Cast Me Away

Now that I have time to relax I am slowly slipping back into my normal routine of reading, watching movies and day dreaming. Over the years I've realized that I thoroughly enjoy many forms of escapism. I've always wondered if this was because of a true love and passion for almost all forms of art or if it is only a gateway for me to escape the harsh realities of the world in which we live. Perhaps it is a combination of the two or perhaps art is a form of escapism that can only be taken advantage of by the people who truly appreciate it and understand its purpose. Whether it be reading something someone has written or examining a painting someone has painted or watching a movie someone has filmed, I can fall so in love with these things to the point at which I am consumed by them. For however brief a moment I am somewhere else, lost in someone else's mind and heart.

A lot of the time this scares me, how lost I can be and how much I enjoy the escape. It's almost as if I have to force myself to stick with reality a lot of the time. I constantly have to pull myself out of my own day dreams or the day dreams, ideas, and thoughts of others. For most of my life I've always preferred walking through a painting, living the adventures of fictional characters in the books that I read and relating my life to people in the movies that I watch than actually living my own life. I suppose its a much more comfortable position to be in, that of the dreamer as opposed to that of the doer. I need to become a doer.

I hope to discover a way to balance the part of my personality that is the dreamer and the much smaller part of me that is the doer. I'm very capable of accomplishing things and I almost always succeed at anything that I try. However, its too easy for me to escape life and I'm constantly looking for a way out. It's almost as if I get bored with my life or bored with the way things are in general in this world. I always have to add excitement and beauty to it, when really, its not all that dull, theres just not witches, wizards, and dragons flying around.

Just Keep Those Sleigh Bells Jinglin...

Christmas definitely snuck up on me this year. I still can't believe its only 3 days away. I feel like I didn't have time to get excited about it, let alone prepared. The extremely odd warm weather isn't helping me either. I relate a lot of different smells to the feeling of christmas, one of them being the smell of wood burning stoves when you walk outside, which no one has been using this year because its been 60 degrees. And so, I feel extremely robbed of my christmas spirit. My usual demeanor of happiness and light heartedness around this time of year is completely absent. Is this what christmas is like for all adults? A holiday that just sort of happens in the middle of every day life and responsibility? It scares me to not possess that feeling, I've been trying to get in the mood, but its just not there. Instead, this year I seem to be more stressed by christmas than anything. And at this point, stress is a more familiar feeling to me than any other emotion. I also chose to work christmas day and new years day as I desperately need the money, you know, so I can buy school books for next semester. It shouldn't be too bad since I'm going to be in the house with family anyway, might as well be by the computer getting double time for it and it shouldn't be too hard to sit at the computer with a hang over. Anyways, happy holidays.

The Sociopath Next Door...

I'm reading an extremely interesting and almost horrifying book right now called The Sociopath Next Door. Did you know that 1 in every 25 americans is a sociopath? Now, at first, I was extremely surprised at this, however, as I read on and reevaluated people in the world today it made perfect sense to me that 1 in every 25 of us don't have a conscience. It would make sense that the person that almost ran you over with their car would feel no remorse or guilt at the fact they almost killed someone or bumped someone in a crowd or jumped in line or stole something from a store or robbed a bank. However, one of the most interesting points in this book is that those people are the only sociopaths we truly recognize, the ones that commit crimes and get caught. What about all the people that get away with it or the sociopaths that aren't violent or openly commit crimes? There are many reasons why we don't recognize such sociopaths and it is simply because those of us who do have a conscience constantly make excuses for those of us who don't or we choose to ingore them or we are so manipulated by them we can't even tell that something isn't quite right about Bob.

There are several types of sociopaths. There are the psychopath sociopaths, which are the people that commit serious crimes and/or kill other people, a lot of these people are in jail, or at least I hope so. However, there are also the sociopaths that often go unrecognized. These include (to name only a few because I haven't finished reading the book yet) the covetous sociopaths, which are the people that have an "inordinate desire" for the possessions of others and will therefore do anything to somehow sabotage people they are most often jealous of or in fact strip that person of what they have that the sociopath desires. This isn't necessarily a possession but can also be a personality trait or beauty or accomplishments etc. There is also the intellectual sociopath, which are most often your business men or lawyers etc. These are the power hungry sociopaths, the people that will do anything for their own personal gain, and I mean anything (because they don't have a conscience), in order to obtain a feeling of power over other people. Then, there is the average sociopath, the sociopaths that don't equal the intellectual sociopaths in intelligence, good looks, or charm but obtain their sense of power by more mediocre tasks. An example she gives in the book of the average sociopath was a man, who they reffered to as "Stamp Man", because he would break into local postal offices, steal all of their stamps, and then sit somewhere close by to watch as the early morning workers panicked and called the police. He was almost always caught for this, however, he didn't care, the pleasure he got out of this was enough for him to not care about the consequences or even think about them.

I am just completely side swiped by this information. It's extremely hard for me to imagine not having a conscience, to inflict pain on someone or be the cause of putting someone in danger or manipulating someone enough to cause them anguish or sabotaging someones life, just for the hell of it, for the pleasure, and not feeling any remorse or guilt because of it. Just amazing...1 of every 25 of us was born without a conscience, without a jiminy cricket, scary.

So, how many sociopaths do you know?

Why?

So, its 1am and I am sitting here drinking a bottle of apple Boone's Farm, that isn't mine I might add, while staring at the blank and unstimulating computer screen trying to find some source of motivation in order to write something. It use to be so easy for me to write when I was younger, anything and everything inspired me...I just feel more and more jaded by the world the older that I get, "simple" things don't have the affect on me that they once did and so now I must be hit by a motivational cinder block to have any kind of inspiration to write. Perhaps I set this standard for myself somewhere along the way to write something meaningful, touching, surprising, interesting, etc instead of just writing because it makes me happy. Or perhaps this standard was forced upon me, this way of thinking, and I just allowed it. I feel so forced by society to set standards for myself, to have these huge expectations of myself even when it comes to my writing, something that use to be so simple and easy for me, something that use to belong to me completely. Most of the time I wish that I never submitted to this, I wish I had never let myself fall subject to the high expectations that society as well as my family has set for me. I submit to these things by constantly succeeding at whatever is placed before me by them or by feeling immense guilt for any failed attempt. Why?

I don't regret many things because I truly believe that any decision that I make, good or bad, has an overall possitive affect on any decision I might make after that. This is because I choose to turn every experience into something that I've learned instead of repeating the same mistakes. However, I do regret the strong grip that I have allowed things in this world to place upon me. Instead of fighting this control I accept it as life and base decisions around those barriers.

I constantly wonder what life would be like if society hadn't drawn such a solid line between what is acceptable and what is not, what is supposed to be achieved in life and what isn't considered fulfilling. Happiness is so important to me, as well as balance, and I repeatedly feel thrown from those two things. How can I ever achieve them if I can never be completely content with my life, and in this world, contentness and comfortability are so often the equivalent of either riches or fame, and most of the time they go hand in hand. I don't want to be rich and I don't want to be famous, I think both of those things are such a waste of life, yet, they are extremely desired by our entire society. Why?

I don't know, at this point I am just rambling. However, it has been a constant struggle of mine, the hardship of choosing what will make me the happiest and what is "right". I need to break free of this grip and just say fuck it, so what if I don't become a doctor, so what if I choose the life of a hermit and live in a tree somewhere. Its so obvious to me that living a life without happiness isn't a life at all, I just need to take that leap, put my happiness first and then everything else second. I will take responsibility for my own happiness and whether that is considered right or wrong from here on out, I could care less.

"It may be that we are puppets-puppets controlled by the strings of society. But at least we are puppets with perception, with awareness. And perhaps our awareness is the first step to our liberation." -Stanley Milgram

Life As My Cat

I often find myself wishing that I was my own pet...Such a comfortable and loving position to be in...

Amanda comes home, I run towards her, while making that purring sound that she likes, and she gently places her 50lb book bag on the bench as to avoid scaring me away. She then sits in the middle of the kitchen floor, just like one of us, to make it easier for me to climb into her lap and drool lovingly all over her jeans. I have nothing in the world to worry about, I depend on her to feed me, clean my litter box, spend hours upon hours petting me, the kind of devotion, love, and attention that I know she wouldn't waste on any human, and then let me fall asleep on her chest, which I know can't be very comfortable for her, but she allows it anyway. Every now and again I will scratch at the wooden railing and sit inside the kitchen sink, both of which she scolds me for, but that kind of reprimanding is always followed by oodles of compliments about how beautiful and good I am. I always reciprocate these acts of love by nudging her in the head with mine when shes sleeping, keeping her clothes warm while shes in the shower right after she is done ironing them, and not to mention placing myself directly on top of anything that she might be reading or paying the slightest bit of attention to. If only all cats were victims of such unconditional love, I know that I'm lucky, hey look, a house fly.

From Katie...

ForEverDance17 (11:51:33 AM): I just want you to know how amazing I think you are. This semester was such a struggle for all of us, but when I look at you and the amount of stuff you take on, it blows me away. You are such a smart, beautiful person inside and out and I think your busyness and hard work was overlooked a lot this semester. We were all upset that we never got to see you anymore, but no one took into consideration that the only thing you were trying to do was keep your head above water and succeed and I just want you to know, no matter how corny it sounds, that I am so unbelievably proud of you. When it comes down to being mad and frustrated with life, I think about all you do and it makes me feel not so bad. SO, I just want you to know I love you to death and am so glad you made it!

As I sit here in tears I realize just how much I needed something like this to come from someone I care so much about. It is moments like these when you realize who your true friends are, the people that are there for you for better or worse, through the good times and the bad. I love you, so very much, and saying that I love you doesn't even seem like enough, so, I'll say this also: For the rest of my life I will try and make you as happy as you have made me with that short paragraph that I see before my eyes.

Last Night

So after my Anatomy/Physiology final last night my professor took us all out for a drink, it was the least he could do after putting us through the absolute hell that he did. At the beginning of the semester he said that the first round of drinks were on him. By the end of the semester that turned into drinks all night because there was only about 13 of us left out of 40 something, good for us...Anyways, we enjoyed running that tab up as high as we possibly (physically) could and then we decided that karaoke was an excellent idea. Let me just say, karaoke is extremely tricky when alcohol is involved. Simply because it is much easier as well as much harder to do karaoke when you're drunk. I'll explain, it's much easier to actually get the balls to go up there and sing in front of people but much harder to actually read the words on the screen. And I'll tell ya, I never knew I was such a good (entertaining) rapper. I'm sure I would have made Kanye proud with my version of Gold Digger. I almost died with laughter though when I realized they changed the line, "but she ain't messin' with no broke nigga" to "but she ain't messin' with no brokey broke" I said, what the hell is a brokey broke, or something that sounded like that I guess and then continued to sing (butcher) the song.

All in all, I'd say last night was the perfect closing scene to this semester.

P.S. I dedicate this entry to all my brokey brokes out there, cheers!

The End Is Near...

I only have two days of school left in this semester (aka semester from hell) and an immense release of stress is hitting me in the form of a coma. All I want to do is sleep, to make up for all of the sleep I've missed over the past 3 months. Though, besides the release of stress, I was expecting to feel some other sort of relief in the form of feelings of accomplishment and triumph. Like there was going to be some sort of prize for learning all the bones, muscles, veins, arteries etc in the human as well as in animals (Note to self: replace human anatomy with something more useful)

I am one step closer to achieving my degree in Veterinary medicine and instead of feeling like Ive gained something I feel as though I've lost something extremely valuable to me. I feel so detached from myself lately and now that I have time to look back and reflect upon the past three months all I see is a vast bluriness that was my existence. Ive never needed a break from school so badly, medical school is not easy and working full time along with it should be against the law.

I can't wait to sit down and read a book that I actually want to read, I can't wait for all of the useless information crammed inside my brain to slowly leak out, and most importantly, I can't wait to close my eyes at night and see nothing but the back of my eyelids, as opposed to flashes of the male genitalia model I had to learn inside and out, literally.

It's almost like I've broken out of a shell of myself to discover that Im in the present actually being able to live my life. I'm slowly starting to shed the thick skin that got me through this semester. Anyway, I intend to focus on gaining my sanity back over my winter break so I can lose it again come spring, and oh yeah, its almost christmas.