Flibbldy Floo

Right now, it is not quite midpoint in the semester. It is just a little bit left-of-center - as it may always be in my life - and I am left in a complete state of panic.

This is not a new feeling for me.

I live my life in a perpetual state of anxiety, or misanthropy. or anger. You could lob a small water balloon at my emotions and it would not burst and splash too far from any one of the three mentioned above. Some say it's a defense mechanism, that I wrap myself up in the most unsavory of feelings and stay there for the sake of my own pessimism. And most people do perceive me as a hopeless pessimist, the opposite of that most telltale euphimism, and you know which one it is.

Did I also mention that I am a masochist?

I get a charge, not necessarily a positive one, from putting myself in difficult positions and seeing if I can get out unscathed. For example, this semester - my last, in fact - I am in the process of taking six classes. In the semester system, that amounts to eighteen college credit hours. Every single class is an English class as well. I don't think that I've met one person who has said this was necessarily a sane or smart thing to do, but that I would be happy once it was over. I still don't know if that's true, because I have not quite reached the symmetrical center of the semester yet and my nerves are nearly to the breaking point.

Kurt Vonnegut once said in a collection of his speeches and thoughts, called Palm Sunday, something derogatory - though true - about English students. I can't particularly recall what it was at present moment, but let that be the end to this little diatribe.