"Darling are you feeling / the same way that I'm feeling?" ---song from ER last week
April 29, 2003
time 9:20 pm feeling infinitely better reading CSCY wearing pajamas music whatever ready for ? next scan for James
"Darling are you feeling / the same way that I'm feeling?" And that's any way, any feeling, any all-encompassing thought or emotion that measures the tranquility I feel right now. What a turnaround.
After my horrible panicky outburst yesterday, I stormed off to practice trying to calm down. Three hours and many skills and numerous laughs later, I returned to normal and became myself again. Maybe too confident, maybe arrogant, maybe a little bit unwilling to change. But myself, and happy with me. It wasn't just the people, though that's always a help; it was everything. I tried roundoff back tucks on beam, this new move for me, something I am nowhere near powerful enough to complete (but wanted to try anyway), and it helped me greatly. I was terrible at them when I put them on the beam, crashed to my head a few times, but it turned things all around. This is what I wrote about it when I came home:
I remember seeing the pale blue mat, the bright lights, my outstretched hands, everything turning over, whipping by. Literally turning my world upside down as I crashed back to the mat and reality. In that moment of intense fear and anticipation, of thrill and awe and nervousness, I found more of myself than I knew gymnastics could hold. In those microseconds, in each milliminute, hour, day, there was some peace I had not known, some moment of silence and introspection that brought quiet curiousity and stillness. Stillness within a whirlwind of movement, silence within a vacuum of sound. And reflecting on it later, on the time between my feet leaving the ground and my body hitting it again, when my world turned upside down, it made everything right.
Pretty silly, I know. But what isn't? So yesterday I had my breakdown, had my crash, and today I can turn around. (OH WAIT, what does THAT phrase make you think of? --- TOTAL ECLIPSE OF THE HEART!!! Anyway.) Just a week and half left, but somehow it makes me sad. I have Spain, summer, a hundred nights with Matt and in Madison to look forward to, but for once the idea of leaving doesn't sit so well. I am definitely looking forward to these things, but I have been lucky enough to have a great semester and year, and it makes things bright.
So maybe academically (or at least DHA-wise) it wasn't my best semester (fall definitely was, so that can make up for it), but so much more. So what made me like Minnesota more this year? Let's see....well, for one, my Kinesiology classes, that Competitive Sport class, so wonderful. Competitive Sport may very well have been my most enjoyable class yet, there was nothing we did that ever felt like work even though we did a lot of work (REAL work - I know!). Everything was so interesting, and just what I had been looking for, and it made me love sport, not just gymnastics, but ALL sport, so much more than I had known. Gymnastics club - my team was awesome, and I became closer to some of my teammates than I had ever been. And my gymnastics improved as well, which is always a plus. My love for coaching was also renewed this semester, Competitive Sport reminding me of the importance of my work and the kids making me so happy with their jokes and smiles and skills. Class with James - I love him. He is the calm within the storm of design, and painting and just whatever we did was always satisfyingly different and fresh.
Speaking of which, these are the three best quotes I've gotten from teachers this semester:
Haha, a bit of comic relief. Anyway. And my friends...friends. Last spring I kind of stumbled out of the True Ten and only somewhat picked up again this fall. It was my own fault completely; I was so nervous about something (maybe just that it was junior year) and looking for something new. As Matt noticed this semester, I had a renaissance of sorts with these True Ten, and for this I am ever grateful. I have always had the best times with my roommates; now I remember these times with the greater span of the ten of us as well. It was hard to have three of them gone, but now I know that they will return.
There's a lot more, but we'll let that lie. Obviously these are NOT the only things that made this semester so good - Matt and my family (including my far away sister, whom I shall see in just a few weeks!) and my WI friends are always a part of it - but that is for another time, and probably, another place. We all should be so lucky.
So while I finish up these assignments, while I'm sending things 'to the grave', I have to relish what's left, or something. Time flies. See, I knew 2003 would be a good year. It's something about the 3's.
And this feeling that I'm feeling...out of nowhere, all the things she said, if you want to be happy...everything just runs through my head, and leaves me happy. And being happy in my life is what truly should matter to me.
Goodnight.
---Lexi
If You Want To Be Happy
"Oh I didn't know you did gymnastics. I guess that makes sense." ---Brad...what is THAT supposed to mean?
"Thank you, PROM QUEEN." ---Steven...I got on his bad side this semester, WCYD.
"I suppose I have to tend to Lexi now." ---James, today, like I'm a sheep or something.