the thin line between optimism and delusion…

I have been thinking about the adjustments that have to be made in order to survive law school. A couple of them are adjustments from college to law school – as opposed to simply real life (which I have little experience with) to law school, but regardless, these are the things I struggle with.

1. I struggle with getting actual work done during the day. In college, I studied at night. Unless I was writing a paper the hours before it was due in the morning, I studied exclusively at night. I think better at night. I focus better at night. Actually, I think too much at night and studying is a good way to not dwell on other things. Well, in law school, studying during the day is required if only because there is so much work to be done. Also, if you think about it, in the real world I am going to be required to do work during the day and not at night. I guess it is something I need to learn anyway – but I honestly and completely prefer to study at night.

2. I struggle with the wireless internet. Right now, I am in class. I should be paying attention to my professor who is engaging and animated – but instead I am writing this. On one hand sometimes I can listen better when I am doing something else, but I’m sure I would learn more if didn’t play on the web. On the same note, I would fall asleep in class more often if I didn’t have the internet.

3. I struggle with being under the microscope. I am being watched, I know I am. Some people pay attention to how much I eat, others keep track of how much time I spend in the library, others observe who I hang out with, who I spend too much time with, how many days I have missed of a certain class, who I left the bar with Friday night, how often I work out, when I started outlining, if I read for class today, etc. I know that this is all part of being an intense environment, and I know that I do it too. College allows us to be anonymous on many levels that law school does not. Just because I am paranoid doesn’t mean someone isn’t following me.

4. I struggle with my professional self esteem. I ooze self esteem in most parts of my life, but for some reason I can’t be confident about my place in the working world. The rejections suffered in law school have negatively impacted me. But I think this goes back before law school, it goes back to the first disillusionments of college. I have so many people that believe in me, but at the same time it has been a long time since I felt truly good at something. Also, I have never gotten anything I have ever interviewed for. I am great at cocktail parties, terrible at interviews. It amazes me, I really don’t understand.

5. I struggle with self discipline, time management, and staying focused. Not much to be said about that. Once I start to get really stressed, I start to lose things and misplace stuff, which just makes me more stressed. I am learning. Law school is a great exercise in accomplishing a task with little to no guidance or direction because what works for one person is not going to work for another, so it is all about figuring it out on your own. Kinda like a concentrated version of life.

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Isn’t amazing how God can tell you things through the books you read? If you don’t think this is true, then maybe you should read more (just kidding). Sometimes I get restless and start to despair that the things I really want out of life aren’t going to happen. Then I come across passages that really calm me and give me a peace about life. I have been reading A Circle of Quiet by Madeline L’Engle – and I put it down for a couple of weeks, and when I picked it up this week, I was comforted.

Madeline L’Engle wrote A Wrinkle in Time, which is one of my favorite books of all time. But it took Madeline years to find a publisher for A Wrinkle in Time. A publisher who had rejected the book made her realize that timing was everything with the book, if it had been published immediately, it might not have been as well received. When reflecting on how long it took for someone to believe in her book – this is what Madeline has to say –

“Thank you, God, for not giving in to my importunate demands.”

This is my new motto. I need to remember that things happen on God’s time, and not my time, so I just need to chill out.

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Keith Urban won the Country Music Award for best male vocalist!!! I love him so much! Honestly, he has been my favorite for about three years now, and I am so happy for him that he won! He was so dumbfounded – I love it when people are shocked when they win awards – nothing is better. Okay, sorry, had to gush.

ps. Libby met Keith Urban a couple of weeks ago!! OMG! I might have passed out. (I don’t normally feel like this about famous people, but for him I can make an exception).

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I went to movie last night with roommate and friends. We saw Alfie. I can’t stop thinking about it. I found it quite depressing. I guess I should have assumed that a story of careless living would carry with it dark moments, but I wasn’t prepared for the whole movie to be dark. This is me being naive – I wouldn’t expect a movie about hard drugs to have a very happy tone – and although Alfie is not about hard drugs – he has a disregard about others that mirrors that of someone on drugs. Well, that might not be fair, because on some level he is unaware of how much he is damage he is doing to others – and how much he is becoming damaged. The movie made marriage seem depressing, and it also made being single seem depressing. I definitely think a lot of people could get a good message out of the story, but overall it was not an uplifting flick. The photography was unbelievable – and all the people in the movie were gorgeous. It was visually stimulating. Maybe it was just too realistic a look at the human condition. Not being a realist myself, sometimes I am jarred by it.

I have two new words that I like a lot. Actually, they aren’t new words, but they are words that most people use incorrectly – or don’t actually know what they mean. Temperance and Prudence. Temperance is not abstaining from things, it is knowing when enough is enough – for you. So everyone should have a different level of temperance, and everyone has to find it for themselves. For some people, temperance is abstaining. It is all about being able to stay in control. Prudence is taking into account the repercussion of your actions – thinking about how your actions are going to affect those around you and yourself in the future. Now, I’m not advocating being Prudent all the time, but I think part of being Prudent is simply being aware of the repercussion, even if you decide to disregard the consequences at the moment of action. Because simply being aware of the consequences adds new meaning to the action and allows you to anticipate and be responsible for the end result. Alfie lacked Prudence. Because it never occurred to him to think about what might happen, when bad things did happen, he didn’t feel the responsibility that would have allowed him to learn a lesson. So he made the same mistake again and again. But Alfie did have Temperance about some things, enough to keep him from ending up on the street without a job or a place to live. He had just enough temperance for self preservation, but not enough to save those around him from destruction.

Okay, sorry, deep thoughts for a Tuesday. I feel better now.

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I had the most unbelievable weekend – and the best thing about it was that nothing overly spectacular happened. I mean, I was in New York, which was awesome, but the reason it was so awesome is because some of my favorite people were there – and it all fell into place. I will give a cast of characters: (I have a lot of best friends – I see this as a class of people, not a ranking)
Libby – best friend from home, went to the university of maryland to swim, moved to new york this summer.
Maggie – another best friend from home, carpool friend from kindergarten, 5th grade best friend, pledge sister in college, and roommate last year. Maggie moved to New York last week with Emily.
Emily – best friend from kindergarten, went to Notre Dame and worked in Milwalkee until moving to New York last week.
Jennifer – best friend from college, also from Augusta, also roommate from last year, a year younger than the rest of us, very important person in college, also in sorority with maggie and me. Just moved to D.C. but is not settled yet.

Originally, Jennifer was not coming to the city, but Thursday decided to take the train. This was very exciting, because Jennifer and Libby and Maggie are three people that I miss a great deal. I am used to missing Libby, because we haven’t lived in the same town since high school, but I haven’t lived away from Jennifer and Maggie ever – and I am used to seeing them on an everyday basis. I was on the verge of tears just thinking about seeing Libby and Maggie in the same place, but throw Jennifer into it and I was a wreck. Actually, I was just ecstatic.

It was pouring down rain on Thursday when I arrived in New York, and this was a huge hassle, but after the rain stopped that night, the weather was perfect and mild and beautiful and windy and wonderful.

Things I learned this weekend:
1. Not all Karaoke bars are the same. Some are scary and dark and creepy.
2. Hunan Chinese food is very, very, very spicy – to a degree that I can’t handle.
3. Chinese food tastes good with Miller Lite tall boys – especially if you drink the beer out of the little tea cups on the table.
4. Some people in New York are still so upset about the election that simply being from a red state is enough to merit abuse.
5. Bars that don’t have names on them and look like a random warehouse in the front can be really great if you have the best group of people with you.
6. Doing handstands on the sidewalk is fun, doing headstands is less fun.
7. Marathon runners are really accomplished and impress me greatly (they make jennifer and nick feel bad about themselves – like, what did you do today? oh, I ran a marathon. Really? I slept in and ate a huge brunch and drank a bloody mary).
8. Central Park is so pretty, if I lived in New York I would have to spend a great deal of time there just to make up for the craziness outside the park.
9. If the Chinese food at dinner is too spicy, just go down the street and get a Gyro – I promise that it will make you feel better.
10. Football is always fun to watch on Saturday in the fall.
11. Pizza is ALWAYS good in new york.
12. Frozen hot chocolate is yummy, but if you eat the whole thing, you could feel sick (kinda like how jaeger is fun, but doen’t drink the whole bottle!).
13. Pumpkin Spice Lattes are great fun and taste like liquid fall (leaves, deep blue skies, warm kitchens, brisk winds, cool grass, warm sunshine, warm cookies, big hugs, sandwich from ham straight out of oven, apples, pecan pie, sweet potatoes, sweaters and fresh bread).
14. EVERYONE has an iPod on the subway.
15. I am so lucky to have such awesome friends and I have no right to complain about anything because I have such wonderful people in my life. In addition to having such great friends, I am in a position to visit them and have spectacular experiences. This has been the greatest year of my life when it comes to opportunities and experiences, I feel so blessed and happy.

p.s. If you haven’t caught on by now, I am a bit of a gusher. All weekend they made of fun of me, being like, so Charlsie, how are you feeling right now? which was enough to launch me into a monologue of how happy I was and how much I loved everyone. I think enthusiasm is important.

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Sometimes I don’t think about. I really have wonder friends in Athens. But every once in a while, I get a voicemail (when did we stop calling them messages?), or I think about a certain problem in my life…..or I hear a song……and a wave washes over me, my chest tightens, my heart aches, and I can’t help but sighing……..(this is where I would shed a tear if I was a crier).

There are certain friends that I will never be able to reconcile my life far away from. I used to think that I couldn’t live far away from Georgia because of these friends. But oh the irony. They have almost all moved away and left me here. Thankfully, some are in Atlanta – which is a lifesaver. I talked on my cell phone 3000 minutes last month. Yep, that is about an hour and a half a day.

But the good news is that I am going to see two of these special people tomorrow when I go to New York. I am excited about seeing the city and everything, it has been a couple of years – but more importantly, I am looking forward to recharging with Libby and Maggie. I miss them so much. How come you miss people the most right before you see them?

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said I wasn’t going to watch this show, but some-how-or-nother I got sucked into it. I spent the last hour watching Wife Swap. On one hand, I think it is a sort of sick idea, but on the other hand (if this episode is any indication), it seems to really make people appreciate what they have. It makes me realize how crazy people are in general and what extremes can be found in this nation. It also makes me realize how lucky I am to have grown up in such a great family. I think that ABC must try really hard to find the most polar opposite families for the swap. Lets look at tonight’s two families:
Family A – California:
1. Three boys
2. Mom wakes up at 5:30 every morning and works out for three hours every day – she is a former body builder. She eats raisins when she is hungry.
3. Boys will be woken up at 6 in the morning if they don’t finish all of their chores – which include laundry, dishes, and trash.
4. Father is OCD and cleans compulsively.

Family B – Florida
1. Two boys
2. Mom doesn’t cook – if it can’t be microwaved or picked up – it isn’t eaten in this house.
3. Boys are never woken up, Mom thinks they should be able to sleep as late as they want to.
4 . Father has never cleaned anything in his life. Neither have boys. Mom does everything.

So they swap for two weeks, and the first week the mom follows the other mom’s routine, and the second week the family follows the new mom’s routine.

If you can’t tell, this is a disaster waiting to happen. OCD father can’t follow the rules, Mom B can’t work out for three hours a day…….I guess it is kind of interesting to watch, but also a bit painful. Not something I would set the TiVo for, if I had a TiVo. But I don’t even like to think about what else would happen if I had a TiVo…..I have a bit of an obsessive personality.

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Everyone is very fired up today. It is exciting, as I have said before, I love people that are passionate. But I’m not that passionate about this. (shhhhh, don’t tell anyone, I might get jumped in the law library). Don’t worry, I took a couple of hours out of my life and the lives of a couple of complying friends to drive to Augusta and participate in early voting. I kinda wish I was registered in Athens, because they seem to have a lot more things to vote for. Augusta didn’t have that many, and about half of the people I voted for didn’t have anyone running against them. The only big thing in Augusta was the SPLOST part of the ballot. Another reason I need to get registered in Athens is because I don’t know what is going on in Augusta. I voted against SPLOST because my good friend’s parents had VOTE NO TO SPLOST! all over their yard and I noticed it on the way to the poll (that and the fact that I didn’t think they should turn regency mall into a sports complex, we barely use the civic center as it is).

I know it is amazing that I am discussing local politics when I should have lots to say about the presidential election just like everyone else. But, in my opinion, there is no way to know what will happen either way. I’m not educated in political science enough to make intelligent comments about the possible ramifications of the decision, either way. I am glad that people care, I do think it is important. I like being around people with strong views, both sides. And I have certain strong views. But I can’t say that either candidate shares all, or even most of my strong views. Don’t worry, I voted, but I didn’t enjoy it.

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I had a spectacular weekend. I don’t have time to give all the details, but lets just say that I look like a kid that just got back from an irresponsible summer camp. I have bug bites all over me and lots of bruises. Bug bites are what happens when spend too much time outside in rural Georgia and bruises are what happen when you (or at least, I) drink beer. Drove down Thursday with Anne and Cristina – stopped through in Augusta so I could vote (we also ate lunch with my dad at favorite sandwich place, picked up food from my mom, and kissed the dogs).

Friday we spent the day on the beach, it was 85 degrees and partly cloudy. And everywhere I looked was an old friend and a new friend. There was a dance off around 5 – involving mostly guys – that a large portion of the beach took part in. Friday night was random and scattered – chatted with old boyfriends and old crushes – it was like a time warp – but also tons of fun – and I made the correct decision to go home with my friends before it got to late. Okay, I will give details, I’ve already started.

Allison brought me back all the stuff I left in Sea Island from Saturday night when I went to the house she was staying in for a dance party and a late night swim after we got off the bus. Important things recovered:
1. Cell phone
2. Black rainbow flip flops which I love with all my being
3. Digital Camera – complete with exceptional photos from the weekend.
4. Adorable leather flask purchased in Rome that holds great sentimental value and which I just recently recovered from parents home.
5. New Koozie from North Atlanta National Bank – Jessie’s contribution to the weekend.
6. A bit of cash that I desperately need.
7. Favorite Lipstick collection (chubby, lipstick, two glosses, and a tube chap stick – the blue kind).
8. Drivers License
9. Favorite t-shirt (50/50 blend) – “My Dad is an Old Dawg” – UGA football letterman club shirt (wasn’t that worried about this one, I have about six)
10. Black clutch pocketbook that has been through a lot with me.

Now, as bad as this sounds, most of these things were in my pocketbook, and as such – lose one thing and lose a lot is the case. And to be fair, I knew that I had left my pocketbook seconds after leaving the driveway, but Allison, as driver, said she would bring them to me, and I wasn’t worried (she did say that she found my pocketbook, flip flops and cell phone scattered about the house, but the important thing is that she found them).

back to chronological order:
Saturday:
The bus down to the game worked out perfectly. So this is how it works. The game is in Jacksonville. But everyone stays up and down the coast. Most of my friends stay in St. Simons/Sea Island or in Amelia/Fernendia. St. Simons is about an hour and a half from Jacksonville – 2 hours on game day. So most people charter buses in order to make things safe and easy. But it is a huge hassle to get together. And you always run the risk of being on a bus with people you don’t know, or worse, don’t like. Because it is always pretty random. It was wonderful to get on a bus with people I like a lot, especially after speaking with my roommate from freshman year who was on a bus with a group of people that I could not have handled. But it made me love my old roommate that she felt the same way.

The game was awesome, I did get really sleepy at one point during half time, but while play was going on, I was in tune. Hot dog count – 3. Dip -n- Dots – 1. Coca- Colas – 3. Got to hang out with Travers – always a good time.

The bus ride home from the game was one of the most fun things I have done in years. We had a dance party all the way home – we popped champagne – and I just have to hand it to whoever had the mixed cds that we listened to, because they kept everyone awake, this was no time for people to go to sleep. All the other bus rides back to St. Simons I have experienced involved reasons to sleep – we lost. This time, we won. Overall, the bus ride was a success. The house we stayed in was a success – the people made all the difference here as well. I got a new t-shirt at the game, and I made some new awesome friends. At after bus dance party – danced to “Thriller” about seven more times, also spent some quality time dancing to other Michael Jackson songs (before and after swimming). Wow. No wonder I am the worst law student in America.

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Two quotes from my favorite television show – Scrubs – one from tonight’s episode and one from a couple of weeks ago.

“Sometimes the easiest way to lose something is to want it too badly.” – JD (Zack Braff – who I am in love with).

“show me a well-adjusted, successful man who wants to settle down and have kids, and I’m not interested, but find me an alcoholic in his midthirties that still thinks his band might make it, and just tell me where I can show up and buy him dinner.” – Molly (Heather Graham) the psychiatrist.

I don’t know why these two quotes struck me, but I like them. I love Heather Graham’s character, because she is totally aware of who she is and she is okay with it. She is also overly optimistic, happy, and chipper. And the amazing thing is that her happiness and optimism totally irritates a lot of people. Fascinating.

Jessica and I were discussing the upside to living in a fantasy world. In our fantasy world, everyone has good intentions and deep down is a good person. It takes a lot for someone to convince me that they actually don’t like me. I know I talk about this a lot, but I honestly don’t have the energy to think that someone doesn’t like me. I have been working on this new life approach for a while, and here it is (if you spend much time with me in person or on the phone, you can probably skip this part because I talk about it a lot).

New Life Approach:
I believe that all the problems in the world and especially in relationships come down to two things: 1. Bad Self Esteem and 2. Miscommunication.

This being the case, I am no longer going to take people the wrong way and I am going to try to keep my bad self esteem from getting in the way of me loving people. Bad self esteem makes me react the wrong way to people – and then it is easy to miscommunication. I have been trying to think of practical ways to put this plan into action, and the simplest thing I can do is to not react. Or maybe, not to over-react. If someone is not nice to me, I am going to give them the benefit of the doubt that it has nothing to do with me, and they might just be having a bad day.

Another important side of this new approach to life is to be aware of others bad self esteem and inclination to misunderstand me. So it is important to be a good communicator. When ever possible, I am going to be upfront with people about how I feel (but remembering their bad self esteem at the same time). The downside of this is that I have a tendency to wear my heart of my sleeve – my mom has been trying to teach me not to do this for years – but some things you just can’t change. Therefore I must have a high tolerance for people in general – or only hang out with people I really like – in order to not increase someone else’s bad self esteem. But I really and truly do like most people, so maybe it won’t be that difficult. Also, must be aware of situations that are likely to bring out bad self esteem, we all have our own – mine tend to be around people I really like a lot who I am not convinced like me, and also with regards to my usefulness – I love to help, and some people don’t want my help – and this is where I get very defensive (there are many others, but examples – oh I also hate it when people want to take my temperature about something – my academics, my spirituality, my dating life – i.e. – “How are your outlines coming?”).

This might make me seem overly concerned with others and selfless – but really this is pretty much for self preservation more than anything. I don’t know, I guess it is just important to me to believe that people are inherently good for the most part – and this is a way for me to analyze away some of the everyday problems that I see with the world. I know, I’m delusional and naive, one day I am going to have to deal with the real world, but until then, don’t be the reason I lose my enthusiasm.

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