Adventure Post of Adventure-ness (2 AM Edition!)

Disclaimer: My fabulous cousins are in from South Africa on their annual trek to the United States and as such this is going to be a relatively short post, as I'm rather busy and will continue to be during the next week or so.

Disclaimer Number 2: 

It is 2 AM. I am sleepy. This will be rambly.

Moving on.

My grandest adventure, hm?

To be honest, “adventure” seems a pretentious word to use, to me. It implies a journey, feelings of new discovery and resulting insights into the world around us. It has connotations of that sense of prickly danger on one's skin and pleasantly anxious tightening in the chest as you charge forward on a beautiful and perilous undertaking toward New Things and the Beautiful Unknown, standing atop a mountain or navigating the U.S. in an unreliable vehicle with (hopefully) slightly more reliable friends that never fail to make you laugh.

Frankly, from my personal experience, this is extremely hard to come by, especially at the young age people who use the word typically are. It's more of a word that tumblr addicts use to put a name on this teenage ideal they wish they had the energy to go out and pursue (but instead paste with pretty fonts over nature-y backgrounds with a sense of brooding, yearning angst). So I don't like to use the term in everyday conversation.

But, persnicketies aside, the closest I've come to experiencing this sort of sensation is when I was a kid and everything beyond my backyard kind of buzzed with that electric, magically fun sense of immediate peril. Especially at my friend Cat's house, when we would venture into her woods when her parents were away and climb up into this enormously tall tree stand, sitting and overlooking the Lands Surrounding with an air of throned Narnian queens. She, her cousin (and mutual friend) Virginia and I would pretend we could control elements in the wickedly kick-butt manner of Last Airbender characters and were sort of heroes in this make believe world we had between the Tree Stand and the Creak. The Creak was a muddy trickle of an ordeal that served as the line beyond which Magical Things were probable to occur. Arachnia is the name we came up with for this realm. (Apparently, add -nia to any moderately cool-sounding prefix and BAM. Alternate fantasy world, done.)

So yeah. Childhood. That was when everything felt like an adventure by its traditional definition, places and things being innately new and mysterious and interesting, and that was wonderful. I think it's important to not lose touch with that side of ourselves, even as we grow, and perhaps even one day quit yearning for this unattainable perfect summer journey full of whimsy and ridiculously witty dialogue with the helpless desire that we do. Because unless you are a John Green character, it probably isn't going to happen the way we envision it.

Don't color me pessimistic, though. It doesn't mean you won't have good times, because you will (you'll have some great ones too, if you're lucky). It doesn't mean you won't exchange witty dialogue from occasion to occasion, or laugh so hard you fall over at something devastatingly hysterical a friend says. But it does mean that we all should appreciate these things when they happen because they usually won't be lumped together in one great big fabulous and oft-romanticized summer stew.

If one learns to see an adventure in everything they experience then life suddenly becomes a lot more interesting. Let's all stop brooding and do something today.

Talk to you all next week, hopefully in a more coherent and eloquent manner.

Elizabeth

My One and Only Brush With Fame

I won't lie.

I've got some kick-butt stuff in my room.

Including but not in any way limited to: posters, useless knick-knacks, a giant stuffed cow, a typewriter, etc. 

And this light switch.

But I've acquired most of these things from rather mundane places. Wally World. Mail order. Random antique stores and flea markets I stumble into.The only thing with an interesting story behind it is wedged between the books on my shelves, inside the front cover of Walk Two Moons.

Firstly, one of my favorite authors of all time is Sharon Creech. I've read nearly all of her books, and as a wee tot, lived and breathed her stories. Her characters are brilliant and everything naturally intertwines in simple and lovely ways. One day, struck with a chronic boredom that hung over me as darkly as the plague, I decided to take action and take my day into my own hands. Which meant I did some hardcore research on the internet in the form of consulting the almighty Google “what to do when bored”. And benevolently, the search engine bestowed answers upon my weary soul. “Write a letter to your favorite author!” And I was all like mmkay. So I did.

I said all the usual things. Ur books r gud. How do u write gud? Ur kewl. Write back plz kthxbai. I slapped a stamp on that piece of practical literary genius and shipped it off into the unknown, completely unsure if the hour or so I'd spent constructing it would be a total waste of time.

Several months later on a similarly dreary, boring day, I received a response in the mail. Lo and behold, heavens above, my name was on the envelope and hers up in the left hand corner, written by hand with the same fingers that had typed out some of my favorite novels of all time. I tore it open with mad fervor, disbelieving that this could actually be happening, someone I really admired and who had won various Newbery awards had written a letter to me, some random kid who was really bored and had nothing better to do but hope for it, man I was excited.

To be honest, I was a bit let-down when I gutted the envelope and frantically looked over its contents. It was a form letter, a generic response to the fan mail she received, covering all the basic answers to the regular things a little kid with a pen might have to say/ask of her in a letter. Everything I asked her. But I was  overjoyed nonetheless, because she signed all the little papers inside and wrote me a little note at the top of one page:

“Hi, Elizabeth-

Thanks so much for your great letter—I hope this and the enclosed sites answer your questions. Good luck w/ your writing!”

So. Pretty good, for an eleven-year-old kid.

Months passed. I got bored again. But a couple of Sharon Creech books fixed an afternoon of that, and her book The Castle Corona gave me so many happyfeels all I wanted was a sequel. I was desperate for one. So I was all like “POWER TO THE PEOPLE” and wrote her again, asking if she would ever consider expanding her fantastic book in the form of a continuation in a series? I highly suspected it was not to be, but at least I would know, if she decided to answer this annoying little kid who kept pestering her.

Less time than before passed before I received a response in the mail. It wasn't another hefty envelope, but a postcard with a cute little polar bear stamp, and it felt more personal this way because everything had been written by pen this time. By “everything” I mean my address and the couple of sentences she scribbled down, but that was enough to make me explode with joy.

“14 Dec '11

Dear Elizabeth-

Thank you for your beautiful letter. Although I hadn't planned to write a sequel to Castle Corona- you never know!

xxSharon Creech”

So yeah. This is the closest brush with fame I've ever had. I keep all of the papers inside their original envelope and in the front cover of the first book of hers I read. Hey. Could be valuable, someday. Not that I'd ever sell my precious correspondence.

Have a fantastic week,

Elizabeth

P.S. The only other real interesting thing I have with 

something of a little backstory are these two posters. One my dad rescued from being thrown out in Quebec City, and the other came from a tiny little festival in Florida. They look pretty similar, don't they? I think they're really awesome. XD

I Scooted My Way to Victory

Oh goodness, embarrassing stories.

One of the first things you will found out about me if you start talking to me, not so much on the internet as Real Life although it still applies to the former, is that I am the living embodiment of the metaphorical concept the Awkward Turtle. I often don't know what to say, when I do speak say offbeat and awkward things, accidentally repeat the same word too many times because I have subconsciously latched onto it (the week or two it was “epic” was particularly painful), etcetera. Sometimes I mentally labor over saying something for minutes at a time and when I do eventually say it and people don't react the way I want, my insides silently shrivel in hot waves of regret and shame. 

These kinds of embarrassments are the most common I have. I suffer them on a daily basis. Not the kind of theatrical blog-worthy thing that is at all interesting to recollect.

But last night I did manage to come up with a memory. Lucky you. Aren't you in for a treat.

So my friend Megan (Psalm118 of OYAN, for those who know what that means) was gracious enough to invite me along with her sister Anna and a girl named Maia to a water park hotel for the weekend a couple of months ago. After a car ride during which feelscreys were shed (yes, we watched a girly movie), we pulled up to this super awesome building complex with some kick-butt water slides sticking out the back, all neon and twisty, shining like a colorful plastic mirage in the afternoon sun. We checked in, settled into our epic (D'OH) suite and donned our swimwear for a day of poolside frolicking. 

Now, no offense to my friends as this is not a put-down toward them but a shameless exaltation of my own Rad Skills, but I was ready to ride everything there, no sweat. I have practically no fear when it comes to thrill rides, so these were going to be a cakewalk for me nerves-wise, albeit a super fun cakewalk. But perhaps my friends have a finer-tuned interest in preserving their well-being because they were more cautious. It took us quite a while to work up to the funnel slide, and this was only through deceiving Maia into thinking it was not That Sort of Slide of Which I Have Spoken. I rode backwards on it without holding on just to freak them out. 

So when we walked to the outside section of the park and there was this giant loopy-majigger thing forebodingly titled “The Vortex”, they were less than eager to join me on it.

 

But I knew I had to go. 

It was my destiny.

How was I supposed to return home and report back to my brothers that there had been a Big Slide there and I hadn't taken up the opportunity to conquer it? The prospect was more shaming than anything.

But perhaps not so shaming as what was to come next.

So there we were, all shivery and cold, staring up and hearing the drop of the platform and watching the figure plummet down the 80 degree angle hearing the screams of pure delighted terror (...perhaps just plain terror), and I knew I wasn't going to convince any of them to come with me. I tried, but eventually I did coerce Anna into joining me in climbing the ladder to to the top wherein I would be sent to my fate. Executed, from the way they were treating my endeavor.

Though truth be told, I was a bit apprehensive myself.

The thing about the Vortex is that the tube is really narrow. You could barely sit up in it, and you go without a tube, on your back with your arms crossed across your chest. The floor flops out from underneath you on a hinge and you fall/slide down this incredibly steep drop, and the resulting momentum is supposed to carry you over the next steep hill, around and down again. I couldn't fathom how you could make it up that far just sliding, but it seemed to be working okay for all the other riders, so I dismissed this fear. 

We climbed the climb. We stood at the top. It was quite tall. We waved to the ants that were my friends at the bottom. 

I made idle chat with a previous rider, watching person after person step into the scary little cylinder and have the floor dropped out from underneath their feet. They slid up, around, and landed in the splash pool, one by one.

Up came my turn. There was only a girl in front of me in line, now.

She stepped into the cylinder. The clear little concave hatch thing closed shut with a hiss like blast doors. The electronic voice came forth: “Three... Two... One.” And she did fall.

Except she made it neither up nor around.

She slid back and forth like a skateboard between two slopes, horrified and panicked, grabbing at the sides and trying to do anything to get control. An employee ran over, keys in hand, to unlock a hatch on the tube and manually evacuate her. 

The girl climbed out, and speed-walked quickly away with her face firmly smothered in her hands. Everyone at the top of the ride was peering over the side with some sympathy. But mostly curious amusement at her incredible failure, who-was-that-girl, and man-am-I-glad-I'm-not-her-right-now. I could only imagine the unparalleled shade of red her face must have been.

Then it was my turn, and all of the sudden, I felt a bit less confident, and my knees were a bit more wobbly under my weight. 

I stepped in. The round plastic platform was wet, slippery. The clear hatch hissed sealed, and with it, my fate.

“Three... Two... One.”

 

I dropped.

It was so hectic, I can't describe it, with water gushing over me and and practically free-falling and screaming in horrified ecstasy. The current smashed over me, roared and rushed and I didn't even have time to register how icy frigid it was. I slid up, and up, and up.

But not over. 

I felt my momentum slip to a crawl, there at the near-top of the incline, and to a halt. I was sliding back and I was going to fall backwards and be manually evacuated and run off with my face in my hands I knew it and gosh I was never ever ever going to live this down why the HECK did I decide to ride this thing help.

I flung both of my hands to the tube walls and held myself there. No. I would not fall. I would not. I was going to save myself, darn it.

So there, in the clear plastic tube which everyone on the ground watched and everyone above observed, I began to scoot. 

I clung to the wet, smooth sides of the slide with my fingertips and I scooted myself up and forward, with increasing confidence, until I made it over the peak and to victory, and with the kind of relief that can only come from a successful scoot I slid down to the end.

The splash pool was so glorious.

“Are you okay?” asked the employee at the end of the ride. “Are you okay?” asked so many people I encountered after that, alerting me to the facts a) that I had obviously had quite a struggle and b) everyone had seen me and c) that I was identifiable as the One Who Had Scooted. 

“Wait, I think she's scooting!” Megan's mom reports that one of the onlookers had cried.

Well, I do suppose it could have been worse.

I had a successful failure.

I was a Succailor.

A Failceeder.

Suck Sailor.

Fail Cedar. 

Yeah.

You can't touch this.

'Twas the day I scooted my way to victory, and no, nobody present shall ever let me live it down. 

Kthxbai.

~Elizabeth

OH CRUD IT'S NINE PM AND I HAVE THOUGHT OF NOTHING FOR THE POST I WILL POUND OUT NONSENSE

It's my belief that to an extent I am the least qualified person on the planet to write in any detail about myself. Especially as a teenager, caught in that nether-region between the safe familiarity of childhood and the promise and mystery of what is to come. That doesn't help at all with my sense of Identity, this wiggly, slimy little fish that I'm trying to grab with my bare hands, one that I roll my pants up and wade into murky waters attempting to catch time and time again without much success. Besides the simple fact that the way I think of myself is almost certainly not the way you think of and/or will think of me (all three of you readers). But Ranger, the bossy-face he is, said to introduce myself. And I shall do my best.

First and foremost, I'm a Christian. I'm still unsure about a lot of things, but I'm trying to understand more and more about what exactly that means over time. Luckily for me, I have great friends who are wonderfully strong believers and they inspire me to grow in my faith more than any preacher could. Shout-out, yo. 

 

I guess the main thing about me other than that is that I like to create things. When I write, or I draw, I produce something with my consciousness with which to say “this is who I am,” other than myself in my body trying to talk to you or make a positive impression. These things that I create are more expressive of myself than I am in the flesh, in a sense.  

I can't be happy unless I have a way to pour out this excess existence into something else, and this often involves pencil and paper, whether I'm attempting art or trying to put words down in a semi-coherent way.

The reality of my situation, however, is that the stories I hold inside of me get warped and damaged on their difficult Odyssey from brain to the clickity-click of fingertips on a keyboard. It's like trying to roll a great big paper mache boulder down a mountain without it getting destroyed (or becoming disfigured beyond recognition). But I write to remember these stories, and I write because as guarded as I am sometimes, I really do want other people to see them. Someday I hope to be able to actually untangle this mess of thoughts to show as I have seen in the warm, cozy, and sometimes-lethal darkness of the viewing room in my mind. The projector flickers and sputters, but I crouch in front of it with my pencil and pad, scribbling things down as best I can. 

 

(...I draw though because I like to look at fanart pictures of my favorite characters. I have only recently taken up this hobby. Not quite so pretentious and brooding. x3 Sorry, writers just get that way. When God was handing out the traits, he knocked over the big Bucket-O'-Angst into our souls. We can't help it. Resistance to its sway is futile.)

Some Random and Mostly Useless Facts:

-The BBC ruined my life.

-I'm a lucky lucky ducky in that I have some fantastic friends, including in cliché homeschool-ness, my brother. Not that I don't love my four others, but we've been the David and Elizabeth Show since we were very little. So that's fun.

-I play piano, and I like to squeeze in learning modern arrangements of songs between Mozart pieces like a little Pilgrim girl sneaking sweets before dinner. Both my strictly-classical teacher and my mom dislike the “franticness” of the style I enjoy. But hey. Beats the dull, clangy plinking I perform for the other Pilgrim children and their parents at recitals.

-I also do tae kwan do and 4-H shooting sports, both of which are activities I admire from a safe distance but are terrifying and difficult once you're actually involved in them. The majority of the energy I devote to these things is fantasizing about being much better at them than I currently am.

-I smell books, and I adore the smooth blackness of ink, and I fell in love with words a long time ago.

-I enjoy anime and the celebration of Japanese culture. I dunno man. Something about it fascinates me. Besides the fact that a lot of anime I see seems extraordinarily frivolous and silly at first, but they open up into these massive hidden caves of stories with all kinds of twists and unexpected depth. The art style is really pleasing to my eyes as well, and it's something I hope to get better at replicating with my own pencil over time.

-I like to climb trees, ride roller coasters, and do anything that takes me to great heights and gives my adrenaline a boost.

tl;dr

I guess I'm just a derp with an internet and too much time to think. That's the way I view myself in a nutshell.

If you theoretically wanted to find me elsewhere, I live at these webbernet locations:

thejabberwocksden.tumblr.com (in which I reblog)

thejabberwocksden.blogspot.com (in which I blog, or have in the past, as I have been very neglectful of it)

Hope to see you around, metaphorically speaking in that internet sort of way.

-Elizabeth

Totoro

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIl6eS5xckg
I found the piano sheet music to this song online...
o_o
JOY.

School

I had homeschool co-op thing today.

Half of my class was gone.

IT WASN'T THE SAME WITHOUT THEM.

Woah

How...
How did I get here?
xD

Hm.
'Tis no matter, I suppose.

MY BLOGGING PROWESS WILL RAIN FROM THE HEAVENS AND SHOWER THIS DUSTY WEBBERNET CORNER WITH GREATNESS.
*strikes "all the things" pose*