a certain game that i have

Monday January 20, 1990

Today we had school when just about everyone was out of school!

School was really confusing! Math is as confusing as someone telling you that theres a corner in a circular room!

I hate math! but I love, spelling, English, & art!

Cecilia is cleaning up her mess right now.

Today we went to grandmas so Aunt Kay could go to Uncle Eddie’s funeral. Tomorrow we got to go to Uncle Eddie’s burrial.

Kitty bit me twice!

Laura & Cherie are moving to Flemington I think. Sometime next month. I’m gonna miss them! I wont get to see them as much during the summer.

My Uncle Fred is thinking about moving into their house! He’s really crazy!

I pray that I can see them pretty often in the summer!

Well Gotta go!

Love,
Monica

Memory Verse – 2 Kings 13:3

Breakfast – Oatmeal

Lunch – Chicken Cardon Bleu

Dinner - Soup

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Scattering dust bunnies from the corners of my closet, I came across this old journal of mine from when I was 10 years old.

For reasons unknown, I found it necessary to record everything that I ate on a daily basis.

This is… well, it’s embarrassing but very funny and almost sweet (dare I say?). And it makes me realize that I think it’s become pretty easy to forget that I've grown up. After all, there are no clear boundaries drawn between the age of 10 and the age of 27 until I come across an old journal, or photos from summer camp, or a letter from a pen pal that I haven’t heard from in ages; there is no line in the sand from that time when I made the decision to grow up. I never received a date stamped receipt for my purchase of adulthood.

In fact, the debate is still out on whether I’ve actually yet become an adult at all.

My first response to these journal entries is to laugh and to think how different I am now. And that’s partially true; I’m not as simple minded, I suppose; and I’d like to think that my writing has improved a bit. I had little to worry about when I was 10. I was a book worm who constantly chose function over fashion. I was too practical for my own good and my friends thought I was strange because of it. And I only really had friends because I was active with my church – they were people I had known nearly my entire life. They accepted me as-is because… well, because we were church kids and that’s just what we did. I think most people would have considered me a little naïve and quite the tomboy. I played matchbox cars with my brothers and preferred dirt bikes, climbing trees, and building forts out of scrap materials to my sister’s Barbie house and fashion plate transfers. Not only was I nerdy and bookish, but I desperately strove to be such. *

So really, what’s changed between then and now?

Life; I suppose that would be an acceptable answer.
Bills, debt, heartache, death, loss, broken dreams, broken promises, broken glass **, mistakes (tons and tons of mistakes)…

And I focus only for a moment on how different I was until I realize that almost nothing has changed; almost nothing at all.

I still (at least mentally) compartmentalize my day into digestible fragments.
I still hate math (some of you know this first hand), and find it completely frustrating.
I still love art and enjoy the English language a great deal.
I still keep obsessive tabs on the food that enters my mouth in a given 24-hour period.
I still don't care for cats.
My Uncle Fred is still crazy, and Cecilia is still cleaning up her mess.

I take a pill every morning to make me happy and I take one every night to keep me that way. I enjoy drug induced sleep because it’s the only good sleep I get. I don’t listen to music anymore to dance – I listen in hopes that someone else’s words will help me make sense of things. I still strive to memorize scripture, but I often just find myself quoting what I memorized when I was 9 years-old instead of trying to memorize something new.

“Blessed is the man who walketh not in the council of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in that law doth he meditate both day and night…” ***

The words cycle through my mind in a continuous round, peddling slower and slower until I finally drift off to sleep.

When I was 10 I was too stupid to feel helpless, or lonely, or trapped.
So yeah, I guess life is what happens in between then and now.
And I might still be a little too stupid to feel lonely.
The difference is that now I know the difference.

* I had a specific outfit that I wore whenever we were going to the library. It involved a red, plaid, pleated skirt; penny loafers, a blazer, and a pair of my sister's old glasses that she used to read with. I didn't require corrective lenses at the time, but I desperately wanted them. They completed "the look" (I'm almost certain Alejandra will have a comment about this).

** In February of 2000, during my family's annual visit to Peru, an overhead window fell from its framing and broke over the back of my neck, leaving a nasty scar. I have some picture lying around here somewhere that I might share with you all at some point...

*** Psalm 1:1

Currently reading : The Fasting Girl By Michelle Stacey Release date: By 25 September, 2003