Just Another

My mother is convinced that if her daughter does not go to homecoming with a boy-date, she is a failure. First, somebody asked me. Then he fell for someone else. Oh, well. I'm used to it. Then, someone else asked me when he really wanted to ask someone else, so I said no. Now she thinks I'm a fucking failure or something for some little blot on my worthless high school history that won't even matter in 2 years.

Does it bother her that I have high standards?
That maybe I want someone to take me to the dance who actually--WOW--wants to go with me? And just me? Is that too much to ask for a homecoming date that asks you because he actually thinks it would be fun to go with you? Or are my standards just too high? I guess I'm supposed to settle for someone that doesn't really want to take me, but just will because I'm kind-of their friend. That's great. I'd rather spend the night with my best friends than with a boy that doesn't really want to be there with me.

This isn't a pity party; I understand these boys don't exist in my life right now. That's okay. But it doesn't mean I have to be second-best and desperate.

And then she insults my friend, saying she will end up "LONELY" if she keeps insulting our school and our country. WHAT! She doesn't even insult our school or country, she just misses her home country and her old life. She JUST moved here! I'd miss my old life, too, if I moved to a foreign land with different customs. And here's my mom insulting her for not "assimilating" because SHE doesn't want a date to the dance, either. We're going together as girl-friends, is that wrong or less-than-what-you-wanted? I'm sorry I want to hang out with my friends and make them feel welcome and loved at a new school. I'm such an awful person, I guess. Sorry.

She has this pre-conceived notion that I'm anti-social but, really, we're just diagonal opposites. She's a socialite and I'm NOT. That doesn't make me any less of a person. In fact, my personality is not set in stone. Nothing about me is. I am subject to change. So maybe she should wait before criticizing how I'd rather spend Friday nights at home, reading and playing piano, rather than at a stupid football game with people that wrote me off a year ago. It's my life, it's my choice.

I can't wait until I'm alone in this world, without a past. With just a future and a present.

My mother's perfect idea of a life for me seems to be that suburban home with 2.3 kids and a handsome, polite husband who is a lawyer while I am a smart, independent yet motherly engineer who helps save the world by making bridges or computers or something else I could care less about. What if I DON'T want that? I know it's going to be up to me eventually and she can't control that, but it just hurts to feel like a disappointment just because I'm not like everyone else: perfect, pretty, friendly, bubbly, laughy, happy, neat, well-driven, and has everything figured out. THAT IS NOT ME. That will NEVER be me. I will never be you or be like you. I don't fucking like to plan every second of my life on my Blackberry and I DON'T like engineering and I don't want to BE an engineer and I'm not a fucking social butterfly, I just love the best friends I do have and I'm doing my damn best to make them happy and myself worthy of them. I am so blessed and grateful for my life, and God is the one I love. Why can't you be proud of this? Because your idea of Catholicism is just being a good person? I agree that being a Catholic means living it out and treating everyone with respect, but maybe I like going to Mass. Maybe I like reading the Bible and praying and trying to deepen my faith through doctrine. It doesn't make me a fundamentalist or a cult member! I just love my faith and I feel like you don't. It feels like everything, EVERYTHING I do is wrong, wrong, wrong. I'm sorry one of your children is fucked up and a drug addict and homeless; I'm sorry I can't be a perfect daughter to offset your other child. Maybe both of your children will end up "different." I don't love money, I don't love beauty, I don't love status, all I love is this: God, my friends, my dog, music, and my life. I am a simple person and you are not. I am not a realist. I hope I never am. I have dreams and I will have more, I plan to reach those dreams at all costs. I will not be hindered by the world telling me "You're too ____ you can't do this. You'll never do this. You'll never reach your dreams. You are nothing." If the world ever says that, as it says it to everyone, I will ignore it, I will beat it. Does it make you sad that I want a better life, the best life, for myself? That I have a dream?

Well if it does, fuck you and all you say. Because if you can't love me as I am, you're in for a hell of a surprise when, in a year, you WON'T be there to tell me what to do and I can live my life as a I choose. But if you can, show it. Don't insult me.

When You Crochet, I Feel Memorized and Proud

Words are futile devices.

There is a joy in my heart that died two years ago; revived; died one year ago. It is that fragile joy whose neighbor is precaution and wariness. I worry I overstep myself. Because once this joy dies, and it is risen, you will do anything.

Fast in Bed, Not Quite Sleeping

We were in love.

Oh, Sufjan. You make me want to sing out. It is unnatural how happy people I don't know make me, yet those right next to me do not please. I am a mixed-up human being.

To wait for winter's cold and the Christmas, it makes my soul rise up for goodness. I feel that something either very good or very terrible will happen soon. I woke up about a week ago at 4 in the morning, in complete darkness, with this insatiable terror that bore down on my soul like a hatchet. It filled me from every angle, the idea that some faraway future day holds a terrible fate. I don't know; I really worry a lot. I'd worry no matter where I was. Whether it be Runberg or NYC or Chicago or Bejing. I will always be a worrier. But I also think something very good is going to happen this winter. Maybe any life change is good, because we learn? I want to learn (I take it back).

I feel as though this is wrong. So different. I was happy for a night but now things have changed and I can't say that. I just want someone perfect, but I except too much, I know.

I'm already listening to Christmas music!! This year, I'm going all out. The true meaning of Christmas AND Advent. Perhaps I may fast over Advent, and pray of course. I want to buy everyone or make them a gift. I love cheer. Then maybe a party!! (I Sound So Unlike Myself In Real Life). Yes, I'll throw a blow-out party! Blow-out typically means 5 people for me. Eff my small life. But yes, and we'll actually DECORATE this year! The whole house! I must get read now!! I know it's only September. I am not unaware. O come, o come Emmanuel.