Textures of Time

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P25KH6astf8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl4htyW6Rtk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rbjhuTMCio

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWnqzhyPe0Y

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaNPfF_KLQY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5es87Ebol0A

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GA-MWYyhPUM

Last Blog

This technology class has been fun. I've learned a lot. Before this class, I used paint occasionally. Now, I can use not only photoshop, but Sketchup and ComicLife and various other online publications.

I love writing but I had never thought of doing a blog. It is a good way to put my thoughts out there.

The problem is that there are so many blogs already in existence. Having an account for something is simple. It is having people read your work (or view it) that is the challenge.

Over the summer, I want to create more outlets online. I want to continue to film videos with my friend and start creating even more things. Well, I'm off to my last ACH 102 technology class.

High School Assemblies Suck

(One of our motivational speakers.)

The awkwardness of high school assemblies still makes me blush or twitch my eye when I think about it. My high school always had these strange, threatening underlying messages for everything. Our high school assemblies tried to morph your mind. We had one man who I can practically guarantee through observations of my own-and my friends'- that the man in the wheelchair was faking it.

I never understood what they desperately wanted us to learn. Or, if I did grasp the concept they were drenching us with, I ignored it. We had a group of college students come into our gym, dressed in black and perform a dance to a song by Switchfoot (or some band of its equivalent)and it was supposed to represent sex. They switched their "dance" partners and the women looked in the mirror and cried.

We once had a graduated college football player come in and tell us how he didn't make it to the NFL because of physical limitations concerning his spinal cord but that when he heard his daughter's footsteps, he scored a touchdown. That's so cheesy. I don't want to give up on my dreams to have a family.

I've heard at other places, high school assemblies can actually be fun. I never care to find out.

Women vs. Men

During my first week at Stony Brook, someone asked me if I was a feminist. I think feminism is just understanding that men and women should be equal. I feel like women have so many more responsibilities though.

If a woman and man has a kid, it's always the woman's responsibility. The guy can run off and do whatever and the woman has the responsibility. There is always talk about single moms. Where are the dads? It's very, very rare for there to be a single dad. And usually, if he is, it's not by choice but by a forced-on responsibility (like if the mom dies). For instance, a single mom is forced with raising the kids but the man can go off and do whatever. He isn't held responsible. It's hardly mentioned.

If a mom leaves her kids, there's practically an uproar. But when the dad leaves, it's like it's nothing. Women have more responsibilities--regardless of whether or not it's right.

Dating Vlog

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfB0l6HMzZs

Kick the Can & Crab Apples

My mom grew up on a diary farm. My grandmother's house, though in reality was about 40 miles away as a kid, seemed like it took hours to get to. Part of that had to do with the winding dirt roads that required a less than 30 mph speed but a lot of it was the cramped amount of us kids in that station wagon.

It was my two brothers, my sister (who always rode in the front seat with our mom), and me. I was sandwiched between the boys and they would push me around to the other if I got too close. On rare occasions, they would fight over who got to sit closest to me and argue about who I liked more. But that was only sometimes. Usually, they were pushing me away and flying kites out of the passenger windows. (My mom was, and still is, the most oblivious person I have ever met.)

When we'd get to Grandma's, we'd torment each other to touch the electric fence holding in the cows. (My brother Ben actually did once!)We'd terrorize the garden, depending on what season it was, or climb the trees for a crab apple. Then we'd collect dandelions and rub them on each others' faces. Stephanie was usually inside, playing Spades or Euchre with the relatives. My brothers and I were the hoodlums. We'd get a game of kick the can going and only stop for refreshments.

S C R A B B L E

Scrabble is one of my favorite board games. Maybe it's because I like writing and words or maybe it's because it makes me think of childhood. But either way, if anyone ever asks me to play Scrabble, I will say yes.

It's not that I'm very good at Scrabble. I just like playing. I don't like being the scorekeeper but just playing off of each other's words is fun and exciting.

We have a Scrabble game in the dorm. However, you can only rent it until 11 pm. Scrabble is a game to play till the wee hours of the night. (I feel like the dorms have way too many rules; I'm not even that much of a rebel and I've been written up twice-as a freshman. I wish I was a commuter or I lived in an apartment. Because when even Scrabble time is limited, restrictions are too harsh.) I love playing Scrabble, even when the words I draw aren't useful.

Medicine

I'm very hick about a few things. It makes me sound very uneducated but medicine is very hard for me to comprehend. It's not that I'm distrustful; I know it does work. However, medicine was always taboo for me growing up. It was seen as giving into the weakness, rather than naturally fighting off illness.

Doctor visits for always for my broken bones (and I've broken a lot of things) until I was about 17. When I was 17, I went to the doctor because I thought I had strep throat. That was the first time I went for an illness. And, as it turns out, I didn't even have strep throat so I felt incredibly stupid.

Growing up in a small town, advice is medicine. I know many people who think microwaves are dangerous and contact lenses will give you eye problems. But I do think that people should be more cautious about medicine. I try not to take medicine when I'm sick. I drink fluids and sleep it off. I don't even like to use hairspray because of the chemicals.

YouTube Covers

Sometimes I like covers better than the originals on YouTube. Often, the covers I like are not the extremely popular covers. I seem to always be drawn to the 5,000-ish views, rather than the hundred of thousand of views. I like it better that way. There is less of the "PLEASE SUBSCRIBE!" and other comments.

It's simple and truly about the music. Here's an example of one good Iron and Wine cover: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1y6G3dmtSkM&feature=related

I do enjoy folk music. But I think I enjoy rap equally, just in a different sense. I probably listen to folk more when I am alone but sometimes, I do play rap. That's how I know if I really like music, if I will listen to it when I am alone.

Everyone is always asking me about all these new bands and I don't really know any. I just listen to what I like, over and over again. Part of this is due to the fact that the internet here is very slow at Stony Brook so it is just easier to let a song load and then keep replaying it but it is also partly because I like listening to the same song over and over and over and over and over and over.

Prom

I'm adding to the problem by writing this blog about prom. By giving this subject attention, I'm adding to the hysteria surrounding it. Everyone talks about prom-- or their lack of attendance at the prom.

Prom was fun. I went my friend George. I loved my dress. It was short and red and (see picture!) it had a bow. However, I didn't spend lots of money. I used barely half of my Big Boy check, actually, probably a fourth (and my boss used to deduct money out of our check because he thought people were stealing pecan rolls). I love deals.

But prom was prom. It was over with and my date was on crutches. Yes, it was fun. But I really doubt I'm going to talk to my children about it. I don't like the tinge of sadness people have when they talk about missing their prom. There is soooo much more to life.

over 1,000 miles

We are over 1,000 miles away. Morgan (A.) is in Minnesota and I am in New York. (I put Michigan first and then I had to erase it. Sometimes I forget I am in New York.) We are both doing our own thing but it is hard to be so far away.

It's a sick thing to be so far away from the people you are closest to. I wish I could combine worlds: there are so many more opportunities here than in my hometown. Michigan is losing its population steadily. However, there are so many kind people and great friends there. And, of course, my family is there too.

It's nice to know that your friends will be there for you though, regardless of the distance. I talk to Morgan everyday. And, over breaks and in the summer I see her everyday.

Hood Boss

Rap is today's poetry. Hood Boss, a Michigan rapper strugglin' to make it, is the epitome of what I want to become.

He is a local celebrity. He wears chains and sunglasses and people know he is a BOSS. Though his real name is Don, he has such street cred. that no one (except for maybe a lumberjack or two) would call him that. Even the waitresses at Applebee's know who he is (and that is a busy place!).

Hood Boss is a true rapper, with guts to spit rhymes that Lil' Wayne wouldn't be able to say. Lil' Wayne has to slap on a synthesizer but Hood Boss keeps it raw. His Myspace is super popular.

I've attached the link for his Google search page:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=hood+boss&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=

Nail Polish

Art is everywhere. Sure, New York City has plenty of art museums. There's even art on the street. There's graffiti on buildings, too. But I find art is most apparent on people's finger nails.

MY fingernails are pink, with droppings of silver. The silver bits are randomly displaced, intentionally so. When I look at my finger nails, not to brag, I feel talented.

Nail polish is art! With different textures and colors, a true creation can be made on the thumb.

Lullaby

I will admit: I still wish people were singing songs to me around my bed, the way they did when I was little. I try to simulate the feeling by playing Celtic Woman YouTube videos but nothing is the same. I miss the melodies as I drifted off to sleep.

That has been the most difficult adjustment of college. Many warn you about homework and tests. Some people even find exams stressful. However, I miss the soft melodious murmurs of my family and neighbors as we all huddled in by 6 ft. by 3 ft. room. I'd turn the electric blanket on, hold my purple platypus and rejoice in my happy life.

I appreciate college life but boy! do I miss the melodies before bedtime. I want to appreciate college life but I do long for those wondrous melodies. Long nights lead into great days. I hope one day my husband will sing to me.

Platypus

I wish National Platypus Day was more than a one day celebration. The joy surrounding the day was evident in everyone's attitude yesterday: Waitresses were kinder; the train conductor winked approvingly at my platypus hat; many people smiled broadly at us yesterday and commented our apparel.

I know New York has a stigma attached to it. However, holidays bring people together. By National Platypus day being more of a secular holiday than a religious holiday (though some devout platypus lovers would argue against National Platypus Day being a religion), it really brought people together. Religion can segregate certain groups of people but everyone loves National Platypus Day.

I should generalize by saying everyone. However, the diverse group of people Morgan and I befriended yesterday all were thrilled to hear of the holiday. (I, too, was surprised some people were just now hearing of it and didn't have prior knowledge.) National Platypus Day shouldn't be a day; it should be a yearly state of mind.

National Platypus Day

National Platypus Day was yesterday! To celebrate, my friend from Michigan (Morgan...Z!) drove here. Though she had some difficulty with Boarder Patrol in Canada due to an overstuffed car (they didn't believe anyone with twelve platypus stuffed animals was only coming for a few days), she did make it here safely. Well, considering that she got one ticket due to a missing headlight bulb, which we fixed today.

Yesterday involved me cuddling with my platypus for up to 16 minutes. Morgan set all her animals around her. (My platypus is purple; Morgan had a range of colors.) We all sat by each other and appreciated the day. It was, in fact, much like my family's Kwanzaa celebration (except we didn't have Grandma Betty's bean dip or Uncle Junious' angel eggs).

We went into Manhattan to celebrate to glorious day. The weather matched our mood and the winter jacket I wore was not necessary. Morgan and I took turns wearing her platypus hat. We took many photographs but, unfortunately, they are all on her camera and alas, she is resting on my right foot as I type on my purple computer. (I got a purple computer to match my purple platypus.) I will post pictures in a future blog.

AA

Charles Bukowski was an alcoholic. He's also one of my favorite writers. True to Ockham's razor, Bukowski combines the angst of life other writers seek out but in a simple way. His language is crisp but even with his short sentences, his impact stays.

My favorite poem of his:

Let It Enfold You

By Charles Bukowski

either peace or happiness,
let it enfold you

when I was a young man
I felt these things were
dumb, unsophisticated.
I had bad blood, a twisted
mind, a precarious
upbringing.

I was hard as granite, I
leered at the
sun.
I trusted no man and
especially no
woman.

I was living a hell in
small rooms, I broke
things, smashed things,
walked through glass,
cursed.
I challenged everything,
was continually being
evicted, jailed,in and
out of fights, in and out
of my mind.
women were something
to screw and rail
at, I had no male
friends,

I changed jobs and
cities, I hated holidays,
babies, history,
newspapers, museums,
grandmothers,
marriage, movies,
spiders, garbagemen,
english accents,spain,
france,italy,walnuts and
the color
orange.
algebra angred me,
opera sickened me,
charlie chaplin was a
fake
and flowers were for
pansies.

peace an happiness to me
were signs of
inferiority,
tenants of the weak
an
addled
mind.

but as I went on with
my alley fights,
my suicidal years,
my passage through
any number of
women-it gradually
began to occur to
me
that I wasn't different

from the
others, I was the same,

they were all fulsome
with hatred,
glossed over with petty
greivances,
the men I fought in
alleys had hearts of stone.
everybody was nudging,
inching, cheating for
some insignificant
advantage,
the lie was the
weapon and the
plot was
empty,
darkness was the
dictator.

cautiously, I allowed
myself to feel good
at times.
I found moments of
peace in cheap
rooms
just staring at the
knobs of some
dresser
or listening to the
rain in the
dark.
the less I needed
the better I
felt.

maybe the other life had worn me
down.
I no longer found
glamour
in topping somebody
in conversation.
or in mounting the
body of some poor
drunken female
whose life had
slipped away into
sorrow.

I could never accept
life as it was,
i could never gobble
down all its
poisons
but there were parts,
tenous magic parts
open for the
asking.

I re formulated
I don't know when,
date, time, all
that
but the change
occured.
something in me
relaxed, smoothed
out.
i no longer had to
prove that I was a
man,

I did'nt have to prove
anything.

I began to see things:
coffee cups lined up
behind a counter in a
cafe.
or a dog walking along
a sidewalk.
or the way the mouse
on my dresser top
stopped there
with its body,
its ears,
its nose,
it was fixed,
a bit of life
caught within itself
and its eyes looked
at me
and they were
beautiful.
then- it was
gone.

I began to feel good,
I began to feel good
in the worst situations
and there were plenty
of those.
like say, the boss
behind his desk,
he is going to have
to fire me.

I've missed too many
days.
he is dressed in a
suit, necktie, glasses,
he says, "I am going
to have to let you go"

"it's all right" I tell
him.

He must do what he
must do, he has a
wife, a house, children.
expenses, most probably
a girlfreind.

I am sorry for him
he is caught.

I walk onto the blazing
sunshine.
the whole day is
mine
temporailiy,
anyhow.

(the whole world is at the
throat of the world,
everybody feels angry,
short-changed, cheated,
everybody is despondent,
dissillusioned)

I welcomed shots of
peace, tattered shards of
happiness.

I embraced that stuff
like the hottest number,
like high heels, breasts,
singing,the
works.

(dont get me wrong,
there is such a thing as cockeyed optimism
that overlooks all
basic problems just for
the sake of
itself-
this is a shield and a
sickness.)

The knife got near my
throat again,
I almost turned on the
gas
again
but when the good
moments arrived
again
I did'nt fight them off
like an alley
adversary.
I let them take me,
i luxuriated in them,
I bade them welcome
home.
I even looked into
the mirror
once having thought
myself to be
ugly,
I now liked what
I saw,almost
handsome, yes,
a bit ripped and
ragged,
scares, lumps,
odd turns,
but all in all,
not too bad,
almost handsome,
better at least than
some of those movie
star faces
like the cheeks of
a baby's
butt.

and finally I discovered
real feelings of
others,
unheralded,
like lately,
like this morning,
as I was leaving,
for the track,
i saw my wife in bed,
just the
shape of
her head there
(not forgetting
centuries of the living
and the dead and
the dying,
the pyramids,
Mozart dead
but his music still
there in the
room, weeds growing,
the earth turning,
the toteboard waiting for
me)
I saw the shape of my
wife's head,
she so still,
I ached for her life,
just being there
under the
covers.

I kissed her in the,
forehead,
got down the stairway,
got outside,
got into my marvelous
car,
fixed the seatbelt,
backed out the
drive.
feeling warm to
the fingertips,
down to my
foot on the gas
pedal,
I entered the world
once
more,
drove down the
hill
past the houses
full and empty
of
people,
I saw the mailman,
honked,
he waved
back
at me.


It's a wonderful poem, very true to Bukowski's essence. I've always had a soft spot for Bukowski. From his short stories and various novels, I feel like I know who he is. He acts rude but he does little things that show how truly great of a person he is. He drank a lot. He disrespected women. He didn't respect authority. However, he had a gentle soul. He cared for animals and for people who really needed it.

On the outside, he looked like a grumpy drunk. And, I'll admit, I hate watching his YouTube clips, especially the one where he kicks his woman. But beneath all of that, there was a sensitive person. He was compassionate and empathetic. His problem was he was afraid of his emotions. He guzzled booze but he couldn't escape his sensitivity. Just read his poem "Bluebird."

productivity = the opposite of love

I was in math today and I wrote a poem about how productivity is love's enemy. Love is such a sought after emotion, even though it is often ignored as a commitment. Artists try to capture love while posters try to coin love and writers try to explain love. Teenage girls just want to feel love.

But when you do "find" it, it's kind of like, well shit. You can't be productive when you're in love. You've captured this feeling that scholars seek and you're supposed to stop looking into those green eyes to do homework? It just doesn't make sense.

Love clashes with society. It's hard to be constant with your homework and your studies and your job when you just want to cuddle. But it's very important to maintain who you are and stay independent. Love is great but so is having independence and accomplishing things-- plus, those things last.

Technology

The masked woman and the technological man, oblivious behind the screen: welcome to the 21st century. Woman use technology as a mask and men use technology to hide themselves. All the expansions in technology are really allowing society to revert back; instead of branching out and "connecting", we are adding more wireless walls.

Technology is great for networking. With one simple "like", you can create instantaneous rapport. Likes lead to comments and comments can lead to a conversation (via Facebook chat, of course). However, it's easy to use Facebook as a shield. With the graphics and the links, it's easy to become absorbed in an online persona and forget how to socialize without the standard, yet passive pokes. People often avoid talking to their new crush in class and instead, add them as a "friend" online.

In this class, we're learning all about marketing ourselves. As a requirement, we are connected on online sites--we're all linked together on this blog site and we all have YouTube and so many other sites. But it hasn't made me feel closer to any of the people in my class.

Shane

There are lots of quotes floating around that I could put under this picture. They're all kind of obnoxious though. The quotes that people use to try to capture everything either try too hard to be deep or they can't come close. I do love fortune cookies but sometimes you can't just sum everything up with a few words.

Youth. Youth. Youth. Youth. Youth. Youth. Youth. Youth. Youth. Youth. Youth. Youth.

This picture captures everything without our faces. It represents youth and even though it's only been a few months since then, I have aged. I don't want to make this blog more than it is but I don't want to make it less than it is either. That's why I don't want to add a quote; I just want the picture to represent itself and fall in New York City.