Currently Things as they are.

I am trying to take a long hard look at myself. Re-examining things that through the past couple years I have forgotten and ignored.
I'm trying to find again those things that really make me happy, why I got started with all of this crazy school stuff in the first place.
The point where I left New York, and decided to come back here. What was making me happy then, what did I think I wanted to do with myself.
The past months I have been working at Whole Foods, as some of you might know, slinging cheese, you know, cutting cheese, wrapping cheese, buying cheese... all things cheese. Cheese is still a really strong inspiration for me, as all food is, but it's not my passion. It is a passion, but not the one that has kept me going.
When I left New York I came back to my parents house in a van. We took all my stuff, which had tripled courtesy of the overflowing New York garbage can, in a mini-van back to Chicago. Everything that had filled my tiny room/cell in New York fit in a mini-van. I worked on a paper throughout this road trip, the miles and hotels passed like they had never been. The only memory I have of this return is sending in a paper I had rather poorly written to one of my teachers because I had missed the last day to head home before the holidays. I remember standing, with a desk directly in front of me, looking out towards a window, onto some sad excuse for a courtyard in another standard issue motel. The only thing I remember after that is waking up in my parent's house, setting up my computer on the living room table, and laying down in PJs to watch Aria the Natural. Anime had really become my only standby. While there was a ton of stuff to do(it's New York), it wasn't always anything I wanted to do, could afford to do, or was old enough to do. This has been a problem for a very long time as people always take me for older than I am. Now that I am not limited by my years there really isn't anything I'd like to do, even though there is ton to do. My focus becomes very broad without limitations, and therefore I get nothing done.
Back to the couch, sitting there watching anime... at some point I heard from two important characters, my old boss at the South Loop cheese counter, and an old family friend at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
I must've thought to myself, "Well, it'd be good to have some money" and then... "why not go back to school here?"
Those decisions were quick and soon I was wrapped up in the whirlwind that was the last three years of my life, most of which I can't remember. From the late nights to the never-ending constant freak-out fear of the fashion department, I very quickly lost track of what exactly I was doing there in the first place. My artwork and fashion work just focused on brief instances, what I was interested in for short periods of time, not necessarily with any outcome. I'm going to try my hardest to go back through this work and reexamine it. In the flurry of school, I threw my artwork on the ground, in boxes, in the garbage, hidden in chains of file folders... I honestly don't know where most of it even is anymore.
Here I am. Last semester of college. This week is my Senior thesis set up, which once again, is another brief moment of fleeting interest. I'm going to do my best to document the process, but also another very important process that is much more directly related to my mental health.
Last year I decided to go back to work at Whole Foods. The decision came naturally, I was on seasonal at the Cheese counter. And I was extremely low on funds after the expensive fabrics I was supposed to be purchasing. I started back up again and very quickly found myself with a position within the administration. I thought this was grand for the first couple weeks. It was rough, hard labor, constant lifting and a never ending stream of condescending commentary.
"How are you going to lift those wheels?"
"Where's a man to help you do your job?"
"You mean, you are the only person to grab this order?"
Yes, Yes. Yes, Yes Yes Yes Yes.
I didn't think I'd be affected by it, I thought I would be stronger. That's always how I've thought of myself, but my return to Chicago had really changed many of my self-impressions.
I got sick, from weird things that grown-up people don't get sick from. The doctor kept telling me, your immune system must be really weak. I couldn't understand why at all...
Until I started getting these heart palpitations, which I'd never gotten before. I'd be sitting on the couch, watching TV, and all of a sudden, it was like I was running. My boyfriend, worried about me, sent me straight to the doctor as soon as we could. All the test results showed that nothing was actually physically wrong with me. It was the weirdest thing, for me, because as I soon began to talk to people, I was getting panic attacks.
Panic Attacks happen to people all the time. All people, all the time, apparently. There's no one I've talked to who hasn't had a story related to one of these things, but for me, for all I'd been through with getting beaten down by teachers, friends, whatever you could think of, never ever ever had I had something like this happen to me. So if this is really what's happening, why is this happening?
Three really obvious reasons:
1. I'm graduating... and then what?
2. I had five bosses at whole foods. Each of them can fire me, and they all contradict each other.
3. I hated absolutely everything about what I was doing with my life, and I could see no reason to continue doing it that could benefit me

Benefit me. I'm 21, I'm not 45. I'm not having a mid-life crisis at 21, right? But in a way, I was, and still am.
I had to reconsider what makes me really really happy, what I was doing then that I actually enjoyed. I'm still working on what precisely all that is, without dismissing it. Part of my training over these years was in cynical behavior, I am trained to deny certain things as legitimately making me happy. What I figured out is that (as silly as this sounds (see there I go dismissing it again!)) anime, sewing, and this silly 'living as a person from another time' type situation (ie. star wars costuming, world war II reenacting, 'lolita lifestyle'/victoriana/rococo) make me very very happy. Within each of these situations, in the present and the past, I have had some of the happiest times of my life, even when things were otherwise miserable.
There are particular situations I keep returning to as points of intense personal happiness.
1. Sewing lolita on commission for egl-people in my parents studio, listening to loud music, sometimes with Tori, sometimes late nights.
2. Running the anime club, or really just being there, running panels, being at Acen(oh yes, it's silly, but I really enjoyed myself)
3. Sewing all night for the Rockford reenactment when I finally realized that I was madly in love with my now boyfriend. the whole time there was fantastic... even now it makes me smile.
Of course the reasons for each of theses things are clear, each time, I made something or did something I was proud of. That pride was something I could carry with me and take personal happiness from. Sure the fashion shows at SAIC were great, but the constant fear that something was going to happen to my clothing or to me, or to my friends, made it all really miserable. And talking about everyone, judging yourself against them, really made me unhappy. I maybe made one real friend that whole time, everyone else... I'm not sure. Even still that one person I have a very hard time trusting.

Why waste my time on something I don't care about? Why waste my life away on something that will never find me actually important? I need to build my own self-worth and self-confidence again for myself, not for someone else, not to make my school look good, and definitely not for a gigantic corporation.

I decided to start sewing lolita again. I had entered SAIC with the intentions of starting a lolita brand. I had hired a Japanese tutor to teach me Japanese so I could go work in Japan, for a lolita brand. Each step of the process, I made something that basically had a lolita silhouette with some art-school crap on top of it. Those of you within the happier part of the lolita community may think that this final realization of my personal dream is great, while the trained cynics like myself start to mock. Why should I do this? Why me? Why now? I don't have answers to these questions yet, but I'm working on them, because I want to make sure that this is the right thing to do. I'm not making any money, and I probably won't for awhile, but as my mom so wisely said yesterday "You aren't making money, you are instead paying for your education." In having to buy business licenses, making mistakes, talking to people about this, etc etc etc I'm getting a very different kind of self-driven education. One that I'm really beginning to appreciate, even though I've only just started a couple days ago.

There you have it. I'm going to use this journal as a photo-journal/base for myself and this 'brand.' Be prepared for tons of photos with this awesome new camera I've purchased, and lots of complaining. I'm going to try my hardest to begin to write about how I am attempting to reinvent myself, within my personal style, and my mindset. And that's that!