I'm not going to run out and get a Tumblr, but maybe I should break down and start collecting the photos I find pretty and inspiring instead of wishing I knew how they did that. Aya over at Strawberry Koi posted a few of these Tamara Lichtenstein pictures, and I ended up sitting for an hour browsing through her entire photo portfolio afterwards. I love how most of them look like snap shots that ended up being beautiful happy accidents.
And I have to post this last one simply because I own this dress. But I do not look like that in it. I'm going through a hopefully short lived phase where I hate everything in my closet I've owned for longer than a few months. Most of it I've either shrunk or let wrinkle beyond recognition. I've spent today and will spend tomorrow and most of next week in professional conferences, and I'm tearing through my closet to find clothes that aren't sloppy. It makes me want to shop, but I know new clothes would look the same as the old ones after a washing. Verdict: I need an iron.
A facebook friend posted this, and out of incessant curiosity I started watching it. Then I started laughing, then I started crying, then I laughed some more while simultaneously crying. Carla Zilber-Smith was a writer/singer/actress/blogger I'd never heard of till now, and now I'm ticked about that. I hope her family puts together a book from her writings.
"Live the s*** out of your life" - Mac, her 16 year old son writing out an abridged version of her guiding principle in life for her final blog post and eulogy.
Now I want to go out and work on worrying less and having more fun per the suggestions in the eulogy. And I think Carla would tell me to start making googely eyes at whoever I want; being embarrassed is lame!
It also makes me think about what I would miss most, and what I would regret not doing. I feel good right now, though, like I'm actively pursuing everything I want to be doing. I'm writing - a lot - even working on my poetry book that I'm putting together and editing, making plans and trusting I'll have fun, even if the plans are by myself, getting up early for runs, reading on my balcony, cooking healthy hippie food, and getting ready to start my job at the Ann Richards School for Girls - which I am BEYOND ecstatic about. As long as I tell the voice in my head that worries about the growing old alone thing to shut up and shove it, I feel very, very good about where I am and where I'm going. That's nice, (now if only the flowers I planted would sprout).
I consistently have the nagging feeling that I've done everything wrong - I didn't go to the right college, I didn't choose the right major, I didn't take the right career path, I didn't focus with the right intensity, I shouldn't have bought a house so soon, I shouldn't have been so stubborn in that argument, etcetcetc. Too many decisions and too many possibilities often overwhelm my thought process.
My only real peace with this is to tell myself that no matter where I've been or what I've done, I have to focus on actively putting myself on the path I want to be on - sometimes this means getting up earlier than I would like. Getting to write for real publications is the right path - I know this like some people know they have soul mates, or love mashed potatoes. I know I needed to leave Arkansas for a while and be on my own, although the "on my own" part I'm just now getting to. My biggest regret is not having more confidence when I was younger. I always thought I was too young to do something well, and as I got older, I thought I was aging too quickly to do anything significant. I'm learning to shake both of these beliefs.
I'm not the only person who devotes a large part of my thinking to questions about being wrong - Kathryn Shulz of Slate is writing a series of Q&A's about people's relationships with being wrong. Recently she interviewed Anthony Bourdain, and I love him, so I wanted to share a couple of my favorite snippets from the interview.
"Travel has made me more optimistic. I believe now that for the most part, the world is filled with people doing the best they can under the circumstances."
After a whole lot of years in New York kitchens, you're suddenly traveling almost all the time, largely overseas. In my experience, that's an incredibly good way to be wrong pretty much hourly.
It's the most exciting thing about travel to me. You're constantly wrong. You're constantly challenged by your own preconceptions. You're forced to relearn such basic, basic things. Words you thought you knew the definition for become completely changed: the word work, the word hunger, the word generosity. Or you think an entire country's going to be one way and then it's another way. I like being wrong in that respect.
I also had no idea he was a heroin addict, I suppose I should do more biographical research about my few favorite celebrities. It's nice to know if you can turn your life around from being a hard core drug addict, I can probably make a few positive modifications in my career trajectory and inability to fight nicely so that when I turn thirty I feel a little more confidant in my standing.
Other words that need new definitions: success, need, expectation, love.
Today, while at work, Jonny Stranger showed me the WikiLinks Iraq video of a US military helicopter shooting a crowd of people on a street, presumably because they were all believed to be dangerous. Adding to the indescribably unfortunate nature of the whole thing, two of the people killed were journalists and two of the injured civilians were children in the front of a van coming to collect the bodies.
If you've been with me for a bit, you may remember that I'm a huge Dan Eldon fan from this post. Dan Eldon was also a photo journalist killed in Africa by an angry mob when he was twenty-four years old. In addition to images, he left behind volumes of art journals that visually depict his travels and experiences. I find him admirable and inspirational, and I always hope that my life can have an ounce of the meaning and beneficial impact that a life like his had.
My desire to have a positive impact on the world in some small way is one of the driving forces behind my decision to enter teaching and working with kids. That, and most of the time, I like kids, (most of the time - mine drive me insane sometimes - today I busted a dice-rolling-gambling circle, little twerps). My soft spot for children is why this picture moved me when I found it a few weeks ago.
One of the journalists killed in the attack shown on the WikiLinks video was only twenty-two years old, and was known for taking pictures that would break your heart in twelve mega-pixels.
It takes a special kind of guts to have the audacity to interfere on someone's tragedy with a telephoto lens, and do it so seamlessly that no interference is actually made, except for the one projected on the viewer of the picture, like us.
I'm in no way anti-military. I'm an army brat, I have family and friends in the military and in Iraq. But can we all agree that some things are just wrong?
And the final question is always... what do we do about it?
Jennifer of The Novelista Barista just got back from a vacation in Jamaica, and asked for guest bloggers while she was gone. I sent her a post about traveling, journals, and my time studying abroad in Spain. Here is the post I wrote for her, and I'm so excited to see it on her lovely blog!
Quoted throughout most of my journal, and the title of this post:
"Promising Light" by Iron and Wine. Any surprise I taught myself this other song as soon as I knew the chords?
About a month ago, I was perusing my blog reader when I stumbled upon a post in the Live Journal group jr_nal. A girl had posted her diary writing and collages from a trip to Turkey, pressed into the pages of a Miquelrius book, known for their soft covers and lightly lined graph paper.
Having grown up as a military brat, I traveled all over the world, keeping pages and pages of scribbles, art work, and scrap book memorabilia to document my trips. In ninth grade, I lived in Izmir, Turkey, so her mentions of the almost ghostly call to prayer at 6 a.m., and the incessant meowing of street cats written next to pieces of an apple tea container brought back, literally, volumes of memories.
When I studied abroad in Malaga, Spain, in college, I took with me a similar Miquelrius notebook that I bought at Barnes and Noble before my trip. After reading her post, I decided to pull it out and share some of the pages, hoping to remind myself what it feels like to find everything about a new place wonderful - movie ticket stubs, embossed napkins, postcards, photographs of sunsets - with the thought that maybe I can inspire myself to find a similar wonderment amongst the artifacts of my current daily life.
Here are a handful of pages I found in my Spain diary:
As I've grown up I have stopped journaling this way. I am not sure if this is for lack of time due to work, boyfriends, Gossip Girl reruns, or simply because I do not value spending time alone with myself, a blank book, and the fragments of days I want to preserve the same way I used to. Trite as it may sound, I often hear Ally Sheedy's voice in my head, when, in the movie The Breakfast Club, she says, "when you grow up, your heart dies," which I can't help but feel to be true when I choose more "practical" pursuits over saving the bits and pieces of my day and pressing them into books with the hope of creating something lovely.
I know I do not want that to be true of myself, and that may be the only thing I know for certain at this point of my life, straddling the line of young adult and full fledged adult the same way I used to stand between being a teenager and a young adult, like a person frozen between two railroad tracks with the sound of a horn in the distance.
There are some beautiful inspirations for art journaling in the world, and I mean to revisit these to help me return to a once-favorite hobby. Dan Eldon, the photojournalist killed in Africa, kept intricate, layered pages of journals that chronicled his travels across Africa's continent. There are art books dedicated to the beauty of journals, and even friendly tips to be found on how to keep travel and scrapbook journaling part of your writing routine.
While rereading entries written only a few years ago in actuality, but what feels like centuries ago, can be both embarrassing and humbling, it's moving me to pick up a book with a blank page, a pair of scissors, a pen, and go outside to try and see my day as something beautiful, and worthy of both exploration and preservation.
I feel like the books I've been reading are going in a psychological chronicle order. I started with Cleaving, about affairs, broken hearts, and reconstructive "surgery" (butchery?), moved on to Committed, a brief study of both the history of marriage around the world and the author's desire to make peace with the institution, with her own love story tying the disparate parts together, and now I'm onto The Happiness Project.
I just started it, but one of the first manifestos the author makes for herself, is that she is going to act the way she wants to feel. This is incredibly difficult for me - as I easily become an emotional wreck and let whatever negative energy I feel take on an almost crushing affect. But if I make myself move - cook dinner, go to a concert, get out of bed - I usually find myself feeling in accordance with my actions.
So - rule of the day - act how I want to feel! And yesterday morning I was in a great mood. It was sunny, warm, and breezy.
Denim trousers: J. Crew Plaid shirt: Gap Black tank: Wal-Mart Pink t-shirt: Gap Blue wedge shoes: Target Necklace: Accessory City Ring: Charlotte Russe
The relationship issues of recent weeks, (months?) have been coming to a head in excessive amounts of anxiety, both mentally and physically manifested. I'm trying to relax and take things in stride.
Last night I met up with Lennon, Eirik, and a couple other friends after work at the Austin Poetry Slam, and then had a late dinner at Magnolia's, all things and people I love.
There's a show at Emo's tonight that I want to see, and I haven't bought tickets in advance so I hope I make it there in time. I'm determined to have a beautiful Easter weekend! And read a lot. Preferably outdoors.
What is one (or more) of your rules of being positive? I'd love to compile a list.
You may remember my enthusiasm for this dress on this post, so here it is a different way. I wore this on the last Saturday of SXSW when I wanted to go see free outdoor music shows and browse around South Congress with Michelle, but then the weather decided it wanted to be like a windy corridor in cold Chicago! Needless to say, our outing was cut short by the literally whipping winds and all the crowds cuddling together in stores just to be off the street. Not even tights, a sweater, and a jacket were cutting that kind of cold.
One of the reasons why I love this dress is because of the built-in petticoat that gives the skirt its volume. I feel like a cross between a ballerina and Scarlett O'Hara in a hoop skirt.
