Open those windows!

I won't lie.

I'm upset.

I never thought things like this would bother me, especially since it's only one part of my life. They shouldn't bother me because they'd never bothered me in the past. Or maybe things were just simpler before. Regardless of why it didn't matter, it matters now.

Last night was Winter Ball. For the most part, I had a good time. But I had a better time last year. I had a great time last year, in fact.

Maybe I'm being selfish and bitchy just complaining about this, but I really need to vent.

In order to get where I'm coming from, I need to give a little backstory.

First of all, I'm friends with a couple of guys (no, this isn't a guy problem; it's a "friends" problem), who I'd been pretty close to up until a few months ago. Out of the two, there's one who's like a brother to me. The other one, I'm not as close with, but we were good friends. Or so I thought.

My surrogate brother's real brother is good friends with this other girl. (Yes, I'm aware this almost sounds like a catfight, but rest assured, it's more of a me-against-the-world thing.) He's a year older than me, so he went off to college this year, and guess who she started hanging out with? Mmhmm. I don't know how it happened, but over the last couple months, they've gotten super close - which I honestly don't have a problem with - but they just sorta left me behind.

I don't know... maybe I let them drift away?... but I remember up until maybe October we'd been same old, same old. Everything seemed fine over the summer. We were laughing, hanging out, having fun. And then it was like I just wasn't good enough for them anymore. Which is ironic, because those two guys aren't exactly the epitome of "cool" anyways.

Seriously, I just want to know what I ever did to make that happen. Did I do something or say something? So far as I know I've been the same as I have been. I never tried to comform, and everyone seemed fine with that.

My brother-friend (guess I'll just call him X and the other Y) still makes the effort to talk to me, but mostly only if the other guy's not around. I guess I'm supposed to be appreciative that he talks to me, but really, it's just kind of insulting. X is the kind of person who will friend the loner on Facebook because he feels bad for him. I know this because he's done it before. He freaking told me about it himself.

Y has just makes fun of me. He always teases, and it used to be good-natured, but it's turned into the mean kind of teasing. You know, the kind that sounds like they're just playing but you know they're making fun of you because they don't like you.

I'm pretty sure they talk about me behind my back - about what, I don't know, because according to them, I don't have a life. I don't know what their new friend (I'll stick with the lettering system and call her Z) has to do with it, if she has anything to do with it, but I do know that Y and Z do talk about me when I'm not around. I honestly have no idea why they do. I'm not particularly interesting, and I thought that I'd always been nice to them. I can't think of any time where I purposely was mean or rude of whatever.

Yet, I've seen them laughing at me from far away, because wearing a pair of contacts can do wonders. It almost makes me wish I weren't wearing them, so maybe I wouldn't know about it. You know what they say about ignorance being bliss.

Anyways, the day before, during free period, I was talking to X's older brother. They all came over and started talking to him, and then right in front of me, they decided that they all were going to Jamba Juice as a group and just walked off. Like, hello? I'm standing right beside you, and you don't even have the decency to ask if I wanted to go too?

I guess what bothers me is that three months ago, when the weather was still nice, I brought back smoothies for people who weren't able to leave campus and I didn't even ask them to pay me back. The week before this, I went shopping during free period and I asked if they wanted to come because I didn't want to leave them out. It's not feeling like they owe me something - I don't feel that; it's that I've been reaching out to them again and again, and I get it thrown back in my face. I'm not asking for much, just common courtesy.

So anyways, last night was the final straw. Y ambled over after one of the dances and said the DJ told him that I was dancing like a dork. I don't know if what he said was true because if it was, wow, double wammy, and I really should have been expecting that, since I am being talked up behind my back. For some reason, Y seems to have a tremendous influence over people. I don't know what he meant by telling me that. I don't know what the DJ meant by that; perhaps it was just an amused observation and was harmless. I tried to explain to him that I'd never done that dance before, and my shoes were making my feet hurt. He just started laughing because I was barefoot and went go tell his friends. Well, sorry for taking my shoes off because my feet were dying in those heels!

I didn't talk to them much last night because it was just pointless.

At the end, they all decided to go up to take a group shot up at the photo booth with the photographer. I didn't expect at all that they'd ask me to join, but what hurts is that they just don't... I don't know, seem to care. They were one of the last groups to have their pictures take, and since I'm a senior who was supposed to help clean up in the gym, I was called up to help wipe down tables. I could hear a couple people in particular up there snickering, but I didn't really mind that much; I was just glad to have something to do.

They made plans after, to go see a movie or something after, and one sweet girl who's in the group asked me if I was going. She's one of the only ones in that group who I actually feel genuinely likes me. Or at least, if she doesn't, she's damn good at faking it. I said no, of course, since I'd made other plans with a couple other friends to sleep over at their place, but they'd never told me about it, and truthfully, I don't know if I would have wanted to go.

Those people used to come over and talk to me on their own, now, if I don't go up to them and say hello, and even then, they'll act like I'm not really there. They pretty much won't give me the time of day unless I'm the only one around. I don't get it.

Oh, well...

I guess I can't expect much from a clique. One of my third grade teachers berated me once for having cliques, saying me (and a friend) were too old for them. Ever since then, I've tried to include people in things. I can't tell whether I've succeeded or not, but when there are other people who engage in cliques now, like ten years later...

What kind of kills me is that I can't do anything about it. Maybe it's just all one big misunderstanding, but I don't want to ask them about it because.....................

I know they'll never read this, so I can say it: thanks for making my senior year not as great as it could have been. Go do something very anatomically impossible to yourself. Once summer's here, I'm gone, which is probably just what you want, and that's fine with me. I don't want to be somewhere I'm not wanted.

Welcome to the real world, I guess.

"We probably wouldn't worry about what people think of us if we could know how seldom they do."

I read this book over Christmas break called Wild Roses. It was about this girl who had a genius musician stepfather. He was an asshole half the time and the other half, a mostly prick.

One of the things that bothered the girl, Cassie, the most about him was that she despised him, yet his opinion of her really mattered.

It's weird, isn't it? I hate that feeling; knowing I really shouldn't care what someone thinks of me but still do. Knowing you shouldn't care, don't need to care, but nevertheless do... how do you get rid of a weakness like this?

"Eyes are the windows to the soul" ~Unknown

I disagree.

There's just something about music that can speak so eloquently.

I love music. It's one of my joys in life, along with (have you guessed?) writing. The thrill I feel when I hear a tune for the first time that... how to put it without sounding ridiculously cheesy?... connects with me. Funny that, as a writer, I connect quicker with the melody - not the lyrics - of a song.

Music touches you in some innate way, more than anything else ever could. Beyond the most poetic words and the loveliest expressions, music speaks to the human soul the most profoundly. Music inspires; it gives and it takes. It needs no language; it is.

It's mysterious - one melody is put together to form something beyond what words can say. Tiny atoms are thrown together, in this cosmic universe, without accident to create something beautiful.

But... couple the music with words, and you have something that can give warmth and melt a frozen statue.

It's strange what music can do. It can throw me into a completely different mood, or I can lose myself in it. One instance, late at night, one song even made me cry. Sad songs can make my heart ache; the voices that sing are filled with such an aching and longing that I can't help but feel it too.

The deep chords, the right instruments, and the pure notes, and an expressive voice can do wonders. I can easily lose myself in music, however lame my musical taste (I can't help my pathetic taste). Lots of times, I will just zone out when I listen to music. Why?

It reaches somewhere deep inside me, past my subconscious, into my core - into what gives me hope, sadness, what makes my heart weep or leap for joy. Somewhere, the music rushes down into my being, and releases my imagination. When I hear good music, my mind goes soaring. Bits of stories, flashes of feelings, snippets of emotions, even vivid colors - I see these, in my mind's eye, as different pieces capture different parts of me.

But what intrigues me is that these feelings and emotions aren't mine. They belong to the writer of such a piece. How can one being pour so much of his heart and soul into one chord, one progression of notes, one resounding chorus, so that the listener feels what they feel? And so acutely?

The writer and listener both, for one short moment in eternity, transcend time and space and beat with one heart.

That, truly, is the essence of being human.

what makes you different makes you beautiful

Last fall, when I went to visit my old gym coach, she told me, "Don't change."

God..... she's so right. Maria's always had good advice, but I didn't realize what she meant by it.

To change yourself to become someone's idea of a better person is ridiculous, stupid, and just plain BS.

But at the same time, to stay static is to refuse change, improvement, and growth..... How can I word this the way I'm trying to say it?

Don't change your looks, your ideas and opinions, your person to satisfy someone else. Don't stay static out of fear you'll become different. Grow as a person, but don't degrade yourself by succumbing to the demands and the pressure of others to become someone you aren't and never will be. No matter how hard it is, stay true to yourself.

I know it's cliche, how everyone says "Be true to yourself". The thing is, they never tell you how difficult it is, how it may happen without you realizing it. And they never tell you how difficult it is to go back to being yourself after you've been impersonating others for so long.

There was nothing wrong with me last year, when I listened to alternative music, dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, and laughed when I felt like it. People liked me for me because I didn't care what other people thought.

Somehow, sometime last spring, I became different; I paid more attention to what people thought of me and I cared. @$&%! I became one of them.

But no more.

I am me.

Don't like it? Sucks for you, cause there is nothing you can do about it. There is no reason I should change myself to please others; if changing myself for you is what I have to do to be approved, you weren't worth my time in the first place.

Nostalgia is like a grammar lesson: You find the present tense and the past perfect. ~Unknown

I both hate and love how life is.

There are those special times in your life when you're happy. You know them: small, fleeting moments or long days that you wish would never, ever end.

I love those. Those are the times that you look back on and smile.

It reminds me of a well known saying that goes like: "Let the good times roll."

However, I've always thought that there was a missing phrase in that quote. What comes after that, when the good times come to an end? Change?

See, I've never really been one for change. In fact, I was diagnosed with Adjustment Disorder earlier this year, in October. Yes, there really is such a disorder...

But I have learned, over the course of my life (my meager seventeen years), that a lot of times, changes bring good things.

When you later reflect on what's changed in your life, (ideally) you can hardly imagine how things were before. =]

Changes, no matter how much we wish they wouldn't come, are inevitable and they move us forward.

It's just.. always hard to say goodbye.

And saying goodbye is what I hate the most.

<3 Mariko

___________________________________
Flames to dust... Lovers to friends..
Why do all good things come to an end?
~All Good Things by Nelly Furtado

Still on the face of this planet...

After two years in the FMA fandom, I am pleased to announce that........

Your dearest Mariko is finally caught up on all things Full Metal Alchemist!

I spent this past weekend relaxing after my school performance of Godspell by catching up on the manga (about thirty chapters' worth) and finally, finally starting the new 2009 anime. All caught up on the first eight episodes, and I am highly anticipating the release of Funi's dubbed version. I know that their dub projects are always kept on the down low, and it probably won't come out for another year, but I'm pretty stoked that most of the original voice actors will be returning. Call me stupid, but Edward Elric is not Edward Elric unless Vic Mignogna is doing his voice. Paku Romi is good, but I love the fact that a man is actually doing Ed's English voice. LOL

Speaking of the anime, my favorite moment in the new series is in (was it?) Episode 5. It was when Ed and Al were in Tucker's library and Nina came along wanting to play because her father, the abominable Shou, was too busy studying. Edward had a flashback to when he and Al were peeking into Hohenheim's study back in Resembool when they were younger, and then he threw down his book and went outside to play with them. It just made me go "awww", and then the EdWin fangirl in me started brainstorming for a new Ed/Winry fanfiction piece.

And I'm all caught up on the manga now, so I actually know what's going on, and WOW. I am so excited for next month's chapter. Everything is getting so close now; I could care less (not reall) about the coup in Central as long as I get to see Ed and Winry get together. Chapter 84, I believe it was, was so amazing. :P

In other FMA news, one of my fellow anime/manga freak friends got to go to the Fanime in San Jose, this past weekend! I couldn't go, since I had Godspell, but she promised to get me some Hagaren merchandise, something I am desperately short on. Since, well, I don't really have any FMA merchandise at all, besides the manga books, but those don't really count. Yes, I'm just that broke. Plus, one of my dreams is to go to Comic Con, and I have to save for THAT. lol.

Anyways, while Annie was at Fanime, I was at the TOSPS performing the musical Godspell. It was amazing! And if you've ever done anything theater-related, you know that the week before a performance is jam-packed with rehearsals, last minute changes, stress, and just overall busyness. You hardly spend any time at home because your become consumed with the production. But that, in my opinion, is what makes it all worth it by the end.

So mostly, that's how my week went. I spent a wonderful Memorial Day simply doing nothing, except now that almost everything I was doing this year has started coming to an end, I think I'm going through withdrawals because my brain thinks I have nothing else to consume my time with. Hahaha...

Haiyaku, FMA, for another chapter and episode, so I have something to give my life to! :P Because I'm just that pathetic.

Love, Mariko. <3

Fanfiction Notification

Anyway... aside from that emo-centric post... I shall note that that was my second post on this blog and this is now my third! Yay! XDXD

This is just a bit of news for you, if you came to this log through my FF.net account, I want you to know that I am working on a new Zelda/Link (yes, I have played Twilight Princess now) piece, set in modern Hyrule- obviously AU. It's a humour/romance oneshot that has somehow shot past my usual thousand word oneshots and it now at about four thousand. Whew... so we'll see how far it gets.

And also expect an EdxWinry follow up piece sometime in the near-ish future. Yes... a follow up on that awfully-writtin, really OOC oneshot called "Glass Dreams" that I posted about ten months ago. This time it will be from Edward's POV and mostly deals with him and Al trying to get back home. There is a great deal of fluffiness and happiness at the end, though, so don't sweat too much. I'm aiming for a good ending that might make people cry, but I was never good at pulling emotions out of people, so we'll see... hahaha...

Just FWI, these two pieces were not announced in my profile because my profile has not been updated for quite a while, and they're basically just side jobs.

I like to think that my writing has improved since last year, but of course, it's me... so how would I be able to accurately judge whether the quality of my writing is better? XD Lucky you- you get to decide in a little while when I post it! (Expect the ZeLink oneshot out first.)

So, drop me a note, if you want.

Amour, Mariko.