Dear Diary,

It was on fifth grade when I first saw him. He was that oh-so famous sixth grader; Junior Basketball captain and Team Leader of the Boy Scouts. I was that girl with four Nancy Drew books in arm and a paper sticking somewhere at my backpack. I didn’t mind. Everybody seemed to like me the way I am. I was never the nerd girl. I was just me. Madeline Gray.

And here I am talking about Jared Cortell.

My childhood crush.

I knew him through my friend, Reagan when she dragged me from the second floor to the ground floor just to carpool with them. Jared is the popular guy but that doesn’t tell that he has his own squad. He mingles with everybody exactly. And because the whole carpool is a thing at school, you can’t blame the guy to join in when his younger cousin is also part of the said carpool. (Who is also my classmate. What a coincidence.)

So that’s where we met.

Kind of cliché there but that’s what happened basically.

So Jared was quite the opposite if you ask me. He was that silent guy whereas Library girl (a.k.a. me) was the most annoying and loudest person inside the entire carpool ride. Talk about irony in its finest.

I was the one laughing at the signage with a wrong grammar across the street or the drunkard sound asleep outside a bar. But what makes me do such things? Is when I saw the Jared Cortell crack a smile whenever I laugh.

That was the best days of my middle school life.

But then high school rolled in and it was a no match for those flowering middle school days.

News stirred at the school that Jared Cortell finally had a girlfriend. Well I thought he was going to ask me but that’s just daydreaming. It was his sophomore year and I was just a mere freshman with grades to pass. (And books to read, duh) so I set it aside. But that doesn’t mean I don’t carpool with them anymore. I can sense the awkwardness every time Jared Cortell would bring in her girlfriend and do a full out make out session, not even caring that I am at the back of the van reading.

I swear I was close to puking.

Then junior year came in for me (the whole sophomore year is me reading loads of books and writing some poems which is about him mostly and me almost failing Chemistry) and for them it is Prom season. And usually seniors get to ask us juniors to be their Prom date. I was never the expectant type but I did hope that Jared Cortell would ask me out. Turns out Jared Cortell took Sheena Jones instead. Fake boobs, fake personality and my worst enemy. And then again, I didn’t mind. It’s his problem that he get to pair himself up with a brunette girl that always picks her nails and sits unladylike.

And so he graduated and I never seen him again. I swore to almost everything and everyone that I will get over Jared Cortell. He doesn’t even deserve my attention, anyway. Since he doesn’t even know I exactly exist. So what’s the point in there, right? I’ll just continue on reading and writing, my whole brain set for college and completely forgetting that Jared Cortell exists.

But the odds are never in my favor when it comes to Jared Cortell.

Date report: 71st day of Internship

Remaining days of Internship: 79 days out of the total 150 days a.k.a 5 months

Status report: Still waiting for the "okay" call from St. Pete's regarding my internship for a Film studio. Or basically anything that has something to do with cameras and actors. I've been stuck in this radio company for almost two months. "Pending scholar" is what they call me here. (Not that I hate the people here much more to music. But this is not what I was studying to for the last four years.)

Personal quote of the week: Believe in second chances and don't ever waste them.

"Good morning Huckleberry and time check is now six-thirty flat and here we are! Another day for students of St. Pete to roam around the suburbs and Mrs. Hensley, your granddaughter from Philly left a card here to great you a Happy Birthday!" I started the day with my usual cheery voice over the microphone and on to my usual spot at Radio Finn. The sun just started to rise, peeking it's way to my window. A cup of  freshly brewed Starbucks coffee on my left and my notebook right in front of me. All set for another day of internship.

One thing that I love about this internship on a radio station is that everything is between you and the listener of the radio. Nobody knows how many people are listening right now. My voice might be playing on a cafe shop near the Arcade or maybe in a barber shop just near the craft store. The thought of someone out there just listening to what I say is completely something extraordinary.

The confusion that me, a Film major, is having an internship at a Radio station (which is clearly for Music majors) is still taking its toll inside my brain. Every moment that I step foot inside the studio I always think to myself that someday a man wearing a tuxedo will come and be my Superman the moment he says "You're transferred to a Film studio. Please come with me." But that doesn't mean I despise what is going on here, right? Like I said, there is always someone listening to me out there somewhere.