Reasons I fail at life: getting into the holiday spirit

Me:  I should listen to holiday music because it’s December.  December is holiday season and this will put me in a wonderful holiday mood full of festivity and cheer.  

Me:  *Listens to All I Want for Christmas is You by My Chemical Romance*

Me:  See, holiday music isn’t that bad.  Yay, December!  

Me:  *Stops listening to holiday music and listens to Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge on repeat*

Conclusion:  Listening to holiday music by your favorite artist only puts one in the mood for that artist.  

Reasons why I fail at life: Eyegraines

Once, someone was telling me about how whenever they wear their glasses they get eye migraines (also known as visual migraines which would have stopped my line of thought cold), and I was trying to be serious because eye migraines seemed like a serious matter… when my brain decided that eye migraines could just be called eyegraines.  

My brain was so proud of this that it started rewriting the lyrics to the Twenty-One Pilots song Migraine so it was about eyegraines.  

I tried to make myself think of other things, like how, for some creepy reason, there was fish gelatin in the milk, or how I had a sinus infection, but my brain kept singing to itself about eyegraines.  

Why I got rid of my teal hair

A few weeks ago I decided to dye my hair teal.  I used emerald something from Splat, and I really liked it, for a while.  

First, let’s talk about the bleaching process.  My hair is naturally really dark brown and I had been dyeing it various shades of dark red and purple.  I needed to bleach it for a long time to get those colors out.  The bleach got really thick half way through bleaching my hair, and I almost didn’t have enough to finish.  Even though my hair's really thick, it’s also really short, so I thought one container of bleach (and dye) would be fine-I’ve always had more than enough dye with just one box before.  So consider this fair warning if you’re going to use this and you have long hair, you probably want to get more than one box.  Also, if your hair doesn’t take bleach well it might not take all the color out.  I had some yellowish parts, some platinum blond parts, and some parts that were still brown, EVEN THOUGH I left it on for an hour.  I would recommend using a different type of bleach.  The last time I bleached my hair I used a box for platinum blond-that worked well and there was plenty of it.

The teal dye phase of this adventure was another story.  Teal dye dyes skin really easily, and my scalp was teal for longer than my hair was.  There was enough of it, but I had to apply it carefully.  So carefully, that I had my hair dressed neighbor do it for me.  The first day great.  The color was neat and interesting and everything I wanted it to be.  By that evening, I was worrying.  Apparently, you sweat teal if your hair is teal.  Thank goodness my hat was black.  After a week, the tips of my bangs and some other parts of my hair had already faded back to yellow-blond so I tried to stain it blond-red, it didn’t work, and now it’s Clary Fray orange.  Not exactly what I was after, but it is stable and I’m not sweating orange.    

When I started wanting to dye my hair neon colors I was eleven or twelve and my hair and clothes looked like everyone else’s.  I thought I could be different by having blue or pink hair.  I wanted to look different, be different, and establish myself as not normal and traditional.  But my hair was long or close to shoulder length at the time and it looked normal, as did my clothing.  My hair would have been the only rebelliously different thing about me.  This seemed out of sync with everything else and didn’t make the sort of strong statement I was after.  So I didn’t dye my hair weird colors then.    

Now I have short hair that isn’t like everyone else’s and I wear clothing that looks different; so dyeing my hair teal, even though it was fun for the week it lasted, didn’t make me feel like I was making the big statement that I thought neon hair would make when I was eleven.  It was just another change to my physical appearance.  What makes me different and unique is who I am when I write my poems and play guitar and fangirl about Fall Out Boy and the Raven Boys.  

Why I'm not going to get my lip pierced right now

For the last couple months, I’ve been wearing a fake lip ring.  A few people have asked me why I don’t just go and get my lip pierced because then I’ll have it pierced for the rest of my life and, in their opinion, that would be easier.  

Here are my reasons.

I know it makes sense to you to get my lip pierced now so it’ll be pierced for the rest of my life.  BUT THEN IT WILL BE PIERCED FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE.  I know that I can just let the hole grow shut, but what if it doesn’t grow shut and what if it leaves a mark after it grows shut?  I don’t want to have it for a year, decide I don’t want it, and then have a scar on my lip for the rest of my life.  

I have braces right now and I would worry that maybe the lip ring would mess up the braces and I would have to have them on longer, or the braces would bother my lip ring, and maybe I would have to take it out and get it pierced again after I get my braces off.  This is the second time I’ve had braces and if it doesn’t work this time I would have to get my jaw broken and wired shut for a LONG TIME and I don’t want to risk messing my braces up.  

Needles.  The thought of getting a shot makes me feel light-headed and sick.  If I could get it pierced like I got my ears pierced, I might be able to do it, but it would be way more painful, AND I can’t decide exactly where on my lip I like the ring to be.  I’ve decided on the right side because that side feels more comfortable for whatever reason, but I move it around a lot whenever I’m wearing it and I can’t decide if I like it more off to the side or closer to the middle of my lips.  I don’t want to get my lip pierced and then decide a month later that I actually wanted to have the piercing half a millimeter to the left.  

A nine dollar fake lip ring from Etsy is less expensive than getting a piercing and I have important things to buy like eyeliner and CDs and beds for my cat.  

And I’m not fooling anyone by wearing this.  Do you think I’m trying to fool people with my dyed hair?  Do you think people will be mad when they learn that my hair is not naturally Party Poison red or Burgundy?  Of course not.  Because that would be ridiculous.  Nobody thinks I was just born with green eyeliner around my eyes and grey eyelids.  Also, I’m not going to tell anyone that it’s real.  It’s fake.  If you ask, I’ll tell you it’s fake.  End of story.

So I’m going to wear a fake lip ring and do things on my own and on my own terms.    

A review of More Than This by Patrick Ness

(Very full of spoilers.  But if you’re actually going to read the book-which is a terrible mistake-run away while you still can-read a kind of spoilery review or at least skim it so you know what you’ve gotten yourself into.)  

First, let me say, The Matrix was better.  

And The Matrix doesn’t make you wonder if the world you’re living in is a real world or some computer world.  

The book starts with an uncomfortably gory chapter about EXACTLY how Seth dies.  I don’t mean a little bit gory, I mean I was uncomfortable reading this.  It didn’t just say something like “his arm broke” it was HIS ARM BROKE AND IT FELT LIKE THIS AND IT MADE THIS SOUND AND THEN THE BONE CAME THROUGH THE SKIN IN THIS WAY AND ALL OF THIS IS BEING DESCRIBED IN AN EMOTIONALLY SCARRING WAY!  What was Patrick Ness going for with this?  It doesn’t add ANYTHING to the plot, and it doesn’t make the story any more enjoyable (it actually makes it LESS enjoyable).  Was he trying to make Seth’s death seem even more terrible?  If so, why?  

I read all of this book at night, so maybe I was bothered by it more because it was night?  Or maybe I was just bothered by it because it’s…  I don’t know what word describes it.  Creepy maybe?  Unsettling?  

It took a VERY long time for Seth to actually find other humans-more than a hundred pages elapse before he met Regine and Tomasz.  Yes, he had those flashbacks about his life, but I don’t count those because they were dreams or memories or whatever and there weren’t actually real people.  His backstory was important, but maybe he could have run into someone when he went to find food in the town and he could have told them his backstory?  It could have been a personal narrative and he could have thought about the past and his backstory.  Perhaps he could have come to some important understanding about his life and himself.  I would have been fine with both of those, but instead it was over a hundred pages of flashbacks and Seth wandering around eating canned spaghetti.  

I might have been happier if there had been something he saw while walking around the town.  Maybe a shadow out of the corner of his eye, or maybe he thought he heard voices but there was nothing.  Something.  I was expecting this book to be horror, and even though there were other people and there was a monster I had started to think that the whole book would be about him wandering around and having flashbacks.  It was boring, but there was nothing to be afraid of so I relaxed.  I guess some readers might have been bothered by the idea of being all alone.  I suppose not being bothered by that says something more about me than about Seth.  

And then, without warning, there was The Driver.  

The Driver is the thing of nightmares.  It’s one of the most terrifying monsters I’ve read about.  

One of the worst points of this book is that Owen, Seth’s beloved little brother, is dead.  Let me say it again:  OWEN DIED.  The whole time I thought Owen was alive and just in the computer world and then I figured out that he was dead!  I don’t even have words to describe how angry and sad I was when I read this.  I don’t do well when little siblings die because I really love my little sister and I can’t think about little siblings dying.  

The ending was also terrible.  If it had specifically said that Seth got back to the computer world or specifically said that it didn’t work, I would’ve been much happier.  (Actually I wouldn’t have been.  After I figured out that Owen died the book was dead to me.)  

NO STARS.  Fine, one, but I don’t really mean it.  

I would recommend this book to people who want to stay up until four AM questioning their existence.  

IT'S NOT YOUR LIFE

Recently I’ve heard a few teenagers talk about how young people (thirteen and fourteen year olds mostly) can’t be in a relationship.  

IT’S NOT YOUR LIFE.  SHUT UP.  

I haven’t had a boyfriend and I don’t want one.  Right now I would rather have a really nice electric guitar or unlimited concert tickets and money for t-shirts because I like music more than people.  I also don’t think I completely know who I am because I’m still pretty young, and I, at least, want to know who I am before I have a boyfriend.  

But just because I don’t want a boyfriend doesn’t mean I’m going to freak out if someone younger than me has a boyfriend.  

I don’t care if you’re thirteen or fourteen and you have a boyfriend or girlfriend.  If that makes you happy then I’m happy that you’re happy.  That’s not what makes me happy, but whatever, it’s your life.  If everyone in the relationship is happy and everyone is nice to each other, people should just shut up.  If dating makes someone happy, people shouldn’t yell at them or say that they’re too young to actually feel that way.  It makes them happy, and we need more happiness in the world.  

Even though it may look like I’m the weird punk girl who probably hates love, I think love is nice, and if dating makes you happy, go for it.  It’s not my place to say what you can and can’t do.  If you try to rant to me about how love is stupid and how teenagers are too young to feel real emotions, I’ll probably throw a book at your face because that’s one of the stupidest things I’ve ever heard.  Also, if you’re a teenager and you’ve been saying stuff like this, YOU ARE A FREAKING TEENAGER, DON’T YOU FREAKING DARE SAY THAT TEENAGERS’ EMOTIONS AREN’T REAL.  IF SOMEONE SAID THAT YOUR EMOTIONS WEREN’T REAL YOU WOULD BE UPSET.  

I would be less upset about this if I didn’t mostly hear teenagers saying this crap.  Why do they do this?  

I’m freaking sick of people trying to control other people’s lives just because other people are living their lives in a way some people disagree with.  

Everyone just needs to calm down and leave everyone else alone.  Especially if the person isn’t someone you know well and you’re just freaking out about how they’re living.  IT’S NOT YOUR LIFE!  

About Clothes

If you’ve met me, you know how I dress.  Skinny jeans and baggy t-shirts and hoodies and slouchy hats and fingerless gloves and sneakers.  Yes, I do have skirts, tunics, and other clothes, but I’m most comfortable in the things I listed so that’s what I wear most.  

I don’t like short-shorts or tight-fitting shirts or tank tops so I don’t wear them.  If you wear them that’s fine.  That’s your choice and I would be a terrible human if I yelled at you for wearing what you want.  

I don’t care if you’re ten and you want to wear tank tops and short-shorts, because that’s your choice!  Sure, it’s not the one I would make, but I’m NOT you so I can’t tell you how to dress.  

I hate when people freak out because OTHER PEOPLE wear things they don’t like.  Just because a child is wearing something you wouldn’t have worn at that age doesn’t mean you get to freak out and say terrible things about their clothes, their morals, and the state of childhood today.  

There are some things other girls my age wear that I would NEVER wear, but I don’t care that they wear this kind of thing because IT’S THEIR CHOICE.  

I don’t care if you’re eleven and you like to wear short dresses and high heels.  I wouldn’t have worn that at that age, but it’s your body so you should be able to put whatever you want on it.  

I feel the same way about piercings and tattoos and hair.  It doesn’t matter what people do with their own hair, their hair is not your hair so you don’t get a say in how they style it.  I don’t care if you’re eleven and you have short hair or dyed hair, because IT’S YOUR HAIR.  If you’re fourteen and have a bunch of piercings, that’s fine.  It’s your body and if you feel comfortable getting piercings, that’s great.  If you have a bunch of tattoos, that’s also cool.  

I don’t judge people for what they wear, or what they do with their hair, or what piercing or tattoos they have.  I judge them by how they treat others.  Why can’t other people do the same thing?  

Dream Journal

I had a dream about a giant, seven foot tall, purple egg that appeared in the hallway outside my room.  It was like a giant evil version of one of those pale purple eggs that you find in Easter egg hunts when you’re little.  I know this sounds weird.  Just go with it.  

So in my dream I went downstairs and told my mom that a giant purple egg was sitting in the hallway.  My mom wasn’t like, “Wait, what?” she was totally cool and was just like, “Oh yeah, that’s the purple egg of doom.  It comes when people have anxiety and it stays outside their room until their anxiety is gone.”  

I know that everything causes me anxiety, but a giant purple egg that can tell that I have anxiety would probably give me MORE anxiety.  Way to go purple egg of doom!  

So in my dream I lied to the purple egg of doom and I said that I was totally anxiety free and it just disappeared.  Right in front of my eyes.  

Here’s the catch-because there’s always a catch, even if it’s an evil purple egg-if you think about the egg, or talk about the egg, it comes back because it gets angry.  

So it’s a giant purple egg that comes when you’re already a stressed mess and then comes back if you talk or think about it.  And it’s mad because you thought about it.  

This will not get rid of any anxiety.  This will CAUSE anxiety.  Who came up with this.  

Oh yeah.  I did.  

…

I’m normal.  

Lost Endings

This isn’t about anyone specific.  This is just something that can be irritating sometimes that I wanted to rant about.  

People seem to think that when I tried to write novels I actually knew what I was doing.  

I didn’t.  

First, I thought I was really awesome at writing fiction, second, when I started writing a new novel (which I did a few times a week or sometimes even a few times a day) I would have no idea what I was doing with it, where it would end up, who would live or who would die.  Spoiler:  almost everyone was going to die.  

Sometimes I would just have a title and a random paragraph from some random spot in the middle.  I would have no idea what happened after that short paragraph or how I got there.  Normally I just had a sentence or character and went with it.  

I tried to plot out novels a few times because I would have no idea where it was going but I would get tired of the plot I had written down so I would go back and erase the parts that disagreed with what I wanted to write.  

After a few attempts at writing out the plot before writing the novel I gave up.  

I was better at short stories because I could finish it in a day if I really tried and I was less likely to go back and change everything.  

A lot of the reason the plots in my novels got messed up is because I would be awake at two AM staring at the ceiling wondering what the meaning of life was when I would suddenly wonder what my novel would be like if I switched something.  Or maybe one character dies (most of them did).  Or maybe I would rewrite the entire thing because I wanted to change one detail.  

I’m kind of getting off topic.  I started writing this with a specific idea of what it was going to say and now I’m getting off topic and rambling.  Nothing has changed.  

Anyway, sometimes I talk to people about the stuff I used to write and after I explain roughly what happens in the beginning and weird, random middle parts that don’t fit in with anything, people ALWAYS ask how it was going to end.  

I have no idea.  

If I know how it ends I’m probably confused about how it starts.  

The middle is always kind of fuzzy and confusing.  

THE POINT OF THIS IS, if you want to talk about my old writing (and it’s perfectly fine to want to talk about it, I really don’t mind) don’t get irritated when I don’t know how some parts will go.  I started most of my wannabe novels when I was around ten or eleven, it’s been YEARS since I started writing all of them, and some of them just got printed and buried in my closet because I hated everything about them (for example:  WINDOW WORLD.  That’ll be buried in my closet forever.  If I find it, I’m burning it).  If I did know how it ended I really don’t know now.  

Why I don't Write Fiction

Before I started playing guitar I was pretty sure I was going to write novels.  

When I say pretty sure, I don’t mean that I kind of wrote a little in my spare time, I mean that I was pretty sure I could write an entire novel and get it published before high school and be the next JK Rowling.  

Yeah.  No.  

The beginning of the end started with The Window World.  I wanted to be original, so I didn’t want to write something about a mirror world, and I thought a window world would be so creative and probably NO ONE had ever done something like that before.  

So I started writing The Window World.  The plot went something like this:  Girl gets mad at her parents for some stupid reason, she goes down into her basement bedroom, and wishes she was somewhere else.  SOMEHOW the glass in the window beside her is magic and her combination of words was close enough to the spell to take her through the window and then there she is in the window world.  

Confused yet?  

So when she gets into the window world (which she thinks is just like her world but creepy, because she’s still in what looks like her house), she meets a crazy old woman and her long lost sister.  In the original copy I had her figuring out that this girl was her sister one page after she showed up.  So then some evil guy shows up, he dies, the main character (I think her name was Kristen) goes upstairs and finds HER EVIL/CRAZY WINDOW WORLD DOUBLE.  I’m not kidding.  I originally thought that the window world copies would be the reverse of each other, but I kind of abandoned that after I decided to make it a love story.  Looking back, it could have been more interesting if I had gone with that and forgotten the love story.  Anyway, then an evil plant called The Weed takes over the house and the the evil window world double dies.  

Still following?  Great.  

Then a long period of time is skipped and it goes to an awkward romance that seems very forced and weird because I wrote this when I was ten and eleven and I didn’t know how to write a believable love story.  

I’m not even going to mention what happens happens with the awkward romance BECAUSE IT’S FREAKING EMBARRASSING WHAT I THOUGHT A LOVE STORY WOULD BE LIKE.   

The things my younger self thought make me cringe.  

At some point in the story Kristen’s long lost older sister got a boyfriend.  He died.  I think the long lost sister died too.  And Kristen’s boyfriend, he’s dead, too.  

After a while I would get sick of writing about a character so I would just kill them- PROBLEM SOLVED.  I wouldn’t have to write about them anymore!  

But I killed literally every main character except for Kristen and the crazy woman.  

My writing REALLY started to crash and burn when I decided to write a novel based on my life.  

I was twelve.  

I hadn’t really done enough living to be able to base a whole novel off of my life, but I thought that I would just go with it and see how it turned out.  

No.   

I decided that it wouldn’t be completely about my life, I would just name the main character after me.  Or my best friend.  Or after my favorite book character.  Whatever, at least they had a name.  

So then I decided that the book would be about a girl finding who she really was and finding a best friend and just being cool and learning to love her flaws.  

...I got three pages into writing that one before I got bored and started writing about unicorns.  

I really knew it was the end recently when I started to write a short story.  

First, I wrote about a page and and then decided that it would all be in present tense.  After I changed the tense in the entire story so far, I wrote a little bit more.  And then I just got bored with it.  I realized a few days after writing the first page that I wouldn’t actually read this short story, and I should really stop.  

So now I stick to nonfiction like this, and songs and poetry about my life.  

Hopefully, this will go better than the nonfiction I wrote when I was younger.  When I was ten I tried to write my own autobiography.  It was just a four page list of people I didn’t like and why I didn’t like them.  I really didn’t like them.  It was apparently the whole of my world.