I can't tell if it's my depression setting in or if I'm finally starting to think rationally. I keep making plans that fail, and even though it's usually circumstantial, it usually has some affect on my day. The generated effect is that feeling of being behind. Behind on service, behind on friendship, behind on school work, behind on progress. I have unknowingly created a playlist about failure, and even though I've come to realize this, I still want to listen to it. I know what failure sounds like, but for some reason hearing the pain through Tegan and Sara, feels good.

I'm trying, I'm trying to drink away the part of the day
That I cannot sleep away.
- Polar Opposites by Modest Mouse

I'm used to jumping to conclusions about people, classes, and certainly expectations.
I'm used to having a daydreamer perspective about the things that I want.

I ran out of the medicine that controls my thyroid and I remember thinking, my hormones can't do that much damage in two days. Then today my coworker said she was having a bad week but in two days it would be better. When asked about it, she threw out the word hormones. Two days. Hormones.

That answer coming from a girl doesn't always mean periods. Sometimes it's two days without medication. Sometimes it's two days without balanced meals. Our hormones are affected by any number of reasons. Sometimes you want to misbehave. Sometimes you want to lay down and pull a Sleeping Beauty.

So, sure, I could just close my eyes.
Yeah, sure, trace and memorize,
But can you go back once you know?

I have to get out of this awkward phase. It's not like that middle school/high school awkward phase, just me being awkward. And I don't understand, cause I get really excited and have a good time and then I find that I've become awkward. GO AWAY STRANGE AWKWARD STATES! For real!

This week is another week of possibilities. Can't wait for all the sunshine! And of course, fingers crossed for you!

Cause love is just a dialogue
You can't survive on ice cream.
- Cheap and Cheerful by The Kills

I love those lines. I have this strange kind of drive that allows me to procrastinate on almost everything but that pushes me to accomplish a few less important things. I push myself to walk faster, to make it somewhere in the same or less time as previously. Sometimes it leads to ridiculously good results like toned legs and salon quality nails. Sometimes it seems just useless. I have been pushing myself for a year to finish a mixtape, Advancing a Friendship, but I see so many different ways to compose it, to write it, that I can't choose a direction to take it. What if mixtapes don't have to be finished, but could simply stay playlists? You can add to it and remove what you'd like, but where is this pressure coming from to finish it?

I've started a new mixtape theme, and I don't know when I'll finish it, but I love making it. I'm calling it The Innermost Thoughts of a Girl in Like.

I need to revert back into the art of texting.

Jenn sent me one last night that was like a long awaited sigh.
"You're a poet and I'm a writer. We make things more complicated because it sounds good on paper. - you"
She quoted something I've said before. My heart filled with warmth and happiness and truth and then the truth set in. That quote is still applicable to our lives, no matter how much we avoid it or embrace it.

I may have said this last semester, but it still holds true dearest Linny:
Keep all of your summer dreams and let them lead you to sleep. Let yourself dream it. In the morning you can be happy, if just for that first moment.

Don't forget what you could have, what you deserve, and never lower yourself to anything less.

Just a warning to any minor who stumbles across dear Libby, some content may be more inappropriate than normal.

I adore Ovid, ever since I first translated him. I've always had a strong liking for Daphne, and I even dressed up as her for Halloween once in college. Despite the fact that she was a strong devotee of Diana and that Diana/Artemis is my favorite goddess, I always liked Daphne for some other reason. Maybe for the courage to end her mortal(ish) life to become a tree.

Well we are reading The Metamorphoses in my Roman Culture class and my ever amusing professor made her usual set of comments that got me thinking. Daphne is this radical militant virgin who dedicates herself to just one god. The ancients didn't approve of only worshiping one god, however, and the popular favor was with Apollo. So radical virgins are wrong and Apollo was right to run after her for sex.

Now rape is still not something accepted in our society, but would Daphne still be looked down on for being so radical? It's one thing to accept it as not your cup of tea and continue with your own pleasures, but it's another to stand there and judge her for not wanting children or commitment to a male sex partner.

Is virginity the new societal shun?

There's that rumored allure of female virginity that makes it a conquest to take a woman's virginity. However, the male virgin is not seen as so ideal for women of these days. A virginal bride is not something completely lost these days, but it's that willpower that others find too hard to keep. More kids in middle school are getting knocked up these days making the unexpected high school pregnancy seem not as sinful as society once saw it.

But is there something beyond the willpower that is admirable about a virgin? Is virginity really so radical? The claim of virginity is something either whispered softly or proudly declared. It's a secret you withhold in embarrassment or it is a part of who you are. Is this a claim you want to hold on to very long though? You don't encounter people who live their whole lives as virgins. There isn't a whole community of virginal senior citizens, but there are those commendable individuals who wait until marriage, until true love, until something better than what's been offered. It's commendable but not attainable for the whole. There's that bewitching puppy love, the revolting passion of youth, and all those hormones on overdrive. There's trickery, deceit, and revenge - the evils of the heart.

Then there's this song, not about virginity per say, but the choice of sex.

Do you remember
we made love on the floor
and you still haven't called
So I'll wait 'til they're closing the bars.

I made a wish
but the match never lit.

There's a break in the preceding music for a crescendo of love. Nate holds the last word, gives it a few extra syllables, and there's an idea of beauty and of wonder. Then a sort of pleading is left in his voice, a sense of dying hope, and then a wish that never comes true. It's all a choice and everything that happens is an effect of your choices and the choices that you don't get to make.

Labels: virginity

When I was a little girl and I'd get mad at my parents, I'd tell them I wasn't going to talk to them. As if that was real punishment for however they hurt my feelings. The only problem is that I could never keep my mouth shut. Now all I want to do is thank my mom and I can't even speak. Thank you laryngitis for enlarging my lymph nodes and pushing unfairly against my voice box.

So my mom came up with Charlotte and they were everything I needed. When I took the second dose of my medicine, I started to fall asleep on her lap while she played with my hair. And all I dreamed about was Etta James singing Sunday Kind of Love. I wish life had more moments like that.

Labels: Best of Libellus

I don't know why I don't immediately find ten various meanings behind Horace's poems, because my imagination really has no boundary at the limits of the possible horrors in my life. I realized recently how much I have to change my verbal responses to things. I went through a phase last year where when asked how I was I would respond with the truth or a pause, because I couldn't bare another white lie. But if you don't have a witty or cute quick response, people make you intro into your bad day or whatever it was. When things aren't going well enough to respond with an "I'm fine" chances are my lips and mind are not synced up so well. It's a slower pace all around.

Maybe I'll stop pretending to be fine around the people who actually care. I wish I had had this idea.

On another note, Lou: I hope the mixtape helps you with some of what you're going through. I will gladly lose my voice for you any day, as well as leave a creepy awesome voicemail. I would do that for any good friend, after all, who can pass up a hot almost mannish raspy late night radio host's voice?

EDIT: My roommate keeps pointing out how drugged up I sound. Let's please remember I am mixing pills to breathe.

Disappointment. Again. It makes me the worst company. It makes me feel so frighteningly alone.
It's always you and it's always me. Just like Rumor personified in the Aeneid, you search for me when things change and like the Furies you just run rampant ruining what I have. Embarrassed, rejected and confused. I said too much, I always say too much.

This is where I run out of words
That describe how I'm so damn hurt
This is where I fumble and fold
And take what I'm told

I'm perfecting my This Blows mix. It doesn't help.
I deserve the whole story. I don't deserve to have feelings that fester like this.
Let's be honest, it hurts being so unsure and feeling rejected. When do I get to know the full story? How else can I make up my own mind and heart?

For my birthday I would like one time turner and certainty. That is all.

Sometimes people surprise you. Sometimes you surprise yourself.

I scrubbed and swiffered the bathroom clean. I vacuumed my room, hallway, and living room. I swiffered the kitchen. I fixed the couch. I put things on the wall. I finally found enough time for myself to watch Daria. I have the tingling sensation in my chest perfect for putting pen to paper. I might even finish reading The Nibelungenlied and finish the parts of The Aeneid I have left.

But I'm home all alone, and it's part choice and part effect of choice. Choice, my friend and foe, has me surrounded on all sides this month. I am genuinely happy most days, and content the rest. But I've been having slips in mood a lot lately. At work I manage to shake off all feelings of happiness until the contentment is gripping onto my wrists, afraid to fall off. Stephanie keeps catching me drifting off into my zombie states and I can't describe how it feels to be numb.

Parts of me keep trying to contract away from being happy. My total lack of responsibility hits overdrive whenever I start to feel comfortable. They ask if I mind being single. It's not that big of a deal. It's not that hard, to live in fear. How much do your fears drive you and how much do you drive yourself to ignore fear?

I think I'm always consumed by fear around my birthday. It's one day, and it comes and then it goes, just like all the rest. I just don't want to face them yet. I don't want to become the worst friend all over again, but I want to pull the covers over my head and listen to this playlist over and over again.

Labels: Birthdays, numb

This song gets me in the first chorus. Something sets in my bones and then I hear that line, and I know I have to start it all over again. Then she hangs up and says "I ain't never gonna see the winter again" And I don't know how, but she smiles. I think I'm crazy because I know it will make me cry eventually, but I play it on repeat letting it soak in my bones. It reminds me of my mix of lyrics, Smile like you never tried to take your life. But this is deeper, like it's being sung about Sierra but also like it's being sung by Kaely. They carved your name into the stone and then they put it in the ground, I run my fingers through the grooves When no one's around. I'm not sure anymore if the stories of my past drive my characters or if my characters drive me. I put my Oxford poster on my door again to remind me to dream. I think of her dream and I think of your dream and I won't watch them collide. Lord, don't let them collide.

1 - Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine by The Killers
2 - The Dress Looks Nice On You by Sufjan Stevens
3 - Calendar Girl by Stars
4 - Better by Regina Spektor
5 - Dark Blue by Jack's Mannequin
6 - Of A Broken Heart by Zwan
7 - Standing Outside A Broken Phone Booth With Money In My Hand by Primitive Radio Gods
8 - Those To Come by The Shins
9 - Raindrops by Regina Spektor
10 - Tesselate by Tokyo Police Club
11 - Diamond Sea by Yeah Yeah Yeahs
12 - Let It Rain by OK GO
13 - Rain City by Turin Brakes
14 - Ten Dead Dogs by Wild Sweet Orange
15 - Gypsy Melodies by The Snake The Cross The Crown
16 - All These Things That I've Done by The Killers
17 - Let It Rain by Tilly And The Wall
18 - Lemon Grove Avenue by Mason Jennings
19 - Swim by Jack's Mannequin
20 - Thirteen by Big Star

Labels: mixtapes, Rainy Day Mix

1 - Tony The Tiger by Manchester Orchestra
2 - Have At Thee! by Say Anything
3 - Weekend Wars by MGMT
4 - You Only Live Once by The Strokes
5 - Sweet Disposition by The Temper Trap
6 - Keep The Car Running by Arcade Fire
7 - Brother (Annuals Cover) by Manchester Orchestra
8 - Lost Coastlines by Okkervil River
9 - Our Swords by Band of Horses
10 - You Don't Know Me (feat. Regina Spektor) by Ben Folds
11 - Non Photo-Blue by Pinback
12 - Slumming It With Johnny by Say Anything
13 - That Time by Regina Spektor
14 - Plans by Bloc Party
15 - Time Bomb by The Format
16 - All The Pretty Girls by fun.
17 - Cold December by Matt Costa
18 - Car by Built To Spill
19 - So Much Beauty in Dirt by Modest Mouse
20 - Don't Steal Our Sun by The Thrills
21 - Take Your Time (Coming Home) by fun.

Labels: 316, mixtapes