post the thirty-third

I've been home for a little more than a week now, and I'm finally realizing how much I simultaneously like and dislike being home over break.

Wow, that wasn't what I'd intended to talk about. Let's go with this thought for a little bit, though.

I really do like being home. Christmas yesterday was one of the finest Christmases of my life. Not only did everyone get everything they wanted (except possibly for me not getting the Gorillaz' Demon Days - sadness), but the things that we got were clever and useful. I now have copies of both Boggle and Scrabble that I'm excited to get some use out of when I return to school. We all genuinely enjoyed one another's company. I haven't had so much fun with my family in years, I don't think. We've gone all over town and just had fun with each other over the last few days. I like being home.

There are, of course, obvious reasons to not enjoy being at home, though. My younger brother was a little impatient on Christmas morning. He woke up at 4:00 and couldn't go back to sleep for excitement; at 6:00, he decided he couldn't take it anymore and decided to wake everyone else by playing Flogging Molly as loud as he could. This caused my youngest brother to respond by bellowing, "Ho ho homicide," which aptly summed up what the rest of us were feeling. He shut up for then, but came back with a vengeance around 7:00, screaming at the top of his lungs, "Wake up! It's Christmas! WHY AREN'T WE OPENING PRESENTS?!"

For reference, he's 17.

That in and of itself isn't enough to convince me that being at home isn't all it's cracked up to be. I love being with my family - really, I do - but the fact that I just don't know anyone my age here other than my sister is a little rough. I moved to Portland when I was starting my senior year in high school (oh, that was fun), so I only really had one year to get to know people here. Most everyone I got to know during that year has either moved away, gotten married, eloped and vanished, or gone insane. (I am not exaggerating in the slightest. I got to know an interesting group of people.) Now, when I come home, I spend time with my family and no one else. There's really no one else to hang out with. It's fun for a while, but it gets old pretty quick. I love being at school so I can be with people that I can relate to. That's probably what I miss most about being at school - all the good friends that I have. Yes, I miss you all, unless you're one of the people who happened to stumble on my blog and doesn't really know me, in which case I probably don't miss you all that much.

Don't worry, though. Life is still good. I'm happy. I like being home. And I'm excited to go back and get my life moving again.