5 People You Should Know (And Love)

I couldn’t fall asleep last night because my dad’s snoring sounded like a giant industrial machine coming to kill me and my family, it was raining, and random thoughts and vague fantasies were exploding in my head like schizophrenic fireworks.

So I shut my eyes and tried to drift off happily into a world of dreams. I’ve heard that the harder you focus on falling asleep, the harder it is to actually fall asleep. To distract myself, I decided to think of all the people in the world that I’d like to meet.

In my brain, these people paraded themselves in front of me in a form of competition that was a bit like “Survivor” mixed with “America’s Next Top Model”. What follows is a list of the people who won in my imagination. I have put them here because everyone should know and love these people, not only because all of them look good in Anna Sui, but also because they are incredibly talented.

1. Louise Rennison, the evil genius/mastermind behind the Georgia Nicholson diaries. She practically created her own language filled with words and phrases like “boy entrancers”, “nuddy-pants”, and “double cool with knobs”. Through all of her hilariousness, she’s always insightful and makes those of us who are probably clinically insane feel a little better.

2. Chris Colfer, the actor who portrays the adorable Kurt Hummel on Ryan Murphy’s “Glee”. He’s a good role model because his character is strong but relatable, and Colfer is a believable actor. His fashion sense is top-notch. In all of the interviews that I’ve seen with him, he seems poised and sincerely sweet.

3. Ellen DeGeneres, who voiced Dory in “Finding Nemo” and is a warm and friendly talk-show host. I feel like I know her personally. She has written books that are filled with laugh-out-loud funny-ness, and her TV show brightens the most dismal of mornings.

4. Javier Bardem. Sex God extraordinaire with a gorgey accent.

5. Michael Cera, who has his roots in Arrested Development. He is as cute as a button but he’s capable of playing a jackass.

The runners-up include: 1. Jane Austen, the brilliant woman behind six nearly perfect novels that I’ve read at least twice each; 2. Oscar Wilde, pretty much because he’s Oscar Wilde. I don’t care if he was gay. If I could go back in time, I would spend all of my time trying to seduce him; 3. Robin Hood, because he stole from the rich and gave to the poor. Duh. 4. Shonda Rhimes, the writer of my favorite TV show. I think I would actually eat a hot dog if it meant I could be on "Grey's Anatomy".

Something I wrote nine months ago and never posted because I thought it was stupid, but now I think it's actually pretty good, considering.

"Sometimes there's airplanes I can't jump out
Sometimes there's bullshit that don't work now
We all got our stories, but please tell me
What there is to complain about."
- Good Life, OneRepublic

It just takes some time.


Since I've been revoltingly sparse on the writing front these past three months, allow me to provide a general idea of what's been choking my sanity:
Way down, back up, plateau, stop this train, brick wall, way down, back up, gobble gobble.

I knew everything would change once people left for college - in the back of my mind, I really did. But I didn't expect the change to be so instantaneously obvious. I figured it would be gradual - we'd all make new friends, start to care about other things, and eventually forget about high school. But until now, we've all been more-or-less on the same pattern at the same speed. Nobody really got so far ahead you couldn't see them anymore, and no one got stuck in the dust, because the only dust there was to get stuck in was middle school. (Less mature dust than what we were in during high school, but still pretty much the same dust). When college started, some people took off, some people stayed in the same place, and some people are still hanging out in the ambiguous middle-area, wondering where they belong.

"The moon is shining now and shadows are what's left of all the noise,
simple silhouettes and cut-outs, as if we had the choice."

Hi. I'm Megan, and I'll be your tour guide for the popular middle-area. The area where "..." is an expertly descriptive sentence, and gray is the new black. I can't think of anyone more qualified to give you a tour of what floating around in ambiguity feels like right now, though there are probably a handful of people out there who are. But all the same, I've done a lot of floating, and a lot of thinking. More thinking than I probably should have. And here is what I realized:

..

...


Yup. That. Nothing.
I realized that I know nothing.

The stupidest things I've ever done.

1. Ate two large bowls of Chocolate Moose Tracks (a la my feelings) with generous gobs of Jif peanut butter swirled in. And that was just last night.
2. Said, "Hey, three-year-old girl, do you want to play with paints?"
3. Assumed any part of me would ever be capable of using a Wii. That stuff is just not compatible with my level of coordination. Rainbow Road was a terrible, terrible tragedy.
4. Told myself it would be a good idea to call Jesse McCartney's fan voice mail gizmo with two friends, tell him we were in college, and giggle like eleventeen-year-olds. Good story, but still embarrassing.
5. Watched The Ring.
6. Asked a short man with a mustache if he wanted a kids' menu.
7. Thought, "I can take 8:30 classes every day next semester. I'll get used to it."
8. Stared at a bell pepper plant for a few minutes asking myself why the tomatoes were shaped so weird.
9. Washed a few plates with laundry detergent because I was too lazy to go get the dish soap. (It made things taste funny).
10. Dropped a fork on a baby while busing tables.
11. Watched a cat eat pizza off a plate for a good three minutes before realization kicked in that I should probably prevent it from doing that.
12. Woke up and immediately decided my left eye had gotten five hours of sleep, while my right had gotten six. And didn't realize what was wrong with that thought until half an hour later.
13. Tried to find fireworks on the Fourth of July. (Seriously, just go to the city. Because NOBODY ELSE has them).
14. To be continued. Trust me.

Black Death

Responsibility (n) - that from which Amy flees like the plague.


I suppose that, sometimes, the need to be responsible just attacks you.

Example a: One morning, a giant bearded wizard informs you that you are in possession of the ring that will decide the fate of the earth. You can't give the ring away, you can't just chuck it in a river, and you can't even melt it down into nothing in your ordinary fire. You have no choice unless you want the whole world to go to hell in a hand basket.






You have to saddle up, take responsibility for your god-awful luck, and head out to Mount Doom to destroy that evil power forever. If you fail, you might as well be dead...and the rest of the good world along with you.

Sometimes, people take up responsibility on their own.

Example b: McDreamy decided one day to become a kickass doctor and save lives. Now he is responsible (by his own choice) for his patients and those annoying interns studying under him.




Then, there are people like me who run away from responsibility like a loon.

For the fall semester at Pitt, I had enrolled in a teaching class that required observational field experience. In order to do that, the state mandates that students in this class get a number of clearances so they don’t infect the children with TB or molest them on their lunch break. Fair enough.

But could I do it? Could I call to make a doctor’s appointment to get a TB shot? Could I go down to the UPS store to get fingerprinted and prove that I’m not a raving, homicidal, child-molesting crazy person? No. No, I couldn’t it. Because doing so wouldn’t have shown that I was responsible, that I could get stuff done without being poked and prodded incessantly by a higher power, that I could do things on my own.

But, instead of gritting my teeth and being responsible, I dropped the class after a month of debating with myself.

I don’t know what my calling is. I certainly haven’t figured out what I’m good at or what I want to do with the rest of my life, but teaching clearly isn’t for me. Saving the world from doom and destruction by dropping a ring of power into a volcano-esque mountain thing probably isn't for me, either. But you never know.

Three babies and a basket case.

I have decided I've had enough with this "Myehh, I wanna write things but everything I say is stupid!" crap that goes through my head every day. The whole point is just to write things. Who cares if it's any good? It's better than not writing anything, which is the strategy I used a lot of this past year, and look where that got me. Nowheresville, Ohio. That's where.

So that's the new decision. Here is what happened to me today. (I've decided this story is best depicted partially though illustration).

Twice a week I babysit this collection of objects from 7am til about 5 in the evening.

 

Today's situation, however, was a little bit worse than usual. (Not that the situation is usually bad at all - I should clarify before I veer off on this rant that I love this family. They're sweet). The enjoyable teens were off at band camp and a random aunt had dropped off her insane puppy for the week. So essentially I was watching three toddlers by myself. Not particularly fun, but doable. Or so I believed. The day started out okay.

The spunky 3-year-old ripped off her clothes and demanded that I set up the sprinkler, which I did while carrying a dripping baby who refused to be set down for even a second without screeching unpleasantly. I thought to myself, "Okay, well this is going to be a long day. But I can do this."

After about two minutes in the sprinkler, Spunky announced that she was hungry and darted into the house. So, sighing heavily, I followed her inside, still carrying the baby. By the time I got into the kitchen (which was really only about twenty seconds later), she had already helped herself to a popsicle and was contentedly sucking on it. I thought about starting an argument over it, but all I did was ask, "So are you done in the sprinkler, then?" She nodded. So I set the screaming baby down, told Spunky to stay inside and leave all the doors shut, and went to turn off the hose.
This was my fatal mistake.
No sooner had I made it down the back steps to the yard than Spunky slid the doors open and screamed "MEGAN! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" And the most hyper little white blur I'd ever seen sped past her, down the steps, and straight under the neighbors' car.

Spunky helpfully called, "Megan, the dog got out!" to which I replied "GO INSIDE AND SHUT THE DOOR!" (Here, you have to understand that I'm usually not a screamer. I can be very patient when I need to, and I tend to skip over outright anger altogether and just take everything personally. But at this point, my thoughts consisted mostly of repressed obscenities). The dog, who I'd actually thought was cute and lovable yesterday, turned out to be a big huge jerk. It thought I was playing with it. It would jump out from behind things and flash past me, and then stop just out of reach and look really happy with itself. And I would look at it and say pleasantly, "I'm not playing games. I will kill you."

As I was busy chasing the giant cotton ball around the yard, I didn't immediately notice the sound of the door sliding open again. It wasn't until I heard Spunky yell, "Megan! The baby got out!" that I stopped in my tracks and turned my back on the dog. At that point, the thing could have been abducted by a UFO and sucked into outer space and I wouldn't have cared; I didn't even bother to keep an eye on where it was going. I charged up the stairs and caught the baby just as it was contemplating throwing itself down them. For whatever reason.

I snatched the baby from its imminent serious injury and carried it inside. (It started crying, of course). I grabbed Spunky by the wrist and pulled her inside, too. And I said "LISTEN. If you open this door again, the baby is going to fall down the stairs and die, and you are going to be in BIG TROUBLE." And Spunky said "Kay!" and slid the door shut in my face.
I turned around and descended the stairs with much less vigor than I had climbed them.
And this is what the stupid jerk dog was doing.

Let's celebrate being alive.

Because, let's face it - some people aren't.

Anyone who has known me for upwards of five minutes can tell you I like to invest my emotions in things. Give me a good Disney movie, a moderately well-written chick flick starring Hilary Duff or Amanda Bynes circa 2002, or just a heartfelt cardboard Valentine, and watch the waterworks begin.

But then sometimes when real stuff happens - like the death of someone who meant something to my life- I don't really react like I think I should.  I put on some music and stare at the ceiling and wait for suffocation to embrace me. But it doesn't. I just lie there and think about how small and breakable I am, and how the blood in my veins and the air moving in and out of me all the time is such a miracle that I never, ever appreciate.

I don't want this post to be about me. Because it's not. And I don't want it to be about how you should seize the day because very rarely in life are there ever second chances. Because you can go see Charlie St. Cloud if you want that rubbed in your face for a few hours. (However, Zac Efron is dreamy, so go see it anyway). I ALSO don't want all of my posts to be this emotionally-invested. Because as I said before, that's how I've been since I was eleven, and I'm trying to find a way to balance that. But it's been an emotionally-invested evening. So you'll have to forgive me this time.

I want this to be about how we're all human beings, and how every second of every day there are lights turning on and off on this huge planet. Hundreds, even thousands of people dying, and even more being born. Every minute. And somehow, we've been standing here for years. Through the mess of all these lights flicking on and off, day and night - somehow, we've managed to keep ours on. Constantly. And there's no rhyme or reason to it. But here we are. We're alive.

We have no idea how lucky we are.