45 minutes

I'm having Chinese leftovers for dinner. My dad is playing loud Chinese pop club music and it's making me nervous. I have been in bed all day, either texting for help, responding to Merry Christmas texts, or finding someone to gchat my problems with. I found out I like listening to girlfriend issues, so I welcome those, if anyone has any & doesn't have anyone else to whine to. I am dying, scared, anxious, uncomfortable. I need to get out of the house maybe. Tomorrow one library book is due, so that will be something to do. I long for boring stretches of time, just like this, but when it happens, I don't know what to do with myself even though my reading list is long and I haven't watched one episode of the many that I had planned to yet. Do you know what I wanna do? I wanna fill out one of those long survey things that we used to post on Xanga. Here's one. A short one.

A - Age: 25

B - Bed size: Twin

C - Chore you hate: Ironing clothes

D - Dog's name: I don't have a dog.

E - Essential start your day item: Coffee :/

F - Favorite color: to wear: black; for pens: green, purple, maroon

G - Gold or Silver: gold

H - Height: 5'4"

I - Instruments you play(ed): I "played the violin" in Beginner's Orchestra for a year. There would be times I held the bow over the strings and moved my arms in the gesture of playing, though. . .

J - Job title: Department Assistant

K - Kid(s): I want a child, just one,  a daughter or son, I don't care

L - Living arrangements: I live at home in the basement. I'm not gonna feel like a total loser until the rest of my Asian friends from Chicago move out of their homes and then I'm gonna feel like oh shit I need to move out NOW

M - Mom's name: Ann (how come the D above was for Dog's Name instead of Dad's Name?)

N - Nicknames: Vee, VickE, what else have I been called

O - Overnight hospital stay other than birth: Nope

P - Pet Peeve: I would like to not list my pet peeves to make anyone self-conscious that they are doing something that is peeving me, which is how I would respond to any pet peeves list BUT I do have them, BUT they are minor, I think

Q - Quote from a movie: I really like the "Let's start over" line at the beginning of Happy Together by Wong Kar-Wai, or whatever that line was.

R - Right or left handed: Right. I can write with my left, and I did the entire year for 5th grade.

S - Siblings: Kevin, 5 years younger

T - Time you wake up: I set my alarm for 5:45 a.m. but I can't seem to get out of bed until 6:15. On the weekends, I'm awake by 9, but not out of bed until 10a.

U- Underwear: I think they are Hanes?

V - Vegetable you dislike: when there is too much broccoli in my pad see ew noodles, bean sprouts (is that a vegetable?)

W - Ways you run late:  CTA delays or stupid rescheduling of bus routes etc, otherwise, I try not to be late

X - X-rays you've had: Teeth

Y - Yummy food you make: I can't cook

Z - Zoo animal: the monkeys, predictably (?)

I don't feel very good about completing that alphabet survey, especially since it didn't ask me for anything that personal. I was hoping to get confessional tonight. I have so many pages left to write in my journal so that I can start a new one in six days. I'm afraid my thoughts all suck. Last night at Triple Crown, my mom took a picture of me on her cell phone where I posed with vacant eyes into the distance, a hand under my chin, like I was deep into composing a thought that would lead to a realization that could redirect my current ways and it was really funny because I looked so dumb. I feel like I have given up on thinking, except to think about how I can't think. I rewatched the ending scenes of Before Sunset with my brother earlier and when Celine talks about not wanting to get into relationships because she's been in so many and has always come out hurt, I was thinking how I am so much more like Jesse. I feel younger than my age, maybe not in a good way. I'm ready to be heartbroken. I have to go.

It's past midnight
I'm on my phone
The guy and girl across from me on this 22 Clark bus are playing that hand slapping game where you have to dash your hands away to not get smacked
I saw 44 plays for 44 presidents tonight at the Neo Futurists theater--my first time there and I don't usually enjoy plays b/c of the exaggerated dialogue and hyper energy but I do like musicals and I did like what I saw tonight.
Now I'm off the bus crossing the street, gonna walk home for half an hour. Gonna look over my shoulder when I'm not looking at my phone. Gonna get off my phone b/c it's not safe to text and walk in the night for a girl like me. I Like the feeling when someone turns around like they're scared of getting mugged but they see me and feel relieved. Non-plus side is that I gotta be cautious. It's easy to push me down. I fall down but on my face, the last look I'll give you is that of Anaïs at the end of the film, A Ma Souer!
Good night friends
xo

Hi Friends—
That's me and Bettina in Vienna, a statue of a woman with a red heart sticker in Prague, me in Göd, Melinda in Göd. Not sure if I should upload the rest to Flickr. Not sure what I should write on here re: the trip either. It is autumn now.
More soon!
vicky

Harper Memorial Library girls bathroom, stall 1

Maria's in Pilsen

              I love I Love Dick by Chris Kraus, which I was reading in bed, but I fell asleep at 6 p.m. and woke up at 1:38 a.m. so now I am awake at a terrible hour, thinking of worst case scenarios as if to prepare myself when it comes time to accept bad luck news. In the day, I daydream, though. Wow I'm spacing out too much between sentences. I really can't write more than one paragraph? Really? Maybe later, good night.

Stolen picture of a financial staff's office who has a cat wall. The one with a reddish cat has a quote that says, "The more people I know, the more I like my cat."

Mnemonics to remember Hungarian grammar rules

Friends

Collecting cute dentist pictures #1

Cute dentist sign on Devon Ave #2

OPEN BOOKS half-off sale which I missed due to successful exercise in self-control re: not buying any more books

Trying to justify the situation of dude who won't move his leg by taking a picture of his profile + his knee, annoyed that we touched knees like this for 15 mins, but when he was getting out of his seat, he became a gentleman and said, "Pardon me"

Alternatives

my bed

I turned around with the intention to give a squirrel a dirty look b/c it was making so much rustling noise behind me while I was having lunch and then I saw this turtle!!!

Playing basketball with friends

Stolen poor quality picture of a birthday party for a girl that I don't know lol but Bettina knows her sort of from a couchsurf event and we counted 8 couches in this room, 4 loveseats, and 2 ottomans.

It was aTwin Peaks themed party, and I haven't seen an episode of Twin Peaks, lol

My new lunch bag matches my best friend and has a banana for the zipper :)

Failing to design my business card That $1 mouse I borrowed from mom is a failure, too lol

Took this today, I love the colors and mosaic art in general

"I feel the crux of your conflict is that you want to go too fast. At twenty-five I was like you—ambivalent, uncertain. Take time. It is an organic, slow growth. You hurt yourself by looking at me now in late maturity and comparing me with your youth. You're hard on yourself. The neurosis is there—shocks, wounds, losses. I turned for help at those moments. The neurosis keeps us from growing. Can you deal with that? Can you get help? You are rich within and full of potential, humanly and poetically."

(Nin, Vol. VII, 256-7)

=================

I AM GOING TO WRITE THE ABOVE ON A POSTER AND HANG IT ON MY WALL TO READ EVERY DAY OF MY 25TH YEAR

I would like someone to write a two-hundred page novel about a heroine in her twenties who isn't all that spectacular, so kind of like the typical Murakami protagonist who gets into all these events with the unusual characters he meets. The prose would be written partly conversational, partly literary, in a fluid way, like the diary of Anaïs Nin. Meaning this book will try its best to be beautiful. The heroine is done with college, but doesn't know about grad school, and real-life websites will appear all the time in the narrative as imaginary solutions to the heroine's problems: Craigslist for all kinds of stuff, Okcupid for relationships (sometimes friendships), and Tumblr for the feeling of belonging to fandom communities that would receive eye-rolls elsewhere. This would be the kind of book relevant to Right Now, with Gmail refresh-inbox syndrome, Gchats, fantastic feelings, doom feelings, so it is self-conscious, anxious, introverted, depressing, and it might be hated if published, but it could be used to draw forth those who are the same way, which is what matters in the end, right.

The heroine is named Joni, for now, and she is. . . . . . . . . . . . . .I will continue this next Sunday.

An excerpt from a comic by my brother, years ago. Our rooms don't really connect like that, but when we first moved into this house, we did communicate through the vents and thought it was so cool. The left is my new Gchat pic, and I got my brother to set the right one as his, so now we have matching Gchat pix, lol.

It's Sunday morning. I look forward to the weekends and then I don't receive new emails or chats and it seems like no one is online so I feel so bored that I begin writing for myself. I suppose I'll go outside. Have a nice day, friends!

v

Nothing dramatic will seem to have happened to me when I look at the five years that have passed: I will have the same face and body size and one of two hair styles that I switch between, I will still be in Chicago doing the same kind of administrative-type work in a university setting but hopefully in a new role, and I will probably feel similar to how I feel right now, which includes pointless longing, brief joys, and constant questioning about the choices I make that influence the direction of my life. In 2017, I will turn 30. The last night that I am in my twenties will be a Friday. I will stare at my radio alarm clock for a while and feel sad that I am in the same twin bed I slept in all my life, holding my George, thinking about how my parents are in their sixties now, how my brother is the age I am now as I write this, but when I wake up, the sun will shine through my window and I will feel good again. I will go out for a run because by then, I will be more conscious of my health and stuff. I am not sure if I will still live at home with my parents. It is likely. I just don't have enough imagination to think otherwise right now.
I believe I am writing this self-portrait from a source of repressed low self-confidence that I thought I had overcome during senior year of high school but lately my crushing moods lift me up and drop me down so fast that I really have no idea how I feel about myself—again. From now on, I would like to compensate for feeling stationary by making travel plans, alternating between domestic and international trips every other year, so this year it will be Budapest/Vienna/Kraków (!), parts of Canada next year, then India, then the Pacific Northwest of U.S., then Iceland, then Mexico. In one to two years, re-learn how to drive.  I was raised to think badly of people who traveled often—not that I do—because my family never went anywhere until recent years, due to low funds-low security, prioritizing food before fun, my mom would say, but I don't know. I think exploring around is important, if it's possible. The space I'm in is important, too. If I live on my own, I want a bedroom with just a bed, table and closet and small window that is connected to a study where I have my desk, books, and large windows. Hardwood floors, warm colors, plants, A CAT, on the second or third floor, and within walking distance to the train. The fridge will always be full. I will be too old for sleepovers but it's nice knowing that I have the chance to do something I didn't get to do as a child. I foresee my attendance at a friend's wedding, friends having babies. I foresee myself meeting maybe three or four girls that I have good or bad tension with (as in I like them, or they like me, but it won't be mutual) and that lead nowhere in particular until the feelings dissolve and we're either friends or acquaintances + having my first relationship at age 28 (that begins out of mutual interest) that will last between two months to a year. I predict 28 based on a sample size of two women's anecdotes about how they didn't really "do" anything until that age. Oh yeah, that's also the age Anaïs Nin met Henry Miller, isn't it, who "awakened" her. Um.

I meant to write this as a note-to-self, so that I could look back on this post in five years and see if any of my "predictions" came true, but I don't think I really predicted that much. I basically wrote all this stuff about how things will be the same, which turned this post into something depressing, lol. I have a lot to look forward to, and even if my external conditions remain the same, I will have changed majorly on the inside, and the person I am now will embarrass me forever, I am sure. When I cringe in the present, sometimes it's because I'm cringing for myself in the future who is looking back at myself in the present, so it's like I'm anticipating how terrible I will find myself now, and that is not living in the moment at all. That is bad. I will stop that. I will begin each morning with a positive mantra, and at the end of the day, in my diary, I will write down the highlights.

Today's highlights—receiving emails from friends, having errands to run around campus which gave me a feeling of movement and time out of the office and staring at the computer screen, being thanked for the work I have done in the busy-busy-ness of this week which I really don't expect but surprisingly it made me feel better like I actually wanted to work (proving my mom's "negative encouragement" approach "wrong"), finding out that new albums will be released this year by Beach House and Metric, um, and that the weekend is now!