#11

A reality: I am ridiculously lucky.
     It's true, I'm probably one of the luckiest people in the world. No matter what I do, it works out my way. Grades, friends, situations, it all just goes along as well as it possibly could. Maybe my it just seems this way because pretty much all my memories lose emotion, so once an events happens, I only think about how it affects the here and now. I don't care that it was horrible at the time. It all seems like something that happened to another person (like my burns). But even if that's why I feel lucky about friends and social situations, I really am lucky in school. If I guess on something, I usually get it right. Or when I don't, everyone else got it more wrong. I'm a ridiculously smart person (I'm still learning just how true this is, it always surprises me a little. Great, now I sound like a self-worshiping douche. Oh, well.), I'm naturally skinny (not muscular, but I'll take skinny over fat), and my family was always good to me. I suppose there's a couple things I'm not so lucky about (glasses, braces, bad posture, etc.) but I can't change them, and I've learned to accept them.
     The reality is, there are only two things that I consider unlucky about myself. One is my depression. And when I actually think about it, mine's not even bad compared to other people's. The only really bad part about it for me is the complete lack of motivation. That and the urge to drink myself to death. But yeah, not that bad. The other thing is something I, again, can't change. However, this one is something that is much harder to accept about myself. This one might actually impact my relationships with people. Some people who come here from certain other blogs may have a good idea what I'm talking about. It's a work in progress. And that's why I say fuck reality. I'm ridiculously lucky to be myself. I'm a extremely smart white male in the United States. My life is pretty much made. But I get hung up on two things about myself. What is wrong with me? Oh, well. All I can try to do is be more grateful and try and improve myself. I still hate that it's a problem in the first place. Fuck reality.

6-30-12

So this week hasn’t been super eventful. We took some tours of things, had class, I had to write a couple things. I should do a couple things this weekend, but there’s nothing hugely important. I wasn’t nearly as productive last weekend as I should have been. Oh, well. This week, the professor didn’t give us actual homework in the evenings. He did give us questions, but I didn’t do them, and he didn’t explain them. Maybe I should start at the beginning, though.

                So each week we have a different professor and then have a test at the end of the week. This week we were talking doing some rather complex stuff, and the professor evidently thought we had all had more background in the subject than we did. I was worse off than almost everyone in the class (me and one other girl (Jul) had no experience with quantum at all). Jul complained that she didn’t know what was going on, but the professor was very unsympathetic toward her and said she wasn’t going to make it far in life. I’m sorry we can’t teach ourselves quantum mechanics in a couple days. He was much nicer after Jus pointed out most people didn’t know what was going on a couple days later, leading to some speculation that there might have been a sexist element (the professor was kinda an older man). The professor didn’t really explain things, just go over equation after equation, without trying to give analogies and examples to explain them, or even explain the variables to any degree. I don’t know if you have experience with complex equation without having the variables explained, but it sucks. He would just drone on and on. He had a European accent too, which made his voice seem more monotone and that much more difficult to pay attention to. The professor was also terrible at answering questions, just kinda talking his way around everything but the answer, or even directly how to find it. I was never quite clear if that was intentional or not. At first I was struggling to pay attention, but I realized that I was going to be fucked no matter what I did, so I started tuning him out a bunch. I really didn’t learn much in class. I learned the most sitting down with St. T and Jus on Thursday evening to try and figure stuff out. I still didn’t have a super great idea what was going on, but I learned more with them than I did the entire week from the professor. This was also the first professor to use print out notes rather than writing on the whiteboard, which I didn’t like. However, before the test he told us that we’d already had the most important part of the exam: sitting down, trying problems, reviewing the material. He said that was the most beneficial part of a class. It really made me respect him a lot. I love professors who think like that (my Organic professor was a lot like that too. I don’t think he was unaware of the difficulty of his lectures. This was just his first year and he didn’t know what to expect from the kids here. I hope the course director has him back next year because I think he’d be a lot better his second time around (especially if he was more clear about answering questions).

                The people were kinda interesting this week. I actually talked with Jus for a while. I still think of him as a grade grubber, but he is nice and interesting to talk to. I also talked to St. C for a while as well, which was also more fun than I would have thought. I really need to go back to my viewpoint from high school that pretty much everyone is OK if you get them one-on-one. I also hung out with Cla last night since we were some of the few who didn’t go out with everyone else. We had moronic conversation, and he didn’t want to sit down and do anything for long periods after we started it (like movies). He also is very hard to escape from once you’ve had your fill (we’d already talked for an hour or two at that point). I’m going to continue avoiding him in the future. St. T is really racist against any other Asian group than the one he’s from it turns out. Asians are kinda racist (the ones I know at least. And they admit it, they just don’t care). He’s funny about it though, and we tease him about it. Sar is all enlightened and is like “that’s just not right.” Obviously she’s never heard “Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist” from Avenue Q. I also found out she’s an RA. I’m really glad I haven’t had one like her, the one’s who seem to think it’s possible to have a deep personal connection with anyone and everyone, no matter how little you actually know them. Forgive me for not opening right up to people. That’s not how I want to go through life. I want a couple really meaningful connections with people, not a bunch of shallow ones that I can’t differentiate from deeper ones. And finally in my list of character developments, there’s Ant. He’s managed to get on the program director’s bad side by complaining so much about this professor this week. Ant’s been complaining about how much this place sucks (it kinda does, there’s nothing to do and the internet’s terrible/super blocked) since we got here. Usually his complaints are amusing, and it’s not a big deal. But he’s also a really arrogant kid, and not afraid to get in people’s faces, and he feels the victim a lot. He was bitching about the program director (Let’s call him Dr. P) after Dr. P told him he had an attitude problem. He’s a super friendly kid, though, and has probably talked to by far the most people in the dorm than anyone.

                Last night, I mentioned, I stayed in and foolishly allowed myself to get snared by Cla. A bunch of people when to the beach, the movies, and back to the karaoke bar last night. I kinda wish I had gone, but I didn’t really feel like drinking, and they left pretty early in the evening and didn’t get back until really late. So I guess I’m sad I missed the company, not the activities. Though the beach would have been fun. There might be some drinking tonight, but I probably won’t do anything tonight either unless someone bothers to specifically stop at my door and invite me. It’s one of my faults, wanting to be specifically invited even if there’s a blanket/open invitation to everyone. I feel left out and exclude myself if I don’t feel wanted. It’s partially why I don’t have many friends. I don’t horn my way into a group’s activities and they bond without me to the point it would be awkward to go even if I was invited later. Oh, well. I realize I’m never going to be surrounded by a ton of friends, and I can be content with just a few closer ones. I am going to miss Barry when I go back to college this fall, since he’ll be off student teaching and then graduating. But back to my earlier point, I’ve been sort of slowly withdrawing from the other students since this program began. Jul accused me of being antisocial after I declined an invitation to play pool with the others. I am being antisocial. My depression hasn’t been bad at all the last couple days, but I haven’t been eating much which really makes me tired constantly, and I just haven’t been in the mood for people. Oh, well. I should start on my term paper tonight, but it’s not urgent, and there’s not a whole lot going on this week. We get a day off for the fourth of July, and there’s no test on Friday. Great, just what I need. Excuses to not feel pressured to do homework early. We’ll see how it goes. That’s it for now.

6-23-12

So I guess summer has officially begun. Today is Saturday, and I don’t actually know what day stuff was. Yahoo was claiming the solstice was Wednesday (6-20), but Google’s homepage didn’t have anything special that day. I thought the official first day of summer was today, but Google’s banner is something else (some dude’s birthday). I don’t know if it was in the last couple days or what, but oh well. If I actually cared, I’d look it up on a calendar. So my motivation is continuing to get worse for this program. I’m procrastinating terribly, and really not being as studious as I should be. A perfect example of this is the fact that I drank on Monday night. I got slightly buzzed (I wasn’t drunk since people could get words in edgewise- I’m a really talkative drunk), and really made my homework a lot more difficult than it should be (I had to do it early the next morning). I also sort of drank last night (I got an even lesser amount of buzzed than Monday) and now some of the kids think I’m an alcoholic. This isn’t helped by the fact that I used the drinking lie to explain my scars (drunken bet, the same story I told one of the doctors), so they think I get fucked up really bad and do horrible shit all the time or something. I didn’t get really drunk either night, and even if I do count them, I’ve only been drunk like 13 times in my life. Really not bad at all. I’m still concerned where I’m heading though, with my drinking two nights in one week. My depression and lack of motivation came back after only one week. I’m having the not-actually-going-to-kill-myself-but-still-consttantly-thinking-of-suicide thing lately, and it gets really draining really fast. I’ve been having urges to hurt myself like I did this spring, and I’m really kinda regretting not starting meds like Dr. H. wanted while I had the chance. One good thing, however, is that I texted Vee I was drinking Monday, and she got really concerned that I was drinking by myself. She’s heard me talk about maybe becoming an alcoholic later in life, and she actually does get concerned for me. “You know I don’t like it when you talk like that.” I really don’t think she cares about me that much most of the time, but every once in a while she proves me wrong. Now if only I could say I cared as much about what she does. I’m kinda a terrible person. But she does sort of have reason to be concerned. I know a lot of it’s the depression talking, but I really can’t see myself having a happy successful life. What I picture is me in a crappy, unskilled job, alone, and drinking every night just to keep from killing myself. Hopefully that won’t actually happen. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that next week is better. We get a new professor every week in our program thing, and I really didn’t like this week’s (he was actually the program director). So maybe we’ll have a good one next week and that will help things. In the meantime, I need to write two lab reports this weekend, so hopefully I won’t procrastinate too much and I’ll actually get one done today.

            So what happened last night with the drinking? A bunch of us were going to go to the beach again, but it clouded up and started raining off and on throughout the rest of the night. So instead, a bunch of us decided to go bowling (Jul, Jam, Ama, Ant, Sco, Da, the TA’s Je and Cor and two of the German kids in the class Ale and Car). The alley had black lights and technoey music with the bass turned up insanely high. I recognized several of the songs from riding with Vee in her car, and I think she would have loved it. We played three games. The first two I sucked at, but the last one I actually did pretty good at (for me). That’s how bowling is for me, though. Suck and then decent. Anyway, the guys had been drinking a little beforehand and that’s why I drank last night. My buzz pretty much went away while we were bowling, which was kinda sad. I sort of wanted to get legitimately drunk last night. After we paid (I’m kinda sick of this area, everything’s more expensive than back home), we went to the second half of our plans for the evening: karaoke (hence my wanting to be drunk). We had to sit around for an hour and a half before it started, during which the last of my buzz faded. All but two of us were 21 (me and Jul) and at first no one really wanted to order us drinks. By the time they were trying to get me to drink, I didn’t want to because I didn’t think we’d actually stay that long, and I didn’t want the alcohol to just be hitting me after we left. That would defeat the purpose of drinking that night really. So I didn’t actually drink there at all. Once karaoke finally started, I think everyone sang at least once except Cor. I sang twice: once by myself (Peace of Mind) and once with Car (Time Warp). It went a lot better when I sang with Car, but it was still fun. Some of the people in our group were really pretty good (Car, Sco, Je), and there were some people who were apparently regulars that were outright amazing. It was fun for a while, but then it began getting too crowded to get to sing much and too loud to talk. Everyone else tried to talk anyway, but I have trouble hearing over other noises (I suspect my ears aren’t that great, and as loud as both places were, they’re not going to be improving any time soon), so I didn’t talk. I just sat at one end of the table and listened to the singers, watching the lyrics on a TV. I could tell people thought I was being antisocial and a downer, but they were all feeling it, it was too late for me to start drinking (I was thoroughly sober by that point), I couldn’t hear, and I was pretty tired by that point. I really just wanted to go back to bed, but I couldn’t leave without everyone else. Finally everyone got a Long Island iced tea except me and the driver (Cor) and I was accused once again of being a downer. Then everyone paid (another reason I was glad I didn’t drink: it was super expensive) and we left. On the ride back, Ant especially was drunk and some of the people were really irritating. I went straight to bed. All in all, the evening started out pretty fun, but it didn’t end soon enough and I ended up with a reputation as a downer because of it. If we hadn’t stayed at karaoke so late, the people wouldn’t think I’m a downer. Though I suppose I should be glad it went as well as it did. I’m pretty sure I’ve talked about how bad I am at parties before. That was basically the last hour or two, me being antisocial. Before that, though I was doing pretty good talking to people. It helped that I liked all the people who went (except Je). All the people I don’t like didn’t come (St C, Cla, Sar, Jus). I wish St. T and Ann had come, but they both said they were too tired and you can’t really blame them since we had a test yesterday morning. I do think it’s sad that I already hate a third of the class after just a third of the course. St. C is just painfully awkward and nerdy, Cla is a “know it all” moron who never shuts up, Jus is a superior-feeling grade grubber, and Sar just comes off overly industrious and insincere. I really need to work on my people skills. Oh well. I’m staying holed up in my room for today I think. I’m praying I get my shit done this weekend, or more specifically, one report done tonight. We’ll see. I’m most definitely going to try. Until my next journal entry, so long.

6-17-12

It seems I am having my first major problems of the summer school session. Today is Sunday, and the first week is almost over. The classes have been sort of challenging, but that’s not what I’m concerned about. Yesterday was the trip to New York City. We went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Let me start off by saying, I don’t care that much about art. I don’t see it as some semi-mystical expression of some deeper human condition, or something to make a statement with. I see it as something that should be made to please. I want to look at a piece and think “Oh, that’s neat,” or “I like that” and leave it at that. So hours in a museum full of art that I don’t care about was a little much. I stuck mostly to the historical pieces for the most part because I do enjoy older civilizations so that made them more appealing. After a while I decided to get something to eat at the way overpriced café. I bought something and looked for a place to sit down. There wasn’t a single place. And you couldn’t take food in the museum itself. I walked back and forth a couple times and saw people slowly eating small snacks while reading the newspaper or done eating and sitting there talking. No one had the common decency to think “Oh, maybe someone else wants to sit. Maybe I shouldn’t linger.” It made me mad. So mad I threw away all my food without eating any of it and immediately left the museum. (I think I was the only person from our group to wander around entirely on my own at the museum.) On my way out I was livid and was constantly imagining doing violent things to the people I passed and the art pieces I saw. It didn’t help that the museum was a maze so I couldn’t get out nearly as fast as I wanted to. Outside I walked a couple blocks still angry before finding a bench to sit on. I started thinking. First I realized that what I’d done was really very like something my dad would have done, throwing away something and storming out. I really don’t want to become my father. He’s not someone who is happy with his life. Next I realized my actions had sort of a “see what you made me do” sort of aspect to them. This is very like when I burned myself this spring after my ER visit. I can’t remember what direction my thoughts took after that but I know I ended up tearing up in the middle of New York City (the bench was by Central Park) and wishing Dr. H had given me a prescription for a valium or something. I think I got vaguely suicidal and was feeling very down after my angry outbreak. I spent the rest of the afternoon wandering on my own in kind of a numb state. When I finally met up with other people, I felt better. Being around people fends off my moods for the most part, but I don’t seek the company of people all the time, not Vee and most certainly not people I’ve only known for a week. But the rest of the evening was OK, since I spent it with the group. We went to an Irish pub for supper, went to Trump Tower, and walked through Times Square to Penn Station (Jam, Jul, St C, Jus, Cla, Ama, Da, those are the kids who went. That’s just so I remember, not for people who read this). The problem now is that today I was supposed to get some homework done for tomorrow (I’ve been up since relatively early and meant to do it), but I haven’t even got anything done yet. My laziness is now taking its toll, and thoughts of worthlessness and vaguely suicidal thoughts creep through my head. “You’re lazy and pathetic. How are you going to accomplish anything in life? You should just give up.” They’re not bad, but they’re tiring and decrease my motivation even more. Whatever. As long as I get what I need to done by like midnight. You may notice this is kinda heavier than a lot of my other posts, not just little whinings (at least I hope not). I don’t even know if I’ll post this. If I do, it won’t be for over a month at least, after the school is done. Maybe I’ll write something about the other people in the program, though if I do it’ll be at the end, when I know them as well as I’m going to. We’ll see if anything worthy of posting happens in the next couple weeks as well.

                On a positive note, Friday I saw the ocean for the first time and swam in it too. It was a fun experience. I’d seen the Great Lakes before, which are also water as far as you can see, but the ocean is different somehow. The waves coming in just have this never-ending, ceaseless quality. They just keep coming one after the other. After the kids who came (Ant, Jul, Jam, Jef, Cor, Sar, Cla, Sco, Ama, Da) went swimming, we walked down the beach and then played ultimate football which was fun. People asked me about my burn scars and accepted my story of a drunken bet. A couple kids stayed at the beach and got thoroughly drunk and the rest of us went back and hung out at two of the guys’ apartment. I didn’t really drink there. It was very chill though. A good start before my kinda emotional fail of a weekend. It really makes me think hard about starting antidepressants this fall with Dr. H. She said it gives you a cushion with your emotions, and so I would think they’d prevent unreasonable anger spells that leave me feeling depressed like yesterday. But again, do I want to change who I am? Do I want to drug myself into someone I’m not? We’ll see. Those are problems for future me. I shouldn’t worry about them now.

Update

So I wasn't going to post stuff until I finished my summer program, but I decided to change that and post the stuff I've written so far. I wasn't sure about the place I'm at's computer policies, but it's looking like they're a lot more lax than they act, so I'll post them now. Not that anyone reads my blog anyway :) Also, the ones I've been writing lately are more of just journal entries than the ones before. I like them, so I'll try to stick to mostly that with minimal angry/bitching rants from now on.