Sunday

Last night was pretty chaotic. I stole a hat from a boy I didn't know. So now I have a bowler hat and don't really know what to do about it. I'd like to give it back actually, but 1) I don't know if it was actually his and 2) I don't know who the hell he is. I'd like to find him solely to figure out his name, and also because he was pretty fantastic at guitar and I enjoyed singing along with him. My life is pretty weird. In other news, I've got a show on Wednesday. I might die. I hope I don't die but I really might die. Of nervousness. I mean, I'll probably be fine right? I hope so. All points bulletin, shy girl plays show by herself, doubts ability at guitar.

So, after much introspection I've kind of decided that I might like to date people again. Hopefully I won't end up going out with guys who are boring or kill seagulls, but I suppose I've got to start somewhere? I don't know. I'm a sucker. You sweet talk me and I'll just melt, it's one of the things I hate about myself. I wish I wasn't such a romantic. I was raised on sad British pop music and Hollywood golden day romance films. I suppose it was inevitable. But I am also a perfectionist. So that complicates things. If things don't work exactly as they should according to my head, I don't really feel compelled to continue. Maybe that's stupid. It's almost definitely stupid. Real life isn't a movie, I have acknowledged that, I acknowledged that when I was 16 and crying after being dumped after prom.

Things should happen in a way that you're at least proud of talking about. They don't have to be picturesque or interesting, they just ought to be something other than "I was super drunk and I made out with this person, so yeah, I didn't hate them when I wasn't drunk so we went out." That doesn't really roll of the tongue very nicely. So, maybe college isn't the best environment to try to date in. Maybe Olympia isn't the best environment to try to date in. But I'm only 19, I've got time. I'm using that time to figure out what the hell I'm actually looking for. Will this result in some very overt flirtation? Yes. Will this result in me getting out of my comfort zone? Yes, yes it will. If that means stealing a few hats, I suppose that there will be some cold heads this winter.

Well

It would seem I've probably bored everyone who bothered to read this. I'm kind of alright with that. A lot has been going on. My Sophomore year crisis seems to be over, though the life crisis a persistent theme that varies in intensity. It's just the general anxiety of being. Things are good though. I'm getting to the point where things don't stress me out really, no matter how big or small. I just don't see the point in it anymore. I spent so much time being stressed out, generally about other people. There's just no point in it. People will do what they will do, I've got very little control over that. I can control what I do though. I guess I realized that a long time ago, but I just didn't really put it into practice.
I'm starting to decipher what I want to do with my life. There are a few things that I consistently get excited about, and the more I learn about them, the more excited I am. Audio is one of those things. Physics isn't really, though it interests me, it's just not a priority. I think I'm going to start volunteering at The Northern running sound, it would be good experience and I think it would be a lot of fun. The other thing is bikes. Bikes bikes bikes. All day everyday. I'm excited for my contract winter quarter, it'll be grand. Mechanical drawings are so beautifully simple. Cooking and food does come in, but I don't think I could make a living of that, I might start to hate it. At least if I would if I had to dishes at a constant rate, which seems likely.
Anyway, I'm doing well. I'm figuring things out. I'm making new friends. It's good.

Anon

I feel small and broken. I feel like I can't be the person that the world seems to think I am. I want to be that person again. I want to be happy. I get so scared. Of everything. Of being. Of loving. I paste a smile on my lips before I put on my coat and walk out the door in the morning. I feel safe, isolated from the world by stereo headphones and dark sunglasses.
I don't know how to be sometimes. People start to care and I am terrified by it. I don't know how to tell them that I don't know how to be what they want anymore. All of the things that they think I am are a crumbling facade.
Everything is so good though, or it should be. I've got a great job, I get to go to college, I live in a wonderful and safe place, I'm not hungry. I'm surrounded by great people. But sometimes I feel like I'm just spinning. I get so confused I don't know where I am. I forget things. I don't know how to interact with people. I'm being sincere but the words roll off of my tongue and sound so wrong. So robotic. It's not always, but sometimes is enough to scare me.
Sometimes I feel decidedly useless. I feel like I'm drifting further into my mind again. I don't want to go back to that. I don't want it to be that way anymore. I need good people around me, I can't push them away. Or, I shouldn't. I certainly can, and have, but have never wanted to. I just get scared.
I'm building myself back up after a hectic year, the first and sudden plunge into adulthood. In the process I lost who I was. Now I'm finding that self again, and some of the pieces are missing or warped. So I've become my own reconstruction process. I want things to be different. I don't want to feel insecure. I don't want to feel like an ugly duckling. I don't want to feel like I am constantly spinning. Not even sometimes.

Things

Things I needed tonight:
- Night time bike rides
- Wind on my face
- Rushing water
- Sprinklers
- Shooting stars
- Constellations
- Adrenaline
- Hills
- Kitty

Things I didn't need tonight:
- Feeling disconnected
- Feeling as though my efforts to cheer someone up are unappreciated
- Being snapped at where an explanation will do
- Weird drivers
- Distraught woman yelling downtown
- Feeling inadequate

Bike Weekend!

So much bike stuff this weekend!
- Looked at bike porn (thanks Velogogo, totally read EVERY post).
- Adjusted my derailleur
- Look at more bike porn
- Played bike polo
- Cleaned my front fork
- Tried to buy new brake pads (kool stop continentals), but the bike shop was hecka closed due to Sunday
- Helped housemate pick out a new bike (1967 Schwinn Varsity, built like a tank, still had original components all in working order, and good price considering the condition it is in-- very little wear and tear, just some paint scuffs).
- Played more bike polo.
Good weekend at home. Just what I needed.

Flight

Maybe I'm not ready. Maybe it's too soon. I don't want to hurt anyone, it would hurt too much. I'm scared. I'm really scared. I don't know how to proceed. I don't think I'm ready to commit. I've only recently become comfortable and happy in myself, it's still novel, I'm still figuring things about myself. I can't get lost in someone else. I can't mix someone else up in it. I'm just not ready. I can spend time with people, I can share things with them, but I'm not ready to give up flight yet, not when I've just started exploring outside of my past gilded cages. I don't want to be contained again, not yet, not until I know how to be happy in a cage.

Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps.

Perhaps it is time for a change of heart.

Perhaps it is time. Time to stop being so shy.

Time to stop being afraid of my own potential.

Perhaps.

Windows

Sometimes I'm not sure what to make of myself. One minute, I'm sitting on the bus listening to music, and the next I'm biting my lip to push back a feeling. Why these outdated thoughts continue to cross my mind confounds me. I wasn't necessarily sad, more disappointed, and the feeling was not even necessarily unwelcome. Getting lost in the words bouncing in my headphones, I got caught in a daydream a year late. Conspiratorial affections shared among the stacks in the library, in reading rooms. Words traced intentionally on wrists. Sketched out flirtations and hearts drawn on hands.
I remember where it was and when it happened. A bit of ball point pen ink from a bic pen, in just the right shape. It was perfectly centered around the freckle below my knuckle. Our palms sweat and we didn't seem to care. I couldn't stop smiling. Even our feet fit perfectly together, standing at attention for a farewell. How it all went wrong is obvious to me now, but that doesn't mean I don't regret that it did. It was what always happens: life. It was fleeting, passionate, and lacking the dedication to persist. We were both too flighty, both too unsure, both too scared. Too lost. It wasn't meant to last, though it was meant to be, if only for a little while.
I know why it didn't work. I still think about him, and I wish things were different. I wish we just talked, because he pulled me up, he knew me from cover to cover, and I didn't mind. When blue eyes met brown, I knew he knew me. He didn't always know what was on my mind, but he cared. Even when he was so caught up in his own messes, he'd try. Or I would relent. It wasn't really enough, when he wasn't all the way there, when he was too distracted. I still wish we'd talk, just about things, things that actually matter. He made sense to me in a funny way, a way that nobody else has really made sense to me. I really do love him, and I know he feels the same, but not in the way that either of us can parlay into a committed relationship. It was too unstable. We understand eachother, but not in the right way. There was too much judgement. It wasn't quite unconditional. It was forgiving, but not unconditional.
Sitting on the bus on your way to work in the morning is not the best time to lose yourself in thoughts that are bound to make you look lonesome. As I walked to work, turning up the music, and forcing a smile to my lips, I worried that my eyes would give it away. That some passerby would catch my eye, and notice it. They're the one place I can't always make smile, and I'm not sure I want the world to know I'm not smiling. Eyes are the windows to the soul, and it seems to me that it's safer to keep the shutters drawn. Someday I'll open the windows and let the wind blow through again.

Zen Toast

I've developed a new game! It's called 'Zen Toasting'. The basic concept: you wait for toast to pop up. That's it. But! There's so much more to it than that! It makes waiting for toast the most exciting part of your morning, or afternoon, or midnight (depending on how deeply devoted you are to toast). First load the 'edible projectiles' into the 'magic gluten convector', and press down the 'automated lever of magic convection'. Step two, stare expectantly at the 'magic gluten convector',as it's mysterious inner-workings toast the 'edible projectiles' to crispy perfection. This next bit is very important: You MUST not take your eyes off of the toaster. Nail biting is definitely allowed, just don't take your eyes off of it. Don't time your toaster either, that will ruin the whole game. The entire game is dependent on the fact that you don't know exactly when the toast will eject, and you will enjoy a distinct terror when you are surprised. Personally, I find this particular terror to be a very enriching element of my day-to-day activities. Toast cannot hurt me, it's just bread, so, really it doesn't go much beyond startling me. Toast cannot eat me, to my knowledge, nor is it handy with a gun or a butterfly knife. Thus, the fear I experience is very controllable. This game can be used as part of a training regimen, if you are training to become a ninja. It will sharpen your senses, and train you to control your fear. However, toast is not a very realistic simulation of a real-life enemy, who might have a sword or a lazer or whatever. So, take it with a grain of salt, or butter, I don't know, whatever you like on your toast?

(Clearly I need more excitement in my life).

Indulgence

I've pretty much done nothing of a material value today. I've laid in bed watching movies and petting the cat. Days like this are. I can't seem to motivate myself to do anything, so, in recognition of it being summer and that meaning I don't really HAVE to do anything, I'm not going to do anything, except think. I've been feeling pretty burnt out. I spend a good deal of my time at home. I try to read, and generally grow disinterested fairly quickly. I don't know. I was supposed to have company this weekend. I'm glad I don't, it would have been a bad idea anyway, considering who it consisted of. I definitely prefer time to think, rather than acting rashly and feeling terrible afterward.
I'm excited for the bike trip next weekend. Until then, I'll swoon over Gregory Peck and draw silly pictures.

Heat Wave!

Today is about:

- Blue plastic kiddie pools
- Dollar store beach balls
- Tiny innertubes
- Kool-Pops
- Squirt gun fights
- Chasing the the ice cream truck
- Cab Calloway
- Bikinis
- Beer squirt gun (awful)
- Bikes
- Short shorts
- Chess in the backyard

Flattery

This is what I deal with.

stranger: pretty pics hun
me: thank you.
stranger: thank you
stranger: :)
stranger:what ya up to hun?
me: listening to Jazz and enjoying my day off, and why do you keep calling me hun?
stranger:cuz you cute
me: I am aware of that, but pet names are odd
stranger: you like a different pet name?
stranger: like hot lips or something?
me: no, none would be preferable, haha
stranger: sitting around in anything cute?
me: ummm... I think you've got the wrong girl mister.

Seriously? I mean, a little effort, really, at least read my profile. I don't even begin to understand dating sites. (Yes, I admit it, geocaching has turned into actually meeting new people, of the male variety).

Compelled

Despite being so very tired, I can't seem to sleep. My mind is abound with recollections of books read and bike rides. I spent a lovely afternoon after work reading an autobiography about Nikola Tesla and planting seeds, as well as calling my housemate who is currently rooted East, until August. Now I am trying to work the thoughts out of my head so I can get some peace. I hear cats fighting outside, and the room is filled with the quintessential summery aroma of freshly picked lavender. I am attempting to examine my thoughts and actions as they relate to my external reality. However, I am happily exhausted, so it's not really working right now. I am in the charming company of my cat, but I'd prefer someone to talk to. Everyone in the house seems absorbed by their activities at the moment though. Maybe I'll learn to catch crows...

Dirt

Things were accomplished in the yard today! Many things! Two vegetable beds were dug, a lavender plant was transplanted, as well as some bulbs. A storage lean-to was constructed against the fence. An arch was built out of sticks and twine for the grapevine to climb on. Hands got dirty. Death-eyes was played. Picnics were had. Seeds were planted! Songs were sung! Needless to say, but for the sake of saying it, today was a good day.

Status

Cruising the town on your bicycle, riding up high on one pedal down the sidewalk. You're acting cool, calm, collected, untouchable. You're wearing that cool sweater you found at the free store, the perfectly worn in kicks, and feeling really hip. Even when things don't go your way, when you discover that no store seems to have what you are looking for, and you relent and resort to plan B, you take solace in the fact that the guy in the computer section was taken aback by your knowledge of cables. You stop for coffee, collect your nerves. You make conversation with near strangers. Stare at birds on the powerlines. Pet dogs wearing shirts. Make witty comments about the dogs in shirts. The wind in your hair on the ride home makes you feel free.

Really you're awkward, and didn't have half a notion what to say. You tactfully hide the fact that you are shaking out of nervousness. Somehow your brain spit out combinations of words that seemed to fit together. You analyze the day from afar, sitting in your front yard with an amplifier, listening to music in the sun. You get excited over pranks that aim to convince your housemates that robots are taking over the world. You feel strange, somewhat alien, and often very alone. You amuse yourself drawing strange pictures of strange events happening to strange creatures. Somehow you have cobbled this strange mixture of social awkwardness and dreaming into a personality. This is who you are, and you are fine with it-- though you wouldn't mind a bit more people skills. You feel cool, sometimes.

Then there's that moment, as you prepare for a morning shower, when you are wearing only Halloween socks, and you feel so ineffably cool. But only because the door is locked.

Progress

It strikes me sometimes that technology is always moving faster than I ever will. In fact, society seems to be moving faster than I ever will. But it also seems that a lot of things are progressing in entirely the wrong direction. Growing further and further from their roots, until there is no more room to grow. I believe in progress certainly, but what's wrong with turning around and taking a step in the other direction? It's still progress, you're still moving forward. The only difference is you're not taking the last step off of a cliff, but back towards land. It's logical, it's sane. But things just keep moving "forward" faster. Like HD televisions that are so fast that the human eye can't even detect a good deal of the images it is spitting out. I mean, really, what's the point of that? It just seems absurd. To make ourselves feel so inferior in contrast to the technology we created. The fact that we created it is a complete aside in this case, it's hardly something to be proud of if you can't even fully utilize it. Though it's not nearly as useless as inventing something with entirely no purpose, such as, let us say, a pet rock? I don't know. I hardly see the progress in this progression.

Soul

I've been doing a lot of thinking over the past couple of weeks. I had a bit of a mental breakdown, which I was lucky enough to have a friend through. I'm not perfect. I never will be, nor do I aim to be. I have tried to be in the past, but it's all for naught, not to mention it's self destructive. I'm content with where I am in life, even if things are tough sometimes, and a constant nagging wanderlust shakes at the foundations I am building. I am in a good place, and have friends I can trust. The recent realization that many of the issues I have developed surrounding trust are a manifestion of my own lack of faith in myself was a hard truth to come to. As well as my fear of revealing that I am not perfect, nor always happy, to the people in my life. Being open and honest with people isn't a trait that makes you weak, quite the contrary in fact. Here is a short list of things I have only recently made evident to the world existing outside of my skull:

- I hate money. I hate thinking about money, I hate talking about money, I hate dealing with money, I hate that I have to have money.
- I constantly dream of running away somewhere nobody can find me.
- I am not the person I used to, and don't necessarily like everything I have done in the past.
- I have stared into the abyss and considered it logically; in other words, I have stood at the railing of a bridge, peered into the cold rushing depths below, and considered, if fleetingly, the notion of inducing nothingness.
- I'm afraid of falling in love again, and in some ways feel it would be a betrayal to the emotions I once held.
- I really really like cats.
- I love to see the double features at Capitol Theater alone. It's how I escape.
- There's nothing wrong with being strong.

Now, I've not been big on opening up lately, so baby steps. Also, it seems I have developed a following in China, so, hello Chinese fluent followers! I've managed to translate some of your comments, and they have been very kind. Thank you for reading! Not sure how on earth you found me, but nonetheless. Anyway, I've got geek matters to attend to, time to read books.

Bukowski

A name has been bestowed upon the new cat, and it's, drum roll please... Bukowski. Apparently it's a somewhat commmon cat name, but it fit. He's a womanizing little vagrant. For short, the name is Bu, which works well also. Anyway, enough about the cat, as wonderful as he may be. Our house has internet! The router arrived, and I managed to set it up. Summer is starting to hit me, finally. I also experienced something entirely novel to me: buying ice cream from an ice cream truck! The music was playing around the neighborhood, and I, being daft, assumed it was some cruel joke or parody of a real ice cream truck. I grew up in the middle of nowhere, there was no damned ice cream truck, if you wanted ice cream you walked to the store and got it yourself. I went so far as to suggest to Ben that we should start an ice cream truck in our neighborhood. Someone beat us to that enterprise though, and after chasing the truck down, I used pocket change to buy ice cream from the man with the weird teeth and friendly demeanor. I think I'm going to regress back to my elementary school mindset so I can experience growing up in a neighborhood, because it is seemingly awesome.

Summer!

image, originally uploaded by organicallyvagrant.

It's summer! I am doing very little and it is awesome. Today I:
- Woke up
- Layed in bed
- Played sudoku
- Pet the new cat
- Moved to the couch
- Played sudoku
- Pet the new cat
Now I am at Vic's, drinking coffee and internetting with my housemate. I successfully read all the new comics put out by Hark, a vagrant, A Softer World, and Happle Tea, as well as new Dallas Clayton poems. Now, I am just going to sit here and try to think of interesting things to google. Yeaaaaah, living the dream.
(Maybe I should do something productive, but whatever, it's summer and it's the weekend.)

Attached is picture of new cat. :D

1 Year to Climb a Mountain

On this most unremarkable day of my final evaluation of my freshman year of college, I feel like I should reflect, or something along those lines, on what the past year has held. I suppose since I've been on a list kick lately, I'll start with that, or maybe, a poem evolved from a list? Drunken poetry has inspired me to do such...

Trepidation, full boxes, empty room,
empty bed, full mind.
The room is small and smells of dust,
but everything seems to fit.
Wandering amongst the trees,
unearthing treasures untold, ensuing lateness
for the date I didn't really care about.

Complication of library love long since faded,
bodies tangled in the sheets.
Crying there on the edge of a borrowed bed
to a boy who knew nothing about me.
Nighttime bike rides in the fall heat,
flying down Harrison, faster than my worries.

Rearranging furniture in a temporary home,
listening, learning, collaboratively drawing.
Blue typewriter stolen shopping cart,
Complete honesty, and the rebuttal.
Coffee is still tops.

Staying out all night
Drinking cheap coffee with friends
Wandering the dew soaked morning
Watching the sunrise from a statue
Shivering. Cold and afraid
to let someone get too close.

A house, never quite a home,
Passive aggressive tendencies
Frustration, tears, a shove.
A nudge toward chaos.
I walked 6 miles in the dark.

Misanthropy, illness.
Bedrest, new home, new life?
Wanderlust, backpacks, bicycles,
new friends in old places.
Life on the road with a full heart.

Fear of flying, foreign country.
Could this be it?
Explorations of the mind,
and a stone city. Hoist up the sails.
I want to go home.

Wandering the woods in the rain
With a new friend.
Plotting, planning
Executing, entertaining.
Insignificant?

Existential crisis
Breaking and entering
Staring into the abyss, unafraid.
Reassess the map.
Sea Change.

A home. Anticipation.
Numbers crossed out on a chalkboard.
Counting down the days until summer
Morning bike rides, books,
and Jazz.