I'm not ready.

I'm not ready for graduation. In so many different ways. I'm nowhere NEAR having my projects and papers done.

I'm also not ready to be graduated, to be a college graduate, to be an "adult," whatever that means. I don't know where my life is supposed to go. I don't know where I'm supposed to go. I have a few different options, geographically that would all hold great possibilities for me. But I don't know which one to choose. I really need some guidance here, God. Help me out, please?

And...this week my ex re-friended me on Facebook. And I'm not sure if I'm ready for this. I realize it's only facebook, and facebook friends aren't exactly like real friends, but I don't know if I can be friends with him just yet.

And I'm not ready to leave Kapelle. I know I've been over this before. But the feeling still lingers.

I'm just not ready.

Well, last week was my senior recital. And if you weren't there, you missed out. Because it was AWESOME.

It feels kind of surreal to have it all be over. I mean, it's the one thing you work towards for your entire college career, and it's over in 30 minutes. In a way, it's kind of a let-down, and a little anticlimactic.

I feel the need to learn a super hard aria that's way past my skill level in order to fill the void.

"Grand" adventure does not equal "Fun" adventure

So, I spent Thanksgiving in Louisville, Kentucky visiting my Aunt, Uncle and Grandmother. So on Tuesday night, I had a grand adventure driving down from Chicago. And by "grand," I really mean "SUPER LONG."

Let me preface by saying this: GOOGLE MAPS IS STUPID.

They had me get off of I90 onto some dinky little Indiana State road. Their logic was to take me from this state road, to I80, then to I65. The dinky little state road was CLOSED. So I went to follow the detour. And got lost. Twice. First I got lost because of the stupid inadequate detour that ended NOWHERE. And then after I called Dad and got directions back to the highway from him, I turned the wrong way. And got lost again. So FINALLY I got back to I90, with the aid of the wonderful Samantha, who told me that I should never have gotten off I90 in the first place, because it connects with I65! So I get to I65 eventually, blah blah and I'm driving and it takes forever, yada yada.

And then about 70 miles from Louisville, traffic on I65 (IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE!) stops, and is crawling for MILES on end. There is an hour-long traffic jam in the middle of nowhere for NO reason.

The point of the story? What should have been an easy 5 hour drive, became an 8 HOUR drive.

Needless to say, I'm definitely going to hate driving for a while.

Theatre is like life

As part of my porfolio for my senior project, I have to write a reflection on what theatre is. I was kind of intimidated by this, because theatre covers a broad spectrum of things. But basically the conclusion I came to was that theatre is like life.

I'll explain.

Example one: we are in control and in no control at the same time. We can control our actions, our words, the decisions we make from day to day. But ultimately, we are not in control. God is in control of our lives. In theatre, as a director, you can control almost everything that happens; you can control which actors to cast, you can shape their performance and interpretation of their character, you can control the blocking, you can even control the tech elements to some extent. But once the performance starts, you are NOT in control. What happens onstage is no longer under your power. I realize that this analogy breaks down if you analyze it too much, but that's true for all analogies.

Example two: In theatre, everyone is interdependent. It is a collaborative effort, and each person must do their part well for the whole to be successful. It's the same with life. Life is a collaborative effort. You can't just go through life alone and a hermit. As humans, we are made to need each other, and consequently we are interdependent.

This is why I think theatre is immensely important. It has so many lessons to teach us.

As an amendment to my last post, I have since found out that my grandmother is being released to the rehab facility next door to the assissted living she lives in. Which is good. They still haven't figured out what caused her to be nonresponsive. Pray that they find out what caused it.

I'm not sure I can handle this.

My senior recital is a week from Friday. And I don't feel nearly prepared enough. I practiced tonight, but it only made me more worried and depressed. And I have my stupid senior project (that I am making good progress on, but that's besides the point), and a million and a half stupid papers to do that I haven't even really done very much work on. And I'm trying to keep some semblance of a social life so that I don't go completely insane from doing school work all the time.

And...on top of it my grandmother is in the hospital, so that's got me worrying. (Even though Mom tried to tell me not to. It was a gallant effort, Mom.) She fell early last week. She only had a hairline fracture in her hip, so they sent her home after doing x-rays and all that jazz. But then after she left the hospital, she had a brief spell where she was unresponsive. Conscious, but unresponsive. And so now she's back in the hospital undergoing tests to figure out what's wrong.

That brings me to my next topic. Do you know how when you're a kid, it's like your parents and grandparents are made of steel, like nothing bad can happen to them? And then as you age, you realize that people are mortal and eventually die. But you still don't really think about it, until a certain point in your life, when you realize that your grandparents are getting older, and eventually they won't be around anymore. Well, I've found myself coming to that point. This issue with my grandmother, and also with my grandfather's cancer sort of made this truth that we all know more of a reality for me. And it's kind of scary.

I'm so busy lately, it's turned me into a really lame person. I haven't talked to my family in so long. There are friends I really want to reconnect with that I have been kind of neglecting. I'm just so tired of all of this stuff I have to do. I've had massive headache all day, and I think my subconscious is trying to tell me to lay off all the work I'm doing. But I can't lay off. I have to keep going. I have so much stuff to do, I can't even think about it, or else I might go crazy.

In other news, I had my last Kapelle Home Concert last night. And it wasn't as sad as I thought it might be. I didn't even cry at all. I was too busy soaking in everything, enjoying the time with Kapelle while I still could. I can honestly say I enjoyed singing every single piece. And let's be realistic here. In choir, you're NOT going to like every single thing you sing. You're just not. You can't like everything all the time; that's not how the world works. And some of the stuff we did on tour I don't like as well as other stuff we've done in the past. But last night, I sincerely enjoyed singing every single piece. Last night, I wasn't concentrating on how sad it was that it was my last concert. I was concentrating on how wonderful it was to be singing with everyone, and thankful that I got to spend so much time with them.

Do you ever have days where you just...don't fit? Where you manage to go about your day with relatively no problem, but it just seems like something's not quite right? Like things could be so much better? I have days like that. I kind of feel like that today. And the feeling isn't just a not fitting in feeling. It's more of a longing. It's days like today that make me long after Christ, that make me remember where my real home is, where truly the thing I want most in this world is to be with Him, to see his face, to spend all eternity singing and praising him and frolicking in beautiful, heavenly golden fall leaves (if you're confused, read my last post). Some days I remember more than others that I am His. And right now, I honestly don't want to be anyone else's.