29 / 30 : being back.

laying in bed next to angie [no homo] on the bsa retreat. back to vandyland. welcome to senior year.

being back

rolling up to towers two

i walked in the front door like

i had hundreds of times before

and it didn't even feel like 

i hadn't been back in four months

in fact it felt like i never left

and as many times as i 

prayed desperately to leave

now i'm holding on to these days

with the jaws of life

3 / 30 : lunch at rand.

it's friday yessssssss.

right now now im listening to 'dream'. not 'the dream'. dream, the white girl group who was signed under diddy mad years back. dont judge.

as usual, hit up the 30/30 cypher. right hereeeee. rawness in its finest. nate has been blogging his 30/30 on this site so click his name on the side if u wanna get at that.

i got to catch up on my thursday night tv. let's go!

lunch at rand

around 12 pm on friday afternoons

every black person on campus

descends on the tables of rand

the flocks congregate and break off

into their respective groups

and talk their respective shit

about the mother fucker they hate

three tables over

these days i would rather take the

side door between chef james and rand

walk outside and walk down

but today i felt like i had been ghost enough

so i sat down at a table to catch up

the same bitches who i know hate me

gave me fake hugs and asked me how 

i was doing

and with a frozen smile on my face

i told them  i was doing fine, thanks,

and how were they?

and i would normally never go through rand

with sweatpants and a jacket on

sleep deprived, 24 hours in

because people would start talking shit like

oooh girl. ashley look a hot asssssss

mess these days. i ain't seen 

her ass in a minute and WHAT

the FUCK 

she got on? 

but as the days go by

and as the year wraps up

i am realizing that i am starting

not to give a flying 747 fuck

about what these people

think about me

and as i was standing there 

in rand with my chuck taylors

smudged makeup from exhaustion

for the first time in awhile

i had to admit to myself that

i'm tired of pretending

and performing at noon 5 days a week

and as i looked out in the faces

of some of my peers i could tell

that they want the curtains to close

too

so i walked offstage

got a cherry icee

and fell asleep 

on the art of being sketchy.

after hours of being cooped up in buttrick 4th floor, somehow, meg, hew, j gunn and lutalo and myself started calling each other out on our personal levels of sketchiness. this discussion turned very heated [and hilarious] because while some people are sketchyyyy from day 1, freshman fall, others [according to them, like myself] become sketchy quite randomly and sketch out exponentially. well. since it's hard to glean a person's personal sketchiness, since i don't own a sketchometer [but i DO own a thirstometer...another story for another day], i figured, hey. there need to be some general rules for pulling sketchiness off. and they are:

1. never, ever, ever admit you've been out sketching when if u get caught. lie.
2. the hours from 11 pm - 7 am are sketching hours.
3. any male in cole and any female in tolman can be considered lurking/being sketchy even outside of the set aside sketch hours.
4. anyone wearing the same clothing you noticed them wearing the day before = busted
5. when lurking in towers, always go down to the first floor then come up.
6. when lurking in the commons, at least have a computer and 1 notebook so you have proof that you are taking notes on some obscure subject.
7. when you're on the vandy van between the hours of 1-5 am on a weekday and you see someone getting off on a stop where they don't live, they're lurking. but don't bust them out, because odds on you're on the vandy van for the same reason. no group project meets at 2 am.
8. generally, upperclassmen on commons after 10 pm not in the commons center = lurking
9. generally, freshmen on main campus after 10 pm not in sarratt = lurking
10. luckily, in the winter, you can hide your identity. hoods. scarves. glasses. boots.
11. if you are approached about your comings and goings and the nosy individual guesses correctly, you can/should ask them about any recent gossip concerning them to throw them off track.
12. when signing someone in to a dorm that has security [towers, ingram, north, etc] and your friend is off campus, but from the nashville area, do not write his/her correct name down. nosy people look through these lists.
13. best method of establishing a lurk connection = instant messager, as long as u close out the application afterwards. cant be traced.
14. don't be ashamed if you are indeed caught lurking. you're getting yours and the haters are greeeeeeeen.

vsdub.

1 lebanese dude from boston
1 blonde white boy from ohio
1 dominican dude from brooklyn
1 freckled black bruh from chattanooga
1 half haitian girl from cincinnati
1 night out of the busiest week in
1 room of the bcc basement taking
1 turn at a time spitting poetry and
1 by 1 we're turning ideas into magic and
1 day soon we'll speak and they'll listen.

the three.

the two of us
were the first people he met
that july two years ago
and then we became three.

and the three of us
sat on a couch
for three hours
and strived for a compromise.

although this should have been settled
last year when it was 3[+1]
and now that the [+1] is his [-1]
and she's the 1 who is trying to
destroy and dismantle what we've built.

but the three of us
have been through hell and back before
so what the hell. why not
once more.

korey.

korey works at the munchie mart in my dorm.
and he's seen me in some of my finest/
most embarrassing/ most scandalous
moments but he claims i'm still his favorite
'customer'. 

so lately, 
korey has been giving me advice on a variety
of subjects but tonight we resumed a conversation
we had last weekend about a situation that i feel like
im stuck in.

korey told me that im 20 years old
in a college full of niggas so i shouldn't
even be concerned with just one. and i explained to korey
that not everyone can grow up to be a whore like him.
true, he said. but don't let your ego and pride
blindside you. you're stubborn. and you'll
end up fighting for something
for someone
that you don't even really want.

linden franklin.

my mother always told me that there are
some people that when you meet them,
you'll know. you'll just know.

she never embellished on what i
should know but when i met him
i knew that he was the one
that i knew i should be aware of knowing.
if that makes sense.

that was over a year ago when
he was that transfer student that
answered all the questions in class
and i was the sophomore girl who
attended psci 249 only when i had
a paper due but when we finally met
i knew.

and he is the type of man who'll leave the
sports bar on a sunday
tear himself from his beloved carolina panthers
and listen to me cry
about some other nigga who broke my heart
again
and will sit quietly in my multicolored room
in the chair in the corner and listen patiently.

and during finals time we
depend on each other like ying and yang
like day and night like wrong and right
he's my alarm clock, calling me at
4:00 am
waking me from a semblance of sleep
telling me to get up and finish
our paper that's due at 11 am.

and when i tried to push him away
because i was uncomfortable with the fact that
a man genuinely cared about me
and didn't want anything in return he still
held on and i held on to his body
wrapping my arms around his broad shoulders
sobbing.

i pray for him every night
and i thank God for
transfer students