circumstances and decisions

I have always lived in imagination, but never dreamed that my life would be based on such a fragile artistic structure. I'm finally at Cornish, though classes don't start until Sept. 3rd. At the orientation yesterday, I was thinking how funny it is, here I am, surrounded by artists, all of them incredibly talented, with even more potential to develope, and all of us hope to make a living doing this, creating these fantasies for others to see, hear, experience. But the arts are such a fragile community, always overpopulated and underfunded. At any given time, only 5% of actors are employed (I'm relieved to say that that figure is 95% for techies, thank god). For some reason, when I pictured my future, it always seemed more definite, more solid, not that physical therapy is any less difficult a field to be known in, but it seems more stable, more like a "real" job. I don't know. It's kind of sad, all of these young hopeful people with big dreams. How many of them are going to be crushed, swept aside and forgotten? Some of them will do great, but they're also competing against the peole from Juliard, TISCH and numerous other arts schools and acting programs. Oh well. Enough of the philosophical musings.

I really like it here. The weather is, so far, what I'm used to, the people are far more friendly than I'm used to. The lady across the hall gave us a spare key with the offer to borrow anything we might need, is going to give us her TV (not that I need to distraction), and offered use of her Volvo. The guy down the hall, who we met briefly, gave us a corkscrew when we asked to borrow one. The building managers are pretty flexible about stuff, both very nice, and everyone at Cornish seems very cool. Happy days. There are two other girls in tech that want to do lighting too. One of them, Dante, rather intimidates me. It seems like she has so much more experience, is somuch further advanced than me. We'll see, though. I like her, despite that. She has energy and passion for tech. So does Beth (who I keep wanting to call Kylie, after Kylie Minough [spelling?], who she sort of looks like. Beth has a bit more experience than I do, but I think we're pretty evenly matched in that department. I really like her, she reminds me a bit of myself. The three of us and two otehr girls went out to lunch together yesterday, talked techie stuff the whole time. It's so great to be around other people my age who seriously care about tech. One funny thing, though. Out of the 9 people yesterday, only one of them was a guy. That's so wierd. At lunch, that was one of the things we talked about.

Switching gears slightly, our apartment kicks ass. I'm so happy with it. Now that Tabitha's desk and all are set up, and we've got the kitchen all pretty, when you walk in, it looks like an actual place, like it looks good, and inhabited, and pretty. Then our bedroom kicks ass. I'm so happy that I finally have my loft bed with the desk underneath. I like the neatness, the compactness of it. The only problem with the apartment is that it's definitely a short persons place. The stove is low, and so is the shower (almost too low for me, but Tabitha thinks it's perfect. Poor Matt when he comes up. Also, my bed is up so high, he'll hit his head on the ceiling. Hmmm. Oh dear. Oh well. Can't wait till he comes up here at the end of September. I can't remember how much I wrote before about all this, so forgive me for any unneccessary backtracking or gaps. Leave me a note if you want to know more or something. Anyway, we've been going out since June 9th (and I do mean actually going out, hanging out places, going out to eat, none of this go-over-to-his-house-and-sit-there-while-he-plays-video-games bullshit. That's not fair of me. Alex and I watched movies, too. I like watching movies with Matt a lot more. He has slightly better taste in them, and is also the best film and theatre critic I've ever met. He's able to assimilate quickly, then say exactly what he liked and didn't like, and why, and is open to discussion about it. This parenthesis is way too long, so I'll stop it now), and he finally told me he loved me on August 12th. I had known it before, but it was good to hear it, have it more palpable and definite. And I know that he means it, not like with Alex, and saying, 'well, I'm going to say I love you, because I do, in my own sort of way. If I ever really mean it, I'll tell you.' That bothered me, because those are not words you toss around lightly, and not something you say because you ought to, or it's habit. So it's kind of good that Matt waited until he was absolutly sure. "I think it'll work because... because I love you. And I don't want to be with anyone else." We were talking about what we were going to do when I left for Cornish. He said that, with my permission, he'd like us to stay together and make it work, even though that's rather long distance and long term. Side note-Tenaya and her boyfriend, Justin, had the same dilema, she's going to Sarah Lawrence. They broke up twice over whether or not they would stay together while she was there. They love each other enough to try, though. One of the points Justin brought up interested me. He said that he didn't know if he wanted to because that was a huge commitment, that making the decision to stay together now, while one if going off, was kind of like making it permanent, like staying together your whole lives. I think he might be right, saying I love you enough to hold onto you even tough we're apart and won't see each other that often is kind of akin to saying I love you enough to stay with you no matter what, i.e. forever. But I don't know. And I have no idea of what Matt might say to that. Who knows. I miss him an awful lot, have talked to him twice, both times for almost two hours without realizing how long it was. When I was on the phone with him, it was fine, but about an hour after I hung up, I was hit with a wave of missing him and sadness. I have to postcard he wrote me on our two month anniversary and a little picture of him right over my bed on the ceiling. I didn't realize this till recently, but the picture was taken the night he decided to pursue me. That always makes me smile. I need to stabilize my bed more, it shakes too much. Hmmm. Alrighty, I think that's all I have to say in this entry. I'll write again tomorrow. Going to go off to the second day of orientation now.