England Bound

I've always had this nagging feeling that I haven't been in the right place. I have always lived in the city- grown up around cars, sky scrappers, and gas guzzlers. When I was younger my father would take me and the rest of the family to my Godfather's ranch. It really was it. It was out in the open, with life, and air. It was full of horses, pecans, and hay. (So that might not sound amazing to you, but when your a child who lives for adventure and feels closed off in a city with too many walls, and blinding lights, you long to be in the soft glow of the stars, and having your day planned to the punch the freedom of going to the ranch is cool air filling your lungs.) 

When I was out there, I loved to explore. I was a very wired kid so the first couple of trips it took me a while to figure out that, I wouldn't be waking up and watching Scooby Doo. I remember wanting to just ride my horse into the mountains and explore all day. I just wanted to look at everything, and find places that no one had seen before. I wanted get lost in the country. Unfortunately when we would leave I would be thrust into a happy life of sign posts again, where you couldn't get lost if you tried (or at least I couldn't). 

My father grew up in England. His mother was born there, and then when he was in his teens they moved over here to Alabama. (Why they picked Alabama, I don't know.) So every now and then my father would take me over to England to visit my family there and get to know them. I was so excited to go to England. It is one of my favorite places. My cousins and I would ride are bikes up and down the streets, and I could get lost just following the horizon. 

I think I felt more comfortable searching the country inside the island of England, then I do speeding the familiar streets of my 'homeland'. 

Junior year I plan to go for a year long study in England. I guess it is me kind of testing my British legs. I will be able to see if that really is the place for me. 

Writing

I m sorry about not posting in a while, but I haven't had enough to say. Here is something I wrote near the end of the school year- thoughts?

Cane sat a while at his mahogany desk. His left hand pulled at the bridge of his nose, stretching the skin into a vibrant pink hue. His right hand was thumbing the corner of his yellow legal pad. The pages passed so quickly from the zenith of his thumb to the rocky bottom of the blank yellow pages, that they blurred in a speedy brush stroke. Although he willed it so, Jerry could not fix his mind upon any subject specific enough to satisfy his quivering pin. Tracing the same scribble he had for the previous ten minutes he willed the words out, his brow turning an increasingly darker shade of pink.

To will the pen upon an end,

Create a world with just your hand

To mask outlined reality

And splash a watercolor soft imagination

*************************************************************

This story is not about me. I am just waiting. Not like Jona was waiting, but in my own way. Jona waited in the belly of the dark cavernous alleyway. Fire escapes climbed, bone like, up the sides of the adjacent buildings, and trash dumpsters floated stagnantly, like dead fish, waiting to be gutted. Jona’s hands were sweaty inside his jacket pockets. Rubbing his four fingers with hi thumb, he had rubbed the pads raw. A loud bark sounded at the back of the alley. Tony and Cobain sauntered out of the disapaiting steam seeping from the sewer drains, breathing under the sculpted dumpster.

Tony pierced Jona with a charcoal pupil, “So have you got it?”

Jona’s lips quivered and his fingers twitched in heartbeat, metronome clicks, “well… half.”

“All I ask of you is if you had it. You said you did- you don’t. I wash my hands of you.” Tony turned on the ball of his Armani tux shoes and paced away with Cobain at hi side. Cobain’s hips sauntered with an arrogant pop in each step. They both disappeared into the fog and Jona stood with his arms outstretched and forgotten as they began to quiver. 

Senioritis

I thought that at the end of this senior year, I would be motivated through the end because it would move so fast, and I would want to leave with a good mark on my record. Unfortunately, I am plagued with senioritis. It is a devastating epidemic passing through the entire senior class at ESD (and even some of the Juniors). All of us have been accepted into a college we are interested in and some of us are even making choices between a few that really interest us, unfortunately that gives us no drive to do well. All we want is to have a fun chill fourth quarter and the teachers feel an unquenchable sensation to crush us with work, and stress us out even more than before. I only have about 15 days left, and am more crunched with work then ever. Why do teachers punish us for doing well the last three years?

Confessions

I have a confession. I warn you it is frightening. I am a little embarrassed to say it myself.--- I drink my morning tea with a straw. Yes, I know, it is frightening, but the first step to recovery is admitting that I have a problem-- right?

Anyway, when I pick up my tea (from a place that rhymes with Harbucks) I insert a lengthy green straw into the small (too small) slit for the straw and quickly "suck the sweets of sweet philosophy." If philosophy is what you call the small quotes on the side of the cups that they give you. Such as, “People don’t read enough. And what reading we do is cursory, without absorbing the subtleties and nuances that lie deep within — Wow, you’ve stopped paying attention, haven’t you? People can’t even read a coffee cup without drifting off." This quote came from David Shore the producer of House and fittingly so, he mirrors the character of Gregory House himself.

I realized this morning when I was enjoying my quick cup of sweetened English Breakfast Tea, that I drink it too fast. I finish my glass of tea before I get to school- maybe a seven minute trip from the shop that rhymes with Harbucks to school. And to top that, I stick a straw in the cup to enjoy the drink in my car safely. I have reasoning for drinking it with a straw- I can drink it in my car and still watch the road, and also it stops the liquid from pouring out the cup and staining the center console of my car.

I realized at that moment, that I live my life too quickly. Jumping into the car to go from one place to another, without stopping to simply look at the sky. For instance, today- I woke up at 6:00 so that I would get out of the bed by 6:30 and be ready for school by 7:00 when I would leave my house. HA, No- I woke up at 6:00 and promptly, almost robotically turned my blasting radio down so that the drone of the NPR announcer would lull me back to sleep, which it did. I then woke again at 7:00 and freaked. Jumping from my bed and dressing faster than a jackrabbit with a fox on its tail, I raced out of the house at 7:20 to get to Starbucks (whoops I'm going to fast I said the name) to then be off to school. Ugh, I then got my acolytes in order. Luckily, I had some really funny guys today so the process wasn't as stressful as it can be. All in all though I rushed through the morning and didn't even get to look at the sky and see how blue it was, splashed with white clouds brushing across the atmosphere. I really do miss looking at the sky. Most of the time I'm in such a hurry I don't get to do my favorite things anymore. I love to walk. I try to walk everywhere I can. I even park my car half way across campus just so I have the excuse to walk to it, but I found today that I was sprinting to my car so that I would be able to rush a quick dinner and be back at the school by 6:30 in time for play rehearsal. I also love to dance. I haven't danced in weeks. Well, we have had rehearsal and choreography for a couple weeks at school, but that is 45 minutes of basic movement for a choral piece in show choir. Not really the satisfaction I am looking for. I put no offense towards show choir, its just I look for something a little more fulfilling, and intense in my dance. I am a student of dance, egar to learn and happy to do so. I have dropped my Monday night dance schedule this entire semester. I haven't danced since January.

Goodness, I think in the end, I miss enjoying life, and doing what I like to do. I mean, I enjoy being buys, but I really what to go back to what I really liked to do.

Don't worry, not to much longer, and I'll be back to coffee mugs- just as soon as softball season is over. (wince* wince*)

Rambling

I've been really tired lately. This last quarter of school has been one that I really have wanted to leave in good spirits- you know. I have really wanted to make my friends smile, and spend the days having fun. Unfortunately, I feel more like I have been pushing my friends away. All of the girls I usually hang with seem to be further and further away. More than usual. I found out today why I am so far away. I am an easy person to make fun of, and I really have fun telling jokes about myself, but sometimes they hurt. I have been hiding it for four years, but the constant jabs and sticks have worn me down. I wish I could be the bigger person but sometimes I just get frustrated that all of the tear downs are focused on me. I work so hard for some people and it feels that all they can do is make fun of me, offer me ways of doing it better, or laugh. I feel like I am complaining, but the truth feels so much better when it is rationalized. I don't really know how to talk to these people. They are my friends and I feel like it should be really easy, but when I feel so alone it is hard to feel like I can talk to anyone. I don't want to be the girl that everyone feels like they need to tread softly around but the constant stomping has finally flattened me.

Where am I supposed to go from here.
Alone in the world and saddened by my presence,
There's no one around.
The world is becoming vast,
To big for my small presence,
Where do I go from here.
I'm lost and friendless,
No one to hold onto,
Here I go, walking alone.

Now I feel like the real emo kid, sitting in my room righting poetry and writing about the hard times in my life. Goodness. Life really isn't that hard though. Other then that everything seems to be turning in good circles.

Swinging on swings,
Higher and higher,
Push to the heavens,
Land on a star,
And soar the galaxy.

Have you ever wished for a superpower?- I've always wanted to be able to fly. Would that be the coolest thing ever? I would be able to fly high and see the world from and angle no one ever has before. The wind beneath my wings, and the clouds trailing me. If I could fly, the first thing I would do would be to race the clouds. I've wanted to know what a cloud feels like. Sitting in one?- is it fluffy like a cotton ball or wet like a wet... uh... cotton ball (LOL I can't think of a better word.)

Stretching Beyond the Bounds of our Education

I've always wondered why people feel, when they are younger that they can do anything and as they reach an older age, that sense of superhero abilities seems to fade. Maybe it is the world view cynic in me, but I think has something to do with the world's impression on our lives. It is as if we are students learning the ways of the world, but the world wants us to think that it is not possible for us to be great, amazing, interesting people with the ability to change the world. I believe that every child can lead an army against anything and it is only when we are told we can't do something that it comes into our minds that maybe there are things we are not capable of doing. It makes me think of Finding Nemo. Marlon keeps trying to protect Nemo from the horrors of the world, but by doing so he makes Nemo feel over protected. Through out the movie Marlon finds himself saying things like "you can't, you just can't," and other such words to extinguish the thoughts of greatness in Nemo's mind. Nemo gets that instilled in his mind and when he is in the tank, getting sucked into the propeller, he says he can't because of his fin, and only someone who is cut off from the greatness of the world- the true extraordinary expanse that it is, an tell Nemo that he can do anything. It is almost as if we have to be taken out of the world to truly understand how we can succeed in it. Every human has the ability to do great things, it is just weather we chose to use those abilities or not.

Just Talking

I know that I haven't posted in a long time, and this is going to be a short one. It has been a while and there is a lot to say, but I don't have the patience to say it right now. December was a big month: I got accepted into Meadows School of the Arts at SMU. I got deferred from SMU's undergraduate program at SMU until March. It was Christmas. I had a lot of family stuff going on. There just has been so much that I have grown exhausted. My arthritis has come back and so it has taken a lot of my mobility away sometimes. I am frightened by softball season. I don't think Coach understands my health and would most definitely let me stop for it. I have been able to go to the movies and catch up on my pop culture but I have to admit I am missing the theater. I do wish that I was there and working. Oh well. School starts up in a couple of days and I am not ready. I am disappointed that school can end this quickly. Oh well. I think I will be more shocked when school is over in 5 months. That will be a huge shock.