I was thinking of skipping my graduation...

In 5 days I will be walking across a dinky stage to be handed an extremely expensive piece of paper (personally, I have $16,000 worth of loans built up in 3 short years). Usually, people tend to be excited about their graduation from college. I, on the other hand, am not so ecstatic. In fact, I'm thinking of skipping the ceremony all together.

This has nothing to do with the actual ceremony. I think it might be pretty neat to have the piece of paper that has consumed my life for 3 long years, and will have me up to my ears in debt for the rest of my life. I'd like something for all my trouble.

No, the reason I don't think I'm going to the ceremony is simply based on who I have found out will be at graduation. Namely, my family. Any time my mother and father (divorced for 7 years now) have to be within 10 miles of each other, shit hits the fan. Now add my stepfather, sister, stepsister, and any other random family members that might decide to crash the party, and we're going to have to call the state police to maintain peace over the ceremony. Forget family for a minute. Well, you can't really. My family is pretty unforgettable. But besides the family members, I have recently found out that at least 2 of my ex-boyfriends will be at the ceremony. Neither one is a fellow graduate. One of them, we'll call him "Joshua," has not spoken to me since 2 weeks before he broke up with me (which, by the way, was also 2 months before I had planned to move 500 miles just to be closer to him).

Upon hearing this news (and by "upon" I mean after the nervous breakdown subsided), I decided that there is only two things I could do (besides skipping the ceremony) to make myself feel better.

1- Get drunk moments before the ceremony,
and
2- Casually smack "Joshua" up-side his head, and then pretend nothing happened.

So perhaps I'm not quite confrontational enough to complete number 2, but I am seriously considering number 1. I don't think a single person would blame me either (at least, a single person who knows the entire story between "Joshua" and I; but I don't want to share that story with anybody else--it just sucks).

It's decided. I figure I'll have to wake up around 7 am on Saturday. I'll begin drinking immediately. I'll have a beer with breakfast (shit, probably a beer for breakfast). I'll drive the 45 minutes over the mountain to the school, and continue drinking during the drive (hey, if I get arrested for drunk driving, at least I'll get to miss the ceremony). Graduates must report on campus at 9 (for a 10 am graduation). I will still be drinking at this point. I'll stop drinking about 5 minutes to 10. That will insure that I am drunk before the ceremony, during the ceremony, and after the ceremony (because I will begin drinking again as soon as the tassels are turned and the caps are tossed). I think it's a brillant plan.

Leave the Boogers for Barry; Stupidity is MY Beat

I just (and by "just" I mean almost three hours ago) finished reading the greatest book in the history of books I've read. Dave Barry's Boogers are my Beat is absolutely fabulous (and by "fabulous" I mean hilarious, which by "hilarious" I mean choking in my own laughter). Dave Barry is a humor columnist, who apparently everyone in the free world (as well as the imprisoned world) has heard of except for me (apparently I've been living under a rock for 21 years).

I have read some funny books (Anne Heche's autobiography was hilarious, but that's because she's clynically insane), but Boogers are my Beatis by far the funniest. This is the only book that has made me laugh out loud--literally. I took the book with me out in our pretend-we-have-a backyard as I smoked a few cigarettes, which means our neighbors (whom we share this non-backyard with) have now realized what they have suspected all along--the girl wearing combat boots, a beanie, bathrobe and pink shorts is legally insane. My roommate, the quiet one, has also realized this fact. This is because she sat next to me on the loveseat (which, by the way, you do not have to be in love with the person you share it with--I did not know this) reading Harry Potter XXII: the Children Go Through Puberty in which Harry, Ronald and Hermionie Have a Menage a Trois. I'm sure the three-way tryst was interrupted too many times by my annoying laughter. I'd apologize to her, but I'm afraid if I think anymore about Dave Barry's boogers and weasels, I will spontaneously combust.

Dave Barry has made a career at poking fun at--and I'm not making this up--everything and everyone. He gets paid to do this. Dave Barry is my hero. I am not a comedienne by any means, but I wish I were. Dave Barry would be my role model. Fuck, Dave Barry is my role model. Now, if only I could be intentionally funny (and by "funny" I do not mean funny looking, nor do I mean stupid-funny--for that is what I already am).

In the beginning

The page loaded, and there it stood. The inevitable--pick your template page. I froze at the keyboard of the laptop I received as a graduation gift from a father whose only way of showing love is through his gifts. How does one pick the template for their blog. In a way, it's like deciding what you're going to wear. The only difference, is your blog will wear this template for--at least in my case--the rest of its life. I know that I have the option to change its appearance, but I never do anything about it. I am lazy, and therefore, I must choose a template for my blog to wear until the end of its existence.

I scrolled lazily through the minimal templates, contemplating whether I should use my self-taught HTML skills to customize one of the templates into something representing me a little bit more than these manufactured templates could. In the end, I chose simple, basic black. Nothing extravagant (because I'm not); nothing too complicated (because I am). Just plain black for plain Elizabeth Black.

Once the stress of choosing my blogs clothing came to an end, the first thing the site wanted me to do was fill out a profile about myself. No big deal. Kept it as simple as possible; didn't want to give away too much information. You see, I do not use a pseudonym to hide my real identity. "Elizabeth Black" is not the glasses to my Clark Kent, not the strip of black fabric to my Bob Parr. In fact, those who know me in the non-online sense would see this name as obvious as those examples (Superman and Mr. Incredible, just in case you were wondering). I use Elizabeth Black to hide from myself. Under a different name, I become a different person. Without worrying about what I'm writing, or who might be reading, I can relax. I can hide behind this sheer facade for a while longer, spilling my thoughts out into the Internet, wondering if anybody is reading--if anybody is caring.

For now, I will hide behind my Clark Kent glasses, my strip of black fabric, and I will pretend that you are not the boy I crushed on in high school or the girl who slapped me in elementary school. You are my reader. You have stayed this long for a reason. You will read my stupid words, and you will hear me. A writer, struggling for her spot in the world. You will look for the name, even though you know it will not grace the cover of my first novel. That kind of readership will be let in on the secret--my real name.