on learning

Here is a list of things I have learned so far that I think are important or noteworthy:

(1) Always drink water after a long night of drinking. You will be glad for it in the morning.
(2) Always wear your seat belt.
(3) Never drink and dial.
(4) Be kind to everyone.
(5) Be kind to everyone, but take care of your heart first and foremost.
(6) Everything tastes better with hot sauce.
(7) Always check your blind spot.
(8) It's better to be safe than sorry.
(9) Push yourself.
(10) Push yourself, but know your limits.
(11) Wear sunscreen.

on pride, part ii

I used to think that love meant that you were willing to swallow your pride for your significant other, taking one for the proverbial team (“team” meaning the relationship). And it is, to an extent. I think most people are stubborn in their own ways, whether it’s about giving up useless hobbies or toxic friends, or submitting in a fight. The most fundamental reason why people fight in relationships is that each side believes in their infallibility, and their refusal to admit any wrong prevails over reason. But naturally, fights can be subjective, or words can be misconstrued, or a simple miscommunication can evolve into a bitter struggle over who’s right and who’s wrong.

These fights, while inconvenient, frustrating, or even heart-wrenching, are also, unfortunately, an inevitable and vital facet of a real relationship. I think it’s important to fight sometimes so that each person can discover what makes the other tick; what angers them and why; and how they respond to duress. Ultimately, when you fight with your significant other, you see what kind of person they are – not because it exposes what initially angers them, but because it reveals how they react in the face of conflict. Thus, in a fight, I think you should not only to take some time to see the situation for what it is and acknowledge that you’re wrong if you’re wrong, but you should also just swallow your pride once in a while and admit defeat in the name of love.

However, if these moments of strong heart and weak resolve occur more often than not, there’s a chance that you’re losing yourself in the relationship. It’s indicative that you’re not just swallowing your pride once in a while; it might just mean that you’re swallowing your self-worth. It means that you are admitting that you have more faith in someone else’s beliefs than your own, and there’s really no pride to take in that. The more I dissect and analyze relationships, the more I realize that they’re remarkably difficult balancing acts – tip the scale in one direction and you’re both headed for the ground. And that may have easily been the cheesiest metaphor I’ve ever used, but it’s true.

on heartbreak

Most people recover and move on with their lives; a few don't, and shrivel into a miserable existence and eventual demise; and some just secretly harbor their anguish and carry the broken pieces around with them in the pocket of their souls.

on novelty

It's funny how jaded people can become with time. Or disillusioned. When I was 13, a walk around my neighborhood on a crisp fall afternoon with a Discman (I think these were pre-iPod days) full of good music was all I really needed to be happy. And when I was 16, a Friday night drive in the summer with the windows down and music up sufficed (for the most part). Looking back now, life seemed so simple then, mainly because I didn't know anything yet. I tolerated my family; I hated school; I loved music; and I just wanted to hang out with my friends. I don't know when things got so complicated and how I experienced so much that anything could trigger nostalgia or painful memories. It seems like anything that reminds me of the past either forces me into a wistful haze, leaving me wanting to go back to another time; or it forces me to relive an experience so unpleasant that I just want to forget it ever happened. It shouldn't be so difficult to be happy in the present -- to bask in the here and now. I think a lot of it has to do with desensitization as people grow older; the more people experience a certain feeling or event, the more they take it for granted and it loses its novelty.

I can't say I want to go back to a time when I was happy because I didn't know any better. Instead, I just want to appreciate things for what they're really worth. And I want to experience that novelty again; but this time, I'll hold onto it for a little while longer.

on girlfriends

I’ve never had a lot of girlfriends. Growing up, I wasn't really interested in painting my nails or talking about boys; even now, I’m still more interested in playing videogames or talking about music. Attribute it to my childhood rife with Power Rangers and pogs, or my aversion to idle chit-chat or petty drama, but it’s always been easier for me to forge and maintain friendships with the opposite sex (purely platonic though, of course). Even when I started dating, that mindset remained the same and I didn’t see anything wrong with it until recently.

I think it’s safe to say that I was feeling pretty lost after I graduated college last year. Several big chapters in my life had ended, forcing me to lose some friends in the process, all the while losing more friends to other situational circumstances. I like to think that I'm pretty good at making friends, but I’ve always found it extremely difficult to maintain those friendships, or to foster them into deeper relationships. And with the strains of distance and time, I was left without any close ties, apart from my family, and felt extremely lost.

By chance, however, I met a couple girls through a mutual friend at the start of the summer. I didn’t think much of the encounter initially but it eventually led to some real friendships. I’ve had several close girlfriends in the past, but never such a solid group of them before. I soon found myself having more fun than I’d had in a very long time (albeit drinking much more), and it was nice to feel lost in the fun for a while. It was the much-needed distraction I had been waiting for. And what started as a carefree distraction turned into an actual commitment. I actually wanted my friends to know what I was doing and how I was feeling, and I was (and still am!) genuinely interested in their well-being. When I moved to Springfield and everyone else parted their professional and academic ways, I thought the looming strain of distance and time would strike again. But it didn’t.

In a way, my newfound friends saved me last summer. And in the same way, they continue to save me. As much as I hate being isolated in Springfield, I have that much more reason to return home now. And I really can’t ask for any more than that. I complained in an earlier post that I needed a Zooey Deschanel typecast figure in my life, but I guess I already have that.

on moving and staying

Sometimes in certain moments of weakness, I wish that I could pack up a few of my meager belongings and move to another state without looking back. My top choices would be California, Maine, or Minnesota (don’t ask). And I’ll daydream about what I could purge my life of here and the refreshing new life I could make for myself somewhere else; the new, fascinating people I could meet; the hobbies and skills I could cultivate.

When I first moved to Springfield, I thought an 11-month stint in this foreign town could/would act as a precursor to my future endeavors (when my dreams were still a feigned reality). Even before any real heartbreak entered my life, I’d always wanted to move away to a place where I didn’t know anyone and could reinvent myself. However, my time here has shown me that that isn’t always the case. Sometimes you just can’t change who you are or whom you’ll miss. The underlying sentiment remains the same: I could never leave my family and I wouldn’t ever want to leave my friends. And in the more recent months, I’ve also come to terms with the inevitability of my future, and the very limited scope of that future.

There exists a fine line between whim and reality, like the line between frivolity and practicality. Every time I start thinking about moving to California and starting a new life, I force myself to cogitate on the next three years of my life and what that kind of commitment will demand. Just last summer, I typed up a long list of law schools in California, hoping and willing myself to apply and anticipate acceptances. But there was a moment -- I’m not sure when it was or how it came about -- when I realized that what I really needed wasn’t a weak possibility of a dream realized, but that I needed a real, tangible, future plan. And so I applied to law schools according to that plan. So far, I believe it's the right choice (at least, 94% of the time), despite its generally solidifying my place of residence to be Chicago for the next decade of my life.

I still slip into moments in which I daydream about leaving; I can’t really help it. But the more I figure out who I am and what I want and what I ultimately need, the more I realize that I need to stay in this blistering, two-seasons-a-year state, at least for a while. I should really revisit Sufjan Stevens and his albums about the Midwest...

on pride, part i

Here is a list of my more recent accomplishments, from the order of "I am SO proud of this" to "I am kind of proud of this":

(1) flossing regularly. This is something that I have been wrestling with since I was six years old. I don't know why but I always lived by the doctrine of "brush now; floss later, and by later, I mean never."
(2) quitting smoking. I don't think I need to describe the gravity of this feat. Six full weeks and going strong.
(3) decidedly trying to break the habit of nail-biting, my long and faithful companion for over a decade.
(4) subsisting on fish, milk, cereal, coffee, Red Bull, and absolutely no real-life human interaction this weekend.
(5) becoming very knowledgable about the NBA. I never realized how fun/exciting watching basketball can be. Or how much it will impress people if I tell them what Danny Granger's ACT score was (30), or why Derrick Rose couldn't play for Memphis after one year of college (illegitimate SAT score and his brother had been travelling with the team for free).

"on pride, part ii" to come later. This post was about the pride of accomplishments in a blithe sense; the next post will focus more on pride in terms of swallowing it.

on puppy love

Whenever I see a couple that has weathered through many years and different transitional periods of life (high school, college, graduate school, etc.), I always wonder how that success came to be. Did these people just know who they were and what they wanted from an early age, never waning in their decisions on life partner? Or are they just immature and so cluelessly ignorant that they are just settling for whoever found them first? Obviously the latter is the less desirable option, but there is some truth to the cliché "ignorance is bliss." Sometimes I wonder if I'd prefer being ignorant and happy, as opposed to self-realized and miserable. There has to be some type of happy medium in this story, but I haven't figured it out yet. In any case, couples of the former description, I applaud you.

on zooey

I really like Zooey Deschanel. I don't know if it's because she can sing well; or because she's married to Ben Gibbard; or if it's because of the characters she always plays. She's kind of a static actress; she always plays that weird girl who saves people from themselves. But I love that. I love watching her movies because I love seeing that kind of salvation happen; but at the same time, I hate it because it hasn't happened to me. Yet.

"But she would just grimace, wash the thumb clean under the tap, wrap the thumb in a paper towel and keep cutting, while the blood slowly soaked through the paper towel, crawling, as blood crawls, outward from the wound's wet center."

on impressing/losing your friends

The aforementioned list is proving to be more difficult to write than I thought, so I will instead entertain you all with a list of my burgeoning useless talents:

-using vibrato whilst whistling
-chugging beer at an abnormally quick rate
-editing friends’ essays for free
-eating an inordinate amount of watermelon in one sitting
-playing Scrabble
-making a nice conversation real awkward, real fast
-playing Guitar Hero and Rock Band

These aren't so much talents as they are hobbies that no one cares about. Once in a while, though, I can impress someone by combining some of them. For instance, getting a perfect score on an expert Guitar Hero song while chugging a pint of beer and then playing a 140 pt word in Scrabble? That could be impressive...or just really sad.

"harder, better, faster, stronger"

This post is a bit personal, but I figure it’s okay for me to post it since I only have four followers (not that each and every one of you aren’t important).

I think I’ve always known that happier doesn’t always mean better. When I began college, I was in a long-distance relationship with relatively zero commitment besides monogamy, so I spent my freshman year forging lots of platonic friendships and learning to do things on my own. During this year, I spent every other day reflecting on who I was as a person and trying to improve myself (ad nauseam). I don’t think I’ve ever known a person as contemplative as I was when I was 18. So when I started dating someone new after my freshman year and found myself in a constant state of pure bliss, I knew that I wasn’t becoming a better person; I was content and consequently, stagnant as a person. But I was happy, for a very long time. However, even during those subsequent years of intoxicating happiness, I would break for a moment every so often and realize that I’m settling; not settling on the person I loved, but settling on the person I was. I became a part of another person before I ever had a chance to figure out who I was. And so after these groundbreaking moments, I would decide that from there on out, I would be an individual primarily, and then be in a relationship secondly. But my self-control and resolve have never been laudable, and I would always sink back into the precarious arms of relationship bliss.

That isn’t to say that I never grew from the relationship. I think the best part about the first year was that we matured a lot together. I learned to communicate, to resolve issues, and to sacrifice more during this year than any year prior. It’s just that after that year, I became complacent with who I was because I was happy – and why would I need to change if I was happy? But all things must come to an end – both good and bad – and so, when the relationship ended, I was devastated but I knew that I needed to grow up if I ever wanted that relationship, or any other, to work in the future.

This past year has been the most unique and difficult yet oddly beneficial year of my life. I don’t think I’ve ever been so miserable before, but this kind of misery is what makes people grow up and become better people. The most prominent people in history are the ones who have endured relentless hardships yet still emerged at the top. Not to say that my pain or difficulties are at that same level, but have any of you ever lived in Springfield, IL? Not even Blagojevich wanted to live here, and he was the governor.

In my next post, I will address what I believe it means to be a better person and the attributes that that kind of epithet entails.