I can't prevent changes or find your place for you.

It is hard for me to accept people's changes. Not that that's that uncommon of a thing, not many people actually like or believe in changes. It's not that I don't believe people change; I of all people should know the capacity people have to change. It is hard for me to experience someone's transformations firsthand and easily take them in. It's hard from me to acknowledge even the simplest of my own changes sometimes. For example; I need to eventually need to stop introducing myself as Riley, the 12 year old who likes dolphins and is afraid of the movie War of the Worlds.

Why I Don't Care if You Think I'm a Teen Mom High-School Dropout

(This entry would make more sense if I explained that it was written last Wednesday, a day that I had to myself thanks to not having a 5th period exam. I just procrastinated with transferring here, from the back of folded up study guides.) 

I am trying my hardest to embrace and utilize today, since I am spending it with myself and whatnot. 

This morning, after taking Ryann to school, I went to Super Target. I zipped into a front space, Turned off the car (despite the fact that I was into this particular segment on NPR Morning Edition), shrugged at the fact that the parking lot was virtually empty, and skipped into the store to buy my sister's talent show costumes. Pausing only momentarily to jump over one of the red concrete balls in the front of the store, because it's 9 in the morning and I'm virtually always that annoying peppy at 9 in the morning.

Beginning to clue in to the slight oddity of my situation, I felt that I really needed to justify myself and casually explain my motives to the only other person in the kids section; a hefty woman in a red employee polo and a floor length khaki skirt, mundanely refolding hot pink Disney Channel teeshirts.

For whom?

This past weekend my mom's friend Leslie was visiting town and stayed with us for a couple of nights. Leslie has an uncommon ability to express this certain sense of worldly insight that many inquisitive people never grasp. Also being very in touch with her inner self, Leslie heard her calling and moved from Greensboro, NC to Sedona, AZ. To me, this was a profoundly eye opening act. Her utter ability to pack up her life and follow it to wherever her free soul points, providing no other reason than "This is where I'm meant to be right now"
Leslie and I were sitting at my kitchen table on Thursday talking about a multitude of topics; among them were my relatively new found interest in writing and her recent trip to Peru.

My Childhood, Why I'm a strong person, and my dreams of being on Oprah.

Throughout my childhood I was always afraid of the dark. The pseudo satanic nightmares produced by my 3 year old subconscious left me permanently huddled in fetal position under masses of sheets and blankets, surrounded by a pillow fort and a barely soothing army of stuffed animals. Instead of sleeping, my paranoia would eventually wear me out. 

When my parents split up, staying with my dad was hell. I have never known a parent who got mad at their kid for ordering off the children's menu, but everything was about image. Unfortunately, as far as image goes, I uncannily favor my mother. That was a  fact that he didn't take lightly.

I Promise I'm not crazy.

I am the type of person that plays out scenarios in my head. Whether it be recollecting or anticipating a conversation, preparing my reaction to some said event, or, more often than normal, placing myself in a total daydream-esque fantasy rundown. I fully and readily blame my wondering and creative mind for the times when I walk down the hallway muttering to myself. (No doubt considering my rebuttal, were I to run into a debate-ready Obama or Letterman on my way to the girl’s stall.) If that were the extent of my physical reactions to mental situations, I wouldn’t complain. But my body has no boundaries of subtlety when I am in daydream mode. I flinch in preparation to fall of a cliff as I descend in the stairs in the morning. I bat my eyes and play footsie with the extension cord of my World history class; if only it were the boy sitting across from me at the café I am in, in my head. My daydreams keep my true state of lonesomeness at bay, as I snuggle up on the couch and offer a piece of popcorn to my extremely pillow-like boyfriend replacement.

I'm hardly phased by my actions of this nature anymore. I barely notice as I throw my hands up in italian-styled expression at blank computer screens and twirl my foot out of it's imaginary rope coil. I am who I am.

dwell on it, my free-expressing followers.

Chic bobs and stealing Sedaris from my mom's bookshelves: Memoirs on how I very recently stopped being a phasey.

Teenagers are phasey people. Going in and out of what’s hip and what’s cool, what’s not cool, what’s cooler than cool, and whether or not “cool” is even a cool term. I have a theory that high school cliques are just clumps of people bonding over the fact that they are stuck in the same dreadful phase.

I’ve been through a ton of these phases. I’ve been the nerd, then the wannabe, then the prep, then the emo kid, then the scene kid. Phase after phase after phase. Fueled by a lack of self esteem and a desire to be different, I have made changes to myself based on people and things I wanted to be like and have.

Upon realization (over the summer; to be exact) that I was set in motion on the never ending phase cycle, I made a promise to myself for sophomore year: Do NOT change yourself for people. All I have ever done is change myself so I could be liked by people who I personally hated. I am done officially done being a puppet that masks the true me. (Cheesy, I know.)

Passion

Passion is one of those words that I refer to as “romantic white noise.” We hear it delivered from the dramatic voices of daytime soap operas and printed on the front of classy hallmark cards/boxes of valentines’ chocolates. But the meaning has become road-kill on the frantic highway of rushed work and love. We have honestly lost the passion and drive that motivates us to do what we do not only better and more productively, but with heart. If you are someone who dances or has ever watched someone dance, there is an obvious separation between the people who do it and the people who do it with passion.
Recently I got the opportunity to attend the pairs’ free skate and pairs dance segments of the US Figure Skating Championships. The way the couples glided and twirled was beautiful, but the real beauty lied in the routine of one couple; a brother and a sister who (even though they fell down a couple of times) had the most beautiful and passionate routine I had ever seen. Of course they didn’t win, which sort of undermines my example. But do I remember the people who won? Am I writing about the second placer’s technicalities over the third placer’s? NO.

Passion makes the sport. But don’t play it like a game. (lolcheesylines)

Dwell on it, my passionate perusers.