The · Elusive · A#

I feel obligated. I'm sitting here watching the autosave click up and up and up. My roommate is singing Lion King songs and shuffling hair brushes and homework. I don't think she even knows she's singing.

I bought a begonia today. And a pot. And fertilizer. and potting soil. I think this might have been vaguely irresponsible. Who knows where I'll be in six weeks. You can't take a begonia up a mountain. I thought about this as Cara and I carried everything however many miles it was back to campus. "Thank goodness I didn't buy an pea gravel." We got lost. I told Cara it was gangster gangster and rolled up my pant leg. It was nice to be in the sun, being asked to subscribe to Maxim magazine. The girls always win, the salesman told us.

Jim told me when I see him my senior year, he's going to pretend he got mean. I told him I would, in turn, pretend I had become nice. — The roommate escapes to the shower.

I would like to form a cocoon around my head.

Taking four creative writing classes has me perpetually grasping at poetic terms and phrases. I'm always trying to find things that are beautiful. The reality is, I think, that things are not beautiful (obviously) and we are not always supposed to write a lot of crap about how delicious the sunshine is.

I learned the same thing four times this week, once in journalistic reporting and writing, once in creative writing studio workshop, once in escritura creativa, and once in fiction writing. It must have been important. or something.

Pavan and I are going to Des Moines I think.

habia empezado a llover.
— Chalk chalk chalk — contra el pared.

Do people know when the best part of their life is over. I'm afraid I'm going to wake up and discover that the happiest I could ever be has come and gone. Will it mean that it's the end and I'm alone?

Spanish video. good. graduation. weird weird weird. that vitamen c song. can't wait until tomorrow. fridays are so good. last night was really fun. I feel like I should treat myself to dinner. so much work. i'm going to miss spanish class a thousand times more than any other class next year. I always think about thousand island dressing when I write out long numbers. And mrs. bramlett. crows neck. or some other camp. where they showed you how much water a hamburger wastes.

48 delightful hours of deluge and wind and jack johnson. it was really nice to finally feel like i got to spend a significant amount of time with people that are important to me. This weekend was delightful. There wasn't a second I felt was wasted, and that is what is so important to me right now, because I feel like I may never be able to come back. Selsdon wanted to shake my hand today and tell me it was nice knowing me. I told him if he was ever in Iowa to look me up. And that was strange. I am leaving something behind. Not what really matters, but I'd be stupid to think everything will be the same. I just hope everything that counts will.

"Memphis just isn't very pretty"
-me
"Well, it's a big city"
-Brandon
"But Chicago's pretty"
-me
"Well, Memphis is the ghetto..."
-Brandon

I tried to write my last column for a long time today. But really, I don't know what I want to say. i had some vague idea about going out with a bang last august, but not a whole lot now.

this morning i took my mom to school at 5:40 so she could take girls to columbus for some women in engineering thing. when I got home i went back to sleep and an hour later ate ice cream and went to school with my hair wet. i decided to dry it under the hand dryer. a world dryer. it could dry the whole world! I used to wonder when i was a kid if we all turned on our air conditioning and left the doors open if we could cool of the planet. but then they made me take physical science. i don't actually remember learning anything, but i know some stuff now. today is better than the day before.

It's only a month until my graduation. I've been thinking about eighth grade a lot. how i used to listen to Destiny's Child and Vitamin C. how i 'dated' zach paul and how he used to write me love letters when i was in california how i wrote him a letter every day every single day i was gone because he said i couldn't possibly remember how that july i went to band camp and met new people and forgot all about zach paul called him from sierra's house and broke up with him. she held my hand. i only liked him because he had been a hot item. or something along those lines him driving up to the front of the school in his old white car and showing the whole world that i was old enough to date someone and i was going to date him and he liked me and not joanna and not jessica. we met five years ago next week. i think he lives in new england now. wears a yellow hat. things were so easy. i have this theory of relativity. for the past month it has been time for something bad.

I'm still waiting for the weatherall guy. he was supposed to be here an hour ago. oh well. Jake told me I was exempt from the editor's meeting today because I'm a senior. pretty soon Xi and Ryan and I are going to be making pretty paintings.

as it turns out the deadline for creative arts fair isn't that soon, so I may enter a picture. maybe. it depends on how silly i feel. I'm wearing my mom's clothes, and that makes me feel nice. time for class.

I'm in one of those moods that i know is going to take at least 500 calories to cheer up.

i don't feel quite as angry as that face looks though.

i might go do some of that homework. yuck.

The band trip was really fun. really cold. really long time on the bus. 17 hours. I woke up a lot during the night, and there was always someone eating something. I was really full, and i brushed my teeth a lot. Dr. Irvin shared one of his brush ups with me. i thought it was really nice, and i calculated how much it would cost to rent him for 72 hours. something ridiculous, like 2,800 dollars. he told me if michael and i ever needed to rent him for three days he could give us a special deal. I laughed a lot. and then i found a historian named sean who showed me blood stains on uniforms and told me which confederate officer had affairs with such and such. he was an art major. got his job by starting out as a receptionist. I'm so glad to be home. sleeping laying down.

"You're hotter than a solar flare"
-me

"I'm not, and I'm glad because then I wouldn't be able to go anywhere near you."
-guillermo

April is good

one day I will find the Stephen Speaks cd on amazon, buy it, and then I won't know what to do with myself. amazing. amrazing. prom is soon. so is mspa. another four day week. hooray for that. i don't want it to be summer, but i'm tired of work. i feel like i'm floating around waiting for something to happen. like i need to give birth to myself or something. It's annoying that restaurants close here on sundays because they can't serve alcohol.

"I believe that unless we preserve absolute freedom of expression democracy will perish"
-Frank E. Gannett

the man who later started a multi billion dollar company that gobbles up small papers.

today was good. i walked my dog 2 miles and looked at the place where foster and i kissed. and i jumped on the ground, and it didn't fall in, and i smiled a little bit. i thought my face might crack. dry skin. dry wind. flowers. i wrote a "high school literary magazine" poem, and it made me laugh a lot. here it is. don't take me too seriously:

sleepyfilled eyes
splish-splashy
warm wet ground
sliced bananas, cotton candy
morningtime summertime grassytime
windy warm blowing back--
ward--
lingering in t-shirts

it's a riot eh?

Borrowed this from Xi. but appropriate today:

You cannot touch love. It is not a palpable object. “It doesn't matter,” you say. Well, why don't we discuss another impalpable object... Time. What does it say on your watch? Right now, mine says 1:42, but the clock on the wall says that it is 1:41 and my friend's cell phone states that it is indeed 1:45. So, which one is right? There is no answer. Love and time are “things" that humans have made up to make us feel more comfortable... It is nothing but hope. Nothing but hope that we would get to school on time, nothing but a hope that there is a state beyond happiness.

who believes in love? not me. not me. not me. not me.

if i leaped into a fountain would i resurface? I left nothing to be desired. i thought.

I thought about holding my breath until I passed out, but decided to breath instead. hardly, can we tell? I don't want to talk about it.