Thursday, April 28, 2011

Next Stop: FINALS! (and musings on Harry Potter)

Today I left my last class ever with not a bang, but a whimper. All that was on my mind was the final next week and whether I cared enough to study or not. It wasn't even until I was later in the WC that it dawned on me. Then I was happy. Turns out most of my English friends are feeling most of the same things I am right now - glad to be done, sad to be leaving friends, excited/scared/nervous/looking forward to/running away from/etc. our destinies and impending futures. I was sitting in the lab chatting and stuff with my friends, most of them writing tutors, and as their shifts ended or whatever, I watched them leave the place to probably never come back.
Later, when it was time for me to go to work, as I walked out of that old Braithwaite building, I thought that I might never go back in that lovely writing center again, and I felt emotions that I only sort of read about in books: saying goodbye to a place you might call home, even though it might be a place where you don't live or happen to love. A book that captures that feeling of odd nostalgia is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows at the part where Harry leaves Privet Drive for good. Speaking of HP, the movie trailer for Part II released last night. I am quite sure that my emotions today are mightily influenced by my viewing of that trailer, as were the feelings of my English friends as well. We grew up on HP. All of us. And now it's truly coming to an end.
I remember finishing the last book and feeling weird that the story was over, but I still had the movies to look forward to, then, later, I saw Deathly Hallows Part I and still felt like I had more to look forward to. Now I have the last movie to await, and when that is over, I will have nothing! I will slump and crawl under the theater seat and lie there until someone has the gall to carry or drag me away from my final resting place.
I kid.
But seriously, as soon as the final film credits roll my childhood will officially be over. If there is any kind of sentimental montage set to tender music in the film I will lose all composure. I better bring some tissues to mop up my wet-cry tears. The last time that I cried during a movie in the theater was when I saw "Aladdin" at my fifth birthday party. I think I cried for the same reason I cried at the end of "Beauty and the Beast" and why other people cry at weddings: They are just so darn happy!
So anyway, I'll be sure to sit through the whole movie, credits and all, so allow myself to come to terms with the fact that it will be time to be grown up and stuff. Wouldn't it be perfect [irony] to come home from the movie to a house that's been robbed? "Welcome to being grown up!"
Back to crying at happy things, like weddings, I'm totally going to a "Royal Wedding" party at a friend's house in a few hours. Because of time zones and live broadcasting and magic and stuff like that, we will be taking part in the festivities at 2 am. I'm going to take English things that I brought home from my London Study Abroad trip to help Eglify the occasion. I'm sure the wedding will be beautious and lovely and all, but I don't think I'll cry, I won't dry-cry either.
Dry-crying is real, you guys, so don't even make fun.

Monday, April 25, 2011

My Last Week of Class!

Next week is finals, which means this week holds the last few class  sessions of my undergraduate life. It's sort of bittersweet. I'll be  glad to be done with classes, but I'll be sad to probably never see most  of my classmates again. If I do, it'll probably be a classmate I didn't like, and we'll just meet up by chance at the DMV or the grocery store line and have to go through the pleasantries of asking how life has been while pretending to care and smiling at each others' children.
Aside from that possibility, I have made some great friends at college, and some of them are even going to Korea. Let's just hope they are as fun as I am (on the outside as well as inside, right next to the spot that holds their "true beauty").
A melancholy moment occurred the other day as I was getting ready to leave school - I was darkening the doorway of the beloved Writing Center seeing who was in there, and it came to pass that all of the writing tutors who were there were all younger that I. When did that happen? I suddenly felt like the senior I am and realised that my time at school is almost up. Then I was sorta let down because my friends who usually dwell in the WC weren't there.
Every time I think about how I "hang out" in the WC I feel like a dork. At least the people there accept me and treat me nicely. But I still feel like a dork.
Thankfully, my dorkiness hasn't grown too much from my time there: I still don't always know when to use "who" or "whom" and I never plan to (unless I have to to in order to keep my English-teaching job in Korea...).
My ears do perk, though, every time someone starts talking about Harry Potter.
I'm such a dork.

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Good Friday

Yesterday was Good Friday, and I didn't have school or work. Because I had no reason to wake up early, I stayed up late the night before, which did cause me to sleep in. Sleeping in almost always makes me feel lazy and worthless, but waking up early almost always makes me feel tired and angry. Nevertheless, I did get a lot of cleaning done. I called it "Spring Cleaning: Part I" because I still have a little bit more to do. I vacuumed my room twice because I like the carpet to feel fluffy and soft. Also, I like the carpet to feel clean.
Changing subjects, I watched "Where the Wild Things Are" last night because Netflix was kind enough to recommend it to me. I've seen many movies in my life and liked most of them for some reason or another, and I liked "Wild Things" because the puppetry and and technical stuff were really cool, and the whole film was really neat to look at. Other than those things, though, I'm not so sure I liked the movie....The crazy boy in the movie reminds me too well of the out-of-control-kids in the library where I work. And I don't like to take my work home with me. I felt like I was just watching a naughty child revel in his rotten-ness for 2 hours, and when the movie came to its end, the kid just ate his dinner while watching his exhausted, over-worked mom fall asleep at the kitchen table. And then the little snot smiles.
Movies like "Wild Things" make me nervous to have kids of my own someday.
Afterward, to make myself feel better, I finished watching "Angels and Demons" - Adults doing crazy things in movies doesn't seem to bother me as much.

Friday, April 22, 2011

I'm a Blogger!

In just two weeks I will be a college graduate!
I decided that blogging might be a good way to express myself and my macabre sense of humor since my English major friends and I won't be hanging out and sharing our nerdiness in our beloved writing center for much longer.
And there is still a lot of nerd left in me. I'll probably never run out of stuff to say, so this lovely blog can grow and flourish into a journal-like thingy, except more fun and random and obviously totally public.
Also, I got a teaching job in South Korea (!) and I leave in June. All the more reason to keep a blog, I think.
So, for the few - if any - of you who read this, I might cover things like:
  • Life
  • Movies
  • Books
  • Music
  • Woe
  • The Weather
  • Whatever I feel like
  • Basically, Everything
Even though I'll have an English degree, I am sure I'll make spelling mistakes, and some might even be intentional.
I hate writing papers, so I'm amazing myself by starting this. Hopefully it will be a fun experience for me and the few - if any - who might read this. (If you are reading this, feel free to comment and say nice things, I'll probably love you.)