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May. 5th, 2012 09:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stormdogI had the most horrible nightmare I can ever remember having yesterday morning. I woke up around 7:30, gasping for breath through sobs. ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lisagems was next to me and must have been awoken by the noises I was making. She helped me get my brain back to reality over the course of five minutes or so, and I'm very grateful she was there.
Details are a bit fuzzy at this point, but somehow both of my brothers had been killed in an accident, or accidents, of some nature. I distinctly remember going over the prospect of never seeing them again in my head, thinking about how empty my house would be without Tim, how viscerally distraught I felt. But something happened in this dream that I've never had happen in a dream before. I woke up, and I was next to Lisa, and I told her what had happened, and she confirmed that, yes, in fact my brothers had been killed and was trying to be comforting.
But then I woke up. Yes, again, and this time for real. It took me I don't know how long to manage to put words together, and five or ten minutes for the terror and despair to full go away. I've never had an experience like that before. I'd be just fine with not doing it again, please.
Lisa suggested it might be some anxiety that's been lurking in my brain since my friend Devin was killed on his bicycle, and I think that's probably a big part of it. I've been riding my bicycle a lot lately and thinking about him from time to time. Plus, one of my brothers commutes around town by bike, and I worry that he's not riding as safely as he might be able to, despite me talking to him about it a few times.
I think part of the problem is that, unless you have a lot of experience driving a car, it's difficult to deeply understand how drivers perceive, or fail to perceive, cyclists. I know what it's like behind the windshield. That's why I ride predictably, use hand signals, and steer right down the middle of the lane. Hugging the curb means I could hit debris or encourage people to pass me without enough space. When I act like a car would, I'm much more likely to get the respect that a car does. But it's a point of view informed by my experience that my brother, who has never held a driver's license, does not have. I think I'm going to talk to him about it a bit more in depth the next time I see him; try to explain where I'm coming from a bit better.
---
Well, to go on to less anxiety producing subjects, I had my Spanish oral exam on Friday and did decently well. I feel like I could have done a bit better. Last semester, my partner for the exam and I were told that we were the best students in the class, which made me feel really good! This semester, though, was a lot harder for me than last one. Most of it was preterite verb forms, which have a lot of weirdnesses and irregularities. I was expecting the class to be as easy as the last one, and when it wasn't, I didn't quite compensate for that enough. I'm expecting probably a B in this class, as opposed to all the other ones that I'm expecting As in. I'd be a little sad to not have a second 4.0 semester, but you know, 4 As and a B is still pretty good.
I am still pretty neurotic about school. I feel like I have to be if I really want to transfer to UW Madison after next year, and then go on to grad school. My original record from 10 years ago is poor enough that I have to really excel. Not to mention that grad school, I gather, is pretty competitive to begin with.
---
So on Friday, after the exam, I drove down to Chicago to visit Lisa. We set up her new airbed, went grocery shopping, and were otherwise boring and tranquil. It was nice. Today we were going to meet up withdanaeris for lunch after I spent the morning looking at condos with Danae, but she got a migraine and went back to the hotel she'll be staying in with her mother tonight and tomorrow. (Her mother is down from Canada to assist with the real-estate purchasing process from her perspective as a former real estate agent.) So met up with Lisa for lunch (and ice-cream at Baskin Robbins! *wags*) and drove her to Navy Pier where she was working at the green festival before joining up with Danae at the hotel, where I am now comfortably ensconced next to her in bed as she pores over her real estate spreadsheets.
I think tonight I'm going to stay until her mother arrives so I can see her again. I haven't since visiting her family over Christmas, and I like her a lot so it'll be nice to see her again. I had had it in my head that I might stay at the hotel and go out with them to look at places tomorrow but we hadn't all sat down and talked about it beforehand, so instead I think I'm just going to go back up to Kenosha tonight and use tomorrow to study for finals. I could see about staying with Lisa again and meeting up with Danae and her mother in the morning, but I think I'd rather go home and study before all the exams on Monday and Tuesday.
It's so weird to be ending my first year back at school! I'm a little sad, and a lot excited. My anthro professor told me that I did so well that I may not have to take her final. She also told me that the paper I wrote for her was excellently written and very nuanced, and that she liked it so much that she exclaimed on Facebook about how good the paper she'd just read was. I think I actually blushed. She keeps saying really good things about my performance. In fact, all my professors do. I might just be doing this school thing the right way this time.
lisagems was next to me and must have been awoken by the noises I was making. She helped me get my brain back to reality over the course of five minutes or so, and I'm very grateful she was there.Details are a bit fuzzy at this point, but somehow both of my brothers had been killed in an accident, or accidents, of some nature. I distinctly remember going over the prospect of never seeing them again in my head, thinking about how empty my house would be without Tim, how viscerally distraught I felt. But something happened in this dream that I've never had happen in a dream before. I woke up, and I was next to Lisa, and I told her what had happened, and she confirmed that, yes, in fact my brothers had been killed and was trying to be comforting.
But then I woke up. Yes, again, and this time for real. It took me I don't know how long to manage to put words together, and five or ten minutes for the terror and despair to full go away. I've never had an experience like that before. I'd be just fine with not doing it again, please.
Lisa suggested it might be some anxiety that's been lurking in my brain since my friend Devin was killed on his bicycle, and I think that's probably a big part of it. I've been riding my bicycle a lot lately and thinking about him from time to time. Plus, one of my brothers commutes around town by bike, and I worry that he's not riding as safely as he might be able to, despite me talking to him about it a few times.
I think part of the problem is that, unless you have a lot of experience driving a car, it's difficult to deeply understand how drivers perceive, or fail to perceive, cyclists. I know what it's like behind the windshield. That's why I ride predictably, use hand signals, and steer right down the middle of the lane. Hugging the curb means I could hit debris or encourage people to pass me without enough space. When I act like a car would, I'm much more likely to get the respect that a car does. But it's a point of view informed by my experience that my brother, who has never held a driver's license, does not have. I think I'm going to talk to him about it a bit more in depth the next time I see him; try to explain where I'm coming from a bit better.
---
Well, to go on to less anxiety producing subjects, I had my Spanish oral exam on Friday and did decently well. I feel like I could have done a bit better. Last semester, my partner for the exam and I were told that we were the best students in the class, which made me feel really good! This semester, though, was a lot harder for me than last one. Most of it was preterite verb forms, which have a lot of weirdnesses and irregularities. I was expecting the class to be as easy as the last one, and when it wasn't, I didn't quite compensate for that enough. I'm expecting probably a B in this class, as opposed to all the other ones that I'm expecting As in. I'd be a little sad to not have a second 4.0 semester, but you know, 4 As and a B is still pretty good.
I am still pretty neurotic about school. I feel like I have to be if I really want to transfer to UW Madison after next year, and then go on to grad school. My original record from 10 years ago is poor enough that I have to really excel. Not to mention that grad school, I gather, is pretty competitive to begin with.
---
So on Friday, after the exam, I drove down to Chicago to visit Lisa. We set up her new airbed, went grocery shopping, and were otherwise boring and tranquil. It was nice. Today we were going to meet up with
danaeris for lunch after I spent the morning looking at condos with Danae, but she got a migraine and went back to the hotel she'll be staying in with her mother tonight and tomorrow. (Her mother is down from Canada to assist with the real-estate purchasing process from her perspective as a former real estate agent.) So met up with Lisa for lunch (and ice-cream at Baskin Robbins! *wags*) and drove her to Navy Pier where she was working at the green festival before joining up with Danae at the hotel, where I am now comfortably ensconced next to her in bed as she pores over her real estate spreadsheets. I think tonight I'm going to stay until her mother arrives so I can see her again. I haven't since visiting her family over Christmas, and I like her a lot so it'll be nice to see her again. I had had it in my head that I might stay at the hotel and go out with them to look at places tomorrow but we hadn't all sat down and talked about it beforehand, so instead I think I'm just going to go back up to Kenosha tonight and use tomorrow to study for finals. I could see about staying with Lisa again and meeting up with Danae and her mother in the morning, but I think I'd rather go home and study before all the exams on Monday and Tuesday.
It's so weird to be ending my first year back at school! I'm a little sad, and a lot excited. My anthro professor told me that I did so well that I may not have to take her final. She also told me that the paper I wrote for her was excellently written and very nuanced, and that she liked it so much that she exclaimed on Facebook about how good the paper she'd just read was. I think I actually blushed. She keeps saying really good things about my performance. In fact, all my professors do. I might just be doing this school thing the right way this time.
