i would love to be an illustrator

i'll be honest. i have been in a strange sort of funk for the last month. after reading some of my previous posts, i think it has sort of seeped into my writing. that being said, i live for the moments of non-funkiness. i had one of those tonight.

some people read on friday nights, others go to vespers and chat, and still others sleep. tonight i went to vespers, and was captivated by the awkward beauty of the banjo's sound. vespers was all music, and good music it was. i then went to my room and shamelessly imitated one of my favorite painters. it was the most enjoyable two hours of my day. now, i am sure i am not destined to be any sort of art forger, but i think, somewhere in my consciousness, i would enjoy being an illustrator. great. another thing to add to the list of things that intrigue me.

here's the result:


i figure if you can tell who the original painter was, it's a decent reproduction. you can tell, right?

competing visions of hell

in my warped mind, hell is

a) an enormous music rehersal, in which you are the last act to practice. the number of groups before you is infinite and time passes slowly whilst you sit in limbo, instrument in hand, vaciliating between staying and leaving, being ready and missing your chance. you are hardly more useful than a human vegetable.

b)having your hands tied behind your back while wearing a one hundred percent wool sweater with no undershirt in a hot room where the windows don't open.

i think b is worse, although i hate long, drawn-out dress rehersals. what's the point of this rather gloomy post? i am just trying to make myself feel better about studying in the fishbowl by myself after midnight. [sigh] it's pretty miserable. but it sure beats hell by a long shot.

there must be a better way to study.

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0137

its 0137 hours. down the hall, someone is playing coldplay on an acoustic guitar. i like coldplay. but i am more ambivalent about my music tastes at half-past one in the morning. i think that it might be the ra. does any one else see the irony in this? my tired brain yearns for unconsciousness.

peas.

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a good day, after many that wouldn't qualify

today is one of those days. one of those days when the beauty of the world inspires joy that just can't help but come out through your face. i close my eyes and the sun lightly toasts my cheeks. the cool breeze, however, keeps the sun from really showing its muscle--it's late afternoon. a nearby willow tree more resembles an avian apartment complex than its ordinarily quiet and graceful form; the springtime sun and breeze apparently inspire the birds to break out in a raucous chorus of song. not sure that it's destined for any top ten lists, but my ears (and the rest of me) are enjoying the soundtrack to a beautiful sabbath afternoon in march. and the sky. they say simple minds enjoy simple pleasures; for me it doesn't get any better than sitting outside under an expansive dome of deep cerulean. so i guess sign me up for a life as a contented simpleton.

i suppose that this is the peace after the storm of exams. and i insist on stocking up on sun and feelings of contentment to last for the worst of spring quarter. i suppose the best and the worst thing about the passage of time is the unchangeability of the past and the hope of change in the future. you can be the judge of which is good or not-so-good. i just desire to be big enough to inspire and weather the change to be.

last night, i was laying in bed thinking about the future. i should have known better. all sorts of questions bumbled around my brain: big ones, small ones, some as large as your head. [smirk] i wish I could say that i found some sort of solution for my quandaries, but i didn't, and i don't expect to anytime soon. maybe part of growing up is learning to accept the incertainty that is inherent in life. but that's not to say that it is easy and neither is it to say that I am anywhere near grown up [have mercy]; it's simply an admonition (mostly to myself) to let life unfold and unravel its adventure at the speed of the farm, no faster than growing grass.

and like the springtime sun that imbues the earth with renewal and joy and causes the grass to grow at its pace....well, i suppose the spiritual parallel can go without saying. i don't think i would make a very good devotional writer. i would probably leave the spiritual things up to the individual reader to discover. no use trying to soak people in religious jargon to inspire spirituality. and there goes my meandering brain, off on some quixotic tangent. i should quit while i'm ahead, or at least while i'm not being lapped.

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ugh!

forty hours since the last time i saw my pillow. never again. ugh!

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you made your bed, now you have to sleep in it

there is a eight to ten page research paper due tomorrow. i procrastinated. i finally started. i realized that all my work was on the wrong topic. i spent an hour lecturing myself on how horrible of a student i am and how it is finally catching up with me. and now, now i am just despondant. i have contemplated quitting school. seriously. that's how bad i feel like i'm in it. i wish the earth would swallow me up.

oh yeah, then there is the one thousand plus pages of reading to do before wednesday. yep, in case there was any doubt, i am an academic idiot.

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damn the demons, or happiness is not an empty laundry basket

today was a day when all my shortcomings decided to attend a conference, from which they promptly sent me a manifesto containing a concise definition of who i am and a list of that which i impotently strive after. i am ready to throw in the towel and go on vacation. an inconvenient truth, however, is the certainty that you follow yourself wherever you go. thus, the impulse to run away is irrational, and basically no better than chasing your own tail. yeah. ask a dog; while entertaining (read: distracting), the best case scenario ends with you biting your own butt.

i'd like to ban my shortcomings from free speech. just thought i'd throw it out there. usually, when the fault squad shows up, i begin to clean. call me neurotic (as opposed to psychotic--seriously, look it up), call the cleaning a form of escapism, fine, but i am not crazy. there is a distinction. besides, i find it mildly cathartic to tidy up where i live. actually, i am aching to clean right now. statement of fact: this translates to the fact that i am stressed, and really annoyed with myself because the stress is self-induced.

gosh. and yes, that was a euphemism. damn those demons. and that would be a dysphemism.

[insert horrible segue] i was doing laundry today, and i spotted the following maxim on the box of powdery all:

happiness is an empty laundry basket.

after a bit of contemplation, i realized that the phrase was complete bull. unless one's laundry is done completely in the nude, you will always have dirty clothes, and, subsequently, a laundry basket that is somewhat less than empty. all in all, it appears that happiness is unattainable, at least as it pertains to laundry. i am ok with that. i strongly dislike laundry anyways.

When I counted up my demons
Saw there was one for every day
With the good ones on my shoulders
I drove the other ones away

So if you ever feel neglected
And if you think that all is lost
I'll be counting up my demons, yeah
Hoping everything's not lost

i am clinging to the hope that everything's not lost.

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