Tag: Growing Up

Here’s a Slice of Senioritis

Posted on by Sierra

I legitimately have a list of things to do that is taller than me, and before you insert a short joke here, consider how daunting 5’3″ tall To Do list would look, even if it was written in a big font.

I have A LOT to do. So I scripted my To Do list, which was enjoyably stressful, as always, and I planned on going to the store to start our crock pot dinner, and then start the crock pot dinner and then get started on my 27,000 list of things to do. I was feeling as optimistic as a bright young cherry might if a cherry knew how to feel. I was planning on conquering the world tonight. I saved myself a Dr. Pepper, which I try to only drink now when the world needs conquering.

It looks worse in person, if you’ll believe it.

But you see, I got derailed. First, I had to find out who went home on The Bachelor, and now I think Ben is an idiot. So I had to mourn for a minute about who went home on The Bachelor. And then I thought I should get started on my homework, but instead, I took a nap, watched this Ellen video about fifteen times, got hungry, ate instant soup, tried to start my homework, showed my husband the Ellen clip, took another nap, cuddled with my husband, and then made a Lean Cuisine (which, I don’t even like, and didn’t really eat). This whole procrastination process took six hours. I have become a procrastination expert. 


I am choosing to blame Super-Senioritis, which is what happens to you when you were supposed to graduate a year ago, but then you had to stay even longer, and your brain is so addled that if you ever have to read another poem or critical essay again, you might decide to intentionally run over a trashcan with your car just because you’re horribly fried, and for some reason, that sounds like a good idea, and also use run on sentences because that also sounds like a good idea. That’s what Super-Senioritis does to all your thoughts and sentences that used to be neatly organized inside your brain and out.

I don’t remember having Senioritis this badly before. Certainly not senior year of high school, although admittedly my senior high school teachers were quite obliging; you’d get an A for participation if you said “Bless You” when the teacher sneezed. But in college, I still have 16 grueling credits, all of which would be totally awesome if I had taken them any semester except for this one.

And here’s the thing. My To Do list is still 5’3″ and this blog did little to help (though I think I will count it as a Slice of Life to make myself feel better).  I think it might actually be time to start on my homework.


After I watch that hilarious Ellen video one more time. 

Brace yourselves. It’s world-conquering time.
My poor untouched backpack, casually flung
 and disregarded on the floor

Animal Therapy

Posted on by Sierra

When I was a little girl, I opened the door to go outside and play, and found that my front porch had become the resting ground of a baby bird who had flown the nest much too early. I closed the door and broke into sobs, so devastated by the crumpled wings. Later, when I’d gathered my emotions, I went out to give the baby a birdie burial. But I heard my dad on the other side of the door.
            “Uh oh,” he said to someone, I think my brother. “We better take care of this before Sierra finds it.”
            He knew about my tender nature. He knew that my first love, before I loved writing, or theatre, or movies, or hanging out with friends, I first loved animals. I even wanted to become a vet before I realized that I had no brain for science whatsoever.
            I still think that the very saddest day of my life was the day my dog died. Now, you might say that I haven’t had a very hard life, which might be true, but I tell you that to illustrate that really, I have a deep and profound love for animals.
            The love lay dormant for a few years. Once I got into college, I didn’t have time to think about pets or animals of any sort. But a little over a year ago, my friend asked me to pet/house sit their dog, Sadi, and it was easy to remember why I love dogs so much. I was having a sad day, and Sadi got up onto the couch with me (I assume that was allowed) and very intuitively placed her paw in my open hand. I didn’t ask for it or prompt it. The dog was just a good. And it made my whole day better.
            Our current apartment is not conducive to any sort of critter, and Jeremy doesn’t have paws, but he has found a way to help me through sad days.
Today, I was having a bad day. He sent me this:
            

SOL: And No One Knows, Tiddly Pom, How Cold My Toes, Tiddly Pom, Are Growing

Posted on by Sierra

I am typing (my 100th post!) in gloves. I am letting my hands recover from the cold. They feel like they’ve been holding dry ice for a couple of seconds—literally burned by the cold.
When I was a kid, I was the kind that would hang out in the door wells during recess in the winter. The recess aids, Mrs. Pemperton (whom the students spitefully called Mrs. “Temperton”) specifically, would come and pull me from my safe haven of extra warm, and scoot me back into the cold. I’m still not sure why they made the rule about not hanging out in the door wells. I wasn’t doing any harm… besides maybe a pagan indoor dance or something (not really. I was probably reading a book). 
Anyways. Whenever Mrs. Pemperton escorted me back to the playground, she always added advice to her rebuke. 

“Go run around like a normal kid. It will warm you up!”

15 years later, I am here to debunk this childhood myth, like the ones parents tell you about your bread crust being good for you, etc etc. I can now attest that there are some colds that body heat just cannot compete with. That was the cold of this morning. I know this because I was walking very briskly today and that still didn’t stop my boogers from turning into icicles and my ears becoming hard enough that you could chisel them from the side of my head like a sculpture. That didn’t stop the furious pinking of my cheeks—in fact, it probably only augmented it.(I’ve taken my gloves off now, in case you were wondering) Walking briskly did little, in fact, it was so cold this morning that my joints started to freeze up as I was ascending the RB stairs, and my brisk walk turned more to the pace of a dying praying mantis.
Image Credit 
I’m the kind of person who hates waking up in the morning, not because of the early hour, but because I hate getting out of my igloo of blankets, my carefully constructed heat dome of happiness. But I’d gladly wake up early to beat the dancer kids to the parking spaces outside the RB, if only to stay a little bit warmer-longer on my morning walk to campus.
*Ten Blogger Points if you catch the literary reference in my title. 

Starting Over Number 1

Posted on by Sierra

        It has recently come alarmingly to my attention that I should have written in my blog more during 2010. Unbeknownst to me, a special someone was collecting my blog posts, gathering them up, and binding them in a special little book, so that I could feel the joy of being published. And I petered out in September. Not to diminish the extreme treasure this little book is to me, or to diminish the extreme treasure the giver of the book is to me—but it feels incomplete—just like all the other projects and goals that I was so excited about at the beginning of 2010.
        But let me explain something. I love new beginnings. I love a clean slate. I love the first of the month. I love blank notebooks that are ready to be filled with a gigantor list of all the things I want to do that day/week/month/year/instant. I love birthdays and holidays, because all of these times are “Starting Over” times for me—times that I can recommit to stop biting my fingernails (which have been growing strong since my birthday in early December, in case you were wondering), or to start working out, or to write in my blog more often.
            Yet, seeing as every day is not a “starting over point,” and seeing that I stopped “starting over” with my blog in September–this leads my to my newest New Years Resolution:  No more “starting over” landmarks. 
Every day is the first day. 
Tackle your goals as if it’s the first day of the year, and this is the year you finally decided to start using dental floss.  
Fill your notebooks with scribbles, and letters, and pictures, and thinkings so that at the end of the year, your book is full.

You lived your life. At least that’s what I’ll tell myself by the end of 2011. 
            I’m back, blogger friends, and it feels so nice. Happy Starting Over Day #1. See you on Starting Over Day # 2.