Change: A Necessary Evil

Fine Art Photography by Scott Pollack

Another school year has begun...come to think of it, my final school year has begun. In nine short months I will be graduating college and beginning another chapter in my life: adulthood. As I have begun to face the prospect of no longer being protected by the cocoon which academics provides, I cannot help but face the future with apprehension. I'm scheduled to take the LSAT in December, but aside from that frail hope of being accepted into law school I have not a clue as to what the future may hold for me. Three years ago I thought that leaving what was familiar to me was an exciting opportunity for self-growth and exploration. I am just finding it more difficult to view the upcoming changes with the same optimism. I know that it is my nature to take challenges and changes head-on so there is little doubt that I will survive this transition, however, it just seems like the most life-changing transition I've ever had to make.

A Trip to Remember

So, I had the amazing opportunity to attend the 2007 Warped Tour in Orlando on July 22nd. In a word: awesome. My boyfriend, B, friends D and J, and myself went down to Orlando to stay with some of our buddies the night before the concert on Sunday. As per our usual Orlando debauchery, we went out drinking that Saturday night. The night started with drinks and food at Buffalo Wild Wings. I had never been there before, as all the places I've ever lived don't have one, but it was actually a really fun sports bar. They have trivia games that you and other patrons play from your table. You get a controller that shows the question and lets you choose answers a-d. Your score and the correct answers get put up on one of the many large-screen televisions around the bar so everyone can either see your untapped genius or (as in my case) the severe lack thereof. I think I scored about a C+ overall. Pretty pathetic considering I am a senior at a very respectable university.

Afterward, we went back to our friends' apartment for a rousing game of drinking Jeopardy! The rules of this game are actually quite a bit more intricate than one might think. At the beginning of the game, you basically "pick your pony" and bet a certain amount of drinks up front on whichever contestant you believe is going to take the cake. This bet in and of itself is a major decision. One might think that picking the champion is the automatic choice, but many times this has proven to be a mistake. Those challengers can take out even the most wiley champions with one or two good Daily Doubles. After deciding who it is that you think will win, you bet a certain amount of drinks (which, to show good faith, you must drink up front). If your contestant ends up being the champion, you get to give out the amount of drinks you bet to all other players. As for the meat of the game, each question can be answered by any player, however you must be the first to correctly answer in the form of a question. If said player fails to answer in the form of a question, another player is then allowed to take that player's turn and pick up the points. If you submit no answer for a question, there is no penalty. However, if you answer a question incorrectly or fail to answer in the form of a question, you must drink. Luckily, DVR allows us to record episodes of Jeopardy! so this game can basically be played any time and with all players given equal opportunity to complete the game in whole. Fortunately, my trivia skills proved to be somewhat more useful in the game of Jeopardy! than the game at Buffalo Wild Wings.

After the game of drinking Jeopardy!, most of our friends decided it was time to hit the hay. However, this was probably around 12am, which to my friends is like most people's 8pm. My boyfriend, B, our friend, J, and myself decide we're going to play a drinking game until we're ready to go to bed. Understand that we were planning on getting up at 7:30am to get to Warped Tour early. We had tickets to pick up at will call and my friend, D, was pretty gung-ho about "getting there in time to see all the good bands." Unfazed by the prospect of little to no sleep, the three of us, equipped with nothing more than Bud Light, a few Solo cups, and four pingpong balls (staples of any college apartment, mind you), determined to make up a new drinking game. After several hours (and many Bud Lights later), we had little to show for our valiant efforts. Out of boredom (and sparked by who knows what drunken comment), the topic of religion was brought up and, armed with my digital camera, I proceeded to capture fifteen minutes of the religious debate that lasted until around 6am. We had no idea, but apparently we were "discussing" are varying opinions at the top of our lungs. Most of the apartment could hear our ranting and, yet, none of them came out to the living room to tell us to shut the hell up. I still feel bad about that.

We finally went to bed around 6am, shortly following the debate of doom, and woke up promptly at around 8am. D was not having any part of us being later than he planned and was unsympathetic to our lack of sleep. We arrived at Warped Tour, picked up our tickets, and proceeded to our first concert of the day. Over the next eight hours, we saw Coheed and Cambria, Chiodos, Paramore, As I Lay Dying, Cute Is What We Aim For, Haste the Day, Killswitch Engage, New Found Glory, Red Jumpsuit, and Scary Kids Scaring Kids. It was easily the best day of music I've had in a very long time. I was exhausted and sunburnt at the end of the day, but it was so well worth it. Warped Tour 2008 is just around the corner and I cannot wait to go. Who knows what stories I'll have to tell after that trip. Hopefully they'll include more great music, more great friends, and more great memories.

My Secret Love Affair

The Beautiful Bettie Page

I'd give anything to be as beautiful as the now notorious Bettie Page. I have such an obsession with the 1950s, and she was simply the most popular pin-up of that era. Not to mention a pioneer in the world of bondage. She was so inadvertently ahead of her time...and that's why I love her. If only women still looked like that: unknowingly sexy, seemingly innocent, and quaintly accessible.

On the other hand, I may just be a pervert.

Twenty Just Ain't Old Enough

Alochol can ruin your life...

...Or at least your night. So last night some of my friends and I decide to go out in our college town. We choose a bar that we frequent at least three or four times a month; a bar that is a dive and has no reason to be hard on I.D.s. All of my friends happen to be over twenty-one, so I am alone in my blue wristband among a sea of orange ones. I am mid-pool, patiently waiting for my next turn, and I make the regretful decision to pick up my friend's beer off the edge of the pool table and take a sip. A few seconds after I replaced the bottle to the table, seemingly out of nowhere a cop taps my shoulder and asks for my I.D. I calmly give him my I.D. and wait for his realization that I am still four months away from the glorious day when I can legally drink. He motions for me to follow him and his female partner out the back door of the bar.

Quickly followed by my now worried boyfriend, I am escorted to the hood of a cop car sitting outside. The male officer and I find ourselves alone at the hood and he begins to write the ticket.

"Do you know why I took you out of the bar?"

"Yessir. Probably because I took a sip of that beer."

"Yep."

He continues quietly with his writing and I continue quietly with my misery. The female cop finally comes over to where we are standing.

"Is that your boyfriend?"

"Yes."

"Well, you need to tell him that if he comes over here I'm going to arrest him. I've already told him three times."

I look over near the exit of the bar and my boyfriend B is standing there on the phone visibly upset and nervous. The male officer and I go through the motions: social security number, height, phone where I can be reached. As I'm standing there, the female cop grabs my wallet from the hood.

"Do you have anything in here that I need to know about?"

"No ma'am."

She searches my wallet and proceeds to pull out my older sister's I.D. Shit.

"Who is this?"

"My older sister. But it's expired. I can't even use it."

"Oh, yeah. Like we're stupid. Like this is our first time dealing with somebody like you. How'd you get that wristband then?"

"Ma'am, this is an under twenty-one band."

"If you keep up your smart-ass attitude, I'm going to take you to jail."

"Ma'am, I wasn't trying to be smart. Sir, haven't I been cooperative? Why are you being so rude to me, ma'am?"

It's at this point that all sense of calm has left and I begin hysterically crying, shocked at how I'm being treated. My boyfriend looks about ready to come over and yells, "Are you okay?" I yelled for him to stay away because she was going to arrest him. For some reason, the female cop decides me following her direction to tell him to not come over warrants her putting me in handcuffs.

"Alright then. This is what you get for having that smart-ass attitude. You get to go to the county jail tonight. Have you ever been to the county jail?"

"No ma'am."

And I then find myself in the back of a cop car, handcuffed as I decide that I'm spending the night in jail. I sit there, attempting to calm myself for about fifteen minutes. I can see the officers finishing the ticket, reading it over, and then the male officer walking toward me. He opens the back door and leans down.

"Alright. Here's what's going to happen. I'm going to take you out of the car, take you out of those handcuffs, you're going to read and sign this ticket, give me a fingerprint, and then be on your way. But you will not go back in the bar."

We do just that and I am advised to "take my boyfriend and go home". So now an individual who has never had one ticket in almost five years of driving, nor been in one car accident has a court date for an alleged misdemeanor. August 9th will determine my fate. Literally almost all of my friends have been charged with underage drinking and they all received such different punishments that I have no idea what might happen. They luckily didn't write me up for having the fake I.D. (although they took it). Best case scenario is that they just wanted to scare me and won't even show up to the court date so my charges get dropped. But if not, I'll at least get off lightly for being a first-time offender. Hopefully I'll be able to get some advice from a lawyer and will know what to do. So basically the next four months leading up to my twenty-first birthday will be a very long, boring four months.

Oh, to make it out alive.

Blogger On the Go

Mobile blogger is an interesting addition to my blog... Now i can post wherever i am, whenever i want! Too bad my phone is from the stone ages and i don't have a camera. In fact, i have nextel (unfortunately) so texting period is quite a challenge. Awesome. But i make do :-) so yesterday i played the new mario party for the wii at my friend's apartment. It was pretty frickin' sweet! Despite my natural lack of hand-eye coordination and my terrible loss, i had a lot of fun. I told my friends there was a reason i ran in high school instead of playing a sport that required any skill! Haha. Wii is honestly such an amazingly innovative and clever system. I'm not much for electronics, video games, or an "early adopter", but i really admire the wii simply for its cleverness. It's a system for hardcore video gamers that actually requires the player to get up off the couch and move. Plus, i've heard many of my friends say that their parents actually enjoy playing wii games just as much as we do! In a country where obesity has overtaken the majority of the population and the television is more enticing than the gym, i think it's awesome to create an interactive game. I suppose that's also why i admire dance dance revolution. I think these two innovations in gaming are just the beginning of interactive video games (or at least I hope so).

Color Me As I Am

Happiness Sold Separately

Today marks another inconsequential day off my calendar. Other than reflecting on my life and watching (against my will) the new Fantastic Four movie, I once again managed to accomplish nothing. The movie was simply boring...not disappointing. Something for which you have no expectations really doesn't have the ability to disappoint. Therefore it was more like something to occupy an hour-and-a-half of my day. I fully intended to buy a Father's Day gift, but my father is the most difficult person to buy for so I didn't begin that venture for lack of ideas. The man has everything he could want or need...so what do I do? Buy him something I know he'll never use? It's really not worth it. Besides, he knows I love him already. Haha.

So I suppose there is of course the current dilemma of my life to talk about. I am insanely in love with my boyfriend, B. We've been dating for about six months and things have gone really smoothly. He, however, caught me at the very end of a really nasty breakup with my high school sweetheart, J. We had dated for five years and the breakup left us both broken and bitter. We didn't even have any contact for three whole months after we broke it off. Then we started to be "friends", which of course made B really uneasy, and understandably so. At first, we were truly happy for one another. We had grown individually, both were happy personally, and so far past all the shit that we had gone through that it hardly seemed to matter.

Then of course, he ended up dropping the bomb on me: he was still in love. He wanted another go at it, but only if B was out of the picture. What the hell am I supposed to do? I wanted to be honest with B and tell him about my confusion. That only launched us into a kind of limbo that has been excrutiating for the both of us. We're "not together" but we spend everyday together. He freaks out if I talk to or see J. I'm dying. I don't want to break anyone's heart, especially not my own, and yet all I can foresee is me at the end of this, alone. I am going to keep the three of us at this standstill caused by my indecision and fear until they both decide I'm simply not worth it. It's sort of my specialty: waiting for people to realize what I already know.

I want to be happy. I really do (or so I tell myself). It just seems that the closer I come to true happiness, the farther away I end up. It's like that saying: the higher you are, the harder you fall. And I seem to be perpetually falling. Can't there just be some manual you get when you're born that tells you who to be and what to do with your life? Free will is simply overrated.

Oh, to make it out alive.

Summer Just Isn't My Season

The free time summer break grants is much like a double-edged sword. Although it provides a bit of a break from the stresses of classes and crazy schedules, it also allows time to realize exactly where one sits along the path of life. It seems that when I think of how I began this journey and then where I am currently, I cannot help but to feel a bit like "What the hell?" I am no closer to knowing who the hell I am, where the hell I'm going, who the hell will be there when I get there, or why the hell I want to be there in the first place. For example, today I accomplished precisely nothing. (If of course, you don't count beginning a new blog in which to rant about my inability to be productive.)

Friday, June 15, 2007

1. Slept until 4pm.

2. Took a shower.

3. Took my trash out.

4. Drove an hour to my hometown.

5. Spent six hours on the computer.

That is exactly what I accomplished today. And the previous days of this week were of equal or lesser value. I am so frighteningly close to completing my bachelor's that I refused to take summer classes, but, in my defense, I have applied to around a million and one jobs with absolutely no response. That certainly upped my feelings of self-worth. Haha. So back to my initial point: I feel absolutely unproductive. Absolutely out of my element...or at least what used to be my element. I am possibly even more confused about life now than I've ever been before. And at almost the ripe old age of twenty-one, that is a terrifying thought. I am wandering in the world without direction. Hopefully somebody is familiar with this terrain. Hopefully I can cheat and find my way to somewhere.

Oh, to make it out alive.