testing testing 1 2 3

MARIONETTE

something about the bugs made it the worst idea

I've been watching "Six Feet Under" recently, and the mom, "Ruth Connor," is a really interesting character, but one of the things that makes her the most interesting is her sense of style.  While at the beginning I thought of her style as outdated and frumpy, as the season continued I came to realize I had a sort of fascination with her high waisted washed-denim and her collared shirts.  It reminds me of a 1970's version of "Little House of the Prairie."  The last few days, I've become more and more obsessed with the way she dresses and today at AvaNava's house, I convinced Ava to put on her mom's dress from the 1980's and prance around the garden for me.  Except, I didn't take into account the 100 degree weather or the relentless mosquitoes.  I got in a few shots, but I think that about 5 minutes after we were outside both of us were sweaty and COVERED in bites.  Even now, typing this, I feel the itching on my legs.  I'm afraid to check to see how many I actually got.  I want to continue playing this "Little House of the Prairie" meets Sonny and Cher look again and in a more extensive form.  Until then, enjoy these: 

funny messages

"Just because it's Tuesday.  Love you.  Mr. Good"

Same guy, two separate orders.  Cards reading, "I just felt like it."

"I wish you a great new age.  I wish that we stay together for forever!! I LOVE YOU!!!  I wanna be loved by you and I love you until we die.  Love, D."   (this guy ordered the arrangement from Turkey)

the most beautiful children on the face of this planet

water for chocolate

A majority of my time spent thinking revolves around this wild fascination I have with retracing the memories I have anywhere from yesterday to five years ago, and I think about what I would do if I consciously could go back in time into "past ranna" but with the knowledge that I had already lived these events and with the knowledge I have today about what occurred during the events.  I think about ways in which I could...I don't want to use the word manipulate because I feel like it has a negative connotation, but it's the most fitting...let me think of a better word...hold on...maneuver?  The way in which I could maneuver the situation to work out more preferably, perhaps, or just differently than it originally had the first time.  Why?  Well, I've come to think that I really have a big problem with this abyss we call "the future."  I don't like the uneasiness I feel about my future right now: what's to become?  I don't like living without a sense of purpose, and recently I have felt as though I'm being tossed into this black hole.

I know that all you Eckhart Tolle fans are reading this and shaking your heads in stark disappointment.  I've let you down with this confession.  I understand this.  But I really have tried!  I promise!  But sometimes I just think that maybe I don't have enough self control to remain completely in the present.  It's very difficult for me to think about each breath that take.  It's very difficult for me to do something without thinking about why I'm doing it, and what the end result will be.  I have spent time trying to remain conscious of every move that I make: when extending your arm to reach for something, think of your extended arm moving in the air as it reaches for the object, do not think about taking the object, do not think about what you will do with the object upon capturing it in your hand, feel the heaviness of each movement, like your arm is moving through water, pushing through the current.  

But it's very difficult for me to continue thinking like this over a long period of time.  So, I end up thinking about what I'm doing in my life, what I'm doing in the next three months, why I have to do something now in order to achieve something in six months.  Each time these thoughts occur, I break a sweat, my chest starts to tighten and I like to occupy myself by doing something that requires no thinking.  For example, watching, "Law and Order: Special Victims Unit," or putting my headphones on and dancing crazily in my room.  It's the only way I can get my mind off of these thoughts that have really taken over and are sweeping the energy out from my body.  

Thinking about the past in the way I described to you makes me feel almost as if I would be doing something devilish.  I would know people before they knew me.  I would know details about them before they had the chance to tell me.  I would be able to live events over knowing how they turned out the first time, and changing them to see how they would be able to change.  It could be like those mystery novels we read as children: "if Bob travels into the jungle to slay the lion turn to page 46.  If Bob goes home to his family for dinner turn to page 49."

But, I'm sure I've mentioned to you more than once that the Economist magazine once wrote an editorial about a book that said that clairvoyance was actually the only impossible thing in life.  They said that time travel would be possible one day, which makes me really happy.  But clairvoyance?  Sorry charlie.  Not going to happen.  Until then I have my imagination, I suppose.  And I'm so sorry to all my Tolle fans that I find thinking about tampering with the past so much fun.  I'll try not to....starting tomorrow.  

Exploration # 52

I took a water sample from the fountain in the flower shop, a water sample from one of the vases with flowers, and mixed them with these gelatin like ball things that we use to decorate flower arrangements that had been hanging out in water in the heat all weekend.  I put all of the samples into a clear glass container and I covered it and placed it by a window.  Just to see if anything is going to grow.  I'm sort of hoping to see a parasite or something by the end of the summer.  Or mayyybbeee the microbes are slowly going to mutate into humans!!! Then it's bye bye God, hello Darwin.  Can't wait. 

that was SO hetero normative

Danica Radoshevich has been a friend of ours (Salma, Ranna, Neela, Bardia, Rene, Genevieve, Nazy, Sanjar, Parsa, Aria, and others) since Salma was 7, and I was 9.  The first memory I have of Dani is one day when she came over for a playdate with Salma, and I was OBSESSED with cutting out pictures of models from magazines and using them as faux paperdolls, because randomly paperdolls were super expensive, and my mom would only buy the books for me sometimes, because after I [carefully] cut out all of the paper doll outfits, I would play with them for a little bit before I would get a little bit bored and slowly the pieces of the outfits would get lost.  Now that I think about it, I had this amazing "Gone With the Wind" collection and it took me like a week to get all of those giant Scarlett O'Hara dresses cut out.  That paperdoll set lasted a while actually.  So did the Christian Dior paperdoll book that Genevieve gave me.  Mostly because my mom didn't let me cut out the dolls for a really long time.  Because just like she knew what would happen with our Barbies* she knew what happened to my paperdolls.

Wow.  I just totally segued into another story completely.  Back to Dani.  So anyway, I was cutting out the models from the magazines and just doing my own thing.  I thought I was so cool as the older sister, playing with my paper people, having a good time.  And Dani's like, "oh hey, can I join you?"  And I like grudgingly gave her one of the uglier models, one of the ones who was standing really strangely.  Like, in the picture, she was probably standing normally, but the cutout was just proportionally wrong to all the other paper people, and she was just the outcast cutoff.  So I gave her that one, and she started to play with me, and the next thing I know, she's like looking into the doorknob screaming, "ICEBERG AHEAD! ICEBERG AHEAD!" And i'm like, "Woah woah woah, WHEN DID THIS BECOME THE TITANIC??!"  But then...somehow, from there, I decided Dani was going to be my best friend.

And best friend she remained.  We lived really close by while we were growing up.  We'd always hang out at each others houses.  Summers were spent together, going to the YMCA pool, bothering our babysitter Evie, playing cops and robbers at night.  Our parents were friends too.  Our dads randomly loved each other, and our mothers would spend time complaining about the eccentricities of our fathers.  Salma spent more time with Dani, of course, because they were classmates, the same age, the same height.  Randomly they were "shoe sisters" because one time they bought matching shoes at Target.  Also, they had this Mario and Luigi sketch they would do because Dani had this ancient game for Nintendo 64, and her and Salma would always play it.  Anyway, Salma would be Mario, and Dani would be Luigi, and they would go around doing this really funny run, and I ALWAYS wanted to join, but Salma was all, "No, it's just for two people."  And I was like, "But I can be Princess Peach."  And Salma would be all, "No, thats not how the game works."  And they would keep doing their thing.

Dani knew everything about us and understood us completely and perfectly.  Even this weekend while she was here, she still after not living near each other for the last six years, she totally just got us.  We laugh at the same things, we get annoyed at the same things.  It just complete honesty and comfort.  It's awesome is what it is.

She came from New York, where she's doing an internship in Brooklyn, to visit for the weekend.  We took her to Eastern Market and she bought a bag.  We went to this Cajun restaurant around there and watched the "Ghana-US" game.  Everyone in there hated us because Salma was loud and obnoxious and every time Ghana would do something good, and everyone would yell, "No!  No!  No!" Salma would yell, "YEAHHH GHANNNAA!!!"  She said she had to make up for the lack of support Ghana was getting.  So Dani and I sat there, watching the game, but getting more entertained by Salma's enthusiasm over her team.  We were scared to see what would have happened had Ghana lost.  So good thing we saw a victory there.  Otherwise we would have seen a very scary Salma.

Dani's super cool these days because she goes to Grinnell which is in Iowa, and she studies studio art.  She's working at a print shop this summer and she throws around words and phrases like, "ableist," and "hetero normative."  I love it.  She's so articulate and manages to get her points across so well using the most brilliant vocabulary ever.  But then, in the midst of discussing something with my mother (who thinks of Dani as her third daughter), she'll be like, "do you guys remember that time we all goozed (cus DUH she knows that word)?"  and then we'll all go and replay that story over and over again.  No.  Not by goozing.  Jeez.  We just do the sound effects.  Haha, that makes it so much better, right?  Right.

It was so completely normal to have her here with us this weekend.  All these years Sal and I have lived in Virginia, we always bring Dani up.  We always say, "if Dani was here, she would do this," or "If Dani was here, we could go here..." But alas, we only get to see Dandan like once a year.  It's ok though, because we decided that one day we're all going to live near each other again.

Right, guys?  When we start our "SaDaRa" band and sing "O-Town" songs.  And Michael Kramer (whose name is actually Michael Fraiser) can be our manager and hire us a choreographer because we really don't know how to dance.  And then Dani can pretend the soccer ball is actually Kevin from the Backstreet Boys head, and Ruth can make moussaka, while Zhivoin complains about Bill Clinton and jokes around with Bardia.  :)

Found Words

I read in the paper the other day that scientists have discovered the meaning of life.*

What was it? 

I forget. 



* Conversation borrowed from Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle

Flower talk

As many of you know, I work at a flower shop these days.  My aunt, Maryam's, shop.  I do a little bit of this and that, but part of my job requires that I address the cards that are sent with the arrangements.  Whenever I take an order, I have to ask if they would like a message on a card, if they do, then I listen to them tell me what they want written.  Most of the time, they are simple, "I love you's" or, "Our thoughts are with you..."  But sometimes the messages people send are really funny.  Here is a collection of some of those messages.  I thought I would share.

" Thank you              Your Baby's Daddy

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.......       Vincenzo

From an admirer       --Admirer

Happy Birthday dad!      Your favorite daughter

When I see the sunlight in the morning, taste the breeze in the afternoon, watch the stars dance across the sky every night, I thank them all.  My heart beats for thee, Jessie Leigh!       Zozo

Good luck and good health, if you're not, its your own damn fault

Colleen, here is to DANCING IN THE RAIN!!!  Love, Your Bear

You know, the Communists just used women as a substitute proletariat where necessary so they could equate support for women's liberation with fidelity to the regime.  "



It's funny and slightly awkward at the same time because I feel like some of the messages are meant to be so intimate, but as the middleman between the sender and the reciever, it's our job to read them and document them onto the cards, without us, the messages would only remain verbal.  Is it bad that I'm posting this as a blog entry?  Am I totally taking away from their privacy?  I mean, they're funny!!!

I've decided on the no shame approach to this.  I'll keep posting these as the months progress.  Hopefully you're just as entertained as I am. 

Love, Ranna

you cant disapparate on hogwarts grounds (story of my life)

It's not fair.  I'm supposed to be sleeping.  I'm sooooo tired.  I was supposed to close my eyes and fall asleep.  Instead, thoughts are taking over my body.  They're creeping over me and making me have restless leg and arm syndrome.  I can feel them infesting me at full force.  I just want to sleep.  Instead.  Instead, I'm looking up ticket prices.  It's what I do when I don't have anything else to do.  I look up ticket prices.  I try to find the best deals, and I try to rationalize purchasing tickets to far off exotic locations.  Yesterday it was Spain.  Just now, I checked ticket prices to Copenhagen, hoping they would be cheap enough for next week so that Salma and I could go to Roskilde again.....yeah right.  It's depressing to see the thousand dollars pop out on the page and know that no matter how badly I want to go, its a little impossible right now.  Plus, I have to keep telling myself: Short term satisfactions?  Or long term ones?  I prefer the long term ones.  That's why I'm working like this.  That's why I'm saving all of my money.
Still, its doesn't mean its not depressing to see ticket prices that are so unbelievably expensive.
And then, to make matters worse (...maybe I'm a masochist that I keep doing this) I checked ticket prices from inside EU.  So I looked up prices from Paris to Barcelona, Barcelona to Copenhagen.  It's ridiculous how cheap they are.  It makes me wish I could just disapparate to Europe and take advantage of their ticket prices.  Then again, if I could disapparate then I wouldnt have to worry about ticket prices.
And I sure as hell wouldnt be here tonight....

Ring Around the Nosey

You know how certain smells can evoke strong emotional reactions?  This is because the human body houses these things called olfactory receptors.  These receptors are directly connected to the limbic system, which controls our emotions.  So, lets say you walk outside in the morning after it's rained and you breath in and get a whiff of the wet grass.  By the time you correctly name the smell, as in, "wet grass," the scent has already been activated in the limbic system and this triggers a stronger emotional response.

In my time alone sometimes I think about the five senses we have as human beings and I try to rate them.  Which one is the most important to me?  Which one can't I live without?  I've ended this self-discussion by coming to the conclusion that sight and hearing are the two most important senses for me.  In their own rights, I cannot distinguish which is more important than the other.  From there, I think I rank smell as third, touch as fourth, and taste as fifth.  I think.  Although, I still argue with myself because taste may be just as important as smell.  Also, I think without touch I would go crazy.  Then again, maybe ranking the senses shouldn't be brought to discussion.  Maybe we take them and understand that each one is as important and valuable as the next.

But anyway, back to olfactory receptors.  Mine must be strong because I associate some smells so strongly with certain sentiments and scenarios (alliteration much?).  For instance, where I work now, with my Ameh Maryam at her flower shop, I work with this woman named Britta.  Britta wears a perfume that caught my attention from the very first day I began to work at the shop.  For the life of me, I couldn't remember how I knew this perfume, but whenever she walked past me I was reminded of Colorado and that feeling I felt when Shannon Saufley came to my house to say goodbye and whispered into my ear, "I'm going to miss you so much," kept flashing through my head.  And then, *BAM* today Britta walked past me and all of a sudden I knew where I knew that perfume.  It was Abercrombie and Fitch's "8" and Katie Rodman began to wear it in the 9th grade.  I used to love how it smelled.  But more than that, it began to remind me of 9th and 10th grade when I used to go over to Sarah Hayes-Davis' house to watch the OC and Katie Rodman would come over looking like she had just walked out of an Abercrombie advertisement, fall down onto the couch next to me, and we would watch Ryan and Marissa's saga and eat sour candy, the smell of her perfume slowly washing over me.

And then there are smells that come and go and I'm left wishing they had lasted longer.  For instance, sometimes, in certain buildings, I'm reminded of the smell of Ramin and Rassah's house.  I don't know how many of you are familiar with that smell, but it's very distinct.  I can't describe it for you either, it is what it is.  And it's another comforting smell for me because a couple years ago I used to love going over to their house, and I always felt very at home there.  I get reminded of going into Rassah's room and each time thinking, "holy crap, and I thought I had a lot of clothes."  Sitting on her bed and sifting through her art.  Or going down to the basement to see a half-naked Ramin dancing in front of his mirror, making that typical, "ints, ints, ints, ints, ints," sound (please tell me you know what I'm talking about).

Scents make me feel nostalgic more than anything else.  Most of the time they are a reminder of what was, and perhaps no longer is.  However, the ones I love the most are those that give me comfort.  The comfort of knowing what they represent and that something beautiful once existed that contained the scent.
Freesia.  Genevieve's old apartment with the awesome basement.  The one she invited all my friends to come and have a sleepover in after the 5th grade Shakespeare play.
Nivea hand cream.  My grandmother.
Zlatan.  Paris.
Nap Champa Incenses.  Camping at Laama Foundation in the summertime with my dad, sister and Genevieve.  Baba and Genevieve would go off and have silent meditation retreats, or go to the sweat lodges, and Salma and I would have to keep ourselves entertained for long periods of time.  Sometimes we would swing on the wooden swing we were always scared was going to break.  Sometimes, we would play four square (we made so many friends that year.  Remember, Sal?).  Other times, we would play 20 Questions for hours on end.  Only, we had an unlimited amount of questions.  And each time it started:
Player 1: Is it a boy?
Player 2: Yes.
Player 1: Is it a girl?
Player 2: No.
Player 1: Is he pushy?
Player 2: Yes.
We never knew where "Is he/she pushy?" came from, but we continue to ask it till this day.  And Sal and I know that there are certain people we have to choose at least one time during the games: Rosie O'Donnell, Celine Dion, and Kate Winslet.  Why?  That's just what we came up with.  My, how we could keep ourselves occupied...


So you see, I'm glad I have a nose to smell with.  I'm glad I can identify smells with these memories, or the feelings with which I associate the memories.  I'm glad that even though there is a deep longing for some of them to return to me, I know I will always have my good ole' olfactory receptors to make sure I never forget them.

Remember, Remember the 3rd of June

I came home from Paris to a sick mother.  A mother who, usually, takes care of most things around the house, but for the time being, is not able to.  These past couple days at home, we've all been working together to take care of her and keep the house running.  Yesterday we had guests.  Mom asked me to go the grocery store, buy some stuff, and make dinner.  And make dinner, I did.  I made a spaghetti that beat all other spaghettis.  I mean, it was so delicious, I cried.  You cried?
The first time we made love, I cried?
YOU CRIED?

Sorry.  I got sidetracked.  So yeah.  Best spaghetti which totally boosted my confidence about cooking because everyone was like, oh ranna, all hail ranna, ranna's cooking is so good, you cry.

Then today, we were having guests again, and I decided to make salad olivieh.  I don't know why this food in particular.  For the past couple of days I've really been craving it and since no one else was going to make it, the only way I was going to get some was if I made it myself.
So.  I needed to get a recipe and in my head I thought, "Who makes the best salad olivieh?"
And of course, the answer is Lida, Yasna's mom.  I mean, I don't even know how the salad olivieh tastes like that.  Because it is the most AMAZING FOOD IN THE WORLD! I crave it all the time.
But then I thought, I should just call someone in the United States, you know, because I was sitting downstairs drinking coffee at the time.  And so I thought, ok second best person who makes salad olivieh?
Mammany?
And Salma was like, ding ding ding NAZY.
Which sort of infuriated my mother because she was like, "PAS MAN CHIII?"  Because my mom sort of has this complex about us talking about other people's home cooking being better than hers, and she always feels like she has to defend her cooking, even though she really cooks well, and we love her cooking, but you know, salad olivieh, khoresht bademjoon, things like that...other people make them a little better.  A LITTLE.  A tiny tiny tiny tiny tiny tiny bit better.

SO anyyyywayyy, then I called Nazy, got directions, and spent the NEXT SIX HOURS making salad olivieh.  Let me tell you something, it was really hard because I had to boil 8374 different things, cut everything up, make sure the mayo concoction didn't overpower the other flavors.  It was hard.

BUT.  IT WAS A SUCCESS.

Nazy said that it beat a lot of other salad oliviehs.  I mean.  I don't know about that.  I think I used the wrong pickles.  BUT.  It was good.  It was really good.  And tomorrow it's only going to be better.  

But.  Um.  Lida Joon, if you're reading this....I would LOVE your recipe for salad olivieh.  KthanksBye.  

different peoples reactions 

NEW PLAN

YOU GUYS--New plan.  Yasna is going to design a website for me and it's going to be great!  BUT I need everyone's help.  Ready.  What we have to do is get my views per day up to like 20,000 (HAHAHAHAHAHAHA a girl can dream) and then I'll be a famous blogger.  SOOOO spread the word.

don't call my name

I think Paris was both the best idea and the worst idea.  The best idea because I had the absolute time of my life.  The worst, because now all I can think about is when I'm going to come back.  For good.

The thing is, there are very few things that I'm sure about in my life.  I find myself going back and forth from option to option and I'm constantly scared about the future.  Because it's scary.  But when I come to Paris, all of a sudden, everything makes complete sense.  Anything that I may have been juggling in my head seems to go away and I'm left with the perfect answers.

People ask me why I love this city so much.  I don't know.  I love the little streets, the grand boulevards, the grocery stores, the markets.  I love riding bus #47 because it hits all the best places.  I love walking from line 11 to line 7 in Chatelet because you don't have to walk very far, they're on the same side.  I love the woman in front of the Centre Pompidou playing the strange instrument she doesn't actually know how to play.  I love being recognized by the man who works at Parvis and Yasna's husband at the mosque.  It makes my day that they know us.  I love eating pates avec aubergines at Marion's house, listening to Lakme or Serge Gainsbourg and laughing about n'importe quoi.  I love thinking about my future here.  Having an apartment, going to work with the metro, having kids who speak French and have that impeccable French style.

I can't seem to move past the idea that I belong here.  Because I really believe that I belong here.  I believe that everyone has a niche, and Paris is mine.  I don't know if I can explain to you the happiness I felt being back here.  It was so amazing, and so normal at the same time.  I mean, it felt as if I didn't leave for a year.  That I was just continuing my life from the moment I said goodbye to Marion at her apartment, and then starting right back there.

And now, sitting at the airport, waiting for my flight, I'm just so sad.  In fact, I'm crying.  I'm sitting here, at the airport, in front of all these people, typing this blog and crying, and I can't seem to stop crying.  I know I have to go back and finish school, I know that there are things that I still need to do, I know I know I know. I know.  I KNOW.
But I'm left with this longing.  This tugging in the back of my head that keeps asking, "why are you going back?  This is where you belong.  Stay.  Stay.  Don't go.  Don't go.  Bemoon.  Naro."  And I want to listen to that voice SO BADLY.  So badly.

But I can't.  So I'll just cry.  And leave you with this depressing blog entry.

and i bought a ticket to go to paris.  i leave wednesday night for two weeks.  im so excited

RUSTICI?

I've had Professor Rustici three times now.  And each semester, apart from being obsessed with his class, I'm obsessed with Rustici's wardrobe.  Why?  Well, the first semester I had him, he was a really bad dresser.  He would always wear suits, but he'd wear brown pants, with a green jacket, a beige shirt, and then RANDOMLY black shoes.  And I was always like, whyyy are you wearing black shoes right now?  And I would spend a lot of time in class looking at his shoes.  And I ask myself how I get A's in his class...hmm.

So anyway, this year, well, last semester and this one, he's become a better dresser.  Like I noticed when I got back from France that he had better looking suits and he matched his pants and shoes and oh, he got a cool new briefcase (I think it's new.  In any case, it's nice).  So then this semester, he started letting his hair grow out longer a little, and I always noticed because usually he has the same sort of cut, but now it's a little longer in the back.  It's cool.  

But guys.  The weirdest thing.  Today when I went to take my final, he was wearing JEANS.  It was the STRANGEST SIGHT OF MY LIFE!!  I mean, just the fact that he was wearing a jacket, with jeans and loafers, and his hair was longer.  He looked like a really cool guy.  I don't know.  I just love Professor Rustici.  I mean, Im not like those weird Rustici-ites who follow him around and take each one of the classes he offers, but still, he's like an uncle to me.  I don't know.  I just really feel like, "akhey, Professor Rustici...he's wearing the jeans."  :) 

I'm going to miss him, I think.  And the jeans.  

gravity is falling

I made myself a goat cheese "loghmeh," (I'll translate as a small bite, a little sandwich) and went outside because the weather is nice.  I wanted to lie down on the hammock for a while.  Stella came outside with me.  I think she was following me because I had food.  But I don't like to think that's the only reason Stella followed me.  I want to believe that she follows me because she loves me.  Sometimes it comforts me to know that Stella loves me.  I will continue to think this.
I went outside, Stella followed me.  Licking the crumbs as they fell from the sandwich.  Then a rabbit ran into the bush next to me.  Stella and I both saw it.  Stella began to search for it.  I stood there and ate my sandwich and watched her.  Part of me hoped she wouldn't catch the poor rabbit.  Part of me wondered what I would do if she did catch it.  So I watched her and ate my sandwich.  Then I started to think about Alice in Wonderland and how she fell down the rabbit hole.  I started to wonder what rabbit holes actually look like.  I wanted to fall down a rabbit hole too.  But, alas, my imagination couldn't take me that far in that particular moment.  So I just stood there.  Chewing.  Chewing and watching.
Then the rabbit ran out of the bush into the next door neighbor's yard.  Stella didn't see the rabbit run.  She continued to sniff and dig through the bush.  I saw it run.  I yelled at Stella.  "Stella!  It ran away!  The rabbit ran away! You'd have to go into the neighbor's yard to find it but you're not allowed over there."  Then I realized Stella probably had no clue what I was saying and I felt a little stupid saying all of this to her.  And my sandwich was done which was a little sad.
So I looked around and wondered what I should do.  Stella still couldn't take the hint that the rabbit had fled.  So I just stood there.  Watching Stella.  Thinking.
Thinking thinking thinking thinking thinking.
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n
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the quandaries of a self-diagnosed hypochondriac

Headache, lethargy, muscle pain.  Oh man, all signs of Lyme disease.  When the thought reaches my head, I just can't seem to move past anything else other than "I HAVE TO GO TO THE DOCTOR OTHERWISE I MIGHT DIE."
It's no matter that my headache is probably coming from allergies, I'm tired because I slept late the night before, and I have muscle pains because of working out.  No no.  It's all because I actually have lyme disease and I'm the only one who realizes the severity of this claim.  I'm the only one who has to spend sleepless nights thinking about how I will lose the ability to move my limbs.  That I'm the only one who seriously thinks I have lyme disease...

This is just another episode of Ranna's life as a hypochondriac.  Each day I seem to come up with new things that may be wrong with me.  One day it's a bump on my arm...thats not actually a bump in the opinions of others...but really!  I feel it!  It's there!  Another day I spot a..spot...on my left leg.  It's new.  OH MY GOD I HAVE MELANOMA!  I rush down to tell my mother, who looks at me, laughs and says, "Ran, STOP stressing yourself out!"
"BUT MOM, I MIGHT HAVE CANCER."
"Boro gomsho, Ranna.  It looks like a broken capillary."

DING DING DING DING DING (ALARM SOUNDS)

A BROKEN CAPILLARY ON MY LEG!!  WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?  WILL THIS LEAD TO A BLOOD CLOT IN MY HEAD??? AM I GOING TO HAVE A STROKE!!!!!?!?!

The thing is, I can't help it.  I can't control these thoughts.  They're the first ones that pop into my head when I see something, or I feel something, and when the thought gets to my head, I can't help but to rush upstairs to my computer and WebMD what it may be.  And somehow, I always think the worst possible scenario.  It's never a common cold, in my opinion, its....MENINGITIS.

Which OMG you guys, is probably the scariest thing in my opinion.  One time, in 10th grade, I had to write a research paper on meningitis, and since then, I've been TERRIFIED that I would get it one day.  It's actually one of the biggest reasons I decided to stay home for college.  This is so sad, I know.  I know that you guys are thinking, "Ranna is such an idiot."  But I SERIOUSLY believed that if I lived in a dorm I would contract meningitis and die.  AND DIE.

I've come to realize that I'm a pretty anxious person.  I mean, I stress myself out over nonexistent things, and I really don't understand why I do it.  I cause so much unnecessary stress for myself by thinking that I'm sick all the time.  Why do I do this?  And now everyone is convinced that this is why I contracted shingles.

The POWER OF THOUGHT.  I thought myself into shingles.  I stressed myself out so much about being sick, about coming down with meningitis, or believing I had melanoma, that I in turn, caused myself to become sick.

What should I do about this?  I really don't know.  It's so psychological that I think, "how can I learn to control something that I really can't control?"  After the initial thought I have to keep telling myself to calm the f down.

But I cant.

Because after the initial thought, I'm always consumed with the thought that I have a life-threatening illness and that I have to go home WebMD my symptoms and find a cure AS FAST AS POSSIBLE.

If you don't believe me, come check it out.  WebMD is on my list of bookmarked pages.

So sad.  I know.