normalcy. right?

Its a funny thing when 'normal' changes.

I use to need to go out every night and be with people for the sake of being with them.

Now?

I crave being alone.

and when someone asks me how I'm feeling, I say fine. Because I am so use to feeling ill now.

Did you know that Warren G. Harding made up the word 'normalcy' for the sake of his 1920 campaign?

I wish I could make up words.

I ought to be in pictures.

I haven't said a lot of things out loud lately, mainly because I don't know who to say them to.

The greatest part of my days are listening to people I care about talk about people who care about them. I can picture the descriptive encounters so vividly and my mind is rushing with things I need to write.

For once, I feel like a true observer. Before my observations were riddled with biases and thoughts about my life and where I fit into the scene.
its now just me watching things play out.

but for the first time, this weekend, I realized something that I'll at least write down:
I want to be in the movies.


[my lump is smaller but its still not gone. something still doesn't feel right]

misty blue.

I have things to look forward, and for the first time this summer, they are in sight.

horcruxes and answering machines.

"Well, we got your results back. Your lymph nodes are very infected. Especially the one that is five centimeters big on the right side. If it remains that size for a month we'll do another scan."

First the education system, now the medicine?! This has been going on for a year. Can't we just find out what is wrong with me?

The medicine I'm taking is reminiscent of what I assume Albus Dumbledore felt when he drank that poison to weaken him when they tried to get the second Horcrux.

one small step.

The inside of my neck looked like the lunar landing,
with craters and mysterious unidentified objects.

it was beautiful and frightening.

ruining white rice for you.

As I vomited every last grain of white rice in the staff bathroom at the spa all I could think was "NO RICE GRAIN LEFT BEHIND" a way better promise than GW Bushy made to children a while ago. I laughed as I vomited the entirety my conservative lunch, splashed water in my face and walked to the reception desk.

"I just threw up. Will you cover my phones for the rest of the day?"

The doctor prescribed a 'mega antibiotic' to basically cover every base possible. the side affect of the antibiotic is vomiting. if it is truly an infection of my lymph nodes, I should be well in 24 hours. but to be safe, the doctor wants me to go to the hospital tomorrow to get a scan of my neck to see if its something more serious.

As my oceanography professor droned on about the formations of waves my mind was with waves crashing on my favorite island: Catalina. I thought about the pebbles that got caught between my toes as the water pulled the rest of them back out. I thought about the morning we woke up to watch the sunrise wrapped in towels on the beach and when we made it to the top of that mountain....................


I didn't even realize everyone had already gotten up for break until my professor said:

"Sarah. You look pale. Are you okay?"

"I'm not sure exactly. I'm somewhere between awful and blissful."

"you could rest at the foot of my bed
and whisper reassurances
cause I'm not sure of anything
I'm not sure of anything"

behind the desk, in front of sleep.

I promised myself I would not write about how sick I feel anymore but it is hard not to. All I have these days is sickness, work and school.

I feel weak and small and the lumps in my neck are getting bigger. I need to get this figured out.

I'm sitting at work, watching all of these refreshed, rejuvenated people walk down the stairs after their treatments and I can't remember the last time I felt like that. I wake up every night from 10 to 15 hours asleep feeling exhausted and miserable.

My bed is drenched with sweat and my head is pounding.

its all the same.

except it gets worse with every day.

I miss the clean Oregon air.

and I miss the people there.

I'm so exhausted I didn't even mean to rhyme.

but whatever, I guess thats fine.

team neville.

Last night I saw Harry Potter. I forgot what it was like to laugh with these people. As we sat at dinner I watched them order their food with such strange enjoyment. I kept laughing and when they asked why I said:

"You guys are being so you tonight."

And it was true. They were all being the greatest versions of themselves.

I felt an odd sense of euphoria, I was giddy even. The dazed expression on my face was left unnoticed by the six of them and I was fine with that.

As we watched the final film of the books that I loved so much I thought about the impact the characters from the story have made on me. That's when I realized they have made as much of an impression on me as the people sitting around me have.
Tonks and Lupin at the end....

It actually had a way of putting things in perspective for me.

which I needed.

lymes and things

things aren't so bad.

I'm sick but its tolerable.
I got a job that pays well and will be eaaaasy. [receptionist at a SPA.]
I'm doing well in my oceanography class and I might actually be learning something which is SHOCKING because I've never learned anything in the math and science world.

I keep dreaming about next summer, and how getting a job on Catalina Island would be the best thing I could ever imagine. I need to start working on my application as soon as its available.
Things happen in a year. I could feel differently but as of right now a summer away from home and school sounds like the greatest scheme I've ever thought of.

I also keep dreaming about seeing you again. [I wonder if it will be different.]

Aight. I need to get a grip.

happy graduation, sister.

first: my sister tells me I can't borrow a dress because I won't fit in it.
second: I borrow a dress from my mother and my family over-compensates and tells me I look stunning in a fake disgusting way.
third: I change because I feel over dressed into jeans and a casual shirt.
fourth: my family once again "oooo's and awwwes" like I'm in a wedding dress because my mother tells them to.

How is it that I feel like a million bucks, and perfectly happy with my body at school. then I come home and deal with the rude sly comments of my size double zero sister and mother who works out every day.
even worse why do I let it affect me?

And I CAN'T STOP SLEEPING and I'm feeble and hurt when people touch me. I slept eleven hours last night and for at least four during the day. My head pounds when I sit up and I wake up sweating even though my window is open and I have a fan on. My body shakes uncontrollably and my swollen gland has become a hard scary mass.
Seriously. something is wrong.

ball and chain

"Got to take advantage of my freedom tonight." The man child said.
"Your freedom? What happen to being madly in love with this girl?"
"Well, I am. Of course. but you know. Its nice to have a night off."
"Why is it that you can only hang out with us when she's busy?"
"Because that is what being in a relationship is."


hold the phone.

WHAT?

swollen lymph nodes.

I realize now that every part of me was holding out for the first week in August when I would see my lad again. But now that he can't make it out here and I can't mope anymore.

Yesterday I went to the chiropractor. She does the B.E.S.T method. something that I have always been skeptical about. she basically reads my body and my body tells her what it needs.
I've been going for years [shes a close friend of my moms] but honestly thought it was silly. I didn't buy into it.

Until yesterday.

I was laying of the table and she began to read my body. she cleared physical stress and my neck for the first time in over six months finally began to feel better. then she moved on to clearing my emotional history. [when ever she says "I'm going to clear your history" I imagine myself as a giant computer and her deleting my web history.]
When I was driving up to her office I passed a spot along the road that made my body tense up. I thought back to when I was seventeen years old sitting in a car with a boy.

Then she said, "Okay, looks like we're going back to when you were seventeen."
"What?" I said sitting up.
"Wow. It must be something big."
"No." I said laying back down.


After my treatment I lay there on the table with my eyes shut. I was calm and happy for the first time in weeks.

"You don't believe others actually care for you. You have a difficult time allowing yourself to feel other peoples compassion."
"I don't think thats----"
"Hey its just what your body told me."


I'm weak. Always tired. Its odd. I could sleep all day but someone always wakes me up. When I'm awake I wait and anticipate what I'll dream about at night. My dreams have been vivid and little glimpses of my past and things that haven't happened.

I think something is wrong with me.

All children, except one, grow up

I made a promise to myself when I was four:
never grow up

When I was eleven I realized that wasn't a logical promise.
I changed it:
never grow up alone

I never break promises to myself.
if that is true, why do I feel so completely alone?

baby, lets be honest. You're not actually a firework.

The sky was black with tiny explosions of color breaking through the darkness. I stared out my window and watched three different firework shows on the Fourth of July.

Though all I wanted was to stay in bed all day I begrudgingly put on my black bathing suit and left for the beach.
I immediately regretted this decision as I wove through the crowd of scantily clad drunk teenagers, hoping that my former classmates would not recognize me and pull me in for sloppy hugs. Luckily I was like a undercover spy with this new hair of mine and safely made it to the beach unharmed.
It was hot, and the drunk underclassman we met up with made me sad.
I remembered past Independence Days: Two years ago making smoothies at work and going next door to the little boutique my sister worked at on my break and returning to the dish washing station smelling like booze. And last year being the designated driver for my friends and sister as they lay in the sun drinking vodka poorly disguised in a water bottle.
I felt sick to my stomach remembering both of these instances.
It was the first time being home that I felt miles away from all of them.
I had never been this far.
I disappeared from the cluster of towels and walked up the long hill back to my car.
Since when were we so far away from each other?

I want to create something significant. how can I do that when everything is so disposable?

As the last of the fireworks faded away and only the distance sound of them remained I couldn't help but wonder when this place changed for me.

we'll always have....

Saw a movie last night that forced me to step back and examine myself. [aren't those the best kinds of movies?]
It was Midnight in Paris, Woody Allen's new flick. [what I would give to be in a Woody Allen movie.]
The story is a about a man who is successful screen writer, in a seemingly great relationship and is in Paris for a few weeks with his rich fiance and her parents.
He wanders around Paris wishing he could have seen it in its prime, the 1920s and to his surprise a car picks him up and takes him to a roaring party in the 1920s. He parties with the Fitzgeralds,chats up Hemingway and has his novel read by Gertrude Stein.

I was mesmerized with the Paris scenery and this fantasy because it is one I have had far too often. why couldn't I be drunk with the Fitzgeralds instead of watching my friends get stoned?
Somewhere in the middle of the movie my mind was made up. I wanted to quit school and move to Paris. I knew that I wouldn't be able to time travel but anything seemed better than being here.
The main character walked by the river seine in the exact spot where we all sat eating ice cream on our free day in Paris.
I wanted that back.
but I realized, while I wanted Paris back, I really just wanted those people back.

Maybe I will move to Paris someday.
but for now I need to focus on being here and find a way to break through the monotony and get back to the river.