A few Odds and Ends

2 posts in one day! Gasp!  This isn't going to be my normal sort of update, but I just have a few things I want to throw out there.

1. I am slowly working on a new project.  It's going to be a web novel over at wordpress.com.  It won't be out for awhile, but if you want to check out what's to come go to

www.struckbylightningweb.wordpress.com

Like I said, I won't be updating it for awhile now, but go ahead and let me know what you think,

2. I was honored to find out that I have been awarded the Liebster Award by blogger Julz Perri from Fish and Frivolity.  I am honored that she has been reading my blog so closely and is inspired by what I post.  As part of gaining this award, I get to award 5 other bloggers with the award as well, a task I will be working on completing in the next week so look out for my nominations. 

Again, thank you Julz for this honor. 

I don't know what I did to deserve something like an award for my blog. Especially a blog where all I do is complain about my life (haha) but I am greatly appreciative of it and I am so glad people enjoy what I am doing. 

Thank you for all the support and thank you for coming on this journey with me. 

Until next time.
-Kat

Reconsidering Everything

I know I haven't written a blog in what seems like a lifetime, and I could make some sort of excuse for it, but I'm not going to. Point blank, I haven't felt like writing a blog post. That's that. 

But lately things in life have gotten to a strange point where I can't help but want to run away and hid from everything.  My job, my friends, my parents, my social life, everything.  I'm currently hidden away in the lab I work in with the door shut and locked hoping that no one will come in here and that I can finally have a few moments of peace.  But I know as soon as I open that door, I'll have to face the problems of my life all over again.  They're not just going to vanish. 

I'm reconsidering a lot of choices that I've made lately.  Am I doing the right thing? What's going to result of my choices? Those kind of things.  Maybe it's the fact that suddenly, out of no where, I'm growing up.  Which in itself if an odd sensation that I've never before had the pleasure of really knowing.  Maybe I'm realizing that my choices effect me even more than they did before, or maybe I'm just becoming more scared of life as I grow older.

Situation One includes a bird in which the lab I work in is rehabilitating.  I'll be completely honest, if I could do anything in the world with this biology degree I'm getting, it would be bird rehab, but I honestly don't want to go vet school anymore.  So of course, when my professor asked me if I wanted to rehab the bird, I jumped at the opportunity.  My parents, however, are not so happy.  I'm having second thoughts about bringing this bird into my house, where I have a cat and parents who don't want the bird.  Honestly, I don't even know how to take care of a bird.  I don't know what I'm going to have to fed it, what its going to be living in, if it's going to get out and try to fly around my brother's room (the room I am keeping it in since the brother moved out last month) or even my house.  There are just so many unanswered questions that I have that make me too nervous to even be sure I want to take care of this bird for a week and a half.  Plus my parents are unhappy with me wanting to do this, and I honestly can't blame them.  Neither of them are bird people, and my cat certainly isn't a fan of birds.  So what am I supposed to do besides sit here and question my choice?  This bird comes home with me in about two hours and then who knows what will happen.  I have no idea what I am supposed to do. 

The second situation seems like a no brainer, but when you break it down, it's the most complicated decision I have had to face yet. 

Two weeks ago, I was accepted into a program to study overseas in New Zealand for Spring of 2013 (Spring here, summer/fall there).  Of course, it's the most exciting information I've ever received and I wouldn't have applied if I didn't want to go, but now that the trip is actually within my reach, I'm questioning even going.

The list of Pros of going in long enough for it to seem like I should be going. It's basically a once in a life time opportunity.  I'm going to finally have the chance to live away from home, in a place completely new to me, and I'm going to get to travel around places of the world I normally wouldn't get to see.  Just do it, right?

I have reserves.  I have a lot going on here, back at home right now which make it tough enough for me to leave for more than a week at a time.  I have this research I'm doing, and I'm afraid if I leave I'm going to miss out on so much of it.  I'll miss presentations, I'll miss papers being written, I'll miss the chance to spend a summer out in the field again.  I haven't even told my research prof I am going yet; I am just way to nervous to tell her I'm going to be leaving for 5 months when we already have such a good flow of things going.

I have my reserves about the school I'll be going to as well.  For starters, I won't know if I get housing until before I leave to go.  Applying for housing is scary enough for someone who's never had to do it, but to not even know what kind of housing you're going to get is even worse.  I can't cook so if I have to live in an apartment style housing complex, I am doomed.  Also, I am not going to be even able to schedule my classes until I am in New Zealand. So I won't know if any of my classes will transfer.  I honestly would love to graduate on time.

I know it seems like a no brainer, but I'm really just afraid I'm going to miss so much here if I leave.  I'll miss opportunity I have here and things that could be very important to a career I may want.  But then again if I go I might discover myself in new and exciting ways. 

I don't know what to do with myself anymore.  Hiding seems like a great choice.  No one has to know where I am, or what I'm doing there. I can just be by myself to escape the world.  Maybe into a book, or a story I'm writing, or a movie I haven't seen yet.  That's all I want to do right now.  I just want to escape.

Goodbye Alice In Wonderland

I used to think I had this firm grasp of reality.  I could separate my own little fantasy world from the truth of what was around me.  I prided myself on that fact.  And because of that, I thought I had something special that the rest of the world was lacking. 

It seems to me that college has started to form me in ways that I’m not sure I really like, especially in the past year.  I feel like I’ve started to turn to fantasy to cope with the stress and the fact that, despite how much I don’t think I’m ready, I have to grow up.  The perfect way to explain it is that I’m Alice and, despite the fact that I don’t want to, I’m slowly slipping into wonderland. 

Yes I have this fear of growing up and getting a job and living on my own and being my own individual, but I am almost positive that it’s something that everyone at my age feels.  I for one think that 20 is far too young to be deciding what you want to do with the rest of your life because despite what we have been exposed to already, we are all still so naïve.  Many of us don’t know what’s out there in the world and what it has to offer.  Most of us only now about where we’re from and what’s around it and what we’ve learned from media of other places, and let’s be honest, even that’s a really rough picture painted of things that are mostly false. 

I don’t know how anyone else copes with this growing up thing, but for me, lately, I’ve been working really hard to just avoid it.  I ignore emails, I ignore phone calls, I disappear for periods of time.  Basically, it’s just what it sounds like.  I’m slipping into my own version of Wonderland, and to be honest, it’s not as great as Alice made it out to be.  I sleep more than I’m awake anymore, yet I am still ALWAYS tired.  I don’t care about school anymore, although I still am trying to do well, I just am not pushing myself as much as I have in the past.  It would be pretty simple to draw that I’m depressed, that much is obvious, although I have no reason to be such.  Things are going well here, and it’s actually been sunny in Erie, although that hardly makes me hate this place yet.

I think I am just ready for a change in scenery, and Wonderland has been my way to get it.  To watch one of your best friends be in Italy, while you are stuck being in the same place you’ve been for 20 years takes it toll eventually I guess.  I just keep reminding myself that one year from now I’ll be in her shoes and I’ll be having my own adventures.  I just have to keep my head up, work hard, and get there.

With that said, I am going to have to take a seriously hard look at my life and remind myself of the truths in which I once so firmly believed.

1.       There is a firm difference between dreaming and pretending.  I can’t keep pretending that I can make a career out of something that is never going to happen like if I move away to LA and do film or writing.  It just isn’t going to happen.  I am perfectly happy with biology.  In fact I love it.  It might be hard at some points, but it’s the only thing I really like next to writing, and there is so much I can do with it even if I don’t want to go to Vet school.  Yes, I can still write.  I would never give that up. But at some point I have to face the fact that it’s not the career for me.  I don’t have the means to become a writer full time, and that’s okay.  I will be happy doing what I am doing and I will still be able to use writing and reading as a means of release from hard days, so long as it doesn’t at any point become my entire world. 

2.       I need to start reorganizing myself so I don’t get over stressed out and fall into a world I don’t want to be in.  I need to seriously live by my planner, and even have two of them if I need to, so long as I keep them updated.  It seems like I don’t handle stress well.  I don’t know how to handle situations when I have a lot going on, and I sleep when I am too stressed which only makes me more stressed.

3.       I need to start fixing my sleep schedule.  I am a total nocturnal, and whereas that fits me well, it hurts me too.  I am always tired during the day and have trouble getting up in the morning and being alert during the day.  I need to be alert for classes and alert for life.  I can’t afford not to be.  I need to sleep earlier and longer. End of story.

4.       I don’t have to grow up now.  There’s no reason to.  But I do need to start considering what kind of an adult I want to be.  And that comes with experience and knowledge.  That means I can’t let little things get me down.  I have to learn how to brush off and get back on the trail.  I have to learn how to balance who I am with who I want to be and getting there.  I have to learn who I want to be through the trial and error process, but not let the error get to me. Hey, it happens. 

I have to crawl out of the rabbit hole now.  I can’t stay there forever.   It’s not doing me any good now.  I can’t sit around and let my soul die.  I have to be able to bounce back, and that is what I plan to start being able to do.  So Goodbye Alice In Wonderland. It’s been nice, but it’s time I move on.  This is my life.  Not yours. 

The journey is going. I’ve hit some rocky roads, and it looks like there are plenty more to come, but I have to remember to keep my mind open to them.  No blindfolds, no rabbit holes.  Just me.  Just the road ahead and the destination that has yet to be revealed. I’m ready.

If it's a job, it's a job...

The thing about being away for so long is that I’ve had plenty to actually write about, I just haven’t had the time or the energy to write it.  There’s been plenty on my mind, plenty of growing points, but I just haven’t been able to bring myself to write them down.  With that said, I am forcing myself to write a series of small updates about how the semester has gone so far and what my life has been.  It is completely uninspired so you don’t even have to read it because to be honest, I doubt its going to be that interesting. 

For starters I guess I should start with work or something equally as uninteresting but totally relevant to my life... 

I’m still working at the dreaded veterinarian office.  In which the simple solution this this dreaded job would be to quit, it’s certainly not an easy task.  Yes I hate it at points, I really do, but there are days that it goes well.  There are days I learn things.  There are days that I enjoy what I do.  But honestly, I think the bad days far outweigh those.  I certainly don’t love it.  I hate waking up at 7am on a Saturday.  I hate constantly getting yelled at.  I hate not getting to learn knew things and try things.  Basically, it’s just not the job for me.  But I have been given such an amazing opportunity by getting to work there.  If you think about it, I’m not educated in this field whereas the other techs went to school for a couple years to learn what they were doing.  I got hired so that way I would get the experience.  And over Christmas break my boss, the veterinarian I work for, wrote a note with my Holiday Bonus (another awesome perk of the job by the way), that she was looking forward to working with me after vet school, which to me meant she was planning to give me a job.  So how can I just walk in there and quit?  How can I just drop everything they have given me when they never had to do any of that?  They never had to stick their necks out for me and yet they did.  It’s going to be even harder for me if I don’t end up going to vet school I am sure.  After two years of working there I feel like if I don’t go to school I have wasted their time and their money when they could have had someone who was actually good at working there working instead.   I feel so obligated to them that it makes life rather difficult sometimes.

Yesterday though I started with my research project.  When I say started I mean I got a tour of the lab and some research materials to read up on and research further.  I am really nervous about starting this project since I have to come up with the experiment processes and the work by myself.  It’s a new territory I have yet to be exposed to, and to be 100% truthful, I’m not sure if I’ll be any good at it.  I know all I need is a little confidence, but it’s all just so new to me that I’m unsure about any of it really.  I do know one thing for sure, I am excited to get to start the work.  I walked in yesterday and got called the “Ornithologist” and THAT was seriously one of the best feelings ever.  I felt like I was something special because no one else at this school (or anyone I have met as of yet) is that.  But as it goes, I haven’t started into my research, that will be a weekend task, but I certainly hope that it ends up going well.  I guess we can only cross our fingers and hope that I end up loving it.  I get to work with birds, measuring shell densities and thickness and such, so we can study bacterial effects.  Its something completely new to me, that’s for sure.  I’ll have to make sure to update on how it goes.  I’ll just have to make sure to update more often (I’ll shoot for tomorrow but I have loads of work to be getting done this weekend).

Next post will hopefully be about casual dating and relationships.  We’ll see.  Haha.

For now I have to go study for the exam I have later today.  And get coffee.  I definitely need some coffee right now.

The Things I do During Biology Tests Amaze Me.

So today during my biology test, in which I was epically failing so it’s no surprise that my mind began to stray.  For example, I began to think about what exactly it is that I want to do with the rest of my life.  Not exactly biology test sort of topic, but when it comes to my life, it does include biology, so I guess it was somewhat time appropriate.

I’ve known for awhile that I really want to work with birds, but as this biology class I am in has passed I’ve started to find out what about ecological research I am interested in and what I am not interested in.  Whereas I always pictured myself being really interested in interactions between birds and other species, while we were learning about that in class, I really wasn’t interested. 

Maybe this is my NaNoWriMo talking since it has a lot to do with genetics and evolution and such, but I have found myself really interested in genetics and evolution.  I truly enjoyed that topic, and I did really well in the part that we learned about it.   So its gotten me thinking lately that I might actually be interested in studying birds and their evolutionary changes and their genetic code if I could find a grad school doing research like that or if the research was even available to do it.

 It surprises me daily how much I can learn about myself in one day.  How one biology class can affect my life forever.  I get to realize daily that I have so many options for life and what I am going to do outside school.   

So maybe I bombed my biology test today, I still did decent, and at the same time I discovered something about myself.  In the end, I guess I had a very productive morning without even realizing it.

But what am I doing here posting a blog. It’s November! I have a novel that needs writing and I should be doing that.

I glimps into the mind of a 17 year old me

Since NaNoWriMo is quickly approaching I have been going through some past novels.  I guess this sort of goes along with the finding myself thing because back when I was 17 it wasn't so much that I knew who I was, it was that I knew who I wasn't.  My novel that year focused around the story of me finding who I didn't want to be.  Back then I was facing a lot of changes in my life, and I bore through it all with minimal damage. 

This is an excert from my 2008 novel.  It's probably one of my favorite pieces of my writing thus far.  I am actually really proud of it and I just wanted to post something here since Tuesday starts the crazy life of a NaNoWriMo novelist.

(Note that this is fully unedited.  Hey, come on, it was Novemeber, who edits!!!)

Taken from NaNoWriMo 2008 "The Italian Bracelet" (unedited)

I would sit and watch as the children at the house next door played. They would jump on their trampoline and they would laugh and sing and be happy together. I learned a hood could hide someone for a short amount of time. My hoods hid my insecurities for some time and I would sit every day and watch the little kids jump around on their trampolines while I sat outside on my deck cold. They were carefree. I longed to be carefree. I longed to be able to jump with them, my hair down catching the wind as I coming plummeting back down to the springy surface of the trampoline. The neighbor girl was maybe eight her brother was a year younger than me in age and six years younger than me in maturity. He still went outside and played and had fun with his friends. I never did that. I hadn’t done that since I was in the fifth grade. Whether it was because I had grown up or because people decided they no longer liked me was suddenly in question every day I watched them bounce. The never knew I watched, they were too caught up in their laughing and fooling. I was jealous. I wish I could be my age, and like the neighbor boy have no cares in the world even when there was homework to be done and papers to be written.

Realizations can happen at the weirdest time. We talk about society every day in history class, and on some days, I actually do take in what my crazy teacher is telling me. I actually go home and think about it. As I watch the neighbor girl jump I watch as she grows tired. The same way I had grown tired dealing with the world around me. The way I grew tired jumping through hoops to be with my best friend when she had other interests. The neighbor girl would then proceed to sit down on the spring surface and spread herself out. She was hot from jumping all that time and she tired. It was time for a break. Was that what was going on in my life? Was I just on a break from my old clique? Was I going to get back up and continue jumping again and go on like nothing happened? That’s what everyone would tell me. They would say we were just petty girls. That was true. We were petty. We were girls. But I never believed for a second that we were petty girls fighting. This time was different we were fighting over more than just a boy. And maybe we weren’t fighting at all. Maybe we were disagreeing. I think there is a fine line between fighting and disagreeing. Disagreements can lead to unseen points. I did not see her point and she did not see mine. We no longer saw eye to eye, we saw heads butting heads. I didn’t think this was going to be one of those times that I could get up and continue to bounce as if nothing happened. I think the trampoline broke under the pressure of our disputing and unstable ideas of one another.

The trampoline could be taken other ways as well. Laziness maybe. Was it that I was possibly too lazy to fix my relationship with my “best friend” and so I just laid down and gave up? I don’t think I ever gave up. I just stopped trying. There was little point to it. But maybe that is how all of society is. We work for so long and we push ourselves to the limit and then all we have to be lazy and take a break. Too lazy to fix out problems, too lazy to make dinner, too lazy to do our homework, that was society, and that was how we all functioned. The working class was being laid off left and right and we were becoming lazy because we didn’t want to work to find a new job. So we sit in front of our televisions everyday and watch reruns of old shows from the 90s. That is one exciting way to live life. I wasn’t lazy or I tried not to be. I tried to do my work, I tried to do my chores, I tried to fix my problems, but sometime those problems either didn’t want to be fixed or couldn’t be fixed. I wasn’t lazy. I worked my ass off instead of sitting on it all day. Society blames the world for it’s problems. I know better than that. When I have a problem, I know it is my problem. I try to put in on myself. I try to fix it. I’m not lazy. I should still be on that trampoline jumping up and down like a little child. I want to be like a little child.

Growing up is a hard thing to do. I never wanted to do it. Who would really want to? It’s a lot to take on. And I don’t mean growing up physically and by age, I mean mentally. I always wanted to stay in that childhood world where we could fly and where we could be anything that we wanted to be. But truth be told, we can’t be what we want. I will never be the president of the United States, nor will I ever want to be. I will never be an actress even though I’ve always dreamed of it. But I wanted to remain as a child. There was something about that dream land that made life seem …less depressing. But truth had to come out eventually, and we all have to grow up at some point. Well, most of us. Some of us cling as long as we possibly can to the little last bit of a dream we have. The world that was created for ourselves. A world of green skies and blue grass, or a world of magic and magicians where nothing in the world came over come the strongest of warriors. Or my favorite, our own fairy tales. Everyone had a prince in mind, and every dreamed of having that prince whisk them off their feet someday. I, myself, had a fair share of people I imagined to be prince charming, but after years of heartbreak and disappointment, I learned that there was little to no point in trying to have a prince charming. Things like that, fairy tales, didn’t exist. It was pointless of me to pretend that they did. We all had to grow up at some point and come with realization that things weren’t what we wanted them to be. I found myself having troubles with those facts. I wanted things to go back to normal. I wished that I could travel back in time and change what happened with our fight. I wished that our fight had never happened, but it did and that was reality and I had to live with it.

I liked to think I was different from the general society. I wasn’t lazy in the fact that the fight happened and I couldn’t change it. I wasn’t really lazy about it at all. I just didn’t want to get up and fix what couldn’t be fixed. Like the rest of society, I grew tired of jumping on the trampoline at one point or another, and I knew that getting up was almost pointless. I knew that I had fallen hard enough that getting up would take more energy than falling down and staying down.

Somewhere along the journey I’ve lost myself

This to say the least has been one of the worst and most confusing semesters of my entire life.  I have really been struggling lately with figuring out who I am and what I want to be, and along the line I really fear that I have only become what I never wanted to be.  I fear that I have lost myself along this journey.  That in this process of finding who I am, I’ve gone astray and gotten lost on some side road I never should have gone down in the first place.

I’ve always prided myself on the fact that I am different from the crowd.  I’m not a hipster by any means, but it could be argued that I am very close to it.  I don’t want to be like the popular crowd.  I take the road less traveled by.  Now it’s no surprise that along with college comes clubs and organizations and sports and sororities and fraternities.  Every girl that I had known from high school who joined a sorority changed for the worse.  I always promised myself I was never going to join a sorority.  There were better ways to meet people, cheaper ways, and with sororities came too many rules, and I am far from being one for rules.  Freshmen year my mom actually wanted me to join a sorority.  I told her no, and I was adamant about that choice. 

This year I think I became possessed by some strange virus that caused my brain to turn to mush and all the things I was so headstrong about to go flying out the window.  It started with just one requirement event.  One little meet and greet.  Which turned into a week of social events, which lead to “pledging” which led to a member in training class, which, in about two weeks, is going to lead to a full on membership.  Now, it’s not like anyone forced me to join.  No one held a knife to my throat and demanded that I join; I did it on my own.  Obviously I liked something about it.  It’s a service sorority, and I do miss my old days of Girl Scouts, but it really does make me wonder. 

Any of my friends that I have told about the fact that I joined a sorority tell me that its unlike me.  They never pictured me as a sorority girl.  And often at social events and get togethers, I see it myself.  I’m not the same as most of the girls, I like them, but the things we have in common are small and I act like the shy one who sits in the corner a lot.  Then again, that’s just me in any social setting really.  But one thing is for sure: it really isn’t like me.

Maybe it’s part of growing.  Maybe I am not who I always thought I am.  Maybe expanding my horizons is what I need to help me on this journey.  Some nights I am okay with the fact that I joined, other nights I question why.  I have fun with the girls.  We get along, most of us. (I’m not a people person after all).  I’m not sure what things will happen in the future with this sorority thing.  It’s a road I certainly never intended to take.

But that’s not the least of my struggles currently. 

I never intend on getting married, and for the longest time I never intended on dating.  I didn’t want to waste my time about it.  And back when I thought that, I was 100% happy with myself.  I felt independent and in control of my life.  I was me and I didn’t need anyone to tell me otherwise. 

I’ve become broken.  I’m not as strong as I once was.  I wish I was.  I find myself falling into crushes these days, two boys particularly that I go in-between, one of which who doesn’t know I like him (and I’d like to keep it that way) and the other that is too dumb to ask me out (which actually might be okay).  So what’s the problem right?  I obviously don’t have to worry about dating these days so just get over it and move on with life: be strong again.  It’s not that simple really. 

When the opportunity to go on a date comes around I can’t help but think to myself that I’m lonely and I have to say yes because if I don’t give someone a chance maybe I’ll miss out on something.  But really if it’s not something I want in the first place, what am I really going to miss out on?  I still don’t have a plan to get married.  I don’t have time to date.  I don’t have the energy to put into myself let alone someone else.  Yet I can’t seem to say no because something pulls on my heart every time. 

I don’t believe in love.  I don’t believe in a lot of things actually.  Mostly these days I don’t believe in myself.  I don’t believe that I have the strength to be me anymore.  I feel lost in my own world.  I feel like I don’t control myself anymore.  I feel like everything is out of my control and that I have to give into the world around me.  I don’t want that.  I want to stand tall and by myself.  I want to be that independent woman that I used to be.  Because without that person I have nothing to search for.

I have this semester, tried too many times to just lie down and give up because I have lost my own strength.  I’m certainly not who I used to be, and I would give anything to be able to go back to those old days. 

I feel like I need to give myself another promise like I did in my last entry oh so many months ago.  So here I go.   I promise myself that I will be strong.  I will not let any man, any women, or any object stand in the way of who I am and the journey to find what I want.  This journey thus far is about me, myself and I, and those who want to come along can come along as journeyers next to me, not as part of me.   I promise to be an independent woman with original ideas and world changing thoughts.  I will not be pulled down.  I promise I will not forget who my true friends are.  I promise I will not get lost again.  I will take the path less followed but I will not take it blindfolded.  This is my battle.