Shiny news!

One big piece of news and four small ones.

1. In Japanese, Patrick Sensei pulled aside the smart kids (e.g. me and all the kids with Japanese parents) and said that we were going to learn the 450ish kanji required for the AP Japanese test. Now, I am the only one taking the test, and I would have had to learn them anyway, but now I have specially sanctioned classtime to do it in rather than wasting my precious sleeping time on it. Huzzah!
   
2. Orchestra. Johnny (the second most qualified cellist) and I have been working on Vivaldi Concerto in G minor for 2 Celli for the past few months with the intention of playing it at the end of the year concert. Wednesday, the rest of the orchestra got their parts for the piece, so I will be playing with a whole orchestra accompaniment. I need to practice before I can get too excited, though. Huzzah anyway!
3. Japanese again. At the start of class, Patrick sort of pulled me aside and told me (in Japanese, of course) that he had nominated me for some award for foreign language students. "You'll probably get it," he said. Actually, he said, 「たぶん、もらえる。」 but I knew what he meant. Huzzah!
4. Report cards came. I had been anticipating an unprecedented two B's, one in AP English and one in AP History, but when the envelope was opened, low and behold, I had three A's and two A-'s. Not half bad. Huzzah!
5. Ok, here's the big one. I received an email that informed me of my fate for the next year. I will be staying in the city of Banska Bystrica in Slovakia. Yay for mountains! It's about the same size as Eugene, and even has a university. It was also the center of anti-Nazi activism during WWII. What with the political activism and all, it sounds an awful lot like Eugene, but about 700 years older and a lot snowier. Just in time to tell all those lovely Rotary folks at this weekend's meeting. Super Huzzah!

Ok, before bed, a random, humorous literary quote for your edification:

"Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.
Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail."

-Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol.

Don't ask why I was reading it in April...

Mary Poppins Bag

I'm cleaning out my purse tonight. Always eager to dispose of as many of both birds and stones as possible, I am posting a list of its contents. Lists are excellent blog fodder: easy to write without all that tedious engaging of the neural synapses. Psychoanalyze away.

• Hand Sanitizer- Warm Vanilla Sugar scented
• A mint teabag
• Planner
• Reminder for last week's Orchestra field trip
• Checkbook, including receipts from lunch at the Safeway next to my school, my AP tests, Buffalo Exchange, Fred Meyer, and Paintball Palace.
  
• A leotard (dirty)
• A lemon ginger teabag
  
• My Creative Zen (aka FauxPod)
• Two programs from church
• Keys
• Another mint teabag
  
• Three (3) granola bar wrappers (incidentally, bought at Safeway)
• A second lemon ginger teabag
  
• My Life, by Isadora Duncan
• A CD that my friend asked me to bring to my dad for the recital
• A "Mint Medley" teabag
  
• Cell Phone
• Bookmark, sans book
• A third lemon ginger teabag
  
• Headphones
• A fold-up-able umbrella (never been used)
• A set of blank notecards
• A plain old lemon teabag. The package says "Lemon Lift", but it's actually plain old lemon.
  
• Colloquial Slovak, by James Naughton
  
• 7 pens and pencils, ranging from a highlighter to a golf pencil.
• Dove "cool essentials" deodorant. Apparently it is "Ultimate Clear".
• A packet of Emergen-C
  
• Cello Rosin (cracked)
• A Japanese fan
• a toothpick (used)
  
• A fourth lemon ginger teabag
• The official DMV Guide to Provisional Driver License Restrictions
• Burt's Bees lip balm, in plain, champagne, and nutmeg
• Two tootsie roll wrappers
• Six dollars (Cash)
  
• A cello mute
• Nine hair clips
• A large binder clip
• a button that came off of my dress last week
• Sixty-two cents in change
• 3 ponytail holders
• Warm Vanilla Sugar hand lotion

Things that aren't in my purse at the moment, but have been recently:

• Three apples (They weren't that good. I gave them away.)
  
• Metronome (I took it out because it started ticking... and someone yelled "BOMB!")
• A Kanji dictionary (I put it in my school bag)
• The cord to my lappy (if it were in my purse, then I couldn't be posting this now)

Now you know why I was cleaning it. That mess was heavy. I could have lived through a Russian winter on the teabags alone.

An Emo Post.

At this point, I don't know who I am, exactly. Up to this point, I have been Aubrianne: dancer, cellist, flinger of witticisms, fairly good looking, and generally okay. Who knows, however, who I will be next year.

I know that this means my identity is misplaced, since, if I were centering myself around being a child of God, I would be fine when everything else in my life changes as it's about to.

I've been going through some sort of identity crisis lately. I have come to the conclusion that I am less afraid of leaving my surroundings than I am of losing myself, shucking the things I used to define myself by like an ear of corn. What will be left? Not a creamy nougat center, I'd wager.

I worry about leaving people and places pretty much to the extent that I define myself by them.

Who am I?

I know the right answer, but for once it's not enough.