arms spread wide in an open field

So you know how you find yourself sometimes on facebook and you see a profile picture that is interesting and you click on it. Then you find something else interesting looking so you click on it, and then you see they have a blog link and you click on it. And then you realized, you're a High Class Stalker and you know more about this acquaintance/person you've never met than you ever should? This has just happened to me. Upon briefly looking at their blog I found this poem that I really like. So I will post it here and not say who it is, but I will link their blog so they are given credit they are due. Here it is:

I am all locks and no keys:
an empty picture frame,
gates around an abandoned house,
a tree without leaves.

I am dead flowers,
colours fading,
dry &
paper thin &
as welcoming to careless sparks.

I am embers into ashes,
wasted space on dirt floors,
paint on bricks,
former moths &
loved ones.

I am blank stares,
torn pages,
broken strings,
arms spread wide in an open field.

Just to clarify, I'm not posting this because it explains how I'm feeling. I don't feel like this, but it's still true of me. I had a really great first week back to school, and I did end up dropping those two french classes haha, not even 24 hours after I wrote my last post. But this semester looks like it will be all work and no play!

on stubbornness

In the last few days I've been realizing how stubborn I am and how this has been really affecting my life in the last little while. The lethal combination has really been my stubbornness + laziness + selfishness. I realized last night that my stubbornness is the reason that I've done pretty poorly in several of my classes last year - especially (ESPECIALLY) my french classes. I hate learning french in class; i'm terrible at it. My grammar could make small children run away screaming in horror and in ugly pain. Profs put on sackcloth and ashes. I'm just bad at it! I learn best by being immersed in the language. And so class after class it's a fight between my moral self and my stubborn self in getting me to actually go to my class. Last year Kathryn and I skipped a lot of our french classes because I could always justify to myself reasons I should get out of them. As a result of that, I vowed that I wouldn't take any more french classes because its kind of a waste of my time and money. And yet, somehow, I'm enrolled in 2 this semester.

I did this because I figure I should make an effort to learn french since I hope to move to Quebec in the fall. But last night when I realized my only classes are french classes today, my heart stiffened and I was dead set in my attitude of not wanting to go. I know intellectually I should keep up with these classes. One is an oral course, and the other is Genres of Quebecois Literature. I just don't think I have the fight in me to force myself to go to the second one. But the other problem is finding a course that fits that wont make me totally annoyed at cynical 'academic' discourse.

Another way my stubbornness has reared her fiercely ugly head is in my stupid hate for grocery shopping. I actually don't even really hate it much. I even have time and access to a vehicle to make it easier. I just will always inevitably put it off until I'm left spending too much money on campus feeding my laziness. I need self-discipline!

2007 in review

2007 was a really great year for me I really got to experience all areas of life this year. While I faced a lot of exciting things I never expected to this young, I also walked through experiences I never would have anticipated in my lifetime. I never thought I would actually have to endure my mother's wedding. Intellectually I knew it was coming, but I could barely even believe it even when I was bawling in the bathroom listening to Leslie distract me with stories of her cousin's sketchy Facebook photos (thanks les!). I also never ever thought I would have the discussions I had with a friend this past year; I never anticipated ever asking my friend if I could have the pills with which she had planned to kill herself. And if that wasn't crazy enough, Margaret's parents insist that I saved their daughter's life when I took her to the hospital.

After a painful wedding I had the opportunity to truly celebrate the joyful marriage of my very close friend Amanda and Jordan. This was a huge growing-up experience for me, being the Maid of Honour. You really realize you're no longer a child when your friends start committing their lives to each other for FOREVER. And after the seeming-near-death experience with my friend, Amanda and Jordan a few months after their wedding announced they were expecting!

There were a lot more less-intense firsts I had the privilege of experiencing this year: my first vermin infestation, and learning about life and God from a homeless man. I remember hanging out with Brittany in City Park every Sunday this summer and the crazy 7am Servant Team meetings. I remember Kathryn and Alison pulling too many all-nighters and losing their sanity regularly to our amusement. I remember the excitement I felt and happiness I had/have for Mel who got engaged this past fall! I remember my housemates moving out and the loneliness that followed, and watching Angela fundraise to go to North Africa while Lydia fundraised to go to Montreal and all the crazy cool stories of that process. I remember the hours of agonizing readings that I loathed so deeply this past semester and the physical pain of endurance that I felt at times. I remember feeling so surprised when my friend Alison was recounting her feelings in her parents separation, as if she was telling me my own story back to me. I remember spending hours thinking about what I would do after I graduate this spring, and changing my mind 8 different times until I settled on joining Staff with Campus for Christ. I remember my first Rockstar, the hours I spent in Mac-Corry Cafeteria, eating pizza every day. I remember how I let down a lot of people in being so self-absorbed. I remember how much Transformers the movie rocked my world.

And there's one last sentence that I really want to end with, but I can't because it will reveal how I'm still unable to control my heart. Bittersweet.