Sharing My Life

Its not a surprise that this blog has become my online diary. It is on this day, that I have finally let someone in. I have spent my entire life in a relationship with volleyball and schoolwork. I was perfectly happy on my own because I knew that the only person’s happiness that mattered was my own. I am a junior in college, and I have finally let someone in. Do i regret that I waited this long to let someone in? No, because I know who I am and I know what I deserve and I am not going to risk who I am just for someone else. I have learned that I am valuable and I am not easily replaceable. It has taken me 19 years to discover this, but that time spent alone was spent observing and understanding what I deserved.

I have finally found someone worth my time. Someone who is just like me its frightening. I have always know I’m a unique sole, and that I have a very different way of thinking about things. I have never met someone who shares the same strange interests as I do, let alone believe in some of the same outlooks on life.

It amazes how much time I want to spend with him because we are so alike each other that I dot have to pretend to be someone I’m not. I can truly be myself around him and to finally find someone who I’m able to do that with is such a comforting feeling. I feel like such a giddy little girl finally being in my first relationship. I can’t believe this is happening, and I’m just so thrilled that this is finally happening for me.

What Relationship?

In college, most students are focused on partying, meeting people (a.k.a. getting a boyfriend/girlfriend) and then somewhat focused on their schoolwork. There are so many people that feel that they must always have a significant other, and that having another person who their world revolves around, is how they are supposed to live their life. It is disappointing and I constantly thank my parents from teaching me that I did not need a man to make me happy, and that I did not owe anyone anything. It may come as a surprise to some, but women are perfectly capable of taking care of themselves and we don’t need men to make our lives meaningful.

As a junior in college, at family dinners and holidays, I am constantly questioned about my relationship status. I’m sure my parents wish they could brag about their eldest having a boyfriend, and I’m sure my father is pleased that he never had to worry about some careless boy breaking his daughter’s heart. I’m sure my mother always wished that I would go on my first date and she would break out the camera and take pictures of my every move, or even getting cute pictures of us before prom. But that never happened.

Do I wish I had a boyfriend in high school? No. Not at all. Some may say I was being too picky by what I wanted in a boyfriend, but I refused to settle for someone less than what I deserved. Growing up, my father showed me what it meant to be a good husband and I figured out through watching him what I wanted in a man. My standards may be too high to some, but why would I lower my expectations for some guy? I watched girls in high school go out with guys who did not deserve the time of day, but the girls gave it to them anyway. I may be old-fashioned, but I refused to be taken for granted in a relationship. I’ve been fine not being in a relationship, because I have been given all the time in the world to figure out who I am as a woman, and what I deserve.

There are so many relationships for people to be in that don’t involve another person. People can be in relationships with their careers, sports, hobbies etc. My friends that go to other schools and aren’t collegiate athletes are finding relationships and are doing things that I just don’t have the time to do. Do I mind that volleyball plays such a huge part of my life? No, not even a bit.

Volleyball is the longest relationship I have been in, and for that I am thankful. The gym has always been a place for me to go when I needed to relax or just needed an escape. If anything my relationship with volleyball is so much better than any relationship I could be in with a man. I say this because volleyball is paying for me to go to college and get my degree, it kept me from making bad decisions in high school, has kept me from slacking in school, and I have shared some of the most memorable moments in my life with it.

Some of those relationships are just as fulfilling as a relationship with another person could be. With those types of relationships, you never have to worry about them judging you, they will always be there for you, and they will not leave you for someone else. Typically, those relationships are the safest because with a person, things can be unpredictable and people don’t like not being in control of things. It’s human nature to want control of things. Unfortunately, in college, we are discovering that we cant control everything with can be shocking to some. To the perfectionists like me, this is one of the hardest things to come to terms with.

Society’s Pathetic Little Girl

Lately, things have been too good to be true, and now I’m starting to see just that. The little girl inside me is shaking her head at some of the decisions I have made in the past few months. I have allowed myself to be played by more than one guy. The problem with being too caring is that things like this are destined to happen. Its inevitable. I spend hours staring at my phone’s lock screen waiting for a notification to pop up with a certain person’s name on it. I allow myself to become emotionally attached to someone that isn’t as invested as I am, and for some reason, it surprises me when I get hurt. Im not naive enough to think that I have the power to change someone, do I think being able to do that would be amazing? Yes, but will it ever happen, probably not.

The thing that kills me the most, is the amount of time I spend staring at my phone, waiting for the one person I want to talk to, to text me back. It kills me to know that I am not as big a priority to them as they are to me. I hate being clingy, and I was raised to be an independent woman who doesn’t need to depend on others to do things for me. I don’t want to ask what exactly he sees happening between us, because I’m afraid of it not being the answer I want to hear. I feel so pathetic wasting this much time waiting for one person to take two seconds of their busy day to respond to one “hey”. I am not one to ask for anything, and I don’t think asking someone to respond in a timely manner is too much to ask.

The other thing that irritates me is that when I don’t respond, suddenly I’m the bad guy, but whenever he doesn’t respond, everything is fine. I am not going to waste my time and effort if you aren’t either. I don’t want to waste my own time on something that isn’t going to help me grow and positively effect my life. Understanding who in your life is a positive addition and who isn’t is a very hard, confusing and depressing self-reflection. I don’t like cutting people out of my life no matter the reason, but knowing when enough is enough is a huge progression for me. Most of my life, my decisions were made to make someone else happy, I am now after 19 years finally doing what makes me happy. There is a quote that I found that I love, and I wish more guys would understand that being clingy isn’t always a bad thing. Being clingy doesn’t mean that I want you to buy me things. It simply means that to me, I just want your attention. I want you to text me back, I want you to FaceTime me and tell me about your day, and no matter how insignificant the detail, I want to know.

Getting to Know Me!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GwnY6HiBwaY

Balancing Family and Distance

Since this is my first year being away from my family, it is both difficult and amazing. Not only am I able to get space from my very loving family, but I am also forced to in a way, fend for myself. In college, you are on a different body clock than the rest of the world. We live in what I like to refer to as the “college bodily clock.” I wake up early, take naps whenever I can fit one in, and stay up into the early hours of the morning. When I finally get around to attempting to call my family, it is in the un-godly hours of the night, and no one is awake. And then we end up playing a huge game of phone tag. I of course want to FaceTime my sister, and parents, but whenever I try to, it is always at an inconvenient time for them. When I think about which form of communication to attempt, (texting, calling, FaceTiming etc.) I always think about which would make me feel better. Texting is a quick and easy way to communicate, and does not require immediate responses. Calling is a slower, and more intimate way of communicating, but is does allow both people to hear the other’s voice which allows for a more intimate way of communicating. My personal favorite, FaceTime allows for me to visibly see the other person, hear them and see where they are which makes me feel more involved. When I am able to see a relative, I am able to see how they are changing and what they look like. When I am able to see their surroundings, it makes me feel like I am with them. No one in the world knows me like my sister, mother or father. So when I am not able to talk to them, I use a filter when I talk to people on campus; my family never judges me, so I don’t have to use a filter when I talk.  Luckily my roommate is also someone I can confide in, and I have made tons of friends in my classes and just around campus.

Sure I have friends, and a roommate who is one of my best friends from high school, but to not see my sister everyday or my parents is a strange feeling. And I miss my dog more than anything. Everyone says they miss their dog, but it is true, a dog is someone that knows when you are sad, and can make you feel better by just being in their presence. My dog has always been there for me, and even though he growls at me, he knows whenever I am sad, and he will let me hold him until I feel better. Best of all, he never disagrees with what I am feeling, and he never argues with me, unlike my family. Of course I love my family, and I know they love me, and I know I haven’t really made this transition for them very easy due to the fact that I haven’t really made an extreme effort to stay in contact. My parents tend to be the ones instigating the conversations, and I seem to continue the high school answer trends of, “School is good”, “I’m having fun”, and my personal favorite, “I’m fine”. In high school, my parents had ways of figuring out what each of those things meant because I was living with them, and in high school having access to information wasn’t that difficult. My mother was the emailing queen. She would email our teachers before something would happen, and she would have a plan about what was going to happen after that. It is like she was psychic. At times, that was nice, but other times it was paralyzing. I wasn’t able to really do anything without my parents finding out, and that thought alone stressed me out.

My whole college searching process was based around a school that was farther away from my hometown. I wanted a college that I was not tempted to go home very often, and quite possibly get me into a different climate zone. My first concern was to get out and be on my own. In high school, my parents were very involved with my life, and they still are today, but I never really felt like I was independent. My mother and father raised me to be independent, in the idea that I could make my own decisions, and I didn’t need to depend on anyone else. Sure, I was able to adapt that mentality, but I was never really able to experience what it meant to be independent. It was a scary time when I started to realize what exactly being independent meant. Im not sure if even today I would consider myself independent. I know that in the next few years I will continue on my road towards independency, but right now, I have not reached the end.

View this blog at: http://www.depauw.edu/admission/student-bloggers/post/balancing-family-amp-distance/

Prepping for the Winter Storm

Growing up in Greenwood, Indiana, the random Indiana weather does not faze me anymore. Last year, was quite possibly one of the worst winters I have ever lived through. We missed almost a whole week of school due to the terribly high amount of snow, the freezing temperatures, and the large quantities of ice covering the pavement. At the time, I was excited to have a longer winter break than expected. Going to college definitely reinforced the fact that not everyone who attends DePauw is used to the Indiana weather. I am used to the cold weather, and the random warm days mixed into the freezing weeks. After talking to a lot of friends who are from all over the world, I have definitely been exposed to many people with many different levels of exposure to the cold weather.

One of my friends just jumped into a leaf pile the other week for the first time. That alone shocked me at first due to the fact that growing up; I saw leaf piles every Fall season. It was tradition to rake leaf piles in the Fall, and then jump into them. It was a way to do the yard work that your mom wanted you to do, and then you were rewarded afterwards with some fun playing in the leaves.

Another shocking event that happened at college was when my friend from California saw it “snow” for the first time last week. My other friends and I tried to explain to her that what she was considering “snow” was what “we” from Indiana refer to as flurries. She was so excited, and she would not stop obsessing over the fact that she had to wear a winter coat in order to stay warm. I am constantly reminding, and informing her that this winter is expected to be worse than last year. She is constantly complaining about how cold it is, when it is around 30 degrees; a temperature that we from Indiana would possibly consider warm for the winter season.

The same friend has been preparing for the cold winter ahead. She has ordered a thick and long puffy winter jacket, a slightly smaller winter jacket, winter boots, various hats and gloves, and scarves. She is always asking me what kind of winter gear I have, and as I am trying to explain to her, that she is going to stick out like a sore thumb if she wears all of her cold weather stuff when it gets cold outside. To say that this winter will be a very strange one for her is most likely going to be an understatement.

There are definitely many exciting things about living in Indiana; most of those things that I enjoy, others do not. I enjoy the fact that we do get all the four seasons. We have beautiful sweater weather in the Fall, cold snow weather in the Winter, nice rainy Springs, and hot sunny Summers. I love being able to experience all the different seasons in one year.

View blog at: http://www.depauw.edu/admission/student-bloggers/post/prepping-for-the-winter-storm/?no_redirect=true

DePauw Real Beauty

Last Wednesday I was able to attend Stacy Nadeau’s talk about the Dove Real Beauty Campaign. To say it was inspirational would be an understatement. Stacy was a college student when she was asked to be a model. She was very apprehensive at first, and then her friend went ahead and told the modeling agent that she would go to the audition. Stacy was upset at first, then realized that this wouldn’t be that bad. After going to the audition, and many weeks later, Stacy found out that she had gotten the job. She was going to be apart of the Dove Real Beauty Campaign. She was photographed in her underwear with five other women. The campaign had gotten both good and bad reviews. These women did not look like the stereotypical models that we see in advertisements. They looked like your everyday women, what we look like. They got scrutinized for not being the same size of a model, and being in their underwear. They were being told they were ‘fat’ and that they were ‘disgusting.’ How does someone tell someone else that they are disgusting? A male journalist was saying how much he hated the campaign and just completely bashing Stacy’s body. She remained civil, and waited trying to figure out what to do. It turns out that she didn’t have to do anything, thousands of people wrote into the newspaper responding to the journalist’s opinions, and telling him how wrong he was. They were not only standing up for Stacy, but for themselves. They were not going to let a man tear apart a woman who looked similar to them. They were not going to let someone tell them what was beautiful or not.

Stacy was talking about what it means to be beautiful, and how it varies based on every single person. There is no universal definition. We are all beautiful in our own ways. We do not have to be a size 0 in order to be considered beautiful. If you are a size 0, then great for you, it just means that you are built differently from others, which is nothing to be embarrassed about. We as women, and men should encourage each other to view our bodies and selves as beautiful, instead of tearing them apart whenever we get the chance. Instead of pointing out the bad things we see, we should be pointing out all the great things about us. We are all so unique in our own ways, that how could we possibly try to compare ourselves to everyone else. It is like trying to compare apples and oranges. We are all uniquely beautiful, and we as college students should be confident in our bodies. Granted, I am not completely confident in myself, but thanks to Stacy, I have been able to make small changes in order to try and change that. Instead of pointing out everything I hate about myself, I am trying to pick out things that I like about myself.

If you have never heard one of Stacy’s talks, I definitely recommend it! She is so inspirational, and it will definitely inspire you, or people you know to change how they view themselves, and others.

View this blog at: http://www.depauw.edu/admission/student-bloggers/post/depauw-real-beauty/

13 Girls & 2 Showers

Ever since the day I arrived on campus, I was very skeptical about the idea of sharing a bathroom. Having a younger sister, I came prepared to share not only my room, but also the idea of a communal bathroom. Not only was my first destination on move-in day my dorm room, but also the bathroom that I would be sharing with my wing. When I walked in to the very basic tiled bathroom down the hall, I immediately got flashbacks of the high school gym locker room bathroom. There is nothing extra-ordinary about a college dorm’s bathroom, other than the initial excitement of it being something new.

When the initial excitement wears off, the only thing left is an ugly blue-tiled bathroom left. Having to share a bathroom with 13 girls sounds absolutely terrible, and it did to me at first, but what I am about to share with you will surely shock you. In the months that I have been living in Humbert, I never once have had to wait to use the bathroom, or even wait to use a shower. As crazy as it sounds, and trust me, I know it does sound crazy, sharing a bathroom with more people than just my sister, isn’t as bad as it could have been.

There is rust on the showerheads, there is terrible water pressure, most of the time, and the water temperature is mostly luke-warm. Consider yourself lucky if you have a hot shower, and no, it is not necessarily someone’s fault, you just have to hope you get lucky when it is time to shower. Our shower stalls, are not like the ones back home, they are not spacious, and certainly not the ideal shower situations, but we make it work. We are always playing music when we are in the shower, which ultimately entertains everyone else not only in the bathroom, but down the hall too.

Lucky for me, the girls on my floor are very considerate in the fact that we don’t take too long of showers, and we don’t make a mess in the bathroom. We also have the best housekeeper that we all love so much, that we couldn’t stand making more of a mess for her to clean up, because it is not her job to clean up after us. As college students, we are old enough to pick-up after ourselves.

 

View this blog at: http://www.depauw.edu/admission/student-bloggers/post/13-girls-amp-2-showers/

Socializing as a First Year Student

As a freshman, moving onto campus is a very exciting and nerve-racking task. Not only are you being thrown into extremely uncomfortable situations, but sometimes you are completely alone. You are surrounded by so many people that are stuck in their own bubble, and they refuse to have any sort of communication with you what-so-ever. Luckily for me, I knew my roommate, and lucky for us, we are best friends; so I had one person on campus that I knew. However, that did not mean that we would be together for the entire year. Sure, she is my “safety net,” she is the one person that will always be there and the one person that I can always come back to and lean on for support. I am not going into the college life completely alone. My roommate and I are the same person, but we are also very different socially.

Living on Humbert 2 is quite amazing! We have thirteen girls and eight guys on our wing. We all get along very well, but it was really awkward at first. On move in day, a few of us were already moved in, and we sat back and watched as everyone else was moving in, but it didn’t stay that way for long. I quickly caught on to the fact that if I was going to meet anyone on my floor, then I had to go and be more assertive, instead of waiting for someone else to do all the work. So out I went. I went around knocking on doors, meeting the girls. Soon, guys were calling us into their room for help on decorations, and what command hooks would work better.

Not everyone is as outgoing as others, but we make it work. The first thing we have realized is that music helps. If you want to make friends, play music! Another way is to keep your door open, and to invite people to hang out. Our wing is always in our lounge, so when in doubt, go to the lounge. Whenever we are hanging out around Humbert, we are always getting comments about how close we are and how everyone wants to move to our floor. So basically, if you want to even have a chance at having a fun dorm experience, then I highly suggest meeting your wing-mates.

 

View this blog at: http://www.depauw.edu/admission/student-bloggers/post/socializing-as-a-first-year-student/ 

Sleepless in Humbert

Its one of those nights. One of those days when I just can’t seem to relax. My mind keeps racing with so many thoughts. I’m starting to feel some of the same feelings that I luckily have not felt in a few months, and i’m not sure if its a phase, or not. I guess time will tell. 

Anyhow, i’ve official started college and it’s the first official full week of school, but so far, I’m loving it. There is really no way to describe college. So many people have asked me how college is, and I try to answer to the best of my ability, but I’ve only been here for a week and a half. That is not a long time to experience college life, especially when freshman aren’t even allowed on greek property till October. 

Dorm life is amazing, I have the best wing in the world! There are 13 girls and 8 guys on my floor. I love them all and I definitely hope that we all stay friends. Of course, that will probably not happen, but a girl can dream can’t she? Ive been hanging out with so many different people and I’m starting to get a little nervous about who exactly I should be hanging out with or not. I know that they are all great people, and I know that I should not be worried about finding my “group” just yet, but I just want to know who is going to play a major role in my life and stick with them. I never imagined starting over in college would be like this, not that I’m complaining, its just very different that I expected. 

Since coming to college, I have tried to adopt the ideal of being “comfortable with being uncomfortable.” It is an idea that I have learned through volleyball, but decided that it applies perfectly to college. Since volleyball and college did not work out for me, I felt that it would be the perfect time for me to go out and try new things. The amount of extracurricular activities that I have signed up to participate in is crazy. I have auditioned to be an anchor for the school’s television station, I am in InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, Volleyball Club, Relay for Life Committee Chair, a Tiger Host, a student blogger, an ITAP intern, a Circle K member, and multiple others. As you can probably tell, I have completely immersed myself in the extracurriculars. 

I want to say that I miss high school, and the familiarity of what I had, but I know that this process is a necessary aspect in character building. I know that everything will be fine, and that I am just over thinking everything, but it doesn’t make the present any easier to handle. I know that I am beyond blessed for the opportunity to be able to attend such a prestigious university, and I hope that not only am I able to get the most out of what I put into DePauw, but that I am able to provide the same to the DePauw community. 

When people ask you what your intended major is, most people are not expecting someone to say that they are double majoring. No one is expecting you to also say that you intend on double minoring also. Yes, if you followed any of that, yours truly plans on double majoring in Economics/Management and Communications, and double minoring in Business Administration and Film Studies. Not many people know that in order to major in communications, I would be required to take the same classes minus one or two to get my major, so to me, it would be stupid of me to not take the one class to get a minor. The same goes for business administration. 

I have a 8:20 class tomorrow, and I am still awake. I know that most people don’t want to read a narration of a college student’s sleepless nights, and I can’t blame you. However, no one is forcing you to read my thoughts, so if you are still reading this, thank you! 

With that, I will leave you all in an attempt to catch a few hours of sleep.

Wish me luck! xoxo