Songs

A very long while ago, before I had my optic white Chuck Taylor Converses, Dave told me he was writing a song for me. Overjoyed with the romance of it, when I did get my shoes, I vowed not to write on the left shoe until I had my lyrics to put on the right one. Time has passed, and despite two reminders, I remain lyric-less. I'll concede, his lyrics aren't very strong, but it's the novelty and sweetness of it. Yet, during my forays into terrible territory, I've wound up talking to Squid's drummer about the cliché lyrics of love and heartbreak. My stance it to write epics about communist uprising or obscure myths, and basically put a tune to prose. In a moment of inspiration, he wrote me a four line song detailing our encounter, the scandal, lust, betrayal, and guilt. I'm going to write on that left shoe now.

The Things I Threw Out

I cleaned my room today, completely and utterly, taking down things that have been hanging on my walls for years. Pulling out all sorts of materials from all sorts of crevices. These are some of the things I threw out:

A backpack
Several tacky purses
Lime green squishy pillow
Dasani "Mini Water Bottle" Box that I shaped into a mask for the pit water bottle cap fight in Viv's basement
Perfume set "FlowersbyKenzo"
Bath beads shaped like roses
Duke logo on cardboard
Polymer clay cat
Telephone chord
Tiny fake plastic spider
Poetry on Post-It Notes
Fairy wings
Christmas box
Wooden, painted on closet
Stickers from tween questions book
Penn State Plush Basketball
Jeff's paper CD cover
Reusable water bottle filled with unopened Crayola Glitter Glue tubes
RoseArt and PRANG colored pencils
Crayola crayons
Xavier Gibson's TI-30s
A full UNO deck
Full regular deck of cards
Tupperware container
Cookie tin with a pumpkin on it
Stretched out silk hair elastic
The heart balloon JoeKat gave me last Valentine's
A PEZ dispenser with a pumpkin at the top
Blue food dye
Toy pet carrier
Torn list of the books I want to read before I die
Awkward "getting your period" book
Half a plastic pirate sword
Coloring page of Uncle Sam I got from Trader Joe's when Viv and I went to buy veggie burger's for the 4th of July party at Sarah's
LEGO piece
Babysitter's Guide Folders from training course I took with Katy Creppon at Riddle
Business card with the handwritten numbers for 3 separate GameStops
Magnetic pencil holder for lockers
Pink and purple jump rope
Pit warm-up "Adelaide"
Broken Mardi Gras beads
Wooden display case

I just thought these things were interesting. Also to make room, I put all but four of my remaining stuffed animals away in a bag. I feel like I'm suffocating them. They are:

David, my bear from JoeKat
Tiger, the tiger Darrell gave me the last day of 4th grade because he wouldn't be able to make it to my birthday party because he was going to Dallas, Texas, but he brought me back a bracelet with Texan charms on them
Sarah, my white tiger I got from Toys 'R Us
Pumpkin, the singing, vibrating pumpkin my poppop gave me on his last Halloween
Sammy, the pink bear that Darrell gave me the Valentine's of 5th grade
Puppy, the little plush dog that Darrell gave me in 3rd grade as a secret admirer for Valentine's Day
Three plush kittens from Rehobeth, DE that my mom got me
Jasmine, the stuffed Jaguar I got at Build A Bear for Liana's birthday and Katy Creppon was there too and some of the money went to the World Wildlife Fund
Chico, the stuffed penguin I got at the Baltimore Aquarium named in honor of our 7th grade penguin adopted from the Philadelphia Zoo in Mr. Knight's class

I already gave away so many, these were the ones with the strongest memories.

New Year's Eve Party

Yesterday evening, nearing six o'clock, I shut down my laptop that finally got internet access (but causes Vista induced head explosions) and ate dinner. Getting ready to spend the night at someone's house is much easier when you don't intend to fall asleep for some reason. On the way to Jeff's house, there was a lot of good classic rock on the radio and I sang, though I don't think my dad did. It was "getting the Led out." Gina, Joey, Dom, and Jeff were there already, so Gina and I enjoyed a warm embrace after so long without. There were Jeff cookies and eventually he opened a bag of M&Ms as far as the best party food ever goes. The next people to arrive were Matt and his cousin, Nick, who I greeted with, "Are you the cousin who does robots? Trisha said you were cute. Not that I don't agree." The next guest to arrive was Trisha... Abby, Sarah, Hannah, and Shana showed up before going to Johnny Mackin's, which is where Dom as a chauffeur and Joey were headed as well. We played BLOKUS, and I lost the most, but helped other people cheat. Following BLOKUS was MarioKart64 which I got with Trisha at Gina's house. Eventually Jeff and I played ping-pong, then Nick and I, and within the first hour of the New Year, Nick, Matt, and 'Leesh. Jeff attempted to get me a forums account, but that didn't work, so we read creepy Wikipedia articles. Somehow it made me very sad that I wasn't horrified. Erik came bringing a beautiful Gingerbread lighthouse. Some of Johnny Mackin's came back. She got me juice that wasn't expired. It was nice. I drank the last of it as the clock hit 2009. I was playing Ping-Pong very soon after the ball dropped, and Jeff began asking people what their most and least favorite moments of 2009. I attempted to listen in, although I didn't want to make Nick sit through to stories he didn't know the background of. Many of them were surprising to me. I knew Sarah's least favorite, but didn't want to ask. Nobody asked me about my favorite or least favorite, so I talked about good memories, but not the memories. Around 1 AM, there was a terribly awkward conversation about the frustrating, unreasonable tragedy that are Gina's parents. I interrupted saying, "So almost all of my favorite memories of 2008 were in hammocks. I like hammocks, they're really relaxing!!" Eager for a change, most people chimed in to agree. Around 1 several people left, and Mrs. Glanfield was my first non-obligatory hug of 2009. I called her before I called my mom as far as Happy New Year's wishes go.

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Gina had to leave around 2, and Abby and Sarah decided it would be awkward, and so we left. We made prank phone calls for around 2 hours, then I got really hungry and ate pizza with Hannah and Sarah. Then Hannah and I shared a can of Progressive Chicken Noodle. Shana got a "whoopie cushion" application on Abby's iPhone, we played a couple rounds of "would you rather," and Shana put whipped cream on Abby's face and hand. Sarah and I remembered how our freshman year totally kicked the freshmen years of Shana and Hannah. We explained general drumline relationships and how Gina and JoeKat had been the couple. At 6, Lexie, Sarah C., and Catey T. showed up to explain their fantastic evening. Around 7, Hannah, Shana, and I went outside to try to watch the sunrise. I explained skunk apes to Hannah and made her look it up on YouTube. Then I went inside, watched a few minutes of Entourage, then the end of The Land Before Time II. Woke up, felt crappy, went home, went to my mom's house, fell asleep, showered, wrote this.

Chloe's 2009 New Year's Resolutions

From last year to this year, I wouldn't have seen any of the wonderful things that happened. Except maybe JoeKat, but that kinda started on New Years. My summer was the most beautiful and thrilling experience for days at a time, with adventure, romance, and great friends attending to my every move. Fall swept me up with love and scandal, heartbreak and reassurances. Winter has been an emotional hell hole, but last night made me feel better. I was awestruck by the night sky for the first time in weeks, and we sang "Build Me Up Buttercup" louder and more joyfully than many other singing experiences of my life. None of that was planned. I remember everything from this year vividly and passionately, and next year is going to be the same. Maybe my resolutions are reckless, but both of my parents told me this week that my brother is the one to watch. Probably true, I still want to give them a run for their money. You're only a teenager once, and if I'm going to make terrible decisions it would rather be when they are forgiven as experimental behavior. I will still keep my reasonable head about me, and always in moderation, but here they are:

Learn to drive
Attempt to get an amateur radio license
Make strides towards obtaining my SCUBA license
Participate in a sport or athletic activity (swimming, Ultimate)
Watch the following films:

Dr. Strangelove
Requiem for a Dream
Apocalypse Now
An Inconvenient Truth
American Beauty
Braveheart
Alice's Restaurant
Fight Club
American History X
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Office Space

Get my passport
Learn to ride clutch
Read at least 10 books from my list, including A People's History
Try to meet through written letters, Tommy Smothers and Pete Seeger
Dye my hair a different colour, temporary or otherwise
Get "something" pierced
Set off fireworks
Get drunk, high, lost
Reconnect with Kristen and Kyle
Be able to name and play 10 Guitar Chords
Incorporate the 4 Elements of Hip-Hop culture into my daily life
Graffiti something
Get into college
Go out for breakfast
Visit Philadelphia and New York
Sneak out a minimum of 3 times
Practice breakdancing, surfing, piano, and guitar
Learn to safely jump from heights
Watch all of Dr. Who in 1 sitting with Molly
Ask more questions
Learn to play the electric mandolin
Ride a roller coaster
Catch a beach sunrise
Use practical Spanish
Watch celestial events (preferably with company)
Bike and walk more
Think of and possibly enact a senior and band camp prank
Be section leader
Practice getting over different types of fences quickly
Vandalize a bathroom stall

I won't feel guilty for not achieving them, it's more of "things you should do while it's still forgivable" guideline. Some of them I already achieved not through strenuous attempts, but I'll find some sort of calendar of celestial events this year (the International Year of Astronomy) and post that so other people can sneak out with me. It's been a hell of a year for growing up, but we've got one more year without saying goodbye, so I'm going to make it count.

Things I Would Name a Band from the Wikipedia Article I Read

August Coup
Brothers to the Rescue
Lincolnshire Poacher
Cryptographic Function
Hotel Kilo
Firedrake Jammer

The Memories Came Back

The problem with hookups, is sometimes they start to respect you as a person, when all you really wanted was to feel like a slut. That way there's a reason for him not wanting you back, rather than "things just happened."

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I kinda think that that is my song, and I kinda want to jump off a bridge.