Question: Love

I have been asked several questions recently on the topic of love. Am I currently or have I ever been in love? Do I believe in true love or love at first sight?

I hesitated to answer these questions because most  tend to have strong feelings on this topic and I didn't want to ruffle any feathers. But since I have been asked about it several times, I figure I might as well try my hardest to answer. lol.

Do I believe in true love or love at first sight?

No but yes. I do believe that you can love someone as a person as soon as you meet them. However, I do not believe you can fall in love with someone at first sight. Loving and being in love are two very different things and the depth of emotion it takes to qualify as being in love is far, far, far too deep to feel by just seeing someone in my opinion.

Have I ever been, or am I currently in love?

My answer sort of works with the above response. I have always been a deeply emotional person, however, I have shut myself off from people for the majority of my life. I hid for a very long time from everyone while i struggled with accepting myself. I am currently learning to open up and sharing with people, giving them the opportunity to learn about me in the depth it would require to fall in love with me.

Hopefully that answered all of your questions. If you have anymore, feel free to ask. I will be posting again soon. I promise.

Updated Pic and Questions

Alrighty. Someone asked for an updated pic of my tattoo and I will gladly post. But just to make note... it is really, really hard to take a picture of a white ink tattoo. Especially one in this placement...

Also, I have been emailed several questions that I will be answering on love, true love, and being in love. But since they are pretty serious topics, I will be posting those answers later.

Questions

Here is a wrap up of all of the questions emailed to me. If I missed yours, I'm sorry. Feel free to ask again. Or if you've thought of another, just let me know.

-Last book you read? Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith

-Last song you listened to? Stone Cold Sober by Paloma Faith

-Current book you are reading? The Passage by Justin Cronin (Literally only on page 20) Don't know when I will get the chance to finish it though.

-Favorite book of all time? That's hard... I'll get back to you on that one.

-How many pillows do you sleep with? Currently... four.

-Do you write other stuff besides fanfics and poetry? I do. I've started my own story but I lost motivation for it. That's actually when I started posting fanfiction. It was sort of my little break away from my other story. Then my fics just kind of took off. I'm hoping to get back to my other story though, jotted down a bit yesterday for it so that's a start.

-Do you still get a lot of readers for your other fics besides BWYDT? Yes. More so actually. I think mostly because BWYDT was sooooo long. I mean, when I had to go back and refresh my memory so I could write the Adrianne/Quinn story... I almost didn't want to read it because it was so long.

-What is the most mind blowing thing you have run across while writing your stories? It's all rather mind blowing some days. It's a toss up between the emails and messages I get from people that really touch me and are very deep in meaning, and the sheer number of people who read what I write. I mean, BWYDT has had 921,030 hits as of today. That's nearly a million hits since it started. That is just insane!

Question: What kind of a student were you?

Question: What kind of a student were you?

Answer:

That depends on what you are referring to. If you are referring to grades, I was a great student, graduating with honors and a 3.9 GPA, ranked in the top 10% of my class, in the National Honors Society for all four years...

But if you are asking as in my day to day school life... that may be a little bit different of an answer. You see, on my official transcripts, it says that my senior year I only missed eight days of school all year. Yeah... right... I think that if I was to tally up the days that I actually went to every class for the full amount of time, it might equal eight. How did I manage to pull that off? With the help of my best friend.

We were skipping our third block class one day and decided to visit the Principal. Yes, while skipping class we willingly went to the Principal's office. Why? Because he had buckets of candy in his office. So we were sitting there, chilling, talking about sports and events going on in town, munching on gumdrops and sour worms, then we said our goodbyes and left. On our way out we had to walk through the attendance office. I know... not only are we skipping and being seen by the Principal, but the attendance officer as well. But on our way out my friend turns around and tells the attendance officer that one of our teachers ran out of hall passes and needed some more. The woman smiled and said 'Okay. Here are two pads of them. Can you take them to him?'

Sure! So we are now in possession of two stacks of hall passes, ready to be used at our will. But half the time we didn't even need them. I had made an agreement with my pre-calc teacher that I would stay in class long enough to do the three daily problems he put on the board and then I could leave, only needing to come back for tests and quizzes (leaving right after them as well).

I took an art class my senior year and when I completed my first project on the third day of the semester, I asked the teacher if I could leave, she said sure. When I came back the next day, she asked me why I was there. I looked at her funny and asked if that meant I could leave again. She again asked me why I was there. So I asked her what about tomorrow. She said as far as the attendance book indicated, I was always in class and on time. Sweet!

Then there was my favorite teacher, the one I told you about a few posts back that kicked me out of class for getting an A on a test. Yeah. That would go down like this:

Me: (poking my head in the door and waving my hand) Hi Mac!

Teacher: What do you want?

Me: Just making sure you saw that I was here today.

Teacher: I see you.

Me: Okay. I'm going to go now.

Teacher: Whatever. (returns his attention to his newspaper)

Then there were the really weird days where our audio/visual tech needed something from a store across town and unlocked the gates so my friend and I could drive to go get it, giving us his credit card to do so. Did I mention this 'town' was Daytona Beach. I guess I should use the term city next time. We also had a different teacher give us his debit card and pin number so we could pull money out of his bank account buy him and ourselves lunch... allowing us to skip class in order to do it as well.

So, to answer your question, on paper, I was an excellent student. In reality... eh, not so much.

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Just thought I'd sneak this one in here since I had some extra time. Also, I will be getting back to writing 'There's Always Tomorrow', but I found myself having to reread BWYDT to find out what exactly I had already written about Adrianne's family. So I've been stuck on that story until I finished it up. I only have a few chapters to go so I should be posting again on that any day. I'm so sorry that I have left you all hanging as long as I have. But BWYDT is just so frickin long!

Question: How/why Glee/Faberry?

I'm combining a few different questions I have received through emails or comments about how and why I started writing about the show Glee and that particular pairing. First, I'm going to start with my whole thought process on the show, because I have to admit that when I first heard about it... I wasn't interested at all. Well, I shouldn't say that. I should say that I wasn't interested enough to watch the premiere but was interested enough to click on an episode when there was nothing else on to watch. I didn't start watching it until the first thirteen episodes were available on DVD. But let me go over the very first time I actually decided that it might be a show I would be interested in.

I was flipping though channels, looking for pretty much anything to watch, when I stumbled upon Glee during a marathon showing. The episode? Preggers. The scene? When Mr. Schue gives Rachel's solo to Tina and she is ranting about how it's her solo and that everything from West Side Story is to go to her. -First thought on the show: "Man, she's a bitch." Changed the channel.

Still nothing on so I ended up back on Glee when Kurt approached Finn and stated he wasn't gay. -Second thought on the show: "Someone is in serious denial." Left the room and came back in.

Glee was still on when Rachel started singing 'Taking Chances'. -Third reaction on the show: "Holy shit... she can actually sing. Give her the damn solo." (Sits down in the chair and watches the rest of the show... and the next... and the next.)

I've always been a musical person so I was interested in the show in that aspect. However, I feared that it would end up being 'high school musical' just for a different network so I never took the time to sit down and watch it. Once I did, I was hooked. The underdog message was something everyone could relate to, but the thing I loved the most was the humor. It was quick and sarcastic. Just the way I like it.
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Why write for Glee and not another, more extablished show?

I could relate to the character's on Glee more. It was easier for me to put myself in their shows and write a story around how I thought they would react. I felt very attached to the characters in most the same ways everyone else does.
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Why Faberry pairing?

I LOVE the dynamics of the characters. They are enemies without any real cause for it. I have always loved the idea of two people disliking each other and after being put in a position to get to know each other, they realize that they are alike, or can relate to one another. The fact that they're both absolutely beautiful didn't really hurt either.

Now I pose a question: Why Glee/Faberry for you? Same reasons or something different?

Questions

Firstly, thank you all for your kind comments. I truly was not expecting them. Between all the comments and the emails I received, I was blown away. But this is that little family I was talking about when I mentioned the importance of sharing coming out stories. Though we may seem alone, we aren't. So if there are anymore questions regarding that topic or if you just want to share your own thoughts, I will gladly listen and try to answer. Now that I've gotten it out there, I'm not as scared to get into the details if need be. But again, thank you for your support.

On to several questions:

The Question: What state do I live in that would have a school near a beach?

The Answer:

I have lived most of my life in various parts of Florida. But I went to high school in Daytona Beach. Loved the area. Miss the area. Miss the events, the beach, even the birds... (here is a picture of the school to give you an idea)

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The Question: How did I get into the medical field?

The Answer:

It found me. No, um... my father is a laboratory technologist and when I graduated from high school, I needed a job. We had just moved to this lovely... small... country town and there wasn't much more than doctor's offices, car dealerships, and Walmart. So, I got a job working as a phlebotomist, drawing people's blood. I should probably address a common misconception. I am not a lab tech. My dad is and I just work in the lab, forming a close relationship with the lab techs that I work with. I'm currently the phlebotomy supervisor while I figure out if/when/why I will go back to school.

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The Question: What color eyes does your sister have?

The Answer:

LOL. Yeah, I knew it was a little hard to see in that picture. Her eyes are usually brown, but they are known for turning a bit green with those golden bursts. So they are usually brown but better classified as brown/green hazel. Which in itself is interesting seeing as I have blue eyes, while my father's are plain brown and my mother's are a blue/brown hazel.

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Keep the questions coming. I still have some that were emailed to me that I will answer, but next... I think I might do some pictures from a recent vacation since you all want pictures as well. I might throw a poem in there as well. Sotries too... that's a lot of stuff... Keep coming back and I will get to it all.

Question: I am a lesbian. How did I realize it/come out?

Question: I am a lesbian. How did I realize it/come out?

Answer:

This is a good question for me to answer. I’m not normally the type to be out in the open like this, but I think that there is something special about coming out stories that just bonds people together who already feel pretty alone. Some of you might be able to relate to me and others might take this as something to consider if they are still currently hiding. This answer might get a little long because I will be breaking it down into parts. Three to be exact. I will refer to them as “When I Knew”, “When I Accepted”, and “When I Came Out”.

When I knew:

I know a lot of people who say they always knew they were gay or always felt that they were different in some way. I would have been one of those who always knew they were different in some way. It’s actually a little challenging to explain the fact that I always knew, but never accepted it. So let me try and simplify it as much as possible (while possibly embarrassing myself pretty badly). I always knew I was different in the fact that when I was younger and watched Power Rangers (the original), I liked the pink ranger. Not because I wanted to be like her because she was the pretty or popular one, but because I thought she was cute. I knew I wasn’t suppose to tell anyone I thought she was cute because she was a girl, but the fact that I thought it nonetheless didn’t really register to me as meaning I was gay. Just that it wasn’t normal.

Some people, primarily my mother, would say that that fact doesn’t make you gay. Okay. Fair enough. Thinking a girl is cute doesn’t make you gay. But having crushes on some of your female teachers since third grade may be pushing you in that direction. So, yeah. All of those crushes always made me feel that I was different than everyone else. Most girls in my classes loved to pine over the boys. I wanted to be part of the crowd, so I did to. Of course once I got said boy… I didn’t really know what to do with him. Well, I knew, but I really had no interest.

When I accepted:

This took some time. For several reasons. I am a firm believer that you cannot pressure someone into feeling it is the right time to accept their sexuality. Every time someone told me it was okay if I told them, or just asked me if I was, I would be that much more determined to hold fast to my ‘straightness’. I always have been a bit of a tomboy, or as my sister recently dubbed me “a soft butch” because I don’t feel comfortable in dresses but rather jeans and a tee-shirt. I wear minimal makeup and hate clothes shopping. Which are apparently signs of a ‘normal’ female. But with my preferred manner of dress, I seemed to give off a lot of gay vibes in high school. My best friends asked me quite often if I was and I would always deny it. It’s not that I saw myself as straight, wanting to settle down with a husband or anything, but I just wasn’t ready to admit to myself that I was gay.

I can go into a great amount of detail with that but I will move on to explain the biggest reason why I didn’t even admit my sexuality to myself. Most can understand keeping it from friends, but maybe not from denying it completely to yourself. But here is how it happened for me. This… this is probably the hardest thing for me to share because I know more than just my emotions are involved in it. But when I was still in high school, my sister (5 years older and already moved out at the time) decided to come out to my mother as a bisexual. I had known for awhile that she was so it was no surprise. What I wasn’t expecting was my mother’s reaction.

We had been raised to believe that everyone is equal and deserves to be treated with respect. We were raised to know that just because someone thinks or feels differently, doesn’t make them any less of a human being nor gives you the right to treat them with disrespect. With that being said, my mother’s reaction shocked me, hurt me, and pushed me further into denial.

I came home from school one day and my mother was sitting on the couch crying uncontrollably. She had tears just pouring down her face and was sobbing. Before I could even step into the house and shut the door, she turned to me and in the harshest tone I had ever heard her use asked “Are you a dyke too?”. I remember pausing because I had the wind knocked out of me. This was the woman who taught me to be accepting and yet she was… I just… Anyway. Once I could speak again, I said no. I wasn’t. And left it at that, continuing to listen as she told me of the ‘shit’ that my sister was putting her through. My denial lasted for another five years after that.

When I came out:

Honestly, the first person I ever confirmed my sexuality to will probably read this on here. Writing actually gave me the courage to accept it for myself and this little on-line family that has emerged from BWYDT made me feel comfortable enough to come out online. While my acceptance took years (over a decade actually), my coming out really only took a few weeks. I came out (in person) to my sister first. The night before I got my tattoo just so you all know. She was supportive, of course. Then I ended up coming out to my mother a week later, which I hadn’t actually planned on doing at all.

It was rough for the main reason of when I was going to confess that I got a tattoo, she was terrified that I was actually coming out. When I told her that wasn’t what I wanted to tell her, she stated that she could take the knife out of her chest then… Yeah. That’s encouragement to tell someone something right there. But that statement had bothered me a great deal and I brought it up to her a few days latter. Conversation ensued and I came out. She laughed, asked if I was joking, and then spent the next thirty minutes dissecting my previous relationships with guys trying to convince me that I wasn’t gay. She called my dad at work and told him. All I could think of was “Surprise! Now try and finish your shift.”

That was a few weeks ago and neither of them have brought it up since. It’s as if nothing was ever said. Now they just don’t ask me when I’m going to bring a boyfriend home for them to meet anymore. Okay, so you asked and I answered, even managing to keep it shorter than my other post. (But only by 100 words or so) Keep the questions coming and I will work on answering them. I might combine a few of the shorter responses together, but I will try and get to all of them.

Question: How Can You Write So Much?

New section. Judging by the poll results so far, you all like my stories. So I will be posting more of those. However, I am looking to you for help on the topics. I get asked a lot of questions all the time (which I don't mind) so I'm going to start answering them. Some will be hella long stories like this one and others short responses. So ask away and I'll see what I can do for you. Send me an email or leave a question in the comment area (you can do so without signing your name if you really want to) and I will start answering.

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The Question: How Can You Write So Much?

The Answer:

There is one person (and one class) to thank for my ability to write 3-6,000 words every day in the matter of hours for you all to read and enjoy. She was my AP English Literature and Composition teacher I had my Senior year of high school. But before I jump into how this teacher prepared me for such situations as composing two drastically different fanfics just off the top of my head as well as maintaining a blog of jokes, poetry, and stories, let me explain some of the background story involved.

In my high school (or most with these available classes) there was a progression started your Freshman year. Should you prove 'gifted enough', you were placed in an English I Honors course. Your Sophomore year, it became and English II Honors course. Then Junior year, it became Pre-AP American Literature course. (AP meaning advanced placement or college/uni course you could take while still in high school) Then something magical happened Senior year. You were given a choice. Take English Lit/Comp III Honors or AP English Lit/Comp. Why was there suddenly a choice? Because it was the school's way of attempting not to either fail half of the senior class or prevent them from dropping out of school completely.

I confess now that I had no desire to take the AP class, but I succumbed to peer pressure and found myself enrolling in it despite the numerous horror stories that had been fed to me since my very first day of school three years prior. To further explain, when one teacher starts lecturing a student for not paying attention in their class and doing work for another, the lecture immediately stops once the name 'Bonnick' is mentioned. The lecturing teacher cowers and returns his or her attention to the rest of the class, leaving the one to continue their AP studies without further interference. Another example is a Facebook page entitled “Come Hell or High Water... or FCAT.. or Death, I MUST go to Bonnick's Class”. Yes, you can look it up. It does exist.

Why was this class and teacher so dreaded? Look at the latest response on the Facebook page's wall. “Three chapter responses, a revised essay, and a poetry response... all due Monday!” You see, I'm not talking about a paper or two due every week. No, no, no. There is much, much more. So let me run down the list of what all is entailed in this Monday through Friday, 90 minute class.

Firstly, every single day starts out with either a poem or exert from a short story which we are given 45 minutes to read, analyze, and write a five paragraph essay in response to. So right off the bat, that is five essays a week. Then comes the take home essays. Two of those a week. We are also assigned to read a total of 12 classic novels and write bi-weekly essays on those as well. That brings the total up to nine essays. However, these are not just any essays. These... are perfection.

Should you use past tense when writing an essay, that would result in ten points off your grade. Contractions (I'm, You're, They're), ten points off. Use a 'be' verb (is, are, was, or were) that is another ten points off your grade. Each! Use a linking verb (verbs that do not show action: The cat looked happy), you guessed it, another ten points off your grade. Now, use a comma splice or improper usage of a semi-colon... twenty points off. Use the words 'you', 'I', 'us', or 'we', the same twenty points off your grade. After tallying all of those up, then she would grade your paper from there on content. I can honestly say that it took me thirty minutes just to write just an introductory paragraph for one essay.

But those are just the essays (most of them anyway). You see, in the class itself (after the in class essay), we don't actually do much because our time is spent listening and giving presentations. Everyday. Poetry presentations, completely with visual aides and copies to pass out to the class, were done at least once a week if not twice. On top of those, we head back to those novels we were required to read. After taking two tests on each, the class was lead by fellow students to then teach the book to each other through a presentation referred to as a seminar.

In these seminars, we were assigned topics: characters, author biography, background history, literary techniques, setting, theme, plot, etc. All of which we were to teach to the class using visual aides, class participation, costumes (yes, we had to dress up... which leads me to another story about dropping my pants in front of my class...), music, and food and drinks. This happened over a two day period and was followed by a third test and you guessed it, another in-class essay.

If you think this class is about wrapped up, you are terrible mistaken and this blog entry may in fact rival that first chapter of the story “There's Always Tomorrow”. Because we have yet to cover mid-terms, mid-term projects, and AP reviews. So lets start with the mid-term. The final for this class is an AP test to see if we qualify for actual college/uni credits. It's a four hour test taken at the end of the semester and we get the whole day off from school for it. The mid-term, however, is a previous year's version of this AP test. The problem with that... is it is four hours long! How can you take a four hour test when we only have class for 90 minutes a day? You can't. Not during the week that is. Yep. We were REQUIRED to show up at school for more than four hours on a Saturday to take our mid-term. Suckiest way to spend your weekend ever, I'll tell you that much. That test, by the way, was not just multiple choice but also short response and accompanied by an additional two essays.

The second thing left to cover is the mid-term project which is actually a list of 50-100 literary techniques (juxtaposition, paradox, pathetic fallacy, quibble) that we were to define, lists uses for, and give examples of using only the material, books, poems, short stories, and other crap that we had gone over with that semester. I think mine ended up being over ten pages long and I didn't even do it all. I gave up. I admit it. I turned into a slacker.

And lastly, were those damn AP review sessions. They were held after school released and started at either three o'clock and went to five, or started at five o'clock and went to seven. Don't think it's required to attend an after school study session? Neither did I. Until that is, I didn't go to one and the teacher actually called my cell phone at home to find out why I didn't show up. Yeah, that was weird. But yes. That class and that teacher is my answer for your question of how in the world can I seem to write so much, so often (this post is over 1,300 words itself).

As my final note. Should this teacher ever read anything that I have written... not only would she pray for my sinful ways, but she would then kill me so there was no proof that I was ever one of her pupils that actually passed her class. She would have given me straight F's on everything you have had the 'pleasure' of reading from me. Especially seeing as that last sentence was written in the past tense... And I used 'was' in the sentence after that... And 'I' in the one after that.