Juxtapose

Hee hee. Now everyone thinks that the only thing I ever think about is weddings.

Well, it's not true.

The only things I ever think about are cute boys!

Okay, so that's not really true either. And I don't think about school all the time, or God all the time like I should, or His mercy, or His grace, or my horrible inner man, or any of that stuff all the time. I'm an amalgam of thoughts at all times, so I'd probably never become someone to consult when trying to keep your doctoral thesis compactly branched out yet connected. I feel kinda badly that my brain gets to wander so rampantly through the forests of thoughts that run through it (that's a paradoxial illustration, but you get what I mean) while I write these things on here that make it seem like I have been dwelling on these deep but simplistic thoughts for a good twenty year stretch. I mean, I'm neither smart enough, nor dumb enough to attempt such a feat. Actually, I'm a pretty boring person. I live a boring life, spiced up only by the interesting goings-on of my own little household of siblings and amusing parents and by the people around me. I know this may come as a shock to you all, but I get most of my kicks from watching other people do stupid things with their lives. By that I mean that I don't get KICKS out of it, but that's what I usually end up doing most of the time - observing and commenting to myself in my brain. I pick people apart and analyze their lives and wonder how I would, through my most infinite of wisdom stores, fix things if I were in their position. In simpler, more blunt and unbecoming terms, I'm a silent know-it-all with compassionate tendencies. I mean, I KNOW I'm a know-it-all, but I always think that I'm right anyways because I just want tohelp people. I've got my own thing, all, "At least I'm not like them," even though I try not to say that. Who can help it, though? Really, who can? Then again, everyone knows that I have my own problems that are enough for me to handle, let alone handling other peoples' problems.

My days are pretty mundane. I go to school, study hard, eat my peanut butter sandwiches that I make while sitting in my car and listening to the Emerson College Radio station's Jazz Brunch. I drive a station wagon, guys. I put my hair up until a clip in the mornings after my shower without ever brushing it out, and I dress, usually, like a shapeless blob, even though I'm lucky enough to be of average height and slim, at least for the time being. I don't get asked out on dates too often, and I've never been kissed, even at my ripe old age. I go to church on Sunday mornings and evenings and Wednesday nights, and this morning when I went, I was so tired that I kept dozing off in the service like an old man. I have my good moments and my bad. I'm shyer than shy, more than anyone could know, but, in a lone work that I can be proud of, I have taught myself to stop being self-conscious. God helped with that one too, believe it or not. I wear funny glasses because I think they make me look cute, because they hide the dark circles under my eyes, and because they make me feel a little more comfortable with myself, much like standing behind a podium makes a speaker in an auditorium feel more comfortable because there's something in front of him, even though it doesn't hide him at all from their view. I make spelling and grammatical errors (especially with my commas) all the time because I'm too lazy to pay attention, despite the fact that I know my grammar well enough that even the English department heads can't find fault with it in my papers even if they DO disagree with my interpretation of the texts. I have a hot temper when I'm provoked enough, and sometimes I yell at my brothers and sister. If I babysit and they don't behave and argue back, sometimes my voice gets hoarse from yelling too much. I wonder, sometimes, that anyone sees fit to associate with me. I wonder, even more often, when I will make of myself, or, rather, God will make of me, a Proverbs thirty-one woman. My heart says, "Someday, Cass, someday!" But it really seems far away. I've grown into my own skin a lot in these past five years, recounting so many memories of life-shaping occurences and conversations and people I have met, but I've really not gotten much of anywhere, it seems. The little things still remain that I would like to change. I know I could change my character, but I fall into the same sins and foolishness every time because it just feels so good to sin. Yes, I said that. Sin is so much fun. It isn't until the parachute pops on the ride down that I start to pray and ask God for a miracle to mend it.

And it's not even sin. It's just me. Not even the horrible things I do, or my major flaws, of which I could point to a million and a half, it's just me. I want to change. I want to become a better woman, better suited for life as we know it. Anyone can become a nurse and soothe the fevered brow of natives, and any girl can become a wife who brings her husband his slippers every morning. But that's all null and void if it's still just me as I stand now.

And that's basically what I want out of life, what I think about as a conglomeration of all the things I think about every second of every day. I mostly think about myself, and that's what I need to stop before I can move on in life. I have managed to stop worrying about what people think of me enough to let me be myself with many different types of people in the world. Now I just have to stop worrying about what I think of myself. Let God do the work for once. What a novel idea, Cass.

Progression is hanging off the limb of a tree in my mind. It's red, juicy, shiny, and I'm so hungry. I can't wait to climb the tree and taste it.

And these are the things I think about at 10:30 at night.