Home

So I'm sitting in the library at the state college I went to for one whole year. Staring out the window at a campus covered in snow and having the weirdest feeling that this is all wrong. I shouldn't be here, I've moved on. I moved away, have a career, have a life outside this tiny town.

At the same time, it's almost healing to visit this place again. To be back where I was when my life was all possibilities. Where each new day could change my path forever. It's so much the same as it was then, and yet many small changes remind me that this is now, that I'm not 19. The campus green is gone, now buried under a building full of classrooms. Parking lots have been moved, sidewalks rerouted. The bells in the clock tower just chimed. And again I have to shake the feeling that this is still 1999.

Going home has the eeriest effects on me. I've already run into people that I went to school with. You have that strained 2 minute conversation about where do you work, where do you live, are you just home for the Holiday? You walk away not knowing if they were glad to see you, if it should evolve into meeting for coffee to really catch up or if they're thankful to be out of your presence until the next time you awkwardly bump into each other in another 3 years.

My 10 year high school reunion is this summer. It will be interesting to see how everyone hasn't changed and who ended up married to whom after we graduated and went our separate ways. I feel like my life is in order enough to not be embarrassed about comparing files with all the ghosts from my past. I can't hold a candle to the guy who is now a Super Bowl Ring sporting, Pro Ball Player, but I work for an international corporation and have a title that sounds important if you don't really know what I do. I know it shouldn't matter how everyone else turned out, that I should be happy just to be me, but who is really ever happy with that?

Back From the Dead

Okay, so I've avoided this for far too long. 11 months later, I should surely have new things to say, but I'm not entirely certain that I do. Work is still much the same, though a transfer to a new category has meant a lot of late nights trying to get a handle on things. Life outside of work is basically non-existent, which is sad in so many ways. I go to work, stay late, and then come home and crash on the couch. Wow, I'm so exciting.

It's the Christmas season, so I should be out drinking and making merry, but really haven't been into it this year. I've been a bit of a shut in. I can't seem to make myself put on a happy face and go play nice with the other kids. All I want to do is sleep. I feel like I could sleep for the next 2 months and still not be caught up.

Today I should have been working on the new dresses I need to have sewn by January. "Should" is such an ugly word. It's actually been banished from my house. I'm not allowed to say it out loud, in the hopes that it will help keep our house stress free. My sister, who I share a house with, is an artist. Things that "should" be done are very low on her list. Which I can definitely see the joy in. Why force yourself to do the things that should be done, when there are so many more things that "could" be done.

My biggest problem is that my days are upside down. It's 10:45 pm and I'm just starting to feel like I have the energy and enough focus to work on all of my projects. I have 4 dresses designed in my head that I'd like to get done by the next event, but I'll be lucky if I get through 2. I feel like I could finally start working on them now, but my sister will be home soon and all the noise that sewing machines make is not so conducive to her being able to sleep. I'll have to start again tomorrow.

Really not looking forward to the first step. I have to redesign the pattern for the dress. It's a very fitted style and the last ones I made are now way too big. I'd give anything for a Simplicity pattern that could just be cut out and sewn, no thinking required, but accurate clothing from 1370 doesn't come from a Halloween costume book. Still trying to figure out exactly why I put myself through this...no I'm not. I'm crazy, that's why I do it.

Time to get a few things done, now that the creative juices are flowing. I'll keep you posted on the progress.