An Open Letter to Angst

Dear Angst:
This is a break-up letter.
I'm just writing to let you know that our little off-again-but-mostly-on
constant codependent excuse for a relationship is through.
I'm over you and your late-night shaking shtick.
But in that defiant adolescent way
where I'm not so over you as to not potentially benefit
from an angry poem or two.
Here's the deal:
I'm a 17.5-year-old American female,
 meaning I have an average of 60.3 years left,
which is not long enough to be some tautological panic receptor
tuned to some white noise anxiety station.

I'm playing with the dial.

Finding a place where there's airspace enough
for me to breathe freely.
I'm taking all the time I need
for flower-picking, poem-plucking,
absent-minded humming, hand-holding
and other general happiness-seeking activities.

I'm rewriting the script and putting some balance back into it,
remembering that homework is meant to be educational- not just stressful!-
and that reading books is a pretty nice way to spend time.

So angst,
next time you come knocking on my door
looking for some middle-of-the night
shit to stir,
I'm hoping you'll find me asleep.

Sincerely,
Me







P.S.
 Um... hey. One last thing.
Thanks, y'know... for helping me write this poem.
Come to think of it...
are you free next Thursday?
I've got a slam coming up...

Springy

A haiku for spring:
seventeen syllables of
bare feet and new growth.

Holy Monday Mornin'

It's interesting to note that "unholy" doesn't just describe a lack of holiness, but actually indicates a demonic or Abrahamically Evil nature. There's no middle ground, here; you're either with Yahweh or you're against Him (and babies and puppy dogs and all things beautiful and innocent). How does one indicate neutrality of sanctity?  Blessing-ambiguity? Can our puritan knee-clapping heritage even handle that concept? Maybe this is why "atheist" (or "agnostic," for that matter) is instantly translated to "amoral" 'round these parts.

I Exist. Sometimes.

"Did I subscribe to your blog?"

It took a moment for my sleep-deprived brain to remember that I actually had one when that question was thrown at me this morning. Thanks for the reminder, Chuck. Sorry to be so neglectful, little blog.

I have three points to address, at the moment. Here we go:

1. Why you gotta psych me out, atmosphere? After all this wonderful spring weather, not only do you have to rain on a day I would really like some outdoor mobility; you don't even have the decency to give me a warm rainstorm as if it were spring- you've gotta give me this cold, miserable winter dribble. Fickle bitch.

2. Who the hell leaves a mostly-eaten MacDo-lookin' biscuit thing sitting on the stairwell post in a theater/college arts building? Seriously? The effort to carry the thing the rest of the way up/down the stairs and find a trashcan was too much? That's just... something people do? I was kind of blown away by that. (I left it. Sorry, Kathryn.)

...I swear I had a third point. It's gone now. Feathers in the wind.

I might update this thing more frequently, now. Hrm. Maybe I'll post poems. Maybe.

Art

Andy Warhol said, "Art is what you can get away with."
William Saroyan said, "Art is what is irresistible."
Amanda Palmer said, "Stop pretending art is hard."
Salvador Dalí said, "Milk of today born!"

A Rose By Any Other Name...

I wrote a romantic poem this evening:

Roses are rose;
violets are violet;
your name is Alden
and you've got me smilin'.

In other news, I'm incalculably behind in everything, especially NaNoWriMo.  Darn you, time management skills, you evasive fiends.

Beginning

"Well, I'm drowning in this class!" exclaims the overweight middle-aged woman in the cartoon-printed scrubs. People who wear scrubs in casual, non-medical settings make me uncomfortable, because they look like freshly-minted zombies, the vectors of the newest plague. Her waddle could easily be a shamble in disguise. I give some awkwardly friendly acknowledgement and restrain myself from obviously quickening my pace. What am I supposed to say? The Political Science class we're leaving is an effortless A and I'm coasting on piles of extra credit. Every time I see my Community College classmates- mostly returning education students old enough to have parented me during some fiasco of misspent youth- complaining of how challenging the courses are or hear them snoring loudly during lectures, I become more convinced of my need to escape to some higher institution the first chance I get. I dream of university utopias, off-beat ivory tower resorts where I'll be challenged and stimulated and surrounded by intellect and radicalism and nerdiness.* I want this idealized future to be mine!

The tricky questions are where I want to go and when I'll get the applications together and whether I'll get into any good schools ("Yeah, I dropped out of highschool to attend a mediocre community college! I have pretty okay-ish test scores! I've read a few books! I'm seventeen and I've left Missouri like, two times or something!** LOVE ME!") and how in the hell I'll manage to PAY for any of those schools and whether I'll be emotionally stable enough to move wherever Mystery School happens to be by next fall.

In other news, it is November 2nd and I decided this morning that I will participate in NaNoWriMo this year. If you're unaware, the premise of the event is to challenge oneself to write a 50,000 word novel during the month of November. I've always liked the idea of it, but I've never worked up the (admittedly limited) pinasch necessary to actually give it a shot before. I suffer severe Chronic Backspace Syndrome*** and usually get frozen on the first paragraph of any writing I undertake, so I see this as a way to challenge myself in breaking down those inhibitions. Even if I get nowhere near the 50,000 mark, if I make decent progress and learn from the experience I'll see it as a success. Also: if I do "win" NaNoWriMo, how freaking awesome would that look on college applications? I'd be impressed if I were an admissions officer. It'd theorhetically help make up for my lack of formalized English curriculum right now. I might even squeeze a Common App essay out of the experience, if I haven't worked something better out by then and I still have time.

To actually meet quota I'll have to average 1,725 words a day starting today, and I still have no idea what I'm writing about. On to brainstorming! (Not really. On to Equality meeting, then home, then brainstorming.)

*Okay, I mostly dream of awkward social situations, confusing interactions with strange mishmashes of acquantances, and lots of bizzare, disjointed sexual encounters. Often all three of those at once. But the point stands. I fantasize about colleges (and also much-less-disturbing sexual encounters, among other things).

**Lies! At least 11.


***Caused by excessive levels of self-doubt, Chronic Backspace Syndrome is a disorder wherein subjects become stuck in cycles of perpetual writing and deleting, impeding any substantial progress towards a larger work.