its crazy to think that you can like someone so much, but as time goes on you just realize how you like him more and more and more

life is so good :)

oh hey there! i wish that i could sleep, ever.

i figured i should have at least one public post about my time in rome. it's been incredible! i've met some really sweet people, and am excited to continue our friendships when we return back to east lansing. four girls in particular - love them. so excited we are all living relatively close to each other for this upcoming (...senioryearsshhh) school year. i knew studying abroad was going to be an awesome experience, but this surpassed anything i'd ever thought. it's cool to see how close 33 people can get within six weeks. i mean, they are pretty much the only people around that speak my language, have the same general interests as young American's in a university. we only have each other - there was no room not to care. we always told the long story, we always listened as hard as we could. we had the time to. and although i do miss my friends back home, i really just don't want to leave europe. the culture, the way of life, the cuisine... everything. the simplicity, the character, the normalcy. American's try so hard to impress anybody. if i knew the language, i'd be set.

mostly, i'm learning more and more about people in general and, especially in my field as well as life (obviously), it's important. and although i've met awesome people on the trip, i've met a few shitty ones as well. you learn something new everyday. here are some key things i've taken away from this trip:

First impressions are irrelevant. Although maybe a slight indicator, it takes one week to determine if someone is genuine. At least a week.

There are millions of fish in the sea, not to be cliche. Being confined to your hometown is terrible, being confined to your home state is bad. Leaving the country is the biggest eye opener of your life. The United States is a bubble. An annoying, obese, disgusting bubble.

Find the people you click with and stick with them. Don't limit yourself, but don't try to please everyone.

Do what you love. Say what you mean. And if you screw up those two, learn from your mistakes. Don't dwell. Mistakes give a person character. If you can't help but dwell, remember that time heals all. And if time isn't fast enough, pray.

Embrace everything. Don't complain. If something is awful, take a nap. If something is awful, think about the story you'll tell the next day. Think about what you'll learn from it. And if you can't do either, then stop overexaggerating and stop being a fucking drama queen.

There is no point in being anything else than yourself. Be honest with yourself and what you do. Yes, sometimes its hard, but it's for the best. Nothing great comes with ease.

ah, so here i am. at my new house for my (uh!?) senior year and it is so awesome. park lane is so cute and my room is so cute and it's so much better already living in the city / downtown than in some student ghetto. it feels great leaving waters edge behind. i mean, i loved it so much. i met awesome friends and had some crazy, great times and it was fun. i got it out of my system. but some crazy shit went down there and it's sort of a reminder of shit and, yeah, it's good to leave all the bad things about this year just at the shithole apartment.

but i mean, i'm leaving for rome in 5 days so like, it's just a little tease for now. but yeah, rome is going to be badass. i need to learn some italian. maybe ill study when i'm on the plane to amsterdam for ten hours. yikes. and it'll be cool to not have my phone with me, and not have a computer really around. i'm so stoked. it's still sort of surreal, but i can't wait.

quite excited to go to my cottage on thursday with eric and travis and brittany. it'll be a great way to say goodbye to the country, with some sweetass people just having an awesome time. aah so excited.

so yeah, things have been crazy this year, ups and downs but it's all good, everything is just fine. pretty awesome. the new setting is just what i needed. and i love it.

So one of my manager's, Dan, is pretty funny and goofy but he says (in my opinion) the most inappropriate things to me, and other girls say he's said weird things to them too. "So how many STD's did you get in Austin, Sommers?" Uhm, zero. He pointed to a girl at work who was pregnant, "Sommers, if you keep acting like you are acting you are going to end up like her." Like, what the fuck Dan.

And one time, when I was bending over, he poked my stomach and said "Too many donuts, Sommers?" and I was like excuse me, that is so inappropriate. And he like, would not stop with it. I was like Dan, shut up and he kept going on and o, "Taco Bell is your favorite food when you're wasted, isn't it Sommers?" Like, no and no.

Oh yeah, not to mention all the times he asks if I'm wasted at work. Or all the multiple times a day he tells me how bad my hair looks, if I own a comb, etc. And, sure, these things I find kind of funny because, sure, I've stumbled into work still a little tipsy once or twice on a weekend morning and, okay, on those same days my hair still has a little messy party in it, so whatever. Those are tolerable, humorous even.

Tonight he says to me "Sommers, have you lost weight?" And I was like, uhm, no, like totally cut off guard. I don't think so? I didn't think I'd gained any weight. "Oh, well it just looks like you lost some weight.", pinching the fat on my arm. Are you saying I was fat? "Sommers, I never said you were fat." But don't you realize how inappropriate that is? "Why are you getting mad, Sommers, calm down, Sommers." Because you were saying that I lost weight which obviously means I was... "I never said you were fat, Sommers, maybe a bit husky." He smiles. I don't understand.

What the fuck? I mean, it's not like I gained weight. What the fuck, Dan, why would you say that?
Does anyone else think this is extremely inappropriate? Honesty, please.

I lost my one true love. I started drinking. The first thing I know, I'm in a card game. Then I'm in a crap game. I wake up in a pool hall. Then this big Mexican lady drags me off the table, takes me to Philadelphia. She leaves me alone in her house, and it burns down. I wind up in Phoenix. I get a job as a Chinaman. I start working in a dime store, and move in with a 13-year-old girl. Then this big Mexican lady from Philadelphia comes in and burns the house down. I go down to Dallas. I get a job as a "before" in a Charles Atlas "before and after" ad. I move in with a delivery boy who can cook fantastic chili and hot dogs. Then this 13-year-old girl from Phoenix comes and burns the house down. The delivery boy—he ain't so mild: He gives her the knife, and the next thing I know I'm in Omaha. It's so cold there, by this time I'm robbing my own bicycles and frying my own fish. I stumble onto some luck and get a job as a carburetor out at the hot-rod races every Thursday night. I move in with a high school teacher who also does a little plumbing on the side, who ain't much to look at, but who's built a special kind of refrigerator that can turn newspaper into lettuce. Everything's going good until that delivery boy shows up and tries to knife me. Needless to say, he burned the house down, and I hit the road. The first guy that picked me up asked me if I wanted to be a star. What could I say?

- bob dylan

She reads the sentence. She reads one word. She comprehends the word. She reads the next. Understands. She puts those two words together. Attempts comprehension. She reads the third word and upon the last syllable the fact that she has to string that word, that comprehension with the previous two brings confusion and unpleasantness through her brain and she gives up.

It's just that easy.

She looks down from the projection screen and stares down at the newspaper. Why even bother.

It's times like now when she tries to figure out, which is worse; to be too strung out to realize you are strung out, or to be so strung out that you realize you are strung out?

The complex thought excites her and she realizes that, perhaps, she has taken too many drugs to care about the things that sincerely don't matter. That it isn't about how you comprehend, it's about what. Quality over quantity. Cliches are cliches for a reason, of course.

And inconsequential classes are just the beginning.
Negative and jealous friends who find pleasure in seeing her suffer is another. Those who can't be happy for your happiness is an obvious enough reason to have that person removed from your life. The fact that she has lost her oldest, closest friend to this reason is one that doesn't bring her sadness or regret, but it's the underlying reason of her constant state of euphoria. It was when such negativity was out of her life that she could finally find pleasure in all other aspects of life.

And the negative experiences that are bound to happen (or, for some, far too often), even for the most positive or the most strung out? Those are the best, enjoyable in a way, because the knowledge and growth one gains is absolutely essential and beautiful.

Oh, hi! I'm back at school and, sincerely, I couldn't be happier. After all the craziness from welcome week is long gone and it's football season (or, for me, just straight up tailgating season because I'm not even going to pretend to go to any games because it's just way too heartbreaking) and everything is sort of back to normal. I mean, it's never normal. But I'm just saying, I'm starting to feel more normal and that makes me happy.

Classes are going beautifully. My ADV prof really liked the first ad I designed which made me excited considering it was my first time ever using InDesign and it's hard/confusing as fuck. My CAS class is good, I love writing so even technical writing isn't so bad, plus my prof is like a hot 40-something, plus I have like 400 friends in that class. ISS is really interesting, the economics of sports really is quite fascinating and crazy and, even though I'm reading a lot of boring sports statistics, there are about 50 hot dude-bros in my class and that is cool. Accounting blows but, really, what's new. So despite accounting, my classes are really interesting and challenging and enjoyable and I love them.

My balcony neighbors are... so amazing. I can't believe how lucky I am to have met them. All four of the guys are just so hilarious, so generous, and so fun. Ron sort of brings out the destructive in me and I like it, throwing bottles into the street and cheese onto that car below was/is so hilarious. (And the Steele Reserve night when the security got called... priceless.) Evan is so great, he is such a good cook and is so thoughtful and so pleasant, plus those piercing blue eyes (haha) are great. Alex is, ugh, so fucking great. I just love him so much. I just felt instant friendship since the moment I met him. And Tommy is just the best ever. He's just so nice and so fucking funny and just a good person to spend time with. And the best part (well, there are lots and lots of good things) is that they aren't creepy douche bags. It's awesome. Guy friends that aren't going to hit on you!! It's refreshing.

My job is good. The crew in Okemos is pretty much entirely new since last year and it's way, way, way, way better. It's really like working with friends and making some bank. I couldn't ask for anything better.

So, yeah. Everything is really so, so great. I'm sad that I'm halfway through college, but, I really can't wait to be done with school and to focus on my career and to move and to live.
How nice is that? I'm excited to live.

Something else comes and it makes me feel weak and scared and fragile and I don't want to be hurt and this feeling is the feeling I have when I know I can be hurt and hurt deeper and more terribly than anything physical and I always fight it and control it and stop it but her voice calms me and her arms warm me and her smell lightens me and I can feel her heart beat and if she let me go right now I would fall and the need and confusion and fear and regret and horror and shame and weakness and fragility are exposed to the soft strength of her open arms and her simple word okay and I start to cry. I start to cry. I start to cry.

It comes in waves. The waves roll deep and from deep the deep within me and I hold her and she holds me tighter and I let her and I let it and I let this and I have not felt this way this vulnerability or allowed myself to feel this way this vulnerability since I was ten years old and I don't know why I haven't and I don't know why I am now and I only know that I am and that it is scary terrifying frightening worse and better than anything I've ever felt crying in her arms just crying in her arms just crying.

She guides me to the ground, but doesn't let me go.

- james frey

While dealing with health insurance today, the frustration confirmed my support for Obama to 100%. Before, I was leery and nervous about universal health care, but a conversation with Kyle made me realize al ot, and now dealing with it first hand, I've really decided how fantastic it would be. And by dealing with it, I mean that the whole system is confusing. My parents have awesome health insurance (helllooo free massages), but it's just gay and annoying to deal with; so many forms and restrictions and long, annoying pin numbers. And, as Kyle made me realize, universal health care will be prime for us (those just graduating college) because we won't have to fucking deal with signing up for health care when we get our full time job, it'll just be added into our taxes. So, even though no more free massages and free blood testing and what not, I won't have to deal with signing up for it. We will just have it. AWESOME! YES WE CAN!

crazy crazy craziness.

my summer is craziness. i haven't slept more than probably five hours a night for the past, uh, week or so. i spent pretty much all of my money in nyc and on other things that i shouldn't buy, but i'm so happy. i'm so happy. i love this, i love hanging out with everyone and my best friends and it's crazy, i'm so happy :)

I haven't written a public entry in awhile so here goes some stuff that might be appropriate.

Work is better. People actually like me there, a novel concept for my coworkers. Someone even gave me a hug because I hadn't been there in like five days and they "missed me"!

I'm going up north until friday, coming home, and then leaving for new york on tuesday.
I'm stoked to visit kyle for, uh, 100 reasons, but one of them being the simplest; I'm excited to just see him and talk for 20 hours straight, to just hang out and get coffee and talk our little hearts out. Mostly, that is why I'm going to visit him. Oh, and the shopping and bars and fireworks should be decent too.

Life has been awesome and fun and exciting (well, it could be more exciting, but I'm doing the best I can in saginaw). The beginning of my summer was weird and gay, but it's been a lot better and I'm happy. I'm still super excited to move back to school. I just paid my first months rent (for august) WHICH IS AWESOME, I can't wait to move in and have my own place again, parents really are an inconvenience.

i'm visiting kyle in new york city july 1st - 7th. i am so, so, so, so excited :)

that's all. :) :) :)

dear faggy, cliquey girls that work at the chili's in saginaw:

you work at the chili's in saginaw
you went to delta like six years ago and now you are trying to make ends meet by not even using your "college" education. you are 30, or nearing it, and your white "blonde" hair looks nice accented next to your beer gut. btw, i go to msu. yeah. and i'm only working here so i can buy booze and save up for studying abroad because, unlike you, i have a great future ahead of me and i'm glad that you are obsessed with your sory ass job. sorry that i could care less about this fucking sell-out job, anyway. get a life.

it's the CHILI'S in SAGINAW you fucking losers.

go away,
jess

Aaaaanyway, the non-faggy girls that work there and the guys are all really cool, it just sucked that tonight I was the only girl that was not apart of "THE CLIQUE" and they all hate me for no reason and are mean to me and talk shit and i don't know why. I guess having a shitty summer job is a good aspect in the book of my life.

There is a certain type of straight-girl that hates my guts the moment they meet me and I can't quite put my finger on why, but I guess it's just something I'll have to deal with for the rest of my life and hope that in my future career I don't work in an office composed of those bitches.

Can it be August yet? When do I get to go back to State????

True or False: If my biggest problem is that [I let?] people walk all over me, then am I in a good position?

Oh hey, hi! My life sucks. What am I doing with myself?

Wow, not to be totes cliche but this is crazy that I am half way to getting a bsa in creative advertising and that is so weird...

It's going to suck being at home, I have a feeling I'll be taking a lot of trips to East Lansing.

Last night I went to Brian's apartment for the last time, because his parents were taking him back home to New Jersey the next morning (hah.. didn't leave until almost 5am, his parents came at like 7;30 and woke him up. god i love him). And then tomorrow (friday) he is leaving for europe for three weeks to study abroad... he's going to Amsterdam first. Lucky bitch. He has got to be one of the most favorite people I've met at msu, ever. I'm really sad that I won't see him for 3-ish months. But i'm really excited he's living on evergreen next year, it's still pretty far from c.vill but it'll be so worth it, i love the guys he is living with too. hmm... we were confessing our love (sort of hahah) to each other via text messages this morning, he's like "i'm really happy i got to see you last night, i had a fun time" and i was all like "ooooh me too! i'm going to miss you over the summer!" and he's all "i'm glad we got to know each other, you rule!" hahah and i'm all "it was such a weird coincidence too... you're the best!"

oh!

It was sort of strange how we met... I was with some of my friends that I rarely party with and we went to his apartment at Abbott Pointe which, mind you, I had never even been there before and like never had even heard of it. So we are at this party, it's pretty fun, and all of a sudden I hear the first song from Wilco's "Sky Blue Sky" come on and I was like "what, who plays wilco at parties" and I go "Who is responsible for this music!?" and Brian was like "me" and... it's been history every since. sigh.

ANYWAY, I've met a lot of cool people this year, more than last year, so when people ask me which year was a better year (freshman or sophomore), I guess I would have to say sophomore. I loved my freshman year, but they were both just different. But I did a lot more, different, fun things this year, I met more people and stayed better friends with those that I did meet. There was a lot of bullshit at times this year, though, which sucked really, really bad but in the end it's the tough things you go through that makes you a better, stronger person and more grateful for the people and things in your life (corny). I learned a TON about myself and my friends and just people in general, so even though it was a hard year at times it was way more fulfilling. yes.

I just hope that next year is 100 times better than this year and then I'll just explode with happiness. Even though sometimes I wish I had gone to school out of state or even though I had a break-down at the beginning of the year and wanted to transfer to u of m (yeah, like i'm smart enough to get in there), I love love love michigan state. I don't want to leave, ever.

i don't want to leave.
i hate the end of the year.

PISSED

expect a public rant in the near future, like tonight probably

Can I just say that I am radiating with excitement and my body is aching of happiness because of all the love I feel from my friends,

I'm so excited for next year. I absolutely love Janna. And Alex. And Brittany, duh. Yes, we are still best friends, boo hoo you are jealous and wish we would've failed as friends. Nope!

I just talked to Ben for AN HOUR and it was so nice, he is such a lovely person and sincere friend and I'm happy I'm friends with him. General statement, sure, but I love him.

I love State in the Spring.  Everyone is outside drinking, fris-ing, being happy. It's nice!!

Ben.
Kristin.
Janna.
Alex.
Jackie 2 (AH i made a friend across the hall!!)
Brittany.
kyle.
TAYLOR!!!!!!!
Katy
Angie
Alex Pielataaaaas
Jarrod
Everyone. So Happy :D

"And I would sit and watch the sunset every single night. I would sit out and pretend like I knew what was good for people, what the sky said and what it was striving to convey. Sometimes, if ambition trumped laziness, I would kayak to the west side of the lake just so I could feel closer to the sky. So many times I would kayak back in a fury, splashing warm water all over my hoodie and bare brown legs because I was so scared of what the dark lake had become and anxious to be comfortable.

Sometimes, I would get so lonely I would turn the t.v. on to the single channel we got just to hear voices.

The later the summer got, the muggy humid days of July, the creeping feeling of the return of school in August, the more desire would trump lazy and I would wake up to see the sunrise. I would walk barefoot down to the dock, guiltily stepping on sharp acorns and crunchy leaves and little fallen sticks, disrupting the looming silence at the break of dawn. A large cup of black coffee would radiate the blood from my palms to my fingertips and warm my perpetually scratchy throat all the way down to the inside of my stomach. I'd stick my feet into the lake still warm from the prior day's sun and splash them to the summer song stuck in my head, lay down onto my back and watch the sun rise over the trees, over the fresh day that brought along every minute of summer that is so preciously wasted. And other days I'd kayak to the east side of the lake to enjoy this, but then race back to the cottage, anxiously splashing warm water all over my hoodie and bare brown legs, racing back to get a start to my new day that I would also preciously waste and enjoy every single solitary second of"
                                                                                           - - -

THIS is what I'll be doing this summer if I don't get the internship with Starcom. I seriously worry about it everyday. I check my e-mail about five or more times a day in anticipation, even though they said they wouldn't get back to the applicants until late March / early April. I'm so nervous. So, so nervous.

i'm becoming quite immuned to disappointment. over and over and over again.

"fashionably sensitive but too cool to care"