musical influences

It's surprising to me that for being a music major i'm really not that into music as a whole. I listen to the same music day after day, month after month, year after year sometimes, and it's all music that's been recommended to me by someone else. I don't know why, but i've just never really been into finding music for myself. Maybe it's because i've always found those people annoying who're like, obsessive over finding new indie bands that they can brag about. I've always just listened to whatever music my loved ones or people I respect tell me to listen to. Like I said, strange for a music major. But i'm not complaining; it's lead me to a lot of good music over the years. Actually, all of my favorite artists andsongs are from recommendations from other people. Ben Folds, Dashboard Confessional, Queen, Belle and Sebastian, Neutral Milk Hotel, Chet Baker, Scissor Sisters, Rooney, Vampire Weekend, Lady Gaga (who i'm hesitant to put in the same category as all the previous artists but oh well), they're all artists I never would have thought to listen to on my own but have been recommended and they're some of my favorite, most feel good music to listen to.

I think part of the reason that is is because of the fact that people I love told me to listen to them. Every single artist I mentioned reminds me of one specific person and I love that about music. Actually, every single artist either reminds me of Sam or my sister Jenna (with the exception of Vampire Weekend). What can I say, they both have great musical taste. Ben Folds, Queen, Neutral Milk Hotel and Chet Baker (as well as just jazz in general) all remind me so strongly of Sam. I can't listen to any of that music without thinking about him. I like it, but I guess it would suck if we broke up. The music I listen to would be cut in half. Hahaha. All the others remind me of Jenna (with the exception of vampire weekend, like I said. Maddie got me into them). She's always influenced me with

music, probably more than anyone else in my life. She was the one who got me out of listening to mainstream music at a young age. Hahaha. If it weren't for her, i'd be listening to shitty rap and all the pop songs they overplay on the radio. My parents also had a pretty big influence in my music. They've always liked the oldies, like most parents do, and i've grown up listening to 40's big band jazz and Billy Joel and stuff like that. This is a random blog, but it's just always been interesting to me how I've come across all the music I love and listen to on a regular basis. I didn't even get into classical music myself, it is always my Grandma who buys me classical CDs, or my old flute teacher who loaned them to me. Anyways, I'm listening to Belle and Sebastian right now, and they are like, the most feel good

music for me to listen to. they put me in such a good mood. I'm gonna go practice now that I got that rant off my chest.

procrastination

Today is the third day i've spent exactly $6.32 at Starbucks. We're completely out of coffee creamer AND milk. I only realized that after I made myself a full pot of coffee the other morning. So, I've been forced to go to starbucks in the bookstore every morning, wait in the out-the-door line with the sorority girls ordering their passion teas and venti double shot iced soy skinny vanilla lattes, and pay that much for a tall pumpkin spice latte and a scone that I down in ten minutes. This morning I watched the barista put the whipped cream and lid on my drink, then look at the cup for my name and get that puzzled look on her face like they always do, and call out "Pumpkin spice latte for Louis."

Um, I've gotten Elsie before, and Alice many times, usually as the result of the misspelling "elise," but never before have I gotten Louis. I was embarrassed to go up and claim my drink. The lady got confused and wrote "louise." I guess it's always too loud in starbucks. Anyways, dorm life kind of sucks and i'm quite tired of eating shitty food all the time. Today all i've eaten is my latte, my scone, and some pringles. This sucks. I can't wait to go grocery shopping.

I've been feeling the need to blog more. So I figure, why not start now, when i'm supposed to

be writing a 5 page, 150 point essay or practicing scales and my orchestral excerpt for my most important midterm tomorrow? I get the most unnecessary things accomplished when i'm trying to procrastinate something. Maybe if I wear my glasses it will help me feel more scholarly and inspired. What I want the most is to just have a clear, clean desktop and make myself a pot of coffee and drink it out of my favorite mug. That always makes me feel more able to get started on work. But... we have no milk.

I like thinking that no matter how bad I might mess up my scales and excerpt, no matter how late I stay up writing this paper, tomorrow at this time I will be done and have this weight off my shoulders. And then i'm going grocery shopping.

summer living

I'm in phoenix with my dad and fiancee, tying on my brand spanking new mac book pro :)

I love it! i'm so happy to finally have my own computer. the only thing is, I wish all of my photos and documents and music were already on this computer. it's a pain to transfer all of them.

I should blog more, since this is the summer and i'll have more time to do that now than when school starts... so let's think. What monumental things have happened?

I found out I got a five on the AP english test, which was so unexpected, but awesome. I finally feel confident in my english abilities. I wish that I wasn't that way. It's like, when i feel like i'm good at something, i'm usually right, but one bad experience can put me into thinking that i'm not as good as I thought I was. It's that way with everything. I go back and forth between thinking i'm good and thinking i'm below par at everything. It always takes something big to prove to myself that i'm really right. But, then it goes away again. It's a neverending cycle.

anyways, also, i've been sewing more, since my sisters got me an awesome sewing machine for graduation. It's actually the model they use in project runway. I found a cool dress pattern in another blog that i've made a few dresses of. I would post a picture of the finished product if I had one at the moment, but I don't. I'll be sure to take some soon.

and this is sad, but my dog unexpectedly got cancer and we had to put her down a few days ago. It was just so sudden. We came back from our california vacation and she seemed off; she stopped eating after a few days and was panting like she couldn't breathe well, so we took her to the vet and they did a blood test and found that her white blood cell count was 3 times what it should have been. that either means an infection or cancer, and it was not an infection because she didn't have a fever or anything. So we didn't want to see her suffer... she was already refusing to eat anything and having trouble breathing and not getting any sleep because of that... It was sad.

I lose important things frequently

well, it's been a while.
i'm thinking of starting a fashion focused blog. I have always felt like that's a vain thing to do, because it's just like saying to the world "look, i dress cute! so cute that i'm going to tell you how I make up each of my outfits so you can copy me!" and... i've never been much of a fan. well, i like reading fashion blogs, but i've always felt like i couldn't do one because it's too vain. but i think i'll give it a try. it's more like... laying all your ideas out in front of your face on a screen because they're better that way, rather than contained in your head. it helps you process things. come up with new, better ideas. It's like journaling, in a way. fashion journal! hahah.

well, anyway, that's my take on the whole thing. I think i'm too lazy to update regularly, though. and also, i can't find my digital camera, which really sucks. but once i find it (i'm crossing my fingers that i will), maybe i'll start my fashion blog.

also, i'm... kind of enjoying my summer thus far. kind of. it seems like i had this built up ideal of summer in my head that my actions aren't fulfilling this time around. maybe it's cause i have a job this summer, so i'm always having things i actually need to do and places i need to be. it kind of sucks. but at least i'm making money. Anyways. more to come later.

I like snow in april

I always love snow... it being in the middle of spring just makes it all the more unique and great. it's so beautiful I can't help loving it. At least until i have to walk around in it. hahah. So i went to prom and honestly, it wasn't very good. last year I felt out of place and slightly uncomfortable, only because i'm too self conscious to really want to dance, but this year I felt out of place because i was just thinking... I don't belong with these people at all anymore. I just don't identify with any of them. I'm so done with all of the people that I go to school. minus a select few. I don't really have senioritis, because my workload is so light, but I am at the point where I cannot handle any more of the immaturity i'm faced with on a daily basis. Anyways, i'm glad and sad that it will be over in a few weeks. I don't handle change well at all but i know i'm ready to be out of high school. For your viewing pleasure (hopefully), here's another sonnet I wrote for my 1000 lines... this one's a bit more melancholy, although it's also about spring (i'm writing a collection of spring sonnets hahah).

nature sends a silent beacon
somehow synchronizing subjects
of her rein, they choose a seeming
random day to bloom, and beaming
sunlight fools them all to expect
steadiness of her, but weaken,
weaken, that they do, when frosted
wind sweeps through the boughs and petals
of the trees and roses that grow
slow and beautiful. but you know
sadness that I have, it settles
over when I think, exhausted
realizing that roses always die
before their beauty from me springs a sigh

I really do love springtime

All the flowers in the house are cheering me up immensely, I think. There's a vase full of yellow roses on the counter, vases with tulip bulbs in bloom all over various parts of the house, and a mini garden of daffodils outside. It's nice. In fact, since I have to have written 1000 lines of poetry by the end of this month, I wrote a sonnet about spring. It's pretty cliche, but I'm proud because it fits all the specific requirements of a sonnet: it's 14 lines, the rhyme scheme is abab/bcbc/cdcd/ee, and each line is 10 syllables and in iambic pentameter. I sound like such a nerd. but i'm proud of it!

the plum and cherry trees are born anew,
their beauty is forgotten until spring
the virgin blooms flinch back from icy dew
that on reluctant winter branches cling.
in winter morning air the bluebirds sing,
they sense the gentle rising of the sun
she shows her quiet face with warmth to bring
against the frigid winter moon she's won.
a ray of light falls where there once was none,
illuminates a bud that's lone and still
and once the spring's unfailing work is done
her hand has formed a thousand daffodils.

eventually she withers, fades and dies,
she can't endure the heat despite her tries.

I don't know if i'm cut out for this

I had a pretty good spring break, with it starting out how it did, finding out i made all state and everything. Then my mom and I spent a nice couple of days in Phoenix, laying out in the sun and getting manicures and such, which we both needed. But then I pretty much spent the rest of it being sickeningly nervous about my UofA audition, which was yesterday...

I thought it actually went better than I had anticipated. I played well, I felt, and I was pretty happy with it, until the professor and I started talking at the end... It almost seemed like he was trying to convince me NOT to be a music major. We started out talking about all the drawbacks, like how his first job was 17,000 a year with no benefits, and how the odds of being a professional musician are less than being a pro basketball player... But that in itself didn't really discourage me. I've always known my chances wouldn't be good.

He also said that I would probably be taking 8:00 classes every day of the week until i'm a junior. Which really, really sucks. But I would do it to be a professional musician; just to be as good as he is someday. That is what I want so bad. Another thing is that he said it would probably cost me around 57,000 in extra costs to be a performance major through 4 years of college, because I'd have to buy a new professional level flute, travel costs, etc. As he said, being a musician has been called a "rich man's profession," ironically, since "starving" musicians are obviously linked to not making much money.

He also told me that more than anything, more than being a really, really talented musician, you need a lot of tenacity to be in this profession, and bluntly, that if you don't have it, you need to get out. Tenacity being like, grit and determination and the will to keep going when you get rejected or beaten, and the ability to assert yourself and pretty much force your way into the business. That is something I am so not good at. I'm just hoping college will open me up a little, and being in the real world will make me more outgoing and assertive. I know it did with my sisters.

I just hate the funk I get into when I do badly at something, or don't make something, etc. I just don't know if i'll be able to handle that pressure at an adult level. or even a college level. I definitely need practice...

Oh, and speaking of practice, I should be practicing about, oh, three or four hours a day by this time. If i'm really serious about this. God. My arms and everything hurt just from practicing so much for my audition and PFAA. I've been doing MAYBE an hour of real practice a day, not including band and lessons. Ugh...

I made all state!!

This has been such a good few days...
I went to the movies to see She's out of my league (which was pretty bad) with Sam and found a 20 on the floor in the bathroom stall. That sort of stuff never happens to me!
I slept in until 11, made coffee, practiced a little, went to the DAV and got 6 skirts, 2 dresses and 2 purses for $5, then came home and found out I made all state.

I am so excited! I am one of the 14 best flute players in the state! and i'm the only person besides Tiffany from PHS that made it... I am so happy. I went to phoenix for a few days with my mom and we just hung out by a pool (I even got a little tan, it was awesome) and relaxed. Now i'm back home and gonna be starting my new job today. yay!

I'm more nostalgic than the average person

especially lately, I can't get certain things off my mind, certain people, certain events... i'm too nostalgic for my own good. all it does is make me wish things were the way they used to be. I like being able to remember things, but it wears me out sometimes. and at the same time, I wish I could remember them more clearly. I kept a journal through most of last year pretty consistently, and then I destroyed it, something I regret so much... I cringe every time I think about it. I so wish I hadn't. So much of last year was worth writing about for me.

And I was looking forward to being able to look back and laugh at it (still don't quite think i'm at that point yet, but that's not the point, I would have been, eventually...). It's always a bad idea to destroy something you've written. No matter how stupid or dangerous you think it might be. It's like, now, I only remember snippets of things... only certain feelings, events, good memories. I think it's been triggered by the time of year. I just remember what I was doing at this time last year, and how different things were. Just flashes of things, like picking thousands of post-it notes off my car on a windy day, going to lunch alone, parking in the exact same spot every day, picking out my prom dress...

I just feel like if I don't constantly re-remember my memories, they'll go away and i'll lose them forever. It's irrational but it's a big fear for me.

And i'm still having fitful dreams, the kind where nothing in particular sticks out, but I feel less rested when I wake up... I feel like i've been thinking and stressing out all night long instead of resting. I hope they go away.

Meanwhile, I'm kind of excited for prom again this year, even though my date totally isn't... which puts a damper on it for me, but oh well. I know that prom is a kind of stupid, immature high school thing, but it's just something you have to do, and I had enough fun last year to do it again. This year I think i'll go for a sort of 40's hollywood vibe, with a really classic, simple dress kind of like this (black or red, most likely) and a wavy, 40's glamorous hairstyle. Pearls. Dramatic cat-eye makeup. I'm excited.

I actually CAN be responsible and productive

It's spring break! I'm just saying that to try to make myself more excited, because I really feel no excitement.

I feel a little proud of myself at everything i've done lately. I always seem to really kick it into gear in the last few days before a report card comes out. Hahah. I've brought my grades up, one from a 64 to an 80 in a day, and so now i'm getting two B's and two A's which is one A better than last quarter. go figure. I am so proud of my abilities to bring grades up at the last possible minute.

I think what's helped a lot is that i've started actually using my planner and making lists of everything I need to do. I've set up all my PFAA stuff, made a lot of business phone calls to stragers (which doesn't sound like a big deal, but strangely it's a thing I absolutely loathe doing) i've set up all my college stuff (my audition in is ten days... i'm freaking out), i've pretty much done everything I can do. I feel good about myself when i'm productive like that. Oh, and I have a job! big plus. I will FINALLY be making some money that I can actually like... spend on things. It's so weird to think that i'll have a regular paycheck. it will be so nice to have money to my name.

So other than the fact that allstate auditions are tomorrow and I have my college audition coming up ridiculously fast, i'm in a good mood. I feel like i won't even be able to enjoy break much though, because i'll be so stressed out. I'll be practicing like, three hours a day. Hahah.

I wish I had some cool picture to put along with this blog but I don't. I think I need to start taking more pictures.