Trent Gaspard

It's been a while... soooooooooooo... WHAT'S UP?!

Friday night made me go through some serious self-reflection. I realized that everyone is fake... EVERYONE! If you say you "don't like fake people," I say take a look in the fucking mirror. I feel like a lot of people that I trusted and cared for just don't really care about me and just keep me around as a lackey. I happened to go through this at a party Friday. It also made me realize that usually, when I have a dislike for someone, it's for good reason. I feel the need to apologize to one person because this person didn't deserve all the shit I gave them behind their back. This person is great, but did something that I wasn't able to let go of for over a year. I thought I did let go a while back, but I still gave this person shit. This week, I WILL let go. I'm talking to this person ASAP. Later that night, I talk with my brother, who feels heartbroken and betrayed. We weren't too great at talking to each other as we are both quite depressed and thinking to ourselves about how bad shit is starting to get. At this point, I have no hope and thinking about who is a REAL friend to me. But later that night, I had a new hope that there ARE good friends out there. A good friend is someone who will drive you around Lafayette at 3 AM for an hour, no matter how tired they are, just to talk and let you vent (thanks for being my angel Friday, Amber Kemmerly). I'm glad I had that drive. Afterwards, I listened to a song that I really indentified with. It made me feel a lot better the next day...

"Feel" by Chicago

So everybody's pulling you in all directions
You don't know how much longer to take it
So you've learned how to fake it

That smile on the outside's fading fast
Like the things that you thought for sure would last
But they didn't
You know something's missing
Is it your life you're not living?

Your heart is cold, your soul is numb
You don't like who you've become
You played the game and paid the cost for long enough
So grab the reins, yeah, take the wheel
Lose what's not and keep what's real
It's not too late,
Just close your eyes and feel

You can't tell if you're happy or sad
Can't tell the good from bad
It's senseless
To waste your senses
Maybe stop thinking with your head
Start using your heart instead
Just try it
You just might like it
Aren't you dying to start livin'?

Your heart is cold, your soul is numb
You don't like who you've become
You played the game and paid the cost for long enough
So grab the reins, yeah, take the wheel
Lose what's not and keep what's real
It's not too late,
Just close your eyes and feel

Every breath that's going through you
Take each day that's given to you
To love back the ones who love you

Your heart is cold, your soul is numb
You don't like who you've become
You played the game and paid the cost for long enough
So grab the reins, yeah, take the wheel
Lose what's not and keep what's real
It's not too late,
Just close your eyes and feel

You can't tell if you're happy or sad
Can't tell the good from the bad
Feel and stop thinking with your head
Start using your heart instead

Your heart is cold, your soul is numb
Yeah, yeah, yeah….
You’ve played the game for long enough, oh, no, no,
Everybody’s pulling you in all directions.

Why must I always be depressed about being alone? I must've listened to Chicago's Peter Cetera soft rock era (their 80s stuff) stuff all day today because I felt lonely. I don't exactly care for Chicago's 80s work, so I must be REALLY  depressed. I can make a girl happy. I know I can. I just wish someone would see it!

I love the brothers of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia! I will miss the Delta Epsilon chapter this summer. Hopefully I'll get to see you. Until then, this video goes out to my fellow Sinfonians:

OAS AAS LLS!!!

 "It's not about how hard you can hit. It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward."

- Rocky Balboa

It's nice to know that when I try to rekindle a friendship a with nice, thoughtful, from the bottom of my heart apology letter (since you won't let me apologize in person), that it will be read and laughed at by quite a few people at a party. What? You thought I wasn't going to find out at all? Well, one of your awesome friends spilled the beans to my frat brother (remind your friends not to make that mistake again). This truly shows that you are not worth my time and still have a lot of growing up to do. You are still stuck in high school and it's kinda sad. I poured out my heart in that letter and you don't even bother to call me up after? NO! That was a PATHETIC display you put on. Talk to me when you grow up. Seriously!

Congratulations to Herbie Hancock on being the first jazz musician in 43 years to win the album of the year award at the Grammys!!! He truly deserved it. Kanye West and Amy Winehouse are nowhere near the same league as Hancock, and I'm glad that they didn't get the award. Whenever people such as Kanye and Amy are put in the same category as a great such as Herbie Hancock, that makes me realize how much of a fucking joke the Grammys are becoming. What's even worse is that they won a shitload of awards. What happened to great musicians? What happened to great singers? This is what happened - they are all either dead or not getting any damn respect or recognition from the general public. PLEASE PEOPLE, GIVE REAL MUSIC A CHANCE AND GET CULTURED FOR GOD SAKE!!! That was my rant for the day. Thanks for reading!

Get cultured!
Trent Alan Michael Gaspard

P.S. What's even MORE funny is the Soldja Boy Tell 'Em was nominated for a Grammy. LAWL! Give me a fucking break!!!

I'm just chillin this Valentine's Day. I can already tell that it isn't going to work out with this girl. Oh well. I have other options. I'm working on it!

I hate it when things go so well, and then I have to do something to fuck it all up again. 
I hate myself.
I'm so sorry, Kilburn!
Please forgive me, bro!

Pretty cool, huh?

I want to lead a better life. I don't want to hate people anymore. I am so paranoid of what people think of me, but I realized that I do hate on a few people. There's very few that I hate on, though. But right now, I want to end all the hate. I want to be cool with everyone and hope to have the same comes to me. To all those that I carried hate for, I'm sorry! It is a fault of mine that I want to fix and hope to get better.

Also, I've come to the realization that there is only one girl out there for me right now. Over the past year, I've gone on a few dates, but none of those girls even compare to her. I went on one date with her and she hardly knew me, but she held my hand for comfort after getting a disturbing text message (from a stalker). That made me feel special. It made me feel that she trusted me enough to help her through the night. I want that feeling again! Unfortunately, I freaked her out and nothing really happened after that. I plan on getting the fraternity to serenade her during Valentine's Day. Hopefully, I can have that feeling again!

This is one of my favorite songs. This song is so true to life. It suggests that to be content with yourself, you don't need everything. I felt for a while that everything was falling apart in my life. Then I listened to this song, had a deep conversation with my best friend, and with that help, I stopped myself from getting myself into something stupid. It's 
true that the good are good without reward and to be king, you don't need a castle. I'm finally realizing that! 

I think that this rings VERY TRUE! 

Ode to the Nice Guys
This rant was written for the Wharton Undergraduate Journal

This is a tribute to the nice guys. The nice guys that finish last, that never become more than friends, that endure hours of whining and bitching about what assholes guys are, while disproving the very point. This is dedicated to those guys who always provide a shoulder to lean on but restrain themselves to tentative hugs, those guys who hold open doors and give reassuring pats on the back and sit patiently outside the changing room at department stores. This is in honor of the guys that obligingly reiterate how cute/beautiful/smart/funny/sexy their female friends are at the appropriate moment, because they know most girls need that litany of support. This is in honor of the guys with open minds, with laid-back attitudes, with honest concern. This is in honor of the guys who respect a girl's every facet, from her privacy to her theology to her clothing style.

This is for the guys who escort their drunk, bewildered female friends back from parties and never take advantage once they're at her door, for the guys who accompany girls to bars as buffers against the rest of the creepy male population, for the guys who know a girl is fishing for compliments but give them out anyway, for the guys who always play by the rules in a game where the rules favor cheaters, for the guys who are accredited as boyfriend material but somehow don't end up being boyfriends, for all the nice guys who are overlooked, underestimated, and unappreciated, for all the nice guys who are manipulated, misled, and unjustly abandoned, this is for you.

This is for that time she left 40 urgent messages on your cell phone, and when you called her back, she spent three hours painstakingly dissecting two sentences her boyfriend said to her over dinner. And even though you thought her boyfriend was a chump and a jerk, you assured her that it was all ok and she shouldn't worry about it. This is for that time she interrupted the best killing spree you'd ever orchestrated in GTA3 to rant about a rumor that romantically linked her and the guy she thinks is the most repulsive person in the world. And even though you thought it was immature and you had nothing against the guy, you paused the game for two hours and helped her concoct a counter-rumor to spread around the floor. This is also for that time she didn't have a date, so after numerous vows that there was nothing "serious" between the two of you, she dragged you to a party where you knew nobody, the beer was awful, and she flirted shamelessly with you, justifying each fit of reckless teasing by announcing to everyone: "oh, but we're just friends!" And even though you were invited purely as a symbolic warm body for her ego, you went anyways. Because you're nice like that.

The nice guys don't often get credit where credit is due. And perhaps more disturbing, the nice guys don't seem to get laid as often as they should. And I wish I could logically explain this trend, but I can't. From what I have observed on campus and what I have learned from talking to friends at other schools and in the workplace, the only conclusion I can form is that many girls are just illogical, manipulative bitches. Many of them claim they just want to date a nice guy, but when presented with such a specimen, they say irrational, confusing things such as "oh, he's too nice to date" or "he would be a good boyfriend but he's not for me" or "he already puts up with so much from me, I couldn't possibly ask him out!" or the most frustrating of all: "no, it would ruin our friendship." Yet, they continue to lament the lack of datable men in the world, and they expect their too-nice-to-date male friends to sympathize and apologize for the men that are jerks. Sorry, guys, girls like that are beyond my ability to fathom. I can't figure out why the connection breaks down between what they say (I want a nice guy!) and what they do (I'm going to sleep with this complete ass now!). But one thing I can do, is say that the nice-guy-finishes-last phenomenon doesn't last forever. There are definitely many girls who grow out of that train of thought and realize they should be dating the nice guys, not taking them for granted. The tricky part is finding those girls, and even trickier, finding the ones that are single.

So, until those girls are found, I propose a toast to all the nice guys. You know who you are, and I know you're sick of hearing yourself described as ubiquitously nice. But the truth of the matter is, the world needs your patience in the department store, your holding open of doors, your party escorting services, your propensity to be a sucker for a pretty smile. For all the crazy, inane, absurd things you tolerate, for all the situations where you are the faceless, nameless hero, my accolades, my acknowledgement, and my gratitude go out to you. You do have credibility in this society, and your well deserved vindication is coming.

Happy Freaking New Year, honkies!

I really want to start a funk band!
I want to do a little something to keep me busy, singing and playing trombone.
Any takers?

All women, just STOP leading me on. Quit saying that something is going to happen with us and then start a relationship with another guy. In other words, STOP BEING FUCKING STUPID!!! You all talk big about men being stupid. Women are just as stupid, you just don't like admitting that you are (there are a few exceptions though). I hate being lied to!

In better news, I crossed into the brotherhood of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia last night. It was a long time coming and well worth the wait. I love all my brothers with all my heart. May there be many memories to come!

OAS AAS LLS!
Trent Alan Michael Gaspard a.k.a. Ol' Man River

Should I fall out of love, my fire in the light
To chase a feather in the wind
Within the glow that weaves a cloak of delight
There moves a thread that has no end.

For many hours and days that pass ever soon
the tides have caused the flame to dim
At last the arm is straight, the hand to the loom
Is this to end or just begin?
* Chorus: All of my love, all of my love, All of my love to you. (repeat)

The cup is raised, the toast is made yet again
One voice is clear above the din
Proud Aryan one word, my will to sustain
For me, the cloth once more to spin

Chorus

Yours is the cloth, mine is the hand that sews time
his is the force that lies within
Ours is the fire, all the warmth we can find
He is a feather in the wind

Chorus

After the Phi Mu Alpha/Sigma Alpha Iota camping trip, I realized that I fucked up bad last fall. All I did was blurt out "I love you," and I ruined something that could have been special. I was still young and immature at the time. I'm now one year older, one year wiser. I just hope that she will give me another chance to prove myself. I don't think that I ever stopped liking her...

"Against All Odds" by Phil Collins

How can I just let you walk away, just let you leave without a trace
When I stand here taking every breath with you, ooh
You're the only one who really knew me at all

How can you just walk away from me,
When all I can do is watch you leave
Cos we've shared the laughter and the pain and even shared the tears
You're the only one who really knew me at all

So take a look at me now, oh there's just an empty space
And there's nothing left here to remind me,
Just the memory of your face
Ooh take a look at me now, well there's just an empty space
And you coming back to me is against all odds and that's what I've got to face

I wish I could just make you turn around,
Turn around and see me cry
There's so much I need to say to you,
So many reasons why
You're the only one who really knew me at all

So take a look at me now, well there's just an empty space
And there's nothing left here to remind me, just the memory of your face
Now take a look at me now, cos there's just an empty space
But to wait for you, is all I can do and that's what I've got to face

Take a good look at me now, cos I'll still be standing here
And you coming back to me is against all odds
It's the chance I've gotta take

Take a look at me now

I am going to change my major when we get back to school. I will become a Mass Communications major with a minor in Music Performance. Instructing at AHS opened my eyes to many things and made me realize that I really don't want to be a teacher. I hold nothing against the organization or it's directors, though. I love music and want to continue to be involved in the music program at UL but just not as a major. I have made many great friends through the doors of Angelle and will miss seeing everyone everyday, but I am happy with the decision that I am making. This is the closing of one chapter and the opening of another. Thanks for reading!

Sincerely,
Trent Alan Michael Gaspard