Teenage years

I've said it before: I haven't felt like a teenager for a long time.  I'm not particularly sad at leaving those years behind.

However, I am only twenty, and ages 13 through 19 were years of enormous change and, I would hope, growth.

I'm going to tell you about a few of my favorite moments from the years.

I was 18 in 2011, and let me tell you, that has been thus far the best year of my life.  Let's start at the beginning.  In January I got a Nook eReader as an early graduation present.  That was cool.  And then in February it snowed 6 feet and I got pneumonia.  That was less cool.  It was the year I started thrift shopping and changing my wardrobe to more suit my style.  It was the year of the royal wedding, when I woke up at 2:50 AM to watch it all happen.  I went to homeschool prom that year (which sucked big time), and "graduated" from high school, and had a nice graduation party with my best friend from birth.  I turned 18 and got an awesome Instax camera.  My brother's girlfriend became one of my best friends

the price of 20 minutes in the snow

I went to Florida again, for what I knew might be the last time for a while.  I got to have the time of my life with my mom, brother, and sister in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.  We got to drink butterbeer, and ride a hippogriff, and fly with Harry Potter.

We got to meet Wolverine, my brother's hero.

I got to go back to Epcot for the first time in 17 years.

I got to meet my Disney crush and crushette.

My guy & girl Disney crushes

My family and I went on a road trip to New Jersey to see my brother.  The drive there was one of my favorite memories.  We met all the brothers of his order and loved them like they were our own brothers.

I went to New York for the first time, and saw the entire city in one day.

I fell in love with the beautiful friary where my brother lived, in the heart of the Newark slums.  I got to experience what it was like to live a life where your day revolved completely around prayer, and it was my favorite thing ever.

I got to see Carlo's Bakery from The Cake Boss, and eat delicious cake and cannoli.

My brother :)

Lady Liberty from the New Jersey side... aka the back

I got to see one of my favorite cousins get married in Key West!  I walked from the Gulf of Mexico to the Atlantic ocean.  I went to a wedding on the beach, and watched two people perfect for each other say "I do."

I witnessed the end of Harry Potter, and cried like a baby.

I went to Mall of America in Minnesota with my favorite family members for the first time since I was a baby.

I got the amazing, amazing, utterly unforgettable experience of seeing Paul McCartney live.

I still can't believe that one.  ohmylanta.  I have the best Aunt and Uncle in the world.

I started college, and met one of my best friends of all time, and the kindest person I know.

My brother mentioned in passing that a movie starring Dennis Quaid and Zac Efron was being filmed an hour away from us, and that they had an open casting call for extras.

2011 was the year I was in a movie, and I hugged Zac Efron.

Despite being the granddaughter of a former Bears player and a lifelong Bears fan, I went to my first Bears game ever in December 2011

It was a crazy incredible year.

Venticinque

The lack of posting isn't due to laziness.  I wish I could attribute it to my life being just so freaking exciting that I never have time to write anything down.  Alas.

My life is school.  School is life.  I study at a two year community college, and unfortunately, I'm coming up on the end of my second year and I'm not finished yet.  It bums me out a lot that I won't complete my degree with all of my friends on time.  When I started at my college, I didn't know what I wanted to study, and so I was aimless in registering for classes that first year.

This semester, I have an idea of the degree I want to pursue, so I have a full course load this year.  Unfortunately, since I was so lax the first year, I'm almost a full semester behind. It's not ideal.  

So I have four classes this semester, four over the summer (yes... four over the summer >.<), and then four in the fall. BUT THEN, then I shall be done!

Well, done with my Associates degree in Art. After that, I'll be transferring to a school with a undergrad degree in communicative disorders/speech language pathology, which hopefully — due to my prior 2.5 years at community college — will only take two years, and then it's on to grad school...

So... school is life, pretty much.

In other news, it is 25 days until my 20th birthday!  I feel ready for twenty.  I don't have any delusions that my life is going to radically change when I turn twenty, but I haven't felt like a teenager for a very long time.  I'm ready to move on from teenage years for good.  They've been good to me - especially 18 and 19 - but I'm hoping that the best years of my life are still far ahead.  I'm praying that 28 will be better than 18, and 38 better still.

La vita è bella.  La vie est belle.  Life is beautiful, and I look forward to it.

On hate

These are my candid, spur-of-the-moment thoughts, and my thoughts alone.  I also don't claim to know everything.  Okay, I do claim to know everything, but I DO know that I actually don't know everything.

Hate is a tricky subject.  I fully believe it is possible to love and hate something or someone at the same time.  On a tangent that I will save for the future, I believe that humans want to categorize themselves in such a black and white way - i.e., you can either love or hate someone, not both at once - when in reality, we are capable of multiple feelings and opinions and attitudes, however contradictory they all might appear.

I'm not going to lie... I joke about hating people a lot.  Not specific people, but people in the general sense of the word.  

It's true; people make me sick.  I am constantly disgusted with the things that people do, and the things that have now become acceptable just because people won't stop doing and saying them.  I'm devastated at the direction the world is going.  The human race shames me all of the time.

But darn it if I don't still love them.

I hate and violently disagree with a lot of what our Mr. President says, does, and believes, but I love him for trying.  I love him because he's human, he was created by God, in God's own image and likeness - and if my all-perfect God loves someone that flawed, then clearly he is worth being loved, even by someone equally and maybe more flawed.  He is worth being loved by me.

I am, and undoubtedly will continue to be, the recipient of, what appears to me, undeserved hatred.  I know for a fact that there are people who claim to hate me, and I can't think of a single thing I've done to make it so.  I recognized this SO young, and it destroyed me.  I was insecure, and wanted nothing more than to be liked - and instead I was hated?

But now I believe that people don't hate you.  They can't possibly.  They hate a version of you that they've created - and what does that say about themselves?  If you create something, I'm going to go out on a limb and say it means that you wanted it in the first place.  People who create someone in their head to hate, just want someone to hate.

There is no possible way that anyone who hates you knows you well enough, knows enough about you, to hate you.  You know what?  I FULLY believe that if you knew every single thing about a person, everything about their life and who they are, you couldn't hate them.  You couldn't possibly, because if you knew everything, then you would know why they are or act in such a way that would make someone want to hate them.  A large part of who we are is what happens to us, and most of the time, we cannot control what happens to us.  So what right do others have to hate us?  And what right have we to hate others?

None.

People don't hate other people.  People act horribly, people act unthinkably evilly toward one another because of an idea they have of another person.  They don't hate the person.  Hate for another, real person, doesn't exist.

And thus, the devil has already lost.


"What Susie says of Sally says more of Susie than of Sally." ~(source unknown)

Recent IGs

Recent snapshots into my life :)

1. I set up some pretty Christmas lights in my room this year.  2. I read Ivanhoe in 2012.  It was such a good read, and had many inspiring quotes.

 

3. I submitted a poem a few months ago to my school's magazine, and it was accepted!  I currently have two issues sitting in my home for those who'd like to read it :)  4. I wore my Doctor Who shirt and Gryffindor scarf to the midnight screening of The Hobbit.  I like my fandoms.

 

5. Songs that I listen to when my soul needs soothing.  6.  The first snow is the best.

 

7. I mostly use sharpies in my sketchbook.  8. Spoiled film!

 

9. My little love.  10. Spoiled film being put to use.

 

11. OBSESSED WITH WATER.  12. New Years Day: The Recovery

 

13. Flashback Friday: that time we saw Paul McCartney in concert.  It was amazing and a plethora of synonyms.  14. My Saturday nights often consist of 8 cups of coffee.

 

15. My sister and I have been getting into art & redecorating our room.  Pictured: work in progress.  16. The finished subjects: Beatles' quotes!

17. Thankful to be alive and able to go to church on Sunday.  I was out driving late the night before, and it was super icy!

Happy 2013!  I hope it's going well for everyone.  What are your goals and resolutions for the year?  Mine are mainly school, health, and self-growth.  I have a pretty heavy school load this semester, so I want to work on my procrastination problem by creating a reasonable study schedule and sticking to it.  Classes start this week.  With me luck!

Natale

Christmas Eve + Christmas Day, 2012

It snowed just days before Christmas

The presents were so pretty by the tree

We have the most random conglomeration of ornaments

We have a tradition of Chinese food for dinner on Christmas Eve

One of my favorite presents this year...

... Doctor Who: Series 5 :)

There were some... hilarious moments...

... like when my sister got The Lucky Ones instead of The Lucky One

But mostly it was just lovely moments of giving

& I got a freaking cute owl ornament from my BFF

It was an excellent Christmas

On Christmas Eve, I received two (2!) packages in the mail - both presents to myself, from myself, and both free.  One was this hat, and the other were red glasses.  I have yet to take off either.

Also, my brother was my Secret Santa, and he got me this squee-worthy sheep sweater.

I got a ton of Starbucks gift cards

 I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas.  It's not over yet!  Time to start on your New Year's resolutions.

Depression

Here's the thing about being depressed:

It's hard to talk.  It's REALLY hard to talk.  It's almost impossible to talk about what is wrong.  

It's much easier to answer.  We can't start a conversation about it, but we usually can answer questions about it.  But the thing is, the right questions need to be asked in order, or else we won't answer helpfully.

It's not that we don't want to.  It's that we can't.  We feel like we physically can not talk.

I think that must be how people get depressed.  They are overwhelmed by things that they feel like they can't share with people (for various reasons), so they turn it all inward and don't say a thing.  And it messes them up.  It screws with their mind.  They can't tell anyone.  They can't tell anyone.  And unless you ask the right questions, they can't tell you.

You can't ask "What's wrong?"  Because that's the wrong question.

You have to start with small questions.  Be a detective.  Ask questions, hear the answer, draw conclusions from the answer, and ask more questions.  Try to discern yourself what is the problem.  Ask very direct and specific questions:  "Did *someone* doing *something* at that *someplace* make you *something*?"  Keep asking until you get confirmation, or some sign that you are getting close.  

This is all a lot of work, yes.  You actually have to care to do this.  If you don't care enough about the person, please: don't bother.  Nothing - nothing nothing nothing - is worse than finally being able to tell someone what is wrong, and getting silence in return.  Please, just don't go searching at all if you really don't care.  Just leave it.  Eventually someone who does care will come along.  Shut up your curiousity and leave it for them.

But if you do all this, you are the most important person in the world.  You, at the very least, are saving a depressed person from overwhelming and terrifying feelings that they struggle with - loneliness.  At the most, you could be saving someone's life.  You are being someone they can talk to, someone they can hold onto when they feel they are drowning.  I can't even explain how much it means to have someone to hold on to.  Even if you can't change anything, you are trying to help, and that means the world and more.

The first step, though, is noticing something is wrong.  Because we won't say anything.  Because we can't.  It's too hard to talk.

Boughs of cheesy Christmas movies that are amazing

Love at the Thanksgiving Day Parade

Hallmark

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Your typical modern Pride & Prejudice with a holiday twist.  A perky, bubbly woman is in charge of running Chicago's Thanksgiving Day Parade (Chicago has a parade?), but she gets news that funding for the parade might get cut.  Enter the Darcy-esque guy, who would be in charge of said fund-cutting.  They dislike each other immediately, and yet they are constantly thrown together.  Mix in a would-be fiancé, an ex-girlfriend, and nutty movie night, and you have yourself a gloriously enjoyable cheesewad movie.  

The March Sisters at Christmas

Lifetime

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As the title may suggest, this is a modern take on Little Women - and a lame one at that.  But who says lame can't be enjoyable?  We find Meg (a blonde), Jo (blonde), Beth, and Amy (a brunette in this version) trying to fix up their old home so their parents won't sell it.  Meg is dating some nerd, but still has feelings for her ex, John Brooke.  Jo is trying to get published, but she thinks the editor, Mr. Bhaer, has it out for her.  Theodore "Teddy" Lawrence is their next door neighbor, and Jo's best friend her entire life.  Their friendship is basically the greatest thing ever, and a big part of why this movie is adorable.

Hitched for the Holidays

Hallmark

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I think it's an accepted fact that if Joey Lawrence is in it, then it's going to be lametastic.  I'm fairly certain that all of his movies have the same plot: guy and girl fake dating, they start to really fall in love, their 'fake' relationship is exposed, they have their sad montage set to a sad {Christmas} song, he realizes he's really in love with her, and makes a grand gesture to get her back.  Crap, I just gave the story away.  This movie may be cliché of clichés, but it's entertaining, and the guy and the girl are sweet together.

Love at the Christmas Table

Lifetime

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You guys.  I did not expect this movie to change my life.

I kid... but this movie is seriously adorable.  Omg.  Yes, it's cheesy, and the acting is whatevs, but the story is so.cute.  It's so cute I don't want to spoil it for you.  Let me just say... Luke from Gilmore Girls is in it. HA!

In conclusion, if you aren't a Scrooge and enjoy these cheap holiday movies, please watch these four in particular.  Especially the first and last ones.  Please.

Merry Christmas!