it has been an interesting week indeed. heath ledger died, people celebrated their birthdays, and i continue to be disturbed by the radical church planning to protest ledger's funeral bc he played gay in Brokeback Mountain. what? now, actors can't even play gay? i recognize that this 'church' is in the minority, at least i hope so, but it puts a major damper on my faith in humanity when people get this crazy. okay, i get it, gay is bad. gay is anti-bible. gay is likely the culmination of everything bad in humanity. what else? feel free to add on.
i think it's a need to blame, a need to point fingers, that makes these radicals find fault in others. after all, global warming is obviously caused by gay people, as is starvation in africa, the war in iraq, osama bin laden, and the reason i like my saturday morning spin class. this last one is true, because my instructor is so awesome. but i digress. i think humans are programmed to think in terms of boxes. everything needs to fit in a box and be assigned a label, categorized, itemized, lather, rinse, repeat. when things don't fit into those boxes for whatever reason, someone needs to be blamed because something has obviously gone horribly awry. but why? why does not fitting = wrong? can we not expand our minds to think that there are other ways to live? other methods of thought? other ways to be happy? things that may not fit into our conventional boxes. new things are discovered all the time, products are improved, there's a 3lb laptop for christs' sake, modern aviation, the Smart car, i mean really. can it be a fear of the new/different if we embrace 'new' in so many other arenas? are we going to hate on the 3lb laptop bc it's different? bc it's not the 10lb laptop (or dare i say, desktop) that we own? why is it so scary to some? is it bc they're afraid they wont fit into a society that includes the new/different? perhaps. perhaps, they fear becoming the minority if this new/different catches on. (again, not to say that they're in the majority now) why is it bad to be in the minority? because that makes them different from the majority. how silly. how stupid. how obtuse. are we in the 2nd grade? i think 2nd graders may be more evolved. all this bc heath ledger played gay. if you're gonna protest someone's funeral for gayness at least pick someone that actually was gay. geezus. they can't even get that right. dumasses. damn minorities...
here's the actual story:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22813570/
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Sunday, January 13, 2008
A Narrator?
Still reading "Love in the Time of Cholera," and came across this sentence that intrigues me:
'As a kind of compensation from fate, it was also in the mule-drawn trolley that Florentino Ariza met Leona Cassiani, who was the true woman in his life although neither of them ever knew it and they never made love. He had sensed her before he saw her as he was going home on the trolley at five o'clock; it was a tangible look that touched him as if it were a finger. He raised his eyes and saw her, at the far end of the trolley, but standing out with great clarity from the other passengers. She did not look away. on the contrary: she continues to look at him with such boldness that he could not help thinking what he thought: black, young, pretty, but a whore beyond the shadow of a doubt. He rejected her from his life, because he could not conceive of anything more contemptible than paying for love: he had never done it.'
Firstly, I started only typing out the first sentence of the quote above but was so throughly enraptured by the resulting description that I had to copy the rest of the paragraph. Is there an omniscient narrator out there narrating all our stories? Is there an entity out there that has all our lives mapped out in front of them? I think so. I just hope not to ever be in Florentino's position...ever and if I were to end up there I think I'd rather not know.
Honestly I don't know why I picked this book up at Target back in December but I haven't read quote unquote literature in quite some time and I think this book prompts me to get back into it. To me there are some things that can only be described just so. Some of the complexities, floral, and ethereal qualities of language have been lost in time and perhaps it's only in reading, again, quote unquote great works (on who's invisible list?) that allow me to understand things and think about them in different lights. And isn't it in pondering things, circumstances, and life in general through different lenses and varying angles that make us as diverse and multifaceted as we are? It's our experiences that shape us but if we are limited in experience for whatever reason why not see what other possibilities and perspectives there are out there in the words of an artfully written novel?
I think one of the main things I like about this particular book is that you know the end before you know the beginning. Marquez tells you exactly how the love story ends within the first fifty pages. It freed me from rushing to get to the end to find out how the love story turns out. Do they end up together? Don't they? What happens? Instead I'm left to linger over the actual story for the remaining pages. I don't need to gloss or skim because I really do want to know how it all transpired. How it all came to be. How it all got so incredibly twisted.
Other choice quotes:
'Lionlady of my soul'
'"That may be the reason he does so many things," she said, "so that he will not have to think."'
'No: he would never reveal it, not even to Leona Cassiani, not because he did not want to open the chest where he had kept it so carefully hidden for half his life, but because he realized only then that he had lost the key.'
'She would defend herself, saying that love, no matter what else it might be, was a natural talent. She would say: "You are either born knowing how, or you never know."'
'She was yesterday's flower.'
'As a kind of compensation from fate, it was also in the mule-drawn trolley that Florentino Ariza met Leona Cassiani, who was the true woman in his life although neither of them ever knew it and they never made love. He had sensed her before he saw her as he was going home on the trolley at five o'clock; it was a tangible look that touched him as if it were a finger. He raised his eyes and saw her, at the far end of the trolley, but standing out with great clarity from the other passengers. She did not look away. on the contrary: she continues to look at him with such boldness that he could not help thinking what he thought: black, young, pretty, but a whore beyond the shadow of a doubt. He rejected her from his life, because he could not conceive of anything more contemptible than paying for love: he had never done it.'
Firstly, I started only typing out the first sentence of the quote above but was so throughly enraptured by the resulting description that I had to copy the rest of the paragraph. Is there an omniscient narrator out there narrating all our stories? Is there an entity out there that has all our lives mapped out in front of them? I think so. I just hope not to ever be in Florentino's position...ever and if I were to end up there I think I'd rather not know.
Honestly I don't know why I picked this book up at Target back in December but I haven't read quote unquote literature in quite some time and I think this book prompts me to get back into it. To me there are some things that can only be described just so. Some of the complexities, floral, and ethereal qualities of language have been lost in time and perhaps it's only in reading, again, quote unquote great works (on who's invisible list?) that allow me to understand things and think about them in different lights. And isn't it in pondering things, circumstances, and life in general through different lenses and varying angles that make us as diverse and multifaceted as we are? It's our experiences that shape us but if we are limited in experience for whatever reason why not see what other possibilities and perspectives there are out there in the words of an artfully written novel?
I think one of the main things I like about this particular book is that you know the end before you know the beginning. Marquez tells you exactly how the love story ends within the first fifty pages. It freed me from rushing to get to the end to find out how the love story turns out. Do they end up together? Don't they? What happens? Instead I'm left to linger over the actual story for the remaining pages. I don't need to gloss or skim because I really do want to know how it all transpired. How it all came to be. How it all got so incredibly twisted.
Other choice quotes:
'Lionlady of my soul'
'"That may be the reason he does so many things," she said, "so that he will not have to think."'
'No: he would never reveal it, not even to Leona Cassiani, not because he did not want to open the chest where he had kept it so carefully hidden for half his life, but because he realized only then that he had lost the key.'
'She would defend herself, saying that love, no matter what else it might be, was a natural talent. She would say: "You are either born knowing how, or you never know."'
'She was yesterday's flower.'
Friday, January 11, 2008
bored
I've never been so bored. i hate being sick but who doesn't? in the meantime, i'd like to ponder why it is that i know there are so many things i could be doing with this time yet i refuse to do it? thoughts?
So I watched Almodovar's "Talk to Her" yesterday and I have to say that I love him. He may be the only person who can make one feel empathy for a rapist. It is, without a doubt, a twisted story. A man essentially falls in love with a comatose woman. He knew very little about her before she feel into coma and I think he kinda makes up the rest along the way. What's interesting is the ability of the mind to not only make stuff up but for the person to then believe it. Wholeheartedly. Tricky thing that mind. Tricky tricky. it's an amazing thing.
in other news, i was just re-reading a bday card i received from a dear dear friend and i thought i'd share:
"Barb, this year I wish you more love in your live. It's not to say that you need more joy & love from friends & family because you will always have that forever without a doubt. I wish for you a kind of love that makes you flutter, a love that makes you cry, a love that makes you angelic and fly high."
i fear that this is a common sentiment among my friends about me. fear not dear friends. this is the one arena in life where i have patience. all good things come to those who wait.
So I watched Almodovar's "Talk to Her" yesterday and I have to say that I love him. He may be the only person who can make one feel empathy for a rapist. It is, without a doubt, a twisted story. A man essentially falls in love with a comatose woman. He knew very little about her before she feel into coma and I think he kinda makes up the rest along the way. What's interesting is the ability of the mind to not only make stuff up but for the person to then believe it. Wholeheartedly. Tricky thing that mind. Tricky tricky. it's an amazing thing.
in other news, i was just re-reading a bday card i received from a dear dear friend and i thought i'd share:
"Barb, this year I wish you more love in your live. It's not to say that you need more joy & love from friends & family because you will always have that forever without a doubt. I wish for you a kind of love that makes you flutter, a love that makes you cry, a love that makes you angelic and fly high."
i fear that this is a common sentiment among my friends about me. fear not dear friends. this is the one arena in life where i have patience. all good things come to those who wait.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
An exercise in self-medication
That is my challenge today. Chicken broth, grapefruit, pineapple, ginger tea, honey and no dairy products. Will it help me with this mysterious malady? I'm not sure if it's a cold combined with soreness from the gym or the flu which comes with it's own soreness. Who the hell knows. We'll see how i feel at the end of the day.
Saturday, January 5, 2008
Sympathy Pains
Do you believe in it? I think I do. My mood changes as the people close to me go through ups and downs. Is that bad? I don't know. I do know that after I spoke with J in her anxiety ridden mode last night, I slept horribly and have had a cloud over my head until I spoke to M this afternoon who told me that J was doing better as of this morning. Then I just spoke to J myself and I feel almost normal, except for the Nyquil from last night that has me in a fog. Hopefully coffee will cure that. It makes sense to me to be affected by the emotions of those closest to you, if you're that connected it's bound to happen. I worry for them, with them.
I went to yoga this morning for the first time in ages and vowed to go regularly once again bc i was completely inflexible. Completely. Not as smooth as I used to be and I attribute it to lack of practice, so if i were to make a resolution which I don't normally, I'd say it is to go back to regular yoga practice every week.
Lets see if i can keep to it.
I went to yoga this morning for the first time in ages and vowed to go regularly once again bc i was completely inflexible. Completely. Not as smooth as I used to be and I attribute it to lack of practice, so if i were to make a resolution which I don't normally, I'd say it is to go back to regular yoga practice every week.
Lets see if i can keep to it.
Friday, January 4, 2008
We are eggs
So it's the new year. I got back from 8 days in Miami (actually Hollywood, FL) this past Wednesday. What's that you say? A tough life? I know. I know. But I help make these trips happen so I deserve it. :) In any case the first 4 days were entirely relaxing, just lazing about from beach to pool to beach. But before you get green with envy I'd like to also say that I had a bit of a mental collapse. Not as dramatic as it sounds but I think I just cracked. I had a stressful week just before Christmas but really it was just me choosing to take the world on my shoulders, as is my nature. And so I snapped. I started crying. Crying. Yes. Crying. And it felt good. One of my other issues is that I don't like feeling week. Not the same as feeling vulnerable because I don't believe I have that problem. But I don't enjoy feeling that I'm not in full control or visibly showing that things do affect me. I'm not quite sure how to explain it but I do know that I was lucky to have someone there to talk me out of it. To tell me it's okay to cry and to not be the one taking care of someone else all the time. To let someone take care of me. It felt good. I know that I have to let other people take charge sometimes but I also have a fear of disappointment and abandonment so if I give those people a chance to care...and they don't I will feel all of the aforementioned things that scare me. Perhaps that's why I try so hard as a person. I want to show people that I deserve it because I've demonstrated as much to them. And so here I am. Writing this post. Pondering a quote that I recently read in "Love in the Time of Cholera:"
'She would not shed a tear, she would not waste the rest of her years simmering in the maggot broth of memory, she would not bury herself alive inside these four walls to sew her shroud, as native widows were expected to do...she would go on living as she always had, without complaining, in the death trap of the poor where she had been happy.'
Why did I feel compelled to jot this quote down?
The first reason is that I really appreciate the level of description: 'The maggot broth of memory?' Who writes that? Gabriel Garcia Marquez did and it's the ability to strike people. To make them feel things through words. This is why I do what I do. While memory is but rarely a maggot broth, it sometimes can be the thing that holds you back. Because it is memory of feeling like a disappointment, feeling like i was abandoned that makes me who I am now. But who am I to question the person I've become? On a normal day, it's awesome and it all works so this is just a vent. A bit of self-reflection as I am also prone to do. It's the things that happen to us, the things that happen around us and between us. The things we go through, the good, the bad, and all the gray area in the middle, that makes us who we are. So we crack like an egg once in awhile. We're human. It's okay.
Thanks to twins one and two who took shifts babysitting me. :)
'She would not shed a tear, she would not waste the rest of her years simmering in the maggot broth of memory, she would not bury herself alive inside these four walls to sew her shroud, as native widows were expected to do...she would go on living as she always had, without complaining, in the death trap of the poor where she had been happy.'
Why did I feel compelled to jot this quote down?
The first reason is that I really appreciate the level of description: 'The maggot broth of memory?' Who writes that? Gabriel Garcia Marquez did and it's the ability to strike people. To make them feel things through words. This is why I do what I do. While memory is but rarely a maggot broth, it sometimes can be the thing that holds you back. Because it is memory of feeling like a disappointment, feeling like i was abandoned that makes me who I am now. But who am I to question the person I've become? On a normal day, it's awesome and it all works so this is just a vent. A bit of self-reflection as I am also prone to do. It's the things that happen to us, the things that happen around us and between us. The things we go through, the good, the bad, and all the gray area in the middle, that makes us who we are. So we crack like an egg once in awhile. We're human. It's okay.
Thanks to twins one and two who took shifts babysitting me. :)
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