A couple of nights ago, I had the strangest dream that I’ve had in months. It took place outside in my backyard, but my backyard was not familiar to me. It had a bigger pool, more space, palm trees everywhere, and lit torches for light. Apparently, it was my birthday and I was having my birthday party around midnight. Many people were there—my family, my neighbors, some friends, and most prominent of all, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt.

Angelina raised her glass of wine and said that she and Brad had brought me a present. I was very excited, of course, because Angelina and Brad are obviously rich which meant there was a probability they brought me something highly expensive. Sadly, my excitement didn’t last long. Their present turned out to be an adorable, healthy, gray kitten. I wanted to tell them that I was allergic to cats, but I didn’t. I thanked them, told Angelina her dress was pretty, and I went off to play with my new pet.

However, whenever I even tried to touch my new kitten—it grew much smaller. There was no hope in trying to pet it, or pick it up, because it would just shrink. Eventually, I became frustrated and tried to touch it so many times, that the kitten became microscopic.

And at that point—when the dream got most confusing and strange—I woke up. What exactly was the point of that dream? Is there a meaning? Is my mind telling me that I should not touch kittens? I don’t think I’ll ever know for sure.

What’s the strangest dream that you’ve had?

I will have already been to college, which was a highly memorable expierence for me. Since I earned a perfect score on the SATs, it was not necessary to apply to colleges because colleges were the ones that were applying to me. On my refrigerator will be hanging my Master’s Degree and Bachelor’s Degree (both having a frame of real gold) in English Literature from Harvard.

I will be a famous novelist but with a pen name of Lulu Wigglepop or something of the sort—so that I’ll have two identities. Hence my two identities, I will never be seen in public as Lulu Wigglepop (I’ll want to avoid the paparazzi and all the screaming fans)—and that means there will be a lack of any public sightings of Lulu Wigglepop, which will spark a new hit TV show called “Where in the World is Lulu Wigglepop?”. Regis Philbin will be the host, Alex Trebek will be co-host and Queen Latifah will be co-host to the co-host.

Otherwise all of that, I will have a completely relaxing life with my 68-year-old pet octopus named “Iggywiggyboogiegroovy the Fifth” and my puppy named… “Jane”.

… My imagination tends to get out of hand a little, but I’ll like to pretend that all of this will be possible in 2018. How will your life be in ten years from now?

I love you and I will always love you!

“Name 3 cities in the U.S. that you would like to live in,” my dad says oh-so-randomly.

“… Hmm, well, maybe Seattle, because I like rain and coffee…” And I do. I like them oh-so very much, and I’ve always wanted to go to Seattle. “… Maybe Florida?… Nah, I don’t like hurricanes.”

“I mean, pick 3 cities near Washington D.C… because we’re moving.”

MOVING?! To Washington D.C?! I think that news is uberly whimsical and spiffy, don’t you? I’m glad my dad’s gots a promotion in his job. This is oh-so-very exciting, though since Washington D.C. might be a little too much for our wallet, we’re probably live somewhere near—like a suburb in Maryland or something. Wheeee!

First of all, there’s my cookie addiction. If you must ever put a plate of chocolate-chip cookies in front of me, please do not be surprised that the plate will be squeaky clean in less than a minute. Also, there might be a small mess of cookie crumbs on the floor because I prefer to devote my focus on the cookies than how cleanly I eat them. You should even feel free to think of me as the cookie monster, only not blue and fuzzy. I think I might even marry a cookie when I grow up.

Another addiction of mine is… bubble gum. My mother and I might go to Wal-Mart to buy some waffles and a packet of gum for me, and then in two days, I will have chewed 18 sticks of gum. I’m not picky when it comes to gum—I like all kinds of it, whether it’s cinnamon gum, or minty or strawberry-watermelon or even orange-flavored. Though, I still have yet to tackle the task of blowing a bubble with bubble gum. Every time I try, I always just get a funny noise coming out of my mouth.

I also quite like the computer. A lot. It’s sad that I stare at it for so many hours a day, but I can’t get off it. The computer that I use is not even that great. I imagine how addicted I would be if I actually had a laptop that wasn’t about 8 years old. Even if on some occasions, I have to kick it to make it work, I have the greatest respect for my PC. And the Internet. And websites. And everything that’s computer-related. Maybe if my cookie husband and me happen to divorce up one day, I could always marry my computer.

What addictions do you have?

In my 4^th class of the day (Honors Science), I dashed into the classroom, sat down at my desk, and noticed the dead earthworm on said desk. Then, I made friends with the dead earthworm. I tried to make talk with it, you know, but I quickly learned that dead earthworms like to give you the silent treatment. I named this earthworm ‘Camilla’ (I think it’s a very pretty name, don’t you?). Camilla was a very, very, very, and very stinky earthworm. I don’t blame her. I would be stinky too if I were a rotting dead earthworm.

The dissection went very fast in my opinion. I was grouped with three other girls, all who seemed to be scared of Camilla—and because of their fear of innocent Camilla, they made me do basically the whole dissection. I put on these gloves (like the ones my dentist wears!), grabbed the scissors, and started to… errr… cut Camilla up. It was really disgusting. I saw lots of worm juice ooze out of Camilla (and onto my dentist-ish gloves) and I was almost ready to faint. I swear I will never look at juice the same way again.

Once Camilla was cut up, I had to pin her down and look at her internal organs (and yet, there was more worm juice)… Camilla’s insides happened to be all the same dull-ish, brown-ish color, and all the organs were too small for my four eyes to see. I kind of poked around with her hearts and brain, literally. They were squishy, if I may say so.

I could go into much more detail about this dissection, but I’m afraid that either you or I would vomit, and that’s not… good. Happy Earth Day! (And please excuse the weirdness of the dates on my comments. If you know how to fix that, please contact me.)

My class is going to dissect a frog either this week or next week. ‘Bruce’ sounds like a good name for it.

The scene was my English class, around 11 in the morning. The class’s assignment was to write a poem about childhood in class, and it was to be 40 words at the very least—and it had to be about childhood. Which stinks. Because I like writing random poems. Like really, really, really random poems. Like the one I wrote in my head (because I’m far too lazy for paper and pen) that was about a family of turnips who lived in an igloo in a lady’s shoe. Nevertheless, I wrote a poem that was about childhood, and I gave it to the teacher to inspect.

She looked over it, nodded, and told me it wasn’t really anything about childhood and to perhaps change it. Though she did say this politely, I decided not to change my poem. To me, it was about childhood. It wasn’t really straightforward about it, but not every poem about childhood has to be straightforward, does it?

Then, some classmates of mine read their poems out loud to the class, and they were all the same stuff. The same words. The same things. The same yawns coming out from my mouth. I’m quite surprised all my classmates had the same childhood—they all had a fear of getting cooties, and they often rolled around in the grass, played outside with friends, and ate Grandma’s cookies…

My poem was actually one of the few that didn’t rhyme. Mine was perfectly free-verse, because I like free-verse poems the bestest. They’re free… of course.

Mariana’s Childhood Poem

this poem has to
have forty words; but
to me it is
not possible to fit
all my childhood in
just forty! words. childhoods
are different from person
to person but sooner
or later we all begin
to miss them.