Not Again

I'm having trouble sleeping again. I wake up several times in the middle of the night. It's still not as bad as it was two years ago. I am thankful that I fall asleep rather quickly at night time. A couple years ago, it would take me hours to fall asleep, then I would wake up very early. I think I woke up less in the middle of the night, though.

I woke up with a stomachache for the second day in a row. I don't think it's a coincidence that its my second day of taking my medication. It blows my mind that it is the same exact dosage I took before, but because it has been a while of not taking it, it messes with my body. I usually have trouble sleeping when my body feels depressed (I say my body, because I don't want to acknowledge my mind as apart of this crap). It's weird because when break hit, I started sleeping great--and all of the time.  I finally decided, with the help of both Adams, to go back on medication. However, that changed up the depression again, and now I am no longer sleeping soundly. I hope that means I will get better soon. At least I am writing a lot. When I get really bad, I can't write. I'm thankful for the writing I have been doing. It's very therapeutic. Write on.

The Cliff

This is one of ten poems for my final portfolio. I'm posting it because it was an experimental style for me, and I liked it. It's going to be a late night finishing all of these poems and papers to go with it! I'm all done tomorrow, though!

The Cliff

Kiss rocks cutting
each toe before jumping.
Your mother’s not
here to stop you
from licking blackberries
oozing with death and sex.
Seduce God because
heroin addicts do
find needles in haystacks.
Clench sheets, moan, manipulate
your maker, leaving
me a mouthful of prayers
I’ll vomit on the ceiling.

Publication!

I found out last night that I will have my second publication appear in a lit. journal next semester. It is an essay about my friend, Adam. It's very unique, and probably not one that my parents and grandparents will want to read, but it's my favorite piece of writing that I've produced. I'm ecstatic that a lot of strangers will read it.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday. I never get as excited for it as I do for Christmas. It always sneaks up on me. I think that might be why it's my favorite. There's a lot less pressure to have it be the perfect day...therefore a lot less disappointment. It's just a day to spend with family and eat. It is more about the being together. It's not clouded by gifts and materialism. Plus, it's a secular holiday that everyone can benefit from. What a great idea: "Let's set aside a day where we reflect on how thankful we are for everything good in our life."  

I'm thankful for a lot in my life... the usual stuff: food and a place to live. Two things I'm especially thankful for today are the people in my life and the opportunity to be educated. I know everyone should be thankful for these things--I hope it's implied that I am always thankful for these things--but I want to be especially mindful of them today.

Last night, I went to dinner with the gang from the South Dakota trips. I don't see these people often. The last time we had been together as a whole was last Thanksgiving. Yet, we have this amazingly intense connection. It's such a beautiful love and respect for one another. Being with them made me so thankful for everyone who loves me in my life. It's easy for me to forget just how many people are on my side when I get caught up in feeling alone. I have amazing friends, though. I have several very different, close groups of friends. They are all so unique and special to me that I can't compare them at all because my life would be so different with out any one group of them. I recently heard a writer speak. He said he worried about how he would divide his love between his kids when the second kid was born, because he loved the first child with everything he had. He said he eventually realized love doesn't work like that. He said, instead, his love just multiplied, and there was plenty of it to go around. My friends make me realize that love works like that. I don't love any of my old friends who I don't see as much any less than I ever did, and I still love my new friends just as much as my old friends. I also used to worry about new friends replacing old friends, but love doesn't work like that. I'm very thankful for the way love just grows and multiplies. I am also thankful for my family. I have to admire the way so many people with lots of differences try to be together, even if it's not always easy. We've all hurt each other at some point (most of us multiple times), yet we just keep showing up to be together. Thank you to all of my friends and family. I love all of you. You make me feel loved.

Now, I feel the need to explain how thankful I am for my education, because school has been driving me insane--to the point of me saying I hate it lately--It's really just the stress, though. I can't take the stress sometimes. However, I am so thankful that I have the opportunity to enhance my quality of life by learning about such a variety of things on a daily basis. I don't ever want to stop learning. I don't think I will, but there will come a time when I am no longer in classes. I won't be able to hear experts in a variety of fields speak regularly. I won't be able to ask them questions. I know when that day comes, I will miss these days.

I can't help but think of Frederick Douglas. We just read his slave narrative for my American Lit. course. His life was totally changed by the fact that he learned to read. Knowledge really is power, and his story reminded me how thankful I am to be able to read and write...not just in a merely functional way, but in a life-enhancing-sort-of-way. My life is truly better because I can read books of all sorts, and I know how to express myself clearly with words. Life just wouldn't be the same with out this gift. I don't ever want to forget how fortunate I am for experiencing equal education despite the fact I am female and went to public schools. I wish everyone could say that, but I'm aware that it is a gift that is more rare than it should be. I appreciate it nonetheless.

Complaining

If you don't like complaining, don't read this. Everything hurts. My head, my body, my spirit. I think I'm sick. It doesn't help that I was already worn down and burnt out. 

I've been laying in bed a lot. It's hard to go to class. I also haven't felt like eating (but I make myself do it anyway). This scares me, because it's classic textbook depression symptoms, but I have to believe Im just physically sick. I've been working so hard to keep my mental health in check. I've been doing such a good job at staying in control. I find it hard to believe I could just randomly fail without some tragedy coming along. There has been no major tragedy, nothing to set this episode off. I might just be sick. I'm going to keep resting and taking vitamin C. We'll see what happens. I have awesome friends and family, though, who keep checking on my progress. I'm probably just sick.

I wish I could use this non-productive time to write and free my mind and spirit. Instead I just lay in bed. I'm tired and everything hurts. 

Coffee Shop Reflections

I'm writing in a coffee shop. Stereotypical, I know. I should be doing homework, preparing for an exam this week. It's hard for me to work on stuff that doesn't matter to me when I need to write. I just don't get to write like I need to anymore. I am beginning to accept that I need to make time to write, even if that means stressing out about homework later. It's more important that I feel mentally healthy, and writing is essential to me for that. 

I'm so sick of school these days. I have trouble caring enough to put in the required effort, but I keep working to the best of my ability. Somedays my best is less than acceptable, though. I like college much better than high school, but my number one complaint about college classes is that there is never a day where I feel like I have no homework. I could always be doing more. It's just a matter of what needs to be done. It makes me feel lazy sometimes, but somehow my GPA turns out okay. I hate that I never know what my GPA will look like all semester. I worry about it all of the time and feel guilty for not working hard enough, but then I get my grades, and I somehow do okay.

I miss writing prose so much. I've been working on some tonight, but it's much different because my use of language has changed from working on poetry so much. I can't wait until Christmas break. I hope to write a lot. I guess, I didn't have much to say. I just have gotten bad about keeping my blog up, so I thought I would reflect a bit while I had a minute.

Today is alright :)

Today's horoscope (courtesy of Yahoo) seems to be right on. I love it when that happens. I could elaborate on all of the ways that it has proved to be true today, but I want to work on a poem. I need to be studying for my quiz at 5. Too bad, I'm working on this poem since I haven't felt creative in far too long :(

Quickie
The big changes coming into your life are going to take their time -- be patient!
Overview
Your communication style is always a bit poetic and today it's even more so. You may have a harder time speaking with people who are too literal-minded, but fortunately there aren't many of them.

Honestly?

Today was one of those days where I keep telling myself I'm fine, but things keep going down hill. It seems the last week or so has been like that. It's not any one big thing, but instead a bunch of little things.

I got back my midterm from that week where I had an 8-page paper due, a quiz, and three exams. I got a C. It started the morning on a sour note. Then it just continued to be a bunch of little things...like a firedrill at work during my all too short 45 minute lunch. Oh and did I say one fire drill? I meant two. TWO.

I've been under a lot of scrutiny for my project lately. I'm getting e-mails (yes, plural) that are asking me questions I can't answer. I don't know if I can keep working on it. It's draining.

I don't want to complain about all of the little things bogging me down, but I'm trying to communicate the feeling of drowning. I am involved in too many things so that I cannot excel at any of them. I'm constantly flaking out. I'm not writing. It makes me angry.

Speaking of anger, I've never allowed myself to feel anger in a healthy way. A part of my therapy is to pay closer attention to my feelings. I've been feeling angry about sexism a lot. I never realized how much it is a part of everyday life. It's starting to jump out at me. For example, I notice the way I am passive and constantly let men interrupt me, etc... It's not worth getting angry about when I can 't evaluate all of the feelings more, but it doesn't just go away either.

This is a pointless blog. More for clearing my head than anything else. It's going to be a long week. I'm supposed to camp out at midnight tonight in cardboard boxes and freeze for WPI. Good times.

VOTE

I am voting for my first time tomorrow. It would be so much easier if Tuesdays weren't my busiest days of the week. I wish one of my professors would have cancelled class to allow us time to vote. Oh well, my dinner break will just have to be a little bit shorter. I'll survive.

It feels good to be back

I haven’t allowed myself to freewrite on here in so long. I didn’t even now how to start, so I thought I would acknowledge my uncertainty. I wanted to take a break from poetry to write prose. It used to feel so natural, but I’ve gotten used to carefully analyzing every word. My job also affects my writing. I’ve spent so much time with academic writing, rewording, and precision. It’s good for my writing overall, but it’s forcing me to change and grow so much that it just doesn’t feel natural to me.

My poetry professor said that I’m improving rapidly. I felt like I was getting worse. He said that’s normal, because improving is like working up hill. It requires getting used to new techniques, and you might wake up sore from your effort the next day. He talked about improving up hill, having intervals of plateaus where you rest and feel comfortable until someone forces you to dig deeper and start climbing toward the next. I’m climbing pretty aggressively, and I like it overall. I’m still not very confident about it all, though. It doesn’t help my poems were rejected by this lit. journal on campus again. It happens—a lot for writers—it still is annoying, though. I’m glad my professor is so encouraging, because now I don’t necessarily think that my poems are rejected because they aren’t good enough. I think my style is unique and doesn’t mesh well with a lot of the poetry scene folks up here.

I dressed up like Cleopatra last night. I spray dyed my hair black for the evening. Two showers later: I’m mostly free of black dye, but our shower is stained, and there is black all over the sink and walls. Black even came out when I blew my nose this morning.

I’m at a coffee shop with intentions of writing. I guess this is a prewriting warm-up. I’m going to have to dig a lot deeper than this to get some real writing. I don’t even know where to start. I had a crazy busy week. It ran me to the ground. I handled it better than I expected, but I don’t want to write about that. I’m sick of letting business define my life. I had a literature professor comment on a profound story. He said something along the lines of, “We are busy are whole lives, and doing what? Nothing when you think about it.”

Last weekend I felt happy on the camping trip. I’m trying to be more observant of my feelings, especially happy ones. I felt happy watching my friend, Nik, hike with a walking stick while wearing mismatched clothes and a circular piece of birch tree bark on her head as a hat. Nik is one of those rare individuals who is just so full of life. My friend Adam is like that. I have similar feelings of happiness when people I love are full of joy. I’m reminded of how happy I feel on the day where we take the kids to the water park at work in the summer, or how happy I felt when I saw my dad child-like excited when we walked into the Piston’s game last winter. I guess, maybe I feel most alive when in the presence of joy. Adam and Nik are joyful people. It seems like the rare individuals I know who possess so much life, have all experienced some sort of emotional death at some point. It leads me to believe that one has to truly know the depths of despair to feel the greatest level of pure joy.

I don’t know what else I want to reflect on, but I think I’m ready to post this as a blog, then really start writing.

I'm Outta Here

I had an opportunity to go camping in the U.P. this weekend. I've never been to the U.P, and I was looking forward to beautiful scenery and no technology. The friends I am going with are going to treat it as a sort of writers retreat. I am aware that I need something like that, but responsibility kicked in. I turned them down, because I have a huge paper due Monday, two exams next week, an appointment Friday morning, and a meeting for work Friday afternoon.

That being said, my friend who invited me said I could change my mind if I wanted, and that I wouldn't have to cancel my appointment tomorrow morning, because they are not leaving until 11. I decided to get the guts to ask my boss if I could miss the meeting. I don't know why I was so nervous. She's incredibly nice. She didn't directly answer my question, but was asking me about all the fun things we would do up there. Then I asked, "Is it okay, then?" She said no. Then she explained that she can't tell me that it's okay to miss these meetings, because I'm new, and it's not. She said it was forgivable, though, and that it sounded like a lot of fun, so I should go.

I can't believe how excited I got. I think I realized that I couldn't need to get away more than I do now, and that I'd probably benefit more from going away one weekend, then working my ass off next week to recover. I don't even know how much I would get done if I stayed and moped around up here about how much I had to do. I would just be feeling guilty about my lack of ability to get anything done.

Therefore, I'm going camping, and I can't wait! :)

Dreaming Big

I just heard a Feminist Islam scholar speak. I am really tired, so I don't know that I got as much out of it as I should have, but I really enjoyed it. It gave me a burst of creative energy that will motivate me to work more on my poems that I'm submitting to a local lit. journal tomorrow. I don't think they will be done in time, but I have nothing to lose. I feel obliged to submit something, because you just never know when someone will like a poem. 

My poetry is really evolving in the past week or two. I'm trying new styles (I can't wait to post one or two when I get around to fixing them more). The latest poem I did when my class took a field trip to the art museum. We had to write a poem about a painting of our choice. The one I chose featured distorted bodies dancing in a city street to the drum beats played by a poetic/jazzy looking drummer. I used a lot of onomatopoeia to mimic drum sounds, which made the rest of the poem so much more rhythmic and fun to read aloud. The idea of performing one of my poems terrifies me, but with something like this I wouldn't want people to read it on paper. I would almost consider performing this one. Right now my favorite couple of lines is something along the lines of, "Ba da ba tic tic ta./ My heart skips a beat. I'm dancing bare feet in the street./" I don't know what else I'm going to do, or if that will even stay in the poem, but I like the rhythm.

I am sad that I have not worked on my project in three or four weeks. It makes me feel like it won't happen. I got an e-mail from a friend I lost contact with two days ago. He asked how the project was going. It's really nice of people to ask about it, because it makes me feel motivated to work on it, and like it's a worthwhile project.

Scheduling is also coming up. I always go most insane during scheduling time. It's so demanding, important, and it doesn't even have anything to do with my current classes. I have my first audit in a week or two. Hopefully, I'm on the right track to be done in four years. I'm already trying to think about my masters. My poetry prof. seems to think it would be good for me to stay here just for my MA so that I'm ready to jump right into an MFA or a PhD, and don't have to waste my time with "life experience" (he made fun of the fact that he was a gym teacher) when I already know I want to learn how to teach college courses and study writing. If I could teach classes here and have my education paid for, he said that would be a good way to kill/grow for two years before entering such an intense degree program.

I need to go start scheduling, e-mail strangers about my project, finish some poems I want to submit tomorrow, and start a 10 page Jesus paper that is due next week. I won't due all of that tonight, though. Dream big, right?

Little Glass Bluebird (The Final)

I believe this is the final.

Little Glass Blue Bird

I run my thumb
over scars from a crooked
price tag and fingerprint bruises
across your breast,
remembering when I burnt
my feet on the pavement,
dropped the newspaper,
and ripped open
your yellow envelope.

Sliding into my hand,
riding a cardboard tag
stamped with “The Bluebird:
A Gift for Happiness,”
wrapped in a letter from a friend
scribbled with smiling
stick figures, trees,
and the sun in black
pen at the bottom.
It read, “I bought this
seven years ago.
Crazy how time flies,”
and “Remember that first night
we talked until breakfast,
laughing when the birds sang?”
Didn’t mention
how she was doing or explain
why she sent you.

I called, rambled a two-minute
thank you message.
Didn’t mention
how I was doing or explain
what you meant— -
because I know
she knows we’re too fragile to carry
happiness alone,
yet you’d make me believe
I could support its weight,
knowing in the end
happiness might break us.

Memoir

This is a poem I have chosen as one that inspires me to look up a book from the poet. The next step for my class will be to look up the poet. I wanted to post this, and soak in the poem before I get to know the poet.

Memoir: by Vijay Seshadri

Orwell says somewhere that no one ever writes the real story of their life.

The real story of a life is the story of its humiliations.

If I wrote that story now--

radioactive to the end of time--

people, I swear, your eyes would fall out, you couldn't peel

the gloves fast enough

from your hands scorched by the firestorms of that shame.

Your poor hands. Your poor eyes

to see me weeping in my room

or boring the tall blonde to death.

Once I accused the innocent.

Once I bowed and prayed to the guilty.

I still wince at what I once said to the devastated widow.

And one October afternoon, under a locust tree

whose blackened pods were falling and making

illuminating patterns on the pathway,

I was seized by joy,

and someone saw me there,

and that was the worst of all,

lacerating and unforgettable.

* From the New Yorker

Salman Rushdie

I just had the privilege of hearing Salman Rushdie, controversial writer of "The Satanic Verses," speak. I never felt so excited to be a writer. He was what I needed to get the energy to start writing again. Too bad I have to spend tonight writing a 4 page paper that's due tomorrow morning... If only creative energy was something you could save and ration.

Surviving

Looking at my schedule for the next two weeks terrifies me. However, once I survive those two weeks, the rest of the semester should be doable.

I have something to look forward to for every weekend until the second week in November. That should help me get through the craziness of these next few weeks. Christmas break never sounded so appealing.

I Wrote this Last Night

I just took two Nyquil. So I’ll sit with all of this pressure in my head until peace rescues me for the evening. My body has gotten the best of my mind and spirit the past week. I’m never very tough about getting sick. I don’t see the point. Why use energy I don’t have to pretend that I feel okay and trick everyone into believing they shouldn’t worry about getting sick? I’d rather sulk and stay in bed all day. Unfortunately, my schedule does not allow that. I skipped two classes this week, staggering them so that I would gain the most from resting during that time, but not missing anything substantial. I was really tempted to call into work sick and skip my Spanish quiz. Luckily, some cold medicine was able to give me the pick-me-up I needed.

I’m determined to dig deeper with this entry. I’ve been so busy that I crank out shallow, meaningless blogs that aren’t even worth reading. I want truth. List format might be all I can handle right now.

1) Being sick messed with my mental health. I was trying to keep close tabs on how I was doing, but now I have no clue.

2) I’m frustrated with how my poetry is turning out for class. I know I’m a better poet than I’m showing in these poems. I have a final midterm portfolio due soon. I’d like to spend this weekend attacking and tearing apart these poems.

3) I am still unsure of myself at work. It seems to be getting better. I do like my job; I just don’t feel the best about myself when I’m doing it. I think I’m too self-critical, because the people I work with regularly seem to like me.

4) I need more time to write. I’m burnt out from school already, which is taking away any creative energy I have left. It’s also having a negative effect on my mental health. I need to find a muse.

I guess that’s all the truth I can spill out. I need to pass out in bed. I am in pain. Being sick sucks. Having a blog to complain about it on: Priceless.

Abuse

*These are all words from a writing handbook on punctuation .


Commas help communicate,
internal,
revisions,
it’s acceptable to omit
there’s no possibility of misreading,

do not set off a restrictive element,
although,
it’s not wrong to omit the comma
before the final conjunction in a series,
mild interjections,
between parts of a compound predicate.

Commas help communicate.

TGIF

I'm run down and burnt out. I just had my first session with my new counselor. He seems pretty qualified, and I am much more articulate than I used to be, so I think I make things easy. We seemed to jump right in and talk about realistic goals for the future. I told him about my project and he was really impressed and excited.

From what I understood, he seemed to think I was doing a good job at taking care of my mental health. He emphasized the fact that there is a lot of family history with mental health problems. He pointed out how it seems like I am constantly pounding into my friends head the fact that they can have biological depression, but I don't really believe that I have a Biological problem, and I just blame myself and feel like I am making myself depressed. I am doing that in some sick way, though. However, I'm still I'm open to the Biological theory. I'm a lot more accepting of my friends' shortcomings than my own.

I lost my five subject notebook with all of my class notes and information in it. These things happen when I am stressed and a little bit crazy; I lose things...A LOT. I have a lot of homework this weekend, and I need to catch up on sleep. Work is going well, but it's exhausting. I've started drinking a lot more caffeine, because I have to be alert to sit and listen to other people's papers, which is difficult when I haven't slept much.

I'm getting bad at blogging. There are so many more things I should blog about, but I'm tired and I just feel a little bit apathetic about expressing myself this morning.

Fall

Fall is my favorite season. It is also the season when I feel the worst. I get horrible headaches with all of the change in weather, my mood takes a nose dive due to lack of sunshine, and I get cold and lonely a lot. So why do I love it? I love the colors and smells, I love feeling like I have a purpose and being back in classes. However, the stress from being back in classes is usually what sends my mood spiraling a bit. I honestly feel like I can't win sometimes. 

I'm at the library right now, and gave up on a practice exam, which makes me feel guilty. It's not worth any points it's just for us to see how he grades. I feel like I should take advantage of this, since he didn't like my first paper (he really liked the second one, though). However, the essay question has made my head spin and I find myself giving up, tempted to go home and type out the two versions of the parable I picked to do my paper on for my Jesus class. That class is soooo interesting. There's so much about the Bible they never taught me in Catechism.

Today we learned that Luke left out things from Mark (that's not all that scandalous), but one of the passages he chose not to include was one where Jesus made some type of "racial slur" to a Psyro-Phoenician woman. It is speculated this was included in Mark, because Mark was writing for a Jewish audience, but it was left out of Luke, because he was writing for Gentiles, and this might have offended them. Crazy, isn't it?

My poetry class is getting harder. We are starting to work on all of this technical stuff that is frustrating. I think it is really good for me, but who knew there were all different types of rhyme and alliteration, and that I'd have to try to use them? I think out next assignment is to write a sonnet. I'm terrible at formal poetry. I don't even know where to begin. I'm disappointed with my last poem too. That one was lame, so I don't think I will post that on here anytime soon--unless it has some miracle turn-around soon.