Long time no blahg

It's been awhile.. let's catch up!

Ethan and I went to Vegas. That was fun. We'd both never been before, so we spent most of trip being bewildered and walking around. And drinking. I had a lot of fun sleeping into the day and being up all night..and getting dressed up. I bought a bunch of Vegas clothes that I probably will never wear again. And shoes..ow. I feel silly wearing the shoes I did in a city where you walk everywhere. We went over two months ago, and I still have the blister scars on my feet.. yikes!

What else...oh! We also celebrated our one year anniversary on the 23rd of August. That made me really happy. We went and saw a free Gin Blossoms concert in Santa Cruz. I got Ethan a garlic holder. He got me roses, coffee and the Sunday paper in bed; I was a very happy girl that weekend.

Either shortly before or after I started classes, I'm in my fifth week now. Wow! I'm taking some interesting courses, though as they're still GEs, not as interesting as I'd like. Developmental Pysch, Human Sexuality, Art Composition and Writing. I would never admit to my dad or brother that I like writing a lot. I'm still very far from being any good at it...but something about it makes me really happy. So far classes are going well. I still don't know how much I liked this semester business, I feel like it's midterms time already but really I'm only about 1/4 in. I'm thinking about doing online sexuality (some part of) for my human sex presentation and paper...if anyone has good ideas of what my focus should be, let me know!

I had a couple strange things happen over the course of the last few months. Not related, but within myself.

First, I realized that the birth control pill I was taking caused me to become super depressed/anxious/moody. I had never, ever felt so bad in my life. I've suffered from different variations of depression before in my life, but this was a whole new beast. For about two months I was not myself. I was crying all the time, I couldn't tolerate people at all (which wasn't very good for my job or my relationship), and really hated myself. I was waking up at 3AM and crying for hours, and had these horrible thoughts running through my head. This was also around the time I'd quit smoking, so for the first few weeks I thought I was just withdrawing really bad. Long story short, I stopped taking it, and within a week I felt like myself again. I'm not really sure how people put up with me!

Secondly, everyone other day when I'd check facebook or myspace I'd see a girl around my age declaring her engagement/marriage/pregnancy/birth. This was blowing my mind. I spent a lot of time in the last couple months evaluating my thoughts toward marriage. My conclusion thus far is this: Marriage is something I don't understand. Not to say I think it's bad, or people shouldn't do it. It's just outside my grasp of comprehension. Especially for people my age (22ish). Here's my thought process...let's say I did understand marriage, and wanted to do it. Well, I'm 22. I'm going to change a LOT within the next 10 years. I've changed a lot in the last 9 months. Yes, it's easy to say and feel you love someone forever. However, you change, they change...what's important to you now may not be in 10 years. What you like about this person may not be attractive to you in 10 years. Whatever, you get my point. Again, my caveat is if you are 22 and married, engaged, I'm not knocking it...especially if you're happy. I'm just saying it's not for me. Okay, onto the point of "Why do people get married?". When I first thought I was falling in love I asked my friends and family what love meant to them. I like people's perspectives on things. So, I've asked the majority of my close friends and family what their thoughts on marriage are, and why they think it's something we do. To sum it up, I mostly got the answers, "It's what people expect you to do when you're in a committed relationship.", "Tax breaks, insurance, etc...", "If you want to have children, you should be married." Fair enough, though, I still don't understand the point. That being said, I don't understand the point of having babies...but I'm not one to say I will never be a mother. I've learned about the "maternal instinct", and I assume the "marriage instinct" might be there too. Just, right now, at this point in my life, I don't get it. To put this in context: I live with my boyfriend. We are incredibly committed to each other, perhaps to the point of co-dependence (not in the drug way...and I'm kidding anyway ;)). I love him very much, and he does me. We spend as much time together as possible. I know he'd do anything within his means for me, and I would for him. I don't feel any need to get married to him. I love him, our relationship works, and we trust each other explicitly. I don't see us breaking up anytime soon (or later). But, I don't want to marry him...I feel it would be unfair to at least him, where I'm still very young in terms of knowing what I want, and what I want to do forever. Okay...I could keep going on this, so I think I've made my point and I'll stop. :)

Let's see...tonight I'm going to see Counting Crows! I'm really excited that I get to see both of my  favorite 90's bands within a month of each other. Mr. Jones and meeeeeeeee!

I'll do better (promise!) at keeping this updated, hopefully with more pictures, less semi-nonsensical ramblings. byeee.