Catherine

It's kind of been a while, Joel and I ended things. But, that's not what this is for. Ben went to Steve's going away party tonight, so, since it's really cold and I was staying in to work on projects I drove him there and then picked him up after. Katie (his ex-girlfriend who he had dated for 2 years) was there. So he came home kind of a mess. We cried together. I just, I see his pain and it really becomes mine. I can relate to his story, because ours are similar, though, Patrick and I were not together nearly as long. The pain is there. Ben struggles to get over relationships it takes him years. I think it takes me the same amount of time I just, I can't do it on my own. I use other people to get over the big ones. The ones that hurt. Hell most of the time I wonder if everyone that I've been with since Burt isn't just someone I'm trying to use to replace what Burt and I had. Talking to him again has been just one big pile of emotion. I cried during a skype call on video with him last week, we put it all out there: how he didn't appreciate me, the lies I told, the hell I put him through after it was over, all of it. No more secrecy or lies or wondering what had gone on after I left. It was an incredible release for me. I finally felt like we were back to the incredible friendship that we had, after that, it was easy. We laughed, he told me about a girl he saw before he left for basic, we swapped stories of mutual friends, the conversation never stopped. I have a friend back. Talking to him brought up other lost friends. Then I came across a picture, friendships forgotten. Lisa is engaged, Tara is engaged and Brittany is married. Tara is the only one I am still friends with. She's become my best friend through all of this. To be honest, we're the only 2 left really. Lisa and Brittany left us both. It just, it makes me nostalgic and sad. Despite the terrible things Brittany did to me, she was my best friend through most of high school. I can't ever forget that. We always talked about how we would be in each others weddings, present for births, for any of life's events. And that dream never happened. It's a little bit of mourning for the loss of all of that. And finals suck. I think I've procrastinated to the point of an all-nighter Sunday...hooray... In an unrelated yet still slightly related note: I have a date tomorrow. "And all at once I knew how Margo Roth Spiegelman felt when she wasn't being Margo Roth Spiegelman: she felt empty. She felt the unscaleable wall surrounding her. I thought of her asleep on the carpet with only that jagged sliver of sky above her. Maybe Margo felt comfortable there because Margo the person lived like that all the time: in an abandoned room with blocked-out windows, the only light pouring in through holes in the roof. Yes. The fundamental mistake I had always made--and that she had, in fairness, always led me to make--was this: Margo was not a miracle. She was not an adventure. She was not a fine and precious thing. She was a girl."-Paper Towns

i don't know how much more of this i can handle. i am literally falling apart. i found out on tuesday that i have an incurable skin condition. that MIGHT go away on its own...in a month or 2, or i might have it for the rest of my life. they MIGHT be able to control the symptoms, so that i can be touched without breaking out in hives and an uncontrollable itch. joel could hardly touch me last weekend without intense pain. i can't even take a shower without experiencing pain afterwards. i couldn't even wear a bra today because the rash around the bottom band is really bad. i was handling everything ok this morning, until i got home from work and showered and the pain and itch afterwards was just awful. and it's spreading up my neck and down my legs. on top of all of this, tonight i got a yeast infection, probably from the medicine i'm taking that's supposed to make the hives go away. so i had to go to wal mart at midnight to get one of those stupid kits to cure it. i come back to my apartment to a person parked in my fucking garage spot. i mean, seriously, kick me while i'm down. i left them a bitchy note and parked a block away. i was fuming as i walked that block back to my apartment. and now i've collapsed into tears in bed. i'm so frustrated and itchy. i literally just scratched myself until i started to see blood. i'm sure that will be great in the morning. i'm so over this. i hate my body. i hate how i'm always sick. i hate the way i feel. i hate the way i look. it's all culminating into just this...pile of negativity. i just want to crawl into bed and sleep through the rest of the week...but, oh wait...if i stay in one position in bed too long, i break out in even more hives. so i can't even fucking do that without more itching. i'm sick of it all.

I hugged a homeless man on Sunday after Church Under the Bridge. It moved me. More thoughts to come, I need time to process.

One of the many people I stalk on the internet is the always charming Hayley G Hoover. I started watching her on youtube and have recently started reading her blog. She is amazing, she writes about day to day stuff, but somehow it makes me laugh out loud or think. She's definitely gifted when it comes to writing. I wish I could write half as well as her, I'm going to work on being much more interesting. I have begun to feel very disconnected from campus life lately. I'm only on campus on Monday through Wednesday and these classes all occur after 4 p.m. I think I've read the Daily once, maybe twice. This past week was Homecoming week, which, really is just a glorified Greek Week. I forgot that it was Homecoming until I drove past a frat working at all hours on their lawn display. I'm looking forward to practicum being over, so I can be back on campus during the day. My parents came with to tailgating and the game. I definitely introduced them to the world of college binge drinking, they both found it hilarious and neither left too concerned about my relationship with alcohol, so overall the day was a success. I came home from work today to find a friend request waiting for me from Burt. Needless to say, I was shocked. The last conversation we had (was via text) and ended rather awkwardly and it happened right before he left for basic. I sent the first message, just told him how glad I was he got ahold of me because I had been wanting to tell him about Bernadette. I mean, she lived in his apartment for a summer and he really liked her a lot. I just, I wonder what's changed in his head. I feel like I need forgiveness in the whole situation, I need some sort of closure on it. I just hope this will bring me that closure.

Hi! My name is Catherine Lowe, I am (almost) 22 years old and I live in grand ol’ Ames, Iowa. I am a senior in Elementary Education at Iowa State University and I’m planning on graduating in December of 2010. To be quite honest, I never really know what to write when talking about myself, I don’t know if you want the facebook profile rundown or the “deep emotional” side of me. So, I’m going to just going to keep it short I guess. I spend most of my time going to class, working at Cold Stone Creamery (glamorous, I know) going out with my friends and reading books. I can’t cook but I can bake cookies like it’s nobody’s business, I’m notoriously clumsy and I’m a huge nerd at heart. I’m applying to Ford because growing up, my Mom always mentioned your agency in this sort of reverent way, like she was talking about a historic monument or something. I wanted to pack up and move to LA and do the whole, “be a waitress until I’m discovered thing” right after high school, but, my parents told me I had to go to college first. In retrospect, they were pretty wise in their decision to keep their naive 18 year old near home. College is winding down now, and most of my life I’ve had people tell me that I should model. (I’m sure you hear that all the time) I honestly don’t know if I “look” like a model, most of my friends just go off of the fact that I am generally considered “pretty”, am naturally thin and I get compared to celebrities by total strangers, which, is kind of creepy, but, flattering nonetheless. Basically, this is something I’ve wanted for a long time. I love photography (though, admittedly I am an amateur at it) and the aesthetics of the body fascinate me. I want the chance to be a part of that world. I want the chance to experience something new, have an adventure and challenge myself and my way of life. Thanks for taking the time to read my application and I hope you’re having a great day, wherever you are.

I think I want to start a new blog. I think this is an impulse I will indulge on another day. My first week of classes went well, aside from all of the lame get to know you games. I hate those. I never feel like I can fully explain myself in two words or in the short time where I say my name, major and a fun fact about me. It always depends on my mood for the day, so few people really know all of the sides of me, because, I'm always changing which side people see. It's my deep deep desire to be well liked. I'm working on getting better...but it's a slow process. I went to visit Joel over the weekend. It was fun, I could tell he liked introducing me to his friends. It was so interesting to see the world he lives in, it's so very different from mine. There are so many contrasts. I went to church with him on Sunday morning. Honestly, I was kind of uncomfortable at first and I'm embarrassed to admit that I was extremely anxious and nervous about it all. Mostly because I assumed when I met people that they would ask where I was from and where I went to church. Thankfully, only Mark asked me, and he's one of Joel's best friends, so I wasn't afraid to be honest and tell him that I don't really go to church. Quite honestly, I'm terrified of going back. I haven't even really sorted through all of my thoughts about it. I mean, it really wouldn't be going back, because I wouldn't know very many people at the churches here in Ames. James invited me to the Salt kickoff on Thursday, but, it was outside and raining so I didn't go. I just feel weird about it, because I know that of all the churches and church groups on campus that Salt will have the most people that I know. I don't know that I want to face that yet. I'm so frustrated about it all. I had started a few months ago telling people I was agnostic if they asked, or if it came up in conversation. I was confident in my answer. I could answer questions people asked me about my belief, because it was mine. I didn't have to answer for the other agnostics they had met, I didn't have to explain the atrocities people had committed in the name of my god, it was just me, being honest about what I thought about religion and god and faith. It's all topsy turvy in my head now. I nearly cried in church. We were singing a hymn I vaguely remembered from my childhood and I just had a flashback to being a kid and singing songs in church, with my Dad kneeling between my sister and me. Every Sunday, when worship started, he would get on his knees, down to our level so that he could listen to us singing. It was a memory that I had all but forgotten. I had to fight back tears for the rest of the song. It made me think of Jenna's graduation party over the summer and how it was the first time I had ever been honest to someone's questions from DMC about church. I flat out told her that I didn't go anymore because I had had enough of it and I was done with church. She was one of my parent's friends and my parents were right there listening. I was elated after it happened, it was like a weight had been lifted, I was incredibly proud of myself, I rarely stand up for myself like that. But, at that moment in church, for the first time, I thought about how it probably embarrassed and disappointed my parents. I hate disappointing them. I wonder if my Dad ever thought about who Elizabeth and I would become when we got older. I wonder if I'm anywhere near what he imagined. It's strange how one situation can cause two incredibly opposite emotional reactions. I just, I want to live what I believe. What I was taught to believe is so different from what I have seen since moving from home and so different from what life has taught me. A lot of terrible and a lot of beautiful things have happened to shape my beliefs over the last few years. I survived and grew in those terrible things on my own, without desperate cries to a god who doesn't listen to me and the beautiful things were incredible moments of joy in my life, and were no less joyous because I don't put my faith in a god. That's where I am.

I'm back in Des Moines today. Headed on our usual trek to Florida with my family. This time, with the addition of the dear Elizabeth Dawson. Who might as well be my sister as well as Heather Knoff. My friend from elementary school in GA. I'm pretty excited about going, we haven't been in a few years and being near large bodies of water always brings me peace and genuine contentment. Alicia called me earlier this week, as she and Garrett were headed back to Iowa for a vacation. We got all the details settled and decided to get together today. Chelsea and Elizabeth were able to come too, we went out to DQ :) I think it was the first time that the 4 of us had been alone together since Spring Break '08. It was really fun, we always laugh so much when we're together. And so much had changed since then, Alicia got married and is now pregnant. Which just blows my mind. She's like 2 stages ahead of me in life. But, at the same time we're the same age and still friends. I felt weird talking about the bars I go to or the parties that I have. She's going to be a mom in 5 months. She's been a wife for a year and a half now. I don't know what any of that is like. She let me feel the baby kicking. I think it's the most incredible and crazy and magical thing I have ever experienced. I got teary eyed as I felt this small baby fluttering against my hand. I can't wait to experience that for myself, but, then I realized I can. Alicia and I are 2 different people. She has wanted to get married and have a baby since we were 14 and having sleepovers together. Is it something I want someday? Absolutely, but I just don't feel like I'm quite at the stage of life where I'm ready for that. Marriage? I could probably handle within the next couple years. But having a baby? I want to experience life with my husband and travel and have my career and move around. I'm excited for that stage of life. Also I have been kind of emotional over the last few days, but haven't had a good cry yet. That needs to happen soon, and before we move Elizabeth in. I've been avoiding thinking about it and emotionally dealing with it and it's starting to show. It needs to come out sometime soon. I'm really thankful for the next 7 full days I'll have with her (and the rest of my family) I love spending time with her and this will be a fantastic time together. It's looking like I'll see her in October for the first time after moving her in. Mom and Dad are planning on going to Baylor's homecoming and I think I could make it too, with no class Friday it would be worth the trip. That's only a month and a half apart. We can handle that. I miss Joel I wish he was coming on the trip with us.

and he's the reason why. take it slow. breathe. enjoy it. let yourself fall. trust him.

i think i need a good kick in the ass like a break up more often. seriously, i've accomplished more in the last 48 hours than i have in the last 6 months on my list of things i need to do to improve my happiness and my life. patrick's overall lazy attitude about everything really brought me down to his level, it's like now i am finally back to who i used to be. people have already noticed a change for the better :) i like that. oh and he already has a new girlfriend...they had been "hanging out" before he broke up with me. so that was fun news, i was emotionally cheated on (and probably physically as well) the real kicker? she was his TA for speech class. how fucked up is that? my sister and lizzie have apparently already been picking on him/her via facebook. god i love it when people stick up for me, it's so satisfying. knowing that i'm not the only one in the world that was mad as hell. it's like i put up with the alcoholism (which almost always lead to verbal abuse) the put downs, him making me feel stupid, his ridiculous demands for my time, his overall indifference towards me/my feelings and his overwhelming concern about his ex-girlfriend long enough. i have been liberated. and it feels great.

I thought I would actually compile a list of things which I will now be looking out for in my next relationship. 1. Someone who is close with their family and can be close with mine. I had this with Burt, and after not having it with Patrick, it's something I really really have to have. 2. Someone who is secure. Brett was lacking in this category, it gets old having to reassure someone every 2 seconds that you do love them. 3. Someone who isn't an EF. I seem to really attract extroverted feeler primaries and being an extroverted feeler like 90% of the time myself, the two of us being one really really does not work. 4. Someone who isn't self-proclaimed to be "really into music" more specifically, someone who doesn't pretend to know how to play guitar or how music actually works. Brett and Patrick both did this. Brett with a bass and Patrick with a guitar, they each knew like one song that they had figured out on their own, each would pick up their guitar and play said song (rather poorly) and then hope that it was impressive. It's not. Either you play guitar or you don't. 5. Someone who doesn't drink in excess. 6. Someone who has a fairly clean slate when it comes to ex-girlfriends. They have to be in the middle, they have to be able to be civil toward their ex or not in communication with them (but not bitter/angry towards them) The whole "we're still best friends" thing sucks as does the "I'm super angry and do mean things to them still" thing. I need middle ground. 7. Someone who is content doing nothing as well as someone who is able to be flexible with plans. 8. Someone who has a busy life of their own. I've never really dated anyone who has as many commitments as me, I think it would be a nice change to have someone that is busy. I feel like they wouldn't guilt me away from spending time with others like most of my ex's have. 9. Someone as nerdy if not nerdier than me or someone that can be into my "nerdy quirks" 10. Someone who wants to move away from the midwest. I'm sure I have more...I need some sleep though. To Be Continued.

I was dumped, for the first time since Bobby, back when I was still in high school. It's strange how much it hurt for those first few hours and how relieved and ok I am with it now. The usual angry stage only lasted a few hours this afternoon and I think it was fueled by the people I was talking to. Are there things I would like him to know? Yes. But that will happen eventually and probably not in person, honestly, I don't want to talk to him again for a long time. I don't want to be his friend, I'm not going to do to his next girlfriend what his relationship with Caylee did to me. Period. It's funny how I can look back and see how this relationship was not so different from my previous ones. So far, nearly every guy I have dated has had the same general issues with me. They're all the same. Every fight becomes monotonous, every problem they have with me gets old. They're things that if I wanted to, I could change, and have changed temporarily for them. But, ultimately if I made these changes permanent I would have few other friends, would not be doing well in school, would care little for my family and would be an unreliable employee. I think with the relief and satisfaction I feel with this breakup it's teaching me that those are things I shouldn't compromise on. I feel strong. Someday I will find someone that admires my ambitions and priorites and someone who has enough of their own to keep up with me. If not, then I'll continue to take joy and pride in my life and the things I accomplish, as I always have.

"I wanted so badly to lie down next to her on the couch, to wrap my arms around her and sleep. Not fuck, like in those movies. Not even have sex. Just sleep together, in the most innocent sense of the phrase. But I lacked the courage and she had a boyfriend and I was gawky and she was gorgeous and I was hopelessly boring and she was endlessly fascinating. So I walked back to my room and collapsed on the bottom bunk, thinking that if people were rain, I was drizzle and she was hurricane. " -Looking for Alaska

Can't believe I didn't mention this the last time I wrote... I saw this and thought it summed up what I felt. Dear Bigots, Suck it. Love, Iowa (and Vermont, Connecticut, Massachusetts and (kinda) D.C.) I cried when I found out. I was (am) so excited. It took the US until 1967 to allow interracial marriage, 42 years after that, gay and lesbian couples can get married in 4 states. Their children will now have a legally recognized family and will no longer have to question the legitimacy of the parents that they love. I think that's what made me the happiest. It's not destroying the family, it's strengthening it. Two things said at the rally on Friday that I thought were fantastic: One man said, "When more people receive a college degree and advance in education, we say that our culture is advancing. When more people have jobs, we say out culture is advancing and stronger. When more people vote, we say our culture is advancing. And now we can say, with more people getting married, our culture and our families will get stronger." A woman who is a preacher was telling a story about an altar call at her church. A young man came up and decided to give his life to Christ, he was a teenager who had been moved from foster home to foster home, he had been abused and unwanted. He got up in front of the congregation and said that he now has a family in his church and with the foster family that was going to adopt him. The foster parents were two men, a gay couple and had shown him love and acceptance and gave him a sense of belonging.

Sometimes I wonder if the power of the internet has opened up stalker sides of people, who, would ordinarily have no way of stalking people. Everyone jokes about it, "I was totally facebook stalking earler..." but, is it a serious problem? Do the people who stalk my profile actually see who I am and have a deep understanding of me? No. In no way does it help us understand each other more complexly. Sometimes I wonder if it's all just some big joke. I mean, to an extent, it is. Facebook can collect and analyze incredible data just from everyone's profile pages. Why do you think the ads reflect what you have in your profile? I'm just as guilty as everyone else I spend way too much time on facebook or the internet in general. Though, in the last week or two I have gotten better, there were a few times I would go a day or two without checking facebook. I think it's a crutch and a waste of time, if I'm sitting around I should be able to think of at least 10 things to do that would be a better use of my time. There's no need to just instantly grab my computer. I mean, I think I take it a step further than some people, I spend a good half hour a day on youtube. Watching people talk about their lives. There's a different level when you can hear them talk, watch their facial expressions and learn about their lives. I catch myself feeling like I know these people, when, I really know nothing about them. I watch them for 3 minutes a few times a week and I see what they want me to see. Just like facebook profiles. Wow, I just went to delete my myspace and that profile has had 22,331 views. Obviously that doesn't mean 22,331 different people have looked at it, but even if each of them were only there for a minute, that's 15 days, 12 hours that people have spent looking at my profile. Insane. Ugh, still trying to figure out how to delete the damn thing. Where is the button? Also, I deleted 50 friends from facebook this week, but, I still have over 700 friends. Absurd. I'm debating just deleting mine forever and then starting over. I'm trying to decide if that would be easier than purging more than half my friends. I'm sick of it. I don't want people that I no longer talk to, using my profile to judge me for becoming a feminist or for becoming liberal in college. I don't want to give them the satisfaction or the gossip of knowing I strayed from the "straight and narrow" It's ridiculous. Wow, I found the button and as I'm deleting the thing, myspace is barraging me with peoples profile pictures and info saying "They'll miss me." It's all gone. Bye myspace!

i am neither this nor that happy :: sad content :: restless smart :: dumb driven :: lazy hopeful :: hopeless lonely :: smothered friendly :: reserved liar :: truthful i want the extremes back

So I'm completely in love with my classes this semester, I applied for the teacher ed program last week, things are going well school-wise. Last semester was the best I've had yet as far as GPA goes and I intend to continue to raise the bar each semester and do better and better. I actually thought critically about the books I bought the semester, and am *gasp* actually READING them. I'm not bringing my computer to lectures, it proves to be more of a distraction than a benefit. Dr. Quick trained me in 9th grade to write quickly, I can generally summarize every slide a teacher talks about and successfully write it all down. The more I get into teaching the more I think about my future classroom, the kind of environment I want to create there for my students, it's all quite terrifying really. I'm totally freaked out by the idea of my own classroom, I'm pretty sure that won't happen after graduation (I'll graduate in December) it'll end up being subbing for a semester most likely. But, still. My New Year's Resolution to read 50 books in 2009 is going so-so, I still have only completed 2 books (1984 by George Orwell and Let it Snow by John Green, Lauren Myracle and Maureen Johnshon) however, I have 2 in progress, (A Man Without a Country by Kurt Vonnegut and Uglies by Scott Westerfield) I like Vonnegut, looking forward to reading more of his stuff. So I was going to write about my "aesthetically amazing" moments for my Art Ed class, but, that didn't happen and now I'm sleepy. Opening tomorrow...woohoo