am i correct to defend the fist that holds this pen?

From the fifth floor of the library it looks like the snow is going up from the ground. I can see that it's already starting to kind of stick to the ground and to the grass.

I really hate this time of the year. I hate the cold. I hate how it's cloudy and grey all the time. I remember freshmen year I slipped on ice TWICE walking back to my dorm from study hall one night.

I should be working on my eight page Economics paper due and/or my twelve page CFP paper, both of which are due next week. But then I'll be in Florida and the semester will finally be over. I just can't get myself to work right now. My head is swimming.

I know I shouldn't be dwelling on it. But it just annoys me that Jill has time to respond back to Gordon, but not my email. I really just want her explanation. It's fine to me that she quit, and that she wasn't happy, hell I can understand where she's coming from, but I'd just like an explanation. Is that too much to ask for?

How do we move forward from here?

i should tell you, i'm disaster.

I could barely get through yesterday without crying. I laid down on the pool deck and pretended to sleep because my eyes were watering. I'm so tired. I don't know what I'm doing with my life right now. I'm in a rut. I thought I was doing so well. I can never swim well at this time in the season. I was ready. I swear I was. I don't know what I did differently a month ago. I don't know how to get back to it. I'm just a mess right now.

dream big.

It mystifies me how some people have no dreams. No aspirations.

Life deserves a purpose, otherwise what's the point.

Some lives need to be given a purpose. You have to choose what it is you want in your life and then go for it.

Have some goals. Have some dreams.

You can't just live life day to day and expect things to happen. You have to make things happen.

Today was one of those WIN days. I didn't think that it would go to well when I walk outside for morning practice and it's raining and gloomy, just one of those days that you know you won't see any sunshine.

Yet, classes went well. I got out of my presentation that I was dreading. Practice went surprisingly well after initially dreading the sets.

A good hump day.

give them nothing. and take from them everything.

Some days some people just have it made.

Saturday was a good day. A win. For the team and for me. My first against a conference team. Pat seemed happy with my races and I'm finally contributing in dual meets in a tangible way on a regular basis. I finally have the confidence to race and to be a leader in a more vocal way.

It feels good. I'm happy with where I am right now, swimming wise.

We definitely are more of a team now than ever before and it's visible to everyone around us.

Thursday was a rough day because we confronted people and issues on our team but I think we've settled them to the point where people understand the sacrifices that have to be made.

A tough end of the week is ahead so we've got to push through and get ready to swim fast this weekend against ECU.

love.

two thousand miles and one left turn

A win.
A loss.
Too many emotions running from this weekend.

I need confidence in what I'm doing. Otherwise, what am I doing? I'm wasting my time pushing myself in practices until I ache. I get to meets and I freeze.

No, it wasn't all that bad.

I finally have speed. My sprint freestyle and sprint back looks good. My 200 back on the other hand. Supposedly, my event...

...bad.

I've tried to hold it in. My emotions. I called my mom, not even meaning to talk about the meet or the race. But it just came out. Right in front of the library.

I need to get my head out of my butt. Basically.

step on the stage. the lights. the praise.

It's October. It's ninety degrees outside. Does mother nature care to explain why she's messing with our heads?

I want to wear hoodies and not have to worry about what my hair is doing because I can just cover it with a hood.

Midterm in economics tonight. I don't feel as worried as I should be. I think it will all come to me when I put the pencil to the paper.

Big test this weekend when we travel to William and Mary for the meet. We're all pretty excited. Last year, the women's team won by seven points. This year, we have the depth and the experience of knowing what it was like to beat them early in the season. We can pull this off. I know we can.

Save the drama for your mama. I really want to bring that saying back.

Caps are 3-0. How about them apples?

r-e-s-p-e-c-t

Somebody let me know, but is that too much to ask for?

If you give it, you're supposed to get it back right?

Regardless, it's something that's seriously lacking.

I'm really not in the greatest of moods. I need to be able to go up to someone and tell them my true thoughts. Have a backbone. Believe in what I say and then DO IT. Because if I don't, nobody will. I'm starting to believe that.

I am not going to sit on my ass as the events that affect me unfold to determine the course of my life. I'm going to take a stand. I'm going to defend it. Right or wrong, I'm going to defend it.

too afraid of anything that may not come that easy.

I'm feeling like these next couple of days are not going to be okay. I'm feeling extremely overwhelmed and I've spent the whole day kind of floating from place not paying attention to where I was cause my head is swimming.

Midterms next week. Winter is around the corner. Alumni meet tomorrow. No social life. Parents coming. Patrick Mead. I'm so tired. And sore. I can't talk in public. Why do my professors keep calling me Kathy? Whenever I try and write and make myself sound intelligent in papers, I always get questions marks in red ink. I hate swimming with the boys in the afternoon. I hate having six people in a lane.

I need something. why are you still standing there just watching me drown?

I'm just stressed.

*81 was the year shit hit the fan.

Had a good meeting with Pat this morning. I think I've realized the reason why he doesn't hold my hand through everything like he does some other people. He knows that I can be stronger than I am, he knows that I try to get through things on my own. It might take time, but in the end it's me who's overcoming things on my own. He knows that my confidence is not where it should be but he has seen how I've matured and he expects more out of me than he does others.

It's comforting to know that he does see me for everything good I do and when I start struggling he wants me to come to him. Because I tend to keep things to myself, but when I start struggling I have to get to the point where I go to him to talk without me self imploding.

This season is going to be my breakout season. I'm no longer going to make mistakes in overestimating or underestimating for that matter the other team, my teammates or myself. I'm not going to have the nerves that I've had in the past. I know what I need to do to be the best on the team and to be one of the best in the conference. It's going to happen.

It's all happening.

I broke down for the first time since the beginning of August when I was still worried about swimming with my busted toe. I was nervous about not doing well at tryouts. Then Pat names me captain and I think this is going to be a great season where Pat and I have an open line of communication and my practices were going fabulously.

Then I have a day like today, where I don't even give up on the set, I just physically could not keep pushing myself. And when I have basically no encouragement from my coaches, let alone my teammates. At some point it gets hard to motivate yourself. It wasn't even that bad of a set. But I'm not the kind of person to place blame on other people or give excuses. I wasn't even that upset about it. Sure, I would have loved to go faster. I would have loved to beat certain people.

But when Michele points out that Robin went so much faster than me and that she should "teach me how to swim IM". It's just something that got to me. I've never had ANYONE say something like that to me. And coming from Michele, who really knows nothing about swimming other than the name of whoever touches the wall first, it shouldn't bother me. But that didn't matter at the time. I was appalled and devastated. She wonders why the girls team can't stand her? It's comments like that.

This is two weeks in a row that my last half of the week has gone poorly. I don't know how to explain it.

I need help.

how bad do you want it?

Well, yesterday I foreshadowed my cracking up. A rough morning followed by a rough practice in the afternoon. I gave up on the set as soon as Hill texted me what the boys were doing when I was at the study abroad meeting.

When I have bad practice I try not to let it affect me. It's just one day. And today it was just the one set. The last thing we did redeemed me a little bit, but it was still in my head. But in a good way. I wanted to prove myself.

I just don't know what to say to Pat when days like this happen though. He asked me and all I could say is "it was a shitty day". I've been having out of this world practices recently and it sucks when I stink up the joint one day cause it really sticks out.

if we sweat all these debts we're sure to drown.

I'm about to lose it.

I don't appreciate the idea of something wrong with my mom. Cause if something happens to her, my dad and I will not survive. She is our line of communication. Things have gotten better since college started, but it's still not normal. At this point in time, I'm probably over reacting. Her doctor says it's not cancer, but there is a swollen duct and they don't know why. I just really want to see her. She called me still really shaken cause have the first mammogram today, they decided right away they had to do an ultrasound. They were supposed to come up, but she's still rocky from the idea and not knowing.

I can't wait until Saturday to see her. I might lose it.

I've lost my patience with little things. I need to relax and stay calm, but it's hard. How am I supposed to behave normally?

I'm a worrier.

i'll pretend my ships not sinking.

It looks like study abroad is a go. go. go. Pat's input was that the earlier I go the better and that once I get back I need to commit to the last two months of training before my senior year. He also commented on that if I "come back a drunken lush that he'll kick my ass." Point taken. The study abroad office is officially calling my name. I'm trying to decide if I want to stay in Paris and all the beautiful architecture or southern France with the beautiful scenery and Mediterranean. Oh what a predicament to be in...if only life was as easy as choosing which beautiful place to visit.

Mom has a mammogram scheduled for tomorrow. The fact that it is her second in two weeks worries me. And the fact that she wasn't even going to tell me is what worries me even more. I'm sure she's fine, but I am my mother's daughter and a bit of a worry wort. Granted I haven't been home in over a month and so I'm sure there is a lot of stuff going on that she hasn't told me, cause that's just how she is. She doesn't tell me things that happen between her or my dad or anything about their health, because she doesn't want me worrying.

There is something calming about fall weather when the sun is out but it's chilly. It's just more comfortable to walk around in a hoodie and jeans. In winter, the coats are too bulky to be comfortable when you're outside, but just a light hoodie is perfection.

head back leaning through the traffic.

This morning was a tough morning to wake up. Sometimes it's definitely tempting to just roll over and fall back asleep. But you've got to put on the happy face and head out at 6:07 in the morning...only to be greeted by faces that want to be there just as little as you do.

Sooner or later though those faces are going to turn into happy ones, if only the cancer kids would be gone and stop negatively affecting others.

It's one thing to be confident and strong in your convictions, it's another to be brash and think that you're God's gift to the earth and that you can do no wrong.

I probably shouldn't be drinking coffee so close to pool time. The jitters will most likely hit me as I'm walking to Burdick. Sometimes I consider starting to drink it before meets. I just wouldn't want to crash and burn from my caffeine buzz at a random point during it. Can you imagine it hitting you during a 400 IM?

I've got piles of readings to do and questions to be answered and papers to write on airplanes and Speedo.

I've got stuff to talk to Pat about. This summer, studying abroad. I don't want him to think this is me trying to get out of training. Cause it's not. God knows, that I get right back into the swing of things when it's crunch time. I just need that extra push to get me there.

It's 1:11. Make a wish.

Wait. That's 11:11. Oh well. Make one anyway.