Have you ever been singing a song in your head while you're thinking about, writing, talking about, watching, or doing something else, and you realize you're singing the wrong words? Today as I searched for my Microeconomics class in Reasoner 319 (you'd think after a year and a half I'd know which building is which) I sang "Back in the Saddle Again" in my head, only I realized, since I wasn't really paying attention, I was singing, "Back in the salad again." I've never been in the salad, but I think I'd rather be there than in the saddle.
Coming to college reminds me of going off to war, only I can't shoot myself in the foot to be taken off the front-line. "First day of classes" carries the same ring to it as "England declared war on Germany." Papers, books, and tests all mean the same to me as tanks, grenades, and rifles. I think it's funny how I always bring back books from home to school with me, thinking I'll have time to read them. And they always sit on my shelf, with a thin layer of dust on their tops by the time I pack them up to take back home with me. I wonder if, when I signed that "I will not drink, smoke, curse, or dance" contract at the beginning of my college career, the words "or have a life" were at the bottom of the page.
I shouldn't be so pessimistic and depressed. After all, there are so many people who have it worse than I - cross-cultural students who can't go home all year, students who can only go home once a year, and students who can't even come to college. What a privilege, honor, and blessing it is for me to be sitting in these classes and my chapel seat. I'll try to see it that way from now on.
Meanwhile football season is practically over...and...I wonder how many times I've mentioned "football" and "war" in the past few entries. I'll make an effort to mention more things about happiness in the future.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Wednesday, January 9, 2008
reflections of a college student on break
I feel like I'm on death row. I'm trying to get shove all this stuff in before my time is up. I've set a reading limit of 200 pages a day so I can finish The Woman in White before I go back to school. (It's a phenomenal book, by the way. I just can't sing its praises enough.) I'm eating all I can because I know once I get back to school it's Cheerios and stolen milk from the cafeteria. What's that? Someone just gave us home-shot deer sausage? I'm not hungry, it's ten o'clock at night, I've eaten an entire continent already today...but give it to me anyway. (It was phenomenal. Praises, praises, praises.) Maybe I should start setting my alarm at intervals during the night so I can wake up and eat. Deer.
What do you think zebra tastes like?
I think the best part about staying in your pajamas all day is that you don't have to change into them again at night. You're already in them. And if you fall asleep during the day and confuse the night with the day...it doesn't matter. You're in your pajamas.
I met a man at the bank today who made me pretty excited to be opening an account there, if you know what I'm sayin'.
The other day my dad began asking my advice on a dilemma he's facing at work as I sat on my makeshift window seat (my grandpa's WWII army chest that is now home to notebooks full of poetry and pretty stationary with bunnies having tea on it instead of the kraut lugers and bullet-dented helmets it once housed [actually not really, my grandpa was a dentist stationed in Pennsylvania during WWII, but unfortunately the bunnies having tea on my stationary really is a reality]), but I accidentally drifted off, looking at my books on my bookshelf. I heard the majority of what he said but I didn't have any response for him when he stopped talking.
He looked at me in mock belittling. "Are you 21 yet? Do you know anything?"
I simply shook my head. But boy, I can't wait for all that knowledge that comes with turning 21. (These days "knowledge" is code for alcohol, most likely.) 9 more months until I can down a pint of knowledge.
Today my mom came home from wherever it was she went (I'm dazed most of the day, except for when I'm eating) and asked if I'd heard the sirens.
"No..." I said, looking at her over my book. I had just woken up from a nap, and apparently slept through a house on fire down the street. I probably would have slept through our own house on fire, and only mildly complained out of my delirium for Mom to turn the heat down. Except she can't. Because I'm on fire. But at least I got a good nap in. And I'm already in my pajamas! So even death isn't really that bad.
One day between Christmas and New Year's we went to the Chinese restaurant and my fortune in my fortune cookie said, "You will step on the soils of many countries." I liked that fortune. THAT'S a fortune, not those stupid things that say like, "Beauty is red like a rose bleeding love." What the heck. (I just made that up. But I wonder if you can submit fortunes to be put into cookies, because that's a winner.) My brother and/or dad (they're interchangeable sometimes) said that I was stepping on foreign soil right now because the employees had mud from China on their shoes and had tracked it across the floor...anyway. The next week we went to the Chinese restaurant again (our arteries weren't crying loud enough for us to hear) and my fortune from my fortune cookie said, "You will step on the soils of many countries." What do you think that means? Can God speak through fortune cookies?
I also think it's fantastic when you're watching a foreign movie with English subtitles and you can't hear what they're saying so you turn up the volume. It doesn't matter, though. They're speaking Japanese. You can't understand them, anyway.
Taking pills labeled "colon flush" makes me nervous.
I'm tired, and luckily I'm already in my pajamas. I planned ahead this morning when I considered getting dressed. I thought, "No, because I'll be going to bed tonight." Always thinking ahead.
What do you think zebra tastes like?
I think the best part about staying in your pajamas all day is that you don't have to change into them again at night. You're already in them. And if you fall asleep during the day and confuse the night with the day...it doesn't matter. You're in your pajamas.
I met a man at the bank today who made me pretty excited to be opening an account there, if you know what I'm sayin'.
The other day my dad began asking my advice on a dilemma he's facing at work as I sat on my makeshift window seat (my grandpa's WWII army chest that is now home to notebooks full of poetry and pretty stationary with bunnies having tea on it instead of the kraut lugers and bullet-dented helmets it once housed [actually not really, my grandpa was a dentist stationed in Pennsylvania during WWII, but unfortunately the bunnies having tea on my stationary really is a reality]), but I accidentally drifted off, looking at my books on my bookshelf. I heard the majority of what he said but I didn't have any response for him when he stopped talking.
He looked at me in mock belittling. "Are you 21 yet? Do you know anything?"
I simply shook my head. But boy, I can't wait for all that knowledge that comes with turning 21. (These days "knowledge" is code for alcohol, most likely.) 9 more months until I can down a pint of knowledge.
Today my mom came home from wherever it was she went (I'm dazed most of the day, except for when I'm eating) and asked if I'd heard the sirens.
"No..." I said, looking at her over my book. I had just woken up from a nap, and apparently slept through a house on fire down the street. I probably would have slept through our own house on fire, and only mildly complained out of my delirium for Mom to turn the heat down. Except she can't. Because I'm on fire. But at least I got a good nap in. And I'm already in my pajamas! So even death isn't really that bad.
One day between Christmas and New Year's we went to the Chinese restaurant and my fortune in my fortune cookie said, "You will step on the soils of many countries." I liked that fortune. THAT'S a fortune, not those stupid things that say like, "Beauty is red like a rose bleeding love." What the heck. (I just made that up. But I wonder if you can submit fortunes to be put into cookies, because that's a winner.) My brother and/or dad (they're interchangeable sometimes) said that I was stepping on foreign soil right now because the employees had mud from China on their shoes and had tracked it across the floor...anyway. The next week we went to the Chinese restaurant again (our arteries weren't crying loud enough for us to hear) and my fortune from my fortune cookie said, "You will step on the soils of many countries." What do you think that means? Can God speak through fortune cookies?
I also think it's fantastic when you're watching a foreign movie with English subtitles and you can't hear what they're saying so you turn up the volume. It doesn't matter, though. They're speaking Japanese. You can't understand them, anyway.
Taking pills labeled "colon flush" makes me nervous.
I'm tired, and luckily I'm already in my pajamas. I planned ahead this morning when I considered getting dressed. I thought, "No, because I'll be going to bed tonight." Always thinking ahead.
Monday, January 7, 2008
What is leave?
- A pause that only makes everything after it so much worse. ((All Quiet on the Western Front))
It's raining outside, and the occasional rumble of thunder makes it feel more like a foggy spring morning than the first week of the new year. The air is tinted a strange yellow color through the raindrops on my window screen. The snow started melting drastically a couple days ago, about the same time our tree refused to light. It's as if Christmas has gone and is now reaching back to pluck away whatever remnants it left behind. Mom even threw away a tin of Christmas cookies that Dad and I weren't quite finished with.
Some might enjoy the warmer weather. Dad went out without a coat on the other day, excited that the temperature had reached 30 degrees. I, on the other hand, rather like turning on my heating blanket to a toasty 8 and falling asleep while my toes search out the warm spots in my bed. I almost prefer the cold of the bathroom linoleum on my bare feet; it makes the reward of crawling back in bed so much more worth it.
I think the mornings are definitely my favorite, while Mom's still in bed and Dad's at work. I lie on the love seat with my book (first All Quiet on the Western Front, then The Good Soldier, and now A Room with a View), my subconscious listening to the tick of the grandfather clock while I'm completely absorbed in the black letters on the page. And I hear the clock strike 8...then 9...and I realize that while my body has been lying on the love seat this whole time, my mind and emotions have been racing through Germany and England and Italy with characters deep, pensive, and true.
Why is it that I only seem to find the books I want to read when I've so little time left? Now that second semester swiftly approaches, I have a good 5 books in my sight that I want to read with less than a week left to read them. I'm sure if I devoted myself to only that, I could do it. But I get distracted by the sounds of the football game and the warmth of the blanket and the sleep that beckons me after a long Sunday morning. Only a month left of football season. Why must everything come to an end?
Things that don't have to come to an end, no matter the season: Lindt white chocolate truffles, the Glenn Miller orchestra, House marathons, friendships, knitting projects, my list of "to read"....
Why, I remember on that afternoon I saw a brown cow hitch its horns under the stomach of a black and white animal and the black and white one was thrown right into the middle of a narrow stream. I burst out laughing....I chuckled over it from time to time for the whole rest of the day. Because it does look very funny, you know, to see a black and white cow land on its back in the middle of a stream. It is just so exactly what one doesn't expect from a cow. ((The Good Soldier))
It's raining outside, and the occasional rumble of thunder makes it feel more like a foggy spring morning than the first week of the new year. The air is tinted a strange yellow color through the raindrops on my window screen. The snow started melting drastically a couple days ago, about the same time our tree refused to light. It's as if Christmas has gone and is now reaching back to pluck away whatever remnants it left behind. Mom even threw away a tin of Christmas cookies that Dad and I weren't quite finished with.
Some might enjoy the warmer weather. Dad went out without a coat on the other day, excited that the temperature had reached 30 degrees. I, on the other hand, rather like turning on my heating blanket to a toasty 8 and falling asleep while my toes search out the warm spots in my bed. I almost prefer the cold of the bathroom linoleum on my bare feet; it makes the reward of crawling back in bed so much more worth it.
I think the mornings are definitely my favorite, while Mom's still in bed and Dad's at work. I lie on the love seat with my book (first All Quiet on the Western Front, then The Good Soldier, and now A Room with a View), my subconscious listening to the tick of the grandfather clock while I'm completely absorbed in the black letters on the page. And I hear the clock strike 8...then 9...and I realize that while my body has been lying on the love seat this whole time, my mind and emotions have been racing through Germany and England and Italy with characters deep, pensive, and true.
Why is it that I only seem to find the books I want to read when I've so little time left? Now that second semester swiftly approaches, I have a good 5 books in my sight that I want to read with less than a week left to read them. I'm sure if I devoted myself to only that, I could do it. But I get distracted by the sounds of the football game and the warmth of the blanket and the sleep that beckons me after a long Sunday morning. Only a month left of football season. Why must everything come to an end?
Things that don't have to come to an end, no matter the season: Lindt white chocolate truffles, the Glenn Miller orchestra, House marathons, friendships, knitting projects, my list of "to read"....
Why, I remember on that afternoon I saw a brown cow hitch its horns under the stomach of a black and white animal and the black and white one was thrown right into the middle of a narrow stream. I burst out laughing....I chuckled over it from time to time for the whole rest of the day. Because it does look very funny, you know, to see a black and white cow land on its back in the middle of a stream. It is just so exactly what one doesn't expect from a cow. ((The Good Soldier))
Tuesday, January 1, 2008
goodbyes
I feel like Frodo Baggins at the end of The Return of the King: "It's gone. It's done." (Except I'm not standing on a rock surrounded by lava on Mount Doom, in need of a shower and a new index finger.) I never liked New Year's. Sure, as far back as playing Jeopardy on Brandon's Playstation at Y2K I can remember spending New Year's with my family and friends, watching the ball drop, eating shrimp, going to bed to Frank Sinatra's "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" and wondering where the season went. This year I spent 4 hours with a group of people I didn't know, was too tired to eat shrimp when I came home, dismissed the ball-dropping because it had dropped an hour earlier, and went to bed a little after midnight without any Christmas lights on. I have yet to have that "one last time"-listen to "White Christmas."
The snow has been lovely, as has the time with my family. The traditions haven't stopped just because we're in a new house, but they feel different. Is that possible? Yes, I know it is. In a sense I feel very homeless, because school isn't home, and this isn't home. I love being with my family...but it's possible to feel out of place even when they're here.
Well my friends, it's time to say goodbye to Christmas and wish you all a happy beginning to 2008. I wonder what the year will bring? What things will be different this time next year?
We sing His praise this day of days and pray this time next year
we'll all be near to share the cheer of a Christmas auld lang syne
The snow has been lovely, as has the time with my family. The traditions haven't stopped just because we're in a new house, but they feel different. Is that possible? Yes, I know it is. In a sense I feel very homeless, because school isn't home, and this isn't home. I love being with my family...but it's possible to feel out of place even when they're here.
Well my friends, it's time to say goodbye to Christmas and wish you all a happy beginning to 2008. I wonder what the year will bring? What things will be different this time next year?
We sing His praise this day of days and pray this time next year
we'll all be near to share the cheer of a Christmas auld lang syne
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