my mother says that i can't please everybody and i should just focus on myself.

i guess that's true.

i just can't help but think that if there's something i can do to make someone's life a little better, without it killing me, why not?

well because then i end up doing things that i really don't want to do for people that really don't deserve it.

hello, headaches.

every time i'm feeling sick, i go to the Symptom Checker at webmd.com and this is basically the list of possible diagnoses that i get every single time.

-migraines
-headaches
-anemia


tonight i learned that there is a type of migraine of which i was previously unaware.

vestibular migraines.

symptoms?
all the symptoms of a migraine, minus the stabbing headache.

so i'm betting that the dizzy/nauseous/lightheaded/i-feel-like-i'm-moving-even-when-i'm-sitting/laying-down/sensitivity-to-light is probably that.

because let's be honest.
i get migraines, cluster headaches, tension headaches quite frequently. and i'm anemic.

so why not this type of headacheless migraine?

welcome to my life.

over it : linguistics and nyu

i just changed my schedule.

next semester i will be taking :
etymology (boring)
language and society (boring)
versailles : life as art in the age of grandeur (potential)
modern irish language (COOL. i think.)

i did so because i am so sick of the linguistics department and want to be done with them as soon as possible, so i am going to take my final two classes and then never speak to any of them again.

aside from the core classes and the brilliant professors who teach them (mark baltin, gafos, lisa davidson, chris barker) and a few select TAs (marcos, violetta, oana), linguistics classes at new york university have been a waste of my time.

i wish i could retake sound & language or semantics. such interesting classes. even drawing sentence trees in grammatical analysis was fun. ( i admit that i learned very little in phonological analysis, but that was maybe my own fault --- and it was quite difficult. difficult enough for me to attempt to BS my way through instead of try to learn the material. it worked ... i got a b+ )

mais non.

better to just graduate and move on.

i feel like i'm supposed to DO something with my life and i feel like i won't be doing something in publishing.

i mean, i will. it's the coolest job in the world and it would make me forever interesting.

but ugh, i feel i'm meant to do something smaller and at the same time, bigger, in the big scheme of things.

i feel selfish for wanting to do publishing.

i'm supposed to do something else, i think.

i'm supposed to help people. make the world a little bit better.

helping to create novels helps in an escapist sort of way. it's art. it's wonderful.

but maybe less tangible and maybe less real than what i'm meant for.

does that make any sense?

i am such a grownup because i didn't cry today.


or maybe all that really means is that i'm numb and resigned.

thought

doing something takes so much more effort than doing nothing. making that decision to take action rather than sit idly. and with the latter, we know what to expect --- more of the same.

and so why do we bother taking the risk?

the adventures, the excitement, the opportunity.

because it's life, and it's what you do.

it's usually worth it.

and even if it's not, at least it's an escape from the mundane.

2009 has been very stressful and trying and confusing, and i finally got myself to a place where i am really happy and purposeful and NOT NEEDY. this took years. i will not allow it to be destroyed so easily.

what the fuck is my problem??

i will not go back to that.

it's much easier said than done, but i am going to put up such a fight.

kate & leo

in the delusional fantasyland in which i live, this is a reality and not just a picture from a movie set :



---------------------------------------------------------------

now. revolutionary road. i meant to see it when it came out, of course. i was dying in anticipation. somehow, i just never got to the movie theater. i rarely do. i'm kinda against paying 13$ to see a movie. that's half a ticket to a play.

anyway. everyone warned me that it was depressing and awful. my sister and my mother were horrified by kate's character. but i understood her. i'm not that sad about it. it was a sad situation, but i can't imagine it ending any other way. i wish it could have. i wish with all my heart that they made it to paris and could have been happy. but kate('s character) had gone crazy. she didn't see a way out of this boxed in suburban life with a white picket fence.

it's just like the Awakening, really.

????? x infinity

so this is generally what happens when i make a decision about something.

if i decide against publishing, my favorite literary agent that i interned for will say something like "you are really good at this" or "there's nothing in the world like finding a manuscript you love."

if i decide that i should give publishing a try, someone will tell me how ideal teaching is and how great i am with kids and how rewarding it is to be a teacher and how you get summers off and how the pay in NYS is great.


usually i flipflop every few days. sometimes weeks.

today i was set on teaching, then got an email from michael about a manuscript that i pitched to editors that is getting published, AND THEN i saw my french teacher from jr high who gushed about how i would make a great teacher for 10 minutes and how she'd help me.


i am so freaking lost, this isn't funny.

??????

can someone please tell me what i'm supposed to do with my life?

it's the constant struggle of



vs.

where i'd rather be v.1.0

washington square park, because though it no longer looks like this, it is NEW and OPEN and actually quite beautiful, and i walked through it yesterday in the rain and i was sososososososososo happy.



fire island, because it is FINALLY june AND sunny. i'd like to go there with lovely friends and not obnoxious 14 year olds who are clearly too old for summer camp.


le pont des arts, paree. because nothing is better than getting drunk outside off 3e wine. sadly neither i nor my comrades experienced this many times, as the weather was generally far from pleasant until two weeks before our departure.



because, obviously...


here. i would always rather be here.

can't please everyone ...

So someone started collecting really amazing/hilarious negative reviews of masterpieces and classics of literature, film, and music.

Reading them keeps me entertained for hours.

For example, a review of the movie Gone With the Wind from an amazon.com customer :

at no point in this movie does anyone’s head explode in flames. truly great films such as welcome to spring break recognize the need for such scenes, but this movie clearly fails to understand the emotional resonance a burning head can create. if you want to see a truly great movie, check out welcome to spring break.

a-m-a-z-i-ng.

staircases.

I would very much like this staircase in my chateau. Isn't it gorgeous?

Nothing beats a good staircase, except, of course, a good bookshelf.

xoxo