Returning in Style (or Trying)

Anyone you ask who knows me well could probably tell you I’m a jeans and t-shirt girl.  There’s not much to my fashion beyond that and when I went to SPU for my freshman year (a year ago now) I often felt like a total scrub in comparison to some of the other girls there.  I’ve never been one to really care about what others thought of me fashion wise and I paraded through the year in my jeans and my t-shirts and my sweatshirts and sweatpants.

I even wore a pair of plaid pajama pants to class one morning and then to lunch and I got a ton of compliments from different guys about how cool they were.  I’m pretty sure the girls thought I was out of my mind though and after that I didn’t wear them out in public anymore. 

I didn’t realize how into fashion Seattle is in general and after a certain amount of time I got to the point when I decided I kind of wanted to look really cute some days too.  Sure, I dressed up really nicely if I ever went on a date with Will or out somewhere special with friends, but otherwise I didn’t really bother very much.  At least in my mind I hardly tried. 

When spring in Seattle hit it was as if the clouds were producing sundresses instead of raindrops since they seemed adorn every girl on campus.  The few sundresses I owned had been left at home since I had no idea that 70 degrees in Seattle was basically considered sundress weather, or summer for that matter. 

Let’s just say I finally decided it was time to add some clothing improvements to my closet.  This summer I bought a new pair of boots, some new jeans, new cardigans, scarfs, and lots of different things that could be layered.  I even bought some new dresses!  My mom spent a lot of time shopping with me this morning and she helped me pick new things out.  I had a lot of fun spending some time with her before I head off to school and even she bought a new sweater for the fall. 

I feel like I’m ready to return to Seattle in style.  Sure, I’m going to have a lot of days when I dress like my casual self and forget what the word makeup means but at least I know I’ll have options if I ever feel like looking cute.  (It seems like people hardly recognize me when I really try, which makes me laugh a little.) 

One more day of packing tomorrow and then I’m returning to my college home! 

Time & a Fishbowl

I realize I’ve been a terrible liar.  Every time I say I’m ready to write, I don’t.  I think it’s partially because I’ve put too much pressure on myself to keep my blog going, which has worked negatively and caused me to say pretty much nothing.  And of course life happens and sometimes I’m just not good about leaving time for myself to open a blank word document so that my words can flow.

So, no more promises and no more saying “I will” or “I won’t”.  I’ll write when I can and I have no idea when that will be.    

At the beginning of my freshman year of college, a year ago now, I started my blog.  It’s incredibly hard to believe that everything went that fast.  Looking back it was as if I snapped my fingers and transferred myself to now.  Freshman year was wonderful and full of new learning experiences and a completely new life.  This year I’m going back to something I already know and long for, which makes me almost more excited than before. 

I’m in the same spot again, trying to pack and wrap things up before I leave, but this time most of my things are waiting there for me and I’ll have to pick them up along the way.  I told my mom yesterday that it’s going to be like Christmas because I don’t remember half of what I actually packed in all those boxes.  As I open them I’ll start to rediscover bits and pieces of my college life from last year, and somehow I will reassemble those to help me start this year.

I’m going to be rooming with one of my best friends from my floor this year and we have already talked a little bit about how we are designing our room.  Believe me, it is going to be amazing once we actually move in and organize things, but at the moment we aren’t entirely sure how it is all working out.  I’ve been crafty this summer and I’ve made magazine coasters and wall hangings that will hopefully help add to the aura of our room.  

My room at home is once again littered with bags that I’m shoving everything in to.  It seems like I managed to collect a decent amount of things to take back with me to school this year.  For example, I’m taking a fishbowl.  (Most of you are thinking, why take a fishbowl when you can buy one up there?  Well, it just so happens I like this one and that’s exactly what I told my mom when she asked me that question.  She said I’m going to have a problem taking a suitcase of glass up to Seattle, since I’m also taking some mason jars as well… I’m not a hipster but I think they’re cool.) Anyway, I want a fish in my room this year and my future roomie said that’s fine as long as I’m the one cleaning it. 

In all honestly, I’m a little bit scatter brained right now trying to keep track of everything that I need to do… and then I remembered that it’s been almost a year since I started blogging and I thought to myself, why not take some time to write?

There’s always a little bit of time to spare.   

Taking the Back Roads

Today I learned something about myself.

I learned that I love to take the back roads.  I do everything I can to avoid the highway.  I’d rather roam through the countryside in my suburban for an extra hour than blaze through the land and arrive at my destination in a timely fashion.  The highway can be convenient in some situations, but in most it has become tiresome and annoying.

I love driving the long way, through the neighborhoods with the cute old fashioned houses that all have a porch swing, along endless fields of grass, down roads I didn’t know existed.  I love all of that.

I like to take time to looks at things and observe, and the highway moves too quickly for me to get the chance.  All you see is pavement and the fronts and backs of hundreds of cars cutting across lanes or tailing other people.  Not to mention the countless people as of late who have left their blinker on for miles after changing lanes. 

What happened to everyone wanting to move so quickly from place to place?  Everyone has somewhere to go and hardly anyone ventures of the road to take another way.

If I were to plan a road trip it would be a ROAD trip, not a highway trip or a race across the country.  I like stopping to take pictures and sight see.  Sure, I can’t get everywhere without taking the oh-so-big-stretch-of-cement every once in a while but I’ve discovered that I don’t need to take it as much. 

Bring on the cute houses, flower gardens, mailboxes, and picket fences.  Some days I just like to take it slow.  

An Abundance of Sweaters

This entire week I’ve been in process of moving back in.  I’m not anywhere close to being finished, but I am slowly and surely starting to get it done.  I have a lot of things to sort through in my room since my sister redid the room while I was gone and most of my things were put in plastic tubs.  I love how the new room looks, but I have to decide what I want to keep and what I should probably get rid of.

Yesterday I finally had the opportunity to do laundry.  Walking downstairs to the laundry machine and throwing things in without paying quarters was heavenly!  At school quarters were pretty much gold—if I ever found one it went directly into the laundry fund.  By the end of yesterday I had done $5.25 in laundry for free.  To be precise, that would be 3 washes and 3 dries worth of money. 

In the midst of laundry I realized something peculiar.  It seems like a lot of the clothing items I brought back are sweatshirts.  What was I thinking?  It’s been in the 80s and 90s since I got back and all I’ve worn are shorts and tank tops.  I could have gotten away with bringing only 2 or 3 sweatshirts back, but I probably brought closer to 10.  Right next to all my sweatshirts were several pairs of jeans, which I haven’t worn yet either.

Then it hit me.  I’m more used to the weather in Seattle than Colorado.  That just proves I haven’t been home in quite some time, and I’ve now realized how different the weather is between my two states. 

In Seattle it’s all about the layers.  In Colorado you have short sleeve shirts, long sleeve shirts, and sleeveless shirts.  And in the winter you have one giant winter jacket.  Otherwise, forget wearing more than one piece of clothing over the other.  (It was in Seattle that I finally understood what a cardigan was.)

Looks like all my sweatshirts and jackets are going to be hanging out in the closest for a while, which is totally fine with me.      

Ready to be Back

(Written 2 nights ago--finally got a chance to post it!)

When I don’t play the piano for a long time I get an itching sensation in my fingers.  It’s as if I can feel the end of them tingling, telling me that it’s time to touch the ivory keys, telling me it’s time to produce music.

I’ve had that same sensation in my fingers for two months, except this time it’s been in regards to writing.  For two months I have been blogging in my head, but not once did I touch the letters on my computer to actually write.  Now it’s near midnight, I’m in a small town so close to Canada that I don’t receive cell phone service, and I suddenly had the urge to pull out my computer and write. 

This past quarter I wrote countless papers, personal essays, and stories for classes but not once did I write for myself.  I reached a point when it was too hard—it’s not that I did have anything to say, but nothing that I had to say was making it’s way onto paper.  Some of what I had to say I couldn’t share with the whole world either. 

Blogging is like journaling, but what I write needs to be censored.  If I share all of myself with the world I won’t have anything left and I think I needed to keep some of my feelings to myself.  Spring quarter was full of emotional ups and downs for me, like turbulence on an airplane or an earthquake—completely unpredictable.  I couldn’t write about trivial things that are fun to share when so much of me was bursting with heavy emotions that took time for me to sort through. 

Long story short, I’ve made it through that and now I’m here.  Now it is finally summer and I’m once more ready to pick up where I left off.  I’ve missed the color scheme of my blogging page, not even joking. 

I’m ready to be back.

To those of you who have so patiently waited, thank you.

I hope you enjoy reading what I have to say just as much as you did before.  

An Apology

I must apologize for my terrible lack of blogging lately.

I promise I am not done, it just seems that lately I haven't had much to say, or if I do I don't know how to go about saying it.

Most of my writing energy is going into my Imaginative Writing and Christian Formation class, so writing for myself has been absurdly difficult.

I don't like it at all.  Not one bit.

So please be patient with me, and keep your eyes open for the next time I write.  I know many of you have expressed that you miss reading my blogs and, believe me, I miss writing them.

Once I write again I know my heart will be lighter.  I'm hoping it will be soon.

Thank you for all of your support!

Email questions or comments to nomercyformosquitoes@gmail.com

Well, That Was Embarrassing

There is so much I could write about.  So much!  I could talk about my weekend and playing laser-tag with my floor, or I could talk about being sick, or I could bring up conversations with my mom on the phone, or I could shout for joy about how I ate a full plate of food today for the first time in 5 days!  The possibilities are quite endless.

Instead, I thought I would tell you one of my most embarrassing moments so far this school year. 

Yesterday morning I had a class at 9:30am.  Needless to say, I wasn’t wide-awake and I wasn’t feeling very well since I had spent the weekend being sick and feeling incredibly fatigued.  I spend most of the class slowly eating a banana and trying to get some protein into my body. 

My UFND class is all about the Christian faith, and we are currently starting to investigate the different divisions of the faith such as Lutheran, Baptist, Protestant, etc.  At one point during the class the girl next to me, Sammy, raised her hand to make a comment.  Sammy is the Teacher’s Assistant in my class, which means she is the sophomore that answers the freshman’s questions about work in the class while also helping the professor grade our classwork.  She also happens to be one of the girls on my floor, so I know her fairly well. 

Anyway, Sammy raised her hand and Professor Drovdahl called on her.  I’m sure she was saying something quite profound, but considering what happened during the next instance I don’t really remember any of it.  I had just taken my hair out of the bun I had put it in earlier that morning and was going to redo it.  The chair I was sitting in had a back that would bend when I leaned back.  I’ve talked about these kinds of chairs before in Chair Paranoia. 

As Sammy was talking, everyone was looking at her, which meant I was the next closest person that they could have been looking at.  Trust me, the next instance they were definitely looking at me as the left side of my bendy-chair completely snapped, causing me to throw myself forward in order to keep from smashing my head against the wall behind me. 

The Professors face went wide-eyed and so did everyone else’s and during the brief silence that followed and I had enough time to say, “My chair just broke.”  During the laughter that followed I tried to regain my composure from my near falling-out-of-my-chair experience.  I was laughing as well and thinking that I must have looked like an absolute fool. 

Somewhere during that time the professor cracked another joke and everyone was laughing again.  I didn’t actually hear it considering I still had a ton of adrenaline running through my body.  (I was told later it was something about how I shouldn’t eat such an energizing breakfast, a comment resulting from the fact I had propelled myself forward very quickly when my chair broke.)  I just smiled and laughed.  Sarah told me later that I covered it up pretty well.  I guess my few years in Theatre actually paid off.  

At the end of class the professor said goodbye to me by name, and patted me on the back.  I’m sure he’ll never forget my name now.  I’m sure none of the class will forget either.

Later, when I was talking to Will and a couple of other guys in their hallway, Danny (who has UFND with me) walked past us and said, “Hey Will, your girlfriend’s chair broke in class today.  It was absolutely hilarious!”  So of course I had to tell the story and all the guys were laughing at me.

I can say that the instance was literally a “jump-start” to my day. 

I think it’s about time for SPU to invest in some new chairs.