Sandy speaks on matters of life and mirth.
Monkeys are seldom present.

Thursday, March 22, 2007

Reflection

I was asked recently to tell someone some crazy things I've done. The result was sort of an edited highlights reel of my life. I took it, and added to it, and here's what I came up with, in no particular order:

running outside on the snow day wearing just a pair of very tight denim shorts; inventing a fake band and then being interviewed as six different people at the same time in order to convince people they exist; spending six days in the Scottish highlands with people I barely knew, surviving mostly on German sausage; going to Paris and inventing both a secret handshake and a song about said handshake; running around a park in a ninja mask and beating up girls; playing the wonderful game of 'Shouty-shouty'; coordinating a sixty person picnic, lying to people on long-distance transport, dining with the grandparents of famous people, pretending to be foreign, going for long walks at five in the morning through sculpture parks, embarrassing streakers with a floodlight, camping out in a outdoors shop, buying tiny jackets to prank people with on April Fool's Day, falling for a multitude of different girls, each of whom is completely wrong for me in their own little way, planning and hosting a cabaret evening for my school, and doing it so well that i was asked back the next year, even though i had left, performing in a play that starred my best friend and my sister, and was directed by my ex-girlfriend, discovering what time subway opens, getting caught sneaking into a hotel, having waterfights with buckets at two in the morning, playing volleyball, late-night five minute chats that go on for hours, platonic dates, planning not so platonic ones, trips to visit friends, constructing endless 'Top Five' lists, writing letters that never get sent, screaming into the night, crying on shoulders, sleepovers, spending endless hours on video-games, appearing in movies, exulting in past glories, discussing movies at the top of my voice, having a street-brawl with someone I just met, exchanging countless in-jokes, going to concerts, supporting friends in need, running to hand in an essay by the deadline, dancing, fishing for the first time, planning parties, having my heart broken, then realising it wasn't broken at all, just bruised, making new friends, losing old ones, making out, discussing girls, discussing boys, seeking, finding, exulting...living

I could tag everyone I shared one of these experiences with, but it would really be rather futile. Life is meaningless without people to spend it with.

I'm feeling rather poetic today.

Thursday, March 08, 2007

Mmm...Cake

Wow, it has been a while.

Just thought I'd say that - it wasn't really constructive in any way. I do that a lot, I've noticed.

But anyway, what have been up to?

In a phrase, not a lot.

On March 6th 2007, I turned 21. This was only significant because I was in America. If I had celebrated this birthday in Britain, it would have been simply another year. But because I was in the States, where the drinking age is three years higher, it instantly became an exciting event. And yet for me, it shouldn't have been - not only have I been legally able to drink since I was eighteen, three years ago, in high school, I also don't even drink that much back home.

Admittedly in September, I did decide not to drink in the States until I turned 21, and so there was an element of success in arriving at the date, but still, it should not have been as exciting as it was. Bizarrely, it was like turning eighteen all over again - the same excitement, the desire for one day of the year to be IDed, you know how it goes. I definitely over-celebrated, though. Ah well, as long as it doesn't become a habit.

Much more excitingly, on March 6th, my cousin gave birth to her fifth child, Isa. he is of course, due to his birthday, by default my favourite cousin, and so I intend to spoil him outrageously.

It's beginning to dawn on me that my time in Illinois is coming to an end. I'm not sure how I feel about this. I mean I know I love Edinburgh, and all my friends there (and this Christmas only served to accentuate that) and I know that I am going to be very attached to Illinois because I am currently here and yes, I know that were I in Edinburgh right now I would probably feel the exact opposite, but the fact remains that were I offered a chance to do my final year here and graduate from Illinois, I would jump at it.

This isn't to say that I don't want to go home. I do, desperately. I love Edinburgh, I love all of you there, I love my church, and I know that the next two years of my life are there. It's just that, right now, I really don't want to leave. I guess you truly can't have your cake and eat it too.

That won't stop me trying, though.