Happy Thanksgiving

It's good to be home.

I haven't died -- I still visit my blog! I might blog more after I graduate. Maybe.

P.S. I'm graduating 20 days from now.

The problem is, I don't have a place to live after that yet!

Oops.

I gotta get on that.

this one is for Aaron, whose college is shut down due to contagion.

How near Thou art in the day of sickness. Thou Thyself visitest the sick; Thou Thyself bendest over the sufferer's bed. His heart speaks to Thee. In the throes of sorrow and suffering Thou bringest peace and unexpected consolation. Thou art the comforter. Thou art the love which watches over and heals us. To Thee we sing the song: Alleluia!

It's part of an akathist (in the Orthodox church, a shorter liturgy than the one used on Sunday mornings) that was written by a guy named Gregory Petrov in 1940, shortly before his death in a prison camp. Seems kind of crazy (in the absolutely best way possible) that he would claim the presence of God so strongly near the many ill he saw on a daily basis. . . .

Today I formulated to myself what I want to do with the rest of my life. It's a big project, and there are many ways in which it could find expression. And it's obvious -- it's been in my work's basic impulse from the beginning, I just never thought of it. I never stopped to make a manifesto from it.

(When Daniel heard that I had a manifesto, he immediately brought up the unibomber. What a great start to our afternoon discussion, right?? But no, it's not that kind of manifesto.)

I've been having a lot of discussions lately about the way technology is changing not just our day-to-day lives but the way our very brains function. Essentially, we're losing our ability to focus, brain-experts say. Other friends of mine are convinced that in 20, 30, 100 years no one will unplug from the internet, ever. We'll have little implants in our brains.

And I'm one of the only people so far who, no matter what -- no matter how futilely -- argues against that possibility. No! my insides say. That would be terrible!

So what's my manifesto? I want to formulate work which demands people pay attention to something rigorously observed outside of technology. I want to create work compelling enough to draw people into the real world -- i.e. flowers and trees and other people and gardens and working with your hands. I want to make people pay attention to what's going on in their walk from their house to their car, maybe just one day after they see something I made.

Simple, right? All the roots of that are already in what I'm doing. But in verbalizing that, I feel such a sense of freedom. . . It's the thing that ties together all the different things I do. I can blog and be pulling people into the world. I can be writing a novel and be doing that. I can paint and do that, make prints and do that, feed people and do that, have an amaryllis in my apartment and do that.

And you know what Daniel said to me when I told him that? He said, "You should teach!" Well yes, Daniel, thank you for remembering that I've always wanted to teach. . . . but in any case, the fact that he immediately saw that same thing as the central pillar of what he does as a professor and thought that desire could fit me for a teaching career -- that's so great! It makes me extremely happy.

In five or six years or whatever, I can go in to job interviews and when they ask me about my philosophy of teaching. . . well, that's it! I'm there to help students see something they've never seen before, change their vision and equip them with something vital that the rest of society needs. . . .

I know, chalk it up to being young, but I'm really passionate about that.

i saved the 695 post for a good cause.

Now there's a lot to catch you all up on.

Last Tuesday Greg and I tried to go to New York City and got into an accident instead, due to freakish snowstorms blanketing New Jersey. I think one place got 14 inches. We were one of 5 cars off the road in a particular place, and yet no one was hurt.

The next day, Wednesday, I got an internship with Central PA magazine that starts this Thursday. Woot!

Sunday, Greg and I finally made it up to NYC to visit friends, and that was wonderful. Without mishap, in large part, just tiring.

Last night, I woke up really sick with the stomach flu, so today I just chilled out and didn't go to classes or work.

This has allowed me to watch nonstop re-runs of The Daily Show and the Colbert Report. Clearly, I am utilizing my extra time for educational purposes. I'm so up on this election stuff, it's not even funny.

Oh, and I got all my old info from my old computer to my new computer! Yay! Now I just have to re-install a few programs so that my ipod is fully functional, and I'll be golden.

What's next on my rigorous schedule? Rustling up some kind of light dinner.

Quote of the day:
"I have felt like election day is a more special day than last week on my birthday."
-- Amy

Man, people are all about this political thing, aren't they? Good thing I had my ballot in a while ago, 'cause otherwise I'd be having all kinds of last-minute debates. Oh, and I would have had to drive with the stomach flu.

so i just realized i've posted 694 times so far.

This one makes it 695. It made me stop and wonder -- what if I had been a webcomic artist instead of a writer? I might well have 695 comic strips to my name. That would've been totally, absolutely rocking.

I mean, not that this blog isn't rocking. . . just not as awesome as awesomely drawn webcomics might be. But I guess I was never a draw-er (I just now realized that draw-er and drawer are spelled exactly the same way. Now I'll never be sure if I'm making drawings or holding clothes).

In good news, however, Daniel says that if I continue with my extra-curricular drawing exercises (bell peppers of the wrinkled and shrunken variety), I could well develop my own economy of mark-making. Which would be super, super exciting. Yes, I need to learn to render, and rendering aids all kinds of other artistic understanding, but my own economy of mark-making? That would be super, super awesome. It's all I've ever wanted. It would mean having the vocabulary to describe whatever I see it in an aesthetically pleasing way that also addresses my visual obsessions and individual perception of the world.

In the difficult news -- well, it's difficult to find time for extra-curricular drawings. But I'll keep at it, and it will be good and rewarding.

Also -- happy birthday, Dad!

oh, ursula k. leguin, you may have just won me over

"I am going to be rather hard-nosed and say that if you have to find devices to coax yourself to stay focused on writing, perhaps you should not be writing what you're writing. And if this lack of motivation is a constant problem, perhaps writing is not your forte. I mean, what is the problem? If writing bores you, that is pretty fatal. If that is not the case, but you find that it is hard going and it just doesn't flow, well, what did you expect? It is work; art is work." -- Ursula K. LeGuin

See, it's funny, because I guess publishers didn't like her first five novels because they were "remote." Which is kind of what I don't like about her later work, too. So she never got over the problem. . . she just found a niche market.

In any case, I think that quote is pretty awesome. Way to give it to us straight, Ursula. Don't baby us when you don't have to.

Maybe I should give this quote to my professor. Man him up a little.

in which i apologize for not posting in two weeks

But what can I say? Life is busy, and I know you don't want to hear me rant about homework every day.

Does anyone know where I could find out at what point a minority political party becomes, legally, a majority political party? I've heard once one of its candidates gets 5% of the national vote the party is considered a majority party. Which, as far as I can tell, means that it would take part in debates and possibly receive more funding, but not much other than that. It would be decidedly interesting to know for sure, but anything I read on the internet is a little bit suspect.

Also, the onion tart is really quite a success. Make sure to carmelize the onions before you put them in the tart -- I didn't do that quite enough. It was still delicious, but I think it could be even better. Also, it's really more of an onion quiche than an onion tart, per se.

Also, I think I'm learning more about cooking! Because the other day I made up a soup that tasted pretty darn good. It was:

1 bullion cube
1 potato
2 leeks
2 handfuls of green beans
2 bay leaves
sprinkle of thyme
some onion
1 clove of garlic
and enough water to cover all of that. Not a bad way to use up some leftovers. I mean, now I have leftover soup. . . but it's decidedly more appetizing than all those things were individually. And that's the point, right?

OK -- I've got to go to work for a couple of hours before I can call it officially the weekend. But I'm excited. Today's Friday and I'm not even exhausted (might have to do with the fact that instead of studying for my midterm today I slept for 10 hours).

is cooking a healthy response to stress?

Because right now, I'm kind of stressed -- and off the top of my head, there are at least four things that I'd rather cook. I don't want to write my papers. I don't want to read. I want to make cookies, an onion tart (which I think must be as good as french onion soup, but in solid form), butternut squash and carmelized onion gallette, acorn squash with chile-lime vinagrette, and beef, leek and barley soup. And, you know, that's just for a start.

My favorite things lately are squash and soup. So imagine how fun it was to make a squash soup from the More with Less cookbook (go look it up, it really is great tasting). Does anyone have any tips on how to peel a squash though? I kind of didn't, and just threw chunks of squash in there, and then dug the meat out of the rind and threw the rinds away while I ate it.

My least favorite thing ever right now is papers. And homework. And being enrolled in school period. Yep, I've got senioritis so bad it's overcoming my fear of unemployment and when graduation comes I'll bust out of here so fast and so happily I might cause a vacuum in my dorm which will then implode on itself.

Oh, and my other favorite thing is milkweed pods. So cool.

Also, it's fall! Yay! I like it! Oh, and my fall break is this week. So totally awesome I'm happy to have an extra two days off. Even though yes, they will probably involve homework, it will be OK.