It's 11:28 and I'm Still Crazy As Hell

Documenting the typically ignored hours of time. That's what I call this.

While I type *clickity clackity* away at my chemistry lab write up. That is due tomorrow. That I am starting now. That will probably take 3 hours for a 98, 2 for a 90, 1 for an 85 and NO I WILL NOT ACCEPT ANYTHING BELOW A 98. THANK YOU.

So, thus I commence.

11:30 pm-

Strange noises are noted from the upstairs hallway. It could possibly be my parents stirring at my disturbance of the stillness in our household's appropriated slumbering hours. My hypothesis? My mom will amble down the stairs and order me to sleep, and I will refuse. Who knows?

11:31 pm- I begin on my chemistry paper and replay Regina Spektor for the umpteenth time.

11:47 pm- Just starting the Introduction. What, you ask, do I have done? The data table and the Title Page. Yay. Luckily, I already wrote out my Introduction on paper! (Wow, this must be the most boring blog entry I've written. At least to an outsider. Sorry, sorry, whoever is reading this.)

12:00 am- Hey, the lab is due in 9 hours and 15 minutes!

12:27 am- I am rolling on a river of chemistry! I have finished the Introduction, the Materials List, the Method, and I am now working on the Results' Description. After this, all I have left is the Discussion (ooh, but that one's the biggie... the grade changer...) and the Conclusion (EASY!). So I'm good. I feel oddly energized, but just give me a few minutes and I'll be asleep. I'm going to have to wake up early tomorrow and check this whole paper anyways.

12:49 am- Just the Discussion and the Conclusion. I can do this. I can do this. I can... Ugh. Why can't I do this? I'll just write the conclusion before the discussion. Because it's easier.

1:00 am- How long have I been working on this? I started at around 11:30 pm... An hour and a half?!

1:38 am- The weariness is seeping in. Slowly, slowly, just as it seeps out in the mornings. But wait!- it is the morning. Even better: it is the morning of my last day of school before the long awaited Spring Break. I remember when, about 2 months ago, I prayed for the hasty arrival of this week. Now, I'm not so sure. Now, I wish time would just stop being so slow. Time goes so fast, and in the words of Jacob, "I'm here to slow the motherf*cker down."

1:51 am- PRINTING!! Now all I have to do is hole punch, correct everything, and fill in the handwritten calculations. OH HAPPY DAY... Or morning.

At Times You-At Times You Just Get So

So busy.

Spring break, o thine placebo of SHINING QUINTESSENCE!! How you are adored by yours truly; how I long for the quiet dispositions that come as a result of the slow, slow, fast days.

TAKE THAT, WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

Yeah, right. I scoff.

Maybe I should just start on that lab. Maybe I should just start on that lab. Maybe... I should just... start on that lab...

Nah.

In Gelterkinden, I Remember To Laugh

(And never, ever forgot it again.)

Tuesday.

So, technically Pi Day is March 14 at 1:59:26 but my school is celebrating it tomorrow because March 14 is a Sunday. And as cool as pi is, I am not waking up for it on a Sunday. Sorry, pi.

What a wonderful holiday. Being a complete and utterly shameless math nerd, I'm so glad that pi is recognized. You know, pi is pretty amazing when you consider it. It never stops. It always keeps going and going. Hell, at any given moment--HEY! Pi is currently STILL being calculated. Look at that constant go, baby! How marvelous! How formidable! How... How..... WORDS CANNOT DESCRIBE IT!

.

Oh, no wait not quite...

$$

OH MY GOD. I saw math equation SHIRTS on the internet! I am so getting those. And pi earrings. I'm so jealous of all of those lucky Mu Alpha Theta members and/or properly attired math enthusiasts. I wish to join the ranks. Aye, aye; I am ready with calculator in hand, Cap'n Factorial!

.

Life was kind of perfect today. I was so alarmed to see moments go so swimmingly, because I usually cringe at happiness and accept contentment with a lighter hand. No, but it was. As everyone stepped forward for Eucharist at Mass, I just noticed the way each person walked. Wine or no wine? Swagger? And the colours of their hair. The certain blondey, on his way back to his seat, gave (his little sister? A young friend of his?) a little tap on the shoulder, and the tiny girl turned to see. He was gone. I smiled.

So this closing title is fitting. I remembered to laugh. I will always forget, every day. But it's not chronic amnesia. I will be okay.

Thank you, world. For giving me a life without pain and a brain that houses much thought and lastly...

MATH!

I had to. Sue me.

In Dusseldorf, I Met A Clown

(With bad breath and a really good tan).

Last post, I swear. It's just a picture.

How amazing is that? I don't think she knows that. But it is.

I Should Have Held An Afterparty

(For all the thoughts I didn't say).

And thus is the consummation.

Goodmorning! So it's like a drug, the writing is. I don't know what an adjective clause is, I know I want to study literature this summer, and I know I don't want to work in anything with language because I'll go insane with "Why's?", but for now the writing is rare and keeps me insane. And I like my eggs scrambled.

I just gorged down too much food. I thought "TO HELL WITH IT. If I'm going to be fat, I'd rather be less fat because I'm young." I don't get it at all.

You see, though. When I look in the mirror, I don't see what people tell me. I see potential for ugliness and potential for picayune prettiness; I see all the components that could make me both ugly and pretty, but I can't separate a goose from a gander. It's all melded together and I can't tell. I really can't. But it doesn't bother me, all the sordid mortal things (WOW I SOUND NERD AND BITTER). It won't matter when I'm old and rich or poor and have a job. No one will care. But right now, it's all people care about. It's all they look at. That's all. We are too young to have internal organs or anything. Underdeveloped, we can't spell or think, we can smile perfectly fine but it won't work if you have ugly teeth. So you better not have ugly teeth, or you won't be good for ANYTHING!

And now I'm starting to think that I should stop writing for the night. It's 10:38, and it 20 years this same moment it will be 3:38 and the year after that will frequent the 4:00's and 5:00's and so on. I will become nocturnal. I can't wait! I'm tired of living this way. Like I'm young when I am. You see, it's so sad to see the 9-year-olds out in the street on their bikes. It makes me so sad. Because when I was 9-years-old, I was kept inside and wouldn't dream of asking for a moment of fresh air... by myself. That phrase had no place in my life then. It still barely does. I cannot even cross the street at night to ask my neighbor for eggs without being watched, and I am 15-years-old! It makes me so sad that I don't know what it's like to be outside and to be alone. Maybe that's why I like being alone. Because I'm sick and tired of NOT being alone, of being with EVERYONE and EVERYTIME and never being... alone. Outside. Just me and the sun. NO, not me, the sun, and the whole damned neighborhood breathing down my back like prisonguards. Just me. The Sun. The Moon. Goodnight.

In Corsica, I Floated Away

(All the way to Marseilles).

Sunday.

I'm making up for lost time with this post. I've felt un-thoughtful for the past week or so, but good ol' Chinaski got me back on track with his tales of booze and women. Funny stuff. I like it though, because although it's stark and mainly depressing, he tells stories in a way that is unpretentious enough that you feel as though you are there. And Romanticism is pretty, but his poetry is Romantic in the way that the doorknobs are sorrow, in the way that the wind is his friends, in the way that people don't live in houses but something different. Something special and horrid and sordid. It's like Romanticism, DEPPILF.

Isn't it lovely the way people were back then? Patriotic, young forever on the screens and speakers. They're all dead now. It's so sad. That they're all dead or slowly approaching that or halfway there in a bed tonight. It's not fair. We're given so little time. Or a lot. Maybe God is generous, but we're just greedy. Or maybe he's stingy and we're greedy. Either way, we're greedy.

Kind of wasting our time like I'm doing now. When I could be studying for English so that I keep my 97 average and could quite possibly have the highest grade in the class, in the school, and quite possibly get into Cornell where it won't matter if I'm fat or skinny or if I wear glasses because when I walk in the hallway, I have somewhere to be. No one will care if I spend my hours studying math and eating frosting by the gallons and puking, because I'm studying! I'm going somewhere. But that won't happen if I continue to type. So I continue to type.

And it's weird. I wonder what it will feel like, however many years from now (One? Twentytwo? Sixtythree?) when I'm on my deathbed or my deathwhatever and I look back at all the moments I spent just spending. Not with anyone in particular, just being. What will I think? I know that when I reach that point, and there's nothing I can do, I'll be regretful. Not because I wasted my time and didn't accomplish what I wanted to, but because it's a shame I couldn't just live 20 lives and be 20 people and know 20 stories so well. That's why we have Humanity, so we can vicariously live those other 19 lives. And then we won't feel so bad on our deathbeds, because we've lived so much life. That's why I love strangers.

Today at Mass, I looked at all of the people receiving Communion. They were old and young and babies and boys and girls and fat and ugly and pretty and bored and tired and justanotherSundaychurchgo-er. But they all had something to tell me. All of them. Something. Maybe that time that this happen, and now Rubik's Cubes make them think of a girl named Sally. Or how pine trees make them think of their old teacher, Mr. Kauffman. Or how the book "The Great Gatsby" makes them think of warm summer afternoons in the parlor, back in 1956. They all could tell me this. I'd listen and I'd love their stories. Because I think it's odd how everything brings to mind everything else. And I want to know it all! All of it! Why and how and when and the who's, especially.

And you know what else is weird? I found out today how murders happen. It's all because of... undergarments. Yes, undergarments! Just hear me out:

So today, I was fussing with my, erm, undergarment strap, and it was refusing to cooperate. It was early in the morning, I was tired, and I needed to change for Mass.

"COME ON, YOU STUPID THING! Just work! I swear, I'ma kill someone!"

Then I stopped dead in my tracks. ERRRR.

I've always hated that term. "I'll kill ya!" "I could just kill someone right now!" "Kill, kill, kill." I don't want to be a damp blanket, but that phrase is so morbid. I know it's a joke, and no one is really serious when they say it, but it makes me shiver. Because that's how it happens. A real killer, lying dormant beneath the suckling skin, is fussing with his, erm, undergarment strap and he's late for Mass (Yes, killers have gods--they just don't pay as close attention to homilies) and the stupid thing won't work.

"COME ON, YOU STUPID THING! Just work! I swear, I'ma kill someone!"

Later, there is an obituary with a young face and someone buys the newspaper and sees it and says to his buddy, "What a shame. What a sick word. What a sick person. Musta been a helluva sunuvabich." They walk on.

No, no. He wasn't. But the stupid strap wasn't working! And he made an ultimatum with fate, as we so often do: Do this, and I'll do this.

Honestly, it happens. Why couldn't he just have gone commando and saved a life?

"Sunday Morning Coming Down"

I hate blackberry pancakes.

Who puts blackberries in pancakes?

Blackberries aren't like blueberries;

They're big and mushy and black and too sour for a pancake

for the a.m., they wake me up too fast

when I don't want to be lucid.

That's why I was mad when I said that to my dad.

"I hate blackberry pancakes."

"Fine." He replied, equally as stubborn.

I marched away in time,

and ended up somewhere

in the stupid radius of my house;

with no where else to go.

I came back an hour and a half later

with some real hunger in my stomach

and looked around for those damned blackberry pancakes.

There were none.

I was mad.

How dare they not save me pancakes!

thinks my mind.

I grumble on and on, mutely,

about the gravity of the situation.

Me! I want my damned blackberry pancakes!

Then I see them, sitting politely on the counter.

They heard it all.

Sheepishly, I perambulate towards the stack of pancakes.

Sorry.

Silence ensues.

Hey, I said I was sorry. What more do you want?

Pancakes are so uptight.

They just sat there

Stared back with their ugly blackberry stains

Kind of bringing to mind ugly birthmarks.

They work me up, y'know,

Just keeping so painstakingly still and silent

So the silence grows and even builds a dynasty

In that time.

I just give up,

I go to the refrigerator

And get a damned Coca-Cola

And suck away at the damned Coca-Cola

Like I just opened happiness itself.

I gloat it in front of the pile of pancakes.

I smirk inwardly as the ugly, birthmarked, stained, silent, awkward

Pile of pancakes stares back.

It wasn't until my mother said something to me

That I had realized

I had just spent my morning moments

With pancakes.

And even then,

We still couldn't agree on anything.