Vassar is enormous. Not to mention enormously posh. I haven't seen a dorm room, of course (probably it would be cluttered as usual), but from the outside the buildings are ridiculously graceful & beautiful. The library is gorgeous inside, as well, and large enough to swallow my dormitory twice.
And the Alumnae House (don't look at me -- that's how they spell it!), where I'm staying, is all antique dark wood and brass. At the continental breakfast, they totally had custom-embellished plates that read "Alumnae House" with a little golden coat-of-arms thing and white tableclothes. The one other occupant of the dining room just left his dishes sit on the table and stalked out -- clearly someone in a black suit shouldn't be expected to walk slowly! -- leaving us in a quandary. What to do with our dishes? It feels so rude to just leave them on the table. In the end we put our things on a sideboard with some other random dishes. "Let's scarper," I told Greg after dropping yogurt on the lovely hardwood floor as I was taking my dishes over to what may or may not have been their proper spot. "Before anyone says, 'why the hell did you just put your dishes on the tupping sideboard?'"
Apparently elegance makes me want to sound British.
I keep remembering Jenn's all-purpose advice: "When in doubt, kick 'em in the nadgers and run away." Not exactly appropriate to dealing with librarians. So instead I'm trying to follow Sir Ian McKellan's advice about acting: I think to myself, "how would a Mackenzie act who researches like a grown-up and lives in elegance all the time?" and then I act like that person.
It's much like pretending I'm a punctual person. I thought the special collections opened at 9, so I showed up at 8:30 and sat around for a while. I found out at 9:30 that the reading room doesn't open until 10.
While waiting, I found myself in some sort of science section. So between "How to identify a snail" and "Octopus" by Wells (which for a brief moment made me think I was in a science fiction section -- it made me think of Cthulu), I chose to peruse "THE INSECTS: STRUCTURE AND FUNCTION" by R. F. Chapman. An imposing white tome with posh gold lettering, it informs me that "the tentorum consists of two anterior and two posterior apedemes which form the internal skeleton of the head serving as a brace for the head and for the attachment of muscles."
Fascinating.
Unable to actually understand a word of what that means, I amused myself with analyzing its punctuation. I really think it needed another comma.
"The Pylorus," I learn next, "is the first part of the hindgut and from it the Malphigian tubules often arise."
Truly, I had always wondered from whence those pesky tubules arose.
If I learn anything about Elizabeth Bishop, I'll let you know.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
"the dark book of the beginning"
My car WOULD choose the coldest days of the year to run out of antifreeze again. Katie said it was 15 degrees last night, and I believe her. It's the kind of weather when you walk outside and your hands instantly freeze. INSTANTLY. You walk inside 20 minutes later and realize you also can't feel your ears or nose.
At nearly 650 posts, it seems a shame to stop making blog posts now. I may put the blog into rehabilitation, though. Like a movie star. Except without drugs.
Maybe I'll do that thing where people post recipes. Greg and I have this thing called the Guide to Culinary Awesome. Mostly it's what happens when we modify recipes or fly by the seat of our pants and come up with something ridiculously awesome all on our own. Last night's adventure? Sword fish and rice!: Take 2 swordfish steaks of about 1/2 lb. each and brush with a white wine and olive oil mixture. Place in a baking pan of some kind. Cut up a tomato, some onion, and a lemon, and put all that stuff on top of the swordfish. Broil it for about half an hour, flipping the fish over halfway through (like any fish, you've just got to make sure that it's no longer clear in the center). Mmmm. . . . While that's broiling, make some rice. But add jasmine tea to the water when you're making it. It's delicious just like this, with a hint of jasmine flavor, but if you also sprinkle with lemon pepper to taste, it's UBER-AMAZING.
And that whole meal? Literally it took only 45 minutes from prep to ready meal. That's what I'm talkin' about! Someday we need to try that on a grill -- maybe having marinated the meat beforehand.
Dang, now I'm super hungry.
And super disappointed that J-term, with its opportunities to cook, is going to be over in such a short time. AAAGGGHHH! Where did that time GO?!
Ooh, check it out: my Jesus College blog contains new content. At the end is a funny vignette about me as a youngster.
Ooh, and I met with Professor Perrin today for breakfast -- so much fun! I love that woman. I love talking to her about anything and everything. She also made contact with a family I could live with this summer. Apparently an uber-amazing homeschool family, who would be interested in having me become a part of their lives. I'm kind of excited, actually. Very excited. I've just got to be a grown-up and contact them in a timely manner. We'll arrange to meet together and then re-evaluate whether we feel like we'd be a good fit for a couple months of co-habitation.
A few people actually really liked the Rilke poem I posted last time, so here's another one for your contemplation:
THE ANGELS
They all have tired mouths
and bright seamless souls.
And a longing (as for sin)
sometimes haunts their dream.
They are almost all alike;
in God's gardens they keep still,
like many, many intervals
in his might and melody.
Only when they spread their wings
are they wakers of a wind:
as if God with his broad sculptor-
hands leafed through the pages
in the dark book of the beginning.
At nearly 650 posts, it seems a shame to stop making blog posts now. I may put the blog into rehabilitation, though. Like a movie star. Except without drugs.
Maybe I'll do that thing where people post recipes. Greg and I have this thing called the Guide to Culinary Awesome. Mostly it's what happens when we modify recipes or fly by the seat of our pants and come up with something ridiculously awesome all on our own. Last night's adventure? Sword fish and rice!: Take 2 swordfish steaks of about 1/2 lb. each and brush with a white wine and olive oil mixture. Place in a baking pan of some kind. Cut up a tomato, some onion, and a lemon, and put all that stuff on top of the swordfish. Broil it for about half an hour, flipping the fish over halfway through (like any fish, you've just got to make sure that it's no longer clear in the center). Mmmm. . . . While that's broiling, make some rice. But add jasmine tea to the water when you're making it. It's delicious just like this, with a hint of jasmine flavor, but if you also sprinkle with lemon pepper to taste, it's UBER-AMAZING.
And that whole meal? Literally it took only 45 minutes from prep to ready meal. That's what I'm talkin' about! Someday we need to try that on a grill -- maybe having marinated the meat beforehand.
Dang, now I'm super hungry.
And super disappointed that J-term, with its opportunities to cook, is going to be over in such a short time. AAAGGGHHH! Where did that time GO?!
Ooh, check it out: my Jesus College blog contains new content. At the end is a funny vignette about me as a youngster.
Ooh, and I met with Professor Perrin today for breakfast -- so much fun! I love that woman. I love talking to her about anything and everything. She also made contact with a family I could live with this summer. Apparently an uber-amazing homeschool family, who would be interested in having me become a part of their lives. I'm kind of excited, actually. Very excited. I've just got to be a grown-up and contact them in a timely manner. We'll arrange to meet together and then re-evaluate whether we feel like we'd be a good fit for a couple months of co-habitation.
A few people actually really liked the Rilke poem I posted last time, so here's another one for your contemplation:
THE ANGELS
They all have tired mouths
and bright seamless souls.
And a longing (as for sin)
sometimes haunts their dream.
They are almost all alike;
in God's gardens they keep still,
like many, many intervals
in his might and melody.
Only when they spread their wings
are they wakers of a wind:
as if God with his broad sculptor-
hands leafed through the pages
in the dark book of the beginning.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
"i have woven a parachute out of everything broken"
The above quote comes from William Stafford, a poet, and is actually in reference to his own work. Thank you, Writer's Almanac, for bringing such lovely quotes to my attention. And such profound quotes. Who would not like to be able to say that they'd woven together the broken things and created something beautiful or something redemptive that might stop our fall?
I just looked out the window and realized that it's snowing. Snowing quite intensely, in fact. Winter has actually arrived?
These days, blogging makes me think: other people actually earn a living from this, or create beacons of creative amazing to broadcast to the world wide interwebs, express themselves beautifully, or seek some sort of self-actualized goal using their blog as accountability.
Maybe I should do more with my blog. But what? I can't post things that I'm writing, because that counts as publishing for all practical intents and purposes.
Nor can I post photography, because I don't currently have a digital camera.
So the answer is, I don't particularly have motivation to keep this blog going at the moment. I mean, it's a nice way to keep in touch with some of my friends and family, but does it really serve a purpose worth the effort?
Ideas? Anyone?
I just looked out the window and realized that it's snowing. Snowing quite intensely, in fact. Winter has actually arrived?
These days, blogging makes me think: other people actually earn a living from this, or create beacons of creative amazing to broadcast to the world wide interwebs, express themselves beautifully, or seek some sort of self-actualized goal using their blog as accountability.
Maybe I should do more with my blog. But what? I can't post things that I'm writing, because that counts as publishing for all practical intents and purposes.
Nor can I post photography, because I don't currently have a digital camera.
So the answer is, I don't particularly have motivation to keep this blog going at the moment. I mean, it's a nice way to keep in touch with some of my friends and family, but does it really serve a purpose worth the effort?
Ideas? Anyone?
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
"your hair was long when we first met"
I do love J-term.
Maybe I've said that already, a lot of times. But you know -- maybe it's bitter cold, and maybe the weather has been freakish this year, and maybe I feel like hibernating, but I still love J-term. I get up at a reasonable time of the morning, I work, I go to class, I work some more, I make and eat a leisurely dinner, I socialize, I do some homework, I go to sleep. It sounds so simple. I still spend 9 or 10 hours working a day. But work that I dislike is kept to a minimum, I'm much more focused, and all around much happier.
I feel like part of the reason I haven't been posting as much of actual note lately is because probably a good 50% of my social life involves Greg, and he doesn't like being mentioned in my blog. Nor do I want to be that girl, who talks about her boy all the time to the detriment of her communication with the rest of the world. I understand that the rest of the world is not as enthusiastic about him as I am, nor are they interested in my surprise at having dated him almost a year now. I also understand that the rest of the world is not enthused about the weird proofreading mistake I found the other day while I was at work, or about how much I love the smell of the pine wood I'm carving! In other words, my attempts to keep this from being simply navel gazing make me feel inadquate when I sit down to write! I feel so vehement about these points that I must utilize more exclamation points!
Although I did get this hilarious alumni announcement yesterday. It foretold the end of the world, that J.F.K. would come back as the antichrist, that the next pope would be a false prophet, and that Bush is apparently this rigteous man who will be taken out of the way as it is written in the end times. I laughed, and then I was disturbed. Very disturbed.
I leave you with a Rilke poem which I utterly adore. My new theory is that when Rilke says "a word that grows ripe in silence" (a concept he utilizes frequently), he has a very specific word in mind. As for what that word is -- well, that's part of the mystery, I suppose. But I think, at least in his divine poems, it has something to do with love.
ENTRANCE
Whoever you are: in the evening step out
of your room, where you know everything;
yours is the last house before the far-off:
whoever you are.
With your eyes, which in their weariness
barely free themselves from the worn-out threshold,
you lift very slowly one black tree
and place it against the sky: slender, alone.
And you have made the world. And it is huge
and like a word which grows ripe in silence.
And as your will seizes on its meaning,
tenderly your eyes let it go. . .
Maybe I've said that already, a lot of times. But you know -- maybe it's bitter cold, and maybe the weather has been freakish this year, and maybe I feel like hibernating, but I still love J-term. I get up at a reasonable time of the morning, I work, I go to class, I work some more, I make and eat a leisurely dinner, I socialize, I do some homework, I go to sleep. It sounds so simple. I still spend 9 or 10 hours working a day. But work that I dislike is kept to a minimum, I'm much more focused, and all around much happier.
I feel like part of the reason I haven't been posting as much of actual note lately is because probably a good 50% of my social life involves Greg, and he doesn't like being mentioned in my blog. Nor do I want to be that girl, who talks about her boy all the time to the detriment of her communication with the rest of the world. I understand that the rest of the world is not as enthusiastic about him as I am, nor are they interested in my surprise at having dated him almost a year now. I also understand that the rest of the world is not enthused about the weird proofreading mistake I found the other day while I was at work, or about how much I love the smell of the pine wood I'm carving! In other words, my attempts to keep this from being simply navel gazing make me feel inadquate when I sit down to write! I feel so vehement about these points that I must utilize more exclamation points!
Although I did get this hilarious alumni announcement yesterday. It foretold the end of the world, that J.F.K. would come back as the antichrist, that the next pope would be a false prophet, and that Bush is apparently this rigteous man who will be taken out of the way as it is written in the end times. I laughed, and then I was disturbed. Very disturbed.
I leave you with a Rilke poem which I utterly adore. My new theory is that when Rilke says "a word that grows ripe in silence" (a concept he utilizes frequently), he has a very specific word in mind. As for what that word is -- well, that's part of the mystery, I suppose. But I think, at least in his divine poems, it has something to do with love.
ENTRANCE
Whoever you are: in the evening step out
of your room, where you know everything;
yours is the last house before the far-off:
whoever you are.
With your eyes, which in their weariness
barely free themselves from the worn-out threshold,
you lift very slowly one black tree
and place it against the sky: slender, alone.
And you have made the world. And it is huge
and like a word which grows ripe in silence.
And as your will seizes on its meaning,
tenderly your eyes let it go. . .
Sunday, January 13, 2008
with gladness and singleness of heart
Today I talked to Maria Louisa!
And then I cried a lot.
Nobody ever told me that studying abroad would change your life in terms of splitting you into pieces -- one with every person you came to love while you lived in a foreign place, and one piece with the place itself and every familiar bit of the walk along the cliff. Mostly they emphasized the traditional benefits like, education in the wide world, broadening your horizons.
I don't want to be that person that talks about their study abroad experience all the time, but I guess I sort of am.
Dr. Skills is coming to visit this Thursday, and that makes me glad -- we'll have lunch with him. Maybe I've got all my crying out of the way right now so that can be a joyous meeting.
I don't think I came back from Orvieto any more certain or grown-up or grounded. I just feel like I can't handle making decisions about people.
But maybe that's what grown-ups feel like all the time.
And then I cried a lot.
Nobody ever told me that studying abroad would change your life in terms of splitting you into pieces -- one with every person you came to love while you lived in a foreign place, and one piece with the place itself and every familiar bit of the walk along the cliff. Mostly they emphasized the traditional benefits like, education in the wide world, broadening your horizons.
I don't want to be that person that talks about their study abroad experience all the time, but I guess I sort of am.
Dr. Skills is coming to visit this Thursday, and that makes me glad -- we'll have lunch with him. Maybe I've got all my crying out of the way right now so that can be a joyous meeting.
I don't think I came back from Orvieto any more certain or grown-up or grounded. I just feel like I can't handle making decisions about people.
But maybe that's what grown-ups feel like all the time.
Friday, January 11, 2008
"still it would be marvelous to terrify a law clerk with a cut lily."
I found that part of a poem by Pablo Neruda and fell instantly in love. Not with the rest of the poem, but solely with that line. It would be marvelous, Pablo, it would.
Andrew has started posting on his blog again! Imagine! I'm in awe of his witty randomness. I chuckle madly at his writing, even if I'm accidentally at work. (Accidentally!)
Today I feel good at my job. That makes me pretty happy. I'm not, like, wildly proficient, but I'm doin' alright. I called someone out of the blue and interviewed them, which always takes just a leetle bit of courage.
You should check out Mipa Lee. She graduated from Messiah a while back, and I really like her work, really a lot a lot.
J-term rocks. That's my conclusion, and I'm only three days into it. I'm failing at getting up early to get my work done, but I'm getting a lot done while I'm conscious, and also having a lot of fun. I don't want to speak too early, but I'm managing to make being in the warehouse part of my routine (knock on wood). My class might also be more interesting than I thought. Once we get into discussion, the three hours passes much more quickly.
Last night it thundered, and I liked it lots. Katie opened the window and we talked desultorily and listened to the rain and thunder and then went to bed.
Andrew has started posting on his blog again! Imagine! I'm in awe of his witty randomness. I chuckle madly at his writing, even if I'm accidentally at work. (Accidentally!)
Today I feel good at my job. That makes me pretty happy. I'm not, like, wildly proficient, but I'm doin' alright. I called someone out of the blue and interviewed them, which always takes just a leetle bit of courage.
You should check out Mipa Lee. She graduated from Messiah a while back, and I really like her work, really a lot a lot.
J-term rocks. That's my conclusion, and I'm only three days into it. I'm failing at getting up early to get my work done, but I'm getting a lot done while I'm conscious, and also having a lot of fun. I don't want to speak too early, but I'm managing to make being in the warehouse part of my routine (knock on wood). My class might also be more interesting than I thought. Once we get into discussion, the three hours passes much more quickly.
Last night it thundered, and I liked it lots. Katie opened the window and we talked desultorily and listened to the rain and thunder and then went to bed.
Saturday, January 05, 2008
"above the rooftops the full moon dips its golden spoon"
Well -- I'm going back to school tomorrow! Hopefully for a few days of leisurely work and hanging out before I have to begin the grind of classes once again.
Our Christmas tree is standing completely unadorned along the outside wall of our living room. I've got to say, I kind of like the undecorated tree, too. But it's sad to know tomorrow it will probably be pulled down and dragged out to the burn pile in our back yard.
I am, actually, ready to get back to my work, even if I know I'll soon be wishing I didn't have to focus on it with the intensity college forces on us. I try to think of it as my job, though -- I earn about $20,000 a year, if you count earning and maintaining the scholarships as actual income. Still a crappy hours/income ratio.
But it's better than thinking of it as racking up debt every year by working my bum off.
I can't decide if I should wish for snow when I get back to Pennsylvania or hope that it's a ridiculously mild winter. Snow is gorgeous, and life doesn't seem so cold while it's snowing. But then I also get scared to drive around in really heavy snow in my unreliable car.
Oh well.
I hope it snows.
Our Christmas tree is standing completely unadorned along the outside wall of our living room. I've got to say, I kind of like the undecorated tree, too. But it's sad to know tomorrow it will probably be pulled down and dragged out to the burn pile in our back yard.
I am, actually, ready to get back to my work, even if I know I'll soon be wishing I didn't have to focus on it with the intensity college forces on us. I try to think of it as my job, though -- I earn about $20,000 a year, if you count earning and maintaining the scholarships as actual income. Still a crappy hours/income ratio.
But it's better than thinking of it as racking up debt every year by working my bum off.
I can't decide if I should wish for snow when I get back to Pennsylvania or hope that it's a ridiculously mild winter. Snow is gorgeous, and life doesn't seem so cold while it's snowing. But then I also get scared to drive around in really heavy snow in my unreliable car.
Oh well.
I hope it snows.
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
"i've got things i need to work on and other things that i live by"
Yay! Happy new year! Now we all get to be confused when it comes to writing the date for the next three months. Actually, even as of a couple of weeks ago, I sometimes accidentally wrote "2006" when dating my class notes. Oops!
It's interesting to me that everyone suddenly gets introspective on January 1. What I really find interesting is the spate of articles I'm currently reading on personal finance, thanks to my college friend and roommate Mrs. Micah. I'm officially only 2 semesters away from graduating (does that make me a real senior now?), and the prospect of finding a job, finding insurance, financing a car and a place to live and food and all the accoutrements looms large.
Hmmm. As possibly-a-professional-artist-in-the-future, I don't find most articles on personal finance helpful, simply because they assume the person reading them has a salary. A salary is a good thing, and a steady job is a good thing, but when they talk about making money from your hobbies as an alternate form of income. . . well, as an artist, it would be my primary source of income. And who has actually understandable and digestible information about getting health or dental insurance on your own as a freelancer? Different tax brackets you might be in as a freelancer or as your own employer?
Basically, it's confusing, and I'm glad I can defer the learning experience a little bit.
There's one bright side to being a student going out into the working world -- if I earned even $1,000 a month, it would seem like a fortune (it would be 125% more than I'm currently making). So if I can find a salaried job at a decent starting wage, maybe the world of personal finance won't seem so discouraging. On the other hand, as a student going out into the working world, I'll be facing a starting wage job with a load of student debt (not as bad as some of my contemporaries. . . but considering the small earning potential of either of my majors, not that great either).
The problem: deciding what my priorities are when it comes to finance. To be debt free? Yes. To actually be able to retire sometime? Also yes. But in between? How important is it to not go out to eat so I can buy a better computer? Or do I feel that money is well spent going out to eat, since that helps me build and maintain friendships?
Who knows -- maybe I will find the whole personal finance thing to be an exhilarating challenge, and I'll love it really a lot. Or maybe not (it does, after all, involve lots and lots of numbers).
Whatever the case. . . I'm sure it won't be boring. And you'll probably hear all about it right here, on my section of the interwebs.
It's interesting to me that everyone suddenly gets introspective on January 1. What I really find interesting is the spate of articles I'm currently reading on personal finance, thanks to my college friend and roommate Mrs. Micah. I'm officially only 2 semesters away from graduating (does that make me a real senior now?), and the prospect of finding a job, finding insurance, financing a car and a place to live and food and all the accoutrements looms large.
Hmmm. As possibly-a-professional-artist-in-the-future, I don't find most articles on personal finance helpful, simply because they assume the person reading them has a salary. A salary is a good thing, and a steady job is a good thing, but when they talk about making money from your hobbies as an alternate form of income. . . well, as an artist, it would be my primary source of income. And who has actually understandable and digestible information about getting health or dental insurance on your own as a freelancer? Different tax brackets you might be in as a freelancer or as your own employer?
Basically, it's confusing, and I'm glad I can defer the learning experience a little bit.
There's one bright side to being a student going out into the working world -- if I earned even $1,000 a month, it would seem like a fortune (it would be 125% more than I'm currently making). So if I can find a salaried job at a decent starting wage, maybe the world of personal finance won't seem so discouraging. On the other hand, as a student going out into the working world, I'll be facing a starting wage job with a load of student debt (not as bad as some of my contemporaries. . . but considering the small earning potential of either of my majors, not that great either).
The problem: deciding what my priorities are when it comes to finance. To be debt free? Yes. To actually be able to retire sometime? Also yes. But in between? How important is it to not go out to eat so I can buy a better computer? Or do I feel that money is well spent going out to eat, since that helps me build and maintain friendships?
Who knows -- maybe I will find the whole personal finance thing to be an exhilarating challenge, and I'll love it really a lot. Or maybe not (it does, after all, involve lots and lots of numbers).
Whatever the case. . . I'm sure it won't be boring. And you'll probably hear all about it right here, on my section of the interwebs.
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