blog

1. stayed up late, slept not that late (unfortunately). went shopping with my friends, bought a snowboard bag, edited the poster abstract.
2. about to go out, i love college, yay!
3. again, i don't have that much to say today! but it's still been a good day.

i don't have that much to say tonight! i'm just in a really good mood and happy that i'm around my friends. i'm also hanging out with friends from last year tonight, which is good. so yeah, life is going well. let's hope it continues. i guess tonight it just a night to be thankful. i'm thankful for all the good in my life right now.

i get by

1. great day--read a good book, wrote up some stuff for school, went to lunch and had an amazing with my grad student friend. 
2. it was cold and beautiful (one of those days i really love).
3. went out tonight with my friends, old and new. it was so much fun.

so i've blogged a lot about my friends and how much people in my life mean to me. but this is a different kind of post. it's similar to one of my previous posts about how random people can end up being so significant in my life. during the lunch talk today, we talked about how decisions can change people's lives without even knowing it. how is it that so many people have and will continue to impact my life? i guess this post is about how relationships change people. so this is an obvious statement, right? like, duh, C, people change other people's lives. but think about how many people had to make each specific decision in their lives to end up in yours. and then think about how all of these people will have impacts on your life. and when someone new enters one's life, it's hard to judge how that person will affect one's current path in life. but one thing is for sure: you never know when your life will change (at every second of every day), nor do you know why it is changing. and that is enough to think about for a lifetime.

momentum

1. looooong day today. class all day and then a meeting from 7-10:15. yikes.
2. but about to go out now! let's relieve all the stress from this week by hanging out with my girls. more than looking forward to this weekend, too.
3. SUPER EXCITING NEWS! but it's not like i can actually talk about it here. if interested, get in touch with me and i'll share. 

isn't it weird how feelings work in spirals? one week can be REALLY bad, but then the next can be REALLY good. i've always wondered whether it's a function of how people tend to perceive one day, and then they let that carry on to the rest of the week, or the days in a week really are just all similar. but i've been having one of the good momentum pushes lately. and today, when it had started to wear off (stress, headache, homework, etc.), it all of a sudden got WAY better. so now i am confused. maybe it's just a pattern that i'm noticing because i'm living in the moment right now. this could just be my experience. but isn't that what this blog is about? tangent, sorry. anyway! i'm really excited and i spent a majority of my night doing a literature search (nerdy? yes. required? yes.) and i just ended up getting really excited about grad school because i spent time looking at researchers who do work where i want to go to school and who i want to work with. so this post hasn't had much direction, my bad. but it's just been a way for me to get my thoughts out! and to say (in my eternally optimistic way) that things may seem like they are bad, but they will get better.

color me

1. waking up at 6 am benefits: i heard the birds chirping, there was no traffic, and it made me feel like i accomplished a lot. waking up at 6 am drawbacks: starbucks/alpine bagel were not open, the ROTC runners made me feel guilty, and it was cold.
2. did a lot of work today; still not quite caught up but i'm feeling much more optimistic than i was this time last week. tomorrow at 4:45 my weekend starts! then it's spring break!
3. SPRING BREAK!!! countdown: 9 days.

the color of my day today was orange. orange to me in energy and vitality and accomplishments. i felt good today because my adviser announced my summer plans in the lab meeting and i got some "ohhhs" and "ahhhs." good stuff. my days and my moods are always characterized by colors. whether or not i actively think about it or not, looking back on a day i can always figure out what color a day was. and this is why i cannot pick out my clothes the night before. i always dress for my mood and wear whatever fits my mood that day. this is how i see my life--in moods, in colors. my favorite color is yellow, so those days are always the best. but sometimes, a blue day or a red day are just what i need. blue, rightly so, is usually subdued and relaxed, sometimes sad or pensive. red is a "get your ass in gear day." i like those days. they make me feel (hypomanic) and uberproductive and like i can do anything. green days are good too; those are like when i am feeling friendly and helpful and content. pink, oh pink. pink days are glam and sexy and confident. i think wearing pink takes cojones--it's a notice-me color. so pink days are notice-me days. purple...fierce and funky. basically. again, all these are personal for me and how i feel about colors and how they reflect on my life. but i take these motifs and look at other people through these lenses too. i just see the world in full color, and try to live my life the same way. it's about recognizing that not every day is a typically beautiful day, but that every day has inherent beauty. not every color is considered beautiful, but by just being part of the spectrum, they are beautiful. so is this a corny way to end a post? yes, but it's true. i'm thinking (but how can i know?!) that tomorrow is a purple day.

watch out!

1. i actually ate breakfast this morning. unfortunately, it was in the dining hall. gross. 
2. class today wasn't bad; my last class always seems to go really quickly (a huge relief), and my history class is proving more interesting as the weeks progress.
3. did i really just set my alarm for 6 am for tomorrow morning?! ugh...i haven't been up that early since hawaii this summer. but i did stay up that late last weekend...yeesh!

i'm super nervous that just by posting about all my superstitions, they will come not work anymore. so that should tell you what i'm posting about tonight...i am a very superstitious and nervous person! i believe in the cosmic connection (i've talked about this before) and i absolutely believe in jinxing, bad juju, the evil eye and the whole nine yards. i knock on wood anytime anyone says anything that can be jinxed. "oh, you'll do fine on that test!" "there is no way we can lose tonight." "don't worry, i've never wrecked doing this before..." these are all examples of times i furiously knock on wood to appease the cosmic forces at work. it's such a "gotcha!" mentality--you say something is for sure, and the world will show you that nothing is for sure. bad juju may just be a southern thing, but it's a definite cause for concern. you have to be nice to the witchy women or they will juju the hell out of you. meaning, they will make your life miserable! so you better have your gris gris handy to ward off any evil. okay, so this is getting very voodoo very quickly, but really. i am always concerned that things will be jinxed or i will mess up some crazy cosmic balance and get screwed because of it. for example, when i was a little girl, i would never step on the cracks on the ground. like, i'm talking OCD behavior. not even the cracks in the floor tiles in the schools were OK to step on, much less sidewalk cracks. also, blowing all the seeds off of the dandelions was crucial to the success of the rest of my day when i was little. i would get so worried so easily that something bad would happen as a result of me not protecting myself. now that i am typing this out, it seems really weird. i was not a crazyweirdscarymovie kid...just superstitious and slightly OCD. when looking at a cognitive-behavioral model, these go hand-in-hand. i will not bore my readers by going into the basics of this model--just take my word for it that the two concepts are related (a.k.a., they are both reinforcing anxiety-reducing behavior...). one last superstition, i try as hard as possible to stay inside on friday the 13th (really...just ask my friends). and yes, i used to spend a lot of time looking for these...

la da dee, la de daa

1. got new shoes in the mail today! i love them. purple, silver, and white tennis shoes.
2. after falling off the wagon for some of my lent items, i have added them back on. gotta stay strong.
3. very excited about stuff in my school/career life right now!

for all the references to songs that i have sprinkled throughout my posts, it is crazy that i haven't posted yet about music. music=♥ i grew up listening to blues, jazz, and oldies. side note: believe it or not, but i did not like CCR (creedence clearwater revival) for a large portion of my life. crazy, i know. i love louis armstrong, santana, ella fitzgerald, van morrison, the black eyed peas, dr. john, miles davis, U2, joe walsh, enya, CCR, frank sinatra, john lee hooker, vivaldi, lucinda williams, the beatles, rilo kiley, girl talk, beyonce, jack johnson, lil wayne, so so so much more. music is such an outlet in my life and allows me to express my feelings. granted, i do not play any instrument or sing (i would not torture the world) but i can still appreciate music and its capabilities to make my life wonderful. i love the fact that artists and songs have touched so many people's lives. music is so personal and so individual, but can be wildly popular and have an effect on so many different kinds of people. that appeals to me. one song or one band can cross generations, races, social classes, and political views. that kind of unity for people is rare, and the fact that the music industry can create it is intense power. my moods are pretty variable and the songs i listen to always accommodate. i have songs for all my moods and all my activities--the ipod is a great invention.  

for those we...

1. woke up late again, but was more productive today than yesterday. 
2. it was a feast day! yay for eating junk food!
3. bed early tonight. like, really early. i'm thinking 10.

i need to talk tonight about sacrifice. this is a pretty personal topic. sacrifice is really individual and what each of us has done in terms of sacrifice for other people can change dramatically from person to person. i have had so many people sacrifice so much for me. when i think of my all that my parents and my family have done for me, i get so overwhelmed. i don't like to feel indebted to people, so i like to relieve that burden by helping other people. this is a trend in my posts lately, but it's a huge part of who i am. i need to be able to pay back the people in my life who have done so incredibly much for me. and what's hard for me also is not knowing about all the sacrifices that have been made for me for things i don't even realize or know about. how can i ever repay what i don't know about? and the answer to that is by doing similar things for people around me. not similar things, really, but sacrificing for the sake of someone around me just because it's what they need. so that's what i'm going through in my life right now. there are things i rarely sacrifice, like my school and career ambition, but sometimes i have to learn to defer in other parts of my life to do what is best. it's like socialist feelings--feel what is best for the most people. i have to balance my need to live my freakin' life the way i want to live it with needing to realize that other people are affected by how i act and by what choices i make. this has been a bit of a wake-up call. not that i've been running around being selfish and ruining lives, not at all. i just need to remember that choices i make has this inexplicable and unforeseeable effect on people. i have lost my train of thought now. but basically, sacrifice is a big part of my life right now, and it's difficult to deal with. but it's something that needs to happen.

the next item for my list: go on a roadtrip. like a legitimate roadtrip with friends involving not much planning, junky food, amazing music, and beautiful weather.