Why So Serious?

I often wonder how people perceive me, whether they think me rude or sarcastic or funny or moody or serious... And then I'm reminded that my constant mood swings and flip-flopping emotions change their perceptions whenever they see me.

They can clearly see the smile on my face and in my eyes, insane though it may appear; the crease between my eyebrows and the anger glittering in my irises is a clear 'back off' statement; the clear and open-eyed look on my face means I'm listening intensely and thinking.

But in my writing, I'm not visible. There are not tell-tale hand tremors to be noticed by readers when I'm nervous, no teasing smirk to let them know I'm only joking and I didn't mean it.

Which is where my tone comes in. Or is it my topics? How I write? I set out not only to inform, but to make readers feel emotionally connected--whether they laugh or cry or, hell, anything in between, I want them to imagine themselves in the same situations, or form an opinion about something.

I've noticed the posts on my blog aren't... well, they aren't necessarily cheerful or funny. In fact, for some reason, I come off as serious in quite a few (in my own opinion). Some, because of my topics--I'm very reflective on this blog. Others, because I was feeling lame that day? I don't know why.

So for today, I'm going to try not to reflect on anything. Instead, I'm writing a list. A list doesn't even have tone, most of the time. Today, I attempt the art of toneless.

Of Things To Do:

*Call Jenny and set up a hair cut, possibly for Friday before the fashion show. Ask for Les' senior picture.
*Finish scholarship crap. Yes, crap. It's more annoying than an application to college itself.
*Make flashcards with derivative, antiderivative, inverse functions, integration of log(arithims) and natural logs, ect.
*Call Nick, plan fashion show performance
*Stop by Barnes and Noble (get gas first!)
*Get gas when I get money for my article in the paper... any day now, check, I'm waiting...
*Shave my legs
*Call Laurie about job interview results
*Congratulate Qutob and Mortensen on pregnancies
*Write both papers on Dorian Gray
*Write Ayn Rand final research paper
*Research prices/grants/loans for SFSU
*Proof-read/edit final pages/index
*Start new story?/continue old idea
*Wash Sharpie mustache off of index finger now that Zack can't yell at me about 'shaving' it off
*Find something else to do besides scan facebook, blog uselessly, read fanfiction, and ignore assignments

Better get started, I suppose.

~hyacinth

Song Rec: "Gold Guns Girls" by Metric