Advice for the Undergrad

SO! It is officially my last week as an undergraduate. That's pretty cool, right? And it means that I have had four years of muddling my way through an undergraduate degree, which means I am full of amazing advice. And since I think I am so smart and charming, I've decided to give you that amazing advice, right here and right now.

1. Try really hard for the first couple of weeks. Go to class with the readings done. Participate in class discussion. Show up fifteen minutes early. That way you don't fall behind while trying to figure the class out. It's way better to realize the textbook doesn't matter after you're fifty pages into it than it is to realize the textbook does matter once you're fifty pages behind.
2. Bring things that make you comfortable as long as they don't make others uncomfortable. This is a bit of advice for if you're living in the dorms. So, go ahead and bring the dorky picture of you and your family on a ski trip and set your teddy bear on your desk. But, leave the slightly-pornographic posters and actual-stuffed-bear at home, okay? 
3. Give people the benefit of the doubt. Almost everyone, especially when they're around new people, is a little uncomfortable in their own skin. As a result, some people act angrier, more pessimistic, ditzier, more enthusiastic, or a number of other more-ers than they really are. I can't even begin to tell you how many angry, I'm-such-a-misfit, nobody-likes-me-and-I-like-it-that-way people I've met who are just playing up a giant don't-want-to-be-genuinely-rejected facade. Did you ever watch The O.C.? Do you remember that episode where Seth and Summer had really bad sex and then Summer had to go to him and say, "Look, the thing is, we were both virgins..." and it was, like, really shocking to him and the audience? Because she wore this I've-hooked-up-with-every-guy-in-Orange-County facade. Anyway, that's what life is like. Tons of people acting like something a little different than themselves because they don't want to get hurt. 
4. You don't actually owe anyone a chance, let alone two, or three, or four. Yes, sometimes it really behooves you to give them any number of chances. But you don't really owe it to them. I mean, yes, totally be open and kind towards new people. But, I went on three dates with this guy that I was never really interested in because someone said you don't really know if you like him until you give him a chance. And you know what? All of the dates were boring. And I kept going because I thought I "owed" him a chance. But I didn't. In fact, it was kind of just a waste of both of our time. I could've just said, "I'm not really interested, but you seem nice," and spent my Saturdays reading books, instead. I'm not saying, "don't give people chances." Totally give people chances. If you don't give people chances, you'll miss out. But, also, use your judgement. 
5. Don't hang out with people who make you feel bad about yourself. I ranted about this in a video, so I'll just link it here. 
6. Eat breakfast. Tons of people are like, "I don't really eat breakfast..." but there's a reason they say it's the most important meal of the day. And that reason is: you probably haven't eaten in like eight hours. So eat something! Let's say you sleep in. What do you do? You buy a box of Poptarts so you can eat something while running to class. Don't be immature. Skipping breakfast or just having coffee for breakfast doesn't make you edgy, cool, or mature. It makes you hungry and unfocused. "Oh, not me!" You cry out. Bitch, don't lie. You fall asleep in class like all the time 'cause you don't eat breakfast. "I do not! I drink coffee." Great, you pump your body full of uppers with nothing to nourish you. Yeah, that's good for your physical and mental health. I'm being sarcastic. Eat some food, you damn fool.
7. Read your books and go to class. Now, if you were to pay full price for tuition at my school, and you were to take twelve credit hours, each credit hour would be $2,062. If you were to take eighteen credit hours, each would cost $1,375. At my school, your average class period costs $412.50. So, I know you think it's super cool that you slept through Chem or didn't read any of your Women & Lit books and still passed with an "A" or a "B" or whatever. But, in reality, it's stupid. Because, if you're in a school like mine, you're spending $412.50 per class period to apparently not learn anything. School isn't just about getting grades. It's about learning stuff. That's why you're spending that money. So, great. You got an "A" on your paper about The Epic of Gilgamesh and you only read the sparknotes. Fabulous. You wasted your money and your time. And you now you probably don't know shit about the Epic of Gilgamesh. Which is a pretty freaking cool epic, too.
8. That having been said... Everything is going to be all right. If you're like me, you'll be totally freaking out going in to class when you don't have the reading for the day finished. Or, you'll be two seconds away from an emotional collapse if you have to walk into class ten minutes late. But you know what? It'll be okay. It's not the end of the world if you bomb a test or have to turn an assignment in late. Be responsible for your actions, don't makeup excuses, and talk to your professor as soon as humanly possible. But don't make yourself sick over it. A small mistake here or there won't cost you your GPA, your future, your scholarship, or whatever. So long as that small mistake is, like, missing a pop quiz and not, like, manslaughter. 
9. Be nice to people. Don't call people names, don't dismiss people's feelings, don't gossip about people behind their backs. Don't call someone a "freak" to their face or a "whore" to their back. Here's a secret: people like nice people. Trash-talking jerks? Not so much. 
10. Sleep at night. Sleep at night, limit your alcohol/tobacco/coffee consumption, walk whenever you get the chance. All that shit is good for reducing your anxieties. 
11. Be polite at dinner parties. That means: be willing to try new things. Thank your host for everything, even the things you didn't like. If you can't eat something... Let's say you're a vegetarian or you 110% hate eggplant or you're allergic cheese... try and let the host know before hand. If you're not able to do so, say, "Thank you very much for offering, but I'm going to have to pass. Still, I really appreciate you making this for me." If you try something new, and you don't like it, don't make a show about not liking it. 
12. Try new things. Show up at open mic nights, take dance classes, and join your friends for a knitting circle. Whenever you can, take classes that interest you but aren't required of you. College, and life, is about widening your horizons. So do it.
13. Apologize when you've hurt someone's feelings. If you notice someone getting quiet and sad, stop what you're doing immediately. Ask they're all right. If you've done something to hurt their feelings, even if you didn't mean to, apologize. And just apologize. Don't justify your actions. Saying, "I'm sorry, I didn't realize I was offending you!" is okay. Saying, "I'm sorry! I was just joking! It was just a joke! Joke-joke-jokity-joke!" is not.
14. Leave bad situations. If you're feeling uncomfortable, if people are hurting your feelings, if everyone at that party has gotten a little too drunk, if someone's asking you to do something you aren't comfortable with, or if someone's lit up a joint? Feel free to leave. Seriously, I encourage you to leave. 
15. Pull your weight in group projects. Don't be that person who shows up two-hours late when the presentation is already pretty much put together and then sits around complaining about how they have this project and a speech and a test and a paper all due this week. College is rough on everybody. Lots of people are taking tons of credit hours. Lots of people are working off campus. Lots of people are working on campus. Lots of people are really involved in clubs. Sometimes you will have to listen to an audiobook of Frankenstein while putting together a "fairytales-and-fable land" board game for the English Club. Sometimes, you will have to work on a paper while visiting with your grandparents. It's hard to balance everything sometimes. But don't use all of that to excuse not doing work in a group project. Because, most likely, everyone is trying to balance a ton of things. And those people, the ones who are also trying to balance a ton of things, are having to take on more work because you're slacking off. 

Okay, so... as an experienced college student, that's my advice for you. Oh, and, if you're in multiple lit classes, seriously consider getting audiobook versions of some of your books. That way, you can "read" while getting ready in the morning, driving, walking, grocery shopping, and idly staring at attractive men in coffee shops. 

My most important piece of advice, though, is to remember that everything will be okay. Seriously. It will. 

In the Last Four Years

So, I am officially less than a month away from graduating college with a bachelors degree in English and blah blah blah you don't care. Okay, so, let's talk some about the college experience. Actually, that sounds boring, too, so... I'm going to mostly just give you pictures and short descriptions of memories. But before I do that, I'll intro it a little better than this.

So, there were a lot of shitty things about my college experience. I had relationships with people who made me feel small and stupid and worthless. I spent a year in a foggy haze of sadness, battling weeks of depression and waiting for the three-days-of-relief in between. Some of my friends went through some really horrible stuff. But that's life, right? Really terrible things happen. People you care about really hurt you. Sometimes you really have to force yourself to get out of bed. So, the point is, there's some shit you have to deal with. But there are also some really spectacular times, moments, and things. (Ugh, so vague, my advisor would be so mad at me if she read this.) The point is, there are a lot of good things about life. There have been a lot of good things about my college experience. And sometimes when I start to think thank goodness this is almost done it has been hell I have to remind myself that there have also been a lot of good times. And, honestly, I'm very thankful for the majority of my college experiences.

Okay, boring introduction finished. Now, here are some things I enjoyed about college:

Jacob drew a picture of me as a magician
to make amends for the fact that I was
NEVER a magician in his dreams.

• My freshman year of college, Nash was going to the same school as me. Especially during the second semester, almost every night Nash, Renee, Jacob and I would go to Starbucks to do homework. Renee would, for chunks of time, abandon our table because we were distracting. Nash and Jacob one time wrote a bunch of scripts for a webseries based on our conversations. I just remember that, in one, Nash impaled himself with a pen and in another I gave Renee my purity ring so that I could go do not-so-pure things. Anyway, those were good times.

Nash being proud that the barista drew a cat on his coffee cup.

I was looking for pictures from the excursion or whatever
but I think must have lost them. So, this is from when I visited
her this past February.

• My sophomore year of college, Nash had left school. And for various other reasons, there were a lot less instances of group study trips to Starbucks. But, my lovely friend, Dani, and I would go get ice cream late at night a lot. Also, one time we went on this excursion of sorts, where we made up different identities for each other and went around pretending to be different people. 

• My freshman year, I took this Theater Appreciation class with Nash and Renee. (Side story about the first day of class: earlier in the day I had Women and Lit. One of the kids in my class called our professor "Ms." and she went on a little rant about being called either "Dr." or "Professor." I saw her again as Nash, Renee, and I were leaving Theater Appreciation. Immediately, Renee goes, "AMY!" and runs up to talk to her. It was... sitcom timing. She wasn't mad, though. It's impossible to be mad at Renee. Renee is the kindest/sweetest person alive.) Anyway, basically everything about Theater Appreciation was fun because Nash and Renee were there. We did group projects together! We watched The Man Who Came to Dinner. We were of the only five people who would do the improv games as anything other than "intoxicated" characters.

  

  Renee as one of the fairies from Midsummer Night's Dream.

• During spring break of my... when was it? Freshman? Sophomore? I think sophomore... year of college, my mom and I went to Columbia and stayed with my uncle, then we went to Springfield and stayed with my aunt. While we were in Columbia we got to see Matt Nathanson in concert. Also, mom braided my hair and we went to a pet store to hold bunnies. 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Twice, I've taken mini-road trips to visit my best friend, Alli. The first time, shortly after I arrived we went to a rap concert. Which is a little weird, I have to admit. Also, I was so exhausted from driving, and it was pretty late at night, that despite the fact that it was super loud, I fell asleep. Then we went to eat pancakes. The second time, I stayed for a couple nights. We went to a fall festival at her school. She had to leave at one point to do sorority stuff, so her roommates and I went to get pizza. Anyway, good times. She's the best. 
• ALSO, this past February I went to visit my aunt. I wrote a blogpost about that, so, you might remember it. One thing that was nice about that, was it snowed and then I got to skip all of my Monday classes.
• Once, sophomore year, Renee asked me if I'd be free on Saturday to go on a picnic. Then, I guess she forgot that she asked, 'cause Thursday and Friday she was all giggly, like, "I HAVE A SURPRISE PLANNED FOR TOMORROW!!!" The surprise was a picnic. Renee's a goof. I love her so much.
• I won the playwright award for our school's literary magazine two years in a row. I also won Mock Trial Student of the Year, once. Also, I won some super secret excellence in English award. I also was president of the English, and then Spanish-English club, two years in a row. ...That bit wasn't really "fond memories." It was mostly just bragging. 
• I went to the Kansas City Slut Walk. Nobody went with me, and it was after a shitty week of depression, and some of the friends that I invited and didn't go with me, went to the gym instead, and that really irked me. Also, it was kind of rainy and humid that day. But, now that it's a bit later, I can just think fondly of the fact that I went, you know? 
  
• Nash invented "coffee house games" and throughout the past few years, we occasionally have coffee house game nights. So, a handful of people will get together and we'll all lay different writing games. We've gone to coffee houses, cafes, and just thrown parties in people's livingrooms. It's so much fun. You can read some of the products of these games here.
• Usually, I hang out with the church folk more often during the summers. Which is fun. I like helping out at, like, VBS. One summer, I did an internship for Coldwater, which is the nonprofit run out of my church. Also, we sometimes go on a cool retreats.v

  

  A whole slew of us lovely church ladies rockin' the same hairstyle.

• Speaking of church retreats... My freshman year of college, I went with the youth on a retreat. And I had so much fun. I felt comfortable refusing to participate in any ridiculous scaling-building or falling-off-poles exercises. I wrote "Kat is Pretty" on basically everyone's forearm. And... I'm actually not quite sure what else happened that weekend. I mean, I have a lot of memories, but we went there so many times that I'm having difficulty differentiating trips. 
  

• My Freshman year, I started a youtube channel. And I have had so much fun youtubing.  

This is my first ever youtube video. So. Yeah. Enjoy or whatever.

• Remember how I said that I saw Matt Nathanson perform in concert? Well, that was super exciting because he's one of my favorite musicians. And I've also had the pleasure of seeing Frightened Rabbit and Mountain Goats in concert, which is cool, because they are two of my favorite bands! Plus, Nash. Nash is one of my favorite musicians (not just because he's my brother, either) but I'm basically always hearing him perform live. 
• Related: two or three times we've hosted house concerts. I always really enjoy those. Once, I made vegan brownies. Which didn't taste like brownies. They just tasted odd. 
• Also, I hosted a release party for Nash's second album. (I say "I hosted" because I fixed all the food and it was on our back deck, but, I suppose technically Nash brought and set up the sound equipment. Plus he's the one who released the album.) It was great, we had loads of friends and family come out. 
• This past year, I also had the pleasure of meeting two of my favorite authors, John Green and Rainbow Rowell. I wrote a blogpost about that, too. Can I just say: Rainbow Rowell is crazy beautiful, you guys. We were standing in line, waiting for her to show up, and when we saw her walking up, my mind totally blanked on everything other than she is so pretty, she is so, so pretty. Also, when I met John Green I was pretty incapable of saying anything because I just kept thinking this is weird, he really exists.

  

  Me and RAINBOW FREAKING ROWELL

  

  Here it looks like I'm talking to John Green, but in reality he's saying,
  "Thanks for coming out" and I'm just staring at him.

• Renee and I went on a quest during my junior year of college. We went to coffee shops and walked around the city and scoured an antiques shop to find letters. I think we went to three coffee shops in total. IN ONE OUTING. That's ridiculous. But I love it. 
• Once, my sophomore year, Renee and I talked about how neither of us had been on a "real" date before. So, we decided we would go on a date together. We dressed up, got coffee, lunch, and ice cream. It was so much fun. 
• My freshman year, Alli came and stayed with me one weekend. The next morning, Nash, Renee, Jacob, Alli, and I went to one of my favorite breakfast places in the Metro, Simply Breakfast. We had a good time while we were there, and then we all wrote notes and drew pictures for the waitress. We left them with the tip. 

• During my sophomore year of college, I learned how to make sock bunnies. When spring came, I threw a Spring Tea Party. I invited my guests by putting invitations in hollowed out and painted egg shells (where they would have to crack them in order to get the invitation) in little origami boxes. Everyone who came got a sock bunny as a party favor. (Then, everyone stuffed them in their shirts and we called it a "boobs and bunnies" party.)
  
  
  
• Speaking of parties, I actually threw a handful of tea parties during my first two years at school. My freshman year, on Halloween, my friend, Charlotte, and I threw a zombie tea party, which was fun. The next year, I just threw a run-of-the-mill tea party for Halloween.

Nikki and I at the Zombie Tea Party

These losers didn't wear costumes. 

• One time, my brother and I participated in Search Out Hunger. It was a scavenger hunt that rose money and awareness(?) for a Back Snack program that sends weekend meals home with kids on free and reduced lunch programs. (I'm not actually 100% sure if my info is right here. It might have, instead, been to help fund a food pantry which provides people in need with free groceries a few times in the month.) Anyway, we were supposed to dress like heroes, so Nash and I went as Oscar Wilde and Charlotte Bronte. So, we took some artistic liberties with that assignment. 
• This past Halloween, I had a lot of work to do for my senior thesis. But, I took a brief break from it to go with Nash to our friend Liz's party. He went as hipster!Link and I went as Robin. We played jenga and watched people play... beer pong? I think. Then, we had to leave early, and I had to stay up until about 1:00 in the morning working on my thesis. But, it was fun. So, it was worth it.
• In July of 2012, I threw a Princess Party! It wasn't for my birthday, but also it kind of was. Everyone (but Nash) came dressed as some form of royalty. All of our refreshments were related to one royal or another (mostly Disney princesses, if I remember correctly). It was fun. Really fun. 

• That year, the day after my birthday, I celebrated National Lumberjack Day with some of my friends. We wore flannel shirts and ate pancakes. My friend, Ben, gave Alli and I fishtail braids. 
• Shortly after National Lumberjack Day, I went with a group of friends to see Step Up... 3? 4? Whichever one came out that year. It was good. I like the Step Up movies.
• Last semester, the Spanish English Club hosted an open mic night. I recited some poetry, Nash played some music, and one of my friends (Alden) dynamically read the first few pages of Hugh Laurie's novel. In the end, we all did improv until crazy-late. It was a lot of fun.

Nash and Jacob performing "Finger Stains"
(like the jackasses that they are)

Alden... has issues with gravity? I can't really remember
why he was ballet dancing. I think it had something to do
with clouds, though.

• Last year, at the Sound and Fury release party, each of the "winners" were supposed to read their submission out loud. When it was my turn, they offered, "I guess you could read one of your poems instead..." but there were only two main characters in my play, so... Nash read the male part, Renee read the female part, and I read all the other characters and the stage directions. I had forgotten, but there were, like, seven other small roles, so I had to employ several different voices. 
• When Renee was getting close to graduating, I started hanging out with her all the time. One time, a bunch of her friends went to her apartment to hang out while she was packing. They were all so cool. I can't even describe it, really. We weren't doing much. Just calling dibs on the sweatpants and t-shirts she was having to leave behind. But it was one of my favorite days. 
• I worked as a cashier with this guy, Barry, and he was the coolest old guy. He would asked me if I had a boyfriend, and accused me of lying when I said I didn't. After that, he asked what I thought about almost every young man who I sold books to. Also, he asked what I thought about several of the guys we worked with. (The first time we worked with one guy, he was training, and when he went to break, Barry goes, "What do you think of him?" And I was like, "He seems smart, he'll get the ha--" and he interrupts, "Boyfriend material?") He's hilarious. 
• My sophomore year, I went to a Scott Pilgrim vs. The World screening with my friend, Liz. She went as Kim Pine and I went as Roxie Richter.

There are so many other things I could include. I have about 10,000 wonderful things that I could say about my classes this semester alone. My freshman year, I had a writing class with a really eccentric teacher who, as a metaphor for "thinking outside of the box" drew a line on the wall above the dry erase board. Then, he fell back with an expression of shock and panic. It was hilarious. I have tons of good memories with my dog, Jubilee, from these past few years. I discovered the pleasure of going to movies alone. My mom and I went to see Veronica Mars. I'm not positive but... I think Alli, her mom, and I went to see Little House on the Prairie: The Musical within the past four years... no, actually, that was probably when I was in high school... but that was a hysterically bizarre production. My freshman year, there was a group of about five of us who ate breakfast together almost every day. Nash, Nikki, and I went to a murder mystery party. I wrote two novels. Shitty novels, but, still. 

So, there are a tons of other things that I could include. But, let's be honest, this has already been a crazy long blogpost. But then, it has been like four years. That's a lot of time, yo. The point is... there are good things in there. I know so many fabulous people now. I had so much fun. I dressed up on so many non-Halloween days. Yeah, I had a ton of work to do. I had some difficult times. But, man, there were so many spectacular moments. 

"thinking outside the box"

Elevator Introductions//Business Card Brainstorming

Okay, as I am about to reach the "scrambling for a job" stage of my life, I've been brainstorming "Elevator Introductions"--which are quick descriptions of self that you can give someone during an elevator ride, if necessary, in order to help you network and potentially get hired. Anyway, here's some that I've come up with, let me know what you think! For our purposes, today, I'll put them in the potential business card version.

• Katrina High: Like a maniac shooting flaming arrows of death -- Proverbs 26:18
• Katrina High: In the words of Disney's Frozen: Her quote "engagement" is a flex arrangement and, by the way, I don't see no ring
• Katrina High: Not everything she says is a lie. 
• Katrina High: Has at least 7 friends. Is literate.
• Katrina High: Can braid hair. Cannot do french braids, fishtail braids, or any other fancy, elaborate braid styles.
• Katrina High: Cold. Sleepy. Sad. 
• Katrina High: Learns fast. Forgets faster. 
• Katrina High: Does lots of things kind of well. 
• Katrina High: Eats food before checking to see if it forms divine images. 
• Katrina High: Almost always wears shirts. Almost never wears pants. 
• Katrina High: Usually sleeps at nights. 
• Katrina High: Has been alive for at least half of her life!
• Katrina High: This isn't her real number. #########*
• Katrina High: Sometimes she thinks before telling a joke. But then again, sometimes she doesn't. 
• Katrina High: Patronizes people so well, that sometimes they don't realize they're being patronized. But then, sometimes they do. She's also pretty good at apologizing.
• Katrina High: Seduces men. Practices witchcraft.
• Katrina High: Probably hasn't ever stolen anything from you.
• Katrina High: At least she isn't Rush Limbaugh, you know what I mean?
• Katrina High: Adds vanilla extract and cinnamon to her French Toast Recipe. 
• Katrina High: Can't remember what real hamburgers taste like. 
• Katrina High: One time she got hit by a car.
• Katrina High: Just like Leslie Knope but without the optimism or the work ethic.
• Katrina High: Wears those jeans well.
• Katrina High: Has at least two good stories.

Uh, yeah, so that's what I've come up with so far. Let me know what you think. Also, comment down below with your business card/elevator introduction ideas... 'cause I want you to.

*The joke** here is that, if you count, there are only nine number signs. 

**Yes, these are jokes. You don't have to advise me against calling myself a maniac shooting flaming arrows of death*** on business cards or saying that I "do a lot of things kind of well" in an elevator introduction.

***In case you didn't get this one, there are actually two levels to the "like a maniac shooting flaming arrows of death" joke. See, Proverbs 26:18-19 says, " Like a maniac shooting flaming arrows of death is one who deceives their neighbor and says, 'I was only joking!'" So, the first level of the joke is the surface: calling yourself "a maniac shooting flaming arrows of death" to potential employees isn't wise. But then the other level of the joke is that I'm actually calling myself deceitful, which is true. As referenced in my third business card suggestion, I lie a lot. 

Room Cleaning

So, for... a really long time... I've been in the process of cleaning my room. During the semester, I get super busy with class, commuting, work study, and homework. Then, during my breaks, I often get in a do-absolutely-nothing slump. So, my room gets... well, disgusting to be frank. So what's been happening is that, during the weekends, in between homework, video-making, blogging, and, let's be honest, napping/watching cop shows featuring handsome men, I tidy up bits of my room. But I never get it CLEAN clean, and then throughout the school week, it gets TORN UP again. It's madness.

Now, I've also been dealing with a lot of anxiety as of late. So, I sat down and thought about what steps I could take to improve my emotional health. One thing that occurred to me is that, when my room is a mess, I don't feel comfortable there. So, I don't really have any sort of refuge.

SO: this weekend, I was determined to do a deep/spring clean. I tweeted about it a couple times and then, finally, tweeted out that I had finished cleaning my room. Renee promptly replied my favorite sort of reply ever: PICS OR IT DIDN'T HAPPEN.

So, Renee, this is for you.

Cleaning my room, I found lots of cool stuff. Like, this blinging costume jewelry. Also, I found this page of a notebook where I've written, "Things that make me happy" and then... didn't add anything to that list.

I started cleaning my room on Friday early evening. By about 11:00, I'd created a proper mess... as can happen in the process of cleaning. You know, as you empty out drawers and rearrange the closet. Anyway, I reached the "super exhausted" stage of cleaning just as I reached the "small mess is officially a massive mess" stage of cleaning. So, my bed looked like this:

So, that was frustrating. And most of that just ended up back on the floor in order for me to sleep immediately. 

Saturday morning, I got up early to get back to cleaning. But at 11:30 A.M. I had plans with a friend, so when I got back at around 5:00, there was still a lot that I needed to do in my room. Cleaning my room, and covering my bed in crap, inspired a lot of curiosity in my cat. So, here's a cute picture of her sniffing my boots:

Anyway, we should get to the pictures of actually finishing my room cleaning, as that's the bit that Renee questioned my success of... So, just.... look, okay? It looks really nice and I'm excited about it.

Ah, lovely, right? Right. Beautiful. Wonderful. Clean. Hahaha. Told you, Renee. 

"This was a pointless blog post," You say.

I place my face in my palms and sob, "DON'T TELL ME HOW TO LIVE MY LIFE."

Pear Shaped Selfies

Okay, there are, approximately, ten hundred thousand trillion majillion things to hate about yourself. Here, for instance, let's talk about some things I can hate about myself:

• I have scars from rashes along my jawline that make me look like someone maybe spilled some acid on my face while I was sleeping and then tried to clean it up with a paper towel but did a half-assed job. 
• I have THICK eyebrows that are uneven and oddly shaped so ladies at ULTA are always approaching me, embarrassed, to tell me about their brow bar and ask if I've considered getting bits of my eyebrows ripped out of my face.
• I have BAD skin. Have you seen it makeupless? Because it's even worse makeupless. Here, I'll show you a picture: 
  
  
  
  See? I told you. Bad skin. Terrible skin. Awful, horrible skin. (Also, see that bit on my chin? That's a scar! It's not acne! It's a weird looks-like-someone-spilled-a-bit-of-acid-on-my-face-and-tried-to-clean-it-up-with-a-paper-towel-but-did-a-half-ass-job-at-it scar.)
• I have a giant, potato nose.
• Most lipsticks stay on my face for .2 seconds before they become patchy, faded, and smeared. 

And all that was just stuff about my FACE. If we got into the rest of me, we'd be here all day. I mean, from my body (sometimes, I picture they just took a balloon person and filled it with chocolate pudding and then gave it life and that was me) to my personality (I mean do you think I enjoy being an asocial raging bitch? Well, I don't.) the list would be SO LONG that I would have to start up an entirely new blog to finish it. (Also, side note, I did start a new blog, it's about beauty and lifestyle for poor-ish people, you can check it out here. Okay, enough self promotion, I suppose.)

But, we're not going to go through ALL OF THE THINGS that I COULD hate about myself, instead, we're going to talk about why I don't hate myself. 

"Whaaa?" You may ask. It's a good question. I mean, it could be a good question if you could get out the rest of the non "whaaa" part of the question, but obviously you are dumbstruck by the fact that a raging-bitch pudding-person with a poorly-cleaned-up-acid-spill scar would love themselves. Now, once again, I could give you a list of reasons why I love myself (I mean, my humor is on point, I have a GIANT, POTATO NOSE which is pretty cool, and did you see how good I am at makeup? Plus I have the hair of an 80's Sci-Fi Alien Princess.) But, I'm not going to give you a list. Instead, I'm going to... who knows? I haven't really thought this blog post all the way through.

First, it's important to note that I didn't always love myself, and there are some pretty shitty days where I still don't love myself. I wrote something on my Tumblr not too long ago (you can read it here) that was similar--about not always relating to my appearance, and then not always feeling like other people could like it, and other stuff. Anyway. Sometimes people make it seem like: either you are confident, or you are insecure, and there is no in between. Either you like yourself, or  you don't. But I don't think that's true. Sure, there are some people who are totally comfortable with themselves, they are completely confident, and they just genuinely like themselves. ("I don't believe that's true," you shout from the peanut gallery. Well, "Shut up in the peanut gallery," I snarl back, 'cause who knows, you know?) And sure: there are people who just don't like anything about themselves and they are entirely self-conscious and insecure. But I think most of us are floating about in the middle.

I am... large? There's not really a delicate and appropriate way to put it. "I'm fat" prompts a shower of assurances that I'm not. "I'm pleasantly plump" is, quite frankly, as ridiculous as most alliterations are and makes me sound a bit more like a Christmas ham than living, breathing person. "I'm voluptuous" sounds like I'm in denial about not being a luscious curvy lady like Marilyn Monroe or Jennifer Love Hewitt.

I'm also pear-shaped. I saw this cartoon where someone was criticizing the terms "pear" "apple" and "hourglass" to refer to figures where the artist sketched a pear and then attached a woman's head, arms, and legs to it. It was meant to point out the absurdity of the terms, but... well... "pear shaped" is a pretty decent term for me. Here, look:

See? You see. 

(Side note, here: As I was graffetti-ing an otherwise nice picture of myself  with a giant pear, it occurred to me that people can't do a whole lot to hurt my feelings. I mean, honestly, I'm both funny and mean. Plus, I have a self-deprecating sense of humor. There are very few means of mocking me that I haven't already exploited.)

(Another side note: my self-deprecating humor doesn't mean that I don't love myself and think I'm spectacular. I mean, I've met myself. I live with myself 24/7. I think I'm the shit.)

So, the thing about my size, is that have pretty sizable thighs. In a culture flooded with "get that thigh gap" propaganda, it isn't easy to walk around, well aware of how well the phrase "pounding the pavement" describes your feet on the road, to hear the thunderous thuds of your footsteps, and feel the reverberations trembling up your legs. 

I have felt uncomfortable wearing shorts and skirts with bare legs. I have, on several occasions, covered my legs with blankets while sitting in groups. I have watched, embarrassingly, the ripples along my legs while doing jumping jacks. I had a shitty friend scoff at the size of my jeans when I was in seventh grade. 

And I would love to give you the exact recipe I used to transform my body-hatred to body-love, but, quite frankly, I don't know it. 

But let me just say this: I started looking in the mirror. And I started taking pictures of myself. 

I think one thing that makes it easy to hate bits of yourself is that... you don't see yourself a whole lot. You would probably never call your mother, your sister, your best friend, your cousin, your brother, your dog, or your grandmother "fat" or "ugly." Because you see them all the time. So, let's say your father has giant ears. You probably don't look at him and think, "Man those are huge, disgusting ears." You see them all the time, and they're part of someone you love. So, you probably either don't think twice about his ears, or you might even think them a handsome feature. By contrast, if you have large ears, you might look in the mirror every day and think, "Damn those are some massive, awful ears." Because you don't see yourself all that much (probably no more than an hour each day, right?) and, more importantly, you most frequently see yourself in fragments. Hands, face, thighs, feet, stomach, face, hips... Fragments. 

On top of that, we're bombarded with magazine photos. 

But, maybe start to change the way you see yourself. And how frequently you see yourself. Okay, so, I started a totally fake fashion blog. For over a year I've been taking pictures of myself, editing them, and uploading them. That, along with my vlogs, makes me look at myself a lot. Plus, I started to really look at myself in the mirror. Anyway, the point is, I think through excessive amounts of photographs, I started to like myself--especially the little bits of myself I used to not like. See, look:

I've got a really pretty pear shape, don't you think?