have a spooky weekend.

walking to teach my labs this morning, though I was behind schedule...

my old econ TA found me taking a photo and said "you know what they say about red clouds in the morning don't you?"

"take a photo?"

"red clouds in the morning, sailors take warning."

what about red clouds in the morning on halloween?

this situation.

today I felt sad. you know those days when nearly any thought makes you tear up? today. at about midday, I was walking on the Secret Path, when I thought "I am sad today." making my way from the Great Staircase over to the Twilight Zone, I ran into an old friend. John. I was so glad to see him--though I probably didn't show it at all. afterwards, continuing on the HFAC, Carl introduced himself. he told me he tries to meet at least one person per day. he's from Granstville and asked me if St. George was growing pretty fast. afterward, I ran into Marcus--an old acquaintance. we only said hello but it his blue shirt made me think of the blue sky and how incredibly blessed I am. I often use the word lucky to avoid the word blessed. I know what I mean when I say lucky..I mean blessed. I know it's not luck.

I hate myself for being so blessed. I don't deserve it. the opportunities I've been given are tremendous--whether it is the opportunity to meet with brilliant minds in an intimate setting with 20 other brilliant minds, or the opportunity to talk openly and intelligently with girls my age about politics and moral issues; or the opportunity to run into John or Marcus or meet Carl, or the opportunity to encounter the past acts of someone else, like small green fruit lined up on the edge of the planter--I want to invest myself in these things. where will I have made my mark?

I hate that I've made mistakes. and that I'm going to make them more. I don't hate mistakes because I am a perfectionist--I don't think I am. but I am just disappointed in myself for having made them. for not knowing what to do next--it will almost inevitably be a mistake. and I'm sorry. a lot of mistakes I have made have cost others--and I hate that too. but not as much as I hate it for myself.

so the day that was sad and then cheered up, is again sad. I feel teary. and I feel grateful for my luck. but I feel disappointed that I'm undeserving.

happy Halloween.

ocotber 30.

this tree whose leaves are on fire is right on my way home. the weather has been delightful lately, by the way.

ivy loves byu.

this girl is going places. go cougs.

farmer's market.

three weeks ago, meredith took me to the downtown farmer's market here in Provo. and two weeks ago we made the venture to Salt Lake for their last week. I am so sad that I didn't go more often. I love love love them. and I love blowing wads of cash at them. this past weekend I went down to St. George and its still flourishing down there. I'd been to St. George and SLC before. honey is my favorite commodity. isn't it so beautiful? also, the Salt Lake farmers market has so many dogs. who knew? now I'm just sad it's over. does anyone know any cures for the lack of a farmers market during the upcoming seasons?

drawing class.

early drawing class--about 8 am. I don't think they're drawing that renaissance/hebrew tent thingy. in front of the SWKT. (pronounced swickit)

love hurts.

I just love the way they think about things. could be yours for $40.

t for troy.

if this isn't reality, I don't want any part. 

fitting in. and fitting it all in.

I am supposed to be writing a one-page, single-spaced, personal essay right now. on what? anything. I can write it on anything. what kind of prompt is that? this creative writing class is turning out to be...well...not just anything. it's good but not great. and I am perusing the archives of my blog to find some inspiration on anything. and since the last 5 minutes, I am mourning.

I mourn because I have been looking through my past year at school. I have 2 general thoughts: (1) I was so young. as I look back through the posts I wrote a year ago, I feel like a much more seasoned, experienced young adult. (2) I miss the days of 5-posts-a-day and taking my camera everywhere with me. I am settled here at college, and therefore less fascinated by it. I loved--and still love--the little fish big pond. I blended in last year and that was a good feeling. mainstream-ness is incredibly underestimated. but this year...I am becoming somebody. not becoming "who I am"--but becoming somebody that has a title, a recognizable face, an eyesore--if you will. I probably have gotten slightly uglier since my freshman year (joking..but still possible), but I don't mean eyesore literally. I mean--I am fitting in less and less by achieving things. I don't like it.

as I gaze on those past posts, on this post, I think of my freshman-self as a kind of stargirl. who was absurd and bazarre--so obviously not in that way. but just in a la-dee-da way. I took pictures of whatever I wanted and walked to school 30 minutes each way. I found new places to be and new people to know. I came home and ate refried beans or Pastaroni. then, after all was said and done, I sat at my desk in my BYU housing, and blogged. I went happily unnoticed.

now, I eat out of vending machines and the candy jar in my boss's office. the first item on my to-do list is: "write to-do list." I see beautiful trees and think "wow." but do little to share or little to capture. I walk to and from school in 2 minutes flat. I talk on the phone and my face is oily. I am applying for this and fulfilling that; attending meetings and orientations and speeches. I feel too busy to make a canned-chicken sandwich. I feel good--but busy. and I look at my old self through this online record and feel I have cheated myself, I have cheated this diary of my experiences. this is my formal apology to myself. self, I'm sorry. please let me make up for lost time.

there is a need to identify: is the old college try going to be about remembering moments...or checking off a to-do list. my latter self is definitely fitting it all in--American Heritage and India and phone calls and boyfriends and papers and---everything I want to have accomplished by the time I die--perhaps I'm getting there. but what about that tree whose leaves are bright red for only a week? and how the Y stands out the best on the mountain when it is orange--not green or white. is the old college try about my resume, or about my life?

I made a goal during the summer for this semester and for the rest of my life: make conscious decisions and make decisions conscious. I think one of my most pressing fears is waking up one day and asking, where did my life go? perhaps I'll be able to come here and look.

trying.

cougars don't cut corners.
POSTSCRIPT: student bloggers feature.

fall is here.

1.
and who'd have guessed. the trees around me are on fire, and I have yet to take a good photo. over french fries and chicken wings at Applebee’s, we talked and talked of the great weather we’ve been having, all over dinner. the conversation, though, inevitably jumps off a cliff when someone brings up the day. the day is a reference to the day we wake up with a knife in our backs. the day we discover the dirty love letters that Summer wrote to Winter—every evidence of their affair makes itself known in the form of Autumn. and now, that day has come. how could this happen? we ask ourselves and consider going on a scripted talk show to play the whole thing out. Every moment we ever shared with Summer is a bitter memory. the seasons have changed, and now we wear pea-coats and walk to school with a runny nose.

2.
life has been good lately. good but confusing.

dead babies have been making appearances in my dreams lately. I turn and there it is on the ground, genderless, swaddled in a thin blue blanket. I don’t know it is dead until someone holds it up, and then it is dead. he sets it back down, and I walk, looking down at it as I pass.

"to see a dead baby in your dream,” my trusted online dream dictionary tells me, “symbolizes the ending of something that is part of you.”

the telling rings true, but as is customary with change, makes me uncomfortable. I guess I am changing.

3.
my computer died. the computer itself is being resurrected by a genius even as I write. but the life inside it is gone. 6000 photos. 2000 songs. a year's worth of college essays. all dead and buried in a coffin that blinks itself on and off again--blue folder with a question mark. 2 pieces of advice: 1. buy applecare. no matter what. 2. back up your hard drive. no matter what.

4.
I'm applying to do a field study in India. I don't know if I've told anyone that. but hopefully by Spring '09 I will be living with a family in the jewel--researching the impacts of online journalism on development among the Indian people.

5.
I hope you haven't been wondering if I still love my blog. I still do. I love it as much as ever. it just seems my creative juices aren't flowing as freely anymore. and my time each day dwindles. but I am still here. following all of you.

rush limbaugh

if I could, I would paint you a picture of the maintenance man in my apartment complex. an older man, every day I find him working on the 70's building that, in order to live in, I had to sign a lead-paint-waiver. his most recent project has been hand-painting the railings. yesterday, a faded brown. today, brown. not a spectacular improvement, but how remarkable it is to watch this chalk-haired man whose belly hangs slightly over a tightened belt, stroke the color onto the posts with a brush small enough to paint a picture.

in the afternoons outside my door, he stands on a ladder and listens to Rush Limbaugh. next to his finished pole, a small orange cone is placed with a piece of paper taped to it. "wet paint" it reads in legible handwriting.

self discovery: 11

(this really is self discovery:10. don't know how I ended up with 2 no. 8's.)

hello my dear readers. college is indeed trying me lately. I love my job. being a TA is so fulfilling and is a guiding factor in my daily life. I also love the people I work with--boss, colleagues, and students. the job pushes me and I need that. I have discovered that people believe in me and that is a good feeling. I am enjoying digging into my classes. though most of them are merely surface-skimming courses, I enjoy the wide range of information that fills me. my roommates are fabulous and we get along fabulously. I have but a few tomatoes in the fridge and what seems like a hoard of decisions to make, but really, there's only one.

and my most vivid memories are of Gram sitting on those purple couches saying "I think I'm ready to go home. I think I'd like to go home" in what was the most polite manner she could. and now she is home--though it took a little longer than she probably preferred.

but yes that one choice is here and confuses all my doings. I thought I'd settled on a decision, but doubt and question wriggle up my throat and into my mind, where the choice I thought I'd made lingers in uncertainty. and it all hangs in the balance as the auctioneer watches for the slightest raise of my bidding hand. oh how I am wishing someone would tell me just what to do. but I've researched and studied and spoken with the experts. and still. the decision I thought I made 48 hours ago remains unmade this moment.

I want someone else to make my decisions for me so badly. and this cruel discovery is that I have to make it.

today i'm wishing i had someone to talk to.

Immediately after the thought
chafes me, my mind, like an old obtrusive
metronome, lists the people

who are at my
conversational disposal. And today
I’m wishing I was Felicity—
pushing a poet’s musings
into a 90’s-esque tape recorder.
Which tape I will send

to my long-distant comrade that will not
only understand me with a god’s
eye, but will deliver advice that uncages
the nervous balloon dwelling

in my stomach.