All The Roosterbear That's Fit To Print

I got into an interesting conversation this morning while I was helping set up Gay Bingo.

We were talking about the gay community, specifically young gay men. Both of us, the only two guys who showed up to help out, were complaining about the up and coming generation, the twinks in their late teens and early twenties. It seems like, no matter where I look to get a sense of young gay men, whether it's scanning the ads on Craigslist or looking in LJ communities, there is no actual sense of community among them. When AIDS broke out in the 80s, it seemed like gay men really came together as a group, kind of grew up in a sense and learned how to look out for each other, look outside themselves. I remembered how, when I first started having sex with men, many of my partners were significantly older than I was; in my late teens and early twenties, most of my sexual partners were in their thirties, at least, and often older. Now? it seems like most young gay men think that twenty five is old, and thirty is maybe worth a pity fuck if he's really hot. When I was younger, I valued those "relationships" (I use the term loosely) for what they taught me, about myself, about sex, but these newer gays seem to think they know it all already. They seem, for the most part, selfish, petty, shallow, and cruel.

But as I drove home, another thought occurred to me: what if it's me who changed?

When I think about it, the truth is that I was just as self-absorbed as I claim the young guys are now. At least, that would be a fair perspective to take, based on casual observation of the face I put on for the outside world. Most of my energy went into a desperate search for external validation, in the arms of a lover, or in the gym, where at some points I spent up to ten hours a week trying to sculpt the perfect body, or at work, trying to be the best customer service agent (or earlier, fleet service agent) in the airline, driven not so much by a strong work ethic as insecurity and a longing for praise. Even as I remained emotionally aloof, I craved that validation, trying to make myself good enough to earn it and deserve it. I was so busy trying to be good enough that there wasn't really time for anything, or anyone, else. Instead of developing some inner substance, I was running away from it, avoiding that deep pit inside me that whispered that I really wasn't worthy, that nothing I did was going to amount to anything.

I didn't get into the business of trying to make the world a better place until I was well into my thirties, and even that, one could argue, was the result of a few happy accidents. I stumbled into it, rather than intentionally seeking it out. While I thought a lot about joining the Speakers Bureau, it was eventually money (really, the utter lack thereof) that finally drove me to make that commitment. I kind of let myself be led into doing AIDSWatch, nudged by a couple of key people who were, not surprisingly, older than I was. As an aside, this aspect of my personal progress is consistent with what I learned about normative development in my Human Development class this past semester; as a person reaches the end of young adulthood and moves into middle age (i.e. that period from mid-thirties into mid-forties), the focus moves from one's own life to concern about the next generation.

I thought further about another conversation that I had a few days ago at a health fair with a school nurse. She was bemoaning the fact that her school district does not allow her to distribute condoms, because that might "encourage" sexual behavior. Meanwhile, several of their students are pregnant, and in fact they've got one of the highest rates of teen pregnancy in the state. I'm around the age of the parents of these teens now, probably within five years of them, and I find it baffling that they cannot stop for a moment and remember what it was like when they were in high school. From my perspective, it wasn't that long ago! I mean, I guess maybe one could argue it was, but not so long ago that I cannot remember what it felt like, or remember that when some authority figure told me I "couldn't" do something that I felt compelled to do, it just meant that I had to be sneaky about it. I remember thinking, at that age, that I would never treat my kids that way, that I would never say certain things. I imagine many of these parents were the same way when they were themselves teens. And here they are, my peers, saying them.

Which leads me to my ultimate point: it seems that every generation does this. We tend to say the same things about the other generations, both ahead of us and behind us, that have always been said. Parents of teenagers tend to think that their teens are out of control, that "we were never that wild/crazy/stupid", that they are shallow, totally at the mercy of their hormones and if we don't try to control them then they're just going to fuck everything up, good. Teens tend to think that their parents are out of touch, old fashioned, unable to accommodate change. Are teens actually getting more out of control? Probably not. I mean, in some ways, sure, things are different now, but look at the context. My generation didn't have the internet, for example; the one before me didn't have to deal with AIDS, and mine came around just as that ball started rolling. Those are just two small examples. Would my generation have done any better, or different, than the current crop of teens?

All of which is to say: I hate falling into a predictable trap. As hard as I try to be vigilant about my own biases, sometimes I'm just as fallible as everyone else. While it might be a valid perspective, that today's young gay men are shallow and selfish, it's only part of the story, and I'm not necessarily in a position to criticize them for it, as if I were any different when I was their age. At the same time, my point of view is necessarily influenced by my age in relation to theirs; from the vantage point of 39, young gay men appear to be self-absorbed. The challenge, then, is to remember to examine how much of my observation is some absolute, and how much is a function of my own biases.

---

So I got a tattoo today, number five. It's a bit of a gamble for me; even though I set the money aside from selling my textbooks to pay for it, and it's something I've been wanting for about a year, it's a stretch financially. I had to spend about $450 unexpectedly on my car a couple of weeks ago, money I didn't really have at that precise moment, so maybe I should have waited on this. I know it's all going to work out; next month I get my "stimulus" check from the IRS, which more than balances what I spent on my car. Still, even though it's done and I'm happy with it and there's no undoing it, I'm not sure it was the smartest choice.

I figured out in my head, on the drive home, that I've spent $600 on tattoos altogether, not including tips. And I've got four more definite tattoos in the queue, two of which need to actually be designed, and vague ideas for probably three more after that. Heh heh. And that's not even turning me into a walking mural or anything; they're all going to be covered up when I'm wearing a collared shirt and pants, and there's still going to be plenty of non-inked skin showing.

Anyway, I attempted to take a few pics of the newest and a couple of them turned out okay, so for those who are interested, check behind the cut.

( two tatt pics, plus a bonus pic, all work safe for a change )

Spring school semester: done!
birthday: celebration in progress (it's a week long event honey)
nerves: soothed
load on my shoulders: lighter
CD4 count: lower, but not troublingly so
car: running better, thanks to an unplanned investment

Yeah, I need to do a more thorough update, but it can wait. This semester totally kicked my ass, but it looks like my grades are reasonably good; one B+ and the rest are probably As. W00t!

So yeah, more later. My brain needs to go on standby for a while. For the moment, there's a Civ IV game beckoning me.

And perhaps dinner beckoning me, as well.

I'm once again doing the AIDS Walk in June, and looking for sponsors.

http://www.firstgiving.com/roosterbear08

That's the place to go to make a donation. Thanks!

There's more to say, but it probably deserves a separate entry because it's totally off topic.

I just have to take a moment from my busy weekend to make an observation.

I was driving home after working on a group project in my Social Work class, when I noticed that my phone was ringing. It's usually on silent, but I made a point of turning the ringer on in case the other group member got lost and needed directions. Anyway, it was my sister, rano_kwiatek. She was calling me from a train station in NJ, on her cell phone, and wondered if I was near a computer. I just happened to have my laptop with me, because I brought it along for the ride; all my school stuff is in the same bag in which I typically carry my laptop. She wanted to know if her train was delayed, or if she'd missed it because she had the wrong schedule. (The station where she was waiting was basically a platform, with no clerks or monitors.)

I was very close to Brewed Awakenings, which I know has free WiFi, so I took a little detour and dropped in. It's pretty empty because the weather is gorgeous; the few customers are outside enjoying an all too rare glimpse of the sun. So I plopped myself down on a comfy love seat, took out my computer, and looked up NJ Transit's website. There were no service advisories (in fact, the website specifically said that everything was running on time, and it had been updated within the last half hour) but it looked like she had the wrong departure time; the next train was scheduled for about ten minutes later. That made things dangerously tight for her at the other end, and she wasn't quite sure where she was going. So I opened another tab on my browser, fired up Google Maps, and gave her specific directions so that she'll make it to her final destination on time.

(So then I had to buy something, out of a sense of... not really guilt, more like fairness; I'm using your WiFi connection, so the least I can do is actually be a customer.)

Yeah, I know that for many people this is ordinary and unremarkable. For me, it's still kinda nifty. Everything about the interaction, from the cell phones (calling from anywhere to anywhere) to having a portable computer to knowing where to get free WiFi (even the concept of WiFi, free or not) to having websites that tell us so much information, updated information... the complete package didn't exist five years ago, in a form where it was ordinary and affordable to normal people. Even for rich geeky people, little of it existed ten years ago. None of it existed twenty years ago, although the potential to create it and the beginning of the infrastructure was there.

At the risk of sounding like people in my parents' generation who probably marveled at the wonders of microwave ovens, VCRs, and debit cards, I can't help but feel a little bit in awe of the pace of change, at the conveniences we have available to us now that were a techie fantasy a generation ago, that were unthinkable a few generations ago. Maybe I'm more aware of this right now because the last lecture in my Western Civ class was about, among other things, leisure activity in the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, what people did with themselves in their spare time before electricity and all the toys that came with it. I don't know. I also realize that many of the conveniences we currently have might disappear in another generation or two, as climate change and diminishing resources affect the way we do things.

In any case, we live in a miraculous time. For all the problems we face, we really do have a lot of neat stuff. Perhaps part of the reason I remain cautiously optimistic about the future of the human race is that I appreciate the enormous creativity and brainpower that put us where we are now, and if we have any hope of navigating through the next few years and coming out of it in one piece, we're going to need all of that potential. At least we can say that we have it. Whether or not that potential gets applied in a constructive and successful manner is another issue, but at least we have it.

Every so often, I get into one of these moods where I wish I could go back in time and say something to the person I was several years ago. Most of the time it's something simple, like a piece of advice, or a reassuring word that things are going to work out okay. Other times, I really wish I could slap some sense into the younger Me and wake him up to an opportunity right in front of him that he missed. On one level, I realize that it's a pointless exercise, that I can't change the past and even if I could things would probably still work out about the same way that they already did.

Still, it's an interesting mental hole into which I let myself fall periodically.

Today, I've been thinking a lot about the period when I was fresh out of high school. I took a long-planned trip to Europe about six weeks after graduation, and it was one of those turning points that I didn't appreciate until much later, the way that it opened my eyes and expanded who I was. For the first time in my life, I was being treated like an adult, an autonomous person who didn't need permission to do things. Just like a fish doesn't necessarily know that he's wet, I didn't realize how caged and controlled I had been up to that point until I experienced real freedom. Technically, there was a "chaperone" assigned to me, but we were on a first name basis. We were the only two people in the group who could speak anything besides English, so I think that probably helped her respect me as an adult. Yeah, my French was broken and my Spanish was barely functional, but it was close enough to Italian to get by and understand what was being said to me. So, since I was (barely) eighteen, I was given carte blanche to do what I would. There was this expectation that I was a grown-up and I knew how to behave myself, without a Mommie to tell me what to do, and I lived up to that.

And then I got home. About a week before I left, my dad had stormed out in a huff and temporarily moved in with a bachelor friend of his; he showed up to see me off at the airport, and that was the first time I'd seen or spoken to him in several days. I fully expected my parents to be in the early stages of a divorce when I returned. Instead, Dad was home, the fight was magically swept under the rug, and I had a new car. Well, it was new to me anyway. It was a three year old Honda Accord with 100k+ miles on it, but the seller swore that it was primarily highway mileage and that the car was in good condition. (He was mostly right about the condition, but not totally.) My dad had forged my name on the loan papers, because he wanted it to be a surprise. (Actually, I suspect that he, and Mom, wanted it to be a done deal, and maybe a debt that would keep me from flying the coop.) Another development while I had been away was that I'd been offered a job, through Dad, with USAir. I'd met the station manager informally when Mikki and I had been out to dinner, and he was impressed. That job would have meant many things to me: the ability to fly for free, a 50% hourly pay increase from my crappy grocery store job, my own insurance policy.

But I didn't accept it. Mom voiced concerns that I would change overnight into some foul-mouthed monster, and Mikki was afraid that I wouldn't be able to handle myself with her coworkers, that I was too fragile. As I flew home from Europe, I had definite plans to find myself a better paying job and get the hell out of that house; I knew in my gut that a divorce was coming, and I did not want to get sucked into the middle of the drama, and I also felt like exploring further this feeling of autonomy. For whatever reason, the moment I got home, I crawled back into the cage and did what other people asked of me. I let them talk me out of it. As a consequence, when the marriage fell apart about a year and a half later, all my worries came true; I found myself stuck in the middle of the drama, and it was excruciatingly hard to move away from Mom and her guilt machine when I was 21. Sure, I did end up going back a few months later and taking the job, but I'd spent my savings down to nothing because I was working for $4.20 an hour* while paying for school and a car I never asked for. I had lost valuable time and momentum in my hesitation. Certain things were inevitable, like the divorce and moving out on my own, and my lack of nerve only made the process a lot more painful for me.

There's a part of me that wants to sit that boy down, the person I was almost 21 years ago, and tell him in no uncertain terms that he is to take that job and move out. While I'm at it, I would also like to recommend that he learn French like his life depended on it, and not drop it after a one semester intensive course, and also to follow his heart where his studies were concerned. Because I was living with Mom, it was all too easy to be swayed by my family's insistence that I should major in something like Computer Programming or Finance, subjects that just make me feel dead inside. I'm sure that, away from my family's influence, I would have either stumbled across Social Work or at least gotten a BA or BS in Psychology, which would make my life a lot easier now. And I would also probably be fluent in French. And hell, while I'm at it, I would probably tell that 18 year old to move to Providence in the mid-nineties, and buy some real estate, since I know that the property on Federal Hill (for example) jumped up in value big time between 1997 and 2007, in some cases fivefold but in most cases at least threefold. I could have really made out like a bandit.

The thing is, if I could go back and change all those choices, I would lose so much of my current life and experience. Perhaps I'm so self-aware because I had to fight those parts of me that wanted to follow someone else's lead ferociously to get to where I am today; that struggle gave me a lot of insight. There are a number of people I probably never would have met, people who are important to who I am now. Would I have even met quillon, much less moved in with him? Would I have discovered soc.bi, or LiveJournal, or NaNoWriMo, and met all the dozens of people that those virtual communities introduced to me? There's also a fair chance that I might have still been just as much of a slut in my twenties as I was in this version of my life, only in places like NYC or San Francisco, and the odds are good that I would have become HIV+ earlier, before the miracle of HAART, and I could be dead. Hell, if I had grabbed that position in July 1987 instead of January 1988, who knows whether or not my (then future) brother-in-law would have been hired when he was, and then fallen in love with Mikki? or whether she would have even been available when he was hired? I might not have the nephews I have now.

This is what usually happens when I indulge myself in these little exercises; I come back to the things I would have to sacrifice in such a scenario, and maybe I appreciate my current life more, trusting that things are working out exactly the way they're supposed to. Still, I don't know why the concept holds such interest for me. Even though I know logically that it's impossible and it's wasted energy longing for the chance to change a choice (or several) that I made at critical junctures, I still find myself losing several hours daydreaming about it, about the conversations I would love to have with my former selves. Maybe it means that I'm at such a juncture now, failing to see an opportunity right in front of me. There are several possible forks in the road, with everything from the Speakers Bureau to AIDSWatch to school. Interestingly, I feel like I'm just plodding along, half asleep, as I go through the motions there. Part of it is my allergies acting up, sapping me of energy and focus, but maybe I'm just using that as an excuse.

In any case, I do feel like I'm on the verge of something big. I think back to where I was a year ago, when I was just starting the process of returning to school, and wonder if that man I was would recognize me now, and I'm pretty sure that in about a year I'll be able to say the same thing.

* Bear in mind, $4.20 in 1987 was the equivalent of $7.83 now, according to
this nifty website. But still.

Well, drat.

I raced to get to a school this morning, and was just barely on time. I had a series of presentations to give; every year, this school has a Wellness Day, where they invite a variety of speakers. We each give our short little presentations and then the students rotate to the next one. It's a little chaotic, but the students last year were very receptive, the staff was awesome and very appreciative, and each speaker gets the opportunity to reach a lot of people.

Unfortunately, it was yesterday. Oops!

I got to talk to the teacher who set it up, and it sounds like I wasn't the only one who got the dates mixed up, because there were two other no-shows. I just checked the email message, and it was my fault, I'm the one who screwed up the date, so I feel really awful about it. I don't know how I did that, because I booked it way back in January, before the semester even started, not in the midst of the crazy that I am swimming through currently. She was nice about it though, and it felt good when she told me that she knew it wasn't like me to just not show up. I guess I made an impression last year. The good news is that there's a potential opportunity to schedule something later, when finals are done and the seniors are basically idling while they run out the clock.

So, the first thing that hit me, after I got past the initial feeling of being a complete fuck-up, was: sweet! I have four hours open that I didn't have before, so now I can get some stuff done! The teacher pointed me toward a really cool little coffee house within walking distance of the school, and since they gave me a visitor pass to park in their lot... that's where I am now, enjoying an iced chai. As an added bonus (obviously, since I'm using it right now) they have free Wi-Fi. That means I can actually finish the assignment that I couldn't finish last night, even though I was up till 2 am, that I was going to try to squeeze into the 90 minutes between the end of the Wellness Day and the trip to the Holocaust Museum this afternoon, where we're having class. And I'm trying (and mostly succeeding) in trusting that everything works out the way it's supposed to, and this is actually a good thing. If I had done the WD yesterday then I would have been 1) completely wiped out, and 2) not so well prepared for the exam that I had yesterday afternoon.

And yeah, that means I need to stop blogging and actually do the homework. But I had some extra time and figured a peep in here would be a good thing, since I barely update anymore. Heh heh.

I'll get to sleep again in May, so it's all good.

There's a ton of stuff I want to write about, but I don't have time because I have a paper to write, um, tonight, because it's due tomorrow and I'm getting up at 5:30 in the morning to go to a high school and speak for three hours before I rush to RIC to, among other things, turn in said paper.

But I really wanted to write about the dream I had last night this morning, the thing I woke up to. In short: Mom was still alive. I was talking to her, and I was extremely confused (and embarrassed) that somehow I was mistaken that we'd had a funeral and buried her. I think (it's foggy now, but I didn't have time to write about it this morning) she was telling me how she was going up to the space station; I think she won the trip on some contest. She was calling it Mir, and even though I knew she had to be wrong, I didn't have the energy to argue with her. Then, somehow, she actually died (again). I think that maybe a couple of people were upset that I wasn't more upset about her death, but it was, yanno, old news to me. Been there and done that already. That part is fuzzy.

The thing that sticks out about the dream was that she wasn't angry at all, but rather bored. I didn't have any hang-ups about talking to her, watching what I said, worrying about how she might take it, and she didn't have the usual crazy and unpredictable reactions to me that I remember her having when she was actually alive. I'm sure that, when I have the time to properly think about it, I'll probably be able to come to some conclusion about what the dream means, whether it's some communication from her, or maybe a demonstration of some milestone I've reached in processing her death, or something else. I just wanted to make sure I recorded something before it gets lost in the shuffle.

Another thing I wanted to note about my dreams in general: yeah, I'm having bizarre dreams, but they're not the acid-trippy, neon-colored, frenetic, random rollercoasters that I had when I was on Sustiva. It appears that, finally, I am free from that. I'm realizing that I've missed having meaningful dreams. Some of the dreams I had when I was on Sustiva were meaningful, but I had to wade through the layers of nonsense to find the meaning. Similar to the effort I had to exert on a daily basis to appear grounded and clear headed when awake, it took a lot of effort to figure out the meaning of my dreams, or whether there was any meaning in the first place. I'm glad that's behind me.

Overall, I'm happy with the med switch. It's a bit of a pain in the ass to have to eat breakfast every morning before I take my meds, and I've got more GI issues, but overall? better deal.

Okay, on to the paper. Hopefully, I remember the other stuff I want to write about later on in the week, when I have the time to write about it.

( castles and movie sets and wrestling alligators, oh my )

It seems that lots of people are passing away right now. My landlady lost a very dear member of her family yesterday. A fellow student in one of my classes, with whom I am doing a project, had a wake to attend yesterday afternoon. And friends on my list have lost loved ones recently.

I woke up this morning to learn that I've lost a friend myself. His name was David Bedard.

I admit that I didn't know David very well, but he still had a profound influence on me. He was the speaker that I shadowed quite a bit before I became a speaker with the Speakers Bureau at APRI myself. He taught me several important lessons that continue to serve me well, to this day. He suffered from PML, a brain infection that can cause short term memory issues and confusion. Because of this, he always carried around note cards to help him remember where he was in the presentation, to ensure that he made all the relevant points he needed to make, and that brought my awareness to how I function best when speaking, that I really need to know what I'm talking about in order to do a good job. He was upfront about his condition, right off the bat letting people know his limitations, and seeing how people responded to that helped me understand that it's okay to be less than perfect, that people will work with whatever you have to offer, that in general they're not sitting back looking for reasons to criticize and reject you or your message. Until I started thinking about him this morning, it's a lesson that I didn't realize he taught me through example.

He also had this boyish playfulness that unravelled any attempt at mockery or misdirection. There was one presentation that I think I will always remember, and cherish: a student asked a question about using a dildo, clearly in an attempt to derail the conversation and trip him up. The teacher was horrified, the other students were chuckling under their breath... and without missing a beat, David answered something like "oh, good! I'm glad you asked; that's an important issue. When you're playing with toys, there are a few things you need to remember..." Sure, he was smiling when he said it, and he was aware that the question wasn't serious, but he didn't let it throw him off or lose confidence; he simply used it as an opportunity to teach even more. In that moment, he managed to show them that he was for real, and they could ask him real questions (and after that one, they did); he also gave me a great model for answering questions myself.

Probably the most important thing he did for me was give me yet another reminder that our time here is finite, and the way he dealt with that limitation was inspirational: have fun! Enjoy your visit here. Don't worry about doing everything perfectly; just do your best, and enjoy the ride. Given the stuff on my plate right now (mostly school-related), that's a very timely reminder for me. Outside of the Speakers Bureau, he did a lot for the community. He hosted a long-running local cable access show about what's happening in the world of HIV treatment and education, and he was a member of APRI's Board of Directors, and that's just what I remember off the top of my head; I'm certain there was plenty more. I am saddened that he's no longer with us, that I don't get to know him any better than I do, that we lost another really good one, but I know that he was struggling mightily with the PML toward the end, so I'm happy for him that he's shed the limitations of his body and moved on to a better place. And while it feels like I barely knew him, I'm grateful for the impact he had on my life. Perhaps the reason I'm not totally falling apart right now is that I'm confident that his was a life well lived.

So, David: wherever you are, dear sweet man, I'm sure you know that you'll be missed. Thank you for the role you played in shaping who I am, just by being yourself, and the work you did for all of us. And thank you, most of all, for the joy you brought into the world.

I just took my final dose of Sustiva. I recorded the moment on iMovie, with the intention of making some sort of video about it, maybe show clips of me taking pills interspersed with audio voiceover talking about the process of changing meds, but that just might be a little too much work and/or drama for me. I have this image in my head of what I could do with it, and I haven't decided yet whether it's over-the-top stupid or potentially really powerful and groundbreaking (or probably in the middle, interesting to a few people and forgettable to others). Still, it's one of those moments that I can't redo, so I wanted to make sure to record something. Since I recorded the moment, I have reserved the option of going back and doing something with it. And I'll theoretically have a clearer head in which to decide whether I want to do that or not.

( I relate Schrodinger’s cat to my grades, among other things. )

1) I haven't written about this publicly yet, I don't think, but after a lot of deliberation I decided to switch to Reyataz, starting Thursday. It's the end of the Sustiva era for me, as I've finally decided that being perpetually stoned is too great of a price to pay for being alive. Hopefully, I'm not trading in a foggy head for a puke/diarrhea factory, but time will tell. I've got the pills now, but I've also got three exams this week and figure that the last thing I want to do is add new-regimen stress to the pile. I feel better about it, but I'm still nervous. I'm kind of bracing myself for the onset, knowing that the initial week or three might be bad, but that I can expect whatever side effects there are to taper off.

There's an entry in there, but it'll have to wait.

2) quillon lured me in front of the TV while we were eating dinner, and we just got done watching a show about this island community that's being built in Dubai, called The World. It's a replica of a world map, made of ~300 man-made islands off the coast. They originally envisioned it as a playground for a handful of obscenely rich people, but for some reason the $20 million price tag for an island scared away everyone but the developers, so now it's looking more like a resort community for several thousand obscenely rich people.

I'm torn between the obvious snarks, like how all the petroleum products they're consuming to build this monstrosity, and the associated greenhouse gases, are going to help the icebergs melt faster and the sea levels rise and thus bury the damned thing under a wall of water, and feeling really offended that there can be millions of people very close to Dubai who are living in absolute squalor, crowded and filthy and hungry and without hope or means to eke out a better life, while we're expending all these resources to build essentially play houses. The estimated price tag for this little indulgence? $14 billion. Meanwhile, about half the world's population lives on less than $1 a day.

They initially wanted to build seven big islands, but then figured they had to break it up into a couple hundred islands because the rich folk wouldn't want to share their island with anyone else. And they had to struggle to find the perfect balance with the buffer island around this thing, making it high enough to protect it from tidal waves (like I said, at least before the sea rises twenty feet as Greenland becomes ever more green, and Antarctica disappears) and yet low enough to where it wouldn't obstruct anyone's view. Because the worst thing in the world would be to spend thousands of dollars a day for a room at an exclusive luxury seven star hotel, and dammit I can't see the ocean!

Maybe I'm becoming more of a socialist as I get older, but it seems to me that rich people have some pretty fucked up priorities. I would like to hope that, if I had that much spare cash to drop on a secondary resort house, I might spend it differently, but in all fairness I guess I can't honestly say.

3) I'm feeling some anxiety about the coming week, not so much because of the med change (that's at the end of the week, and I'm actually looking forward to it) as the exams. I feel totally hopelessly behind, and I can't see how I'm going to pull this off, and yet I know from experience that I'm probably better off than I give myself credit for and I'll somehow magically manage to pull another rabbit out of my hat. But I still feel like I've got an impossible amount of stuff to do in the next ~72 hours.

So I better get back to it, and I owe my journal a better update later in the week.

BONUS! I came really close to making a YouTube video earlier, when I was really high from Sustiva and really aware that the whole bottle it up and hide it and pretend you're clear headed mechanism is just totally GONE, just so everyone could get a sense of what I've been hiding, and fighting. But by the time I got home (I was out running errands, and honestly kinda trying to clear my head), the inspiration left me. I still like the idea, but doubt I'll have time to do it before Wednesday, which is the last day (I hope) that I take Sustiva.

So you'll just have to use your imagination. (unless you've seen it firsthand, which some of you have)

A funny little lesson on masturbation, for males.

I just woke up from a dream where I was back in San Antonio, and I needed to give my high school friend, Martin, a ride to the airport to catch a cruise. In the dream he had his high school head of hair, rather than the shaved head he was sporting at the reunion. My sister Mikki rode with us in the back seat of my car, which was a mess. I asked her if she needed my help in clearing a spot for her, and when she told me "yes" I kind of ignored her, and left her to clear her own spot.

Earlier, I had been typing a letter to my old boss, who then showed up (along with his second in command, and my dad) and I had to figure out a way to hide the letter. He was easy to distract; I just had to appeal to his inflated ego and he totally forgot that there was a typewriter in the back seat of a car. (It was a rental; I have no idea why it was there of all places.) We never ended up moving, though, because he got a phone call, and had to be somewhere else. By the time Martin needed the ride to the airport, this rental was gone, so maybe my old boss found someone else to drive him when he finally got his shit together.

We (Martin, Mikki and I) were driving past one of the malls, and Martin mentioned something about how there had been a terrorist attack there the day before, and Mikki was a little bit alarmed. But I went into a spiel about how yeah, maybe two or three people died there yesterday, but thousands of people who drove past didn't die, and to allow myself to be frightened to drive past the mall just wasn't logical. They can strike anywhere, I reasoned, and they probably won't strike the mall again because they have limited resources and it's a poor use of them. Less bang for the buck and all that.

I woke up because I had to pee. I know there was a lot more to it, but that's all I can remember.

Over the weekend, I had another dream that I know is a recurring one. I wish I'd written it down, because now I can't remember a single specific detail. I told quillon about it, and if he remembers anything about it he might be able to jog my memory of it, but it's not that important. Hell, if I really need to remember it, I'm sure I'll have the dream again. I do know that it had something to do with San Antonio though, but what I was doing there? with whom? and why? I have no clue.

---

Yesterday was a pretty important day, but I haven't finished the entry about it. Yeah, I know, I said I was going to go with more simple entries, and while overall that's true (I think) sometimes I just need to say more than a quick entry can get across. I'll probably have that posted later this morning.

One: I just finished reading ALL SOULS: A Family Story from Southie, for my Social Work class. OMFG intense read. Highly recommended, but there are plenty of sections that are not at all easy to read. I'm not sure what specifically I'm reacting to, but it really got to me. I guess I'll have to figure it out, since (I think) I'm going to have to write a paper on it eventually. Thankfully, not in the next week.

Two: I'm feeling a little less conflicted about the change in meds. I still haven't actually made the switch yet, and there's still a kind of internal war going on between the rational, logical side of me and the emotional side of me, but at least the initial flood of feelings is starting to quiet a bit. I can't say I'm happy about my options, but I'm perhaps a little more realistic about them.

There's more to say, but it will have to wait.

On a related note: quillon is a doll. For whatever reason, he wouldn't let me sulk on Wednesday night, and somehow he managed to get me to smile a few times in spite of myself. I don't think anyone else in the world could have gotten away with that without losing a few teeth in the process.

I'm lucky to have him in my life.

I just got back from giving a presentation to the Providence Police Academy about HIV, and one of the issues we discussed kind of rings out for me right now.

I am so fortunate to have the support that I have. It's true that some of my friends abandoned me when they learned that I was HIV+, either directly ("I just can't handle this") or indirectly (ignoring me, fading into the background), but for the most part I've had just an incredible wealth of support from people. My family, in all its different forms, has stood by me, and many of my friends have gone above and beyond the call of duty, either listening to me, or comforting me when I've been stressed and/or freaked out and/or depressed, or providing me with material support, money when I've been broke, a place to stay when I really shouldn't have been alone. I've said this many times, that I'm here on the backs of so many people who have carried me.

I don't know how I would have done it without that level of support, and it's sobering to consider that many people don't have it. It nearly drove me into a nervous breakdown trying to hide my HIV status from the world for just two years; I cannot imagine having to do it forever. I can't fathom how I would deal with my family treating me differently, "protecting" children (nieces and nephews) from me, making me use different plates and glasses and silverware and towels because they're afraid of my AIDS cooties, or even just completely shunning and disowning me. I don't know how I would handle it if I were so afraid to be seen around anything that associated me with AIDS (like a support group, or a doctor's office) that I holed up and hid. And yet I know there are lots of people whose reality includes this kind of thing as a matter of course.

Bottom line: I am feeling extremely grateful for the love and support that I've received, and continue to receive. It's likely that if you're reading this you are one source of that support, whether or not it's obvious, whether or not it seems like you've done anything special, whether you're a part of my daily life or just on the periphery, whether I've met you in person or just know you through the wonders of the internet. You are one of those little angels that helps keep me sane and healthy and alive. So, I want to thank you, and acknowledge the positive impact you've had on my well being.

I would also like to invite you to consider the things in your own life that elicit gratitude, because it's such a powerful force.

I was hoping that maybe being in my mother's house would help with the spacey issue. Heh heh.

I'm visiting my birthmother and sister this weekend, because there's a family reunion-type party and the last time I remember being invited to one (or actually, attending one, since I wasn't technically invited to the last one) was, I think, back in 1992. We were welcoming a new edition to the clan; she should be in high school now. Weird how time passes.

Anyway, while it was restful to sleep here, I find myself just spaced out enough to not really want to do any homework. The good news is that she has clients booked this afternoon, so it's not like she's around entertaining me. I'm hoping to either get some reading done (although every so often I just stare at the book and think blahblahblahIdon'tfuckingCARE) or, if rano_kwiatek comes over, I'll watch the documentary that I have to write a paper about eventually, that I'm borrowing from my Developmental Psych professor this weekend.

I have an insane amount of work due next week and I can't even make myself think about most of it. The only good news is that next Wednesday I'll be seeing my doc, and hopefully the medication issue will get resolved. So even though I feel like I'm wasting this weekend in a homework sense, hopefully I'll have a clearer head next weekend and I'll start being a lot more productive. And I have gotten at least some reading done, so I'm not insanely behind. I'm sure that I'll manage to pull a miracle out of my ass (again) somehow.

It's weird to think that I'm about to remove something that's been a part of about a fifth of my life (Sustiva). Being a geek, I just calculated that I've been on a Sustiva-containing regimen for 99 months. Odds are really good that there won't be a 100th.

Okay, back to reading.

One of the classes I'm taking right now is a Sociology course about the family. We got this assignment last night, in which we're going to have to make a five minute presentation arguing a point of view. Our partner (picked last night) is going to argue the opposing point of view. So we'll each get a five minute spiel, then two minutes each to react to the other's spiel, then the class gets to cross-examine. Each pair will be up there for about 20-25 minutes. Should be fun. I'm not at all shy about speaking to a classroom, for obvious reasons, especially when I'm given time to prepare a statement and research the subject in question.

So: what's my topic?

Single-parent and non-traditional households can provide a solid foundation to raise a family.

My first reaction was horror, because it's a meaty subject and I've got some strong feelings. Plus that's a subject that the dorks over at the Family Research Council (among others) love to "study" in totally biased and unscientific ways, and countering that crap without getting into a yelling match would very likely be difficult for me. But the woman I'm paired with is awesome, she basically agrees with me, and she's just playing a devil's advocate. While it might be more satisfying to debate the topic with someone else (her topic is something like the traditional family provides a superior/the best environment to raise a child), it would be really difficult for me to keep my emotions in check. The point isn't to win, but to present a strong point of view, and it would be really easy to get baited into nasty territory.

So, I've got my work cut out for me, because it's actually a tough subject. There's a lot of research out there that says that children in (heterosexual) two-parent households fare better than in one-parent (single-mother) households, I'm sure, but I also know that there's some research that says that same-sex couples are just as good at raising children, and possibly some that might say that, with the proper support, single-parent households do just fine. I'm not asking anyone to do the work for me, but if anyone knows offhand about such studies, could you share? at least to give me a starting point? That would be awesome.

In any case, if I have my shit together enough I might post the findings of my research, for those who are interested.

Heh, the song is completely random... I had this huge rant written out that was pretty much incoherent babble, so I elected to start over.
(Twice.)

I skipped breakfast this morning so that I could have a clear head; I have homework to do, and I have phone calls to make. Unfortunately, it didn't work, and I'm still stoned from my meds. And hungry. And kinda pissed off that I'm stoned, in spite of skipping breakfast. It appears that, after eight years of Sustiva, it just makes me stoned all the time now, no matter what I do; it's just a matter of scale. Maybe the fact that I had some chocolate milk last night, well over 12 hours ago and at least 8 hours before I took my meds, has some bearing, but if so then that's just fucking insane.

At some point over the past month, I've noticed this inner mechanism shutting down. Some might find this really obvious, and some might be surprised: I've got this real need to suppress any part of me that might make other people squirm. If I do something that might make waves, I have to obsess over it for days before and days after, and it's a big deal. It's probably tied to a survival mechanism that made living with Mom feasible, and I'm guessing it's another casualty in my persona as some part of me continues to process her death, as much as I would love to think that I'm totally done with that. The whole "being stoned" thing is a good example: I've invested a lot of energy covering it up and/or minimizing it, except when it's funny or I'm just way too fucking baked to pretend (in which case I hide) or I'm around someone who knows me well enough (ie quillon) that covering it is pointless, because it might make people uncomfortable knowing that I'm stoned, that my meds cause me any hardship, because there are plenty of people with a lot worse than feeling stoned on their plate dealing with HIV (or any other chronic condition). Or I'm somehow supposed to be giving my 100% anyway, even though I'm stoned.

Anyway, I've noticed a really strong oh yeah? well, fuck that for the past month going on inside me. It's something deeper than just not feeling like accommodating everyone, though; it's hard to explain. It's kind of like a tumor, or a weed; it looks like it would be really easy to just yank it out, but there are all these roots, more than you would expect, and they run deep and they are wrapped around a lot of seemingly unrelated stuff. In a similar manner, that deep need to make everyone comfortable is tied to so much more. There's this undercurrent of anger: at myself, for playing this game; at Mom, for teaching me that it's my job to make everyone (really her) comfortable; at Big Pharma, for pretending that another one of its drugs is relatively innocuous when it's no such thing for me; at my body, for being so fucking persnickety and sensitive and reactive to medications in thoroughly inconvenient ways.

At the moment, most of the anger is focused at the drug itself, and seeing an insert that claims that "a little lightheadedness might occur for about three weeks, but then dissipate" like it's not still in there frying my brain (like it has for the last 8+ years) would likely make me pretty stabby right now. In any case, I just have to hang in there till 2/13 (a week from Wednesday), at which time I will see my doc and drive the point home, clearly, that I've got to switch to something else, NOW. Fortunately there are some better alternatives on the market than the last time I hit the OKAY ENOUGH line, so maybe it's a good thing I've hung in there this long.

I'm not saying that the ability to recede into the background isn't helpful; it's probably one of those gifts I'll appreciate a lot later, when I've processed the way I had to contort myself and the parts of my psyche I had to crush and the things I had to unconsciously believe about myself and my place in the universe in order to make it work. I put it in the same category as my capacity for reading another person's emotional state as easily as I do, another necessary survival strategy skill I developed being around Mom. It will be a very useful talent later, when I'm done with school. For the moment, though, I'm just really pissed off and on a short fuse. And the drugs are not helping me be sane about discovering this skill right now.

---

While I'm updating, there are a couple of other bits of news that I should probably include in this random update. One is that I was under the impression that school started on Wednesday the 23rd. I learned, as my Sociology class started last Tuesday night, that no, they started on Tuesday the 22nd. That means that I missed the first class, and had homework due that I totally didn't know about. Fortunately he told us that we could turn it in this coming week, but it means that I have three weeks of reading to do, plus this (actually not that difficult) writing assignment. And I'm stoned and I don't want to do it right now, but I'm concerned about putting it off for Tuesday.

The other thing is that I feel pretty good about my chances of making good grades this time around, although there's a lot of overlapping material. Three of my classes mention Conflict Theory, for example, but each one means something slightly different, and that might suck when they all want to test me at the same time. There's enough overlap in the definitions but yeah, definitely not going to keep that clarified while stoned. The med change has to happen.

I think that's all I want to say in a public entry.

Well, my day has been a craptastic crapogasm so far...

I busted my ass to get to the clinic on time for a very important doctor visit, only to wait for two hours without even getting my blood pressure checked (heh, that would have been interesting) so I had to leave. I jokingly told the receptionist that it would be nice to reschedule for something before April (when I have my next round of bloodwork) and she gave me this kinda frightened look, like that might not happen. I was overcome with the urge to cry as I walked to my car because I really needed to talk to him, like, a month ago, about a couple of big things: my regimen (it needs to change NOW) and testosterone. I was all geared up to do that and I didn't even get to hear his voice, much less see him, because (surprise!) he was behind. And because I have classes on Monday afternoons (the only other time he's available) I really might have to just stick with this crappy regimen for the moment, and I'm pissed off. And frustrated.

So I made it to school, found a remotely serviceable parking space (I only had to walk for about 5-10 minutes to get to the part of campus I needed to get to), and went into the bookstore... to find a ginormous line, which means that I'm starting this semester with no books. It couldn't be helped. It was close to 1:30 and my class starts at 2:00. Because of a minor banking snafu, added to me not remembering to make a transfer until last week (which got credited to my account this morning), I just haven't had the money to pay for books. Now that I (kinda) do, there's not enough time to actually buy the books without missing class.

On a bright note, I'm in the classroom for my first class (I think) and it's got a reasonable WiFi connection. So at least there's that.

I'm just totally not in a good frame of mind to start another semester. But, like it or not, it's showtime. Man, I hope this prof is cool.

I just wrapped up a life coaching session, and I've come to a conclusion that might be obvious to everyone else, but is kinda news to me: the reason that I didn't really put too much in my journal last year is that I'm too wordy.

I think that I have this tendency to want to write a novel every time something of note happens in my life, and so there have been few times in the last year (well, actually longer than that) where I've had the luxury of spending an afternoon writing all about it, and then paring it down into something that makes sense (or, more often, expanding it to an even bigger behemoth in the editing process). So, one of my goals this year is to teach myself to get to the point. That's not to say that I won't write any more long entries (in fact, there's one that's brewing that's probably going to have to be broken up in parts), but I don't need to write ten pages when two will do.

I'm hopeful that perhaps if I become better at getting to the point, I might have more time to write about the stuff in my past that's worth reading. I've got a million little stories running around in my head about things I've done and experienced, and I want to get them written down before I die.

On a related tangent, I have a lot of stuff. We have this den that would make an incredible little office for me to do my homework (and later, for quillon to do his), if it weren't cluttered with boxes of crap that I've carried with me for years. I think I've finally found the framework in which to explore paring it down, getting ruthless about what I keep and what goes into the trash, or recycle bin, or posted on Craigslist: I plan to make a habit of taking at least a few minutes of each day going through stuff, and asking if it still serves me. If it has become extraneous debris, it goes. I can honor the role that it played in my life up to this point, bless it, and let it go. It could be what some might consider a religious experience, I suppose, in that there's a recognition that it was important to me at some point, and I can be mindful of that even as I purge it. I'm not setting a timetable because that's all artificial and really just a trick to get you to do something, and it's also an opportunity to fail. Besides, I am not sure what it's going to look like when I'm done.

I recognize that there's a connection between all the crap that I hang onto in a physical sense, and the extra words I use to tell a story. There's a relationship between the way I talk (or write) and the way I live. That's getting edited this year.

This could get interesting, in and of itself.

I know I am seriously behind, so I'm resorting to bullet points. In no particular order:

• I've been sick for the last couple of days. Actually, I think I've been coming down with something for a while; I had night sweats for one night last week (which was kinda weird) and then Wednesday, all of the sudden I just felt wiped out. I was halfway to my support group and just decided not to go. The next morning, my voice was pretty much gone. So I saw a doc yesterday (not my doc though) and he basically said that I've got some sort of viral infection, for which there is no magic pill, and I need lots of rest and liquids. I'm guessing he didn't mean spiked egg nog. I'm glad that it's nothing serious, but not happy about the prospect of feeling crappy through NYE, which is the only night out of the year that I am pretty reliably drunk. Might have to adjust my habits this year, dammit.
  
  Related topic: quillon has been sick for most of the month himself, and was just starting to get over his upper respiratory crap as I came down with my (hopefully different) version.
  
  
• Our internet access was down for a good part of the month. In the midst of finals, our landlady decided to upgrade to the flatulent suckogasm known as Vista, and it fucked up the network. At first she thought that the router was dying, so she bought a new one, and suddenly our spotty fickle connection completely died. Unfortunately she was leaving town the next day, and didn't have time to play with it, so we had to wait till she got home for it to be restored. But the good news is that, for now, Vista has been beaten into submission and again lets us access the internet.
  
  
• I never updated about the snow storm. It took me 2½ hours to get home, and a big part of that was thanks to this really stupid woman stopping near the top of a hill... to wipe snow off her back window. Once I stopped moving I couldn't get traction again, and came very close to just abandoning my car at one point. Took me an hour to get moving again. I had a thought to call one of my classmates in my Social Work class to ask if I could crash at his place (I know two guys in the dorms) and I guess this is a lesson to listen to my intuition. As bad as I had it, though, I heard lots of stories that were much worse. Still, I was traumatized by the experience.
  
  
• I got my grades back tonight for the semester, and I'm pleased. Straight As. 4.0 baby! I'm this weird mix of gratified and surprised, because there were so many points during the semester where I felt like I was treading water, or in over my head, or totally lost, and it all worked out. Not only did I get all As: I got the high score on my Biology final. Even without the curve, I still had an A, and with the curve it was an almost perfect score (again). I ended with something like a 98 average, way better than I expected four months ago.
  
  Maybe the real reason I'm so floored is that there's such a disconnect between the person I was last time I went to school and the person I am now, and I'm still just getting used to it.
  
  
• quillon was a real sweetie and got me four things from my Amazon wishlist, which I totally wasn't expecting. The biggest item was the fifth season of Six Feet Under, which was plenty, but then he also got me three books: Don't Get Too Comfortable by David Rackoff, American Fascists by Chris Hedges, and The Art of Possibility by Zander and Zander. It's nice to be reading something that's not assigned, for a change.

That's enough for now. As crappy as I feel, I have this urge for something chocolate...

My dad gave me a call a couple of days ago to tell me that he was sending my Xmas gift, and today was the first chance I had to call him back. (It was money, I already knew that, thanks Dad!) So he lets me go on for about four minutes about my semester at school, the crappy weather, and maybe a couple of other things before he tells me that he is in the shower.

Uh, yeah.

So he was expecting a couple of calls, one from my stepmom and one from a car dealership (his car is being worked on today) and he really really didn't want to miss it, which is why he had the phone in the bathroom and answered on the speakerphone.

So now, in spite of my best wishes, I am stuck with this mental image of I was just talking to my dad while he was naked. He even shared that his head was wet and his hair was full of shampoo.

Thanks Dad, but next time you can just say can I call you back?

So I got myself to school early today, because I had a paper to turn in before noon. Made it with about 20 minutes to spare, and had a great little conversation with my Opera professor. She rocks.

When I went inside, there was a stray flake here and there. When I came outside about 5-10 minutes later, it was like OMFG snowing hard. Not really sticking yet but it's only a matter of time.

I went to my Biology lecture, one of four students who showed up. I was not parked in the best spot, because my Social Work final, scheduled for 5pm tonight, is on the other side of campus.

When I finally ventured outside, after loading up on a yummy salad, this is what I saw:



Yeah. That's supposed to be a road. I got the news that all classes were canceled about half an hour ago. They made the decision around 2. See, the thing is that I've heard all kinds of things about how they never cancel class at RIC, for anything, so I'm a little worried. On top of that I know that I don't have email access at home.

So now, I'm about to head home. I'm guessing (hoping?) that it doesn't take me more than an hour, but I know that's probably optimistic. I have no idea when the final will be rescheduled, or how I would find out; the RIC website lists my class as not having a final. This really sucks.

Okay, I'm just putting off the inevitable mountain of Suck, so I might as well get my ass out there. I will check in somehow when I can.

I have a paper to write tonight, and a final to study for, and I probably won't sleep much at all tonight... but I just have to take a moment to say something, partly because the internet connection at home is currently FUBAR and partly because this is on my mind and I don't want to gloss over this moment.

Today was my last Opera lecture, and the last Western Civ class (we had our final tonight, thank you for not making us come back to school next week Ms. Western Civ professor). I'm feeling this weird jumble of things right now: sadness, because these classes really have grown on me and become part of my routine; accomplishment, because while I might not have aced my final tonight, I know I did a really good job with it (although I totally flaked on the writer's names, which will mean I lose some points); relief that the end is in sight, and after tonight I should be getting good sleep again for the first time in months; and this sense of time moving right along and everything changes, similar to the feeling I had when I saw the final episode of Six Feet Under. I know I can't rest yet, because I still have these other finals and I'm going to have two more Biology lectures before that final, but the bulk of what I consider the hard part is going to be done in the next 16 hours.

And I'm not only registered for my Spring 2008 classes, but the tuition is already paid too; I got the news when the bill showed up in my mailbox, and it's a $97 credit. The financial aid for which I applied, for which I never got any kind of it went through notice, was applied to my balance, and there's $97 left over to pay for maybe most of one textbook. Heh heh. Yeah, time just marches right along.

I felt like saying something to my classmates, and professors, because I really do feel a deep sense of gratitude toward them. If you recall, I was terrified of going back to school. I mean, I had this knowledge that I had the capacity to do well, but I feared a repeat of past mistakes. Maybe I didn't write too much about that, but the fear was always there. I remember distinctly that knot in my stomach as I walked into my first Opera class, the first classroom I'd entered as a student in thirteen years. Hard to believe that was four months ago. Not only did the fear fail to pan out, but my professors (and the students) rocked. My Opera professor was, from the beginning, a joy to behold, and I actually learned an appreciation for opera that I never knew I kinda wanted. My Western Civ professor gave me all kinds of positive reinforcement about my writing, and broke the curse that had followed me up till this year: I can write creatively, I can blog, but I can't seem to work my magic when there's a grade involved. No more. I couldn't have asked for a better experience.

And the classes themselves were their own flavor of awesome. In every class, there have been plenty of students who participated, who contributed to lively discussions, and never did I feel stupid for my point of view. Maybe that was always there, in all those other classes I took years ago, and I simply had to grow up enough to dive in there and get involved in the discussion. It's made me feel more alive than I've felt in years.

I did something that might seem like major butt kissing, but I don't care. I had a paper to turn in tonight in Western Civ. I'd been stressing about this thing for weeks, worried that my point of view was totally backwards, feeling more stuck than I ever have, paralyzed, unable to translate my coherent thoughts into a coherent paper. I finally let go of wanting it to be perfect sometime this morning; given that my grades have been good so far, and this paper is only a portion of the final grade, even if I get a C on this paper I'm still in good shape. Somehow, once I let go of perfectionism it all came together (jeebus, didn't I learn anything from NaNoWriMo?), and I managed to whip out a decent paper that felt good to hand in. I was done at 1:30; I had to jump in the shower, print it, and barely had time to get to school at a reasonable time. So where's the butt kissing? In addition to my paper, I wrote my prof a thank you note, not stapled to my paper, not double-spaced, just mixed in the pile. I told her about how stressed I had been about going back to school, and taking her class specifically, and how much I appreciated her teaching style, how awesome it is that she focuses on our ability to express a point of view rather than regurgitating her point of view back to her, how she's helped me find the confidence I need to go forward.

I feel like it's important to let people know when they have an impact on you.

I might write something similar to my Opera professor; I have to hand in my paper in person tomorrow. Then again, I might just say something to her. But then I run the risk that she'll be busy, or distracted, and writing it down allows her to process what I want to say at her own pace. I don't know.

In any case, though, I better get home to write that paper, so that I have more than a Thank You note to hand her tomorrow...