The End II

How can it possibly be the end again? And in some of the same ways as it was last time... I was not ready for this end, and don't want to write about it really, because maybe if I don't write about it, then it's not really the end.
So I'll just be off, with tear-stained eyes, to pack up my room, load up my car, and settle in for the night. Without him.

17 McMaster St.

I recently wrote this essay for my Nonfiction Workshop class.

Yellow with red shutters. 885-4953. Staircase railing so tempting to slide down. Two doors to each bedroom. A huge mirror next to the stairs. These are memories of my old house. It feels like I went through with a mental camera before we moved and took a picture of each part of the house. Why is it that certain images, and not others, are stuck in my head? Disjointed, random, sometimes meaningless – that is the form my memories usually come in. They are small snapshots of a time gone by, fragments of my life, arbitrarily cemented permanently in my mind.

***

The Porch

I learned to roller blade on the porch, with my big sister at my side. With my purple knee pads strapped on tight and my ankles wobbling with uncertainty I rolled myself along the railing, not willing to let go. Why should I? I was perfectly content with this pseudo version of roller blading that kept me on my feet… most of the time.

Pictures were always taken on the porch: first day of school pictures, with my sister and I standing near the stairs, about to embark on a new adventure, dressed to the tee. My lunchboxes changed over the years, from Barney, to Beauty and the Beast, each with a matching thermos inside.

My sister’s prom pictures were also taken on the porch, her with her arms slung around her boy of choice, with a face saying, “Mom… no more pictures!” We pretended to dread them, but it was all an act. Getting pictures back from being developed was, and still is, one of my favorite things. My memories are preserved for me; I don’t have to worry about losing them.

My Bedroom

My best friend since nursery school and I used to play “Pet Shop” in my bedroom. We bought and sold animals, and when they were sold, we chucked them out my doorway into the hall. One time, we drew a red mark under one of the bunnies’ eyes, an “unknown ailment,” and I thought for sure I was going to get into huge trouble. I don’t remember if I did.

The tree branches always scraped against my window, I swore that a witch was lurking in my doorway, and I was convinced that when the teenagers got done skateboarding across the street, they were going to come rob our house. Sometimes, during a nightmare, I would fall out of bed with a thud onto the floor and my mom would come running. I don’t move at all in my sleep anymore.

The Living Room

My dad always lies on the carpet in front of the T.V. head propped up on his elbow. and 45. He looks extremely uncomfortable, but he’d rather be there than on the couch. In our old house, the T.V. had no remote and only five channels – 6, 10, 13, 23, Some nights, while he was laying there watching Jeopardy, I would tie his hair into millions of little ponytails while trying to answer the questions with him. We would play with coins; whoever got a question right would get a certain amount of coins added to their pile. He pretended the ponytails bothered him, with their multicolored hair ties; inside, he loved it.

The “Wizard of Oz” is always on T.V. once a year. One year, my aunt, sister and I decided we were going to reenact it. I spent hours making a “yellow brick road” leading from the kitchen to the living room. I was so proud of it, so upset when people would mess it up. It just consisted of pieces of yellow legal pad, arranged into a path, but I treated it like a work of art. It was in the living room where I found out that my Great-Grandma Amy died. I remember that the call came through on the gray phone under the side table. I don’t remember who told me, or if I cried, or how I felt, but I remember that the phone was gray.

***

My mom’s walk-in closet, watching lightning storms from her window, the CD rack in my sister’s room, a mouse in the paper bag in the garbage can, antiques above the cabinets, the Christmas tree with apple ornaments in the greenhouse, the wooden swing in the backyard. My memories are a mile long; they may not be continuous, or important, but they’re mine – mine to hold onto. There really is no place like home.

Procrastination brings out the best in us

I am ashamed to see that it has been six months since I last blogged. I can't even begin to sum up everything that has happened in the past six months, so I am not even going to try. Glimpses include San Francisco, Florida, the fulfillment of very long-time-coming dreams, random reoccurring friends, lounging in the pool with Tonya, spending my days with a 5-year-old, going on my first date in over two years, making a new best guy friend because of a common goal of saving each other, torrential downpours, interesting article subjects, trips to Connecticut, a momentary revival of a flame thought long dead, Cold Stone, accusations, flower-picture-taking, working, living in Champagnat again (flashback central), walks by the river, Grease!, Avenue Q, Phantom of the Opera, Chicago, Texas, papers, poetry, kisses, snuggling, parties, Boston, Australia-planning, internship applications, newspaper and Mosaic editing, lack of sleep, and finally the feeling that college may be the best time of my life.
For the first time the other night, as I was surrounded by my literary friends in the Henry Hudson room, I thought, "I'm going to be sad to leave this place," and I never thought I would think those words. But now that I actually am leaving, in February for Australia, I am starting to get a pit in my stomach. I'm going to miss my friends, my coworkers, my fellow club members. I'm going to miss my house, and the river, and even that annoying noise the cross-walk light makes. I'm going to miss hot cocoa with the girls, Chinese food with Alex, and late nights putting together the Mosaic with Amanda. I'm going to miss losing every game of intramural volleyball with my dedicated team.
It is so strange that this place that was once so foreign, so daunting, so unwelcoming to me is now the place I am going to long for; it now holds the people that I care about so deeply, the memories that I can only hope to remember.
But now, an essay and a snuggling partner await me, so I will stop writing for tonight. I promise to write more later, and post some pictures (sometimes it helps to "say it outloud").

The End...

Turns out it's the end of many things this week... Some expected, some unexpected.
It's the end of classes, finals, essays, tests, sophomore year... but also the end of laughing with the girls, cooking dinners, hanging out on the balcony, trying to learn as much as possible.
It's also the end of my relationship with Steven. I wish I had some insightful things to say about it... but I'm too close to the heartache right now, and don't want to look back on this post and regret things I said. I know that I should just treasure the time we had and hope we can be friends in the future, but it's so hard... I know I shouldn't want someone who doesn't want me back, or someone that sometimes I don't even want, or someone that broke up with me three times now, but I find myself having a difficult time with the whole "not wanting him" thing...
But I'm going to San Francisco on Saturday, for an impromptu visit to my sister, and to Kelly, which I am so excited about. I get to escape, at least for a week, from the summer of living three doors down from my ex-boyfriend.

It's Crunch Time...

I had the crazy busiest week ever. So far, just this week, I have:
- preformed in a band concert
- seen Art in a pirate hat
- met an independent publisher poet
- worked at least 16 hours at Marist Poll
- solidified a perspective student's decision to go to Marist
- did two class presentations
- wrote 16 pages for papers for different classes
- watched a stupid Spike Lee movie
- got accepted to the Honors Conference
- had to tell the nicest teacher ever I was bailing on his Hawaii trip
- saw a Holocaust survivor speak
- talked to someone I hadn't talked to in a long time
- had crazy dreams
- played tennis
- watched Crash
- made lots of lists
- gotten the finished Mosaic back

And I have yet to:
- watch my housemates win MAACs for water polo
- go to Mark Twain's house
- watch the One Act Play Festival
- attend two BBQs
- work some more
- write some more papers

Oh college. I bet I'm going to look back on this post when I have grown up, and just go to work and come home every day, and wish I were doing all of these crazy things.
Only two more years of this kind of life... and then... who knows.

This sounds awful, but I think walk-a-thons are kind of stupid

It's true. I do. I understand the idea behind it, to raise awareness... but I think more awareness could be raised if, instead of walking around a track for 12 hours, which is what the Relay for Life, the American Cancer Society's, event consisted of, people walked door-to-door for 12 hours, collecting money from each house, and handing out a pamphlet with information about whichever disease they were trying to raise awareness about.
I'll admit that Relay was really nice, I had a lot of fun, and it made me reflect a little and realize how good my life is. When I saw the the bags, lit by candles, (called luminarias) all labeled with people's names who had or have cancer, on the border of the walkway, it really made me realize how lucky I am.
And when I heard that my friends had raised $100, $200, even $300, I wished that I had put more effort into raising money. But I have to believe, if I understood the idea of Relay more, I might have put more effort in.
I'm not really sure where I'm going with this post, but I just kind of wanted to get the idea out there that we think that walk-a-tons are a great way to raise money, but there may be other ways out there to raise even more money, and help to fight the awful monster we call cancer.

Memories and Senses

It's amazing to me how songs can evoke such emotion. Today, I was in the gym for open house (crazy that mine was exactly two years ago now) to play for band, and the Kenny Loggins CD was playing (Rainbow Connection, House at Pooh Corner) and I immediately was brought back to the times when my sister and I would sing those songs. I still have all of the lyrics memorized and still remember how I felt when we would sing them. I can still hear our voices singing them, a little off key, but it never mattered.
There are so many songs like this... "I Love Rock and Roll" and "You Shook Me All Night Long" bring me right back to high school dances.


If I hear any John Denver song, I'm immediately transported back to Sunday afternoons, with my dad playing guitar on the couch... he never really got all the words right, but to him, the words didn't matter all that much, it was the feeling he got from playing the songs of his hero.
Different songs bring me back to different seasons and times in my life. "Summer Girls", "Allstar", "Soak up the Sun" "SOS", and "Unwritten," have the ability to make me feel like the sun's beating down on my shoulders no matter when I hear them.


Backstreet Boys and N*Sync songs remind me of the good old days, when Sarah Todd and I thought it'd be a good idea to do one of their songs for the Talent Show... luckily someone discouraged us.
"Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays" brings me back to two memories now; the first: rocking out to it in the car before the Christmas dance when we all (except me) wore matching outfits; the second: this past Christmas, blasting it in the kitchen as my house mates and I made cookies for our A4 Holiday Party.


Any of the pep bands songs make me feel like I'm sitting on the bleachers, cheering on my favorites.



The same thing is also true with smells. For some reason, my Herbal Essences shampoo makes me think of Peru every time I use it, and I can't figure out why.


The smell of brownies makes me think of my mom, the smell of "just-showered-clean" makes me think of the mornings Steven would come over before school. If I get a certain whiff of something, I'm immediately brought back to Lindsay's house, Grandma Veet's house, the middle school cafeteria.

I wish my job could be something to do with memories... I'm a big fan of them... I just have to remember that if I'm too caught up in the past, I won't be making any memories in the present to reflect upon in the future...

Oof...

Steven was driving with his sister on the way to school the other morning. When he came up over a hill, he saw someone stopped at a stop sign, and then saw that person pull out, cutting him off. He braked, and everything would have been fine, but then the man stopped. In the middle of the road. Steven swerved to miss him and hit this tree. Hard.

He and his sister got out of the car, and Steven was complaining his back hurt. The man said he would go for help, and Steven told him it was okay, that he had his cell phone. But the man repeated himself, and left. And never came back.
A 60-year-old man left two teenagers on the side of the road, at 7:30 am, with their car in a tree.
What an upstanding citizen.
I don't understand how someone could do that. I would never be able to sleep at night knowing that I caused an accident and then didn't own up to it. I hate that there are people in the world that would do this. No, it's not murder, but it still really stinks.
On a more positive note, this video made me smile and tear up a little today.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4DTme1SZ10
It's nice to be reminded that there are good people in the world.