I don't even know where to start.

Running back to ULC after the PCGB retreat this afternoon, the sky opened up. Quarter-sized raindrops began pelting my face, my body, my white shirt. My two biggest [tangible] fears in life: wasps and tornadoes. And so as the clouds deposited their accumulated moisture, I looked into the brown-tinted, murky sky with apprehension. My legs started moving a little faster, I hiked my backpack further up on my back to enable me to trot along a little faster. I kept turning my face into the droplets, again and again, thinking about how thirsty I was and feeling the slight prick of the water against my tongue was a torture. And then it hit me: God, please give me the strength to not crumble like a little girl in tears because I'm so afraid of being swept away, Dorothy-and-Oz style; give me the perseverence to get home.

I felt fear's grip on my heart loosen just a smidge; I felt my head tilt a little more towards facing frontwards; I felt the ends of my mouth kind of turn upwards, almost into a smile. I had God with me. Oh, yeah, that's right.

After being baptized yesterday, I feel like I have this whole new support system I've never known before, one which is insurmountable. It's exciting. I don't know the words yet to describe what's gone through my head. Soon enough.

I can't believe a whole year has passed since I wrote what I did in my last journal.
2002-05-03 - 2:12 a.m
i can't believe it's almost nearly entirely over. my freshman year gone. that's one of those pinacles in life that everyone looks forward to....but then what happens? where do i go? where do i set my sights? where do i aim to be and how many years from now do i set those goals? i've become so frustrated with society and people i just want to fly in an airplane and read a happy readers digest. i wonder sometimes if its partially because im disappointed in myself, that i hsould/could be better but im not and so i redirect that disappointment by blaming other people. that's not cool of me. as much as i want the year to be over, im going to miss everyone alot over hte summer. this whole moving out thing didnt really hit me until i walked into harrison tonight (this morning?) and saw nearly completely bare walls; i reach my door and the very vitality of that structure had been ripped from its seams: our message board had been removed. it really bothers me when people automatically take ownership of certain shared things. like floor space. just because you finished your finals first doesnt mean that you can take all the room you wnat to pack and clutter things up and make me feel unsettled for my final and closure-processi. i'm tired of politics and seeing other people happy about stupid things and im tired of georgia and im tired of tech and the supercompetitive mindset it breeds- what happened to compassion for mankind? i think there's a definite lack of balance here, the scales tipping to the side of coldness and cruelty. sure i love science, but id rather have fun and learn about hte world, what's going on in it and to whom than worrying about whether the girl sitting next to me is going to ruin the curve- my life should not be determined by an arguably arbitrary number. my life should be in the cusp of my hands, with me forever chasing it to catch up and it constantly looking back with a grin asking which turn to take next. none of this ink marking on a paper deciding what happens with the rest of an otherwise possibly widely twisting and turning life! i should go sleep so that while the man still controls things and decides that this number on paper is so important i get a somewhat good number. humph. i feel unsettled and dissatisfied. hopefully once tomorrow is over, i will feel better once more.
love.

and,

2002-04-18 - 1:12 a.m.
with the semester and school year drawing to a close, it's becoming more and more real that i'm a person. its scary because this is supposed to be the prime of my life. right. primo alright. what if im wasting it away without accomplishing anything, realizing the goals ive had since i was a wee tott in the frozen section? humdedum. it also makes me excited/worried about the summer...jody, me, the world. will antarctica be awaiting my return to tech or will the flowers of finery and joy bloom at the faint whiff of my presence? will i be abducted by culture in europe, never to return to the mundance existence of a tech student? will it forever make me long for soemthing other than what i have? so many questions.
i should probably stop wasting my time perplexing myself and do something productive. i'm off.


I felt like pasting this here just cause. The other journal has a password. (these are mostly from what i call the "difficult period" ehem. grrr thats all i have to say)

2002-11-21 - 10:44 p.m.

does my doting deserve
to be considered "misdeserved"?
do my thoughts of affection
need to be dispelled?
because i love you
unduly, perhaps.
even still, my heart stays true
beating with the rhythm of
your name in my mind.
the days grow long and
i long for your touch,
the tender sweep your lips
caress my forehead.
i just love you.
for this,
i am sorry.

ive been meaning to write in here for a while, mostly because i've had lots of thinking moments, revelations the past couple days. and of course, now that i go to write them they have escaped me. the semester has flown. it seems like just yesterday i wanted to shrivel up and die. and now i feel like my life is a flower, on the cusp of blooming. on my walk to and from the house tonight, i realized that i need to get out more. i am starting to feel afraid of people, the same afriad i felt when i took CS, the same afraid that is bred by sitting at my computer, focused on fonts and grammar instead of emotions and blood. i feel very vulnerable, like a little kid who can't take of her jacket because it is her blanket, her shield from the world. with that jacket on, no one can see her, no one can see her heart to hurt it. but hten when i was wlaking, i was shook out of this reviere, i was shook to see this huge world around me. i felt as though i was walking in the bottom of a full bowl, glancing up at the goals and places to go dangling up above me in this bowl of life, of opportunities, of chances. i have realized that i am sorely disappointed in myself that i wont be able to study abroad again this summer. i feel like im taking a step backwards, a step back into my past, into my high school self. i feel like i've already come so far from that girl and i dont want to risk going back. ive become my own person, figured out my priorities, and know where im going. if i go back to lving with mom and dad im not going to keep growing as a person, im afraid i m going ot stagnant into someone i dont like and dont want to be. sure i love my friends, but my friends aren't what make me, i make me and what if i forget how to? what if i lose myself to what i think im supposed to be? when youre far away from everything that defines you, its so much easier to see who you really are. (and this is how it will end, with you and me bent) and to see what you like about who yuou are and what you want ot change. you have no one elses expectations to mold that self other than your own and thats an amazing feeling. to do things because they are what make you truly happy and fulfilled. wow. to feel like that again. but the missing. oh, the missing. i dont want that again. but the sweet sweet weeks of unadulterated joy...they made it all worth it. hum. i miss my bike. ive had visions of the sunset the past couple days walking to and fro around campus and ive randomly, suddenly, thought about the amazing view i had of the sunset with all its brilliant purples, goldens, reds, and yellows, when i was perched atop my bike, zooming down holiday drive and layne boulevard.


i gave jody "advice" if you could call it such, about relatives the other day. and it made me sad, and sort of feel regret and like a hypocrit.he was complaining about having to see his grandma during thanksgiving and i told him that he shouldnt bemoan it so much because he should enjoy it while he still has it. it made me choke up alot. i feel like my family is disappearing in front of my eyes. all these wonderful people just dying all around me. i know i was never the most joyful one to get up early on a sunday to go visit gma l, but i always did, and was happy i had afterwards, because no matter how hard it was, no matter what we talked about, i could see in her eyes and hear in her voice how proud she was of me, how pure her love for me was. my heart is clenching to think about how i never utilized my elder family members as much as i should have. i never probed their brains enough, asked enough questions, found out about their pasts. they make me proud to have known them. to see the sparkling look in the eyes of gma l's friends at the funeral, to know what a great lady she was to them, how she affected so many other people's lives. sometimes i think (and selfishly, im sure) about what people will say about me when im gone - i want them to be good things, and deserved good things, not just good because im dead so theyd feel guilty to speak the truth. i want to know that my time was not a waste of oxygen. that i wasnt the one who was supposed to get a brain tumor, not johnny. :( i should go to sleep now. i love so many things, im beginning to learn. but i feel enriched and empowered by this overwhelming and newfound passion. i wonder if its a product of feeling loved as well. because someone pours their love into me, builds me up, i have all this love to then give as well. i miss my grandpa.

2002-11-03 - 7:52 p.m.
the computer is too slow
to chronicle my life's woes
by the time the screen appears
i have settled my fears
i have subdued the tears
i have told myself its all good
the future won't rob me
the present and past already have;
so no worries.
but now i still want to relieve
the worries and pain
that consume this heart
but how to make the words
purge my mind, my heart, my viens
of the thousands of tiny memories
and sweet things
that made my heart ring with joy
and now i have disappointed and failed
the very dearest
the only one who has cared all along
the only one who really wants to know
whats going on in my mind
the only who hugs me with all his might;
misses me with tears and
loves me with friendship.
and now i know that he is sad
I have made him sad
i am awful and don't deserve his affection
but that doesn't mean i want to push him away
oye!


he will be there for me and show me that summer can be a good time, that maybe i shouldnt give up on life and the future jsut because my mind makes it seem like the world is going to slip by, me losing my centripetal acceleration and fall off tangentially from the earth. when did i stop being good? when did i grow a heart? well i hate it. i hate feeling and i hate loving and i hate hate. i hate that i have the capacity to wish, to want, to dream, to hope. it's like torture to my soul, chinese water torture to the desert wanderer.


my tears fall
splish splash
splash
and i want them to drown me.
i want them to just push me under
into the soft ground where it is warm.
the music drowns out the sobs
and the pillow muffles them
like the world muffles me
i need a thing
to pull me up
to fixate on and move towards.
i need the college of high school for college
right.

i love you
to feel your arms around me when i woke up
was heaven.
to feel your warm breath on my neck, slow
was peace.
your eyes flutter open and make me nervous,
the eyelashes beating in time to my heart.
dont hurt me today!
not again!
please.


i tell myself i am strong
i have control of everything
and nothing at all.
i want ot be able to control
the plop of tears, to stop the everconstant
fear and mistrust.
they say it wouldnt have worked out anyway
and now its just another lonely day
furhter along we jsut may
they say now cant last forever
but i want it to
maybe?
i dont want to preclude my future;
that takes away the point of living
dont let statistics rule your future
beat the odds.
fly a plane.
candle flames flicker across your face in the dark
burn you.