A lot of years, I miss this date, I think about it afterwards, but today I happened to be paying attention to the calendar, so I thought about it all day. Okay, not all day. Just when I had some down time (like in the car).
So what happened Feb. 23, 2000 at 9:30 or 10:30? A cute story. My high school boyfriend officially asked me to be his girlfriend. I don't even talk to the guy anymore, or really think about him, but I happen to know all of the anniversary dates of my major relationships, and he was the first one. You never really forget the first.
Feb. 23 used to make me cringe. The breakup (and the last several months of the relationship) were kind of ugly, as teenage love gone wrong tends to be. Okay, they were really ugly. I spent most of my time pining after another guy (or two) that I could never have and wanting to stab my boyfriend with pointy sticks. He felt the same way about me (pretty much). So that's never a good thing. We were one of those super annoying old married couples in high school, the ones who SWORE to anyone who would listen that we were going to be together FOREVER.
Feb. 23, 2001? I got a diamond ring. It wasn't spendy or anything, but it still meant we were pre-engaged. After the initial "You know you're seventeen and you're COMPLETELY INSANE, right?" people started to believe it. We were together a year and a half before we finally admitted that we absolutely hated this relationship. People were shocked. My mother cried. She thought she had a son. My dad rolled his eyes and said "what made you think they were going to get married? I knew they weren't." Hehe my dad always tried to be the voice of reason in that relationship, but my mom wanted to believe in high school love. So did I. I mean, I was seventeen. I knew EVERYTHING. Or so I thought.
So after it failed and I had to eat my pride with a rusty fork and no salt, I did not want to think about Feb. 23. Every time I heard our song on the radio ("Amazed" by Lonestar--that was everyone's song who started dating Jan-March of 2000!) I wanted to bash my face into the steering wheel. I used to like that song so much, too, it was a great power ballad, which makes it so hard to turn off. After awhile, I changed the words to something like "every time our eyes meet, this feeling inside me, makes me want to vomit on your face."
Side note: if you're in high school and you're picking a song for you and your boyfriend/girlfriend, don't make it a song you really, really like. Because you'll probably break up, and then you can never listen to that song the same way again.
But now, that we are officially 12 years out (ugh, 12 years ago was high school???) it doesn't bother me so much. I can look back at it and go, oh that was cute! Kind of. Sure, a lot of our relationship was totally cringe-worthy (the crap we told each other, ugh, I can't think about it, and it made it pretty hard for us to be friends many years later, more on that in a bit) but it was a cute high school romance. At least, that day. Before we (I) went totally off the deep end and decided we were getting married. (Honestly I don't remember whose idea it was first, at least, out loud).
We were juniors, and we had been hanging out for about a month. We had the same group of friends at that point. I had kind of floated around from group to group, being a new kid I could get away with this, and after Christmas starting spending a lot more time with this group. He claimed that he'd noticed me practically the first day of school, however, or at least the first football game. I kind of noticed him sometime that winter, I think. The sad part is, our last names varied by about four letters, which meant we were locker mates. So I was inches from him for several months without us ever really crossing paths (or at least me remembering it.) Some high school couples shared lockers? There was no need to for us. Our entire high school careers we were smack next to each other any time our class was put in alphabetical order (yearbooks, lockers, seating). We even graduated next to each other. Ick.
Anyway, that semester, (the first of the new millenium!) we ended up having history class together. Along with my then-best friend. You know how jealous girls can be in high school, and how possessive of their friends...she's thinking we have this class together and can hang out with each other and suddenly all my attention is on a guy (one that she went to the fall dance with AS FRIENDS) and she doesn't have any prospects...it didn't go over well. So it was a weird love triangle for a long time. Oh, teenagers. Everything is such a BIG DEAL. So much drama.
I realize at this point that our history teacher was really, really cool. Because he put up with the three of us passing notes back and forth (boyfriend sat next to me, best friend sat behind me) all semester. And we weren't exactly discrete about it. No, there was no texting, this was old fashioned paper messaging. Only my boyfriend had a cell phone at that time. There was still land-line drama.
So we'd been flirting heavily and hanging out a lot since January, and I was really hoping that Valentine's Day would be THE DAY that he finally asked me to be his girlfriend. I even remember what I was wearing--black flared pants, a red v-neck t-shirt (those kind with the double front so there was no seam at the collar that were so popular in 99-00??? You remember???? You know you do.) and a white cardigan. Totally ready for Valentine's Day. And...he didn't ask me. We went to Bruggers after school with our friends like always. Totally not special. The weird part was, I'd gotten three flowers (our school did carnations: red for love, pink for crush, and white for friends.) Two pink and one white. White was from best friend, obviously. One pink was from my soon to be boyfriend, which he admitted. And the third was a secret admirer. Never found out who that was. So weird. I accused all my friends of doing it as a joke, but they were just as baffled as I. Plus the handwriting was bad (not on purpose) and obviously male.
I was so bummed though, that I didn't have a boyfriend on Valentine's Day. You know, thinking back, I'm not sure that the boyfriend did get me a flower. Maybe it was only two. I think that maybe he was thinking about it, but decided the flowers were dumb. We obviously already knew we liked each other, we spent all our time together. So he really felt like an idiot when I got one from some random guy, and not him. I seem to remember now that was how it went down.
Back to the point--we were in history class exactly one week later--Feb. 23--and passing notes back and forth when he officially asked me to be his girlfriend. Turned out he thought Feb. 14 was just a little too soon, we needed another week apparently. He wanted to make it exactly a month that we'd been "officially" hanging out. I remember writing yes!!!!! on the piece of notebook paper, and immediately looking at the clock above the door so I'd always remember the exact minute he asked me.
Huh, yeah, that worked out real well. Maybe if we'd stayed together, I'd remember the exact time? I decided to look in my planner to see if I wrote it down (I always save my planners from each school year because I didn't use them for homework, I used them as diaries).
Nope. I wrote down (in pink ink no less) "Well, everyone thought we were going out, but we formally decided to be B/F G/F today!" and drew a bunch of hearts in gold ink. My friends and I were crazy for gel pens. Crazy.
But oh, this planner. It makes me laugh every time. I wish I could post a picture but I am too lazy to take out my camera and upload one. For the entire first two weeks of February, my best friend and I were fighting (about various things, including my soon to be boyfriend) and I wrote "still mad" on every day in those two weeks.
My planner also confirms that my second guess at the flower scenario was right--I did only get two flowers on Valentine's Day. And it was not exactly a week later that we started dating, it was 9 days. Valentine's was Monday, Feb. 23 was Wednesday. I know, because it really matters, right? I also see that I forced him to watch home movies one Sunday afternoon. Oh for shame. Generally no one wants to see your home movies. No one. Except your parents, which is why they shot them in the first place.
Man, this planner is like a book of embarrassing secrets. Good thing it never fell into the wrong hands. All my crushes are written all over it--with days I saw them and what we did, etc. I wish I could say that behavior changed when I got to college...but it didn't.
I also found my schedule from that fateful quarter/semester. My locker was 845D, which would have made my boyfriend's 844D. I had American History first period (which means likely 9:30 is the right time, or possibly even 8:30), Sculpture second period, Advanced English third period, and Computer Essentials period four. (Woodbury only had 4 classes a day at that time, each 90 minutes).
Ah, computer essentials. We were supposed to be learning the Microsoft Office Suite, but instead we learned how to illegally download songs on Napster (remember Napster???!?!) and hack into people's email accounts. Okay, the teacher didn't teach us any of that. That was all bonus from my classmates. He didn't each us much MS Office either, in fact I think we were handed instruction booklets and left to figure it out, which left so much more time for illegal downloading and hacking.
I also found: my fourth quarter schedule, some computer essentials assignments I printed out; several ads for nail polish colors I wanted (all pink); a good luck card from my friend when I tried out for the dance team; a Valentine from same friend; an overdue book notice for the book "I Love You, Am I Trapped Forever?" (ooo, what an ominous premonition!); a detention slip from my English teacher Mrs. Stinger for being late to class (too busy making out with boyfriend in hallway); a fortune cookie slip from a fortune cookie my boyfriend gave me (he made it in cooking class along with cream cheese wontons and we ate them all in one sitting and got sick).
And the piece de la resistnace: a slip we had to fill out for the yearbook (or newspaper?) about our likes and dislikes. Obviously I never handed it in, since I still have it! I described my personality as crazy (understatement of the year), talked about staying in bed as long as possible in the morning (question was what do you always do before you start your day), most embarrassing moment was when a friend wrote a love letter to my crush and signed my name to it in 8th grade (hmm, I don't even remember that!), I hated it when sophomores ruined things for everyone, hated when guys acted so horny, if I could give the opposite sex one piece of advice it would be grow up, if I could change one thing about high school I would let juniors go off campus for lunch too (only seniors could). My favorites: clothing was Delilas, TV show was Popular, sport was dance team, movie was Titanic, and perfume/colonge was CK One/CK Be. Does that ever scream late 90s, or what?
It does make me think of perspective, though. Sometimes you look back at a time in your life and think you were soooo happy, and everything was perfect; or you look back and think it was the worst ever. Then you read a diary and realize everything wasn't perfect (you were fighting with your friends all the time) or it really wasn't that bad (your crush told you he didn't like you.) You forget how much drama there was, then realize that the drama wasn't anything that actually mattered. Sometimes you wish that you could go back and shake yourself (this is not bad--wait until you're 27 and broke and don't know how you're going to pay your rent or EAT!) Sometimes you want to go back and shake yourself from a situation that you thought was really good at the time but you know will turn out horrible in the end.
Most of the time, I wish I could go back to my eleventh grade self and tell her to go ahead and date that guy, but keep it casual and move on after a few months. Date other people. Have more experiences in high school than just him. Make more friends! I just saw most of my high school classmates at our reunion in November. They are such cool people, and I wish I would have gotten to know more of them in high school instead of sticking with the same bunch the whole time. Fortunately, I have Facebook now, where I can keep in contact with them instead of waiting for the next reunion to come around.
So younger kids, take that for what you will. I hope my daughter (and other future kids not in the world yet) will listen to me someday when she's in high school and thinks this is the end of the world.
It's not. Something else to my eleventh grade self (and I've probably said this in other posts) is everything will turn out all right in the end. I still need to remind myself of that some days, even staring down 30 :)
p.s. I never mentioned what happened with my ex and I trying to be friends. I'm pretty sure I've talked about it in other posts (like the 9/11 one?). Anyway. I don't recommend it, even five years out. We still knew way too much about each other, and we could only have a good few hours together before fighting about stupid stuff that happened in high school. Maybe ten years out we're mature enough to let it all go? I'll probably never know, even though we live only a mile apart right now(just like in high school!). Which makes life all the stranger...
Thursday, February 23, 2012
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Look Out...Pregnant Woman Loose On The Internet!
Okay, tomorrow I am 18 weeks along, and definitely feeling better again. Like myself. But very, very opinionated and with a short fuse. The sickness was apparently replaced with sudden annoyance at everything and everyone! Yikes. I was going to try to stay off my blog, but hey, that's what the Internet is for, right? To post angry thoughts directed a cyber space? So the question is--did you make my sh*t list? Read on to find out...and brace yourself.
People That Live In Minnesota (and the general north) And Hate Snow:
Okay, seriously. Look around you. Check your GPS coordinates. You know what country are close to up here? No, it's not Mexico. It's CANADA, mother f---ers! CANADA! Which is not known for its tropical temperatures! They don't call it the Arctic Tunda for nothing. So you live next to Canada. That means in October--May, we should not be surprised when it snows. And we should not whine and complain when it does (or say how much we love it when it does not.) If you really hate winter that much, here's a really simple solution. MOVE!!!!!!!
Teen Mom 2:
I don't watch this show with a whole lot of regularity, so I'm not sure of everyone's names. But that Joe kid who is dating the blond girl, who is whining that he has to pay child support? GET OVER IT! You created a child. She's let you off the hook this long without paying a dime, and you live with your mother f---ing parents and she's on her own. Grow a pair. Funny thing about kids, is when you make one, you have to pay for it. If you didn't want to pay for child support, then you should have kept your dick in your pants!
Janelle...wow. I have almost no words. That idiot you call a boyfriend is using you. He's a manipulative loser. I know because I've dated one. WALK AWAY. But you never do, every time he says he wants you back you just go crawling back, even though he's abusive. Seriously. You probably don't care because all you want to do is smoke weed. I feel bad for your son, you've got to be somewhere on the list of The Worst Mothers Ever.
True Life: I'm A Sex Offender:
I am all about forgiving people that make a mistake once. Who hasn't screwed up once? Who hasn't driven drunk or done drugs or had sex with a fourteen year old? The thing is, when you make the same mistake twice, you're just an idiot. This eighteen year old kid had sex with his fifteen year old girlfriend, then they broke up and he got arrested. Okay, you made a naughty. You learned your lesson, right? Wrong. He turned around the next year and fooled around with a fourteen year old. With his dick. He got caught. Now, I don't feel bad for you. Now you're just an idiot. But now I know about the punishments for sex offenders. And the sad thing is, they're good for real sex offenders, who probably never follow them because they're bad people and they don't care. But when you've an 18 year old who had sex with his fifteen year old girlfriend, they're way to strict. This kid is following the sentence because he doesn't want to get in trouble again. That's not fair. Something needs to change.
Packer Fans:
It's funny to me that the Packer fans spent two seasons ripping on everyone else's football team, tooting their own horns. But as soon as they lose, (and they can't even admit that it was in the first round, because it wasn't a wild card game--seriously that's lame. It was their first playoff game and they blew it. Get over it) they can't stand to have anyone else making fun of them. So you can dish out all the crap you want, but you can't take it back? Grow a pair.
Lauren Scruggs:
This one is touchy, because everyone seems to feel really bad for this girl. And I admit, she seems like a really nice girl. I almost feel bad for writing this. Almost. If you're not sure who I'm talking about, she's the model/blogger who walked into a moving plane propeller. Google it. I felt bad for her at first, but at the same time I was going "who is stupid enough to walk into a moving plane propeller?" She is, apparently. Isn't this a common sense thing? It's not like she's five years old. This plane has a propeller on the front. That is how it flies. It doesn't fly on wishes and rainbows. So when the plane is running, I should stay far away from the propeller and the front of the plane. Isn't that how someone with half a brain would think? And now we find out that the pilot TOLD her to walk around the back of the plane, actually reached out of the window of the plane and grabbed her arm and told her to stay away from that propeller! How much more does a person need? This isn't like a hot stove when you're a kid "don't touch, that's hot!" and you touch it anyway and get a painful blister. She lost an eye and an arm. Did she really have to learn that lesson the hard way? Couldn't she just have listened to the pilot and common sense? But I guess not everyone has common sense. That's why there are democrats, right?
Paula Dean:
I am so horrified that everyone is so angry at this woman for hiding the fact that she has type 2 diabetes. SO WHAT? She made her lifestyle choices, she never put a gun to anyone's head and said "eat my food every single day." The common sense thing plays in here again. Obviously her food is not the healthiest. She's not telling you to eat it all the time, you have to figure out that you shouldn't eat it every day. But we live in a society that lives on fast food--McDonalds, and I'm not even going to tell you what I learned about mechanically separated chicken parts yesterday. Let's just say even if I could eat chicken nuggets and patties, I would not. Tonight, the Travel Channel had a special called "State Fair Food." Pretty much everything was deep fried. There was deep fried beer, deep fried bacon, Krispy Kreme cheeseburger with chocolate bacon, and even deep fried butter! And people are mad at Paula Dean? Americans are fat, sick and lazy! So why are we coming down on Paula Dean for having a fattening cooking show? You bunch of hypocrites!!! Stop blaming everyone else for your problems and look down your own damn pie hole! No one is force feeding you. The government could probably stop this but they want everyone sick and dead so they don't care. And honestly, I don't want them to stop this because they need to stay out of our lives. People need to start making their own decisions. The joke that is the FDA needs to start doing it's job. I'm not even going to get into it, because it would take another blog, but our FDA is terrible. Cook your own food and use your stupid brain!
American Idol & Jersey Shore:
Die. Seriously. I hate you. AI is old and tired and sad. No one cares anymore. Jersey Shore is a picture of everything that is wrong with this country. It has made me never, ever want to visit the east coast. They're like orange animals. Can we please go back to sitcoms? Where we're not just relying on putting people who hate each other together to make drama? Yes it can be a guilty pleasure, but it really is lazy. There's tons of people in Hollywood who want to be writers. Can someone please write something that is better than this crap? Like House. I love House. And supposedly it's not coming back. Sad days.
SOPA:
Yet another reason for me to write this post. Because if this bill goes through, I might not be able to? The government could shut down my blog with no rhyme or reason if it feels as though I am using material that is pirated? That's a lot of crap. No one wants their stuff stolen, I get that, but this is way too far. Once again the government needs to stay the f-- out of it.
My Husband:
Who right now thinks he knows everything. Just kidding, sweetie. But seriously. Shut up.
And now, to balance this out a bit, a few of the things I love:
Skittles
Olives
House (Dr. Greg House is hot)
NY Ink (I love Chris Torres and Meghan Massacre together. I want more about this relationship (or lack their of? Can we please answer this?))
My dog
My computer
Writing
My job
The Oatmeal
and Three Lakes, of course!
People That Live In Minnesota (and the general north) And Hate Snow:
Okay, seriously. Look around you. Check your GPS coordinates. You know what country are close to up here? No, it's not Mexico. It's CANADA, mother f---ers! CANADA! Which is not known for its tropical temperatures! They don't call it the Arctic Tunda for nothing. So you live next to Canada. That means in October--May, we should not be surprised when it snows. And we should not whine and complain when it does (or say how much we love it when it does not.) If you really hate winter that much, here's a really simple solution. MOVE!!!!!!!
Teen Mom 2:
I don't watch this show with a whole lot of regularity, so I'm not sure of everyone's names. But that Joe kid who is dating the blond girl, who is whining that he has to pay child support? GET OVER IT! You created a child. She's let you off the hook this long without paying a dime, and you live with your mother f---ing parents and she's on her own. Grow a pair. Funny thing about kids, is when you make one, you have to pay for it. If you didn't want to pay for child support, then you should have kept your dick in your pants!
Janelle...wow. I have almost no words. That idiot you call a boyfriend is using you. He's a manipulative loser. I know because I've dated one. WALK AWAY. But you never do, every time he says he wants you back you just go crawling back, even though he's abusive. Seriously. You probably don't care because all you want to do is smoke weed. I feel bad for your son, you've got to be somewhere on the list of The Worst Mothers Ever.
True Life: I'm A Sex Offender:
I am all about forgiving people that make a mistake once. Who hasn't screwed up once? Who hasn't driven drunk or done drugs or had sex with a fourteen year old? The thing is, when you make the same mistake twice, you're just an idiot. This eighteen year old kid had sex with his fifteen year old girlfriend, then they broke up and he got arrested. Okay, you made a naughty. You learned your lesson, right? Wrong. He turned around the next year and fooled around with a fourteen year old. With his dick. He got caught. Now, I don't feel bad for you. Now you're just an idiot. But now I know about the punishments for sex offenders. And the sad thing is, they're good for real sex offenders, who probably never follow them because they're bad people and they don't care. But when you've an 18 year old who had sex with his fifteen year old girlfriend, they're way to strict. This kid is following the sentence because he doesn't want to get in trouble again. That's not fair. Something needs to change.
Packer Fans:
It's funny to me that the Packer fans spent two seasons ripping on everyone else's football team, tooting their own horns. But as soon as they lose, (and they can't even admit that it was in the first round, because it wasn't a wild card game--seriously that's lame. It was their first playoff game and they blew it. Get over it) they can't stand to have anyone else making fun of them. So you can dish out all the crap you want, but you can't take it back? Grow a pair.
Lauren Scruggs:
This one is touchy, because everyone seems to feel really bad for this girl. And I admit, she seems like a really nice girl. I almost feel bad for writing this. Almost. If you're not sure who I'm talking about, she's the model/blogger who walked into a moving plane propeller. Google it. I felt bad for her at first, but at the same time I was going "who is stupid enough to walk into a moving plane propeller?" She is, apparently. Isn't this a common sense thing? It's not like she's five years old. This plane has a propeller on the front. That is how it flies. It doesn't fly on wishes and rainbows. So when the plane is running, I should stay far away from the propeller and the front of the plane. Isn't that how someone with half a brain would think? And now we find out that the pilot TOLD her to walk around the back of the plane, actually reached out of the window of the plane and grabbed her arm and told her to stay away from that propeller! How much more does a person need? This isn't like a hot stove when you're a kid "don't touch, that's hot!" and you touch it anyway and get a painful blister. She lost an eye and an arm. Did she really have to learn that lesson the hard way? Couldn't she just have listened to the pilot and common sense? But I guess not everyone has common sense. That's why there are democrats, right?
Paula Dean:
I am so horrified that everyone is so angry at this woman for hiding the fact that she has type 2 diabetes. SO WHAT? She made her lifestyle choices, she never put a gun to anyone's head and said "eat my food every single day." The common sense thing plays in here again. Obviously her food is not the healthiest. She's not telling you to eat it all the time, you have to figure out that you shouldn't eat it every day. But we live in a society that lives on fast food--McDonalds, and I'm not even going to tell you what I learned about mechanically separated chicken parts yesterday. Let's just say even if I could eat chicken nuggets and patties, I would not. Tonight, the Travel Channel had a special called "State Fair Food." Pretty much everything was deep fried. There was deep fried beer, deep fried bacon, Krispy Kreme cheeseburger with chocolate bacon, and even deep fried butter! And people are mad at Paula Dean? Americans are fat, sick and lazy! So why are we coming down on Paula Dean for having a fattening cooking show? You bunch of hypocrites!!! Stop blaming everyone else for your problems and look down your own damn pie hole! No one is force feeding you. The government could probably stop this but they want everyone sick and dead so they don't care. And honestly, I don't want them to stop this because they need to stay out of our lives. People need to start making their own decisions. The joke that is the FDA needs to start doing it's job. I'm not even going to get into it, because it would take another blog, but our FDA is terrible. Cook your own food and use your stupid brain!
American Idol & Jersey Shore:
Die. Seriously. I hate you. AI is old and tired and sad. No one cares anymore. Jersey Shore is a picture of everything that is wrong with this country. It has made me never, ever want to visit the east coast. They're like orange animals. Can we please go back to sitcoms? Where we're not just relying on putting people who hate each other together to make drama? Yes it can be a guilty pleasure, but it really is lazy. There's tons of people in Hollywood who want to be writers. Can someone please write something that is better than this crap? Like House. I love House. And supposedly it's not coming back. Sad days.
SOPA:
Yet another reason for me to write this post. Because if this bill goes through, I might not be able to? The government could shut down my blog with no rhyme or reason if it feels as though I am using material that is pirated? That's a lot of crap. No one wants their stuff stolen, I get that, but this is way too far. Once again the government needs to stay the f-- out of it.
My Husband:
Who right now thinks he knows everything. Just kidding, sweetie. But seriously. Shut up.
And now, to balance this out a bit, a few of the things I love:
Skittles
Olives
House (Dr. Greg House is hot)
NY Ink (I love Chris Torres and Meghan Massacre together. I want more about this relationship (or lack their of? Can we please answer this?))
My dog
My computer
Writing
My job
The Oatmeal
and Three Lakes, of course!
Saturday, December 31, 2011
Recurring Nightmares...
Two years later and I still have nightmares about MVC (Minnesota Vikings Cheerleaders) tryouts. Two years! I will probably have them all my life. Ideally, after I'm done having kids I would like to try out again (if I can get my body back) so I'm sure they'll keep coming. And man, will that be scary, being 30-something and having had kids, surrounded by a bunch of 21 year olds with perfect bodies. But the oldest NFL cheerleader is 41, so if she can do it, I can at least try out.
Mostly the nightmare centers around me needing a new costume days before tryouts (when it's pretty much impossible), or forgetting parts of my costume, or forgetting choreography and getting yelled at and told I suck (which does not happen at tryouts).
The nightmare got me thinking about the pre-tryout meltdown, which usually happens in the week before actual tryouts. Any time I've ever had tryouts for a professional team, this happens. Any other girl I've talked to at tryouts will admit she had one too. Someone sets you off (usually a family member or your spouse or boyfriend) and you start crying hysterically and everything in your life seems impossible.
There are a couple reasons for this. One, you're on a strict diet. Which means no comfort food and when you're already stressed, steamed broccoli does not make you feel better like a fudge brownie would. Two, you're in the gym almost every day so you're exhausted and now you're worried that you only have a few days left and your body isn't exactly perfectly right. You've been doing hair and makeup and nails and photo shoots and tanning and dancing (all this costs a ton of money too) and trying to get everything exactly perfectly right for months now, and it's finally occurred to you that in two days (or whenever) everything is going to end.
It only takes a few hours for someone to squash the four/five months of hard work you did. A huge chunk of girls don't make it past the first day. You'll probably be one of them, even though you did everything you could. You might as well have skipped the whole thing and spent the last five months watching t.v., eating Cheetos and drinking beer.
Once you get past the meltdown, you feel better, and you realize it doesn't matter, you did everything you could do and it's up to them now (and you not to screw up). Once they announce the first cuts and you have to go home, you're almost relieved--at least now you know. These past few months have been really stressful and you wonder if you'd be crazy to put yourself through a whole year of this while on the team.
Then you get home and you're sad because your dream didn't come true and you'll have to wait a whole year before you can try again.
But hey, at least you have a super banging bikini body for the summer :)
Mostly the nightmare centers around me needing a new costume days before tryouts (when it's pretty much impossible), or forgetting parts of my costume, or forgetting choreography and getting yelled at and told I suck (which does not happen at tryouts).
The nightmare got me thinking about the pre-tryout meltdown, which usually happens in the week before actual tryouts. Any time I've ever had tryouts for a professional team, this happens. Any other girl I've talked to at tryouts will admit she had one too. Someone sets you off (usually a family member or your spouse or boyfriend) and you start crying hysterically and everything in your life seems impossible.
There are a couple reasons for this. One, you're on a strict diet. Which means no comfort food and when you're already stressed, steamed broccoli does not make you feel better like a fudge brownie would. Two, you're in the gym almost every day so you're exhausted and now you're worried that you only have a few days left and your body isn't exactly perfectly right. You've been doing hair and makeup and nails and photo shoots and tanning and dancing (all this costs a ton of money too) and trying to get everything exactly perfectly right for months now, and it's finally occurred to you that in two days (or whenever) everything is going to end.
It only takes a few hours for someone to squash the four/five months of hard work you did. A huge chunk of girls don't make it past the first day. You'll probably be one of them, even though you did everything you could. You might as well have skipped the whole thing and spent the last five months watching t.v., eating Cheetos and drinking beer.
Once you get past the meltdown, you feel better, and you realize it doesn't matter, you did everything you could do and it's up to them now (and you not to screw up). Once they announce the first cuts and you have to go home, you're almost relieved--at least now you know. These past few months have been really stressful and you wonder if you'd be crazy to put yourself through a whole year of this while on the team.
Then you get home and you're sad because your dream didn't come true and you'll have to wait a whole year before you can try again.
But hey, at least you have a super banging bikini body for the summer :)
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Fall Cleaning is Awesome!
Today I am gearing up for the annual big fall house cleaning. Maybe you aren't a neat freak, or maybe you've never attempted Fall Cleaning. So I thought I would include my list of things to clean for those of you who didn't grow up in an uber clean family.
1. Clean the fridge--throw away the old leftovers, things that have expired. Then I take everything out and wash the shelves with hot soapy water. If your fridge has a funky smell (and you don't have old leftovers) this will take care of it. If it smells musty, use some bleach in your water. This year I'm taking on our downstairs fridge as well, which has been neglected for a very long time. It's rusty and moldy. Should be fun...
2. Pull out your appliances (fridge, stove) and clean and mop behind them. Same with furniture-move it away from the wall and vacuum behind it, then dust the woodwork. If you have allergies, this is a great place for dust to hide so getting rid of it will only help you.
3. If you usually dust around knick-knacks, pull them all off the shelves and dust under them. Take everything off your kitchen counter and get rid of the crumbs (a bug attraction) and if the tops of your kitchen cupboards are exposed, clean up there too. Also dust light fixtures, ceiling fans (they get so gross) and if you have mini blinds wipe them down well. I also walk around with a duster and hunt for spider webs in every corner and nook and cranny. Fall is when spiders move into your house for the winter so if you can get rid of them now, it will help you later.
4. Clean closets. I don't know about you, but I love my house neat and I have an issue with throwing things in a closet to get rid of them temporarily. So every few months my closets are a total disaster. Every fall and spring I go through them and throw away things I don't need or use (or donate to charity). Try on all your winter clothes from last year and if they don't fit or you don't wear them, toss them! It's a great way to keep from collecting too much junk over the years. Do linen closets, hall closets, bathroom cabinets, bedroom closets and basement closets. I don't have a full basement, but I have a closet under the stairs. If you have one of those or a full basement, take everything out and sweep and mop it out, then get rid of as much as you can and reorganize it in there. I did this in the spring with my under the stairs closet and I was good and didn't mess it up, so I probably won't do it again this time.
5. Sweep out and organize the garage. This one is self explanatory.
6. Wash all the windows and glass on the outside of your house. You'd be amazed at how dirty these get, especially if you live in the city.
7. If you have any holes in your lawn, plant some fall grass seed. I don't have to clean my gutters (I don't have any, weird, they built my house cheap!) but if you do, clean them too. Also I clean all the tracks in my doors--patio and front doors. I look for holes around the door seams too, where bugs can get in and I caulk them shut.
8. If you have a wood burning fireplace and want to use it, call a chimney sweep. Chimney fires are very common. If you burn damp wood, it smokes a lot and all that creosote builds up in your flue. If you don't clean it, it will suddenly ignite and burn off--which is not an issue unless your chimney has cracks in it or the insulation has broken off--that's how the fire gets into your house, usually your attic.
9. Check out your furnace before you turn it on--a woman near Three Lakes just lost her home and suffered burns because she turned on her furnace for the first time without checking it. Take off the panels and clean the dust and lint off the parts inside, check the belt and replace the air filter. They recommend changing the filter every month during the winter, but if you have a nice furnace or get expensive filters I think once a year is fine. Unless you have allergies--then you should do it more or get a HEPA air filter. You can also hire someone to come in and check the furnace. If you haven't cleaned it and your furnace is more than 5 years old, I would definitely do that.
10. Dirty clothes dryers are a big cause of house fires. I say this every six months, but CLEAN YOUR DRYER!!!! Check out your venting system--if your vent is more than 20 ft to the outside of your house (I think the rule is add 5 feet for every bend in the pipe) then you could have serious lint issues in your dryer and hose because you're not getting enough suction and then because it's not venting well it gets too hot and can spontaneously combust. This happened to a friend of mine and she nearly lost her home in the fire that resulted. Take the hose off your dryer and take a look at how much lint is building up. If you don't think lint is that flammable, they use it in homemade bombs as the ignition.
11. When you're cleaning your dyer, clean your washer. Washers build up E-coli and mold and other nasty stuff. Fill it up with hot water (no detergent) and add a quart of bleach. Allow it to run on its longest wash and spin cycle. Fill it back up with hot water and a quart of distilled white vinegar and run it through the longest wash and spin cycle again. Now it's clean! You can also take out your bleach/additive dispenser and soak it in warm vinegar water to clean it.
12. If you have pets and don't wash their bowls a lot, this is a good time to clean out all the slobber and gunk.
13. Fish tank. Enough said. *blech*
14. Check for cracks in the silicone around sinks and toilets and tubs and fill them. If you don't scrub the foot of the toilet or behind it much, do that too.
15. If you still feel like cleaning after all this, detail your cars! :)
If you have a husband who is willing to take on half this list, delegate it to him. But if you're me and you get *paid* to stay home and take care of this, have no fear. Girls can do house repair stuff and clean appliances too! If you don't know how to do something, just Google it :)
1. Clean the fridge--throw away the old leftovers, things that have expired. Then I take everything out and wash the shelves with hot soapy water. If your fridge has a funky smell (and you don't have old leftovers) this will take care of it. If it smells musty, use some bleach in your water. This year I'm taking on our downstairs fridge as well, which has been neglected for a very long time. It's rusty and moldy. Should be fun...
2. Pull out your appliances (fridge, stove) and clean and mop behind them. Same with furniture-move it away from the wall and vacuum behind it, then dust the woodwork. If you have allergies, this is a great place for dust to hide so getting rid of it will only help you.
3. If you usually dust around knick-knacks, pull them all off the shelves and dust under them. Take everything off your kitchen counter and get rid of the crumbs (a bug attraction) and if the tops of your kitchen cupboards are exposed, clean up there too. Also dust light fixtures, ceiling fans (they get so gross) and if you have mini blinds wipe them down well. I also walk around with a duster and hunt for spider webs in every corner and nook and cranny. Fall is when spiders move into your house for the winter so if you can get rid of them now, it will help you later.
4. Clean closets. I don't know about you, but I love my house neat and I have an issue with throwing things in a closet to get rid of them temporarily. So every few months my closets are a total disaster. Every fall and spring I go through them and throw away things I don't need or use (or donate to charity). Try on all your winter clothes from last year and if they don't fit or you don't wear them, toss them! It's a great way to keep from collecting too much junk over the years. Do linen closets, hall closets, bathroom cabinets, bedroom closets and basement closets. I don't have a full basement, but I have a closet under the stairs. If you have one of those or a full basement, take everything out and sweep and mop it out, then get rid of as much as you can and reorganize it in there. I did this in the spring with my under the stairs closet and I was good and didn't mess it up, so I probably won't do it again this time.
5. Sweep out and organize the garage. This one is self explanatory.
6. Wash all the windows and glass on the outside of your house. You'd be amazed at how dirty these get, especially if you live in the city.
7. If you have any holes in your lawn, plant some fall grass seed. I don't have to clean my gutters (I don't have any, weird, they built my house cheap!) but if you do, clean them too. Also I clean all the tracks in my doors--patio and front doors. I look for holes around the door seams too, where bugs can get in and I caulk them shut.
8. If you have a wood burning fireplace and want to use it, call a chimney sweep. Chimney fires are very common. If you burn damp wood, it smokes a lot and all that creosote builds up in your flue. If you don't clean it, it will suddenly ignite and burn off--which is not an issue unless your chimney has cracks in it or the insulation has broken off--that's how the fire gets into your house, usually your attic.
9. Check out your furnace before you turn it on--a woman near Three Lakes just lost her home and suffered burns because she turned on her furnace for the first time without checking it. Take off the panels and clean the dust and lint off the parts inside, check the belt and replace the air filter. They recommend changing the filter every month during the winter, but if you have a nice furnace or get expensive filters I think once a year is fine. Unless you have allergies--then you should do it more or get a HEPA air filter. You can also hire someone to come in and check the furnace. If you haven't cleaned it and your furnace is more than 5 years old, I would definitely do that.
10. Dirty clothes dryers are a big cause of house fires. I say this every six months, but CLEAN YOUR DRYER!!!! Check out your venting system--if your vent is more than 20 ft to the outside of your house (I think the rule is add 5 feet for every bend in the pipe) then you could have serious lint issues in your dryer and hose because you're not getting enough suction and then because it's not venting well it gets too hot and can spontaneously combust. This happened to a friend of mine and she nearly lost her home in the fire that resulted. Take the hose off your dryer and take a look at how much lint is building up. If you don't think lint is that flammable, they use it in homemade bombs as the ignition.
11. When you're cleaning your dyer, clean your washer. Washers build up E-coli and mold and other nasty stuff. Fill it up with hot water (no detergent) and add a quart of bleach. Allow it to run on its longest wash and spin cycle. Fill it back up with hot water and a quart of distilled white vinegar and run it through the longest wash and spin cycle again. Now it's clean! You can also take out your bleach/additive dispenser and soak it in warm vinegar water to clean it.
12. If you have pets and don't wash their bowls a lot, this is a good time to clean out all the slobber and gunk.
13. Fish tank. Enough said. *blech*
14. Check for cracks in the silicone around sinks and toilets and tubs and fill them. If you don't scrub the foot of the toilet or behind it much, do that too.
15. If you still feel like cleaning after all this, detail your cars! :)
If you have a husband who is willing to take on half this list, delegate it to him. But if you're me and you get *paid* to stay home and take care of this, have no fear. Girls can do house repair stuff and clean appliances too! If you don't know how to do something, just Google it :)
Friday, September 9, 2011
9/11...Ten Years Later
Everyone is remembering 9/11 this week, since it's the big 10 year anniversary. Me, I watch the t.v. shows every year. Last year while painting our new townhouse it was literally all I watched on t.v. Now every time I think about that week I spent painting, I think of 9/11.
This year it's meant more. It always means something more when it's a big anniversary. I can't believe it's been ten years. It feels like yesterday. My husband wonders why I watch it so much, but it was the day my whole life changed. How could I not want to remember that? Sometimes I think he'd rather forget, but that's just how he is. He wants to forget everything bad and move on.
Ten years ago I could still technically say I lived here in Woodbury, but my house was empty and had a for sale sign slapped on the front yard. Most of the time I wish I had just stayed there until it finally sold in November. 2001 was a hard year for me. I had just graduated high school, which I had no desire to do. If I'd been thinking, I should have flunked out so I could go back a third year :) But since I had graduated my parents were finally free to do the thing they'd been desperate to do--move back to Wisconsin. How excited was I to be forced back to Wisconsin? Let's just say there is probably still a trail of my fingernail marks all the way down Interstate 94. At least this time we didn't move far, we were still in the Twin Cities, just on the Wisconsin side.
It might as well have been the other side of the world. We didn't have long distance or cable or Internet, so I was totally isolated out in the country. All my friends were away at college but even if they were still in the Cities I couldn't get a hold of them to hang out unless they happened to call me. My ex and I had a lot of angry conversations about why I hadn't called him to hang out and I had to repeatedly remind me that I couldn't.
As a member of the class of 2001, I felt like I was the only one not excited to go to college. It kind of seemed fun, but it didn't compare to wonderful, beautiful high school. The only good part about it was that I got to spend the days back in Minnesota, away from my parents, and forget the seventh ring of hell where I now lived. Yeah, I didn't get to live on campus. My parents gave me their car so I could commute. I was desperate for a new car, so I took the deal. Also commuting meant I could keep my job at Panera Bread and they were all I had left of Woodbury. They were like my other family, so I literally needed them after loosing all my friends.
My ex decided to join me at Northwestern in St. Paul. Okay, I might have twisted his arm a bit. I didn't want to be alone and I didn't want him off at some other school meeting hot girls. Now that we lived over a half an hour apart, school was the only time we could really see each other. Except this was college, not high school, and since we had totally different majors we had no classes together. The one time of day we saw each other was a half hour for chapel. He might as well have not been there, honestly.
College wasn't quite as horrible as I thought once it started. I still remember going to the State Fair a few days before with my ex, and I was kind of excited (of course I still lived in Woodbury at that point, so I was still a happy person). Since Northwestern was only a mile from the State Fair grounds, we'd gone to the bookstore to get our textbooks and then to the Fair. It was also our anniversary, so we were pretty happy. And then next week when school started, I still lived in Woodbury so I was still happy. There was only one minor issue when on Tuesday I only had one afternoon class and I forgot what time it started. I realized that it was starting in about five minutes when I was still at home (twenty minutes away) and panicked. I actually hit our mailbox with my car. It was a class I needed for my major (drawing) and I was looking forward to it so it was a big deal.
That weekend we moved and suddenly it was real--I had to leave Woodbury, the only place I'd ever been happy besides Three Lakes and Sheboygan. I was thrown into depression. Plus it was Labor Day weekend so I had three days to be miserable at the new house. I could still see Minnesota from my bedroom window, and all I remember is sitting in my window, staring at it.
By the time Monday, September 10th rolled around, I at least felt like I had this college thing down. I knew what time I had to show up on campus, where my classes were, what I had to do for them, and it wasn't so bad. The only bad part was that I had to live in Wisconsin. At least my car still had Minnesota plates. I could pretend.
September 10th I was actually wearing my I ♥ NYC t-shirt with a picture of the Twin Towers on it, which I found really ironic later. I also had on super low rise flared jeans and a sparkly belt, just for an idea of the fashion back then--back when the top parts of our jeans were so tight some of us were losing circulation in our legs and a lot of muffin top happened...wow that makes me feel old.
I remember that day so clearly because I got in a fight with my best friend that day. It was an email fight, since he was at UW Green Bay and over three hundred miles from me. It was a stupid fight--I made a joke about his new girlfriend, but without realizing it my joke had rung true and he took offense. After a few angry messages, we vowed to stop speaking to each other (at least until he broke up with that girl.)
September 10th, 2001 I thought, was the worst day of my life. I was so upset about our fight that I wanted to cry all day. We'd been friends our whole lives and never had a serious fight like this. I couldn't believe that this had happened.
I was still thinking about it the next morning as I got in my car and began my forty minute drive to school. My first class was at 8:40 and I was running late as usual. I should have left at 7:45 but it was almost eight now.
And then the whole world changed.
I always listened to KDWB on the drive to school. I usually flipped stations a lot, but I always started with KDWB. I think most people in the Cities between the ages of 12-25 listened (and still listens) to that station. I had just turned it on as I reached the bottom of our hill to turn onto the highway. It was 8:03 central time, I remember because I looked at the clock (I can still see it) when I heard the words come out of Angie Taylor's mouth--"Oh my God, another plane has hit the other tower!"
I gasped, my hand went over my mouth, and I got chills, but had no idea what she was talking about. It sounded bad from her tone of voice. She went on to describe that two planes had hit the World Trade Center, for those just tuning in.
I still had chills, but I thought this has to be a joke. A week earlier, KDWB had made a big deal that they were going off the air, forever. They told everyone they were shutting down and we were all upset, and it turned out to be a big prank. It was fake. I don't even remember what the point was, but I think they went off the air for about a second before they came back and said "Just kidding!!!!"
So understandably I thought this must be a joke, again. I was actually saying out loud, "this has to be a joke." And I thought, what a sick joke! I'm done with them, making up all this crap. As I crossed the bridge into Minnesota, about ten minutes later, they were still talking about it. And they sounded horrified, and I began to wonder if maybe, this wasn't a joke. So I changed the station, to see if anyone else was talking about this.
It was real. I had 12 buttons on my radio and every one of them was talking about it. All I could say was "oh my God" over and over. I could hardly drive. I don't think anyone could--traffic was horrible that morning. We were all inching along and no one noticed. Every car I saw was just staring ahead in shock. I went back to KDWB and Angie Taylor was wondering if this was some kind of accident. I didn't know how she could think that--two planes?!? No one hits something accidentally, twice. I knew that we were at war. I knew that someone had done this on purpose, I remembered the '93 attacks. But at that point, I didn't think anything else would happen.
I was crossing the 694/35E interchange when President Bush came on the radio with his famous speech from the elementary school in Florida. We were all inching along and I thought, everyone must be listening to this. Every station was airing it. When I heard him talk, I wanted to cry. I knew this was really happening.
I pulled into school at 8:50, and by that time everyone on the radio was buzzing that something had happened to the Pentagon, but they weren't sure what. An explosion, for sure. They didn't know more. I wanted to stay in my car, but by this time it was nearly nine and I was really late for class. It never occurred to me to not go to class, and I wish I wouldn't have. I wish I would have gone to the student lounge and watched t.v. so I could have seen everything happen in real time.
Just before nine, I burst into the silent classroom, near hysterical, and everyone looked at me like I was crazy. And then it hit me--they had no idea what had happened. No one in the dorm was allowed to have t.v.
"Hi, have a seat," our group leader smiled strangely at me.
"Don't you know what happened?" I gaped at her.
"What?" she still looked like I was nuts.
"Two planes hit the Twin Towers! Something's happened to the Pentagon! It's war! We've been attacked!" I announced to the class frantically.
I expected the class to break into hysterics, but I was met with more blank stares. Did they think I was kidding? I wanted to slap them. They did not understand what I was saying. I sat in my seat, drained. Our group leader went on with class. We were about to have prayer time, and some genius said "well, maybe we should pray for New York."
I could not understand the lack of reaction. Were they all stoned? Was I the only person awake in this room? My group leader asked me to explain what had happened again, since I was the only one who knew. And I told them again, but was met with no more of a reaction.
I was so frustrated. I couldn't wait for that class to be over, I had to know what was happening. As soon as we were dismissed, I booked it to chapel, where I would see my boyfriend. Chapel was required, the whole student body was supposed to be there.
By now it was eleven and most people knew SOMETHING BIG had happened. But no one was sure what, and there were still a ridiculous amount of people who didn't know anything had happened.
"How do they even put out a fire that high?" I asked my boyfriend.
"You didn't hear? They didn't. The towers collapsed," he said frankly, apparently having been in touch with the outside world.
"No way," I gasped, horrified.
"I swear, that's what they said," he put up his hands. "I haven't seen it,"
A girl sat down in the empty seat next to me and caught the end of our conversation.
"What's going on? What's everyone talking about?" she asked me.
"You didn't hear? Two planes flew into the Twin Towers and," I looked to my boyfriend for confirmation, "they collapsed!"
"Oh my gosh," she gasped, but didn't seem like she really understood.
The Dean of students got up, and started chapel by explaining to everyone what had happened to our country. People were still whispering about it, and after he'd said a prayer for New York, he went on with chapel. Out of everyone I'd seen on campus, he looked the most upset. He told us that after chapel, they would put down the video screen and stream live video from CNN for anyone who wanted to stay and watch. We'd be excused from class, if we wanted.
As chapel was dismissed at eleven thirty, the giant screen slid down, and my friend, boyfriend and I hurried down for a closer spot to it. Shockingly enough, people were actually leaving to go to lunch or class. The screen flicked once, twice, and then the first vision I saw was the shot from the helicopter at the smoking towers. The whole auditorium went silent. My friend and I clung to each other, while my boyfriend just sat there. The t.v. told us that indeed, the towers had already fallen. They showed the video of everyone running in panic as the south tower fell. I'll never forget that video--I haven't seen the exact version of it since. The shows always show part of it--but they cut it out before the end, because at the end there was a woman in a white suit hiding behind a taxi. I'll never forget her. And then they showed the north tower sinking down into itself like it had just given up life.
I couldn't believe they were gone. I'd always wanted to visit the Twin Towers, they were my favorite part of the NYC skyline. And now I couldn't--they didn't exist anymore.
My boyfriend, who was technically my fiance--I wore a diamond ring on my right ring finger from him--stood up after about ten minutes and said he was going to class. He didn't hug me goodbye, he hardly looked at me. The friend who was with me--she was his friend. They'd met in a class he had, even though she and I had the same major, and she didn't like me because she had a crush on my boyfriend. And she and I were hugging each other, watching this video, and he didn't even touch me.
Despite the horror of what was happening, I knew something was wrong then. Here I was pressed against a girl who I barley knew and we didn't even like each other (we became friends after that) and the person I was supposed to marry had treated me like a stranger when I just needed him to hug me and tell me it was going to be okay.
Finally I forced myself to leave the auditorium and I went to have lunch in my car and listen to the people on the radio talking about everything. I called my mom thinking she might not know, but she had turned on the t.v. and she did. I can't remember what she said. I can't remember a lot of the rest of the day, it's kind of a blur. I thought of my best friend who I wasn't speaking to and I wished that I could talk to him. His birthday was the next day and what a horrible day it would be now, and for the rest of his life he would always have to celebrate his birthday the day after 9/11. I remember in drawing class we went out on canoes on the lake to draw and I kept hearing sirens start all over the city and I would jump, thinking something had happened here.
By the time I went home, I remember walking to my car and thinking that something seemed so strange, the air was empty. I looked up at the blue, sunny sky (it was a beautiful fall day) and it seemed empty too--then I realized what it was. The planes were gone.
Ever since I'd moved to Woodbury, I'd gotten used to the sky being constantly full of jets. I remember my best girl friend and I walking through my new neighborhood in 1999, counting the planes. We were so enthralled with all the planes! I think we counted 12 in our ten minute walk. Eventually I got used to them, and when they roared overhead I barley noticed. Now all I could notice was their absence. Every flight had been grounded for safety.
That night at home I did nothing but watch t.v. All the shows were cancelled, we just watched 9/11 coverage. And I knew then, I had to write about it. I was taking notes as I watched, planning stories.
I've written tons of 9/11 stories since then. Some of them were just about 9/11, but most of them were stories I already had that would end up having some part of 9/11. But I realized this morning that I never wrote MY 9/11 story. I've told it many times, we all tell our stories. I've written parts of my story into my character's lives--I'm working on one right now where my main character is a freshman in college during the attacks, just like I was. But never just mine. So here it is.
Of course life went on, as it does. But I never felt normal again. I never felt safe again. I was now afraid to live in my country and that was something I'd never known. I hated those terrorists for taking my sense of security away from me. My fiance and I broke up a month later (almost to the day), and life changed drastically again. For two years I'd planned my entire life around him and now the rug was ripped out from under me. I had to start over. I made new friends at Northwestern, picked up some bad habits from my Panera friends. I drove by the Minneapolis skyline every day wondering if I would see a plane crash into one of those buildings.
I made up with my best friend by September 14th and we both agreed that in light of everything that had happened, our fight was really stupid. He broke up with that girl shortly after, and admitted that my joke had really been true, why he'd been so angry. People all around talked about patriotism, wanted to join the army. People who were in the reserves realized they were getting deployed--and I needled my now ex, because he had wanted to join the reserves until I talked him out of it. People who hadn't cared about President Bush before the attacks loved him now. My ex finished out the year at Northwestern, then transferred to the University of Minnesota. We tried to be friends until we realized we hated each other, and we just needed a break. We'd changed so much over the last year we couldn't be around each other anymore. We finally cut the apron strings.
We all moved on.
But every 9/11 and every time I see a show about it, no matter where I am, I always am right back in 9/11/01, in my car, at Northwestern, watching at home that night on t.v.
We will never forget.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Minnesota NOT Nice
I'm always one of the first (and sometimes only) ones to stick up for Joe Mauer. Not only is he my favorite baseball player, but he's a fellow St. Paul kid who graduated the same year I did. I sensed some anger directed at him from Twins fans before the mega-contract came in 2010. They were all accusing him of running after money because a deal wasn't done yet. They said "that jerk is gonna go to the Yankees. We hate him."
So he got the deal done, signed with Minnesota for the foreseeable future. Then, they said "that jerk is making too much money. We hate him."
Then he had the misfortune of having health issues at the beginning of 2010, and Target Field didn't quite click with him (did it ever click with anyone on our team, besides Jim Thome?) and everyone said, "that jerk got his contract and now he doesn't care."
Then he had the extreme misfortune of having off season knee surgery and showing up for Spring Training unable to compete, then to add insult to injury he got sick. Rumors of horrible illness began to float around, no one liked the explanation he and the team gave, and everyone wanted to know what was really going on. Then they said, "that jerk is going soft, he can't handle a little pain."
I truly didn't think that too many people felt this way in Minnesota. From 2004 (2001 if you followed baseball hardcore) until 2009, people were eating this guy up (yes, there was the knee stuff in 2004 but for the most part people still loved him). They were clamoring for him to befriend their sons and marry their daughters.
But then last night, I began reading the comments on "The Joe Mauer Story" as it's being referenced. There were over 200 of them.
And they were mean. Really mean. What I thought was more telling, was that you can "like" or "dislike" a comment. And a lot of people liked the negative comments. Not too many liked the few people who still supported Joe.
And I thought, when did I move to New York City? Last time I crossed the border to come home from Three Lakes, the statue of our great state was still displayed at the edge of the St. Croix. My phone's weather app still claims I'm in St. Paul.
Look, our season is done. I am always the last one to give up hope on a season, I was the only person at my job in 2009 who thought the Twins still had a chance. When we won the division after an amazing September. I haven't done the math on this season yet (you know, where the statistics of games left/games we are behind from 1st meet up and we're officially DONE), and I still think there may be a tiny bit of a chance left that a miracle could happen, but this season has been too historically bad. I don't think it's gonna happen.
I felt that this season was cursed from the beginning, because ever since Nishi suffered the broken leg in May, I felt that I could call out the players who were going to go on the DL next. And for the most part, I've been right. We've had horrible luck. I want someone to check the Minneapolis history books for Ancient Indian Burial Grounds underneath Target Field (seriously did someone check for that?!?) Or maybe someone buried a Torii Hunter or AJ Pierzynski jersey under home plate (this was the closest match I could think of to the Babe Ruth curse)? Maybe Nishi brought some bad "Kitsunetsuki" (Japanese witchcraft, thanks Google!) with him?
The thing is, it's been everyone. If I listed all the people who had been hurt, and all of their injuries, it would take up 10 pages.
But all anyone wants to talk about is Joe. I don't get it. It must just be because he's the most well known player and he's too quiet. People think he should be a vocal leader like Cuddyer, or Morneau. But that's not his personality! They didn't magically give him a personality transplant when he signed his first major league contract. So, if Joe was out there giving you all of his medical records and calling out teammates in the media and throwing bats at Umps, then you would like him? The way that people are acting now, they wouldn't care if his legs and arms fell off. They'd still expect him to be out there, hopping around on stumps, trying to bat with his teeth.
So this is what I came up with--I was discussing it with a friend online this morning. There is a thin line between love and hate. At the end of 2009, people loved Joe so much, there was nowhere for it to go but down. When you love someone so much, sometimes it's really easy to hate them just as passionately if they let you down.
That's a really crappy way to behave. Everyone is going to let you down, sometime. But if you read my previous post about the world going down the tubes, you see that really it's not surprising considering the level of morals we have now days. And I wrote that BEFORE the riots in London.
I could finish up with a lot of things. I've had neck issues in my life, and they're debilitating. So maybe that's why I'm not jumping on Joe this time. You can't function in regular life, much less play Major League Baseball. But everyone thinks he's being a baby and comparing him to Cuddyer. Hey, does anyone remember a week ago when Cuddyer had a neck strain and didn't play? Does anyone remember a little thing called the 2008 SEASON when Cuddyer didn't play pretty much the whole year because of...a broken finger? Why does everyone think this guy is God? He's had his issues, too. They all have. Stop comparing them. And don't accuse me of being a Cuddyer hater. I love Cuddyer, he's one of my favorite players besides Joe. I think he's done a great job this season. But I don't think that just because he's the best friend of the media, everything written about him should be so one-sided. Because people are listening to what the writers are saying and forming their opinions about what's going on, based on it. "Cuddyer is amazing, why can't Mauer be more like him?" That is all I've read this year. No wonder the fans are going to start thinking it.
Why can't Joe be more like Mike? Um, because he's NOT Mike? Just throwing that out there.
I finish with this, and I've said it before--before we run around lambasting people with pitchforks and torches on the Internet, let's remember that we're talking about real people here. Joe's not a super hero, he's a real person who can read and has feelings (and guess what, his family can read too) and none of you are helping the situation by verbally stringing him up from the nearest tree. One of the best comments I read was someone saying just that--No one is helping Joe by ripping him a new one publicly. He needs to know that people support him. He's had a stretch of bad luck--nothing more. He didn't get in a crazy secret car accident and then lie about it *cough* someone on our pitching staff *cough* or violate his contract by playing anything other than golf (Aaron Boone). He's not sleeping behind a bar in Dinkytown, out partying until 6am *cough* someone else on our team *cough* (in 2003-2006).
So let's all just lay off, eh? 2012 is a new year. Let's add some good karma to it by shutting up now.
PS. Maybe we should fire Bill Smith. If anyone should be taking heat right now, it should be him. Not enough people are saying that.
So he got the deal done, signed with Minnesota for the foreseeable future. Then, they said "that jerk is making too much money. We hate him."
Then he had the misfortune of having health issues at the beginning of 2010, and Target Field didn't quite click with him (did it ever click with anyone on our team, besides Jim Thome?) and everyone said, "that jerk got his contract and now he doesn't care."
Then he had the extreme misfortune of having off season knee surgery and showing up for Spring Training unable to compete, then to add insult to injury he got sick. Rumors of horrible illness began to float around, no one liked the explanation he and the team gave, and everyone wanted to know what was really going on. Then they said, "that jerk is going soft, he can't handle a little pain."
I truly didn't think that too many people felt this way in Minnesota. From 2004 (2001 if you followed baseball hardcore) until 2009, people were eating this guy up (yes, there was the knee stuff in 2004 but for the most part people still loved him). They were clamoring for him to befriend their sons and marry their daughters.
But then last night, I began reading the comments on "The Joe Mauer Story" as it's being referenced. There were over 200 of them.
And they were mean. Really mean. What I thought was more telling, was that you can "like" or "dislike" a comment. And a lot of people liked the negative comments. Not too many liked the few people who still supported Joe.
And I thought, when did I move to New York City? Last time I crossed the border to come home from Three Lakes, the statue of our great state was still displayed at the edge of the St. Croix. My phone's weather app still claims I'm in St. Paul.
Look, our season is done. I am always the last one to give up hope on a season, I was the only person at my job in 2009 who thought the Twins still had a chance. When we won the division after an amazing September. I haven't done the math on this season yet (you know, where the statistics of games left/games we are behind from 1st meet up and we're officially DONE), and I still think there may be a tiny bit of a chance left that a miracle could happen, but this season has been too historically bad. I don't think it's gonna happen.
I felt that this season was cursed from the beginning, because ever since Nishi suffered the broken leg in May, I felt that I could call out the players who were going to go on the DL next. And for the most part, I've been right. We've had horrible luck. I want someone to check the Minneapolis history books for Ancient Indian Burial Grounds underneath Target Field (seriously did someone check for that?!?) Or maybe someone buried a Torii Hunter or AJ Pierzynski jersey under home plate (this was the closest match I could think of to the Babe Ruth curse)? Maybe Nishi brought some bad "Kitsunetsuki" (Japanese witchcraft, thanks Google!) with him?
The thing is, it's been everyone. If I listed all the people who had been hurt, and all of their injuries, it would take up 10 pages.
But all anyone wants to talk about is Joe. I don't get it. It must just be because he's the most well known player and he's too quiet. People think he should be a vocal leader like Cuddyer, or Morneau. But that's not his personality! They didn't magically give him a personality transplant when he signed his first major league contract. So, if Joe was out there giving you all of his medical records and calling out teammates in the media and throwing bats at Umps, then you would like him? The way that people are acting now, they wouldn't care if his legs and arms fell off. They'd still expect him to be out there, hopping around on stumps, trying to bat with his teeth.
So this is what I came up with--I was discussing it with a friend online this morning. There is a thin line between love and hate. At the end of 2009, people loved Joe so much, there was nowhere for it to go but down. When you love someone so much, sometimes it's really easy to hate them just as passionately if they let you down.
That's a really crappy way to behave. Everyone is going to let you down, sometime. But if you read my previous post about the world going down the tubes, you see that really it's not surprising considering the level of morals we have now days. And I wrote that BEFORE the riots in London.
I could finish up with a lot of things. I've had neck issues in my life, and they're debilitating. So maybe that's why I'm not jumping on Joe this time. You can't function in regular life, much less play Major League Baseball. But everyone thinks he's being a baby and comparing him to Cuddyer. Hey, does anyone remember a week ago when Cuddyer had a neck strain and didn't play? Does anyone remember a little thing called the 2008 SEASON when Cuddyer didn't play pretty much the whole year because of...a broken finger? Why does everyone think this guy is God? He's had his issues, too. They all have. Stop comparing them. And don't accuse me of being a Cuddyer hater. I love Cuddyer, he's one of my favorite players besides Joe. I think he's done a great job this season. But I don't think that just because he's the best friend of the media, everything written about him should be so one-sided. Because people are listening to what the writers are saying and forming their opinions about what's going on, based on it. "Cuddyer is amazing, why can't Mauer be more like him?" That is all I've read this year. No wonder the fans are going to start thinking it.
Why can't Joe be more like Mike? Um, because he's NOT Mike? Just throwing that out there.
I finish with this, and I've said it before--before we run around lambasting people with pitchforks and torches on the Internet, let's remember that we're talking about real people here. Joe's not a super hero, he's a real person who can read and has feelings (and guess what, his family can read too) and none of you are helping the situation by verbally stringing him up from the nearest tree. One of the best comments I read was someone saying just that--No one is helping Joe by ripping him a new one publicly. He needs to know that people support him. He's had a stretch of bad luck--nothing more. He didn't get in a crazy secret car accident and then lie about it *cough* someone on our pitching staff *cough* or violate his contract by playing anything other than golf (Aaron Boone). He's not sleeping behind a bar in Dinkytown, out partying until 6am *cough* someone else on our team *cough* (in 2003-2006).
So let's all just lay off, eh? 2012 is a new year. Let's add some good karma to it by shutting up now.
PS. Maybe we should fire Bill Smith. If anyone should be taking heat right now, it should be him. Not enough people are saying that.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Our society is really in the trash
Tonight I watched a movie on ABC Family called Cyberbully. Emily Osment from Hannah Montana is the star. (Yes I have watched that show and liked it). Emily Osment is a rockstar. I always liked her a lot on Hannah Montana and loved her brother in any movie he ever did. But I really like her a lot more after seeing this movie. She did such a great job.
I've seen so many movies on bullying. I'm a sucker for those After School Special type movies. I was a kid who was bullied to the point of nearly having a nervous breakdown in junior high, so I know how evil kids can be.
But now it's really starting to hit me how much worse it is for kids now days. When I was a kid, you could go home (or in my case, run away to Three Lakes where these people didn't exist) and it would all be over until school the next day.
Now days, you can't escape it. It's everywhere these kids go because it's all over the Internet, and most kids have Internet on their phones and we all know anyone over 14 pretty much is surgically attached to their phone.
And it's so much worse on the Internet, because we all know we're so much braver when we're not face to face with someone. So we say things we wouldn't normally say. People spew horrific comments without thinking much about consequences, because let's face it--there aren't many.
When I think about how much worse it will be when my kids will be in school, it's enough to make me think twice about even having them. Because really, to put them into the world to deal with people like that? Even if I banned them from the Internet, there's no stopping some little brat from creating a fake page about them if there's some kind of tiff at school. So do I have to home school my kids to avoid this? Do we have to go Amish? My husband of course says the answer is Christian school, but hey, I went to a Christian school for college and my senior year in high school a few of them from the local school here joined our class. The only difference between Christian school and regular school is that everyone pretends to be nice on the surface and basically just lies about it. I'm not putting my kids into that environment. I'm not saying that all Christian kids are like this--but I'm saying that when kids are forced to go to Christian school they're pressured to display a certain image and that image is usually fake.
BUT this isn't really about that, I don't want to be on my Christian school soap box. Or maybe I do--I'm getting there.
Because I think that the problem lies with our society as a whole. I always wondered why my parents never warned me about how evil kids can be. Sure, they talked about teasing and bullies, but it never went to the scale that I experienced.
Tonight I realized that the reason my parents never warned me about this was because they didn't know. They didn't have these issues. In the 50s and 60s most kids didn't act like this. Those kids were raised with true Christian values, like "treat your neighbor as you would want to be treated." Sure there was teasing and there was always that kid with the switch blade who sat in the back of the room and dropped out at sixteen, but that was it.
I realized I was right about this when I remembered a conversation my mom and I had last week when we were in Three Lakes. We don't have cable, and we have this one channel that only plays old sitcoms. (Side note: now I know who Hazel the Maid is!) She was watching Father Knows Best and comparing it to tv shows now.
Of course there is no comparison. She pointed out that if television was like it is now in the 50s, no one would have watched it. They would have thought it was appalling. But we know how life is--people love controversy. So to keep people watching, tv has had to get more and more degrading over the years.
And then of course the 80s happened, when everyone got focused on their careers and most of us who were kids during that time were lucky to grow up with our parents at all--most of us grew up in day care and in front of the television.
So is it really surprising how we act? Look at what our teacher was. And shows weren't even that bad when I was a kid. Full House? Boy Meets World? Those were good shows. Now days what can families even watch together? I like Modern Family and Rookie Blue and Family Guy as much as the next person, but I'm not going to let my kids watch that. (Don't have any kids yet, wanna point that out).
It's even worse now because most parents have totally given up parenting. Let someone else raise their kids! They gotta work six jobs to be able to pay for their extravagant lifestyles. Those of us who grew up in the 90s, I think, got pretty spoiled with how good things were. The economy was booming and we had everything we wanted. I know I did. And then we grew up and thought, why should I wait until I'm old and lame like my parents to have cool stuff? I should have it now!
And from what I see lately, it's even worse with kids today. Those rich kids expect the world on a platter and no one ever tells them no. Am I the only one who is scared of what is going to happen when these kids grow into adults? No one is teaching them values, no one is teaching them about hard work. No one is saying NO.
And what does television teach us? Shows like The Real World and My Super Sweet Sixteen and Basketball Wives and all those shows that glamorize the rich and the celebrity (and drunken sexed up craziness)...it teaches us that unless we have designer clothes and drive a Hummer, we're nobody. We're worthless. And how many of us can really, truly afford that lifestyle?
Is it any wonder addiction and substance abuse are running rampant? I wouldn't like myself either if I thought I was nothing without those things.
And then, I began to pair the ideas of cyberbullying and our messed up society together and came up with a whole new link--paparazzi.
I know we all know how horrible the paparazzi is, especially after Princess Diana. We all know that buying tabloids and even looking at them feeds this frenzy. But do we stop? I'm just as guilt as everyone else, I'm always looking at the covers and reading the sites--I've even read thedirty.com. Some people really hate thedirty.com but I thought it was entertaining until I really thought about it. Those are real people that are up there (even if some of them are really shady people.)
But celebrities are real people too, and because they're public figures, that gives us carte blanche to say whatever we want about them, no matter how horrible? I've been reading up some on the subject recently and why do we think that so many Hollywood relationships fail? Because of all the rumors flying around the tabloids. Some of those are true but some are not and it just really messes things up for people. Yeah I think Hollywood has its own issues besides that. But being a public figure is rough business. Everyone is watching you and judging you.
And now, thanks to the Internet, if you hate a certain star, you can make a whole website about it. And if you think they'll never read it, guess again. We've all gotten bored and Googled our names to see what comes up, what makes you think celebs wouldn't do the same? Sure, they said they don't read that stuff, but they do. And at the very least, their families and friends do.
So where is our filter? Is our society just doomed to keep falling down the rabbit hole of degradation and hate? Recently there have been a lot of people pushing for gay rights--well how about human rights? How about all of us just treating each other like human beings and not just a pair of hands typing on a piece of plastic? People do have feelings, when you post hate on the Internet it gets out there. I've seen a lot of my friends talking about how people on the Internet trashed them just because they posted their opinion.
I'm going to try to stop feeding those sites. It's going to be hard, because I'm a female and ingrained to like gossip. But all it's doing is hurting people. And when fun comes at the expense of someone else, well, it's not really that much fun, is it?
Join me in loving your neighbor as yourself. Maybe we can turn this world around...
I've seen so many movies on bullying. I'm a sucker for those After School Special type movies. I was a kid who was bullied to the point of nearly having a nervous breakdown in junior high, so I know how evil kids can be.
But now it's really starting to hit me how much worse it is for kids now days. When I was a kid, you could go home (or in my case, run away to Three Lakes where these people didn't exist) and it would all be over until school the next day.
Now days, you can't escape it. It's everywhere these kids go because it's all over the Internet, and most kids have Internet on their phones and we all know anyone over 14 pretty much is surgically attached to their phone.
And it's so much worse on the Internet, because we all know we're so much braver when we're not face to face with someone. So we say things we wouldn't normally say. People spew horrific comments without thinking much about consequences, because let's face it--there aren't many.
When I think about how much worse it will be when my kids will be in school, it's enough to make me think twice about even having them. Because really, to put them into the world to deal with people like that? Even if I banned them from the Internet, there's no stopping some little brat from creating a fake page about them if there's some kind of tiff at school. So do I have to home school my kids to avoid this? Do we have to go Amish? My husband of course says the answer is Christian school, but hey, I went to a Christian school for college and my senior year in high school a few of them from the local school here joined our class. The only difference between Christian school and regular school is that everyone pretends to be nice on the surface and basically just lies about it. I'm not putting my kids into that environment. I'm not saying that all Christian kids are like this--but I'm saying that when kids are forced to go to Christian school they're pressured to display a certain image and that image is usually fake.
BUT this isn't really about that, I don't want to be on my Christian school soap box. Or maybe I do--I'm getting there.
Because I think that the problem lies with our society as a whole. I always wondered why my parents never warned me about how evil kids can be. Sure, they talked about teasing and bullies, but it never went to the scale that I experienced.
Tonight I realized that the reason my parents never warned me about this was because they didn't know. They didn't have these issues. In the 50s and 60s most kids didn't act like this. Those kids were raised with true Christian values, like "treat your neighbor as you would want to be treated." Sure there was teasing and there was always that kid with the switch blade who sat in the back of the room and dropped out at sixteen, but that was it.
I realized I was right about this when I remembered a conversation my mom and I had last week when we were in Three Lakes. We don't have cable, and we have this one channel that only plays old sitcoms. (Side note: now I know who Hazel the Maid is!) She was watching Father Knows Best and comparing it to tv shows now.
Of course there is no comparison. She pointed out that if television was like it is now in the 50s, no one would have watched it. They would have thought it was appalling. But we know how life is--people love controversy. So to keep people watching, tv has had to get more and more degrading over the years.
And then of course the 80s happened, when everyone got focused on their careers and most of us who were kids during that time were lucky to grow up with our parents at all--most of us grew up in day care and in front of the television.
So is it really surprising how we act? Look at what our teacher was. And shows weren't even that bad when I was a kid. Full House? Boy Meets World? Those were good shows. Now days what can families even watch together? I like Modern Family and Rookie Blue and Family Guy as much as the next person, but I'm not going to let my kids watch that. (Don't have any kids yet, wanna point that out).
It's even worse now because most parents have totally given up parenting. Let someone else raise their kids! They gotta work six jobs to be able to pay for their extravagant lifestyles. Those of us who grew up in the 90s, I think, got pretty spoiled with how good things were. The economy was booming and we had everything we wanted. I know I did. And then we grew up and thought, why should I wait until I'm old and lame like my parents to have cool stuff? I should have it now!
And from what I see lately, it's even worse with kids today. Those rich kids expect the world on a platter and no one ever tells them no. Am I the only one who is scared of what is going to happen when these kids grow into adults? No one is teaching them values, no one is teaching them about hard work. No one is saying NO.
And what does television teach us? Shows like The Real World and My Super Sweet Sixteen and Basketball Wives and all those shows that glamorize the rich and the celebrity (and drunken sexed up craziness)...it teaches us that unless we have designer clothes and drive a Hummer, we're nobody. We're worthless. And how many of us can really, truly afford that lifestyle?
Is it any wonder addiction and substance abuse are running rampant? I wouldn't like myself either if I thought I was nothing without those things.
And then, I began to pair the ideas of cyberbullying and our messed up society together and came up with a whole new link--paparazzi.
I know we all know how horrible the paparazzi is, especially after Princess Diana. We all know that buying tabloids and even looking at them feeds this frenzy. But do we stop? I'm just as guilt as everyone else, I'm always looking at the covers and reading the sites--I've even read thedirty.com. Some people really hate thedirty.com but I thought it was entertaining until I really thought about it. Those are real people that are up there (even if some of them are really shady people.)
But celebrities are real people too, and because they're public figures, that gives us carte blanche to say whatever we want about them, no matter how horrible? I've been reading up some on the subject recently and why do we think that so many Hollywood relationships fail? Because of all the rumors flying around the tabloids. Some of those are true but some are not and it just really messes things up for people. Yeah I think Hollywood has its own issues besides that. But being a public figure is rough business. Everyone is watching you and judging you.
And now, thanks to the Internet, if you hate a certain star, you can make a whole website about it. And if you think they'll never read it, guess again. We've all gotten bored and Googled our names to see what comes up, what makes you think celebs wouldn't do the same? Sure, they said they don't read that stuff, but they do. And at the very least, their families and friends do.
So where is our filter? Is our society just doomed to keep falling down the rabbit hole of degradation and hate? Recently there have been a lot of people pushing for gay rights--well how about human rights? How about all of us just treating each other like human beings and not just a pair of hands typing on a piece of plastic? People do have feelings, when you post hate on the Internet it gets out there. I've seen a lot of my friends talking about how people on the Internet trashed them just because they posted their opinion.
I'm going to try to stop feeding those sites. It's going to be hard, because I'm a female and ingrained to like gossip. But all it's doing is hurting people. And when fun comes at the expense of someone else, well, it's not really that much fun, is it?
Join me in loving your neighbor as yourself. Maybe we can turn this world around...
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