Tag: school

That paper…

So, that paper, the one that was due yesterday… I still haven’t written anything for it.

I have done extensive research for it, learned loads, and have ended up fully confident in my belief that the book’s history is absolutely absurd and somewhat hilarious (though it might not have been to those involved at the time), but I haven’t written a word of the actual 12-15-page paper that is due on it.

The thing is, I can’t figure out how to argue something about this book.

Sure, I could say its history is absurd, but is that actually acceptable, and do I actually want to look up the definition of “absurd”, and then develop how the book’s history lines up with it?

…

Maybe… not too bad of an idea, actually… huh.

Let me see if I can somehow compare it to something like a soap opera or telenovela, but more clever and better related to the book and time period…, then, I think I could make it all work out okay.

Ugh.

Other parts of my life just feel like s total mess, and having these papers makes it feel like I can’t address the real stuff in my life, and it just feels like I’m focusing on something stupid that pales in comparison to the rest of my life…, and I can’t seem to make it feel worth my real time, effort, and attention…

But I signed up for this program, and I am definitely capable of producing results…, so, I guess, let’s do it.

Then I can always look back at it as a face-palm sort of event in my life – one that totally improved me as a person, but really(?), that’s the route you picked, banana?(!!!???)

Yeah… exactly.

Post-a-day 2018

Goals

Your goal should always be to aim higher than you think you can reach

-George Strake

29 Nov 2018

It was in the middle of a speech that George Strake said that, and I found myself in a whirlwind to write it down as quickly as possible, so that I could return to it continuously in the days to come.

I felt it to be of the utmost importance in my life, both immediately and long-term… and I have done just that, returning to it each day (sometimes multiple times a day).

I started tearing up when he said it, because I could see almost immediately how wonderfully fulfilling such an endeavor could be, while simultaneously seeing how I very much was not undertaking anything of the sort…

I tend to aim right where I know that I will succeed, and only on occasion do I aim a bit higher than I think I can get, but only when the outcome relies on someone else in some way – like someone else’s opinion says how it turns out – and it leaves me not to blame for the lack of achievement in the end…, but it is still very likely that I will achieve what I’d hoped to achieve anyway.

So, here I am now, wondering what I might actually do with this idea – will I pursue it, or merely be afraid of it for a while longer?

I do believe that I will pursue it, but I’m not sure when or to what degree I will do so… I guess it all depends on how much I’m willing to give up around ‘playing it safe’ in life, you know?

Post-a-day 2018

School

I have to give a 20-minute presentation tomorrow on a 15-20-page paper I haven’t yet written, the research for which I have only just tonight begun reading… and had to stop reading, because money (aka real) work last night went so late that I didn’t get enough sleep to be at a level of quality functioning today…

I imagine I’ll manage something decent for the presentation, but ugh, this being exhausted so often and having to do work I don’t particularly want to do is just really exhausting. 😛

No wonder I feel ill.

P.S. I am a long-time procrastinator, so the last-minute work is nothing new – just the exhaustion from other stresses and whatnot combined with the procrastination is new and stressful.

Post-a-day 2018

School… really?

I share tonight the end of an e-mail I sent this evening, because it seems to encompass all my current thoughts.

Hope you have a great week!  I’m struggling to write a long paper I don’t want to write for school, so I’ll go back to that now… it seems so far that 2/3 of my degree is on stuff I genuinely don’t care about and sometimes even dislike. :/

Peace
Hannah
Sent from my iPhone

I wanted something to do, and it seems I’ve gotten it.  I just wish I’d come up with something a little more to my liking for the long reports and papers, you know?  Oh, well… only two more semesters of the not-fun stuff, and then I get to the fun stuff (Woohoo!).

Post-a-day 2018

Kid Friends

(I imagine I have shared this here already, but it is on my mind yet again, and so I will share it again.  😛 )

Do you remember what it was like to make new friends as a little kid?  Perhaps it was different by generation, but, in my generation, it was really simple:
“You wanna be friends?!”
“Yeah, okay!”
And that was that – you’ve got a new friend, possibly even a best friend.  Nowadays, as an adult, I feel as though people think I’m totally nuts and unfortunately childish whenever I present a similar conversation… I’m starting to realize that I don’t really care.  Sure, I want the new friend, but perhaps we aren’t meant to be friends if the person is put off by my question of wanting to be friends.  You know what I mean?  Because asking just like little kids ask is natural to me; it’s part of being true to myself.  I’m not being purposely childish and avoiding being an adult when I ask – I’m genuinely excited at the prospect, and hoping that the person will be just as excited as I am at having a new friend.

I also mean it, too, about being actual friends.  Not just Facebook friends or any of that nonsense – actual friends who talk with one another and do things together and enjoy and explore life together; friends who help one another become the best version of themselves.  A friend is someone who helps you be the best person you can be.  A priest actually said that once to a group of us, and I’ve always remembered it.  And that‘s the kind of friend I’m always looking for, asking for, and also wanting to be for others.  My best friend and I are like that with one another, and it’s wonderful.  However, we definitely don’t live near one another (try 4,811 miles apart, approximately), so it’s nice to have other people around, closer, who can be friends, too.  🙂

I’m not so sure why people seem so uninterested in that kind of relationship with me, though.  Perhaps I scare them… I am a bit much to take in under certain circumstances, especially when it comes to my saying openly things that people often are not straight about.  (Not like I’m vulgar and offensive, because I really don’t promote cursing or vulgarity at all… but I answer honestly when someone asks how I’m doing, or what I think of the food, or even how an outfit looks on someone… it just isn’t worth it to me to lie.  I don’t want my friend to go out looking horrendous in some dress making her look fat and lumpy, do I?  [No, I do not.]  And I don’t have to be mean about saying it, but I do have to tell the truth.  At least, I strive always to tell the truth, as well as to be appropriate with how I express it.)  I don’t know… I guess the right people will show up in the right places at the right times.  Maybe they’ll even ask me if I want to be friends with them, instead of the other way around.

Here’s to finding spectacular friends, y’all.  😀

Post-a-day 2018

Forward thinking

The problem with everything being automated, electronic, is that, as I have said many times before, when the power goes out, not only can you not see the toilet, but you can’t really use/flush the toilet, and you can’t even wash your hands afterward… which gets really terrible in a building filled with a thousand-ish high school girls…. even if the power is out for a short time.

But we live in Houston, Texas, where hurricanes take out power for days just about every year in the late summer and early fall.

Forward thinking, to me, doesn’t just mean going digital and automatic/electronic/whatever… it’s about actually thinking through things…

Post-a-day 2018

Where we belong

Today, I was reminded that I am exactly where I belong right now… Just like when I let go of things having to look a certain way when I lived in France – when I acknowledged that the exact French life was not for me, because, well, I’m not French – and I could just be myself (while, of course, still being respectful of and to those around me), I ran into the people whom I liked best.  I started going where I liked to go and doing what I liked to do, and friends showed up.  I had failed at making friends by trying to be French, so I stuck with being myself truly, and friends popped up all over the place, better than I ever could have expected.

And today was just like that, but on a miniature scale.  I was doing what I felt was the right thing for me to be doing, and I followed my heart and intuition while doing it… and that led me to a wonderful person (someone about whom I have been wondering a lot lately, but whom I haven’t seen in years!).  As we chatted, walking together to the person’s yoga class, I felt as though this one encounter was perfect for me and my life, and that it had a positive impact on that person’s day and life, too.  It was like one of those feel-good movie moments, those “meet-cute” situations, where the music is happy and everyone leaves the scene feeling better than ever about life in general.  My being the main character of the scene, I especially felt wonderful about life – things are still totally insane right now, but I can see that that’s really okay for right now.  It’s going to be even more amazing than I ever could have imagined, and so I just need to stick with moving forward in what feels right, and let go of being so tear-prone angsty and totally freaking out on such a regular basis (except actually… that’s no joke, though it totally makes me laugh).

Yeah… so I’m trusting what feels like the right path, even though it’s terrifying right now. It serves no one when I am so stressed and panicky as I have been, least of all myself.  And I want to take care of myself, so that I can do all of these extraordinary things I’ve been dreaming up, and better.  ðŸ˜‰

Post-a-day 2018

Tears of fear and laughter

I was all set to write something good, using my computer…, but the internet is, yet again, not working properly, so I got pushed back to my phone for a short bit of thumb tapping instead (because I like two spaces after my periods in writing, and the phone application doesn’t allow such a thing).

Life can be tough and miserable, or it can be tough and comical… I think I’ll aim for the latter this week, since this small incident is one tiny straw on this bundle that feels like it’s breaking my camel’s back…

Post-a-day 2018

Book characters

In class tonight, talking about literature, I mention that – and this is somewhat quietly after someone else mentions that she loves the character ‘so much’ – I mention that I kind of hate her.

The classmate who always sits by me says, almost immediately, “Hannah, you don’t ever like nobody,” and we both crack up, knowing that it is kind of totally true (at least in terms of the books we’ve discussed for class).

Post-a-day 2018