So this week- well this year really- has consisted of a lot of sleeping and time alone sitting around with Nomad Cleopatra (who is, by the way, the best dog anyone could ever ask for), and obviously (me being me) I've been thinking about a lot, and have even come to a few realizations...

For one, I never thought that last year would be my last year at home. If I would have known this, I may have taken more advantage of the fact that it was the last year of my life that I call myself a part of an actual family. I guess I have always just relied on the fact that there was always more time, and that even when time was running short I still had another year, and another year, and another year...until I really did have just one more year, only it wasn't to be spent as expected. I acknowledge the fact that I have my entire life ahead of me for a legitimate family atmosphere (although at this point that vocation is looking more and more unlikely, especially considering the fact that the world is most likely ending in a few years) and am by no means implying that I would rather live a life filled with animosity and pain than one that is perhaps a bit lonely at times. I also realize that I should just appreciate everything that I have, and I hate myself everyday for not having the ability to do so.

Since I was a child I've listened to everyone lecture me on the fact that I don't respond to change in the way that I am supposed to--either too easily embracing it or not responding at all, as if I were supposed to alter everything about myself to adjust to the temporary environment. The thing that I could never understand was what the point was in adjusting, or even acknowledging, what was a mere transition period between the past and the future. Lately (it took me long enough) I've come to realize that all of this confusion was a simple misunderstanding. Not everyone, or really anyone, sees change as temporary. This simple realization has allowed me to understand a lot of other abnormal perceptions that I was graced with at birth--and, well, it explains a lot. A few examples:

-I have never understood the significance of death, and often find myself amazed at the extravagant measures that people go to to comfort themselves after someone that they love has passed away. In fact, I have always just assumed with everyone else that I was just an unsympathetic, cold-hearted person who doesn't care enough to empathize with others in tough situations. But this isn't the case at all- quite the contrary actually. I empathize too much, to the point where I find myself in that person's situation--only in that situation I react quite differently, so it just leaves me bewildered and frusterated, like nothing that i can think of is capable of comforting the person. I've always worried about this because it seems like a lot of times the more I try to help in those types of situations the more I tend to offend--which in turn frustrates me to the point that I get defensive and can even seem disputatious. Maybe this is all one big excuse for actually BEING disputatious, but again I really don't think so.

-Birthdays. Im sorry, but they're dumb. Congratulations you have gone another 365 days without dying? It just doesn't make sense to me. The world keeps spinning and because it does so 1/365th of the population is deserving of presents and attention? Call me a Jehova, but I don't get it.

-Dating. I'm sorry that I take into consideration that everything comes to an end. This doesn't mean that I don't trust and it certainly doesn't mean that I don't care. All it means is that I'm not going to get carried away by temporary things, understand grudges or "breaks" (because all they do is take up the little time that two people are able to share in amiable friendship), or let the little things get to me. In my opinion, it's a considerate, efficient way of handling things- but I understand that to others it seems untrustworthy, careless and disrespectful, and I'm sorry about that too.

And the list could keep going and going, and hell I would probably even come to realize a whole lot more about myself, but I won't. I don't see that as my job and I refuse to waste my time trying to appease others. It seems like this attitude would piss a lot of people off, and it does, but what I do know is that everyone who calls me a friend accepts me for who I am and that's enough for me. I don't even know where this note began and I don't know where it will end but that's just the way life is. It's impossible to predict. It's painful and it's incredible and its temporary...but it's real. And I guess that's all we can expect from it- all we can expect from each other.

So if sickness is holding me back so be it. Maybe I am missing 1/9th of the first semester of my senior year, but maybe others have missed a whole lot more of their lives, lost in unrealistic expectations or spent waiting for something that is never going to come.

I guess all I'm trying to say is that pity is unnecessary, grudges are a waste of time and it's about time that a lot more people begin to truly live. How's that for a concluding paragraph? I've never been one for those anyways....