"We're just crossing our fingers it doesn't assert itself and become rude and large".

I'm writing a story with The Boy. The way it works is I write 500 words, then give him the last two sentences and he writes 500 words off of them. Continue ad infinitum. The only reason I'm putting it here is because I wrote this at work and I don't want to save it on the work computer because that would be weird and I'd probably forget and the next person who uses this computer would inevitably find it and just think "what the fuck?" and while that would be amusing I would just rather not. Plus I can't access the work computer from my house. I don't know if this will become a thing or not. Here's the first part:

“In any case, it’s still a lost cause”. Barnaby Wilke stared down into his destroyed garden, flower petals strewn about it like tiny delicate corpses on a bloody battlefield, the weeds holding their spears and pitchforks high in victory.

“What about the perennials, though? They’ll just pop back up next year”. Amelia Jean looked up at her father.

“Then I suggest telling Mrs. Kershluck to watch for tulips next spring, because the bulbs are on her lawn”. Barnaby pointed at the boxy grey house across the street, in front of which at least twenty tulip bulbs were lying.  

“Well we can fix it!”

“It’s done, Amelia”.

“So you’re just going to leave our entire front yard looking like this?” Amelia waved a hand over the chewed up soil and broken plants. Suddenly, the snapped marigolds sprung upright; the petunias got up and replanted themselves; Barnaby watched as a sunflower waddled over to a patch of forget-me-nots and stood them all up straight at once. As everything began to settle down, Amelia crouched to peer up close at one of the daffodil. It swayed a little as she exhaled, but other than that made no move. As she stood up, she noticed the tulip bulbs lying immobile on Mrs. Kershluck’s lawn. Picking through the garden path, Amelia made her way to the curb in front of the boxy grey house. Feeling ridiculous, she flicked her hand over the bulbs and watched them roll their way across the street and back into the soil.

Amelia’s father stared at her as she walked back up the driveway. “Well fuck”.

***

“I’m not letting you cut into my fingertips!” Amelia slammed her hands down on the table.

“But how else are we supposed to figure out how this happened? There’s got to be something here to find!” Barnaby stirred his pot of macaroni faster and faster until elbow-shaped noodles were flying out and sticking to the walls.

“That’s not the point! I’m not a science experiment. Take me to a doctor! Tell them I hurt my hand and need and x-ray to see if it’s broken. Look at my fingerprints through a magnifying glass, I don’t care. But you’re not cutting me open”. Amelia took the cooking spoon away from her father and resumed making the macaroni at a more normal pace.

Jeremiah Wilke sat at the counter, watching his daughter and husband argue. He had arrived home from his rock-polishing class to find Barnaby and Amelia yelling at each other in the kitchen, Barnaby waving about the macaroni pot in frustration. Upon hearing about the incident in the garden that afternoon, Jeremiah had promptly pulled up a chair to watch the hilarity ensue. Amelia slammed the lid on the pot and marched around the counter to her father. “Dad. Do you honestly think you’ll find anything if you look in my fingers? Really?”

“I might. That’s the point. I don’t know”.

“Well you’re not cutting me open”. The macaroni began to boil over.  

Blankety Boo

I don't understand why sleeping with a blankie is considered childish.

Okay, well, I do understand. Sort of. Babies sleep with blankies. Children sleep with blankies. And after you reach a certain age, you start thinking that you want to be a grown-up. You start wanting respect from the people you admire. You start thinking that you have to be strong and mature and that being strong and mature means immediately ceasing any and all behaviours associated with being a child. Including sleeping with blankies.

I think that when kids start going through this, what they don't realize is that being an adult doesn't make you this impenetrable wall of security, because often times that's all they see. They see their parents. They see their parents deciding what to make for dinner and telling them that there is nothing under the bed and that the massive gust of wind won't actually pick them up off the ground. They see their parents being secure, because that is what their parents show them. A parent doesn't generally show their child the bills piling up in the mailbox that they won't be able to even start paying until Thursday; a dad reads Cinderella to the kids until they fall asleep and then cries himself breathless because his wife is having an affair she thinks he doesn't know about; or maybe she's not having an affair but he thinks she wants to but she says she doesn't but he doesn't believe her because how could she love someone as insecure as him? You don't show your kids that shit. You don't want to scare them, or hurt them, or have to try to explain something to them that is uncomfortable and that you probably don't even want to think about or that you maybe don't even fully understand. And so children grow up believing that adults don't need help, that they've all had security permanently stuck inside of them in an official Growing Up ceremony that gave them all the answers when they turned twenty-five.

Blankies give comfort that children trying to grow up don't think they should need. But everyone needs comfort. I think at some point everyone realizes that adults are still confused, only with bigger consequences. We realize that there is not going to be a moment in our lives where we are suddenly sure of everything and will feel completely safe for the rest of time. I'm still half hoping. But once you realize that, how can you think it shameful to need a blankie? Why is it only okay to fall asleep holding something if it is alive? We cuddle our friends and our loves and our pets and our parents, but what about when they aren't around? Are we supposed to just suddenly shed our need to be close, to have something or someone to hold on to? I think that's stupid. If I'm in bed alone and panicking and need something to remind me that I'm still attached to the earth, I will squeeze my blankie against my chest and feel safe.

Would You Like to Play Again?

I think I need to reset myself. It's been a while since I've spent any substantial amount of time alone, and that's not necessarily a good thing. That's not to say I don't adore the people around me; I do. But, being the type of person who doesn't know how to be around others without trying to gain everyone's attention, I tend to get more crass and obnoxious the longer I go without time alone. It's like time by myself allows me a chance to do things that I enjoy as an individual, and doing those things gives me substance. The more time I spend around other people, the more that substance starts to deplete; I use it up having good conversation and making banter. The less I have, the more self-conscious I get about people finding out and, consequentially, the harder I have to try to hide it. That tends to result in my becoming increasingly crude and obnoxious, classless, if you will. Apparently, in my logic, my increased volume will make people more inclined to listen to what I am saying. And I think I hate it. Therefore, I think that I need to enforce a certain amount of alone time every week. Regardless of what others are doing, my homework still needs to get done. There are books to be read and singing to be practised and poems to be written. Neglecting those is not going to make me happier, and it certainly won't make me a more interesting person to spend time with. I don't know whether I want to be better more for myself or more for other people. Whatever the reason, it still needs to happen. 

My Logic

I do sweet bugger all day long. That's code for "nothing". No really, I am a champion procrastinator. I'm sure you already know that though. It seems to be a theme within these blogs. Me whining instead of actually doing anything to resolve the issue. However, I come to you on this fine morning not to complain, but to validate. Because I have officially come to terms with the fact that I'm always going to be the type of person who works best at the last minute, who works best in the dark.

My whole world is awake during the day. The people that I interact with face-to-face are up and about, the Sun is shining (on those precious days when the rain doth not tumble), and there is much to experience. Why would I spend those bright hours doing work? I can do work just as well when the rest of the world is asleep, and then I can do it without missing out on the reading of The Philosopher's Stone happening in the quad.

I can handle being a little sleep deprived. Yes, I know it's rude to doze off in class. Yes, I know that it's not particularly fun to feel like your eyes are too big for your head. But it's manageable. And in return for losing some sleep, I get to spend time with the people around me, get grades that won't warrant my father slapping me across the face, listen to a bit of slam poetry, and maybe even do something spontaneous.

So as I see it, while sleep would feel good, it wouldn't feel as good as it does to be awake.

I'll Take My Data Plan in an I.V. Please

If you want to be somewhere else, be somewhere else. If not, put down your phone, and be where you are. You don't need to check Facebook at dinner. "Nobody's talking to you." you say? Well, maybe they would be if they thought that you were at all interested in what they had to say. Maybe you should actually engage in the conversation, and jump right in there when you actually have something to contribute.

Unless someone close to you has just been admitted to the hospital in critical condition, there is no need for you to be checking your phone for updates while you are spending time with another person. And if that's the case, why are you not at the hospital right now? Get your priorities straight.

Whatever you are texting about, there is a very good chance that it is not nearly as important as you think it is, and that it can wait the twenty minutes it will take you to eat dinner and show the people around you that you actually give a shit about them. If it really can't wait-if you need to solidify plans RIGHT THIS INSTANT OR THE WORLD WILL IMPLODE-then at least try to be discreet. Keep your phone in your lap, type fast, and make up for it afterwards by not gazing around like an aloof asshole, just waiting for your phone to ring or buzz or beep again and distract you from the obviously inferior company surrounding you.

It's called a watch. Checking it when you have somewhere to be is much less obnoxious than staring at the digital clock on your phone.

Too much or not enough

I have this story that I really want to write.

I think that it's a good idea, and that it could be wonderful and unique with the proper touch of a pen. But I don't know how to write it. I don't know how to progress plot in a way that is compelling and I don't know how to think things through and I don't know how to focus on one thing long enough to grow with it and improve it and make it perfect.

I'm afraid that I'll never be able to. I'm afraid, so I don't try. I'm lazy. I'm scared and I can't and I won't.

It's the "I won't" that upsets me the most. Fear can be conquered. Inability can be overcome through education and effort. But unwillingness to try? That cannot be fixed. Wait, typo. What I meant to say was "That cannot be fixed by anyone but me". No person can instill in me the will to try. My parents can pay for my education. A teacher can show me a plethora of ways to approach what I am doing, introduce me every skill they possess. A friend can encourage me and support me and tell me to get over myself and just write the damn thing. But only I am able to want to try. And that scares me.

Maybe once I've gone to school for a while, I'll feel more capable, more worthy of writing something. Maybe I'll stop giving up whenever what I'm writing feels more like a self-indulgent diary entry, and instead know how to start over from a different angle. Maybe I'll be able to differentiate cheesy and pretentious and trite from poetic and deep and true. Maybe I'll write to impress myself, and not anybody else.

Maybe I'll get over myself and write the damn thing.

Seconds turn into years, and then you're all like "Whaaa? Where am I? Why do my fingers smell like soup?"

It is distinctly unsettling to wish your life would go by faster.

It's one thing to have goals for the future for you to work toward in order to make yourself as happy as possible. It's another to wish away what you have right now by continuously thinking that the future will be bring you divine satisfaction, and therefore the present is somehow inferior.

Your life is every second you are alive, not just the memorable moments.

 If you are at work, that is your life right then. Regardless of how mind-numbingly mundane life feels for the duration of that shift, the only way it will be a waste is if you allow yourself to adopt the mindset that you should just "wait for it to be over". That is literally saying that you do not wish to be present for every moment of the oh-so-limited time in which you are bestowed with the privilege of consciousness. You could not possibly be so audacious. You are most likely there to make money so that you can be a functional member of first-world society. You have to be there, for all intents and purposes. That job may not be the first thing you would wish to do with your time. It may not even be on the list. But you are there. And wherever you are, it is important to be present. Smile at people. Tell somebody what you like about them, for no reason other than giving them permission to do the same thing for somebody else. Compliments from people who don't owe you anything are usually the most genuine. Be aware of the thoughts inside of your own head. If there aren't any, think some. Sing songs to yourself. Feel yourself breathe. Whatever you do, don't wish for that time to be over. All of those tiny bits of time that you bide away being dissatisfied add up, and if you're not careful the compost under the sink will get clogged with all of the seconds you mistook for rotton carrots. And then the sink will explode, and your kitchen will flood, and there will be a mess everywhere. And you wouldn't want that, would you?  

Irrationality

I have this fear that, one day, I'll turn my back to my parents, only to find that while I wasn't watching, they transformed into their true selves, two monsters staring back at me, faces identical to those I love but with eyes reflecting gleeful malice like shattering glass in a hurricane. I fear that I have placed my trust in two time bomb spiders, biding their time for years, nearly two decades, crouched in position, rubbing hairy pincers together in hungry anticipation, drooling through their fangs, weaving my infallable reliance on them until they have enough fabric to smother me, capture me, throw a dinner party. Make sure to use the good china. Forks on the left. Use red wine glasses for blood. Charming.

I can't look at mirrors when it's dark out. An irrational brain has convinced unreliable eyes that my face will melt off its bones, that who I see will gesture and blink of her own accord, that she will be the one with dagger cheekbones and hook eyes that pierce with barbs; that she will walk out of her frame, have her own reflection in that mirror. I'm torn between removing my eyes from their sockets as I run out of the bathroom, and forcing them to prove me wrong.

Flicker

The world can be truly beautiful if you catch it at the right moments, like the tiny hint of a smile caught in the reflection of a mirror, the twinkle in her eyes so quick you have to wish on it.

Street lights will go out precisely when you need to see the stars.

When the moment comes, take it, without urgency. Allow it to dissipate at will. It will come back.

You're not dating? Ooooh, I understand. Is it contagious?

For Chrissakes, I'm not diseased. I'm also sick of being called a "single", as if my not being in a relationship automatically means that I'm free to be snatched up by the first horny guy to notice I exist.

"Like, oh my god, you aren't in a relationship?"
"Nope".
"But aren't you looking forward to finding somebody to share your life with?"

Why do I have to share my life with somebody? Whenever I express the desire to remain single, the general reaction is "Oh sweetie, you'll find someone who will change all that". And maybe I will. But why is that the goal here? In case you have failed to notice, I am perfectly whole on my own. I'm not missing pieces. I don't need another person to make me feel complete, or to make my life better. In every "relationship" I've ever been in, I've actually felt like pieces of me were falling off; either I was shedding them, or the boy in question was trying to pick which pieces he liked and discard the rest. They're my pieces, and I'll do what I wish with them, thank you very much. Why do people keep insisting that I'll find someone who I'll fall head over heels for into a drooling puddle of looooove. Who on earth would believe that kind of emotion to be healthy or permanant? What I want to know is why they think I'll be happier with someone. Are they so unobservant that they never realized I was miserable every time I tried to have a relationship? I'm not going to pretend to be all cynical. "It" could very well happen for me. But I am currently unable to imagine myself being fulfilled while in a relationship. And that is okay.

Do people have this obsession with curing single people of our obvious disease because they pity us? Like, they just want us to feel the pure bliss of finding true love? Guess what, darlings: pure bliss can be found in many places. I defy you to tell me that I can't find it in other ways. I sing. I write. I have friendships. I have places. Tell me I'm not blissfully happy while experiencing those things. Tell me. I dare you. You're pity means nothing to me. I'm happier alone than I've ever been while linked to another person, and many people who are currently linked seemed to me to be much happier whilst unattached.

Or, does this desire to "couple" everybody happen because we live in a culture where you haven't matured until you've had sex, which is something often associated with relationships?

"You're still a virgin? Haha, you must be a prude/immature/scared".
"You're still a virgin? Good girl, keep your innocence for as long as possible".

Why does it matter if I've had sex or not? Whether I'm "immature" or "innocent", why am I considered different just because some guy hasn't shoved his penis inside of me? If you're different after having sex, I'm pretty sure that means you're doing it wrong. If a person hasn't had sex in our culture, then they get two choices: be asexual, or claim that they're "waiting". The former aside, why must people be seen in relation to whether or not they've fucked somebody else? She's "waiting". She's not, you know, a fabulous artist, or an aspiring travel journalist, or an avid collector of obscure socks. Nope. She's a virgin. Because a person hasn't lived until they've had sex. They need that other person in their life, however briefly, in order to validate their existence. They can't possibly be content with their life if it does not contain romance.

I'm not saying I think legitimate love doesn't exist, or that there aren't people in relationships who are so happy they feel like there are rockets in their feet that could shoot them to the moon. I'm saying stop defining people by whether or not they are currently "single" or "in a relationship". Stop telling me that eventually I'll change my mind and get married. You don't get to tell me that. I'm 17; there are many other much more important things I should be concerning myself with right now.  

Every single person is not a set-up waiting to happen, Yenta. This is not Fiddler on the Roof.

Flee Until Nobody Speaks Your Language

I recently started running. Well, running is a loose term here, because I run marginally faster than I walk. But pride is still present. I'm getting better, building up stamina. I can run four kilometres without stopping, and without feeling like the inside of my stomach is home to ancient tribal dancers who are over-zealous with their spears. I feel strong when I run, and that's weird for me. Feeling strong, I mean.

I'm a relatively weak person. I can't do a push up. I can't stand the idea of somebody thinking anything negative about me. I can't stand it because I have little conviction. I don't think about anything long enough to form a strong opinion about it, and so I have no passion to back up what I say. That passion would make negative opinions bounce off me, because I would know what I believe and be able to articulate it. Instead, I form half-baked opinions and then go about shouting like a fool. I don't like it. Whenever I say something stupid, or rude, or tactless, my first and strongest desire is to simply run away. To Europe. Where nobody knows me and I can live alone and never have to associate with anybody ever again and be mysterious and read lots and lots of books. I could be he biggest coward with the least pride; the fastest runner you've ever seen.

Regrets

There is no point to whining about how you wish you hadn't done something. It's done. It's over. Move on.

If you know that you're going to regret what you're about to do, or what you are planning to do, or what you are considering doing maybe, there is a very simple way to avoid that regret: DON'T DO IT. You might try to convince yourself that it will be fun, or that it's not that big of a deal, or that you won't regret it as much as you think you will. Guess what? The fact that you need to think about it this hard probably means that you shouldn't do it.

I believe that more people have good instincts than we can see. It's just that a lot of those people ignore those instincts and try to pretend that things don't matter to them that actually matter quite a bit to them. They ignore the nagging feeling that says "You're being stupid/a coward/immature". But no matter how hard you try to murder it with a samuri sword or a fork, you'll always feel that nagging in your chest or your head or your back or the third toe on your right foot or wherever that nagging feeling hits you.

So, you can make the choice to do it anyway, then try to brush it off and say that next time you'll be stronger and make the choice that feels right. Or, you can make the right choice now, even though it might not seem as fun, interesting, or kind. But, whatever choice you make, you have total control over the situation. If Brotips has taught me anything, it's that "you can literally do whatever you want". So stop whining about your regrets and actually do something about them.

Somebody Link This to Me When I Backslide

No more complaining. Only doing or fixing or getting over or standing up for. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a science lab to complete.

Go Out Into the World and be Mediocre!

Right now, most high school almost-graduates are flipping just a little bit of shit. Everyone has to think about the future. Some people have parents who are predisposed to do a lot of that thinking for them. However, it is still up to the almost-graduates to make their own decisions, if they plan to be relatively happy with how their lives turn out. Their parents aren't going to live their futures for them. But I digress...

High school is all about grades. It is all about getting the highest grades possible so that you can prove that you're a smarter, harder worker than everybody else. It's a competition. It is supposed to be about acquiring knowledge and figuring out what interests you and learning self-discipline. Ha. That's a very noble goal. High school is not a noble place. In high school, acquiring knowledge is unnecessary as long as you can remember something long enough to puke it out onto a test; who cares if you've actually benefitted from the class, as long as you pass it? In high school, interests are certainly not cultivated, broad music classes and sports teams aside; if they were, why would my school have so few clubs that the Yearbook Exec had to scramble to find enough to fill a page? And self-discipline? You've got to be kidding me. I'm writing this blog instead of writing an overdue lab report about pee. Self-discipline in high school consists of being able to hold your liquor, not talking back so much that your teacher actually punishes you, and handing in your assignments before the teacher refuses to mark them.

We're supposed to be "acquiring knowledge". LEARNING. But even I can't say that I'm trying very hard to do so. All I want to do is pass the test and get out. Only I also want to learn. I keep saying that I'll learn more tomorrow; I'll learn when I have the time, when I'm not busy doing busy work. I have to make time. I'm lazy, and that needs to change if I plan to live a life worth being proud of. Not everybody seems to care so much about pride of accomplishment, of learning for the sake of bettering yourself. You can't force people to learn. You can stick them in a chair and talk at them and be all big and scary and tell them how their future will be so much more open if they actually try, but you can't make them try. Motivation has to come from them, and if they don't have it, all you can do is struggle and scream and push until they pass the test. High school is all about creating functional members of society. It teaches you to conform; sticks you in a giant machine that makes a really ominous whirring sound and tries to scare you into getting good grades because that means that you get to have a future.

I understand: people do need to be functional members of society. We can't just have a bunch of lazy bums wandering around, leeching off other people and doing nothing to contribute. But it makes me sad that all high school does is encourage mediocrity, even if it is unwittingly. It might tell us to thrive and to think and to be creative and to be innovative. But when your teacher lets slide a deadline because nobody did the work, because everybody was so busy with the bajillion other things they need to do to graduate, it makes me wonder if this system, overloading people who have not yet fully matured with pile of work to do, is actually the best approach. We could get it done if we tried. I truly believe that. We don't need to be on Facebook updating our statuses about how much homework we have instead of actually doing our homework. But we're not getting it done. Personally, I'm not getting it done because I'm not motivated, because my whole life I've have been told that the test is the most important thing, and I'm starting to realize that it's not. Some of people aren't interested in their classes. Some do so much that they have to pick and choose what to care about. And some of us just don't like to be told that we have to do something-which I agree is a poor excuse for not doing something. But whatever the reason, we're not actually passionate about learning, at least in our current setting. We're passionate about passing. We're, however unwittingly, setting ourselves up to be merely functional. We need to figure out a different system; one that gives students the motivation and direction they need in order to actually find something they're passionate about. If they're passionate about it, they will try. Trust me.

I'm so caught up in shallow concern for what I'm supposed to be doing that taking time to do what matters to me feels like blasphemy.

Public education is better than no education. I believe that anybody should have the chance to learn. But that does not mean that everybody is going to take that chance. So many people waste their schooling. They are to blame for doing so. But the schools are letting them. The schools couldn't care less if the students are happy, or working to their full potential, or doing what they love. As long as the students aren't overly disruptive, do well enough to get a B, and end up as decent, tax-paying citizens, the schools brush off their hands and call it a day. Who cares if anything spectacular is created ever again? We just want to survive.

There's a reason Michelangelo and da Vinci existed so long ago. They didn't go to public high school.   

Of Teddybears and Bedsheets

What's the deal with sleep? It seems as though it has always had this power over me. When I was a kid, sleep was something that was forced on me; I wanted to be mature and be a part of the action in those mysterious hours after I was told to put head to pillow. And then, as I started being able to stay up later and later because I learned that if I close the door to my room, my parents can't see that the light is still on, sleep became a thing of fond memories, sometimes resurfacing in the middle of Chemistry. 

Sleep runs the show, no matter what.

I know that we need a certain amount to function, but I want to know why sleep is so important to me. Is it just because it feels good to lay there in comfort and be given a free pass to do absolutely nothing? That seems legitimate, but a lot of things are enjoyable. They don't dictate me like sleep does. Is it because I fear pain? I don't want to go through a day in discomfort? If I'm a little sore from going for a run (*gasp* Riley exercises?! It must be the apocalypse.) I still manage to get through a day just fine. I barely think about it. Is it because I want my mind to be as sharp as it can be? I haven't used a sharpener in years anyway, it's not like it makes too much difference. Plus, lack of sleep often gives me some of my most entertaining stories (see: Rita, the Family Friendly Pole Dancer).

So why is it that at the hour I feel I should be tucking myself in, if I am not doing so, the clock becomes all I can watch and I realize how quickly time is passing and how much sleep I am not going to get. I know that I'll be fine. This is not life threatening. What's the deal?

*lightbulb*

I'm a creature of routine. As much as I romanticize spontaneity, whenever my routine is broken, I go into my shell and try to keep myself as safe as possible. Change is only good if I control it. When I have to stay up late because I need to finish homework that I should've done eight hours earlier, it feels as if I'm not in control of what I'm doing. My procrastination got the better of me; past me is controlling present me. I like it when present me controls present me. It's nice. It is also a very rare occurance.

When I'm up late (early), not sleeping, it feels like I'm in this weird alternate universe, isolated, and it's a little lonely. My world is supposed to be asleep, but I'm fighting against that and it feels unnatural.

The overhead lights shouldn't stay on passed eleven. Then it can be bedside lamps until four for all I care. Reading into the morning feels natural. Typing and social networking and feeling my whole upper body cramp up from sitting hunched in the same position, does not.

Sleep is just another part of my old routine that I'm refusing to defend, along with caring about grades, and being quiet. On the upside, it never takes me long to fall asleep anymore. Head, pillow, out.

Beliefs?

Life sucks and then you die. Life is beautiful. Everything will be fine. If you're not attentive you will end up miserable. Life is meaningless unless you have someone to share it with. Don't define yourself by another person.

There are so many ways to view the world. I think I'm starting to figure out which views are mine.

A Prime Candidate for an Arranged Marriage

The guys I date fall into one of two categories:

1) People I'm not attracted to;

2) Douchebags

Awesome.

A Letter to All High School Guitarist Wannabees

TAB paper is not music.

If you are unable to read ACTUAL MUSIC, you are not a musician. I don't care how well you can play "Smoke on the Water" or "Hotel California" using a piece of TAB with the fingerings spelled out for you. Actually, I don't care if you can play "Smoke on the Water", period. Nobody wants to hear you play "Smoke on the Water". If you can't pick up a sheet of freaking music, put it in front of you, and learn a song from scratch, then you either need to learn how to do so, or put down the guitar and walk away. TAB is for lazy people.

TAB DOES NOT SHOW YOU RHYTHMS. One cannot get by with music that only shows pitch. Pitch is only part of the music. Rhythm is another, equally important part. So with TAB, one can only play songs that one already knows the rhythms to. Which roughly translates to "songs that one already knows". Which keeps from expanding one's musical horizons. News flash: Classic Rock isn't the only genre of music out there. I get it, you're cool and have excellent taste in music that you weren't alive to hear when it was released. Eric Clapton did it better than you. Get over it and play something new.

I can play TAB. Trust me, it's not difficult.

Your music teacher knows you've been playing the same three songs the entire year. He knows this because he's the one who assigned the songs to you. He is aware that you're not capable of handling anything more challenging. He is also aware of your attendance record. He is able to notice patterns and make connections. He knows that you can't play a scale to save your life. He judges you more than you realize. He's right. If you're not actually planning to learn anything in your music class, stop wasting the teacher's time while you sit there thinking you're hot shit because you can pluck out a few chords. Being a musician is not easy. If it's easy for you, you need to reevaluate how much respect you have for what you're doing. You also need to look down and see if your sheet music is comprised of notes, or of numbers on lines. If it is the latter, feel free to stop anytime you like.  

You are not a musician. Learn to read music, or get out.     

So What Would That Make a Library?

Books are utterly astonishing. Think about it. Set aside the love that you have for your favourite novel; all of the emotions it elicits. Forget about everything that you can learn just from moving your eyes across a few pieces of paper. Think just about the book itself: months upon months, sometimes years upon years, sometimes even numerous generations, of story, information, life, all dissolved in ink and flattened out onto pages and bound into a perfectly compact book. Pick up a book. Right now. Any book. The closest one to you. Hold it in your hands. Toss it around between your hands. Gauge its weight by bouncing it up and down a little. YOU ARE HOLDING A LIFE. Numerous lives, in fact, all snuggled in there somewhere, dormant, running on hamster wheels until somebody has the decency to exposed the pages to light, let them stretch a little, shout a little, be a little. I think that it would be so cool to have x-ray eyes, so that I could look through a book cover and see all of the words layered over top of each other, the ending of a story visible through its translucent beginning, hours of reading condensed into a split-second overload. Picking up a book, you have this whole other world, right there in your fingers; a piece of somebody else's existance has literally been captured for you to experience. It's possible to love books more than you love reading.

P.S. eBooks are Magic Destroyers

We need to make books cool again. If you go home with somebody and they don't have books, don't fuck them. - John Waters

And Then All I Heard Was "Blah Blah Blah Ginger"

Don't talk to me when I'm talking to somebody else.

I want to hear what you have to say. I want to give you my undivided attention. If I'm trying to listen to two or three people at once, I can't give each person the attention they deserve. And then I feel overwhelmed from trying to keep up, and empty because each conversation was superficial instead of in-depth, and any extra conversational flair was destroyed, and everything that could have been said wasn't, and there was no finality to the conclusion.

I don't care if we're discussing who is driving who where, what you ate for dinner last night, your father's heart attack, or religion. I want to give you my attention. I don't want to feel like a douche for trying to flip from one person to the next, jerking my head back and forth like a defective robot. My attention is not particularily valuable, but if someone wants it for whatever reason, I want to be able to give it to them.

It seems that nobody has a desire to talk to me until, all of a sudden, a few people decide that they all need to say something right this second. And then they start, as if my current conversation doesn't even exist. They just start talking and I get the fun job of deciding who I'd rather listen to.

If you want to talk to someone who is currently talking to somebody else, all you need to do is say "Hey, can I talk to you?", and then wait a moment or two so that they can wrap up whatever they're discussing with the other person. Not acknowledging that two people were talking before you got there is rude and unfair to everybody involved.