As for a breath

I kind of need to take a breath. It's finals week. These are the grades that are going to be sent with my college application - you can't even fathom the pressure. This is the last step - if I fail, I will be devastated. After all this time...I can't screw this up. I just had a mocha. It's a mocha kind of day. Actually, it's a mocha kind of week. I had copious amounts of chocolate last night.

I have been listening to the soundtrack from An Education nonstop still. This song is my new favorite discovery.

A Sunday Kind of Love - Beth Rowley

As for some little things

I did have a lovely time reading Belinda in the sunroom today - cuddled up in one of those big rocking chairs...that was fleetingly nice.

Hugo, directed by Martin Scorsese, was truly a spectacle. A beautiful love letter to the fantastical, to the imagination, to adventure. I just loved it. I particularly loved Isabelle, with her precocious vocabulary and love for literature (even Jules Verne!)....and her style.

And a treat for all of you....I adore this.

 

The Ballad of Love and Hate - The Avett Brothers

As for lonely nights

Tonight was just one of those nights. Spending the day with family was nice and all - dinner was  great, I love seeing my cousins and doing all of our traditions and such. Apples to Apples as always, and we had pumpkin cake with maple ice cream - keeping it classy! Near the end I got pretty claustrophobic, but that's ok, I just needed to escape to my room for a bit.

But yeah, just feeling kinda bummed. Then I wallowed in my bummedness. Then I listened to this song and danced around my room. Literally. Teenage girl style, all out (sans hairbrush microphone). Except, of course, I do not dance around to trashy pop music, I dance around to...

Eyes - Peter Bjorn and John

As for identity

We are all a conundrum of definitions.

5 feet tall. 100 pounds. Jewish. Upper-middle class. Student. White. Hourglass. Eastern European. 17. Brunette. Hazel. Bad eyesight. Straight teeth.

...and then, me.

I don't know about you guys, but I've always felt somewhat detached from my external self.

As for location, location, location

All these years of high school I've always thought about where I was exactly a year ago, and where I might be a year from that moment. After sophomore year, it really hit me how much a person can change in a year, and it kind of baffled me that once I was a junior, then a senior, I would have different attitudes and morals and experiences and opinions. That's pretty cool. But one thing that was always constant and predictable was my external situation; whereas internal was volatile, external was always the same. But now when I look to next year...I could be in Chicago, California, Philadelphia, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, or Maine. Now that baffles me.

As for validation

It's a good morning, isn't it? I'm buckling down on some college supplements, but in a motivated and excited way (not in an anxious and rushed way). This is good. I'm stressing a bit about some tests on Tuesday, but...let's not talk about those.

This past week there has been a lot of press on a program that I work on (I won't discuss it in detail here because then this would turn into a blog entirely about that activity. Long story short: I've been working on it since ninth grade, it's been a huge growing experience, and I love it.) and lots of the adults in my life and that my parents know have been giving us lots of compliments and being very 'adulty proud,' etc. A big part of me dismisses the compliments. I know this sounds ridiculous and conceited, but ever since elementary school I've been overachieving and 'making adults proud.' Their fawning is nice, but I really do not get an ego boost out of it or feel more proud at all. I've always overachieved for myself. Kind of like a need to prove to myself my own worth (we're about to get psychological: watch out). I've never been the prettiest or the most popular; I got bullied a lot in elementary school and it took me a while to find really close friends (which I have now - hey guys, I really appreciate you). Overachieving is under my control. I can succeed in it and every day I feel validated by my successes. I suppose that's why the college process is especially scary for me - everyone is nervous about getting in to where they want, I understand that. But for me it feels like my acceptance or rejection answers the question "Was it all worth it?" Was all my work enough? Am I enough? I never had a "bad semester" or lull of achievement; I don't feel like my application has to make up for any imperfections. It is simply me at my best. And I need to know that my best is enough.

Also I would just like to say that being single last year was the BEST thing that ever happened to me. Sure all year I was all why don't any boys understaaaaand me, this sucksss (in that really annoying teenagey way). But that lack of social life really allowed me to dig into my studies and pound the pavement like I never have before. Last year was a great success for me academically (and therefore, overall). There was a lot of personal growth that I'm really proud of. That year and this fall have really proven to me that when I really need to get shit done and achieve, I will. That self-validation feels pretty great.

As for my autosocial life and books

Autosocial: (adj.) Aw-toe-soe-shul A word of my creation, of vague definition. In loose terms - when one enjoys being by oneself while others participate in their active social lives. The lifestyle of an independent operator. I still haven't quite figured out what it means either.

After one-act play rehearsal today, I went to the coffee shop for dinner and to do homework. Yeah....Friday night and homework. Mostly motivated because I won't get anything done tomorrow as I'm going to New Haven for the Yale-Harvard Game with a friend (which I'm very excited for)! So there I found myself, with the more seedy types filtering in and out and in general just not feeling the calming influence it normally has on me during the daytime. So now I'm home alone, in bed, with a hot water bottle, blogging, and watching The Daily Show/Community/Grey's Anatomy and reading Crime and Punishment and The Belly of Paris. This is so calming and comforting and good for decompressing, e.g. exactly what I needed. Lovely!


I also recently discovered these old Penguin Books ad campaigns; they are all so simple, clean, and thought-provoking/witty. Some of my favorites....

(c) Penguin Books

...and these.

I've also started progress on the mini-room-redecoration - last night I found myself taking out old dark-room prints and tearing out pages from the NYTimes Design magazine and pinning them up on my bulletin board. At 12:30 am. I wake up at 6 am. Still with physics homework to do. Eh, my functionality today wasn't the best.

Also my goodreads to-read list is absurd. It's obscenely long and awesome. It's such a problem because I desparately need to read each and every one right now, but can't commit in the throes of college application  and school (for which I'm always reading 2 or 3 books for at once). I find it painfully ironic that school keeps me from reading. Especially because the books that I want to read are not teen lit or trashy adult novels, but deeply fascinating fiction and nonfiction works. This is an issue for me. (p.s. if you want to share booklists on goodreads.com with me, let me know! This message is not endorsed; goodreads is just awesome).