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."

Rainbows, I'm inclined to pursue

So, I think that it's galactically important never to get too enamored with concepts or potential symbols, especially when those ideals involve other people. For example, I was talking to a friend who admitted to harboring affection for the same girl for years now, despite her obvious lack of interest. In concept and assuming a level of relatively severe depth of feeling, I could find this romantic, tragic, and Gatsby-esque, which I guess seems pretty cool until you remember the part where Jay's face down in the pool. In a more practical light, he's probably depriving himself a lot of possibilities for the sake of living in a heart-wrenching literary theme. I suppose it just depends on your priorities.

I'm not sure, but I think I'm getting a little tired of cereal. Apocalypse now!

I've come to realize that a relatively significant drawback to a habitually logical personality is that it becomes automatically expected that everything that is said or done has heaps of logic behind it. While frequently that's a pretty safe assumption, everyone has those little character anomalies and weaknesses (pet peeves, bad habits, an affinity for golf) in which any kind of discernable rhyme or reason has very little to do with it. Usually I can explain myself away, but occasionally I can't, and I don't particularly like feeling like I have to.

Most people would agree that sometimes it's necessary, thanks to hindsight and for the sake of your own sanity and wellbeing, to remove certain activities, influences, or people from your life. Yet somehow I don't think most people feel so chummy to that mindset when they're the ones that end up on the cutting room floor.

I like Thanksgiving, if just for the fact that, unlike the ChristmaHannaKawaanzadan season, there's no real politically incorrect way to greet someone, with the possible exception of "Happy Putting-a-Happy-Face-on-What- was-Essentially-a-Genocide Day, try not to think too hard about the Trail of Tears."

It took me too long to realize that I don't take good pictures, 'cause I have the kind of beauty that moves

Since the day I learned the definition of an adjective until the last couple of years or so, if you asked me to describe myself, the first word that came out of my mouth would have been "nice." While I still, overall, consider myself a nice person to a large extent, it's become pretty evident that niceness as a dominant trait is kind of a bad thing. It's a little boring, first of all, but more significantly, being nice is sometimes synonymous with insincerity and complacency. It would be much better to consider yourself tactful or diplomatic, because at least those qualifiers take into consideration the fact that being nice and being honest are occasionally divergent paths.

Or maybe that's just my excuse to cover up my guilt over the fact that I've gotten a little more jerkfacey over the years.

I'm reading The Picture of Dorian Gray right now, and, flying in the face of my usual philosophy that writing in books is annoying and unnatural despite what annotation-freak English teachers tell you, I've started reading with a highlighter next to me. I now have the theory that Oscar Wilde's books are more of an excuse for him to make an ungodly number of quippy one-liners than an actual novel.

Things Making Me Smile Right Now:
- Not being sick
- The prospect of my and Megan's Caribou extravaganza
- My nearly perfect relationship with Roomie
- Taco Bell
- Making my entire floor smell like my coffee
- Cardio kickboxing

I try, but I'm not convincing

I have little wars inside my head a lot, usually involving having to choose a perspective from which to approach a situation. And when I say wars, I mean they would be wars if I was less indecisive. You can't really call it a war when both sides are afraid to fire the first shot.

At Wesleyan there's a class I almost took completely about the concept of perfection. I'm sure it's all about the illusion of perfection and how it functions as a powerful lie that society impresses upon unsuspecting teenagers, forcing them into anorexia, depression, and unfortunate haircuts. There's a popular line of thinking going around right now that perfection doesn't exist except conceptually as a tragically unreachable goal. I don't think this is true, only because I don't think that these people go on the correct definition of perfection.

The Barbie Doll variety of perfection is impossible. That's the kind of perfection that demands acquiescence with every conventional stereotype until the contradictions and discrepancies inherent in the ill-defined pop-culture ideals induce a high pressure implosion of failed expectations. Real perfection necessitates imperfection; when things like weaknesses only heighten appeal and frustrations ignite a curiosity and desire for understanding, they become part of the ideal picture. "You're perfect to me" seems like a cop-out, but it's the only real kind of perfection that exists, so why don't we just accept it?

Words and Phrases Used in Serious Context in Geology That I or, More Frequently, One of My More Immature Male Classmates Initially Snickered at:
Cleavage, dike, flank eruption, wacke, mass wasting, discharge, joint, groin, feeling bottom, butte, playa, love waves

It must be exhausting to lose your own game

If you became deaf, do you think you'd miss the sound of your own voice?

So, all in all, my outlook in life isn't always the most optimistic. Sometimes I promote pessimism (like how expectations and hopes should always be kept low to avoid disappointment or how it's helpful to remind yourself constantly that things could be worse) as if it was a joke, but in my head, I consider those values essentially true. Logically, I assumed that gloomish mindset would transfer to my opinion of people, too. As it turns out, my concept of humanity is so sweet and light it would probably manifest itself in the form of fluorescent cotton candy if given the opportunity.

Like most people, I'd imagine, I have this habit of trusting my own personal opinions and instincts more than the reported history and facts others give me. If you specifically and explicitly informed me that you were a horrible person and listed two or three examples of various appalling behaviors you used to partake in, but you strike me as pleasant and reasonable, you're still Wally Cleaver in my eyes. And, as long as indiscretions are met with what I judge to be sincere remorse and/or logical explanation, forgiveness and some degree of forgetting will be instantly granted. I really do believe that everyone, deep down or in totality, is a good person. At least in their own minds.

I can also see how that frame of mind could easily be written off as young and ignorant and doomed to be inevitably crushed in time by heartbreaking experience and DMV employees, but for the moment I still have another two years before I have to renew my license.