Knick Knacks

God I hate Knick Knacks! Even the word, it's like it gets stuck in your teeth on the way out, like a seed and you spit it out. I JUST WANT TO SMASH ALL CUTE LITTLE ITTY BITTY ANIMAL FIGURINES. Just split 'em to bits.

Anyway.

It's the Eve of the Eve of Christmas. You know those movies about the insane relatives that come to your house and tell really embarrassing stories about how one parent or another almost drowned when they were four. Surprise! "So if that had happened, you would never have been born Kate." It's good to know that at least some of Hollywood is based on fact.

But to all, I'd like to wish a Merry Christmas. And to all that don't, Happy Holidays. And to all that don't acknowledge, Happy Winter Break/ Paid Holiday. And who all that... BA HUMBUG!

Wear flannel, snuggle lots, watch Elf on AMC, and go decorate a tiny sapling with one huge red ornament.

And listen--

I love you.

I'm Melting!

Wrapping holiday presents late at night makes me feel elfish.

"And then I just showed up, they were all standing there plastered, the music was terrible. So I dropped trow and ran through yelling 'I've got the GreeeeeeeeEEeeen BeaaaAAAnnnnn Casseroollllllleeeeee!!' and they were staring at that, and it was green. Hopefully they will now appreciate the Holiday dinner party."

So far, I got The Graduate! and Henna for Christmas so I can go about crossing them off my list. However, my good will toward men is slowly degenerating.

"It's like I was playing some kind of game, but the rules don't make any sense to me. They're being made up by all the wrong people. I mean no one makes them up. They seem to make themselves up."

Sincerely,
College

Don't Lick That!

'tis the season for A Christmas Story.

Day Three of being stuck at home. Not counting Wednesday, even though I should count it.

Congratulations are due, I taught myself guitar.
Every time someone else would try to teach me it by telling me what to do their instructions just sort of whizzed over my head, you could hear them, passing by as my eyes glazed over and I became internally engrossed in my own thoughts. I don't take spoken direction well.
But, ye gads! I can read guitar chords! And I even tuned the ancient Yamaha!

So, I haven't completely wasted my free time. I holiday decorated too. AND had a wild rumpus in the snow... all by myself. Dammit. But I really need to go Christmas shopping for the ones I love... most of the time. Which means a trip away from home! Yay!

My grandmother is moving in- to town- not into our home. I've never had a relative close by before. It'll be... interesting.

Speaking of Christmas, this is my Christmas list, even though it's like a week away now. Snuck up on me.

Henna

Indoor Soccer shoes that fit, my old ones are tiiiiight

Beach House CD and or Iron & Wine CD- since I'm missing those in my pitifully small collection

Skis!

Well I mean, I really REALLY need my own laptop

Snow?

The Graduate (So here's to you, Mrs. Robinson)

All Seasons of Freaks and Geeks

Some clothes! But I'd rather buy them on my own.

Peace on Earth

Good will toward men

A pet Nautilus

Tickets to go see Macbeth at the Shakespeare Theater

Curtains

The following books:
The Threepenny Opera
Water for Elephants
Pride and Prejudice and ZOMBIES
The Eyewitness Knot Tying Book -- What? Knots are... cool.
The Little Prince
Girl Who Kicked...
Girl Who Played..


And this-- Quack

Everything is Illuminated

Or it was slightly, fleetingly illuminated, a break in the clouds, the flash of a camera.

Deep breath. Done.
Prediction of snow: high.

Exams this week were hard. I was highly disappointed in myself. Of course, the irony of being disappointed in oneself is that you are the only change in your life when it comes to the will. You have to have will to do things. Things like study and get good grades. Somehow I'm losing the will. Sigh.

Anyway, Calculus and BIO 101 Exams = failure.
English, no exam --yet.
AP Art-- pretty sure my instructor wants to strangle me.

But today is another day, in which, after my Calculus exam I went home and passed out for three hours, because unfortunately I set my alarm on my phone wrong and didn't wake up to go to English. I can make it up, I just hate missing that class because it's my only surviving A. That and English is greeeeaaaat.
So I woke up, pulled my running clothes on and went for a run. Then I ran into my coach because she was running too. Went to Baine's. Hung out. Rented a ton of movies. Watched Sweeney Todd while eating chili (never EVER a good idea).
Now I just have my Shakespeare paper and a bunch of AP Art Homework to do and I'm free at last.

And, my college hunt just turned south for a little while after I got a letter from SUNY-ESF, stating that, no- I did not get in, that my application had been pulled for lack of information. Which, led to a mental breakdown for 10 minutes as I franticly tried to call the Undergraduate Office, which I finally reached and explained that I didn't realize I was missing anything. So, apparently they're reopening my file. Which is good news.

I still have the rest of Hamlet to read and I'll probably not have soccer this weekend, even though I was looking forward to it. Snow bound!

I wish that we could talk about it,
But there, that's the problem.
With someone new I could have started,
Too late, for beginnings.
The little things that made me harassed,
Are gone, in a moment.
I miss the way we used to argue,
Locked, in your basement.

I wake up and the phone is ringing,
Surprised, as it's early.
And that should be the perfect warning,
That something's, a problem.
To tell the truth I saw it coming,
The way, you were breathing.
But nothing can prepare you for it,
The voice, on the other, end.

The worst is all the lovely weather,
I'm sad, it's not raining.
The coffee isn't even bitter,
Because, what's the difference?
There's all the work that needs to be done,
It's late, for revision.
There's all the time and all the planning,
And songs, to be finished.

And it keeps coming,
And it keeps coming,
And it keeps coming,
Till the day it stops

-Someone Great
lcd soundsystem

Change of Scene!

No, really we've got to change the fucking set before the act is over...

I have a comfy corner! It's upstairs at Baine's, and since I spent all day Sunday huddled in it I now claim it as mine. I have the left end (with arm rest) of this ancient corduroy? couch, that when you sit on it sinks half a foot, creating a butt chasm. I then fold both legs over each other and rest my laptop on top. Unfortunately, I'm making due with a folding chair as my coffee table, but Generic White Coffee Mug doesn't mind. It also is set so far back in the room that only on closer inspection can you see me, tap taping away in my cute little elf shoes.

IMA MAKE PUMPKIN BREAD AND THIS IS NOT COPYING BECAUSE THERE'S EXTRA PUMPKIN IN THE FRIDGE FROM PUMPKIN PANCAKES THE OTHER DAY. THERE WILL BE NO NUTS IN PUMPKIN BREAD. YUCK.

So, also, I've been thinking about what I need in the case of a zombie apocolypse, and since I obviously have guns and ammunition I need to ensure my own safety from possibly faulty clothing.

There is no clothing at Urban Outfitters suitable for the zombie apocolypse.

Scenesters die first. People that call scene kids "scenesters" probably die first as well.

I think that from now on I'm going to buy hiking//running boots for my only footwear, because the first rule of the zombie apocolypse is CARDIO. And I really can't run in TOMS. Guess what happens to all the third world inhabitants that TOMS helps shod? THEY GET NOM NOMMED BY ZOM ZOMS. Sorry.

All houses with windows must go.

Where's the nearest CDC?

I'll need almost 200 gallons of gasoline.

And a pick axe.
ROAR.

Family Matters

Melodramatic Thanksgiving is now done.
We fried a turkey.
We killed a possum.
But, my family, is so disconnecte that we can not have a whole day together, with all of us in the same house without a mediator of a TV. We're all slaves to digital boxes. I mean, we can spend a day together, in the same house, but not without frequent outbursts of unpleasent adjectives. So if we ever became ship-wrecked like the Swiss Family Robinson, without modern technology, we would probably kill each other off. I don't know how this would ever change, except that my sister and I will probably move away from my parents, inciting a loss of mental stability as to why we didn't move back near my parents. The relationship I have with my sister, or lack of relationship will then downgrade from there, and so we'll end up in different parts of the country, with families that don't see their relatives. Just. like. now.

So, that's just what gets pushed into my brain on break. Happy holidays.

But in other news, my feet are violet. Violent violet. And really, really cold. Snuggling is now in order.

Seasonally Out of It

I habitually stare out the window during class.
The Autumn weather is going to be my Titanic. Because I can't stay inside to do school work when the most beautiful orange days are fading away. What about when it snows! I'll just have to be inside, and it will be constantly grey. Let me soak up the dirt, and the smell of tomatoes and watch the high cirrus blow across the mountains before its all covered in snow.
Snow... Ski season.

Can I handle the seasons of my life?

I had the urgency to blog because I couldn't focus on school.
Currently studying: Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Electric cars. Logarithms. mRNA. T.S. Elliot.

Currently obsessed with: Obsessions!

Ha.

I'm slowly loosing my sense of humor to my power of analyzing. Like, that area where I analyze something is expanding into the area where my tiny sense of humor is stored. It took it up! It encroached! R.I.P. sense of humor.

strA

And grab your glue gun
And grab you glitter
and grab your clay
'cause they be crafting everything up 'n here.

I feel like I have an underdeveloped sense of arts and crafts. So, when I was a kid I could just mash a bunch of little felty thiings on cardboard and I was assured no matter HOW MANY TIMES I ASKED, it looked perfect (and even then, I was such a fucking perfectionist) but now, now I have to TRY to make beautiful things. And I think about those poor souls in art school and go 'Where do they pull out this infinite amount of ability? Are their brains special? This is bananas!' And then I walk over and put a brick through their window. JK. They'd probably think its this void of a whole and keep it there for the effect when they pull out their 35 mm and start snapping pics evy'where. But I envy them boogers.

I'm stuck on college essays. Time isn't down to the wire yet, but,...yet.

If K--- drops a bomb in the woods, does anybody hear?

Before Sunrise

Daydream delusion
Limousine Eyelash
Oh, baby with your pretty face
Drop a tear in my wineglass
Look at those big eyes
See what you mean to me
Sweet cakes and milkshakes
Don’t you know me?
Don’t you know me by now?

I wish I could take credit for such a master stroke,

Aunt Jemima Puddle Duck

Here Comes the Sun Again

I hate this 'dark so quickly' jizz.
How am I supposed to run long and not get hit by cars?

I've got green tea, and I failed my Calc test and... I feel all warm on the inside.

And I meant to say, in yesterday's post--

Now that I have your attention,
let me lose it by talking about myself.

I backed out of writing a Gay Marriage (for) argument paper today.
In retrospective, I'm not sure why I would do that.
Most of the time I am directly inflammatory and though you're not supposed to approach these sort of essays with the kind of attitude that says 'hey, I'm going to be intentionally inflammatory of everyone's really backwards and conservative views', that's what I believed I would do with this. I would throw their stupid homophobia.

But, when she called on me, with my hand raised, I blurted out "I'd like to do my essay on electric cars, and I'm against them". This clearly wasn't what I had chosen to, and had made up my mind, to do. But that was what I spit out. And it got me thinking that if I can't even talk about this subject comfortably, or write a three page (three pages, for God's sake, a trifling amount) paper about it, then I am no better than the homophobics of my school. This saddens me, because I do support gay rights, and if I can't voice an opinion on it then does this make me a coward? Clearly, the electric car topic was weak sauce compared to this.

11:18

My Mechanical Toothbrush!

And other witty things that vibrate.

So now that I have your attention....
Come in for...
A Hot BOWL OF...
Soup

I'm trying to put more thoughts into blog form since it's creative/ thoughtful/ caring/ compassionate/ loving/ fondling/ getting/ a/ little/ handsy/ ach!

PUMPKIN PANCAKES and WOOL SOCKS are the only things I want in life.

If I had to give a self-description of myself I'd put in it that I'm the mounds of laundry I never do because I only think about myself and I drop the s-bomb in English.
But only when provoked.

When the cops ride behind me with their lights on I find that I get more butterflies in my chest then I whenever I talk to guys. Because, when guys are hitting on you, you're supposed to get all fluttery right?
Too bad cops are the only ones that have that effect on me.
This all sounds despicable...
if it weren't for the fact that I've had two close run ins in the last month

I believe it's true that we both hate and fear what we do not know.
Like, how I fear calculus.

Just GO with it

I'm not dead. Haha.
So, I carved my pumpkin today, and it'll be on display at Baine's. It's a wise owl.
I'm thinking snoopy and woodstock for the other giant pumpkin that's mine though.
I have a ten-o-clock bed time tonight, I've got to get back into good health.
Which isn't being helped by all these peanut m&m's and half-hearted frisbee. But, actually, my frisbee skills are improving with time. Which means rec sports in college? Probably, not. College, college is this ache in my heart right now, college....college, love me please college. I hate begging for someone to like me, but I'm doing it now.
I keep falling asleep in class and having these dreams where angry men yell at me, like taxi drivers in New York, if I ever were to drive there, that's the kind of yelling that would happen to me.
Currently reading: three books at once! Canterbury Tales-- in the analyzing process, Into The Wild --less depressing that the movie, and the Chocolate War --hoping it's not a waste of my time, I hate football.
And what I hate worse are the stupid football players that yell at the XC team while we're doing speedwork.
If I see one more thing about cathedrals, I might die.
Districts is Wednesday.
ACE is Wednesday.
Work is Saturday.
XC King's Dominion trip is Saturday.
My life is all give up and go with it.

My skin is clear, and you can see what I'm thinking.

It's been an eventful last week here on Lake Woebegone.

I can't even begin, begin to tell you about your judgement, so I'll stop, I won't let you win.

The college clock is ticking down.

The concert was spectacular. Thank God for friends.

I'll be running along to work soon.

They keep telling me not to grow up, and then other people tell me to grow up. Surely there's a Goldilocks zone? Not too hot, not too cold.

Just right.

Too cool for Mondays, since it is Tuesday

I haven't meaked out any music in nearly ages.
But, I've been trying to put together an enjoyable fall car listening, driving through leaves as they crunch, goldenrod afternoon, orange haze, pumpkin seeds in the oven, playlist.

you've got the love- The xx
jacksonville- brandon flowers
sometimes- miami horror
casimir pulasi day- sufjan stevens
heartbeats- the knife
spanish pipedream- the avett brothers
tightrope- yeasayer
once in a lifetime- the talking heads
feel it all around- washed out
you'll see it- washed out
see the leaves- flaming lips
mrs. robinson- simon & garfunkle

i'd also just like to address, for the sake of addressing, one of my dear friends and her responses in conversation with me

"Sorry I can't hang out, I have a visitation to go to"
Her:"Oh, that bums."
--yeah, it bums cause I called the man my uncle for my whole life

**we were talking about our parent's marriages, or something along the lines of that topic
Her: "Yes, my mom has taught me how good wives should be submissive to their husbands"
--My mom skipped that lesson

**And when the topic of religion comes up, all Hell breaks loose
Her: "Christianity is not a religion! It's a way of life!"
Me: "Uhmmm, right? How about those dinosaurs..."
--Actually, it is a recognized Religion by all those faiths you can't force to convert, if it was a way of life, well... wouldn't we all be Christlike?

There was a man in the front in Oakleys and work boots playing the cello with his six other identical sisters and brothers.

A small child in a backpack decided to rub theapple that was on my table. That backpack was attacted to a leash. She kept petting the apple. I lost my patience.

All around was the sound of PAWP PAWP, from the pop guns and pop explosives and popping gum.

The noise echoed up and down and around the town as I ran my way through the opening booths, the first gyro stands opening up, the smell of grease and peppers hot in the ten-o-clock air.

Lost Highway and their cowboy yodels as I squeezed lemon after lemon, like doing a fist pump over and over until all the lemony goodness was out.

Haggling with vendors.

Getting extra apples for being sweet to the farm vendors.

Feeling like a zombie as I eat my chicken on a stick and wander down through the streets, emptying their crowds as the vendors close up.

Watching the fireworks through the front windows as the street dance blared dance music and the train flew by.

Eating too many scones.

Going to the Texas Inn for the first time. I don't care how gross the cooks look, it's so awesome to sit at a counter in a real diner where they have their own language. "Cheesy plain with a Denver and an Apple" (pie), that is.

The marching band at the Teddy Bear parade.

Coming home, and sleeping it off.

"That is what to the pain means. It means I leave you in anguish, wallowing in freakish misery forever."

Running and racing are two different things.

So today, we had a tri meet against Nelson and WC and we have a double meet week, one Monday and one Wednesday, and it's pretty killer on the whole homework and staying warm and sleeping along with working a ton this week because of railroad.

But this is inconsequential.

In comparison to the fact that I MUST BEAT NELSON. They are a plague to Appomattox and our rivals in all sports and because half of their girls cross country team is composed of soccer players, it's just too easy for me to hate them. Tri meets just make it acute how close I am to them without actually being able to finish them off, like seeing how everything plays out in front of you and all you can do is run to see it sooner. Since it's just me trying to get points even though the middle schoolers beast up all the time I WANT TO KICK THEIR ASSES SO BADLY.

So, that means dropping time really fast at the end of the season, which.... hurts when I'm not properly prepared. But pain wins over seeing the dejected faces of Nelson runners ANYTIME.

:]

They were hawking my stroller. My means of transportation! Utterly upsetting! My five year old mind could not comprehend this unfair exchange of paper for a comfy hammock with wheels. I was consoled when my dad took my hand and we went to get Superman ice cream from a stand at the Flea Market, the kind that turns the whole lower half of your face blue as you lick your lips in satisfaction. Satisfied I finished my ice cream off in an unrealized lesson in life.
I watch the old ladies dragging along their grandchildren through our maze of piled high tables and trailers full of baby clothes and watch as the kids ask for the mermaid I didn't even realize we owned until my parents pulled it out of a box for the yard sale. Two quarters for a new(to them) toy. A pittance, but the lesson is passed on to the grandchild as they clutch the half woman, half fish to their chest, and just like the Ice cream the mermaid is the vessel of the lesson this time.
Some call it recycling, some call it getting rid of old junk, but the lesson is the same. Thrift. I wish it hadn't taken so long for it to sink into me, but watching unused items that my family had stock piled for our yard sale walk away in the hands of new owners I realized that a valuable lesson had been taught to me back when I was five. Because thrift doesn't only work through Goodwill or Flea Markets, it works everywhere. Saving things for the use of other people and giving to them what can be given again. Recycling the old for the new and useful to you and me. It can be almost anything, boxes full of baby clothes being resold, newspapers being recycled, collecting leaves from you town for compost instead of a life in a landfill.
My lesson of ice cream with money from a stroller and other items we had set up at our Flea Market booth that one day when I was five will be with me through my whole life. Utterly upsetting, no, completely empowering, yes! Because thrift is transferable to anything, and if you resell in the name of thrift, than you recycle, if you recycle, than you reuse, and by reusing you reduce.
Now that calls for some Superman ice cream.

The world is mud-luscious and puddle-wonderful.

--e. e. cummings

In another title, this post would be called "My Sister is a Palindrome, or might be"

But it's raining outside.


My Sister might be a palindrome. But she might not appreciate it.
I might wear my watch right side up, so that you may read it.
I might like freshly ground coffee with only honey or only sugar and half & half. Never milk.
I'm might be reading, now, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius.
I may or may not have Dyscalculia.
It might be raining outside. It might also be that my feet are FREEZING.
I might like my soup burning hot. Scalding even.
I might like you. But, I might not talk about it.
I might be in love with The Battle at Isus.
I might not be fast.
I might love the cold.
I might go puddle jumping.
I might throw Rice Krispies at you. The ones with the writable packaging.
I might sit and wonder why.

"If you want to look at my feet, say so," said the young man. "But don't be a God-damned sneak about it."

Exceedingly long title, but such a beautiful line.

Eh, eh. Being sneaky lately. Like noticing my sister's morose aura at having broken up with her 30 year old pet monkey, or, boyfriend, as he was so lovingly called. He had a five-o-clock shadow er'day, and I mean I was like "what the hell you always got to be sitting on my coach making my sister feel all loved and shit, dayyyuuummm." But love never lasts, now does it?

But let me explain about the stickers.
You see, me madre is in this Master's Program through the fine institute of ODU, which I don't actually know is fine, but they do have this fountain, which raises them up on my college application a notch. 1 or 2, actually. So, she's getting this cute little teaching degree and the teacher assigns this do-good experimental "stickers" where if we say nice things to family members like, 'nice shoes' or, 'you aren't a bitch today, it's awesome" then we get rewards! Like ponies! And carrion! And beer!
But no, we ACTUALLY have to do nice things, so that we ACTUALLY have to hang out as a family. Which is ACTUALLY always unpleasent and always ends with the oh-so-famous line (and my personal favorite)--

"Why did you have to ruin this?"

(Due to my character: a bit harsh, with overtones of sarcasm and hints of "I don't give a fuck"-especially in my earlier Kaiser Chiefs period I almost always earned this line at the end of every "trip" together (and can't you see, it makes me glow with pride))

Anyway, listening to the Pocahontas soundtrack so my running mellow isn't harshed.Peace.

Pitter/Patter

Rainfall.
And some have it right, there is nothing better than rain on a tin roof, and naps under said roof.
But, I don't have a roof like that. Mine is normal.
So, I'm in need of a tin roof to borrow, especially for rainy day naps.
Call me, I'll pay reasonable prices.
It's also in the agreement that I need a (somewhat clean) sofa, or bed, or perhaps shag carpeting to nap upon. I don't mind if it's a bit musty and smells like old books. I like that smell.
And I'll raise the price if you have a COPPER roof. 'Cause those are just awesome.
I haven't heard the acoustics of slate roofs, but I imagine that they sound nice as well.
I also like grilled cheese after napping. Or macaroni and cheese. Or cider.
Book reading is nice too.
Soft jazz and/or folk.
Snuggly socks.
Warm lighting.
A slight cold draft.
A view of a tree(s).
Yeah, I'd pay for that.

Doctor, Doctor, Give Me the News!

'Cause I've got a bad case of....
Gunky eyeballs.
See, there's this thing when I free my eyes of glasses and wear super awesome contacts, that my eyes turn completely bloodshot. As if I smoked a shit load of weed. An ELEPHANT shit load. And not only that, but it also feels as if a rather small fist, like a baby's, has come and given me a stiff right hook, right in the lookers. And not ONLY that, but it forms this lovely crud which I feel The Beatles summed up in this one lyric--
"Yellow matter custard, dripping from a dead dog's eye."
-I Am the Walrus
It's okay to cringe, it's pretty repulsive I'll admit.
So I'm wandering into my Optometrist's office for the billionth time this month (or the second, I'm not sure) and by this time the receptionist actually calls me on my phone (at school) to tell me that my mom has scheduled an appointment, just for me, as if I'm special. My optometrist and I are forming quite a repore, he asks me nothing about my personal life and I ask him why my eye is so mortally fucked up.
"I think my eye may be dying, right at the roots, you now, like when small inbred dogs pop their eyeballs out and it's tethered with that string thingy..."

"Your optic nerve."

"Oh, that's what that is. Crap, yeah, it's severing...at least, it feels like it is. Is there a cure to this disease, my diseased little, beautiful, blue..."

"Here's your prescription, now get the fuck out of my office."

"Okay. :["

Or something like that.

Also, all these male nudes in Art History are making it highly uncomfortable to sit next to underclassmen. Because they can't handle fuzzy ancient Hercules man balls. Just. Can't. Do It.

"In the Disney movie he wore clothes."

Punch.

Fall-lala-la-la

Fall is the worst season known to man, and be assured, man has known about it for quite some time. It's not just the acorns, and the gathering fuzzy little squirrels, or the whacked- out weather. It's the feel. The cold mornings where you jog down to the kitchen while Listerining and stare at the coffee pot in a confused stupor until you realize again that you're actually awake and not in one of those pre-morning dreams where you dream that you just brushed your teeth. But then you realize that you aren't in the mood for coffee, still swishing away with mouthwash BECAUSE of the mouthwash, and you can't drink orange juice, because eww, mint and orange war in the mouth. So you pull the stale coffee out of the pantry and make yourself a pot and you put honey and milk in it and it's too sweet and then you dash off to school where you promptly fall asleep in calculus because your body just won't let you sleep anymore.

This Fall it's like Summer got out its glock and concrete and took care of that whiny Autumn by throwing it in the Hudson. It's the no let off bow that will eventually break because the finger slips and it shatters into a million pieces, and not pieces of crisp 60 degree weather, but of snow. Or maybe it will never snow. It will just be a million degrees forever and the Fall will fade into brown grass with brown dogs laying brown turds in the lovely little piles of brown leaves you rake up.

And Fall, and running, makes me have these weird cravings. Like for more sleep, and friends, and olives and arts and crafts and college and electronic music which has this weird effect of being both slow and fast at the same time and I feel the need to run on and on and on and on with no commas. But I just wish it would be 30 degrees with a chance of blizzard conditions because I love the feeling cold air makes in your lungs as you run. Like you're being torn inside by multiple lumps of steel wool and it always makes me crave hot chocolate. Basically, I want Summer to end and Winter to begin. Fin.

mawage.

So, Kat's wedding was darling, completely and utterly spectacular. I'm going to fuss over it for forever with that high pitched squealing easily excitable girls do that goes something like eeeeeeeOOOAAaaaahhhhhhhHHH!!!

My Internet was down today for the billionth time so I ramble on over to Baine's to see what the general biz is and to get more understandable directions from my old stand by, Mr. Google Maps. But, he wasn't any help as is commonly the case for Appo back roads so then Dustin helps me out and by that time it's 2:20 and the wedding starts at three so I jump back over to the house, throw myself into a dress and demi heals and some handy mascara, put Lil in her kennel, kiss her good-bye (by this time my sister and parents had already gone somewhere else) and scamper off down 460 while counting the ever escaping minutes. I turn off the highway onto a back road, onto another back road, which leads to a gravel road (which is highly washboarded and as I fly down it my teeth chatter and almost fall out of my mouth), which leads to a driveway full of rocks and I'm there. But where is there? I see absolutely no tulle (which basically is the sign of a wedding anywhere) but the cars keep rolling in and I'm directed into a shuttle disguised as a mini van and driven down to a turn around that drops down into woods. There Bryan greets me, seeing as in the last 3 months or so he has been ordained, not only as the owner of the store, but also as (a commissioner of weddings...?) and will be legally wedding the lovely bride and groom. So in I go down the path through the woods, thanking my lucky stars I went out and bought a pair of almost flats before the wedding instead of all the pairs of 4-inch heels I have floating around in my closet, and I walk into a little cleared "valley", which on one side of a creek holds the wedding party and the other side holds the guests who sit upon the hill in white wedding fold up chairs as the party and band slowly trickle down the slightly treacherous path to sit under a huge and handsome, gray barked Beech.

Deja Moo and Ken and Bonnie strike up wagon wheel as Kat walks down and looks stunning, shes had the family (and minister) bedecked, not in flowers, but in peacock flowers, and all the girls in the ceremony where feathers in their hair, which I must say looks gorgeous and makes me want to rave (and copy) the whole design. The flowers are all from a friend of the family and are all wildflowers and they look delicate but not too arts and crafty and then they say their vows and they pop on their rings and doves fly out...not really, but we all get up and clap because the whole ceremony smelled like sweet leaves and cedars and everybody is hugging and the sanctuary is made of trees.

After we all hug and shake the hands of the groom and hug the bride and some of us hide from the cameras because they haven't worn a dress since the 5th grade (not me, I assure you) we all make our way up to their newly built pottery workshop that has beer and sweet tea, which by this time we are all dying for, it hasn't rained in decades, and sit in the shade. The band strikes up and a million pictures are taken and I write a message to Kat on her white board and the food is amazing, sweet couscous and grilled chicken, and barbecue because well, this is very much a southern affair. All the people fan out and the Baine's group, older and newer sit together for support and gossip and I just lean back and sip my tea and watch all the black and white clad ladies fan themselves as the late afternoon sun turns everything red. It smells like freshly brewed coffee and ladies perfume and sweat and the cold smell of clay and fresh flowers and candle wax and the band sings Sippin Cider and my other favorites and I watch as the crowd becomes steadily more intoxicated and friendly, but I have to leave and go to work and now I smell like coffee and my feet are still dirty from the wedding. All and all, a good day for the sanctity and harmonious binding of mawage.

September

Tomorrow is homecoming. It would be an oppurtune night to die and watch The Graduate and learn guitar and study. But instead I'll write a little something about sleeping.

Red eyelid mornings
in a green orchard field
10 is the Sun on it's way from far east
somewhere between flannel and sheets
orchard grass cut in hammocks
over green grass, swinging

Much too late to wake up
cover myself in grasses
and spend time watching the apples ripen
breathing in dusty, dewey alfalfa beside my bed
my mouth tasting like peanut butter

Rolling over to catch
that mocking bird twittling out
a laughing snide remark at my extreme bed head
I try to hid my eyes
behind my blood eyelid red




School--Life
"oh I'm just a failure rolling in misery

like if I was a reese cup

misery would be my choclatey covering

and peanut butter would be my soft creamy failure"

I'm waiting for my hair to grow longer now. They say it's asign of a steady relationship for a woman to claim territory over hair and then to chop off all her lovely locks. To analyze
--it could be that they want their boyfriends to worry about them.
--it could be because they want to gain power over said friend.
--it could be because their hair is hot.
--maybe the want to donate it to a good cause.
--maybe it's a war for what is mine and what is yours in the relationship.

Why do girls cut their hair?

--she wants to look edgy.
--she's tired of being beautiful.
--it's grown too long, so as they can tuck it into their pants.
--she needs change.
--it's because you have her body, but you can't have her hair.

Whatever it is, it's growing out now.

Barefoot bouncing.

You want to know what I love, sometimes, more than anything in the world?
Being alone after running, in the heat, oh the dreaded heat.
Swallowing all the water in the world in one huge gulp.
Taking my shoes, and my socks, off. Slowly.
Wrinkling up my toes so that they stretch and feel good.
And collapsing in some very cool and soft and bouncy and shaded grass.
And just laying there.
Quietly.
Without the boys team, oh the dreaded boys team.
Without the middle schoolers.
Without the goddamn freshmen.
Without music.

But then I'd get up in the morning and do it all over again.
I swear I would.


I miss playing frisbee.

--I like school this year.
Let's go color guys.

I can't capture that dusty, upward traveling light that plays and swirls the grass, and comes from the West, as the sun is one massive tangerine, plummeting from the sky.
Its all bubbly and sounds like grasshoppers.
Its the halo outline of every living being and shines through every window of every house.

Afternoon magic, Sunday night, tragic?

Second week of school, a beauty, aye?
Already have had my first meet. No jokers, I haven't quite yet, so suck it. Hard.
Suprised my coach, taking it as a good thing. Just have to keep the training coming.
AHHHHHHH SENIOR YEAR!
Attended my first actual football game. Now that, that IS tragic.
Bittersweet.
And not in the way you would think.

Summer Love Tour

A title like that conjours up those days fresh out of high school when I took a trip up to the coast of Connecticut. O.o.

No but really, it's Prairie Home Companion...you know,

radio personalities?
Guy Noir?
...Dusty and Lefty?
P.O.E.M.?

Sigh.

Hopefully I'll go and watch them, real life version. Cause Lindsay Lohan....has a fire crotch, and that's just awful.

Today I cleaned out my car
and found

-a tambourine!
-a whole three yards of bubble wrap!
-my teal duct tape!
-frisbee
-shoebox
-more mardi gras beads...really, Katrina?
-half naked Megan Fox
-books
-more books
-Big Star CD!

More Music For The Fall Playlist-

Rill Rill- Sleigh Bells
Modern Man- Arcade Fire
As Long As The Grass Shall Grow- Johnny Cash
10 Mile Stereo- Beach House
Mustang Sally- The Commitments
Porcelain- Moby
Alphabet Aerobics- Blackalicious
When I'm With You- Best Coast (conjours trips to the beach in the 90's)
I Only Have Eyes For You- Summer Camp
Cheaters- Teengirl Fantasy
Here Comes the Breeze- Gomez

Hooks

And all the poems in my brain
are slipping
too sloppy
too floppy
ultimately too ugly
to adorn your pretty eyes here
the inverse of the type face
I see as you are
staring into
my soul!

They're here
melting sticky gum
thunderstorms
rainstorms
coughs and sniffles
shuffles feet
scoot scoot of chair
kids smoking cigarettes after hours
rustling of paper in a quiet room
full of people
acquaintances.

There's the black dance of birds
in the black windows, reflecting
a beautiful blue sky
just a horizon for the
dirty black pavement
mirrored twins walk along side
you stare,
they stare,
into the windows
of the ABC stores
and the blaring safety lights
and the night seems young, but
it has seen too much
too much already, for its age
but there is no sense in dieing.

It's the seasonal shift
a chemical shift
a birth of blue jeans
and scattered around
there's leaves
where there were none before.
Aye, but you hear it.
The beginning.

Up to speed

Polka plays in background at Baines.

My internet is down. So I'm here.

T-2 for the whole school business.

Felt like I was in some collegiate prison last year.

Now I feel like I need to kill someone to get back in.

POP POP!

Listening in about how America has been taken over by Satan. Duh, could have told you that. I think the Devil may be a great painter.

Had conversation with Jude about who his favorite painter is. Answer: "Have you ever been to the modern art museum? They make art out of cabinets."

"I dig modern art."

I'm searching for bigger and better music, but right now I'm just craving bluuuuueeeeegraaaassssss. Yessir!

Wrote a story last night about going to the coast. Total nostalgia coma. It felt good until my computer crashed. It's hard to be inland.

I hope you can follow this.

Sister has friends over. It's lonely here. People are employed at leaving and going away. I'm employed at drinking coffee (which I have taken back up, next thing you know it will be cigarrettes and the banjo) and paying taxes.

Finished Lolita, made me cry. You know you're a good author when you can make someone cry about statutory rape. Or it could have been a good seasonal cry, or the fact I haven't ran. Or the fact it is sad. What a drag.

Starting the Princess Bride, thinking about starting some design collages. I'm no good at art. But I can foist it (vocab word).

What if my English teacher found out I had a blog? She'd be hip with it. Same women has a bumper sticker in honor of Bruce Springstein on the back of her Jeep. I'm pretty sure I'm the only kid to get that reference in the last 10 years.

Shooting camp finished (looks at watch) Thursday, worthless watch, lots of fun, played some backyards water pong, or at least watched some. Got in a fight about Obama and how 'they be taken' all mah guns away'. Something like that.

Lanyards are for lame fools.

I'm employed at breaking necks.

Come visit. I'm going to hide and move in with somebody at their dorm room. I miss college kids.

You're right Todd, it's going to be a long year.

New art form (from the princess bride?), filling balloons with paint and the shooting them, for practice, I think fun, yes!

I'm addicted to my new Colt pistol, fashoooore.

Eh scup ayy

Can you give me a morning call?
I'm escaping these walls
and catching a train to San Jose.

He said, it's got a red caboose,
travels fast down to the border
and is steaming for the shore

If I can get out of this hole hell
in the morning hours
I can jump aboard real safe

Cause the beating police
carry a whopping piece
and I just can't share my brains

So call me up,
fore the sun comes up
and I can get a jump real clean

I've got hobo friends
be travelin' with 'em
and they lend me a helping hand

I don't know where I'll go
but if it comes to blows
I'll get off and head to town

I'll buy me a horse
take a straight course for where else
and take up weaving baskets

Ther' End.

Saw the worst decision driving down the road tonight. Ugly thunderbird and te smartest guy in school, driving around with a beard and one of the oddest and most sheltered girls I know. It's just a reaaalllly bad decision on his part. I hope one day he doesn't have to find out just how bad.

I find walking through the woods, and just walking in general, not running, helps put the whole writining fire in my head. That and my English summer course workbook "1100 words you need to know"

And with that I'm going to go watch the stars.

"Don't do anything risky"

Chris Brown!

This blog goes out to my besty for L1FE, Chris. I think you might be 8 years old now. And you're my cross country coaches' son. You'll probably grow up to be a terrorist. When you steal my frisbee and throw it at people, hard, it only makes us better friends. And when you say my name with your definitive lisp that they will have to correct through your whole elementary school career it makes me feel bad for you. So here's to you, spiderman. May you be climbing walls and jumping fences and running around like your pants have been set on fire by 3 hobos that just ain't got no fire wood. I raise my glass. Best fwennnndddsss. No seriously, my name is Kate, not Katie.

Gak!

I Missed You!

"Wow, you were growing older out there, look at your skin, you so tan gurrlll."
"Blog, I'm sorry to have neglected you!"
"Fuck you, did you go spelunking!?"
"...No."
"Then you have failed me and every word you type, we are now going to grow as limp as a clock in a Salvador Dali painting and fall off the page as you type... OOOOoooOOo nooOOO slipping. Now if your going to put down elephant shit poems you have to go eat worms off of Billy Idol's face to earn our trust back, the trust that you won't leave us so lonely and cold out where creepy old men can read your thoughts and actions...."
"I'm sorry! I thought about you when I was driving my car around with children under 16 in the back seat!"
"Not hard enough! Think harder! Let me see your toilet face!"
"I don't do any...."
"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!"
"Ehr?"

__________ Blog's Back!____________________________

Futurama

"Why was that the first thing to come to mind?"
"Little Pussy?"
"Yes! Why was the ghastly fuzzy creature put into your mouth from your head, from your tiny little brain cells, in which small cheesy grits slip into holes filling out words in an elimination process. Whever the sheesy grits land is where a letter won't be produced because the letter cannot fall through the hole because of artery clogging cheesy grits."

....


So for college essays

works of art for common app:

>> my first run in with Paul McCartney

>> Microcosmos

>>first Dr. Seuss reading experience

>>Andy Goldsworthy

>>Levi van Veluw

>> Cross Creek

Traveling Sleep

Bad dreams in a strange bed as your neighbor sleeps on and on. You turn on the tv, you turn it on, only to here its static song. Telephone lights of people in far off places, with nothing to do but send you the messages about their life. Wanting attention. Your stomach rumbles as you get up and walk around quietly, shuffling your feet, groaning, blurry eyed with sleep and bad vision. The clock glows a red six o four. The silence is too grave for sleeping, outside is too dangerous for waking. Washing your face off in the mirror you stumble back in bed, which is cold now, unbearably so. Your mind drifts. Complimentary breakfest, ha, that's what we're all waiting for.

Soc(her)

I may have drunk thirty gallons of water. Ah water, tasty water.

And it was watching 30 boys sprint into dorms for bedtime.

And today soccer camp was done. It was my first taste of the insanity and training that are involved, (and skill) of these superhuman girls that I was going to camp with. They were man fast, they didn't look down, they dribbled past you in a flurry of adidas climate cool shorts and generic soccer t-shirts, doing pull backs and volleys and turns until your calves grew weary from your controlled watch on the ball (and their hips) and you melted to a puddle on the turf with heat and despair. But then you got a water break and you did it again. With a positive additude and some pizza in your stomach.

So now I'm reading Ender's Game, staying up late after a midday nap, blogging, listening to Frank Zappa and watching parts of Heathers that I can't remember word for word... because it's on Youtube. Tomorrow consists of evening out my soccer tan, packing for Tennessee and working. Not very interesting for now, but I must prepare myself with the uninteresting so I can savour the interesting, the incredibly interesting familia road trips. I'm dissapointed hat the Grand Ole Oprey isn't in refurbished yet. :[

Tonight I had a long discussion over how old farmhouses rank over most new houses for "livability". I find them very attractive. Sort of like black and white stenciling and leather couches.

Summer song.

Summer is many things. An escalation of heat mirages. A dip in the creek of a neighbor. A heat stroke mid July.

It's when the flowers of the roadside are grey with dust, and so is the sky, an orange haze sweeping over the mountains in a gauzy fog, blurring out their crisp silhouettes from the dimming day.

When the oil runs like water, a heated syrup dripping from every nozzle of every gas pump for miles and many more miles.

It's the popping of the ears in a pool ten feet deep, with skin drenched in chlorine.

When the tanning oil babies run to the sand, and lay there, throwing their bodies on the Earth, belly down, their skin sizzling.

The sound of chalk dust on concrete. The sound of bicycles whirring away down hills at night. The taste of Kosher hot dogs on the air.

It's a midnight sparkler.

A heat filled room. Stifling, with no breeze.

It's sandals full of well... sand.

The late night shindigs thrumming a house up with yellow light and conversational voices, echoing out across a star filled lake.

It's slippery when wet. It's a flash flood. A downpour that was unexpected.

It's the night bugs rasping out their Summer song all night long.

Jahahahahaha (Mexican Laughter)

Best Facebook Message I've Ever Been Sent Goes Something Like---

"Yeah so I deff just face book stalked the hell out of you lol, went through trevs friends just had to say sorry about being short with you to day I was late to getting my rabies shot. Nice seeing you tho..."


I appreciate this. The nice touches like, getting his rabies shot. Must be protected from those crazed mooses.

Rolling.

When I'm on the road, little ideas about how to describe the things I see, feel, hear, smell and lick are so much easier to think of because I have so much time, and since I fail at thinking of things on the fly, those little fleeting thoughts just get sucked out with the raging wind coming in the car windows as everything flies by at 75 miles per hour.

And.

When I'm on the road everything seems so far away. It's almost as if I'll never see the same people or places, because all I can see is this new land roling past me.

And.

When I'm on the road and I'm away, it's as if somebody pushes a reset button in my brain. It used to happen all year, never settling. But I don't know if I like it now...

And.

When I'm on the road at night, anything seems possible, and it is. But I have to deal with the consequences, especially if it was trouble that was playing its hand. So I can store them away, those consequences, and try and forget them in he morning. But fate never really likes to be forgotten. And there is always a road near at hand. Ready to make or break you.

And.

When I'm on the road, I always want to take you with me.

Leave off

So the other day, I asked my mom as a gag would it be okay if I went to art school? And, her face sort of dropped after the question was asked, but then I waved her off and told her I was joking. No, but really, I don't belive there is any talent in me to waste my time going through art school. Art and nature can coincide, but when I go to college fairs my first question is, Do you have an environmental science major? And then I move on to, Well what about scholarships? But, what if don't even know, what the bloody wang I want to do.

Jesus.

So anyway, I figured out I could twirl a small kitchen knife in my free time. And then I reconsdered practicing before some and more turned into not having a thumb to hold a gun with.

Yesterday, I went out to sit outside of Baines and just sit and read, with my dog, in the heat, but then she wouldn't sit so I took her to my mom and whn I got there her first comment was "Your shorts are too short". It's 100 bajillion degrees outside mother, I'm not dressed like a skank, and besides, I have proof that you were just completely off the handle when you were younger, so just leave off. Leave me be.

You know those days when you feel like you've been underwater, ten feet underwater all day? You figure your dead and then you get off the couch to get a drink of water and your eyes slowly roll back to the front of your head but you still can't shake the teaspoon of water you have stuck in your ears? Yeah, I know the feeling.


I guess I should pack soon. It's going to be a hell of a drive. Expect really long texts about nothing in particular.

Woody Allen is a good storyteller.

Shot my lover as she tried to run.

I'm starting to experiment with stenciling and I feel like I'm going to whip up a batch of wheat paste for something eventually when I get the time to create out of my head. But it looks like I'll be a bit busy for the next couple weeks. There are major advantages and disadvantages to traveling in the Summer.

Advantage: See new places, won't be stuck at home, meet new people, won't be lonely

Disadvantage: Won't always be going to the places I want to see or visiting the people I want to see

Today I went out and bought sidewalk chalk, spray paint, beads, fabric, string, nail polish and temporary tattoos. Everything I could want to make my mark. But nobody to do it with. But I don't think it matters since I won't be around. I leave this weekend. And then have soccer camp I think? And then Tennessee...which is an interesting state I guess, but only in certain parts. Plus, since I'm older I feel like it gets harder for my relations to relate to me. Not that they have since I turned...thirteen. Oh well. In there somewhere might be my hearing, but who even knows. All I want to do is swim, for a very long time, 'til all my skin peels off and I'm as brown as an Indian.
Speaking of making marks, if I accumulate a rose for every birthday I'll have 33 plants by the time I'm 50. That's an incredible amount. I want to try.

I just made a chocolate beet cake. It's uber delicious and the only way I will ever eat beets. Ever.

One summer I want to try to wear white every day from the beginning of Summer to Labor day.

Anybody willing to help me cover some songs next open mic should. I desperately need a guitarist. You can be the M. Ward to my Zooey.

17

That was an incredibly lengthy weekend. I feel the need to vegitate all day, so I must. Besides, I now have a copy of The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy that I highly recommend to anyone with a soul. I didn't get it for my birthday, well maybe I did. I dd get a fantastic drawing kit for my birthday and a beach boys CD and a rose bush...don't judge me, I wanted it, and other lovely gifts.

A synopsis:
I got back from 4-H Congress Thursday, which was a horrible and boring experience exactly like last year. Then I slept.
Friday: A-Todd arrived
Saturday: Went to a Bluegrass festival, because I love bluegrass with all my heart. Again, stop hating. Was going to Rave but that was whack. Ran around Lunchburg in a tiara screaming "That's a Low Price" ...must remember that special occasions do not reason drug use
Sunday: Continued the camp tradition by hiking 6 miles around Holiday Lake
Monday: Visited Nature Camp

Late as usual

Hey My Birthday!

I was batman!

Light and Dark

The body is hung from the blue gallows of the sky. Strung up in its noose at the tip, at the almost breaking of dawn and then slung up into a lightening sky, it chokes all day. The orbiting Earth, drawing the great spherical head of the Sun up into the sky from its body of space. Raising it, for all the land to see, of its death upon the ground below, a show for the millions. The head is drawn down at sunset, and cut loose from the gallows, the body as a whole then resting below the ground. Day after day the Sun endures this death, rising from the dead at sun rise and falling back, it's death taking only a moment to the Sun, but a whole day for Earth's people. The eternal rise and fall and glaring rays of a dying man's face causes the masses to squint as they stare up into the noontime surrender, when the Sun's final breathe catches, deep within the lungs and the eyes close, slowly, slowly, across a darkening sky.

Tumultous Times; Turning Tables, Turning Tides

How do I even start to describe, the turmoil, the sudden, unexpected turmoil of Summer.

Something I vaguely remember about what I thought would be all
sweat
cabbage moths
long starry nights
love
tiger lilies
long gravel roads
lemonade
birthday candles
hands to hold
thoughts to ponder

Turned into some wandering loss.
Good night.
Won't be back for a while.
Come visit.
Soon.

serendipity

Psssshhaaaw

Goddamnit. Curse you gov school and all your insolent dog shitty hell.
I'm NOT going back next year.

Just for you that don't know, theres an oil spill going on. And, I mean, I go down to Florida at least once every two years, or somewheres close to that. And I want to go help!! Activism isn't activism unless you push for something and put time in. If things work out I'll be fairly close to the Gulf this summer, which by the way, if you never have been there, the water WAS gorgeous. Crystal clear, wade out for yards, drop dead gorgeous. And now it's all about as wasted as one drunk dead man on a motorcycle with his head half shaved off onto asphault. I'll be down in Texas, which is going to be so itching close, and I want to DO something about it.

For activism see also:
The Cove

Talk about a mind fuck-
Tarintino and Kubrick movies back to back

The second day is only the first.

So, school is all over. And here I am, watching Bruce Willis with Karen O's twin, racing around on a chopper. So I've decided to run this summer, and to make things different then...then before. In about two weeks my summer will be over for about a month and a half, and I want to enjoy what I have until it's done. I need ideas on what to do. I have a couple ideas....

I need:
my first slurpee
a motorcycle ride
run Percival's Island
watch Fast Times At Ridgemont High


but right now,
that's all I have.

Sittin on the Dock of the Bay

Can I expect the world to hold on its turning
never a second breaks
without new breaths unfurling
every second aches
It is etched in the glass I drink from
the lip's residue of glazed food
ticking upon the sun
the trickling sands I view
Summer, expendable, dwindling, reaches
a new forray into sublime
and bayside a preacher preaches
a new meaning to ripe time
There's a boat to carry those
spending the time life bought
with fleshed dallores
and here we keep the catch we caught
Each of us sailing an impenetrable sea
passing hands against the glaring sun
we're all ripe from the breeze
and we'll sink when we're done

Foreigner in a Native Land

Hi...
Smacks gum. Hi.
I'm here for my appointment.
She flips through her book, Name?
I lean over the counter and whisper it to her, watching her eyes as the cognitive gears whir.
You? In the papers?
Shh. Please.
Yeah, sure, I thought they had you nailed. Everybody in the town has been searching for you. I didn't recognize y...
Yeah. Can I go in?
Let me tell him your in, you aren't going to do anything are you?
I stared at her, I'm innocent, I gave her my innocent smile.
Okay..... be back in a second.
I waited, sitting beside a businessman.
He watched me.
I watched him.
He looked at my legs, then looked away nervously.
I picked up a magazine to hide my skirt.
He looked back.
Watch it kid.
What?
Shhh, holding a finger to my lips. It echoes really easy in here.
What?
I started reading an article in the magazine, and he stared at me.
I guess we're all in here for the same reason.
I felt the wh... forming on his lips. Then it registered.
Yes.

Except.

What?
Nothing.
Good.
You look familiar?
...Not a smart move.
No I don't.
Okay.
Okay.
Door opens back up.
He'll see you now, quickly.
Bye kid.
Whaa...
Don't bother. I smoothed my skirt back over.

He was standing in the hall.

Pulling in, I remembered back to what they said. “You can’t just expect him not to, you know, he just wants the best.” But I figured, that if what we couldn’t agree to wasn’t best, than I should just leave. Normally, that was how I did things anyway. Shirking the right to a good full on fight. Scared of what it might cause. I can’t help it if I left the coast. It was only my nature….

The driveway was short and circular for the first house I pulled into, and I could see immediately that it was completely wrong. All over the property there was Virginia pines, broom straw and other scrub, where there should be a lawn. No shade could be offered to the roof of the house and the brick screamed a fiery red in the noon time blaze. The soil was a cracked and dusty, the same Virginia clay that the house was made with, baked into a solid brick acres wide. In the back, the hum of the air conditioner carried on the air like the buzz of hornets.

“I’m glad you found it ma’am” he said, reaching out a sweaty palm to me. I took it and shook it loosely, nodding. Once we unfastened I wiped my hand off on my dress as he stood there, watching.
“It sure is far out here, but it was no trouble finding it. Hot day, isn’t it?” I said, rearranging my dress. He made me uneasy, with a wrinkled shirt that was sweat stained where it contacted his body. “I’m really not sure it’s what I’m looking for, too big, you know?” That really wasn’t my trouble with the house. It was gorgeous in its design, a real modernist’s approach to the classic Southern planter’s home. But the surrounding area, and the total attitude of the house was wrong. He waved me inside and I followed obediently, my curiosity to search the inside overwhelming that sickness that comes when I walk into an empty home. It was cold as a Frigidaire as I stepped into the living room, steps echoing from blank dry wall and hardwood floors. I rubbed my arms, skin prickling with cooling sweat. He showed me around and blabbed on about the square footage and whatnot but I tuned him out and only responded to the silence with mmhhms, to show I was listening. The view out past the windows was horrendous, a real scraggly nightmare. I started heading back to the front door and he followed and I shook his hand there and told him goodbye.
“You’re not interested in the house ma’am?”
“No, I don’t think I am. It’s not what I was looking for at all, but thanks anyway.” I knew the only reason he had assigned me to the listing was because my price range was so high and he was looking for the extra money so I left him inside to lock up and walked out my car, cranking the windows down in the baking interior.

The corn was small, dry in its rows. Row after row.
I drove down through the fields, acres and acres of them, along the back roads. Looking for the lane I slowed down, encountering no traffic except for the occasional slow moving truck. Other than that all that took up the roads were blackbirds that flew up as I came through and then settled back down onto the black top. Heat mirages waved up as the road stretched out between its shadier, curvier sections. Winter wheat, yellowing on the stalk and drying in the sun, frizzled and fried like a blonde burnout.

My hair kept catching the wind, both windows down, the humidity sticking my dress to me along my back and chest, sweat edging my upper lip. There wasn't any wind here to clear it off like there was on the coast, the air all full of spit. And there wasn't a shady cloud in the sky, the sun magnified and reflected off the hot flat open.

All the houses along the road up to that point were either cinder block three room homes, sometimes covered in vinyl siding, or they were dilapidated farm houses. But as the farmland began to stretch out in dusty expanses, the houses grew larger,with trees in the front sometimes shading a moss-like yard extending out from a front porch covered in chairs. But these were few and far between, the roadside littered with dumpy little villages of three or four houses built right on top of each other, yards littered with rusting cars and plastic swingsets and yard furniture. Scruffy dogs barked from chainlink prisons as I drove by, paying little heed to their calls.

Men in the fields were gathering sweet hay, all covered in denim and long t-shirts in defense the of hay dust which made your skin itch to the bone and your eyes swollen. They were red faced and sweating, but raised a hand in courtesy as a greeting of my travels. This was a custom here as I had learned, and even though growing up on the coast I had encountered this kind acceptance, what I encountered more often were the cold or wandering stares of tourists, you can never seem to keep their eyes, or their hands for that matter, to themselves. People here waved from porches, from the drivers side of their cars, from tractors, and from lawn chairs sat out in their yard, where they keep a watchful eye on the road during the heat of the day.

Camomille flowers and a small yellow wildflower lining the road swung in my wake as I watched them through my rear view mirrors. Dragonflies flitted to the left and right before clearing a path before me and then taking off into the oak trees lining the road. I slowed down more here, taking a gravel road off the state route as my directions told me to.


To be continued...

Clean-up and Maintenance

True to my word, I cut off more of my hair. I was resolved to do it all winter, and now its finally gone. Hello heat, meet short hair, less heavy and warm than long hair. The sweet peas are blooming and so is the honeysuckle. It's all over the roadsides here and it smells delicious when I'm running and it's so sweltering. Swelter swelter.

But anyway,
what I really can't take, are those people that make you feel bad in your skin. They could possibly be your best friends, and they say that they aren't judging you, but then you say something that they don't agree with, and their face turns upside-down and gets a bit cloudy for a couple moments, and then they lie to you and tell you it's okay. Or, they stay silent, and utter out a few uhms, and let the subject pass. To something lighter. To something easier. They consider for a few moments, how they are on top of the world, and much more cultured or sophisticated or intelligent than you are. How they have everything together. They make you tense.

However, there are those people that are just at ease.
They say: "Oh, you did that? Me too."
Or they say: "I totally understand where you're coming from"

They don't judge, they don't lie, they discuss, they analyze, they show you what's right in their eyes and what they consider wrong.

they do not lie.
they do not lie.

Body Work

CAR THEMED TITLES WEEK

Ok, okay guys
I chopped off all my hayur! I know, this is crazy talk! I haven't had it this short since 5th grade. Not to say that I haven't cut my hair, but jeez Louise is it light and different. I had goddess hair some days...not to sound conceited, but it was nice and curly and lush. Not to say that it isn't now, but it's different. And Im not even done with those scissors. You're right, once you start you can't stop.

In other world news, my AP Enviro exam is next week. Joy joy joy. Yak.

Gov school ends in less than three days!! Ohmygod I can't stand it, not even, it makes me all smiley and happy to know that that abysmal hell is over. And the last day is a picnic. No really, it is! But of course, who has physics homework out the ass for tomorrow? This kid.

Promenades are over (at least the planned ones). Mine was more chill, but not without its hang-ups and collisions or its good parts either. No stores are open at 4 in the morning for celebratory donuts.

So much still to happen:

Regionals- I almost forgot!! Holy Cow!!
My birthday
graduation (Anfony's)
school's out (forever)
SAT retake...goddamn collegeboard

Well it is lovely outside....

Night Car

Backseat pretty sleepy
camping out on those nights, in a car carpeted in silk
in sweat
in Clapton
and there is a hush hush
whisper whisper
shift
with a pretty in the backseat
pretty sleepy
In a morning summer, dark with fogged dew
clinging to the outside of the Night Car
driving us up and down through the outer reaches of
my fingertips
of the galaxy
through your eyes


The feeling going down
is like twangs
and bass
on my insides
butterflies rushing my windshields
and climbing down my throat
down to my toes
every breath I bring out
flutters and lifts to the top of the ceiling
ripping the upholstery
breaking glass
shattering every thought
for the first time
never a last time

The backseat
pretty sweet
may carry us down hallways lined in, gold
takes me to places I've been,
but swore I wouldn't return to
not for a long while
gilted in fresh promises
and new problems
but it's all whispers, sticks and stones
shaking hands
rattling bones
in the Night Car
we'll travel pretty far
with a beaut in the backseat

What Heart? My Heart.

Me Gustas Tu- Manu Chao
Laid- James
Help Me Rhonda- Beach Boys
Giant of Illinios- Andrew Bird
Crystallize- The xx
I'm Not The Girl- LMNTL by Angela McCluskey
Sweet baby James- James Taylor
Indian Summer- Jonsi and Alex
Saw- Tanlines
Goth Girls- Wavves
Girl I Love You- Massive Attack
Lemonworld- The National
Hellhole Ratrace- Girls
Skulltaste- Mux Mool
Helicopter- Steve Aoki
Make It Take It- Amanda Blank

Me gustas tu

Work was, amazing tonight. It was the first time that it had been chill, not awkward, just silent and whispering and laughing, and there was this jazz husband and wife duo that came in and knocked our socks off, her on the piano and him on the trumpet. This weather is sombre...sombre enough for sweet, loud jazz hitting the ceilings.

Foggy weather is a good time for jazz, when the streetlights and houselights get fuzzed over like they are covered in muslin. When that mood strikes me and it makes me want to dance slow or curl up and read Sylvia Plath...ok, maybe not Sylvia Plath, but to read and to stare at the ceiling with my favorite person and talk about future plans. And then, sleeping long, long hours and walking around in socks and making french toast and huddling on the couch together with said person and watching The Office, or Scrubs, or Life of Brian. For the world, and school, and everyone else to just glance off into that other direction, of empty space, like some challenged spiraling satellite. The slightly chilly pea soup afternoons, like today, when the cold fronts push in and and the outside of my car windows get all foggy, rather than fogging up on the inside and the fields down the road are long and tall with hay that bends and turns silver with the condensation beading along the stems, which makes me want to run through and create tiny rain showers with my own chaotic motion.

The same condensation stuck to my bare feet as I walked, out around my house, cutting flowers and playing with the dog and by the time I got back inside the flesh of my feet had turned to green grass. So I tiptoed upstairs and ran my feet under the tap in the bathroom and the shivers got all tangled up in my spine, the well water is always chilly and prickly on my toes. With the radio sitting in the bathroom pumping out piano concertos and talk radio, playing jazz part of the day. When I finally decided to take a shower tonight and wash out my fuzzy braided hair, my shower singing was pushed around and diluted in the water streaming down on me, the tune unclear if someone was to be positioned outside the bathroom. The sleepiness hit soon after that and the warm soup smelled delectable wafting from downstairs as the evening news bleeped in and out. Then that dark blue haze of sleep sort of caught me hanging, floating out in bed ,and pulled me gently down.


Find a job you love. Find a swinging place.

sweet, silly things. leaking out of my ears.

I want to know what my interests are!
Of course, I already have a job.
But.... how will I want to know...what I want to do...later?

Interests/Preoccupations (of everyday life)

school? as in viable school, not this Online AP garbage, I actually like school, I'm just burnt out. 5:30 wake up calls for 8 months? Finally...it's getting better. You know it's bad when waking uo for AP tests late feels like a vacation.
rantrantrant

soccer -which employs my time from 5:30 to 7:30 and sometimes 3:30 to 10:30, but more than that, I've discovered a little of a talent of it, and even though sometimes I don't do as well as I should I still have so much to learn. It's just so, uh, challenging and skilled and when done right it looks flawless and beautiful (for the winning team).

music- FAVORITE BANDS or ones that I listen to right now (not in any particulr order)

Amanda Blank
Steve Aoki
Mux Mool
Kid Cudi
The Flaming Lips
The Chemical Brothers
The Beach Boys
Big Star
She & Him
Peaches
Kimya Dawson
Allison Krauss
Iron & Wine
Broken Bells
The xx
Feed Me mixes
Deer Tick
James Taylor
The Doors
The Velvet Underground
Girls
Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings
Charlotte Gainsbourg
Beck
Matt & Kim
Justice
The White Stripes
the Beatles
Pink Floyd
Billy Idol
Billy Holiday
Apollo Sunshine
Arcade Fire
Beach House
Blitzen Trapper
Yeah yeah yeahs
Mumford and Sons
Conor Oberst
Cold Play
Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros
Feist
Fleet Foxes
Grizzly Bear
The Hives
Iggy pop
Jimmy Buffet
Rafi
The Killers
The Kinks
The Kooks
Major Lazer
Of Montreal
Ok Go
Passion pit
Pearl Jam
Phoenix
Radiohead
Rokyskopp
ratatat
the ramones
Santogold
surfer blood
vampire weekend
the who
Muse

The end is only the beginning of the end.

Prom. Prom was good. Prom was great.
It had its ups and downs.
Ups: being, finally, in harrisonburg again, on my own, with a car.
Downs: the police
Writing this is like flicking through a mental slide show of what happened. It was great in some ways. Really really great, sort of like...generic high school prom great? And I guess way more. I finally got to meet those people that I wanted to meet, and that have apparently, without my knowledge, have wanted to meet me too, and always greet me with "I've heard so much about you." This greeting is hard to respond to. You can't lie and say, "I've heard so much about you too" if you haven't, you have to say "I love being here" or, "It's great to finally meet you." The road trip was really great and that evening, with all those people and Iron Man and my dog cake and everything was really really nice. And there was staying up late into the night and as Larry likes to put it "The bumpin and grindin and sex and butt doing on the dance floor". Thanks Larry for eating my cake, it was really nice seeing you. One more prom to go, which is mine and will be incredibly more chill I believe. Just going to play some wii and dress up and watch some stars and dance to some really bad music. I think that that is my only huge beef with prom. The music. I would really appreciate some decent techno, even though the DJ played Sandstorm, which I believe is about as good as its going to get. Oh well, maybe one day they'll have actual DJs- that means you Jerm. Sorry to all those people I never texted back and thank you to Nevin, who so willingly let us into his home and let us pet his cat. Yeah...try not to take that in the wrong way.

Downs: Chinckening out
Ups: My first ever I-hop

Hush

So Please
please
please, let me
let me, let me, let me
get what I want
this time









The Lancers are coming.

My Favorite Game

- The Cardigans

Those favorite people of mine. The games they play. The secretive suprises. The great vibrations. The wonderful excitations.

Those favorite people of mine.

Larry R. and Anthony T.
The ones that jump in a car together and come visit me on a whim. They lie and they show up at my house on a Sunday aftrnoon and there is hugging and sweaty reunions and them hanging out of my car. Not only do I love them both, but I will be friends with them forever. We're Harry, Ron, and Hermoine. I love Larry like Mary loves Jesus. We'll even let Larry's girlfriend into the group. 'Cause they are my handsome, loveable, completely senseless, heartwarming, suprising favorites.


Did I take you shopping? ...Even if you're my sister? Did we buy scandalous things together?

You're my favorite, Hannah T.


Do I know what your favorite music is, and talk to you almost everyday, for hours? Even if we don't talk in person that much? And we can always, always talk music.

You're my favorite, Jeremy B.

Are you always the first friend I go to, cause we both know you're one of my bestfriends here and I know you can always give me the right (morally right) answer to my problems?

You're my favorite, Rebekah S.

I know my favorites by what I say to them.
Did I send you a text a midnight? Was it your birthday?

You're my favorite, Andy G.


Have you gone through that high school hell for me? Are you there waiting for me to show up so that me can read The Onion and Drudge Report and have become my number one friend this year, all just because we bondedover politics thatone day and we hang out all the time? I make you CDs and you stand up for me and you're going to take that Korean girl to prom if I have to beg her?

You're my favorite, Palmer G.

Will we always be friends and live parallel lives and fight for the highest chem grade? Will we always have deep conversations about family? Soon? Will you teach me to climb trees and play guitar? Will your brother date my sister again? Will I always be mocked for "not washing these knives"?

You're my favorite, Jude S.

Do we have those great, slighlty awkward little siter/big sister friend conversations on the bus twice a week and have become pretty good friends over the past months? Do we have the same tastes in schools, music, men, clothes? Do people mistake us constantly for one another? Do you walk like a dinosaur?

You're my favorite, Zaina N.

Do I always love seeing you? Do I think you're a brilliant, incredibly gorgeous musician/icon/friend? Do I think we Should hang out more? More and more. Yes. Is there so much more to say about you that I can't put into words?

You're my favorite, Nora K.

Let's sound circle.

http://soundingcircle.com/newslog2.php/__show_article/_a000195-000336.htm

Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

Groupie

so let's go

In explosions of rainbow glow
April came with seeds to sew
In murmuring whispers of lo-fi reverb
trees rustling was all that we heard
After three days of setting suns-
we landlocked lovers were looking for sun
Found it hiding under the docks at about mid-June
freedom, was whispered, it's coming soon
But the rain falls heavy with a ozone smell
and the life of it all is a scribbling hell
Pummeling madly at my window screen
in a million broken drops of cycling sheens
Heaved from heavy laden clouds in my April sky
the air is permeated with its dripping highs
The lows of the cattle and the bird call sings
in the mornings that now April brings
And the fervor, the unwavering, the steady pound
of millions in spring fever, screaming loud
Yelling, jumping, telling Now!
Now is the time to move about!
There are bruises on their knees and thighs
they run and push and kick all night
They win their wars, they lose them too
they sink down into the wallowing blues-
And reds and purples and violets of spring
the pungent yellows, the green sprigs
Laid out in wet grass with soft yellow dogs
watching clouds overhead and the lingering fog
The fever catches and bites in hard
its hard not to gallop and trot and charge
Up and Down! and Up! and Down again!
the bruises will heal, the bones will mend
Theres no fever like tomorrow, the promise of today
so let's go kill April til the 1st of May

C'mon

Oh on a sunday afternoon
shouldn't you be sitting on a pew?
No, the rain it falls too hard
you find yourself dancing in the park
listening to the songs.

Flowers Never Bend With The Rainfall- Simon and Garfunkel
Acid Tongue-Jenny Lewis
Blood Bank- Bon Iver
Four provinces-The Walkmen
Walking On a Dream- Empire of the Sun
God Save the Queen- Nouvelle Vague
Skeletons- Yeah Yeah Yeahs
World Spins Madly On- The Weepies
Cosmic Dancer- T. Rex
Dandelions in a Bullet Hole- Sarah Harmer
Summerwind- Ole Frankie Blue eyes
Ain't No Sunshine- Bill Withers
Bonnie & Clyde- Serge Gainsbourg and Jane the F*CK Birkin
Islands in the Stream- Feist
Whenever you're Ready- The Zombies
All This Is That- Beach Boys
Cinammon Girl- Neil Young
I Found Love- The Free Design
Unforgettable- Nat "King"
If I Should Lose You- Joe Williams
Im Your Man- Leonard Cohen

Collegiate Environment

I'm absolutely terrified and excited and horrified by the idea of college now. Just as the early April news of colleges burnt through CVGS with congratulation going out to those that got into such prestigious entities such as Princeton, MIT, University of Chicago, and the great colleges of Virginia, and all the news of wait listing and rejection letters blew through, I was left a little shocked I could say. Maybe, more frightened, of just the process; the essays, compiling portfolios, applications, money, wait listing, rejections, life decisions. All of those things that culminate into that one step of adulthood that it is almost necessary for all Americans to take in the current environment. College. I know its for me. And, even though, my parents would love to persist in the reasoning that I don't have to move away to go, that I will always be around to sort and wash the laundry properly and to play soccer in the spring and ask them permission to go to the movies. But, college is that one step, that one really big step in the path of adulthood, and its one that is almost completely necessary in every Americans life in this current environment that we have created here. College is a necessary institution that anyone should be ready to partake in. Right now I realize that I'm not ready, and so my persistent moans of "I'm never going to college" is just the fear releasing itself in a less unhealthy way than others. The stress of SAT/AP/Gov School exams all got piled up into two or three weeks, and this fall looks as far away as it ever has. I'm not even halfway into the clear, even with almost one month left and maybe this is why college is just college. It's not yet tangible as much as I walk around UVA or watch college soccer games. But I haven't lost hope in going the distance with my education. I just have to find that niche, the one that I hope a university might facilitate. Not only is it a place to grow, but it seems to be the place to find yourself, the place that brings people together that should be together and the place that either strengthens or unties those bonds that were made in High School. An adjustment to where caring is only slightly considered by both teachers and students alike.

I probably shouldn't be scared of college. But for now I'll remain unconvinced as to what my proper attitude towards it should be. I guess I'll just have to consider the fact that I'm still young, as everyone over the age of 25 likes to tell me. But, young is almost never an excuse, it is only a pardon, just as college is not a requirement, but a gateway. A gateway that I'd really love to get into.

Fill it in.

I'm bored with writing. Back to lists!

Clothed in?
A sweater, jeans, white tee, it's chilly

Weather?
Sunny and cold as....as (insert dirty joke about oprahs vj here)

Best love song ever?
God Only Knows - by the cute Beach Boys

Best making love song ever?
Caress Me Down - Sublime

only rivalved by maybe Strange Love by Little Annie

Song in my head?
Lay Me Down by Dirty Heads

Eating?
Enchilladas ...Yogurt

Wanting?
that movement
whispers
uh, uh
BOOKS!
photos with flowers...and me :[

Needing?
Air
Breathing
Loving
the sun (I'm a flower)
summertime (oh sublime, where the livings easy)

Oggling?
watches
the 70's prom pictures
WALT WHITMAN
your car
that car (that blue beatle)
rap stars girlfriends
spray paint ...temptation
you
words
adrogynous males/women
IDYLLE blog
The Magic school Bus
color pigments
art in all its flashy beauty
fountains
Interview mag
the color red
flowers that you pin on
cloth

Take a bite out of life.

Touch your lips,

then stop

Then do it again.

Texts I send
Chat I write
Words I speak
in a day:

"They have ultra sharp teeth to bite your earses off"

"Your face makes me angry"

"Is there anything sexier than a ginger fro??"

"He's never going to cut his hair, and so you'll never kiss him. Good luck on having children NOW."

"Give me my rootbeer before I reach for your crotch!!" (To my sister)

"Kenya is the same as Ethiopia"

"I want Jack White to be my friend"

"Papau New Guineau smells sooooo good"

"MERRR"

"You want to make love ice tea?"

"Shorter dresses mean easy access...just saying"

"When you were dancing you moved your arms"

"I wouldn't kill you, just throw angry cats at you"

"learn about races and their food likes, so that way you can exploit them."

"I realize that that ....... ohmygod, man walking cats!"

"I forgot to tell you, but today a ginger ate my homework"































mmmm life is tasty

Grievances

Grievances:

Girls that hold your hand when you tackle them in soccer
bitchy assed teachers
spicy food at night (like now)
no phone calls ?
dress lengths at the knee and below
touchy touchy people
screamo bands
bruised knees
bad haircuts
un focused cameras
red faces
crying people

{Juice}:
saran wrapping cars
petting
tanning like a bear does... think about it
low necklines
watching movies between classes
writing poems in my head

then forgetting them


Better:
seeing the full time boyfriend
not talking
cursing at the other team
puching/bruising/pushing/bullying
love
rings
shoes
live music
crashing birfdays
unforgettable saturday nights
Pop rocks
mocking birds in pet stores
really cute dogs
sarcastically making jokes about how good you look

You look so good even Mick Jagger would be jealous.

smiling with your canines
Heathers
that tingling sensation at the back of your legs
Harry Potter pick up lines
drawing elephants with unusually large trunks
mustaches
bagels

Teal

I used to write the most amazing haikus is fifth grade. They went something like...

There are large golden fields
swinging with wind
hear them humming

Hmmm...

I have a dress, it is a spectacular teal color. I want to wear it everywhere. It's not very appropriate for dancing, but I feel it looks like greek, grecian, Goddess atire. I have to decide what shoes to wear, and earrings and all those girl things.

It's very late on a thursday night, but it feels gorgeous outside, and I had a nap in the sun...and am tanner now.

A little music-

Don't feel like dancing - Scissor Sisters
Electric Shock- Gorillaz
Dirty Dishes- Deer Tick

They are all stuck in my head, and I wanted to share.

Let those

Let those weathered hands
full of sand
fall down upon
upon the ground
lift up the weight
the hills
the crates
take your burden to the shore
earth movers
here
shoveling palms
there
build castles from fine rock
they build it
all
upon the
sand
with extremely large
weathered
hands

Let those lungs full
of billows
made of paper
3 inches thick
breathe in and
out
move the earth
about
and make it move
around
and round
make wind fall hard
upon the scars
where the
rocky
underbelly
of the land
shows

Let the feet of turpentine
and sap
pick up aaaaaalllll the pieces
of sand
of earth
of dirt
and deposit it in one sitting
after running
deep in and across
this earth
make a mountain!
make the earth move!
make it turn!

Orange/Spinning

I took a bite out of an orange rind
but I couldn't quite break the skin
and the acid dripped slowy out
from the teeth marks I had bit in
and the zest hit my mouth
like the thorny edge of the sea
bites down hard and cold
against your bare legs and kness

I knocked hard on your door
and you let me right in
we slipped on the yogurt poured
all over your walls and floors
why was there dairy there?
we weren't really sure
but we slid all over your house
on those slippery curds

Now we are down by the lake again
skating across on the cellophane
we were walking all across
and running back again
our shirts are getting soaked
and the sun is getting wet
put back on your overcoat
the world, we are splashing it

All those people, kissing touching
all their remnants
kissing touching
all their ghostly shadows
kissing touching
in the dark
kissing touching

I was once excalceated, walking along a gravel road. It was 115 degrees.

At the same time I was wearing no sunblock and a bikini.

It was a stupid time, but not one I regret.

By the time we walked the two miles across the island we were parched and scorched and had finally found a source of comfort. Water.

Hidden from all the masses on the other side of the island was a cove, man made possibly, but gorgeous, twisting and opalescent. There was a private sailboat sheltering there among the rocky limestone crags. All of us sunk in and cooled the boiling skin that was shedding its water down our backs. We were brown skinned and light headed but the Caribbean was cool. We heeded no warnings that this was private property. At that moment we were only using it in passing.

We were foot sore by the time we reached the other side of the island, our bodies ten pounds lighter for the millions of drops of sweat pooling in our wake. The only thing that kept us from passing out in the humidity on the hike back was that we mugged my more appropriately geared family.

Reaching the other side of the cay where the rest of the boat was relaxing, we rested briefly before hunting down fresh pineapple and then stepping out to snorkel well into the twenty foot deep natural pool on the front side of the island. The ocean water was bath water warm and the swimming was easy, with a natural buoyancy that characterizes salt water. But the life jackets that one had to wear with full on face gear wouldn't allow for deeper diving. Swimming back in I took off the mask and life jacket and switched out for a smaller, lighter mask. The waves were small enough that someone could roll through them and I swam way out and dove down, looking at the bright parrot fish. The ocean was beautiful.

I feel like it's time.

For a little something about my religious views. *sigh* Cause, things like that are personal, and that's what you put in a blog thing, and I guess my religious views are a little skewed. I've had this conversation a couple times, and nothing makes it any easier in explaining it. If my mom would read this she would send me to church everyday.
Because I don't believe in God. Simple statement, bad consequences.
It's not like I haven't tried.
I spent a good thirteen years of my life devoting my time and effort to praising Him, but to no prevail, here I am at 16 and not only do we not have a personal relationship, but I do not believe in the Almighty. Why? Not because of personal tragedy, anything, such and such, other than, I do not believe that God, a god, or any type of deity created a completely infinite space. I don't think one thing could craft the Earth. I believe that the Bible was written to be followed and that if you don't listen to what it says than you may want to think about the basis of your faith.

I remember once that I prayed to God to find my flashlight. I was at church camp. It worked. There you go...

But I don't think that any God would create the good and the bad of the world. I believe humans are too proud to say we grew from primates and were placed here for no apparent reason other than to love one another and reproduce. Because we weren't put here for a reason, I don't think there is a reason.

If there was a God, he would want us to get over ourselves, stop praying in churches every once in a while, and enjoy a beautiful existence.

I have no desire to ever say there was an Adam and and Eve. I think that there were dinosaurs before there ever was a man and a woman and a snake.

I like to stare long ways into space and think about just how far it reaches.

Forever

I don't belive in anything. I don't belive in any other religion over another. There are too many, and they all came about to explain the meaning of life.
Most of them say the same things.
Live well.

Atheism is in non-belief. Some people see it as falacy, as if you can't "not believe", as if it is an opinion. I just don't think that there is a god. I just like to think that the world was made, a long long time ago, by a chaotic happinstance.
And we are man.

Some Christians like to fight with me about how I define morals if I don't have something to set them against. I like to see it as this, drugs are bad. Why are drugs bad? They mess up lives. How would you be able to tell if the good book didn't define morals yadda yad.... You can see their work, don't play dumb. Those are the conversations I dislike having when it comes to my lack of faith. Maybe its a little of a transcendental under-pull, but I believe in the good of man. Possibly humanistic, but I haven't studied enough to delve deeper into that. I just know that when I die, I would love to think that there would be angels and singing, but in fact, I know and I fear, that there will just be blackness.

For a long time.

That's why life is so important now.