Sunday, April 3, 2011
7:23pm
This has to be short, because I desperately need to get to work. I have a paper to write for Ferreras that's due on Wednesday and I haven't even started outside of some minimal research. I don't think anyone knows what's expected with this paper, and it's stressing me out. A lot of my time this past week that I probably should have spent on the paper has gone to Bollywood rehearsals and performance and then this afternoon just a lunch get together at Arathy's. I decided not to rush, though, because honestly, I haven't encountered such transparently decent people in a long time. I just sort of reveled in their presence. I've really enjoyed getting to know them all and spending the time we did dancing. I think it's so important to dance and do things just for beauty and spirit sometimes. Otherwise, it's so easy to get washed away in the busyness of life. We are all only here for so long. I wrote about this earlier on paper, so I'll not go into it all again.
On Friday, I met author Mempo Giardinelli along with several other members of the department. I was excited; his life story is very interesting, and it inspires to me that someone could endure something so horrible and live to turn it into art and then be such a jovial person. He answered my question about writing, so for me that was exciting. If you know me, you know I love to write and to have a famous author answer my question, especially in Spanish, was pretty awesome for me.
I don't know what else to write about. I think I am really just procrastinating on this paper as it seems so overwhelming with not knowing what to write about at all. :/
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Busyness
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
11:59PM
Just a quickie post to defrag before going to bed. I am so tired. Up at 8 this morning, which was later than I wanted to be up. Sat on the futon with the cat, having coffee, listening to classical music, and reading for Tuninetti's class as well as practicing for my presentation. Worked out at home to save time... did some intervals to get in some resistance training as well as learn some new choreography. Should have probably gone to the gym and done straight resistance, but I'm just letting it be what it is this week, since we're doing all the stuff with Bollywood. Showered, headed to campus. Bustled up through the alley late, because there was... a problem at McDonald's. Anyway. Office hours 2-4. Tuninetti's class 4-7. I sat there just waiting to give my presentation. I walked in feeling moderately confident, but then I had to sit there and wait forever. He's been pretty critical of my presentations in the past, and I'm not saying I disagree with his comments, but... it does make me more nervous to present for him as opposed to other instructors. I feel like at any second, if I look out of the corner of my eye, he's going to pick up that pencil and make a note of what he needs to deduct points for. :/ After class, went to Rec for Bollywood rehearsal from 7:30-9:30. Oh yeah, stopped at Subway for some dinner first. I ate it in the car. Rehearsal went well. It's coming together. I enjoy the people I'm dancing with for this brief moment in time. Came home, pet the cat who is the biggest attention whore of a whine baby (but exceptionally cute and cuddly for all that) of a cat I've ever met. Sat here on the futon some more planning tomorrow's lesson and getting started on grading compositions. I would really like to be able to hand them back on Friday when they turn in their exams. Have that off my chest before I have to start grading exams. My work is cut out for me this next week- paper for Ferreras due in a week, and everything else I'm doing, plus this massive all-at-once quantity of grading that needs to be done right now. I'm just gonna keep truckin', because i don't know what else there is TO do, and hope I get it all done when it needs to be.
Now, however, it is time to let a very busy, productive day go and get myself to bed.
11:59PM
Just a quickie post to defrag before going to bed. I am so tired. Up at 8 this morning, which was later than I wanted to be up. Sat on the futon with the cat, having coffee, listening to classical music, and reading for Tuninetti's class as well as practicing for my presentation. Worked out at home to save time... did some intervals to get in some resistance training as well as learn some new choreography. Should have probably gone to the gym and done straight resistance, but I'm just letting it be what it is this week, since we're doing all the stuff with Bollywood. Showered, headed to campus. Bustled up through the alley late, because there was... a problem at McDonald's. Anyway. Office hours 2-4. Tuninetti's class 4-7. I sat there just waiting to give my presentation. I walked in feeling moderately confident, but then I had to sit there and wait forever. He's been pretty critical of my presentations in the past, and I'm not saying I disagree with his comments, but... it does make me more nervous to present for him as opposed to other instructors. I feel like at any second, if I look out of the corner of my eye, he's going to pick up that pencil and make a note of what he needs to deduct points for. :/ After class, went to Rec for Bollywood rehearsal from 7:30-9:30. Oh yeah, stopped at Subway for some dinner first. I ate it in the car. Rehearsal went well. It's coming together. I enjoy the people I'm dancing with for this brief moment in time. Came home, pet the cat who is the biggest attention whore of a whine baby (but exceptionally cute and cuddly for all that) of a cat I've ever met. Sat here on the futon some more planning tomorrow's lesson and getting started on grading compositions. I would really like to be able to hand them back on Friday when they turn in their exams. Have that off my chest before I have to start grading exams. My work is cut out for me this next week- paper for Ferreras due in a week, and everything else I'm doing, plus this massive all-at-once quantity of grading that needs to be done right now. I'm just gonna keep truckin', because i don't know what else there is TO do, and hope I get it all done when it needs to be.
Now, however, it is time to let a very busy, productive day go and get myself to bed.
Friday, March 25, 2011
Soup, Pie, Nil
Friday, March 25, 2011
11:34am
Spring Break is winding down all too soon. I'm sitting in my pajamas, listening to nothing but the sounds of the dryer and the furnace. First thing this morning, I cut up a 3 pound chuck roast and tossed it in the Crock Pot to make vegetable soup, or really... more like to a stew. John's down in his office, and it seems this morning is almost eternal for the loneliness. I'm trying to relax into it, because at any other time, I would want time expanded.
We just got back yesterday afternoon from our little getaway in the woods at Berkeley Springs. We rented a cabin there for a couple nights and were mostly lazy. There was a jacuzzi on the deck... I wished we could have made it hotter, but 104 degrees wasn't so bad once you got used to it, and you could stay in it longer that way. On Wednesday we were sitting out in it, and there had been rain all morning so that the woods were enshrouded in fog and the the trees looked more gray than brown, blending with the air around them. The steam coming off the water and hitting my face before bouncing on up toward the sky made me also feel very blended. But then, it's just a thin layer of skin that keeps our blood and organs back, holding us separate from the world around us.
We played a couple games of Scrabble while we were there, one of Monopoly, and passed the time burning Duralogs in the fireplace. Last night I met up with the aerobics crew at Chili's. Betty, a woman I perceive to be in her early 70s, very beautiful, used to be a model, asked what we did there. Skiing? Something exciting? We played lots of Scrabble, I said, and she raised a brow and wrinkled her nose. I suppose that didn't sound so appealing. But... sometimes it is nice to just stop. Watch the world move on by, and the only thing you really want to be separate from is time, which pulls you unwillingly along on its strings, stitched together by some unseen hand. And all you want to do is pause. Look and hold. And it's silly, of course, because this is not possible. Nonetheless, the slower you get, the closer you get. And the arcs made as x approaches infinity, never quite touching, crossing, intersecting, but still you think of it. It was really nice to just move slow for a couple days and just be there with each other. I didn't take the computer. I didn't get on the internet. We didn't use the TV much. Just the last night to watching "South Park" and a couple other things, but we were doing it together. I'd like to be back there, but that invisible seamstress keeps tugging at the thread I'm sitting on, of course, and it's time to move along. I have, however, cleaned the trailer all up and, although time is always in such short supply I can't keep things neat, am trying to bring a homier feel into our home and let it last as long as possible. I'm not necessarily on a domestic kick so much as trying to remember that the small joys are the things that ultimately seem to matter most and so to... draw as much flavor from the bones as I can. Why can't I say anything straight? Language always eludes me like some strange animal disappearing into a dark forest. And maybe this is why sometimes I see no point in talking. Things are disappearing, and it's not bad and no reason to be scared of it, but... why blubber on giving meaning to the disappearing things? The meaning perhaps is only in the witnessing, for me, anyway, and I like to watch.
I am in a weird mood, because I am reading a book called The Secret Scripture about a 100-year old Irish woman. Her voice is so strange, her thoughts crazy and crystal clear... much madness is divinest sense. Yes, that's how I feel today. I think maybe I'll make a pie later.
11:34am
Spring Break is winding down all too soon. I'm sitting in my pajamas, listening to nothing but the sounds of the dryer and the furnace. First thing this morning, I cut up a 3 pound chuck roast and tossed it in the Crock Pot to make vegetable soup, or really... more like to a stew. John's down in his office, and it seems this morning is almost eternal for the loneliness. I'm trying to relax into it, because at any other time, I would want time expanded.
We just got back yesterday afternoon from our little getaway in the woods at Berkeley Springs. We rented a cabin there for a couple nights and were mostly lazy. There was a jacuzzi on the deck... I wished we could have made it hotter, but 104 degrees wasn't so bad once you got used to it, and you could stay in it longer that way. On Wednesday we were sitting out in it, and there had been rain all morning so that the woods were enshrouded in fog and the the trees looked more gray than brown, blending with the air around them. The steam coming off the water and hitting my face before bouncing on up toward the sky made me also feel very blended. But then, it's just a thin layer of skin that keeps our blood and organs back, holding us separate from the world around us.
We played a couple games of Scrabble while we were there, one of Monopoly, and passed the time burning Duralogs in the fireplace. Last night I met up with the aerobics crew at Chili's. Betty, a woman I perceive to be in her early 70s, very beautiful, used to be a model, asked what we did there. Skiing? Something exciting? We played lots of Scrabble, I said, and she raised a brow and wrinkled her nose. I suppose that didn't sound so appealing. But... sometimes it is nice to just stop. Watch the world move on by, and the only thing you really want to be separate from is time, which pulls you unwillingly along on its strings, stitched together by some unseen hand. And all you want to do is pause. Look and hold. And it's silly, of course, because this is not possible. Nonetheless, the slower you get, the closer you get. And the arcs made as x approaches infinity, never quite touching, crossing, intersecting, but still you think of it. It was really nice to just move slow for a couple days and just be there with each other. I didn't take the computer. I didn't get on the internet. We didn't use the TV much. Just the last night to watching "South Park" and a couple other things, but we were doing it together. I'd like to be back there, but that invisible seamstress keeps tugging at the thread I'm sitting on, of course, and it's time to move along. I have, however, cleaned the trailer all up and, although time is always in such short supply I can't keep things neat, am trying to bring a homier feel into our home and let it last as long as possible. I'm not necessarily on a domestic kick so much as trying to remember that the small joys are the things that ultimately seem to matter most and so to... draw as much flavor from the bones as I can. Why can't I say anything straight? Language always eludes me like some strange animal disappearing into a dark forest. And maybe this is why sometimes I see no point in talking. Things are disappearing, and it's not bad and no reason to be scared of it, but... why blubber on giving meaning to the disappearing things? The meaning perhaps is only in the witnessing, for me, anyway, and I like to watch.
I am in a weird mood, because I am reading a book called The Secret Scripture about a 100-year old Irish woman. Her voice is so strange, her thoughts crazy and crystal clear... much madness is divinest sense. Yes, that's how I feel today. I think maybe I'll make a pie later.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
March 20
Sunday, March 20, 2011
11:23pm
Sitting here in the family room. Mom's snoring on the couch, and Carly is up in bed trying to get some sleep before having her wisdom teeth removed tomorrow. I want to go to bed, but my nails are wet. Writing this right now is merely something to do for entertainment until they are dry.
So... today... Dad woke me up to say that Mom had made breakfast. Score! In a rare moment, the four of us all sat down to homefries, kilbasa, biscuits, and eggs together. Dad went to bed soon after as he'd worked the midnight shift. I continued drinking coffee and screwing around online for awhile, just waiting for it to warm up. Went for a 5-mile run down at the park, came home, showered, and headed out to the Richies', where Isaiah taught me how to shoot two different automatics, a rifle, and a revolver. The revolver seems to be the best option for me. I really do want to purchase a home defense weapon. I know there are a lot of opinions floating around out there about how people should or shouldn't have guns in their homes, but basically, it's my right. I feel the people who are judging me for wanting this should take a step back and either think about why I might want a gun, or just... even better... leave me alone. Me being me, if I ever had to shoot someone, it would absolutely devastate me, even if it was done in self-defense. However, I don't think I deserve to die or endure an attack on the outside chance that someone would break into my home. Chances are if someone's breaking in, they're coming in armed. Also, I imagine myself as having kids someday, whether biological or adopted. If someone broke in and had my child, absolutely I'd want to have the ability to defend that child... or really anyone in my home in a dangerous situation. It's something I hope I never have to do, but in the event that it would, I want to be prepared because I would absolutely choose to protect the life of the victim as opposed to not "playing God" and just letting the perpetrator take an innocent life. Again, I'd never shoot that gun in an intent to kill unless it was imperative. I don't think guns are fun. I don't think guns are toys or cool, though I don't judge people who have fun shooting for target practice or hunting. I just do have the write to protect myself and my loved ones, and that's a right I feel like exercising. I was grateful to have a friend who knew a good bit about guns and who obviously takes safety very seriously to teach me.
Came back, put the food away I'd cooked earlier, and met up with Dad and Carly down at Pap-paw's and Mam-maw's. Lori came down, too, and we basically just hung out.
This evening Carly and I learned a couple routines off my ZIN DVD. I'm trying to get some choreography locked down over break here so that when I return my class will feel a little fresher hopefully. So that's been my day... running, guns, Zumba, visiting, and some drumming.
11:23pm
Sitting here in the family room. Mom's snoring on the couch, and Carly is up in bed trying to get some sleep before having her wisdom teeth removed tomorrow. I want to go to bed, but my nails are wet. Writing this right now is merely something to do for entertainment until they are dry.
So... today... Dad woke me up to say that Mom had made breakfast. Score! In a rare moment, the four of us all sat down to homefries, kilbasa, biscuits, and eggs together. Dad went to bed soon after as he'd worked the midnight shift. I continued drinking coffee and screwing around online for awhile, just waiting for it to warm up. Went for a 5-mile run down at the park, came home, showered, and headed out to the Richies', where Isaiah taught me how to shoot two different automatics, a rifle, and a revolver. The revolver seems to be the best option for me. I really do want to purchase a home defense weapon. I know there are a lot of opinions floating around out there about how people should or shouldn't have guns in their homes, but basically, it's my right. I feel the people who are judging me for wanting this should take a step back and either think about why I might want a gun, or just... even better... leave me alone. Me being me, if I ever had to shoot someone, it would absolutely devastate me, even if it was done in self-defense. However, I don't think I deserve to die or endure an attack on the outside chance that someone would break into my home. Chances are if someone's breaking in, they're coming in armed. Also, I imagine myself as having kids someday, whether biological or adopted. If someone broke in and had my child, absolutely I'd want to have the ability to defend that child... or really anyone in my home in a dangerous situation. It's something I hope I never have to do, but in the event that it would, I want to be prepared because I would absolutely choose to protect the life of the victim as opposed to not "playing God" and just letting the perpetrator take an innocent life. Again, I'd never shoot that gun in an intent to kill unless it was imperative. I don't think guns are fun. I don't think guns are toys or cool, though I don't judge people who have fun shooting for target practice or hunting. I just do have the write to protect myself and my loved ones, and that's a right I feel like exercising. I was grateful to have a friend who knew a good bit about guns and who obviously takes safety very seriously to teach me.
Came back, put the food away I'd cooked earlier, and met up with Dad and Carly down at Pap-paw's and Mam-maw's. Lori came down, too, and we basically just hung out.
This evening Carly and I learned a couple routines off my ZIN DVD. I'm trying to get some choreography locked down over break here so that when I return my class will feel a little fresher hopefully. So that's been my day... running, guns, Zumba, visiting, and some drumming.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Spring Break starts today.
Friday, March 18, 2011
9:03PM
Got up, planned my lesson for today, which was surprisingly easy today. It often takes me two hours to plan a one hour lesson. Today it took thirty minutes, so that is nice.
I got the news from Spain last night, as I already posted on Facebook, that I have been accepted to the program to teach English for one year at the University of Valladolid. It´s bittersweet. I´m thrilled for the opportunity, but it's hard to leave people, especially John and my sick grandma. My parents don't know yet that I applied. I just wanted to have it all set up before I went to the pains of explaining what was going on. I have surprisingly few details, and had even fewer earlier and didn't want to have to answer questions. Plus, I generally feel perturbed at the ambiguity in life, so to have to analyze the ambiguity with others just makes me... anxious. I hope they'll be happy about this. My grandma will be sad, and that will hurt my heart, but I think I have to do this. I feel handicapped in the Spanish language, but I'm not going to say I suck. I've learned it entirely in West Virginia, nowhere else. Given that, I'd say I do pretty well. However, it's never been a language I was dependent on, so I do struggle. I want to be fluent, and this is how I can do it. I don't want to wake up every morning with a lot of regrets, so despite the difficulty of leaving people for a year, I'm just going to have to do it. And I am excited. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity.
So last night was Bollywood rehearsal. I had such a blast. I had to miss the first rehearsal, because I was working on two presentations over the weekend. So... as far as formations went, I had no idea where I needed to be. And it was like, "Casie, run!... Casie... over here!" Lol, reminded me of marching band. Formations were always the last thing I learned, and I just followed the herd. Somehow, it worked out. Idk, this has been a good opportunity working on this performance. Just another one of those things in life that has just magically fallen into my lap. I'm not sure where we're performing this, or in front of whom. I don't care. I just want to dance and maybe make a few friends in the process. Toward the end of the rehearsal I got a little more insight as to how much they're wanting to do with this when I saw the costumes, lol. I currently have a red dress in my car that I'm borrowing from another woman I just met, lol. And it's been really good, too, because everyone involved is very cooperative. There are no divas. I'm just enjoying it for what it is, and I don't even know exactly what that is, lol. It's a charmed life.
Wednesday night I went to Gibbie's with Joe. We met up with Isaiah, Andy, Carman, Carly, Sally and her boyfriend. It was a good sized group for me... we could all fit at one table. I was really pumped that Carly came out and had fun with us. She and I did a karaoke version of "All that Jazz," so that was pretty spectacular. We are both insane/dorky enough to go all out Vaudeville with it. I enjoyed just being with friends, too. I miss the shindiggers especially, and I feel like Isaiah and Andy have generally been people I could connect with for conversation.
So yeah... Spain. Bollywood. Karaoke and friends. I'm lying in bed quite sore from my workout on Wednesday followed by the Bollywood rehearsal... four hours including the class... last night. But I have a week off from school now, and that makes me feel amazing. I have been needing it sooooooooooo badly! I don't think I'll do much work over the break, perhaps start working on a paper for Ferreras, but I really need some time to cool my jets. I'm glad to be getting it and to get to see Miss Mammaw.
Better get ready. Advising appointment at 11:30.
Peace.
9:03PM
Got up, planned my lesson for today, which was surprisingly easy today. It often takes me two hours to plan a one hour lesson. Today it took thirty minutes, so that is nice.
I got the news from Spain last night, as I already posted on Facebook, that I have been accepted to the program to teach English for one year at the University of Valladolid. It´s bittersweet. I´m thrilled for the opportunity, but it's hard to leave people, especially John and my sick grandma. My parents don't know yet that I applied. I just wanted to have it all set up before I went to the pains of explaining what was going on. I have surprisingly few details, and had even fewer earlier and didn't want to have to answer questions. Plus, I generally feel perturbed at the ambiguity in life, so to have to analyze the ambiguity with others just makes me... anxious. I hope they'll be happy about this. My grandma will be sad, and that will hurt my heart, but I think I have to do this. I feel handicapped in the Spanish language, but I'm not going to say I suck. I've learned it entirely in West Virginia, nowhere else. Given that, I'd say I do pretty well. However, it's never been a language I was dependent on, so I do struggle. I want to be fluent, and this is how I can do it. I don't want to wake up every morning with a lot of regrets, so despite the difficulty of leaving people for a year, I'm just going to have to do it. And I am excited. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity.
So last night was Bollywood rehearsal. I had such a blast. I had to miss the first rehearsal, because I was working on two presentations over the weekend. So... as far as formations went, I had no idea where I needed to be. And it was like, "Casie, run!... Casie... over here!" Lol, reminded me of marching band. Formations were always the last thing I learned, and I just followed the herd. Somehow, it worked out. Idk, this has been a good opportunity working on this performance. Just another one of those things in life that has just magically fallen into my lap. I'm not sure where we're performing this, or in front of whom. I don't care. I just want to dance and maybe make a few friends in the process. Toward the end of the rehearsal I got a little more insight as to how much they're wanting to do with this when I saw the costumes, lol. I currently have a red dress in my car that I'm borrowing from another woman I just met, lol. And it's been really good, too, because everyone involved is very cooperative. There are no divas. I'm just enjoying it for what it is, and I don't even know exactly what that is, lol. It's a charmed life.
Wednesday night I went to Gibbie's with Joe. We met up with Isaiah, Andy, Carman, Carly, Sally and her boyfriend. It was a good sized group for me... we could all fit at one table. I was really pumped that Carly came out and had fun with us. She and I did a karaoke version of "All that Jazz," so that was pretty spectacular. We are both insane/dorky enough to go all out Vaudeville with it. I enjoyed just being with friends, too. I miss the shindiggers especially, and I feel like Isaiah and Andy have generally been people I could connect with for conversation.
So yeah... Spain. Bollywood. Karaoke and friends. I'm lying in bed quite sore from my workout on Wednesday followed by the Bollywood rehearsal... four hours including the class... last night. But I have a week off from school now, and that makes me feel amazing. I have been needing it sooooooooooo badly! I don't think I'll do much work over the break, perhaps start working on a paper for Ferreras, but I really need some time to cool my jets. I'm glad to be getting it and to get to see Miss Mammaw.
Better get ready. Advising appointment at 11:30.
Peace.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Surprise Naptime
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
4:42PM
For some unknown reason, Dr. Tuninetti walked into class today only long enough to announce that we weren't going to have class anymore. So I'm home now, in the recliner, under my WVU blanket, listening to rain hit the trailer. I don't have any lights on, and it's quiet. Of course, as soon as I got the news we weren't having class, I immediately began thinking of everything I could do with those extra three hours... actually get all my reading done for tomorrow? Do my lesson plans early and go to bed on time? Maybe, but I am so tired right now, that I think I'm just going to sit in this chair for awhile, maybe take a short nap.
The last three nights I think I've averaged about 5 hours of sleep a night. That's what having two presentations in one week... on Monday and Tuesday of all days... will do to you. And the exhaustion is starting to make me confused. Earlier, I tried to iron my shirt with the electric mixer. Then I got lost in the tiny building of Chitwood after having worked in there all year. Yes, just listening to the rain for right now sounds like a pretty excellent idea. When I wake up, I can decide what else I feel like doing. :)
4:42PM
For some unknown reason, Dr. Tuninetti walked into class today only long enough to announce that we weren't going to have class anymore. So I'm home now, in the recliner, under my WVU blanket, listening to rain hit the trailer. I don't have any lights on, and it's quiet. Of course, as soon as I got the news we weren't having class, I immediately began thinking of everything I could do with those extra three hours... actually get all my reading done for tomorrow? Do my lesson plans early and go to bed on time? Maybe, but I am so tired right now, that I think I'm just going to sit in this chair for awhile, maybe take a short nap.
The last three nights I think I've averaged about 5 hours of sleep a night. That's what having two presentations in one week... on Monday and Tuesday of all days... will do to you. And the exhaustion is starting to make me confused. Earlier, I tried to iron my shirt with the electric mixer. Then I got lost in the tiny building of Chitwood after having worked in there all year. Yes, just listening to the rain for right now sounds like a pretty excellent idea. When I wake up, I can decide what else I feel like doing. :)
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Thoughts over the first few sips of wine
Sunday, March 13, 2011
10:58PM
I'm thinking again, and I suppose I oughtn't. Then again, pensar es servir. Recently I had to replace my ink cartridge. Tonight I needed to print the 12-page speech I have prepared for myself so that I can give it tomorrow. Unfortunately, the printer didn't recognize that there was, in fact, a cartridge in the printer. So John and I went down to Brooks and he printed it for me there. I think he was more upset about it than I was. I think I'm a little numb to getting really upset about things right now. I've been like that this whole weekend, which is unusual for me when I'm under this heavy a workload. But I just keep thinking about Japan, and it makes me sick. The biggest earthquake in Japan since records began 140 years ago, and one of the top 10 ever. Watching the footage just makes me... well, I'm being redundant, but... sick. One second homes are sitting in happy order, the next that wall of water rushes through them making them pool toys. I seriously have tears in my eyes right now and will be crying soon. I just hate this so much. I think about what it would be like to wake up, maybe my spouse was working a night shift, and now... he's never making it home. Or... I've got my car in the highest gear and I'm trying to drive away, but the water eclipses me and I'm done. I'm breathing, healthy, full of fight, and Mother Nature decides it's simply time to crush me. My heart is breaking. Some things I've heard in relation to what's going on, ignorant political statements really, just kill me. How can you think about borders and history at a time like this? I hate history classes in some ways. It's good to learn about the past, I suppose... but a lot of time all it does is perpetuate hate. Why else would a child in my seventh grade history class be proclaiming that he was going to kill those Japs? And it makes me think about borders and rules on a scale beyond the current. So many times we aren't supposed to care about someone, love someone... because they're from another place. Or someone is in "your" home, or you're in "theirs," and one or the other of you is supposed to feel displaced. I listened to John Lennon's "Imagine" earlier, because I needed some healing music, and one of my favorite lines is Imagine there's no country... imagine all the people, sharing all the world. What if we didn't think in terms of countries and borders? What if this didn't happen to "Japan" but part of our own selves? After all, national borders are nothing more than arbitrary lines drawn by cartographers. If you were on the border between the US and Mexico, as it was before fences and immigration officers, you wouldn't have known where one country ended and the other began. I've been working all weekend on this presentation about Mexico. Some of the people I love and who are close to me have very big problems with the ideas of immigration. This is "our" country. But... it isn't. Yeah, we pay the taxes here, but there's a bigger law, a better, more perfect law, which yes, I believe is God's law. This is God's world; we're sharing it for a time, and to play keepsies from Mexicans is about as juvenile as one sibling holding a gift from a parent over the other sibling's head. I know there are politics, and I don't want to argue. I just wish people would love each other already. And it can be argued that that's overly simplistic. Maybe it is, but when love is at the center, things do become simpler.
So, they're on the verge of nuclear meltdown in Japan. That depresses and scares me, too. I know that "we're safe" from the meltdown and all that, but it's just so sad... to think of a power that can be used for so much good getting turned into destruction. How would it be to wake up to a huge hole in the ground where your town used to be? And I think of humanity in those terms frequently, capable of such infinite goodness, often screwing it all up, perpetuating hate and hurt. And one of the ways I envision us doing this, eventually, is with nuclear war. It terrifies me, but mostly... depresses me. The way Hitler was born with the same DNA as any of us and just became... bad. What if Hitler had had a nuclear bomb? What if someone like Hitler gets hold of one such a bomb eventually? I used to have apocalyptic dreams all the time. A radiation wave from a blast was always coming at me. When I first started having the dreams, I was nothing but terrified, running, knowing I couldn't get a way, but in my dreams time was warped... those milliseconds between realizing I couldn't escape and the wave actually touching me stretched on infinitely. In the more recent versions of the dream, I just felt a sense of futility and surrender, depression. There we were, humanity, capable of such a beautiful life and world together, about to be completely obliterated. That's the upsetting part, not the horror of death or mass destruction, but the knowledge that it could have been so much better. What makes us chose fear over love? Over and over again? Why do we do that? I wish we could just recognize, yes, this is temporary, but it's no excuse to not fall in love every day. These things we love and experience, they're gifts. They were never for us to hold onto, so why begrudge their going? We do, of course. It's our nature. But... what if we could... just be, and be in love?
10:58PM
I'm thinking again, and I suppose I oughtn't. Then again, pensar es servir. Recently I had to replace my ink cartridge. Tonight I needed to print the 12-page speech I have prepared for myself so that I can give it tomorrow. Unfortunately, the printer didn't recognize that there was, in fact, a cartridge in the printer. So John and I went down to Brooks and he printed it for me there. I think he was more upset about it than I was. I think I'm a little numb to getting really upset about things right now. I've been like that this whole weekend, which is unusual for me when I'm under this heavy a workload. But I just keep thinking about Japan, and it makes me sick. The biggest earthquake in Japan since records began 140 years ago, and one of the top 10 ever. Watching the footage just makes me... well, I'm being redundant, but... sick. One second homes are sitting in happy order, the next that wall of water rushes through them making them pool toys. I seriously have tears in my eyes right now and will be crying soon. I just hate this so much. I think about what it would be like to wake up, maybe my spouse was working a night shift, and now... he's never making it home. Or... I've got my car in the highest gear and I'm trying to drive away, but the water eclipses me and I'm done. I'm breathing, healthy, full of fight, and Mother Nature decides it's simply time to crush me. My heart is breaking. Some things I've heard in relation to what's going on, ignorant political statements really, just kill me. How can you think about borders and history at a time like this? I hate history classes in some ways. It's good to learn about the past, I suppose... but a lot of time all it does is perpetuate hate. Why else would a child in my seventh grade history class be proclaiming that he was going to kill those Japs? And it makes me think about borders and rules on a scale beyond the current. So many times we aren't supposed to care about someone, love someone... because they're from another place. Or someone is in "your" home, or you're in "theirs," and one or the other of you is supposed to feel displaced. I listened to John Lennon's "Imagine" earlier, because I needed some healing music, and one of my favorite lines is Imagine there's no country... imagine all the people, sharing all the world. What if we didn't think in terms of countries and borders? What if this didn't happen to "Japan" but part of our own selves? After all, national borders are nothing more than arbitrary lines drawn by cartographers. If you were on the border between the US and Mexico, as it was before fences and immigration officers, you wouldn't have known where one country ended and the other began. I've been working all weekend on this presentation about Mexico. Some of the people I love and who are close to me have very big problems with the ideas of immigration. This is "our" country. But... it isn't. Yeah, we pay the taxes here, but there's a bigger law, a better, more perfect law, which yes, I believe is God's law. This is God's world; we're sharing it for a time, and to play keepsies from Mexicans is about as juvenile as one sibling holding a gift from a parent over the other sibling's head. I know there are politics, and I don't want to argue. I just wish people would love each other already. And it can be argued that that's overly simplistic. Maybe it is, but when love is at the center, things do become simpler.
So, they're on the verge of nuclear meltdown in Japan. That depresses and scares me, too. I know that "we're safe" from the meltdown and all that, but it's just so sad... to think of a power that can be used for so much good getting turned into destruction. How would it be to wake up to a huge hole in the ground where your town used to be? And I think of humanity in those terms frequently, capable of such infinite goodness, often screwing it all up, perpetuating hate and hurt. And one of the ways I envision us doing this, eventually, is with nuclear war. It terrifies me, but mostly... depresses me. The way Hitler was born with the same DNA as any of us and just became... bad. What if Hitler had had a nuclear bomb? What if someone like Hitler gets hold of one such a bomb eventually? I used to have apocalyptic dreams all the time. A radiation wave from a blast was always coming at me. When I first started having the dreams, I was nothing but terrified, running, knowing I couldn't get a way, but in my dreams time was warped... those milliseconds between realizing I couldn't escape and the wave actually touching me stretched on infinitely. In the more recent versions of the dream, I just felt a sense of futility and surrender, depression. There we were, humanity, capable of such a beautiful life and world together, about to be completely obliterated. That's the upsetting part, not the horror of death or mass destruction, but the knowledge that it could have been so much better. What makes us chose fear over love? Over and over again? Why do we do that? I wish we could just recognize, yes, this is temporary, but it's no excuse to not fall in love every day. These things we love and experience, they're gifts. They were never for us to hold onto, so why begrudge their going? We do, of course. It's our nature. But... what if we could... just be, and be in love?
Missy Mam-maw
Sunday, March 13, 2011
4:26PM
So I have about three and a half more minutes I need to fill on my presentation about Mexico for tomorrow, but I can only deal with the boredom of history for so long. I have worked on it for about three or four hours today then transitioned into some reading. It's obvious I am not going to get finished with all the reading I need to do- I'd need about another ten hours between now and class tomorrow, so the fact that I'm writing this right now is really irrelevant. But I skimmed and took some notes so that at least I might be able to slide by on participation.
Took a lunch break just now- did the nasty college kid thing and ate rewarmed fish, beefaroni, and drank grape juice. Whatever. All I'm going for is "relatively healthy" right now. I called my Mam-maw while I was having lunch. We're still awaiting news of whether or not she's going to be placed on the transplant list. I truly hope she is. Such a major surgery for someone as sick as she is is terrifying, but I know she wants to try it. She tells me what she tells her doctors, that she wants to live, she has a lot to live for-- six wonderful grandchildren, great husband and family-- and that she'll fight. She says, "I hope they seen that in me, that I'm a fighter, 'cause I've pretty much had to fight for everything my whole life." Her voice broke, and the subject got changed.
I've been having mixed feelings about going home this weekend at the start of Spring Break. Last time I was in wasn't so good. Depression at every turn. Damaging ideas. It was just rough being there. The only time I get to go home these days I have to basically steal from other activities, and if I do actually get to go when I might get to rest, I want to be able to do that, rest. And sometimes the way things go, it just upsets me, and I come back in worse mental shape than I was before I left. I hate that, but I'm learning to at least respect myself enough to say... it doesn't make me a bad person to not want to be subjected to this. It does not mean I don't love my family. Still... I think I'll be making that trip this weekend at least. I won't stay the whole break, because I really do need a little rest and recuperation that I just can't get there anymore. But I need to go see my Mam-maw. I think... despite her depression and illness, she makes me feel positive because she does fight so hard to live. She thinks there's something worth living for, something I'm not always convinced of. And for her, I'm part of that something worth living for, and I don't think of myself as quite so much, but I know how much I miss the smile on Little Mam-maw's face everytime she rushed to open the door and it was me on the other side. She laughed a laugh that was just for me. And now that laugh is gone. Mam-maw has a certain smile when I come to see her, too, and whether or not I think my presence should elicit such a response, I'll provide it if I can. Maybe I can take home some cobbler filling and we can bake. Or if she doens't feel like it, since sometimes she doesn't these days, I can just bake it myself and we can talk, and maybe the family can come down after and have a piece with ice cream on top. I think it was a little more than a year ago I insisted that she teach me to make cobbler. I knew my mom could teach me. I knew based on my pie experience (Mom's all like let me teach you to make pie and proceeded to get on the phone for two hours with an old girlfriend, so in my impatience I just figured it out) that I could learn on my own. But I remember wishing my great grandma had taught me to make pies since she was so famed for hers, but by the time I could have learned, she was already fading. And so... it was just pie. I wanted Mam-maw to teach me to make beef noodles a few years ago, and she said she wouldn't teach me 'til I was 25. I remember thinking sadly, I hope that that isn't too far away for you. I'll be 25 in half a year. I want to learn how to make the beef noodles, and not downin' on any of the other ladies' bovine pasta stylings, but Mam-maw's are really the only ones that taste right. I'm cashing in in September... provided I'm here. :/
I don't know why I'm yammering on about this. But I just want to go see my Mam-maw.
4:26PM
So I have about three and a half more minutes I need to fill on my presentation about Mexico for tomorrow, but I can only deal with the boredom of history for so long. I have worked on it for about three or four hours today then transitioned into some reading. It's obvious I am not going to get finished with all the reading I need to do- I'd need about another ten hours between now and class tomorrow, so the fact that I'm writing this right now is really irrelevant. But I skimmed and took some notes so that at least I might be able to slide by on participation.
Took a lunch break just now- did the nasty college kid thing and ate rewarmed fish, beefaroni, and drank grape juice. Whatever. All I'm going for is "relatively healthy" right now. I called my Mam-maw while I was having lunch. We're still awaiting news of whether or not she's going to be placed on the transplant list. I truly hope she is. Such a major surgery for someone as sick as she is is terrifying, but I know she wants to try it. She tells me what she tells her doctors, that she wants to live, she has a lot to live for-- six wonderful grandchildren, great husband and family-- and that she'll fight. She says, "I hope they seen that in me, that I'm a fighter, 'cause I've pretty much had to fight for everything my whole life." Her voice broke, and the subject got changed.
I've been having mixed feelings about going home this weekend at the start of Spring Break. Last time I was in wasn't so good. Depression at every turn. Damaging ideas. It was just rough being there. The only time I get to go home these days I have to basically steal from other activities, and if I do actually get to go when I might get to rest, I want to be able to do that, rest. And sometimes the way things go, it just upsets me, and I come back in worse mental shape than I was before I left. I hate that, but I'm learning to at least respect myself enough to say... it doesn't make me a bad person to not want to be subjected to this. It does not mean I don't love my family. Still... I think I'll be making that trip this weekend at least. I won't stay the whole break, because I really do need a little rest and recuperation that I just can't get there anymore. But I need to go see my Mam-maw. I think... despite her depression and illness, she makes me feel positive because she does fight so hard to live. She thinks there's something worth living for, something I'm not always convinced of. And for her, I'm part of that something worth living for, and I don't think of myself as quite so much, but I know how much I miss the smile on Little Mam-maw's face everytime she rushed to open the door and it was me on the other side. She laughed a laugh that was just for me. And now that laugh is gone. Mam-maw has a certain smile when I come to see her, too, and whether or not I think my presence should elicit such a response, I'll provide it if I can. Maybe I can take home some cobbler filling and we can bake. Or if she doens't feel like it, since sometimes she doesn't these days, I can just bake it myself and we can talk, and maybe the family can come down after and have a piece with ice cream on top. I think it was a little more than a year ago I insisted that she teach me to make cobbler. I knew my mom could teach me. I knew based on my pie experience (Mom's all like let me teach you to make pie and proceeded to get on the phone for two hours with an old girlfriend, so in my impatience I just figured it out) that I could learn on my own. But I remember wishing my great grandma had taught me to make pies since she was so famed for hers, but by the time I could have learned, she was already fading. And so... it was just pie. I wanted Mam-maw to teach me to make beef noodles a few years ago, and she said she wouldn't teach me 'til I was 25. I remember thinking sadly, I hope that that isn't too far away for you. I'll be 25 in half a year. I want to learn how to make the beef noodles, and not downin' on any of the other ladies' bovine pasta stylings, but Mam-maw's are really the only ones that taste right. I'm cashing in in September... provided I'm here. :/
I don't know why I'm yammering on about this. But I just want to go see my Mam-maw.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
bedtime
Thursday, March 10, 2011
11:05pm
Unwinding for the night finally. So ready for bed. It's been a long but good and productive day.
Got up around 7. Ate some cereal, had some coffee, put away some dishes, and John and I headed to the Rec. He went to do his own thing, and I went for personal training. That went well. Just remembered I said I'd do my biceps and shoulders on my own... but I never did. Oh well. They made me run suicides today. I haven't done suicides since high school gym class.
During the afternoon, I spent three hours in E Moore hall reading and starting to put together the presentation I have to give in Tuninetti's class on Tuesday. Presenting for him makes me nervous. He's tough. John and I had lunch together in the Mountain Lair. Stromboli makes me happy.
Then I went to the library to work while John went back to Brooks. I got a good bit done on my presentation. Seems like I get more done in half the time at the library just because I'm focused on what I'm doing. After all that John dropped my off at the Rec so I could take the Bollywood class, which I reallly enjoy. It's the same basic idea as Zumba, but it's fun to move my body in new and different ways and to different music. The woman who teaches is fantastic, very full of energy and joy. She really rather radiates. As I was leaving, she asked me to do a performance with her at an elementary school. I said I would- why not? Sounds like fun to me!
Came home, showered, ate some fish that John made, and worked on my presentation for another hour and a half. Definitely ready for some sleep.
11:05pm
Unwinding for the night finally. So ready for bed. It's been a long but good and productive day.
Got up around 7. Ate some cereal, had some coffee, put away some dishes, and John and I headed to the Rec. He went to do his own thing, and I went for personal training. That went well. Just remembered I said I'd do my biceps and shoulders on my own... but I never did. Oh well. They made me run suicides today. I haven't done suicides since high school gym class.
During the afternoon, I spent three hours in E Moore hall reading and starting to put together the presentation I have to give in Tuninetti's class on Tuesday. Presenting for him makes me nervous. He's tough. John and I had lunch together in the Mountain Lair. Stromboli makes me happy.
Then I went to the library to work while John went back to Brooks. I got a good bit done on my presentation. Seems like I get more done in half the time at the library just because I'm focused on what I'm doing. After all that John dropped my off at the Rec so I could take the Bollywood class, which I reallly enjoy. It's the same basic idea as Zumba, but it's fun to move my body in new and different ways and to different music. The woman who teaches is fantastic, very full of energy and joy. She really rather radiates. As I was leaving, she asked me to do a performance with her at an elementary school. I said I would- why not? Sounds like fun to me!
Came home, showered, ate some fish that John made, and worked on my presentation for another hour and a half. Definitely ready for some sleep.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Ash Wednesday
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
4:00PM
I'm glad I got my rest on the weekend, because I am not getting it now.
Monday- taught Power Pump at 8:30. Good as usual. 10 women in class. :) Taught 2 sections of 101. Office hours equaled giving three make-up quizzes due to student athletes and musicians and giving a make-up composition to someone whose car broke down because I'm nice. We watched Dona Barbara in Latin American Culture class. It was OK, over the top and extremely sexual. Monday night was just reading and finishing up lesson plans for the week.
Tuesday (yesterday)- up early. Reading. Grading in the office. Tuninetti's class. Gibbie's for dinner. Grading. Reading. Sleep. Not even a workout.
Wedesday (today)- up early again. Grading. Teaching 101. Handed back compositions, quizzes, and homework today, so I'm sick of grading. I'm also sick of the way chalk feels on my hands. I detest that feeling. After teaching, John and I went to Panera for lunch. I didn't mind spending the money, because I just really needed to be away from the work environment for that long. Now I'm home, drinking more coffee, and trying to get myself ready to read the rest of Ardiente paciencia. I have two presentations to give at the beginning of next week, and one of them is on an article about this book. So this is the first step in getting that presentation done. Probably take a break to either swim or go to spinning tonight. I need some exercise.
Today is Ash Wednesday. I used to be so all about Lent. With everyone posting their stuff about Lent, I just feel sort of left out. I feel that as impossible as it is to say anything authoritative on the topic of spirituality, because let's face it spirituality doesn't pertain to the empirical world... people want to take a harder, faster stance on that than things that actually have physical evidence. Like, if I told someone, one of these is not true: Gravity exists or Your spiritual beliefs are correct. They would tell me gravity doesn't exist first. It baffles me how people take something that can't be proven and not only believe in it but defend it vehemently. I like having spiritual conversations with people. It interests me. It's a need I have. But what I don't need is to be honest and have that open me up to scorn and anger. I would like spiritual reflections or discussions that don't start with, "God does this or thinks that." How do you know? I would like to sit by a river with someone and talk about spirituality outside of my pondering on the crucifixion... maybe it didn't go down that way. How 'bout we get to something a little more universal. How 'bout we talk about possibilities instead of alleged certainties? How 'bout we just watch the flowers grow and the river wind through mountains and just... contemplate instead of asserting all our various claims. I feel that no one is interested in this explorer attitude. People want to say religion is dumb or great, but not... curious. Science is flawed or awesome but not... wonder-inducing. Everything is right or wrong, great or stupid. So many different things seem possible to me.
We discussed Luna caliente in class yesterday. As usual, I had a difficult time talking. Everyone seemed to have one reading or another. I had about five at once. When I read, I'm just not set up to say... this is about X, Y or Z. I'm more inclined to thinking this about X, Y and Z. These are all possible, and I read them all here. I don't come to conclusions on anything ever. For me, that's happy and works just fine. I like being curious and having questions. But I think it makes people think I'm stupid or that there's something wrong with me. It's not that I can't reason. It's not that I can't think. There are just so many things to think about, so many unseen factors, that our conclusions are almost always flawed in some manner. I prefer to be curious.
4:00PM
I'm glad I got my rest on the weekend, because I am not getting it now.
Monday- taught Power Pump at 8:30. Good as usual. 10 women in class. :) Taught 2 sections of 101. Office hours equaled giving three make-up quizzes due to student athletes and musicians and giving a make-up composition to someone whose car broke down because I'm nice. We watched Dona Barbara in Latin American Culture class. It was OK, over the top and extremely sexual. Monday night was just reading and finishing up lesson plans for the week.
Tuesday (yesterday)- up early. Reading. Grading in the office. Tuninetti's class. Gibbie's for dinner. Grading. Reading. Sleep. Not even a workout.
Wedesday (today)- up early again. Grading. Teaching 101. Handed back compositions, quizzes, and homework today, so I'm sick of grading. I'm also sick of the way chalk feels on my hands. I detest that feeling. After teaching, John and I went to Panera for lunch. I didn't mind spending the money, because I just really needed to be away from the work environment for that long. Now I'm home, drinking more coffee, and trying to get myself ready to read the rest of Ardiente paciencia. I have two presentations to give at the beginning of next week, and one of them is on an article about this book. So this is the first step in getting that presentation done. Probably take a break to either swim or go to spinning tonight. I need some exercise.
Today is Ash Wednesday. I used to be so all about Lent. With everyone posting their stuff about Lent, I just feel sort of left out. I feel that as impossible as it is to say anything authoritative on the topic of spirituality, because let's face it spirituality doesn't pertain to the empirical world... people want to take a harder, faster stance on that than things that actually have physical evidence. Like, if I told someone, one of these is not true: Gravity exists or Your spiritual beliefs are correct. They would tell me gravity doesn't exist first. It baffles me how people take something that can't be proven and not only believe in it but defend it vehemently. I like having spiritual conversations with people. It interests me. It's a need I have. But what I don't need is to be honest and have that open me up to scorn and anger. I would like spiritual reflections or discussions that don't start with, "God does this or thinks that." How do you know? I would like to sit by a river with someone and talk about spirituality outside of my pondering on the crucifixion... maybe it didn't go down that way. How 'bout we get to something a little more universal. How 'bout we talk about possibilities instead of alleged certainties? How 'bout we just watch the flowers grow and the river wind through mountains and just... contemplate instead of asserting all our various claims. I feel that no one is interested in this explorer attitude. People want to say religion is dumb or great, but not... curious. Science is flawed or awesome but not... wonder-inducing. Everything is right or wrong, great or stupid. So many different things seem possible to me.
We discussed Luna caliente in class yesterday. As usual, I had a difficult time talking. Everyone seemed to have one reading or another. I had about five at once. When I read, I'm just not set up to say... this is about X, Y or Z. I'm more inclined to thinking this about X, Y and Z. These are all possible, and I read them all here. I don't come to conclusions on anything ever. For me, that's happy and works just fine. I like being curious and having questions. But I think it makes people think I'm stupid or that there's something wrong with me. It's not that I can't reason. It's not that I can't think. There are just so many things to think about, so many unseen factors, that our conclusions are almost always flawed in some manner. I prefer to be curious.
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Restful Weekend
Sunday, March 6, 2011
11:31pm
Sitting here in bed, watching steam rise off my chipped, green inspiration mug. John made me a cup of chammomile and mint tea to drink before bed. This weekend I have accomplished very little for school. I graded quizzes tonight, but other than that, I did nothing. I was just utterly exhausted. Part of that has been due to the ever-lovely PMS, and the other part has just been from the last several weeks of this intense pace and then the past two weeks just feeling incredibly stressed over various things.
On Friday, if this says anything, I didn't even work out. Those who know me know I rarely take more than one day a week off exercising, and frequently I don't even take that. Since I had already taken Tuesday off, the fact that I took Friday off, too, should speak to my level of tiredness. I'd said earlier in the week to John that all I wanted to do on Friday was just stay home with him. So that's what we did. After school, we went to Ruby Tuesday's for lunch. He had a turkey burger... I had a steak. I was feeling like I just didn't care how much food I ate, so I consumed the steak, zucchini, and french fries, and then pouted for some Italian creme cake. We split a nice, rich slice, had some coffee, then came home and took a nap. While I did do other things besides sleep... though I don't remember what that was now... reading and messing around online I suppose, I didn't move from the bed for any extended period of time after 5pm on Friday.
On Saturday morning I got up and went to the Rec Center and put in a good, hard workout. It was a challenging one, but after a day off and so much rest the day before, I felt fine to do it. Circuits of all out sprints followed by resistance training. Rinse and repeat. Home. Shower. Well, not shower immediately. John and I went to Subway first to pick up lunch. I felt the man serving us was incredibly rude to me, and I don't deal well with that. I didn't want to make a big scene, so I satisfied myself by responding snippily... fyi, I'm a great customer in a restaurant. I always say, please, thank you, and tip well. I don't think it's "cool" to belittle waitstaff, as I have worked in food service on many occasions and understand the challenges. However, this guy was being a total d-bag. Somehow that spiraled into and argument between John and me. Mmm.. I nearly kicked down the bathroom door. I am grateful it wasn't latched shut, or I probably would have. In the end, I think we just both reached a critical level of stress, and I know that I, for one, have some things I could work on.
Saturday from 12:30 to 2:30 I was down at Colson Hall. Cari had asked Daniel and I to help discuss our trip to Bolivia with those stopping by for the open house. Sometimes I just don't know what to say about experiences I've had. I tend not to go into things with a lot of expectations. I remember my main expectation about Bolivia was that I would feel scared, and I did... but that's just me being me. And when I am in another place or a new situation, I don't tend to judge it against previous experiences quite that much. Truly. My brain's just not set up that way. Even now, any new class I'm taking... I don't know how the new instructor is going to handle it. In group situations, I don't necessarily anticipate how people are going to behave. It kind of puts me in a suspended state where I just witness things as they unfold to me, and in some ways that's great. But... in that case, what do I have to say? Frequently, not much. I don't know why I just went there. It didn't have much to do with what we actually did on Saturday. I think I was just thinking in advance, what if I have to speak about my personal experience in Bolivia on the fly? I was sort of concerned that's what we'd have to do. But fortunately there were pictures and it wasn't an in-front-of-people situation. It was just sitting in front of her office and chatting with whomever. Again... I didn't know what to expect or anticipate. Lol.
So after that, came home, got ready, Andy and Joe came over, then Carly, and we loaded in her car and took off for Wheeling. Mom, Liz, Carman, and Wes were all up there, too. The Celtic Festival was really nice. I enjoy the spirit of Celtic music. I had a few beers and wound up dancing where I wasn't necessarily supposed to. But I feel like... there are far more obnoxious behaviors than dancing, and even when I'm sober I'm always trying to get people to dance, so really... that's no big thing. Carly and I danced in the corner, and after a bathroom break, John and I danced in this open area above the stairs. I was surprised by his willingness, but he seemed to be just as full of joy at that moment as I was. I had a blast and proceeded to pass out on John's shoulder the whole way home.
Joe slept on the futon in the living room, and this morning we all had pancakes, bacon, eggs, coffee, and strawberries together. John made breakfast. I'm not sure about my early morning competence in the kitchen. Without that initial hit of caffeine... oof. I tried to wake up Joe by various methods, such as waving fudge and bacon in his face, but it didn't work. He must have needed to sleep.
After breakfast, I feel back asleep on the futon while the boys played games on their phone. Then I got woken up to tell Joe goodbye, and John and I went in and slept 'til 2 in the afternoon. I've done quite a lot of sleeping this weekend, but I needed it. Even though I'm getting tired now because it's late, I still feel like I'm more rested than I was at the end of the work week. Although I'll have to work harder through the week now, I think this sleep will ultimately prove more beneficial to my overall state and performance throughout the week than being a little more ahead in work would have. My nerves and body have just been... raw. But this weekend I ate and slept a lot, and I'm feeling better.
I did Zumba here at home today... didn't feel like getting dressed and going to the Rec. Showered. John came home... he did some work at Brook's today, and then we went grocery shopping at WalMart. We had Digiorno pizza and asparagus for dinner, and I graded my students' quizzes.
As far as tomorrow goes, I have a handout ready to use, which should really guide most of the class. Still, I might look over things before I go to sleep. And in the morning, I'm teaching Power Pump at Healthworks instead of Zumba. Some of the women expressed that they'd like the mix, so I asked for it and got it. It's less overwhelming teaching Power Pump in the morning than it is teaching Zumba. Physically, it's just as challenging, but mentally, I don't have to be as with it. I just go anatomically through the body and make sure I hit every major muscle group. I don't have to remember a whole hour's worth of choreography, and sometimes it's nice to just go to bed on Sunday night and not be worried about Monday morning's hour-long salsa, merengue, hip hop fest.
Anyway, I suppose that's all for now. The week's gonna hit me like a sack of bricks tomorrow, but I think I'm at least rejuvenated enough now to meet it with some energy.
11:31pm
Sitting here in bed, watching steam rise off my chipped, green inspiration mug. John made me a cup of chammomile and mint tea to drink before bed. This weekend I have accomplished very little for school. I graded quizzes tonight, but other than that, I did nothing. I was just utterly exhausted. Part of that has been due to the ever-lovely PMS, and the other part has just been from the last several weeks of this intense pace and then the past two weeks just feeling incredibly stressed over various things.
On Friday, if this says anything, I didn't even work out. Those who know me know I rarely take more than one day a week off exercising, and frequently I don't even take that. Since I had already taken Tuesday off, the fact that I took Friday off, too, should speak to my level of tiredness. I'd said earlier in the week to John that all I wanted to do on Friday was just stay home with him. So that's what we did. After school, we went to Ruby Tuesday's for lunch. He had a turkey burger... I had a steak. I was feeling like I just didn't care how much food I ate, so I consumed the steak, zucchini, and french fries, and then pouted for some Italian creme cake. We split a nice, rich slice, had some coffee, then came home and took a nap. While I did do other things besides sleep... though I don't remember what that was now... reading and messing around online I suppose, I didn't move from the bed for any extended period of time after 5pm on Friday.
On Saturday morning I got up and went to the Rec Center and put in a good, hard workout. It was a challenging one, but after a day off and so much rest the day before, I felt fine to do it. Circuits of all out sprints followed by resistance training. Rinse and repeat. Home. Shower. Well, not shower immediately. John and I went to Subway first to pick up lunch. I felt the man serving us was incredibly rude to me, and I don't deal well with that. I didn't want to make a big scene, so I satisfied myself by responding snippily... fyi, I'm a great customer in a restaurant. I always say, please, thank you, and tip well. I don't think it's "cool" to belittle waitstaff, as I have worked in food service on many occasions and understand the challenges. However, this guy was being a total d-bag. Somehow that spiraled into and argument between John and me. Mmm.. I nearly kicked down the bathroom door. I am grateful it wasn't latched shut, or I probably would have. In the end, I think we just both reached a critical level of stress, and I know that I, for one, have some things I could work on.
Saturday from 12:30 to 2:30 I was down at Colson Hall. Cari had asked Daniel and I to help discuss our trip to Bolivia with those stopping by for the open house. Sometimes I just don't know what to say about experiences I've had. I tend not to go into things with a lot of expectations. I remember my main expectation about Bolivia was that I would feel scared, and I did... but that's just me being me. And when I am in another place or a new situation, I don't tend to judge it against previous experiences quite that much. Truly. My brain's just not set up that way. Even now, any new class I'm taking... I don't know how the new instructor is going to handle it. In group situations, I don't necessarily anticipate how people are going to behave. It kind of puts me in a suspended state where I just witness things as they unfold to me, and in some ways that's great. But... in that case, what do I have to say? Frequently, not much. I don't know why I just went there. It didn't have much to do with what we actually did on Saturday. I think I was just thinking in advance, what if I have to speak about my personal experience in Bolivia on the fly? I was sort of concerned that's what we'd have to do. But fortunately there were pictures and it wasn't an in-front-of-people situation. It was just sitting in front of her office and chatting with whomever. Again... I didn't know what to expect or anticipate. Lol.
So after that, came home, got ready, Andy and Joe came over, then Carly, and we loaded in her car and took off for Wheeling. Mom, Liz, Carman, and Wes were all up there, too. The Celtic Festival was really nice. I enjoy the spirit of Celtic music. I had a few beers and wound up dancing where I wasn't necessarily supposed to. But I feel like... there are far more obnoxious behaviors than dancing, and even when I'm sober I'm always trying to get people to dance, so really... that's no big thing. Carly and I danced in the corner, and after a bathroom break, John and I danced in this open area above the stairs. I was surprised by his willingness, but he seemed to be just as full of joy at that moment as I was. I had a blast and proceeded to pass out on John's shoulder the whole way home.
Joe slept on the futon in the living room, and this morning we all had pancakes, bacon, eggs, coffee, and strawberries together. John made breakfast. I'm not sure about my early morning competence in the kitchen. Without that initial hit of caffeine... oof. I tried to wake up Joe by various methods, such as waving fudge and bacon in his face, but it didn't work. He must have needed to sleep.
After breakfast, I feel back asleep on the futon while the boys played games on their phone. Then I got woken up to tell Joe goodbye, and John and I went in and slept 'til 2 in the afternoon. I've done quite a lot of sleeping this weekend, but I needed it. Even though I'm getting tired now because it's late, I still feel like I'm more rested than I was at the end of the work week. Although I'll have to work harder through the week now, I think this sleep will ultimately prove more beneficial to my overall state and performance throughout the week than being a little more ahead in work would have. My nerves and body have just been... raw. But this weekend I ate and slept a lot, and I'm feeling better.
I did Zumba here at home today... didn't feel like getting dressed and going to the Rec. Showered. John came home... he did some work at Brook's today, and then we went grocery shopping at WalMart. We had Digiorno pizza and asparagus for dinner, and I graded my students' quizzes.
As far as tomorrow goes, I have a handout ready to use, which should really guide most of the class. Still, I might look over things before I go to sleep. And in the morning, I'm teaching Power Pump at Healthworks instead of Zumba. Some of the women expressed that they'd like the mix, so I asked for it and got it. It's less overwhelming teaching Power Pump in the morning than it is teaching Zumba. Physically, it's just as challenging, but mentally, I don't have to be as with it. I just go anatomically through the body and make sure I hit every major muscle group. I don't have to remember a whole hour's worth of choreography, and sometimes it's nice to just go to bed on Sunday night and not be worried about Monday morning's hour-long salsa, merengue, hip hop fest.
Anyway, I suppose that's all for now. The week's gonna hit me like a sack of bricks tomorrow, but I think I'm at least rejuvenated enough now to meet it with some energy.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Busyness, Love, Hate, Dark, Light
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
11:00PM
Just turned on Regina Spektor on the Pandora radio.
I'm glad tomorrow is Wednesday. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday are my hardest days of the week, although I think... from here on out 'til the end of the semester, including spring break, it is going to be pretty much non-stop. It's like I've told those close to me... it's not that I mind the work. I'm a hard worker. The part that bothers me is the need to turn off so many other parts of myself in the meantime. Constantly I have "Ants Marching" playing in my head, and I think of how it's true, and I remember a time when there was so much art and music in my life, when we played that song together. And we were good, and we knew how to use four mallets at one time. And we knew people weren't buying tickets to support the community kids. We were something to see and hear. I listen to classical music as I grade papers. "Please watch your handwriting." "Please follow directions." "Use accent marks when appropriate." "Where is the other half of your assignment?" My hands write these words again and again, but as the pre-recorded sound of a bow pulling across the strings of a violin plays in my ears, my heart gets pulled along that string. I want to write a poem. I want to play the piano. I want to do anything but sit in this fucking office, trying to behave appropriately. I used to sit in Mass, imagine spontaneously jumping out of the pew and turning 1, 2, 10 back handsprings up the aisle to where the priest was consecrating the host. Would they think I was possessed? Would they yell at me or pray for me? Certainly they wouldn't encourage me. How do we decide that we should let the life be choked out of us, that we should choke it out of ourselves? We talked about Las batallas en el desierto hoy en clase. One of my classmates mentioned that the protagonist "unlearned" things. Yes. Unlearned how to love. "El amor es una enfermedad en un mundo donde lo único natural es el odio." We do this to ourselves, too, place limits on our love, how much, whom, how many times before we give up. In the best case scenario, we learn to love with limits, but often we learn hate. I wonder about hate, how we arrive at it. I suppose it's just because we've been told so many times that our own care and desire to reach out are wrong. So we shut ourselves off, and that feels unnatural, creates dissonance. So how do we deal with dissonance? Most of us can't live with it, so we eliminate it, perhaps by coming around to the opposite point of view, learning to hate what we're not allowed to love. By hate here, I don't mean the need to go out and beat someone and scream insults at them. That's better. There are much more creative, more damaging ways to hate.
Anyway...
I sent my docs to Spain today. I nervously await a response. Intuition tells me it won't be, but we'll see, and at least it won't be for lack of trying.
I should be reading. I've read so much today. Over a hundred pages. In Spanish. My head is tired.
Spring is coming, encroaching on winter. Don't we usually say it the other way around? We think, the cold is what we'd resist, not the warmth. But cold cannot come to us. Only heat can move, because heat is energy. Cold is only its absence. Spring is threatening our apathy, and it's time to get up.
I've been thinking about darkness. The Speed of Dark has forever changed my way of thinking about the topic of darkness. Darkness is beautiful, necessary, fast. Dark is there before the light, so if light is fast, darkness is faster. Things grow in darkness, seeds, thoughts, fetuses. I don't know that it's about lightness coming into the darkness so much as it is about one having had sufficient time in darkness, without stimulation, to come back out into the light.
And every day I walk into Hodges, I see the perennials (I think they'll be daffodils or tulips) pushing up further and further through the gravel. Some buds are finally on. I think they'll burst into flowers soon. The warmth encroached on the cold, forced a growth, but these flowers, they've had enough time under ground. They're ready to come into the light.
I think it's important that we honor our darkness, not push ourselves into activity and false joy before we're ready. Sometimes one needs isolation, solitude, to grow alone. Seeds don't grow together. Fetuses don't grow together. External influences encourage growth, but in the end, growth is individual, and we need to stay in the darkness for as long as we want. Go ahead. Draw the blinds. Turn down the lights. Crawl in your bed, and just... wait.
11:00PM
Just turned on Regina Spektor on the Pandora radio.
I'm glad tomorrow is Wednesday. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday are my hardest days of the week, although I think... from here on out 'til the end of the semester, including spring break, it is going to be pretty much non-stop. It's like I've told those close to me... it's not that I mind the work. I'm a hard worker. The part that bothers me is the need to turn off so many other parts of myself in the meantime. Constantly I have "Ants Marching" playing in my head, and I think of how it's true, and I remember a time when there was so much art and music in my life, when we played that song together. And we were good, and we knew how to use four mallets at one time. And we knew people weren't buying tickets to support the community kids. We were something to see and hear. I listen to classical music as I grade papers. "Please watch your handwriting." "Please follow directions." "Use accent marks when appropriate." "Where is the other half of your assignment?" My hands write these words again and again, but as the pre-recorded sound of a bow pulling across the strings of a violin plays in my ears, my heart gets pulled along that string. I want to write a poem. I want to play the piano. I want to do anything but sit in this fucking office, trying to behave appropriately. I used to sit in Mass, imagine spontaneously jumping out of the pew and turning 1, 2, 10 back handsprings up the aisle to where the priest was consecrating the host. Would they think I was possessed? Would they yell at me or pray for me? Certainly they wouldn't encourage me. How do we decide that we should let the life be choked out of us, that we should choke it out of ourselves? We talked about Las batallas en el desierto hoy en clase. One of my classmates mentioned that the protagonist "unlearned" things. Yes. Unlearned how to love. "El amor es una enfermedad en un mundo donde lo único natural es el odio." We do this to ourselves, too, place limits on our love, how much, whom, how many times before we give up. In the best case scenario, we learn to love with limits, but often we learn hate. I wonder about hate, how we arrive at it. I suppose it's just because we've been told so many times that our own care and desire to reach out are wrong. So we shut ourselves off, and that feels unnatural, creates dissonance. So how do we deal with dissonance? Most of us can't live with it, so we eliminate it, perhaps by coming around to the opposite point of view, learning to hate what we're not allowed to love. By hate here, I don't mean the need to go out and beat someone and scream insults at them. That's better. There are much more creative, more damaging ways to hate.
Anyway...
I sent my docs to Spain today. I nervously await a response. Intuition tells me it won't be, but we'll see, and at least it won't be for lack of trying.
I should be reading. I've read so much today. Over a hundred pages. In Spanish. My head is tired.
Spring is coming, encroaching on winter. Don't we usually say it the other way around? We think, the cold is what we'd resist, not the warmth. But cold cannot come to us. Only heat can move, because heat is energy. Cold is only its absence. Spring is threatening our apathy, and it's time to get up.
I've been thinking about darkness. The Speed of Dark has forever changed my way of thinking about the topic of darkness. Darkness is beautiful, necessary, fast. Dark is there before the light, so if light is fast, darkness is faster. Things grow in darkness, seeds, thoughts, fetuses. I don't know that it's about lightness coming into the darkness so much as it is about one having had sufficient time in darkness, without stimulation, to come back out into the light.
And every day I walk into Hodges, I see the perennials (I think they'll be daffodils or tulips) pushing up further and further through the gravel. Some buds are finally on. I think they'll burst into flowers soon. The warmth encroached on the cold, forced a growth, but these flowers, they've had enough time under ground. They're ready to come into the light.
I think it's important that we honor our darkness, not push ourselves into activity and false joy before we're ready. Sometimes one needs isolation, solitude, to grow alone. Seeds don't grow together. Fetuses don't grow together. External influences encourage growth, but in the end, growth is individual, and we need to stay in the darkness for as long as we want. Go ahead. Draw the blinds. Turn down the lights. Crawl in your bed, and just... wait.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
to bed to bed
Completely exhausted. Needing Spring Break to already be here. I feel like all I've done this weekend has been to work, the only breaks being for workouts- swimming and running. Today all I did was read, work on a presentation, run, dye my hair, read more, eat dinner, plan lessons, design a quiz, and design a section of an exam. I keep thinking... if I work through weekends, I'll get ahead and be able to breathe. But even though I'm working weekends and every day I'm still behind. I was told grad school would be like this. I can deal, but I reallyyyyyyy need a break. Constantly exhausted. Sleeping pill kicking in. To bed, to bed, the babysitter said.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
the week
Saturday, February 26, 2011
10:49am
Still lying in bed waiting to get up. I got up earlier, and John made some pancakes and sausage. I started to clean, and then we just both went back to bed. This is what we used to do every Saturday, and I miss it.
The week went pretty well overall. Monday was Zumba, teaching 101, Garcia's class. The discussion I had to lead on Marti went OK. I appreciate those in my group who are patient with me as I struggle through my use of Spanish. Tuesday morning I went swimming then went to campus to get copies made, read, have office hours, then Tuninetti's class. On Wednesday I taught 101, did some reading around campus, and then had Dr. Ferreras's class. I really enjoy him as an instructor. Carly actually picked me up after class on Tuesday, and we went to Los Mariachi's for National Margarita Day. She had her first real margarita, and I had a fish-bowl sized one, and we chatted. It was good. (chronology... i suck at it) Went to spin class in the evening. The instructor who teaches Wed. nights is really enjoyable. She's calm, which I appreciate. I'm not someone who needs a teacher to shout at me for an hour. I much prefer her smiles and her letting us just enjoy the music. Later that evening, Maureen and I headed to Gibbie's for "a beer," which turned out being two beers for me, a beer and two long island iced teas for her, and the two of us singing karaoke. On Thursday I went to the Rec at 9 for personal training with Evan and... I think his name's Ryan. Evan has an intern. They push me and encourage me but are also chilled out and easy to talk to. Spent the rest of Thursday doing work-related stuff, mostly at Zenclay.... grading, record keeping, reading, working on a statement of purpose. Rick and Sheryl were there, so I talked to both of them. That was nice. Rick bought me a cup of coffee. I have trouble letting people do things like that for me, but I'm learning gradually to just smile, say thank you, and appreciate that someone wanted to do something nice for me. Thursday night I met up with Maureen at the CAC, and she and I, along with two of her friends listened to the orchestra. I wasn't a huge fan of the first half, but the stuff that followed intermission was nice. I do enjoy orchestral music. So... Friday. Got up early, actually FELT LIKE going to the Rec, went swimming, taught 101, which went well, went grocery shopping with John, had dinner out with Sr. Rachel, and then went to the wine and cheese social. I really enjoy a lot of the geology people, especially the profs. I don't know what to say to them, since I don't speak their language, but it's good to listen... and drink. Drinks are important. Also, Dorothy has three cat, and one of them is a fat bastard, and I like fat bastard cats.
Now I need to get up and work on soooooooo much shit that i don't even want to explain. I'm excited for swimming this afternoon as Carly's friend Claire has said she would teach me how to do the swim flip. I'm nervous because water is scary and I'm afraid I'll seem like a moron, but also excited.
10:49am
Still lying in bed waiting to get up. I got up earlier, and John made some pancakes and sausage. I started to clean, and then we just both went back to bed. This is what we used to do every Saturday, and I miss it.
The week went pretty well overall. Monday was Zumba, teaching 101, Garcia's class. The discussion I had to lead on Marti went OK. I appreciate those in my group who are patient with me as I struggle through my use of Spanish. Tuesday morning I went swimming then went to campus to get copies made, read, have office hours, then Tuninetti's class. On Wednesday I taught 101, did some reading around campus, and then had Dr. Ferreras's class. I really enjoy him as an instructor. Carly actually picked me up after class on Tuesday, and we went to Los Mariachi's for National Margarita Day. She had her first real margarita, and I had a fish-bowl sized one, and we chatted. It was good. (chronology... i suck at it) Went to spin class in the evening. The instructor who teaches Wed. nights is really enjoyable. She's calm, which I appreciate. I'm not someone who needs a teacher to shout at me for an hour. I much prefer her smiles and her letting us just enjoy the music. Later that evening, Maureen and I headed to Gibbie's for "a beer," which turned out being two beers for me, a beer and two long island iced teas for her, and the two of us singing karaoke. On Thursday I went to the Rec at 9 for personal training with Evan and... I think his name's Ryan. Evan has an intern. They push me and encourage me but are also chilled out and easy to talk to. Spent the rest of Thursday doing work-related stuff, mostly at Zenclay.... grading, record keeping, reading, working on a statement of purpose. Rick and Sheryl were there, so I talked to both of them. That was nice. Rick bought me a cup of coffee. I have trouble letting people do things like that for me, but I'm learning gradually to just smile, say thank you, and appreciate that someone wanted to do something nice for me. Thursday night I met up with Maureen at the CAC, and she and I, along with two of her friends listened to the orchestra. I wasn't a huge fan of the first half, but the stuff that followed intermission was nice. I do enjoy orchestral music. So... Friday. Got up early, actually FELT LIKE going to the Rec, went swimming, taught 101, which went well, went grocery shopping with John, had dinner out with Sr. Rachel, and then went to the wine and cheese social. I really enjoy a lot of the geology people, especially the profs. I don't know what to say to them, since I don't speak their language, but it's good to listen... and drink. Drinks are important. Also, Dorothy has three cat, and one of them is a fat bastard, and I like fat bastard cats.
Now I need to get up and work on soooooooo much shit that i don't even want to explain. I'm excited for swimming this afternoon as Carly's friend Claire has said she would teach me how to do the swim flip. I'm nervous because water is scary and I'm afraid I'll seem like a moron, but also excited.
Monday, February 21, 2011
Leaving
Monday, February 21, 2011
11:57AM
Sitting in E.Moore Hall waiting just a little while until it's time to go teach Spanish. Today is less a teaching day and more a guiding day, as the assignment was pre-created for me by the textbook. They have to write compositions today. I think I'll play Latin music for them while they write. Sometimes in that class... I know as the teacher I shouldn't say this... but I just feel like... what's the point? I mean, they have to start somewhere, I guess, but I feel like I can't really do much to help them learn. I just teach the form then meander through the rows of desks checking on progress, answering questions, and saying yes, you can do this.
Taught Zumba this am. That was rough. I couldn't sleep last night, so around midnight I took a sleeping pill. I figured I'd immediately relax and fall asleep. But I just got hyper, had songs running through my head, and was up 'til after 2am. When John woke me up at 7, I was more than reluctant. Everything hurt, and I was so groggy. Teaching, I felt like I couldn't move. I think I sweat excessively just from exhaustion. I know I was having a rough time because usually I drink one cup of coffee and am ready to go for it . This am, I had two and still just felt like I weighed a million pounds. I couldn't remember choreography and wound up making up shit on the fly. Ugh. But might as well let it go, because as we learned long ago, we all have those days.
I decided to lift a little, too. Why?... because I'm insane I suppose. It really doesn't make sense to do that when you were just struggling for sixty minutes as it was. But I get anal about my workout schedule, and because it was a Monday morning, I just had to do giant sets before I left.
Went home this weekend. Did a lot of reading while I was there, some writing. Visiting was minimal. I was really excited about going home, just to be somewhere calm and familiar, but the opposite was true. Old, stagnant ideas (and I know every kid who goes to college and then goes home says this, but I'm talking some seriously upsetting ideas like border-line racism and homophobia), and I just seem to be under foot when I'm there. Everyone at home, save my Pap-paw maybe, was unhappy, bugged, sick, or depressed.
I've been emotional all weekend, too. I think I just need a break. Did a lot of crying, which always makes me feel a little spastic.
Friday night my parents and i went to dinner at ChooChoo's, and I remember just sitting there having this "Ah-hah" moment of just how different the culture is in New Martinsville vs. Morgantown. Just a 90-minute drive, and you have guys in flannel shirts and camo hats telling their friends, "You're gonna be in TROUBLE!" as opposed to a bunch of young hippies in a coffee shop yammering on about their ideals. Idk, I miss home. But I feel like I cna' tbe there for an extended period of time anymore. I just don't think that way, that it's OK to be angry at other people because they're immigrants, that it's OK to walk out of a room because there's a shot of lesbian couple (holding hands, having coffee) on television. I miss my family, but I just can't relate to them anymore.
John and I were talking in his car, on Saturday, sitting outside of Baristas. I was wound up about various things, and I think I just realize, sort of all at once, how short the rest of my time here probably is. I've always loved West Virginia, but at the same time, I knew I couldn't stay here after awhile. There's nothing here for me career-wise, and the ideas make me want to jump onto a bed of broken glass. But I'm going to miss so many people. Friends, best friends, and family. And that's really been just... crushing the last couple days, thinking about that. I always knew the future was coming, but it's getting closer now. I'm ready to be done with grad school now, and even while a year and a half left seems impossible to manage right now, I know... it's really not that long. My parents talk about John and me getting jobs in the area, moving in with them so we can save money to get started. That just... can't happen. I can't stay here. I can't... live in this muck. I really need to be somewhere with more sunshine and people happy to be alive, not just drudging through miserably. I'm not saying the people here are naturally miserable, but it's a Depression Era town, and the economy of the valley just isn't there. Everyone's struggling. Everyone feels a victim, and really, they are. I don't want to be a victim, I don't want to feel trapped and suffocated, and so while it's going to hurt to leave a lot of people, and with some of them it could downright kill me... I've got to get out of here.
Anyway, time to teach. Thinkin' I might need some Excedrine.
11:57AM
Sitting in E.Moore Hall waiting just a little while until it's time to go teach Spanish. Today is less a teaching day and more a guiding day, as the assignment was pre-created for me by the textbook. They have to write compositions today. I think I'll play Latin music for them while they write. Sometimes in that class... I know as the teacher I shouldn't say this... but I just feel like... what's the point? I mean, they have to start somewhere, I guess, but I feel like I can't really do much to help them learn. I just teach the form then meander through the rows of desks checking on progress, answering questions, and saying yes, you can do this.
Taught Zumba this am. That was rough. I couldn't sleep last night, so around midnight I took a sleeping pill. I figured I'd immediately relax and fall asleep. But I just got hyper, had songs running through my head, and was up 'til after 2am. When John woke me up at 7, I was more than reluctant. Everything hurt, and I was so groggy. Teaching, I felt like I couldn't move. I think I sweat excessively just from exhaustion. I know I was having a rough time because usually I drink one cup of coffee and am ready to go for it . This am, I had two and still just felt like I weighed a million pounds. I couldn't remember choreography and wound up making up shit on the fly. Ugh. But might as well let it go, because as we learned long ago, we all have those days.
I decided to lift a little, too. Why?... because I'm insane I suppose. It really doesn't make sense to do that when you were just struggling for sixty minutes as it was. But I get anal about my workout schedule, and because it was a Monday morning, I just had to do giant sets before I left.
Went home this weekend. Did a lot of reading while I was there, some writing. Visiting was minimal. I was really excited about going home, just to be somewhere calm and familiar, but the opposite was true. Old, stagnant ideas (and I know every kid who goes to college and then goes home says this, but I'm talking some seriously upsetting ideas like border-line racism and homophobia), and I just seem to be under foot when I'm there. Everyone at home, save my Pap-paw maybe, was unhappy, bugged, sick, or depressed.
I've been emotional all weekend, too. I think I just need a break. Did a lot of crying, which always makes me feel a little spastic.
Friday night my parents and i went to dinner at ChooChoo's, and I remember just sitting there having this "Ah-hah" moment of just how different the culture is in New Martinsville vs. Morgantown. Just a 90-minute drive, and you have guys in flannel shirts and camo hats telling their friends, "You're gonna be in TROUBLE!" as opposed to a bunch of young hippies in a coffee shop yammering on about their ideals. Idk, I miss home. But I feel like I cna' tbe there for an extended period of time anymore. I just don't think that way, that it's OK to be angry at other people because they're immigrants, that it's OK to walk out of a room because there's a shot of lesbian couple (holding hands, having coffee) on television. I miss my family, but I just can't relate to them anymore.
John and I were talking in his car, on Saturday, sitting outside of Baristas. I was wound up about various things, and I think I just realize, sort of all at once, how short the rest of my time here probably is. I've always loved West Virginia, but at the same time, I knew I couldn't stay here after awhile. There's nothing here for me career-wise, and the ideas make me want to jump onto a bed of broken glass. But I'm going to miss so many people. Friends, best friends, and family. And that's really been just... crushing the last couple days, thinking about that. I always knew the future was coming, but it's getting closer now. I'm ready to be done with grad school now, and even while a year and a half left seems impossible to manage right now, I know... it's really not that long. My parents talk about John and me getting jobs in the area, moving in with them so we can save money to get started. That just... can't happen. I can't stay here. I can't... live in this muck. I really need to be somewhere with more sunshine and people happy to be alive, not just drudging through miserably. I'm not saying the people here are naturally miserable, but it's a Depression Era town, and the economy of the valley just isn't there. Everyone's struggling. Everyone feels a victim, and really, they are. I don't want to be a victim, I don't want to feel trapped and suffocated, and so while it's going to hurt to leave a lot of people, and with some of them it could downright kill me... I've got to get out of here.
Anyway, time to teach. Thinkin' I might need some Excedrine.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Imagine
2-19-11
10:39pm
home, been getting work done, walked with mom today, read early on then more later... then more at baristas. john came up we talked picked up pizza watched water at dam, and obviously im not into relating the events of my day...
What if we woke up tomorrow morning with no memory? All of us? And we didn't remember that this one was our brother or teacher or doctor or student or friend or lover... what if we woke up and weren't bound to the roles we and society have cast ourselves into? What if in the morning we forgot all the things we were supposed to want and weren't aware that any of our desires were forbidden? Who would we be, as individuals and to each other? Would we, perhaps, just take off and live in caves or tents with whomever and how ever many we chose? Would we wind up in the same combinations, as familys, cliques, friends, lovers? Would we reorganize, and whoooooooooooooo would we beeeeeee? It occurs to me that the idealistic freeing ourselves from the past bit is utterly impossible unless we experience total amnesia. Otherwise our memories follow us around, shaping our present and future with our past. We make no decisions without some thought to who we were previously, before that decision, we weigh risks based on previous let-downs. Because we have memory, none of us is really free from our past. I'm not saying I want to wake up and have to relearn how to walk and flush the toilet, but it might be nice to have a selective amnesia in the morning. I would love not to know any social rules, like when I was a kid and just did and said whatever the hell I wanted. I wish we'd all just wake up tomorrow, forget our grudges, forget the rules, throw ambition to the wind and just sit down and love each other.
You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.
I hope someday you'll join us, and the world will live as one.
10:39pm
home, been getting work done, walked with mom today, read early on then more later... then more at baristas. john came up we talked picked up pizza watched water at dam, and obviously im not into relating the events of my day...
What if we woke up tomorrow morning with no memory? All of us? And we didn't remember that this one was our brother or teacher or doctor or student or friend or lover... what if we woke up and weren't bound to the roles we and society have cast ourselves into? What if in the morning we forgot all the things we were supposed to want and weren't aware that any of our desires were forbidden? Who would we be, as individuals and to each other? Would we, perhaps, just take off and live in caves or tents with whomever and how ever many we chose? Would we wind up in the same combinations, as familys, cliques, friends, lovers? Would we reorganize, and whoooooooooooooo would we beeeeeee? It occurs to me that the idealistic freeing ourselves from the past bit is utterly impossible unless we experience total amnesia. Otherwise our memories follow us around, shaping our present and future with our past. We make no decisions without some thought to who we were previously, before that decision, we weigh risks based on previous let-downs. Because we have memory, none of us is really free from our past. I'm not saying I want to wake up and have to relearn how to walk and flush the toilet, but it might be nice to have a selective amnesia in the morning. I would love not to know any social rules, like when I was a kid and just did and said whatever the hell I wanted. I wish we'd all just wake up tomorrow, forget our grudges, forget the rules, throw ambition to the wind and just sit down and love each other.
You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.
I hope someday you'll join us, and the world will live as one.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Happy, sad, bored.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
3:51PM
I have been sitting in this futon/bed really just about all day reading for Latin American culture and grading compositions. I've taken a couple breaks to eat and hang out with John, but mostly I've just been doing this.
The weekend has been one of mixed emotions. Friday was great. My cousin Emily and three of her friends came and stayed over here, because they wanted to "go out in Morgantown." I went to the departmental party at Sidelines, drank a lot, sang some karaoke, and just enjoyed being out among friends. They always dance, even when there's no dancing, so that's great. I did three karaokes- "Roxie" (favorite), "What if it's you" and "Closer to Fine." Karaoke always cracks me up, taking turns being goofy and entertaining each other.
Saturday morning John left around 6am to go out in the field with Jim. Sounds like it was a cold, miserable day for him. I met Nelson on High Street at about 11:30am, and we went to Drum Circle together. It was another big crowd. This group wasn't as advanced, but it was still a great time. I just enjoy playing and everyone being in the music together. I was pretty wiped out from the night before, so I didn't do much work yesterday. Had lunch out with Emily, her friends, and Carly. I was napping when John got back.
The night got sad. I feel simultaneously outraged, helpless, and sad. I am convinced there is no real justice in operation in our world. And I don't believe in karma, so... it just is what it is, and it sucks is what it does. Don't want to go into it publicly, but positive energy and good thoughts/prayers are welcomed.
School has been... whatever. I'm bored of it. I'm still interested in what I'm doing, sure. But I'm like... ADD. I need to change activities frequently. I'm still into literature and learning Spanish, but it's hard to convince myself to leave my sketchbook, piano, drums, and dance shoes alone. I dreamt I was going to a physics class last night, and I was so excited to learn some math and science. There is no balance in this that I am doing right now. And I know we are a society that has created not only the ability, but also the necessity, to specialize. And I'm just getting... bored. I want to write poetry. I want to take kids backpacking. I want to climb up on a horse and ride crazy across a field again. Blah... putting my nose back to the grindstone.
3:51PM
I have been sitting in this futon/bed really just about all day reading for Latin American culture and grading compositions. I've taken a couple breaks to eat and hang out with John, but mostly I've just been doing this.
The weekend has been one of mixed emotions. Friday was great. My cousin Emily and three of her friends came and stayed over here, because they wanted to "go out in Morgantown." I went to the departmental party at Sidelines, drank a lot, sang some karaoke, and just enjoyed being out among friends. They always dance, even when there's no dancing, so that's great. I did three karaokes- "Roxie" (favorite), "What if it's you" and "Closer to Fine." Karaoke always cracks me up, taking turns being goofy and entertaining each other.
Saturday morning John left around 6am to go out in the field with Jim. Sounds like it was a cold, miserable day for him. I met Nelson on High Street at about 11:30am, and we went to Drum Circle together. It was another big crowd. This group wasn't as advanced, but it was still a great time. I just enjoy playing and everyone being in the music together. I was pretty wiped out from the night before, so I didn't do much work yesterday. Had lunch out with Emily, her friends, and Carly. I was napping when John got back.
The night got sad. I feel simultaneously outraged, helpless, and sad. I am convinced there is no real justice in operation in our world. And I don't believe in karma, so... it just is what it is, and it sucks is what it does. Don't want to go into it publicly, but positive energy and good thoughts/prayers are welcomed.
School has been... whatever. I'm bored of it. I'm still interested in what I'm doing, sure. But I'm like... ADD. I need to change activities frequently. I'm still into literature and learning Spanish, but it's hard to convince myself to leave my sketchbook, piano, drums, and dance shoes alone. I dreamt I was going to a physics class last night, and I was so excited to learn some math and science. There is no balance in this that I am doing right now. And I know we are a society that has created not only the ability, but also the necessity, to specialize. And I'm just getting... bored. I want to write poetry. I want to take kids backpacking. I want to climb up on a horse and ride crazy across a field again. Blah... putting my nose back to the grindstone.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
.
Blue Moose. Can't concentrate. Feel stupid. Can't get his dumb voice out of my head. Or his. I'm doing the hard thing first, like I said I would. It is hard. Every day I feel dumb. Then I think I'm not and just feel angry. Why could I never have left, for awhile, to learn? Jobs. That's why. The absolute necessity of employment. And now I'm stuck, struggling, hoping to somehow break out, get out. Your geolography and desired mindset are so tightly bound. I'd plant potatoes in West Virginia soil, but preferably not my brain. I don't want to make these thoughts mine.
wknd
Sunday, February 6, 2011
9:28AM
Just got up and still haven't even made it out of bed. Writing this to excuse myself so that I don't spend the whole day freaking out about how behind I am. Today I am supposed to read a novela and 5 academic articles, (long), prepare questions for one of them, and write a short essay on the novela. In addition, I should work out and must plan lessons. So I am feeling under the gun to say the least, and when I get like this it's easy for my mental voice to shift to finger pointing and blame... on myself. But, I have to take this moment to be real about it. Friday just straight up sucked. I was extremely upset due to various reasons and just spent a fair amount of time crying, not doing anything. Saturday, yesterday, was not a bad day- Joe and I went to Drum Circle, he, John, and I ate lunch at Black Bear, and we went to a mini-party at Andy's. BUT... all day I had a miserable headache, and the time in between, between lunch and nighttime, I couldn't do any homework whatsoever. Honestly, if the headache hadn't been so present, I would have probably skipped going to Andy's and just done my reading. But it hurt so bad most of the day that I felt like throwing up. So yeah, I'm definitely behind and probably not going to get it all done this time around. That always stresses me out. Nothing has made me feel stupider than graduate school, and I know a lot of it has to do with how I struggle in Spanish. Still, I want to do well. But I may just have to get up, eat the pancakes and bacon John's in there fixing, get my shower, and just go get done whatever I'm able and try to BS through on that this week. So far this semester, I've read every single little thing I've been assigned, and that's saying something. I definitely am in severe need of Spring Break already. I. need. to. breathe.
But, good things, too... seeing everyone at Andy's last night was really great. I get to missing people. I think I hugged everyone goodbye, lol, which I don't usually do hugs, but why? I enjoyed the conversation and the laughter. A few bottles of Harp didn't hurt anything either.
Drum Circle was lots of fun, much moreso than I expected. But we really got a good jam session on. A little older lady who used to take my fitness classes was there, and she is just absolutely adorable on her drum. She breaks out in a huge smile, closes her eyes, picks up her arms, and starts dancing back and forth. There were six of us, and I am doing my best to badger people into coming next week so that we have a good crowd again. After drumming, I knew I should do some homework, but with the headache also knew I'd never be able to tolerate looking at text, so I suggested we do lunch at Black Bear instead. That was really nice, hadn't been there in awhile and hadn't really talked to Joe in awhile. It's been a few weeks since we've hung out.
So, still there were about 5 hours I could have done homework between eating and ice skating, but I was in so much pain. I just lay down and went to bed. Then there was a terrible wind storm, and I felt the trailer shaking. John and Joe were leaving to play badminton, and to be honest, I was scared to stay home alone in the storm, so I grabbed a swimsuit, and sat in the hot tub just trying not to be in pain anymore. After about 25 minutes and the new dose of ibuprofen setting in, I started to feel better. FINALLY. So we went ice skating as planned. Carly joined us, so we were four. That was fun. My former yoga instructor was there, and of course she is amazing on the ice. Always in teacher mode, she tried to teach Carly and me how to skate backwards. I got the hang of it after a few laps. Just stick your butt out and wiggle basically, lol. I would feel more comfortable going fast if the rink wasn't so crowded.
Okkkkkk... time to get out of this bed, eat breakfast, and get on with the work I know I'm not going to finish. Here's to being calm about that. Cheers.
9:28AM
Just got up and still haven't even made it out of bed. Writing this to excuse myself so that I don't spend the whole day freaking out about how behind I am. Today I am supposed to read a novela and 5 academic articles, (long), prepare questions for one of them, and write a short essay on the novela. In addition, I should work out and must plan lessons. So I am feeling under the gun to say the least, and when I get like this it's easy for my mental voice to shift to finger pointing and blame... on myself. But, I have to take this moment to be real about it. Friday just straight up sucked. I was extremely upset due to various reasons and just spent a fair amount of time crying, not doing anything. Saturday, yesterday, was not a bad day- Joe and I went to Drum Circle, he, John, and I ate lunch at Black Bear, and we went to a mini-party at Andy's. BUT... all day I had a miserable headache, and the time in between, between lunch and nighttime, I couldn't do any homework whatsoever. Honestly, if the headache hadn't been so present, I would have probably skipped going to Andy's and just done my reading. But it hurt so bad most of the day that I felt like throwing up. So yeah, I'm definitely behind and probably not going to get it all done this time around. That always stresses me out. Nothing has made me feel stupider than graduate school, and I know a lot of it has to do with how I struggle in Spanish. Still, I want to do well. But I may just have to get up, eat the pancakes and bacon John's in there fixing, get my shower, and just go get done whatever I'm able and try to BS through on that this week. So far this semester, I've read every single little thing I've been assigned, and that's saying something. I definitely am in severe need of Spring Break already. I. need. to. breathe.
But, good things, too... seeing everyone at Andy's last night was really great. I get to missing people. I think I hugged everyone goodbye, lol, which I don't usually do hugs, but why? I enjoyed the conversation and the laughter. A few bottles of Harp didn't hurt anything either.
Drum Circle was lots of fun, much moreso than I expected. But we really got a good jam session on. A little older lady who used to take my fitness classes was there, and she is just absolutely adorable on her drum. She breaks out in a huge smile, closes her eyes, picks up her arms, and starts dancing back and forth. There were six of us, and I am doing my best to badger people into coming next week so that we have a good crowd again. After drumming, I knew I should do some homework, but with the headache also knew I'd never be able to tolerate looking at text, so I suggested we do lunch at Black Bear instead. That was really nice, hadn't been there in awhile and hadn't really talked to Joe in awhile. It's been a few weeks since we've hung out.
So, still there were about 5 hours I could have done homework between eating and ice skating, but I was in so much pain. I just lay down and went to bed. Then there was a terrible wind storm, and I felt the trailer shaking. John and Joe were leaving to play badminton, and to be honest, I was scared to stay home alone in the storm, so I grabbed a swimsuit, and sat in the hot tub just trying not to be in pain anymore. After about 25 minutes and the new dose of ibuprofen setting in, I started to feel better. FINALLY. So we went ice skating as planned. Carly joined us, so we were four. That was fun. My former yoga instructor was there, and of course she is amazing on the ice. Always in teacher mode, she tried to teach Carly and me how to skate backwards. I got the hang of it after a few laps. Just stick your butt out and wiggle basically, lol. I would feel more comfortable going fast if the rink wasn't so crowded.
Okkkkkk... time to get out of this bed, eat breakfast, and get on with the work I know I'm not going to finish. Here's to being calm about that. Cheers.
Friday, February 4, 2011
Eh...
Friday, February 4, 2011
10:08PM
Sittin' here waitin' for a call or a text that will let me know it's time to go out. Sometimes it'd be nice to live down town or just be roommates with someone from the department. This living up here, having to get dropped off, text to find people is a nuisance.
Got a haircut today. I'll probably never let it grow out. I liked long hair, but now it's just a bother.
Eh, I dk what to write about. Wish John liked to go out with me sometimes. It's like there's this whole other side of me he can't get to know after five years, because it's always someone else I'm cuttin' up with. I kinda hate that, because I like myself much better when I'm free. Believe it or not, I can actually be a lot of fun. Inhibitions are easily set aside when the setting is appropriate. ft that's what I go to do, that's what I do. Bleh.
Joe and I are planning to go to a drum circle tomorrow, hoping to maybe ice skate in the evening, go to Maureen's show on Sun, so it's gonna be a hoppin' weekend, and I have plenty of homework to do on the side. It needs to be Spring Break already, or, more accurately, I need it to be Spring Break already.
10:08PM
Sittin' here waitin' for a call or a text that will let me know it's time to go out. Sometimes it'd be nice to live down town or just be roommates with someone from the department. This living up here, having to get dropped off, text to find people is a nuisance.
Got a haircut today. I'll probably never let it grow out. I liked long hair, but now it's just a bother.
Eh, I dk what to write about. Wish John liked to go out with me sometimes. It's like there's this whole other side of me he can't get to know after five years, because it's always someone else I'm cuttin' up with. I kinda hate that, because I like myself much better when I'm free. Believe it or not, I can actually be a lot of fun. Inhibitions are easily set aside when the setting is appropriate. ft that's what I go to do, that's what I do. Bleh.
Joe and I are planning to go to a drum circle tomorrow, hoping to maybe ice skate in the evening, go to Maureen's show on Sun, so it's gonna be a hoppin' weekend, and I have plenty of homework to do on the side. It needs to be Spring Break already, or, more accurately, I need it to be Spring Break already.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Existes tu?
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
8:14PM
Ughhh...
Again with the questions theme and open-mindedness. Me vuelve LOQUISISIMO cuando algunos cerran sus cerebros y deciden que todas las otras ideas y opiniones son estupidas, mas cuando sus propias son RIDICULOS!!! Erg...
I'm just sayin'... how can you live in the 21st century and NOT believe in evolution? Evolution isn't a belief. It's science. It's like, here, here are all these reasons, and they're like... eh, nah. Evolution is silly. Do they KNOW how stupid they sound?
My students this semester are doing well. They have good attitudes and don't seem to struggle with the material. So that's a good thing.
I really enjoyed my Span 653 class tonight, even as it broke my heart. Let's see if I can make this intelligible... We were discussing a novela, Noches lugubres, escrito por el Jose Donoso. We talked about how it was a classic piece of work from Romanticism, although it was written before its time. Donoso refused to publish it during his life, because allegedly it was autobiographical... and what an autobiography it was! Guy fell in love with an actress, who died, and so he wanted to exhume her. I think he did it. He wanted to kill himself to be with her. We talked about how, nowadays it's ok to discuss things like suicide, digging up a body, being that in love. At the time, though, it was just breaking the law, suicide was a crime that sent you straight to hell, and it wasn't "being in love," it was "being disgusting and over-sexed." So that's sad. So when he wrote it, he knew it wouldn't be well received so he didn't try to publish it. So to give that context, we talked about the basic concept of communication (I don't know this in English): hay un emisor, un mensaje, y el receptor. Y cuando escribimos, lo hacemos con un receptor en la mente, y si no hay receptor, quien cambia el emisor y vis a vis, pues, el emisor tambien desaparece. Me causo pensar en la imagen de la infinidad, una curva arriba a hasta punto en el centro donde los dados se encuentran. A veces he pensado en el imagen de la infinidad como dos personas, una a un lado, la otra al otro. Y es un intercambio que nunca termina hasta que una de las personas rompen la connecion. Despues, no hay mas comunicacion. Pues, lo entiendo eso muy bien, pero hoy... cuando el profesor borro el "receptor" y despues el "emisor," me entendi que si uno o otro desaparece, no hay mas que el mensaje... pero el mensaje no puede existir tampoco. Si una en una buena relacion sale, no es solamente que parra la relacion sino que causa un parte de su misma y un parte de la otra desaparecer... por siempre. Entonces, si tienes una amiga con quien compartes muchisimo, quizas, todo... y la relacion esta rota, que puedes hacer aparte de desaparecer? Un parte de tu misma va a morrir, y no hay nada que puedes hacer para salvarlo. Pero, a veces... supongo que es mejor morrir rapidamente que despacio, y quizas puedes renacer como algo mas... diferente... mas colorida y vibrante... quizas puedes estar resucitada de otra manera. Esta nueva tu... vas a querer decir alguien quien estas hoy. Pero... la otra esta desaparecida. No hay nadie decir. Existes tu?
8:14PM
Ughhh...
Again with the questions theme and open-mindedness. Me vuelve LOQUISISIMO cuando algunos cerran sus cerebros y deciden que todas las otras ideas y opiniones son estupidas, mas cuando sus propias son RIDICULOS!!! Erg...
I'm just sayin'... how can you live in the 21st century and NOT believe in evolution? Evolution isn't a belief. It's science. It's like, here, here are all these reasons, and they're like... eh, nah. Evolution is silly. Do they KNOW how stupid they sound?
My students this semester are doing well. They have good attitudes and don't seem to struggle with the material. So that's a good thing.
I really enjoyed my Span 653 class tonight, even as it broke my heart. Let's see if I can make this intelligible... We were discussing a novela, Noches lugubres, escrito por el Jose Donoso. We talked about how it was a classic piece of work from Romanticism, although it was written before its time. Donoso refused to publish it during his life, because allegedly it was autobiographical... and what an autobiography it was! Guy fell in love with an actress, who died, and so he wanted to exhume her. I think he did it. He wanted to kill himself to be with her. We talked about how, nowadays it's ok to discuss things like suicide, digging up a body, being that in love. At the time, though, it was just breaking the law, suicide was a crime that sent you straight to hell, and it wasn't "being in love," it was "being disgusting and over-sexed." So that's sad. So when he wrote it, he knew it wouldn't be well received so he didn't try to publish it. So to give that context, we talked about the basic concept of communication (I don't know this in English): hay un emisor, un mensaje, y el receptor. Y cuando escribimos, lo hacemos con un receptor en la mente, y si no hay receptor, quien cambia el emisor y vis a vis, pues, el emisor tambien desaparece. Me causo pensar en la imagen de la infinidad, una curva arriba a hasta punto en el centro donde los dados se encuentran. A veces he pensado en el imagen de la infinidad como dos personas, una a un lado, la otra al otro. Y es un intercambio que nunca termina hasta que una de las personas rompen la connecion. Despues, no hay mas comunicacion. Pues, lo entiendo eso muy bien, pero hoy... cuando el profesor borro el "receptor" y despues el "emisor," me entendi que si uno o otro desaparece, no hay mas que el mensaje... pero el mensaje no puede existir tampoco. Si una en una buena relacion sale, no es solamente que parra la relacion sino que causa un parte de su misma y un parte de la otra desaparecer... por siempre. Entonces, si tienes una amiga con quien compartes muchisimo, quizas, todo... y la relacion esta rota, que puedes hacer aparte de desaparecer? Un parte de tu misma va a morrir, y no hay nada que puedes hacer para salvarlo. Pero, a veces... supongo que es mejor morrir rapidamente que despacio, y quizas puedes renacer como algo mas... diferente... mas colorida y vibrante... quizas puedes estar resucitada de otra manera. Esta nueva tu... vas a querer decir alguien quien estas hoy. Pero... la otra esta desaparecida. No hay nadie decir. Existes tu?
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Questions, Fitness, Sor Juana
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
10:32PM
So I should absolutely be finishing up my reading of Sor Juana right now instead of writing this, but I'm procrastinating, and when I find myself procrastinating for any length of time, it's usually an indicator that I have something else on my mind. Don't know what that is exactly right now, probably just a desire to be with my own mind for a little while. You never really know what that means until every moment of every day is occupied with someone else's thoughts, ie graduate school and pouring in everything from professors and authors, never time for something like this.
So I was thinking rather generally about blogs today, why people keep them, what they intend to accomplish. It occurs to me that it's strange, my particular brand of blog, which is basically a personal journal, mildly edited for public viewing. Most people seem to pick a topic and write about it, but I feel that would be so wrong for me. It's like in anything I've ever done... writing, art, piano, dance... I never settle on a style for anything. Writing- one day I'll be into abstract, spiritual, mystic musings, and the next it'll be some smart-ass rhymy bit or some far-fetched bilingual something or other. Art... I'll do anything, abstract, realism, paint, chalk, oils, as long as it's not a boring pencil and paper. I like being able to change, and I feel like if I were to start a blog about gardening, for example, and say, hello, this blog is going to be about gardening, I could never write about... cooking, or relationships. Life changes daily, and I like to talk about it all... so long as that's in writing, lol.
Today I'm thinking about... questions, physical fitness related stuff, and the awesomeness of Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz.
#1 Questions- I find myself irritated frequently. It seems to me we should all be asking a lot more questions and asserting a lot fewer definitives. As my lovely Indigo Girls say, "There's more than one answer to these questions, pointing in a crooked line, and the less I seek my source for some definitive, the closer I am to fine." I am not surprised I don't want to talk more than I do; people always already have the answer. And the admission of a question reflects not a desire to learn, but a lack of knowledge... stupidity. I'll value curiosity 'til the day I die and maintain that it keeps us young. It's just... it would be lovely to have conversations with people, say hey, here's the 5 different ways I see it, instead of just, this is how I see it. Why CAN'T I think multiple, possibly contradictory things at the same time? Why does that need to cause people aggravation? I feel the aggravation stems from not wanting to feel confused, but if we're honest with ourselves, we have no way of being certain of really... anything. So, I want to hear your questions. I want to answer in questions. How would that be? If you could ask anything and not have an answer, just infinite space for the blooming of your curiosity? What if you're a flower, and you erupt into a space you're comfortable with, and the sun comes to you on its own? What if you could grow in your own good time, in your own perfect beauty? Wouldn't it be lovely?
#2- Fitness stuff- So I signed up for this Physique 7 at the Rec Center, which is a seven-week program to help you make a fitness transformation. I signed up, why I'm not really sure. I was hoping to have a reliable spotter and someone to push me in the person of the trainer. I never have a spot. Guess what, most women don't like to lift the way I do, or maybe they think they shouldn't. And John doesn't lift either, so I have no partner. I stop shy on everything, because I'm afraid I'm going to drop the bar on my face or have a back spasm and not get back up. But the trainer wanted me to do light weights, high reps of everything. I said that's not what I was looking to do. I'm hoping that when I go back, he'll have revised the routine instead of insisting I should go for muscular endurance over raw strength. My endurance is excellent. I swam 30 laps non-stop tonight, and if that's not testing muscular and cardiovascular endurance at the same time, I don't know what is. It seems sexist. He sees a girl, he assigns high reps and plenty of cardio in between. I am not looking to lose weight. Put some damn muscle on me! I also decided I might benefit from the nutritional advice by turning in nutrition logs once a week. The response I got on my three logged days made me laugh more than anything, and then it bugged me. I know where I need to tweak some things, but at the same time, I know the world isn't going to fall apart if I don't change them. Again, I'm not looking to lose weight. I'm just looking to eat for health. I wrote that I had a BigMac, and I still say it's fine to have one once in awhile. But it just said "No" in all caps and red. Some of the language was pretty derogatory. I think that happens in fitness sometimes. I don't feel any guilt over what I eat; I'm looking for health advice. It was interesting, I thought, which things were emphasized. "That will be stored as fat." "If you eat junky food, it will show in your skin, nails, and body." I don't feel my body is something to be punished or made villainous. It does a good job for me, and I love it. I think so often we think of diet and exercise as tools to lose weight and fat, and it should be about so much more. If you really want to focus on numbers, how about blood lipids, blood pressure, resting heart rate- to me, those are much better indicators of health. When I wake up, still lying in bed, my heart rate is about 50. It used to be around 80 or 90. That's my improvement. I have developed a fairly massive stroke volume, and so my heart doesn't have to work quite so hard. I feel these sorts of things need to be emphasized more. I guess for as long as I've really been involved in fitness, it's been my opinion that it's something you do to feel good, be healthy, make yourself stronger, not something you should do because you're punishing yourself. Every time I have a fitness student tell me they need to lose "30 pounds" as they rub their stomachs, it breaks my heart. I say, "That's a lot to lose in such a short time, it might be healthier to do less." But they think that by beating themselves to a pulp for 3-6 months, they're going to do it . THEN they're going to be better people, I guess. I don't know. It makes me sad. Love your body, love yourself. Exercise, eat healthy, do it because it's good for you and makes you lose that sluggish feeling, not because you think you need to look a certain way. ergggg... this will always irritate me limitlessly, and I suppose I'll write about it several more times.
#3 Sor Juana- I'm losing steam by this point, but I'm reading her stuff right now for Garcia's class. I have to present questions on it next Monday, and I'm glad she is one of my topics. I absolutely love her. Her word play is unimaginably witty, and what I'm reading now is a response to something another "sister" wrote to her, condemning her non-religious writings, her unholy fascination with knowledge in general- science, math. As a nun, this other "sister" told her, she should be writing about God. Sor Juana knew who wrote the letter and that it was a religious man tricking her. She responded as if she hadn't the faintest, and "apologized" for her writings in such a way that it was impossible for the reader to do anything but admire why she wanted to learn, etc. She was brilliant, absolutely brilliant, and a rebel. The way she thought on things is they way I've often wished everyone would think about things... ask your questions, look for answers but don't arrive at them to soon, you may be stopping short. Any time I've had to read her for school, I've felt so... non-alone, like somewhere, sometime, there was a woman who thought like I do, albeit she was about a billion times more intelligent. I would have loved to have met her, spent the night in her convent astrolab, have her teach me about the stars and what she really thought about God, which is so unclear in her writings. She says stuff about God, but when she's talking about God, her tone is so different, her rhetoric is gone. It's like, here, I believe, and probably her readers accepted that, even though she seemed to write it only out of necessity. Many consider her to be the first feminist. I loved her villancicos when I read them a couple years ago. She seemed to write women into divinity, in places they weren't supposed to be, and I thought that was so revolutionary and amazing, defiant, for her time and place.
Anyway, I kinda want to get back to her now and wind down for the night. Peace. Blessings.
10:32PM
So I should absolutely be finishing up my reading of Sor Juana right now instead of writing this, but I'm procrastinating, and when I find myself procrastinating for any length of time, it's usually an indicator that I have something else on my mind. Don't know what that is exactly right now, probably just a desire to be with my own mind for a little while. You never really know what that means until every moment of every day is occupied with someone else's thoughts, ie graduate school and pouring in everything from professors and authors, never time for something like this.
So I was thinking rather generally about blogs today, why people keep them, what they intend to accomplish. It occurs to me that it's strange, my particular brand of blog, which is basically a personal journal, mildly edited for public viewing. Most people seem to pick a topic and write about it, but I feel that would be so wrong for me. It's like in anything I've ever done... writing, art, piano, dance... I never settle on a style for anything. Writing- one day I'll be into abstract, spiritual, mystic musings, and the next it'll be some smart-ass rhymy bit or some far-fetched bilingual something or other. Art... I'll do anything, abstract, realism, paint, chalk, oils, as long as it's not a boring pencil and paper. I like being able to change, and I feel like if I were to start a blog about gardening, for example, and say, hello, this blog is going to be about gardening, I could never write about... cooking, or relationships. Life changes daily, and I like to talk about it all... so long as that's in writing, lol.
Today I'm thinking about... questions, physical fitness related stuff, and the awesomeness of Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz.
#1 Questions- I find myself irritated frequently. It seems to me we should all be asking a lot more questions and asserting a lot fewer definitives. As my lovely Indigo Girls say, "There's more than one answer to these questions, pointing in a crooked line, and the less I seek my source for some definitive, the closer I am to fine." I am not surprised I don't want to talk more than I do; people always already have the answer. And the admission of a question reflects not a desire to learn, but a lack of knowledge... stupidity. I'll value curiosity 'til the day I die and maintain that it keeps us young. It's just... it would be lovely to have conversations with people, say hey, here's the 5 different ways I see it, instead of just, this is how I see it. Why CAN'T I think multiple, possibly contradictory things at the same time? Why does that need to cause people aggravation? I feel the aggravation stems from not wanting to feel confused, but if we're honest with ourselves, we have no way of being certain of really... anything. So, I want to hear your questions. I want to answer in questions. How would that be? If you could ask anything and not have an answer, just infinite space for the blooming of your curiosity? What if you're a flower, and you erupt into a space you're comfortable with, and the sun comes to you on its own? What if you could grow in your own good time, in your own perfect beauty? Wouldn't it be lovely?
#2- Fitness stuff- So I signed up for this Physique 7 at the Rec Center, which is a seven-week program to help you make a fitness transformation. I signed up, why I'm not really sure. I was hoping to have a reliable spotter and someone to push me in the person of the trainer. I never have a spot. Guess what, most women don't like to lift the way I do, or maybe they think they shouldn't. And John doesn't lift either, so I have no partner. I stop shy on everything, because I'm afraid I'm going to drop the bar on my face or have a back spasm and not get back up. But the trainer wanted me to do light weights, high reps of everything. I said that's not what I was looking to do. I'm hoping that when I go back, he'll have revised the routine instead of insisting I should go for muscular endurance over raw strength. My endurance is excellent. I swam 30 laps non-stop tonight, and if that's not testing muscular and cardiovascular endurance at the same time, I don't know what is. It seems sexist. He sees a girl, he assigns high reps and plenty of cardio in between. I am not looking to lose weight. Put some damn muscle on me! I also decided I might benefit from the nutritional advice by turning in nutrition logs once a week. The response I got on my three logged days made me laugh more than anything, and then it bugged me. I know where I need to tweak some things, but at the same time, I know the world isn't going to fall apart if I don't change them. Again, I'm not looking to lose weight. I'm just looking to eat for health. I wrote that I had a BigMac, and I still say it's fine to have one once in awhile. But it just said "No" in all caps and red. Some of the language was pretty derogatory. I think that happens in fitness sometimes. I don't feel any guilt over what I eat; I'm looking for health advice. It was interesting, I thought, which things were emphasized. "That will be stored as fat." "If you eat junky food, it will show in your skin, nails, and body." I don't feel my body is something to be punished or made villainous. It does a good job for me, and I love it. I think so often we think of diet and exercise as tools to lose weight and fat, and it should be about so much more. If you really want to focus on numbers, how about blood lipids, blood pressure, resting heart rate- to me, those are much better indicators of health. When I wake up, still lying in bed, my heart rate is about 50. It used to be around 80 or 90. That's my improvement. I have developed a fairly massive stroke volume, and so my heart doesn't have to work quite so hard. I feel these sorts of things need to be emphasized more. I guess for as long as I've really been involved in fitness, it's been my opinion that it's something you do to feel good, be healthy, make yourself stronger, not something you should do because you're punishing yourself. Every time I have a fitness student tell me they need to lose "30 pounds" as they rub their stomachs, it breaks my heart. I say, "That's a lot to lose in such a short time, it might be healthier to do less." But they think that by beating themselves to a pulp for 3-6 months, they're going to do it . THEN they're going to be better people, I guess. I don't know. It makes me sad. Love your body, love yourself. Exercise, eat healthy, do it because it's good for you and makes you lose that sluggish feeling, not because you think you need to look a certain way. ergggg... this will always irritate me limitlessly, and I suppose I'll write about it several more times.
#3 Sor Juana- I'm losing steam by this point, but I'm reading her stuff right now for Garcia's class. I have to present questions on it next Monday, and I'm glad she is one of my topics. I absolutely love her. Her word play is unimaginably witty, and what I'm reading now is a response to something another "sister" wrote to her, condemning her non-religious writings, her unholy fascination with knowledge in general- science, math. As a nun, this other "sister" told her, she should be writing about God. Sor Juana knew who wrote the letter and that it was a religious man tricking her. She responded as if she hadn't the faintest, and "apologized" for her writings in such a way that it was impossible for the reader to do anything but admire why she wanted to learn, etc. She was brilliant, absolutely brilliant, and a rebel. The way she thought on things is they way I've often wished everyone would think about things... ask your questions, look for answers but don't arrive at them to soon, you may be stopping short. Any time I've had to read her for school, I've felt so... non-alone, like somewhere, sometime, there was a woman who thought like I do, albeit she was about a billion times more intelligent. I would have loved to have met her, spent the night in her convent astrolab, have her teach me about the stars and what she really thought about God, which is so unclear in her writings. She says stuff about God, but when she's talking about God, her tone is so different, her rhetoric is gone. It's like, here, I believe, and probably her readers accepted that, even though she seemed to write it only out of necessity. Many consider her to be the first feminist. I loved her villancicos when I read them a couple years ago. She seemed to write women into divinity, in places they weren't supposed to be, and I thought that was so revolutionary and amazing, defiant, for her time and place.
Anyway, I kinda want to get back to her now and wind down for the night. Peace. Blessings.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Flat
Monday, January 31, 2011
7:34PM
Someone said something today that sort of struck a chord with me, frankly irritated me. Someone called me "flat." John taught me something about rivers recently, specifically the Ohio River. He told me that the Ohio River flows faster than any mountain stream, which I refuted vehemently because it's just not what I "see." But it's true, that river that I used to run to in order to watch the fog lift off, despite how smooth it looks on top, below, en la oscura profundida, it's moving tempestuously.
I've withdrawn, sure, and despite the fact that some people want to call that a "symptom," I think it's good to withdraw from time to time. Maybe we're arguing terms here. Maybe I say "withdraw" but mean "retreat," or vice versa. All I know is, that when you pull away and go silent for religious or spiritual reasons as part on an established religious or spiritual group, it's perceived as holy, admirable, but when you do it alone, it seems just... strange. Something wrong with you. But my withdraw has been great for me.
I've traveled back inside. I have learned again what it means to "touch" music. Music is an animal, with claws and soft fur that can envelop you or claw your eyes out. Some art vibrates because of the intention behind it, whether or not it's aesthetically pleasing. Of course it's hard for me to work up white, foamy waves on my exterior. I'm pulsating out of control down below, in the greatest release of my life, coursing invisibly between mountains and sky.
It seems at times in my classes that my classmates, professors, think I'm thought-less. Sin pensamiento. No soy. It's that I read something and go immediately to the universal with it. These details don't interest me, although I acknowledge their importance. It's just not in the details where I lie. Everything dissolves. Everything is absorbed. Ultimately, it's all forgivable, no matter how much we vainly hold onto the contrary to justify our own hurt. Let it go. Watch the wind sweep sand from your fingertips. Lie down, let ocean waves wash over you, pull parts of you, dead skin cells, back out to her center. You always were and never have been. Let it go.
7:34PM
Someone said something today that sort of struck a chord with me, frankly irritated me. Someone called me "flat." John taught me something about rivers recently, specifically the Ohio River. He told me that the Ohio River flows faster than any mountain stream, which I refuted vehemently because it's just not what I "see." But it's true, that river that I used to run to in order to watch the fog lift off, despite how smooth it looks on top, below, en la oscura profundida, it's moving tempestuously.
I've withdrawn, sure, and despite the fact that some people want to call that a "symptom," I think it's good to withdraw from time to time. Maybe we're arguing terms here. Maybe I say "withdraw" but mean "retreat," or vice versa. All I know is, that when you pull away and go silent for religious or spiritual reasons as part on an established religious or spiritual group, it's perceived as holy, admirable, but when you do it alone, it seems just... strange. Something wrong with you. But my withdraw has been great for me.
I've traveled back inside. I have learned again what it means to "touch" music. Music is an animal, with claws and soft fur that can envelop you or claw your eyes out. Some art vibrates because of the intention behind it, whether or not it's aesthetically pleasing. Of course it's hard for me to work up white, foamy waves on my exterior. I'm pulsating out of control down below, in the greatest release of my life, coursing invisibly between mountains and sky.
It seems at times in my classes that my classmates, professors, think I'm thought-less. Sin pensamiento. No soy. It's that I read something and go immediately to the universal with it. These details don't interest me, although I acknowledge their importance. It's just not in the details where I lie. Everything dissolves. Everything is absorbed. Ultimately, it's all forgivable, no matter how much we vainly hold onto the contrary to justify our own hurt. Let it go. Watch the wind sweep sand from your fingertips. Lie down, let ocean waves wash over you, pull parts of you, dead skin cells, back out to her center. You always were and never have been. Let it go.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Bilingual breakdown
It's just that... Everything is in every thing. Es en la arte como en las ciencias, en la música como en la literatura y estoy casi cerca a pedir mi mente enteramente y por la última vez.
Él me dijo, parece que ustedes hablan la misma lenguaje, pero ¿Qué más hay?
¿QUÉ MÁS HAY, QUÉ MÁS HAY? ¿ESTÁS REALMENTE PREGUNTANDOME QUÉ MÁS HAY?
Yo no hablo la misma lenguaje con alguien. Para mí, no es pequeña cosa hablar la misma lenguaje. Estoy capaz de disculpar alguien cualquier pecado si solamente pueden entender las palabras veniendo de mi boca. No necesitan entenderme como yo, solamente mis palabras para que yo sé que no estoy hablando una idioma de extraterrestrios.
I had one such a run in today with someone who speaks a different "l"anguage with a little l than I do. OK, fine. Our tongues are different, but is it really possible that I say "worm" for example, and you hear "butternut squash?" J.H.C.A. And for crying out loud, don't be MEAN, RUDE, when you don't understand what I'm saying. I'm not talking about a misunderstanding on the literal level. Literally, I got it across. I am just SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO tired of saying things and people looking at me like I'm crazy.
Things matter to me. Everyone has something that matters to them, a lover, a friend, a group. This things are all... good. But what matters more to me is answers, understanding. And I just become downright furious when someone treats me like I'm dumb for asking questions. Don't tell me I'm dumb, just think. I get so discouraged when no one wants to think. This is grad school. It's too much work if all you want is your name on a piece of paper that says you have a master's degree. I don't understand why anyone would go through this if they don't have questions. So yeah, speak my Language, and I'll forgive you anything. Too bad this is excessively true.
I need some crayons... or my drum. Alcohol? Stuff to do tomorrow.
Él me dijo, parece que ustedes hablan la misma lenguaje, pero ¿Qué más hay?
¿QUÉ MÁS HAY, QUÉ MÁS HAY? ¿ESTÁS REALMENTE PREGUNTANDOME QUÉ MÁS HAY?
Yo no hablo la misma lenguaje con alguien. Para mí, no es pequeña cosa hablar la misma lenguaje. Estoy capaz de disculpar alguien cualquier pecado si solamente pueden entender las palabras veniendo de mi boca. No necesitan entenderme como yo, solamente mis palabras para que yo sé que no estoy hablando una idioma de extraterrestrios.
I had one such a run in today with someone who speaks a different "l"anguage with a little l than I do. OK, fine. Our tongues are different, but is it really possible that I say "worm" for example, and you hear "butternut squash?" J.H.C.A. And for crying out loud, don't be MEAN, RUDE, when you don't understand what I'm saying. I'm not talking about a misunderstanding on the literal level. Literally, I got it across. I am just SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO tired of saying things and people looking at me like I'm crazy.
Things matter to me. Everyone has something that matters to them, a lover, a friend, a group. This things are all... good. But what matters more to me is answers, understanding. And I just become downright furious when someone treats me like I'm dumb for asking questions. Don't tell me I'm dumb, just think. I get so discouraged when no one wants to think. This is grad school. It's too much work if all you want is your name on a piece of paper that says you have a master's degree. I don't understand why anyone would go through this if they don't have questions. So yeah, speak my Language, and I'll forgive you anything. Too bad this is excessively true.
I need some crayons... or my drum. Alcohol? Stuff to do tomorrow.
Friday, January 21, 2011
My rose
Friday, January 21, 2011
11:07PM
Sitting down here to watch Up with John "on demand." I'm not sure that's either of our type of movie, but what else are we going to do on a Friday night? We went to Pizza Hut for dinner. I was still wearing the cardigan over a button up, and I caught a glimpse of myself in the bathroom mirror. I looked like I was forty years old.
This am (italics is messed up and will not turn off...) I wanted to go swimming at the Rec, but because of the snow, I decided it was safer to give the road workers a few more hours to clear the streets. I stayed in and did yoga instead. Sometimes Shiva Rea gets a little out there for me... don't get me wrong, I'm into the spiritual aspect, I just don't think I need to stick my tongue out and grunt to get at that aspect. That just makes me feel odd. But I did enjoy... sort of... the first meditation. You were supposed to visualize a flower at heart center and pull it up to third eye. That was fine, relaxing. My flower was immediately a white and yellow rose in full bloom. Then you were directed to visualize yourself in a river and to give your flower as a gift to everything... I tried and then before I could see anything else just started weeping. The universe did not want my flower, my gift, me. That's just generally how I've felt lately, like I have things to give to people and the world but that... are not accepted, and that hurts ridiculously.
My mom called me up a few weeks ago with some personality test thing she'd taken for school and wanted to know what my results were in comparison... I'd done that very test a few months prior and come up INTJ, which according to the results constitutes only a very bizarre 1% of the population. My mother went on to say how strange it was that I started out the extrovert and Carly the introvert and how it had changed. And she was hyper-interested, wondering why that happened, and I sort of just muttered, well... I think it was gradual. I so many times just came to people with everything I am, think, and feel, and as many times was rejected. So I stopped. She went on to say some interesting things about herself, which I'll not disclose her with the potential for others to read... but I think I always knew that. As a kid, I knew no strangers. Every summer we'd go on vacation, and I made friends with every single other child in the hotel. I had a new friend every day on the beach. I asked kids for their addresses. I wrote them letters. People fascinated me. I talked to everyone. Gradually, for various reasons, that changed.
Last night I was playing piano, singing a song that has had me baffled awhile. Suddenly, I got it. No conflict. It was what it was, and I sang as tears streamed down my face. It was fine, great, impossible. Some things are. And that sort of came back to me this morning in my meditation... I have me, myself, whatever gifts I might possess, in my mind I see this rose, and I've wanted so much to love and give myself to others. To me, five, six years ago, that would have been invariably a good thing, but as I felt more and more rejection through the years, I came to think that whatever I had originally thought I could offer was no more than malignancy to anyone else. I don't feel like going into a lot of details since I'm online... this is just quicker and easier than writing things out, so I'm more likely to do it on here. Anyflip... so it's been an issue trying to reconvince myself I had anything to offer. Based on the rose I saw in my meditation, I decided to make a picture of one such flower. I was going to hang it over my piano, I had decided... I'll look at it and try to love it and find it acceptable. It was only for me to look at to help myself, which is never a motivation really for my art. Obviously, it comes out of myself always, but this was just... different. I was sitting on the couch tonight, making this flower, kinda happy that I was doing it, sad about what it meant to me, and then John claimed it. He just said, "I want that one." I had to think about it. But in the end I gave it to him with an explanation of what I had made it for and this am's yoga. He said, "We do that a lot with each other." Yeah, I guess. Anyway, it is what it is tonight. My rose is sticky tacked to the wall above his computer.
11:07PM
Sitting down here to watch Up with John "on demand." I'm not sure that's either of our type of movie, but what else are we going to do on a Friday night? We went to Pizza Hut for dinner. I was still wearing the cardigan over a button up, and I caught a glimpse of myself in the bathroom mirror. I looked like I was forty years old.
This am (italics is messed up and will not turn off...) I wanted to go swimming at the Rec, but because of the snow, I decided it was safer to give the road workers a few more hours to clear the streets. I stayed in and did yoga instead. Sometimes Shiva Rea gets a little out there for me... don't get me wrong, I'm into the spiritual aspect, I just don't think I need to stick my tongue out and grunt to get at that aspect. That just makes me feel odd. But I did enjoy... sort of... the first meditation. You were supposed to visualize a flower at heart center and pull it up to third eye. That was fine, relaxing. My flower was immediately a white and yellow rose in full bloom. Then you were directed to visualize yourself in a river and to give your flower as a gift to everything... I tried and then before I could see anything else just started weeping. The universe did not want my flower, my gift, me. That's just generally how I've felt lately, like I have things to give to people and the world but that... are not accepted, and that hurts ridiculously.
My mom called me up a few weeks ago with some personality test thing she'd taken for school and wanted to know what my results were in comparison... I'd done that very test a few months prior and come up INTJ, which according to the results constitutes only a very bizarre 1% of the population. My mother went on to say how strange it was that I started out the extrovert and Carly the introvert and how it had changed. And she was hyper-interested, wondering why that happened, and I sort of just muttered, well... I think it was gradual. I so many times just came to people with everything I am, think, and feel, and as many times was rejected. So I stopped. She went on to say some interesting things about herself, which I'll not disclose her with the potential for others to read... but I think I always knew that. As a kid, I knew no strangers. Every summer we'd go on vacation, and I made friends with every single other child in the hotel. I had a new friend every day on the beach. I asked kids for their addresses. I wrote them letters. People fascinated me. I talked to everyone. Gradually, for various reasons, that changed.
Last night I was playing piano, singing a song that has had me baffled awhile. Suddenly, I got it. No conflict. It was what it was, and I sang as tears streamed down my face. It was fine, great, impossible. Some things are. And that sort of came back to me this morning in my meditation... I have me, myself, whatever gifts I might possess, in my mind I see this rose, and I've wanted so much to love and give myself to others. To me, five, six years ago, that would have been invariably a good thing, but as I felt more and more rejection through the years, I came to think that whatever I had originally thought I could offer was no more than malignancy to anyone else. I don't feel like going into a lot of details since I'm online... this is just quicker and easier than writing things out, so I'm more likely to do it on here. Anyflip... so it's been an issue trying to reconvince myself I had anything to offer. Based on the rose I saw in my meditation, I decided to make a picture of one such flower. I was going to hang it over my piano, I had decided... I'll look at it and try to love it and find it acceptable. It was only for me to look at to help myself, which is never a motivation really for my art. Obviously, it comes out of myself always, but this was just... different. I was sitting on the couch tonight, making this flower, kinda happy that I was doing it, sad about what it meant to me, and then John claimed it. He just said, "I want that one." I had to think about it. But in the end I gave it to him with an explanation of what I had made it for and this am's yoga. He said, "We do that a lot with each other." Yeah, I guess. Anyway, it is what it is tonight. My rose is sticky tacked to the wall above his computer.
Thursday, January 20, 2011
I suppose
Thursday, January 20, 2011
8:35pm
I don't feel like getting too heady right now, so perhaps I'll just leave it at the facts... perhaps.
Today was my "off" day for the week. I have no on-campus obligations on Thursdays, so I stayed home, read for a couple hours and played piano and did housework this morning. John and I went to the Rec this afternoon. I lifted, he did elliptical. Stopped at Subway, came home to eat. Showered. I've been reading for the last two hours. Brian turning to mush. Not sure why I'm doing this all, but it beats the alternative of just sitting here staring into the abyss. Wish I was buzzed and dancing somewhere right now. I just have so little motivation for anything, which isn't to say that I'm not still getting it all done... i am. i always will. That's what i do. But I kinda feel like just... not. Talked to my gma on the phone today, that was... of course, not pleasant. Never know what to say to her anymore. I suppose it was nice to be home this morning, reading in pajamas, drinking coffee, alone... I suppose.
8:35pm
I don't feel like getting too heady right now, so perhaps I'll just leave it at the facts... perhaps.
Today was my "off" day for the week. I have no on-campus obligations on Thursdays, so I stayed home, read for a couple hours and played piano and did housework this morning. John and I went to the Rec this afternoon. I lifted, he did elliptical. Stopped at Subway, came home to eat. Showered. I've been reading for the last two hours. Brian turning to mush. Not sure why I'm doing this all, but it beats the alternative of just sitting here staring into the abyss. Wish I was buzzed and dancing somewhere right now. I just have so little motivation for anything, which isn't to say that I'm not still getting it all done... i am. i always will. That's what i do. But I kinda feel like just... not. Talked to my gma on the phone today, that was... of course, not pleasant. Never know what to say to her anymore. I suppose it was nice to be home this morning, reading in pajamas, drinking coffee, alone... I suppose.
Monday, January 17, 2011
spontaneity and dumplings
Monday, January 17, 2011
10:49pm
So Maureen just left and John just went to get me earplugs, because apparently there's a lot of loud dripping outside. Maureen coming over was really spontaneous. I mentioned I was cooking, she asked if she could pay me to cook for her, and so I just wound up inviting her to dinner. I made chicken and dumplings today, according to a recipe I hadn't used before, and it actually turned out really good in my opinion. I used various types of chicken, onion, peas, carrots, biscuits, and various flavoring ingredients. I'd never made it before, so I was happy with it. I decided to have a glass of wine with dinner, but we all know how that goes with me... one glass quickly turns into, oh... four. So Maureen and I wound up drawing pictures while she and John played with some noise app on the phones. Then we wound up fiddling around on the piano. I am always so embarrassed to play in front of new people, but I think she understood that. It was just a good, spontaneous evening.
10:49pm
So Maureen just left and John just went to get me earplugs, because apparently there's a lot of loud dripping outside. Maureen coming over was really spontaneous. I mentioned I was cooking, she asked if she could pay me to cook for her, and so I just wound up inviting her to dinner. I made chicken and dumplings today, according to a recipe I hadn't used before, and it actually turned out really good in my opinion. I used various types of chicken, onion, peas, carrots, biscuits, and various flavoring ingredients. I'd never made it before, so I was happy with it. I decided to have a glass of wine with dinner, but we all know how that goes with me... one glass quickly turns into, oh... four. So Maureen and I wound up drawing pictures while she and John played with some noise app on the phones. Then we wound up fiddling around on the piano. I am always so embarrassed to play in front of new people, but I think she understood that. It was just a good, spontaneous evening.
Take me back to the day
Monday, January 17, 2011
10:18am
Just got back from teaching Zumba for the first time in five weeks. I was a little rusty, but overall I think it well. We did a new salsa to a Celia Cruz song, "La vida es un carnaval." That may well be my favorite salsa song of all time- hay, no hay que llorar, la vida es un carnaval y es más bello vivir cantando- Well, I think so. It's more beautiful to live singing, in my opinion, dancing as well. I am having serious dance withdrawal right now. It's really just... bizarre. I had too much fun on Saturday night at Tusca or something. Between alcohol and the music, I was damn near ecstatic. I think I even danced alone for about twenty minutes while Klunk was recovering her wits and energy. I just... did. not. care. And that's part of my whole do me/be me resolution, too. Because... who cares if people look at me like I'm insane? I probably am. I danced with several very, very good male leads. The party in Pittsburgh is smaller than the party in Morgantown, but the dancers there are overall better. There was one woman, I'd say in her fifties. She was effing amazing. I've never seen the likes except in Youtube videos. And she had this long, bright, blonde hair that she just let hang limp, so when she was dancing it spin out the top of her head in circles. Looked cool. I was seriously considering asking her to dance with me just to teach me something. She obviously knew how to lead as she was dancing with several women teaching them stuff. It was like my eyeballs were having epilepsy watching. The one guy I didn't talk to at all... his style was stiff and very much a game. It was fun once I figured that out. The thing about dancing and the power dynamic is that... it's not so much the guy is in control of you. It's like... you're trying to figure it out, and once you learn their rhythm, it's like, hah, see that? It's such a game. I danced with three older men as well. I know that creeps some people out, but I like it. The difference between young men dancers and older men dancers is that the older men have it figured it out. There's definitely no virility suggested in the turns, the way the younger men really almost jerk you about. But they have, by their age, realized how to lead a women with very calm subtleties. Then I danced with a Mexican guy. Then his friend came over, and we danced. He was Dominican, so I refused to speak any English so that I could practice. He was probably my favorite to dance with. He was excellent, and I definitely have respect for any dance partner who can take my gringa ass and actually make me dance. I had such a blast. I realized a little too late that I had spent about four hours dancing in my heels. As the alcohol wore off, I thought my bones might snap. But I smiled and embraced the ache as I saw it the sign of a good time.
It was really good to just get out of Morgantown and be among old friends. Certainly as Camp Tygart alumni we have a certain bond... I guess it's what some people may feel about their high school or college but I never did. It's that... they've also all had children on the side of a mountain and had to make it both safe and fun so that the kids never knew that safety was even an effort. They've all also watched kids' eyes light up when they stare at the fire or the stars on their trail. I think they all get what it means to be able to be a facilitator of putting kids in touch with Divinity and their own divinity in that way, in a way that lets them see and experience things that can't be explained. It has meant everything to me.
I made us spaghetti for dinner on Saturday night, and Catherine made an appetizer out of cucumbers, mozzarella, and tomatoes. We ate dinner with Jessica's roommates in their living room. It was really nice just to prepare a meal and have people to share it with.
Anyway, lots of work to get to. I'm definitely missing Pittsburgh. I miss Klunk, Jenny, and Catherine, and I miss dancing and eating spaghetti. I wish I could go out dancing every night. For me, there is nothing like it. And i know I sound half-nuts in my hyper-estimation of Dance. But... it's a connector for me. Every person can detect a beat because we all operate according to various rhythms even we aren't aware. And then the things that get put in music... it's so human- emotions like love, anger, regret... and a lot of culturally specific stuff. So when you're hearing that and you're among others and moving to it... well, I have always felt closer to God on a dance floor that's really hoppin' than I ever have in any church. There have been times I could almost fall down dead from joy just because of what I'm experiencing in those times. I want to go back!!!
10:18am
Just got back from teaching Zumba for the first time in five weeks. I was a little rusty, but overall I think it well. We did a new salsa to a Celia Cruz song, "La vida es un carnaval." That may well be my favorite salsa song of all time- hay, no hay que llorar, la vida es un carnaval y es más bello vivir cantando- Well, I think so. It's more beautiful to live singing, in my opinion, dancing as well. I am having serious dance withdrawal right now. It's really just... bizarre. I had too much fun on Saturday night at Tusca or something. Between alcohol and the music, I was damn near ecstatic. I think I even danced alone for about twenty minutes while Klunk was recovering her wits and energy. I just... did. not. care. And that's part of my whole do me/be me resolution, too. Because... who cares if people look at me like I'm insane? I probably am. I danced with several very, very good male leads. The party in Pittsburgh is smaller than the party in Morgantown, but the dancers there are overall better. There was one woman, I'd say in her fifties. She was effing amazing. I've never seen the likes except in Youtube videos. And she had this long, bright, blonde hair that she just let hang limp, so when she was dancing it spin out the top of her head in circles. Looked cool. I was seriously considering asking her to dance with me just to teach me something. She obviously knew how to lead as she was dancing with several women teaching them stuff. It was like my eyeballs were having epilepsy watching. The one guy I didn't talk to at all... his style was stiff and very much a game. It was fun once I figured that out. The thing about dancing and the power dynamic is that... it's not so much the guy is in control of you. It's like... you're trying to figure it out, and once you learn their rhythm, it's like, hah, see that? It's such a game. I danced with three older men as well. I know that creeps some people out, but I like it. The difference between young men dancers and older men dancers is that the older men have it figured it out. There's definitely no virility suggested in the turns, the way the younger men really almost jerk you about. But they have, by their age, realized how to lead a women with very calm subtleties. Then I danced with a Mexican guy. Then his friend came over, and we danced. He was Dominican, so I refused to speak any English so that I could practice. He was probably my favorite to dance with. He was excellent, and I definitely have respect for any dance partner who can take my gringa ass and actually make me dance. I had such a blast. I realized a little too late that I had spent about four hours dancing in my heels. As the alcohol wore off, I thought my bones might snap. But I smiled and embraced the ache as I saw it the sign of a good time.
It was really good to just get out of Morgantown and be among old friends. Certainly as Camp Tygart alumni we have a certain bond... I guess it's what some people may feel about their high school or college but I never did. It's that... they've also all had children on the side of a mountain and had to make it both safe and fun so that the kids never knew that safety was even an effort. They've all also watched kids' eyes light up when they stare at the fire or the stars on their trail. I think they all get what it means to be able to be a facilitator of putting kids in touch with Divinity and their own divinity in that way, in a way that lets them see and experience things that can't be explained. It has meant everything to me.
I made us spaghetti for dinner on Saturday night, and Catherine made an appetizer out of cucumbers, mozzarella, and tomatoes. We ate dinner with Jessica's roommates in their living room. It was really nice just to prepare a meal and have people to share it with.
Anyway, lots of work to get to. I'm definitely missing Pittsburgh. I miss Klunk, Jenny, and Catherine, and I miss dancing and eating spaghetti. I wish I could go out dancing every night. For me, there is nothing like it. And i know I sound half-nuts in my hyper-estimation of Dance. But... it's a connector for me. Every person can detect a beat because we all operate according to various rhythms even we aren't aware. And then the things that get put in music... it's so human- emotions like love, anger, regret... and a lot of culturally specific stuff. So when you're hearing that and you're among others and moving to it... well, I have always felt closer to God on a dance floor that's really hoppin' than I ever have in any church. There have been times I could almost fall down dead from joy just because of what I'm experiencing in those times. I want to go back!!!
Thursday, January 13, 2011
FML
Thursday, January 13, 2010
2:39pm
I am having a bad afternoon. My mom called me when I was walking around in a room with a head full of hair dye to tell me my sister had been in a car accident. She was fine, but I might want to be prepared to go get her soon. Grand. So I plopped my ass in the shower. So cold it hurt then made me numb. I thought I was back in Bolivia, taking freezing showers with nothing but a bar of Dial soap, too cold to waste time on things like washcloths and conditioner. Then it was just so miserably cold I wound up on all fours with my head under the spigot. About this time I realize I forgot the conditioner for the dye. Ugh... we've cut the damn heat back due to the expense of having it truly warm, so I had to trek through the trailer, hair dripping wet, covered in freezing water to get the conditioner. So I'm in the other bathroom, conditioning my hair on hands and knees under the spigot, because there's no way in hell I'm getting back in that shower, and all I can hear is the running of the damn toilet. OMFG. I'm about to have an aneurysm. I thought John was going to do something with it, but with Carly's accident and the hot water heater going bust, I lost my patience today and proceeded to take it apart myself. I just need to screw in the screw that holds the floater in place, but thanks to the infinite genius of those who previously lived here, there's a shelving unit that includes a back support bar so that I can't slide it out OVER the toilet. Nooooo... It has to be either lifted in its awkward, bulky, 60-poundedness up and over the tank... OR... it has to be taken apart piece by piece. Why is this important? Because the lowest shelf of the unit sits so low that I cannot effectively reach a screwdriver underneath it. I tried using tweezers in lieu of a screw driver, but the effectiveness was limited at best. I got fed up with flushing and reflushing the toilet, watching it fill up with water, hoping that THIS TIME the floater would float on up and close the valve. Fuck the toilet. FUCK THE FUCKING TOILET!!! (I feel mildly better.) Try again when John gets home and can lift the shelving unit with me. Yeah, I could take it apart, but that would probably take me clear up until he gets home. I flipped the breaker on the hot water heater. Hoping it just needed reset. There is WARM water now, not hot. So it could either be an element or just that it needed to cycle through a tank before the next one comes out with strong heat. omfg, argggggg... At least it's heating somewhat, so the tank itself doesn't need to be replaced. Still... we've been getting hit really hard lately. Heating this winter has been stupidly expensive since it got cold so early, and all those lovely back-to-school expenses. My lovely department gave us all a 500 dollar bonus. I appreciate that they see the need for that, but that's still not enough to cover the graduate fees at the beginning of the semester. I don't blame the department. I blame fucking WVU. All these fees. My tuition is waived, I feel that these fees should also be waived. I'm not using the PRT, that old, broke-down piece of shit, so why should I have to pay for it? If I have to pay for the Rec Center... whatever, I use it a lot. However- I should be able to take a guest without them having to pay $10.00 if it's going to be that expensive. They call all this shit "free" but it's very expensive, and we never have the opportunity to use most of what we're forced to pay for. But the fees are not optional. You cannot opt out of paying for medical or psychiatric services you don't use, a gym you don't go to, a library you never visit, a PRT you never ride in, buses that are always full. I'm getting pissed. I'm not saying I don't use any of it, but 700 bucks at the beginning of every semester is outrageous. It's about a quarter of our tuition for God's sake! If I could just have hot water and know that we're going to be able to use the toilet, I would calm down. GRRRRRRRR!!!
2:39pm
I am having a bad afternoon. My mom called me when I was walking around in a room with a head full of hair dye to tell me my sister had been in a car accident. She was fine, but I might want to be prepared to go get her soon. Grand. So I plopped my ass in the shower. So cold it hurt then made me numb. I thought I was back in Bolivia, taking freezing showers with nothing but a bar of Dial soap, too cold to waste time on things like washcloths and conditioner. Then it was just so miserably cold I wound up on all fours with my head under the spigot. About this time I realize I forgot the conditioner for the dye. Ugh... we've cut the damn heat back due to the expense of having it truly warm, so I had to trek through the trailer, hair dripping wet, covered in freezing water to get the conditioner. So I'm in the other bathroom, conditioning my hair on hands and knees under the spigot, because there's no way in hell I'm getting back in that shower, and all I can hear is the running of the damn toilet. OMFG. I'm about to have an aneurysm. I thought John was going to do something with it, but with Carly's accident and the hot water heater going bust, I lost my patience today and proceeded to take it apart myself. I just need to screw in the screw that holds the floater in place, but thanks to the infinite genius of those who previously lived here, there's a shelving unit that includes a back support bar so that I can't slide it out OVER the toilet. Nooooo... It has to be either lifted in its awkward, bulky, 60-poundedness up and over the tank... OR... it has to be taken apart piece by piece. Why is this important? Because the lowest shelf of the unit sits so low that I cannot effectively reach a screwdriver underneath it. I tried using tweezers in lieu of a screw driver, but the effectiveness was limited at best. I got fed up with flushing and reflushing the toilet, watching it fill up with water, hoping that THIS TIME the floater would float on up and close the valve. Fuck the toilet. FUCK THE FUCKING TOILET!!! (I feel mildly better.) Try again when John gets home and can lift the shelving unit with me. Yeah, I could take it apart, but that would probably take me clear up until he gets home. I flipped the breaker on the hot water heater. Hoping it just needed reset. There is WARM water now, not hot. So it could either be an element or just that it needed to cycle through a tank before the next one comes out with strong heat. omfg, argggggg... At least it's heating somewhat, so the tank itself doesn't need to be replaced. Still... we've been getting hit really hard lately. Heating this winter has been stupidly expensive since it got cold so early, and all those lovely back-to-school expenses. My lovely department gave us all a 500 dollar bonus. I appreciate that they see the need for that, but that's still not enough to cover the graduate fees at the beginning of the semester. I don't blame the department. I blame fucking WVU. All these fees. My tuition is waived, I feel that these fees should also be waived. I'm not using the PRT, that old, broke-down piece of shit, so why should I have to pay for it? If I have to pay for the Rec Center... whatever, I use it a lot. However- I should be able to take a guest without them having to pay $10.00 if it's going to be that expensive. They call all this shit "free" but it's very expensive, and we never have the opportunity to use most of what we're forced to pay for. But the fees are not optional. You cannot opt out of paying for medical or psychiatric services you don't use, a gym you don't go to, a library you never visit, a PRT you never ride in, buses that are always full. I'm getting pissed. I'm not saying I don't use any of it, but 700 bucks at the beginning of every semester is outrageous. It's about a quarter of our tuition for God's sake! If I could just have hot water and know that we're going to be able to use the toilet, I would calm down. GRRRRRRRR!!!
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
le grumpy
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
9:45pm
Just finished reading a very long essay by Jose Acosta se llama "La historia moral y natural de los indios" para mi clase ensayistico de la cultura latinoamericana. Tengo que funcionar como un lider de discusion en este ensayo por el proximo... ya en esta primera semana estoy preparando estas cosas tan grandes. Ay. Sorry... I've been hearing and seeing no language other than Spanish today. Obviously that is a lie, but the majority has been Spanish.
I keep feeling like I want to write these damn things and then starting them and finding nothing interesting to talk about. I don't feel like yammering on about how I was on campus all day or have been preparing lesson plans this evening. Bleh.
Went to the rec this am. I swam laps while John played on the elliptical. I am not a morning exerciser by any means but am trying to make the switch this semester for both John's and my sake. Swimming my body was just like, why aren't you still in bed? Where's the rest of my coffee? I want a cookie. I want a Pop-Tart, and I'm all like STFU!!!
Met my new students yesterday, seems OK. I feel like I have some crap to say about how things are going with 101 but since this is public, better not to. Sufficeth to say... things aren't quite right. Just gonna do my best and try to make it the best experience for the most people possible. Have 'em again tomorrow and am gonna teach a few things, discuss the syllabus, and give a quiz on it. Sounds bitchy but it'll a. use time, b. ensure the students are aware that they are responsible for following the damn thing.
Anyway, I guess since we're going to the rec again in the am and so far today I haven't done a damn thing just because I wanted to, I'm going to go play a little piano, stretch, and go to bed.
9:45pm
Just finished reading a very long essay by Jose Acosta se llama "La historia moral y natural de los indios" para mi clase ensayistico de la cultura latinoamericana. Tengo que funcionar como un lider de discusion en este ensayo por el proximo... ya en esta primera semana estoy preparando estas cosas tan grandes. Ay. Sorry... I've been hearing and seeing no language other than Spanish today. Obviously that is a lie, but the majority has been Spanish.
I keep feeling like I want to write these damn things and then starting them and finding nothing interesting to talk about. I don't feel like yammering on about how I was on campus all day or have been preparing lesson plans this evening. Bleh.
Went to the rec this am. I swam laps while John played on the elliptical. I am not a morning exerciser by any means but am trying to make the switch this semester for both John's and my sake. Swimming my body was just like, why aren't you still in bed? Where's the rest of my coffee? I want a cookie. I want a Pop-Tart, and I'm all like STFU!!!
Met my new students yesterday, seems OK. I feel like I have some crap to say about how things are going with 101 but since this is public, better not to. Sufficeth to say... things aren't quite right. Just gonna do my best and try to make it the best experience for the most people possible. Have 'em again tomorrow and am gonna teach a few things, discuss the syllabus, and give a quiz on it. Sounds bitchy but it'll a. use time, b. ensure the students are aware that they are responsible for following the damn thing.
Anyway, I guess since we're going to the rec again in the am and so far today I haven't done a damn thing just because I wanted to, I'm going to go play a little piano, stretch, and go to bed.
Sunday, January 9, 2011
Watching Desperate
Watching "Desperate Housewives" here on the futon with Carly at the moment. We TAs had our preliminary meeting for the semester today. I don't want to go on too much in public forum, but I am nervous. Things are much less organized this semester, so lucky I have a semester under my belt now. In spite of myself, I'm a little excited to meet my new classes of students. I want to make it a positive experience for the people in my class... if I could figure out what was going on with the textbook, that would be easier to do. My biggest fear is that this thing isn't going to get off the ground, and it's going to be on me.
John and I went to the Rec earlier today, ran into a fellow Zumba instructor. We chatted for a few, and it was nice to catch up. John worked out on the elliptical. I ran a few miles on the treadmill and did some lower body and ab work while he was finishing up.
Yesterday he and I went up to Cooper's Rock and hiked for about an hour through the snow-covered mountains. It was gorgeous and serene. If it wasn't for the cold, I could have stayed out there indefinitely.
Dinner at Olive Garden last night with John and Joe. Ran into a girl I went to high school with and did theatre with as a kid. She's teaching 9th and 10th English now. I guess we're to that age now, lol.
John and I went to the Rec earlier today, ran into a fellow Zumba instructor. We chatted for a few, and it was nice to catch up. John worked out on the elliptical. I ran a few miles on the treadmill and did some lower body and ab work while he was finishing up.
Yesterday he and I went up to Cooper's Rock and hiked for about an hour through the snow-covered mountains. It was gorgeous and serene. If it wasn't for the cold, I could have stayed out there indefinitely.
Dinner at Olive Garden last night with John and Joe. Ran into a girl I went to high school with and did theatre with as a kid. She's teaching 9th and 10th English now. I guess we're to that age now, lol.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Last few days
Friday, January 7, 2010
1:34pm
I am being so exceptionally lazy today. I am still in my pajamas, John's robe over top, drinking chai. But I gotta soak it up now, because in just two days, my semester starts again with a Sunday night meeting of the Spanish TA's.
Wed. I didn't write because I didn't do much. I cleaned house for about five hours, cooked for two, and did TaeBo. Anyway, the trailer's clean now. Very, very clean.
Yesterday I started off reading one of the essays for the culture class I have next semester. The reading isn't due finished until January 24, but I figured I'd get a head start because for one thing, I should read everything twice being in Spanish, and, also, I can only sit still with nothing to do over break for so long. Right now, I'm very much at my own, relaxed pace. Hopefully, by reading ahead, I can maintain that moreso throughout the semester. I would really love to still be cooking, playing piano, my drum, drawing, and sipping chai in pajamas once the semester starts rolling.
In a way, I am glad for the new semester. As I've said several times, last semester was just rough. So much to deal with in such a compressed time frame. Going in this time, I am less nervous. I know the department, the expected standards. I am more interested in the course material this time around, too. I am going to have to get used to a new text book really quickly, but at least I now trust myself in front of an academic classroom. I can teach Spanish. I was nervous the first time, maybe more than I realized, not shy, but just untrusting in my ability to really do it well. So going in this time, I'm fine with it. Things are also a lot less cluttered in other areas of my life. I've been doing a lot of mental clearing out, which has helped with things internally, but also, things have calmed down a lot externally. I hope it continues in just such a way, but even if the external changes, I think I've gotten back in touch enough with myself that I can still maintain a moderate internal climate.
John and I went down to Brew Pub last night, met Tiffany and Jim, a couple other people in the geology department. I had my first PBR in a few years and a couple Red Stripes. We had an OK time. I like to be out and have a few beers and just relax, but I wish we could talk about something other than geology and the goings on of the geology department. It's to be expected, of course, but I get bored.
This morning I got up about 9:30, whined until John got out of bed and made some coffee (he was already awake, had to go to the office, so I wasn't being mean), had some cereal with John, and then I started cooking. I cut up a three pound chuck roast and threw it in the crock pot with some water, beef bullion, and onion slices. That's been in for three hours now, so we're getting there. I also fried up some chicken breast in small pieces for our pitas. John and I are both trying to eat better this semester. Last semester I was eating all kinds of bullshit all the time- pizza, burger after burger... that's fine in moderation, but I just got overwhelmed with scheduling, and honestly just some emotional stuff too that left me too tired to care about cooking. I really do like to cook, surprisingly, and by cooking at home we save money and get better nutrition. I intend to be overall less strung out and helpless with myself this semester.
I watched "Wife Swap" while eating a pita and having some V8, had some chai, and played piano. No one's here, so I sang loudly. I love to sing... the vibration in my chest and the noise escaping the body has always been so calming and connecting for me.
I think I'm going to head to the Rec now for a swim. I was going to go to the Rec with John later, but Joe's joining us for dinner after he gets done teaching at 5:30, so the timing won't work out. John won't care anyway, so he can just go do his thing and I can do mine. He's been doing really well with his exercise- four days in a row now. I'm proud of him. It is important to make that commitment to your own health.
It's not even all about longevity. It makes every day better. If I had to wake up and be sick every day, I'd rather just not wake up. I'm under no delusions of immortality or perfect health if I exercise and eat right, but I do know that it contributes to better energy levels and feelings of wellness every single day. And since every day counts in my book, that's worth it in and of itself.
1:34pm
I am being so exceptionally lazy today. I am still in my pajamas, John's robe over top, drinking chai. But I gotta soak it up now, because in just two days, my semester starts again with a Sunday night meeting of the Spanish TA's.
Wed. I didn't write because I didn't do much. I cleaned house for about five hours, cooked for two, and did TaeBo. Anyway, the trailer's clean now. Very, very clean.
Yesterday I started off reading one of the essays for the culture class I have next semester. The reading isn't due finished until January 24, but I figured I'd get a head start because for one thing, I should read everything twice being in Spanish, and, also, I can only sit still with nothing to do over break for so long. Right now, I'm very much at my own, relaxed pace. Hopefully, by reading ahead, I can maintain that moreso throughout the semester. I would really love to still be cooking, playing piano, my drum, drawing, and sipping chai in pajamas once the semester starts rolling.
In a way, I am glad for the new semester. As I've said several times, last semester was just rough. So much to deal with in such a compressed time frame. Going in this time, I am less nervous. I know the department, the expected standards. I am more interested in the course material this time around, too. I am going to have to get used to a new text book really quickly, but at least I now trust myself in front of an academic classroom. I can teach Spanish. I was nervous the first time, maybe more than I realized, not shy, but just untrusting in my ability to really do it well. So going in this time, I'm fine with it. Things are also a lot less cluttered in other areas of my life. I've been doing a lot of mental clearing out, which has helped with things internally, but also, things have calmed down a lot externally. I hope it continues in just such a way, but even if the external changes, I think I've gotten back in touch enough with myself that I can still maintain a moderate internal climate.
John and I went down to Brew Pub last night, met Tiffany and Jim, a couple other people in the geology department. I had my first PBR in a few years and a couple Red Stripes. We had an OK time. I like to be out and have a few beers and just relax, but I wish we could talk about something other than geology and the goings on of the geology department. It's to be expected, of course, but I get bored.
This morning I got up about 9:30, whined until John got out of bed and made some coffee (he was already awake, had to go to the office, so I wasn't being mean), had some cereal with John, and then I started cooking. I cut up a three pound chuck roast and threw it in the crock pot with some water, beef bullion, and onion slices. That's been in for three hours now, so we're getting there. I also fried up some chicken breast in small pieces for our pitas. John and I are both trying to eat better this semester. Last semester I was eating all kinds of bullshit all the time- pizza, burger after burger... that's fine in moderation, but I just got overwhelmed with scheduling, and honestly just some emotional stuff too that left me too tired to care about cooking. I really do like to cook, surprisingly, and by cooking at home we save money and get better nutrition. I intend to be overall less strung out and helpless with myself this semester.
I watched "Wife Swap" while eating a pita and having some V8, had some chai, and played piano. No one's here, so I sang loudly. I love to sing... the vibration in my chest and the noise escaping the body has always been so calming and connecting for me.
I think I'm going to head to the Rec now for a swim. I was going to go to the Rec with John later, but Joe's joining us for dinner after he gets done teaching at 5:30, so the timing won't work out. John won't care anyway, so he can just go do his thing and I can do mine. He's been doing really well with his exercise- four days in a row now. I'm proud of him. It is important to make that commitment to your own health.
It's not even all about longevity. It makes every day better. If I had to wake up and be sick every day, I'd rather just not wake up. I'm under no delusions of immortality or perfect health if I exercise and eat right, but I do know that it contributes to better energy levels and feelings of wellness every single day. And since every day counts in my book, that's worth it in and of itself.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)