$50 on 5

Oh, I owe you a few stories, and maybe an explanation.  There are just so many emotions that this cold heart of mine does not want to relive.

I keep going home.  In the seven weeks that have occurred in this quarter, I have gone home twice.  That's a total of 24 hours of driving.  Just me behind the wheel, driving driving driving.  Which is probably why I haven't been doing anything as often as I'd like.  I'm behind in school, in blogging, and I think today I just finally caught up on all my sleep.  So here we go, me attempting to get back into blogging.  I think I'm afraid that I'm no good at it anymore.  Not that I was great to begin with, but that homeless guy/little girl I babysit post was one of my favorites of all time.  That was two trips home ago.

The last time I went home, I left for my drive at like 740 PM.  Except at the gas station before I left, I locked my keys in my car.  Yes, my only key to my car, trapped right inside my car, visible.  I had no phone, only an ATM card that I had grabbed in order to pay for my gas.  So I ran into the gas station and borrowed the cell phone of the man working there to call triple A, only they couldn't find my membership record so then I called my dad so that he could drop everything and take care of it remotely for me.  (I have a really outstanding father by the way).

AAA didn't get there until just after 9.  So in the mean time, I had so, so, so much time to talk to the man working at the gas station and to keep myself from crying because it had already been a long day and I just wanted to be home already, and I don't handle these things well, as it turns out.  I can't remember his name, mostly because I never quite pronounced it right.
But the man was from Nepal.  And in Nepal, he had gotten his college degree in Economics and then after graduating, he got a visa to come to the United States, and without thinking twice, he and his wife and child moved to this here US of A.  And when he got here, he tried to take some college courses and some English languages courses, but he had to make ends meet, and he took a job at ARCO to get some money and to help his English.

This man told me that he knew all of his numbers very well.  After 5 years of living here, his son had near perfect English, but he and his wife still struggled.  And when he got to this job, he learned that the only thing that people would say to him was '$30 on 4" and "45 on 7 please."  No one ever said more than that.

I would have cried for that man, except that by the time 8:45 rolled around he started asking if I had a boyfriend and if I was on facebook and if I liked to go out to the clubs.  It got weird fast, and I made excuses to go clean my windshield.  But still, I had to think about him.  I don't realize sometimes, that I am literally living a dream.  I am a Stanford student with a bright future and I'm studying Econ, a topic that just seems right sometimes.  In fact not only am I living a dream, but when I was in high school, this was my dream.  Only now I have new dreams.  Too many dreams that don't quite meld together very nicely.

I think my point, or my realization, was that dreaming is good, but living is more important.  Or maybe that happiness is not going to happen all of the sudden if a dream comes true.  Life is not a waiting game til the next thing you want happens.  Every moment is not a stepping stone, it is a time, right now.  Today is a day; 24 hours where I can decide to live a happy life.  And there is so much to be happy about.



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P.S. Look for me on my sister's blog.  I will be posting there ish-regularly and if I'm not there, than you can just admire how much cuter her blog is than mine.  No, but seriously, her blog is so cool.

An Update

I didn't much like my last post.  For the first post I had in over a week, it wasn't much of anything good.  I don't like to be so whiny when i first come back.  It's like if you haven't seen someone in a long time and the first thing you do when you see them is get mad at them for not spending time with you in a long time.  You should reward them first for visiting you because secretly you are training all the people you like to be horribly addicted to your presence. 

Now that I have revealed my sociopath roots, it's time for a picture show of what I've been doing or seeing or experiencing or whatever in the last couple of weeks that I haven't blogged already.  And here's where the words end because I want you to experience some mystery, because a TA told me once that mystery is the spice of life, although I disagree. Ok enough is enough.

Sweet

My little brother just turned 16.  Coincidentally, on Saturday I wore the same shirt that I wore to my 16th birthday party.  It fits me the same now as it did then (it vaguely looks like a maternity shirt).

Thinking about my 16 year old self makes me mostly realize how much less I had to worry about, but at the same time, how I have probably about the same worry level now as I did then.  So probably in 5 years when I think about my college days I will wish that I had reveled in how little I had to worry about.

But 16 year old me knew what she wanted.
She wanted a Stanford education, and she wanted people to not think she was little or that nothing great would come from her.
21 year old me is all too indecisive
One day she thinks she wants this and the next day she thinks she wants another thing and the next day she is driving home because she wants to quit school and live at home now.  And then when the weekend is over she goes back to school and fails a couple midterms.  Well, in her head it felt like she failed.

This third-person thing is getting creepy.

That is all.

Listen

The following was written yesterday in a bought of stupidity, and is yours to enjoy here.

I've been so unable to write today. I wrote about half a not-disgusting blog post and then i got struck by writer's block. Everything was coming out wrong. Nothing was insightful or good.

And nothing is coming here either. Or on the cover letter i was supposed to write. My mind is empty of anything worth recording. I wonder why. 

I think maybe i am trying to record the wrong things. Actually, i don't.  I can tell I'm at the edge of a few great things.  Teetering there.  Is it that I'm afraid? I don't think so. 

I think I'm just supposed to do more action.  Maybe. Maybe I'm supposed to go. and not think.
Maybe just see and feel and not use words.  Act. Dance. Listen.  There it is.  I'm supposed to listen.
What's being said?


And since we're on the subject of listening.