BE-YOU-TIFUL

a hundred days have made me older

i used to not believe what people said about college being a time of finding yourself. but after actually finishing my first year of college, i think that’s exactly what i did. lots of things happened between august 2011 and may 2012. even though this school year felt like it only lasted 2 months, these 9 months of school have really made me realize and discover the kind of person i am.

i don’t know exactly at what point in the school year i became rougher around the edges, more abrasive, or “hardened.” i’ve been thinking about it and i think after breaking up with simon, i just stopped caring about what he thought or what anyone thought about me. i stopped feeling like i needed to be nice to him, i felt resentful and regretful we couldn’t stay together, and i felt angry about those times he was at parties with other girls. i just really wanted to stop caring about him and not see him but that was hard because we have the same friends and he was still friends with all of my friends. also after simon and i broke up, i felt like my friends weren’t even really mine anymore. simon and emily were basically my only links to roy, sm, kevin, jinghao, tahseen, robbie, etc. so a lot of the times we hung out together, i would look around and ask myself why i was even there. i didn’t understand why i was hanging out with roy when i didn’t even know him or even really enjoy hanging out with him. i didn’t know why i tried so hard to get closer to sm because he was already so so tight with emily. i didn’t know kevin, tahseen, or robbie at all and robbie wasn’t exactly the loudest or most welcoming person i’d ever met. and jinghao and emily were already really close. and simon and i broke up and everyone in that group knew about it. and then i’d hear from emily or someone that like tahseen and robbie were joking about me being really quiet or that i never talked and how roy thought i was like a pet or something. so i guess after simon and i broke up, i didn’t really know at all why i was even hanging out with roy and the rest of the group. not that i felt more mean or abrasive but probably those feelings had something to do with it.

i don’t know why i feel more at liberty to say more caustic or jokingly mean things to jinghao and simon and even yun, who i barely know and is actually one of the nicest guys i know. i don’t think i was like this in high school. i do feel bad after i say some things to simon but at the same time, i also don’t really care. i guess i don’t really care if i hurt simon even though that’s the last thing i want to do to simon. maybe i just want to say things that could hurt him because i want him to know that just because i broke up with him doesn’t mean i felt any less sad or any less hurt than he did. probably those feelings also translated onto jinghao because i do feel regretful that i at least sort of liked him or made a rash/too quick of a decision to not like him. actually i don’t even think i’m that mean to yun. he just annoyed me a little for a while, not because of anything he did, but because some of his habits just reminded me of stuff i don’t like in guys. well not just guys, but people in general. even though he’s one of the nicest people i know, some of his habits just drive me crazy and for a while, i couldn’t separate his being so nice from stuff i don’t like about him. i mean i still feel pretty nice/haven’t changed towards roy and sm and other people.

in terms of other changes college has brought about, emily said i am more of a J. i think i’ve always been like this— it’s just that college has amplified it. in high school, even if i wanted to get ice cream with friends at 2am or stay up until 4am with them, i physically couldn’t because that would just never happen. stores would be closed and our parents, or at least my parents, probably wouldn’t let me. and those physical restraints were the excuse for me not going out. i’ve always been a routine, strict person. i need to be in control and i need to not sleep in until 12pm and i need to go to the gym and i need to not spend 5 hours doing homework with my friends to discover i’ve only done 1 hours worth of work. wasting time and getting off schedule have always been things i hate. in college, there are no restraints to what we can do. technically we can do anything we want to and i just don’t feel like getting off my own schedule. i don’t think i’m more of a J, i think college creates more opportunities for my J to come out.

i do think that i care way less about what people think of me. the only thing i care about what people think is how much self-respect i have for myself. just like most people i know, i have the utmost respect for my own body. dressing relatively conservatively is important to me because i don’t want people to think i don’t care about myself. i don’t want people to think i’m a slut or trashy or that i show too much skin. basically i don’t want anything i wear to give off that impression. that sounds kind of hypocritical when i dress up to go out, but it’s college and i want to have fun too. also i don’t think what i wear when i go out is majorly slutty or anything so i’m ok with that.

one thing that oliver said a few days ago really bothered me actually. he said that i compare myself to emma and basically that i feel jealous sort of. or at least i compare myself to her. i’m sorry, i don’t know how to put this more clearly but i NEVER compare myself to emma or anyone and i am NOT jealous of ANYONE. i don’t think you realize how much i love my own self and how INDIFFERENT and APATHETIC i am to emma and other girls about appearance. the way other girls look or dress rarely crosses my mind at all because i DON’T CARE about them or how other people dress and i don’t try to compare myself to anyone appearance-wise. i’m not mad at you or anything like that oliver, i just really need you to understand this.

coming to college has made me love myself more. besides being seen as like a slut or as someone who has no self-respect, i honestly don’t give a sh*********t what other people think about me.

ok wow this post is not very happy looooool. i love the person i have become but at the same time, this summer will give me a lot of time to think about things i want to change about myself. wow i didn’t even talk about my perspective on guys or relationships but…I’LL TUMBL ABOUT ALL THAT LATER.

Tuesday May 15 04:33pm