Holy shitake mushrooms.

Holy shitake mushrooms.

They gave me tassels. I mean REAL tassels. I have proof:

I think this means it's real? This is crazy. 

Forever and a day

It's been forever and a day since I posted.

And now I'm sitting in the Denver airport with five minutes to go until boarding. The Bachelor (the women tell all episode) would not cooperate with me, and I figured now is as good a time as any to try to regain some of my lost blogging dignity.

I've been thinking a lot about family, lately. I'll be seeing cousins I haven't seen in years. The cousins I'm actually closest in age to on my mom's side. They are also, incidentally, the cousins I live closest to. It bothers me that we never see each other, although we live within 20 minutes of each other. But yet, here we are (or will be soon), all together again to celebrate a wonderful life that has passed. And when I sit and think about it, the last time I saw my cousins was to celebrate a different life.

Why is it that we can't seem to manage to make time for each other until someone passes away? Part of me thinks it's just downright stupid. (That's one of my words of the week. That and damn.) I mean, seriously. We don't even make it to see each other at Thanksgiving or Christmas. It's only when someone dies that we drop everything and hop on planes to be with each other. To console each other. But I've been stirring this around in my head for a few days now, and I've decided I'm okay with that. If we only see each other once every few years, at least it's during a time when we really need each other. At least it's during a time we've all set aside to celebrate life. I don't know what it all means, and I know that as much as I keep saying "celebrate" I really mean mourn. Because that's the kind of person I am.

But at least this is an opportunity for reconciliation. Nothing makes you put your life and your relationships in perspective like death. I refuse to let petty nothings come in between my family and I. I know that this isn't going to change anything and that it'll probably be another few years before we all see each other, but this is a step forward for us all.

I really don't know what I just wrote. I hope it makes sense. Time to board. Wish me luck, loves. 

Little Mysteries

To know a friend is gone from this world and has passed on to the next is a terrible thing to know. RIP Friend. My first college "dance" goes to you.

This was a weekend full of ups and downs. It snowed again. A beautiful fresh snow that came down like the flakes in a snowglobe. I went out at 11 PM Saturday night with two friends of mine and we just sat there and caught snowflakes on our tongues. It sounds ridiculous. It probably was. But it was beautiful, and I can honestly say it was one of my favorite memories of this year. We went sledding, lost my friend's white phone in the snow and found it 20 minutes later. What luck!

Things aren't always so bad. And sometimes they are. It's a part of life, I think. And it makes you wonder how we make it through without losing our minds. There's sledding and there's loss. How can those two even match up to each other on any level? How are they comparable in any world?

Words are failing me. I don't know what the point of sledding this weekend was. I was supposed to be wrapped up in homework, pissed off at the world for reasons that don't need to be mentioned. But instead, I accidentally put my work hours in the sub log, had nothing to do at 9 PM on a Saturday night and found myself laughing hysterically in shin-deep snow with two girls I haven't had a chance to hang out with much this year. How is that possible? That something as simple as snow and laughter can make loss a little more okay?

The mysteries of the world, man. I will never understand them.

Semester of Lasts

Here we go. Last semester of my college experience. Last semester at Drake. Last semester in the dorms. Last semester picking classes and reading politics books and writing poetry and getting graded on it all. Last semester eating dorm food. Last semester of so many things.

Last 4 months with these amazing people. Last 4 months in this amazing city (which I complain about a lot but love in some weird sentimental way). Last 4 months with these professors. Last 4 months in the safety shadow of this little school I love so much.

So many lasts. And while I know that these 4 months are going to be long, I have this weird scary feeling that they won't be and that someday I'm going to blink and these will all be gone and these lasts will be so far in the past that they were just a dream.

I know that all the lasts will open doors to firsts, like my first job and my first home. Eventually, there'll be my first car that I buy with my money and the first dinner that I host. My first cat, my first set of real dishes (more than two pieces of which will be identical... unlike now), my first... everything.

But there's still something terribly terrifying about all of this. I'm expected to journey straight from lasts to firsts, but that transition seems like such a harsh one. Going from high school to college, the focus was the same: go to class. My mom always told me that school was my number one priority. Even if I was frustrated with making new friends or being uncomfortable with the food or being homesick... it didn't matter, because I was here to go to class, first and foremost. Everything else was secondary. Quickly (although at the time, it seemed slowly), I made new friends, grew to love my independence, and the homesickness subsided, and even though I knew that school was  (is, really) my main priority, everything else was important too, and everything else made (and is making) my experience here so completely worthwhile. But that comfort of class and the academic routine helped with that transition, and this next transition is going to be different. What is my main priority now? This is my life. It isn't a game. It isn't 100% about a job and school, but in many ways, that is a main mental focus. And what about my heart? I have a deep love and passion for school and academics, and that's partly why, I believe, my mother  told me to focus on that when I was having a hard time. But that's not going to be possible anymore. I guess it's just interesting. I feel so rooted in this path right now, but at the end of these 4 months, this canyon I've been walking in is going to level out and it's going to be wide open something or other. Maybe desert. Maybe jungle. I don't know. And I'm so excited. But so terrified. And so amazed at what life has offered me so far. I just don't know how to feel. I hate change. I'm notorious for hating change. What do I do with this now? What do I do with these lasts? How do you prepare for so many lasts? How do you savor these last cozy months in the big tall canyon?

Happy 2011

First post of 2011. Here we go.

There's a lot going on this year.

My sister is getting married.
I'm graduating (!).
I will potentially (read: HOPEFULLY) get a big kid job.

So I thought I'd set my new year's resolutions accordingly:
1. Accept change with patience, understanding, and optimism.
2. Be ready.

Whenever I come home, waves of nostalgia rush over me, and I find myself navigating between the world of big kid and young daughter so much more than usual. When I'm at home, people care what time I'm home at night, someone else cooks me dinner, and it's someone else's house. I don't feel like a guest at home, but I do feel a little less entitlement than I do when I'm away. That's not a bad thing at all, it's just different, and it takes a bit of getting used to. On one hand, it's so nice to be home, to feel taken care of, and to have home-cooked meals. On the other hand, though, I find myself yearning for my independence and to go back to school where I know no one's watching my every move. It's when I'm home that I can't help but think so much about these upcoming months. I'm graduating.

... graduating.


I don't know if its the weird back-to-a-kid feeling I get when I'm home or the realization that my kid room is so far back in my past and so different from who I am now that makes me just shocked at the thought of graduating. Or of my sister getting married. Things are changing. And all I can think is wow.

I'm not a big one for resolutions, but I'm going to truly attempt to stick to these ones. Everyone knows I have a problem with change. I don't deal with it well. I never have. I'm addicted to home and the past and the way things are, and I'm terrified of these being the last moments of life as-is. But I'm starting to realize how inevitable this all is--I can't just NOT graduate... my sister IS getting married. And I'm happy about those things, but I want to stay happy even up to the moment it happens. There's SO much yet to come, and I'm genuinely excited about it all... I just want to stay that way, even as it gets closer. I want to stay as ready for all those moments as I am right now.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Merry Christmas! :)

Cetus a petus!

So many interesting things!

First: The boy is 25 today! Happy birthday Boy! Going to see him in a couple of hours and give him his presents. So exciting!

Second: The winter solstice is today! It's the first day of winter! Whooo! That means it's the shortest day and the longest night.

Third: There was a lunar eclipse this morning. I would have written about it in preparation if I'd known, but I literally happened to be on facebook at midnight-ish and saw that people were talking about it. Walked outside, and lo and behold, it's the moon being all awesome. The pictures above are a couple of the many I took. My tripod didn't cooperate very well, but I tried.

Anyways: EXCITEMENT! I'm hoping that all this excitement is just predicting the most awesome rest of break ever.