ball of lightning [dot] com

[Loud, audible, sigh]

The newfound meteorologist in me would just like to point out for the record; Hurricane Katrina will go down in history as possibly the worst landfalling U.S. hurricane EVER.

I forgot how Ithaca weather can actually not suck for about two or three weeks a semester. Not bad.

So I’m back in Ithaca, bored as fuck presently, and therefore I feel the need to write an insipid, uninspiring, and somewhat simple-minded update in regards to my insipid, uninspiring, and somewhat simple-minded day-to-day life.

But seriously, what am I going to say?

Gun Hill - It’s probably pulling a B. It’s not as awe-inspiring as the website, pamphlets, and even brief tour made it appear, but the freedom is worth its weight in gold. I get my sweet Ford Contour, which doesn’t look like it’s going to get driven for the first time in months today. Oh well. It’ll get put to good use– I have faith.

Cornell - 16 credits. Sixteen not so tremendously difficult credits. No econ, chem, or calculus. Let’s put it this way, if I’m still pulling a 2.8 after this semester– I’m not going to be very happy. Taking an EAS elective (which doubles as an ASTRO elective), an EAS major requirement, and an astronomy writing seminar. If I don’t know what my major is after this year– I’m going to have a problem. I just now read a blurb that said if you get lower than a B in Calc II, you shouldn’t take the advanced level of Linear Algebra. Oops. That MIGHT explain it. I was in a class of overachieving Vince Hartmans. No wonder I couldn’t break the curve.

As for the mental state– well coming back to Ithaca did help it along quite a bit. Although I still have flashbacks of me slipping into this world where I’m not good enough at academia nor life. They come and go, I don’t know how long it will take for them to completely subside. They are quite annoying, but maybe I was just blessed with a too fucking positive outlook on life. Maybe this is how I’m supposed to be. Maybe it’s the real me. I should stand up… and put one of those fingers on each hand up… and be proud to be out of my mind and out of control… one more time– hey, I can’t believe I remember those.

So, at the present, I’m sitting in my car in the parking lot for one of the Chem buildings mooching off Red Rover because Gun Hill’s wireless sucks harder than Mrs. Fucking Nee.

Yeah.

Bullshit. Kira’s going down.

Last post from Torrington, circa summer 2005.

Today was my birthday. A somewhat typically meaningless one, of the 19th variety. But with all the turmoil in my life lately, somewhat of an important one psychologically to me. Now see, I have changed some definitions of one of the essentials of life. Friends. This summer, I’ve come to the hard reality that friends are not what they put up as a facade. I’ve learned this summer that many of my “friends” are calloused, shallow, ignorant, and deceitful individuals, whose relationship with me was nothing more than a glancing smile or selfish laugh. So now I’m in the process of redefining my friends– of shrinking down the list of “acquaintances” into people I truly trust, empathize, and enjoy being with. One of those small defining traits came today– see, I was curious on how many people actually took time out of their “all-too-hectic” lives to think of me in particular, and have enough self-motivation to wish me a pleasant day. The results were interesting. Nearly 1/2 of my well-wishers came from Cornell– yet my Torrington buddy list dwarfs my Cornell one by nearly a 10-1 ratio. Even more disconcerning was the notable absence of contact from a few people, both of whom were told the other day that today was indeed a somewhat special day for me, truly in my time of “depression” as some would put it.

So what did I learn today? That Torrington *might* just be dead to me. We’ve cliqued and everyone has gone off on their different ways. And as much as I love to call people friends, I suppose I’m not even important enough for an IM anymore. Sad, but the truth.

That was the all-encompassing theme of a dreadful summer that saw so much promise turn to rubble on so many fronts. I didn’t find anything my heart was looking for, I didn’t reconnect with my roots, I didn’t take the lessons I have learned time and time again and use them to a benefit to me and this crazy world. I worked and functioned in a mindless, idiotic stupor, being led by promises of money and a large error in judgment in mixing emotions and rational thought. I didn’t learn anything new, I am no closer to overall happiness, nor enlightenment. I am sad, frustrated, heartbroken, angered, sick, tired, bored. I labored, and slept, and was ignored, and bypassed. Friends who I used to believe in forgot me like a wrapper on a park bench. Friends who I used to believe in hurt in me in ways they could never have imagined– unbeknowst to them or not, the general and overriding theme of ignorance and selfishness ran deep.

I learned many people are self-centered, self-indulgent, self-interested, and self seeking. They are liars who say one thing, and then are out doing the exact opposite the next night. They are cowards who are afraid to speak their mind for fear it will come to hurt them. They are parasites who feed off of my attention, laughter, insight– but drop me at a moment’s notice once I stop providing them with sustenance. If I ask for something in return, it’s a chore, easily forgotten and ignorable. Helping one’s self-esteem is met by deafening silence the next morning. Laughing with one person one day results in a three hour conversation. A more melancholic tone the next day is met with an abrupt end to sentences, curt replies, and an eventual disappearance. So people can lean on me, but I can’t lean on them? Some people love to be somber and oppressive, and they are labeled emotional, affectionate, candid, and outspoken. I’m high maintenance and obviously too much negative work to deal with.

See for many people life is just like a physics problem. They’ll put work in, only if the energy focused back towards them is more than what they put in. They then have a surplus of attention, affection, interest, whatever you might call it. Unfortunately there is not an infinite amount of energy to be given by the entire species at a single point in time. This means that for every ten positive seekers, there are a few of us (like me) who end up burned in whatever fashion that our companions decide is appropriate. Since there are so few of us, we carry a much bigger burden than it is worth for someone’s self-status to increase by a mere fraction. But since there is no reason for the leeches to stop and look back, there is never a change to this cycle. It is akin to one person leaning on a small sapling, which eventually breaks due to the weight. Instead of planting a new seed, or tending to the broken foliage, one just merely finds a new tree to lean on, until such a person finally finds a tree that will support their weight. And sooner or later, more dependants lean on that tree, eventually taking it down. And so falls the forest. And someday there will be nothing to lean on. And people will lean on each other. And eventually there will be two. And one will win. And they’ll fall down too. And it’ll be the end.

The state of the human race is miserable. The outlook is bleak. The flaws in individuals are glaring, and fatal. People can believe in an eventual destination, but lack overall faith. I am not a perfect person myself. I have many flaws that I have identified in my character, and some I probably haven’t. But the first step towards solving a problem is admitting you have one. If you are blinded by the light, you can’t see the path in front of you, can you?

In private grief with careless scorn. In public seem to triumph and not to mourn.

What could have been?

I don’t know. I don’t think she ever felt the same way. So it’s probably a moot point. I let myself get too wrapped up in what I wanted, what could have been– instead of what it really was– quite frankly, nothing. Waiting for the messages, the messages, the messages. She never had a clue what she meant to me. I don’t know If I had a clue what she meant to me.

All I know is once again I’m on the losing team. Shot blocked, time expired. Waste of 6 months, of hoping, waiting, trying, being. Another scar added to the heart. And is anyone surprised? Not me.

All I want is one basket, I don’t care if it’s a swish or if it clanks of the backboard and takes a couple hops on the way down.

One measly basket.

And I don’t know if that shooting percentage is going to climb above .000 again. I don’t know what I do wrong. Why this always happens to me. I’m so good, so careful, so accomodating; and yet I’m never the one. Never good enough.

But I guess I have to have faith. It’s the only way I can pick up myself and move forward. Otherwise I’d sit outside and stare into space for the rest of my life, wondering where I fit in. I don’t want to do it, but I want to believe in myself so much. Too much.

Maybe I just haven’t been rewarded yet. Maybe there’s a place for me in someone, somewhere. I can only pray.

After all, it only takes one basket to win a championship, right?

Ugh.

So I talk to people last night and today. And whether they know it or not, they have further thrown me into the pit of depression. I am now really under the impression that people are just too fucking stupid to think about what comes out of their mouth. Really. Fucking. Stupid. It’s people like some of my “friends” who make me lose faith in humanity as a whole.

This is a bit different from my depressed boo-hoo state though. This is like “Holy shit, the world is so much more pathetic than I ever could have imagined– never underestimates peoples’ ability to kill one another.”

Mindless lies. No one thinks of the consequences, they think of covering their ass at that very moment. I find it comical that one can lie to make oneself (me) feel better, and completely neglecting how stupid that lie is going to look when it is uncovered. Stupid. Tremendously idiotic. Retardedly idiotic. I mean, I’m far from a perfect person but honestly, I think about things that will actually have an effect (that I can discern) on someone’s life.

I really don’t know if Cornell is going to make it better. All I know is Torrington is growing dead to me. This was the most wasted period of 3 months I hope to ever encounter in my lifetime.

I really wish that someone would wake me up and say “Hey, you get to start ALL over again.” At which point I’d say, “Fuck dealing with the world, I’m going to sleep– wake me up when I’m 65.”

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea’s Dear Leader Kim Jong-il never forgets a phone number, a cadre’s career or a line of computer code.

According to an article posted Tuesday on a Web site run by North Korea, Kim wakes up early every day for intensive memory training where he sits down and commits to his keen mind items such as the phone numbers of workers in his Stalinist state.

“I remember all computer codes and telephones that workers are using now,” Kim was quoted as saying on the Web Site “Uri-Min-jok-kiri,” or “Among our People.”

Kim surprised a group of North Korean officials attending a meeting in 2002 by recalling all their phone numbers “with lightning speed,” the site said.

On a day Kim visited a cemetery, he looked around at the tombs and he remembered the achievements, characteristics, tastes and bereaved family members for hundreds of the dead by a quick glance at the names on tombstones, it said.

“All the attendants were surprised at his incredible memory,” the site says.

North Korean propaganda is ripe with the amazing achievements of its Dear Leader. The highly controlled state also closely monitors its citizens to make sure they do not speak out against Kim or challenge his rule.

Kim pilots jet fighters, pens operas, produces movies and accomplished a feat unmatched in the annals of professional golf by shooting 11 holes-in-one on the first round he ever played.

The Web Site said Kim told all workers they should develop their ability to memorize. “The memory of a person gets better when a person uses their brain often,” he was quoted as saying.

Meh, feeling a bit better– I still really think I need to get out of T-Town. That’s OK, not a whole lot of time left, and most of it is spent in mindless stupor wearing my MQP shirt. I don’t know what it is, but I’ve become far too stagnant here– I don’t really do a hell of a lot anymore except for the occasional wanderings on the weekends, and I’m quite isolated from a good deal of people that I used to be pretty close to. I’m lethargic, perpetually tired, I don’t smile or laugh nearly as much as I should. I have stiffness in the bones (lyric from somewhere– Ah, “Fat Bottomed Girls” - Queen) and I sit here all alone.

This post above is a prime example of complete lack of motivation to do anything sitting here in my room. But now “Free Falling” is on the radio, so I’m going to stop typing and let Tom Petty sing a bit.