TGIF

It's Friday. Thank GOD. It has been an incredibly long week. From actors dropping out of the play to tedious class periods spent sanding the floor, from frantically trying to get scripts printed to a body which felt like it had been hit by a large semi about 37 times before being put through all sorts of other pain, from the sudden onslaught of previously nonexistent "love life" to frantic pre-NaNo planning. Boy, has it been a long week.

I learn more every day than I could ever put into a weekly blog post. And hell, why should I put everything into a blog post? I can't learn lessons for you. I learn things I already know all the time. Being told things doesn't make it intuition, doesn't make it instinct. To think that I could somehow put the knowledge life experience has taught me into your brain is ridiculous; it won't happen.

Not that you can't learn from reading. Maybe this is just me, but one of the things I love about books is being able to learn from the character's mistakes. Hell, acting does this too. It's weird. You put yourself so deeply into the life of someone else, live out their life somehow, and then you step away and still have the lessons you learned as that character.

But stepping into the shoes of another will not teach you everything. Reading, as incredible as it can be, is not the same as doing. The best writers can take you very, very, very close to experiencing and learning with the characters, but it still can't beat reality.

So instead of trying to tell you what I've learned this week, I'm just going to tell you to go live life a little, make some mistakes, and learn from them. Nothing you read can come close to teaching you what living can.

My Favourite Teachers

So one of my student's mom's posted this blog post yesterday about her favourite teachers, and I decided that, instead of just leaving a comment about who my favourite teachers were, I'd write an entire post about them. It turned out to be a very long post:

If you ask me who my favourite teacher was, my immediate response, for the past 8 years, has always been Mrs. Webster, my fifth grade teacher. I always loved Mrs. Webster. It's weird though that she should be my favourite. Not for who she was, but because the words "Mrs. Webster" invoke memories of fifth grade as the happiest year of my life while I can just as easily invoke memories of fifth grade as the unhappiest year of my life, just by using different words. It was a bittersweet year.

It was a horrible year because it is the first time I consciously decided I wanted to end my life, that there was nothing on Earth worth living for. Mind you, I could not grasp the concept of "death" and it's finality the way someone older or someone who had actually experienced the death of someone close to them might, so, though it sounds horrible, it was more an ignorant decision than a self-loathing one. In my fifth grade mind, hanging out with my then-recently-deceased dog and God in heaven would be much better than going to a sixth grade where my two best friends for all of my remembered life would not be. Ignorant or not, fifth grade was the beginning of a very depressive spiral I went through for many years, as I entered adolescence right after suddenly finding myself without many of the beings I had previously entrusted with everything.

But when I think of Mrs. Webster, I remember gems, and I remember The Adventures of Coach and Peshie, a comic about my pets who became the superstars of my fifth grade class for awhile. I recall my earliest memories of writing scripts, of creating stories that became more than just fantasies in my head by my own will. I remember a year of creativity and, more importantly, being liked and respected for my creativity which, in case you haven't guessed, has always been one of the biggest things in my own self definition. Mrs. Webster makes me think of being accepted, of being loved, of being praised for being exactly who I was and not expected to be anything else.

Mrs. Ekstrand doesn't usually come to mind right away, but after considering my tumultuous middle school years, I realised that it was tumultuous for my teachers too. I was tumultuous. My very conservative, right wing, uptight Christian school was not prepared for an openly gay 13-year-old. Remembering middle school and my rather dramatic (more so the reactions than me casually telling my friends) coming out experience, I realised that I did not feel safe at school. The administration was looking for any reason they could find to expel me, and parents, teachers, and students alike all seemed to be in agreement that I was a sinner and shouldn't be allowed near the rest of the school.

I hold no anger toward my old school anymore, and I have since forgiven the wrongs I faced in middle school; something people often seem to forget when coming out to others is that they've already had time, often years, to accept and comes to terms with their sexuality, so to expect that those they're coming out to should be 100% accepting immediately is too much. It shouldn't be a big deal, but it is right now. Our society is still learning.

I didn't feel safe in any classroom. I didn't feel safe at school. I knew (though occasionally doubted) that no one would physically harm me, but every room I walked into judged me. Harshly. I was the elephant in the room. I could feel "She's a sinner" and "She's going to hell" in the air everywhere. And it came from my classmates, my teachers, my friends, and my friends parents. From people I loved, people I respected, people who I had grown up with my whole life, all suddenly staring at me with so much negative emotion and energy.

Mrs. Ekstrand's room is the one place I don't remember feeling any of the fear and discomfort I remember feeling in every other place on campus. Somehow, it seems that Mrs. Ekstrand was able to accept me just fine right from the start. Either that, or she never knew. Or maybe she hid her discomfort incredibly well. But regardless, Mrs. Ekstrand was the one teacher who somehow kept me safe from all of the hell-ish hate and judgement I faced everywhere else I went in middle school. And she taught science, which has always been one of my favourite subjects, and creative writing, which most definitely influenced my ever-growing interest in writing and helped build my writing skills while I was in middle school.

The last teacher who comes to mind is a woman who I didn't like for most of the year: Ms. Newton, my eleventh grade English teacher. We clashed. It was an AP class, and I had little interest in doing homework. It was a long year. She was gone for a good portion of the year, due to illness, and I mentally called bullshit. Just because I didn't do my homework didn't mean I didn't want to learn. I didn't think she liked me most of the year. I was a stubborn, lazy, arrogant prick, and I was well aware. I had no qualms missing her class to go work on our school play. School plays were by far more important than her class to me. Plus, I always did more school work when I was missing class to work on the play, oddly enough.

In high school, I had a lot of health problems. A whole lot. Eating made me sick almost all of the time, so I often skipped meals. But this led to fatigue, dizziness, and all sorts of problems. I was sick if I ate, and I was sick if I didn't. And I didn't drink water at school because the bathrooms disgusted me so much that I would do whatever I could to avoid needing to use them, including dehydrating myself.

So when I came into class one day, on the brink of collapsing, to take an in-class essay, and managed to write only about one sentence, Ms. Newton utterly surprised me: she went to her back room, found me some food and some water, and just told me to do the best I could on the essay. My world was turned upside down; I had expected her to revel in my failure, to rejoice in the proof that stubborn, lazy, arrogant pricks like me don't succeed in life, but she didn't. Despite the constant attitude I gave her, she still had enough compassion to care for me just as much as she would any brown-nosing student of hers.

I didn't magically change after that. I was, and still am to this day, a stubborn, arrogant prick. I'm flippant to my teachers, and I rarely do my homework. But Ms. Newton didn't judge me or treat me unfairly for being so blatantly stupid, and in that simple act, she taught me more compassion than any one else had ever taught me. I liked Ms. Newton much more after that, though I can't say I was much nicer to her. It's weird, but it seems you can't return kindness to the giver really; you have to pass it on to someone else. And that's what I've done. She gave me kindness, compassion, and understanding, which I will never be able to give back to her, but those things she gave me that day, I now can freely give to others.

Searing Rain

Prompt: "Help I'm Alive" and "Sick Muse" by Metric
Time: 9 minutes
Result: 387 words

The rain was falling. Hard. More like hail. Except it burned. Hot, scalding rain. She looked up, and the searing rain fell into her eyes. She would have screamed, had she any voice left. So she ducked her head back down, pulled her hood over her head, and ran down the street to the park at the end. The gate was locked, but she climbed the chain-link fence. She lept down, and groaned as she heard her jeans rip. The fence had grabbed her pants and ripped a giant hole in one leg. Her left leg burned as the rain hit her now bare flesh. She swore under her breath, knotted the ripped fabric together to block some of the rain, and continued on. Past the swing sets, past the baseball field, past the once green grass. This was dystopia; no such things had any use now. No one swung. No one played. No one lay in the grass underneath the sun. What sun? All there was was an endless torrent of searing rain. She refused to accept it though. She remembered life before dystopia. Life had been better once, and she knew. There had been light, had been sun. This she knew, no matter how much she had been fed the lies that it was only a dream. It wasn't a dream. She didn't only dream of blue skies, sunburns, children laughing, couples in love; she remembered them. Maybe others only dreamt, as if such things had never existed and never could exist, but she knew better. She knew it had to be more than a dream.

But what if she was wrong? She was fighting for a memory which might have been only a dream. But she was so sure. They had to be lying. They had to have done it. But she couldn't see why. Not even the filthy government workers, the spineless gits who ran everything, liked this. Everyone dreamed of the same sky, the sam parks, the same light. It had to be real. And so she wouldn't stop running in the searing rain. She couldn't. She had to find out what had gone wrong, what had happened to destroy the light, to eliminate things like swing sets and baseball fields and green grass, to find a way to bring it back.

Seventeen Hours

It has occurred to me that, in the midst of my seventeen hour day yesterday, I never managed to get a blog post up. Never fear, I did write. 1668 words, to be exact. I have been practicing getting my daily word count total on 750words.com, which a pretty nifty site for writers and non-writers alike. It's wonderful. You just let yourself go, stop worrying about WHAT to write, and just write the first though that comes to mind. Stream of consciousness. I love it. My writing in there, of course, needs a whole lot of proof reading because I also refuse to hit backspace and fix my errors (though if I skip a word, I'll throw it in parentheses so I can figure out where it goes later) while I'm typing away madly. But it accomplishes something wonderfully useful for NaNo and for life: freedom from fear. I am able to let go of my inhibitions and no longer worry about whether I'm "good enough" while I'm writing on 750words.com, and then, as I get used to it on the site, it flows over into other aspects of my life. It frees me to be more me, to let my creative instincts have free reign over me, and the results are amazing.

Check out 750words.com; it's inspired by the "morning pages" from the book The Artists Way, so you might want to check that book out too.

And so I now hurry off for another long day, only 16 hours of running around today!

The Woman in the Chartreuse Dress

Prompt: Chartreuse
Time: 10 minutes
Result: 369 words

Her dress was chartreuse. A strange, greenish sort of colour, right in the middle of the spectrum. The sort of colour you look at, and no one can seem to find the right way to describe it. Some say it's green. Some say it's teal. No, it's a much yellower colour than that. Teal's a more deep sort of colour. But look at the saturation! On and on, it goes, and no one can agree.

Of course her dress was chartreuse. She was chartreuse. Not literally, but she might as well have been; perhaps it'd be the one thing everyone might agree on about her. But no. She was impossible to describe. From the moment she walked into the room, wearing that indescribably chartreuse dress of hers, all eyes were on her. All minds were on her. Every tongue, ever pair of chapped and chewed and over-glossed lips, every chiseled and unchiseled jaw, every high voice and every low voice could make no sound but the sound of whispering about her.

Who was she? Where was she from? What was she doing here? No one knew. Everyone was confused, perplexed, puzzled by her. It was her way. And she was completely unfazed. The woman in the chartreuse dress was apparently either oblivious, dumb, or wholly accustomed to this treatment. It would be unsurprising to any who stood there that she had always been this way, so indescribable, so addictive.

Yes, additive. No one could look away. Some tried to carry on new conversations, but their every thought still clung to the woman like her tight, form-fitting chartreuse dress did her bosom. Every mind hungered madly for her, to know her, to solve her. Like a Rubik's cube, but worse. Even the brightest minds could never twist and turn her into any form that made sense, that followed logic.

She was illogical. How could she exist? This was the thought on every mind. It was as if she was from another world entirely. She deified all laws of logic an reason known to this world.

And yet she made perfect sense. She was mere a woman. Just another human being. Perhaps it was this simplicity that made her so incredible.

There is just over a week left until NaNoWriMo begins, so for the rest of the month, instead of the usual posts, you'll be getting the results of "word wars" I'll be doing to re-sharpen my speed-writing abilities. Word wars, sometimes called sprints, are high intensity writing "races" in which one writes for a pre-determined amount of time, and at the end of the time frame, a word count is taken to determine how many words were written during the "war". The goal is to write as many as possible, which means that deleting, over-thinking, and hesitating all lower your score. The real point is to shut off the infamous "Inner Editor" which prevents writers from ever getting anything written for fear it might be wrong. The beauty of art is that you are never wrong. Art is just opinion. No matter how many people disagree, it's always yours.

So for the next little-over-a-week, I'll be posting the results of various writing prompts and free writes. Come November, I'll either write about NaNo or post up excerpts from the day's writing, varying as I see fit. Today begins pre-NaNo blogging!

Prompt: "I hope your chair falls apart and someone throws an apple at your head."
Time: 15 minutes
Result: 438
"I hope your chair falls apart and someone throws an apple at your head!" she shrieked, slamming the door in my face. Literally. I stumbled over and landed with a smack on my back. I just sort of laid there for a few minutes. Maybe I hit my head when I fell over too. I don't really remember exactly. All I knew was my best friend had just slammed a door right into my face, my nose was probably broken, and I wasn't even going to consider what kind of pain my back might be in from landing on it. And for what? It wasn't like I had done anything to her. I didn't ask for this! I was tired of it. If I could have given it to her, I would have. After all, she was the one who actually wanted.

But nothing ever works that way, does it? Stupid me wanted nothing more than to just be a normal, average, high school and fit in, so of course I'm the one who gets these stupid powers and can't even function in normal life anymore because I keep electrocuting things. Stupid me. I should have know trying to fit in would only make me stand out. And now my best friend's all mad at me just because I don't want to wear the stupid costume she made me. I mean, seriously? It's spandex. I don't even know where she got spandex, let alone managed to make the whole thing.

I'm going to go to school tomorrow and act like nothing happened. No one else knows besides her anyway, and no one would actually believe her if she started telling people I had superpowers. Because everyone knows superpowers don't really exist. I'm sure it's all just in my head. There's some kind of logical explanation for all of this. A scientific reason. Some sort of electron issue or coicidence or something.

I'm not going to go walking around in some bright yellow spandex tights with a stupid lighting bolt across my chest and a stupid low-cut V-neck thing. What is up with that? That's what I don't get the most. I've never understood so-called "superhero" women who all wore these crazy-tight outfits with their boobs popping out and everything. And high heels! How are you supposed to stop crime in heels? That's ridiculous. I'm not wearing the heels either.

I don't know why I'm even bothering to think about this. It's totally irrelevant. I'm not a hero, I don't have powers, and, actually, I'm going to wake up from this weird dream right about . . . NOW!

Those Who Can't . . .

You learn by teaching. Or so I've been told many times.

This week was intense. It's Thursday night, and I have a midterm tomorrow morning, but I feel like the week is over. A little Spanish test is nothing. Not after this week. After this month! Hell, it's been over a year now of this never-ending pressure to learn everything in seconds. My body aches; my head groans. I've been fighting mild depression for nearly a month.

But it's over. Sure, I still have a massive paper hanging over my head that I have to get written. Sure, I've got months of directing to conquer. Sure, my test tomorrow is a freaking midterm. And sure, I don't know that my car really is going to be here before 10AM today. But all that, save for the directing, will be over very soon, and directing? That's easy compared to this week.

Last Friday, I got a call from one of the high school students. The drama teacher at the school had been out on "administrative leave" all week, and the class had literally fallen apart. It was chaos. Hell. The Advanced Drama students left in charge of the class couldn't keep the Beginning Drama students under control, and no one would listen to any substitute teacher. The principal had come in to try to address the situation, and it was clear they needed someone to lead the class. Some students suggested I do it, and so they called me.

Had I known what I was getting myself into then, I might not have agreed. In my perfect-world head, no one knew enough about theatre to run the class. Theatre? I know enough about theatre to run a drama class for a few days! I literally ran out my door and biked down to the school immediately. I talked with the student who had called me and the principal, and it was decided that I'd come in on Monday to run the class. I was ecstatic!

I got there Monday to find that there was no real lesson plan, and no one seemed to agree on what they were supposed to be doing. The reality that teaching a class was going to be way harder than I thought hit me, and I felt my insides start turning to mush. So what did I do? Faked it until I made it. The class stayed under considerable control for the period, the bell rang, and they were off.

And then I found myself standing in front of my cast only minutes later. It was time for our first meeting/"rehearsal". Once again, I could feel my insides doing a dance of terror, and once again, I acted completely in control. Whatever I said, they listened. My word was law. That was scary. Much scarier than rebellious teenagers questioning my authority. I could trust them not to let me lead them wrong, but now? No, I had trust, and the idea of losing that trust was terrifying.

By four thirty, when the rehearsal was scheduled to be over, everyone was having too much fun to care. I made sure those who had to leave knew what time it was, and then let the cast keep doing the "bonding exercise" they had been playing. I finally had to kick them out because I had to go and couldn't leave them unsupervised in the room. I went home with my heart soaring. I did it. I really did it! I kept control without being tyrannical. I was a leader, and a good one too. I stuck to the plans I had and accomplished more than I intended. I can't wait to do the read-through with the cast on Monday.

And then I walked into the drama class on Tuesday, and it was chaos. The "Little Theatre" where the class normally convenes wasn't available, and I was unprepared to work on anything in desks.  The lesson plans I'd made called for standing up and moving around and the use of the theatre. So we went outside. Where it was all wet and gloomy and the class was easily distracted. I lost half the class, and there was no way I could keep control of all of them. It was terrible. I got the names of all the students who chose to stay focused and told them I'd let their teacher know they were wonderful when he came back. I gave up on trying to teach and got them doing improv games until class ended.

So I walked in on Wednesday with new determination. I knew the theatre wouldn't be available again, so I made up lesson plans that would work within the classroom: vocal exercises. It wasn't a perfect class period, but it was leagues better than Tuesday. I was happy enough with it, and ready to do even better the next day.

So when I went in yesterday, the teacher was back. I was a little disappointed, to be honest, especially after biking over in the "rain", but the class was glad he was back. And then I started hearing the stories about what the class had been like the first week. I knew it was bad, but in my perfect-world head, it was just teenagers talking and not paying attention. A free period.

There were fights breaking out. The students who wanted to learn couldn't. The responsibility to lead and keep things under control was on the Advanced Drama students who had no idea how to keep their peers under control. No one was happy about the situation, not even the "problem" students. People were ending up on the floor in ridiculous wrestling matches of teenage angst, likely only worsened by the loss of their teacher for an indefinite amount of time. No one knew when he'd be back, and no one had any authority.

It had little to do with me personally, but when I came in on Monday, I changed things. I convinced them that I had authority, and they believed me. They told their teacher that I had "saved" the class, and he thanked me for it. The students thanked me for it. And I couldn't be more thankful for the week I had, learning first hand how very hard it is to be a teacher. It's not as easy as it looks.

Which makes it all the more appealing.

November

I know what's missing in my life. I need to create. I need NaNo. November is going to be hell. The greatest hell ever. I will be so utterly exhausted, but it will be the exhaustion I enjoy so much: that specific kind of exhaustion that comes from spending every moment doing what you love.

I'm not doing what I love right now. I'm writing papers under impossible time constraints, limiting my freedom to truly create the profound essay I'd like; frantically trying to learn how to teach a theatre class to students who have no interest in theatre without losing the few who really do want to learn; cramming language and vocabulary into my head without building the natural, "native speaker" connections that'll make them stick under real-life pressure; and wishing desperately for Monday when I'll get to run another rehearsal. That's all I want. That's all I love.

It's scary, you know, realising that the one thing that's making everything else worth it is just a bunch of high school students who probably don't really care about you much. Not that they don't care, but they're not concerned with me the way I am them. They're not near giddy when they see me like I am them. It's insane. My whole existence right now is attached to them and this play. I need it; I need them!

November is going to be wonderful. In only a few weeks, we're going to cram in the blocking and choreography for the entire play. And while we're mercilessly cramming, I'll be a full time college student who is also writing a novel in a month. It will be amazing. I'll never have a moment to even stop and think, "Man, I am so tired!" I'll be too busy and too exhausted from creating so much.

I wish it were November.

I think keeping this blog has been really good for me. I'm glad I do it. Today, however, I recognise that it is more a distraction than a benefit, so I just wanted to wish you a pleasant day and be on my way. I may do this again tomorrow, but there will definitely be a real blog post on Friday. Much to talk about!

On Not Sleeping

You know what sucks? Forgetting that, in your rush to get over to band rehearsal, you managed to completely not post a blog or even finish. Luckily, you woke up at three-something-in-the-morning, so you could write! Right?

Wrong. At three-something-in-the-morning, my brain was not properly functioning, and I was in a half asleep, half awake fog until six when I finally started to re-join reality and took a shower. And so the usual morning business started. Waking my brother up, feeding the dog, re-waking my brother up because he hadn't really woken up and was still dead in bed, eating breakfast, forgetting the dog outside, realising that my phone battery was nearly dead and thus plugging it in, telling my brother for the umpteenth time that lying in bed grumbling at me does not count as being "up," reading a book for a 10-page paper I need to write tonight and finish tomorrow night, making lesson plans in my head, checking my email, and then suddenly realising that, oh shoot, I never posted a blog!

That's my Tuesday so far. Pretty typical, minus waking up at three-something-in-the-morning; my body usually wakes me up right at sunrise, but with the gloomy weather we've been having, my body is terrified of accidentally sleeping in and has now moved to waking me up incredibly early after my not going to bed at a "decent hour". I have to get back to going to bed before midnight at the earliest. It's always one excuse after another though.

Last night, it was my brother wandering into the family room (where the computer I generally use is), sneaking onto the couch, and then breaking down into crying. It was well past his bedtime. So I sat down next to the couch and started talking to him to find out what was wrong. Apparently, his 10-year-old mind had come to the conclusion that, "The world is going to end," and this was just the worst thing imaginable. Obviously, he couldn't sleep.

It's actually pretty common that he gets up in the middle of the night, unable to sleep. As I laid in bed last night to sleep, my mind wouldn't shut down either, and I could not, for the life of me, get to sleep for sometime. I can't assure him that he'll be able to sleep easily in the future, because I've always gotten little sleep, and I hear it from those older than me all the time about not sleeping. Babies can't even sleep through the night. For some reason, we humans, at least in our society, can't sleep all night unless we completely exhaust ourselves and have no choice but passing out like we're dead.

I like passing out like I'm dead. I generally sleep quite well, despite not getting to bed at that magical "decent hour" we idolise and still getting up as the sun rises, because I'm always so exhausted, that I'm out like a rock whenever I sleep. My body is like, "Screw it, I'm exhausted. Let's just be dead for awhile, yeah?" It's a really good actor too.

My brother finally went to sleep after a long talk about science and life and religion and race and the Middle East and earthquakes and New Orleans and Where the Wild Berries Grow. He loves to tell me ideas he has for the play, and he gave me a few good ones last night. I really have to wonder sometimes whether he's really going to be a lawyer like he claims; his mind is too thrilled by physically creating things, just like mine. We'll see. Once we get enough sleep.

Fifteen

I wish I was fifteen again. Remember being fifteen? (Maybe not; for all I know, you might be younger than fifteen or have memory loss) Fifteen was crazy.

I don't actually want to be fifteen again. I was miserable at fifteen. It was the end of the freaking world almost every day. I was hopelessly in love, and I was never going to love anyone else. My first and last love, I swore. And I was definitely going to flunk out of school, end up on the streets, and starve to death. My parents were going to kick me out because they just didn't understand me. My friends all secretly hated me and were conspiring against me, and I knew it. I'm onto you!

Like most fifteen-year-olds, I was a melodramatic twat. I did stupid things every single day, and I knew it. At fifteen, I knew I was inherently evil. I was Hitler. I'd apply to art school and get rejected over and over until I at last gave up and killed all the Catholics for raising me to feel guilty. The world would hate me forever. Internet arguments would degrade into calling each other Elizabeth-Nazis. Good thing that I'm German.

Fifteen was insane. I was living fast and dying young. My life would end in majestic flames, and that's exactly what I wanted. I had no desire to die a boring, slow, cancerous death; I was going to die living. I felt no shame in filling my body with crap I knew was terrible for it. I was like a drug addict, though I never dared touch anything illegal. For all my recklessness at fifteen, I never came close to even smoking a cigarette. But I chugged down multiple energy drinks in minutes, blew money on candy and sugar and caffeine and everything I could find that would give me the energy to live fast and die young.

And, boy, was I a slut. I mean, I kissed three different people in a year! And I wasn't even married to any of them! I'm definitely going to hell now.

I know, I know, you're rolling your eyes. My fifteen-year-old self makes yours look like the Devil Incarnate. But my fifteen-year-old self makes my eighteen-year-old self look like a dried up old hag. A lonely old hag. Those are the worst. I drink water and eat nothing but meat, vegetables, and fruit. I think sweetened drinks, cookies, and candy all taste gross. Coffee is gross. Hell, I don't even like cheese. Staying out past ten makes me feel scandalous. And the last time I kissed anyone was nearly three years ago. Cooties, gross. I don't have any cats, but that's only because I'm so lame that I live at home with my parents who refuse to have cats.

The idea of doing anything reckless just makes my boring self lecture me on why it's a terrible idea. There are consequences. I'll regret it later. I have students who look up to me, a brother who mimics me, people who want to be like me. I'm responsible for others. I've worked my butt off to get where I am today, to get paid to write and direct and lead others, and recklessness could blow it. I've fought for the respect I've finally started to earn, and doing something stupid could lose me that respect. And I've still got so many battles to fight; I can't afford to lose any right now.

I miss the psychological freedom of fifteen. It's not like I'm all that responsible, really. In fact, I'm immature and irresponsible every day, the past few weeks as clear evidence of that. But my irresponsibility tends to be scandalously not sticking to a good sleep schedule all the time or going on Facebook more than I should. My "partying" is going out to dinner with my family Friday nights.

I wish I was as fearless as I was at fifteen.

Short and Sweet

I love you too.

Click.

Dearest Loyal Readers,

For the past few weeks, I've been pretty whiny and irresponsible. I've been moody and lazy and feel like most of my posts have just been me rambling on about stupid things. And it's not just my blog. I've missed classes, not done homework, laid around a lot, and gotten others to do stuff for me because I couldn't be bothered. In other words, I've sucked. Admitting how much I've sucked these past few weeks is hard; I'm fighting the urge to delete this with every word.

My sucky self would like you to know that this is only because my body is sore and stiff and I have no decent way around any more. It wants you to know that this isn't how I "usually" am, that I'm "normally" a much better person, truly incredible and all.

But my sucky self makes a lot of excuses and doesn't do anything to change. I'm not a fan of my sucky self. On the surface, it's a lot easier to be my sucky self, but it always ends up being miserable. And misery leads to suckiness.

So I've decided I want to be more, be better. I'm swearing right here, up on the internet for the whole world to see, that I am going to man up and deal with the stupid "problem" I've turned into my excuse. I'm going to make a doctor's appointment, save up money, buy lights for my bike, and get used to biking around my hilly hometown in the meantime. My parents can't afford to get another car, and our insurance company is so bogged down that it'll likely be months before we see a penny, so it's on me to pay. So what if my lack-of-car is, by law, 0% my fault? It's not my parents' fault either.

Loyal readers, I promise you that I'm taking ownership of my actions over the past few weeks and I'm going to do something about me. I can't possibly think I deserve the right to lead or influence anyone when I cannot lead my own self. Please hold me to my words; I'm going to take care of myself and stop letting stupid excuses stop me from doing the things I must.

Thank God it's Friday. Only one class today, a long-needed a visit with a good friend, and then free time to write the 10-page paper due in less than a week that I haven't even started researching. And I'll set up my doctor's appointment.

Antici . . . pation!

I've grown to love anxiety. Not all anxiety, but a certain kind of anxiety: the specific anxiety that comes when you're anxiously awaiting something thoroughly exciting. Anticipation.

I've been wanting to start talking to my cast about their specific roles for what feels like forever. Casting is horrifying, but once it's done, it's overwhelmingly exciting. So the urge to tell everyone what part they got the moment it was officially cast was ridiculous. It was all cast Tuesday afternoon, and now it's Thursday, and I still can't say anything yet! The cast list didn't get put up until last night, since I couldn't get over to the school, so most of the cast will just be finding out today what part they got.

Some people have been bugging me to tell them what part they got. And it's only made it harder not to tell them. I want them all to know NOW. But I don't want to spoil their anticipation. There's an invaluable moment I'd be taking: that magical moment when all the build up anxiety and anticipation about casting finally bursts as you see your name up on the cast list. It's an explosive moment. I've found out my roles other ways before, and it's never quite the same. Being told over the phone, casting myself, knowing from the start, etc. It's just no where near as exciting. I can't take that wonderful moment away from anyone!

I'm anxiously awaiting and anticipating out first full cast (and crew, whoever we have so far) meeting on Monday. I'm incredibly nervous, but it's my cast list moment, the moment I get to see what role I have. I haven't seen any of the students since casting; it'll be like meeting them for the first time all over again! They're no longer students at my local school, but characters I created coming to life right before my eyes!

As a writer, it is your job to make little marks on paper (or a screen) become life within the imaginations of others, but as a director, you have to take the imagination those words create and turn them into something physical, tangible, real. The story, characters, emotion, and all that's in those words must be transformed into reality. Directing is like playing God.

The power of being god-like is addictive, horribly addictive. I'll be the first to admit it. Directing is my crack. And when I can start with nothing, not even a script, and produce an entire reality out of the raw materials around me, it's the ultimate high.

And what's even more incredible is how each person involved in the production is changed. God-like power aside, it's incredibly humbling. All I do is point people in the direction I think things ought to be going, and somehow, I accidentally hit the switch that transforms people into something greater. The whole becomes infinitely greater than the sum of its parts, and I know that it's because of all the wonderful parts, not just my magical ability to be an awesome director.

There is such a fine line between self-confidence and arrogance, between humility and self-depreciation. I am walking that line carefully, but there are so many people surrounding me who keep me in check. I couldn't so this without them, but I know they couldn't do this without me. Somewhere in there, I think I've found both self-confidence and humility. At least a decent amount of both for only being eighteen. Of course, every thinks they've got it all figured out at eighteen. I guess I'll just have to learn what it is I don't know.

I'm anxiously awaiting and anticipating learning. I love learning, and directing teaches me more than anything else I know. That's why I'm so addicted to it; I'm addicted to learning.

Apparently, blogging daily means you have to do it every day. Who knew?

I promise I'll start writing more meaningful posts soon. I'm just exhausted lately. So very exhausted. And by the time I finally start writing my blog posts, sleep is starting to sound really good. It's really warm right now, for some odd reason. It's extremely early morning, and I'm sweating. Maybe I have a fever. Or maybe I have need-an-excuse-to-not-blog-itus.

It came to my attention (for the umpteenth time) today that NaNoWriMo is fast approaching. 18 days of October left, and the BAM! It's NaNoWriMo! That's little more than two weeks.

For those of you who don't know (and didn't already Google it to find out), NaNoWriMo is short for NAtional NOvel WRIting MOnth. It's this crazy idea, really. You write a novel, defined as being at least 50K words, in one month. Absolutely insane. And I've been doing it for years. I love it. NaNoWriMo taught me how to write.

Well, no. I learned how to write in school, but NaNoWriMo taught me to forget all the rules I learned about writing and just get words onto paper. Or screen. Thanks to NanoWriMo, writing a play every summer isn't all that hard.

NaNoWriMo taught me how to overcome the mythical writer's block. It taught me how to just write without excuses. There are no excuses in NaNoWriMo. And there is no failing either. Every word is a success. I like to think that maybe, just maybe, this post is a success. I am exhausted, but I write anyway.

My thought are jumbling off I fall asleep. That sentence was wrong, but I feel it expressed how my head is quite really. Okay. Goodnight. Or morning. Or whatever it is. Good something. Better posts coming.

Anxiety

Last night was one of those nights. I just couldn't focus. My head was all over the place. I couldn't play guitar during rehearsal. I wrote blog post after blog post of incomplete ideas, never actually finishing.

I'm a mess. It's "last night" as I write this, and I've just given up on writing anything meaningful. I'm too anxious. And it's not even for auditions tomorrow. I could care less. Tomorrow could have already gone by, and I wouldn't even notice. I'm just senselessly anxious.

Actually, I'm just anxious to have my degree already. I want to be done with college, done with worrying about my grades. I hate worrying about grades. I want to worry about my learning and my impact on the world, not pointless validation through percentages. I think I'm going to fail all of my classes this semester. Maybe I should just go join the circus. Or the army.

Part of me wants to just skip the college because, hey, who needs it? I'm a freelance awesome person! But the idea of any of my students blowing off college like I'd sure love to scares me. A lot. I don't want them thinking being a lazy bum is the way to go. And if I ever want to be a doctor or vet or lawyer or teacher or just about anything other than a freelance awesome person, I need my degree.

And that's the problem. I need it. I'm terrified to fail because failing isn't an option. I hate that. Failing should be a requirement; you learn from failure. Oh boy, do you learn from failure! But the way GPAs and admissions work, failure might as well be the end of the world and the end of your hope to get into any kind of decent university. There is NO WAY that USC is ever going to accept me after they see the terrible grades I'm doomed to get this semester.

I can't function without a car. I haven't done any homework since having a car. It's horrible. I just need a car, and then I can beg my teachers to let me make up for sucking so much the past two weeks.

I have a headache. Oh, anxiety.

Urgency

It's weird how certain things all seem to happen at the exact right moment. In my class last night (at my church), one of the speakers talked about a phone call she received at just the right moment and how, had she received the call at any other moment, she would have said no to the rector of my church's request for her to move all the way out here from North Carolina to serve in Pastoral Care here.

Last night's class came at the exact right moment for me. The whole course did, really. Yesterday, as I sat at the computer, trying to type up today's blog, my mind was consumed not with the usual obsessing over school and work (ha, "work") and band and all my usual day-to-day nonsense but with the idea that the moment was coming that my current routines would all end and I would have no choice but to leave. I always seem to be talking about and dreaming about all the things I'm going to change at the high school while working there, but yesterday, my mind was lost in the understanding that I would only be there a little while longer.

Class last night made me come to a realisation about something else we had talked about in a previous meeting: the sense of urgency that the church as a whole has. That day, we were talking about what we wanted to find in church, and I said I wanted to find peace and safety from the urgency of my every day life. At that time, I was overwhelmed; I needed refuge. It had been a horrible day, and so much going on had been stressing me out. Urgency was the last thing I wanted.

But I found the urgency last night. As we talked about those life-changing moments, about being called to begin a new chapter of our lives, I realised that the chapter I'm in right now will soon end. Suddenly, I began to feel urgent. I no longer have forever to take this theatre program and turn it into a force of nature; it has to be a force of nature now. Because who knows? I could be called to do something else at any moment, and I have to be ready.

I'm not ready. Not yet. But I have little time. Perhaps a year or two more, and then I will have to leave. I can feel that it is coming, and a new sense of urgency is filling inside me. I want to change this school, these kids, but I only have so much time to do it. Soon, my time will be up, and I will lose my chance to act.

I feel urgent. I am urgent.

Home.

I am freezing. I stand outside in cold rain, on the doorstep. I think it's snowing now. The wind is cold and sharp. But I won't knock. I won't ring the doorbell. I won't ask to step inside where it's warm. I'll stay out in the cold.

Outside, I am bravely fighting the elements which cannot be defeated. The wind rips at the shingles; I patch them back on. The frost freezes the ground; I give what little body heat I have to the garden. The road ices over; I melt it with salt of my sweat. The walkway and driveway become chest-deep in snow; I shovel away.

Inside, the elements cannot touch me. Inside, it is warm and comfortable. But inside, I cannot fight. I cannot martyr. I cannot.

Someone stands at the door, barely creaked open, calling my name, begging for me to come inside. But I won't; I can't. How could I enjoy the comfort when outside, a storm ravages so fiercely against what I must protect? How could I sit comfortably, knowing a war is going on?

No, I cannot sit. I do not belong in the comforts of a home. These simple comforts tear apart my insides like poison. I will not survive such a life. An allergy. Do not bring me inside, lest I suffer an anaphylactic reaction, my life cut suddenly short.

Home is outside. My home. Let me fight to my death.

Back in May, I wrote (and didn't post) a blog about how anxious I was to get out of high school and the terrible public school system. California is one of the worst states, as far as public education goes, in a country of failing public education systems. And, of course, my hometown is home to one of the worst in the state. In other words, the high school I went to was pretty horrible.

It all goes back to the civil rights movement, actually. The east side of my town was the richer, white side, and the west side was the poorer, coloured side. Because of how the school zoning works, everyone went to the school closest to them. In other words, the rich, white kids went to the school with rich, white kids, and the poor, coloured kids went to the schools with poor, coloured kids. Then someone had this brilliant idea: let's force the kids from the east to go to school with those from the west and vice versa!

It was the worst decision in my town's history; it destroyed the public education system. Parents freaked, private schools popped up, and anyone who had any interest in their child's education found a way to get them into a private school. So the public schools were left with parents who didn't care or couldn't afford to do anything about their child's education. There are 59 million different private schools around here. Everyone goes to private school. Even I went to private school up until I started high school.

I came to the conclusion, back in May, that, though I sought safety from the crumbling public school system in graduating and beginning college, I would not escape it. I was so desperate to get away, to run from the problem, but I knew it couldn't happen. I knew escape was not plausible, that its effects on me were inevitable.

Our education system effects every single one of us. The private school kids and public school kids alike. Parents, teachers, and dentists alike. Today's youth are tomorrow's leaders. If only some of them are educated properly, if only those whose parents had the money to pay for a private school education learn what's necessary to compete in and contribute to our society, what good is everyone else? We all know murder is wrong, but by not educating today's youth, we are taking away the future they deserve and making survival that much harder. Starving your child will get the Child Protective Services after you, so why aren't we sending the CPS after our education systems?

But it's more than that selflessness bull. I want everyone's ideas. I want an advanced society. I want someone else to invent the things I need to do the things I want to do. I need educated peers, educated elders, and educated youth. I need to live in an educated world so that I can learn and strive for even better. You cannot soar like an eagle when you're hanging out with turkeys. I want some more eagles in this world.

So try as I might to run from the atrocious education system, I can't escape the starved turkeys. I'm surrounded by starved turkeys. And that is why I work at such a terrible high school. I pity the poor turkeys, and I want to help them, but I also need them. It's a win-win situation, no matter how frustrating dealing with bureaucracy is or how hard it hope can become when I see all the problems with our education system. I love my job not because it's easy or pays well or particularly fun,  but because I believe in it. I believe in what I'm doing. Even when it gets hard and frustrating and tedious and miserable, I still love it because I know that I'm teaching starved turkeys how to soar like eagles and sing like songbirds and eat like high school pigs.

(Yes, I know it's Friday. Figure out the lesson yourself.)

Department of Motor Vehicles

I don't know if this is a universal (er, national? state-wide? county-wide maybe?) thing, but most people I know would rather shoot themselves than go to the DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles). Boy, I could not agree more. The moment anyone says the letters D-M-V, everyone sympathises. No one likes the DMV, at least not around here.

Yesterday, I had to go to the DMV. I'd heard that the DMV in my city was just so absolutely horrible though, that any DMV would be better. So I decided to give it a try, and ended up driving about 45 minutes to an hour to get to some strange DMV in a city I'd never been to. It was amazing.

The DMV by me has that gross "government building" feeling. It's slightly dirty, outdated, and makes your skin crawl. There's bulletproof glass protecting either the people who work there or the people who have the great misfortune of having to do important things at the hands of the extremely unhappy people working there. I'm not sure who is more likely to pull out a gun, really. And though it's not filthy, it's definitely not clean. It's just so desperately in need of renovations that if feels extremely dirty. And it's like someone died in there. Lots of people, actually. The lines take forever. Even with an appointment, I'm usually there for an hour or two. I just hate it, and so does everyone else I know.

The DMV I went to yesterday was the exact opposite. Sure, the parking lot was kind of weird, but even it was much nicer. The sign that said "DMV" was much less haunting and much more welcoming. The building seemed nice from outside. And then we walked in, and it was amazing. No bulletproof glass. I don't know about you, but bulletproof glass just makes me feel uncomfortable. You only put that in where people pull out guns. Instead of a thick wall of glass between the DMV employees and you, there was just a counter, no glass. I saw people interacting with the employees as if they knew each other, were friends, were comfortable and happy. And the lines were so much shorter. Everything was new and clean. I didn't mind being at the DMV. Instead of the usual stress, I was pretty relaxed being there.

I'm not sure I hate the DMV anymore. Actually, I'm pretty sure it's just the one closest to me that I hate. Maybe all the other DMVs are better. Maybe if I registered to vote with a different DMV, I'd have actually have gotten registered. (Nearly a year and multiple tries later, and that stupid DMV still hasn't registered me to vote yet!) Maybe if the DMV near me was fixed or another one built in the area (part of the problem is that it serves so many cities and is only open like four days a week), everyone around here might hate the DMV just a little less.

Of course, I don't like the DMV still, and I don't think it's every really a fun place to go, but it could at least be less horrifying. No one wants to deal with bureaucratic paperwork and tests and whatnot, but it doesn't have to be a less appealing option than shooting oneself. Shooting oneself is a pretty horrifying option, after all. I strongly advise against. Go to the DMV instead, really. Just maybe not the one near me.

This post is just a bit late and a bit short. It is a post about dreams and plays and heroics and not dying. This post is a post about life; it has to be late and not enough.

I had a dream the other night. It was auditions. (Tomorrow, oh my goodness!) This girl walked up on stage, total badass. She commanded attention. Short, boy cut, spiky hair. Attitude. And I immediately knew who to cast her as, despite how little she physically looked like the character. She was badass. She exuded what the Mel in my head exuded.

I don't know why I dreamt that. I've been mostly dreaming of the exact character walking in all the other times I've dreamt of auditions and specific charcters. It was weird. But that girl walking in was like a dream come true, even if it wasn't the Mel I'd always dreamed of. I think maybe it was about how dreams really come true. Not word for word, letter for letter, but in ways you didn't always expect.

I never knew what I wanted to be when I grew up simply because I wanted to be everything. I wrote. I designed clothes. I sketched out buildings and other structures. I took my legos and built cars, houses, stores, cities, entire universes. I made beanie baby plays. I sang, I danced. I dreamt of making music, playing instruments like my heroes. I created.

Yesterday, I was working on designing sets and costumes when I realised that this really is what I've always dreamed of. It's not word for word, letter for letter, but it's better. Instead of choosing one thing, I get it all. This play is me living out my childhood dreams. And I'm only 18.

I dreamt of being a hero more than anything. There was always a little boy in the street that I'd leap out to save from a speeding car. But dying is the end of being heroic. One life saved, and that's it. No more being a hero. But at least then it's obvious that you were a hero, that you gave your life to another.

I think I am a hero. Maybe not the best yet, maybe not superman just yet, but I'm a hero. Art will save someone's life like it saved mine, and I am making sure art has that chance. My life is given to saving another's.

Or so I hope.

My Big Fat Crush

Last Thursday, I met with the students I will soon be directing. In fact, in two days, they will be nervously getting up on stage in front of me and the rest of their future cast members to audition. You know that jittery feeling you get (or got) when you the girl or guy you like is about to walk by and you want to make sure they notice you and think you're cool but don't want to look like you're trying to hard? That's how I feel.

I have a crush on my job. I really, really like it, but I don't know if it likes me back yet. I think it does. I hope it does. I'm jittery. My heart is doing little leaps. My palms are sweaty. My head is spending every moment analysing and reanalysing everything I said or might say. I had the house to myself the other night, so I sat down and starting talking to my imaginary students, just for practice. I keep texting and calling and Facebooking and spamming and bothering people about my crush. I can't contain it. I'm horrified that my crush might find out though. What if it thinks I'm gross and creepy and weird and stalkerish? I don't want that!

I know the students are nervous too, but they have every bit of naïve faith in me. All they're worried about is whether they're going to impress me or not. Me! When did I become so important? It's frightening. Now I have this image to uphold. I have to act important, be important!

I couldn't stand up on the stage last Thursday and talk to them. I felt so intimidating and so very nervous. So I sat down on the steps, just a little above them. It was better, but they were all just staring at me. That was weird. High schoolers don't do that. They're wild and crazy and don't ever sit still to listen to anyone, especially not some 18-year-old with an over inflated ego who thinks she can direct. But there they were, listening to my every ineloquent word like I was saying something worth listening to. It was crazy. I didn't know how to handle all this new power. I still don't!

I think I'm more nervous for auditions than all of them combined. What if they think I'm running rehearsals all wrong? My student director, theatre expert that he is, will notice every single mistake I make. And the choir director will be there too. What if I screw up and she tells the director of the musical about it? What if they decide letting me be more than just a body to order around would be bad and don't take my input on things this year? What if I go backwards and not forwards?

Blogging is such therapy. I know all the things I'm so afraid of are silly. I'm going to be all right. The only person who will be judging me Thursday is me. The students, including my student director, are all too worried and excited and nervous and anxious about auditions and this play to judge me. All they care about is nailing their audition. And the choir director? Every time I walk in the room, she gives me the greatest welcome ever, and she has been cheering me on with every little step I've taken towards being the hired director of this play. I can't imagine her going, "Oh, that Elizabeth, she is such a horrible director. I can't believe how terrible those audition forms were!" It's ridiculous that I should be so nervous.

But I'm nervous. It's that middle school crush on your childhood best friend. Everything's so great, and you definitely don't want to ruin it, but it is the biggest crush ever. You're going to explode if you don't tell them! And nothing in the world matters more. It's a life or death situation. You could DIE.

I love middle school crushes.

P. S. Just for certain bozos, let's be clear: the crush thing is a metaphor. I don't have a crush on any of my students. That'd be, well, weird; they're my students. The only person I have a crush on is Kristen Bell.

The In Between

I didn't even notice I missed last Tuesday. And yesterday! I'm in the in between right now. I'll probably miss at least one more in the coming week or two. All because I'm in the in between right now.

I function best when incredibly busy. I get things done incredibly fast. I do anything and everything. I am superman.

I can be laid back too. I can relax and just let things happen. This was my late summer/early autumn. I had things to do, and I got them done when necessary, but I spent a lot of time just relaxing, laughing, not doing anything too incredibly important or time sensitive.

I am in the between right now. Half of me is laying on a beach somewhere, just listening to the sound of the rebellious waves crashing upon the sand and then receding right back into the ocean. It's so beautiful and peaceful the way the ocean always lets the rebellious waves back, always welcomes them with open arms no matter what. But half of me has no time for the beach, no time to contemplate metaphors about waves and sand and vast oceans which have little to do with what is happening right now. That half has more important things to do, and it's doing everything at lighting speed.

I think you can see where this is going. My head is chaos right now. The conflicting halves are undergoing a power struggle, a change of leadership. The busy half needs to get the relaxed half in gear and moving. Add in the effects to my cognitive function of what shall henceforth be called That Friday, and my head is just everywhere now. A complete mess. A missed blog post is completely unsurprising and not the only thing I've spaced out on or missed. I'm not even really sure what I've missed.

And my body is fatigued. I'm physically not used to functioning at this speed. I'm out of shape. I'm questioning whether I have put too much on my plate. Clearly, my mind can't handle this, my psyche can't handle this, and my body definitely can't handle this.

But soccer taught me a lot growing up. The first week or few of a season would be hell. I'd feel like giving up all the time. My body wanted to quit. "Hell week" seemed to burn worse every year. But then my muscles would learn, and I was stronger, faster, tougher. Hell week paid off, and each year I was a better player.

The in between is real life hell week. I have to push myself beyond my current limits so I might grow and learn. I have to put more on my plate than I can carry so I can learn to carry all I have on my plate. More than full time student, director of a high school theatre program (that's only in its second year), novel editor (I'll tell you guys about this later), member of two separate families, lead singer of a band, church goer, and a member of society. It's a lot to handle, but I'll push through this transition and learn to handle the new pressures and requirements of me.

I had a dream I was walking amongst the world in an endless sea of strangers. And all around me, I could find nothing-- neither safety nor danger. Every face was blank-- empty.

I awoke shaking. My heart rattled my rib cage, and the putrid smell of my own sweat engulfed me. Fear. I could barely breathe. And I reached for my phone, desperate to call someone and find that the world was filled with more than just strangers, but it was not there. The fear swelled up greater still. I leapt from my bed to find that my legs would not hold me. And I crashed to the floor, weak and helpless, beginning to cry.

I don't know how long I stayed there, crying in misery, too weak to withstand the terror of my dream. Perhaps it was a few minutes, but it was more likely years. Years and years of lying in fear, in desperation. Alone! alone, alone, alone.

At last, I clasped my hands together and whispered to the no one that surrounded me. The only sound was the echo of my own voice and my tired breathing. But a nothing sort of something replied. My legs stirred beneath me and brought me back to my feet. And they carried me from home through dark, empty streets. I should have worried, but the silent reply hushed my fearful thoughts.

And then, suddenly, it was day. I was in the middle of a busy street. People called out to each other-- people with faces! My heart danced. But they did not see me. Cars whizzed straight through me. And soon, I realised I was still alone. Angry, I cursed the nothing that replied, cursed my legs for carrying me, cursed the blind people who could not see me.

And the nothing spoke, voiceless, within the caverns of my mind, suddenly and with fierceness. The nothing spoke without words, without sound, without movement. The nothing merely was. But I was filled with understanding, having received nothing to understand. And my soul, for it lacked a physical home, seemed to explode out of my chest, and I watched as the entire street was ripped apart by the ethereal eruption. I became bodiless.

And as I drifted higher, I realised I had died. My body was in pieces, barely recognisable, and the people rushed to see if it was someone they knew. But upon finding my shattered flesh to belong to someone unknown, they continued about their days, unfazed.

And, at last, I understood that I had always been walking amongst the world in an endless sea of strangers, for who knew me? Who would recognise me, now drifting higher and higher away from the faceless beings? Who would remember that I had ever been anything else?

And the nothingness welcomed me, surrounding and embracing me. And, at last, I was not alone.

Empowered

There is so very much in this world one may fight for. An endless litany of causes, movements, revolutions, struggles, hopes, dreams, and passions. We live in a sea of politics, conflicting ideas, and endless confusion. Who is right? Who is wrong? What is right? What is wrong? It's enough to make anyone feel helpless.

I feel helpless a lot. For all the moments I feel strong and empowered, there are still plenty of moments when I feel like nothing more than one of the billions of humans, simply one species of millions on this plant, simply a pale blue dot in the vastness of the endless space around the tiny planet we call home. When I consider how tiny we really are, how incredibly unimportant and powerless we are in the vastness of the multiverse, every thing we do and value just seems to ridiculous. Every day, we kill each other over irrelevant differences, but does the multiverse even notice or care?

But one human in 7 billion can change our society. It's happened many times. When I consider that, I can feel powerful again, like what I do might truly have an effect. If one person can change humanity, maybe one species truly can have an impact on our planet and even beyond our atmosphere, somewhere in the wide reaches of space.

But I don't think we're ready. I have so much faith in humanity, but it's the future I believe in, not now. I cannot help anyone unless I can help myself first, nor can humanity ever help our world until we learn to help our own species, to help each other. And so the never-ending debate of morals comes in, making it so hard to know where the defining lines of right and wrong truly lie.

We all know, of course, that killing someone without "good" cause is most definitely wrong, but what is a "good" cause? Is there any good cause? Is there any good reason to kill someone? My answer is no. But then someone always has to ask me, "What if killing one person would save hundreds/thousands/millions/everyone?" Our classic example is Hitler. If I could have killed Hitler before the Holocaust, would I? And, somehow, I know the answer is no. Given the hypothetical chance to save the lives of millions of people by taking one life, I couldn't do it.

I don't want to justify my morals. That's not my point. I believe something, and I know I could be wrong. Perhaps the right thing to do, given that chance, is to kill the man who, like me, once dreamed of being an artist. I don't think I have the right to ever take another human life no matter what, but perhaps I'm wrong. I could be wrong. That is the trouble with trying to "do the right thing." It's not that the act of doing something right is so hard or wrong is so tempting; it's that we don't know for sure what's right or wrong. And that is where the helplessness truly comes from.

Knowledge is power, but we can never know. We can only believe. We can only have faith. I have been fighting to have faith for a very long time, and I will always have times of struggle, but I've learned that I cannot ever know, and that I just have to have faith. Faith is my power.

And though I wish I could know (So much for the Tree of Knowledge; what a misnomer.) instead of just believing, I almost like not knowing. Every day, I wonder who is right, and sometimes, my definition of right changes. I learn. It doesn't feel so bad to be wrong, because I can learn. Though I am wrong today, perhaps tomorrow I will learn what is right and become right.

I was not the best director a year ago. I know I wasn't. I did things wrong, morally wrong, by the definition of right and wrong I hold today. And in another year, I will look back again and see all the things I did wrong this year. But each year, I will learn. Each year, I will get closer to bringing our species to that ideal of forever helping each other, getting along, respecting each other, and at last being ready to fight for more than just our own selves, our own little worlds, but for the multiverse.

This blog post, to my amazement, will influence someone. It will make a change in the world, no matter how small, because it will make the tiniest change in at least one person's life, heart, mind, soul. Somehow, with my words alone, I have that power. I am not helpless; I am empowered. You are not helpless either.