On Such A Timeless Flight

Hillary graduated from college in mid-May. Such a scary thought... graduating from college...

I guess (at least in the academic world) we live in a world where every four years there is a change over, a shift of everything we once knew. At five or so we enter kindergarten. My public school system puts the fifth through eight graders together in the middle schools. Nine through twelve is in one building, and then if you continue to pursue academia you are stuck in higher-ed for four years and then...

Well then I suppose it's up to you. I can't even imagine how it must feel to be graduating from college in a recession. Hillary has to worry about health insurance, paying for her car, paying off student loans and feeding herself all in the same thought. I'm nervous just thinking about it.

But I know she can do it, and I know all of the graduates can do it. It will take a lot of strength, maybe a few tears shed and a few days filled with worry and "what-ifs" but what days aren't filled with a bit of worry and uncertainty? Uncertainty is what makes the world go round, lest we would be completely certain of the future and therefore we would sink into complacency.

I worry a bit for Hillary, and a bit for myself frankly because in two years time I will either have to continue on my educational pursuits or find a job with benefits and start to pay off the cost of breathing.

I know she will be okay, I just know it.

Congratulations Hill! I'm so proud of you and so glad that you believe in yourself, because if you believe in yourself you truly can achieve anything.


Hill and a pal from lacrosse, big bad college grads

Grad Schools in Canada

My Uncle on Newfoundland always told me that if the U.S. reinstated the draft, I'd always have a place on the rock where I could go hide. I'm not one for hiding, but I'm also not one for participating in unjustified conflicts, and unless someone is waving a gun in my family's face there is very little that could provoke me to use violence. Besides the fact that I'm an avid pacifist, I also don't believe in fighting for a country that doesn't allot the same rights to me and people like me based on inconsequential circumstances.

I guess I had a lot more faith in Mr. Obama, that he would do more for the community. Takes our votes... then forget about us. Sickening really. I wouldn't get the chance to fight for this country even if I wanted to, because I can't be who I am. I'm sure I could tote a gun just as well as any other person out there. A friend of mine in the Army told me that I should join up and go into the ministry in the Army, that they had a shortage of ministers and they needed more (she was drunk when she told me this, and I had to chuckle a little because... well the Army wouldn't want someone like me. If you tell me the sky is blue, I'm probably going to argue that's it's really more of an off-purple hue. Not to mention the fact that I'm queerer than Christmas). Long story short, I could preach the Word out there probably just as well as the next guy. I'll tell you all about Yahweh and God and Allah and Jehovah (all the same dude) and help make your journey through life a little more peaceful. I'd love to give back to my country (even though they hate me for some reason?), but I can't because I can't enlist and remain an out individual.

I have this vision of a country where everyone is free, where we as taxpaying, country-loving, flag waving, American Idol watching citizens aren't forced subscribers to religions that we never chose to be a part of.

And, like I said to my mother when she asked about the "California thing," this country was founded by queers, you can't even tell me the founding fathers weren't a bunch of homos (no offense intended at all, I happen to be a proud American and I know my history very well, I also know that, more often then not for the better part of the history of most civilizations: men prefered the company of men and women, the company of women).

I guess what I'm trying to say is, this country is really cutting off its nose to spite its face, for lack of a better expression. I don't want to raise a family here when I could pack of my little car and haul it off to Canada where my rights are the same as the heterosexual next door. But I don't want to leave the country where I was born and raised, where my family lives (mainly), where my friends are and likely will remain.

I'm glad Connecticut and Massachusetts (the only two states I give a crap about, sorry to the other 48) have granted marriage equality, but it's just not enough. When my rights are different when I travel to Florida, something is not right. When my relationship with the person whom I love is not equivalent to a heterosexual relationship simply because I can't procreate with my partner of choice, something is not right. When my country tells me to get lost when I try to live my life the way I choose to live my life, hurting no one (in fact, I try to help out as much as possible in order to make life better for people), something is not right.

I just want to graduate from college, go to graduate school, become a Licensed Mental Health Clinician and eventually get my PhD (or PsyD as they're calling it these days for us psych geeks) and just... help people. I want to get married to a nice, soft spoken, warm hearted, charming girl who will make me laugh every day and who I can make laugh too. I want to have a kid or two and watch them learn new things, make mistakes, learn to love this beautiful world and this wonderful life. I just want to be as financially, emotionally and physically secure in my relationship with another human being (and eventually bringing more human beings into the picture), and I don't think that's too much to ask of this life or this world, or particularly this country where we're supposedly "free."

Sorry this is long and probably very disconnected, but I needed some time to process the "California thing" (as my mum calls it).

Newport Folk Festival 50!! Oh, and six months :)

Imagine, if you will, the most ear piercing, high pitched squeel of glee you can possibly imagine. That's the story of my life right now. I got an email saying I can get discounted tickets to the Newport Folk Festival, the first weekend in August, where JOAN BAEZ WILL BE PLAYING *insert another shriek*.

I just... I think I may have died when I read that Joan Baez, Pete Seeger AND Judy Collins will all be there. Just thinking about it gives me palpitations. I'm totally going, whether I go by myself or with other human beings. Probably the closest I'll ever get to utter, pure bliss in my whole life.

Oh, and today is my six month monthaversary with Hillary, heres to many more monthaversaries to come :)


Those are our serious faces... for serious.

Because I'm Mushy Now (yuck), Couples Meme

Found this on my friend's page on Facebook, thought it looked interesting. Also, my boredom at being home has to be utterly apparent by now.

♥ Who asked who out first?
Well, we decided we were dating on November 27, but we had effectively been together for like a week or two prior to Thanksgiving. I guess since I was the forward one I asked her out, but I'm definitely not the kind of person to ask someone else out, I like to try to convince myself that I'm tough and not getting attached :P

♥ How old are each of you?
19, almost 20 (me) and 21, 22 in the fall (Hill).

♥ Whose siblings do you see the most?
I guess that'd be my sister, since we hang out at her house and play with the kids from time to time. Hill has three older half siblings, two of whom she doesn't speak to and one whom she is very close with, but I have yet to meet him on account of her parents told her she shouldn't "come out" to the family (besides them) yet.

♥ Who gets embarrassed more easily?
Hillary is super klutzy (example: we went out to breakfast with her parents and her roommate a few weeks ago and Hillary shook her bottle of iced tea... after she had already removed the cap. Got iced tea all over herself, it was brilliant.)

♥ Which one likes to go shopping more?
We both like to shop, but I think I'm more wasteful when it comes to money. We go grocery shopping together a lot, raspberry sorbet :)

♥ Are there wedding bells in the future?
Ummm... Well I'm 19... I know it's cliche and probably sending up red flags with anyone who reads this... but I do love her a great deal and I can see myself spending the rest of my days holding her hand, missing her when she's not around, eating raspberry sorbet (50% sorbet, 50% whipped cream) at midnight, going to the Peace Abbey on our days off, blah blah blah mushy stuff. But definitely NOT before I graduate from undergrad, and probably not until I at least have my LMHC.

♥ Do you have any children together?
Yes... her name is Alycia... :P

♥ What about pets?
That's my department. When Hillary sleeps over she has to fight off Kitty for a spot at my side (at least when she sleeps over I make the dog sleep outside of my room... or else Hillary would probably be sleeping at the foot of the bed). At the moment I have five cats (my beloved Kitty is the only one I really care about, but I'm pretty fond of Baby too, she was my first kitten), one dog (her name is Puppy, she is eightish, and I've determined that she has ADHD), and two bunnies (Buns, the gentlest soul I've ever known and Russel, the least gentle soul I've ever known). When we get the apartment in 2010 we're planning on getting some type of animal (I've been forbidden from bringing Kitty or Puppy, and Buns is too old and Russel is too much of a handful) because I can't function without animals.

♥ Did you go to the same school?
We went to the same school, I s'pose, now that Hill is a big bad college graduate.

♥ Are you from the same home town?
No, Hillary comes from East Jesus Nowhere, MA and I'm from a suburb of Hartford, CT. About a two hour drive if traffic is cooperating.

♥ Who is the smartest?
Well, Hill graduated cum laude and she was in three honor societies. We're both very intelligent human beings, but I don't often use "intelligent" and "smart" in the same thought, because I personally feel that intelligence is more important than whether or not one is "smart." Smart is subjective, intelligence is lived.

♥ Who is the most sensitive?
Me, totally totally totally. I give off the tough guy facade but I get all weepy about... well... pretty much everything.

♥ Where do you eat out most as a couple?
I'm disgusting, I know, but this question is just so hilarious to me that I can't answer it. It's just too priceless.

♥ Where is the furthest you two have traveled together as a couple?
Florida to Disney over spring break '09. We drive long distances a lot, like when we went to Maine to see Brandi Carlile and when we went to P-Town in late April.

♥ Who has the worst temper?
Me, unfortunately. But we fight because we love each other and we spend a lot of time together (actually, a lot of it had to do with the fact that I am leaving for London in the fall and we're not going to be together for a long period of time until January). We get along very well though, and the "worst temper" isn't really that bad at all in this case.

♥ Who is more social?
Hillary is. I'm reserved (see shy) and quiet whereas Hillary lights up an entire room when she enters. She just has one of those personalities that draws people to her.

♥ Which one is more optimistic?
We're both very optimistic, perhaps too optimistic for our own good (perhaps that statement in and of itself is a sign of pessimism?).

♥Who is the neat freak?
I have OCD when it comes to things like bed sheets (I tend to have a meltdown if the sheets aren't up to military standards), the arrangement of the clutter on my desk, etc. which doesn't qualify me as a neat freak, but it does make me a freak. Hill, on the other hand, likes to keep things neat and tidy, but not overly so.

♥ Who is the more stubborn?
Me. Le sigh.

♥ Who wakes up earlier?
Well now that Hillary has a big girl job (with her own cubicle!) she has to get up at 6 am in order to leave the house by 7 to make the 2 hour commute. However, during the academic year I am in the habit of getting up an hour and a half before my first class (usually that means getting up around 7:30-8:00), something Hillary was appalled by when we first started sleeping over each others' dorms.

♥ Where was your first date?
The Peace Abbey :) We're old hippies at heart.

♥ Who has the bigger family?
Me in the regard that I still talk to and regularly see most of my extended family. However, my immediate family is just me and mum, whereas Hill has two parents.

♥ Do you get flowers often?
I don't think I've gotten flowers... except for Valentines Day when Hill cooked me dinner and I got to keep the flowers that she used in the table setting. I give her flowers pretty regularly (sunflowers, and live flowers because I feel like giving dead flowers is purposeless). Hill knows I have enough flowers to care for (the garden is going to be so pretty this year!).

♥ How do you spend the Holidays?
Which holidays are we talking here? I suppose when I get home from London, since the plan is we will be living together, we'll probably be holidaying together also.

♥ Who is more jealous?
It's a pretty even mix. I'm a little jealous of people from her past (I also revel in the fact that she chose me and she wants to be with me, I win), however Hillary is jealous of some of my friends (straight girls who like to flirt with gay girls... aka gay girls) because they like to make her jealous (and always succeed).

♥ Who sleeps more?
Not sure, maybe me? I dunno. Hill would sleep like a cat if she could though.

♥ Who eats more?
We both came to the conclusion that we were meant to be because we absolutely LOVE food, so I'd say it's probably about even.

♥ Who does the laundry?
Depends who has money on their laundry card when we need to do laundry. I find laundry to be very therapeutic (because I'm deranged. I also enjoy dishwashing, seriously. I should have been a housewife) so I do the laundry whenever I get the chance.

♥ Who’s better with the computer?
Probably me because I have a lot more patience than Hillary does. She'd probably throw it out the window or have a meltdown before she stopped to figure the problem out.

♥ How long have you been together?
Six months tomorrow :) but I've known her for almost two years. She's my best pal, my confidant, my strength when I need it. I truly believe that, if she isn't the one, she is the greatest friend I'll have ever found on this earth.

Schools (Not) Out for Summer

Today was my first day of my summer statistics course, and it actually went very well. It's two hours a day, four days a week, for a month. Not bad, not bad at all.

If I want to graduate in May 2011 I need to finish the statistics course that I already started. It's kind of a long and convoluted story, so I'll give you the brief version. And please, don't judge me because I know that a lot of students use the excuse that the professor is bitch or the professor hates them, and in this case both of those things are true and did happen to me. It's not an excuse at all, it's simply a fact.

I took AP statistics during my senior year in high school. Now, to get into an AP course you need permission from previous teachers, often you need to take an entrance exam, and you need to have taken all of the pre-requs. I did fairly well in AP stats, but I didn't score high enough on the AP Stats Exam for it to count as my statistics requirement for my college. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, because I need stats for my psychology major and a lot of the research aspects of psychology draw heavily from statistics. Anywho, moving on.

I took Stats I Fall 2008, and did fairly miserably (but well enough to move on to Stats II). I got As on all of the exams (all 3 of them), did the homework assignments, etc. but absolutely bombed the final (which speaks volumes for my ability of lackthereof to take finals). Such is life, so I moved on to Stats II.

As it turns out, the professor got the impression that I was, more or less, taking up space and air in her classroom and proceeded to ignore me (when she would address psychology majors, of which there were only 2, myself included, in a class of about 15, she would purposely not address me), to take points off of exams and assignments for arbitrary reasons (I didn't "word" an answer to her liking so she would take an automatic 20 points off my exam, when my answer was similar to the answers of other students and my math was completely correct).

So I sent her an email and basically told her how I was feeling, that I felt like I was being treated unfairly and also that I felt that my situation was hopeless. She emailed me back and confirmed that she did think I was "unresponsive" in class (she cited some occasions during first semester when my eyelids would get heavy and I would look like I wasn't paying attention, for example THE DAY AFTER OBAMA WAS ELECTED sdf;ldhrewnc;welfdsfsdlf) and that she was sorry that I took it to heart.

So I emailed my advisor, at this point we had taken 3 of 4 exams (not including the final) and asked her what I should do, seeing as my situation was borderline hopeless. I had a 100 on the first test and a 50-something on the second test and a 50-something on the third test but I hadn't done the makeup test yet so the grade might have changed. My advisor informed me that it was the last day to drop the class, that she was out for the day but she has informed the psych department, my class advisor, the student success center and registrar to be looking for me (basically it was her suggestion that I drop the class immediately).

So I scrambled around, crying because I felt like a failure, and got the drop class form signed thanks to the speedy work and kindness of the staff at my school, no thanks to my c*nt of a professor.

I'm taking the second section of statistics at a university near where I live, totally different scene than I'm accustomed to but I'll get over it (I go to a college in the woods, 12 miles out of Boston, where I know all of my classmates names/majors and probably what kind of trouble they were getting in to last night, I don't know anyone in my class in CT and none of them know me... ahh the freedom of anonimity). At least my professor doesn't hate me yet, so maybe he'll grade me fairly and impartially and I'll be treated with respect this time. For the most part, though, this class will be a review for me because I've now taken statistics for almost 2 full years, and I basically know it like the back of my hand by now but now is my chance to prove that I know it, I can do the math, and I can give the professor what he wants (because he doesn't overtly disdain me).

So that's where I am today, and tomorrow, and the next day, and every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday until June 25. I at least have some things to look forward to, like Hillary's grad party this weekend (Hill graduated from college May 17, poor dear), Hillary visiting next weekend, my 20th birthday (oh my GAWD) June 12, me visiting Hill the following weekend, my baby niece is predicted to be born the first weekend in July (here's hoping for July 4!) and so on and so forth until I get on a plane bound for London on September 2. Should be a good summer :)

Just a Thought

Home brings out the worst in me.

Literally and figuratively. Just sayin.

Day six of poison oak, still itchy and rashy. Probably going to amputate all affected areas, leaving me with two intact feet.

Food for thought (literally): Rubbing the inside of a banana peel on the affect areas seems to help with the itch and I think it's helping to dry it out. However, I now smell like rotten fruit. A scent to match my personality :P