Sat. June 8, 2002
Right now Courtney and I are ordering food because we are HUNGRY! Julie went to Kennywood today, and I am still feeling sick. I better get better really soon because I am going home tomorrow and my dad will attack me with lysol if I let out so much as a little cough. Life in the fast lane! So …. I think summer is officially here … its been very hot outside and I have gotten my yearly allergy-death season transition sickness. Nothing much new to say. Yesterday I got my Pitt ID and went to the thrift store with Julie. I bought a whole new wardrobe for $22. I also bought a Little Foot stuffed animal for Courtney because she likes dinosaurs and he was really cute. Julie cooked delicious stuffed tomatoes, and we played Clue Master Detective, and another Clue game. I got insanely sick and took some antihistamines which made me very tired … so I drank some coffee to counter-effect it. Needless to say, it probably wasn’t the smartest thing I have done in my life. We played Miss Sue and screamed loudly every time the phone rang. Julie and I told crazy stories …. hers was about a leg and mine was about poop. We sure had some tomato fun! Todd came over around 1 and I was feeling really crazy from the antihistamine/coffee incident. Not to mention that I was sick too. We had a very nice evening/morning together. When Todd left I was very tired but still could not make myself sleep. I ended up not falling asleep until about 10am. I worked on my webpage though, and now the pictures section is done.
Blah Blah and more blah.
I didn’t get much accomplished today. I slept for most of the day due to lack of sleep last night and because I still feel kind of sick. Todd brought me some kettle popcorn which I am happily munching on right now. Courtney and I played Clue online but it sucked. I really don’t have much else to say. I am going home tomorrow and I can’t wait to see my family, my destroyed bedroom, and my cats. I’ll be back someday so I probably won’t update for a few days.
Well I’m getting sick of the recaps I have been posting in my news … they all sound the same. It’s like keeping a log of what I do, and that is cool because I will read them someday and remember how cool my life was in Pittsburgh. Anyways, since I don’t really write anything interesting about myself, here is my chance to do it …. I am bored, have nothing at all to do, so I am going to bore you with my life if you care to read on.
I didn’t know what to expect from life by moving to Pittsburgh. I knew I would be happier because I was honestly depressed in a bad way living in Indiana. Loneliness took a toll on me, and my ambition to meet new people dropped to zero. It was really affecting all aspects of my life. I wasn’t eating healthy, I had negative motivation, and sleep was my number one concern … although I was an insomniac. I’m not crazy, and in general I am a happy person, but the transition from the fun I had last summer at Cedar Point — to going back to IUP, well it just didn’t mix too well. It didn’t help matters that the routine I had lived for the last two years was no longer there for me. Jaime had quit school and moved to Susquehanna with her boyfriend, and Ashley had moved to Pittsburgh. Kimmy transferred to another college, and my psycho ex-roommate was no longer around. Living in a tiny apartment all by myself just added to my lack of motivation to get out and do things. Once I had gotten into the slump, I felt that I couldn’t get out. I seriously started thinking about my life, and where I wanted to go with it. Graduating from IUP was not at the top of my list. Don’t get me wrong, I wanted to graduate from college, but …. it just didn’t seem like it was going to get me anywhere. In December, I began to seriously consider leaving IUP. I didn’t know where I was going to go, or what I was going to do, but a change was definitely necessary. When Ashley mentioned that her and Kim were moving out of the apartment in the summer, and Julie and Courtney were going to need a roommate, I really jumped at the opportunity to move to Pittsburgh. It sounded like a workable plan. Pittsburgh, not too far from home, friends, a new school, new atmosphere … I decided to go for it. By that time, leaving my life in Indiana was no longer just a dream … it was going to happen. I had maintained a GPA of 3.7 at IUP, so I wasn’t too worried about getting accepted to college there. I applied to Pitt in January, and three weeks later I got my acceptance letter. In April, I signed the lease for this summer, and on May 3, I packed up my belongings and left Indiana forever. My parents were very supporting of my decision, and that just made things better. They supported my decision 100%, so I felt really good about the choice I was making. Everyone in my family was happy for me and talked about how much better off I would be in Pittsburgh. I am really glad that they were there for me to help me make the decision because I really wanted to do it, but I was also concerned that I might just be screwing my life up more.
Well, since I have moved to Pittsburgh, my life has taken quite a turn from the boring solitaire life in Indiana. First of all, I have roommates now, and they aren’t just roommates …. they are my friends. Julie, Courtney, and I have known each other forever so it wasn’t like we didn’t know what to expect. Sure, its different when you live with the people … but so far it has been superb. I have lived with Courtney before … last summer, but it wasn’t quite the same since we had 8 other people living with us too. Courtney works all day, and I am usually not here in the evening so we haven’t seen each other too too much. Julie isn’t here a lot, but I think it is a good thing that we aren’t always here at the same time … it makes roommate fun time much more fun. My social life is now a reality … not that I have friends calling my name from every corner of the universe, but that isn’t how I operate anyways. Since I have been in college, I have really haven’t made a lot of new friends. The closest friends I have made are Ashley and Theresa (no longer in existence). I have remained close to most of my friends from home. Well, Julie and Courtney obviously …. I bet we never imagined that we would all be living together and going to the same college someday. I am still very close to Brian and Eric, and even my ex-boyfriend of almost 4 years. My mom could never understand how I could be friends with an ex, and yes … it was hard, and some things are still a little awkward …. like talking about the people we are seeing now, but we talked recently and we have both seemed to be able to go beyond our past history and remain friends. We don’t hang out with each other much, but we talk a lot . I think that when you really know someone, understand them, respect them, and have history …. it just seems better to keep the friends you have as close to you as possible. I can’t imagine my life without them, but it will, inevitably happen someday.
I think the biggest surprise about moving here is that I met someone after only being here a few days … I wasn’t even unpacked and I had a date lined up. OK, that has never happened to me before. I have never even been on a real date. I haven’t had a real boyfriend since I broke up with Steve, and I was starting to feel hopeless. My mom was concerned about me because I wasn’t even attempting to meet guys, but I was starting to think that putting forth effort was just a waste of time. I have known girls who can pick up guys left and right, and I have known girls that can wrap any guy around their finger. From my experiences, I was the type of girl who guys used as experiment to see how far they could get, or the girl that would lead a guy to conclude that his sexual preference was indeed, not girls. Yeah, I have been known to turn a guy or two gay …. haha. I got sick of not being taken seriously, and after last summer I decided that I was not going to try to meet anyone, and if something was meant to happen, it would happen. I purposely tried to avoid interactions with anyone in Indiana, because I wanted to leave so much … and it would just be my luck that I would meet someone or find some reason that would make me regret leaving. I wanted to leave with no regrets or sadness … just good memories. Well, obviously I was not meant to meet anyone in Indiana, because I had no difficulty in warding off the guys. And perhaps my whole outlook and attitude at that point wasn’t exactly attracting the guys either.
In all honesty, I had a worried feeling that I was setting myself up for disappointment by moving to Pittsburgh. I had certain goals that I wanted to achieve once coming here. I wanted to have fun and I wanted a boyfriend. I had already exhausted the 4-year high school relationship, break up … get back together multiplied by 50 … get heart-broken … pine after him, know he is wrong for you, know you have both changed, can’t let go. Got over that one … turned a guy gay, moved onto the crazy Cedar Point summer “Guess what, guys are actually interested in you, take advantage!” Attention is great, a lot of guys are assholes, and if you continue meeting the wrong ones you are going to keep getting burned. Every guy I have ever had a relationship was a jerk. Even the one I held onto for almost 4 years. I kept asking myself if there were really guys that actually wanted to be in a relationship, fall in love, and truly appreciate someone else. Well my last stage was, she doesn’t want to meet any guys, she can be happy by herself. Well I wasn’t happy, but it wasn’t just because I didn’t have anyone. I kind of felt relieved that I was single because I was really confused, depressed, and I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with my life … I don’t think a boyfriend would have made things that much better. My attitude towards guys wasn’t exactly benevolent at the time, and was just sick of putting up with the bullshit. I needed to “find myself” I guess. Yeah, I’m not sure what that’s all about, but I know that this past year has definitely made me realize what I don’t want in life. After I got accepted to Pitt, I spent all of my time planning, forming expectations of what my life was going to be like once I moved. I knew I shouldn’t set so many expectations, but I couldn’t help it because I was so excited about it.
Yes, its no secret — I did have intentions of meeting a boy when I moved here. I was anxious to start my new life in Pittsburgh, and yes that did include meeting someone. I didn’t expect it to happen right away …. I actually didn’t know if it would ever happen, but I knew that once I moved here I was going to at least put forth the effort. I figured out a lot about myself while I was single, but I didn’t want to continue in the slump, be a 40 year old spinster with 125 cats. And I was sick of the games and bullshit. I decided that I was going to make an effort to meet guys, but it was going to be different this time. I wasn’t going to sit around and wait for the phone to ring, I wasn’t going to be second-best, and I wasn’t going to be the bottom priority that gets attention only when subject is bored. But that seemed to be the whole problem … I didn’t know how or where I was going to meet a guy who wanted the same thing. I also didn’t want to go on endless dead-end dates and never find a guy who wanted to spend time with ME. It would also be a plus if I actually liked the guy, if he had some level of intelligence, if he wasn’t some ogre, and if he would be willing to put forth effort to be with me instead of playing the one way game where I do everything. I also didn’t want to settle for the first person that came along and decided to show some kind of interest in me. I tend to meet guys because they are funny or cute, I start to really like them, and then I realize they have flaws but just don’t care. I don’t care about flaws, but in the past I have been to willing to accept major flaws in guys … like not being treated equally, or playing second fiddle to the true object of his affection …. an actual object. So, maybe I was setting myself up for disappointment, but disappointment sure hasn’t caught up with me yet. I don’t know what to say for myself now. What happens when I am barely here for a week, and I meet the most incredible guy who out measures every single expectation I could ever dream of and more? Every single day he makes me like him more, by the things he says, and the things he does. I am in disbelief that I could meet someone so perfect for me … and get this, he likes me a lot. I have known him less than a month, but there is something about him … it’s more than physical or emotional … its different than the typical relationship that has only been in existence for a month … I don’t think that time matters when something is really meant to be … I cannot be 100% sure that he is the ONE, but he is everything I could ever dream of, and I definitely falling for him.
So, to conclude the very long and insane story of my life, I’m happy here. Things are definitely looking up. You have to take risks sometimes, and the risks I have taken have all been quite advantageous. I start school in the fall, and I am going to have a tough semester because I can take some of my classes I would be taking my senior year, but I think I can hack it. If I can make it through the first semester, things should be smooth sailing for the next 2 years. I have to take 17 classes at Pitt to graduate, but that will probably end up taking me 2 years. Transferring to Pitt has only set me back about 6 classes, but the credits all transferred, so yeah. Well its been great chatting …. I’m going home tomorrow for a few days, but I haven’t been home in a month, so I think it is time to spend some quality time with the family and catch up on the chat sessions with my mom.
[…] where Courtney stole my fan and then cut off all of my hair! Why is there a knife in our bathroom? Long ass reflection on my life Very unorganized post which also contains a time […]