It’s so funny how when we’re younger we think everyone has the better life…everyone else is more well adjusted than we are…everyone else has the more “normal” family…and then as adults most of us are pretty thankful that we’re just moderately f*cked up compared to the rest of the world and if we’re lucky, we appreciate what we have instead of moaning about what we don’t have.

Am I making sense? Hahahahaha - too much coffee at 6:47 a.m. and I’m still on a high of being liberated from my family for two weeks. And we’re still on for that “Finish my novel by the end of this month” competition…just cross your fingers I don’t send you the final ms as…um…proof. (ha!)

xo
Rob

I enjoyed reading your quiz answers. Thanks for tagging me.

Mom - I think we both have large doses of child-at-heart.

n.l. - I’m glad to see that not everyone behaves like counselors. The world needs its activists and protectors and irate friends to help create a balance.

Sarah - I always smile when I read your comments.

Terry - You are something. I liked reading your quiz and knowing about Buddy.

Shelley - Those are fascinating stories, and I’m kind of bowled over imagining a 12 year old reading all that Existentialism.

Anneliese - Incredible story you told on your MySpace page!

Jim - Yes, maybe next week.

Lauren - Thanks. I’m tired of diddling away at it and want to set it free.

Amy - I have to enjoy the bliss while it’s there because I know on other days I tear myself down.

Lance - Aw. Sweet.

I once had a college history student who was hanging with the wrong guy in class. He was an obvious player, and a moron, and she expressed a desire to learn. So I told her if she wanted to learn, to go study with the more engaging students.

She disappeared for a while until a week or so later I saw her walking across campus.

Of course I was a jerk as usual and said something of the sort, “Why the hell aren’t you coming to class?”

To which she broke down and cried and explained that the very night I recommended she not hang out with the playa playa to study, that he raped her.

I begged her to go see the campus police.

She refused and asked me not to even though she had evidence.

So I went to the campus police. If there was an issue, they could explore for further evidence. I think that’s my responsibility: to tip the authorities.

So, yes, I would lose my job as a counselor because I would never sit idle (as long as I knew there was some form of evidence).

Well the college kicked that punk out of school.

The girl. She dropped out and disappeared.

Although a lot of students drop out and disappear, I’ll never know why she dropped out… it was always sad to lose students to anything: trauma, poor motivation, etc… As a professor you want them all to succeed, just like we want ourselves to…

Thanks for playing tag, Susan. It’s been a kick learning these little known tidbits about my webpals. My life seems so ordinary next to some of the kids here. A direct link to my five is at: Ovations.

But my job when I was a counselor was to bring about healing, and I worked with cutters and multiple personalities and prostitutes and some very complicated people, and I wouldn’t judge any one of them.

This is why (or at least one of the reasons why) you are so loved. All those who touch your life are blessed.

My parents always encouraged me as an artist. I made a realistic hand, too, that I still have. I was a serious artist at a young age.

Before getting to h.s. I heard rumors of girls beating up girls if you went into the wrong bathroom or hallway.

At 12,my cousin took me to her college classes where I was turned onto French Existentialism. I read Sartre, Beckett and Camus then. I made interesting art then, like an ink drawing of a hill made of insects with a tree made of hands and arms. Or a watercolor of the art room but with bars on the windows which we not there,but I was making a statement about freedom.
I had a very hard year at 13 when I barely spoke at all. A painful year.
My english teacher, Sylvie brought me from Existentialism to Humanistic Existentialism, like Herman Hesse,Rilke, which helped me out of my French depression. Sylvie also encouraged me to learn how to write, saying language is power.
At 14, I had a crush on Richard, who looked like an angelic Michaelangelo’s David, to me. We became friends that would smoke pot, etc, before philosophy class or music class. Richard did well, but I couldn’t be stoned in class, so I stopped that. It feels strange to say Richard, now since Richard is now Rachel. I wore a purple velvet cape, in a nod to glam rockers like David Bowie, Lou Reed that year. On halloween, I would dress up like a male dandy with a stuffed sock in my pants and Richard would get in m to f drag. At 17, I took my girlfriend to the Opera and I wore a white tuxedo.That girlfriend slept around with boys and I found out and broke up with her. She said she would kill herself if I broke up with her. I didn’t beleive her, but she did take a bottle of some kind of pills the next week while her parents were on vacation somewhere else. I helped our mutual friend get her to a hospital. We had a nice circle of friends that were artists and musicians. I got to spend a few hours a day in art class. I think I could just go in whenever there was a seat available and continue working on whatever artwork I was into. I would go into a trance and draw distorted faces or watercolor other faces from my imagination. I wrote a poem about loving night time that was published in the local newspaper, the Medford Mercury.