My Life is Insane

Yesterday was a good day. A strange day, perhaps, and a busy one, but a good day nonetheless. And frankly, I’m surprised I managed to walk down four flights of stairs and all the way to Maggies this morning- my butt is freaking SORE. Let’s start from the beginning.

I had the morning off Boxercast, but my alarm still went off at 6:15am, just to jostle me a bit. I set another alarm for 7:30am and went back to sleep. At 7:30 I groaned for a little while, then dragged myself out of bed. We were out of milk in the dorm, which kind of undermines all of my at-home breakfast options, so I got dressed, put my iPad and my video camera into my bag, and went to the UC for a waffle.

I ate and read Twitter for a while, until about 8:20, at which time I started getting nervous, like I do, because I’d scheduled a 9am allergy shot but haven’t walked the route for over a year. So I left the UC, plugged into the new Mumford and Sons CD and started my walk.

It was a beautiful morning, crisp and cool but not finger-freezing cold, which is the best walking weather in my opinion. Once I got a little ways away from campus, I turned off the music and filmed my TheseFolk video- this week’s walk and vlog week, and what better time to do it, I wondered? I passed about five people while doing this, and they all gave me strange looks, but I’ve gotten to the point in my vlogging career that I don’t really care if people around me think I’m weird.

I got to my allergy shot a little bit early, which the lady at reception (who knows me pretty well by now) noted to me. I had to fill out a bit of new paperwork, though, so it all worked out.

I spent my 30 minutes post injection reading for my Advanced Creative Nonfiction class and writing To Do lists, since I’ve been forgetting a lot of things lately and I have too much on my plate to start forgetting things.

Then I walked back to campus in slightly hotter and much less comfortable weather, and stopped by the UC to get some coffee. There was a poster sale going on, so I browsed for a bit, then ran into the cute French exchange student that I’d been trying to get ahold of for a while. I told him about some upcoming speech and poetry events, and we coordinated so he would come into Portland with me and my poetry class this Sunday for the slam. I also got his number, which was, you know, the most important part of that story.

I had maybe an hour and a half, two hours now before my weight training class, so I spent it half asleep watching YouTube videos and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, because hey, a girl needs a break.

And then, it was time for weight training. That class is going to either kill me or make me the most ripped person ever. Even typing this blog is painful on my arms and hands, I’m so sore. This week in class we upped our weights and intensity, and I am most certainly feeling it. Good God am I feeling it.

Then I took a shower, got dressed, and finished editing the rant poem that was due in poetry, and printed it off for class. I went to said class, had a jolly good time because it’s taught by my favorite professor and I have several friends in there. When class ended, my professor talked to my friend Matt and I about possibly running a weekly open mic at a local coffee shop, and I said yes.

After class I stopped by the speech room to touch base with Colton about speech related things and to pick up some new pages for my interp book, then I went back to the dorm to make myself something for dinner before heading back out to the theater building for auditions.

I didn’t remember I had auditions until that morning at my allergy shot, when I’d checked my calendar for when I could schedule my next appointment, and honestly I barely remember agreeing to go to them. A friend of mine asked me to audition for the latest Lunchbox show (the student-run theater program that does performances under an hour during lunchtime and dinnertime), because she thought I’d be good for a particular part, and so I said yes. Don’t ask me why I thought it was a good idea to add another responsibility onto my plate, let alone another memorization responsibility, I have no idea. (for the record, the other things I have to memorize stuff for is poetry slams, since poems are better and more competitive when they’re memorized, and speech, since our first tournament is three weeks away and, incidentally, the week before Lunchbox shows)

Auditions were… different from what I expected. They had three short plays to cast, and I read for almost every part in all of them. The directors just kept handing me scripts. I played a Barney Stinson character, an addled party hostess, an angel, and a devil. I’ve never done anything like this- I’ve read plays aloud in class with goofy voices and I’ve had a grand total one speaking role on stage (in middle school, no less), but I’ve never actually read for parts. It’s terrifying. You only get a small section of the script, you have no idea what the character is like, past a sentence or two, and you have no context for what is going on. And yet you have to read your lines like you know all of this.

I think I did pretty well, overall, because I got a lot of laughs and nods of approval, and they never had any direction for me like they did some of the other actors. That’s a good thing, right?

Then I met Colton at the UC because he was hungry and didn’t want to go to dinner alone, and every single person I have a crush on at the moment was in the UC at that very time. It was like heaven. If you get to awkwardly stare at people from afar in heaven.

We had another hour or so until Ellen and I had an intramural soccer game, so we all just hung out and talked about our days. Then, the final thing of my day, soccer.

I am bad a soccer. Like, really bad. I haven’t played since I was nine. That’s eleven years and counting. I’m not a runner, I have almost zero coordination, and I fall over walking straight on cement, let alone running on turf without turf shoes. But Ellen’s team needed more girls, for sub purposes, so I stepped in last year.

And even though my understanding of soccer is still low, I’ve gotten a lot more confident lately. I play defense exclusively, and I’m actually not half bad. I’m not afraid of the ball, nor of the other players, so my specialty is coming out of nowhere and blocking goals. Last night we played, for a second time this season, the team on which the last person I kissed is. He’s kind of a raging douchebag, and like last game, I had it out for his blood. And blood, did I get. I have turf burn all down my left knee and shin but when I was on the field I did not let him by me. He might have some fancy footwork but I am short, solid, and unafraid of injury.

That’s kind of always been my sports philosophy- if you’re not good at any skill in particular (as I often wasn’t), just be aggressive and work really hard. I’m excited to be playing sports again. I missed them. I’m a full member of this soccer team now, and even though I’m clearly the least competent player on the team, I hustle and work my butt off and I am a wall. Come at me, bro. Just try.

My life is insane, and I love it. I love that in a day that I only have two classes I’m still scheduled for something nearly every hour. I’m not wasting my college career; I am experiencing it to the fullest. My roommates and I were joking last night that none of them would know each other without me, even though I’m the least sociable of all of them. And it’s true- I knew Ellen from Voyages, Colton from speech, and Dion from radio, and they’re all in wildly different majors and activities. And it’s also true that I have the least number of friends out of all three of them. But you know what? I couldn’t give a rats ass the number of friends I have, not any more. I’m a senior member of the speech team, a founding member of the slam poetry club, a regular attendee at a couple poetry slams, a cast member of an as-of-yet-undecided play on campus, a creative writing major, an editing and publishing minor, an integrated media minor, a regular at Maggie’s Buns, a blogger, a member of an international nerd collab channel, creator of Cooking with Gandalf, a videoblogger, a junior in college, a full-time member of an intramural soccer team, a Boxercast anchor and editor, a writing tutor, and an all-around badass. This isn’t middle school- your coolness isn’t measured by the mere quantity of friends- it’s measured by your willingness to do what you love and be who you are no matter how hard it is or how busy you are. My life is insane, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.