The Halftime Show

ANOTHER YEAR OLDER

Well, today's my birthday. I'm a whole eighteen years old today. That's right, the big one- cigarettes, porn, voting, being tried as an adult in court, and my personal favorite: being allowed to drive past 11 pm. Well, I have never done any sort of drugs before, porn's easy enough to locate on the Internet, the only voting I care about won't happen for about two more years, I'm not badass enough to do anything that would land me in court, and rarely do I have enough of a social life to drive into all hours of the night. Maybe I should do them all today, huh? Really make this a birthday to remember.

It should be a pretty good day. All my friends that are close enough to come home, have, and we're all going to Wendy's to celebrate. I'm hoping my good friend Jesus will be there, as I mentioned in the last blog post. Then we're all coming back to my house to eat more, enjoy each other's company, and watch the Super Bowl. This is how I spend my birthdays. I wouldn't have it any other way.

Eighteen... it does make me feel a little more powerful. I'm an adult now, you know? But the term "adult" is so objective. For instance, to Native Americans, I've been an adult since I got my period. I've had a mind that is more developed than a lot of adults for years. I may be an adult, but I still look like I'm fourteen. I may be an adult, but I still have to wake up and go to high school every day, to abide by my parents' rules, and get in trouble if I don't. I may be an adult, but I still can't drink. I may be an adult, but I still cry like I'm a child sometimes. Yes, I may be an adult today, but numbers don't really mean shit, except in front of the law. Funny how that works, isn't it?

So I'm going to go enjoy the one day out of the year that is supposed to be just for me. And by "enjoy," I mean go take a nap (it's 9:30 in the morning), take a thirty-minute shower, then sit in a fast food restaurant with my friends. And maybe somewhere in there I'll buy a pack of cigarettes and some hardcore porn, intentionally run somebody over while driving at two am, be tried in court for it, be found guilty, and get the death penalty for it. Boy, I really know how to party, don't I? Have a good day, everyone.

"You know, I've been carded for a lot of things. But being carded to be allowed to look at 12-inch dildos... is by far the weirdest." -Ryan

KILLING TIME

Here I sit, in the prison they call school, trying to figure out a way to make it not so terrible. I turn to Blogger.

Okay, so it's not that dramatic. But I'm so bored that I need to cause drama. Or something like that. I have three consecutive periods of nothing to do. That's about two and a half hours of fuming over the things I could be doing if they just let me walk out to my car and drive home. Two and a half hours sitting at a computer, typing, not really because I have anything to say, but because I love the sound of clacking keys and the feel of typing beneath my fingertips. The more I write, the better. Sorry you have to be the one to read it.

Let's play Stream of Consciousness... previously known as Ten Minutes in Em's Head.

- I am so damn hungry
- I wonder when I went to Wendy's last...
- my birthday's on Sunday. We're gonna party it up at Wendy's.
- maybe Jesus will be there, and he'll give me a discount because it's my birthday. He already gives me the senior citizen discount because I'm pretty.
- But all Mexicans think I'm pretty.
- There was this one time I caused a car accident because the Mexicans driving the car were checking me out. That was one of the highlights of my life. Don't worry, nobody died.
- Humor is really interesting.
- Oh, I quit my job at Dairy Queen. After two years, I've finally had enough of that shit hole. I got a job offer working as a filing bitch at an OB-GYN's office, but I'm not sure if I'm going to take it. I wouldn't be able to participate in the Spring Drama if I did, and it's supposed to be a good one this year. But this is exactly the kind of job I've been looking for: good pay, good hours, doesn't involve interacting with customers...
- I hate people
- I hate teenagers more. I hate going to school with two thousand of them. Do you know how stupid everyone here is? I apologize on behalf of my age group. I sincerely hope I'm better than these shit-heads.
- That's the word of the day, by the way.
- What the hell is with all this snow? I'm so ready for summer.
- Summer, when I no longer have to attend Prison High School. Glorious.
- I'm 90% sure I'm going to St. Joe's for college. I got accepted with a $12,000 a year scholarship... pretty nice, but their tuition is a ridiculous amount.
- Somebody loves me. =)
- This period is so freaking long...
- I miss AP Gym.

Okay, I think it's almost time to leave... I'm seriously considering skipping the last two periods of the day and making up some excuse if they catch me. I'm a good kid with a clean record. I look innocent. I don't smell like cigarette smoke. They'll let me off the hook.

I apologize for the ramblings. But you read 'em, it's your own fault. You feed my addiction. Or something like that.

SORRY FOR THE LACK OF UPDATES, I'VE BEEN SO BUSY!

"Hey God. How are you? Look, I know I don't talk to you very much. I don't know what you'd call my religious beliefs, but believing that I have to pray for you to be able to know what I want or what I'm thinking has never sounded right to me. I guess I only really talk to you when I don't know what else to do about a situation, good or bad.

"Look at this boy I'm laying with right now. He is so beautiful. I know that, you know that. But he doesn't know that. He doesn't know, truly doesn't understand, how wonderful he is and why he is such a great person. I want him to understand. Please help him to know that he is beautiful when I tell him so. Please give me the strength to be the one to make him understand it.

"I want this to work out, God. He's really afraid of me, for no reason other than the title he's given me. He's had nothing but bad experiences in the past with this sort of thing, and no matter how much he trusts me, he will always be afraid of being hurt. He is also afraid that he will hurt me, which I know will never happen. He's afraid and uncertain. Please, please let us know that we're right about this. Please show us how right it is for us to be together and that we will be able to make this last. It's something truly beautiful that we have here. I know that. Please let me be right.

"You're listening, aren't you? Are you hearing what I'm saying? ... Look. I know you hate playing these kinds of games with people, but please, if you're listening to me right now, if you know that this is right... let him wake up now."

And he did.


True story. Wonderful life.

WHAT IS LOVE?

I never thought I'd have to ask that. But please, if you would, leave your opinions as to what you think love is in the comments section. The winner gets a Christmas cookie.

OLD AND NEW

Last night, I held our group's "Holiday Party" at my house. I cooked two kinds of lasagna, salad, and garlic bread with a dessert of french silk and apple pies. Everybody from the old group came, and everybody actually dressed up when I asked them to. Most of the boys were even wearing ties.

The night went on interestingly. I think everybody enjoyed the food (especially the pie... oddly, that and the garlic bread were the only things for which there were no leftovers. You bunch of fatties.), and it was certainly good to see everybody again. Pat and Mark, two of my lovely boys, did not let me touch the dishes when it came time to clean up. I have never seen a dishwasher loaded more beautifully. We enjoyed the lovely sounds of Sufjan Stevens' Christmas album (if you haven't heard him, check him out. I have never heard of someone who's listened and not liked him.). All in all, it seemed to be a pretty good night.

But something wasn't right. Pat and I had a good conversation after everybody left in which we talked about how we all interacted as a group and stuff like that. As he said, we as a group have always had a knack for getting pissed off at each other for stupid things. The difference last night was that we didn't wait until after the party was over to talk about each other behind our backs. And we didn't have a problem saying one or two rude things to each other's faces. Now, I'll say some of us are much more guilty of this than others, me being one of the less guilty, but we all do it. It's a really sad thing to see, that we do this to each other. I have always said (I think it was a blog post earlier in the summer, actually) that we need to put all these petty things aside, like things that annoy us, or personal problems, and remember that we're all friends. That we'll all be there for each other and help each other out. I used to think that we did this in our group, and had just forgotten it lately. But I've kind of noticed now that we don't really do that so much ever. Only a few people in the group are truly willing to forget everything else and remember friendship and allow it to be the guiding force between two people. I wish that wasn't true, but I think it really is. And all our time apart from one another has, I think, brought out this quality even more strongly. It seemed like everyone was upset at having been forced to see everyone else again. I didn't, and don't, like it.

I am one of those people who can and will drop everything else to let friendship be prevalent. In fact, I did that with quite a few people last night. I'll continue to do it, because even though I was a little hurt by some of the happenings I just described from last night, I'll still be there for everybody else if needed. Even though other people aren't able to put personal or petty issues aside and be a friend, I always will be able to. I'm not trying to get you guys to do that anymore or anything like that. Just, if any of you are reading this, know that I'm here if you need me. I guess that's the point of this blog post. To state my confusion, my disappointing conclusion, and what I've decided to do about it. And to just keep being me is all I can do.

I'm sorry.

I WISH THIS DIDN'T SOUND LIKE A CORNY MOVIE

If you're a senior at Henderson High School, you'll know of the legacy that we call AP Gym. If you're not, then allow me to explain. We're required to take a "physical education" class every year of high school which meets two days a week for the whole year. But seniors who are intense/really good/enthusiastic about gym class are permitted to take AP Gym, which meets every day for half a year. I decided to go with the AP Gym class because I enjoy playing sports, even if I'm not very good at them, and I'd be able to get gym over with in half a year.

Near the end of the semester, what we call the Henderson Olympics are held. Two of the classes go one day and the other two go another day to a sports training center and compete against each other in various sports. The two classes who win the majority of those sports get to play each other for the ultimate championship. My class went for our first round today. Let me tell you, I haven't had such a fun day in a while.

We'd drafted who was going to play what sport on Tuesday (one person plays three different sports). There was basketball, hockey, soccer, volleyball, Ultimate Frisbee, Tchouckball (if you don't know what it is, don't ask) and Handball. Our class was expected to do well in most sports except hockey, for which we were fully prepared to get our asses handed to us in a neat little box. Well, we did lose, but it took them until the last minute of overtime to beat us in hockey. We won in everything else except handball, by which time we didn't care about who won, because we'd already won the spot in the championship.

But winning was far from the point. In fact, it was the graceful loss in hockey that brought us all together so closely. You know all that stuff that people say about high school kids being clique-y and rude and snotty to each other? Well, most of us (them) are, to a certain extent. But today, our class got along beautifully. We are such a bunch of random people from all different cliques and social groups, but we all cheered each other on, congratulated each other, consoled each other if there was a bad play, cooperated on the field, and took care of each other in the best way. Hockey, the second sport played, brought us together because we realized how well we play when we all work together and care for each other. If anybody on the team had tried to hog the ball or put someone else down, we wouldn't have held our own as well as we did. Truly, we were no match for the other team: they had two varsity hockey players and a great goalie to our six inexperienced players. Nonetheless, our unification was what seemed to carry us as far as it did. Now, we all find ourselves trying to find out more about our class/team-mates. There are some truly amazing players that everybody always thought were real dorks. There are some really kind and interesting people that everybody always thought were nerdy or stuck-up. It's wonderful to get to know the person behind the stereotype. Because almost always, they're not what you think.

Our class will be going back on Tuesday to compete for the championship. We're not expected to win, but I think it will be fairly close. It doesn't really matter, though. All I'm looking forward to is another day where that feeling of kindness and unity is thick in the air, where the day is filled with sweaty high-fives and breathless grinning hugs and pictures where you don't have to fake the smile and catching that pass you thought would be impossible and rushing the field and buzzers and whistles and losing your voice cheering for someone you thought you hated yesterday.

I think this is my "true meaning of Christmas" post, in a weird sort of way, and completely unintentionally. But it fits, don't you think?

Cheer us on for Tuesday.

BEAR WITH ME

A severe case of writer's block has been attacking me as of late, right at the time where I need to be writing the most. So don't worry; nothing horrible has happened to me or anything like that. In fact, I've been pretty content lately. Christmas is coming, all my friends will be home, etc. Oh, and there is nothing better than lying half asleep in bed, snuggled up to a warm towel fresh from the dryer, listening to Frank Sinatra's Christmas album and having your favorite person in the world tell you how much he loves you. All is well in that moment.

Love to all. Read Steve's blog while I'm gone. Or go to the Postsecret site.