50

There are things that I just don't understand
The whole world. It's so
overwhelming

But I can't take small doses
Nothing small
I need more
Always more

I stand too firmly
My feet don't flow with
everyone elses'
They stay
Not moving
Not seeing

A glance caught
A step taken

Nothing changes

I return
Not understanding
How
Why

All I see is red

Children of the Revolution

Tonight I finally heard the Bono/Moulin Rouge version of Marc Bolan's "Children of the Revolution." As usual, I like the original better, but I listened to this one as I drove past a crime scene near my old house. All the flashing lights of authority, the speeding of my car in the night and the spirit of this song awakened my eternal desires of innocence, freedom and charging against oppression.

The experience inspired me to unearth an old poem of mine. I don't have a time stamp on this poem, but I believe I initially wrote it in seventh or eighth grade. It serves as a prologue to the novel I've been working on since seventh grade. Though unwritten before then and sparsely added to for a few years now, the story is always alive in my mind. So, here's my poetic narrative version of "Children of the Revolution:"

Links of a chain,
jointed with strength and passion,
on the plain
of creation.

Feet firm
locked in the fresh grass.
United shoulders confirm
confidence to surpass.

The bleak eruption
in the heavens above
echoes the corruption
of a land once filled with love.

Clouds converge.
Darkness attains.
Thunders surge.
Battle reigns.

Through the damp and hurling winds of strife,
a crusade for salvation
becomes a fight for life.
Faith is replaced with desperation.

Death.
Annihilation.
Last breath.
Termination.

All is gone.
And, yet, with the rising sun
all is reborn.
Resurrection when the worst is done.

Warmth sheds on the innocent
and denies the criminal.
Grass reeds sing in merriment
a song that is eternal.

Love is no longer torn.
Life returns from execution.
A New World is born.
Thanks to the Children of the Revolution

So...

There's this epic blog entry I've been planning. And I do mean epic. Best effing night of my life. For some reason, I keep forgetting to write it whenever I actually have the time. I've also been determined to not post another blog until I get this up. So...that's why I haven't written anything. Ok. Cool.

An Illustrated Blog

The rest of my birthday continued much in the same vein. In addition to Kate's song, I also got a singing voicemail from Kelly and an awesome song from Max. The one from Max was particularly special because I currently have songs from him about just about all of our other friends, but this was the first one about me and it was amazing.

Around four o'clock, as I was finishing the editing of some videos, I received a call from the campus post office. I already knew I had a package because they sent me an e-mail so I was pretty perturbed to receive a call. They told me that I had an edible package waiting for me and I had to come pick it up immediately. An edible package? What is that like the edible diapers on that SNL commercial? Turns out, my dad sent me a bouquet of chocolate covered strawberries! I didn't even know such things existed. Also, my main source of delicious chocolate covered strawberries has been over a thousand miles away from me for months! Due to all of the other food and candy people have given me (six York Peppermint patties, two dozen cookies and brownies, a loaf of french bread), I wasn't able to eat them all in one sitting so they're kind of melting in my mini-fridge right now....I've had to put ziploc bags around each strawberry and wrap the pot in paper towels...yeah, it's kind of a mess.

Another great little birthday surprise came from my suitemates. They left a little message on the back of our toilet stall door. I can say that I've never before read a birthday greeting while in such a vulnerable state.

So the whole birthday thing turned out fairly well. People have much more desire to show how much they care when you're far away from each other, which is nice because the caring thing is what I really like. I've never been big on material presents. I just want to know that people care about me. I'm a needy attention seeker in that way.


Tonight also ended up being a lot of fun. I had been sitting in my bed since returning from my French exam at 10 am this morning (no joke, I actually stayed in bed watching The Office on hulu and sleeping for eleven hours ---- ps, I now have a major crush on Jim) and had totally forgotten that tonight is the traditional Midnight Breakfast. Every week of finals, some of the faculty and staff serve the entire student body breakfast in the Commons and there's karaoke or Rock Band as well. Last semester, there was a horrid sleet storm the night of Midnight Breakfast so my friends and I opted not to go. This year, however, my lovely suitemate invited me to go with some of her friends. I am so glad she reminded me about it. I had fears about going to a place where most of the student body would be (I have a whole list of people who I have a lot of trouble being near and, as a result, stick to my room as much as possible), but it ended up being a ton of fun. One of my favorite professors (who I have been awkwardly corresponding with via facebook message for the last few days), served me a cinnamon roll, which I cherished greatly because she said that every cinnamon roll was special and therefore we got to choose which one we wanted. Here's a picture!

Clearly, I did not participate in karaoke, but watching it was a ton of fun. When one group went up to sing "Hakuna Matata," the entire commons joined in the chorus because it is so apropos for finals week. Actually, most of the commons joined in for all of the songs. My personal favorite was when the group of cute (read: awkward) RAs sang a song from The Little Mermaid. Note: I hate The Little Mermaid, but they were so adorable singing it that I couldn't help loving it.

Basically, Midnight Breakfast rocked and so did my birthday, but I still cannot (absolutely, positively cannot) wait until I get to go home. Despite these little pockets of happiness, I'm still pretty miserable here. I long to see all of my friends and chillax at all our old haunts. I haven't yet found the kind of fun here that I have back home and I really really miss having fun.

Birthdayness

It's hardly begun and technically I won't even be 19 until 5:25 pm, but I'm having a great day so far!

Around 11 last night, I began being bombarded by facebook wall posts saying happy birthday and soon after midnight received phone calls from my two best friends, Joanna and Kate.

All of the greetings, texts, videos/singing grams have been wonderful...

OH MY GOSH! AS I WAS WRITING THIS I GOT A GIANT BOX OF COOKIES AND A BALLOON DELIVERED TO MY DORM!!!! FROM MAX AND JOANNA WHICH MAKES IT LIKE TEN TIMES BETTER!!! AHHHH!!!!

Well....that may have just surpassed everything I was going to say, but I'll try to get back to the direction I was going.

Up until the box of my three all-time favorite types of cookies + death by chocolate-esque brownies, I had received two gifts that aren't actually gifts at all, but have made this day really great.

Soon after midnight, I remembered that a professor had mentioned to me in passing that he had posted grades already. I decided to check online. You have to understand that I royally screwed up a few times in this class. I did not put my full effort into any of the essays and, for the first time in my life, I did not make a 100 participation grade (in fact, from what the professor has implied, I almost failed the participation grade). I was so prepared to accept my first B in college, I was even planning an emo blog entry about how I ruined my chances of getting into Phi Beta Kappa. Well, I'm sure you can guess, when I went to look up my grade, I had succeeded in making an A minus. Considering A minuses are not a 4.0 at SU, I didn't think I'd ever be so happy about an A minus, but I fully started screaming and ran into my suitemates' room to share my joy. Seriously, I could not have asked for anything better.

The other not-actually-a-gift gift is that someone who I've really wanted to get to know better sent me a birthday message via facebook and we have been corresponding all morning. It's exciting, trust me. Maybe not as exciting as a cookie gram or a singing Harry Potter birthday card, but it's still pretty damn exciting.

I don't think I've ever gotten this much recognition for my birthday before. There were always little surprises here and there in secondary school (usually "Josh Brownies" from Josh or giant potatoes from Quirks), but I have never felt such an overflowing warmth of friendship and love from so many people on my birthday. I'm certain it's because we're all so far away from each other now, but it's way special none the less.

There will be more birthday ponderings to come, but for now, a huge thank you to Joanna and Max for the cookies and to Kate for the video!!

Fire Alarms

I had just returned from class and sat down to write this blog when the fire alarm went off.

Again.

For the third time in the past fourteen hours.

Last night, I had just stepped into the shower when the fire alarm went off. I madly dashed around my room stark naked trying to find clothes and hoping that my RAs wouldn't walk in to make sure I was evacuating.

We were finally let back in, I took a shower and fell asleep. At four am, the blaring erupted again. Frustrated and exhausted, I dragged myself downstairs with the rest of the herd and hoped that no one noticed how revealing my drawstring shorts were with no underwear on.

In my lifetime, I've had some pretty interesting experiences with fire alarms. Last winter, the fire alarm went off five times in one day. As soon as everyone had piled back in, taken off their coats and scarves, the alarm began again. And again. And again. And again.

In high school, our fire alarm had a knack for going off anytime the theatre department hosted the One Act Play competition. Without fail, as soon as the visiting schools had put on their costumes (often Victorian formal wear or togas), the alarm would go off.

The fire alarm went off on the very first day of sixth grade because it was a new building and there was some sort of malfunction with the ovens. That particular instance was recorded in several newspapers who had been on campus reporting the opening of the school's new building.

And then early elementary school was rife with instances of "fire drills," which were actually evacuations due to gas leaks.

However, my very favorite fire alarm moment comes from my sojourn at Cambridge University. One night, around two am, we had just returned from a day trip to London. A few of my friends and I were on our way back from doing laundry in the next building over when we heard the fire alarm go off. We stood outside the building and watched hoardes of screaming teenage girls run out of the building --- the majority of them dripping wet and wrapped in towels.

My roommate, a hyperactive "goth" (I don't really know how those properly go together), found me on the lawn and told me her account of what she had been doing when the alarm went off. Apparently, she -for what reason, I'll never know- had been jumping on my bed when the fire alarm went off and, for one wild moment, had thought it was the police coming for her because she wasn't supposed to be jumping on my bed.

We all had a good laugh at this and soon the Porters were letting us back inside (now that I look back on this, I don't ever remember seeing any firemen). My roommate and I got stopped as we filed inside with the others. One of the Porters escorted us into our room where my bed had been turned on its side. Behind the place where my bed had been was some sort of square electrical thing. The Porter told us that it was very sensitive and that hitting it was what set off the fire alarm.

Crazily enough, my roommate had indeed set off the fire alarm by jumping on my bed.

Now if only the problem with the alarm in Mabee could be solved so simply. I fully expect that alarm to go off as soon as I lie down for a nap.

Lily Allen

Lily Allen is going to be at ACL!

In honor of that, here's her song "Smile," which -incidentally- fits my life perfectly right now (or maybe that should be "sadly").

When you first left me
I was wanting more
But you were fucking that girl next door
What'd you do that for?

When you first left me
I didn't know what to say
I've never been on my own that way
Just sat by myself all day

I was so lost back then
But with a little help from my friends
I found a light in the tunnel at the end

Now you're calling me up on the phone
So you can have a little whine and a moan
It's only because you're feeling alone

At first when I see you cry
It makes me smile
Yeah it makes me smile

At worst I feel bad for a while
But then I just smile
I go ahead and smile

Whenever you see me
You say that you want me back
And I tell you it don't mean jack
No it don't mean jack

I couldn't stop laughing
No I just couldn't help myself
See you messed up my mental health
I was quite unwell

etc.