Crying and Laughing and 6 Million

I've completed my Holocaust project.

******

When I finally had my window propped up, with the picture frames set up on either side of it as they will be when it's displayed, and my parents were sitting beside me, helping to hold it up...I just couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe, looking at my creation, what I had done. That I, Mollie, had created this piece of art, meaningful art...and I barely felt like it had been me doing it. I felt like the hands of 11 million victims of the Holocaust - 6 million Jews, 5 million other groups, 1.5 million children - were doing the work through me. I did it for them.

******

On Friday night, I cleaned off the window. I scraped the chipping paint off of the wood, and I wiped off the glass. I have trouble concentrating on things like th

at sometimes, things that have to be done to allow other things to be done...but this time, I felt nothing of the sort. I was entirely engaged. There was nothing of me at that moment except for the scraping and wiping and the feel of the solid wooden floor beneath me.

******

Last night, Saturday night, I stayed up late to work on it. I'd been working steadily throughout the day...well, pretty much the whole day, on the window. And my every waking thought was occupied by that project.

I started faintly coloring one of the pictures red. It's a picture that focuses mainly on one naked, pale white corpse, contorted with hunger, twisted to the side, mouth gaping open... My pencil began to scratch red over his face, and that's when it happened.

I started to cry.

******

I hardly ever start to cry just like that, so suddenly. There's always a warning, a buildup. And there's usually some moment in there when I have a choice whether or not to let the tears flow. But this wasn't like that at all. One moment I was fine, my eyelids starting to droop lower out of tiredness, my fingers busy, holding that pencil...and the next, tears were streaming out of my eyes. There was possible a split second in which I knew, "I'm going to cry," but that was it. No choice. No deliberation. No hesitation.

******

I suppose it was just too much - thinking about that all day. I'd kept the tears at bay, let the grief build up. Not that I was conscious of doing this. I suppose I was just set on doing something - cutting out pictures, or writing quotes - and I was able to think, and

to feel, and to connect with what I was doing...but not to let it all out. Then, in this moment...

******

I bent forward over the picture, and let out a little gasp. I felt out-of-body...I guess I'm not used to doing things so unexpectedly. I let the tears come, and come. Thoughts ran through my head like, "Should I cry now?", "Cry, Mollie, cry! You've been bottling it up!", "God, my head hurts," and "Are these real tears?" Usually my thoughts kind of block out what I'm doing, and I just think. But this time my actions took over. I realized that my body was doing something I honestly couldn't control. I couldn't think, "Don't cry now," and not cry. And I was relieved. I was relieved to know that there was something I had so much passion for that I could cry about it without being conscious that I was crying...without deciding at any given time that I was going to cry.

******

A teardrop slipped off my nose onto the photograph I was hunched over. I watched it spread through my blurred vision, the ink billowing on the edges and becoming a blue-ish color. I couldn't help but feel that this was extremely fitting - having teardrops on part of my project.

And I cried, and I cried, and I cried, letting myself carry the weight of all those deaths on my back.

******

When my bouts of weeping lessened for a moment, I looked closely again at the photograph that had caused this outbreak...at the face of the corpse. And my tears doubled.

Because that body wasn't just a corpse...they were a person, a whole person, with hopes and dreams and friends and a family...they had knowledge, and secrets, and hobbies and talents...they cared about someone else, and someone cared about them...they made mistakes, they got angry, they laughed and cried and talked and listened and watched...

I just sat there for a very long time, thinking about these things

. I looked at other pictures, at other people who could have lived, maybe could have still been living, if it wouldn't have been for the Holocaust.

After a long while of crying, and telling myself to do this, I dragged myself up to my knees so I could reach for the set of picture frames that holds the picture shown below.

******

It's a picture of a starved infant in the Warsaw ghetto.

******

I didn't even know a human could look like that. Especially a baby.

This picture was emotional for me the very first time I saw it, when it showed up on Google Images. I didn't think it could be real. But there it is, real as ever. Now, of course, I cried and I cried and I cried.

******

I cried over that picture for a long time. One of the other pictures in that group of picture frames got quite a dousing of tears. I couldn't help noticing when it was tilted a certain way in the light that the tears had run across the glass in two little trails. They were joined together at the bottom left and branched out...they looked like two fingers help up for peace. Ironic.

******

Soon, I started talking to the baby. Well, at first, I talked to the room, to the dust, the the window, the ceiling...I even addressed God in my pleading of "Why, why, WHY," which I hardly ever do. But eventually, I focused my attention only on that baby. What I said went, briefly, somewhat like this:

******

You were supposed to live. You weren't supposed to die. How could they do this to you? You were supposed to live!

You would've lived a whole life. First you would have learned how to walk, and how to talk. After a few years, you'd go to school, and you'd start learning things like how to add and subtract and multiply and divide numbers, and read words, and write them... And you would have made friends, and had fun...and you would have laughed. Oh, there's nothing like laughing. Laughing...you're so happy when you laugh.

And you never got to.

You were supposed to live. You were supposed to live.

I'll...I'll laugh for you, okay? I'll laugh for you...

And...and then you would have gone to a...well school would have gotten harder. You would be learning more complicated things. You'd interpret books you read, and do more complicated things with numbers, and...you would've, maybe, made some new friends, some different ones. You might have had some trouble with your friends because...you're changing. But you would've had really good friends.

And you would have laughed.

Eventually, you'd leave home and live somewhere else, away from your parents. Here, you would pick something that you want to study about especially, something you’re interested in, and you’d focus on that. And then…well you’d also…you’d get a job and…

And… I don’t know. I guess I just…I really don’t know. I haven’t gotten there yet so…well I don’t know. I don’t know what it’s like.

I’ll…I’ll live for you. I’ll live for you so I can tell you what it’s like. And I’ll laugh for you…

******

I talked much longer than that, and went into much more detail. For example, when I talked about math, I tried to explain exactly what adding and subtracting and multiplying and dividing was. After all, somehow who hasn’t ever experienced anything like that wouldn’t know, right? Now that they would know what I was saying, either…but I think babies can understand. And of course, I was crying through the whole thing. My groups of sentences would be separated by gasps and moans, like spaces between paragraphs. And some words would barely be audible. At one point I had to get up and wipe off my nose, because snot was starting to drip from it, and I didn’t want that on the pictures…oh no. I think that was about the time I started talking about college…and it was scary, really, how I just didn’t know. I could tell about it materially, about what it is…but nothing personal. And even if my words about growing up and going to school weren’t any less materially, my mind was whirring like a video cassette, playing back those memories in my mind, transmitting them to the baby in the photograph. My words carried something with them. But when I got past where I am in life, they were empty. The film was blank, just static. Not recorded yet. So I’ve resolved to live my life for that baby, and for the other babies and children and any person that doesn’t live their full life. Any person whose life is taken from them unjustly. I will live for them.

******

Somewhere in all this crying, I started to think about “6 million Jews.” Six million…that’s a lot of people. A lot of lives. A lot of names. And somewhere along there, I decided to collect a list of 6 million names. Before I die, I want to have 6 million names that I can connect with 6 million faces. I don’t have to know them personally, just have a face. Six million…so that I can try to begin to fathom how many people that is.

Six million names.

******

I kept talking to that baby for a long while…and I realized how hard it is to explain what life is like. How much you’d miss if you…didn’t have it. And once again, it’s hit me how truly valuable every life is. That hits me every day – and every time feels like the first time. Every single person is unique, and has so much that makes them up as a person. How could you take that away from someone?

The last thing I said for the baby was, “I will laugh for you.” I must have repeated that fifty times over the course of that night. So that’s another thing I realized – the value of laughter. Real, true laughter.

******

Eventually, I went to sleep. I asked my Grandma Bee for help. She’s not my real grandma, but she felt like one, when she was alive. And I think I saw her angel. One night, when I was about 4 years old or so, I saw her floating up near the skylight, clothed in a beautiful flowing dress, in my dreams. And she was so real. I’m sure she was real. So I asked her for help last night. I asked her to visit me again.

She didn’t come – at least, not that I know of. Maybe I don’t remember.

******

I hope she comes tonight. And I really do have to go to sleep. But I want you to keep this with you:

Six million names.

and

I will laugh for you.

Holocaust Project and the Power of Words

I've been working on a project we're doing in English class about the Holocaust. We have to focus on a main lesson to learn from it, along with having four other sub-topics under that lesson. Conveniently, this fits right into a Holocaust project contest coming up later this year, which I was hoping to enter.

I'm doing my project on a window, using my poem as inspiration.

My English teacher graciously supplied a window for me, taken from a barn on her farm. And it's perfect. More amazing than perfect. It is a quite extraordinary window. And I hope to make it meaningful.

Tonight, I just finished writing out my whole poem with an ink pen on paper that I had soaked in tea and burned the edges on. It filled three whole pieces of paper, and must have taken me at least an hour.

I could have used a regular pen, which would have allowed me to complete the task much more quickly. But using this pen, I had to focus on every word, every letter, every line that I scratched into the paper. I bent down close to it, I felt the rough spots in the paper, I had to dip the pen in ink again when it was running out... And the process of this is, I believe, a large part of the project's worth to me. I've completely put myself into that poem by etching its life into those pieces of paper. Yes...I do feel that the poem is alive. I feel connected to it. This process that I went through to write it is priceless - and I think it's sad that more efficient writing utensils have been developed. People should take the time to connect to what they're writing, to feel it all through their arm, and to pay close attention to what they do write. Words are a powerful thing - they can hurt, and they can heal - so they should be treated with respect.

*******

Speaking of words, today in English class, while we were working on her projects, my friend Cora uttered some very powerful words. She was making handprints/fingerprints on her board in red ink - it looked like blood. When she came back into the room after washing off her hands, she turned to me, made eye contact, and said quietly,

"It didn't come off."

I looked at her, and she looked at me, and for a moment her face looked stricken, stricken with the discovery that it just wouldn't come off. But somehow, I think she may have expected that - not directly, but she knew that a pain like that could never wash away. And then it was there, right in front of her, on her hands, looking like blood.

It was amazing in that moment because never for one second did I think she was simply complaining or making a observational comment. Between the time when the words left her lips and when they were transmitted to my brain, there was never a time when I didn't know what she really meant. Honestly, never.

I started to turn away, and then I looked back again and narrowed my eyes just a little bit, to face her and face the fact and let it sink in. Then I did turn back to my own work, and it seemed like I didn't pay attention to what she said, didn't notice, but it hit me like a freight train. I felt winded. My hand was a dead weight, my eyes empty holes.

The pain, the hunger, the suffering, the loss and the grief...they never leave you. Never.

*******

Those words were powerful to me, to my day... Those few words changed my day, my thinking, my feeling. So I'd like to say again: Words are a powerful thing - they can hurt, and they can heal - so they should be treated with respect.

Snow, Flights, and Hot Food

I'm in North Dakota right now, sitting on the couch of my mom's cousin. I'm so tired I feel like I could just shut down any moment - my mental and social battery is getting pretty low.

I know this is the first time I've told you that I'm out of state. I'm sorry, but the last week has been unbelievably busy. My great grandpa (who is 97 years old) is very sick, so we decided to come out and see him one last time before he's gone. I won't elaborate on that much here because I'd like to devote an entire post to him.

My aunt drove us from our hotel near my great-grandpa's farm to where we are now - and thank goodness that she's an experienced driver and has snow studs on her tires. It was completely white outside - snow all over the place. When snow was blowing in front of us, all I could see was a few feet of road right ahead of us.

Boy am I glad I'm not driving yet.

North Dakota is COLD. I don't even want to think about how cold it is. Even though I'm getting sort of tired of winter, I would have been happy if it would have snowed like this at home. That would have meant sledding, snow days, hot chocolate, lots of reading in front of the fire...but here it just means our flight being delayed and getting home later.

I don't like flying in the first place. But especially when things don't work out the way they're supposed to, tons of waiting has to happen, and good food is impossible to come by.

Yes, food. When you're on vacation, and you're a vegetarian, and it's cold outside, and you're tired - hot food is the BEST. We stopped to get hot drinks a couple times during our trip - I got a chai tea latte. There's something about drinking something hot that just fills you up from your heart all the way through your toes. We stopped for Chinese food too, and I wasn't that hungry, but just eating some wonderfully tasty, hot food brought me away from my normal nauseous -headachey-ness of riding in the car and made me soo happy. Then tonight, when we arrived at my mom's cousin's house, she fixed us a delicious hot meal, and it was the best thing ever.

Nothing like it.

With that, I'll end. I wish I could write more, but I am soo tired right now that nothing I write or think is very thoughtful. The new version of Alice in Wonderland is on the TV right now, and I'm very much enjoying it. So I think I'l just go to sleep to that. Looking forward to a good night's sleep...

Paperclips, Novel Writing, and Old Composition Books (Memories)

I had a burst of desire for novel-writing tonight. I think it was inspired by Kristina McBride's visit on Friday. I did some planning work on my NaNoWriMo novel - using index cards to write big conflicts and ideas for little scenes on them. I feel so organized! And official! And productive!

I realized that when I want to write, especially novel, or finish a certain short story - nothing else matters. I wanted to write, I wanted to write that book, and even though I have about 4 tests/quizzes next week, I was able to completely forget about them. I was the novel. I was nothing but the story, the characters, the pencil in my hand, and the note cards I was writing on. That was all I consisted of.

And it felt like paradise.

Sometimes I have trouble relaxing. If I'm not satisfied in some way, or feeling out of balance, or just really stressed, I can't relax. But I was able to relax tonight, when I was in the world of A Beginning for the End (the name of my novel). And still, when I've put the note cards aside, gotten enough done, resolved to relax into the night...I still don't feel an ounce of stress. I have an English test tomorrow! Over a book! Over Night! That's important! But somehow I'm able to put that aside, and concentrate on the worlds of Clee and Fabian and Marissa and Dr's Garner and Finkle, and the little girl with the violin, Lillian...I am them.

I used paperclips to hold the note cards together. Paperclips are amazing. They're so bonding, so solid, yet flexible. You can reshape them, reform them into almost whatever you want. And still, they could hold things together.

If only we could use paperclips in every aspect of our lives.

During the Holocaust, the Norwegians wore paperclips to signify opposition to the Nazi party. And a few years ago, some middle school students in Tennessee started a project to collect 6 million paperclips in honor of the 6 million Jews whose lives were taken during the Holocaust. There was a movie made about this called Paperclips...I wouldn't be at all surprised if you've heard of it. We're watching it in English class, and it's the second time I'm seeing it. The movie is phenomenal...as is the idea.

(As a side note, particularly to CVEC: I noticed that my friend has been wearing a paperclip on her sleeve for the last few days, since we started the movie. I know this is also to honor the Jews...and, yes, I've noticed you wearing it. I didn't say anything because I felt that I didn't need to - I could experience the warmth of that paperclip on your sleeve in my heart, and didn't need to in words. I just want to let you know that I noticed. So if I may, I'd like to suggest that you add another Act of Good on your own blog - for wearing that paperclip...and for me seeing it, and the way it almost brought tears to my eyes.)

Finally, memories. I was looking through the boxes that contain the contents of my old desk (which I haven't been able to organize in my new desk since it still lacks a drawer). I have soo many composition books, or just plain old notebooks, that I can't even count them. Most only have a few pages written on...well, about a third of the pages, let's say. There's a spelling book, a book with pages devoid of lines that's for drawing (the first three drawings are of Harry, Hermione, and Ron), and there's one with the beginnings of a story I started several years ago (the main character's name was Dwight Dew). Among many others. I have several of those mini composition books, one of which I wrote "Little Book of Big Ideas" on the front of. And what's in it? Scriggly lines, over the first 5 pages at least, from when I was too young to be able to write comprehensible words made up of letters, but still wanted to write.

I get lost in these memories. It's dangerous, when I start looking at those things. I see drawings, and writings, poems, and old school assignments, folders from camps I've attended...and I start to revisit them. Every single one. I start reading, and I can't stop (which I suppose is good, because it means I'm enjoying my own writing - a rare feat in the world of authors). I get TOTALLY lost.

I only hope that I can use all of those memories sometime in my writing, or just in my life. They're worth something, they really are. Something more than satisfied Sunday nights. They're worth something recognizable, I think.

Bookstores, Authors, and a Perfect Meal

Today has been an amazingly satisfying day. I had two tests, both of which I feel very confident about, and all of my other classes were quite productive too. We finished our recycled materials sculpture in Earth Science! So exciting!!

An author visited our school today. Her name is Kristina McBride, and she published her first book called The Tension of Opposites in May 2010. She went to my school in sixth grade, and she's lived in this area since she was a teenager.

She. Was. Amazing.

I listened to her talk the whole time with rapt attention. There was so much I could relate to - she loves chocolate, writing (obviously), words, lives in this area, had one of my teachers when she went to my school...she was just AWESOME! She's even writing a book that's based in the small town that I live in! That alone makes me very excited.

I had the opportunity to go up and talk to her after school since I had ordered a book. I asked for some advice from her on how to plan my books - which is my fundamental, major problem. She said to always add conflict. That's how you keep the story going - conflict. And that makes perfect sense! I think I had to hear that from a real live author who was standing right in front of me to really take it to heart, however. Just reading that online wouldn't have helped.

I walked away from her talk feeling very inspired to read and to write. I couldn't wait to open her book and start reading it. I was just worried about one little thing: that the writing wouldn't be good.

After all, what's worse than hearing someone talk wholeheartedly about their work, and putting your faith in them, admiring them, and then discovering that what they've been telling you all about isn't good?

Well, I didn't have to worry. At all. When I settled into my seat at the table in the Starbucks cafe at Barnes and Nobles, took a sip of my chai latte, and read the first page of that book, I already knew I loved it. The beautiful thing is that it's exactly the kind of writing that I want to read and the kind I want to write. You can't tell those things from the back of a book...that's why you've always got to open it.

Don't be afraid to open a book.

Here's her website, in case you want to check it out: http://www.kristinamcbride.com/.

******

I absolutely love being in bookstores. They feel like home. They contain so many different stories, ideas, people, tastes, smells, countries, languages, opinions, dreams... A bookstore has EVERYTHING. And I'm interested - or can be interested if I want to be - in EVERYTHING. So it's perfect for me.

If I ever become rich, I'm first going to donate a considerable amount of money to a worthwhile cause, and then build myself a huge, authentic library with couches as soft as clouds around every corner and shelves filled with books of every imaginable origin. I'll spend HOURS in there.

Today, to celebrate my SAT scores, my parents took me to Barnes and Noble after school. I had a gift card from winning the spelling bee that I could use, too. I looked around in the kids' section (more than the teen section, because the teen section is mostly paranormal romance - all of which have some variation of a black cover with a red object of focus in the center...like Twilight), and almost every book I saw looked like the world to me. There's a slight problem with that - I don't have a world of time to read them in.

I ended up getting a book called The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan. I got the one adapted for young readers, so that I could read it faster and wouldn't stumble at all over tricky words that I have to look up. I'm excited about this book because it will help me magnitudes (I'm know I'm not using that word right in context, but it felt right in meaning) with the novel I started for NaNoWriMo. Plus, it's all about food. Who doesn't wanna read about food?

Heck, I love food!

Which brings me to my last discussion point: a perfect meal. My parents brought me to a restaurant called Thai 9 tonight. I love that place. It looks like nothing from the outside - not impressive at all, just a sign and a set of doors. But then you walk inside, and the ceiling's high, and there are people bustling all around, and the lights are dim and flattering, and there's a sushi counter across the room where the presence of food is tantalizingly close. My family shared two different tofu dishes, and for dessert we had fried bananas in a wonton wrapping with homemade coconut ice cream sesame seeds and honey drizzled on top.

It was the best thing. In the world. Ever. The bliss I experienced at tasting that beautiful fried banana with the creamy coconut flavor and sweet honey is indescribable. When I closed my eyes, nothing existed of my but that taste in my mouth.

It was the perfect meal. A perfect ending to a pretty perfect day. So I feel extremely happy.

And might I add: the bathrooms at Thai 9 are exceptionally excellent.

Scores and Full Buckets

At my school, this week is "World Languages Week." On Thursday (today) everyone brings a dish from the country of the language that they're taking in school. We all eat lunch in the atrium and try all different kinds of food - and we usually eat a lot of chips. It's very fun. I brought the compost bucket into the room so people could compost their leftovers (which there are usually quite a few of since everyone doesn't like everything). Did I tell you that I started a compost program at our school? I don't think so...well, I spearheaded that project anyway, and everyday after lunch I get the bucket of compost and dump it into the bin outside. However, usually there are only a few things in it...on a good day, the bucket may be only about a fourth or a fifth full.

But today! It was full to the brim! And it didn't look so disgusting because there were a ton of chips on the top. There's something about full buckets...and dumping out a full bucket...of anything, that's just so satisfying. Accomplished. Finished. Complete.

Today was also the day that the SAT scores were posted online. I checked them during school...and let me just say that my stomach has been doing a victory dance ever since I saw those three sets of three little numbers. I can't believe it.

Numbers control a large part of our life actually: they could determine what college you go to, whether you go to war, what things you're allowed to do, depending on age, grade, height, etc...what food or clothes or house or furniture you can buy...whether a recipe goes right or wrong!

I forgot to bring home my math book today, and we have a test tomorrow.

I'm making brownies tonight...I think. Vegan, gluten-free, and sugar-free (don't worry, there are much better sweeteners in them instead of sugar), might I add.

Kristallnacht Journal and Each Person

We had to write a journal for English tonight as a response to Night and a packet we read about Kristallnacht , the "Night of Broken Glass." I like what I wrote, so I'd like to post it. (The last paragraph is the most voice-ful part of it...the best written, in my opinion.)

The Holocaust was a tragedy too massive and horrific to even be characterized by words alone. The best we can do in our education about it is to understand the ways that stereotypes, discrimination, and apathy bred genocide and persecution of an unimaginable scale.

It is important to commemorate Kristallnacht because, first of all, it was one of the first major and public cruel acts taken against the Jews. We need to be able to see that something that may seem like a stand-alone event, like Kristallnacht, could grow into something so much huger. It is considered the beginning of the Holocaust and the carrying out of the “Final Solution.” These things to be studied and remembered so that they may be recognized if a similar situation were ever to arise again. Second, the story of Kristallnacht reiterates the point that we’ve talked about multiple times: that standing by and watching others suffer while not doing anything is just as bad as making them suffer ourselves. There were many non-Jewish people around during Kristallnacht that let the attacks go on without a blink of the eye. We have to look at this and realize that sometimes we should listen to our moral judgment rather than that of authority.

Whenever I’m reading or watching anything about the Holocaust, the thing that bothers me the most about it is all the innocent children that were involved. When we watched Schindler’s List, I cried when the children were taken away in trucks to the gas chambers. While reading Night, I was especially struck by the passage where Elie talks about the babies being thrown into the crematorium. It’s hard for me to even write those words without stopping and mourning the loss of all those little children for a moment. If I were to teach someone about the Holocaust, I would stress how important every single human being is. I would want them to understand – I want everyone to understand – that each person is a unique individual who has something to offer to the world; and it won’t be the same without them. We are all equally human beings; we all have hopes, dreams, fears, loves, quirks, talents, opinions, values that could influence others…we are more than just bodies – and these things mustn’t be erased. I would want to ingrain this understanding so deep inside a person that it would be completely impossible for them to feel prejudice against any other person for any reason at all; but, unfortunately, it seems that it is innately human to hate to some degree, and to classify people by their physical appearance or one belief they may hold. Events like the Holocaust can teach us how dangerous this side of humans can get. If there was one thing that I’d want someone to remember, it would be the babies – the babies that were torn away from the lives they could have had, the families they could have been a part of, and the world they could have made a difference in – for no justifiable reason. If that doesn’t touch a person’s heart, I don’t know what would.

As I mentioned in that last paragraph, each person is unique. Every person is important, every person is a part of the earth, a part of humanity. This links with what I've thinking about a lot lately, beginning a couple of years ago - who I am. Finding myself. It's something we must all do at some point, especially at my age. There are so many things that constitute "Mollie" alone - things welcome and some not, but all that I'm proud of in some way - that it disgusts me to think that numerous identities - whole people - personalities, talents, dreams, could and have been completely eradicated by another human. It's horrendous and unimaginable.

Blue Lights

When I got home today and started on my down the hallway to my room, I saw some blue light issuing from. I was home alone, and a little freaked. (Yes, the thought of aliens did cross my mind.) When I stepped inside, I saw that there was a beautiful string of little blue light bulbs hung over my desk. Tears of stress had started dripping down my face a few minutes before, and when I saw these lights I was so happy I could almost feel them being wiped away. There was something about those lights - blue and calm, strung up carefully - that was more touching than any words could be. They adorned and illuminated not only my desk, but also the small remnants of joy I had in the back of my mind.

So thank you, Mother. Thank you very much.

Plays, Worksheets, and Pizza

Tomorrow: school, play two-hour play rehearsal, call-time for the play 15 minutes after that rehearsal ends, and then the show starts an hour later. Get home at 10:00 at night, and then go to the spelling bee Saturday morning. AAAHHHHHH!!!!

I feel bummed out tonight. Just bummed out! I was looking forward to our ice cream party in advisory tomorrow, then getting some time to relax with my friend before the show, maybe spell a little, and then go back to the school to get ready for it, fully refreshed. But no. I have to be at the school from 8 in the morning until 9:30 or so at night. Faaaantastic!

Only the end of the play needs work! All I have to do at the end is bring a stupid TV (a wooden frame) on stage and bow! But of course, I have to be there for the whole two hours!

And we're having pizza for dinner. I have to bring in FOUR DOLLARS for pizza that I don't even want (mostly because I know we're having it the next night at the cast party too). It's always pizza, pizza, PIZZA! And don't get me wrong, I love pizza - but not all kinds. Some pizza is just some wheat and yeast that were put in the oven with some rubber cheese and chemically tomato sauce slapped on it! It's become overratted these days, to the point that when I hear "pizza" I groan inwardly.

Deep-dish pizza is a whoooolle different story however.

I love worksheets. Worksheets are nice. You have questions that you have to think a good deal about, but not too much, and a given amount of space to answer them in. And once you're finished with a worksheet, you're finished! And it's only one piece of paper, not a whole notebook or anything. Quite convenient. I like worksheets.

Sorry, but I needed to complain a little.

Another note: playing piano makes me feel better. Especially slamming on the keys really hard...

Ice, Electricity, Neighbors, Hair, and Guilt

This is my second snow day in a row - and it seems like it's been a week. I feel as if I'm quarantined in my own house - which is funny, because there are some weekends where I don't really go anywhere, but that's different than being surrounded by so much snow and ice that you're actually afraid to go outside.

Ya know, maybe if I started limiting my blog posts to fewer topics they wouldn't be so long...well, whatever, it's just me!!

Falling to sleep last night felt like waging a war...a cold war, actually. (Concerning the temperature and the lack of manual fighting.) Outside, I could hear what sounded like sheets of ice sliding off of my roof and cascading to the ground below where they broke into a million pieces and scattered like the ceramic lamp I broke last summer... Okay, well it felt a little like breaking that lamp as I heard all that ice crash. I lay in bed, convincing myself to sleep, but every time I heard another splintering roar from outside I cringed, and realized that my eyes were really wide open, not at all ready to go to sleep. And all I could think about was my rabbit - was he okay out there, in the freezing gale, right under an awning where his hutch would be prone to slipping ice?
When I woke up and saw the damage outside, it really was as if a war had happened - tree limbs lay all about, the ground was covered in ice, and sinister wind blew through the skeletal trees. There were what appeared to be corpses of broken icicles on the ground, along with a thin layer of what had been freezing rain covering the ground. It was quite a drastic scene.

There's this all paired with the fact that our power was out. It went out at about 7:30 or 8 last night, and was out all of today until about 2, when it came back on for an hour, then decided to be difficult and leave again, only to return a few hours later.

Only when we live without electricity for a little while do we realize how much it governs our lives - I couldn't get on the computer or my phone (both were, conveniently, low on charge, and I didn't have Internet connection so there wouldn't have been much point), couldn't heat food on the stove or in the microwave (we used our wood-burning stove instead, which took longer, but frankly I positively LOVED it), and couldn't watch movies. Looking back on it, I'm actually grateful that my electron appliances were not usable - instead, I read and enjoyed just BEING instead of always having to be so...productive. Not that being productive is a bad thing - but it can be, in my case.

Anyway, I walked around the neighborhood with my parents and told people that a building downtown was open with heat and light if they needed it - only two of the people whose doors I went to actually answered - but I still felt very accomplished that I had done that. It was one of those things you do to do, and look back on it and say, "Hey that was pretty cool." I felt like I was helping people and being more independent...I felt pretty good. Well, cold also.

Just a little note: I'm reading a book about kids with electrical powers right now (which I would not recommend...I'm only reading it because my teacher gave it to me and asked me to sample it, and I thought it was cool that he trusted me to do this - the book, I'm sad to say, is not the best. I just thought that was ironic, seeing as they have electricity pulsing through their bodies and we had none to be heard of.

Our neighbors came over and stayed at our house for the majority of the middle part of the day because they didn't have any heat, and we had our stove. They have a little 14 month old baby, who was napping most of the time. Despite that, it was fun to see him all energetic afterward. I had an interesting and actually very welcome feeling while they were here of familiarity - somehow, it wasn't awkward, wasn't strange at all. But there are so many people I know even better than them with whom things are awkward...why is that? There's something about the label of "neighbors" that makes things comfortable. You share something, and that is many a time a great start to any kind of relationship. In this instance, we also shared a situation and the desire to be warm.

Hair, hair, hair...how it affects my mood. Seriously, I will have a much happier disposition if my hair has volume, is not oily, not blocking my vision, and not knotted. But why? Really though, we spend a lot of time with our hair - it's very close to us. And it's one of those things that, oftentimes, no matter how hard we try, we simply can't control. I suppose that could be good, like a little lesson - you just can't control things. And if hair is too controllable, it feels unnatural. But what is hair really? Why do we have it? Protection, maybe? But against what? Is there really a use for it? Or is it just for...looks? Aliens usually don't seem to have hair...is it because we consider this to be something so normal that aliens simply couldn't have hair. Hair is actually quite odd, and difficult to understand.

Finally, guilt. I've realized that I spend a lot of my time feeling guilty about something. Guilty that I ate those last few bites or had dessert, guilty that I didn't practice piano, guilty that I didn't bring my rabbit in, guilty that I watched a movie with my parents instead of reading, guilty that I didn't exercise, that I spent so much time on the computer, that I didn't study three days in advance for a test, that I stayed up too late, that I wore jeans instead of sweatpants... These are all such trivial things! Why should I waste my time worrying about doing them or worrying about not doing them? I have a wonderful life!!! And yes, sometimes there are things that I should have done, but I just have to move on! It'll be okay, and guilt won't make the situation better. I've just got to get up out of bed and stop feeling sorry for myself because I'm so dreadfully tired. I've got to leave that moment-that-could-have-been-if-I'd-something-different behind and just move one and keep going. Whatever I spend my time doing is what I spent my time doing, and I always try to make the best of my time.

Ah...that felt good. Writing all of that. I feel satisfied - very satisfied. Two hour delay tomorrow, then rehearsal, then coming home and trying to not be too wiped out...oh, and I'll probably be disappointed that we don't have any more of those chocolate chip cookie sandwiches...oh well!

I'll just move on!