That desire to run has come back. Not far. Just... somewhere. The beach, maybe. Disneyland. A cruise. Japan. (I guess that's pretty far, though.) I just want to be away from this, to do something else. Just for a day or two. I feel trapped. Hunched over and cramped in a box. That's what it feels like. I just need a day or two to convince myself I'm really not. :)

What the snap? Why didn't this exist when I was in college? :D

I saw the midnight showing of Prince Caspian, which I really enjoyed and will probably comment on more after I've seen it again. The last scene of the movie made me curious about the books for the first time, and I had sort of planned to go check them out at the library, but instead I looked up synopses online. I=impatient dork. Gotta say, though, I'm glad I did. Series that don't continue to follow the main characters throughout the conclusion (or at least most of the way through) drive me bonkers. I may still try to pick up the series at some point, but I'm 99% positive it will only frustrate me. I like the Pevensies and wanted to read way more about them. :(

My parents have decided we're going to try selling the house and moving closer to work--again. They seem a bit more serious about it this time, though, and I actually started packing my room up last weekend. It's been weird with so many of my things not out on display, but it'll be worth it if they actually follow through this time. If they don't... well, something's gotta give. Either I'll have to move closer on my own, or I'll have to give up my most amazing job ever, because gas is OMG-way-too-high for a hundred miles a day. Why am I not smart? Then I could invent teleportation, and none of this would be an issue. :D

Totally craving some bubble tea right now. Mmm, bubble tea.

Hugs and bubbles!
<3

And once again, it's been a million years (read: nigh two months) since I've written anything real. Things are pretty consistently getting better--and by "better," I partially mean better. Whenever I find myself unhappy, it ultimately boils down to perspective and how much I'm letting other people influence mine. One of these days I'll learn!

Not gonna lie, though: there are a few people in my life that are just going to affect me. Some I wish I could spend more time with. Some I wish would let me. Some I'm not sure I want to be around. And some I just can't make heads or tails of, no matter how hard I try.

( What language are you speaking?! )

( On a semi-yet-not-really-related note... )

Things I really wish I'd written about but never did:
.oO Darla and Nick's wedding, which was beautiful and amazing and passed by far too quickly.
.oO Animal Kingdom's 10th Anniversary, which was hot, awkward, fun, and depressing all at once, but was, most of all, highly worthwhile and amusing.
.oO The fact that I have bangs, now. Weeee!
.oO The end of my era of DAK Dream Squadders. None now remain, and that, to me, is heartbreaking.
.oO Dream Squad party '08. But that's what pictures are for.
.oO NATIONAL BUBBLE WEEK.
.oO The slew of other things I've already, no doubt, forgotten.

I got to preview TSM TWICE last night. It's amazing, and I will be taking photos there as soon as it is legal. My personal high score is 98,500 points, and I won a virtual bunny BOTH times I played, which is only fitting! :D :D :D

The next few days are going to be ridiculously exhausting. And I say this having fallen asleep twice already over the course of today, after having my first full night's sleep in almost a month as of last night. Tomorrow night I'm participating in Goofy's Mystery Tour, an after-hours, Cast Member only trivia game/scavenger hunt that is supposed to last 'til one in the morning. I open the next day and will (most likely, since it looks like it'll be a busy day) be working to close... then proceed to work open to close the following day, too. Insert OMG SLEEPY BUNNIES here. But when it becomes a toss-up between sleeping and affording the gas required to drive all the way to my OMG AMAZING JOB every day... yeah. Hoping I can at least find someone to crash with on that side of town tomorrow night, 'cause getting home at 2 and waking up at 5 doesn't sound like a good plan. Then again, I saw a wonderful icon today that said, "Nobody looks back on life and remembers the nights they got plenty of sleep." :D

I once again find myself full of sleepy bunnies and should probably make my bed so I can fall into it! :D

Hugs and bubbles! MWAH!
<3

So I was going through the files in my writing folder just now (shuddering at how very, very bad I used to be--as opposed to simply very bad, now), and I found this IM conversation I'd saved in which a friend and I worked out several plot issues for something we intended to write together. I saved it in March of 2001. At that time, I had already incorporated "bunnies" into my slanguage, although I was using it as a faux-curse rather than as a verbal emoticon. Still, that's seven years I've been using this term.

Wow.

That was back in the day of LYLAS, PMS, chica, and gurl.

I guess that makes language just another one of those aspects of us that, without our realizing, change and grow as we do.

(I've missed this.)

I fell in love with this song the first time I heard it, but I don't think I realized at the time that it could ever be a more perfect anthem for my 24th year of life. Oh Switchfoot, how you write the lyrics of my soul amazes me.

I've been holding onto so many things. The reason the past several months feel like such a blur are because I'm not allowing them to be real to me in favor of clinging to history--which is odd, given my aversion to that subject in general. So I gotta figure out how to let go. Not hard, right? Right. Just keep swimming. Keep moving forward. What was once will never be twice, but those things may always be potential once agains that I'll never reach if I sit here stagnant. Letting go isn't erasing it. And it's not "copping out," but trusting that the change can become the comfort if I will just let it.

The tricky thing is what's missing. Do I let my heart get too attached? I think that's the reason I have so much trouble with this. I knot little strands of my heart around the people in my life, so when we separate, the strands become taut until I feel that painful tug that consistently reminds me I'm missing them. I've never had one break. They just slowly start to unravel on my end, to get a bit looser, so that I don't notice it as constantly until the other person gives a little tug. Wow, how cliché is this? But that's really what it feels like. Am I supposed to cut the threads? Is that better? And if so, how do I do that? Or is it even necessary to break those attachments to achieve the letting go to begin with? And is it really so wrong for me to miss them this much?

I think this makes me childish, but I never claimed to be anything else, so maybe that's okay. :)

I badly need to relinquish control and regain focus again, too.

I feel like I missed a chance. I've never felt that way before. Anytime before, even when it's ached inside like this, I've thought, "Oh well. If it's supposed to be, it'll come around again." This time, I'm thinking, "Why didn't I just try and see if it was supposed to be, now?" Because now, it feels like just another one of those things I need to let go so I can keep moving toward the real.

Thinking. Sitting. Sitting. Thinking. (I'm going to get some tea.)

Hugs and bubbles!
MWAH!
<3

I should have said:

"I don't know. I don't know, because the last person I fell for filled me with confused angst bunnies for the longest time, and even now I can't think about him without wondering, 'What the heck?!' So I don't know the answer to that because I'm still trying to figure out the answers to the last time around."

But instead I said:

"No...? What? I don't know!"



[I always think of what I wish I'd said too far after the saying it is required. This is why I prefer writing.]
[<3]

It felt nice to be "wanted," though it was only because you wanted the alternative less.

And I know you meant well. I really do. And I appreciate it more than I could ever explain. But it also hurt more than I could ever explain. Because it meant, for everyone else, just the opposite of what you said. I think you know that, and I think you actually see what's going on, even though you don't say anything.

And you. You lied. It was just a little lie, and one that I should have no trouble getting over. But I guess what gets to me is that you are just so completely uncaring of the fact that you left me in the dust. I. Feel. Used.

And I'm back in this place... this place where all of you say one thing... that can't be true, not based on your actions. The way things go every day, the way things are turning out... proves I can't be what you say I am. That's why I deny it. That's why I'm tired of hearing it.

And I miss you. And you. And you. And you, and you, and you... so, so ridiculously much.

And I really have to believe that it's me... because it keeps happening. And the only common factor to all those situations... is me.


[I don't remember who some of these are about. I do remember the others.]
[<3]

Miss you. Love you. Hope you're better, now. Hope you know...
<3

So everyone says it... but seriously, where did 2007 go? Goggles. Last year was one of the biggest emotional roller coaster rides I've ever encountered, and it's strange to see it go. I know 2008 is going to be a crazy-exciting year of growth and change, but it would take an awful lot to top last year. Right now, the fact that it's gone feels very surreal.

I waved goodbye to '07 from my couch, watching the Times Square shenanigans and hoping for clips of the fireworks at MK (which I now see were on CNN, not ABC), but seeing as I'd worked early all week and had to work early on the 1st, I called it a night at about 1 (and woke up again at 5). One day I'll tough it out and visit one of the parks for New Year's. :)

As regards working on New Year's Eve and New Year's Day... I have to ramble about the end of the 2007 Year of a Million Dreams and ( be terribly, terribly sentimental. )

So... wonderfulness. I'm not gonna lie, even with all the wonderfulness... I am still feeling nostalgic. Lonely. Insecure. I was so settled at DAK, the same way I was back at Emp when I was terrified about leaving to start Dream Squad. After the initial fear and settling, though, I was never the "new kid" on the DAK Squad. I was the person welcoming the "new kids." And it's hard to be back on the other side, feeling like everything I say or do could turn drastically wrong, and constantly wondering what my new teammates think of me. When I left DS at DAK, my leader told me I'd grown a lot and really come out of my shell. I think the worst thing I'm feeling right now is guilt... I feel guilty because I think that, if he were to see me now, he'd be disappointed in how I've reverted back to an older version of myself.

And I am still missing people in my life that I never thought would be this distant... or worse, gone. And I'm still questioning the nature of the threads that tie me to some of the people in my life, whether those threads are as strong as I initially thought, and why some of those threads can't grow as strong as I'd like.

Yep, I think nostalgic, lonely, and insecure about covers it. :) But I think about October of '06, and it makes sense to feel this way. I'm walking another fork in the road, just like I was then. It's so exciting and new, but I can still see the split in the path behind me, and I'm not far enough down the road yet to stop myself from missing what diverged from me and went the other way. But eventually I'll settle and get used to this terrain, and in the meantime... just keep swimming!

Happy 2008!
Hugs and bubbles!
MWAH!
<3

Back in October, when I was offered a position on the MK DS again, I promised myself I wasn't going to walk away from this TA like I did the last one... barely remembering a handful of the amazing times and Guest experiences I took part in. I promised myself that no matter how exhausted I was or how many other things I had to do, I was going to take the time to write about each of the wonderful moments I shared so I wouldn't look back a year from today and sadly wish I could remember the names, faces, and stories behind the most magical time of my life. I told myself this would be easy and that I would do it.

So far I'm off to a sucky start. I've been back to dreaming for two weeks now and haven't put a single memory down to paper or keyboard!

Bad Erin. Bad.

( So here's my attempt to play catch-up. )

...

Well, let me see. ( News on Rodney )

Goggles, it's almost time for the sun to come up. I should soooooo sleep. I haven't pulled one of these since college. :D

MWAH! Hugs and bubbles!
<3

I don't know why I'm not sleeping right now. It may have something to do with coffee, but it didn't have anything to do with coffee the last two nights... so yeah.

I wish I was lying under a tree right now, but I wish it was autumn so I could stare up at all the colors in the moonlight and feel nothing but inspired and awed. ( I wish... )

Today was my family's Thanksgiving, and we all managed to more or less get along for several hours together--with Grammy! I don't know if that's a testament to the fact that we're getting older and more mature or a testament to the fact that we just don't care enough to get riled up anymore. Or maybe we were all just too tired to bother with things. Hee. :) But regardless of the reason, it turned out to be a lovely little post-holiday. With DRESSIN'! Honest-to-goodness southern cornbread dressin', and not that wannabe stuff they've been serving at work for the past month! Gleeeeeeeeee. Right now I'm excessively thankful for leftovers! Or... I will be... when my stomach decides to forgive me for eating ENTIRELY too much food this afternoon. Meep!

I've been trying to get some people together to go watch the castle lighting with me for ages, only to find out most of them had gone to do so without me. Soooo, last Sunday, after work, I just stayed to watch... and I'm not sure what happened. I cried, of course. I mean, I knew I would. But about the time when I should have been able to turn off the waterworks, they just kept coming. And I found myself thinking about all kinds of things... all kinds of wonderful, amazing, awful, and painful things, and I sat there crying for about ten minutes, by myself, in the Magic Kingdom, staring up at the castle. I don't know whether to blame this on girly hormones or a lack of chocolate, but I've definitely felt... incomplete... since. That makes no sense, but it's still the truth.

Wow, I've been writing this entry for like half an hour, now. :D

I was passing through the living room while my parents were watching TV and overheard this woman say something along the lines of how a sense of belonging is one of the bigger human needs. I haven't stopped to consider whether I agree with this or not, but it instantly made me think of my work situation and wonder whether that has anything to do with my feeling so out of sorts lately. When I finally found my little corner of Dream Squad, when the newness and uncertainty settled, my feet touched stable ground there and... I belonged. Without even trying, I had this place and these people that accepted me and dealt with me, and... I just belonged there. Despite the unstable times, despite any incidents we encountered, I had my roots there. It was a little corner, a little place just for me. It seems that no matter where I went from there, no matter the fact that I've now returned, that place and those people are no longer what surround me, and I feel uprooted and... and like I don't belong. I don't know if that means I can't belong or if I'm just resisting the change because I think it's too hard to try to belong somewhere new. I don't know.

I think I had a point, somewhere in there. But I probably forgot it. :)

Love and hugs! MWAH!
<3