The Zoo

Meet the newest memeber of my zoo...

Albert Baxter...(Baxter for Short)

Note to Self

It occurred to me today as I walked in the doors of Wally World why one does not go shopping on a Saturday. It was insanely packed, reminiscent of tuna swimming in a net. People everywhere, carts everywhere, screaming children everywhere, and ringing cell phones gone nuts. I am a people person, but not a large crowd cannot get where you need to go person. It took me 45 mins to do what I typically do in 15. Note to self; do not shop at Wally World on a Saturday.

The war has begun....

I am fighting an inner battle...and the unexpected thing is which side is losing.

Did she say...*whispers*?

Its crazy to think that summer is now half way over. It seems like it just started, but at the same time seems like I’ve been home for a while. I’ve noticed that I find myself thinking about what I want out of next semester more and more as the summer begins its downhill slope. I have been journaling more of late on this very subject. What do I want out of fall? It’s going to be an interesting semester to say the least. I’ll be working every single morning, but thankfully not early. A very close friend from high school will be moving in with me, bridging the gap of Missouri Meg and Oklahoma Meg. I intend to make the highest GPA I’ve ever made and plan on getting the ball rolling on a semester abroad in Australia for fall of 07. I want to actually do this college thing and stop just sitting at home every night. I want to date, really date….not just randomly happen into a relationship. I want to go to the cultural dinners, movie nights, theatre shows, and even the drag queen contest. I want to study in the Library to say I’ve done it (nerdy right?) and nap on Library lawn. I want to go out with my friends and see a new movie occasionally. I want so many things, and I know that I have no way of packing it all in, but I’m going to try. I tend to put life on the backburner and work instead. I want to be 22/23 and enjoy it. With all these goals in mind there is only one thing I can do…and that is just go for it.

How amazing is life sometimes? I feel so surrounded by people, places, moments, and things that make my heart feel the fullest it has in a long while. As I sit here typing my beloved dog is napping next to me, he refuses to leave my side since I've returned home. On the other side of the room Papa is sitting in his chair also napping, unless I change the channel on the television, then he'd be up and "watching" that. The History channel prattles off some information on World War II and the picture I see through the screendoor outside is of the trees swaying in the wind. Its peaceful and its mine. I cannot express the beauty in stillness that occures here everyday, perhaps I have found a joy here that I had forgotten existed. I miss college very much, at times I feel like I'm going to lose my mind here, but then I have moments like this and it makes the crazy need for my life in Oklahoma vanish. At last it is truely summer for me.

Re uh...re...recap?

For the last week and half I’ve been MIA, and honestly it was nice. I feel like I’ve become addicted to the net in my bored moments, which are many it seems. After a trip to Oklahoma for work, Memorial Day, and my mini-hiking excursion my days have been rather full if I allow myself to actually consider it. The pace however is still much slower than I’m used to and I find myself looking for things to keep my mind occupied. There are a lot of really crappy things going down right now. My best friend is getting married and I can’t go. A chain of events has left me stranded in hillbilly hollow and I will miss his big day. I’m really saddened by this; I love him very much and feel as if I am failing him as a friend by not being there. Anyway I won’t dwell on how bothered I am by that and instead I will get to a happier event. On Monday I went with two of my good friends from hillbilly hollow on a grand adventure. What was initially planed as a three day camping trip, slowly turned more< into a day trip and was a blast. We left around noon and headed to a local Mill/Spring and went hiking. I’ll post a few pictures to show why the Ozarks are one of the most amazing places in the world, but I also have to say I suffered greatly for this adventure. I have a blister a little larger than a dime on my right heel and bug bites all over me, blasted itching, but it was so worth it all. So for your viewing pleasure…the Ozarks in summer.

Yonked from Cindy

I am heroic couplets; most precise And fond of order. Planned and structured. Nice. I know, of course, just what I want; I know, As well, what I will do to make it so. This doesn't mean that I attempt to shun Excitement, entertainment, pleasure, fun; But they must keep their place, like all the rest; They might be good, but ordered life is best.

What Poetry Form Are You?

It has been awhile since I’ve honestly updated, a lot has happened, and hasn’t happened lately. Insane cleaning has been going on in the Hobbit Hole (also knows at my house) and minor traveling to Oklahoma and back. I have insane writers block and am having a very hard time putting words together the way I like. So here are a few excerpts from my journal to just have some form of an entry.

It was sunset again, two years ago, the white sand squished under my toes as we walked. The waves rushed the shore and the seagulls honked their hellos as they passed each other. My stomach danced at the thought of you next to me, and I couldn’t help but want to be near you. I’ll never forget that day, those moments, that trip. I find myself going back there more and more as the summer begins its long stretch, and it is because I miss you. That trip marked our real beginning as friends. I miss random banter and conversations about nothing, how you never look up when you eat your fries from the grill at school, your incessant question asking during a show, how you try to make me listen to music you know I hate, the way people would inject into our conversations, how you look out for me, I just miss my best friend.

I planted flowers today, I dug into the earth and probably killed 1000 worms doing it, but it felt good. The weather was perfect for it, and my Papa sat in a lawn chair just hanging out too. I’ve never grown a plant for real, I have a completely brown thumb, or so I think. There is something beautiful in being apart of life, and this is my first attempt at it. I only hope it works out okay for me, or should I say for the plants.

We went to her grave, just to put flowers on it for mother’s day. Gran got out of the car and walked to the headstone, I wonder what was going through her mind as she stood there staring that grave of her only daughter. She spelled my mom’s name over and over out loud, and turned to me, “Who is this? I’ve never heard of her before.” I felt so helpless, so unsure of what to say. It was a hard moment; I do not wish to relive it with her again.

He brought me breakfast today, biscuits and gravy from his morning haunt. Breakfast he brings with love and with kindness. He knows I spend late nights reading and doesn’t like to wake me in the morning to go with him, “you need your sleep sis.” He always chimes in. How am I so lucky to have a man who loves me more than anything else in his life? He even misses baseball games so I can watch my shows on TV. He truly blesses me everyday, I am the luckiest girl in the world to have Papa like mine.

So that is what they are calling it these days...

Doctor Unheimlich has diagnosed me with Meg's Disorder
Cause:	drug abuse
Symptoms:	automatic writing, restlessness, excessive bad poetry
Cure:	psychiatry
Enter your name, for your own diagnosis:

Hmmm this explains so much...

Oh meg...go to bed!

If I ever happen to have a masters thesis...I'd like to do it over the cultural relevance of burial rather than other methods of body disposal after death....and with that oddity I'm going to bed.

A roundabout

It will sound silly that I, a 22-year-old woman, feel as if I’m back in High School, but it is true. Coming home was a breath of fresh air, and death warrent at the same time. My longing for the Ozarks is unquenchable, I find myself staring constantly longing to be outside, a rarity for me, yet coming back to small town life was not on the top 1000 list of things to do. Walking through the local Wal-Mart, looking like I’d not ever seen a brush, I ran into several people who I have managed for the past 4 years to see hid nor hair of. People always ask me where I am and what I’m doing and with a congenial smile I reply. I then inquire into their lives, because after it would be rude to not care in the least. The looks on their faces when they see me, I’m not sure if it smug pride that they are still snotty and beautiful, or shock that I, the girl fighting to get out, came back. Overall I spend my life making my own way. Once I leave the town limits I don’t look back, and now I see three months of constant battles with my inner pride over escaping. I have never understood the appeal of living here. Everyone knows your business, your last name makes you, being “good” enough is about whom you marry and when you marry them, and after 7 everything shuts down. Perhaps I create this insane idea of what small town life is really about, but in my mind it has always been and will always be about politics here. Don’t get me wrong; there are a hundred things I love about small town America as well. Its nice to have grown up with the same kids and have those people still be apart of my life, to have had a relationship with my teachers because of smaller class sizes, to have been a star in theater because I had few people to compete with, a country with boundless beauty a stones throw away, and a slower pace of life. It is a paradox being here. To find the freedom that awaits me this summer I have to let go of a lot of things, mainly my Pride. Having Anne here for a few days was pure delight, merging my Oklahoma life with my Missouri life, two pieces of my puzzle that are typically separated. While driving between Branson and my hometown I watched the rain cleanse the landscape and the beauty of this part of the country overtook me. So perhaps this summer isn’t going to be an easy escape, but I’m home.

…the somewhat kinda end.

It is almost officially the end of my semester. At 11:30 today I am done. I can’t say that this semester will be sorely missed, but College will be. Yesterday was hellacious. I overslept, and woke up to find packing looming. After intense packing, things kept appearing out of nowhere, it was horrifying, Anne returned home at 8pm and I began to load her car, before long we realized that it wasn’t all going to fit. I began to panic. After a lot of issues, my Tulsa roomie Christy came and we loaded up her Liberty to the max. Everything just barely fit, but praise God it fit. She was able to join my friends and I for free pancakes as well, which was just great. After everything was loaded up she headed home, I really do not know what I’d do without her. It seems God has given me a hundred people to make my life easier, because in a pinch there is always someone there to rescue me. When I called my Papa yesterday he was so excited about me being home Sunday he forgot to feel bad for my stress packed day. It was nice to be wanted though, and I can’t say I am not as excited to spend time at home. I have a lot to do, but overall this weekend is almost finished. I leave Stillytown sometime around 5:30 I believe, I’ll then head to the store once in Tulsa and work until around 2:30amish. Saturday I work prob like noon to 6ish maybe…not so sure about that one. After work there I am hoping to unload what is left in Christy’s liberty at some point, but that might happen on Sunday, I’m not sure. Anyway, the weekend is almost finished and I’m excited about a couple of days in Branson with Anne and then summers full fledged power hits me. I had intended on taking some summer courses, but the cost of the spring was more than expected apparently. So I have to go by the Bursars office today and see what I can do to get my holds taken off. I’ll be netless for a bit after Sunday so I will not likely be updating for a awhile. I’m not sure how long it will take me to get the net set up, but I’m not to horribly worried about it right now. I hope everyone’s weekend is terrific and I’ll leave this semester, and everything else with a couple of quotes for a goodbye. Until we meet again, I sign out.

“Courage doesn't always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, 'I will try again tomorrow.”
-Mary Anne Radmacher-Hershey

“If we listened to our intellect, we'd never have a love affair. We'd never have a friendship. We'd never go into business, because we'd be cynical. Well, that's nonsense. You've got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down.”
-Ray Bradbury

Packing

Packing is Evil...Pure Evil...and on top of that...I have to divide it into what I need to come with me and what needs to stay in Oklahoma for the fall...and needless to say I'm not that orgainized. I have to be packed by 9pm....t-minus four and half hours...and yet I'm still on here...*shakes head* procrastination in my middle name :)

Exhaustion, sweet exhaustion

I can barely move right now, my motor functions are still sleeping in my cozy bed. I worked a shift yesterday for a friend, from Midnight to 4am, but did not make it home until 5:30am. I did go to bed, but of course I couldn’t fall asleep, that would be too easy. Insomnia continues to plague me. I finally conked out, but was up in a couple of hours to go to my next shift. I went home from work yesterday afternoon hungry and tired. After eating I crashed for another couple of hours of sleep and then back on the ball. My University is amazing sometimes, and with Free Pancakes on finals week they hit a grand slam. Some friends and I all went and had these amazing pancakes and a cup of free soda to go with it. After getting done eating we talked until almost one. After a really awesome time I went home ready for bed, after all I had to be at work at 4am. I lay down, and again could not sleep. I finally fell asleep somewhere around 2:30 which gave me an hour before coming in. I’m so tired, so very tired, but there is no sleep in sight. Today my beloved and dearly missed Navy Brother is coming to visit me. I’m excited; I feel more than a little disconnected from my family these days. Having him here will be awesome, and he gets to meet my roomie. After I get done with work today at 11:30am a big group of us are going to lunch and then my bro and I are going to go to Oklahoma City to see the Oklahoma City Bombing Memorial. We’ve never been so my roomie is going to take us. It will be nice to just spend some time with him. I miss him very much; we used to be very close friends. It’s odd to me how life pulls and pushes people together and apart. I cannot believe another semester is ending in two days. I will begin packing tonight after dinner and Lost with Clarkie, it will be our last. There are a lot of endings this week. I am not sure in my exhausted state I can really handle all the craziness going on, but I do know that where there is an end, there is also a beginning. From sleepless nights to relationships altering and changing this week has been physically, mentally, and emotionally packed. I have to keep running until Sunday when I get to sleep finally. Then I get in the car and for the first time in almost 3 years I move home. As much as I say I hate Oklahoma it has become home. I face a summer I’m really not ready for, but I know more than anything it was meant to happen this way. All the doors are closing, leaving a fresh entrance for fall. For all the maddening failure, Brett and I closing a door and pioneering on as friends, losing my Gran mentally, sleepless nights, tiring days, family feuds, money issues, stalkers, emotional highs and lows, and friendships changing, this semester has not been a waste. Since January I have discovered more about myself, my strengths and my weaknesses. Lord only knows what the next three months will bring me. I have always said I am a Drama Queen, but I think this semester I’ve realized that I’m not the cause of the drama so much. Drama seeks me, and I really don’t think I’d have it any other way. In the end it comes down to risk, and the move Elizabethtown had a great point there, “No true fiasco ever began as a quest for mere adequacy. A motto of the British Special Air Force is: 'Those who risk, win.' A single green vine shoot is able to grow through cement. The Pacific Northwestern salmon beats itself bloody on it's quest to travel hundreds of miles upstream against the current, with a single purpose, sex of course, but also....life.”

Driven?

What drives you? What in this world causes you to crawl from blissful slumber into the hectic traffic jam of life? This is something I’ve been thinking about very seriously lately. What drives me? What am I living for? Life it seems is a routine for most adults, myself included. It consists of monthly bills, daily responsibilities, and life long commitments. Yet there has to be something underneath it all, an inner force of will. Last night as I attempted to fall asleep my mind wandered over a few hundred things and I at last cried. Overwhelmed by more than I could handle I lay there in a mess of wet pillow, teddy bear, and blanket, heaving in large gasps of air. Once the tears finally stopped I sat up and leaned against my wall, Snockers in hand. The only sound in my room was the whirring of my fan and the faint sound of music. I listened to the almost silence, and took a deep breath. The coolness of the wall seeped into my back as I sat there starring into the darkness of my room. I sat there for mins or hours I’m not sure, I was unthinking, unfeeling, unmoving. When I finally emerged from this odd state I picked up my journal and began to read the entries of this semester. One by one, word for word I found something missing. I’d often speak in the writings of a desire to see the world, live history, find myself, grow stronger, find my missing compass, meet love head on, face fate, or just simply relax in a quiet wood. Staring at me splattered across the pages, bare and bold, lacking nothing of myself in those words, I discovered something alive, breathing, and growing, but also lacking. I am moving, but right now I am in a darkened valley where the clouds cover the sun. I’ve allowed myself to wander off course, and this wandering lead me to a valley more powerful than any I’ve ever been in. It sucked the life from me, took away my bliss, my pride, my beauty, my inner voice, and my relationship with the one person (God) who could save me from it. For a long time I’ve been so busy trying to be “whole” I let the most important piece to the puzzle go unnoticed in the box. Now I sit in the middle of the valley without the one thing I need, God. What drives me? What in this world causes me to crawl from blissful slumber into the hectic traffic jam of life?

Psalm 139:13-16 (New International Version)
13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
16 your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

Confessions from a Broken Moment

Excerpt from my journal 4/27/06
Words are forever. Words do not care who you are, where you are from, what you did, words do not change. I said it, I felt it, I meant it, and I cannot change it. I live a sheltered existence, surrounded by a shell of my own creating. My wants, my fears, my needs, and my easily damaged self hide waiting inside. I can block out others, but how do I block out myself? I was mortified, in a moment everything I understood was changed. I felt the carpet jerk but had no time to prepare for the floor’s strong catch. I sat there, stunned. The alarms sounded inside, “Save yourself! Run!” and I obeyed. I could not answer you, I could not answer myself. Thousands of thoughts and questions raced through my mind in that moment between your paragraph and your question. I racked my brain for anything to say, anything to respond, anything to save my pride or make me less vulnerable, and nothing came. I went to bed unsure of myself, I woke up angry. A hundred moments, all came back when I opened my eyes from bleary sleep. I laid there unsure of the feeling that was rising in me. I spent the day trying not to focus on my anger, but the silent rage of the Monday weather spurred my inner storm. How would I say it, how would I explain, how would I finally tell you how hurt and angry I was. My pride all of it shattered to the floor, unswept, cut me with each memory of you. I tried to silence the memories, to think of anything else, but all I could do was think of all the chances you had to recant, to tell me how you really felt. I sat on the porch while the weather pounded Tulsa and watched the calm turn into a violent storm, and I raged with it. I sit here now unsure of how to tell you what I am feeling, how your friendship means the world to me, but how I feel as if I’m wandering with you. I do not know what to say, how to say it, or how to ask. I tried tonight in vain attempt to say something, to ask, to tell, to speak of the unspeakable moment. It has created some odd rift between us. Still in random moments I remember something of you and me and fume silently, I was angry with myself at first, thinking what a mistake I must have made. Surely I had assumed too much, I misunderstood you, mistook what you said and what a fool I was, but it was not me was it? I was blatantly open, so completely vulnerable, and so bare. You had to know how I felt; I said it a hundred times. In my words, in my actions, in everything and I would have been fine at no, fine with not what I want had you said it. Why did you not say it? I am not okay, I’m wandering lost, but I will be. I had no way to say it to you, I care too much to stare at your silence and wait for your response. I miss you, and I won’t lie about it. I do not expect answers, and I understand if you never give them. I do not expect to discuss it, or even acknowledge it. I do not expect you to feel the same as me or want the same things that I do. I’ve been here before, at least once before. He is now my best friend, and I am certain we too will overcome if we try. I will be distant for awhile, lost in myself. I will be closed off and hard to talk to. I will protect myself from you, but things will soften, they always do. The real question is if you are willing to wait? Does my friendship mean that much? To finally answer your question from that night, yes.

Yonked

Yonked from Cindy

You Should Be a Joke Writer

-You're totally hilarious, and you can find the humor in any situation. -Whether you're spouting off zingers, comebacks, or jokes about life... -You usually can keep a crowd laughing, and you have plenty of material. -You have the makings of a great comedian - or comedic writer.

What Type of Writer Should You Be?

Computer Lab this is Meg, how can I help you?

Yesterday was complete and utter chaos and I loved every single second of it. After a semester of nothing, just me and my laptop spending every evening in a world physically alone, I finally have regained a sense of why I fill my life up to the top with things. I love it! I complain, whine, get frustrated, and poke fun at myself for it, but I need it. When I am going 90 to nothing with just me and the day of insanity ahead I feel like I’m going somewhere, getting something done. Lately I’ve been so bored, mentally and physically. I keep thinking that this is what broke me, the need for a million things going at once, but it feels so complete to be busy, to have a life. Yesterday I regained a piece of me that I left at the door in January and it is nice to have it back. I had a big meeting/party for work. Every semester all the computer assistants, their team leaders, and the lab manager gets together. We all bring a dish and do a potluck dinner. With all the international students working in the labs it’s an adventure for the palette. At the last event, my first, I was thrust into a leadership role, a semester later I have no trouble with it. I socialized with the other compy geeks and of course met some new people and touched base with some old friends. It was fun. After the eating we all went and signed up for fall shifts. Under my direction (yay power ;) ) my CA’s (compy asst) signed up and socialized. It went rather smoothly and I gained about two CA’s to my team. I’m excited for the fall now more than ever. No more 4 am shifts for me. Rather I’m working Monday through Friday from 7:30 to 11:30 and Tuesday from like 12:00 to 2ish. Just a tinge over the hours I need to pay bills. After all the CA’s left, it was just me, Steph (manager), and another team leader who I’ll call Bill. It was a lot of fun; we cleaned up, joked, talked about serious things like politics (oddly enough), and our future dating service for compy geeks everywhere. As Bill and I were discussing this serious stuff, like perception and what it means to be a “nice” person, he complimented me big time by telling me I was the nicest person he’d ever met. Considering this guy is like the ultimate guy (although he has no idea), handsome beyond reason, 4.0 GPA intelligent, super kind, well traveled, witty, well spoken, helpful, very well kept, and has an accent to die for, it was pretty special. Did I mention handsome? Needless to say I have a great time when he is around, he’s a pretty stellar guy, and the object of many a late night conversation between Steph and I. It was all a blast. I needed it more than I can say. This week is packed, my laptop may just feel a tad abandoned as today brings dinner and Lost with Clarkie, tomorrow I am going to a huge thing here on campus with Steph, Friday roomie and I are headed to a movie and then perhaps having a party at home. Overall I’m packed, I’m busy, and I’m finally free of the doldrums.

Release

The tornado siren is going round and round here. The trees are swaying in the wind while the clouds speed across the sky. I feel as if the world outside reflects the world inside of me. A storm has been brewing and is finally coming to fruition. Other than the rustle of the leaves and the siren it is eerily quiet out here. I am alone in sitting and watching the darkened sky. It measures up to a peaceful melancholy. The porch chimes are tinkling the warning that I should be inside. I can’t help but sit here and watch the weather grow more and more dire allowing the purity in the rage of nature to take me over. I was wrong to go against my instinct and listen to the sound of my mind. Perhaps that is the lesson I’ve learned, my gut has never failed me, thus making these past few months the calm before my storm, and just as the rain comes here so it comes inside me. It will cleanse me, water me, and wash away all that has created this moment. Under this downpour I can smell its freedom, I can taste its bitter release, and I can feel its calming cold. Tomorrow I will be new.

Unmistakable

*sigh*