I got lost downtown today trying to find Quick Print. The fact that it’s 3 blocks from my office does not make me look any less stupid.
I was almost attempted to redeem myself by saying that I got accepted to KU this week, but honestly, that’s not that big a deal. Or so everyone seems to be saying.
I’m proud of myself.
But then, I have an ego that could suffocate a small nation.
I help out with the AV team at church every Sunday. I was working camera 4 (odd because there are only two cameras, numbered 3 and 4) this morning, like I have every week this fall (before that I ran the sound board, but I like this better). I was tired and it showed.
I dropped my headset pack midway through the service and when Kyle asked if I was tired, I said, “yeah, too much partying this weekend.” He laughed.
A few minutes later, “Wait, you’re not hungover are you?”
“Ha! Hardly. I’m the designated driver.”
Chad, goody two shoes that he is, enters in with, “Good, that’s what we like to hear.”
Me and my AV geeks…we’re so dumb. Though I admit, I love being able to talk over the headsets all through the service. Makes it go a lot faster.
The birthday countdown continues… nine more days until I’m legally responsible for my behavior.
An a related note, I currently have no plans for celebration. Certainly an 18th birthday requires some form of celebration, no?
Of course, I always suck at planning a party and no one ever got around to throwing me a surprise party.
Last year, I had a few friends over. Rae earned the title of “The Grim Groper” that night. Amy and Jeff got “engaged,” about an hour after I introduced them. Parthi sat in the corner and felt awkward. I tried desperately to come up with interesting topics for conversation. Funny, everyone who was there always says we should have a party like that again, but I have no idea why.
This year, my birthday is the day after Thanksgiving. My dad’s side of the family will all be in town, and I hope to god I don’t have to spend my birthday with them. Not that I desperately hate my family or anything. I just don’t want to spend my birthday with my sisters, my violent little cousin Daniel, his clingy twin sisters, or my 87-year-old grandfather who only talks about the latest tennis tournament he watched on ESPN and how he needs all of his eighty five million prescriptions refilled. Not even the promise of Thanksgiving leftovers is enough to keep me nearby. I’ve got the day off from school and work. I’ll find something interesting to do, I’m sure.
Today at work, Jannie got the biggest vase of flowers I have ever seen in my life. Thirty red roses from her husband.
I was jealous. It’s been a long time since I got flowers. Not that I’m the kind of girl to demand thirty red roses — I’m not. I swoon over a dandilion plucked from the front yard.
Two people have ever given me flowers. A couple years ago, Dad bought me a dozen roses for my 16th birthday. Last spring, Rorik gave me a total of three roses. The first time, I didn’t expect it. I found a long stemmed red rose in my locker at school first thing in the morning one Monday. Maybe it was just the surprise that made it so sweet. The one merit I’ll give him is that he was good at surprising me with neat little gifts. Of course no gift could make that relationship work for me.
I miss those flowers sometimes, but nothing can beat Justin’s late night “sweetie pumpkin bear to the sixth power” emails.
An hour ago, I was in the biology lab cutting up a sheep heart. I wouldn’t really recommend it. Just trust me on that.
Also: all of my classmates who think they should become doctors might need to rethink that idea after seeing how well they dealt with this heart.
I remember the day all the repressed memories came back. I was sitting in a science survey class, not paying attention per usual, doing some freewriting like I always do. I sit there with an open notebook, writing whatever comes out. I don’t even remember what I was writing about, but suddenly, my thoughts jumped to something new, and I kept writing not even realizing what the ink flowing from my pen meant.
Minutes later, I read what I had just written and I was shocked. It was as if it had just happened to me again. I freaked out, I didn’t know what to do. Where the day before, I was a bright young girl with a strong sense of self, now I was a completely fragmented soul, unable to make sense of my past. An hour ago, I was riding along in an idyllic childhood, and now I was privy to a secret so dark I’d even kept it from myself.
Me, a victim of abuse? Surely not! A person I’d remembered as a friend for the past six years had really just used me as an instrument to vent the frustrations of her own tormented childhood? Impossible.
I looked at that paper, staring, wondering if it were all a daydream, shaking a little. Almost randomly, I had inherited the legacy of sexual abuse. And what was I supposed to do now? Is there some sort of process, some way of healing with this newfound scar?
The language of it makes it sound far more dramatic and severe than it really is. Over the time I’ve spent in silence, I convinced myself that it’s no big deal. A huge percentage of females suffer abuse, and mine was really minor anyway, right? There’s no point in telling anyone, they’ll just get worked up about something I should just get over.
I was fine for a long time. Until we started talking about the long term effects of abuse in psychology. Until my boyfriend started pressuring me to go farther and farther. Last spring, I was a mess. Something that I’d kept silent was screaming inside me and I didn’t want to trouble anyone by saying anything.
So I didn’t.
Over the years, small hints have been dropped, but no one was ever explicitly told. My small cries for help were never so demanding that anyone pried me for further details (save once, before I was ready to talk).
I’ve thought about blogging it a thousand times.
Tonight seemed like the night. (Continue →)
I’ve been thinking that
it would be way awesome if
Al Gore was my dad
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