shoes and laundry.

I have so many different things to talk about today.

1.  College
2.  Shoe choice at college
3.  Laundry

It's really not that many things.

College has lots of facets to it.  I will start by saying that I don't think I would have ended up here were it not for the fact that OSU has an Arabic major.  I think I would've liked a smaller community of people in a larger city.  I do like Columbus a lot and although I have explored a little, I need to do more.    There are definitely things I miss about Cleveland, for example, the privacy of our nature.  This is a weird thing to say, but I miss being secluded in beauty.  There's a pretty garden I should go visit here, but it's not the same as like, the waterfalls in almost-Berea land and the Bradley Woods nature park past center ridge, and the edge of this country that is all of the Lake Erie beaches.  Privacy, in all ways, is probably what I miss most about home aside from my family, my cats, home-cooked meals, my shower, my bed (all of which I miss a lot, in that order).

But of course there are the good things, which are my Arabic class and my Social Psychology class.  It feels great to be taking Arabic again, I really do love it and never find my class to be a chore.  Social psychology I like because of the format mostly.  This is another weird thing to say but I kind of do love just sitting there and being lectured to and taking notes.  That's what I liked about history freshman and sophomore years of high school.  I never studied hard enough to get A's in those classes but I love lectures when they're interesting.  And in some ways I love note-taking?  I realize it's probably a sign of low intelligence to enjoy such mundane tasks.  Don't care.

I also sort of like the social life here.  I keep telling myself to just be brave and try to make friends and be social and admit to being a freshman who is sort of lost and fears loneliness.  Knowing what you're socially up against and admitting your handicaps is the first step to making new friends.  Big house parties aren't that fun because I don't know anyone, so I try to meet people at those parties and make friends.  It works about half the time.

Also something college has taught me:  be straightforward.  Simplify the language you use.  Say what you want, when you ask questions, ask exactly what you want to know.  Life just becomes easier when you stop avoiding what you want to say for fear of embarrassment.  Stop being embarrassed.  Say what you want.

The thing I don't like about college, which Marissa pointed out today, is the blatant hatred and ignorance present on campus.  This comes with any diverse group of people, having varying beliefs about different subjects.  And while the racism here is something I'm a bit more accustomed to (though still not happy about or comfortable with), prejudice against gay people is something I don't think I have dealt with as much, and I have noticed it here sometimes from individuals.

I wrongly (and sometimes rightly) judge people based on shoe choice.  This is something I have always done, but there wasn't as much opportunity for it in Westlake because at Westlake High School, the fashion is fairly homogenous as are the people, which is not meant to be a slam on my community.  It's just kind of true.  There is always bound to be more variation in the fashion choices when the community is people from all sorts of different geographical and socioeconomic backgrounds than a place where everyone is from the same geographical background, and most people are from the same socioeconomic background.  Right?

So anyways.  Shoes.  Obviously most people don't consider their shoe choice to be a personal choice reflecting who they are on the inside, and lots of people don't think about fashion at all, but I still think something is reflected in shoe choice.  For boys, there are usually three schools of fashion:  well-dressed (this could be trendy, classic, or more casual original style.  Either way they look good.), athletic (it is such a cop-out for boys to just wear athletic shorts and sweatshirts every day.  Although, if you have the calves for it...), and awkward (examples:  white tennis shoes, ever, nice shirt with athletic shoes, different styles of clothing all in the same outfit, etc.)  The well-dressed man will have shoes that match the rest of his outfit.  From the same type of style, degree of casualness, and/or color as the rest of his outfit.  The jock will probably have some tennis shoes or sandals with some mid-calf socks.  I get it- fashion is hard sometimes.  That's kind of what I see when I see a boy in this outfit.  Unless he's sweaty, in which case congrats!  Your outfit is activity-appropriate.  And the awkward boy often does not match the degree of casualness of his shirt and pants with his shoes.  That's usually where the awkwardness comes from.  White tennis shoes are pretty much never okay.  I'm trying to think of a situation when they're okay, and no, they're pretty much not okay.

Girl shoes are usually a little easier.  Of course there are the awkward shoes that don't match the outfit, but then after that everything other type of shoe can really help classify the woman's mood at the moment.  Heels?  Don't fuck with her; she's important today AND she's angry because her feet hurt.  Flats?  She's probably looking cute even though it's not required at the moment.  Congrats! You found someone who is probably happy.  Rainboots?  Ask yourself: is it/was it recently raining?  If it is, she is trying to stay warm.  Wet shoes are the worst.  If it isn't?  Maybe she's dumb!  Maybe there's something she likes about her rainboots.

Disclaimer:  Those last two paragraphs are fully speculative.  That's what I see.  You probably don't see the same thing, but I'm not the only person who looks at you and makes inferences about who you are. So look fly, because you'll feel good about it.

Laundry:  I love the laundry room in Drackett.  I wish I could reserve it as a study room.  It's warm in there, and the chairs are nice, and I like the soft rumble of the washers and dryers.  This is why:  it is impossible to study in full silence.  There is always a noise-- the soft scratch of your pencil on the paper, the sound of your laptops fan, the click of your fingers on the keyboard, the flipping of pages.  And those are caused by solo-studying, so multiply that by 5-40 if you're in ANY study room on campus.  So, while the laundry rooms are kind of noisy, it's a constant noise that is loud enough to drown out anything else, and constant enough to study with.  Right? RIGHT? Yes. Right.

I have more things to write about so I'll probably be back within a week!

Pictures of myself that I like

1.  Pictures of me laughing.
These typically come in two variations, with and without makeup.  I like the ones with makeup because usually they make me look pretty AND are candid and genuine.  I like the ones without makeup because they make me look SUPER genuine, and often are pretty of my despite my lack of makeup.  Pictures that are pretty of me when I haven't spent any time on my appearance always boost my self esteem a little bit.
2.  Pictures of me outdoors
I just like pictures taken outside better than pictures taken inside in general.  But I feel like pictures the pictures taken of me surrounded by the beauty of this planet are always of me smiling and happy.  This is not always the case of inside pictures.
3.  Pictures of me with my mouth closed (?)
I guess?  I mean I just kind of noticed this... if my mouth isn't open because I'm laughing, and the picture is deliberate, I usually like closed-mouth ones better.  I have crooked teeth but not crooked enough that I feel self conscious about it... although it WOULD appear that way.  Maybe I am self conscious about it after all.
4.  Pictures of me with my friends
If you would compare pictures of me taken smiling by myself and pictures taken smiling with friends I will definitely appear way more a) human and b) happy in the latter.
5.  Pictures of me doing weird shit
Snowboarding, backwalkovers on the beach, swordfighting on a trampoline, standing on top of big weird rocks, smashing dry wall, etc.
6.  Pictures of me with alternatively colored hair
I know that having blue/purple/scarlet/green hair is NOT attractive in a lady.  Or anybody.  But I LIKE it.  So I'm gonna keep doing it.  Ask me why.  Do it.  Ask me.  Because fuck you, that's why.  I have absolutely no romantic prospects so I'm gonna dress and style my hair as batshit as I can because I don't give a single FUCK what you think.  That's why.

This post should probably be retitled to say Pictures of myself that I like and also the reason Hayley doesn't have a boyfriend and will never get one!

Me writing about respect is probably ironic!

I am definitely not one of those people who refrains from gossip entirely, or even at all.  I will basically always partake because most of the time, it's not going to hurt anyone and I only tell people who are about as likely to pass it on as say, wallpaper.  So, Laura.  Or complete strangers.  Or I just politely listen.  Or I just tell people about the tragedies of my own life so that they can gossip about me because if I were to find out that people are wasting their lives talking about me well, I'd probably be flattered before I took any offense to it.  I'm not telling you to go out and make shit up about me or to go out looking for dirt on me, but you probably won't find anything that's so embarrassing I would refrain from telling you myself.

But it is straight up despicable to talk about a person in a large group setting because
1.  It's not private.  You don't necessarily know these people well enough to trust them to treat the information with a grain of salt.
2.  A lot of those people probably don't know who you're talking about very well, which then leads to them making snap judgments about him.  It keeps the two people from getting to know each other because someone thinks they know something negative and maybe even untrue about the other person.
3.  When it's in a group setting, like perhaps, a floor dinner of a dormitory, and the person you're talking about has to be in the group for say, almost an entire year, you are isolating him from everybody by saying such horrible things in front of everyone.  Let the guy be part of the group, let him have friends.
4.  He's keeping that information private because he wants it private.
5.  This is more specific but the beginning of college is a very very stressful time and you just don't know how well the person you're talking about is handling it.  Knowing people are talking about you behind your back does not do good things for your self esteem, and when such a large group is doing it, you're bound to figure it out.
6.  It's so fucking disrespectful.  Obviously.
7.  By leading such a conversation, I guarantee that at least one person out of the group is going to wonder who else you talk about behind their backs.  It doesn't reflect well on you.

There just aren't that many people in the world who are legitimately horrible enough to deserve being discussed and analyzed behind their backs.  There are plenty of people I don't like but very few who I would ever allow a full conversation to go on about between a group of 6 or more tearing down their character.  It's cruel.