Today, I stayed home and went through my desk, which is coincidentally where I'm sitting typing this all out right now. For years this desk has been my dumping ground of sorts, for anything and everything without a place. Textbooks, other books, random papers, trinkets. You get the idea. Never once in the four years that I've had this desk have I used it for its real purpose: work. Well, writing. So here I am.
Like I said, I cleaned it out. I hadn't really sat down and done so since the day Graham "disappeared" back in the fall of 2010. I opened all the doors and cabinets and drawers in it and pulled everything out, setting it on the floor in front of me. In three hours, I read through journal after journal, paper after paper of things I'd written, most going back to seventh and eighth grade. A couple as far back as sixth. The most recent was from freshman year, my creative writing class. Out of everything I had held onto, everything I'd written from my past that at one time meant a great deal to me, I filled two trashbags to the brim, one being so full that it very nearly fell apart. All that's left is a relatively thin folder of things from my fangirl days, my creative writing class work, the six word memoir contest entries from junior year, a few other pieces, some photos, and my university acceptance letters. Everything else I had no use for anymore. I mean, some of what I threw out I'd already typed up some time ago, so I have it on my laptop. But most of the other parts of it were things I had no reason to hang on to anymore. They were all things from when I was with Graham, starting from my guilt during the first summer of TIP all the way through my suicidal phase during the break-up. And as I was reading through it all, wondering why I still had it, I remembered what I'd been thinking the last time I had done so three years ago: I thought he was coming back. I thought that if I got rid of him from my desk, and thus my life, then he'd never "come home" (I actually wrote that in them; how embarrassing). I thought that if he did take me back, I'd want to have the writing and memories associated with our past together. Well, he's gone. Been gone for almost three years now. We had good and bad times, but it's over. I laughed at a LOT of what I wrote today, more out of embarrassment and shame than humor, but it was laughter nonetheless. Then I threw it in the trashbag. That part of my life was just that: a part. A relatively small part. I stopped letting it dictate things I did a long time ago, and it's time to get rid of it all (sans the rose stained glass piece his mom made because it's just too pretty). I'll track down the box my mom has somewhere of the stuff from us together (what I never got to burning) and get rid of all that, too.
Which in a way brings me to TJ. Like I said before, we're together through the summer, but that's it. No long distance. And that means a closing of that chapter in our lives. Yes, he's my high school sweetheart, so I'm naturally going to keep quite a bit of the things he's given me over the years, but it'll stay here in Florida. When I go to college, it's time to move on. I'm not the girl I was when we met four years ago; I'm not the same girl from when we got together two and half years back. And he's certainly not the same ROTC kid from freshman and sophomore year. We've grown and changed, and now it's off to our separate universities, separate cities. It's over. If we find our way back to each other in the years and years to come, then I'll say it's fate, but I don't know that right now. All I know is that now is not our time.
Segway to Ian. Clearly "now" isn't our time either. Not long distance. We'll see what happens if and when we bump into each other on campus. Maybe we'll start over. Maybe we'll just be friends. Or maybe we won't be anything at all. In any case, anything can happen, but we both have to be open to that, which means putting aside the past. By putting aside the past (unfortunately, the good as well as the bad), only then can we go forward.
What's important here is nothing is set in stone right now. As my mother likes to keep reminding me, I could end up in a halo from a car wreck and be unable to attend Rochester in the fall. Any number of things could happen to compromise the parts of the future that I think are fairly certain. Something that took a ridiculously long time for me to figure out, accept, and put into practice is to always keep an open mind about everything. I can't possibly know all there is about every little thing before I try it, so why judge it? Why live my life in a box of ideas that were parented into me when this is my life now? For the first time, I can make whatever decision I want and not have to worry about repercussions [that involve my parents (I'm fully aware of what's legal and what's not)]. However, that also means that I can't blame my parents for how I think or what I do anymore (like I really could before). Because, as I said, it is my life. I'm fully accountable for what happens in it now. I'm lucky to have the chance at a clean slate; maybe this time I'll scribe something worthwhile.
11 weeks before move-in day, so I'm in this wish-washy period before being an official undergraduate but just after graduating high school. Nothing to do, relatively no commitments. Kinda breaks my heart and decreases my sanity to know this is my first summer in 5 years without any kind of academic program where I get to leave for awhile. So I'm home for 77 more days with only Netflix and online shopping to comfort me. But I am done with high school, and this was only a high school memoir, so that means TTFN: Ta Ta For Now. I'll be taking a break from blogging for the remainder of the summer, so check out my links up top there. Very active on Tumblr and Twitter. But "Story of a Girl" ends here.
It's been real, guys. Over 3,000 views. Heartache, heartbreak, insanity, pain, happiness, growth, strength, failure, and a whole four years (okay really three years worth of posts) of everything in between. I bid thee adieu.
Love always,
Caitlyn
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Sunday, June 9, 2013
"Young Volcanoes"
When Fall Out Boy came off hiatus, I was in tears of ecstasy. And then they released a few songs, and the last of the original three (first was "Light 'Em Up" and the second was "The Phoenix") was "Young Volcanoes." It's the perfect summer song about being young and free. So with this summer being my last before college and the 18th anniversary of my birth (happy being legal to me today), the lyrics inspired me to write an ekphrastic poem. For you guys to "get" the poem, I'll post the lyrics first, and then the poem.
When Rome's in ruins, we are the lions
Free of the coliseums
In poison places, we are anti-venom
We're the beginning of the end
Tonight the foxes hunt the hounds
It's all over now before it has begun
We've already won
We are wild, we are like young volcanoes
We are wild, Americana, exotica
Do you wanna feel a little beautiful baby?
Yeah!
Come on make it easy, say I never mattered
Run it up the flagpole
We will teach you how to make boys next door
Out of assholes
Tonight the foxes hunt the hounds
It's all over now before it has begun
We've already won
We are wild, we are like young volcanoes
We are wild, Americana, exotica
Do you wanna feel a little beautiful baby?
Yeah!
We are wild, we are like young volcanoes
We are wild, Americana, exotica
Do you wanna feel a little beautiful baby?
Yeah!
And poem...
"Speak
of love,
of heartbreak.
Everlasting
joy.
Endless
pain.
Duality.
We
are free, wild;
lions escaped from the Roman
coliseums.
You
are my end,
it’s all over now,
but only because
we’ve already won.
We
are the prize for the other.
Like
young volcanoes,
erupting too early
with passion,
love.
Make
me feel a little beautiful, baby.
But
you?
You’re
the “boy-next-door”
created from asshole.
This
was over before it
really all began.
And
like young volcanoes,
we are unstable,
our explosive lava hot
with anger and hard feelings.
So
pretend I was nothing,
say I never mattered,
anything to make it easy.
Not that you deserve it.
Americana Exotica.
A species of butterfly,
new to be.
Indescribable.
Just fly.
We
really are wild animals,
doing only what feels
right in the moment;
instincts.
That’s how we survive.
You
said last night
you felt you were going backwards.
You’re right.
This
is all backwards.
Tonight,
the foxes hunt the hounds,
not the other way around.
Guess
normal’s just
not our style.
But
this is just beginning.
Only
the beginning."
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Graduation and Growing Up
Yep. I graduated high school. Couldn't be happier to be done with the place. Granted I still have to go and pick up my final transcripts in a week or so, but at that point I'll be 100% finished with Gulf High.
During last week, and most of this one, I've become more and more obsessed with Dexter, America's favorite serial killer. Figures I'd get into it just as the final season premiers at the end of this month, but it's ust something to keep me occupied while the weather is finicky. Once the sun comes out I'll be outside tanning and reading. Might as well take advantage of Florida while I have the chance.
I would've been blogging more, but my laptop has been on the fritz for awhile, probably broken, and my knowing that once I get the money from Florida PrePaid I'll be buying a Macbook doesn't really motivate me to do anything about it. I'll make this post, clean up what I do and don't need from this computer, and then once I buy the new one I'll have the PeachMac transfer everything over. Quite simple, if you ask me. Definitely worth the $100.
I'll be 18 soon (actually in 2 days and 4 hours), and with "official adulthood" comes perks. Like getting a tattoo without a notary and parental permission. My idea? The new Fall Out Boy "Young Volcanoes" logo, sans the "FOB" in the middle, on my ribs. We are wild, right? I wrote a poem about it awhile back. Not sure if I ever posted it. Might post the poem, along with the lyrics that inspired it, one of these days. If my laptop stops being a bitch.
Some updates. A couple of weeks ago, I went out with TJ and Chels to see Hangover 3. It was always Chelsi's and my thing to go see the movies together, and with this being the final installment, we had to go, and TJ wanted to see it anyway. Following the showing, TJ brought up the idea that we go drinking afterwards, and so Chelsi called her boyfriend (who is over 21) and we all went over to his place to meet up with his friends. We got there around 10 or 11, and before TJ and I left at 3AM, I had one of the best nights of my high school career. Drinking, yes. More importantly, "Ring of Fire," and while I was pretty much winning, everyone else had some degree of nudity, and I commented on one of the girls complaining on how being naked was different for girls. She responded with, "Easy for you to say, you have all your clothes on!" So naturally, with my integrity challenged, I proceeded to get stark naked, earning their respect, and TJ's. If that's any nod towards what college will be like, I can't wait.
Oh yeah, and TJ and I are a couple again. Weird right? I'd done a lot of thinking, and after we had the talk about trying to seriously work on things, I didn't really give him the chance to actually try. I was tired. And that's when Ian came in, combined with my Rochester visit. I didn't see myself with TJ anymore, especially in the future, and I didn't want to string him along, plus staying with him at that point would've hurt Ian too. So I broke up with him. Fast forward 2 months, Ian's gone, and we're hooking up, and TJ can't stop telling me how much he loves me and wants to get back together. So I say, "Let's see where the summer goes." If I'm being completely and totally honest, I know that I don't want to do long distance. Not in high school, not over the summer, and certainly not in college. I can't, and I won't. If it's meant to be with him and I, then it'll happen. We'll keep getting pulled together somehow or other. But as far as right now is concerned, I'm going to enjoy my summer with my high school sweetheart. Do all the things with him that we had planned to do our last summer before going our separate ways, like the beach and hanging out and going to a concert here or there and maybe even seeing him off to Chicago. But it's going to end once I move in. I know that, and I hope I made it clear to him, too. It's not personal, our eventual, final break-up; it just has to happen. At least we'll have one last amazing summer, no strings attached. That's all that matters.
I'm off, I guess. I'm glad to end my non-conventional high school experience a little more conventionally, with sun and friends and a summer romance. The last four years have shaped me in ways I'll never forget, some for the better and others not so much. But I am the way I am. How I deal with it from here is on me now.
During last week, and most of this one, I've become more and more obsessed with Dexter, America's favorite serial killer. Figures I'd get into it just as the final season premiers at the end of this month, but it's ust something to keep me occupied while the weather is finicky. Once the sun comes out I'll be outside tanning and reading. Might as well take advantage of Florida while I have the chance.
I would've been blogging more, but my laptop has been on the fritz for awhile, probably broken, and my knowing that once I get the money from Florida PrePaid I'll be buying a Macbook doesn't really motivate me to do anything about it. I'll make this post, clean up what I do and don't need from this computer, and then once I buy the new one I'll have the PeachMac transfer everything over. Quite simple, if you ask me. Definitely worth the $100.
I'll be 18 soon (actually in 2 days and 4 hours), and with "official adulthood" comes perks. Like getting a tattoo without a notary and parental permission. My idea? The new Fall Out Boy "Young Volcanoes" logo, sans the "FOB" in the middle, on my ribs. We are wild, right? I wrote a poem about it awhile back. Not sure if I ever posted it. Might post the poem, along with the lyrics that inspired it, one of these days. If my laptop stops being a bitch.
Some updates. A couple of weeks ago, I went out with TJ and Chels to see Hangover 3. It was always Chelsi's and my thing to go see the movies together, and with this being the final installment, we had to go, and TJ wanted to see it anyway. Following the showing, TJ brought up the idea that we go drinking afterwards, and so Chelsi called her boyfriend (who is over 21) and we all went over to his place to meet up with his friends. We got there around 10 or 11, and before TJ and I left at 3AM, I had one of the best nights of my high school career. Drinking, yes. More importantly, "Ring of Fire," and while I was pretty much winning, everyone else had some degree of nudity, and I commented on one of the girls complaining on how being naked was different for girls. She responded with, "Easy for you to say, you have all your clothes on!" So naturally, with my integrity challenged, I proceeded to get stark naked, earning their respect, and TJ's. If that's any nod towards what college will be like, I can't wait.
Oh yeah, and TJ and I are a couple again. Weird right? I'd done a lot of thinking, and after we had the talk about trying to seriously work on things, I didn't really give him the chance to actually try. I was tired. And that's when Ian came in, combined with my Rochester visit. I didn't see myself with TJ anymore, especially in the future, and I didn't want to string him along, plus staying with him at that point would've hurt Ian too. So I broke up with him. Fast forward 2 months, Ian's gone, and we're hooking up, and TJ can't stop telling me how much he loves me and wants to get back together. So I say, "Let's see where the summer goes." If I'm being completely and totally honest, I know that I don't want to do long distance. Not in high school, not over the summer, and certainly not in college. I can't, and I won't. If it's meant to be with him and I, then it'll happen. We'll keep getting pulled together somehow or other. But as far as right now is concerned, I'm going to enjoy my summer with my high school sweetheart. Do all the things with him that we had planned to do our last summer before going our separate ways, like the beach and hanging out and going to a concert here or there and maybe even seeing him off to Chicago. But it's going to end once I move in. I know that, and I hope I made it clear to him, too. It's not personal, our eventual, final break-up; it just has to happen. At least we'll have one last amazing summer, no strings attached. That's all that matters.
I'm off, I guess. I'm glad to end my non-conventional high school experience a little more conventionally, with sun and friends and a summer romance. The last four years have shaped me in ways I'll never forget, some for the better and others not so much. But I am the way I am. How I deal with it from here is on me now.
Monday, May 20, 2013
Prom
It was a clusterfuck.
Let's start with Thursday. Distracted myself by going to the beach with TJ and a couple friends for three hours. Didn't reapply sunscreen enough. Thought I was okay enough. I wasn't. Ended up getting majorly sunburned and basically my entire left ear is now brand new skin.
Day-of prom. Tried to get over a sunburn on my knees, back, eye (sun-shiner), ear, face, and chest. Nope. Made dinner. Nails done. Rushed through hair and make up to the point where my hair didn't even get to be pinned completely up (UGH). Hit rush hour traffic getting to Katrina's for food and pictures. The rest of the afternoon followed in the same anxious, annoyed suit. THEN prom itself. Total waste of time and $600. If I'd wanted to feel alone and dejected and pissed off and bored, I would've stayed home. I even went on Tumblr. That's how bad it was. So, we got there at around 8:15, and I was ready to leave by 9. Tried going out and dancing some. Didn't really help anything, nor was it exactly fun when all the music is date-grinding music and I didn't have a date. Ended up waiting outside with everyone's stuff until our limo group assembled around 10, where we actually had to wait until 11 to leave because one girl had to break up with her boyfriend and was waiting for a slow song to do it. After prom, I met my "other date" at his house, parked, and he drove us to the hotel, where we proceeded to not get nearly as drunk as I wanted to be (one drink does not equal the half bottle I was hoping for). But the sex was fucking fantastic, and for an hour, I wasn't sad or alone or dejected; I was in pure fucking nirvana (get it? get it?).
However, like all things, it had to come to an end. And now things are just really weird and I don't understand them because I don't really know where I am right now. It's midnight on a Sunday night/Monday morning, and I have my IB French exam in 8 hours but I don't really care. TJ and I are "exclusive" again sort of. We've decided to "work" on things over the summer, see where it goes, no strings attached. Half of me wants it, because he deserves the chance and I want to see it through, and the other half just wants to be alone whilst having beautiful sex. None of this is fair to him, still. Ian is, unfortunately, part of my thought process. Like how pissed I am that prom sucked. How generally sexually frustrated I am because I can't do with TJ what he and I "talked" about. How I know he probably doesn't even give a shit about what this weekend could've been. THEN I FUCKING MESSAGE HIM TONIGHT RIGHT (breaking the two week rule Meredith set in place...I know I know)? And literally all of his responses are less than three words. Most of them involved the word "eh." Like, okay, as much as I want to talk to you, I know when someone would rather not converse with me, and that's the signal I'm getting from you, so I give up. BUT COME ON!
What the fuck, man. Seriously, what the actual fuck.
I have no words currently besides a conglomeration of being really hungry but wanting nothing, desperately needing to cry while falling asleep, and craving "the D" (yes; yes that just happened).
Yeah...I need to go to bed.
Sorry for the weirdness on this one. My bad.
Good news is my birthday is in 20 days.
Plus Trick and FOB concert in just over two weeks.
Graduation in 12ish days.
Summer is almost here.
Let's start with Thursday. Distracted myself by going to the beach with TJ and a couple friends for three hours. Didn't reapply sunscreen enough. Thought I was okay enough. I wasn't. Ended up getting majorly sunburned and basically my entire left ear is now brand new skin.
Day-of prom. Tried to get over a sunburn on my knees, back, eye (sun-shiner), ear, face, and chest. Nope. Made dinner. Nails done. Rushed through hair and make up to the point where my hair didn't even get to be pinned completely up (UGH). Hit rush hour traffic getting to Katrina's for food and pictures. The rest of the afternoon followed in the same anxious, annoyed suit. THEN prom itself. Total waste of time and $600. If I'd wanted to feel alone and dejected and pissed off and bored, I would've stayed home. I even went on Tumblr. That's how bad it was. So, we got there at around 8:15, and I was ready to leave by 9. Tried going out and dancing some. Didn't really help anything, nor was it exactly fun when all the music is date-grinding music and I didn't have a date. Ended up waiting outside with everyone's stuff until our limo group assembled around 10, where we actually had to wait until 11 to leave because one girl had to break up with her boyfriend and was waiting for a slow song to do it. After prom, I met my "other date" at his house, parked, and he drove us to the hotel, where we proceeded to not get nearly as drunk as I wanted to be (one drink does not equal the half bottle I was hoping for). But the sex was fucking fantastic, and for an hour, I wasn't sad or alone or dejected; I was in pure fucking nirvana (get it? get it?).
However, like all things, it had to come to an end. And now things are just really weird and I don't understand them because I don't really know where I am right now. It's midnight on a Sunday night/Monday morning, and I have my IB French exam in 8 hours but I don't really care. TJ and I are "exclusive" again sort of. We've decided to "work" on things over the summer, see where it goes, no strings attached. Half of me wants it, because he deserves the chance and I want to see it through, and the other half just wants to be alone whilst having beautiful sex. None of this is fair to him, still. Ian is, unfortunately, part of my thought process. Like how pissed I am that prom sucked. How generally sexually frustrated I am because I can't do with TJ what he and I "talked" about. How I know he probably doesn't even give a shit about what this weekend could've been. THEN I FUCKING MESSAGE HIM TONIGHT RIGHT (breaking the two week rule Meredith set in place...I know I know)? And literally all of his responses are less than three words. Most of them involved the word "eh." Like, okay, as much as I want to talk to you, I know when someone would rather not converse with me, and that's the signal I'm getting from you, so I give up. BUT COME ON!
What the fuck, man. Seriously, what the actual fuck.
I have no words currently besides a conglomeration of being really hungry but wanting nothing, desperately needing to cry while falling asleep, and craving "the D" (yes; yes that just happened).
Yeah...I need to go to bed.
Sorry for the weirdness on this one. My bad.
Good news is my birthday is in 20 days.
Plus Trick and FOB concert in just over two weeks.
Graduation in 12ish days.
Summer is almost here.
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
Forgive and Forget
Forgiving doesn't always come easy. Depending on the person and the situation, to forgive can be a simple process, or one that comes with a bit more difficulty. When I forgave Graham after everything, it took a very, very long time, mostly out of my stubbornness and inability to just let things be. It took just as long to forgive Jimmy and for the same reasons. Now, TJ, I've said I "forgive" him many times, like I did with the others, but maybe I actually have. Not because I've worked through how I felt, but simply because I don't care anymore. So with this whole Ian thing, I felt caught between forgiving his absence from prom this coming Friday easily and then not-so easily. Ultimately, I think it's mostly easy to forgive, because he did have some points in not coming, and the reason we couldn't do the distance was quite my fault.
But forgetting. That hasn't been so easy.
In the last week since he said he definitely wasn't coming, I've tried to forget. I've tried to forget how much it hurts not to be able to talk to him. I've tried to forget the guilt and pain in knowing I was the problem and that nothing I could do would make him see that if he gave me the chance, I'm worth it. I can't seem to shake it. I mean, it was only two months of talking. I shouldn't be this affected.
Smoking is supposed to relax you, calm your nerves. Slow your heartrate and steady you. But when I start and nearly finish a pack in one sitting, it still doesn't put off the pounding in my chest. I spent five days in a row out with friends for hours, and three of those nights I spent them in sleepovers. I didn't come home for two days. And then I threw myself into a group of 30+ people of fellow Yellowjackets, and we haven't stopped talking since Saturday. While I find myself "eyeing" one or two of the guys, it doesn't push back how they're not what I want. Then there's the sex. Casual hookups with no pressure and no strings attached. Well, one particular repeated hookup. And I've been really into it, which would make you think it'd help the most since, well, it's been really intense. But despite the physicality, my mind flashes to Ian. I try to push it out; it never works for long. Because as hard as I go, I can't fuck my way into forgetting his smile or his voice or the million amazing things he said to me. I can't forget that he should be here tomorrow, that instead of going to the beach I should be going to the airport to pick him up. I remember 7 weeks ago being so excited, and now it's finally here and it could've been, should've been, but it's not happening.
So I'll spend the next couple of days staving off my nicotine addiction. I'll be at the beach tomorrow. I'll try to..."enjoy" myself. I'll make the food I need to for the group prom efforts. I'll have my nails done Friday, and I'll work on hair and makeup. Then I'll dance, hard, and probably have a pretty decent time. Then after, probably going to get absolutely out of my mind wasted, all in an effort to forget that I'm going to miss him there and all I'll want is to have him by my side. Because maybe I'll actually forget how I feel about him and the situation and just him in general, at least for a little while. Maybe I'll forget how badly I want to see his name pop up on my phone. Maybe I'll forget how all I really want is a chance with him at Rochester. Maybe I'll forget how crazy everyone thinks I am, because like I said, it was only 2 months and I really shouldn't be like this, but goddamn when I fall, I fall hard. And I fell so incredibly hard for him.
Fuck.
But forgetting. That hasn't been so easy.
In the last week since he said he definitely wasn't coming, I've tried to forget. I've tried to forget how much it hurts not to be able to talk to him. I've tried to forget the guilt and pain in knowing I was the problem and that nothing I could do would make him see that if he gave me the chance, I'm worth it. I can't seem to shake it. I mean, it was only two months of talking. I shouldn't be this affected.
Smoking is supposed to relax you, calm your nerves. Slow your heartrate and steady you. But when I start and nearly finish a pack in one sitting, it still doesn't put off the pounding in my chest. I spent five days in a row out with friends for hours, and three of those nights I spent them in sleepovers. I didn't come home for two days. And then I threw myself into a group of 30+ people of fellow Yellowjackets, and we haven't stopped talking since Saturday. While I find myself "eyeing" one or two of the guys, it doesn't push back how they're not what I want. Then there's the sex. Casual hookups with no pressure and no strings attached. Well, one particular repeated hookup. And I've been really into it, which would make you think it'd help the most since, well, it's been really intense. But despite the physicality, my mind flashes to Ian. I try to push it out; it never works for long. Because as hard as I go, I can't fuck my way into forgetting his smile or his voice or the million amazing things he said to me. I can't forget that he should be here tomorrow, that instead of going to the beach I should be going to the airport to pick him up. I remember 7 weeks ago being so excited, and now it's finally here and it could've been, should've been, but it's not happening.
So I'll spend the next couple of days staving off my nicotine addiction. I'll be at the beach tomorrow. I'll try to..."enjoy" myself. I'll make the food I need to for the group prom efforts. I'll have my nails done Friday, and I'll work on hair and makeup. Then I'll dance, hard, and probably have a pretty decent time. Then after, probably going to get absolutely out of my mind wasted, all in an effort to forget that I'm going to miss him there and all I'll want is to have him by my side. Because maybe I'll actually forget how I feel about him and the situation and just him in general, at least for a little while. Maybe I'll forget how badly I want to see his name pop up on my phone. Maybe I'll forget how all I really want is a chance with him at Rochester. Maybe I'll forget how crazy everyone thinks I am, because like I said, it was only 2 months and I really shouldn't be like this, but goddamn when I fall, I fall hard. And I fell so incredibly hard for him.
Fuck.
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