Lalalalalala

Instead of writing my take home final, I've been watching things like this...



1 day!
Happy Dance!

Float On

2 (Two!) More days till finals are over.
3 more days till I'm home!
4 days till I get to see some of my favorite people in the world!

Spamming, Shenanigans, and Spiels

I wrote a long blog post this morning that I didn't finish.  And I'm still not done with it so you're not getting it tonight.  Oh well.  Today was a good day, once I embraced the fact that I wasn't going to get any work done at all.  I was on facebook for hours and hours.  Most of the day, in fact.  I watched one movie and part of another.  I played many, many games of solitaire.  I listened to a sermon.  I tried to write a blog post.  And I enjoyed not having class and not having a ton to do.  I still have some things to write and study for, but the end is actually, really in sight.  Finally.  And I am regaining my normal positive outlook on life.  Yeah.  Life is good again.  That isn't to say that in the midst of writing a paper tomorrow, I won't be all "WAHHHHH PAPERS ARE OBNOXIOUS!"  But things are better, and more normal.  I think.  I hope.  I believe.

I can do this!



6 days!

Tonight I wish...

8 Days, not counting the hours left today until I sleep.

What is motivation, and where can I download some?

I am sitting here, staring at my computer, knowing what I need to do before tomorrow, and unable to summon any motivation to do it.  At all.

And I am sad, oppressed by a meaningless sadness that has no actual cause other than some stupid chemicals produced by my body going out of whack for a couple of days.

I freaking hate hormones.

Especially because I know that what I am feeling is a lie, and yet I still cannot summon up happiness or motivation.  I am still slouching here, my face slack and my eyes sad.

10 days.

Homework schmomework

I seem to be having trouble with my homework.  See, I know that I need to do it for tomorrow.  I know that.  And yet I cannot seem to make myself get up off my behind and actually work on it.  I did look at it, went "My brain doesn't want to" and then I didn't do it.  There is just so much more interesting and fun and amusing and great things to be doing.  Life demands to be lived, not filled with things I don't care about.  And yet I don't seem to be doing those great things instead of doing things I don't care about.

15 days

"You know some days are aces, and some days are faces, Well some days are twos and threes."

Paper writing, etc.

So even though I'm in the middle of writing a paper, I'm actually in a pretty good mood right now.  I'm wondering if my mood of death for the past couple of days has been partially caused by dread of writing this paper, and now that I'm actually doing it, I feel better.  I mean, there are obviously other reasons as well (more deaths in the past week, Alyssa's grandma and Lisa's great uncle), but I'm thinking that the paper actually had a larger impact than I thought.  Also the presentation I have to give in a week and a half, but now that I've seen a couple of my classmates do theirs, I feel better.  So yeah.  I'm actually kind of happy right now.  All those shenanigans on facebook didn't hurt, even though I didn't participate in them because I was writing this paper.  And I'm coming home tomorrow to see you lovelies!

Also, because patterns in numbers make me happy, there have been 2323 page views on this blog, and I've written 432 posts :)

It's been one of those days

Except I'm both Calvin and his parents.  If that made sense.  I'm exhausted and at some point you need to know when to give up.  I'm going to bed now, and hopefully things will be better in the morning.

Yeah...

My day has been:

Happy things.
Sad things.
Bad things?
Good things.
Lovely things.

Lovely friends.

"Before my parents left, I remember being slightly alarmed by how indirectly news flowed to and from Clare, Da, Raphael, and even William.  But now, this business of giving and receiving information through third parties makes sense.  Or feels familiar."
I am slightly sad tonight.  Happiness does not always counteract sadness.  They exist, side by side, neither of them affecting the existence of the other.

I am sorry.
I am sorry for your sadness.
I am sorry for your tears.
I am sorry for the way your life seems to be falling apart around you
And the way I do not know how to reach out to you.
Despite how close, we are still so far away.
Despite wanting to bridge the gap
The gap remains.
I love you.
And I know that I don't say it enough, but it's true.
I love you.
We all do, you know.
Know that we love you.
Know that we care.
These tears, tonight, are for you.
And I pray that in your distress, you would reach out to the God of comfort who longs to bring you peace.

Today

It's been another day in which I didn't get what I wanted to/needed to get done done.  Another day of failed opportunities.  I'm tired of this pattern, but I'm starting to wonder if the problem is not my pattern of being unable to get things done and being lazy, but rather my attempts to be someone I'm not or do things that I can't.  Maybe the problem is the fact that I'm trying to do this on my own, too much of the time.  Maybe the problem is that I am not a machine and thus cannot function as one, no matter how hard I try to force myself to.  I try to be efficient, and that's good, up to a point, but it's not everything.  And human beings aren't naturally efficient anyway.

I don't know.  I didn't spend enough time with God this morning, and it showed all day.

And Alyssa's three friends are here this weekend, which is fun and all, but is a little hard on me, cause I'm not really getting true alone time.

And I have homework things that I really need to get done this weekend.  And I haven't really done any work on them.

Things are hard sometimes.  But I know that everything is going to be okay in the end.

Internet, you are failing your job, which is to amuse me.  I suppose I could go do my homework, which is what I'm trying not to do right now.  I don't want to!  But I know that if I don't right now, I will regret it later.  And I don't want to regret it later.  But I don't want to read about the varied meanings of liturgical processions in 12th century Rome when I'm on Spring Break!  And I am not exaggerating.  That is the exact subject of the articles I have been assigned to read.  Blah!

Despite everything that happened today, all of the emotions I experienced, I think that over-all it was a good day.  Also, I'm rereading old letters, blogs, journal entries, and going "did I really write that?" which is always fun.

Okay. I can do this

Right now I feel like I'm running a marathon that is on a track with lots of hills.  I do my little I-think-I-can-I-think-I-can thing to get to the top of the hill, and then I'm all tired out because of that, so the downhill bit is nice, but I'm still running, just not expending as much effort when I just want to sit down and rest for a bit.  But I can't because after a little bit I have to do it all again.  And this is every day for the past week and a half, and will continue for the next week and a half.  So that's great.  I'm not actually going insane.  I'm not even going a little bit insane, because I've been spending time with God every day.  I just want more sleep, and more time to chill, you know?

So this homework assignment

That I had to do yesterday, and was obnoxious and tedious and annoying.  That was all about "hard sciency and math concepts that will make most of you hit a brick wall."  Yeah, that one.  Apparently my summary was "super interesting," it "sounded like I had a good grasp on the concepts," and my grade was an A+, which the teacher only gives out if he feels like the student understands the concept better than he does.  And I'm a history major, in a course that is very sciency and also philosophical.  You might say that I am uniquely prepared for this class, but still.  Who's awesome?  I'm awesome.

I don't even know how I am right now.

My stomach is a little upset, but that might be from eating too much fondue at the fondue restaurant this evening.  Our waiter was totally flirting with all four of us, and it was entertaining.  I haven't really started studying for my exams, and it hasn't sunk in that my fall classes are all over except for my exams.  I am a bit preoccupied with other things - other things on my mind right now - and I basically just want to be done and in Kalamazoo right now.  But I've got another week before that happens.  Oh well.  Everything is going to be fine.

Only four and a half hours of class stand between me and Thanksgiving Break

I'm trying to write a paper.  But it's not working out very well.  :(  Maybe I should just give it up for a while  until it gets dark.  Cause I always work better when it's dark outside.  Yeah.

A Reflective Sestina

This is a poem that I wrote for one of my classes.  It's a sestina, and I'm posting it here because Alyssa wanted to read it :)  It has no title yet, and this is just the rough draft.  So it may be a little different in a week.  But yeah.

They say the way to creativity

is through questions

and the quick play

of the mind - innovation

in search of truth -

as the Buddha

did, and was.  He, the Buddha,

was vastly creative

but claimed an universal and cyclical truth

in order to push away the questions

of the religious types who reacted negatively to innovation

and "play".

This play-

fullness and the desire for the new that Buddha

had is in other innovators

in their creative

pursuits, as they question

this world in search of the truth.

But what is this truth

that comes through play?

Or in the question

of the Buddha?

Or in the creativity

of the innovator?

The innovator

uses the truth

he knows to create,

build upon the work of others and to play

with it - the truth, I mean - like Buddha

as he questioned

his life.  But what is the question

of the innovator,

of Buddha?

Perhaps, what is true and what is truth?

This is what a playful

person is seeking in the act of creation.

Buddha knew it when he was questioned

by those who opposed his creativity and innovation,

those who would see the truth divorced from play.

Another poem from class

This one doesn't have a title yet.  Cause I just wrote it thirty minutes ago.  But it's a sestina, cause I enjoy writing those.  Anyway, here you go.

They say the way to creativity

is through questions

and the quick play

of the mind - innovation

in search of truth -

as the Buddha

did, and was.  He, the Buddha,

was vastly creative

but claimed an universal and cyclical truth

in order to push away the questions

of the religious types who reacted negatively to innovation

and "play".

This play-

fullness and the desire for the new that Buddha

had is in other innovators

in their creative

pursuits, as they question

this world in search of the truth.

But what is this truth

that comes through play?

Or in the question

of the Buddha?

Or in the creativity

of the innovator?

The innovator

uses the truth

he knows to create,

build upon the work of others and to play

with it - the truth, I mean - like Buddha

as he questioned

his life.  But what is the question

of the innovator,

of Buddha?

Perhaps, what is true and what is truth?

This is what a playful

person is seeking in the act of creation.

Buddha knew it when he was questioned

by those who opposed his creativity and innovation,

those who would see the truth divorced from play.

A night of song

I just got back from the Michigan Men's Glee Club concert.  And it was super great.  They're so good.  I always forget that I'm surrounded by so much culture and arts here at college, all of this stuff that I have access to for cheep.  This is an opportunity that I won't really have again.  So I might as well make the most of it.