On being a Senior

With the good comes the bad, I guess.

On Classes:

What can I say? I am afraid to say they are kind of easy because I am sure they will get harder, but right now they are. Seriously, with my schedule, you'd think I would have mounds of homework every night, but I have barely had any homework all week. Oh, well, though, I am sure that time will come.

On Status:

Sweet! It is so nice being the top of the food chain. I like being able to say, "Pfft, I'm a Senior." and acting better than the Freshman. Seniority if very cool. Plus, teachers favor Seniors. I hated that when I was an underclassman, but now I savor it.

On Feeling:

In some ways I feel like a Senior, and in some ways I don't. Obviously I feel the pressure of impending college and the good things mentioned above, but I also feel more. At any given moment, actually most of the time when I am in the hallways, I think about how I viewed Seniors when I was in Younger grades. Elementary: Whoa! Those guys are so cool and really big. Higher Elementary: Wow, still cool, and big. I just want to grow up. Junior High: Wow, they are cool, hey, he is cute. Freshman: Stupid Seniors! Grr. Sophomore: They aren't as cool as they think they are. Junior: Wow, they seem so mature. Is my class ever going to grow up and be that mature? Well, now that I'm a Senior, that is what I think about. Do I live up to expectations set before us? Am I setting a good role model for the kids?

Welcome back to school

Yes, the school year has started and you know what that means. Okay, if you don't, it means that I have less time to post thought provoking, interesting, entertaining, sometimes humourus, always important, entries. I am sorry. I am very very busy. Unless I have the unavoidable urge to put off mounds of homework, like I am doing right now, I will only post around once a week. Again, I regret this, so if I have something intelegent to say I won't hold back if I can help it.

So, I think my Internet is messed up.

Alright, Dylan, oh Computer Wiz, help me out if you can. For one, every time I go to the Google Homepage and type something in the search box, something happens, usually something invovling opening the File folder or a change settings window. This just started happeneing, it never used to happen. I don't know what the problem is. Next, if I go to my favorites folder, like I do faithfully, several times a day, and I click on another blog or a website, I will get a page that is out of date. For example, today (today!!!) my pages updated so that I could read everyones most recent posts. Krissy's post that I had been seeing was the one that started "Um, yeah, update." Dylan: Kraft, to be or not to be...Kaia: the one about you books, where you still hadn't finished Frank. So, if anyone can help me with that please, please, do. It is driving me up a wall.

P.S. Thanks for the solicitor blocker.

Why I cried during Catcher in the Rye

I understood it, on a crazy, weird level. Holden wants to avoid growing up. He nearly hates the world around him, society and all. He hates the phoniness. The phoniness! He thinks kids are gold. In a way he is like Ponyboy from The Outsiders. But anyway, I think I cried during some of the parts because I identified with him. I don't want to grow up! I wish kids could stay young forever. I hate phony people. I just posted about that! Whatever though, I just though I'd let you know.

So it ends...so it begins

I wish I could have been a junior forever. That was a good year. Sure, a little stressful at times, but all around, it was fun. The classes were for the most part enjoyable, the people: the same. It was everything Senior year promises to be, without the pressure of planning for my future.

Summer has come and passed

The innocent can never last

Wake me up when September ends

Like my fathers come to pass

Seven years has gone so fast

Wake me up when September ends

Wake me up when September ends. I know that this year will not be all bad. In fact, I am looking forward to it. What I am not looking forward to is venturing out into the real world. The innocent can never last. Yeah, that is true. Boy, I never realized what high school was going to be like. I am a sheltered kid. I still want to hold on to my childhood. I didn't realize what I had while I had it. Now it is almost gone.

I solemnly swear that I am not going to let the pressure of society conform me into who they want. I will be my own person. I will stand up for my principles. I will succeed, but I will not become obsessed with success. I will not stress over the small things. I will try not to stress over the big things. I will not worry about my future. I will plan for it. I will not be single minded. I will look at the possibilities. I won't judge myself. I especially won't compare myself to other people. I will be myself. I will be a good friend, daughter and sister. I will trust and be trusted. I will show compasion. I will have faith. I will not be afraid. I will enjoy my last year of high school.

People and how I dislike asking them for help when I know I can do something better than them or am to proud to ask them for help in the first place

Here are several more titles this post could be called:

People and how I don't trust them to do things

People and how they are incompetent

People and how they drive me nuts

Me and how I just want to scream

If you haven't already noticed, I am a little on edge. This is partly because I have had a couple espressos and partly because I just got home from a very stressful three and a half hour shift at my job. I apologize in advance for my cynicism.

I discovered today that I really don't like asking for help. There are different situations to this though. One situation, for example, is when there are a lot of things to do at work and there is a very very very very slow guy (who, for the sake of anonymity we will can Big Q) working with me. Now, to paint you a picture, when I say slow, I mean he is lost-to-a-turtle-in-the-hundred-yard-dash-by-one-hundred-yards slow. Trust me, that is slow. Plus, he isn't even very good at the jobs it takes him an hour to do. It isn't even like he is slow in a good everything-he-does-is-perfect kind of way. Anyway, basically I won't ask him to do things that would help me because I know that I can get the things done better and with more efficiency than him, even though this makes me very angry and stressed out. Another situation that this little issue arises in is when I know I can do something just as well as someone else, even though I could probably use the help. I, I think, like to prove that I can do things. This happens, actually, quite a bit when I do homework. I know that if I ask for help from a teacher, or a human encyclopedia, that I will figure out what I am doing much quicker than if I try to do it myself, but alas, I don't ask because I am to stubborn and proud to. Now, when I do ask for help it is usually because of one of two reasons. One being I gave up and concieted that I need help in figuring something out. Two is that I am just being lazy and would appreciate someone else doing it for me. The later doesn't happen that often, and when it does it is a work, so Kaia, Audrey, you can't get out of helping me with stuff by saying I am just being lazy.

Now that I have vented and release some of my anger, I feel better. My hands are still shaking, but it is now because of the caffeine.

Unintelligent meanderings

Well, I had something incredibly thought provoking to say. I thought of it while I was working today. I even thought to myself wow, two intelligent posts in as many days. But, alas, it was not meant to be because I forgot what was so memorable. I thought that if I started typing...haha. What I had been typing was "I though that if I started typing, then what I had been thinking would come back to me." Well, lucky for you, it did, right when I was typing that sentence. So, instead of reading something unintelligent, you will get to ponder over these next profound thoughts. A guy came into work today to get his usual coffee. He comes in a couple times a week. He lives just down the block. I over heard him talking one day (about the Twins, believe it or not) and I vaguely mentioned the conversation to my mom. She said she knew who I was talking about. She said he grew up as a really close friend of my uncle. Well, this guy came in today. I started with my customary greeting and then said "Is your name Joe?" (That is what my mom said it was.) He said that it was and we started talking about how he used to hang out with my uncle. He said he thought it was crazy, because he used to be really close to my uncle and then after high school, they just kind of separated. Oh, no, he said, I guess there were the couple years of college, when everyone came home for Thanksgiving. We still hung out then, but once we hit 25, that was it. He went on to ask about my family, where his old friend was now, and what about my other uncle? Doesn't he still live in Hutch? As Joe was getting his coffee he asked if I was still in school. I dutifully responded that I was going to be a Senior. "Oh, so you'll be going through that all this year, huh?" I hope not. Really. I know that hardly anyone ever stays friends after high school, but then what were all those years? I like the friends I have now. I want to keep them. Seriously.

Fake people and how they bug me

I know a lot of people who come into where I work. Some of them I know because they are regulars, some because they are teachers, some are friends of my parents, some are kids at my school. I have to say that one of my biggest pet peeves is fake people. People with their false smiles, their forced laughter, their meaningless conversations. Countless members from my class at school enter to order overpriced coffee. They see me and don their expressions of surprised recognition. "Hey! How have you been?!? How's your summer been going?" they ask, as if they know me, as if they care. What can I do? In my head I think what I want to say. I don't think I've talked to you since 5th grade. And I think that was because we were doing a class project in teacher-picked groups. It is nice that you've taken such an interest in my life. Would you remember my name if it wasn't on my nametag? But, I confess, I could not actually be that mean. I wish I could be though. Then I wouldn't be forced to answer in the sickeningly sweet voice that I hate, with my own smile that doesn't reach my eyes. "Hey! I've been really busy working. Haha. Yeah. Oh, my summer is going well. And how's yours going?" even though I don't care. It wouldn't be so bad, I wouldn't mind it near as much, if these people were people who talked to me at school. They don't even have to be my friends. A simple "Hey" would do when we are the only two in the hallway. But these are the same people who I could sit next to in three different classes and they would ignore me. What actually brought this chain of thoughts on was on girl in my class who came in to work the other day. She is in my class, and has been for as long as I can remember. She came in and ordered. She didn't ask questions that she didn't care the answers to. As much as I dislike her (for her morals, actions, etc) I admire the fact that she did not feel the need to act as though she knew me at all. I don't know if I am the only one who thinks this way, who hates artificial people. I am probably the only one who even thinks about it.

Apparently, how I am more apt to trust others before I trust myself

I have a general disposition to trust everyone. It doesn't really matter who. Everyone starts 100% trusted with me. They work their way down, not up. If someone did something that made me lose trust in them, then their percent drops. This plague actually stems from the need to find something good in every person. But, as I learned today, people can't be trusted. No siree. You want trust from me? Take it somewhere else, Bob. From now on, you start at the bottom. You have to build your trust. You do something that is trustworthy, your points go up. Not before. So, I guess you could say I had a general deposition to trust people. So long to that. You may be wondering what brought this on. Well, let me paint you picture. It was a cloudy day, exactly like today, because it was today. It was humid. The door was open at the Larkspur Market, the atmosphere: welcoming. It was about 4:00 pm (for Dylan: 16:00.) It had just started to get busy. We are training new people in there, so it was a little hectic. I waited on a guy (a big guy, 6 feet tall at least, 300 pounds, give or take because I don't know how to tell weight, light brown skin, long straggley black hair, nasty body odor) who had a red shirt on. He ordered two scoops of ice cream, to go, in a dish. Lori, my manager, set his ice cream down on the counter and went to wait on someone else. I took his money. He paid me in a one hundred dollar bill. (On a side note, don't you hate people who pay for something that cost $2 with such big bills?) I counted out his change in my hand, twice. I always count it twice to myself before I hand it over. As I started counting it out in his hand, he waved me off and just took it. Whatever, I thought to myself. I assumed he watched me count it in my hand, so he knew it was all there. He then asked for a lid for his bowl of ice cream. Being the helpful person I am, I went to get it for him. "There you go," I replied cheerfully, as I handed him his lid. "Have a nice day." I'll bet he had a nice day, the jerk. After he got his stupid lid he said I short changed him forty dollars. That put me on the spot a little, so I momentarily froze. I didn't know what to do. I knew I gave him the right amount. I counted it. Twice. By then Lori came back and asked what the problem was. I obligingly told her and she had me give him forty more dollars. Being the trustworthy idiot I am, I did, without a fuss, after all, I probably made a mistake. It was busy, I was flustered. Mistakes happen. He left. We finished our rush. I went to talk to Lori. I'm not stupid. I know the difference between forty dollars and eighty. Hello? If I did short change him, it would not have been by forty dollars. Twenty, maybe, but not forty. Well, anyway, to make a long story short. I was right. I gave him the right amount of change the first time. He walked away with and extra $37.86 and a free double scoop Strawberry Cheesecake ice cream, the dirty animal. The police came and questioned us about him, after Lori counted out the till and realized that we got jipped. I feel like an idiot. Seriously, why didn't I trust my gut enough to know, right away, that he was lying? He slipped the two twenties in his pocket while my back was turned and then said I short changed him. Me and my stupid "Everyone is good, they can all be trusted" motto for life. Darn it. That is still my stupid motto, too. I still trust everyone. (Obviously within reason. I won't get into a stranger's car etc, etc.) You can take it somewhere else, Bob, if you want to, but I will still trust you. You can hoodwink me. I will fall for it, because I believe you are an honest person.

Dream Big

Dream Big
Ryan Shupe & The Rubberband

When you cry, be sure to dry your eyes,
'Cause better days are sure to come.
And when you smile, be sure to smile wide,
And don't let them know that they have won.
And when you walk, walk with pride,
And don't show the hurt inside,
Because the pain sill soon be gone.

And when you dream, dream big,
As big as the ocean, blue.
'Cause when you dream it might come true.
But when you dream, dream big.

And when you laugh, be sure to laugh out loud,
'Cause it will carry all your cares away.
And when you see, see the beauty all around and in yourself,
And it will help you feel okay.
And when you pray, pray for strength to help to carry on,
But when the troubles come your way.

And when you dream, dream big,
As big as the ocean, blue.
'Cause when you dream it might come true.
But when you dream, dream big.

When you cry be sure to dry your eyes,
cause better days are sure to come.
And when you smile be sure to smile wide,
and don't let them know that they have won.
And when you laugh be sure to laugh out loud,
'Cause it will carry all your cares away.
And when you see, see the beauty all around and in yourself,
and it will help you feel okay.
And when you pray, pray for strength
to help to carry on when the troubles come your way.