I have not written in a long time, especially publicly.  I always write, I just don't always post it on the internet for everyone to see.  Funny thing about this blog is that it remains rather anonymous even though it is public because I barely ever tell anyone I have it.  It's probably better since it seems that most of the stuff I have posted here has ended up being ramblings or rantings about my life.  Just things I need to get off my chest.  There's no rhyme or reason to it.  I like posting here once in a while, going back and reading, and seeing how my life has changed since the last time I posted.  It's definitely helpful because it helps me to see that I do make progress and changes in my life, even if they are sometimes slow. 

Last time I posted about the wine manager position and its potential.  I decided this evening I have changed my opinion about it.  Life is all about perspective.  I tend to lean toward the cynical negative side of things, so I have decided to change my perspective.  If I were, say, a highly optimistic, enthusiastic person, I would have had a completely different outlook.  I would have not thought of the position as being what people can teach me, but rather what I can learn from other people.  That is the problem I'm having.  I always wait for other people to make up their minds and figure out what they're doing, when in actuality, all I really have to do is just do it.  All the cards are in place.  I cannot rely on people to learn for me.  I have to teach myself.  This opportunity is going to be all about what I can make of it.  It has nothing to do with anyone else.  And that, inherently, solves the question of if I'm going to be married to my job for years and years.  I've already decided the answer to that is no.  No matter what I've decided, if something better comes along, and the time is right, I will move on.  I won't feel guilty.  I'm just going to do what I need to do.  If I'm teaching myself, then I don't have to feel indebted to anyone.  And I am.  I love learning about wine.  The whole world of it is fascinating, and I feel like I've barely started.  I hear these salesmen and presenters talk about their trips abroad to the tiny vineyards in Italy and France and I just hope that one day I get the opportunity to do what they are doing.  They will never work 9-5 jobs, but it doesn't matter when you get the opportunities they do.  It's definitely not all fun and games for them either - often they are just tasting and spitting, which is honestly not the most attractive part of the job.  Then again, how are you going to taste hundreds of wines without getting shmammered?  You spit, and it's gross.  There are occasions to enjoy and occasions to taste.  Just like any other job, it has its downfalls.  I love learning about it all though.  There are so many different stories and schools of thought.  Everyone has a different opinion.  Taste is so subjective.  It's really the variety of it that I like so much.  There is always something different and something new to learn.  I'm just beginning, but it's good so far. 

Drinking some new Sixpoint Resin and contemplating my last few journal entries.  I hate how I flip around so much.  It's just so clear I'm directionless.  A couple months ago I was bemoaning my job and saying how much I wanted a new one, and now I'm contemplating the wine manager thing.  The wine manager thing is what I'm going to call it, because right now it's turning into a mess of stress that I don't want to deal with.  I told my boss I was interested.  This is the truth.  I am very interested.  Unfortunately, I think that he doesn't see it as something serious, and that is a big problem for me.  He is being rather cavalier and nonchalant about the whole thing now.  Before, he was making it out as if it were a big deal and it was going to happen right away and blah blah blah, but now it's "we'll talk sometime this week" and "Well I got you up to 40 hours for the time being and we'll continue our talk in the next couple days" BLAH BLAH BLAH. 

I am not willing to get screwed over by this.  I'm just not.  I fully intend on dictating this to him.  This is important to me.  It's my future.  I want him to take it seriously.  If he's not going to take it seriously then it might be time for big changes for me.  Such as...quitting.  Quitting is a scary thing in this economy, but sometimes I think I just won't be able to motivate myself to get another job unless I don't have one at all.  The problem is that I am hearing different things from different people, and they all make sense.  Some of my friends and family are extremely excited, but others have reservations.  The problem is that the reservations are coming from my coworkers who have worked with my boss and know how he can be.  They understand why I myself have reservations about essentially marrying myself to this place for years.  My problem is that I don't think my boss is taking this seriously.  Huge f-ing problem, and I am bouncing back and forth like a damn yo-yo on it.  The problem is that without this, I don't know what the hell I'm doing either, and then I'm back to square one, which is back to sending out resumes and selling my soul to huge corporations who could give a shit less about their employees. 

Life is stressful.  Gotta make money, and have to sell your soul to do it.  It seems to be the way of the world today.  Not everyone is going to get rich with their own business, but for anyone who doesn't, the future seems rather bleak.  The future of everything seems pretty damn bleak, but I'm a cynic by nature, so you never know.  I am more confused than ever. 

Job Dilemmas

I haven't blogged anything in a long while, and if I knew more people read my blog (a very teeny tiny number of people even know of its existence) I wouldn't write this here at all.  I have a need to hash out a dilemma.  I have been writing about trying to find a job after college and being directionless as to a career path for two years.  I am nearing my 25th birthday.  It's less than a week away.  I have long since realized that my degree is probably going to go to waste, and that perhaps the career path I thought I wanted, which was counseling, is not really what I want at all.  I have had a few interviews, a couple of which I haven't bothered pursuing because of distance or pay or both.  I had an interview for a job a couple weeks ago which went very well but was simply a receptionist position in an insurance claims management office.  I had a good feeling about that job after the interview, but after two weeks time I received an automated email telling me that the position was cancelled and would not be filled.  I have gotten extremely tired and cynical about the entire job hunting process.  It seems doomed to make even intelligent unique individuals fail.  It's a tangled web of resumes and qualifications and hiring managers and HR departments, all which seem designed to reduce human beings to numbers. The cover letter is a guise to make job seekers feel as though they may have a chance to stand out in the sea of qualified applicants. These days, the best and simplest way to get a job is by knowing someone.  They call it networking.  Networking gets people jobs that they aren't even qualified for.  All you need is one person to vouch for you and the job can be yours.

Anyway, as a shy person, a lot of that is difficult for me, although I do see its value.  I do not think it's fair.  I think nothing about the hiring process is fair, but as life isn't fair as we all know, this is a consequence of that.  All of this has led me to my current dilemma.  After hearing that I was not going to get the job at the claims management company, my boss at my current job offered me a sort of promotion.  I work at a very large wine and liquor store.  I always have to explain to people that's it's not your skeezy corner package store.  It's a big store, and I have two bosses who are dedicated to their business and cater to the more high end customer, meaning the customer who buys the expensive craft beers, fancy liqueurs, and fine wines.  There is an enormous customer base for this - larger than most people realize.  Anyway, I have two bosses, one who handles beer and liquor, and one wine.  They are twin brothers.  Previously at my job I was a part time cashier, who moved up to full time for part of the year when I became a shift manager for the cashiers.  Basically I'm still a cashier, I just have more privileges than the rest.  I get called on when there is a problem, train people, etc. etc. etc.  I am not a manager for the whole store.  I have no say at all with the beer stock boys or the wine department unless I am helping them with stocking. 

Obviously I've learned a great deal in my time at the store about beer and wine and liquor.  Beer and liquor is simple, and because of our extensive selection of craft beer I've developed a taste for it and an interest in it and recently started homebrewing.  Wine is more complicated in my opinion.  I have learned the basics but I still consistently have to call who I call the wine guys even for simple questions.  I feel unconfident when talking about wine as opposed to how I feel talking about beer or liquor with customers.

Then my boss asked me last week, if I would like to be made into a wine manager.  Apparently he was planning on hiring a new person from within the industry already, but he told me that if I am willing to commit to stay there for some time, then I would receive better pay and benefits, full time hours all year long, and that he will teach me everything he knows about wine.  This is extensive.  It is flattering.  It also means I would be stuck there for a number of years, but also that I would have the potential to move up and on in the business eventually.  It means I'd be working one on one all the time with my sometimes irritating boss and the current wine manager who can be very nice but also has a huge ego.  They are both men in their upper forties to fifties.  Very conservative, business minded people.  They are also both incredibly knowledgeable about wine.  I don't know where they learned it or how, but I've always been intrigued.  My dilemma is with the time commitment, as well as the seriousness of what he's telling me.  Is he actually going to have time to teach me all these things, or am I going to be fed to the wolves by customers who need good wine recommendations?  It's a chance to get away from the cash register and to make more money, to be stable.  Probably it would have terrible hours (mostly nights) and I don't know how much money he's talking about.  Either way, it would help me pay for my apartment that I'm planning on getting with a friend soon.

All of these things are plaguing me, and I need to ask him these questions before I make a decision.  He gave me a week to think about it.  I know that he thinks I can handle it all, and that in and of itself is very flattering.  At the same time, I already feel stuck where I am, and I don't want to end up in a position where I'm more stuck but unhappy doing what I'm doing because I'm awful at it, or just wishing that I had actually done something with my degree.  It means that my bosses will watch me grow up even more, and watch me succeed or fail.  I don't want to fail.  I am interested in wine, but I don't have the confidence with it.  Essentially what I'm doing is sales, something I never thought I would do.  I really wish someone would tell me what to do, but I have nothing.  I have a week, and then the offer is gone.  I'd like to think that I have so many more options available to me to choose from, but I really don't.  I have nothing ahead of me but the liquor store, as depressing as that sounds.  And isn't it better to be making more money doing that than to be bored as hell as a cashier?  It's like...I'm here anyway...why not make the most of it?  When I look at it that way, it's hard to say no.  There are other things to consider though.  I feel like he's giving me an offer that he knows I can't refuse.  It would be fucking stupid to refuse it.  But what if what if.  What if it doesn't work out?  I can't go back to being a cashier?  Then what?  What if it turns out he doesn't have the time to teach me everything he knows.  What if I feel like moving away in a year or two years?  Two years from now, who will be working at the store, who will I be, where will everyone else be?  Too many questions without answers.  I'm tired and all of this still hasn't led me to an answer.  Happy almost 25, Aubrey.  Good night.

FAT v. skinny, skinny v. FAT

For whatever damn reason, my facebook page is blowing up with people posting pictures of girls of various sizes trying to defend what is the "perfect" sized woman. Let me start out by clarifying that I am pretty sure I qualify as a skinny girl. I'm 5'5", 115 lbs. Not model skinny, but skinny. Below average weight for my height but not even close to the unhealthy range. I've been about the same size since about sophomore year of high school. I've always been a skinny girl - I inherited it from my father who is 6'2" and skinny as a rail. Thanks genetics. I much appreciate not having to worry about my weight.

This has not, however, stopped people from giving me shit about my weight for pretty much my entire life...starting at about middle school age I'd say. I think it's a common problem for girls of any size. Everyone has an opinion (my facebook page proves this) about what ideal body weight is and what is and isn't a healthy weight. The comments about my weight range from "You're anorexic/bulimic and starve yourself," to "I'm so jealous and wish I could eat whatever I wanted and not gain weight," to "you're gonna blow up like a balloon one day when your metabolism slows down and then you're gonna gain a whole bunch of weight." Yup, thanks for the vote of confidence. Anyway, the point here isn't my weight, or it being ideal, it's simply that there is a range of body types, therefore there is a range of healthy weight. Weight is related to height as well as many other factors.

I am incredibly sick of girls thinking that they need to maintain a certain body type in order to impress guys. Guys are not all cut from the same mold. If you read crappy women's magazines like Cosmo they are, but the real world is a bit different. Being a small chested women, I have grown to appreciate this, and realize that there are many many guys out there who have no problem with and actually prefer smaller breasts. There are just as many who like the opposite. Some guys prefer a smaller build woman and some prefer one with more "curves" as the Politically Correct universe would have me say. And who the hell cares? I prefer a certain type of look on a guy as well. I know there are girls who like different than me - I question my two best friends all the time as I just can't understand the men they are attracted to. People are going to be attracted to different people for different reasons - shockingly even ones that aren't related to looks at all sometimes. It doesn't matter. What does matter is how healthy a person is. If they are healthy and happy even if they are bigger, that's fine. If they are thin and happy, fine. Why must we always criticize another person just because they are different from us? Bigger girls hate "those skinny bitches" and thinner girls hate "those fat bitches." Then we females wonder why men treat us like bitches. I'm sick of this big competition women have over which is better. If "big is beautiful" then skinny is beautiful too. Why can't it just be that "women are beautiful" (minus a few uggos of course...had to have my little lol in a serious post).

Anyway - I don't care what the hell size you are if you're a nice, intelligent person who can carry on a decent conversation. You could be the most attractive guy in the world and then open your mouth and a river of bullshit starts flowing and you suddenly become less than interesting. What good is a pretty face and body with no mind to back it up? Sex I suppose, but even that can get dull with a dull personality. I'm over this topic - was never really that into it to begin with. I get irritated with all of the judgment and bullshit that goes along with weight. Be healthy and be the best you you can be. If someone doesn't like your appearance right from the get go, it's just a waste of your time. Find someone who appreciates it. They exist.

Officially way too late for me to be awake - because I'm old, I guess. I still am, only because I have nowhere to be until 4 pm tomorrow. I need a new job, and not because I hate my job. I don't at all. I like it more than some other things in my life, such as my overcritical and perpetually stuck up family that has major problems dealing with emotion.
I adore the people I work with for the most part - they are fantastic people that I don't mind seeing daily. I'm just bored with the job. I've come to the point where I can't do much more than what I'm doing, and I'm not really interested in doing more. My knowledge of the world of wine, beer, and liquor has been sufficiently enhanced, and I do enjoy learning about it, but I don't plan on making a career out of it, as much as my boss might suggest I do. I'm really sick of the customers. I'm not sure if it's just the time of year, or if I'm extra sensitive for some reason, but they've been getting under my skin more than normal. I'm generally very good at letting idiot customers (of which there are many) not get the best of me. I shake it off and move on. That's been harder lately. I find it hard not to roll my eyes at them. I always so want to open my mouth and tell them what's what. I can't do that. It's not my job. I just want to. I'm sick of customers who assume they know more than me. You don't. You never will unless you work in this business. I'm bored.

Boredom seems to be the story of my life. I get bored of things easily. I find a beer I like - awesome. I'll drink it one or two times more maybe until I'm onto the next one. Same with wines. I do go back to ones I like eventually, I just need variety in between. I am the queen of seasonal everything. It's in season or not. I'll just find something I like for this season. I'm not one to cry over seasonal beers disappearing, nor limited releases. They always come back. If a limited release is good enough, a brewery will release it again and it will end up on shelves as a regular rotation. If not, I'll just find something else. Beer and wine are so varied which is one of the reasons I love it. I can always try something new.

I also get bored with boys (men? I don't meet many that can fall under that category), but all the same...boredom. Boys get so dull after a while. They all have their few quirks that are cute for a while. Then they do the same shit over and over and over. It's so tiresome. I have no idea if I'm any more interesting, but clearly I don't need to criticize myself on my own blog. My cursor seems to have disappeared and I am trying to figure out why my 60+ year old mother feels the need to stay up until nearly 3 am. I will outlast you mom, I promise. I'm so my parents daughter sometimes it scares me. Too much alike. I have a lot of both of them in me. It's easier to compare myself to my dad as he is definitely the more hip one of my parents, but I inherited much of my mother as well, and I know it. I don't always like being like either one of them, as I think by nature they are very negative and cynical people. They are thinking people, and too often thinking seems to cause negativity and cynicism.

I have things to say, and I'm not sure how to say them. I don't want to say that I've stopped caring, because that isn't true. I have not stopped caring, nor do I care less. I haven't stopped trying either. So...what the fuck is wrong? I'm different - at least different than before. I'm not sure how, but I am. I haven't stopped caring at all. The things that bothered me in the past still bother me. Some things I don't think will ever fully leave me, but I guess that's what falling in love and losing it does to you.

Everything now is matter of fact. I'm more just watching how people act, without reacting or doing anything. Life is a hell of a lot easier when I just don't bother to get involved in stupid things. So...in a way I've stopped trying. Not for myself, for sure. I'm still fighting like hell to do the right things for myself. But I guess with other people - I'm just watching them now, and feeling nothing. Feeling nothing, as they break up and get back together and get married and lose jobs and start jobs. I don't have the energy anymore. I don't have the energy for people fighting and angry or upset. Even people who are elated and happy and thrilled. Nothing ever changes, and I continually watch people live up to the worst versions of themselves. Maybe it just becomes too painful to watch after a while so I'm numbing myself to it. I don't know. At the same time, I feel happy right now, at this moment in time, with my life. What makes me unhappy is the knowledge that at some point I have to do something different, because it will not be acceptable for me to do this forever, what I'm doing now. So...I will have to put myself in more miserable situations in order to change things for myself because my current situation is no longer acceptable. And it is this that tortures me, because I feel I am running out of options, and all the while falling behind, and well...that sort of kills my good spirits.

It certainly doesn't help anything that the state of America and its government is pretty fucking awful. This is the worst I've ever seen it in my lifetime. It's just arguing and name calling and finger pointing from one side to the other, and from the people actually in power, lies on top of lies on top of lies. We have lies from the people in office and lies from the people trying to run for office. We have a nation of people who are no longer at all united. We have people who don't even remember what it is to help out their fellow man once in a while. These people are so ANGRY. I just don't get it. Being angry is accomplishing nothing, but being complacent isn't either. I think that nobody knows what the fuck to do. At this point, listening to half of the country we all may as well throw up our hands and grab our guns and pray for our lives because, well, fuck the government, right?

I understand everyone, and I understand that people are frustrated and people don't know what to do. I understand that no one has money anymore and yet they are always asking for a little more and raising the taxes a little higher, and you know what? No, it's not fair. There really isn't a whole lot of "fair" involved. The problem is that no one has a good fucking solution. No one can figure out a way to give everyone an equal and fair opportunity. It's impossible to have a social program that some people will not figure out a way to exploit. We have tried the "solution" of tax breaks for the rich and hoping it trickles down the the rest of the population - can we please just all accept that this doesn't work? I feel as though the problem right now is that there is no one person who can feasibly fix the economy and the state of our nation, so all of this debate and BS over presidential candidates and who can do what is all nonsense. I'm so fucking sick of hearing about it that I want to go live on a mountain somewhere far away from anything political and go crazy like Tom Hanks did in Castaway and start talking to a flipping volleyball. That would be vastly preferable to listening to all of these rich assholes talk about Michele Bachmann vs Ron Paul vs Obama vs whoever goddamn else. Like fuck, I just want to enjoy my life.

Unfortunately I guess, life is complicated. It really shouldn't be all that complicated - either you live or you die, but we are supposedly so much more advanced than animals so we have to complicate it. I'm tired of it all. This is a terrible entry. Oh well.

I really should be getting to bed, but I haven't written anything in so long and I was feeling it. I have settled into a rather grownup routine when it comes to going to work in the mornings, and while it doesn't suck nearly as much as having to be at school everyday, it's still pretty terrible because while I can completely see how routine makes everything easier, it is SO DAMN BORING. Oh well.

I really thought I'd be in a different place at this time in my life, but it seems that that is not in my cards. I'm bad at predicting my own future, and it's probably a good thing that it never seems to work out my way, because if I look back at times where I wish I could have chosen a different path I can see how much worse things would have been right now. They are not terrible. I cannot complain. I guess I just get bored easily. Like my father says though, really nothing about life matters except water, food, and shelter. Without those things you would die. Other than that, and all of the other petty things we humans worry about, there is nothing really important. Yes, we assign importance to things - it'd get very old very fast without social interaction, or fun, or work. And work has to be done in order to have food and shelter. Without fun, we'd all go crazy anyway. So, since we are alive - and not sure what comes after life, we will keep on trying to do our best to fill our lives with something, that elusive anything that will give us substance and purpose, and make us more than just an animal with basic instinct.

I like to become introspective about the meaning of life at 12:3o am when I should be in bed because I have work tomorrow - to serve all the alcoholics their booze so they can forget about life for a while. I always have this sneaking feeling that we all try too hard sometimes to make life meaningful when really in the end it won't matter at all. Then again, for the time we are here, it does matter, to us, and those around us, and so we keep on going despite the facts of our existence. I suppose we wouldn't exist if we didn't matter, so we may as well try. I'm speaking in circles now that are beginning to make less and less sense. Books and bed call me.

Dispatch show

So, went to see Dispatch in Boston on Saturday. I struggled hard to think of a concert that it compared to, but I couldn't. Hands down, best show I've ever seen. Jess and I had pretty good seats for it on the floor that weren't too far from the stage, and although it was a hassle for her to get the day off to go it was far far worth it. These guys rock the house like no one else I've ever seen. Crazy. They played like a three hour set. I looked it up and they actually played 24 songs including the encore. The only song they didn't play was Out Loud, so I was really happy overall, and they ended with Elias which I think is a fabulous song to end with. I thought TD Garden was going to collapse. I can't describe the good feelings that were circulating around that place. Everyone was into it. Everyone was having a good time. We took the T back to where we parked and everyone stormed the trains but it was cool because we were all fans. Then on the way back a bunch of kids started singing on the T. I had such a good time I completely forgot to get my schedule from work and had to text my coworkers to make sure I had the day off today. I just wasn't caring about work. If I could have gone back to go to the Sunday show I surely would have. It's going to be really hard for future shows to compare to this one...and next time they come around, I'll surely be going. This show is going to stay with me a long time. Anyway, just thought I would update with the latest thing I'm excited about. Time to take a shower, out with some of my coworkers later for drinks.

The "Rapture"

There's nothing specific to write about at the moment. Life is changing at a rapid rate for me even though outwardly it probably looks exactly the same. I have started volunteer training to be a sexual assault crisis counselor/advocate. It is once a week. It's helping me immensely. I like the format, I like the people, and I am learning things that are extremely relevant to my future career path should I choose to continue on to grad school with counseling. The actual volunteering may not be as involved as the training. It has the potential to go either way. I hope that it works out for the best. For now, at least, I think it was a good decision. It's the first good decision I've made in a long time concerning my future.

It's nice to feel like I'm making progress even if it's going very slowly and taking a long time. I'll get somewhere eventually. I really don't have a choice. I'm always slower to get things like this done than other people because I am not as quick as other people to jump into things in which I will be miserable. I have to take my time and find something that suits me and my needs and in which I feel comfortable. I feel like I'm wasting time otherwise. At least life isn't boring at the moment. In fact it's rather action packed. I should learn never to complain about a boring spell in my life because as my life tends to go, it will do a complete 180 and suddenly everything will be chaos again.

Some crazy religious fanatic predicted the end of the world for this past Saturday. The Rapture, he called it, when all non believers would descend to hell and all the believers would be taken in by God and live in eternal happiness or some such nonsense. Mostly this was all just amusing to me. Lots of people used it as an excuse to drink and throw parties. I know the majority didn't take it seriously of course but there are always whackjobs out there who will believe any crackpot theory someone comes up with because he suddenly "decoded" the bible and came up with a bunch of numbers and a formula to make it sound like he actually knew what he was talking about. I have a feeling that if God were going to end the world, He wouldn't let anyone know about it. We'd all be taken by surprise, and then, we'd all be dead. And who knows what would happen after that.

I'm clearly not a religious person. I wouldn't call myself an atheist but I tend to ignore most of it and not care very much. Some religions and religious ideas are interesting, but I certainly won't blindly follow a faith. Some people need that faith. I was raised without any religion, therefore I don't need it. It's completely unimportant to me and my life. I enjoy living life on my own terms, doing things as I wish to, and following my own moral code that has nothing to do with a book written a long long time in the past. I feel completely content knowing that I never have to feel guilty for the things I do and the choices I make. People are by nature imperfect, so you just have to do your best in today's world to be the best person you can be. Basically, I am untroubled by God, religion, religious rules, etc. My family is Catholic, so at times I do attend church for a wedding or funeral. There are definitely nice aspects of church and faith and good things that they do, but at the same time I know I'll never find a need to attend church on a regular basis. Anyway, this is also completely irrelevant to the point of religious fanaticism which I was trying to make. Pretty much all the fanatics do is provide entertainment for the non fanatics, so I suppose in a way they're still doing something good for society.

Another Quote

Another quote I pulled from a fashion blog I read religiously but never comment on because the comments entertain me fully. projectrungay.blogspot.com

""As we found out later, Joe doesn't really do insincere politeness. He's genuine, and when he says "Let's have lunch or drinks," he really means it. Believe us, in the 5 years of publishing this blog, we can't tell you how many people who never have any intention of doing so, say "Let's have drinks" to us."

Oh, I believe you all right. I literally did not know the meaning of the word "flaky" until I had met an American person for the first time.

But how could I have known that "We should hang out" really just means "goodbye", with zero intention of ever actually hanging out?""

I felt this was worthy of a comment as I think this is a flaw of the majority of Americans. I don't understand why Americans assume no one ever wants to spend time with them, and if someone says they want to, more likely than not, you never will. I think it's a combination of things. It's a "coolness" thing. An "I'm so busy I have no time for anyone thing, therefore I must be cool," combined with a poor confidence factor of "If I actually talk to this person they are going to think I am creepy and stalking them". The obvious answer to this dilemma for most Americans is to friend the person on facebook so they can stalk the shit out of them at their leisure without consequence. I guess I never realized it was a cultural thing until I read this comment though. To me, as an American, it's almost proper etiquette. I can remember times being distinctly weirded out if someone contacted me after meeting at a party only one time to hang out. It seems to be some sort of unwritten rule that you have to see someone a certain number of times before it becomes ok to spend time with them outside of that setting in a friendship type manner. Dating is excluded from these rules. I think it's because forced awkwardness is another unwritten rule of dating, and meeting someone only once and seeing them again almost guarantees awkwardness. I would like to point out that I am sure there are people to whom these rules don't matter and who march to their own drum, but I agree with the commenter that it is a distinctly normative thing to assume in our culture that even if you say that you want to "hang out sometime" you really don't mean it in most cases, and the other person is supposed to accept that without question and without getting offended. People are fucking weird. All of us.

Social culture is so strange when you break it down. I guess it becomes more obvious how ridiculous something like this is when it is mentioned to you by someone from the outside looking in.

Someone's Comment

"Man, mid twenties is a hard time. I feel like there's this societal pressure to have all our shit together, and that people who even vaguely do pretend that everything is super awesome and they're super together - and you know what I've discovered, whenever I've gotten close to anyone? No one has their shit together. Everyone has some aspect of their life, usually several, where stuff isn't together. And that's OK. That's being human. There's a lot on our plate in the modern world (really, any world - how nice is it to not worry about Tetanus and Cholera, amirite?) No one is all the way together. Let's celebrate the good we have. Sometimes our houses are messy. Sometimes we don't know what we're doing with ourselves. And I should stop drunk LJing. But so be it. Life is OK. What you're doing OK. "

A comment on a post from TQC, aka The Question Club, my absolute favorite community to stalk on Livejournal, and also the reason that I never delete my Livejournal account. Thank you. I needed this comment. Too fucking true. Anyone who wants to refute this point and try to prove their perfection...go ahead. All that means is that the next day your cat will die, your car will break down, you'll get laid off, and then to top it all off a bird will take a shit that happens to land on your head. Sorry people, that's just the way the world works. Appearances are just appearances. The people who are truly happy in their lives are the ones who are able to roll with whatever happens and laugh through the rain.

Planned Parenthood

The issue of Planned Parenthood has been brought to Congress, and while I usually avoid talking about politics, as a woman, it's an issue that just can't be ignored. It's also an issue I feel very strongly about. The issue here is to cut government funding for Planned Parenthood in order to lower our deficit.

One word can sum up how I feel about this. Ridiculous. Oh, also ludicrous. Completely backward, irresponsible, and quite honestly a little disgusting. It is pretty easy to see the arguments, and the people behind them. For whatever reason, Planned Parenthood seems to be in popular media associated almost exclusively with abortions. People who don't know any better and are anti-abortion think this is entirely beneficial. Except...the money that the government gives to Planned Parenthood does NOT cover abortions and never has. The government does not fund abortions in any way. If I want to kill my fetus, I'm paying for it myself, out of pocket. Planned Parenthood does, however, perform abortions if a woman chooses to have one, so it's pretty obvious that this "brilliant" plan to reduce our deficit is a masked attempt of conservatives to push along their anti abortion agenda. They don't want to back an organization that provides abortions to girls whether or not the majority of the services offered and utilized by women there are extremely beneficial to women and women's health. PP offers routine gynecological care as well as free screenings for all STI's and cervical cancer. They also offer many different types of contraception, pregnancy planning, etc etc etc. PP is great because it is easy, and it is anonymous. Their primary mission is to keep women healthy and educated. There are statistics that prove that they have succeeded. I have always felt at ease knowing that no matter what happens, I can rely on Planned Parenthood to be there in case I need it. I, in fact, did utilize their services at one point. I wanted to go on birth control. Not living at home at the time and not wanting to wait for an appointment with my regular ob-gyn, I used PP. It was easy, it was quick, and it was anonymous. For girls who can't afford a regular OB, Planned Parenthood is there. It makes me very angry to see this country even considering a piece of legislation so backward. It seems as if they would rather our country regress. America needs to stop being so afraid of change and move forward. We should be a nation of progress. It frustrates me that we are seeing things like this happen in today's day and age when women in the past stood up and said, hey, boys. We matter. We count. Our health counts. Our happiness counts. We can take care of ourselves. We want to take care of ourselves. And we're going to do that if you like it or not. Women have proved themselves, for years. We have proved ourselves to be intelligent and competent. Women successfully raise children while holding full time jobs. These things happen every day. In spite of all of this progress, we are still faced with politicians who can't come up with a better plan to reduce their deficit than denying millions of women preventative medical care.

My answer is, to the men: You are not women, and you will never understand what it is to be faced with even the prospect of carrying a child, and the life changing consequences that can have. You don't know what it feels like to worry constantly that you may get pregnant and not be able to support a baby, and that the guy might disappear as soon as your baby is born, and you might be left alone. You will never understand what it is to make these choices because you will never have to. Please, listen to the women who have fought hard to have things like Planned Parenthood available to them. Cutting funding will only increase the number of children born into unfortunate circumstances because of lack of access to proper contraception. More women will die, and we will spend more treating diseases and cancers in their later stages rather than preventing them or treating them early on. Planned Parenthood may provide a service that goes against your morals, but that is not the service you are cutting. Give us women a chance, please.
To the women (who are for this legislation): You insult us, and you drive us further backward in time. Do not deny the millions of women that have benefited from PP's services in favor of your own selfish beliefs.

I have a very hard time understanding women who speak in favor of things like this. It makes me think that they have never had anything denied them in their life and have always been able to afford quality care. You have to learn how to step out of your own shoes into another person's. You have to learn how to be critical of your own upbringing, and see where your beliefs truly come from. Educate yourself, learn, and read, and exercise compassion even when it is difficult. You never know where a person is coming from.

Downfall

Well, it's been a pretty boring two days but Sunday into Monday usually is. Last night I watched a German film called Downfall which is an account of Hitler's last 12 days in his bunker in Berlin. I forgot I had rented it, but I suppose it was mostly because it had so many good reviews. As far as movies go, it was very very well done. I am not too familiar with all the details of Hitler's time in power, but I spent a good amount of time today doing basic research about the main characters and events in the movie. The movie followed what I read very accurately. Some of the events are downright disturbing, but I suppose you can't expect much else from a movie about a psychopathic dictator. The most disturbing event is when Magda Goebbels systematically murders her six children. I had difficulty watching it. It wasn't gory, and it wasn't violent, but it disturbed me so much that I had trouble sleeping afterward. I've seen movies where children are violently shot and killed, but for some reason the calm and matter of fact way in which Magda went about it was especially bothersome to me. It's a scene that isn't going to leave my head anytime soon.

Rants, Raves, Thoughts

I've neglected blogging. I'd love to say I've been busy...partially true. I am busy about half the time, and the other half I either read or watch Netflix, which is a new and horrible addiction of mine. In general, in spite of all the ridiculous snow we've gotten, I feel pretty decent. Usually this time of year isn't great for me mentally. It does get tiring, but as my father says, we just have to embrace the weather, which means putting on your boots and hats and coats and scarves and buying snowshoes if necessary. I'm sure people back in the 1800's never bitched about this shit the way people do now. We are all spoiled little brats. I have never heard such bitching and complaining in my whole life as I have this winter. The joys of working customer service include listening to people bitch on all levels of everything.
Ex: "I just can't STAND all this snow, I'm moving to Florida! This is just ridiculous I just can't believe it bleh bleh blah blah moan moan cleaning snow sucks blah blah moan."

"No one can drive in the snow! I am the best driver ever in seen in snow and everyone else sucks, they're terrible, took me TWO HOURS to get to work blah blah moan moan."

That's enough examples. Thinking about these people makes me want to throw things. The biggest problem for me is that many of these snow bitchy people are people that I know and usually love. There are, of course, the people who love snow, and then do what I'm doing, which is to complain about the people who hate it, but it seems that these people are few and far between. I just get tired of listening to it after awhile. No one is original, but everyone thinks that they are. The morning after a huge snowstorm, when every status on Facebook is about snow or snow removal, and how bad your morning commute was, it's a little sad. I do not need a motherfucking picture of your snow covered car. MY CAR LOOKS EXACTLY THE SAME. I do not need a picture of yours. I can simply look out my window. Holy shit, a snow covered car! Imagine! Good thing I saw yours on the internet first so I could compare.

People in general make me angry lately. I guess I'm frustrated myself, but I feel as though I walk around in a world completely blinded to all truth. A woman was in the store the other day talking about how much school the kids have missed because of the snow. She was angry because "I already booked my vacation and now with all the snow, it's going to be that last week of school - well that's just too bad for the school, my kids are just not going to go. And can you imagine, the school is saying that kids will only be excused that week with a doctor's note! Well I never! No one could predict 80 inches of snow, and I already booked my vacation!"
I wanted to slap this woman so hard. Really? You already booked your vacation and your poor children might have to miss out because of some snow? How horrible that they might have to stay in school for an extra week! Fuck you, you entitled cunt. People are constantly blaming the schools for not properly educating children. This is a way for shitty parents to shift blame onto an institution for not raising their kids properly. The problem is with students who are ill-prepared and entitled and every time they fuck up get excused because Mommy and Daddy call the school and complain and threaten a lawsuit. How dare the school try to discipline your fragile little lamb of a child who can do no wrong. I certainly do not mean to say that there are no bad teachers and never a reason to complain about a school, or that the school always handles these issues properly. I'm simply pointing out that a lot of parents these days seem to think their kids are special little snowflakes who must be protected from everything, and this is why these kids grow up and become incompetent assholes who frequent my line in the package store to complain about everything.

This entry has turned into a rant. Since I'm ranting, I'll bring up another topic which caught my attention the other day - namely, some guy I read about on yahoo who is touting the idea that kids don't necessarily need to go to college because it is too expensive and a waste of time.
http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/james-altucher%27s-8-alternatives-to-college-535903.html?tickers=COCO,APOL,ESI,DV,EDMC,STRA,^DJI

I think I found this interesting because I completely understand where this man is coming from and I think he has good intentions. It worries me though, that people will start to think this is legitimate. He obviously hasn't exactly thought his ideas through fully, since if you watch the video he basically says that he is not saying that no one should ever go to college but that for some kids it might be a good idea to wait and explore other options, and that not going to college doesn't necessarily mean you will end up flipping burgers the rest of your life. On this point, I agree. I do not agree, however, that we should start encouraging kids to not go to college. I struggled with and still struggle with some of the same questions he brought up - namely, how much you actually learn in college. As someone who attended a four year public university in a humanities major (which we all know we can't do much with in the field upon graduation with no advanced degree), I have an answer. That answer is that students learn a great deal in college. Unfortunately, most of that learning does not come in the form of test scores or essay grades. I was technically, in terms of grades, a poor student. I rarely studied. The problem is that the type of learning I'm talking about can't be measured or categorized. It comes in many different forms. Grades are so often not an accurate depiction of intelligence. I guess in tests where they test students to see what they have learned academically in college, they don't do much better four years later than they did entering as a freshman. I can completely see that. It makes perfect sense. Most classes I took I retained very little actual solid information. If it's information that you are not going to continue to use and is simply memorized in order to use it on a test, it won't be retained in the long run. The best way to retain important information is to use it in the real world, which the world of academia is severely lacking. After all of this and knowing that I wasn't such a huge fan of college, it seems odd that I would still advocate for it, but I do simply because there truly aren't any alternatives that are better. The pros outweigh the cons in this case for me. For most people who are not incredibly ambitious and need a little direction, college provides that. It also provides a bridge from high school to the real professional world.

I would say to anyone that has the resources and ambition to pull off any one of Altucher's alternatives to college to go for it. How I wish I had the funds to take time off and travel the world. Doesn't everyone? Unfortunately that is not a reality for most students. In fact, it is going to be easier for most students to travel while they are in college than not. It is probably easier to concentrate on creating great art while actually in school than just on your own. There are numerous opportunities available to college students that aren't available anywhere else. I wish that I took advantage of them now. Truthfully, I have some regrets about that time of my life. I feel a little bit as if I wasted it. On the other hand, I still feel I learned a lot, both in the classroom and out of it, and in so many different ways. I definitely think that college isn't for everyone. I agree that it is overpriced. I avoided being in a huge debt by attending a public in state university, so tuition was a lot lower. I certainly think that people should be asking these questions and trying to come up with solutions to them. I think that being able to cut tuition costs as well as add some sort of practical element to four year university study would be greatly beneficial to future students. I don't have any solutions for it, of course, but that's why I'm writing a blog about it and not an article. Problems like these are too complex to just start naming off rash solutions like don't send your kids to college at all. Too often we forget how statistics are generated. They don't take into account things that may be so important, so it's important to look at every statistic published with a critical eye. So often it's said that the most important skill people learn in college is critical thinking, and I completely agree.

Tis a New Year

Well, it's a New Year...rang in the New Year right this year. Tons of fun with my best friends. I couldn't ask for more. I hope this year will be a bit of a turning point for me. As of yet, though, I am making very little progress on the job front, which is totally my fault this time. I'm just not trying very hard. It's hard to care when everything else is going well, and I am having all kinds of fun. The thought of searching for a job, writing tons of bullshit about why I am so awesome, then sitting through a painfully awkward interview while some person who has no idea who I really am judges the shit out of me doesn't sound very appealing right now. I'll have to go through with it eventually...I have to do something. I have no choice. At the moment though, I am avoiding my responsibilities like the plague. All of this is completely ignoring the fact that it's difficult to even get to the painfully awkward interview stage, and at this point I am also feeling a little defeated when it comes to that.

Anyway, enough negativity. My positive energy has finally been coming through lately. My confidence has returned, I feel happy and hopeful. I hope this doesn't go away. I feel much more like myself again. I'm enjoying it. Since the past few months haven't been the easiest, this is a welcome change. I need to buy some new boots. I bought a guitar. I was hoping it would come today, but if not today, tomorrow. It's a cheap one, but I've always wanted to learn to play, and if it turns out I don't have enough patience for it, my mother told me she would help me out a bit with guitar lessons. I figure it can't be as hard as playing the violin, so it shouldn't be too bad if I can just for once commit enough time to it. Off I go I think - I'm hungry and I need a shower.

Snow Day

Well, I have a snow day today, and I am not even in school anymore. Sometimes I forget how good the management is at my work until they call me at 6:30 am from home on the day of a bad storm to tell me not to come in because I live in East Jesus Nowhere. Yes, Winter has arrived, and it is dumping copious amounts of snow on everything. I guess this is classified as a blizzard because of the 50 mph winds. That, I think, is the worst part. In inches I think we have about 9 or 10 so far and it's still snowing here in CT, but of course the wind is the worst thing and is making it drift and be much higher in places. It's also brutally cold. Sometimes when it snows it's just a little below freezing, but no, it's bitter cold right now.

Apparently the weather man said that this could be classified as the worst storm since 1993 when we had another blizzard that dumped about three feet of snow on the ground. I remember that storm. We have pictures of it in a very old photo album somewhere in my house. I'm not particularly bothered by the storm as I don't have to go anywhere, and since I generally enjoy snow, this is ok with me. I would prefer it without the crazy wind, but you can't have everything. I would like to go sledding, but I have no idea where we would even have a sled anymore. Maybe out in the shed, buried. It's probably broken. I'll have to go buy a cheap k-mart sled (those are the best kind anyway) when this storm stops. This is only the beginning of Winter. I'm sure there will be more storms. I think I'll probably sit around in my pajamas underneath my CT sheep wool blanket which is the warmest blanket ever, and watch movies on Netflix. My sister got me a six month Netflix subscription for Christmas which comes with one movie rental a day and unlimited downloads. It was a pretty sweet gift, especially since I am currently snowed in.

Christmas wasn't so bad, although I could have done without some of the relatives on Christmas Day. Weird as it is to say, I rather like having a small Christmas in my sister's condo with just my Dad, Mom, and sister. My mother gave me an absolutely beautiful new wool coat, which I love, and I got a 1 tb external hard drive, which was what I asked for. I think Christmas last year was a little more fun, as my sister was incredibly sick and there was more confusion this year, but it certainly wasn't bad. I got a nice bonus from work and money from my dad, all of which is going to pay my student loan bills - boring, but I am rather poor.

I read an article on Yahoo news about reasons to quit your job, and one reason not to quit your job is if you are happy with everything but the pay. This is true to a point. I am mostly happy with most things except for the pay at my job, but at the same time my job is entirely irrelevant to anything I might want to be doing in the future, so it feels more like a waste of time than anything. At the same time, I know I get paid well for what I do, it's just not enough to make a living off of, or live on my own. Therefore, I think money is a very valid reason to be looking for another job. In any case, I think I'm going to go watch some movies and for once stop worrying about jobs and money. I'm going to enjoy my day off.

The Internet

Well, I'm feeling a need to write. Even if I can't say exactly what's on my mind here right now (Big Secrets). I can still write anyway. Life hasn't really begun to look up and people haven't become any less idiotic in the last several days. In fact, it's gotten worse. Who knows what makes people behave in the way they do sometimes. I studied Psychology in the hopes it would help me to figure it out, but I'm no closer now than I was five years ago. Sure, some things are easy to pinpoint and figure out, but others, it's like trying to grab and hold onto a fistful of water. Also, no matter what, someone is always going to assign behavior an idiotic reason when that has nothing whatsoever to do with the current behavior - i.e. this person has a narcissistic personality disorder, or it's because Daddy didn't love him, etc. etc. I see this countless times and ways all over the internet every day. Even the comments made about television shows and their characters. Some of the observations people make are so ludicrous and inaccurate. "*REVELATION* I can't believe that character acted that way, he/she must have borderline personality disorder!!!!11!! *REVELATION*

People really need to learn to shut the fuck up when they don't know what they're talking about. You can't just assign personality disorders off at random for personality flaws. Sure, it's easy to do. In fact, if I looked at every single person I've ever met on a level that's a little deeper than very casual acquaintance, I could diagnose each and every one of them with a personality disorder. It's extremely easy to misdiagnose personality disorders, but really it's something that shouldn't be thrown around so easily. Placing the label of personality disorder upon a person can have damning effects, mostly because they seem to be the least curable of all mental ailments - you try curing a sociopath. I was thinking of this only because I recently finished the Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson (some of the best books I've read in a long time) and Lisbeth, the main character, has been misdiagnosed by misguided therapists her whole life. The effects of it, of course, are innumerable. It is very hard to change someone's mind once they've decided you are crazy.

Speaking of the internet, another thing that people do when commenting or analyzing a show, for example, is cry racism. "That family is so WHITE, of course they act like that" or "All of the black people on this show are the same, the writers must be racist!" Holy christ, people, give it a rest. It's a television show. Its purpose is to entertain. I read all of these comments with amazement. People get so angry, over absolutely nothing, on the internet. They create arguments for themselves over problems that never existed in the first place. It is rather fascinating. The internet is a funny place. You can say anything you want, with no limits and no guidelines. There's no one to check up on you, no teacher to mark your paper up with red pen if you give misinformation. The consequence of that is a plethora of misinformation that people have accumulated that they freely spew because they know there will be no backlash. Anonymity creates an interesting populous of people who I could guarantee would never be quite so opinionated were you to have a conversation with them in real life. I love the internet but hate it at the same time.

I suppose I should wrap this up now. I wasn't sure what this post was going to be about when I started writing but I am glad to see that it ended up with a definitive point. I never know where I'm beginning in writing but I seem to always end up somewhere in the end.

Happy Holidays?

So it's almost the holidays - Thanksgiving on Thursday and then of course Christmas next month. The package store is beginning to own my soul. It pretty much does that all season long. I am not excited at all for the holidays. The older I get, the less fun they seem to be, along with everything else. I'm a little depressed. Somehow, and I don't know if it's just because I am feeling a little down, it seems that everyone around me is having a hard time of it too. I don't know if it's the lack of sunshine or cold, or what, but everything seems to be harder lately.

Earlier on in life, I always had a set plan I was on, I guess, and I never really thought about it much. I always just figured that I would figure out what came next when the time came. It's here now, and I don't know what I'm doing. I just happened to finish college when there are no jobs. Apparently I'm not alone in not being able to find one. I feel that I probably would be able to find one if I cared a little more about what I was going to be doing. I care, but I don't at the same time, and it's a dangerous place to be. Many things in my life haven't worked out as planned, for sure, and I never expected anything to be easy, but that won't stop me from wishing it was. I'm lazy as hell. No one is forcing me to do anything. I am applying for jobs because I can't particularly think of anything better to do. I have to do something. I can't keep exploiting my parents forever. I have a feeling if I were forced to do something, I would do it. It would help to have someone who would tell me I was being a weak idiot. No one will. Everyone is all, "Oh, it's not really your fault, the economy sucks, blah blah, it's fine, you'll find something eventually." My favorite is "Why don't you just go back to school then, if you can't find a job." Yeah, a solid plan, except that I am ALREADY in debt and can barely afford to pay those loans, much less attempting to get into a grad school with less than stellar grades, and taking out even MORE loans, so that when I graduate with a Masters or something I can be in even more debt that I am in now, and most likely still jobless. Basically, I would be me, now, with an advanced degree, and lots of debt. It's like a fucking merry-go-round and it's so fucking annoying.

Speaking of annoying - people in general. It might be me, but people have become even more idiotic recently. I feel rather alienated. I talk to very few people. Being the shy person that I am, it is always hard for me to open up to people, so when communication halts between me and another person it's incredibly hard for me to begin communication again. I know that is a poor excuse, but I have always been shy. It's like an ingrained part of me that will never go away. In spite of being shy, I am incredibly social and love to talk. I know, I make no sense, but I am who I am. Therefore, having no one talking to me is making me depressed which in turn makes me even less likely to go out and seek social interaction. Another fucking merry-go-round. I suppose I am just stuck in a rut, and I spend a lot of time thinking about how to go about getting out of it. I like to come up with elaborately detailed plans in my head which I will never follow through on. Most of them require lots more money and a lot more ambition than I seem to have in real life. Reality is almost always more dreary than what I can come up with in my own head, but I suppose that would be the case with most people.

Long and short of this entry is I'm very lonely. I feel sad a lot of the time, defeated, with zero energy. I know it's not helping, but I can't seem to shake it this time. My dog makes me smile more than anything in the world. I love her to death. She is better than any person. She is always there, cuddly and sweet and crazy, and completely huggable. She is a beacon of bright light in my otherwise dreary existence. I do not care how cliche that sentence was, it is entirely the truth. Our lives are plagued by cliches. I of course am still ever hopeful as always that things will turn around. As always, I must remind myself that there are people and things in the world much worse than my life. There are a great many things about my life that I have enjoyed and still enjoy. I try my hardest to focus on the good instead of the bad, to keep a positive attitude even though I know I default to a negative one. Here's to hoping for some Christmas magic to rejuvenate me. There's definitely something wrong when my favorite holiday fails to excite me at all. We shall see.

Ellipses...

I'm bored. I'm bored I'm bored I'm bored. So damn bored, it's ridiculous. I don't understand how some people can just sit around all the time and not go crazy. When I get bored, I read, and when I get tired of that, I read something else, and when I get tired of that, I drink. Healthy, eh? I don't know what is wrong with me. It's hard for me to even concentrate on a chapter in a book without becoming restless, which is not like me. In the past, when this happened to me, I'd throw myself into some situation which would invariably cause me trouble for some reason. Then when things settled back into boring, I could tell myself it was simply relaxing and blah blah, until I got bored again. I guess I need to go back to school, since finding a job has proved to be a lost cause. I've almost given up. I guess I don't care enough. I don't know. Maybe I don't.

I miss learning things. I like learning. I don't like tests and all that jargon, but I do enjoy learning. I just can't focus on one thing long enough to learn a LOT about one thing. I can't focus at all, in fact. My brain feels like it's constantly on and moving, a million times faster than I can sort anything out. I guess it's compensation for the fact that my outer life has become rather stand-still and boring. I suppose I've shut some people out, but it wasn't intentional. I just get tired sometimes, of all the idiocy, of which there is a lot. Plus, not having money makes it easier to shut myself away. I don't really want to do that. I don't need to become the insanely shy girl I was when I was younger. In some ways I'll always be that girl, but I think for the most part I've learned to deal with it.

In an effort to not make my first blog entry after a long hiatus of blog posting negative, I can talk about the one positive thing in my life right now, my rescue puppy Sydney. I absolutely adore her, and she provides every day with a fairly large dose of joy. She is smaller than I expected, but she doesn't act at all like a small dog, and she is not lacking in personality. It took her awhile to get adjusted to living here, but now she knows it is her home, and she loves it, and running in the woods, jumping on rocks, and running running running. She's lightning fast. She's happy, and she's my girl.

Something interesting please happen? I am too poor to do anything but something that will definitely cause me bodily harm. I'd like to keep my eyes and fingers.

Thinking

It's really hot out. I've been thinking about a lot of things lately. Not that that is anything new, but I notice as I get older there are things I take pleasure in that I wouldn't have as a child, and things that I took great pleasure in as a child that I care for very little now. I mean that's a pretty obvious thing to happen as you grow up I guess. My biggest thought is just that it's a little disconcerting when you think about it and realize that everything you thought you knew about yourself might be wrong. I have to remind myself that there are things about me which are constant and will never change - the things I am most happy about myself as a person in general, and will always be a part of me and who I am.

As usual I am not entirely sure where I was going with that. I guess I analyze life and the changes that happen in it more often than most people. I feel very aware of things. It's almost hyper-awareness. Then again...some things I wish I wasn't so aware of sometimes. I feel as though my place in the world is not defined. I have no place. I do, but at the same time I don't, and that is a very lonely thought. My place is always in between. It's as if I'm constantly just out of reach of something amazing. I haven't quite figured out how to reach that something amazing. I guess I'm always at an "in-between" stage. I don't know if I can't get to the other side because I'm not ready for it or if I am just afraid that it won't be better than right now. Maybe right now is the best I'll ever have, and crossing that bridge will just make me look back in anguish at what once was. The thing is, no matter what, you cannot think this way. I cannot think this way, and I know it. It makes no sense, and it's not as if I won't eventually cross the bridge. I have to. There is simply no other choice. I have to know what happens next. I would regret more not going than I would to go in the end, so I will. I need to build up more confidence in my abilities. I am capable of much more than I ever give myself credit for. For some reason a long time ago I taught myself to downplay everything. Now, right when I need to do the opposite, that is working against me. Who knows. Sometimes I just need to stop thinking so much and just do. I do that sometimes, but not with anything potentially life changing. I want to make the right decision. Maybe nothing is the right decision. I guess I'll find out at some point. Tired of typing, and it's hot.