Back in Fashion

It happened this week. I told someone I was wearing something I had had since high school. Upon realizing this, I was amazed and wondrous, as the size I am now and the size I am now are like night and day.

So, here's what happened. I went to a coffee shop with a friend of mine who was in town. We both wished to escape tiny humans and enjoy a conversation that was not interrupted by the tiny humans (or the husbands). Something you don't realize when you usually converse with a two-year-old and not an adult: you can't have a conversation while there are toddlers present, as they will demand your attention either by talking over you or falling on their face. So, we left the tiny humans with our husbands and escaped for two glorious hours of adult conversation at a local coffee shop.

Now, I love this coffee shop. It was the first one suggested to me upon arrival, but I nixed because it was tiny, cramped, and dark. I wound up going there because it was small and I had a tiny human who was crawling everywhere. I fell in love with it for an array of reasons, none having to do with the coffee. They have a FULL-SIZE CHANGING TABLE. They also gave my daughter a full cup of whipped cream mostly because she was so well behaved while my friend and I had coffee. EMO was maybe nine months at the time. She was crawling and I spent the majority of the time chasing her down when she'd get too far from me. (I would have just let her crawl away, but there were others in the shop and they didn't seem to think I should be letting my kid crawl around the coffee shop.) But, she didn't fuss or complain, simply went back to exploring once I brought her back to our corner. The other's times I've taken her, they've almost always given her something, though never again a full cup of whipped cream (which I ate most of because she was too busy crawling away).

The last time I'd gone to the coffee shop to get coffee with my dad, they'd totally redone the place and it felt bigger, brighter, and totally different, so I wanted to go sit in it and enjoy it without a toddler. While the barista was crafting our lattes, he mentioned that my jean jacket was a hot trend and they were "totally back." (Yes, he did, in fact, say that to me.) We proceeded to have a conversation about how things keep coming back in fashion. He really wanted the 80s to return and for men to wear crop tops. (I was not aware that was a thing for dudes in the 80s, but what the hell do I know? I wore whatever my mother put me in throughout my life in the 80s.) My friend mentioned henleys were coming back in and she'd just gotten rid of her whole collection of henleys, to which I responded, "I only ever get rid of stuff that doesn't fit. If it fits, I keep it just in case."

This is very true. Hence why I have a jean jacket from high school. I also have my Doc Martens from high school. All three pairs. (Which until two years ago when I bought a pair of full price Tory Burch flats, were the most expensive shoes I had ever bought for myself at $120 for the shoes and $110 for the sandals.) I have a sweatshirt and top from Abercrombie. They belonged to my brother and he rejected them. They swam on me in high school, they fit now. The jean jacket was also too big when originally purchased. And here's why: my mom refused to believe me when I told her I wore an XS.

Yup. She refused to believe that at seventeen I knew what size I wore. I had been in denial for a few years, but by that point, I had owned up to the fact I wore a size zero. I accepted it and had embraced the fact I was non-existant. I knew, in the back of my head, that so many of my peers would have loved to buy size zero jeans from American Eagle, who have been jealous of me as I bought double zero jeans from Abercrombie (yeah, double zero. I was double non-existent at Abercrombie & Finch). I wore XS shirts because I had no boobs and going to a bigger size didn't make the shirts any longer.

My mother, who did my laundry, honestly thought I was wearing clothes that were too small simply based on what these items looked like when she washed them. She commented quite often about the size of the shirts when she'd washed them, but never when they were on me. She bought me a crop top. I was never brave enough to really wear it, but she did buy it for me. I've no idea why. I was sixteen. She told me I ought to embrace the body I had at the moment as one day it'd be gone.

Like usual, she was right. And I did listen to her, hence why I owned up to the fact I was not a size 4 and began buying the size that fit: zero. (And man did I feel better about myself when I no longer had a saggy butt and had to wear belts to keep my too large pants up.)

Anyways, in the spring of my junior year, for some reason, we were at Old Navy. I didn't really shop at Old Navy in high school after I embraced my non-existence because they didn't make non-existent clothing. So, my mother and I were at Old Navy and she proclaimed she was buying me clothes. This was strange for a wide array of reasons. She had decided when I was ten she wasn't ever buying me clothing and since I was thirteen I had to pay for my own clothes. Also, I didn't NEED anything. By this point in my life, I had enough clothing to clothe the entire school and then some. (Not that many people wore non-existant sized clothing. This was tragic on many levels, most being I could never trade clothes with my girlfriends as they all wore size four or larger.) But, I was not about to argue with my mom paying for clothes, so I went along for the ride.

We both really liked what the mannequin was wearing, so she agreed I could get the jean jacket and red checkered shirt. When we went to get the clothes, I discovered Old Navy actually carried XS. (They did not have size zero pants, though. I did check.) I grabbed the XS, but my mother said, "No. You're not that small."

I think I blinked.

"You need a small."

I did not argue with her. I simply agreed and got the small shirt and jacket.

As whenever I have new clothes, I was super excited to wear the new outfit and planned to wear it on a field trip to the art museum in downtown Chicago. The morning of the trip, I excitedly put my new stuff on and realized a major flaw.

Everything was too big. The shirt was swimming on me, especially in the chest area. Even with my super bra (either filled with air or water, as Victoria Secret carried both to give you bigger boobs and since I had none and everyone who made clothing seemed to think us non-existant people had huge boobs, I had to wear padded bras and the ones filled with air or water looked more natural), the shirt was too big. I put the coat on over it and the coat was down passed my knuckles-- which was great. I loved sleeves that were too long, but the jacket was not the fitted, cute thing it was on the mannequin. It was wide and boxy.

I wore the outfit anyway, as I was running late and figured that at least my pants fit. I didn't take the jacket off all day and no one told me I looked cute.

I never wore the shirt and jacket again while in high school. I've no idea where the shirt went, but I hung onto the jacket. I think my mom sent me off to college with it. I wore it one day and discovered the pockets were sewn in such a manner they gave me inside pockets that were perfect for my ID. So, I wore it a lot in college because it had extra pockets. The jacket even went to Scotland with me. When cooler weather rolls around, I always unearth it from where ever it is and start wearing it again.

As I stood in the coffee shop at thirty-three-years-old and now wearing a size 8, I stared at the jacket I've merrily worn since I became a size 4. It's always fit since that time. Always. (Except when I was six months pregnant and it didn't button over my humungous boobs.) Was my jacket kinda like the Traveling Pants? It was kinda like a traveling coat. It's been to Scotland, Alaska, Texas, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Oklahoma. It's likely to go off and go to more places because every time I've sat down to replace the stupid thing, I can never find a better coat. And yes, I have sat down to replace it a few times. There's just never a coat that's...well, that coat. So, I give up and just go back to wearing a coat bought by my mother in 2001.

And, guess what? I'm totally in fashion right now with my sixteen-year-old denim coat.

Heed Not the Crazy Singing Lady

I have always loved music. Since I was a baby if I believe my parents. So, logically, once I found about musicals, I was a goner.

The first musical I remember being eaten alive by was Annie. My parents took me to see a live performance that a fellow from our church was in. And by the end, I was in love. My mother took me to the library and rented the CD from the movie. I annoyed the whole family for two weeks solid belting out "Tomorrow" out of tune. (This was the first time I realized I had no musical talent as I couldn't hit that one note no matter how much I played with my voice.)

There were other musicals to follow, various Disney movies and The Music Man. In high school, I was utterly obsessed for MONTHS with Titanic. I'd bought the CD on a trip to the mall when I was in 8th grade, but during either freshman, I began to listen to the CD before going to Youth Choir (yeah, I still couldn't sing, didn't stop me from trying). I felt it warmed up my voice better than doing warm-ups with the actual choir. For months, I'd listen to the whole thing before leaving the house for the evening.

Then it came to Chicago and I about burst a blood vessel. Least to say, when I requested to be taken, neither parent objected to their 15-year-old kid wanting to go to the theater to see a musical about a sinking boat.

I discovered old movie musicals the summer between junior and senior year in high school. I spent weeks singing "There's No Business Like Show Business."

In college, I was obsessed with Chicago. (I actually wanted to listen to the soundtrack to that musical while getting ready for my wedding, but didn't happen due to the fact I was having too much fun and didn't bother to put any music on.)

I love Singing in the Rain, but I hate West Side Story. (Which was reaffirmed last night when I watched it on TMC.) 

Basically, if it's a musical movie, I've seen it.

BUT

I'm currently obsessed with Hamilton. I got on that boat late, but I've been listening to it enough lately my child has started singing it without prompting. EMO began singing last night as she was getting ready for bed, "FOR SHAME! FOR SHAME! I WANT GREEN TOOTHPASTE! FOR SHAME!"

Pilot Boy looked at me like I had done something horrible, but I shrugged as at first, I didn't know what the hell she was singing. She usually needs prompting to sing Hamilton tunes. I spout out the chorus for "My Shot" and she can finish it. She sings along at the end of all King George's songs. She randomly shouts words during the raps, but she's never just begun spouting off things. 

I had a feeling it was from Hamilton, but I had to look it up to figure it out which song.

"Farmer Refuted."

I couldn't stop laughing. While I do enjoy that song, it's not one that we tend to perform together when we do listen to the soundtrack (I am that crazy woman in her car waving her arms and pointing while at a red light with a child in the back doing the same thing). 

EMO shouted her version of "Farmer Refuted" till she fell asleep. 

Back in the Day...

Recently, a childhood friend of mine posted an old school photo on Facebook.

I was utterly mortified. I looked like a complete idiot.

I was an adorable child. My parents will tell you this, other people might agree, and I will tell you this. However, around the age of about ten or eleven, I turned into a complete, awkward mess. I'm not sure if it had to do with getting glasses or what, but something happened between fourth and fifth grade. And it only got worst till I was a junior in high school. I still tended to take horrible photos, but I stopped looking so awkward and geeky. (Sometimes.) I also finally stopped hacking off my hair to channel a mushroom.

But I digress.

The photo posted on Facebook (or The Facebook as some people call it) was from fifth grade. Oddly, I was actually wearing my glasses (I tended to forget them till I was in about seventh grade when I finally became blind enough to be unable to function without them). I also, for some unknown reason, tucked my shirt into my high waisted jeans. I know, back in 1995, those were like the ONLY type of jeans out there, but still. WHY DID I TUCK MY SHIRT IN? Out of the seven or six girls in the photo, only two of us were sporting tucked in shirts. And since I was the short one with the tucked in shirt, tapered jeans, and granny boots, I looked like an awkward mess. Even for 1995.

With the exception of the girl who posted the photo and one other, each person (besides myself) commented on the photo how, well, horrible she looked. Each one thought she looked the worst, completely passing over myself. (Who did look the worst. My brother agreed.) The photo had been up for quite a few days before I realized that likely all of us were totally embarrassed (in a ha ha ha kind of way) of how we appeared as kids. For the most part, when I see photos of myself as a kid, I don't cringe at the clothes. Yeah, I look dated, but for the most part I think I look fine. It's not till I hit that awkward stage (around the time of the photo), where I want to crawl into a hole and hide.

Though, out of all the years, I think my junior high years were the worst. I remember thinking during those years I looked GREAT. My mom let me have more control over my wardrobe (in eighth grade she took me to Old Navy to buy clothes and I almost passed out, as she never took me to "cool" places to shop. I had to take my dad) and I had wire rimmed glasses (which at the time I thought were great and cool).

My hair kept getting shorter, the glasses kept getting geekier, and I had braces. And I am just awkward. I am still awkward. I just can dress and do my hair now. In high school, when I finally stopped trying to channel a mushroom, I finally stopped looking like a complete train wreck. By the time I went to college, I had "style."

Seriously.

I never thought I had my own style. I wanted to look like everyone else. I shopped at the "in" stores (especially after I got a license and a credit card). My hair was finally somewhat under my control and not always in a scrunchie. (Oh god, the scrunchies...) My basic goal in life was not to look like an award mess.

But style? That was the farthest thing from my mind. Yet, for some reason, all my friends seemed to think I was the fashionable one, the one with style, and the one to come to when they had clothes questions.

I spent a lot of time blinking my first year of college when this would happen.

As I went through college, it kind of went to my head. Especially when this one well dressed girl told me she liked my style. I was totally flattered. And blinked a lot.

When I look back at photos from my college years (or late high school), I do not cringe at my hair, clothing choices, or glasses. Even when I still sported the braces, I looked okay. I do cringe at photos of me from after I got married, but not due to what I'm wearing. I usually cringe because I think my face looks fat or something else along those lines. Or why or why did I cut my hair off before we went to Del Rio? I look like a moron with short hair. I don't know why, but I think I look like a loser. And it always makes my face look fuller, so then I look fatter. (I know I am not fat. Even at the moment, I know I am not fat. If I were fat, I'd fit into my maternity jeans and I would have to take them in on the sides to avoid them a) falling down and b) having mom butt.)

That is another thing I began to contemplate while staring at this photo from 1995: will my daughter be an award mess like myself? She will be blind (I'm blind and Pilot Boy was blind till he let some doctor cut his eye up with lasers) and she will likely have some crazy hair. (When Pilot Boy has hair, it's curly and I've got a wavy/curly/straight mess on my head.) Will she likely listen to me when I try to tell her to do something because she will later want to hide her face in her hands when looking at a photo some twenty years later?

No. Just like I didn't listen to my own mother. I doubt she'll listen to me. Such is life.

It's Research, Not Stalking...Honest

When I first began writing seriously (meaning past naming characters, putting them in designer clothing and making up some dialogue), I never did research. I sat in a cold, concrete floored room at the back of The Ditch and wrote what I knew.

Pages upon pages of what I knew.

Then, I began to make outlandish things up.

And I filled pages upon pages with words.

I never sat around thinking, "Hey, I don't know enough about that, I should look it up."

Granted, this was the day and age before the internet was in your hand at all times, but the Internet was a happening thing and I believe I sometimes ventured over to use it to research things whilst still in high school. I know I used it in college.

I hated the internet.

I'm honest. I hated with with a flaming passion because I could NEVER find what I wanted. Throughout college, I sat in the dusty library and did my research using books that sometimes hadn't seen the light of day since the sixties.

And I still wrote.

Still filled pages of notebook paper with words, still typed Word docs filled with stories and characters I grew to love.

But, never once did I research anything passed maybe looking up a meaning of a name I was unable to find within one of the numerous baby name books I own.

It never occurred to me that as a writer of works of fiction, I'd have to do research, have to do something similar to what I did when writing an essay for school.

Then, one day, my mother informed me I ought to "look something up" so it sounded like I knew what I was talking about. I do not remember WHAT she told me to look up, only she created a monster.

I am a research monster now.

I'm still not any good at it, the internet still fails ninety five percent of the time to tell me what I want it to tell me, but I research everything now. Hours of my life are wasted on various websites looking up random bits of information. I've spent time hunting down slang used in the Old West for ONE SENTENCE.  I've wasted time trying to find how a British person would say "crazy" in the twenties. I spent an hour trying to find out when the rollerball pen was invented and how widely used it was in the 1940s. I spent at least two days searching floor plans online till I finally gave up and made my own-- just so I could describe something better. I've lost track of how many time I've made sure the stupid pop culture reference I've made actually would be known by certain characters and are the right time period.

It's a lot of freaking work.

And that's just for the fan fiction I've been working on as if recent.

Last summer I spent days on end looking at school catalogues to get ideas for course to stick students in. I've wasted hours making sure the schedules I made for them actually worked. I've spent years trying to figure out what colleges some of my characters are going to attend, though I don't plan to actually write about them IN college. I've spent days staring at a map of Glasgow on a real estate site trying to find a flat. For a fictional character. (I did find one. Well, two. Then I merged them, as what I wanted doesn't actual exist.) I've scoured the internet for images of interiors so I'd have a good idea how to describe them. (One day just to find out they'd remodeled the building I was trying to write about so I really had to just use what was in my head. No one thought to take pictures of the fourth floor Adam Smith lecture hall before they redid it...)

Hours of my life were lost when I was working on HYRM and I got lost in a world of quotes. Quotes ate me alive for days on end.

Many of the clever things I come up with in my original works as well as my fan fics no one bothers to really take note of...it's like I always thought: no one notices. They are reading and enjoying the story-- not looking for symbolism, not looking for those little things.

Then, I got feedback when someone noticed the painstaking effort I put forth.

One of my stories follows two real people, who are quite famous. I went back to my roots in my fan fics and started writing about actual people instead of fictional ones. I had the idea in my head for awhile and it wanted out, so I let it out. Yeah, you might think it is rather teenybopper of me, and I think it is, but I like the two OCs I created and if I REALLY wanted to, I could change the names of the famous people, change the names of projects, etc and it'd be orignal. So, I guess you can say I'm just too lazy to change the inspiration. (10p technically started out as a fan fic, only I changed the main romantic interests name, then his profession, thus, it's not. See? No...that's fine.)

Anyways, I've become somewhat fixated with where these two people WERE. I don't care where they are right now, I care where they WERE. I get caught up in trying to figure it out, till I suddenly realize what I'm doing and I laugh.

I'd be worried if I hadn't done the same thing when I was writing some of my original works. Granted I cannot scurry the internet to figure out where my characters were located, but if you saw the pile of paper I carry around for RAB, you'd see I'm rather keen to know every detail.

It wasn't always like this. Once upon I time, I just made stuff up and called it a day.

(Except that one time when I was in high school and I drew a map of the town RAB takes place in just so I could name the street's D used to get from one end of town to another. I could have just made that up, but...I didn't. I made an entire map. On lots of paper. I still have it and use it too. Well, I did have it...I'm not sure where it got off to now that I think about it. Hopefully it survies the move.)

The World Turns, I Get Older

Last year, I kind of freaked out about turning 27. And by freaked out, I spent the whole day feeling old and...unaccomplished. Or I guess disillusioned would be a better word.

Well, I'm 28. And...I'm pretty much in the same spot I was last year. Only, I have more hair. And five pounds around my middle. (It comes with getting old, or so I am told every time I complain about it.) We also have more snow on the ground than we did a year ago. And I didn't shovel it. Unlike last year, when I went outside in a thin sweater and shoved the driveway without gloves. I whined this morning I can't find my gloves, so I can't do it.

Like last year, I am thinking about ten years ago. Why? Because I remember being 18, just as I remember being 17. When I turned 17, I honestly didn't remember being 7, as I don't remember much about being 8. Other than I had long hair. Useful, I know.

Anyways, when I turned 18, the following happened:

1. Monsters Inc came out. It was the ONLY thing I wanted to do for my birthday. Really, I want to go see a movie? On opening night? That's a cartoon, fine. It was all I wanted. I didn't get it. Due to teenage drama, the showing I wanted was sold out. So, I didn't see the movie till the following weekend and I was cranky. Because...of teenage drama. Today is Wednesday. No movies come out today I want to see. I have no desire to see movies. Because...I am old. And I am a hermit, so I'd rather stay in my house and use Netflix.
2. My best friend gave me a SUPER SIZED Hersey's bar. Seriously, it was like two pounds of Hersey's bar. And I kept it under my bed. Why? Because that is where I kept junk food when I was 18: under my bed. Gross, I know. Now days, at 28, I keep plastic bins, suitcases and boxes of junk that never got unpacked because it should have been left in Del Rio. (The Hersey's bar remained under the bed till the spring when my mother was like, WILL YOU DO SOMETHING WITH THAT?! So I made cookies. Or something. I don't remember. I just remember it was under my bed for the longest time and I was honesty tired of chocolate by the time I finally smashed it up to make cookies.)
3. I got my blue book back. Which I am currently staring at. Because a few months ago I had my mother send it to me along with all my other journals. I was a writing fiend as a teenager, especially at 18. I don't keep one now. I tried, but, I'm so boring and...not filled with teenage angst. I find keeping this blog hard enough.
4. I remember what I wore that day. And the fact I spent three hours curling my hair into tiny, tiny cork screw curls. The very ones one of the teachers asked me, with a look of awe on her face, "How long did that take you?" It took three hours and by the end of the day, my head hurt from the tug of the ponytail I wore my hair in with the complicated rolls I wore on top of my head. It was a very complicated style and I only wore it twice in my life. It was a total pain. And actually, kind of looked stupid.
5. I had never been in love. I thought I was in love at 18, but I really wasn't. I read a book last night that described falling in love perfectly. (Well a few, but this book really resonated with me, I'm not sure why, but I'm going with it.) You fall. You do not think about it. I just happens and requires no thought or doubt. At 18, I was filled with thoughts and doubts (I have five volumes of journals telling me so much). At 28, I just know. The first time I fell in love, I just knew. It wasn't dramatic. It was the simplest thing in the world. (The falling part, after that, not so simple.) At 18, I felt no relief, only angst and drama. I worried. I was paranoid. I listened to songs and the more angsty the lyrics, the more dark, more drama...the better. I...don't do that any more. I don't see relationship with Pilot Boy in angst-ridden, dark, dramatic songs. Now, I just see CHARACTERS that are in my head in songs I like. Seriously. I no longer have songs, my characters have songs. Stories get songs. My life, not so much.
6. Point six is mixed in with point five.
7. 18 was the first birthday I viewed as a total disaster that I remember. I honestly don't remember turning 15, 16, 17 or anything before that. Those just happened. 18 is the first birthday that burned itself into my mind and refused to let go. And until I turned 21, I had horrible birthdays. They were just...horrific. I always had a horrible day, there was always some sort of drama that unfolded that left me feeling like total shit by the end of the day. When I turned 21...nothing happened. I am serious. I was also deliriously happy, but on the actual day of my birthday, honestly nothing happened. Well, things happened, but nothing that happened due to the fact I was turning 21. I got up late, missed my first lecture, walked to my room in the early morning cold, changed for lunch and then just went about my day till I returned to my room on a hill and fell face first into my bed and fell asleep for an hour. I then woke up, made a Chinese instant meal, ate it in my freezing cold room, was dragged to a party downstairs for like five minutes and then fell asleep. It was...the best day ever. It was the day I fell in love with Glasgow. From that day forward, Glasgow was the best place on earth as far as I was concerned. So much so, I still write love stories about it. And...it's Glasgow.
8. I have something in common with my 18 year old self, though. At 18, I still thought, deep down, I'd be a writer some day. I was beginning to give up this goal, as I had realized sophomore year there was no money in it and I wanted lots of money, but I didn't really give up the writing dream till much later on in my life. And I didn't pick it up till roughly a year or so ago. And since then, I've been working. While Pilot Boy might not think I am "working" I think I am working. I might not be getting paid at the moment, but I write, edit and revise daily. I read for research. Hell, I do research. I never did that before. I just wrote. I thought writing was just about writing the story. I always wrote what I knew, but even doing that...research is needed. I have spent the past year researching colleges, cities, staring at maps of Glasgow, London, Dublin and Chicago. I research names, last names, first names, middle names, back stories, houses, floor plans, and meanings of words in dead languages that no one knows how to speak. I draw maps, I look at maps, and I create entire universes in my head. I spent a whole day figuring out the Scottish schooling system and then another four hours making a freaking class schedule for a character. I spend time scouring the internet for snip its of Scottish/English/Irish/French/Southern American/Etc in order to be able to write out what I hear. I read books I would never read in the name of research. My 18 old self...read Harry Potter.
9. I didn't feel any different when I turned 18. I was an "adult" and yet I did not feel very adult like. I honestly felt like I was not old enough to do the things that 18 year old kids are allowed to do. I didn't think I was old enough to be voting in elections and I had no desire for cigarettes or any of the other things 18 year old kids can buy. I still don't honestly feel like I am old enough to do some things. Something happens after you turn 25, though. You forget how old you are. I walked around this past year, when I was 27, thinking I was 28. Pilot Boy tried to convince me the other day he was only 25 and I was 26. I had to actually do the math to figure out how old I was. And was really confused to find out I was 27. I did the math like five times. At least, this year, while thinking I am 28, I'll actually be 28.
10. 18 year old me burned herself with the curling iron. Often. 28 year old me burns myself, but not usually with the curling iron, as I don't use one as much as I used to. I do, though, usually burn my fingers because I refuse to wear that stupid heat proof gloves that came with the rod thing I bought and use because it makes the most natural looking curls. No, 28 year old me (who was 27 when most of these things happened) just burns herself on the oven, the stove, and the iron. And sometimes the hair dryer. But not as bad as when I was 15 and I dropped it on the back of my neck. I used to balance it in a tissue box over the side of my dresser and then sit under it and blow dry my hair straight and flat. (This was before I knew what a straightening iron was.) One day, the blow dryer fill, right on my neck when I had my head bowed to dry the back of my head. (This was the year of the mushroom hair cut, so I had short hair.) Least to say, I had an ugly red mark on the back of my neck that looked alarmingly like a hickey. And I had no boyfriend to give it to me. I had to go to church and everyone saw it, as I didn't know it was there till I got to church. No one believed I had burned myself either, as it was on the back of my neck. How do you drop a hair dryer there? I had no clue why no one believed me, either, as I thought it was rather well known I had no boyfriend.

Well, there. My birthday entry. Today has nothing speical in store. Other than some eating. I ought to eat lunch today before three pm. Which was when I ate yesterday. Because I forgot. 18 year old me always ate lunch at 10.30 am. As I had fourth hour lunch. 28 year old Ireland, has no lunch time. Sometimes she forgets to eat lunch.

After all this why...

Ten years ago, on 11 September, I was seated in the cafeteria. I had no homework to speak of because I was a senior and just seemed to lack homework in general. So, I was writing in my "journal." (It is in quotes, because I had two journals in high school. A public one and a private one.) Here is what was going through my head the moment I hear the news:

September 11, 2001: I've come to the conclusion I will always have an odd ball obsession with That Guy. You see, most of my childhood crushes, they went away and the person left too. That Guy never left. He's always lurking around in the background, always there. And when he wasn't for a semester what happened? B. And now he's almost nowhere and on my mind 24/7. When I'm not pondering B, I'm pondering That Guy. I swear it is the last name. Generally when I'm thinking or talking about That Guy, it's always That Guy Insert Last Name, though after five years of him I still can't spell it. And now he's remotely cute and people like BF think so, I am just so grrred. And it wouldn't be so bad if I didn't have B in my ear whispering, "i love you babe." Then I feel guilty for thinking about That Guy and those dreams... B either scares me or makes me melt by how much he loves me. At times I feel like a sap b/c I feel like a "7th Heaven" character. Then I wonder will I really marry him? Okay, they just made some announcement that I did not hear, but I bargain someone or people died. I did catch "mom of silence," "world trade center," and "airplane." But, I guess I'll hear later. 


Anyways, back to B. I really don't know what to do with him. At times I love him, miss him, want him near, but then That Guy, who I have next to no chance with, floats into my head. I will never comprehend what that was all about. And then I'm not sure. And then there's this car thing. What is that all about? So what, BF can drive if you can. It's just a car, not a baby. Grrrr....it's hard to juggle people. You know, I'm a bad person. How can I love someone I can hardly ever say anything nice about? I'm one screwed up girl. You know what, I'll probably get an ulcer and it won't be from any pain pills or drugs.


"I need to get away and find something to do. Cause everything I do reminds me of you." -Goldfinger, "Counting the Days"


Later: Okay, big day in history. The two World Trade Towers collapsed after two airplanes flew into them. The Pentagon had a plane fly into it and another hijacked plane crashed in PA. My dad's stuck in San Antonio, thank god he wasn't flying. Third hour we watched CNN. It was surreal watching both towers crumble to the ground. Just thinking I was there and now it's gone. It was just odd. I don't think Dad was coming home today. Plus, all the planes that were hijacked were transcontinental, ie NY to LA. So, I'm figuring that he's just stuck in San Antonio. There's talk of war and such. I'm finding this all hard to believe. It's like straight out of a movie. That's what all the news footage I've seen has looked like. Like the second plane flying straight into Tower Two while the first ones burning. Then the two falling to the ground live on TV. I don't know. I just want to go home and see the news. I need pictures. Well, and I gotta call B. Oh god. I have to deal with this on the retreat. It's like (almost) Columbine. Well, large scale. To put it mildly I'm grrified. It's just surreal. I've never lived through something t his big. I mean, it was announced during school. They didn't announce Columbine. This will be in the history books. My kids might ask me where I was when I heard. I was sitting in my 2nd hour study hall pinning over That Guy and B, wondering what I was going to do. At least my dad wasn't flying. Stupid SBC. If they just followed their stupid travel ban maybe....grrr.....grr....grr. I'm just glad he wasn't in NY or DC. Thank God.

Well, there you have it. That is what Ireland Scott was doing ten years ago. And my reaction to when I actually heard what happened. You see, at the time, there were no speakers in the lunchroom, thus none of us who were in there heard what the hell was announced. We all just looked at one another in a confused manner and the two teachers in with us, kind of shrugged. When the bell rang, we were the ONLY people talking. The whole school was utterly silent. And none of us who were in 2nd hour study hall had a clue what was going on, as no one was speaking. Everyone was just walking around in silence. I went to my locker and then got my stuff. I walked to my 3rd hour class: US Government. I was beginning to get a bit freaked out, as NO ONE WAS TALKING. My teacher, Mr. E, was standing in all his Nordic glory, but he had the gravest, freakiest face on in the world. (he kind of looked like Erik from True Blood, now that I think about it, when he's being all freaky serious). Usually, Mr. E smiled and greeted me as I entered, but on that day, he just stared at me. I was like, "What the hell is going on here?"

The TV was on, and turned onto CNN or something. I don't honestly remember which channel Mr. E chose to watch. I just remember sitting down and staring at the TV wondering what movie he was watching. Then, I realized, it wasn't a movie: IT WAS REAL.

It never sunk in what I was looking at. I just sat there the whole hour, watching the live footage, watching the other footage of when the first plane hit. I watched the first tower and second tower crumble that hour.

Then I went to lunch. I think I wrote that second half of my journal entry at lunch. Or not, as I think I sat with someone that semester for lunch. It was just so surreal going through the day. All I wanted to do was watch the news, even though I knew after the second tower fell, there wasn't much else we could watch. I spent the rest of the day shocked we were still going through the day. Only one teacher actually held class that day. Our physics teacher went on as nothing was going on.

My mother also picked me up because my father (who was indeed in SA and was supposed to fly home the next day) was fearful what the nutjobs in our town would do to the Islamic Center that was behind our high school. The cops had the same fears as they were out in full force when I got out of school. They were there for several days after as well.

The other clear memory was when I heard the first plane after September 11th. I was walking home from school and totally freaked out because I had no clue what the noise was. You'd think growing up under a landing pattern for O'Hare, I'd know what a plane sounded like.

I've asked Pilot Boy several times his memories on September 11th, but he can't tell me much of anything. Which is normal for Pilot Boy. He doesn't remember much of anything that isn't about flying an airplane. He doesn't remember half the things I remember clearly....like the first time I drove down to Purdue for 24 hours just to see him, when I first showed up to LEAD...and sometimes he doesn't remember clearly the events of the day he asked me to marry him.  At least he remembers me...

you can't go on, you can't even talk

I always knew it was time to go back to school (or the school year was upon me) due to certain types of dreams I'd have. They'd always feature a few certain characters and always seemed to leave me in a slight panic.

For the first time in years, I had one last night.

I am serious. It was the strangest thing, as I have not had one in years. Well, since I left school behind me. Recenctly, something needed to trigger for certain people to appear. *coughs*

But, I had a school dream. In school, though it didn't exactly look like any school I've attended. It was like an odd combination of my high school and middle school. And I was "new" but not at the same time. The story line for the dream went as follows: I went to the school for two years, then transfered to Belleville East and then took a semester off. I appeared again and was behind lost. I did the wrong vocabulary exercise in the workbook while a girl I never had English with but was my friend ignored me and refused to help me. Meanwhile, the other guy sat across the room mocking me because I failed to do the work right. No one would help me. Then, during passing peroid, I could not find my locker. Then someone was nice enough to tell me since my last apperance at school, they had added a fourth floor. The fourth floor had green and white floors and looked a lot like Del Rio Middle School. Except with lots of windows, which Del Rio Middle School does not have. I explained my circumstancs to the teacher, who did not care. (They never do in dreams.)

I woke up in a panic.

Then I was confused, as I didn't have to go to school. I seriously wanted to go to school. I still feel like I ought to go to school.

like sands through an hour glass

Recently, almost every time I sign into Facebook, I get a round of names popping out at me from the past. Names I have not thought about in years, names that would never occur to me on a daily basis, or even a yearly basis.

There's a girl I had known since second grade when she appeared and became the best friend of a girl named Amy and they wore little, high heeled granny boots. I remember these boots clearly as day, as I wanted a pair quite badly but my mother said, "Little girls do not wear heels!" I had to settle for boots that had a heel, but not a high heel that made the clack, clack noise I wanted. Nor did my boots look Victorian, they look like boots. They were a poor, cheap let down from the granny boots this girl had. This was the same girl, many years later who had whispered conversations near by me about something so person I couldn't figure out why she was talking about it with someone in school and within hearing distance of me. The next year she had a total hissy fit and refused to speak to her "best guy friend" who sat next to me in English because he had made some sort of lude crack about her and her 'secret'. Two days later she had another whispered conversation with him, while I continued to sit next to him. I heard every single freaking word she had said.

I don't think she wanted me to know. But I do know. When one is writing, they can still hear.

By this point, I had realized that people thought I couldn't hear when I was writing. I could pretty much hear while I was writing, as I am one of those people who can do two things at once when I want to. By my senior year I was pretty sure I could write my stories and pay attention in class if need be. I usually would put away that stuff thought out of resecpt for the teachers. They had enough issues, I figured I'd remain the quiet, modle student people thought I was.

I alwasy knew more than most people figured I would know about the people at our school. Random bits of information keep popping into my head as these names keep popping up on the News Feed each time I sign into Facebook. I am also surprised by the amount of people my age who have children. As I told my husband last night, "I can bearly handle having a dog. I can't imgaine having two kids by now." He stared at me and made some off hand comment about kids that truely would only make sense if you knew him.

Each person, as their name pops up, I tend to click on their picture to see what it looks like. The profile picture tells me quite a bit. I can tell the high flying, still either single or dating types to the ones that have families and kids running around. The ones that still enjoy a good party, and the ones that would rather hug a kid. When I first joined Facebook, I remember scrolling through the people who graduated from high school with me in a search and being suprirsed when I saw there were people who were all ready married. Now that I'm married, I get shocked when they have kids. I guess this will only stop once I have a kid. Which won't be for awhile. As stated before, I can bearly handle having a dog.

Who is currently sitting in the doorway staring at me.

Jessica Simpson stole my drive

From the time I was about 12, I operated under the assumption that I was going to be something. I was never sure what the hell I was going to be, but I knew I was going to do great things and be famous. From 12 until 19, I was sure of this. I was very sure. I would plot out how I was going to do this in my journal. By the time I as 16, I assumed my writing would make me big and something.

I have no idea when I saw the VH1 show "Driven: Jessica Simpson." I remember I was sitting near the window in the family room in the chair near a table. And, tragically, I realized something about myself that would hinder in my ablity to become something big. What was this? Well, ambition and drive. I lacked those qualities in myself. I knew this, as I watched the show about how driven Jessica Simpson was to become a famous singer. I knew, I had none of that drive to do anything with my writing.

However, I still operated under the assumption that my time would come and fame would find me, or at least a publisher. After watching "Driven," I figured I would meet someone who would take me places at Beloit, because I was led to believe that important people came and went to Beloit, people with connection.

They do not. Or at least I failed to find anyone like that. I was unable to do anything really worth while professionally while I was at Beloit. I tried, do not get me wrong. I applied to a ton of internships all four years of college. I never got past the first interview. I always figured this was due to my lack of ambition and drive and one could simply tell that by my voice.

At Beloit, I also lost that assumption I'd grow up to be something big and successful. Everyone it seemed at Beloit wanted to be a writer, or something having to do with writing. Many of these people wrote better than me and they had that ambiton and drive in them to do something. I lacked that. I was sitting at my desk freshman year when I realized that I had been operating under an assumption for years that wasn't true. I wasn't going anywhere, I was not the girl going places like I had been led to believe by myself and others. I bounced from one profession to another while I was at Beloit. I arrived thinking I wanted to be a writer, then I wanted to be a lawyer, then I thought I'd try marketing and finally, by the time I was a junior I gave up trying to figure out what I wanted to be. I just knew what I did not want to be. I became listless and less driven for anything than I had been before. Everyone around me knew what they wanted to be: screen writer, dig in the dirt and find stuff, editor, puppeteer, art historian, pilot, teacher. What did I want to be?

I wanted to be Ed Whitacre. Yeah, you read that right. It was one of those random decisions I made my senior year to get people off my back about what I wanted to do with my future. The answer "I don't know" does not seem to fly when you are a senior in college and not planning to go to grad school. I took it so far to come up with a plan to become Ed Whitacre, which included a year of bumming around New Zealand. However, my mom did not like this idea in the least because it included working any sort of job for a year and then leaving. She reminded of health insurance and student loans and proceeded to crush the idea of ever becoming the CEO of AT&T. Not that I seriously thought this was a goal of mine. I lack drive and ambition, two things all CEOs have.

I graduated from Beloit with an expensive piece of paper that was in reality rather useless for anything I wanted to do. I tried to find a marketing job, they were all sales jobs in disguse. After three months of "job hunting" I gave up trying to find a good paying job that I'd like. I just wanted a job, so that was how I ended up being, for lack of name, an Administrative Assistant. This made me sort of sad because in the back of my head I still had all these allusions of gradure and Administrative Assistant didn't sound to me like a job title I really wanted (though, my job title was really Informational Servies Assistant). The job bore me at times, and after I left the job and went to do actual Admin work, I was still pretty bored most of the time.

I still have no idea what I want to do. I do not think I ever will know what I will want to do with myself. There are days this doesn't bother me at all, then there are days where it annoys the crap out of me because there is that little part of my brian that still believes I need to be someone big, famous, and influential.

But, in the end, Jessica Simpson stole my drive.

Now, do not get me wrong. I am happy in my life for the most part. I've got a great, annoying, cute dog and a great husband who I love. I wouldn't trade being famous for any of it. I wouldn't even trade fame for leaving the dirt hole. It is just that sometimes I wish I knew what to do with myself once I left this dirt hole.

I Write. Seriously.

I've been writing things for most of my life. I remember my first stories, they were all dialouge and had pictures of people in them having things I wanted. In about 8th grade it finally made it though my thick head that a story is more than simply dialouge that isn't identified at all in the course of the story. So, I wrote narration and dialouge and built a story. My mother was impressed.

None of the kids at school were. When I'd be writing during breaks in teaching or when I was done with my homework, most kids would ask, "What are ya doing?" I would tell them I was writing a story. "Why are you writing when its not an assignment?" They refused to believe me it was "fun." So, my first few actual stories went unnoticed. I spent my summer writing short stories about various things, longer ones that had no plots. I entered high school and stopped writing for a few months. Until one day in study hall I was 1) angst filled and 2) bored out of my mind. I had finished what little homework I had, and had nothing to do with the whole study hall. So I took out a piece of loose leaf and just began writing.

And a beast was born. I wrote between between periods, during lunch, and at any point I wasn't supposed to be "learning." Which, it turned out was quite often. I wrote, and I wrote, and I wrote. I went though loose leaf like there was no tomorrow. I had about three "novels" going during 9th grade. One was an on going account, dramatized a bit, of my life. The others were all based off this really odd dream I kept having, which featured people from my daily life. I wrote and wrote and wrote. Now, when people would ask me what I was doing and I'd tell them, they'd either stare at me or ask me (which was the most common) "Can I read it?" And usually, I'd had them either a page I was done with or whatever I was doing. They then would ask if they could read it upon my completion. I always said yes.

None of them read anything upon completion because by the time I was done with it, they were gone, more than likely having forgotten about me and my huge assignment notebook filled with loose leaf.

I did not think I really had much talent for writing. I usually got Bs on essays and papers, usually only due to the fact my mom edited the shit out of everything I wrote. Creative stuff I'd write, I usually would get some comment about how it was a great idea, but needed to be fleshed out or something like that. Teachers never really singled me out as a "great writer."

Except one. My sophomore year my English teacher also ran the yearbook. I was minding my own business, about maybe a month after school started, when he walked into my 8th hour study hall (I know, why was I in an 8th hour study hall?) I had just really finished up fighting with my consular about my Spanish teacher and class and she thought I was nuts for keeping the 8th hour study hall when I could go home. She didn't walk home, I did. I did not want to carry my heavy text books home when I could sit in a room and do my homework. I was doing my geometry homework when my English teacher walked in and asked to see me. He beckoned me with his finger to come and I guess I looked freaked out because he said loudly, "You're not in trouble."

Which was what I thought and couldn't figure out what I had done, as I was a very well behaved kid and was always on time and turned in homework in a very, very timely manner. He took me out in the hall and told me he wanted me to be on the yearbook staff.

This confused me beyond all known belief because you had to "try out" and "apply" to be on yearbook. One could not just join. There were forms and writing samples and a bunch of stuff I was too lazy to care about. But here he was, asking ME to be on yearbook. I think I just stood there staring at him, so he told me he liked my writing style and saw I had great potential to be a great writer. He got this all from a paragraph I had written on the first day of school about...I think what I did over the summer, or something like that.

It took me about three seconds to say yes after this, because I knew 1) I could claim yearbook on my college applications for at least one year and 2) my parents would be thrilled as I had JOINED something.

I ended up hating yearbook with ever fiber of my being. I was bored a lot, because I hardly had anything to do and I was never sure how to do "work" during 8th hour on my story (other than writing it.) Getting quotes caused me panic attacks because I had to talk to people I did not know. I got creative with getting quotes about half way through the first semester. I would assign my friends who knew people I needed quotes from to get them for me, or I would take quotes from people I knew and would anonymously quote them. I know that is terrible, but I did what I had to in order to remain calm and alive.

I realized rather quickly what I hated about yearbook writing was the editors tended to edit out all my creative stuff and made the story as boring as hell. I asked my dad, a journalism major, about this after the first story I wrote and he asked, "Why did they edit out all that? Why do all these quotes have 'said' after them? What happened to the character of this article?" The editors sucks the life out of it, that was what. Thus, writing my stories for yearbook become a chore and a bore. I couldn't do anything fun at all with them. One was even re-written (and not by me) to favor the view of the school administration, not the students. I did not realize it until I read the story in the year book and said, "I did not write that, why is my name on that?"

Much to my English teacher's dismay, I did not reapply for yearbook the following year. I had thought about it for about two seconds, as they were moving to "alternative" copy, but I still had to get quotes for stuff and that was the part of yearbook I hated the most. Either I couldn't get anyone to talk to me once I told them what I was doing, or they didn't want their name in the story and later the editors wanted the names. I refused to give them up, because they had asked not to be named. I got into a few fights with my mentor about this. I gave up by the end and just would glare at her when she would ask me for the actual names. Then, I would just go ask my best friend at the time to find people who were willing to be named. She was usually very successful at this, as she knew quite a few people.

While I was on yearbook staff, I kept writing on my own. I was always writing, usually not what I should have been writing, but still writing. I was a very angsty teen and over dramatic, and it was a great relief to write. I wasn't really into typing my stuff up, but I did at times and when I got into fan fiction, I started my own website. (Which much to my embarrassment I was asked to show to my English class at one point and I think I almost died until a girl I had known since 6th grade got really excited about the fact a few of the stories were about the Backstreet Boys.)

At the end of my sophomore year, I began a story about a girl named Greta. I had written a play about Greta that never was to be preformed, but I had fallen in love with each of the characters and for some odd reason I could not allow them to die. So I began her story. I finished it and started another story from a different character's point of view. And thus, my "novel" began. It became my pet project, something I always, always go back to. I put it away for awhile, but I always come back. I've re-written it a few times, started a new section and re-wrote that. A friend of mine (who had suffered through a few drafts of stories) seems rather...I'm not sure the world for it is, but he seems to think I should stop writing about high school stuff, as these characters are still in high school. He thinks my writing needs to become more serious and less...fluffy. However, while this hurt my feelings because I have spent so much time and energy on these stories, I don't do serious. I have tried a few times to write a "grown up" book. It just does work because that is not what I enjoy writing. I've written a few serious things, one got published in my high school's lit magazine.

I've read it a few times since I got out of high school and I still to this day cannot believe I wrote it. It is dark, serious, and real. And it was born out of this crazy day dream I had when I was on vacation for two weeks and removed from my crazy, drama filled existence. I seem to change when I am removed from my life for points of time, which is usually when turning points happen and I realize I hate myself. This was one of those times and I just got to thinking about what would happen if my parents died. Where would I go? What would happen to me and this crazy life I had? Would I be able to escape from it?

I was looking for escape. I was, thought out high school, looking for away to escape life and find a way to like myself. So, I wrote a story about how this might happen. And it got published and I once again became the focus of how great a writer I was.

I did not become a writer like everyone thought in high school. I had a speech teacher who actually got upset with me when I did my career speech on becoming a marking associate or something in business. He wanted me to become a writer. I never wanted to be a writer because they don't make any money and even at the age of 16 I knew I was expensive and would need a high paying job to get by. He seemed to be lost to this and upset I wasn't going to be a writer. When I declared my major in college, I wondered what he would have thought about me choosing political science and economics over creative writing (which was what I went to Beloit to do, but realized everyone was there to do that.)

As I went through college, I realized that I was not the best writer out there and almost everyone wanted to be a writer, or they wanted to write. There were good writers at Beloit, creative writers, ones that could write that adult, serious stuff. I tried a few times to get people to read my "novel" but no one read it all the way through. No one ever wanted to, no one had the time. It was like in high school. People would say they wanted to read it, but they would vanish and never read it. Only, this time I was hurt because I wanted someone to read it other than myself. I have had two friend who had read it. They liked it. But, what I wanted was all these wonderful writers at Beloit to aid me in making the story better. I have NEVER sat down to talk about the novel and making it better and publishing worthy with anyone. And I won't ever, so it will always sit where it is and I will continuously go back to it and entertain the idea of getting it up to snuff to publish.

It will not be published.

I will still finish the unfinished stories in it, I will still re-write it a few more times in my life. I will still reprint copies and edit them and rework the stories to get them to flow better.

It will never be published.

It is not exciting enough, it does not have a great love affair, there is no actual sex in the book. The book is not the typical sort of book once finds in the Junior Reader section, the Tween section or whatever it is called. I believe the characters are all strong. There is some "romance" in the stories, but they are more about figuring yourself out. Not hooking up and finding a date.

Thus, it will never be published.

But, I will still write.