Jackelopette

Announcement:
While it’s all very much still undecided, I do have an opportunity to do a 3-month internship at the National 4-H Council in Chevy Chase, MD. Once I get a few more of the details worked out, I intend to go do it. I’m excited. It’s about time.

Boston was a good trip. Very few of my plans worked out as expected, but it ended up being a fun fun time. Essentially, I tweaked my back and ended up staying out late, so my planned tours didn’t exactly happen the way I’d intended. So, some highlights:

• Mrs. Hoye look-alike on the Midway-Providence flight. Quite disturbing, for any of my readers who went to VPS. *shudder* And she was directly ahead of me in the SWA line.
• Staying with a couple high school buddies whom I don’t get to really hang out with that often… things change but fun stays the same.
• Harvard Yard was an instance of major deja vu – geography is very very similar to Trinity College. I lolled and people-watched. I may not be a Harvard or MIT grad, but at least I have used the same toilets as the finest minds of my generation… now what does that say about me?
• Eating dinner outside Fenway Park during the Sox-Angels game and watching the fans. Also laughing at the t-shirts.
• Harvard Bridge and Smoots.
• MIT Hacks. I got the first-person commentary on a few of them from Jason…
• The MIT Great Glass Pumpkin Patch. Pretty pretty glass pumpkins.
• I didn’t do the full Freedom Trail but I did manage to wander around Boston Common with an old and a new friend. Horses need diapers.
• Air Force guys are highly entertaining. So are engineers. Commentary becomes comedy…

Now that I know what to expect, my next visit should encompass everything I missed and more. It also got me quite interested in the DC thing. I can’t wait to see more of the east coast… consider me hooked.

The last few days have held enough reasons to rejoice in my old friends that I am ready for whatever fate throws my way.

It’s bittersweet, of course; none of us are in the same locations or frames of mind anymore. Some things have grown easier, some harder. There are friends with whom I’ve lost touch and would like to regain it. There are others, who still haunt the old relationships, whom I’d rather forget.

In reconnecting with the Ventura/Ojai folks I risk losing my Davis family – not because I lack affection for them but simply because I am not there. I find it hard not to follow my more immediate friends, though I know that in the long term I hold this place more deeply in my heart than I do Davis. I’ve near-brothers and near-sisters in both places – those friends of the heart that I could never leave wholly behind.

It’s hard, having to wait. Hard trying to convince myself of one place’s merits over another – and knowing that it all depends not on my choice but on someone else’s decisions. I haven’t spent so long a period at home since I moved into an apartment; it’s required a lot of adjustment but I’m finally content as an adult here, too.

I don’t recall ever dreaming of an escape from Ojai. Of course I’d go away to college, travel, learn, live, love in other places – but I never truly felt trapped here the way so many others do. I never minded the deep roots.

The more I wait for a way to stay in Davis, the more I’m quite satisfied to live in Ojai. I suppose that’s for the best, really – ready to live in either place, accept what comes.

I never saw a need to be jealous of my friends as their lives changed; I’ve always seen life as a series of chapters in an unfinished book. Characters move across the pages, recurring or not as their roles demand. There are some whose return I applaud again and again, no matter how long or how distant their absence. There are also some to whom there are things I’ll never say.

The closer I get to the answer I’ve been awaiting, the less I want to hear what I used to wish for… I keep telling myself it’s all right to feel as I do – that there are no rules for the post-college soul-searching I’ve been doing. It feels a bit *safe* to want to settle back here. I blame it on all the talk of dreams and excelling and proving oneself that we’ve all heard a thousand times before. Still, I don’t find it any easier.

So, consider me still in limbo. Assume that I’ve no answers, for assuredly I’ll let you know the moment I do.

Last night was a bust. Fortunately there was one other person roughly my age with whom I had an intelligent conversation, else I’d have left much earlier. I was the only person from my class. Ick.

Tonight is Mrs. Jardine’s choir’s concert – I plan to go for a little bit and meet up with some old choir buddies whom I’ve not seen in… 7 years? Also dinner at Boccali’s with my dad and de facto big sister Amy.

Carmina Burana CDs and DVDs came. I am now reliving the glory of Bibit.

Gone too soon, friend. Memories just aren’t the same place without that smile.

Hope the view up there is better than the one down here.

Emily found the actual quote from two years ago:

“What gives us the right to… OOH!! bunnies!!! No, look guys, the buck is chasing the doe in circles! It’s spring!” — Cindy

“You’re going to grow up and be in a debate and stop suddenly and say ‘just give me 5 minutes guys. It’s mating season.’” — Jillian

… and two years later …

“Poor little Cindy has to go through taunting every mating season. ” — Emily

Goodbyes…

I’ve never been much good at saying goodbye. I either feel too little or too much, and I never know how to leave it afterwards.

Jason leaves tomorrow for college — I haven’t seen him since the graduation in May. Too many things going on, too many lines of communication not being used. And it’s not just him. I’ve had to say too many goodbyes this summer…

I think the worst ones are the unexpected goodbyes. The ones where there’s very little closure. Where you feel that they have not left knowing how much you cared. Where you know that you could have done more, said more. Stopped by to visit more.

So if you’re one of my goodbyes, I miss you, and I really do care. And if you’re no longer able to hear me say it, it’s hard not having you here anymore.

*hugs*

That’s it.

It’s settled.

Emily and I are running off to be pirates. Wearing tight pants and billowy white shirts and sailing off onto the open seas. With cabin slaveboys and a night crew and luxurious cabins. The cabin slaves will give foot rubs and back rubs, and fetch things and make beds.

And we will be so much smarter than the pirates in disney films.

Mwahahaha!

We’ll take interviews if you want to join us.

I was sitting at lunch with some friends junior year. And the high school was hopping with cottontails, in and out of the bushes.I noticed a pair chasing each other in the middle of a sentence.

me: “we really should consider the deeper meanings of this… ooh! Bunnies!”
them: “Cindy, you think that rabbits have a deeper meaning?”
me: “no, look, bunnies! They’re chasing each other. It’s spring.”
them: “so, Cindy, you think that we should consider the implications of you getting all excited over the rabbits’ mating season?”
me: *speechless spluttering*
them: *teasing for the rest of my time there*

Em and I found our own Matrix Coat in Santa Barbara yesterday. We were both lusting after it. Great fit. Great look. Great sticky-shiny-techno-look vinyl. Until we saw the price tag. Ain’t no way we paying $158 for a coat like that. We’re going to make our own, that way we don’t have to worry about custody agreements and such. *drool* Can’t wait to find my Matrix Coat pattern and fabric! Mwahahaha!

Quick Solstice Run-Down:

After many irritating and useless delays, finally left the house about 20 minutes late. Em had just gotten to the station (I think) after many trials and tribulations at the Evil DMV. The trip up on Amtrak was about 35 minutes, and *cough* despite our best efforts, it was free. I mean, we went up to a guy in uniform holding out money and saying “here, take our money, we want two tickets to S.B.” and he said to go upstairs and chill. So we did. And were ignored by about eight other Amtrak dudes who were collecting tickets from everyone else. *shrug* if they actively dissuade us from trying to pay them, it’s their own fault if they don’t get paid for tickets. Sheesh.

So after that we trotted merrily up? down? along? State Street from the station, under the freeway and back up into the cloudy daylight, past the Adult Shoppe and the cops on bikes outside Ye Olde Donut Shoppe or whatever it was, past the staging area of the parade, to our ultimate goal: The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf outside the Paseo Nuevo. After standing forever in front of two creepy old men (one of whom kept blowing into my hair — SHUDDER! EW!), purchased two mochas and settled down to watch the fun.

And was it ever disturbing! We’ve both been through Mr. Bunce’s “Introduction to Freudian Psychoanalysis” which includes Carmen Miranda in The Tutti Frutti Hat dancing with 7-foot bananas in “The Gang’s All Here.” Well, one of the first folks down the line was an old guy wearing a banana attached to a nose flute (if you’ve never seen/heard one, be thankful) and you guessed it, a tutti frutti hat. At least he wasn’t in the midriff-baring dress from the movie. Insert prayers of gratitude here.

And we mustn’t forget the girl in the stick-dancing group, surrounded by bikini tops and matching skirts/shorts/who knows what. Who was defying convention by wearing no top. Only a pair of pasties (again, if you’ve never seen ‘em, be thankful. Stop drooling, guys!). And yes, there was another old man wandering down the street, rubbernecking to watch every jiggle.
And the Seuss-ian characters with the long beaks, the “Weapons of Mass Creation” inspectors with white paper suits and “detectors” made from household appliances and painted blue. The hula dancers who were actually good. The ski folks. The gorgeous dragons! Em and I are going to make sets of wings too. *drool*

And the Las Vegas-style senior citizens on their high heels (yes, the guys too) and skimpy outfits (groan, yes the guys too!). The stand-out was the guy in a loincloth. We later decided that it was a thong or something equally icky with revealing flaps of fabric tacked on front and back. Waving in the wind. It was nasssssty. And all this after reading the “parade rules” which stated “if we can see through it or around it, you’re naked and in violation.”

*shudder* Santa Barbara has quite a collection of old guys with weird taste.

There is an orange balloon floating around the house, that has an affinity for my head. It stayed on my head from the beginning of the parade, through a store or two, and then sat in my bag for the rest of the day. Static electricity is cool.

Got a pair of ultra-dangly earrings, posts with about 4 inches of chains and stars on the ends. Fun, except when I turn my head and the stars hit my teeth. Em gets a kick out of that.

Mostly just rambled through the various SB stores and then to the park by the Catholic Church (near Folk Mote). Can’t remember its name but it was full of booths and food and vendors. Quite fun. We found butterfly wings there. More inspiration.

On our way back toward the station, went into a vintage/costume shop with lots of overpriced fun outfits. Where we found The Matrix Coat (see above). Drool.

After a few more distractions, finally made it to the station with about 10 minutes to spare, hopped on the train, and had a math lesson. The dude who (5 minutes before reaching Ventura) decided that he was actually going to take our tickets got confused. First we said, “we got on in Santa Barbara.”
He said “no you didn’t, it’s $14 if you got on there, it’s $8 if you got on in Carpinteria.”
So he took a $20 bill from Em in order to buy two $8 tickets.
He didn’t have 4 ones, so I give him 5 ones in exchange for a $5 bill.
So then he gets confused.

16 from 25 is 9. So he needs to give us $9. Well, he gave me a $5. Which took care of the singles he needed to give Em $4. But he took about 2 minutes to figure it out, despite us telling him “$4. $4. $4!” Idiot.

Anyway, he finally gave her the change and we got off in Ventura. Still, can’t beat $8 for a round trip to Santa Barbara, especially when they were quoting $19.20 on the website!

Hehehe. Amtrak is stupid. No wonder they can’t break even, let alone make a profit! Hehehe.

*grin* All in all, a fun day. Now I have to go find fabric for our Matrix Coats.

Oh. For the hair. If you want to see what it looked like two weeks ago, BEFORE IT ALL WASHED OUT *insert incoherent cursing and grumbling here* Colleen just sent me pictures. They finally came through. Mwahaha.

So email me. I won’t post them on here. Don’t wanna tempt fate.