Finding Emmy

It’s officially been a near month since my last blog post. I wish that I could say my absence stemmed from the lack of excitement or blog-worthy material, but it has actually just been the total opposite. Aside from finally making the jump from PC to Mac (I have to admit, I have never made a better decision)… my life has been completely flipped over. The total reclusion from my outlet, the blog… was not necessarily by choice. During these past weeks, I have hardly had the chance to live, much less blog about it. However, on the last “night” of summer (as in, the last one before sleeping to go to class), I am blogging instead of being “cool” and living it up true college style.

Back in the days of Oops! I did it again… and Bye Bye Bye (do I really need to mention the artists?), I used to laugh at the pitiful souls that couldn’t seem to find “themselves.” I didn’t understand how someone could ever be “lost.” It was such a sad stupid concept within my own 7th grade rationale. I mean, if you managed to “lose oneself,” could you really expect that you’d possess the actual intellect to find “yourself?”

Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.
-Dorothy Gale, The Wizard of Oz

Nonetheless, no one was more surprised than me when I found myself at 22-years-old, in a position that could only rival the one of my childhood hero (who I actually had the privilege of portraying in my school’s 6th grade rendition), Dorothy Gale from Kansas. From the time I was 3, I wanted to be Dorothy Gale from Kansas. Transposed to a magical world that eventually led back to the same safe spot–HOME. However, starring in a 6th grade play is one thing, but realizing you’re Dorothy within your own life is quite another.

When I first realized that somehow, I had managed to do the impossible, the unthinkable, unimaginable, ridiculously pathetic feat of “losing myself,” I did what any sane person would do and entered full-fledged denial. Like the blessed shock induced from trauma, my brain similarly refused to comprehend the full reality at stake… following suit, I ignored all possible logic and insisted instead, it’s impossible, if identity is irretrievable. This didn’t happen to me. I prided myself on possessing complete confidence–enough to obstinately override this odious outcome. I was outraged.

For those of you who know me, I messed up. My refusal to admit defeat, stubbornness to wanting to believe in the optimism of human nature slammed into the REAL me at full force. I truly became one of “those” people; I saw what I wanted to see–witnessing my own warped world. Why? I craved normality. Hopeful optimism that when I wrote “man is inherently evil” within the subliminal language of every essay, I would be proven dead wrong (like any other hypothesis). Oz seemed happy enough, but I’ve never been so far away from home.

There’s no place like home… There’s no place like home… There’s no place like home… -Dorothy Gale, The Wizard of Oz

Like my icon, my hero, my role model, me in a 6th grade play, Oz slowly wore out its welcome. I didn’t want to be here anymore. I wanted to go home; now, I just needed to find that damn yellow brick road. Again, true to form, Glenda spared me no journey; I trekked alone through the winding road, somehow missing Scarecrow, Tin Man, & Lion (I blame the Wicked Witch of the West; she was having a bad day, scaring everyone else away). At the sight of Emerald City, memory triggered, and like a trauma victim, pain flooded once-protected receptors.

Impatient, I did the unimaginable. Tired of waiting on Glenda, three clicks of the heels (yep, I rocked stilettos the ENTIRE way… Janice Dickinson would be so proud!), and I was back. I’d come full-circle to learn the age old lesson–There’s no place like home.

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