Moo Psi Moo

 

With the Purple Sign. PV!

 

 

To understand this blog you must first understand a little bit about College Night. Montevallo is a tiny little liberal arts college without a football team (how un-American of us?). In order to make up for our lack of football and homecoming traditions, we came up with our own tradition, College Night. Basically it's like this, our school is split into two sides, the Purple Side (with a cow mascot) and the Gold Side(with a lion mascot). As an entering freshman you choose which side to be on. There is a third side, fictionalized as Green, which is basically for people who don't care at all. Honestly about one third plus of the school chooses to do this. But for those of us who do participate, it's brilliant. College Night is actually a series of events running through January and the start of Febuary, events that are then judged  and one side, either Purple or Gold is announced a winner. To College Night there are three main things that are judged. There are the sports, in which both sides make up their own teams and have matches/competitions. These are (as far as I know) in soccer, basketball, and volleyball matches--along with a chearleading competition.  The next section is spirit, as in which side has the most spirit, with the most people and enthusiam. This also includes not being rude or disrespectful, like a Purple cursing at a Gold would make us lose spirit points, and vice-versa. Then finally there is the most amazing part to it, the show. Every year each side writes, produces, and performs it's own original musical. It is completly student run, with no help from professors or outside sources at all. The shows are kept secret, the only hint at what the show is going to be is seen in the sign reveal (which happens right before a pep-a-rally, that is me with the purple sign above, the signs are also judged). The only people who have any idea of the show are the people actively involved in it. The shows are first shown on the first Thursday of Febuary, usually this one is open to the public and a lot of time future students are invited to it. This is when everyone first sees the show. Then again on Friday (another public and typically a lot of alummni), and lastly on Saturday (where  the show is judged.) And then on Saturday night both sides stand on stage at Palmer Hall and wait for the annoucement of winner. What I find great about it is they don't actually come right out and say who the winner is, they say a catch phrase, like an inside joke from the show or something, and of course from that you know who the winner is. Oh, I should also mention that none of this stuff happens until second semester, the teams aren't made the cast isn't picked. So all of this amazing stuff it formed within the time frame of a month or so. So you got that? That's College Night, that has what has being keeping me busy for the past three weeks, and only two more to go.

 

 

On picking a side.....

 

Somehow it has never crossed my mind to be a Gold. It has to do with Eric Browne. He was the teacher, the one who first told me about Montevallo, and his time there. Most of what he told me was of College Night, and with him being a Purple. I got all these delicious tales of what being a Purple would entail. It all seemed so much fun. And then last Febuary, when I saw the College Night show, it was just so much more amazing. Last Year the Golds won, and I have to admit, there show was pretty great. But the Purple show, I don't know, it made me a feel a lot more than the Gold's did. And then there was the cheering, the sheer enthusiam expressed by those on the Purple Side, it was crazy and I fell in love. So I got here and declared myself a Purple, and I learned even more about the Purple Side, specfically that the Purple Side is one gaint interlocking family. Upperclassmen "adopt" freshman (so deemed "Baby Purples") and people have Purple wives and husbands and children and grandchildren, and it's all great and brilliant. And it's only in recent weeks that I realized it's not just something that fun and games, it's serious, the Purple side really is a true family. I knew I would love College Night from the moment I first heard of it when I was sixteen, and I knew it would be great. And then seeing the show, and thinking "Holy shit, they did all of this in just over a month?", was incredible. I knew that College Night is something bigger than itself. And then there were my rehearsals (I'm in the Pit Chorus) and the pep-a-rally. I literally felt at that pep-a-rally something I haven't felt in a long time, which is a sense of utter confidence. Just dancing and having fun and not caring about the rest of the judgemental world, it was great. Last time I felt it was in my senior year of high school, scattered throughout football games and drama rehearsals, but even then it was waning. But what really got it for me was what happened the other night, an event deemed the "Love In". The Love In is a Purple Side tradition where the Purples take half a rehearsal night to sit around in a circle on Palmer stage and share how they came to be a Pruple and what Purple families mean to them. Anyone is invited, even if you're not actively involved in College Night events and just want to support the side. And one thing that's really beautiful about it are the gifts. Over the years people have built up Purple-themed gifts, mostly plush cows and purple things, cute little things. And at the Love In the upperclassmen give away gifts to underclassmen. Most of the time these gifts are gifts that previous upperclassmen gave to them, and in turn the underclassmen give them to future underclassmen. It's compeltly an act of choice (you can keep your gifts forever), but I think it's beautiful. Some gifts have been in this circulation for years (*as far as I know, one there the other night has been going around for over sixty years*) And just the Love In itself. Some of the stories I heard there were so touching, some people are so close to these "families" they develop with each other. And everyone is there for you, you don't get scoffed at or looked down upon. Because of the Love In I felt closer to a group of people than I had in a long time, and these are people that if it wasn't for College Night, I probably never would've spoken to. And I love the Purple Side, and just within these first few short weeks, College Night has come to mean more to me than I thought it ever would.

 

 

On the sides...

 

Each side is unique in it's own way. The Purple side focuses on being united and a family. We tell each other we love each other, and we do, we really do. And most of all we accept anyone, not matter what, any person is welcome on the Purple Side. I love this more than anything. This is how our official school website defines the Purple Side:

 

"The Purple side prides itself in being diverse, energetic, spirited, united, accepting, motivated, determined, ambitious, creative, and fun! But most of all, we pride ourselves in being a family. The Purple Side is made up of people from all over the world and from every major on campus, with different backgrounds, religions, and ideas; who all are united to make one big Purple family. This family goes beyond the two months of college night and transcends into friendships that will last a lifetime."

 

And all I can say is that it couldn't be more true.

 

 

I do not know much of the Gold Side and I do not hold any ill will against anyone on Gold Side (Ben Kaiser, who I've known since I've been twelve, is on the Gold Side). I can hear stories around campus, about how they are, both good and bad, but I would never be able to pass true judgement without experiencing it myself. And honestly, I wanna stick with my Purple family. This is what the website has to say about the Gold Side:

 

"More than anything the gold side is known for being classy. As great as winning is, it isn’t everything, and we know this for sure. The most important part of college night is the experience we receive from being Gold members. Whenever we get together in large groups and start reminiscing about the Gold side, we are constantly telling stories about how much fun we had with the gold side and the family atmosphere we established and experienced. You will not hear many of these conversations ending in “and that’s how we won”, because winning is only a small bonus, just icing on the cake!"

And that is all to this long blog.
Fin.
-Keshia

Currently Reading The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien



Oh, Peter.

"The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease forever to be able to do it."
-J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens

If you had to examine my obssession with Peter Pan and put it into some measurable amount then you would never to have a very large device by which to measure. Or you could just give up on the task and ponder forever how one person became so infatuated with one fictional character. It is to this question that I can give no answer. I just became. I think I was about three years old when I first watched Disney's version of Peter Pan. For some odd reason, I remembering knowing him and having some vague knowledge of the story before. It have no idea why, because as for as I know in my short three years of life no one had mentioned Peter Pan before. Sometimes I like to pretend that I was remembering my days as a bird in Kensington Gardens and the adventures Peter and I would have there, this is why I knew him so well in the Disney version. This is why I was so in love with him. I formed in mine there, at three years old, that Peter was thirteen. In truth, his true age has never been mentioned in any work. Most versions have the classic line of Wendy Darling asking his age and him answering, "Quite young." But I assumed, because he was at the age where he was at the pinnacle of growing up, when parents talk about a child becoming a man, that he must have jsut broken upon his teenage years. So therefore, Peter Pan became forever thirteen in my mind. For years I went without Peter, but then the 2003 movie came out. I was ten then and I fell in love with Jeremy Sumpter's version of Peter Pan more than perhaps anything. That movie is still my favorite version of Peter Pan and I do believe it always will be. I think it was around then that I started telling people that on my thirtenth birthday that Peter Pan was going to come and take me to Neverland. It just became something I said. I'm not sure of what people really thought of it, if I really was convinced Peter was going to come take me and therefore crazy or if I was just find me amusing. Of course, as you should know, I turned thirteen and Peter never came. With more years I grew more fond of Peter, found him in other ways. There the books, a series of three written by J.M Barrie. Then there was the musical version where even the woman in the lead could make me swoon. There were the Peter and StarCatcher books which led to their plays (which, in my opinion did not win enough Tonys) and most recently SyFy's version of Peter Pan, which almsot won me out as my new favorite. But the the boy in that role is just not as charming as thirteen year old Jeremy Sumpter.

I kepts saying it, that Peter would come get me, and I still say it. I turned twenty a few days ago and yet I was still saying it. Every year of my life since I've been thirteen I have continued to turn thirteen and continued to wait on Peter. And I really don't think I ever will. If people ever asked me what my idea of heaven was I don't think I could ever describe a better place than Neverland.

But that's not what this blog is about, what this one is mostly about it flying. Or mostly about Peter, a little about flying. You see, ever since I've been young, maybe even pre-Pan I've had dreams of flying. And I know flying dreams are a common thing in people. But flying dreams, they were incredible. They felt real. I would wake up with my fingers buzzing and my body itching, sometimes I wanted to jump off my bed, up into the air, just because I as so convinced I could fly. They felt so real to me. I loved these dreams, they were always my favorite. And sometimes in them, I was with Peter Pan, in others, I was in other situations, not with Peter but still flying. A few years back, though, something happened. I was somewhere around the age of seventeen, I had a horrible, horrible dream. In my dream I was fifteen, even though in real life I was two years older. I was wearing a long, white nightgown, one like Wendy wears in almost all versions of Peter Pan. In my dream I tried to fly but I couldn't. I would get into the ait, floating just for a moment but then I would fall. I felt to heavy, and I just couldn't fly, no matter how hard I tried. In my dream there was an elderly man, who for some reason I listened to ardently. And he told me I was losing my ability to fly, not because I was growing up, but because I had lost my faith. I woke up soon after that and it felt so hard, I felt so sad, pulling the emotions of the dream up with and into the real world. I could only cry.

Last week, finishing them up the day before my birthday, I re-read the three books by J. M Barrie about Peter Pan. Which is where I found the above quote, and I was somwhoe sad again, but I had doubted my ability to fly, and I would enerv be able to do it again. But then in my dream last night I flew, I really did. It was just like it had always been. And I know, just know, that Peter Pan is still going to come for me one day.

Fin.
-Keshia

Currently Reading On Writing by Stephan King.

The Art of the Cut.

"Hailey leaned over into the shower again, grabbing a razor sitting on the side of the bath. She had pried it from the blade of a shaver a few weeks ago, and it sat on the side of the tub, unnoticed by either of her parents. But it was there for her, smiling in its coy way, calling her name in such a soft sweet voice. She dropped her towel, it hitting the tiled floor with a muffled sigh, something that only echoed in the silence of the moment. Her grip was that of an expert as she pressed the blade to the upper part of her thigh. It only took a moment for it to break through the skin, a red stream suddenly soaking into her hands and down the length of her leg. The pain echoed through her, at first a fierce tearing throughout her whole leg, a tremor bouncing and rattling inside of her bones--then in one concentrated area, burning along the straight line of the cut. Hailey examined it, the fifth in a row, the others on top of already healing, scabbing over. And this new blood, so bright red, spilling down her leg dripping off the sides of her knees. The pain was gone now, and she wanted it back, craved for it. She dug her nails into the cut, opening up the sides of the wound. And it was good, very good, somehow and someway. The wall was cool against her back as she let herself slide down it, catching her like a comforting hand. The walls were her only comfort, and they didn't even really exist at all."   

 

I wrote that, not that long ago. The first draft was my sophmore year, this is the edited draft. I'm hoping that this draft is a little bit more prolific, but if not, oh well. A character, Hailey, in one of my stories, Italian Bakery, cuts herself. This is the first time I wrote about it, the first time I described it. It is the readers first clue to just how messed up Hailey is. I put it in here because I feel like talking about cutting. It is something I have to talk about, it is something I can't help but thinking about.

 

First I would like to say that I lose respect for anyone who says people only cut themselves because they want attention. These people, they sadden me, they don't even realize how stupid they are making themselves sound with their words. Whether someone cuts themselves on their wrists or legs, or tells no one or everyone, theye don't do it because they want attention, they do it because they need attention. They need it so badly. No one self harms because they want to be the center of attention, they self harm because they need attention, need it so badly. And sometimes they don't even know how badly they need it. I can imagine that if anyone who was going to cut had someone grab their hands and tell them to stop and they cared about them, and that they really meant it and didn't just say it, that they would stop. I hold that faith, I really do, and I wish so badly I had someone there to say and show it to me.

 

Here's the thing about me, I used to hurt myself. I had a special way of doing it, but I guess everyone has their own way of doing things. I cut in my upper right thigh, practically on the hip bone. And I used a steak knife and I didn't so much as cut, as much as I did scrape. And it was always in the same spot, always over the place. I hardly ever bled, as it was scraping and not really cutting. Instead what I had when I was done was something soft and glistening, pink raw skin that I would baptize in soapy water to make my pain last a little bit longer. I wanted to feel the burn, I deserved the burn. I cut myself for reasons that I really can't explain. I just did, and it's not an act you think about very much. It's something that you just do. I was there, cutting the scar deeper and deeper into my leg. And it was anything that I felt that made me do it, anything at all. If I couldn't be stone then I had to feel something, and when I felt something I had to make the scar deeper. And it wasn't even so much about ceremony or anything for me. It was just something. Sometimes, I remember, sitting there and watching tv, totally involved in the program, and my right hand was there, digging deeper into my leg. There was one day too, where my mom saw the scar. It was fresh, the last cut had only been a few hours before. I was changing and she walked in (which wasn't weird because my mom and I shared a bedroom for the first fourteen years of my life). She saw it on my legs and bluntly asked, "What is that?" to which I answered, in I'm pretty sure the exact same tone and she had, "I cut myself." I remember her asking then if she was going to have to get me some help. And it terrified me, the thought of some person trying to understand me when I know I couldn't be understood. And so I said, "No Mom, just no." She never asked me about it again after that day. She also never made any efforts to hide any of the knives in the house or check my legs again. That was my Mom. Somehow I eventually stopped cutting myself. I'm not sure what made me stop. There wasn't a magic moment where I thought, I'm going to stop cutting myself. It just happened, just like the the cutting happened.I managed not to cut myself for a long time. The last time I cut was in when I was fourteen, but then I relapsed again in high school. It was my senior year, the day of my birthday, I cut myself again. I did it in the exact same way as last time, only I was so much more aware of it this time. It hurt much worse than it had in middle school, or at least more than I remembered it to. And I watched it, and I enjoyed it, cutting deeper and deeper. I cut my arm the day of my birthday, not my leg. I got away with by telling people a picture frame had fallen off the wall and cut my arm.

But the thing is that is hard to understand is that even though the cutting stopped in eight grade and hasn't happened again since my senior year, that the harming never really stopped. There are so many other ways to hurt yourself without leaving a mark, you can beat yourself, hitting myself over my head is my particular favorite. You can rip and pull your hair out. And you can tell yourself, over and over, how pathetic you are. That's the worst of it, just sitting there and crying and telling myself, Keshia you are pathetic and stupid. It's so hard to hate yourself, and it's the worse kind of harm you can do to yourself, and yet I can't stop doing it. It's too hard to stop hating yourself. And even if I'm not physically hurting myself, the base of the problem is still there, I hate myself. The first time I remember being aware of hating myself was when I was eight years old. I was in my room, and I remembered I was freshly showered because my hair was wet and sticking to my shoulders. I had a ribbon, a ribbon full of beads, and my sister Jeannie was with me. I took the ribbon and started to take the beads off, one by one. I told Jeannie that the beads were people, and everytime they said something to me or did something to me, that they came off the ribbon. There were no more beads on the ribbon and then I told Jeannie, that it was me, it was the only thing I was. I don't and cannot no matter how hard I try, remember her response. I only remember the ribbon and how pathetic it looked, all curled up and empty. It was me and I hated myself. And I don't think it was so much of a realization but more of a just now knowing the answer. I mean, that had to be something wrong with me for the while ribbon demonstration to happen in the first place.

And with everything that has happened in my life, twelve years later, I still think I hate myself. I cannot say why I hate myself or what it is I hate about myself. If I knew I would fix it, but I just don't know. I don't, okay? I just hate myself. And I can get happy or sad or any emotion under the rainbow, but down to my core I hate myself. I like the person I am and I like what I am doing for myself, but I hate myself, every part of me. And I know how confusing that sounds, because it is confusing. How can I both like and hate myself at the same time, and the answer is, I don't know. I just don't fucking know about it. And leave me alone about it, stop asking me why. If I knew the answer I would anser it but I don't, okay?

And I'm saying this because I've been feeling this way again. I want to hurt myself, I feel like I deserve to be hurt. I won't because I know I don't need to. And it's only in certain  moments, here and there, it doesn't permeate every part of me. The Keshia I used to be, the one who hurt herself with a knife everyday, she didn't  have a moments. She lived in it, every second and every day was divided into different divisions of hating myself. I'm a lot better now, it only happens in moments, small little whispering things in the back of my head. And I'm not going to do anything to make it get worse, I'm really not. But I'm not sure how to make it go away either.

Fin.
-Keshia

Currently Reading Peter and Wendy by J.M. Barrie 

        

Psychosis

Sometimes I think there is a fact about me that I don't think a lot of people realize. They may see it, or know of it a little, but they do not know how severe it is. I love the ficitonal world, all the ones I have read or seen, and people don't seem to comprehend how deep that love is. Not that they should, because if they did, they may just figured how fucked up I truly am. And really, that's anything that I want anyone to see.

 But there are certain occassion when I feel myself slipping. It's like there is this line in between the real world and the fictional world. For most people I imagine it's thick and bold. The dividing line of reality should be a distinct one. Most of the time, I feel like my line is mostly hazy. And I don't know if its because I love the ficitonal world so badly and wish so much for it to be true that I convince myself that it is true or because there really is something mentally wrong with me. If it is the later than it is not surprising and I really accept that. And it's scary how accepting of it I would be. There are moments though, when it's more than just hazy, it's broken. And all of a sudden all of these fictional ideas comes pouring into my head. Some are those of others, stories written by other people that I cling unto so despretly, it's really like I'm trapped in a flood and they are the only thing keeping me afloat. And then there are mine, scavaenging vangeful little things that throw fits if I don't release them unto the world. But they are there, all the fiction, pouring into reality. And it should be something that is overwhelming but it's not. It's small and I barely see it, so engrossed is my mind in the fiction that I barely see the way it dictates my realy life. Little things will happen. I will recall I story I thought I heard someone tell me and tell people of it. It will only be later that I realize it wans't a story I read at all but something that happened to a character in the book once. Or sometimes, particulary with character sof my own creation, my way of thinking about a certian thing will completly morph into the way of thinking of that character. Little things, I don't know them. And even when it's borken, or when it's hazy I am there wishing and hoping it was all real. Sometimes I really do think that it I believe hard enough the things I imagine will come true. And I'm always surprised when they don't.

This isn't a blog about anything in particular.


Fin.
-Keshia

Currently Reading Peter and Wendy  by J. M. Barrie

An Ever Constant String

Last night I had my first quasi rehearsal for the College Night Purple Pit chorus. Only it wasn't really a rehearsal, more like a fill out paperwork/get to know each other meeting in which we all proceeded to sing 'Singing in the Rain' at the end, only with PV symbols instead of thumbs up, because let's face it, we're not Golds.

But one thing I found quite interesting was one game we played to get to know each other. One thing I should mention first is that I knew no one in the room. I mean, I may have seem them around school and or something but I don't know them. So I basically in a room of strangers, and so I thought the whole game of getting to know each other was good, particulary when everyone else seems to know everyone else. I was the only stranger in the room, I felt unknown, which is not a feeling I particulary want to feel when I'm going to be working with these people on a show for the next month. In my experience I found that being the quiet one with no friends in group things like a theatre production is not a great feeling. Not that I expect to get suddenly chummy with the people in the group, but you know, knowing my name would be something nice.

But, alas, to the game, basically we had this purple string and Alex (leader of all things voice and purple) said an interesting fact about himself and held to the end of the string and tossed it to someone else. The concept was that you say something interesting about yourself and then toss the ball of string to someone else, while holding unto the string yourself. In the end it all becomes some sort of big tangled mess, a web weaving between all of us, and connecting us all at the same time. Things like that, right in the feels. And it worked, we were tangled, all covered in purple string and knowing new facts about each other. I was flustered when it came to me, not expecting it, so I said the first thing that popped in my mind, that I spent last summer in Washington. Which wasn't really interesting at all, considering some people delivered facts like they had once swam with manitees or they were an active bee keeper. It made me realize that my life isn't really that interesting or complex at all, I'm just a girl who likes to read and write. And I really have no problem with that, I like that simplicity in life. I hope for more one day, but essentially when you dig down deep into to me I will just be that, a girl starving for fiction, reading and writing running all amuck.

But really what I'm trying to say is something else, and maybe I can do it without starting every paragraph with the word 'But.' There's a point, and it is that as cheesy as it sounds we really all are connected, by some invisible string. It's quite tangled and sometimes can stop us and hold us back or send us foward to new places, catching us sometimes when we fall. But regardless of all, it's there. Human beings are entirely too different from one another to be understood. It's a fact I accept and regret because I want so badly to be really understood and yet it is not a possibility. I'm not one, however, to lose hopes of non possibilities. They stay there. But there is a string, some connecting agency to me and the rest of the world, I have to know that, not just hope it. Maybe it's a good thing or a bad thing, it's not something I could clearly know. Someone told me the other day that we're not born a person, and really we're not. When we're babies we perhaps all for some infinitly yet miniscule moments, we understand each other fully and completly. But from the second our life differs from one another, we become another person. Maybe therein lies the mystery of the string, in that moment it was made, and yet no matter how different things become it can't be broken.

As for rehearsal we lifted string above our heads and piled in one big sprawling purple mess on the front desk. It was us, what small connections we had made last night. Our strings.

Fin.
-Keshia

Currently Reading The Little White Bird by J.M. Barrie

An Introvert.

"I like being an introvert. I like being quiet. I like being thoughtful. I like spending time on my own. And I hope that if we do meet, you will accept me for that. Social awkwardness included."

Charlie McDonnell

There's something I've learned about myself and it's something I've accepted. It's because it's always been here, from as far back as I can remember. And people don't realize this of me, they see other things. But I am not those other things, I am myself, and for the most part I know myself. There are a lot of things I don't know but I'd rather not rely on the observations of others to figure that out. It would make me lose myself, you see?

Let's say this, I am an introvert, and I do like being an introvert. I am always alone and have been ever since I have always known. It's like this, I can be surrounded by a group of people, friends, strangers, I don't care....and I am still alone. That is how it is. I am wrapped up in it and always have been, it's a very tight bind. But I really want to make no efforts to escape. Because I really don't mind or care about being alone. I actually really love it. You see, in order for me to feel not alone I'll have to find someone who understands me. And the world should know by now there is no understanding to me. And so yes, I can have friends. I really can. Does it help me feel any less lonely, no, it'd doesn't. But loneliness doesn't nesscarily have to be a bad thing. I really don't think it is. It makes me sad sometimes, but it's not because of me and my lonliness, it's because of others that I feel like it's bad. The world expects you you to go out and make lots of friends. The world expects you try to find someone to understand you. And in turn the world expects you to dislike the loneliness. But I don't, I really don't. I revel in it, in the staying in being in my bed. In the sitting for hours and just thinking. And yes, I could be going out with friends and doing things, but it wouldn't help. And it doesn't need help. And I really think that is one thing that is so hard to understand about me. I love my lonliness, I really do. And I don't plan to change it much. Because yes I will go out and do things and have friends, and all of that. But it's not going to effect how alone I feel. I will always feel alone when there is a lack of understanding of my character. And yes, I'm only nineteen, I know I have plenty of years left, but so far no one has come even close to  grasping a true understanding of me. No one. Some people understand a few parts of me but no one will understand who I truly am.

Which seems all chessy and cliche, there is a real me, and the world me, and the everything me. So many mes, all different perceptions and things. But I  know who the real me is and she is alone, and she loves it.

Fin.
-Keshia

Currently Reading The Little White Bird by J. M. Barrie

On Places.

I haven't lived in many places in life, really I haven't. In fact I'm probabably a little bit less traveled than most nineteen almost twenty something year old girls. The Bayou, Coden, Everett, Theodore, and now Montevallo. Only five towns I have lived in my life, two of them literally being right beside each other and the other only being only a biut away. I haven't had that much difference in cultureeither, considering four of the five places have been in Alabama. Although I can tell you this, south and north Alabama differ in vastly different ways that can never really be explained but only really experienced. And let me tell you this, every place I have ever lived holds a little bit of my heart.

The Bayou is full of my childhood memories, scattered in here and there all over town. And all the changed that came to the place I grw older, the physical presence of knowing there used to be a resuraunt there or that CVS was once an empty field. And everytime I go there something has been added or taken, a tiny little bit scooted over here and there. I am in the Bayou, eternally growing up. Everytime I see it I get a little older.

In Coden I was older and farther in, people would call them the back woods, changed weren't as evidents there,. But pieces of me are there too, in the park where Marina and I would sit for hours gazing at the ever moving water, it's waves sometimes peaked with white foam and other times the water so shallow we were tempted to step in. There was the cool green grass under my feet as I walked in my yard talking on the phone and the night where the streelights cast a smoky fog from all the fireworks going off to celebrate the new year.

Everett was different, a whole new world and eleven states away. My independence there was glorious, the moving about and having a job. I paid my own bills and made a food bugdet. Then there was the library, the lazy afternoons I spent in the massive place just lounging around and being filled with the wander of fiction. Early morning bus rides where it was only me and the driver were a thrill and the children I played witht he park were so much kinder than the ones I had known before. The most foreign part of all in Everett was getting to know people and people getting to know me, people who hadn't had some pervious knowledge or conception of me. I grew up in a small town, where you literally knew everyone. You weren't friends with them, you just knew them. People who sat beside me at graduation were the same chubby little kids who I had seen on the first day of kindegarten. There were people who I went all thirteen years of school with without ever speaking one word, but I still knew them. In Everett there was none of that.

In Theodore I was back in Alabama again, and it was such a hard unexplainable part of my life that I would never want to go back to it again. I felt useless and torn, my life is nothing to me without a purpose. And os I sought refuge in my work, it became my home and my coworkers became my best friends. Whenever I think of that time I think of the colored walls of Panera and singing and dancing between orders. All the times we shared while working and all the times we shared outside, with parties and beach days and working out together. That was where my heart was at in Theodore.

And now I'm in Montevallo and have been for six months. It's hard to say and I'm not sure how or why but I love this place more than nay other place I have been. It's just something I know, and I have to know. Sometimes I am walking aorund campus, and the sky in a brilliant blue and the grass is a spaklign dewy green, the sunlight it golden and streaming in between the trees in such a way that it feels like a hand is reaching out to me and taking my own and telling me it will be okay. This is where you are, this is where you belong. And even though I've lived here a shorter amount of times than any others I love it more. And I can't help it, my love for this town of Montevallo is pure and simple. My heart is in other places too, sometimes buried deeply and sometimes in view of everything. And I will never forget the places that hold pieces of me and my heart, but I feel as though in my current position of life Montevallo holds most of me. Most of my heart is here.

Fin.
-Keshia

Currently Reading The Little White Bird by J.M. Barry