Lovebreaker!

You know what? I wish I had long fingers. Like looooooong ones. The ones that make piano playing at least look effortless. Long and skinny.



Sorry. I kinda think I have a fetish.



Oh, and I've got a story to share. Ever since my friend Karen transferred, she's been missing her people terribly. She wants to come back and visit for our spring formal/prom/whatever they're calling it now. Thing is, she needs a date. And no one is willing to help with that, since all of the guys she's friends with have the mentalities of eight-year-olds: "Oh no, a girl! Ew! Cooties! Do I have to kiss her? Grooossssssss!" So needless to say, finding her a quasi-date isn't going well, even though the facts are these:



1) He doesn't have to turn this into some romantic escapade.

2) He doesn't have to escort her in.

3) He doesn't have to talk to her.

4) He doesn't have to even acknowlege that she's even there.



How hard can this possibly be?!??!



But shockingly, there's even more. See, Matt was a really good possibility to take Karen for a long while. At least in her mind. But Matt has told me (well, I kinda finaggled it out of him, but whatever) that he wants to ask Layla. Remember Layla? (Pretty, went to the East Coast, apparently a much better actress than I am.) And Layla and I are friends (that keeps the envy under control). And I told her about Matt's secret longing (what? I cannot keep secrets, which the last few days have proved twofold), and she thinks it's funny. So she's not gonna say yes.



Oh, this is disasterous. But it's rather funny. I am so excited to be in the midst of typical teenage drama. Seriously, I'm relishing it.



The relishment of it could change, however, if Matt would get word that I told Layla (and about....hmm....seven other people, give or take).



Ah, well. Time will tell. I'm gonna go take a shower.

Goodness.

I feel a little unmotivated. Most likely because no matter how much I seem to think that I indeed understand algebra, I truly do not. Well....maybe it's not an understanding problem, it's an executing problem. You make one mistake and you're screwed, and I am the type to make mistakes.

I would like a friend. A best friend. Someone who's not in a position of authority over me or an acquaintance or someone I feel awkward around or is quasi-dating some slutbag (but that's another post). An honest-to-goodness friend who I love spending time with and can tell anything to. Not someone I want to strangle after an hour or who's too conservative. Someone that I'll meet in----let's all say it together----COLLEGE! Which is eight million years from now so I'm not even getting my hopes up.

And colleges look at GRADES, so I think I'd better go salvage mine.

WHA-bam! Because there's really no other subject. And it's kind of a catchphrase.

Math is going to drive me into an early grave. It is the third day back and I have already had one emotional MOMENT as I contemplated my deep and dark semester of polynomial woes. Aigh.

In other news, June and Dane are now parents of a post-natal child! Welcome to the world, dearie. It's a strange one.

Of Private Schools and Politics

I don't know what I'm doing. I honestly don't. And I am so jealous of those that do.

At my school, which is very small, there are three groups: Those That Have Instantly Recognizable Names (preachers' children, older siblings as predecessors), Those That Do Not Have Instantly Recognizable Names But Have Still Carved A Place For Themselves In The Social Hierarchy, and Those That Simply Are Unimportant And Will Fade Away Instantaneously After Their Graduation. And I don't know where I am anymore. I'm not related to anyone important. My older sister hasn't graced the school with her presence, giving me a comfortable cushion of friends that allows me to be a total witch to those who won't help me in my life. But I'm not sure if I fit in category number two or number three.

And Dane doesn't get it. No no no. I'm sure he is, at the moment, telling June that I'm delusional. Yes, Dane. You went to a high public high school where not everyone knew each other.

I am so frickin' frustrated.

God! I hate being a teenager.

That's the thing. Your insights are dismissed as typical drama and horomones, as are your actually pertinent issues.

A Day Of Days

Okay. There are times that the Conservative Christian School makes me want to go nuts. But it didn't today. Every single class (well, with the exception of español) made me happy. List?

Singing Class With Dane

Our. Sopranos. Are. Terrible.

Our. Tenors. Are. Non-Existent.

Our. Basses. Screw. Off. WAY. TOO. MUCH.

Our. Altos. Are. Fabulous.

(You can guess which one I am.)

Science Class With The Insane Professor

I didn't totally kill our test. A fun story was told and we got off topic.

Number Class With Dane

Okay, this made me a little mad. Answering questions with questions is....annoying. But I'm almost done with our uberly-long assignment, even though I'm some thousand dollars off. And he felt bad that he made me mad, which is an achievement in itself.

Language Class With Señorita Enthusiasm

....sometimes I wish we'd just copy devotions.

But then again I don't. I've learned a lot from my years with her.

I don't know.

Oh well. She called me "Nita," which means beautiful, which made my year. And I like her clothes and she likes mine, so I'm not one to whine. (But I do anyway.)

History Class With Mr. "Pronunciation? We Don't Need No Stinkin' Po...nun...criati...on"

Well, I sat at the back of the room, wrote a drabble that was basically pointless and his unique turn of the phrase caught up with him.

Food Time With Half The Student Body And A Few Teachers

Good food, good company, and not much accomplished for our promenade that is (not) quickly approaching.

God Class With Pastor Sarcasm

Oh geez. Fun. Fun fun fun. My section is the best. We have these amazingly good conversations that are usually on topic. We get stuff done. Mostly.

Math Class With Mr. I-Can't-Decide-If-I-Like-You

I hate math, all right?

Well, that's a lie. I hate the correcting of math, which is when I get thirteen and three-fifths problems out of thirty wrong. (Speaking of, I still have to do my assignment. Ugh. ...oh well. It can wait.) I like doing the stuff that I know how to. (Oh, this thing tonight is gonna take forever. Lots of numbers.) But it was actually fun today.

Study Hour With Dane

I never actually study during this time. I rant, I play, I try to figure out our friendship, I'm snarky. Today was no exception.

"American Literzzzzzzzzz---Huh?" Class With Mr. Hot And Cold

And that title doesn't really fit, because today was enjoyable. Except Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine can shut up. The stupid inverted sentences and politcal rants about things that were, yes, important during that time but sleeping pill-worthy today (and I know, that's such a teenager-y thing to say). But thanks to some hyper (read as: on crack!) back row dwellers, it was memorable.

It was, in a word: fun.

The Ever-Anticipated..."Twilight"

So I joined the barrage of fangirls and went to see the movie everyone has been babbling about for a month. And I'm ashamed of how much I liked it. Yes, I've read the books, but books and movies differ greatly.

No, Twilight the moving picture wasn't as good as Twilight the written word. But it was still decent. The casting for Bella could have been better, but overall, I would go see it again, buy it on DVD, and wait for my own personal nighttime visitor to appear.

And I have Bella's bedspread in gray, so that was a neat surprise.

I was gonna type something profound, but I just lost it. Probably because my mother is talking to my father (the computer leech) on my cell phone and he's practically hollering stuff about us going to eat tomorrow. No, he's not mad. He just has bad phone skills and my mother's just loud.

I have to gripe about an annoyance before I can let it rest:

Do you think I want to spend like 3 friggin' hours with yoou guys on a Saturday??? No. I do not. And you probably don't wanna deal with me either, so why don't we just leave it alone for the damn weekend and then do it sometime this week? You four have this annoying little friendship thing going on and I feel very left out and the Big Blonde Immature Moron makes matters absolutely no better by being...well, big and blonde and immature and moronic. And you, Mr. Sci Fi/Action Freak! I do not like you, nor will I ever, because you are a retard. And Matt, even though we're supposedly friends, you turn into a complete idiot around your "besties." I'm honestly gonna smack you or start crying or...something.

And forgive me! I don't drive! I'm pathetic! So you'll have to come over and get me, which nobody really seems to have any concern for! I don't know what'll happen, and frankly I wish I didn't care.

Why why why why why didn't you assign groups? I may have friends, but nobody's gonna be willing to work with me above their own little cliques. I am extremely perturbed about this situation.

*breaaaaaaaaathe*

A Soup Bowl of Subjects

Dane. In all of your raging rants and defensiveness when it's not needed and pointed looks, you still remain my favorite person in the world.

This month has just been full of shout-outs. I've really gotta stop that, because no one but me knows that this blog exists. If they did....oy, that could get interesting.

Dangit, internet, go faster. Faster faster faster. I could never go back to non-high-speed. I'd honestly have a fit.

And how are these people friends with this guy's girlfriend? She doesn't go to our school, she's two grades ahead....*sigh.* The wonders of small towns, I guess.

All right. I'm gonna go finish what I have to do and then I'm gonna read.

Y.U.C.K.

I.

Hate.

Math.

And everything related to it, for that matter.

You Can't See This!

All right. Do you want a deep, dark secret that I have never told anyone before because I've tried to block it out of my memory? And it's really not even that serious. It's just humiliating.

Before the Conservative Christian School, I went to school that was literally the Hellmouth. A demon would have been a welcome addition to my class. They were the worst people in the entire world--cruel and demeaning and taking every opportunity to make me feel like crap because I didn't participate in sports or wear the garden variety jeans and T-shirt and flip-flops every friggin' day. I was a fine arts geek before the enviornment was conducive to it. Sure, I tried to get into the elite group, but for a pathetic little seventh-slash-eighth grader who was as far away from cool as she was from anorexic, that wasn't going to ever happen. So there I was, stuck with no niche. Elizabeth, my best friend from late elementary school, suddenly moved on to the "popular" group (which, in a class of about sixteen, was everyone but me) and avoided me like the plague. '

And I'll freely admit that I wasn't the most likable person! But I tried. I gave it my best effort up until around sixth grade, when I gave up on trying to please my classmates and made friends with my teachers instead. (Actually, I'd always been friends with teachers, mainly because they didn't latch on to me like leeches and attempt to suck my self-esteem dry.)

So this leads up to one of the worst mornings I ever had. We were in social studies. The morons on the right side of the room were chuckling and whispering, and I was trying valiantly to disappear, because chuckling and whispering was a sure sign that I was involved in the conversation, and not as the protagonist.

So as the class goes on and we watch a video about something that vaguely relates to the topic at hand, the chuckling continues. I ignore.

It continues. I try to ignore.

It continues.

I can't ignore.

I went over and grabbed the sheet from them, and I think that the teacher looked at me like I was a certified whackjob. I read it, and it was that stupid "Learn Chinese In Five Minutes" internet thing. You know, with the supposedly humorous pronunciations...

"Wai Yu Mun Ching"~~~"You're supposed to be on a diet."
"Chin Tu Fat"~~~"I think you need a face lift."
"Yu Stink I Pu"~~~"Your body odor is offensive."

Those are the only ones I remember, as those are the only ones that I heard. Because they were the only ones that they deemed appropriate for me. (Never mind that they totally got what a facelift does wrong. Yugh. If you're gonna insult, use the right one.) And now whenever I see that list, I can't think it's funny. I would like to, but I can't. It makes me nauseous even thinking about it. Some things fade, but this won't. I know it won't. Because....well, to tell the truth, I don't know why. Maybe because it hit all my fears at once?

You want to know the worst part? No one stood up for me. Not even the other girls in my class (all six of them), not any of the other guys. Not even the teacher. I asked him if I could go talk to the principal and I believe he rolled his eyes and told me to sit down. He didn't want to deal with his football players getting in trouble for picking on the weird girl.

I think I still have that list, somewhere. Maybe in a bag at home, packed away with all my old memories of days I'd rather forget and a personality quirk that I wish I could get rid of--the fear that I really have no friends and everyone is just being nice to me because they feel sorry for me. Because that's what I was told at the Hellmouth. That's my greatest fear. That one day it'll all come out in the open--the only reason that Dean let me basically live in the music room is because he "feels sorry for you--that's the only reason he's nice to you. He told us in the locker room."

Sorry. Quote from cerca seventh grade. Possibly sixth.

I don't know what brought this on now. Probably because confessing to an open page, a blank audience, people with no preconceived notions of me other than what I've chosen to put out there, feels mysterious. And maybe...just maybe....that I have people on my side of this issue.

And as much as it sometims annoys me, I'll take the CCS over the Hellmouth any day. So screw you, the Snobs of the Sweatpants Variety. Be amazing at sports. Get pregnant as many times as you want to. Treat each other like crap. Because I am done. As of now, I am done letting you impede my life. Sorry to have ruined your fun by leaving.

Actually, no. I'm not sorry. Because now you're insulting each other. Ha. I did get the last laugh.

Friends of a Strange Quality

So Dane felt ill today. And I really feel like crap, but not physically. Mentally. Because I was being my usual self (obnoxious, snarky, et cetera) because I didn't know. And now I feel so guilty, because hello! I was sick not too long ago too and I would have smacked anyone who acted so...Anne-esque. (And oh God, I do not want to become her.)

It's so stupid. I want to be friends with him and I want to be friends with other people, but the latter requires me to be a moron eighty percent of the time. And furthermore, being a moron is just me. Yes, I can be serious and intelligent, but there are times when I can be loud and stupid. And those are happening with more and more frequency.

The thing is, I feel like I'm under more pressure because of the fact that we're friends. He's not gonna rip into Wendy, a slighty stupid (read as: braindead) blonde, as much as he would me for being late or talking or anything else that ticks him off.

Sometimes I don't know if he even likes me.

So if the object of this message ever happens to read it, I'm sorry for being typical. And you know I don't want to be typical.

Fabulosity...Or Lack Thereof.

Chemistry. Is. Not. My. Friend.

I have recently learned that I have to be explained to how to do things before I can actually do them. Which is surprisng, since books and I usually get along well. I suppose reading for entertainment is different than Reading For A Grade That Will Affect Your Future. (Heh. Let's not speak of my D+ in Algebra, shall we? Good.)

I am having issues times twelve with Anne. It's strange. Last year, her know-it-all attitude didn't seem to annoy me. Maybe because it wasn't friggin' there. But now, she's got this "high and mighty upperclassman" thing going on.

Is that it? Is she so excited for seniority that she's treating even her friends like her subordinates? I've never thought of that until right now. I mean, it seems plausible now that I mull it over.

Oy.

In other news..............oh, I can't think of anything that fabulous. School tomorrow. It will be The Week The Earth Stood Still, The Freshmen Watched In Terror, And The Seniors Milked Their Status For All It's Worth.

The first week of classes went fabulously. I mean, really really fabulously.

"Why?" you ask with bated breath?

Because I am now in Distinction Choir!

That made my life. And it's encouraging about the whole situation, really.

On a different note, I am never having Anne over for longer than three hours. She's driving me nuts. Have you ever known a story-topper? That's her. Yugh.

*sigh*

You know, it's rather funny. Twelve hours ago I was basically complex-free. I was happy, I was sane, I was utterly okay with myself. Sure, I'm not the Most Fabulous Person in the world, but I'm pretty well off. I have talent, I have friends, I have a personality.

That all changed the moment I saw Layla's pictures.

Layla is, in a nutshell, who I want to be. She's a wonderful actress (and has the award to prove it), a size six (at the most), and a member of Distinction Choir. And she's also a traveler to the East Coast, as I recently learned. Worst part is, she's my year in school. And the real worst part is, we're friends. Not extremely close, thrown together through theatre and the Dane thereof, but friends nonetheless.

Why the hell does everyone get to go someplace in the summer but me???

Music, Music, Everywhere, But No Clue What To Sing

(Ay-yi-yi. Stupid technology.)

School has snuck up on me, and the Distinction Choir auditions thereof. I have no clue what I'm going to sing for my solo. I could do something I've done for contest, but those are old. I've had months to work on those and they've already been rated. I want to expand myself. I suppose I could sing a hymn, but that says "Hello, I can sing pretty with the melody playing with me, see?" Or I could do something from a musical, but then that would eat up my choices in the event we'd ever do a musical. (That remains to be seen.) Those would be.

♫ "I Don't Know How To Love Him" from Jesus Christ Superstar (perfect for my enviornment!)
♫ "On My Own" from Les Miserables
♫ "Memory" from CATS
♫ "I'm Not That Girl" from Wicked

I suppose I could pull out one of those. It's not as if we're gonna do four musicals in my last two years.

Let's see if this version gets posted.

A Year In Review

Everyone has some type of trauma in their life. Some are huge (natural disasters, death, illness), some are menial (Estee Lauder discontinuing your favorite lipstick, forgetting to pick up something at the grocery store, dribbling sweet 'n sour sauce on your new white and green shirt, a la me), and some fall into the moderate category. Not as life-threatening as cancer, but not as simple as having to find a new shade of matte burgundy. Mine is smack-dab in the middle of that category.

A little backstory before we begin...

I am a music person. I love it~singing, playing, listening, critiquing, whatever. It makes me feel alive. My music instructor is a fabulous guy with a wonderful personality and that's where this all gets tricky.

My school is part of a denomination of Christianity that's strict when it comes to fellowship (a.k.a. who gets to participate in what). They're very big on religious unity. But I registered there two years ago under interesting circumstances, I was just happy to be going somewhere different. Hey, I think I told myself. They're Lutheran, I'm Lutheran, what's the biggest difference gonna be? Different Jell-O recipes?

Boy, was I wrong. My branch of Lutheranism is by far the most liberal while theirs is the most conservative. Hello, difference!

My first year at CLS (Conservative Lutheran School), I spent first semester in a daze. It was a totally new enviornment. For one thing, everyone treated everyone else like human beings (more or less). I made friends...Anne, Lyn (a pastor's daughter trying to live up to her older siblings and failing), Caryn (another pastor's daughter with a shy exterior covering up a decent sense of humor), and Dane, the music instructor.

The beginning tremors of my mini-disaster occurred sometime early first semester. It was the day of auditions for an elite (a word I have grown to despise yet covet attached to my name) band and I was lurking around the music room, having a typical conversation with Dane: music, life in general, more music, a bit of snark.

The topic then turned to Distinction Choir, the auditioned group of singers that branched off of the sophmore through senior choir. Every freshman had to be in Freshman Music, which consisted of learning note names, learning rhythms, and threats of detention every twenty minutes, so as of yet I hadn't been too involved with either of the older/better choirs. All I knew is that I wanted to be in Distinction.

That's when the earthquake rolled its' first quiver.

Dane told me, a little tenatively, that I couldn't be in Distinction because while I was Lutheran, I wasn't their brand of Lutheran. Since the choir sang at worship services, letting me in would be violating the specified rules set down by God and, somewhere along the line, the district president. This is when it all gets a little fuzzy, from either time or shock. I remember saying, "Do you see all this control? Would you like to see all this control go out the window?" I remember leaving. I remember going into the ladies' room. I remember throwing my black patent pleather high heels at the wall in anger.

Life moved on from that fateful day. In the back of my mind, there was a small thought of I'm gonna try out and I'll be amazing and they'll beg me to join, regardless of what my acronym is.

This year, the earthquake hit full force.

It was on a Wednesday--the first Wednesday of the school year--that Dane called me into the music room, which was fast becoming my home away from home. On Tuesday, I had asked if I could try out for Distinction Choir and, if I did, "Will you take me seriously?" (I remember this phrase very well. We were both in the office and Caryn was by my side, tsk-tsk-ing about my refusal to let the issue go. She does that a lot when it comes to matters of me.) I was supposed to be having a voice lesson. That never happened.

Dane said that he had talked to the superiors and they decided that I, and anyone else who wasn't part of their branch, wouldn't be allowed to audition for Distinction Choir. We spent close to two hours talking about this and I tried desparately not to cry. It wasn't fair. Everything wasn't fair. He didn't do anything to deserve telling a ravenous tiger that the food shipment had been cancelled.

Auditions came and went. No one in The Reject Pile got in, but most of the population of The Eliters did. I have a theory that this is how they became elite, actually. Musical talent coupled with bubbly personalities. I wasn't the only one that had to deal with this. Elle, a quasi-member of The Eliters and a soprano, did too, which sparked our friendship.

The year passed. Whenever the words "Distinction Choir" were spoken, I would mutter something uncomplimentary (defying the wish that I "keep a Christian attitude"), tense up, and stride away, feeling like I'd been shunned by all. This drove Caryn nuts. Anne, on the other hand, would tell me in no uncertain terms to become one of them or stop complaining.

There were the trips, of course. They went two states away for a choral festival, leaving the band to suffer through two horrific rehearsals. There were the numerous after-school and pre-choir (everyone's choir) practices, which left me looking at the non-members of Distinction and dying inside. Everyone else was either not as blessed in the music field, blessed in other areas and just in choir to pass the time, or heathen, as I'd grown to call myself. (Dane did too, after he was sure that I wasn't going to kill him.)

Then there was the Day from Hell. This is my abridged journal entry for the day:

It started this morning. Caryn and Matt [Caryn's on-again, off-again
musically talented crush] and Maria [Caryn's slightly more outgoing
sister] were working on their hymn for tomorrow in the music room. Anne was
doing her algebra, and I was lurking around as usual. I read the contest [large group contest--band, choir, and Distinction were going to strut
their talent] lists of arrivals and returns and suddenly I saw that
WHAM~Tony and Chuck [two non-Distinction tenors] were included in the
Distinction Choir group. I asked why, Matt said that they needed more people,
and I just left to the shouts of "You're not Lutheran!" from Anne.

Selena [senior soprano with an angelic voice] said that since
Bonnie [junior alto who disappeared mysteriously to...somewhere, no one was
quite sure] is gone, they need more people since they weren't sure they were
a "large" group.

I feel like I've been slapped. It's a stunnment. That's the only word for
it, even though it's not a word.

How could he?!?!?!

Do I not get a "thank you"? A token of gratitude for putting up with all
of this idiocy?

...

Nothing is constant. People change, Distinction Choir changes, nobody
predicts it.

...

If this was a movie, the heroine would be invited to sing with the Choir
for contest, get her guy, and feel included at last. But life isn't a movie.

On the worst day scale, that would be up there on the top.

So that's why this year, I'm not going to sit on the sidelines and count how many freshmen showed up for the Distinction Choir's show choir performance. I'm going to be performing, because I'm becoming one of them. My church will flip. Anne will crow "I told you so!" But you know what?

Music is me.

Groupies

You know what I don't get? Why everyone has to have a group. Honestly. Can't anybody be groupless? A lone wolf, perhaps? Here are the groups in my life that I came up with, off the top of my head:

The Eliters...
~~These are the ones that everybody wants to be friends with. The members vary from class to class, but they basically have the same makeup. While they may never talk to you or write on your Facebook Wall unless it's out of boredom or sympathy because you haven't had a post since your birthday two months ago, you desperately want to fit in. When they reject you, you publicly announce how stupid they are and how you're much more suited for popularity back in your hometown. (See my friend Anne.)

The Crazy Ones...
~~These are the ones that everyone is friends with. They party, they drink occasionally, but they make any class you have with them interesting. These are the ones that Anne labels as "sluts" and "jerks." (She desperately wants to be one of them too.)

The Music Teacher's Chosen Ones...
~~These are the alternative folks. They have musical talent, a strange sense of humor, and relish their spots in the circle. Anne deludes herself into thinking that she's one of them, but she tries too hard. To get into this group, you have to be nonchalant enough to slide in and get your claws into your position. In middle school, I wanted in terribly. Now, I'm in and I don't really know how that happened.

The Reject Pile...
~~These are most of my friends. They're not terribly elite, terribly crazy, or terribly talented, but they welcomed me with open arms and that's enough for me.