Epic Fail

I have not done homework all week.  I don't technically have anything due, but I do have 3 big project/papers due in the next few weeks, an online class that I'm behind in, and 3 midterms next week.  AHH.  I think we should get time off for Halloween.  I feel like it's the holiday season and I should be celebrating, not doing homework.  And something about the weather turning all gloomy makes me want to cuddle up and read.  And I'm getting sick.  And one of my roommates just lent me "A Year in the Merde" and the other two "Merde" books, and all I want to do is read them, even though they make me kind of homesick for France.  Basically, I have a million things to do that are infinitely better than school.

Also, I want to go home for GOTV/E-Day because I don't feel all that invested in Oregon politics, plus E-Day is not as exciting as it is back home because everyone mails in their ballots.  I'm feeling very disconnected from the whole thing...I'm still really excited, but it's different for some reason.  I think I'm just using it as an outlet for my homesickness...if that makes any sense at all...

Um, there was something I was thinking about this morning that I really wanted to write about, but I can't for the life of me remember what...oh well...I have to go try to salvage pumpkins pretty soon anyway.  We are carving them tonight and I'm EXCITED!  I haven't carved pumpkins in ages, and one of the girls from Lyon who is studying here this year is coming and seems pretty excited.  And Sarah and I are going to try to make pumpkin pie.  YAY!

BIZ

Blank

I've been going back and forth in my mind as to whether or not to post this.  I hate emo blog posts, because they always end up being pity parties...so, disclaimer: I'm not doing this for attention, I'm doing it because I'm trying to find my mind right now.  And, hypocritically, I do look forward to that elusive comment that whips my whole perception of the universe around and back on track.  

I've been feeling fairly brain-dead lately.  Unmotivated, uninspired, undetermined, unenthused, unmoved.  A lot of it is that my classes are fairly unengaging in a lot of ways.  And yet I'm entirely consumed by homework and the hundreds of pages of reading I am expected to do every week (with the looming threat of failing some stupid reading quiz...France really jaded me to tedious work like that).

There has been this looming sense of fatality and exasperation with complexly simple social structures that I can't seem to shake.  It all kind of came to a head for me tonight, after not enough sleep last night, a relatively uneventful day, and the promise of pages and pages of reading awaiting me at home.  Instead, I went to my friend's house for a cup of tea, which usually has a way of settling my thoughts.

But not so much tonight.  Tonight, I ended up lying on the floor while my two friends discussed boys and crushes and existentialism and nihilism and Dostoyevsky.  And I had nothing to say.  There are no crushes in my life right now (I know...it blows my mind, too), and existentialism and Russian literature are so beyond my capacity to care.  I am far too hands-on and realistic to see the point of philosophy, I think.  It simply holds no interest for me whatsoever.

So, I'm lying there and my mind was completely blank...and not like good zen clear-mindedness, but like this horrible void.  And it's kind of the worst thing ever for me right now.  I can't seem to care about anything my teachers or friends have to say, and my lingering desire to be involved in things and to have something to give a shit about keeps getting let down and snuffed out in some way or another.

It's an awful feeling.  And so, riding home tonight, I was thinking about the email I need to write to my host-mom from France.  In her last email to me, she was telling me about the girl living in their house now.  Apparently she barely speaks French and seems very disassociated from the heavy stuff--politics, humanism, the stuff that usually keeps me going.  So, Florence told me it's really hard because she misses having someone to talk to about that stuff.

As I was thinking about what to tell her, I realized how much I missed our conversations.  I really took for granted having someone to talk to who had a very different worldview from my own.  And not just Florence, but Wei-Ching and Lionel and Camille and Flo and Romain and the other people from my classes.  That became normal for me, having someone take my thoughts, look at them from a different angle, and send them back, always tweaked.

I miss that.  And when I think about my family, friends, classes--my world right now, I realize that, while there are slightly different points of view, our general way of looking at things is painfully similar.  And, now that I've been spoiled, going back leaves me incredibly bored with it all.  I don't want to talk about big issues, because no one has a significantly different view than I do, and no one asks me sincere questions that are shocking in their simplicity.

I realize that I live in a liberal bubble, but the fact remains that, as much as I am loathe to associate myself with "The Right," we really aren't all that different, and, despite the economic crisis, we are all actually in relatively safe places right now (I mean, people are still driving around Eugene in giant trucks, so it can't be that bad...).  And the effect of that is exacerbated by this liberal bubble around my life.

A memory from this summer just flashed in my head.  Some of my friends got in this huge fight one night.  At the base of the argument was the fact that there were two different ways of thinking and experiencing the world clashing.  It was crazy at the time, and had a heightened ridiculosity from the show tunes we had just been belting out, but the conflict was so visceral and irreparable because the two sides of the argument were irresolvable with each other.

I don't want a scream fest with best friends, but I feel like I need to be reminded that the world is not all homework and boys and coffee and Obama and McCain and consumption and rain and cleaning and frustration.  That there are so many perspectives to look from and so many different filters that people use and so many past experiences that color our perceptions.  And there's my reminder...

And now sleep so I can get up in the morning and put the veil back on and read monotonous pages and sit in class and hope that I can escape this funk sooner rather than later.

What's up with that?

My textbook for my NEPA class is all kinds of whack.  There are more pages of appendices than there are pages of actual chapters.  Kinda blows my mind.

An awkward threshold

It's pretty amazing how much work can be piled on in such a short amount of time.  It kind of feels like I've been in school for several weeks, not just two.  Part of the problem is that I spent a year in France, where the assigned homework is relatively minimal, and now I'm back in a different system that seems to thrive off of tedious exercises designed to test your ability to do tedious exercises more than your understanding of the subject at hand.

Meanwhile, my mind seems to ever be elsewhere.  Right now I keep going over a 5 minute "speech" I'm supposed to be doing on Monday for Indigenous day.  I'm really kind of freaking out about this, actually.  So I'm going to write down my thoughts so I can go away and come back to them Sunday night and hopefully know what the hell I'm doing when I stand up on Monday.

When I was asked to speak, it was at a Coalition Against Environmental Racism meeting.  My friend, who was desperate to find speakers for Monday's Indigenous Day celebration, suggested that we could talk about an EJ issue.  Basically she just wanted some speakers and some representation of allies.  I'm an ally, I thought, and I know quite a bit about the cultural, environmental, and social impacts of mining on Indian reservations.  Why not?  But I decided I didn't really want to talk about environmental justice and list a bunch of numbers and facts about the impact of snowmaking on the 13 tribes who consider the San Francisco Peaks sacred land.  I had no idea what I wanted to talk about, but for some reason, it wasn't any of the issues that I have stockpiled information about for papers and CAER presentations.

My friend's reaction when I told her that I was doing this was ironically, and almost painfully, appropriate: she burst out laughing, saying it was the last thing she expected me to say.  And why not?  If you look at me and my family background, you see middle class white girl whose ancestors are all white Europeans.  

That is never more apparent to me than when I go to a Powwow or the Zuni Pueblo Dances or a Native rights activism event.  It's equally obvious to me when I participate in the LGBTQ or Chicano rights movements.  I'm forever an ally, forever an outsider, and forever wondering if I should really be there.

But, despite my ancestry, there's a lot that you wouldn't know by looking at me.  For instance, I probably wouldn't exist if my parents, who come from very different places and backgrounds, didn't share a common desire to fight for Navajo land rights...to fight for families whose land had been taken away from them, and to stop mining on Native land.  To look at me, you might not guess that I grew up considering my best friend and his family, who are Navajo, to be my family.  You certainly wouldn't know that I called mutton and fry bread "grandma food," and constantly sought to get away from my vegetarian father to eat it.  I have vivid childhood memories of celebrations at Hopi mesa, sitting on a rooftop with a bunch of other kids catching candy thrown by the clown kachinas.

None of this makes the Native movement mine.  I don't suffer from any of the litany of injustices wrought on Native peoples, nor do I lay claim to any of their demands.  But it's important for me to be an ally, because Native culture is a part of who I am and Native rights are important to me.  

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I'm not sure that I can say all that in the five minute time period they are having people speak for, especially if I listen to the little "mom voice" in my head, telling me not to talk so fast, and to enunciate.  I don't know what to say really, but those are the things that come to mind when I think about what I want to say.  My frustration at my outsider status has been a growing thing inside me, making me second-guess myself constantly.  It's one thing to say that to my mom, or write it in my blog, but I'm not sure I want to announce it to the world.  Can I say all that without sounding pretentious or like I can, indeed, stake my claim to indigenous rights without actually being indigenous?  It's a difficult position to try to be PC in.  And difficult to not come off as a privileged white girl trying to make a point about not being a privileged white girl.

Urgh!  I should NOT be stressing about this 5 minute speech when I have about a million years worth of homework, but for whatever reason, it's important to me to assert myself as a legit ally without trying to be someone I'm not.

Finding It

I'm not entirely certain what "it" is, and I'm fairly certain I wont find it any time soon...or ever, really, but I do feel that today led me in a good direction.  I've been feeling pretty lackluster lately...a combination of back to work, homesickness, and this repetitive outsider mentality that I haven't been able to shake for a while, but right now I feel quite a bit better about things.

As much as I hate doing this, I feel like I need to share a run-down of my day.

I slept in, which is always a double-edged sword for me, because it's nice, but my first thoughts were of time wasted that could have been spent doing more important things.  Then I cleaned up some of the scattered leftovers of unpacking and the first week of school, which was badly needed.  My room wasn't so much messy as unfinished, which had been bothering me all week.  It's still not really finished to the extent that I would like it to be, but it's a little more comfortable.

I then spent the afternoon doing homework with some friends.  Which is slightly depressing, as it was the first Saturday of school (as my friend said, I hope that by "homework party," you mean you're sitting around talking about how you should be doing homework but you're not).  On the other hand, it was almost nice to feel accomplished and make some progress.  I know I'm a total nerd.  I've accepted it and moved on.  Please do the same.

I had very lofty goals of being a social butterfly and making mojitos with a friend and then going to a concert and then going salsa dancing and then possibly even going out and doing the college student thing and hanging at a bar, all of which would have been fun, but I'm SO much happier with what happened instead.  With the exception of missing out on Rogue Wave, which I was really looking forward to.  Alas, after a prolonged conversation with my mom, we were kind of pressed for time to get to the concert, so we skipped mojitos.  Then, while taking a little pause at a friends house to say hi, we found out that Rogue Wave had cancelled and the concert was just some local bands.  We decided to stay and drink tea and chat with Devika, which turned into a too-much-time-spent-doing-homework induced giggle-fest on the part of April and I, which was slightly contagious, ending in all of us being sort of exhausted and pathetic, filled with pained, tired, crampy, sicky-ness and hunger.

After being whiny and pathetic about wanting to get food, but not knowing what we wanted or what was open, we finally went out in search of sushi, but ended up eating terrible pretend-tious mexican food.  I ended up going back to Devika's to have a bowl of ice cream to clean my palette of the unfortunate experience that was Qdoba (I'm pretty passionate about how disappointing the food was, if you can't tell), and the bowl of ice cream turned into three hours of amazing conversation.  Some of you may be aware of a frustration I was feeling at the end of this summer about this intense lack of interesting conversation in parts of my life, a strong yearning for the unique interaction that is hours of talking about everything.  My mom pointed out to me that I will never be happy with a person that I can't connect to in a fairly vocal, interactive way...someone that I can really talk to, and that comment has really stuck with me and I continuously notice how true that statement is.  She said it regarding romantic relationships, but I think it's fairly true of all of my other relationships as well.  I really thrive off of a good conversation--one in which you discuss everything from romance to foreign policy to religion to travel to anthropology to sociology to school to sex to music to whatever else comes to mind in a given moment.  Every time I come home from something like tonight, I feel like I just drank 4 cups of coffee and ate chocolate and danced to amazing live music and got some amazing hugs.  It's just so much good and so energizing.

Half of me feels like expounding on some of what we talked about.  But I feel like it's more personal for some reason.  Like I need to process it all to myself rather than out loud.  Plus, I'm finally starting to feel tired (funny how pajamas and a comfy bed can bring on sleepiness.  So, goodnight!

Bisous.

Back 2 Skool

Today was my first day as a senior in college (!!), which is really kind of overwhelming for me.  On the one hand, Im excited to be almost done with school, but as I told my friend the other day, I'm not quite sure I'm done with academia.  There are always a million classes I want to take and I hate having to choose the ones that go best with my major over the ones that just sound cool.  I pretty much never want to stop learning.  I realize that I will continue to learn through my experiences, but I kind of enjoy the classroom setting and the opportunity to sit before an expert and have them relate their knowledge to me.  That and, like most people my age, I'm not entirely sure what I want to do with myself once forced to join that ominous proverbial Real World that looms over us, promising difficulty in finding jobs and lack of parental support and freedom to live as we please.

And so, like so many others, I remain hidden at least partially behind my veil of college student denial, pretending that my responsibilities are minimal...even though they are at the back of my mind, making themselves known at those times that I let my guard down.

Beyond that constant train of thought, when I am able to just sort of be in the moment, things are going pretty well.  I took a week-long road trip with one of my good Oregon friends, who flew down to ABQ, hung out with me and my friends for a couple of days, and then kept me company while I drove to Eugene.  It was SO fun!  I love introducing people to my crazy mix of friends, and I think she quite enjoyed the experience that is my friends (and she didn't even see anyone in drag!).  Some of my friends threw me a little going away party, which was a lot of fun and may have gotten a little out of hand...lets just say it's a really good thing we did it two nights before I had to drive to AZ and not the night before :-P

After doing the NM thing, we drove to Flagstaff and hung out with my dad and little sister, which was really good.  April loves kids, so she had a blast with Sofi, and I just plain adore Sofi to pieces and am so happy when I get to see her.  And it was good to spend some time with my dad, too, since I hardly got to see him this year.  

Well rested after a weekend in Flagstaff, we hit the road again and drove to San Francisco.  This was the only part of the drive I was worried about because it was about 11 hours and I was doing all the driving myself.  Thank god for Macy's coffee and Taco Bell and April, because I never once got very tired.  In Sanfran, we stayed with a friend's mom (as our friend was already back in Oregon), and mostly did a LOT of shopping.  It was insane, but how often are you in a place with Sephora and H&M across the street from each other?  And then Express and the Body Shop were having sales.  *sigh*

The last two days of the road trip were spent driving up the California coast and trying to visit my old roommate's parents (which was, sadly, unsuccessful) and hanging out on the beach, and watching the sunset, and seeing the Redwoods, etc.  I really love the drive between San Francisco and Crescent City because you get to see beauty in so many different forms.

Finally, I had a weekend to get settled and see my friends and prepare myself for going back to school in the states, which is overwhelming after the somewhat experience of the french system (not to say that I didn't have any work, I just didn't feel nearly as stressed in the first week as I do here).  I spent the weekend doing more shopping for necessities for my room and groceries, spending as much time with my friends that I hadn't seen in far too long, and decorating my room to give it the feeling that I live there.  I thing I did a pretty darn good job considering a relatively short time frame.  It's still a little messy because there are a few things I'm not quite sure what to do with and because there is a ton of cardboard waiting to be recycled being stored in my room.  There are still some things I would like to improve, but I'm pretty happy with the place.

On the school front, I actually only had one class today: Environmental Management.  It's looking like it will be an interesting class, but I'm a little overwhelmed because we are supposed to have at least a vague proposal for our environmental plan project by Wednesday.  Eek.  Tomorrow is my busiest day, and I would really like to get a few things out of the way over the next couple of days, but I also kind of want to just hang out a little bit more.  Today, despite knowing that I should have been working, I hung with half of my roommates.  We ran a couple errands and then Andy made mac n cheese, which was delicious, and then I helped Alexa with her French homework, which made me miss France and speaking French SO much (which I had already been doing after emails to Wei and my host family, and looking at Gaby's pics from France).

Ok, I need to send a couple emails, do a little more reading, and then go to bed!

Bisous!

Overdue...as usual

I recently wrote in an email to a friend that the hectic, somewhat spontaneous nature of my summer, while bringing a lot of fun and excitement, has left me feeling like I'm missing something.  Or a lot of somethings, really.  My plans of keeping up the blogging have been unsuccessful (and it's not for a lack of things to say, let me tell you).  I haven't done nearly as good of a job at keeping up with people as I had hoped...both people here and abroad.  I haven't had time to read as many books as I would like (or as I have bought this summer).  I definitely have a sense of absence of quite a few things in my life right now.  Although I think part of that is something that comes with nearing the end of something...as I look toward heading back up to Oregon here in a couple weeks.

That being said, I've been incredibly busy and done so many wonderful things and met a lot of really great people.  There have been ups and downs, but a lot of memories have been made.  I'm not even going to try to sum it all up, because I know I'll forget something, and I know that a lot of what I've done falls into the category of "you kinda had to be there".  I think the big things that really stand out are the great concerts (I really think live music is quite possibly my favorite thing ever), cleaning out my grandpa's house (which has played a part in so many of the ups and the downs of my summer), and, of course, the nights at "Terrorist Gardens" (my friend's apartment building, which has come to be the definitive location of my summers).

Most recently, though, I drove up to Denver for the Democratic National Convention last week.  It was definitely a spontaneous thing...I invited myself along with some friends two days before they were leaving and just kind of inserted myself into the trip, and I have to say they are amazing for accommodating me and pulling some strings to fit me into their plans...particularly calling in some favors to get me into Invesco stadium for Obama's speech on Thursday.  

My political involvement has been at a minimum this year, which is sad considering what an important year it is.  A big part of that, I just realized, is that Napoleon, my political mentor of sorts, isn't doing the campaign thing this year, so my main connect into campaign life isn't there.  I do have other friends that are working in politics, but not as much in capacities to pull me in.  And since LCV isn't running a field campaign in ABQ this year, I don't have that to compel me either.  I also kind of have this sense (which I know rationally isn't a correct one) that there is a lot of hype about this election and therefore enough people campaigning that I'm not as badly needed.  I've gotten the sense from friends that Defenders of Wildlife (who have kind of filled LCV's spot) isn't scrounging for volunteers, and a canvasser from Obama's campaign told me they were doing pretty good also.  I do know that the election is going to be close and I want to be a part of that, but something keeps stopping me.  I really hope I can get over that when I get up to Oregon, although in a way it will be harder there because politics is such an insider sport, and I'm much more of an insider in NM than in Oregon.

Going up to Denver was one of those things that left me feeling more inspired and motivated, though, at the same time as it actually left me feeling like I could have definitely experienced it more.  We ended up not making it to any of the caucuses for a couple reasons, and I think I spent more time looking at t-shirts and buttons than actually talking politics.  But in the end, the energy there definitely reminded me why I want to be a politico.  There's something about the inspiration, confusion, conflict, compassion, gossip, alcoholism, silliness, change, solidarity, struggle, intelligence, passion, insiderness, etc of politics that has a very strong appeal to the crazy schizo in me...while equally kind of making me want to run and hide and get a nice, stable job in an office or something.

Well, I think that's enough for now.  I would really like to say I'll be better at keeping up with this, but I don't like to make empty promises.  I will try, though.  I'm constantly telling myself that the reason I get so caught up in my thoughts is because I never take the time to let them out, but somehow I don't do much to fix that...and meanwhile both my journal and my blog are collecting dust and cobwebs...le sigh