(no subject)
I've been rereading through livejournal today, trying to catch myself up again after a period of departure. I'm really impressed with the writing of my friends. It's been so considered, so thoughtful and interesting and engaging. It leaves me with a lot to live up to! Sometimes I feel like I post here to have memories about who and where I was now for me, years in the future. And some times, like tonight, I feel like I post here as a kind of mass-letter to all of my friends, letting them know about me from far away. Oh, how glorious it is to be connected!
Three things kept me from going crazy in Scotland*: the collected works of A.A. Milne, the ability to call America, and livejournal. I'm occasionally startled by how often I reference my time there, always in the same tone of "in Scotland" like other people say "back in 'Nam". Was my time abroad a harrowing abandonment of sanity?** Kind of. Was it the rock tumbler I expected? Yes. Before I left, I wondered if it would break me to dust or buff me like a ruby. As I am not dust, I am forced to assume I am shinier and harder than I was before.
But that has nothing to do with what I wanted to talk about in this post. I wanted to talk about my - our? I'm sure other people feel the same way - about my obsession with moving on. The idea of staying where I grew up, of living with my parents like I am, makes my skin itch. I want to be in Beloit, living on my own. But Beloit isn't really where I want to be, either. I don't want to be someone who can't move on, who clings to Beloit, when what I'm really clinging to are the people I met there. I'm actively admiring my group of friends - almost exclusively from Beloit, and BSFFA - now that they've moved on. I love following Lex in Madison and Jinx in New York and Rook and Caitlin in California, and Shira in North Carolina and half a dozen more everywhere else in the country.
I told Gordon I felt like I had Cabin Fever for Life. I want to be an adult, and live somewhere I have plans (first, I'll need plans!), and have a place to grow into myself now that I know who I am. Maybe before college I was only a suggestion, an idea. In college, I became a seed, and now I'm looking to plant somewhere. Could that metaphor be any lamer? I would have to try very hard.
Instead, I'm staying in Holland until January. Unless a job and housing leap up and bite me, of course; but they won't. It is wiser for me to stay here and live for free and make money - or at the very least not spend any - for a couple of months. In January, if Robbie and I can find one or two Good room mates, I'll move to Beloit (hopefully already with a job in tow!) for a while and finish out that last credit I owe them***, and see Daniel and Gordon and everyone else I love so much there. Apply to grad schools, really work on a body of work for my portfolio.
God, I need to do more art. I really need to train myself to do art when I need to, and not to just slack off. To develop drive. Now that I'm between jobs, it's the perfect time for me to follow Gordon's suggestion to set aside time every day, the same time every day, to work on art (even if I'm just chewing my pen and thinking). I need to work on concepts, I need to work on technique, I need to prove to myself that I can continue to grow and be better on my own, without assignments from outside to drive me.
Here's where I start to get bored of my own post! That's terrible. If I'm bored by it, you'll never read it, or if you do, you'll be nodding off by the third paragraph. How awful! I wish I had something to show you, to make your efforts in getting this far worth it. Alas, it will have to wait for another time. I would like to leave you with a bit of poetry from Now We Are Six, but I can't really find a good choice. I love you!
*This is ignoring several people who literally kept me from jumping out a window, but they know who they are, and I thank them every time I think about it.
**Barbara, the lovely woman in the Study Abroad office, was shocked to read my review of my time abroad. "Why," she asked, "did you recommend study abroad when you clearly had such an awful time of it?" She was really surprised to find that even though I wouldn't do it again, I would still recommend the experience to other people. Was I cruel? Did I enjoy suffering? No. Sure, I'd have made different choices if given a second chance at the whole thing. But would I erase the experience if I could? Hell No. It's important to me. It's a scar to learn from, and I'm very, very grateful for it.
*** Just the special project for museum studies, to get my minor. Not necessary to graduate. And sometimes I think, is it worth it to delay graduation like this? Is the minor worth it? How much will I want it later - it will either be not at all or very, very much with no real grey area in between.
Three things kept me from going crazy in Scotland*: the collected works of A.A. Milne, the ability to call America, and livejournal. I'm occasionally startled by how often I reference my time there, always in the same tone of "in Scotland" like other people say "back in 'Nam". Was my time abroad a harrowing abandonment of sanity?** Kind of. Was it the rock tumbler I expected? Yes. Before I left, I wondered if it would break me to dust or buff me like a ruby. As I am not dust, I am forced to assume I am shinier and harder than I was before.
But that has nothing to do with what I wanted to talk about in this post. I wanted to talk about my - our? I'm sure other people feel the same way - about my obsession with moving on. The idea of staying where I grew up, of living with my parents like I am, makes my skin itch. I want to be in Beloit, living on my own. But Beloit isn't really where I want to be, either. I don't want to be someone who can't move on, who clings to Beloit, when what I'm really clinging to are the people I met there. I'm actively admiring my group of friends - almost exclusively from Beloit, and BSFFA - now that they've moved on. I love following Lex in Madison and Jinx in New York and Rook and Caitlin in California, and Shira in North Carolina and half a dozen more everywhere else in the country.
I told Gordon I felt like I had Cabin Fever for Life. I want to be an adult, and live somewhere I have plans (first, I'll need plans!), and have a place to grow into myself now that I know who I am. Maybe before college I was only a suggestion, an idea. In college, I became a seed, and now I'm looking to plant somewhere. Could that metaphor be any lamer? I would have to try very hard.
Instead, I'm staying in Holland until January. Unless a job and housing leap up and bite me, of course; but they won't. It is wiser for me to stay here and live for free and make money - or at the very least not spend any - for a couple of months. In January, if Robbie and I can find one or two Good room mates, I'll move to Beloit (hopefully already with a job in tow!) for a while and finish out that last credit I owe them***, and see Daniel and Gordon and everyone else I love so much there. Apply to grad schools, really work on a body of work for my portfolio.
God, I need to do more art. I really need to train myself to do art when I need to, and not to just slack off. To develop drive. Now that I'm between jobs, it's the perfect time for me to follow Gordon's suggestion to set aside time every day, the same time every day, to work on art (even if I'm just chewing my pen and thinking). I need to work on concepts, I need to work on technique, I need to prove to myself that I can continue to grow and be better on my own, without assignments from outside to drive me.
Here's where I start to get bored of my own post! That's terrible. If I'm bored by it, you'll never read it, or if you do, you'll be nodding off by the third paragraph. How awful! I wish I had something to show you, to make your efforts in getting this far worth it. Alas, it will have to wait for another time. I would like to leave you with a bit of poetry from Now We Are Six, but I can't really find a good choice. I love you!
*This is ignoring several people who literally kept me from jumping out a window, but they know who they are, and I thank them every time I think about it.
**Barbara, the lovely woman in the Study Abroad office, was shocked to read my review of my time abroad. "Why," she asked, "did you recommend study abroad when you clearly had such an awful time of it?" She was really surprised to find that even though I wouldn't do it again, I would still recommend the experience to other people. Was I cruel? Did I enjoy suffering? No. Sure, I'd have made different choices if given a second chance at the whole thing. But would I erase the experience if I could? Hell No. It's important to me. It's a scar to learn from, and I'm very, very grateful for it.
*** Just the special project for museum studies, to get my minor. Not necessary to graduate. And sometimes I think, is it worth it to delay graduation like this? Is the minor worth it? How much will I want it later - it will either be not at all or very, very much with no real grey area in between.