where i have been

{a little post to let you know where the h*** i have been }

i've been watching the ice melt under my feet. 

(literally.)

i've been eating cookies

(and cupcakes)

i've been enjoying the little eccentricities of the city

i've been happy that spring has arrived

i've been indulging my shopping urges

check out those glasses!

most of all though, i've been working. a lot.

i've almost gotten so bogged down in the hum-drum no-stop pace of it all that i've forgotten where i've been, why i'm here, where i came from.

sometimes i find myself getting so wrapped up in all of this stuff.

Top 10 Colleges and SAT scores and History papers and test dates, 

and all of a sudden it becomes

really easy to just forget who that girl is who is sitting and

 holding the pencil (with her left hand, by the way-  but more on that later) because i become

so focused on the outcome or the product or the grade.

sometimes its good to get a reminder of who i am. why i'm doing all of this, rather than just going on autopilot with the hope that i can get it all done (w/ flying colors) 

and hope that the rest of my life will wait.

well, it wont.

i need to be a person. not just pieces of a person. 

not just a test grade, or a vocabulary word.

a person. a whole being. me.

this blog is part of that.

i'm back. 

sorry for the absence. i promise i'm here to stay. 

it's easy to lose yourself if you don't remind yourself who you are, why you're here.

i've learned that at least.

as for all that SAT junk...now that's a different story.

xo, Rose

have you ever gotten so caught up in something that you've lost yourself?

 how did you get 'you' back?

scones and snow

yesterday, i had to go out in this weather

and take a walking tour of manhattan.
oh the things that i have to do for my school.
naturally, though, i did what any secretly resentful dumb teenager would do:
I wore sneakers with no socks. Just to....ya know....prove a point?
maybe?
i dont know.
it was dumb.
i thought i was going to get hypothermia.
luckily, (very luckily), i didn't.
when i got home i made scones.
Joy the Baker's Orange&Dark Chocolate Buttermilk Scones
(i made mine whole wheat). yum.
i'd like to call them WWBOZCC scones. go figure.

 zesting was hard. i think i hurt my finger.
is zesting a word?
no. i don't think so.

 of course i'd love baking.
it allows me to make a mess in the kitchen and my mom can't say a thing about it. 

 for at least an hour, anyway.

 aren't these just sick?
I mean, c'mon guys, they have zest.

 yeah they were really good.
especially straight out of the oven.
Can i make a confession?

i made them 24 hours ago and they're already all gone. except for one.

My parents have barely touched them.

 And Willy hasn't gotten to them either.
Yeah. 
I ate them all. (Well, almost.)
yummmmmmmmmmm.

 I wanted to show you something.
I think it'll make you laugh.

Did you laugh?
Yeah, probably not. But you at least smiled, right?
Or cringed?
Either way, i hope you enjoyed my 90's Gap Hat modeling and my raving about orange zest buttermilk whole wheat blahblahblah scones. ;)
here's the recipe.
basically filched straight from joy's site.
i have no mercy.
xo

Whole Wheat Buttermilk Orange zest Chocolate Chip Scones.
or just WWBOZCC Scones. oh yeah.

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 teaspoons orange zest
2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons cold unsalted butter
1 large egg yolk
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons cold buttermilk (i made my own!)
1/3 cup dark chocolate chips
Place rack in the upper third of the oven and preheat to 425 degrees F.  Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.In a mixing bowl, sift together flour, sugar, orange zest, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  Cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse meal.  I use my fingers to rub the butter and dry ingredients together.    In another bowl, combine egg yolk and buttermilk and beat lightly with a fork.  Add to flour mixture all at once, stirring enough to make a soft dough.  Fold in the chocolate chips.Turn out onto a floured board and knead about 15 times.  Roll or pat out into a 1-inch thickness.  Cut into 4 large or 6 small  squares.     Place on prepared baking sheet and bake at 425 degrees F for 12-15 minutes.  These are best when serve immediately with butter and jam. (or clotted cream! ahhhhh)

2 truths and a lie.

remember that game, two truths and a lie?

I think it's one of those "let's get to know each other" things that camp counselors or trip leaders or michael scott would try to do to get a group of people to "break the ice" or get to know each other.

i decided that i want to play that with you guys today.

except, usually, in "TTAAL", you have to think of three stories (two which are true, one which is a lie) and tell them to the group, and then the group has to try to guess which one is a lie.

I'm not gonna make you guys guess.

1. Truth: I used to have friends

I used to consider myself a fairly "outgoing", extroverted person. I used to (by the time i was in 6th grade or so) have a fairly stable group of friends. I would walk into school every day with the basic knowledge of where I belonged, and the reassurance that there would, indeed, be people there who were at least slightly happy to see me on any given day.

this guy's always happy to see me. i'm his best ball-thrower.

This year has been a roller coaster, to say the least. Last week was my one-year 'anniversary' of going into treatment (for the last time), and kind of a big milestone.

I used to consider my social skills to be one of my biggest strengths. In essays that I might have to write about myself for various applications, etc, I would always write that i could be happy anywhere, as long as I had friends, and that I always had a way of finding friends.

I was never, per se, in the popular group at my school, but by the time i was in high school i never really minded. A lot of my self-confidence came from my ability to rely on  the fact that i was generally well-liked and sociable, and I usually thought of myself as, among other things, a good friend.

2. Truth: None of the above is true, not anymore. 

(it's okay i didn't break the game- that's why i wrote in the past tense!)

In the past year i: went into treatment, began my recovery, learned a heck of a lot about myself, ate, left treatment, started this blog, had a summer internship, started with a therapist (for REAL this time), learned to bake, started my 2nd shot at Junior year, and then subsequently had a total meltdown while seemingly floating above water (or snow) for what seems like a very long time (i'm pretty sure i'm still just floating).

That's a lot of stuff.

Here's a picture to give your mind a break

i forgot to mention that i've also begun a slight love affair with online shopping,
particularly Gilt Groupe. I bought myself this bracelet last week. mmmm. 

 Okay, back to me.

One particularly profound thing that has happened to me this year is that my whole outlook, being has seemed to change in terms of my friends, etc. I used to have friends. I told you that.

When i returned to school this year, it was made pretty clear fairly quickly that those friends were no longer going to be a big part of my life, for whatever reasons. I set out to find new friends.

That has proved to be really, really hard. So hard in fact, that i was about to give up, until I met C.

C is pretty cool. She's new this year too, but also slightly different from the other nyc prep-school (not to be confused with THIS awful television show, although i do[unfortunately] know some of the cast)kids in my class. See, C just got back from spending two years in a boarding-house in Holland. I kind of was drawn to her cause she seemed more worldly & less-dumbly-teenagerish than the other kids. We became friends.

one of my infamous B&N stacks lately. I bought a few, and will certainly share the deets once i 'dig in' :)

Recently, C became friends with a few other girls in our class, let's call them A and G. A and G and super cool. I've always kind of admired G. She's a little intimidating but pretty nice, and totally the prettiest girl in our school (imho)

I got a little nervous. C is my friend. And my only (real, female) friend (at school), if we're being honest here. What if she ditched me? Would i really have to resign myself to spending the next two years being that weird girl who walks around with her earphones in all the time? *shudders*

Then today, something happened, and i'm going to share it with you.

I'm pretty sure that i got royally ditched.

Yup, that's right. 

Gossip girl/skins/whatever teenage-high -school- drama -series -you- want -to- insert-in- here- style.

ouch, right?

Here, i'll tell you the story. Today after school, i went to find C to see if she was ready to leave. We always walk to the subway together and catch up on our days. She was sitting with A. They were planning to go hang out for a bit and then go over to a museum or something. I joined in the conversation and pretty soon it seemed like it would be alright, that i could go too (everything is unspoken, obviously. Aint you ever been in high school?)

 G comes over. She joins in. The four of us are making plans and everything seems okay until all of a sudden they decide they each want to split and go home and do work. On a friday afternoon. okay...

it's decided that we'll do that and then meet up tonight and go out for a little bit and then tomorrow and then go to the museum tomorrow, instead. Good game plan. We all walk out of school and part ways.

mug of tea, Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Larabar & the sunrise.

then, a few hours ago, C texts me and says she didn't realize but she can't do tonight because her parents had tickets to a show that she forgot about. Fair.

Then i texted her to say i didnt want to feel like i was inviting myself to their 'date' or whatever tomorrow, is she sure it's alright with A & G ? She texts me back saying that's not happening anymore either, she needs to be with her grandma tomorrow.

oh.

C never stays home all weekend. I know this about her. I definitely was unwanted.

I got ditched. Royally.

phew. that was a long saga, no? i feel like i'm back in high school again...  

3. Lie: I'm okay.

I'm really sick of pretending to me, to C, to everyone that i'm fucking okay all the time. I'm not fucking okay. I'm not. All of this sucks. so much. I used to be happy and have friends and be comfortable.

My biggest worry when i went to school in the mornings used to be whether or not i should have studied for that physics final (as it should be), not whether or not i'll have someone to sit with at lunch.

And drama like today, well, i'm fucking sick of it. I wish (i think) that people would just reject me to my face, instead of going about it in a roundabout way.

Maybe, you say, i've interpreted this whole instance wrong, maybe C really does have to watch the game with her grandma tomorrow, maybe i'm being overly sensitive.

Maybe. Maybe i am.

I hope i am.

But that's not the point.

The point is that i'm no longer myself. I don't feel like myself.

I'm anxious all the time and nervous constantly. My social skills have totally regressed to back when I was in 5th grade and thought that having the highest pony-tail is what made someone cool.

I recently looked up the symptoms of Social Anxiety Disorder, with the fear that i might have developed it. I never used to be anxious about anything.

 Notice that the only "tag" about moods on over there on the right ------------------------------------------->

is "depression", i used to be the opposite of anxious.

i'm sick. stayed home yesterday. made myself pancakes & tea for breakfast. YUM.

EDIT.

while i was in the middle of writing this saga of a post, my friend B called me. 

we just talked for an hour , 15 minutes and 43 seconds. 

i just told her everything. and feel so much better. and like at least i have a friend.

i'm going to post this anyway though, because i feel like this blog could use a kick of reality and real emotion on it. so here goes.

i'm hoping tomorrow will be a better day.

i'll buy you a cupcake if you made it all the way through this post. seriously.

<3

rose

my reader is at 354 unread posts
i haven't flossed, gone to the gym, or talked to my best friend (hi, Lauren- i miss you!)in almost a week.
i really want to write a post, no, scratch that- a thousand posts for you guys, but i'm exhausted and this weekend was crazybusy and i've had a lot going on school- wise (and a LOTALOT going on in my head- note the title of this here blog)


so i basically feel that if i were to offer you guys anything right now it would look a little like this:

source: Mary V Robinson
here, won't you take some itchy, dried out grassy, dirt stuff?

but i'm gonna go ahead and take a wild guess that you don't want that.


i have mucho going on but wanted to pop in and say hi anyway. 
I know, i know, the unwritten rule of blogger-dom is "if you don't have anything interesting to post, don't post anything at all", but this is my blog and i can post/cry if i want to, and since when am I one for obeying the social structure, right?


hope you all have a wonderful start to your week, and i hope to see you soon!
xo
rose
tell me how you're doing in the comments, if you so please :)

A Much Needed Break

I havent' posted in a week because my life has been crazy lately! Next week is the last week before winter break and i think everyone is just about to burst at this point. I've haven't even opened my computer once in the past four days because i've been so busy with school-work and everything that i've barely had time to sleep or breathe, let alone write a blog post!

Tonight though, i decided that i really need a mental break and so (sorry, Mr. P!) i'm putting off studying for my latin test for a half-hour to pop in and say hi.
P.S. It's the last night of Hannukah!
In honor of which, i thought i'd share some festivity-related photos

What's a girl to do in order to celebrate the holiday season?
Bake a Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie, of course!
(recipe courtesy of How Sweet It Is)

my cookie dough and i wanted tosay hi...

don't you just wanna eat it raw? i know---me too.

Who the hell came up with Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Pie?
If anyone knows this individual, would you let them know that i'm single and definitely up for marriage?

the final remnants (blueberry pie was necessary, too, obviously)

 now that i've  probably just lost all my readers by sending them off to the kitchen in search of some chocolate, wanna know what the other best part of hannukah is, aside from baking?


Huh?


Any guesses?

Yes, you're right Noah, presents! (Although i'll pass on the buzz lightyear gun, but thanks for the offer!)

mmm. jewelry AND love? What else could a girl want?

A picture i fell in love with from Charmaine Olivia

                                                       
Alright guys, it's late and i'm tired and have Cicero (quite rudely) calling my name, so i unfortunately don't have the time to prove (via meaningful ramblings) to you that I, am not, in fact, a highly superficial person just because i said that the best part about Hannukah is the presents. :) In any case, its not about the presents, however pretty they may be,  yadda yadda yadda *insert sentimental story about the importance of family here*
I hope you all had a lovely week and I can't wait until this week is over so i can go back to breathing and sleeping and blogging properly like a normal human-being!

In the meantime, for all you nerds out there, i saw this video and thought it was awesome so if you have a few minutes to spare or are at all interested in little known, possibly useless but cool facts about math (and other things) watch away, if not, good night!
xo
Rose

dearest blog,

i have not forgotten about you.
i am so sorry that i have been neglectful as of late.
i have a few good excuses though and many stories that are piling up that want to be told.
i will first say, however, that I will save the majority of these tales for a later date (more specifically, after this friday, when the first quarter ends (!!!CLAPS*), and i can freely return to a less haggard, rushed, stressed state of living & eating & blogging.
For now i will just let you know that I had a wonderful eighteenth birthday.
This year couldn't have started off with more lovely day. (details to follow once i return to the land of the living - as opposed to the land of the working & sleeping & applying lots of under-eye concealer because my american history paper is keeping me up nights)
Other than that, I have been slightly addicted to tumblr, and have found many a study-break/procrastination hour can be easily filled by the pages of beautiful photos. I have updated it quite a lot, so if you want a glimpse into my crazy brain/life- here it is.
Just wanted to say hi because guilt has been pounding on me for not posting here i miss it!
anyway, ta-ta for now, i cannot wait for this week to come to an end so i can finally get back to my usual life.
xo
rose

this might be brief

^^^is that a semi-famous line from something? 
i don't make this shit up ;)
today has been a long day.
in rose language that means...
i haven't done any work and its already 10:30. 
i'm temped to say AH, so is life. so are thursdays.
But i think my procrastination is becoming a little bit of an issue.
i have a lot of pics that i want to show y'all ( i LOVE saying y'all. one of my past bffs was from Alabama and i thought it was adorable when she said it so i tried to be like her and now it just comes out naturally)
but my comp is being stupid and taking forever to load all of them and i'm just exhausted in general and already bored of myself. 
so happy it's almost friday.

this was when my five year old niece owned me at tic-tac-toe at the dinner table

this weekend should be good, maybe.

I have a halloween party on saturday. Thinking of being a greek goddess just so that I don't have to buy anything (bed-sheet toga tips, anyone?)

see that on the left? that gorgeous turquoise stone?!
That, my friends is a BIRTHDAY PREZ. :) Yep. Thanks, dear sis-in-law

Next week should be better than this week. Less painfully slow, at least.

Its my birthday on Tuesday and i'm going out to dinner on monday night (more on how that came about later) and out to tea on tuesday! (can i  hear a cheer for election day on my birthday/aka no school?!)

so yes. it shall be the big one-eight. 

apparently now i can rent my own port-o-potty if the desire strikes me.

i can also refuse to tell my mother whether or not I received my flu shot.

Heck yeah, adulthood!

um yeah no explanation 'cept boredom and i'm exhausted. the view
from my window is (usually) kinda cool, though

food was kind of iffy today. i ate A. LOT. OF. CARBS.

I guess thats what I get for being a bitchnizzle-idiot-pooper-scooper and restricting these past few days.

I feel like shit now. And so many thoughts are spinning in my head about getting weighed tomorrow and how i want to lose and the carbs and blahblahblah. but honestly, i'm tired now, and am not gonna think about it any more tonight

my mom and i made pizza bagels tonight...

Eat cheese. As much as you want. Mostly Mozzarella.

omnomnom  drool-ege right?

alright. time to go walk the dog. Then maybe i'll finally do some work and get some shut-eye.

doesn't this just look delicious?
(not my photo...i'll cite it later)

love you all. 

P.S. Are you doing anything fun for Halloween? Or just this weekend in general?

Also, tips for procrastination issues? Slash somebody just slap me? (jk...)

xo

rose

On Honesty

i wrote in my journal tonight for the first time in a few weeks.
it's something that i used to do all. the. time.
i keep my journal in a protected word document on my computer. its kinda cool to have it all right there in front of me, in digital form. I think my hands would get too tired and i would be discouraged from writing if i had it in a notebook. 
Right now my journal is at something like 86 pages. (single spaced). That's a whole lot of journaling.
Its interesting sometimes to look back at the old entries. Sometimes i even look to see if I wrote something exactly a year or two before on the same date. Most of my journal entries are (sadly) a blabbering on of all the thoughts in my head. Most of the thoughts in my head for the past four years had to do with food and weight. But the thing that was always nice about my journal was that it was the one place that i could lay everything out on the table. Every last thought could be purged (unintentional but appropriate word choice) from my head and I could finally feel at least a little bit clearer, my head a little less "spinny". (title of my blog...) . Journaling tonight was really helpful. I had to kind of pry the honesty out of myself though, because I realized that as I was writing, I was lying to myself. It's only when I'm really honest with myself that I feel that "purged" sense of relief, that maybe things will be okay.
There's so much to be said for the value of honesty. It allows me (when i practice it) to live a more fulfilling life, one that is freer of stress& worry and one where I feel authentic. 
I also just love to write, and for that release I couldn't be more grateful.
What helps you "purge"? Are you honest with yourself? What does dishonesty do for you?


xo
Rose

friday could have come sooner

today was the friday from hell.
i overslept after a weird insomnia-ish night and had to choose between eating breakfast & getting detention or skipping and just being late for class, rather than missing it entirely.
I chose the former.
Reasons for this?
I know how bad it is for me to not eat breakfast. I can't go down that road. Maybe for some other teenagers it's okay (though not ideal) to skip "the- most -important- meal -of -the- day", but for me, I know it's not.
I have to eat breakfast. I have to eat regularly. It's not okay for me to skip  it one day because then it could become the next day, and the next day, and the next. And soon enough, if breakfast isn't "necessary", then why the hell should I eat snacks, or lunch for that matter...
Of course, you knew where I was going with this.
So, I ate breakfast. After jumping out of bed, flustered and late at eight am, I calmed myself down and went to the kitchen and poured myself a big-ass bowl of cereal and just resigned myself to missing first period.
It sucked. The easier thing to do would have been to just go to school and not risk getting in trouble and even maybe feel "accomplished" or something dumb like that for not eating breakfast. The even easier thing to do would have been to say "f*** it" and ask my mom to call me in sick and to just not go to school at all. But I didn't do this. And i'm glad. Today was rough and I was exhausted and running around school working really hard all day, but at least I can lie in bed tonight knowing that I accomplished something. Even though my brain feels like a ball of mush and I'm pretty much convinced that my limbs are going to fall off just because my body is aching with exhaustion, there is something to be said for knowing that I toughed it out today, and ate my food and kept it too. 
Well, I guess  this is all just a long-winded way of saying TGIF, and let's just take a minute to be grateful for the fact that it's the weekend, and for everything, really.
On that note, I'm going to take my ball-of-mush self and go to bed, and maybe i'll sleep a little easier tonight knowing that even though today was a struggle, I've proved that I can field any curveball thrown my way.
xo
Rose


p.s.
I got a Top Anorexia Blog blogger award! (It's in the sidebar) Woohoo!
love you all.