we hooked up and didn't know how to say so. Somehow I knew it would break us and I didn't want that. I knew I was being selfish. I loved him (though maybe not quite as I had before) and needed him, so I clung to what we had, even though I knew what he needed was something I couldn't give. Time and time again I heard him talk about the people who had hurt him in the past and how he was moving past it, leaving them behind.
I didn't want to be left behind.
I hated the idea of hurting him and it seemed to me that the hurt of ending it would be greater than the hurt of staying together without having sex, but in the end only he could decide that. He finally got me to talk about what was bothering me after a month or more of knowing something wasn't right. I said I couldn't keep saying I'd be ready soon, soon, soon, when clearly it was going to be some time before I was ready to share that kind of intimacy with someone. By then I was so far into the valley that I had no desire to try and become ready. I had been trying for months. It just wasn't there. I wasn't in love anymore. I didn't say so, but that's how it was.
I left the ball in his court, and tonight he ended it. Even though I'd seen it coming, it hit me hard. I was crying. He was crying. My God, I made him cry - I didn't think I could. That was what killed me, seeing him like that and knowing I had caused it. I knew I would be okay if he was okay and made him promise he would take care driving home. I was so afraid he'd crash, accidentally or on purpose, or that he would hurt himself some other way. I couldn't live with that.
After he left I more or less dissolved into a sobbing, shaking puddle on the floor. I think part of it was adrenaline. Part of it might have even been relief. But the greatest part of it was sadness. I knew I wouldn't be hearing from Boyfriend for a while (although we're going to have to figure out the Sacramento situation, since I'm officially uninvited). I mopped myself up enough to call his dad and ask him to keep an eye on things tonight. Hanging up, I felt marginally better.
The chapter ends like this. I still love him, just not the way he wants. I want nothing but the best for him and I want to be a part of it if he'll let me. I haven't written him off as a romantic possibility, but he's got changing to do if we're going to try this again, and in the meantime, at twenty, I've got people to meet before I can think about settling down. As for my first love, time will heal him, and when it does I hope that we can be friends.
At least one good thing has come of this: My sister is actually nice to me when I'm miserable. Granted, there's nothing comforting about "well, it was God's will" - it still fucking hurts. But this strange peace I feel says she's right. It was kind of her anyway, and after that she gave me music and said good night. Thanks, sis.
Until the sun wipes the sky from grey to blue,
Miss Rex
These past ten months with Boyfriend have been full of peaks and valleys. I remember going back to school after the first time we kissed, ecstatic to tell Schneckleface all about it and the *DATE* we were going on soon!
There were so many firsts for both of us, and for the most part they were exciting firsts that brought me great joy. First time I ever slept over a guy's house. First time I went behind my parents' backs (for the record, that one was more exciting than joyful). First time I'd ever thought I could stick with someone forever, and wanted to. First time I ever planned on it. Among other firsts that brought confusion and even guilt for this quasi-conservatively raised Christian young lady - but let's not think about that just yet. First, a tribute to the things that made me smile... that still make me smile, and will no matter what.
Our first month together disappeared in a flurry of snowflakes and Christmas lights, which somehow seemed brighter than they had in years past. He was so worried about my present, worried he'd offend me since I was "very religious" and he, well, wasn't. For all that, he did a fine job. He even made it to church a couple times. He was so worried I would cheat on him that first month, and I was so glad I wasn't that person, so glad I wasn't bringing more pain into his life when he'd been through so much already (but it's none of my business to go into detail here). He always made sure to tell me how beautiful I looked that day, and I melted every time.
January: I dragged him to a ska show. He teased me about it but didn't complain (even when I got a bloody nose before ever jumping into the action).
February: I got a little adventurous in the kitchen, trying to bake the perfect Valentine's day gift (which involved way more red food dye than I ever should have fed him).
March: We took a long walk in the woods with every intention of getting hopelessly lost. The only thing I actually lost was my phone. It happened during a snowball fight, which I confess to instigating. Eventually we found both the phone and our way home.
April: I made it through the semester alive - quite a feat with the amount of pressure I was under - all thanks to him.
May: We took a road trip to New York to see Mae, another band he didn't care about at all, and get their scratch and sniff EP. It became a two-day tour of the city that never sleeps. We went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and had dinner with his godmother, who was one cool chica.
June: Our friends came home and much revelry ensued. All nighters. Rock Band. Mike's hard lemonade. Aaand the landmark 6-month anniversary, at which point I was more in love than I'd ever been.
July: His brother Dick took us on a spontaneous late-night road trip to New Hampshire for fireworks, which we set off on the beach on the fourth. I've never nearly died so many times in one night. By that statement, I meant the night of the fourth, but looking back I think I may have nearly died more times on the road trip.
August: I made and promoted the heck out of that video for that scholarship contest with a little help and a lot of support from him.
September: Not much to report, since I was back at school and he was home. We made plans to go to Sacramento for his music video premiere at the Sacramento Horror Film Festival. I was so proud! Oh, and that high school kid raising money door-to-door caught us hooking up in the hallway. Most embarrassing (but hilarious) moment EVER.
October: Well, here we are. Ten months and a break-up later. There are two things I won't say.
1. I won't say I wish I never met him. These are the things that make us who we are. The things that teach us what we need, what we want, what we can live without.
2. I won't say I wasn't in love. It would be a shameless lie.
I will say that it was time to move on. It had been some while since I'd felt the way I felt in June, when I convinced myself I was ready to give him that last piece of me that I had been saving - my virginity. But by the time I got on birth control, I was starting to notice the things I wanted that weren't there and decided not to give it up. Now I'm glad I held out.
I didn't want the darkness and fear he thrived on - the movies he watched, the movies he made, the heavy metal music and the image that went with it. It is my nature to love light and hope and beauty. I love the details that make this world so special. I love the care that God puts into them. Those weren't things he appreciated.
I wanted romance, poetry and love songs. I wanted him to bring me flowers for no reason. I wanted travels and beach days (which he disliked because of the way sand felt on his skin). I wanted adventures and asymmetry (which he couldn't stand, at least not in architecture).
I wanted to be challenged intellectually, spiritually, physically; instead I was only challenged sexually. He never forced me to do anything, yet I always had the sense that I was keeping from him the one thing that would make him happiest. For that I was, and am, sorry; or at least about the pain it caused.
I wanted him to act right around a lady, even when he was with the guys. I was sick of the rude humor and rude language, sick of the way he talked about other races and religions (even if it was only in jest, for to every joke there is a grain of truth).
I wanted to see him quit buying (or, as I saw it, wasting) time and go somewhere he really wanted to go, knowing good things were waiting to happen.
I told him that - that good things were waiting to happen - and in the end, even I couldn't stay his "good thing" forever.
I look at all that stuff I want and think, that's a lot to ask of one person. No one in the world can offer all that. No, but someone can offer some of it. From the beginning I wondered why I was so in love with someone who didn't fit a single one of my criteria, and you know what? It was a good fit. That's all I can say. I was happy, he was happy, and it worked - until now.
About a month ago I started living excuse to excuse. I was constantly relieved to find reasons to stay at school instead of coming back to be with him, because I hated it when we hooked up and didn't know how to say so. Somehow I knew it would break us and I didn't want that. I knew I was being selfish. I loved him (though maybe not quite as I had before) and needed him, so I clung to what we had, even though I knew what he needed was something I couldn't give. Time and time again I heard him talk about the people who had hurt him in the past and how he was moving past it, leaving them behind.
I didn't want to be left behind.
I hated the idea of hurting him and it seemed to me that the hurt of ending it would be greater than the hurt of staying together without having sex, but in the end only he could decide that. He finally got me to talk about what was bothering me after a month or more of knowing something wasn't right. I said I couldn't keep saying I'd be ready soon, soon, soon, when clearly it was going to be some time before I was ready to share that kind of intimacy with someone. By then I was so far into the valley that I had no desire to try and become ready. I had been trying for months. It just wasn't there. I wasn't in love anymore. I didn't say so, but that's how it was.
I left the ball in his court, and tonight he ended it. Even though I'd seen it coming, it hit me hard. I was crying. He was crying. My God, I made him cry - I didn't think I could. That was what killed me, seeing him like that and knowing I had caused it. I knew I would be okay if he was okay and made him promise he would take care driving home. I was so afraid he'd crash, accidentally or on purpose, or that he would hurt himself some other way. I couldn't live with that.
After he left I more or less dissolved into a sobbing, shaking puddle on the floor. I think part of it was adrenaline. Part of it might have even been relief. But the greatest part of it was sadness. I knew I wouldn't be hearing from Boyfriend for a while (although we're going to have to figure out the Sacramento situation, since I'm officially uninvited). I mopped myself up enough to call his dad and ask him to keep an eye on things tonight. Hanging up, I felt marginally better.
The chapter ends like this. I still love him, just not the way he wants. I want nothing but the best for him and I want to be a part of it if he'll let me. I haven't written him off as a romantic possibility, but he's got changing to do if we're going to try this again, and in the meantime, at twenty, I've got people to meet before I can think about settling down. As for my first love, time will heal him, and when it does I hope that we can be friends.
At least one good thing has come of this: My sister is actually nice to me when I'm miserable. Granted, there's nothing comforting about "well, it was God's will" - it still fucking hurts. But this strange peace I feel says she's right. It was kind of her anyway, and after that she gave me music and said good night. Thanks, sis.
Until the sun wipes the sky from grey to blue,
Miss Rex
Fake Plastic Trees
The US government has it all wrong. They’re trying to fix environmental problems by throwing the green stuff at the issue (LA Times article), but the kind of green stuff we need doesn’t come from the Treasury or the Federal Reserves.
I read in a different newspaper, and now I can't find the link to share it, that China is in the process of planting acres upon acres of forest. The thing is, it's not enough to just stop putting more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. There's too much already there. We have to take measures to get rid of the stuff that's floating around up there if we want to have polar ice caps twenty years from now.
Enter my evil plan to save the world.
My new life goal is to plant trees. Maybe a whole forest is a little ambitious, but I can start with just a tree. Imagine if every person in the US planted just one tree. Just one. That's 300 million living, breathing trees! Think of the impact that could have. We could, if we worked together, literally save the world.
Takers? Anyone know where I can get that many seeds? Anyone know where I'd be allowed to plant that many seeds...?
I read in a different newspaper, and now I can't find the link to share it, that China is in the process of planting acres upon acres of forest. The thing is, it's not enough to just stop putting more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. There's too much already there. We have to take measures to get rid of the stuff that's floating around up there if we want to have polar ice caps twenty years from now.
Enter my evil plan to save the world.
My new life goal is to plant trees. Maybe a whole forest is a little ambitious, but I can start with just a tree. Imagine if every person in the US planted just one tree. Just one. That's 300 million living, breathing trees! Think of the impact that could have. We could, if we worked together, literally save the world.
Takers? Anyone know where I can get that many seeds? Anyone know where I'd be allowed to plant that many seeds...?
American English: not quite as dead as Latin, but at least as dead as a zombie.
Okay, writers-in-arms; we need to talk. I spend most of my time editing other people’s work, and I have come to the conclusion that we (as in Americans) are incredibly irresponsible with the English language. If you are in college or, god forbid, writing professionally, you should understand the basic format of a sentence and, at minimum, the basic tenets of grammar. In case you missed that boat, here's a quick run-down of ubiquitous mistakes that drive me bonkers.
- Just because you’re in your last year of school and are clearly Teh Shiz, being a Senior does not give you the right to capitalize your school year. Most scientific words do not deserve the honor of a capital letter, either, no matter how important you think Xylem and The Water Cycle are.
- "Your" is possessive. Ifyour you're looking for a word to go before “uninformed,” try “you’re.” It’s a highly useful conjunction of “you are.”
- A comma is not a period, if the next clause is a separate thought with its own subject and verb, then using a comma is WRONG.
- Subjects should agree in number with their objects.
- There and their: They’re NOT interchangeable!
- There’s definitely no such word as “deffinately.”
- Punctuation goes INSIDE "quotation marks"!
Don’t tell me “its alright.” We are witnessing the disintegration of the English language, and it's definitely not all right.
- Just because you’re in your last year of school and are clearly Teh Shiz, being a Senior does not give you the right to capitalize your school year. Most scientific words do not deserve the honor of a capital letter, either, no matter how important you think Xylem and The Water Cycle are.
- "Your" is possessive. If
- A comma is not a period, if the next clause is a separate thought with its own subject and verb, then using a comma is WRONG.
- Subjects should agree in number with their objects.
- There and their: They’re NOT interchangeable!
- There’s definitely no such word as “deffinately.”
- Punctuation goes INSIDE "quotation marks"!
Don’t tell me “its alright.” We are witnessing the disintegration of the English language, and it's definitely not all right.
Atlas
Everyone famous is dying, and frankly I don't blame them. I don't want to care, I don't want to fight, I don't want the government taking my money for its delusional purposes. I don't want to have to do anything that doesn't seem right. I want to do what's important to me without being beholden to people, least of all institutions. God I hate institutions.
If everyone famous walked off a cliff, would you follow?
Maybe.
I want to live for something. I want the parameters of my faith to be clear. I want a singular, concrete quest with a singular, concrete goal and I want it to define my actions, my life, myself.
I want the world to be different but I don't know how to change it. There's an ocean of problems and I am paralyzed. Too much is wrong. It's not me and people vs. the world; it's me vs. people vs. the world. I feel like Atlas, breaking under the weight of the universe (or the weight of my own, cancerous little universe growing leaden on my shoulders).
It's nobody's place to solve things - yet it's everybody's place, and so many of us do nothing. Even me. We can put all the band-aids we want on this broken world, but sooner or later someone has to do a heart transplant. We are not surgeons, so we do nothing.
"I am a living, breathing hell; come on and resurrect me."
If everyone famous walked off a cliff, would you follow?
Maybe.
I want to live for something. I want the parameters of my faith to be clear. I want a singular, concrete quest with a singular, concrete goal and I want it to define my actions, my life, myself.
I want the world to be different but I don't know how to change it. There's an ocean of problems and I am paralyzed. Too much is wrong. It's not me and people vs. the world; it's me vs. people vs. the world. I feel like Atlas, breaking under the weight of the universe (or the weight of my own, cancerous little universe growing leaden on my shoulders).
It's nobody's place to solve things - yet it's everybody's place, and so many of us do nothing. Even me. We can put all the band-aids we want on this broken world, but sooner or later someone has to do a heart transplant. We are not surgeons, so we do nothing.
"I am a living, breathing hell; come on and resurrect me."
Magical Musical Road Trip Extravaganza pt. 4
My family used to play a cheesy game at the dinner table, where we'd go around the table and everyone got a chance to say the highlight and lowlight of his or her day. In Rex-family fashion, allow me to share with you the high and low lights of Rev Gen 2009. Let's look on the bright side first.
We sat in on Paul Colman's set purely because we wanted to have good seats for Jon Foreman's set, which was next. But Paul turned out to be one of the most entertaining individuals I've had the good fortune to see. We later talked to him and he said he'd love to come play a show at our school. WIN!
Jon Foreman played us a song about being an outlaw, which he literally wrote in his sleep. He also played a number on some wacky variation of a harp, which a friend had given him earlier that day and which he hadn't even had a chance to tune. Somehow the song was still brilliant. Probably because he's Jon.
No one moshed for Relient K, which I'm sure was as sad for the band as it was for me. Nonetheless, it was as great a set as always, made all the more amusing by the fact that the lead singer (Matt Thiessen)'s hair gets more wild every time I see them.
Switchfoot closed out the day with a set that would've sent the Richter scale scrambling for cover. Jon alternated between climbing the scaffolding and swinging drummer Chad Butler's cymbals around the stage, and pausing to ask everyone to look up at the stars for a minute while words of wisdomatic gold dripped from his lips. "We don't know why the dry times come," he said, "but those are the times that force us to dig deeper below the surface."
If you want all the juicy details (and lots of exciting pictures!), go here and here! Remember to click on "Entries" when you get there!
Now for the lowlight. I think this accusatory letter, which I sent to the people at Rev Gen last night, pretty much sums it up:
"...we purchased Switchfoot Interview Passes at $15 apiece and we did not receive what we paid for. The item was called "Interview Pass" on the website. So, naturally, we walked into Tent 7 expecting to see an interview with Switchfoot. Wouldn't you? Imagine our disappointment, then, when only half the band was present and the frontman, the one responsible for writing the songs, was conspicuously absent. All right, there's a little disclaimer at the bottom of the ticket saying interview times are subject to artist availability, so it would hardly be fair to lodge a complain purely on that basis.
But then the interview was cut off after ten minutes of surface-level questions whose answers could have been found on Wikipedia in under two minutes, so that the man hosting the interview can tell us about his daughter who died in a car accident and how her death taught him to seek hope from God. A wonderful message. I truly am sorry for his loss and I truly am glad that he found hope in spite of it. But this was not the time or place to discuss such matters, as the fans under the tent had paid money to watch an interview with Switchfoot. And then he had the gall to try and convert us to Christianity. At a Christian festival.
His sermonette was out of place and condescending. I have never felt so emotionally manipulated in my life. Moreover, it was dishonest and unjust to take kids' money and not deliver what was promised. This is the least Christian thing anyone has done to me in quite some time...."
Total LAMESAUCE, right?! And worse than the injustice to us, it was disrespectful toward the band (or anyway, the half of them that were there.) I know this because I'm a journalist. You don't ask people questions you could've looked up answers to. It's a waste of the interviewee's time and it makes you look unprepared, uninformed and unprofessional. The poor guys were bored silly. Joanna and I agreed that Drew was definitely texting under the table.
But the rest of the day was so wicked awesome that getting ripped off, driving 16 hours, and sleeping just ten across the entire weekend WAS SO FANTABULOUSLY WORTH IT!
We sat in on Paul Colman's set purely because we wanted to have good seats for Jon Foreman's set, which was next. But Paul turned out to be one of the most entertaining individuals I've had the good fortune to see. We later talked to him and he said he'd love to come play a show at our school. WIN!
Jon Foreman played us a song about being an outlaw, which he literally wrote in his sleep. He also played a number on some wacky variation of a harp, which a friend had given him earlier that day and which he hadn't even had a chance to tune. Somehow the song was still brilliant. Probably because he's Jon.
No one moshed for Relient K, which I'm sure was as sad for the band as it was for me. Nonetheless, it was as great a set as always, made all the more amusing by the fact that the lead singer (Matt Thiessen)'s hair gets more wild every time I see them.
Switchfoot closed out the day with a set that would've sent the Richter scale scrambling for cover. Jon alternated between climbing the scaffolding and swinging drummer Chad Butler's cymbals around the stage, and pausing to ask everyone to look up at the stars for a minute while words of wisdomatic gold dripped from his lips. "We don't know why the dry times come," he said, "but those are the times that force us to dig deeper below the surface."
If you want all the juicy details (and lots of exciting pictures!), go here and here! Remember to click on "Entries" when you get there!
Now for the lowlight. I think this accusatory letter, which I sent to the people at Rev Gen last night, pretty much sums it up:
"...we purchased Switchfoot Interview Passes at $15 apiece and we did not receive what we paid for. The item was called "Interview Pass" on the website. So, naturally, we walked into Tent 7 expecting to see an interview with Switchfoot. Wouldn't you? Imagine our disappointment, then, when only half the band was present and the frontman, the one responsible for writing the songs, was conspicuously absent. All right, there's a little disclaimer at the bottom of the ticket saying interview times are subject to artist availability, so it would hardly be fair to lodge a complain purely on that basis.
But then the interview was cut off after ten minutes of surface-level questions whose answers could have been found on Wikipedia in under two minutes, so that the man hosting the interview can tell us about his daughter who died in a car accident and how her death taught him to seek hope from God. A wonderful message. I truly am sorry for his loss and I truly am glad that he found hope in spite of it. But this was not the time or place to discuss such matters, as the fans under the tent had paid money to watch an interview with Switchfoot. And then he had the gall to try and convert us to Christianity. At a Christian festival.
His sermonette was out of place and condescending. I have never felt so emotionally manipulated in my life. Moreover, it was dishonest and unjust to take kids' money and not deliver what was promised. This is the least Christian thing anyone has done to me in quite some time...."
Total LAMESAUCE, right?! And worse than the injustice to us, it was disrespectful toward the band (or anyway, the half of them that were there.) I know this because I'm a journalist. You don't ask people questions you could've looked up answers to. It's a waste of the interviewee's time and it makes you look unprepared, uninformed and unprofessional. The poor guys were bored silly. Joanna and I agreed that Drew was definitely texting under the table.
But the rest of the day was so wicked awesome that getting ripped off, driving 16 hours, and sleeping just ten across the entire weekend WAS SO FANTABULOUSLY WORTH IT!
"I'm a good lesbian!"
True confession: even though I like to pretend I’m BA, at heart I am a bona fide goody two shoes. Yet the beginning-of-term hall meeting always fills me with a sense of dread, especially on the issue of visitation. Nothing ever changes (except that we’re now allowed opposite-sex guests on Thursdays), so why does it feel like the visitation laws get stricter every year?
Hours: 5-10PM Mon-Thurs
5-12AM Friday
1PM-12AM Saturday
1PM-10PM Sunday
There will be “no excessive public displays of affection” in the privacy of your room. This means, beyond clothes staying on, you may not kiss and you may not lie down together (commonly called “snuggling” or “spooning”). And they will know if you try to pull one over on them. Lights must be on. Door must be *fully* open.
However, you may have a guest of the same sex at any hour of any day. You may have the lights on or off, however you like ‘em. You may have the door open or closed – no one cares. And, you may snuggle or spoon as much as you like.
Doesn’t this seem a bit suspicious to you? I’m starting to suspect my school wants students to make the switch to lesbianism (or, conversely, gay…ism?). Last year they made a big deal about “understanding and accepting students who belong to the LGBT community” even though their lifestyle is “against the Bible.” We must “show them Christ’s love” and “not alienate them,” since school should be a “safe” environment for everybody.
Note, it does NOT have to be a “safe” environment for traditional male-female couples who, at our age and regardless of religious inclination, WILL become sexually frustrated if they are not allowed some small amount of physical affection with their significant others. Have you SEEN the pageants our male students put on? Good gravy!
I do not condone “liberated” mentality or “experimentation.” I’m not asking for sexy time in the dorms. I do, however, condone healthy physical relationships between committed couples. Why is that such a bad thing to so many Christians???
Okay, I wouldn’t care quite so much, except my boy is coming to visit for my birthday, and it would be great if we could make out even a teensy weensy little bit. So sue me.
Hours: 5-10PM Mon-Thurs
5-12AM Friday
1PM-12AM Saturday
1PM-10PM Sunday
There will be “no excessive public displays of affection” in the privacy of your room. This means, beyond clothes staying on, you may not kiss and you may not lie down together (commonly called “snuggling” or “spooning”). And they will know if you try to pull one over on them. Lights must be on. Door must be *fully* open.
However, you may have a guest of the same sex at any hour of any day. You may have the lights on or off, however you like ‘em. You may have the door open or closed – no one cares. And, you may snuggle or spoon as much as you like.
Doesn’t this seem a bit suspicious to you? I’m starting to suspect my school wants students to make the switch to lesbianism (or, conversely, gay…ism?). Last year they made a big deal about “understanding and accepting students who belong to the LGBT community” even though their lifestyle is “against the Bible.” We must “show them Christ’s love” and “not alienate them,” since school should be a “safe” environment for everybody.
Note, it does NOT have to be a “safe” environment for traditional male-female couples who, at our age and regardless of religious inclination, WILL become sexually frustrated if they are not allowed some small amount of physical affection with their significant others. Have you SEEN the pageants our male students put on? Good gravy!
I do not condone “liberated” mentality or “experimentation.” I’m not asking for sexy time in the dorms. I do, however, condone healthy physical relationships between committed couples. Why is that such a bad thing to so many Christians???
Okay, I wouldn’t care quite so much, except my boy is coming to visit for my birthday, and it would be great if we could make out even a teensy weensy little bit. So sue me.
How to save a life (and a million other rants)
I got CPR certified today. It's for my job as a camp counselor, which starts the 22nd. I'm pissed because there's this one girl, let's see I'll invent a name for her so it's not gossiping.... We shall call her Alyssa. When I saw Alyssa at orientation on Monday I was like WTF??? She lives really close to me so I know the cops are at her house ALL THE TIME because she's always having crazy parties with booze and stuff. She's been at it ever since she got into high school. And now she's working with people's children?? Really? And old enough to be behind the wheel of a car? I mean we're talking Apocalypse-scale disasters waiting to happen here. Well she was late tonight. When she came in an hour after the class started, I was like YES. Now she can't work. Not because I don't want to work with her, although it's true that I can think of no less pleasant way to spend my summer (except maybe with Angry Frodo), but more because I really don't think she should be around people's children. But they certified her anyway! So now if something actually goes wrong, she won't have a clue what to do! REALLY PEOPLE? >:(
And now a rant that actually crossed my mind a couple nights ago but I was too lazy to post it then. I hate Facebook. I really, truly do. It first entices me to creepdom and then reveals things that make me want to break stuff. So this person from my deep, dark past of not that great a depth or darkness is now living the perfect life in the perfect state with a perfect job and a perfect marriage with the only girl in the world who could ever possibly put up with him. He's paid no dues. He has been entirely irresponsible with his entire life. His high school degree doesn't even count! He never did an ounce of work the entire time I knew him and only graduated because he was home schooled! He never did shit, he doesn't know shit, he's never experienced shit. Now he has a job, like a legit one that there is actually a selective process for getting, and HE DIDN'T EVEN GO TO COLLEGE. He is responsible for guiding kids through the process of adolescence as if he could understand their position, as if he ever experienced a second of normal existence in his adolescent life. I mean, I never hated him or wished bad things to happen to him. I didn't want him to fail at life entirely. But it should not be this easy! He's had no pain and all gain! He's ONLY three years older than me. HOW IS HIS LIFE THIS GOOD?
I think it's funny how high school kids' idea of a good time is taking a zillion photos so everyone on Facebook can be jealous of what a good time they had. I think it's disgusting that Facebook albums no longer have a limit on the number of pictures people can post in an album. Nobody has time to look through a dozen different people's 200-photo albums of the same event! This change increases self-absorption because now we believe that people owe it to us to look at these Godzillalbums. 60 pictures was a lot to ask, but doable. 200 pictures is grounds for deletion of friends. Consider yourselves warned.
And now a question of actual importance. Do employers really look at your friends' Facebook profiles? That's really dumb if they do. No there are no pictures of me naked at keggers floating around the internet. The most incriminating thing you could find would probably be me and Schneckleface dyeing our hair turquoise last year. But never in the past have people been so sharply and invasively judged by the people they work for, especially for things they can't control, like what kind of language and pictures people who went to their high school may choose to use on their profiles. I'm not saying I'm hiding anything. I don't think there's anything especially incriminating about pictures of me and my friends bumming around a 24-hour Wal*Mart with goofy galoshes and a gallon of ice cream. But it still feels wrong, like people are prying into something that shouldn't - DOESN'T - concern them.
Now that I have you all in a nice negative mood, it's time for a poll: Would people comment more if I didn't make such long posts? I tend to treat this thing like a journal sometimes... XD
And now a rant that actually crossed my mind a couple nights ago but I was too lazy to post it then. I hate Facebook. I really, truly do. It first entices me to creepdom and then reveals things that make me want to break stuff. So this person from my deep, dark past of not that great a depth or darkness is now living the perfect life in the perfect state with a perfect job and a perfect marriage with the only girl in the world who could ever possibly put up with him. He's paid no dues. He has been entirely irresponsible with his entire life. His high school degree doesn't even count! He never did an ounce of work the entire time I knew him and only graduated because he was home schooled! He never did shit, he doesn't know shit, he's never experienced shit. Now he has a job, like a legit one that there is actually a selective process for getting, and HE DIDN'T EVEN GO TO COLLEGE. He is responsible for guiding kids through the process of adolescence as if he could understand their position, as if he ever experienced a second of normal existence in his adolescent life. I mean, I never hated him or wished bad things to happen to him. I didn't want him to fail at life entirely. But it should not be this easy! He's had no pain and all gain! He's ONLY three years older than me. HOW IS HIS LIFE THIS GOOD?
I think it's funny how high school kids' idea of a good time is taking a zillion photos so everyone on Facebook can be jealous of what a good time they had. I think it's disgusting that Facebook albums no longer have a limit on the number of pictures people can post in an album. Nobody has time to look through a dozen different people's 200-photo albums of the same event! This change increases self-absorption because now we believe that people owe it to us to look at these Godzillalbums. 60 pictures was a lot to ask, but doable. 200 pictures is grounds for deletion of friends. Consider yourselves warned.
And now a question of actual importance. Do employers really look at your friends' Facebook profiles? That's really dumb if they do. No there are no pictures of me naked at keggers floating around the internet. The most incriminating thing you could find would probably be me and Schneckleface dyeing our hair turquoise last year. But never in the past have people been so sharply and invasively judged by the people they work for, especially for things they can't control, like what kind of language and pictures people who went to their high school may choose to use on their profiles. I'm not saying I'm hiding anything. I don't think there's anything especially incriminating about pictures of me and my friends bumming around a 24-hour Wal*Mart with goofy galoshes and a gallon of ice cream. But it still feels wrong, like people are prying into something that shouldn't - DOESN'T - concern them.
Now that I have you all in a nice negative mood, it's time for a poll: Would people comment more if I didn't make such long posts? I tend to treat this thing like a journal sometimes... XD
We are heffalumps!
Some days I just lie on my bed and laugh and wonder what the hell is wrong with me. Today is one of those days. I feel like I've been awake since... oh, wait, I HAVE been awake since 7:30. That explains it. I got up early to take my car to Firestone to see if they could figure out why it starts screaming and flashing lights at me every time I drive it.
Jenniferin was kind enough to come along and drive me back, though of course, not without a pit stop at good ol' sketchball, greasy-walled Denny's for breakfast. Well, in the end it turned out that Firestone wasn't sure what was going on with my car, so they made up some bull and sent us to Mobil, where the mechanic proceeded to make fun of the Firestone guys for screwing around and completely misdiagnosing the problem. Long story short.... I'm just hoping I'll have a Derry to drive home tomorrow night.
I procrastinated a lot today, but since I was awake for so long, I still somehow got a lot done. I finished the promo poster I promised to make for the environmental club's symposium event, and I must say I am very pleased with it. It's really colorful, thus, eye-catching; and when you're trying to attract kids to symposium events, you need to be eye-catching.
You know you totally want to go to that event now. ^_~
I also revised my Fair Trade PSA script and made up a storyboard for that, which was time-consuming and, frankly, not as helpful as it's cracked up to be, as I can already see the shots in my head when I write up the script. Well, I guess it was a learning experience. I learned that next time I'll just do the production plan.
I'm off to the Prancing Pony now to see whether Evan remembered writers' group tonight. I've got a chapter I've been dying to post, but not before screening it. So y'all better hope he's there.
edit: He wasn't there. I know, I know. Break out the Kleenex.
Quote of the night:
Me: Boyfriend, I want a fucking dragon.
Paul: Yes, dear.
Jenniferin was kind enough to come along and drive me back, though of course, not without a pit stop at good ol' sketchball, greasy-walled Denny's for breakfast. Well, in the end it turned out that Firestone wasn't sure what was going on with my car, so they made up some bull and sent us to Mobil, where the mechanic proceeded to make fun of the Firestone guys for screwing around and completely misdiagnosing the problem. Long story short.... I'm just hoping I'll have a Derry to drive home tomorrow night.
I procrastinated a lot today, but since I was awake for so long, I still somehow got a lot done. I finished the promo poster I promised to make for the environmental club's symposium event, and I must say I am very pleased with it. It's really colorful, thus, eye-catching; and when you're trying to attract kids to symposium events, you need to be eye-catching.
You know you totally want to go to that event now. ^_~
I also revised my Fair Trade PSA script and made up a storyboard for that, which was time-consuming and, frankly, not as helpful as it's cracked up to be, as I can already see the shots in my head when I write up the script. Well, I guess it was a learning experience. I learned that next time I'll just do the production plan.
I'm off to the Prancing Pony now to see whether Evan remembered writers' group tonight. I've got a chapter I've been dying to post, but not before screening it. So y'all better hope he's there.
edit: He wasn't there. I know, I know. Break out the Kleenex.
Quote of the night:
Me: Boyfriend, I want a fucking dragon.
Paul: Yes, dear.
The Goose is getting fat
New from the Starship of Cobra!
Why does Bruce Leroy glow? All I've seen of The Last Dragon is the little clip they posted in their blog, in which Bruce Leroy was glowing.
Golden Goose was awful this year. I mean, not all of the acts were awful, but they were not an entire Friday night worth of good, either. This thing went from 8 to 11 or so, and they could've squeezed the three redeeming aspects of the show into probably 40 minutes: Drake, who hosted it; C.S., whose video was this hilarious infomercial about the cement block as the latest and greatest in workout equipment and whose stage performance was a Blok class turned Disney musical; and Jordan, who painted himself blue and got some blue friends to help him impersonate the Blue Man Group. They had the white piping and everything. It was effing brilliant.
As for the other ten contestants, many of their videos were actually about being in Golden Goose, which is pretty dumb, and most of the performances were dance numbers of various degrees of failure. Which means some of them didn't fail that badly, but neither did they stand out from the crowd as creative or original. Honestly, I would've left and taken Boyfriend with me if I hadn't promised my editor I'd review the show for the Tartan.
And now I don't know what to write, because I don't want to be hated by everyone on campus for saying it was garbage, but there aren't a lot of good things I can say about the experience. I guess I'll try and write it like a news piece rather than a review, thus keeping it as objective as possible.
On the bright side, a bunch of us went out to Denny's after. I hadn't eaten dinner, so it was a fabulous way to top off a not-so-fabulous night.
I've been asking people if they've ever dreamed they had more than five fingers on each hand. You see, back when I was trying to teach myself to have lucid dreams, I read up on controlling your dreams and the first step is to determine you're dreaming. So you do a reality check. I never remember to do them in dreams, but the idea is that if you do them enough in real life, the habit will translate to your dreams. So there are checks like flipping a light switch to see if it has an effect, checking a clock periodically to see whether the time jumps around, checking a mirror to see if you're what's reflected or if it's just shadows, and, of course, checking to see that you've got five fingers on each hand. I always thought this one was bull. I don't pay that close attention to my hands in dreams, but I really don't think I've ever had more than five fingers per hand. Well recently, I remembered to check, and as I watched, a sixth finger grew out of the side of each hand. It was... a very enlightening experience.
Why does Bruce Leroy glow? All I've seen of The Last Dragon is the little clip they posted in their blog, in which Bruce Leroy was glowing.
Golden Goose was awful this year. I mean, not all of the acts were awful, but they were not an entire Friday night worth of good, either. This thing went from 8 to 11 or so, and they could've squeezed the three redeeming aspects of the show into probably 40 minutes: Drake, who hosted it; C.S., whose video was this hilarious infomercial about the cement block as the latest and greatest in workout equipment and whose stage performance was a Blok class turned Disney musical; and Jordan, who painted himself blue and got some blue friends to help him impersonate the Blue Man Group. They had the white piping and everything. It was effing brilliant.
As for the other ten contestants, many of their videos were actually about being in Golden Goose, which is pretty dumb, and most of the performances were dance numbers of various degrees of failure. Which means some of them didn't fail that badly, but neither did they stand out from the crowd as creative or original. Honestly, I would've left and taken Boyfriend with me if I hadn't promised my editor I'd review the show for the Tartan.
And now I don't know what to write, because I don't want to be hated by everyone on campus for saying it was garbage, but there aren't a lot of good things I can say about the experience. I guess I'll try and write it like a news piece rather than a review, thus keeping it as objective as possible.
On the bright side, a bunch of us went out to Denny's after. I hadn't eaten dinner, so it was a fabulous way to top off a not-so-fabulous night.
I've been asking people if they've ever dreamed they had more than five fingers on each hand. You see, back when I was trying to teach myself to have lucid dreams, I read up on controlling your dreams and the first step is to determine you're dreaming. So you do a reality check. I never remember to do them in dreams, but the idea is that if you do them enough in real life, the habit will translate to your dreams. So there are checks like flipping a light switch to see if it has an effect, checking a clock periodically to see whether the time jumps around, checking a mirror to see if you're what's reflected or if it's just shadows, and, of course, checking to see that you've got five fingers on each hand. I always thought this one was bull. I don't pay that close attention to my hands in dreams, but I really don't think I've ever had more than five fingers per hand. Well recently, I remembered to check, and as I watched, a sixth finger grew out of the side of each hand. It was... a very enlightening experience.
How I Sold my Soul to the Dean of Students
My new theory is that Go-Co likes to tell us our souls belong to God so we won't realize we've actually sold our souls to the institution of education.
Do I actually believe that? Not quite yet... but I'm getting close.
This week...
- For tonight: read another 40 pages of the textbook that didn't arrive in the mailroom til Friday (and without its exciting counterpart, the 3.5" disk of special features... I kid you not) as well as two chapters of the book that has not yet arrived. Also, as of yesterday afternoon the prof decided we should all watch the Superbowl ads, pick our favorite, and write about it for tonight's class.
- For the rest of the week: Read like 3 chapters for astronomy because I haven't read a word of that book in over a week on account of all the other work I've had and I'm now behind.
- Photography - read two chapters, BS some stuff about some more library books. Also get supplies that I still haven't purchased on account of not having time to go to the store. This will have to happen soon as I'm also nearly out of food for the dorm room and have been for some time now.
- Sociology - midterm is next Monday (already?! Damn. At least that means it's halfway over.) Also have to pick an essay topic soon.
- Philosophy - write a paper about how we know the soul is immortal or the nature of virtue or other impossible matters. WTF GLENNEY?
- Tartan articles... at least one, maybe two...
- Figure out how to get the damn film on the damn reel without being able to see it.
Holy frick-muffins, this looks even worse when I write it all out. Consequently, being "tired," or even "exhausted," "beat," or "drained," is not an acceptable reason to sleep. Being dead might be. Experiment is still in progress.
Do I actually believe that? Not quite yet... but I'm getting close.
This week...
- For tonight: read another 40 pages of the textbook that didn't arrive in the mailroom til Friday (and without its exciting counterpart, the 3.5" disk of special features... I kid you not) as well as two chapters of the book that has not yet arrived. Also, as of yesterday afternoon the prof decided we should all watch the Superbowl ads, pick our favorite, and write about it for tonight's class.
- For the rest of the week: Read like 3 chapters for astronomy because I haven't read a word of that book in over a week on account of all the other work I've had and I'm now behind.
- Photography - read two chapters, BS some stuff about some more library books. Also get supplies that I still haven't purchased on account of not having time to go to the store. This will have to happen soon as I'm also nearly out of food for the dorm room and have been for some time now.
- Sociology - midterm is next Monday (already?! Damn. At least that means it's halfway over.) Also have to pick an essay topic soon.
- Philosophy - write a paper about how we know the soul is immortal or the nature of virtue or other impossible matters. WTF GLENNEY?
- Tartan articles... at least one, maybe two...
- Figure out how to get the damn film on the damn reel without being able to see it.
Holy frick-muffins, this looks even worse when I write it all out. Consequently, being "tired," or even "exhausted," "beat," or "drained," is not an acceptable reason to sleep. Being dead might be. Experiment is still in progress.
Brighter than the Northern Lights
Today was a bad day. Nothing especially bad happened, but for reasons unknown even to me, I suddenly decided to hate life, including homework, class, school, the entire educational institution, our society, and probs some other stuff that I'm forgetting. Oh, but Roomie was excluded from the explosion of hatred because she listened to me rant and cry and offered condolences in the form of tea and schneckles. Best roomie everrr <3. Anyway, my grievances are as follows.
What am I doing here? Today I have the most overwhelming sense that I am in the wrong place. Not that Go-Co is the wrong school, but that school is the wrong path altogether. I want to learn, but I don’t feel that I gain anything from reading hundreds of pages a week because it’s too much to actually absorb. It all gets stored in the part of my brain designated “temp files,” to be deleted after the exam. Some of it’ll go even before then. This is not because the information is uninteresting, but because there’s too much of it, and because knowing I HAVE to read it and remember it drains all the fun out of learning. I don’t even like reading anymore, and I would’ve thought only the greatest evil could take that away from me. I want to know things, like how space and societies work, and I want to read things, classic stories and fantasy stories and funny stories – but turning exploration into something I will later be examined on makes me hate even the things that interest me.
Most of all, I want to write and create. I know that we can’t always do what we want when we want, but it’s not like I want to go play video games all day. Writing a book is a legitimate and career-oriented undertaking. Doing is the best way of learning a craft like writing. I am ready, willing, and even eager to work hard for hours at a time to accomplish something if I can see the value of the task. However, I cannot see the value of all this material I’m supposed to read and recall. I can’t care about everything they tell me to care about. That’s not to say I don’t see value in the subject, but some things should not be taught in a classroom. Astronomy, for instance. The study of the heavens. Well, the heavens aren’t exactly hard to access; I’m pretty sure you can see them from almost anywhere on earth. What the hell are we doing in a classroom?
I digress. I was saying that I can’t see the value of what I’m doing at school right now, and I think that’s because the goal is all wrong. I’m stressing trying to get good grades, so that I can graduate, so that I can put college on my resume, so that I can get a good job, so that I can make a lot of money and have a “good” life. Who defines something like a “good” life, and what makes ‘em so darn sure it’s the same for everybody? I don’t even want to be rich, and I’m still trying to fulfill society’s expectations! Who’s to say this is the way to “success,” or even what success is? My tenth grade history teacher had a poster in the classroom that said, “Well-behaved women rarely make history.” If I merely follow the path laid out for me by somebody else, I’m only doing what millions of other kids my age do. How can I call myself different? I may SAY I don’t care about the institutions and expectations of society, but I still play by their rules.
It comes down to this: do I want to spend two more years and 70 thousand more dollars on this endeavor? For sleeplessness and acne and crummy food and noisy res halls? I’m not saying I hate college. I’m making connections with friends, professors, even professionals in my fields of interest. Do those benefits outweigh the costs? Maybe. Today it doesn’t feel that way. But could I live with myself knowing I gave up? Could I live with my family knowing I gave up? Is it even “giving up” if you’re closing one door in order to open another?
As for my family, well. I’ve been saying how I spent my younger years trying to please my parents and how I should’ve just done what I felt was right, maybe leading to mistakes, but always providing life experience that would teach me something. I’ve been saying I’m done trying to make others happy at my own expense but I still do it all the time. I am here because I did well in high school and have the means to further my education. They expect me to be here. By “they” I mean teachers, mentors, pastors, guidance counselors, parents, and most of all, culture. Culture says if I don’t do life this way, I’m fucked and a failure and my life is going to suck. But being trapped in a life that is wrong in every way sounds like a worse fate than living in a little house and driving a clunky old car. Is a publisher going to reject my manuscript because I don't have such-and-such a degree? There are two grounds for rejection in the publishing world. Either your submission did not suit the needs of the publishing house and market, or you’re just not good at writing.
But I’m not dealing with publishing houses right now. I’m dealing with teachers and textbooks. I am not taking care of my body. I am not taking care of my heart. I’m only taking care of that little corner of my brain everybody seems to think I should be taking care of. Every part of me is screaming that it wants to do the things I was made to do, yet every second of my time is spent doing anything but. I just don’t want to die before leaving my mark on the world, no matter how small that mark may be. I want to die trying, knowing I gave it everything I had. I want to know something, somewhere, changed because of me. Maybe I don’t deserve that kind of significance; I guess we’re all afraid of being forgotten, aren’t we?
Perhaps I only feel caged because I have such an academic schedule this semester. Perhaps things will only get better. All I know is, I never feel right except when I am creating things, lost in a song, or with people I love, who complete me. Is that so wrong, finding happiness in those places? Tell me what’s so wrong with being happy. You say immediate happiness won’t last? Well I’m gonna goddamn make it last! but I’ve got to start somewhere, and there’s no time like the present….
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I'm too emotionally, mentally, and physically exhausted to write about the Reel Big Fish show tonight. I do, however, have a couple of sick souvenirs to share... you decide which one is more epic.
