[untied]

unmoored freedom

and enjoying that

is rare, so sweet.

these moments are

few and far-gapped.

so hold tight

but no crying

when the slip-away goes.

let your hair down,

and dance in the flurry of papers,

savor it

because hey


why the heck not.

WICKEDGOOD

The key is to extrapolate from your special partiality and apply the feeling to the rest of the world. The "global village, global family" is, honestly, a dream. A psychological impossibility. You can't love the whole of humanity with the intensity of your feelings for a boyfriend. Or a mom. Or your Binky. So when that guy behind you starts humming along to the musical songs you're trying to get all involved in, remember your "annoying" friend who might - who totally would - do that, too, if he were here with you. He wouldn't be able to help himself. And actually, it would be kind of cute. 

And all of a sudden, forgiving is so easy. And you lean forward in your seat, all engrossed and involved in the action on stage, no matter how strainedly huge-guy-behind-you is hummin' along. His girlfriend sitting one seat over is probably a little bit embarrassed and also a little bit endeared to him at the same time, mysteriously happier and sadder in equal amounts, as love tends to make you feel. So I hear. 

Once you've extrapolated your friend-feelings onto the hummer behind you, the whole world is a little bit easier to love. You unfrown those scrunchy eyebrows, uncross those bratty metaphorical arms, which all opens you up just enough to notice the nerdy boy one row over, almost spitting in enthusiasm at the INCREDIBILITY OF THE LYRICS, THE THEMATIC CONSISTENCIES; and sitting in front is a family of smartphoners, each engrossed in intermission-time activities that reveal so much about how different they all are (Harry Potter trivia, flappybird, and one reads an article in small print and serious colors); and then your gaze comes back, full-circle, to your own row of quirkily lovable, funny lovely people, 

and it's all another all-inclusive, conflationary reminder of the World's Goodness, as the harmonies full the theater up to its ceiling, so close, and your ears and heart chambers and eyeballs and lungs. One more example to tuck into the notebook of Things to Remember, to be pulled out in emergencies of faith-loss and the subsequent despair. 

The World is Good. Wicked Good.

in the face of rain bullets,

We were a phalanx of automobile soldiers, encased in our two-ton death machines of sonata silvers, mustang reds, a throng of strangers brought together at that intersection of our common life paths, all converged into one meticulous formation, military precision, for those few seconds on 29 North this afternoon. We're all in this togetherrr -- against our common enemy: the unexpected onslaught of grey Saturday rainclouds, pelting our windshields with deadly multiplicity in our humble commute homeward. Homeward-bound. Rainward-bent. Leaning determinedly into the precipitation that would've been fluffy death, just a week ago. All together now. We'll make it out of this mess.

Until the black Camaro cuts me off/

and the spell is broken. The roadrage urges bubble, boil, just beneath/

all that camaraderie-schmaraderie.

notes of late:

hey, stop yourself in all the busy goings and comings and scurryings to just say

• hello!
• goodbye (properly)
• thank you very, very much. I really appreciate you/what you have done.//I love this!
• I am sorry for this. for making you feel that way. for being terrible. for not knowing it. 
• and thank you for letting me know.
• yesitwasme, I checked out that library book but didn't tell you and now it is missing for your class and ah ahhh AH
• "AHA HA! :D"
• agh. please help me. I need it, your help. I admit it. 
• hey are you doing okay?
• I THINK YOU LOOK MARVELOUS TODAY.
• I'm not sure what this means. I did my best to understand but I still don't. maybe other people here feel the same way. could you explain one more time, please?
• I love you.

mannn I forget the most basic things sometimes. kindergarten lessons everydayyyy.

last minnit weekend muzings

bleary-eyed post for the memory troves

as I tuck myself inexpertly into bed and turn on the warm side of the bedside lamp

head a littlespinning, eyelids a-closin'

and dad hums nanamouskourri to himself next door (having appropriated J's high school room for his impromptu officespace) and the secret garden ost floats emotionally on up the stairs from the youtuberepeater downstairs in the kitchen

just to say that --

23 feels much heavier - weightier in the front pocket of my Life apron - than any of the other numbers, much more, even, than the momentous ones like 15 (if I were mexicana), 16 (so sweet), 18, 21...

just that it feels so much closer to real adulthood for some reason, in some different way than it would were I facing graduation as a 22-year-old, I'm sure.

maybe it's the bodaciousness of the curves on that 3. mm. it's almost too much.

and maybe it's feeling extra-nice, extra-meaningful tonight cause of the extra-weightiness of the 2 and the 3 (all those curves ooh), but I have a real treasure trove of friends surrounding me this year; expert birthday card writers, all of them. are these particular people in this particular location, particularly special? for the conversations we've shared and fierce tears we've seen each other shed and God-seeking we've been doing togetherly? has any of it ever been in our hands? the criss-crossy paths that have brought us together, the buses we rode together, the library dates, the not-so-endless sleepovernights that inevitably ended with someone falling asleep in the middle of someone else's hushed-voice sentence, big-kid swaddled in our orange sleeping bags? or are we just growing up, and with us, the quality of our sentimental sentences and love-laden letters, too?

all of these things. yes.

thoughts that floated in and out while brushing the teef and washing the faze.

so, so thankful.

Ephesians 4:29-32

English Standard Version (ESV)

29 Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day ofredemption. 31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. 32 Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

ba-bump

God, thank you for letting me study these things. Thank you for being infinite and learnable at the same time. Thank you for the collision of connections, for religion in literature, for Judaism and the New Testament, for heretical love. You make all things good for those who love you.

God, blow up my brain and piece it all together with your hands, your glue, puzzle by puzzley bit; start your work of re-Creation and let everything be of you, make everything shine with your presence. Let me love the world as you love it, and let me pray same words with different convictions.

God, I want to hear your voice. Let me seek it fervently and without tiring, and guide my brain and my heart together; let those be just two pieces of a great, mysterious soul. Make me choke up with emotion, re-wire my brain synapse thingies; and in all of this, keep my soul aligned and directed toward you so that everything else is secondary, in their right place, without my own strain.

God, I love you. God, thank you for holding me. God, I want to love you more.

Amen.

;

In certain academic ways, it's very mysterious, but I feel very stupid. Like everyone else in the discussion is getting it gettting it getting it but my brain is just unable to process correctly and all I can do is grasp at wavy-vague brainstrings and go mmmmmmhmm mhm ...mhmm yeah.

And in certain social ways, I often also often feel very stupid. Whether it's the feeling-out-of-place and sorta bewildered in a large party setting because there are too many people to be able to concertedly hear the person I'm wanting to be concentrating on in front of me, or feeling jealous or self-conscious or both cause I'm tiny-hearted and evil sometimes.

But then I mull over all these things in the car ride home, snuggly in the carseat and singing out LOUD to all the right songs that come on, shufflin', and pray to God about all the fun things that happened, thank you, thank you, and for all the beauty and for my car that runs well and for school and for uncertain futures and all these things in my present. And re- re- re- realize that my ultimate identity lies in Christ, and this causes all the beauty; this makes all the happy; this redeems all my mysterious stupidities.

the world is a beautiful and mysterious place

A Hundred Years from Now

by David Shumate

I'm sorry I won't be around a hundred years from now. I'd like to

see how it all turns out. What language most of you are speaking.

What country is swaggering across the globe. I'm curious to know

if your medicines cure what ails us now. And how intelligent your

children are as they parachute down through the womb. Have

you invented new vegetables? Have you trained spiders to do your

bidding? Have baseball and opera merged into one melodic sport?

A hundred years....My grandfather lived almost that long. The

doctor who came to the farmhouse to deliver him arrived in a

horse-drawn carriage. Do you still have horses?

The world is a beautiful and mysterious place

will I still think this way a hundred years from now? a hundred days from now? after the magic of college is actually behind me and days and moods are less dependent on the quality of discussions I had in my classes and the lunch partner of that particular afternoon and who I happen to run into - who happens to run into me - all happy and bright, Maaaaadison?! I haven't seen you in forever!

Will I still think this way, mid-career, when I'll probably want to be having a mid-career crisis and feel panic, realizing that I'm realizing my desire to go back to school for something? On those days I will feel stuck, or stagnant, or too consumed with pesky details I have never liked?

Will I still feel this way when my baby gets sick and I realize I never learned how to take care of sick babies, or when that baby starts asking questions about where babies come from or about math (dear God please let me marry a math-science-technology genius who will be patient with me) or when that baby officially declares the end of her babyhood, ignores my curfew and phone calls? Or takes too many selfies? Or is a he?

Not certain. But today, the world is a beautiful and mysterious place. And today, the world was also a beautiful and mysterious place - of these things I am certain. 

There are: horses and beauty and mystery and happiness in the world today.

The world is a beautiful and mysterious place today.

Missing: Stars from Tonight's Sky

There were no stars to be seen in the sky as I drove home tonight - usually I look up and out to the left side of the driver's seat, dangerously not swerving in direction with the rest of my body, cause I'm a pro stargazer. Even while driving. Even if that means I compensate the multitasking by slowing to crawl-mode on the driving part.

Usually, this is okay because I have a nightly routine conducive to star-drive-gazing:

1. Leave the library sooper late, preferably past 12am.
2. Drive zoom zoomy all the way down 29, catching all the green lights cause no one is driving perpendicularly at this hour; almost no one is driving at all.
3. Make the right turn onto Rio [rye-ohh] from 29, dramatically decrease speed. The whole road is yours. This means almost home.
4. Crawl-mode: on. Swerve head (but not car) left and up, looking up and out my side window at all the stars that come out to glitter upon escape from all the light pollution that is metropolitan UVA.
5. Gaze. Drive, too, a little. All the way home.

But there were no stars to be seen in the sky as I drove home tonight.

Cause they were scattered all over humble earth, blanketing the roads the cars the stores the people's eyelashes with the fluffiest sparkliest most beautifullest gentlest-glowingest snow-stars I ever did see.

step 1.5. take endless pictures of snow scenes on the way from lib to car

Dah. The beautifullest. The bestest.
The cold-redeemingest.

"ten years from now, I am happy"

Ten years from now, I am happy.

Ten years from now, I am twent thirty-two, and married to a person I call "home." 

Not literally his nickname, unless...this becomes an inside joke. With "home" (uh-oh) we make a pair that needs no home other than (mostly) ourselves, living in places that were always recently "far-off lands," and reveling (and reeling) in all the mysteries and adventure (and difficulties) that come with that. Togetherly.

I will be working that dream job that I know exists out there (that I just don't know the title of yet), and 

-----------this is where I ran out of time-----------------

courage, 

contemplation, 

compassion, 

creativity

are just a few of the things I will be learning about this semester. Even though it's stressful and I'm apparently already procrastinate-blogging at the library like I do when I have too much to do, so all is normal. All is well. All is beautiful. Even the struggles. Especially the struggles. 

Another random, bleary-eyed-at-11pm question for contemplation:

"happiness or joy?"

Ten years from now, we will collectively be calmer and drink wine and live in France or wherever that "somewhere else" is (it can be that farmhouse in Virginia hum-buzzing with love), with a comfortable income and joy and/or happiness. 

And/or.

P.S. Do this. Mmmmm wilde wednesdayes mmmmm

"it is the rain that will strengthen"

I dunno what it was about the moment, but these different things came together just now and imploded (boOom...) into unselfish tears free-fallin' down my face.



1. http://lapeaudourse.blogspot.com/2013/11/mille-tristesses-decoulent-de-linstant.html

2. Cela fait "déjà" 7 ans que j'ai perdu mon grand-père, mon "second papa". Il me manque beaucoup, malgré le temps qui passe. Voir souffrir et s'affaiblir une personne que l'on aime, cela est une épreuve que le temps ne peut malheureusement pas effacer. Mais ce sont aussi ces épreuves qui font "grandir", qui nous permettent de nous ouvrir aux autres, de leur dire à quel point on tient à eux. Elles redonnent un sens au mot "vivre", nous ouvrent les yeux sur la vraie valeur des choses. La vie continue, mais différemment. Je suis de tout cœur avec toi.

---------^it's one of the comments to the post in 1. I'm gonna try to translate it. Not cause I think lots of people will be outraged by the lack. Not even to share the exact sentiment I felt cause of it, because translations are slippery with feelings, anyways. Not because I think it's astoundingly artistically wrenching in a literary, aesthetic way, but just cause it's what I was reading when the first tear plopped out. I'm gonna try to translate it so the few of you who read this don't think I'm a showoff uppity aloof French-speaking person. -----------

"It's "already" been 7 years since I lost my grandfather - my "second dad." I miss him a lot, despite the time that's passed. To watch someone you love suffer and wane, that's an ordeal that time, unfortunately, can't erase. But it is also through these hardships that we grow; that we learn how to open ourselves to others; tell them how precious they are to us. It is these hardships that remind us what it really means to live, that open our eyes to the true worth in things. Life goes on, though differently. My heart goes out to you."

3. http://www.listenonrepeat.com/watch/?v=czFgKa7YcIQ

4. Writing a paper that feels like the culmination of a semester. Academically and emotionally. And feeling so out-of-the-blue humbled.

5. And in the sneaky way that end-of-term papers and final exams (and ends of terms in general...and emoish folksy songs on repeat...) tend to have, just reflecting from this tail end of the semester back on what's passed thus far and how I've grown and how there's such a long way to go, still. But for a moment, closing my eyes to future things and past things, too, and letting eyelids sqeegee out tears that are just there and enjoying all the intricate little fragments of this implosion.



Hm I think I've just figured out that this list is in reverse order of significance.

dear blue-eyed, full-lipped, dark-haired man,

Hello, you are quite blue-eyed, full-lipped, dark-haired. Quite.

As it so often happens, here I am blogging when I should be studying (&reading through some old posts about blogging instead of studying...a vicious cycle, it seems).

I'm not quite sure if you're worth the moments, but let me just take a few moments to note these moments of sitting across from your blue eyes, full lips, dark brown hair. I can't decide if they are attractive or not...they are almost too much, but still kind of pretty...but almost too muchhh ehhhh cannot decide. They teeter totter on some kind of beauty-ugly-scary verge. A three-way face precipice.

AHHH YOU JUST LOOKED AT ME and for a moment I thought you could:
1. read my mind reading these words
2. read these words backwards and all, through the back of my computer screen

3. but then realized that it was probably because I was crunching my extremely green, extremely sour, mediumly delicious apple, extremely loudly. Oops. Sorry.

But as I said, I'm not quite sure if you're worth these moments. I am also not sure of many, many other things about you. I wonder if you are kind. I wonder if you enjoyed that butter-only-no-cream-cheese-nuh-uh bagle as much as I'm enjoying my extremely green apple, which is only a medium amount, and I hope you enjoyed it more than I'm enjoying this but I dunno you seemed pretty matter of fact about it all. Knife, butter, Swipe-Swipe, Take Bite, chew-Chew. I wonder how long it has been a habit of yours to purse your extremely full lips in the way that you are doing. I wonder if it's a stress-induced thing, cause you look quite stressed, though you seem to be productive. But of course I cannot read your mind and the words it is reading (not) out-loud to you, or read through the backside of your computer screen, or indeed even read backwards that fast, so who knows. I wonder what kind of music is pulsing through your earphones into your earholes into your brainwaves. I wonder if it is stupid that I systematically call everything remotely related to brain activity "brainwaves." But most of all, I wonder if you are kind.

And then secondly, if you are worth these few moments that took to write up this blogpost, the answer to which, I spose, is related to the answer to my biggest wondering.

Goodbye and good luck! Dear God please bless everyone at this table, in this room, on this floor, in this library, in any library studying right now. I know it's silly and naive to think that this small prayer will suddenly make everyone's studyings better or brighter or even cause a little burst of energy or something, but I pray anyway that you touch each person in the way that they need to be touched by you right now, in small and significant ways that are only apparent to you and him and her. Most of all dear God, please help us all survive this exam season more or less unscathed. No. Triumphant. Please, God, use me in ways that make other people's days sparkle a little bit in these sparkle-lacking times. What a blessing it is to study for exams.


Woah you just stood up. You are also quite tall. Quite.

Spying

on a beautiful moment of koinonia. Real fellowship. Was wondering why these otherwise seemingly-typical, JCrew scarf and pea coat-clad girls with be-Ugged feet and perfectly unperfect curl-ed hairs, seemed somehow so different. So earnest in conversation and dedication to each other, not their cellphones, sharing about Christ-filled revelations, jelly-filled donuts. Just kidding, no donuts. I wasn't planning on spying but when I saw the brown sweater girl pull out her journal and start reading from it to the grey sweater girl, I couldn't help but pause

(which had been repeatingrepeatingrepeatrepeatpepatiepaing like thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiis)

and listen. Eyes sparkling, voices trembling, hands waving in excited gesticulation and true connection of love, truth, spirit-filled fellowship. What a blessed moment this is, this moment today in sunny Nau 11/18/11 12:something pm.

It reminds me of my own, so mystifyingly, tear-renderingly (okay no tears, usually, but you know what I mean?) beautiful fellowship moments with my beloved sisters in Christ. And makes me so excited for what lies ahead, what more beauty and tears (of tragedy, of joy) that God has in store for us all.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. Love you, love you, love you.

"i'm so sleepy" in the 411*

So she was sitting in front of her wheezing whirring laptop, which was working hard even though she was not, and she slow started to lean forward little by little, like so little-y that I didn't even notice until she was almost doubled over, forehead to the keyboard, almost almost. No one said anything but I was kind of worried because I wanted her to be comfortable and to not have an achy back and just sleep more in general because I am not sure if she ever sleeps, this grace. And her laptop, so oblivious to her apparent tiredness, still whirring and wheeeeeze-wheezing away, so inconsiderate, SHH please be quiet!! But you know how semi-old-ish (maybe?) laptops are. They'll be loud if they feel like being loud.

So she was sitting in front of her laptop and dozing a little and I think this is the first time that I've ever seen her so vulnerable. to sleep. and vulnerable just in general, maybe. That's strange and...also not strange at the same time. Gah sorry for saying nothing. But yeah so she is sleepy.

And I loooooooked over and leeeeeaned toward her cause I wasn't sure what I was to do. Shall I wake her from this tortuous state of half-sleep, half-waking? Shall I let her sleep even though it looks so uncomfortable and surely she will acquire a crick in her back (hah a crick in her back) if she stays in this position for a long time? Shall I close her laptop to shut it up from being so freaking loud so she will be that much more (just a leeeettle bit more) comfortable? Shall I call out her name or what? Shall I or shall I not?

I had no idea, so I just stayed leeeeeeeeeaned over and looked at her and kept wondering and then looked over at raney who is working in the room with us. We eye-connected and she smiled a wee smile that told me that this was a normal thing; that everything was and shall be okay. At least in this small moment. This is the life of this apartment here. People sit here and doze in front of their loud laptops and it's no big nothing whoop. And everything is going to be okay. And okay and okay and okay.

It was such a knowing and wee and somehow reassuring smile that it contented my heart and turn to sit to face to look to my own mediumly-loud computer and to open up this Ctrl T, mjl, New Post, and then Publish this fastest blogpost ever ever ever.

And to wonder if you are hating this stream of consciousness-esque-ness-itude-ity.

*quote attribution: some angel of the night

10:22 am October 29th, 2011

It's the second officially cold day of the season
And the snow that was supposed to come is
falling
Over shivery fall leaves,
Sideways on the current of the wind,
Splashing jacketfronts,
As freezy raindrops, breaking in tiny explosions on the topsides of umbrellas.

The last sip of a cold hot chocolate in hand,
I'm walking your way and
You, mine.
I'm rushing just the right amount and
You're leisure-loping
(But we travel toward each other at the same pace; your legs are much longer than mine).

And these moments are cold and dangerous
We calculate, size each other up,
Notice how skinny the sidewalk gets when two of us, and two umbrellas, too, must share it.
Will I step onto the road?
Will you run into the wall?
Or shall we collide -- tangoing missed steps, tangled umbrella spokes -- ?

But time's up for thinking, decision-ing,
Cause you're here and I'm here
The moment is now and somehow,
We share a few seconds of brain wave synchronization:

You'll lift your umbrella arm
While I duck to fit under it,
And it's magic - we're a smidge and little bit,
Two momentary puzzle pieces
Made to fit together at this moment, on this rainy sidewalk, in our umbrella tango.

breath & balance

Today was technicolor leaves and oversaturatedly blue skies.

I was making my favorite walk across grounds after work (slowly across the Lawn on Old Cabell side, skip down the stairs behind Wilson, marvel through the leafy trees-surrounded brick gateway onto the jeffersonparkavenue,walksignisontocross crosswalk, approx. 5 o'clock in the afternoon sun or rain or cloudy weather) and being way too busy to deserve the beauty all around. Though I was finished with classes, with work, my mind was still way too crowded - with things waiting in my backpack to be done, thoughts of dinner to be eaten at what time with whom, lists to make and to be checked off blip blip bloop bah. 

Surrounded by so much beauty; so much wonderful, but "too busy" to pause and soak myself in it in a way it all deserved to be taken in....in. Realized, and actually stopped to think about, how much fewer pictures I've taken this year compared to the amount that I had taken by this time last year (probably. not completely sure). Don't get me wrong - I still have a bZillion and thirty-eight pictures to put up on facebook, but this year I have let myself pass beauty scenes by so many times because I was rushing from one busyness to the next. Just rushing rushing thinking about rushing, being tired from scurrying about everywhere, simply getting from point a to point b waving at people hello hello ah! oh! hi! being caught off guard wishing to stop to capture a scene (in my mind and on my camera) or to give someone a proper smile but not doing so and letting all the soul thoughts spill away and resorting to texting myself gigantic passages that I hope to someday make into blogposts. . .

So I stopped. Noticed an old man (as so often there seems to be in my life) standing in front of Old Cabell and just gazing Lawn-ward. Because it was obvious. Because it was a travesty not to stop and give this beauty some attention. So I stopped, too, and took my walking, moving legs out of my path of travel and stood. Facing the Rotunda and perpendicular to my route, rebelling against the urge of let's go go go hurry up please it's time, etc. hehe

And it was tear-inducing, this beauty. 

...PAHA actually, it wasn't - the leaves were too technicolored and the skies too melodramatically blue. Like OKAY SKY, JUST CALM DOWN YOUR BLUE BRILLIANCE IS MAKING MY EYEBALLS WANT TO THROW UP A LITTLE. Haha! But I did wipe my eyes because there was a small speck irritating the left one and then felt self conscious because I didn't want the people sitting on Old Cabell's steps to think that I was actually moved to tears. Which is silly because:

1. I love crying.

2. It is natural and beautiful to be moved by beautiful things.

3. Probably no one was paying attention to me anyway.

Silly.

Then I took a breath and felt the instinctive urge to check the time. Check my phone. Check my shoelaces. Check something and look busy and purposeful and not all alone. Sigh I didn't even wear shoelacey shoes today. Sigh I don't even care about being alone in public. Sigh when did I get so attached to my cellular, anyway?

But my hands had already lunged into both pockets of my jacket so I had to do something. I mean people were probably watching me, waiting, expecting for something momentous to happen, and I couldn't just let them down, you know. So I gripped both fists - the left clenching my phone and the right clutching my iPod - and almost pulled out the left, but ended up taking out the right. The iPod seemed like the lesser evil or something. Saw that it was some hour, some minute but didn't really care.

Then turned myself 90 degrees and resumed the trek homeward. 

And kept stopping to take pictures of this and that and this again (and these CHRISTMAS BERRIES!) - combined with walking really fast when I wasn't stopped - so that I was passive-aggressively racing this girl who was on the same path. Passing her, letting her pass me, passing her. 

And realized that I must find a balance. I can't just keep stopping in my tracks whenever the mood strikes - that disrupts other people's walks home, other paths of travel, the journey of point a --> point b, which sometimes does indeed trump capturing a beautiful moment. Must find balance. Bal-a-nce. B-alanc-e.

A baal-ance between tackling a formidable pile of homework, getting ready for another Wilde Wednesday (my busiest day of the week) and just stopping to write a blogpost while listening to my mmmmm playlist.

Even though everything is a mess. Because sometimes, just not doing what you "need to be doing" is exactly what you need to do to be able to finish doing what you need to be doing. Ya see what I'm doooing?

painting a house, finding a family

This is officially day 3 of Lee Family Project: Paint the Whole House Some Shade of Yellow, and I've managed to escape the madness...for a few hours. So here I am, documenting. Let's see if I can pump this post out in 20 minutes. Wouldn't normally do this, but seriously, when I go back home, there will be no time for computer silliness, or any other kind of silliness except for paint, duct tape, and preventing Binky from making too big of a mess with his foot, er...paw prints. It has been crazy and tiring and enlightening, this house-painting experience, and I'm realizing than I'm finding out so much about my family (and relationships and marriages and families in general) through it all. Bullet points GO GO GO!!

• My dad is like obsessed with me. Like, he likes me a LOT, thinks I'm like the best apple ever. Don't really get it, cause I'm really not that great and - perhaps a more fair judge of the situation - the other parent doesn't seem that enthralled with me at all. When I was helping paint the near-ceiling edges of my room, Papa Lee offered his hand to steady me on that high, teetery stool I was standing on and when I accepted, he was so happy. Kept insisting for the rest of the evening that I hold his hand. "See how helpful it is, to hold my hand?" "Good thing you're holding my hand, or else you'd be falling!" "Okay okay now hold my hand" etc etc etcccc
• Painting is kinda like working on a marriage. Easy breezy when you're working on a simple, four-sided room with no crown molding, but pretty rocky when you have to work together in a kitchen with endless corners and crannies and edges and CABINETS. You have to work harder to communicate, to overcome frustration, to tape more edges, and inevitably, to clean up more messes that are going to be made. So painting is kinda like a marriage...and like any other kind of relationship in which you may face trials and tribulations. Okay so that was a really bad, overly-general metaphor, but what can I say, I've got painting on my mind. 
• Peacemaking: I've been realizing a bit of this all throughout this summer, but it's really clear now. My mom and dad communicate and express themselves so differently and this sometimes causes communication issues. What my dad says in order to re-organize the situation and reassure all participants, my mom finds repetitive and unnecessary, and therefore annoying. Sometimes it's like a train...no, car, collision just waiting to happen and I can see it and RUN in the middle to stop them both from completely collisioning. Reassure dad that what he just said makes sense and is good; distract mom with something new and more problematic or more useful so she doesn't get upset about the repetition. Kinda worried about what will happen when they decide to take up the next big collaboration challenge and I'm not there. Need tons of prayer.
• In painting and in relationships, you have to be willing to get dirty and all paint-covered if there is work to be done. Don't worry about it. Everyone else is getting paint all up in thur hurrs and hands and noses, too, and look at what a beautiful thing you're creating on all the walls. There's always a shower to be taken upstairs. Unless the bathroom's being painted too, in which case...that was just bad planning, and now it's a lesson learned! :D!!
• Cooperation is KEY. Sometimes you get tired, and ask the other person with the roller to meet you in the middle (or maybe more like 25:75...usually dad, cause he likes you the best HEEhe), and then you'll finish the whole wall, something you never imagined possible!! And then you can stand back with your knuckles on your hips diva-style and say "MAHAHA I HAVE PAINTED A WHOLE WALL!! with dad's help"
• Sometimes you just have to use your pinky finger to fudge some of the corners cause NO BRUSH OR ROLLER WILL REACH THAT TINY NOOK. Like relationship and families, no paint job (no...anything, for that matter) is perfect. Don't get too upset about it because I saw Mama Lee doing it, too.

OKAY THAT IS ALL FOR NOW. MUST RUN. PICK UP CHIPOTLE FOR DINNER (THIRD CARRY OUT DINNER IN A ROW!!) AND RETURN TO THE WORLD OF YELLOW SHADES OF PAINT!!

More to be added, as more is learned, realized, painted :)

observations from lindt

Transcribed straight from one, two, three, four, and a half yellow sticky notes of thoughts scribbled down from Lindt, at Barracks. 

"6/18/11

• Old people like peanut butter.
• The Black Currant Excellence bar is surprisingly tasty. So fragrant and delicious.
• I'm not such a good salesperson here because I feel like I'm making - tricking - people (to) spend money on something they really don't need, but I'm getting over it. Lots of people come in here for gifts and w/ an actual purpose of buying chocolate, believe it or not.
• Some people refuse free samples.
  ...yeah I don't get it.
• I like leisurely chocolate buyers - the ones that want to talk, discuss, hmm and hmmm over chocs...
• I enjoy working by myself but these times are also the most dangerous. The sample bucket calls my name. . . .
• I like the music here - it's surprisingly not repetitive, or maybe I just don't mind the repetition so much. Hah It's music that's pleasant if you listen or don't listen. It skips along and around, but not uncomfortably or intrusively. You can listen to it, or not, and it doesn't really mind either way.
• The magic apron hides all - lots of people comment on how skinny I am, [a] surprising [fact to them,] when compared to the relative proximity/quantity of such delicious chocolate. Little do they know...
• Opening is not so scary
  every day is a little less frightening
  and Sue is wonderful
• My co-workers are great. esp. Sue!
• My favorite truffle is coffee. It is a "limited edition" flavor; apparently they're just trying it out but I really hope they keep it.
• Sue loves to tidy & clean. Maybe not necessarily the actions, but she takes ownership and responsibility [of keeping things neat and stuff].
• Sam is a chocolate expert and a Lindt expert and getting people to buy more than they intended expert. It's admirable in kind of a scary way.
• There is an ever existent clash of my identities as a salesperson & a consumer.
• there is something adorable about the way chocolate bunnies hollowly clinkety clack against each other when you rustle them while organizing. I know it's just the same chocolate, formed into the mold of a bunny shape but whoever thought of these is a genius. They're just so appealing. Hahaha"

"7/31?

• "so long" man [This one man said goodbye to me with a very cool, very casual "So long," after I handed him his bag full of classy and refined chocolates. Without a hint of irony. Was caught off guard by the outdated language and unironically suave manner. It hit me, at that moment, that this man was the epitome of what all hipsters are trying to emulate. Cool guy.]"

"8/3/11

• :9 lady [Just yesterday, one lady literally made the colon-nine slurpy yumyum face when I told her to "Enjoy your chocolates! :) " It looked exactly like the emoticon in a non-creepy, cute kind of a way. She was a little bit rotund like a teapot and had short gray hair and soft-looking skin.
• White man reeking of Indian food [walked into the store and proceeded to talk forever about everything.] Everything he owned (like his cooler, to carry the chocolates in), handed to me (like the 1 dollar bills and 5 dollar bills), touched (Fill-Your-Own truffles, $7.50/lb.) smelled of the Milan lunch buffet. Strangely appetizing and gross at the same time. "

More updates to come :)

the longest eyebrow hairs in the world

Standing in front of me this very moment is the owner of the longest eyebrow hairs in the entire world. His facial hairs are confusing - no excessive beard hairs or nose hairs or even ear hair tufts poking out like you often see in old men's ears...but the eyebrow hairs are so long and...bounteous (thanks, thesaurus.com!). Yes, bounteous. Plentiful and abundant and fertile, flush, generous. Prolific and replete. Swiiiiimming. Teeeeeeming.

He owns a head full of white hair - with a (somehow) not-unpleasantly-receding hairline - and kind eyes and smile wrinkles. He is clean-shaven, appropriately-dressed in a not-overly-fancy-but-well-put-together in a science professor kind of way. He is articulate as he formulates his complicated questions about bibliographic searches one can conduct in the library system, but I hear nothing as Cheryl, master librarian of the Chemistry Library and my supervisor, has taken over and I sit back - pretending to be attentive to their conversation like a good trainee, but in truth only watching his eyebrow hairs move up and down with the rest of his expression like small insects with lots of long, wiry legs. Or two teeny claws extending their long nails in a friendly hello.

They are not unpleasant, these extremely long eyebrow hairs. They add to his conversation, like a small, politely enthusiastic third party chiming in its agreement or confusion, whatever the situation calls for. They are like his own small cheerleaders - approving and punctuating and ever enthusiastic.

I wonder if they provide his eyes with extra shade. I wonder if they get in the way when he runs a tired hand over his face on an especially stressful days. I wonder if he likes them, or if he minds them, or if he has tried to battle them before in his youth but has come to accept them now. I wonder if they have grown longer in his older age, cause I know that happens with old men and their ear hairs. I wonder if they make his brow any heavier than mine. I wonder if he has developed extra muscle - however minuscule - in his forehead from carrying the weight of these extra-long hairs around. I wonder what kind of provisions and blessings God has given this man through these extraordinary eyebrow hairs. I wonder.

I hope he visits again soon.

he wasn't like this.

"one groweth"

Okay first things first, the title is supposed to be "one grows" except in olde Englysh (haha not really) - that's why it's one groweth, cause it's like "He drinketh some coffee...eth." Okay fine really not really; actually Old English is like a completely different language it's pretty crazy.

And second things second, I really have to preface this with a "WHAT?! WHERE DID FIRST YEAR GO? HOW DID THIS HAPPENNN!!!??!" I know everyone is saying that around here, just about their respective school years being over (except the high schoolers...oops), but it really is crazy. How can this year already be over? I'm not done being a first year yet - not done being new at everything, not done living at Maupin, not done being roommates with Maddie, not done eating breakfast at O'Hill everyday...seriously. But I guess I'm being kicked out. Done. Boom. Out out. No more living close to every other first year, no more walking everywhere due to lack of knowledge of the bus system (I'm learning), no more being physically and socially lost (...weeeellll...).

So before it all falls out of my brain, here are a few of my favorite memories (warning: not in chronological or alphabetical or any other kind of order)...

...of my first year at UVA 2010-2011!!

They are small, big, and medium and probably boring for a lot of people, but they were momentous to me, and I'm just trying to keep a record so I can look back and remember. Sorry about the monster-sized post ahead!! The scrollbar will probably be really tiny after I'm done with this.

1. One fateful bike ride with Maddie when everything went wrong at the same moment - 29340984 cars appeared from nowhere, pedestrians popped up to get in the way, bike pedal fell off - but we were too busy crazy-laughing to care too much.

2. Yodeling like these people after one especially sugar-loaded brunch at Runk.

3. 40-minute walk down McCormick Road from Old Cabell to Maupin - just cause I could. I think it was Friday and I was done with all my classes and felt like walking s u p e r  s l o w l y because I wanted to revel in not trying to get somewhere so fast. With my iPod and blue-toed flats, savoring every. slow. step. and hopefully not annoying too many people...heeehe I tried to stay on the edge of the sidewalk, like the slow edge of the track, you know?

4. Taking the scenic route up to my room from the beginning of the Maupin sidewalk. AKA walking purposely a little extra distance (like 3 feet, no big deal) instead of straight up the close-by stairs because the trees in front of our building are like a canopy under which one feels like a forest princess (or prince, yes).

5. Cramming into one tiny practice module at Old Cabell with Rajni, Densey, and Ericsam to practice this incredibly sad song over and over:

6. Naming Eric Ericsam - I've never had much luck with nicknames until E.S.! His real name is Eric but on the first day we met I think I decided (what a brat) that he looked more like a Sam and called him that for days until he finally broke down in tears and pleaded with me to at least call him Ericsam (just kidding about the tears). Wait a minute - I just realized how close this is to Samneric, from LOTF...WOAH.

...WOAH!!

7. The first night of art explosion when Maddie and I started scribbling all over our walls and officially became friends, not just roommates.

before (left): awkward and naked
after (right): comfortable and decorated! haha sorry Maddie...it's another sleeping picture...
(maddie and walls, respectively)

8. Lovey-dovey couple sighting at Clemons with Tim. I think they were in the pre-official, flirting stage so they would keep just sneaking looks at each other and being subtly annoying with their giggles and ticking each other. There was a bit of internal drama for the girl for a while because the guy went somewhere and didn't come back for a long time - she kept looking around, worried, unable to move on from the one page she was reading for like 400 minutes. And also she looked a little bit like a lion. I don't know - something about her...nose/mouth area. I had been chatting with Tim and told him to come over and see the small spectacle these people were making of themselves and at first he was like nah they're not so bad, but soon agreed with me that they were kind of ridiculous. Anyways by the end of the night (or day, whenever it was), they (and I) had gotten no work done. Absolutely none.

"bleh we like each other so much but we're not officially dating yet just flirting so it's kinda awkward! bleh we're gonna keep distracting other people around us by being cute/noisy/annoying! bleh! bleh! bleh!" (them, not us)

9. "Homeworking" at Crossroads with Maddie in the booth next to the extremely loud bro who was talking about girls and weekends - seriously I have never heard anyone with a louder conversational voice. The homeworking attempt just ended up with me and Maddie just making loud, obnoxious noises once in a while, half imitating the bro, half hoping he would take the hint. And then laughing about it like this: beweehwhahahhhHEIhihihulhuoohohlhlhuhuhlahahaaalal!!

10. Eating nova-originated pho and feeling a little bit bad about stinking up Crossroads - delivered by David "da bait" Densey. Seriously THE BEST <3

11. Finding, and freaking out about, the straightest banana in the world. 

I mean just LOOK AT IT!!

12. Exam-induced mania that resulted in secret identities.

Stanislov and Boris

13. One solitary afternoon spent exploring the Rotunda and all its symmetry! I think I got distracted on my way home from class and ended up here. It was a Monday. Solo adventures are the best - sometimes you just gotta be alone, and that's O.K!

from inside - hellooooooo Old Cabell!

boO

trying to take a timer picture in the Dome Room, fulfilling so many stereotypes: asian, tourist, noob first year...

14. Going to Skyline and oooh-aah-ing at the 2 billion shooting stars that decided to fall that night! Then coming back to Earth and eating McDonald's with John, Clarisse, Kenneth, David at the Lambeth amphitheater.

15. First day of Musicians on Call when mystery shopkeeper gave me a tiny paper bag with 3 Lindt truffles inside with a quiet "thank you."

16. Finding a wardrobe of mysterious purposes in Webb Lounge - "The Morgue" - and deciding to hide in it and then deciding to do a whole photoseries about explorer Maddie discovering a strange creature inside the weird wardrobe.

17. Christmas celebration in Maupin 220s for which we were never given our rightful reward of 1 Arch's ice cream pie. Though we spent 2.5 hours waiting for the judges to come and way too many dollars at the dollar store on cheap decor, it was worth the suite bonding and general Christmas merriment.

18. Plucking a certain DH's overgrown eyebrows in Christina's common room and being walked in on by Jacqueline, our RA. Taking pictures to document the evening's activities but swearing to never ever publicize them. 

19. Skipping February 7th of my a-picture-a-day calendar because it pictured a woman so ugly it was frightening. Seriously, what were they (the artist, museum personnel who chose to make the painting important, calendar publisher...everyone who had a part in causing the painting to reach my eyeballs) thinking?! Shudder...

20. Conquering DungeonMan. 

THE FLASK

21. Every time that this happened in chem postlab. Though all green doesn't necessarily mean you're all right...haha.

so excited I took a screen capture of it...

22. Discovering our downstairs (like through the ceiling and through the floor) neighbors in 123!! And proceeding to jump up and down while facebook chatting, "CAN YOU HEAR US?!" and yelling out the window and being responded with chairs banging on their ceiling/our floor. SO MAGICAL! :D

23. Spending an entire month of wintry nothingness, reveling in the beauty that is college vacation time. Being a baby at home and drinking hot chocolate all the time out of giant mugs and bathing Binky and building fires in the fireplace every night. 

24. Texting Joshua Hahm about the state of current precipitation whenever it was raining.

25. Coffee date with Josh Larosa - opposite-soul-revealing, etc. Coffee, blogtalk, discovering how different our brainwaves are.

this isn't from THE coffee date^, just a random time I happened to take a picture of Josh with a cup of coffee

26. Valentine's Day blahblah don't careboutit blah sorrybout it lalala. Okay seriously though - from GCF first year boys' awesomeness to lovenotes in Italian to secret stuff that was crazy but not regretted, really truly.

27. Amy and David's wedding in Philadelphia over Spring Break. It was my first real wedding (one for "my person" getting married, not a family friend or someone my parents know or something) and so touching and crazy (people I know as my sort of peers are getting married now?!) and also they played the Amelie soundtrack at the reception <3

not Amy and David HEEEHEEee

28. This obnoxiously gigantic apple that I found at O'Hill one day that followed me, like, everywhere, and demanded that I take pictures of it in like, every pose. 

if you're fb friends with me, you can read his whole life story!

29. Unplanned all nighter at Clemons that snuck up on me, but was somehow enjoyable in lots of different ways: because of boys talking about basketball (or something...), candy thrown into the air, early morning texts about being "awake as ever EVER!" and the stupid IR final that justified the all-nighter in the first place.

30. Easter Eve, ordering kabobs to Clemons and then ice cream cake at midnight to break Lent. Nuff said. ...Okay but with that said, must add: also doing healthily happy things with Maddie, like spending my entire last day at school together picnicking in New Cabell, sun-lounging and clover-searching in front of Maups, taking good pictures of one another and talking and laughing about everything. 

31. Creating several-minute-long videos, trying to capture my life at certain memorable moments and ending up with shaky footage of things anyone not in the video will skip through (actually I can see some people in the video skipping through it, too). Haha but it doesn't matter because it makes me laugh and remember and marvel at a time "so long ago!" when so many things were different, but also the same. Oops sorry for saying stuff that amounts to nothing.

32. Sitting through extremely long Tollywood movies and groaning about them afterwards.

33. Convocation: sitting facing the Rotunda and thinking about how we'll turn around to face Old Cabell in just a few years. Lots of people complained that it was boring and cheesy, but I really liked it.

34. Train traveling down to Charlottesville from a short stay in nova. It was too short of a ride for all the pictures I wanted to take, all the reading I wanted to do, all the chocolate I wanted to eat picturesquely. 

35. Taking Claire Lyu, who blew my mind every Tuesday and Thursday with her brilliance, out to lunch  (despite my secret fear of Western utensils). My notes from FREN 3032 are full of emoticons like this ":o !!!!!!!!!!!!!!" At lunch, we both had the chicken caesar salad, talked about France/Korea/America, and wondered about each other's brains, I think. 

36. James Cargile, the only reason for me not dropping Symbolic Logic like 309482 times. He enjoys banana bread as dessert to his lunch, works "for freedom", often forgets (to turn on) his hearing aids then sheepishly grins about it. Unfortunately I will probably never again take another class with him (at least let us hope not...for my academic sanity's sake) - I shall miss his brilliance, kindness, and weird humor that makes him admit his "minor pedagogical tragedies."

37. Eunice NO FEAR Jang, the common denominator to so many delightful things in my life this year: prayer team, being tablemates at Amy and David's wedding reception, GNO (girls' night out, as abbreviated by Bobbie) with much Enchanted sing-along-ing, Anne of Green Gables party with kimchi bokeum bap and cookies, crashing a sleepover at Aileen's with a funny collection of people :) 

38. Planning to write a blogpost about all the ways in which "one groweth" during the first year of college and realizing what a baby I still am and therethusforthly not being able to write that original post at all. Realizing that I'm a work in progress and all the ways in which God provides and being okay with not even having that much closure. Learning that I'm immature in ways that I didn't even imagine - how bad I am at moving out and saying goodbye. And at ending blogposts. eep.

GOODBYE FIRST YEAR!