i feel lost...

I never understood why people get so emotional about graduating. In the past, I've listened to coworkers, classmates, and friends express everything from anger to paralyzing fear about leaving the undergraduate realm. Honestly, I can't tell you how many times I've been the shoulder-to-cry-on or the assistant job seeker for people.

When I say I never understood, I mean that I never felt the way they did. People would say things, "I'm just not ready to leave," "I've got nowhere to go now," "I'm so scared that nothing is going to work out," and the like. Out loud, I was supportive, and I could both logically and empathetically see where they were coming from. It's a big step, leaving the campus and people that have become so familiar. Life once again becomes uncertain. On the other hand, I internally wondered why they weren't jumping up and down for joy at the chance for freedom -- for real adulthood -- for graduate school or job opportunities -- for bigger and better things -- CARPE DIEM!! Get me OUT of here!!

With my own graduation ceremony looming less than 72 hours away, I suddenly feel a rash of emotions and sentiments that previous students have expressed. While walking across campus today, I couldn't help but utter a noise of disgust and say, "I hate this place." Surveying the grounds and the pretty pink tulips, I thought, "Well, it's not so bad. But still -- I can't wait to be finished with all of this." Then, as I received my cap and gown, I trudged slowly across campus in tears, thinking, "They're kicking me out. All I did was what they asked, and now they're sending me away to who knows where doing who knows what with who knows who! How could they do this to me?!"

It's quite the rollercoaster. I don't recommend it.

Lately, I've been having nightmares. I mean, I usually do, but these are different. Often when I sleep, I dream of a void: me suspended in empty, crushing darkness. There is no up or down, no point with which to orient myself and determine where I am, or even who I am. Nothing is familiar, and I am alone. I've had these kinds of dreams before, but never with this intensity or such lingering effects.

Waking from these dreams leaves me in a fog of uncertainty. I go throughout the day as though still stuck in that dark, cold emptiness. I felt it again as I unwrapped my wrinkled, too long, navy blue graduation gown and untangled the gold tassle strands. Running my fingers through the tassle strands, it suddenly hit me -- the dreams and lingering feelings come from my feeling of placelessness. It exists so strongly in me that it manifests itself in my dreams. I truly feel lost, along with a decent amount of panic.

As I've thought more about this, I've concluded that this sort of anxiety speaks to feelings of displacement based on my changing position in the world. Though I do have places that are important to me, none of them are permanent. Everything in my life is transitory right now: graduation this week and finishing school in June; leaving the university I've grown to know well; acceptance to graduate programs that I'll never actually go to because they're online; leaving a student job and needing to find other employment; even my housing situation is in flux. My present places are quickly becoming my past places, and future places are presenting themselves -- though some are not really places; more like virtual experiences.

It's an unknown -- it's a feeling of anxiety that occurs even before losing an important place. Facing graduation, loss of employment, and an almost place-less form of virtual graduate schooling creates that anxiety in me.

Of course, changes like these aren't a bad thing. They're actually very good things; things I've worked for and looked forward to for a very, very long time. The emotional effects, though, are incredibly real. Being displaced from the undergraduate experience, employment, and people is a lot to handle all at once. It's kind of like when someone is forced into homelessness or made into an exile through war or foreclosure. I don't mean to minimize these events by comparing them to my current transition; losing a home or a familiar place because of such traumatic events is without a doubt much worse. I use that comparison because it's the only one that makes sense to me, that I can understand.

Graduating is turning me into a school-less (and somewhat reluctant) migrant student -- an exile from everything I have known for the last three years. While my exile is partially by choice, and the graduate program I've chosen to attend does provide a new place to go, I'm still being displaced. I have met the requirements for graduation, and my diploma becomes both a celebration and a pink slip.

I don't like change. I don't like losing the places and the people I have come to know and appreciate. However, I am human, and so my body must move. It must change and move and go new places, do new things. I of all people understand this now: after spending nearly a month in bed recovering from a surgical procedure, I've learned that staying in a room too long really can make a person go crazy. I wanted out! I wanted to move and change and go to other places. And I could not.

It was hugely frustrating.

None of us is meant to be stationary; movement of some sort is necessary. Still, the emotional distress that occurs from losing place is real. I'm feeling it in a big way now. I feel a mixed bag of loss, excitement, anger, sorrow, anxiety, betrayal, anticipation. These places have been critical in forming who I am and where I will go in the future. It's probably universal: places affect us and shape us. Perhaps the fact that places are key formative elements is what makes the displaced feeling distressing. We know we must move on from certain things, but letting go is difficult due to the ties to the place we grew and changed in.

For me, my feelings of loss over my current state and place are helping to spur me on to the next experience. I mourn the loss of familiarity and worry over the new places I must find, yet these familiar places help me realize that I can't stay. Current places have shaped what I do, who I am, and where I will go. My experience as an undergrad student, while coming to a seemingly abrupt and frightening end, has created that desire to move to a new place because of the experiences I've had in the place I now leave.

It's a strange, almost cyclical phenomenon: loss of place creating sadness and anxiety over the loss, while silmultaneously pushing us to find new places, which also creates uncertainty and grief. This constant shuffling of place is what makes us grow and change. Memories of old places shape our interactions with the new. Both types of places directly influence who we are, how we think, what we will become, and where we will go in the future.

Thinking about it in this way is helping to turn my feelings of terror (yes -- terror) about the coming changes into excitement. I won't lie. The fear is still very real, as is the deep loss I can't quite understand and never expected would occur. However, it's being tempered with curiosity and excitement for the experiences and places that lie ahead of me.

Though don't expect me to be all hopeful all of the time -- I'm desperately hanging on to any happy thoughts to keep myself from falling apart!

so far, so good...

4 days into the new year and it's been good...

...my bedroom is reorganized, with only a small-ish mountain of clothes to put back into the dresser...
...my last full semester of college is scheduled and my graduation application has been submitted (yikes)...
...I've seen Saving Mr. Banks and had Chik-fil-A (if heaven were a sandwich)...
...I've been to an amazing art exhibit and had an incredibly delicious dinner at a fancy restaurant for which I was not allowed to pay (which is a lot easier for me to allow than it used to be)...
...the mystery of Sherlock's two year disappearance is still frustratingly unsolved, as Steven Moffat will not ever give an inch when it comes to satisfying fans' curiosity...
..my articles are appearing online and I only have six left to finish by Monday...
...I've had good, long, honest late night talks with people I care about, and I've laughed and cried and felt alive...
...I've been hugged -- close and tight and long -- it's amazing what an honest hug will do.

A part of me still aches. That frustrates me. It frustrates me because despite all of the good things that I have, I feel desperately out of control. I feel frightened and alone and sad and helpless -- so full of feelings that I'm empty. I say that a lot, but it's the only way I can describe it.

I don't want to be like this. I don't want to feel so terrified and sad.

My wish for moments of happiness does come true, and frequently. All of the things that I've done and seen this week were happy moments; more than moments, some of them were hours. Hours of time where I could get out of the emptiness and really feel alive again, instead of being trapped in this seemingly endless state of feeling too much of nothing good.

Truly, I feel helpless. I feel so in need of help that I worry that I'm needy. I don't like needy people. I don't want to be a needy person. I want to be strong and independent and comfortable in my own skin. Right now (and for a long time) I've wanted out of my skin and into something...different. I've never been totally confident. Who is, right? But I've been better than I am now.

Hopefully, good things will keep happening. And they will -- they haven't stopped so far. What I really hope is that I'll be okay enough to see the good things, and not push them away because I'm too scared to do anything. I hope I don't do that.

the future is coming...

I'm staring down the barrel of my future, inserting the bullets that will soon shoot into the long thought of, always a dream and never a reality target called graduate school.

Seriously.

Friday afternoon I discovered that I can, if I desire, graduate in April. Being an intelligent person, I'm going to delay that date until August, because 18 credits plus a job will most likely kill me. However, one 3 credit hour class in the spring means that I will be done with my bachelor's degree in June of 2013 -- a year later than I would have liked to graduate because 8-year-old me set a goal to be done by age 20, but a year sooner than 21-year-old me ever imagined.

I've found three schools so far that match well -- they offer a Masters in Library and Information Science with Archival and Special Collections specializations, and each of them are either online or offer satellite programs near where I live. The dream would be to actually go somewhere for grad school, but practical me realizes it's not an option. There are far too many things keeping me here -- possibility of landing a job at the BYU library where I work now, money (always money), family things, Adam (yeah, he's a major stay factor), and money (again with the money). To top it off, one of the programs  has the option of specializing in Museum Studies, which few others have. I learned about that through one of my professor's, who is the director of a museum on campus.

Even better? None of these programs require test scores from the GRE. I'd hash tag my excitement level, but I'll spare you.

Now I'm beginning to understand the sentiments expressed by friends who have graduated.

This is crazy.

I'm 21. I'm going to graduate a year earlier than I thought possible, with a minor I just added last month. All of the sudden I'm forced to think about not just the classes I have to take this fall, but the applications for colleges and scholarships, student loans, finding a real job (though my job is pretty darn close), and applying for graduation. Me. Applying for graduation!

I'm growing up. And almost throwing up at the realization.

It's too terrifying to be exciting.

Also. Pray that I pass Economics 110 this semester. If I don't, my life will be on hold until I can at least get a C out of the devilish beast.

i am iron maiden...

False.

While I would like to believe that I embody qualities of Tony Stark, as in the ability to laugh in the face of danger and be phased by nothing, that is the absolute opposite of the truth. Case in point, sitting through Iron Man 3 was a nightmare. After wobbling through the parking lot, desperate to get to my car and on my way home, a panic attack ensued, leaving me so exhausted and shaky that I could barely drive.

Yep. The film was a bit too intense for this girl. Objectively, I believe that it is the best of the three when you look at character and plot development, as well as graphic quality. The film also had an actual bad guy who was legitimately frightening. Stark's other nemeses? Snore. Subjectively, not my favorite film, and one I probably will avoid in the future in favor of a Psych marathon or Captain America.

Second severe anxiety episode this weekend. Thank heaven for good friends who let you spill how you feel, who don't judge you for the crazy thoughts you share, and hug you tight so you feel safe.

Also, the puppies are seven days old as of this morning. Their eyes opened yesterday, and they are precious. I'll post some pictures as soon as I get my camera back from my sister -- can't believe she's graduating this week. It's a wee bit insane.

lookin' back: 2011...

Wow. I can't believe the year is over! It went by so incredibly fast, I'm not even sure what happened in 2011 and what didn't! Thankfully I have thousands of pictures in seasonally categorized folders on my computer...if one picture is worth a thousand words, how many words are a thousand pictures worth? Hm...

LDC had Spring Retreat at the beginning of the year. This is my family group, the Dis-Harmonizers! We were the coolest anti-super hero group ever.


Meghan and Amanda performed in their first ever MVHS choir fundraising concert. It was really great to go back to my high school to see all of my still in high school buddies perform, and to see my sisters be spotlighted in each of their numbers.


Institute Date Night! I've made so many good friends through LDC and through Institute. It's been a huge blessing in my life.


Brianna, Shelby, and I got to go to a session of General Conference at the Conference Center. It was a grand adventure, complete with riding the Trax train. "What is that? It's the wrong shape for a bullet hole..." Good times!!


I graduated from UVU! Associate's Degree, baby! It wasn't a super huge deal, but it was a really great accomplishment for me.


LDC performed our spring show, The Family: A Musical Proclamation. This is the show that we were invited to perform in the Conference Center at Temple Square. It was a really amazing experience, to be able to work with professional sound and light crews, a real live stage manager, and to have a fully functioning stage to perform on. I loved every minute of it. Dream come true, to perform on that stage!


Choir tour!


One time Meghan forgot to get a group together for Morp. Adam and I helped her out by going as a second couple, even though we'd graduated a year before.


Jordan and Meghan...Peter Pan and Wendy.


Institute on parade!


Manti Pageant with my sisters and Jenni. It has always been one of my absolute favorite things to do in the summer. I'm so glad we got to go this year! It was the first time in nearly 3 years, and it was a total blast. Thanks to dad for driving us down and hanging out with all of us girls!


New job! Super fun.


Natalie's birthday adventure!


July brought saying good-bye to my best friend Jordan. He is currently serving in the Independence, Missouri mission, Spanish speaking. I honestly don't know where I would be without this kid. I love you, Elder Raddatz!!


The final installment of HARRY freakin' POTTER! Midnight showing, of course.


Summer vacation part one: the ZOO. Where we actually belong.


Summer vacation part two: LAGOON. Where only half of our family belongs...the rest get sick (myself included).


Summer vacation part three: GRANDMA'S HOUSE!! EVERYONE belongs at grandma's house.


A new year of LDC: new friends, new music, new experiences, same Spirit. This is a picture from fall retreat. White Power! I mean...uh...yeah. Try coming up with a cheer when you're the white group! It all comes out sounding racist.


Carrots and Choir Chica Sista, my two best girls. I love them so, so much. From heartbreak to hyperness, they've been there for me every step of the way this semester. BFF's!


LDC presents Mulan! Well...sort of.


On a whim I bought a fish. I named him Leonardo. Leonardo DiFishy.



Insert imaginary photo of new job at PartyLand!



Halloween!!


Fall photoshoot courtesy of Michelle. They're kind of super late senior pictures combined with pictures to use for audition packets. Thank you, Michelle!


Another photoshoot courtesy of Michelle. It was so great to be able to take pictures of all three of us together! Usually I'm the one behind the camera when it's me and my sisters, so this was great. Merry Christmas, mom and dad!


We got a dog and named her Molly. She's a gremlin. Seriously.


LDC performed with Michael McLean in The Forgotten Carols. It was an amazing experience.


Christmas-ing with Carrots at Blickenstaff's!


We're elves. You know...Christmas elves. Santa's little helpers.


It was a Charlie Brown Christmas.


LDC performed our Christmas show, A Silent Night. All of that music and the words came to mean a lot to me by the end of the run. It was a great experience, despite being strangely difficult for me personally. I'm really glad I have those memories.


Chillin' with the Eggletts, Brother and Sister Eggett's children. They are so stinkin' adorable! And all of them are so very kind. I love them!

day 4...

a picture of my night...

Tonight, I went back to high school.
My sister asked Jordan to MORP, the last couple dance of the year. She needed a group, so I asked one of my other graduated friends to go with me. The theme was Party in Space. Jordan and Meghan dressed up as Peter Pan and Wendy; Adam and I were their stars. We never did decide who was the second star to the right. It was the first time I've been to a high school dance since I graduated last year.

It was weird.

I had fun. :)

a little somethin' called grajeeayshun...

Yep. I done did it. I grajeeayted.

It's kind of cool because it's my second graduation in less than a year. In 2010 I graduated from high school. Two days ago I received my Associate's Degree (AS). Both times I graduated with High Honors. I don't know how that happened. In high school, I worked for it. In college? I didn't even know until the alumni coordinators told me I needed to buy high honor cords. "Why?" I asked them. "Um...well, you have a 3.9 and that means you have high honors. Do you not want to get the cords?" They were only five dollars, so I got them.

I also didn't know what sort of degree I was getting until the day of graduation. There are different types of Associate Degrees. I never learned that in high school! Mine's an Associate of Science in University Studies (aka they lumped me in with all of the other people who didn't know what they wanted to major in so just took everything to fulfill basic general eduaction requirements). So there I was with my black gown made out of recycled soda bottles, my dorky graduation hat, my honor cords, my green university neck hanger thing (they never told us the name), my black University College tassel, and a bad case of what-the-heck-am-I-supposed-to-be-doing?! Oh yes. I was graduating from college.

I felt less dorky once I was surrounded by other people wearing those caps. I don't know why they chose caps like that for graduation ceremonies. They don't look very cool. But I guess it's better to look scholarly than it is to look cool. Unless you're Justin Bieber or Lady Gaga. Then you can wear whatever you want and make money, no diploma needed.

Okay, so it wasn't that bad. I just felt super out of place and awkward. I didn't know anyone around me, which was very different from high school graduation. I think that was the weirdest part, not graduating with any of my friends. I'm one to two years ahead of most of them when it comes to college degree requirements, so when I am halfway through or done with my Bachelor's Degree my friends will be receiving their Associate Degrees. I'm excited for them, more than I was for myself. Graduations have never really seemed like a big deal to me. It's just what you do. You go to school, get a degree, go back to school, get another degree, and so on. Ever since I was a kid, school and getting degrees have been the big deal at my house, even moreso than politics. My parents, mom especially, have talked up college since I was probably three. So graduation? It's just another requirement.

It doesn't help that my mom got really mad at me after my convocation was over. I interrupted her without meaning to because I thought she was finished speaking. Apparently not. I don't know what it is with my family. Everything ends in a fight that mom starts and finishes by walking off to her car and driving off. That kind of ruined the entire day.

HOWEVER! There were some really good things about the day. I'll list the highlights:

1. Being found by a lady in my neighborhood who was also graduating. She let me stand in line with her and her friends, so when we were actually walking I wouldn't be by myself.
2. Matt Holland, President of UVU, gave an incredible speech. It was awesome because it felt like he was talking directly to me. It was exactly what I needed to hear, addressing all of my fears and concerns. In short, his speech said that it is critical to move forward with your life, and you have to do it despite things being imperfect. "You cannot wait for the perfect set of circumstances." It was really great.
3. Cafe Rio for lunch!
4. I don't know if this could be called a highlight because it was very scary, but I was put first in line to walk in the processional for convocation. I never lead any lines, because I'm usually the shortest or almost shortest. The tall people are always in the front, haha! Both of the girls behind me were tall. I was standing between them, but the usher came over to us and said that it looked really weird to have two tall blondes separated by a short brunette, so she moved me to the front.
5. I got a text while people's names were being read (yes, I had my phone on). It was from Jason. Here's the conversation:

Jason: "Are you graduating right now?"

Me: "Mhmmmmm!"

Jason: "In the UCCU Center?"

Me: "No, in the PE courts."

Jason: "Shoot! We're at the wrong graduation!"

I literally laughed out loud when I read that. I was so glad that they'd even made an effort to come. And guess what else? They brought me flowers that they picked from their own garden. Tulips, red and yellow ones! They're so pretty. If my camera hadn't broken during the ceremonies I would have taken a picture. I'm glad I kept the receipt with the warranty on it!

So yeah. The day was interesting.