At first I appear like a stone
Make him fish for what feels right
While I dare him to leave me alone
And avoid his line of sight
My stubbornness should drive him away
But he persists without frustration
Until he gets what he awaits
And I quit my feigned irritation
Soon my smile betrays my facade
And I am laughing at his loveliness
So thankful for these odds
And set on keeping our happiness
I spent the past 36 hours mostly devouring Junot Diaz’s novel, “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao,” along with the various food items I find in my dad’s kitchen. Although not currently depriving himself of meat, cheese, or gluten, my dad has stocked the refrigerator and pantry with such random bulk items that I find it hard to assemble a balanced meal. However, I know my dad would easily solve this problem by pulling out his current food fixation… quinoa. I love my dad. I love every single one of his food phases. Told him so last night while warming up some leftover taco meat, homemade by the vegetarian himself a couple days ago.
There are less then two hours left in this day, which despite the shootings in Washington, was rather uneventful. As I said, I spent most of it reading. Though, I kept a window of time blocked out to shower, primp, drive and undergo my third interview at an upscale restaurant in Indianapolis. Only to receive a call from the manager 3 minutes after pulling out of the driveway that she needed to reschedule (second time this has happened). At this point, I am wondering if I should even go. The only reason I will probably force myself is so that I don’t feel so guilty living this penniless existence under my father’s roof. He does so much for me. He also ordered me the Hindi Rosetta Stone today. 🙂
I am finding it difficult to maintain the determination I need to find a job for the remainder of this year before I depart, despite the glaring fact that I need money for student loan payments and this supposed trip to India that still feels unreal to me. Maybe it’s a pride issue, but I just don’t want to be somebody’s waitress anymore… I don’t want to be in a position where I will inevitably be ignored and demanded simultaneously. My feelings did not remain hidden in my interview either I am afraid. Despite my rehearsal of answers to interview questions, my words sounded fake as I heard them come out of my mouth to the over-confident restaurant manager (who I could tell did not like me from the start, probably because I looked like a bitchy suburban prude in my pencil skirt and blouse). It also didn’t help that she asked me directly what my career aspirations were. If I really cared about the job, I would have told her…. restaurant management. But uh, no… what did I say? I would like to go into the foreign service and become a diplomat to South Asia. Honest. Probably too honest. Oh well.
So, when I found out the interview was postponed, I pulled into a driveway and turned back around to drive the short distance to my house. Admittedly, I was exhilarated… I needed to get back to my book to find out what happened to Oscar’s grandfather when he refused to allow the Dominican dictator Trujillo to meet his daughter for fear that he would rape her. I found out within the hour, and finished the novel shortly after.
I did attempt to make progress in my own reality as well. I am slowly, and painfully, preparing to take the GRE examination with the hope that somehow I will ace it, and by emphasizing my India internship on all of my applications, get admitted to one of my five dream schools (with scholarship), and be on my way. I am dubious… as always. But it’s the plan I must repeat to myself. I felt hopeful today… some alignment of the stars helped me pass a math exercise with a 90%! …after scoring a 55% last night. When presented with a math problem, my brain expends most of its neurons finding reasons to justify my lack of attention. However, today I was adamant. We will see what tomorrow holds.
That’s it for the night. Just had to force myself to sit and write some thoughts. Because I also have this idea that if I read enough, I will eventually find the courage to write something myself. Stupid, stupid procrastination, which isn’t really procrastination, it’s actually fear. But that is a whole different subject that I have been intending to tackle. All in due time…?
At least I got some internal mumblings down.
I turned 22 yesterday. A healthy age. An age that agrees, “You have made it through the absurdities of youth.” I tell myself that frequently these days. Give myself a mental pat on the back for surviving college… all of those border moments when I found myself teetering on the edge of life and security. Here, I find myself at another one of those phases of transition. I remember slightly feeling this way before leaving for college… like a part of me had died. It is more extreme this time around though. The future is so abtract. Even as I am making plans, I feel as if I will not be around to experience them. In fact, half the reason I opened up this blog and decided to make a post was to document where I am in my life right now… in case I never have the chance to share it.
I feel so mortal. So suspicious of death. When I think about how “in the moment” I was during college, it astounds me. Because now, there is hardly a day I am not wary of death. Every time I hop in my car, I see airbags deploying, vehicles flipping, and bodies moving in slow motion. Fear creeping in… sometimes consuming me.
I think about organs a lot. I cannot believe how they all work together to create this living, breathing, feeling, thinking creature. And then I think about the living, breathing, feeling, thinking creatures that I know and love. My eyes well up when I think of how they are mortal. I wonder if my thoughts are permanently stuck in this morbid darkness. In some ways, it helps to remind me of the preciousness of everyone and everything. But it severely holds me back as well.
I leave for India in 4 months. Already I am imagining the moment when I walk away from my family, friends, boyfriend to board the plane. And I know what I will be thinking. I will imagine that I will never see one, some, or all of them ever again. Fear and panic. Yet, for some reason I think I need this trip so that I can overcome this fear-induced paralysis. And if I come back, I think I will be a stronger, more confident woman.
If I can remember, I want to update this blog as I prepare to leave for India… for several reasons. Some quite depressing, others quite innocent. 
As with all diaries/journals/outlets, i have neglected you, dear wordpress. It might make you feel better to know that I appreciate the organization of the world wide web when it comes to self-reflection. From time to time, I do sit down and reflect by scribbling down some thoughts. But the reflections are lost in my mess of a life (literally, I can rarely see the floor of my room), and I never have the pleasure of returning to them.
At least you are dependable, wordpress. Thank you for keeping all my thoughts from the past locked down. I hope to add to them soon, because lord knows, there is much to say.
But for now, it is finals week. And the weather is beautiful. No time for online blogging. ew. I am off to Western European Politics now to learn about the dynamics of the EU. Peace.
“I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race”
-James Joyce
SUMMERTIIIIIIME & the livin’s easy.
thoughts on a tangent —
This right here is my desperate attempt to document what I’ve been struggling to keep quiet through this entire trip. I know nothing meaningful will come out of this, but I’ve got to write the words as they come to my mind or I’ll go insane. I’m going in and out of my thoughts–the ones that continue to ring let me know that I do have a few skeletons in the closet that need addressing. Thoughts can be demented, so much so that I have seen them bend. I’m trying to keep everything straight, but we all know that’s not gonna happen. I fear that I’m ruining this beautiful, sunny picture… I keep trying to write around everything to save the rest for some special occasion. I don’t know what I’m saving it for… Just run with it, Ashlyn. Take it. Stop waiting around for that distant point in the future that will magically somehow release all of the gorgeous demons from your soul and twist them into some kind of sense. That’s not reality. And it’s not just going to happen.
I feel myself coming back to all of the shame. Shame for the girl I have turned out to be. But that’s not the half of it. There is something in my spirit that I defend. All and all, it’s great to be back in a weird, fucked up kinda way. (And that “weird, fucked up kinda way” that I use to dismiss all the complexities of life that I’m too much of a coward to confront, is about to start being described in more tangible terms).
Rambling…
It might be the depiction of some scene, or some careless string of words falling from the lips of a certain stranger that somehow captures the fire of the universe that we’re all trying so hard to describe. Art is…us… our painful episodes at trying to express what’s eating our insides, driving us mad. Then I guess you take a step back, and you can finally see that we’re all just making a huge mockery of ourselves. Who can satirize life the best?
…I’m going to start being more optimistic. I’m not really this depressing…
Guarded hands and skeletal fingers
Skim the spine that carries your tears
Swelling and swollen, it swallows. It swells while it builds and it swells–bigger, fuller, swallowing while it swells. Around me, swollen to the brim it swells whole and potent. Clamoring while it swells in the cloisters of my self, it threatens me with a release beyond my bodily tolerance and fathom.
Swollen to its peak it swallows. I submit.
-Ode to Gertrude Stein? I apologize for my necessary use of nouns and adjectives as I am a novice to this method of writing and objectification of words. First attempt– I will continue to experiment. -AAA
Pardon me as I excuse myself from this pretentious table
And while I am away,
Think of two notions that may render me stable
As you mutilate the meat that dominates your sight
Remember the teachers who guided this flight
THE OFFICIAL PACT: we pledge to remain single–in all aspects–until the minimum age of 25. At that point, we’ll be the proud owners of a cozy little home in California (or another Western state that agrees to abide by the lives of Sara and Ashlyn) with a breath-taking back porch overlooking the beautiful landscape of the west. And we are not bound to the age of 25… that’s just a minimum. Two friends who just love to live. woooooo Caallliiiiiii!
