I Am So

worried and angry and helpless that I feel sick all over again.

Life
Goes
Straight
Down

Tuesday, January 20th, 2009 – Freewrite

Prelude (First Band, English)
“Happy Inauguration Day.
President Obama, you will be forced to make some tough decisions. Follow Bruce Wayne’s lead and make the right ones, because even if short-term America resents you for them, long-term world history will remember you. Well.
They didn’t start dissecting Lincoln’s second inaugural address until long after he was dead anyway.

Townsend Harris High School
1/20/09
Writing Process – 6
Kari Wei

*written on Microsoft Word*
This fill effect is called daybreak, which is actually quite fitting for the occasion.

Inauguration Day.

 

          A new day dawns for America- and for the universe. Because no matter how far we have fallen in the public eye, this is still the greatest country in the world. We are the focal point in the international eye. Our glass ceiling, albeit still intact, has 18 million cracks within it. Our president- our president- is a half-African man, and a full American man.

            President Barack Hussein Obama.

            President Barack Obama.

            President Obama.

            Washington. Jefferson. Madison. Lincoln. Jackson. Kennedy. Johnson. Reagan. Clinton. Bush. Obama.

            Welcome to a new day, America. Welcome to change. For better or for worse, we are moving- forward or backward, we are moving, and this man has both hands on the steering wheel. We, America, we, the people of the world, the next generation and the future of the universe, pledge to follow you wherever you may take us.

            You are both the white knight and the dark knight. You will maintain a beloved public image while simultaneously making the right decisions even when they do not please everyone. You are Barack Obama, 44^th President of the United States of America, the leader of the modern world. You will uphold our constitution, our bill of rights, our spirit, and our hearts. You are the colors I use to write this (red, white, blue). You are the flag. You are America, and America is you.

            Good luck.

Turn D-Day back into V-Day

Ah, the dread that accompanies the “most romantic day of the year”.
Perhaps for a lucky few, this is indeed what Valentine’s means. However, for those of us who are not so fortunate (and the number of people falling into this category are usually greater than the former), Valentine’s Day is just another glaringly obvious reason to feel miserable about the lack of a one true love with which to share all those truffles.
For those of us who are, for various reasons, planning to spend V-Day miserably adding pounds to our thighs in front of the TV, I have a little proposition for you. Misery does love company, and what better way to bemoan your solo status than among your closest and equally self-pitying friends?

LAIR: My humble suburban home
MOMENT: Either on V-Day itself or the day after
DECADENCE: A mind-numbingly long movie night over boxes of chocolate that you WOULD have bought or would have liked to receive and, of course, the never-failing tubs of ice cream.
TICKETS: Yourself, your favorite romantic movies, and as many sweets as you can pack.

If you’re interested, leave me a comment with at least three of the following:
- Your name
- Whether/when you’re available
- Movie suggestions
- Whatever sugary delicacies you can bring
- Why you’re qualified for this fabulously sad little gathering

No, I have not discussed it with my dad. No, I don’t think he’ll have a problem with it. RSVP ASAP! Sadness and solitude are NOT a good combination.

It’s not that my LIFE isn’t perfect. It’s that I am… not.

NOTE: If you are not comfortable with me being a selfish, bitchy, self-pitying ingrate, I would not suggest reading this.
<VENT>
As opposed to
a) having to tell each of you individually and feeling a huge lump at the back of my throat every time
b) sitting in my room unfit for human company (even over aim) and doing absolutely no work
c) both…
… I am going to BLOG about the storm cloud of epic proportions raining miserably useless hundred-dollar-bills on my greasy head.

If you’ve been talking to me at all over the past couple weeks, you will have heard of my too-good-to-be-true plans for February involing a certain member of the opposite sex. Well, this time around, it really IS too good to be true; numerous complications have made it entirely impossible for me to see him before summer.
For those of you that are, like me, mathematically challenged, that is SIX MONTHS. Twenty-four weeks. Around one-hundred and eighty-three days. 4, 392 hours. 263, 520 minutes. 15, 811, 200 seconds. In Kari-Time, that translates to, well, infinity.
And when he does come? Well, two weeks would be lovely. If by some miracle we can manage three (I highly doubt it), my joy will reach unparalleled proportions. But that’s, what, 14 out of 365 days of the year? 21/365 if we are blessed by some gratifying higher power?
I’m not even sure that’s the worst part. What is, then, you ask?
Knowing I can do nothing about it other than WAIT. At which I, frankly, suck.

Of course I expected my little Christmas miracle to make this long-distance matter quite a bit harder. And of course you SHOULDN’T have expected not to hear me complain about it.

I am grateful for all the good things in my life. A beautiful “bond family”, members of whom have never deserted me despite my many, MANY shortcomings (this post being one of them). A mindblowingly understanding father who keeps stealing my stuffed animals and pretending to twist the heads off those given to me by Tyler (at least he doesn’t insist on e-pepper spray). The love of the ages, bestowed upon me, a mere, unremarkable fourteen-year-old. An opportunity for a, well, good education. Presumably. Which I am pissing away by- big surprise- whining about it.

So why, why, why am I sitting here wasting my time and rotting away in my misery? Who knows? Human. Flawed. Undeserving of the 12031893948190283018 blessings I have. That isn’t stopping me, though. I sit here armed with a large container of water, a pack of gum, and a popsicle stick that previously held ice cream, waiting for some kind of apocalypse. My life is amazing. But it doesn’t feel like mine.

It was not half this difficult before, when I did not know what I was missing. But how do you go back to drinking crappy refrigerator beer after your lips have touched the world’s finest wine? Stale Milky Way bars vs truffles overflowing with soft, warm caramel? (Okay, let me now make a mental note to resist the urge to run downstairs and raid the box of chocolate cookies.)
I digress.
Those few hours I spent with Tyler on that unbelievably cold December weekend were more than just the physical consummation (by this, I do NOT mean sex) of an excruciatingly long and unfulfilled relationship. I expected magic. What I got was life.

I cannot remember ever having felt that… alive. Or at least, alive in the way that I was at that point in time. And after the first four grueling months of freshman year, laden with the typical adolescent apathy, “why-do-I-exist” questions, and mundane daily life where I felt like I was viewing the world through third person; well.
I should be the good, grateful, responsible girl my life deserves. I should stop wanting what I don’t have, what I can’t have. I should instead what I DO have. Love, opportunity, unparalleled friends and family.
Key word? Should.

So why is the only constant thought in my head a question, the kind that prompts me to throw away everything I have? Why is that dark little devil dancing the cha-cha on my left shoulder taking up such a big part of my mind?
Stop living for others and start living for yourself.
Oh yeah? Well what if the only time I feel alive is when I’m with someone miles and miles away? What if there are too many obligations for me to throw away everything I and those that love me have worked for in order to follow a baseless, impossible whim?

Regardless of all the above- and that little devil- I will sit, I will wait, and I will take it. Simply because that is what I have always done, in the end. The good thing. The right thing. Thanks, Mom. Seriously.
</VENT>

Edward Cullen: Satisfying Your Secret Bad-Boy Complex?

Or not so secret, as the case may be.
Below are links to the interpretation of the modern Romeo + Juliet (namely, Bella Swan and Edward Cullen) by one of my favorite authors, Megan McCafferty.
The fact that she does not fall under the ‘obsessed teen-tween fangirl category’ already gives her brownie points. The remainder of the essay- written from a more critical but still irresistably Meyer-magnetized perspective- should serve to set its integrity in stone.

Whether or not you understood a word of what I just said, FOLLOW THESE LINKS IF YOU KNOW WHAT’S GOOD FOR YOU.
Which most of you don’t, but whatever; if you can identify Ctrl/Command-C + V on your keyboard, you are honor-bound (and Cullen-bound) to check this out.
[Spoiler Alert; Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse (Stephenie Meyer)]

http://www.meganmccafferty.com/archives/2008/12/vampire-books-are-not-my-bag-part-one/
http://www.meganmccafferty.com/archives/2008/12/vampire-books-are-not-my-bag-part-2/
http://www.meganmccafferty.com/archives/2008/12/vampire-books-are-not-my-bag-part-3/

Protected: The Truth About Edward: Dear Edward

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We’re All Slaves to Society

I really shouldn’t be getting this up-close-and-personal this early in my blogging lifespan but fuck it; I just had an epiphany of sorts and it might be marginally beneficial to share it. And if it’s not? What-fucking-ever. At least I have the words saved somewhere.

I just finished a book called “Sloppy Firsts” by Megan McCafferty. I thought it might echo with my recent, angsty-teen mindset. It did. It went above and beyond the call of duty. And this is what I learned.

a) Making sure things with me and the one guy who’s ever really appreciated me for who I truly am are where they should be is more important than getting a conventionally “cool” boyfriend or hooking up with guys or being wanted by them
b) Getting a first kiss that really means something is worth more than getting it over with just so I don’t have to feel like a loser of a lip-virgin at parties
c) Actually doing my homework, not taking naps in Ms. Reilly’s geometry class, and bringing home the best grades possible to my dad is more important than hanging out and eating frozen yogurt and getting fat no matter how low the calories are [not dissing frozen yogurt btw; red mango = orgasmic.]
d) Making friends that will stay true is more important than making friends that will look good in pictures
e) Hanging out with my “sister” and really listening to her is more important than shopping for overpriced clothes that I don’t really love
f) Practicing my violin and not losing touch with the gift my mother gave me whether or not it takes me really far is more important than refreshing my Facebook to see if I got any more comments on my profile picture

My excuse for all of this was that I already have the friends-for-life; I don’t need any more. I don’t care if people like me for all the wrong reasons as long as I can have a good time. So maybe that makes sense. But maybe it’s not enough. Why not make more lifelong friends? Can you ever have “too many” true friends? Hell no. And in allowing myself to think otherwise, I might lose the true friends that I already have. And then what the fuck would I be waking up for?

I go to high school every day worrying about how I act, how I look, and who I’m with at all times just to come home and wonder why I’m alive. I’ve always known that it’s not worth it but I thought it was worth trying for a while. Well, it’s been a month of proverbial PMS, and I was right. It’s not. And fuck trying.

This is who I am. Either you’re comfortable with it, or you’re not.

Now the only thing that remains is seeing whether I have the strength to follow up.