Grace Tang

Quotes

2011-10-16T19:22:00.002-07:00

“In a word, I was too cowardly to do what I knew to be right, as I had been too cowardly to avoid doing what I knew to be wrong.”

― Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

confused much?

2011-07-26T22:54:00.000-07:00

So it's been a month since I last talked to my friend who accidentally got me sick.

Like seriously, WHAT THE FUCK?! I know it's probably selfish on my part for saying this but....How the hell did this happen? I'm the one that got sick and he's blaming himself and in the end I'm the one who loses the most cause I just lost my FUCKING so called "BFFAE" over the stupidest day ever (ok, technically he loses a friend too, but I'm not in his head so I don't care about his feelings right now.)

I said I didn't care about that day anymore. I said it wasn't your fault. I said fuck your guilt our friendship is more important than that...

BUT NOOOOOO....apparently it wasn't. I just hate myself the most for crying over a friendship that apparently wasn't even going to last.

You said you wanted space I gave it, you invited me to hang out with you...you somehow uninvited me without my say in any of it. Why the fuck did you bother inviting me if you weren't even ready to.

I know you have your issues, but like I told you, I DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR PAST, it's who you are that matters....and apparently you aren't who I think you are.

Another year, another bunch of people I no longer trust. I gotta learn to stop depending on friends, no offence to most people, but some of the people I've befriended have let me down.

Maybe it's me, maybe I have high expectations. But me thinking that friendships would last forever and ever was a dream.

I should have stuck to what I know best. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A BEST FRIEND. And if you think you found one who is, I hope it works out for you. Cause I've given up.

It’s been a while

2011-05-16T13:43:00.000-07:00

Here’s what’s been happening...

Dodgeball’s over, still so much drama within but did my best to stay out of it

Disconnected with my cousins, and I can’t do anything cause apparently anytime I feel something it pisses people off

I almost died twice in 2 days....

Dodgeball is over and I couldn’t be happier. The stress of dealing with people made me more anti-social. And talking to jerks really annoyed me. But season’s over so what’s done is done.

I’ve been antisocial for a couple months now barely talk to anyone. Told my cousins that I was antisocial, then one day 7am in the morning I get a text. It said that they were cancelling/thinking about cancelling their trip here. Truth be told, I thought they were probably making the right decision. I wasn’t feeling up to making them like it here, when I know they probably wouldn’t even like the places I take them. We’re so different, I’m laid back and like just sitting around and talking. They like to go out and about. Our only hold to each other was the fact that we were family and we loved each other. I guess we still have that. That is until I told them I’m not going to NY this year.

They have no idea how long I had to think about that decision and how hard it was to actually decide on not going. When I told them I wasn’t going to NY this year...I haven’t spoken to them in 2-3 weeks maybe a month. I would apologize if I felt that there was something I did wrong. I mean I know I’m at fault for some stuff, but I also felt that they overreacted when I was “avoiding them”....I was avoiding everyone....I guess the distance just made it harder for us. I wasn’t online for like a week so I had no idea what was happening outside of my house.

I feel sad that I lost track of my cousins, the fact that apparently words are stronger than blood...but who knows in the future this may all be different.

Now...how I almost died....

I haven’t told anyone else this because well it was pretty bad. My friend and I were hanging out and beforehand we agreed we’ll eat special rice crispy he bought. I have to back track...

...This week has been pretty bad health related...At first I thought I just had a cold. Then on Thursday when I woke up, I coughed up blood for 10min...Went to walk-in clinic, after 1.5 hour wait my doctor told me my left lung wasn’t breathing as well as my right. He prescribed antibiotics, chest x-rays, and blood/urine test....no test results for a week or so....

Back to my friend’s house... So we were watching movies and then he brought out the rice crispy square. I ate a little less than half...it tasted bad...I probably can never eat rice crispy squares again. I felt nothing until about 20 min...then my breathing slowed down a lot...to the point that I began to hyperventilate. I don’t remember the night that much; I know my friend made me throw up to get it out of my system. Then I remember not wanting to sleep cause I was sure I wasn’t going to wake up. For about 2-3 hours, I think, I was having a lot of trouble breathing, I no longer had control of my body and I was screaming a lot. I told him no hospital and don’t call my brothers/parents. Because if that happened...he’d be dead. Eventually he called up his best friend to come over to help him take care of me.

At about 12:40 I started to calm down and stopped screaming/hyperventilating. Most of the stuff was out of my system and I was seeing clearer. Finally fell asleep at woke up 40 min later, back to normal.

That night scared the crap out of me...cause I thought I was going to choke from puking or I would stop breathing.

Next morning was Monday playoffs...I woke up with my breathing feeling a bit heavy but got ready and was prepared to go play. At 1145am I made it to the gym, but I knew I couldn’t play because my breathing was so off. When I went up to my...supervisor?... I was telling him I can’t play today and needed a sub, but when he asked why, my throat started to feel like it’s closing up when I was saying I couldn’t breathe. Then I pulled one of my friends over and told her she had to sub for me because I couldn’t breathe by then my eyes started to water up cause emotions just went crazy. Then finally as I was trying to go outside to take deep breaths I bumped into my friend who is somewhat my boss...He was asking me how I was cause he heard I got sick last week. Then I broke down and couldn’t hold it anymore and breathing was very hyperventilated. He went to get my brother and my brother took me to the hospital.

When I got to the hospital I was still having a lot of trouble breathing and I was very numb. After 1hr the doctor gave me a paper bag and told me to breathe into it. Breathed so much that I almost passed out. But eventually I calmed myself down enough. After my x-ray tests my breathing slowed down a lot and I felt a lot better but felt like there was still something stuck in my throat. I assume the doctors couldn’t figure out what was really wrong with me (come to think of it, I’ve been to the hospital a couple times for 3 things, and they never know what the cause was). They said I had a normal cold and that I had an anxiety attack. No cancer, no pneumonia. They asked me if I was stressed about anything, technically I didn’t think so, but apparently my body thinks so. I’m thinking maybe it’s my cousins thing but I’m pretty sure there’s more to it than just that.

When my brothers were at the hospital with me, made me realize how much they mean to me...even when they piss me off so much. For them, blood is thicker than water.

Now I’m just resting trying not to overreact about everything cause that makes me breathe harder, had to learn how to do relaxing breathing.

Friday night changed a lot of things for me.

2010-12-01T02:59:00.002-08:00

I can’t take it anymore.

If you don’t like the way I do things, then fucking do it yourself. Am I bitter now? Yes. This experience has changed me. These people changed me.

Everyone is corrupt. Everyone in the exec body is corrupt. We pick sides; we talk behind each other’s backs. And we lose friends. This is all bullshit. I’ve cried like twice this year and both times are because of these people.

My brother is a douche bag. People I have to be nice to are douche bags. People who act all nice in front of everyone are the worse because I know they are lying.

Exec’s are supposed to be professional? That’s BULLSHIT!! It’s all personal. In the end of the day, it’s all personal. It’s to do with people who only care about themselves and winning. What happen to the honor and sportsmanship in sports! What the hell is the point to winning if you have to cheat to get to it! How is that a win at all? If you continually attack a person in a way that makes it not fun for them why the fuck would they bother playing against you. I’ll gladly give you the win if it stops you from headhunting those who they perceive as a threat and someone they cannot beat. If you can’t beat them one way, then change to a different way! Yet we have to believe in them because they are Execs.

My friend’s right; the longer you are with the organization the more people you dislike. I think it’s time for me to leave. This is not an organization I want to be a part of when I know the dark side and the personal attacks.

2010-11-08T13:15:00.004-08:00

~~you always want what you can't have~~

and sometimes you just realize that you never wanted it at all

No-Balls

2010-09-15T14:48:00.001-07:00

I take back the last paragraph of my last blog post, when you come back for 2 weeks and the guy who said that he liked you before you left doesn’t call, message, or even mentions anything than chances are he wasn’t worth the 2nd thought.

I’ve never met a guy with no balls,until now. Let’s flashback to 2 months ago, the day before I’m take off to New York for a month and a half, he comes over and talks to me and says I feel something for you…I reply with no real answer. Later that week I message him saying, he took me off my guard and that I don’t know where we are, but I wouldn’t mind finding out when I get back. 2 weeks into my trip, he started liking someone else…oh and by the way, he never tells me.

Funnier story, I tend to have weird sixth sense, small things happen…and a few months later I realize that, that small thing was a bigger thing than I thought. I knew he liked her, like a month before I left. She drove him to playoffs and when I mentioned I thought she has a boyfriend to him…his face was somewhat disappointed. And the day before I left a bunch of us had a bbq together, I sat beside him, and saw he was texting her, so him telling me that he feels something for me the next day was really a surprise. Like seriously, when I asked you on msn years ago if you liked my friend, you said no, and I knew you were lying. No poker face whatsoever.

Back to this, 2 weeks after I came home I was talking to friends and they all were hinting something to me but won’t tell me, eventually my friend confirmed my assumptions because that guy had no balls to tell me himself. He told her not to tell me so he could tell me...it’s September now…he still hasn’t told me. I think he’d rather not man up and tell me himself, in hopes someone else will. Or he’s hoping that now he’s changed his msn display picture, I’ll just figure it out myself.

I had no emotions invested in this and wasn’t planning on investing emotion into any of this until I came home, but I’m your friend and you didn’t think it was right to talk to me first, who do you think I am, to not understand? And after all that, you still had the nerve to ask me to join your team, even after many times I said I don’t want to play on 4 nights, you sir, are a dumbass. I don’t care if you are with someone else, I’m your friend, I’ll be happy for you, but to do it this way, was pretty shitty. And if you ever have feelings for anyone who’s about to leave for a while, don’t tell them before they leave, especially if you can’t wait that long.

Where Are We?

2010-08-18T15:24:00.001-07:00

Why is this question so difficult to bring up? Trying to figure out the status of a friendship turning into a relationship can sometimes be like cracking a safe. Asking the question “Where Are We?” can lead to wonderful treasures in the safe, or it could lead to an embarrassment bomb blowing up in your face.

I don’t understand why some people can risk it all and ask that question, actually scratch that, I do know why they do it. They do it because they are following their hearts and hoping for the best. Sometimes I can be brave like that too; when I was in highschool I told one of my friends that I liked him over msn. Nothing really came from it but I don’t regret saying it. I do regret liking that guy but that’s a whole other story.

So a guy tells you that he feels something for you or somehow shows you that he has feelings for you, how do you react? Well, the way I act is by running away. And I mean literally running away, I’ve left a room before because I suddenly realized the guy liked me and that he might make a move. I didn’t run that far since we were at my house, I just ran to my room.

Now what do you do when the guy tells you he feels something for you, when you are in your escape room…well, I sat in my computer chair and just stared at my monitor and didn’t give him eye contact because I was in shock because I didn’t expect it and also because I didn’t know what to say back to him. And from my own outsider’s point of view, I totally blew him off, which I wasn’t trying to do. I like the fact he was upfront because it pisses me off when guys aren’t, but it probably pisses guys off when they are upfront and girls do this confusing shit. But people should understand I am bad with confrontation, I’m okay with instant messaging confrontation because it gives me a couple seconds to think about what to say. I still feel bad about how I acted that day. And to make things worse, I was about to leave for vacation the next day to New York for about 6.5 weeks, so I won’t even be able to really talk to him face-to-face. For a week my friends that knew about this, told me to talk to him, eventually I did but not much can come by it if I don’t see him for 6.5 weeks.

Do I feel something for him? Maybe. It’s a terrible answer, I know. But I really don’t know how to answer any other way, especially if there’s no way to see how I feel until I get back which is 6.5 weeks long. I wouldn’t be able to tell if I felt more for him, unless I hung out with him more, which is what I told him.

In the past months, I’ve been watching different relationships occurring. There were new ones forming, there were ones that were having problems, there were ones that were ending, and ones that were starting up again. I’ve seen many tears and the heartbreak through other people’s eyes. And I can’t understand why they can’t just get over it. But then I put myself in their shoes, they are heartbroken because they depended on the other person so much, so much to the point that they can’t live without them. When I hear people say, “I can’t live without him/her,” I find it ridiculous. You can’t live without food, you can’t live without water, and you can’t live without air. You will survive a break-up. Also, I don’t understand people who continue to hang out with the person they broke up with, because the two of them think that they can just be friends. You might be able to continue to hang out with each other with a group of people but to hang out just the two of you, it usually doesn’t end well. You’ll rather end up back together or get back together for a bit before you guys tear each other apart again.

I am being a bit narrow minded, seeing that I have no real break-up experience. But every time relationships fail, and how broken up the person becomes, I tell myself, never become attached to someone like this, because in the end I’ll probably be like this. But again I know myself, it’ll hurt like hell, and I’ll probably be pissed as hell, but I’ll push past it. There are worse things in life than risking your heart to love and have it being smashed. I’m good at jigsaw puzzles; I’ll put it back together in no time.

Anyways back to my “thing”, so I’ve been back for 2 weeks and still haven’t seen him nor have I really talked to him that much either. Should I take this as a sign? Or should I mention something? I could just say, hey is there still something between us? Yes? Ok let’s go hang out. No? Ok. Let’s pretend nothing happened. I don’t know where I am anymore, or where I want to be, and who I want to be with. *sigh* If only life was easy and my future husband comes to my front door and tell me he’s the one. Until that happens, I guess I just have to learn to put myself out there. But I’m still young and I have the rest of my life to worry about being alone. I think being in a relationship right now would just be nice and comforting.

Never Enough Time

2010-08-10T15:38:00.000-07:00

1 month and 18 days
6 weeks (+5 Days)
48 days
1152 hours
69,120 minutes
4,147,200 seconds.

No matter what unit I call it by, it was still too short of a trip.

Goodbye New York, I miss you so much.

What is a friend?

2010-04-03T15:43:00.001-07:00

Haven’t blogged in a while, so here we go.

I consider myself an okay friend. I might be a great friend to some people but I feel like I'm not as good as a friend I could be to others. I try to keep up with everyone, but there’s just too many people to keep track of. I admit, I try harder sometimes for certain people, but truthfully I wish I can keep up with everyone. I use to think close friendship happened because you talked to the person everyday, hung out with them everyday and basically knew a lot of detail about their lives. And yah that is one way to be close with someone. But for some friendships, you just run out of things to talk about and you are in the routine of talking about the same things over and over again. And eventually there’s nothing to talk about. Then I have other friends who I speak with like once a week or I would only see them once a month. And I feel closer to them than my other friends, because they are not WITHIN the drama/situations I'm in and they have the outsider’s point of view. They know and have met enough of my friends to understand what’s going on. I think those are the people I'm closes with. The ones I don’t hang out with and talk to everyday.

Anti-Social...ism

2010-01-20T23:32:00.001-08:00

I just learned I have a new phase in my routine of life.....

It's called anti-social...i was online....and i barely replied to anyone...all my msgs were screened...and when i did reply...i was kind of a bitch...so when i realized i have become anti-social i had to go offline cause there's no point to be online if i don't want to talk to some ppl on msn.....

fun times....gosh life is a pain in the ass....

when is a giant meteor going to hit earth and kill us all quickly?

i'm waiting for that day =)

Emo-ing...

2009-11-09T13:28:00.000-08:00

i was so friggin' emo last night to the point where i sent everyone this message.

"fuck man i really wish i would die already. life is such a pain in the ass
all we do is work and study
all for what?
to make our lives a little better until we actually die
WTF B.S. is that??? "

about 30-45min later i calmed down a bit, but i still think this is true. i really wish death would just come sooner cause life is killing me.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
i feel like i should be more emo but i'm acutally somewhat happy(ish) and don't think the reasons why i would be emo is worth making me emo....did that make sense?

drama drama drama----sorta

2009-11-08T03:26:00.001-08:00

I am overthinking again. This time is about war, not the war before two countries. But the social war between people. You think that this only happens in highschool, and I wish that was the case.

Drama never ends. If you are required to see a number of people, frequently, you are bound to have drama with some of the people eventually. But if you are lucky, you can have friends that are willing to work through whatever is wrong. For those I don’t hang out with anymore, I feel fake when I have to see/hang out with them. I don’t want to feel/act this way but I can’t help it. I feel like they are being fake to me so might as well act the same way back to them. The problem with this is...my “feelings” can be wrong.

There is so much in my head. Most of the time I think it is me creating drama within my head, and that destroys me, like it is doing now. I really want to kill myself when I overthink like this. It’ll make everyones life easier and I wouldn’t have to overthink anymore...mostly cause I'll be dead and all....but I don’t want to do that because there’s a lot of people who do love me unconditionally and it’ll hurt them a lot if I did this. But if or when I get hit by that car...it’d be better if I don’t get resuscitated.

Halo Effect

The Halo effect, to me, is when you put someone a pedestal and believe that they can do no wrong. I actually tend to do this, and it is unfair to the people I do this to and stupid for me to do it because this causes more pain when that person hurts you. I have done it to some people and usually it doesn’t end well. This usually leads into my overthinking. I don’t do this as often anymore, I'm understanding now that there are a lot of flaws to people and to be a good friend, we should just accept them.

Sometimes I wish I could be cold hearted or at least learn to close my heart to others. It would protect me from a lot of pain. I trusted people who I no longer trust the same way, but I’ve also found new friends that I can share with which is surprising. And I am worried because I am basically putting myself up to fall again, it’s a risk I keep putting myself through. I'm also trying to balance if it is them or me? It is so hard to read people. Most of the time I think I got it right, but you would never know unless you ask the person you are trying to figure out. And usually they won’t tell you the whole truth because they don’t trust you enough, which sucks, cause all you are trying to do is help and let them talk it out. But if they aren’t willing to tell you anything how can you help? You can’t really drill into their problems if they don’t want to share. And when it’s your turn and have a problem, you wouldn’t really want to share with this friend because you feel as if they didn’t trust you enough to share their problems. It’s just a very bad circle of untrustworthiness between supposed “friends”. And the sadder thing is I open up to people very easily if they ask, but if I know that they don’t share their problems with me then that’s the only time I won’t be willing to share.
Right now I'm trying to make a decision about whether or not to end something I don’t find pleasing anymore. I haven’t decided for sure yet, but pretty sure it’s going to happen.

Whatcha gonna do...

2009-08-05T01:32:00.000-07:00

I notice that I am a hypocrite, but then again so is everyone else in the world whether they admit it or not. I am one of those people that admits they are a hypocrite, but probably in person, would deny it. I have my problems with friends but I also act differently when I'm with these friends too. To the untrained eye, I am being a hypocrite and giving people a fake face. But then I remember what I have grown up with. Throughout the years I have seen and heard people talk crap about other people, but when they are in the same room they would act as if they are great friends. Some people do that to keep peace between common friends. Some do it to show professionalism. I do it because just because I dislike the way someone acts, it’s not enough for me to end a perfectly good friendship. It takes a lot more before that would happen.

I have also learned that I grow attached to people easily. I always complain feeling left out or feeling like there’s some unsolvable problem. For a while now I blamed the situation or maybe subconsciously blamed others, but I'm starting to think it’s mostly me. I'm trying to get some distance from everything and think a bit and with a New York plan HOPEFULLY coming into action, it’ll be a lot easier to keep distance. Because I keep my distance, then I can stop growing attached to people. And here comes the hypocrite again, I love my friends and I have loved getting to know the friends I’ve gotten a chance to become close to. But I think I have changed a lot in the past year too. Or else I'm just overthinking again and probably should get punched in the head.

Fun times this year =I

Keeping Up

2009-07-31T01:51:00.000-07:00

I have many friends, and I am very happy to have them in my life, but I am close to only about a handful of them. I wish I could keep up with everyone. Throughout high school, I saw how my central group of friends changed.

I am at a time in my life where I am trying to figure who I am, and what kind of person I want to become. And this would be effected by the people I hang out with. I always wonder what is considered a good person. Am I a good person? Is the person I am sitting next to a good person? Or does everyone have other intentions. Yes, I have trust issues. It has gotten better throughout the years, but the fact that I try to keep myself at least an arm’s length away from people still keeps me from getting hurt. For a while now I wonder a lot about the people, I spend most of my time with. Some I trust more than others. And others just get like...face value of my life. But in the past few months I have learned there are different secrets or information about myself that can be shared with only certain people. Like I will share this one thing with this person cause I know they can handle it, and share a different thing with a different friend because they understand that better than anyone else. I’ve gotten use to doing this. Now I know who can handle what or who I can trust with what. Give me better balance in my life. And in time I started to being able to share more with those I wanted to trust.

Yah, so during the dodgeball season I was trying really hard to remember names. But when so much is happening during the night it’s hard to keep track and remember. A lot of the times I see the person again and they’d be like “Hey Grace!” and I'll just stand there and be like “heeeyyy!”. Hahaha I feel bad when I do that, but at least I remember they are in dodgeball and usually somewhat remember what night/team they play. For the coming season I wish to meet more people and do my best to remember their names. This should help me when I am introduced to new people in general. And it also helps with networking when I am able to remember people and what they do.

Some friends that I am close with, well there’s “appearance of close-ness” and actually being close. Not really the same thing. Sometimes I have to remind myself not to try so hard.

And finally I'm trying to meet more people nowadays. I want to expand my network and variety of friends. Sometimes it’s nice to go back to the good old times and sometimes it’s better to try new things. Right now I at this moment I feel like I haven’t done much with my life. This is not the place I think I’d be in right now in my life. I wish I have accomplished more in life. And I wish I knew how to reach my goals. I feel like I'm just aimlessly wandering the world right now, not sure what to do.

Clinically depressed?

2009-04-18T02:46:00.000-07:00

I know I said I would post this up later, but decided I really need to get this out there now.

Lately I’ve been having some anxiety issues. I can’t really tell what is causing it but most of the time my stomach feels like it has stones in it, my throat feels like there’s a rock in it, and my heart feels heavier then ever. There are a lot of things I’ve been overthinking, and I think me overthinking/overanalyzing is also causing to my stress/anxiety. As I sit here right now, about to go out to lunch with a friend, my breathing and heartbeat still feels irregular. But thanks to my friend inviting me out for the day, I felt good about not feeling like I'm trapped in my room with my thoughts. That day was pretty good and relaxing. Extremely cold, but relaxing. (that paragraph was written 2 different days)

Death

I won’t live past 30.

This has been going thru my head a lot lately. Right now, I don’t fear death, sometimes I welcome it. Recently a lot of time has been spent overthinking whether I should be here or not. I find myself walking somewhere or in the car on my way home or anywhere, and it really doesn’t bother me to think...I wonder if this car will hit me or...sometimes even, I hope this car will hit me. If an oncoming car was coming at me, reflexes should make me move. But right now, I think my emotions will make me stay. All this death thinking makes me want to cry, but I can’t and that actually hurts a bit. And it also makes me think I'm clinically depressed. I wonder, maybeit’d be easier if I just wasn’t here anymore.

No more overthinking/overanalyzing.

No more pain

No more anxiety

No more pressure

There are lots of times in the night, I feel like getting out of bed and walking onto Knight street. Or maybe even just standing on the top of my house,( I'm scared of heights..to a certain extent).
But when I'm up there I feel free-er. I would never off myself, I can’t do that. But I don’t mind getting away with, being hurt from an accident. So basically right now I kinda have a death wish (this is the clinically depressed version of me thinking). These are the thoughts that have been going thru my head. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t here, sometimes I wish I left Vancouver and moved to New York instead. (...I just noticed I rhymed =P)...on Thursday night as I was cramming for my exam that was happening 8:30 am Friday I started to cry. After all this time trying to cry but couldn't, my body decides that moment seemed like a good time. I was pretty pissed off but could not deal because I started to suppressing the emotions again because I was over stressed about studying.

On Wednesday night I was talking to my friend about this. It’s weird I only met him a couple months ago and last few months I’ve talked to him more on a regular basis. But during that time I’ve gotten to know him and he’s understanding and pretty helpful.

Oh sidenote - I also learned that, I DEFINITELY have better relationships with guys than with girls. Girls give me too much drama. And right now the people that knows about most things that have been happening with me are all guys.

So anyways, Wednesday after a day of studying at Langara, I was bussing/walking home and I just kept looking at cars and their speeds. Again I was thinking about car crashes. And as I was thinking about this I got angrier and angrier. To the point that when I got home I was in such a rush to get to dodgeball I acted like a jerk to my parents. And during dodgeball I was hoping to get some aggression out, and I did a bit. But I don’t have my elbow brace anymore so I can’t try to seriously hit people out. After dodgeball I was at home feeling angry again and procrastinating doing my essays (which I am doing again, right now). And I started talking to my friend. For a couple weeks now I haven’t seriously told anything to anyone and holding it all in because I don’t think some people can understand what I'm going through. And others just can’t deal with drama and I know that so I don’t bother them with mine.

So I finally decided I'll spill my guts to him, because I know he won’t judge me, and he knows enough about me and the people I hang out with to be understanding. We talked til about 6am in the morning, about....everything.

My issues with friendships

My issues with relationships

The fact that I think I'm clinically depressed. (he tells me I'm not, I still think I am a bit)

And some other stuff.

After that talk I felt a bit better (better then the way I’ve been feeling this past few weeks). So I started opening up to my other close guy friends. Even though I had to wake up at 9 am the next day (ended up waking up at 11 am), the sleep deprivation feeling didn’t feel too bad since I shared some of my issues with someone. And that made me want to share it here.

I find that sharing my problems with people I know to be sympathetic, caring and helpful to be very helpful. It’s Saturday 3am, I was just out talking with my friend about my what’s been up with me. And I felt really refreshed to tell her I think almost everything. And I thought, “ooo I'm going to sleep well tonight”. I sit here right now typing and I actually feel better but being in my room alone in the dark, I actually feel some of the “depression” feeling in my chest again. *sigh*

Below is part of a post I wrote a couple years ago... I think I kind of defined a bit of it in the past few weeks.

Monday, September 3, 2007

WHY?

1) I can’t understand why I can open up to some people yet to others I tend to shut down. (This is actually something I’ve been battling with for a while now. I just started to find a pattern to it so I’m still working on it)

I think understand this more. I don’t think some people can understand what I go through. That’s why I am more open to sharing with some people and not others because I can tell who will be more receptive and who will just give me their opinion when they don’t really understand at all.

2) I tend to have moments when I can be as happy as ever yet pretty much in a split second I can turn around and be holding back tears.

This is the depression thinking.

3) It’s a good thing I blog out stuff now, but still somewhat bad because I feel like I still have to go through it by myself

I'm learning that after I overthink to myself, I'm more willing to share with people. But I tend to open up all of a sudden because most of the time I spent suppressing it until I feel like I'm going to burst. It all depends on who I'm talking with.

4) I’m still not willing to burden people with my deeper feelings. (again my blog is somewhat helping with opening me up. Just too bad I can’t do that in front of people)

This is still true, I don’t think some people can deal with drama, and do their best to avoid it. That’s why I don’t bother trying to open up to these people, they don’t want drama, I won’t give them any. And also sometimes, these people don’t open up to me so I don’t really have much more to say on that.......

5) I use sports to release anger. Whether I like it or not, I tend to be a angry person.

I think if you watch me play sports, there’s competitiveness and there’s me blowing off steam. It’s a bit noticeable but sometimes I dont’ even notice til about midgame and I'm like...wtf?

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I have most of these symptoms that make me think somethings pretty wrong (if I continue to feel this way, I might go talk to a doctor about it)

Common Symptoms of Clinical Depression
There are different forms of clinical depression with different combinations of the following symptoms:

Physical:

Sleep disturbances-insomnia, oversleeping, waking much earlier than usual
Changes in appetite or eating: much more or much less
Decreased energy, fatigue
Headaches, stomachaches, digestive problems or other physical symptoms that are not explained by other physical conditions or do not respond to treatment

Behavioral/Attitude:

Loss of interest or pleasure in activities that were once enjoyed, such as going out with friends, hobbies, sports, sex, etc.
Difficulty concentrating, remembering, or making decisions
Neglecting responsibilities or personal appearance

Emotional:

Persistent sad or "empty" mood, lasting two or more weeks
Crying "for no reason"
Feeling hopeless, helpless, guilty or worthless
Feeling irritable, agitated or anxious
Thoughts of death or suicide

I Will Remeber You

2009-03-11T22:28:00.000-07:00

It just hit me. It happened last night, I somewhat have an idea of what I was doing at the time. Last night the world lost a wonderful person. She was a wife, a mother, a daughter, a friend and a teacher. When my friend informed me of D.W.'s passing, it hit me a bit. I cried. Then the next day I had a lot to do so I tried to push this behind me until a later time. I had a terrible nights sleep, so throughout the whole day I felt pretty beat. There were certain times during the day where I would think about D.W. and the feeling I got when she talked to me when I was little. I've known this woman most of my life. Her kids grew up with my brothers and I. I can't even imagine what's going through their heads and hearts. I was totally tired and beat during dodgeball, even when I started getting competitive, I still couldn't throw. And now my arm has like pulsating pains coming and going. It was when I saw my parents the facts hit me. I didn't want to cry in front of my parents so I waited til I was in the bathroom. I finally let it out. Reason why I was quiet today, reason why I can't throw, reason why I'm tired, is because the passing of this family friend hit me since yesterday, I just suppressed it til now. Which is what I usually do with my feelings. I think because it was the end of the day and I was tired, nothing really stopped me from feeling what I was supposed to be feeling. I think about my family's "counter-part" siblings and I wonder how they are doing. I know they are an extremely close family and that they are incredibly strong. They will get through this, together. It's times like these that I don't really know what to think about or how to act. I'm terrible with death. I try to be there for my friends who have dealt with it, but I'm never completely sure how I can help. And in the past I've had some issues with dealing with death. I was completely scared and angry at it. I felt that no one should be close with anyone else because in the end you'll probably just end up losing them. I still sometimes feel that way. But in my elementary to highschool transition I learned that I didn't have to fear death. That death did not always mean that life is over, it means that now we can start our spiritual life with God and our loved one's who we have lost.

It's weird. I didn't think it'd hit me and cause me to feel this down. She had cancer. So we all had time to cope with it, but I think a lot of us were just praying for a miracle. Might sound stupid, but I didn't think she was going to pass away. I really thought that she would fight and win. She most definitely fought, but sadly there couldn't be a miracle this time.

Auntie D. I miss you. I can't imagine going to North Shore and you not being there. I will never forget you. You always bring a smile to my face and to the faces of everyone you interact with. I know you are with God now, and that you are no longer in any pain.

Lost Generation Video

2009-03-03T22:31:00.000-08:00

Wow.

Friggin' Hell

2009-02-26T22:48:00.000-08:00

so this past week i've been a bitch. i've been soo irritated by everything and everyone. i'm not PMSing, but for some reason i'm just become very agitated by everyone.

and now i'm annoyed of myself because i feel like i'm a bitch to other people and they are getting annoyed by my-ass-of-a-self...

friggin' hell. and to makes things worse i can't release rage in dodgeball because i already threw out my arm and my knee is messed up a bit too....so now i have to learn NOT to throw.

i'm just really really irritated about this weeek...i'm sorry if you got hit with some of my moodyness chances are it's not your fault, i'm just being a bitch. this might have all been caused with this whole week being really stressful.

effing hell, i should just do my self-defense mechanism thing....makes things easier for everyone, and myself.

Birthday Week/First Time Clubbing

2009-02-22T01:17:00.001-08:00

This past week has been hectic.

Saturday was the Anti-Valentines/Unvalentines and Graffiti Parties night. A smaller group of us headed to Julia’s house first for the Anti/Un – Valentines party, where we played some games and Julia and I were being pyro-maniacs with candles. Then I got dropped off at home and had to wait for Lisa and Amynta to pick me up so I can show them where Mon lives. Graffiti party was pretty cool. I’ve never been to one before but this was pretty cool. Basically all you need is a white shirt, markers, and a group of good friends (Drinks are optional). So you wear the shirt and just start writing on other people -random stuff. I love how my zip-up looks, soo cool. I just can’t wear the hood...(Damn Amynta). There was some interesting drawings and information that was written on shirts. I hope to go to another Graffiti party, it’s awesome.

Because I had to teach a Sunday school class the next day I couldn’t drink a lot during the Graffiti party and I had to leave early. After Sunday school class, I went home to nap. Then I had to clean up my room a bit because I had some family friends coming over to my house to eat a big turkey dinner (my mom bought a frozen turkey a while ago, but never had time to cook it...i think this was going to be my new years dinner). James called me and told me that there was a grand opening at this bbt place and I should go with him to get some bbt and he also wanted to go to this burger place downtown, then JIT called and said that he’s going to be cooking dinner at Julia’s house and I should come over. So I timed it to...eat turkey dinner at home, go with James to get BBT, then James, KWu and I will head to Julia’s place. The JIT made chicken and it was delicious =P. Then there was more pyromania and the distruction of the Rubix cube. Sunday was a very filling day.

Monday instead of starting my “Weekly Runs” with my friend, Lisa, we end up going to lunch at Red Robbins with two other friends. One, The JIT, was heading to China on Wednesday and the other, Amynta, was going to Korea for 5 months on Sunday. After lunch we decided we should go watch a movie. We were going to watch ‘Shopaholic’ but instead watched ‘Push’. ‘Push’ has a good storyline idea I just thought the acting somewhat sucked, and same with some of the special effects (e.g. telekinesis powers). This may not just be the movie’s fault but also the fact that I watched ‘Charmed’ for so many years. After the movie I had to rush home and get ready for Dodgeball. That night was the first week for my brand new team, ‘The Procrastinators’. First thing my co-captain and I told our team is that we don’t expect much. And also that we are going to sit off first. Wow, our team did surprisingly well. I was really really impressed.

On Tuesday, it was my 20^th birthday. What did I do? I showed up for my one, 1 hr class and did not pay attention at all. I then headed home to take a nap, instead, I sat in bed playing games and MSN’ing on my laptop and watching movies on my desktop. Before dodgeball the JIT and I had dinner plans at Julia’s place again, this time the JIT made SALMON. OMIGOOSSHHH THIS WAS THE BEST AND JUICIEST SALMON I HAVE EVER TASTED IN MY LIFE!!!!!! SOO DELICIOUS, I WISH THE JIT WAS BACK IN VANCOUVER SO I CAN TRY SOME MORE SALMON!!!!!!!!!!!! Afterwards I had to get to dodgeball. I don’t remember much about dodgeball that night but after dodgeball we headed off to BBT and went to sing Karaoke (Karaoke thing was decided on Monday). I got hit by something and I felt soo dizzy and sleepy that night (we sang til about 2-3am). But it was really fun because weird thing is that both my brothers was there. It was also fun to watch Amynta sing because she puts her heart into it and she dances a bit too. Hahahaha.

Wednesday had their exhibition night. Out of all the Girl Scouts only Helen (Sexy Bear) and I showed up. It’s alright because it’s exhibition night. Exhibition night was alright but what happened after is the surprisingness. Okay so I’ve had this goal of going clubbing before I turn 20, and it was my mistake for telling Lisa that (because I'm starting to notice she uses this kind of information to guilt me into doing stuff). So during the last couple days since about Saturday night during Graffiti party, Amynta and Lisa has been asking me to go Clubbing for Amynta’s Goodbye Event. (just so you know, Amynta had like 4 Goodbye type events that whole week.) Amynta’s reason for why I should go is because it’s her last time clubbing in Vancouver for a few months. Lisa’s reason is because I suck and I told myself I would go clubbing before I turned 20 and get my ‘L’ both of which I hadn’t done. And Alvin and Donald also inputted their two-cents of why I should go clubbing. So I had all these people telling me I should go. And then again one Wednesday night after dodgeball the girls again continued telling me I should go...they don’t take no for an answer. Lisa just told me to go to my bag get my wallet and come back to buy the ticket... I don’t’ know what I listened to her but I think it’s the couple days of hanging out with them (I saw both Lisa and Amynta that whole week). So while in the changing room and discussing how I still might not show up to clubbing because I felt sick, they both told me I suck and said that unless I'm in the hospital, I have to show up. After that discussion they told me they are going to watch a movie and I should go to...then they proceeded to kidnapping me. (I was tired so fighting back, was a bit difficult.) This time we actually did watch ‘Shopaholic’. It was pretty damn good and pretty funny, I'm soo glad I found advil in my bag otherwise I might have passed out during the movie. After the movie we went to get some BBT at Estea (hanging out with these people has made me get bbt on a weekly basis compared to highschool days when I went like once a month). On the car ride home all I was doing was saying to myself out loud “I can’t believe I agreed to go clubbing...” Then again Lisa yells at me and laughs that it’s too late to turn back now because she’s the one picking me up on Friday...(Lisa is a such a good friend to me. >.<).

Thursday, I skipped dodgeball because I felt soo tired and sick and I thought that since I had to go to clubbing on Friday I shouldn’t try to go out that day and try to heal up a bit.

Friday has come. I was pretty nervous that whole day, mostly because I didn’t know what to expect. So the plan was that Colleen will come over to my house and help me get ready. (I can’t dress myself up worth a damn). And around 930pm Lisa and people will come pick us up from my house. Colleen and I started getting ready around 7. First was the picking of a dress. 3 choices. 1^st didn’t close because my rib/boobs are too big. Lol. 2^nd fit but I couldn’t breathe. 3^rd fit and showed...a lot. I'm a tomboy, I’ve been one my whole life. So seeing myself in that dress surprised me, and during the time I was getting ready all I did was stare at my boobs LOL. They were quite mesmerizing because I never see them like that in a dress. So anyways, before I could leave the house my mom HAD to see what I was wearing...because my explanation of what I was doing that night in Chinese was, I'm going dancing. So my mom saw me in the dress and she said flat out. Are you kidding me? NO. But Lisa was almost at my place so there was no time to argue, all I could do was scream I love you mom...and then run out the door....LOL. yes I'm a chicken. And as I walk up to Lisa’s car I see the smiling...no...laughing faces of Amynta and Lisa (again, such great friends >_<). So I had a couple of friends who said they’ll call me or contact me at some point during the night to make sure I'm alive and safe. And there were ‘rules’ that were assigned to me on what I can and can’t do at the club. As we walked from the parking garage to the club I was freezing my ass off!! Clubbing during winter...not that great. So we went into Fabric got ID’d, they patted me down for weapons and checked my purse (still not that great of a security system, but with all the people coming in, guess it’s the best they got). Checked-in our jackets and then I stood around uncomfortably. LOL. I did this a bit that night. So I went to talk to the guys. Then Amynta and Bekka pulled me into drink some shots with them. And I started to loosen up a bit, but I was still very aware of myself. I think for me to do this properly I have to take like 2 shots every hour or so just to loosen up. Now people started dancing...we were there a bit early so it was kinda dead. It started out with just the girls dancing...for some weird reason I found this somewhat uncomfortable...hahahaha might be the dancing (I can’t/don’t dance..in public), people dancing with me, or the way the girls danced with me, for some of them, they started dancing in a way that I'm not too comfortable with and my dress prevented me from dancing that way, so I kinda just stood there like and idiot while they continued to dance like that.....hahaha after like 5-10 min..I walked away to grab the guys. Dancing with guys is sooo much easier then dancing with girls...I guess for the fact that guys don’t really dirty dance.. LOL at least the guys I danced with didn’t dance like that. But all in all it was alright. I seriously can’t dance and I think a couple more shots would have helped me loosen up some more. But because I really didn’t want to be drunk or throw up that night, I just endured with the dancing and the uncomfortableness. Luckily there was like a million people so it’s harder to notice me hehehe. After hours passed but only seemed like 1 or 2 hours (we left around 2am and I thought, wow that was really short...and it’s still really early). But my feet were killing me and Amynta was starting to become a bit tipsy so it was off to No.9 we go. Drunk Amynta is quite an interesting sight. She becomes quite angry and verbal to everyone...even those who aren’t near her, yay to cell phones. I'm just happy she was angry and not pukey. So during our late night meal, my mom calls me...(I'm snapped back to reality and remember that she’s still pissed). She’s asking were I am, when I'm getting home, and to hurry up. Boy I could hear the anger in her voice. My mom usually sleeps at 11pm...she stayed up til 3am for me to get home. During the rest of the meal I was trying to figure out how I could fix this, and prevent my ass from getting kicked when I got home. At this point Lisa said she’ll come in to try to talk to my mom and Amynta said she’ll come over the next day to talk to my mom. I told them both that, that’s a pretty bad idea because I dont’ want my mom to remember them for that. My plan was just to say it was all my idea, and just reassure my mom that I was safe the whole time. Got home and my mom was standing in the dark at the top of the stairs, I couldn’t see her but I can see how mad she was... I swear I felt her anger when I was coming out of Lisa’s car and going towards my house. What I usually do for when I piss off my mom is hug her and smash kisses onto her cheek and just keep saying sorry. Which is what I did when I got upstairs. I reassured her that I was safe the whole night and was ALWAYS with friends. I didn’t drink ANYTHING (I'm not going to tell her about the 2 shots.) and again reassure her that I was okay. This might not have been that smart because afterwards I smelled my hair and it just smelled like smoke LOL.

So Lesson learned.

1) NEVER GET READY AT HOME

2) WEAR FLATS

3) Go with a group of friends and have guys that are willing to dance

4) DRINK before and during

5) It was smart to bring runners for after clubbing

6) Tell mom I'm sleeping at someone’s house.

7) RED BULL IS MY BEST FRIEND. Drink one before, and after (if needed, because you need to take care of drunks)

8) Club in the Summer, it’d be easier

9) Go with Good friends who likes to dance

10) Have FUN =D

And yes, I'll probably go again...eventually.

Road to Gold - COMPLETED

2009-02-06T02:45:00.000-08:00

Keep in mind that this was supposed to be posted up around January 27, 2009.

It's been a little over a week since my last post. The past week has been pretty good. Got to spend some time with some friends and catch up. This week we had a party for my friend Victoria to celebrate her career change. It was really fun to have a dinner at someone's home, with all of us gathered around the table and even toasting to the Vic. After dinner we were all chatting up and trying to do chin-up to gain access into my friend’s room. Afterwards we headed out to Gal Chae to sing some Karaoke. I enjoyed myself while singing K. Although I don't think I sing as well as [I think] I use to sing, but it didn't stop me from trying to sing out loud and proud =P. Singing old-school songs makes me really happy. After singing K we headed back to the Bao’s Maison and watched some dodgeball videos and then watched late comers try to do chin-ups and fail. It was quite hilarious watching people punch walls, fall to the ground, jump and land in the room.

So today I’ll be talking about ‘My Road to Gold’. Sadly I'm not talking about winning a gold medal from Olympic (maybe one day...). So yes my road to gold...As many of you may know I play dodgeball and I am completely in love with it.

Genesis – The Start of My Dodgeball Career.

I started playing in 2006, when I was 17 (I'm supposed to be 18 to play in the league...hehehe). My first team ever was the ‘Power Rangers’ with my brother and his girlfriend and her brother and their friends. I remember when my brother, Eric, first asked me to start playing dodgeball. It was spring 2006, and I just finished dinner and was in my room playing on my computer. Eric calls my cell and asks...actually TELLS me that I'm going to be playing dodgeball, put on some shorts and he’ll be in front of the house in 5 min. In my head I was thinking, why is my brother playing dodgeball? Dodgeball is just throwing rubber balls around; I'm going to get killed!! But since he gave me no choice (because he just hung up) I got ready and prepared for my first taste of dodgeball. I was really excited and scared. I was excited because I’ve seen people play dodgeball on TV but I have never played it for real. I jump into the car with Eric and the rest of the Power Rangers. On our way to DT they explain the rules to me. Here’s how it goes:

Hey so you ready to play dodgeball?

Yeah, I guess.

So here are the rules. Have you watched the Dodgeball movie?

Yeah

That’s it.

Oh...okay.

Don’t worry you’ll get it as you play.

Okay...

As I walked into the DT gym, I just felt the energy of this new sport. I see people tossing the rhino skinned foam balls around and just warming up. Then I see some familiar faces. It was the then called Preparation H team, now known as EDA. On this team I see my eldest brother, Peter, and his group of highschool friends. I was extremely surprised to see both my brothers playing dodgeball. Until dodgeball started, I barely talked or saw either of my brothers.

First Game

After Eric’s explanation of the rules of dodgeball, I was pretty excited to play. I kept thinking, “It’s just foam balls with rubber skin, how hard could they throw?” Then I see a ball fly right by me at a fast speed, I thought it was going to hit my head! I was so amazed at how fast pace this game of dodgeball went. People were jumping around dodging balls; they were throwing balls that would hit the wall hard with an intimidating hard bang. I don’t exactly remember my first game and how I did, but I'm pretty sure I sucked. But I do remember the first person I hit out in the league. Just so happened to be my big brother, Peter. I was so surprised I hit him, because I have never actually tried to throw a ball AT someone. I was very happy and proud of myself that I hit my big brother out.

First Playoffs

Wow. After many weeks of league play and getting a “hang” of the game, it was finally time for playoffs. I thought league nights was pretty intense, but PLAYOFFS. WOW. Being in playoffs felt amazing, I haven’t felt that kind of energy in a long time. This was my first playoffs in Dodgeball and I was a bit worried, I didn’t have much hope in my Power Rangers team in winning since we were all still kind of noob together. But I loved playing with Power Rangers. With the Power Rangers I was allowed to play my best without worries. I can just do my best and have fun. We didn’t have high expectations, we just did our best. And that’s how all sports should be played, to the best of our abilities.

Under the Radar - Discovery

The Power Rangers are known as the underage team that infiltrated VDL. Half our team members were not of legal age to be in the dodgeball league, but we all loved it so much that we would try our best to always have good sportsmanship and spirit to stay under the radar. We could not risk having any of the execs figure out that we weren’t all legal yet. Then the day we hoped never would happen, happened. We were finally discovered, one of my underage teammates was at school and one of the execs happened to be subbing at that school that day. They saw each other and soon after that there were emails between the execs and the Power Rangers were outed as an underage team. But since we were very well behaved (i.e., never fought with refs or player, go to pub night etc.) the execs decided we were allowed to stay in the league and continue to play.

Excuses – Season 3: New Beginnings

Around Season 3, VDL started Thursday League Nights. Of course I wanted to play some more but I didn’t have a team. Four weeks before playoffs (you need 4 weeks of play to be eligible for playoffs) a girl named Ellie found me on Facebook and asked if I wanted to play for her Thursday night team, Excuses. At first I found this pretty creepy (because I didn’t know who she was, and I’ve never been approached by a VDL player because I’ve spent previous seasons being under the radar to prevent execs from finding out that I'm underage, but in season 3 I was of legal age so I didn’t mind playing for them). After a couple wall-to-wall chats on Facebook I agreed to sub for her team that week, but didn’t promise to join their team in case they were weird and stuff. As I was getting ready to go play I was really excited and scared about playing for another team. This will be my first team with no family associations. That means no backup in case these guys were creepy but it also meant that I had nothing to hold me back. We were at St. Patrick’s gym; it felt extremely weird to be playing dodgeball for a team where I didn’t know anyone. But my love for the game made that uneasy feeling go away. And playing for this team was really fun, I kept thinking maybe one day I'll win the gold with them...but again I was still somewhat noob for dodgeball so that was only a dream. After that first night of Thursday night dodgeball with the Excuses, I decided that I'll join their team for the rest of the season. During one of the weeks at St. Pats I was trying to jump up and to dodge a ball but then in mid-air the opposing guy throws the ball and it gets stuck in my legs, I come back to the ground and it’s still in between my legs, everyone was just staring at me and we’re all like...uh, I think she just caught it. This team marks the start of my weird catches, and being known for making weird-ass catches. The Excuses made me the player I am today.

Excuses ended the season at playoffs with 5^th place.

Excuses – Season 4

This season is when the Excuses did a lot of team bonding events outside of dodgeball, that I think made us a stronger team. We started doing weekly dedication and somehow formed a friendly rivalry with the team, Spartans. We had a 15-0 night this season. It was amazing I remember counting in my head our wins and I noticed that we didn’t lose any of our games that night, and of course I wasn’t going to mention it until after the games because I didn’t want to jinx it. But my teammate, Keith, mentions it before our last game. He ends up being last against 4 guys (I swear if he lost that game I was going to smack him!!). In the end Keith stepped up and took out all 4 guys. That 15-0 night was like winning playoffs for me. We headed to our favourite restaurant after games, White Spot. Days before playoffs Excuses strategize. We were kind of being jerks and posted pictures of teams on our Facebook group (now removed) of potential people to be feared, and those who we don’t have to worry about. It was all out of fun, but we pissed off some people, so our Facebook group becomes private until after playoffs LOL. The playoffs were a major blow to us, mostly because we were at a great momentum and then during semi-finals there were some bad calls made and that just brought us down. What also brought us down was the fact that my teammate and I were EXTREMELY sick that day and was just popping halls all day long. I spent most of my time worrying about chocking.

Season 4 Excuses ended the season with 1^st place 105wins-30losses overall league nights.

Royal Family eliminates us and we end with 4^th place in the playoffs.

Excuses – Season 5 “The DARK Season”

This season was painful for us. Our team was basically not very committed because half the team had other sports to do so we had 2 players rotating playing time each week and Keith had hockey to focus on so he could only make it to half our games. The start of the “Dark” season was exhibition night. I showed up to the gym by myself and the rest of my team didn’t show up at all. I felt pretty cruddy and to make things worse...my brother’s team, DDR, came up to me and said, “Grace, we would have never done this to you. Too Bad.” Hahahah that pissed me off too. But it was all out of fun. Weeks before league started DDR was trying to recruit me but I was too loyal to Excuses. That night after many emails to the rest of the Excuses, starts our new rivalry with team DDR. In the playoffs we sweeped the team M-150 formally known as the feared team, HATESAUCE. We beat our rival team Spartans after an intense 5 game series. But was eliminated by Royal Family and Tap Some Balls

Excuses ends up with 3^rd place overall and 3^rd place in playoffs

Eliminated by Tap Some Balls and Royal Family

Excuses – Season 6: Road to the Playoffs

At the start of the season, I didn’t think much about the team, probably because of how we played during last season’s playoffs. I was also going through some personal things at the time, so playing dodgeball wasn’t much of a priority for me. But the team made a promise to each other. 6 players come out each week, fully committed! And we also decided that this will be our last season together. To be truthful, we played like crap for the first 5 weeks. We were all there but I don’t think we were all “there”. Half the team has a talk during some late night sushi, and we all decided that we are going to change things up. We will have new uniforms, we will do team cheers, we will reinstate or nightly dedications and of course my favourite – we will have a catching contest! Our new uniforms consist of us having black shirts with the words ‘No Excuses’ on them. This is meant to remind us that this is our last season, there’s no reason to hold back, there’s no reason that we can’t win. There are NO EXCUSES. The catching thing was kind of my idea because since season 5 I have been obsessive compulsive about keeping track of how many catches I make for each night I play (I have a spreadsheet to keep track...). The final agreement is that whoever makes the most catches by the end of the season will get free bubble tea from Keith. Our team’s momentum and morale just SKYROCKETS! We played to win, not just against other teams, but against each other. We all wanted some free Bubble Tea, especially at Keith’s expense! And my weird catching streak continues. During one of the league nights I was playing and ended up on the ground, I knew if I got up right away I’d be hit out so I'm just sliding back as fast as I can. Somehow during the motion of sliding back my legs are pushed up into the air so my shoes won’t drag and slowdown my sliding, someone from team S.H.I.T. (Rogan) throws the ball and it ends up getting stuck between my legs (okay, it got stuck between my legs near my crotch). I looked at the ref and then I looked at the player who threw it and then watched my teammate run back into the game. Turns out I caught it!! I was very confused because I really thought I didn’t but the refs said the ball didn’t touch the ground so it counts.

Excuses – Playoffs: November 30, 2008 12:30pm!!

The day has come. The day to show everyone that we are the best and that we deserve to be Champions. I was EXTREMELY sick that day, I had a terrible cough and my throat was hurting. I felt like if I ran too hard/fast I would pass out. And to make matters worse I had a sore back because of dodgeball for the past few weeks before playoffs. During our last week of league night games I slammed my back into a wall trying to make a catch, I made the catch but I was so sick and tired that night and my teammate, Coop PICKED me up spinned me a couple times and kind of dropped me on the ground after. That night was painful. So during playoffs I was eating halls and other throat candy to stop me from coughing like crazy during my games so I could focus. I was also putting a lot of back cream on my back, because it was hurting a lot that day. First few games were a blur to me. What I remember most are our games against Royal Family and DDR. We went up against DDR: The JIT Remix, first. These games were intense!!! DDR was killing us 2-0 then we finally stepped up and finished them with 3 straight wins. DDR is basically my brother, Peter, and his highschool friends. Both our teams are good friends so it was fun to play competitive against them. During these games I knew DDR was on fire and I was not willing to throw unless I had to. So whenever I see one of my guy teammates without a ball I’d run right in front of them and pass them a ball. With my teammate’s accurate throwing, this was the best strategy for the team. Even though I wanted to throw, I was not willing to risk my balls being caught for a kill.

“We are not a team of heroes, but instead a heroic team”

-Dylan Cooper

I loved the games against DDR. I made a major catch against my brother and I got balls to my teammate in time to knock out another player. I would have loved to play finals against DDR. After DDR we played our Semi-Final games against Royal Family. In previous seasons, Royal Family has contributed to the Excuses elimination. This season we were not going to give them the satisfaction. Last season we sat down for long periods of time and lost momentum when we tried to play again. This season we made sure we warmed up before our games. We would not lose momentum. The semi games of Royal Family vs. Excuses ended with 3-1 for the Excuses. Ellie made an awesome game/series winning catch, and I made one of the girl-iest jumps I’ve ever done and it was caught on video too. I remember that moment so well. Eddie and Ellie had balls and were throwing at each other. Then when Ellie was ball-less Eddie made his move and shot the ball at Ellie. I was right beside Ellie at that moment and watched as Eddie’s ball made its way across court to Ellie’s face. The ball bounced off Ellie’s face and was flying up, I was about to make my reach for it but then I told myself I shouldn’t because Ellie can still make that catch. So I just stood beside her in anticipation to watch her try to catch, or be prepared to pick up the ball and use it. Ellie made a 180° spin after getting hit in the face and caught the ball!! As soon as she caught it, I made my girliest jump ever. You can see it in game 4 of the semi final between Excuses and Royal Family. Excuses made it to the finals. This was the furthest we’ve ever gone. I was totally pumped up. I was ready to take on whatever challenger we had to face. But before Finals can occur we had to figure out who we’d play against, so the games of DDR vs. RF occurred. I was cheering my heart out for DDR to win. Mostly because it’s a family team and also I would love to play against them for the championship, I find that I have the most intense games with DDR. In the end RF won 3-1 against DDR. Up next were the final moments before the championship games

Excuses – Playoffs: For all the Marbles!!

This was it. This is for everything we’ve worked for in the last 10 weeks. This is what we’ve been fighting for, for the past 4 seasons. This is what we deserve. Minutes before our game I was chewing on my Halls candy and just jumping up and down. I felt really nervous to be playing my hardest with so many people around but I also think that I would play my very best because so many people are around. I thought I needed to warm up because I haven’t played in like 15min and I was cooling down, fast. I ended up forcing myself to do lines and throw the ball around. With every throw I just got more nervous. Then the moment of truth has come. It was the Finals. It was time to show the rest of the league what we can do. We were going to give it our all and won’t stop until we win it all! This won’t be like previous season and we end up getting eliminated in the end by the Royal Family. There are NO EXCUSES!! The battle against Royal Family was long and hard. Although as I watch the videos right now, all 4 games added together did not last longer than 10 min. But when you are in the game, it just seems to take forever. When I am playing sports I usually never keep score. I just play the best to my ability and take every win as it is. And I start every game as if it’s my last.

GAME 3

There were only two games I remember the best. Game 3 near the end of the match it was Ellie, Wing and I vs. Tijana and Byron. RF players took out Ellie together and in doing so they hurt her thumb (which was already injured). When I saw that Ellie’s hand was hit, my first priority was to check if she’s okay. All she did was yell at me to keep playing while she walked off on her own. I was now mad and ready to explode (I wasn’t mad at Tijana and Byron for hitting her injured hand, they didn’t aim there, and it was an accident. But my teammate was injured so I felt like I had to defend her). It was Wing and I against Tijana and Byron. First objective, we hit out Byron (You always take out those who seem to be a bigger threat, with Byron’s throw and the fact that he’s a guy, made him a bigger threat). During our throw against Byron, Byron released his ball and hit Wing. Double Elimination between Byron and Wing. And also during that moment, Tijana released her ball and I dodged and end up falling on my ass, HARD (I felt pain traveling from my but to my back and into my stomach). Tijana and I are left. 10 second countdown to SHOWDOWN has begun. I had one throw left in me (especially after that fall); I wind up (the count is at 5 seconds left) and try to throw the ball as hard as I can at Tijana (3-2-1 Showdown).

Showdown of the Year

I hate showdowns, I usually die in showdowns. During one of my Underground Dodgeball Session with other dodgeball people we started having a mini showdown tournament. I had to play/practice against Coop. It was terrible out of like 10 games, I only won 1 game. Coop kept telling me that I was leaving myself too open and I'm always going to get killed unless I change my playing style. I always keep this moment in mind when I have a showdown. I always remember that I have to play defensive (this may not always work for other people, but it works best for me) and to do this, I have to make sure I ALWAYS have at least one ball in hand. I`m standing at the wall gripping the balls tightly with both my hands, I hear the crowd cheering my name, and all I am doing is repeating the same thing over and over again to myself. “Do not lose, do not let go of this ball, do whatever you have to do to win!!” The awaited words are said, “Players are you ready?” ” “Yes” (I totally wasn’t, but I think I play the best under pressure) “3-2-1 Showdown!” We both make our way to the center line, inching closer and closer to our respective center court balls. I roll my ball forward, making sure I never take my eyes off Tijana or her balls. We get closer, wind up. Both of our first balls are released and miss. I reach for the center ball and prepare to block as I see Tijana wind up for the 2^nd throw. I do one of my jump dodge/block things. I am safe.

Tijana scatters to reach for another ball and tries to hit me out before I get up. I jump and dodge/block again. I am still safe.

Tijana is out of balls. This is my chance, it’s all or nothing! I had no time to get up and onto my feet. I wind up my ball and throw with all the might I could muster up while kneeling on the ground, and at the same time, Tijana decides instead of running away from my throw she’s going to come at me. The ball bounces off her. I am still kneeling on the ground waiting for cheers to come from either the Excuses or Royal Family. I hear Tijana landing on the ground and then cheers erupt from the Royal Family. At this moment, I fall to the ground and release the ball I told myself never to let go. My head was going crazy I felt so crappy after those 18 seconds of play. These thoughts all ran through my head as I was lying in self-pity. “Dammit, I lost it for my team!” “I should have stood up and threw harder!” “I should have killed her when I had the chance during the last set before this showdown.” “I can’t believe I just lost, I am so tired.” “I wonder if that was it, and I can just lie here and stop playing for a while”

Little did I know that the ball had bounced off me before Tijana caught it. Therefore, the ball was officially dead and I had hit Tijana out. Showdown win goes to the Excuses. Those 18 seconds of Dodgeball was the most intense 18 seconds I’ve ever had in the league. I felt so much pressure and my own competitiveness to win. I was so sure I lost and that games were done (Again, I don’t keep count of wins/losses as I am playing sports). I was also extremely tired and hoping the games were over, so I could stay on the ground and just rest. I was ready to stay on the ground and just lie there for the rest of the night. Those dodges made my sore back feel a lot worse. I was sick, my back was aching, I was sweating like crazy (from playing hard, and I might have had a fever too), and I felt like crap because I thought I lost the game. My teammates just came over to where I was lying and picked me up. I remember the words Keith said to me as they were holding me and making sure I was okay. “Grace, I know you are in pain right now but we can finish this!” Our team made a promise to give our 100% to all our games. As soon as I heard Keith say those words to me, I knew I could play until we finish off the Royal Family. I was ready to give all the energy I had left for the upcoming game (turns out to be our last game before we seal the deal on the championship) and as many more games until I know we have won.

LAST GAME

The game was just as intense as the other games. Excuses were now up 2-1. We just needed this last win. At first Excuses did not look like they were going to win, within 30 seconds of the game 2 of our guys were caught out and 1 was hit out. I was still tired and trying to recover fast from the showdown. Royal family had possession of 5 of the 6 balls and was targeting Coop. I had one ball in hand; I needed to time it properly so I can hit one of the players out. And try to gain an advantage a better chance for our team. Coop dodged all 5 balls and shot one out at Truong and hit him. I, however, didn’t know he was hit and I was in the middle of doing a hit and run (I ran up to the line hit Truong in the chest and then ran away); 3 vs. 4.

Eddie hits Ellie out next. Coop and I are left with possession of all 6 balls. Coop hits C-Belle out. Coop and I throw cross court, I hit Byron on the foot, and Coop hits Tijana out. Eddie is last. He attempts to try and take out Coop and myself. Eventually both Coop and I get possession of a ball. Eddie’s running back, Coop and I wind up and release.

I watched as Coop’s ball flies towards a kneeled Eddie’s head but hits the wall,

then I see my own ball make its way to Eddie’s stomach and extremely close to his ‘Box’ (Catching Zone) “Oh no!!!! I didn’t throw hard and/or low enough, he’s going to catch it!!!!!”

Then I watched as my ball hit Eddie and flies away.

Cheering EXPLODES throughout the gym! Excuses just became Season 6 Thursday Night Champions! (I didn’t know that, that game was the last one. I just assumed we still had another game. Eventually all the cheering got to me and figured out we just became Champs). First few thoughts that came to mind, “I can’t believe it’s over and we are now champs!” “Thank God it’s over!!!!!!!”

Medal Distribution

For the past few seasons, the thought of winning the championship did not really occur to me. I’ve always just played for fun. Then I became ‘Baby Excuse’ (Youngest of the Excuses) and found a team that team was strong enough to win it. But for 3 seasons we just didn’t have enough to get the gold. I always thought that I would probably cry if I ever won a championship from VDL. After the games were over I was coughing like crazy and just ready to pass out. While they announced Excuses as Thursday night Champs, I was lying on the ground slowly dying.

I was so happy and so very exhausted. As the Execs are placing the gold around my neck I just felt so proud and happy at that moment. Everything seemed so surreal.

Next was the announcement of the Most Valuable Player award. Again, in all my seasons of playing in dodgeball, I’d never imagine even receiving the MVP award. Never thought of myself to be good enough for that. So I was just standing with the Excuses admiring my cool new medal and I was announced as the youngest female MVP. A mix feeling of happiness, exhaustion, and uncertainty went through my mind as I went up front to get the MVP trophy. It’s the MVP award of course I was happy!! I was exhausted and so I thought I heard them wrong, and then I see my teammates cheer me on. As I went for the award Coop, in his happiness picks me up and spins me.

As I spun around over and over again, I felt sicker but also extremely ecstatic. It really happened, The Excuses are champions and I just received the MVP award.

The rest of the Excuses come over to congratulate and hug me. Then I feel Keith hug me and all hits sweat hit my face (Excuses guys have a tradition of hugging the girls in moments of happiness and also to hug sweat onto us =__=). Ellie quickly runs and points and screams, “Look she’s crying!!” I quickly reply with, “Ewwwww, no it’s not tears, Keith just wiped his sweat on me.” I was so happy that I was speechless.

Congratulations Excuses as the Fall 08 Thursday Night Division Champions, I couldn’t be any prouder to be called, “Baby Excuse”

My Corny Speech to the Excuses

‘Excuses’ is one of the only teams I am willing to go all out for, even if I’m sick. I have been injured and continued playing, in previous playoffs I have also been sick but that did not stop me from downing a couple halls and keep going. 4 seasons of play together we moved from 5^th place to 4^th to 3^rd and now we are at FIRST!!

Keith the reason why I was playing so hard for this team this season is because you promised me that you are going to give your 100% all throughout the whole season. With that kind of promise, nothing in this world could have kept me down. And knowing that when it's over and I’m on the ground in my coughing huff, I will have my teammates lift me up again and help me out! Especially after that showdown against Tijana I was ready to die, but you guys came over to pick me up, Keith I heard you, "Grace I know you are in pain but we can finish this". That was enough to keep me going until we finished Royal Family off once and for all!!

WE have been through a lot these past few seasons. There were some rough times out there but in time, we pulled back and made our team stronger than ever. WE came together as individuals not knowing who the other people are, but we leave this team as good friends and we will come back and defend our titles together again, one day. I received the MVP prize because you guys helped shape the player I am today. You guys gave me my first no-family association team but in the end I just formed another family. I AM VERY THANKFUL THAT ELLIE STALKED ME ON FACEBOOK AND GOT ME TO JOIN THIS TEAM. Never been so lucky to be in a team with such great friends.

If you read all of that congrats. This whole thing ended up being 20 pages long.....But to tell you the truth, I can talk about Dodgeball for a very long time. If you are interested in joining the Vancouver Dodgeball League or some Dodgeball Tournament or just want to test it out. Leave me a message and I'll help you out. Believe me, this game is not as scary as everyone perceives it to be.

Weekend Retreat at Mt. Baker

2009-02-01T21:21:00.001-08:00

Hello Everyone.

Well the VDL execs and I are back from our retreat in the boonies of Mt. Baker. This weekend has been quite an interesting time. Full of drunken fools, major clean ups, and questionable card games. Let’s start off with Friday night.

Friday – The Road Trip
V, J, B and I headed to the boarder around 3pm…when we were supposed to head out around 2pm. We headed towards the boarder from V’s house but I fell asleep as we were leaving Marine Dr. Last thing I remember was going pass the Superstore on Marine and then waking up because Jo needed our passports. We are at the boarder and we were explaining to the customs people why we were heading to the States. We mentioned dodgeball and of course this guy never heard about playing Dodgeball. During this whole time I’m in the back seat holding back laughter because I noticed the customs officer’s name was “Hancock”. When we passed the boarder I told the other people and we were just laughing away. Few minutes before reaching the boarder our car receives a text message from a Mr. R.L. Turns out he lost his license at a mall in we were heading to, so we had to go there and try to “search” for it. We wasted a good couple hours walking around the mall but found nothing. Instead some of us did some shopping (Ray eventually finds his license in his belongings). We headed to Fred Meyer to buy some alcohol and snacks for the cabin. This is the moment I remembered that in the States I’m still considered underage! But yay to everyone else in the car who was of age…except B. Before heading to the Lodge we figured we need to get some food in us, so we head to an Olive Garden. It was delicious. We mostly filled up on breadsticks and 3 bowls of soup each and packed up our food to go after eating half of it. I felt so fat after that. Now to the Lodge we go. I think we started heading to the Lodge from Olive Garden around 8ish….after many twists and turns and stopping at the side of the road when it’s pitch black to look at the stars (which were very very beautiful because there was no street lights so we can see everything). We kinda got lost on the way up to the Lodge, and ended up at the main office. Just so happens that we were near a WI-FI hotspot so with the little battery life my laptop had left, I quickly logged on the net and went through my email to see what we are missing. We eventually get to the Lodge around 1030pm. When we got there, about half the people were drunk. I come in see E.M. and she was just about to throw up, E.L. kinda attacked me trying to hug me…or he was actually trying to attack me. T just spent the time trying to get people to take shots and spilling drinks on himself. Everyone was just a bit drunk. Then the trouble starts. Throughout this whole drinking time B decides he needs to catch up and drinks like a fish. He ends up drinking a lot and doesn’t really know to stop himself from drinking. After the 2nd cabin people leaves, B’s still running around the place and ends up beside a sleeping K. Then all of a sudden *hhuuuurrrll**. The guy threw up next to K’s bed. K was soooo pissed off, he was ready to knock the crap out of B if A and T didn’t stop him first. Then K gets a bag to B, but he somewhat missed and then he tries to “clean up” and throw away the bag….THE FRIGGIN GUY TRIES TO THROW IT OVER THE RAILING DOWNSTAIRS LIVING ROOM WHERE VIC AND I WERE SLEEPING!!!!!! Thank God for K, who saw him and stopped him before he had a chance. Then the rest of the night consist of people (A, T, and K) rotating and taking care of pukey B in the upstairs bathroom. And it was a huge pain too, because they were trying to put him on his side so he doesn’t choke on himself, but then he wouldn’t stop flipping over. In the end they ended up wedging a stool between B and the wall to keep him from flipping. Keep in mind B is now half naked because he hurled on his shirt. Around 6am Saturday morning this guy wakes up because he’s shivering like crazy. And for some reason, instead of going to the bedroom right next to the bathroom he’s crashing in, he runs to R.L and K’s room. Tells K to move over in the bed because he’s cold. K again pissed off and annoyed just got out of bed and ended up sleeping on the floor in the living room next to me and V’s pull out couch.

Saturday – Cranium Debacle
Morning after people are awake and cleaning up. E.L wakes up (he’s supposed to be in the other cabin, but was too drunk to get there) and spends the morning trying to figure out what the hell happened to him last night. And spent a good while looking for his shoes. B surprisingly, woke up. But we spent most of the morning complaining about how drunk he was and how everyone wanted to punch and just knock him out. During this time, we banned B from drinking during the rest of the trip. After seeing him that drunk, I wasn’t willing to get drunk at this retreat. Most of the group was heading to the mountain to snowboard, but we thought B was too drunk yesterday to go snowboarding today. In the end I just told him, if he wanted to go boarding he has to clean up all the vomit and shit he left upstairs. Long story short, on the way up the mountain B puked while in K’s car. And again pissed K off. I’m seriously surprised no one punched Billy during this trip. Hahahaah. So all the people who didn’t go snowboarding went to have lunch and hot tub with the other people who didn’t go. We baked some cookies, and then started watching the Robin Hood movie. I watched about 10 min. of it and then passed out on the couch. Apparently I was in a very uncomfortable position because I was just sitting there slouching back and my head was just hanging down…eventually I slowly went into fetal position on the couch. Hahahah. In the end the guys just told me to crash in the room J.C was napping in. I was too lazy to make it to the top bunk and ended up crashing on S’s bed. Few hours later the lights come on and S comes in and sees me in her bed. “Uhhhh, what are you doing in my bed??” and then I remembered I was still in the other cabin and was like, “oh crap sorry I napped and just ended up here”. Then I got all my stuff and made my way back to my cabin because it was time for the “Cook-Off”. There was sooo much food. My team made lasagna and a birthday cake for E.M By the end of the night we had soo much left over food. After dinner we decided to play Cranium. I learned that when you are in a group about 20 people and most of those people are competitive, Cranium is probably not a good idea. My team got so rigged, out of like 10 rolls we had like 8 Club Craniums, and we never win it!!!! Soo annoying. The time we spent playing it mostly consists of us arguing about rules and exceptions.

After Cranium, we were all hanging around trying to figure out what to do. Since we had soo much food left over, someone suggested RPS for food. Eventually we end up playing with cards…in a very wrong way. So someone brought up a deck of cards with like naked girls in different positions. And somehow the guys started a game of them drawing cards randomly and trying to do the pose. We have many many many hilarious pictures, but due to our rule of “what happens in Baker stays in Baker”, these pictures probably won’t get posted up. But if you happen to be at my house….hahahahah.

After all the posing and Cranium debacle-ness people started heading back to their cabin. Some of our people moved over there to watch the match of the century “Monopoly”.

This picture kinda explains what happened.

So they play til about 4am. While the rest of the people in my cabin cleaned up (check out was at 11am Sunday morning). After some clean up we decided to gather together (there was about 5 of us) on the fold out couch and lounge chairs and watch ‘A Knight’s Tale’. I didn’t get to finish the movie, I fell asleep about 20 min before the movie ended.

Sunday Morning
Nothing too special happened today. Just lots of clean-up and memories. I am supposed to study today for my midterm that is tomorrow…instead I typed out all this. Fun times. Okay I should start studying now…since it’s 9:18PM now.

This will be a post in place of “My Road to Gold” for now because I’m STILL NOT finished typing that up.

Later days.

Self-Defense Mechanism a.k.a. I'm a Dumbass!

2009-01-20T02:55:00.000-08:00

Some people have been asking me about my msn name and I’ve been kind of giving my reasons in a round-about way…Everything I’ve told them is true in a sense, but still I can’t tell them everything, mostly because I don’t really understand it either.

So why have I been calling myself a bitch? Easiest answer; because I’m acting like a bitch. Most of you haven’t actually seen me enough lately to notice this, but I and those who know me well enough have seen that I’m not acting the same. What is this “not acting the same”? One may ask. Well, from what I have noticed so far, it’s my STUPID ASS avoidance thing!!!!! I have no idea why I do this AVOIDANCE thing when something hasn’t been going the way I wanted it to go. This avoidance thing is basically less talking, less eye contact, and less of myself. And I feel like shit when I do this because I know people are trying to talk to me and then I kind of finish the conversation and just zone off to something/someone else. So lately I’m coming out of the Emo Grace and becoming somewhat “normal” Grace. At least on MSN I’m normal, but if you see me face-to-face, I’m not really completely there. It’s confusing (Think how I feel!!!) but I tend to do this a lot more than I’d like to. When I do this and people start noticing (Especially those who I’m avoiding) and they think I’m pissed off at them, so they get confused. Usually that’s not the case. Right now I feel like I send out mixed signals to people because I’m “normal” (in some sense) on MSN but when they see me in real life it’s not the same and I fell like I’m just annoying the hell out of them because I’m being a bitch and doing the hot and cold thing. Gosh I suck.

I really really really hate myself when I do this. I’ve done this many many many many many times in the past, and each time I just think of myself as a bitch and it’s true! Some of you might be like “Wow…you are…” others might think “No you aren’t, you can’t help what you are feeling” and some might even think “You need a psychiatrist”. I think all those are correct (except the one that says I’m not a bitch).

I think I do this sometimes because when I’ve been hurt by someone or start to come out of my Emo days my heart/mind starts to do what I call, “Self-Defense Mechanism” to protect myself. In some sense, this is great and it does help a bit. But this can really screw up my friendships with people. During some time last year I did this to my friend because we had a couple arguments earlier that year, and I guess my dumbass of a self never let it go and eventually stuff built up and I did the Self-Defense Mechanism. But in doing so I just screwed up this friendship to the moment that I was EXTREMELY emo and couldn’t even play dodgeball properly. My relationship with this person was completely going down the hole and there was nothing I can say/do to fix it. At one point I think we actually STOPPED being friends all together. And when I’m upset about something my brain/heart goes into overdrive and I OVERTHINK like ccraaaazzzy. So after about 2-3 weeks of overthinking, and was forced to sit in a car with this person and another friend and hearing them talk while I sit in the back wishing I was dead. I FINALLY figured out why I was being such a bitch to her. So I stayed up til about 5am writing a verry lonnnnggg ass email apologizing and explaining to her why I was such a dick. In the end we somewhat worked it out. We are friends again, but we aren’t the same as we used to be. I guess that’s just gonna be a reminder to myself that I shouldn’t be such a brat. I regret what I did. Everyday. But I keep thinking this is my mess, and I have to live with what I did. And I accept that. I’m not really that close with her anymore, but I think that’s all for the best. I don’t want to accidentally do this to her again. If I ever did that to her again, I’d probably jump in front of a car.

In conclusion, if I’m doing this to you right now, I’m really sorry and you have my permission to slap me. If I’ve done this to you in the past, I’m really sorry and again you have my permission to slap me. Actually maybe slapping won’t hurt enough, maybe you can try punching me in the face and kicking me a couple times...then maybe I’ll finally learn to stop being an idiot.

That’s all for now.

Short and Simple

2009-01-19T00:52:00.000-08:00

So I'm starting to notice I'm being a bitch again.

I should smack myself back to normal, already...

Wish it was that easy.

.

"What are some things you have wanted to say to people that you were too afraid to tell them?"

2009-01-18T20:31:00.000-08:00

ooohhh man...Throughout all these years I've held so much back. I've held my tongue because I've feared of what I have to say cannot be taken back and what I have to say would hurt someone else. And sometimes I fear what I want to say won’t be reciprocal with the other person. So this isn’t in any kind of order.

“I think I’m in love with you.”

“I’m over you” --- about 3-5 years after the first one =)

“Stop acting like a little brat or I will smack you.”

“I want to pick you up and shake some sense into you”

“Don’t call me ever again”

“I really don’t want to talk to you because whenever I talk to you, it seems to go nowhere”

“You annoy me, can you stop bugging me already?”

“You are such a hypocrite”

“I need some time, just leave me alone for a while”

“I don’t understand why I open up to you, and you just close yourself to me”

“Stop being anti-social!”

“Why can’t you get the message that I don’t want to talk to you”

“This is why I am pissed at you. You NEVER learn from your mistakes. You NEVER make yourself accountable for your mistakes. And whenever we all hang out, you somehow make some form of drama that would lead to your own misery, or someone else’s. What you did to _____ was the last straw for me. How dare you tell someone else’s personal secret to someone else!?!?!?! Especially to the one person they didn’t want to know. And what’s worse? YOU had the same effing secret and yet you spill someone else’s because you were too scared to tell yours?!?! AND you kept bringing it up after the event, when people stopped being disappointed in you. WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU DO THAT?? But then again, why should I be surprised? In our time of friendship I never trusted you enough to tell you anything personal about myself because I know in time; you’ll be the one to betray me. We were “good” friends, but we were never going to be “close” friends because I could never trust you completely. I’ve spent weeks thinking about how I will forgive you, thinking how I will make my other friends feel better, how we can just stop the pain from coming back over and over again. We would never tell you this face-to-face because you were our friend but I think that was our mistake. We should have told you after like the 3rd time you gave us this drama because that might have got you to start realizing your mistakes and maybe even learning and becoming a better person from what we have to say to you. I admit the end of our friendship was not just your fault. It was my fault for not talking to you, for not yelling at you. I shouldn’t have left it all alone and just stopped being friends with you. I should have explained it to you, talked to you, get you to talk to me. I should have been more mature and told you the truth of why I did not want to talk to you anymore. But the anger that built up within 2 years prevented me from being able to articulate any words that wouldn’t end up being a punch to your face. I hate how you treated my friends. I hate your jealousy, and thinking that EVERY guy you have a crush on is YOUR property, I hate how you make my friends feel. Funny thing is, I don’t hate you. I felt sorry for you. Even worse I worried about you. I was scared that losing us would make you even more emo. You have no idea how long I had to think about my decision before I finally decided on an action to prevent anymore pain on either side. I know you probably hate me more than anyone in this world. You probably think I’m the biggest bitch in the world, that I said some shit about you and then got everyone to stop being your friend. First of all I would never tell my friends to stop being friends with people because that’s some major immature shit. Second, the way it all ended, you are right to think I’m a bitch. Because at that moment, at that final decision, I was a bitch. I didn’t give you an explanation or anything. I just walked away. (But then again, how many times have you done that in our years of friendship? Whenever something was going bad, you’d do your best to avoid it.) After that final day, I would thinking on a weekly bases, is what I did really necessary? Maybe I should contact you and we can just talk this out? Are you going to be okay? I hope you have a support system. I hope you’ll be strong and get through this, learn from your mistakes, and just grow up. And every time I would always think “Maybe I should just forgive you one more time?” and then memories of our past just come rushing in. Your actions or the drama you gave us, outweighed how much more I am willing to take. I’m sorry this happened. I’m sorry we aren’t friends anymore. But in the end, I think this was the best decision.” -----The person and I aren’t friends anymore, but I still wonder if their life is okay.

That’s about it for now. The last one is what I held in the most and for the longest time. I’m glad I finally got it out there.

edit//

“I wish you didn’t just tell me that.”

"I"m Jealous" ------losing a friend to someone else...

"Why do you like her?"

“I'm sorry...” ---- sometimes apologizing isn't that easy.

Amnesia

2009-01-16T12:23:00.000-08:00

So I tend to be a bit morbid sometimes...well I tend to be more morbid when I am blogging/typing stuff out. The person you see me, face-to-face, isn't really the same person I am on this blog. This blog I'm allowed to be myself, I get to vent, and I get to just let almost everything out. This has been very good for me, because I tend not to be able to share my emotions with people that well.

I have a topic in mind today...I'm sorry but it will be a bit emo…Sort of.

So I spend a lot of my time thinking, what would happen if something happened to me? Who will be there beside me? Who will turn their back on me? One of these "accidents" I think about is, what if I hit my head somewhere (as some of you know, I can be a bit clumsy sometimes) and get amnesia. Short term or long term = there are many pros/cons to this. Yes this post is a bit conceited, but again this is the blog where I can spill my guts. This is the sort of thing I would never actually talk with people about, because I do find it pretty conceited.

I tend to have an obsessive compulsive personality, and I also tend to worry about things a lot. So when I think about this Amnesia thing, I think about whether I should write a note to myself telling me the most important stuff that has happened to me recently that I don't want to forget. Or like tell me stuff like passwords to stuff that will help me access things that would help me in remembering.

In my life, just like anyone else, I like to forget about past regrets. There are so many things in my life I wish I could redo. Many words that were exchanged, when I could have said something else. I’ve done some things that I will never be proud of. There were friendships I wish I spent more time solidifying and friendships that I wish never happened.

All this wishing and hoping and dreaming that I can somehow, someway, someday, change my past are pointless. Life is full of ups and downs. We have to go through things that give us pain or happiness. Us with adversity people learn, they grow. If I didn’t go through any of the hardships I’ve gone through in the past, I wouldn’t be the person I am today. The question is, Am I proud of the person I’m starting to become?? Sometimes I think yes, I’m a good person. Other times I doubt I’m a good person for the way I treat some people. I wonder what makes person considered “good”.

There are many times in my life I wish I had amnesia to erase the pains of my past. But if that happens I’ll be giving up the happy times in my life, and I think my happiness outweighs the pain… I guess that’s the most important things we should keep in mind when we think like this.

But I think if I ever did get Amnesia, I don't have to worry about remembering the good times, because I have the most FANTASTIC support system in the world with my friends and family. =)

$3.5 Million

2009-01-15T21:23:00.000-08:00

Recently a friend told me about a Craigslist posting about some girl who's selling her virginity to the highest bidder. She says this money is meant to pay for her tuition. Last I heard was that she was offered $3.5 MILLION!! It amazes me what people do with/for money these days. This girl is willing to sleep with some stranger for money, this is like a one time thing but this would be considered prostitution still. It's just "New-Age" prostitution. Then I continue to think,

what would I do for $3.5 Million?
What would you do?

The chief value of money lies in the fact that one lives in a world in which it is overestimated.

H. L. Mencken (1880 - 1956)

Birds of Prey

2009-01-13T19:56:00.000-08:00

My sleep cycle has been terrible these past few days. I’ve been sleeping at 4am and waking up around 11am or earlier. And when I get home from school or wherever, I end up taking a nap, which adds on to my problem sleeping at night. Which is extremely weird, before this started happening, I had the ability to sleep at night without a problem, even if I did nothing that whole day except nap a couple times. So now I’m kind of screwed and hope that I can fix my sleeping schedule soon.

Today was a pretty eventful day. My brother was nice enough to offer me a ride to school today. So we parked at a church near my school. As I got out and started walking I saw something weird on the yard of the church near a bush. There was a huge eagle like bird. At first my brother thought it was an owl, but because I learned a lot about owls when I was little, I knew it wasn’t. This bird had a lot of eagle like features, except that it was fat. As my brother got a closer look (because he wanted to scare it away…and or kick it) he came back to me to report that that bird just killed/ate a pigeon. There was a lot of white stuff near it, and I couldn’t make it out. Turns out it was feathers of the pigeon. As my brother and I stood on the sidewalk and just stared at the bird, it continued to stand on the carcass of the pigeon and tear through it. I looked at this in amazement; I kept wondering if that eagle really killed that pigeon, or just ate something that had died already. This amazed me because this is the circle of life, survival of the fittest. But living in the city you don’t really see survival of the fittest in the animal kingdom.

After class I decided to walk by that area again to see if the Eagle is still feasting. The eagle was gone and he didn’t leave much behind. Sometimes I think it would be better in life if I wasn’t human, maybe it would have been better if I was an Eagle or something, just soaring through the sky. No problems, issues, or drama. Just to fly and live. And be free.

Today the awesome person that I am decides to walk home from school. I walked all the way from W.49th to Knight, then from Knight to E.37th. This walk was actually quite quick and refreshing. Last time I did this it took me 1.5hrs, today it took me 45min. I keep thinking maybe on Mondays and Tuesdays I make a habit of walking home from school because I only have one class. I figured I have time to waste, so why not waste it on a nice walk home. I feel pretty relax when I go for these walks, so I think continuing this habit will be good. This year I’m going to try and create better habits for myself, and by the end of the year I can become a better person. For myself and for others.

Jan. 9 - Jan. 12, 2009

2009-01-12T21:19:00.000-08:00

The past few days I've been procrastinating blogging, because I wanted to write up a post about Amnesia. As you can probably tell, I’ve procrastinated finishing that too. So today I’ll be just catching you up on the past few days.

Friday was the mark of the end of the first week of school. My Friday consists of class from 830-430…you would think this was bad, but since my breaks are short the school day doesn’t seem that long, even with only 4 hrs of sleep. And I couldn’t go to sleep when I got home that day, I had to do some things on the computer and then at 6 I had a Exec/Volunteer dinner to go to. The dinner was at Tracadero. They have pretty good food, I really enjoyed the lamb. Anyways, after dinner some of my friends decide that tonight would be a good night for some underground dodgeball…when we are stuffed. So the process of making many calls to people asking if they wanted to go play dodgeball began. We ended up with about 20-25 people. So we played games of dodgeball starting around 1045pm to about 2am. I was done by like 1230am because I again, only had 4 hrs of sleep that night. So I ended up taking a nap on the stage. I’ve learned recently that I can “nap” by just closing my eyes and not moving. This gives me the energy I need to stay up another 2-3 hours.

Okay so this day-to-day stuff is pretty boring so I’ll go straight to what’s been happening with me. Recently a friend of mine has upset me quite a bit. This did not cause my emo feeling, but it did add to it, and probably prolonged it a bit. So this friend and I use to be close a while ago, but then there was a rift in our friendship. I can’t really explain what happened but I know that this rift was not the first time this has happened. And this isn’t the first time I’ve been close with someone and then all of a sudden something changes it. But here’s the thing, I have trust issues. I don’t like to give people the power to see my weakness. This tends to keep my friendships with people at a distance. So when this kind of thing happens I tend to withdraw and keep my distance from people. We are starting to be on speaking terms again. My friend is trying to make it as if nothing happened. I tend to forgive pretty easily, but forgetting, that’s a problem. And since I tend to remember EVERYTHING, it’s kind of hard to get back to the normal when you just keep reminding yourself what happened. And when I do this I tend to hesitate to share anything with this person. I want my friend back. But me not having the ability to easily forget things, has prevented us from going back to the normal way of things. This is difficult, I feel as if I’m giving mix signals. I want to be your friend again, I want things to go back to what it was, but I don’t want to open up to you anymore, or at least not right now. It takes time for me to start trusting someone again after a disagreement that caused a rift in our friendship.

I haven’t seen this friend for a while now. And I feel that if I see them now, I might accidentally punch them in the face. A bit harsh, but that’s how I feel. This is why I’m probably going to avoid any face-to-face confrontations for the time being. “Absence makes the heart grow fonder.” In this case, it makes the chances of connecting my fist to their face less likely. Yes I’m a jerk. I really wish I could forget some stuff, because if I did, my friendships with people would be a lot better. But I think that I tend to remember stuff because I want to protect my heart from pain, I’ve had enough of that in my life already.

First Day of School.

2009-01-08T23:02:00.000-08:00

I know today was not really the first day of school, but today I made it to my classes so I guess I just consider today to be the first day.

Today I had two classes, Psychology and a Criminology Ethics class. I actually took this Psychology class last term, so I have my notes to look back on. The reason I'm re-taking the class is because last term I had this class as a 3 hr class from 330-630. Ended up dropping it before exams happened. Now I'm retaking it and it's everyday m-t-th-fr 1230-130. It's still in a lecture hall, but it's smaller and shorter time. so I prefer it this way, and I'm hoping I'll actually focus since this class is spread out throughout the week. Tomorrow will be my busy day. Friday schedule is kinda long, but I don't really have that long of a break so that's good I guess. So at 830am-1225pm I'll have my Business Management class (teaches me something about presentations and stuff), 1230pm I have to get to my Psychology class, and then after a 1 hr break I head to my Crim Ethics Class. Seems like a long day but I guess with such a short break, it doesn't really count. I'm gonna be soo pissed when/if I get exams from each class on a Friday....

All in all this week, hasn't been too bad. Still on the job hunt. If anyone has any suggestions, I'm up for anything =)

Day 3 of Deactivation...

2009-01-07T23:31:00.000-08:00

As you can tell by the title, deactivation of Facebook is quite boring. But during this time I have watched a lot of episodes of Moonlight Resonance (Chinese Drama). Yes, yes, yes, I have become quite Asian these past few months. So my mom has also started the series and within 1 day she caught up to half of the episodes I have watched so far. That makes me really sad LOL. Yes, as a person I tend to be a bit too competitive sometimes. So because of my competitiveness, my drama intake has increased. I am now on episode 16/40, and my mom is probably on episode 8-10 by now. For those of you who don't know, Moonlight Resonance is about a broken family. This was a happy family of 6 kids, a mother, a father and the father of the mother started up a bakery dedicated to the Mid-Autumn Festival. But because of the father's infidelities the family was split in half. 3 of the kids had to live with the father and his new wife, and the other 3 stays with the mother. So anyways the storyline is basically how the family has to find some peace between the 2 households. There's a bit too much drama in this series, but I guess all good shows should have some drama in it. So far I've really enjoyed watching this.

So today was my mom's birthday. We had an expensive hot pot dinner. I actually ate before I went to dinner, but again its food and I love food, especially free food, so I ate as much as I could. I actually really enjoy family dinners, especially those in restaurants. I love it because I have a chance to talk with my family, especially my brothers. Yes, I think the best time for family bonding, is when food is involved. During these family dinners, my brothers and I actually chat quite a bit. And it's usually random stuff, and probably the most interesting conversations I have with my brothers. When we were younger my brothers and I were never really allowed to sit next to each other during dinner, because we piss each other off pretty easily. But in the past few years, we've chosen to sit next to each other during dinners, probably cause out of our whole family, each other are the best company (that sentence had some terrible grammar =S). Actually I think what brought us together was our Dai Yee Ma, whoever sits beside her basically has to eat double! Sum it up = I love family dinners.

So today I finally got a bit of time to catch up with my friend Lilian. Lilian and I, our friendship is…it can’t really be explained in words. Lilian and I have been friends for YEARSSS…in a couple years I can say we have been friends for decades! Our friendship has been the same and will always be the same no matter what we do. We don’t get to see each other often, but when we do see each other, it’s like we were never apart. (This is an extremely corny moment) We are sisters. We aren’t blood sisters, but we are most definitely sisters for life. We have been through a lot in our lives, together and apart. But whenever either of us have a problem, we can just spill everything to each other and the other will understand. Right now we are about to go through something quite major that we both can’t really understand very well yet. But I know when it happens, we will have each other to lean on, and figure out some answer together. It’ll just take some time.

So during our msn chat and somewhat catching up about some issues, I came up with this line. It won’t really make sense to anyone else but us, but to us it’s pretty important.

“The person they are, makes you want to completely forget them. But the person you are, makes you want to forgive them.”

Grace

Lilian

Credited for stimulating my brain…=)

Walking through the Snow....

2009-01-06T18:46:00.000-08:00

Day 2 of my Deactivation.

Trying to figure out what to do on the net when I can't automatically go to Facebook. I am very tempted to reactivate my Facebook but I really want to see if i can stay off it for like a month. I think I'm going to go crazy soon LOL. Well today I had school...if you can call it that. I had one class that I was late for and ended up missing it. So I went to school and dealt with some stuff, and then I bussed home. When I got to 41st and Knight, I decided to walk home from there. Yes, I'm a genius. It's cold, it's icy, it's pouring rain/snow, and this is the moment I decide to WALK home...

The walk was surprisingly refreshing. I spent my time looking down and listening to my music...loudly. When I got to 37th and Knight I decided to walk down Kensington. Standing at the top of the hill and looking at all the untouched snow felt very calming. And I noticed that staring at the snow actually has a weird visual effect, it's like waves. It's weird, when you have the chance you should test it out. So I made my way through Kensington. I stopped at the very top of the hill where I've been sledding on this past winter break. I tried to get the feeling of when I was there playing in the snow with my friends, hoping it'd give me some joy. It did. As i made my way to the bottom of the hill, I kept thinking of all the times we went up and down that hill, making complete asses of ourselves but still having so much fun. I missed those times of happiness. I know for sure I'll be having lots of fun and laughs this year. This feeling I've been having will go away. I just feel that I need a better distraction in life, to keep me pre-occupied. So today marks the start of my job hunt. Yes, yes, yes, I've said I'm on a job hunt many times before, but this year I think it's important that I actually stick to it.

So some happier news, my parents said they'll get me a laptop for my birthday. I find that pretty weird, that somehow my dad convinced my mom to get a laptop for me. The search of this laptop is on its way. I hope I get it soon, so I can be distracted with something new and shiney. Also I need to get a job sooner, because at the end of the month I'll be going on a VDL exec retreat at Mt. Baker. Seems interesting enough. I'm sure I'll have some fun and drunken times with the Execs of the Dodgeball League.

I'm going to start on my job hunt right now. Since I don't have Facebook to distract me hopefully, I find something I may like.

Deactivation

2009-01-05T21:46:00.000-08:00

Today marks the first day that i deactivate my Facebook Profile. I chose to do this because i tend to spend a little too much time on Facebook, and i want to see what else i can do with my life besides stalking people. many people have told me that i'm crazy to try this, some say i'm not going to make it. But i dont' care what they say, my Facebook Account is going to stay deactivated until AFTER my birthday. I bet that a lot of people won't remember my birthday without that little notification on the side where it tells people of upcoming birthdays =P.

Anyways, today was a unproductive day, beside me deactivating my Facebook. After my post yesterday i received some msn messages because people wondered why i was emo-ing. i just sent them the link to my blog and they can just read it all. this is way faster than before. i use to have to copy and paste parts of my conversations from other people into the conversation window because i don't want to waste time repeating myself. After chatting it up with some people about my blog, i felt somewhat better. this morning i woke up and felt content about life. i started listening to english music again and the energy of some simple plan/bif naked songs pumped me up. it is now night again and i've been sitting in my room in the dark, for the past 6 hrs or so.....just listening to music (with some drama watching on the side). I've started listening to Christian music again too, Christian music always calms me. In the past few hours i've been thinking about life and death. Thinking about how i can be a better person for myself and my family and my friends. But what i felt like doing the most today was cry. usually if i'm alone i can cry if i feel the need for it. it's only when i'm around people that i tend to hold it all in, until i'm alone again. but tonight was different, i'm alone yet i'm holding the tears in. i try to put my music on calming songs that would put me in that emotional state to just let the tears come. Although some tears have come out, i am still holding back a lot. i don't really understand it.

i also feel that if i see some friends right now, i'd burst into tears (which might be a good thing...but again i'm the type of person who doesn't want to show my sadness to others). When i was younger, i was extremely emotional. i pretty much cried everyday. And of course my older brothers would make fun of me for crying so much. In time i learned to not show my weaker side to others and just hold everything in. There's no need to blame my brothers for making me hold stuff in, it's not their fault. i actually thank them, they made me stronger. But i usually have to remind myself that it's okay to cry sometimes. Last time i really cried was because i accidentally ate a jalapeno pepper....that was an extremely painful 20min. and of course my friends made me feel better by laughing at me =p. right now i wish i had some jalapeno peppers to get me to release some emotions. i think when i cry this out i might actually start to feel better.

i'm starting to figure out some words to my feelings.....it's a mix of guilt, pain, worried-ness, heartache, and just the feeling of wanting to be alone. My heart is just full of a lot of stuff right now that i can't really explain or understand myself. This isn't the first time i've felt this, so i know in time i'll be back to normal, but it'll just take some time and tears.

It's always darkest before the dawn.

Jan. 3 - 4, 2009 - VENT

2009-01-04T18:22:00.000-08:00

January 3, 2009

so it was a normal saturday. slept at like 4am woke up at 1pm. and it was pretty much just like every other day of winter break. Chat on msn, eat, nap, movies, DBZ, drama, eat, and of course FB stalk people throughout the day. Today some photos of NYE were uploaded so my friend and i were bored, so we split the work and tagged an album with about 123 pictures in it. that occupied us for about 20 min. later that night we decide to go sledding with a bunch of other people. sledding out in the snow was extremely refreshing. it gave me a chance to see the happier side of life, instead of worrying about the crap i have to do in the next few weeks/months. sledding was quite fun, especially with the surprise ramp. there's a snow ramp on the bottom of the hill, and you can't really see it until you are like right next to it, so basically you won't know it's there until it's too late. but it was really fun. It was especially hilarious to watch the "couple" next to us try out different "positions" as they sled down....my friends and i spent quite a lot of time watching them. on of them started to actually "direct" them...but without them knowing. haven't laughed that hard in a while. that night was just full of laughs.

January 4, 2009
Today was my cranky day. might have to do with school starting soon, maybe it's cause my dad left a cordless phone in my room and the ringer was on, maybe its cause i had to go to richmond for a couple hours when i only had about 7 hrs but interuppted sleep, and lately i've also been in a mood. i've been kinda dodging my friends a bit. i love my friends sooo much they mean the world to me, but lately i find seeing some of them stressful. i kind of have 2 groups of major friends right now and splitting the time between them is difficult. Most difficult time was during New Years Eve when i had to be with both of them because one group didn't feel like going to the party the other group was having. My group was kind of drunk while i was buzzed and they made me feel pretty guilty about leaving. And hanging out with the other group for this long now, i felt really sad that i couldn't count down and party with them. i can't really blame my friends for not going to the other party, it's just the way they are (and it's not all of them, but when 1 or 2 don't want to do something, we can't just leave them)

Another thing that's been bothering me...my heart has just been feeling pretty heavy in the past few weeks. A friend of my family has cancer. This women i have known my whole life, i've been friends with her kids my whole life. She is a very kind hearted soul, and just one of the best people you can ever talk to. In 2008 she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She's been fighting it all year long. I understand death comes to everyone eventually, but to happen like this at such a young age? It seems unfair. Their family has very strong ties with each other. They are all in HK right now beside her and just waiting for her to go to heaven. I had issues with death when i was younger. After a while i eventually got over it. But to have this feeling of heartache and not knowing what i can do to comfort my friend hurts me.

So now i just feel very sad and emo-ish. This is one of the reasons i don't feel like celebrating my birthday this year. not because i'm mourning, but because i think there are better things in life to worry about, instead of planning out some dinner/party for myself. i'm already withdrawing from my friends, and with school i'll just bury myself in that for a while. But i know i'm suppressing a lot of emotions that i should probably just let out. i just can't do that right now. so for now, this feeling will just have to stick with me.

2009

2009-01-03T13:58:00.000-08:00

So 2 years after my last post, somethings have changed.

With some persuasion I've decided to keep track of my doings this year. I'm going to try to blog everyday-every other day....or at least once a week. This is supposed to help me remember how my year went and a what I've learned

December 31, 2008
For this to work out properly we have to talk about the day before the New Year.
Last Last New Years Eve, my friends couldn't decide what to do so i ended up at my friend's Ellie's place, and partied it up with some dodegballers.
This year my friends decide they want to do something, problem was i had a party with dodgeball people at a studio. So i had to figure out how to split myself for 2 different parties. My friend who picked me up, and brought me to the studio from my friend's place was extremely helpful. The day before this i was kinda upset at my friends because they said they didn't want to hang out with drunks during NYE....and i thought that was a pretty stupid reason. But in the end i had promised that i would countdown with them and i did. but they sure made me feel like guilty when i was trying to leave to the other party. Cause they take forever to drink and then actually become drunk...so by the time they did, i was ready to go. and i don't think i'll ever be fully drunk with my friends cause i dont' think they have the capability to handle me. LOL

So after that i was buzzed and brought to the Studio for the other party. by the time i got there, a lot of people were drunk already. Studio was one hell of a party, but because i wasn't there since the beginning i missed out on stuff and i missed some people too. I think i remember most of what happened but as days go on i tend to forget and blur some stuff. Basically i drank, consistently, maybe it was cause i was late to the party and thought i should catch up, or maybe i was pissed off at something. i don't know. but i did have fun...until i threw up.
Throwing up was killer. Because i threw up everything in my stomach and then i was just hacking up whatever was left. i do remember that i was mumbling stuff. i kept asking how's peter? because i could hear him hurling at the next couch over..and also i kept saying sorry. i dont' know to who or why, but i just kept saying sorry.
so then during my throwing up moments, i also kept thinking hmmm people say how/who you spend new years (with) is how/who you'll spend the rest of the year....so basically i was thinking..oh crap i'm gonna spend it in a bucket.....LOL
And during this whole time i couldn't stop shivering because i spilt my drink on my shirt and had water spilt on me by my friend. and so i couldn't pass out because i felt cold and kept thinking i was going to die from pneumonia, so i was hoping someone will get me home eventually..sooon!

in the end i got home, crawled upstairs, turned on the heater, turned on my music, took off my pants and changed to sweats, and passed out on my bed. i made my friends J&J sleep over because i was scared i would puke on stuff (even though i've never drank enough to do that, i'm very good at aiming and knowing where/when is the time to throw up) but they slept over on the floor while i baked next to the heater in my bed =) But lesson of the year, i shouldn't drink when i'm upset about something (but it was one of those annoying feelings that you feel that something is wrong with you but you dont' know exaclty what it is but you know soemthing's not exaclty right but again, it was NYE i was gonna drink no matter what =D), cause i've done that a couple times now, not that great. All in All New Years Eve and New Years Day, good times!

January 1, 2009

The day after drinking. it's always an interesting time. No hangover for me =) but i did have a small headache cause my friend dropped a heater on my head. so it was dim sum time, and time for everyone to discuss what had happened to them the night before. we also had to figure out what happened to some other people too =P

Later in the night we had bbt with a different group of people and again, dicussed what happened during the studio party.

WHY?

2007-09-03T18:02:00.000-07:00

so this weekend was my church's summer camp retreat. This year we went to Squeah Camp near Hope. This year's camp theme is Faith in Full Bloom. My friend and I were helping with organizing stuff for this camp. Well 1 or 2 weeks before camp we were informed that we need leaders to help with worship time. After asking the leaders that usually lead and they said no, which we actually already assumed they would, we had to take on the responsibility of leading worship. To tell you the truth, I was scared and worried that I couldn't do this. But I know that for this to work out we had to help support each other and just have faith. When it was my morning to lead I was shaking a bit. Just before I did my stuff my friend asked "Are you okay? Are you ready?" I told her "no, but let's do it anyway!" I guess this may be one of those things that make me seem brave (And it’s helpful to see the babies while I do my stuff. Seeing their innocent eyes every time I sing in worship gives me hope) I might be scared but I have to face whatever is put in front of me. I’m a bit of a perfectionist, people say my set was good but I didn't think so. It didn't go the way I felt it should of. Maybe if I had spent more time preparing. Hopefully one day I’ll have the courage to lead another set and have it go and feel the way I want it to.

When camp was first mentioned I was not sure if I was gonna go. But then my brother said he was going so I just said okay decided to follow along. I never expected to get anything out of this camp. Usually when I feel like that I do more self-reflection than anything else. So this is what I’ve discovered.

1) I can’t understand why I can open up to some people yet to others I tend to shut down. (This is actually something I’ve been battling with for a while now. I just started to find a pattern to it so I’m still working on it)

2) I tend to have moments when I can be as happy as ever yet pretty much in a split second I can turn around and be holding back tears.

3) A lot of the stuff the speaker talked about I seem to have already gone through some of it. So it’s a good thing I blog out stuff now, but still somewhat bad because I feel like I still have to go through it by myself

4) I’m still not willing to burden people with my deeper feelings. (again my blog is somewhat helping with opening me up. Just too bad I can’t do that in front of people)

5) I use sports to release anger.

So my biggest reflection period occurred on Saturday. In the morning I was leading my first worship set. I was scared but pretty much content. By mid-afternoon something had changed. It was a weird feeling. My heart started to feel heavier and a little tight. Pretty much all I wanted to do was be alone. I kept playing basketball because it helped me focus on the game more than what I was feeling. After our BBQ dinner I had to leave, I didn’t know where to go to be alone so I just went to drop off some stuff at my tent and head to the gym. That’s where/when I let some of what I felt out. I ran and shot the basketball as many times as I could. I slapped the puck with a hockey stick as hard as I could. And I kicked a soccer ball as hard as I could. Doing all this help me let go of a feeling I didn’t understand. When I felt somewhat well enough to go inside and be with people i went back upstairs to where EM was. The feeling came back a little. I spent most of my time before worship sitting by the window breathing and praying. I was hoping that God would give me enough strength to just hold in what I’m feeling and just praise Him for all he’s done. I thought it worked until I had to sing. My heart was hurting and my eyes were slowly tearing up. But where the people were sitting at they couldn’t tell. I wiped the tears and just held it in and smiled. Singing was a little difficult. It’s kinda hard to sing to your Lord without your whole heart. And my heart was just somewhere else at the time. I was thinking about just leaving after we sang, in case I couldn’t hold it in. But I felt bad because our group is small enough. So I just stayed my kinda kept my head low. The speaker talked about being content. Not needing so much material things. I was thinking as he spoke, I’m not really materialistic. I never actually buy things I want. I might think about it but then I just thought, “Nah I don’t need it. I’ll use the money for something else” yet I always seem to have no money…so I guess it works out well. If I want something badly it will still take me sometime before I buy it. I don’t really buy impulsively unless it’s food. It took me about 6 months to buy my speakers which I’ve now had for about 3 years and is still working fine. Anyways, when the speaker was done my plan was just to leave and maybe go hang out in the gym. But we had to break into groups and share our thoughts. Usually I would love to do this but the timing then was kinda bad. So my “depressive” state was noticeable and the girls asked if anything was wrong. Again I felt like I wanted to tell them, but then I kept holding back. I still don’t know why I do that. At winter-con I had a similar feeling and when asked about it, I wanted to say something but just couldn’t. I wanted to say I was angry, sad, and confused. But then they would ask why? And then I would have to say I do not know. Then there would be further confusion, and uncomfortable silence. As soon as we were done, I pretty much just left. I’m not sure if anyone even noticed but it didn’t really matter, I just needed some time alone. I walked back to camp by myself. I was scare because there wasn’t much light. But then I was more scared about what I was feeling, so I didn’t care. As I walked I finally got to just let go and cry. When I got back to camp I saw that a bon-fire was set. I was alone and all I could do was stand by the fire and feel the heat. After crying and feeling the heat of the fire I felt better. Not really sure how that worked out but however it did, made me feel better. And the rest of the night was spent with girls and 1 guy talking about love. Mostly about how our parents all fell for each other. Each story shows how much love our parents share. It’s just amazing what they all went through for each other.

This whole rant was pretty jumpy, but that’s just the way I am. I’m very emotional, I just never show HOW emotional I am. I will always wear a mask to cover it all. I just hope one day I can open up and let someone in.

My Future.

2007-08-24T22:17:00.000-07:00

lately i've been thinking about where i'm going with my life. there's my life at school and my life at church. a few months ago our pastor left our church to start up a new church, i never thought about other people leaving with him until recently. a couple of weeks ago a girl from my ministry told us that it will be her last time leading and that starting sunday she'll be heading out to our pastor's new church. then i started to think...."who else is planning on going?" 2 weeks ago there was a meeting about this issue. and i just found out this past sunday who will be leaving my church. these people i've know for a few years now...maybe even a decade. and i can't imagine not seeing them anymore also i've been wondering about the state of my church. in the last year we've gone through some hard times. most recent is was our need for 3 new pastors. 1st is or EM pastor, he was with us for about 8 years. 2nd is our CM senior pastor, this man started our church and i've known him my whole life and now he's retiring. 3rd is a teens pastor, this is a new idea...even though EM has been complaining to CM about getting one for a VERY long time now. people i've known FOREVER has been leaving the church for the past few years. some reasons are: school, work, relationships, some just don't think they belong in the church anymore. in my whole life i have never thought about leaving the church, at least..not my church. now that i think about it. every person who ever left my church...i never really talked to again. except one. this person i've known my whole life. she was a teacher to me, a role model, and a friend. we've kept in touch after she left our church...i think it started when she was emailing me jokes she found online lol. we then started to email each other once in a while to catch up. and now thanks to facebook. i can poke her everyday =D. she recently got married and i can't even explain how happy i am for her and her new husband. i've been invited to a couple of wedding in my life time. her's is the ONLY one that i've been to the whole thing (ceremony and banquet). sorry to anyone else who asked/invited me before, but...she messaged me on facebook to invite me lol. she was there for me when i was an extremely hyper brat, so i owed her. i even got dressed up WITH MAKE-UP. i poked each eye about 4-6 times...and i guess it paid off, because according to everyone i looked VERY grown up. and as i heard all those compliments i noticed that i really have grown up. in more ways than one. i vaguely remember how i was when i was little. i was a brat. i was sweet at times but when i got some candy i was off. i might have had ADHD. my goal in life back then was to rebel as much as i can. cause what i learned from school , was that being bad was cool. doing the opposite of what i was told to do is good. i annoyed a lot of people back then...i'm surprised they didn't try to kill me. i hated my brothers, i never understood why i needed them. they were never gonna be there for me. i didn't like being in my family..i saw some of the sibilings at church and i couldn't understand how they got good ones while i only got my brothers. Times have changed now. my brothers still piss me off sometimes but i can't imagine life without them. and my family is definitely one of a kind and i love them for that.
so back to my original ranting so i've been thinking about the people leaving my church. and i was thinking what if i go too. for the past few days i've been thinking about the pros and cons of leaving my church and going to a different one. and it's pretty much balanced so far. everything just keeps contradicting. like if i leave this one..it's like i'm abandoning my church. EM is small enough and it takes everyone to do their part to keep us going. if i leave i might grow more with God. if i leave, am i leaving cause i feel like i have to or because of some people? i've had a lot of trouble deciding this..and i still haven't come to a conclusion. i feel like i should. but if i do what if it doesn't work out and .... i don't know. it's all very confusing to me. None of this should really matter. the point of church is to worship God as a community...should it matter where i do it? i want to ask someone who might understand this. but this person is a little busy right now. but hopefully i can get my chance.
before i mentioned about leaving because of some people. well what i meant by that was...well growing up in my church...i grew up with innocent eyes. everything was simple. people at my church were good people. as i grew up i saw more than i needed to. some people are just very hypocritical. what i thought they were like..the person i saw when i first met them is very different from the person i got to know. and me beign me...i can't tell them how i feel. i can't say i don't really like you because of this. again..this is a church. and i'm supposed to love my neighbour. but i'm supposed to be truthful. but if i am truthful i would hurt someone even if i don't like them. so basically being in my church with these people make me feel very hypocritical. which has been pissing me off a lot lately. i give the a nice face but inside....not so nice. and i've also noticed how fake people can be when they think no one notices...i dont' even think they notice. and i'm probably sound like a jerk right now cuz i'm not supposed to judge others...but i'm human, and that's human nature.
so my life in general has been pretty confusing. lately i've been renovating my own room. and i'm pretty proud of it. but while doing it i've had a lot of time to think. i change my room's look about once every few months. why can't i keep things the way they are? why am i not happy with the things the way they are? i might be happy now but what if i change my mind AGAIN in a few months? then i start thinking about my plans for my future professions. when i was little i wanted to be a Vet. because i love animals. then that idea got thrown out. then i wanted to be a doctor. few years later that got thrown out. then i wanted to be a lawyer the i wanted to own my on business..maybe a club. (that's still part of my plans). and now i've decided i'll goo into criminology. try to be a cop. what makes me think i can do this? others seems to have a lot of confidence in me. they think i'm fearless, i can do anything. but they have NO idea how much i fear. a fearless face is very different from a fearless heart. i fear that i will never have success in my dreams. i fear for my family's health and safety. i fear of crime. i fear death. i fear that i'll never find love. i fear that i will continue to live my life without goals or success. i fear i'll lose everything in a blink of an eye. i fear of what some people think of me. fear has always been there for me. it's probably the only constant thing in my life the one thing that will probably never change. all i want to do is change the world somehow...or effect someone's life in a way for the better. i want to live a life with meaning. that's my goal. i'm scared and worried most of the time..especially at night, because that's when i'm most alone in my life. that's probably why i'm always listening to music while i'm sleeping. to keep me from my thoughts. keep me from my fears. maybe even protect me. might sound silly to you but it's how i feel.

so that's my rant for this month at least. if you read all that..i'm truly amazed. thanks for reading. if you are complaining about how long it is. that's because i tend to hold everything in until i have to let it out.

2007-02-24T00:15:00.001-08:00

school's been actually pretty great. i got a 16/16 on a chem quiz. my chem is improving soo much. THANK GOD!! well poonam and i have spent the past 2 or 3 months trying to figure out if we should go to Christian club. the one time we went by, the teacher(sponsor) was sitting alone in the room eating. we got freaked out and walked away lol. so this thursday there was a meeting for the Christian club and we finally decided, yes this time we shall go!!! we dragged raylene along with us. so as we walked down the hall getting closer and closer to that door, we started to get nervous. we were like...i don't know what if it's weird and uncomfortable. we spent 5 min in front of the door contemplating on whether we should go in or not. eventually one of the teens in there saw us looking through the window and opened the door for us...so we went in. at first it was kinda uncomfortable but then it turned out to be pretty good. WE PRAYED IN A CLASS ROOM AS A GROUP! that's amazing just by itself. i pray like all the time in my heart at school but never in a group of people i don't know and some friends. it's was pretty good and kind of a relief. as we left the class room, we were thinking of whether we should go back next week or not but all i could think about was "what if i have a test to study for, i won't have time for this" and that just made me feel bad. then i went back to Queenie's testimony. Queenie is a great student and she studies really hard. and she found herself overstressed about all this studying and making time for friends, family, or even God. so in her testimony she said that in the bible it says "thou shall not worship other idols" and she never consider herself to do that but then she noticed that she was putting her school work before God and that's not right. my friends and i all do this and it feels really bad. we are told to love our God and put Him first in our lives. but we cant do that because we are constantly distracted by our busy lives. We are expected to do well and excel in our schoolwork and to only focus on school... i'm trying to create a better balance for this. I'm trying to do well in school by asking God to help me. i just hope that i can make time for Christian club ...actually not just Christian club but make time for God. God will always be in my life and He should be in every part of my life including school. Hopefully i'll get a chance in letting Him in.

always remember

"Live by Faith, and not by Sight"

2007-02-13T23:06:00.000-08:00

A long time ago someone told me that God will never give anything to me that i cannot handle. i actually take great comfort knowing this. everytime i think something is too hard for me to handle i think about this and that God has faith that i can do this so i will continue to try. Giving up is hard for me to do. Giving up shows weakness. i've always felt that giving up would make others disappointed in me, that's why i keep pushing it. but i recently learned that i have to let some things go. if i can't do something i can try postponing it. it's not giving up it's just like "BRB" sorta. it took me forever to try and get out of math. i was failing soo bad but i didn't wanna drop it. but i found out that if i didn't drop it then i will have to suffer the consequences with my GPA. until i finally figured out that i'm done i cant do this. i wrote a letter to my principal tell her that i can't handle this. i'm about to fail chemistry too. so i asked to drop math to give me more time to learn chem. i have a greater chance of passing chem then math. i prayed soooooooo much last week. hoping that my principal will let me out. i got my prayers answered. i got out of math and i'm slowly improving in chem. i'm more focused in chem now that i don't have my math mark as a distraction. God helped me so much. i prayed to improve in school and now i think i can. i'll take math in summer school or night school. i will finish math. i just hope taking it in summer school or night school will let me focus on it without distraction.

i will never give up without a fight

...if i do slap me back to reality...

The Five Faces of Grace

2007-02-01T22:50:00.000-08:00

I haven't really told anyone I have this site but it's a good place for me to write stuff without judgment or fear of who's reading it. Well for the past few months I've been self-reflecting, especially after winter con, in Calgary. I'm a big suppressor. I suppress my feelings all the time, most of the time I don't even notice it. Well what I've basically learned about myself is that there are AT LEAST five different faces of me. Grace with Family, Grace with Friends, Grace with Church, Grace with School and Grace with Herself. The thing is that I've been good at keeping all theses Graces from mixing with the other Graces. But it's a huge burden to carry all these Graces too. Carrying these burdens made me feel little odd. I've noticed now that I don't like sharing about my life or my personal problems. I’m willing to help anyone with their problems and help them but when it comes to me I tell everyone I’m fine and I don't need help. It’s about like once every 6 months that I seriously talk to someone about this. And I think I'm starting to actually admit to this too which I guess is process (Thank God). I don't let people in my life or like let them get close to me that well. I think I have trust issues, I fear they'll betray me, or judge me and leave me, I’m not sure when this all started. Here I go...

(GRACE WITH FRIENDS) I always considered my self a good friend, I’m there for my friends no matter what and I can be close to them for like one day and the next day I give them a cold shoulder and I may seem like a bitch (I don't even talk to many people on msn). This is the worse thing ever because I do this especially with friends I really want to know. It’s the stupidest thing to do. I love my friends so much and life without them would suck. I am such a jerk. Sometimes I’m sooo protective of my friends yet in the end it seems like I’m the one who hurts them (I'm sorry).

(GRACE WITH FAMILY) well I’m close with my family but they don't really know what's happening with my friends and I , or what's up with me in school. I am so ashamed of my report card because even if it's good my family tends to look for the bad. I know that they mean well but ya. My parents tend to sometimes put me down. They sometimes say I’m overweight and should stop eating so much. I think they do that because I eat before I sleep which is bad. They say I shouldn't wear some close because I’m showing too much skin or something. But after all that I never let them bring me down. As much as I care/love/respect my parents when they say stuff like this I might take it in subconsciously a little but usually I reflect it. Which I consider a good thing otherwise I might be bulimic or anorexic. I’m a little overweight to my sense but I’m slowly working it all off (the healthy way). My family is dysfunctional but I think this is a great think because it makes my family unique. Can you say your family literally wrestles on a weekly basis? I love my family and despite our projection of life I’m very proud of them.

(GRACE WITH SCHOOL) school is one of my biggest troubles. It’s not that I do really badly in it. But school does bring me down. I swear I understand the stuff I study but during a test (especially for math) I blank and then bomb the test. I finally figured that I’m just going to drop the course because I’m not willing to fight for this. Usually I don't give up that easily without a fight but it's just not worth fighting for right now. I consider this a tie and I’m off to fight a different battle, chemistry. Math will be there when I’m back with better armor. Anyways for the longest time I was struggling and I found out the best way to learn is to be there 100% in class. Don’t study for another test or do other homework if you have to learn something. But all school does for me is make me feel stupid. Common sense, Christianity, puzzles all that I can solve or make sense of. School just brings me down. In school the Struggling Grace dwells there. She tries to go up the ladder of success but then gets pushed down. I also blame my poor study habits. I am easily distracted with my room. I wish I had somewhere comfortable to sit and study. I always arrange new study habits for myself but in the end I always break them. This is also very frustrating. I just pray everyday that I can have a chance to improve.

(GRACE WITH CHURCH) for the past few years I’ve gotten to know my church and the members of my church and they are all very amazing people. When I was little and in Sunday school I was a brat and a pain in the ass probably. I thought I’m soo cool if I don't listen then I’m cool. But now I have a complete opposite view of this, well sorta. After spending time with the younger kids I really appreciate what all my Sunday school teachers had to deal with when they had me. Around 2001, I had a big problem with death. It might be from 9-11 but I think I had this fear I suppressed for a long time. Well the point of my fear was me being scared of death. Not my own death but actually the death of loved ones. This is a huge problem that I never knew how to deal with, and so the more I suppressed my feelings of death the more nightmares I had at night about losing loved ones. For the longest time I tried to avoid everyone/anyone. I was afraid to get close to these people and in the end just lose them. The main part of these fears was the fact that I can lose my parents or my grandmother. I…I couldn’t understand why God would give us these people and then take them away. But as I started paying attention in Sunday school and trying to understand death, I continued to pray for an answer. My answer came in a dream. God showed me that there is life after death, with Him. I know that when someone I love passes away that I’m going to feel like crap but it’s also good to know that I’ll get to see them again. God is a tricky fella. I consider him to be a puzzle maker and that it’s my job to decipher the code. When I pray I am asking God for some hints in helping me solve the puzzle. My most recent discovery was me asking Him to let me get close to Him through the Winter Conference. I didn’t get it right away. I didn’t really get close to Him but I did get to know myself. I didn’t understand why I was feeling crappy about myself or about how fake I felt. But then I learned about my different faces, and yesterday night I finally figured out this recent puzzle. I was talking to a friend about all of this, and she gave me the answer I was looking for. “Our relationship with God deepens as we get to know ourselves better” and it all worked out. My puzzle is somewhat solved. But I know my God and He’ll give me time to celebrate this and then He’ll challenge me again. Side-note for the past few weeks I’ve been scared someone would ask me to share about my experience at Winter Conference. But I was afraid I have nothing to say. But again God has helped me again without me noticing. I do have something to say now but I’m not sure how I would share this with people. (By the way I’ll be uploading my conversation with May about God. There are some good analogies in there)

(GRACE WITH HERSELF) this has been the hardest for me to uncover. And I'm not actually done figuring this one out so i will get back to this one.

To be continued...

I have a prayer that i wrote during WC.

"Dear Heavenly Father,

I'm a jerk. But i want to change. Please change me from who i am to someone you can use. i don't want to live in my world the way i am now. i want to live it the way you want me to. i need you in my life. especially now. Please, please be with me as i try to change. Give me strength.

Amen."

The Beginning ..... of the end

2007-01-24T21:26:00.000-08:00

Just kidding.

high school's a pain in the butt, but it's over in a couple of months and none of it would matter any more.

just can't wait.