“I try to avoid looking forward or backward, and try to keep looking upward.”

- Charlotte Bronte

Well, hello hello! Instead of dwelling on the fact that I have not posted a blog in forever and ever and ever, I am just going to dwell on the things that I find fascinating and important that you, uh, probably don’t.

So, I have been up to MULTITUDES of FANTASTICAL and EXOTIC things in the past few months, weeks, days and hours. Well… maybe I’m exaggerating a little. Or a lot. Or a whole lot. But no matter, because I do have a few things worth mentioning. One being my SUPER DUPER not incredibly successful life in the world of Debate. Yes, this lovely specimen whose life you read about and care so dearly about has begun debating competitively with her school’s forensics team. I am involved in the Lincoln- Douglas debate category and am now an Official Member of the National Forensics League, or the NFL for the People in the Know. I’m not great but I’m not horrible and every tournament is a learning experience and I get a sick rush every time I know I have kicked someone’s ass.
Other than debate and debate and more debate, I have been reading quite a bit more. I recently finished Anna and the French Kiss by (nerdfighter!) Stephanie Perkins, where part of the title of this blog post comes from. I though the book was good, due to how the ending turned out and the writing was sweet and clever. The book started out slow and I thought that the character was a bit stupid, but once you get into the book more and start to become engrossed with the romance and the relationships surrounding each character, it is absolutely fantastic. I also just finished Chuck Palahniuk’s Invisible Monsters, which, to be honest, I was disappointed with. I was told by multiple Palahniuk fans that it was his best work, and it was fantastic, but I think I might have liked Snuff more, but I plan on rereading it eventually, so we’ll see if that changes my thoughts on it. I’m going to begin Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro tomorrow, because I’ve heard fantastic things about both the novel and film.
Aside from debate and reading, I have been tumbling obsessively, arguing with people on tumblr, pissing off my close friends and just generally fucking up greatly. I think I’m going to begin blogging more, to let off steam or what have you. I think I’m going to start going out more, whether it’s alone or with others, because I need fresh air. I need to see things other than the four blue walls of my room. I need different noises and sounds and things to experience. I’m going stir crazy and I’m lonely all the time and I’m bored and I’m aggressive and mean and impulsive with people I care about. I need help more than anything, I need someone to talk to and I need to get out more. But right now what I need to do is brush my teeth and go to bed. Goodnight, lovelies. I’ll see you soon.

WHERETHEDUCKSGO

p.s. I had a snow day today and we didn’t get ANY snow at all. Twas wonderful.

“The idea of waiting for something makes it more exciting.”

- Andy Warhol

So the year ends soon. It seems as I get older, years go by faster, but weeks and days go by slower, if that makes any sense. It feels as if time moves at weird paces; as if days move slower when you see what they contain or what they lack, and that years go by faster when you press play on all of the things that were recorded as time passed. We all know my fascination and obsession with the concept of time, so there is no need to dwell on that. I’ve looked back on the two posts I made on this blog about the new year, and I feel as if posting about it is a tradition for myself and for this blog.
In 2008, when I made this blog, I was naive (more naive than I am now) and I hadn’t lived as much. I had written a short entry about how my best friend and I became best friends after she lost her mom. I wrote about discovering Nerdfighters. In 2009, I posted the things I had become obsessed with, and when I remember writing that, I remember that I didn’t want to write about what was actually going on in my head and my life at that point in time. I was slowly but surely losing my best friend to her boyfriend, I didn’t have any other friends, and my dad was sick.
And now, here I am, writing a blog post about 2010. This year was one to remember, I guess, as are all my years. This year I became more invested in my online life; I realized that my friends online are closer to me than the ones I have in real life, and in some instances they are much better than my real life friends. I met a girl I often call my best friend, who I love and I never want out of my life. I found tumblr, which is one of the most intelligent and amazing communities I’ve ever been a part of. Even when tumblr has it’s bad times, which tend to be often, the community is still wonderful and the people I’ve met there are still incredible.
This year I was diagnosed with depression and GAD, and I was getting stress sick a lot. I still spend all of my weekends, for the most part, on the computer. This year I discovered the world of forensics and debate, something that I wish I had become involved in much earlier because I love it so much. I turned 16, and was spoiled by my parents, who I know love me more than anything. My mother got a job and my dad recovered, for the most part, from his illness, and things started to get better at home. I walked around for most of this year with the sinking feeling of emptiness or the heavy burden of guilt for putting people through the hell that is dealing with me.
This year I fell into like or love or lust or whatever the fuck it could possibly I called. I learned what it’s like to be wanted by someone and then have them pull away and then push back. I learned what it’s like to give yourself to someone for them to pull away and never push their way back in. I learned what a broken heart feels like. I learned that a broken heart is nothing I want, and nothing I ever want again.
This year I learned how to defend my opinions. I learned how to accept other people’s opinions even if I don’t agree with them. I learned how to listen to other people’s opinions and try to see their sides of things. I learned that something I want to be and something I am is accepting; of everyone, no matter what.
This year was rough in some places. There were times I wanted it to be the last year I ever lived through, but there were more times I wanted the exact opposite. The times that I succeeded, like when I placed second in debate, that made me want to keep going. The times I failed kept me going; the times I fell down made me realize I hated sitting on the ground because it was a pain in the ass. I learned a lot about myself this year, I learned a lot about how much I need to grow up and I learned that I have a lot more to learn and I need to stick around to learn it all.

Happy New Year, welcome 2011.

WHERETHEDUCKSGO

photo credit: (creative commons license) New Year’s Eve, 1956

I’ve always been the kind of person that hated people. Well, at least since I was about 13, I had a strong dislike for people and being around them. I didn’t like being in big groups, or even having anyone over or going to a friend’s house. I hated it. But now… now I’ve discovered that I don’t hate people. I want to be around people almost all the time. I want to be around the guy I am in serious like with, have him wrapped around me in more than just the physical sense. I want to be around my wonderful friends that write beautiful prose, or the ones that make beautiful films. I want to be around my friends who argue with me about silly things, or have long interesting discussions about what’s going on in the world. I want to be around the people who listen to music and get up to dance and sing. I love being around people who can carry on an intelligent or interesting or thought-provoking conversation. I love being able to walk around a college campus with some of my best friends, dressed well, and belting out A Very Potter Musical, while it snows. I love being able to hug someone or hold someone’s hand, whether they are a casual friend or a close friend or a boyfriend. I just… well…to quote Jenny Mellor;

“… I’m going to talk to people who know lots about lots.”

WHERETHEDUCKSGO

*   *   *   *   *

I. My favorite one-letter word, because I shamelessly and self-indulgently love writing about myself. Other than my obnoxious vanity, I love love love to write. Over the past few years, I’ve become incredibly serious about writing, so much so I’ve begun to think it will be the career I choose to pursue. Recently, I’ve become more experimental in my writing. Such as trying poetry, essays, blogs, short stories and this absolutely insane project called NaNoWriMo, which stand for National Novel Writing Month (yes, you write a 50,000 word novel in one month. It’s the weirdest form of torture out there).

Naturally my love of writing stemmed from an early love of reading. I embraced reading in 4th grade, where I read young adult fantasy for way to long, among the few random books that I didn’t fully comprehend at the time. I evolved to reading more genres in the realm of books that is young adult fiction, and then so on. I’m always open to suggestions, and I’ve been getting into what some would call “proper” literature recently.
Along with my intense obsession with reading and writing, I love the internet. Something I get laughed at behind my back for, I’ve found refuge online in a community of like-minded people, i.e, people that also love reading and writing and other somewhat nerdy things. I’ve met friends that are closer to me then a great deal of my school friends. A “world” many people are hesitant to enter or embrace, I went in full-force and my parents have embraced it as well, so much so one of my friends I met online is flying to New York to stay with us for a few days late next summer.
These are all necessary things to know about me, because they are currently the things that make up a great deal of who I am and who I am becoming. I incorporate a great deal of what I’ve learned from writing and reading over the years into every English class I’m in. And more recently, I include a great deal of what I learn from the large community I’m involved in online in my ideas, opinions and thoughts.
For me to do well in English, I need to be met with a reasonable amount of patience and understanding. I also need my procrastination and occasional close-mindedness not to be tolerated, considering it tends to interfere with my ability to focus on the task at hand and the broader picture of things. My writing is incredibly weak and needs a large amount of work, not to mention I want to work on my editing skills because, let’s face it, a great deal of writing is re-writing. In a nutshell, that’s me, who I am right now and at least for the foreseeable future.

“I get nervous when I fly, I’m used to walking with my feet.”
- “Go On”  Jack Johnson

All I’ve been wanting to do lately is write. Poetry or prose, I have no preference and my fingers seem to itch for the quiet comfort of both. But every time I take a pen out and press it to the fresh cream page of my little poetry book with it’s precious few pages that are stained with ink, I seem to freeze up. Nothing will come out, and if something does it’s terrible, awful and must be ripped out at once. Or my pen will have a bent tip, or be the wrong color ink or will smear all over the page and ruin the poem. Whenever I attempt prose, I fumble with the keys that are so sure beneath my fingers when tweeting or going on facebook. But it seems when my heart is on the line, my sanity is in slight jeopardy and my self-esteem is out there, low and vulnerable, I can’t quite grasp the “typing” thing and it seems as if every word is wrong. Phrases are wrongly put, sentences aren’t structured well, there is no story in it at all, the entire paragraph reads like one long boring cliche and so on.
My blogs are even troublesome. I can’t put my visit to Kenyon College in more than bite-sized words. I keep worrying that I will screw up that amazing trip and that amazing day if I write one crappy blog post about it. My blog about Oberlin was simple, and I think it was even semi-good, but I wasn’t so genuinely attached to that college, that trip, that day. I wasn’t concerned on screwing it up too severely.
Another thing I hate to admit is that I have this tendency. This awful, heart wrenching tendency to not be able to stay motivated or believe in myself. Other people keeping tabs on what I do keeps me motivated. Those six or seven of you that read this regularly are the ones that keep me going because it just shows that yeah, maybe someone somewhere out there cares what I have to say or whine about. The reason I love genuine compliments on my poetry is because I feel like if someone else likes it, then I have a reason to keep going. It’s one of my worst weaknesses, and therefore one the most powerful ones, but I need others to believe in me in order to believe in myself. I’ve never quit anything, even the times where I would have absolutely no attention to anything I poured my heart and soul into. When I posted things on fictionpress, I would get one review in a blue moon. My best friend at the time started and she got 2+ reviews a day. It took me weeks to get that much attention on stories. When I started blogging, I had maybe one – three hits a month. Things like twitter and tumblr don’t effect me as strongly, because I’m not putting things out there that I want feedback on, I’m not putting effort into those things, I’m not putting the most important parts of me in those things.

WHERETHEDUCKSGO

“I feel I’m stranded in the wrong time, where love is just a lyric in a children’s rhyme.”

-“Is It Any Wonder?” by Keane

What? What is this? Caitlyn, did you really blog TWO DAYS IN A ROW? Yes, curious high-pitched voice dwelling in my head, I am writing a blog and posting it after doing the same thing the night before.

Moving on, today was day two of the Ohio trip, and day one of college visits. We went to visit Oberlin College in, wait for it… Oberlin! We went through the town first, which was honestly a tad sparse, and sort of like the college town near where I live. But this is not the problem I though it to be. Apparently the college kids make things happen all the time, so there is rarely ever a dull moment. We went into admissions and I filled out a slip for something, they gave me a bit of information that I already had, but took so my parents could be informed/ content.

The part that made me weary about the whole “let’s apply to Oberlin” was the deal about being a creative writing major. To major in creative writing you need to take the 201 writing course. The catch? It’s by application only. When you’re a second semester freshman, you can apply for the course and if you get in and get a B+ or higher in the course, you can take the 300 level classes. But the creative writing major is a competitive field, and about 1/3 of applicants get in. Hearing this, my heart sank and I cried a little inside, but I tried my best to remain composed. I made a few jokes, asked some boring questions, argued like an idiot with the program coordinator (yeah, Caitlyn is SMART) but… then something weird happened.

The program coordinator said that most students have the problem about writing something other than the one or two genres they’re used to, which is what hurts most and causes many to fail out of or not get into the program. I, being the dumb ass I am, just said: “I will write ANYTHING. I mean, I’m not afraid to write badly; that’s all I know how to do.” Which she laughed at, said that she thought I was a smart, driven and funny kid, and that I should contact her if I have any questions, and then she handed me her card. This may not seem big, but it felt that way. I almost died.

Granted, I probably have no chance of getting into the writing program because I’m so SHIT at writing, but still. It was nice. Night!

WHERETHEDUCKSGO

“static silhouette somehow.”

– “Rome”- Phoenix

I am currently sitting in a room with textured white walls, boring paintings of roses in vases and outdated 90’s light fixtures. You guessed it; I’m in a hotel room. My mother has blasted the air conditioning to the “Alaska” setting, because Ohio weather does this weird thing where it stays hot at night. As this rather scatterbrained and unclear intro may have indicated, I am not home in my bedroom with the slight slant, surrounded by a wall of mountains in cold Upstate New York. I have traveled down to the flat (yes, the rumors are true. It’s flat, but then again, I live in a mountainous state) and warm, if a little stuffy, state of Ohio.

My parents and I hopped in the car and drove the seven hours to visit family and look at colleges for me. We just got back from having dinner at my father’s cousin’s house, and it was one of the most relaxing and laid back evenings I’ve ever had at a distant relative’s house. They spoiled us with yummy appetizers and sandwiches, and there were kids running around and everyone was just interesting and lively and down-to-earth. Once sufficiently full, we caught up about our respective crazy family members, i.e, my favorite uncle and favorite uncle’s crazy ex-wife. I was thrilled to see these people, and even more thrilled to hear that when they last saw me, at age 10 (blonde and blue-eyed), I was writing. I thought my writing phase began much later, and when I was told that I had been writing since then, even if it was just rhymes and stories about haunted houses… I don’t know. I feel like it renewed my faith in myself and my writing. I’m not going to keep exhausting myself with the “I’m a WRITER, I need to WRITE all the time” mantra.

Whoops, little rambly again, but you must be used to that by now. I lied on twitter, saying there was no blog today, I am working DILIGENTLY on a blog that will be well-written (in my opinion, and hopefully others’) and read through by several other people, considering the piece is rather… delicate. I am expressing an opinion I don’t think many will agree with, nor support, and I really hope that the negativity in the entry doesn’t cost me any friends. And if you would like to read it and give constructive criticism, or even your straight up opinion, say so in the comments or reply to me on twitter. I’m off to read The Hunger Games because it’s positively brilliant.

WHERETHEDUCKSGO

BONUS FEATURE

Here’s a short cheesy story.

“Spiteful words can hurt your feelings, but silence breaks your heart.”
- C.S Lewis

This blog is going to suck, as the title may have tipped you off. I’m feeling uninspired, a bit annoyed and just incredibly frustrated with myself. I haven’t written a poem in almost 3 months, at least not a decent one, every time I start to write any sort of prose it’s stupid and cliche, and just plain bad. Blogs are the only thing I’ve been writing, other than an all too personal letter that I just sent off without thinking twice (the letter is the cause of the frustration with myself). But writers, since some of you reading this must be writers, you know that awful feeling that is writer’s block.
To me, it’s like being sick. Due to the fact that I have a terrible immune system, I’m sick an awful lot, and it’s hell. I get chills, then I’m sweaty and hot and clammy and nasty. I have headaches, throat aches that make me want to cry and awful chest coughs that last far too long and disrupt any class I’m in at the time. Oh, and I get a runny nose. Writer’s block for me is quite similar. I start out at nice temperature, then things slowly get frostier and then things get warmer too fast and then I start tossing and turning, or in the writing sense, pressing the delete button, typing, delete, type. Symptoms of writer’s block also include headaches, but the sore throat comes in the form of wrist cramps, the chest cough a pinky that always locks up after being used for typing for too long. And the runny, gooey snot nose comes in the form of self-hatred and constant bullying from the voices in my head. (Some of them yell at me in German.)
Now, if that poorly executed metaphor didn’t tip you off to the fact that I’m creatively stifled, I don’t know what will. Photography hasn’t grasped my interest enough lately, not to mention my camera sucks/ is broken. Prose really isn’t working out too well, and I can’t organize my feelings to write a poem. But apparently my writer’s block could be put on hold to write a stupid letter. Stupid letter. gr. grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

WHERETHEDUCKSGO

EXCERPT FROM THE VELVETEEN RABBIT
~ By Margery Williams ~

“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”

“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but Really loves you, then you become Real.”

“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.

“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”

“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”

“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get all loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

I went to a wedding yesterday. My second mother and my dad’s best friend since high school were hosting their son’s wedding. Now, I’m going to just throw out there that these people have a pig roast and Christmas party every year and they know how to throw a party, but this wedding blew my mind. The only other weddings I’ve been to were my brothers’, and those I was either too young or too easily forgotten to enjoy, so I have grown up with a bitter hatred for weddings (my hatred for matrimony and “endless love “[not just the song] also added to that, but I digress). The ceremony was short (thank goodness), not religious (phew) and it contained this lovely reading from one of my favorite books as a child, The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams (the reading is the block quote at the beginning of the blog). Then, in a field behind their house which used to be overgrown and filled with all sorts of clutter, was now a clean and well kept grassy field surrounded by trees and smelling faintly of pine, empty, save for a shed and a large tent. This tent was (thankfully) not like the tent I suffer work under, but  instead of covering tacky plastic tables and screaming pre-pubescent boys, it sheltered pretty tables draped with tablecloths and topped with glasses and pretty centerpieces, all while protecting the well-dressed guests from the bugs and wind outside.
Because the groom’s mother is my second mommy, and a genius, she put me at a table away from my parents with people who had graduated with degrees in graphic arts, history, or people majoring in Japanese. I only talked to the latter of the group at length, considering she was sitting right next to me. The Japanese major, who’s name is Sarah (or Sara. I’ll just alternate spellings). She was AWESOME. We talked a lot about random things, then moved onto the basics, i.e, movies, television and books. So, while on the subject of television, she asked me what kind of shows I watch and I immediately admitted “I cannot tell you what shows I watch, considering they are highly embarrassing.”, so she asked, “Like, childish embarrassing?” to which I answered, “No. Teeny shows. Like the ones on the CW.”
This carried onto her connecting the CW to The Vampire Diaries, which she apparently wanted to see, and then carried over to her watching True Blood, and then back to how The Vampire Diaries was almost exactly like Twilight, but it doesn’t suck (my opinion). So then I went onto putting forth a neutralish view on Twilight, in case she was a fan, and then she just flat out said that they sucked. I then laughed and said, that yes, they are indeed awful, but it reassures me that if I ever do decide I want to publish a book, I know that I might have a chance, provided that piece of crap was published. She laughed and then reached for her phone while saying “Have you seen ‘Alex reads Twilight’?” To which I burst out laughing, and then explained, in bits and pieces, parts of Nerdfighteria.
Anyways, the food (lobster and drawn butter and delicious cupcakes. yum) was fabulous and I do not just say this because I was across the tent from my parents and at a table with people who thought I was legal, and therefore they constantly kept filling my glass with yummy champagne. The 80s cover band was absolutely fantastic and kept everyone dancing and singing, not to mention these people there were just plain fun. There were no fights, no drunken messes, no problems and it was perfect. I know I don’t want to get married, and maybe this will change, but I highly doubt it. I can’t picture myself being with someone forever, but I love weddings. I love the idea that two people can be happy and in love enough to take such a monumental step. I love the idea that maybe my friends in the next five or so years will all be getting married. And I hope I can be there for it, because it’s one of those carefree and happy experiences that I savor. Also, free champagne is a real plus.

WHERETHEDUCKSGO

photo credit: Andrew Morrell