you are the big rocket launcher

So we have come to the end of the great blogging experiment. I am a terrible blogger. Of course, this month has hit me with the worst news ever: that I will not have a job at the end of the year. So I've been very maudlin. I still have no idea where my life will be heading or what I'll be doing this time next year. I have some options, but nothing really concrete.

I shall see. We shall see. Thanks for your visits, for those of you who visited. I would love to do this again, actually. It really helped me focus.

What is xenophobia, really
but an irrational desire
to claim the only true life
is your own?

What is it, really, but
never leaving your house
never leaving your land
and insisting that the way
you see life is the way it is?

And when 'they' finally come
your vision is destroyed
but not before you destroy them
first.

If I could sum up my life so far in one word, it would be: disappointing. Disappointment? Disillusionment? I have not had a single good thing happen in my life ever. There have been happy 'moments' in my life, but in general the overall trajectory of my life has been a series of stupid mistakes, bad decisions, and failure. I guess I was never meant to amount to anything, anyway.

I've been travelling my entire life. I've visited every continent except Antarctica. I would love to visit one day but I'm also aware of the ecological impact of too many tourists to fragile ecosystems like Antarctica.

My favourite places to live/travel are definitely all in Europe. I love France and I LOVE London, but I also love The Netherlands. I'm learning Swedish because I would love to go and just be able to chat in Swedish with people.

I think my love of travel and my love of language is intertwined. I see much more of a country when I've learned the language. It's one of the reasons I've learned so many and want to learn more.

I think I'm a reasonable person, for all meanings of the word 'reasonable'. The only thing I'm pretty unreasonable about is my very, very liberal/progressive political stance. I'm unreasonable about things like universal health-care and pro-choice rights and LGBT equality. If that makes me an awful person, then I am an awful person.

I am so very tired of living in the South, in America. It's...pretty wearing everyday to hear about the evil liberals who want to...I don't know...give people rights? I'm a little in the dark on how we're bad people for wanting more rights for people.

If I sound a little...pedantic about this, it's because most of the things I want are pretty standard issue in most 'developed' countries. Perhaps it's because the USA doesn't like to take advice. We are an 'exceptional' nation...

(And no, I don't like Hilary Clinton, but I suppose I don't have any choice. I don't think any of the ten Republican possible candidates are pro universal healthcare.)

I don't make new years' resolutions, and I tried to do the 101 in 1001, but I already know that I won't make any of that. I'm so terrible at sticking to goals. I'm just as fat as I've ever been, I oscillate between biting/not-biting nails, and I'm just...a lazy, stupid, fat, awful person. Sorry. I know you're supposed to be all positive about your life, no matter what, but I can't do that and be honest about it.

I hate listening to music out of its place. I can only listen to certain bands in certain countries or I get terrible depressed and fall into a terrible state. Some music can only be listened to whilst walking along streets in a thousand year old city and some can only be listened to on planes or trains. I only listen to NPR in the car in the USA; in England it's Radio 4 in the car (although I've gotten used to listening to Radio 4 at home, but only through podcasts, sometimes live).

Every song puts me straight back to where I heard it last, and sometimes that can cause me to burst into tears. I haven't done that in a while, but you know, things change.

I listen to all sorts of music. If I do have music on, it's usually thematic. I love the Songza playlists for certain times of the day, but I don't listen to it very often. During dinner or in the mornings getting ready at the weekends (if I don't have a podcast to listen to).

I realise I am a strange, strange soul.

I think I am a kind person. I help when I am able to, and I give things from my own possessions if I can. Little acts of kindness go a long way. Last year I paid for someone's Girl Scout cookies. The only reason I remember this is because she started crying. Which kind of freaked me out.

Today at the post office I gave the person in front of me two stamps. I don't use a lot of stamps in my daily life, but I always carry around a book of stamps just in case! Today was a perfect time to use them, I suppose.

Do you do any random acts of kindness? How do you feel after?

I am not the only person going through the things I am going through right now. I am not the only person having to make the decisions I have to make right now. But I am making them. And I am terrified.

Also, I definitely forgot yesterday so I will go back and put an entry there which will make me feel better. Completion and all that.

I could probably write this in German, but it would be filled with embarrassing grammatical errors because I am a lazy, lazy sod.

My mother is German, and I have dual citizenship. I am so, so proud of being German, but mostly, I am proud of being European. I feel European (and German) much more than being American. I was born in Texas, but I feel no connexion with it. If I had to choose to live anywhere in the world, I'd live in Europe: Either in England or Scotland, France or Germany, with the Netherlands and Sweden very close behind.

Weirdly, I can't articulate what it means to be German, other than the language and the common history. I know what the stereotypes are: ruthless efficiency, lack of a sense of humour, and pessimism, but none of those apply to me (though they sort of apply to my mother).

What does it mean to be anything, really? What does it mean to be American, or French or German? I'm sure this has been the question of the ages, really, and caused a lot more grief than necessary.