I'm supposed to be writing. I'm always supposed to be reading or writing something. Any moment spent not doing either of things, even if they are activities designed to keep me alive such as eating or sleeping, make me feel procrastinator's guilt. It is ludicrous that I'm writing this right now, though the extremely low volume of posts lately makes me feel a different kind of guilt.
I feel like I've been spending both abnormally large and extremely small amounts of time on myself lately. I am striving for improvement based upon a self-help plan of my own design, and I can feel it working. I can feel progress in way I don't think I ever have. Usually, I can mark my progress by my constant introspective musings; I can see where I've been, write down where I'm going. But I haven't been lately. I haven't been writing about myself.
Does that have a simple explanation? Moving back to school and then school itself is time consuming. I don't have time to sit around and ponder my own existence. On the modern hierarchy of a college student's needs, food, friends, working, homework all come before long hours of self-reflection. Perhaps it's growing busy, growing more mature, growing away from the self-centered world of an adolescent?
But also I am making such active strides toward change. Shouldn't this provide more to write about than any previous times in my life? Shouldn't it be a catalyst for creativity? Am I taking out whatever part of me inspired me in the first place? Are those parts worth losing in order to be more socially acceptable? Is that what I'm doing here? Making myself into a socially acceptable human being, something I never felt I was before.
In my memoir class, we constantly talk about the guilt the writers feel in using the lives of their families and friends, sometimes leaving them ravaged like a mountain after the coal miners have passed through. But they never consider what they're doing to themselves. Isn't probing your own mind just as risky? Do I harm myself by living inside me all of the time? Can I live somewhere else? No, not happily.
What is growing up? What is maturity? Who am I?
I am always a list of hypothetical, rhetorical questions I will never answer. So I write.
Aug 30, 2012
Jul 8, 2012
Getting Over Myself
While my computer was off being fixed, I badly wanted to write. But something about the unfamiliarity of my mom's laptop's keyboard felt wrong. I just couldn't do it. It was like exposing secrets to an untrustworthy acquaintance instead of a close friend. I know this computer is impartial, all computers are. But I couldn't write anywhere else.
I tried paper. But paper felt too serious. The only time I've written on paper is in a black, silver-studded journal that I kept beside my bed to help with my insomnia. Having prohibited myself from looking at a computer screen, yet still imprisoned by the thoughts rolling in my head, I turned to the journal to empty my mind so I could sleep. But that felt wrong too. The paper felt like middle school anxieties, remote and immature. I wanted my computer.
And now I have it and now I can write. The driving force behind the desire was a fight with my father, the exact details of which don't really matter. The whole problem is that I can never fully explain my frustrations to him, or anybody else it seems. They belong solely to me and this computer screen.
I used to be okay with that, mostly. There's this whole part of me my family doesn't know, or care to know. They probably wouldn't like that part of me very much. But often, I think it's the best part, the most precious part. I'm no longer sure if I think so because it really is or because it's been only mine so long that it just hasn't had the opportunity to be colored by the opinions of others. Whenever I dare to expose a bit of me outside of what he is so familiar with, my dad reacts terribly. (I just realized this sounds very much like I'm talking about my sexuality, which I am not. That's a very telling analogy though.) Usually such discussions end with him telling me "to get over myself," which is his answer to anything that he doesn't understand.
What he doesn't understand are the things I'm most passionate about. He doesn't understand that reading isn't just a hobby, something I do when I can't sleep. He doesn't understand how a book or even a single sentence can be so beautiful you want to cry. He doesn't even really understand what I'm studying or what I want to be. He doesn't know I write anything besides term papers, and he doesn't even know what they involve. I am actually pretty curious as to what he thinks I study, and sort of sad that he would never make it through one of my school essays. He'd find it boring, extraneous, unnecessary--the ways he finds any book that isn't about golf.
Sometimes he surprises me when he delves into some sort of philosophical concept, but he regards me skeptically still when I voice my opinion. He seems sort of surprised I even have one.
I love him more than anything, and I wish so much that he knew the part of me that lives on this blog, in my bookshelf, in my mind. The one that's stored away in files on my computer. But it makes me sadder that he doesn't want to know that person. But that's not who he is.
Something in my parents' composition resists passion for anything more important than their golf games. Artistic sensibilities, strong political motivations, just passion. If I have those, I "need to get over myself."
I fear that one day I'll end up loving a man that loves the part of me that they don't know. They won't understand our relationship, they won't like him, they'll think he "needs to get over himself." But I can't spend my life with someone who doesn't understand my passions, but I don't think it'd be any easier to spend my life with some one who pushes me away from my parents.
I'm destined for conflict and this is only the beginning. But I cannot choose between my relationship with them and my relationship with myself. I don't need to get over myself because I care about this world, about art, about politics. I remain the silent and obedient girl they want me to be in their presence, but I know what I believe whole-heartedly, and I need so much some one to share it with.
It can't just be mine any longer.
I tried paper. But paper felt too serious. The only time I've written on paper is in a black, silver-studded journal that I kept beside my bed to help with my insomnia. Having prohibited myself from looking at a computer screen, yet still imprisoned by the thoughts rolling in my head, I turned to the journal to empty my mind so I could sleep. But that felt wrong too. The paper felt like middle school anxieties, remote and immature. I wanted my computer.
And now I have it and now I can write. The driving force behind the desire was a fight with my father, the exact details of which don't really matter. The whole problem is that I can never fully explain my frustrations to him, or anybody else it seems. They belong solely to me and this computer screen.
I used to be okay with that, mostly. There's this whole part of me my family doesn't know, or care to know. They probably wouldn't like that part of me very much. But often, I think it's the best part, the most precious part. I'm no longer sure if I think so because it really is or because it's been only mine so long that it just hasn't had the opportunity to be colored by the opinions of others. Whenever I dare to expose a bit of me outside of what he is so familiar with, my dad reacts terribly. (I just realized this sounds very much like I'm talking about my sexuality, which I am not. That's a very telling analogy though.) Usually such discussions end with him telling me "to get over myself," which is his answer to anything that he doesn't understand.
What he doesn't understand are the things I'm most passionate about. He doesn't understand that reading isn't just a hobby, something I do when I can't sleep. He doesn't understand how a book or even a single sentence can be so beautiful you want to cry. He doesn't even really understand what I'm studying or what I want to be. He doesn't know I write anything besides term papers, and he doesn't even know what they involve. I am actually pretty curious as to what he thinks I study, and sort of sad that he would never make it through one of my school essays. He'd find it boring, extraneous, unnecessary--the ways he finds any book that isn't about golf.
Sometimes he surprises me when he delves into some sort of philosophical concept, but he regards me skeptically still when I voice my opinion. He seems sort of surprised I even have one.
I love him more than anything, and I wish so much that he knew the part of me that lives on this blog, in my bookshelf, in my mind. The one that's stored away in files on my computer. But it makes me sadder that he doesn't want to know that person. But that's not who he is.
Something in my parents' composition resists passion for anything more important than their golf games. Artistic sensibilities, strong political motivations, just passion. If I have those, I "need to get over myself."
I fear that one day I'll end up loving a man that loves the part of me that they don't know. They won't understand our relationship, they won't like him, they'll think he "needs to get over himself." But I can't spend my life with someone who doesn't understand my passions, but I don't think it'd be any easier to spend my life with some one who pushes me away from my parents.
I'm destined for conflict and this is only the beginning. But I cannot choose between my relationship with them and my relationship with myself. I don't need to get over myself because I care about this world, about art, about politics. I remain the silent and obedient girl they want me to be in their presence, but I know what I believe whole-heartedly, and I need so much some one to share it with.
It can't just be mine any longer.
Jun 19, 2012
Home Videos
This evening, my dad yelled up the steps, "Saaamantha, I wanna show you something!" When I turned the corner, I found my toddler self filling up the big HD television screen. Since I was expecting our latest Netflix movie, Happy Feet Two, I was a little taken back by the sudden walk down memory lane.
With no explanation, Dad played the video. This particular moment has become infamous; I was about a year old, and Mom and I are engaged in our first fight. I'd been carrying around a pen, and she took it from me. I was not happy about this. Defiance etched into my tiny features (evident even through the baby fat), I went after the pen time and time again. "Peeen!" I repeated, in a mixture of baby talk and a dreaded Carolina drawl. Finally, I managed to get a hold on just the cap, leaving mom with the naked pen. I looked at the cap like the world stopped for a moment, forgetting my anger, and urged Mom to fix it. She did, and I resumed my quest.
The showdown lasted for quite some time, according to my parents. It is ever so fitting that my first argument featured a pen.
I found myself marveling over how that little creature, a vocabulary about twenty words long and about three hairs on her head, somehow grew into the me typing this right now. I don't believe in anything divine, but watching that video really made me feel like some sort of miracle.
Even though me and the toddler appear to have very little in common, you can see the grown me brewing under the surface.
The only birthday presents my one year old brain was drawn to were books. I tried opening one on my lap, but my undeveloped fine motor skills were no match for the intricate clasps. Maybe different drives propel me to eagerly open my books now, but then again, maybe not.
It was clear my Grandma Meg was my favorite person. Any time she appeared on the screen, I was right there with her. My favorite video was of my first trip to the beach. Ironically, the timestamp on the camcorder shows it occurred nineteen years ago today. Mom and Dad were unpacking the car outside of the hotel, and Grandma had already scooped me up and was halfway down the beach. Dad quickly found the camcorder, and you can hear Mom complaining about being robbed of her daughter's first encounter with the ocean.
But in the living room, Mom's real time complaints sound half-hearted. We all pause a little at seeing Grandma's alive and healthy form on the screen, clutching me and waving to the camera with the ocean roaring behind us. I don't remember her hair being that dark, but I remember that beautiful, genuine laugh. Watching her hold me, I feel the softness of her skin and the warmth of her hug. I don't know if I'm grateful for the video, or just sad.
Everything is so new and exciting to that baby. I pick up and examine with great intensity every weed in the backyard, the sand on the beach, a speck of dirt on the floor. The ocean provides endless thrills, seeing it all for the very first time. I miss the world being wondrous. I miss the pure joy of an uninhibited existence. I miss my grandma.
With no explanation, Dad played the video. This particular moment has become infamous; I was about a year old, and Mom and I are engaged in our first fight. I'd been carrying around a pen, and she took it from me. I was not happy about this. Defiance etched into my tiny features (evident even through the baby fat), I went after the pen time and time again. "Peeen!" I repeated, in a mixture of baby talk and a dreaded Carolina drawl. Finally, I managed to get a hold on just the cap, leaving mom with the naked pen. I looked at the cap like the world stopped for a moment, forgetting my anger, and urged Mom to fix it. She did, and I resumed my quest.
The showdown lasted for quite some time, according to my parents. It is ever so fitting that my first argument featured a pen.
I found myself marveling over how that little creature, a vocabulary about twenty words long and about three hairs on her head, somehow grew into the me typing this right now. I don't believe in anything divine, but watching that video really made me feel like some sort of miracle.
Even though me and the toddler appear to have very little in common, you can see the grown me brewing under the surface.
The only birthday presents my one year old brain was drawn to were books. I tried opening one on my lap, but my undeveloped fine motor skills were no match for the intricate clasps. Maybe different drives propel me to eagerly open my books now, but then again, maybe not.
It was clear my Grandma Meg was my favorite person. Any time she appeared on the screen, I was right there with her. My favorite video was of my first trip to the beach. Ironically, the timestamp on the camcorder shows it occurred nineteen years ago today. Mom and Dad were unpacking the car outside of the hotel, and Grandma had already scooped me up and was halfway down the beach. Dad quickly found the camcorder, and you can hear Mom complaining about being robbed of her daughter's first encounter with the ocean.
But in the living room, Mom's real time complaints sound half-hearted. We all pause a little at seeing Grandma's alive and healthy form on the screen, clutching me and waving to the camera with the ocean roaring behind us. I don't remember her hair being that dark, but I remember that beautiful, genuine laugh. Watching her hold me, I feel the softness of her skin and the warmth of her hug. I don't know if I'm grateful for the video, or just sad.
Everything is so new and exciting to that baby. I pick up and examine with great intensity every weed in the backyard, the sand on the beach, a speck of dirt on the floor. The ocean provides endless thrills, seeing it all for the very first time. I miss the world being wondrous. I miss the pure joy of an uninhibited existence. I miss my grandma.
May 2, 2012
Choke
(First of all, this new blogger format is weird and seems unnecessary. Why is the internet perpetually fixing things that aren't broken?)
Anyway, sometimes I feel like I overly intellectualize a lot of things, usually tv shows. But perhaps that's silly because if fiction isn't for analyzing, then what's it for?
This week's episode of Glee resounded with me, and that sentence still seems silly. But it's true.
I've always defended the seemingly insufferable character that is Rachel Berry. In fact, throughout all the crazy storylines and autotuning and whatnot, Rachel's story is the one that keeps me watching. People find her so annoying.
She is annoying. But she's annoying because she's passionate. She's ambitious and confident. These are qualities that are still frowned upon, however subtly, in women. When men work deliberately toward their dreams, they're being proactive. When Rachel does it, she's being manipulative. Her confidence is interpreted as arrogance. Of course she isn't perfect and takes it too far sometimes, but fans seem to use that as an excuse to hate her for her ambition. She knows what she wants, and it intimidates people.
One of the few things Glee's gotten right is Rachel's character development. Generally, they're terrible at developing characters. Personalities and motivations fly all over the place with no rhyme or reason. But Rachel's steadily improved throughout three seasons. She's matured and softened, but also hasn't lost sight of who she is--"a star."
I've always liked Rachel. I've always been ambitious, but sometimes I'm afraid to tell people so because I think they'll consider me delusional. But I'm not delusional. What's so delusional about aiming high and having the confidence to go after what you want?
Then on this week's episode, all of Rachel's hard work culminated one audition, and she choked.
As she cried and begged for another shot (which was amazing acting on Lea Michele's part, by the way), my heart broke for her. Because I feel like I'm on that stage, choking, right now.
Today, I officially got my first C in a class. Later in the week, my second one is inevitable. People always say Cs aren't the end of the world. I agree, they aren't the end of the world. But they're the end of a part of my world, and I'm not going to pretend that isn't a big deal and I'm not upset at it and myself. And I'm not going to pretend that these terrible grades have very real consequences for my life, academically and personally.
Rachel Berry's whole life centers around her singing. My whole life is centered around school. When it all comes crashing down, there's really nothing to do but grin and bear it. I recognize how false people's attempts at making her feel better after her choking sounded; it was one of Glee's few realistic moments. There isn't any comfort. There's nothing you can do. You want so badly to go redo those few moments that messed everything up, but you just can't.
But Rachel's fictional and fixing her problems is easy as typing a few paragraphs onto a screenplay. My life isn't as easy to figure out. What am I going to do now that I've sabotaged myself?
I impulsively signed up for creative writing, dropping a fancy education class. If I'm going to fail, I should at least write about it. I need to do something where I feel in control of my own fate and where I feel like what I'm doing matters. I need to love it. If I get a C doing something I love, then it would be worth it. C's for things I don't care about, that are just check marks on a future planning worksheet..that's not worth it.
I'm scared of going to my academic advising appointment in the fall and telling them I've failed, waiting for them to say "I should look at other options." I'm scared of facing my family members who are so sure in my genius. I'm scared of facing the teachers at home who had so much faith in me.
I'm tired of feeling isolated in my despair; it's hard to let go of much of what you've planned on your whole life, but I have to. Everybody thinks that's dramatic, but it's true. C's don't go to grad school. At least I have Rachel Berry to sing a depressing ballad over and over through my computer's speakers.
"Is it over yet? Can I open my eyes? Is this as hard as it gets? Is this what it feels like to really cry?"
Anyway, sometimes I feel like I overly intellectualize a lot of things, usually tv shows. But perhaps that's silly because if fiction isn't for analyzing, then what's it for?
This week's episode of Glee resounded with me, and that sentence still seems silly. But it's true.
I've always defended the seemingly insufferable character that is Rachel Berry. In fact, throughout all the crazy storylines and autotuning and whatnot, Rachel's story is the one that keeps me watching. People find her so annoying.
She is annoying. But she's annoying because she's passionate. She's ambitious and confident. These are qualities that are still frowned upon, however subtly, in women. When men work deliberately toward their dreams, they're being proactive. When Rachel does it, she's being manipulative. Her confidence is interpreted as arrogance. Of course she isn't perfect and takes it too far sometimes, but fans seem to use that as an excuse to hate her for her ambition. She knows what she wants, and it intimidates people.
One of the few things Glee's gotten right is Rachel's character development. Generally, they're terrible at developing characters. Personalities and motivations fly all over the place with no rhyme or reason. But Rachel's steadily improved throughout three seasons. She's matured and softened, but also hasn't lost sight of who she is--"a star."
I've always liked Rachel. I've always been ambitious, but sometimes I'm afraid to tell people so because I think they'll consider me delusional. But I'm not delusional. What's so delusional about aiming high and having the confidence to go after what you want?
Then on this week's episode, all of Rachel's hard work culminated one audition, and she choked.
As she cried and begged for another shot (which was amazing acting on Lea Michele's part, by the way), my heart broke for her. Because I feel like I'm on that stage, choking, right now.
Today, I officially got my first C in a class. Later in the week, my second one is inevitable. People always say Cs aren't the end of the world. I agree, they aren't the end of the world. But they're the end of a part of my world, and I'm not going to pretend that isn't a big deal and I'm not upset at it and myself. And I'm not going to pretend that these terrible grades have very real consequences for my life, academically and personally.
Rachel Berry's whole life centers around her singing. My whole life is centered around school. When it all comes crashing down, there's really nothing to do but grin and bear it. I recognize how false people's attempts at making her feel better after her choking sounded; it was one of Glee's few realistic moments. There isn't any comfort. There's nothing you can do. You want so badly to go redo those few moments that messed everything up, but you just can't.
But Rachel's fictional and fixing her problems is easy as typing a few paragraphs onto a screenplay. My life isn't as easy to figure out. What am I going to do now that I've sabotaged myself?
I impulsively signed up for creative writing, dropping a fancy education class. If I'm going to fail, I should at least write about it. I need to do something where I feel in control of my own fate and where I feel like what I'm doing matters. I need to love it. If I get a C doing something I love, then it would be worth it. C's for things I don't care about, that are just check marks on a future planning worksheet..that's not worth it.
I'm scared of going to my academic advising appointment in the fall and telling them I've failed, waiting for them to say "I should look at other options." I'm scared of facing my family members who are so sure in my genius. I'm scared of facing the teachers at home who had so much faith in me.
I'm tired of feeling isolated in my despair; it's hard to let go of much of what you've planned on your whole life, but I have to. Everybody thinks that's dramatic, but it's true. C's don't go to grad school. At least I have Rachel Berry to sing a depressing ballad over and over through my computer's speakers.
"Is it over yet? Can I open my eyes? Is this as hard as it gets? Is this what it feels like to really cry?"
Apr 7, 2012
A New Nostalgia
I feel so retro this weekend.
Though my life has changed radically in the last year, this weekend has felt like it belongs to years past. Remembering is different now, though. There is less nostalgia. While I still remember it fondly, there's a distinct feeling of being glad it's over, living happily in the present and looking toward the future, without longing at all for the past. I'm grateful for its being and even more grateful for its passing.
I left my shiny new laptop's charger at home, leaving me to edit my short stories on my old faithful desktop computer, the computer that carried me through late middle school and high school. It contains my teenage years in folders of pictures and writing, a digital scrapbook of me. The computer's painfully slow speed gives me time to contemplate each file I open before proceeding to the next, thinking of where my head was at when that photo was taken or that piece written. Sometimes, I don't recognize the person I see at all. This does not scare me like it might have before.
My computer's files prompted me to scan through the inscriptions in my high school yearbooks. The people who wrote in them hardly exist to me anymore. The laughter behind the inside jokes has faded in a way the pink gel pen never will. I remember how I felt slightly queasy about a particular inscription, with it's overly sentimental message and promises, and feel even more queasy about how untrue its become. That's all I wanted when it was written, but now I wish it didn't have to be that way. I expected to feel this way five or six or ten years after graduating high school, not in a year. But now I can safely say with supreme confidence that high school is not the best years of your life.
Sitting on the couch, eating my favorite frozen pizza and watching sporting events with my parents reminds me of the evenings after school I spent in that very position. At one point, I pulled out my homework assignment from UNC and it felt so alien, like an artifact from the past carried home in a time machine. I looked at my bookbag with suspicion before stuffing the assignment back in.
Sitting here at this desk in my my messy room, waiting on Dad to finish grilling hamburgers on the deck, typing away on my desktop computer, it feels like I should get up tomorrow morning and drive to the community college, park the car, and step into the T-building lobby. I feel that same way each time I swing my car Bessie out into the road in the direction of town, just as I did each morning for several years. Though I have a shiny, new car, I still feel at home in Bessie's driver's seat; it's safe, I'm in control, it's comfortable. But I'm not overly sad about it like I suspected I would be. I want to drive the new car, with it's new car smell and updated interior. It is change, and I like it.
But the time I feel most like my past self is when I'm reading at night before bed, forgetting the time and the rest of the world until I turn over the novel's last page. Books, though always new ones, are the one constant thread throughout my twenty years, and they faithfully evoke the same comforting feeling time and time again. Whether I'm reading them in my bedroom at home by my halogen octopus lamp, or reading them perched high in my lofted dorm bed, I feel peacefully present. I know as long as I can access that feeling, I'll never be lost.
Though I must rejoin the actual present tomorrow night, I'm happy I've had this weekend of reminders to show me where I've come from, to remind me of where I have to go.
Though my life has changed radically in the last year, this weekend has felt like it belongs to years past. Remembering is different now, though. There is less nostalgia. While I still remember it fondly, there's a distinct feeling of being glad it's over, living happily in the present and looking toward the future, without longing at all for the past. I'm grateful for its being and even more grateful for its passing.
I left my shiny new laptop's charger at home, leaving me to edit my short stories on my old faithful desktop computer, the computer that carried me through late middle school and high school. It contains my teenage years in folders of pictures and writing, a digital scrapbook of me. The computer's painfully slow speed gives me time to contemplate each file I open before proceeding to the next, thinking of where my head was at when that photo was taken or that piece written. Sometimes, I don't recognize the person I see at all. This does not scare me like it might have before.
My computer's files prompted me to scan through the inscriptions in my high school yearbooks. The people who wrote in them hardly exist to me anymore. The laughter behind the inside jokes has faded in a way the pink gel pen never will. I remember how I felt slightly queasy about a particular inscription, with it's overly sentimental message and promises, and feel even more queasy about how untrue its become. That's all I wanted when it was written, but now I wish it didn't have to be that way. I expected to feel this way five or six or ten years after graduating high school, not in a year. But now I can safely say with supreme confidence that high school is not the best years of your life.
Sitting on the couch, eating my favorite frozen pizza and watching sporting events with my parents reminds me of the evenings after school I spent in that very position. At one point, I pulled out my homework assignment from UNC and it felt so alien, like an artifact from the past carried home in a time machine. I looked at my bookbag with suspicion before stuffing the assignment back in.
Sitting here at this desk in my my messy room, waiting on Dad to finish grilling hamburgers on the deck, typing away on my desktop computer, it feels like I should get up tomorrow morning and drive to the community college, park the car, and step into the T-building lobby. I feel that same way each time I swing my car Bessie out into the road in the direction of town, just as I did each morning for several years. Though I have a shiny, new car, I still feel at home in Bessie's driver's seat; it's safe, I'm in control, it's comfortable. But I'm not overly sad about it like I suspected I would be. I want to drive the new car, with it's new car smell and updated interior. It is change, and I like it.
But the time I feel most like my past self is when I'm reading at night before bed, forgetting the time and the rest of the world until I turn over the novel's last page. Books, though always new ones, are the one constant thread throughout my twenty years, and they faithfully evoke the same comforting feeling time and time again. Whether I'm reading them in my bedroom at home by my halogen octopus lamp, or reading them perched high in my lofted dorm bed, I feel peacefully present. I know as long as I can access that feeling, I'll never be lost.
Though I must rejoin the actual present tomorrow night, I'm happy I've had this weekend of reminders to show me where I've come from, to remind me of where I have to go.
Mar 24, 2012
We Were Born to Overcome
This has been the worst week of my first year of college.
But it's okay. It's going to be okay.
I know this because the worst week of my first year of college could be so much worse. I got to experience Holi Moli. I'm not sure how religiously accurate it was, but it was fun. Thousands of UNC students, dressed in old white clothing on a huge white tarp, gather in Polk Place and throw vibrantly colored pigment at each other until everyone is just a blob of color. The pictures reveal the multicolored cloud of dust hovering about the cheering crowd. An uninformed viewer might think were extremely dedicated hippies, even tye dying our smoke.
The Holi festival, a Hindu celebration, is supposed to celebrate the coming of Spring. Rebirth. While I was tossing paint manically at my friends, this message seemed distant, just an excuse to defy the long-ingrained instinct not to make stains.
However, as I stood in the already-stained-purple shower, watching the water run off my skin in little rainbow rivers and leaving me squeaky clean and new, I understood. Spring blooms everywhere, pink and purple and green coloring the campus, even the dusty yellow pollen coating everything brightens up the place. Even after the spring showers have washed away all the evidence of spring's coming, the hope is left. The birds chirping in the rain, the sweet smell of May mornings, the sparkling morning dew.
I'll admit a few tears might've mixed into the mess of soap, water, and paint as I stood in the shower evaluating my life. But it's okay because next spring, as I stand in the middle of the colorful crowd at Holi Moli, this week won't matter anymore. The grades will have faded into the background; the sting of inconvenience of being temporary homeless and temporary extraneous will have dulled into a vague, old ache; the midterms will be long-forgotten. It just won't matter. I'll wash myself anew in the shower, and it'll be another new beginning.
"And we carry on
When our lives come undone
We carry on
Cause there's promise in the morning sun
We carry on
As the dark surrenders to the dawn
We were born to overcome
We carry on."
But it's okay. It's going to be okay.
I know this because the worst week of my first year of college could be so much worse. I got to experience Holi Moli. I'm not sure how religiously accurate it was, but it was fun. Thousands of UNC students, dressed in old white clothing on a huge white tarp, gather in Polk Place and throw vibrantly colored pigment at each other until everyone is just a blob of color. The pictures reveal the multicolored cloud of dust hovering about the cheering crowd. An uninformed viewer might think were extremely dedicated hippies, even tye dying our smoke.
The Holi festival, a Hindu celebration, is supposed to celebrate the coming of Spring. Rebirth. While I was tossing paint manically at my friends, this message seemed distant, just an excuse to defy the long-ingrained instinct not to make stains.
However, as I stood in the already-stained-purple shower, watching the water run off my skin in little rainbow rivers and leaving me squeaky clean and new, I understood. Spring blooms everywhere, pink and purple and green coloring the campus, even the dusty yellow pollen coating everything brightens up the place. Even after the spring showers have washed away all the evidence of spring's coming, the hope is left. The birds chirping in the rain, the sweet smell of May mornings, the sparkling morning dew.
I'll admit a few tears might've mixed into the mess of soap, water, and paint as I stood in the shower evaluating my life. But it's okay because next spring, as I stand in the middle of the colorful crowd at Holi Moli, this week won't matter anymore. The grades will have faded into the background; the sting of inconvenience of being temporary homeless and temporary extraneous will have dulled into a vague, old ache; the midterms will be long-forgotten. It just won't matter. I'll wash myself anew in the shower, and it'll be another new beginning.
"And we carry on
When our lives come undone
We carry on
Cause there's promise in the morning sun
We carry on
As the dark surrenders to the dawn
We were born to overcome
We carry on."
Mar 22, 2012
Doubt
"Oh, how I ricochet between certainties and doubts."
"I'm trying to be assertive; I'm making plans. Gonna rise to the occasion, yeah, meet all their demands, but all I do is just lay in bed and hide under the covers.
It's too hard to focus through all this doubt, keep making these to-do lists and nothing gets crossed out."
Oh, Sylvia and Conor always know what to say. I'm having trouble articulating my doubts to anyone; everything seems to think I'm being silly. They overestimate me. They don't try to think of my situation objectively. I can't meet all their demands. I just keep hitting snooze.
I get so frustrated when people think I'm overreacting when I doubt my future. Give it time, give it time. I don't have time! The future is now; the future is always right now. I don't want to screw myself over later by not knowing what I'm doing right now. I have to feel prepared; I have to be working towards a goal. I have to assess my own abilities honestly and truly. But I can't! There doesn't seem to be an objective enough person on earth.
The cloud of a false reputation surrounds me. I'm not as smart, responsible, capable, determined, or ambitious as anyone thinks I am. I suppose I should take it as a compliment that people perceive me as so much better than I am, but it is going to catch up with me. I'm always living in dread of those moments when the veneer cracks a little. Eventually, it's going to fall all apart and I'll be left without options. I wonder if I'm actually any of the things people attribute to me, or I've just been hearing them so long, I started to believe them myself.
As I have learned from my meager studies, a fracture between identity and essence is not good for mental health. I don't want to be Mrs. Dalloway, perched on the edge of instability all the time--inches away from being Septimus falling from the window at any given moment.
So I'm searching, searching for what I want. What I'm actually capable of. But I can't figure it out without any honest assessment. That leaves me obsessed with my falling grades, the image of the Cs tainting my papers and tests, mocking me with their averageness, their reek of failure. But they're objective and unyielding. They're the only reliable measure of my abilities. And they're telling me I'm not good enough.
I try to listen to what the grades are telling me. At a certain point, my mantra of just "work harder" fails me because I hit a stalemate of work and ability. Sometimes, my best is just not good enough. My dad always says it's okay if I'm doing my best. Is it? Their conception of my best is not what reality may be. What am I supposed to do if my best isn't really good enough?
The desire to do something, to earn a Doctorate's degree, is not enough to obtain it. Why am I the only one who thinks so? No, you cannot do anything you put your mind to. Everyone has limitations.
I just don't know where mine are, and testing them is slowly chipping away at me. Is it cowardly to back down into safety, or is it the smart thing to do?
I don't know; I don't know. I just hide under the covers. Academic advising is going to have a good time with me.
"I'm trying to be assertive; I'm making plans. Gonna rise to the occasion, yeah, meet all their demands, but all I do is just lay in bed and hide under the covers.
It's too hard to focus through all this doubt, keep making these to-do lists and nothing gets crossed out."
Oh, Sylvia and Conor always know what to say. I'm having trouble articulating my doubts to anyone; everything seems to think I'm being silly. They overestimate me. They don't try to think of my situation objectively. I can't meet all their demands. I just keep hitting snooze.
I get so frustrated when people think I'm overreacting when I doubt my future. Give it time, give it time. I don't have time! The future is now; the future is always right now. I don't want to screw myself over later by not knowing what I'm doing right now. I have to feel prepared; I have to be working towards a goal. I have to assess my own abilities honestly and truly. But I can't! There doesn't seem to be an objective enough person on earth.
The cloud of a false reputation surrounds me. I'm not as smart, responsible, capable, determined, or ambitious as anyone thinks I am. I suppose I should take it as a compliment that people perceive me as so much better than I am, but it is going to catch up with me. I'm always living in dread of those moments when the veneer cracks a little. Eventually, it's going to fall all apart and I'll be left without options. I wonder if I'm actually any of the things people attribute to me, or I've just been hearing them so long, I started to believe them myself.
As I have learned from my meager studies, a fracture between identity and essence is not good for mental health. I don't want to be Mrs. Dalloway, perched on the edge of instability all the time--inches away from being Septimus falling from the window at any given moment.
So I'm searching, searching for what I want. What I'm actually capable of. But I can't figure it out without any honest assessment. That leaves me obsessed with my falling grades, the image of the Cs tainting my papers and tests, mocking me with their averageness, their reek of failure. But they're objective and unyielding. They're the only reliable measure of my abilities. And they're telling me I'm not good enough.
I try to listen to what the grades are telling me. At a certain point, my mantra of just "work harder" fails me because I hit a stalemate of work and ability. Sometimes, my best is just not good enough. My dad always says it's okay if I'm doing my best. Is it? Their conception of my best is not what reality may be. What am I supposed to do if my best isn't really good enough?
The desire to do something, to earn a Doctorate's degree, is not enough to obtain it. Why am I the only one who thinks so? No, you cannot do anything you put your mind to. Everyone has limitations.
I just don't know where mine are, and testing them is slowly chipping away at me. Is it cowardly to back down into safety, or is it the smart thing to do?
I don't know; I don't know. I just hide under the covers. Academic advising is going to have a good time with me.
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