i need the smell of summer

I'm starting to worry that summer isn't going to turn out at all like I'd hoped it would. It's been exactly what I expected so far - hot and boring, but I was hoping that after this past weekend it would be wonderful, mostly because Ashley is back. This weekend was supposed to be especially epic, and it was for the most part, but along with epic adventures came some possibly bad news.

It all started Saturday with the world's hottest drive to LA to see Brand New play a sold out show at the Troubadour. You can not even begin to imagine how excited and anxious I was for that show. Waiting two hours outside the venue felt like an eternity. Watching the guys walk by while hardly anyone noticed was hilarious, especially because the people behind us talked about how stupid they felt for the next hour. "We fucked up so bad! I can't believe no one said Hi!" That was highly amusing. Knowing a girl in line from AP got me way close to the stage which was super nice, but the high temperature combined with the crowded room and my weak body led to me feeling sick after the first few songs. I literally thought I was going to pass out or throw up or something. I had to lean on a speaker for a while just to stop being dizzy and eventually I had to head for the bathroom and give up my spot in front of the stage. I enjoyed the rest of the show from the back of the crowd, which was still fine, but I hated that I'd had to move at all, especially during Brand New, especially in a small venue.

After the show was over I almost got lost on my way back to the 101 but eventually made my way to Ashley's house to stay a few nights. Kelvin was there and I hadn't seen him in ages, so it was fun catching up and sitting around in Ashley's room. He left and we stayed up late talking and listening to music until we finally fell asleep. Totally missed the alarm Sunday morning but not by too much. We got semi-lost on our way to CDM but made a cute new friend so that was nice. Ended up being an hour late to the beach but we got to see some old friends and tan a little before heading to a ridiculously nice pool elsewhere. I prefer pools to the ocean for swimming, hands down. No contest. I love the beach, but pools are wonderful.

We also got Chipotle and drove around listening to hip hop for a while. Chuck is hilarious and probably the most friendly and outgoing person I've ever met, next to Vick. He's also way cute and apparently thinks the same of me. :D Later he and Ashley and I went to see I Love You, Man at a three dollar theater before calling it a night. Ashley and I were pretty much exhausted at that point so we grabbed some In n Out and went back to her house.

Sunday we met up with my mom, dropped my car off for standard servicing and went to see Harry Potter. If I'd read the book more recently, I'm sure much of the movie would have annoyed me but I enjoyed it a lot, especially the part when Harry was high on liquid luck. Amazing. We picked my car up after it was over and found out that my axle is getting worn out or something, which could mean less driving for me. I don't know how that's supposed to work out when I go back to school in September, but I really don't want to miss out on as many visits with Ashley as I can fit in while she's here either. That news definitely put a damper on my day but a little frozen yogurt makes for a nice pick-me-up, so all was well. We hung out with Jason for a little while too and then spent almost four hours trying to find something to do for the rest of the night until I had to go home. Somehow, the fifteen or so people we tried to get in touch with must have been really busy (or just ignoring us) on a Monday night of all nights, but we finally heard back from Isaac just before we were ready to give up and head back to Ashley's. Sweet hangs ensued and I drove home around two.

Overall, I'd say the good outweighed the bad this weekend, but I'm also worried that the bad parts will be a foreshadowing for the rest of my summer. I really don't want that to be true.

from the corner of his eye

Anyone who's read enough Dean Koontz books most likely knows that once you've read a few, you've pretty much read them all. He's a great writer and his books are all interesting and easy to follow, but they all follow pretty similar plotlines and his style really doesn't vary all that much from one story to the next. All that aside, From the Corner of His Eye is one of my all time favorite books.

I've read a handful of Koontz's books, none that I can remember all too clearly except for the first one I read, The Door to December, and, of course, From the Corner because I've read it so many times now. I just finished for at least the fourth time, possibly the fifth. It is still somewhat similar to his other books, especially considering the multiple story lines of different characters that all eventually become tied together in some way, showing the interconnectedness of all things, and especially considering the underlying theme of some supernatural powers at work in the universe, but there's something about this book that gets me so involved in the lives of every character each time I read it, and all the similarities between this and his other novels just fade away.

I think two signs of a really good book are 1) not wanting to put it down and 2) taking away some deeper meaning from the story even after you finished reading. The paranormal aspect of this book is really somewhat comforting in some ways, though it's a little bit eerie in some as well. There's a quote I want to type out that may help explain it a little better than I could in my own words.

"Your father is gone from here, gone forever, but he still lives in other worlds. This isn't a statement of faith alone. If Albert Einstein were still alive and standing here, he'd tell you that it's true. Your father is with you in many places, and so is Phimie. In many places, she didn't die in childbirth. In some worlds, she was never raped, her life never blighted. But there's an irony in that, isn't there? Because in those worlds, Angel doesn't exist- yet Angel is a miracle and a blessing. So when you're lying in bed tonight, kept awake by grief, don't think just about what you've lost with your father and Phimie. Think about what you have in this world that you've never known in some others-Angel. Whether God's a Catholic, a Baptist, a Jew, a Muslim, or a quantum mechanic, He gives us compensation for our pain, compensation right here in this world, not just in those parallel to it and not just in some afterlife. Always compensation for the pain... if we recognize it when we see it."

This idea of multiple worlds resulting from every decision we make comes up a lot earlier in the novel in the form of a young boy, Bartholomew Lampion. He turns out to be really smart at a very young age so he tries to explain this idea to his mother a few times throughout the book, but the most clear conversation comes when he's three and they find out his eyes must be removed because of a fast-spreading cancer.

"But what I've been wondering... when you talk about all the ways things are... is there someplace where you don't have this problem with your eyes?"
"Sure. That's how it works with everything. Everything that can happen does happen, and each different way of happening makes a whole new place."

I remember this idea being explored in an episode of an old Disney show, So Weird, once too. In the show, two worlds resulting from a simple decision basically collided and the effects were problematic for the main character because there were two of her running around trying to live the same life. It was essentially the same idea, though - every choice we make results in a separate world, and all these different realities exist together, in the same place and time. Every different possible life goes on at once, and in some of them we are far better or worse off than we are in the life we know now. In some, we are less fortunate and our lives are riddled with trials and tragedies and perhaps in others, we are blessed with every thing we could ever possibly need. In others still, our lives might not be all that different than the ones we know. It's a new and different way of looking at life and knowing that things are never what they seem.

The book in general is really quite compelling and uplifting in many ways. As most books do, it has a happy ending, despite all the death and loss that occurs throughout the story. The bad guy gets what he deserves and good ultimately prevails. Almost all the main characters come together in the end, despite their different lives, and become one big happy family. It's a really nice story, and definitely a book I would recommend to just about anyone.

The only other quote I wanted to bring up actually reminded me of a different post I wrote a few weeks back, after watching Into the Wild again. After his wife dies, another character, Paul Damascus, starts walking up the coast of California, just because. It's slightly reminiscent of Forrest Gump's run across the country, to be honest. Anyway, some of the description reminded me of Christopher McCandless' travels so I thought I'd throw that in, too.

"He traveled prairies and mountains and valleys, passed fields rich in every imaginable crop, crossed great forests and wide rivers. He walked in fierce storms when thunder crushed the sky and lightning tore it, walked in wind that skinned the bare earth and sheared green tresses from trees, and walked also in sun-scrubbed days as blue and clean as ever there had been in Eden."

I want to see the world so badly.

lyrics

"Time Like a Ghost" by Races to April

I'm lying awake and I feel you breathing, asleep and dreaming next to me
We're lost without the formula for comfort we've invested in
As time flies like a ghost, like ribbons of smoke floating weightless and blue
In this room, where there's nothing to remind me of me without you

So put your hands where I can see
Something doesn't feel right, like you're feeding me a line
Cause I swear I've heard this somewhere before
I'll swallow every word between your lips
But if you're just lying through your teeth,
Maybe you're right and we knew it all along
We're better off alone

Bands of light of the morning through the blinds are there to wake me when
I can never miss you more than when the sheets are cold beside me

So put your hands where I can see
It's fair to say my better days have got the best of me

Something doesn't feel right, like you're feeding me a line
Cause I swear I've heard this somewhere before
I'll swallow every word between your lips
But if you're just lying through your teeth,
Maybe you're right and we knew it all along
We're better off alone

My favorite lines are bold. My discovery of this band and this song were completely unplanned. It's sort of funny in a way. I forget what messageboard I had been posting on at the time - this was a few years ago - but I was in a thread with one of those silly band name games, where you post a band whose name starts with the last letter of the band posted before you. My letter was R and I went to Purevolume to look for interesting bands that started with R, and I came upon Races to April's page. I never really got into any of their other songs but I've always loved this one. It's still up on their Purevolume page if you want to check it out, too.

i hope you're as happy as you're pretending

My god, you are pathetic. I can still admit that I do continue to miss you from time to time; in fact, I'm not sure that will ever change, but it's not the same as it once was. It's not really you that I'm missing - it's the you that you once were. You're not the same person anymore, and who you are now is someone that I can't help but laugh at. The facade you keep up is so ridiculous; the superior, "I don't care what you think of me" attitude, the fact that the one thing you seem to look forward to is the next time you'll be drunk. I almost pity you, because I know what you used to be and how much potential you had and I see you wasting it now on things that matter so little. I almost wish I could reach out and say something, tell you to change your ways before it's too late, but then I remember what a terrible friend you were and how utterly fake you are and I know you don't deserve it.

It annoys me endlessly that I missed you for so long, that I tried so many times to reconnect with you, that I found some meaning in the way we always had no trouble sharing things with each other, even after losing contact for so long. It always struck me as something to be proud of, something worth holding on to, because if we could be close like that after not being friends at all, that had to mean something, didn't it? If we could instantly go back to the way things once were and feel comfortable telling each other anything at all, wasn't that something special? Wasn't that important enough to forget about all the lying and deceit and backstabbing and using? That's what I always wanted to believe, but that was also before I realized you'd never be the same.

I like to imagine that there's still some sliver of the girl I once knew in you, somewhere, deep down. I wish you wouldn't hide her under all your makeup and hair dye and false superiority because she was one of the greatest people I could ever hope to know. That's the girl I will never stop missing, and I think I'm okay with that. I should probably just cut off all ties with you, but I can't help wanting to be around to see if she ever makes an appearance again. Hope is an important thing to hold on to, right? Even if there's little chance of the thing you hope for coming true.

There's one line that always comes to mind when I think about you.

I hope you're as happy as you're pretending.

on the fourth of july!

Drove past John Wayne on the way home tonight and almost cried. Why can't I just forget?

Dr. John's Fourth of July party was fun. I mostly hung out with my mom, laughed a other peoples' adorable babies and played a few games of pool. I beat both of my parents and lost to a thirteen year old. Some kids can actually be pretty chill though, when they're not obnoxious. There were six kids I was hanging out with in the pool room at one point. Two pairs of brothers and then one brother and sister. In each pair, the younger sibling was always the annoying child. Funny how that works.

Everyone seemed to enjoy the cookies my mom and I made this morning. They were oatmeal and chocolate chip, and the whole plate got cleared off before the fireworks started. We could see three different fireworks shows from John's balcony, all fairly close. Fireworks are pretty fun to watch. I really enjoy the ones that leave trails of light in the sky, or the ones that fan out and turn into dozens of smaller explosions. (in the sky?)

On our way there, we stopped at the Albertson's by my best friend's mother's house and it made me feel so nostalgic. Every time I'm near or in Tustin, I really really miss living there. We got some drinks, including a few Kahlua Mudslides which I would highly recommend. They are delicious. I had one while we were eating and before I even finished, I lost balance while I was squatting down and fell on my butt. That led to plenty of jokes about how I'd had too much to drink. Highly embarrassing. That was the only drink I had, but when we were in the car my dad told me not to get too carried away with myself. Anyone who knows my dad will understand why this is humorous.

It's still fairly early but I'm extremely tired. I think I'm going to see the Proposal with my mom tomorrow, or maybe we'll see Up instead. I'm not sure yet.

day twenty - a day late?

So I've decided that since I always end up posting outside of my 24 hour limit and end up posting really pointless stuff, I'm not gonna worry too much about the once-a-day business. I'd rather post less often and have it be more meaningful than post about arbitrary bullshit on a daily basis.

That being said, I don't really have anything good to write about today. I went out with my mom and got some new shoes and a shirt. At Target I noticed they still have the same sunglasses that you bought me last summer. The same sunglasses that broke once because the screw wasn't tight enough to hold the arm on. I probably still have the original pair somewhere because I kept it, along with the loose screw and the detached arm, in a ziploc bag. I ended up buying the same pair again, and it broke too, in the same way. I gave up after that. It almost seems metaphorical. I kept trying but it was too hard for me and in the end, I gave up. Or maybe that's just the way I like to see it because it hurts too much to think that I hurt you for my own selfish reasons. I doubt I'll ever stop missing you. They always say you never forget your first love.

day nineteen - twilight, like oh my god

Currently listening to: "Take Tomorrow (One Day at a Time)" by Butch Walker. Watch here.

I'm not sure what else to write about still, but I just read the partial draft of Midnight Sun by Stephenie Meyer this week, so here goes. It's essentially Twilight from Edward's point of view and I honestly think if a lot of people that criticize the relationship aspect of the movie would read Midnight Sun, they might understand it a little bit better. There is so much more thought and analysis and inner dialogue on Edward's part than on Bella's. It's actually humorous the way he over thinks every last detail and questions everything. It makes the animal instinct quality of their attraction to each other more clear, as well.

I enjoyed Twilight series very much, to be honest. I know a lot of people hated it, even after giving it a chance, and I'm not trying to argue with that at all. I wouldn't go so far as to say they are very well-written books, and the movie doesn't do Bella and Edward's story justice at all, but I like it all nonetheless. I really enjoyed the final two books and honestly wouldn't mind owning the whole series someday. I also really hope that Stephenie Meyer chooses to finish Midnight Sun, despite the fact that it was leaked onto the internet prior to being finished. I really enjoyed the first draft and I think it would make for an interesting counterpart to the original story.

day eighteen

I don't know what to write about today. I keep feeling angry and depressed this week and then making myself think of other things to stay happy. Apparently I'm good at that.

I'm learning to cook more and more. Nothing insanely special so far, but I did make dinner on my own tonight. Shake n Bake and Pasta-roni. It all came out pretty good, so I was proud. I'm gonna make cookies from scratch again this week too, probably for the Fourth of July party my parents are going to. I'll probably tag along for the third or fourth year in a row just because I have no other plans yet. It's at a super nice house, one of my dad's work friends is throwing it. It just isn't all that exciting to me to spend time at a house with a bunch of my parent's friends. At least he has a pool and a hot tub and a beautiful view. Good enough for me.

Currently listening to "Cannonball" by Damien Rice. I love this song and the album it's on so much. It's absolutely on my list of songs I'd like to learn someday. I should play more guitar this week. I want to learn a lot of songs but I'm pretty slow at learning new things. I tend to get really easily frustrated.

I feel like this blog is going downhill. I need inspiration.