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

It feels like an eternity, but it is has been just weeks since I lost my dog, Ginger. The whole family lost her, actually, but more than any other pet I've had, I really felt like Ginger belonged to me. I belonged to her.

Ginger, March 30, 1996 - May 5, 2010

Since I moved back to my parent's house in Winder, Ginger became primarily my responsibility. In the beginning, it just meant making sure she was fed and spending a little time with her each day. Last summer, it meant bringing her inside in the afternoons and letting her sleep or pace around my room while I worked, so she could get a break from the heat and I could have a little company. Soon after that it meant anticipating when she needed to go out, and cleaning up after her when I missed the window. I cleaned up after her a lot, and so did my parents.

Ginger started getting stuck in the bushes and groves of bamboo scattered around the yard, and I had to go out at all hours, from early in the morning to after midnight, to untangle her from whatever briar she'd gotten herself snagged in. This started happening several times every week. She'd bark and bark until I went to get her out, over time I became tuned in to that bark, so I could hear it even when I had the TV or loud music on. Read More »

There's a feeling I sometimes get before going to a party. This sensation that I'm about to step into a den of lions, where I have no control. Where there is a possibility, though sometimes faint, that I'll be eaten alive.

I've always been fairly big on comfort zones. I like knowing my surroundings, spotting all the emergency exits, finding my allies in the crowd. Not having these things makes me nervous, not just for comfort reasons but also for safety. Read More »

For kicks, or maybe because I'm just feeling beat down by the world today, I headed over to OK Cupid and retook The Death Test. The last time I took it was ages ago, back when OK Cupid was still wet behind the ears and was a place people actually visited. At that time, The Death Test predicted I would die at the age of 24, with the probable cause “sealed for privacy”. (The only reason I even know this is because OK Cupid saves your results; I had remembered it as 35 years old or so. Boy was I off.)

Since I took this test those many years ago, I have stepped up my drinking habits to a near alcoholic level, I became a smoker instead of someone who smokes sometimes, I've engaged in some lite but nevertheless illicit drug use, I've partied hard and all night, I've left my drink unattended in a crowded bar, I've driven drunk, I've kissed more people than I can count, and I've gotten into a few sticky (ahem) situations with men.

I took the Death Test this time around fully expecting at the end a fullscreen pop up that said something to the effect of OMGWTFBQQ How are you not dead already? flashing at me over a chorus of moaning evangelical Republicans.

Wait, are you maybe writing from the afterlife? 'Cause that would be so badass.

But this is not what happened. Instead, the test now says I'll die at the ripe old age of 28, of cancer. So I managed to add four years to my life, despite all my less-than-wholesome activity, but I don't get that fun feeling of wondering what cause would warrant a “sealed for privacy”. So I get to live longer, but I no longer have, say, the distant possibility that I'll die from drowning because I fell off a diving board where I've been straddling a hot Cubano pool boy, you know what I'm saying?

Did I just get more or less interesting as a person?

R.I.P. Will the Fish
2003-2005

Hi Jenna
Your Personal expected death date is 06 March 2062
You have 20983 days to live.
Have a nice day.

What we talked about in Religion today:

First, what does "I" mean? Is "I" the body? the soul? your individuality?

We all have a collection of things we would like "I" to be: your name, sex, religion, things you like (books, movies, music), people you like, the things you do each day.

But if any of these things are "I", what does it mean to say, "I am alive."?

"I will die."

Why are we afraid of death? It is suggested that because we each see ourselves as the center of existence, if you died, existence would end. "Confusing one's own ego for life is the root of the fear of death." says Sonam. Liberation from this fear comes when you stop thinking of yourself as the center of all existence. Until then the fear of death (and really, all fears, because they connect back to death, except, for maybe, public speaking) is really fearing the end of existence, of sat.

If you die, you cannot continue to experience the world. But maybe "I" is just a variable: the only thing that changes is the experience.

I am hungry. I am tired. I am happy.

Etcetera.

I could start on what it even means to be afraid, but we'll have to save it.

Last night I dreamt that they had installed these teleporters all over campus. You stood under it and it zapped you where you needed to go. But it wasn't free. They deducted money from you UGA card for every trip. I was looking at a map of all the locations of teleporters (many of which I don't think actually exist at UGA) and was very frustrated because none of them seemed to be near my building or my classes or even downtown.

Nevertheless, I decided to try it out. I punched in a code, stood under the teleporter (which, by the way, looks like the top of a shroom, especially when someone is standing under it, except more metallic) and was promptly—

zapped out into space. Where I died. Why do I always die in my dreams?

My roommate says that psychologists claim that if you die in your dreams that you die in real life, and that I'm some sort walking case study.

I don't know how true that is but it's an interesting thought.