Disclaimer

My conscious has been poking at me and I realized I have this horrible fear i might put a bad taste in your mouth after reading my posts. I want to avoid this. I used to not be self conscious of my thoughts/actions offending other and I cant quite pinpoint where this guilt is coming from now. Quite frankly, it could be that I was recently immersed in a very dense mormon/conservative population therefore my concept of appropriate was alarmingly... An extreme. As a result I feel this disclaimer is absolutely necessary because I have been exposing my opinions.

Warm regards.

Summer Realization No. 5-

Culture

I have lived in Moscow the majority of my life and for the mOst part I have loved it. However, I am just now discovering a new little subculture. Deep down somewhere, I knew it was there but I didnt realize to the extent of how it functions.

The other day I went swimming with some friends at the Grove pool. For starters, I swore that i would not be in a bikini at ALL this summer until I get back in shape... But peer pressure exists and the cool water was welcoming so I bit my tongue. Had tons of fun right. So the next day Jason wanted to do it again. We went at an earlier time and holy heck when we arrived and picked out our spot I felt like Mel Gibson in What Women Want when he just begins to hear The girls thoughts and he looks like hes about to have a seizure... Yeah that was me.

I literally had to sit down and try to think for a second. You see these kinds of girls on TV making a fool of themselves or you see these lookalike jersey shore dudes ... Elsewhere. Not in Moscow. Now dont get me wrong, I am a very accepting person of all different lifestyles hut yes, i guess i do discriminate against the superficial ones. The thing is- yes, these girls are prettier than me, yes they are in really good shape, and yes they give off the impression that they are living the life.. and with what Im about to state about them one could conclude that I am jealous of them and wish to live their life. Surprise! I never could. Their priorities are out of wack. I dont spend hours a day working out because i work three jobs. Even tho my parents will help me with rent I find great pleasure and satisfaction in buying something when it is with my own money and i dont have to go running to daddy for money. I also love doing something with my life and i feel accomplished after a good week of work. And lastly, Why lay by a pool when you can swim?

I have never been the shallow superficial type. I go out in public without makeup on and even in sweat pants. Gasp. And i love it. Of course i love getting all dolled up and of course i Enjoy being a girl. But i guess my idea of beautiful isnt blonde hair, orange skin, and a vocabulary of "like" and backstabbing other girls. I coudnlt live that life so this year will be a test of my true tolerance level.

There you have it. I miss Pocatello's social atmosphere and the beautiful people who are there. Its more fitting for me then this "party-spoiled" vibe up here. I would trade all the girls at ISU, yes even the obnoxious athletes who lived below me, for all the girls up here... Because those girls are indeed more beautiful in every way. I am of course speaking of the inside...
but I am also speaking of the outside. Where is the beauty in blending in and looking like another face in the crowd? All my friends from ISu stand out in a crowd. And my sorority encouraged diversity. Everyone here looks like everyone else. Barf. At least in this subculture, by the pool.

Summer Realization No. 4

So I finally had a good talk with the boyfriend and he no longer thinks this blogging of mine is stupid. No offense to any other blogger, please. This was the guy in his junior year in high school, when we first met and starting to date-ish, he didn't have an email. Lakota and I made him get a facebook and he STILL thinks it's a little stupid but he keeps it so he can be friends with his baby's momma and see pictures of his beautiful little girl.  I am pretty sure he didn't get an email until ISU gave him one...

We had this talk on a bike ride around the neighborhood, talking of a lot of serious manners for some reason, but it eventually blogging came up. Blogging doesn't necessarily bother him but he definitely doesn't understand why I do it... and as a result, if he ever catches me blogging I get a heavy sigh and a, "Blogging.... reaally?" It wasn't a problem between us but we were definitely not on the same page until our bike ride.

It turns out, I am also using this blog as an outlet to begin writing again. Since high school, my writing has been very scarce and nonexistent. And that really scares me. I love nothing more than taking the time to organize my thoughts in an eloquent matter, putting it down on paper (or in this case, typing haha), and getting the satisfaction of rereading it later.

In my junior year especially, I could sit down with a notebook and write poetry for hours... no writing blocks, no rhyming gimmicks, no problems. But now, I feel as if I have to have an enormous euphoric life changing experience and even then... grabbing a pen and writing it down will be too much work, or I lose my mojo by then.

Don't get me wrong- I have had my perks over the years to get my juices flowing... for instance with my current job I get to write a 15 to 20 minute script for my kids at camp. As limiting as that may seem, (I have to stick to either Disney or Broadway ideas), when the kids learn the blocking, their lines, the music, and perform it on the last day of camp it is just as satisfying, if not more so, than rereading my work.

I also had an Eng 100 class at ISU last spring that I ate up. I loved that class so much that I was pretty much BFF's with the professor and a year later she still remembered my name and we would chat it up whenever we saw each other on campus.

So there you have it. I' am also blogging to at least be writing something. Besides poetry, I would write more stream of consciousness pieces anyway so blogging is perfect. And that's why I began my Summer Realizations.

These pictures are my kids from the first week of camp: Adventures in Wonderland. This next week we have the last camp- Broadway,  and Annie begins.

Something Special About Sundays

This last Sunday our last cat from Georgia finally passed away. I say finally only because she held on tight to each last day at the ripe old age of nineteen.

Her name was Sinatra. She was my dad's cat, he obviously named her, and she had bright blue eyes-- so the name was only fitting. She was a Siamese, therefore slightly nutty, and she found us on a Sunday.

She found us. The reason I remember it was a Sunday is because my mom, my brother, and I were all at church and when we got home that Sunday my dad had a delightful surprise awaiting us. It was a rainy day in Georgia, (surprise!), and my dad heard meowing at our front door. We had two cats at the time, Gomez and Russel (who both survived the move from GA to CA and then later passed away in ID once we moved here), so like clockwork my dad opened the door and let the cat in. To his surprise, it was a kitten. He put her in a box, gave her food, and gave her milk. 

And to our benefit, no one ever claimed her. Full of flees and ready for her first vet visit, she became part of our family. 

I say this in the fondest manner, but Sinatra was a strange cat. She became a fat cat but since she was  frightened by almost everything she was super speedy. It was rare you would see her come out from underneath my parents bed and rare that she would ever go outside. The only time she came downstairs was at night when everyone was asleep to eat. 

And if you know me at all-- I will hold cat if I want to hold a cat. Sinatra was somewhat okay with this mentality but it would usually end with her growling at me until I let her go. She would never hiss at me, scratch, or bite... but it was more likely that one would hear her growl more than her purr.

Except for my dad of course. He was the only she would let pet her. So with her last weeks we were all surprised when she would wait on the ceaderchest by my parents room and greet anybody who walked by encouraging them to pet her. We all loved the last few weeks with her because of this but we definitely all joked suspecting her eyes have gone bad so she thinks anyone who petted her was just my dad. 

However, there was a time when my dad was the bad guy. (Or my mom haha). When we were packing to move from Georgia to California ... Sinatra went missing. We packed up everything and moved out of our house into a rental before heading to Cali and we thought we'd never see Sinatra again. It was after we had given up looking for her and when she appeared in the garage of our rental house... my dad (or my mom) had packed her in one of the boxes! It was probably at least half of her fault for being sneaky. 

Once in California, her new hiding spot was in the living room behind the TV. Back then, we had one of those huge box set TV's that took up the whole corner of the living room. As a result she was safe and sound back there. And as a kindergarten/first grader when a guest drawing artist came to my elementary school and at an assembly asked, "What silly things do your pets do?" I sure as hell raised my hand... and he drew me a picture of good ol' Sinatra, sitting behind the TV. I still have this drawing and my mom framed it for me and even to this day, I still have it hanging in my room. 

Finally, arrived in Moscow ID, her hiding spot wasn't so... sneaky. Sinatra believe that if she placed herself under the covers of my parents bed that no one could find her. Even after numerous experiences of pesty children, like myself, bother her and pick her up... she still hid under those covers. Very clever, Sinatra. 

And even though for the majority of her lifetime she spent it growling at me, running away from me, hiding from me, or removing her paws when I tried to hold them... the last couple of weeks meant the world to me. She purred and meowed more than ever (with everyone) and in fact, made it difficult to stop petting her with her cuteness. 

Regardless of her strangeness, she will be greatly missed- or perhaps missed because of her strangeness. We don't know where she came from but we are thankful she found us on that rainy Sunday in Georgia and we are thankful for all the Sundays we shared with her up until her very last one. 

Rest in peace, Sinatra Stone. 

Summer Realization No. 3

 I'm through accepting limits

'Cause someone says they're so.

Some things I cannot change

But till I try, I'll never know.

This isn't really a summer realization. I realized this last summer. When I got back involved with the theater. What was I doing down at ISU? Studying just voice? I really didn't know what I was doing. I was just going to get a degree. But what was I really wanting to do with it? 
It is true. You don't know how much someone, or in this case something, means to you until it's gone. And I didn't realize how much musical theatre meant to me until I went a whole year without it. 
I felt like I lost sight of who I was and where I was going my first year in a half in college. I want so bad to be a performer, but not of opera or classical music... but of Broadway shows. I NEVER once wanted to be a Music Education major... the only teaching I was interested in was a private voice studio. I cannot see myself as a high school choir director or at the collegiate level. That's not where I want to be. And I love kids... but teaching choir would not make me happy. 


It took me a good year to finally realize all of this. It wasn't until last summer when I was a Camp Instructor and director for the theater. I taught two weeks and one week, both morning and afternoon, were all under my instruction. This week's theme was called "Adventures in Wonderland" but instead of making it all about Alice, I tied together scenes and music from Wizard of Oz and Peter Pan. I had so much fun writing the script and casting all the children in their roles. Not to mention, I loved watching the kids grow and pick up all the theater etiquette, the music, and develop their characters. That was satisfying. 


It wasn't until I returned to school in the fall when the familiar feelings washed over me. I felt limited. I was not good enough. Not in my element. I felt like I was treading water, opposed to swimming. 


So that's why I transferred.
It had nothing to do with Pocatello, Idaho State, the professors... it had to do with what I wanted to do. I want to do musical theater as a career so I want my graduate degree to prepare me for that path. Alas, here I am and I'm the happiest I have been in a very long time.

Believe me, I was scared with this decision. I made leaps and bounds with my studies these past years... switching voice instructors is always a risk and really scary when things are going well. But I had opportunities waiting for me at U of I/ Moscow area and these opportunities were ones similar to what I want to do for a living. And thus far, even with new struggles with the Music Department up here, I know I have made the right decision. I'm back at the Regional Theatre of the Palouse for the second summer doing children's camps (busy, but loving it!) and I am in the upcoming production of Annie in the role of Grace, Daddy Warbuck's secretary. I'm moving in with my best friend, also a musical theater major, and I even got a real person's job that pays! Although I miss my friends and sisters like crazy-- and so far I can't stand the GREEK superficial atmosphere, I have my family here, and my kitties, and I feel at peace. Each day there is a different reminder that I did make the right decision.

"You helped me find my way
There's still so much to learn
So many dreams to earn
But even if I crash and burn ten times a day
I think I'm here to stay
I'm gonna find my way."