Changes

I've been going through...changes.

No, not those kinds of changes.

Basically, everything in my life is changing, very fast, and it's scaring the crap out of me.

First: I'm taking a college class about Philosophy this summer, and it's really challenging to challenge everything you believe and really ask yourself why you believe what you believe.

Second: I start working at Starbucks this Tuesday, which is scary and exctiting at the same time. It's such a great company, and I've heard great things from people who have worked there--and it's my first job, too! Plus I really need a job--really badly--so I can start saving for college and maintain some level of independence with food and gas and things like that.

Third: Forensics. Basically, everything with forensics. I've grown a lot this year from it, from learning how to lose, to learning to win--to going to Nationals and realizing how much I wanted to win, and realizing the level of disappointment one can have in themselves when they know that they didn't do as much as they could have--that the reason they didn't do better is largely their fault.

Then, learning how to be a good friend--I've learned a lot about that, and I've completely changed as a friend, and I've learned how to deal with people that I don't particularly like, and I'm learning how to be okay with the fact that some people just aren't going to like me.

Then all of my friends are leaving (read: not all, but a good majority, and certainly my best friends). I'm going to miss all of them so much. Last night I said good-bye to one of them, and I realized that it might be the last time I see him ever again. With him and the others, it feels too soon: there is so much I want to do with them, tell them; for some of them I feel like I wasn't always the best friend I could have been. There's a hearbreaking combination of regret and sadness, as well as a feeling of empty, that overwhelms me: change.

This fall I'm going to be President of the team, and...there's just so much I want from next year--so much I feel my heart might burst. I want to be the best I can be. I know I worked this year, but I want to work so much harder next year because I know I'm better than what I gave at Nationals. I'm frankly ashamed of myself, and I want to redeem that next year: I want to prove myself to myself. I'm going to get to Nationals again next year, because I'm going to spend all year working on my technique, working on my arguments, working on my flowing--everything, so that I can kick butt and end up on that stage thanking my family and coaches before I read my speech in front of a few hundred people.

Fourth: I'm going to be on-campus at the college this fall, taking 17 credit hours towards my Associate's Degree, and that scares me as well--not only will I be on a campus I've never been at before, I'll be taking more work than I've taken before.

Fifth: I'm not going to date in high school. I know that sounds really melodramatic, but it's honestly a big deal, and certainly a change. I've been sort of hoping something would happen with someone for the last three years, and nothing has: and now I'm a senior, and looking at going to a school out-of-state when I graduate--not exactly a good time to start a relationship. But it's still a change of mindset for me.


Some of these are good changes, but all of them terrify me beyond belief. I was happy with where things were however many weeks ago--saying goodbye to my friends was a long way off, and I didn't have to worry about my future because it wasn't happening yet, and I had no way of knowing I would disappoint myself so painfully at Nationals.

There's no escaping them at this point: they're happening, and all I can do is try to enjoy the good changes and get through the hard ones.

Reasons

Reasons Why I Fail: 

*I still haven't started my vlog (I've written the script, but I have yet to film it)

*I haven't posted on here in forever

*I still have a few episodes of Doctor Who to post about

*I was pathetically unprepared for Nationals, and so was knocked out during the preliminary rounds

*I have missed two days of my Philosophy class already, because I was at Nationals, and now I can't go tomorrow either because I have a dentist appointment--making that three classes in a row



Reasons Why Life is Good:

*My summer has actually started

*I had an awesome week with my team

*I start work on Tuesday

*I'm posting on my blog now

*Doctor Who comes back in five months (to the day)

*I have a three month break from forensics before I start getting into gear to rock people's socks for the next forensics season

*Life is going to get crazy and really good


A friend of mine asked me what my goals were for the next year, and I told him that it would have to be

A) to not get overwhelmed by everything going on around me (because it's a lot)
and
B) to enjoy everything going on around me (because it's all good)

I need to not stress myself out about everything I have to do and when I have to do it, and just realize that life will always be busy, but I'll get it all done--and remember to not get so caught up in how much I have to do that I forget to have fun doing it.

My most popular post

After publishing the last post on Graduation, I started looking at the individual views for all of my posts, trying to find out which of my posts has the most views. For a while, it was one of my posts on the oovoo toolbar. Then I got to my Season 1 days, and there it was, with 24 views: Boom Town.

BOOM TOWN?! Boom Town is my most popular post? Why? I hated that episode! Of all seven seasons of Doctor Who that I've seen, that's probably my least favorite episode, and that's the post everyone reads? I was taken aback to say the least. My brother thinks it might be because it's the most interesting of all of my posts, but that's not true. My Oovoo toolbar updates are far more entertaining, and you would think recent Who (not season 1) would be the most viewed.

I'm just flabbergasted.

Graduation

So today is one of the days for graduation. The school I compete at is having their graduation today, so I have a lot of friends who are graduating today.

Initially, I wasn't going to go because I just didn't want to. I hear stories from people about how it's really like sitting for two hours and just hearing names called out, and cheering every once in a while for people you know.

And that just didn't sound fun to me.

Then this morning, I got a text from one of my friends who is graduating today, and she said something like, "You're coming to the ceremony tonight right?"

It was like a knife to the gut.

Because I guess I'd just assumed that the graduates wouldn't care if I came. That was my first mistake. Then, as I realized I had to tell her I couldn't come (for a legitimate reason), I realized that I actually wanted to go. I mean, it would be less exciting if I had to sit by myself, but if I found some friends who were also going, I could sit with them, and it would be fun cheering for my friends who I care about so much, and getting to see them afterwards and congratulate them.

And now I can't go, which is making me feel depressed. Why can't I go? Because earlier this week, when my mom asked me if I had anything going on on this particular night, I said no, because I thought I didn't want to go. So we're having someone over. Not that it won't be fun hanging out with this particular person, but I feel like a horrible human being for not going to the graduation, and it's all my fault that I can't go.

So, friend, if you're reading this, I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. I wish I could come, but I can't. And now you know why.

BUT for all of my friends who are graduating today, I will probably be at your graduation parties tomorrow! So I'll still get to see you and congratulate you, even if it's not tonight. Though I wish it could be tonight. Okay, that's enough feeling sorry for myself.

I think I'm going to do it. Finally.

Months ago (perhaps a year ago) I discussed on this blog my idea to do a vlog on YouTube, called Confessions of a Vamp1reslayr. I was going to do "confessions" every video, where I confessed that I was a fan of Doctor Who, or that I had a blog, or various other pointless tidbits about me and my life.

I've changed my mind. Not about having a vlog; that desire remains strong. But rather, I've changed my mind about what the vlog will be about. I'm not going to do Confessions. In fact, I won't probably have a theme.

So why am I going to start now? I'm inspired. It started, obviously, months ago, and then I talked myself out of it as school started and life got cray-cray. Then I started watching this "weekly" documentary called Becoming YouTube. Becoming YouTube is fantastic. Absolutely fantastic. It's all about YouTube and the YouTubers who make content, and the content that they make. From the start, it was inspiring, with its calls to people who want to make YouTube videos to actually make YouTube videos. Most inspiring was the episode on Girls on YouTube. This particular episode centered on the content that females make, and the responses they get, as well as the major discrepancy between females and males on YouTube. Frankly, not many females make YouTube videos. And if they do, they tend to be hair and makeup tutorials, not quality vlogs. That episode ended with a call to females to make content--and to make good content.

Yet, when that episode came out, I was deeply entrenched in my second semester of college-work, and had no time to start. Then I discovered Itswaypastmybedtime, a vlog created by Carrie Fletcher. Carrie is awesome. She's one of my favorite people on YouTube, and she makes really good vlogs. I fell in love with her videos, and I've been watching them regularly. And then, school ended, and I had all of these ideas about what I wanted to do with my summer. And vlogging hadn't occurred to me. Then just the other day (Thursday) we watched a movie called Indie Game, which is about Indie game developers. Which you wouldn't think is related to vlogging, but they were talking about the creative process, and how it was sort of like sending your kid to the first day of school, and you can only wait. And it just reminded me so much of what YouTubers say about YouTube, and the videos they upload, and so many different videos came to mind:
Becoming Youtube, every single episode
Charlieissocoollike, I'm Scared
Crabstickz, Quitting YouTube

(And no, I did not alphabetize those on purpose--though I did just finish fixing our movie stand for alphabetization)

And I realized right then: I wanted to start making YouTube videos. So I started thinking about when I could do it, and I was busy Thursday because I was going to a grad party, and Friday I had breakfast with a friend and a grad party, so I decided that today, Saturday, was going to be the day I made my first YouTube video.

We'll see if it actually happens. It's 2 pm already, and I haven't eaten lunch (it's almost ready), and I still have some chores to get done, and then we have someone coming over tonight (I dunno when) so we'll see if I actually have time to film it.

But I have an idea, I have the resolve, and I think I'm actually going to do it this time.

I think.

Soccer

I wish I could get in shape. Honestly, I really do. Part of my desire to exercise is to lose a little bit of weight. But since I only have a little bit of weight that I really need to lose, my primary aim is to get in shape. I want to have muscles and be able to run, and things like that.

Besides, I just enjoy exercising.

Yet, for some reason, despite my very obvious desire to exercise, I have the greatest trouble actually doing it. For whatever reason, every time I decide that I want to exercise, my brain tries to sabotage me by coming up with excuses. Some of the excuses are good: it's snowing outside; you're sick and shouldn't over-exert yourself; you have a million other things to do...And some of the excuses are not good: but you could watch TV instead; you'd have to change your clothes; but you were about to eat lunch!

More often than not, I think I'm afraid to start exercising because in all of the times when I started exercising, I ended up stopping at some point for some reason. And if I know that it's not going to last, I think I end up asking myself:

What's the point?


All of this to set up what I actually want to talk about today. Last night was the Forensics Team Picnic, a time when the team gets together and attempts to grill food (and fails most of the time), announces Mock Awards, and elects officers for the upcoming season. The Picnic is also the time of the annual soccer game.

It happens every year. The seniors and alumni/coaches team up against everyone else in an epic game of soccer. We play barefoot and with street rules, though that doesn't stop the other team complaining about there being six different goalies, while they have people playing with their shoes on. It is a time to foster team cooperation and love.

For me, this was a great chance for me to exercise my competitive nature, and kill everyone else on the team. Not literally.

I had not had so much fun in such a long time. It was like all of the great things that I love about debate: being able to go on offense, and put others on defense, and attack, and use my skills to receive results. With an addendum: it was physical activity.

Gosh, I have missed physical activity. Again, I will repeat: it has been a very long time since I have exercised. So when my chest was restricting, and it was hard to breathe, and every part of my body wanted me to quit moving and go sit down, I could smile. I relished the feeling, and kept pushing myself. Instead of sitting down, I would spring harder than before. I would get right up with the ball, and kick it away from people, and follow where it went, and run over to the goalpost to try to be available for someone to pass it to me so I could kick it in (which they never did until I was incapable of shooting from where I was).

The other thing that was fantastic about it was that it was sort of all instinct. I knew how to kick the ball, and how to get the ball away from people. Obviously, I don't have any training (other than playing when I was in first and second grade), but it just felt good to play.

So I love soccer. If I was going to play any athletic sport, it would be soccer. In fact, I realized last night, if I could play soccer to get in shape, I would. Today, I'm sore in my thighs, calves, obliques, shoulders, and triceps. Not to mention how good I feel today simply from having the exercise. I could get in shape fast if I played soccer every couple of days. And now that's what I want to do. I think it would be fun to get friends together over the summer to just play soccer.

Maybe make it a regular thing, where like every Tuesday night or something we all just meet at the park; who can come comes, and we just play.

Or, I could just start running up in the mountains I live in now, and get in shape super quickly, and just play soccer when I can. Maybe I should buy a soccer ball.

Anyway, I need to start exercising, and I love soccer. And hopefully those two things will work together, and make my summer rock.

Oh man

So I've seen the finale of Doctor Who. And I still had an episode before that one to review. And honestly, I don't particularly want to review it right now. To start, I need to see the finale again before I can truly process it. My mom says it's the best episode of Doctor Who ever, but I think I need to see it again before I can decide if I agree with her. There was some nice conclusion, with a couple of characters, and some nice humor, and some nice emotional moments and everything. It was a really good episode. Anyway, a full review coming later. Suffice it to say: Wow. I can't wait until November.