This first full day of being 24 is kicking my ass. There's the aborted trip to the vending machine for M&Ms (they cost a freaking DOLLAR? And wait, they're all GONE?!?), the really supremely bad hair day, the sweaty palm syndrome that seems to be here for the long haul, and the hour-long excursion to the DMV that went shamefully bad (I need proof of U.S. citizenship? Whaaaaa...?).
So the beginning of year 24 looks like this: I'm an illegal driver with frizzy (yet limp) hair, sweaty palms that can barely grip the wheel, low blood sugar, and zero patience.
I'll make it home from work without getting pulled over, right? RIGHT?
Age 24: 1
Kaitlin: 0
Friday, March 14, 2008
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Alphabetica: A
Well, I crawled out of my cave this morning and discovered the temperature to be a balmy 64 degrees. Such a happy reprieve calls for storytime.
I stole this idea from City Wendy, who ripped it off from Amy Krouse Rosenthal's Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life. But it's a good one, I promise. The idea is to write snatches about your life prompted by single words as determined by the alphabet's progression. Here we go, starting (obviously) with A.
A: Academics
The bar was always set a little higher for me. Maybe because I had proven myself as far back as preschool. Maybe because I was born first and inherently expected to set an example. Or maybe because I was, simply, a girl. It doesn't really matter which it was, what matters is that academics became my priority. Anything less than a B was unacceptable, and even that was dipping a little low.
Though my parents always expected me to do my best, and though I certainly felt great pressure to succeed, I never resented them for it. Probably because I didn't have to try very hard. Had it been any other way, I'm sure my resent would have been palpable.
But instead, I sailed right on through. In elementary school, I was in the highest reading groups and won the school spelling bee. In high school, I was the curve-setter, enrolled in numerous AP classes and graduating in the top 10 percent of my class. I was a Mt. Oread Scholar in college and did well to balance my schoolwork with my, ahem, social obligations. On the whole it was, for lack of a better word, easy. I got high grades without really taxing myself, letting projects and assigned reading idle in my backpack until the night before the due date. All to good results.
But there was one falter in my stroll through the park. It came during my junior year in high school. I was never cocky about my academic prowess (to anyone but my brother, that is), but it nonetheless came as a shock when I couldn't for the life of me grasp the concept of chemistry. It just. Wasn't. Making. Sense. And though I wasn't failing, I wasn't passing with the flying colors I had become so accustomed to. So, with my parents' urging and assistance, I got a tutor.
I don't remember how many times I went over to her house for chemistry lessons. Only that I completely wore down the erasers on my pencils and had to endure the cloying smell of whatever she had cooked for dinner for the hour I was there. She wore baggy sweatshirts and her glasses hung in a chain around her neck when they weren't perched on her nose. But with her help, my grade slowly crawled back up, though I don't think it ever hit the mark I wanted it to. (To be completely frank, math and science have never been buddies of mine. But it was chemistry that bogged me down the most.)
In the dense nostalgia that followed college graduation, I would look back on all my years of academics, only to realize that I was forever fleeing that at which I was best. Though I may adamantly state otherwise, I miss it dearly. School. The crackle of a new textbook, the anticipation of a test score, the harried studying. Everything. I should have been a teacher.
I stole this idea from City Wendy, who ripped it off from Amy Krouse Rosenthal's Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life. But it's a good one, I promise. The idea is to write snatches about your life prompted by single words as determined by the alphabet's progression. Here we go, starting (obviously) with A.
A: Academics
The bar was always set a little higher for me. Maybe because I had proven myself as far back as preschool. Maybe because I was born first and inherently expected to set an example. Or maybe because I was, simply, a girl. It doesn't really matter which it was, what matters is that academics became my priority. Anything less than a B was unacceptable, and even that was dipping a little low.
Though my parents always expected me to do my best, and though I certainly felt great pressure to succeed, I never resented them for it. Probably because I didn't have to try very hard. Had it been any other way, I'm sure my resent would have been palpable.
But instead, I sailed right on through. In elementary school, I was in the highest reading groups and won the school spelling bee. In high school, I was the curve-setter, enrolled in numerous AP classes and graduating in the top 10 percent of my class. I was a Mt. Oread Scholar in college and did well to balance my schoolwork with my, ahem, social obligations. On the whole it was, for lack of a better word, easy. I got high grades without really taxing myself, letting projects and assigned reading idle in my backpack until the night before the due date. All to good results.
But there was one falter in my stroll through the park. It came during my junior year in high school. I was never cocky about my academic prowess (to anyone but my brother, that is), but it nonetheless came as a shock when I couldn't for the life of me grasp the concept of chemistry. It just. Wasn't. Making. Sense. And though I wasn't failing, I wasn't passing with the flying colors I had become so accustomed to. So, with my parents' urging and assistance, I got a tutor.
I don't remember how many times I went over to her house for chemistry lessons. Only that I completely wore down the erasers on my pencils and had to endure the cloying smell of whatever she had cooked for dinner for the hour I was there. She wore baggy sweatshirts and her glasses hung in a chain around her neck when they weren't perched on her nose. But with her help, my grade slowly crawled back up, though I don't think it ever hit the mark I wanted it to. (To be completely frank, math and science have never been buddies of mine. But it was chemistry that bogged me down the most.)
In the dense nostalgia that followed college graduation, I would look back on all my years of academics, only to realize that I was forever fleeing that at which I was best. Though I may adamantly state otherwise, I miss it dearly. School. The crackle of a new textbook, the anticipation of a test score, the harried studying. Everything. I should have been a teacher.
Friday, March 7, 2008
(sigh)
This unrelenting winter has driven me to new motivational lows. "Ennui" just about sums it up. I find myself sitting at my desk, completely devoid of any compulsion to work. I stare at my to-do list and then check my gmail account. I attempt to start my monthly report and then go to shopbop to see what's new. I'm sick of the itchy wool sweaters and the boots tucked into jeans and the long double-lined winter coats. I'm sick of staticky hair and chapped lips and using so much lotion in the morning that I could act as a melon-scented flytrap.
This hideous phase of winter, the phase where we fear there may never be an end to our icy agony, should have been over in February. That's why there's Valentine's Day, right? To perk us up and pull us out of our warm house-cocoons. And imbue us with fuzzy, glowy feelings when that witch Mother Nature isn't putting out.
I've never seen a better case for hibernation in my life. Wake me up when the word "dormant" can't be used to describe anything. And when the temperature hasn't dropped below 75 for at least two consecutive weeks. So, June. See you in June, friends.
P.S. - It's only 4:15 and I'm pretty sure I'm the only person left in the office. Methinks I'm not alone in my feelings. Now I just need to go find the cave they're all hibernating in. I bet there's beer.
This hideous phase of winter, the phase where we fear there may never be an end to our icy agony, should have been over in February. That's why there's Valentine's Day, right? To perk us up and pull us out of our warm house-cocoons. And imbue us with fuzzy, glowy feelings when that witch Mother Nature isn't putting out.
I've never seen a better case for hibernation in my life. Wake me up when the word "dormant" can't be used to describe anything. And when the temperature hasn't dropped below 75 for at least two consecutive weeks. So, June. See you in June, friends.
P.S. - It's only 4:15 and I'm pretty sure I'm the only person left in the office. Methinks I'm not alone in my feelings. Now I just need to go find the cave they're all hibernating in. I bet there's beer.
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