Winter Break

I realize now that most of my blog posts last year were about my fears about going off to college...

And I can honesty say that I survived my first semester! It was a big change.....and it took me two months to be completely home sickness-free BUT I LOVE IT!

I didn't want to come home for winter break. My 'home,' my life is there.....now back at my childhood home....I am bored and more lonely. I miss my friends, my routine, my roommate the food!

It is all very conflicting, I get to see my family....but I don't really feel happy and in the Christmas spirit.

And as much as I don't necessarily want to be home - neither do I want to go back to school.

But all in all, I love college and everything about it. I KNOW I choose the right school and I am in the right major :)

Merry Christmas to all, Happy Holidays, Season's Greetings and Happy New Year!

College Update

So I am entering my fourth week of college and I am feeling a bit stressed because well it is my busiest so far. I am battling between staying up with friends or going to sleep early (but if I do I cant sleep).

But I love it, I was anxious at home watching the pile rise in the living room of things I needed to take with me. But now that I am all settled and have a schedule, friends to eat and laugh with and activities to take me away from work (one of which is laundry) I find that everything for the moment is in a nice balance.

ha.......

The End of an Era

Of all the things I wanted to say, it seems that they have all gone away.

Six years of elementary education was just fine,

three years of middle grew me up

and four years of high school gave me strength

Then betwen me and college came a summer to remember, with warm nights riding with your best friend with the sun roof open and listening to country music, and the freedom of having no worries, no obligations, no daunting dates. I was free.

And now I am just 12 days away from knowing my other life, the rest of my life as I go off to college and leave it all behind. But I will never fear-for my best friend will always be here :)

Happiness :)

I am really excited!
I have a very fun weekend planned out, actually...the next two weekends planned out :)

First I'm going to the beach with the most fabulous group of friends, and then my cousine and I are going to celebrate our graduation together >..<

I am so at peace right now, all the stress of school is gooooneeee!!
And though I know that I should be excited for my freshman year of college in the fall, I'm not. It's work and stress which I don't really want right now.

But for right now, everything is perfect and excellant, just the way it should be.

Early Summer Update

I haven't posted in a while so here I go
my first post of summer 2011.

A lot has happened...I'll try to catch you up in a nut shell

On Valentine's Day I had the greatest surprise of finding out that I had won a prom dress!
I recieved the pink ball gown in April, got it fitted and in early June I went to my Senior Prom. My date was a sophmore friend, I dragged him along but I know he had fun dancing as much as I had.

I only had to take one final: Physics becasue I got A's in all four marking periods and on the midterms of my other subjects. It was heavenly.

I got a 97 on my research paper. A feminist approach to the book, Bread Givers.

I graduated from High School in late June. My last name starts with a "y" and since there were no "z" names I was the last one to graduate! It was so exciting and I got the biggest applause (because everyone was excitied for it to be over but since I loved it)

Today I just got back from a trip to British Columbia, Canada where my Grandma Nita lives with my baby cousin Tommy.

Happy Fourth of July to all and have a safe and healthy summer!

Buffalo Girls won't you come out tonight...

So lately I have been putting together a little bucket list, if you will of all sorts.
These are fun little things that I (can soooo do) would like to complete while I am still young and "full of life" as they say.

1.Go swing dancing. It just seems like soo much fun! Whenever I hear music with saxophones (like the song "Buffalo Gals") it just makes me want to get up and move. I don't like the club dance moves which my peers enjoy (like grinding). I have never really slowed danced with anyone either but hopefully my senior prom next week will change that and it will be fun.
2. Be envolved in a historical reenactment, especially around the civil war and revolutionary war era. I LOVE history and especially the clothes they wore, and I just thought it would be fun for one day (or weekend) where I can dress up like they did back then and churn butter the old fashioned way.
3. Run a muck race. I don't know if you have heard about these, but they are a 5K race with obstacles! Like climbing ropes, jumping over logs, swimming, and RUNNING THROUGH MUD! Sounds like fun doesn't it? It is soooo up my alley and I wish I could do one right now.!
4. Do a polar bear plundge. yeah...this one I am not sooo hyper about but it seems like one of those things you just gotta do.
5. Hike the Appalachian Trail, I once wanted to be a "thru hiker." A person who spends 6 months on the trail hiking the entire thing! Day in and day out, and the trail runs from Georgia to Maine...but now I just want to hike a piece of it, and I have with my cousins. BUT I would like to spent 2 weeks out on the trail or at least an overnight hike.

Do you have a bucket list? If so, what is on it?
Have a wonderful end of spring and don't forget to go outside!

-Kathleen

Birthday

My birthday is coming up in less than a month and I know exactly how to celebrate it....with a chocolate movie night with my friends :) (Though I am lactose intolerant) I think it is a great way to just relax and laugh with my friends. One of my favorite movies is Chocolat, (one of the main actors is Johnny Depp) and I thought, won't it be fun to show my friends this movie and enjoy eating chocolate at the same time? I always get hungry for chocolate while watching the movie anyways...

Life Update

I would like to go to college to get away from all the stress my family brings.
But living on my own, had its own set of challenges and dilemmas.
If an article of clothes isn't washed, it will no longer be my mom's fault but my own. I may have to stay up late after studying just to purposly do laundry. When I want something to eat, I won't have a packed fridge and cabinets at my hands. It will be up to me to put on my shoes, and bundle up to walk across campus to the only school food store and or lunch room. It will be all up to me, and how I want to handle it. I partly feel that I will be successful at it though. Just having to worry about me and my work. I don't have a boyfriend so that also will make things easier. 50 schools days left til I graduate high school and then two months before I head off to college. I thought just yesterday I learned how to tie my shoes without the "bunny ears" didn't I just take the training wheels off my bike? But now I am driving a car. I can't imagine how my parents feel, they are the ones that taught me how to walk. They remember me way beyond my earliest memory.
I am ready for college. I am ready for the rest of my life.

Growing Up

What have I done?
I've just moved on
Past the arcs of memories
And into the sun.

The rays block my view
of what there is to come.
As I slowly move forward
what is done is done.

Time makes me forget
of the pain that I had.
And I eager look forward
squinting and reaching
for what there is in store.

Where are my bread crumbs?
Where have they gone?
They marked the path to memory
and what I've already done.

Did I move forward to fast?
Or did I miss the train,
As I was growing older
you grew more in pain.

But I must kept moving on
Standing still causes a fear
of being ambiguous and
you can only move forward into the sun.

Didn't you know that?
Or were the rules on clear.
The older you grow, the older
you appear.

It was not a trick, life
was not meant to cut you.
It's how you handle your fears
that life gave to you.

College!

I did it!!!! I enrolled into college!
I'm a college bound girl now!

Yesterday, I accepted a private not-for-profit college in the wonderful county of Lancaster and I can not wait! June please hurry up! I want to graduate high school already!

Nostalgia

It's kinda funny, I become the most nostalgic when spring comes around. When the season turns into spring, with warm and breezy temperatures, you are freed from a jacket and bulky clothing. At least where I live. And I become the most nostalgic around spring because spring and summer are where I have most of my childhood memories. I think to myself, wouldn't it be nice to be a younger kid again? With no worries, or at least simpler ones? Playing outside from sun up to sun set. Playing tag in the morning and man hunt at night. Not having to worry about school work, or the future. The future was the "now," the future was "what are we having for lunch?" instead of "what degree do I want to study?" should I study more for the SATs? You didn't have to worry about eating too much or too little, you ate till you were full than ran outside and played again.
What I really loved was playing in the dirt, and the mud, and out in the puddles on the sidewalk in rain storms. Being entertained by anything animated on tv and making friends with any kid who walked by. But I'm just probably forgetting about all the problems and mishaps of childhood. Being a teenage is great too, but soon I will be going to college and every now and then, I get scared. Really scared. What if I don't make it? What if everything I did to prepare was all for not? What if I'm not prepared? What if it is too hard?
I don't know, but what I would probably do is come home, and play in the next rain storm.

-Kathleen

Classic Novels

So I was sitting in my English classroom today. Homeroom had just started so I just sat there, bored. And behind me is this book shelf, with a nice menagerie of books in it. I looked at the top shelf and picked up the novel "The Lord of the flies". I remember that a movie version of it once came on when my dad and I were watching TV one day. But he changed the channel and said he didn't want me watching it; that was six years ago. I guess now that I am now older I should pick the book up sometime during this summer, I've been told that it gives a very shocking insight into human nature. Laying next to Lord of the Flies was A Raisin in the Sun I was about to read the first page but it was a play, and I'm not a big fan of plays. But it too I will pick up sometime in the summer, because the author sees the world from a viewpoint of which I am not familiar.
Right now in English we are reading The Catcher in the Rye and I absolutely love it. And I'm not even sure why. All the protagonist does is give an account of three days wandering around New York City trying to find himself and waste the days leading up till Christmas Vacation. But it is so full of teenage agonist and sorrow and disappointment, that I can identify with. That I can empathize with and reading the pages of the book is in many ways, putting my worries and anxieties on paper. Even though I am only in chapter 10, I already know that I will be sad once I finish it, because there is no more to read.

Aw The Fruits of Summer

I know that it is only March, but I am already thinking of summer.
The hot sweltering days, the warm breezy nights.
Just thinking of all that free time puts me in a happy mood.

And the one thing I LOVE about summer is the fruit!
Watermelon, Blueberries, RASBERRIES (my fav), canalope, honey melon, sweet due,
strawberries, grapes
berries, berries, BERRIES!!

The other day I made blueberry scones because St. Patrick's Day is coming up. And while I was at the store buying blueberries, I bought some strawberries too, and they are just soooo good!
Now since they are not in season, they are not as sweet or big as you can get them in August, but savoring each one just brought me back into my happy place.

Hoping you can find your happy place too,
-Kathleen

Respect

Last year the Seniors told me, watch out Senior year goes fast.
And it has, but not like any other year.
I always felt that it would be more glorious than it is.
It is really nothing special except that I am graduating.
There is no pomp and circumstance for me. Yes I love saying I'm a Senior.
But I don't feel like one, I don't feel like I belong to any grade.
As a freshman, I felt soooo young compared to all the other kids
and not as a senior, I feel so old. So older than everyone else.
And I don't feel like I'm the person I want to be.
I let freshman get the upper hand and I would have never tried to
do that to a senior when I was a freshman. I gave them
a ridiculous amount of respect, that they didn't deserve just because
they were "the big scary seniors" but now as a senior I feel
like I should get that and I'm not. The underclassmen don't
show me the ridiculous amount of respect I feel I should get just because
I have been in the stinking High School for four years.
I should be less meak, but I'm not.
That will be my March resolution to step up and believe in myself.
To stand up straight and respect myself my commanding respect from others.

-Kathleen

Spring

Well it is now the spring of my Senior Years. March, April, May, June..graduation and then the rest of my life. Just four more months, then EVERYTHING changes. Everything I have ever known. For thirteen years I have been doing the same thing. Wake up go to school, after school activities and homework. School has always ended in June and started again in the next grade, come September. But once school ends this June, nothing is clear. Will I be going on to college? Will I travel? Will I get a job? And it is really stressing me out...not knowing what lies ahead. I can't think of any fun times, only stressful nights studying dilligently away at college. But what if I fail at college? What would I do then? Transfer? Get a low paying job because I didn't finish college? And unlike public grade school, college is EXPENSIVE! And I don't want to be wasting my parents's and my own money.
Just four more months
-track
-spring break
-Easter
-my birthday
-Prom
-Finals
-Graduation
-Project Graduation and then what?

Track starts tomorrow and I am really really anxious and nervous and depressed over it. Once I get into the season, track is so much fun but March is killer. March is when we prepare for May championships. "March pain equals May championships." As my track coach always says. And it really also bothers me knowing that this time tomorrow I will be sore, really really sore.
At least the tulips are coming up, and oh yeah I won a prom dress! A free prom dress from a contest I entered. So that is another exciting thing coming up.

Can't wait for the warm weather to come
-Kathleen

Short Story:1

We both stood respectively in front of the long bathroom mirror. She at her sink, to my right and closest to the hand dryer, and me at mine. She leaned closer to the mirror as Alice did, before she feel into the looking glass. Into another world of wonder, and imagination...or LSD.

She took out a pink tube of lipstick, spread it on her lips and gave a final "smack" of approval.

"That man makes no sense," she said to her reflection or me, turned on her heels and walked out; not leaving a speck of dust behind her.

She had not spoken to me in three years. We were never friends and still aren't. But we do have a common dilemma, a common interest of hate for a certain class and teacher.

After I finished washing my hands, I gave a quick wipe on my shirt and pant legs and gave a closer look into the mirror to see what she could see. But I saw nothing of interest. She must have been talking to her reflection, I say to myself; and walk out back to class.

I think this story is not bad for my first short story. But it needs a better ending. Any suggestions?
-Kathleen

Short Story Project

I am going to try to write a short story every week.
They will be about various things almost all will not
pertain to me.
Hopefully, this will improve my writing skills and help me to articulate
my thoughts better.
Have a happy Thursday!
-Kathleen
P.S. First short story will come out soon!

A Middle Child stays in the Middle

I'm always caught in the crossfire, in the middle no matter where...
On my soccer team, I tend to be quieter because I cannot relate to them. Not to sound full of myself, I am smarter and not as into my appearance.
Amongst my friends, who are brillant, I tend to be louder like a fool. I am not as smart as them and feel ashamed to be into my appearance at all.

My athletic friends are into brand names and the newest trends, and I do get looked down upon for shopping at lower stores.
My smart friends are so NOT into brand names. They wear tee-shirts and jeans everyday, and I do get looked down upon for shopping at those higher stores. They think I am so into my appearance, like that is all I do.

So where do I fit into this? Personally, I don't care wear I am, if I like an article of clothing, and it is either on sale or a good price, I buy it! From Wal-mart to Anthrpologie, it really doesn't matter to me. But I do get a thrill from finding something on sale, and final sale.

My smart friend and I have been looking at prom dresses. I tried one on in a store, so she bought hers, I then won a free prom dress, and she exchanges hers for a dress $100 cheaper. I feel like whenever I talk to her, it is always a contest! And she always wants to win! And today when she told me about returning her dress she said that she was 'worried that I would yell at her, for buying a cheap dress. Because I am really into those brand name expensive dresses." And I take offense to that. But I saw her face when I told her about my prize; she had lost. I got my dress for cheaper (for free) so she had to justify the situation in a way that she would come out victorious.

Before gym class, she change. I found a nickel one day and kept it in my shoe for the entire period. And she was jealous! I somehow in her mind, had won. Then when we went back to change, I dumped my shoe upside down to get the nickel out of it. It fell to the floor and she jumped on it! She picked it up and said "I got it, I got it" and she shoved it in my face. Because in the end, she had won.

I'm an athlete so yes, I am competitive but I do not always want to win. I have been playing soccer since I was four years old, so yes I have some skill. In gym class when we were playing soccer she was soooooo aggressive against me, so that she could win. But in the end, I did knock her on her butt a couple times.

I don't know why, but our lives are ALWAYS competitive and in a passive aggressive way. And I'm tired of it. Many times when we were younger, she would tell me lies, that I knew weren't true. And then when I would call her out on them, she would say no I said this, you must have forgot or heard wrong...and played me as the dummy, as me as the fool. And I would just always take it. I'm an easygoing person, somethings just aren't that important to me. But after awhile, it gets to you; and you got to say STOP!

In our eighth grade graduation photo together, she was standing on her tippy toes and stretching her neck up, so she could be as tall as me (or closer to it, since I am four inches taller than her).

If I buy someting expensive, hers is better because she got it for cheap. If I get something at a moderate price, I find out that she got a Gucci bag for Christmas.

Three years ago I showed her these shoes that I liked online, she then told me that she bought them offline and that they were being shipped to her cousins's house. When I ask her if I can see them (because I wanted to see them on her) she then told me that her cousin hadn't given them to her, but has kept them to herself. In the end, I am pretty sure she jus made up the whole story.

When I won the prom dress, I told her by showing her the printout of the e-mail because I knew if something went wrong, and I didn't get the dress, that she would accuse me of never actually winning it. And I'm sure glad I did because it has been three weeks, one week after they actually sent the dress out.

But again, being in the middle. I had on a new necklace and a friend came up to me (a friend who only shops at expensive stores) asks me where I got it. I said JCPennys, and that since my sister works there I got it for 10% off.
She then in return sarcastically said oh wow, 10%

It seems like no matter what I do, I can never win. I am quiet and shy around some, and loud and abnoxious around others. I just don't know!

I guess maybe that is why I often hang out with my family. Because I act totally me, and at ease around them. I am funny, and witty ( I don't act dumb) I speak freely and am just myself...my true self.

Midterms!

Midterms start this Wednesday! YIKES!
But let's talk about something on a happier note. In an hour the Jets and Steelers will play and whoever wins that game will play the Green Bay Packers in the Super Bowl! And I am soooo excited! I love the super bowl, and then after that will be Mardi Gras and then Lent and then Track, Spring Break, Easter, Track Ending, Finals and GRADUATION!! YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYYAYYAYAYAYAYAYAYYYYYYY!! I can't wait!!!!

Hope all is well and unstressful!
-Kathleen

Midterms

So in two weeks I will be taking my midterms, the last midterms of my high school career. But this is no time to be sentimental...I have work to do. For a week straight I will have to take a two hour test for each one of my subjects.
This time of year usually gets pretty stressful for me because I have to get in shape for spring track, I am not getting enough sunlight, and I have to study everything I learned this year.
And unfortunately, just because I'm a Senior does not mean they get easier. However, if I get straight A's in a class and get a A on the midterm, I will not have to take the final...and I want to do this so badly.
So for the next two-three weeks, I will have no life. But hopefully it will pay off in the end? That education is the "smarter" route?
But studying for midterms are hard because teachers are still giving regular tests up to the day before...and you have to pass those too.

So farewell blogger and facebook, e-mail and my cellphone
I will see you in Feburary.

On a happier note I got into my sixth college today! Six for six.
I got into every college I applied to. Which is a big confidence booster.

Happy January and Feburary
-Kathleen

Bread Givers Is So Sad

I am reading "Bread Givers" by Anzia Yezierska
Now this is a story about a poor immigrant family from Russia who has moved to America (1910) in hopes of a better life. They are poor and have little to eat, their clothes are ratty and the father depends on his four daughters and wife to work and bring in money, and he always gets the best food...but for me the saddest part of the novel is romance.

The eldest daughter Bessie is bounder age "old maid" she is nearing her 30s
she found a good hardworking man but to her father he was not good enough!
But the main reason why the father did not let her go was best she makes the highest wages! And he was too selfish to let her get married, he said no to her marriage because her boy friend refused to support the father.

Then the second daughter finds a rich piano playing man. But the father does not like him because he plays the piano on the Sabbath. His father then makes him stay away from her because her family was poor. She cried and cried. But when they reconnect her father turns him out and makes her choose between her father and her boyfriend, she chooses her father.

The third daughter was deeply inlove with a poor poet. They would write love letters back and forth to each other and felt that together they would be truly happly. But his poverty was all the father had to hear and he turned him out.

The father boasted about how he could get his daughters married so quickly he had no time to think about their happiness. The first man was for his second daughter, he was going to leave his eldest to become an old maid because she brought in good wages. He found a diamond seller and got her married off. But it turned out that he was a liar! He did not own the diamonds, he merely worked in the store and got fired for letting the second daughter wear them. She went hungary many nights before she came home for something to eat. But did the father take responcability? NO! He blamed the daughter telling her it was her fault that she did not see the flaw in his character, that she had to "sleep in the bed that she made."

He found a coats and furs salesman for the third daughter. She married him quickly just to get out of the house. She told her eldest sister of how she would always love her poet and that she only accepted the gifts from the coats and furs salesman to fill the void. She moved across the country. But she wrote home telling her parents that he was a gambler. But the father refused to let her come home because it would look bad in front of the neighbors. That "no one would believe that you left him, they would think he kicked her out." It was her fault that she didn't see the faults in him and that since she was six months older she was six months less pretty and less attractive to men, and that she was too far gone to find another husband. "She must sleep in the bed that she made."

This was about the time that I began to cry. I am a big sap for romance and I just cannot imagine how heartless a father could be! How could be not let his daughters marry the men they loved? Instead he found fake husbands for them, now they would be miserable for the rest of their lives! And on top of it, instead of taking the blame himself, he blamed in on them!!

AND!! He won't let the eldest daughter get married because he wants her to continue to support him. She can only get married to a man that is willinging to support his own familly and her father.

This is no doubt the sadness book I have ever read on heartbreak.

-Kathleen

Christmas