Sleeping on the Library Floor

Preamble & Amble; Theme & Variation

2011-01-13T20:29:00.003-06:00

Preamble

I have things I'm putting off, so it seemed like the perfect time to distract myself further by writing in my blog which I have similarly neglected. I love being in school. That's not sarcasm. Also, to be fair, I did complete the assignments necessary for tomorrow. Now to the blogging.

Amble

So. I want to try some experiments. I need to make a multimedia experimental poetry installation of psycholinguistic stuff. For example: me using my blend of common sense and a small amount of expertise to attempt to break down the etymologies of various words. I am also going to from now on write in this blog as I feel like it, with all my language play intact. I am going to avoid watering things down- not that I've really done that so far in this particular outlet.

I'm enjoying the kinds of themes that recur and recur throughout my intellectual life.

SHORTLIST O' THEMES:

building on the shoulders of giants/the things we inherit/technology, knowledge, culture
everything is like everything else/the universe is a fractal of sorts/universal truths recurring/patterns and geometry/¿chaos = order = chaos?

I remember, as a child in school, getting the simple definition of technology as being applied knowledge. This idea really fascinated me and continues to do so. I remember asking my mother why people couldn't've just made computers at the start. I saw a computer as an obvious thing to think up– of course, I was standing on the shoulders of giants without ever having looked down. She explained that complex things develop gradually. Needless to say, this statement of hers continues to apply in most cases.

I have a lot of questions about correlations. It almost makes me want to do math. There are too many things that I want to know how to do and want desperately to do, but I don't have the patience for at this time.

2 MANY THINGS THAT I WANT TO KNOW HOW TO DO AND WANT DESPERATELY TO DO BUT I DON'T HAVE THE PATIENCE FOR AT THIS TIME:

Learn statistics reel guud
Learn how to program for iOS and OS X

THINGS I NEED TO DO BUT DON'T KNOW IF I'LL EVER HAVE THE TIME FOR:

Learn about philosophy
Learn the freaking history of the world
Take voice lessons
Take more anthropology classes
Take more psychology classes
Study in France, too (not just Russia) !

I've stopped caring so much about some of the nitpicky details. Sometimes when you're young and your world goggles are still getting adjusted for basic proportional perception, you confuse the details as being the most important thing instead of the big picture, when in reality, you only do so because it's what's in focus, it's what you understand, it's what you see clearly. You have only a nebulous idea of the thing that looks, frankly, like an indefinite, looming, shape on the horizon, and all you can make out is the color.

Something I wrote in my notebook today: "This silence, like many other careless or hopeful silences before it, was a pregnant silence."

I wonder how much meaning you can cram into one utterance. I wonder... what the equivalent of that meaning-packed utterance would be in the form of silence/the absence of an utterance. How would it manifest itself? What would be an example of a situation in which it would manifest itself?

THINGS TO THINK ABOUT:

cognitive archaeology
mental schema

2010-05-27T10:07:00.002-06:00

–You've had far too much to drink tonight.

–And you've had far too much to say tonight.

I have decided that Russians must know something secret and remarkable about life and humanity. I can think of no better ways to spend my time this very hot summer than to read Russian novels, brush up on my languages, and to write. Reading always makes me want to write. I have several things lined up to read, and a thing I've finished already:
A Hero of Our Time by Mikhail Lermontov (finished)
On Walden Pond by Thoreau (begun)
Speak, Memory, Nabokov's autobiography
Пиковая дама/La dame de pique (The Queen of Spades) by Aleksandr Pushkin (it's bilingual French and Russian)
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Solzhenitsyn
Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
La pesanteur et la grâce (Gravity and Grace) by Simone Weil

I'm also planning on reading a couple of Steven Pinker books through, as thus far I've read them in parts either according to personal whim, or to the necessities of my research. I'm going to read some St. John Chrysostom. Perhaps I'll have it in me (and the good time) to read some Dostoevsky or Tolstoy.

So, tell me what one does when one comes to hatred about so many things in society. What am I to do? I hate the credit card companies, the fashion magazines, the "gentlemen's" magazines, Bratz dolls, the vacancy in the eyes of too many of my classmates. And boredom! I hate being bored. It is just an insult to God. I am determined to not be bored and I really must figure out how to jettison from myself this hatred which does absolutely no one any good.

Я Люблю Русский Язык!

2009-12-02T22:41:00.001-06:00

Oh this is some kind of life

2009-05-02T00:49:00.003-06:00

I've heard it said life is unfair and that God cannot exist because of ______ (fill in your choice of trite argument based on human logic). I don't buy it. I mean, nobody ever promised anybody that life would be fair. When I hear that, my response however juvenile is, "yeah, duh." The challenge we are presented with- and yes, it is a challenge indeed- is to turn our suffering into growth and to love everybody, everything, all of creation. Loving someone doesn't mean liking their character, necessarily, but understanding it- not sympathizing with it- just understanding without judging in order to love better. Like Jesus says (and I'm totally paraphrasing from memory), "what is it to love those who love you? Even sinners love those who love them." The idea, of course, being to love your enemy as yourself. That is difficult to do. The more I think about the way I act and the thoughts that are in my head, the more I am convinced that I have a lot of work to do on myself, so no matter how "messed up" I'm thinking this other person is, I really must learn how to remember that taking the right path is so difficult and we happen to be quite blind to many important things about our actions and how we could make them that we would be better. Pride is a big cause of blindness, I've definitely found for myself. Also, I'm pretty sick of how society treats Christianity these days. I see a lot of issues with Western Christianity because it strayed from the original Church teachings (if you can't tell yet, I'm an Eastern Orthodox Christian- or a catechumen, anyway). I've been an atheist before; I've been Protestant before; I've thought about Catholicism before; I've been agnostic before; I've been a pseudo-Buddhist before; when I was a child, my family went to churches in which people just gathered 'round waiting to be... entertained by a miracle, ready to will themselves into a trance: I was a passionate and mercurial teenager with a restless nature. I felt firmly about each (or in the case of agnosticism, well, you know). None of them, however, had for me what Orthodoxy has for me. Orthodoxy has the emphasis on humility and love that I think is absolutely essential to the content of any attempt at a statement of truth. Here is another relevent quote from Christ: "Become good and merciful like your Father in Heaven, and as He rains on bad and good and makes the sun to rise on just and unjust alike, so also is the one who has real love, and has compassion, and prays for all." I'll write again soon about Orthodoxy. Time for bed- this is the latest I've stayed up in months.

DON'T TRY TO SELL ME ANYTHING

2008-03-08T23:03:00.004-06:00

The space I had been occupying.

My frustrations with dishonesty have really been coming to a head lately. There's dishonesty with whatever guy who's trying to impress me with ____________ in the hope of seeing me naked; there's dishonesty with companies competing for my dollar vote, the first I can think of being Apple, which is a company whose products I use and find to be better than the others on the market and am quite fond of, but I find myself sick of the aura surrounding the company (or at the very least, a large group of its customers) that it's some sort of club to join, that you're either out or you're with Apple. I am so tired of fallacy and conceits. I wonder what this world would look like if everything would just molt off their skins and quit pretending or implying. NO more innuendo, NO more selling sex, NO more trashy television, NO more 100 calorie snack packs, NO more exclusiveness, NO more handbags bought just to show you could afford them, NO more exploiting people by way of religion (that means you, televangelists), NO more selling things for more money because they're "green."

HEY, QUIT LYING TO ME!
STOP TRYING TO SELL YOURSELF WITH, "As an artist..." or "as a musician..."
I don't care what you own
where you've been
who you know

I'm someone who is admittedly attracted to well-designed packaging; I will take that aesthetic and smoke it. I must, however, remember how to place myself opposite the headache of being sold something, and next to the smiling feeling of buying something because I need it to survive or because it's beautiful or useful in an honest way.

The things I do and claim as my own I will only dare to claim with a bare spirit and a smiling heart. I love to look at the stars, I love to practice ballet, I enjoy making things, I love to reach for a goal, I love to think, I love my boyfriend, I love to eat fruit, I love to find joy in small things- none of this makes me anything other than I am, which is just a girl somewhere on the road of progression through life.

EDIT: I wouldn't have been in the clarity of mind and heart to write something like this and realize these things without Cody who is a gift from God.

Taking Care

2008-02-08T22:21:00.000-06:00

I went to the book store in my shiny black shoes with some money in my coat pocket. The doors don't open themselves there- I kind of like that. I looked through magazines and featured book tables and eventually, I stumbled onto a glossy photo book. The paper isn't good paper, it's magazine paper, it's one of the TIME-LIFE picture books they stick in the newsstand every so often. I got the hi-gloss cover smudgy and thumbed through. I handed the cashier a smooth bill and felt happy. These are all pictures of Audrey Hepburn. In some of them, her baby deer is asleep with her on the couch. I want to be that kind of elegant, humble woman.

This is an age of days with elegant exertion, ungraceful negligence, aesthetic ideals forming, a sharpening of the mind and the transfer of emotions. I think about the things that transcend and try to figure out what they are, where they are, how to communicate them, how to find more, and how to immerse oneself in them. I think about how I can write better. I think about food and being kind. I am taking in more information than I exert. I need raw material to process. Someday, something good will come of all of this.

I think about drinking milk out of small paper cartons and eating cut-up food with oversized utensils. I think about popsicles running down the stained wooden stick and sliding down my arm. Then I'd have sticky fingers.

One Hundred Wonderful Things

2008-01-29T03:40:00.000-06:00

This list is an exercise in finding the good in everyday life. I won't be listing the things I'm working towards because I'm trying to find things to be thankful for right now.

books
stories
fantastic ideas
the night sky
men who explore and wonder
the moon
birds
maps
finding things you thought you'd lost
stationery
writing letters
making a nice cup of tea
understanding one's self better
people who encourage their children to be modest and kind
herbs
the language of flowers
kaleidoscopes
knitting
feeling proud of one's self
being forgiven
pillows and blankets
having a prince for a sweetheart
ballet
old things
femininity
cooking
keeping a coin collection
keeping a key collection
owning a car
rice
having nice things
being able to eat three meals a day
always having a roof over my head
having parents still married
finding quotes that perfectly express a feeling
finding movies that perfectly express a feeling
truth and beauty in nature
truth and beauty in books and art
having clean hair
eating a spectacular salad
Twitter
The Bible
various Buddhist works
being young and healthy
bodies of water
getting a good night's sleep
technology
making things
Understanding
Apples to Apples
Etsy.com
sugar snap peas
bagels
Obama likely the next president
Jewish moms
tart candy hearts
science
philosophy jokes
organic whole milk
Monk
Nova
The Everyman's Library
spreading good things to people
ravioli
gnocchi
handkerchiefs
morse code
free audiobooks
porridge
melons
keeping a garden
birdseed
Movies Being There and A Woman is a Woman
laughing
dancing because you feel like it
knowing you're loved
keneidlach (matzo balls)
deer
apples
maps
Jane Austen
wearing dresses
hugs and kisses
learning
Macintosh
Wendy's chocolate frosties
picnics
possibilities (scary, too)
affirming one's self
Aesop's Fables
good handwriting
chupacabra ;)
James Joyce
feeling accomplished
making progress
finally seeing the writing on the wall
lolcats
painters
carnival glass
music

You can well see that food is one of the big contributers to my happiness. :)

A Queen

2008-01-29T03:12:00.001-06:00

I painted this sometime in December. I've been feeling very uneasy lately and on occasion frustrated to tears. I feel like I'm having to actively seek beauty to give worth to my survival (wording and idea somewhat from a C. S. Lewis quote). The more I live, the more I agree with the Buddhist idea of suffering as a constant, and the more I want to establish myself in the soil of happiness, or at least contentment, as much as possible. In fact, contentment would be an amazing gift to have right now. It's just that I must always remember love. I am very much in recovery. My soul is still aching from the past and I have to make a balm for my heart. I am having a decidedly weighty day. My mind is growing heavy. Happiness is only achievable through working towards it, but working towards it is hard work and sometimes very tiring. If one is idle, though, happiness is rarely attainable and to what real degree? I guess I have to focus on obtaining a joyful heart that is a constant through all things. I will have to seek out things to store up in a cache for joyfulness and constantly milk it. I will place my faith in the philosophy that everything is always going to turn out all right, as hardships are often the point at which you need to be to develop as a person anyhow. I will constantly work towards self-betterment and reap the rewards of its success. Surely that will bring great joy in itself. My mind is not a peaceful one today, but hopefully sleep will quell its storm with the freshness and renewed possibility of another day.

A moral treatise that will be greatly misunderstood by a great number of people, I am sure.

2008-01-27T03:53:00.001-06:00

Please note that the following portions concerning relationships and individual gender roles probably does not (to my better knowledge) apply to homosexual people or their relationships. I'm not trying to be indelicate in saying so, it is simply that I cannot pretend to know about the proper dynamics of relationships of that nature. Also, as I am speaking about what we "should" be, note well that this is all of my very own experience and it is quite necessary for me to fulminate on this topic or I shall feel as though I am never quite through with it. Furthermore, you may also note well that I am always quite out of fashion with the times, these days. At least my style of writing and speech is, to be sure. Besides these asides upon the nature of the intentions of these writings, I feel that no apology is required because herein lie my own beliefs, which are made honestly and with a good heart, even if they are quite wrong.

Tell me, friends, what has become of the passionate, masculine, virtuous man? What has become of our good gentleman explorer from days gone by? He is a rare and wonderful thing to find in the cultural landscape of today.

Tell me, too, where is the fine and modest woman? Where is the feminine woman gone to? I shall not be persuaded that femininity is accurately portrayed by gaudy celebrities. Where is the caring creature? When can we say today that we have ever truly seen a lady?

I will not be barked at for desiring something beautiful that has now withered and become most misunderstood. I never mean to say that a woman cannot herself explore, that she cannot be as passionate as a man might be. No, never! I never mean that men and women are not equal in value. I wish for men to again be masculine! I wish for women to again be feminine! I wish for people to work for their own self-improvement.

When have we ever shunned an elegant and graceful woman with charge of herself and not the least need to reaffirm herself through the mirror of others? The woman who cares for her friends and speaks not ill of anyone with either malicious intent or shallowness and irresponsibility? When could one scorn a woman of discretion, modesty, and integrity? At which point did these things all go out of fashion? When did being a kind, loyal, and thoughtful woman go out of style and being frivolous, vain, catty, and tacky come in?

What did happen to a man who possesses both zeal and composure? A caring, thinking, wondering man who is loyal and moral? A man who respects a woman well enough to protect her body from ill-use, both from himself as well as others? While on the subject of respect, now that the lady reader has had the opportunity to agree with the need for a man who respects women, how about a woman who respects a man? She should respect him as her equal and partner, as one she loves, as one who loves her. She should, likewise, protect his body from being used merely for the exhaustion of her lust and desires. She must respect his body, heart, and mind as precious things. She must expect the same from him. No corners are to be cut for either sex. You both pull from within you everything you have, and only when both are working equally and sincerely with honesty and a good sort of selflessness that is not without self-respect, with both be able to attain their balanced happiness together. Or so this is my experience. I believe it to be a universal truth, but to state it as fact to be so will only bring more letters of disgust than I can afford time, mind, or heart to reply to.

Even when out of fashion, virtue should never be out of mind.

It is a thing perceived as being straight-laced and inhibiting, when, in fact, it is the very key to our happiness, written down for us already. Its being written down before makes us only more suspicious and thus rebellious, but I promise you that when both parties in a relationship work towards virtue, they will be the better, the happier.

I have strong feelings, too, on sexual morality which will be well-received by few. I will not include them here yet.

Edit (10 March 2008): correction of a typo.

Wishlist

2008-01-25T05:25:00.000-06:00

All of the material goods I desire are surprisingly academic and/or old fashioned. I warn you ahead of time that I will be using the word "fine" quite frequently through all of this.

I want the following:

Letter Writers Alliance Gift Bag
Telegram Stationery Because I want to send telegrams but they are surprisingly crazy expensive.
Black Ocean Globe Because it's classy.
Royal Quiet DeLuxe Portable of late 1940s My desire for this typewriter goes way back. I would love to have this on my desk. Love.
The entire Everyman's Library collection Fantastic.
A library in my home with loft/balcony shelves up a spiral staircase and rolling ladders
Very nice ex libris plates, stamps, and embosser.
Some fine personalized stationery with good-looking envelopes.
The Pilot Birdie Pen
More notebooks
A fine set of calling cards
A fine watch for an inquisitive lady (I like the one displayed on the top middle- something thin and elegant with many astronomical and chronological instruments)
The Oxford English Dictionary, the 20 volume set
A beautiful world atlas- I have yet to find a current one to my liking online.
An astrolabe in the classical style
A sundial, specifically a ring dial, perhaps for a necklace
An orrery. Oh, how I'd love an orrery.
Any other beautiful scientific instruments of old
An old-world telescope
A celestial globe, certainly more old-world than the one linked would be too pleasing.
A good microscope
This book in color. I only have the black & white version :(
A beautiful star atlas

I am sure I could go on. I will let that much be the start.

Essay

2008-01-10T03:20:00.000-06:00

I am working on an essay for my Old Testament class. The title is "The Relevance of the Old Testament in the Postmodern World." I am pouring fourth a lot of passion into it, too. I love to think, and then I love to write about what I think. I am really proud of what this essay is becoming. I am proud of it in the way that people are proud of something when they feel like they've achieved an accomplishment equal to their abilities. I am not proclaiming it as great, I am proclaiming it as my own.

Things to strive for:

2008-01-05T15:54:00.000-06:00

Calling it a "New Year's Resolution" always felt to me like bad luck for some reason, so I won't call them that- these are just things I need to do that happen to be said out loud at the beginning of a year. I'm writing these in the form of addressing myself frankly.

Drink only for taste. For example, have a beer with a meal or a glass of wine to enjoy it. Do not drink in excess or allow yourself to lose your judgment. People get stupid and disgusting when they are drunk. You're not being cool when you talk about yourself at a breakneck speed to anyone who will listen.

Quit smoking cigarettes altogether. You've never resolved to do this completely, and you still smoke if you feel like it and even buy cigarettes on occasion. Stop. You're going to get cancer if you don't. Plus, your lungs feel horrible and your breath smells bad when you smoke. If you want to dance ballet like you keep talking about, the smoking is going to make you lose your breath too quickly. Also, you always clear your throat all the time during a move. That has to be really annoying to everyone around you. It's going to be hard while taking Adderall again for the school year, but you're going to do it because this is called "growing up."

Do not eat because you are bored. Sure, you look good now, but if you keep the habit up, then not only will looks catch up with you in age, but health will as well. Stop eating for no reason. Eat when you're hungry, stop when you're satisfied.

Keep your environment clean. You want to be a mother and wife one day, but I'm sure your child will be in no way of happy health if you leave small objects and trash all around that he or she can choke on. I'm sure your husband, too, will grow tired of the mess caused by his wife. Let's not forget yourself. Your sloppiness disgusts you and you know it. It stresses you out and puts you out of spirits. You know how pleased you feel when everything is neat? Well, I know you're a perfectionist, so do not allow yourself to be inhibited by the question of "what if it isn't going to be perfect when I finish?" because do you know what? It doesn't matter. Also, anything better than what you're settling for now is acceptable. If you manage to get it "perfect," then fantastic- you can add another tally mark on your side.

Keep reading. It has improved not only your writing style, but your character. When you allow yourself to learn lessons the easy way through Jane Austen characters, then you're already starting to win this battle you've been waging for a wise and calm life.

Keep watching movies. You've only started really paying attention and understanding them in 2007, and don't stop. You'll only get more out of them as time goes on and you hone your skills. They make you exhilarated. Don't lose another hold on happiness to apathy.

Continue to be sweet, polite, and respectful to your parents. They deserve it. Being any way otherwise only makes you ugly.

Take a little bit of time out of every day to practice piano and violin. You'll be glad you did. You notice how you've been playing each for years and years but you only sound like a beginner? Remember the thing about being a perfectionist- you aren't going to get to that desired level without a lot of practice. It would make you so happy and fulfilled to be able to play both of those instruments well enough to play in front of someone else, so do not stop. It will bring joy to your heart to accomplish something.

Always finish all of your work in your upcoming classes. You know you are intelligent, let your grades reflect that. Do not make excuses anymore.

Keep in contact with your female friends and strengthen the relationships. The only male friend you should hang out with and talk on the phone to is your boyfriend. He deserves the ability to trust you completely. Keep healthy distances between yourself and your male friends. No matter how wonderful they may be, you know that people have no difficulty in finding temptation whether they are looking for it or not. Love your female friends and continue to care for them. Real friendships with them are too valuable to throw away. They will be there for you. Remember, though, that you need to "be there" for yourself when nobody else can. Remember to keep loving yourself.

Respect yourself. You don't deserve to receive such low offers of sex from strangers. Learn how to slap people when they touch you or tell them off when they make comments in a way that asserts your self-respect. Be assertive when you know you are right. Do not be weak in the face of someone attempting to devalue you.

Have great integrity. You are important in your life. This is one of the most obvious things people forget.

Have good manners. You should behave like the pretty sort of person you know yourself to be capable of being. Everyone around you deserves some amount of civility, even if they've done you wrong in the past. You know when it is wise to make exceptions to this rule. You understand when to slap someone for touching you or when to run away and scream for help. We will leave this out as a no-brainer.

Continue to improve your character. This will be a life-long work in progress. It is up to you. It will take a lot of hard work, but don't let that scare you away. It is very much worth it.

Practice spontaneous kindness (with discretion- ie, don't pick up hitchhikers when you're driving alone at night, etc- be wise, protect yourself). I shouldn't have to explain this one. It's a gift that gives back.

Continue to create things. It is worth the effort and having a result makes you gleeful. I know you've noticed yourself like that before. You cannot pretend like you don't love to be that way.

Continue to have good hygiene and take care of your body. Take your medicine on time, eat well, drink plenty of tea and water. Wash your hands frequently. You are a pilot and this body is your machine. Keep it in good shape or you will break down before you can achieve the things you want. If you need inspiration for taking care of yourself past yourself, think of your future children; think of how unpleasant it would be for your boyfriend to kiss you with your teeth un-brushed. Take care of your body- it has gotten you this far and endured some hard things. It deserves it.

And thus ends my list. Perhaps I might inspire someone else to take something from it. It helps to speak to yourself as a third person. One is less apt to lie that way, or at least I was. Also, it keeps one from feeling disgustingly selfish for writing a list full of "I"s.

Trust me,

2008-01-02T16:55:00.000-06:00

DON'T

PANIC.

Enjoying Myself

2007-12-26T00:50:00.000-06:00

I love words and I am going to have to own myself enough to fully admit it without becoming quite silly. I am in love with language and languages. I love words and symbols. I would do well to become a linguist. I've been quite enjoying the website, Wordie. I've just now been looking at the entry for "tesseract." I am sure you cannot have heard much in your life more poetic than its definition. Who knew how sexy 4-D geometry could be? Moving at right angles to the existing dimensions? Excuse me, but that is lovely. It should be noted that in addition to words and language, I am quite in love with science and all of its friends and relatives, which might thus be my excuse for finding such a "dull" thing so enthralling, if dull is indeed what you come away now thinking it.

I shall turn in now. I am currently all yawns.

Yo.

2007-12-21T16:54:00.001-06:00

Merry X-mas, Y'all.

Photographs from the day

2007-12-18T19:41:00.001-06:00

Movie Making, Movie Receiving

2007-12-18T16:09:00.000-06:00

Well, I never thought it would be so materially advantageous to keep a blog or (attempt to) channel Anna Karina. However, a very generous stranger has sent to me a wonderful gift of a DVD of Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless. I am sure you cannot imagine my surprise. Me? I am all smiles. I have since sent a thank you note to this generous person's myspace which was supplied to me in the gift message on the packing slip.

Today I got on a kick of movie making. I have never really done any before and I decided today that I would like to make one. So I made the one in the post below. My digital camera did record video at one time, but that camera is dying and I will have to get a new one soon, preferably a decent video camera. For this movie I just used my built-in iSight camera on my MacBook and the very basic iMovie HD software. It's a film short summarizing my trip to Argentina. Let me know what you think about it. I had a lot of fun making it. It's a cute little movie, I think.

Today's been a great day. I hope it has been for you, too.

My First Film: "Venturing Down South: Part 1"

2007-12-18T16:02:00.000-06:00

Venturing Down South, part 1 from Cait on Vimeo.

Brand New Key

2007-12-14T16:14:00.000-06:00

This is an ode to my new roller skates. Also, I'd like to mention that her voice in this song- and especially on the chorus- is great, it reminds me a little bit of Coco Rosie (which is kind of interesting because a couple of people think that I sound like them. That's probably why I like them, but then, I'm a bit of an ass).

...Looking in your eyes and seeing mine, warning me to read the signs

2007-12-14T14:41:00.000-06:00

If you recognize the source of the title, you'll know I've been listening to Nico. That is a really beautiful song (Fairest of the Seasons). It seems to me that most of my cathartic moments are figurative two steps forward and eventually, one step back. I figure out what needs to be purged and reorganized (emotional closets, anyone?) and then I put things back as well as I know how, but ever still, I don't have it just right, and I am ever becoming. I cry a lot these days, but not in the bad way so much. I cry at beauty, not because I'm happy about it, necessarily, it doesn't feel like such a nameable emotion as all of that, it's more like awe. It's a recognition of truth. Because of this, I have stopped wearing mascara (Another quick aside here, which you can't be surprised about with my unabashed use of parentheses: "We should boycott women who do not cry"). It's what I love so much about art, in the widest sweeping sense of the word (I don't want to hear some canned bullshit phrase about anything here). Movies and books in their own different ways especially because stories are exceptional things that have the depth of time that a painting doesn't (usually) have. Movies, in particular, capture the spirit of something in a way that nothing else can (ditto for books, but in a completely different way, obviously). I feel like whenever I find this amazing expression of an incredible truth, be it a human aspiration, the deepest depths of wretched emotion, giving up, never losing hope, etc, it is the most beautiful thing to me and I often cry, but always it gives me a swelling of emotion and a desire to take in as much of these things as possible and then when I'm ready, make them myself.

So here, Gentle Reader, I have embedded for you a clip that I will file under "human aspiration."

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Christmas Time!

2007-12-13T03:32:00.001-06:00

I don't think I've been this excited about Christmas since I was ten. Not only have I asked for like THE COOLEST STUFF EVER, but I have made/been making/will make some great presents for everybody. SO! I don't want to tell what I'm making so I don't give the secrets away, but I'll tell you what I've already asked for.
1. Skates
Okay, these are more than awesome. I am so excited about these... I am really such a little kid. Nothing is better than white lace-up skates with pink wheels.
2. Le Petit Prince
I love this book. I already have it in English and Spanish (well, I own it in English, but my boyfriend has been borrowing it for the last half-year) and I love languages, so it seems only natural to buy a copy that is for one, in the original language, and for another, in a language I'm learning.
3. Der Kleine Prinz
Refer to number two.
4. St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves
This just looks great. I want to read more stories like these.
5. Moon River print by Elloh
One of my favorite movies (Breakfast at Tiffany's) and captured here as a really lovely little painting.
6. Holly and Paul in the City print by Elloh
Refer to number five. By the way, if you want to visit Elloh's store and look at her other paintings (she has some really awesome ones based on the American version of the series The Office), then here is the link. I don't think you're ever too young to start buying art.
7. Pink Rose Ring
Because I like pretty things and I like being girly. Here is the back view, and this is the link to the store I bought it from.

Whew! That is the list I gave my mom (and the Karen Russell book I showed to my sister) when I was asked for a list. I've already ordered the items from Etsy by request of my mother (technology is not nearly as stressful for me). I don't know how I'm going to be able to stand waiting for those skates, though. Whew.

This Saturday (the fifteenth) is my sister's birthday and I have been making something nice for her. I might talk about it after I give it. We'll hang out this weekend and I'm making her some chocolate cupcakes at her request.

Something good is going on behind me- we've dug the bread maker out of the storage room and I can hear clicks as the temperature is being adjusted within... There Will be Bread!

Much love to all and I wish everybody a wonderful holiday season!

Douglas Adams is Stellar

2007-11-15T04:10:00.001-06:00

Today has been nice, except for the persistent aching of my belly. I painted a picture of a queen. I think I'll put it in the site design I've been "working on" forever now (except of course I was actually not working on anything) for www.thebirdandtheapple.com . It is not even anything.
Don't bother to go there.
Also today, I read a great deal more of my copy of The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide. Omnibus is fun to say because it sounds so heavy-handed and sort of silly. Well, this is the Hitchhiker's Guide omnibus. It's delightful, to say the least. The prologue makes me cry, just about everything else makes me laugh, and it's all written in such an honest way that it gives one a better feeling about humankind- or maybe I'm just emotional. Anyhow, if you haven't read it, then immediately do.
I watched the Godard film A Woman is a Woman (Une Femme est une Femme).
Sorry to be so positive about everything but my stomach today, but that is a genuinely charming film.
I do not mean charming as in the sort of usage that Holden Caulfield would've called me a "phony" over,
rather, I mean charming as in absolutely and totally enchanting and engaging and full of beauty (which some might say is synonymous with "full of truth").

And now I think I'm going to fix another cup of Earl Grey.

Channeling Anna Karina

2007-08-18T04:32:00.000-06:00

From time to time I pick a new person to "channel" via style: an old film star, 1950's poet, etc, and lately, that person has been Anna Karina. See for yourself:

This Homey Weekmiddle

2007-08-17T02:56:00.000-06:00

Wednesday was grocery day. I bought tons of Pocky, most of which is eaten already. Also, I bought ingredients for the dinner Friedrich and I prepared earlier "tonight" (Thursday night, actually) to eat with my folks. It was an amazing vegetable medley sauté on a beautiful white bed of vermicelli, served in black bowls- a gorgeous meal. Also on the list were Honey Rice Puffins, Lavender Dr. Bronner's Soap, and new string shopping bags. I'm proud of using only one Target shopping bag after I bought my string bags at the health food store- and I bought a lot of food. Enough talk- here are some photos, including a few shots of me with my longer hair and the beginning of my latest knitting project.

Homey Weekmiddle

On Domesti[Cait]ion

2007-08-14T23:47:00.000-06:00

Today's been lovely-busy, filled with pleasant household chores, a few science shows, cupcake baking, and a knitting project. Take a look at my pictures from the day in my little photo album.

On Domesti [Cait] ion

Alone

2007-05-21T04:28:00.000-06:00

I find that the pleasures of my life now almost completely exclude other people. I sleep, eat, watch movies, read, listen to music, write on occasion, and spend a lot of time on the internet. I loathe the idea of becoming misanthropic, but just about nobody is appealing as company and the majority of people seem to be sort of stupid in one intolerable way or other. The people I love that I would want to spend time with are gone for the summer. And I wonder who else has felt exactly this way before. I'm in hate with the past and every other day seems like another plucked out of last year. I'm living mostly as a shut-in. This is stupid. Fuck it.

Nowhere, Not here

2007-04-02T15:40:00.000-06:00

I'm never quite sure if I'm on the same page as anyone else. I'm sure that I'm spacy as
hell. I don't want to be here- at home- and occasionally, I'll be out driving and try to think of someplace, anyplace at all that I wouldn't mind being at, and I won't be able to think of anything. I feel like I'm sweating out restlessness like it was some booze I'd been drinking. I have this incredible growing urge lately, to catalogue and categorize everything in my world. Everything from books to ideas to people to products to foods and feelings. I want to make logs of everything. I'm not sure what the deal is, but it's satisfying. I just started learning Openoffice.org Base, which is an open source database program. The day is young. I want some coffee and somewhere to settle down.

Photograph of me was taken during the fall semester of 2006 by Cody Head using my Smena 8M 35mm Camera.