Poem

I am reading poetry on a Friday night.

Silence by Billy Collins

Now it is time to say what you have to say.
The room is quiet.
The whirring fan has been unplugged,
and the girl who was tapping
a pencil on her desktop has been removed.

So tell us what is on your mind.
We want to hear the sound of your foliage,
the unraveling of your tool kit,
your songs of loneliness,
your songs of hurt.

The trains are motionless on the tracks,
the ships at rest in the harbor.
The dogs are cocking their heads
and the gods are peering down from their balloons.
The town is hushed,

and everyone here has a copy.
So tell us about your parents -
your father behind the steering wheel,
your cruel mother at the sink.
Let's hear about all the clouds you saw, all the trees.

Read the poem you brought with you tonight.
The ocean has stopped sloshing around,
and even Beethoven
is sitting up in his deathbed,
his cold hearing-horn inserted in one ear.

-----------

Sorry, Billy. Sorry, Beethoven. I'm not telling anything tonight.

Staying In

It's a boring Wednesday night in Syracuse. Most of my friends headed down to Funk 'n Waffles to see on of our floormates play open mic night. Normally, I would have been right there with them but tonight...eh. I've noticed that when I'm at college I never have any quiet time. Whenever there's a quiet moment I snatch it up for sleep.

I'm not an anti-social person but for most of my life I've always enjoyed my alone time. Alone time meant I could read or write or play the piano or just sit and think. I haven't been doing much of any of that lately. As much as I love college, sometimes I just feel out of balance.

And so tonight I decided to stay in, not so I could do work but because I just needed to stay in.


NanoWrimo is quickly approaching and I still don't know what I'm going to write about. I'm starting to worry. I've never gone into November without a plot in my head. This will be my fourth attempt and I don't want it to be my first failure. I look forward to November all year long but, once again, lately I haven't been feeling the excitement. And I want to be excited. I love to write. I've always loved to write and I don't know why the excitement has waned lately.

Even writing this blog. I'm not writing to write. Whenever I'm writing here it's because I need to sort out my thoughts. There's nothing wrong with that. That's always been a part of my writing. But it was just a small part, the majority of my writing was just for the pure joy of writing. I'm afraid I've lost that and nothing scares me more than that. If I've lost that, then who am I?

Sometimes I just wonder if I've lost a little too much of myself lately. I don't want that.

Bittersweet Homecoming

Here is a surprise: I am sitting on the Big Purple Couch again! Not only that, but I am sitting on BPC while watching my RAVENS on TV.

It feels so nice, so familiar. I came home for the weekend expecting everything to feel a little different now that I've lived away from home for six weeks. But instead it feels the same. I just fell right back into my life here, complete with old drama and disturbances.

First riding in on the bus I was giddy with excitement. I didn't realize how much I missed home until I was within an hour's distance. Then, I have never been so happy to see my house in my life. My dogs came running and practically tackled me. Honestly, I missed my dogs more than I missed my family (more on that to come). Firday I ended up driving out to all my old haunts. Retail tharapy at the mall just like old times (weird the things you miss but I've never tried to hide my shopping addiction), Smoothie King and reservoir run (we saw the regular horde of NDP girls and it made me want to go back), lounging by Emily's pool (which was sadly closed).

I mentioned that I didn't really miss my family all that much, not surprising given our history, but I did miss my friends, who stood in for my family for 4 years. We met for a "Family Dinner" at Emily's and as everyone arrived we would scream and run out to tackle them in hugs. It was stupid and silly, it's only been 6 weeks and we've been skyping all the time, but just to be able to give my friends a hug felt so good. I can't even explain how many times I've been at college and just wanted a hug from Liz or Dena or Kathleen and had to settle for a Skype conversation instead.

I suppose I should have put my family on more of a priority. After all, they are my family and they haven't seen me in six weeks either. But, honestly, I just wanted to stay and talk all night with my friends. Instead I left my friends to go home and see my family (when I had been home earlier everyone had been at work and my siblings hadn't gotten in yet).

I shouldn't let it bother me anymore but almost as soon as I walked in I was just thrown right back into the mess that is my family. It's the sort of mess that everyone sees, everyone takes part in, but no one wants to admit to. We make each other feel like shit, we are conscious of it, and yet we just go on. I thought going away for college would help but if anything it made it worse. It feels bad when your family makes you feel like shit. It feels even worse when your family makes you feel like shit after you've been away for six weeks and they should be happy to see you. Now, I know they are happy to see me but I don't understand how they can have me crying on my first day at home. (As always the issue was something stupid. This time: banking)


Sigh. Such is life. I take what I can get. I come home for the weekend, some things are great (hugging my best friend, watching the Ravens game) and some things are not so great (family and friend drama that can still ruin my day) but at least I'm home. I slept in my own bed, showered in my own shower, and in approximately two minutes I will be playing my own piano.

Bad Habit

The wind and rain are lashing against the window right now like a whip. I'm imagining they are whipping me personally for being such an unruly slave. That's right I am a slave, a slave to my life.

I haven't been the happiest lately. This horrible weather fits my mood I suppose. It's not that I don't love my new life here at college. I do. It's just that I thought, stupid Rosalee, I thought that by moving far away from home I could move far away from the problems that haunted me. But, of course, I was wrong. I ended another Saturday night crying on the sidewalk. It's becoming a bad habit of mine.

Restless

There has been a lot going on in my life and yet at the same time nothing at all. I'm a college student. Sometimes I feel like my life just isn't real. It's all just so ridiculous sometimes. Let's look at some examples:

- Last weekend started with a Thirsty Thursday event in Kenny's room. He invited his friends Stephen and Alan. We ended up having a dance party...a topless dance party because college has brought out my inherent sluttiness a lot more than I expected (bras on, of course, not that slutty but still there was a lot of dirty dancing that night). We knew this kids Stephen for one night. The next night he caused our floor to erupt in drama. He broke up the established couple of the floor. He started a horrible rumor about our friends. He ended a friendship between two girls on the floor. And all of this exploded at 1 AM, on a street corner, in the rain. I ended up sitting on the sidewalk crying [I was already emotional because of drama from home that I won't get into].

- I was elected Condom Queen on my floor. I had to pick up the bag filled with at least fifty condoms from Health Services and then I took them with me to class. I spent an hour discussing the encomienda system with a bag filled with condoms with me. There is also a drawing of a flying dick with an actual condom taped to the drawing and a pamphlet on how to use a condom (complete with illustrations) on my door.

- One of the friends I've made at college is now spending all her time with the boy I hooked up with for three weeks. I care but I don't care at the same time. Because it's college. He is into Michele now. I'm not even on his radar anymore. But we're still friends. Sometimes I really care because this situation feels so familiar (hooking up with a guy and then being forgotten about). But most of the time I just act like nothing ever happened, like nothing's weird about the situation. And, yes, this is partly because I am a champion repressor of emotions. But, also, I just feel like I'm not living in the real world where this situation would be fucked up. At college, it doesn't bother me because it's college.

- Last night we went to a Playboy themed party. Most of the time the themes are a little more clever. We're still expected to dress like whores but we have to be creative. For this party, the whole theme was to just dress like a whore. Girls showed up in just lingerie. I wore leggings and a shirt, no pants. The night was spent grinding with complete strangers, flirting with the bartender, smoking too many cigarettes outside and making friends with John the security man. By the end of the night I was soaked through with beer. And I thought it was a really fun night.

- We've only been here for a month. I've only known these people for a month. It seems impossible because time has never moved so slow. It's non-stop here. Every second I am with my friends. There is always something going on. When I look back and try to map out my time here, what I did each day and each night, I can't because everything runs together. One drunken frat party and then another.


I feel like a different person here. Or rather I'm just a version of myself here that I would only occassionally take on at home. I love a lot about these experiences but I do miss somethings. I don't want things to change too much but already I've let things get away from me. I'm not reading every night anymore. I'm not writing, here or at all. I want to change this. Starting now.

I am going to do NanoWrimo this year. Originally I thought I could never do it at college but I think I need to. It will get me back to my old self a little bit. I'm changing my major so that I can have a Creative Writing minor. I need to get back to writing. This will be my fourth NanoWrimo and I'm not about to make it the only one I've failed. I need to get excited about writing again.

Also, in important headline news. I'm trying out for the equestrian team next week. I've thought a lot about it and yet at the same time I haven't fully considered everything. I don't want to talk about it right now (see above portion about repressing emotions, this story is how it all began) but there is something hiding just below the surface here that needs to be confronted before I get back on a horse.


I feel restless right now. I'm loving college. Yes, I've changed a little but I like that I'm exploring new parts of myself and having more fun. But I can't forget who I am. College is really feeding the beast for me right now, the beast being my problems with repressing emotions. I'm going to try to find more of a balance.