or, a secret peek into shannons night life:
read ee cummings poetry from my prized possession, the complete works of ee cummings. wish i had someone to share it with when i find a beautiful poem. have no one, so fantasize what it will be like when someone cares that i found a poem that made my soul collapse. reconcile self to the thought that maybe no one will ever care.
mark off where i have been in the wonderful book 1000 places to go before you die. while marking, plan trips to germany, greece, and anne frank's house. consider getting in my car and driving across america, but too cold to get out of bed.
read about radiohead on the internet. research arcade fire and their affiliation with the church. look at beck's art work online and wonder if he really believes in scientology.
wikipedia things i want to know more about that i wrote in the margins of my notes during class. previous searches: earlobe functions, gender difference in latin america, zoot suit riot, fox news and animal language to describe migrants, modernization theory, child prostitution in thailand, lead poisioning, dandruff and its causes.
watch snowboarding videos such as white balance. remember back on times when i used to be cool and reconcile myself to the fact that i will probably never be cool again.
ride my bike at 2 am. its cold at that hour, i probably don't recommend it.
see how many times i can listen to one song in a row before i get so sick of it i never want to listen to it again. i probably have the highest tolerance for repetition you have ever seen. watch beyonce irreplaceable on youtube and feel liberated from malekind.
write family newsletter emails to my whole family that describe the things i learned in school that day and end with sincerely, the prime minister of the world. ally mehner now refers to me as prime minister of the world in her daily conversations.
listen to music while lying upside down with my feet on the bed and my head on the floor. i like doing this while i eat laffy taffy and drink diet soda. i also like doing this when i am depressed.
write poetry that you will never read because i will never show it to you. consider sending poems i have written about various people across the world to them, realize this is bad idea and remove idea from head. as a warning, i write a poem about every new person i meet, so if you are reading this i have probably written a poem about you. i hope that terrifies you.
do reading for school, only never assigned reading. only reading that is due much later in the semester and that in no way will benefit my education at this point. i also read stuff from past semesters, that will not benefit me grade wise either.
buy stunna shades online.
get depressed about the state of humanity.
decide i am going to help the world. resolve to be more productive tomorrow.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Thursday, January 24, 2008
why i am glad i am not perfect.
sometimes by around 5 30 when i have been on campus since 9 i look at myself in the women's restroom mirror and this is what i see: eyeliner smeared around the corners of my eyes, jeans that have become perpetually baggier as the day has worn on, greasy hair that is frazzling in interesting ways, usually with greyish roots since my real hair color is called stray cat grey by most color charts, clothing that doesnt match nor seem to fit my body correctly, and a new zit forming on my lower lip. i have never been one of those girls that always look perfect, with flawless skin, coordinated ensembles and a sassy smile, and even if i try real hard, i never will be. i am not sexy. i am just a mess.
beyond the fact that i am a physical mess, i am an internal mess too. i am never on time. i always seem to crinkle every paper i own. no matter how often i vacuum my car, there are always crumbs on the floor. i say the wrong things at the wrong time. sometimes i forget to read my scriptures. sometimes i exercise, sometimes i dont. i am opinionated, loud, introverted and extroverted at the same time, emotionally unstable, and care way too much about everything. i wear unsexy costumes at halloween. i love diet dr pepper and i drink way too much of it all daily. i encourage chevron employees to fulfill their life dreams and acquire tattoos of hearts with wings. laffy taffys are my favorite food group. i lose my wallet 6 times a day.
in the official kingdom of marriage also known as provo, perfection seems to be the ideal. sometimes at 6 30 am, i look outside into the snowy darkness, and there are four girls out running in 9 degree weather. i know girls with 4.0s that have never missed a class in their lives. I know girls that always look perfect, never daring to step out of the house without their foundation and mascara on. i know girls that pretend they dont fart. i know girls that would never consider seeing an R rated movie, never consider thinking an ill thought of someone else, never admit they are sad or angry or occasionally cuss in their heads or say something that would hint at them being anything but perfect people that come from perfect families and do perfect things and think perfect things and act in perfect ways.
i used to want to be perfect. i used to think in order to trick a man into loving me, i had to be perfect. i used to think being righteous meant being perfect. but one day, while downing 32 oz of diet dr pepper while wearing orange mesh shorts some like to describe as my lesbian shorts, i realized it is all one big fat lie, and that being perfect will land you in a mental institution or on mass amounts of antidepressants. NO ONE is perfect, and being a good person does not mean being perfect, or even working on becoming perfect. the problem with being perfect is that perfection like what i am describing is not REAL. REAL people are not perfect, and people that put on the pretense of being perfect are not facing reality. perfection is a big hoax based far too much on everyone else's opinion and holding in your gas at all times. the problem with perfection is there are always people that are going to be more perfect than you. so if you don't figure out something else to be, you're going to end up almost perfect with another perfect person beating you out for prom queen of perfection. you're going to end up with pneumonia because no one should run in 9 degree weather. you're going to never experience what its like to say what the hell and miss your class so that you can go jump in mud puddles with your galoshes on. you're going to end up with an eating disorder, because not everyone is naturally thin and gaining weight is part of life and it happens to everyone. you're going to end up trapped in a box of perfection, desperately attempting to cover up your imperfections so no one finds out your secret that you are a real human being. you're going to end up living all the rules of religion, without ever figuring out why you are living them or what the real meaning of being like Christ is. you're going to end up thin, accomplished, poised, polished and absolutely miserable.
I think this quote probably sums up my thoughts on the matter perfectly: "but nothing important, or meaningful, or beautiful, or interesting, or great, ever came out of imitations. What is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself. More difficult because there is no zeitgeist to read, no template to follow, no mask to wear. Terrifying actually, because it requires you to set aside what your friends expect, what your family and co-workers demand, what your acquaintances require, to set aside the message this culture sends...and then look, everyday, at the choices you are making, and when you ask yourself why you are making them, find this answer: because they are what I want, or wish for. Because they reflect who and what I am" (Anna Quindlen).
I am not, in any way, promoting being mediocre. I think it is good to strive, to work, to long, to push yourself. But I think that all of these things need to be done in reality, by real people. And I think that because a person wears a bikini or isn't super woman and cook and clean and get straight A's and aspire to be the best homemaker and relief society president and iron their sheets everyday and never have emotional breakdowns or says something bad about someone else, doesn't make them not righteous, or not good, or not a fabulous person. I think it just makes them REAL. I think we probably all need to give up this quest for perfection, and start on the quest for progression. We need to face reality, we need to accept ours and others flaws, which are sometimes not even flaws, but just idiosyncracies that make us individuals. We need to realize that really we are just commanded to love and that is what brings us to God, not wearing perfect clothing or exercising perfect amounts or smiling perfect smiles. We need to embrace our individuality, our unique identities, and enjoy being a mess, and use that mess to become more loving, more beautiful people. I will never have perfect eyeliner or get up at 5:30 AM to read my scriptures for three hours a day. i will never be prom queen of perfection, and neither will you, and I am FINE WITH THAT, so I think you should be too. I am glad I am a mess. I am glad I can chew with my mouth open, laugh too loud, fall asleep in church, admit that I suck at several things and eat like I'm four years old, have opinions other people don't agree with. I am glad to be me and not someone drowning in nonreality. I am glad I left the cage of perfection, a free bird in mismatched clothing singing the praises of imperfection. it's a much better way to live provo, i promise.
beyond the fact that i am a physical mess, i am an internal mess too. i am never on time. i always seem to crinkle every paper i own. no matter how often i vacuum my car, there are always crumbs on the floor. i say the wrong things at the wrong time. sometimes i forget to read my scriptures. sometimes i exercise, sometimes i dont. i am opinionated, loud, introverted and extroverted at the same time, emotionally unstable, and care way too much about everything. i wear unsexy costumes at halloween. i love diet dr pepper and i drink way too much of it all daily. i encourage chevron employees to fulfill their life dreams and acquire tattoos of hearts with wings. laffy taffys are my favorite food group. i lose my wallet 6 times a day.
in the official kingdom of marriage also known as provo, perfection seems to be the ideal. sometimes at 6 30 am, i look outside into the snowy darkness, and there are four girls out running in 9 degree weather. i know girls with 4.0s that have never missed a class in their lives. I know girls that always look perfect, never daring to step out of the house without their foundation and mascara on. i know girls that pretend they dont fart. i know girls that would never consider seeing an R rated movie, never consider thinking an ill thought of someone else, never admit they are sad or angry or occasionally cuss in their heads or say something that would hint at them being anything but perfect people that come from perfect families and do perfect things and think perfect things and act in perfect ways.
i used to want to be perfect. i used to think in order to trick a man into loving me, i had to be perfect. i used to think being righteous meant being perfect. but one day, while downing 32 oz of diet dr pepper while wearing orange mesh shorts some like to describe as my lesbian shorts, i realized it is all one big fat lie, and that being perfect will land you in a mental institution or on mass amounts of antidepressants. NO ONE is perfect, and being a good person does not mean being perfect, or even working on becoming perfect. the problem with being perfect is that perfection like what i am describing is not REAL. REAL people are not perfect, and people that put on the pretense of being perfect are not facing reality. perfection is a big hoax based far too much on everyone else's opinion and holding in your gas at all times. the problem with perfection is there are always people that are going to be more perfect than you. so if you don't figure out something else to be, you're going to end up almost perfect with another perfect person beating you out for prom queen of perfection. you're going to end up with pneumonia because no one should run in 9 degree weather. you're going to never experience what its like to say what the hell and miss your class so that you can go jump in mud puddles with your galoshes on. you're going to end up with an eating disorder, because not everyone is naturally thin and gaining weight is part of life and it happens to everyone. you're going to end up trapped in a box of perfection, desperately attempting to cover up your imperfections so no one finds out your secret that you are a real human being. you're going to end up living all the rules of religion, without ever figuring out why you are living them or what the real meaning of being like Christ is. you're going to end up thin, accomplished, poised, polished and absolutely miserable.
I think this quote probably sums up my thoughts on the matter perfectly: "but nothing important, or meaningful, or beautiful, or interesting, or great, ever came out of imitations. What is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself. More difficult because there is no zeitgeist to read, no template to follow, no mask to wear. Terrifying actually, because it requires you to set aside what your friends expect, what your family and co-workers demand, what your acquaintances require, to set aside the message this culture sends...and then look, everyday, at the choices you are making, and when you ask yourself why you are making them, find this answer: because they are what I want, or wish for. Because they reflect who and what I am" (Anna Quindlen).
I am not, in any way, promoting being mediocre. I think it is good to strive, to work, to long, to push yourself. But I think that all of these things need to be done in reality, by real people. And I think that because a person wears a bikini or isn't super woman and cook and clean and get straight A's and aspire to be the best homemaker and relief society president and iron their sheets everyday and never have emotional breakdowns or says something bad about someone else, doesn't make them not righteous, or not good, or not a fabulous person. I think it just makes them REAL. I think we probably all need to give up this quest for perfection, and start on the quest for progression. We need to face reality, we need to accept ours and others flaws, which are sometimes not even flaws, but just idiosyncracies that make us individuals. We need to realize that really we are just commanded to love and that is what brings us to God, not wearing perfect clothing or exercising perfect amounts or smiling perfect smiles. We need to embrace our individuality, our unique identities, and enjoy being a mess, and use that mess to become more loving, more beautiful people. I will never have perfect eyeliner or get up at 5:30 AM to read my scriptures for three hours a day. i will never be prom queen of perfection, and neither will you, and I am FINE WITH THAT, so I think you should be too. I am glad I am a mess. I am glad I can chew with my mouth open, laugh too loud, fall asleep in church, admit that I suck at several things and eat like I'm four years old, have opinions other people don't agree with. I am glad to be me and not someone drowning in nonreality. I am glad I left the cage of perfection, a free bird in mismatched clothing singing the praises of imperfection. it's a much better way to live provo, i promise.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
why you should read my favorite book.
From the time I was in fourth grade, I’ve known I was crazy. You’re probably not crazy, so you think I’m ridiculous and dramatic. But I know I’m crazy, and the funny thing is, I guess I’m becoming okay with that. If you’re not okay with that, then go read something else, because this essay doesn’t end with me realizing I am actually normal or that my insanity will one day magically disappear or even that there is medication for this sort of thing. I am honestly just a lunatic, and I probably always will be.
I think I was always crazy, but fourth grade is when I admitted it to myself, and my mom started calling in the therapists. We were assigned to read Bridge to Terabithia for 4th grade English, and I, being the creative soul and complete disaster that I was, procrastinated reading it until 7 PM the night before. We had had about a month to complete this task, so I knew I had better do some good skimming if I wanted to advance to fifth grade. I figured I’d thump through the chapters, get an idea of what happened, and use my brilliant ability to completely fake it to charm my teacher and fellow classmates. It had always worked before.
My plan crashed and burned the second I got to page 2. I was dying to know if Jess Aarons was going to win the 5th grade race. I was dying to know why his family didn’t understand him and how he was going to survive when at the ripe age of 10 he already felt abused by reality. I was transported into a world where I fit—where imagination and deep feeling and magic were part of the landscape.
I found myself in Leslie Burke. She appeared on page 9 and Moonlight Sonata rang in my ears. She was tough and complex and creative and completely comfortable in her own skin. She didn’t give a damn that the other kids thought she dressed weird or that she didn’t have a TV or that her parents were ‘hippies’—writers that the southern world of Lark Creek not only didn’t understand, but rejected. She rejoiced in her abnormality, she delighted in her insanity. Her soul sang to mine, and for the first time in my nine short years, I felt like I had a place in the world.
I read voraciously for hours, enthralled with the magical world of Terabithia Leslie and Jess create, jealous that they found each other, immersed in the way that they fed and nurtured each other and created a safe haven to protect their tender souls from the outside world. I couldn’t stop; I was hungry. Hungry to know that it is okay to see things from a different lens, hungry to know that this beautiful world wasn’t going to be destroyed right before my eyes. I could see the sun shining off the walls of the gold room so clearly it hurt my heart; I craved climbing to the tops of the trees of Terabithia so badly it made my fists clench.
I got to page 212 and almost collapsed. Jess’ beautiful world came tumbling down when Leslie drowned. I thought it was over. The magic in the universe was gone, shimmering for a fleeting second and then disappearing into a cloud of vapor. I resigned myself to a world of social constraints and superficial emotion, of always feeling misunderstood and repressed in my box of isolation. I cried and cried, not sure if I could continue reading. When Leslie died, a piece of me died.
But I was valiant. I read on, perhaps partly out of morbid curiosity to see how Jess could possibly withstand this giant defeat. I needed him to fight, because I wasn’t strong enough. The universe stood silent, uneasy and not sure where to turn from this point. Do we let the Janice Averys of the world take over? It seemed to be asking.
But Jess fought. He wavered, he sunk, but he did not give up. He took the gift of this little girl that had showed him the beauty inherent in the very fabric of the universe, and he held tight to it. He knew, better than I, that Leslie had endowed him with responsibility. So he marched on, with courage of heart and nobility of character. He knew that when Leslie died the magic didn’t die too. He would just have to learn to recognize it on his own.
By the last page, I was no longer crying out of sorrow, but crying because the infinite amount of pain and beauty in the universe was weighing on my soul. Leslie awakened the magic in the universe for Jess, and now it was Jess’ turn to awaken the magic in someone else. On Page 213 he fights on in the way we must all fight on--He takes his sister Maybelle’s hand and he introduces her to the land of Terabithia.
Maybe it took me until I was 9 to figure out was I was crazy. Or maybe it just took getting to know Leslie Burke to realize that crazy isn’t a bad thing, but a beautiful and noble thing if you use it to fight the giants of Terabithia and the suffering inherent in reality. It isn’t easy being crazy—people don’t like the way you dress, or they laugh at you because you don’t have a TV and see the beauty in sonnets and leaves and little boys named Jess that like to paint. Sometimes you wish you didn’t feel it in your soul when you heard a hummingbird sing or suffer with your mom as she battles terminal cancer. Sometimes you just want to surrender to the Janice Averys of the world and throw in the towel.
But Leslie taught me that Terabithia can be found anywhere. Leslie showed me that the magic is all around you, but first you have to find it inside of you. Leslie taught me that being crazy doesn’t mean you get to sit comfortably in a box of isolation for the rest of your life, but that with lunacy comes responsibility: the responsibility to fight on and awaken the magic in others, because there is suffering and pain in the universe, but there will always be more beauty. You just have to know how to see it.
I think I was always crazy, but fourth grade is when I admitted it to myself, and my mom started calling in the therapists. We were assigned to read Bridge to Terabithia for 4th grade English, and I, being the creative soul and complete disaster that I was, procrastinated reading it until 7 PM the night before. We had had about a month to complete this task, so I knew I had better do some good skimming if I wanted to advance to fifth grade. I figured I’d thump through the chapters, get an idea of what happened, and use my brilliant ability to completely fake it to charm my teacher and fellow classmates. It had always worked before.
My plan crashed and burned the second I got to page 2. I was dying to know if Jess Aarons was going to win the 5th grade race. I was dying to know why his family didn’t understand him and how he was going to survive when at the ripe age of 10 he already felt abused by reality. I was transported into a world where I fit—where imagination and deep feeling and magic were part of the landscape.
I found myself in Leslie Burke. She appeared on page 9 and Moonlight Sonata rang in my ears. She was tough and complex and creative and completely comfortable in her own skin. She didn’t give a damn that the other kids thought she dressed weird or that she didn’t have a TV or that her parents were ‘hippies’—writers that the southern world of Lark Creek not only didn’t understand, but rejected. She rejoiced in her abnormality, she delighted in her insanity. Her soul sang to mine, and for the first time in my nine short years, I felt like I had a place in the world.
I read voraciously for hours, enthralled with the magical world of Terabithia Leslie and Jess create, jealous that they found each other, immersed in the way that they fed and nurtured each other and created a safe haven to protect their tender souls from the outside world. I couldn’t stop; I was hungry. Hungry to know that it is okay to see things from a different lens, hungry to know that this beautiful world wasn’t going to be destroyed right before my eyes. I could see the sun shining off the walls of the gold room so clearly it hurt my heart; I craved climbing to the tops of the trees of Terabithia so badly it made my fists clench.
I got to page 212 and almost collapsed. Jess’ beautiful world came tumbling down when Leslie drowned. I thought it was over. The magic in the universe was gone, shimmering for a fleeting second and then disappearing into a cloud of vapor. I resigned myself to a world of social constraints and superficial emotion, of always feeling misunderstood and repressed in my box of isolation. I cried and cried, not sure if I could continue reading. When Leslie died, a piece of me died.
But I was valiant. I read on, perhaps partly out of morbid curiosity to see how Jess could possibly withstand this giant defeat. I needed him to fight, because I wasn’t strong enough. The universe stood silent, uneasy and not sure where to turn from this point. Do we let the Janice Averys of the world take over? It seemed to be asking.
But Jess fought. He wavered, he sunk, but he did not give up. He took the gift of this little girl that had showed him the beauty inherent in the very fabric of the universe, and he held tight to it. He knew, better than I, that Leslie had endowed him with responsibility. So he marched on, with courage of heart and nobility of character. He knew that when Leslie died the magic didn’t die too. He would just have to learn to recognize it on his own.
By the last page, I was no longer crying out of sorrow, but crying because the infinite amount of pain and beauty in the universe was weighing on my soul. Leslie awakened the magic in the universe for Jess, and now it was Jess’ turn to awaken the magic in someone else. On Page 213 he fights on in the way we must all fight on--He takes his sister Maybelle’s hand and he introduces her to the land of Terabithia.
Maybe it took me until I was 9 to figure out was I was crazy. Or maybe it just took getting to know Leslie Burke to realize that crazy isn’t a bad thing, but a beautiful and noble thing if you use it to fight the giants of Terabithia and the suffering inherent in reality. It isn’t easy being crazy—people don’t like the way you dress, or they laugh at you because you don’t have a TV and see the beauty in sonnets and leaves and little boys named Jess that like to paint. Sometimes you wish you didn’t feel it in your soul when you heard a hummingbird sing or suffer with your mom as she battles terminal cancer. Sometimes you just want to surrender to the Janice Averys of the world and throw in the towel.
But Leslie taught me that Terabithia can be found anywhere. Leslie showed me that the magic is all around you, but first you have to find it inside of you. Leslie taught me that being crazy doesn’t mean you get to sit comfortably in a box of isolation for the rest of your life, but that with lunacy comes responsibility: the responsibility to fight on and awaken the magic in others, because there is suffering and pain in the universe, but there will always be more beauty. You just have to know how to see it.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
a letters a letter no matter how small. or an explanation for why i do not capitalize at the beginning of sentences in this blog.
i don’t believe in capitals. i guess that’s really not true—its not that I have something against capitals, its just that i don’t like using them in their proper places, at the beginning of sentences and for titles and names and so forth. ive had always a soft spot for lowercase—the dot hanging out in its teeny circle of solitude above the lower case i, the little q dipping its tail into the next line, a bit self conscious about its extra appendage. If lowercase q went to jr high, he’d be the one getting picked on, his voice not yet changed and still wearing superhero briefs even when everyone else has graduated to the manly world of boxers. I’m not sure why I love the little guys so much, I’ve just always felt wronged somehow watching the innocent r and baby s marched into place by the big bad capital Ds and Fs of the world. maybe I just read the world through a marxist lens, but it always seemed like the lowercase letters deserved a chance to be at the front of the line too.
i think this natural disgust for the aggressive nature of capital letters was what led me to fall in love with ee cummings. ee cummings doesn’t use capitals in his poetry. In an ee cummings poem, everything seems equal, nonintimidating, just lower case letters smoothly unfolding down the page, like velvet carpet or creamy sorbet, with no big bad capitals to intimidate the weenie lowercases to get back in their places at the back of the line. For a while, I tried to live in an ee cummings world devoid of capitals. i started writing everything in little letters, refusing to buy into the idea that capitals are a necessary part of the world of language. my teachers didn’t agree, constantly marking up my harmonious worlds of liberated lowercase with angry red pen—The beginning of sentences need capitals! Why is everything lowercase!? i tried to explain it was deliberate, but 6th grade teachers don’t believe you make errors like that on purpose. in danger of failing 6th grade (failing elementary school does not bode well for your academic future) and being scorned by all the capital-using students around me, I relinquished my poetic license. social pressure had forced me to become a capitalist.
i hate the fact that I gave into the Man and continue to give into the Man, but i do. im a capital-using prostitute that has a lowercase soul, a little letter loving woman screaming damn the man inside while turning in perfectly punctuated papers conformed to the perfection society demands of me. such is life says my father. but a little piece of me dies everytime i replace my shy friend little b with his angry and ferocious older Brother.
one day when i have a complete nervous breakdown and finally allow myself to break free of social norms (this is inevitable, mind you, for ive been conforming to standards completely against my nature since i was potty trained and at some point i assuredly will snap), the first thing im going to do is turn in an essay in all lowercase letters. yes, this will involve an inordinate amount of work seeing as microsoft word conveniently auto capitalizes all words that are supposed to be capitalized within your document. but i think im up to the task, armed with the knowledge that breaking free of the system is not going to occur overnight. reaching outside of the box of conformity we are all drowning in is going to take going back to every sentence within my document and de-autocapitalizing, but im okay with that. we must start somewhere.
for now blogging world, don’t be fooled by my outward conformity, my capitalist appearance. i remain an advocate of the underdog, a proponent of the i and r and o, a lover of the little man.
i think this natural disgust for the aggressive nature of capital letters was what led me to fall in love with ee cummings. ee cummings doesn’t use capitals in his poetry. In an ee cummings poem, everything seems equal, nonintimidating, just lower case letters smoothly unfolding down the page, like velvet carpet or creamy sorbet, with no big bad capitals to intimidate the weenie lowercases to get back in their places at the back of the line. For a while, I tried to live in an ee cummings world devoid of capitals. i started writing everything in little letters, refusing to buy into the idea that capitals are a necessary part of the world of language. my teachers didn’t agree, constantly marking up my harmonious worlds of liberated lowercase with angry red pen—The beginning of sentences need capitals! Why is everything lowercase!? i tried to explain it was deliberate, but 6th grade teachers don’t believe you make errors like that on purpose. in danger of failing 6th grade (failing elementary school does not bode well for your academic future) and being scorned by all the capital-using students around me, I relinquished my poetic license. social pressure had forced me to become a capitalist.
i hate the fact that I gave into the Man and continue to give into the Man, but i do. im a capital-using prostitute that has a lowercase soul, a little letter loving woman screaming damn the man inside while turning in perfectly punctuated papers conformed to the perfection society demands of me. such is life says my father. but a little piece of me dies everytime i replace my shy friend little b with his angry and ferocious older Brother.
one day when i have a complete nervous breakdown and finally allow myself to break free of social norms (this is inevitable, mind you, for ive been conforming to standards completely against my nature since i was potty trained and at some point i assuredly will snap), the first thing im going to do is turn in an essay in all lowercase letters. yes, this will involve an inordinate amount of work seeing as microsoft word conveniently auto capitalizes all words that are supposed to be capitalized within your document. but i think im up to the task, armed with the knowledge that breaking free of the system is not going to occur overnight. reaching outside of the box of conformity we are all drowning in is going to take going back to every sentence within my document and de-autocapitalizing, but im okay with that. we must start somewhere.
for now blogging world, don’t be fooled by my outward conformity, my capitalist appearance. i remain an advocate of the underdog, a proponent of the i and r and o, a lover of the little man.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
my stability in life.
her name is marie and she is pretty much the greatest person of all time, ever. she is upward of 60, has clear braces, and volunteers with me at a grief center called canary garden. i may sound like im being sarcastic, but i assure you, im not. she is simply the one thing, next to diet coke, purple skittles, watching stunna glasses videos on you tube, and reading ee cummings poetry, that gets me through the week and reminds me that though people suck and tsunamis happen and i may have a 43 percent chance of being stabbed by my exboyfriend, life is beautiful and everything is going to be okay.
why? you may ask. let me tell you why. beyond the fact that she is a lovely human being and attempting to better humanity through service rendered at canary garden, she unashamedly, unabashedly, and might i even say boldly and with a certain air of flair and elegance, LOVES mickey mouse. No, my friend, she does not simply like mickey mouse, or even love mickey mouse in lower case letters. she LOVES mickey mouse. how do i know this? because her life (and her wardrobe) is CONSUMED by mickey mouse. she spent christmas vacationing at disney world (i asked her how it was and im pretty sure no one has ever loved a vacation more than marie loved disney world). her keys are adorned with a micky mouse key chain. she wears mickey mouse clips in her hair daily, sometimes several. if i could get a close enough look, i would even submit a 32 percent guesstimate that the brackets on her braces are in the shape of small mickey mouse heads. she loves mickey mouse like britney spears loves shaving her head and exposing her lack of undergarments, like hilary clinton hates to lose, like i love my hip hiptionary that is on its way in the mail from amazon.com. a whole, hella, lot.
tonight i walked into canary garden and there was marie, with her mickey mouse clipboard in hand, mickey mouse clips in hair, and mickey mouse keychain in pocket. joy swelled within my bosom when i realized she had a new piece of paraphenelia tonight--a mickey mouse leather bomber jacket. seeing as i grew up 30 minutes from disneyland and have frequented the disney store since the age of 4, i have a pretty good hold on the prices of mickey mouse related items. i would render a guess that this jacket cost upward of 100 dollars. to marie, it was a small price to pay to be swathed in the mouse that she loves so tenderly. all i can say is, boy did she look hot in that leather beauty. i cant wait to see what next week brings.
so you want me to stop mickey mousing around and tell you why the heck i am telling you all of this. im getting to it, really. my sister and i have speculated on what it is that fostered such an attachment (possible theories: her parents got a divorce when she was young and watching mickey mouse on tv helped her cope, her deceased husband was walt disney, she was born with a disfigured head that resembled mickey mouse ears, etc.) its not really important what it is that caused this fixation to occur. maybe one day i will ask, when i can control my giggles enough to resemble a normal human being around her. but right now, im not concerned. what makes me so happy about the whole situation is that marie has found her stability in life, and she wears it loud and proud. marie knows what makes her happy and she sticks to it loyally--she's found a way to survive in this ridiculous chaos we call life. mickey mouse is her system, and im pretty sure we all need some sort of system to navigate our way through the jungle that is mankind.
marie is my hero because she knows what it is that will bring a smile to her face--putting on her mickey mouse socks in the morning, jingling her mickey mouse key chain, wiping her nose on mickey mouse tissue. maybe disney is a worldwide corporation that is contributing to globalization and hyperreality and all other things bad in the world, but maries not worried. mickey mouse is her man, and she loves him. she doesnt love disney, or love disney movies, she just loves one man, one mouse, and his name is mickey. to me, thats what its all about--finding your mickey mouse in the world and sticking to it, regardless of how ridiculous your grey strands may look pulled up into a pastel mickey mouse claw, regardless of how many people are giggling behind your back because lets face it, mickey mouse obsessions are a little odd. its about not caring that you are upward of 60 and maybe too old for mickey mouse, or leather jackets for that matter, not caring that mickey mouse probably stopped being cool in 1972 (unless of course you are sporting the retro mickey mouse sweatshirt, in which case you have reached the pinnacle of indie coolness). marie loves him anyway, and she loves him for real. not because its cool, not because other people think shes funny or hip, but because she honestly, truly, LOVES mickey mouse. she adorns her soul and wardrobe with him, and i like that. for marie, he is the one thing that will remain stable and true, a constant in a sea of change.
marie has inspired me to find my own mickey mouse, my own system for smiling my way through the day, and i suggest you all seek your mickey mouses too (and if possible, find a leather bomber jacket as cool as marie's). how many of us really truly love something from the bottom of our soul, even when its not cool or hip or even when people may diagnose us with slight mental derangement for loving it? how many of us love something for real?
for now, marie is my mickey mouse, increasing my happiness level one mickey mouse themed item at a time. i hope next week brings embroidered ears atop her cute little head, sure to provide a stunning accent to her mickey mouse brackets.
why? you may ask. let me tell you why. beyond the fact that she is a lovely human being and attempting to better humanity through service rendered at canary garden, she unashamedly, unabashedly, and might i even say boldly and with a certain air of flair and elegance, LOVES mickey mouse. No, my friend, she does not simply like mickey mouse, or even love mickey mouse in lower case letters. she LOVES mickey mouse. how do i know this? because her life (and her wardrobe) is CONSUMED by mickey mouse. she spent christmas vacationing at disney world (i asked her how it was and im pretty sure no one has ever loved a vacation more than marie loved disney world). her keys are adorned with a micky mouse key chain. she wears mickey mouse clips in her hair daily, sometimes several. if i could get a close enough look, i would even submit a 32 percent guesstimate that the brackets on her braces are in the shape of small mickey mouse heads. she loves mickey mouse like britney spears loves shaving her head and exposing her lack of undergarments, like hilary clinton hates to lose, like i love my hip hiptionary that is on its way in the mail from amazon.com. a whole, hella, lot.
tonight i walked into canary garden and there was marie, with her mickey mouse clipboard in hand, mickey mouse clips in hair, and mickey mouse keychain in pocket. joy swelled within my bosom when i realized she had a new piece of paraphenelia tonight--a mickey mouse leather bomber jacket. seeing as i grew up 30 minutes from disneyland and have frequented the disney store since the age of 4, i have a pretty good hold on the prices of mickey mouse related items. i would render a guess that this jacket cost upward of 100 dollars. to marie, it was a small price to pay to be swathed in the mouse that she loves so tenderly. all i can say is, boy did she look hot in that leather beauty. i cant wait to see what next week brings.
so you want me to stop mickey mousing around and tell you why the heck i am telling you all of this. im getting to it, really. my sister and i have speculated on what it is that fostered such an attachment (possible theories: her parents got a divorce when she was young and watching mickey mouse on tv helped her cope, her deceased husband was walt disney, she was born with a disfigured head that resembled mickey mouse ears, etc.) its not really important what it is that caused this fixation to occur. maybe one day i will ask, when i can control my giggles enough to resemble a normal human being around her. but right now, im not concerned. what makes me so happy about the whole situation is that marie has found her stability in life, and she wears it loud and proud. marie knows what makes her happy and she sticks to it loyally--she's found a way to survive in this ridiculous chaos we call life. mickey mouse is her system, and im pretty sure we all need some sort of system to navigate our way through the jungle that is mankind.
marie is my hero because she knows what it is that will bring a smile to her face--putting on her mickey mouse socks in the morning, jingling her mickey mouse key chain, wiping her nose on mickey mouse tissue. maybe disney is a worldwide corporation that is contributing to globalization and hyperreality and all other things bad in the world, but maries not worried. mickey mouse is her man, and she loves him. she doesnt love disney, or love disney movies, she just loves one man, one mouse, and his name is mickey. to me, thats what its all about--finding your mickey mouse in the world and sticking to it, regardless of how ridiculous your grey strands may look pulled up into a pastel mickey mouse claw, regardless of how many people are giggling behind your back because lets face it, mickey mouse obsessions are a little odd. its about not caring that you are upward of 60 and maybe too old for mickey mouse, or leather jackets for that matter, not caring that mickey mouse probably stopped being cool in 1972 (unless of course you are sporting the retro mickey mouse sweatshirt, in which case you have reached the pinnacle of indie coolness). marie loves him anyway, and she loves him for real. not because its cool, not because other people think shes funny or hip, but because she honestly, truly, LOVES mickey mouse. she adorns her soul and wardrobe with him, and i like that. for marie, he is the one thing that will remain stable and true, a constant in a sea of change.
marie has inspired me to find my own mickey mouse, my own system for smiling my way through the day, and i suggest you all seek your mickey mouses too (and if possible, find a leather bomber jacket as cool as marie's). how many of us really truly love something from the bottom of our soul, even when its not cool or hip or even when people may diagnose us with slight mental derangement for loving it? how many of us love something for real?
for now, marie is my mickey mouse, increasing my happiness level one mickey mouse themed item at a time. i hope next week brings embroidered ears atop her cute little head, sure to provide a stunning accent to her mickey mouse brackets.
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