Ah Wee-u has blown it again. We had the chance to win the football game and we blew it. Am I surprised? Only a little. Here is irony for you. Me, the girl who spent her childhood irritated at her dad and brother because they hooted and hollered at the television while watching sports games has become a sports fan. I don’t even like baseball and I was rooting for the Cubs. No, not just because they made it to the playoffs, but also because they really deserve to win. I mean come on. How can you now want them to win? But also when I leave a football game early (I had a valid excuse, crazy infection of some kind) I go home and turn on the radio. Four years ago there would have been no radio listening! I would have said huh, I wonder if we won. Doesn’t matter to me. Now I’m all sorts of pissed because the team blew it. Grumble.

I have got to get out of this town. It’s sucking the life out of me. I am a full believer that the only person who can make me happy is myself but I’m not going to make anyone happy until I get out of this god-forsaken wasteland. There are some that like this town. There are some that want to stay. I say good for them. If Mac-town is treating you right, more power too you. It is not treating me right. It’s turning me into another mediocre human being.

Now I’m not so arrogant as to proclaim I will ever be more than a mediocre human being to the world, but I’ll be damned if I’ll be only mediocre to myself. The world needs secretaries. The world needs librarians. One day when I’m old and retired I’ll be one of those two things. Right now, I’m better than that. I can’t write, can’t sleep, I’m certainly not happy. It isn’t good when you don’t want to go to bed because you dread the coming day. That isn’t right. It isn’t good you look for reasons to get out of town because that offers the illusion of doing something with your time. I’m glad I didn’t go to school immediately, if I hadn’t taken some time out of school I wouldn’t have realized it’s what I love, but now I’m stuck in limbo until I can find some place else to go. I know if all else fails I can go to Peoria come January, but I really want to get into school. I really want to get a degree and go teach at a college somewhere. Not a big one necessarily. But it isn’t about the salary or the size or the prestige. It’s about helping people learn.

I don’t know if I can teach English as well as drums but I know I’ve got to try. It’s what I should have done in the first place. I like teaching. I like watching someone get better at what they’re doing because I helped them. I like making the world a better place. I looked at my parents and their struggles in the school system and I thought that wasn’t for me. And I still think elementary or high school is not for me but college—community college or a university could be for me. Teach kids that books are cool. That poetry is worth reading. There is so much to be learned from books! I am young but I was so young at eighteen. Hell if I knew what I wanted to do with myself. I still don’t know exactly but I know what I could do for a little while. That’s a lot more than I’ve known for about four years. But the first step is getting out of this town. If I were braver I would just cut ties and go. Maybe I’ll find it within myself to do that…I don’t know. There are places I could go, Vegas, North Carolina, Peoria, Chicago. At some point I just have to decide if I want to pursue present hopes and dreams or take off and make new ones. I’ve never been good at that.

Ah well, I’m sure no one reading this cares but then hey, maybe no one’s reading this. One can only hope. Maybe I’ll inspire some one else to get out of this town. That would be worthwhile. Maybe I’ll inspire myself. Maybe I should stop making excuses and just go. Hmm..there’s an idea. I hate it when I’m honest with myself. But I’d hate myself if I weren’t. What’s a girl to do. Maybe I’ll go pray, couldn’t hurt. Dear God let me be accepted…