looking back on today:

hello, readers!

another year ends. at this rate, i'll be lying face up in a rosewood coffin soon. 2008 was an epic year in many ways: birth of the iphone, record gas prices, 2008 olympics in beijing, &c. while i scarcely compare to such milestones in our world's history, i believe that 2008 was also an interesting year in the life of andrea. i'm no obama-- and don't pretend to be-- but here's a little blog post dedicated to giving me some "media" attention beyond my previous blog posts:

in 2008, i moved 3 times: from my parents' house to vista, to the yellow house in hillview, and to my own lovely apartment.

in 2008, my ipod music collection grew from 0 on 12/25/2007 to its now present size of 1573 songs and 2 videos.

in 2008, i was officially single for the entire year. the dating scene appalls me in so many ways. but in 2008, i also shopped around a little and unofficially hung out with: an immature army boy/fling from high school, a book-reading boy from the navy, a deceivingly perfect-for-me MFA student with nerdy glasses, a cardiologist, a tall army engineer from hawaii who reads hunter s. thompson, a tortured emo kid, and my ex of 4 years.

in 2008, i fell in love with japanese delicacies: sushi, miso soup, and saki.




in 2008, i experienced las vegas for the first time. with kim at my side, we explored airports, casinos, dark and smoky clubs, limousines, designer clothes shops, the bellagio fountains, the best sausage ever, swimming pools, andrea getting carded to buy a bottle of water (yes, it really happened), a bonafide VIP suite at studio 54, and dangerous cab rides.


in 2008, i became a gaming nerd. from fowl words on miniclip to rock band on xbox to color junction on igoogle, i started losing sleep over the arrangements of dangerously attractive pixels.


in 2008, i jealously coveted young hollywood's glamour.


in 2008, i learned more about teaching and read more teaching theory-- to no avail and to great impact, simultaneously.

in 2008, i witnessed two namings of america's next top model through the glorious, all-real television: plus-size southern belle whitney and painfully gorgeous mckey.

in 2008, i wrote a lot. i dabbled in creative nonfiction, and my love for poetry was renewed with ENGl 406G. i journaled almost every day from may to october. i wrote finalized 13 poems, and i am the most proud of my creative writing that i've ever been.

in 2008, i ended my teaching career at boise state. i also gave up my totally sweet office.


in 2008, i discovered ed hardy and betsey johnson.

in 2008, i was walked on and taken advantage of. in 2008, i lied, cried, and vowed revenge. in 2008, i was scared, lonely, and vulnerable. in 2008, i was selfish, self-centered and vain. in 2008, i saw a chance for a brighter discontent.

in 2008, my friend amy got married, as did my high school crush.

in 2008, i became an educated woman.



in 2008, i presently look forward to a better 2009. my deepest, most sincere wishes to you in the new year-- always.

tell me what you don't like about yourself.

a few years ago, i unassumingly flipped through television channels and stopped: on my screen in a dashing blue collared shirt, dr. christian troy pouted with his perfectly shaped bottom lip to his plastic surgery partner sean mcnamara about sucking the fat out of a size 2. words like "ethics" blurred with the sound of expensive shiny shoes tapping on the floor. a gorgeous white lamp glowed in the background.

when i subscribed to netflix, i browsed through the TV section (bad bad bad bad idea), and found "nip/tuck." i added all seasons. approximately 3 months later, i've watched all four seasons, or approximately 24 discs, or roughly 72 episodes.

let me attempt to explain how i could fall so in love with ryan murphy's brilliant show about plastic surgery in south beach, miami (even though it's actually filmed in los angeles):

1. the characters are dramatic but three dimensional. christian is a womanizer (oh. womanizer. oh.) but was sexually abused as a foster child by his father. sean tries to fix his son conor's disability because he, at one point in time, suffered from a physical abnormality that caused his parents to divorce. ava is really a man. and julia is beautiful, smart, and tragic.

2. after watching a DVD extra on the set design for "nip/tuck," i can't stop craving cold furniture, circular reflection ponds, and green & gray together. everything about this show's sets makes me dreamy.

3. you learn valuable lessons like: don't take blood money from drug lords because bad people like escobar gallardo will demand a facial reconstruction and then point a gun at your head, don't take a pretty face home from a bar or you may wake up without a kidney, and don't believe a man's rating system-- an 8 is wonderful.

4. joely richardson is magnificent. i love her. l.o.v.e her.

5. speaking of miss joely, john hensley is actually only 12 years younger than joely-- even though he plays her 18-year-old son on the show.

6. gerbils shit. a lot. and flushing them down the toilet is not a good idea.

7. just when i think i am numb and can't possibly be moved by anything, "nip/tuck" explores the devastating effects of alzheimers and a dedicated wife who undergoes intense surgery to look 20 years younger so her sick husband will recognize her. and julia decides to leave sean (again) but runs back to him outside the airport and whispers: "i love you, you know" as she wraps her slender arms around his neck. and christian is raped-- by a man.

8. everyone has flaws. some you can't see; others you can; all are what make us human.

a dear student

i complain a lot, don't i? it's such a misrepresentation of my life; i am continually reminded of the many blessings that enrich and complete me.

for example:

1. i have a fabulous new apartment all to myself. i can set the heater at 62 (please believe it, because anything else is a waste of money; that's why God invented fleece zip-ups and socks), i never have to look at a dirty dish collecting mold on the kitchen table, and i have a great view of several trees and an empty pond.

2. i love my peers, and i almost cried tonight when i walked to my car after saying goodbye to jessica after our last 561 class of the semester-- of ever.

3. i realize that no phd program will ever accept me based on my lack of scholarly research, publications, etc., but at least i don't slander the literary name like jodie foster did in "the brave one": she used robert frost's line of poetry "i could not stop for death so he kindly stopped for me" as her justification for her vigilante killing spree.

4. on the last day of 101, one of my students came up to me afterwards and said he was sad that our class was over. (insert my heart breaking here.)

then he asked if it was okay that he signed up for an hour block to go over his portfolio with me during conferences. he said our unit 3 conference helped him a lot and he wanted to make sure he had enough time for the portfolio conference. both unit 3 and portfolio conferences were optional. (insert pieces of broken heart breaking into smaller pieces.)

and then during our hour long conference going over two of his poems, he said, "can i come back later this week to talk about my short story? this is so helpful. i don't know what i'd do without you."

i thought my students had stolen my soul, tortured it with their eye-rolling, taunted it with their finger-guns silently blowing out their nonexistent brains, and crushed its vibrant desires into runny pulp and squelched dreams. but this student's comments reminded me that i do indeed still have a soul.

and that soul will miss teaching.

i'm not in denial... i just refuse to listen to your truth.

i graduate in approximately 9 days. in 9 days, i could drive across the country. in 9 days, i could listen to "brighter discontent" by the submarines over 3,103 times. in 9 days, i will be unemployed.

my impending poverty makes me question my recent purchases that could have provided 6 months of groceries, like the above betsey johnson dress. add the ed hardy watch and you're approaching 8. add the nina shoes and you're at 10. add my diamond necklace and you're at 2.5 years. all for one outfit. (i'll insert here that the black shrug was only $6 on clearance at vanity!) the occassion that calls for such extravagance: the 4th annual english majors association banquet.

nevermind that the theme of said banquet was "the great depression." boxes of baking soda, mac and cheese, and canned corn were the centerpieces. a brown, worn boot accepted donations.

two of my friends' fathers have been laid off in the past week. another friend works 2 jobs and complains about the whiny "masters holders" that work at starbucks with her. the career center rep from BSU bemoans the sudden dearth of off-campus job postings.

i'd like to think that even albertson's needs someone to arrange the red, shiny apples just right. or some lazy CEO needs a girl to staple his revised budget reports and proposed productivity increases. or bath and body works needs an "elf" in a green apron to offer product scents and squirts of lotion.

leave me to my denial. let me bask in the glory of unfulfilled expectations. it's nothing that i'm not used to.

i can't be who you are.

i just woke up for the last time at my lovely little yellow hillview house. my room is bare except for my (gutted) desk, bed, and computer. some of my landlord's furniture lines the walls-- all empty. i feel like every keyboard stroke shatters against the bare blue paint, echoes glaringly off the gold curtains (now limp and pulled taut across the windows), and weighs heavily on the floorboards that creak with my last footsteps across the knots and separating planks.

i won't lie-- i'll miss pieces of you. but for the pieces i won't, i've boxed up our memories, sealed them tightly in a circular, green box and left them for you in the corner. parcel them out yourself.

be warned: you'll find cobwebs of wide smiles, dusty lint that whispers late night conversations stuck on repeat, and many, many pictures of regret.

goodbye, you bastard. may you reign here as unhappy as you were when i first shook your hand and fell for the mask they all still ignorantly accept.

i suddenly understand:

i heard a line somewhere (perhaps read a line somewhere) that's something like this: "at the precipice edge we stand alone." sounds pretty dark, right?

but that's where i am right now.

in many aspects of my life, i've reached the end:

-the end of my student days at boise state
-the end of my masters degree
-the end of my conversations with fellow TAs about the meta-meta-metaness of rhet/comp theory
-the end of my teaching faithful yet heartless 101 students
-the end of my cohabitation with a guy i used to really admire and who seemed to emulate all those wonderful bookish-writerly things that i never was
-the end of living with roommates.ever. (husbands don't count)
-the end of purchasing spendy (and now very mainstream) ed hardy items online, since i now have a rent payment/utils to pay for SOLO
-the end of vacillating freely in the far-off notion that someday i'll have to make a decision

because i've reached the edge of the precipice. and i am alone. i won't have my student peers to remind me of how english studies dumb i am, or students to email me frantically in the middle of the night so that the first thing i do in the morning is check my "teacher" email, or loudly thunking footsteps outside my door in the AM.

i wish i could describe the view from here, but i'm afraid of opening my eyes. i wish i could dance and sashay my hips a little to celebrate that i've made it. i'm here. i've arrived.

just please tell me it's not a dead end. i don't have wings to fly. and i don't have the guts to jump.

personal essaying

last night, i sat down and wrote a segmented personal essay. it gets better: not just any personal essay, but a personal essay that i assigned for my students. i sat down in my cozy, welcoming office (*sudden outburst of hysterical laughter distracts writer*) and looked over my own assignment sheet for unit one.

i asked my students to explore the question, "why write?" which framed my entire 101 semester. we brainstormed some reasons in class, and the activities we did responded to their ideas. but it was my turn to share why i write with my students, and i referred to a list of brainstorming questions i gave them almost 10 weeks ago.

not only did i stare at the blank screen for longer than expected, but i found myself bullshitting my own assignment. "ha, i write because i have to. neener." "i write because i'm emo." oh man, is this what happened for my students too? and why did i feel the need to mock an activity that i use to define myself-- my interests-- my goals in life?

perhaps i was uncomfortable admitting to my students how seriously i really do enjoy writing. it's not a choice for me. i write because i am a shriveled up, cranky, apathetic mess without it. how could i possibly share that with them? i'd seem like a freak. (who wears ed hardy shoes. i just have to add that because i'm staring at my pink shoes with a bright koi fish staring back at me. loves.)

but i am a freak.

aren't you too? don't you write because you have something to say? and not just anything: but something you deem important enough to set pen to paper (or-- who am i kidding-- finger to keyboard)? writing is selfish; writing is self-centered; writing is--

self.

it could always be worse:

greetings, dear blog readers (all 2 of you!). i've been noticeably absent lately, and i whole-heartedly blame this on a number of things-- including the typical "i've been busying updating my facebook status... isn't that enough to appease you people?!" excuse-- but i also point the finger at the increasing emo attitude that has sunk into the return of my purple eyeliner and 3 skimmer shoe purchases lately.

(the shoes are cute though. one pair is black with blue and purple stars on them. not at all emo. stop looking at me like that.)

it seems like any post that i wanted to start would probably detail how miserable grad school makes me right now (including no literature classes...it's sooooo great that i'm pursuing a degree that doesn't offer any interesting classes at the right time for its students!), or how i die a little inside each day i walk to my 101 classes, or how much i hate being single and i'm becoming increasingly convinced that i am utterly undesireable and destined to reign domestically alongside 10 ferrets and closets full of ed hardy shirts.

but, in all reality, school is much better than i thought it would be. and my students are actually fabulous writers with incredibly rich backgrounds and beliefs about writing. and my love life would probably improve if my choice in boys would likewise improve.

so, you ask, what is your deal? can you find nothing to celebrate?

boise's rapid descent into winter has begun with the threat of rain, chilly mornings, and almost overnight change of leaf colors. this morning after i woke with a killer hangover (from my attempts to drown my emo outlook with blue boar beer and season two of "arrested development"), i made a special trip to campus to print and deliver an article for a student (i care too much, even though i said i wouldn't). on the way there, i selected p!nk's new song "so what" to blast on my stereo, slapped on my hot pink aviators, and slung my left arm over my steering wheel like a bad-a from mo-town in central cali.

i floored it. so what? i'm still a rockstar. i've got my rock moves, and i don't need you. and guess what? i'm havin more fun. and now that we're done, i'm going to show you tonight: i'm all right, i'm just fine, and you're a tool. so... so what? i am a rockstar. i've got my rock moves. and i don't want you tonight. p!nk is surprisingly therapeutic.

as i rounded the corner, i passed a lady in a light blue tank and sweats walking a large brown dog. her head whipped around to look at me with scorn as i passed. so i backed off on the gas. it's probably not a good idea for retired women with a penchant for punishing reckless driving youths to know my car and where i live.

as the corner straightened out, i slammed on the brakes so hard my ipod flew off my seat and landed on the floor.

at least 10 squirrels.

frolicking on the asphalt.

chasing, ducking, tumbling, chattering (i suppose). playing. gathering. together.

i sat there in my car watching their friendly tag. i realized how much i love boise at this time of year. if i wasn't teaching and had a "real" full-time job, i would have missed this sight. if i wasn't a student of writing, i may not have the right skills to present these miniature experiences so that you, dear reader, might appreciate it too.

oh, autumn. let me fall with you.

whilst most turn to their religious book of choice, i turn to moby-dick.

"Again: as the profound calm which only apparently precedes and prophesies of the storm, is perhaps more awful than the storm itself; for, indeed, the calm is but the wrapper and envelope of the storm; and contains it in itself, as the seemingly harmless rifle holds the fatal powder, and the ball, and the explosion; so the graceful repose of the line, as it silently serpentines about the oarsmen before being brought into actual play-- this is a thing which carries more true terror than any other aspect of this dangerous affair. But why say more? All men live enveloped in whale-lines. All are born with halters around their necks; but it is only when caught in the swift, sudden turn of death, that mortals realize the silent, subtle, ever-present perils of life. And if you be a philosopher, though seated in the whale-boat, you would not at heart feel one whit more of terror, than though seated before your evening fire with a poker, and not a harpoon, by your side."

We try to live honest lives, but like the seamen on the Pequod, death circles us-- often unbeknownst-- like a whirlpool in my coffee cup or a steady wind from the east.

los angeles: the city of traffic, palm trees, mark, and more

listen:
as i pack for my second summer trip--to las vegas (with my bff kim texting me every hour or so asking if i've packed yet... she's been packing for a week now)-- i realized that i didn't blog about my last trip to los angeles. after a tumultuous beginning of summer-- with my teaching/student dilemma, dumb boys, and moving into a new place (complete with my ex-friend-current-roommate-"awkward"'s shrinking my laundry, insulting my family, and telling me to "move the fuck out"... good times!), i really needed a break. i haven't felt this bitter about and spiteful towards people and life in a really long time, so i booked a flight to a city that makes everyone feel like they belong: los angeles. (can you sense the viscosity of sarcasm here?) my friend from junior high, mark, graciously offered to let me visit him and his new residence.

instead of giving you a detailed account of everything that we crammed into 3.5 days, here are some of the highlights:

- i toted kurt vonnegut's breakfast of champions with me to read on the plane, along with 5 fashion magazines. i read vonnegut the entire way there, immersed in the american life of kilgore trout and dwayne hoover. i pondered over words like "legume" and decided i want to start every piece of writing with "listen:" hovering over my prose.

- there are birds in LAX. no joke. chirping birds.

- upon arriving, mark informed me that his place was broken into the night before. the primary suspect is a 10-year-old boy who lives next door. however, little convict-in-training stole mark's keys, including ones to his home and car. that meant:

- going to in-n-out burger was a must before our ride departed. i would marry in-n-out.



- i got my butt kicked at trivial pursuit: dvd edition. it didn't ask me the important stuff: angelina jolie, britney spears, or "america's next top model."

- los angeles zoo! we spent 5.5 hours walking around, eating cold treats, wondering why the wax figurine makers were out of commissions, marking off all the viewed exhibits on the map (i left that up to mark), watching the "world of birds" show, and taking funny pictures like this:


(i love the camel's mouth. it's a black cavernous hole.)

- visiting mark's old seminary school, mostly because he treated me to a wonderful sushi dinner and warm sake in old pasadena:



- experiencing the getty museum: garden tour, bernini exhibit, and soaking in all the wonders of art. at the peru exhibit, a botanist drew a picture of a morning glory and assigned a latin phrase to it (here translating in english): "on the same day brings forth and ends it." beautiful.



- "nothing but beethoven" by the los angeles philharmonic symphony at the hollywood bowl. this was perhaps one of the coolest musical experiences i've ever had. if you look closely, you can see the hollywood sign above the bowl in the hills above it:



- hearing (which i did at venice beach) and seeing (from the getty) the ocean (at the same time) in santa monica:


- realizing that no matter where i go, i still feel so small. the world is such a big place; i'll leave this earth only having come to know a miniscule percentage of all it has to offer: