You found your way out

I spend these late hours writing and then looking, looking -- but for what? Who will appear and what will they say to take away this feeling?

Spend your time well before you go.

I think I may need a mix CD for the return.

To fictitious mountain towns

Do I use these words to try to bring myself closer?

I wonder if this place will matter as much when you're gone.

On the verge of peppermint mocha

The wind's still rolling and now I've caught on. I run quickly down alleyway and walk next to deep blue river. Reeds bend, water breaks, my hair flies. She says "beta" and I think of fish in a bowl, swishing fiesty tail. She says I'm the powerful one and I realize she's right, that maybe I have been all along.

southern lights

This wind has soul.

simplicity.

Soft rain on roof. Christmas music but I'm not cringing (too much). I am thankful for two healthy legs that will be very sore when I wake up, two feet that bounce up hills and curve around beams. Two hands for typing the two current stories. Two parents, three brothers, two girls, two boys, three teams, fourteen students, one love. Many loves. Many friends. Many words, many miles, many songs. Nights with Lauren and tea. Nights with all of us dancing. I danced all day today and never when there was music. That's the joy, I think.

On Northern shores

I look to the ocean and feel thankful for the Sound.

Home for approximately 1.5 hours

and I'm not very good at staying still.

"I'M EIGHTEEN!"

Some nights all we need is good company, windows down, and the most ridiculous songs the dial can find.

92 pages and rising

I look forward to next semester's Fridays, where I won't work for 9 hours and drive an additional two hours and then spend Saturday afternoons sleeping it away. Sometimes Sunday, like today, is the day of the sleeping-and-reading hangover. You know what that's like?

I'm all right. Amotivated but that's everyone right now. I'll miss teaching next semester and I hope that there's some sudden burst of students who need to be taught and that they'll pick me. I want to learn everything exciting and minute and breathtaking. I want something worth sweating over, something worth the miles under aching knees.

Maybe it's the YA novel-reading of sixteen-year-olds with their best friends for life, but today I miss our friendship more than normal. I know it's "people change" and "who cares" and imagined vendettas that really mean nothing. Still, though. I miss it.

Thanks for the memories

Sunshine in November, and I wake up free of everything that held me back before.

luck be a ladybug

"Can we use a springboard for bars?"
"Can I do a straddle kip?"
"Can we go to Panera?" --> followed by a chorus of "YEAAAAHHHH!"

9.3. 9.2. 9.2. I'll take it!

thirteenth, Friday

There's water on the moon and water on the south shore. Ice under speed skaters with long legs and swinging arms. It's almost that time for dancing and snow sprays and anthems. For now, I screw the lid and keep the heat.

--

There are a couple of things I'd like to say. First off, if you want to make "joking" advances, why would you do it while I'm standing there? Or at all, even, especially if I'm your friend?

And secondly, I've grown weary of consistent status updates, sad faces, blah blah blah over "I'm not in a relationship"/"I can't have her"/"But I want him/her." Yes, we've all been there! But you are allowed to enjoy the rest of your life sometimes!

We all have times when we've got to let it out. But for the rest of the time: If you have something emo to say, don't say it.

Samurai chai & 11.11

"Diana, you always keep me on task during stretching!" - Kaylee

That's why they keep me around!

--

Between the safety dance, ligers, panda death, and a single xylophone, I'm feeling pretty inspired!

"Instead of 'fin,' you'll say, 'PIN!'"

Spring '10 Shelter Island dorm themes, as composed by Ashley and me in the Tree House Lounge today:

-12 apostles
-Stations of the cross
-Communist countries
-Countries of Africa
-Colors of the Wind (shotgunning Grandma Willow)
-Boots (with the fur)
-Shakespearean insults
-Phases of Ashley's life

And on the plus side for creativity, I did win the random drawing in the name of the shoulder stick: Sebastian.

(This pursuit of the MFA is clearly paying off!)

"I'm like Enrique Iglesias."

Adventures in (real) Wainscott coupled with WEHM DJs jumping the car and the pink elephant mini golf course in Candor. Surprises in Suite 1! Quick and frigid beach trip with fuschia pink sky burning. Conflicting stories. Continuing stories. Caralyn's life story. Boys in boxes with foam axes. "...Even my smell."

And... and...

G'night!

Post-Deana Fridays

are brutal, even without Lauren's influence. ;-)

Last night: Eleven of us packed onto chairs and couches in the Greenport common area, watching "The History of Porn" or something similarly ridiculous that's even more absured under the influence. Everyone's making wise-cracks and laughing. Dom offers his house for my birthday party "as long as you invite Kimberly." 12:36 a.m. is the appropriate time for an adventure under piercing moon, deep blue sky. At 3:00 a.m. Family Guy parodies Mel Gibson and Dusty's put Deana on the couch. When I leave, the sky is perfect black and I move quickly over the sidewalk, bag in hand - the doctor is in.

And I'm a million different people from one day to the next...

Today the sun pierces just as much as the moon, but I'm barely moving. Spanish music on Pandora's the only thing to keep me awake (and Christina!). My fingers slip on the keyboard. I can only think of convenient gym closures and sleep, but neither will happen.

--

"I think we should go into business together and start a club where people can't touch each other. Like they have to wear signs that say, 'It's okay to grind on me.'"

--

The good thing this week is that I've put in the miles. Done real skills. My left shoulder's never going to loosen, both knees hurt, my left hip flexor shoots a nagging tightness down the leg, my back yelped as I turned quickly toward this computer.

And how do I feel? Fantastic.

remember, remember, the fifth of November!

Open gym, 11.4:
-System of A Down songs that I'd forgotten about blast against all walls.
-Matt swings on the rope above the trampoline, wearing a Superman cape.
-I lift into the air, twist, land lightly. Do it again.

--

"I haven't been to the library since 1984." - Tara, age 25

--

As I drink water and we discuss babies: "I hear they die easily. Like pets."

"Take your shirt off!"

So I really need a break.
And I ended class fifteen minutes early for lack of anything else to teach.
And my knees hurt despite taking today off.

But I've got a thesis settled upon,
a first-round acceptance into a lit mag,
skinny black pants,
and you know,
it's not last year
but I'm starting to
(!!!) like this year.

I need a little more time on Tuesdays

Knock it off, you dreams, you!

Nowhere to go but out, so I'm gone

There's nowhere to go in this town but out, so I'm gone. Like the ones I laughed with--they're gone, too. I don't know what's next, but I don't want to stay.

If she ever had the chance, would she do it all again?

I dreamt about this old song yesterday. We tried to make a music video to it and got as far as walking on the beach, me wearing one of your shirts and a pair of sunglasses, stepping solemnly by the water. You step elsewhere now.

But I'm back in our woods. I run because that's always been the best way to pass this transition time, the time I'm too impatient to sit through for the wait and see. Leaves cover roots so I bounce lightly, more up and down than forward, but faster than I'd thought.

Take a bow.

No. Keep going.

These two legs will save me.

Star maps to the sun.

Light streaks through the trees and breaks against the orange, red, yellow--I break faster--

You're playing you now.