Reflection

Obsessed with My Schedule

2011-02-18T14:21:00.000-05:00

I’m sitting outside in the wind as I write this. It’s beautiful out—sunny and 63 degrees. Frankly, beautiful weather like this is unheard of in Pittsburgh in the middle of February. But, it’s a blessing so I’m not about to jinx it. Yet, at the same time, I have plans to go skiing on Sunday and balmy weather like this isn’t going to get me closer to that goal. This sunshine that is beating down upon me, giving my pasty white skin some color at last is really putting me in a difficult position here. And I want to just live in the moment and enjoy the vitamin D soaking into my skin, but I am simply not able to.

This is not unlike other problems I’ve bee having lately. I think in general I have been over-planning. I’ve discovered that I like scheduling, planning, creating pretty colors on my calendar, but it’s had a nasty side effect. I have gotten so concerned with my schedule that it’s hard for me to let go. It’s not that I’m always booked, I’m just never able to escape knowing what the next thing is. The next test, the next presentation or simply the next night out I have planned. I’m so hyperaware that I can’t just be. But I don’t want to give the impression that I’m stressed or too busy, it’s just the awareness.

I’ve tried different relaxation strategies. For instance, I do yoga three times a week, I try and go running six times a week and while I’m doing them I am relaxed. I’m being productive so why wouldn’t I be? I’ve cut out the caffeine and eat less carbs so I don’t get jumpy and I’ve tried really hard to get enough sleep. But, see I have to schedule those things. I think about if I have time to go running when my class is canceled, when I’m going to do yoga. What am I going to fit in between? I stress out about when I’m going to focus on managing my stress. Isn’t that absurd, ridiculous, ludicrous? But, hey, for now, I’m totally on top of everything I need to do and that in itself is oddly relaxing.

Snowflakes

2011-02-03T00:24:00.002-05:00

Snowflakes stick to my coat. Well, I should say they stick to the tiny fibers that stick out from my wool coat, but the specifics aren't important, the images are. These beautiful white fluffy flakes stick to my coat, each one's individual crystals glistening. And the patterns are truly stunning.

I get distracted while I'm walking because I'm busy staring down at my coat like some obsessed narcissist. But, it's worth it, for each one is truly different and beautiful and amazingly unique. The intersections between the larger clumps are gossamer thin spindles and the symmetry is astonishing. But truly what gets me is how delicate they are. I know it's cliche, but somehow the fact that they melt as soon as I touch them makes them all the more special. And I love that the ones that collect on my coat are mine to look at, and mine alone.

I've never before considered that I'm quite lucky that I live in a city that has had snow at least once a week since Thanksgiving, but I thank my coat for making me see the bright side, and I look forward to many more viewing chances in the upcoming blizzard.

Unexpected Discovery

2011-01-24T10:02:00.000-05:00

The past six months at Carnegie Mellon have been unexpected in many ways. First, I have found myself more at home than I could imagine as a humanities student in a college most people attend to learn about computer science, math, engineering, or creative arts--all subjects I am quite anxious to avoid. But, I was almost immediately convinced in the first week that I could fit in as a humanities student in such a scary world dominated by enthusiastic mathematicians and scientists.

But, most unexpected of all, I have discovered that I really enjoy learning and school. Perhaps it is that I finally have true freedom over what classes I choose, perhaps it is because I have breaks between many of my classes; but all of a sudden, I have this love of school and learning. I enjoy going to class most of the time, and I don’t mind doing all the extra work for them. I have actually decided to overload this semester because I wasn’t satisfied just taking five different classes.

It's a great feeling, enjoying what I'm learning, being genuinely interested the majority of the time, and as a result being able to focus. Because I am overloading, it requires a lot of multi-tasking and careful planning, but I'm even enjoying that. Perhaps I've finally learned how to become a good student--if only I had known earlier that all it took was a little freedom and interesting subject matter.

A Word From the Rejected Generation

2011-01-12T21:25:00.001-05:00

I decided in September to find an internship in the DC region for the upcoming summer. Since then, I’ve researched a bit and picked a few places I would love to work. This past week, I started filling out applications and suddenly got hit with the strangest sense of déjà vu. Here I was filling out yet another application, trying my hardest to figure out how to sell myself to the best advantage, all the while feeling more and more dejected about my chances of being accepted. It hit me—I was essentially filling out college applications again. And I was paralyzed with sudden fear.
The college acceptance year for the high school graduating class of 2010 was the worst percentage wise in history. Acceptance percentages at most of the Ivy League schools were in the single digits, and I was among dozens of friends who did not get accepted into any of the schools we thought we had a chance of attending. And we were devastated as hope after hope got dashed by piles of thin letters each branded with the name of yet another shelved vision. But slowly, we rebuilt our dreams, and some, like me, realized that perhaps it was for the best and forgot about it for the most part. But now, as I write more essays trying to persuade some unknown person to like me, to accept me, I feel the burden of proving myself once again.

Decorating the Tree

2010-12-14T21:38:00.000-05:00

I am the worst Christmas tree decorator in the family. I like simplicity and matching colour schemes; I like to actually be able to see the shape of the tree instead of a hazy collage of mix-matching, clashingly bright colours and reflective surfaces. I like plain white lights entangled in delicatedly draped tinsel. I prefer the small traditional silver and gold glass ball ornaments and a few delicate glass blown adornments of particular sentimental value. In short, I am a Christmas tree snob.
This snobbery makes it very difficult for me to decorate the tree with my family. Primarily because they are members of the "use almost every ornament we own" camp. So, I bite my tongue as I see clumps of decorations forming a nebulous mass in the middle of the tree. And I fold my hands beneath my legs to stop rearranging all the small wooden animals that my sister has strung in a thick layer at her head height. I fight the urge to sneak down in the middle of the night to reorganize the tree. And instead of sitting in the living room facing the tree, I turn my back on it and instead face my beautiful family, whom I couldn't reorganize even if I wanted to.

Snow

2010-12-05T22:11:00.001-05:00

It snowed today. Big, fluffy flakes that hurried diagonally across my window. Bunching together to drape bands of blankets upon our cars.
The trees were dressed with scarves of snow and the grass struggled to defiantly fight the white chains thrown upon them. The snow skirted the street. It clung shallowly to the edges, and one thin string ran down the middle of the road, as if it were trapped while still deciding which side ti scurry to.
I went out to play and the snow whipped around me until it was caught in the net of my hair. Flakes landed upon my cheekbones and melted, the drops caressing my pale skin until they slipped onto my lips.
The world became a flurry, a blur of pristine whiteness just inviting me to jump in and make a mess.

Feet

2010-11-14T19:59:00.000-05:00

I'm sorry. I have been neglecting my duties and I apologize, but once again today can only be a short post because life is a tornado of stress and appointments and deadlines and conversations and essays and everything else all at the same time. So, I will try harder.
However, I also have something else to say:
Today I came to the realization that I have tremendously unattractive feet. They're hideous. Somehow my toes came out tiny, but the rest of my foot is very thick and wide. From the side, they're not that bad. My arches are beautiful if I may say so myself, I have dancers arches which bring their own set of orthopedic problems with them, but at least they're mildly pretty. But the point of this mindless prattle about my feet is that I have lived all my life with essentially these same feet, but it took me until today to realize how ugly they actually are. And it makes me think, is there anything else that I still don't know about myself? Is there something that everyone sees as a fault that I simply acknowledge as my own?
Think about it.

Sick

2010-09-22T21:41:00.000-04:00

My first full day in Beijing, I fell miserably sick. I normally have a pretty strong stomach, so when my advisory went out for lunch, I eagerly tried all the foods that were placed before us.
Unfortunately, on the completely unsupervised scavenger hunt, I found out that I had severely overestimated my stomach's tolerance.
I just barely made it to a restaurant's bathroom before swiftly emptied my stomach of that day's lunch and the one slice of bread that I had had for breakfast. It was violent. I was drained and had to take a couple of tries to stand up. One of the other members of my group finally came to find me and she finally almost carried me the two blocks back to school.
Once there, I fell asleep on the couch, exhausted and feverish. I woke up in the bedroom of my host family's house thirteen hours later, with my host mom sleeping in an arm chair by the door. I woke her up as I went to go get some water. Then, as she went to bed, I drank two bottles of water and fell back asleep for another eleven hours.

Princess

2010-09-22T13:36:00.000-04:00

My sister went to one of those pottery painting stores a couple of weeks ago. She came back super excited about the craft that she had created, but refused to tell me what it was. I wondered about it for a little bit, was it a mug for me to drink my morning tea out of? Was it a pottery dog that she would play with? But then, I forgot about it altogether.
Well, last week she brought it home, and gave it to me. I was speechless. It was a princess, but it was also the creepiest thing I have ever seen. I am just as much of a Disney fan as the next person, but I definitely do not want to meet that fairy tale woman anywhere, especially in a dark alley.
Being a princess, she had blonde hair, blue eyes, and a pink dress. But the watery blue of her eyes had melted a little so that her eyes were huge and took over about a third of her face. They dripped into the jaundiced yellow of her cheeks and took on a greenish tinge. Her skin was a mottled yellow and pink, with speckles of other colours underneath the thin layer of paint. Her dress was a beautiful shape but changed colours so frequently that I could not help but notice the startling similarity to vomit.
But of course, (because what else could I do?) I gave my sister a hug, told her that I loved her, and stored the statue in a drawer so that it couldn't watch me sleep.

Packing

2010-06-15T15:59:00.001-04:00

I have spent days of my life packing. Each trip requires a certain set of clothing. Is it casual warm? Tropical dressy? Simply comfortable? Will I need dress shoes? Multiple purses? How much jewelry do I want to bring? Does everything that I have packed match?
I plan ahead, creating a mental list of essential items that I need. Then I do laundry, and start creating piles-mountains of presents, stacks of clothing, lists of items I will have to pack at the last moment. They expand and overflow until my carpet is filled with insolently sprawling assortments of items I will need for my journey.
Then comes the careful placement stage. Each thing must fit into my case in the most efficient way. Do I roll it up sideways? Fold it into a small container? Socks get pushed into the hollows of shoes, thin shirts are rolled up and placed into the corners and sides of suitcases. Everything is condensed, combined, minimized.
It's a competition, this almost obsessive need to be as small as possible, to carry the least. I must improve on my last packing excursion. Try to beat myself.
So I pack, and I arrive. And unpack. Then, I got through it all again-trying to outpack myself.

"My Kids"

2010-06-02T00:11:00.002-04:00

Today one of my kids got in trouble. He punched another kid on the playground. To an outside observer, it could appear that it wouldn't be that big of a deal to me personally- after all, I am not personally responsible for these children at all and their behaviour does not reflect on me.
But, when I heard the news, I felt as if I had been the one that was punched. I thought this child was making such progress and that I had been helping him along the way. I knew that he had been in altercations before, but we had had such a good past few days.
On Tuesday, I had received a note from his teacher saying that he had picked out his first chapter book to read during silent reading time, and I had been so happy. He had been asking if he could write an article for the sport's newspaper and I had created a lesson for him on how to write a news article. It had all seemed to be going so well; but, now this.
Isn't it funny how they have suddenly become "my kids"? I don't know them all that well, we're not old buddies or even student and official teacher. I've just observed them over the course of five weeks. I've learned how to catch them right before they go off topic, and how to properly encourage them to read.
But I've also unknowingly adopted them as my own. Each smile and wave of acknowledgment as I walk by is a victory because I know how easily they could have decided to begrudge my interference. I love each time they sound out a word instead of skipping it, thrill to the echo of their laughter when they understand a joke in a book, really try to always focus on them and think of new ways to keep them engaged and interested in learning.
So, for now, one of my little pupils is in trouble. Perhaps we'll make more progress tomorrow.

Look In The Guest Bathroom

2010-05-30T13:41:00.000-04:00

My dad is absurdly talented in hiding things. Whereas most people use their sock drawers or the top shelf of their closet to hide gifts, that is too easy for my dad.

One year, he hid a full-sized ping-pong table. He bought it a few weeks before Christmas and hid it in a box under his bed.

For my mom’s birthday we snuck my mother’s old cello out of the house to have it repaired and tuned. She had been talking about wanting to start up playing again, and with my leaving and my siblings getting older and more self-sufficient, we figured this was the year.

So, we get home from treating my mom to a nice dinner, and my dad has hidden the cello in the backyard behind an armoire. So, we sat my mother down on the couch and told her to close her eyes. My brother and sister retrieved the newly refurbished and polished instrument.

My mother opened her eyes and was speechless. She was clearly, deeply moved by this gift. “But where is my case?” she asked. “Look in the guest bathroom,” my dad said calmly.

Six Year Olds

2010-05-21T21:34:00.000-04:00

I baby sat for a teacher of mine's son today, and once again was reminded about the complicated net of things and actions that is the life of a six year old. He would be speaking in Chinese to me about school, and then switch to English and ask me if I wanted him to get me a couple bolts of silk from China. And for all of you super logical people out there to whom the transition from Chinese to silk is enough of a connection, we then switched to talking about pumpkin pie, and from there onto a science activity he had done in which his balloon popped when he blew it up.
Then after this fun game of try and confuse Lindsay as much as possible, we got into a joke competition. His winning joke: "Why did the chicken cut off its finger?"
"It was hungry?"
"No. To be a zombie for Halloween!"

Exactly the way I would want

2010-05-12T22:50:00.003-04:00

Sometimes I wonder what would happen if I died. Who would come to my funeral, who would be invited, who would cry? I don't think about my family when I'm in this morbid frame of mind. I know what it's like to lose a loved one and would never wish that pain on someone. But, I do occasionally think about my friends. My bright, loving, compassionate friends.
I come to the same conclusion about them. They would mourn, grieve, reminisce sadly, and then the would (unconsciously for the most part) move on. Their causes would swallow them once more, their busy lives erasing my memory day by day, replacing it with the fullness of their lives.
Perhaps a plaque would be posted, a tree planted, a symbol erected stating, "this is for Lindsay because she once lived."But, gradually they would forget me.
And this is how I would want it. To be loved, remembered, and then forgotten.

Black Couch

2010-05-10T23:32:00.000-04:00

When I was younger and students got in trouble, our teacher’s used to send us to the black couch. It was an ancient piece of furniture- faded and stained black leather with slightly ripped armrests, a truly terrifying chair. And students would have to sit there, so I hear, and everyone passing through the vast great hall would know that they had been sent there. And there shame would exponentially grow larger and more encompassing as each person looked a moment too long, or asked why they were sitting there.

As I was a ridiculous goody-two shoes, suck-up, teacher’s pet, etc. when I was younger, I have no personal experience with the black couch to share. But, as part of the strange dual life that my internship has caused me to lead, I recently had a very sitcom-like moment completely related to the dreaded black couch.

I was in puppy-dog mode, trailing my supervisor around and nodding and murmuring “mmhmm” and other supportive sounds, when she stopped in at the Vice Principal’s office. Now, she didn’t tell me to come in with her, so I didn’t know what to do. So I stood awkwardly by the staff’s mailboxes, waiting for a gesture from her to indicate what I should be doing.

But, no such gesture came, and my legs started to get tired. So, I looked at the couch. And it appeared to look back, it’s broken leather staring at me darkly. So, I waited some more, and my legs started to tire even faster, my feet started aching in my cowboy boots, and my body realized that I had to sit down soon. But I couldn’t do it. I could not voluntarily resign myself to that seat of shame.

So, I sat on the floor, a little bit less comfortable, but nonetheless innocent.

Standardized Test

2010-05-07T12:34:00.000-04:00

We're doing standardized testing at my internship this week. Rows of fidgeting children have been paraded through the small classroom in which I complete the majority of my work. Their kindly faced teachers leave them with the parting words, "be good, behave." and then escape. They can barely suppress their glee at having a whole hour of unplanned free time.
And then, it is a sudden flurry of excitement- students touching laptop keys, asking unrelated questions, scurrying to make sure they get the seat next to their best friend and not the one next to the class troublemaker. It's controlled chaos, and we try to minimize the amount of time spent in this stage. We flick the lights off and on, and recite all the catchphrases in the book, "1, 2, 3, Eyes on Me" ("1, 2, Eyes on You!"), "Lights Out Means Listen", and "please, please, please, dear god, let the noise stop."
Finally, my prayers are apparently answered and it does indeed stop. They sit, log into the test site, and start their tests. And I start pacing, nervously checking that everyone's test is working properly. I roam about the room, circling, tracking restlessly, like a lion watching it's prey- daring it to move. I am so alert that I anticipate problems and questions before they happen. I am the best damn proctor these kids are ever going to have.
If only they noticed.
And then it's over, computers are snapped shut to sleep, lines are formed once more, and they scurry back to class. They are soon replaced by another just as similar group.

Duckling Friends

2010-05-05T20:47:00.000-04:00

I made about three dozen new friends today. Unfortunately, they are all between the ages of four and twelve. You may well ask how I became so popular in this age group so suddenly. Well, it's a simple answer- my senior project.
Now if you're as smart of a cookie as I believe you are, your next question is probably, "what is a senior project." So, I shall tell you.
My school gives us high school seniors the last month of school off of classes to go out into the world and do some good. So, being of the category of people who always find it terribly difficult to move on with their lives, I decided to go back and volunteer with my old elementary school.
So, that's what I've been doing for the past week, and what I'll be continuing to do for the next three.
It's been interesting- a clash of old feelings and sudden flashbacks and the same shocking sadness that unfamiliarity in an old safe-haven always brings. But there have also been the same familiar faces, and the odd moments where I see myself in other students, my story being played out with different actors.
But, by far the best part of this experience has been my new friends. The children that have decided to become Velcro in my presence, clinging, hooking themselves on so gently that I don't realize how entangled they have become until it is too late to send them back to class. I had a kid ask if he could be my "personal helper" today, and I have about a dozen kids who have suddenly transformed into some sort of puppy/duckling crossbreed- tumbling over themselves and trailing me around and always, always chattering.

A Strangely Productive Week

2010-04-28T13:58:00.002-04:00

I've been insanely productive this week. I'm talking about multi-tasking with three or four different tasks; simultaneously editing a movie scene while writing a short story; working out on the elliptical as I draft this blog on paper; and even planning and inviting all my family friends to a party even as I am prepare for my final exam filled week. And yes, I did study for each and everyone of my exams.

I edited movie scenes for the Chinese movie that my entire class is creating, and I was somehow put in charge of editing. I wrote a character analysis of Beatrice in Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, I completed a lab on Radioactive Decay using M and M's as my materials. I did as much as I could as quickly as I could because the list of things to do just became longer and longer. And oh yeah, there were lists. Lists of household chores- do a load of laundry, sort my winter clothes from my summer clothes, clear out my bookshelf, finally put up the pictures I've been meaning to put up since June of last year, and just take advantage of this productive streak I was on as much as I could. I had lists of things to do for school and things to do on my way from home to school- pick up a pack of batteries, a combination lock for my gym locker, go to the gym, drop off books at the library, etc.

And so as the week draws to an end with my last exam taking place tomorrow morning, I'm reflecting on this oddly productive week. Truth be told, I'm extremely proud of my normally extremely flustered self, but I'm also exhausted. So, today, I'm going to walk home from school, and instead of walking, testing out my background music for my movie, and memorizing my English skit lines all at the same time, I'm just going to walk.

What Was A Time That You Tried Something You Weren't Good At

2010-04-19T19:24:00.001-04:00

When I was younger, I was convinced that I had artistic talent. My aunt is an artist by profession, and both my cousins inherited her talent. I filled notebooks with sketches of flowers. But, everything was slightly wrong. My petals were slightly imperfect, the stems asymmetrical. They were not good enough.
I didn’t cry. I didn’t even get angry. I just continued to believe that someday I would be better. I took drawing class in middle school, to learn how to be an artist. I learned about perspective and how to create realistic looking shadows, but my drawings were still flawed in some way. They lacked a spirit, a true ingenuity that I saw in my aunt’s work. But still I tried.
It took me until a couple years ago to realize that I was never going to be a good artist. I was trying to sketch a marble and I couldn’t get the slightly off-centered shadow quite right. I put down my sharpened number two pencil and admitted that I wasn’t going to get it just right. It wasn’t in me.
The revelation had surprisingly positive repercussions. I gave away most of my art supplies to my little sister who loved them and I started to focus on other things. I realized that I loved to write, and that was where my relative talent lay. I relaxed and didn’t worry about my lines being perfect. Instead, I just worked at my writing, confident that someday I will be better.

The China Girl

2010-04-13T18:15:00.003-04:00

I have a confession to make- I officially hate being "that China girl." Not because it is so nondescript and not altogether personally flattering, but because of the muddled attitudes it lends itself so easily to attract.

Firstly, I despise the way simply the word "China" causes most everyone to either blatantly turn and stare at me, or to allow their eyes to flit towards my form in a way I am sure they hope is nonchalant. It's a challenge keeping my composure under the weight of these few second connections. It's an interest derived by wanting to know my opinion on whatever has been said, a challenge glinting behind their many-coloured pupils that dares me to refute the statement. I don't often take the bait, but when I do I know that I have finally conformed to their idea of who I am- that I have cemented myself even further into the mold of "that China girl" who I am not.

On the rare occasions that I rise to the challenge, I confront the most frustrating part of this falsely simplistic personality they have thrust upon me. Any negative views I have of anything Chinese (whether it be products or policies)serves to enforce what they have already heard, so they walk away satisfied in their own cynical worldliness. Contrarily, if I have something positive to say, it is dismissed as a "party line" I must have been force fed during my nine months apart.

So, I find myself between the proverbial rock and a hard place; one way, I reinforce views they have already heard, therefore somehow validating everything they have heard, or I am ignored as "yet another" brainwashed naive girl. Fortunately, I suppose, I know that whether I choose to force myself against the rock or against the hard place, either way I am still "that China girl."

Easter

2010-04-04T21:42:00.000-04:00

I love Easter, not because I am religious or because my family has a particularly big celebration. I love Easter simply because it's activities naturally appeal to my sunny and rather fun-loving personality.

My favorite activity is, of course, the scavenger hunt. I love plotting and planning, finding good places to hide candy and new ways to leave clues leading them there. But, I also love dying Easter eggs.

I always have such high hopes for mine, putting stickers and wax on to preserve the original white of the shell before attempting to dip it carefully into the plastic cups filled with dye. I try to dye just one end or side, to create stripes and zones of colours with distinct borders. But the colours often drip, or the egg drops off of the spoon into the cup and I'm left with a mess. So there's only one thing to do, dip the egg into the deep blue or purple colour, and let the dark pigment erase all the evidence and all the failures of execution.

Hiding the Coasters

2010-03-28T18:48:00.000-04:00

We have these coasters that we place on our table. They're quite beautifully tacky. All clear, with pressed flowers in the middle. But, since my parents are intensely afraid of our newish dining room table getting those white smiles that wet glasses fiendishly leave behind, we use them frequently.

I suppose these coasters fulfill this purpose well enough, but they also tend to stick to the bottom of the glasses. It's a slow process. As the condensation drips down the glass, it oozes and pools to sit in the middle of the slightly curved plastic surface, resting just above a pressed pansy or a small yellow buttercup. (Why are they called buttercups anyways?) Then, as the heavy glass continues to rest upon this pond of wasted water, it slowly suction cups itself to the coaster. Finally, as the unaware drinker picks up his glass to take a sip of deliciously filtered water, the coaster drops into their plate of spaghetti, splattering the tomato sauce all over their dry-clean only work clothes.

So, although my sister and brother both think that it is supremely hilarious to be assaulted by these attacking pieces of dinnerware, I am now taking the time to chronicle their existence before I hide them in some unexpected place so that they may never be found to stick to my glass again.

Playing the Invalid

2010-03-25T18:06:00.000-04:00

I’m not a very good invalid. Part of the problem is that I don’t like to sit still; the other part of it is that I place far too much store in my own self-judgment. I tend to get out of bed before I technically should. I sometimes push myself too quickly, eating foods that I shouldn’t at the time and just trust my natural nervous energy so much that I push too hard.

I’ve been sick more than a couple of times before. I’ve been left home alone while I’m sick a couple of times too. But, I’ve never been seriously sick like this before. I’m really good compared to how I thought that I was going to be—I can walk and talk, which is of course fantastic. But, I’m also not steadily ill. I’m slightly unsteady on my feet at times, and my appetite fazes in and out. The medication is the most mysterious of the variables in this sickness formula. At times it makes me very very dizzy, at times woozy, and most strangely of all it sometimes doesn’t affect me at all. Perhaps that’s part of the magical cure: it keeps me guessing, predicting what’s going to happen next, whether it’s going to be me walking into a doorframe or whether I’m going to be able to act as if I was normal. So, instead of taking the usual route and playing it safe, I tend to act like everything is fine and deal with the challenges as they bump into me. So, thus, I’ve come to the realization that I am a pretty bad invalid.

Tonsillectomy

2010-03-22T22:28:00.001-04:00

I’m getting a tonsillectomy tomorrow. I’m fasting tomorrow morning, then going in to a surgery center and getting my troublesome tonsils removed. I’m getting the procedure because I was recently diagnosed with chronic strep throat, a diagnosis that I’m shocked wasn’t issued much sooner. After all, the symptoms are often getting strep throat, and I’ve come down with strep every year for the past ten odd years—and have often had three or four cases in a single winter season. Thus, the chronic strep diagnosis.

Now, I’m a little worried about this surgery, but I’m mainly excited. Excited because I’ve never undergone surgery before, because I’m not going to get sick as often, and because it’s all just a bit of exciting drama, isn’t it. But primarily, I’m excited because if I don’t focus on the excitement, I’m going to be terrified when I wake up tomorrow morning.

Special Schedule

2010-03-18T21:08:00.000-04:00

I used to put so much store in time passing—In anniversaries, in countdowns before an event, in dates, times, and schedules. Then I realized it was all a distraction, a way to try and make times special. To make days become more important, to add suspense to my normal routine. It wasn’t actually the passing of time that was important; it was that I thought those things that passed time were important enough to mark. They weren’t special unless I placed additional value on them. They weren’t inherently momentous; I simply made them out to be special. I did it because I needed some things to be special, needed the ordinariness to somehow become extra-ordinary.

Girl Scout Cookies

2010-03-12T22:43:00.000-05:00

It’s March. Which everyone knows means Girl Scout Cookie season. There are stands outside of the grocery stores, beglittered and highlighted signs with rudimentary pictures of each type of cookies. Students at school have forbidden stashes of tagalongs on the top shelf of their lockers. There are boxes of thin mints clogging up my freezer, and there is the sweetly sour taste of those crispy lemon crème cookies lingering in the recesses of my mouth. One thing about Girl Scout cookies is that they are not only cookies; they are little edible moments of childhood. They are a bite of all the knitting club adventures, international club cooking failures, and projects made out of toothpicks and cotton balls. It’s like being able to relive your most childish moments, your immature fears and irrational spontaneous moments of giggling. Yet, its also a perfectly bite-sized delicious cookie. What could possibly be wrong with that?

Floating

2010-03-08T20:58:00.001-05:00

Sometimes, I feel like I’m sleeping, even when I know that I woke up that morning. I go through the day in a daze, conversations float lazily over my head, even as I respond in monosyllables, nods, and throaty sounds of agreement. I swim heavily through my schedule, each moment and step lethargically graceful. I have none of m usual frantic energy, none of the bounciness that usually characterizes who I am. Instead, everything is slow, syrupy, and cam. It’s strangely relaxing, this mode of sleepy dizzy movement. But, it is also often dangerous.

I get too slow, too calm, too muted. I forget conversations, obligations and agreements. Eventually, my friends figure out that I’m coasting on neutral, that I’m not listening. I have slow reactions, both in my actions and my speech—everything blurs until I don’t know what I should reply to, what I should let go, what I should leave in peace.

Marshmallows

2010-03-05T21:02:00.001-05:00

I like my marshmallows half-burnt half-raw. The tops burnt to a crisp quickly while the bottoms have barely any time to become softened at all. Maybe I like them this way because they take less time and finesse to cook. Maybe it’s because the charred pieces bring out the perfectness of the slightly softened half. Or maybe it’s just the way that no one tastes the same as the other. Instead, they have different textures and are somehow perfect in their imperfections.

What Do You Want?

2010-03-04T21:28:00.000-05:00

I want everything. I want all the clichés and the moronically impossible stereotypes. I want you to be you, and me to be me, but more than anything I want us to be Us. For that simple word to mean something greater than we can possibly describe, for it to become an almost physical being outside and totally made up of the two of us. I want to know what you want without you even thinking it yet, and have it there for you, before you know you wanted it.

I want something that’s so “us” that everyone hears it and smiles and can’t help but think our two names. I want our history to be intertwined, for me to know all the little things about you-the way you like your coffee, the way you stand when you brush your teeth, each little variation on your brilliant smile that indicates a different mood, a different feeling. I want you to tell me that your world would be different without me and to mean it, not just use it as an exaggeration or proof of your own sweetness. I want us to have disgustingly cute nicknames for one another, and for you to know exactly what to say to make me cheer up. I don’t want things to change- I want them to stay the exact same, only more perfect. I want to feel as if nothing will ever separate us, even if I know exactly what will. I want to pretend, and to be left alone to pretend that everything is going to be amazing forever and always. I want everything to change, and nothing to have to change. I want us to already be perfect—really, I want the impossible.

Cleaning

2010-03-03T20:00:00.003-05:00

I am a methodical cleaner. I sweep from one side of a room, around to the other. I slowly conquer the clutter, leaving a glistening clean path behind me.
I set objectives. A corner, a desktop, a chair draped with handbags and scarves. It is not only the counter tops, the visible shelf surfaces that get cleaned, de-cluttered, picked apart- the drawers are emptied. I organize into messy piles; items to keep, to throw away, to donate. Then, at the end of the day, these piles get cleaned themselves, clothes neatly folded by item, memorabilia placed on shelves or wrapped in bubble wrap and put in neatly labeled bags. Donations get put in bags, and neat lists are drawn up of each thing I intend to donate, so that we ma correctly file a tax-return.
It is hard to believe that someone so messy as I can accomplish such a feat of organizational skill. It is surprising that I can stay focused long enough to clean my entire room from top to bottom. Yet, I find it soothing, this minimizing. I like to look through my old memories, and see how I have grown. And, in the end, its always refreshing to have new space to fill.

Alone

2010-02-28T20:51:00.001-05:00

I hate being alone. In rooms, in houses, at school, simply walking outside. It’s the boundary-less expansion that bothers me—that my thoughts extend outward and without the boundaries, barriers, clashes that occur when one is surrounded. So, instead of dealing with those pleasant intrusions upon my thought bubble, I am instead faced with the opposite problem.
I am weightless. Too free to lose myself within the realm of imagination that is “me.” I fear getting sucked in. As if I were a tornado and myself the only victim. I see the flashes of thoughts go by, swirling within the depths of this thing that has been begot of me, but then rebelliously declared its independence when I was not paying attention. And these flashes glimmer brightly, seductively, luring me further and further away from myself.

Popcorn Reading

2010-02-25T17:38:00.002-05:00

I wish I could pretend that I only read high-level books. That I was so sophisticated that only the best written, most innovative and inspiring books could tempt me to open their understated, yet elegant covers and conspire with their equally high-tasted authors. Alas, that is not a statement that I could honestly make.
That is not to say that I do not read relatively high-brow books. I have read several of Shakespeare's plays. I have similarly completed all of Jane Austen's novels, both the engrossing Emma and the more dry Lady Susan alike. I like books exploring Economic phenomenoms and actually buy sociology books for myself. But, still, I can not possibly claim that my reading experience has remained full of these bright, unpolluted works.
I am often a "popcorn reader." A self-named gobbler of inaccurate historical fiction, romance novels, teen-age works of frivolity about shape-shifters determined to defeat their own natures to do good, and above all books with inconceivably happy endings. I go through these books quickly, with a crunch and an appetit that can never be satisfied by just one, two, six of these guilty pleasures. Instead, I need bowlfulls, gallons of them, until the sea of my mind is so choked up that it is necessary to retreat to more sophisticated ground once more.

How Babies Are Born

2010-02-24T18:18:00.000-05:00

We were sitting at the table a few weeks ago, and somehow the subject of childbirth came up. My mother said something about it being painful, and my brother, being in his ten-year old, "I know everything" stage, agreed. My mother then challenged him, asking him what he knew about it. (After all, my brother still believes in Santa and so of course he has never had "the talk" with anyone in my family. So, we were all curious to hear his response.
He shot her an annoyed look, as if to ask her whey she would ever doubt that he would know the answer to such a simple question. He then answered in his most smart-ass tone. "A hole opens up int he stomach, and the doctors reach in and take the baby out."
Now, while this may sound completely absurd, my mother did give birth to both of her children with cesarians, so while his details may have been a bit off, he understood the essence of how he was born. Sadly, the same can not be said of my sister who corrected him by crowing, "No the come out your butt!"

Push

2010-02-18T19:51:00.002-05:00

You reminded me of a fish- always so instinctively sure of where you were going, even as the tide swept you off course.
I admired your determination, even as your sycophantic loyalties disgusted me. You had the ability to see all the potential of your future, clear as silhouettes projected onto the ever-changing screen of what ifs. But yet, even though you saw it, you never took that last leap to grasp the future and hold it in your palms. You said you needed more time, and you waited, gazing at what could be your world as the tide grew closer and eventually pulled you away. It was only then that I realized that all that time you had been simply waiting for a push.

Secret Life

2010-02-10T14:14:00.000-05:00

My Hulu history is a testament to how long I have been snowbound. Originally it had shows I was actually interested in: House, Lost, etc. Now, I am almost afraid to admit it, but I have watched more than one episode of the “Secret Life of the American Teenager.” Surprisingly, that was just as difficult to admit as I thought it might be.

But, anyways, the show is astoundingly bad. Not only does it have a plot with very little development, the characters are walking clichés, and their decisions are so incredibly juvenile. As a seventeen year old, I get offended by the storyline. There was a shotgun wedding which the two fifteen year olds pulled off by purchasing fake IDs, the protagonist of the entire show is a pregnant fifteen year old who believes that she can just go on living her life the same way she had before she got pregnant. Her two supposed best friends are wishy-washy characters who pop in and out of the scenes to give their advice, a few sentences of earnest pearls of wisdom, but then are seen criticizing the protagonist’s decisions behind her back. But even more frustrating than the transparent characters, the fact that people probably look at this show and think they are seeing the way teenagers think. And that is what bothers me.

And yet, it makes great background noise, so it will probably show up again at some point on my Hulu history.

Pooh Lore

2010-01-31T22:13:00.000-05:00

My sister has a very active imagination. Sometimes annoyingly so. She makes up stories about all of her stuffed animals and is very enthusiastic about other people participating in them. She takes care of the furry toys, asking if they're thirsty and feeding them different dishes. It can be frustrating, listening to her prattle on about those animals in her constantly chipper voice. Yet, its often also educational.
For instance, did you know that Winnie the Pooh likes strawberry cake with chocolate icing? Or that when he was little he wanted to be a doctor? On our recent three hour car trip to go skiing, I also found out that he likes honeycomb crunch soup, he drives a motorcycle (but never in the hundred acre wood because that would be too dangerous), he loves to play with Legos, and has four sisters. All of these things were quite a shock to me. After all, I had considered myself to be very well versed in Pooh lore.

Rain

2010-01-28T17:17:00.002-05:00

I love the rain. The feeling of it sliding down my skin, gently soaking into my clothes, and drenching my hair. It looks beautiful, blurred and distorted when seen collectively, but each drop is beautiful, glistening in the greyness.The sound is amazing as well, the irregular tattoo it beats out as it taunts my heartbeat to harmonize with it. But most of all I like the feelings of simply getting lost in it. The way it brings out my emotions and ignites them, before washing them away in the flood of water pouring into gutters. It's draining, standing in the rain, watching the tears the sky cries so I don't have to let them fall myself.

Memories

2010-01-26T20:01:00.003-05:00

I have no complete memories from before the age of six and twelve days. I have flashes of events, of places, and of sounds from about age four and older. But, I've come to learn that even those memories can't be trusted. I've learned that many of these earlier memories are combinations of dreams, wishes, and fragmented memories, instead of recollections of a past reality.
However, I do not only own a treasure trove of false memories, I own a bundle of non-important false memories. I have flashes of a bedroom wall colour, a fairytale story, and a cat which turned out to be my neighbours, not mine.
In the wake of these insignificant memories, it is even more heartbreaking that I can't remember my mother's face, my first best friend, or how my brother looked before his senior year of high school. After all, if we're supposed to remember the important things, why do I only remember little things- a ring on a finger or a flower in the background, never any faces or the complete story.
Occasionally it seems as if two or three little memories line up and mix to reveal a more complete picture, but it slips away before I can fully grasp it. Memories are slippery things.

Brownies of Happiness

2010-01-22T09:59:00.003-05:00

I think happiness is like making brownies: you can make them in different ways, use different ingredients, timings and temperatures but essentially they end up all the same. The build up is hard-work- the careful cracking of the eggs. the vigorous mixing, and the ginger pouring of the chocolate sludge into the diligently greased pan. Then there come the blissful relaxation, a thirty-five minute interval in which they start to puff up, to crisp, and to emit delicious curly-cues of chocolate aroma. These smells start to expand, slipping under the cracks of doors and sliding down stairs, until suddenly the whole house is filled with the joy of them.
Then you burn your hand pulling the pans out of the oven, and they are not quite how you pictured them. a little cracked, a little wrinkled, and they stick to the bottom of the pan. Yet the smell remains, taunting you with expectations of perfection.

Friends

2010-01-21T17:52:00.000-05:00

My first best friend was in first grade. He was one of the other five new students at my elementary school and the five of us clung together in our new environment. We were automatically misfits in the new school, but we adjusted slowly. I was naturally drawn to one of the other children and he became my best friend. He played hockey and I would go and watch, sitting on the bleachers trying to find him amongst all the other bulkily padded players.
Now, I realize exactly how much time I spent with him, driving to games, watching them, and then going back to his house so he could introduce me to yet another thing designed to scare me. It was with this friend and his brother that I first watched Indiana Jones- I was so scared that I started crying. They taught me my first swear words, amazingly I hadn't learned any from my fourteen year old brother. They taught me how to sweet-talk myself out of situations, and it was their house I went to when my baby-brother was born.
Yet, somehow even after all this shared history and corruption, we grew apart as we grew older. He focused even more on hockey and I made more friends, wanting to hang out with them during recess rather than my one best friend. Eventually, he went to a different school and we didn't keep in touch. But, the other day I saw this friend. He was attending an event at the school across the street from my house, and parked right by my driveway. I was returning home and I immediately recognized him, he looked exactly the same, just about a foot and a half taller. But I was shy, so I didn't say hello, and instead I went into my house, and thought of all the things we had done together back when we were friends.

Speed Dial 12

2010-01-19T21:14:00.003-05:00

I have a friend who by all the usual rules of friendships should not still be my friend. We haven't seen each other in over a year, live a couple thousand miles away from each other, have broken each others hearts more than once, and have that knack of saying exactly the wrong thing to one another.
Yet, in spite of all of that, he's still the one that I turn to when things go wrong. Maybe its just habit, perhaps its because I know that he will always answer his phone, but I don't think the reason that we talk is all that important. Its enough that I still press speed dial number 12 and wait until he answers.

Little Things

2010-01-17T15:53:00.000-05:00

I dance when I brush my teeth. I hate taking things out of the oven. I set my alarm a little earlier than necessary in the hopes that maybe someday I'll be motivated enough to spring out of bed instead of pressing snooze. I hide behind my hair, letting it duck in front of my eyes as I write. I obsess over presents, trying to make them perfect. I remember dates and times abnormally well. I still leap the last few feet between the light switch and my bed. And I am convinced that I am much more unique than I truly am.
I used to be sure that these things somehow define me, but lately I've begun to see that I am the same as so many others. Maybe these little things about me are absolutely insignificant, but I'd like to think they matter a little bit.

Fallen

2010-01-15T20:46:00.000-05:00

I fell down the stairs a couple of weeks ago. My foot slyly slipped out from beneath me, and all of a sudden my right slipper was at the very bottom of the stairs, and I had bumped down four stairs. At the time, I was laughing too hard at my very typical “Lindsay moment” to even feel a twinge of pain. An hour or so later, it was much more evident. However, my friend was coming up to stay with us for a night and I was too excited about his visit to dwell on the pain shooting through my tailbone every few minutes.

It’s been seven weeks now, and my self-diagnosed bone bruise is coming along quite nicely. My only problem is that I can’t sit normally: can’t cross my legs, or really lean back against anything. So instead I’ve had to improvise, leaning on one side or another, bending one knee under the other, or simply laying down on my stomach. Anyways, my real point is that I’ve recently become very grateful for all the things I can normally do, like sit on a chair for longer than ten minutes straight.

Tic Tac Toe Part I

2010-01-13T19:55:00.003-05:00

There is a kid that I see all the time at school. I see him in the cafeteria, and in the library. We pass each other in the hallways almost ever period and do the little awkward half-nod of acknowledgement. He is a little scrawny Italian kid who always wears a Georgetown sweatshirt. I don’t even know his name, even though I’ve asked several people. Some told me it was John, others told me Ian. But, I did not write this story to write about Ian-or-John-whichever-he-may-be. Or at least it’s not to talk about him directly. Instead it’s about a game that we’ve started to play.

I have a favorite seat in the library. It’s on the bottom floor in the first row of books. I sit with the wall behind me and I read in my little enclosed nook. There are other booths like mine scattered throughout the library, but that one is my favorite. I sit there whenever I want to study. It has become my place. It has been my place However on Monday I went into the library to study and found a coat slung over the chair and a backpack placed on the desk. I waited all period at a small table, but nobody ever came to collect the bag or the jacket. Seventh period it was the same, but this time there was unfinished homework beside the bag. So, because I was in a bad mood and really upset that my spot had been invaded, I left a note. It was really nice, courteous and written in lime green pen.

“Hello,” I wrote. “Your stuff has been sitting here all day, but you have not been here. If you wouldn’t mind moving it to another desk, that would be great because this is my favorite study spot. Sorry to bother you, but it would mean a lot.”

I left it on top of the half-completed homework and walked away.

When I returned to see if they had moved their stuff, I was delighted to find that it had indeed been moved, but I was even more delighted to find a tic tac toe board with an x in the middle in place of the homework. At the top there were two words: “apology match?” it said.

I took out a blue pen and wrote, “of course!” underneath the words, then made my move.

Now anyone who has played games with me knows that they should never, ever challenge me to a game of sorry or a game of tic tac toe. I have very little board game skill, as my scrabble skills can attest to, but I am magical at sorry and tic tac toe. So, it was of no surprise when I beat my unnamed opponent.

Mario Party

2010-01-11T16:38:00.001-05:00

So I spent a lot of yesterday playing a wii game called Mario Party with my friend and her brother. the game in itself is intriguing. It involves a combination of a board game type strategy and also the motion sensors that wii games are known for. But, the entire time I was playing, something was nagging me. Yet, I couldn't put that feeling into words.
When I got home I realized what it was. Quite simply it was that I was playing a boardgame on wii. As a self-proclaimed lover of boardgames, that was disturbing to me. It's not only that no one plays boardgames anymore- I mean how many times do you go over to someone's house and pull out the monopoly board. (I must admit that in my fantasy world, this would probably be about every fourth time I saw my friends- the other three times would be made up of playing Sorry, Trouble, and Ticket to Ride.) But even more than my general disappointment at the lack of boardgames in general social situations, it was the fact that I was playing one on a game consul and watching my progress on the television. It was the total lack of boardgameness in the boardgame. It was a farce of a boardgame, and it felt wrong.

Batter

2010-01-09T10:04:00.003-05:00

I walked downstairs to find my dad slyly running his finger around the edges of the stainless steel bowl I had just mixed cookie dough in. I wasn't wearing my slippers so he did not hear me approach, but when I spoke to him, his shoulders hunched up and he jumped a little. When he realized he had been caught, he turned slowly refusing to meet my eyes. I had always assumed he was too proper to eat the batter before it was cooked, but in that moment I understood why he was always willing to clean up the messes I left behind in my baking frenzies. Here he was, age 46, and he was blushing after being caught licking batter from a bowl.
I loved him all the more for it.

New Years Resolution

2010-01-05T21:42:00.002-05:00

This year I vow to read. To devour books, at least once a week, until my mind aches from being too full. I vow to swallow words whole, choking down the long ones and letting the more familiar ones slide down my tongue like velvet-soft honey. I promise to meet as many new characters as I can, inserting myself into their world, befriending them briefly before leaving them heart-broken as I chase after a newer, fresher life. I will find new worlds, forgotten realms, and enter them as many have before. I will witness events, real and fictional, and sail across the world on my private paper plane. I will read.

Quotes From the Past

2009-12-20T19:24:00.001-05:00

I’ve been slowly reorganizing my room over this break. I’m not sure that I have really gotten that much organized, but I certainly have made some great discoveries from the past.

While sorting through some papers, I found a page of inspirational quotes that I had copied and placed in a drawer. Here they are:

“When I was, God was not. When God is, I am no more.”

“Just as certain world religions say that people who do not believe in a personal God outside themselves are atheists, we say that a person who does not believe in himself is an atheist. Not believing in the splendor of one’s own soul is what we call atheism.”

“Love thy neighbor as thyself because you are your neighbor. It is an illusion that makes you think that your neighbor is someone other than yourself.”

“We do not live in our time alone; we carry our history within us.”

Remembering Everything

2009-12-18T22:47:00.002-05:00

He remembered everything: dates of obscure events, where he had put the birthday candles three months ago, all of our friends and relatives' birthdays. he remembered them all.

He used to say he remembered because we had so little time that he couldn't afford to forget anything. I didn't understand what he meant.

The day he came home late, I knew something was horribly wrong. He was never late,never early either, simply always exactly on time. So when the minutes clicked by, I didn't know what to do. I stopped making dinner and tried to call his phone, but it went straight to voice mail. In the end, I simply sat in the dark and waited.

Then came the call. It came to our land line and the shrill, harsh sound had me lunging for the black portable phone I had placed on the hallway table. I listened for a moment , then hung up. I finally understood what he meant.

I drove to the hospital slowly. After all, there was no need to hurry any longer. When I got there, everyone around me was rushing to and fro, jerking back and forth. Their speed was desperate, as I plodded through them to get to the main desk; after all, they had lives to save. I told the nurse in the pink uniform my name and she told me how to get to his room. The doctor would be waiting there.

I walked into the cream wall-papered room, and the doctor was indeed there. "I'm so sorry," he said. "I know this must be a shock. But trust me, he was expecting this to happen any day now." This middle-aged, tired man with a stethoscope around his neck proceeded to inform me that my husband had been suffering from a brain tumor for the past year and a half. He had in fact been coming into the hospital for regular appointments and had recently come to terms with the fact that there was no cure or treatments for his particular situation and that he had a short while to live. He had always known that there was nothing to be done. So he remembered everything.

He remembered because we had such little time together, he couldn't afford to forget anything.

College Applications

2009-11-30T20:38:00.001-05:00

I've been having a lot of trouble writing lately. I didn't know exactly why until tonight. Normally, writing is a way that I reflect upon myself. A little bit of my personality is seeded in each and every post. So, its a welcome release.
But, while writing my college essays, I've been forced to introspect. Not because I'm ready to share a part of myself, but just because I need to show "who I truly am". There is a lot of pressure to reveal myself. Instead of controlling my own pace of sharing, I've been forced to give up control and to answer probing questions with deep responses. And to add to the stress, there are limits. I must describe who I am with and where I come from in 200 words or less. I must explain one of my interests in less than 8 lines. I must dig within myself so much, but tell everything in so little.
At first, I was able to separate my writing for myself from my writing for my applications. But, especially as deadlines draw nearer, the line is becoming more and more blurred. Writing for myself is now filled with second guesses. Is my tone flippant or playful? Can that word be construed as overly negative? Will this help me or hurt me in some way? Will this get me in or not?
That's really the worst thing for me. Writing has always been a positive thing for me. It's been so personal, and its an outlet for me. The process can be emotionally worrying, but the end piece was always good for me- it always helped me. The idea that something that I write can deny me something that I want is new, puzzling, and horrifying.

Christmas List

2009-11-29T08:56:00.000-05:00

My parents keep asking me to create a Christmas list so that they can let family friends and extended family know what I really want for Christmas. so far, I've come up with a list of books on sociology, politics, and economics which admittedly are not the most exciting things to gift, and a list of things that are difficult to giftwrap.
I want fun. I want to laugh until I cry with my friends. I want a weekend that is filled with just doing things that I want to do. I want a teleporter. I want to get into my first choice college, to know exactly what I want from the future, to be able to fix any problem. I want to be not stressed out. I want to be able to sleep for ten hours straight, to grow another three inches, and to fly. I want a moonbounce, a mile high hill of bubble wrap, and my own amusement park. Most of all, I want time. I want to be able to do everything and not worry about balancing time tables and upcoming deadlines. I want to be me.

Confessions!

2009-11-28T14:23:00.003-05:00

1.) I still haven't given my brother a proper birthday gift.
2.) I spent the three dollars I was supposed to use for the bus on coffee.
3.) I am legitimately worried that I have a caffeine addiction, but am too afraid to do anything about it.
4.) I stole my sisters dinosaur stickers, so that I could use them to decorate my locker.
5.) I told my friend to stop cuddling with me while we watched Friends, but secretly I was glad when she didn't stop.
6.) I promised myself that I was only going shopping for gifts, but still bought a pair of pajama pants.
7.) I still leap the last few feet into my bed when I return from turning out the light. Just in case.

Harmony's Paintings

2009-11-26T20:54:00.001-05:00

My grandmother paints. Landscapes of snow covered trees and icy lakes flow from beneath her wizened hands like water through a funnel. Her actions look care-free, a flick of the wrist, a dab of the brush. But her face displays her focus, a wrinkle appears between her perfectly painted eyebrows, and a soft bite of her lip. She mutters to herself as she writes, a mixture of Korean and English and words that I am not sure even exist.
My grandmother's paintings hang all over her house. They sit under sheets in her garage waiting for the finishing touches of her thin frail wrist with its thin horse hair brush. Yet, her sight has gotten worse and worse over the years. Now, each brush of her stroke means intense pain, headaches. Her hands tremble, further blurring the lines of her acrylic oil paint. Her scenes are more misty than clear and sharply focused. Yet, they are just as beautiful and lonely as they ever were.

German Embassy

2009-11-25T20:26:00.001-05:00

On my way to school, I used to pass by the German Embassy. I would go up to the gate, my uniform skirt and maroon jumper swaying in the faint dusty breeze that blew down the road. I would call out to the guards, and they would come over and wish me good morning. Teasing me with conversation before finally getting what I wanted: The big stick. It must have been over a foot long and weighed at least five pounds. As a five year old, I had to bend my knees and jump up when I released it to make it fly over the pointed fence and into the vast yard before the stone steps leading to the actual embassy.
They would go into their guard house and bring it to me. Then the taller one would whistle, the sound echoing loud and piercing over the grounds. The barks sounded immediately and within seconds the three German Shepherds would be at the gate in front of me. I would stare round-eyed at the massive beasts before me, sticking out a hand so that they could sniff and lick at it. Then I would bend down and retrieve the stick, throwing it over the gate and watching as they stampeded to catch it before it hit the ground. Most of the time they would bring it back—dropping it just inside the gate where I could reach through the bars and grab it, stroking the winners thick dark mane before stepping back to heave it over the fence again. But occasionally, a fight would ensue. They would snarl and snap at one another, each trying to protect the branch from the others. I would stand just outside the gate, my face pressed between the bars, terrified that they would hurt one another. Then, I would try to whistle them back to me, back to safety. I was not loud enough. I could not purse my lips and emit that screaming demand that the tall guards in their house could. But, I tried every time.
Now, whenever I whistle I think of them. The tall guards and their friendly teasing and the massive thick-haired beasts with whom I never tired of playing.

Thanksgiving in Poughkeepsie

2009-11-24T21:14:00.001-05:00

Thanksgiving in Poughkeepsie is like entering another reality. It is a softer place, a slower life where the background is the sounds of Cartoon Network and the foreground soft blankets imported from Korea and pancakes and bacon for breakfast.
The time table is different here. We hardly ever leave the two story house, except to go to the arcade,play tennis, or get food. Instead, we live in a cycle of eating, sleeping, and napping again.
However, this year I have to break that cycle. I am spending the next three days writing short essays about myself. I am to search my soul and past experiences for reasons that I am who I am today. I will be fighting off cliche phrases, my usual flippant tone, and all urges to curl up and fill the deep sleep deficit that I have accumulated in the past week. So the pace is still slower here, the smell of bacon permeates the background. Yet, this year I will not be sleeping all weekend or watching endless hours of television. So to me, it really just doesn't feel like Thanksgiving in Poughkeepsie.

Tiger

2009-11-22T20:12:00.000-05:00

At my sister's school, the children were all asked to paint a self-portrait for their upcoming Arts Night. The idea was to hang the paintings so the parents could admire them and later buy them from the school.
All the children were excited. My sister kept talking about using "real canvas." And so the project started. Paints and thick brushes were rationed out, and each child stood before an easel.
The teacher started walking around about half an hour into the furious painting session. She glided past her tiny students, complimenting a color choice here, a facial feature there. She got to my sister and stopped.
"Grace, we are painting self-portraits. Why are you painting a tiger, she asked?"
And my sister replied, "I'm painting what I would look like as a tiger."
I have never been more proud of her.

Name a Time That You Made Someone Cry

2009-11-19T09:06:00.003-05:00

Like most girls, I was engaged in first grade. He was my best friend. One day, he opened his lunchbox, handed me an oatmeal raisin cookie, and solemnly told me that if I said yes, he would let me eat his oatmeal raisin cookie every day. It was an easy decision. I said yes.
And he kept his promise. That month was full of cookies. But, as all things do, it had to come to an end. As word of the cootie epidemic infecting boys spread among us girls, I realized the danger I was in. I made the very difficult choice to break if off with my cookied fiance.
It was rough. He cried. I gave him a sip of my Berry Blast Capri-Sun to calm him down. Then, being careful not to touch him and catch the dreaded cooties, I dropped a home-made cootie catcher into his palm and walked outside for recess.

Scrambled Eggs

2009-11-15T13:55:00.001-05:00

My sister and I have a word that we use to describe mixed feelings. We call it feeling “scrambled eggs.” It seems like the perfect word because you start with a raw ingredient, yourself, then you smash it, mix it up, whipping it around and around until it is unrecognizable as that original perfect orb of yolk, protected by the clear white. Then you add some salt, tarragon, rosemary, and milk, put it in a pan, push it around, and a couple minutes later have something completely different, but yet delicious.
Lately, I've been feeling a lot like this. I can sense that I have changed quite significantly since last year, and probably even since the beginning of school just over two months ago. Yet, because I still am created out of most of the same ingredients, it has become difficult for me to define myself, or even sense how I've changed. But, I know that something is different. So, yes, I acknowledge that I am scrambled eggs. I just need to know what to do next.

Words Upon the Crocuses

2009-11-14T20:57:00.001-05:00

I just read one of my old journals. The book itself is quite beautiful. It's a spiral bound notebook, with a yellow background upon which crocuses have been printed. The words and images inside... are not quite so beautiful.
My first impression upon reading the stories and thoughts that I imprinted forever upon the pale lilac pages was sadness. The words were all so impassioned, fiery and angry. I had rants against hypocrisy, secrets, and general injustice. Each word is a dart, designed to pierce the reader, the person who it is written about, anyone who will listen. While, perhaps not the most useful way to bond with one's readers, the hunger for a solution, an answer, and end to all the wrongs I could find in the world was enthralling. I don't think I have that same passion now. Partially because I believe it was grown out of a deep naivety about the world, but also because I believed that my writing the words would make a difference. I thought that perhaps, I, in some small way, could make a change, just by writing.
Now, my writings are smaller in scale. But, they are more relevant, more recent, more realistic in scope. But, yet, there is a large part of me that calls out for the passionate little girl with fire in her eyes who believed that her words would change the world.

November Tenth

2009-11-10T08:59:00.001-05:00

Each year, this day, November 10th, is always the day that I feel most conflicted. It is my adoptive father, Andy's, birthday and therefore the night is devoted to a huge family dinner, presents, and cake. However, it is also the anniversary of my biological mother's death.
My mom died twelve days after my sixth birthday. She had been sick for several months, and had been in and out of the hospital for chemotherapy treatments. That day she had been in the hospital, and my soon to be adoptive parents had headed to Delaware to celebrate my adoptive father's birthday. They were apparently called back to the hospital before they even reached Delaware.
I don't remember very much of that day. It was a regular school day as far as I remember, but the moments shortly before 3:15 will forever be imprinted in my mind. All of us, the students in Ms. Benson's first grade class that is, were waiting to get in line to be dismissed. We had a rule where we couldn't go outside to be picked up until after the bell rung, so there would inevitably be one or two minutes of pandemonium and whispering in line after we had collected our lunch boxes from the plastic blue storage boxes. We were anticipating the bell, and I in particular was waiting for it to ring so I could go outside, when my name got called over the intercom. "Lindsay Elliott-Foose, please report to the main office. Lindsay Elliott-Foose, please report to the main office." No explanation, no nothing. So with a nod of her head, Ms. Benson sent me off. I almost skipped down the hall, went out the stairs, and into the great hall- the vast expanse of linoleum flooring that stood in between our library and the front doors to school. But, as I started click-clacking my way across the tile, I saw Andy and Tina, the couple we had been living with while my mom was in and out of the hospital sitting on the blue carpeted stairs. Tina was crying, and as I slowed down, I knew something was wrong.
That is all that I remember from that day and much of that period of my life. I vaguely remember her funeral, there are patches of memories of crisp fall leaves and people speaking about Veronica, who I suppose was my mother. But, I didn't think about her as Veronica, she was my mother. She was mine. And all of a sudden she wasn't there any longer.

What is the single moment you've been the most happy?

2009-11-05T22:36:00.000-05:00

When I was younger, it was always my older brother, my mom and I. But, when I was six my mother died of cancer. My brother went to live with his father in Chicago, and I was adopted by two very close family friends. Because of a strained relationship between my mother and my brother's father, I hardly got to see my brother. I saw him for a weekend maybe once or twice a year. I think it was my fourteenth birthday, although it could have been my thirteenth.
As was tradition in our family, my birthday started out with pancakes and syrup. But, then everyone seemed to disappear. My brother had a soccer game, my mom and dad both had errands to run. It was a Saturday, so there was no school; and I didn't know how to react to this absence of ceremony. On one hand, it was nice that there was not a lot of fussing and reminiscing about all the cute things I did when I was younger, because I really do like my birthdays to be quiet affairs. On the other hand, it was my birthday: It was supposed to be special. So, I sat in my room trying to puzzle out why it all felt so anti-climactic until I finally decided that all birthdays were a bit anti-climactic so I shouldn't worry about it too much. I then went downstairs to watch some television.
Sometime during my vegging out in front of the TV, I heard our front door slam and a man's voice call my name. The voice sounded a little like my dad's but was slightly different. I couldn't put my finger on whose voice it was, however, but turned around when I heard footsteps coming down the stairs. When my brother turned the corner to walk into our play room area, I honestly couldn't think. I jumped up, tipped over the arm rest of the couch I had been cuddled into and ran over to hug him.
I think that was the single moment where I could put my finger on exactly what I was feeling- pure shock and happiness.

Another Dose of Confessions

2009-10-28T14:22:00.006-04:00

So, it has been a month since my last series of confessions, I figure it's about due time for some more.
1.) I didn't order my little brother's birthday present until today- his birthday was on the 24th.
2.) I may have contaminated five of my friends with the flu.
3.) I have been avoiding talking to someone for three weeks simply because I don't want to cause a confrontation when I finally do talk to them.
4.) I received a text from one of my friends who is graduating from college this year. In it he told me that he was proposing to his girlfriend this weekend. I didn't respond for a couple of hours. When he called to ask why, I said that I hadn't had service and just received his text. That was a lie. Really I just had to control my urge to text and inform him that he can't because we are destined to get married.
5.) I killed a bug when I easily could have thrown it out the window.
6.) I went to school this morning even though I was under quarantine.
7.) I spent ten minutes today having a competition with a friend over who could make the best cookie monster sounds.
8.) I was the one who made a pterodactyl noise in the library. However, it was my friend that made the mandatory T-Rex roar reply.
9.) I did not recycle the 3-D glasses we used for "Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs." Instead, I smuggled them out in my panda bear sweatshirt, and wore them for Spirit Week.
10.) Instead of cleaning my room this past weekend, I simply stacked all of my papers together and stuffed them in a folder, my clothes in the laundry hamper, and all other miscellaneous items in a sports bag which then got placed in the closet.
11.) I made my brother, who is recovering from Hernia surgery, laugh so hard that he bled... I still don't know what I said that was so funny.
12.) I have not eaten real "dinner foods" for the past six dinners. Instead I have had a bagel, a cupcake, cheetos, a lemon popsicle, eggo waffles, and edamame.
13.) I talked to a telemarketer on the phone last Thursday. Instead of letting him start his scripted speech about whatever he was selling, I told him it was my birthday but I was too sick to go to school, so I felt like it wasn't being celebrated. He then wished me a happy birthday. I thanked him. And hung up. He didn't call back, I feel like it was his birthday gift to me.
14.) I may have been the one that ate the last of the prosciutto. And maybe it was the same prosciutto that my sister had wanted for lunch. But just maybe.

Desks

2009-10-20T09:03:00.001-04:00

There are these desks in the library at school. I like to hide and work on them whenever I need to escape the eroding pressures of the outside school world. They are made of smooth wood with a silky finish and they are raised on both sides to give one more privacy. Those edges tower over me as I sit here slumped over trying to write.
Each desk has a small silver plaque engraved with the name of the person who donated it, and so I sit, and in the slightly padded rocking chair and think about who on Earth would donate a desk. I mean a library, an auditorium, or a classroom, certainly. Please go ahead and publicly acknowledge me as a donor- but a desk? I'm not sure that I would want my name to be on something so utilitarian, or something so abused with doodles, love notes, and general graffiti. Frankly, I would be hurt if my desk got desecrated in such a way.
So, anyways, I am now sitting at one of these desks, trying to block out the slight noises and rustlings as well as all the emotional pressure just being in this building around me with loud techno music. I slump down to write this and rock back and forth, back and forth, in the slightly padded rocking chair trying desperately to not think of anything.

Talents I Wish I Had

2009-10-18T15:15:00.001-04:00

I wish I had the writing talent to paint images with the stroke of a ball point pen on a piece of fresh lined paper. That I could mix my metaphors the way that DJ’s mix beats, underscoring the heartbeat of the piece, and harmonizing with the storyline. I wish I could somehow relate my feelings with the rounded capitals of my handwriting, and that I could express the exquisite beautiful sadness of a salty tear gliding down a smooth cheek.

Not so elementary my dear Watson

2009-10-06T20:47:00.002-04:00

Sometime between lunch and right now, (approximately 1:35 PM), a big blue stain has found its way onto this page. Upon the conclusion of my Political and Philosophical Thought class, I turned to a fresh new page, and placed my notebook in my dark blue L。L。 Bean bag. When I took it out, there was some sort of amorphous being's blue imprint upon the previously pristine page.
Worried, I have checked my bag many times to make sure that nothing is leaking, and therefore destroying my other possessions, but I haven't seen any other signs of anything dripping blue. On closer inspection of the blue blob, I saw that it looks a bit like a frog's body imprint, so I again searched my bag- this time looking for the slightly slimy muscular body of a little frog, but I again failed to find a culprit. For now it is simply a mystery, and I will leave it at that, for now at least.

Would You Call Yourself Grown Up?

2009-10-05T17:17:00.001-04:00

I used to think that there would be some point in my life at which I would realize that I was grown up. But then when I reached, 6th grade, 8th grade, age 16, basically all the stages of my life during which I thought I would finally be "all grown up." Yet, I wasn't. I still felt something was missing, that I wasn't done yet.
I used to try and think of all the ways that I would know that I was old enough, that I was done developing. I thought maybe when my feet stopped growing, I would know. Yet, at the end of fourth grade I felt that I still had further to go. So maybe it was once I stopped growing taller, but I still felt incomplete at age fifteen. Perhaps it was once I knew what I wanted from life, when I first cried myself to sleep over a boy, once I spent a significant amount of time away from my family, when I got to high school...
But, it hasn't happened yet. I haven't reached the point in which I am completely comfortable and satisfied with myself. Yet, maybe that's the true proof that I am grown up. The fact that I am able to look back and see how I've become who I am, and can admit that I still have a long ways to go. So, really I don't know. I may be done, I may not. But, I'm okay with that at last.

Scene from the Metro

2009-10-03T09:30:00.000-04:00

At the end of a hard day-
slumped against the doorway
collared shirt wrinkled slightly
revealing a surprisingly blue contrast
to coal skin, tinted and highlighted chestnut, honey and caramel

people step over him,
unnoticing, unmoved by his predicament
nowhere to go and no one to help
I see his clothes have been washed recently
and he is barefoot by choice
his toes stretched out
his newly bought loafers dangle in his left hand
dwarfed by the power in those muscular arms
and delicate wrists

nobody sees his chair
balanced perfectly on one leg
supported by a body full of grace
the people swarming around him
screaming nonsense words into phones cradled like babies

his eyes
just too tired to open
his body
too dejected to respond to the madness
he sits with the cup by his outstretched foot
his sign reads "Help."

Inspiration For A Rainy Day

2009-10-02T09:10:00.001-04:00

Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You’re off to Great Places!
You’re off and away!

You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself any direction you choose.
You’re on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the guy who’ll decide where to go.

You’ll look up and down streets. Look’em over with care. About some you will say, “I don’t choose to go there.” With your head full of brains and your shoes full of feet, you’re too smart to go down a not-so-good street.

And you may not find any you’ll want to go down. In that case, of course, you’ll head straight out of town. It’s opener there in the wide open air.

Out there things can happen and frequently do to people as brainy and footsy as you.

And when things start to happen, don’t worry. Don’t stew. Just go right along. You’ll start happening too.

Oh! The Places You’ll Go!

You’ll be on your way up!
You’ll be seeing great sights!
You’ll join the high fliers who soar to high heights.

You won’t lag behind, because you’ll have the speed. You’ll pass the whole gang and you’ll soon take the lead. Wherever you fly, you’ll be best of the best. Wherever you go, you will top all the rest.

Except when you don’t.
Because, sometimes, you won’t.

I’m sorry to say so but, sadly, it’s true that Bang-ups and Hang-ups can happen to you.

You can get all hung up in a prickle-ly perch. And your gang will fly on. You’ll be left in a Lurch.

You’ll come down from the Lurch with an unpleasant bump. And the chances are, then, that you’ll be in a Slump.

And when you’re in a Slump, you’re not in for much fun. Un-slumping yourself is not easily done.

You will come to a place where the streets are not marked. Some windows are lighted. But mostly they’re darked. A place you could sprain both your elbow and chin! Do you dare to stay out? Do you dare to go in? How much can you lose? How much can you win?

And if you go in, should you turn left or right…or right-and-three-quarters? Or, maybe, not quite? Or go around back and sneak in from behind? Simple it’s not, I’m afraid you will find, for a mind-maker-upper to make up his mind.

You can get so confused that you’ll start in to race down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace and grind on for miles across weirdish wild space, headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.

The Waiting Place…for people just waiting.

Waiting for a train to go or a bus to come, or a plane to go or the mail to come, or the rain to go or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow or waiting around for a Yes or No or waiting for their hair to grow. Everyone is just waiting.

Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for wind to fly a kite or waiting around for Friday night or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil, or a Better Break or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants or a wig with curls, or Another Chance. Everyone is just waiting.

No! That’s not for you!
Somehow you’ll escape all that waiting and staying. You’ll find the bright places where Boom Bands are playing. With banner flip-flapping, once more you’ll ride high! Ready for anything under the sky. Ready because you’re that kind of a guy!

Oh, the places you’ll go! There is fun to be done! There are points to be scored. There are games to be won. And the magical things you can do with that ball will make you the winning-est winner of all. Fame! You’ll be famous as famous can be, with the whole wide world watching you win on TV.

Except when they don’t. Because, sometimes, they won’t.

I’m afraid that some times you’ll play lonely games too. Games you can’t win ‘cause you’ll play against you.

All Alone!
Whether you like it or not, Alone will be something you’ll be quite a lot.

And when you’re alone, there’s a very good chance you’ll meet things that scare you right out of your pants. There are some, down the road between hither and yon, that can scare you so much you won’t want to go on.

But on you will go though the weather be foul. On you will go though your enemies prowl. On you will go though the Hakken-Kraks howl. Onward up many a frightening creek, though your arms may get sore and your sneakers may leak. On and on you will hike. And I know you’ll hike far and face up to your problems whatever they are.

You’ll get mixed up, of course, as you already know. You’ll get mixed up with many strange birds as you go. So be sure when you step. Step with care and great tact and remember that Life’s a Great Balancing Act. Just never forget to be dexterous and deft. And never mix up your right foot with your left.

And will you succeed?
Yes! You will, indeed!
(98 and ¾ percent guaranteed.)

Kid, you’ll move mountains!
So…be your name Buxbaum or Bixby or Bray or Mordecai Ale Van Allen O’Shea, you’re off to Great Places!
Today is your day!
Your mountain is waiting.
So…get on your way!

By the great Dr. Seuss

How Do You Listen to Music?

2009-10-01T18:46:00.001-04:00

I have two modes when I listen to music. One is my jumpy mode where I just want to inhale as much music as possible, and I skip to the next song before the first one is over. This mode can be frustrating for others, but I generally at least let the song get to the chorus before I skip. The second mode is repeat mode- the one in which I can listen to a single song more than thirty times in a row.
Lately, I've felt that my life has been on repeat mode. Instead of moving forward, I keep repeating the same mistakes over and over again. I feel as if I am just going through the motions of my life, without really moving forward with passion. And as I keep going through these days of monotony, I know what comes next. The song will just keep repeating each day, a chorus of conversations that are all the same, a slow movement of the journey home and perhaps a sweet guitar solo for when I am able to be done and have some time to myself to do whatever I wish with. But then, inevitably the song will have to fade away into my dreams and the next day it will repeat again.

Sick

2009-10-01T10:10:00.002-04:00

I am sick. As in 3 boxes of tissues a day sick. As in the feeling of my brain having been liquidated in a microwave and then slowly dripped out of my nose.
There is this slight buzz in my head that distracts my focus whenever I most need it, and everything somehow seems off balance and slightly more dull and grey than it usually does.
Music and caffeine have had no effect thus far, but my next plan of action is to sleep more than six hours every night this week.
So, off to nap, I don't think even I could handle more complaining. But on a closing note, if I wake up and still feel like I do now, something will be hurt.

Which Kitchen Appliance Are You?

2009-09-30T18:26:00.001-04:00

I recently have started reading Sarah Myers McGinty's blog on college essays. As an example of an extinct supplemental essay she asks the question, "If you were a kitchen appliance, which would you be?" I immediately knew my answer:
If I were a kitchen appliance, I would be a blender. A simple, clear blender with sharp blades protected by a rubber safety stopper. I am the type of person to whom you give a straightforward idea, and I will mix it up, add a pinch of something another little pinch of something else and turn up with something new. A blender is simple and easy for everyone to use, you just push a button and voila, something smooth, perfectly creamy, and new.

Birthday Cards

2009-09-29T06:49:00.002-04:00

My mom was really good with birthdays. She kept a bunch of cards in a weathered blue box in the closet, so that she would be prepared whenever a special occasion arose. As a result, I now have the fifty-odd cards that were left behind. Strangely, I can't bring myself to part with them.
It's weird how certain insignificant things can become so meaningful. She had already written on one of the cards, but for some reason had never sent it. By now, her signature is already worn into a smooth indentation from my tracing it over and over again.
Even the ones that she left alone, stiff cards in plastic wrappers, sit in the same light blue filing box. Try as I might, I can't bring myself to use them. So they lie untouched, each yellowing envelope lying flat against the next glittering painted face, faces that grow older and further removed from her as I do.

Original Confessions

2009-09-28T13:34:00.002-04:00

I've had this plaguing feeling of dishonesty following me everywhere lately. Its nothing literal like the cloud above Eeyore's head in Whinnie the Pooh when he's upset, it's more just a general nagging that keeps telling me (in a voice very similar to my mother's) that I'm hiding too many things about myself. So here is a dose of confessions for you all:
1.) I haven't been really studying in the library lately, I've just been hiding there in order to avoid what happens outside.
2.) I forgot my little brother's birthday and planned to go to a party that night.
3.) I lied and told one of my friends that I couldn't make it to her house because I had too much homework- it was really because I wanted to talk to a guy on the phone.
4.) I've started walking the three miles home, just so that I can delay the time when I actually have to be home.
5.) It was I who ate the last cheese bagel this morning.
6.) I did not fold my laundry and put it neatly away this week. Instead, I stuffed it into a miscellaneous drawer.
7.) I misspelled "heel" yesterday and wrote it "heal." I did not notice until today.
8.) I laughed when I heard that my half-brother's father had his leg karate chopped by a segway scooter.
9.) I still sometimes hold my hands up with my thumbs out to check which way is left and which is right.
10.) I had a diet coke today even though I am trying to limit my caffeine intake.
11.) We watched a short video in Science today of a pride of lions attacking an elephant. I was rooting for the lions.
12.) I used a thesaurus to make my paper on Aristotelian Ethics sound more sophisticated.
13.) I lied today and pretended that I had left something in my locker, just to have an excuse to get out of an awkward situation.
14.) I think College Humor is funny.
15.) I don't ever follow my own advice.

Well, that's all I have for today. I'm thinking about making this a weekly staple- a combination of both a reflection of my own faults and the smallest insignificant details of my life. Surprisingly, this made me feel a little bit better.

Pictures

2009-09-22T08:15:00.002-04:00

Everyone who has ever tried to take a picture of me knows that I hate them. Think about your feelings for Monday mornings, seeing that the coupon that you were planning to use expired yesterday, an unexpected visit from your mother-in-law, that moment when you realize that it's about to pour and you don't have an umbrella, and every single time that you've burnt you tongue on too hot coffee. And if you imagine all those little gems of hatred somehow melted together into one ultra-violet concoction of pure odium and you get close to my hatred of pictures.
This abhorrence stems from several things. One is that I have a really round face, so I tend to look about five in all pictures. I also always seem to be blinking or talking in all pictures, so that my mouth is either gaping like a fish gasping its last few breaths of air, or my eyes are half-way closed in a blank kind of meditative state. But, besides being one of the unfortunate few that never have an attractive picture taken of them, it's the idea of pictures that I balk against. How can a picture possibly tell you everything about a moment? How can you capture the sunset's soft breeze in a single snapshot? How can you decide which is the best angle? Whether something should be taken in black and white or color? How can you find a single point on which to focus? Photography is beautiful as an art form, and yeah it can be helpful in remembering an event, but I do not believe it is the only way to pass down the memory of a person or event for generations. I say instead, tell stories, write poems, compose songs. And for the person that wanted me to take more pictures of myself, I will. But only because it is you that asks.

10:12 PM

2009-09-21T22:12:00.001-04:00

Here are the main points from today's English class on Kafka's childhood:
1.) Was Kafka a babe?
2.) How did Kafka's childhood shape his outlook on life?
3.) Don't you just want to cuddle up to Kafka?

Thank You Notes

2009-09-18T14:22:00.001-04:00

I received a thank you note yesterday. It was from my cousin who had stayed with my family and I for ten days in August. She had typed up a quick letter and mailed it to us, but it was so thoughtful. She had told us several times how grateful she was for us having hosted her and shown her around DC, and she had even brought us gifts from England. So, as far as dutifully polite gestures of gratitude go, she was covered. But yet there was something extra special about this note. Maybe it was that it had come by mail as opposed to e-mail. Maybe it was because she had signed her name on it with pen, as opposed to just typing out her name. Maybe it was because of the slight whiff of formality that was involved. But, whatever it was, it was very sweet of her.
There are some days where I am very aggrieved that we as a society have primarily given up on formal letter writing as a mode of communication. Yes, it is not instant, you can't send videos through a letter, and you have to pay the ridiculous sum of 44 cents per stamp. But, at the same time, there is something about getting mail and something extra personal about seeing someone's actual handwriting while they are writing to you. So, yes, this year I will be writing personal thank you notes to everyone, and maybe even a few casual letters in between.

Peas

2009-09-16T19:12:00.003-04:00

My sister and I got in a tiff the other day about setting the table. It started because I was super tired and worn out from my school day, and she was tired. But when I'm tired, I get really quiet and defeated, and she just gets defiant.
So, anyways, she had requested peas for her vegetable dish at dinner, and so I asked her to set the table. She ignored my request. I asked her again, but she still ignored me. Finally I took the peas off the stove top and said I wouldn't continue to cook them until she set the table. This was her revenge:
1.) She set my place with both the hello kitty place mat and the matching plate.
2.) She gave everyone but me a napkin.
3.) She told me that "Mommy was going to sit next to her tonight...[instead of me.]"
4.) She turned on her sing along music loud enough to be able to avoid talking to me.

I did not finish cooking the peas.

Tubing

2009-09-14T14:43:00.002-04:00

Can there really be any task quite as satisfying as washing a stainless steal bowl full of the last few scrapes of Betty Crocker brownie mix?
Why yes there can! You can eat said brownies four hours later on a motorboat on a beautifully sunny and lightly breezy Sunday afternoon. Now class, can anyone guess what I spent yesterday doing? Correct. I went to a family friend's house and spent a beautifully relaxed two hours on his motorboat. Anyone who hasn't been tubing in their lifetime (or the past few weeks) you should do it. Now.
It was wonderful. At first, there is this irrational tug of fear as the boat pulls away, leaving you alone in the water on top of some sort of rubber and fabric concoction designed to push your life jacket up your neck until you feel as if your life preserver has rebelled and is trying to choke you. Then there is the moment when the tube tilts upward a little and you first start skimming over the water. That's the moment when you start thinking, "why would I ever want to subject myself to this dangerousness." And then you're flying and bouncing over the waves and there's no more thinking. No more fear. Nothing, but the insane urge to smile and laugh. It doesn't matter how far out you are from the boat, it doesn't matter that the water you're in is a dull, murky brown color, or that your hair will surely dry in wet salty slicks. All there is is you getting dangerously close to flying and falling, and you fly on and on, until... CRASH.
The proper way to fall off a tube is to try and get your limbs and appendages to go in as many directions as possible. Ideally, it looks as if you did a corkscrew in the air, and you absolutely must be absolutely gasping for breath when you're done. then you must get back on the tube, (if you can, I must admit that I failed on that count) and try again.

9:33 AM

2009-09-14T09:33:00.000-04:00

I am a horrible, horrible blogger. And I sincerely apologize to anyone who may be following this blog at some point, not that I know if there are religious followers or not. But through my internet connection with you, whoever you are, I apologize.
I started the school year with plans to blog every day, even if it was just a few lines about whatever I was doing that day, but, somehow the days slipped past me and instead of it being September third when I next logged in, it had somehow turned into September 13.
So, once again, I am so sorry. I will try harder to earn your trust, dear reader (s?).

Five Months

2009-09-13T22:38:00.002-04:00

How can it have been almost half a year since I got back? I keep trying to remember what I did this summer, but, as it usually does, the summer just appears to be a blur. There are, of course, days that I remember distinctly, and I'm sure if I looked at a calendar I could tell you what days I was working, what days I was in England, what days I was college visiting, etc., but I just find that in comparison to last year, life seems so ordinary. I can actually walk down my street and not see a single other person. If I choose to, I could spend an entire day indoors lying down underneath my window air conditioner unit on my bean bag chair. I don't go through a guide-book every week looking for new places to go, and checking off places that I've already been. I didn't have any three-week long trips carrying only the things I could fit in my backpack. My problems consist of deciding where to go study during my free periods or trying to figure out how to best maneuver the DC bus system to get home sooner, instead of having my bike stolen, again.
But, as much as life back home seems very, very VERY tame, I've come to see the charm in it. It's nice to have my mind filled with more manageable things like friendships and thinking about installing a lock on my door so that my sister can't just barge in, rather than worrying about how I'm possibly going to experience all of Beijing in the next five months. I absolutely love having a bed that fits the entire length of my body, (an therefore having warm toes all night), and it's pretty sweet to see my little brother and sister every morning, as well as to see my friends every day in the hallways.
So, although I'd still jump on a plane to Beijing if given a half second opportunity, I must say, it's nice to be home.

Do You Still Make Superstitious Wishes?

2009-09-01T09:08:00.001-04:00

I was once told that if you made a wish during the first day of a new month, it would come true exactly one year from the date that you had wished for it. The catch was that you could only have one wish per year come true. For instance, I could wish today for a pony, but if on December first, I wished for a Lamborghini, that wish would cancel out my pony wish and I'd have to wait until December 1, 2010 for my luxury car.
So, I used to wait all month until the first day of the new month and think about what wish I would want to come true in 365 days. So, I would think and think and finally decide on the perfect wish, but then as soon as the second or third day of the month rolled around, I'd think of something new and even better that I wanted, and I'd go through the whole process again.
However, today I know exactly what I want this time next year. What is it? Well, if I told you it wouldn't come true now, would it?

11:03 PM

2009-08-31T23:03:00.000-04:00

There is a cricket in my room. It's chirping over and over again. Unfortunately, I can't find it. I can only hear it. It must be a large one too, because the sound of its wings brushing against it's legs is very drawn out and piercing.
I wish I could find it. Then I would be able to throw it out the window. Although, I'm sure it would fight with it's chirping to the end, just to show me who was boss.
I hate this cricket. It woke me up. But, if I were to go down into the basement to get the cricket traps, I would wake my parents up. So, therefore, by the same rules of cause and effect that prompted me to get the traps, they would be entitled to go get Lindsay Traps and throw me out the window.
Enough, I'm going cricket hunting.

What's The First Time You Remember Being Intentionally Cruel

2009-08-28T21:06:00.001-04:00

I remember when I was eleven or twelve and had persuaded my brother to embark on an arts and crafts project with me. I knew that my mom had been stressed out because of work, and so we decided to make her a gift. For reasons that I can't recall now, my brother picked out a mirror with a wooden frame and handle for us to paint. Because I was painting with a younger child, it took us a while and an enormous amount of paint-dripped -on newspapers. But, finally, finally, the painting was done and we just had to wait for the paint to dry.

The last day was the hardest for me. I so wanted to see my mom smile and just be happy at us. So, I was about to go upstairs to wrap the gift, when my parents sent my little brother into the next room and sat me down in our living room. They then proceeded to lecture me. They told me that I read too much, and that my school work was being neglected as a result. I just sat there and listened, and thought how it was so unfair that they had to tell me this now because I couldn't possibly give my mom the mirror now because it would seem like an excuse. I couldn't give her the mirror later because it would seem like an apology, and I was NOT going to apologize.

Eventually, they were done talking to me, and I slid up the stairs to my pink-carpeted room crying silently. I curled up on the floor and cried for a couple minutes, and then went into the bathroom and wet a towel with cold water to put over my eyes. I wanted to look strong when I confronted them, not just like a little girl with a red nose and a tear-inked face. Then, checking that my eyes were dry so that I wouldn't smudge the ink, I selected a black sharpie marker from the top drawer of my arts and crafts bin and wrote the words "I guess it's not all reading..." on the back of the light brown frame of the mirror.

Later, my dad found me curled up defiantly in our linen closet, thinking of all the ways that I could fight them in the future. When I refused to emerge from my angry den, he came in and sat with me, and somehow persuaded me that what I had done was "wrong and hurtful" and "in no circumstances appropriate." Then he uttered the sentence that I find most unfair: he said, "but we still will always love you." I hate that sentence, it puts an end to all arguments, because, face it, how do you fight back against that? But I never fought back directly against them, or let them know how angry they made me at times.

To this day, I regret letting go of that passionate defiance more than any words I may have written in sharpie.

Strep

2009-08-27T16:19:00.001-04:00

On Friday, my sister got diagnosed with Strep throat. My little brother felt really ill Sunday night, so my mom took both my brother and I into our family's pediatrician's office to get tested as well.

I'm never quite comfortable in our doctor's waiting room. It's more than just being the oldest and tallest patient waiting to be seen. I tend to feel as if I have stepped into a disinfectant commercial. You know, those ones in which they show a child touching the phone, or the doorknob, or petting the dog, and then the cameras zoom in to show larger than life, cartoonish-looking germs covering whatever surface the adorable child had just put their hands on.

My mind pulls the same trick at the doctor's office. I look over at the pile of books, the rolling school bus replicas that play jingly songs when you pull on them, the cute little primary-colored rocking chairs. But crawling all over these surfaces is a layer of armies upon armies of bright red and orange germs just waiting to attack my already handicapped immune system. Needless to say, I'm always relieved to step into the more sterilized room sin which the doctors actually see you.

I'd have to say that I'm always a little embarrassed to be a 16-year old at the pediatricians. It's not that my doctor isn't great, it's just that it can be a little awkward to be asked about my sex life as a 3 year old screams in the next room over. Also, the mothers tend to point at me as I get lead away by some nurse to have my height measured against the giraffe poster in the hallway and whisper to their children, "Don't you want to be brave like the big girl?"

I have to fight temptation every time I hear this whisper not to turn around and tell the kids, "Hey, don't worry. I cry a little every time they put that huge Q-tip down my throat, the room spins every time I get my blood taken, and I hate these damn paper robes you have to wear. But, come her, I'll tell you a secret; all of it is worth it for the grape Popsicle you get later."

PS. All three of us have strep.

Starbucks in the Rain

2009-07-23T14:29:00.001-04:00

People pass by holding newspapers on their heads, sides of cardboard boxes, as well as umbrellas decorated with college names, company logos, and wide garish stripes and designs. Under covered verandas outside of stores the smokers stand; Huddled in the rain, as the gray smoke mixes with the sweet grey rain.
The coffee steams silently, syrupy shadowy shapes emerging from the 90% environmentally friendly cardboard cups and people run by, trying to outrace the thick layer of fog covering all of us. And I sit, looking out the huge glass window in front of me, staring out at the guy glancing in at me. And as the pair of people next to me start chatting, I turn up my music and glaze over as the drill of the rain beating the sidewalk drowns them out. And so perching on the edge of an armchair, I wait for the sky to stop crying and allow me to continue on my way.

A Story From Grace

2009-07-23T14:11:00.001-04:00

Once upon a time, there was a family in the jungle. They had a hut. It was small and one day they were walking in the jungle when suddenly they stopped. They stopped because a lion was coming in their direction. So, they ran and ran and ran and ran and ran until they reached their little hut. And when they got there, they slammed the door.
THE END

Taxi Driver

2009-06-16T21:57:00.001-04:00

Somewhere amidst the tangled trails of Beijing’s hutongs their lives a taxi driver with thoughts far wiser than those that are expected of him. He works seven days a week, and holidays are his busiest times of the year. He travels in the crowded bike lanes, weaving in and out of pedestrians and bikers, deftly avoiding accidents, spreading confusion in his wake. He is worldly, all his opinions, facts, and frequently used statistics inherited from the small black radio embedded in his dashboard. The static voices issuing from within are his conscience, his sayings, and his informants.

In clumsy, fumbling Chinese I ask what the thinks of the news. He takes his time and responds slowly, checking my expression in his rearview mirror to see if I understand, “There are too many problems.” Curious, I ask him about these problems, and am rewarded with a shrug, and straining to hear what he is muttering into his canteen of hot jasmine tea I hear the word “American.” Picking up on the problem, I lie and tell him that I’m from London, and I’m studying abroad for the year. Evidently these words soothed any fears he had about expressing his opinion about America to an American customer, and immediately he responded with relief as his attitude gets far sunnier. He asked how I liked Beijing so far, and I tried to communicate my instantaneous love for the city, with its quirks, history, size, style, and diversity, but much of this was lost in translation. After hearing me talk about all the pleasant aspects of the city, he seems startled as I try to explain that I’m worried about what the growing gap between the rich and the poor could do to the magnificence of the city. He sucks in a quick sip of tea and then immediately spits out that “Beijing may have problems but it’s not nearly as bad as America,” with all the authority of a man who had lived in America for all his life. In response to my questioning look, he enumerated some of America’s faults: the poor healthcare system, homeless people, war, the failure of the government to help the less fortunate members of the society, the precarious situation of the economy, the complications of the political systems, and the overall lack of a united American identity. I listen carefully and attempt to explain that I agree that that all of these are problems, but does he really think that the problems facing the Unites States are much worse than the problems facing other countries, after all most places have problems. He shrugs and sadly, he shakes his head with the truth of the statement, “yes,” he says, “yes. Everywhere has problems.”

Later on, in an adventure that takes me to the end of the block to buy money for my phone, I pass by children with worn clothing full of holes, old women squatting by the curb to discuss the latest gossip, a faithful wife pushing her legless husband in a wheelchair, trash littering the sides of the streets, street vendors trying to sell their wares to the innocent looking foreigner, and businessmen darting by in their slick BMWs, averting their eyes from the urban scenery around them. The city is riddled with migrant workers attempting to make enough of a living to support loved ones back home, population control has caused a surplus of elderly people relying on their children to support them in their old age, families are getting smaller and smaller, and the population of educated children is growing smaller every year, leading to a labor shortage. The smog is sometimes so thick it completely veils the mountains only 50 miles away, but it cannot cover up the truth that is written in the souls of the people, yes this place has problems. But then again everywhere has problems.
Somewhere amidst the tangled trails of Beijing’s hutongs their lives a taxi driver with thoughts far wiser than those that are expected of him. “Yes,” he said, “yes. Everywhere has problems.”

Home

2009-06-15T21:46:00.002-04:00

What does being home feel like? It feels like being made into scrambled eggs, somehow mixed and mashed into something completely different, yet made with the same ingredients. Re-emergence into America was the natural pull of gravity along the fault lines of who I became while I was away, and I slowly dripped back into life as I knew it. But something is different; there are nights where I wake up and look around for my Hello Kitty clock and the cramped, cozy quarters of my Beijing room. There are days where all I want to do is hop on a plane simply because once I reach Beijing I’ll know who I am again. And then there are days where a song will play, I’ll see an old friend and it’s as if I never left.

How My Mother Murdered My Fish

2009-05-19T03:07:00.001-04:00

The day started out innocuously enough, I came home from school completely exhausted but yet excited because I had less than a month before I went home. So, I managed to drag my 30 pound backpack home (not an exaggeration, my backpack weighed 13.7 kg. I measured) I let myself into our front doorway of our apartment building, said hello to my next door neighbor as she met me on the stairs on her way to go grocery shopping. Then let myself into my host house as quietly as I could. My host mother was hovering in the bathroom over something in the sink, so I went into my room, dropped my bag and switched into my ridiculously fuzzy house slippers from my plastic alphabet flip-flops, then went to the doorway of the bathroom and said hello to my mom. Normally, these little discussions when I come home are filled with mindless chatter about our days and the weather, etc. But, today when I said hello, she jumped about a foot in the air and quickly snatched something out of the sink and hid it behind her back. Laughing at her expression, I asked her to show it to me, so she did, her face crumpling slightly. As she pulled a clear jar out, I quickly shrieked and backed away. It was my fish, Xiao yu, flipping up and down spastically. “What’s wrong!” I cried grabbing the jar from her. My poor little goldfish continued to flop as though it had been electrocuted in the beautifully transparent water it was submerged in. I tried to scoop it out of the water to deposit in its normal habitat, (a uninhabited container that used to hold a tarantula), but quickly drew my hand back as my poor little fish bit me. “Bad fish! Bad fish!” my mom started chanting at him (I actually don’t know the gender of the fish, but had decided that it was boy), as she looked at my small gaping wound. “I didn’t know fish had teeth,” I told her. “Of course they do, how else would they eat?” she responded. I looked at her for a second, trying to decide whether I should explain about turtles, because they do not have teeth. But I decided that trying to save my rapidly dying fish was much more important than winning an argument in Chinese, for the moment at least. But as we both turned to look at Xiao yu and saw it was too late. He was belly-up. Later, after she had disposed of Xiao yu, I worked up the courage to ask her what had happened, my little fishy had seemed perfectly fine when I had left that morning. “I cleaned his water,” she responded. “And…?” I questioned, after all it wasn’t a complicated process and chances of injury to Xiao yu were minimal. We simply captured him in a corner of his tank and drained two thirds of the water out and then added more tap water to fill it up to the rim. ”Did you drop him?!” I accused, staring from her to my poor dead fish and then back at her. “No, no, no.” She assured me, and then held up a small packet. I leaned in to look at it, and after a minute or two of having to translate characters I saw that it was a water purification packet, the chemical filled little packets that clean all traces of bacteria out of the water so that one may drink it without fear of any diseases. As I stared at her dumbfounded, she murmured “I used this.”

Spring Study Trip-Day 5

2009-05-12T11:07:00.000-04:00

nce again the day started with sore shoulders and backs, because of the hard wood beds, and rooster crows ringing in our ears. I stumbled out of bed, and tripped down the narrow stairs to let our host family know that we had to leave at 9. Then went back upstairs giddy because the rain was so moist that you could almost taste the rain that was sure to fall soon.

I packed my bags up again, got changed, and went downstairs to be met with a lukewarm pot of noodles and egg. Tired of eggs after pretending to be a vegetarian for two days, I ate as little as I could without being rude, and vowed to gulp down an apple as soon as we were away from their house. Then , I said goodbye to my nice, if somewhat distance, host family and walked to the bridge where we were told that we would be busing rather than hiking out of the village because the trails were too muddy.

So we watched a ceremony welcoming other villagers into Dadilong for a festival, and all screamed when they set off fireworks a few feet from us and ran, still covering our ears from the waves of villagers that came up to our group offering us more of their home brewed alcohol as a parting gift.

After boarding the buses, we settled into a terrifying three hour drive around twisting hills at least a hundred feet above any soft landing surface. On previous occasions, our driver had proven to be aggressive and fond of driving faster than any other cars, including the bus that was supposed to follow behind us. Mr. Bissell had asked him to drive behind the other bus for our ride to Leishan, where we would spend the night, but the request did not slow him down much.

Normally the fact that our driver was absolutely bonkers would not register with me, because by the time we reached any sort of main highway I would be knocked out by Dramamine, but we had run out, so I was actually aware of my surroundings. But we did get to our lunch destination safely, and later to Leishan with no incident.

The last stretch of the trip was filled with rockslides and construction, resulting in us having to wait about 40 minutes for dump trucks to shift away all the smashed up boulders scattered on the road, but we finally got to Leishan, and more importantly dinner.

Dinner was, once again, not that delicious, besides an absolutely amazing chicken dish. We were all a little wary when they put the dish in front of us, as it looked like a plucked chicken put into a bowl or broth. We were all too apprehensive to try it, and Julia, the vegetarian at the table, just stared at it with Bambi eyes so large that we all had to laugh. But then George jammed his chopsticks into the drumstick, tasted some of the meat, and pronounced it to be “actually good.” This started a feeding frenzy among all of us that only ended when the chicken was no longer recognizable as any sort of meal, only as polished bones.

After attacking the chicken, we got up to stretch our legs, and walked into the town. This small venture ended in everyone sucking lollipops with glow-in-the-dark sticks on the bus ride to our hotel, and playing with bouncy balls, half of which were immediately lost, no doubt to be found later by small Chinese children.

Poem of a Migrant

2009-05-12T00:11:00.002-04:00

A cracked window frame
Spider webs sweep the corners
White paper has been used to conceal stains on the old wall
A bed, a table, a light
My home!
I will not say it is desolate; I will not say it is too dark
Look…
Books in a profusion of colors sit on the table
I read beneath the light
Hoping in this way to begin
My dream
I will not say it is endlessly remote; I will not say it is too far
See…
The lighthouse in the sea from the book is guiding me
The shore is waiting for my arrival
All is silent
My house
Only has lamplight dark dusk, but it illuminates so far, so far

A Poem created by Hou Lijie, a migrant woman working in Beijing

Spring Study Trip-Day 4

2009-05-11T03:09:00.000-04:00

Dadilong Fields

After our fishing expedition, we rested for a little, met with the local village party secretary and returned home. As it was not quite dinner time, I went up to my room, hoping to write a little. Being unsuccessful in that goal, I went down the stairs to try to persuade my family to let me set the table. My host dad saw me and seemed excited, although it was difficult to tell due to his very stoic nature, but I said hi.

“Come see.” He said, drawing me over to their huge white tile sink with a hand on my shoulder. I looked down to see four large fish swimming around in circles, “oh pretty!” I said, smiling at him and naming them Sammy, Franklin, Cooper, and Jinks in my head.

“Yes. We’re going to put them on the coals, okay?” He asked rhetorically.

I can only nod. I don’t usually see the food in its pre-cooked stage.

“Pick which one you want,“ he encourages holding a large one up. “This one?”

“Whichever one is smallest” I reply choking slightly on the words. Poor Sammy.

Spring Study Trip-Day 3

2009-05-10T03:09:00.000-04:00

Kaili to Dadilong village

Astoundingly after awaking to the prospect of an 8 hour bus ride to the village we would spend the following two nights, I was not altogether entirely eager to get the day started. But I packed up my stuff and got on the bus, swallowing some Dramamine as Mr. Bissell came around with it in it’s little orange prescription bottle. As is characteristic of any bus ride involving Dramamine, the trip passed in a blur of my head banging against the window, rest stops, and our tour guide’s voice.

We finally arrived at the large village, 12,000 people or so, of Dadilong. Greeted by a chorus of singing girls, we waited until they stopped before crossing the ornate bridge entrance into the village. This turned out to be unfortunate for us, because, in order to enter the village, one must drink some of their home brewed alcohol. By lining up to enter the village, we had made it much more difficult for us to sneak past the children trying to force the alcohol on us.

So we entered the village and climbed up to the village’s main meeting area to be given to our host parents. Stephanie, my roommate for the trip, and I were abandoned for a while with the boys while a local village child went to fetch our host parents, who, apparently tired of waiting for us to arrive, had gone back to their house for a brief siesta. But, eventually, they were located, and we went home with our elderly host father to meet his wife and twenty-something year old son. However, I must admit, our brother’s motorcycle was fore more interesting than he was, and we just stood gawking and admiring it as we stepped into the tiled foyer/ dining room/ sitting room of our house.

After depositing our bags in our two-bed bedroom, I walked around the village, played peek-a-boo with a little boy dressed in an army outfit, saw the local elementary school and had dinner with our family. (Although, after seeing the meat dishes of pork fat and chicken head, I told my family that I was a vegetarian, and ate some eggs and rice.)

Then, Steph and I changed into sweatpants to protect ourselves from the growing flocks of mosquitoes and went up the winding steps to the village’s central square. There, we came across Chris, our vaguely teddy-bearlike classmate, making monster sounds to scare the children that had gathered for our bonfire. This, of course, inevitably led to a mass tickle fight between the supposedly more mature and adult SYA kids and the Dadilong five to twelve year olds, which of course they won due to their superior numbers and the fact that they soon realized that we really weren’t that frightening. So we settled down with various troops of children, singing to them, telling jokes, and generally being adored.

And thus the evening was spent in front of a bonfire, being clung to by little children, and listening to the villagers sing to us in eerie beautiful voices.

Spring Study Trip-Day 2

2009-05-09T07:10:00.000-04:00

I woke up at 6:30 to the previously befriended group of people all sitting on my bed playing cards. After briefly considering taking back our established friendship because they were crushing my feet and mashing me against the side of our compartment, but after realizing that I didn’t know how to say “revoke our previously developed friendship “in Chinese. So instead of trying to figure it out, I just lay in the narrow bunk bed, considering how much our compartment was like a small dark cave, and curled up in the corner.

After attempting to fall asleep for about two hours, I finally gave up and stared reproachfully at the woman sitting on my left ankle, grinding it into the slightly padded metal of the bunk beneath me. My repeated wishes for them to leave were apparently heard by someone, because eventually they all got to their feet, putting their cards in their square bulky bags, and trundled off the car. So with the new relative silence that settled onto the car, we started our card game once again.

Our playing spree was briefly interrupted by a visitor from a few bunks down coming to talk to us. He was perfectly friendly and sat across from me and asked us questions. Unfortunately he had quite a thick accent, making it difficult to truly understand everything he said, so I simply nodded and smiled when I didn’t know what he was saying. This turned out to be quite unfortunate though, when minutes after I thanked him for warning us about earthquakes, Annie bolted up in bed and told me that he had not mentioned earthquakes. Instead, he had told us to watch out in Sichuan because some people might want to kidnap us and sell us as brides.

Spring Study Trip-Day 1

2009-05-08T03:11:00.000-04:00

I’m sitting on the train somewhere between Beijing and Guizhou. We have been sitting on the train for about six hours, but amazingly I have not gotten bored yet. I think this is primarily due to Becca, Annie, and my five hour poker game. We used Annie’s various meds and receipts and my matches as chips, resulting in the highest value poker chip always being remembered as an Imodium in my mind. I ended up winning our very long, although I must admit that was primarily due to luck and not so much skill.

Life on a train is still something I’m not sure that I’ll ever be able to actually enjoy. It’s just far too personal to have a complete stranger sleeping about a foot and a half away from me. I’m always terrified that I’ll talk in my sleep or fall off the narrow bed or something equally embarrassing.

The three men opposite me are actually pretty-nice guys. They have really thick accents when they speak Mandarin, but are patient with my Chinese and the long response time to questions that I need to decipher their questions and then think of an appropriate response. But, besides when talking to us, they converse in a dialect I have never heard before. We invited them to play cards with us, but they refused because we didn’t know the same games. So, instead they invited their friends over to their bunk opposite the three of us. There they stared at and discussed us with a curiosity generally reserved for endangered animals or Smithsonian exhibits until the lights went out and we all scrambled to get into out proper beds.

Another Sister

2009-04-03T17:27:00.000-04:00

I am actually trying to complete an assignment we were given by our English teacher. We were told to keep a daily journal on our two week trip to Sichuan and Guizhou provinces, and then to write a two page paper about something interesting we learn. It seemed like this would be a fairly easy assignment; after all, I learn so much on every trip we go on. And indeed I have learned a lot already—I have learned about the Dong minority group’s customs; I have learned about singing in the village of Dadilong; I have learned things about my classmates I wish I had never found out; and I have learned about our class dynamic as a whole. It is not a lack of new information that is causing me trouble; instead, it’s the fundamental lack of depth within that pool of information, and the utter lack of uniqueness. Half of our class learned the same things I did about the Dong people, the singing is so ethereal it is impossible to give words to, and I really don’t want to fill up two pages with SYA gossip, no matter how amusing that may prove to be to my English teacher. I am left looking for is an amazingly unique experience that I can learn something about myself from. So while I sit wallowing in all my crushed dreams for this paper, I am interrupted by a small bump of something against my left white and orange Nike brand sneaker.

I look down and see a pink rubber bouncy ball. Looking at the girl who has frozen, I slowly, as if trying to move within the presence o f a small woodland animal, get up and walk slightly stooped to crouch down and pick up her toy. She looks frightened, but I just say softly in Chinese, “is this yours?” She looks confused and so I repeat the question in the clearest tones and accent I can manage. Finally she shakes her head spastically, a motion I take to mean no. But as I straighten up she starts nodding. Confused I bend back down, ignoring my still exhausted calf muscles. “What’s your name?” I ask softly not wanting to scare her off. She just looks at me confused, her big brown eyes wide and blank. I try again, “How old are you?” She just stares, so I try a different approach. I hold up my fingers in a symbol for five and look at her with my head cocked to one my side. She shakes her head firmly this time, and holds up three fingers. “good” I say switching to English since she clearly doesn’t understand me, and smiling. She smiles back and looks at the ball cupped in my hand. I throw it swiftly against the wall and she looks after it. “Go on, go get it, go get it.” She runs after it and brings it back with a delighted peal of laughter.

Yes I am playing fetch with my host sister, and even more surprising than that, it’s pretty fun for both of us. She slowly gathers confidence and starts to trust me and then I realize she is not dumb or stupid, she’s just too young to have been to school. Thus, she hasn’t learned Mandarin yet. Soon she is jabbering away in the language of the Miao people of Gaoyang village, tugging on my hand and pulling me around to see her family’s fields. Explaining first in her language and then with complicated hand motions and gestures. She shows me the fields, her room, her brother’s bike, their dog, their new born kitten, the basketball courts. Slowly she tires and I pick her up and carry her home, laying her down on my bed to sleep. Looking down at this little slightly dirty exhausted girl that I will always remember as one of many sisters I have had on my trips. The lesson I was supposed to seek out on this trip bursts from behind my frustrations like the tempting fifty cent firecrackers we have been forbidden to set off. You don’t need to speak the same language to communicate, clear conversations aren’t necessary to form friendships, sometimes its simply a shared game of fetch.

Chinese Bakeries and Future Plans

2009-03-29T03:13:00.000-04:00

Chinese bakeries are like toy commercials, or movies about teenage dancers trying to “make it” in the big, bad, super competitive world. From every outward angle they look appealing. They have colorful wrappers on the food, uniformed Asian girls trailing you around the store, and commercials with bright eyed children and deep voiced announcers. Of course due to the nature of chocolate and sugar here, the treats are never as good as they appear. There is something fundamentally missing in their weird eclectic mix of flavors. Plus, the treats they have themselves are very strange. They have a variety of cakes with weird syrupy fake fruit flavorings, dry cookies which always trick you into thinking that they’ll maybe, just maybe, be delicious this time, and simply awful fake imitations of cheesecake.

The reason that I write about strange Chinese bakeries is that being in China has given me the strangest ideas. I play this game with myself where I ask myself if I had unlimited time and if money were no object whatsoever, how would I spend my years. Over the course of my time here, I have come up with several things that I would like to do. My most absurd one is to be a Disney princess at the Disney resort in Hong Kong, because they clearly type cast their characters and I think I could pass the type casting considering that I am a tall white girl who can speak both Chinese and English reasonably well. Another idea is for me to come back to Beijing as some sort of teacher. But my greatest idea right now is for me to set up a bakery in China, one with real things like cupcakes and brownies and real cookies, perhaps even real cheesecake.

Jianshui Pathway

2009-03-10T03:33:00.001-04:00

To find paradise, you can go to the Chaoyangmen Gate in Jianshui, Yunnan, and turn down an alley filled with hump-backed old ladies speaking intelligibly as they cook tofu squares on miniature grills, small children pulling on sleeves asking for money, and smoke-filled shadowy rooms inhabited by wizened older people with wrinkled skin smoking through bongs almost as large as their own shrunken frames. Eventually you will emerge from this shadowed underworld, onto some train tracks. Take a left and walk along the tracks, past dirty alleyways, piles of trash decomposing, and people walking their mangy miniature mutts, you come to a gap in the brick on your left side. Enter this gap and take a second left, walk past the three broken doors, through a narrow brick doorway, and look out upon the absolutely heavenly sight in front of you.

The minute I stepped through the brick entrance, all I saw was an orange-sorbet colored expanse of water across which you could see the Chaoyangmen gate, faint illuminated signs of bars, and vague low shadow buildings. While the scenery across the water was absolutely breathtaking, the narrow path itself that connected the train track passageway to the rest of Jianshui was also spectacular. I stepped out further onto the narrow cobbled stone passage and realized the other side was also surrounded by water. Giving the avenue not only an amazing beauty, but also a sense of adventure as walking along it gave me the feeling of being in one of those video game where you have to maneuver fast enough to reach your destination in time, butif you fall of the edge your character lets out an echoing squeak and falls of the screen.

I sat down in my new found spot, jotting down notes about it and trying to figure out how I could possibly find a way to pack it in my suitcase to brign home to enjoy at free will. The air was pleasant with a light breeze and in the silence I listened to the sound of a Chinese man singing opera in a low rumbling tone somewhere in the distance. His tones floated across the pomegranate sea towards me as the ripples emphasized the beauty of the foreign words being sung, even as they drifted up to collide with the bats fluttering overhead

Talking about Japan

2009-03-09T17:20:00.000-04:00

The dinner routine always starts with their knock on my door. I always say “come in” but they never do, they never even open the door, it’s reassuring but in a sort of lonely way. As if they were those children which smile from a distance but are too shy or nervous to actually interact normally with you. But by now, I’ve learned to ignore the implications behind them never entering my room, and the actions are so routine that we don’t even think about them; we all know where we’re supposed to go, what we’re supposed to do, and how we’re supposed to interact with the rest of the family. While my father puts the food he has made on our stovetop burner into dishes my mother cleans off the table. Then they come and they get me, I always mutter softly that I’m going to wash my hands, then I come out of the small bathroom and fetch the stool for my father to sit on. Then they bring out the food and we wait until my father finally sits down and complains about us waiting for him.

This routine is repeated every night that I’m home for dinner and the conversation during dinner is varied. Some nights it’s common day talk about school and work, and others we discuss the news on the television. Throughout the course of the past six months, we have discussed many topics during these discussions, but there have always been a few topics we have skirted. These include Communism, whether or not the news is biased, and the Japanese. So when faced with an assignment in which talking about the Japanese was essential, I was a little worried about having to approach the subject. I had in fact talked of racism towards the Japanese before, but my mother’s methods of brushing me off and distracting me from the subject proved so effective that I never brought it up again.

“So…” I said slightly awkwardly, alternating between looking at our television set and my bowl overflowing with homemade noodles that my host father had set in front of me. “We’re reading Red Sorghum in English class.” But this feeble attempt was only rewarded by a nod conveying recognition and nothing more. “I think it’s very interesting,” I continue softly, “have you read it?” My father shakes his head with his mouth full of noodles and my mother just looks at me vacantly. “Well have you seen the movie?” I try more desperately. “Yes,” said my father, his crinkled face suddenly more open than before, “I liked it.” But I hear the catch in his voice that it always has when he’s not being entirely truthful, only polite. So I decide to be trickier.

“What did your friends think of it?” I say looking innocently at the orchid plant that my mother received at Chinese New Year. I start counting each individual bloodshot wilting flower, the red veins standing out vividly against the pale yellow background of the soft petals, as he gathers his thoughts. “They said that it actually had very little to do with the book,” he says absentmindedly stirring the salty sweet cocoa colored sauce that we put on our noodles. “Really, that’s strange, I would expect a movie to try and follow the book’s story,” I say inquisitively cocking my head to the side in my normal gesture expressing curiosity. He nods slightly, putting his left elbow on the table, his tawny hand going up to rest against the side of his leathery face. He slowly turns so that he’s looking at the television, dismissing me in his normal gesture meaning “back off.”

Trying another tactic, I ask, “Wasn’t the movie done by the same person who directed Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon?” knowing that I am wrong, but that if I say an incorrect fact, my host mother won’t be able to help correcting me. And she doesn’t disappoint. Almost as soon as the words are out of my mouth, she leans forward with that half worried half triumphant expression on her face that she seems to always have around me. “No, Ailin that was someone else. Didn’t you see Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon?” she half mocks half crows, glad to have caught me in what must be about the seventieth mistake of the day. “Actually I didn’t.” I say facetiously, glad to be able to wipe that smug look off her face. She frowns and leans down over her bowl to shovel more of the delicious noodles into her mouth. I don’t know what’s been going on between us lately. She’s normally so nice and sweet, but the last month she’s had a new obsession. Normally, this would make me happy because I think she stays in the house too much, but the new obsession is catching me making mistakes.

Glowing slightly from the victory of finally beating her in a round of her new favorite game of Criticize the Lindsay, I use the advantage of finally drawing her into the conversation to ask about how they feel about Japanese people now. “Oh, we don’t have problems with them now. We don’t like it when they move here and buy up the houses, and I don’t buy Japanese products, but we don’t discriminate against them.” My body which was minutes ago curled up with my heels on the soft yellow padded seats of our kitchen chairs and my back against the pleasantly chilled walls freezes in its plaid pajama pants and uniform shirt. Is she being serious?

“Wait, you boycott them but don’t discriminate?”

“You forgot the ma, Ailin. You always forget a ma.” She chides, trying to keep from grinning.

“Mama, this is more important than whether I forgot a ma. You don’t think that by discouraging Japanese people from moving her and buy refusing to buy their products you’re not discriminating?” I say trying to at least sound impartial.

“Yes, I do. I’m not protesting, or saying bad things about them. I’m just making my own choices.” She says her voice a little higher than normal. Recognizing the danger signs, I concede victory to her. I am a guest in their house; it is not my right to argue with them. “Okay, Mama, you’re right. When you say it like that, I can’t disagree. Of course you have the freedom to decide not to buy things made in Japan.” Inside I’m shocked, and I hate myself a little for not standing up for my own views. “Their house, their house, their house…” I chant in my head. This is my strategy whenever I need to stop myself from fighting with them as if they were my real parents, as if the bond between us would be strong enough to hold all my opinions and all their denials.

I stand up and push my chair in carrying my bowl and chopsticks into the kitchen, starting our clean-up routine. I smile wanly at my host dad as I go into my room. I know there will be no more talk of Red Sorghum or Japan tonight.

New Year Preparations

2009-03-08T06:36:00.000-04:00

The sheets have been changed and washed and the curtains torn down, soaked in lilac smelling soap and hung out our window to dry. Spring Festival paper cuttings and fortune signs have been put up on windows, doors, and my house is overflowing with oranges, leaving their sweet sharp smell floating out the window into the frostbitten air. We’re preparing ourselves for the New Year, cleaning, cutting, and buying gifts. Almost overnight, stands selling fireworks have sprung up from the cracked sidewalk, and signs with the character “福“，meaning fortune or prosperity have been placed upside down above every visible door frame. The foot bridges crossing the long four lane streets have been inhabited by people selling red envelopes with gold lettering on them, stuffed red cows with gold horns, and paper cuttings called “window flowers.”

My host parents have started the preparations for the Chinese New Year by whirling around Beijing in a mad dash of helping their parents get ready for the holiday, cleaning our house from the hello kitty clock on my bedroom wall to the bright orange couch in our sitting room. This cleaning is similar to “spring cleaning” in the states, it is an act representing cleaning out the old to welcome in the new. In addition it insures that the house is sparkly clean for the visitors that visit during the week long holiday. These visits include gift-giving and lots of good wishes for the New Year, as well as the tradition of giving red envelopes to children. For those of you who are familiar with the red envelope, you know that the adults give children small, red envelopes filled with money. This money is free spending money for the children, and it is often used during the first few weeks of the New Year, when the sites are colorful, there are special types of food that only come once a year, and the sales in stores are fantastic.

In preparation for the season of gift-giving, the stores in Beijing have gone absolutely bonkers; it’s basically the equivalent of Christmas in the States with maybe a pinch of Black Friday mixed in. There are major sales in every store and the peddlers on the streets with their goods either piled high in their bicycle carts or with their wares spread out on sheets in front of them. The bridges are filled with people selling everything from DVD’s to CD cases to completely unremarkable jewelry to pots and cookware. Purple signs claiming fifty percent off sales have been placed in store windows, and flower stores are overflowing with baskets and pots of flowers to bring as gifts.

There are also fireworks, tons and tons of fireworks all the time. For the past week, I have been hearing fireworks from just after sundown at around seven at night to around eleven. The booms echo past the full moon and explode as if they were right in front of my low first story window. A law was passed saying that fireworks cannot be set off within the second ring road, or what used to be the walls of the old city. However, I live in between the second and third ring and so they set them off in the bricked courtyard of my apartment building. The smaller ones leave trails of paper strewn across the floor as they crackle in the sky, but the larger ones leave their empty shells and the boxes covered in strange animals in front of exploding stars in different colors.