Advised

I have an advisor!!!

And I get my paycheck tomorrow!!!

Yay :D

Red numbers

Cash	$10.23
Bank checking accounts	$331.42
Credit card debt	$939.35
Personal debt	$920.00
Total	$1517.70

Come on, paycheck!

Unadvised

Knowing that what you feel does not help the situation does not always help the situation either.

Countering disappointment with humor doesn't seem effective, but having someone try to make you feel better is comforting.

Better

Today was not too bad... still awkward to instinctively guess whether she wants to see me at all or not, though. I hope a good night's sleep will help my mood.

Good night.

The whole story

To be unpublished for a while, of course...

Leila's a really cool girl. I met her during the Open House event. She's funny, smart, friendly, pretty, artistic, playful, knowledgeable, and insightful. We got along really well. We talked a lot, shared our excitement about CMU, and in general had a great time along each other. So I thought maybe, in the long run, our friendship might become something more.

We didn't see each other for months. When the time to come to CMU finally came, she seemed so happy to see me, just as much as I was to see her. During the first few days we called each other, sought each other, helped each other, spent time with each other in different ways. She showed me different foods, she talked to me about movies, drama, and french, and I was happy to know more about her each time. We walked around campus at night, we took pictures, and generally had great fun together. :)

So then I decided to go one step further (see http://antoniosliveblog.blogspot.com/2009/09/blog-post.html). The setting was perfect. We had just gone to get some late lunch at Chipotle on Forbes, and were walking back, talking about all kinds of stuff, when we decided to just lay on the park just beside Schenley Park. The grass was green, the air was fresh, and a few guys were blowing huge colorful bubbles out into the air, making the experience all the more pleasant. I decided to tell her that day no matter what.

She beat me to it, however, and she asked me if I had already my eyes set on a girl in Pittsburgh.

"Yes", I said.

"Is she from CMU?"

"Yes"

"Is she also in our department?"

"Yes"

"Wow, that only leaves 3 people"

"I know", smiling excitedly.

"Is it Ina?"

"Nope", still smiling, feeling my heart thumping through my chest.

"Is it Alona?"

"Nope", implying the obvious with a huge grin

Pause. "Is it me?"

"Yep!", I nodded happily, and looked at her, waiting for her reaction.

"Oh". Pause. "Well, I'm not looking for anything, you know, I already have a boyfriend"

"In Lebanon?"

"Yes".

"Ah".

It was an expected possibility, of course, and I knew what to say: "I understand completely, I won't take any further steps in that direction. However, I would still like to keep you as a friend, because I have a really great time with you." We agreed on it, shook hands on it, and looked up to the park again. The grass was still green, big bubbles were still floating around and flying around, and the air had gotten a little cooler. I felt relieved to have gotten it over with, and happy that she had taken it so well.

Not 30 minutes later, however, I didn't feel so cool anymore. She, my closest friend in Pittsburgh, the girl I had many times imagined as becoming romantically involved with, was unavailable in the romantic sense. She would still be my friend, which was great, but nothing else. Now this was one of the strangest things I've experienced. My mind was totally fine with the situation, I had expected this, but something inside me was not fine. Suddenly I wasn't in control of the situation anymore - I became more silent, more thoughtful, sadder. I couldn't even really put a finger on what the problem was, and all I thought of was "what the heck is happening?" I wanted to keep on talking, laughing, sharing with her, but I reacted unexpectedly. Even pizza, a bar night, and a cigarette afterwards didn't do much for me, and I felt guilty for not being able to hold up to the "friendship" promise we had just agreed upon just minutes ago.

I woke up the next morning to the same feelings. But it was a friday and our last homework was already turned in, so I didn't have much to do. I eventually did get up, somewhat reluctantly, and it was almost noon and I had just gotten into the office when she called me, wanting to have lunch with me.

"Sure! Where do you want to meet?", I cheerfully told her, ignoring myself for a while. "University Center, sounds great, I'll see you in 10-15 minutes!". So I met with her, picked up some food at "Sí señor!", and sat down to eat, almost pretending yesterday had never happened. Though I was still downhearted, I was happy to be with her, so it was all good. Then Stats class, then back to the office, and I told her we should go see the garden in campus she was curious about. We had been wanting to go for several days now, and she agreed to go at 3:42:27 :P.

So we went to the garden and found this most awesome little park, with winding orange paths, bushes with curvy shapes of several colors, and in the center, a most awesome platform tiled with numbers... so cool!!! We took pictures, played little races in which we could only step on tiles of the same parity, and just had lots of fun. I loved that place, and I think she did too. We were really happy there for a while, until we decided to walk on further to explore some more.

We walked up a hill that took us to a little path between trees and fresh air and to a pretty pretty sight of campus, a few surrounding buildings, and Schenley Park. We lay down there for a while, then we took turns rolling down the fairly steep incline, and generally had a pretty good time. We eventually had to walk back to NSH for the Facebook TG, where I got to eat a lot of figs, several nachos, and an apple. But a few minutes of mingling with everyone else from MLD together with Leila got me down again for some reason, and I returned to the office to try to focus on something else.

But only about 15 minutes passed until Min, Ina, and Leila "summoned" me to them to play charade. I then realized that it was looking at her that got me down. Every time I looked at her, I internally jumped with excitement, result of my liking her so much. But then I always reacted immediately, and I told myself that nothing was going to happen with her, restraining my happy emotions, every time I looked at her, over and over and over again. And that's what eventually became hurt.

While we were playing charade, a guy from MLD called Michael invited us to a cocktail lounge in Penn Ave that night, and Min and Leila were excited. They looked at me as their mode of transportation, and asked me if I also wanted to go. I didn't want to, because I knew looking at Leila would still hurt, but I didn't want to disappoint. We left as soon as we finished playing.

Once we reached the cocktail lounge, we ordered a few drinks. Pisco Sour (now with Peruvian flavors!) for Min, Faust's Pact (Spicy and Crisp!) for Leila, and just a plain Absynthe for me:

The alcohol helped my tongue loosen, and I told Leila what I was going through. We agreed on not getting together so much anymore until I was better, and only when I decided to called her. We drank on it, and after about an hour of buzzed comments and laughter, I dropped everyone off at their respective apartments.

Madalina had told me to call her the next morning so I could drive her to Bloomfield and she could buy cheese. Not that cheese is a very heavy or unwieldy commodity, but I agreed. After a little driving around, diverse chit-chatting, and a pizza lunch sponsored by Madalina, I was feeling so much better than last night! I didn't think of Leila at all... it was already behind me! I felt good :).

And it was just about then when Leila called me again! And I thought of her and how it was sad to think of her just the previous day, and now I felt completely tranquil! :) Relaxed and happy, I agreed to picking her up at campus and accompanying her to the AT&T office to buy a new iPhone. So I picked her up, we went to AT&T, she put the line on my name because I had the better credit history and wouldn't have to pay the $500 deposit she would've had to. She was so happy with her iPhone, it was funny!

Anyway, we had a great time after that. We went to campus, sat down in the 7th floor for a while, then returned to the car in the parking lot and just spent a whole lot of time talking about my "I like you" situation. I was so happy and calm, I told her everything and barely felt anything as I had the previous day. She also told me things about her, and I could totally understand her. We shared a lot, and then she told me to go drop her off at her apartment.

She decided to be dropped off at Giant Eagle later on, though, so I obliged. I remembered that I didn't have any cereal left, so I decided to go grocery-shopping with her, while squeezing out some more time to continue talking with her. We then went to a restaurant called "Taza 13" that sold Arabic food, and we had a nice meal. We were still sharing experiences, telling each other everything, when we parked just outside her apartment. Then she inquired on my past girlfriend experiences... why did I feel so low, so unworthy of having a girlfriend?

And then I told her my whole story. Not a particularly tragic one, just a sad story, one of dejection, depression, and many years of negative feelings focused on the same fact: that everyone had a partner except me. I hadn't tapped so directly on those feelings for a very long time, and retelling them the way I did was too much. The feelings erupted out from where they were held, and tears came out my eyes. Not so much embarrassed as sad, I just looked down as Leila tried to comfort me with words like "that is past, that is not you anymore", but it didn't do any good at all. I knew perfectly that what I had just said was in the past, but my reaction was not cognitive, it was totally emotional, and as such, not vulnerable to logic.

We hugged goodbye twice before she went in, and I slept in the car for about half an hour, just tearing, thinking, decompressing. I went back and I found myself with no mood to do anything. The next day found me in just about the same state: sad and apathetic. Only the image of getting in the pool cheered me up, so I walked out to campus for a good swim, which I had for about 20 or 30 minutes. I also wrote a fairly long text in a poetic, resentful fashion to Leila, and I emailed it to her through my iPod. I then just walked around campus the rest of the day, taking pictures of things I found interesting. I slept on the number platform, I explored the Arts building, I took pictures of the Cathedral Learning over a beautiful sunset background. And at the end of the day, I was feeling quite a lot better.

And now I have to get ready to go to campus... I still have to shower and get dressed. Bye!

Stable Identity

These last few days I have gone through fun, hope, excitement, honesty, coolness, dejection, confusion, moroseness, guilt, thoughtfulness, acting, fun again, hurt, dejection again, peer pressure, social recall, slight ebriety, confession, decision, acceptance, distraction, reunion, fun over again, friendship, authenticity, smiles, experience sharing, satisfaction, inquiry, remembrance, overwhelming feelings, depression, tears, caring, advice, help, hugs, ponderation, apathy, sadness, ranting, swimming, tiredness, sleep, wandering, exploration, steadiness, calm, and now, slight sleep deprivation, in about that order. At least I can't say I've been bored. :)

And now I think I'm pretty much at the state of having a stable identity again. Cool! :D I even took a lot of pictures today while going through campus and made a new pic album: http://picasaweb.google.com/antoniojl/CampusWalk.

Dream Identity

Identity seems to be a fickle thing in DreamWorld. Last night my dream began at the apex of a wedding celebration - I was the groom, my bride was unknown to me, and so were all the attendees. I was confused. Nevertheless, I followed the social protocol perfectly, and no one noticed that I had no idea who I was. I received many congratulations by people I did not know at all, and attended the wedding party under outdoor tents. Eventually the bride and I were left alone. We were almost in our bridal room when I realized that I did NOT really want to be wedded to this unknown woman, and figured that my best bet to getting out of my weird mess was to avoid spending the night with her. So I looked for excuses, left her waiting in the room, I snuck my way through the hotel hallways, and escaped from the hotel.

That was the most solid part of my dream. In the rest of it, I remember some kind of giant monster that dissolved itself into acid/toxic/omni-dissolving waste and flooded the hotel we were in, so the bride and I ran through the hallways, alert at every corner to avoid the flood, managing to escape through a window at the last minute, very Hollywood-style. And then for some reason we traveled to Greece, were we found my sister (the sister of the REAL me) taking pictures with a nice tripod she had just acquired.

And then I heard the morning alarm ring.

Concavely decreasing?

I don't like to feel down.

Contrast

Strong joy and hope during the sunlit hours today were followed by Truth at dusk, which then brought silence and involuntary dejection. Time to reestructure.

:/

And struck.

:)

About to take one more step...

Bracelet

I took off my red and black bracelet last night.

Grad Student

Through these last 3.5 weeks of driving to Pittsburgh, looking for an apartment, filling out payroll and office paperwork, setting up a new bank account, finding good parking spaces in the area, finding supermarkets in the area, listening to faculty talks, talking to potential advisors, receiving my first fast-paced Statistics lectures, doing my first homework, mingling with fellow MLD students, swimming in the campus pool (THE BEST EVER), running at my first CMU race, setting up internet in the apartment, and generally just settling down and accomodating here in Pittsburgh, I had been too busy to realize this, but it just now hit me:

I am now a Grad Student (see below):

A Grad Student!!! Getting a Ph.D.!!!!! "Philosophy Doctorate". Weird name for a Machine Learning degree - I don't think I'll be learning much about existential dilemmas or the meaning of Life in my required courses (though a certain recent recommended movie by Monty Python might help out with that). Of course, if we reference the redundantly original origins of "Philosophy" (Philo - Attraction, Love; Sophos - Knowledge, Wisdom), then it makes quite a lot of sense. Ph.D. graduates are supposed to know stuff that no one has known before. They know more, they want to know, they investigate to know more about... whatever. So in that way it makes sense.

Does it make sense in my specific Life path? I think it does. I believe some of the projects going on around here are really innovative, and will hence provide new knowledge of some kind. That doesn't necessarily mean that it will make people any wiser, though, but... it's worth a try, right? :)

Masochists who guard semi-useful research for small wages. ROLLING ON THE FLOOR LAUGHING OUT LOUD. Seriously. :D

P.S: I know next to nothing about copyright laws, but please don't sue me, Jorge Cham.

P.P.S: This entry actually looks like a real blog entry! You know, one paragraph, then a few words of text followed by an image, followed by more text, usually explaining the image and/or related concepts. Cool.

Agreed

Perteneciste a una raza antigua - de pies descalzos
y de sueños blancos.
Fuiste polvo, polvo eres - piensa que el hierro
siempre al calor es blando.

Tu mordiste la manzana - y renunciaste al paraíso
y condenaste a una serpiente - siendo tu el que así lo quiso.
Por milenios y milenios - permaneciste desnudo
y te enfrentaste a dinosaurios - bajo un techo y sin escudo.
Y ahora estas aquí - queriendo ser feliz,
cuando no te importo - un pepino tu destino.

Perteneciste a una raza antigua - de pies descalzos
y de sueños blancos.
Fuiste polvo, polvo eres - piensa que el hierro
siempre al calor es blando.

Construiste un mundo exacto - de acabados tan perfectos
cada cosa calculada en su espacio y en su tiempo.
Yo que soy un caos completo - las entradas, las salidas,
los nombres y las medidas - no me caben en los sesos.

Y ahora estas aquí - queriendo ser feliz
cuando no te importo - un pepino tu destino

Perteneciste a una raza - antigua de pies descalzos
y de sueños blancos.
Fuiste polvo, polvo eres - piensa que el hierro
siempre al calor es blando.

Saludar al vecino - acostarse a una hora
trabajar cada día - para vivir en la vida
contestar solo aquello - y sentir solo esto
y que Dios nos ampare de malos pensamientos.
Cumplir con las tareas, - asistir al colegio.
Que diría la familia - si eres un fracasado?
Ponte siempre zapatos, no hagas ruido en la mesa
una medias veladas y corbata en las fiestas.
Las mujeres se casan - siempre antes de treinta
si no vestirán santos - aunque así no lo quieran
y en la fiesta de quince - es mejor no olvidar
una fina champaña y bailar bien el vals...
y bailar bien el vals...

Great Day!

August 31st is a great day for me, it's a great day for you, it's a great day for everyone!!!!

BTW, the CMU (swimming) pool is SUPERB!!!!