WHO AM I???? Jean Valjean!!!!

Dear Diary,

You know when the caterpillar in Alice in Wonderland asks Alice who are you? Well I've been thinking about it. It seems like such an easy question when he says it, like the act of answering one name but it is pretty hard to explain. Sometimes I don't even really know, those are usually the times I find myself cheating on a test or not being able to stand up for a friend. Those are the times when I think and say that I am loyal and truthful but then end up lying to someone or telling them a secret. It's also things like never really being able to figure out what to wear in the morning that complicates the question Who am I? 

Then again I think I may be just complicating things Liza said we should write a little bit about ourselves but I'm pretty sure who I am is a part of that. Maybe I'll just tell you things that shape who I am since I obviously am having problems answering the question directly.

My name is Nikki. N-i-k-k-i, not Nicky, Nicki, Nikky or Nicole, and most definitely not Nicole.

I play basketball and just started acting this summer. In my free time I write poetry and stories that never get finished, but mostly poetry. I also read a hell of a lot, you could say it is one of my favorite things not unlike snow flakes on eye lashes. That brings me to the third thing I like which is musicals.

WOW I never thought I would sound more filling out a profile on eharmonyish than this. I know I'm saying my own work sounds like something of eharmony when I'm supposed to be a confident young women but it is just sooo hillarious. Oh! that brings me to another fun fact about me I laugh at myself and random things way to often. For example when Javer died in the movie version of Les Miserables and his back cracks I guffawed. Also, I started laughing randomly in the hallway by myself when I thought I was hearing moaning noises from the boys bathroom.

I guess that kind of shapes up who I am but as my humanities teacher stated that she will learn more about us through the work we accomplish, you diary, will learn more about me through the things that I write.

Love,

Nikki

Saskia

Dear people (I'm sorry, I can't do the whole dear diary thing....),

Hiya! I'm Saskia (SAS-like sassy or sassafras-KEE-like a key you put in a lock-UH-like UH I have so much math homework to do)

Here's a little about me...

I have two little sisters

I love trees

I love stars and skies

I have a dog, Cleo, two cats, and two fish

I am a vegetarian

I love outside

I love drama

I love animals

I love nature

I love swimming, climbing, running, dancing

I love ramen

I love stuffed animals

I love music

I love trumpet

I love rain, in fact, I dance in it


I love life!

Adventure Time!

Dear Diary,

I feel like there are so many times were I feel like sprinting, running, climbing up a tree and overall having an adventure but daily life stops me. Who creates this system of life and why don't people ever seem to doubt it? everyday going to school, freaking out over a test about quadratic functions. Everyday I continued circle over and over, a life of organization, planning and trying to always be on top of things. No one ever has asked me whether I wanted that life.

When I was young I did not care about grades or money or college all I cared about was getting to school in the morning and hanging out with friends. Most days after school I went outside stole fruit from peoples yards, visited the crazy dog lady, ran around the neighborhood or bought candy from CVS. Of course my grades sucked and I got in trouble a little but I felt adventurous, daring and full of life. 

Ever since seventh grade I've been wanting to have an adventure, wanting it to come and sweep me away instead of me finding it so teachers and parents won't call me irresponsible, idiotic or inconsiderate. Yet nothing ever comes besides the things I make up that keep me up all night. Things that make me scream for someone to check under my bed for monsters because I made myself think the footsteps outside the door were those of a mutation.

One day I'm determined to have an adventure in a distant land were I will become a pirate and battle faeries. Die a noble death and have my last words be may adventure find you at every corner, and someone will write it on a great list of quotes under mine name because they were my death words. Even though some poor girl who lived through adventure books and never had any friends but was brilliant will have said it before. Oh goodness gracious now I've gone and ruined the ending. Eh, well when does life ever have a perfect ending.

Now, to prevent myself from going on an angsty rant about how life sucks I'm going to do my math homework and listen to my Les Miserables soundtrack. Oh my goodness I LOVE MARIUS!!!!! goddammit I'm just a rant machine.

Okay now seriously I have to learn about quadratic functions or whatever its called.

Sincerely,
Nikki

Liza on Valentines Day, being in love, and herself.

Dear Diary,

Teenage love feels super present now that all the stores are switching their merchandise from used Santa Claus costumes to Valentines Day shit.  Last Valentines Day, my friend and I wore all-black, expressed our newfound teen angst to all those who were watching.  My crush gave me a card and I was giddy, which sort of killed the deadpan mood I was hoping to spread to the annoyingly awkward middle school couples surrounding me, and I remember skipping to my locker and singing A TEENAGER IN LOVE to a tune that sounded right, creating the soundtrack to an imaginary movie about me having a crush and being the only one to dance at the 7th grade dance and biking around the neighborhood and making hot chocolate.  Everything felt perfect, black lip gloss smeared across my chapped lips and my mom's heavy black skirt swishing against my thighs.  There's something addictive about crushes, like listening to the same playlist over and over knowing that it'll get you through the day until you get sick of it and it's just this constant thrumming in the background when you craft or do homework or whatever, and it's specialness is kind of gone.  Crushes LAST in a different way, though--thinking about experiences and songs and excitement and nervousness and movies that I associate with certain crushes gives me a rush of nostalgia and longing, like there's always a piece of me that longs for not as much that person but the excitement of admitting to the piece of notebook paper I write angsty poetry on, or later, a friend, while we watch Arrested Development on the floor of her basement, that I'm in LOVE.
I'm Liza, by the way, thirteen almost fourteen, eighth grade, stuffy but prestigious private school, cracked (not a brand or a nail sticker, actually cracked, like in the olden days) nail polish adorned nails, unmade bed, red cheeks, unfinished but satisfying when I wrote them to-do lists dotting my desk, spotify playlists playing as I clean up my room.  There's so much that comes to mind when I introduce myself--through writing especially, because with writing you can choose how you want to be seen--but I'm holding off on jucier labels for the time being. 
I have to go work out now, watch 30 Rock, think about roller derby, and then read about soil in my science textbook.
Love,
Liza

the crew.

The Crew came about when a dad asked how the crew was doing.  It’s what we joke about calling ourselves and the table we sit at, our semi-ode to Mean Girls and Heathers and the kind of girl-gang-movie-exclusivity we pride ourselves on not having but secretly sort of desire.  We’ll post in diary entry style, inspired by the Dear Diary aspect of Rookie Magazine, and though we don’t know what this will or won’t turn into, we’re hoping to be able to use this really public forum as a way to embrace the kind of shit that comes up in diaries wrapped in tissue paper underneath an unmade bed—cheesy, awkward, melodramatic, entries that talk to the diary like it’s a living breathing human whose sole job is to take in secrets, experimental swearing, smears of chocolate, unfinished collages and political statements.  Crushes and secrets and rants and anecdotes and LIFE.  We hope that this can become a blog for girls to be inspired by or, almost more importantly, to relate to, to help them (us) feel like there’s a huge clan of confusing, sexy, awkward, gangly, noisy, confident, bitchy, fantastic humans spread out around the world. 

Sincerely,

the crew.