I like the aesthetic of the forgotten but consequential human—the teacher of the dude who did the really important thing. The dude wouldn't have done the thing if the teacher hadn't said that specific thing. We'll never know their names, but we'd be worse off without them. I feel like saying this confirms that my soul is affirmed in the existence of the after-life. Post-humous recognition that you get to experience. A covered concept.

I'm notorious for saying yes a lot. Those yeses got me here, and I appreciate it. It's painful at times, but I tend to romanticize the strife.

Anyway, it's 5:30 a.m. This is my second all-nighter this week, and I've sent so many emails. Google Docs will forever be a G. I am not looking forward to moving this over to LaTeX. ChatGPT and the man above will bless me with no errors. Amen.

House music is newly discovered, and I'm a little hype. I'm wearing nice-ish clothes to sit at my desk because letting myself go usually means the end of it all.

You asked to be pushed to your limits, not explicitly, and here we are. The biggest mindset shift was that you can never drop a ball unless it's the ones that you carefully place down with intention. I'm not getting sleep today until the afternoon. I call Erika this afternoon. Tonight, I did a little work on the proposal, and it looks good. I think. I hope. I pray.

Some of me thought my passivity could persist and competence would outweigh it all, but frustration would get me to speak my mind. Passive aggression is seeded in some nasty emotion; trust me, I know. I stood on what some would call business the other day, and it felt good.

Paper submissions are coming up. I'm submitting two papers. It's grind time. Classes are over, and I have a lot of time. This time last semester was horrendous. Relatively doing much, much better. Busy, but in a different way. I am in a much better place to handle it, though.

For the econ paper, my collaborator went ghost, found another one and so it goes. I was frustrated, but it happened. I found another one not too long ago after being confused about what to do. Collaborating means I would theoretically do less work; their experience is also good. Anyway, you do more work. This is life. Ended up meeting someone else. He can't co-author, but he is very helpful. All the stake is on me; this may be good.

He sends a ton of feedback over email and he's now heading off to start an assistant professorship. Will probably be busy for a while, but excited for him. He's a sweetheart. Thanks for responding to my email.

Everything feels urgent.

I met this woman a few weeks ago, and she instantly psychoanalyzed me in a comforting way. She said that not everyone deserved to look you in the eye. Opposing the courteous eye contact we were taught to make. No way. No damn way.

But I kind of get it now. There's too much for one to say. So much that the correct amount is almost none. Courtesy is a lie at times. This blog is a lie in some ways. I don't talk like this. You don't know that I probably have this blog because I fear being uninteresting. And I write words here to cope. There is so much you don't know.

You get this lick of being the reason something happens, a lick of trying, and it paid off, a lick of reading so much that you can hold your own in conversation, a lick of what happens when you do your homework, a lick of disappointment when you realize not everyone does. The worst and common one being a lick of your scars from fumbling and tumbling because at the end of the day you're just a buggy, imperfect human, prone and bound to error.

But let's taste everything because if you do everything, you'll win.

Let's do it. Or try and eat dirt. But at least you licked that, too.