inconsummate

new semester, new opportunities.  right?  right.

well, at least i hope so.

it's really cold, and the heater doesn't work, and the guy who was supposed to come attempt to fix it did not, and the company said they're booked next week.  so i'm looking at at least another week of no heating, which is really, really cold and really, really blows.  at least the electricity bill will be cheap.

i feel sorry for people who have something happen in their lives that causes them to lose a part of themselves.  i know of two different people who had to give up not just a part of themselves, but probably a LOT of themselves, just so that they could keep on living.  both of these people had friends near and dear to their heart taken from them by a cruel twist of fate, and now they can't open themselves up quite like they used to.  well, at least i can get through to one of them now.  the other is one of my better friends' best friend, so i trust he's in good hands one way or another.  i just bring this up because i was talking about these kinds of people just a minute ago.

i don't know what else to write, really.  i went to my classes yesterday and today, and i'm not really sure what to think about this semester.  most of the classes weren't as bad as i was expecting them to be, which i suppose i should be thankful for, but all i have to go on so far as the professor's ability to present a syllabus.  even in spite of this simple task, i'm starting to think that dropping one of these classes is potentially going to be a good idea.  i just don't know how i'll be able to justify it to my mom without her going ballistic on me for not taking enough units... despite the fact that i'll still graduate at LEAST a semester early, and the only backing she has is that she wants me to 'put my maximum spirit into it' and i'm like lol, since when do i do that?  simultaneously, she's concerned about my lack of sociability and harasses me about it constantly.  well, bitch, do you want me to try to get a social life or do you want to swamp me with work?  unfortunately, i am not superman, nor do i want to be.  i don't think i'm even capable of getting a social life in the first place, add work on top of that and you have a really good out or demotivator.  or both.

well, i can't please everyone.  guess the most important thing here is to keep MYSELF happy, and i wish the solution to that problem would just fall out of the sky so i could focus on keeping other people happy so we could live happily ever after.  lol pun.

Literally.  40 degrees?  pls holy god save me from the cold

I go back to Tucson sometime at the end of this week.  It's been a really unadventurous adventure.  I think the most exciting thing I did was go to the mall.  But, back at home, usually the most exciting thing I do is just go to class.  So I suppose I shouldn't really downplay my time here as uneventful when I don't really do anything at home, either.  Regardless, I've been pretty bored.

I don't really know what to say.  Same old, Same old, I'm down in the dumps with no foothold to climb back up and I don't have a grappling hook or Navi to guide me.

It's funny that I pick up making it a habit to post in this journal fairly frequently out of nowhere, but I'm sure I'll forget about it again soon enough.  Maybe, one of these days, I'll look through ALL my old entries and try to explain to myself, in text, how I feel I've gone through life.  I mean, just at a glance, my typing style is drastically different from back in early 2000 when I still spent most of my time talking to Sarah.  Moof.  (I almost miss saying that)

But that's sort of time consuming, and by sort of, i mean 'really fucking,' so I probably won't go to that extreme.  Still, maybe I'll make myself a reflection based off of my memorial recollection.

either way, now is the time for bed, not for thinking.

I'm not sure what to do with myself here.  I'm not in a bad position, in fact, I'm probably in one of the best positions I'm going to be in for the rest of my life.  But I've already fucked it up so much, and it doesn't seem like there's anything pushing me in the right direction.  It's demoralizing, and I didn't have very much morale to begin with.

I'm tired.  It seems I am a lot, recently.  You know what that means?  It's not time for bed, it means I feel like shit.  The worst part is, I don't call myself on it until I start getting the urge to go take a nap.  Then I realize, I'm not actually tired, I'm just depressed.  Sleeping's a temporary cure for that, sure, but half the time I wake up more tired than I was before I laid down and then I never want to get back up.  Then I start that nonsense I had last year where I'd go to bed at 8 PM and wake up at 2-3 AM.  It didn't really do much, since even in the face of depression I can't force myself to sleep more than 8-10 hours.

My mom reminded me of my roommate today.  I'd almost forgotten about him... when I'm at my apartment, it's like he's not there.  He's got his door closed, and at first I started leaving mine mostly open in case he wanted to talk to me.. but I slowly just did what he did and closed my door, too; and I'm back to where I started with me, myself, and I.  I question constantly how I'm able to keep on going.

I feel trapped within myself.  I want to burst out, to be free to be with others, to let my heart chase after its own dream... but I can't.  And I have no reason not to, I just...can't.  It's pathetic.  I give myself shit for it, I try to coerce myself out of it, I try to coerce myself into thinking it's not a big deal, I try to work in spite of it, and nothing ever happens.  I end up here, by myself, in my fucking room, talking to people I'll never see face to face.

This is why I turn to my dreams.  I think, what if i hadn't said no?  What if I'd mustered the courage to tell him - and he'd said "Me too?" What if I'd been born a completely different person... someone who was actually capable of being happy with themselves.  It's not that I'm completely unhappy with myself, there are a few things here and there that I'm glad I did, or went through with.

But for the most part, that's just me trying to convince myself that it's not so bad because I'm still alive and breathing and I still have a chance.  I was going to say that my academic knowledge is something I'm proud of, but it's not.  It's useless in a lot of situations, and I paid a hefty price to get it.  I wish I could go into the past and force myself to give up knowledge for human interaction.  Maybe I could have lead a happier life.  Maybe I could have pushed through to say I love you, and get my god damn happy ending after all.  Maybe not.

But maybe one day, yeah?  If I can't at least hold onto that, then there's nothing left.

I think I'll go back and make everything public.  There's nothing to hide here except my feelings, and hiding those are half the reason I'm so miserable.

I don't know where I'm going with this, but I want to be able to come back to it, so I'm going to write it anyway.  That's the thing with me and journals, I've had so many... I think my livejournals date back to 2002 or 2003; it's a good thing i keep friending my old journals so i can find them later.  I can see how I've come to be the person I am, even though I'm rather reflective and I'm usually aware of how I'm growing at any given moment anyway.  Unfortunately, there are a lot of things I wish hadn't happened or things that I wish I hadn't done or things I wish I hadn't failed to do.

I'm not the happiest of people.  Really, I never have been, and I never really have had a lot of reason to be.  I'm not going to sit here and cut myself like my sister is doing up in her room and then showing it off to people and saying she's ~emo~ ~never happy ending.  No, I know better than that, and for that reason all I can do is turn to my hopes and dreams.  They're the only things that have been keeping me going all these years, it's probably a good thing that I'm a really avid daydreamer.

I play it over and over in my head, "You know how when people are talking about death they always somehow get around to the topic of regrets?" I'd say, and he'd answer, "Yeah?" "Well, I was thinking about it, and I think my biggest regret was telling you no."

Now, this never happened.

This poor kid, Graham, was a good friend of mine in middle school.  We hung out, fucked, and confided our development in one another.  And then one day, he asked me to be his.  I said no, that's just your cock talking.  I probably wasn't wrong, but if there's one thing I regret, it's not taking advantage of the opportunity he gave me.  The kid's dad went on to die two years later, and then he got expelled from school for dealing drugs.  I feel guilty - if I hadn't turned him down, or if I had gone to the funeral, or if i had done SOMETHING to try to keep with him... maybe, just maybe, i could have stopped him from going over the edge like that.  Maybe we could have had a happy ending.  I can't say it's all my fault, I tried to get a hold of him September '06... but his mom was practically begging to hang up on me.  I guess she didn't want to tell me that he was probably still in jail, or still getting over that trauma, or whatever.  But I never tried again, and I regret that too.

I still want to try to do what I can for him... I don't want to give up just yet.  But, fuck, it's hard.  I have all this reason to back up my lack of spine to get up and try to DO something, but I just can't.  I don't even play a 'what if this goes wrong scenario' in my head, I just can't do it.  It's just because I'm a filthy coward, and I wish there was something I could do to combat that.  I guess I'm just looking for the easy way out, for someone to help me get over this.. but no one's going to swoop in and be my hero.  I don't have anyone to even tell this to who'd give a shit, or be able to tell me anything, so I'm pretty much just telling myself by posting it here.  Maybe if I keep wallowing in self-pity I'll eventually get fed up with my own bullshit?

Probably not, if I'm able to talk to myself about it like this.

It just seems so hopeless, like there's nothing I can do to stop myself from ... well, stopping myself.  And then all I've got left to hold onto to keep myself sane are the hopes and dreams that maybe, one day, I really can come home from my shitty job and just curl up with the best thing that's ever happened to me.

But, given the rate I'm heading, the best thing that's ever happened to me is probably going to just be a dog.

But maybe there's solace even in just that.

I think it's gonna be okay.  I mean, I'm not naive enough to say that it will be beyond the shadow of a doubt but things are looking pretty good.

I guess they have been for a long time in more than the immediate sense I am talking about but I just think it's gonna be okay.  I hope my expectations are met.

I can't say I haven't done anything wrong to deserve a scott (scot?) free life though.  But sometimes you just kinda wonder some things that just add up or slap you in the face all at once that you can't necessarily do anything about that you wish you could.  It's pretty bullshit, too.

I never did talk to Garrett.  I wish I could have, and I haven't necessarily given up yet.  This is one of the times where I wonder what the fuck happened in my personality.  Once you bring the person to me it's easier for me to talk to them, but getting them to me is the problem.  For some reason it's absolutely nervewrecking and horrifying to decide to message someone that i don't necessarily know personally without some sort of valid reason / excuse.  Just wanting to talk to them isn't a valid excuse.  I don't get it, and I wish I wasn't like this.

I have told this journal before, I believe, that I've only really got one friend, Michelle.  Michelle hasn't necessarily been the best of friends to me, seeing as I confide a grand total of jack squat in her since the way she operates would generate the 'get the fuck over it' or 'nobody fucking cares' response, in spite of her being a pretty good person.  She just doesn't get in tune with other people's problems, I guess.  That's not a quality a lot of people have.  But anyway, she's a nice girl, and she really loves her mom.  She used to have an older sister, too, but her sister died before I even met her.  I don't even know what happened or how old she was, since it really isn't anything they like to talk about.  I think I've seen her picture on top of their fireplace once, but I can't really be sure since I didn't really want to ask and bring up bad memories, since I saw it on Michelle's birthday.  But anyway, the purpose of the preface of her attachment to her mom and the rest of her family is that today she and her mom went to the doctor.  Her mom got some sort of general scan I guess, while Michelle was there for an ultrasound because she was complaining about lower stomach pain.  I don't know how Michelle's tests went, since she skipped that and mentioned her mom first - her mom has four tumors.  Lungs, Adrenal Glands (near the kidneys,) on the base of the skull, and near her spine.  The only thing she didn't know was whether or not any of the tumors were malignant, but what with having four and all, the chances of none of them being malignant are pretty slim.  She's already lost her sister, and now she's probably gonna lose her mom, or at least have the family impacted financially for medical expenses.  They're far from rich, although they aren't exactly poor, but they were probably having a hard time mustering the cash to send Michelle to community college, and she was planning to go to university this coming spring.  I didn't really want to ask about that either, but you better be damned sure that if her mom has to undergo some sort of surgery/surgeries for any reason the whole family is probably going to be in deep financial trouble.

I don't even know what to add to this.  The whole experience of this summer school is sort of bringing me down as I get closer to real university in the fall, too, since I get more and more concerns about what's really going to end up happening.

I wish I had someone to hold me sometimes.  All I've got are my dreams.

This will be the first serious entry I've made in this thing in quite a while.  I guess these kinds of moments where I just need to talk to someone is what I made this thing for this time around.

I just think it's funny that I'm sitting here and I could probably play this entire song, albeit only on the piano as I've never played any other instrument, and I sit here and I never let my voice's tone die out completely... if it's got lyrics and it's in my range, I'll probably sing it.  I'm not amazing at it, but I had a fair bit of practice with an instructor in a choiresque thing when I was a kid, so I'm not terrible, either.  Now the funny part about it is that I'm actually rather fond of it.  I like the way the music flows, portraying its own emotions.  It's almost like it's alive.  It's an art form.  It's nothing I'm going to be touching as anything short of a side-hobby for the rest of my life.

I'll be sitting in chemical laboratories, looking at the clock, wondering how much longer til I can leave.  Everyone in college tells you, do what you love, not what pays.  I don't believe that shit for one second, there are fucking cab drivers making minimum wage on a PhD in English Lit or what have you - some degrees are just useless unless you stay with the University - something I don't intend to do.  Yea, you can still make decent money on a bunch of things that aren't as outdated as English, like a psychology degree (which is becoming increasingly popular for a variety of reasons)... but if you're going to go out of your way to pick a degree to work at for the value of it rather than for what value it has to you, then you may as well go all the way.  I don't necessarily hate chemistry & pharmacology, it's just not something I imagine I'll be having fun with for the rest of my life, despite doing it.

But on the other hand, my situation is a little different than just 'you're going to go make money with your degree whether you like it or not.'  I don't have an academic passion.  The people who tell you to do what you love are the same people who tell you that one day you'll find your passion.  Now, see, I already have.  My passion lies within the people who I care for, despite not really having too many of those kinds of people.  My passion is to be able to go home from my shitty job that brings me a 6-digit income and have there be someone there for me.  Doesn't have to be a housewife kinda deal, maybe they'll get home later than me for some reason.  It doesn't even have to be a lover, I'd be happy just having a bundle of friends.  And therein lies my dilemma.

Aside from the people I've got on the internet, and Michelle, I've got nothing.  I'm a spineless coward.  I can't even bring myself to make proper conversation with people who introduce themselves to me, so that I don't have to.  I mean, I'm not going to intentionally back away from a conversation after you've started it (unless I hate you) but I'm just completely incapable of holding a conversation with someone I don't feel a certain connection with.  And the further problem is that in order to develop that connection, they've got to talk to me, and I've got to talk to them.  So I've got to get this sense of a particular feeling from them, and, in general, if you're out in a public area, you're not going to want to talk about what I want to talk about.  All I care about is what's under the 'hi' and 'what's your name' and 'how was your day' - what your feelings are at any given moment.  It's a vulnerability - if you let me in like that, I'll gain the ability to watch you more carefully.  Even before a person opens up to me, I can tell a lot about how they're feeling, but I can never be completely certain, so there's always something you can hide behind.  If you open up to me and I can really see what's going on in your head, then I know for sure how you work, and I can figure you out better.  It's a trust thing, and I'm bad at developing it.

I've got this friend who I used to know when I was a kid.  His name's Garrett.  He found me on facebook a few weeks back, and started talking to me a bit.  I answered him, but I didn't want to spend hours reloading my facebook to talk to him.  So I gave him my number, and took his.  Since then I've talked to him a grand total of once, but he was busy because he was driving and he just wanted to say hi... I guess that was nice, but then I told him when he could call me later, and he never did.  So I keep trying to get his attention, but I lack any sort of assertive quality.  All I've got to go by on whether or not I like him anymore is the tone of his voice, really, and I'm not disappointed yet.  I want to talk to him.  ... I just can't bring myself to do anything more than occasionally give him like a fucking text message to see if he cares enough to answer me.

My career's set.  I know I'll end up in some sort of pharmacology - it's the easy way into good money.  It's a chemistry degree, so I don't have to get my hands dirty like a biologist does, and it doesn't involve much physics - which I am terrible at.  The only hard science left is chemistry, and if you aren't doing a hard science, you're probably not going to be making that ideal salary.  My mom's friend's husband (who graduated with a phd in pharmacy) is making 110k$/yr straight out of college, as much as she makes with 25 years of management experience and built up raises.

It's horrible because I don't know what to do with myself.  Actually, it's even worse, because I do know WHAT to do.  I just can't bring myself to do it.  I don't know what all those self help fuckers are talking about when they're telling you to figure out the problem... anyone with a real problem knows what the problem is, they just need help getting over it.

I wish I had someone to help me climb over it.

It just does.

I'd write more in depth but it's not something I want to remember if I ever read this again.

It blows even harder because i'll have gone to school for nine straight days before i get a weekend - and then on saturday i've got something booked for the majority of the day one way or another, too.

Today, my sister talked to me on MSN on my dad's name.  She introduced herself as her daddy's daughter, and she said that talking to her brother on MSN was an event she should put in her book.  I do not believe she actually has a book, leading me to believe she has a diary.  Now I am obligated to go find and read it while she is not home.

I am not an asshole.

I forgot about this thing pretty fast.  Well, I guess nothing interesting really happens to me so there isn't much to tell.  I'm still here, though, just... forgetful. D: