New Goals

To go from this:

Or this:


To this:

To remember the beauty of place:

And moments:

To slow down. To breathe. To focus on what and why and how. To keep the details of school and life and choices from crushing me. To recognize hope. To ponder. To pray. To trust.

Oh, and just because all of these pictures are from the recent trip to California, I have to add one more. To always, always respect and honor this:

Woosh

I don't know what it is about the ocean that is so calming. The wind, the waves, the water. The sense of continuity, of eternity. The constant goings-in and goings-out. The feeling of endless possibilities that comes with gazing towards the open sea. The feeling of comfort and safety that comes with the routine of the tide. Contradictions within a comfortable setting. I want to be the ocean.

Sleepy

Guess who's back. Back again.

It's me. I'm back from sunny California. It was an epic and interesting adventure. I'm pretty excited to return to my bed. It's a place of magic and wonder and sleepiness.

Imma gonna talk about my trip tomorrow. Be excited. Be very excited. Be so excited you will pee yourself. PS, Lauren is dictating right now. Continue Lauren. She started out as reading, but soon her brilliant ideas just made their way on to the page. More thoughts from Lauren should be on this blog. Considering Lauren doesn't post on her own blog. Dangit, spell my name right. So yeah, Lauren's awesome. And pretty much the best roommate I've ever had. Make me a sandwich and go to bed. OBEY MY COMMANDS.

Half done Lauren. Half done indeed. The going to bed part. HAHA, SUCKER.

Uh-oh. She knows where I sleep at night.

Sleep afraid. Sleep very afraid. And dream about how your spelling has deteriorated.

The End.

Check-in

Well, there goes the blogging every day in March. It's a little difficult when you're staying at a place with no internet.

So here I am, in California, holed up in Starbucks with a raspberry hot chocolate and my computer.

I'm having a really, really good time.

Yesterday I saw a lot of Rodin, including the original Thinking Man. It pleased me greatly. I also pondered on the manner of going home, of visiting places without regressing to the person you used to be there.

It's interesting.

I like California so far.

I bet I'll like it even better tomorrow. MAGIC MOUNTAIN, Y'ALL.

Guess What?

In seven hours, I'm leaving for sunny California.

Gear up the Zeppelin and the Mamas and the Papas*, cause here I come.

True, I might have killed myself working round the clock this week, getting stuff done days ahead of time so I could go. But worth it? You betcha.

I'm tired. But excited.

*"Going to California" and "California Dreamin'," respectively.

Procrastination

I don't want to write my "Inquiry Paper" (socially acceptable way to say research paper. Ha! I am not so easily fooled).

I love my topic. I love it so much I am nigh unto obsessed with it. Using TV and movies in the classroom? Sign me up! The research process has rocked. If I could do nothing but sit and read articles about television, I would be the happiest girl in the whole wide world. All my findings have organized themselves neatly into a cohesive paper, with my outline practically writing itself and just waiting to burst from my typing fingers. And I'm oh-so-very eager and excited to share my findings and rub the glory of pop culture into snobby elitist faces.

The world of academia, actually, the world in general, never really progresses past playground fights, does it?

Anyway, this paper should be the easiest thing I've written in my college career. Yet here I sit, swigging from a two-liter of Cherry Coke and whining about how I don't wanna do it.

Oh, and procrastinating by salivating over things at outofprintclothing.com. I want them all!

Here are the best, with the selection based less on appearance (though that's a factor) and more on what books I've read. I don't believe in false advertising, and I will not wear a shirt of something I don't support.

This is my favorite, the one I dream about at night:


These are all equally delightful, and I want them:






Out of the those, I'd have to say my top three shirts are Fahrenheit 451, The Song of Solomon, and The Lord of the Flies (or To Kill a Mockingbird). Fitting, since those are a few of my favorite books.

I should really just write a hierarchy of my preference in literary shirts. Can I get a Nerd Alert?

The Loneliest Thing in the World...

... is a single person riding a tandem bicycle. A.k.a. what I saw as I walked home. Poor guy. I felt so bad for him.

In happier news, I survived today! And you know why? Because of the Flaming Lips. That's right ladies and gentlemen, the Flaming Lips saved my life. Not only did they save my life, but they enriched it. I must have listened to "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Part 1" about six times in the past twelve hours. And I'm not ashamed to admit it. Come on! It's incredibly infectious music.

I think this comic from Questionable Content sums it up pretty well:


It's true! You just have to be happy when listening to the Flaming Lips.

To go on yet another small tangent, I had a throwback today. I had to complete a seventh grade writing assignment as if I were a seventh grader. In reality, I completed it like I was a fifth or sixth grader, but I think it evened out, as I was an incredibly advanced writer. Of course. Smarmy smarmy smarmy.

But honestly, it was fun to remember those days. Back then, I was destined to be an author. Writing was my passion, and I thought I was the bee's knees. But my stories were riddled with cliches and crutches. They all involved two girls as the main characters, and their names always started with 'K' and 'C', because my name started with 'C' and my best friend's name started with 'K'. One girl (me) was always a sassy tomboy, and the other would be nervous and shy. And I swear, every story alluded to the main character having a crush on a boy whose name started with 'M' and who played soccer.

Man I was subtle as a kid.

It was fun to relive those days. To turn off my brain and just write as over-the-top and exaggerated as I could. I had talent, I tell ya, pure talent! Or I just read way too much. Sigh. Those were the days.