Cold, Lost, Scared, but not Alone

Finals week. Cliche of the century.

Wow, that's rather epic. The whole century has nothing on finals week. . . therefor I too must write about it.

Finals week is something akin (I would imagine) to crawling inside a very small, tightly packed igloo. Not the big awesome kind real Eskimos make, with chimney's and firepits. . .no. The kind you make as a kid that's just a bunch of ice packed together, threatening to fall on you and retaining no warmth whatsoever. Upon crawling into this igloo, you realize you have no room to move, turn around, or even sleep. Also, you've left all your victuals about a mile back, you've forgotten your own name, you don't remember ever having friends, and (just before depression and madness sets in) a heavy iron gate falls and closes behind you, locking you there for a full five days. Have fun kids.

You think that's all, you think it's the pit, the bottom of the bottom. . . but no. It's then that the igloo expands, just big enough to allow a huge black dragon to appear. One who demands knowledge out of you, demands to know random bits of information that have never proven useful before and will never prove useful ever again. What's this?! You beat your fists into the ground. This simply isn't right! No ones ever taught you anything about the significance of the cranial capacity of homo erectus versus homo sapien, or the occipital bun of ancient beings! No one said what in the world Ologesailie is! How can the dragon demand this of you? But demand it he does, with thick stench rolling up his throat, over his hot tongue, between his slime-dripping teeth and straight into your panicked face. What to do, what to do?!

Lay down and cry. That's about all you got now.

See you on the other side beauties,

Yours Truly

L'essence . . .

Doesn't that look pretty? And isn't that such a fancy French word?

It means gasoline.

You, my dearest reader ( I am convinced there will be at least one of you) are now involved in a very common, but fascinating incident. The 'Procrastination of Super Important Things' incident. I have a huge test tomorrow, and I'm only hurting myself by not shoving my nose in-between the glossy, smelly, marked up textbook pages. . . but making a grilled Apple-Brie sandwich seemed so much more beneficial at the time.

Sleep sounds pretty nice too.

But passing that exam? Priceless.

What's the point here? There is none.

Someday I'll write an anthropological-esque entry on what I've observed during the day, focusing on the behavioral habits and adaptations of traditional middle-class college students in middle America and it's effects on the psyche of the subject and the culture of the surrounding area.

Until then. . .

Amy

Knit Your Ribs

Yet again, ballet class teaches me more about living than anything else in my limited world.

In our first cold, fall morning ballet class of the season (just a note, ones body behaves like an entirely different animal when it's cold) our ballet instructor was seething frustration. Her tone was sharp and short, her instructions concise and clear. She did not repeat, she did not take questions, she did not look you in the eye. She commanded, you danced. Which was perfectly fine by me, as I prefer to move through a silent class anyways. Only half an hour into the class, she stops the music and begins correcting people, the same old corrections over and over again; "Jane, plie."

"Amy, knit your ribs."

"Marielle, you're back. Come forward."

"Anna, heels down heels down heels down!"

She finally stopped and looked us, "I know you've had eighteen-plus years of the wrong training. I know you danced for people who didn't care and let you get away with things like this, I'm trying to fix you. If we don't get this fixed, you'll get injured. I'm not yelling at you, I'm helping you because I actually give a care."

Well. . . in so many words.

As I stood facing the mirror, trying over and over again to bring my ribs together, it struck me. . . that's life. We have to forget our past, our years of 'the wrong training'. You simply can't hold onto things for too long or you'll get hurt. Okay, so you made a mistake. You messed up big time, but you can't let it define you. You can't let it worm it's way into your psyche, tint the mirror you see yourself in, become central to your definition. I can't keep thinking of myself as 'the dancer who's always leaning backwards'. Even when you recognize that it's a problem, if it becomes part of your definition you'll never fix the problem. You'll just focus on it, make it bigger.

In life, you have to forget where you came from, clear things out, start again. Start again, how beautiful is that? Okay, so the past is haunting you. It's dug it's way into who you are and now you feel like it's all you'll ever be. But listen, you simply will get hurt if you stay that way. Listen to the corrections you're given, be brave enough to face up to a critical eye, and have the courage to move on. God is going to ask you to face up to the sickly patterns in your life, He is going to ask it of you over and over again. He'll go deeper and demand more than you think is reasonable or necessary, God will push you past limits you only thought you had. But don't give up, listen. He isn't picking on you, He isn't hating you or condemning you for your wrongs; He is fixing you because He loves more than anyone. God loves you too much to let you keep dancing that way, He knows it'll get you injured and out of the game.

So chin up friends, this is something you absolutely can do.

Love!

Amy

(PS, knit your ribs child.)

Existentialism

I'm blogging just because I want to. Because I feel like it. In reality, I don't have much to say.

I guess I could comment on the severely blustery day, which I enjoy so much (there is something about strong wind resistance that makes me smile).

I could note that the bird I'm sitting next to is just staring me down and screeching, and has been for the past hour. I hardly hear him anymore.

Perhaps you'd rather read about how there are two-three men in my apartment, tearing down a wall in my bathroom. A wall they discovered wasn't mounted to anything, and was held in place by a single screw at the top of the wall. Against code? I think so.

Another possibility would be my telling you that I had 4 shots of espresso earlier, so I'm extra chatty and feel a little bit in love with everyone I see (a common side-effect, not dangerous, but if feelings continue longer than 24hours, contact a Dr)

Maybe you'd rather read all of the interesting information I learned today about baboon lifestyles and development? They aren't as violent as you'd think.

As fascinated as I'm sure you are with all of this information, I think I'll settle on simply sharing this photo with you. Enjoy.

Yours Truly

Much Like Edison . . .

My list of bad ideas just keep on growing. Like my mentor in failed attempts, I'm trying to view each poor decision as a lesson learned, another way I now know that will not make a lightbulb light. What's the use of this knowledge you ask? Why, take the following example, and be shamed in your critiques;

You are on a walk, and you come to a fork in the road. One way is clear, with green mossy trees, the occasionally whistling bird, a fluffy deer romping around, and a sun dappled pathway on which to walk. This path also, very conveniently, has a sign that lists it's possible ends. They read, "Wisdom, happiness, joy, peace, fun, good times, lollipops, soda pop, etc."

Beneath the sign is a list of contacts and testimonies of people who have gone before. There is a couple on the path ahead of you, proclaiming it's joy to you as they take cushioned steps forward.

The other option is not so much of a path it all. In fact, it looks more like some trampled grass caused by an inebriated traveler one day who stumbled off only to wind up lost and attacked by vicious mythical creatures. The sun does not shine here, there are thorns and brambles (big ones), dead frogs, and pages of ripped up, stained warnings that scream "avoid this path at all costs". And occasionally the distant scream of someone in pain.

Obviously, you are at a loss. What to do? What to do? You call me of course, and ask what's down that dark twisty path. Because I, obviously, have already been there, and give you some much needed counsel in the area.

In the long awaited conclusion, this knowledge is basically useless for anything except warnings against rather obvious odds.

As I fight my way back to the bright sunny path, I'll leave you with this word of advice:

So no matter how cute the rum-running Italian is, don't let him do you any favors.

Though the man driving the car says the puppy is super nice, don't get in.

Obviously, accept no candy from strangers.

Please just say no to the free drink from the shady man outside the bar

When in doubt, think again.

Right turn lanes are, indeed, meant for turning right.

It might seem like a good idea at the time, but sharpie on your face never is.

Think about how tight that cord is tied before you bun-jee off this bridge.

Ink stains. Plain and simple.

No matter how angry you are, it's never a good idea to beat up that car.

Going around in circles wastes gas and time, ask for directions

Mean people happen, you might be one of them.

Everything has consequences...SO. . .

Do your homework. You won't regret it.

Yours with many words,

Amy

Experiment in Pure Poetry

I will love you when you're blue

So what am I to you?

It never rains when you want it to

So, please forgive me.

She's got your eyes,

I see you all the time.

what do you say,

when it's all gone away?

I don't miss you at all.

I don't think of your smile.

I see conclusion

in all this confusion

But I don't care,

I want you to stay.

Lead me outside,

above ground.

I'll be with you someday.

Forgive me pretty baby,

I always take the long way home.

I can't hold on very long.

Got a head full of lightening,

a head full of rain.

just creepin' in.

Hot like to burn my lips

In the morning, baby in the afternoon

funny how my favorite shirt

smells more like you than me

current's strong from what I've heard

so my toes just touch the water

I thought this time that it may be true

walked a mile just to find the edge

now I'm here and I can begin to move

looks like morning in your eyes

but the clocks held 9:15, full house

the afternoon's already come and gone

suprise suprise, couldn't find it in your eyes

moving so fast, going nowhere

Tell me, how does it feel?

To be so high, looking down here?

Is it lonely?

He was only your fool for a while

Now he's gone back home, and left you wanderin' there

The prettiest thing I ever did see,

Is lightening from the top of the clouds.

Looks like home to me.

Lately I just haven't been myself at all,

But now I'm dreamin again,

Like I've always been.

I just want to hear those sweet words

So, I am experimenting here. We connect with music because of the vibe, and the lyrics right? It matches us, or inspires us. So, I'm choosing random albums that fit my mood at the time, putting them on shuffle, and clicking through them writing down the lyrics that stick out to me in each song. It's creating some potent poems. Try it, and let me know what happens. This post is from Norah Jones, Feels Like Home.

Amy

Is Your World Spinning?

4:45am - alarm goes off in a delightful thought-blocking sort of screech at ascending levels of volume. Snooze.

4:51am - alarm goes off again

4:58am- and again. Why did I choose seven minutes? It should be thirty

5:o5 am- once more

5:12am - okay, just seven more minutes

5:19am - I guess there's really no reason to look too cute at work . . . seven more minutes

5:26am - If I don't get up now, I won't get up at all. Then I'll be fired.

5:28am - sit up, dart out of bed before it can pull me back into it's deceitfully comfortable and comforting arms of slumber

5:29am- hit the doorway on the way to the bathroom (one of these day's I'll remember it's there)

5:40am - changed, hair messily pulled back, dark circles covered (for the most part)smelling like perfume, peaches, and the faint aroma of pillow, earrings in, shoes on, out the door.

5:45-12:30pm- serving coffee (staring at each cup wistfully as it passes from my needy hands into the equally needy grasp of another. Darn the lack of time for a sit-down and a scone). At some point, I down a shot of espresso (or perhaps put a cup of coffee in the back, which I'll manage to sip a few times before the days over).

12:35pm- leave work, dreaming and longing for that beautiful nap before me

12:45pm- too hungry to sleep. I'll make a quick lunch and go to bed.

1:45pm - food gives you energy, dang it

2:00-6:00pm- Stupid nap-stealing busywork like; paying bills, calling old friends, cleaning, moving, figuring out a place to stay, etc.

6:00pm-dinner and various obligations to social groups/networks/individuals

9:00pm- I can finally sleep!

9:01pm- freaking second wind

9:01am-11:00pm- stare at ceiling, desperate for sleeping

11:00pm-12:00am- . . . I think this is sleeping.

12:00am-4:44am- okay, this is definitely sleeping.

4:45am- alarm.

Coffee is no stand in, nor is youth; self-induced insomnia will drive you mad. My friends, we must take back what is ours. We must take back the right to rest, to function, to think, to dream. We must take back nap time. Join me, together we'll restore sanity to our towns, our country, our world. Hey, if we all do it, whose gonna stop us?

Pillow please,

Amy

Take Off

The central past is asymmetrical in comparison with the proposed future.

However, pursuit of the abstract status in said situation is not without it's merits, and can be expected to be rewarding in the end.

This also, though, brings to question the concept of an 'end'. As many are deceived, and yet all really are aware, there is only one 'end' and it is not yet here. Even that end though, is the gateway into a beginning. But at some point it all moves on, and one things transforms into another, so that in many years, or in many emotional steps taken, the existence of such a thing is confined to the past, to a memory. In that way it is still real, though not really ended, but no longer immediately affecting the mind and being of the person who dealt with it.

To be sure, life is a pattern of things repeated intwining with new experiences. Unique to the individual, familiar to the whole.

In this we find the stars, distant beings that bear a very near witness to our history. In this we find the earth below us, a constant in a consistent, though every changing, earth. In between we find humanity, struggling to reach up, to understand below, and to find the truth in a haze of lies.

In love there is heartbreak, there is pain, suffering, bleeding. In love there is goodness, ultimate goodness, ultimate joy.

The furies of the mind are nothing to themselves, they are often the only company we keep. In great company, they are ignored, silenced.

We find the great axis of the life turning on this one point, this one picture. And yet it is undeniably impossible to comprehend. To even see.

So the questions all have answers; and yet if one can not understand the answer given, the question becomes wether or not it was worth asking. We have found that it is.

Equations of metaphysics hold no solid truth, and yet somewhere in us we are aware of what that truth is. Though knowing nothing but darkness, the concept of light is all the proof we need.

Circles are perfect as far as numbers can say, however it holds nothing against the past, present, or future.

And yet it tells us all we need to know.

In conclusion:

breakfast is the most important meal of the day.

This is What I Think of You

Just sayin'.

With love,

Amy

The Way Things Are

Dear,

Perhaps I am just a cynic, but I find no use in writing about changing the world when it is constantly changing itself.

Today I, yet again, served coffee to a hundred or two people; most of them bleary eyed and unaware of the fact that their shirts are on backwards and they are still in pajama bottoms. But these are the people I have come to love. It's funny to me my dear, how the character of a person shines (or dies) in the simple interaction of ordering a drink. There is one man, Dry Cappuccino, who has treated me with the social calling of detached politeness for the past ten months. That is, until he learned about my trip to England; after that, well, he brightened up to tell me all about his years spent in some of the same cities I went to. Sometimes people just need some common factor to bridge the gap.

Another customer, Double French Roast, asks me my name every time he orders a drink from me. He gives me a hard time because I nearly always hand him his receipt (and he doesn't want it); I just do my best to stop myself from writing my name is big black sharpie on his receipt and pinning it to his well pressed button-up. But it's okay, Double French Roast's mind is elsewhere. . . apparently all the time. I can not decide if I want to laugh, or be offended for women everywhere, when he leans across the counter and, in a hushed voice, asks me to make his wife's drink as low-calorie as possible. She usually returns it minutes after he hands it to her, asking for the real thing.

Other customers never take their eyes off their cell phones to meet mine while they order. But it doesn't bother me, we don't have to have a relationship. They just want their coffee, and there is nothing wrong with that.

But my dear, I've come to terms with this one fact; wether or not these people want it, or realize it, I am in their lives. Sometimes all a person needs is a genuine smile from someone to get through their day.

So, I'm trying to be that person. I'm trying to see the people in my life that I would normally skim over; even if they are just people I pass on my way to class everyday.

Also, I've become a fan of strawberry smoothies.

Yours Truly

Planes, Trains, and Delays

Oi with the poodles already.

Today has been another fabulous day of England. Though rather than sight-seeing, we were rushing blindly through the day hoping and praying our legs could carry us as fast as need be to make our train. Well, trains. And then buses, and then more trains. All of them sadistically scheduled with no time in between. Darn these Brits.

So, with a backpack, a purse, a large sack of tea, and a suitcase weighing the same as a grown person I set off in hot pursuit of my travel-guide and dear friend. A dear friend whom was herself dragging two suitcases (her's had wheels though, dang it) and a backpack behind her. A dear friend who was deathly worried about missing her train. A dear friend who has spent far more time running after trains than I have, and who therefor traveled a good twenty paces ahead of me the entire day.

Needless to say, people on trains don't like getting knocked in the head with large suitcases. Nor do they like when you stop in the isle for minutes to lift said large suitcase overhead. However, they do feel a sort of pity towards a girl whose blinking her eyelashes and pointing helplessly at her bent up train ticket. That's when they let you through the gate anyways, and forgive all the mess you made. Thank the Lord for that.

Obvious lesson of the day? Well, there are two.

Number 1 - Sore muscles, aching feet, tired back, and an exhausted mind are totally worth it when you reach your destination (as long as that destination includes a couch and cold drink).

Number 2- Train delays happen. Make sure you've got you've got a great friend sitting next to you when it does.

Airplanes and Sunshine

Let it be said that one of the most startling things is to wake up, turn to your side, and get an eyeful of the blue, blue ocean a thousand miles below you. And then, blinking in that blinding sunlight, there is another moment of startle when one looks at the clock to see it's only 1:00am. After all, the sun does indeed shine when it's early. . . go figure. Time change is a necessarily confusing thing, one that kept me traveling for a full 24 hours straight. The St. Paul airport started to feel like home after a while.

And this is the abrupt ending.

The Chasm

Hello vacant and distracted space we call the internet! I am here to fling my thoughts and words at you and watch as they fall down, down, down this cyber tunnel and bounce off your arithmetically molded walls in an endless display. If you, my dear reader, wish to jump on in after them, well then, please do.

Tonight, I will not sleep. That is because tomorrow I will board an airplane (four books and two ipods for company) and begin my small adventure in this foreign land they call 'England'. I feel rather unequipped for international travel, as my skills in other languages restrict me to such things as, "Hello. Where is the coffee?" in French, "bathroom/why" in Spanish, and "I'm cold" in largely unspoken Irish Gaelic. These are obviously the only things you'll need to know so what's to worry about?- you might ask. I'll tell you what's to worry about, it's a worry that I don't speak a lick of British. Here's to hoping I get seated next to a Frenchman of Spanish origins who's willing to teach me British.

Until I have more intelligent and lofty ideals to fling your way, I'm ending this post. Enjoy your evening readers that may or may not exist.