(no subject)
Flow of consciousness, quickly, because these three glasses of wine have made me have to pee.
Caroline, new housemate, totally just stopped a conversation with an old friend to talk with me for a few seconds, to say we needed to sit down and catch up in the next day or two. A-mazing. This year seems to be a continuation of the last, of a time that I'm living in where I surround myself with people who care, with people who aren't just fair weather friends. I didn't think I was unhappy my first two years here...in fact I met amazing people who I still consider to be dear dear friends...but I wasn't being constructive enough with my life. The past six months (out of the past year-and-a-half that have been my project months) or so I've been learning how to be assertive. Hah. I can hear you all laugh. She who intimidates almost everyone she knows upon first meeting, she who is confused with staff for the way she deals with nylon tents, she who is guaranteed to get anything done because she's that good. Well. I became sick of extending myself, sick of always giving people the tools they needed without acknowledgement, without people realizing that I put things there for them (although an actual quote from the mushroom incident, I do, I set up situations for people and provide them with opportunities and far.too.often. they seem to be oblivious. So, anyway, I've been learning to say no. Learning to take care of my own oxygen mask before I help the person next to me, so to speak. I go to bed early if I need to. I read a book every once in awhile. I sit between classes and write letters. I do my laundry, go grocery shopping. I take the time to breathe, and like today, I laugh when I get caught in a complete downpour, because why be afraid of getting wet?
I'm painting my own canvas, and there are a ton of red splotches on it. fire red, with a bit of orange, like a poppy.
Last swallow of cheap wine.
If you're a good person, you're an orange-red splotch on my chaotic canvas. You're beautiful, lovely, inside and out, a dream that I can't even believe I'm a part of, a way of life that screams to my soul in a way I can't ignore. I FINALLY FOUND WHERE I WANT TO BE. And it's not being in grad school, it's not wearing somebody's goddamn gold ring, it's not rushing into anything, it's floudering around and fucking up and drinking damn good coffee while I'm at it. I make my own bed and I lie in it, and I learn from my mistakes while loving-so-much-I-could-eat the successes.
There are people I wish could be splotches. I don't know if they'd (she'd) be orange-red...I imagine more of a royal purple, with a baseball cap. I fucked up. C'est la vie. We learn from mistakes, do we not? But a beer over the past would be exactly what I needed. Goddamn the respect I have for a beatifully freckled shy republican. Goddamn.
Flow-of-consciousness drifting...I never wrote an essay about hair at nelp, never wrote an essay about (literal) hair at UM. Not taking enough women's studies classes I suppose. Today I received, gave, became an intrinsic part of, a million hugs with Oren. A completely huggable, entirely lanky, beautiful jumble of verbs who never knew me not taken. So many double negatives. But I do give damn good hugs. I love them for what they are, for what they represent, for the fact that so many people are missing out on them...Pat, I can hear you cringing, FEEL you cringing right about now in your fever-induced what-the-fuck-is-she-talking-about nonsense, and I love you for it, I love you, I love you more than the I-will-relieve-myself-of-all-guilt-by-crying-with-you man, more than avocadoes. More.Than.My.Tomato.Plants. But give me freedom to dream, for far too often I am grounded in reality.
That's the problem. FAR TOO OFTEN I AM GROUNDED IN REALITY.
Last night Lee and I proved our incredibleness by partner dancing through a crowd of twenty at a mid-week show at the blind pig. the second dance they challenged us and we rose to the line with a waltz. fuck them--partner dancing is my charade, the only realm in which my control over my own body ceases to exist, the realm in which i fake my ability while fulfilling my soul. my body will do what your body tells me to. i will spin like you've never seen. i will bend in ways i didn't know i could. i will lose myself in the 1-2-3 of it...and i will be mine, exhilarated, blown, a maggie kate of all maggie kates, a transient of time who follows her bliss to places she never thought she'd see. thank god she's doing it early, instead of fumbling her way out at 44.
yesterday a boy played me a martin sexton song on a guitar for "whatever i could give him." i gave him my name, a handshake, my smile, and a laugh. he asked for my number, i said :i'm sorry:. he was beautiful. he made martin sexton sound beautiful. i will learn this song, i will sing martin's words for this boy in black, sing them for all the boys who have the balls to say hello and ask for the girl who's already taken. i think they have my heart more than anyone else.
tenacious, that's the GRE word for the day. tenacity.
Caroline, new housemate, totally just stopped a conversation with an old friend to talk with me for a few seconds, to say we needed to sit down and catch up in the next day or two. A-mazing. This year seems to be a continuation of the last, of a time that I'm living in where I surround myself with people who care, with people who aren't just fair weather friends. I didn't think I was unhappy my first two years here...in fact I met amazing people who I still consider to be dear dear friends...but I wasn't being constructive enough with my life. The past six months (out of the past year-and-a-half that have been my project months) or so I've been learning how to be assertive. Hah. I can hear you all laugh. She who intimidates almost everyone she knows upon first meeting, she who is confused with staff for the way she deals with nylon tents, she who is guaranteed to get anything done because she's that good. Well. I became sick of extending myself, sick of always giving people the tools they needed without acknowledgement, without people realizing that I put things there for them (although an actual quote from the mushroom incident, I do, I set up situations for people and provide them with opportunities and far.too.often. they seem to be oblivious. So, anyway, I've been learning to say no. Learning to take care of my own oxygen mask before I help the person next to me, so to speak. I go to bed early if I need to. I read a book every once in awhile. I sit between classes and write letters. I do my laundry, go grocery shopping. I take the time to breathe, and like today, I laugh when I get caught in a complete downpour, because why be afraid of getting wet?
I'm painting my own canvas, and there are a ton of red splotches on it. fire red, with a bit of orange, like a poppy.
Last swallow of cheap wine.
If you're a good person, you're an orange-red splotch on my chaotic canvas. You're beautiful, lovely, inside and out, a dream that I can't even believe I'm a part of, a way of life that screams to my soul in a way I can't ignore. I FINALLY FOUND WHERE I WANT TO BE. And it's not being in grad school, it's not wearing somebody's goddamn gold ring, it's not rushing into anything, it's floudering around and fucking up and drinking damn good coffee while I'm at it. I make my own bed and I lie in it, and I learn from my mistakes while loving-so-much-I-could-eat the successes.
There are people I wish could be splotches. I don't know if they'd (she'd) be orange-red...I imagine more of a royal purple, with a baseball cap. I fucked up. C'est la vie. We learn from mistakes, do we not? But a beer over the past would be exactly what I needed. Goddamn the respect I have for a beatifully freckled shy republican. Goddamn.
Flow-of-consciousness drifting...I never wrote an essay about hair at nelp, never wrote an essay about (literal) hair at UM. Not taking enough women's studies classes I suppose. Today I received, gave, became an intrinsic part of, a million hugs with Oren. A completely huggable, entirely lanky, beautiful jumble of verbs who never knew me not taken. So many double negatives. But I do give damn good hugs. I love them for what they are, for what they represent, for the fact that so many people are missing out on them...Pat, I can hear you cringing, FEEL you cringing right about now in your fever-induced what-the-fuck-is-she-talking-about nonsense, and I love you for it, I love you, I love you more than the I-will-relieve-myself-of-all-guilt-by-crying-with-you man, more than avocadoes. More.Than.My.Tomato.Plants. But give me freedom to dream, for far too often I am grounded in reality.
That's the problem. FAR TOO OFTEN I AM GROUNDED IN REALITY.
Last night Lee and I proved our incredibleness by partner dancing through a crowd of twenty at a mid-week show at the blind pig. the second dance they challenged us and we rose to the line with a waltz. fuck them--partner dancing is my charade, the only realm in which my control over my own body ceases to exist, the realm in which i fake my ability while fulfilling my soul. my body will do what your body tells me to. i will spin like you've never seen. i will bend in ways i didn't know i could. i will lose myself in the 1-2-3 of it...and i will be mine, exhilarated, blown, a maggie kate of all maggie kates, a transient of time who follows her bliss to places she never thought she'd see. thank god she's doing it early, instead of fumbling her way out at 44.
yesterday a boy played me a martin sexton song on a guitar for "whatever i could give him." i gave him my name, a handshake, my smile, and a laugh. he asked for my number, i said :i'm sorry:. he was beautiful. he made martin sexton sound beautiful. i will learn this song, i will sing martin's words for this boy in black, sing them for all the boys who have the balls to say hello and ask for the girl who's already taken. i think they have my heart more than anyone else.
tenacious, that's the GRE word for the day. tenacity.