Reflections

I know. It's been a while. The past few months have been torturous to say the least. Many times, I had a Zoolander "Who am I?" moment and still struggle being away from "real life", while still having to deal with the family issues and decision-making power that a head-of-household has, in addition to school.

In the past few months I have learned that:

1. I am my parents' daughter, first and foremost. I am the eldest child. I am part of a close-knit family that I can never escape, regardless of distance. Whether I want them or not, family-affecting decisions are my burden alone.

2. I have the greatest friends in the world. They know the struggle, and I know, if push comes to shove, they will to be there scheming with me as if we're back to being young and carefree. (They are also the reason why I was so tired from my Spring Break... too much fun... great talks... too many laughs.)

3. My mentors (back home & here in the Midwest) are awesome. I got lucky in this regard. They want me to succeed just as much as my friends do.

4. The Midwest isn't so bad. You just gotta get used to it.

5. I have learned that I have to do business with the personality that I have--being obnoxiously loud is not how I related to my clients pre-B school, it doesn't have to be how I relate to clients now. Being sincere goes a long way.  

So a rundown of the random things currently in my mind:

1. Baseball. Yep. Said it.
2. My godbaby will be 6 months in a couple of days. 
3. A lot my friends/cousins/classmates are getting married, and therefore, I need fancy clothes. And shoes.
4. I need a job. Loans, bleh.
5. The weather here is more fickle than the weather back home.
6. I don't enjoy SBTB as much as I used to (particularly Screech and Slater... was Screech always so stalker-ish and was Slater always such a douche?). It makes me very sad.

Fin.

Basketcase

I wrote a post a few days back and after re-reading it I decided that I didn't make sense (even to me), so I canned it. I guess that's what happens when have you stress and homesickness hit you at the same week. With the start of baseball season--the home team, its annual FanFest on Saturday (yeah, I know it's stupid that I use a sport to gauge parts of my mood) and the mark of being away from home for 6 months, my energy level has been nonexistent and my thoughts/spirit have been back home... not a good deal if you have 18 graduate units.

Phantom of the Opera

Dyshidrotic Eczema. Just diagnosed myself. Forget the fact that my hands look ugly... if it gets any worse, I won't be able to write. I'm so scared that it is going to get worse--and then what do I do? I never type my notes... it's distracting and I never learned how to work WordArt fast enough to draw diagrams if needed. Professors here don't like laptops on during class, either.  So, what do I do? Am I supposed to get a note from my doctor stating that my hands are too disfigured to write? Sheesh... just writing about the possibility of it makes me wanna cry.

The first thing the websites have said to do is relieve stress. I'm in school. It's practically an oxymoron. The second thing was the avoid extreme cold weather. Ahem. Being where I go to school, it's impossible. My hands are chilled to the bone even with gloves on (and not the cheap Target gloves, mind you, the nice Macy's high quality ones). Third thing... sleep. HA!

I hope that once I get home, I can really start a moisturizing regimen. I have 3 weeks to turn my skin around or it will get worse when the dead of winter (and negative degree weather) is upon me. I'm hoping to stop by the school clinic today--I hope they can tell me what I can do to relieve this pain (oh my GOSH... the pain of eczema... it really does hurt.)

Yeah... I've been having a really shitty week. Will keep the positivity, though... 'cause there's nowhere else to go but up.

Wake Me Up When September Ends

Constant vigilance. Be aware. Be safe.

******

It has been 10 years. It feels so distant. It feels like a lifetime ago, and yet, I almost remember that day in its entirety. 9/11 flipped the world around, especially for the high school graduating class of 2002. I don't say that because it was my senior year, or to make us sound more important than we really are. But we were the first adolescents to turn into adults post-9/11. Our academic futures, our careers and our political stances were all shaped by what happened on 10am Eastern Time that morning.

My creative writing teacher told us, a few months afterwards, that he thought that this event would be our Vietnam. We were silent in our thoughts; politically correct, I supposed. But while our voices were nonexistent, our actions said everything. A year later the United States entered into enemy turf preemptively. I wonder, had it not been for the attack on American soil, would we have had enough troops to enter a foreign territory? 

Yes, our world has changed dramatically since it happened. Do you remember what it was like before this? Sadly, I cannot. All I can remember are reds, oranges and yellows. No working bathrooms in underground subways. System-wide "emergency" drills in college. The randomly parked bomb squad van near the school's stadium. The paranoia of going to beloved landmarks. The fear of losing family and friends to a Lo-Fi massacre.

Are we safer now than we were before? Will we ever get that sense of security back? All I know is that I'm hoping nothing happens tomorrow or ever again. Both sides cannot continue to devolve. No God would want this for any of His people. No economy can financially support the hate. But human nature innately forces us to defend our rights and privileges. Everyone loses, no one wins.

Hello Goodbye

I said my piece

To make my peace

I tried to say it right

The anger deep inside me 

Just makes me want to fight

AHahaAHA. Can you tell that's been a hell of a long time since I've written any rhyming poetry?! (Try 05/05/05... actually, it may be more recently than that... possibly 11/26/05.) These few lines have been stuck in my head for about 2 weeks now and decided to write it out--sounds a lot better when you think of it as a slam piece (slam piece... oh, you.). Who am I kidding?! *Rolls eyes at self* Slam piece. It's a bit contradictory, but oh well... I am a walking contradiction at times--okay, most of the time. 

Won't have much time to dwell on the anger, so expect to see the splashes of red here when necessary. I'll leave the sob stories for personal correspondence. 

Good day. Don't let the thunder scare you. Don't let the lightning strike you.

Untitled [How Does it Feel?]

I really don't know what's going on with me. I want to write. And not just babble on the page... but write essays and arguments, things that need time and cultivation, things that require quotations, all in proper format. 

It has been more than a year since I turned in my psychological analysis/profile. I started off with a C in that class--I admit, my academic writing was horrible (it was 5 years between my thesis and this paper)--but I ended up with a semester A... and I think it was due to my profile. It probably wasn't my best work, but it was enough to get the job done... and I'm pretty sure it was compelling. But yeah, I miss writing with a purpose. It's been a cool while since I've had to write something with such importance. Yeah, it's only for class that I merely took because I was bored, but I felt like I was uncovering something, some truth to the human condition. <-- That sounded so dorky. 0_o

So, I apologize in advance if I ended up posting an essay (with references and all) about Harry Potter and social theory. Muahahahaha.(It probably won't happen.)

And my favorite Harry Potter insult (at the moment): Go accio some commonsense. Ahahaha.

Material Girl

There are so many things that I "need" right now. I had a bit of "saver's" regret after not catching a deal on a new laptop--I literally threw a tantrum... randomly yelling "I'm so mad at myself!!!" every few minutes yesterday for about an hour. My friend, who understands my situation, offered to lend me her laptop for a year or two (thank you, you know who you are!) but I declined. I know very well that her comp would have worked perfectly fine... and I don't plan to run any games on the computer (although I am very tempted to)... but I know that everything is about appearance... I know that the people who will be around me will have the best of everything from a woman's stockings to a man's cuff links... and for once, I don't want to stand out like a sore thumb.

I started getting misty eyed when my mom offered to buy me a watch. My current watch is pretty banged up and it's not savvy to pull out the cellphone every time I need to check the time. It's all starting to pile up... I just feel so guilty... I really do wonder if I deserve to be selfish... Here we are in the midst of a family emergency and my mom asked if she can buy me a stupid watch. What kind of person would I be if I accepted?! But yet, here I am still coveting something shiny and new. And I hate myself for it.

The fear that I have of losing myself in the fray is starting to happen.

And I'm pretty scared.

True to Your Heart

I always think it's funny when high-maintenance pretty girls exclaim that they're real. I mean, how do we really know how real they are if they look fake? Fake outward appearance, but real inside? Does it work that way? Everyone tells me that as long as you're true to your heart that the "realness" will show. But does it really? 

Apparently to some, the true-ness in my heart consists of gooey darkness... but if that is how I feel, then isn't it still the truth? The truth never claimed to be pretty. And if I hid my feelings, would that be living a lie? And if I'm living a lie, is that a sin? But what if my heart says to lie to save people pain? Is it my job to save people from pain? What about my own pain? Are other people, who don't take my feelings into account, given priority over my own well being? In the end I have to live with myself... and with all these issues of self worth, esteem and image all coming into play, I question if my feelings and thoughts are worth any value because in all my life they never were.

Aren't we all just playing the parts we are given? Like poor fools who stumble across the stage, waiting for that big break in life. And what if the role is being fake, then are you fake or are you just diligently playing your part? This is why I prefer to be managing backstage... I rather be controlling the spotlight than under its heat. Too much trouble being on stage. Attention only brews discourse. 

Recreation. reCreation. It was a word that I threw contempt at. 30th Anniversary of a tradition drenched in culture... I thought everyone on board this show would be in it to be a LIVE part of history... to make change... to creatively recreate a story of struggle, growth and determination. But no. Mostly everyone was in it for their own advancement, their own spotlight and their own greed. It was one of the very few times in my life when I lost hope in people. It's been five years now since I last cued the lights and sound for that star-crossed lover show... it's been five years since I've looked at that word. 

reCreation.

I think it's time that I face that word once again. Whatever that means, I don't know.