blogger, i am over you.

i gaze sadly into the mirror at my left love handle. the one now cascading over the side of my jeans. i poke it, like one would poke anything mushy, play dough for example. hating my life and vowing to never eat again, i proceed to consume mass amounts of s'mores at maggie's camp fire. "tomorrow," i think to myself. "tomorrow."

6:29. i have 15 minutes. i switch off the alarm and open my eyes at 7:23. i am supposed to go to work with mom to aid librarians from quebec, shaky on their english. the more i deny my own ability to speak french, the better of an idea it seems for mom, who shrugs off my ambivelence as sheer modesty.

"no mom. i'm serious. i will not be able to do this."
"oh dont be silly honey, you told me you could carry on conversations!"
"yes. ones that consist of 'may i help you,' or 'what would you like to eat,' or 'some weather we're having.' Not much more, and definitely not about establishing a central library network. i barely know what that means in english."
"oh you'll be fine. you're getting paid!"

i suddenly imagine my anti-hero, bridget jones sliding down the fireman's pole, landing thong-first on the camera. bridget got paid for making a fool out of herself, i certainly could. but there would be no mark darcy in the forseeable future, and definitely no hard-hitting interview with kafir and eleanor. somehow i slip into presentable attire, apply presentable make up, and guzzle a presentable mug of coffee, making it to the car at 7:50. if you want to feel good about yourself, go wherever it is that the most middle-aged women have watched you grow up, because when you walk in as a 21-year old, finally out of her awkward "i dont know what to do with these boobs and hips" phase, they are bound to tell you that you look great. i assume it is mostly because nothing has begun to sag and my navy heels make my calves look great and add a teetery swagger to my step. i am met with:
"we were trying to figure out who the movie star with your mother was!"
and
"look at you, you could be a model! cant she be a model? what a figure."
yes. figure. as i am not 65, i am the envy of many women there. i smile and say thank you, my cascading love handle a distant, but poignant memory.

the meeting consists of me being stared at blankly by two french librarians and two english librarians, both asking me to translate sentences upon sentences at once. i try to think back to tv translators. do they listen for 2 minutes and then successfully translate everything? i do not remember. i mumble something about "maximum network loans" and the french librarians nod approvingly. somehow, success and four hours later, a lunch on the house and a beer to aid in my forgetting what had just happened...and how i'd spent the past four hours learning how library systems operate.

we stop at the supermarket on the way home, my toes numb from my shoes. i curse them and vow to remain faithful to my flats. picking up the essentials, i head home and prepare a messy linguine carbonara a la ruth reichl, new culinary role model. somehow successful despite mass amount of dishes and minor burns, i am back to a vow of early morning jogging.

tomorrow.

i feel like i've just been dropped by the one thing i've ever loved, dedicated so much time to, and felt so little in return with respect to the effort i've put into it.

forget loving another human. this was enough.

i don't know what to do.

i'm scared.
so scared.
of life.
of myself.
of who i am.
of the fact that i cant even articulate what frightens me to myself, let alone anyone else so i have to psych myself into being happy. and i can be happy, until i start thinking again.
i hate these words. i hate all the words i write. i hate that i don't think i'm capable of what i want to do with my life. i hate being alone all the time. i hate that you wont talk to me even though its me who should have given up on our friendship a long time ago. i hate what this place does to people.

a tad in advance but still something for me to ponder is that i will be spending my birthday alone and in England this year.

it seems like it could go either way. meandering the streets of london with my i-pod and a map, being really happy or really lonely. i imagined how it would feel as i walked home from class this drizzly february day. "the weather," i thought, "will probably be a lot like this, though slightly warmer..." i thought of sitting in a cafe somewhere on some street whose name i do not know yet...reading a book, surrounded by strangers who have no idea that i am american/canadian (unless they hear me speak) or that it is my birthday or that i have no friends to speak of within phoning or walking distance, as my friend rachel, whom i am spending much of my time with, will be off studying somewhere distant for that weekend. i wondered how i'd feel. completely alone? homesick? or possibly, and hopefully, independent and actually ready to be 21. it's a big age, for some reason. everyone seems to hype it to no end, and i wonder if i'll feel that, or if i'll just gaze dreamily out the window of my imagined cafe watching everyone else's lives pass me by..



21. in england. may 5, 2006.

to run through grassy backyards on cloudy days is what i want to do right now. a day when the humidity hangs lazily in the cool air. to run through the open yards of neighbourhoods, across manicured lawns as the mist starts to fall. i stop and look up at the sky. let the mist fall. or dance. the mist dances. the mist dances and i am its partner and we dance and twirl together on our grassy dance floor. it leads, i follow. Frolicking through the yards and lots of green grass and daffodils as the grey sky gazes wearily on...

this is all i want right now. lightness.

i'm okay.

it's not that my blog is dying, it's just that there seems to be a lack of things worth saying for the past few months. that's not to say they've been bad. in fact, they've been some of the best i can remember. i firmly believe, as many other writers have said before me, that we write when we are sad and when we are happy we have nothing to write about. i'm sure it's been stated much more eloquently, but that's the best i can do at 12am with a final to study for.

i suppose what i can do is wrap up my semester as best as i can remember. truth be told, i can't actually believe it's almost over. i'll be home in just over a week.

the good:
- learning. so much. reading. so much. loving school more than i ever have.
- new friends, tighter friendships with older ones.
- learning to not so much love being single, but to accept it. really, this has been the first time since i can remember that i havent felt a void where another person should be...except today due to a combination of just seeing "pride and prejudice," the decemberists being signed to capitol records, finding out that ben gibbard is married, and that colin meloy is expecting a baby with his long-time girlfriend. it'll pass, as soon as i remember the fact that mr. darcy is not real.
- blossoming friendship with most amazing professor ever (ie the one who made me realize my own love of shakespeare and inherent desire to become a professor)
- first A on paper received from said professor, included in commentary was that i had "an original and convincing argument..." about hamlet. enough said.
- everything that happens at 4428.
- finally finding school fulfilling
- being allowed to take shakespeare seminar next semester. if wes remembers to let me in.
- self discovery. more on that later.

the bad:
- torie is not here. i miss her, despite my best efforts to know she is doing so wonderfully in egypt, i still find myself, in my selfish moments, wishing she was in the lagoon with me talking about silly things.
- hepburn's propensity to give me B-minuses.
- hemingway
- six papers. six. papers.
- my room is so white and i havent the time or the money to paint it. i've sufficiently covered a whole wall in posters though.
- i have seen no where near enough of david anderson, whom i sincerely believe is the closest living being to mr. darcy that i shall ever come into contact with.
- no time to remove ben and liz from fiction limbo.



ah me. i am stubborn. i am an idealist, a perfectionist, and an optimist to most but a pessimist to myself. i dont mind being single because i have never been close enough to anyone to imagine anything emerging that is worth emerging. yes. i want to be in love, but i do not have time for it, and therefore, do not mind that i'm not. despite what people tell me, that i'd find time, which i highly doubt. i havent met anyone worth finding time for. i want to get my master's, and then my phd, and then i want to make students fall in love with shakespeare. i am scared that the mistakes i made in my first two years of university will inhibit me from doing that in the institutions of my choosing. "pride and prejudice" is my favourite book ever. dammit, i'm a stereotype. i have a firm belief that many romantic comedies produced since than are rooted in the characters of jane austen. i love being a nerd, and the people who accept that and who can join in on my nerd jokes and sayings. i love that wes ran up to me in a cafe wielding a meat pie and laughing at its resemblance to the people pie in "Titus." he then told me he liked my paper. i love that for the first time in my life, school and my friends are what makes me the happiest. i love to laugh. i love that everyone i surround myself makes me laugh and that i can do the same to them. i really love that i felt it necessary to take time out of my final studying to tell you all this, and i'm glad i did.

good night. and good luck.