Category Archives: Life As We Know It

A Well-Oiled Dysfunctional Machine

04 Thursday Jun 2009

Posted by in Life As We Know It

≈ 1 Comment

For those of you just looking to see pictures of the new apartment and not read my mindless prattling, please skip to the end of the post.

Jessica and I have been living here for just shy of three weeks.  Being that I have lived alone for the past four years (and, arguably, essentially alone for many years prior to that), I have frequently been asked how living with someone else is.  I always pause when asked this, because I am never quite certain whether I am being asked about living with another human being (and two cats) or whether I am being asked about living with Jessica in particular.  The two seem to be two very distinct and different questions, and I think Jessica would agree with me in saying that they possess two markedly different answers.  We are very unique individuals, and we both prefer to not have a roommate due to that fact.  However, it is much easier financially to have one, especially in metro Boston.  We dove into this together thinking that we could make this work.

The story of how Jessica and I met is one for a different time, but we met almost four years ago.  We didn’t really become friends until about two years ago, and we didn’t start to actually hang out and become close until a little over a year ago, but when we did, our friendship quickly blossomed.  We are very different people, and if you were to ask us how we fit together so well, we would tell you that we simply do not know; we just do.

I was worried about having a roommate because, while I am opinionated, I am also extremely empathetic, and I always feel bad for telling people how I feel about things that pertain to them and myself when it is something negative.  I would be horribly embarrassed to ask someone to please refrain from doing something.  I don’t like being reproached, and I guess I assume that it is embarrassing for everyone else, too.  Jessica is one of the few people I can be honest with and who doesn’t make me feel bad about being so.  I was afraid that someone would take advantage of that once they realized it, but I knew she wouldn’t.  In my mind, she became an ideal candidate.  The fact that she is my best friend didn’t hurt her chances either.

Jessica was living alone in a studio apartment in Allston paying way too much and living in sub par conditions.  She was looking to get out at around the same time I would be done with school and looking to move.

The timing was right for both of us, and we obviously get along splendidly.  Neither of us were excited about having a roommate (I was quite paranoid about it, truth be told), but we were excited by the prospect of having each other as a roommate.  Our only real reservation, or at least my only real reservation, was the impact that it might have on our friendship.  In my experience, friends have always been transitory.  I tend to be the rock people break themselves upon, and securing my affection has always seemed to be the nail in the coffin for devastating absolutely everything.  (I really should come with a warning label–Warning: Securing Her Affections May Result in Horrible Life.  Best Run away Now.)  However, that is not an excuse she is willing to accept.  In fact, every time I go self-deprecating on her, she always responds with, “I’ll pretend I didn’t just hear that.”  We discussed it, and we both came to the realization that in our friendship we have never once been angry with the other.  She told me that she cannot say that of anyone else in her life.  I said that I could not either.  It struck us as a little odd, so we decided to remedy that by moving in together.

Three weeks later, that fact still holds true.  Everyone always says that you never really know somebody until you live with them.  I suppose that’s true, but I have yet to be surprised by Jessica.  Both the good and the bad, nothing has come as a surprise to me, and even the things that would normally bother me and make my eye twitch don’t really bother me quite so much with her.  It is a manifestation of who she is as a person, and it is part of the reason I absolutely love her.  Anything less wouldn’t be her.  Though, you won’t hear me complaining if she suddenly decided to magically love Gilmore Girls or stop watching VH1 all. the. time.  No, the VH1 can stay.  I do not understand it, but I can embrace it.  From very, very far away.

Jessica would tell you that I freak her out constantly.  She tells her friends that I apparate and that I am at times too quiet.  I always seemingly sneak up on her unintentionally.  She is absolutely convinced that I apparate.  This seems to open quite a large venue of occupational opportunities for me and a wealth of cardiac arrest potential on her end.

I must confess, it is also nice to live with someone who understands anxiety attacks and panic attacks.  She, too, suffers from an anxiety disorder, and so she just gets it when other people usually don’t.  We are quite eccentric, and we are not at all your normal girls.  I think that is part of the reason why we fit so well.  But this, coupled with our lovely mental dysfunctions made us decide to call our apartment The Asylum.  If you aren’t quite crazy when you enter, you undoubtedly will be when you leave.  (We even have an Edvard Munch print of The Scream that we are planning to hang.  It seems to fit incredibly well.)

Anyway, a lot of people have been requesting photographs.  I initially was not going to post any, because I don’t think our living quarters to be that interesting, and does anyone really want to see everything?  But apparently I was wrong, as I have been handed requests left and right to see absolutely everything.  I have obliged to the best of my ability, but I drew the line at showing you inside my underwear drawer and giving you in-depth pictures of our closets–bedroom, coat, linen or otherwise–because that’s just creepy.  I should note that I permitted Jessica to take pictures of her own room, so all of those are her handiwork, not mine.

Without further ado, I present to you: The Asylum.

Happy Thanksgiving to All and to All a Thanks Given

27 Thursday Nov 2008

Posted by in Life As We Know It, Sleepy-Tired!

≈ 3 Comments

Well, my Thanksgiving has been a blissfully quiet one.  As I said before, I spent today alone.  I did not mind.  I went to bed last night at 11:30 which is early for me; I honestly cannot remember the last time I was in bed that early–I always have so much to do.  I ended up sleeping in until 2:30 this afternoon.  I slept fifteen beatific hours.  No one is more surprised by that than me.  I never sleep that much, not even when stressed or recovering from sleep deprivation.  It has already been suggested that I am coming down with something, and I am sincerely hoping this is not the case, though I would be lying if I said that I did not worry about that being the cause for my sudden hibernation-like slumber.

I had been informed that if I spent my holiday alone doing work that I would, under no circumstances, ever be allowed to spend another holiday alone again.  The point more or less hit its mark, and I made every effort to follow through.  I tried to spend my day fully relaxing by reading and watching movies.  I mostly succeeded.  I did end up caving and doing some work, but hardly enough to be labeled as substantial in my own estimation.  I tried.  I have been feeling quite exhausted and fuzzy-brained, though, so it was not too much of an issue to tear myself away from my work and take breaks.  It may not seem like much of a victory, but for me it is.

Ultimately, that is what I find myself particularly thankful for today — some quality sleep, a curbed workload and freedom from myself and the outside world.  For most people those might not seem like huge blessings, but for me, they are.  They are such rarities in my everyday life that I cannot help but be graciously appreciative of their occurrence, however few and far between they are.  I am thankful for a great many things, but instead of catering to my ambitious side, I shall be content with these few things, because they are more than enough.

I hope you all are enjoying your Thanksgiving as well.  I pray that time with family and friends renews and restores you.  Many blessings to you and yours.

Pianos & Posts Getting Shafted

25 Tuesday Nov 2008

Posted by in Blargh, Life As We Know It

≈ 1 Comment

Today has been an extraordinarily busy day, and I am nowhere near finished even though it is 11:30 at night.  So, this is essentially a cop-out post.  I still have to clean my room and do some laundry before I begin my Thanksgiving break tomorrow.  I am just hoping that I manage to get some sleep before I have to be up and out of here.  I will make an effort to post something more substantial tomorrow.

I will, however, share a joke, because jokes are wonderful.  Besides, who doesn’t love some good ol’ corny humor?  Nobody I wish to associate with, that’s who.

What do you get when you drop a piano down a mine shaft?
A Flat Miner.

Um, “Fore!”?

21 Friday Nov 2008

Posted by in Life As We Know It

≈ 3 Comments

I think I mentioned that I hadn’t slept the past two nights due to insomnia.  I didn’t sleep at all last night either, because I was too busy reading and then writing the paper I had due today at noon.  I purchased two energy drinks last night — a small one to get me through the night and a larger one to get me through today.  I drank the small one over the course of the night, so it was nothing too strong that caused my heart to work overtime.  The big one is a new design that has a metal twist cap like a thermos.  I appreciate this new design feature immensely, because it allows me to bring it with me so I don’t feel the need to drink it in one sitting.

I drank some of it early this morning to help me get through the remainder of the paper.  In a moment of sleep-deprived hallucination, I thought I saw something in my periphery falling.  I unthinkingly reached my arm out.  My reflex ended up hitting the energy drink quite hard, and the mostly full can went flying across my room and hit the wall.  Fortunately, I had had the cap on.  Unfortunately, however, it started making weird noises.  I quickly grabbed it and placed it on my tray table.  I walked across the room to grab a Ziploc bag to put it in in case it was leaking, and right as I reach the other side of the room my energy drink… exploded…

Note that I was across the room.  Yet, still, my hand managed to get pegged and bruised by the metal cap which just so conveniently hurled itself directly at me.  Not only that, but I got completely soaked by the exploding can, requiring me to take my second shower before noon.

Living with me is a safety hazard.

Bloody Hell

12 Wednesday Nov 2008

Posted by in Blargh, Life As We Know It

≈ 2 Comments

My plan for today was so set in stone Sisyphus himself couldn’t move it.  I had Linguistic Anthropology at noon until one.  Then I had planned to go get lunch and spend my remaining time in the study room at the Catholic Center working on the talk I’m giving tomorrow evening.  Then, I was going to go to my Annotation class at four until five-thirty.  I would then return to my room, finish up preparing my talk and then have supper, relax by doing some light reading and go to bed.

It was perfect.

Then somehow my feet got an idea of their own after Linguistic Anthropology.  I was walking into one of the big dorms on campus to go to the dining hall for lunch.  I saw signs for the blood drive going on, and my feet somehow took me there instead of the dining hall.  I had never given blood before, and even though I had a plan to be productive, I figured I could spare some time to give blood.  After all, I’d be helping other people, and it really took nothing on my part to do so.  Besides, I love volunteering, and I haven’t really had much of a chance to do much for anyone lately, so I excitedly jumped  at the change of plans.

I read the information packet, I got my number, I filled out my survey and then I waited for my number to be called.  It finally was, and I got to go through the boring registration process.  Again, I was directed to a chair to wait.  After a couple of minutes, I was called to a table to get my blood drawn.  After the spiel about how normally the arm of your dominant hand tends to have the best veins and my comment that doctors normally tend to find my left arm easier, the attendant ascertained that my left arm was, in fact, easier.  She marked my vein, put the iodine stuff on my arm and taped the tube to my lower forearm before putting the needle in.  I’ve had a lot of needles put in my veins throughout the years, but never before today have I ever felt like someone was going deep sea diving in there.  I was half expecting the needle to come out through my elbow.

Once she finally got everything set up, I had been instructed to squeeze the bar placed in my hand every ten seconds once the blood started flowing.  That was easy enough; it gave me something to do.  I could immediately tell when the blood started going through the tube, because part of the tube had been taped to my lower forearm, and I could feel the heat of the blood going through it.  It was an extremely eerie experience.  Even through the tube, I could feel how hot my blood was, and seeing it go out from my body seemed somehow wrong.  I don’t know whether it’s the Catholic in me or the bookworm in me that caused me to think that, but I did.  It made me think about blood and what it means.  It’s life, and I was willingly giving away some of mine to help someone else–someone I don’t know and will never meet.  That thought was surprisingly comforting in an otherwise uncomfortable situation.  Christ spilled His for us willingly and without regret.  I’ve bled countless times throughout my life, but I had never lost as much blood as quickly as I did today.  I could feel it leaving my body, and it was not a comfortable sensation.  Nothing about the situation was violent, but nothing about it was pleasant either.  It gave me new insight and love for Christ and what He experienced, small as that insight may be.

Of course, those thoughts only consumed my mind for about the first half of the process.  Then my mind turned to mush.  It was about when the attendant told me I was halfway through that I realized that my counting left a little something to be desired, mainly the numbers.  It was the fourth or fifth round of counting, “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen–” when I realized that I was counting incorrectly.  I didn’t really think anything of it aside from chuckling at myself, squeezing the bar and starting over.  I was starting to feel really sleepy, but I pushed it aside.  My arm started feeling numb, and I realized I couldn’t really feel anything other than the warm blood coursing through the tube taped to my arm.  I didn’t really think anything of that either.  I had difficulty focusing, and I kept messing up on my counting, but I remembered to squeeze the bar every time I recognized my counting was wrong.

My mind was pulled out of the clouds when I heard a beeping indicating I was done.  Another attendant came over and took care of everything.  She asked me to hold the gauze over the puncture wound and hold my arm straight up for a minute.  I couldn’t fully hold my arm up, and with every passing second my arm slumped lower and lower.  This must have been when they realized something was wrong, because someone asked me how I was feeling.  I said, “Well, I’ve certainly felt better.  I’m really sleepy.  I can’t feel my arm, and I feel really dizzy and weak.”  She put my arm down and put her fingers on the inside of my wrist to check my pulse.  Her forehead wrinkled, and she said, “Your skin feels like ice, and I can’t find your pulse.”  I probably should have been more concerned, but I just laughed.  She had someone grab a cold, wet napkin and put it on my forehead.  It felt lovely.  She said that I was extremely pale and my skin was splotchy.  I was told to just lie there.  I felt like going to sleep, but every time I closed my eyes, someone would tell me that I needed to keep them open and told me to stay with them.  I kept wondering where they thought I was going until it hit me that they thought I was going to pass out on them.  This made me chuckle, and that only puzzled them more, but I was too exhausted to explain it.  After a while they replaced the napkin with another one and put a cold compress under my neck.  It was very soothing.  I was then brought juice and they put a straw by my mouth and told me to drink it.

After an hour of lying down, they were ready to let me try sitting up.  I fainted as soon as I did.  Once I was horizontal again, I came to, and I must have turned a very bright shade of red, because the attendant asked me what was wrong.  I told her that this was extremely embarrassing, and she just rolled her eyes and said that it wasn’t a big deal, that I wouldn’t be the last person today to go through this.  Fifteen minutes later they let me try to sit up again, and again we were unsuccessful.  We waited another half an hour, and finally I was able to sit up.  They had me sit there for about fifteen minutes, because my eyes couldn’t keep their focus and kept wandering around over anything and everything.  Everything was spinning, but they wanted to get me up to move me to a cot that was closer to the ground.  They asked me how I was, and I said, “Fine!”  They knew I wasn’t, and they asked me how the dizziness was.  I said that it was manageable.  Again, they rolled their eyes at me, and they had a man come over to help me off the table and hold my arm.  I wavered unsteadily on my feet, and they pretty much ended up having to drag me over to the cot.

Once there, I was told to lean back against the wall while sitting.  I was brought more juice and cookies.  I was starting to feel better, and I was tired of staying there, so I asked if I could go.  They asked me how the dizziness and nausea were.  I said it was tolerable, and they hesitantly allowed me to stand up to walk.  I collapsed again.  Dang it.  I was forced to sit back down.  Within the next forty-five minutes or so, I tried to escape and leave seven times.  I really didn’t want to be there, and it was embarrassing.  Besides, I had class at four!  I fainted a couple of times, and after the second escape attempt, they had someone watch me like a hawk, so I never got very far after that.  After the seventh time, the lady finally relented and said that I could leave if and only if I could call someone to come walk me home.  She told me I could not go to class.  I had called my dear friend Jessica first, forgetting that she was at work.  She was unable to leave early since she’s taking Friday off, but she said, “You know, leave it to you to go try to do something good for other people and end up ill from it.  This could only happen to you.”  I tried another couple of people before I finally managed to get ahold of a friend to come by.

While I was waiting for him to arrive, the lady took hold of my arm and had me walk around the room a bit to practice.  I mumbled something about this being embarrassing, and she just laughed.  She told me that she has never had a patient as stubborn as me before.  This embarrassed me, and my face turned red again.  She just laughed and said, “Honey, trust me, this is the best entertainment I’m going to get all day!  I’ve never had anyone try to escape before, and you tried seven times!”  She continued to laugh while I just crossed my arms over my chest and took several deep breaths.  She brought me over to a regular chair at a table to have me try that until my friend got there.

He got there a few minutes after that.  I heard him say, “Hi, my name’s Jack.  I’m here to get my friend Lindsay.”  I then heard someone else say, “Oh!  The girl that fainted and keeps trying to run away!  She’s right over there.”  My face turned red yet again from embarrassment as Jack walked over to me smiling and laughing.  I got up to put my jacket on and hug him to thank him for coming by since he was in the middle of a bake sale when I called.  I was about to grab my backpack when the attendant said, “Here, can you get her bag for her?”  He grabbed the bag before I could, and then he grabbed my purse.  I looked at him and said, “Jack, I’m perfectly capable of carrying my purse.”  He just smiled and said, “Nope!  I got it.  Besides, it goes well with my jacket.”  I tried to argue, but he refused.  He put his arm around me and led me out.

I’m quite thankful he had his arm around me, because I was still feeling faint and kept tripping over my own feet.  When we got to the front of the building and I was safe from harassment, I tried to take my stuff back, but he refused.  I told him that I could get home on my own.  He just laughed.  “Lindsay, that might work with someone else, but you called me, and I’m going to walk you back.”  I tried to reason with him, because he needed to get back to the bake sale.  Reason should work with men, I thought.  He said it was on the way.  It is not on the way.  He just laughed and refused, and led me back to my dorm, much to my consternation.

I finally got back, thanked Jack for being so kind to come get me and then put up with my tenacity and grumpiness.  He just told me it was no big deal.  Then I proceeded to apologize over and over and over again for taking him away from his commitments.  That was when I realized that not only had I pulled him away from a commitment, I was miserable company the whole way back.  I apologized for that, too.  I know I didn’t seem grateful, but I really was.  He didn’t seem to mind at all.  Like usual, he just smiled and laughed and told me I thought too much.  He pulled me in for a hug and told me that if I fell on the stairs on the way up to my room, it was not his fault since he offered to help me to my room.  That put things back into perspective, and I immediately stopped apologizing and just glared at him.  I gave him a kiss on the cheek and then slowly climbed my way up the stairs to my room where I proceeded to pass out from all the spinning.

(Edit: It just occurred to me that my portrayal of Jack could be misconstrued.  Jack and I are friends.  He was in my orientation group when we were freshmen, and we have no interest whatsoever in each other.  I can safely inform you that Jack has no interest whatsoever in any woman.  As we were walking out, I fell into him with all my weight and my head was right by his neck, and I just blurted out, “You smell good.”  He chuckled, tightened his grip on my shoulder and said, “It’s the gay.”  He was holding my hand part of the way, and he saw some guy he knew on our way to my room, and Jack told me that he was afraid the guy was going to think he was straight now.  In my mind mush state, I offered to yell to the gay that he was still gay.  Jack laughed and said it was all right.  I am an idiot when I am not coherent.)

Round Two

01 Saturday Nov 2008

Posted by in Life As We Know It

≈ 3 Comments

It would seem that National Blog Posting Month is upon us yet again.  I had debated as to whether or not I was going to partake of the experience again this year, and then I realized that I haven’t read any blogs on my feed reader or written any emails that were not related to school or my activities in weeks.  At this point in time, the thought of trying to catch up on all of that is…overwhelming to say the least.  I am toying with the idea of simply marking everything as read and starting off on a clean slate, because I know I don’t currently have the time to catch up on the two hundred something posts that I haven’t read.  Anyway, with that being said, I decided to do NaBloPoMo this year even though my time is lacking.  I’m fully aware that this post is a cop-out, but it’s a break from the silence with a promise of further prattling, so I figure it will suffice.  That being said, I imagine this month will be incredibly long for me.

Oh, and happy All Saints’ Day!  This will be where I continue tomorrow.

Little Reminders

26 Friday Sep 2008

Posted by in Elatedness Abounds, Life As We Know It

≈ 2 Comments

As is by now fairly obvious, this week was not my favorite week.  I moped through the week, intent upon getting through it, but otherwise allowing myself some degree of brooding and general moodiness.  All in all, I can’t really begrudge myself this, because I am not a very moody person.  In fact, I am still waiting for the angst and rebelliousness characteristic of the teenage years to hit.  A little moodiness here and there is healthy.  (Although, I’ve been told that my moodiness more aptly resembles a kitten who is deluded into thinking it’s a tiger.)

Supposing you accept my premise, you can then trust me when I tell you that this week I was very healthy.  Superbly so!  Of course, it did not help matters that I managed to injure myself yet again this past week in three different instances.  I made the mistake of wearing heels Sunday to Mass.  The heels themselves were only half an inch to an inch tall, but I am clumsy, and I cannot wear heels.  They present a hazard for me that, to most, could only be likened to chopping things blindfolded.  While I managed to not trip during the torrential downpour that occurred Sunday evening, I did manage to get quite a number of blisters, one of which ripped several layers of skin off the bottom of one of my big toes.  Walking became problematic after that.  Then, on Monday night, my darling friend took me out to supper at the Cheesecake Factory.  The restaurant is at the Prudential, and we were taking the escalator down to the lower level.  My friend was in front of me on the escalator, but she was turned facing me to talk.  The moment she turned away, I somehow managed to twist my ankle.  On an escalator.  Without actually moving.  So, limping ensued.  It came as a surprise to no one, then, that the very next day, I tripped on some stairs and twisted the same exact ankle.  I should probably mention that this also happened to the same foot I got the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad blister on.  As of this writing, my ankle and my foot are sore, but they are doing significantly better.  I can very nearly walk normally again.

This morning, I woke up to yet another torrential downpour.  This soured my mood nearly immediately, because my beloved rainboots kicked the bucket recently, and I have not yet procured myself a new pair.  Even with an umbrella, I was ill-equipped to handle the monsoon, because umbrellas accomplish absolutely nothing when it is raining sideways.  My pants were quickly getting soaked, as were my socks and even my shirt.  Right as I was inhaling a deep breath in order to grumble, the song on my iPod changed, and “Good Day Sunshine” by The Beatles came on.  This stopped me right in my tracks, and it actually made me laugh instead.  I smiled a little to myself at the irony as I looked at the umbrella in my hand and the rain falling down all around me.  I stared at the reflective puddles on the ground, and I watched after all the people hurriedly passing by.  Then I pulled my umbrella closed, and I turned my face towards the sky.  I took a few moments to feel the rain beat down on my face, to register each individual drop as it hit my skin.  It was surprisingly refreshing, and it made me think back to when I used to wholly enjoy these kind of experiences.

Truthfully, I still do enjoy rain, though now it is for entirely different reasons — it provides perfect nap weather, as well as the perfect atmosphere to curl up in a blanket with a book and a cup of tea.  Today, though, it reminded me of when I used to look forward to the rain simply because I used to love playing in it.  I felt a resurgence of the exhilaration I used to feel at getting my clothing completely soaked until they clung to my body and the anticipation of changing into warm, comfortable clothes before wrapping myself in a blanket.

I realized it had been quite some time since I had truly enjoyed weather like this, and I gave into the dormant excitement.  I let the rain soak me as I slowly walked through it, enjoying every puddle and every cold caress of the water.  As I was making my way back to my room and after The Beatles sang their final note, U2′s “It’s a Beautiful Day,” a song that never ceases to make me smile, came on.  And, for those two songs and the time I had while I walked back to my brownstone, I found myself truly happy for the first time in weeks.

Would Have Been

22 Monday Sep 2008

Posted by in Life As We Know It, Relationships, Steven, Year Wrap-Up

≈ 5 Comments

Today would have been my 3-year anniversary.  I would have written a love letter to Steven, complete with pictures, and posted it here.  I probably would have toyed with the idea of writing a poem instead since it’s been so very long since I’ve written one, and I miss writing poetry.  You would have been reading that today instead of this.

It’s been just over 3 months since the break-up, and, for the most part, I think I have been handling it well.  The first couple of weeks were a torture in their own right, but I managed to pick myself up and keep going.  I was coping, and I was doing so effectively enough that most people have assumed that I am quite fine.  I think that, considering what I have gone through, I am doing extraordinarily well.  It is not without great effort, of course, and is in large part due to books.  Books have, yet again, saved my life in a very noticeable way.  As much as I criticize the writing of the series that I have been rereading, I may very well owe it my sanity.

At least, I was doing quite well until the past two weeks.  Subconsciously I registered the upcoming date, and my mood — my stable, predictable mood — began to resemble one far more emotional, irrational and erratic.  At that point, I finally understood my mood swings, and I really began to fear today more with each passing day.  It is humorous — of all the things that have happened lately that could unravel me and shake my core, this day did, just by existing.

I suppose it is not so unusual that this day should manage to unhinge me somewhat.  For the past few years, this date used to cause me an inordinate amount of joy, and now the reason for that joy is gone.  It is yet another reminder of what an unforgiving year this has been for me: I lost LilyCat, I lost Grandma and then I lost Steven.  They were my greatest sources of comfort and my greatest sources of unconditional love.  Their absence in my life has had a palpable impact.  I feel like part of myself has been torn away, yet, paradoxically, I somehow feel complete in myself.  Discussing the break-up is difficult for me for multitudinous reasons, but the most difficult being that everyone repeatedly reminds me that I will find someone else.  I understand the intentions behind the words, and I am thankful for the kindness and support, but they do not quite address the problem.  None of this was ever about losing a boyfriend or a prospective life mate.  None of this was ever about being alone.  Honestly, as I stated previously, I actually feel wholly complete in who I am.  I do not mind being alone.  I do not simply want to be with someone.  Should it happen someday with the right person, I will welcome it, but that is not the issue which caused me so much grief.  All of this was only ever about one person — Steven — and the feelings I felt for him and he for me.  It was as simple as that.

I suppose I could liken it to death.  Once someone passes away, that individual is gone.  You cannot replace him or her.  In the case of a pet, you can always get another one down the road when the time is right.  Perhaps the new pet will far exceed your expectations and come to be the best pet you’ve ever had.  The position was replaced, clearly with something even better, but that does not detract from the wistfulness you have for the previous one — for the love you had, the experiences you shared, the mutual evolution you both experienced during your time together.  That first one will remain an irrevocable part of you and who you are.  As upsetting as this day is for me, I do not regret much.  How could I?

I slept little last night.  I think I slept for maybe one and one-half hours, possible two.  Most of my day has been spent in bed, regardless, finally allowing myself to reflect on things I have been pushing out for the past few weeks.  I listened to music that holds a particular emotional significance for me, and I cried in waves here and there.  I imagine that I am not yet free from the traitor tears which continue to take me by surprise, but I at least finally had the presence of mind to grab a Kleenex box to keep near me.  My darling friend Jessica is taking over the second half of the day, refusing to let me be alone, and my other dear friend Whitney set a phone date with me for this evening.  I offered multiple times to stay in my dorm today in isolation from the world, and I would have if they did not fight me into acquiescence.  I can only imagine how difficult it must be for both of them to deal with me when I am like this, and yet they do so willingly and lovingly.  They’re being Jesus to me today, and I hope they both know how incredibly grateful I am.  Even in all of this, I can see how blessed I am.

I always hesitate to post anything about Steven on here, because I always fear that I am depicting him in a bad light.  I earnestly try not to do so, because I do not even think that he reads here anymore.  He continues to aid me in my technical difficulties on here and host the website for me, but beyond that, I do not know that he reads the content.  I do not blame him.  Most of the readers here are here because of me.  If I were him, I think that I would probably be afraid to read that I am writing, and especially what people are saying in response to that.  I was asked several times if I planned on talking to Steven today.  The answer is no; to be completely honest, I do not know if Steven is even aware what day it is, and if he does, I imagine it probably is not exactly a wonderful day for him either.  I have no desire to draw his attention to the fact and make matters worse for him.  The most that I can hope is that only I noticed the calendar date.  I think that I would make things worse for him if I were to approach him, and he certainly does not need my emotional distress to make him feel worse or guilty.  So, given all of that, what I am about to do may be entirely pointless or may confuse those of you who are reading this.  However,  it seemed appropriate, at least to me, given the day.

Dearest Steven,

I have seen you at your best, and I have seen you at your worst.  I have often been at the receiving end when you are at your worst.  I bear you no enmity or bitterness because of any of it.  I have forgiven you for everything you have done to me, intentionally and unintentionally.  I know that you never meant to hurt me.  It so often just happened that way.  I understand that.  I only hope that you will be able to forgive yourself.  I know that you do not, but I sincerely hope that one day you will be able to.  Because, despite the things you have done, you have also done a great many wonderful things.  Never forget that, and know that I do not regret any of it.
While you may not be completely sold on the point, you are a good person — you have always been a good person.  You deserve a life full of joy, and I pray every day that you might have one.

Be happy; that is all I have ever wanted for you.

All my best,
Lindsay

So, I Guess I Can Cross “Ballerina” off the Short List

15 Monday Sep 2008

Posted by in Life As We Know It

≈ 6 Comments

Of all the adjectives that someone could attribute to me, you will not once find “graceful” used.  At least, you will not find that adjective on any list of anyone who knows me well.  Intelligent, yes; kind, yes; gracious, yes.  Graceful, no.  You’d be much more likely to find “clumsy,” or, if the individual is a particularly generous one, “unlucky.”  I suppose, in their own way, both adjectives are true.  It’s true enough that I seem to possess two left feet and an uncanny ability to wind up face first prostrated on perfectly flat, smooth surfaces.  However, I also seem to be unbelievably accident-prone even without my special ability to go from vertical to horizontal in one second flat.

Friday afternoon, I was heading back to my room after a class.  I was thinking about going to the gym and then getting some food.  I was crossing the major road of campus (for our campus is much like that of Vegas — it is all essentially on a long strip of road).  Actually, I was just finishing one side of the street, walking through the middle where the T tracks are when I tripped.  At least, this is the assumption.  I don’t know what happened, and I have no recollection.  All I remember was walking, and then the next thing I remember is being down on the ground in a lot of pain.  Of course, all of this wasn’t quite enough on its own, so to make things more interesting, I landed, unbeknownst to me, directly on the subway tracks.  This, of course, happened right as a T was barrelling directly toward me honking its horn.  At the time, I wasn’t particularly aware of what was going on.  Fortunately, there were two men nearby who did, and they quickly picked me up and pulled me to the side.  I tried to get up, but they told me to stay still for a moment while we attempted to ascertain what exactly I hurt.

I was hyper aware of a sharp pain in my left elbow, right knee and my left wrist.  My body was battling with several pains at once, but those appeared to be the most dominant.  My head also hurt, and my palms and right wrist weren’t feeling exactly up to par.  I was still rather shocked by what happened, not that I know what happened, but you catch my drift.  I knew I needed medical attention, but I also knew that I was in Boston, so chances are that medical attention was going to take quite some time.  So, before heading over to the student health facility, I grabbed lunch.  One of the guys offered to carry me, but I was embarrassed enough without publicly drawing attention to my clumsiness, so I used lunch as an excuse and politely declined.  (However, I must admit that I now feel rude.  I was too shocked and hurt to even remember to thank the two men for saving me from further bodily harm.  Not that my mishap excuses my lack of manners.)

The doctors looked me over and poorly cleaned out the bloody wounds on both my knee and elbow.  They’re both still in pretty poor shape, but they’re immensely improved upon from Friday.  The skinless section of my elbow hasn’t even begun to scab over yet.  My knee, thankfully, has, but it is still extremely bruised (nearly black, but not not as big or disgusting as it was on Friday) and still somewhat swollen despite the multiple icings per day.  The knee continues to give me difficulty in the walking department, but it’s getting gradually better day by day.  My right palm has cleared up nicely, and my right wrist is only marginally sore.  My left palm is starting to heal, but my left hand still has some bruising; my left wrist is wrapped up.  The pain in my wrist is rather excruciating, and they think I may have a hairline fracture.  I went in for x-rays today, but I don’t know the results.  When I was at student health on Friday, they determined that I had a concussion from the fall.  I had a tiny little bump on my head and a minor headache.  Fortunately for me, the pain elsewhere distracted me from a potentially larger headache.  In determining whether or not I had a concussion, they asked me several questions.  I couldn’t tell them what day it was, I couldn’t tell them what had happened (they think I passed out for a moment), I couldn’t tell them who the governor of Massachusetts is (that’s a question I wouldn’t have been able to answer sans concussion, so I deem that one unfair) or give them answers to a multitude of other questions.

I ended up spending Friday evening with my darling friend Jessica.  When I told her what happened, she volunteered to fix me supper, so I gladly headed to her apartment.  She took care of me Friday night and had me stay with her.  She was concerned about my concussion, so she wanted me to sleep overnight.  I can honestly admit that she took far better care of me than the doctors did or than I would have been capable of on my own.  She cleaned out my wounds (after, of course, she expressed her horror at how bad they were and how terribly the doctors cleaned them), she fixed me breakfast Saturday, and she even woke me up several times to make sure that I could wake up and hadn’t slipped into a coma whilst in her bed.  Apparently I slept like a statue Friday night and didn’t move much at all.  This understandably caused her anxiety.  I never stay still in my sleep.  I move all over throughout the night.  I toss and turn, I wake up multiple times, and my bedding often ends up on the floor.  I’m assuming my sound sleep was due to the concussion.  Jessica is a saint for taking care of me.  You could not ask for a better friend in those kind of situations.

I’ve had to shower with a bag over my left arm, and that makes showering difficult and exhausting.  Between that and attempting to dress myself, I’m pretty much always ready to go back to sleep before I’ve even really started my day.  It doesn’t help that every time I change my clothes or wake up I discover a new bruise or a new pain.  I somehow have pulled several muscles in my chest and hurt my lower back.

It’s disconcerting to think that all of this came from my tripping, most likely, over my own two left feet.  Every time someone asks me what happened and I tell them, they either laugh or call me a liar.  A more probable story for my injuries would have been that I got hit by a car.  That story also seems to take less of a hit on my dignity.  As things stand, I’m racking up all sorts of retorts, from being told that I should get a bodyguard to protect me from myself to being told that I should get a seeing eye dog (I do not like dogs) to being told that I should just get a protective layer of Nerf to wear everywhere.

I’d like to go one year without severely injuring myself.  Too bad it’s only September.  The school year practically just started.  Sigh.

On the bright side, thank goodness I have fantastic medical insurance.

Tossed Salad

08 Monday Sep 2008

Posted by in Academia, Bostonia, Die Bücher, Life As We Know It

≈ 4 Comments

I’ve been back in Boston for nearly two weeks.  It’s nice to be back.  I’ve had a lot going on and even less to say about it, but I just thought I’d post an update on my life.

The trip here started off somewhat tumultuously with a cartop carrier falling off on the interstate.  A semi hit it and my bedding exploded, flying all over the place.  It all turned out ok in the end, though.  I only lost one thing, and it’s nothing too terribly regrettable.  The important thing is that no one was injured in the process.

I’ve spent the past week becoming obsessed with a series of books that I am embarrassed to name.  They are not terribly well written, and the typos throughout the books are maddening.  It was difficult to read the book when I wanted to take a red marker and just start crossing out entire paragraphs and pages that are wholly unnecessary and even distracting.  HOWEVER, I was not the editor, so those paragraphs and pages were allowed in the final product.  Still, I fell in love with the books (and the male lead).  I love the storylines.  I am not naming the series, but I imagine there are a few people who will read this paragraph and automatically know of the series I am speaking.  To those people: JUDGE ME HARSHLY.  I am mostly chalking this all up to me being more of a girl than I realized.  It’s not good literature, but I suppose everyone is allowed to have their indulgences.

I didn’t iron out my class schedule until Wednesday of last week.  My class schedule is rather forgiving.  One of my classes is a directed study, so that just requires me to meet with my advisor to discuss my thesis, but the frequency or infrequency of those meetings is entirely up to me.  (My program is run in an Oxford manner since the co-directors and assistant director are of Oxford backgrounds.  I like this.)  I took the two MA fall classes last year, so I had to come up with two classes to replace them this year.  I’m being allowed to take the two Ph.D. courses instead.  Neither one meets often during the semester (one meets ten times over the course of the semester, and the other one meets approximately eight times), so that frees me up to spend time in the archives and working on my thesis.   My elective is a linguistic anthropology class.  This class actually meets with an undergraduate class, though the graduate students meet an hour a week with the professor to have our own discussions and to work on our separate work and readings.  The linguistic anthropology class meets three times a week.  This is obviously significantly more often than any of my other classes.  It’s the only class I’ve had so far, and it also involves an extensive amount of reading.  I am finding myself wishing I were a fast reader.  Unfortunately, I very much am not.

Tomorrow is my first day in the archives!  I don’t have class, but I set things up so that I won’t be able to stay the whole day; I have errands to run and loan deferrments to get approved.  If I didn’t have other things to do, I know I’d end up staying until they kicked me out, and it’d be a bad idea anyway.  Because I am sick.  Boo.

I am starting (I think) to recover from a bout of the stomach flu that started yesterday morning at six in the morning.  I am a wimp when it comes to throwing up or being nauseated.  I can handle nearly anything, but stomach pain?  Noope.  It also prevented me from attending Mass yesterday, and that just put me in a sour mood.  Fortunately, I have a lovely friend who was kind enough to stop by the store and pick me up some Pepto Bismol, Fiji water & Gatorade yesterday.  I thanked her approximately one hundred times.  She kept waving it off as nothing, but I don’t think she realizes how much her little errand helped me out.  It helped yesterday be tolerable.  I also kept trying to throw all sorts of money at her to pay her back, but she kept refusing.  Finally, she gave in and agreed to take half of what I was offering.  I like when people are willing to compromise.

This post is too cursory for my liking, but I still have an elevated temperature and the nausea is overly distracting.  I guess something is still better than nothing, though.

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