Don't Want to Say Goodnight

Some quotes I've been meaning to put up.

Torch: So how many years is it before it's murder instead of late-term abortion--sixteen, seventeen?

Toad: Bacon is one of my two favorite tastes.
Trin: ...What's the other one?
Toad: (cough) Girls.

Jade and Trin died laughing. >:)

Trin: Oh my god. I'm going to have to cook bacon all the time now aren't I? I don't eat bacon!
Toad: I can survive on other things besides bacon...

She died laughing. It was awesome.

Trin: So do your parents drink coffee?
Me: Yeah.
Trin: Okay. They're good people.

Oh boy. Talk about a whirlwhind of emotions the last couple of days.

Some news:

The main computer is not working so I'm alternately borrowing Mom's and donewithmorals. And I am just realizing that the smell giving me flashbacks is this laptop overheating and reminding me of Steve's LAN party all the way back at the beginning of the summer. Crazy. It seems like a year ago or just last week.

I'm home from camp, so now my task is basically pack everything up for school and WI. Camp was...camp was camp. Camp was fucking insane, camp was fucking amazing. That's really...all I have to say about that. I can't possibly tell every story, so I won't tell any. You'll have to get them from me in person if you want to know--since I talk now and all. :P

And...I met someone. And I'm happy. :) Really really happy. And she's amazing and beautiful and just a really cool person. And did I mention awesome and hot? And I had an amazing couple of days with her before I had to go back to CT.

I'm still trying to figure out how to mention it to my parents--well, my mom, because my dad's in WI. See, 'cause I don't know whether I should have the hard conversation first (Lindsay) or the nice conversation first (Trin). Or when I'll have time to have either properly.

But I did manage to use my interpersonal crisis management skills from camp to tell her that we value different information when meeting people and her reaction when I don't have the answers to all the factual questions she asks about my friends makes me uncomfortable and doesn't inspire me to get the information she wants next time. Which is a problem we've had for a long time.

See, because she asked me where Trin goes to school before we were even out of the train station and I had to say I didn't know. It's either something that never came up in a story, or I didn't think to ask, or I was told and I don't remember. She always wants to know that sort of thing and it's never the way I catalog people in my head. Like I had this whole conversation with my brother about how it's not the what, or the where, it's the why and the how that make the who. It means more to me to know the look on her face when she sees a shooting star, or how she stands up for her principles, or how she talks to a homesick kid for five minutes and manages to not only figure out what's wrong but get them to stop crying and go to sleep and have a good week and that she does it not just because it's her job but that it's her job because she cares--instead of what year she was born in, or what kind of neighborhood she lives in, or where she goes to school. The latter are things I'll pick up eventually, but they don't make Trin, Tricia.

Anyway, that was my philosophy lecture for the day. I don't really have much more to say because I have stuff to do and people to call. I'll do my best to catch up on people's entries but I know I won't be able to, so I'm sorry. Also, I found these gorgeous boots that I'm trying to convince my mom I should have--and anyone who knows me will be utterly shocked that I want them. O:P

Love to all.

Fuck camp drama.

That's all I have to say about that.

I got to kayak this week! It was awesome.

I don't know. There's stuff going on but I don't really feel like writing about it. Just living it is enough. Ask me sometime if you want to know stories because guess what--I actually talk now. :P Sometimes.

It's been a long week, and it's only Wednesday. Well, at least things haven't been boring, huh?

Apparently some people have been complaining that Trinity has been playing favorites with Jade and me--because of the whole Jade-and-Toad-are-twins-and-Trinity-is-their-mom story thing--maybe. Honestly, because all of this comes through convoluted channels so nobody knows who specifically is complaining, it's all very confusing. And upsetting. That's one thing.

The other thing is that apparently, Council has recommended/decreed that all staff be referred to as "she." We're all so pleased.

And you know, I'm not even that upset about it for myself--I was never expecting to get anything else, and although I may have gotten spoiled by getting the treatment that I prefer, I was prepared for the alternative when I took this job.

However, I am upset about it on principle. We preach safe space hard and fast around here--how can we claim that camp is a safe space for kids if it's not also safe space for the counselors? I even told Trinity that it was the single thing that made me feel most welcome, that she used male pronouns for me almost automatically. And it's ridiculous to bring it up now, because we're halfway through the sixth session. And it's ridiculous anyway. I always thought the Girl Scouts were better than the Boy Scouts--I even described it that way to someone, "it's sort of like the Boy Scouts, only much cooler." But if this is going to be their un-official official position--because it's not like they're making an official statement that gender identity is either worthless or important, either way--then I don't think I'm cool with that.

And I'd been seriously thinking that this was something I could do for awhile. Like sure, there are things I don't agree with or that I think could be done better--I'd get that anywhere. But I feel safe here. And this is something I can actually do, and it's fun and it's challenging and it's good for the kids. But if this is going to be their attitude...

And really, it does bother me for myself. Because as much as it doesn't matter which pronouns I get for most people, I think it would really bother me if certain people suddenly had to switch to female. Guess who.

And really really, it bothers me because all of this is breaking Trin's heart.

This is my life.

Thanks a lot, Liz. While I was in denial I wasn't thinking about it all the damn time. :P

I got the best present ever from my secret buddy last night. It's this really adorable dragon puppet. Betty named it Frog. :D I keep sneaking it out of my bag and playing with it. :DDDD

This week is holiday week, so yesterday was the whole camp's un-birthday and today is Christmahanukwanzakah, basically. So Santa came to breakfast. Trin was like "Go get Jade, I want a picture of my kids with Santa." Because apparently, on top of Jade and I being twins, Trinity is our mom. She has a pin now that says "Toad and Jade are my BABIES!" that Jade made. I'm working on one for her that'll have all the Matrix code behind her name but actually correct, because she has a similar one only it has the wrong alphabet.

Yeah, yeah, shush.

Anyway. I will probably be in Baltimore again this weekend because it's third Friday and thus terribly significant what with the high percentage of the staff and I have been invited by Trinity. Lol, so my dorky "I've seen you before. I saw you last week--you were Rainbow Brite *sheepish grin*" has apparently convinced that group that I'm a trustworthy off-camp companion.

I don't know. There are a lot of undercurrents that I miss.

Also, I hate it that everyone here assumes that I don't like boys. I was watching Patch Adams a little earlier and I squealed when I saw Alan Tudyk because I didn't know he was in it and Jade said something like "Walking back into the closet, Toad?" Like okay, I like girls, I like girls a lot--but that doesn't preclude the possibility of me liking boys. Jesus people.

The Brownies are having a "fairy jamboree," according to Trouble, and they're all so adorable.

So this week is holiday week, and Thursday is fall holidays--including Halloween. Jade wants to be Morticia Adams and have me be Gomez. She has a shirt for me. And it's not like I have any other options because I didn't know it was holiday week, but...I don't know. It just bothers me a bit. Too bad Foliage doesn't have anymore black hairdye or I probably could be convinced to dye it. Although then I would be stuck looking terribly emo for the rest of the summer.

I always wanted black hair when I was a kid. Or red hair--I really wanted red hair.

I'm going to let Margarita on now and go back to the movie.

I really do not want to be sucked into being Jade's nursemaid but I feel like a complete bastard if I do anything else. I guess I'm not as strong as I thought I was. I asked her not to tickle me with campers around (she runs up behind me and grabs my stomach--it's not even really tickling because it's too quick and too hard and it actually kind of hurts) because I don't want to provide an example to them that attacking people is okay. And I almost, almost took it back because of her reaction. Almost. She trained me well.

Anyway. Love to all as always. :)

Okay. I've got, like, five minutes because this computer is so slow.

So obviously, since it's been awhile since I had any contact with anyone, I've got stories to tell, and no time to tell them.

Last week was fine. Only three days worth of campers, no problems, it was all good. I had a great time working with Pinky, Narcissus, and Panda. They're like the coolest people ever.

The weekend was...interesting. Trinity, Trouble, and Mad River make me nervous because I don't know what they think of me. I went to Claymate's house with Jade, and I finally got to see Ocean's Eleven. It was pretty good, but I like Twelve better. And Twelve was even better with everything from Eleven to help it make sense. Anyway.

So we didn't even finish Eleven but still stayed up until about three a.m.--laughing, cuddling, and being silly, basically. Because apparently, Jade is also cuddly. So that was nice. I got my neck scratched. :)

Saturday we slept until 2, lounged for awhile, took showers, went out to TGIFridays to pretend it was Jade's birthday. Then we went back to Claymate's house and finished all the movies.

Then we weren't sure what to do, because we still had laundry, it was 10:30, and staff meeting was 10 the next morning. We decided it would be a great idea to find Victor/Victoria at Walmart (because it hadn't been at Blockbuster) and watch it in the staff house while we did our laundry. We didn't think about the fact that everyone who had gone to the beach that day would be in the staff house. That was kind of where it all went to hell.

Basically, Claymate is not well at all, Jade got no sleep, and I got about five hours. Sooooo today was fun.

Good news, I have a button that says "[Angelfish] ♥ me" from Angelfish and one that says "Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal" from Pinky. I gave her back one that said "Mine is an evil laugh." Yay Firefly.

Yeah. I'll probably say more in letters to people because my breaks over. I sent some letters out on like Thursday, so write back so I have something to do!

Love you all.

Okay, so a semi-real entry today, although not much of a one because it's rather late and there's stuff I have to be doing tomorrow. Stuff like getting Father's Day gifts and finishing my room.

I went to an absolutely wonderful play tonight with my parents. The Drawer Boy by Michael Healey. It has three actors, it's set in Canada, and it's beautiful. It's hilarious, and poignant, and it's real even though it's ridiculous.

Something I just remembered after reading a totally unrelated mialamu entry: when Ben (Liz's-new-roommate-Kate's Ben) was giving me a tour of his house, he offhandedly mentioned his Illuminati game. And I was going, I've heard that name before, but where...? and then I remembered. I played it with Lindsay and Jon and nimue9 and veganstatesbest and kamili and others--possibly Paul, Kayla, mialamu, and twoscoopsofruit?--the first time I was in Chapel House, maybe the second or third week of school. I remember being horribly confused by the game, and horribly awkward around people who knew each other very well but I didn't know so well, but very glad to snuggle with Kris. :) And I had totally forgotten said memory until Ben mentioned the game.

I think teaching may not be such an incomprehensible choice after all. This week at camp didn't really feel like work for some reason. I felt invincible. When she picked me up at the train station, my mother asked, "So were you just a camp counselor goddess?? :D" and I cringed--but the concept isn't that far off the mark. Not that I'm an amazing counselor, because I was totally out of my depth in dealing with some of the stuff we had, just that it seemed to fit me somehow.

I mean, I was definitely eager for my two hours of break time every day by the end of the week, but the intervening time didn't feel like work like cleaning my room or reading my Physics textbook does. I had a splitting headache Thursday afternoon and evening, but I was an energetic Toad right through it. It's frankly a little ridiculous. We'll see if I feel the same way by the end of the summer.

I feel different at camp. Bolder. At least around the kids--I'm pretty much the usual Rob around just the staff. It was really interesting watching myself subside into my regular self as I left camp on Friday. It was also interesting to hear similar things that Liz always says to me coming out of Trinity's mouth. She didn't say them like Liz does, but it was the same basic "Rob never speaks; he should speak more" concept.

Trinity is a puzzle. Not once has she used female pronouns in reference to me. And I am dead serious, not once. Like, am I that obvious? Or is she just good at recognizing the signs because of who her friends are?

There was a lot of gender stuff going on this week. I got a huge kick out of it too. I was highly amused because two of the counselors are Charm City Boys. I was asked twice to my face by campers if I was a boy, and apparently other counselors were also asked about me. And half the staff had adopted male pronouns by the end of the week after numerous "mistakes" made it obvious that I didn't mind in the least. We played the "switch with me" game Thursday night and someone called out "Switch with me if you're a girl"--so there's me, blithely not moving an inch while everyone else looks for another pair of shoes. The kids are mostly like "what the hell" and the staff are mostly "yeah, so?" about it. And I'm not the only one.

Yeah, so to all the crew who were like "Girl Scout camp? WTF?" when I told y'all about it--this is fucking awesome.

I don't really know how I feel about pronouns in general. From strangers, I'm tickled pink to get assumptions that I'm male and disappointed/annoyed as hell to get assumptions that I'm female. From friends, either one is fine, but interestingly. I don't mind female pronouns from friends like the CWIT crew; I expect it, I'm used to it, it just suits those relationships. Female pronouns from my brother don't rankle because despite my non/gender-ness I don't think we have a brotherly relationship. (My parents are a different story because it makes me feel like they don't care--which I know is ridiculous because it's my responsibility to say something if it bothers me and I haven't.) Male pronouns from the FA crew make me feel...safe. And now it's the same with camp. It's very odd. I feel protected, sheltered when people use hes instead of shes. It's a feeling like being stroked on the head.

Another thing about camp is that the lines of drama have already been drawn after three weeks of contact--but I've missed two of those weeks, so I'm not included in them. So I'm not fighting with anyone yet, as far as I know. I get all the sides because people vent to me as neutral territory. I actually like that. I'm not very good at giving feedback and I don't like it when people expect me to take sides, but I like knowing what's going on. I guess I'm just a hopeless gossip. :P

I hope the rest of the summer continues as well as the first week went, despite all of the issues there were to deal with. One thing I do know is that I'm suffering from a serious dearth of cuddling. After that intense weekend of cuddling, I was busy getting ready for camp for that week, and then busy at camp the next week, and I haven't gotten any cuddles since. Trouble did this weird thing Friday morning at flag ceremony where he sort of snuggled into my side and put his head on my shoulder--which was nice but how the hell do you react to that? And Dragonfly sort of hugged me Thursday night and I think she kissed the top of my head in the process?--which was also nice but how the hell do you react to that? But what really made me realize that I need some cuddling is that one of my campers touched my necklace because she was admiring it and I caught my breath a little because I wasn't expecting it.

I just want to curl up in a pile with someone(s) and relax. Obviously there are a few someones who are high on the list but I'll take cuddling from whoever.

I think that's about it for tonight because it's 3AM and I didn't really want to stay up so late. I'm sleepy and I shouldn't be exhausted for going back to camp--because although I go to bed earlier and get more sleep than I do here, it's not as good sleep on those damn cots. Tomorrow I will most likely be pretty busy but I think there are a few more thoughts bouncing around in here.

It's interesting having to be ON all the time. I haven't really experienced that before. I don't know whether, having experienced it, I'll be able to actually do my work next semester because I'm good at keeping track of things and doing what needs to be done, or I'll just be so sick of it by the end of the summer that I'll do nothing at all.

So it's my second day of working and I haven't lost any kids yet. I'm on "Three For Me," with 24 11-13-year-olds, in the second-farthest unit from main camp. I knew everyone's names by last night--all my kids, anyway. I'm still working on some of the counselors.

I'm working on letters. I started them Saturday night because I had nothing else to do, and then I haven't had any free time since to finish or send them.

This place is definitely a den of lesbians. I'm amused. I've counted seven so far.

I finally decided on Toad. Now I just need to learn how to respond to it in less than three tries.

It's been raining almost nonstop since Saturday afternoon. The pond overflowed last night so we had to wade through knee-deep (on the girls) water to get to breakfast this morning, as well as numerous puddles. It takes 20-30 minutes to get from main camp to Bald Eagle, and we've already done it like six times today. Wading through puddles every time. My feet look like they belong to a corpse because they've been sitting in water all day.

I think I'm doing pretty well though. I started to shut down about an hour and a half ago, though, when I was supposed to have a break but couldn't. There's a girl in my unit who's got some issues and in any group she's in we need one counselor to keep an eye on her and one counselor to watch the others, so when we split up for archery and horses, and I was supposed to take my break, I had to walk with Margarita to the stables so she wasn't alone.

Other than that, life is life. Also, I'm always hungry. I guess because I'm always walking. I just keep eating and eating. I finished off a bowl of ham bits and a bowl of cheese gratings that were supposed to go with scrambled eggs after I'd had my eggs and hashbrowns because I was so hungry. I was so hungry I actually ate hashbrowns.

Oy. Yesterday was so crazy that I don't even know what the rest of the week will be like. But I'm alive and it's a good experience and it's fun for the most part. I can deal with 11-13-year olds. It's 2-year-olds that give me trouble (sorry Declan).

I really pimped out the button maker yesterday...I have a button that says TOAD but has a horrible drawing (mine) of a frog, a button that says DON'T PANIC, and a button with a rainbow(-ish) on it. And I made myself a rainbow spiral knot choker out of embroidery floss, and a hemp choker that I put my tiger kanji pendent on. So now I'm wearing three necklaces (with my dragon necklace), plus my staff ID.

When I put on my staff shirt on Monday, Mad River said, "Oh, you look cute in orange." So I guess, since she's like the fourth person to say that, orange is a good color for me. o_o

I hope I can get people to ease up around me.

Anyway, I should probably get going. I hope everyone is well. :)

I need a camp name for Girl Scout camp by, presumably, Saturday. Help me out?

Just leave suggestions, maybe with some reasons why if you think they're particularly suited to me, and I'll consider them. I'm open to both serious and silly. :)