Completion and Reflection or, Conflection

As this school year comes to an end, I look back and wonder how on earth the time has passed so quickly. Seriously, there is absolutely no logical explanation for why school is almost over when it was just last month that we were starting the semester. Know what I mean?

I've learned a few things this past school year, no doubt about it. Not the school-type things, at least not for the purposes of this post, although I did learn quite a bit (some recent additions being the subjunctive tense in Spanish, what a worldview is, the fact that Paul wrote 13 books of the Bible and that John Quincy Adams was perhaps the most moral president we have ever had).

For your general enjoyment, here is, in no particular order, a list of things that I have learned this year:

1. It is harder than you think to stay in touch with friends from high school.

2. Sometimes people you've only known for eight months become your family away from your family.

3. Living with someone else takes adjusting. You have to learn how to come together in just the right way so that you are both happy. When it happens, you are grateful, when it doesn't, your life becomes awkward.

4. Sometimes the best plans are the ones that change when you least want them to.

5. You know that you have someone special when he drives around a parking lot for 30 minutes waiting for a parking spot just so you can go to a museum.

6. There is nothing like a good movie watched late at night when you should be asleep to encourage bonding between roommates.

7. You know when you spend a lot of time with people when you start sounding like them.

8. Become friends with international students if you want to meet some of the nicest people on campus.

9. Family is really important and every moment you can spend with them should be highly valued.

10. There is no time like the present to be forced into considering the future.

11. Grades are not everything. If you mess up, so what? Get on with it and do better next time.

12. No matter what happens, no matter how busy you are, there is always time for walking around the pond and taking random dance breaks.

13. Sometimes, you just have to eat in the cafeteria. Get used to it.

14. Power outages are fun while they last, but once they are over, it is back to reality.

15. Don't ever think that you know what is coming next...God's plans for your life are definitely not what you have in mind for yourself.

16. Developing a hobby or two is very important. You have to make time for yourself.

17. Having no money is a fact of life. When you get it, use it well.

18. There is nothing like an unexpected letter, note or email to brighten your day.

19. If you think it's windy now, wait until tomorrow.

20. Never go to Walmart on an empty stomach.

If you read all of that list, I have to admit that I'm impressed. I think this post may have been a little long, but hey, there is a lot of learning involved in this life of mine.

Walk the Line

Courtney is watching Walk the Line right now. I think it's a pretty good movie over all, but a little long. Like any good movie that has a romance even remotely implemented, there are some great lines.

Better than any of the lines, though, is the song "Ring of Fire." I love love love that song, and the music that accompanies it. Quite possibly my favorite song in the movie is "I Walk the Line." I may have forgotten about it at first, but upon further consideration, it replaces "Ring of Fire."

My cousin Courtney likes the song "Jackson," and if memory serves me correctly, she does a mean rendition of it. It's pretty awesome. :)


That's all for tonight. I just wanted to share those thoughts and encourage everyone to check out the movie.

Confession

Whenever I don't do as well as I wanted to on something I've written that I feel is pretty darn good, I feel horrible. Horrible. This feeling, for most people, is reserved for really traumatic events, events that stick with you through the entire day, and sometimes even longer. This is the way I feel when I get a paper back with something that declares my writing to be sub-par.

Many people would say that I am overreacting, and, if I were anyone else, if this were anything else, they would stand basking in the light of their correctness. However, for me, this response is not overreacting, but a completely rational, completely natural response.

When I write, I almost without exception pour myself into my work. Nearly every word is used with a purpose, every sentence and paragraph considered. Writing is my passion, and I feel that it is deserving of all the attention that I lavish upon it. This is the reason that when I get a grade or comment on writing that makes all my work for naught, I feel horrible.

This post is not so much a compliant about a grade that, in all fairness, I shouldn't be too broken up about, but is instead an explanation of why something so small as a grade can make me feel so awful. It may not make sense to anyone else, but to me, there can be no other way of life. I have to write, and it has to matter to me.

Not just penciled in

"Just in terms of allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There's a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning."
- Bill Gates

When I saw this quote, several things crossed my mind. The first was that I have to agree with the fact that yes, there is a lot more that you can do with your time instead of go to church on a Sunday morning. You can walk your dog, check your email, read the paper or just sleep in. However, none of those things will serve you very well after you die. It's pretty important that you have a relationship with God...you know, there's this whole thing where if you're saved, you go to Heaven and if you don't, you don't. I think that receiving eternal salvation is more important than walking your dog, and that developing a relationship with the God who loves you is a bit more pressing than figuring out what 37 down is in the crossword puzzle.

The second thing that crossed my mind was the fact that God isn't supposed to be efficient. He was not trying to fit into our schedules, and he doesn't really care if he messes up your plans. He doesn't exist to fit into your plans, but rather, you exist to fit into his.

I'm not saying that I am always in church when I should be, or that there haven't been many Sundays when I've wished the entire time that I was in church that I was somewhere else. Because I haven't, and there have been. Nevertheless, I realize that on a Sunday morning, there is nowhere I should be but in church with other Christians, allowing God to see that he is more important than efficiency.

Not knowing the context of this quote, I'm going to have to say that it features a pretty bleak outlook on life in general. After all, when all you have to live for is keeping up with your schedule and crossing things off of your list, when your life goal is efficiency, your life, well, sucks.

I may not have a massive fortune, and people all over the world may not respect and revere me, but at least my life isn't so full of other things and times, meetings to attend and contracts to sign that I feel the need to always be efficient, even on a Sunday morning, even to the extent of blocking God out of my life because he didn't call my secretary for an appointment.

Should kids be allowed to watch TV?

http://www.newsweek.com/id/76823/page/1

The above link is a story by Karen Springen in the August 21 issue of Newsweek. I came upon it while reading another article, and found it really very interesting. The issue at hand, for those of you who would rather not read the article is the author's decision to not allow her children to watch television.

My first reaction to this was one of utter disbelief. As a girl who fully remembers watching Sesame Street, The Muppet Show and, yes, Barney as a child, I remember many good times spent before the television, times that were downright fun. Apparently, I didn't suffer any ill side-effects from the hours I sat glued to the screen, because here I am, happy, healthy, well adjusted and quite normal, thank you very much.

Upon further consideration, however, I realized that, as the author says in her piece, there is more to life than images coming out of the TV screen. Springen notes that her daughters spend quite a bit of time reading, playing outside and enjoying museums. Wait right there.

Come to think of it, none of my favorite childhood memories feature television shows. Instead, the good times I had with my family, reading a good book or playing outside in the backyard alone are the times that I recall when I think back to the happiest times in my childhood.

I used to watch a large number of educational shows on TV. By used to, I mean as recently as last summer. Once I came to college, though, I made the transition to almost no TV time. The only TV show I regularly watch now is Lost, once a week for an hour. I've found that the vast majority of things on TV just don't interest me. Granted, there is still a lot that does, but these days, turning on the TV for entertainment just doesn't really occur to me.

Now, I don't have children at the moment, nor do I want them any time soon. Despite this fact, however, I have to consider the fact that kids don't need TV to be happy. I'm thinking that when I have kids, I'll probably want to limit the hours they spend watching TV, but not ban them all together. after all, as long as parents know what their kids are watching, TV isn't bad.

OMG...Look at me!! The story of the modern American teenager

This post is about the like, totally cool new thing where really awesome people do really awesome things and then post the really awesome pictures on their Facebook profiles and Myspace pages.
See, the idea is pretty much like this: we go out, drink (while underage!!!!!), mess around, whatever, who cares, and then post alllll of our sweet pictures online for everyone to see. Dude, trust me, it's awesome. Everyone will love looking at the endless supply of us both holding like five different kinds of alcohol while smoking.

Yeah, the boring lame types will be all like "Don't do that, blah blah blah...." They totally think that having those pictures up on the internet "will ruin your future forever." Whatever. Like, everyone does it anyways. And really, what kind of employers actually take time out to look at that stuff? Duh, none. Anyway, it's not like they don't want to be doing the same thing. Hellloooo...everyone wants a killer social life. Don't hate.


OK, so here's the plan. You grab the hookah and I'll take the picture and flip off the camera. Deal?

Where I Want To Be

The winner of the what should Katie write about contest is Mark. Sure, he was the only entrant and quite possibly the only reader of my post, therefore making him the only one who cares...(jk, if anyone else reads this!), but I really liked his suggestion.

If I could go anywhere, specifically, on vacation, I would chose China. Now I am aware that China is quite large, and most people would probably narrow it down to a specific city or place, however I would like to see quite a bit of it, so I won't get that specific.

Why China, you may ask? Well, for one I really want to teach English there at some point. I think that it would be absolutely incredible to do so, and would love to be able to live in China for a year or two and do just that. But since I am talking about taking a vacation, I would probably start out in Hong Kong, just to get my bearings (English is probably a little more common there). From there, I would work my way up, stopping at Guangzhou, Shanghai, Xi'an and the Great Wall before ending up in Beijing.

I think that being immersed in China for a week or two or fifty two would be incredible. I'm not gonna lie, I think China is a pretty sweet place. It's no America, but it's awesome.

Nope...not happening.

It is definitely time to write a new post. There is however, a slight problem.

I have no idea what to write about. A million thoughts crossed my mind as I pondered this dilemma, however, none were good enough to make the cut. I will now take suggestions.

Half a Year of Pure Fun.

WARNING!!! This post will probably not be interesting to anyone not named Mark or Katie. There will be a large ammount of me discussing things that bring me great joy. Either read another post or continute on this one. It's your choice. Consider yourself warned. Thank you.




So tomorrow is the sixth month of the relationship between myself and Mark. This is a very exciting time for me, as I have never had a relationship that made it this far. :)

The past six months have been amazing. There have been, of course, times that were less fun than others...arguments, etc., but all in all, they were purely wonderful.

A brief recap:
SWAT. School. Rangers. Granbury. Pond. Walnut Hill. Dave and Busters. Flowers. Lots of dates. Illinois. Thanksgiving. Christmas break. Illinois again. More flowers. More dates. Valentine's Day... flowers again, 18 cards and a wonderful dinner. More dates. Kil'n Time. And BAM! Six months.

It has gone by soooo fast, but in a really great way. I have been able to share so much of my life with Mark that I really can't imagine it without him. Crazy? Perhaps. Worth it? Entirely. We have had a million and five great things happen to us, and have had fun time after fun time. From seeing lots of amazing movies, to expanding culturally through the DMA to seeing wild animals at Fossil Rim and the Dallas World Aquarium, we have made so many memories. I wouldn't trade anything for these past six months...but there's still something amazing to be said here....I have so many memories to look forward to! I can't wait to see what happens in the future. Stay tuned for details!

This post is dedicated to my best friend and boyfriend, Mark. Without whom I would most certainly not have had such a fabulous past half year.

Chasing the Paper Trail

Today I registered for a spring break mini-term. Being the bureaucracy-naive girl that I am, I expected this process to be fairly simple. I figured a quick stop into my adviser's office and a pop into the cashier's office, and I'm done.

This, not astonishingly, was not the case. After a slightly longer than expected visit to my adviser, I was sent to the registrar, financial aid and finally, the cashier's office. Now, it's not like I had to work my butt off or fill out a mountain of paperwork, but still...I thought that's why computers were invented...to take away unnecessary treks across the wilderness that is a college campus.

It all worked out for the best, though. I got everything done, got to cross something off my to do list, all with the help of my trusty sidekick Courtney. All in all, it wasn't too bad. Just boring. Welcome to the real world. :p

In other news, Winter Ball tickets were successfully purchased today. YAY! I'm looking forward to a night of high-society fun...or maybe just a game of dress up and a dance or two. Still, I know that Mark, Courtney and myself will pretty much rock the Diamond Club. Can I be honest? The fact that the whole soirée is at the Ballpark makes me really happy. :) I'm a weirdo, I know. But at least I have a great time!

Side note: Although I didn't do great on the first two tests of the semester (I passed, but didn't really meet my goal (it was blocked, lol, CLS class)), I totally killed my American history test. Take that British colonies! And don't come back!

Well, I guess that's all I've really got for today. Hmmm.....it looks like we're overdue for a random thought. Here we go:

Outside of my window, there is a red bicycle chained to the colonial-style lamppost. Whenever I see it, I imagine that it is really lonely. Especially during really rainy weather. I always feel like someone should cover it up somehow. It's in pretty good shape, though, so I guess my worries are unfounded.

That is all.