Hiiiiii guysssss.

Thanks to everyone that took the time to reach out after reading my last blog. It meant A LOT, especially since I was so worried about how the topic would be received. *hugs*

Okay onto the playlist.

I made this on Spotify because it’s the superior music streaming app (sorry Apple Music lovers). So you can just get it there if you want, my username is noodles1116! (I don’t want to talk about the username, it’s circa-2015 and I thought I was so qUiRkY) If you don’t have Spotify, then idk add these songs to your own fall playlist.

Everyone loves a song that reminds you of daylight savings, coming inside to a toasty warm house after a walk in the chilly October air, and crunchy leaves. So these are some tunes that I associate with the fall time, and ones that I can listen to while I walk around campus acting like the main character (so quirky, lolz).

noodles1116

Landslide – Fleetwood Mac

Patience – The Lumineers

Beige – Yoke Lore

Robbers – The 1975

Sleep On The Floor – The Lumineers

I Always Wanna Die (Sometimes) – The 1975

Supercut – Lorde

England – The National

Happiness is a butterfly – Lana Del Rey

Mr Loverman – Ricky Montgomery

September Song – Agnes Obel

Godspeed – Frank Ocean

Drunk on Halloween – Wallows

Skinny Love – Bon Iver

Be My Mistake – The 1975

This Side of Paradise – Coyote Theory

Heather – Conan Gray

Take Me to Church – Hozier

Like Real People Do – Hozier

Work Song – Hozier

Hymn – Bjéar

All Your’n – Tyler Childers

Lady May – Tyler Childers

Nose on the Grindstone (OurVinyl Version) – Tyler Childers

The Way I Loved You – Taylor Swift

Beauty – The Shivers

Still – The Japanese House

Medicine – Daughter

The End of Love – Florence + The Machine

8TEEN – Khalid

Coaster – Khalid

Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want – The Smiths

Leaving My Love Behind – Lewis Capaldi

You – The 1975

Remembering Sunday – All Time Low

Heaven – Khalid

Looking for Knives – DYAN

Call If You Need Me – Vance Joy

Past Life – Maggie Rogers

Dumb Stuff – LANY

Feathered Indians – Tyler Childers

Nobody Knows – The Lumineers

Colder Weather – Zac Brown Band

Cherry Flavoured – The Neighborhood

Saw You In A Dream – The Japanese House

Hurts Like Heaven – Coldplay

Shrike – Hozier

Light On (Acoustic) – Maggie Rogers

You Ruined the 1975 (Lofi Remix) – Koy

If This Was A Movie – Taylor Swift

All Too Well – Taylor Swift

Kilby Girl – The Backseat Lovers

Runaway – AURORA

Cover Me Up – Morgan Wallen

Daddy Issues – The Neighborhood

Better Views – Yellow House

Slow It Down – The Lumineers

Single – The Neighborhood

watch you sleep. – girl in red

Anyways,,

l8r sk8rs

MACK

If by the slimmest chance this post finds Yeezus or his team, no copyright pls. I am a busted college student and needed a catchy title for this blog. Everyone open your Spotify and stream KIDS SEE GHOSTS. As if I need to worry about Kanye finding my blog, but you know a girl can dream.

Now that that’s been taken care of…I can get on with life. So basically, I was purging my 30 drafts on file (yes 30, it’s not all sh*ts and giggles behind the scenes) and I found this one from over a year ago when I was CLEARLY in my feels. But I liked it because it was honest work and it’s my kind of writing. There’s a sense of a detachment phase that comes during your freshman year of college, or there SHOULD BE. I know many people who didn’t experience this phase and still go home every weekend like they never left. To each their own, but I personally think it limits some areas of growth. I’ve realized that whether we like it or not, our hometowns shape us and we’ll always be tied to it in a way.

I’ve realized that you don’t just get to uproot yourself. My roots still belong in drive-by RC in the middle of a cornfield. My home is what shaped me. The people are what shaped me. I grew up roaming the streets of my town without a care in the world. I played outside with the neighborhood kids until my dad yelled out the screen door that we had to come inside. In a way, a part of me will always be on the block of Day Street. It’s my family’s block. Just ask my sister, she’s on the verge of living in like six houses on our block HAHA. I’ve lived in three now. My grandma lives on our block. I remember a few years ago, walking the same stretch of asphalt towards the cornfield, I wondered how many times I had followed the same path. I imagined my grandparents strolling down the same stretch. I felt the safe feeling of holding my dads hand as we walked down to my grandparents’ house. I imagined my mom walking in the same spots that I walked before RC wasn’t her life anymore. I pictured my grandpa walking down to my house for my birthday parties before he passed away. I remembered learning to ride my bike without training wheels with my dad standing on the end by the stop sign, waiting to catch me. And I know the exact spot that I crashed and burned for the first time. I remembered how the street used to be littered with walnuts until our neighbors chopped down the walnut tree. Trying to sled during the icy wintertime. Watching my dad tinkering in the garage from across the street. Racing to the stop sign to determine the fastest kid on the block. Frying an egg on the asphalt on one of the hottest Indiana summer days. Hauling candy home from trick or treating in my bumblebee costume. Dripping blue BugJuice down my shirt all the way home from the gas station. So much life occurred on the 100 ft asphalt strip and no one seemed to realize. Life has literally come and gone like it was nothing. Who really knows what Day Street has witnessed.

I had never been the kid that was so desperate to leave RC and Indiana. I liked Indiana. I enjoyed small town life and I didn’t understand why people wanted to leave. Well, now I get it. I know there is more to life than RC, and I feel bad for the people that can’t seem to get out. But RC will always be home. The people will always be home. I am so grateful I had the opportunity to grow up in my town and to have such a strong sense of community. I went home last weekend since it was my first weekend I was able and because it was my birthday weekend. I went to the football game on Friday. Coming home for the first time from college is straight up WEIRD. I talked with my friends’ parents and realized how much I had missed seeing them on a weekly basis. I saw family friends that I missed catching up with whenever I ran into them around town. I watched a good ol’ Pioneer football game with the sun setting on the cornstalks surrounding the field. The canon went off more than 7 times, followed by the harmony of the moms’ cowbells. The same blowout game except different boys were wearing my friends’ jerseys.

I saw ghosts. The ghosts of upperclassmen graduated years past. The ghosts of friendships that grew apart after freshmen year. The ghosts of the boys I’d eagerly wait for after the game. The ghost of myself in my spirit wear for the night’s theme, surrounded by my best friends. The ghost of what used to be.

I spoke with some friends that are still in high school and realized how simple high school really was. To all you seniors, I know how hard it seems. I struggled big big big time. But I also know that you don’t get it back because even things you don’t think will change or people you don’t think will leave you- they will. Soak it in. Realize you will never get these moments back. But also realize that college is a ride! Don’t be that person who peaks in high school and is practically still going there. Pioneer doesn’t belong to me anymore, bless up. I left a part of myself there, and now I have nothing to tie me back there except ghosts. In this life, we keep moving forward. Hopefully by the time I graduate, I’ll find myself in a position where I don’t have to move into a house on my family’s block and instead I can be boujee in NYC or become a hermit in New Mexico. You know, just something slight.

Things are different now. The neighborhood kids grew up and left and got married and are having babies. Their houses were filled by a new generation of neighborhood kids. Now, my little sister rides her bike up and down my street. (And might possibly crash in the same spot I did, who knows) My nephew and niece hang out with their neighborhood friends. Some things don’t change, even if the people do. Day Street doesn’t belong to me anymore. RC doesn’t belong to me anymore. And I’m not a homebody any longer; in fact, I avoid coming home if at all possible. Nonetheless, I still am hit with that wave of nostalgia every time I look towards the cornfield at the end of the street.

In the wise words of Hannah Montana…”you’ll always find your way back home.”

Again, this was written a year ago when I was still in a transition stage. It’s interesting to see how your perspective changes over time, huh?

XO

MACK :)))))