Random Thoughts with a Sigh

So. I really don't have much of anything to say. Today's Memorial Day. I'm sure you're all having Barbeques and such things. That's what I'm doing. My dad's having one at his house. Small-just my dad, his girlfriend, my grandparents, my uncle, and me. But since everyone in my family is obsessed with poker (mainly Texas Hold 'Em) there will be a poker game. Unfortunatlly, I got stuck with a stupid project on the Oregon Trail to do over the long weekend because since it's the end of the year and my teachers have to get their grades in there have been projects and quizzes and homework left and right. I graduate on June 15th, but my last day of classes is the 6th. Less than a week left of my evil math teacher. And besides, this week we have two masses that we have to go to- one for the second graders making their communion that we have every year in the gym, and one for all of the eigth graders going to Catholic schools on Staten Island that we have to take a bus too. You know, graduating from Notre Dame (even though this is a terrible analogy) is like getting out of a street gang- they don't let you out without a fight. I still have all of those letters to do. Did I mention that? We have to write a hand written letter to everyone in our grade outlining one of their positive qualities. That's 43 letters. Other than a select few, they're are absolute murder to write. You can imagine. And my dad's making me write a speech for graduation. Because at my screwed up school we don't have a valedictorian or anything. Anyone who wants to write a speech can and then my teachers combine them all and all of the people that wrote them split it up to read. Oh-and we have to decorate sneakers that we will wear at the anual Walk-a-Thon on Friday. With stuff about being nice to each other on them. Ew. It's probably going to be hot to walk too. It's been really hot here the past couple of days. Like in the 80s and close to 90. I'm sure that's nothing for you Amita. I can only imagine what it's like in Arizona right now.

Hmmm. Spring is always supposed to be the season of beginnings. Like, new life and all of that. But spring always seems like it brings so many endings with it. End of school, and my years in the polyester uniform prison. End of my piano year, and possibly piano for good, though now I'm not so sure I want to give it up anymore. End of my dance year. The really painful one. Because I don't really see my dance friends outside of dance, and I can't stand facing the thought that I then can't dance for two or three months after that. And it always ends in lousy circumstances. Because we have our big performance (well, small. It's a small school.) and it's on a really hot day and there are a lot of people there so you don't get to really talk to anyone and it's so...rushed. And in all of the classes before it they usually just bring everyone in and make it a dress rehearsal and Rosemarie gets a bit crazy every year and starts kind of panicing. So it's not like my normal classes which are all small and intimate and stuff. I remember last year, I didn't really count the performance as the end. The Sunday before, we still hadn't finished the jazz dance, so even though it wasn't a normal class, Allisyn called all of the girls in my class in to finish it. It was our last chance to be our crazy wacky in class selves. Especially for me, because I knew I wouldn't be coming back until November because of stupid Kaplan classes. I think I've opened up a lot in dance in the past year. Because up until just a few years ago, I never really felt at home there. I've always been quiet. Shy. I'd hardly ever say anything. And whenever I'd get close with someone they'd quit dancing. It was frustrating. I've come out gradually over the past years-very little at a time, but this year I felt like a really made a huge step. I think CTY might have had a hand in it- it gave me more confidence. I remember even just two or three years ago, Allisyn said to me in the fall, "Miss Mary Emily, we're going to have you talking by the end of the year." Well, it took a little longer than that, but I finally feel really at home at dance. I've come so far and improved so much in the past year. With my friends. With Allisyn. With Rosemarie. In my dancing itself. Now I find that I never want to go home, and I hang around even after class is over. Because I don't want to leave. It's funny. With my theater group, I live for the performing, not the rehearsal time and social part of it. I don't really feel that close with anyone there. But with dance, I live for the classes each week, for the social aspect and the need to practice and perfect rather than the performance aspect of it. Since I became an assistant teacher on Saturdays, I knew that I would have to pick between that and theater in the fall because the times conflict. I don't think I'm going to do theater in the fall. I asked myself which I enjoy more. And the answer was simple.

M.E.