October 28, 2004
Day Ninety-EightI put myself into everything I do, for I know no other way. I slept 4 hours this afternoon. Otherwise, I haven't slept since waking up for a nine o'clock class on Tuesday morning. Time, place, distance, importance; none of these things have been clear. I suspect when I wake up tomorrow morning they will again be unclear. But for now I am me, and I type with Asia blasting across the headphones.You can get an ear plug lodged so deep into your ear that you can only dig it out with a paper clip. And not just any paper clip. You'll need a large fucker for that. Sox won the World Series. Sweet Caroline. Scheduling conflicts. But for now, sleep.
posted by Adam at 00:39 |
October 17, 2004
Day Eighty-EightHaving just completed watching the first two hours, eight minutes, and thirty-six seconds of Dead Poet's Society, I pause for a moment while what I can only hope is the remainder of the film is acquired. I reflect upon a day that - like so many in this beguiling and bitter transition towards eventual adulthood - was filled with highs and lows. My high came during a spectacular hike with out Outing Club along the trails of the Stony Brook State Park. My low came during the afternoon, when the rigors of the hike compounded with a truly abysmal sleep pattern last night to create a pit of despair that I could not see myself surviving. I may still not; if I don't sleep the next two nights I will have to raise serious questions about my current place in life.In the meantime, I had a great hike and watched two hours, eight minutes, and thirty-six seconds of a film that left me utterly inspired. Both in how lucky I am to have parents which love and support me rather than cast me into their pre-defined mold. And to give me the perspective to reach beyond the drab surroundings of my current world and let my mind soar, let it challenge the status quo of what my life has to be. I researched colleges tonight. The research helped allay some of my fears and confirm others. But the research itself is perhaps enough. I also spent a good deal of time helping Mike look for his cellphone. It was a wholly worthy pursuit for reasons that circumstance won't allow me to properly translate. Good night.
posted by Adam at 03:27 |
October 16, 2004
Day Eighty-SevenWell, here I am. It's 12:47, and I still have a fucking migraine. I woke up with a crippling migraine. Now it's not as bad. I was so bored that I actually did the first dozen and change problems of my math homework. Then I got to Crossroads just as they were closing. So I hauled ass back to Gracie's, went through a tuna sub, a few bites of a doughy slice of pizza, a slice of pumpkin pie, and a bowl of raisen bran. The I came back to my room and chatted it up with people. My mom was distracted because Grandma is down. She'd just gotten home when I instant messaged. Then I tried unsuccessfully to play Yahoo! Pool. Talked with Alex on the phone. I've got to get up at nine tomorrow for the hike. So I'm hitting the sack now. I also got my absentee ballot. And a card from Mom I haven't opened yet. I'm saving it for when I'm really down.
posted by Adam at 01:52 |
October 15, 2004
Day Eighty-SixI just got back from watching Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. I knew a revelation was imminent, having had one of the worst nights sleep of my life last night. Last night was the type of night where I was having such problems sleeping that I would have gone into my parents' room and waken my mother up and asked what to do. And she would have made it better. But I couldn't do that here, and so I was alone. I was alone lying a bed that was positively damp with my own sweat, and the nature of my alone-ness was driven home more than ever. I couldn't have gotten over five hours of sleep last night.Right now, I'm fairly calm; my roommate has gone to bed, I'm having a decent time chatting it up with Darren, and a high school friend that's at Colgate now and I are having fun bitching about how much college sucks. And then I'm righting this. Anyway, Eternal Sunshine jumpstarted all of the processes that I'd allowed apathy to shut down. Suddenly I was so full of feeling that I felt like I'd been stabbed - and that I was going to puke. I didn't even like the characters much, but the movie got the barest deepest rawest essentials of what a romance could be, and it reawakened something in me. Sometime that makes surviving here far more uncomfortable. But something that I realize now is essential. Love is pain, pain is love. I'm willing to accept the pain, so that I might love again.
posted by Adam at 01:22 |
October 14, 2004
Day Eighty-FiveIt's time to admit it: I'm scared positively shitless. The world around me is swirling and changing and evolving, and through it all I stand in limbo. I know I want to get out of this wretched place, but toward what or toward whom I have yet to determine. At the moment, the only appealing direction I can see is backward to the safety of the friends and family that I'd grown up with. But if this last month and change has taught me anything, it's that dwelling on pleasant impossibilities can lead only to madness and despair.This still presents the problem of what do I do about it? How do I get my derailed life back on the tracks. How do I decide on a destination? Who will be there when I arrive? Is the rest of my life going to be able settling for less than I once had or am I moving towards something better, deeper? For I know in my heart of hearts that that which once satisfied me wouldn't satisfy me forever. It's like a breath of fresh air, a haven, for now. But the crutch won't always be there. Whatever lies in my future, it needs to be something that represents and matches the growth that I myself experience. How do I pick a career when none of the fields that I am presented with provide the elements in which I could find happiness? If the field is one that I would find satisfying, it's one that would dominate my life and squeeze out everything else from being any sort of substantial element. If the field is one that allows me to "leave my work at the office" it's a field of such boredom and sheer technical prowess that I'd be wasting away for a third of my day. The bitch of having my life being an open slate before me is that every opportunity represents a possibility for making the wrong decision. If circumstance forces you into a situation, you make the best of it. If you enter into a situation by making a wrong decision, regret hangs over everything that you do. RIT was the first major mistake of my life. I'm keen not to make another for a while.
posted by Adam at 00:44 |
October 12, 2004
Day Eighty-ThreeIt is perhaps fitting that I've just finished Reading "The Garden of Forking Paths" by Jorge Luis Borges twice, and each time was a completely different order. The predominant indications point to the second ordering being the correct one, but I'm not surprised (having read it these two times) to find that the first reading was not any less valid.The model of time - which has been taken in countless films, TV shows, and novels - is a fluid one. This moment in which I am typing is for me the only true singularity. Everything before this moment stretches out in all variety of pasts. Everything which follows this moment spans infinitely across all possibilities. There is are countless futures in which a 747 will come plowing through the side of my residence hall and kill me with its impact. And those countless improbable futures are only a small spectrum of the possible futures. The journey to find a setting conducive to reading it led me to my first twinge of depression in a week. Earlier today, the possibilities that programming offered me got my really really jazzed. The problem was that I ended up spending the two hours I'd set aside for finishing my lab designing the main menu system for this game I've started as a pet project. I did end up getting one of the activities done, and most of the way through the second to last one. I'm planning on finishing that up during the break between Computer Science and Calc. It was so cold this morning that I actually broke out the intermediate jacket that I'd gotten back during the summer. Even with that on I was chilly. Having neglected to get milk Sunday night and finding the Corner Store was closed until after I had to leave for Comp. Sci., I ended up doing a quick meal at Gracie's. So now I'm one meal ahead of where I'd like to be. Today was open house, so I took advantage of the ability to have one extra non-Gracies meal to hit Crossroads (you, know where the shooting happened.) I got a small tuna sub with lettuce and American cheese on their plain sub roll. It's amazing what using decent ingredients does; for the first time since arriving here, I not only finished my meal, but I wanted more! I satisfied my lingering hunger by getting a packet of peanut M&Ms out of the vending machine in my Cultural Anthropology building. I managed to remember to call my grandmother before my Red Brick meeting this week. I took my first opportunity to break off the quarter-mile after leaving Calc and hit the call button on her name as soon as I felt sufficiently isolated. It was a nice thirteen minute call that took me all the way to Gracie's and a little after, even taking the back way. Aunt Sarah and Uncle Tony had a massive boulder removed from the lawn of their camp. It was a major operation, but apparently it worked out all right. Overall, today was a beast of a day; non-stop from waking up until eight, pretty much. Tomorrow's going to be busy to make up for my excesses today. But hopefully, with Outing Club not until nine, I'll have a nice break in my day. Monday and Tuesday are proving to be the real hump to get past. Wenesday and Thursday I'm beaten down from the first two days, but they're fairly smooth sailing. In another window I'm talking with Darren, and he's slowly replacing Alex and I. I have mixed feelings on the matter.
posted by Adam at 01:13 |
October 11, 2004
Day Eighty-TwoI'm clearly going to have to watch my Myst IV playing. It's 2:07 and I've got to get up at 6. I got all 39 math problems done, but during my break tomorrow I need to finish Thursday's Computer Science lab and do my English reading for Tuesday. I didn't get up until well past eleven. Talked to my parents online and then on the phone. I felt bad because I cut off Dad to go take a shit; I think I would have talked a lot more had I not done that. Got my photoshop collage of what's on my door done today. Had the room to myself most of the day which meant that I spend far more time here than I'd planned on. All in all, a pretty low-key day. My parents come up in twelve days. Things are survivable, but the pace is picking up and I only hope I can keep up; I need to call Grandma right after Calc tomorrow.
posted by Adam at 02:11 |
October 10, 2004
Day Eighty-OneIt is currently two hours and thirty-six minutes into the eighty-second day from the start of this journal. I have just checked a few of my favorite websites after stopping for the night on Myst IV: Revelation - which bears all of the problems I figured it would. It bears all the problems I thought it would, and get these problems are far less irritating than I thought they'd be. While the acting and scripting are a step down, the rather non-linear nature of the game is delightful. I acquired the game today, and got it onto DVDs and installed on my harddrive by shortly before the end of the eighty-first day.As I type, Nat King Cole's version of "The Little Drummer Boy" plays in my headphones. Not sure why, but it seems totally appropriate. The sounds of death and destruction which may be coming from my roommate's speakers are drowned out and I am at piece. As soon as I finish this entry, I will go to bed, taking advantage of my last night of not worrying about the alarm before the start of the second half of the first quarter. Sitting here, I realize that I have not called my parents; nor have I IMed Darren. This tells me that perhaps for the first time in a long time I have successfully filled my day with activities that bring me contentment. Myst IV put me over the edge in regards to disc space, so I spent the afternoon transferring much of my multimedia files to other media. This process kept me very busy, and soon it was 6:30 and time for dinner. I ate with the people from down the hall whom I'd avoided eating with a day or so ago because I was fairly certain that the offer was made mockingly. I'm am still fairly certain that was the case, but I decided that with a lack of pretense I should afford them the benefit of the doubt. I had a tuna sandwich on white with lettuce, a slice of pumpkin pie with whipped cream, and a plate of ziti pasta - no sauce. I also took a slice of pizza but never got around to eating it. So we sat. They talked of drinking parties. I just ate. I'd hoped to save a meal option when I got up at 11:20 this morning, the incessant pounding of obnoxious floormates on my R.A.'s door - two down from my own - denying me any chance of returning to my slumber. And in any case I had the Outing Club picnic at noon. But first I showered for I decided if I didn't do it first thing I would go another night of sleeping in my own filth. The walk down the hall to the shower with the good faucet head revealed the reason behind the racket; apparently they were having a cereal party. I was invited but did not join in. When I got there at ten after noon, only the co-presidents were there, with a grill and a pile of barbecue related supplies. One of the co-presidents left to get more carcoal and I, realizing that it would be a while before the food would be ready if at all, hit Gracie's, where I had a bowl of Corn Pops and a plain sugar donut. When I returned the turnout was much more substantial. The whole shindig lasted until roughly three-ish, and I got a burger, a hot dog, and some decent conversations out of the whole breezy affair. Sandwiched between the Outing Club barbecue and me playing Myst IV was a trip to the Field House where I biked for roughly forty minutes while watching Lair, Lair as Mike drifted among several machines. This was followed by hot tub, which I'm pleased to say was back up to its usual standards of high temperature. I managed to floor around the whole pool without moving a muscle, through the aid of water currents and two noodles. After showering and drying off, I hit RITchie's with the two Mikes. Everyone was watching Mean Girls. They stayed I didn't. Good night, Rochester and the world. A rough day follows slumber. And maybe a little Myst, too.
posted by Adam at 02:59 |
October 08, 2004
Day Seventy-NineI sit here for the first time in a long time in a dark noiseless room. I am completely pantless, and my right nut is hanging at the edge of my briefs. I am sweating slightly under my bathrobe, which covers my shoulders and back only. I alternate back and forth between this and an IM window. I have managed to outlast my roommate which means I get to go to sleep in the dark. I just don't give a shit anymore. And it feels good. The Big Lebowski was the shit. I will talk for about ten more minutes, then stick a couple things to my door, brush, piss, and go to bed. For the moment, life is simple. Complexity looms, but for now I breathe.
posted by Adam at 01:48 |
October 06, 2004
Day Seventy-SevenI have hit at least one major low and one major peak since I stopped keeping journal. During the low, I was too fucked up to write. During the peak, I was feeling too good to want to contemplate my current situation. Now, on my second day back - a Tuesday, my least favorite school day and my most favorite school night - I finally have reached a simple balance that allows me to again address this journal with perspective. I have kept the records of the emails to my father to fill in the gaps and I will post them at such a time as the personal details contained within are no longer a private concern.I am not happy here, nor really content. I am however resigned to my current situation. The panic attacks that have plagued me since last Sunday have almost entirely subsided. I am managing to survive the continuous onslaught without losing hold of my identity. I define my days by taking pleasure in small positives, picking two or so things to look forward during the school day. Tonight was the second instant messaging session with my mother and Outing Club. My mother didn't last as long IMing as she had Sunday, but Outing Club was right up to par. The highlight of my night, however, was watching the V.P. Presidential debates from CWRU with Mike at RITchie's. After that, I got the calendar which hangs from the side of my dresser in order. I used red Sharpie for Red Brick activities, brown Sharpie for academic paper and quiz dates, blue Sharpie for mundane "to do" items, purple Sharpie for CAB events including the Thursday night movies, green Sharpie for Outing Club events, and orange Sharpie for personal dates. I also printed out all seven pages of this shit story that Darren had sent me in the largest browser text size and taped it up in the hallway outside my dorm room. It got some mixed interested. But for now, I have a class at 9 for which I need to get up at 8. If I don't get to bed soon I'll be absolutely shot for class tomorrow. Hopefully I'll be able to keep up from here on out, but I'm not going to let it become another obligation to pull me down.
posted by Adam at 01:21 |
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