Safe Under a Pile of Bricks

I was reluctant to get this. The last time I had a blog was early in high school. I think I got my first one just as I started Sophomore year and posted regularly until about halfway through Junior year. Maybe not even that long. Point is, I associated blogs with that time in my life, which was a weird time. Not altogether unpleasant, just not something that I'd be thrilled to repeat.

Why now? Probably a few reasons. I've been blogging for a website at my school called OleVillains.com. It's a joke about the student website, OleVille.com (people associated with my school are known as "Oles"), and I've enjoyed it a lot. It's not fantastic, and it's a total joke, but entertaining nonetheless, even if I'm the only one entertained by it. On top of that, finals for this semester are wrapping up, so naturally I'm spending my time writing about myself instead of actually studying.

Also, my best friend has a blog that I've taken to reading, and I enjoy seeing what he gets out of it. What I liked about my blog in high school was the fact that I could sort out my thoughts, and people would tell me if they were valid or not. I like to think that now I'm a lot more mature, and will get a lot of mature responses to what I think. I'd like to open up a dialogue. I'd like to know when I'm being an idiot so I can learn from it.

My last final (Introduction to Norwegian) is in about an hour and a half. Despite the studying I did do, I'm sure there's something I missed and I'll kick myself for overlooking it. Languages have never been my strong point. Partially because I have a hard time wrapping my head around a lot of the rules and ideas (a product of my upbringing and early schooling), and partially because I'm awful at studying. I was never really taught how to do it, so now I'm learning. It's a challenge, but one that I hope I'm living up to. I have two more semesters left before my requirement to graduate is fulfilled.

My other finals went fine. Two of them I actually enjoyed a little (I know - what?). I'm just forcing myself through these last few hours before I can pack up and go home to relax for two weeks. I've been ready to go home for about a month. Which is another reason I decided to create this.

This fall I've been struggling with feelings of being an "other" here. I don't want to sound like I'm whining; I'm well aware of just how blessed I am to have the friends I have here at school. I'm well liked, and I'm content. The problem is that I always feel a little bit like I'm the entertainment. There are times that I feel people are just curious about me, and hang out with me because they want to know what I'll say in certain situations, or about certain things. All of that is fine, but it creates a strange and sort of lonesome world. There's no flow of ideas back and forth.

It's something that I miss from home. No matter who I'm with at home, I feel like we're always playing off of each other's ideas. It's always, "Yes, that sounds fine but what about this?" I love to be around people who will take my ideas and make them better, and are open to allowing me to build on, fix, or alter their ideas as well.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not miserable here, and there are definitely people that consistently push me to try new things, but overall, I can feel the ideas stagnating in the back of my mind. So this is my forum for letting those ideas out, and giving them space to evolve. I'm looking forward to sharing it with people, both from home and school. I'm excited at the prospect of being surprised by people.

One last thing before I head off to cram some last minute Norwegian into my brain: I say that this is a forum for my ideas, but that's sort of glorifying everything. As I said before, I want to sort my mind out and let people see it. I won't force anyone to read this, and I'll probably only share it with a few people. And some days, I'll simply write what I'm feeling. I'm sure this will evolve ten times before I stop posting (or become a famous blogger).

Thanks.