So I went driving the other night. Not the deliberate "I'll go for a drive alone" driving, but rather the "I just drove past my neigborhood, and I am pretty sure it was on purpose" sort of driving- led entirely by impulse. I was in a thinking mood, and driving facilitates thinking somehow- especially middle of the night driving. Same with walking. Anyway, I discovered that random, capricious driving is not intelligent for one so directionless as I. Thus, instead of just driving until I found my way home, I was forced to retrace my path. It's ok though, I still got good thinking time. I was lost, but eventually found a major highway. In the end, I drove in my driveway with thoughts still as unclear as my mental roadmap. I guess things have to get less orderly before they can be ordered again. Let entropy take precedence, let the natural order of things go for a bit, then maybe clarity will come. It is like pulling everything off a shelf to reorganize. So I went backwards, but made progress in doing so, if that makes sense.
See, I told you my thoughts were tangled.

I thought that starting this thing would make me feel obligated to write. Turns out that doesn't work. Well, I feel mildly obligated because people have asked about my long hiatus, but it just hasn't been overwhelmingly important. Finals came quite viciously, and didn't go away for a bit, which is one excuse for not writing. The funny thing is that I had plenty of free time to write, but I wouldn't because guilt would have overcome me when thinking of what I REALLY should have been writing- history essays. I think that I might still be caught in the high school "I don't need to study" mode, because, well, I did much less than I should/could have. The thing is, I don't really care. (*GASP* Kara doesn't care about SCHOOL!! What has college done to her? Has the freedom has led her astray and into the world of binge drinking and wild nights of uninhibited partying?)....ok, hopefully reading this means you are aware that the previous statement is stereotypical of many people, and vastly untrue for me, the anti-person. I mean, no, I am not an ANTI person...I guess un-stereotypical would be a better way to describe it. Anyway, the importance of school remains in my mind, but my mind has less sway with me these days. This is the major change that has occured in me this year: my heart is taking over. It has always been there, but it was wrapped in plenty of chain linked fence and barbed wire. Jason (the boyfriend for you unacquainted folks) has been working pretty diligently with the wire cutter for quite some time now, and has made plenty of progress, but for some reason the freedom of college expediated the process. Perhaps the liberty to hang out into all hours of the night with no curfew encouraged the roaming of my heart (night being the best time for it to show itself, since my mind generally shuts down rapidly after midnight. During the day it is overbearing, but at night it runs away like cinderella. It is such a pansy little princess. Typical of those bully types. [heart talking-time is 1:50]) Anyway, so the more the heart got to breathe, the more I became used to allowing it to do so. Or maybe the heart finally gave a braveheart-esque (need i point out the pun?) pep talk to itself and the surrounding visceral tissue, and after shouting freedom and painting the right ventricle blue, it just went from there. It wouldn't be THAT much of a stretch- the textbooks paint the right ventricle and atrium blue already anyway. wow. see- i am still bookish and nerdy.
Anyway, I learned to place relationships far above the books I love so dearly, and I am in the process of learning to share my heart in those relationships. It is a good change to have undergone, and was a step toward the maturity of balance between heart and mind. Unfortunately I don't think maturity is really a place one ever reaches- it is just the journey towards a very abstract destination. The world may view it as how seriously one presents themselves publicly, but I think it truly lies in the depth of what one thinks internally, and with what sincerity they examine the external as it relates to the internal.
So, I guess that is my "what I learned this year" entry. It is funny how those cliche essay prompts from elementary school seem to be legitimate now, like "what do you want to be when you grow up?". I DON'T KNOW. STOP ASKING.
(frustration exaggerated. go ahead and ask)