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Monday, August 29, 2005

I shall never succumb.

Sometimes, late at night, I cry just for the simple piece of mind that comes with not failing.

I feel as if I carry this great burden. My grandfather turned down medschool at Vanderbilt. My father deserted in Vietnam. I've heard until that time my family was very prominent. A family full of doctors, lawyers and prominent farmers. I have even heard that I am a descendant of a general, but I have not checked it out.

So I have to wonder what is within me. Do I have what it takes? Or am I rather destined to fail like the two generations before me?

It is one day before my 22nd birthday. I am tense and nervous. I do not know what to expect. I wish I could treat it as any other day, but it is a day when I really will start to reflect on what I've achieved in the last year. I fear it is not enough. I know I will begin to push myself even more now.

Also, I fear feeling alone. It seems no matter who I am with, I always feel alone. Maybe it is all in my mind, but lately birthdays have been a very depressing time.

I guess all I can do is have hope. I finish all I can finish and do all that I can every day. I don't stop until I'm exhausted. I don't waste time. I don't dig my head in the sand and hope the problems just go away, but I can only do what I can.

I miss being adventurous. I can't wait until I'm done with my undergrad. I have a feeling it will be the hardest time in my life. I have no finances for school, so I'm continually stressed out. I am also caught in a part of the country where I feel trapped - never allowed to leave.

Monday, August 22, 2005

Let it go...

I realized today that one of my worst fears is not being able to have any control over my own life at times. It is a pretty scary concept for me. I realized when I start to fall on a lead climb, I cannot just let go and take the fall. I always need to know I"ll have some way to protect myself from its consequences.

But such is life and such I must learn. I must learn to just let go with trust in my heart that everything will end up okay.

I worked today trying to get my internet hooked up but with no avail. I went up to see if Ryan wanted to go get something to eat and he was hanging out with Caitlin. I just felt like I was getting in the way. He called about going climbing tomorrow - maybe he felt bad. My schedule is too busy though. Today was pretty much the one day I might have had. It is okay though. However, I can just imagine how our friendship is going to be - scattered, infrequent. But that is also okay. I understand he has priorities the same as I do.

Later, I called a girl I like. I asked her to go to the movies, which is pretty untypical for Monday nights, but I thought what the hell. I might as well try. She shot me down, but sounded like she might want to do something. I need to find more stuff to do in Carbondale. I don't know though. She always seems to want to do something around her roommate. It makes me uneasy and awkward like I'm being watched. She also never seems to want to leave her house. Or maybe it is just me. I have a tough time reading the girls I like. It just seems like too much trouble sometimes.

No one wanted to go climbing yesterday either. I've met three new climbers so far. But I still value my old friends too much and trust them too much with climbing. I wanted to go with them. I guess I'm just being a little childish and should just find a new partner.

It is only the beginning of school. I knew there would be some kinks. I still have a good feeling about this year.

Sunday, August 21, 2005

I awake.

Agonizingly, I crawl down from bed - each step, one step closer to silencing a ringing alarm.

Then I focus. I stretch my arms and legs and walk down the hall to a room with a nice 16th floor view. I sit down and concentrate. I focus on where I am, right now. I focus on the present and remember who I am and what I am trying to do. I focus on all that has happened since the last time I sat down. My mind finds this zone and I lose myself.

Before I notice, half an hour has passed. I feel centered. I leave.

My focusing in the morning might have something to do with the fact I started to cry in church today. When something bad happens, I become cold. So when Carrie died, my heart cried out and then began to chill. When I was told I couldn't go out to see the mountains, I became a little colder. And when I found that I was still seen as dependent upon someone who clearly cannot support me through college, my heart sunk down and only my will kept it alive. I never lost hope, but my heart clearly could not speak for everything it wanted to say. It might have been too painful.

Now, it starts to speak again. It wants to seek something. It wants to do something with all of its ability.

I worked my body to the point of collapse lastnight. It now feels good to feel the soreness in my muscles.

As I begin to focus on my own life, I would only invite those in that would not derail what I'm trying to accomplish. I want those good in heart and purpose to be part of my life. I want those that speak of truth and uncompromising principle to find a good place. I want those people that need help to come to me. I do not want the callous anymore. I could not handle the fake. Let them go and be with others. I shall not go and seek anyone like this.

This year is a year to prove my own self worth. If I focus and use the resources God gave me, I shall begin to see my entire potential. I would really like to see that.

I think if I could even realize my entire potential just once, I would never lose confidence in my abilities ever again. But who knows... one must have goals.

Thursday, August 18, 2005

Excitement

So I'm broke. No biggie. A time will come when I am not anymore.

So I have three semesters left. Not a prob. A time will come when I'll have my undergrad, and if I work hard enough, I should get into a pretty good law school.

There shouldn't be anything to be excited about this year, except a lot of hard work and various projects.

But I'm very excited. I'm excited over this mystery I've put into my life. I did something crazy one day (I know. Quite a surprise.) and it has resulted in an unexpected meeting for this Fall. I wonder how it will go. Will it be one hour, one minute taken from my life? Will it be a couple months? Will it result in a lifetime friendship or something more?

We are masters of our own future.

I think it has a lot to do with the way we see things. I've taken a lot from this summer, surprisingly. I never thought I would, but maybe having things get really hard just makes me better. Or maybe I just hung out with the right friend all summer. Maybe I finally saw that some girls just definitely aren't worth it, and I should trust my first thoughts on things.

Or maybe the Dean's list just makes it all worth it.

I have to say, I like who I am. However, I do not like where I am.

This year, I'm going to make the best out of it though. I am going to find the things that will not only make it bearable, but beautiful also. I want to search myself and become a better person.

I have my list of priorities. I have my goals. I have my wits about me.

Gotsta get a move on though.

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Clouds and haze.





Everything I want must be earned. I will never get a break and it will make me strong. I realize that nothing is free in this life. I will strive on.


I must.





I have overcome so much so far. It has brought me down time and time again, but not this time. I will not buckle. I will not cry. I will smile.


At one point, I wanted my life to be so complicated. I wanted independence and hardships. I wanted to overcome some great obstacle. I begged for it. I wanted something to make me stronger. And now here I am, agonizing over my every word.


Clouds and haze block my path. They create another world for me. One filled with mystery and hardships at every point. I am really alone in my struggle. For even those helping me along couldn't lift this burden. I could have made a mistake on my way, but instead it is just what society says I should be that hurts me so much. They see no mistakes, yet I see so many.


Today, I am overcome by the grief of an unexpected surprise. One that was never supposed to come. It will make this year very hard on me. I really do believe I shall be alone through my undergrad now. It will make me strong and I will be able to look upon the smaller things with great emphasis and delight. My life will be fuller in the long run.


My soul will convey a great symphony into the world. It will not stop at a single beat.

Monday, August 15, 2005

Milk Chocolate and Beer!

Nothing happens here in Taylorville, or at least I allow nothing to happen for me.

I went to a bar lastnight with some friends. I saw two things. I first saw a girl I had a crush on all through high school, now just a fleeting thought of how pretty she is and how she didn't interest me, and second, a couple in a fight too splintered with emotion for anyone to have a chance of breaking it up. The guy was insecure. He feared what was not there. Everyone could see it was not there, except the guy. It was awkward, and I just wanted to slap him in the face and tell him to wake up. Wake up like I had never done when it happened to me. I wish I could have had a lesson plan in my previous relationships or maybe a little booklet on what to watch out for. As novice I was wreckless, my mistakes should have never hurt anyone.

I had two dreams lastnight. Two dreams which compelled me to write. They were interwoven together but with nothing in common.

First.

A big city. Skyscrapers rushed over my head. Everything turned with the wind. It was a feeling as if I was confused and looking around in every direction trying to find my way. The kind right before I fall down, dazed and unsteady. I had a friend with me. I could not now recall his face, but I knew I trusted him.

We walked through the middle of town to my apartment. I looked behind me and saw a narrow figure block out the sun. He was a knight wearing red with a huge steel cross painted on his chest. He was narrow, but in heighth had to reach 30 ft.

My friend and I both turned and ran. Beside us, splintering shafts of wooden spears burst against the ground. My friend turned. I stopped to look back. One wooden spear launched directly at him burst off his shield. He turned and ran again. I turned and ran also. But as I ran, I thought of the shield and how my friend had nothing to fear. So why was he running, turning his defenseless back to this monstrous, spear-throwing knight?

His glance caught mine and I knew too well. I was the reason. I had no shield and obviously he turned and ran with me, rather than fight.

I snapped. I just couldn't take it. I had no shield, but I ran straight back to the knight. I carried a sword and swung it heavily upon his legs. A spear came down on me. I felt the pain in my shoulder. It seered down my back. I started to climb the giant knight using my sword. I kept feeling the pain from the spears, but kept climbing. I don't know what kept me going, but I just kept going. I got to the top and with one lash of my sword I brought him back down to my height.

I now felt myself back on the ground. The knight was laying on the ground and I standing over him. He had cold gray eyes. Eyes with no emotion. Standing over him, I could see my reflection now old and weary where I had once been so young and brave. My body was brittle and I had used up everything trying to conquer this monster. As he layed there beaten, I just left. I knew that he wasn't a threat to me now so what's the use.

And as in dreams, time flowed very fast. I was now at my apartment. I opened the door to a friend coming to pick me up for something. He looked the same except for the cold gray eyes I knew once so well. I was now old and a brittle in actual years. He grabbed me and tried to squeeze the life out of me, but I fought back and he could not do it. I pushed him back into the hallway. His body crumbled into ashes. I awoke.

The second.

I was back in Greeley, Colorado. Travelling down a sidewalk to the Beatle Beanery (local coffeeshop with an upside down VW Bug in front,) I saw a girl I once knew. At least in the dream I knew her once. In reality, I had never seen this girl before. But it is a dream. It isn't supposed to make sense.

We walked together as the snow fell down in the daylight air. It made a little arrangement on the towering oak and hung heavily on the evergreens. I saw in everything a coldness, and as she talked I knew I had done something wrong. She started to cry and I broke down. I did not want her to cry and thought of anything I could do, but I did not even know the problem.

She ran back into a large house on that street right across from Central Campus, the street next to the brick entranceway and the clocktower with a broken bell. The street I had always walked down in Greeley in hopes that she would come out and talk to me.

Before I knew it, I was being chased by a mob of girls. It was crazy. I somehow found myself going into random shops, begging the managers of the store to keep them away from me. But everyone seemed to be in unison about how I deserved it. So I must have done something really wrong. A million things flashed through my head. 'Man, I have to deserve this,' I said to myself.

So somehow in the dream, I crept up and had the nerve to ask one of her friends what was going on. She told me how I had kissed her and never had any intention on loving her. She told me how I had kissed many other girls. She said the girl on that sidewalk on that day heard all the stories and knew I had kissed her in the same way, never for anything just for the moment.

But that wasn't true. When had I ever kissed anyone without the hope? I kissed everytime with the hope that this kiss would make everything right. It was a tool of hope, not a tool of deception. I kissed her on that sidewalk in hopes she might be everything to me, and she had walked away just because so many other girls had failed to make it that kiss, to be that hope.

I told the girl how I would do anything in the world for that girl. I just wanted to make sure I had found her. I told her how I had kissed with so much hope, but in the end I just waited for that girl. I waited every single second on that sidewalk. I held my breath for that girl, and every single girl I kissed who wasn't her I lost a little hope. At times I had lost all hope and I would go on thinking I would never find her. At other times, I had all the hope in the world until I kissed the girl and would realize what a tragedy I had committed because she would be hurt and I would be the one that hurt her. I had lost girls that I thought was her, but obviously they couldn't have been because their kiss wasn't true.

And then I had found her walking down that sidewalk, and she had walked away. She had thought of so many loves and just walked away. I thought as much would have happened. So, I begged her friend to go into the house and get her, because I really did care. I never stopped caring, but I just had to be certain.

So she came out of the house and I held her. It never felt more right and I knew this time I had found her.

- I know how this last dream intertwines with my very own life, but the ending is some ideal I really don't know about right now, but it stands as the basis for a lot of my hope. Everything else I know I can accomplish with the right effort and focus. This is a dream.

End of dreams

I blame everything on the four beers I had at the bar then the two glasses of milk chocolate at home. I should have known it would result in weird dreams. But hey, they were entertaining.

Saturday, August 06, 2005


I made plans. I executed plans.
I started a goal this summer.
I was pushed this summer and I loved it.

Some days, I had no food. I had no money to buy food, but the only thing on my mind was to study. It didn't matter, because I had a reason to study. That is all I ever wanted.

I actually believe in where I want to end up. It is just as good as the feeling I got when I thought of all the people I could help being a doctor, as when I first started school. ~But very different~

This time it's me. I am using my true self to achieve my goals and not trying to be something I am not. Over the past two months, I have picked up a new minor, one that I know will give me a great deal of power to help people (economics.) I have also fortified my interest in Africa. What I learned about the people of South Africa was horrible, but what I saw them do in exchange was awesome. They massed together. They moved singing songs of unity and hope. They gave me hope. Professor Benti said at the end of the course he believes anyone can overcome anything in life just from what these people did.

Three hundred and forty years of rule at the hands of cruel white minority. 1652-1992.~

You give me great hope, South Africa.

I will leave this weekend to go wherever the wind blows me for a while. I will return in the Fall to start up classes, to meet new people, to climb with some of my best friends, to grow everyday as a person with many hardships, to watch the leaves brown and to feel the air grow crisp then cold. I will leave this weekend knowing no matter what happens I have the rest of my life ahead of me. I have the rest of my life to sing a song of unity while marching away trying to make this world a better place at least one person at a time.

Wednesday, August 03, 2005

a little short.

I apologize if I've been a bit out of it lately. Much has happened.

Financially, I think everything is figured out. Woooohooo!

Exam Friday. Kind of stressed. Badly want an A.

Two things I am thinking right now: Climbing, South Africa.

After Friday: climbing, hometown, Florinda's Ristorante, a bit of good wine, tons of sleep, tons of running, tons of no worries.

I was just talking about how badly I wanted to go climbing tonight and some girl IMs me out of nowhere and BAM! climbing partner for the weekend. Josiah gave her my name. Apparently, she is some girl from Northwestern. She just got back from South Africa. I think it could be fun. Little chance of rain, but I doubt it. I really hope not. Sunday is mine! (if not Saturday)

I want the Fall to come with the crisp fresh air. I want my friends to return.

My priorities have changed. It is all about Law School now. Just not any JD either. We're talking Peace Corps - best law school I can get with the best human rights/international trade program - life and doing stuff with it.

Someone told me I was smart today during work. I said something very practical and common sense. Main guy in charge treated me like a bleedin spectacle. I really have to think things might have been different if I would have cared a great deal more where I went to school after high school. (Bitter words from a tired me who can't go to sleep.) Word to the wise - Never drink three cups of coffee in an afternoon when you have been avoiding it for years. Caffeine can hurt you. Badly.

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Ambitiously enduring.