Coming Soon

So I recently made a list of things I want to do. Similar to Jocelyn’s list (and she helped me come up with the list) except that I’m not sure if I’ll be posting mine. But anyway. One of the things on the list (item #16) is to do the flickr 365 which I’ll be doing over at my this&such flickr account. If you have flickr, add me and watch this experiment unfold. I’m going to start it on the new year because, erm, that makes sense.

And in other news…

2008 is almost over.

In case you haven’t noticed.

And that…

kind of makes me happy and excited.

I mean 2008 was a good year, don’t get me wrong. A really good year. I grew a little bit. I gained back a lot of what was lost of myself during the move. I’m… happy now. I feel like I’m myself.

And I’m looking forward to 2009.

Running & Falling

((What’s on my mind doesn’t really have to do with Madi, but this story is a good way to highlight this particular… trait… of mine.))

Madis has always been the most temperamental of us four. Always the one freaking out over the smallest things, melting down as if her world was ending when me or Brad did or said the wrong thing to make her upset.

And I have always been the one chasing her, especially when we lived in Radiator Springs and she would, in a fit of tears or screaming, leave our house and run towards hers. I would trail after her, sometimes in shoes, sometimes barefoot, and sometimes (much to the chagrin of my mother), in my sock feet. 

So she would be upset and I would be trying to reach her before she locked herself in her room or ran to Grandma. I would be trying to get to her so I could be the mediator – left to her own devices it could and would be hours before she’d talk to us again and while Brad and Taylor were always perfectly content to let her simmer out, I was always trying to help. Trying to let her know that I knew she was being ridiculous and wasn’t afraid to tell her even though I loved her. Trying to stop her from being stupid and crazy, somehow.

I always want to do this. Stop people before they go to far. Let them know when they’re being ridiculous. Let them know I care.

In short, I always want to save people. It sounds dramatic that way, doesn’t it? Like an ER doctor or a firefighter. I guess what I really mean, if you want to continue with the running metaphor, is that I always want to catch people. I always thought, back when we were younger, that if I ran fast enough or hard enough (I couldn’t, of course, but if I could) and caught up to Madi soon enough then she wouldn’t have a tantrum and we could continue our fun without the interruption.

I don’t know if that’s true or not – probably not – but I do know that somewhere along the way, the things I am running for changed.

Now I want to catch people, not to get them to not freak out over a game of Monopoly, but to catch them before they fall. Before they really fall. Or at least be there with a box of band-aids in the aftermath.

But tonight I was driving in my car home from work, and it felt like sub-zero temperatures and the steering wheel was frozen in my hands and somehow those memories of me chasing Madi across our yard, the grandparents’ yard, her yard, to calm her down, came back at me all at once and this realization hit me with a serious amount of force:

sometimes I have to stop running at people. Sometimes I can’t fix things, can’t stop the fall and can’t do much when it happens. Sometimes, much as it sucks, I just have to let the ones I love deal with their own falls and hope that they come out the other side okay.

So It Goes…

My favorite word lately has been ‘ugh’ because it seems to be the only thing capable of coming close to summing up how I feel. Life has handed me squash. And I know, I know, I’m not exactly up on the whole metaphor thing – I’m sure I should be talking about lemons instead of squash, but whatever.

Life has handed me squash and I have been thinking these deep, annoying thoughts about the people we meet and the ways they affect us and the twists and turns our life takes. Big things like that. How much everything has changed since I moved here nearly four years ago, the fact that I have no idea how my life will look in four more years. Life has a way of surprising me – sometimes in good ways, other times bad ways, but always unexpectedly.

And so recently I’ve been dealing with the not-so-pleasant facts of life.

But then tonight happened.

I’m up at one in the morning, working on something extra special secret, and I take a short break and read my friend’s blog and then, not five minutes later, I get a text from her.

It’s one o’clock here.

And four o’clock there.

IN THE MORNING.

And we’re online talking. Imagining the future and discussing how great it could be and for now, this instant, everything seems like it could really be good. Amazing. Perfect.

Right now, I’m happy, and the world is full of fireflies that I’m catching in a jar.

Ferris Wheel of Doom

So today I escaped death.

No, really. This is a good story. Pull up a chair.

You see, it all started with this old, out-of-service ferris wheel that my sister the lovely thought it would be a great idea to take pictures in front of.

So we went on a hunt for it, driving down the old highway, getting text directions from Meg, and then turning around and taking the freeway only to discover we’d been about a quarter of a mile from it when we were on the old highway. 

Now let’s set the scene. A rainy, foggy, gloomy day. Two sisters driving down a back road. An old carnival behind a wire fence – ferris wheel, broken-down roller coaster, abandoned carousel. Forbidding signs on the fence saying “No Trespassing” and “Beware of Dog”. The parking lot gated shut so you can only park on the side of the road. At the far corner of the parking lot, what I can only assume was the old ticket booth, which now looks like this…

 

Old ticket booth. Notice the tie-dye colors.

So the scene is set and it is raining and the large, closed-off parking lot is covered with water and mud.

“Hold on,” I tell Taylor as we get out of the car, “I need to be sure of where I put my keys. We may need to make a hasty getaway.” That was a joke. Also: famous last words.

I’m not sure about finding a break in the fence to actually get to the old carnival stuff, but the parking lot seems safe enough and we can take pictures by the shed and in the trees on the other side.

We make our way to the shed/ticket booth and see a tiny dog (Maltese?) tied up behind the fence, near the ferris wheel. (The dog the ‘Beware’ sign had warned us of?) We joke about how creepy it seems as Taylor poses in the jungle-esque scenery behind the shed and I snap some pictures. Her in an oversized t-shirt and her awesome red skinny jeans.

Then she says, almost laughing, “Haha, there’s a man in the yard over there.” I look over and she’s right and the man is fat and haggard looking and not the sort of person you want to meet in the middle of nowhere. But he’s just standing there with that tiny little dog, so we don’t freak out too much, just make our way to the other end of the lot. So we’re laughing and talking and making our way to the other end of the back of the parking lot as we go through the few pictures we’ve got on my camera.

And then.

And then.

And then we’re in the middle of the parking lot, what seems like miles away from the car, and I’m going through the pictures and we’re not really moving and suddenly Taylor is moving and she’s saying, “Jordyn, there’s a dog,” as she runs.

There’s a dog. Running at us. Charging at us, big and snarly and growling and barking and chasing us. And he’s not the tiny cute little Maltese – he’s a big dog. A big dog that could chew us up and spit us out.

“Run!” I yell, my mind thinking of the man behind the fence, the man who sent his huge dog after us, and who, I’m sure, is perfectly willing to kill us if we hang around. If his dog hasn’t already done the job.

“Hold my hand,” I tell Taylor as we run, aware of the water and the mud and the fact that, just like in horror films where the girl always trips right as she’s getting away from the killer, falling down will only lead to our speedy demise.

So we’re running, and we’re holding hands, and the dog is chasing us, growing, barking, charging at us all the way across the parking lot, all the way to the car. And I’m struggling with my purse, my hands fumbling to get the keys, freezing in the cold as I find the keyhole to unlock the door. “Get in,” I tell Taylor, locking the doors behind us, still not convinced we aren’t going to be facing THAT MAN and HIS GUN very shortly. I’m still shaking as we drive away, and it doesn’t help that as soon as we pull onto the road there’s a car following closely behind us and it’s raining harder and HOLY CRAP HOLY CRAP WE COULD HAVE DIED.

And the scary thing?

I really don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say that. If the dog hadn’t got us, the man would have.

I’m Back

Well, I’m back from Arizona and I suck at vacation posts.

So yes it was wonderful and way too short, cut shorter by the snowstorm I didn’t get to enjoy.

But hi.

I’m back.

And nothing I want to write wants to be written. I mean the words are stuck in my head and they refuse to arrange themselves in the right order, refuse to come out.

Fine, mind. You win. I won’t write tonight.

Spoonful of Cinnamon

I dare you to stick a spoonful of cinnamon in your mouth and try to get it down without drinking water or anything.

Go on, try it.

I dare you.

(And note: if you think it will be easier to do this if you think of something really awful, then stick the spoon in your mouth so that THAT won’t be so awful by comparison… it ain’t gonna work. No matter how awful the thing you think of is, the cinnamon is more powerful.)

Tweet Talk

Oh. Hi there!

In leu of a “real” post, I have announcements and a few of my more humorous/interesting tweets. If you’re actually following me on Twitter then I apologize: you already know all this stuff.

But here goes anyways…

first the tweets,

• I wonder who designed the shopping cart. [I sent this while I was in the grocery store & by the time I got back home one of my twitterpals had sent me a link to the wikipedia page on shopping carts. Turns out they were designed by Sylvan Goldman who owned a chain of "Humpty Dumpty" supermarkets in Oklahoma City. Who knew?] [See, this is why you should read my blog - you learn interesting things!]
• I say some interesting things. [I had just been talking to Michelley. I believe the exact sentence was, "Sometimes I wish I were short so everything would match." Umm, yeah... moving on...] 
• Well the sheriff was just in our ‘hood. (I get to call it a ‘hood now since the sheriff was here.)
• I won’t be surprised if Spencer Pratt ends up being a sadistic serial killer. He frightens me. Maybe I should just not watch The Hills. [Okay guys, seriously. Did you hear his "proposal" to Heidi? It was less let's-spend-our-lives-together and more I-wanna-lock-you-away-in-a-cage. Did he honestly say he wants to "lock her away from the world"? Umm... yes, he's a creeper. That's kind of even worse than Edward SNEAKING INTO HER HOUSE TO WATCH BELLA SLEEP.]
• What are they SAYING in Impacilla Caprisung? [Really I'm just including this one because I really want to know and nobody answered me. I suspect the song may be in another language or just gibberish or trying to take over our minds. You all know what I'm talking about, right? Impacilla Caprisung, by The Ting Tings. YouTube that one.]
• My grandma says I should be a “romanceologist.”
• I seem to have a lot of dreams about people sending me letters. [I was reading my old journals, and sometimes when I have a particularly interesting dream I write about it in my journal. And there are quite a few that included people giving me letters. Usually the letters either made me deliriously happy or broke my heart; there were no lukewarm letters, apparently.]
• For some reason “and” is really difficult for me to type. Ane? Ana? NO! And! [Haha okay so. This reminds me of that episode of Friends where Joey says to Chandler, "If you have a hard time remembering what day it is, just do what I do.. Monday, one day; Tuesday, two day; Wednesday, what day? No! Thursday!" blahahahaa. No but really, the whole and thing made me particularly annoyed.]
• I just saw Santa by the student center talking to his friend. College is great.
• Redthebook/gmail FORBIDS me from seeing my contact list. KAOS must be behind this. [Always. Blame. KAOS. It is one of my rules in life.]
• Sometimes I just really want to hurt the people who hurt the people I love.
• THE HOT SAUCE IS DOING VERY WELL. [This is not an inside joke, actually. It is something I saw on tv, on, umm, VH1 100 Greatest Songs of the 80s, I think. Apparently someone from Aerosmith or something like that has some hot sauce brand out there. I found the statement hilarious.]
• MY MOMMY BOUGHT ME DORA THE EXPLORER POPSICLES – SHE IS AN ANGEL.

And now for the announcement:

I am going to Radiator Springs. I know, I know, my family literally EXPLODED today and we were going and then we weren’t and then we were but not really and then we weren’t again and… now we are….

I think.

I mean, umm, WE ARE of course DUH!

So yeah, if I don’t post in the next week that’s probably why.

Lists of Doings

So I have about seventy bazillion things on my ever-growing to do list. 

Dear Jordyn, these are all the things you need to do:

• write your ethics paper (due thurs.)
• study for your history final (thurs.)
• pick up paycheck from work
• go to the bank
• get smog checked
• find out about the whole “arizona” thing. when are you leaving and are you driving and are you going straight there or stopping at the midpoint?
• clean your room 
• clean your bathroom
• clean your car (before leaving for radiator springs)
• eat something 
• do all your mounds and mounds of laundry (soon, before they take over your room)
• pack for arizona (before leaving)
• hope you’ll be able to go to arizona (it never works out like this, we never PLAN to do something and then ACTUALLY DO IT so i’m waiting for the other shoe to drop)
• email all the people you need to email
• go to the book study tonight
• actually study for the book study before going

And, dear Jordyn, here’s the things (productive and not) that you’ve been doing:

• taking a math final (eek!)
• working on your ethics paper, but just barely
• wasting way too much time on facebook
• watching the hills
• keeping up with girl week on reviewer x’s site
• bible study/reading
• making macaroni and cheese, tapioca pudding which was not great and that you still ate all of (there wasn’t much, swear!)

Now. Here’s what you WANT to be doing:

• sitting in starbucks working on your novel

Le sigh.

Such is life.

Following A Yellow Brick Road

So lately I’ve been reading through my old journals and, umm, yeah.

Here are some real gems. You know, the rare bits I don’t mind people reading…

and do you sense a pattern in these maybe?

Oct. 10, ‘05
The real problem with me is I don’t know who I am. I did, at one point, I think. Remember 8th and 9th grades? I was completely confident in knowing who I was. So I don’t know if I lost myself somehow, with this move, or if I never really knew myself….
But, especially lately, I have so many doubts, questions, and insecurities about myself that I feel so, so lost. Lost from myself.

Oct. 16, ‘05
Ever have a day where you wish you could be anyone but who you are? Where you just want to give in & be the sort of you people want to see?

Nov. 30, ‘05
I am trying as hard as possible in school and still failing my classes. I am lost as to what to do.

Jan. 29, ‘06
Why are all my emotions all over the place? Like my heart can’t stay in one piece?
What’s my problem that I never feel completely whole? Always there’s something missing.

Dec. 6, ‘06
I don’t really know why, but whenever I’m with a group of them they make me feel so crappy about myself. Like I’m not good enough or not the right type of person to hang out with them.

I want to fly back in time and tell this girl that things will work out for her. I want to tell her to hang on, to not give up, that eventually she will see the good in herself again and she won’t feel less than and she won’t feel inferior to everyone else and she will be able to look herself in the mirror and be proud.

I want to tell her she’ll find herself again, that she’s not lost, just temporarily misplaced. That her confidence is only on hiatus, not gone for good. That good friends are worth waiting for and though she will find them, they may not be who she expects. They may not be here.

I want to tell her that life is never perfect, ever. That there are bumps in the road and she will get through them and even when she gets to today, to the present, when her family feels out of sync and her life feels wobbly, she still won’t give up because she knows:

this is just a phase. Just a blip in the radar, a slight detour in our normal route.  

In addition, I want to tell her to keep her heart open, that even when it gets bruised and broken it is still not dead and she can still hold a lot of love in it. I want her to know that people will matter to her, even if they don’t matter in the ways she wants them to at that moment. That though she gets hurt by them, it is rarely if ever on purpose and everyone else is a bit confused too.

Because no matter our age, we are all just kids trying to find our way.

Are We Happy Yet?

So I’m not in the best of moods, to put it lightly.

So in light of that I’m going to make a list of happy things that should make me happy.

1. I got 200 out of 200 points on my “research paper” for English class. What I actually turned in was a chapter of my WIP (work in progress) that had research in it and a bibliography (or whatever they call it now) at the end. This made me happy and I nearly did a little dance because (complete honesty here) I was not a very big fan of that chapter in particular. I did like the last paragraph of it, which I may share with you guys, but the rest was basically just… eh.
2. December 19. I am going to Arizona. I AM GOING TO ARIZONA. Let me reiterate: I. AM. GOING. TO. ARIZONA. With or without my parents. Forget the fact I’ve never actually taken such a long driving trip on my own before, or that I have to mapquest the directions, or that it makes me a bit scared driving through the canyon and knowing I will get zero cell service. Umm, eek. No wonder Ash thought I was crazy when I told her I might drive out.
3. I’m not dead. In fact I’m slowly (very slowly) (so slowly it’s kind of like torture) getting better. Getting over this horrible head cold I’ve had. Like, I went to school today and when I got home instead of feeling too weak to move and sleeping four hours, I only slept two. Improvement!
4. Madi got a cellphone. Which means we have been texting and having conversations like this:
   me: I recently walked into a wall on accident.
   her: that sounds like u
   (To be fair… it really does sound like me. I’m more of a klutz than you could possibly imagine. Today I nearly walked into another wall. IN BROAD DAYLIGHT!)
5. There is a chance (I’m trying not to get my hopes up) that I might get to see some of my old school buddies when I’m back in Arizona. Can you feel my very hesitant excitement about this prospect? 

EDIT: I just realized I told you guys I’d possibly share with you the paragraph of my chapter that I was especially proud of… and then I didn’t. And I meant to. So here it is, along with the preceding paragraph so you have at least some background…

………..

I look for signs of anything amiss as I step into the apartment. Mom’s at work tonight – Cezaro’s, which is this bar/restaurant downtown – and she left the place a mess. As always. After my two hour nap I’m not exactly exhausted and could easily go all OCD cleaning the place up, but tonight I don’t feel like it. I don’t much feel like going to bed either though, so I venture into my mom’s bedroom to find our DVD of The Princess Bride because I don’t much feel like real life right about now.

Her bedroom, as always, smells of Jessica Simpson brand perfume, dying roses, and… something else. Sadness maybe, or helplessness, if that were an odor. The bed is unmade, covered with clothes and Glamour magazine. It’s a mess, but not the sort of mess my room is sometimes when I forget or don’t have time or don’t care to stick around to clean it. Her mess is more like the sort of thing that happens when you stop noticing things and don’t realize that if you don’t do something soon your closet will be empty because all the clothes are laying either on the bed or wrinkled on the floor. It’s a mess that grows out of neglect, because neglect is her expertise. It’s a mess in the same way her life is a mess. Which is depressing, sad, annoying, and scary all that the same time. I feel myself shudder involuntarily as I stand in the midst of her mess – if it’s true that we become our mothers, or that addiction is partly genetic, or that her choices will influence my choices even when I don’t want them to, what hope is left for my life?