What it is.
There is a plastic bag over my head. My vision is straining, my hearing is muffled. And boy, is it hot in here. It seems that no matter how close or far away, everything is blurry. And likewise, no matter where I am, it always seems like someone's talking about me. Again. And the heat! I break under pressure. And stress. And pressure and stress together. I don't enjoy this so much. Don't blame me. Do you honestly think you would?
Hopefully someone will trash this bag soon. I'm suffocating.
"describe this board in front of you. this board. the dry-erase board." - connell
1. The board is long.
2. The board is long. The board is white. The board is white and long.
3. The board, the long and white one? It's missing.. something. Words, perhaps? Yeah. That's it.
4. So that very same board, it's lame. Boring, even. It makes up approximately 60% of the most insipid and utterly unattractive wall in this room. Yet it's the one we seem to stare at day after day..
5. I've got a feeling that this board is trying to talk to me. About my life, that is. You might say that I'm crazy. But I'm not. And I'm not in denial either. The smudgemarks and the erasers symbolize the many, yes, many, mistakes I have made and will undoubtedly continue to make in my life. The half-empty (or perhaps half-full, depending on your perspective) bottle of board cleaner stands tall and proud next to the limp rag. It reminds me of a soldier, standing tall and stiff, ready to go into battle, which might not be the best possible place to be in, but that soldier's not going to give up. He's going to go in there and fight for want he believes in. And the bottle of board cleaner is going to do that too. He just wants to make things better. He tries to erase the mistakes and smudges that the erasers leave behind. But the erasers aren't the ones creating the mistakes. They place blame on the two markers. The green and the red. If I had to guess I would say that the red is causing the majority of the mistakes, or perhaps, trying to correct them. The green is happy, content. The red, though, is angry. While they battle it out in my mind, I glance upon the right upper-hand corner of the board, and I see old Edgar Allan Poe just hanging out. Literally. Chilling? His trusty dark, demon crow at his side. Or more on his arm. And there he hangs. In a black suit. Against a white board. Rather contrasting if you ask me. Life is black and white. There you go. You might call it bumbling? On the bottom right-hand corner of the board is a tag, possibly warning children not to eat markers or smell fumes. But more than likely not. It has a green mark on it. Which, now that I've spent so much time studying the board, will probably bother me for the remainder of my time in this classroom. Ever. Finally, the pathetic yet almost engaging snowflakes hanging all crooked and confused above the board remind me to just be a kid again, forget about all this high school nonsense and just have fun. High school blows. Grades blow, classes blow, the SAT blows. Friendships blow (and even blow UP), wearing cheerleading warmups to school two days a week blows, Ashley Ann's gravel personality blows, and Connell's hearty attempt but obvious fail to sneeze blows. It blows. But the snowflakes are there to tell us that if we take everything a little lighter, a little more elementary, then maybe, just maybe, we'll be able to appreciate the little smudges in life just a little more.
8 things i CAN do without.
1. homewrecking whores
2. purple jackets
3. "punk rock princess"
4. tommy irvin
5. bad gas mileage
6. headaches
7. drama
8. posers
8 things i can not do without.
1. sweet tea
2. la musica
3. sweats
4. grey's anatomy
5. baseball pants
6. christmas
7. the heifers
8. my home g's
trust thyself.
"it is harder because you will always find those who think they know what is your duty better than you know it. it is easy in the world to live after the world's opinions; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who is in the midst of the crowd who keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude."
in today's world, we feel that we must conform to the thoughts of others. we let other people make extreme decisions in our life that might in fact not be the ones that we would have made had we been thinking for ourselves. we seem to have no problem whatsoever living for ourselves when we are alone, though. in solitude, we will listen to the types of music we want, watch the movies we want, and talk to the people we want. however, once back into the world with lack of solitude, we conform to the popular music, the popular movies, and the popular people. the difference between two people in solitude and two people in the world can very well be the difference between a great friendship and straight up backstabbing. for example, in the movie a walk to remember, mandy moore's character is rather unpopular. shane west's character is the hot shot of the town, and always takes every chance to put down moore's character while around his friends. moore and west are friends in private (or solitude), as she helps him learn his lines for the spring play, a consequence for his reckless behavior prom night. when moore approaches him at school, however, he acts disgusted and completely shies her away. in the world's view, these two characters should not be friends, and for that reason, west declines her public offer of friendship, and in the next scene, loses a friend. if we can not learn to think for ourselves while outside of our desired solitude, we will grow into mindless drones who, at some point, won't be able to come back.
"for unconformity the world whips you with its displeasure."
this is as simple as it gets: if you fail to conform with the world and it's requirements, you WILL be shunned. moreover, you will be looked down upon with distaste and disgust. simply, you must conform if you wish to get anywhere in your life.. according to emerson at least.
"they measure their esteem of each other by what each has, and not by what each is."
the measure of a man is not by his personality or characteristics. the measure of a man is by his salary or wealth. his actions towards another man aren't accounted for. only the size of his checkbook and the number of zeros in his salary matter.
oh is that so? i beg to differ.
"love makes the world go 'round."
for generations, this simple statement has brought even more meaning to an everyday love. it has sparked countless romances and inspired couples to shoot for the stars. unfortunate for these naive, love-struck, silly little puppies, i am here to prove them wrong.
love does not, i repeat, does NOT make the world go 'round.
while experiencing so called "love", a person will be fooled into doing many regretable things that, after heartbreak, are looked back upon as idiotic and quite nauseous. in my life, i have been in two "serious" relationships. during the climax of both of these relationships, i was convinced i was in love. as i look back upon both of them, i realize i was in lust. lust for the feeling "love" brings.. lust for that one "special" person.. lust for.. lusting.
perhaps i should explain. my first more "serious" relationship began when i was in eighth grade. i thought i was on top of the world. my boyfriend was sixteen. he was "hot". i had it all. we "dated" for thirteen months. and three days before my fifteenth birthday, four days before valentine's day, my "true love" absolutely mutilated my heart.
looking back upon that first relationship of mine, i realized that i was in fact one of those naive people, completely fooled by the thought of love. i never, ever imagined getting my heart crushed and stomped on. yet it happened. grasping these new concepts, i looked at what i had learned from my first boyfriend and took it to heart.
ten months later, still trying to get over "him", i was introduced to who would soon become my second and most recent "serious boyfriend". he was perfect: drop-dead gorgeous grayish-blueish eyes, dark skin, shaggy brown hair. we hit it off.. rather fast in fact, and within a week of our first date, we were "dating". over the next eight months, our relationship blossomed into something that i think was probably a bit more than my eighth grade "love". he was a junior, i was a sophomore. i seemed to have more experience in the relationship department, and had a stronger backbone. i never would let my guard down, just for the sake of protecting my pride and not letting myself get hurt again.
everything was great. we never fought. time and time again, our friends would tell us how jealous they were of the love that the two of us shared. we were together every weekend. i would go watch him play baseball, and he would come watch movies with me. we went to his prom, which was a first for the two of us. we shared in all the typical moments of "high school sweethearts". that's what we were. or so i thought.
with summer came traveling. i was off at shows, and he was off at baseball tournaments. neither of us wanted to disturb the others goals in life, and so we were understanding. we spent as much time together as we could. but we were struck with the same demise as most high school romances. a week-long trip to panama city beach with his closest buddies led to lies and tears. and a broken heart.
we broke up. didn't speak for four days. within a week of the breakup, however, we were back together. he swore it was what he wanted and that he wasn't going to let me down again.
he lied.
which leads me back to the point of this ranting.
love does not make the world go 'round.
while being in love (or lust as i actually was), you experience the most amazing feelings in the world. nothing can substitute for it. except for the pain of heartache. and since the majority of relationships do in fact fail, love does not make the world go 'round. the only push it gets is from the one "true love" that is found in a lifetime, if at all.
on a negative side, the effects of "love" are harsh. while the first boyfriend and i are now friends, the second boyfriend, the one i was so sure was god-sent, and i are not. while we've "been with other people" since we broke up, we are in no way over each other. i miss him and i know he sure as heck misses me. but because of our experiences, neither of us will let our feelings get in the way of our pride, and we will continue our lives never knowing.
and of course, and never giving love a chance to make the world go 'round.
What is an American?
WHAT IS AN AMERICAN?
to be an american is to enjoy the privileges established by our forefathers:
baseball, apple pie, and freedom.
on the fridge.
so here's my strange fridge magnet thing:
CaptiveBut presently, all on the sudden, they heard a great and strange cry, which they knew to be the same voices they heard in the night, though they varied their notes; and one of their company being abroad came running in and cried, "Men, Indians! Indians!" About that time there came an Indian to me and he bid me come to his Wigwam, at night, and he would give me some Pork and Ground-nuts. That night they quartered in the woods, he still expecting (as he had done all this long time of his imprisonment) every hour to be put to one death or other, for all their feasting.
..i don't think i ever finished this thing!?
