Sunday, August 22, 2010

Kiddies/ College Nerves

Oh, and what a relaxing last day of my summer vacation I had. I woke up early in the morning to birds chirping, got things done, and relaxed the rest of the day with the piece of mind that tomorrow I would be going to a whole different school of a different level and it would all be okay......

In my dreams.

My last day of summer went something like this:

My cousin and his girlfriend had their babysitter cancel on them so they called us desperate and unable to change the plans they already had for today. They asked us if we could watch their little girl, my cousin laila. My mom agreed because she understood how that feels to have someone back out on you and you are left hanging by a small fraying thread. But yesterday my aunt came over and my mom decided my cousin Liz and Laila should have a play date, so now two kids were scheduled to come on Sunday- the day I had planned to relax and just get use to the idea of going back to school.

So basically today was filled with little kids screams and giggles and "Let's play this game!" in the air, while I clenched my teeth and sat back rubbing my temples. To be honest, I did enjoy some of their company. I played with them and they weren't bad for some parts of the day but when my patience ran out it ran out. I was getting annoyed and frustrated and mad. Today was not what I had planned and I hate that, but what's done cannot be undone. Now Laila is the only one here, seeing as how Liz left a half hour ago, and she's quietly watching TV. Perhaps my day is not all lost.

I'm writing in attempt to get rid of my headache and also make myself feel less nervous about tomorrow. I'm pretty good with changes after I get use to them. Initially, though? I hate change. I don't like not knowing what's to come or what something has in store for me. Once I've gotten a small glimpse of it though, I'm okay. I get use to it and move on. This is a huge change, and right now I am not looking forward too it. Obviously I paid for college, I want to go, but this is such a huge step up from high school. It's like a stepping stone just too far out of reach and I can't seem to quite get the stone under my foot to leap over. I'm pretty sure that once I figure out how to safely land on the other side, I'll be settled on that next stone and ready for the next thing thrown my way.

I've got my tote bag all college'd up with the books for my Monday classes, a thick notebook, a thousand pens and pencils just in case, candy, a calculator and my phone and iPod will soon join the ranks. I may not enjoy change, but no one can say I don't meet it head on by being prepared. This feeling is exactly what I got with High School, although not as worse. Shifting to high school was so scary. It was bigger and the class schedule was different, and people were so much older than me. Guys had beards. Girls wore makeup and dresses. Back when I was a middle schooler we were all just starting to dig into that stuff (now I bet middle school is pretty much an extension of HS anymore). College is like that except the age differences doesn't bother me, I see tons of guys my age with beards, and I'm a girl who wears a dress or two herself while doll'd up in makeup. There's just the huge campus, the classes that sounds way harder than I bet they are (or at least I hope) and the huge dollar sign hanging over me saying "DON'T MESS THIS UP". Maybe I should feel very scared, but mostly I'm nervous. I'm a people person at heart but throw me in a crowd of new people and even I clam up a tiny bit. We all have that fear of nobody liking us, not matter what we look like, who are parents are, how much money we have, or what we're wearing.

Ah, my headache is finally residing. So is my nerves, because deep down I know that the people who I love will always be there for me and that's all that matters. If i flunk out of school, I will still have friends and I will still have family who love me unconditionally. The people at school don't like me? Pffft I already have the greatest friends on the planet, why should I worry.

Yeah...I'll be okay. (:

Friday, August 20, 2010

Be True

We were pushing on it being almost a year since I've had a job, just shy of a few months. This summer has been filled with many things, and filling out applications has been one of them. I just couldn't seem to get a break. I filled out application after application but no call backs. Not one. I was talking to the women down the road who is with the owner of the restaurant/bar we were in, telling her about my job woes, and she slyly slide over an application. I am now a waitress at their restaurant.

Is it nepotism? Hm, possibly. Do I care? Hm, no! These times are tough, and we need to help each other out in anyway we can. People have resorted to lying, deceit and even violence. I think resorting to a friend helping me out is pretty innocent compared to some things people have been doing to get by. I am so grateful she gave me a break and decided to interview me and give me a job. Believe me, I am so so grateful. I just wasn't expecting waitressing to be so....hard. I've had three days of training and I've already had tears prickling at the back of my eyes. Not to say it's an impossible job- not by any stretch of the imagination. I honestly think most people could do this job if they dedicated themselves too it, and that's exactly what I'm going to have to do.

Being a waitress is hard in the sense that I need to know the restaurant inside and out. I have to try and give people what they want and make their meal pleasant. I need to know the menu, I need to know what comes with what dish, i need to know what the food LOOKS like. It's difficult for someone who has literally only ordered about a handful of things off the menu at the restaurant. I'm slowly starting to get it. I've taken tables, orders, given food, refilled drinks and done the cash register without anything blowing up, someone yelling or something breaking. A few minor mistakes, but it's to be expected.

I think I could be really great at this job, I just wish I'd had time to train earlier. These training days are cutting into my school hours, so now I have this I have to deal with on top of a whole new world (COLLEGE) I need to get use to. It's like walking into a new world where you don't know the rules and then getting employed at a shop in said new world, where all the rules for working are different. It's pretty nerve wrecking, but I usually pick stuff up quick, so I'm hoping that skill doesn't fail me for this.

Besides that little stresser in my life....I'm pretty excited for college. I may not be moving away, or going to a huge school, or living in a dorm with someone, but I feel like this experience is a significant one in my life. Despite the huge dollar sign on this experience, I am going to make the best of it. I want to suck every opportunity I can from College, because you're only young once. I have my first class this Monday, and I'm going to lock up that shy girl from middle school like I've learned to do and be the best welcoming, out going person I can be.

I think people believe that once you're older, you stay the way you are- like you're personality is in a rut. Nonsense, I say. I think you can be 11, 21, or 81 and you're still becoming a new person each day, shaped by the experiences we encounter and the things we reach out to in our lives. I want to wake up a fresh person each morning. Someone who is still who she was yesterday but also has an open eye and blank canvas for the days to come. I want to always be open to changing my ways, seeing new points of view, making new friends, and learning new things. If I can't wake up one morning and now want to be silly, or laugh or skip around when I want to skip...then who am I really? Whether I am a waitress, a college student, a daughter, a best friend- whatever I may be, I want to always be true to who I really am. College is going to help me with this, I just know it.

I want to join groups, I want to study with classmates, I want to laugh with new friends, have dates with boys that make me smile. I think this is a door opening to a wonderful beginning.

Monday, August 16, 2010

First

Summer is coming to a close, or at least the summer of waking up mid-afternoon, staying in PJs all day, hoping in the car with my friend and heading to pick-a-random-place, and pulling all nighters. Approaching at a break neck speed is college. This ultimate huge first that seems scarier than any first I've ever experienced. This place where no one really knows me, this place where I get to start over, make new friends, have new experiences.... It's scary and frustrating, and to be honest I have shed too many tears over the price this college has been costing me, but behind that is this tingling excited feeling that starts in my finger tips and engulfs me. This is starting my life and becoming the adult that will find love, will have a family, will laugh with friends over her dorky childhood past, who will create so many more memories. I have such high hopes for my future, and it starts now. In order to shape the future I need to make every minute of the present count.

This whole month has been filled with a varying degree of emotions. Fear, excitement, happiness, hope, sadness... I have had a headache more times than I have before in my life. It's all been worth it, though. This experience is needed so I know how I can handle stressful situations in the future; situations that just come out of nowhere and bombard you when you're not looking. I had to put college on the back burner for a week though because my best friend had her 18th birthday party this past weekend, and I wanted it to be amazing for her. She asked me to help her make her birthday cake, which was not as easy as it sounds. She wanted a cake boss-esque topsy turvy cake that literally put us threw hell and back. As fun as it was, towards the end we couldn't even look at the cake without cringing.

Although it wasn't perfect, and the fondant sure as hell didn't want to work with us one inch, for beginners I think we did alright. The final product (before it decided to fall over on itself because of the weight) turned out like this:

Her party turned out great. It was the only day it didn't rain, the clouds were out so it wasn't sunny, and everyone was down with the games we picked out to play. Although our cake was tilted so badly we had to keep it up with a huge jar of pickles (way funnier if you'd seen it) people liked it. Believe me, the buttercream? Tasted AMAZING. We laughed so hard we almost peed ourselves at times, and we danced the night away when it got darker. She deserved a good birthday bash and I'm glad we could pull it off so everything went okay.

I think this college stuff coming up has put me on the wrong track. So many people get worked up about money and needing to get this and that and bills and.... we need to step back. We need to see whats in front of us and what's important. Sure, money and bills and education means something in society. But what means the most to YOU? Family. Friends. Love. Laughter. Those are what mean stuff to me, personally. This has been making me forget that I'm building my education FOR those things. So I can life a comfortable happy safe life with my loved ones. I just have to remember that.

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Serenity

God, grant me the serenity

To accept the things I cannot change;

Courage to change the things I can;

And wisdom to know the difference.



I was watching a TV show I happen to adore and one of the main characters recited this poem to his friend, telling her his father always had it up on the fridge despite not having ever touched a drop of alcohol, it was just because he liked it. I didn't know this poem was used by the members of Alcohols Anonymous and other step programs, but just like the characters father I too like the poem. There's just something about it that while reading it....it makes you feel like any obstacle can be overcome. Whether it be by your acceptance of it being there, or by moving it yourself.

When he read the poem, the first thing that came to my mind was when I found out I wasn't going to get financial aid for college. I was devastated. I was heart broken. I worried my friends and family because all I did for days was isolate myself. This poem defines just what exactly was going through my head, what's still going through my head. I accept that I cannot change my financial status, but there are so many things I can do instead, I just need the courage to do them. I think I'm going to tape this to my mirror so that every morning while staring at myself bleary-eyed in the mirror my eyes can skim over it and know that while things are unstoppable in this world, many many things are changeable. Many things we can overcome, we can change. We just need to be strong and courageous enough to change them.

It was so very scary and hard to change my college last minute. Not only am I a college newbie, I didn't know if I had the strength to go through it all again with another college. The applications, the emails, the phone calls, the financial aid, the letters in the mail, the accounts, etc. I had been boosted on the excitment for the first college, but now that it had all went down hill I was wary and didn't want to find myself blindly falling off a cliff like last time. But I knew what had to be done. I wanted an education badly enough that I packed away my fears and boldly got myself in gear. I am now fully enrolled in my states community college (all gen ed classes, I still plan on transferring to my original college) and all this has taught me that sometimes you take a road that ends up being a dead end half way through your journey, or has a bridge closed down so you can't pass, but that doesn't mean there aren't ways around it.

Our world is run by dreams, ideas, thoughts, and those people wouldn't have these wonderful businesses or be successful if they hadn't either accepted some things that have happened to them, or changed those that needed to be changed. As I get older I realize this, and while there's sometimes cloudy rainy days scheduled ahead, the sunny days with beautiful clouds filling the sky are right behind them.

Without bad how would we know what good is? And vise versa. I can handle what gets thrown at me, as long as I continue to stay strong.

God, grant me the serenity...
 
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