Sunday, August 3, 2008

Daily Education on a Thursday

Assuming that I'm looking at the right calendar, (which in my experience is not necessarily likely,) today was a Thursday.

I say 'was' because the day is more or less over. Actually, the fact that it was a Thursday is not so important to me as the fact that this Thursday was August the Third, 2008. I don't even particularly enjoy Thursdays. My favourite day of the seven is Monday, despite popular consensus that it is a dreary and miserable day. My fondness for it is probably due to three things; firstly, that I haven't yet had a proper job to which I dread returning on Mondays; secondly, that I rather like school, so Monday is a pleasant day for me; and thirdly, I was born on a Monday.

I don't know why this should matter. I would bet that most people don't even know what day of the week they were born on, only the number and month and year, and their ignorance is justified; it doesn't really matter at all. This year my birthday is on a Wednesday, and last year it was probably some other day, and which one it was doesn't make the slightest difference in whether or not it comes or how many presents I get or how many years older I am.

Still, knowing that I was born on a Monday, I can't help but feel some appreciation for that well under-appreciated day. If it weren't for Mondays, I would have been born on either a Sunday or a Tuesday, and I don't like either of them very much, (my hamster died on a Tuesday and Sunday reminds me of churches,) so I owe that to Mondays. I try to repay this debt by rooting for them whenever I can, though Fridays and Saturdays seem to be the preferred days of my peers. Such is life.

The third, on the other hand, is a much more appropriate label for this day. The third of August is even more helpful. With that information, I can tell you that there are a hundred forty-four days until Christmas, ninety-one days until Halloween, thirty-five days until school begins, fourteen days until I go to camp and six days until I turn fifteen. Those last two probably don't matter to you very much, but they're a point of interest for me, and possibly my friends and family, who will be obliged to celebrate another year of my existence through gifts and kind words. Personally I don't find it that exciting. All that's happened is that the Earth has gone for another spin around the Sun, which it does every year anyways, and time has passed in that elusive way it has. What boggles my mind is that people honour my birthday because, and I quote, "I'm a year older." Unless I'm very much mistaken, EVERYONE is a year older than they were this day a year ago, aren't they?

Besides, my existence should be celebrated every day. (Joking.)

As meaningless as it might very well be, it's my birthday that's been haunting my thoughts for the past couple days, and no doubt will continue to do so for the next week. It's a nice place to start blogging, though; something easy to talk about, easy to relate to, simple and uncontroversial. Not that I'm not a fan of controversy. I just wouldn't want to scare off my readers too early.

Birthdays are fun. They mean parties and presents and copious amounts of sugar in diverse forms; candy, cake, pop and etc. I don't know what I'm going to do for a party this year, or indeed if I will do anything... I haven't in previous years, mostly due to laziness and lack of motivation, but I do have a season's pass to Wonderland this year. That holds potential.

At this point you're probably wondering what I want for my birthday, since, parties aside, gifts are the most important part of being older. What's the point of being worshipped for a day if people don't give you anything you want? That being said, I'm not the kind of person who wants a lot. Well, okay -- let me reiterate that. I don't want many material things. I mean, I'd like a horse, or a castle built entirely of chocolate, or a jet plane, but I would give up all that and more for happiness, understanding, knowledge, articulacy or wisdom, to name a few. Unfortunately those don't go on sale, so my wishlist is limited to the superficial, and also constrained by reason. (eg, the chocolate castle is out of the question, and so, most likely, are the horse and jet plane. Shame.)

With those restrictions in place and the past several months of brooding contemplation, I've dredged from the swamp of desire three items that I'm now broadcasting to the world in the hopes that at least one of them will arrive along with the socks and sweaters. Here they are, prioritized for your convenience;

1) iPhone 3G. I'm not picky about size, (gigabytes, not physical size,) though the bigger the better. I am the only fifteen year old I know who is not currently in possesion of a cell phone, and though this never used to bother me, my friends are becoming increasingly irritated with my mooching off their minutes. I've been drooling over the iPhone basically since the first rumours of its release hit the internet, and owning one would be the culmination of my life-long dreams. Or close enough.

2) House. Not in the bricks-and-mortar sort, but in the medical-soap-drama variety. You know, the TV show? With nothing better to do in the long lazy months of summer, friends and I have been sporadically renting and watching episodes of the show, and after three sleepless nights and twenty-something hours of back-to-back House M.D. delight, I've developed a severe addiction to the show which can only be treated by buying all the seasons I can get my hands on.

3) Books. I figure this is self-explanitory, but I'll explain it some more. I love writing. Consequentially, I love reading. I don't know which one I started loving first, actually, but now that I practice the both of them with near religious zeal, I figure nothing can be better for an aspiring writer than to be a voracious reader as well. I will read anything I can get my hands on, though I have a penchant for YA fiction, sci-fi and fantasy novels. I love reading about religion and religious history, science, culture, language, philosophy, psychology, and I do enjoy the occasional (or frequent) murder mystery. I have a growing list of forty-something titles I would love to aquire and I'm hoping for gift cards to help me cut that list down to a bearable size.

Wow. Glad I got that over with. Listing my wishes for this year is more painful a procedure than one might imagine, and its completion has left me thoroughly depressed. The sad truth is that I can't really even hope for two of the mentioned three, since an iPhone is made out of the question by the fact that our family plan is with Bell, and thus I have to get a phone serviced by the same company. Thus my dreams of an iPhone are dashed to pieces. As for the House, well, both my parents are under the belief that buying any part of a series I've already seen is a thorough waste of money and time, and since they both insist that I'll only watch them once anyways, they would rather I just rented the discs whenever I felt the need. How to convey to them the irrefutable grip of teenage obsessive fandom? I'm afraid it can't be done, and so I'll have to go Houseless (but fortunately not homeless,) for quite a while.

Recounting this verdict still stings, since they only just informed me today of my dreams' futility. No doubt I'll get over it in due course and go on hoping for other impossibilities in that dogged denial for which humanity is known. It's not assured that I'll ever get anything I wish for, but at the very least, we can always count on Friday to come after Thursday.

Until Friday,
Ember Knowles

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I love you, Ember hunni ;D