Post Script

I've decided there must be something about me (my affinity for squinting? The color of my nails? The cut of my jib?) that gives people the impression that I rain judgment down on them like a post-apocalyptic god. On the contrary, I never make specific or unalterable judgments about people, and I can count on one hand the number of times I've even been seriously disappointed in someone. To count the occasions I've been accused of or insinuated to be judging others, however, would probably require the collective phalanges of the San Francisco 49ers. As most of these instances are either alcohol related or induced, I can passably write off a good portion of them, but regardless, it gets a little wearing.

You can't make someone love you with a song

The other day I was in my family room listening to Tim and Leslie talk about Tim's current classes and potential career options. He's majoring in management, so the exciting prospects included in their discussion all required serious, adult-y words like "financial advisor," "acquisition," and "office." I won't lie, my mind started wandering at the first mention of accounting.

It occurred to me at that point that, while I will presumably someday have a "real" job (unless I pull a Beverly Hillbilly or, if I'm lucky and discover a penchant for respirators, an Anna Nicole Smith), I'll never fully live in the same kind of utilitarian real world that people like Tim or, say, Donald Trump do. Whatever career I decide on will likely in no way ever involve real estate, finances, or anything that insinuates that I make any money. I'll never fully understand the stock market, worry about the intricacies of owning a small business, or have my mind totally wrapped around immediate concerns. I'll always care more about Shakespeare than standard deviation, and as such my life will never be entirely practical.

That little fact, incidentally, doesn't surprise me at all. For some reason what shocks me is the realization that some people probably go a year or more without thinking about books.

I think our culture sometimes stresses love, specifically what I earlier termed the "marital, 'til death, Fred and Ethel-type love," too much. I'm starting to get to that age where I feel a little underdeveloped for not having been "in love" before, like that one remaining squeaky guy in eighth grade who missed the first go around on the voice changing boat.

I'm not going to deny the severity, passion, or importance of Golden Anniversary love, but I think all the love that falls into the "other" category tends to get underemphasized, getting lumped unceremoniously under "love for family" or "love for friends," as if categorization is remotely logical; you love each person you do in unbelievably diverse ways and depths for infinitely wide-ranging reasons. Categories are impossible unless we want to start making ones like "Love for people you click with so well that no matter how much time passes, you can always pick up right where you left off." Or "Love for the people you understand to the point that you practically serve as their brain." Or "Love for the one person capable of making milk come out your nose from laughing (even more significant if you're lactose intolerant)."

The dubious state of "In Love" is extremely powerful, of course, but not the end all be all. Even if it exists as a single, specific brand of love, it exists as one of millions. Its presence is not necessary for me to be deliriously happy, to be in gut wrenching pain, or to be, for one or two people, willing to die.

How many movies can Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson do together? Seriously.

I'm leaning on a broken fence between past and present tense

I don't know about anyone else, but I don't really write letters too often in any consistent capacity, so when I do, I always wonder for a moment about the most appropriate way to end them. "Sincerely," "Your friend," "Thanks," "Love," and "Yours truly" are all generally regarded as appropriate closings and are used pretty often and interchangeably, with only small variations in formality. But it's interesting to consider the actual, literal implications of some of those endings. Especially "Yours truly." Think about that one. Then think about its implications the next time you use it in an e-mail to professor or worse, a complaint letter to Wal-Mart.

Ellipses (better known as the dot-dot-dot) irritate me, mostly because no one ever uses them properly, unless begrudgingly to "improve" an MLA citation so it fits more appropriately in a paper. Their primary modern function in conversational society is allowing sentences to inexplicably trail off. I, too, used to overuse them horribly, until I realized the benefits in ending thoughts conclusively. Like not coming across as the penmanship equivalent of a dementia patient.

They say that unhappiness is a lot of the time due to the whole "grass is always greener on the other side" mentality. Which means happiness is easy enough, so long as you can't see other lawns. It also means it's nearly impossible if you can.

For my gateway class I wrote a long-winded paper on all the reasons postmodernism sucks. Personally, though, I think the only major reason I'd never subscribe to the philosophy is because I'm a big fan of labels. Like any true fan of rhetoric and persuasion should be, really. It's unbelievably interesting to see how the way something is branded affects the way it is perceived, no matter how wrong, inconvenient, overused, restrictive, or unnecessary the brand is.

For example, sometimes I do art. By simplified definition, I'm an artist. I refuse to ever call myself an artist, though, because I think that label is presumptuous and completely eye-roll worthy, since it's been ruined by teenagers who want to seem cultured and deep. If other people call me an artist, I usually respond with, "Well, I draw." It's pretty silly. But I love that the label exists for me to be annoyed with and irrationally deviate from, and a postmodern mindset would take that away from me. Being annoyed by stereotypes is one of the many random joys of my life.

Being annoyed in general, actually, is pretty essential to my happiness. Constant contentment would give me so much less to think about.

Never take friendship personally

One step forward, two steps back.

It sometimes takes a lot of effort for me to acknowledge (let alone accept) the fact that other people have systems and levels of emotion that are at least as complex as my own. It's not a pretentiousness thing; it's more like a personal mental deficiency. For example, in my world (and, I assume, in most others'), my relationships aren't ranked in any way, shape, or form. Each one is obviously different, with its own strengths and weaknesses and hilariously nonsensical inside jokes, and it's easy to say that I care incomparably greatly for several people in simply different fashions. It's also equally easy, for some reason, to fail to recognize that other people probably operate the same way, and to erroneously assume that the strength of my friends' other relationships affects their concern for me.

And I'm pretty sure this kind of oversight (or rather undersight) is practically epidemic, 'cause if it weren't, jealousy wouldn't be such a huge instigator for break-ups.

I think Adam Sandler had it all wrong in that Click movie. If I had a remote that could put time in my control, I'd use the rewind button way more than anything else. My desire to relive certain moments far outweighs my somewhat reluctant curiosity to see an inevitable future.

Is removing a band-aid less painful when it's slowly and arduously pulled back or ripped off in one intense motion? I get the feeling it'll always be a situational and preferential thing.

Top 5 Simple Pleasures I Will Enjoy Over Break:
- Driving Theo (or more importantly, singing in the car)
- Being with my seeester
- Using my cell again
- Ranting angrily about Hummers and Escalades
- Baths

Smash the silence with a brick of self control

According to my geology textbook, the energy it takes to maintain the average American lifestyle is comparable to that of 300 servants working around the clock. I'd like to send a thank you to the people at McMillan/McGraw Hill for giving me another reason to feel guiltily Marie Antoinetteish about my existence.

A few weeks ago I insinuated an aversion to ambiguity, but let's be accurate. While extreme ambiguity may kill me, in the presence of predominantly constant, total conclusiveness, I'd probably kill myself.

I'm pretty sure I'd still be disgusted by coffee if it weren't for the fact that I have it mentally associated with outstanding conversation.

So, I'm more or less unwaveringly dependent on my own thought process. Considering that, I think it's pretty ironic that my (mind you, overwhelmingly successful) solution to several issues is to not think about them.

Speaking of which,
Linda's Pet Peeve of the Week: There seems to be a general epidemic misunderstanding of the word "ironic." Getting diagnosed with terminal cancer with a predicted week remaining to live is not ironic; it's unfortunate. Your best friend getting diagnosed with terminal cancer the next day is also not ironic; it's coincidental. Dying a week later from a drive-by would be ironic.

Sometimes, living by your own standards can be astonishingly difficult.

I'm just going to get my feet wet 'til I drown

So, here in America, land of the free, whenever schools put together student governments, it's always modeled democratically after our federal system, with presidents and voting and committees. Which stands to reason, I suppose. Do non-democratic countries have student governments? And if so, do they model them after their respective federal systems? Would China's be communistic? Are there student dictators running around? Or monarchs? So many questions.

I think that the most difficult, all-encompassing, Seventh Heaven-style life lesson I've learned thus far in life is that other people's worlds don't revolve around me. It always seems like a concept I've already crossed off my Emotional Maturity Checklist, but it's sometimes startling how unsettled I get when something pops up to remind me.

Things I Need:
- Sleep
- A neckrub
- For the weather to stop freaking me out
- Ideas for my Christmas list
- Milk
- To work on my paper
- An endless supply of muffins

"As it was, we always misunderstood ourselves, and rarely understood others. Experience was of no ethical value. It was merely the name men gave to their mistakes. Moralists had, as a rule, regarded it as a mode of warning, had claimed for it a certain ethical efficacy in the formation of character, had praised it as something that taught us what to follow and showed us what to avoid. But there was no motive power in experience. It was as little of an active cause as conscience itself. All that it really demonstrated was that our future would be the same as our past, and that the sin we had done once, and with loathing, we would do many times, and with joy."