Jenna's House of Idiosyncrasies Version 10.0 [Focus.]

Often, it just takes one sharp pain in your gut to snap everything else into focus. That's what recently happened to me. The pain wasn't the worst I had ever felt, in fact, it wasn't distinguished in anyway. It didn't feel awful, it just felt like more of the same. The pain was just one more thing in a long series of events that indicate to me that perhaps I'm sometimes lacking some needed rule of self.

These turns of fortune, quiet murmurs when separated, gathered together at the sore place and had a pow-wow, where suddenly, in a group, they were able to make a lot of noise. The clamor was basically a plea for Jenna Tollerson to stop acting like all rules are there to be uptight and puritanical and for once take responsibility and reign herself in. I pride myself often enough on being easy-going, aiming to party, and always laughing in the faces of those who insist my less-than-wholesome behavior has any sort of destructive quality.

However, I've chosen I need to prove something to myself.

For once in my life, I need to make myself do something that I may not enjoy, for my own damn good. Forcing myself to do unpleasant-but-personal-growth-producing acts has never been my strong suit; an all-but-failed academic career is evidence enough of that. But it's something I need to be able to do if I want to get anywhere in this life. So, starting this weekend and throughout the entire month of February, I'm not going out drinking on weekends. I'm not doing this because I think my drinking is a real problem. I'm doing it to show that I can. I don't just want to say I can quit anytime I want, I want to be able to point and say, “That was a time when I said I was going to abstain and I did.” I want to know that even though that I may never care to again, that I can put down the bottle whenever I damn well please.

This reason, this needing to know, has become doubly important as I mulled over this decision for the last 48 hours. Why? Because once I decided what I needed to do, giving up my weekends at Barcode—even just for a trial period—has started to sound just this side of impossible. Of course, this serves well to underscore how badly I need to do this.

Here's the thing: between getting ready to go out, going out, and then sleeping it off, I usually pretty much manage to use up my entire weekend, every weekend. Sure, sometimes there is some leisure time in the afternoon when, still a bit groggy, I watch DVDs, maybe getting up to check my e-mail. Often though, I'll sleep from sun up to sun down, and when I greet my favorite bartenders on Saturday night, it's less than 12 waking hours since I last saw them.

I'd like to see what will go different this month. I plan to use my weekends to organize, clean, do the laundry that's been piling up for multiple weeks, and read. When the sun's out I could take photographs, walk around the neighborhood, and if it really warms up, use a mid-afternoon to lounge a bit on North Campus. I want to use a little less time being up all night and a little more time digging some sunshine.

If you'd like to engage in good Christian-youth-type activity with me, such as seeing a movie (something I now do maybe twice a year now, when given the amount of leisure time I boast should really be so much more), getting coffee, or, quite frankly, anything that will force me to get up, take a shower and leave my apartment before one in the afternoon, please do be in touch.

I feel like such a major square for doing this, but I just gotta remember, it's not forever. My birthday celebration at Barcode the first weekend in March will feel so much sweeter and more special if I've spent a month and some change getting my life together rather than just having a good time.