There's A Tear in My Beer

And so another week has come and gone, this time, without infestations or sickness. Thank goodness! I made the decision to quit something, I turned in an internship application (three weeks late, so much for professionalism), I spoke up in a class I don't like to talk in, I cried, and I felt affirmation.

Since starting college, the 2 weeks before spring break have always been a time of questioning, quitting, and unexpected happiness. My freshman year, I quit 2 of the extra curricular activities that were making me miserable, got a boyfriend, and went on a really long run. Last year, I decided to take better care of my mental health, went to a really fun party where I made some decisions about how I wanted to deal with romantic relationships for the rest of my time in college, and cried a lot.

This is always a crazy time for me, partly because it forces me to think about the near future, something I've never liked doing. It's always much easier for me to decide what I want to do for grad school, which fellowships I want to apply to next year, and what I want to name my future children than what I want to do for the summer, where I want to live next year, and what I want to eat for dinner.

It's also the time when people figure out housing, and since I don't have what I like to call a "roommate soulmate", that is, a person who I get along well with as a roommate that I can live with semester after semester without trouble, this time is always stressful for me. I have so many good friends, but at the end of the day, I'm the odd one out when it comes to living together. I think I do this to myself by having so many different friend groups but not having a single best friend (I don't want to pick! They're all the best! That's why they're my friends!), but it still hurts when it's 2 days before the housing deadline and the people I thought I might live with if I decided to not be anti-social have actually been talking to other roommates. And ultimately, I'm always okay with living by myself or living with a random roommate, but it would be nice to have some stability. I've had several excellent roommates in my time, but none that it would logistically work with to live in a dorm at Oberlin with for multiple semesters (i.e. roommate in Kentucky, roommate who goes to a different college, roommate who has off-campus status). It's always frustrating and anxiety inducing, and I absolutely hate it.

Last night, I had a good talk with an old friend. She helped me remember that I'm fine (and probably happier) living by myself, and that it doesn't mean that I'm a bad friend or a bad roommate if I don't have a roommate soulmate. She inspired me to continue to take control of my education, and not let it control me, and to not get stuck in situations that make me unhappy. And over cheap beer and good talk, I remembered why I am here, and why I live alone, and why it's okay to cry this time of year, because it's stressful (midterms! duh!), and the near future honestly scares me more than the far future.

So I'm sitting here in a booth in the student union, typing this, crying. But these aren't sad tears, they're the happy tears of self-affirmation.

Something Weevil This Way Comes

Last night, I decided to prepare a very delicious looking pasta dish that was like pasta carbonara, only with brussel sprouts instead of bacon and will less fat and more veggies. And I was using my favorite pasta shape, those curly tubes that I can never remember the name of. About halfway through the pasta cooking time, I noticed that these little black things had floated to the surface of the water. This had never happened to me before, so I fished them out of the water, put them in my hands, and discovered that they were weevils. Ew ew ew ew ew. More deterred by the thought of an infestation than by the thought of eating bugs (I'd been on the go all day and was really hungry!), I googled "Can you eat pasta with weevils in it?" The general consensus on the internet was "Yes, you'll probably get extra protein, but who'd want to eat food that had bugs in it, weirdo? What kind of disgusting freak are you?"

"But what if you've already cooked it? What if you don't have time to make anything else or enough money to go out to eat? What if you're tired?" I wanted to say back to these internet naysayers. But disgusted by the thought of infestation, I proceeded to clean out my entire kitchen and throw away any food that could possibly have weevils in it (beans, flour, raisins, 2 boxes of pasta, lentils, pecans, etc). It was a bummer and I was hungry. I couldn't help wondering what I'd done wrong? I keep my kitchen relatively clean, clean my stovetop at least twice a week, and throw away any food that's gone bad. I'm pretty sure the weevils were in some of the food when I bought it, but I'm not sure what and it's creeping me out. But I guess the moral of this story is that weevils, like head lice, can happen to anyone. I'm not sure what lesson I've learned from this, besides having my trust in the US food system completely shaken. Seriously, how to I know that what I'm buying won't contain little bugs? Is it safer to buy organic, or will that just mean it's more likely to contain bugs? Is it better to buy things in smaller packaging, or does it all come from the same weevil-infested pasta company?

I have no idea. If this had happened to me in Kentucky, I wouldn't have batted an eyelash. I had so many domestic things to deal with, like leaky sinks, stapling plastic to windows, making sure the pipes didn't freeze and making sure Sadie was healthy, that I wouldn't have batted an eyelash at an infestation. In fact, I did have one, when I first got Sadie and she had fleas all over her face. I would scratch her head and see bugs crawling around her eyes. It's terrible when you have a baby animal that is covered in bugs. But we dealt with the fleas and Sadie forgave me when I tried to give her a bath and blow dry her in order to get rid of them.

And I dealt with the weevils and I'm pretty sure they're gone now. I'm going to enact a personal "Look before you cook" policy. And I'm never going to ask the internet for advice about bug consumption ever again.

The Women's Blog and Why I'm Pretty Sure I Could Create One

After I came to terms with the fact that Facebook was causing me more misery than good and inducing me to do thinks like post pictures of my friends in their underwear (it's from a school dance party, alright?), stalk ex's new girlfriends (why is she skinnier and more artistically talented than me?), post controversial opinions online and then get upset when people criticize them (yes, I know that's a stupid idea for a tattoo. no, I still don't think you're taking the issue of mountain top removal seriously enough), and realize how many of the boys I had unrequited crushes on in middle and high school are MARRIED now (at least 2 that I know of), I deactivated my Facebook.

So it's still out there somewhere online, waiting for me to log-in and reactivate it and make sure I don't get a job because I forgot to untag the photo where I'm pretending to pick my nose. In the mean time, I am recovering quite nicely from this addiction (this is week 2). However, one cannot do as much homework as I do without some kind of reprieve or distraction. This distraction for me has been The Hairpin, thehairpin.com, a blog for women who are sort of in my life stage and who are feminists but wear make up and appreciate pop culture while being skeptical of it and like men or women but realize that people can be jerks much of the time. In short, I spend lots of time reading articles in the Hairpin, and will probably submit something to them as soon as I write something witty enough.

But then I realized that instead of trying to join the current women's magazine-style blogs, I should just make my own. I mean, come on, think of all of the blogs I've created, Janney's January Appalachian Adventures, where I talk about everything from water quality to happy hour, the now ignored Janney Lockman Living where I share my tips for being a young, feminist, modern, unmarried housewife, and the also underused Cats Do the Darnedest Things, where I share cat anecdotes (or would share them, if I weren't too lazy to update it).

Anyway, combine all these blogs together, add some advice about relationships and articles about movie stars, make up, and Barbie dolls, and you've got the Hairpin!

So I'm going to start a new blog that is a women's magazine for fashionable, smart, young feminist women who live in rural places in the US. This isn't happening now. But it will happen in the near future, so mark my words. In the mean time, stay tuned to this blog, and if you decide to deactivate your Facebook and get bored, I suggest The Hairpin

http://thehairpin.com/