The Farewell Blog

These last couple of weeks have all been about goodbyes (and pretending to do my directed study work)-- from signing "Have a nice life!" in yearbooks or otherwise treating yearbook entries as confessionals. But instead of these trite little farewells, lit has helped us go out with our grand last lectures. And here are my thoughts:

I'm sorry if I ever gave the impression that I disrespected anyone in my last lecture (as some of you might have gathered). I don't think I could ever give an accurate view of my life up until now without an existentialist perspective. It's not that I hate religion or that I'm scared of it. It's that it has just never played a role in my life. And I'm sorry for those who thought my lecture was depressing because it wasn't meant to be. I'm not sure where I would be in life if I couldn't sit back and remark on all of its irony. I look inside myself for strength, and mostly I laugh really hard for hours. But that's just me.

On a grander note, I was overall under-whelmed with our presentations. Not because I think you guys are boring (haha, I know I know, I'm really boring) but because of how the project was presented to us. I get the feeling that most of us didn't really open up during our speeches, and the one's who did almost couldn't go anywhere with it. I want to say it's because of you Ms. Marcy. I'm sorry. I felt that you could have opened up to us more, and maybe we could have opened up to you. That also doesn't mean we had to give sob stories to make a point. We just had to be real, and maybe we felt that we couldn't be real because if we did, you might not agree with it.

After sitting in on Ms. Clinch's class lectures I began to realize that everyone in their class was a family bonded together by their teacher, whose open life inspired interest. They were able to communicate freely, most not needing powerpoints, and some using -gasp- bad language to get their messages across. I hate that, for some reason, I was never able to connect with our reading or grow as a writer. And now that it's over, I can gladly say I won't miss lit class.

So farewell lit class. Farewell blog. It was nice knowin' ya (but you never really did know me).

Goodbye Regal!

I quit my job. I can't tell if it's because I really just hate Regal or because I think myself so above a minimum wage job that I gave into my instincts and said F--- the world (Ms. Marcy, please don't kill me, I can't hold back any longer, this is how I talk in the real world). But there is a deeper reason. Every time I work I get the feeling that the harder I work, the more the company makes, the less I ever see a dime of that money (and I can't accept tips) and the more customers snap at me for reasons unknown except for the fact that they need someone to snap at, and why not me, the worthless minimum wage employee?
Or it's more than That. It's that every time a customer opts to buy three small popcorns instead of one large tub, I die a little inside, "Do you know how dumb you are? I want to pity you but I can't because I'm too busy pitying myself for watching this." and of course, my managers tell us to push more. More. Make them buy, make them love you, make them drink the Regal juice, or just the half-filled cup of instant coffee that our machine cranks out after you spit into the top of it (we don't really do that, but sometimes I am nice and press the button twice-- but only if you happen to be a cripple).
And then the intervention. The life intervention. The only analogy or explanation for this intervention I can find is Mersault, the day his boss promotes him, or more accurately, the time he is on trial for his entire life's misdeeds. The conversation went something like this, "We really like you. You're a really strong employee. But lately we have noticed your apathetic attitude. You don't upsell or push the Two for Ten combo. If you really hate it here, we suggest we quit before we fire you." What I'm really thinking, "Honestly, we sent you to Paris and back and you don't care anymore." So yeah, the real reason I quit my job? I sacrificed wonderful, carefree weekends and lovely, snow covered holidays to save for France. I did everything for Regal except lick the hot dog buns to keep them from growing stale. And then I got to France, I was in Paris, it was all happening-- and the same consumerism that sends me into a blind rage every time I am behind a register made a comeback again-- that these awful teenage girls would rather sit in a shopping mall and wander around drinking nutella shots (I am talking about myself here) than visit the catacombs. Or that our tour guide would have the audacity to forget to check the schedule for the Louvre. Or that I could spend a year of my time drained into Regal with the prospect of something better, that when I got something disappointing, I couldn't stomach the punch-drunk stained walls or the plush acid-trip carpeting because, quite frankly, I don't care anymore. So I quit.
And guess what? It made me happy. For those two seconds I was inscribing my initials on to my two weeks notice and throwing the shirt over my back, to the minutes I sat in my car and thought, "Holy S--- I'm broke" But that's okay because today I applied to the Tilted Kilt (Scottish themed Hooters) and I am honestly excited for a change.
p.s. Ms. Marcy-- after that speech you gave us today, I thought about how irresponsible I am/was because my dad does not have a job and neither does my mom, so right now we are hippies. And I kind of can't wait for college when I can just be a hippy. I guess the best thing to do would be to invest in a Kindle now because at some point before these next four years are up, my text books will be available online for three bucks.

Well, isn't it ironic

So everything is ending-- the married couple has called it quits, Charlie Sheen is off the air, and Bin Laden has just been executed. I would say it's the end of an era that marks this high school "journey" (or for those who can't stand to think of life as a grand narrative, a "hurrah"). The only thing I can say about the upcoming festivities is that I am stressed, excited, and sad.


Breaking your metatarsal a few days before the AP exam must be incredibly difficult. Not only physically debilitating, but ominously ironic. All I can say is-- don't worry about us, we have been prepared to our utmost! Omen or not, we will do well.

Also ironic, my date sprained his ankle two days before prom. I can't tell if I was angry with him or just amused. It's ironic because, if not for a sprained ankle three months prior, we would not have created the Folk Ravers (our joke band, but for those who read this blog, you probably already know this). Therefore, why be mad if it is what brought us together in the first place? Furthermore, he sprained it by tripping over a tree root while avoiding jumping over a bush, which, by his judgment, would have been more dangerous.

Yes, everything is winding down, including classes and AP exams. Except this thing that may or may not be winding down, which I newly discovered, but is probably already winding down, although it's just starting up.