sometimes i think too much.

i need a hobby.

suggestions?
nothing crafty, please and thank you.

I need to watch Dirty Dancing.

I'm missing several people very much.

Paige, Nicole, Sophie, and Becktron - leave Africa. Come home to me.

a brief note to the world

Sometimes, when things are at their worst, I forget how absolutely wonderful you are. I mean, sure, there are a lot of bad things. Disease, war, selfishness. But there is a lot of good too. I love the way the sun feels on my skin and the way the air feels first thing in the morning. I love pop music in the summertime, reading out on the lawn, and spending time with people who are dear to me.

So I apologize for forgetting how great you are. You are always so patient and you always find a way to remind that life is filled with happiness (if I am just willing to see it).
Thank you.
I promise I will try my best to remember how I'm feeling right now.

dreams that don't make sense

I dreamt that I got lost in Provo. I had just left the house of an elderly woman. There had been about thirty hipsters crowded in her tiny living room. They were all watching Gilmore Girls and being cool in the way that makes you wonder if they ever crack a smile. I told brother Ryan that I needed to leave. It was late and I had class in the morning. He kept saying we would leave, but got distracted by something each time we started to go. Finally I just got up to leave without him. The old woman kissed my cheek and told me how much I'd grown. I didn't know that I had known her as a child.
I left the house and started to walk home, following the GPS on my phone. I made a wrong turn and ended up in the middle of a rice paddy. A threatening looking man biked up next to me and would not leave me alone. I stepped off the dirt road in the hope that he would just pass by. A family with a dozen small children paraded by - some of them in little red wagons and some of them on bikes. Once they'd gone, the man on the bicycle began to move in closer and closer to me. I was getting a little more panicked when out of nowhere hot Ryan showed up on a skinny framed bike. He was wearing an old fashioned police uniform. He had a bronze whistle around his neck. He started chatting with the threatening man, which made me nervous until I realized that he was trying to intimidate the guy into leaving me alone. I wasn't sure whether I could trust either of them, so I ducked into a secondhand store to wait out the night. I fell asleep in a pile of old stuffed animals and woke up in a puddle of antifreeze.

Then I woke up for real on the top bunk in Amy's room, feeling overheated and groggy.

Edit:
According to every online "dream resource"...
antifreeze
to see or use antifreeze in your dream, suggests that you are being emotionally cold and perhaps need to warm up to others more.

A few weeks ago I also dreamt that I was stranded in the snow crying antifreeze tears.

Please note that I generally have pretty weird but pleasant dreams. I've just had a few weird(er), more upsetting ones lately.

poetry, chlorine, and life

This morning I slept in, spent the morning cleaning the house, and then went swimming with Amy. Once I started to feel my winter skin stinging in the sun, Amy and I decided to get dressed and go to the farmer's market. We stopped for lunch on the way and spent some time talking and taking photos together. As she chewed thoughtfully on a chicken nugget, my sister said something that got me thinking. She squinted at me the way she does when she has something serious to say, looked me up and down, and said, "You are very different from the way you were when you were little." She went on to say that I look different, I act different, and I am just different all around. She followed that up with, "You used to be kind of chubby." Such a little gem.

But my little sister's lack of sensitivity is not the point here. I really am different from the girl I was when I was her age (ten). I've evolved from a dreamy, bookish child, into an insecure high school freshman, to a world-weary eighteen year old cynic. I graduated high school and went off to college - starting on the journey that brought me to my current state (a dreamy, bookish, but vastly different twenty year old).

To say that I get nostalgic in the summer would be an understatement. Not that intro-/retro-spection are uncommon activities for me. Anyone that knows me well would agree that I spend a lot of time tucked into my own head. But the summer time has always felt like the end of things. It's a chance to take stock of the events of the preceding year and to set new goals. Blame it on fifteen years of being a student, but I've said it before and I'll say it again - the calendar may change in January, but the new year begins with the scent of pencils and a new pair of shoes.

Of those fifteen years of student-hood, I feel like this past year has swept me farther away from shore than I've ever been before. Through everything, I know I've become stronger, more independent, and much more comfortable in my own skin. I've started working out what my priorities are and what I want out of life. My beliefs are taking on a more defined shape. I see the world through new eyes.

There is a lot that I could say. I could start listing all of the things I've learned and I could try to share some of my new found convictions. But there is just too much to include in one silly blog post.

What I would like to say, though, is that I am happier now than I have ever been. I am writing poetry again and I've dusted off my sketchbook. Life is full of beauty and I wish that I could find a way to show people that.

So Amy, thanks for the chat. Just don't call me chubby again, k?

really?

This has been driving me crazy for nearly two years.

Two summers ago I was on a late-night crawl through the labyrinth that is Wikipedia. Somewhere in my trawling I came across a small bit of trivia. I was surprised to learn that there was a special name for a particular type of architectural ornament. "Cool," I thought to myself. "I'll store that away for future use."

Being in an only semi-lucid state, however, I neglected to bookmark the Wikipedia page. Besides, I have a great memory and normally have no trouble recalling these things. (That was a joke, there, in case you were wondering.)

Months later, I saw one of these little devils hanging in a garden somewhere and said, "Oh! Did you know that there is a name for those? It's... it's... uh......". And I drew a complete blank.

Today I was determined to solve the mystery. I put one of my most prominent talents to work - stringing together the perfect search terms to find just about anything on Google - and found the Wikipedia page again.

So, what are the called?
Green men.
They are called GREEN MEN.

How sad.

dating is hard and other realizations

Something I realized: Dating is hard. And I am such a rookie.
Ah, well. Maybe someday I will get it right. In the mean time - let's just hope my blundering doesn't end up causing too many problems for people.

I've been having that feeling lately like it is time for an overhaul. A personality, life, everything-type overhaul. I've got a 12ish hour drive ahead of me this weekend - so that will give me some time to come up with a course of action. (Think diagrams.) I've already wasted away the first quarter of my summer. It's definitely time to get down to business.

Brainstorming:
I need to work on
- my intellectual/educational pursuits. Summer is not an excuse for losing sight of my goals. It is time to be preparing for the coming year, exploring new avenues of thinking, etc etc.
- the way I interact (or don't) with other people. There are a lot of things that will be going into this category. It's time to be more assertive and self-assured. Enough of this grass in the wind business.
- dating. Focus more on meeting people, getting out, making friends. Learn how to date. Stop kissing on the first date and freaking out after the second.
- my sense of style. It's time to get one.
- my health.
- financeeessssss.

Okay. A good start.