What is stress? What exactly is it? Is it when you're tired, angry, sad? Or is it just when you're worried? Can loneliness be a kind of stress? What about boredom?

My mom has taken me to the doctor's a lot recently. Anytime I explain my symptoms, though, they just kind of look at me and frown. Both my usual doctor and the dermatologist in the city have thrown the same word at me - it could be caused by stress. They ask me if anything's bothering me, any big stresses in my life, and all I can do is shrug and shake my head. I mean, my life could always be better, but right now I'm content. I get to lay around, with hardly any responsibilities and unlimited access to a multitude of entertainments like the computer and books and such.

Even news websites are constantly throwing out articles about stress being related to this disease and that condition. The whole world seems so stressed and overworked, like a bunch of ants scurrying around sleeplessly, and here I sit, relaxed and for the most part, content. My life has few highs at the moment, but it has few lows as well. I don't exactly love myself, and mirrors are not kind to me, but I don't mind me. I know who I am, and as flawed of a person that is, I've come to accept it.

It's like the world is telling me I should be stressed. I'm not the perfect person, there's lots of things I should be doing better, and even though it doesn't bother me at all, I feel like I should feel stressed about that. So I develop strange symptoms and bad habits akin to a way a person would relieve their stress, yet deep down I feel nothing but a slight boredom and frustration with my inability to figure out what the hell is going on.

I want someone to give me something tangible. As much as I know it's highly unlikely, I want someone to be able to say, "What's wrong with you is X, and Y will fix it. Case solved." And I want to believe it - whether it's the placebo effect or a solid cure. The power of belief is something I know to be very strong, but the problem is that this world is so strictly bound to facts and the truth. I am sick because no one will believe in me, and I can't be cured because no one can believe that I'm even sick to begin with.

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Haha, no, I do get outside. I swear. I go on runs, which I really do enjoy even though I tend to have trouble getting out the door sometimes. Last night I went on a run and the sun was setting into all that smoke and the air was still and just the right temperature for running and even though I had to park at school to avoid Craig Stern it was lovely. I just ran down Novato boulevard towards the Cheese factory, and at one point I just stopped and held my breath. No cars, no cows, no nothing, just me. It was a wonderful moment, seeing myself all alone in that big open space. I could live in that place and never see a house again and be perfectly happy.

In reality, though, I spend a lot of my time at home. I like it that way. My mom always talks about how we're all homebodies in my house like it's a bad thing. It's up to me to decide whether the life I'm living is a successful life. If that means collecting junk food in my room and never coming out for the next ten years, what's it to you, Mom?

Whatever, she tries. She's just one of those people who can only see everything how it could be better, not how good it is now. It's not like I'm really that big of a homebody, either. Well, I am, but when I was up in Crescent City and that area, I hardly wanted to sit around long. It really just depends on the people I'm with. I'm always worrying about what so-and-so will think when they realize I'm this or that way, and then I kind of realize that if I'm so worried by the time I run into them again I'll have molded myself to be neater, kinder, more energetic, whatever it is.

In other news, I passed my AP English and AP Photo exams. AP Bio... not so much. Hahaha.

Oh, and I found my camera... Like, ten minutes after I wrote that post. It was in my bag, too. Story of my life.

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Little flower

It's funny because the laptop actually has a much brighter screen than my old computer, so a lot of images look different now. My layout, too. Only after I got my lappy did I actually notice that the white smudges were actually eyes of these funny little black creatures. I didn't mind them, but I felt like changing it anyways. So now we have this.

Today I went to the city with my whoole family and we had dinner at this nice restaurant where my uncle was playing in a jazz group. It was as family outings usually are, where everyone is bickering and things are always going wrong and any laughs we have are usually at someone else's expense, but it was still fun. We don't ever do family-like things. Lucas really has changed, I realized. I think it has to do with this friend he has, Travis. One time Lucas mentioned how Travis is cool because he's always so happy and chill, and ever since then I've been noticing that Luke seems to try pretty hard to be like that. He never complains or talks down about anything, really, aside from complaining about other people's complaining.

It made me realize that I'd like to be less abrasive as a person. I mean, I'm not really when it comes to friends, but the better I know people (my family) the looser my tongue is, and the more things I say that I regret. I want to be able to communicate well and resolve conflicts. It seems like a lot of disputes and problems that people run into each other are because they just didn't communicate. If I could just always be genuinely happy and relaxed and know how to word my desires and intentions clearly as well as listen to and understand others just as much, I don't think I would have any regrets about myself as a person.

Tomorrow I leave for Crescent City to visit family.. I'm really excited to see everyone, even though from what I've been hearing it's been a huge dramafest since some things went down on the 4th of July. Whatever though, mang. I'm still excited. I love having a big family!

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Close-up

I want a best friend again. I need that one person I can actually trust. And I can't tell anymore, whether not having one is just because there aren't any to have, or because I've become the kind of person who will be always, deep down, be completely alone.

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Roads and Sunsets

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Flower Eclipse

I woke up about a half an hour ago and I can't sleep. I'm dead tired, but I can't. THE SUN ISN'T EVEN UP YET.

I have to admit, I'm kind of excited to see the sunrise, but still.. There's something very wrong about being up earlier than I was on most school days, during the summer.

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Summer can go a few ways. I could be productive, and do all the things I know I want to, like do some deep cleaning and throw a bunch of my crap away, or I can do the thing I should and get a job and start saving money, or I can do the thing I've done the past summers - which is absolutely nothing. Every summer is the same. I lounge around, cut myself off from society, play computer games, read books, write, and eat. And every summer I gain a bunch of weight and come back to school just as socially awkward as I was at the beginning of last year.

It terrifies me to think I'll gain even more weight, most of all. I could care less about anything else, but you have no idea how terrible it is to look at old photographs and think of how easy it was to get from there to here. It feels like it's impossible to change myself, now, like I'll always just be the chubby one. It's not like I have a huge problem with being a little fat, but I know that I could easily feel so much better if I was just 10 or 15 pounds less.

It's inertia, though. I'm so stuck on this path of staying inside, being lazy, eating crap, and hating myself for it, that it's hard to change. It's like the choice between rolling a boulder downhill or pushing it uphill. It would take a lot of self-motivation and help from others to roll it up. I've directly asked people to help me, and even though they go "sure!" the next day they've totally forgotten about anything but their own problems. I hate it.

Ugh. I hate this. Fuck summer, fuck this. I want to be at college, doing shit. I don't want to get a fucking job when I'm moving away in two months. By the time Ben Franklin's calls me back I'll be in fucking college, I guarantee it. ARGH. I'm so pissed. I hate this. I want to work at a fish store, or a dog groomers, or somewhere I actually like and can stay and make bonds and commitments. I want to be with my family, with my cousins, who will hang out with me more than once a month. I really miss those days when having a best friend really meant that - someone you hang out with every single day, tell all your secrets to, know everything about. Not someone who might take you on errands with them once a week.

I'm really tempted to move up to Arcata over the summer now. The only thing I think I'd actually miss is the pond, because I'm a bitch. Wow. It's such a good idea. Once I get my laptop, I really want to. If I could find a job there, that would be so sick. I could be free!

I started this post okay, and then I just tumbled into illiteracy. Blah.

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It's over, once and for all. I am free as a bird, and I can finally turn my back on high school.

Safe grad was alright.. Sort of like a quieter, closer version of the Disneyland trip, just because I got to experience the same sleepy headaches. I promised like three people I'd go to their grad parties today, and then I just didn't go.. and I feel really bad, but I know I would feel worse if I tried to drive somewhere loud and people talking and too much food. I just feel like crap, inside and out.

Anyways, I can't even remember what else I was going to write about. I'm gonna pass out.

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Bedroom View

It feels like I'm forgetting something. All day, I just keep wondering what big due date or forgotten thing is going to pop up, but nothing comes. It really looks like I'm done. High school is over. If I want, I don't ever have to see another classroom again. It's a trip. I need to stop talking about it.

I'm really worried about myself in the future. I really don't care about my life. I just care about my dreams. I dream about living in the redwoods and finding my prince in shining armor and being healthy and fit and doing well in school and being passionate about my studies, but I kind of feel like when I do finally get there I'll just shift my dreams to whatever comes next - owning a house and having a job or whatever.

I want to start caring. I want to care about the heres and nows and not just the maybes and the laters.. but I can't. I can't force myself to care. Every now and then I'll get into it, I'll start going on more runs and clean my room and actually hang out with people, and then it's like somebody flipped a switch and I just don't give a crap anymore, and I retreat to my room and watch random television shows and movies and read books and write. I feel like I'm never going to be anyone.

In other news, there's a new inhabitant of the pond! He's a water skeeter, and you have no idea how happy it made me to see him when I was sitting out there today. I've always thought they were awesome, and now I have one of my very own! I hope he has some babies or brings friends or something, because he's cool. And he helps eat all the dead things in there, too. If the pond wasn't in such a disgusting state I'd take a picture.

Speaking of pictures, I do plan to keep putting pictures in my posts. It makes things prettier, and I can actually do it now that I got the fucking uploader to work. My uncle came over yesterday and he was on my computer and he was like, "This thing is slow!" and I was like YES. I felt so justified. Everybody goes, "Waaah my computer's slow" but mine ACTUALLY IS. SO THERE.
 

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So today, while my computer was going through one of its regular temper tantrums, I stepped back and started to look through my top dresser. You see, it's been this weird tradition of mine since I was little to have my top dresser just be a mini treasure chest of random items. It used to be a potpourri of toys, but recently I dumped everything childhood and filled it up again with a bunch of paper. Some with meaning, some completely blank.. A lot of my letters from college, report cards, test scores. I actually unearthed a gigantic Harry Potter poster, as well as my favorite book in the world, Harold and the Purple Crayon. I also found my journal from freshman year and the yellow one that I failed to complete sophomore/junior year.

It's strange to see how much I've changed. I mean, it's easy to see it in pictures, but it's hard to grasp how I've changed as a person. I don't know whether to feel good about it or not. I experienced so much more, then. My ups and downs were much more vivid - nowadays I tend to experience no radical ups or downs, everything is just okay.

So I really want to start writing stuff in my journal again. Maybe I'll do a combo written/photo journal..

Oh, and in other news, Big Brown didn't win the triple crown. It's funny because this black horse with some Indian name bolts out of the gate, gets 1st place within two seconds, and no one can touch him after that. Of course, though, all the focus goes to Big Brown. People are expecting a lame leg or something, but really, Big Brown was just having a bad day.

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