Empty Room

Yesterday I walked into my dorm and was immediately hit with two overwhelming emotions.

The first was that I don't have a new roommate...yay!

I think?

I was happy that I didn't have to meet anyone new or have to get into the swing of things with everything in that circumstance. But I also didn't want to come home to an empty room.
But I did.

Hence my second emotion which was how much I missed my old roommate. I could not have asked for a better freshman experience and a huge part of that was due to randomly being paired with the best roommate anyone could ask for. She became one of my best friends and part of my PSU family.

I'm so glad to be back, especially since I'm with my best friend/hubby, but I feel bad when I have such a depressed attitude with everything. I'm not good with change. And that's what this entire semester (at least the beginning of it) is all about.

How unfortunate.

I guess it will make me stronger and all that....blah, blah, blah. But I feel like I'm emotionally unstable and that I can't deal with this. I legit just am in my room looking at my roommate's completely empty side and it physically hurts. Our room used to have so much more color and personality and now half of it is just empty.

Definitely more of a rant than anything, but its ok. Life will go on.

The end

Growing Up

The other day when I was at work with my mom, her boss (who I've known for years...we're not tight but she and her husband came to my graduation party, etc.) pulled out one of my senior pictures.

Holding the picture next to my face, she said to my mom, "Look at how her face has matured. Even though it hasn't been that long since this was taken, look at how much she's changed. She's beautiful."

Needless to say I felt really awkward and I'm sure my face turned a bright shade of red. Of course she meant it as a compliment and I hadn't really noticed the difference (and still can't truly see it) until she pointed it out.

I'm growing up.

Obviously I always have been, but some of the biggest changes of my life are happening around this time. in the next few years I'll be on my own. That transition process has already begun. And so far in this life altering transitions, I think I've done very well. But I've never been abe to cope with the fact that I have to grow up.

I still stand by what I've said for years...I don't want to grow up. There is nothing like being a kid and being carefree (although at the time your biggest worry was about who kissed who on the playground). It's not that I don't want to take responsibility for myself or I don't want to help the community or world. But I was happy when I was a kid. The world was mine. I had the chance to explore whatever I wanted to. I went through ballet, piano, voice, soccer, basketball, skiing, and other stuff. Now I'm kind of stuck. And this is supposed to be the best time of your life. I'm not saying I haven't had great experiences in my college career so far, but it's at the time where you're forced to choose a path.

I don't want to have to go through the mistakes of adolescence. I want to know what's best for me. Or not have to know what's best for me.

And I always want time to slow down. I remember wanting it to speed up when I was like, 8 years old. But even in high school I was terrified of the speedy movement of time. And I know that I'm going to blink and be graduating.

Blink. Marriage. Blink. Home owner. Blink. Children.

I'm still a child. OK, not a child maybe, but an adolescent definately. I don't think I can do it. I know my life will fall where it should but I really just want to go back to childhood. Growing up offers so many fantastic additions to life and I truly am looking forward to them but at the same time I just want everything to stop. I like being a teenager and I know I'm going to love my 20's. But...there's always the "but"...

I guess overall I'm just scared.

Time to take a deep breath and suck it up.

2009

To be completely honest, I'm not really excited about the New Year. I mean, I'm always excited for the future and what it might bring, but New Year's Eve just doesn't seem fun this year. Just like every other holiday.

It sucks. :(

I want this to be a time of reflection or new committments or something, but really, I feel as though I do that almost every day. Through blogging, or talking to my friends or family, or just reflecting by myself. Yeah, the coming of the new year makes me look back and appreciate and analyze and contemplate what has changed in my life. I've realized so much about myself and come so far in the past year as far as maturing and setting my path. I've gotten close[r] to people who have changed my life dramatically, and dropped people who brought me down. I have been disappointed, scared, anxious (ha), excited, and at some of my lowest lows and highest highs ever. I was able to learn from myself and others in ways I had never expected.


I guess this night is more about reflection, rather than setting goals all of a sudden that kick in at the stroke of midnight. My goal is to make this year better than last year and use all I've learned to do so.



Happy New Year.

Silence

I really DESPERATELY miss singing.

That is all.

3

Holding Back

A lot of times I look at myself and question why I express my emotions in a certain way, or why I express them at all. I mean, I think emotions are good things to have, but does that mean you should always convey them?

As a person who shows emotion almost always, I can say it's exhausting, but sometimes feels like a release. I've never kept feelings suppressed, because I've always seen doing so as being a negative thing. But is it really?

I'm apprehensive to discuss this because I've only ever really been on one side of the argument. I mean, of course there are some things that you keep to yourself, but that happens to everyone. So let's begin with the pros of communicating emotion and cons of keeping it held inside. Expressing emotion is one of the only ways to let people know how to act around us. For example, people know what pisses me off and what makes me smile because I've shown reactions to things in the past. Thus, they are able to be sensitive and make the communicate between us better and more comfortable. Another good thing about opening up is the release of energy. Cooping all of that emotion can be exhausting and by being expressive, you may not get rid of the emotion, but you'll probably drain a lot of the build-up behind it. It's emotionally healthy and can really be very theraputic. By not allowing yourself to insinuate how you're feeling, you can also put a barrier beween yourself and others much more easily. Generally we can tell when one of our friends is feeling some kind of way about something, but if they refuse to talk about it, you may wonder what else they don't talk to you about. And that's what friends are there for, to help you through things, to celebrate with you, and to just be there if you need them.

So what about the cons of opening up? Like I said, I've rarely been on this side of the spectrum, but I'm trying to keep my mind open and examine all senarios. I guess one of the main things is that you become more vulnerable. Or at least feel like you do. Because by expressing emotion, you allow other people to see how you're feeling which could then allow them to take advantage of the situation. And if you're ashamed or embarrassed of your feelings, that's a given. I feel like that happens a lot with guys, because happy or light emotions can give the illusion of being carefree, and often guys feel the need to be stable and resiliant to any kind of "weak" feeling. I think the last main one here is the fact that emotions can be really personal...too personal to share. I know I've experience this one before. So I understand this one the most. There are some things that people just don't need to know. And if they find out then they have to know the entire story, otherwise some kind of judgment will be passed. Which will then require you to justify everything even if you aren't entirely sure why you did some specific action.

I guess I'll stay with expressing my emotions to people but, hey, the other side doesn't really look all that bad. Maybe it's something to take into consideration on some occasions...

Mushy Mush

Be prepared for a one sided discussion fully on my relationship. If it makes you gag, just don't read. Awesome!

Alright. So this guy is the best friend I've ever had in life.  And I've never been lucky enough before to have my boyfriend be my best friend because they've always been on different aspects. But like, we were talking about it and we realized that we've basically been dating for the entire time we've known each other. Not romantically, obviously, but we've seen each other at our worst and our best and all the in between. The most we argue about is how much we're perfect together and how much we mean to each other. I undoubtedly loved him before we were together, although not in that way of course. But it made it even easier for me to love him "like that" after. It's interesting to me how few things have changed since we've been together. I know many people agree with me when I call him amazing, but it's on a whole different level now because I can truly see us together in 50 years. And that's the weirdest thing. The concept of a long term relationship with him is so easily visible. And I can't wait for it.

He affects pretty much everything I do and everything I feel, so that I've opened my mind to a lot more things. And I've never been more confident in a relationship than I am in ours. He's my stability and I know he always will be. Our friendship always comes first.

The best and most stereotypical thing ever is that even now I still have butterflies.

I love him.

The end.

Oreos and Zebra Stripes

Alright so this blog is actually slightly more bloggy than my other ones I think. To your right you can see a picture. That's me with my sister. Biological, non-adopted sisters.

I'm not always sure who to identify with. As a biracial person I mean. Because I've grown up in White society, but at the same time, I identify with my Black roots much more, and have thrown myself into situations with minority groups.

For example, there's this one program that I did throughout high school called MSEA (Math Science and Engineering Academy) for the Cooperative Developmental Energy Program at Fort Valley State University. Located in Peach County, Georgia, Fort Valley is an HBCU and I was surrounded, not only by Black people, but southern Black people. If you haven't looked at the difference, check it out. Like, Black people in DC are completely different than those from Atlanta and Macon and Warner Robins. Alright, nonetheless, I think it was at this time when I immersed myself much more in Black culture.

Up until that point I could relate with White culture exponentially more than I could with Black culture. I mean, come on, I live in Northern Virginia where the percentage of Black population is at about 11% I think. Then we moved to Carson City, Nevada where the Black population was even smaller at 1.8%. I moved to Carson City when I was 3 and stayed there til I was 8 or 9. Ultimately I think living there affected me so that I was almost completely oblivious to any racial differences. I'm trying to remember a single black person in any of my classes in elementary school and I can't do it. Interesting.

Anyhow. Throughout high school, like I said, I became more "in touch" with Black culture and realized that I actually could relate to it more than I knew. And I'm considered a minority because you can tell I'm not White solely just by looking at me. I know I identify with minorities and have all of the same things to go through, but I just don't truly fit in anywhere.

Even in my family, everyone looks one way or another and I'm just the misfit. My sister looks White. No question about it. My dad is Black and my mom is White. And even my cousins (their mom is White and their dad is Hawaiian) look Hawaiian. Yeah I'm gonna be stereotypical and say I feel like I don't fit in.

I check the box "Other" when there is no "Biracial" or "Multiracial". I don't feel like I can only check the box that is labeled "Black" or "African American" or whatever. I've done it before when it doesn't even have an "Other" on it, but I feel like White society has made me so much of what I am.

I'm clearly confused.

And when people started asking if I'm Hispanic I was like "Wait...what?" I've never gotten that before going to Penn State. I mean, maybe people thought it, but they sure didn't ask me about it. So that makes everything feel more complicated.

Confusion sparks thought so maybe I'll get somewhere with this today.