"personal truth"

I was in Ithaca once as a freshman with c and some old friends who have grown up and gone away since then, and we went to a coffee shop where a hippie woman gave us free mate and talked to us about personal truth. I can't remember exactly what she said, but Oedipus Rex was brought up in our argument against her, and we thought we were so brilliant because we had read it and argued circles around this woman, who was illogical, but just had a different opinion than we did.  We thought we knew so much, about how Oedipus' personal truth led to the truth, and how it affected his world.  Years later, in our theory of knowledge class, we were told that there was no such thing as personal truth; there is only the truth, and then there are our perceptions of the truth.  I personally don't see the difference, aren't personal truth and perception the same thing? Right now everything looks darker to me, and I am "perceiving" that we aren't talking, and I'm perceiving that I'm drawing away from everyone, even though that's not what I want, or need.  My personal truth is that I'm losing them, all of them, and it's my own fault. 

ode to d

My brother made me a bracelet so that I wouldn't forget him when I go to college. I thought that it was sweet, but kind of silly. Why would I forget him; he's my brother. He's one of my best friends. Unlike other people that come and go, he'll always be around to make me bracelets out of unevenly-sized clay beads, break out into harmonies, and talk about Harry Potter with me. I'll miss having someone around to make fun of for being obsessed with Apple products and not doing things in a logical order.

math doesn't like me

For once, math is not a codename for a person or action or event, math is what it is, and studying for my math test tomorrow is not working out. It's so frustrating-why don't I understand this? I thought I was supposed to be good at math once upon a time.

the "good" old days

I'm taking a break from writing my college essays. It's too exhausting. I'm writing about when I was ten, how I would sneak into the basement and read snatches of pages of my mother's copy of Foxfire by Joyce Carol Oates, and how it caused me to stay sane during a time when everything was insane; about how those girls could be powerful even when I could not be, and how those fragments of a novel saved my life. I'm worried that it's too personal-it's probably not what anybody is looking for. I'm pretty sure it counts for something though, even though I'm not writing about how the book wanted me to save pandas or attain world peace.

Thinking about those days brought up a lot of memories that I had forgotten, or at least tried to forget, but I feel like this Foxfire essay has to be written, it's been whispering in my ear, asking me to write it for years, and now I have the opportunity. Even if I don't send it out, even if it's not perfect, it will be written for myself, so that I can never forget that Foxfire burns and burns.

only three

Only three this month-I'm slacking off, in life in general. I am not ready for the intense extended essay writing that will happen this weekend, the college essay writing that will hopefully happen and be completed this weekend, the everything else that is going on at the same time. I need to be more diligent, not rely on the adrenaline rush of stress to get work done, get things done earlier so that my insides aren't eaten alive by what I am feeling. I don't want to grow up and be responsible-to have all of these things that I have to do. c yet again halfheartedly tried to get me to skip school, though all the while she knew that we wouldn't, that we never do and probably never will. I think we need to think about skipping school to prevent ourselves from actually doing it-if I start asking myself why I do everything, would I ever get anything done?

streetcar

Writing here again, accidentally on purpose, when I should be writing about Blanche and Stanley, the moth and the Man, feels more right. I don't want to talk about the "palpable tension in the air" any more, I think it's more worth it to read the play than my essay about the play anyway, and is there any other way to show that I get it, I know, their worlds are irreconcilable, I know. I know that. How can they not be? I know I need to finish, I know I need to sleep, to eat, to dream so that I have enough energy to get up and do it all over again, riding my bike to school, going through another day of the same classes, doing more homework, practicing violin, the same worries about college and my life and school now repeating in an endless loop in my head, failing to sleep and eat the way I am supposed to, finally sleeping again. why why why-cue mental temper tantrum, because my mushy brain (everyone's brain is mushy) has lost the will to send out electrical impulses, I've lost the will to think and be and here I am now, nearing this point of Done-ness, my eyelids heavy with lost time.

I couldn't sleep again last night, and the spell checker is stuck on French spelling so everything I am writing now is underlined in squiggly red, like everything is wrong wrong wrong. I have dread in my stomach again, the place where it always lies, like a large stone that I swallowed inadvertently. I don't know how to make it go away, or how to be happy, or unstressed, or not worried, because it's always there, in my stomach. It's almost as bad as the dread I felt when I was little, the kind that I wasn't aware of because it was always there, and only realized it had been there after it had gone, when I flinched at loud noises and didn't realize that I'd been doing it until after I had stopped. It's back and I'm afraid I can't ever make it go away.