i still got it.

sometimes i need a little ego boost.  in the most minor of ways.

audience

who are you?

why are you here?

it seems that more people than i expected actually read this thing.  more people at school, and even some people i don’t know.  (although, as julia will yell at me, i have no qualms about online relationships.  no, no, not romantic ones, but you know, friendships.)  the thought is oddly comforting (after all, why do i publish semi-private thoughts publicly?) but also disturbing.

i am curious as to who you are.  thanks for reading.  feel free to say hi.  or you can just email me.

realization

When I realize how out of touch I have been with those around me, with those I love, I shudder inside.

But you know what’s even worse?

Sometimes my pain comes from not knowing that I have not loved others like I should have, but from pride.

From PRIDE!

Oh God, please squish my heart into soft jello that melts so that I can love fluidly, love like You did.

Haha, terrible analogy.  :)  Even when I’m on the brink of tears, I’m such a goof.

Let’s try that again.

Oh God, soften my heart.  Break my heart for what breaks Yours.  I don’t know what to say, so I steal the words and breaths of others in order to try to give form and shape to something I don’t understand.  Where have I been?

I shudder at myself.

24 ‘For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. 25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. 28 You will live in the land I gave your forefathers; you will be my people, and I will be your God. 29 I will save you from all your uncleanness. I will call for the grain and make it plentiful and will not bring famine upon you. 30 I will increase the fruit of the trees and the crops of the field, so that you will no longer suffer disgrace among the nations because of famine. 31 Then you will remember your evil ways and wicked deeds, and you will loathe yourselves for your sins and detestable practices. 32 I want you to know that I am not doing this for your sake, declares the Sovereign LORD. Be ashamed and disgraced for your conduct, O house of Israel!

Ezekiel 36

I will have to come back and digest them properly.  Right now all I can think of is how wretched a faux servant I’ve been.

Give us clean hands
Give us pure hearts
Let us not lift our souls to another

Oh God, let us be
A generation that seeks
That seeks your face
O God of Jacob.

“Give Us Clean Hands”

dark chocolate

seeping into the tongue
pleasantly
but too much –
overpowering,
heavy.

hello goodbye hello

today (yesterday) was glorious.

simply glorious.

it was amazing.

so blessed.

i spent time with people i love (not all of them, of course, but with many) and outside in the beautiful weather.  a friend (jm) had something amazing happen (thesis) which was totally deserved… i have no ownership, but i felt pride.  it’s nice to live vigorously through your friends, especially when they’re amazing.  haha.

i realized joyce is leaving soon.  i haven’t spent much time with her, or really gotten to know her, but i am really sad that she is leaving.  i wish i had taken more effort and time to get to know her earlier, to spend more time with her earlier.  i let my selfishness and procrastination and work get in the way of getting to spend time with people — not just giggling and having fun, but really getting to know them — and not just joyce.

i saw andrew and becker in hargadon studying this evening.  i realized i will also miss them so much.  andrew has such a great smile (when it’s not scary and it’s sincere).  i wish i had spent more time getting to know him.  i know i’ll see him in the spring, but.. you know.  and becker.  i’m really going to miss him.  one thing that i absolutely love about that kid is praying with him.

it’s weird — i spent so much time with andrew but so little getting to know him.  i respect him so much, and i wish i had had the guts to be more assertive and, i don’t know, cultivate a closer friendship.  i always felt slightly intimidated by him, especially when i think about the similarities we have but the gap between our achievements.

i don’t feel bad for where i am — i’m quite happy about where i stand — but there is so much i admire about him, and i suppose when i admire, i’m a bit more hesitant to approach.  which is why there are a lot of missed opportunities or missed time in my friendships.  i notice people and then wait.  is the waiting necessary?

i’ll always remember when one day at frist, andrew was making fun of me (and i was thinking, where does this squirt get the guts to make fun of someone he doesn’t know but i’m glad we’re all hanging out and having fun) and he suddenly stopped and said (in very typical andrew-fashion), “you know, the more fun i make of you, the more i like you.”

:]

i will miss them, but their physical absence does not indicate an end in our friendships.  they may not be deep, but they’re tied together something so much more than just our actions or affections.  saying goodbye is bittersweet, but we’ll say hello more than we’ll say goodbye, right?  someone said something like that once.

oh yea, at senior banquet, i made a fool of myself.  but it was to be expected.  and people enjoyed it.  i’m glad.  :]

i never had

any of those people–

but i still have to let go.

it’s not even like they’re slipping away: i never had them. or maybe i did and i still do. but it’s not something i can hold on to.

there are parts of people’s lives that i can’t be a part of, and you know what? it’s better that way.

i’m not saying that as consolation, but it’s too exhausting. let it go, let it go, let it snow.

that’s a pitfall that this increasingly connected society has. as we become increasingly voyeuristic (after all, what is blogging and journaling online?), we see more and more of what we’re not part of. it feels like we’re invested in that, invested in this, and it’s all mental.

well, life is pretty much mental.

this is when i’m reminded why i used to only journal in private. this half-private, embarrassingly public exposure of my thoughts… i am an exhibitionist, after all.

i was talking to zach

and realized that junior year is difficult not because of academics but… there are other things that happen.

and i think for many of us that other things are human relationships or lack thereof.

oh, how broken we all are! (interjecting, i am) junior year is hard, so hard, and so so hard and no one ever warned me. it wouldn’t have mattered. besides, it’s not like it’s junior year academics that are the brunt of the stress (it does contribute, i’d say so i’d say so oh why), so it’s not anything that anyone could have or would have foreseen.

example conversation (with whom? with myself?):

“hey sumin, junior year is going to be hard for everyone.”

“no way. why? sophomore year was hard! but it’s gonna get better.”

“yea, it was hard, but junior year? harder. work. but mainly people.”

“what do you mean?”

“crap’s gonna happen and there’s nothing you can do about it. you’ll cry your heart out and it won’t solve anything. you’ll see people in pain and you can’t reach out. you’ll laugh and then hear someone weeping and what can you do?”

“what?”

“basically, i’m telling you lots of things will happen and it’ll take its toll.”

“what?”

“you’re stupid.”

“um, looked in a mirror lately?”

“anyway, it’ll be hard for everyone in different ways. you’re not going to be able to really change anything for anyone, so stop meddling. the best you can do is listen. and listen to yourself. don’t be selfish, but don’t ignore your own needs.”

“oh.”

“good luck, you’re gonna need it.”

“what?”

“i’ll pray for you. and your class.”

“thanks.”

[gets up to leave]

“you know, you’re still going to love it. junior year is going to be hard, but it’s necessary. and you’ll still be happy.”

“i know.”

visitors

I always forget how much I love having people over.  I think I will always be a people person at heart.  I will always want to make people comfortable and happy.  I think.  When I have people over in my room, I feel like my parents when I was younger.  Most nights (and always on the weekends) we would have people over visiting, laughing and eating in the living room.  My first instinct when someone comes over is to thrust food into their hands and smile, “so, what’s up?”  (I used to detest saying “What’s up?” and “‘Sup.”  When did I suddenly start saying, “What’s up?”)

Sometimes I lose sight of why I became a RCA.  And you know, I still don’t know sometimes.  It’s discouraging, remembering how much I wanted to be one when I was a freshman and how happy I was (I was so happy!) when I found out, but when it came down to it, I realized I could never really be there for my zees, I could never really carry their burdens or make their lives easier.  And the plain fact is, most of them don’t need me.  Which is great, because I’d rather not be needed than they have loads of problems.

Too soon too fast I came up against problems (not specific to one person, rather, a culmination) I couldn’t handle.  I couldn’t handle the emotional burden, and I drew away, burned.  Mindy told me, don’t be emotionally involved.  It’s not your problem.  Don’t let this affect you.  I didn’t know how to do that, I didn’t know how to not be emotionally invested.  I learned too late that I could maintain a distance, and it dampened me.  There’s not anything I could have done, nothing, nothing, nothing, yet I feel like that’s exactly what I did and I could have done something, something, something.  Those people are fine without me, those people are perfectly fine now, but I still feel somehow responsible.  Not responsible.  No, I’m not responsible.  I’m just a student, I’m just a fallen human being.  But I am still somehow guilty.  Those people, willingly or unwillingly reached out to me for a semblance of help, and I just shrank into my comfortable corner of friends and laughter and happiness and pityingly smiled and offered a cookie.  I didn’t love like I should have, and I didn’t love like I could have.

It’s discouraging when I think about all the administrative stuff I have to do and my relationship with my boss (the mere fact that I refer to her as my boss is unnerving–I adore her, I do.  She is a sweet woman who knows what she is doing, and is very capable.  I just feel like sometimes we don’t have 정.), and how I’m never around for my zees to actually come and hang out with me.  I don’t know many of them, and the ones I do, my relationships aren’t as deep as I’d like.  It’s entirely my fault.

I’m never around the dorm, because frankly, it’s far and I’m lazy.  I’d rather spend time laughing with Julia and Dahae.  It’s not that I would rather spend time with them (well, I guess it is), but when I’m in the moment, I’m not going to think about coming back and hanging out with my zees.  I’m never around, and now that it’s second semester, it’s too late to go back and deepen my relationships with them like I could have.  It’s not impossible, but now we have a semester gaping in between them and me, that semester when I wasn’t around and would come back at 3, 4, 5am and smile tiredly and trudge into my room.  Spring semester is speeding up, and now they have their own lives, they have their own things to take care of, instead of talking to some old RCA who wants to be buddy buddy and shove candy down their throats.

Thank goodness I spent so much time with them during freshmen orientation week.  I’m glad that we got to know each other on the right foot, and no matter how little I’m around, they’ll still remember me as that RCA that shepherded them around (albeit annoyingly) to all the University events, who almost started crying when we were discussing date rape, who said ridiculously dumb things at the diversity event.

Sometimes I don’t want to talk to them.  (Not just my zees, but everybody.)  Sometimes I just want to be by myself in my room.  Sometimes all I want to do is talk to them, but they’re not around, they’re busy, or it’s 4:01am and I’m blogging instead.  :)  Last year, it was so easy.  It was so easy to be their big sister, and I wasn’t even a real RCA.  It hit me the other day–it wasn’t that these guys were different from last year.  Last year the freshmen were amazing, this year, my zees (sophomores included) are amazing.  But I changed.  I’m no longer a sophomore that can identify as closely with the freshmen.  I’m a junior who has my own selfish problems to face.  Some days, all I can think about is myself, and how little I care about the trials and tribulations of Princeton underclassmen.  I say, what do you know about being busy?  What do you know about work? in my head, and it’s all wrong.

It’s all wrong.  They do know.  I know, they know.  Every year is hard, every year is difficult, everybody’s burdens are heavy.  It’s not like mine are especially difficult, if anything, they’re pretty light in comparison to other people’s.

And then there’s my decision.  I’m not going to be a RCA next year.  The thought that I won’t be that RCA, that person, that nuna and unnie on a hall full of freshmen and sophomores to love and adore and to be loved and to be adored, sometimes, it needles me.  Did I make the right decision in being selfish and wanting to live with my friends next year?  Was it?

I know that I will still have contact with underclassmen next year, and I’ll make the effort to be involved in the Butler community as a fellow, but it’s hard.  It’s not the same.  It’s not the same at all.  Everytime someone asks me, “Are you going to be a RCA next year?” I feel a twinge of sadness, guilt?  Everytime someone exclaims, “You’re not going to be a RCA next year?” I twist inside.  And worst of all, when my zees found out, “Sumin, you’re not going to be our RCA next year?”  They’re asking me now, especially with room draw coming up, and everytime they ask, I cringe.

To so many people, a RCA means nothing.  A RCA is just someone who gives them food once a week or twice a month, and spouts University propaganda.  And you know what, that’s a lot of what we have to do.  But at the root of it, I care.  Others care.

This brings me again to the beginning of my first sigh.  Do I really care?  I mean, I know I do.  But I realized that I don’t always care.  I don’t care like I used to.   I pray that I will somehow find the ability to love like I should, like I want, and that care will somehow be a comfort to someone.  I pray that my apathy will dissolve, melt away, disappear harmlessly.

I guess much of this is a feeling of inadequacy, especially in light of the superhero failing to accomplish superhero duties.  Also, it’s because I know I can do better, I know that I can do so much more yet I choose to be mediocre.

In honesty, a RCA is really not that important.  Most people who come to the University are pretty self-sufficient, and if they have problems, they’re usually beyond the scope of their RCA.  Self-glorified, puffed up importance, propaganda machine, is that what I have merely become?

I like to think that I’m more than a mere University funnel of crap (and some good things, but mostly crap).  I like to think that somehow, by being me, by being a Christian, I can bring a more balanced view for my zees.  I like to think that I help them and that I can somehow help adjust their outlook on life.  (After all, are grades really that important?)  It’s a lot of “I like to think”’s.

I suppose the only way to start again is to open my door, and invite them in.  Ask them to sit on my sketchy, retarded futon, and offer them unhealthy candy or snacks (because pretty much everything I bought today is ridiculously unhealthy).  Now, in order to find the time to do that, that means a major restructuring of my lifestyle.  That’s where the difficulty lies–I like it so much right now.  I guess I’ll choose one night of the week and leave my door open, and that’s the night when anyone can just drop on by.  Now, I must find this evening.

What a self-centered entry.  What a self-centered entry.