Epidemic

Let's get one thing straight. I may not be the most popular person in the world, and I may have spent a lot of years feeling lonelier than Robinson Crusoe (he didn't seem to mind much, after all) but I have always had friends. Close friends, friends I could talk about Important Things with.
The more people I talk to here, the more often I hear "yeah, I've never had any really good friends..." Two people in my life, neither of whom I would consider myself particularly close to, have even told me recently that I am their closest friend. Me! It is flattering, but at the same time perplexing and incredibly saddening. Where is the richness of human interaction? the sharing of human experiences, joys and pains, thoughts and laughter? Where is trust? the knowledge of your friends' most mundane habits, their troubles and flaws? Where are the late-night laughter and conversations that are sacred to girls' friendships? How could someone miss out on that and not seek it? How could someone not seek to be known?
I am baffled. I was talking with a friend & mentor from school the other day, and she says she sees this everywhere in our university, and it worries her. She doesn't understand, she says, because her college friends are her nearest and dearest, and that is the pattern she has seen in most other colleges too... so what makes ours so different? A cultural phenomenon, she called us.
-which baffles me even more. I want to do something! I long for close friendships in my current life, but let's be real. I cannot be everyone's best friend. These girls need to learn to be in friendships, real friendships, with kindred spirits. I count myself privileged to have had so many good friends over the years... Annalisa. Hannah. Ann-Phyllis. Delice. Alexa. Kenan. Ashley. Angelica. Cameron. Godis. Most of these relationships are still alive, and that's not even all of them, only the deepest. I don't know who I would have become without them. So, knowing the satisfaction and solace that these sorts of friendships provide, I would like to do my best to promote them on my campus. Like I said, I can't be everyone's best friend. But maybe I can lead by example. Maybe I can make a few good friends, and be a good friend to a few people, and in so doing, provoke a longing in others to have a similar sort of community. Maybe I can encourage my acquaintances to think about their acquaintances, and whether or not they could turn them into friends. It's at least somewhere to start.

over 'n out.
E.O.

I just watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
It hurt. But it was good, too.
I'll let you know when I figure out what I think about it.
I'd seen it before, but at like... 3AM, after prom, so... haha, yeah, it totally made no sense that time around. Anyways.
over 'n out.
E.O.

Adult-ish

My newest discovery:
Being an adult and having my own place means, among other things that I can run and jump onto my bed (multiple times!), and no-one can say a-ny-thing about it. ^^
Of course, it helps to have a bed the size of a small bouncy-castle.
Oh, the joys of being a grown-up(ish).

over 'n out.
E.O.

Tonight

Tonight my head hurts, and I somehow can't get rid of the idea that my thoughts are getting fuzzier as I grow older, concepts and truths escaping me the more I chase them.

Dehydration really sucks. xD

Also... I want someone to take care of me. I want someone who has the resources to try... to want to, and to try. But is that a fair thing to ask of this world? I think probably not.

over 'n out.

Pockets! and Buttons!

And so it happens. The new school year comes, and every day I have material for a new post, I want to blog 'til my fingers ache. Fortunately for the internet, I don't. However. This, I have to write. Because you know, it's making me happy. I bought a jacket the other day from a large chain-store that shall remain unnamed. Within two days of buying said jacket (with pockets! in the right places!), the thread holding the buttons onto the front of it started to unravel, resulting in my almost-losing three of them. I decided to fix this issue. And, since the button-holes didn't look too great (read: sturdy) either, I decided to sew 'em up. The only problem was, I really didn't know how... aaand wasn't sure I even had a needle.
Fortunately for me, my roommate DID have one, and the internet can tell you ANYTHING- including, without much trouble at all, how to hand-sew a button-hole.
So what have I been doing for the past two days, do you think, instead of studying for a test*, or finishing my homework, or starting new homework, or doing laundry, or reading for class, etc? Yes. I have been sewing on buttons and re-sewing button-holes into this new jacket. It makes me feel nice and craft-y, like I actually did something with my money - after all, someone else would've just returned it, and then- what do big chain stores do with faulty clothes? throw them away? donate them to the homeless? hmm... if it's that last one, maybe I should've swapped it after all... piffle, I should've asked the attendant. Sigh. Anyway- Paradoxical, no? =) ...I just hope the rest of it isn't as flimsily sewn as the buttons were. :S
over 'n out.
E.O.

*which turned out to be the easiest test of its kind that I've ever taken, fortunately.

I'm here.

I'm here. Here to listen to your troubles, dear. Didn't think I'd be the one you'd pick to say, hey, I can't take this shit, please listen to me for a bit. Didn't think you'd see such strength in me, didn't think I'd have the eyes to see that something's troubling you, causing you to doubt yourself. But if I can, I'll help.
I'll do for you what I wish someone would do for me, ask you how you are- no really, I mean it, it's more than just a greeting, I can see that something's keeping you from smiling, so- I'll ask what's up with you, and try to help you reason through, let you know there's someone here who cares about just you.
And these new eyes I have? This new-found strength that lets me reach out? No, no, it's not my own, it's not from me. This ability I seem to have, now, comes from knowing that God loves me, somehow, and has my back, and what's more, has commanded me to love him back. So I will. I do. And that is how I am able to be here for you, and hope that you see in this love that seems to come from me that He, he loves you too.

Thank you Skip.
over 'n out.
E.O.

If I'd had a dream

Today I had a tutee who reminded me of Imogen Heap, but Chinese. It was something about the structure of her face and the way she pronounced her vowels (she had spent time in Britain- I'm not totally crazy, y'all).
So then I started to imagine, well, what if I DID tutor Imogen Heap? - And then promptly realized that that could only ever happen in a dream. So. If I had had a dream about tutoring Imogen Heap, here's what it would've looked like:

Last night I dreamt that I was helping Imogen Heap edit her paper for English class. It was hard for her, because she only ever writes in song, and she couldn't seem to get anything down in prose. She kept trying to explain to me that she needed to condense her ideas all the way into one word, and she couldn't understand why I wanted her to change "which" to "who" ... She was up a tree, she said, and needed to get down, but couldn't find the branch she came up by. Eventually, we agreed that if I told her where the button on the tree-trunk was that would make the branch she wanted come out, she would use the right word in her essay. Then she was back on the ground with me, singing something about her heart, and I sent her on her way, saying that I couldn't help her WRITE the thing, I was only there to help EDIT, and she ought to get her ideas out onto paper first, before she came asking me things. Then she suddenly had a typewriter that was typing words into the air and I was trying to catch them, like bubbles, and put them into an organized sequence... but they kept popping as soon as I had more than one.

etc. etc.

Yes. I just wrote a fictional dream. Um... ? How to explain... I don't know. Sometimes you just have to write silly things, for the heck of it.

over 'n out.
E.O.