and long weekends without regrets

so this weekend my family and i went to visit jamestown/yorktown/williamsburg. when we got to the inn we were staying at, we were told that they didn't have wifi. okay, we thought. we can go three nights without internet. when we got to our room(s), we noticed that we could barely get phone reception either (you were lucky to get like half a bar near the window). in fact, we could barely get phone reception most places we went in the area. we were happy to get a few minutes with one bar at a time. now me, being an unreliable phone answerer at best and a complete ignorer of all things telephone related at worst, struggled little with my sudden inability to contact the universe. to my sister, on the other hand, it was the end of the world. most of the weekend saw her walking around in circles with her hand up in the air trying to find reception.

anyway, our days started with breakfast, went on to visiting one of the historical towns, and ended with me reading an old story a friend and i wrote years ago that i recently downloaded onto my kobo. this made me feel like i was living in a bubble of a world that consisted only of muffin tops, the american revolution, john smith, and fictional characters (who were a lot more arrogant and a lot worse friends than i remembered them being) completely separate from the rest of the world. somewhere classes were being taught, people were going to work, and my wedding was coming up, but none of that existed to me then. it was sort of peaceful.

overall, the weekend was fun. there were times when i could swear i was being cooked alive by the sweltering heat coming from a sun much too hot for may, and i can't say i'll miss sharing the bed with my younger brother, and we were stuck in a traffic jam for way over an hour on the way back because they decided to close down an entire highway, but it was an awesome pre-summer-vacation vacation nonetheless.

this could have been a better post, but i'm actually really tired and the trip has inspired a couple of posts for the next few days so it's okay that this one is a little pointless.

*Rain Delays - Crash Parallel

you finally know what was wrong: you are not young anymore

a few weeks ago (or possibly longer) while discussing music with my mom (who actually has pretty awesome taste in music) and how i couldn't find a song online to listen to before i bought it, we came to the brilliant realization that i could use my mom's CD collection which conveniently has the very songs i wanted. it was a great moment. really. this idea hung over my head in the following weeks when i couldn't remember to take said collection from the middle of a pile of tornado-esque debris and/or when i was too busy to worry about adding music to my iPod. finally this morning i brought the CDs up to my room. they have sat here all day next to my computer, just waiting for my parents and brothers to go to sleep. by the time they did, i was pretty excited because it's been a while since i did a major music add to my ipod.

so i put the CD into joe and waited. and waited and waited and waited. and then i remembered that joe's optical drive only reads DVDs now because he is getting old and going senile and has forgotten how to read CD. and i tried a bunch of different things to try and rekindle his memory because he used to have a lot of fun with CDs, but nothing worked. when you're old, you're old. i was quite disappointed. and of course junior doesn't even have an optical drive so he's no help either.

i was really looking forward to a bunch of new songs to listen to on the drive up to yorktown/jamestown tomorrow and now i'll have nothing new until i get the chance to steal someone else's computer for an hour or so (or, you know, until i download something). i'm thinking it's about time to actually get junior an external optical drive. or... could it possibly be time to retire joe? nah.

*You Are Not Young Anymore - Raining Pleasure (i changed the punctuation for the lyric to make it fit.)

and now, the end is here, and so i face the final curtain

sometimes, i get majorly anxious about this summer. i've always had a big peter pan complex and this summer is like taking the dream of neverland that was always hovering just out of my reach and throwing it in the trash. in zimbabwe. a hundred years ago. so far away that i can never even think of it anymore.

it's like my entire "childhood" or whatever you can call this extended childhood of mine that has lasted into my twenties is just ending. at once. all together. it's leaving and forgetting to take me with it.

this all started earlier this year, with things like my sister moving away and all the other stuff that was going on. but the culmination of it, the dramatic dropping of the curtain on my life so far happens this summer.

first of all, i'm getting married. that's obviously a very un-stay a kid forever kind of decision.

second of all, harry potter, which has been a defining part of my life, is ending. that's it. done forever. the funny thing about harry potter is that it always coincided with major events in my life. graduate from elementary school? the fourth book comes out. start middle school? the first movie comes out. i move back from saudi arabia when my brother gets super sick? another book comes out. start my senior year of grade school? sixth book and fourth movie come out. graduate from high school? i'm more torn up about the end of my friend's and my story we were writing than the end of school. my sister gets married? the fifth movie and last book come out. i get married? the last movie comes out. i realize that with a book and movie coming out every year, this is not really an exceptional thing, but it was a big part of my life. so to have it end is like, really having it all just end.

that's it. this summer marks the end of everything. i am coming up to the last page, the credits will soon start to roll, the actors will take a bow, i'll close the back cover... and then i will be an adult.

*My Way - Frank Sinatra

hoping for the best, but expecting the worst

i will be the first person to agree when i'm called a cynic. no one ever confuses me for an optimist, and when you can't find the downside of a situation, you can bet your life that i can find it for you. despite all that, i carry around this stupid hope that i'm wrong. that things are better than they seem. that a person really can't be that bad, that selfish, that stupid. though i may not be able to kill that stubborn hope, i do manage to hide it pretty well.

but it's finally happened. the hope has died. not all the hope, mind you, just one specific point of it. and it's gone. it realized how delusional it was and went to try its luck being an accountant or something more realistic. and you know what? it's oddly liberating. the absence of hope is not a bad thing, it's a relief. it's like this responsibility i was given has been taken away because it was just too impossible, too unrealistic. a weight has been taken off my shoulder. i had been told to put the moon on the ocean's floor and keep it there, and after years of trying and trying and trying, they finally realized that you just can't do it. and there's really no point trying anyway.

i know that sooner or later the hope will spring back up again - hope is kind of like a weed in that matter - and then i'll get back out my rope and scuba gear, but until then i am free.

on a completely unrelated note, a few days ago when i was on campus, i saw this lady sweeping the grass. she was just standing in the middle of this grassy area - with no trees around or anything - with her broom. sweeping. it was weird, and for some reason she keeps popping into my head. i really wanna know why she was sweeping the grass.

*Forever Young - Alphaville

caught in a craze, it's just a phase, or will this be around forever?

i've gotten too comfortable with not posting any new blog posts. it hasn't been that long since my last post, but i feel if i don't force myself to write something today, i'll end up just stopping this thing. dunno why, exactly.

anyway, yesterday i was teaching my brother how to finger crochet. when he got the hang of it, he was super excited. this was his first reaction: "awesome! now i have a way of making a living. i'm gonna live in a cardboard box and when anyone gets near me i'm gonna yell at them to go away cause i'm finger crocheting." a boy after my own heart, he is.

also when we were in the car going to pick up my sister, this was our conversation.
him: sarah, if you could go back to any time in history, when would you go to?
me: the victorian era. (this is always my off the top of my head answer for this question.)
him: i dunno what that is.
me: it's when queen victoria was queen of england. a lot of books i read are about that time. and they wore pretty dresses.
him: oh. i would go back to my childhood.
me: you're only ten.
him: no, i mean my childhood before school. when only hannah was in college and daddy would take us to play by the lake and he would chase us and me and ali would run away and hide and we'd have to jump over mud puddles. those were good times.
i had some stupid answer i can't remember. it made me kinda sad.

random note, i woke up this morning suddenly thinking about my old inflatable chair. remember how those were so popular back in the day? (well, if you were a 90s kid.) and speaking of the 90s, i feel like i'm going crazy because whoever i mention pogs to has no idea what i'm talking about. pogs were a raging fad back then, weren't they? i couldn't have just imagined the whole thing. and MASH. do you guys remember MASH? that's still how i decide my future. oh, and what ever happened to skorts and overalls? i was having a conversation about them the other day. i used to own both and loved them both. they were the cool things to wear. okay i'm gonna stop before this just becomes a 90s nostalgia word vomit thing.

*Stop - Spice Girls (i thought it was appropriate)

some things in this world man, they don't make sense

i'm always grabbing at flames, trying to hold on to the fire because once i let go, the pain can set in. the tears will come to season the burn, but my reasoning is scorched and everything i touch comes out too salty. and i prefer the adrenaline pulsing through my veins while my mind holds on to the hope that maybe this time will be different, maybe this time it won't hurt, to the dull aching realization that i was wrong, that i am always wrong. and i'm grabbing at the flames just to let them go because the pain is familiar and scars never change. my tears are the only ones that are always there for me when the world turns upside down and everyone else runs away from the falling pieces. i am comfortable in the misery. i know my way around bitterness.

you know you were wrong and say i should forgive you, but i'm pushing you away because i'm just too tired to be forgiving. i'm fed up with understanding and would rather see red than have my eyes slipping down my cheeks. i'm not afraid of being hurt, i just don't have the energy to go through it all again. sentences are coming out of my mouth still born, and the pictures i paint are blending together into a black hole that's pulling me down, pulling you in, dragging the whole world to nonexistence.

you tell me i'm not making and sense, and well, if i wanted to make sense i would get a job, but i never held much worth in money and green was always my least favorite color. i never held much worth in you, either, but i'm still breaking myself into pieces to put you back together.

*Bright Lights - Matchbox 20

i want you to keep everything

it's amazing what you find when you clean your room. really clean it, not just doing the top three-quarters of the mess. it's what slips into that last quarter among the piles of batteries that may or may not be dead and old pens that are missing their caps that can really surprise you. uncovering all the hidden reminders of days so long past that the memories are fading can really put into light just how much you've changed over the years. i've been living in this room for almost a decade, give or take a year or two, so there are many years worth of stuff piled up in here. i'm a pretty sentimental person, and end up keeping a lot of junk most people would throw away. i am also a major pack rat (a characteristic i like to pretend i don't have) which means even more stuff. going through it all was just... weird.

for example, in a pile of old papers from high school (including every math test from tenth grade forward. even i had to raise an eyebrow at that one) i found this math packet that was half solved by me and half solved by this kid i used to have the biggest crush on for years. he had filled it out one day on the bus in a confusing, rather pointless story that i'm not gonna write out here. but anyway, i haven't seen this kid since our graduation in 'oh six (actually, i think i might have seen him on campus a couple of weeks ago but i'm not sure) or really talked to him aside from a couple of facebook messages a year or so back. i kept a packet just because it had his writing on it, i could pick him out of a crowd from a mile away, and now he's just not in my life at all. and i don't even notice his absence. like a lot of people i used to know. a lot of high school memories were surfacing today. 

i also realized that i suck at sending cards. i have an entire pile of thank you and get well cards, signed with little notes in addressed envelopes, that i just never got around to sending. talk about a waste of money. i can't even remember when some of them are from but judging from my handwriting they are nowhere near recent.

oh, and looking at how my handwriting has changed on all the papers was interesting. the fact that i had handwritten essays in junior year surprised me too. so did finding a paper that didn't make me want to scratch my eyes out by rereading it. that rarely happens. (there's this essay i wrote junior year of high school on gone with the wind that i was obsessed with. i thought it was the greatest thing ever written. i can't even look at it now without wanting to take a red pen to it.)

there were magazines i had saved because of some actor/actress/singer on the cover that i couldn't care any less about now.

there were things i had lost years ago like my mini stapler from my freshman year at college and the silly putty i bought for my brothers when they were four and five. they are now nine and ten. i found my high school diploma and tons of old hallmark cards, some not even for me. 

and i kept every. single. thing any kid ever drew me. i have tons of stuff from my brothers from over the years, but also drawings and notes from the kids i used to substitute for and girls on my bus. it's crazy. 

there were lists of songs i had wanted to download, half of them i never got around to, and statements from my old bank that doesn't even exist anymore. 

there's just so much stuff and it's taking forever to get through it all because i have to stop and read everything. 

*I Want You to Keep Everything - These United States

assuming that she'll get it wrong, perfect only in her imperfection

do you ever wonder about how much of you is you and how much is based on other people? like what parts of your personality would be the same no matter what place and time you were born into and which parts developed because of the environment you found yourself in. a common characteristic of INTPs is that we don't try something unless we know we'll excel at it. for example, i'll probably never ride a horse. not because i don't want to, but because i don't know that i'll get it right the first time. the idea of being okay with the fact that i'm not good at something i've never done before is ridiculous to me. i just don't know how to do it. the fear of failure is extreme. the fear of not being good or as good or good enough defines a lot of what i do. that's just the way i am, the way i've always been.

but here's where the lines blur. is that really who i always was or is it who i became? is there really a difference? since i was little, i've been known to be the smart one. not trying to sound cocky here, but it was just assumed that i would do well at whatever i tried. this image of perfection everyone had of me came with its own set of pressures. i hate to disappoint people, and if they expect me to be perfect then that's what i had to be, or so baby me always thought. but when your aim is constant perfection, it's hard to try new things that you aren't perfect at. it's hard to fail at something again and again, even if it is something you've never done before. trying new things, things i wasn't absolutely certain i could do, became an impossibility. because perfect people do not make mistakes. and i had to be perfect for the people around me. or that's one way of looking at it, at least: i need to be good at anything/everything i do because that's what people expected of me.

you know, though, having everyone think of you as perfect is a lot less satisfying than it would seem. you don't congratulate someone who's never had a sip of alcohol on their sobriety. you don't go around giving awards out to people every night for not killing someone. you don't throw a celebration when a senior in high school can correctly solve ten simple addition problems. you don't because that is all expected. it's just the natural order of things, and what's expected is never as exciting or praise-worthy as something that's not. so actually doing well in anything was never a big deal because, well, of course i was going to do well. i'm me, after all. and any small slip was/is the end of the world because, well, i'm me after all. 

so you could draw a compelling case that the part of my personality that refuses to see mistakes in myself as a normal part of life (though i'm more than okay with others making mistakes and go out of my way to assure them that everyone does. yeah yeah i can be hypocritical. whatever.) is because of the environment i grew up in, but you could also convincingly say that that's just the way i am, the way i've always been. it's just me. 

do personality traits that are completely you, unadulterated by any outside forces, exist? is everything you are based off of who you know, what you've seen, and where you've been? does it make any difference?

/psychobabble.

*Beautiful Disaster - Jon McLaughlin

you are gold and silver

figures that when i actually have things to blog about, when i want to write a post so bad that i'll refresh the page a million times a minute hoping for change, the site will be down. and then it comes back right when i have to sit with people downstairs far away from either of my computers. and when i finally do get a chance to get on the computers hours and hours and hours later, the stories are suddenly after the fact and i'm too tired to make them exciting. oh, and i have a bunch of drafted empty posts that i didn't start because the site was down but that i now need to delete. on the bright side, i used my free time this morning wisely by rewatching easy a and painting my nails sparkly gold and silver. they're rather pretty if i do say so myself.

so the other day i was sitting in class (it feels like i'm the only one in the world that's not out of school yet) and the kid in front of me takes out his computer. a dell. and out of nowhere, the dell guy pops into my head. my sisters and i used to love the dell guy. really. you know, before he got caught with drugs and everything. actually, we still loved him, but we never saw him anymore. anyway, when i got home that night, i decided to see what happened to him. in my google search, which showed me that my imagination was a lot more interesting than fact, i cam across this which made me feel really really old. you should click the link because some of the things really amazed me.

so, pointless post, but do you have any idea how hard it is to write a blog post in the commotion that is my house right now? pretty near impossible, let me tell you. this has taken me three days to write and it's barely worth reading (though i would click on that link if i were you).

*Pop! Goes My Heart - Hugh Grant

i know what you're thinking

blech so enough with the years late teenage angst that's filled the last few posts, let's talk of something happy in this one, shall we? something like... presents. and how i have always gotten awesome ones, but recently i think i've gotten psychic with my presents.

case in point: a few weeks, possibly months, ago i was putting off something by trying to look at every single webpage on the internet, or something like that. point is, i was looking at a bunch of random stuff. anyway, i came upon this book teapot and thought, "huh. that's cute. i should tell someone to get it for me." but then i moved onto the next page and never did. on sunday when my grandmother came down, guess what she had for me? the teapot! it's super amazing.

case in point: about a week ago i was looking at the hogwarts acceptance letter on the warner bros website, wishing someone had gotten it for me for my eleventh birthday and planning an elaborate potential birthday gift around it. yesterday, my sister finally gave me my birthday present. apparently she was waiting for me to get mail to stick it in the middle of it. it's kind of a running joke around my house how i never get any mail despite my desperate desire for some every single day. she finally gave up waiting. anyway, i wake up and sitting on joe is my very own acceptance letter to hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry along with a list of the school supplies i'll need. it is awesome. (random fact: apparently the top birthday to get this letter as a present is 11. the second is 23.)

case in point: a few weeks before my bridal shower i was contemplating buying an e-reader. i had a running list of reasons why i should that my sister got to listen to whenever a new one popped into my head. then my bridal shower comes and guess what one of the gifts was? yup. and while there are some books i will read on jj (my e-reader) and then have to go buy off amazon so i have the hard copy (i'm still an amazon addict), and i sometimes find myself trying to turn the page instead of pressing a button, i love jj.

so yeah, basically whenever i come across something online now, i will just wish for it and wait for someone to present it to me in gift form.

*Don't Speak - No Doubt

take it, take it all, take all that i have

for everything i've done for you, you'd think i'd rate a little higher on your list of priorities. instead i'm somewhere between gum stuck to the bottom of your shoe and that kid on the class the day after yours.

underneath all your supposed intelligence, you'd think you'd have the ability to see that everything you're complaining to me about them is everything you are.

common decency is really all i'm expecting. my expectations in humanity were buried along with my hopes for it, but i thought i'd get at least that much. but go ahead, blow me off and then subject me to hours of complaints and stories about the people you ditched me for.

kick me when i'm down. pull my feet out from under me. eat all of my chocolates. and then go crying about how i'm mean. tell me that everything is my fault. please. i'd like nothing more.

you're bleeding me dry and calling me worthless, using my brain, my arms. my legs and whining that they're not smart enough, strong enough, fast enough. you're taking everything that i have and complaining that you're going broke.

open my chest and pull out every capillary from my body. use them to tie your lies together into a gleaming red coat of self-confidence. use my logic to justify yourself. but i'm not listening. i don't care anymore.

unless you grow up, and fast, this is it. i've used up all my patience, borrowed from the neighbors, and finished that too. i'm done with this. i'm through with you.

---

the people in my life are really fucking amazing.

*Never Gonna Leave This Bed - Maroon 5

you weren't there for me

we may not talk anymore, but you are never more than a thought away from my mind. i write you hate letters in my spare time and relive all the things you haven't done for me. i count the times you weren't there when i needed  you on blades of grass and butterfly wings. i try to measure how far your good intentions have taken me but it's too short for my ruler to catch. i paint your picture with my blood on my bedroom walls and try to scream out all my memories of you. it doesn't work, and now i have a headache. i keep old tissues in the space where our conversations used to sit, and have used my faith in you to plug up the cracks in my ceiling. i'm setting fire to our past, but the flames scorch my mind, scarring your memory into it forever.

i promised myself that i wouldn't let it get to me. i swore that you would stay out of my thoughts, my voice, my words. i said that you didn't deserve to be immortalized on papers, screens, or pixels. i was never good at keeping promises and never could speak the truth.

i wish i could say i didn't care.

---

you would think that i could write something happy once and a while as a fluke.

*Down Poison - 3 Doors Down

let me tell you the story

write a story of us, you say.

i know you want butterflies and rainbows, but our story doesn't include either. not anymore. you are preparing yourself for sunshine and daisies, laughter and birthday cakes, and i'm beginning to piece together a narrative where they wouldn't survive. because our sunny days are buried in the past and the sound of our laughter is too distorted to be recognized.

our story has clouds of disappointment that rain down bitterness indiscriminately. it has pages and pages filled with enough tears to make the ink run and drown the world. our story has a vase filled with dead flowers on every single table because you never could remember to water them and i wouldn't do your job. i'm putting together a story that tells of high towers, shaved heads, and laryngitis. i'm trying to find the words that describe a dying breath and trying to remember the exact sound of a breaking heart. the pages of our story are littered with false hope and lost trust and lunch plans that fell through the cracks. every letter of every word screams about the kind of hate that starts wars and ends lives.

the best part of our story, though, is that i'll cover it with lies to make it pretty and you won't even care enough to listen. the best part is that we'll smile as we deteriorate into bones and dust. the best part is that we're serving each other poison and drinking it with relish, calling it lemonade though no one is fooled. the best part is that by the time it gets to "ever after," "happily" will have been a long lost dream.

*The Call - Backstreet Boys

if you're vaguely attracted to rooftops

it's been such a struggle to write anything here. i know it hasn't been that long since my last post, but if you could see how many drafts have been piling up over the past four days, you'd understand. of course, you can't see the drafts and you probably never will. otherwise i would just be publishing them as posts and this post would not exist. so you just have to take my word for it. it's kind of funny because it seems like i finally have the words to express something that i've been trying to express for as long as i can remember, and suddenly there's no one to say it to. so they're just being piled into drafts never to be read again. they're building a castle out of themselves for a part of me to live because there doesn't seem to be room for it inside of me anymore. i don't think i'm making any sense. i'm pretty sure i don't mind.

anyway, my grandma came down from connecticut yesterday. she's like our biggest fan and head cheerleader. she used to photocopy our report cards and show them off to the people at the library she works at. when we were in high school. she still brags about us. when my brother-in-law made fun of me (jokingly) she was about ready to claw his eyes out; the only thing stopping her was the fact that she has better manners than that. she also really likes to compliment us, sometimes on things that probably shouldn't be complimented (like my old flip flops that even i can admit need to go). despite knowing that there is probably no merit backing the compliments, it can give a person quite an ego boost sometimes.

today i was told that i sound like a valley girl when i talk, and you would never expect me to even know how to open a book let alone read. i'm not sure if it was meant as an insult or a compliment.

i want to go on a road trip before the summer starts. like really, really want to. i know this is impossible - for several reasons - but that doesn't make me want it any less.

i like to make plans for "next year" that will probably never happen, if for no other reason than that "next year" was originally two years ago. nothing big or noteworthy, really. just stuff like "i'm going to start yoga next year." "i'm going to eat healthy next year." "i'm going to not ditch a single class next year." (i think this one might actually happen for once next semester.) "i am going to write every day next year." i don't know if next year will ever come, but i hope it does. the me that lives then seems like someone i wouldn't mind being.

the title of the post has been my answer to almost everything my sister has said this weekend which is why it was chosen as the title despite having nothing to do with the post.

*Hannah - Freelance Whales

ahh makes no sense at all

there's this thing where you take a song and write a short story using the words from it. you can only use the words from the song however many times they were said. (some people say you can use other words but every word from the song has to be incorporated in the story. i didn't do it that way.) it's really hard. plus, i only started doing it in an attempt to keep myself awake for my sister, and being half asleep makes it harder. anyway, here are the two that i did tonight. they don't make sense. at all. and are more like a choppy collection of random sentences than any short story, but whatever. (kinda like this post i'm noticing.) despite not making sense, they were pretty fun to do. i'll probably try it again when my brain is functioning, and maybe not limit myself to just the words of the song. maybe.

(High of 75 - Relient K)

So the weather forecast said that it is sunny with a high of 75, but now there is a cold frost outside and the temperature is freezing. And since I know tomorrow will have rainy clouds in the sky, and because the weather has not been sunny, I don't know whether I'll catch sight of the sun light. What's with you? Be. I'm just sad and depressed, on and off. I'm bi-polar at best and hoping I wake up to the sun. I know that I'll be funny and enjoy life if I find a light. And after the dark, when you're happy to be alive, my heavy heart might break of my own volition. I just got control over how you fought, and consequently we don't find it funny how you enjoy your heavy heart. And lately you're missing life together, or talking, or the sun, and it's when you're made up. If their heart took you up high, then I'll wait with you. This was the sweeping over of my light. It's how you made and took my 75. Since we were so happy to have made it and be alive.

---

(Read My Mind - The Killers)

I got in a blazing fight trying to move on on the corner of main street, mind. Well, the good old days break down and the honest man gave up, I got a broken wrist cause I pull up to the front of your driveway on a green light. You're a line falling back and behind, waiting on some sign. Just turn around. I'm gonna keep this thing on me. Oh, I don't mind your southern drawl if you don't mind the restless loaded gun. You wanna jump on a trampoline out of this little two-star town, the promised land that no one sees? Well I don't. I don't mind if you drop dead, breaking your spine slipping on a big trapeze. You say you mind cause you can read my mind. The city don't mind if you don't shine. Before you go, can you let it sting? Before you fall out of the world, can you say I'm it? It's funny how I just don't shine if you cut my rebel heart with the diamonds, I don't mind if you wanna read the fire soaking my dream. Can the teenage queen, the chosen one, breathe magic? I don't really read what you find in a subtle kiss. Tell me you never returned that call. Put back the stars. Put back the sun. Oh, and if you open that unseen door again, woman, don't read my mind. I never shine when you read my mind. Can you? Can you read a wall? Read my mind? Me? Cause when I put my faith I shine. She said don't shine. Don't shine. You never read my mind until you read my mind. Don't you like me? Can you read my mind? My mind?

*Makes No Sense at All - Outkast

it's time to move on, it's time to get going

the end of the semester is just a breath away, and with every second i regret my decision to push back graduation more and more. i could have been finished in a week. done. completely. i could have walked across stage in that master's hood thing and a gown that costs way too much. i could have picked up the paper from the alumni association begging for money and posed for pictures that i probably won't ever look at again and went out to celebrate with my family. but i'm not. because i'm stupid.

and now i have to go through another whole semester of classes i learn nothing from and people i can't stand just so i can do the whole graduation thing next year with my sister (that by the way wasn't the reason i pushed back mine). when i was contemplating this, the stupidest decision of my life, why didn't anyone tell me to just take the extra class and finish now? why didn't anyone remind me that dragging out this thing any longer is just masochism at its finest? why didn't anyone say that the money just isn't worth it? why didn't anyone stop me?

i don't want to have another semester to look forward to after the summer. i don't want to spend anymore time on this degree. i'm sick of it. i'm ready to move on. and i can't. because i'm stupid.

*Time to Move On - Tom Petty

so when you look at me you better look hard and look twice. is that me baby or just a brilliant disguise?

Very early in my life it was too late. ~Marguerite Duras, The Lover

And suddenly, as he noted the fine shades of manner by which she harmonized herself with her surroundings, it flashed on him that, to need such adroit handling, the situation must indeed be desperate. ~Edith Wharton, The House of Mirth

It was like sawdust, the unhappiness: it infiltrated everything, everything was a problem, everything made her cry - school, homework, boyfriends, the future, the lack of future, the uncertainty of future, fear of future, fear in general - but it was so hard to say exactly what the problem was in the first place. ~Melanie Thernstrom, The Dead Girl

When I think of all the things he did because he loved me - what people visit on each other out of something like love. It's enough for all the world's woe. You don't even need hate to have a perfectly miserable time. ~Richard Bausch, Mr. Field's Daughter

If you take someone's thoughts and feelings away, bit by bit, consistently, then they have nothing left, except some gritty, gnawing, shitty little instinct, down there, somewhere, worming round the gut, but so far down, so hidden, it's impossible to find. Imagine, if you will, a worldwide conspiracy to deny the existence of the colour yellow. And whenever you saw yellow, they told you, no, that isn't yellow, what the fuck's yellow? Eventually, whenever you saw yellow, you would say: that isn't yellow, course it isn't, blue or green or purple, or.... You'd say it, yes it is, it's yellow, and become increasingly hysterical, and then go berserk. ~David Edgar, Mary Barnes

There's nothing I hate more/ than nothing/ Nothing keeps me up at night/ I toss and turn over nothing/ Nothing could cause a great/ big fight ~Edie Brickell, "Nothing"

People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion. ~Albert Einstein

I started out on burgundy/ But soon hit the harder stuff./ Everybody said they'd stand behind me/ When the game got rough./ But the joke was on me./ There was nobody even there to call my bluff./ I'm going back to New York City./ I do believe I've had enough. ~Bob Dylan, "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues"

She is the rain,/ waits in it for you,/ finds blood spotting her legs/ from the long ride. ~Diane Wakoski, "Uneasy Rider"

God have mercy on the man/ Who doubts what he's sure of. ~Bruce Springsteen, "Brilliant Disguise"

I myself am hell ~Robert Lowell, "Skunk Hour"

I'm going out of my mind/ With a pain that stops and starts/ Like a corkscrew through my heart/ Ever since we've been apart ~Bob Dylan, "You're a Big Girl Now"

now it's raining it's pouring/ the old man is snoring/ now i lay me down to sleep/ i hear the sirens in the street/ all my dreams are made of chrome/ i have no way to get back home/ i'd rather die before I wake/ like marilyn monroe/ and throw my dreams out in/ the street and the/ rain make 'em grow ~Tom Waits, "A Sweet Little Bullet from a Pretty Blue Gun"

I know the bottom, she says. I/ know it with my great tap root:/ It is what you fear./ I do not fear it: I have been there. ~Sylvia Plath, "Elm"

After they had explored all the suns in the universe, and all the planets of all the suns, they realized that there was no other life in the universe, and that they were alone. And they were very happy, because then they knew it was up to them to become all the things they had imagined they would find. ~Lanford Wilson, Fifth of July


*Brilliant Disguise - Bruce Springsteen

stuck in a lava flow of brakelights

i left the house last night to go to class at five:fifty-seven. i know this because right before i left my brother said, "but you still have three minutes before you usually go" and i said, "i guess i'll just be three minutes early." i have never been so wrong. the drive to school takes about twenty minutes on average, fifteen when there are no other cars on the road and i get all green lights. last night i pulled into campus at seven:forty-five. that's almost two hours after i left my house. two. hours. by the time i found parking and got to class, it was almost eight. class officially starts at seven:twenty, but the dude always starts at seven:ten-ish.  my final presentation was yesterday. i race across campus, and if you knew me in high school PE days, you'll know that i tend to get really red whenever i race anywhere for however long. so i get into class looking like a tomato, my professor informs me that i missed my time slot but i can go immediately after the dude presenting, i get in front of the class two minutes later and completely bomb my presentation. i have never in my life presented so badly. ever. i think if it was possible to take points from my already mediocre grades that i have gotten in this class so far, the professor would. just because there are not enough points he can minus for the presentation. he should probably dip into my other classes too. it's like i was watching myself completely screw up and couldn't do anything to stop it, though i knew this presentation inside and out. i was ready.

anyway, someone told me that all of the traffic was because the whole "osama bin laden was killed" thing. which i completely don't understand. so the dude is allegedly killed and the number of cars in virginia suddenly multiplies? or have all of these people been hiding in their houses too scared to drive while he was alive but now that he's dead they're out and about again? i just don't get it. the same person also told me (when i was complaining about said traffic and the way it ruined my grade) in that i'm so patriotic and if you're not you must be a terrorist tone, "i don't get why you're complaining. it seems a small price to pay for the death of a terrorist." what the hell? why should i have to pay for "the death of a terrorist" by sitting in my car for two hours wasting gas and showing up late to class? how does that make any sense? and why the hell does my annoyance with the traffic mean that i was the number one osama supporter? (which i'm not if any of you had any doubts.)

gah just reliving yesterday through this is pissing me off again.

*River of Brakelights - Julian Casablancas