I could lamente about how much I miss my friends, but I won't. I'll just leave it at that I do miss them. Home has been okay so far, but nothing really exciting has happened. Yesterday I went to the Huron Softball banquet at the request of my old coach. It was nice to see all of my teammmates who are still there and say goodbye and goodluck to the graduating seniors. I can't believe it's already been two years since I graduated. I ended up sitting with the Nye family who also had Ashley's boyfriend along. Mr. Nye pointed out how much Ashley has changed from the extremely shy freshman she was freshman year to the outgoing person she is today. Amazing how things change.

More on the note of missing things, I miss my teddy bear. I had to leave him at school because he didn't fit in my bag to come home and I wasn't about to take him out to Camp Buckner. It's comfy curling up to sleep holding him in my arms and resting my head on top of his head. Of course during the course of the night he usually ends up either on the floor or smashed between the bed and the wall, but at least he's there to start off with.

Yesterday I went to the store and bought a notebook journal that I'm hoping to start writing in regularly. We'll see how that one goes. I also bought ingredients for banana bread and cranberry bread. I made some cranberry bread last night and it turned out pretty well, except that I chopped up a lot of the cranberry's too much and so they got lost in the mixture and don't add a lot to the taste. The ones that are still there are delicious though.

I get to see Matt today at his graduation party. I haven't seen him since Christmas and have only talked to him 2 or 3 times this semester. As I've said before, I'm not great at keeping in touch.

At last I'm home. Actually, I've been home since Wednesday night. Yesterday I went to Dearborn High School to talk to the students there. They seemed pretty interested and asked a bunch of questions. I had a little trouble finding the school because I had directions to the administarative building and not to the high school. Today I'm headed over to my old high school to talk to the students there. I'm aslo planning on visiting a few of my old teachers and my coachs. My high school counseler never knew who I was until I told her that I wanted to go to West Point. From then on she always knew who I was. After that I think I may stop by and say hi to my Grandma. I haven't seen her since Christmas and have only talked to her on the phone once or twice this semester.

It's nice being home, but it is kinda boring. A lot of my friends from high school aren't around anymore and I don't know where most of the rest of them live. I'm not great at keeping in touch with people. I called Misha last night and we're going to go hang out and go to a movie or something next week. He has a huge test today and so he couldn't do anything last night. Liz and I are supposed to do something next tuesday, but then at dinner my mom told me that Isaac has an end of school recital that afternoon and I want to go to that.

I met Roger last night. He seems like a good guy, but doesn't look like the picture that Besty sent me. He didn't appear very tall in the picture, but then in person I think he's taller than my dad. I never really thought about it, but I guess I am the shortest in my family. I always assumed that I'd grow a little more and surpass one of my sisters or my mom, but it looks like that's not going to happen. I guess I'm stuck being referred to sometimes as "hey shorty" by Betsy and I can't even get back at her by calling her "bigfoot" because we wear almost the same size show now. Life is so unfair :)

Last night I had a few minutes before I had to do the taps accountability check for my squad and so I decided to sit down and write a little. I wasn’t sure how to start or what to write, so I decided to write a letter to Matt just like I did all of last summer. This summer I don’t think that I’ll actually send the letters to him because times have changed and I’ve come to understand more clearly what the purpose of those letters was. I have to find a new purpose to write. What I write this summer will help me more than anything with my development as a leader. A journal would be best, but in the past I haven’t been very good at consistently writing in journals. There needs to be someone who I’m trying to talk to about what is going on in my life and my thoughts. As much as I tried to deny it and ignore it, that was why I started this journal. I had a specific person in mind that I wanted to share stuff with. That is still the case, but that person has changed. I still write, and always have written, primarily for myself and to jot down what is in my head and going on in my life, but a lot of the time I’m hoping that someone specific reads it and is interested in it.

On the topic of journals, the other day the under three classes were tasked with cleaning out the trunk room. We were allowed to throw out anything marked with the year 2003 or lower. Of course, when we found boxes of stuff we didn’t immediately throw them away, but first went through them to see if there was any good stuff that we wanted. I found the book The Long Grey Line, a very nice book of the complete works of Shakespeare, over 20 wooden hangers, and probably the best find was a leather journal. I saw it buried in a box we were going through and picked it up because it reminded me of a journal that I had bought at the bookstore at the beginning of plebe year but only managed to write in a few times. I opened it up and saw that only a fifth of the pages had entries so I saved it and figured that I could tear those pages out. That didn’t exactly happen though. I must confess that I read the journal and it has made a very big impact on me. It was written by someone when they were a plebe. I’ve forgotten who’s box I found it in and I don’t really care to find out. The anonymity is part of what makes it so moving. They poured out there heart and feelings in there and it has opened my eyes to some things that I think will help me more understand one of the people in my life.

Back on the topic of writing in journals, in this one I’ve become much more guarded in what I say. That has its good points and its bad ones. It is hard to say what I truly want to say when I have my guard up and put some topics off limits and speak in generalities about certain things. One thing I found very refreshing about writing Matt was that I did away with those barriers for the most part.

Yearling year is now officially over for me. Today I left West Point to come home for CPRC and the first part of my summer leave. Yesterday all of the plebes and the cadre for the summer went out to mini-Buckner. It felt like hardly any time had pasted since I was out there as a yearling, but now I’m out there as a squad leader with 10 people under me. So far I like being a squad leader. It’s stressful and has kept me pretty busy, but I feel like I’m actually doing something and leading. This summer I think that I’ll grow a lot. It’s going to challenge and push me to go past my limits once again, but that’s why I came here. If it was easy then anybody could do it.

Wow! I got the lock combo on the first try. Now I have one for Buckner.

Packing is going extremely slow. My roommates have been wonderfull and put up with my mess so far. I'm sure that they'll be glad after tonight when everything is packed up. At least Tara will be glad. Alyson will probably start on her stuff.

This morning I rushed from breakfast back up to my room so that I could get to book return, but as I was walking down the hall with all of my books I looked at a sign and noticed that today it didn't open until 12, so I decided to walk down to Carlson Wagonlit to try and get my plane tickets worked out for my AIAD. Since it's Memorial Day the bus either wasn't running, or was on a really wierd scheduale and didn't come at the right time. I met up with 4 other guys headed down there and so we all walked in the rain together. We got there about 5 minutes before it should've opened, and then waited for about 10 minutes after it should've opened. It wasn't open today. I decided to go check out a different building by myself, which wasn't open either so I started to walk back. I made it 3/4 of the way back and then an officer offered me a ride the rest of the way. Around 11:15 I headed down to book return because I saw some people already going there. I was about 10th in line when I got there and it didn't even open for 45 minutes. People started to flow in really fast around 11:30. I ended up getting $131.50 for my books. It would've been more if I hadn't thrown away all of the CD's that came with the books. Joel went around and got other peoples books that they had thrown away. He ended up getting over $400. Since they take the money for the books when we buy them out of our cadet account it's kinda like free money when they pay us cash when we return them. I like the system.

Why couldn't the rain today have held off untill tomorrow morning? Oh well, Brigade runs are fun....riiiiiight.

My room is an absolute pit right now and it's all my fault. I'm trying to clean it out and in the process I've emptied out just about every nook and crany to get the junk cleared out and sort what needs to stay here, go home, and go to Buckner. It looks like a bomb exploded.

This weekend turned out pretty well. Saturday I didn't end up cleaning up my room at all because right after I got up one of my friends IM'd me and invited me to got to the city and watch the Yankee's game with him and some friends. I was debating to go or not but then he said that he'd come up here and beg me if I said no, and I didn't want him to see me in my pj's so i decided to go. (yes, for once I actually was wearing real pj's and not gym-a). We went to the city, walked around a bit, went to the game, went to Time's square, ate dinner, and then came back. Right after we got off the train in the city Jordan noticed that I had a big blue spot on the back of my shirt and so she let me borrow her sweatshirt for half the day. She got cold during the game and so I gave it back to her and decided to ignore the blue spot. Today I woke up around 11:30 and started cleaning out my desk.

On both Friday night and Saturday night Josh IM'd me around 3am to say hi. I was asleep both times, but it was really nice to wake up in the morning and see his message.

I got my CS grade today and somehow managed to get a B-. I had a C+ going into the TEE. In AP I ended up with a B- as well. I think I had a B going into the TEE.

One thing that is very nice about this weekend is that it's giving me a chance to relax, forget about school for the most part, and think about stuff that's going on in my life. This past week, or past few weeks should I say, were pretty stressfull with crew and school work competeing for my time. Towards the end of this week it was really starting to catch up to me and affect all areas of my life. It's nice to have some time to myself.

I guess I'll just start talking about what's on my mind. It's Josh. Not a big suprise there. He's usually what's on my mind. I can't help but wonder if I can ever mean as much to him as other girls have. I know I shouldn't compare myself to others, and I try not to, but it happens. Because of that question in my mind I don't want to admit to myself or others how much I really feel about him or care about him because what if he doesn't to the same extent. Therefore I avoid thinking about it. I see it as a weakness because it's a place where I'm very vulnerable. I know that he does care about me and that he likes me. I like him, especially the little things that he does. This past week I spent a lot of time with him and had a good time. It will all work out and be okay.

Ahh yes, it's TEE leave once again and what am I doing this time? Sittting in my room. Of course, that is my fault because I decided that I wanted to spend the night here so that I can hopefully start and maybe even finish packing up my room this weekend. Last night I went out with Leah and we spent the night at the Hanlons. Right before we went over there we made a stop by the Comm's house. Celio was over there and wanted us to come by before we left. We went over and I met Gen. Brook's two daughters and his wife. Thankfully BG Brooks wasn't there. I'm sure he is a pleasent man, but still, he's the Comm. Today I came back to West Point so that I could pick up my AIAD orders and then I went back to the Hanlon's with Annah. Later Terry, Tia, Jordan, and Natalie came over and we all went out to dinner along with Amy, and then hung around the house some more. Annah was the only person not on pass so she had to come back to school by TAPs. I decided that I'd have a better chance at getting some work done on my room if I actually spent the night in it instead of at the Hanlons again. I don't think I've ever had the room to myself at night this year because I'm usually the person who isn't here. It's different.

4 out of my 6 TEE grades are in. Unfortunatly I'm not going to make the Dean's list this semester. I got a C+ in spanish, B- in physics, and a B in both probability & statistics and dirt. I'm still waiting on american politics and computer science. I think all grades have to be in by tomorrow, so I'll find out soon. That's one really nice thing about this school. There's a really fast turn around time for grades.

NOOO! I missed Steph's phone call again. I wish I could call her, but I don't have her phone number. It was kinda wierd today in the mess hall because for a moment I thought I saw her walk in, but then I looked again and it was just somebody who looked a lot like her. I wish I could talk to her and find out how basic went. She might be home when I'm home, so hopefully I'll see her then.

On a happy note all my TEE's are finally over. So far I only know how physics and dirt went. Still waiting on CS, Spanish, AP and Math. Spanish is the one I'm most worried about.

I have a lot to write about this weekend, but I don't know if I'll get to it or if I want to get to it. Sometimes it is easier just to ignore or avoid subjects.

I think I"m really nervous for some reason. I have my AP TEE in an hour and I should be studying, and I was, but all of a sudden I got really antzy. I don't know why, but I can't stop moving. My roommates think it's pretty funny. Doing push-ups didn't help, walking around the room just made it worse, and sitting still my leg bounces. I just hope that I don't crash during the TEE. That would really suck. I only get this way if I'm really stressed or tired. Only 3 more TEE's left, that's 10.5 hours of tests. I can do it. Halfway through right now. 1 more today, 2 more tomorrow, and then I'm done. Okay, I'm slowing down a bit now. My leg stopped taping. I should be able to get back to studying soon.

My parents sure do a lot for me. My mom bought me a plane ticket to come home tomorrow after my last TEE because I'm doing CPRC, but a few weeks after the people in charge said that was fine, they changed their minds and decided that going to Mini-Buckner was much more important and that I couldn't leave until a week from today. My cadet chain-of-command tried to let me leave early, but there's not much you can do when a LTC tells you something. I called home and told my parents about it and my Mom was wonderful and got my ticket changed. I don't think that was a cheap thing to do. It cost over $200, plus the time and energy. My Mom is a great person. She's always sending me packages with food and quarters for laundry. When my roommates need to find the address for CGR they just go through my stuff looking for a box from home because they know that I'll have at least one around and that it'll have the address. My Dad is always there for me when I have a question about why my computer is acting up. Once last year and then again once this year I was working on a CS project late at night and got stuck. I called home and he stayed up and helped me. They've been up here numerous times to visit, and even came to one of my regatta's this spring. When we came off the water from practice that day and were soaked to the skin, my parents collected up some of our clothes and went and found a laundrymat in town to dry them. My friends love them a ton. It meant a lot to Steph that they were still there for her even after I left to come here. Annah gets real excited everytime I tell her that they're coming. Of course, that doesn't prevent her from teasing me and saying I have the perfect midwestern family. I love my parents.

No hablo espanol. Mucho crapo. Oh well. It's all good.

Quick note: Below I'm using the terms optimistic and pessimistic in the way that most people tend to think of those words. Optimistic being positive and having a good outlook, pessimistc being more negative and a not so good outlook. They are not being used in the correct psychological way.

Now that I have a little time, or more that I'm putting off studying spanish and AP, I can talk some more about last night and the conclusion that I am actually an optimistic person. It started out with Bea-hob asking me why I always hated everything after I told him that I hate physics. I told him that it's not actually that I hate things, that is just the easiest answer to give at the moment and usually I'm not very fond of whatever it is. It's the slacker way out. That transitioned into us talking about personality. I said that I was a pessimistic optimistic person in that outwardly I usually sound pessimistic and try and perpare myself for the worst, but deep down I'm actually pretty optimistic and believe that everything will turn out okay, even pretty good. The reason that I don't say that out loud, or let myself think that in my head, is that I find it much easier to expect the worst and find out everything is just fine, rather than expect the best and be let down or dissapointed. Bea-hob told me that this meant that I had a deceptive personality. I asked Josh and Justin about it as well, and they both said it was deceptives due to the fact that I outwordly say something other than what I really feel deep down. I'd never really though of it that way and I didn't like it, so I decided it was time to put aside the pessimistic outward attitude and start focusing on the optimistic one. It's requiring a little more concentration on what I'm saying and thinking, but overall I think it's going pretty well so far.

2 down, 4 to go. This morning I took my physics Tee. I think my answer to the last question just about sums up the test. The question was basically "State if the experimental value was accurate or percise compared to the manufacturer's value. What was the main source of error?" My answer: " The experimental value was neither precise nor accurate when compared to the expected value. The main source of error was that I used the wrong equation because I had no idea what equation to use, or what it was that I was looking for. Other than that the main source of error was systematic due to the fact that the values did not overlap." I'm hoping that they are very generous with partial credit. If that's the case, then I have a chance at doing okay, I think. Otherwise...

Tomorrow I have Spanish and AP, and then on Thursday I have CS and Prob&Stats. Yes, 20 hours of tests in a week is great. At least it's combat PMI all week. And when I mean combat, I mean that I haven't even made my bed. It's great.

Time to start embracing the suppressed optimistic person inside of me. Everything is going to be okay. I may not have gotten all of the questions on the dirt Tee correct, but I'm pretty sure I passed.

Wish I could talk more about my switch from being an pessimistic optimistic person to just an optimistic person, but I need to get to bed. Physics Tee tomorrow. I can do this.

This weekend was one of those weekends that leave me feeling like I need to sit back and have a moment to think and organize my thoughts. It was fun, but overload. Saturday I hung out with Josh and Joel in NJ. We went and saw the Matrix Reloaded. I personally like the first Matrix better, but this one was okay. It had some pretty cool fight scenes. Then today I went over to the Shumackers house for our small group party. MAJ Shumacker, Brian, Jess, and I played bocci ball. MAJ Shumacker won by alot. This evening I had a Buckner meeting and there was some pizza to eat. I think I got a little food poisening from it. Tee's start tomorrow so I started studying and stressing. I guess lack of sleep and stress are the major contributers for feeling like I need to sit back and zone out the world for a few minutes.

In my mind I see things in terms of colors, time lines, and shapes. The colors I can't really give definate color names, but I can tell if they are dark or light. For example, my first grade room was light, where as the other first grade room across the hall was dark. The days of the week are arranged in my mind in a row of rectangles with each haveing a different color or shade. When I was little and memorized violin pieces by ear I would listen to them and develop a mental picture of the piece. Then, when I played the piece I would walk through that mental picture. When I hear music nowadays I still kind of do that. The only think missing from my mental picture is that there isn't any room place in it for the name of the piece or who it's by. There never has been, and perhaps there never will be. It just doesn't belong.

Time for bed.

Yay! I got to talk to Misha today. I haven't talk to him in so long because when he's online he's either busy, or I'm busy, or he's just not there. It sounds like the Chemistry department at UofM is just as bad, if not worse, than the one here. That is, it's a great department, but seems like a haze and everybody hates it. This weekend he's going to go see the new Matrix. I really want to see that.

Hmm, Mark just came by with laundry detergent he borrowed. I should've asked him if it's busy down there right now. I need to do some laundry.

When it rains, it pours. It's pouring right now. Today my stress level increased by the hour. I was told I have have the options of either doing the Air Assualt train-up duing TEE leave, passing and going to AA school, or doing a second detail. Plus, in 20 min I have my combatives TEE that i'm pretty nervous about. Added on top of that is the fact that for some reason I didn't go to bed until around 2 last night. Why? I'm not quite sure. I was working on Math and all of a sudden it was really late, but I still had to try and do Web Assign for physics. 2am is pretty late for me on a school night when I have to get up at 6 and I don't function well when I'm tired. The little stuff gets to me. If I'm ever in a bad mood or mad, the best bet is that I'm also very tired and exhausted.

I'm the Activies SGT next semester. Time to plan some BBQ's.

Today was a quite productive day for once. I got up this morning at 5:30 and Anne and I went over to Arvin gym and climbed the rope and did the monkey bars. We were going to do some sit-ups, but it was crowded where we were going to do them, so instead we did a short run. Then today in CS I got my project back. It was a C-, not great, but at least not failing. In Dirt I got out about 40 min early and so I went back to my room and filled out my itinerary for CPRC. MAJ Robinson handed back our AP papers in class today, but right before he handed them back he put up a power point slide of the top ten sentences he found in the papers. The number one sentence was "The 1770's were a time of peace, free love, and drugs." I did a lot better on my paper then I expected, which brightned my day even more. After lunch I went to dental sick call and got a filling. It's four hours later and the part of my mouth is still a little numb. From there I went to visit Josh and then came back to my room and emailed my DAC about getting an AIAD for this summer. Tonight I'm going over to the Surdu's house for a goodbye dinner. LTC Surdu is moving to a new post at the end of the month.

I just had my embarrasing experiance for the day/week/semester. This morning I was relaxing after my spanish oral TEE and and sitting at my desk with my belt undone and shirt untucked while reading the newspaper and listening to music. I looked up to see my TAC, 1st SGT, a Congressman, TACNCO, and a few other officers standing in my doorway entering the room. My roommates and I had to stand up at attention to greet them, but I was had the predicament that my shirt was untucked and belt was undone. I didn't have time to fix that or any way to do it inconspicously, so I just stood up and held the newspaper in front of me while trying to stand at attention. It was very embarrassing. The Congressman asked my roommates and I a few questions about where we were from, looked around the room a bit, and then left. I wanted to hide.

Last week of classes. Yuck year is almost over. YAY! This past year has pushed me, challenged me, broken me down, built me up, made me think, changed a few things and strengthend a few others. I wouldn't change anything, but I'm glad that I never have to go through it again. At least I hope that is the case. I'll see how everything turns out after TEE's are over.

Crew season is over. It went by so fast. This past weekend was Dad Vail and ECAC's. My boat raced 5 times over the course of the weekend. At Dad Vail's we made it to the semi-finals but unfortuantly did not make it to the finals this year. Then, on Sunday at ECAC's we won the Petite Finals by 0.2 seconds. I was so glad that we didn't end the season by losing yet another race by a tenth of a second. It's sad losing Kathie, Cas, AB, and Margaret, but I'm glad that they've survived West Point and get to graduate in a few days. Next year will be very different not having Coach Hall as a coach anymore and so many other people gone as well. I'm glad that I was able to row with all of them this season. Prarie Dogs, learning to scull, 5:30am practices, unexpectedly swimming in the Hudson, getting third at States, beating each other up at the Hanlon's house, spanking manatiees, contagious shoulder problems,West Virginia...need I say more, the super secret plan...It's been a good year.

: )

That's for you.

Yes, I am a pessimist. No, I don't think I work hard enough at anything. I just turned in my CS project and it royally sucked. I need to get out of this mood right now. All I'm doing is berating myself. Right now I'm not living up to my expectations and it really bothers me, but yet I also am not doing a whole lot about it. It's a catch-22. What I need to start doing is figuring out what I need to improve and actually work to improve it. Do I do enough, push myself enough? Other people work much harder than I do and seem to manage. Why do I feel like I'm sinking? I think I need sleep, but there are others things that I should be doing.

Outside B4 is playing dodgeball. Cool. Dodgeball at HVS was the best with those big mats to hide in and behind. That and kick the can in the dark.

I think I finally stuffed enough cardboard under the leg of my desk to prevent my top two drawers from slidding open all the time. It only took me a semester to do it.

Crap! I called Matt this evening but he was sleeping so I said I'd call him back, but I forgot. I think the last time I talked to him on the phone was over spring break. He's never home when I call. Such a busy guy.

This weekend at the New York State Championships my boat won our heat on Saturday and then got third place in the grand finals on Sunday. That means that now I have a shiny new medal hanging on my bookshelf. Overall Army placed second at the regatta. Not bad. I get to leave Thursday afternoon for the Dad Vail Championships in Philadelphia which are on Friday and Saturday. Sunday is the last regatta of the season and it's the ECAC in Camden NJ. It's going to be a busy week. We have practice in the mornings this week at 5:30 so that we can focus on homework and sleep in the afternoons. I have a big CS project due on Tuesday that I'm not very far on. Only two more weeks of classes before TEE's. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can....

Gotta love doing laundry. It makes me feel like a real college student. I wait until I have almost no clean clothes left, or none at all in the case of my crew clothes, and then search every corner, pocket, and drawer in my room for quarters so that I can actually do my laundry. My mom sometimes sends me a roll of $10 worth of quarters and I thought that I still had some left from the last time she sent them, but when I looked for them where I thought I had stashed them nothing was there. I started going through all of the pockets in my back packs, crew bag, and drawers and managed to find enough quarters for one load of laundry. Long ago I'd given up on trying to keep my white's sparkiling white here so I was just going to throw everything together, but then I rembered hearing some change jingle in my running suit pocket so I searched there. I didn't find any quarters, but I did find $3. I love finding money in pockets.

Yay! Josh just stopped by because he's out checking his squad's TA-50.

CS project or sleep?

I'm looking forward to the end of classes more and more. For some reason this week has left me extremely tired and exhausted. I've even decided to cut out my morning run for today and tomorrow in hopes getting a tiny bit more sleep and becoming more rested for NY States this weekend. Crew practice has left me drained of all energy and academics are slowly killing me. During practice I try and row as hard as I can and do my best, but I feel like it's not enough; that I'm not doing as well as everybody else and that I'm slowing down the boat.

Today in Prob &Stats class we got into a discussion about West Point vs. other colleges. My teacher put up and excell spreadsheet that showed the dean's guidance for grades here vs the dean at Harvard's guidance for grades. The point he was making was that if we went to Harvard, or any other school our GPA's would be raised by about a point. I'm not sure how accurate that is, but thinking that I'd have a 3.9 or so someplace else is nice. Too bad it's just not here.

On a more cheerful note, right now my hands are covered in glitter. For Easter my mom sent me some play-dough with glitter in it. I just picked some up and a lot of the glitter rubbed off on my hands. When I move my fingers back and forth really fast it looks cool.

The other day when I was in the library working on my AP paper I picked up the book Covered Wagon Women. It's a book of diaries and letters from women traveling west in the late 1850's. I've only had time to read a little of it so far, but it is pretty interesting and nice light reading. Although I'm not that great at history, I like reading about people's adventures and how they survived.