Hard Work Actually Does Pay Off, No Way!

Meaning, I got accepted to West Chester University's Music Program!

I'm so excited, I want to throw up. I cried when I got the email. I'm going to cry again when I get the letter in the mail. I don't know what to do with myself.

My audition was yesterday, I can't believe how quickly they got back to me - the email was sent at 530 yesterday afternoon! -whistles- The audition felt good. It felt like the best audition I'd ever had. And that, my friends, is a phenomenal feeling. Especially given my track record of auditions. To be honest, I usually crap out completely, lose my mind. I was sure I'd cry yesterday, on the way to the school, at the school, before the audition, after the audition. But I felt great, and I think that's because I felt prepared. I knew what I was doing. Yay college :) Now to work on the financial stuff - lots of scholarship applications to get working on.

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In other news, we had off today and I did nothing with the extra time save for sleep in, shovel, and freak out about college. Of course. After the excitement wore off I kind of just sat around for a while, read through peoples' facebooks, creeped. Of course. I know the excitement will come back tomorrow when I see my friends, but at the moment everything's pretty neutral. I'm Switzerland at the moment. And I happen to know that some people haven't been having the greatest times lately. I found this on youtube a while ago and sent it to some who I thought could use it. I found it again today, and it made me feel good about life. Somehow, little weird quirky things like this do that to me. All the time. So this? This is for Eva, this is for Shelby. This is for whoever needs it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRLQx9ceKLo

Let it help you.

Gravity Released Me.

"...A t-shirt pulled from one of your drawers early on a tired silent morning - i hope you feel less alone when you look in the mirror. i hope it reminds you of community, that you're part of a bigger thing. i hope it sparks some conversation that brings change like a fire on the coldest night.

You'll need more than us. You'll need more and better. You'll need other people. You'll need people to help you process, people to help you let go, people to help you remember what's true and people to help you forget what's lies. You'll need the stories and advice of people with gray hair or white hair or no hair at all. Don't buy the lie that suggests they have nothing to offer or nothing to say - they were young once too. They are stories still going and they've seen the places you will go. They've been stuck at times as well, just like you and me and everyone.

You'll need coffee shops and sunsets and road trips. Airplanes and passports and new songs and old songs, but people more than anything else. You will need other people and you will need to be that other person to someone else, a living breathing screaming invitation to believe better things."


I have my first college audition on tuesday, at West Chester University. For a long time, talking about college, thinking about college, being in the presence of somebody who was thinking about college - I wanted no part of it. For a long time, the word "audition" made me really, ridiculously nervous. For a long time, I've hated the fact that a professor who has no idea who I am holds the next four years of my life in his or her calloused hands. However. Lately, things have been changing. People change, friends change, weather changes, classes change. Plans change, facts change, tastes change, places change. I change, and so do you. Obviously. Obviously. I say that, but it makes me feel like a bit of a hypocrite (for lack of a better word) because I only accept this obvious thing sometimes, on and off. Not always. I'd like to, you know. I'd like to accept it and move on. So I've been trying this new thing, where I let the little things roll off me, like water off a duck (yay similies!). Where I don't get down when there's no reason to. Jason Mraz says, "it's our time to make the most of it." I'm working on that. So, this new thing I'm trying includes trying to accept that graduation, college, future is coming and I can't do anything to slow that down - only to make it worth it. At the moment, I'm not going to worry about what'll happen when that time comes. I know we're all going to be separated. I know we're going to change, I know things will be different. I know, we all know. But at the moment, I'm not going to let it get me down. When that time comes, we'll work through it. We will. And I know that even though we go away, we separate, we change - Home is always going to be Home. We're always going to have this place to come back to, to put ourselves back in check. Home's not going to change. Mom, Dad, Brother, Sister, Cousin, Puppy, bedroom, home - everything's going to stay part of us. The place we've called our own for so long, the places in which we've created and destroyed and renovated and hand-me-downed ideas and clothing and objects and friendships and relationships -- that's not going to change, that's not going to leave us. I'm excited for my audition, I think. I am, I'm excited. And whatever happens from that is what happens, you know? And it'll be good, whatever it is - because we'll make it good. Nobody else is going to make it good for us. Dr. Stroope said, "this day will be like no other in your life, so you might as well appreciate it." I get that. I like that. I agree. Do you?


"We're still alive, you see. You and I on this night that's never happened before. Spread out across a giant circle, winter on one side and summer on the other, day and night the same. And then it moves and turns and changes. Things are always changing."

Thank you, TWLOHA. Thank you. It's the truth.

i'd rather not say "i can't."

yo firecracker: alkjsdfkljsdlfkjLKJSDFLKJSDLFKJSDF

yo firecracker: OH

yo firecracker: MY

yo firecracker: LORD

girovuelta: ?

yo firecracker: by the way.

yo firecracker: today

yo firecracker: mr tucker

yo firecracker: told the jazz band

yo firecracker: that if the teachers don't get a contract by feb 2,

yo firecracker: the jazz band won't be allowed to do competitions.

yo firecracker: competition season is the reason jazz band exists.

yo firecracker: AND.

yo firecracker: tucker also said.

yo firecracker: that the spring concerts (band, choir, orch, etc) are more than likely gonig to be held. DURING. SCHOOL. what the hell, man. what the hell.

yo firecracker: the choir hasn't / won't be doing any of the community singing things

yo firecracker: at all

yo firecracker: this entire year

yo firecracker: no new york, no competitions, no invitationals, no nothing.

yo firecracker: no. nothing.

yo firecracker: i'm so. pissed. off.

yo firecracker: i can't

yo firecracker: no, i'm not pissed. i'm frustrated

yo firecracker: to the point where i can't make myself focus on the fact that i am a senior, that i am going to graduate eventually, that i am in a decent school.

So I'm frustrated. I can't help it. And I don't know what to do about it. I know there are a million things I could do, but to be perfectly honest, there's no way I could get up at a board meeting and speak. There's no way I could handle that. I'm not mature enough to get up in front of those people and speak in a coherent, mature or calm manner. I'd absolutely explode. This is why I commend all the adults and students who have the power inside them to speak their minds effectively. It's unbelievable, the weakness I feel when I try to stand up for what I feel, or think about doing so. And it hurts. I know we're all hurting from this. I'm just in disbelief at the way our senior year is being ripped apart. Nothing's working.

2009 is recieved.

I myself am made entirely of flaws, 

stitched together with good intentions. 

-Augusten Burroughs