Star-gazing

Last night there was a meteor shower. Some of my friends and I bundled up and headed out around 11:30, stopped at Taco Bell for some Mountain Dew and nachos (because that's what we're fueled by, mostly) and drove until we could see stars.
It took a while.
I get bothered about stars every once in a while. There's so much light pollution in Canton that's it's futile to look up. I can only see the brightest stars. I can't see the Milky Way. Sometimes panic jumps up into my throat when I wonder if someday Millersburg will be like that, too. When I go home, I can see the Summer Triangle and Cassiopeia and even Draco, which is the hardest for me to find and sometimes I think I'm making it up as I go along, connecting stars that aren't meant to be connected. Still, the orange haze of civilization is already creeping up around the horizon of my house on the hill, and it's only a matter of time before I won't be able to see anything but streetlights and cars. I already feel isolated. Human beings are already consumed with ourselves. If we can't see the rest of the galaxy, how will we remember that we aren't the only thing that matters, aren't the only things that are breathtakingly beautiful, aren't the only thing that God created?
We started driving through fields and past Amish houses (you can tell they're Amish because they don't have shutters) and started wondering aloud where we should stop. Laura said we should just stop in a field someplace. I didn't want to because people have private property and I didn't want to get shot.
We stopped in a field someplace.
Sarah and I brought our guitars, but it was too cold to play, and we were close enough to houses that we decided it was best to stay as quiet as it's possible for four girls to be after midnight. So we put down a blanket and flung ourselves into a heap on top of it, and covered up with each other and more blankets. Then we looked at the stars.
At first, everything was overcast, and we could only see things out of the corners of our eyes. We weren't even sure if we were seeing stars or if our eyes were tired and beginning to fail us. Then a tiny hole in the clouds appeared and we could clearly see Orion's belt. Sarah started pointing out constellations that I didn't even know, and told us that she used to want to be an astronomer. As we waited for the clouds to blow away, Chelsea regaled us with stand-up comedy routines she's memorized and then just told us stories of her own. Laura flipped out every time a new star was visible.
I laughed until my stomach hurt and I couldn't feel the cold anymore.
I looked away for a second, and everyone gasped. "Did you see that! That was a giant one!" Laura practically yelled. Everyone had seen the first meteor of the night but me. I looked back up at the sky, and before long there was another. As the night grew colder, we snuggled closer together and gasped when another piece of space shot across the sky.
Eventually the clouds covered the stars again, and we all packed our stuff up and drove back to Malone. Laura cranked up the heat, and I almost fell asleep, covered in blankets and friendship. I crawled into bed, exhausted but complete.
I don't think I ever could have given myself a better life than God has.

Regressing

I was kind of surprised when the girl behind the counter at Starbucks asked me a question while I waited for my tall mocha frappuccino, so I didn't really hear what she'd said, especially over the roar of the coffee-making-machine-thing.
"What?" I said, leaning over the counter.
"Do you have any big plans for tonight?" she asked again. I shook my head.
"Oh, uh, no." I paused, trying to think if I was doing anything special. I'm usually not. I'm single and don't have a driver's license, so any "big plans" of mine usually involve watching movies or going to Walmart and buying candy and/or milk with Sarah and Laura. Which are all of immense importance to ME, but usually aren't considered big plans by anyone else. "I'm, um, going home."
She smiled. "Oh, that's nice! Have fun." She handed me my coffee, and I was on my way.
I felt really grown up. Partially because I was drinking coffee, which I don't do a whole lot, especially not coffee from Starbucks, but mostly because that was the first time I've mentioned to a stranger that I don't live at home. I live on my own, now. For all she knows, I'm a famous safari explorer who has been living in the Sahara desert for 5 years. Although I suppose my immaturity is revealed by the fact that the first example I thought of just now was so farfetched.
My friend Grape is spending the night. She's downstairs about to sleep. We both have church in the morning. I went to a concert at her church with my little siblings and ran into her there. She saw me and literally screamed with excitement. It made me grin. It made my heart expand. She tackled me in a great hug.
I love hugs, I think. I'm really awkward with hugs, but I like them. I never realized that I didn't know how to hug until last year. I was in a play and was supposed to hug my "husband" and it became all too clear to everyone that my body couldn't manage to coordinate itself into a hug. Maybe it's because I'm used to hugging people much shorter than I am (my siblings and mother) or much taller than me (my brother and dad) and not used to hugging people who are roughly in my height range. Or maybe I'm just not used to hugging people who aren't my family. Anyway. The moral of the story is that now that I am better equipped to hug people, I like it. I especially like when Grape tackle-hugs me. Because it's an overflow of love and joy and it's slightly violent, but only because it's unrestrained. And wonderful.
So what I'm saying is, everyone who sees me anywhere should just hug me. (That's not true. Only because I think people would be crazed out if they thought I was serious.)
Do you ever feel like you're in junior high again? Sometimes I look in the mirror and can only see an awkward 8th grader. I remember one time in 8th grade I wore an outfit that consisted of all items of clothing with the word "princess" on them. Even my socks. My shirt said princess. My jeans said princess (and, to be fair, other things as well). I might've even been wearing a hat that said princess.
Why didn't anyone tell me that wasn't okay?
I'm often afraid that I'm making those same mistakes. I'm still the same person, if you think about it. I haven't learned all that much about fashion since then. I still just wear whatever stuff looks awesome to me. It might still be ridiculous. I wouldn't know. Most of my clothes come from thrift stores, which means that most of the things I wear are things that other people have already decided that they don't even want to own, let alone wear. The only difference between myself then and now is that now I'm aware that I'm capable of being and looking completely silly when I think I look great.
Maybe that's okay, though. My dad used to have a mullet. My dad is even a reasonably cool guy. If everyone in the 80s was duped into having a mullet, it might be okay for me to dupe myself into wearing weird clothes.

Snakeskin

I don't like losing people.
Who does?
The other day in one of my classes, my professor mentioned that losing touch with people is just a part of life.
That part of life freaking sucks.
I don't want to lose my high school friends. I don't want to lose my college friends. I want to keep everyone trapped in a little box with pins stuck through them and I want to pull them out when I'm lonely or want attention.
That is unfeasible. And cruel. And self-centered. However, it's what I want, deep down inside.

All these thoughts of letting go came from Fall Break. I went home. My brother wasn't there. He's in Pennsylvania, training for the 6 months he's going to spend in Africa. This break is the first time I've really been home for any substantial amount of time without him being there. I kept wandering into his room to talk to him, but he wasn't there.
Then I started thinking about how he's probably going to start living on his own soon. How, after he gets back from Africa, we don't really know what he's going to do. He doesn't really know. So, basically, I can't go home ever again. Slowly, we'll all leave. And I can't be a kid anymore. And I can't have a family anymore.
Freaking crap.

(I'll still have a family. We'll just all be living other places and some of us will have other families.)

Why do things have to change? I don't feel like I change that much. I guess I do, though. Probably some people feel like I've left them. I don't like leaving people, either.

As my professor said, it's an inevitable part of life.

We'd all be on horseback

Sometimes I wish for brilliance. Sometimes I want to be so ruthlessly intelligent I could cut people down with a single word. I want people to be afraid of me. I want to be a hard and sharp and cold as a diamond. I want Emma Thompson to play me in a movie.

Here's who would really play me: Rosie O'Donnell.

One thing I really like is when I'm passing someone I know, and instead of saying "Hi," or "Hey," or "What's up?" we just nod to each other. Not the kind of nod where you smile and nod completely. I'm talking about the kind of nod where you just lift your chin up and are both too cool to smile or say anything. It's my favorite thing to have happen.

I think I'm the least edgy person in my playwriting class. Everyone else is writing this really artsy stuff or gritty stuff or meaningful stuff, and I'm not, actually. I mean, I think it's meaningful. Sometimes. But it's just stuff about people meeting other people and falling in love over and over again before they realize that falling in love isn't a real thing. And then they realize that love is actually better than falling into it. And I don't know anything about anything, so maybe that's just a load of bull that I'm writing. Do I believe in love at first sight, or do I just believe in hormones? Does anyone believe in love at first sight anymore? I believe in a lot of things that are weirder than that. I don't believe in that, though. I don't really believe in destiny, either, but I find myself thinking that things are destined. Does that make me a hypocrite? Or does it just make me human?

Here's the reason I'm not edgy: I don't ever swear. I really don't. I have a foul mouth in my mind, but I don't say it. One time I called my brother a dick, and one time I said I was being a bitch, but that's it. When I try to write characters who are realistic and swear, they just sound silly. They sound like they're trying too hard. That's because they are. That's because I am. Other people can write things where people have no problem cussing, and it's natural and realistic. And edgy. Not I. I want so badly for a character to tell someone to fuck off, but it's not going to happen. I know why it's not going to happen.

A) I can only ever seem to be alternative and awesome, when really I'm vanilla. I might be a poser. I like things that are different and weird, but I myself am neither of those things.

B) I can't shake the feeling that swearing is not the right thing for me to do. I don't care if other people do, but I can't. I can't can't can't justify it for myself. I like beautiful things, and swearing isn't beautiful. It's raw and emotional and honest and real, but it's not beautiful. It's something I can respect, but I'm not enough of any of those things to write and/or do it. It doesn't make sense for me to feel like that, because when other people swear, I get this weird kind of admiration for them. When people create art with vulgarity, I like it. I mean, I don't like all of it just because there's swearing, but if it's good, I like it.

Lately I feel trapped in my head. I wish I could just shrug out of my skin and take a vacation. I'd float around the ocean for a while and not think about anything anymore. I'd come back when everyone had forgotten about me and I could make myself something new.

I think life is a process of becoming something you aren't yet. Smarter. Stronger. Kinder. Maybe that's good. I think that's good. But if that's true, does that mean that contentedness is stagnation? I don't want it to be. Do I only think progress is good because that's society? Isn't trying to get closer to God trying to progress? I'm going to be honest: I don't feel like I'm close to God right now. I don't really know what I'm supposed to be doing. I pray, but I feel like my prayers just jostle loose my insecurities, which bounce and echo in my head, and sometimes I think they're God talking, and sometimes I know it's just my own voice coming back to me.

Are all the things I feel are right really wrong? Are all the people I think are hurting people really helping them? Last year I found out that I knew a lot of stuff I didn't think I knew. This year I'm finding out that I didn't really know a lot of it.

Is this just another time for me to grow? I remember when I was 8 or 10 I went to the doctor because my knees hurt and I was tired all the time. Turns out I was just getting taller and older. Growing pains. I thought I had a disease. Maybe that's what's happening now. Maybe I don't have a spiritual disease, maybe I just need to get taller again.

I played some records today. Artifacts are just as good as time travel. I pretend I'm living in the 60s, only computers were around back then and also Snow Patrol, because I've been listening to them more lately too.

Here's another thing I love: coming into my room and seeing Laura crashed on my couch. I love when people are comfortable around me and just act like themselves. And when I come into my room and see that Laura is fine with chilling there even when she's alone, I feel like a real person.

And that's why I'm never going to be hard as diamonds.

Imbued

Ever since I was a tiny child, I have wanted to be a writer. My first book was entitled "Dad's Book," which I both wrote and illustrated, and which featured a drawing of my dad standing in front of a barn wearing overalls. No, my dad had never done that (and still hasn't) but I choose to view that as a sign of my creativity, even at the tender age of 5.
By 8, I was writing my own memoirs, although I never got much further than the titles. A few I remember are "My Great Boring Life," and "Tales of the African What-What Bird," which sounds like it might be about something made up, but was actually referring to the fact that my mom had called me that one time because I guess I had a penchant for not hearing what people were saying and then yelling, "WHAT? WHAT?"
I'm trying to say that I wrote a lot, and have always wanted to be a writer.
Technically, I am a writer. I write on a regular basis. I don't do it for money, but I do it for a living. As in, I would probably die if I couldn't express myself using the written word. Heaven only knows I don't express myself well in the spoken one.
The other day I was thinking about how crazy it is that I'm actually good at the thing I love. One could make the argument that I love to write because I'm good at it, but that doesn't explain why I've loved writing before I could do it well. I loved writing even when I wrote things in my journal like,
"Oct 22 1999, Age 9
Today was bad. Aleks couldn't find his shoehe's so every one exepte him was looking for his shoe, mom calld pop & dad. After that she blue up she yeled at us all including me. Why me? I'm upset."
(Don't ask me how I knew how to spell "including" but not "yelled" or even "shoes.")
Worse yet, my journal also documents the angst and inner turmoil I suffered when, at age 11, I discovered that Aaron Carter didn't write his own music.
This is not the height of literature.
Somehow I managed to break through my hatred of my handwriting workbook (thank God for keyboards) and my inability to focus on anything that wasn't how angry I was at my siblings or how betrayed I felt by the music industry. Somehow I made it to college, where I've discovered that I have become, completely by accident, a writer.
How crazy is that?
How crazy is it that the one thing I want to be more than anything else in the world is the one thing at which I excel? The one thing I'm completely comfortable doing.
I know it's not an accident, obviously. I know it has nothing to do with me, and everything to do with this God I worship, but still. I know people who want to be actors but who can't act their way out of a paper bag. I know people who want to be musicians but who can't carry a tune in a bucket. I know people who want to be original but only use worn out metaphors like "act their way out of a paper bag" and "can't carry a tune in a bucket." Seriously, though. Is there anything more torturous than wanting something with everything you've got in your finite little body and not being able to come anywhere near it?
I think I might be the luckiest person alive.

I'd give you everything I've got for a little peace of mind

"I just want you to be happy," he said, rubbing my back gently. "I want to spend the rest of my life with you." He looked at me intensely, and I looked away. He didn't stop. "I love you."
Yes, that was the most romantic thing anyone has ever said to me.
No, it wasn't real.
Last night I went to an interactive mystery thing, and my character, Gabby Backer, was dating Larry Linebacker. We went to homecoming together before my brother was killed by Cindy Sensational, who wanted her boyfriend, Kevin Kicker, to get the scholarship my twin brother Bobby was about to receive. It was a really fun time: I got into a huge fight with Sally Spirit and Dr. Chambers had to break us up, and then Peter Prez tried to crown himself homecoming king since the actual winner (Bobby) was dead and couldn't fulfill his duties, and Laura and I were two out of the four people who correctly deduced that Cindy Sensational was the murderer, which resulted in our "Smoking Gun" awards.
Still, Larry Linebacker's confession of love was a little unnerving. Not because he was being creepy or uncomfortable. We were both acting out our parts and being silly like everyone else. It just made me think about my own horribly uneventful love life.
After the event, Laura and I started talking about how she and her boyfriend ended up dating and about how my mom thought my dad was going to kill her when he proposed (Spoiler alert: He didn't), and about how Sarah is engaged and all that kind of stuff, and it threw into sharp relief the fact that I have never had a boyfriend in my entire 19 years of existence. To make matters worse, I've never even been pursued. (Okay, one time I was at a square dance and this creepy kid followed me around for a couple hours and ate my pretzels, but I was like 13 at the time and it was a fluke.) And to be honest I'm not THAT upset about it. I don't want a boyfriend just for the sake of having a boyfriend. There are so many great things about being single, really. I don't have to worry about missing anniversaries or spending enough time with my boyfriend, or worry that he's cheating on me, or keep myself from talking about celebrity crushes (although I usually end up going for writers, who aren't that intimidating anyway) or any other things that people who are dating have to worry about. And I heave a sigh of relief.
But there are sucky things about being single, too. Every once in a while I start wondering if I'm ever going to have a partner. I can't help but notice that more and more of my friends are engaged, and that leaves me on the outside looking in, worried about seeming awkward when someone's fiance or boyfriend shows up, completely eclipsing my presence with his charming smile and his cologne.
"What's wrong with me?" I wonder, watching girls my age as they casually touch their engagement rings and smile a little.
I think that's really the part that bothers me. Is there some aspect of my personality that drives people away? Am I a repulsive person? It's the not knowing that's upsetting.
I'm too afraid to let anyone know that there's some little part of me that wants the kind of relationship where people say silly things to each other and fall completely in love. It's like when I'm sitting alone in the cafeteria but I don't want people to know that I'm not sitting alone by choice, so I give my best impersonation of a person who just wants to sit alone for a little bit and doesn't need anyone else in her life. Because obviously letting it be known that there's a romantic part of me is completely pathetic, because who does that? Even writing on my blog about this is uncomfortable. It's too much to reveal. It's weird to confess that I'm pretty sure I'm going to end up a batty old maid living a shoddy apartment in New York writing plays for my cats and keeping a blog about how our civilization has really started going downhill ever since earthquakes shook the midwest into molten lava and California slid into the sea back in 2012 (gosh darned mayans!). For someone who claims to hate romance, I'm sure hung up on the concept.
There are a lot of people in my life who love me. And those relationships aren't inferior to a boyfriend/girlfriend relationship. Those relationships are loving and stable and I appreciate my friends and family so much. And more importantly than that, I have a God who will love me even if everyone else in my life doesn't. That's not something I take lightly, and it's not something I'd trade for anything else.
I just wish I could shake this feeling that there's something wrong with me. Or that I could figure out what that something is.

Things People Say To Me

Yesterday, I got a chance to see my little sisters when we went out to get a dress for homecoming. (I was going to just wear some random clothes I have, but my mom was like, "We can go to Encore and pick up a dress, no big deal.") So while we were there, my little sister who is 6 was trying on the tiaras and making Laura and Sarah do the same. One of the women working there looked at my little sister and said, "Aren't you just gorgeous!" My little sister, who was gazing at herself in a hand mirror, replied smugly, "Yes!" Laura said her self-confidence balances out my complete lack of that virtue.

Just a couple of minutes ago, I was talking to my suitemate Melissa about homecoming, and she said it's her dream to be homecoming queen someday. "You should vote for me, because I'll bring an end to world peace!"

That's a good campaign strategy for sure.

And now for a segment I like to call, "Laura's Words of Wisdom."

Yesterday at dinner, I was talking about how my little brother is having a hard time at school because apparently all the kids he goes to school with make fun of him and call him "The Weird Kid," even though he's legitimately one of the awesomest 14-year-olds I know. Laura's advice was, "If you can't beat them, don't join them. Kill them."

Righto.

After watching Dead Poet's Society, Laura's comment was, "The moral of this movie is 'Don't trust a ginger.'"

Don't trust a ginger, never trust a ginger, don't trust a ginger; don't trust me.

Finally, a word of caution from Laura: "Don't just eat grapes."