Hello, mighty voting warriors! Thanks to your help, my video has landed a spot in the top 10! A humongoid thank you to all of you!

Let’s get down to business. Things are serious now. It’s up to the voters how much of a scholarship I’ll receive: 1st prize is 5 big ones. 2nd prize is 1 grand. 3rd and downward receive $250 each. You may vote once every 24 hours from now through August 25, so vote early and vote often. Let’s make every day count! Please, if you are so inclined, pass this on to anyone you know who might be interested in helping a college student fund her education.

Here's the video, for your voting convenience: http://tuition-tales.com/video-contest-entry-profile.asp?vid=F3AC93DCFEB24B59B538CAD71098D690

If you'd like daily reminders to vote, and I do mean daily, please join my Facebook group: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=105850106241

Please help me out! I would be ashamed to get beat out by a fourth grader... and after just one day he already has 20 more votes than me. This is blasphemy! He's not in college! For the sake of rationale and justice, if nothing else - vote for me! =D

I recently made a video for SallieMae's scholarship contest, which asked entrants to create a 30 second video showing how they are saving money for college. The videos could be serious or silly as long as they're creative. If I win, I'll receive $5000 towards my college education! Even if I come in second or am a runner up, I'll still receive $1000 or $250. Please take 30 seconds to watch my video and vote for it between now and August 1! You can vote once a day, every day until then and I would encourage you to do so, since many entrants have had their videos up longer than I have and so have more votes than I do. The leading video right now has 860 votes. By comparison, I have 174. I have to catch up, and keep up - and I can't do it without you!

You can watch my video at: http://tuition-tales.com/video-contest-ent...538CAD71098D690

If you'd like to be reminded to vote daily, please join my Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=105850106241) and I'll send you reminder messages! If not, that's okay, but please vote at least once!

Thanks everyone!
~ Amandasaurus Rex

HEY HEY HEY! Long time no post! I'm here to let y'alls know that I've got a new story excerpt posted on the new blog! I'm really stoked about it, so please leave comments because they make me feel loved - or at least, not ignored. Then pull a Taking Back Sunday and Tell All Your Friends. kthxbye!

Identify these acronyms:
1. NATO
2. NASA
3. ATM
4. NYSE
5. EPA
6. IRS
7. DEA
8. AFL-CIO
9. UNHCR
10. CDC
11. ATF
12. ACLU
13. DNC
14. HUD
15. EEOC
16. NAACP
17. GAO
18. NTSB
19. FEMA
20. OSHA
21. NOW
22. NRA
23. OPEC
24. RAM
25. WTO
Answers:
1. North Atlantic Treaty Organization
2. National Aeronautics and Space Administration
3. automated-teller machine
4. New York Stock Exchange
5. Environmental Protection Agency
6. Internal Revenue Service
7. Drug Enforcement Administration
8. American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations
9. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
10. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
11. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms
12. American Civil Liberties Union
13. Democratic National Committee
14. Department of Housing and Urban Development
15. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
16. National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
17. General Accounting Office
18. National Transportation Safety Board
19. Federal Emergency Management Agency
20. Occupational Safety and Health Administration
21. National Organization for Women
22. National Rifle Association
23. Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries
24. random access memory
25. World Trade Organization

Identify these personalities in arts and entertainment:
1. Toni Morrison
2. Selena
3. Frank Sinatra
4. Frank Capra
5. Herman Melville
6. Pierre-Auguste Renoir
7. Maya Angelou
8. Jodie Foster
9. Nat King Cole
10. Lauryn Hill
11. Leonard Bernstein
12. Sylvia Plath
13. J.D. Salinger
14. Garry Trudeau
15. Roberto Benigni
16. Spike Lee
17. Rita Moreno
18. Georgia O’Keeffe
19. Patsy Cline
20. Alfred Hitchcock
21. Billie Holiday
22. Salvador Dali
23. Octavio Paz
24. Theodore Geisel
25. Pearl Buck
Answers:
1. Pulitzer-Prize winning author; “Song of Solomon,” “Beloved.”
2. Female Tejano singer slain by member of her entourage.
3. Actor, singer (primarily ’40s, ’50s, ’60s.; won Academy Award for part in “From Here to Eternity.”
Died 1998.
4. Filmmaker; “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” “It’s A Wonderful Life.”
5. Author; “Moby Dick.”
6. French Impressionist artist.
7. Poet, author; “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.”
8. Actress, director; “Silence of the Lambs,” “Little Man Tate.”
9. Deceased bandleader and singer; “Mona Lisa,” “When I Fall in Love.”
10. Rap, R&B singer (Grammy winner at 1999 Grammys).
11. Composer; “On the Town,” “West Side Story.”
12. Author; “The Bell Jar”, committed suicide 1963.
13. Reclusive author of “Catcher in the Rye.”
14. Cartoonist; “Doonesbury.”
15. Italian actor, filmmaker; won Academy Awards for “Life Is Beautiful.”
16. African-American filmmaker; “Do the Right Thing.”
17. Singer, actress; “West Side Story,” “Carnal Knowledge.”
18. One of the founders of Modernism; known for paintings of flowers, western terrain.
19. Country singer; “Sweet Dreams,” died in plane crash in 1963.
20. Filmmaker; “The Birds,” “North By Northwest,” “The Man Who Knew Too Much.”
21. Jazz vocalist; autobiography “Lady Sings the Blues.”
22. Leader of Surrealist movement; “Persistence of Memory,” one of best-known works.
23. Mexican author who won the Nobel literature prize in 1990.
24. Otherwise known as Dr. Seuss; author of “Cat in the Hat.”
25. Author; “The Good Earth,” won Pulitzer and Nobel prizes.

Identify these political figures (officeholders,
activists, national leaders):
1. Henry Shelton
2. Bruce Babbitt
3. David Satcher
4. Madeleine Albright
5. Maxine Waters
6. Dennis Hastert
7. Henry Hyde
8. Elizabeth Dole
9. Togo West
10. George W. Bush
11. Kweisi Mfume
12. William Rehnquist
13. Dianne Feinstein
14. Louis Freeh
15. Jesse Helms
16. Robert Rubin
17. Trent Lott
18. Bill Bradley
19. Martin Luther King Jr.
20. Ben Nighthorse Campbell
Answers:
1. Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff.
2. Secretary of the Interior.
3. U.S. Surgeon General.
4. Secretary of state.
5. Democratic congresswoman from California.
6. Illinois congressman, speaker of the House (Republican).
7. Illinois congressman, chairman of Judiciary Committee (Republican).
8. Former head of Red Cross, candidate for GOP presidential nomination in 2000 before dropping out of race.
9. Secretary of Veterans Affairs.
10. Texas governor, running for GOP presidential nomination in 2000.
11. President of the NAACP.
12. Chief justice of the United States, presided over President Clinton’s impeachment trial.
13. Senator from California.
14. FBI director.
15. Republican senator from North Carolina.
16. Secretary of the Treasury.
17. Senate majority leader (Republican).
18. Former Democratic senator, running for Democratic presidential nomination in 2000.
19. Minister, 1960s civil-rights activist, slain in 1968.
20. Republican senator from Colorado, American Indian activist.

Identify these international figures:
1. Tony Blair
2. Slobodan Milosevic
3. Saddam Hussein
4. Boris Yeltsin
5. Gerry Adams
6. Nelson Mandela
7. Benjamin Netanyahu
8. Osama bin Laden
9. King Abdullah
10. Jiang Zemin
11. Mikhail Gorbachev
12. Jacques Chirac
13. Yasser Arafat
14. Kofi Annan
15. Elie Wiesel
Answers:
1. British prime minister.
2. President of Yugoslavia.
3. President of Iraq.
4. Former president of Russia; resigned New Year’s Eve 1999.
5. Sinn Fein leader.
6. Former president of South Africa.
7. Israeli prime minister.
8. Suspected terrorist, wanted in U.S. embassy bombings in Africa.
9. King of Jordan.
10. President of China.
11. Former Soviet president.
12. Prime minister of France.
13. Palestinian leader.
14. U.N. secretary-general.
15. Nobel Peace Prize winner, Holocaust survivor.

Identify these figures in the sciences, math and
health:
1. Sigmund Freud
2. J. Robert Oppenheimer
3. Albert Einstein
4. Max K.E.L. Planck
5. Marie Curie
6. Thomas Edison
7. Louis Pasteur
8. George Washington Carver
9. Jonas Salk
10. Edmund Halley
11. Alexander Graham Bell
12. Albert Claude
13. Galileo Galilei
14. Jerome Lejeune
15. Charles Darwin
Answers:
1. Austrian psychiatrist, founder of psychoanalysis
2. physicist, director of Los Alamos during development of the atomic bomb
3. theoretical physicist, known for formulation of relativity theory
4. physicist, originated and developed quantum theory
5. physical chemist known for work on radium and its compounds
6. inventor, held more than 1,000 patents, including one for the incandescent electric lamp
7. chemist, originated process of pasteurization
8. botanist, chemist and educator
9. developed the first successful polio vaccine
10. astronomer, predicted periodic reappearance of comet
11. inventor, first to patent the telephone
12. a founder of modern cell biology
13. astronomer, physicist, a founder of the experimental method
14. discovered the cause of Down syndrome
15. established theory of organic evolution

Identify the following sports figures:
1. Jackie Robinson
2. Steffi Graf
3. Arnold Palmer
4. Michael Jordan
5. Joe DiMaggio
6. Tiger Woods
7. Muhammad Ali
8. Jeff Gordon
9. Arthur Ashe
10. Katarina Witt
11. Mark McGwire
12. Jesse Owens
13. Willie Shoemaker
14. Pele
15. Florence Griffith Joyner
Answers:
1. Black player who broke baseball’s color barrier with Brooklyn Dodgers, 1947; MVP, 1949.
2. Female German tennis player, won Grand Slam in 1988.
3. Golf player, golf's first $1 million winner.
4. Former basketball player for UNC Tar Heels, Chicago Bulls.
5. N.Y. Yankees outfielder, died 1999 (side note, married to Marilyn Monroe).
6. African-American golfer, only golfer to win three consecutive Amateur titles.
7. Three-time heavyweight boxing champion.
8. NASCAR driver, Winston Cup champion.
9. Tennis player, won Wimbledon, U.S. singles (died of AIDS).
10. German figure skater (won Gold medal 1984, 1988).
11. St. Louis Cardinals player who had 70 home runs in 1998 season.
12. Track and field star, won four Olympic Gold medals in 1936.
13. Jockey rode four Kentucky Derby and five Belmont Stakes winners.
14. Brazilian soccer star, scored 1,281 goals in 22-year career.
15. Sprinter won three Gold medals at 1988 Olympics, died 1998.

Historic dates:
1. What is the significance of June 6, 1944?
2. What happened on July 4, 1776?
3. What is the significance of April 14, 1865?
4. What happened Dec. 7, 1941?
5. What is the significance of Nov. 22, 1963?
6. What happened on Aug. 9, 1974?
7. What is the significance of Jan. 28, 1986?
8. What happened April 19, 1995?
9. What is the significance of Aug.6 and Aug. 9, 1945?
10. What happened Feb. 20, 1962?
Answers:
1. Allied invasion, D-Day, in Normandy, France, during World War II.
2. Declaration of Independence was approved.
3. President Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth in Ford’s Theater.
4. Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
5. President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas.
6. President Nixon resigned.
7. The space shuttle Challenger exploded after liftoff, killing 6 crew members and teacher Christa
McAuliffe.
8. The Oklahoma City bombing. 168 killed.
9. Aug. 6 — Atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima; Aug. 9 — bomb is dropped on Nagasaki.
10. Lt. Col. John H. Glenn Jr. became the first American in orbit when he circled Earth three times in
the Mercury capsule, Friendship 7.

General Knowledge and Current Affairs
1. In newspaper style, when are months abbreviated?
2. Who wrote: “Tender is the Night,”
“Moby Dick,”
“The Scarlett Letter,”
“Main Street,”
“Sister Carrie,” and
“The Last of the Mohicans” ?
3. What is Associated Press style for the Labour/Labor Party in Britain? Who is its leader?
4. Who is the prime minister of Canada?
5. Who is the U.S. secretary of state?
6. Who is the chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court?
7. Who succeeds the presidency if both the president and vice president should die in office?
8. How many members are in the Senate?
The House of Representatives?
9. Is the lessee the one who pays the rent or the one who receives it?
10. Which is longer, a meter or a yard?
11. What amendment to the Constitution is designed to guarantee a fair trial?
12. Name as many of the seven dwarves as you can.
13. What is the significance of June 6, 1944.
14. The battle of Gettysburg was fought in 1777, 1812, 1848, 1863, 1898?
15. If a story contains no names, it can/cannot be libelous?
16. How many items are in a baker’s dozen?
17. What does the term Third World mean?
18. Name the three branches of the U.S. government.
19. Who was Ernie Pyle?
20. From where are the Pulitzer Prizes administered/distributed?
21. What are blue laws?
22. What is a sacred cow in newspaper parlance?
23. Describe what the prime rate is.
24. What is libel?
25. What is gerrymandering?
26. Which is more serious, a misdemeanor or a felony?
27. J. Paul Getty made his money in what business?
28. List the capital cities of _______________, New York; , Oregon; _____________, North Carolina; _____________, Texas; ___________, Missouri?
29. What event triggered the May 1992 riots in Los Angeles?
30. Name at least three scandals that have plagued President Clinton’s administration.
31. Who was Anne Frank?
32. Name three prominent people who have died of AIDS.
What do AIDS and HIV stand for?
How is it spread?
33. Name the person who wrote “Cannery Row,” “The Grapes of Wrath” and “Of Mice and Men.”
34. Name the site of the infamous crackdown on dissenters in China.
35. Who is Eric Rudolph?
36. These cities are the capitals of what countries?
Amman
Buenos Aires
Vienna
Ottawa
Lisbon
Tehran
37. What is the Enola Gay?
38. What was Reconstruction?
39. Who is the founder of Microsoft?
40. What is glasnost?
Answers:
1. Months are abbreviated only when used with the date or the date and year.
2. “Tender is the Night,” — F. Scott Fitzgerald.
“Moby Dick,” — Herman Melville.
“The Scarlett Letter,” — Nathaniel Hawthorne.
“Main Street,” — Sinclair Lewis.
“Sister Carrie,” — Theodore Dreiser.
“The Last of the Mohicans” — James Fenimore Cooper.
3. Labor Party; Tony Blair.
4. Jean Chretien.
5. Madeleine Albright.
6. Chief Justice William Renquist.
7. The speaker of the house; Dennis Hastert, R-Illinois.
8. Senate — 100 members; House of Representatives — 435 members.
9. The lessee is the one who pays the rent.
10. meter.
11. The Sixth Amendment is designed to guarantee a fair trial.
12. Doc, Dopey, Grumpy, Sneezy, Happy, Sleepy, Bashful.
13. June 6, 1944, is D-Day.
14. The battle of Gettysburg was fought in 1863.
15. If a story contains no names, it can be libelous.
16. There are 13 items in a baker’s dozen.
17. Underdeveloped or emergent nation.
18. Executive, judicial and legislative.
19. Pulitzer-winning Scripps Howard World War II correspondent who died in the Pacific.
20. Pulitzer Prizes are administered/distributed from Columbia University, New York.
21. Blue laws are laws prohibiting business on Sunday.
22. A sacred cow in newspaper parlance is a subject regarded as above criticism or attack.
23. The prime rate is the minimum rate that banks charge their better customers.
24. Libel is any false or malicious written or printed statement.
25. Gerrymandering is redistricting of voting districts to the advantage of one party.
26. A felony is more serious.
27. J. Paul Getty made his money in oil.
28. Albany, N.Y.; Salem, Ore.; Raleigh, N.C.; Austin, Texas; Jefferson City, Mo.
29. The acquittal of police officers accused of beating Rodney King in Los Angeles (the incident was caught on videotape).
30. Whitewater, Filegate, Travelgate, Paula Jones, Monica Lewinsky and other sexual accusations.
31. Jewish girl whose family went into hiding during the years of the Holocaust. Her diary “The Diary of Anne Frank” told of her life in hiding. Her family was
found and she later died in a concentration camp.
32. Arthur Ashe, Rock Hudson, Ryan White, Perry Ellis, Brad Davis, Anthony Perkins.
AIDS — acquired immune deficiency syndrome;
HIV — human immunodeficiency virus.
AIDS is spread through unprotected sex, intravenous drug use, being born to an infected mother, blood transfusions.
33. John Steinbeck.
34. Tiananmen Square.
35. Suspect in the bombing of an abortion clinic in Birmingham, Ala., and one in Atlanta (Still at large).
36. Amman, Jordan.
Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Vienna, Austria.
Ottawa, Canada.
Lisbon, Portugal.
Tehran, Iran.
37. The American B-29 bomber that dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan.
38. The imposition of political and economic controls on the South by the victorious North after the Civil
War.
39. Bill Gates.
40. It is Russian for openness in government, a policy instituted under Soviet leader Mikhail
Gorbachev.

Who'​s your favor​ite redhe​ad?​
Fred Weasley

Of all your frien​ds,​ who would​ you want to be stuck​ in a well with?​
why a well? uhhh lets see. probably ryan, john or andrew because they're tall and i could climb up them to get out. ^_^

Rock conce​rt or symph​ony?​
rock concert. no question.

Favor​ite Soda?​
i dislike soda. but lately i've been drinking mountain dew.

If you could​ only use one form of trans​porta​tion:​
teleporter. no! no! i'd grow wings and fly places. and get subs installed. in my... uh... shoulderblades, so i could rock out while i flew places. and heated seats to keep me warm at those high altitudes.

Most recen​t movie​ you have watch​ed in theat​res?
tropic thunder (and it sucked)

Name an actor​/​actre​ss/​singe​r you have had the hots for
William Beckett

What did you have for dinne​r last night​?
uhhhh. i think i had some fro yo before my 3 hour nap, then i had coffee and a muffin. ugh. how disgustingly un-nutritious.

Do you buy your own groce​ries?​
when i'm at school.

Have you ever eaten​ snow?​
yep. we used to mix it with juicy juice to make "snow cones," and maple syrup was really good with it too.

Have you ever tried​ gluin​g your finge​rs toget​her?
no but i've done it by accident

What time do you go to bed?
uhhhh well i aim for midnight, but that generally fails. a lot. 2 is more accurate.

What CD is curre​ntly in your CD playe​r?​
!viva la cobra!

What movie​ do you know every​ line to?
the wizard of oz

What is your favor​ite salad​ dress​ing?​
poppy seed

What do you want for Chris​tmas this year?​
for my dad to cover my car insurance again. =P

What famil​y membe​r/​frien​d lives​ the farth​est from you? Where​?
anna lives in germany

Do you like hugs?​
hugs are my favorite!

Where will you be 2 hours from now?
babysitting

Does anyone love you?
nope. no one.

What are you doing tomorrow?
9 hours of class, baby!

Who was the last person you said I love you to?
probably Sares

What is the scariest thing that has happened to you lately?
having to take exit 37A to get home.... scariest off-ramp in life.

Do you fall for people easily?
merh. unfortunately.

What does your last text message read and who is it from?
Chris telling me I can get paper for paper stars at the kam man

Would you kiss the last person you kissed again?
hmm. maybe.

Are you too forgiving?
oh yeah.

You're stuck on an elevator with the person you've fallen the hardest for. What happens?
probably go ADD and press all the buttons so the lights make fun pictures lol.

Do you think best friends can be replaced?
someone else can become a best friend, but they can't become the best friend you had before. if that makes sense.

Are you going anywhere next summer?
'twould be nice but idk if i could afford it after AZ and Cali last summer. =/

Is the last person you kissed mad at you?
no.

Do you announce when you have to pee?
haha yes, in the most awkward manner possible.

Do you believe exes can be friends?
Yes.

What are you looking forward to in the next three months?
Cobra Starship show, The Academy Is... show, seeing Gill and Cara next month

Would you ever donate blood?
I pass out every time my doctor sticks a needle in me, so no.

Do you hate it when people smoke around you?
you know, i used to make a huge deal about it, coughing way harder than I actually needed to and stuff. but now, depending on the kind of smoke, i actually sort of like the smell.... o_O Not that i would DO it or anything.

What did you do last night?
slept, drank coffee, went to Catacombs, pretended to work, and slept some more.

If someo​ne liked​ you right​ now, would​ you want them to tell you?
please. it would save so much drama and stress. lol

Have you ever falle​n compl​etely​ in love?​
how will i know?

Do you belie​ve in yours​elf?​
usually. i'm pretty sure i exist today. other times i think i might be a figment of isaac marion's imagination.

Have you ever broke​n a heart​ befor​e?​
mmmperhaps.

Do you belie​ve in long dista​nce relat​ionsh​ips?​
yeah but apparently i suck at them.



Okay, Mandii. You had your fun. Go write that frickin essay on how to be a good teacher.

1:43 AM
short fiction I drafted senior year of high school, finally complete.

I woke up from a dream about you last night. I could feel a smile on the lips where you had just been, and was dismayed to realize that it hadn’t been you at all, and merely my imagination – taking advantage of my gullible mind, once again. Everything was as it would have been in life (except that the couch we were sitting on was located in the middle of a frozen pond…). Is it sad that I know you so well that even my dreams of you seem true to life?

It was just… your hand felt so solid, so concrete, so existent in mine. Your breath was gentle and warm on my cheek. Our conversation mirrored exchanges we’ve shared before. You know the kind. When I say, “Isn’t this fun?” and you shrug and say, “I miss video games,” but I can tell you’re really enjoying yourself in spite of whatever you say.

I was saddened, and really rather offended, that you chose to dissolve at precisely the moment I trusted you most. You would never do such a thing in life, now, would you? But I suppose you couldn’t help it, being a figment of my imagination and all. I suppose I couldn’t blame you, having created you in my mind, right?

I was awake for a long time after that.

I got a drink of water. Then I ate something that tasted surprisingly good for 1:43 in the morning. I checked on the cats. Even they slumbered on, mindless of my restless state. It was as though the earth, and time, and everything within had come to a halt beneath the isolating, muffling, time-stopping blanket of snow I could feel weighing on the skylight. The only evidence otherwise was the engines purring inside the cats.

It was like being the only one alive in all the world. Eerie. Lonesome. I wanted to fall back asleep, to come find you again, but toss and turn as I might, 1:43 AM did not take pity on me.

I wondered, would it be so catastrophic if I told you everything? Would that destroy the friendship I already cherish? Would I have to be content with this mirage of you… indefinitely?

Infinitely?

Dreams don’t really come true.

“There you are! I was waiting for you.”

“Waiting? For me? I’m flattered. Sorry for holding you up.”

“Don’t be sorry.”

“All right.” Pause. “Hey, let’s go adventuring! Look, we can cross the tundra! Let’s pretend we’re pirates, and global warming reversed, so the whole world froze over, and we have to fix it!”

You’re looking at me like I’m crazy. You have no idea. “Sure, okay.”

Commence trekking. You’re not saying much. That’s all right. My ears might be too cold to hear, anyway. Those icy gusts slice right through my snow gear more effectively than our plastic swords ever could.

“Hey. Is that a sofa?” I guess I can still hear all right. Good to know.

“What? In the middle of the tundra?”

“Looks like it.”

“In the middle of the tundra?”

“Let’s go see.”

“Looks like it belongs at the dump.” Obviously that doesn’t bother me much since I sink into it anyway. “Being a pirate is tiring. Let’s take a break.”

You collapse beside me. “Okay.”

“Isn’t this fun?”

You shrug. “I could be playing video games.”

Glare.

You laugh and admit to it. Your smile, your eyes reassure me that you aren’t just telling me what I want to hear.

We’ve lost our mittens. Suddenly our hands find each other. The warmth of your fingers enveloping mine sends chills up my spine. You’re looking at me, truly seeing me, and I realize: this is it. You’re going to kiss me. It took you long enough.

I feel a spark on my lip (and to think we haven’t actually kissed yet). My heart skips a beat or several.

All at once I realize I’m clutching your hand at all, but rather that hideous plushie you won me at the fair last summer. I taste blood: I’ve just split my lip smiling.

I sigh and stumble out of bed. I’m sure you don’t think of me this often. I check the little clock in the corner of my laptop screen. It’s 1:43 AM. Something about that seems eerie to me, but I can’t put my finger on it.

Instant Messenger. Yes. A brilliant invention. Conversation is the best form of distraction.

You’re the only one online.

“Trouble sleeping?” you ask.

“You could say that.”

“Weird dreams?” you ask.

“You could say that.”

“I mean, really – pirates?”

I stare at the blinking cursor, wondering if I’ve lost it. The snow drifts press in on the little bubble of the house, insulating my little corner of heaven on earth. It’s 1:44 AM.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
New poetry - Fall 2008
“Bridges”

I’ve been jumping off bridges without you,
and it’s just not the same.
I had a dream that you weren’t there. I went
out to find you in the rain.

The trail you left wound up, up and
nowhere. There I saw you, framed
like the pixels and particles you
arrange so lovingly; framed
in the lilies and the leaves and the toadstools,
framed

in a pool of water deep as the sky
and green with tree trunks mid-cartwheel.
There is something better on the underbelly of this
reflection, and I am going to find it.

Raindrops leave their perfectcircle deathnotes,
scars spinning across the perfectmirrorpool.
It can’t be summer all year round.
Soft, sunshine, don’t you make a sound.
I put my face to the dappled mirror, wanting
to see the inverted city’s wooden skyline
But I drown trying to get there.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
New Poetry - Fall 2008
Diptych in syllabics - two stanzas, each 8 lines or more, with the number of syllables in each line repeated in the second stanza. Pt. I had to be a tangible object (I chose a letter). Pt. II had to be a response to the object.

"Postcard"

Hello. I am here
to let you know that someone is thinking of you.
He hopes you’re well.
Phase one of boot camp has been hell
but he says he’ll make it through.
Hello. I am here
Because someone carved out time to write just a few
words on a page
in the midst of a loaded day
because he’s thinking of you.

Thank God you got here.
I’ve been waiting all summer long to read his scrawl,
this month the third
Since I last heard from him. His words
I draw about me, a shawl.
Last time he was here,
we sprinted on the sky. When we got tired, we sprawled
in the tall grass.
Unstop my pen. I can’t write past,
“Wish you were here. Yours always.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
New Poetry - Fall 2008
Poetry assignment I did with the sixth grade boy I babysit. I got mad because the restrictions of the framework they gave him made it hard not to end each line at the end of a sentence, but amazingly this isn't crap.

"I Am Bored."

I am bored and thinking inside the box right now.
I wonder what’s for dessert….
I hear Cobra Starship playing inside my head and
I want to have a dance party.
I am bored and thinking inside the box right now.

I pretend that I can fly. Sometimes,
I feel the clouds between my toes and
I touch the moon with my face.
I worry that I won’t be able to come back down, and then
I cry for all the people I left behind down there; but
I am bored and thinking inside the box right now.

I understand the parameters. I just don’t like them.
I say a poet should be free to touch the moon with her face!
I dream of creation beyond the walls of this box.
I try to break free, try to put an end to this over-end-stopping.
I hope the frozen yogurt is vanilla tonight.
I am bored and thinking inside the box right now.

So LJ, I've decided we should just be friends. I might not tell you everything about me, but I can still write for you.

The Assignment:
Choose a poem. Take the last word of each line and use those words at the ends of the lines in an original poem.

Where the Sidewalk Ends
Shel Silverstein

There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermint wind.

Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.

Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends.


Draft#1:
“Home is Where the Freeway Ends.”

There is a place where the freeway ends
and the Pacific ocean begins,
where the waves are capped with white,
the sand sparkles bright
with gold, and burdens take flight,
borne away by the wind.

There is a place where the ocean ends and the black
pavement begins. The road once had its bends
through the places where palms and pine trees grow,
and we drove slow.
One place remains for us to go.
We drive east to where the freeway ends.

The road once had its bends and we drove slow.
One place remains for us to go.
Although it’s no adventure, well we know
that home is where the freeway ends.


Draft #2
“To Peaceward”

There is a place where the freeway ends
and the Pacific ocean begins,
where the surf froths and crashes white,
the sand sparkles bright
with gold, and anchored earthworms take flight,
origami birds borne away by the wind.

There is a place where the ocean ends and the black
pavement begins. The road once had its bends
through the places where palms and pine trees grow,
and we drove slow.
But now, with one place still to go,
we speed east to where the freeway ends.

The road once had its bends and we drove slow,
the world setting at our backs. Peaceward we go.
We are carved in the sandstone hearts of those we know.
Home is where the freeway ends.


The rewrite is due tomorrow night. Any opinions? What are the strengths and weaknesses of each draft? What should I work on? My prof said to be "more ambitious" after he saw the first draft. Did I do it?

Last night I went to the Apple store to pick up my compy after 3 days in the Apple ER. It was wonderful to be reunited. =) The lappy has a new face now (but it's just as pretty as ever). Oh, and because it got resurrected after three days at the Apple store, the compy's new name is Jesus, pronounced the Spanish way. That is all.

Actually, I lied. That is not all. Three days without LJ at my fingertips left me with a few other things to say.

In my class about tutoring (the point of which is to prepare students to work at the writing center), my professor asked us to compare the way we write to something in nature. So I wrote:

"When I am given a new writing assignment, I tend to look at it like a dandelion gone to fuzz, and I am the wind, or perhaps the curious child, that scatters the seeds in a thousand different directions. All of these seeds have potential to land, take root, and grow. My ideas, too, can go in a hundred directions when I first start to write. I, like the wind, must choose one, carry it to its destination, and watch as the flower unfolds. The result is not a weed, but something with a raw and honest beauty to it; something wild, yet cultivated with intentional and intimate thought." So if you ever wondered how I do it.... Now you know: Drugs. ^_^

And now, drumroll please...... I have more randomtastic, tripped out, fuzzalicious dreams to share with all y'alls!

The other night I dreamed that The Academy Is... came to my school for some reason. I don't think they played a show; they were just there. I ran into Billvy. Sarah Mac and Trisha were with me. The four of us walked around campus, talking and goofing off. I told Billvy that I wanted to be in TAITV for saying the dedication to Adam T. Siska (which Sarah and I had talked about right before I went to sleep). Then Billvy wanted to take silly pictures of each other, so we did.

Then the scene changed and we were in a mall. I don't know why my dreams about TAI are always set in malls. Maybe the guys like to shop? Anyway. Billvy decided to go find the other guys and told us to keep an eye out for his cell phone, which he'd apparently lost. Later, Sarah, Trish and I spotted the phone in the lost and found. Trish knew it was his because she remembered him using it in the podcast. So we took it to give back to him. I was excited for the chance to snag his number and to sneak mine into his contacts, especially since the dream implied that we had kissed at some point. Sadly I did not get to experience that part of the dream; I just sort of vaguely remembered it happening. But for some reason, I didn't get his number right away, and when I asked Trish for the phone the next day, she said she had already given it back. =(

There is a fire alarm going off in another building, and its sound causes me severe distress. I've always hated alarms, but now I have all the more reason to. Why? Because the computer I busted on account of the last fire alarm is going to cost me 700 frickin dollars to repair.

So this evening, I was innocently working on an article for the school newspaper, the Tartan, in my room. It was about how the lounges in my dorm got turned into five-person rooms.

All of a sudden the fire alarm starts going off! And I was pissed, because I really hate getting interrupted when I'm working. Not wanting to break the flow of my writing, I decided I would take my work to Jess and Sarah's apartment until the hubbub died down. So I shut the computer and headed for Bromley, which is right next door to my building.

But apparently when I shut the computer, the plug from the power cord was inside of it. So the next time I opened the computer, the whole left side of the screen was just.... blackness and random stripes of color, with this ominous black spidery shape in the bottom corner. I freaked out and rebooted it, which only made the problem worse: now I could see nothing but my dock in the one functional stripe of screen.

I wanted to save my documents on a flash drive so I could finish the article and make the deadline, which was midnight. But I couldn't see enough of Finder to locate it, let alone drag and drop it to an external storage device. There was nothing for it. Sarah and I got in the car and booked it to the Apple store at the North Shore Mall.

I wrapped the compy in my rain coat so the rain wouldn't get it wet (sacrificing my own dryness for the baby...) and ran into the mall. Poor Sarah could hardly keep up. I was panicked, I couldn't help myself. I strode into the Apple Store and the guys in the back were immediately like, "Oh no. Is it alive?" Which was actually rather funny. The whole interaction with them was really funny, but I think I was mostly laughing out of panic. Because it turns out this whole mess is going to cost me anywhere from $380-$1200 to fix.

More panic ensues as I try to think of ways to scrape more money out of my babysitting job and writing for the Tartan. Just when I thought I was going to make it through the semester with no financial stress, this had to hit me. I'm just praying that it's a best case scenario. $400, I can afford. It'll suck, but I can do it. Sorry, Gill and Nathan, this means I will not be coming to Pennsylvania with you guys this semester. Suckfest, I know. What can I do?

Why must I break everything??? This is why we can't have nice things. I don't want to have to call my dad and tell him I broke something else. It's not that he'll be mad. He's always really chill about me messing stuff up. I just feel like the biggest loser, like he'll be so disappointed in me when he hears about it. At least all the data is safe, and I got my articles saved onto a jump drive, and I rescued all the material related to The Broken Sword. It's just the screen. If I really can't afford to fix it, I'll rent an external monitor from somewhere and use it as a desktop until I have the money. It's just that... leaving it there was like leaving my firstborn child with strangers. I'm thinking it might be healthy for me to be rid of it for a while if I'm looking at it like a human baby.... o_O

The best part of the whole scenario was the Apple store guy telling me and Sarah to go buy a couple drinks and relax about the whole thing. To which Sarah responded, laughing, "she's nineteen." And the guy goes, "underage drinking is cool. Especially on campus." We just laughed harder and said, "not on our campus....." I did get a steamer at the little cafe under Chase hall, though. They were out of menthe. I sort of had a moment of helpless confusion because what else am I supposed to order at Claymore besides my beloved mint chocolate steamer? I got a chocolate hazelnut one instead. It was mediocre. Or maybe that was just my life.

YES! I know it's hard to believe, but I am in fact POSTING a STORY that I wrote! I started it ages ago. Must've been junior or senior year of high school. I hadn't touched it since then, when all of a sudden I figured out why I had to write it, and where it was going, and that it was way more important than preparing for my Media Writing class tomorrow by reading the elusive Zinsser text, which finally came in at the book store today. So here it is! Drumroll, please:

HELLO, MY NAME IS NOBODY.

. At first we were amused by Seth’s total goofball attitude, his lack of social graces, and his few inhibitions regarding classroom conduct. At first, his lack of direction and motivation in life seemed normal attitudes for a teenage boy. At first we laughingly blamed his alternating hyperactivity and exhaustion on obsessive video gaming habits and a fictional addiction to Mountain Dew. At first, we poked fun at him for the way his shoulder blades stuck out like little wings that never got the chance to grow.
. All that changed when I “adopted” Seth.
. Seth was in my journalism independent study first semester of senior year. He was, in fact, the only other person in my journalism independent study. Consequently, I learned a lot about Seth just from working overtime on layout. I couldn’t believe how little I actually knew about him. We ate lunch together with a few other guys and girls, drove around town listening to ska and reggae music with that same small crowd, played some video games in our spare time – but what did I know about his life? Nothing.
. In Journalism, I learned that Seth’s parents were separated. He lived in town with his mother, while his father lived upstate – far enough to be forgotten for the most part, but close enough to stop by and stir things up whenever Seth and his mother least expected it.
. I had never met either of Seth’s parents, but from what I could tell, well, let’s just say that the irresponsibility and quirkiness we all knew and loved in Seth were not unprecedented by any stretch of the imagination. More like “inevitable.”
. His father spent his free time (which he had in abundance, as he was unemployed) on eclectic projects. He was big on “routine” home maintenance – that is, hollowing out the walls so he would have somewhere to hide his valuables, which consisted mostly of comic books but may have included several thousands of dollars in cash. He was also fond of elaborate culinary endeavors whose products he rarely consumed, but rather concocted in bulk as though for a huge, imaginary crowd. In Seth’s own words, “the man is definitely not all there. Christ, he gave me a power drill for my fifth Christmas.”
. Meanwhile, his mother scraped up enough money working at a nearby factory and performing various odd jobs in the community to pay rent on a townhouse each month. Because of her erratic and time-consuming schedule, she was rarely home.
. Second semester rolled around. Once again, Seth and I were the only students in fifth block Journalism independent study. The more time I spent with him, the more I tasted the off-color, bitter, lonely flavor of his life. He didn’t let on much – I mean, when he told me about his family, he stated things as cold facts with a practiced indifference and discussed their abnormalities as though they were some kind of joke to be laughed at.
. And I played along. I laughed. I didn’t know what else to do. He seemed okay with the way things were. I got the feeling he didn’t know any other way of life existed. The best thing I could do for him was to continue being his friend in a school that, with the exception of the five others who ate lunch with us, left him to fend for himself on the outskirts of high school society. The most I could give him was a companion when he was comfortable being the odd one out because no one ever let him in.
. And that was all.

. “Adelaide.”
. “Yep.”
. “Could you… uh….” He tapped the keyboard lightly, uncomfortably. “Could you come to my house and help me do my laundry?”
. I had to laugh. “Do your laundry? Where’s your mother?”
. I regretted that comment the moment it passed my lips. I kept forgetting that things didn’t work that way in Seth’s home.
. Seth shrugged. “She went away. On business, I guess.”
. On business? What business? Factory workers don’t go on business trips. There was still so much about Seth’s family that I didn’t know. Like why his mother would leave a kid like Seth to look after himself over an extended period of time. Though it sounded like Seth knew no more than what he’d told me, and I couldn’t hold that against him.
. “When will she be back?”
. Seth shrugged again. “Dunno. But my laundry and dishes are piling up, and I’m hungry.”
. I’d developed a soft spot for Seth, and he didn’t need to add “I ran out of ramen” for me to agree to go help him out.

. I waited in the parking lot after school. Seth didn’t drive. It wasn’t that he couldn’t if he wanted – he just hadn’t gotten around to getting his license.
. Seth would be nineteen that summer. I figured it was about time he started taking care of himself, especially if his mother made a habit of up-and-leaving for indeterminate amounts of time. Call it maternal instinct, but I was ready to take on the challenge of preparing this kid to face college in less than a year.
. “Your car smells like a box of crayons,” Seth commented as he ducked into my 2003 Volkswagen Golf.
. “Just what I needed to hear.” I checked the rearview and backed out of my parking space. “Look, I got it used from this eclectic little old lady. And the air freshener is pine.”
. “I didn’t say it was a bad thing.”
. “All right.”
. Seth played with the knobs on the radio while I dreaded the state of his house. I’d never been inside before, though I’d seen the place when our friends dropped him off after long drives and Denny’s runs. Parking on the grass (the driveway was full), I couldn’t help noticing that the townhouse seemed a lot bigger from the perspective of a housemaid.
. “Come on,” Seth said, popping out of the car like a Jack-in-the-box. “We can just go in through the garage.” I followed him tentatively. The garage didn’t look too bad. But that didn’t necessarily indicate anything. Maybe Seth never made it out to the garage with his trash.
. Seth crashed through the door without holding it open for me, and I tripped along behind him. Yes, the garage had been a poor litmus test for what lay inside. I tried to pretend it didn’t smell too bad and waded to the kitchen through clothes, soda cans, junk food wrappers and other debris. I had to ask: “How do you live like this?”
. Seth shrugged and laughed. “It’s easy. Too easy.”
. I sighed. “All right. Let’s start with laundry. Do you have a basket?”
. “…Basket….”
. I looked around and found a basket on top of the washer machine. “Put your dirty clothes in here,” I said, passing Seth the basket. He looked sheepish. I sighed in exasperation. “Okay, I’ll come.”
. Like scavengers, we rooted through the carpet of crud. I wasn’t too picky and let him judge what needed to be washed without commenting on what was left behind. He must have owned as many pairs of jeans as I did. And as many shirts, and as many pairs of underwear – which is especially scary because I have this weird compulsion that my panties and bra must match the rest of my outfit, so I have a lot of underwear.
. “Umm… I think I need to wash these pants,” Seth said apologetically, indicating the pair he had on. Without further warning, he pulled them off and threw them in the basket.
. “Oh my God, Seth!” I shielded my eyes in horror.
. “It’s okay. I’ve got boxers on.”
. “I don’t care. Put something else on. You must own something that isn’t currently carpeting your floor.”
. I toted the overflowing basket downstairs and ran the load of laundry, showing Seth which buttons to push. “How do you know that?” he asked in awe. “This isn’t even your washer!”
. I stared at him in disbelief. “Uhh…. They’re all pretty much the same. How about some food?”
. That piqued his interest. I dug through the fridge, trashing several leftovers that had seen better days. Seth watched in amazement as I scrambled four eggs that seemed fresh enough to eat. He remained oblivious to my requests that he hand me a spatula or a plate, so it was dinner-and-a-treasure-hunt for me. I threw some bacon on the side and toasted a few slices of bread. Seth wolfed it all down while I loaded the dishwasher.
. “You’ve got to rinse them before you put them in the machine,” I explained.
. “Mmhmm,” Seth said around the largest bite of eggs and toast I’d ever seen anyone take.
. “Wanna help me get some of this trash out of here?” I asked when he was done.
. He looked at the wrappers, cans and pizza boxes on the floor. “Looks all right to me,” he said calmly. I noticed he still wasn’t wearing pants.
. I snapped. “Seth, I’m not your mother! I don’t mind helping you out, but God, you’re going to have to get it together! People won’t just do this stuff for you your whole life. What are you going to do when you go to college next year?”
. “I guess I’ll figure it out when I get to college next year,” he said, pairing the statement with his classic reply, the shrug.

. Going to Seth’s house after school became routine. I got the house looking habitable again within a couple of days. But the routine stuck even after his mother returned from whatever “business” trip she’d been on.
I look back fondly on those afternoons of studying for my AP Literature test while he destroyed boss after boss on his Xbox. Most days we had dinner together, even if it was just something dumb like peanut butter and jelly. Our friends liked to tease us, saying that I might as well just move in because we were more or less married anyway.
. “You should,” Seth told me sometimes. And sometimes I wanted to. I felt like he needed me there while his mother was working, and the more time I spent at his house, the more I realized that she was always working.
. Springtime flowered all around us. Unfortunately, that meant exams. I’d never had such a stressful birthday as that May morning when I took the AP Literature exam. When I stumbled out of the testing room, bubbles swimming in front of my eyes, Seth was waiting for me.
. “Happy birthday,” he told me. I was flattered that he’d even remembered. “Can I take you to lunch?”
. “Seth, we always go to lunch together,” I mumbled.
. “I mean, can I take you out to lunch?” he corrected.
. Out to lunch? That definitely was not allowed, and I said so. In twelve years of school, I had never cut a class, never left school grounds without permission, never taken any chances with the administration. Why should I start now?
. “We have Journalism after lunch hour. Let’s go then.”
. He was so persistent about it that I agreed. Lunch break, although it had never provided enough time for me to eat, stretched out like Laffy Taffy that day. I was famished after my exam. I couldn't help thinking, Seth had better something really good in mind.
. As soon as the bell rang for fifth block, we signed out on newspaper business and headed for the parking lot.
. “This way,” Seth directed.
. “My car’s over there. Where it always is,” I said.
. “But we’re not taking your car,” he said with a grin. He reached into his pocket and dangled a set of keys in my face. “We’re taking mine.”
. My jaw dropped. “You got your license?” I squealed. I hated the sound of my voice just then. It sounded like it belonged to a silly fangirl, not an almost-high-school-graduate. I blushed.
. “It took me like, three tries…” he confessed. “But I got it in time for your birthday!”
. “This is so exciting, Seth! Where are we going to go?”
. “Well, since I emptied my life’s savings account to buy this car and have about ten dollars left to my name…. In ‘n’ Out?”
. That was so typically Seth. He drove us there in this clanking garbage can he appropriately called “Brown Car,” which was covered with more dents than paint and was missing the left mirror. He bought my burger and fries. It was delicious.

. My phone rang early in the morning the day of graduation. I knew something had to be wrong the moment Seth’s name appeared on the caller ID. Seth did not make phone calls, not even to me.
. “Adelaide?”
. “Yeah.”
. “You’re not going to like this,” he said. The static was heavy: It sounded like he was somewhere really noisy.
. “Where are you? I can barely hear you.”
. “I’m in the back seat of my dad’ car. He’s got the radio up really loud. I don't want him to hear me talking to you, else I’d turn it down.”
. I swore. “What the hell are you doing in your dad’s car? We’re graduating today!”
. “I’m not,” he said despondently. “My dad wants me to move in with him.”
. I was enraged. “And he won’t let you get your diploma first? What kind of father does that?”
. I could almost hear him shrug in the silence at the other end. But his answer surprised me. “I don’t know. I want to be there. I was always the Nobody people didn’t expect to graduate. I wanted to prove them wrong.”
. I couldn’t speak.
. “Adelaide?”
. “Yeah –yeah, I’m here. What do I do?”
. “Do?” he asked, bewildered. “Why would you have to do anything? I was just calling to tell you I wouldn't be there. And congratulations, since I won’t see you later.”
. “When will you see me?” Suddenly that question seemed more important than Seth graduating or me being at the ceremony. It’s strange the way habit works on our minds. After seeing him almost every day for the past six months, just the thought of life without him left me feeling aimless and hollow.
. “Hopefully soon,” he said. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll dig some of Dad’s cash out of the walls and buy a train ticket home.”
. “Promise?”
. “I’ll do my best.”
. “Promise.”
. “Why is it so important that I promise?”
. “Because,” I said. “I need you here.”

Yes, I totally stole the name "Brown Car" from Allison.
And yes, I had a friend who made me do his laundry, and yes, he ended up walking around his house in boxers, which was really awkward at the time but now I really just laugh every time I think of it. My home friends probably know who I mean. ^_^

Writing for the Media:
"Suzanne, will you read next please?"
"I'm Amanda."
"Oh....."
It's okay. I'm used to it. My mom's friends all think I'm "Sue" when I answer the phone.

Poetry:
Stevick didn't photocopy my poem with the rest of the class's, which I wouldn't mind except I don't want him to think I never turn anything in, and I didn't email the first assignment. I didn't know we were supposed to. I didn't read the email asking for it until after class let out. So I was extra careful to send this one in plenty of time for the deadline, and somehow...... it still disappeared.

I had a 3 hour class at 9:45, which let out after an hour and a half, which was how long it took us to go over the syllabus. The whole time I stared at this kid who looked like Sisky (from The Academy Is...) and tried not to laugh that his name was Bill..... same as the lead singer for TAI. =3

In my time off I drew a new map of Myriad that worked out better with the storyline I mapped out last night. It also showed more details and names of places on the mainland.




Then I had Media Writing, 1:15-2:50. Then Poetry, 3:00-5:00. Next I'm going to my applied Communications meeting, which is essentially the same as film club but I get credit for it. That's from 5:45-7ish. I was supposed to brainstorm ideas for a documentary this summer. Didn't do it. I'm not big on documentaries. As Robby has said, real life is just so boring! "There aren't any werewolves!" But last night I thought of something that would make a really interesting documentary: synaesthesia! Remember when I went on and on about that last spring? There's a documentary I'd enjoy working on!

At 9 I'm going to the meeting about the school paper. I'm not a noobie so I don't have to, but I want to make sure nothing's changed since last year, and I want to meet my editor in person.

I'll sleep well tonight.

I’ll put the emphasis on the evidence, begging for the proof.
Sometimes the hardest thing to believe is the truth.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I asked God for the chance to do things wrong. I wanted to come to him the way “real” sinners do, desperately needing his redemption. This was probably foolish of me, but it was what it was, and I wanted it. Because if one does nothing wrong one’s whole life, then one does not need God, and I wanted to need him. I wanted to feel that need for him. And then I wanted to feel anything at all, and that led me to do things wrong. Isn’t it funny how God can give us exactly what we ask for?

I am only a small, lost little girl. The older I get, the littler I realize I am. I realize that I am not going to grow any bigger, and I am not going to find my way. Sometimes I’ve wondered if there is even any way to find. Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about a world in which God did not exist. In some ways it would be liberating: We could do whatever we wanted, no guilt! The Bible says this isn’t true freedom, but in a world without God, what the Bible said wouldn’t matter. I am not saying this is the right way to look at things, only one way to look at them. I do not think it is the right way.

I’ve been feeling aimless since I started thinking like this. In a world without God, what am I supposed to live for? What’s left that even matters? Love? But then, without God, what is love? Do we expect to love by ourselves? We can’t do it. Most people in our culture don’t even believe in love anymore. The young and idealistic do. The couples celebrating their fiftieth anniversary do. But so many of those in between just can’t fit it into the routine functioning of the world. They just don’t see it there. And without God, there is nothing to see.

Here is what it comes down to. I cannot cope with a world devoid of love, and I do not wish to cope with a world devoid of God. There are things I can never see with my eyes, but it wouldn’t be faith if I could. Anyone can believe their eyes. It takes something different to believe your heart. I am still learning this. Sometimes I am still dumbfounded by what my God has done. I am human. Perhaps I am wrong. But I would rather be happy than right.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"The essence of prayer is song, and man cannot live without a song." ~ Heschel

Savior
He can move the mountains.
My God is mighty to save.
Forever
author of salvation
He rose and conquered the grave.
Jesus conquered the grave.

This is not to say that these are all marvelous poems or anything. I just felt like posting something. But yeah, input on these would be fab. I always like input, even if I don't really like it, you know what I mean? ^_~

“Faraway” (Spring/summer 2008)

Faraway cars pass on faraway roads.
I in beauty’s realm repose.
Yellow birds dart chirping past.
Bright ghosts do haunt this frosted glass.
Oh, warmth’s embrace! Oh, sunlight’s kiss!
Who contrived an eye so blue as this?
A robe so green? A cheek so smooth?
What accident spilled starlight in this tiny ocean’s grooves?
What mind imagined bobbing birds of light?
Blazing diamonds crown each ripple bright!
A faraway note in a faraway steeple
Sounds faraway hope for faraway people;
But here am I, touching sunlight’s face
And faraway hope I now embrace.


"Faith vs. Pride" (Revised. Summer/Fall 2008. I wrote the original in high school... probs freshman year, maybe sophomore year. In that version I just.... go on too long about the same thing.)

O fallen daisy, grace my path!
Thou prey of someone’s rash attack.
Trampled beauty, all for naught:
Marred perfection someone wrought.
My heart ignites and burns with wrath.
I ponder: is this bloom, perhaps,
A symbol of the soul? A token
Of a heart at long length broken?

It’s a battle deep inside,
A matter of faith versus pride.
“Soft now, child, take a seat.”
You speak with grace. I sit at your feet.
The pearls of wisdom You impart
Fall on me like the sunshine heart
Of a trampled daisy in my path,
Igniting peace instead of wrath.


“Cold” (Song, Winter 2006/7)

Am I trembling ‘cause it’s cold?
Or because I’m cold?
Once again, it’s that season
I’m asking Santa for a reason
Why these hearts are bitter cold
Waiting for you is getting old
The only thing you give is up
I’m sorry, dear, that’s not enough.

Hold me close, just hold me close
Were we the only ones who didn’t know
That this was how things had to go?
Hold me close, please hold me close
We were the only ones who didn’t know
Were too afraid to let emotion show.

Am I trembling ‘cause it’s cold?
Or because you’re cold?
Once again, I watch for signs
For revelation in your eyes
And I can’t explain the way
Your smile lights up my entire day
But the only thing you give is up
I’m sorry, dear, that’s not enough.

Hold me close, just hold me close
Were we the only ones who didn’t know
That this was how things had to go?
Hold me close, please hold me close
We were the only ones who didn’t know
Were too afraid to let emotion show.

She says, “Nothing takes the taste out of peanut butter
Quite like unrequited love,”
And she keeps a jar in the back seat of her car,
Just in case she ever needs a taste.


“Life on ‘Loop” (Song, Winter 2006/7)

I can’t live this double life forever.
I feel caught in lies, and I sense some stormy weather.
I’m not trying to hide – just can’t decide
Which way is better?
All that I know
Is I can’t go on like this

You go around and go around
But you never seem to come around
I’ve had enough of waiting
Three years of contemplating
Would you have ever come around? Come around?
Well someone else is waiting
For me to stop debating
It’s time for me to come around and
Let you go.

Were hearts, like rules, designed to be broken?
Mine’s fading fast. I’m sick of being frozen.
Is this the hour that sets us both
In motion?
One gained, one lost –
What do I want the most?

You go around and go around
But you never seem to come around
I’ve had enough of waiting
Three years of contemplating
Would you have ever come around? Come around?
Well someone else is waiting
For me to stop debating
It’s time for me to come around and
Let you go.

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder
But yours just taught my eyes to wander
Your silence screams louder than words
Stop yelling. I already know this hurts.
I guess you’re not who I thought you were.
It’s letting go that’s so impossible.


"Mr. Fair-Play Man" (Excerpt, because the rest of it sucked hardcore. Song, Winter/Spring 2007)

Hey Mr. Breadwinner, where is your bread?
You kind of look like you’re losing your head.
Hey Mr. Fair Play Man,
I can’t tell what has happened to your plan.
We’re all grown up and acting like infants.
I could tell you what love is, and this… isn’t.

Someone told me that true love exists
So long, I’m off to learn what it is.
It’s the wide-eyed, wondering me you’ll miss,
Not this butterfly with her rebel’s kiss.

And I know now you can’t count on
The ones you love to keep things rolling along
But you’ve got to keep moving on,
Yeah I’ll keep moving on in spite of it all.

We’re all grown up and acting like infants
I could tell you what love is, and this… isn’t.


“Foreshadowing” (Spring/Summer 2007)

Now I can feel it coming on,
The way the day is signaled by the dawn,
The way a reckless leap precedes a fall:
Gravity renders it inevitable.

Yet I have no fear of falling,
And you would wonder why –
When our every moment’s spent recalling
Once-shared dreams that taught us how to fly.


"Insignificant Other" (Song, Fall 2007)

When twilight crept in
When you heard the rain begin
Did I cross your mind?
Or did my memory pass you by?

When your roommate played guitar
When you watched the falling stars
Did you think of me, back home?
Or have you left me here alone?

I don your hoodie to combat the chill in your wake.
Why couldn't you have left without a trace?

Nothing’s forever, though we think we could be.
Immortality wasn’t ours to seek.
We’ll sing the melody of a song we used to know
Until we can admit that it’s time for us to go.

I pinned my wishes to a star.
We watched it fall from your back yard.
I always thought that I knew better
Than counting on stars to keep us together.

I don your hoodie to combat the chill in your wake.
Why couldn't you have left without a trace?

Did it take you back in time?
Did you realize that you missed me?
Did the falling stars remind you
of the moonlit night you kissed me?

I don your hoodie to combat the chill in your wake.
Why couldn't you have left without a trace?

Did you miss me? Did you miss me?
Or did you just dismiss me?
Did you need me? Did you need me?
Or had you already freed me?

I don your hoodie to combat the chill in your wake.
How could you leave me without a trace?
If we’re done, then walk me to the door.
I can’t exist to make you smile anymore.


Lynn wants the moon to explode. (Fall 2007)

She’s the butterfly that needs no motive to fly,
The shooting star that needs no reason to shine….
And yet, a lone wolf, howling at a moon
That she can’t quite reach with her lasso.
A firefly, once glowing in the everglades,
Now captive to your jar as you watch her fade.

She’s giving up on promises you can’t be made to keep.
She’d sacrifice the wings you’ve pinned, all for honesty.
Silence is her sentence, but beneath those subtle words,
A shackled spirit longs to join the revelry of birds.
She padlocks the wrought iron gate as she goes.
You built it. You should have known.


VOL DU SOLEIL (Fall 2007)

Ce matin, le soleil prend la fuite.
Morning: my soul with sunlight meets.
And here, cries Fall, is sunlight that has not known
the strainer of noncommittal haze,
nor the suffocating restraint of saturnine skies.
Here, cries Autumn, oh, here is sovereignty.
Behold the commencement
To succeed the denouement.

This morning, the sun
Glanced off the steeple in the distance,
Skated across a patch of ice on the quadrangle,
Cross-hatched the asphalt with the contour of a picket fence and
Illuminated the foliage as though from within the birches themselves.

This morning, the sun
Cast a shadow alongside the coneflower
(one stalk,
one ring of vintage Tokyo violet,
one eye that sees more than I)
that always nods when I pass.

Oh, yes, I forgot to post about my wonderfully epic birthday celebration. First my mom called and had everybody in the house sing to me. This was actually a surprising number of people, including my youth pastor's wife, who made sure to tell me that she met my youth pastor when she was nineteen. "So this is the year to be on the lookout for cute boys," my mom added. Good grief. Isn't every year? Bahaha.

Then Megan from camp brought me cake after she got out of school. It was fantabulous. Frosting is a beautiful thing. She probably could have brought me a can of vanilla frosting and I would've been just as happy, but probably a lot sicker, too.

At five, Jess, Sarah (Taz), Karmen, Aaron, Dave and I took the train into Cambridge. It took for EVER to get there. Driving would have probably taken less time, buuuuuut I would've gotten completely lost. We ate at the Blue Fin, a Japanese restaurant at Porter Square that Trish and I frequent. We also frequent the grocery store there for the amazing Japanese candy and the little shop with all the Miyazaki plushies, but we didn't have time for that the other night. Anyway, what I wanted the most was mochi ice cream (which is this yummy invention that involves ice cream wrapped in a flavored rice cake. It's sort of like daifuku, but if you know what daifuku is, then I probably didn't need to explain mochi to you either XD). And the Blue Fin brought me mango mochi ice cream with a candle in it! It was adorable. And delicious (says Guy Ripley... O_O).

I grabbed some bubble tea on the way out and nearly killed Dave with it. Apparently he didn't realize that the tapioca pearls go up the straw. Which is silly, because why else would they give you such a big straw? But yeah, that was amusing. We had to be back on campus for hall meetings at 9:30. Honestly, I would've skipped but financially I couldn't afford to - it's $10 per meeting if you miss it! Then I got really flipping mad at the hall for scheduling the meeting when they did. As if it wasn't already in the way of me going out for my birthday. When I got back to my room, I saw that I had missed a call from Joe by FIVE MINUTES! And I haven't heard his voice in three months because he's been at the Coast Guard Academy, and the stupid floor meeting made me miss it! At least he left me a voicemail. But it's not the sameeeeeee *big fat emo tears.*

Then my floor fed me brownies and ice cream. By this point I was about ready to explode, so I insisted on taking a walk. Aaaaand then came the thing with the car and the bushes. Clearly turning a year older had absolutely no effect on my maturity level. Good to know.

My first day back here, I met some new friends through John, my tall, frisbee-wielding, bathrobe-wearing, guitar-playing pranking buddy. One of them, Aaron, is big on walking around randomly at night, which, wouldn't you know it, is one of my favorite things to do. I am very deprived of this simple pleasure of life when I am home, as my family thinks walking around at night is sketchy. In Coho. Rofl.

The first night I got back, we took a walk down Grapevine and found a sign for a cemetery I'd never known existed. We both decided we were up for an adventure and followed the signs to this lovely open field, which narrowed into a drive, which narrowed into a tree-lined path with no streetlights. Said path was peppered with cold spots. Reeeeeally creepy. Then we got to the actual "cemetery," and it was like, three headstones, one of them with a candle in front of it that I tried to convince us both was a will o' the wisp, and a random house. Yeah, not such an adventure anymore. It was exciting for those first five or ten minutes though.

Last night was more exciting. Sarah, a.k.a. "Taz," came with us this time. We walked all the way into the next town (but when I say ALL the way, I really mean that it took us about 15 minutes to get there). We were on the lookout for another adventure, but all we found were houses. Then we came to an intersection that had a couple of little islands in the middle of it, and Aaron goes, "Wouldn't it be funny to hide in those bushes on the island and jump out at oncoming cars?" And I go, "Yeah! Great idea!" Sarah was just like, "oh Lord.... I'll be over there...."

So Aaron and I crouched behind this bush and waited for a car, then jumped up, waving our arms around like lunatics. Mind you, we didn't actually go out in the street or ANYTHING. But this car STOPS, and the two of us choose the darkest looking street and take off down it. It was hard to tell what the car was doing, but it definitely looked like it was pulling around the island to follow us. I thought we were doomed. I thought they were going to call the cops on us. I don't know what I thought. It's not like we actually did anything bad, but this is the way my mind works under pressure, apparently.

Tonight it was me, John and Aaron going spooning. Which is not exactly what it sounds like. Sorry to disappoint. I know all two of my readers were hoping for a little more drama than this. Spooning is simply a euphemism for "pranking." First we took all the plastic spoons from the dining hall, a daring feat since it was earlier than we usually go spooning and there were still lots of people around. John and I discussed staging a hold-up at Denny's to get spoons next time. It might have been more subtle. (We also talked about spray painting spoons with neon paint and sticking them out of his head like a peacock, but we'll leave that one alone.)

Then we make the trek to Woodland, which somehow doesn't seem half as long when you're not actually going to your car. We stuck a spoon under the windshield wiper of every car there. Or almost every. We would have gotten them all if John hadn't put like 10 in this Jeep that was wide open to the world, but it was worth it: he put spoons on the windshield, all four seats, the steering wheel, and the spare tire. Four of them on the spare tire. It was hilarious.

I always wish I could see people's reactions to our little pranks, but alas, our work tends to get undone by the Go-Po before anyone can appreciate it. I think this one might actually get people talking though. I just want to hear ONE person reference it in passing. Just one.

So I am nineteen today. I can't really think of any songs to usher in this new year of my life. "17, 18, 19, routine...." Ugh, no, not that one. Anything but routine. Oh, well.

This means I've only got one year left as a teenager. And that makes me sort of sad. I feel like these past couple years have been what being a teenager is about, but before that.... I don't know what I was before that. A work-a-holic or something. Anyway, I'm happy to be nineteen because it is SUCH a better number than 18. It's odd AND prime. Good things are going to happen this year...... I'm really weird, aren't I? But I don't know, it's always nice to have that hope that the best is yet to come.

And this year IS going to be good! At least this semester is! I only have classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays (and one for 3 hours on Monday nights). So, I will have LOTS of time to work on my fantasy book, The Broken Sword. MAYBE if I'm REALLY having a good semester, I'll even post excerpts! But ONLY IF PEOPLE START COMMENTING! Bwahahaha.... bribery... I love it. I also need to get a job. I've got one month of car insurance covered. That's my birthday present. My dad told me he feels weird not giving me anything tangible, but I'm so stoked to have my car on campus that it really doesn't matter to me. I'm gonna sell $200 of meal points to cover October. After that, I really WILL need to be working. That'll suck, but I guess I can't complain. I have the easiest schedule in life and I'm still scraping together 15 credits for the semester. That takes skillz, yo. =P

Okay, off to make The Broken Sword be even half as epic as LOTR.

It's been a long time since I posted anything substantial. Goodness, I spent an entire week on the West Coast and never said a word about it. And there are many words to be said. But for now, these one will have to suffice:

“Nothing is so Beautiful”

I’ve never seen so much nothing.
Our headlights flicker against the tombstones of a ghost town,
Pale widowmakers poking out of the plains
like so many toothpicks.
The highway disappears beneath our wheels.
We leave no trail.
Nothing is so beautiful.

We watched the stars fall over Flagstaff,
then flare up on the flat horizon
where the burnt moon balanced,
an orange on a string.
Nothing is so beautiful.

The dawn broke on the canyon’s rim.
Its yolk ran into the crannies and crevices of rock.
To think that someone saw this first!
On the shore of a sunflower sea,
Far-off mountains reared their rocky heads.
Someone slashed the plateau and it bled into the hills.
Nothing is so beautiful.

The rusty smokestacks of Sedona
aspire to be towers and turrets, floating in the sky.
Wind and water shape the places we go.
Why not me?

Today, stuff happened. Nothing monumental or anything. I didn't win the lottery or meet my future husband or anything. But I ate Thai food. Then Trisha's car failed at life and her mom came to put in new brake fluid, which did nothing to solve the problem so she called AAA. Meanwhile, Thai food had been lunch at like 1:30, and it was now 4:30, and Chris demanded my presence at her house. Well, I say that like it was forceful, but she's too cute to be forceful. I guess some people were over there and I HAD said I would go, but I was a little bit stranded. So then we took the car Trisha's mom had come in, which was actually her father's car, and yeah it was complicated but basically the only functional car that Trish is supposed to drive got taken on a road trip by her dad and her brother, so us taking this one was kind of a no-no. She dropped me off at Chris's house and junkfoodage and videogamage ensued. And stickerage!! Oh my god she has soooo many stickers! Sparkly ones, squishy ones, and all of them adorable because they were Japanese. So we put them all over EVERYTHING. Phones, iPods.... My iPod now looks like this:




Oh and at Chris's house I discovered some wonderful items of life. She had a Picchu soap dispenser. A SOAP dispenser! I want one! And a Totoro washcloth hanging up in the bathroom. Send me to Japan, please.

Then I got Rob to drop me off at Trisha's house for our "unbirthday" celebration. My birthday is in 2 weeks, but this will cover it since we won't see each other again before then. So I got birthday presents AND unbirthday presents. AWESOME! And I got her this splitter from the Apple store. It lets you plug in up to 5 pairs of headphones, or a second iPod so you can create mixes, which is one of her favorite things to do. So that was her unbirthday present. She made me a 30-page coloring book using scenes from The Academy Is... Television. It's fantastic. And she crocheted me a purple penguin named Mochi and bought me Japanese candy and a sweet keychain and wallet from Korea. She's so elaborate about birthdays. I'm totally not that cool. I don't have a ton of money OR time on my hands, which makes things difficult. But I shall remember that she deserves an awesome birthday present this year. Something homemade, I think. Like that Anime card I promised her forever ago. All right, way to be a lamesauce friend, Mandii. -_-

My sister and I went to Derby Street so I could buy a book for school and an unbirthday present for Trisha. Then my dad came and met up with us for dinner. On the way home, my dad was ahead of me most of the way. I was glad of this because I hate driving in front of my parents. I feel like they'll judge my driving. He was going kind of fast, and I started to worry that he was testing me, like if I kept up then he'd lecture me about going too fast or something. Finally I lost him at a stop sign and I just sort of let him get ahead. But then I went by this turn-around spot by the side of the road, and he was pulled over in it, waiting for me to go by. I was like ohhhhh shoot. Now he's going to follow me to make sure I don't speed. *Slows down even more.* Then I lost him, and I started to wonder what exactly he thought he was doing.

Turns out he noticed the car behind me tailing me. I didn't, because I'm used to people being that close behind me, since I drive relatively slow for a Massachusetts driver. Well, he started tailing that person so close that the guy pulled over and got out of the car and started yelling at him. My dad was like "Oh yeah? Well YOU were tailgating that person." The guy kept denying it. My dad finally goes, "Look, that's my daughter, all right? And if I have to get out of this car, it will not be pretty. So get in your car, and drive away, and stop tailing people."