TAKE THAT, FINALS
I WROTE SEVENTEEN PAGES FOR ONE PAPER IN LESS THAN EIGHT HOURS
now why couldn’t I just do that for everything all the time

life would be

so….easy………. .. . ……

Time to celebrate! I’m going to a reunion party with all the strong personalities that I worked with over the summer, but only after I go to one of my best friends’ opening night of the show she’s directing. Woohoo for being busy! Hooray Chicago! Wriiiiiitiiiing! Friends! I LOVE THINGS 

When some people get drunk, they…decide to buy a Nintendo DS Lite on Amazon 

I mean I don’t know who
but I guess
some people…..do that…………. 

Today and this next week/end are gonna be GREAT

Today I have my three favorite classes (one on Jean-Luc Godard, where we will be watching Pierrot le Fou; ethics in video games and cinema; fieldwork in arts writing which is just the best), and for that last class, we are meeting at Navy Pier to attend this year’s renovated Art Expo, which is RLY EXCITING. 

I am part of a small group of people who always get together to drink and talk on Thursdays and that’ll be great, I just know it

Friday I have nine hours of class/work but hey, I love work and money is money and I also love money

Saturday is a food truck rally with the lovely Kristen (whose birthday is today…!) and two of our other friends, and also a time for me to spend time with two other people (separately; I WILL NOT REST and it will be great)

HOORAY Harry Potter half-marathon on Sunday with a whole shit ton of people

YOU GET THE IDEA 
I have plans for each and every day next week too and I am so wildly energized by spending all this time with people and I hope that all of you guys are having wonderful days and lives and LIVES 

• Why are there pretzels in Chex mix? Nobody ever eats them, and so they’ll put them back in the bag. This increases the ratio of pretzels to good things (especially gardettos) and decreases general happiness as a result
• It’s really great to see some people from high school after a year or two. It’s especially lovely to see people who have grown into themselves so beautifully and gracefully that your heart breaks a little
• I felt this little flicker of nervousness when I smelled autumn today. It was sweet and smokey, and faintly damp. I think it’s going to be a cold winter. I can just feel it.
• I love my sister more than just about anyone. We sat today and colored styrofoam blocks (her idea, admittedly) and sang all her favorite Gaga songs and walked around the block with our dog while she was on her bike. Then, she picked out a movie (“for me,” which was Up) and told me she loved me and I could swear my heart broke a little then, too
• I miss writing poetry
• My heart breaks a little quite a lot, it seems. I think it’s just because I feel everything all the time and am overwhelmed by how great everything really is. It’s nice to experience every emotion under the sun, but it is also draining. I guess that’s the tradeoff.
• I will always be scared of hospitals. I will always worry that when my critically ill family goes in, that they will not come back to me. I worry that someone in a pale coat will tell me things will not be better. I worry, in the present, for my mother. 
• I worry.

You know, I wish that there were more movies and stories about women who choose their careers and aspirations over a relationship and are satisfied by that decision. This isn’t to say that relationships can’t be fulfilling, or that I’m against them, or even that I haven’t enjoyed mine, but whenever they end, I always feel this nagging “should I have made that decision, because that’s not the norm” and I hate it. 

Of course, I am rational and self-aware enough to realize that my own happiness comes first, and that I wouldn’t be happy with someone else unless I was happy enough on my own, but it really hurts me to think that there are women who feel that their own dreams of careers (or just not being in a relationship) aren’t “normal.” Fuck that! You’re worth more than that! If you don’t want to be in a relationship, and you choose instead to go after that kickass internship that’s gonna look great for that job you want when you graduate, that’s awesome! If you just aren’t feeling like dating anyone—for any reason, that you should never feel you have to justify—that’s reason enough. You owe no one anything. You owe yourself everything, and if you’re not happy with yourself…well, it’s a ripple effect into other parts of your life (and I don’t want to see you like that, okay?).

While these seem like thoughts that maybe seem obvious, it’s frustrating to think that there are women who really actively struggle with the crisis of their “value” in a relationship versus on their own. I wish that there were more that I could do to make them feel more empowered and happy with themselves and their decisions. 

Bottom line? Relationships can be great, but please don’t ever feel like you have to be in one. Please? Just do that. For yourself. Not for anyone else. You deserve it, and I’ll be there to write these stories so that we can show people that this decision is perfectly okay.

Hello, fine peoples! I have been very busy as of late with my job for this summer, and I will be for the entire song, but I am in a positively jovial mood right now! I’m not so happy that I’ve had Mariah Carey’s “Fantasy” stuck in my head for several hours (she’s a dirty hobag but that’s another story entirely), but that’s fine! I’m going to go out and it’s going to be great. The weekend will be very rejuvenating, and it will be much needed: orientation is a lot of fun, but it is…well, two very long days, and I have two sessions a week. Ah! Oh well. I’ll come back and do more writing and shit when I’m not so spazzed out from all this work and fun and running and LIFE LIFE LFIE 

Well! Got a lot done these past few days. I moved all of my things from one end of campus to another, and I am thoroughly sore because of it, even though my boyfrand-thing (it’s really not as complicated or ~*~dramatic~*~ as it sounds) and one of my best friends said I couldn’t carry the heavier things, like the little fridge and laundry baskets packed with kitchenware. Why? Not because I’ve got some weird damsel-that’s-gotta-be-saved complex, but I have had massive surgery to repair four spinal fractures. I’m kind of a frail lady! I’m actually really upset about the fact that these injuries have rendered me as feeble as they have. I hate having to rely on other people to carry things for me. It just makes me feel incapable! But four lumbar spinal fractures will do that to a girl, I suppose. Better safe than sorry, and at least I have people who care enough to not only help me, but literally wouldn’t even let me pick stuff up. Seriously, I get so embarrassed sometimes that I can’t do that stuff. I feel really incapable. 

Anyway, I moved in with the rest of the orientation staff today, and I’m anticipating some interesting stuff going down. I know that’s a pretty boring word to use (“Interesting, Victoria?” you ask quietly. “But aren’t you studying writing? Isn’t your vocabulary more…well…”), but I just feel like it’s an interesting staff to have all together. Lots of disparate personalities. I like a good handful of them a lot already, from the other things that we’ve done together, and I’m looking forward to seeing how the whole team’s chemistry is. It seems pretty natural! I love my roommate to pieces (she was one of two that I was hoping I’d get roomed with), and she’s a dramaturgy/criticism student. I look forward to many discussions with her on the differences between drama and film theory. She’s really great and smart and gahhh we just mesh well, really well, from all of our former experience. ;3;
And, Sophie, she’s half Brit! Her “mum” is from Yorkshire. I thought you’d be pleased to know! She showed me all sorts of commercials and things for tea and goddamn does she have a lot of tea.

Otherwise, I saw Snow White and the Huntsman (I have a lot of feelings—mostly negative), had a real nice dinner, got to spend a lot of time with two important people, played Bananagrams, and—aaand!—bought a collection of six hard-to-find Natalie Wood movies for less than thirty dollars. Sigh! A resoundingly successful week/end. Tomorrow, I’m going on this retreat thing with the rest of the orientation people, and I’m going ziplining. I’m super terrified and excited and I’m so tired. You guys are good people. My favorite people! I don’t even know if people read these GOODNIGHT, you lovely persons

Just finished one history paper, and now on to the other one before I am completely done! I have one more three-page paper due by midnight and then sophomore year is DONE. This is my cue to turn up even louder The College Dropout and just bury myself in my work even more. Communism and modern China, it’s been nice but it’ll be nice to be done, too. ;w;

Well, after I finished my second film final today, I finally did it: I declared myself as a screenwriting major! I’ve struggled with wanting to study “frivolous” (re: creative) writing for some time, but I have mentors, family, and friends who are not only supportive of the one thing that I love/know how to do, but were insistent that I pursue it. It’s great to have such wonderful people surrounding me. Their faith is so much more inspiring to me than I think they really know. ;w;

But these film and writing classes have never felt more RIGHT than anything else I’ve ever studied! I was talking with my teacher who pushed especially hard for me to take actual screenwriting (without having ever read any of my non-expository writing), and was telling her how excited and just soul-contended I was at having taken these classes, and she told me I was lucky, because not everyone got to experience that. I’m incredibly grateful to have really, really found where I belong in this school, and to study in LA my senior year at a production company, and just…yes, I feel very blessed. 

So yeah! That’s my life, I guess, and I was just so happy to have made that change—officially, with the counselors and all!—that I felt like I needed to share it. I hope you guys are doing wonderfully, too! :D

go to your interview, watch a very promising Glee episode, and relax some more. YOU GOT DIS, VICTORIA.