Heh, this is only the third time that I'm writing something while here in Italy. It's probably because it's really hard to write directly in Italian. It's definitely not because I don't have time; I basically don't do anything all week. It makes me mad, because when I don't do anything, I get into a rut. And right now it's just like that: I don't write my essays and I don't study until the last minute, and I'm doing the same thing with my honors thesis and my graduate school applications. I don't like being like this; it's much better when I have "too much" to do because then I don't have the luxury of not being on time. It's frustrating, too, because I want to change, but I can't.

I realized that I must be really frustrating to deal with. When I have to keep up with deadlines, I always think that I don't have to do anything for a while. However, when I get around to actually checking when the deadlines are, I find that they're coming up soon and so I ask everybody to do everything soon. Even iCal doesn't help, because I still leave everything to the last minute. For example, since I didn't even start my essay until Tuesday, I asked the professor that corrects all the Italian essays if she could look at my essay the next day (Wednesday, yesterday). But the problem was that the next day was a holiday, and so I had to e-mail it to her so she could correct it and send it back to me. (Recall that this is a holiday.) But the real deadline for the essay was Tuesday, and so I had to ask my cinema professor if I could give it to her on Wednesday, and then I had to ask for another extension until Thursday. And then I didn't even finish my first draft until 1 AM yesterday, so she had to correct it in about two hours. I really am half-lame (actually, more like totally lame). [Heh, sorry, the joke doesn't translate well.]

In other news, I'm lame. I lost my camera. I left it in my backpack at a hotel in Rome for the last day, and someone took it from out of my backpack. I knew that I had to keep it with me, but I didn't do that. $150 down the drain! And now I have to buy a new one since I'm going to Egypt, and it's going to cost an arm and a leg because of the damned strong euro.

Another thing I realized about myself is that I like being a bit depressed. I don't know how to explain it; it's not like I'm suicidal or anything like that. It's just that I search for pity from other people, and so I try to be a little depressed so that maybe somebody will realize it. (It doesn't work, obviously.) I do this often when I feel lonely: I take a walk in the rain, or I stay outside in the cold thinking for an hour, but instead I just want someone to talk to.

I think that it looks to other people like I have a lot of self-confidence, but I really don't. Not in regards to academic stuff, but in regards to being social. I'm really shy with people I don't know, so I never meet anybody new. It's like that here in Italy: I've only made friends with the students from Stanford, and even then I'm not very good friends with them. (This might be because I'm a senior instead of a junior like everybody else is, but I don't think that makes much difference.)

In reality, everything comes down to the fact that I've never had a girlfriend. I never succeed at getting my intentions across, so I hide everything inside me, and then I just end up becoming friends with whoever. And that's why I always seem to have crushes only on my friends (like I have now) -- and everybody knows how much harder it is to say something to a friend. And in the end, this insecurity makes me shy.

It's hard for me to write all this, but I have to. Someone should slap me in the face, tell me that no one is going to wait for me for their whole life, that no one will remember me if I don't talk, that I shouldn't be so depressed, and that I can't hide myself behind my work and my computer. (Probably the best person for doing this would be Morgan.)

Too bad I can't say it to myself.

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Amazing still it seems
I'll be 23
I won't always love what I'll never have
I won't always live in my regrets

CHORUS:
You'll sit alone forever
If you wait for the right time
What are you hoping for?
I'm here and now I'm ready
Holding on tight
Don't give away the end
The one thing that stays mine

from "23", by Jimmy Eat World