(Did I mention? New Vice President of Sigma Tau? And ME got President? Rocks to be us.)

We were not prepared to be in charge, but our last meeting of the semester was the day before, and the President’s folder was handed over, and there we were.

I ended up being emcee for the night, introducing people and such, and read my poem first, to kick off the night. I hate being first. And microphones. But it went well. There weren’t very many readers — I blame it completely on the lack of fliers announcing it — but I think there were about ten of us. And our advisor is good at filling time; he writes songs that the English majors love to hear. And the place was crowded — much more than attended last semester.

I really like open mic nights. I love hearing people read their stuff, and for some reason, I alway get a bajillion ideas. I always end up with notes scribbled all over whatever is available.

Tonight, I came home with ideas for three new poems, and finally figured out to illustrate an image that’s been stalling me on one I’ve been working on.

So next year, Open Mic nights are going to be my pet project. Better organized, better promoted, and an actual donation jar. I can’t wait.

But which poem should I write first? Things I Will Never Do for You or You Can Tell This is a Party Because We’ve Got Red Plastic Cups?

Who am I kidding? First up is on the list of things to be worked on is the one I talked about last month. I’ve finally got the image I was looking for, this one I can show to my parent’s when I’m done.

Oh, and two more weeks until the end of the semester. Can’t wait for that to be over too.

And it’s not because I had a ton of work to do or fights with people. No, instead it’s because I’m a dumb ass and break things easily.

My harddrive crashed last Monday night. And by crashed, I mean the disk actually shattered. Trying to boot up, my computer sounded like it was playing plinko as the pieces moved around as it tried to spin.

So, no recovery possible. I’ve lost everything. All of my papers, all of my notes, all of my music. I had to skip class last Wednesday for an emergency trip down to Sacramento and the Apple store.

I’ve come to grips with losing everything. The most important things I was working on — a research paper and a poem — I had emailed rough drafts of to Josh, so I have those to work with. I’d have been so bitter if I had to start that poem over from scratch.

Things will be silent around here for just a little bit longer. I’m slowly piecing back together my computer and the things I need, and there are three weeks left in the semester with four papers that have to get written, along with a huge InDesign project and trying to piece back together my Sociology notes to study for the final.

I’ll miss you blog. Not as much as I miss my harddrive, but still.

It’s still working it’s way through the cogs of my head, trying to find the right images (words will follow later, I hope). I’ve taken E’s advice, writing everything down that I can imagine, trying to figure out which images to string together, where my emotion is.

(By the by — does anyone know how to attach something physical to music? Because that’s the image I’m struggling with right now. Everything else has had actual physical equivalents, but music eludes me. I want to attach something to a song, so that everyone can see it, not just a copy that I own, like a CD.)

Instead of struggling with the most awesome awesomeness to come out of my imagination, I’ve started on a poem that is inspired by a single line: I wanted to write you a love poem.

This work is entirely different that what I usually write. To begin with, couplets. I don’t think I’ve ever actually written couplets, and it’s interesting to try to think about where the line breaks should be, and as I add and change lines throughout the poem, I have to be mindful of the couplet breaks.

The imagery is different than usual, too, since usually I attempt a single running metaphor (the universe, perhaps?), and this one switches up three times, but it makes sense because it’s more stream of thought than I usually attempt.

Think Billy Collins, really. I’ve been gorging on poetry between chapters of The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins required for class, and his poetry moves me like nothing else, and there are no “love poems” so much that there are poems filled with love.

My poem is… I know I know, this would be so much easier if I could share the poem with you all, but I’m working on it for submission for the Sigma Tau Delta lit mag, and I don’t want to put it up here and have that count as prior publication and thus get excluded solely for that. But once it gets rejected, I promise to share it with you all.

But I’m really excited. It’s like my muse has decided this is the week she’s going to be awesome. This week, I heart poetry. And to show you, here’s one of my favorite Collin’s poems, animated. I think all poems should get the “music video” treatment.

Which makes it so odd, then, that so often there are poems that attempt to worm their way out of my head.

I have every poem I’ve ever written since I was 10. I started collecting them into a journal notebook when I was in the eighth grade. I started actually writing poetry in drafts when I was 23. I have never written anything that I would send out for publication.

It is very interesting to flip through that self-made poem book, and see how my poetry has evolved. I look back on those high school poems, so full of angst and anger and death, and can’t remember a single event that caused me to feel that way. They read a lot like the journal from my sophomore/junior year. Full of emotion, hardly any images. And so very much crap. Only the thought that I’d probably burn down the condo keeps me from burning this book.

My poetry now revolves around images. Scenes in my head that mean more than just the event. The hardest part is to get out the emotion behind the image. It’s like for some reason, my brain cannot process both into the same poem. It’s always either/or, never both.

I am very lucky that I have a wide group of friends who all write, or all understand the process of writing (but deny that they write), and are willing to listen while I hash out ideas and images and emotions. I’m never at a loss for finding someone available when I need to talk through my writing.¹

Right now, there is a poem that needs to fall out onto the page. I’ve been thinking about it on and off for the last week. I have an image that’s been building. I know what the emotion is. I have absolutely no words to string together. ME and Am think it’s an absolutely brilliant idea. E tells me to write about it like I write stories — describing everything I see, and maybe the poem will come. I day dream about the poem while I’m in class, the image running through my head like a music video to a song with no lyrics.

I need to get these lyrics out. It’s a love song, both happy and sad. Hopeless and hopeful. Haunting and haunted. It’s pretty much going to be the best thing I’ve ever imagined.

But first I must get the damn image on the page without losing the emotion.

1. Thank you! omfg thank you! I’d go crazy without you all!

I fell asleep looking at this photo the other night. Danny, in addition to inspiring me when we talk, inspires me with his photography (can’t wait ’til I can afford to buy some of his prints).

So, I fell asleep thinking about birds, and flying. It was the title of the photo, though, that really got me to think.

How hard do you fly?

Since I was little, I always wanted to be able to fly. I used to stand in the back yard, arms straight up in the air, and imagine that I could fly around my neighborhood much like Superman. But as I’ve grown up, I imagine flying less and less, to where that imaginary memory doesn’t feel real like it used to.

It seems to me that as we grow and evolve, our imagination begins to take a back burner to our lives. While I never had an imaginary friend — I had a little sister that never left me alone, why would I need to make up a friend — I used to imagine lots of things that I used to think was absolutely normal and real.

Flying like superman, for one. I also used to imagine that I could walk on the ceiling, holding a mirror in front of me so that I could only see my new “ground.” I’d imagine that the tree in our front yard was really my home; I had branches that were designated to be my bed, others for the living room, and so on. I would pretend to be different people, different animals, different anything.

But somewhere along the line, I stopped playing make believe. I can’t pinpoint when it happened, but I remember one day standing in the backyard, arms straight up in the air, and I could no longer fly. Walking on the ceiling felt more like walking with a mirror in front of me. The tree became only a tree.

My imagination became internalized. I still imagined things, but it happened in the dark, when I was asleep, or when I was throwing words on paper to see what would stick. There was no physicality left to my imagination, there was no one else involved.

I wasn’t trying hard any more. I gave up on flying. It was easier to believe that flying wasn’t an important.

But it is! I’m not flying hard enough in my life. My imagination is the one thing that sets me off from other people, and I’m not using it to my fullest extent. As an adult, my imagination outlet is my writing, and I find ways to put that off, convince myself that I don’t know what to imagine anymore. Imagination takes work. Flying takes work.

I need to try to fly harder, to find that place within myself that allows me to stand in my backyard, arms upstretched, believing that I can fly. Because I can fly.

I just need to believe.

Because of our history, Danny knew without my explaining it that I didn’t mean just about physical goods or outcomes, but emotional goals we’ve set for ourselves without realizing. He began to set out this theory of his that explains how he believes the universe works in these situations — when the want is a state of being, whether it be the want to be rich, or the want to be loved by millions.

what we want has to be a subconscious desire, a driving motivator behind what we do and say and think consciously. because we are not in complete control of what happens (ie. there are other humans involved each with their own free will), we have to forget that we’re trying to rig the system in our favor. sorta like quantum theory, how all possibilities are actually happening until you observe it from outside the box. because the universe is going to correct course, if you are aware that you are rigging the system.

Danny went on to give me a political example; I however was thinking on a more personal level, and about the way people interact.

For example, Jimmy really like Katie. Jimmy makes it really obvious that he likes Katie. He calls her, he sends her text messages and pokes her on Facebook and IM’s her in the middle of the night when he sees that she’s online. Jimmy consciously knows that he really likes Katie and wants her to like him back. However, by over thinking his actions, he in effect drives Katie away because whether or not she liked him before, she now feels that he is slightly creepy and way too involved for whatever she was ready for.

It is when Jimmy loses hope, when he drops off his interaction to her, when his like for her has dropped to the subconscious — he still likes her, but he doesn’t think about it any more because he’s sure that she doesn’t feel the same way — this is when Katie is going to come back and show that she likes him. As Danny says:

people who accidentally fall in love with each other are still looking for love, acceptance, relationships, but they’ve taken that from a conscious to subconscious level and when that happens they’re able to focus on the individuals, ignoring their fatal flaws and hyperbolizing their strengths

When what you want — or what you think you want — still dominates your conscience, everything becomes overanalyzed. Does he like me? Will he call? What is he thinking? Questions dominate, what you want seems too far out of reach and an impossible goal because the goal requires another person, with their own wants and desires, to acquiesce to yours. And everyone is selfish when it comes to what they want.

Pushing what you want to the subconscious is terribly hard. After all, it’s what you want, it’s what you think/dream/wish for. But it’s when you put it aside, focus your energy on something else, that what was once unreachable will be within your grasp.

And obviously this doesn’t work with everything. Some things to require you to work hard at it. But others are much better achieved by knowing you want it, but allowing the universe to work itself out in unknown ways. It’s like getting a present you’ve always wanted but never having to tell anyone explicitly to give it to you.

1. idle in that we were talking about random things when I brought it up. Danny and I have a history of philosophical discussions about life, love, and the universe. He is, in fact, my go-to guy for discussions that are about more than what they seem

This is a different type of piece for me though. It’s based in real life on real events, but from someone’s point of view that is not mine. It’s an exercise in imagining what it’s like to be someone else, especially someone I don’t know very well. It’s also focused more on the internal character development, as opposed to the dialog that I usually rely so heavily on.

I don’t think that this piece will ever see the light of day, except with a few select friends who I trust with my life and my secrets, because the piece is intensely personal for being from another point of view.

However, it’s good to finally be able to stretch my imagination again. I haven’t written anything but half a poem since January; the words have been bottled up inside me, which is always an uncomfortable situation. I’m always coughing up chunks of dialog or exposition that goes no where, free to roam the wind because I didn’t catch them with my butterfly net and pin them down.

This piece though, has got me thinking about writing another story, with the same starting inspiration, but with entirely fictional characters and fictional events. Of course, some true-to-life events will slip in, but only because I couldn’t make it up better than it happened, and it’s what caused me to open up a text window and tap out a few words here and there until they were lined up into a story.

It’s such a relief to have the words back, to finally pour onto the page what is inside me. I was afraid they would be gone for good, that nothing would come to me again.

I can’t wait until my characters start taking over, when things come out that I never expected or imagined. I missed my imagination taking me someplace new, someplace unmapped and undiscovered.

I can wait.

I am not a patient person when it comes to things I want.

If I want something, and it’s within the realm of possibility — meaning that I don’t need to break the time-space continuum or engage a team of scientists or programers to make it happen — there are two possible things that will happen. Either I will talk myself out of wanting it, or I will do anything in my grasp to get it.

I talk myself out of lots of stuff. When shopping, I will hold something for the entire half-hour I’m wandering around the store, but put it down when it comes time to actually pay for it, convinced that it’s too expensive and I can live without it. If I make plans early in the week, sure that the event is one I must attend, I will have managed to convince myself by Saturday night that I don’t want to go out, and would really rather stay home and read a book.

Then there are things that I want very badly, and whether or not I can afford it or is good for me, I’ll get no matter what. My Wii is a good example. I don’t really need it, probably should have saved my money, but I wanted it more than I’ve wanted anything else in a long time. My sister bought it for me the week before spring break, and I was impatient to get home and play with it. Books fall into this category too; I have far too many books waiting to be read, but every time I go to the bookstore, I end up with more, impatient to have them waiting and available to be read, whether or not I’m going to read them in the immediate future or not.

This impatience for things I want extends past physical goods — it extends into personal relationships as well.

I’ve been hanging out with a guy for a while now that I really enjoy spending time with. We go to the movies and sometimes to the bar, we play video games and board games, we hang out in groups of friends or on our own, we txt and IM and stay up far too late at night doing absolutely nothing. We were not introduced by friends, and so have to decipher each other’s character without an intermediary to help us along, pointing out habits that are ingrained but not obvious to the casual observer.

We do not talk at all about what it is we’re doing, or if it means anything at all.

Part of me is thrilled with this. I like the uncertainty this brings to my life, the unexpected curve-balls inherent in any new thing.

I’m trying very hard to be patient. To let things go on in their slow undefined state, to take things as they come, to puzzle them out and slowly decipher this fragile thing that has sprung up in an unexpected place.

I have never been patient when it comes to relationships. I’ve always been afraid of the awkward stages where nothings been defined, and you don’t know where anything is going, and a misspoken word — let alone a blog post — can screw the whole thing up. And I’ve always been afraid of screwing things up.

So here I am. Half of me wanting to let this play out slow, to live in the moment of not knowing, to relish in the uncertainty and the whims of life, the other half wanting to know where we are now so that I can expect what’s coming in the future. Is this a fling, something to fill the time between classes and homework, or is it serious, where there’s a chance of meeting parents and comparing histories and learning what makes each other tick?

And the part of me that wants to define what this is doesn’t care what the definition is. There’s no set answer I’m looking for. It’s just that I haven’t figured out how to be psychic yet, and I’m not sure what is expected or wanted from me, and that makes me impatient.

So, I’m trying to wait, to be patient and not force something that isn’t ready. It’s driving me (and those closest to me who must listen as I try to puzzle it out) batty that I can’t let it be, let it play out and unfold without any hints to what is coming. That I can’t stop analyzing what this is that’s standing before me.

But you know what?

I can wait. I’m going to have to.

I use Schoolhouse to organize all of my assignments and notes, and to keep track of what’s due when (brilliant at that, really), but I never look forward more than a week in advance. Thus, I didn’t notice until Sunday night that seriously? this week bites.

It’s the week before spring break, and for the first time in a long time, the majority of my classes have a midterm attached to them. And if there’s not a midterm, there’s a writing assignment that is sucking my soul (take your pick, they all feel like that this week).

I’ve been ready for this week to be over since before it began; just thinking about what has to be done is driving me crazy. It’s not like it’s hard, it’s just that it’s far more than I expected.

It doesn’t help at all that I’m working on absolutely the worst paper I’ve ever written in my life. I had to have a rough draft ready for class yesterday, am waiting for peer reviews that are due tomorrow, and have to pull everything together to turn it in on Friday. I’m at seven pages already, and it’s a large rambling mess that’s comparing two radically different articles with out a thesis statement in sight. I’m sure I’ll have to come up with something soon.

Granted, I thrive on the stress of a tight deadline, but really I hate when it’s stretched out over the entire week, because I can stare at Thursday’s list, thinking “OMG THREE MIDTERMS IN A ROW, WHO PLANNED THIS SHITTY SCHEDULE” and then I remember that it was me, and I don’t feel any better or have anyone to take it out on.

So this week is an exercise in not breaking things, because I get antsy and angry about thinks I don’t like but can’t change and haven’t passed.

But… thank god for spring break. And the Wii that’s waiting for me at my parent’s house.

Am told me last week that I’m a serial-monogamist, which is completely true. I spent two years with Fat-Boy, and after a three month break, five years with Dustin. I have a problem with long term relationships and leaving them (lets leave the reasons behind this problem, for another day, shall we?).

However, this elephant-in-the-corner that we’re ignoring leads me to a new problem. How do I differentiate between the different types of men the newly-single me will now encounter?

Mr. Right: Obviously, this is what optimally I’m looking for. At 25, I’m ready to find someone to settle down with. Hell, at 22 I was ready to settle down. But Mr. Right is supposed to become Mr. Forever (at least in my book), and that always takes awhile to figure out. So, Mr. Right will most likely start out as…

Mr. Right-Now: Any guy who I would call my boyfriend would ideally fall into this category, but not always. Mr. Right-Now is the guy that seems like he could become Mr. Right, but it’s unclear. Usually it’s a gut feeling that tells you he’s not the forever kinda guy, and in the back of your mind you’re questioning whether or not there is someone else out there who would be a better fit.

Mr. Right-in-front-of me: This is the hardest guy to figure out, because he can wear many different disguises. The one-night-stand, the rebound-guy, the all-consuming-crush, and Mr. Right-Now are all different aspects of this category. The hard part comes from trying to decide who, in the grand scheme of things, Mr. Right-in-front-of-me is.

So this is my problem. I must start at the bottom, and work my way back up, and so thus will begin with Mr. Right-in-front-of-me. But figuring out which roll he (whoever he is) will play in my life is a much harder thing to grasp.

It doesn’t help that I’m being thrust into dating after seven years of serial monogamy. Dating at 25 is different than dating at 20, which is different again from dating at 16, which is the last time I was really active in the “dating scene.” This whole thing is making me feel like high school all over again.

I think my greatest fear is in being wrong again. I’m terrified of making the wrong decisions at this point in my life. I’ve been wrong so many times before, and am tired of it, and thus find myself keeping away from any sort of serious decision that isn’t related to my college courses.

If there isn’t a decision to be made, I can’t be wrong, right?