It's been a while.

I've largely abandoned my blog, in case you haven't noticed. It's all good, it's purely for my own amusement anyway. Except for that one time when Kyle got a hold of it and left anonymous LRS-related comments on it. Good gravy. Oh yeah, and Ana and Rachelle read this, I reckon, but between them and me, that's about it.

In any event. I reckon I'll update for anyone in the world who's interested:

1. Aaron and I are engaged. ... HUZZAH! :D Quite exciting. A bit scary at times, too, let's be honest here, just because it's like ... "dang. Well, I've never been in this position before. Hope I don't screw it up." Believe me, it's standard nervousness if there's anything at all; it doesn't have anything to do with not loving Aaron or not wanting to be with him (because, trust me, I do). It's more like existential-crisis mode, and that's not going away anytime soon. I doubt that I'll grow out of it even after I do graduate from college and find some kind of "real" job. So ... yeah. Not bothering too too much about that one.

2. Well, everything aside from that is small, so I guess I'll just let myself ramble.

I've developed some kind of a crush on Shane MacGowan as of late. The man has no teeth, sure, but for some reason he makes a cute old man. Plus, he apparently flipped me off when I saw them (I deserved it, I flipped them off the entire show ... it was all in love =P). Holy crap. I ended up with a set list, too, although lemme tell you what, I really wanted the metal tray that Spider beat the crap out of. Or Shane's empty bottle, but that stupid girl next to me got it. Bah. >:( My angry face says my opinion of the matter.

Man. That was an awesome show. I kind of wish I could go back in time and relive it, or at least see them again. It helps (or doesn't help? depends which way you want to look at it) that I'm on a MAJOR Pogues kick right now. I watched Straight to Hell again last night because now I can actually recognize everyone in the Pogues. I doubly appreciated Shane's frying-eggs laugh, and I laughed pretty hard at it myself.

Oh ... I guess I just thought of something coherent enough to warrant a number three:

3. This summer I start my Honors capstone project. So far, all I know is that I want it to have something to do with the philosophy (or -phies) of punk, and possibly where that interesects with theology. (?) I'm not sure how exactly to tie this in with my theology major, but it definitely means that I've been hatching hare-brained schemes to interview anyone or everyone in the Pogues and any other band that I can think of off the top of my head. It also means that me and Ana began hatching hare-brained schemes to go to London in order to interview people and generally kick around. But we all know how the scheme-hatching goes.

In any event, I kind of wish that I had started my Capstone in the spring instead of the summer, just because I absolutely can't wait to get started on it now; although I reckon that the wait gives me time to actually start reading some books (one of my teachers let me borrow his copy of England's Dreaming whenever I told him my idea for my capstone). I figure I'll start getting something narrowed down when I start reading books and articles. Maybe by that point I'll figure out the angle that I want to go for. I would definitely like to interview Aaron, Ana, my brother, my sister, bands like Fight to Die or Destroy Nate Allen (bands who I've actually seen and/or met personally); if I can manage it I'd also like to try and contact bigger bands like the Pogues, Dropkick Murphys, whoever else ... and for god's sake, if I really did get an Honors program grant to fund my trip to London, I'm pretty sure that I'd at least try to get in touch with someone like Mick Jones or Paul Simonon or Topper Headon. And then I'd proceed to pee my pants with excitement if I actually succeeded.

Yeah. I'm nerding out over this, big-time. I think I might actually enjoy this whole capstone thing. Funny, because I used to dread it.

And now tell me that he doesn't make a strangely cute (and entirely awesome) old man:



Don't pretend like you're weirded out by my random Old Man Crushes. You have them too. Don't lie.

This is Emily, signing off for now.

I'm fan-girling something awful.

By which I don't mean, I am a fan girl of something awful. What I mean is, I have found something to fangirl over a lot.

In the past two weeks or so I've become obssessed with Clive Barker's Abarat series. And here we go once again, I think I'm in love (okay, maybe he's just my favorite character) with the villain, and when I go and think that I'm going to be the weirdo in the Abarat fangirl community for liking him, turns out every other fangirl is twice as in love with him as I am. This happened with Phantom of the Opera too, way back in the day. Maybe some day I'll figure out why fangirls are so attracted to the tortured villain. Might have something to do with the nature of the people who are fangirls, but hey, I like to think that I'm a well-balanced individual ... =P

So. This guy:



I think I'm in love. =P Okay, I have to catch myself again, I don't think my fascination borders on psycholove near as much as some of the other people out there, plus, I already have a boyfriend who I love very dearly, so he wins first place on the list of "People I Am In Love With." But further down the list are a bunch of fictional characters/historical figures who I'll always have a place for in my heart. Now Christopher Carrion (that guy ^) is on The List. God help us all.

Ranting about anything and everything.

Just asking: Is this much cleavage really necessary to model a hat?

http://www.hottopic.com/hottopic/Accessories/Hats/Beige-Crocheted-Beret-231352.jsp

Sorry I couldn't figure out how to get the image up. This new technology, it confuses me.

I'm at work, but it's Thursday, and I'm guessing that none of the Spanish 1402 students felt like coming in to lab today. It's empty in here. So far I've watched "The Pied Piper of Hutzovina," which you should definitely check out, on YouTube (it actually wasn't a bootleg--it's paid for by ads). It's about Eugene Hutz going around Europe in search of Gypsy music. Check it out.

Now I'm just in one of those moods where I feel like waxing philosophical and/or ranting. Yep.

Haha. Right now I'm MySpace stalking people (okay, not really ... just surfing MySpace) to see what they've been up to, especially people I haven't talked to in a REALLY long time. I happened across the profile of a guy I used to like, the guy I met on a mission trip, and read one of his blogs ... which also happened to discuss how metal was an improvement on all the crap on the US radio, including "punk-rock." And now I know why God said "no" to that one. =P Funny how that works out.

Oh yeah, and did I mention that $6000 pretty much dropped in my lap yesterday? The Texas B-On-Time loan. Pretty much, it's a state loan that I don't have to repay--it turns into a grant--if I keep a B average and graduate college on time. And you know the best part? With that in place, I only owe HSU seven dollars for this semester. Once again, funny how that worked out. I think that God's laughing at me right now.

Here I was worrying my butt off, tearing my hair out, because I was going to have to spend pretty much every penny of my bank account on tuition (I was going to owe HSU around $2200 this semester)--and then God pretty much drops this loan out of the sky and into my lap. The moral of this story: I really like the ladies in the Business Office now (they sent me upstairs to talk to Mr. Brower in Financial Aid and pretty much wouldn't let me pay until I'd talked to him, and then he signed me up for this loan), and go talk to Financial Aid if you can, because it's pretty much true that they'll give you some kind of money just for taking the time to talk to them. Seriously. It isn't just a myth.

Yeah, and on a terrifying side note, the guy I talked to in Financial Aid started off our conversation (after looking at my information on his computer) with, "So, you're a senior now, huh?" And I went, "... I am?" So apparently I'm a senior. It's friggin terrifying. =P Okay, maybe not that bad, but it definitely came as a shock to me. Guess I was further ahead than I thought.

Yep.

Rather pissed off right now.

So I went on my Yahoo account--my e-mail--and noticed that there was a picture of, I kid you not, a pair of boobs in a string bikini being pushed together as my profile picture. I clicked on the "My Profile" link and it sent me to a page for "Hannah Rutledge," whose interests were "drinking, clubbing, and looking for cute bois." So I clicked "My Profile" again. And again. And it kept taking me back to this page. I don't know if someone got into my Yahoo and set up an account, or if this is some sick joke on Yahoo's end for not ever setting up an account, but either way I went and deleted everything--especially that disgusting picture of boobs--and changed my password. So yes, I'm rather pissed off right now. But hopefully the problem has been solved.

Yes, I am at work right now.

Yay for having a computer at work!

... but seriously. I can't lie, hearing the whole thing about Izzy and Nick and the near-actual-breakup and dating someone else for a while freaked me out. I always looked to them, consciously or not, as some kind of model for a long-term, long-distance relationship. They're one of those couples where you expect them to get married as soon as college is over, not get embroiled in some weird kind of drama reminiscent of someone else's life. But in all fairness, that's a whole lot of heaping my own expectations on something that I know absolutely nothing about. Also, That line of thinking involves not dealing with life as it's happening to me and trying to make sense of someone else's life as if it were my own.

Either way, I worked myself up over this for a couple hours, probably, until it dawned on me out of nowhere: That was her choice.

It frightened me initially because the whole ordeal proved that yes, it is indeed possible to get embroiled in this kind of drama even if you've had the steadiest, most drama-free relationship ever for the past six years.

But maybe that's part of it: Six years is a long time. People change between freshman year of high school and junior year of college.

In any event, I was thinking--rational or not, I don't care, this is how I was thinking--that if it could happen to her, then it could happen to me. But not like something I wanted; in my mind that kind of drama happens more like a coconut falling out of the sky and landing on my head, and then a flying monkey tries to drag me off kicking and screaming. And then the light bulb came on: It was her choice. It is not my life. The whole drama-tastic situation isn't a flying monkey waiting for the right moment to drop the coconut; life just turned out that way, and that was her decision in dealing with it. But--and here is the important end of that thought--if the same thing happened to me, I would be free to choose however I wanted.

Sometimes I feel like life is sitting out in front of me, already mapped out, but I'm feeling around blindly in the dark and no one's telling me the direction I'm supposed to go. Kind of like when my sister had to write her first research paper and the teacher wouldn't tell the class what exactly they needed to do, she just told them when they were doing it wrong. I suppose the end result of that mindset is that I feel like there's a flying monkey waiting just around the corner to drop a coconut on my head and steal my wallet. But I'm pretty sure that life isn't that way.

I guess, if I had to pin it down, that you can't ever be sure what life is exactly like. But that uncertainty is something you can hang your plans on. "All I know is that I don't know nuthin'." I have to remind myself of that a lot. There are a lot of fears crowding around inside my head: Unalterable destiny of graduationmarriage, the whole idea of graduationmarriage, my extreme perfectionism that makes me worry about these things that actually have no bearing on present day, present time ... but I constantly have to remind myself, for my own benefit more than anyone else's, that these thoughts are merely thoughts; they can't take substance and hurt me. They can't attack me out of nowhere. Once I actually acknowledge that they're there, they're easier to work around--instead of pulling the strings in my mind, they're just rocks jutting out of the waters I'm trying to navigate: Still there, but separate, complete, avoidable.

Sometimes I think I'm crazy, but then I remember, hey, I'm just a woman. I've got fourteen open windows in my head right now and popup ads intruding all over the place, and that's okay. =P

And did I mention that God's after me?

I haven't even gotten my mind fully around this idea, but on Saturday it occurred to me that God is after me: He will continue to thwart and frustrate my self-made plans at every turn.

I realized this when I was driving home from Ranger shouting "Why does everything I try to do have to end up sucking?" That also ties in with my last year of school, which, overall, has probably given me an anxiety disorder. In retrospect, the Fun/Not Fun balance was extremely off-kilter in the direction of Not Fun--which is to say, there were more parts of it that sucked than there were parts that were good. I don't know why. I'm still not entirely sure. But it occurred to me as I was driving home that, haha, maybe God is out to get me. And then I was like, Wait a minute: I think he really is. I mean, part of it is just that life sucks sometimes, and there's nothing you can do about it. But I also have a sneaking suspicion that God is purposefully thwarting me, at least in my mind, because he has other plans for me--plans far greater than the ones that I am currently creating for myself.

The flipside of this is that I realized that once I give in, I give in. There will be no more cute little plans for the future on my part; I will be accepting with both hands the blank slate that God keeps nudging me with. And he keeps giving me the urge to go get the Unity tattoo. Call this stupid, but my excuse for putting that off has been that I won't be able to hide it in a wedding dress, thus my Nana would kill me when I got married and she saw it, thus I can't get any tattoos until after I get married (which in my nicely-packaged little plans--the ones that God is always thwarting--would still be at least another year and a half away). So I could still ignore God and his blank slate for another year and a half, and afterward I would probably just go, "Oh, that was just youthful college indiscretion; everybody wants to do something rebellious when they're away from home. How droll." And then I would rationalize that nudging doubt away once more.

But here God is, nudging me with that frickin blank slate, telling me to go get a tattoo that says "Unity" so that I can't rationalize everything away and work back into a state of spiritual equilibrium anymore. That's why I had to smoke that cigar on Saturday night. I had to do something just enough out of the ordinary that I couldn't explain away that feeling of being pursued as just another passing fancy. I honestly feel that this is something God is calling me to--but once I go and do that, once I go and get that tattoo, there will be no turning back. I wonder if he didn't tell me to go get that first so that I would have to throw out all my neat little plans, all of which involve me waiting to doing anything until after I graduate or get married. Damn it.

So yes. God is out to get me.

Cold feelings in the night.

I have to be honest with myself: I've been depressed and listening to Social Distortion (hence the "Cold Feelings in the Night"). Not always a good combination. But I have to own up and admit what's been bothering me, because it's always something different.

1. I'm afraid that, in some way, shape, or form, I'm going to hopelessly screw up my relationship with Aaron beyond repair. Usually my thoughts taunt me from the direction of "what if you fall out of love with him?" And the resulting despair makes me hurt so much that it makes me sick to my stomach, which--ironically--proves that I actually do care (usually a sign of love--giving a crap what happens to the other person) and proves that I do indeed love him. But apparently I'm not even allowed to think such thoughts, even though the conclusion I inevitably arrive at is that Aaron is so much a part of me and my life that I can't even separate him from my thoughts. And that's a good thing.

2. You can tell I'm depressed because I use big words. (Inevitably much?)

3. God is not holding out on me. I can't seem to get that through my head. Or am I just beating myself up over it, and then beating myself up for beating myself up? Am I just freaking out because I'm freaking out? Am I just depressed because I'm depressed?

4. I worried last night that the salad days were over, that here on out it's always going to be this way: Me literally worrying myself sick. Things always seem so much better in retrospect. If only my vision in the present were as clear as my hindsight. Then life would be perfect, huh?

5. But what is perfection? Just another thing I've subconsciously strived for my whole life? No, not even my whole life, there has been a period where I didn't care. Life was life, not a means to the end of perfection. And things haven't changed, my perspective has just unknowingly slid back into how it was before ... ?

6. God will come through for me. He is not holding out on me, and he will come through for me in the end.

7. And at the same time, this is just a rough patch. It happens in life. Maybe today in particular is just a bigger crack in the patch of rough asphalt that I'm going through on the Sidewalk of Life, but either way, there's good patches and there's bad: and they're both life just the same.

8. Furthermore, I know that I tend to respond to things with (1) Pessimism/depression; (2) Beating myself up for said pessimism/depression; (3) Beating myself for beating myself up; (4) Freaking out; (5) Freaking out over freaking out; (6) Getting depressed over the whole process; (7) Getting depressed because I can't even keep myself from getting depressed ... et cetera.

Et cetera is just fun to write out.

But see, what happens next, right, is whenever I manage to cheer myself up, Hatin' Brain (the part of my brain that hates on the rest of me) is like, "Ohhhh, but what about UNRESOLVED ISSUE X?! Shouldn't you have had that one figured out three days ago and been skipping around in spiritual daisies ever since?" And I think that because Hatin' Brain is incredibly cynical, doubts everything, and is almost always in a bad mood, it must be right. Because clearly nothing that is happy has any truth in it. (Hey ... I should start my own philosophical school or something. =P)

Alll I can ever boil it down to is that it's all in my head--life doesn't have its jaws around my throat nearly as much as I tend to believe it does; it's just how I perceive things. And that's a small comfort, but sometimes I wonder if it's the right way of looking at things.

There I go again! The "right" way! There is no right or wrong way to life. There is living. It's a pretty inclusive term, whether I like it or not. Fact of the matter is that tomorrow doesn't functionally exist, my thoughts don't exist outside of my own head, and despite the cold nasty weather it's a miracle that I'm alive and breathing. And shut up, Hatin' Brain, I'll never resolve the fear of losing Aaron.

Ugh. I'm confused.

I'm feeling unproductive.

I should be doing homework, but instead I find myself listening to Madness and attempting to put posters on the walls (doesn't work too well, by the way, but smaller paper stuffs--flyers, the like--stay up pretty well). The warm weather and listening to the Skoidats on the way to church has given me the wanderlust, and on top of that, our current Bible study in the college group is over Epic by John Eldredge. Now it just keeps bringing me back to The Journey of Desire, and that deep and intense yearning to be part of something larger than myself ... to be part of a larger story (which is what Epic is about) ... to do ... something. It's like, in my brain, life doesn't start til after college. I think that's why I keep rushing myself to finish periodically ... my thoughts are hedged in terms of "I need to get this out of the way before I can do anything else."

You want to know something else funny? I don't have weird marriage paranoia when I think in terms of Journey of Desire or Epic. I ask myself the question, what is the deepest desire of my heart?--and I can feel it; I can feel the answer. Somewhere deep in there is the need to wander, the need to meet and reach out to people; and I definitely want Aaron to be there with me. There's none of those lingering cultural questions like "but what if he isn't THE ONE?" Fact of the matter stands, I don't give a rat's ... backside ... if there even is such a thing as "THE ONE," because even if there is, Aaron's the person I want to be with. Well, that makes sense in my own head. Anyway.

In any event, I've realized that I don't want to "grow up," settle down, get married, have kids, you know the drill, just because it's what I'm supposed to do. There's nothing wrong with any of those things, and I'm not throwing out the idea that I'll ever do them. But I absolutely refuse to do it because it's what I'm supposed to do. I'm not going to get married because it's a cultural rite of passage that I absolutely have to go through, so I might as well pick the least offensive person for the job; I'm going to get married, when I do, because I want to.

What is the deepest desire of my heart? ... I can feel it, but I can't explain it. And at this point, I wish that it would come about sooner--I have a deep and intense longing for it. Aaaargh.

And on that note:

I feel the burning need to make fun of the e-mail that she sent me that one time. Hooray!

----------------- Original Message -----------------
From: chloeDate: Jul 30, 2007 1:45 PM
this is so awkward but ummm on your profile and onn aaron's it like says ya'll are together how long has this been going on because like umm some stuff like happened this summer and i hope you two just barely started going out other wise i feell really bad about this whole situation so like message me back so i can figure out whats going on aarons messing with one of our heads and i need to figure out which one of ours it is ok??sorry again lol

Thought 1: Holy crap, how old do you think I am, twelve?

Thought 2: Who takes the time to write "umm" in an e-mail?

Thought 3: Same question, this time regarding "like."

Thought 4: A drunken one-armed monkey named Jimmy the Wonder Ferret could type better than you, and he's on edge because he's about to go to rehab. What's your excuse?

Thought 5: ... was the most sarcastic e-mail that I've ever written:

From: Emily
Date: Jul 30, 2007 4:31 PM


So.

Hello.

Just so you know, I don't believe a word of this crap. Never have, never will. It's not even worth the effort of trying to convince me. =P In case you didn't notice, I'm a grown woman who doesn't subscribe to juvenile MySpace getting-back-at-someone-else gags. In all honesty, there are two things about this whole prepubescent attempt at revenge that really make me angry: One, you were trying to mess with Aaron. That by itself pisses me off to no end, as I get pretty touchy when people screw around with the people I care about. Two, on top of trying to destroy the life of someone I love, you tried to do it through me. What do you take me for, a twelve-year-old? Did you really think that you could manipulate me that easily? I'm insulted that you think that I'm that stupid. Actually, come to think of it, I'm almost impressed that you're so shallow that you thought you could use me to get back at Aaron in some way. Wow.

So ... yes. Before the sarcasm gets truly biting, I will end this e-mail with: Just leave us alone. I'm insulted that you really thought that you could get back at Aaron by sending me e-mails full of your nonsensical, juvenile, lying, entirely fictional ... sweet mother o' mercy ... I can't think of any other adjectives that aren't full of expletives. And I'm not going to sink to that level. =P Whatever the case, leave me out of your twelve-year-old mind games. They clearly don't work on me.

Nice doing business with you.

... Emily

And oh yes. While I'm thinking about it: Don't try that "It was all a mistake" crap on me, either. I, being a girl myself, know how we think, and that was a very deliberate action on your part. Thanks to this whole episode, I will never believe another word that comes out of your mouth ... as if I would've in the first place.

And don't you talk smack about Aaron around me. I will not hesitate to kick yer butt. I'm pretty sure that I've got half the city of Abilene on my side, too. So, back off.

And learn to spell.

And learn another word beside "like."

Happy holidays to all.

("You were feeling really bad about this whole situation" ... oh my ... good god ... how manipulative can you get? It really floors me every time I read this. Did you think that you could play me like some kind of game? Did you really think that low of me? Some advice, my friend: Get a job. Get a hobby. Whatever you get, get off MySpace.)

Thought 1: ... that is single-handedly the most sarcastic piece of communication that I've ever written. If I hadn't been in such a blind rage I probably would've just cussed a lot. As it was, I think that my apparent calm scared the piss out of her, because she tried to pretend like nothing had ever happened:

yes mistakes take place somewhere in this picture you look alot like a girl I know rather well so my mistake.....her MIDDLE name is emily and I thought she was trying to run from me.....trying to subclude herself in some manner......but I didnt even look at you pictures this whole deal is NOT my fault, I told my friend about the ordeal I was in she knew my myspace password and I didnt write any of this stuff......I dont know how it came to be that you AND your significant other got mixed up in this I am sorry to the fullest about this situation what ever damage has been caused by these words I am sorry I take responsability for what has happened because I was stupid enough to let someone know my password I am confused on what all has been said....Im not asking you to forgive me or anything I just wanted to clear things up

have a good life high hopes for you and your loved one-Chloe

Thought 1: ... pretty sure that "subclude" isn't a word. Good try, though. Attempting to sound smart so that I would think that we had something in common. FAIL!

Thought 2: Once again, the drunken monkey can write--and lie--better. Your excuse about a friend having your MySpace password is complete BS. Oh yes, and so is "her MIDDLE name is Emily." Kudos for a lie so transparent that, if you used it as a sliding glass door, birds would fly into it on sunny days. I'm impressed ... at your stupidity! Bahaha!

Maybe I should lay off this for a while. I'm starting to get really smarcastic. =P Oh well. It made me feel better.

I do have to add, though ...

... that I've always wanted to go on Stormy's (Aaron's distant ex) MySpace page and write, "Your poetry is trite and cliched! Try using a metaphor instead of a simile every once in a while! And for God's sake, everyone your age has written an America-sucks-so-hard poem ... at least write about something original!"

But then again, I don't really care, because (as I've mentioned before) she doesn't even appear on my radar anymore. Every now and then I remember when she created the fake MySpace page, and then I remember how much I want to go make fun of her poetry. The least she could do is use halfway decent grammar.

Maybe I'm just bitter because she has 5.3 billion friends who all fawn over her terrible poetry because they wouldn't know good literature if it latched itself onto their right legs and called them all George, while clearly I'm a literary genius who is much more deserving of their praise and adoration. Yeah, I think that's part of it. Stupid subconscious jealousy. Oh well. At least I can laugh at it, I reckon. =P