tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-51096240463929539382024-02-08T03:50:52.067-08:00Channel Paul NewsPaulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.comBlogger178125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-60754707883995680772013-12-30T21:11:00.000-08:002013-12-30T21:15:23.097-08:00The Last Two Years, Because Why NotHow predictable. I'm going to write myself a reflection as the year comes to a close. Originality isn't the striking feature of this post, now, is it? But originality isn't the point. The point is that I need this type of reflection. Thus, I'm going to reflect on the recent past because of an agonizing need for clarity.
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Coincidentally, an agonizing need for clarity is what punctuated the start of these last two years. That's what makes a two-year period the logical chunk of time for me to examine. I'm struggling to find words to write, but that's exactly why I need to do this. I need to reclaim my identity. I need to reclaim control over the direction my dreams and aspirations will even pull me, if they pull with any significant amount of force at all.
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Succinctly, 2012 was the year my world was shattered, and 2013 was the year I picked up the pieces. The point is not to dwell on the shattering though, because life went on. Life still goes on, and I honestly have no idea how it does. At the end of 2012, my mind could not grasp the idea that a new year, 2013, was about to begin. I didn't think more years were possible. It took until summer for me to consistently write "/13" whenever I signed the date on a document. Compared to the thought that 2013 was even allowed to exist, the only thing more incredulous to me is that it's about to be completed from start to finish, like the placement of the keystone in a stone arch of time that took 365 days to construct.
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What happened? What's happening? Why do things keep happening? Maybe my disbelief that life goes on stems from a lack of control. This isn't what I wanted, yet time keeps on moving. Life isn't going to wait up for me-- this much is evidenced by the fact that life hasn't waited up, and it still isn't. There is no pause button. This isn't goddamn Mariokart where I can stop midway through racing Donkey Kong through Koopa Troopa Beach and finish the rest later.
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I never imagined what it would be like to be 24. I also never imagined what it would be like to be 19, 20, 21, or any age beyond that. As a child, I dreamt of what it would be like to graduate from the limitations of being a minor--in my case, this consisted of reserving a hotel room, renting a campground, and maybe ordering something from an infomercial that spoke that haunting mantra, "You must be 18 or older to call." I had no interest in drugs or buying porno mags (because I'm from the generation that knows how to use the internet). Still, adulthood in the official sense was something to look forward.
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I didn't really know what to expect in college, either. My parents never really told me about their respective histories. My dad started at community college and didn't even last a year, and my mom had a rough time in her teens and twenties, working part-time and attending school while maintaining herself with the added difficulty of both her parents having been deceased. I had no concept of what my college years and my young adult life would look like. This cluelessness was a new feeling to me, because life has a pretty clear path for you when you're in school. When you're in sixth grade, you look forward to seventh grade. When you're in junior high, you look forward to high school. But when high school hits, you realize that your future could play out in a plethora of different possible ways. The paths of your peers become more divergent than ever before. You look at the photo of your third grade class, and you see how you defined your peers--the kid who brought an air freshener to school, the kid who made uncanny cricket noises, the kid who used to play Pokemon cards with you, and the kid who called you a pineapple with rabies that one time. But that all seems petty and unspecial compared to the way you remember these former third-graders as adults-- the guy who struggles with his sexuality as he tries to become a minister, the girl who had to drop out of college to help her dying mother, the guy who moved to California to found a startup company creating I-Phone applications, or the guy who remained unmoved after spending months in juvenile hall for selling drugs in eighth grade and is probably selling more somewhere.
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We weren't equipped with the power to curb-stomp our own innocence as children, but as our respective destinies became more pliable, we bent them into untold combinations of ridiculous shapes. And now that I've seen the wide array of different ways a life can be moulded, I can only question my own decision making more than ever. The power we each hold over ourselves is perhaps the most important power to consider, and every action I perform is punctuated with the question pulsating painfully in my mind, "am I doing it right?"
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My first rebuttal to that question is, "of course not. If I was doing it right, I would be happier." But then I have to suggest to myself a different idea: maybe the key to being happier isn't doing better-- maybe the key to greater happiness lies in refraining from asking myself these pesky questions. Maybe all I need to do is to stop myself from second-guessing all of my own actions. Being an idealist is a disease.
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I don't know what I'm doing. But maybe all the others don't know what they're doing, either. Yet, they've come to terms with the thought of marching onward through life without perfect 20-20 foresight, and if this is why they're happier and more secure than I am, then perhaps I'm the one with the disease. No one told me how my twenties would look, and that's because my parents have different personalities than mine. And I suspect that the other twenty-somethings differ from their parents in a similar way, too, implicating that they had no idea how their twenties would look based on their parents' experiences, either. So that means I'm reaching forward blindly into the darkness looking for the light switch, and all of my contemporaries are, too. I guess I am the one with the disease, and I should settle down and get used to this perceived blindness.
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This is what it's like to be 24, then.
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Now, in the tradition of reflecting on the past year, I will discuss the last two years of my life. It has to be two years, because I spent this year picking up the pieces from the wreck that was the year previous. 2012 was the worst year of my life, for several large reasons and for several smaller reasons which supplement.
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I spent 2011 hopelessly fallen for this girl who really didn't end up caring for me like I thought she did. In January, 2012, she let me down. I don't remember a time in my life when I was more heartbroken. I'll just leave it at that. I was decimated for months. I didn't fully get over it until later in the fall, almost at the end of the year. My resolve in 2012 was that I would never fool myself again into believing that someone loves me when she, in fact, doesn't. You might also use the word "paranoia" to describe this "resolve," and it lingers to this day. I haven't dated since, and it partly owes to this.
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I had a world in mind for my future, and this world consisted of the two of us. I hoped to do everything together in the future. I had to redefine my entire idea of my future with her departure. This adds to my inability to cope, because this isn't the life I expected. I blame a lot of my inability to cope on my inability to expect any of this. I didn't know from my parents what to expect, and I didn't know to expect heartbreak and solitude.
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I came home on spring break to my dog dying. My dad found Tosha and her brother, two husky puppies, stranded in a parking lot at Midway Airport in 1996. She was all white, and one of the most gentle regal dogs I'd ever known. She was quiet, but had a personality all her own. I watched her die. She had become unable to move or support herself. My mom was hysterical; my dad, our family friend Randy, and I loaded her into the back of our red 1999 dodge caravan so we could drive to the emergency vet. There was nothing to do for her. RIP Tosha.
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I graduated college in May 2012. From there, I started a job in June working for a transportation engineering consulting firm, where I could practice my lifelong dream of designing roads. Having a job right out of college doing exactly what I always wanted to do was a sweet deal. After a couple months, though, I started coming home with intense migraines, complete with dizziness, visual auras, and sharp pain to my forehead, behind the eyeballs. The pain was often so intense I had to vomit. These migraines would persist every other day, or every single day. I tried various coping strategies, but it reached the point at which showing up to work was a form of willingly subjecting myself to torture. I had to leave my job. It was kind of my dream job, too.
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In June 2012, I heard unbelievable news regarding who I later realized was my best friend from my childhood. At an intersection very near my house, my friend Garrett was struck and killed by a drunk driver around 2:00 A.M. as he was walking home from a local bar. He was married to a girl he met in Canada, Patricia, who would later become my friend. I can't imagine being widowed at age 24. Could you?
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On the day of his funeral, it was 100 degrees Fahrenheit and hailing. I won't forget that, because it's one of those instances in my life that led me to believe that there's someone or something upstairs in the heavens-- and in this case, that someone was infuriated.
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I'm working on a song about him. He didn't care about silly things that most people care about but shouldn't. That's why he allowed me to be his friend in the first place, when many others wouldn't. Many held a prejudice against me because I was widely known as the smart nerdy kid. Garrett never thought anything of it, though. I always had his respect, and he always had mine, even though there were choices he'd make later in life that I wanted to stay away from. What kind of bizarre world is this?
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My relationship with my mom went south that year, a couple times. For a couple prolonged periods of time, I wouldn't speak with my mother. We couldn't get along. After I quit my job, I helped my dad's surveying business for the rest of 2012.
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Enter 2013. I'm still working with my dad, standing next to that machine on the big yellow tripod that you sometimes see on construction sites. That winter failed to live up to expectations; we hardly got any snow until late February. In fact, it was February when I received a call from a man interested in my resume. As I was working outside in the backyard of a house in DeKalb, Illinois, I talked to a man who wanted me to come to Chicago for an interview. I accepted, and before I knew it, I was sitting in an office with an older man and a younger man answering questions. It wasn't long before they offered me a new job, and by mid-February I was commuting via train to the big city.
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Commuting from the outer Chicago suburbs isn't a gig you want to endure for long, because of the amount of time consumption. I would leave the house at 6:15am to reach work by eight; then, I'd leave at five to arrive home again at 6:45pm or so. This adds up to three and a half hours in transit each day. At least it was nice to zone out on the train; it was less taxing than driving all the way.
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In March, as I was sitting at my Chicago desk, I received a call from another employer, a county highway department. Without really thinking about it, I kindly informed the lady that I was sitting at my new job and that my search for a new job had concluded. When I went home that night, I reconsidered my actions. This new opportunity was for a job where I could work outside, and no longer be confined to an office cubicle for eight hours per day! I used my lunch hour the next day to call the lady back and ask if they would still consider me for the job. They called me in for what would become known as the most enjoyable interview I would ever have to date, and I was accepted for the job. This meant I would have to drop the bomb on my second employer (third if you count my dad) that I'd be leaving them for a third (fourth).
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In May, I started at what is now my current job.
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In October, I moved out of my house. I now have my own apartment close to work. It's pretty nice.
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In December, I rekindled my relationship with my mom and we get along great now. I also got sick over Christmas and she selflessly took care of me. I'm still kind of sick from that.
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I have a job and my own place! And my credit score is pretty darn good. I have taken off on the runway to adulthood.
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Now what?
Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-87645878242488282422012-01-11T20:23:00.000-08:002012-10-09T18:02:22.029-07:00It's interesting that people tell me what to do. It's actually pretty insane for me to listen to any advice on how to live my life, given who I am. I am one of the most thoughtful, introspective, and sensible people I know. There, I said it. And all anyone does when they try to tell me how to live my life-- is tell me what they would be doing with my life if they were in my shoes. And in the process, they expose the flaws of their approaches toward living their own lives.<br /><br />It's quite educational, really. I get to learn how their perspectives on how to live differ from mine, and therefore, I get to learn the attributes of their respective personal philosophies that I don't like.<br /><br />Someone is trying to tell me to live my life working a depressing but high-paying job, resulting in a static, dull lifestyle in which the only glitter is gold-- money, that is. Someone else is trying to tell me to go after a million beautiful experiences, and grab whatever I want when I want it, yielding an ever-changing lifestyle.<br /><br />Neither of these options suits me. The former of the two I mentioned is unappealing for reasons that should be pretty clear. Happiness does not depend on money. The happiest people on earth are not rich. Rich people get spoiled, expect way too much from the world, and complain about everything, depressed. <br /><br />The latter option fails me because I can't live my life asking for everything. Happiness does not come from the number of experiences you have or from the extravagance of the experiences you have. You can travel the world, go to parties, go on roller coasters, attend concerts, and go on safaris, and still be dissatisfied with your life. There is no limit to the insatiable nature of people. How do you think people in bumfuck nowhere stay happy? By making the most of it, and by having a will to enjoy what you have.<br /><br />My purpose in life is to help people. My purpose in life isn't to take and take and take from life, and to continue to ask it for more. I realize that I only have one life, but as a male, I seek simplicity. All I want to do is find something, or several things, that I can consistently work on throughout my life that helps others. I thought that becoming an engineer or a mapmaker would satisfy that desire. Making music does, too. I'm also going to make Youtube videos, and I have ideas for a board game...I have all sorts of things that I can contribute, and that's what I focus on. I don't focus on what I want to take. I focus on what I want to give. Life is one big decision of what you want to give to the world. I'm here to help. I want to create inspiration in other people's life, and though I will need at least some intake of inspiration to generate something productive, that's not the main goal. My main goal is to make a difference, not be the one for which someone else makes a difference, though I welcome that. It's just not my main objective, or what I set my sights on. If all I wanted in life was to be the recipient of others' contributions, I would be a strictly selfish person, and I would hate myself.<br /><br />My purpose is to be a creator. That's the way I look at my life. Therefore, my life is a quest for appreciation for the good things I create and bring to the world, whether they are big projects or everyday deeds. And if you're not going to appreciate what I give to you, I will not want to have anything to do with you. There are people out there who will appreciate the good things that I do, and I know that. My life is also a quest to find those people, who will accept me for who I am and be supportive of what I create. I've reached a point in my life at which I have realized that I need to dump some people at the side of the road because they bring me down and don't even attempt to support me. If there were positives to balance out the negatives and result in a net gain, it would be different. But I'm cutting off the people who are overwhelmingly negative, because I'm a good person, god damnit.<br /><br />I have the best intentions out of almost anyone I know. I want nothing but good things for people, and I want positive actions to be rewarded. People would see my generosity much more clearly if I had anything to give. My task now is to make myself and everyone around me believe I have a lot to give, and to execute that giving. When I give back to the world, people will see the physical manifestation of my generosity, at which point my generosity will be undeniable. People will see how willing I am to give to them, because the only way to make them see that is to actually give to them. So here we go. We are entering the age of Paul making a positive difference in the world. A very positive difference. I hope you're looking forward to it, because I am. I'm looking forward to living a life that I can smile at as I look back on it. I'm looking forward to being happy with who I am as a person, because as I prove to everyone else how good of a person I am, I will be also proving it to myself.<br /><br />And if you are willing to stick with me and see where this goes, I want to thank you. I appreciate you being there in my life still, even after the past few months of being a lifeless shell. I assure you all that things are on the upswing, and if you were able to put up with my dumb ass for the past semester, I'd like to reward you by showing you some improvement. A lot of improvement. And by having some fun. Thanks guys.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-37779962421961166402011-10-19T00:50:00.000-07:002011-10-19T00:51:46.012-07:00My mom sent me this email:<br />"In June, 2011, Philadelphia was named the 2nd most Dirtiest City in America by Travel and Leisure's readership, for a variety of ways, including litter, air pollution, and taste of local tap water.<br /><br />In 2006, Philadelphia's homicide rate of 27.7 per 100,000 people was the highest of the country's 10 most populous cities."<br /><br />What does this accomplish? Is she trying to scare me away from doing what I'm obviously going to do?<br /><br />I was about to reply, "well, the homicide rate of my town is going to rise if I don't get to be with my lover right soon."Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-39561910833378776662011-09-25T21:13:00.000-07:002011-09-25T21:25:26.117-07:00Today I drove away from the greatest source of light shining into my life and giving me energy, as I drove away from the sun which was in the process of setting behind me. The symbolism was so easily conceived that a mediocre fiction writer could have written it, but it was very real. As most think of the sun as the greatest source of light in the physical realm, she is the one who best fits that title in my eyes. When I first pulled away from the airport where I left her today, I regarded it as just another departure, having been our fifth. And while I seem to be getting used to the repeated stiflings of our times together, I also am getting used to the feelings of sudden emptiness and disdain which summon moisture into my eyes after each time this occurs. Another departure, another day of feeling like crying. It's just part of the process.<br /><br />She suggested that I shouldn't feel bad because we have departed from each other many times now. This is our lives; this is what we do. But the crying and heartbreak doesn't come from naivete with regard to these situations. It doesn't matter how many times this happens or how much practice I have had dealing with it. I'm still going to feel like crying because a large part of my personal foundation is being taken from me. Something is being lost. <br /><br />The one difference that did occur today was that I kept on moving. Tears welled up in my eyes but I was not debilitated. I got right back in the car, eyes glossed over, and kept moving. I am getting better at dealing with it, but the emotions of heartbreak and emptiness aren't things that subside with time.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-67873743781477651492011-06-12T16:52:00.000-07:002011-06-12T17:04:14.876-07:00Love is real. I know because I have discovered it firsthand.<br /><br />In order to experience love, you must achieve the following objectives:<br />1. Be in touch with your emotions<br />2. Realize that your purpose on life is to improve the world around you<br />3. Know what to look for and what criteria are important<br />4. Know what criteria are NOT important and should be ignored altogether<br />5. Have an ideology that is well-developed enough to converge with other well-developed ideologies<br />6. Don't be self-centered<br />7. Be open-mindedPaulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-59125536324027673312011-04-09T19:43:00.000-07:002011-04-09T19:44:39.820-07:00Fired<br />Rockin the Suburbs<br />Time<br />Army<br />Sentimental Guy<br />Your Dogs<br />Selfless, Cold, and Composed<br />Brick<br /><br />^Songs by Ben Folds that I play on pianoPaulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-82137828729097989292011-02-14T12:08:00.001-08:002011-02-14T12:13:40.185-08:00I hate Valentine's Day.<br /><br />It's a lose-lose-lose situation.<br /><br />Let me explain<br /><br />You are either:<br />1. Single<br />2. Taken but not totally confident in your relationship<br />3. Taken and confident that what you have will last.<br /><br />1. If you are single, you feel left out. And that sucks.<br />2. If you are taken and not confident in your relationship, you will try to woo her with some material objects you bought with your material money. But it doesn't really make sense to state something immaterial with material generic stuff. It costs you money that you otherwise wouldn't spend, and it doesn't really make sense anyway.<br />3. If you are taken and confident in your relationship, you reaffirm your connection with her every day, and you don't need one special day a year to do so. You should be showing you that you care every day. This day should be no more special. And if you know this, Valentine's Day is pointless and useless.<br /><br />I also hate it when people discuss how terrible an exam was right after they walk out of said terrible exam. It's going to be painful enough when I get the grade back. Don't drag out the pain by slowly revealing to me all the things I did wrong, so that I feel worse and worse the more we talk about it.<br /><br />I'm finding, now, that when I fail at something, or I endure some form of hardship that would typically get me down, I find myself thinking, "at least I found love. And no matter what happens, I'm going to be with her. So nothing is ever all bad."Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-47839396968281132932011-01-29T13:09:00.000-08:002011-01-29T13:25:08.885-08:00TOURSt Louis<br />Oklahoma City<br />El Paso<br />Tucson<br />Phoenix<br />San Diego<br />Los Angeles<br />Riverside<br />Fresno<br />Las Vegas<br />Denver<br />Lawrence<br />Indianapolis<br />Columbus<br />Pittsburgh<br />Durham<br />Richmond<br />Baltimore<br />Philadelphia<br />Jersey<br />Manhattan<br />UCONN<br />Boston<br />Portland, ME<br />Montreal<br />Toronto<br />East Lansing<br />Ann Arbor<br />Chicago<br />Madison<br />Minneapolis<br />Winnipeg<br />Edmonton<br />Calgary<br />Vancouver<br />Seattle<br />Portland<br />Pocatello<br />Sioux Falls<br />Omaha<br />Iowa City<br />Memphis<br />Dallas<br />Austin<br />Houston<br />New Orleans <br />Tallahassee<br />Gainesville<br />Tampa<br />Miami<br />Jacksonville<br />Athens<br />Atlanta<br />Nashville<br />ChampaignPaulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-25215555754890971332011-01-04T09:47:00.000-08:002011-01-04T09:49:49.948-08:00I never understood teeth whitening.<br />Why do they need to be white?<br />I decided I want mine to be blue.<br />So I ate nothing but the blue raspberry flavor of Fun Dip for three days straight.<br />I lost 45 pounds, went to the hospital, and the worst part is,<br />My teeth didn't even end up blue like I wanted.<br />They were more of a cerulean; I was looking for more of a royal blue,<br />AND THAT JUST DIDN'T WORK FOR ME!<br />That's not the most exciting part though:<br />The most exciting part is that,<br />None of that actually happened.<br />I'll bet none of you believe that though, since I'm such a skinny motherfucker.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-58705177531844989032010-12-22T22:01:00.000-08:002010-12-22T22:21:24.345-08:00UpdateI am announcing that I want to start getting back into Youtube videos to an extent. I want to make more thoughtful videos, partially because I've found that the vlog style of Youtube channel isn't working so well for me. I think so much that I feel like it would be a waste not to share much of it with other people.<br /><br />This is why I love the internet. If you have something to say, you can use the internet as your voice, and millions of people will have access to it. If they like what you have to say, they can come back for more; if they don't, they can go do something else. <br /><br />I am a person who pretty much always has something to say, and who definitely always has something on his mind. I plan on sharing these things, because it's not fair that, at this point, I'm the only one who gets to hear them. I'm not saying that everyone else will want to hear them, but I'm sure there is some small fraction of the populace who will care enough to listen. Why should I deprive them of what I have to say?<br /><br />I hope you feel the same way I do. I hope you feel like you have something to bring to the table, and that you feel like there are things you can create that people will appreciate. Because there are. We all have different things we can share with the world that people will appreciate. If there wasn't, what would be the point?<br /><br />All people have an underlying desire to be appreciated. We want to do something positive and know that we did. That's why the internet is ridden with people who are always trying to share this or that, from long well-crafted films posted on Youtube to mundane thoughts posted on twitter. I have a lot of thoughts to express, and I'm going to use Youtube to express them. <br /><br />I'll have a channel where I express these thoughts, and a secondary channel that's more of a personal journal, a "vlog channel". I'll let you know how I set this up later.<br /><br />P.S. I swear to GOD my dad snores louder than the noise made by household vacuum cleaners.<br /><br />Currently listening to "Your Dogs" by Ben Folds (of course)<br /><br />That's another thing--I'm in the midst of a massive Ben Folds phase. I usually get into musical artists in phases; I obsess over them one at a time. Previous obsessions include Jamiroquai, Flight of the Conchords, and Imogen. But this Ben Folds phase is by far the most potent. He's my favorite musical artist, hands down. I just went to one of his shows in Chicago a month and a half ago, and I'm contemplating going to his upcoming venue in Champaign on January 25. This indicates a much greater passion than I've had for any other musician, since I had never been to a rock show before that Chicago concert.<br /><br />MY DAD STOPPED SNORING NOW'S MY CHANCE TO GET TO SLEEP BYEPaulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-54340360872894795392010-12-20T00:03:00.000-08:002010-12-20T00:58:43.940-08:00Too Much to BearThank God or Nature or whoever the fuck was responsible. It's over.<br /><br />More than anyone, I should be thanking myself for ending what has ended, but at the same time, I should be blaming myself for getting into this mess in the first place.<br /><br />I am talking simultaneously about the relationship and the past academic semester. As with every major mistake I make, I treat these two components comprising the past semester as learning experiences. I learned never to date the paranoid. I learned to trust my own judgment, that I should never take anyone seriously who can't manage their own psyche. I learned that I should chill out in the presence of a lot of change in my life, and that I shouldn't create more drastic changes to add to the ensuing confusion. I learned that a relationship in which I am constantly scrambling to please the significant other to compensate for my inadequacies is a commitment for which I am either not prepared or for which no one should ever care. I learned that professors of higher-level classes are no more merciful than the ones I've faced previously. I learned that in order to become a professor in science or engineering, you must either be hell-bent on inflating your ego, or too intelligent in mathematical ways for any intelligence to be left in ways that would allow them to be able to communicate with other people effectively. I learned that I should have listened to myself in the first place. I learned that, when the people I doubted in the first place cause me harm, the people who I always thought I could trust will come back to me in the long run.<br /><br />She told me I made her happy, and it meant nothing to me, because of the constant dissatisfaction she expressed otherwise. I explained this to one of my brother's friends, and he brought up the fact that about only ten percent of happiness is conveyed verbally. I don't think he realized how perfectly relevant that fact was to my situation. He was exactly right. You can't tell me "I love you," and then proceed to tell me twenty problems you have with our relationship, and bring up problem after problem you have with me. If you think of so many problems, I don't see how you can call anything "love." If I hear repeatedly, "this is wrong," "this is wrong," "this is wrong," then there's no love present.<br /><br />Love is a feeling that skews people toward focusing on the good shared between two people. This is why first impressions are so important. I feel like love comes from luck in a lot of cases. If two random people are placed in each other's presence, they will have a certain amount in common. The odds that something they share in common is revealed right away is somewhat small. Now, the odds increase when there are more things they have in common to choose from, but in any case, these two people might have so much in common but can go through a whole conversation or party without mentioning a single commonality. On the other hand, they might happen to highlight a lot of the things they have in common, causing a spark that gets emitted when two people are already thinking about all of the wonderful things about each other. Love grows from that.<br /><br />Now I don't know the opposite feeling so well, because I feel that it's no use thinking about it. This is the feeling when you think about all of the things you don't have in common with someone. It's when you think about the differences between you and someone else and the problems they cause. This can be seen as an opposite to what love is. This is the feeling that causes you to doubt your connection with someone. This is the feeling that tells you to sever the ties because you're just so different and dysfunctional together. This is what she felt for me, no matter how many times she said "I love you," and it's why it meant nothing to me when she said it. If you can't accept other people for their flaws, you'll never love. <br /><br />If you take one mundane misunderstanding and manipulate it in your head until you feel like it's a sign of a much larger problem, then I'm not making you happy. It might not be my fault that you have these paranoia-driven episodes, but I'm still not making you happy. If I can't do that, I can't be content with a relationship, because you're creating anti-love by emphasizing how different and troubled we are. Your overwhelming dissatisfaction is telling you that the relationship is not a good idea, whether you want to accept it or not. I can see why some people would refuse to accept it, though, because they feel that way about everything in their life to different extents.<br /><br />Some people aren't satisfied by anything, and she was one of them. I'd never satisfy her, and I knew that. Could I go on in a relationship knowing that I would never make the other person happy, even knowing that it was impossible? No. I can't. Because, like everyone else in the world, I need to be appreciated.<br /><br />She needed to learn. She needed to change, and become able to accept the world for what it is. She didn't accept me for who I was, always telling me I needed to change everything about myself. I know she deserves to be happy, and I want her to be in the future. I could be more charitable and stand by her in her efforts to change and be better able to deal with the world. But am I that charitable? Do I have the effort, time, AND capacity to do that?<br /><br />No.<br /><br />I knew that, in making this decision, I was being selfish. But being in emotional shambles constantly was an indication that I needed an increase in my selfishness. I tried way too hard to please someone who I couldn't please, and that made me feel inadequate, thinking that she was like any special girl. Now that I realize that her standards aren't normal, I find that I am at least a mediocre human being, and not a constant failure.<br /><br />It'll take me a while to bring myself back up to self-esteem. I'll know I'm back into the swing of things when I no longer feel like I'm lost, and I regain sight of who I am and what I want out of life. It's slowly coming back; I can tell, because I started drawing something in Google Sketchup out of curiosity. I always knew I was a creator of things, and I want to get back to creating things. I am now realizing that I abandoned my passion for creating things, because for all that time, I didn't feel like anything I created would be something worth creating. Now I'm starting to feel like what I can do will be worth it, if I just follow my instincts like I should have in the first place.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-47608614444047450882010-11-29T16:34:00.001-08:002010-11-29T17:05:31.864-08:00We meet againSo now it's 2010. LATE in 2010. It's almost December, and it might as well be, as the school year is winding down. Reading through this, I find that I left off last New Year's, commenting on how demented and twisted 2009 was. I can't say that 2010 was much better. <br /><br />I'm finding that the perceived quality of a given year in the life of Paul is largely based on the fun I had during its summer. Well this year, I had no summer. I spent the summer driving around in Rednecktopia, and while it's a 'topia for the Rednecks, it's the doldrums for me. Having just arrived back at school from Thanksgiving Break, I am realizing that my head is the clearest it's been in eight months, because I had no chance over the summer to clear my head. The Monday after the weekend in May when I moved out of school was the day I started my job working for the state department of transportation (DOT), and the weekend after the day I quit was the weekend I moved back down to college in August. My job title may as well have been "idiot," though my brain makes me capable of so much more. <br /><br />With 2010 having largely passed, I find it safe to make concluding statements reflecting back on this year, and with that, I conclude that it was the most anxious year of my life. This year was nothing but a ride on a bullet train barreling through nature, arriving at the station wondering what the fuck the scenery looked like. <br /><br />The anxiety came from five major sources, the first of which was the measly fact that I never fucking got a break to collect my thoughts until just this past week. I had literally no summer. I didn't even get a family vacation. <br /><br />The extent of my travels was to New York City, the city of chaos itself, and the second reason for my labeling 2010 the year of anxiety. Fuck the nickname, "The City that Never Sleeps." All that means is that no one ever gets a break, and if no one gets a break, no one is ever happy, except maybe the people who make shitloads of money from always having to work so hard.<br /><br />Third was finding my summer job so shitty that I actually doubted my major. During the process of getting my thoughts together this past week, I have come around and concluded that I was wrong to doubt it, but how was I supposed to react if I hated just about every living thing around me during the whole summer? I just learned that one thing's for sure. I don't care what my dad says; I am NOT getting a job in rural America. I am working in the city or the suburbs, and that's final. All my coworkers talked about were the terrible songs on the radio, their daughters' softball games, and pooping. One of the guys could have started a twitter account just to post updates on his bowel movements. <br /><br />Fourth was getting the new apartment when I came back to college. I wasn't ready for that commitment yet, but you have to start sometime. It really wasn't that big of a deal compared to my fifth reason, but these last two reasons combined simultaneously to create a formidable duo.<br /><br />The fifth, last and largest reason why my life has been so chaotic lately is my decision to launch myself into a relationship with someone I wasn't familiar with yet. Please note how I wrote the words "MY DECISION." It WAS my decision, though you're right, she was way more into me in the beginning. It was much too great of an opportunity to pass up, so I jumped on it. Unfortunately, the drastic change was so great that it took me over a month to get used to the idea of being in a relationship with her.<br /><br />I told my mom about this inability to handle drastic changes, and she compared it to when she first moved in with who would become my father. She had a new place to live, a new partner, and a new job, all within the same month, and this made life hard to handle. It makes me wonder how hyperactive people like my girlfriend live their lives. Maybe they aren't hyperactive; they just didn't ever learn what it was like to chill out and become comfortable for a while. Either they didn't learn to, or they are less capable of chilling out and fully grasping where they are in their lives. I can't live WITHOUT that comfort; the lack of such comfort is what makes me anxious. And it's why I've BEEN anxious for the length of this semester. <br /><br />My girlfriend and I are both dysfunctional in our own little individual ways, which I guess makes us compatible. I've noticed a fundamental difference between the ways in which we deal with ourselves, though. When I don't know how to deal with a social situation, I shut the fuck up, be respectful, and spend time thinking about what I can do to pitch into the conversation. She just blurts out whatever comes to mind, and half the time, it's discomforting or offensive. It makes me feel like she's inconsiderate.<br /><br />That's the problem. I can't tell if she's even trying to be nice. She tells my brother he smells like tiger piss, declares she hates Dairy Queen while standing at the front counter of a Dairy Queen, and tells me I'm all sorts of things I'm not going to bring up. I'm going to talk to her about it right now.<br /><br />There's been way too much going on that I don't like. I feel like my life is out of control. I'm starting to get it back though, and I'm going to make sure that nothing stops me from doing so. 2010, shut the fuck up. At least no one I know died this year.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-57872132133174096362010-01-01T16:08:00.000-08:002010-01-01T16:10:28.113-08:00NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONSTO MAKE 2010 HAVE LESS SUCK:<br /><br />1. Be more blunt and honest to people. <br />2. Stop posting tweets to people in which the subject is ambiguous.<br />3. Make my breath not stink.<br />4. Do some basic calisthenics when I get up in the morning.<br />5. Stop being so selfish, only focusing on building up my future, and serve some life purpose in helping other people.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-11948132873708817192010-01-01T01:08:00.000-08:002010-01-01T01:14:04.573-08:002009. What a Load of BullshitWhether it comes to the news or personal experience, 2009 was a year of demented retarded bullshit: sick, twisted occurrences happening in place of what I felt should have been dreams coming true.<br />The media once again chooses to worry about stupid shit when important things are happening at the time.<br />A friend with conservative quiet roots manages to get knocked up.<br />Someone I considered my best friend makes a rash life decision without even telling me.<br />Some family decides to create a scene as if their kid is in a giant opaque (so you can't see inside) balloon when he really isn't, and has the media lie to thousands.<br />I learned that getting together with someone from the internet is probably not a good idea, when you learn that the person relies on the internet for social interaction almost entirely--because that signifies a PROBLEM.<br />And much, much more.<br />2009, suck my dick. 2010, you better not fuck up that bad.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-83124051923818717222009-12-13T20:14:00.000-08:002009-12-13T20:18:28.948-08:00Oh god.<br />Oh god.<br />Mother Nature is fucking with me again.<br />Another scary coincidence.<br />Yet this one I can't share with just anyone.<br />It harps on dark secrets.<br />Yet, it is so bizarre that I have to share it somehow.<br />Curse you, fucking ambivalence.<br />I don't have time for this. I only need to be shut into myself for two more days. Two more days? Can I just have two more days to focus entirely on my personal situation? I'll start caring about other people after then, I promise! Please?<br />I do have to write it somewhere, though. Just not here.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-75274073349069858592009-12-10T18:38:00.001-08:002009-12-10T18:38:47.094-08:00Guys, I fucked up in academia.<br />Really bad.<br />I have to get back to doing my best again.<br />I'll see you on December 16.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-24238452721891501082009-12-09T17:41:00.000-08:002009-12-11T21:51:50.814-08:00Winter break bucket list1. See all three other members of my quad from high school<br />2. See Jessica in person and have some arbitrary form of heartfelt conversation with her<br />3. Modify the words to the opening theme to "The Fresh Prince of Bel-air" so it applies to my own life, and recite it<br />4. Finish learning to play my version of "The Walk" by Imogen Heap on the piano<br />5. Travel to a state that does not border Illinois (cannot be Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, Kentucky, Indiana, or Michigan). (This one is the most ambitious)<br />6. Finish my drawing of "BlogTV Town"<br />7. Write a song for Jackie about mowing the lawn<br />8. Throw a snowball at a female (weather permitting)<br />9. Make a youtube video every Wednesday and release one each Thursday.<br />10. Organize and list every legitimately completed song I've written.<br />11. Make Japanese food.<br />12. Get a N64 controller and a copy of Super Smash Bros.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-56012892703131303152009-11-28T00:08:00.000-08:002009-11-28T00:10:15.002-08:00Maybe I'm not gay. Maybe I'm just a nice person. Assholes.<br /><br />There are a few people on the internet who thought I was gay at first. I'm trying to figure out why.<br />Maybe it's because I write "<3" to girls who give me the same sentiment.<br />Maybe it's because a lot of people on the internet I associate with are gay.<br />Maybe it's because I'm not a complete tool of a male.<br /><br />Any ideas?Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-30170679672391097642009-11-27T23:41:00.000-08:002009-11-27T23:51:05.528-08:00I had a weird-ass dream last night revolving around a certain musician named Imogen Heap. <br /><br />I found myself in a strange and very large and spacious building. The building had floors that were twenty feet high or taller, and the hallways all had open ceilings, like at a shopping mall or something. The rooms all had glass walls forming a plane of windows between the rooms and their adjacent hallways. Some of these rooms were offices of professors, so I was apparently at some educational institution for music. For some reason or another, I was required to work on a musical project to turn in to Ms. Heap, as were many other people in the building. I had a partner I worked with in a room on the second floor, but my partner refused to be cooperative. We had until the beginning of her performance in the great hall on the second floor to finish our projects, and time was quickly running out. After a while, I gave up working with this douchebag and I ran down stairs and up other stairs to get to the concert hall to see the performance. At this point is when I woke up.<br /><br />Possible real-life origins of the elements of this dream:<br />1. A couple days ago (in reality) I was trying to figure out the notes to "The Walk" by Imogen Heap, and I found out that the song was actually in Eb minor, the most obscure and confusing key signature of all 24 major and minor key signatures, instead of F minor, in which I was trying to originally figure out the song. I found this immensely frustrating, just like the douchebag partner I had in my dream.<br />2. Imogen Heap was just in Chicago earlier this week, and I resented that I didn't make any effort to go to the performance.<br />3. "The Walk" has been stuck in my mind for the past few weeks.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-81140946335331736822009-11-26T17:17:00.000-08:002009-11-26T18:44:24.740-08:00If I were a DogI'll TELL YOU how my fucking Thanksgiving went.<br /><br />I live four separate lives right now. One is at college, one is at home, and one is with my high school friends, and one is on the internet. The one I live at home is a sick, twisted bastardization of what I expected it would be as a child. The few friends I had remained in contact with made wrong turns in their lives. This made me expect Thanksgiving at home to be awkward.<br /><br />We had our family friends from across the street come to our house, since my relatives are people we don't keep in contact with. But I like it better this way anyway.<br /><br />I expected it to be awkward, but it turned out all right. We laughed about our experiences in school, and everyone got along great, as we always do.<br /><br />We finished dinner at about 5PM. We gave our three dogs a little bit of everything that was on the dining room table, because we love them and spoil them. After this, we were joking around when my dog Mophie (originally named "Sophie") started yowling in pain. We rushed over to the family room, where she lay moaning.<br /><br />Both families gathered around her petting her and trying to comfort her. We scrambled to try and find out what was wrong, but about 40 seconds later I was comforted to find that she stopped grieving. Little did I know that I was supposed to be the one grieving at that point. <br /><br />Her tongue hung out of her mouth.<br /><br />She stopped breathing.<br /><br />The two dads and I rolled her onto a beach blanket, and she was carried out.<br /><br />My mom, an avid animal lover, took it the hardest by far.<br /><br />It ruined the rest of out night. But I started thinking--if I were a dog, what would I want as the last thing I do before I die?<br />I would want food. GOOD food. Like a Thanksgiving dinner.<br />Well, that's exactly what happened. So I guess if she had to go, this was a good time for her to do it: right after eating a Thanksgiving meal.<br /><br />RIP Mophie 11/26/09 5:12 PMPaulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-23673695749456360212009-11-25T22:30:00.000-08:002009-11-25T23:15:42.844-08:00They're there.<br />Everywhere I go.<br />The people who don't matter.<br />The people who both A) have no confidence in their own ability to judge what is socially acceptable or not, and B) don't know that the best thing is to just be accepting of people who are different, and that there are no criteria people have to fall in line with to be accepted. These are the people who follow. They don't feel like they know what's cool and what's not cool. And it's not because they're bad judges. It's because they don't know that they shouldn't be judges at all.<br /><br />I was going to room with these guys I made friends with at school. I didn't really have many other friends other than them. So I clung to them. But as I clung and I hung out with them, I grew continually more wary. I was beginning to learn that they...were people who didn't matter.<br /><br />Most of them were followers. But a couple of them were leaders, or rather, misleaders. Every exclusive clique has them--the people who make the judgments of who is acceptable or not, with their own sets of fictitious criteria upon which they evaluate outsiders. <br /><br />In particular, this group had one ringleader, who so happens to be one of the most judgmental people I've ever met. He seemed to be confident in his idea of what was socially acceptable or not. This confidence was only stupidity, though, not only because of his high standards, but because he HAD ANY standards. When he set forth the name "Club 10" to our group, I should have known how exclusive he was based on the usage of the word "club." But now I get it.<br /><br />Other than this ringleader, the others were all mostly followers. Since they didn't have any confidence in their own judgment of what is cool and uncool, they relied on the ringleader's judgment. It's not because they were assholes that they decided to be as exclusive as the ringleader. It was just because they were weaklings. Since they felt that they didn't have the capacity to judge people properly, they relied on Mr. Ringleader to do it for them. In fact, some of them are actually nice guys. But they're weak on the inside, so they listen to the ringleader.<br /><br />I never thought that I would see behavior like this after junior high, but I sure do. In fact, it's horrendously common, and rampant even. It's ridiculous. There are so many people who just follow. They follow because they don't trust their own judgment about what's cool and what's uncool, and they don't realize that THEY SHOULDN'T EVEN BE CHOOSING TO EXCLUDE PEOPLE AT ALL. Some people say "don't judge me," but what they really mean is, "I know you're going to judge me, but don't hold a grudge against me based on any of your judgments." That's akin to racism, sexism, and other "isms" of the sort, even though it may be on a smaller scale. Don't hate people based on their character traits. Hate them based on their bad dispositions. <br /><br />I think that maybe people follow others like this because THEY aren't socially aware enough themselves. They don't realize that they shouldn't be closing themselves off to people just because they're "uncool," because they're the very same people who do the same. They exclude people, and then wonder why other people won't talk to them for a certain trait they have. DON'T THEY REALIZE WHAT THEY'RE DOING?<br /><br />This activity goes on on the internet too. There's a character, and he's upbeat and the life of the party. Other people begin to cling to the character. These people together form a group. The character makes a lot of judgments based on who is cool and who is not. The other people follow his judgment. But then the character starts hating on someone that one of the followers actually values as a friend. Is the follower strong enough as a person to stand up for his friend? Chances are, no, he's not. Who would you rather be friends with, in this case? The character, or that guy who is your friend that Mr. Character was hating on?<br /><br />I actually got into a situation like this in college, and the choice was clear to me at the beginning of this year. I chose the obvious choice. I picked the people who were being hated on. I rarely talk to anyone from the group anymore, because I realize how they function now. They may not realize it, but I do. And it's stupid, like the semi-geeky table of guys at my junior high school who never branches out to any new friends. But they talk about their video games, and make the same tact-less jokes over and over until you get sick of them. I mean, sure, inside jokes are fun, but at some point YOU NEED TO TALK ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE. SOMETHING RELATABLE. Whether they notice it or not, they reflect a social failure. They fail at connecting with other people outside the group. They fail at realizing that judging people is wrong. They fail at recognizing that they are being followers, led by someone with a worldview that is greatly flawed and needlessly exclusive. And they fail at being their own individuals. <br /><br />The internet is also full of people like this. People who use the internet for socializing are often people who fail at meeting people face-to-face. And these are typically the same people who are too weak to take action in the case of being individuals and renouncing other people's judgments to determine who their friends are independently. And these are the people who don't know not to judge people and exclude them. And these are the people who create bullshit criteria of "what's cool" and "what's not cool" to judge whether or not to accept them as people. And so they call each other out on each other's character flaws, which aren't really flaws at all, and then they start fighting with each other. As this happens, the people like me who know not to judge people so harshly sit back chuckling with our metaphorical buckets of popcorn watching them tear each other apart. Either that, or you know, they just awkwardly cease to talk to each other. Actually, the last thing I just said is a lot more common. If people are too wimpy to make decisions independent of one another's, they're also too wimpy to tell each other off.<br /><br />People on the internet act very strangely. Cowards have an extreme advantage on the internet, because the interaction isn't face-to-face. You know, cowards. People who never let their true character shine because they're too afraid of other people's judgments. And they're afraid of other people's judgments either because they're just timid, or because their true character SUCKS and they know it. The people who's true character SUCKS and they know it include people who troll on the internet, people who drive aggressively, and people who go to sports games just to scream at and irritate the opposing team and its fans.<br /><br />The internet provides all sorts of opportunities for cowards. They can hide behind alternate identities, or even remain anonymous if they want. With this anonymity or false identity, they can do any manner of annoying, belligerent, and denigrating things to people without being recognized. There are people who LIVE to watch other people get pissed off. The internet is a harbor for people like that. We like to call them "trolls." But what we're really talking about is people who are cowards and who are looking to be detrimental in small ways to people so they can derive some sort of sick fucked-up satisfaction from it. It can be from poor treatment as a child, or from a lack of parenting, among other things. But no matter what the reason for this psychological malfunction, it's fucked up, it needs to stop, the people involved need to grow up, and it pisses me off.<br /><br />The people I was friends with in college included many people like this. It's kind of funny how all of these psychological immaturities come together in the same people. It's like they're all correlated.<br />Well, I'm going to bed. Let me know your thoughts on this, too.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-11558314260724422442009-11-20T22:52:00.001-08:002009-11-20T22:52:34.271-08:00Greetings, oh people who matter.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-47494205181003038522009-11-20T22:50:00.001-08:002009-11-20T22:51:44.500-08:00There were two girls. I hugged one of them. Then the other pretended to punch me in the face jokingly. But there's a subconscious reason for every action we do. She wanted one too. I think she digs me.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-11944477732138675682009-11-20T22:39:00.000-08:002009-11-20T22:40:13.125-08:00I'm fucking stupid.<br />I've been on this bus struggling to think of something to do to pass the time as I have my internet-less laptop and nothing to do, and in trying to excavate an idea from the far depths of my mind, I didn't think to write anything! I can write anything wherever I go; all I have to do to put it on the blog is copy and paste! DUH!<br />Whenever I first open my laptop, my immediate instinct is to click directly on Mozilla Firefox. I've done that at least twice so far, not even considering that there IS NO FUCKING INTERNET ON A BUS. I think I may have an addiction. Perhaps I need help.<br />I'm not sure why, but I ended up in a short traffic jam on Interstate 57, about 10 minutes south of Interstate 80. For some reason, there is a traffic jam at this location about half the time I pass by it, and it's not even a busy or heavily-populated area. I don't know what it is about that place that always gets it all jammed up. <br />I should have downloaded an arsenal of music to listen to on the bus as opposed to the smattering of a beat the douchewagon behind me is blasting through his headphones. They're probably ear-buds too. The ear-waxy kind.<br />I don't know how much literary merit these musings bear. I don't know how much I care about how much merit they have. I guess I do care somewhat. I DO need to manipulate these words in the best way that I can so that the thoughts that you think are in my head based on reading this match the actual thoughts I have in my head as closely as possible. So I weave and stretch and move and bang these words into place so that what's in my head ends up being very similar to what ends up in yours. The only problem is that there are infinitely many ways to do it.<br />There's an annoying kid three seats from the front who keeps asking stupid questions, the epitome of which is "Are we there yet?" I feel like responding, "DID YOU SEE THE BUS FUCKING STOP? 'NO?' WELL THAT MEANS WE AREN'T FUCKING THERE YET. USE YOUR TWO GODDAMN EYES."<br />In my desperation to find something on my computer to keep my attention, I found a folder I made called "Old mementos." (A couple of obnoxious Harley drivers sped past us just now. I hope they die. Anyway,) In this folder I found the products a tactic I've used to combat insufficient self-esteem that may come my way: conversations I've had on instant messengers with girlfriends I've had in the past.<br />Sometimes I feel like no one is capable of loving me--hey, we all do at times (for some, it's just more frequently than it is for others). But then I look back at the evidence I've recorded. Hell, you might actually like to try it yourself. It helps you to remember all of the wonderful things you've experienced in your life. <br />There are some conversations I've saved that are pretty much useless. I know I've had girls I've considered to be mistakes. You don't know until you try it, and I tried it...And it turned out like shit, for some of these girls. Those are the conversations that I don't care to look back on. Some of such conversations are in there. But there are others...MUCH better ones.<br />So I looked back at those. And I wondered what the hell happened to end all of them (because obviously I'm single now). Some were my fault, some were the girl's. But it's interesting to think about the passion that you felt, the passion that you know is real, and the passion that you thus must be capable of expressing in the future. Fuck, if I've done it before I can do it again. That gives me hope. I wonder if any of you do the same thing.<br />I should be arriving at the station now. Instead, I'm about 10 minutes away.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5109624046392953938.post-1894511718814749712009-11-19T23:47:00.000-08:002009-11-20T00:46:22.181-08:00It's too late. But my roommate isn't here, and I don't feel like going to sleep. Thus, I am going to write a bunch of shit in here again. I look back on some of my old posts and realize that HOLY FUCKING SHIT THEY'RE FUCKING HUGE. But you'll listen, won't you?<br /><br />Should I really care if you want to read all of the musings I write in here? I don't think so. Theodore Giesel p.k.a. "Dr. Seuss" once said, "say what you think, and do what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." If you give a fuck, you give a fuck. And if you don't give a fuck, you don't matter. And if you don't feel like reading this whole thing, I understand that it's a long investment of your time. So don't read all of it. If you do read all of it, I'll assume that A) You REALLY REALLY REALLY REALLY like reading, or B) You're obsessing over me and that creeps me out. Stop, please.<br /><br />There IS a girl I know who really really really likes reading. And she's amazing at it. She puts all of her kindergartener classmates to shame. I don't know if I should write her name on here, because there's a thing called confidentiality and I'm supposed to maintain it as required by my employers, whoever they are. A bunch of people who write a bunch of mandates on paper and give them to people who like killing trees. Whatever.<br /><br />She used to be shy around me. She thought I was intimidating. Here comes the guy over six feet tall. No one's really sure why he comes here. But he takes the kids outside, one-by-one, like the admitting room into a doctor's office. Not just any doctor's office--the kind with needles. Maybe he uses a syringe to stab kids in the forehead and inject liquid knowledge.<br /><br />The first time we read together, the first book we looked at wasn't a story. It was a series of words with a picture above it representing the word. Normally, what I'd do is ask the kids what some of the words were, and what letter it started with--we'd use it for letter sounds. THIS girl was reading every last word, breezing through with no mistakes. She went on to read some storybooks. Flawlessly. I was happy. Not only had I found someone whose skills were impressive-- I had found someone like me.<br /><br />I read Charlotte's Web front-to-back when I was three years old. That's what my mom tells me, anyway. I guess I sort of remember it? The English language was like a puzzle to me--a puzzle I HAD to solve. I wouldn't rest until I got it right.<br /><br />And now here's this girl. Way ahead of the rest of her class. I could tell she was bored. I had been in her position before. She had little opportunity to move ahead of her class, though she was very capable of doing so. She was bored, like a puppy in an enclosure in an animal shelter waiting for a home. I had to do something.<br /><br />Some carry iPods with them wherever they go, but I always have a notebook with me. I love to write, and I love to give my neverending thought a place to manifest itself in the real world. I like to explore things that can be seen on paper, like geometry, maps, songs, poems, prose, and whatever randomness that can be written. <br /><br />On the bus, where there are only strangers to potentially comfort me, I open my notebook and turn to a blank page. With a mechanical pencil in my hand, I sit there with my open notebook and I'm comfortable. I feel safe, safe from the danger of having ideas that spontaneously come to my head become lost forever because they were never written down. Sometimes I won't even write anything, but I'll just be sitting there, thinking. But I'm comfortable.<br /><br />When I go to the elementary school, I bring a bus schedule and one of my notebooks. I noticed that the smart girl was having trouble with words with double vowels, like "ea" and "ou" and "oa." So I wrote down some words in my notebook and asked her to read them. If her class wasn't going to lead her to make progress, I certainly was going to try to.<br /><br />As we read more and more, she began to like it more and more. She felt like she could finally be free to be herself, as opposed to trying to dumb herself down to someone she wasn't while she was in the classroom. I know what it's like to be confident about what you can do, and feeling like showing the world what you can do. I want all the kids I tutor to feel that, including her.<br /><br />Now, she's all smiles around me. She waves, and we actually have somewhat of intelligent conversations. Yes, intelligent conversations, and she's only six (or almost six). I say this because she structures her sentences intelligently and carefully. And when she expresses friendship toward me, I feel that it's because I did something for her.<br /><br />I'm just glad I could help someone and that I could do it well.Paulhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16032028037146612053noreply@blogger.com0