Artistry

Friday I was carrying a croissant in a clear plastic bag as I walked from school to my mom's office. I was thinking about eating it when I passed by a homeless person sitting in our school field, and thought instead, wouldn't a good person give their croissant to a homeless person? I kept walking.

Later I had a story concept about a little girl who has a cookie and when a homeless person asks her for it, she gives it up willingly. The next day on the news, a homeless man is found dead near the school with a plastic bag on his head and a cookie crushed into crumbs in his stiff, clenched fist.

Imagination replaces guilt. An artist, all right.

From a Promise to a Threat

The future is scary. Oh yes I'm only fifteen and I have a whole lot of it before me, and it is damn scary. Looking at schools is scary. Thinking about trying to find a real job is scary.

It's scary because I'm a hedonist and the idea of a life that I have chosen but that don't like is the worst thing I can imagine. I want my life to be good enough for me, whatever 'good' means. (Starving artist/full-time waitress? Works for me.) I only know what 'good' doesn't mean: having a job I despise, and being tied down with bad commitments. I don't want to screw myself over by getting myself into something I hate. I think it might just be a run-from-responsibility thing.

Anyways, I'm looking at applications for a Master of Arts in Journalism at Columbia University and all this reality just came crashing down on me. It also looks like my French isn't good enough to land me a page position in the House of Commons in Ottawa so I can get a BA at Carleton, either.


Why is real life so expensive?