Warning: Emotionally introspective entry ahead. Read at your peril.

I had the most marvelous converstion with my dad last night. It's become sort of a habit for me to stay up at nights when I'm home and talk with him after my mom and my sister have gone to bed. Anyway, last night we went through his old high school yearbook. He told me about two of his old teachers: W.H. Nelson and Robert Treuer. From what he's told me of them, they (particularly Mr. Nelson) absolutely fascinate me. I've read through my dad's yearbook now and it sort of makes me wish that I'd known him when he was that age. Two things really stick out to me: Mr. Nelson's message for him and a poem that my dad wrote on the inside back cover. It would be too much of a breech of privacy if I were to print either of them here, but they make me wonder who my father was when he was about my age. I talked to him about it a little last night, about his friends and classmates and teachers, but there's so much more that I want to know but that I know that he wouldn't remember.

Here's another interesting question... I want to know if my dad was ever really happy. The poem in his yearbook seems so melancholy, and I suppose the high school warrants that sort of attitude for the most part. But so many of the things that my mom has told me about my dad, and so much of what I know about him now, is sad. He's been hurt a lot, and I know that he's depressed and has been for years, certainly off and on from when I was 10 years old, and according to my mom, even before that. The scary thing for me (and this seems very self-centered) is, I see the same sort of thing reflected in myself. I know how miserable I was from about 6th grade on until I started school this year. I don't know if i'm looking for patterns where there aren't any, but it does concern me. I can't get specific on here, for all sorts of reasons. But for anyone who knows me and is reading this, it's not a problem for me personally right now. I am happy with who I am and where I live, and I feel like I'm going somewhere. I guess what I'm trying to do in this course of inquiry is to get close to the people and things that I mostly ignored when I was so mired in my own head that I couldn't see past myself. And if it ever happens again, I want to know something about the source so that it might encourage me to get help instead of being miserable for a prolonged period.

I don't know if that made any sense.

Anyway, I'm headed home in the morning. Gonna drive for four hours, get home, watch the Super Bowl, do homework, and get sleep. Lotsa sleep. Sleep is a wonderful thing. Possibly go to church tomorrow too. You never know.

Oh, yeah... my sweet sister and her lovely one-act cast took third place today at subsections and they're going on to sections tomorrow. So I'm real proud of her right now. Go, lil sis! You rock!

Well, after all that emotional talk, I'm spent. Very sleepy. I will sleep well tonight, despite having taken a long, kitten-interrupted nap this afternoon. So, I'ma gonna go to bed. Peace and love be with you all!

Literature, among other things.

I'm home! Yay! My dog and my cats all missed me! The kittens are huge! Only 4 months old and already 6 pounds apiece!

(Too many exclamation marks?)

In other news... Long ride home. Drove about halfway in the dark. I had someone with me so it wasn't too bad. We stopped in Brainerd for dinner... mmm... Arby's.... My friend tried her hand at writing poetry as I was driving. It was sorta interesting. Maybe it'll go somewhere.

I went to classes before I left. British Lit II was the standout today. I think I'm in love with Lord Byron. I'll have to add his name to the list of writers I've fallen in love with through the aegis of my literature classes: Byron, Coleridge, John Donne, Walt Whitman, Emerson, Thoreau, Shakespeare, Milton, Edgar Allen Poe, Emily Dickinson... I'm sure there will be others before the year is out, and even more by the time I've got my degree. The ones I've discovered through my British literature classes have stuck in my mind in large part due to the professor's lectures about them. The other cool thing about his classes is that by the time you're done, your vocabulary has doubled. Damn fine professor, that one. I'll have to get my hands on that book of his sometime.

Been a long day, so I think I'm gonna go and get some much needed rest. Breakfast with a friend tomorrow, deposit my financial aid check, then a nice long day of homework and kitten-playing. Possibly some computer stuff, too. So... G'night, everyone!

Dancing Girl Barbie! err... Britney...

This is sad, but oh so fitting. :) I knew that was what *nasal voice here* Britney *end nasal voice* was up to. But must we glorify it? I just don't get people sometimes...

Some little randomnesses (is that a word?)

I love Elliott Smith. So sad that he killed himself. I'm listening to his album, either/or. Best song, in my opinion, is 2:45 am. I can't listen to the CD very often because it's just such sad music, but I love it. So why am I listening to it today? I'm in the mood, I guess.

Just sorta waiting around. I don't have any urgent homework to do. I'm gonna go down to a friend's room tonight to help her with her blog. See, I like playing with HTML. A lot. It's sorta the same thrill I used to get out of solving a really difficult algebra/geometry/calculus problem, before I gave up on math. It's all logical but when it works right it feels like a magic trick. Speaking of HTML, I did some messing around with this thing today, put up a comments thing, did some cosmetic changes... I'm still thinking about changing some of the colors to make it less monochrome, but it's hard to find colors that mesh with what's already here.

I like the idea of memes. Neat little things that you can write in your blog if you can't think of anything to say, or if you just want to find something new and different to do. Thing is, there's so many that look like fun that if I did all the ones I liked, then this thing would be nothing but meme entries. But they're fun. Maybe later...

I was pleased with my poetry class today for once. I guess I was just in a good mood today, cuz I liked the poems I brought in, I wasn't too nervous about reading them for class, and I actually agreed with the prof's suggestions (for the most part) for once.

I'm less sick today than I have been in a while. I'm coughing considerably less, and there are fewer Kleenexes scattered across my desk. Still have to carry a bottle of water with me to pretty much every class, tho. I think my professors are getting a little sick of me interrupting their lectures with my half-muffled choking. I blame it on the outside air. Still cold, just instead of being -40 F, it is merely a lung-searing -25 F. Of course, the year I decide to come back and go to school in Minnesota, we end up having the coldest year in about a decade. I'm a Minnesota native, so you'd think this wouldn't bother me. But... so cold... in New Mexico last year at this time, it was about 40 degrees ABOVE zero and warming. At least during the daytime. At night it was freezing, but that's to be expected. It's the desert, after all.

I'm headed home tomorrow afternoon. My plans for the weekend include breakfast with a friend on Saturday morning, depositing my Financial Aid check into my bank account so I can afford to buy my groceries for the rest of the semester, and lots of playing with kittens and my dog. I miss my pets a lot when I'm away from home for so long. So much so, that I'm considering volunteering at the local animal shelter so I can be around animals. It's hard being a college student, I tell ya. When I get older, I'm gonna be the crazy cat woman, living in the house on the hill with my seven cats, writing my books and chasing unruly children off my property with a broom. At least, I hope so. :)

Okay, that's all for now. Gotta get away from my computer and go play with someone else's. :)

Cliche Finder

Ah, the bane of every English major! Cliche Finder tells you exactly what NOT to say about any subject. I know a few people who could use this....