Tuesday

September 29

I think I'm feeling better today than I was yesterday. Even though I wasn't necessary feeling bad yesterday, just thoughtful. I'm excited for the weekend because there's a lot going on. Every night I sit out in the hall on the computer so I don't disturb Laura and I've kind of gained the reputation of being the hallway computer girl. Jake from down the hall often comes down and contemplates my predicament in a very humorous way. Tonight he sat down and we talked for about half an hour. He told me about how much he loves cats and the day he had to put his second cat down, he got the cat high, then fed it ice cream. I asked how you get a cat high and he said you blow the smoke into its ears. I thought the story was sweet in a strange and slightly morbid way. Actually it's seeming more morbid now that I'm writing it here. Oh well, Jake has good intentions; that much is clear. I can feel a sickness coming on and I'm dreading it. I hope I'm not sick for this Friday because we're having an open mic night and I think I might sing and MAYBE play guitar. Maybe. Or maybe I'll just sing. Either way, it'll depend on how scared of the prospect I am at the time, and whether or not I'm sick. If I don't buy food tomorrow I'm gonna die of starvation. Dan just came to say hi! We're talking about love.

Monday

September 28


To the weather: My sentiments exactly. 

Today was my favorite day at Umass so far. It started out ordinarily, I went to Art History and Anthropology, which I love more each day. Then I sat out in the sun for a while and didn't do any homework. I liked my literary journal class. Every time I have that class I have an inspiration to write and create. Unfortunately I usually don't, and then it wears off until I have that class again the week after. Nobody can decide what they want the journal to look like. After that class we went to dinner and it was fun and then Alex and I and Nicole Reynolds went to the craft fair. There is a darkroom and if you pay five dollars you can use it which I was really excited about but secretly afraid a little because I don't remember how to use a darkroom/ never really completely learned. And I didn't want Alex to have to teach me because I already ask her to teach me so much and I don't know Nicole that well yet. But then I asked the girl at the desk and she said people will always be there to teach you how to use the different crafts, which makes sense, since how else does everyone learn how to make books or mosaics or leather printing. So I felt much better and excited for becoming better at photo and developing my creative potential. From the craft fair we went to the meeting for the LBGT march for Equality. I am so incredibly excited for this. There were almost thirty people at the meeting and the ones who ran it were so surprised and touched that that many people showed up. I am so inspired by the people who came to that meeting. Being around such motivated, passionate people reminded me how little I'm doing to make the world a better place. At the same time, during the meeting and after it, when I walked home in the rain with Alex and Michelle and then  ran around Butterfield with Alex taping posters for the march to the walls, I felt like I was doing more than I've done in the entire three weeks I've been here. Even being around people who are taking a stand ignites inside me the inspiration of which I so often lament the suffocation. 

The impression I took home from the meeting proves metaphorical for a lot of what I'm feeling in my life right now. I feel like I need to be more inspired and more inspirational. Like I never will be. Like I'll never be as smart or as passionate or as much of an individual or protect my beliefs by puffing out my chest in the face of their oppressors as you do. Like I'm not as captivating or enthralling or pretty or attractive or like my thoughts aren't as complex as yours and my emotions are of much less magnitude. These are my fears. But don't worry, these fears are healthy. When I was upset and I couldn't articulate why and you said sorry sorry I made you upset I told you no it was good, it was healthy. My fears only drive me to be better. I am fascinated and in love with way I someday hope to be. Sometimes I'm sad that I am not accomplishing all I want to accomplish, all that others have already achieved, but I know in the back of my heart that I will get there. It took me longer than it took you and God I don't know why I didn't get there before but I think now is as good a time as ever so I'm ready.

All my fears have a rationality to them. Like the kind of fear you know it's okay to have and that you can comfort yourself out of. I'm scared of losing my identity, or rather never finding it, because I don't think I have all of it yet. It doesn't matter from where you get your ideas and your beliefs. All that matters is that you believe what is right is really right so strongly that you could pull your car over to the side of the road and put your face on the steering wheel and cry because you believe it so strongly and you won't be happy until everyone else in the world sees what you see. Once you feel this, the ideas and the beliefs you took from other people become yours. Beliefs can't be bought or sold. Anyone can take them and keep them at will, unless you keep them for the wrong reasons, like status or sex. I hate how fleeting thoughts are. Sometimes I feel like if I don't write it down I'll forget it and it'll never come back to me.

I needed to write tonight but my somebody else has my journal so I wrote here. Sorry it's so long. I didn't come up with the following, but I love it so much, and I hope it's okay that I put it in here. Love, Phoebe.
 
If we could only find the strength to turn around
to face the horizon and not be aware of the lengths of our shadows
If we could only find our misplaced hearts and put them back into our chests and LIVE.

I believe in love.

September 27


I had a great time in New York. It's hard even to pinpoint why it was so fun. All I can say is that I should have written this entry when I was still there, because I started to forget how I was feeling as soon as the bus pulled into Umass. I was so happy to be home. I was so happy to be able to cross the street without fearing death by oncoming traffic, to see trees and walk on wet grass, to return to the comfort of my now-bedroom and lay down on my bed and look out the window and see, not miles of skyscrapers, but a half-occupied bike rack and a brick dorm building. New York City has always been foreign to me, but after spending three weeks in this confined yet immensly intriguing new world, I could have journeyed to a completely different space-time continuum. I know I made the right choice and I know I belong here. Even if it's going to take me a while to find myself, to find what I am passionate about and to practice it, I know that I will find it. I would love to go back to New York City and visit my friends again in a while. Maybe in December. I can imagine the chaos and the illumination and the thrill of the city will entice me again sometime soon. Until then however, I will revel in the intensely pleasurable experience of comfort and relief and happiness I have here.

Sunday

September 26


Best concert of my life. If you don't already listen to Why?, you should start now, they will enrich your existence. 

September 25

Wednesday

September 23

Today was too hot. We watched "Little Dorrit" in my Literary Classics on Film class and I couldn't focus at all because I felt like my insides were melting. I brought a banana and ate it. Tomorrow I am going food shopping. I need to clean up my room. And read more Art History. Anthropology is my most interesting class. Today I learned that there is an extremely slight difference between the human sexes. A lot of animals have much greater differences like gorillas and cardinals. Boys and girls are almost the same. I'm hungry and when I chew these Honey Bunches of Oats my noise-canceling earphones amplify the noise louder than the music I'm listening to. The song of the day is "People" by Andrew Jackson Jihad.

Tuesday

September 22


Today I felt sad because I have so much inspiration and willpower to be creative but for some reason I can't put it to action. I wanted to go to Amherst to buy zines and read them and get inspiration but I kind of knew that wasn't going to happen so I took out my journal in Astronomy, my most boring class, and started to write. I didn't have any plan of what to write but what ended up on the page was a list of my fears. I don't want to write them here even though I've already shared them with some people, but I will write one. The fear is fear that I wasn't meant to create art. I did write a poem today though, and it's the first poem I've ever written not for an assignment, which really means it's my first poem ever written. I'm not very proud of it. I already let three people read it, which I kind of regret because I need to learn to keep some of my writing private. I don't think I would include this poem in an anthology my poems created after my death. People say there are no rules to poetry and you don't need to know how to write them to write them but I disagree. I'm so afraid that after I write my words and call it finished, I won't know for sure if I put them like that because it felt right or because that's what I thought it was supposed to look like. Do you know what I mean?

I feel like I'm not doing enough here: like there is so much to take advantage of and I'm going to miss something important. But at the same time I'm learning so much about myself, what interests me, and what I value in other people. I miss everyone a lot! I'm seeing some of my friends this weekend and I'm really excited. I know the dynamic will be different but not that much different. It was really warm out today. I thought it was going to rain but it never did. I'm glad I found a way out of my temporary blogging/ writing slump. I think it was reading old literary magazines in my Writing Butterfield Journal class that inspired it. Maybe I'll write another poem before I fall asleep.

Depends on if I can find my musical words or not.

Monday

September 21

I feel like my life at this moment in time is in a sort of suspended animation that results from being stuck in between seasons. This is especially distressing to me because this is one of the two seasonal changes of the year that brings me discomfort. Today was so beautiful and I sat on the hill with some friends and pursued "hippie freshman" activities, or so deemed by the bro who drove by and yelled out the window. To clarify, hippie freshman activities are playing guitar, taking pictures, and writing in journals. I wrote in two journals. One was my real journal, which I attempted to keep regularly at the beginning of this year and failed miserably. The other is the memo pad in this picture. I carry it in my pocket and it's almost half finished. I can't stop the wordflow; it's my new habit. It was never apparent to me how many meaningless phrases float through my head until I had somewhere to write them. Some of the phrases are not meaningless, and they go in the notebook too. 

Quote of the day, shared with my by my dad:
"Autumn is a second spring where every leaf is a flower."
-Camus

If only the passing into October was like that into June.

September 20


Fall is in the air.

Saturday

September 19

I have nothing to say, at all. Today is Rosh Hashanah. 

When we're on different sides of the globe
I thought we'd keep our veins tangled
like a pair of mic cables
And if there ain't enough slack to reach
then we'd solder them together
across oceans they'd stretch

Friday

September 18


I'm home! It feels weird to be here because I was just becoming accustomed to living somewhere else. Now I'm a vagabond, traveling without a seatbelt on. Returning home gave me a strong sense of nostalgia of whose type was foreign because it was nostalgia for something I haven't yet experienced. I can't wait for the feeling this winter break when I drive home in the snow and when I enter my house the pellet stove is warm and my mom is cooking dinner and somebody has to dry off Stella because she went out in the snow. And maybe I'll listen to "Listening to Otis Redding At Home During Christmas" by Okkervil River, because it's about returning to the comforts of home after being absent for a while, and I'll hang out with my high school friends and I'll love them as much as I always did but I'll know that I'm only a part of their lives now, not the whole of it. Coming home reminded me of this feeling, that I'll have someday, probably soon. The word "nostalgia" always makes me think of snow for some reason.

Falling out of touch with all my
friends are somewhere getting wasted,
hope they're staying glued together,
I have arms for them

September 17


Thursdays are exciting

Tuesday

September 15

Today after dinner I went to this kind of reclusive grove of maple trees with some of my friends. The trees were wide and strong and beautiful and it was that time of the day where the light on everything drives you crazy. I forgot my camera though, and this is a cell phone picture. Shoot me. It was just too pretty to not be picture of the day.

I bought a little notepad, about three inches wide. I'm going to carry it around in my back pocket and write down the stray thoughts I never know what to do with. So far I filled two pages with such nonsense that I already forgot what most of it means. I'm excited for tomorrow because I have my two favorite classes. I'm also starting to look forward to going home this weekend. It's only for one night; I wouldn't want to stay away for longer. But that's enough time to sit in my room completely alone, and just sit there, doing nothing, alone, just sitting. I miss that kind of thing here.

On another note, today was maybe the first time I felt really like this is my home. I've heard a lot of people compare what college feels like to a dreamworld or just a really elaborate summer camp. Both are really fun of course, but neither lasts too long. I hate my bed and my Lit class, and I love mostly everything else.

The song of the day is "Daylight" by Matt and Kim. The song of the day tomorrow and the day after that is also "Daylight" by Matt and Kim.

Monday

September 14


I feel like all my pictures from Umass are either of people or of sunsets. Today was fun because I really enjoyed all my classes. First I had Art History which is my favorite class probably, and then Anthropology which was boring last week but was interesting and entertaining today. When I left the lecture hall I met Alex and Deana and Leah at the dining hall and on the way there the temperature was perfect and I texted my sister to say I was having a perfect college moment. I loved where I was. Later I had a new class called "Writing Butterfield Journal." It only has fifteen people and our first class was out on the lawn in front of Butterfield. The whole class is just designing, editing and choosing selections for the journal. At the end of the semester we have a release party. I'm on layout. 

I'm writing this while sitting in the hallway with four of my friends. We're all on our laptops. After I finish this I'm going to join them in a music swap. College, if nothing else, leads to good music.

The song of the day is "Daylight" by Matt & Kim.

Sunday

September 13

To anyone who looks at my facebook, sorry you've already seen these photos. 

Also sorry that I haven't blogged in a couple of days! I had a tumultuous, for lack of a better word, weekend. I'm feeling weird right now. It's because I literally haven't been alone, save for showering, since Friday. And not much before that either. I miss my alone time, but at the same time, I love living here so I shouldn't complain.

I promise to be a better blogger this week.

September 12

September 11

Friday

September 10

If you'll excuse the cliche, I love college.

Wednesday

September 9

Today was 9/9/09 and that is apparently a really big deal. Except I think 10/10/10 will be better but who knows. I had fun today and I like being here a lot. It's two o'clock in the morning and I stayed up talking to various people. Deana and I walked through every floor and said hi to people and hung out in their rooms. Today I had my worst moment so far of college but it really wasn't that bad. I had a class from six thirty to nine that consists solely of watching a film adaptation of a literary classic. Tonight it was Jane Austen's Emma. It was okay I guess, it was mostly Gwenyth Paltrow being strange and Toni Collette being ugly. When I left the class, I was so hungry, maybe more so than I've ever been ever, and the main dining hall was closed. So I had to go to a really faraway one and while I walked there I thought about how my mom tells me never to walk alone at night. Don't worry Mom, there were lots of people around, and also I took my key out of my backpack and held it in my hand in case I needed to stab someone in the eye. Then I had to eat alone. But then I got a banana, and I put the peel in the compost, so I felt better. And the night went uphill from there.

Also today I had two other classes. Art history, which seems so long ago. Was that even today? And anthropology, for which my professor is actually insane. I went to the club fair with Alex and they gave us sorority flyers and the only clubs I signed up for were Amnesty International and Quidditch Club. The song of the day is "Jackie" by the New Pornographers.

Oh I almost forgot, I bought an "Indie Rock Coloring Book!" Amherst is so cool.

Tuesday

September 8

Lanny said it best, college life is not conductive to bloggin'. My blog sucks lately, I apologize. Everything is so hectic and I just want to detail everything I do and every person I meet but that's not the point of this blog and we all know it. 

I'm really grateful for meeting cool people. It seems like everyone I'm friends with is interesting or nice or has good taste in music or has weird or cool stories. I miss the feeling of being close to others though, and everyone I tell this to agrees and knows the feeling. I want to feel close to these new people but I know it will happen eventually and I don't feel the need to rush it. College is a completely different environment than high school. Maybe some of the people act the same, but never have I before experienced this ability to walk into the bedroom of a stranger, introduce myself, and become friends. It's liberating. 

I woke up at six this morning, and when I looked out the window, all I saw was thick milky fog and absolutely none of my beautiful view was visible. It's not foggy today, so I think maybe that was a dream. The song of the day is "Muzzle of Bees" by Wilco. I haven't done that in a while.

Oh and I saw Chris Watt today. It was weird and nice to see a familiar face.

The sun gets passed from tree to tree,
Silently, and back to me

Monday

September 7


I am sincerely enjoying my time at Umass. I love the independence and the feeling of managing my own schedule. I am much neater when I know no one else is cleaning up for me. I have a couple of good friends. Above is Deana. She is really sweet; she's the person I would go to if I wanted to have a long talk or if I was sad. Last night I was minutes away from sleep when Deana texted me saying, "Where you at i got studf 2 talk abou." So I lifted myself up from the comfort (or lack thereof, I have no mattress pad yet) of my bed and sat and talked with Deana for an hour. It was really nice because I didn't expect to have someone I can talk with about my life issues for a while. College days seem to have no end. Both nights I've been here I've gone back to my room, expecting to be done seeing people about three times only to go out again. Today I hung out in my new friend Alex's room. We just sat there but she is really cool and it was somehow the best part of my day. Earlier I was going to Amherst to see Adam with Deana, Leah and Emily. I met them all at orientation and spent most of today with them, napping, listening to music, and aimlessly walking around campus. Before we left for the movie Alex walked by so invited her, and that's how we became friends. 

This blog is going to be cut short because I just got invited into this room and am now hanging out with three drunk people. Drunk people are funny and nice.



Sunday

September 6


This is Laura, my roommate. She is sleeping right above my head right now. That's kind of weird, I feel like I am being rude by typing. Our room is really nice and everyone loves it. I won't say much now because I don't want to wake Laura up. I think I am going to start getting in the habit of blogging not-at-one-in-the-morning!

Oh, and so far, college is great!!

Saturday

September 5


My mom told me to go to bed at 12:15. Right now it's 12:51 which is almost the same thing except for a lot later and the minute numbers are reversed. Today was my last day at home before college. I'm really excited for tomorrow but I'm really sad to leave my family. I so often detail the pain involved in saying goodbye to and missing my friends in this blog. I don't really address enough how important the three members of my family are to me. Days like today I wonder how the two types of love can even compare to each other; I've lived with my family my entire life. My dad made me a goodbye video. It was an hour long and featured clips of video taken throughout my life, from the day I was born until my high school graduation. It was so great. He even put a Neutral Milk Hotel song in it! How did he know? 

To my sister, you had it only half right in what you said. I am excited, yes. I might not have ever been this excited ever. But I can't boast confidence. I'm afraid that as soon as I am left alone at college tomorrow, I will recede into my naturally shy demeanor. The one I fought so hard to conquer until, I don't know, maybe a few years ago. I only wish I was as confident about entering this new phase as I am about the fact that my relationship with you and with our parents will always remain as strong, if not stronger, as it is now. Friends come and go but family never leaves you alone as long as they're not too old to walk or get on a plane and fly across the country to bother you :)

My dad once told me a great quote, and I don't remember its exact wording but I remember the point. The quote was along the lines of, "the only constant thing in life is change." It's a really simple thought but one surprisingly oft forgotten. I guess the thing to remember, is that if you don't like the way things are, you can rest assured that they're going to be a lot different soon. Trust me, I know this to be true.

Friday

September 4

I packed today and that's all. Wait no it's not, I went out to lunch with my Dad and we signed me up for a new bank. Liz came home to visit this weekend, and she gave me the most thoughtful birthday present ever. It's a book made on the computer of pictures from our high school years. It is really well made and I can't wait to show it to all my friends at college so they can see how classy and attractive my high school friends are. The song of the day is "Oh, Susquehanna" by Defiance, Ohio. Tomorrow is my last day on 83 Laurelwood Road. I hope it's a good one, or at the very least I hope no birds fly into the windows and die.

And I wonder, what did they do with the bodies?

Thursday

September 3


This is Zippy. Tonight my neighbors, Val and Barry, invited my family over for dinner in celebration of my going to college. Emily and I felt strange in their house because we spent so much time there as kids, and to return was a reminder of our childhood. We used to ring the doorbell everyday and either Val and Barry would bring us juice boxes. Sometimes they would bring us orange and banana flavor, and we hated that one. We couldn't drink it but we didn't tell them to be polite. Then we squirted them out in the bushes and went back for another juice box the next day. We haven't been over for dinner in maybe three years but it felt the same as it always did before. They made me a cake and gave me fuzzy socks and stationary, which are two things I really needed but are too decadent to buy myself.

I'm feeling kind of like a bad person and I'm afraid I won't believe anyone who tells me otherwise. Maybe I look good on the outside but they don't know me like I know me and I'm bad. I'm so scared to leave, two days. But at the same time, if I left any later, I'd be crazy.

It's weird to feel like you miss home before you're really gone.

Wednesday

September 2


This is packing, but really only about five minutes of it. I'm sick of being a boring blogger. All I listened to all day today was Sufjan Stevens. But the song of the day is "A Better Son/ Daughter" by Rilo Kiley. Tonight I drove to Lauren's house and I drove through an actual cloud. I know it was a cloud because suddenly I couldn't see anything and was surrounded by heavy fog on all sides. And when I got through it I parked the car and looked behind me and there it was, an actual cloud, in the middle of Princeton, and I had just driven through it. This was the first cloud I've met firsthand other than on a mountain or on a plane.

Most days, I have a habit of making mental notes of noteworthy occurrences so I can later write about them here. I did that today once, and it was when I exited the basement door of my house and there were no lights on, and when I stood on the green indoor-outdoor welcome rug outside, I felt its wrinkles with my feet and I feared for a second or two that I was standing on an animal Stella might have killed. I wasn't, but it reminded me that my entire life, whenever I stand on this welcome mat and it is dark and I can feel the wrinkles with my feet, I am afraid it might be a dead animal, mostly because one time it was one.

That's it.

Tuesday

September 1


I can't believe it's September! This is the worst thing that's happened all day.  Summer is over and soon my seasonal depression is going to kick in. Really, this is awful. I feel like summer went by so quickly. I don't even remember it. That's not true. Tomorrow my sister starts school. It's weird that my summer is longer than hers on both ends. We just watched 28 Days Later and it was really great! Not quite as scary as we hoped, but it made up for that by being a really excellent movie. I'm starting to feel self-conscious about the monotony of this blog. Most people who are reading this are in college and probably have more things in their lives than one movie per day and not much else. The song of the day is "The Electric Version" by the New Pornographers. Oh, and I started As I Lay Dying. Reminds me of the Grapes of Wrath, I like it a lot.

Sorry my life is still boring!