Boys Go to Jupiter to Get More Stupider

If you knew what I was about to write about, you would understand the irony of me being in the DC library and writing on my blog instead of tackling my horrendous workload. Ah well, in a mindless, endless, fruitless effort to keep my posts short, lets get to the point.

This weekend I went home again--HOLY CRAP, the world must really be ending in 2012--and had a relaxing weekend with my parents. Oddly enough, the euchre addiction gene seems to run in my family, as Yahoo Euchre was kind enough to babysit Robert for the duration of a peaceful weekend. I had a chance to enjoy lots of nice meals, conversations with my parents, and of course...MOVIES! What did you think we were going to watch--TV? So my parents buy tons of pirated movies from the local Chinese malls, and whenever I come home, I am obligated to get through that pile. So I started with a random one called An Education.

Synopsis pulled from the Internet: Jenny (Carey Mulligan) a very bright girl on the cusp of her 17th birthday, finds herself in a whirlwind romance with the much older David ( Peter Sarsgaard). Prior to meeting him, Jenny was working hard at secondary school to ensure getting to Oxford University. When she sees the lifestyle David can provide, one she never imagined could be hers, she's hooked and thoughts of Oxford are forgotten. Then, when things are looking pretty good for Jenny with the dashing (yet a little too smooth) David, the truth hits her like a ton of bricks. Jenny goes from being a bright eyed school girl and a sophisticated young lady, all the way back to questioning if she really knows who she is at all. 'An Education' won the Audience Choice award and the Cinematography award at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival.

Out of all the random new movies I could have chosen to watch, I was strangely drawn to this one. Can you see why? If the most you know about me is what you read from my blogs, I'm not sure if I have ever emphasized my wide-eyed, deer-in-the-headlights outlook on life. I basically have no idea what I am meant to do or if there is a place for me in life--particularly when it comes to a career. Especially at this point in my life when I have recently turned the blessed age of 19, I am more confused than ever. A HUGE part of me wants to ditch all my schoolwork, stock up on party clothes, and live the life I have stuffed under my bed for so long. Yet size is not always strength, I suppose; my tinier, vaguely obedient self longs to make anything that was ever invested in me worth something someday--especially for my parents' sake. Like Jenny, I reallllllllllllllly want to get out there and have fun, for once, but something keeps me shackled to the prospect of, what I guess you could call, a slower suicide. Sometimes I wonder if this makes me a weaker person--and not necessarily obedient. We all want to have fun. I just want to take the safer route, stay far inside the edge, and find some shallow comfort in the idea of "long term prosperity". Especially since Jenny actually had a goal and I don't, I feel I have even more reason to let loose and party...but I know realistically, if I let myself step any further into that kind of freedom and actual LIFE, I might never come back.

I'm gonna stop the post here because I feel so guilty for postponing my work again despite in-your-face looming deadlines--and the shackle is dragged along another few steps before stopping at the end of the slack.