Author’s Gab, Reader Talk.
A letter to you, the reader, so that you can finally figure out what I’m thinking.
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This Month: Reality [“Be Ok” (song by Ingrid Michaelson)]
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Dear Reader,
Last month I wrote you that I was enjoying vacation and that I didn’t want to think about reality just then. Well, the news is, reality has hit, whether I like it or not, and now I have too work through it. This is pretty much what I’ve been working through this month.
It’s a fairly simple pattern of events, actually. As soon as July hit, I started getting caught up in school and work, as well as making the necessary preparations for the upcoming year. I started Composition II on July 7, the first day which fell, very thankfully, on shutdown week for work, so I didn’t have to juggle both at once.
“Shutdown week”, as it’s called at work, is basically a maintenance week at the pool. The staff closes both pools for the week, to drain the pool and put new water in it, to make necessary (and long neglected, because of general operation) repairs, and to scrub the place from head-to-toe, to make sure everything is spick and span for the upcoming year (the old one ends when shutdown starts and the new one begins when shutdown ends). The management uses us lifeguards to clean the facility, so they give everybody the option to sign up for shutdown week. For some people, this takes the place of the regular work week. For others, if the schedule is full by the time you get to it, it’s a week off. For me, the schedule was pretty full by the time I got to it, and I had class starting, so I didn’t sign up, but this ended up being a good thing, as I said, because I started my new class that week.
Since then, I’ve been guarding on Thursdays and Saturdays, from noon to close, which has worked well for me. I just got my new schedule yesterday, for the upcoming new pay period, and I’m going to be working all day on Fridays now too. I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing, but it does feel like a bit much for me to handle right now.
Currently, going to school feels like a laborious rat race. I’ve always said that I don’t have much patience for composition/writing courses, which is why I take them in the summer. But, this is not because I don’t like the material, it’s because I’m very familiar with it and because I generally feel like I know what I’m doing when I write. That’s not to say my writing can’t be improved, because it always can be, but I’m pretty quick witted about it, and dragging it out over a period of 15 weeks is just……. BLAH…….. no thanks….. I get the idea, already. Plus, I’m not too technical of a person, so when it comes to doing grammar and MLA stuff, I comprehend things like a lost puppy. I have some idea where things should go and what they are called, but it’s far better if I use the book or easybib.com to come up with where the period should go or if a title should be in quotation marks or italicized. And so, the reason I’m no longer an English major is this: because I hate doing grammar. The letters, the words, the sentences, the paragraphs, the stories, are the best part. Haha… and so the writer confesses that she’s not a perfect writer either. 😉
And, as I said, I’ve been preparing for my future, which is no easy task. The future holds so many great, fantastic possibilities; anything goes. It’s where I love to live, the future. But, I’ve also been learning that the future is also now, and so living in the present is just as important as living later.
Nevertheless, anyways, the future I’ve been preparing for is the upcoming year. I’ve figured out that I’m going to spend one last year at OCC taking classes, and then, hopefully, I will graduate in May 2011 with my associate’s degree in Global Studies. Beyond that has been a great mystery for me, because, again, I feel lost as to what I want to do for money in terms of a full time job. This confusion arises because my previous choices have been fairly unrealistic, so I’ve been told.
I mean, it’s one question to ask a child “What do you want to be when you grow up?”, but it’s another entirely to ask them, “What do you want to do for money so you can survive on your own when you get older?” Thus, in this respect, I feel cheated, because what I want to be “when I’m grown up” is an entirely different story than what I want to do for money so I can “survive when I get older”. It’s an unfair question, really, I say. So, while I’ve been college hunting, I’ve been grappling with these questions and questions of life management. So far, I’ve been accepted into Oakland University, and I have Univ. of Michigan, Michigan State, Grand Valley State Univ., Eastern Michigan Univ., and who knows what else to go, but that’s all never going to work out unless I figure out how to manage my life and what I’m going to do for money at the end of it all.
And, on top of it, there are my dreams. These dreams cost too much money for them to actually happen right now, but they exist in my heart and they are real for me. These dreams include returning to Taylor University, a place which I fell in love with my first year of college and still love today, not to mention the fact that I yearn to go back and redeem/prove myself there. They also include embarking on Semester at Sea, a voyage that, no doubt, would give me great learning and great joy to go on, as well as fulfill a great desire within myself to see more of the world. And, I mean, really travel it and explore it, not just stop in for a visit once and awhile, because I want to know, really know, what’s out there. And, finally, there is a dear friend of mine living in China who I have not seen for a very long time, and I sincerely, very much, would like to be with her again… I’m not even sure I even care how that happens anymore, as long as it does and we get to hang out for a very long time.
One thing about my career choice remains certain though, I need to be working with people and ideas, and, whatever I do, I need to be writing. This has come as a grave realization this month, because I’ve been locked out of “The Rose”, possibly for good, because (silly me) I reset my password and forgot to write it down. Now, the wordpress staff will not let me in unless they receive an e-mail from the address the account is linked to (now non-existent) or my API (my user number for my account, which I think I got rid of because I didn’t know what it was). The prospect of losing my beloved “Rose” has bothered me to no end. My initial reaction was: no, no, no, this must be fixed as soon as possible!! But, now that I realize that it may not actually get fixed, I may have to accept its death with the grain of knowledge that I must write, I must report… I need to do these things. And, if “The Rose” doesn’t exist anymore, I will go on reporting and writing about what I see and what happens to me. It’s as I said in “How I Write” (maybe needs to be retitled “Why I Write”) once: “Soldiers keep daily dying in my world enough that I can’t hold back penning them up. So, somehow, always, I will kill past the sky. CURSES!! This hand keeps flying!! There’s no secret as to why.”
Plus, to top everything off, I’ve been undergoing changes associated with turning 21. These are subtle changes, and you wouldn’t notice them just by looking at me, but if you really looked, you would see that I’m going to a new doctor, have a new horizontal driver’s license and new insurance card, and that, in two weeks, I will be able to legally drink alcohol in public for the first time. You will also see my terror, a shivering, frightened little girl, as people start calling me an “adult” and expect me to act like one. Yet, I know in my heart of hearts that I cannot be the perfect ideal they expect of me, and for the first time in my life, I’m nearly dreading my birthday. I’m not even excited. I mean, for a day I’ve been waiting for my entire childhood, one would expect that I might be pleased that it’s finally almost here. But, I’m not. I actually want it to go away because I’m not ready for it to happen yet. The trouble is, it’s going to happen anyways, so I’ve got to deal with it, because that’s just reality.
I think this all comes down to one theme for this month, as I work through everything, and Ingrid Michaelson says it well in her song “Be Ok”. In terms of my life this month, I feel her every word in this song. Honestly, I “just want to be ok, feel the day, and know that I will be ok”, because “open me up and you will see, I’m a gallery of broken hearts, I’m beyond repair let me be, give me back my pieces, and give me back/let me hold my broken parts”. Absolutely.
Finally, for your reading pleasure, there’s a new semi-perfect sonnet up (“Through my Lucid Storm”), if you haven’t had a chance to look at it yet. There’s also this really rough copy of a very impulsive piece of work I did this month called “Today”, floating around out there if you’re interested. Go to “thisbreathforward89.wordpress.com” to read it. I started working on a more journalism oriented blog called (for now) “Exposure”, but somehow, nevertheless, that ended up being my first post anyways. I might get rid of it in the future, but that all depends if I can get back into my wordpress.com account or not. Also, “I Miss You”, after a few tweaks, should be ready for publication, but again, I can’t publish anything unless I get back into my account.
And, there you go. Really, that’s what I’ve been thinking about this July: reality. This month even has a theme song, “Be Ok”, by Ingrid Michaelson, because I want to “be ok”.
And, if you’re wondering if the same is true about my spiritual life, it is. Going to OCC has worn me (and my spirit) down considerably, because it’s not easy being a light in a dark place. They (nonbelievers, non-Christians, that is, and sometimes, even believers) ask me, “How do you know that you’re right that God exists?”, and I turn around and ask myself the same question, because, truth be told, I don’t know, I simply believe it to be true. Jesus says to Thomas in John 20: 29 (NASB), “Jesus said to him, “Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.””
It was really discouraging to hear my Composition teacher (they very valiant Dr. James, accomplished poet and storyteller, and distinguished department chair of English at OCC- Orchard Ridge Campus) tell us in class the other day that the best argument is one that can be proved logically by factual evidence, because he followed up that comment by saying that, therefore, we couldn’t argue religion (including Christianity), because religion was based on belief rather than fact and knowledge. It’s sad, really, to see these people say that you can’t prove that God exists or doesn’t exist. But, I’m reassured by John 20:29. It just makes me wonder, if these people did actually see God Himself, would they believe? Or, would they still doubt? “”Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed”” (John 20:29b NASB). That’s how I know God is real.
But, anyways, that’s all for this month. Thanks again for reading, and take care until next month! I love you guys! Happy writing!
All my love, your writer,
Jessica A. McLean ♥ ♥ ♥
The Rose 