i can never get down everything i'm feeling in one sitting.

today a young couple from our church (the youth minister and his wife, actually) came to my home for dinner. they wanted to come while all of the sisters were here so that they could lead a discussion with us about what we think young people want to see happening in the church. so it was mostly katie and adrienne telling them what they thought... i had a lot to add, but i restrained myself because i think adrienne and katie would have taken it as a personal attack. i just didn't agree with anything they were saying. they see Christians as genuinely stupid closed-minded people. it's not always like that. if you feel that way, then maybe you're demonstrating your own closed-mindedness. there are smart and stupid Christians, just like there are smart and stupid anybodys. it really makes me furious, but i can't call anybody on anything because it would create unnecessary problems. i'm learning self control, perhaps. people who consider themselves "free-thinkers" are sometimes just the opposite... by having such strong liberal opinions and believing that anybody who can't handle it must be an idiot, then you're doing the same thing as the hardcore conservatives who believe that anybody who disagrees with their traditional values must be a maniac. they're so "free-thinking" that they forget to be open to the reality that not everybody believes the same way you do. you have to recognize other people's opinions as existing within the realm of possibility. you have to understand that some people don't have the same openness you might have. it's about respecting people, i guess. and loving them, for sure.

so... josh. every time i'm online, he instant messages me and asks what ellen is doing. he asks me to tell her hello, and that he loves her. i realize that they're in love and everything, and they're all twitterpated and such... but i wish he wouldn't ask me those things all of the time. it's like he's not interested in even talking to me. i feel like he only views me as his ellen-information-generator. it seems ridiculous to me, but i think he really doesn't understand the way it comes across, so i really can't be mad. i tried to tell him today, but he logged off after i brought it up. i had hoped ellen would talk to him about it, since i always feel in danger of making him upset, but it looks like i'm just going to have to live with it if he can't understand. it just seems so silly to me.

there's an unpleasant feeling in my stomach today. i feel a sense of urgency to do something, but i'm not sure what i'm supposed to do. i guess i'll just pack for washington, d.c. and worry about all of that later. or not worry about it at all. sounds good.

my father had a job interview in washington, d.c. tomorrow. he's flying out in the morning and returning the day after. when i woke up this morning, he asked me if i wanted to go with him. so just like that, we bought tickets and i'm going to d.c. tomorrow. life is pretty crazy sometimes. it will be ellen, my father, and me... i think the plan is to hit the smithsonian, although personally i'd like to see the holocaust museum again. not that i'm incredibly morbid.. it was just so moving. and i feel like it's important to remember things like that, and that genocide still happens today. if we forget about it, or ignore it, then so many people were slain for nothing. we should honor them by remembering what happened, that they were real people with real lives and not just a few million dead bodies from the pages of our history textbooks. at the very least, everything is a learning experience. have i mentioned that i think everybody should have to read farewell to manzanar in grade school? just a thought.

i spent most of the day listening to music that adrienne ripped and brought to alabama for katie. lots of ani difranco. i had no idea how much i enjoyed her music... she's got some strange and beautiful insights.

they say goldfish got no memory/ i guess their lives are much like mine/ the little plastic castle/ is a surprise every time

when i say you sucked my brain out/ the english translation/ is i am in love with you/ and it is no fun

they were digging a new foundation in Manhattan/ and they discovered a slave cemetary there/ may their souls rest easy/ now that lynching is frowned upon/ and we've moved on to the electric chair

the things she says are so simple, but she makes them sound beautiful. and she's got a whole lot to say, if you can hear past the f-word, which i can. the more i listen the more i love it. and i haven't even begun to crack the surface, i suppose.

the take-home message for the day is that one shouldn't ask questions that one knows one will not enjoy the answer to. i think that's great advice, and so i'm puzzled by my consistent choice not to follow it.

today was the first sunday in three weeks where i attended church. that is very strange for me. i was sick, then i was traveling, and now i'm home at carriage hills church of christ. it's not so terrible, really. my attitude about the church just isn't too fabulous. i see it as a place where the people my age don't speak to me, and the adults speak to me out of obligation to my parents. granted there are a handful of people who seem to express a genuine interest in me as a person... it's just difficult to come "home" to a church that isn't necessarily mine. plus the preacher has frightening hair and called the congregation "beloved" when he preaches. that really isn't helping anything.

why is it that people play games with each other? we don't seem to tell anybody how we're really feeling ever. we have to dance around things with our actions and words. we prefer to give the appearance of something without actually trusting a person with reality. i suppose that works out alright in casual acquaintanceships where everything is filler and you've got nothing to share. but we do this even with our closest friends. i don't want to do that anymore. people aren't as scary as they look. we're all people. and the person you are afraid of would most likely react to something in a similar way from how you would react. if you walk up to somebody and say "hi, i've seen you around, you look like a really interesting person and i'd love to get to know you", what are they going to do? spit acid at you? i mean, what would you do if that happened to you? you would be polite, you would be flattered, you would maybe have a conversation with them... why is a stranger so different from you? sometimes i feel like i'm on the brink of something extraordinary, but i can't quite get my hands on it. like it's floating just above me. i don't want to be afraid of people anymore. i think i'll start that today.

i do not dislike being at home, but i am growing a tiny bit restless here. i think it's more that i don't know the town very well than anything else. there doesn't seem to be much to do but shop, and a girl can only spend so much money before she has to do something crazy like get a job. today ellen and i rode around historical montgomery. i saw the capital, the court building (home of what i see as roy moore's flagrant violation of the Constitution), martin luther king jr.'s home and church building, the first white house of the confederacy, and the confederate monument. king's home is so modest, and his church building so humble in appearance. and they've kept them that way all of these years. i think it really embodies his spirit of humility. it was a bit disturbing to see the confederate battle flag flying and the confederate monument... to me, it's somewhat like having a nazi monument or flying a nazi flag. it's a symbol of an historical mistake, and shouldn't be celebrated. perhaps solemnly remembered, but certainly not celebrated. i suppose many many people disagree though, and that is certainly their right.

the group dynamic is so different with all of my sisters here. we all revert back to how we were years and years ago, when we were all living at home still. i find myself both adoring and detesting it. i love my sisters so freakishly much, and i really enjoy the times that we can laugh together and act immature... but by the same token, i hate thinking of myself as the kid sister who acts silly for attention. i doubt i ever stopped acting that way, honestly, but it's drawn out of me in a more powerful way when i'm around katie, adrienne, and ellen. every once in a while we'll have moments where we'll try and re-establish ourselves as the women (can i even say that about myself?) that we've become. that's usually when the arguing begins. =)

i had a very nice talk with robin tonight. i suppose we haven't had the time to really talk in a while, or maybe we haven't had the desire. i'm not entirely sure, but that's alright. people come and go and come and go and exist to be appreciated at every opportunity. i know i acted so strangely this past semester. but i can feel myself changing all the time. that's got to count for something. it feels like God has taken the lid off of my brain, and begun to fill it with these marvelous things... i have thoughts sometimes that i don't know where they came from, but they're too awesome to have been born inside my mind. it makes me feel like i have something special inside me, that i can carry around all of the time. something that the world doesn't know about. like a secret power inside of me. i suppose it sounds strange, but i can't explain it any other way. it's amazing to me that i can like the way i am and at the same time want to be better. not to say that i like everything about myself, or that i think i'm particularly wonderful, i just can enjoy my company and the way my mind works. i like living as the person i am. i feel like i've come so far already, and i know it must go on and on and on. i anxiously await it.

now it's three in the morning. and i showed katie how to play snood around one in the morning. i can hear her playing still. i need to put an end to this. goodnight blog.

guess what time it is!....

it's kiser family photo time!

katie, ellen, and i worked night and day on our new-age gingerbread house. it's been hit by a tornado. here are some pictures of the devastation:

see the little gumdrop man? he's screaming in agony because he just lost his wife to the tornado. she's inside the house:

let's see the poor, broken man one more time, shall we?:

we're so proud. ellen's in blue, katie's in brown, and that's me in black. yes, that's what i look like. you may have forgotten. =) in this picture, you can see the little tornado we made out of pipe cleaners. remember, kids: pipe cleaners aren't edible! it's best that you not learn the hard way.

every year my father gives my mother pink flamingos, as if we weren't already white trash personified. here she is putting them in the yard... we decided to immortalize the moment with a photograph because mom looks like a patient in a mental home with her pajamas and christmas crown. welcome to my childhood, guys. my mom's got a case of the crazies! =)

just so you guys have seen all of my sisters, here's adrienne and her husband kenny:


well, that's all the fun you get. more later. =)

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today i was out shopping by myself all day, and i loved it. i guess i might feel lonely usually, but when i have music on i don't feel lonely at all. it's like the music is my companion. and we talk. or, at least, i talk to it. i'm not crazy, right? yeah, that's what i thought.

i bought the new switchfoot cd,

which rocks my world into tiny pieces. tiny tiny pieces. plus it was purdy cheap at the christian outlet store i stumbled upon in my explorations. then i came home, and had a meatless dinner with my family. now that adrienne is here, and she's a vegetarian, there's not much meat on our table. it's fun, though, because vegetarian food is really great when my dad cooks. eggplant is heavily featured, which i love. listen to me; i'm such a dork. =)

my sister are waxing their legs in the other room. i can hear their shrieks from my desk. why do girls do that to themselves? perhaps the world will never know.

anyway, after dinner i got into a little argument with my sister katie about harding. she was talking about a paper that was due for one of her classes (she's in graduate school at the university of london), and i commented that i'd only had one paper due during my first semester at harding. so she goes off making fun of my school, saying it doesn't challenge me at all and that it's ridiculous that i don't have to write more papers. that hurts my feelings so much, i can hardly stand it at all. i tried to explain that (a) i tested out of the english classes that i would be writing papers in, (b) i was only taking 14 hours of fairly easy gen ed classes because of how late i registered, and (c) there were papers i could have written but didn't because i decided i didn't need the credit. then i got even more upset because i realized i was trying to defend harding, and i don't have to do that. harding is a good school. i am happy there. i don't need to debate it. and for me, feeling challenged isn't all about my classes... mostly, the challenge is being surrounded by people who really think differently from me. and i'm learning, and i hope they're learning, and everybody is becoming better. i certainly don't think that is anything to ridicule.

afterwards, i realized that the reason i get along so well with my dad and ellen is because everybody else in the family either thinks it's dumb that i want to study political science, or thinks it's dumb that i am at harding. dad and ellen think both things are great. and i get along especially well with my dad because he is actually interested in politics and ellen isn't. man, i love my dad. and it's funny that i should mention this now, because yesterday he was the reason i was so upset. but he apologized to me, so i feel better now.

christmas was awesome for me this year. some noteable gifts from me to my family were the perks of being a wallflower for all of my sisters (i can't wait to hear what they think about it...), glow by j.lo for my grandmother (normally i would be embarrassed, but it was the perfect gift for her), and a samwise action figure for ellen (who lusts after samwise, which i find unnatural and disgusting, as legolas is supremely hotter). my family gave me many gifts, for which i am very thankful. some of them were common sense by thomas paine, political newspaper clippings from london, and the spirited away dvd. they sure do know what i like. =) i bought myself the trekkies dvd for christmas, on account of it was on sale and i love well-done documentaries. verdict? fun time had by all.

today is my sister katie's twenty-fifth birthday. hooray.

today i had a great day and a bad night. my sister adrienne and her husband kenny are here, but that's got nothing to do with me being upset. i'm quite happy to see them, actually.

anyway, i'm going to post later when i'm not still sad. as for now, dead alive. zombie holocaust=family fun.

oh my stars and garters. last night i was at the mall and my sister talked me into getting my eyebrows waxed. i never thought i would actually be paying somebody to bring me such incredible pain... oh, it still hurts. i guess that's what i get for being so trusting and pure. =) but really, i actually bled. and my eyes were watering so bad that i just started crying. it's funny, in retrospect, but at the time i was experiencing levels of misery previously unfelt.

shortly before that terrible terrible mistake, i was hit on by the most incredibly nondescript boy. i haven't had a guy walk up to me like that in a long time, so i was simultaneously disgusted and thrilled. i was wearing my "miyazaki rocks" shirt, and he asked me about it. and then when i walked by him later he waved and said merry christmas in a very i-want-your-bod type of way. i still got it... =) too bad i'm just visiting for christmas. oh, and that i have standards. he looked like a republican anyway.

oh, dude, i totally saw "elf" last night. it rocked my world into tiny pieces. if you haven't seen it, you should. and katie: i'm definitely answering our phone next semester with "buddy the elf. what's your favorite color?"

this morning i had a shockingly pleasant conversation with my sister adrienne. she's the one i don't always get along with, so i was really excited about it. now that she's got her new husband ken, she is really nice and seems genuinely happy. i'm so grateful for that, and i hope it lasts. she's coming the day after christmas, and i'm actually pretty excited to see her. life is funny sometimes. i hope i'm not getting my hopes up too much. i'm also enjoying being with my grandmother... that's something that doesn't usually happen. she's so sweet these days, always talking about how much she loves us and how nicely we've turned out. God has blessed me this year with family that i love being around. also, God has blessed me with friends that i really care about, and around whom i feel cared about. see, i always felt that the difference between family and friends is that you can't choose your family (unless you're mormon), but you choose your friends. and i'm glad God chose my family for me. it's really working out for me these days. such unbelievable joy.

i hope that we can do the gift of good words this year with my whole family, even adrienne and ken. i have so much to tell them about how i love them. what's gotten into me? could it be... Jesus? =)

"God bless us, every one."

i love you guys. mucho love-o.

well it's looking a lot like my dad will get transfered to washington, d.c. there are pros and cons to this, just like everything else. pros? oodles of free museums and other things of historical relevance, plus i can really protest instead of just the fake-political-shirt-protesting that i do at harding. cons? dubya. so close. close enough to throw rotten fruit at. wait, that's a pro! ten bucks says i can make it onto the white house enemies list. oh, how i love democracy!

i went to the dentist today and got my teeth cleaned! boy, was that exciting. the hygiene lady and i got to have mini-conversations. you know what i mean. "oh, is that your dog in the frame there? how cute." "so how's school going?" "so where is guam, exactly?" it's funny when you sit back and think about how people's brains work. we have these mini-rituals of bringing up just the most inane stuff to avoid silence. i will probably never see this woman again, but thank goodness she could explain to me the intricacies of owning a terrior. i'm happy to just sit back in the chair with my mouth wide open and my tongue hanging out, daydreaming about what might happen if i started biting at her hands like an animal. really, are they trained for that type of thing? i doubt it. in a world without consequences, i might try it out. and many other things, for that matter. come to think of it, hooray for consequences! sigh, good times...

the funniest thing in the universe happened last night, while my family was decorating the christmas tree. in the middle of it, my dad somehow sneaks into the other room and gets on the computer. about five minutes after this, i notice that he's gone and playing alpha centauri, so i begin making playfully-loud comments about how nice it is to be home with my family, and how great it is that we can share these times together without any distractions, especially not the computer. and when i see that dad is ignoring me, my sisters and i start doing impressions of him. he used to tap our collarbones really hard to scold us, so we were doing that to each other and saying stuff like "you WILL enjoy this holiday season! you WILL unwrap your presents!" my dad also used to grab the waddles under our chins (is there a word for that? i'm not sure if waddles really works out.) to scold us, so we moved onto that. and when i did it to katie, she exclaimed "man, i hated that! dad was such a bitch!" JUST AS DAD WALKED IN. oh my gosh, it was the funniest thing in the universe. my dad NEVER EVER EVER swears, and hates it if we ever do, so we all ran and hid. the expression on his face was so so so amusing. later that night, katie and i went to winn dixie to buy ice cream cake, and looked for cards that said "sorry i called you a bitch, daddy", but apparently hallmark doesn't make them. they're supposed to have a card for every occasion. shame on them!

ok, off to the olive garden for dinner. yay!

golly gosh, being home now is... so different from just going home for a weekend. instead of me and my parents just sitting around looking at each other and saying "i am so happy to be here with you! it's so nice to see you!" and really meaning it, it's stressful for everybody. but that's understandable. my grandmother is here, which hardly ever happens... she drives my parents crazy, but we all love her anyway. she used to really upset me, but now that she's on paxil and i'm on prozac, granny-karyn relations are at an all-time high! my oldest sister (katie, 25) is also home from london for christmas, which makes me happy times ten to the twenty-third. however, her boyfriend frank is here as well, so you can never get more than 20% of her attention at any given time. that's pretty bothersome. plus, today he smacked her butt in front of me... it was disturbing. at least she has somebody now, and she's not lonely, like she was in japan. that's certainly something for me to be really happy about. ellen's here too, but she's such a homebody that i actually go out and do things by myself. it's quite a departure from my pre-driver's-license life, when i had to sit and mope instead of being able to just go wherever i want whenever i want. so i am extremely thankful for everything that i have right now.

been listening to two cd's that tylor burned a long time ago and let me have. the songs make me so starry-eyed, like "calling you" by blue october. i'm telling you, boys, if you would just burn cd's like this for girls then they would melt into puddles and you could shop-vac them up and marry them. that's not how tylor meant any of it though, but its still nice to listen to it and sigh longingly. good times.

i can't wait until katie's boyfriend leaves, then she and i can actually go out and do things. we're both pretty active compared to the rest of my family, so it's nice to have each other during holidays. plus, we've both got some shopping left. and there's a gingerbread house to be made! and eaten! =) now i'm just waiting for frank and katie to get back from dinner so that the whole family can crowd around the television and watch pirates of the caribbean. my parents, my grandmother, and ellen haven't seen it yet, so i'm excited to share it with everybody.

you guys should e-mail me and let me know how you're doing. karynkiser@hotmail.com... it's so uncreative, but it weeds out the people who can't spell karyn. i heart you... later =)

oh, by the way, here's the lyrics to that blue october song:

there's something that i can't quite explain
i'm so in love with you
you'll never take that away
and if i've said a hundred times before
expect a thousand more
you'll never take that away

well expect me to be
calling you to see
if you're okay when i'm not around,
asking if you love me
i love the way you make it sound
calling you to see
do i too hard to make you smile,
to make us smile...

i will keep calling you to see
if you're sleeping are you dreaming
if you're dreaming, are you dreaming of me?
i can't believe you actually picked me

i thought that the world had lost its sway
(it's so hard sometimes)
then i fell in love with you
(then came you)
and you took that away
(it's not so difficult, the world is not so difficult)

you take away the old, show me the new
and i feel like i can fly when i stand next to you
so while i'm on this phone
a hundred miles from home
i'll take the words you gave
and send them back to you

i only want to see
if you're okay when i’m not around,
asking if you love me
i love the way you make it sound
calling you to see
do i try too hard to make you smile,
to make us smile....

i will keep calling you to see
if you're sleeping are you dreaming
if you're dreaming, are you dreaming of me?
i can't believe you actually picked me...

(nice, eh? sigh...)

i'm home!

and instead of 8 hours, the trip took 6.5 hours, because ellen let me drive the whole way! (i was very "efficient")

more later...

just got an e-mail from kerry. two words from him: "everything cool?" how am i supposed to ever reply to that? "no, kerry, i miss you terribly, i miss everything you represented in my life and it was a terrible mistake to abandon the plans we had just because i was hurt and afraid. i wish you were here, or that i was there, so i could finally give you the kind of hug i never got to give you." but no, of course i reply with "yeah, i'm ok. just wanted to talk to you." girls are weird, too bad i'm one of them.

dear diary... (just kidding.)

today katie feels better. and so i feel better. i was worried that relief would never come for her, and she would keep being sad indefinitely. it's frustrating because no matter how much you want somebody to be ok with something, no matter how much advice you could give them or how many nice things you could do for them, people have to feel better on their own. they have to come to it by themselves. all you can do for the people around you is offer up prayers. but really, thats a powerful thing. we just have to believe in the power of prayer. sometimes that can be the tough part.

today i woke up and cleaned everything out of my old room. and i relinquished my key. then, lunch at taco bell with tylor (only the best for us...). there is this wonderful elderly woman who works the register at taco bell for some reason known only to God (might have something to do with bush and social security, not that i'm bitter). she punches the number so slowly that you want to be mad, but she's so adorable in her old age that you can't be. i ordered four steak soft tacos without cheese, and ended up with six beef soft tacos. but it's alright, because cmon she's old! life is pretty funny sometimes. if i ever have my own sitcom, there will be an old woman who works at a cash register and gives you the wrong stuff. i should probably give her royalties, though, since maybe then she can stop working and people can get what they order. sigh. =)

then tylor and i did laundry. beaucoup de laundry. between switching out clothes, we drove aimlessly around searcy, taking whichever road looked less traveled by. no, nothing like robert frost. i'm pretty sure we narrowly escape the highway at one point. "uh, tylor... i don't like how well-paved the road has suddenly become." i even took him to judsonia. and we just sat in the car sometimes and listened to music. it's nice to be able to do that with somebody. mostly it would be uncomfortable, but it's really not for me.

i said goodbye to laura and adam today. that's not very fun. and i ran into kraus before he left, too. that was pretty lucky, if you believe in that sort of thing.

i think it is pretty darned lame that the boys at harding spend all of their time thinking about girls "back home", or some variation therein. there are so many girls here. and we're lonely too, so quit pining over little miss nonexistent... ok i'm done. i mean, do you know how it feels to that boys prefer girls who are miles and miles over girls here? ok now i'm really done.

christmas break has more or less begun. there's a huge black cloud hanging over campus now, since just about nobody wants to be here anymore. the cafeteria has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING tonight, which surprised me. but now that i think of it, i'm not sure what was so shocking about that. just seems like they've removed the thin veil concealing their total lack of concern for whether or not they produce anything remotely edible. no no, i'm being too hard on them. some things aren't so terrible. none of those things were there tonight, though.

had to say goodbye to jared and katie, which is not my idea of a fun time, but such is life. i will see them in a few weeks, and we will all hopefully have some fun new stories to share with each other. by the end of the week it will just be my family and me. i am 100% thrilled about seeing them all again, though. i love them more than my brain can really comprehend, and i miss them all of the time. i cannot wait to hug my sister. and my mother and father. everybody. =)

i spent most of my afternoon, evening, and night with tylor. we had dinner, returned a movie to hastings, then went to the mcinteer and watched some family guy. i'm pretty sure that i would have fun with tylor no matter what we did. like, if i went in for a root canal, and he came with me, it would be fun. i love it.

so the boy i'm going to be spending my time thinking about over break will most assuredly not be thinking of me. why am i so willing to waste my time? but i'm not going to be sad. my sister is actually describing to me, in detail, the plot of the episode of the nanny that she's watching as i type this. tomorrow is another day. =)

LadybugOP: i'm watching the nanny
daaandelions: shame on you
LadybugOP: the oldest daughter thinks she's pregnant!
LadybugOP: this show has gone too far
LadybugOP: holy crap
LadybugOP: ok get this
LadybugOP: the girl wasn't pregnant
LadybugOP: but fran is
LadybugOP: and she goes home to tell what's his face
daaandelions: ... =)
LadybugOP: and he is going on and on about how happy he is that there won't be a baby in the house (referring to his daughter)
LadybugOP: then he's all "what's the good news you have?"
LadybugOP: and she says ".... the mall is having a shoe sale"
LadybugOP: but really, she's sad
LadybugOP: oh, it pains me
daaandelions: no, ellen. it pains ME.

goodnight blog.

for some reason he's popped back into my head tonight. kerry. i have days where i can't stop thinking about him, wondering what he's doing, wondering if he's happy, wondering whether or not he ever thinks about me anymore. whether or not he knows that his picture is on my wall, and that sometimes i look at it and miss him so bad that my heart really hurts. of course, that's ludicrous because it's been a year and a half or so since i ended it. but january 25th will be here again before i know it. two years since he asked me to be his girlfriend. if i feel this young now, i must have been so much younger then, but it hurts like it was two days ago.

but then again he made me pretty sad sometimes, so maybe it's not really HIM that i miss, maybe it's just the feeling that a boy would be proud to point me out to somebody and say "you see that girl? she's mine." i can't even imagine that happening to me anymore. the world is such a scary place sometimes, and i miss being able to have somebody take my hand and tell me that i don't have to be afraid of it. it's hard to believe that things were actually like that for a long time. i hope that someday God will send me a person to share myself with. even now sometimes when i look for him, i can see him in the people around me. and i really i hope he exists, because i'm already in love with him. not in an i'm-anxious-for-marriage-and-will-rush-into-any-relationship way. i just anticipate somebody really special. i'm willing to wait for the miracle. in the mean time, i wish i weren't so lonely. please, God, fill all of the holes inside of me.

now back to free bird.

today was a fabulous day!

woke up at half past ten, and got ready very slowly for my french final... having only quickly skimmed my notes about fifteen minutes beforehand, i think i did relatively well. wasn't finished until about one o'clock though. but after thinking, speaking, and writing in french for an hour, i go into french mode and my brain gets pretty scrambled... so it's difficult not to respond to people in french. it seems like whenever i left that class this semester, somebody would hold a door for me or something and i would automatically say "merci", as if i were deliberately trying to be the most irritating thing in the world. sigh, good times.

afterwards, i was blessed to find everybody in the student center. very few things make me happy like running into my friends, especially when it's unexpected. when they smile, i want to smile. and they all have really great smiles. go figure. we danced around for a while, literally and figuratively. i even got to see kevin before the break, which was fun and exciting. you know how everybody has a few people that they see around a lot, and even though you don't know them well, it makes you feel good to see them? well, kevin's one of those people. i'd love to get to know him. and no, not just because he's excruciatingly good-looking and makes my heart go pitter-patter. he seems like a genuinely cool person. i mean, c'mon, five iron frenzy. anyway, then katie and i went to get the two towers dvd from adam. i can hardly believe it's been a year since i saw that movie! the time really flies by. when i imagine how much i've changed in the past year, it really blows my mind. makes me wonder where i'll be a year from now. or for that matter, what kind of person i'll be. i hope it's better than the person i am now. or at least, older. hardy har har...

after a short lord-of-the-rings review (i studied harder for that than for all of my finals combined), we went off to the caf for dinner and then to little rock to check out the film. the movie was great! but i will not elaborate on the movie. i will just say that i absolutely love hanging out with katie, adam, and jared. i feel so comfortable. we can sit in silence and it's ok, or we could have a conversation about anything or nothing and it's great. it's pretty balanced, since adam and i seem to be a little bit more hyper than katie and jared... plus, katie keeps me from doing stupid things. which i desperately need when i'm feeling manic. in short, i love my friends. and i think they might love me back. happity happy.

what a strange mood i'm in. this calls for some lynyrd skynyrd. goodnight friends, goodnight blog, goodnight moon.

people seem to think that being dysfunctional is cute and entertaining and maybe even glamorous. they think having strange problems makes them interesting. maybe i'm off on this, but i think the exact opposite. dysfunction is boring. and not at all fun. what makes people interesting to me is how they can overcome dysfunction and their general attitude towards life. everybody has problems, but not everybody has solutions... or at least wants to make progress. this has been on my heart today and i'm not sure why. i hope i am not one of the people i dislike.

i'm finished with finals for today, and boy am i happy about it. for all of the time i spent (and did not spend) studying, i think they were a breeze. it's not the ordeal i had envisioned, so i am a happy karyn.

saddam hussein. i have mixed feelings about this, and i'm frustrated because i don't feel like i should. it seems like we're supposed to just detest him without question, and act surprised when we see him on cnn without a forked tongue. i just don't feel that way though. i'm moved to feel a sadness for his actions and his character. most of all, a hopefulness for him. ok, so he's not a great guy. he might even be evil incarnate... but still, he's not beyond redemption. it just seems like if he's going to be put on trial, he'll receive the death penalty. and i don't feel right with that... not because he doesn't deserve to die (we all deserve to die), but because human life is precious, and he deserves to live (we all deserve to live). i'm not sure how else to put it, but it makes perfect sense in my head. i just wish there was something i could do. i guess it sounds crazy, but i'm praying for saddam hussein.

these past two days have been super great, partially because of sandra. i had some complaints about her... eating my food, spilling stuff on my backpack, just generally being really thin and pretty... =) but honestly, she is a fabulous roommate. she can joke around and knows when to be serious, she can sing and dance and knows when you be quiet. we don't have all that much in common, but i've come to be really fond of her. don't get me wrong, i'm still dropping her like a hot red brick next semester, but i'll miss her a lot. it's been a fun time helping her with english and writing and yelling "my roommate is naked" out the window almost nightly and laughing at the questionable acting in her spanish soap operas. i'm glad to have met somebody so different from me. it taught me a lot.

matty matt matt... matthew. what a great friend he is! so affectionate. i'm not really sure how i feel about things. i love him so much as a friend. maybe it's the same thing katie described to me once, how you can feel so strongly about somebody and not know how to express it except for romantically. but expressing it romantically would be incredibly misleading and i would never do it, so maybe matt will never know how much i care about him or how absurdly special he is to me. God didn't bless me with a real brother, but He sure blessed me with so many fake ones. =) matt, andrew, james, charles, philip, zach, all of the boys i've met at harding. i would do anything for these people.

i can feel the Holy Spirit. i had forgotten how hungry i was for it. i don't ever want to be without it.

i just studied geology for about two hours... and i'm rewarding myself by taking a little bit of time to post.

today, for the first time in a long time, i really feel alive. i feel life pumping through my veins. i feel the Holy Spirit bringing me thoughts, wonderful heavenly thoughts. today i realized that i can change myself for the better, and for the better of everybody around me. and today i really want to start. every single situation in life is an opportunity to show love to the people around me, to live the life God has meant for me. instead of everything being a setup for a silly joke, maybe i can start taking everything as a means for loving in actions and truth. i really want to do this. for me, for the people around me, and for my God. and for the first time i feel like its possible. praise the Lord.

more later.

what a day! and almost nothing happened, really.

i didn't miss any classes today, for one. that's quite an accomplishment considering the amount of class i've blown off to wallow in bed this week. being sick really puts things into perspective... you think classes are really important until you have a legitimate reason to skip them all. sigh, good times...

so... yesterday i told a boy that i liked him. which in itself is a pretty big deal, because i'm not usually that bold or open (despite how i act in every other situation underneath the sun), so i was proud. but then things kinda went to crap, because i guess he thought it was a bigger deal than it was supposed to be. i didn't tell him because i wanted anything from him, it was just because it's a nice thing for a person to know. i mean, i thought so. it is, right? right?! anyway, if i had needed anything from him, i would certainly not have been courageous enough to share myself with him. it's only when there's nothing at stake that i can bust out in bouts of openness. i guess its not too courageous after all. but still. anyway, i think he likes my other friend. no big deal. so i'm sad for about 15 minutes later that day. but my being sad is only distantly related to the feelings of said guy. mostly, i'm disappointed in the way things are shaping up for me romantically. i feel like i've given up a lot to be at this school this year... ANY other college, japanese, being an exchange student, another year of high school to be irresponsible and mess around and make stupid mistakes, a national merit scholarship, my parents... tons of things, in my mind. and i mean, CMON, CHRISTIAN COLLEGE... the one thing i didn't worry about was not meeting a boy. life's like that though. last night i was sad, and today i feel fine. boys can't make me happy, happiness comes from inside of me. and sometimes it's difficult to really believe that, but i think today i had it down. i didn't feel bad about that. anyway, what was the point of this? oh yes. i am SO not mad at my friend for this. i feel like i should be, because any normal carbon-based lifeform would be. but for some reason God took that feeling away from me way before i even felt it. i just feel peaceful. and i sorta think it's funny. maybe not laugh out loud funny, but it makes me smirk at least. life is funny sometimes. at the very least, we should be able to laugh at it. anyway, i think that a big part of why i'm so thankful for this peace i feel is because i value my relationship with my friend ridiculously more than my relationship with this guy. i don't know what i would do if i actually was upset by the situation, cause i dont really deserve how cool she is. i think my body would reject my mind... that might be fun to watch.

i saw shelby today. and for about five minutes i thought "wow, i remember why i really dug this guy". then after i spent a while with him, i remembered why it wasn't such a good idea for us to have a boy-girl-likey type relationship. but we will make good friends, and i forgot what a fun time he is. he really puts you at ease and we can joke around effortlessly. plus he's tall. thank goodness for tall guys.

politics. religion. mixing them, discussing it, arguing about it... interesting stuff. i wish they manufactured some sort of stop-caring-so-much herbal supplement for this, but alas i have to actually live with how much i care. i think that a huge part of why i miss my parents so freakishly much is that i feel safe and secure with myself when i'm inside our home with them. like i can really believe anything and its ok. but listen to me, the way i talk you'd think people were attacking me with venomous snakes. it's not so bad. i just care so much!

wow, i just looked outside. the snow is sticking to the ground, how beautiful! but i'll get to that later.

yes, politics. separation of church and state? seems like we dont want the government to have any say in the church so how about the church doesnt dictate the government too? just makes sense to me. would christians support legislation about kids in schools praying towards mecca five times a day? do we want our kids to pledge allegience to one nation under joseph smith? i don't think so. then why are we so upset about granting religious minorities the freedom we enjoy? how about religious freedom for everybody? seems fair to me. and abortion? to me, making absolute statements about abortion is strange... to me it isnt always right or wrong. sometimes its the best of several bad choices. i honestly believe that. not for crackwhore welfare moms to dispose of unwanted mouths to feed, or for college students who want to have all sorts of casual sex and get rid of the consequences. but maybe somebody like my mom, who might get pregnant and find out her baby is anasephalic... that baby has no brain. they have a face and nothing behind it. they dont even look human. they cannot survive outside of the womb. does the mother have to go full term and wait for the baby to die? there's just not easy answers to these questions. mostly you just pray it never happens to you, and you never have to make the decision. and guess what, boys never will. and then gay marriage. whether or not its called "marriage" it just seems like it should be legal. not because i'm a big supporter of that lifestyle, but because they are human beings supposedly living in the land of the free. there are legal complications that they have because its not recognized by most states and they just shouldnt have to just sit by and live with it... just at the very basic level. legal recognition. it's not marriage in a church, folks. just a civil rights thing. i really could just keep typing about this, for hours and hours. i feel like God designed me to be a person who has these issues heavy on their heart. thats really the only way to explain why i care.

yes. the snow. since my roommate is honduran and all, she's getting all sorts of calls (now. at 2 freakin' a.m.) telling her about how its snowing now. well, our phone needs to charge, and right now we can't turn it on. so it just rings and rings at 2 in the morning until our little message plays. it just started ringing again. no joke. no, of course its not irritating at all. i dont mind... im sure the girls around our room dont mind either. they probably think its a really funny joke. we're all sharing a good laugh about it. (i wish i were dead. no, not me. these people who are calling me and leaving messages in spanish.) but enough sarcasm. par-tay!

so thats my day. i doubt tomorrow will stir such a post. don't worry.

oh gosh my phone is ringing again. ooh, seething hatred. and on that note, i'm going to bed. =)