Doubtful Decisions

Every time I have imagined my future it has involved exotic places and adventures with strangers, daring rescues and sword fights, discovering new worlds and different cultures. That's my dream. If I went back and talked to the younger version of myself, the one that always wanted to be a pirate version of the Princess Belle, and tell her that I am now a Math Education major she would laugh in my face. With good reason, too.

All the dreams I had as growing up consisted of getting out of Texas and staying out. However, I now feel as if I have sworn my soul to this state, although that's not an entirely bad thing, and have no chance of escape. For those who are actually reading this and don't understand why I would be trapped allow me to elaborate on the struggles of the teaching certification test.

Each state offers their own test that has varying topics on it. Not one is ever the same. In order to be a licensed teacher, in any state, you have to pass the test. OK. So not as hard to understand as I made it out to seem, however.

So, if I stay with this major, I am sentencing myself to the dusty plains and the dry lands that I have called home for the last, almost, two decades. Don't get me wrong, I love Texas. Almost every town has a rich history and a major contribution in making Texas what it is today. That's not what I want though. I want to go somewhere where the scenery is not the same all year and you can't see for more than a mile in front of you. I want trees and skyscrapers, parties and a sport other than football. I want one season at a time! (thank you Texas Panhandle).

I want adventure.

Now, realize, I love my major. That's the strange thing. I love going to my calculus class and pretending that I know what the teacher is talking about and I have enjoyed my education classes. Every time I go out to a school to observe I can smile and laugh with the students and genuinely enjoy their company. It is an amazing feeling when you sit down and explain a concept to a student that they didn't understand but then you see the light go off in their head. It leaks out onto their face in a triumphant smile and the quicker flick of the pencil. If you haven't experienced that I encourage you to find a way to because it fulfills you more than you think it ever could.

Maybe that's why I have stayed for as long as I have.

There is something that overshadows my want for adventure. My NEED to help people. I don't mean help people by just giving them advice, although that has become a part of it. To me, helping people means bringing them from where they were into where they can be. I understand that I cannot do that if I am traveling focusing on myself instead of the people around me.

I want to help people. 

I don't know what I am going to end up doing with my life, it's only freshman year. Honestly, I don't know if I will ever have it worked out. Maybe one day when I'm laying on my death bed it will all suddenly become very clear and as I am uttering the meaning to life I will simply roll over and die. That would be an ironic moment that I could gladly go out on. For now, I'm going to stay with teaching and maybe one day I'll be able to go and see all the places I've only seen in pictures and dreams.

Clarity

I haven't been keeping up with this like I thought I would. I've been watching that TV show called 'Awkward' lately and thinking that I could easily do something like that but I am learning that I do not have the capability to sit at a computer or notebook or anything and just write anymore. Which sucks. Because I love to write. However, that's not why I'm writing this (ironic, I know).

I'm writing this today mainly to complain so that I don't overwhelm my RA with more of my problems (That poor women listens to all of my issues). Well, how do I begin to explain the idiocy and just plan rudeness that just occurred. General information it is.

I have a lovely friend that will write encourage notes on the whiteboard that I have right outside my dorm on the wall. It's nothing much. Just a small, unfortunately pink, whiteboard that I write my halfway funny comments and thoughts on being in school. So, my friend writes that she loves me and adds "P.S. You are gorgeous!" See! Sweet and encouraging. Makes my day every time that I see it.

Well, what do you know? Someone decided that today would be a fantastic day to be a complete and utter butt-head. They erased the word 'gorgeous' and replaced it with their angry, and may I add not very pretty!, handwriting with 'NOT PRETTY.' All caps. See, that's not pretty. I don't get upset very easily, she says as she complains to anonymous people on the internet, but this hurt.

 I have struggled for years with self image. I do not like the way that I look and a rarely ever feel pretty. On the days that I do I could very well take over the world. Add some lipstick and high heels and I become the Queen of Confidence. However, today was not that day. I woke up twenty minutes late for my eight a.m. class and had to rush to get ready. It felt like everything that could bulge decided today was the day to show itself off to the world. Not the best start to the day. The day progressed and turned out not so bad. I went to get coffee with one of my best friends and mentors and went to an amazing spiritual event. But, as soon as I got back to the dorms, all my insecurities came crashing down on me again.

I am in complete shock that someone would do this. Not to say that I'm the best person in the world because I am definitely not. But for someone to attack me in such a way, and to be such a coward that they wrote it on a white board instead of saying it to my face, absolutely astonishes me. It's shocking to know that people are that way. I guess my little bubble shrouded me from seeing how other people can use their hurt to degrade someone else.

I hope that whoever wrote that reads this some day, not just so they know that the words they use, even when written on a whiteboard, do hurt people and make a lasting impact. You hurt me. And I forgive you. Not because someone talked me down out of my hurricane of emotions but because I have done the exact same thing and wish I had the chance to gain the other person's forgiveness.

The people in my life are amazing in every way. They encourage even when they don't know what's going on and for that I am so thankful. I want to be angry and find out whoever wrote that but the influence that these people have had on me have shown me that anger will not accomplish anything and neither will idly sitting by. Loving people will though. Showing people that they mean something will. Reminding people how amazing they are and that the worldly view of beauty doesn't mean anything definitely will. My challenge to myself is to remember all of those for myself and, whoever may be reading this, I hope you know it too.

Wise words from a Wise Monkey.

Don't dwell on the past words of someone but rather focus on where they can go.

The Great Unknown

Even when I was little everyone would tell me how great college would be. The best years of my life. Blah, Blah, Blah. As I have grown up these cliché phrases have done nothing but inspire anxiety to blossom and fester.
My last year of high school had been- weird to say that in past tense- brutal. Every single thing about it cause me to worry. Maybe because the word 'senior' is also synopsis with the words like 'ending', 'finish', 'future', and 'regret'. This worry evolved into full blown panic attacks.

However, the past is in the past! and I am looking forward to the bumpy and terrifying road ahead. 

Overview of the Past Few Months

I thought that in college everything would change for me. I would instantly become the 'it' girl that everybody loved and I would have to hire a body guard to keep them off of me. Well, let me tell you a secret. Life is not like the movies. It sucks and there's no guaranteed happy endings. It simply ends in a way that you would least expect it to.

For the past three months I have been living on the campus of my obnoxiously small college. I graduated high school with 532 people. That many! Now, that's almost half of the population of this school so, when I say tiny, I mean tiny. Don't get me wrong. I love it here, the intense amounts of social interaction, the crappy cafe food, the druggies down the road, and the constant questions of "What are you doing with your life?" looming at your door.

Basically, it's a loving mixture of both Heaven and Hell (for real. Communal showers should be outlawed).

In the midst of all the crazy that has happened, however, I have made memories that will last a lifetime and friends that will last just as long. So, although my college story has a long way to go before its final entry, for anyone who might read this one day, DON'T GIVE UP. Life does get better after high school and even better, I hope, after college.

So, wear your red boots and scream to the sky because it was that great of a day but never, ever let someone tell you you aren't going anywhere in life. Take it from someone who almost believed that crap, You're going places kid.