| My Life Yet Again... to view earlier entries, click here. March 22, 2001 So I haven't updated my page since the very beginning of October. But it wasn't my fault... really! The PageBuilder thing that I use stopped working. Okay, so it was partially my fault because after it didn't work a couple of times, I completely gave up on it. But still. I had a half day of school today so I figured it was worth trying again, spent a long time figuring out my password, and reinstalled the PageBuilder thing. Because I'm too computer illiterate to know HTML or anything neat like that. But anyway. So of course I should have a whole lot of stuff to write. Tomorrow is my birthday... I'll be 17. Interesting. Ben and I have gotten closer and closer over the last eight months, and it's been absolutely wonderful. Except yesterday and today, because I haven't heard from him at all, which is most unusual. But I'm sure he has a reason and I'm sure he'll call or come online soon. December was a crazy month because of Christmas and me working and my mom owning two stores and both my parents spending all their free time there. But I got a cable modem for Chanukah and a CD burner for Christmas, so I've been using Napster a lot since then. My dad told me about launch.com, which I like because you can choose the artists you like but then it finds different songs by them and other, similar music so that you can maybe even hear something you haven't heard before. So I listen to that a lot when I'm using the computer, but you can't download MP3s from it, so it's no good for burning CDs. But if I like an artist a lot, I try to buy their CD anyway because I'd feel like a bad person otherwise. Especially because most of the music that I like is not mainstream, so I might actually make a little tiny difference by buying their music. Although you never know. Oh, and we have a puppy now. Wow, it's been awhile since I wrote. He's a golden retriever and he's four months old and we've had him since January, and he's so cute it's almost impossible to take. His name is Cava and even though he can be annoying I really really love him. He's fuzzy and soft and curious and energetic and cuddly and very sweet. I hope that I hear from Ben before or on my birthday, or it will be ruined and that would be extremely sad. But I will. School has been going pretty well. I was nominated for Governor's School, which is a summer program and it's supposed to be a big deal but I'm kind of scared of getting in. Applying is binding and it's six weeks long, which means it would take up most of my summer, and it's my last summer before I leave home. Speaking of leaving home, I just last week received the assignment for the family that I'll be living with next year in France. They're really cool. They live near the Pyrenees and there's three kids- a girl two months younger than me who'll be going to my school, and 13 year old boy who is way more mature than American pubescent boys tend to be, and a two year old boy who will be adorable. I talked to them on the phone for a long time- it went really well. We pretty much understood each other and they were all really nice. I'll be going to a 1200 person public school... 8 times the size of the school I'm in now. And they live in a seven bedroom house with a swimming pool, which rocks. But anyway. I want to save this before the PageBuilder thing breaks again and I lose everything I've written, so I'll stop now. But I'll try to update my page more often, now that the program is working again. August 2, 2001 Okay, so I haven't updated my webpage for months, and the last time I did it was also the first time in months. But this time I added a link just about Ben, because he's the coolest person in the world, as you'll see if you look at it, and updated my friends page because friendships change and evolve and I'm not friends with all the same people I was friends with a year ago, and if I have time I will try to add to my movies page, because I've seen some more cool movies since the last time I updated that page. But anyway. What's been going on since March, when I last wrote? I've finished my twelve year stint at Friends School, where I've been since kindergarten, and I am leaving at the end of this month for France, so of course I am scared out of my mind. Sigh. But also really excited. I have a lot to do before I leave, though, like clean my room, finish my college applications, and, of course, pack. All stuff that I should be working on now, but of course I'm procrastinating, as usual. I spent a week of my summer at the beach with my family and my mom's best friend's family; it was pretty fun, although not quite as fun as the week there last year. I guess it just had a different dynamic because there were two little girls who needed constant care and attention, whereas last year it was just me and my sister and my mom and allw e did was sleep, play cards, and hang out on the beach, so it was really relaxing. But it was still fun. Then when I got back from the beach, I spent six weeks at NC Governor's School, which is a place so cool that I can't conceive of the NC government funding it. You learn there to be liberal, to question authority and the values instilled in you by public school (if you have been so unfortunate as to have attended a North Carolina public school), to look beyond face value whenever possible, and to think about your own life and your own definition of success rather than the one served to you on a gilded platter by society. Blah. Heh. It really was fun- I took a poetry class, a philosophy class, and a self and society class, all of which were interesting and/or rewarding in some way, but the coolest part of Governor's School, like TIP, is definitely the people. I met so many cool people there that it's ridiculous (I just wrote about a whole bunch of them on my friends page, so you can go look there, if you want). I was really sad to leave last weekend, but I'm surviving at home. It's nice to have easier access to Ben. And I do like my house and my dogs and my parents and my non-GS friends very much. In fact, one non-GS friend is on her way over here now, so I should go. But everyone should be very proud that I've finally updated my page, and I'll try to update it again at least once more before I go to France. But I'm not making any promises! Sunday, June 16, 2002 My goodness. I'm back from my year in France. Me and yet not. I wasn't able to update my page while I was there. So many things have happened. Everyone's always like, "So, how was your year?" And I'm like, "How do you expect me to explain the unexplainable, and also how do you expect me to sum up an entire year in, like, three sentences, or even in a whole conversation?" Living there was so intense and so different and yet so the same. And I am bilingual and I met so many cool people. I hadn't even thought about my webpage since I got back but I just got this email from Yahoo warning me that if I don't update it within the next 30 days it will be shut down due to inactivity. And that would be very unfortunate because even though my webpage is not exactly wonderful or professional or anything, it's still mine and I have spent a fair amount of time trying to make it interesting. So yes. Maybe I will go update some other sections of it now. My summary of my year in France has to happen gradually. I just bring up things about it as they come into mind or as they seem to relate to what's going on now. I can't just describe it in a little nutshell: Open the box and you will see the overview, neatly organized. Not at all. Brief news: I am single, since December. I graduated last week and I m going to Smith College in the fall. I am bilingual. I have a crush on a new boy named Daniel but I don't really know him at all. I grew half an inch over the year. My favourite dog died right after I left for France and had been replaced before I got back by a new dog who is sort of cute but very annoying. I am working all summer which is very boring. But at least I will have money, and my nights are still my own. And I plan to make full use of them, all summer. |