My Story, pt. 3b
The blue period. Because sophomores wear blue.
My school year always starts with cross country. (Well, it used to at least.) So I guess that's a good place to start. I trained really hard all summer, but then a few weeks into the season I got shin splints and never got over them. Quint and Nick passed me for good and never looked back. My head was just not made for racing. I don't have the right mindset. It was a rough xc season.
We bought a house! My current house, but it was really exciting because:
a) I got a bedroom that was literally twice as big as my old one, and had its own bathroom (so Karyn and I didn't have to share)
b) It has a tennis court and a hot tub, and we put in a pool and a fire pit
c) The total square footage is TRIPLE what our old house's was
It was unexciting because we had nowhere to put our really nice surround sound system, and we still haven't put one in anywhere in our current house. That's the one thing I really miss. The surround sound. I remember once Blake came over and we played Doom 3 on my XBox with the surround sound and all the lights out. Scariest. Gaming experience. Ever. Then there was the time he came over and ate so much pizza that he was literally lying on my sofa downstairs groaning. That was hilarious. Anyhow.
Then homecoming I think was the next big thing in my life. Events leading up to it were hella weird. I thought I liked people, I thought I hated people, I thought people were off limits, I think I was confused, to say the least. In a nutshell, I thought I liked Aimee, I thought Aimee hated me, I thought I hated her (we didn't talk for a while), I thought I liked Rachel Whitcomb, I thought she was off-limits because of her boy back in CO. But I asked her to homecoming anyways and she said yes. Man, I was totally unsure of what was going on. Didn't know how to act or anything. But we had a very nice time (ok, I thought we did). Only weird part was when she started crying on my shoulder. And then, it felt like it couldn't have been two weeks later, although it was really 3 months, she was going out with Vince. And I thought to myself "Wait a minute. I'm interested in a girl but I respect her by allowing her current relationship to run its course before asking her out, yet here's this other guy who could care less...and she goes for him?" I was a little hurt, to say the least, but I got over it. However, I didn't like Vince very much for a while. But I got over that too. So things were ugly for a while, but I think everyone ended up ok, I don't know for certain, but I felt really bad for a while. Because it was a love-asodfgiahosruweo, where an asodfgiahosruweo is the shape you get when a likes b who likes c, and a and c are friends, and a asks d to help with b and b asks d to help with c. Yeah.
*Deep breath* so anyhow, moving on. After exploding those attempted relationships into millions of pieces and krazy-gluing them back together, or I guess, while I was gluing them back together, Kimi and I got together after reconnecting in driver's ed. Mr. Greene takes all the credit for that. She was my first kiss as well. Honestly, based on my past track record, I didn't expect us to be together for more than a month, maybe two at the most. For those keeping score we've now been together for over two years. I still don't know why or how it's lasted that long but somehow we just work for each other.
That winter I discovered snowboarding. I learned to snowboard from my cousin at Willamette Pass, in Oregon. He was really patient with me, and patience is not one of his usual virtues, but by the end of the day I remember going down my first blue slope. From the bunnies to the blues in a day was pretty good I thought, even though in retrospect it was a really easy blue and I fell what felt like a million times. It was an interesting experience though. Having no idea at all what snowboarding would be like, I had no waterproof pants. Bad idea. My cargo pants, thick as they were, were soaked by the time the day was done, since as a total newbie I had fallen down hard and frequently. I had borrowed goggles and rental gear, and I was wet and freezing, and more than a little sore, but somehow I came off that mountain with a huge smile on my face. I don't think I could move the next day. I was soooooo sore. I'm going to be a creaky old man. I already have back issues, and my other joints aren't too happy all the time either.
I thought a lot about religion sophomore year. I remember that. Having a different belief system that someone else can make things difficult, and even a different belief intensity can make things awkward. Maybe I think too far ahead and deny myself just living in the moment sometimes, but I honestly think that long-term I couldn't date someone who's really really Christian, or really really Muslim, or even really really Jewish. It just wouldn't work. I'm not orthodox by any means, but I want to raise my kids Jewish. I decided that sophomore year. I think that's why, before I started dating Kimi, that I never asked out Melanie, or Blessing. I had crushes on them at various times that year, in-between all the other drama (I hate drama), but I never asked them out because I never saw it working, at least not for very long. They're both beautiful people inside and out, and I love them dearly as friends, but for that one reason I don't think it could possibly work for any long-term relationship. But religion is a place where I can go and feel safe. I've been going to the same synagogue since I was 6, minus a year that we tried the one in Olney. It's somewhere that I'm comfortable, somewhere that I can get away from everything else that's on my mind and just relax for a while. Yes I have to get dressed up and get up early, but it no longer bothers me.
Lacrosse was interesting. We got a new coach, Coach Foust, who immediately set about changing the team. We worked out as a team, went to AXIS as (most of) a team, and basically got ready for the season as a team more than we ever had before. I was really excited going into the season, and rightfully so. Our defense was among the best in the county, in no small part thanks to Walt, our goalie, and Aaron, our best defender. Walt made some of the most ridiculous saves and was probably the fastest person on the team by a wide margin, and both were tremendously athletically-gifted. I won a lot of face-offs again, but that was about it. However, I did make it into the county-wide top 50 for number of ground balls won. The one thing I didn't like was that Coach made Austin a midfielder, taking away a lot of our scoring power, and then once he finally did put him on attack he wouldn't let him create like he used to, so his production went way down. I think if Austin had been given the power to create more for the offense, instead of just pass-pass-pass-pass-pass etc., we would have won more games, because he was great at creating, and then great at finishing, but Coach took that away from him. It was a good season and I was really excited about junior year.
Summer, summer, what happened over the summer? I don't know, I'll probably edit this in later. If you remember something then just put it in a reply. And then on to junior year!
My school year always starts with cross country. (Well, it used to at least.) So I guess that's a good place to start. I trained really hard all summer, but then a few weeks into the season I got shin splints and never got over them. Quint and Nick passed me for good and never looked back. My head was just not made for racing. I don't have the right mindset. It was a rough xc season.
We bought a house! My current house, but it was really exciting because:
a) I got a bedroom that was literally twice as big as my old one, and had its own bathroom (so Karyn and I didn't have to share)
b) It has a tennis court and a hot tub, and we put in a pool and a fire pit
c) The total square footage is TRIPLE what our old house's was
It was unexciting because we had nowhere to put our really nice surround sound system, and we still haven't put one in anywhere in our current house. That's the one thing I really miss. The surround sound. I remember once Blake came over and we played Doom 3 on my XBox with the surround sound and all the lights out. Scariest. Gaming experience. Ever. Then there was the time he came over and ate so much pizza that he was literally lying on my sofa downstairs groaning. That was hilarious. Anyhow.
Then homecoming I think was the next big thing in my life. Events leading up to it were hella weird. I thought I liked people, I thought I hated people, I thought people were off limits, I think I was confused, to say the least. In a nutshell, I thought I liked Aimee, I thought Aimee hated me, I thought I hated her (we didn't talk for a while), I thought I liked Rachel Whitcomb, I thought she was off-limits because of her boy back in CO. But I asked her to homecoming anyways and she said yes. Man, I was totally unsure of what was going on. Didn't know how to act or anything. But we had a very nice time (ok, I thought we did). Only weird part was when she started crying on my shoulder. And then, it felt like it couldn't have been two weeks later, although it was really 3 months, she was going out with Vince. And I thought to myself "Wait a minute. I'm interested in a girl but I respect her by allowing her current relationship to run its course before asking her out, yet here's this other guy who could care less...and she goes for him?" I was a little hurt, to say the least, but I got over it. However, I didn't like Vince very much for a while. But I got over that too. So things were ugly for a while, but I think everyone ended up ok, I don't know for certain, but I felt really bad for a while. Because it was a love-asodfgiahosruweo, where an asodfgiahosruweo is the shape you get when a likes b who likes c, and a and c are friends, and a asks d to help with b and b asks d to help with c. Yeah.
*Deep breath* so anyhow, moving on. After exploding those attempted relationships into millions of pieces and krazy-gluing them back together, or I guess, while I was gluing them back together, Kimi and I got together after reconnecting in driver's ed. Mr. Greene takes all the credit for that. She was my first kiss as well. Honestly, based on my past track record, I didn't expect us to be together for more than a month, maybe two at the most. For those keeping score we've now been together for over two years. I still don't know why or how it's lasted that long but somehow we just work for each other.
That winter I discovered snowboarding. I learned to snowboard from my cousin at Willamette Pass, in Oregon. He was really patient with me, and patience is not one of his usual virtues, but by the end of the day I remember going down my first blue slope. From the bunnies to the blues in a day was pretty good I thought, even though in retrospect it was a really easy blue and I fell what felt like a million times. It was an interesting experience though. Having no idea at all what snowboarding would be like, I had no waterproof pants. Bad idea. My cargo pants, thick as they were, were soaked by the time the day was done, since as a total newbie I had fallen down hard and frequently. I had borrowed goggles and rental gear, and I was wet and freezing, and more than a little sore, but somehow I came off that mountain with a huge smile on my face. I don't think I could move the next day. I was soooooo sore. I'm going to be a creaky old man. I already have back issues, and my other joints aren't too happy all the time either.
I thought a lot about religion sophomore year. I remember that. Having a different belief system that someone else can make things difficult, and even a different belief intensity can make things awkward. Maybe I think too far ahead and deny myself just living in the moment sometimes, but I honestly think that long-term I couldn't date someone who's really really Christian, or really really Muslim, or even really really Jewish. It just wouldn't work. I'm not orthodox by any means, but I want to raise my kids Jewish. I decided that sophomore year. I think that's why, before I started dating Kimi, that I never asked out Melanie, or Blessing. I had crushes on them at various times that year, in-between all the other drama (I hate drama), but I never asked them out because I never saw it working, at least not for very long. They're both beautiful people inside and out, and I love them dearly as friends, but for that one reason I don't think it could possibly work for any long-term relationship. But religion is a place where I can go and feel safe. I've been going to the same synagogue since I was 6, minus a year that we tried the one in Olney. It's somewhere that I'm comfortable, somewhere that I can get away from everything else that's on my mind and just relax for a while. Yes I have to get dressed up and get up early, but it no longer bothers me.
Lacrosse was interesting. We got a new coach, Coach Foust, who immediately set about changing the team. We worked out as a team, went to AXIS as (most of) a team, and basically got ready for the season as a team more than we ever had before. I was really excited going into the season, and rightfully so. Our defense was among the best in the county, in no small part thanks to Walt, our goalie, and Aaron, our best defender. Walt made some of the most ridiculous saves and was probably the fastest person on the team by a wide margin, and both were tremendously athletically-gifted. I won a lot of face-offs again, but that was about it. However, I did make it into the county-wide top 50 for number of ground balls won. The one thing I didn't like was that Coach made Austin a midfielder, taking away a lot of our scoring power, and then once he finally did put him on attack he wouldn't let him create like he used to, so his production went way down. I think if Austin had been given the power to create more for the offense, instead of just pass-pass-pass-pass-pass etc., we would have won more games, because he was great at creating, and then great at finishing, but Coach took that away from him. It was a good season and I was really excited about junior year.
Summer, summer, what happened over the summer? I don't know, I'll probably edit this in later. If you remember something then just put it in a reply. And then on to junior year!