#37 at Allstate

Spending 24 hours with someone is not an easy task. In equal parts, I can only tolerate people for so long and people can only tolerate me for so long. Allstate was this past weekend and props to these 12 people for how closely and quickly we've bonded over these past 72+ hours.

This was a crazy cool year, with all of the orchestra kids making it into honors orchestra. Which meant that we were all together and walking into this huge ballroom with mirrors instead of windows and fancy chandeliers with 100 other strangers did not feel scary.

I'd have to say that the culminating moment was Friday night, where we crashed someone's room and played Super Smash Bros. It was my first time ever playing this game and I was pretty bad, but it was still fun and even if it was limited to only SSB talent, we all became very familiar with each other's personalities. Sure, we broke curfew, staying in that room until 12:30am, but hey, we were with our choral director, who was playing alongside us, so it's all cool. Earlier on in the evening, Sundell and Heath (band and orchestra directors respectively) came and played too, and these two guys are undoubtedly awful at SSB, but infinitely patient and relaxed at heart and such great people/conductors/chaperones.

But I did not spend 24 hours consecutively with any of these people. Or rather, the only one who I did spend more than 24 consecutive hours with is Seri (from 11am on Thursday to 5pm on Saturday). The only reason why we didn't spend 72+ hours together is because we had auditions in separate buildings, which was 2 hours that broke the 21 hour streak that started from when everyone boarded the schoolbus that took us down to Peoria.

We've been friends for a long time but spending this great length of time together was very friendship-solidifying. Of course we knew each other's quirks and talents and pressure points, but we managed to see each other's failings and move right on past them so quickly. Maybe it was the 54 consecutive hours we spent together or maybe it was just the fact that we were rooming together, but we learned a lot of give and take. Not just in the literal sense, but also how to trade off the roles of conceding and deciding.

So thank you Seri for being the person who after 54 consecutive hours together, I can say with confidence that we are both just as good friends as we were before this harrowing experience, if not even better friends. Thanks for the late night talks we've had and the moments where we find ourselves on the floor laughing at the silliest things, and even for the moments when I drag you out to visit the outskirts of Peoria and you decide that I am an absolutely nutcase for all the random things I say/suggest. Thanks for the (unhealthy) ramen breakfasts and even for the way that you set up 20 alarms in the morning, each one minute after the other, and don't wake up after any of them whereas I'm up the moment the first one goes off. Allstate was incredible with you by my side for almost every minute.

My one regret is that I didn't try last year to get into Allstate. The bonding that happens when you spend such a condensed but concentrated amount of time with all these people in an environment away from the normal, comfortable school environment is really quite something. It's silly to say but just as Cantus, an acappella group who performed on Wednesday night, explored the different types of love in their hour-long performance, I am beginning to experience the different types of missing that exist. We all go to the same school, but as we step foot back into our high school, we'll resume the lives we've led prior to Allstate. But something has changed, Allstate did happen, and I do know that I can forever smile and laugh with them and make new memories to accompany the ones we've already made this weekend.

72 hours of music, junk food, video games, and TV really does miracles.

#9 on a lake

I heard from a friend that several lakes were completely frozen over last night. Today was warmer than last night, but I still decided to try my luck. I ran to Lake Charles and lightly stepped onto the lake surface. There was no one around so if the ice happened to break and I went under, I would probably have died (okay maybe that's an exaggeration because I can swim, but I would have gotten sick at a time when I can't afford to get sick). I tried to take a panorama shot but the sky was really dark by then, so all the pictures came out as all black. I did take some non-panoramic pictures while standing in the middle of the lake before then, so here's a picture of the peacefulness.

The surface of the lake was covered in a layer of powdery snow, so I cleared a small area and began to slip around. Even though this was done without skates, I still call this ice skating since I skated (slid) across the ice. 

It felt a little empowering to stand in the middle of a lake. Sure, it's maybe a little terrifying with the knowledge that the ice might give way at any point, but it also felt peaceful, surrounded by this wide expanse of untouched snow, smooth and rippled by the wind. It probably wasn't the safest situation with no one around, but in the evening when it's quiet like this and the skies are heavy with thick clouds, it's nice to twirl in the middle of the lake and pretend that nothing else matters in that moment.

#30 in Consumer Management

In Consumer Management today, for our cooking unit, we made french bread pizza. My bucket list, my rules, this still counts. I also didn't get a picture (I know, shame on me) but it is basically french bred sliced horizontally, covered in tomato sauce, cheese, and other pizza toppings. The hardest part was cramming four people into a too-small kitchen workspace and our individual issues with trust. Oh, and that knives were involved for paring the vegetables and cutting the bread. Our first Friday in Consumer (just about every Friday will be a cooking day) went smoothly; no fingers were sliced off, no blood dripped into the tomato sauce, and no burns despite the fact that all of us were crammed in this tight space right near the oven.

On a sidenote, on my walk from the bus stop to my house, a stretch of the sidewalk contained a layer of particularly slippery ice underneath a layer of freshly-fallen snow. Naturally, I fell. And then I sat there for some moments on the snow laughing because it was a Friday that felt like a Thursday (that's a good thing) and there is everything to do but nothing due.

#2 at a birthday party

Friend's birthday party involved many things that almost would have helped me check things off this bucket list, but alas, I didn't actually participate in them (yeah, the party did start before I walked in).

We didn't quite watch Star Wars or really clear up my nonexistent knowledge on Star Trek and Star Wars (#21), but since one gift was a pack of Star War's themed masks while another was a selfie stick, we made good use of both.

Not knowing how to play poker, I watched a few rounds of poker. Ignore all the phantom hands and Ally's hot pink/salmon jacket.

However, one thing I certainly did do was blow bubbles. Another gift was a bubble wand in the shape of a lightsaber (noticing a theme here?). Apparently there is such a thing as frozen bubbles and a few of us wanted to try it. It was cold (14 degrees) but not cold enough for frozen bubbles. It was not the most elegant activity and the select few of us who did go outside to blow bubbles very quickly went back inside, but I was able to catch picture, although it hardly does justice to how pretty the bubbles are. 

            

Of course, I know that bubble blowing will happen again soon, so maybe then I'll be able to capture better pictures...it'll be easier when it's not dark outside!

on learning to fly

Finals are over, and with that, first semester of senior year has come to an end. College apps are over and everything that these past 12 years of school have led up to is now left to the Fates. This bucket list is one way to fill up the waiting time between now and when college decisions slowly trickle in, as well as a way to maximize the time I have between now and graduation, when I part ways with many people who I have known since elementary school.

Some of these bucket list items are individual while others require people. Some are relatively commonplace while others are a little outside of what I normally would do. Regardless, all of them will lead to incredible memories.

Here's to my last semester of high school!