Side Tracked

I like to believe that true love exists, as I watch my parents still hold hands and catch each other off guard with the words, "I love you", at the simplest of moments.

But it seems as if there's this uncanny need for people to someone they want something from the exact thing they want to hear, which makes love seem completely extinct as it becomes an entire exchange on Facebook or text messages.

I just want someone to challenge me, emotionally, socially, mentally, someone who will provide me with a mutual respect and not throw the word love around like it doesn't mean anything, someone who will tell me how they feel when things get rough, instead of turning to my best friend for "emotional support" I'm apparently not providing.

I don't want someone to try and rationalize why we should be friends with benefits. 

And I'm tired of this conversation:

Hey.

Hey.

Wyd?

Homework.

Y?

Cuz I have a lot.

Wow, ok sure.

What?

Nun.

Smh.

Y?

Because. 

(20 minutes later):Well anyways babe we should go out.

The lack of substance in that conversation isn't the only thing that bores me, it's the fact that I'm getting asked out by the end. Am I supposed to feel flattered by that last text message? because I'm pretty sure the rest of the conversation put me to sleep.

And when did I become your babe?

What about talking about politics, or your views on religion? Or  an honest conversation about how what your aspirations are, your biggest fears and insecurities?

So no, I don't want to play 21 questions, in which every question is a variation of whether I'd date you, or how much I like you.

I want to be challenged to think differently, to think deeply about things like whether I'm Catholic because I was born into it, or whether  my love for writing defines me.

So why do continue to get side tracked by the people who call me babe and play 21 questions to see how I feel about them before they ask me out in a text message?

Conquering Fear

I often wonder how people conquer their fears, how they are able to do things they know they can do, but are intimidated by.
I started this year ruminating that, and telling myself that this year  will only be an extension of the last few months of junior year, when I finally realized that college was real, and started working up to my full potential.
And now here I am, in the beginning of my last year of high school, and I'm wondering about people conquering fear.
Because I have a fear.
It's more of intimidation, but nevertheless, it's something I know I have to overcome.
And that intimidation is the rigor of AP Spanish.
(It feels better getting that off my chest.)
Now I knew it was going to be difficult.
But now that I'm here, taking the class, I feel myself asking why did I take this class?
I would have so much less stress if my last period was study hall.
But as I think about this, I go back the initial question:
 How do people conquer fear?
By confronting it.
I know I can do well in this class. I just have to believe  it. I have to speak more spanish at home. I have to annotate the back of spanish books sometimes. I have to watch the news in spanish, and sometimes switch my indie rock playlist for some salsa while I do my homework. And lastly, I have to stop being deathly terrified of messing up my conjugations when I speak spanish in class.

I know I can do well in this class, because of people like Mr. Baker and Ms. Leach who have told me so, and because I refuse to do any less than I am capable of.

So this is me, pledging to swallow the intimidation I feel and accept the challenge. Who knows, maybe I'll trade in my old dreams of becoming a famous journalist and teach spanish instead.


*by the way, if you're interested in reading about a day in the life of a saber in spanish, feel free to check out my new blog:http://thisurlshouldbeinspanish.blogspot.com/
Comentarios son apreciados.

Senior Year..It's Here

So it's official. Summer came and went before i could complete all of the things on my summer bucket list. Seriously, it feels as if I went to sleep on the first day of summer and next thing I know, my alarm went off at five thirty because it was the first day of my senior year.
Wow that feels weird, saying that.
I'm still calling the new juniors sophomores, and yesterday I wrote OSU for my house on my Environmental Science Do Now.
But no, it's true. I spent my entire first day of school defining the word citizenship and strategizing how to sell my school on Twitter.
And soon enough, I'll be going upstairs during lunch for office hours, after school in Essay clinic workshops, and spending my nights sitting at my dining room table, doing homework.
Just like junior year.
But it isn't like junior year, because college is no longer this distant dream I can fantasize about, it's something I actually have to apply for. I can no longer say, "Well there's always next time," because there's barely any time left.
Life has suddenly become terrifyingly real and the opposite of what I expected it to be.
I didn't expect to have collegiate prep first period. I didn't expect to have to write an essay in spanish on the second day of school. I didn't expect to be advised to apply to a community college as a safety school. I didn't expect to see so many unfamiliar faces in my school this year. I didn't expect to be thinking about going to a CUNY for at least two years before attending my dream school.
But I guess that's what happens  when you become a senior and you have to make these life changing decisions that didn't  seem real until about a month ago.

Confession Time

I have a confession to make.
When people ask me questions about the future, it scares me.
They ask me something like what  my major would be if i got into the University of Rochester and I freeze.
My teeth clench and my chest tightens.
Because I don't know.
I have no direction and, that to me, is the scariest thing in the world.
Because it's not about knowing my future major.
It's about the fact that I've always wanted to be a writer, ever since I could remember, that I've never imagined, I mean really thought about what else I would do with my life.
And now all of that has changed.
And the days are getting closer to senior year, to when I have to apply to college, to those acceptance letters, to me stepping on a college campus.
And I have all these questions that I don't have the answers to, and instead of trying to answer them, I avoid them.
Until I can't anymore, and I have to think about my future, the reality of it. Of leaving home. Of thinking of yearly salaries of jobs I'm interested in.
My future is no longer this montage I can imagine and wonder about. It's something I really have to make decisions about.
And that scares me.
But the fact is that I'm going to college sooner than I really understand, and that I have to think about all the things that I thought only grownups thought of, and stop avoiding them like a plague.
So here's me saying that i'm really going to take my future seriously now, stop breaking down when someone asks me questions about it, and get rid of that montage I keep changing and replaying in my head.

It's Killing Me

So I'm freaking out here.
My friends are calling me, saying, "Oh my god I got my AP scores in the mail!! What did you get?"
And what do I respond with?
"....I didn't get my scores yet."
And I've been trying to be patient, thinking maybe it's just because Far Rockaway is extremely far away from everywhere else (I mean it's in the name), but this is just getting ridiculous. It's been days now, and I don't even get an email. Where's the courtesy?
Let me just say, I read hundreds of pages on American history, made countless flashcards on biological processes that I could barely pronounce the names of, wrote either a document based or free response essay almost every Friday of every week  for a year, and sacrificed precious sleep in the morning to go to Independent study.
Don't I deserve to know my scores? Don't I deserve to have my anxiety quelled as I  sit here and wonder? Don't I deserve to be able to gloat like everyone else instead  of saying, "...I didn't get my scores yet"? For god sakes, my handwriting was the neatest it has ever been in my entire life in those history essays.
Have mercy College Board.

I'm Not a Bragger

I don't like to brag about myself.

It's weird right? I can hear myself in my head and can't help but  think, jeez shut up will you?  So I usually refrain from bragging, unless I have to.

And when do I have to?

When I'm writing a college essay.

If you didn't already know, writing a college essay means you basically have to sell yourself without making it obvious, in less than six hundred words, to someone who knows nothing about you but your name and and your GPA, which they got off of your transcript by the way. 

How can I tell you everything about myself in less than 500 words?
How can I tell you that my name is Michelle Elisabeth Soto, that I'm obsessed with Indie rock, that I want to move Chicago and own a studio apartment, that my favorite food is my mother's rice beans and chicken, that my new past time is spending hours making abstract paintings, that I narrate my life in my mind like a blog just like the main character of the show Awkward, that I'm a hopeless romantic and cry when I watch movies like The Notebook and The Time Traveler's Wife, that exposing every part of myself on stage is simultaneously  the most terrifying and most addictive thing I've ever done?
I mean, can't I just give them the link to this blog post?
That would be much easier than fitting 16 years of experiences, growth, and epiphanies onto one page of words.
Maybe I can use a smaller font than size twelve.

I'm a Changed Person

After flying across the ocean and spending nine days in Scotland, I feel...older. Wiser.
It was exhilarating, going to a place full of rolling hills, and meeting people who seem worlds apart, but love indie rock as much as I do.
It's almost overwhelming, being exposed to a place that initially seems almost opposite of mine; different accents, food, steering wheels of cars on the right side instead of the left.
It blew my mind.
But I've never felt so alive.
I've never felt so out of my element.
I mean I've been to camp, gone places where I've known absolutely no one. but that's not the same.
I've never had the realization that the world is much larger than New York City.
Until now.
There's a whole other world out there, a whole world that I have yet to explore.
I made so many memories from Scotland that i can't help but want to go back, and make so many more, to plan to explore other countries and cultures in the future.
I'm a changed person.