Penny Hero (dot) Net

I had a slight epiphany while in the shower… I think I that must have a very incorrect idea about money. The value I put on money isn’t great enough, and so therefore I have trouble understanding how something as non-material as an education can depend so heavily on money. The connection between a non-material thing, like knowledge, and money just hasn’t been made.

But maybe I should be making that connection. And once that sinks in, and I have a greater appreciation for money, I won’t have so many re-occuring problems with it.

I just realized that I have no Japanese class tomorrow morning, so I can stay up late tonight working on scholarship applications and homework. I guess this means I will live, huh. :)

It really is amazing what kinds of insight one can gain while naked.

I want to withdraw. Just go sit in a closed room and read. I don’t want to think about anything. It’s just too overwhelming.

Money, tuition, financial aid, midterms, finding a job, reconciling with (unnamed), registration (which might NOT happen because of my lack of money), anxiety and pure terror about what will happen if I can’t pay my bill…

I was walking through the M.U. on my way back to the dorms and I just felt this white hot envy for all the people I passed… all of them contentedly studying or talking or reading or eating… and all of them apparently able to somehow pay for their tuition. I didn’t like the feelings I felt. I felt so much anger, rage, jealousy. I saw Bruke and Brandi and I ended up lashing out at Bruke when he messed up my hair as a greeting. I apologized and told him I was in a bad mood… but still. I don’t want to feel this way. I don’t want to walk around with such a dark outlook on everything. I look at my neighbors and all I feel is jealousy… because I have no reason to believe that their parents aren’t rich, or that they don’t have financial aid either… none of them come back to their room crying over money.

This is just so stupid. Of all the things I’m broken up over, money is the thing that deserves the least attention. It isn’t important. I’m not motivated by money, or a desire for a high paying job. I don’t hoard things for myself, I have no desire to have any amount of worldly possessions (except maybe a pen and a notebook… ) I just want to stay in school. And it is sickening how money can make or break an education.

I don’t know what to do right now. It’s too late to find a job already. If I were hired today, my first paycheck wouldn’t arrive until next term’s registration begins. My dad says he can’t help me any more than he already is, and my mom hasn’t given me any new information about a possible loan through her bank with her credit record. I have less than 3 weeks to get this figured out or I have to drop out of school.

I am so fucking scared. And I feel powerless. And I feel like a total whiny-ass-bitch because anyone else would have anticipated this and worked harder earlier to get a job, or would have applied for more scholarships. I am so stupid. I didn’t see it. Or rather, I did see it and I just ignored it. I heard my dad say “You’ll figure something out.” and I just trusted that.

*sigh*

I just need to relax. And just keep going. Do what I can for now, and be sure that tomorrow finds me farther than today. (HWL)

I went to Japan with Adi and we stayed with Tomoaki. It was like I had stepped back into my life with him. We were still in love, and I just layed down on his chest and hugged him. I closed my eyes not wanting the moment to fade.

Someone came into the apartment, but I pretended I didn’t hear it. Apparently Tomo did too because he didn’t tell me to get up. My eyes were still closed.

Later, I had to go shopping for something small while Tomo was sleeping. I went to the store, got my stuff, noticed the odd number of English-speaking customers… At one point I was standing over the shoulder of a lady re-stocking medicine. A foreigner came up to her and asked her a question about Rolaids in English. He spoke so quietly that I knew even if the lady understood, she couldn’t hear him. So I tried to answer his question, but the man, apparently embarrassed that he couldn’t speak Japanese began to cry and walk away, never even noticing I was there.

When I was finished gathering my things (two bottles of Japanese mayonaise and some kiwi-fruit) I reached into my bag to find my wallet… and found it was still in Tomo’s apartment. I spent a long time trying to figure out how I might ask someone permission to leave my things somewhere and go back to the apartment. I noticed a stack of abandoned cash on the floor next to a battery display… but with effort I ignored it because I thought the owner would return for it soon.

Finally, I just hid my groceries inside a refriderated display case, and put my basket away and ran outside, through the train station and back to the apartment.

(It was night, and I almost got lost once. I looked down over this cliff where something like the Northern Lights were swimming above a city far below. It made sense to me, and I realized where I was because of it, and ran back the way I came. It was beautiful.)

When I returned to the grocery store, I found my things inside a basket in the refridgerated case… with a ticket saying I owed 2 or 300 yen because I left my food there. Another citation was there because I had not used a basket. This made me angry and I wondered if I’d have enough money. Digging through, I found I had plenty, but still did not want to pay.

I tried to get in line with an English-speaking clerk so I could dispute my ticket, but she was too busy. (She was also my childhood-Newberg friend Alicia… which was odd.) The lady I went to thought I was a very cute foreigner and made me speak Japanese several times just so she could listen and giggle. She held up a line of about 3 people just because she wanted to hear me speak. In the end, I paid my ticket and my groceries with change, and I remember specifically thinking how convenient it is in Japan that change is so commonly used to buy things.
——

Yesterday, Fumi and Yoshi kept saying I was “cute” and had “big eyes” and they went off in hysterics and “セクシー！” paired with “かわいい！！” when I said “ごめん、ね？” to Yoshi because I’d mis-written something for him. The whole “cute foreigner” thing must have slipped into my dream. I was about to buy a phone card from Fumi so I could call Japan (at 5.5 cents a minute!!) so I had Tomo on my mind all evening. Especially after Tim-kun asked me about him over MSN. That must have slipped in too.

Heh, Adi was in my dream because Adi is always in my dreams. *joking* :) *pokes at Adi*

Last night, I had a conversation with someone about religion. (mistake number 1) We exchanged our personal “side” on things. (mistake number 2.) I let this guy get to me when he said I was going to go to Hell. (mistake number 3.) So I went to bed feeling very very hurt. And I woke up feeling like a truck had hit me. Now I am ok of course. Resilience is a skill which never leaves you. Especially for those of us with mild bi-polar disorders.

I discovered last night that in a lot of cases, religion does nothing but divide people. Throughout history, people have fought wars, excommunicated people, damned others to Hell, and flew planes into large buildings all in the “name of God”. Most of these people all claim to subscribe to the same religion too. They claim to believe in the same god. Even in cases of conversation between the most open minded people, negative feelings preside. Each person looks down on the other with sympathy, pity and prays that one day they too will come around. Religion’s purpose should not be to propagate hate for other people. Once religion starts doing that, it defeats itself. I don’t like that. This self-righteousness superiority. I don’t need anyone’s pity. But I am guilty of feeling pity for those I feel are unenlightened.

How does one reconcile these conflicting realities? Christianity has evolved so much over the eras… And even today, one priest will say homosexuality is a sin. And another priest will say it is a regular expression of love. The sick part is that both priests subscribe to the same religion… and both of them believe that the other one will burn in Hell.

As an epilogue, the ragged edges of my soul have been soothed by the comforting presence of my Japanese notes and my English Literature text book. Oh, and Atlas Shrugged. Can’t forget Ayn Rand.

I spent six hours studying in Java II today. I have three midterms tomorrow… grr. Studying was actually quite fun because Takeshi hung out with me and drilled me in my Japanese. We talked and I learned that he really isn’t a superficial flirty danger to my virginity, well you know what I mean. He’s got a girlfriend, but she’s returning to Japan in 2 months, and Takeshi apparently has the same views I have on long distance relationships (and the same apparent addiction. ha. ) So anyway. Seems we are kindred spirits and I think I’m going to go party with him and his room mate soon. And meet his girlfriend. :)

I came back from studying feeling semi-normal. I even went and played Smash Brothers with the guy who condemned me to Hell. (god he is so good at guitar. If we lived in the ’70s, I’d call him “dreamy”) I’m soooo disappointed that our views on theology are so fundamentally in conflict. He was um… very attractive. Stupid musicians. Stupid martial artists. STOP LEADING ME ASTRAY!

La la la. For the record: Adi’s bracelet likes me best. (/inside joke)

I didn’t read the paper yesterday morning, so I grabbed today’s and yesterday’s issue today. Quote from yesterday’s paper:

“Obesity is a huge issue for 58 million Americans”

(Full Story)

I want to meet this clever Stacy Wanless Baro-writer. :)

Written on the back of a yellow sticky-note because I didn’t have a notebook on me (oh my god!):

“Consciousness is just a point in space-time, the body nothing but a label describing a relationship to an invented pair of axes running perpendicular through existence”

It came to me while I was reading Susanna Rowson in Java II. There is a window… and outside the window is a cute little tree. I usually look at that tree when I need a distraction from studying. So this thought came to me while I was looking at that tree.

Consciousness has no measurable dimensions, and neither does a mathematical point. But neither is insignificant. A human person, a body is insignificant compared to the vastness of physical space, but consciousness itself is not. We are tiny points. We don’t take up space, yet we define and give meaning to Everything.

I love my mom. :)

And I think it’s really funny how she still says goodbye over AIM as if she’s signing a letter. “love, mom”. Tee hee.

says:

“I have to translate fucking morse code for CS … I am not happy”

I don’t know why that had me on the floor in stitches… but it did.

*yawns* Goodnight everyone. Time to close the laptop monitor.

Tee hee. I just got hit on by a 404 error page. You can too! Click here.

You know… it really is disgusting how often I go to class completely unprepared, or how often I do my homework mere minutes before class begins, or not do it at all, and still get the grades I do. It’s disgusting how often I bullshit a 3 page philosophy essay in about half an hour and still get an A.

I thought college was supposed to see through slackers like me. I thought that people with bad study skills were supposed to fail at this level.

My teachers and counselors in high school kept telling me that the kinds of study habits I had in high school were not going to carry me through college. Mrs. Chong used to say that she didn’t care how her homework was done, when it was done, just as long as it was in her hand on time. But she emphasized that those kinds of study habits were not going to get us through college, where I assumed all the classes would be as hard as hers, or harder.

College has this reputation for being more difficult, for seeing through the slackers and taking no “Naupaka-type” bullshit from students. (Cue for laughter from WHS’s AP students)… Granted… we can’t forget that Nauapaka-kun is now at Harvard.

Somehow, that just makes me even more bewildered with this supposed “almost-in-the-real-world” sub-universe.

In Other News: Instead of doing my homework last night (which I did today just before class. [see above]), I spent about 4 hours editing for clarity and correcting the grammar in an unbelievably technical graduate paper for Eriko-kun. I had no idea how satisfying doing work like that was going to be.

(I also learned quite a bit about “DVS decoding techniques” and how they might be applied to future hand-held electronic devices which make use of digital video… which was cool)

I can’t tell if I gained all that joy from picking out unclear or erranous language, or if it was being helpful to someone as intelligent as Eriko (OSU’s resident super-international-CS-grad-student) that made me giggly. Some of both, I hope… because I have another “English-help-session” with Shogo-kun at 4 pm today.

Grammar is fun. (yes mom. I am a freak.)

The first meeting for my new web-programming class is tonight at 7pm. And immediately AFTER class, Buxton is hosting a Sushi Night! Both of these things (especially when put together) make me excited and giddy.

Yesterday I became happy because I met a girl in my Japanese class. I saw her outside the building before class… and had trouble listening to my friend because she um… well, because she was very cute sitting on the steps. And then, in class she was also very cute sitting right next to me… Her hair was long and very glossy and it kept brushing against my arm and giving me shivers. When class was over, I asked her name and we exchanged all that “nice to meet you” grinning stuff.

So maybe emily has a new friend. At the very least, now I know another person I can ask to study Japanese with.

In Other News: It really is amazing how much easier it is to function when my room is clean. I really should remember that.