Escaping Goblins to be Caught by Wolves

RIGHT NOW I'M:
Feeling:  relaxed, honestly
Wearing:  Jeans and a tshirt, as usual.
Wishing:  this wasn't a dry campus
Missing: being abroad, taking history classes
Thinking:  about my final paper for King Arthur class
Wondering:  What I should really do next year.
Raving About: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Ranting About:  Library re-training, dance paper
Fangirling(or fanboying)/Drooling Over:  Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.  It's all downhill from here on out.
Thankful For:  My dad, for listening to me be confused.
Planning: MY LIFE
Looking Forward To:  Spring Break, Graduation
Dreading:  Spring Break (hello, GRE!), Graduation.
Wanting:  Someone to tell me what to do.
Hoping:  That I'm not as crazy as I sound, and that I finish my homework for tomorrow.

WHY ARE THERE SO MANY SYNONYMS?  I am not thinking about THAT many things...

Third week into the new semester and already I feel like things are out of hand.  I'm in a world cinema class (which I actually think is pretty cool, most of the time), and we have small groups to focus on one particular part of filmmaking.  We're supposed to meet outside of class and put up guides to our topics and then put up one post a week talking about our topic with regards to the movie we watched that week.  However, our groups consist of 10 people.  10 people with vastly different schedules, who have a million other things on their plates.  I understand that they want to create "smaller learning communities" in a massive class, but I just don't think this works out very well, and just loads extra work onto already busy people. 

Also, I was supposed to have watched the Marriage of Maria Braun for today, but it isn't getting along with my computer, so I'm going to skip the second half, at least for now.  I'm kind of sad, because I was enjoying it.

This is the first time this class has been offered, so they're trying out all kinds of new things just to see what works.  I understand, but it's annoying.  I'm pretty much only in this class because I needed another .25 credits outside the English department, I didn't like any of the history classes offered, and this class is led by my study abroad adviser/English prof, who I really like and wanted to have a class with before I graduated.  I just wish I didn't have to be the guinea pig...

Interim is over now, and I have a week off!  I'm just hanging out at St. Olaf.  I was home a month ago--I have no pressing need to hang out with my parents.  They're busy watching HBO's Rome on DVD, and while I want to see that, I don't really want to watch it with them...

I've been knitting a lot, seeing as I have three scarves on the needles as well as a pair of socks, not even including the scarf I started last year and have long since abandoned.  I just want all of my projects to be done now!  I want to wear them!  Also, I have no patience, apparently.

I got my grades back from last semester, and I did very well. (I made the dean's list.  I'm shocked.)  I'm hoping I'll do well in my interim class, too.  I got 9.5 points out of 10 on every response paper, so I think I'll be fine.

I still have to figure out what I'm doing next year.  It's terrifying.  But I'm going to try to sort things out this week, because I have spare time for once.  And I no longer have health insurance at the end of February, because I turn 22 and am kicked off my dad's insurance.  And this is the government's program, too, because my dad's a federal employee.  I need to get something figured out, because I've just started medication for headaches, and it actually works.  Yay, America!

I have to go to the CEL (basically, our career center) and talk to them about my future.  I am scared.  I also don't have my response paper done for today yet....eek!

Stolen from Lommy...now cut for the relief of your friends page!

 

( meme )

I meant to post over break, but I never got around to it.  Oh well.  I'll put up a quick post before I head off to lunch.

 I pretty much did nothing other than knit, watch TV, and play video games for three weeks.  It was lovely.  The first week was almost entirely knitting and watching HGTV.  I also cut off most of my hair, which hadn't been cut since Sept. 2007.  I finally just got so annoyed with it that I had to chop it all off.  It's much easier to deal with now.  Also:  less static!  I went to the doctor a lot too.  I'd been having daily headaches starting at the beginning of last semester, which wasn't normal, even though I tend to have frequent headaches.  I had to get an MRI and get my eyes checked, but nothing turned up as a cause.  I'm now on medication, but am supposed to wait three or four weeks to see if it really works.  I sure hope so--my headaches got much worse over break (convincing me once and for all that they are not from stress).

Christmas was nice, I suppose.  My mom's whole family came over for two straight days, which is an awful lot when there are two small boys who like nothing more than to beat on each other.  It was kind of annoying, too, because no one needs anything anymore, so no one knows what to get people, and then everyone (especially my mom) starts to stress out about it.  I wish we'd just stop doing presents all together or start drawing names or something. 

But in any event, I'm back at school now, for Interim.  I'm taking a history class on women in medieval Europe.  It'll be interesting, though I think it will generally trend toward social history, which isn't really that interesting to me except in a contextual sense for individual stories.  I'm also working at the library for 12 hours a week.  It's kind of a lot, but I need the money.  Also, since I work 5-8 three nights a week, I have an excuse to go to dinner at 4:30 and avoid people.  I've also taken to going to lunch alone.  Basically, this month is my opportunity to indulge my reclusive tendencies.

I'm still working on figuring out what I'm going to do after graduation.  I have 5 months left.  Hopefully I will use this month to get a few plans laid out.  We shall see...
 

I'm so close to being done I can taste it.  Next Monday at 11:00 (possibly sooner!), I am done with this semester. 

I'm going to miss it, too, in some ways.  This semester was really hard for me, because I had to get back into the swing of St. Olaf academics, plus try to fit back into my social circle, both of which were much harder than I thought they would be.  Last year, I got to slack off, a lot.  I didn't have to do much work to get good marks, and if I didn't do well, it didn't count in my GPA anyway.  I don't think I remembered how to do work again until last week, really.  I really liked most of my classes, though.  I loved my Milton class.  I love that professor and we had a really good group of people in the class.  Even though I'm not the hugest Milton fan, I always looked forward to that class.  And I really liked my history class, too.  I don't know much about history after 1066, and certainly know nothing about English history after 1284, and I absolutely adore medieval history anyway.  I'll even miss my Intro to American Politics class, even though my classmates drove me up the wall with their stupid comments.

Socially this semester has been much more difficult for me.  I'm not going to go too much into that, mostly because I already complain about it to my roommate all the time, but suffice it to say I think we all need a break.  We'll all go away for Christmas, and a lot of us will be gone over Interim (not me, sadly), so we'll have at least 3 weeks to be away from St. Olaf.  It will do us all a world of good.

One more week, two more papers, and two more exams, then I'm done!

Happy (somewhat belated) Thanksgiving, everyone!  It's really nice to have spent this one at home.  Also, my uncles and grandfather came to Thanksgiving at home for the first time in 35 years!  Deer season falls over Thanksgiving, so they're always up at deer camp at this time.  This year, they came down for the day.  It was also the first time I'd seen one of my uncles since I'd gotten back from being abroad.  I hadn't seen him or his family in well over a year.

Yesterday, Mom, Weston and I went out shopping.  That was a bad idea.  I only went because there were good deals on yarn and my mom refused to pick up any if I didn't come.  Firstly, my mom doesn't like to plan out what she wants to get at each store, so she just ambles around, in everyone's way.  Secondly, my brother likes to whine.  A lot.  And he doesn't like making stops for anyone else, so if we go somewhere where he doesn't want to be, he pitches a fit.  Thirdly, there were WAY too many people for my taste.  I like shopping in the middle of the day during the week, when there's no one around.  But, it was the first time I had ever gone shopping on the day after Thanksgiving, and now I have experiences one of our more repulsive traditions, and I got yarn, so, whatever.  We survived.  Plus, we went to Kroll's for hamburgers, which is a Green Bay classic.

Today, I'm going to finish up my paper and then put up the Christmas tree.  Thanksgiving's over, so Christmas can begin in all its tacky glory!

Steve Kagen wins Wisconsin's 8th district!!!  Yes!!! 
 

Way to go, Northeastern Wisconsin!  I'm so proud of you!

I think I've solidified what I feel.  I am glad, inexpressibly glad, that we will no longer have Bush in office.  I am glad that we have (hopefully) put an end to the conservative hegemony that has slowly been destroying my country for the past 40 years.  I am glad that we (white folks, that is) have gotten over ourselves enough to elect our first black president.

I will stop there for tonight.  Tonight is for celebration.

And so it begins.  I don't even know what to think.  I'm excited, but half-heartedly.  See, that's the thing.  I know, intellectually, that Obama is a huge step forward for America on a lot of issues.  But he's also a giant step backwards on a lot of issues as well, most of them extremely important to me.  Like women's rights, for example.  And I can't stop thinking about it.  It's bittersweet. 

Well, he won.  We have our first black president.  Now, to focus on the House race in WI 8th!  Steve Kagen FTW!!! (I hope!)

Just got back from the Milton Marathon (well, that's a lie, I got back half an hour ago and it really ended at (9:00).  It was harrowing.  But really good at the same time.  I had a lot of fun.  There were about five or six of us who were there for the entire thing, and after we were finished and had cleaned up, we went out for ice cream.  Paradise Lost is just so long, though, and has so much extraneous crap in it.  Books 9 and 10 dragged on for ages...anyway, I sold some t-shirts and made coffee and rolled around on the floor of Rolvaag 515 (because 12 hours of Paradise Lost is crazy-making) and talked to the other nuts in my Milton seminar who were there for the whole thing, and I even read some.  It was good.

Oh, the English prof with the best reading voice ever, who I had for interim two years ago, came and read one of Satan's speeches.  Even though he's really drugged up because of back pain from taking care of his wife, who has apparently just had a double knee replacement.  So that was really cool.  And one of the ladies I work with in the library came, and a bunch of other English profs, and one of my Great Con profs all came.  It was a lot of fun.

I am a geek.

You know, it's a Friday night, I've spent most of it alone, in my room, on the computer, and I'm about to go to bed (at 9:30), and I'm not bothered by any of this.  I'm not angry, or lonely, or sad, and I don't hate everyone, as is usual for a night like this.  Yay progress!

Haven't updated in a while.  Things have been pretty quiet since break.  Which was lovely, by the way.  I'm so glad I got a bit of time off, and got to pick up a few more hours at the library.

I've had a lot of work to do lately:  I had a paper due last Friday, two exams on Wednesday, and a presentation today.  Everything went fairly well, I think.  I got a 98% on my Intro to American Politics exam!  As well as a 93 on the paper I handed in a few weeks ago.  I think I'm set for an easy A there.

My presentation today was quite stressful.  I had to give it on heresies in Paradise Lost, especially in Book Three (when the Father and Son are discussing the fate of the world, basically).  But my professor told me I did a really good job explaining the basics of the Arian and Arminian heresies and pointing them out in the text.  Yay for a confidence boost!

Also, the Milton Marathon is tomorrow!  I'm so excited.  I keep talking about it, and am driving everyone I live with crazy.  Tomorrow, I am going to spend 13 hours reading Paradise Lost, aloud, with a bunch of other nuts from my class (and whoever else shows up.  The Vice President of the college is starting us out...).  I also got roped into selling t-shirts for three hours.  It's going to be a lot of fun.

Other than that, there's not that much to say.  My life's kind of lonely, because I don't have that much going on and my friends are always busy.  I haven't done the reading for my classes other than Milton in well over a month.  I never do the homework for my math class.  And I definitely haven't done much with regards to next year.  I have no motivation to do anything.  I also feel penned in here.   I can't really go anywhere, which is frustrating.  Oh well.  I don't have the money to go anywhere, anyway.

Since yesterday evening, I have read The Bell Jar, Roverandom, and the Road to Middle-Earth.  I wish I read this fast on a regular basis...

WPR has just told me that being a church musician is kind of like being a dairy farmer.  Thanks, WPR!

I have 14 minutes left in my shift at the library.  I am so bored.  I cannot do work here, which means I have practically no homework done for tomorrow.  Can I be done with college already?

I am ready for homecoming to be done.  That is all.

So, St. Olaf tries to cultivate this idea of "Lives of Worth and Service" in its students.  We are supposed to lead lives of "unselfish service to others", as I believe the mission statement puts it (have I mentioned how much I hate mission statements?  Well I do.  A lot).  You know what?  I don't want to.

I am surrounded by people who are unfailingly good.  They are passionate, filled with righteous anger, and devoted to making the world a better place.  Even the people I know who are not politically active are good, thoughtful people on a more personal level--the sort of people who are always thinking about others.  I am not a "good" person.  I am selfish, I am egotistical and self-centered, I am unthinking and inconsiderate.  I have claimed a driving political philosophy, feminism, that directly affects me, or that addresses issues that I may face someday.  There is nothing selfless or giving about it.

What I've realized today, is that I don't care.  I know what I want out of life:  a job that pays, a house, lots of books, opportunities to learn more about subjects that interest me, and a chance to travel.  I want to have the people I like near me, and I want to have dogs.  I don't want to save the world.  I mean, I'll help out, but I don't want to give my life to the cause.  I just want to be left alone.

The problem is, that I will likely (short of a complete and total erasure of the middle class in my country) be able to have what I want.  But other people don't have the same opportunities.  Is it selfish of me to cash in on my privilege?  Can I have what I want and yet aviod the exploitation of others?  Is my very existence as a white, middle-class American engendering the oppression of non-white, poor/working class people?  If so, what are my obligations to the people I (inadvertently) oppress? 

I've talked a lot about this with a friend of mine who also studied abroad in England (Lancaster) last semester.  Since we're both just returning to the Hill and are both trying to figure out what we're doing with our lives, we've got a lot of shared experiences.  She wants to be a teacher, and told me, "I just want to work in a nice, cushy suburban school.  And I'm okay with that."  She told me she believes you can just be a decent person in your daily life and still have a positive impact on the world.  She doesn't think you have to give up yourself in order to make a difference. 

I hope she's right.

So, today in my Intro to American Politics class, some guy randomly went off about how people on welfare shouldn't be able to vote because "they don't have a stake in the government".  We were talking about civil rights and the Jim Crow South, specifically about poll taxes.  Then he said he knew people mooched off welfare because his mom was poor!  And knew people who did!  Because his one anecdote TOTALLY proves that all people on foodstamps or unemployment have enough money to own three cars and they ALL are cheating the system and STEALLING OUR TAX DOLLARS!!!!!!!  You see where I get annoyed.  He had no real evidence.  No statistics, no information from reputable sources demonstrating how many people who receive government assistance are squandering it (if any are) versus how many are not, or even how much we spend on government welfare.  Let me assure you, it is not very much.  If he's so concerned about his TAX DOLLARS!!!! being wasted, he ought to be complaining about our largely unnecessary military system, or the government bailing out privately-owned corporations who pay comparatively little in taxes.  The American people are getting fleeced, but it isn't by the poor.