Revitalized

Life inside the olive jar has been revived.. :)
It has been awhile since I last left off with you all.. A few pages have turned, a new chapter has begun. I just want you all to know how sorry I feel for neglecting this for so long, it was never bcause I wanted to.. I have had the worst time management ever since senioritis kicked in during highschool.. :P. I just get too caught up in living in the moment to take a step back and reflect. For awhile that's a good way to live, but to me, self reflection is very important, and when you don't allow yourself the time to do that, you don't really learn or grow. At least not as much as you could. Life has just been moving so fast. It's insane, it really is. Just one month remains until I leave for college.. Where did the time go? I'm realizing that I haven't been taking much time for myself lately.. I just run from one fun thing to another, down for anything ;). It's a fun way to live, but again, I'm the kind of person who likes to live a life with balance.. When your friends are your life, and socializing is your fuel, you know something is off-kilter in your balance. I love being around people, it's just the way I am, I'm not about to try to change that. But I do need to take the time to relax and take care of myself, and most of all, think and reflect.

I can't believe I graduated. I GRADUATED guys, I'll never take a class in highschool again. I think that's an enormous part of why I've been so social lately.. I'm afraid of what the next year to come will bring. Many of the people I'm close with are staying back at the community college for a year or two. On the other hand, I'm going away. Distance is inevitibly going to grow between some of us.. Ever since I realized that, I've been trying to soak it all up while I still can, make those bonds, have those memories to look back on. I want people to really get to know me before I leave.
What I really want to do is to get to know myself on a deeper level than I already do. Up until recently I haven't even been writing for myself.. I used to keep up with a journal, I used to blog regularly, but then it all slipped from me. I'm supposedly a writer, how does a "writer" quit writing? An unexpected someone inspired me to get back into writing in a notebook, I'm really thankful for that.. Another reason I feel like I've taken so long is the pile-up of events.. I'm the kind of person who likes to get most every detail, and after all of the writing opportunities I've missed, I know I'll have to skimp on detail, which it very hard for me. I'm pissed at myself for neglecting to write so much, and I'm doubly pissed at all of the posts I have missed from you guys.. That's what really gets me, I find it difficult to just read the latest post without going through and reading what I missed up until then.. but at this point, reading and commenting on everyone's life
moments that I have missed out on would be a little insane. So I suppose I'm going to start from scratch, sort of. I definitely understand if I have lost some readers, if not all of you :P.. But I really appreciate everyone who reads this or has read my ramblings in the past, I love getting your feedback and support.. And I miss you all, I really do.
A very much condensed re-cap.

I turned eighteen. I have legally crossed into the "adult world". I have yet to really use my new age for anything cool.. But point is that I am ;D. My wonderful friends yet again made sure I had an amazing, memorable birthday..:) I love them all so much. They gave me a picnic with PANERAS(and chocolate covered strawberries) in the park, we walked around this artsy festival, followed by a delicious dinner back at Tom and Julie's. Above are two of the greatest presents I've ever received :). Shayla ordered me my own personal JONES SODA, of my favorite flavor, green apple :D. It was such a thoughtful, cool idea. I think I'll keep the bottles forever. Then over on the right is a really awesome painting Amanda did of me in Disney :)!! She's such an amazing artist.. I can't wait to hang it up in my dorm :D. Seeing it makes me really wish we were all back in Disneyworld.

Das German ;)
This summer has been slightly different, a new member was added to our group :). Amanda's cousin Helene came over from Germany for 3 months. It has definitely had an effect on our summer, in a good way. We all want to show her a good time, so there's rarely a night where we sit around and do nothing. We try to find something, at least, to do every day. Of course we knew how to have fun before Helene came, but I feel like now we have more fun, more often, and I will really miss her when she departs back for Germany in two weeks.. :'(. She's become a really good friend to me, and I hope we all can go to Berlin to get a taste of Germany with her next summer.



I feel like I've kind of been forced to grow up lately. Not only with age or graduating, but I've gone through some shit that I won't go into detail with on here.. But I'll just say it wasn't anything I was wanting or expecting to happen. When you don't keep watch of the fire, sometimes you get burned.. And it doesn't always happen the way you expect. People are human. Humans make mistakes. I don't know, it all really hurt me, but I made myself take a step back and think about how I wanted to react before I did.. thought about the value of the relationships before I severed them by overreacting, or saying things I might regret later, doing things I might regret later. It's all been hard, but I think I handled it well.. and hopefully it will make me a stronger, less naive person in the future.



As I said before, I've been pretty focused on having fun this summer. Pool parties, boat rides, drive ins, a roller derby, and trips to the cupcakery cafe are only a few of our memories.. :)

Sometimes you have to just let go.

Of all inhibitions. All uncertainty and fear.
Sometimes you have to say that thought lingering in the back of your mind. Sometimes you have to listen to that impulse. Sometimes you have to reach your hand out a little further, and sometimes, you have to pull it away when you realize it's not wanted. Sometimes you have to let your mind go blank so you can jump off of a 30ft high cliff without a second, or fourth thought. Sometimes you have to take off without asking when you want to see the ocean. Sometimes you have to just live.



I don't belong here, I've got to move on here, escape from this afterlife
Cause this time I'm right to move on and on, far away from here
Got nothing against you, and surely I'll miss you..
This place full of peace and light, and I'd hope you might
Take me back inside, when the time is right.
[Avenged Sevenfold - Afterlife]


A couple of weeks ago I got to go to my college for Orientation :). That was pretty interesting.. I met some nice people, so I'll know some faces around campus, although there will be many of them.. It's so weird to think I'll be going to such a huge school. Everyone I talked to found it so hard to believe that I graduated with a class of 35. It'll be a change.. I'm ready for it though. I need it. The lectures got boring pretty fast, meeting people was fun, the games were okay. The food sucked one day but was good the next? Dorm rooms are shitty, but that's to be expected. I'll like it better with my stuff in it :). I hate the idea of sharing a bathroom with a hall of other girls. I really liked the fountain, and how you can play in it. I'm excited to be on my own. I'm sad about leaving my friends. I'm nervous about my future. Oh man, this is growing up.

Thanks again for keeping up with me, I appreciate it so much.. I hope you're all doing well. If there's anything I missed that you want to catch me up with, feel free to tell me! I'd love to hear from you all :).
Yours truly, ♥
Olive

The Unimaginable.

You never consider the thought, it just seems so alien. You don't picture something like this happening here, to the people you know =/.

Monday morning tradgedy struck in my hometown. It was a weird morning from the start, I was running late(as usual), making the mad dash from the parking lot to the school, trying to get to homeroom in time to make it on our field trip. Since Amanda and I always sit together on the bus, talking amongst ourselves, we kind of missed out on the surrounding conversations, especially since we sat in the very front. Once we reached the college we were doing our business day at, we caught up with another classmate telling us how she "couldn't believe what happened", and of course we were clueless.. "You didn't know, Ben was found dead this morning.., he killed himself.." It hit me like a ton of bricks.

Always a grade below me, I never had much interaction with him, but we knew eachother, and I have a few fond memories of him that I'll always hold close. He was a polite, respectable boy, who always seemed to be smiling. I would have never expected this to happen to him. He must have held a lot inside :/. He gave so much to the community, more than I ever knew of after hearing the memorial service this evening, that really opened my eyes to who he was. He was a funny kid, anyone who talked to him could vouch for that. Big plans too.. he was determined to go into the army, a very patriotic boy.. Recently he was even accepted into a highly selective citizenship program. The more I think of him, the more I wish I had gotten the time, the chance to talk with him more. Our paths just did not cross at the right moments.
This has had such an impact on us, our school. Everyone is upset even if we're all showing it in different ways. Mostly everyone went down to the conference room at some point to sign the cards, sit with other students to talk, to cry, to find comfort. Many of us wrote letters to him. We all wonder the same question.. why?, but we'll never get an answer. I think there is a lot to his story that we don't know, and never will.
I think it's causing us to reflect, to realize that we're fragile and we cannot take anything forgranted. People are telling eachother that they love them, people are putting themselves out there. We know now that we aren't invincible and neither are the ones we care about. It's just so unbelievable.. we'll never see him in the hallways again, he'll never tell another joke, he'll never reach his dream of being in the army. And it's the saddest thing I've known in a long time.
You'll be in our hearts and minds forever. You will be greatly missed.. :(

Rest In Peace Benjamin ♥

I'm back :)

A lazy day was just what I needed :).

I honestly can't believe how long it's been since I've blogged :(, it's so sad. A note for anyone younger than me; Senior Year FLIES like you would not believe.. I graduate in a little over a month. Where did the time go?! School has been a major comsumer of my time and energy, but then what time I do have for myself, I use it to go, go, go, trying to squeeze in all of the moments I can with the people here, who I'm going to be missing next year. That added with the fact that I have poor time management skills = terrible blogging :/. But I am trying to make a turn around, so let's see where that takes us. Thank you to everyone who reads this, I reallyreally appreciate it, and I'm sorry it's been so inconsistent.

My Life in a Nutshell;

1. Senior Trip to Disney

2. Final Decision on College

3. Working/School

4. Quality Time with Friends :)

Ahh, the senior trip.. I miss Florida so much. It was absolutely gorgeous while we were down there. Warm, but not scorching. I believe it only rained once, and it was brief. I really like the whole airport/airplane scene. I bet I could be a decent flight attendent ;), maaybe. It probably wouldn't be as great as I'm imagining, but it's something I'd consider giving a try, just to do it. Once we arrived in Orlando all of the girls went into the restroom and switched into their shorts--- it was so WARM, a huge temperature difference from upstate NY. Our hotel was one of those 'All Star Resorts", with our theme being music. Our hotels were like, jukebox themed and the pool was shaped like a guitar. Our artroom group, which I'm sure I've mentioned before(Amanda; pictured above with me, Derek, Zack, and myself), stayed together for the majority of the trip. We were probably the most productive group I'd have to say.. While everyone else laid out by the pool we put all of our stuff away and headed out for our first park, Animal Kingdom. It was really cool there, I liked the jungle atmosphere and the animals seemed to be taken good care of. The Yeti was friggen awesome too :)! Fun ride to keep in mind for those of you who haven't been and are planning to one day. I won't go though a daily play-by-play, but we did hit up every park while we were there, and although you can't see everything Disney has to offer within less than like---two weeks probably :P, I still felt as if we saw alot, and not much of our time was wasted. I loved Epcot with all of their countries and futuristic feel. MGM was pretty awesome, we saw quite a few shows there and went on interesting rides. The Fantasmic show and dinner was spectacular. Oh, funny thing happened there-- this little boy got sick in the middle of the 'road', we were on a platform above, and we watched people continuously walking RIGHT through it, then watched their disgusted reaction a few feet later when they realized what just happened! Oh my god, it was gross but I couldn't help but laugh at the poor souls :P. It really brought our class together too, we'd watch someone approach it "Oh,oh,oh,OOHHHHHH" ;P. We were too far to really warn anyone, so we just took the opportunity to find some cheap, uncivil humor hahah. The trip was definitely a success. No real drama, atleast none that I knew much about. I did get to spend time with mostly everyone that went, but I remained with our little quadrant for most of the time ;). There's much more to it than I'm going to ramble about, but it was a great time, and I'd love to go back. I highly reccomend going on your senior trip if you're able to/don't have alternative plans that are really worth it.

UAlbany, it is :).

I finally received my acceptance letters, although Purchase sent theirs only a few days prior to the deposit deadline.. and I decided on going to Albany. It's closer to home, I know a couple of students that go there, it's a little bit cheaper. I think it will be a nice place for me to start off and get used to the college experience. It's HUGE too.. I'm used to a school with 600 kids, kindergarten-12th grade.. It's going to be a drastic change, also being in a "city" setting. I'm excited to embrace the change though :). I'm hoping to be blogging all about the college life next year ;D. It's really happening--I've applied for my housing, got my financial aid information back(although I'm going to try to cut it down a bit more..) and I am ready to go.

Work and school, there's probably no need for me to elaborate much on those. I'm realizing that I've come quite a ways from when I first started working at Polo. I kind of noticed this as I was helping a few of the newbies ;P. I still wouldn't say I'm a retail expert by any means, but it's kind of neat to think that I've learned so much. It has transformed my style a bit too, I can't lie. One of the reasons I wanted to work at Polo was because I never shopped there, hahaha. I didn't want to go spending my paycheck right back into my company. I still don't buy from there alot, but I think it's made me take into consideration what I want to be wearing like, in my twenties. The oxfords I've gotten from Ralph Lauren--I'm sure I'll be wearing them in adulthood. They have the quality to hold up over time as well as being classics. Don't get me wrong, I still like dressing a little crazy:), but it's nice to know I have some pieces that'll last me.

Then there's quality time with friends :).

This would probably be my favorite.

We have been keeping ourselves pretty busy what with birthday celebrations, icecream trips, beginning a new movie, going to the drive ins, ectect.

Also, today was Mother's Day. Well I actually began this blog entry yesterday, so it might show up as yesterday's date-- but nevertheness. I waited for my mom to finally go to bed, which was midnight, hahaha, and I then started to clean the house. It was quite a daunting task. I also bought a few things for the kitchen/bathroom and set those up for her to find in the morning. This all kept me up past 4am, but I feel it was worth it :), she was happily surprised.

It's getting late now, it's approaching midnight and I should probably allow myself some sleep. I spent most of tonight doing some online shopping-- Zumiez is having a sale on their boards, and I kind of want to jump on that before I miss the boat and have to spend a fortune come winter. I think I'll get some advice from Tom before I buy though-- snow stuff is a big investment. Also... thinking towards graduation gifts, what have you guys heard about the Kindle or the Nook? Any thoughts on those? I was thinking an e-reader would be nice in college, especially having my textbooks on there. I love physically owning books, I wouldn't quit buying the real deal-- but having one of these could be useful.

Again, I've missed you all so much! Please tell me how youall have been :).Sorry if this isn't a great post, I'm a little rusty ;P.

PS. My best friend Shayla blogs :D, I highly reccomend you check her outtt.

I'll be catching myself up on everyone's blogs this week, so expect some comments ;D!

♥ Olive