**

WHEN I heard the learn’d astronomer;
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me;
When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them;
When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick;
Till rising and gliding out, I wander’d off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.

-Walt Whitman

Fitting.

I had never ridden in a convertible until the past week.

I had never ridden in a convertible with the top down until the past week.

I had never stuck my hands up like people do on rollercoasters until the past week. While I'll still probably never do that on a rollercoaster (high speeds and rules, you know), I must say it's quite fun in a convertible.

This past week I also got to take a tour of the inner workings of a dairy farm. And not just any dairy farm, but the wonderful farm responsible for milk that tastes like a root beer float. You know you think that sounds delicious.

Lately I've felt a bit like the puzzle piece that looks like it fits, but upon closer inspection it's a little too loose or a little too tight and the colors are just a little bit off. Then I came home. Over the past year I've kept up with my friends on Facebook, and seeing their antics and photo albums, I've worried a little that I wouldn't quite fit back in. I was pleasantly wrong. I realize now that I wasn't fitting into that other puzzle because it was the wrong one. Here, I fit right back in with the gentle, satisfying slide of the right piece.

Today I remembered just how much I truly love jigsaw puzzles. While my mom and I were going through boxes yesterday, we found one full of the beauties. I took some out today. I'd forgotten how good it feels to do a puzzle. It just feels so natural. My dad used to call me the Puzzle Wizard. It's hard to describe, but the best I can come up with is that doing a puzzle is transcendent. I see the pieces differently, almost psychicly. I see peaces.

Listening to: "Best That You Can Do" from Arthur
Reading: The Grass Is Always Greener Over the Septic Tank

Ser.

I've been doing some deep thinking lately.

I've been trying to figure people out and to figure myself out.

So far the results are unsatisfactory. On the one hand is a desire to belong. On the other is a personal pride that refuses to bend to perceived expectations. The former is fueled by shaky self-esteem and loneliness. The latter feeds off logic and habit.

Personally, I'm rooting for the latter, but while the two work out their differences, I think I'm going to hurt for a while.

Buried beneath it all is the nagging feeling that there is some sort of cosmic irony in all this in that I might find more acceptance were I to stop worrying and trying so hard and just be.

I think that's my favorite verb. "To be." So many meanings, so many uses.

The Spanish use two words for it: ser and estar. Ser is used for permanent states and estar for transient ones.

So ¿cuál soy?

I'm beginning to see lo que estoy. Parts of her I would like to shuck off, but others will do just fine. I wonder, though, how much of me will get seared off in the refining.

And because I'm a girl and I can't help it, I wonder who will be waiting for the finished product when the process is done. Or more hopefully, who will be willing to take it while it's still in the fire.

Listening to: "My Immortal" by Evanescence
Reading: Persuasion by Jane Austen

Managing.

"Hello, friends and enemies."

I've been remiss with the whole blogging thing. Now I suppose it's time for a tell-all. But not, because while I'm a bit too open sometimes, there is just some information I don't trust the internet with.

The past few weeks have quite frankly been kind of crappy. For the first time in my life I'm counting down to something. What is this countdown, you ask? The number of days until I'm in Missouri. Right now we are at almost exactly five.

I'm sure your next question is, "Why have you been feeling crappy, Rebekah?"

The short version is that I've been feeling rather lonely and a little abandoned. Sure, my friends try to include me in their excursions, but for the most part I've felt like an afterthought, someone to invite, but then to forget about. During these big group outings I've felt like I just shouldn't be there. Even though people talk to me, it feels like it is in an oh-it's-Rebekah-let's-say-hi manner. I don't feel included at at. I just feel really out of place.

That is why while I was with a large group of friends on Thursday, I called my best friend and rudely chatted with her and her husband on the phone instead of socializing with people who I didn't really feel wanted to socialize with me. It's really kind of sad, too, because we were down at Tempe Town Lake and walking a bit on the Mill Avenue Bridge, both things I have wanted to do and was looking forward to. And yet. I toughed it out for a while, hoping the situation would improve, but after a good hour or more of lagging unnoticed at the back of the group, I made the call. The result was interesting. I got out of it not only amusement and companionship, but a video of a cat going psycho with a sock. And after I hung up the phone I was hyper, something I haven't truly been in quite some time. Sure, I was a shade of hyper during the weekend of the Easter Pageant, but that was nothing like this. This was a bouncing-up-and-down, frisbee-playing hyper. And if you know me at all, you know that such physical activity is not my thing in the slightest. But there it was.

My friends got together again for a pool party on Friday and cliff jumping on Saturday. I defered on Friday because I knew that noone there would hang out with me. The only person going that I was really interested in spending time with was my roommate, but I knew that she would spend all of her time with others on the guest list. I just thought it would be better for all parties involved if I stayed home, that way I wouldn't feel quite so crappy and noone else would feel awkward because I was randomly there. That's not to say that staying home automatically equalled me being euphoric. It didn't. It's hard to be truly happy when my mind is racing through a thousand tangents a minute and worrying about half of them. There's more to it than that, but again: what I don't tell the internet, can't fall into the wrong hands. If I'm remembering correctly, my Friday evening was spent watching the fabulous miniseries Tin Man, because my best friend generously gave me the means to watch such things instantly, providing me with some cheer. I love that girl.

I didn't go cliff jumping because the only reason I had wanted to go when it was suggested weeks ago was to spend time with people that I would now rather not be around. Sure, they're fine separately, but when you get certain combinations of people they stop being good companions. Since the weighty pro of good company was removed, the strong cons of 1. hating bathing suits, 2. being afraid of falling, and 3. not knowing how to swim, won out. Instead, I went to my dad's girlfriend's daughter's graduation in the morning and spent the afternoon helping prepare for her graduation party. Is it bad that I think peeling 20 lbs. of potatoes is more fun than cliff jumping could ever be? I also got to brown meat and fetch things. The highlight of Saturday was probably watching my dad's girlfriend's son open a gallon can with tin snips because none of the can openers would work on it. In the words of my dad's girlfriend, "Hooray for redneck ingenuity!"

The party was also fun. I spent most of it talking to my own extended family. I got to talk to my grandpa a little, then with my cousins and aunts, who I'm coming to realize are all just basically awesome.

I'm beginning to think I've spent the last year hanging out with all the wrong people.

Tonight, my dad worked with me a little on learning how to drive a stick shift.

Listening to: "One Tin Soldier"
Reading: Persuasion by Jane Austen

Mothra.

Since I got up Friday morning, my stomach has felt all tense and fluttery, like I was about to step out onto a stage on opening night. It's made food rather unappealing (except for those garlic noodles...). Also, it's just annoying and can't be healthy. I'm pretty sure I've worked out all the various reasons for its presence and fluctuations in intensity, but I'll keep those mum, methinks. So this has been plaguing me all weekend with no end in sight, but at approximately 6:51 tonight it simply vanished. All it took was a single text from a friend. It was like I was trapped and all it took was a nudge from the right person to release everything. That's not to say it's really released, oh contrare, but all of the tension is.

Thanks, friend.

Listening to: "I'm So Excited"
Reading: The Definitive Wit of Winston Churchill

Sleep deprivation.

Egad! What a week.

Monday's FHE was funner than usual. Friendship Dinners tend to drive me to the brink of madness, but I had a lovely chat with a friend about Ebonics, so that was awesome.

Afterward I had a long conversation with John the Animal about movies and such. I also decided that the Animal must be a title and added a Sir in front of his name. Though if you are going to say it, you have to say the entire thing. An accent is encouraged.

The rest of the week was hectic. I had two papers due, one on Thursday and one on Friday.

Wednesday night, I finally started working on my English paper around 10 PM, finishing around 4 AM. Hello, four hours of sleep. I don't regret it, though. The daylight hours of Wednesday weren't wasted (mostly).

Thursday, I was super energetic all day. It was weird. Although that energy was laced with a few bouts of extreme emotion. That night I had to do a bunch of geology homework and try to start my history paper. I got some of the geology done, but it was an even stranger day in that I felt like I couldn't be alone, so I was trying to do homework while being in a room with a huge group of my friends, who were playing psychologist. Thursday night I got to bed around 2 AM. Enter five hours of sleep.

Friday morning I was kind of exhausted. However, I managed to rock my last geology lab and a Spanish oral exam. I did have to fight to stay awake during a movie in history. I managed to finish my geology homework by 2-ish, at which point I started on my history paper. The one due at midnight. Finished around 5. That kind of worries me in the quality department, but I didn't have anything more to say. At that point I probably should've crashed, but lately I've sort of been feeling like defying logic and after finishing the paper I had a resurgence of energy. Instead I ate my dinner, blew soap bubbles while watching the sun set, then went and chilled by the giant bunnies on Mill with a friend. Mill is an interesting place on a Friday night. There was a guy who was basically apologizing for existing, and then he started talking like he was answering a phone, but I don't think he was on a phone...Then of course there were all of the people offering coupons for free drinks or asking for change. Mill, I love you. I wouldn't want to walk down you alone after dark, but I love you.

I got home around 10:30, but played on the internet until...um...? 12? 1? I'm going to go with 12. Then I got up at 5, my dad picked me up at 6. Chiliquilis for breakfast, went back to bed until 1. In my brand new bed! My room at my dad's was distinctly lacking in the furniture department, but that problem has been rectified. I even have some sweet new sheets. And a plethora of hangers! Did laundry all day.

Listening to: School of Rock
Reading: Justine by Lawrence Durrell