This morning I woke up and felt like I was about to take a long vacation somewhere far away.

Whenever I'm about to take a trip, I get this excited feeling in my stomach. The anticipation follows me through my shower, getting dressed, eating breakfast, checking final packing lists, and heading out the door.

So this morning, when I had that feeling, I was very confused. I am quite confident I have not scheduled a trip for today. It made me think about Germany, and how desperately I want to be in Europe this summer, and to have an escape plan, and to never come back to Muhlenberg. And for a moment this feeling convinced me that I was actually about to fly away from here. I feel a desperate longing for this to be true.

I often wonder if I am following the path I should be following. Often I think the answer is no - I do not think I would get these feelings that I should be somewhere else if I was meant to be here.

I feel like everything in my life now is out of sorts. It is painstaking for me to go through each day convinced that I should quit college, pack my things, get in my car, and just drive as far as a tank of gas would get me. I often daydream that I would actually have the confidence to go through with this plan. I know in all seriousness that I am woefully stuck here for another year.

And making plans for graduate school is that much tougher, because every time I sit down to do this, my mind wanders to a year from now, when I will finally be free of this place and all its vices.

I just want to start over somewhere. My mind and my body rebel against me, not understanding why I succumb to my obligations here.

Perhaps one day something inside me will snap, and I will leave, and I will never talk to any of you again.

I suspect that would feel surprisingly good.

An Addendum

Dear Dr. Carbone,

For telling me this morning that you thought I would make an excellent teacher, I rescind my request for two extra points on my exam. But just this once. Otherwise, you are still unforgivably mundane in my eyes.

Thanking God I Only Have One Week Left With You,
Kate

A Letter

Dear Dr. Carbone,

Pluralism, as defined by a Google search:

1. The condition of being multiple or plural.
2. 1. A condition in which numerous distinct ethnic, religious, or cultural groups are present and tolerated within a society.
   2. The belief that such a condition is desirable or socially beneficial.

As you have used pluralism as a noun in one of the countless inane multiple-choice questions you added to what clearly should have been a predominantly essay-based test, and as, according to this definition, I correctly eliminated the answer containing the word "pluralism" from the other three answer choices, and as, despite you being a very pretentious dick, I have made it to the majority of your classes this semester, I would like the two points you deducted from my test grade to be reinstated.

It is not my fault that you use words (the definition of) which are largely out of your grasp, and therefore I should not suffer from your ignorance.

Sincerely,
Kate Ponte

Musings

Sometimes I feel like God is a suburban fiction.


Mostly, I concentrate on how good tea feels going down my throat.


You may think these two thoughts are unrelated, but in my head, it all makes sense.

Pennsylvania is Right Out.

Certainly not the most original, but perhaps one of the most pot-influenced, songs to come out of the Northeast, Jonathan Richman's "New England" captures my sentiments in that oh-so-I-wear-my-heart-on-my-sleeve sort of way:

http://giniaginia.muxtape.com/

I think there's something to be said about living with your people.
I'm certainly heartsick for it.

Perhaps I am not that intelligent, but rather I appear smarter than 1,923 kids on this campus because my grammar and spelling are astoundingly accurate compared to the rest of the Muhlenberg population.

I certainly hope that intelligence has something to do with it, though.

I am single.
Why am I single?
I am an intelligent, quirky, funny, cute-bordering-on-sexy attractive type of girl.
I speak two languages fluently.
I am willing to put it all on the line.
I AM NOT PSYCHOTIC.
I am the appropriate amount of crazy.
When I speak, I'm interesting 82.4% of the time.
And when I ramble, I don't expect anyone to listen.
I am in the process of self-actualization.
I can read ten books in a day and still want more.
I'm a cheap date.
I always have extra singles in my wallet.
I am affable.
I have weaknesses.
I really enjoy having sex.
If it's good sex.
Sometimes, even if it isn't good sex.
I write bad poems and I post them on my blog shamelessly.
I dig lighting things on fire.
I wear sandals in the wintertime.
I'm better than a shower-singer and worse than an opera star.
I smile at people I don't know.


Apparently, guys just don't go for that these days.

Little poem, little tree

little tree, little tree,
dances nimbly, haw and gee.
Wind-weaved silk arms bend to me
Sings and spins, weaves and grins.

little tree, tiny tree,
teach to me to grow and be.
Lift me branch-high, build with me
songs and dances, clothes and glee.

little tree, Perfect tree,
what tears me away, you see,
is obligation, rule, and law-
no time to live in poetry.

little tree, lovely tree
dances nimbly, haw and gee
Wind-weaved silk arms beckon me
to sing and spin, weave and grin.

Things I try to keep in mind...

As the deer pants for streams of water,
so my soul pants for you, O God.

2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
When can I go and meet with God?

3 My tears have been my food
day and night,
while men say to me all day long,
"Where is your God?"

4 These things I remember
as I pour out my soul...

5 Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
for I will yet praise him,
my Savior and 6 my God.
My soul is downcast within me;
therefore I will remember you...

8 By day the LORD directs his love,
at night his song is with me—
a prayer to the God of my life.

9 I say to God my Rock,
"Why have you forgotten me?
Why must I go about mourning,
oppressed by the enemy?"

10 My bones suffer mortal agony
as my foes taunt me,
saying to me all day long,
"Where is your God?"

11 Why are you downcast, O my soul?
Why so disturbed within me?

-excerpts from Psalm 42

18 "Forget the former things;
do not dwell on the past.

19 See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the desert
and streams in the wasteland."...

26 Review the past for me,
let us argue the matter together;
state the case for your innocence.

- Isaiah 43

22Then Jesus said to his disciples: "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. 23Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. 24Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! 25Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? 26Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?

27"Consider how the lilies grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 28If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith! 29And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. 30For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them.

-Luke 12

For a long time now I've been fairly angry with God. I don't know if that is really practical, or if it helps to be mad at someone I can't see, someone I'll never know if they exist. Sometimes it feels good just to name my emotion and state my anger - sometimes that's enough.

Lately it has felt like God (or whatever you so choose to replace this word with - life, fate, Allah) has given me almost more than I can handle. It has come to the point where little things that would normally not greatly phase me have made me upset to the point where I can't function. I have been depressed. I have been praying and yearning and searching and wishing and dreaming to wake up one morning and have everything right itself.

I know life isn't that easy, but it is so tempting to think that maybe if I try hard enough, I can make it that easy.

I had a rough day today, and it was made the rougher because I had anticipated having a very lovely day. I do not like surprises, especially not-so-good ones. Every move I make has to do with a sense of establishing some sort of security around me, and when these constructs fail me, I often feel hopeless, desperately afraid, and alone.

Now, I realize I am not alone. My rational brain tells me, "Kate, you are silly. You have a bajillion people you could call right now and they would come and comfort you and hold you and tell you that you're going to be okay." But for some reason, I have an awfully hard time asking for this help. I have such trouble calling to ask for comfort, for a friend, for anyone who will hold me while I am sad and help right me so that I can keep going.

And realizing, at some level, that I am not alone doesn't stop the rest of my traitor brain from telling me that I am overwhelmed, lost, terrified and alone. I haven't quite mastered how to stop this from happening. That will be a very liberating day.

I know I am not upset by what happened today. I feel proud that I can name what DID actually make me upset - it was the feeling that I was just settling in to something I thought was going to be secure, at least on a very basic and casual level, and having that be taken so suddenly away from me. And what made me most afraid was how everything snowballed into one big Problem - things that weren't even closely related to the problem I was dealing with. I felt so overwhelmed, and I started thinking in the way that I would have thought during sophomore year. And that's what REALLY terrified me. But at least now I have the sense to call for help.

I feel very paralyzed sometimes by the past. I feel like being vigilant about my emotions is a double-edged sword, alternately helping and inhibiting me to form a plan of action for the present.

And God? It doesn't seem like he helps. But I have these quotes read to me by close friends, and I think, "That makes sense." Now the hard part is trusting in it. I know that is not something I am ready for, or perhaps it isn't something I want.

What I want is to trust in myself. I want to trust I have the strength enough to make the choice each day to get up, do the work I need to do, be supportive to my family, and fall asleep without having time to take for myself. I would really like to have strength left over to help me think about what I need and want from my life right now. But at least I have enough to want to keep going.

But I think that's enough thinking for tonight. I am tired and it's time for bed, so I can get sleep to get up and do it all again tomorrow. I'm happy that's a choice I get.

Ha, life is ironic.

Approaching summers always seem surreal. Summers kind of float in dead-time, at least for me, because I'm reflecting on the year that's just ended and yearning for the year to come. This summer seems particularly trippy - it is the first year I will not spend a significant amount of it at home; it is the first year I will take a vacation for myself; it is the first year I have a 'real' job.

I keep having dreams about being in New York. They are quiet dreams of wandering the Upper East Side, on a cool morning near the end of summer, walking beside the wall that separates Central Park from Fifth Avenue. They are of forgotten playgrounds, broken water fountains, slow traffic, street kiosks. They are of staring out of Zack's second-floor window, eyes meeting with kids dancing in a feeble-looking gyser forcing bubbles of cold water out of concrete. They are of the damp smell of old apartments and the dry smell of steam heat emitting from radiator pipes, the old white paint slowly cracking off, like a damaged eggshell. They are of my favorite mornings in my not-so-favorite-summers. They are the moments I felt grounded.

I really don't want to go to graduate school unless it's in New York City. That's where I can think the most without having the rest of my body float away with my head in some trippy transcendental state.

Being in new relationships always confuses me, because there's a really terrifying period of time between the initial feeling of like and the eventual feeling of falling in love that is kind of devoid of any feeling for me. And I always worry that that feeling will never go away, and that I've started something for no good reason. So far it has always passed.

I'm always waiting for things to pass.

Everywhere I look there are people who know exactly what they want to do with their lives. They go through college with that purpose and that plan, firmly implementing it at every given opportunity. And then there's me, who can't figure out where she's going or what she's doing, who is scared of every option she could take, to the point where she's frozen and she looks at her blank blog page and thinks "How am I supposed to make a living from this?"

the short list of words i like saying because of how they feel in my mouth:
phosphoric
bedizened
claro
sacapuntas

words that feel ugly in my mouth:
subtle
pillow
chasm
llueve

my peculiar pronunciation i like using the most:
quarter

things i find i use far too frequently in my papers:
juxtaposition
subsequent
ideal

things i use incorrectly in my papers:
irony versus humor
motif, metaphor, symbol
the implications of tragedy
or comedy, for that matter
or what exactly happens when the author insists the two combine
(although they combine anyway inherently)

things i am going to be 2 minutes late for:
class

a laundry list of today, for future reference:
-first slam poetry experience. a self-proclaimed chicano.
-a peculiarly acceptable dinner in the garden room. fulfillment of my weekly requirement of carbohydrates.
-mitch hedburg, overdoses, and urban myths
-two bottles of poland spring; halfway through the second, the realization that i have come to like aquafina better
-olive oil from italy with rosemary floating on top
-stress about future. ALWAYS stress about future.
-mulling family and father
-mulling repercussions of speaking about family and father
-mulling
-too much thinking and subsequent headaches
-fabulously brilliant conversations with intriguing professors
-nineteen wonderful kisses and a warm hug

There is something really un-funny about a stand-up comedian dying.

It just kind of ruins the experience of the funny.

On a gentle slope you kissed me
Blue stone set in silver ring
Appropriated for this occasion
To signify another thing
And you chose to make that moment
pass without a hint of bliss
Had it been there, perhaps I would think
that's something I would miss.

Pursed lips brush against my shoulder
as a snore becomes a kiss
and I think, "When I am older
I will come to realize this
as a moment that I let pass
in a daydream-laden mist
I could lie and tell myself that
it is something I won't miss.

Did I force you? Did I blame you?
Did I leave us in the fall?
Did I love you? Did I leave you
missing anything at all?

On a gentle slope you left me
falling into an abyss
But the language and the symbol
stand to forge a part in this
blue stone cold in silver ring
promised so much in the spring
words and metal a decree
twist to see the silly thing-

just a hollow promise given
to invoke the need for this.

Facets

There is much happiness I find in new relationships.

I'm not talking solely about romantic relationships (although those come with their own fun and awkward introductions, as I am currently re-investigating). I'm talking about all types of relationships. Facebook-friend-relationships. Five-minute-introduction-relationships. Lunch-gang-relationships. Relationships based on sharing texts in class. Relationships centered around a common caffeine addiction. Probably most importantly, the relationship between a writer and their medium.

I find it particularly difficult to write on paper. I think after countless classes of Computer and Typing, after countless hours of Instant Messenger and e-mail, paper these days borders on the sentimental. I'd like to think my writing avoids the sentimental and has the gift of "seeing things as they really are", as quite a few Marina Carr characters would dream to have accomplished.

But I guess that all depends on if we share a common opinion as to how things should be seen, and how things really are. If you are reading this I assume that we have at least common elements in thought that have previously brought our relationship to a strong enough point where I can relax and give you pieces of me through this blog. So perhaps, we see things in a common light. I am not sure if any two people can compare how things really are.

I do trust that you separate the author from the person. Writing always reveals a part and not a whole. So I suppose what you find here is an edited version of many facets of me, of how these facets form to see things and emote how they function together to produce a reality of sorts.

Currently, this is my reality.
I expect that to change.