hmmm, a quick recap for you m'dear: let's see... i have a boyfriend, he gave me a gorgeous ring, ummm, i'm dying at school what with AP tests and finals and such... what else? hmmm, oh! he invited me to his graduation! yay!... i was excited, but semi-nervous as that involves meeting his family... advice?

well, two AP down, one to go... if i live, i'll try to let ya know tomorrow hun!

lastly, THE YEARBOOK IS AMAZING!!! it took hours of hard work and dedication and it paid off! AHHH! i love it!

the end. enough. i'm off to study. wish me luck!

p.s. it doesn't exactly count as 'returning home' if you were "in the USA" but still in 'europe'... yes, you went to a portion of land owned by the U.S. but it wasn't really the same dear! lol, i but some people flipped though, sorry i missed reading it firsthand before the disclaimer!

Tags: update
Current Location: home, studying
Current Mood: stressed
Current Music: etc.

well, I'm still questioning everything... nothing new there. but i thought that while i'm at it i'd write some of my musings down.

On Religion:

As we are currently on the last of the three days of the Triduum i think it is only appropriate that i write about this particular subject.

I was sitting in church for the holy friday service yesterday and i began thinking, which incidentally is almost a dangerous thing for my mind to do lately, but back to the original topic. Father Mike's sermon was about how the triduum is supposed to get us out of our comfort zone and also to serve rather than be served (washing feet, venerating the cross, etc). I realized just how different my approach to my faith has become.

my religion at one time was very central to me and i didn't care who knew. Now, i still gladly tell people my faith but when it comes down to exactly how much i enjoy being involved, i'm not as up-front. A part of me knows it's stupid, but a part of me still is afraid that people will judge me because of how involved i am in my church. So, i have decided that i'm letting that all go; it'll be hard but i know those who are my friends will recognize that i'm finally freeing myself and letting them in more to who i am. here goes, this is my first step to being more open:

I am Catholic, i was raised into a strict Catholic family. I attend every Sunday Mass, every holy day of obligation, and every service not required but that we as catholics believe is important. You already know that, but what you may not realize is that i enjoy doing so. I am also an altar server, have been since the 6th grade. This is something i liked, somehting that used to bring me closer into the Mass itself. Lately i have realized that i wish ot become an EM (eucharistic minister) instead and i have been attempting to go through this training. I also attend a weekly youth religious ed group/church social group. I think this is an important thing for me to be with people who share my faith so we can discuss it in a social setting. I have fun with it, we go to laser tag, etc.

The other thing is that i am also questioning my faith. Since birth, i have unquestionably accepted that the doctrine/teachings are what i believe unconditionally, but as i grow older it becomes harder to accept. Don't get me wrong, much of it i believe very strongly and follow it more strongly. But there are a few specific areas of the Catholic faith and teachings that i have been asking myself about: what do i really believe?

Well, this is long and has given you enough to read, i suspect. I may write random religious musing later that should be attached to this post but for now i will leave you to your own devices. HAPPY EASTER!

to the one it concerns...

I'm sorry about the previous entry; but at the same time i'm not... I've been needing to get some of that out and this journal is my only way...

But still, I'm not precisely sure that it came out right. I had a hard time writing exactly what i meant to. I did get some of it very wrong, and i realize this is still kind of rambling... oh well

and sam, i'm in school every day until 3:00... i was in 5th hour when you called and almost got caught on the phone... i wake up around 5:30 every morning so if you wanna call when i'm not in school i'll be able to talk... sorry about that today!

the guilt is consuming, yet something in my mind tells me that the present situation is all i can have. My karmic payback for life, i now only deserve this painful-half-'life'... life isn't the right word, but we'll get to that.

The only reason I feel guilty towards him isn't even about him. It's how we began; maybe not how so much as when. I know i should never have done that, it is the thing i most regret. But now that it has happened, i seem to have let go of the idea that i can do anything else. Now, don't get me wrong, I regret nothing we have done- just the timing of the beginning. I even would have gone further in the recent past, the only thing stopping me was the guilt. And don't get me wrong, i really do like you and i have meant everything i told you. But for you i went against every moral i held close, i let it go for you and yet you don't get it still. You never were really ready; in the beginning you implied wanting to take me out: not just implied, you flat out said it. But when it came to it, you didn't. I accept that you have other things in your life and i accept now that you can never give me more than a physical relationship. I don't like it but, once again, my guilt tells me that i deserve this. What i did is unforgivable and yet the one it would have mattered most to knows nothing of my sad action; yet another karmic payment was that it turned around and they did the same to me. The only difference is i found out about it and they are 'in love'...

And yet, whether i like him or not (guilt aside), I want so much to get over him. I hate myself for liking him, he's a reminder of what i did once. But again, at the same time, I can't get over him. I still like him, still want there to be something between us... I don't want to have this happening; i wish we could have met at another time, another place, another situation where i might have had a real chance. Maybe that's it: maybe i was doomed for this from the beginning. I feel I don't deserve any better, no matter who tells me otherwise and so on I go... keeping myself entrenched in my guilt, unable to escape.

Now, i know that if you read this you will know instantly that i am talking to you. I would like to talk to you about something else that is somewhat but not really related, but i feel that once you read this you might not want to?...

And to my darling SAM: i know that you will read this and wonder exactly what i am talking about. You can guess all you want but i promise you there is no way you will figure out exactly what i'm talking about. I hate to do this but this is the one thing that i won't tell you; at least not yet. My guilt makes me shoulder this burden alone; i have told no one else save one. But don't fret, my dear roomie, this summer i promise to let you know and help, if you wish and if it is at all possible for me to be helped at this point.

hi Sam, this journal is entirely for your eyes! (don't you feel special) well, you know i'm going to ireland with the band and such; we're leaving on tuesday morning. I haven't gotten to talk to you and would really like to, preferably before i leave. i'll be gone for exactly a week.

please try to call me before tuesday my time! also, i need your address, i'm going to send you a postcard or something from ireland, k?

i think that's it. whatever else i want to say isn't stuff i want to write out! call me anytime. *hugs* bye!

this post will make sense to one person and one person only. As I sincerely doubt he ever reads this I can safely write everything i want and not worry.

I'm spiraling. My mind becoming a distant memory of my body. I watch from above my body. I see what is happening. I dissapprove- but who am i to criticize, i'm not there to stop anything. To be there would be to reconnect, acknowledge pain and have to survive it.

I can't breathe. I just "spoke" with someone (if you can call it that) and then read a piece they wrote. It was scarily similar to my thoughts. I pray it wasn't ABOUT me. That would just be confirmation that I have nothing left to handle and honestly i need that handle. The handle being that i thought somebody cared about me. I of course felt things for him; but with those feelings came something overpowering: guilt. I'd long before abandoned my morals, my religion, my personal truths that I swore to never give up. All for this person I wanted to give me a chance. The problem is that not only hasn't he given me a true chance but now i fear i've lost him. Much as i feel guilty for a few things done and said, i still want to have an above-ground clear shot. Something I'll never get i suppose; I think everone deserves this shot but have i used mine? Is it spent, gone with my mind that now hovers, observing and dissapproving silently- yet never intervening.

My faith and ultimately my trust in truth and honesty is gone. It left with my mind. Perhaps that is why i recklessly destroyed what i thought was right? He didn't seem to mind, of course he didn't. He is above all male. That lends to one fact: he too used me for one purpose and now does he regret it? is he guilty? does he wish he got more out of it before some invisible hand reached in and stopped this twisted merry-go-round. But, worst of all, i didn't want it to stop. I thought he would give me the chance, and so i gave with no thought of doubt flickering.

In addition to this rather tormented tale, i have sad news. I cried my eyes out all weekend and have still only told one person for fear that if i told anyone it would be true, not some hellish nightmare i could wake up from. My parents are making me quit guard. The one lifeline i have left. The source i have to hold on to. I love guard. But, mid-season, they are making me quit the top guard, days before a competition. Additionally this means i am not allowed to go to Ireland with everyone else. THe thing i have let myself look forward to. I was getting myself to those days of freedom where i could let go and fly. But now, it too is wrenched from me at a moments notice and the parents i was told would always protect me are the heralds of this very news. Unhappy heralds at that. They bicker, think i can't hear through the thin, vented walls of our house. I hear every cruel word.

And with that, I hear no more kind, now only cruel, discontented words to put me to sleep. To accompany me at school. TO follow me home.

why is it that guys don't listen. i mean sure they listen to what you're saying but at the same time they never seem to hear it. The message is lost. Hell, maybe everyone should give up trying, i'm sure sick of it. I've tried to get my damn life back in order and i thought i had... apparently some people just don't get it. well, at least i tried, that's all i can ask of myself. If nothing comes of it i'll always know i tried and did what i could; maybe then i can let go. I am sorry, does that count for anything. please read my message (that last sentence was to someone who of course i doubt will ever even read this, especially if he doesn't read the message)

HEY! SHOUTOUT TO SAM: IF YOU EVEN READ THIS!!! i NEVER GET TO TALK TO YOU!!! MISS YA LOTS, SOBER UP FOR AN HOUR AND CALL ME SOMETIME :) love ya! (btw, that was a joke, although from your posts it doesn't seem very far off tehe) miss ya roomie!

I'm circling, faster and faster i go around. I feel as if i'm a penny thrown into one of those charity pots that spin before falling. And as to being just a penny? To feel so small, knowing you're worthless and most likely to be thrown away? I think i understand it now... The penny is going faster now, screaming but the onlookers just think it's part of the show; they applaud as the penny drops through. They then walk right by ignoring the thing that just a moment ago they ridiculed as it cried.

The feeling of being breathless, but not in happiness. The feeling when you're at the bottom of the pool and can see the top but can't reach it; I have a small bt of breath left in my lungs, praying it'll last to the top, but i'm finding that this pool isn't as it seems; its only an ocean deceiving me. I'll never reach the top before I cave in, my body giving in just as surely as I will. Just as surely as I tried not to but everything around me pressured me, pressing that air out of me.

Thank you for listening, if you understood half of that, congratulations, you're perceptive... if you read this at all, thank you for caring enough to waste 3 minutes of your day on my babbling.

Tags: falling
Current Location: coocoo land
Current Mood: hungry
Current Music: Last Kiss

INSTRUCTIONS F O R L I F E

1. Take into account that great love and great achievements involve great risk.

2. When you lose, don't lose the lesson.

3. Follow the three Rs: Respect for self Respect for others and Responsibility for all your actions.

4. Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.

5. Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.

6. Don't let a little dispute injure a great friendship.

7. When you realize you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.

8. Spend some time alone every day.

9. Open your arms to change, but don't let go of your values.

10. Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.

11. Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you'll be able to enjoy it a second time.

12. A loving atmosphere in your home is the foundation for your life.

13. In disagreements with loved ones, deal only with the current situation. Don't bring up the past.

14. Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality.

15. Be gentle with the earth.

16. Once a year, go someplace you've never been before.

17. Remember that the best relationship is one in which your love for each other exceeds your need for each other.

18. Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.

19. Approach love and cooking with reckless abandon.



INSTRUCTIONS FOR LIFE - 2ND EDITION (yes, I know some of them are repeated; its cause theyre important!)

1. Give people more than they expect and do it cheerfully.

2. Marry a man/woman you love to talk to. As you get older, their conversational skills will be as important as any other.

3. Don't believe all you hear, spend all you have or sleep all you want.

4. When you say, "I love you", mean it.;

5. When you say, "I'm sorry", look the person in the eye.

6. Be engaged at least six months before you get married.

7. Believe in love at first sight.

8. Never laugh at anyone's dreams. People who don't have dreams don't have much.

9. Love deeply and passionately. You might get hurt, but it's the only way to live life completely.

10. In disagreements, fight fairly. No name calling.

11. Don't judge people by their relatives.

12. Talk slowly, but think quickly.

13. When someone asks you a question you don't want to answer, smile and ask, "Why do you want to know?"

14. Remember that great love and great achievements involve great risk.

15. Say "bless you" when you hear someone sneeze.

16. When you lose, don't lose the lesson.

17. Remember the three R's: Respect for self; Respect for others; Responsibility for all your actions.

18. Don't let a little dispute injure a great friendship.

19. When you realize you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.

20. Smile when picking up the phone. The caller will hear it in your voice.

21. Spend some time alone.

22. Open your arms to change, but don't let go of your values.

23. Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.

24. Read more books and watch less TV.

25. Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you'll get to enjoy it a second time.

26. Trust in God, but lock your car.

27. Create a loving atmosphere in your home is so important. Do all you can to create a tranquil harmonious home.

28. In disagreements with loved ones, deal with the current situation. Don't bring up the past.

29. Read between the lines.

30. Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality.

31. Be gentle with the earth.

32. Pray. There's immeasurable power in it.

33. Never interrupt when you are being flattered.

34. Mind your own business.

35. Don't trust a man/woman who doesn't close his/her eyes when you kiss.

36. Once a year, go someplace you've never been before.

37. If you make a lot of money, put it to use helping others while you are living. That is wealth's greatest satisfaction.

38. Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a stroke of luck.

39. Learn the rules then break some.

40. Remember that the best relationship is one where your love for each other is greater than your need for each other.

41. Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.

42. Remember that your character is your destiny.

43. Approach love and cooking with reckless abandon.


these have been going around chain mail for a while, but they are so true... and remember to appreciate the small things, you never miss them until they're gone!

Current Location: evil mesa
Current Mood: boo for bronchitis
Current Music: wierd al

well, this is officially WIERD!!!... hey, if anyone reads this who knows time zones, what is the time difference between Arizona, USA and France?