university orientation: it was a good day

Most i've interacted, socialized in months. felt soo good.
comfortable more than ever. trust my voice won't crack or strain.
rainbow bracelet from lgbtq club. club mailing lists. one for volunteer services in the community. another to decorate our rose parade float. lgbtq.
signed-up for a Christian bible study club. to learn more. smiled. would i have ever signed-up if i didn't know you?
some social failures and miscues. next time i'll get it right. won't stop trying.
walked around a lot. lots of power point slides.
bad photo ID. in spite of appearances, I don't wear lipstick.
so baking hot. direct sun splitting my skin.
perhaps join production of theater department? perhaps search for internships.
registered full-time.
teriyaki chicken at lunch.

Thoughts:
It was fun. I had more fun than I expected. Most of the day wasn't exciting. It was a lot of standing in line, sitting down, listening to people speaking, and walking around. I didn't make any friends, or really talk to people much. I was just by myself most of the time, which was okay. I normally don't mind being alone when other people are alone, too. (However, when everyone else is together and I'm the only person alone - that's when I get uncomfortable.)

The tour guide was younger than me, which was funny. I felt like I was older than a lot of people there, which probably wasn't true. But at 22, i kind of did feel out of place. it's like, "dude, you're supposed to be graduated already. what are you doing here?" But these feelings were small, and didn't really bother me. Most of this age-gap weirdness was probably only in my head.

What's done is done. let's move on. i can succeed. i can make it happen.

a weird thing popped into my mind. our tour guide was a tall, lanky white guy, about 19 years old, and wore those sunglasses with neon-colored sides. I thought, while looking at him, "Man, he's a pretty good-looking guy. I bet a lot of girls think he's really cute or handsome." I started to feel bad about myself. But then I caught myself and stopped. "Why am I comparing myself to this guy?" Why does it matter to me if girls think he's good-looking? You know? He's who he is, I'm who I am, and that's all. I can't change the way I look. I can't help it if people don't think I'm attractive. It's totally out of my reach, away from my control. Why worry myself and feel badly about it? If someone thinks I'm attractive, they'll think I'm attractive. I'm me. I can only be me. You know? This is who I am. Accept me or don't; I won't be bothered.

I really like this new place. This new life that's just beginning. Is that over-dramatic? I don't think so, since this is such a big change for me.

after lunch, we registered for classes. there were only about five other people in my major at orientation. i met my adviser. she seemed nice enough. then i had to get my ID photo taken. i talked to this couple standing in line behind me. the girl, who had dyed red hair, was one of the five in my major. she had her boyfriend with her. they were both overweight. he had really short curly hair. they were nice. i could tell the boyfriend seemed weary of me talking to his girlfriend. we started talking when he was away for a minute on his cell phone. when he got back, he immediately placed his hand on her shoulder, as if to say, "Hey, buddy. She's mine." But I talked more  to him, and it turned out he had a bachelor's in English. so we talked about that for a bit. then things kinda got awkward, and that was the end of that.

the last thing we did was walk through this room where a bunch of club representatives were stationed. this was really fun, actually. i thought it would be really hard, but the people were so nice and welcoming. i felt comfortable immediately. so that was nice. oh, and i also won a free t-shirt for spinning a wheel prize thing.

it was a nice, tiring, fun day. i feel more confident than ever in myself, in my own abilities to succeed. i feel like i'm putting some of my biggest failures and losses behind me. it really does feel like a new, healthy, strong start to my life. It feels like I'm growing up.