24

Aug

End of Summer Shrug.

Summer is drawing to a close, and I’m not entirely sure what emotion to be feeling. I’ve spent quite a bit of my academic prone thoughts over the last few years stressing about this year, and what comes after it. Now that it’s actually about to happen it feels like just one more thing. Nothing too special. Maybe I’ll feel differently closer to the spring, when being in grad class actually begins to count for something.

 In the mean time, war of 1812, the acting gig I had over this summer and last, is finishing. Tomorrow is our closing show- we had an extra long run this year due to the Fundy Fringe Festival. It’s my last show with Iact- my schedule is far too busy as of next year to keep up with it- which is another thing that I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel about, so I just end up emotionally shrugging a little. I’m going to miss the pre-show traditions of living up to the crazy theatre kid label, jumping around, and trying to avoid the un-initiated so you don’t have to attempt to put it all in context.

(Which totally didn’t happen yesterday. Totally. Not at all. Nobody walked in on our shenanigans ever ever ever.)

The next week is a busy muddle of appointments, getting used to a new job*, and trying to visit people before our schedules are shredded again.

Cheers,

Kaelen

*I got hired at Tims. It’s not a job of glory, but it’s a job of money and discounted Timbits. So, like most other things right now, my emotion about getting the job was a shrug.

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08

Aug

Notable Notes

Over the last week or two everything suddenly decided to revert to last summer. It’s strange, nice enough, but strange. Mostly because I spent all of June getting used to the change, July enjoying it, and August having my brain completely spun about.

Some of the notable things about these last few weeks:

– Tatyana surprised me by showing up on my doorstep, not having told me that she was going to be visiting. She’s here for a month. It’s nice.

– I have a potential job, finally. I’m going in to Starbucks today for an interview, and fingers are crossed that it’s going to work out. If this interview does work out, I have the potential to work uptown (nearby) as opposed to a twenty minute bus ride away, which is what I had reconciled myself to when applying to Starbucks. Selling my soul to the corporate masses for the mulah, fun fun! (Well, hoping to sell my soul.)

-I found a place uptown that sells six packs of lychee  juice boxes for a reasonable price. Nobody really seems to understand my excitement over this, but I really, really, like lychee juice. I also really enjoy juice boxes in general, because they make me feel like an eight year old in the best way possible. And reasonable prices are my favourite type of prices. After finding and purchasing them I t sat in a park happily strumming a ukulele and telling CJ about how great lychee juice was, while he reacted with a friendly, “That’s nice dear.”

-In the course of three days I ate a giant platter of poutine and two packages of Ramen.  Mmmmm, Frat kid.

– My body has decided over this month that it hates me: I’ve got a cough that’s been hanging around for a month, and a random form of eczema just decided to crop up for the first time in my life. Although it doesn’t sound very convincing after my last point, I generally am somewhat healthy, so the whole weird sickness thing is getting a bit wearing.

-School is going to happen soon, and I’m not so much worried about having to enter grade twelve as just ready to get everything over with. I’m planning to try and avoid senioritis, but I’m not quite sure exactly how to do that yet. Maybe by rewarding myself with lychee juice boxes whenever I get good marks?

Cheers,

Kaelen

 

 

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08

Jul

Odds and Ends

Some of my personal highlights from the last little while include:

-Finding a large pile of gravel on the East side, climbing said pile of gravel, and briefly feeling the sense of victory that a small child feels on having done something wondrous- ie. making toast unsupervised for the first time. Then I realized that I had to get down without hurting myself or my I-pod.

-One of my favorite (deceased) authors wrote a bunch of books I didn’t know existed. My library card has been a busy bee.

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Click to make the doodles bigger.

-While swimming in a pond where life-jackets were compulsory I couldn’t fit into any but the children’s size. From thence came a lot of snickering when I realized that I -sixteen years old, studying for my permit, highschool senior- looked more or less like a nine year old. In keeping with this fantastic image, I then went and enthusiastically jumped (flailed) 0n the water trampoline.

-Naps.

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Hope life is swell.

Kaelen.

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29

Jun

Free Time, Say What?

Since school has ended I’ve been struggling with the idea that, woah now, I control my own time. Dude, that’s all sorts of crazy. I better spend this amazing thing by swearing violently while watching episodes of Breaking Bad and refreshing my tumblr feed! Then, when I get too sick of myself, I’ll text friends who live somewhat far away and decide to walk an hour or two to hang out with them.

 In all seriousness, I’ve lost a lot of motivation. Which is kind of terrifying. And strangely ironic, considering the fact that just a couple of months I posted here that, “I’m too self motivated to become a burnout.” Which is probably still true, since having noticed that’s exactly what I’m doing, I’m trying to be a little bit more responsible. By, you know, doing things like studying for my permit*. I think I’ve become a teenager, and it’s a bit gross.

Yeah, driving, that’s a thing now. Weird. I’ve never been overly eager to get my license, and it really doesn’t even matter that much to me, but I figure that I should learn how to drive before I graduate, even though it’s not really useful at the moment.

 In the meantime, when I’ve been going through bursts of actually doing things, I’ve been making art, going for really long walks with only semi-determined destinations, and getting drenched a couple times a day. Walking in my town is a dangerously moist undertaking, made doubly so when the dryer isn’t working.

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Soaked selfies. Huzzah.

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At a cool place I walked to the other day, a local graveyard.

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Forcing myself to be productive, and accomplish things in my sketchbook again.

In other news, I’ve learned how to use my scanner. After that many years of putting it off because I thought it would be hard, it really wasn’t. Took me five minutes of unpleasantness, tops. Having realized this, you can expect to see a lot more of my art here, since it’s easier to upload higher quality images now, and I always manage to screw up taking photos of art.

Until whenever I next decide that it’s been too long since I’ve plugged letters into cyberspace,

Kaelen

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02

Jun

“I want adventure in the great wide somewhere”

…If you get the Disney reference then you had a childhood well spent.
Today has been a lazy catch up on homework kind of day, but I decided to go on an adventure in the middle of it. Because if making my sunburn worse wasn’t a good idea I don’t know what is!

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Although I didn’t find where I wanted to go, I found a cool patch of forest with a nice view. I was happy. Not only that, but I also managed to avoid losing myself (I have a terrible sense of direction). …However, it becomes far less of a victory once you factor in the fact that I was probably ten minutes from a road and houses the entire time.

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I think that might be one of my favourite things about where I live. It’s not a place I’m planning on staying in for too long post graduation, and it’s definitely a “have not” province, but it’s got the neatest little nooks and crannies in it. It’s not too hard to find a place to adventure to when you need a break.

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The picture quality isn’t the best, but I didn’t feel like going to the bother of bringing a decent quality camera with me. Besides, with my iPod, I timed that I can walk to this place in less time than it takes to listen to all of a King Charles album. (It’s not an addiction and I can stop whenever I want.) I think sometime this summer I want to go out here and take good quality pictures though. Plus, it’s pretty shady under the trees, so it could be a good place to mess around with shutter speed and whatnot.

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This weekend was a bit like a taste of summer. (Speaking of which, the new gelato place that just opened at the market is great, and you all should check it out.) Adventuring is starting to become a priority again, and that is happy making.
Kaelen

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01

Jun

Happiness, and Putting Off Burnoutism

 One week of actual classes, three major projects, a show, a facepainting gig, exams, an audition… and sweet, delicious, beautiful freedom.

 In case you didn’t pick up on it from my reclusive behavior on here, or my attitude in general, I am done. I feel like I caught senioritis, but seeing as I’m only finishing grade 11, that’s a bit inconvenient. Perhaps I’ll just call it spring fever instead, to keep from getting ahead of myself.

Alright, there’s a vent to be had here, but  I have had far too many fun, cool- or at the very least, mildly interesting and bemusing- things happen that I would rather talk about than give a vent that’s been covered time and time again on this blog any more space.

So, things.

  • I had a bunch of life plans. But then I decided to throw them out. Which is simultaneously frightening and liberating. Instead I now have a fall back plan (go live the life of an Indie film with Gabe), and a whole whack of decisions to make sometime next year.
  • I have three more IB projects and then I’m done for the year. The problem is that i have no motivation to do them at this point. I’m not sure where I’m going to find this motivation, since I’m starting to use phrases like “my pre-summer evolution into a burnout”, but hopefully I’ll find some hidden resources at the bottom of a frozen lemonade. Three more. That’s all. I can do this.
  • I’ve started not caring about stuff as much. I’m going to have to rein this in sometime (and by sometime I mean this weekend, so I can finish off those final bitter drops of IB), but for now it’s actually just a huge relief.
  • Summertime is here. I have things I want to do, friends I want to visit, media I want to consume, adventures I want to take. And in less than two weeks, I can.
  • I was introduced to King Charles, and now everything is right with the world. My ears are happy as can be.
  • I found my self esteem again. Oh, yeah, that’s right, I am smart and attractive! Balancing confidence with humbleness is a tricky proposition, but just for this moment I’ll veer to the side of cockiness. Because liking myself is something that has fallen to the wayside for the last…indeterminate, but long, amount of time. Now that it’s back, I quite enjoy it.

 Really, I can’t fully cover everything, even using the beautiful invention of bullet points. There have been a billion things that have happened since I last posted. One big thing was *Dramafest, which was extremely stressful, but at the same time, I am so very very proud of my fellow cast members, and our student directors, who pulled through. I made two big discoveries because of Dramafest. 1) I can make it through a double hell week, while sick, and I’ll only mostly hate myself and my friends (the hate passed, don’t worry) by the end of it. 2) When in doubt, clear your throat before coming on stage. Otherwise, if you are sick and full of phlegm, you risk sounding like Satan.

 The second big thing was TEC, which was pretty freaking incredible. Maybe a tiny sprinkling of life altering. Not changing persay, but a little altering, if I can throw phrases like that around at the mature and ripe old age of sixteen. TEC is a place where crazy Jesus stuff goes down, and it’s hard to accurately describe without making most of the people who read this blog think I’m slightly deranged. Suffice it to say, it was good, really helped heal my relationship with God, and gave me a lot more peace than I originally had before going. Also, I got to be of service to other people, which made me pretty happy. I like being useful.

 I’m so glad the school year is almost over. Overall, I’m happy, which due to all the stress I’ve put myself under, is more than I’ve been in a long time.

 Kaelen

*Speaking of which, shameless plug time!!! If you find yourself in need of a show to watch, please come check out our public showings of Yesterday the Children Were Dancing, and the student written play Juicy. Thursday night, SJHS mini theatre, shows starting at 7 pm. Tickets are five dollars at the door.

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31

Dec

In Summary

It’s super snowy out, and even my grinch like sensibilities that normally detest the cold white stuff have been laying low. Good job winter, you’ve managed to win me over.

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Obnoxiously instagramming things is a hideous addiction.

The Year In General:

 Made some pretty cool friends, and got closer with some nifty people that I already knew.

Began to volunteer at the library. Because books and resumes and stuff!

Finished grade ten and began grade eleven, having probably adjusted as much to public school as I ever will. I don’t know how much I’m learning in the majority of my classes as compared to how much I learned while homeschooled, but it’s interesting to see how the rest of the world does that learning thing.

Was in this awesome play over the summer and got to hang out with all these cool people a whole lot.

Was in this awesome play over the summer and got to hang out with all these cool people a whole lot.

Actually made money using my hobbies. Which is a -very welcome- first! And considering that over the course of the year I’ve probably made around $300-$400 just off of ‘doing my thing’, that’s pretty cool, ignoring that it’s spread out over the course of a year. Never did get a job, but if I squint and ignore the math, that’s still pretty cool.

Went to Novia Scotia twice, once with youth group and once with my school’s choir. Two very different trips, but both were great and involved high amounts of snuggling.

Went to TEC, which, if you’re into the whole Jesus thing, I can’t recommend enough. If you’re not, then it really wouldn’t be your cup of tea, but as someone who digs Christianity, it was amazing and I can’t wait to volunteer there in a few months, hopefully giving other people the same  wonderful experience. (side note: I have never been fed so much food as during the weekend I spent there.)

I’ve gotten more comfortable with my singing voice. It’s stil not amazing, but for a theatre kid, being able to not be embarrassed when you sing is a huge relief.

I've gotten a bit better at photoshop. A nice little accomplishment.

I’ve gotten a bit better at photoshop. A nice little accomplishment, though there’s still lots of room for improvement.

Had a ‘we’ve-been-together-one-year-that’s-a-while-that’s-cool’ with my boyfriend. Very nifty.

Despite the predictions of my parents upon seeing how much I was doing, I didn’t have a nervous breakdown, which I probably count as a little bit more of a triumph than  it actually is.

Knit my first full size sweater! …Another one of those things which I probably am counting as more of a victory than need be.

Learned to play the guitar, more or less. Actually, put emphasis on the ‘less’, but still! I can do things, I just can’t do them well. Either way, slowly being able to count an instrument as being ‘under my belt’ is astonishingly satisfying.

Continued to miss all of my west coast family, including the latest addition shown here. (hint, she's the one in the pink.)

Continued to miss all of my west coast family, including the latest addition shown here. (hint, she’s the one in the pink.)

And that’s a wrap. A year and stuff. Weird to think that next time I’ll be typing one of these up I’ll be going on seventeen and close to graduation. Passage of time, aren’t you just the silliest little thing? Happy New Year’s Eve. Go get up to some shenanigans or something.

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20

Sep

Cinnamon and Nutmeg Actually Go Very Well With Chai Tea

At some point in the last week of my life, I have turned into the sort of person who counts down to the Thanksgiving long weekend while it’s still September.

Today is aThursday. Thursdays are the crazy sort of days where I have school, two extracurricular activities that collectively last over four hours and homework. Thursdays also have the extra drag of not being Fridays, no matter how hard you wish upon a star. (or a slow moving helicopter, depending on your luck)

On the happier side of things, it’s cold enough to wear sweaters and scarfs again (I built up a semi-heat tolerance over the summer because I’ve come to the point where I feel naked without at least one sweater. Needless to say, fall weather and cooler temperature is all too welcome.), and there is a Java Moose that I pass on my way to school each morning that sells fairly inexpensive chai tea. (Java gets bonus points for the fact that they have shakers of nutmeg and cinnamon that you can shake into your warm beverages as much as you please.)

I think I’m slowly getting over my extreme pining for the lazy days of summer. Being busy again is taking some getting used to, but since I’ve discovered that you can do homework in other classes (heeeeello, core french!), saving you from having to do it in nonexistent time at home, my quality of life has dramatically improved.
This is good, because randomly inane stress was getting to the point where my friends and I are reminiscing over our “IB breakdowns”. (for the uninitiated, these breakdown tales usually begin with a story about homework or crammed schedules and end with “and then I sobbed”)
Nobody can say the nerdy white kids don’t know how to have a rollicking good tale swapping time.

Kaelen

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03

Sep

 I’m caught somewhere between feeling nostalgic for a summer that’s still got one day to go and excited for the routine of fall.  The  weather seems to be reflecting my own indecision- It’s getting ready to be fall yet still hanging on summer, with  those wonderfully warm days tempered by chill breezes that make September my favorite month.

 It feels weird… this is my first “official” summer break and next year will be my last. I know I’m only going into grade eleven, but a lot of my friends are going into their last year of high school, and all in all it’s just a reminder of  the fact that being a teenager is a very small and fleeting portion of your life which far too much emphasis is put on.

 (Somebody, quick, smack me before I turn into Holden Caulfield.)

Maybe I should just take Lupin’s advice.

 On a more amusing note: although only the grade nines start on Wednesday, my art teacher asked me to come in to talk about the IB art 11 course I’m going to be taking. I just have to come in for the last class of the day, but I’ve come to the conclusion that I quite want to dress in all black clothes, oversized glasses and a neck scarf, then walk around school the entire day, thumbing my noses at the grade nines and drawling things about how someday “You too may do IB”, and, “These are mature things you wouldn’t understand”…just generally being a pretentious know it all jerk.

I probably won’t actually go through with this.

Probably.

 

 

Dealing with the end of summer by messing with the fragile brains of niners in the name of being pretentious…so tempting.

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26

Aug

Overview of the week.

It’s been a while since I’ve posted- this can partially be blamed on being quite busy and partially on being quite lazy. Take your pick.While you’re busy choosing, let me give you a chronological over view of the interesting bits of the last week. (note: interptretation of “interesting” may vary.)

1) The 1812 project.

Our last performance was exactly a week ago, and it was a nice gig to spend part of my summer on.

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Historical accuracy right there, folks.

 

Eight cool cats, including yours truly, (originally nine, but a case of tonsillitis decided to intervene) got to explain the entire war of 1812 in approximately half an hour. T’was a bit ridiculous, but I haven’t been killed in my sleep by any angry historians as of yet.

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Preshow “getting into character”.

 

2) I AM NOW IN POSSESSION OF A PAIR OF RAINBOW SUSPENDERS

I’d say my excitement over this acquisition is fairly self explanatory.

3) Spending the night at Tatyana’s/her fancy late grad party.

We sat around, nibbled lots and lots and lots of food, sang show tunes and drank non alcoholic wine. Which, for the record, tastes just like slightly strange carbonated juice served in fancy bottles. Staying up until three thirty in the morning seemed like a great idea until the construction that is taking place literally outside of  Tatyana’s bedroom window began at seven in the morning.  Coffee and hot chocolate, mixed together, may very well be the only thing that got me through the following day.

4) The Library

Running off of approximately four and a half hours sleep, after walking home from the sleepover  I got to chill  for all of  two hours before I headed off to say hello to my mom on my way uptown for the last library volunteer session.

 Julianne and I have been “actually” volunteering at the library  for the summer… Will, Meagan and Tatyana decided that they were just going to start dropping in and putting together puzzles for the last month or so of volunteering at the same time we volunteer. Because what else would a bunch of cool kids do but hang at the library and solve puzzles while stage whispering obnoxiously loudly? (I love my friends.)

 All this being said, Julianne and I were awarded pizza and liquid diabetes (aka, pop)last Tuesday at the final session of volunteering. Will, Meagan and Tatyana made puppy eyes at the apathetic summers student who was watching us until he finally gave them the go ahead to eat junk food, despite their non-volunteery-ness. What commenced next was quite possibly the most amusing attempts at sneakily eating pizza I have ever seen.

5) Callbacks

I ate a lot of dairy products, didn’t drink much water, and got not much sleep at all the night before call backs. Basically everything you’re not supposed to do.

6) A new cutiepieshnooglebum in my family.

A new cousin, Emmi is someone I can’t wait to meet. Another reason I need to visit the rest of my west coast family.

Emmi would be the small bundle of blankets in the middle. Although you can’t see her face, I guarantee you, she is adorable.

7) Family Bonding Time With Gay Pride

Yesterday we were looking for something to do, since my Dad’s side of the family was in town. (since they live across the country, it’s a bit of a rare occurrence) However it happened, we decided to watch the gay pride parade that was taking place that afternoon. The parade was what I can only guess is a typical her small-ish town pride parade;  rather small, and pretty family friendly. No nudity or anything “risque”, just some people advocating their rights in a friendly, rainbow coloured fashion.

My outlook on life is that if you’re not hurting anyone and you’re happy, good for you! Let’s not judge others and maybe they’ll return the favour and we can all be happy. Some of my visiting family’s views are a bit less liberal though…there were a few awkward silences during our per-parade lunch.

Tonight I’m off to hang out with Murgles, Julianne, and a brand new sock pattern. Life is good.

Kaelen

12 years ago Short URL Comments

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