Valentine's Day

Last year, for Valentine's Day, I did a post for C and my former blog called "Conversation Hearts for College."  As I stated then, "Valentine's Day is a pretty anti-climatic day at a college where hook-ups are the norm. With this in mind, I created some conversation hearts that communicate how most co-eds feel this weekend. And pretty much every other weekend."  For V-Day 2011, I'll share the college hearts that are no longer approp and some that are still in play, as well as some additions for the world of twenty-something dating.

Sooo college:

Still somewhat in play:

The 20-something world of dating:

 

Happy Valentine's Day!

Hi, My Name is C, and I'm a Freshman in Life!*

This past weekend, B came to visit and proceded to drink on an empty stomach (even though I had made her some reallllly delicious mac and cheese and hot dogs!), use a straw to drink gin, and vomit all over my bathroom (...ok not like alll over, and more just like in).  We decided this was perfectly fine because she's a freshman in life.

Welcome to freshman year of life.  You will find that you don't really know your alcohol tolerance (in college you only drank beer that had the physical qualities of piss and took obscene amounts to get you drunk), you don't know anything about who you are (funny how you thought you were a grown "adult" freshman year of college when you were 18 years old), you're a little scared to be out on your own, and you have no common sense (Mom, how long are these left overs good for? I cooked them last Monday).

Thankfully you can take some of the lessons you learned in college and apply them to your everyday life.  The lesson that I learned my senior year of college, which has largely been responsible for my current state of mind, is somewhat rooted in NO.  Things I hate: traffic (concerning both people and cars), books that everyone "just loveddddd" but actually suck, idiotic questions, annoying people, and the way I let NO treat me last year.  Sometimes you just need to make mistakes.  Sometimes, regardless of how many times your friends say noooooooo not again!, you just need to keep making a mistake over and over again. 

I was in a weird place in my life and I made some mistakes.  I let boys disrespect me because I didn't know how to respect myself.  In some ways I'm thankful that I did, because a. now I can spot a douchebag from a MILE away and b. it taught me that I don't deserve to be treated poorly, by myself or anyone else.  That's the thing about self empowerment, sometimes you need to hit rock bottom before you can start the climb. (I hope you're imagining some Miley Cyrus classics playing in the background as you read this)  So, now I take my douchebags with a grain of salt.  I love the bro, and probably will continue to do so until I start looking for someone to, like, marry or something.  They're good, stupid fun...and as long as you keep a handle on it...it's a good time.  It's just like any drug really.  If you over do it and lose yourself, you've lost the very fiber of being that makes you, you.  So don't do that.  My goal is to hold onto my self awareness, keep a watchful eye, and always always remember: I deserve to be treated well.  After all, your bro is my drug.


*Freshman in Life: term created and trademarked by KM

Going Home, It's Not that Easy

Homecoming (def.): the return of a group of people usually on a special occasion to a place formerly frequented or regarded as home; especially : an annual celebration for alumni at a college or university. (a la Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary)

This past weekend B and I ventured back to our small, liberal arts, East Coast college.  I had been looking forward to this weekend practically since the day of graduation.  A return to my former stomping ground.  But as the weekend approached some very traumatic and dramatic events led to a falling out with one of my very best friends who is a senior at our alma mater.  This drastic change of ties led me to be somewhat apprehensive about the weekend; and, to be truthful, I almost did not even venture back to school for the occasion.  I decided to brave it out and just go anyway...I needed to and I had so been looking forward to it.

Things that need be known about the falling out that preceded the weekend.  I was creepily close with this friend, people joked that we were dating...which in retrospect was probably the first red flag that the relationship was unhealthy.  I had asked my friend not to do something, because it would bother me.  She did it anyway and then proceded to lie and deceive me for two weeks before it became apparent that if she didn't tell me what she'd done, someone else would.  Everything about the incident was selfish and stupid.  The very act of lying to me every day showed (to me) that she was not a good friend, and truly did not care about me.

So, I went to Homecoming with the strict stance in mind that I would not (could not!) speak to my friend.  I would be as polite as ever, but she would be a stranger to me...a new acquintance.  I am an adult now, or so I'm told, and I can't just run around campus pouring beers on people and causing a ruckus.  Apparently this was not her stance, as a beer was poured directly on my head in the name of her honor.  I guess I deserved this for being a terrible friend.  Hmmm...  I was greatly hurt by this and really upset about it: how could she be so selfish and mean?!  But, honestly, I am being somewhat hypocritical.

I remember Spring Term of my senior year.  I remember waking up on Sunday morning and thinking to myself: why do I keep acting like this?  I didn't like myself and I didn't like who I was becoming.  Those last few months, I did what felt good...I was a solely epicurian person.  As our school was once so properly described by a school newspaper columnist: "This den of sin that I inhabit."  A den of sin, so perfectly described...for that is exactly what it was.  I did what I wanted regardless of the consequences, because so many others did the same.  It was literally like living inside of a speak easy during Prohibition.  Everything went, and no one asked questions....except for my morality, buried deep, deep within...it was asking some very tough questions, that I couldn't answer.  So graduation came and went, and I started acting like a person I wasn't ashamed of.

I missed my college life, and it is (and has been) an interesting transition to something so radically different.  Homecoming weekend showed me just what I needed to see.  My friend did something stupid, selfish, and shameful....but the things that I did my senior year...were they really that different?  I can't let her back into my life, but not because I don't forgive her.  I really do forgive her.  I can't let her back in, because letting her back into my life opens the door to so many things I left behind at graduation.  I shut the door on that behavior and I can only open the door to her friendship when she too has relinquished her ties to our favorite little den of sin.

Homecoming weekend gave me back everything that I had let go of, let me experience it once more, and allowed me to finally release it from my life...for good.  I can't be that person I was in college anymore because I have lost her, and she can't be found.  I don't want to find her.  I loved the weekend, seeing old friends, visiting old haunts; but come Sunday I was itching to leave.  Itching to get back the real world.  The world where I belong.