take two. or eleventy bajillion.

Let's try this again, shall we?

Okay. After all this time of not writing anything in this space, it's really been on my mind for quite a while. It's easier than a paper notebook/journal, seeing as how I can go back and edit whatever I said and there'll be no record of what I wrote earlier. Although it IS kind of neat to go back and re-read journal entries that you scribbled down days or months or years before. (Personally, I always examine my handwriting when I do that, trying to tell if I was in a hurry or if I took the time to form my letters carefully because I consider myself to be a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to my own script.)

Although-TANGENT-one time, a few years ago, I found one of my old journals from 7th grade and cracked it open to an entry I had written about some crush I had on some boy and I nearly rolled my eyes clear out of my head from the ridiculousness of it all. I vowed then and there to never-NEVER-read any of my previous entries in any of my journals. I have mostly kept this vow.

A few days ago I volunteered to help my boyfriend do some research for an English paper. The paper is supposed to be an ethnography about a subculture-any subculture. (Side note: Why do English professors love to be so vague with the instructions for their assignments? I want an A, you want me to get an A [I hope], so just tell me what you want already, dammit.) So off I went to the local college library at 10:30 on a Saturday morning to look up articles regarding-wait for it-Appalachia.

Oh. Yes. (Side note: SARCASM.)

When I realized that I loved finding obscure articles for an obscure topic, I became a little depressed. Yes, the best part of college is the freedom and the friendships, but for me, one of the best parts was the learning.

That's right. LEARNING. I said it.

I miss feeling the gears of my brain turn, reading for comprehension and details, analyzing texts, figuring out how an article fits into a thesis. When I started finding those articles, it was like putting on my new glasses for the first time: I felt a little woozy at first, but I noticed the trees had individual leaves! On the branches! Not just big blobs of green! What?! That's crazy! Who knew?

Same thing with the articles: I remembered words I hadn't used or read in months, things were making sense, and I kept having one [brilliant] idea after another. It was fricking excellent.

I want to go to there. Again.

Writer's Blockade

Would it be possible to start every entry with "So..."? I think I'd be able to do it. I think it'd be pretty easy--I start out a lot of my sentences with that.

Blogging, for me, has turned out to be a lot like journaling, in that I do it in spurts. Today, while looking around a bookstore at S.O.'s (Significant Other) college, I found the section that housed blank journals. Now, I love blank journals. I love the clean, blank pages that seem to practically beg for my handwriting. I love the fact that I would be the first to write in them. I love that the bindings aren't cracked yet, that the journal is untouched and intact. Most people collect figurines, artwork, or other knick-knacks (like napkin rings--true story); today I decided that I collect journals.

Because of my professed love for new notebooks, it would make sense to believe that I fill up journals as fast as I can, scribbling furiously every day, recording all my thoughts and experiences. FALSE. [Ha!] In literally all of my journals-and I have quite a few-most only have the first 10 to 20 pages filled. I am Absolutely Definitely Distracted (ADD) when it comes to journaling. Distracted by just about everything in life, from the weather outside my windows to phone calls from friends to my runaway thoughts. It's frustrating, because my memory is not that great to begin with, so I'd like to write everything down before I forget it, but I often become preoccupied in the middle of an entry, going off to start or finish a task/activity. Recently I've gotten better at finishing an entry, so that's progress, I guess...but I have still NEVER filled a journal. Ever.

So that's something else I'll work on this year, in addition to becoming a better person. I won't call it a resolution, because I'm afraid I'll feel too much pressure and become bitter and depressed if I don't succeed. Then again, all the better to fill a journal with, right?

leave of absence

So I guess I unintentionally took an extended leave of absence recently. Hmm. I don't really know what to say about that.

But I'm trying this again, mainly because now I have to write either a reflective essay or an essay about place, and where does it get more reflective than a blog? No where, unless it's a mirror.

I need to come up with some ideas for subjects I can reflect upon. So far I've got: my craziness about proper punctuation. Which, really, not that great in my opinion. I think I could write about work and all the "reflecting" I do here at my desk when I'm forced to do mindless, abysmal, asinine jobs (like writing thank you cards for Assessment Day--and now that I've thought about that, I can feel my blood pressure start to rise. Awesome). I think that I actually do have some good material within me; it's just getting it out and organizing it coherently that's giving me fits of the mental kind. I have so many "reflections" running around in my head, but it's like a room full of spider monkeys in there, where they're all hopped up on Mountain Dew and sugar cookies. Or crack.

I want the paper to be funny; I want people to be able to read it and understand my sense of humor and be able to hear my voice--my unique, un-pompous, non-"buoyantly declaring" voice. Basically, I want my writing to reflect ME, not the professor. I'm tired of writing to impress him, because, really, that's what I've been doing for two years now. I guess that's why I started this blog in the first place: I wanted to be able to write and not have someone grading it, taking off points for clarity of expression, word usage, informal language, awkward wording, whatever.

Cryin's not for me

Today has been both better and worse. Well, maybe not worse, but more up-and-down than anything else. I've only cried hard once, which I consider pretty good--especially compared to last night. I've had an ongoing Facebook message with my boyfriend's best friend and fired off a short message to him last night after it all went down to let him know that it was a rough night for both my boyfriend and me. (I should probably assign some nicknames to them both, but I can't think of any. Maybe "the Tall One" [boyfriend] and "the Taller One" [friend]?)

So anyway, the Taller One and I have been messaging back and forth all day about this, and he's provided some really good advice and insight into the whole situation, because he's been there before with his girlfriend. (It might be more logical for me to talk to her, but I don't really want to. I feel like I know him better, and I'm more comfortable talking to him, for some reason. Maybe because I've known him longer than her.)

In my most recent reply to the Taller One, I wrote this:

I have sermon notes from [our pastor]'s first sermon of this year pinned to my bulletin board next to my computer; he was talking about the story of the lame man at the healing pool whom Jesus told to get up and walk--even though Jesus didn't offer any support or help. There's one point that's been haunting my thoughts for months: "Unless the man is willing to take action, he will never experience healing." This has been a sort of mantra for me this semester; I've been trying to turn my life around and become an all-around better person. However, I've been trying to do this on my own the majority of the time and yesterday one of my friends posted a note on Facebook, of all places, that reminded me that there's absolutely no way to change anything on my own--not only do I need God's help, I need the help of other people, too. Looking back on it now, I think that maybe God has been preparing me in a way to be sympathetic toward what [the Tall One]'s going through, and if he has been, then maybe this is the culmination of that preparation and it's time for me to put what I've learned into practice. I don't expect the next few days or weeks to be very easy, but I hope they'll be worth it.

I think if I can just keep this in mind, I'll be able to get through this and move on to something better, which is ultimately what the Tall One (boyfriend) and I both need. I feel like this might be our first real adult challenge in life, and it's kind of scary to have to grow up because of this.

I'm in a glass case of emotion

What do you do when your boyfriend of almost three years reveals something to you that he's struggled with for the last year and a half? And we're talking BIG here, not just something like, "Oh, I swear a lot sometimes," or whatever.

And what do you do when it hurts? Literally, emotionally, breaking-your-heart-for-two-different-reasons-hurts, one because you feel like he cheated on you (technically he didn't, but in a way, yes) and two because he's crying in front of you and you know that he feels absolutely horrible about it? What do you do when, all of a sudden, you're questioning every sentence that comes out of his mouth, including, "I love you more than anything"?

I just cried. I'm not mad. But I am hurt. And I don't know how much I trust him right now. I've always had small issues with trusting him--not because of anything he'd ever done, but because I'm paranoid and can't stand the thought of having my heart shattered.

I still love him, and I want to be there for him eventually, but I don't feel like I can right now. I wasn't even able to say that I forgive him tonight. I mean, I will--when I'm ready. And he knows this.

I feel like in spite of all my effort--the sacrifices I made for him, the things I gave him, the nights I spent crying myself to sleep because I started a fight with him--it just wasn't good enough. I wasn't good enough. That is what hurts me the most. I want so badly to be everything for him, like he is for me. Or was. I don't know. Truth be told, I'm still processing this (I hate that phrase, by the way), and I'm not sure when I'll be fully okay. I feel like things will always be somewhat different from now on, tinged with the slightest hint of some suspicion or hurt, and it makes me so incredibly sad. I think that is what I'm mourning the most--our relationship cannot be like it used to be. It just can't.

This is mostly about my hair.

I've decided (for now, anyway) that I shall address this blog to the ambiguous, engimatic, all-knowing Internet. Kind of like when you were really young, and you first started writing in a diary, and you always addressed it to "Dear Diary" because it was your best friend, better half, and secret confidante. Except when it became so secret that you forgot where you put it and pretty much lost it because it was in the best hiding spot ever so that your little brother and sister would never find it and read it, even though they were only, like, 8 and 5 and absolutely could not give a darn about what you thought, much less read your awkward chicken-scratch writing.

Yeah. Like that.

So anyway, Internet, I have a problem. An addictive problem. A bad problem, if you will.

I cut my own hair AFTER I go to a professional salon to get it cut.

I do it all. the. time. It is a sickness, I tell you. (A horrible, asymmetrical, follicular sickness, full of frustration and idiocy.) Most of the time I only trim little bits of hair off the ends--it's not like I've ever taken the kitchen shears and hacked off 6 inches or whatever. But I have cut myself some bangs, time and time again. It is ridiculous. Because I don't have enough backbone to be direct enough when I tell them what I want.

Here's the weird thing, though (at least to me): I never cut my own hair when I was little. I was such a good little girl that it never popped into my tiny pea-pickin' brain to grab me some toddler-sized safety scissors and go at it, pruning my shrubbery of a head.

[Side note: I love the word "shrubbery." And Monty Python.]

I've learned, however, to never "practice my art" when I'm frustrated or upset, although it is particularly satisfying. Except for this last time--I was mad at how the stylist had styled my hair and was being incredibly whiney and stupid, so I marched across a large parking lot in my high-heeled wedge shoes, up three flights of stairs, and stormed into my room only to immediately whine some more and--you guessed it--furiously manhandle my scissors. Fortunately, I still retained enough of my senses to do a halfway decent job. I'm actually now very pleased with my quasi-bangs (they sweep across my forehead, unlike traditional 5th-grade-picture-day bangs), especially after cutting off just a teensy bit more tonight.

I told you it was bad.

ch-ch-changes

I decided to change the name of this blog. The address is still the same, which is slightly confusing--but whatever.

It's a shame that I can't have Blogger turned on in my head all the time, because I compose posts almost continually throughout the day. Also, sometimes stuff just happens, and when it does, I think, "Gaaah, I should blog that!" (Not like anyone's gonna read it...but I will. Later.)

Take tonight, for example: At the special Chapel service tonight, the speaker declared that "there will be rapping in Chapel on Thursday morning!"

Friends, my school is, like, 98% white. And I mean white.

(After a while, the word "white" looks funny. And mispelled.)

Holla back.