Handfuls

New Blog

2008-09-03T18:41:00.001-07:00

I have the shortest attention span ever these days, so I thought maybe a tumblr account would suit me better. I'll be blogging there from now on.

furnished.tumblr.com

The Science of Love

2008-07-03T09:40:00.000-07:00

2008-05-28T16:50:00.000-07:00

I wish I knew what it is that I wanted.

I'm Graduating!

2008-05-06T07:02:00.000-07:00

About a month ago, I hastily put together 10 pages of poetry to submit to the Senior Writing, Literature and Publishing Awards at my school. Yesterday, I received word that I received the Senior Writing Award for High Distinction in Poetry, as well as the Academy of American Poets Prize.

According to the Academy of American Poets website:

In 1955, The Academy of American Poets established its University and College Poetry Prize program at ten schools. The Academy now sponsors over 200 annual prizes for poetry at colleges and universities nationwide, and has awarded more than $350,000 to nearly 10,000 student poets since the program's inception.

Many of America's most esteemed poets won their first recognition through an Academy College Prize, including Diane Ackerman, Toi Derricotte, Mark Doty, Alice Fulton, Tess Gallagher, Louise Glück, Allen Grossman, Jorie Graham, Kimiko Hahn, Joy Harjo, Robert Hass, Li-Young Lee, Brad Leithauser, J. D. McClatchy, Heather McHugh, Gregory Orr, Robert Pinsky, Sylvia Plath, Mark Rudman, Mary Jo Salter, Gjertrud Schnackenberg, George Starbuck, Mark Strand, and Charles Wright.

For the longest time, I was writing for myself--holed up in my room or in the corners of cafes--never really showing anyone my work except for workshop. After completing this thesis project, participating in the Senior BFA Thesis reading, putting my work out there and receiving such amazing words of encouragement and recognition, I feel really proud of all my hard work. I feel legitimized and validated as a writer--like hey, panic attacks and mental breakdowns aside, these four years really were worth it.

Translation: Means "I Love You"

2008-04-11T13:59:00.000-07:00

Here is something like a confession:¹

Wednesday afternoon I had a panic attack in the library. All of the messy feelings and stress that I've been feeling for the past semester hit me all at once and I simply could not be there. I went home and laid in my bed and cried to my mother and she told me that I should see someone. So I am.

Things are better now. I've been good to myself--sleeping more, relaxing more, tackling things as they come. This video of Leslie Feist covering Broken Social Scene's "Major Label Debut" has helped, too.

¹ Butler, Judith. "Imitation and Gender Insubordination" (1991). My thesis is haunting me.

Shambles, Part One

2008-04-08T16:59:00.000-07:00

My Academic To Do List

Write a poem for workshop, due 4/9
Put together a presentation on Henri Lefebvre's "Contradictory Spaces," due 4/9¹
Write another poem for workshop, plus an essay on a contemporary poet, due 4/16
Present Honors thesis(-in-progress) to prospective and fellow Honors students at the Senior Honors Thesis Showcase, 4/18
Finish and bind BFA Poetry thesis, due 4/23
Read at Senior BFA Thesis Reading, 4/29
Finish Artist Statement/Honors thesis, due 4/30
Peace out of Emerson College, 5/19

¹ I skimmed through this 30 page article and I don't understand any of it. It's 8pm the day before my presentation and I'm doing this instead.

Winter's Been Real Long This Year

2008-03-04T17:53:00.000-08:00

Hello Saferide - San Francisco

I booked my ticket mostly on a whim back in November, one late night when I was home in Tucson. I was bored and restless, entertaining ideas of new places and possibilities. All romanticism aside, though, this trip couldn't have come at a better time--it's dreary and rainy in Boston today and I've been cooped up in cafes and libraries working on a midterm paper. I'm excited to see old friends and to hopefully make new friends. I'm ready to explore a place I've never been by myself.

And it’s time to call in sick and pack your bags and bring the toothbrush, withdraw from that savings account--what’s savings for? Time doesn’t wait. Hold the door, I’m coming! All that jazz

See you soon, San Francisco.

Sweethearts

2008-02-09T08:59:00.001-08:00

Here is my Valentine's Day gift to you:

The Past Three Weeks

2008-01-18T07:29:00.000-08:00

I turned 22, missed a credit card payment, rearranged my room, kissed someone pretty, helped my brother write his college essay, woken up some mornings with new numbers in my telephone and text messages from newly proclaimed "bffs," got kicked out of a bar, rediscovered the Mountain Goats and oh my god, it's all so good. All of it.

My last first day of school is next week. I can't wait.

Adventures in Solitude

2008-01-03T23:07:00.000-08:00

According to iTunes, the first song I listened to in 2008 was "Adventures in Solitude" by the New Pornographers. I also remember playing it on my phone on a roof at a New Year's party while smoking a cigarette with some friends, sometime after midnight. I wonder if that means something or not.

[I'd post the song for you, but you really ought to just get the whole album. It really is that good.]

Boston

2007-12-29T21:23:00.000-08:00

Today I sat in the Texas Stadium Skybox and drank whiskey sours next to an overly familiar ex-Marine waiting for a standby flight to Dayton, Ohio. I had an hour to kill before my flight to Boston, and my choice to indulge in overpriced alcoholic beverages proved to be a good one when I boarded the plane and saw that seat 30E was occupied with a toddler with a broken leg. I took my window seat and briefly thought about my second semester of eighth grade French class. Julian, the boy who sat next to me all year, broke his arm over winter break and spent most of class trying to scratch his arm by shoving a ruler in his cast.

Sleeping through a time zone, I woke up as the plane was descending over the city. It was already all lit up at 5:30pm, and I pressed my face to the window like a child, trying desperately to find my home or a landmark that looked familiar from so high up. I tried to look for the Prudential building because that's like the Northern Star of Boston--that's how Rik and I got home two summers ago when we decided to walk from Somerville to downtown one night, taking only streets we didn't know--but I couldn't see it from my angle. It was difficult to untangle all the highways filled with headlights and I was groggy from sleep and maybe still a little drunk--I hadn't had anything to eat except a disappointing sandwich that I couldn't even finish, that's how bad it was--and before I knew it things got a little clearer, closer and we had landed, but boy, was it a sight to see.

I'm back now, in my bed, heat on low. I miss my family already and feel terrible that my mother and I are always so awful to each other when I'm Leaving. My flights are always so early, inevitably putting me in a bad mood in the car on the way to the airport and my mother doesn't do well with big and vague events like Leaving so her awkward habits are in full force. And those habits, like how she narrates everything that she is doing and all of the things that we pass (I can't really see, is that Campbell up ahead? Oh, no, it's just Park, we still have another block. Oh, there it is. I'm going to just turn right here. Hey I didn't know they put a Safeway here. It must be new.), her tendency to tailgate sometimes and her worrying (Do you have your ID? Do you have enough cash for a cab home? Your bag is really heavy, it might be too difficult to take the train, you should just take a cab. I hope security isn't a pain this time), which I usually find fairly endearing, just grate and I'm short with her and she gets angry and it's awful. I fly all the way back feeling guilty and tired, and when I land, I call her to tell her I'm home safe, that I'm sorry, that I love her.

Skeletons

2007-12-26T13:44:00.000-08:00

I've spent the past couple days flipping through old photo albums.

This is me partying with my mom in the Philippines.

Hanging out at the Reid Park Zoo with my dad, shortly after moving to Arizona.

Just hanging out with some pals of mine.

Tender moments with my boo.

Listening to some sick jams.

Just writing a poem on my typewriter.

I guess judging by the last two photos, things don't really change.

Wintertime Blues vol. 21

2007-12-22T18:38:00.000-08:00

On my flight from Boston to Dallas, I sat next to an astronomer. She was flying to Hawaii to do some research at some observatory there. I told her I thought that was probably the most unexpectedly romantic job ever, researching and analyzing data about stars and planets. She was very sweet and humored me. She asked me what I did, and I told her that I'm graduating in May with a degree in creative writing, meaning I don't know what I'm doing with my life.

My mother had a holiday party today and for three hours I had to justify my choice to study poetry to strangers--my mom and dad's friends and co-workers, who all seem to know so much about me. Why writing? What are you going to do with that? Have you started applying for jobs yet? What's your GPA?¹ The whole experience left me feeling a little bit like a loser, but then I remember hanging out with my high school English teacher yesterday--she just got her MFA in poetry. We sat in my favorite coffee shop for hours talking about poetry and she said that she thinks poets are one of the last real artists because they do it out of sheer passion, not because they are getting paid or getting famous, because they don't get paid and poetry is read mostly by people in the writing community. She read some of my work for my thesis² and gave me really helpful feedback, and it reminded me that I really love being in the company of writerly folks who just get it³.

Being at home has given me a lot of time with myself, which is a little dangerous because this is the time of year where I always feel a little sad. It's usually for Dumb And Not Important Reasons like how it gets so dark so early, how it's so cold outside, how there's not a soft and nice and pretty girl in my bed to keep my warm, how there's never been a soft and nice and pretty girl that lasts for long⁴, how there must be something wrong with me because of that. And then I feel silly for thinking about those things so much, when I'm surrounded with people that I'm really crazy about, but sometimes, after a long day of class or errands or whatever, I like to take the long way home and think about how lovely love must be.

And now, a holiday mix from me to you, friends. You'll have to download each file separately and then arrange them into a playlist in your music player of choice, which is annoying and I apologize... but it's nice to listen to when buried under blankets, which is what I've been doing for the past few days.

When the Coals Burn Way Down Low: A Holiday Mix

01. Brian Eno - The Big Ship
02. Shelby Sifers - Winter
03. The Aislers Set - Hit the Snow
04. The Rondelles - Rediscover Fire
05. Au Revoir Simone - Stars
06. Hello Saferide - iPod Xmas
07. The Pixies - Winterlong
08. Dressy Bessy - All the Right Reasons
09. Sambassadeur - Ice & Snow
10. The Raveonettes - The Christmas Song
11. Chromatics - I'm On Fire
12. Camera Obscura - Knee Deep at the NPL
13. Math & Physics Club - Darling, Please Come Home
14. Stars - Tonight
15. Hello Saferide - 2006
16. The Research - Lonely Hearts Still Beat the Same
17. Snoozer - Winterclothes
18. Christine Fellows - Migrations

¹ I got straight As this semester!
² This was a little weird because I know she's a little religious and I don't think I've ever actually come out to her. I felt a little awkward about making her read my poems that are all about me being a turtle struggling with gender, heeey^‡.
³ Embarrassingly, I've turned into one of those people who gets drunk and talks about poetry at parties.
⁴ I have difficulty sustaining things. I'm too socially awkward and weird or something. I always say that I'm the person that people date to figure out who they really want to date, because everyone I've dated usually ends up in a serious relationship right after whatever it is we did ends.

^‡ My thesis abstract: Turtles, like many species of reptiles, exhibit temperature dependent sex determination. That is, turtle eggs hatch male or female depending on the temperature at which the eggs are incubated, and not through genetics. For the creative portion of my thesis, I plan to write a collection of poems exploring the complexities of turtles, written from the perspective of myself as the speaker, as well as perhaps turtles themselves. My goal for this collection is to address personal issues such as gender, identity, and queerness through the major themes of temperature, heat, habitat and other ecological implications that affect turtles.

Tucson, Ahoy

2007-12-19T01:29:00.000-08:00

No cigarettes no drinking no drugs no fun lots of work on my thesis getting over this cold getting over everything else warmth good food family warmth: what I have to look forward to in Tucson, AZ.

Seriously though, I'm exciting about skipping town for a little bit. It always gets too cold in Boston this time of year, in more ways than one. I'm leaving long enough to miss it [10 days] and I'll happily come running back. In the meantime, get me out of here! I'm looking forward to laying in my childhood bed and drinking Bloody Marys in the Dallas airport during my three hour layover.

Peace out!

2007-12-10T20:46:00.001-08:00

I'm still alive.

2007-11-22T22:41:00.001-08:00

Friends,

I'm in Tucson, AZ, laying in my childhood bedroom after my first Thanksgiving dinner with family in years! This city is strange--quieter than I remember. I spent the other night driving around, anything to avoid going home even though it was nearly two a.m. The streets were silent and I was listening to Neko Case¹ and it was so nice. I guess I hardly get quiet time when I'm in Boston, save for the nights where I'm up and I go outside to have a cigarette but that's more lonely feeling.

I've had a busy and stressful semester, but I'm working really hard to get my life in order.

¹ I missed her playing here in one of my favorite Tucson venues by a single day. You can't even imagine the heartbreak.

On To September

2007-09-03T15:43:00.001-07:00

Dear Nora - On To September

August is over, on to September...

September 1st brought along changes. Some are good, some are not necessarily good, or not necessarily bad, all are welcome. A new room, a new roommate, beginnings, endings, comings, goings, darker nights, crisper night air, fallen leaves on the walk home. Autumn is around the corner which means summer's almost through. And what a nice summer it was.

It Disappeared Into Never

2007-07-29T15:36:00.000-07:00

I've had a case of the ups and downs recently. The past few days have been a little blue for me--I don't know if it's the weather or the fact that I always feel overtired or something else. I've gone to sleep and woken up with the same anxious feeling in my chest, a nagging in my belly, and restlessness in my kneecaps. I'm longing for something, and I don't know what. Something, someone, anything, new. I'm dwelling on regrets and mistakes¹. But these are old blues old blues old blues, and it'll pass eventually. I've been toying with the idea of going home² and listening to sad songs brilliantly disguised as happy songs to get me through.

Le Sport - It's Not The End Of The World
I remember dancing to this song with a new friend, a beautiful boy from Florida with the most stunning cheekbones I've ever seen. It was at a house party³ and we had shared a moment earlier in the night about the demise of the Swedish band Le Sport and this song in particular, how we both found it by accident and listened to it on an endless loop. Both of us sang along so loud to the line I used to wait for hours outside your house, outside your house with our hips shaking, arms flailing. It was such a nice moment set to such a sad song about the give and take and playing it cool⁴ when you really just want someone and their acknowledgement and a body in your bed the next morning so badly.

Anna Oxygen - Red Horse Cafe
On my walk home last night, I listened to this song as loud as I could. Down damp sidewalks, through the poorly lit bike path, and up the stairs to my room I had to consciously stop myself from moving my party shoulders⁵ and occasionally shake my head and take a breath because I felt like I had been punched real hard in the chest. The chorus reminds me of dancing with a really pretty girl, lights flashing all around and everything is so blurry because you're dancing so hard or maybe you've had a little too much to drink because since when can you really dance this honestly anyway? It's the part where you're so sweaty and close because it's so crowded and you're just looking at each other while everything is moving and everything that happens within the span of the song you're dancing to is somehow so important. I like you so much, I don't want to lose you, I think that I could kiss you but I know I will hurt you. How heartbreaking, that inability to meet in the middle of forever and never.

¹ I'm secretly happy and thankful about the mistakes I've made and the potential of fixing them. I don't know.
² I guess something's up when I'm thinking of going back to Tucson. But I think it's the right time, I haven't seen my family in almost a year and that could be a big part of my achey feelings as of late. I need to get my work schedule figured out, but I'm fairly certain that I'll be in the Old Pueblo the first week or so of September.
³ The vest party at my house in October. I stooped real low to get something I wanted that night, when all I really wanted was to crouch low enough to stay underneath the hood of her affection.
⁴ I'm tired of pretense and posturing and calculation and playing games. I'm trying to practice straight forwardness and sincerity because there's no good reason not to. I'm not interested in playing it cool and stifling my excitement for things or people. I'm not interested in others playing it cool with me, either. Let's just be honest with each other.
⁵ Reference: Nathan J. Schmidt listening to a good song at a good dance party. Watch out.

Lilly

2007-07-12T06:16:00.000-07:00

For the past month or so, my neighborhood has been littered with posters for a missing cat named Lilly.

MISSING LILLY! GREY TIGER STRIPE WITH YELLOW-GREEN EYES & DOUBLE PAWS!

(Photo is a little darker than she actually appears)
6-years old short-to-medium hair grey tiger stripe cat.
Loves to play, especially with her laser light!
She has double paws and interesting sandy-pinkish-light brown
patches. Went missing Thurs. June 14.
She does not wear a collar.
If you live in the neighborhood, if you could please check under
Your porches and in your basements, because she might be hiding
there. She is an indoor cat and has only been out three times
in her life in the carrier when we have moved.

IF YOU HAVE ANY INFORMATION ABOUT HER OR FIND
HER PLEASE CALL ###-###-#### OR ###-###-####
THANK YOU VERY MUCH.

I've thought I've found her three times.

1. With Kate, Rik and Mary on our way home from ice cream. Mary was regaling us with the story of how she met her girlfriend when we saw a grey tiger striped cat sitting on a porch a couple blocks away from the address written on the posters. Kate held her while we called the phone number, and Lilly's owner came out. She knew right away that it wasn't her because of the cat's lack of long thumbs. The cat we found also had coarser fur than Lilly. We continued on our walk home disappointed.

2. Early one morning while I was on my way to work. A cat who fit Lilly's description was in the street and I ran after it for a while. When I caught up to it, I noticed it had a collar. Not Lilly. I was five minutes late to work.

3. One night walking home with Stella, a cat who fit Lilly's description was sitting two doors down from the address on the posters, meowing loudly. I crouched low to pet it while Stella rang the bell and, despite the late hour, the woman answered. Once again, she knew right away it wasn't Lilly--I'm sure so many people in the neighborhood have mistaken this cat for Lilly--because the lack of double paws¹.

Lilly's owner is steadfast in her search, to the point where it gives me a tight chest feeling. I often see her walking up and down the street at night in her housecoat and slippers with a flashlight calling out for Lilly. She called the Boston Water and Sewer Commission so they could check to see if Lilly could have managed to get caught in a storm drain. I've noticed cat treats left on the street corners. She leaves a litterbox on her door step and often leaves her door open. Just the other night, Stella and I walked by her open door and saw her sitting quietly at the bottom of the stairs inside, presumably waiting for her cat to come home.

I think about the times when I've lost something and searched for it so desperately--my best friend from high school², motivation, reasons, the photo of me and my brother that used to sit on my desk³--and I hope so hard that she gets her cat back.

EDIT: This afternoon I walked by her house and there was on a sign on her door that said "Lilly is HOME!"

¹
² A falling out occured sometime soon after I moved away and I often think of him, wonder what he's doing. I searched for him on the internet but all of his internet profiles are private. To this day I still wonder what I did wrong.
³ Lost somewhere between the house we lived in until I was in sixth grade that wasn't even really ours, it was my aunt and uncle's because they spent years and years and years in a different country and the house that my family lives in now.

Keep It Between Me And You

2007-07-06T15:12:00.000-07:00

The Fourth of July was spent with friends on a porch for a delicious vegetarian barbecue and later, alone in my bed, listening to explosions from outside my bedroom window. I have many memories of laying on my driveway in Tucson, t-shirt stained with popsicles and surrounded by my family watching fireworks. We lived right next to A-Mountain, where the big fireworks show happened, and we always had the best view¹. These days, the novelty of fireworks is fleeting at best, but I always enjoy any excuse to grill out and hang out with friends.

Summer has been so wonderful so far. When I'm not working, I spend my time with people that I care about and new people that I'd like to know better--on the kickball field, over dinner or a cup of coffee or a milkshake², with 40s by the pond³, on blankets in my backyard, under blankets in bedrooms, in cars, on bikes⁴. I'm excited about the process of knowing people, their inflection and intonation, their quirks, their fears, their histories, their intentions and motivations and anything else that they want to share with me. I'm excited about being available for people to know as well.

Summer's current soundtrack:

Feist - I Feel It All
I finally managed to get a copy of Feist's new album The Reminder⁵ and soon thereafter fell absolutely in love with this song. It fits so perfectly into my ears--at work⁶, on the train or on the walk home. It has quickly become my anthem of the summer.

Cassie - Me & You (Siik Remix)
More a mashup (Cassie vs. Ratatat) than a remix, really, but play-it-on-loop worthy nonetheless. The original version of this Cassie song is tough and gritty, but this is lighthearted and tender and exciting. When I listen to it I feel all of the involuntary bodily reactions usually caused by crushes. The synth kicking in at 0:19 is like the funny tummy feeling you get when someone you think is super cute looks up at you from under their eyelashes. 0:38 feels like the uncontrollable heart flutters when they smile at you sideways. 0:58, when they ask for your number. 1:17 is the breath you take when you're on the first date or whatever and you're sitting together and your knees touch and you don't know if you should keep them there but you don't move and it's okay. 1:36 is the moment right before you finally get to kiss. 1:55 is when you realize that you're totally kissing compatible and it's awesome! 2:14 is when you first see what they look like in the morning. This is the song I want someone to put on a crush mixtape⁷ for me. I can't get enough.

¹ Until I was in high school, because by then our neighbor Bill's tree had grown so tall that it actually blocked most of the fireworks. By then, though, my family stopped caring so much about them. My dad always worked late on holidays like the Fourth of July because there was always a big party or something that he had to cook for, and my mom gave up on fostering enthusiasm for America.
² My milkshake of choice is strawberry with cake batter ice cream. I'm obsessed.
³ My new favorite summer activity!
⁴ I'm trying to get better at riding my bike.
⁵ Thanks Brett!
⁶ One day, Stella and I played this song approximately 8 times in the course of an hour. On the music note at work, whenever I'm working it's usually my iPod that plays and I work all the time so I pretty much have a monopoly on the music selection there. It felt nice when someone left a note in the suggestion book saying "I love the music that you play."
⁷ Do people still make these?! I want one.

Messy Musings on Time & Work

2007-06-22T16:26:00.000-07:00

Nothing was ever wasted in my house when I was growing up. Plastic utensils were washed and re-used. Ketchup bottles were emptied completely before they were tossed into the bright green recycling bin in our garage¹. Time was precious, our most important commodity.

My father worked long and hard hours in a hot kitchen, cooking expensive meals for people with expensive taste. He came home every night just in time for the 10 p.m. news, just in time for me to kiss him goodnight before I scampered away to bed. His white chef’s jacket was always stained, splattered with sauce and grease, and when I reached up to give him a hug and a kiss on his tired cheek, he always smelled like sweat and grease and work.

My mother worked in an office and the details of her job were always a mystery to me. I called her every afternoon when I got home from school, and she would always pick up with the line “Professional Billing, this is Edna, how can I help you?” She never sounded like my mother then. Instead, her voice was sterile and removed. “It’s me,” I always said, and instantly her voice warmed as she asked me how my day at school was. In the late afternoon, she’d come home and iron other people’s clothes for a little extra money while she watched the soap operas she made me program the VCR to record², because there was never enough money around.

Work. That’s all my parents ever did. We hardly went on any sort of family vacations, and I was always jealous of my friends who came back from any sort of school break with pictures from Disneyland³ and Sea World and the beautiful beaches in Mexico. My friends were well traveled, even in the third grade! Devin Myers spent Thanksgiving break in Ohio, Leigh Havins lounged with her family at their beach house in Puerto Penasco over Spring break, and Jessica Gillies went to Germany for Christmas! Having never spent any time outside of Tucson, Arizona, even Ohio seemed like an exciting and foreign place that I’d wished my parents would take me.

This is not to say that I never got to spend time with my family, that my parents were so removed from my life and so obsessed with their jobs that I raised myself and my younger brother and always had nice things because they worked so much and opted to buy me the love they had no time to give. It wasn’t like that at all. I remember huge elaborate dinners during the holidays—intricate salads with tons of vegetables that I didn’t even like, roasted garlic potatoes that were so good that there were never leftovers, rice pilaf and prime rib that was so tender and juicy that I forgot that I never really liked eating red meat that wasn’t nestled between a hamburger bun. My father would wake up early on Christmas Day, or Thanksgiving, or any other day that merited such a meal, and start cooking. I’d wake up to the smell of his coffee brewing and the sound of pans clattering, and I would get out of bed and watch him cook. He always described to me what he was doing, in something that was like a foreign language to me: “Dice the shallots and put them in the pan with white wine and let it reduce. Then you can add the cream and season with salt and pepper.” His words never stuck with me, really, as I opted to simply watch his hands so precisely chop vegetables and stir things in at just the right time.

Time was important in my family, because of work and school and our otherwise busy schedules. I grew up plagued by time--Only time will tell. Time will heal all wounds. I need time. Bad timing⁴. I wondered about time zones, stopped wishing at 11:11 because of my confusion about them⁵, thought for a second that there was a chance I could maybe live forever if I kept heading west because that's where all the time seemed go.

When I sit backwards on the train, I'm able to watch where I've come from waver and blur and disappear right in front of me. It's simultaneously beautiful and terrifying. Inspiring, really. Time passes. But I'm still here. These days I've been spending my days working at a small, independently run cafe conveniently situated two minutes away from my house. Most mornings I open the cafe, which I prefer over closing because I get out in the early afternoon which leaves me with ample opportunity for learning and knowing and spending time with the people in my life that I am the most excited about. I like summer because days are longer, the sun doesn't fully set until nearly 9 p.m. and everything just feels so full in a good way.

Let's spend some time together.

P.S. I've been really into the song "Calendar Girl" by Stars. It's about time passing and is just about the most depressing or hopeful thing I've ever heard, depending on my mood.

¹ Once, my father caught me trying to dispose of a ketchup bottle that still had its hard-to-squeeze bottom-of-the-bottle contents. He gently took the bottle from my hands and showed me a trick—add a spot of water, shake it around, and, like magic, the rest of the ketchup squirted out effortlessly. I used this trick every time I had the opportunity, and eventually got in trouble for watering down my mother’s favorite shampoo.
² I think this was one of my mother’s favorite things in life. One Life to Live and General Hospital were her favorites, and she would get absurdly yet sincerely upset when the VCR malfunctioned and didn’t record them. That started to happen fairly frequently, and that is when we got a new VCR.
³ I've still never been.
⁴ The story of my romantic life, or, the reason for my lack of a romantic life^‡.
⁵ I also used to wish on fallen eyelashes but stopped when I found one of them on the page of a book I was reading.

^‡ Despite the negative tone of this statement, I'm actually in a really positive place in this area of my life right now. Romance seems to be a difficult thing to negotiate in the sort of casual situations I've gotten myself involved in as of late. I've been saving the tenderness for my friends--candlelit sushi dinners, climbing into your bed early in the morning to wake you up with nuzzles and snuggles, taking the long way home just to spend more time together, breakfast in the morning, making dinner and doing the dishes together. It feels really, really good because I really, really love my friends.

Natal Homing

2007-06-11T20:36:00.000-07:00

Also: Numerous studies of sea turtle nesting ecology have revealed that females exhibit natal homing, whereby they imprint on the nesting area from which they hatch and subsequently return there to nest as adults.

Rambly Rainy Day Blues

2007-06-05T07:48:00.000-07:00

On rainy days, as a child, we'd adhere to what Tully Elementary School called "Rainy Day Schedule." Because we couldn't really go outside for recess on these days, our break times would be spent in the classroom, engaging in some sort of indoor activity. These ranged from teacher to teacher--Mr. Sam gave us Sustained Silent Reading (SSR) time, Ms. St. John let us quietly play with the snakes we kept as class pets¹, Mr. MacIsaac monitored games of Silent Ball². My favorite teacher, though, was Mr. Becker, who played the piano and taught us songs. Those were my favorite rainy day recesses, gathered around the piano and singing with my classmates. Even at that age it was apparent that music really helped ease the doom and gloom of being stuck inside in the rain.

It has sure been difficult adjusting from the sunshine and sweltering heat of the south to thunderstorms, cloudy days, and sweatshirt weather in Boston. Here are some key choices from my rainy day soundtrack.

Broken Social Scene - Lover's Spit (Redux)
This track from the B-Side album Beehives features Leslie Feist doing the vocals on a more stripped down version of my second favorite song from the band's 2004 release You Forgot It In People³. The nakedness of the piano and Feist's voice in the first third of the song make the whole thing inherently sadder than the original version--It feels so lonely and it's the perfect song to listen to while melting into your mattress on a rainy day.

Erin Tobey - Peach, Plum, Pear (Cover)
On Erin Tobey's website⁴, she calls this track a "home-recorded-messing-around Joanna Newsom cover." For just messing around, Tobey has managed to create a quiet and successful version of Newsom's already evocative song. It sounds like she's whispering a sleepy secret into your ear.

Katie Dill - The Body's Only Rental
And lonely is what you make it, what you make it, what you make it & I am sure to make it, yes, I am sure to make it.
All of the repetition in this song is so cathartic and Dill's voice is accompanied so simply by only her ukelele. It sounds so spare and empty and undeniably full. I can't stop listening to it.

And, finally:

New Order - Temptation (Original 12" Version)
Because the rain is letting up because the sun is coming out because it's summer and because I'm really happy. The first time I heard this version of the song I was sitting in my friend's living room listening to records on her little turntable. When she played this for me, I asked to listen to it three more times despite its nine minutes of running time. "Temptation" has long been my favorite New Order song, and laying on a hardwood floor in late summer heat with one of my best friends while listening to this is one of my most favorite memories. This song is hopeful and faithful and true, it's what I imagine love sounds like.

¹ We also incubated chicken eggs. They hatched one day while Ms. St. John was teaching us long division and the lesson was forgotten as the entire class surrounded the big glass incubator in the back of the classroom. We raised the chicks until the end of the school year, with the understanding that whenever the chicks were outside of their cage, the snakes would be inside of their tank.
² A game in which we'd sit on our desks and throw a foam ball around the room. Whoever dropped it was out and had to sit back in their seats. However, the big rule of the game was to stay silent as you played, forcing us to pay attention to what was going on or something but it was only in my older years that I realized this game was just a dirty trick teachers used to keep us quiet!
³ My first favorite song on the album is, naturally (and perhaps typical), "Anthems for a Seventeen Year Old Girl." I remember reading something on a music blog a couple of years ago that hailed "Anthems" as one of those songs so perfect and life changing that you just want to hear it again for the very first time. I remember the first time I listened to it--on a plane to Tucson, AZ from Boston, MA after a brief visit to Emerson College and the city that would eventually become my home. It was on a mix CD that a new friend from the Emerson accepted students' preview day made for me. I remember distinctly sitting next to my mother on the plane and looking out of the window while the sweeping banjo and violin built up. Emily Haines' voice in the track, treated with something like a harmonizer or a vocoder or something, was cold, almost inhuman, but so lovely and sincere as she sang the lines Park that car, drop that phone, sleep on the floor, dream about me over and over again and it all made my chest feel so funny and full. I listened to that song over and over again on the rest of the flight home, and for weeks and months after that.
⁴ You also really ought to read her zines and comics. Tobey has such a way with simple words and line drawings. I have this real and unwavering desire to someday somehow become her best friend.

Sarah Hannah

2007-06-03T18:16:00.000-07:00

I picked up Sarah Hannah's book, Longing Distance, last summer and it quickly became one of those books that I go back to whenever I need inspiration for my own writing. I've found myself flipping through its pages a lot these past few days, as I recently learned that Hannah passed away. She reportedly committed suicide, and this news has left me feeling heavyhearted. I was supposed to have her for my poetry seminar next semester, had exchanged a few e-mails with her about my thesis, and was just so eager to study the craft of poetry under her guidance. It's such a loss.

Note to Self
by Sarah Hannah

I was waiting for forecasts from Swansea,
For developments in prints, clear rubrics
Unperceived in the act of photography,
Some pattern in a flash of sun against
A second-story window in a row of flats
to Hackney district--
I was waiting for a map in clear Queen's
English, lines articulated by skilled
And steady hands,
Proper nouns declining certain ways.

Now I think they are trees,
And the map is in my hand.
It is my hand, just pointing east,
This side of the Atlantic,
One cricket pulsing under reeds
Well past his season. When he stops
I write it, Note to self: Return, address.
Note to self: Come see me.
Write it out in pokeweed juice,
Post it from a country mailbox
Along a crabbed embankment,
A riverway still turning darkly.
A home without a house,
A zip code lost in hemlocks.

Six days in.

2007-05-29T18:07:00.000-07:00

Six days into this road trip and I have danced with so many lovely people, done an excessive amount of lounging, and acquired a beautiful new tattoo. We're currently staying with Rik's family in Roswell, GA where there is a huge porch facing a lake. Tomorrow we're leaving early in the morning and trying to get as close to Baltimore, MD as possible, hopefully stopping in Asheville, NC and other interesting spots along the way. Thursday we're off to Philadelphia, Friday we'll be in New York and Saturday (most of) the Boston folks will be homeward bound.

This trip has reinforced something that I've been feeling for quite a while now: I'm so lucky.

A more detailed report along with photographic evidence to follow upon my return home!

Top 25 Most Played Tracks on iTunes (Part One)

2007-05-21T20:52:00.000-07:00

01. Neko Case - I Wish I Was the Moon
I first knew Neko Case as the front woman of the New Pornographers¹. I picked up her album Blacklisted upon recommendation from the same person who introduced me to the New Pornographers, and it quickly became one of my favorite albums. When I first start liking a song, I play it over and over and over again, put it on multiple playlists, listen to it until I can't listen to it anymore. I'm still not tired of this one.

02. Neko Case - Star Witness
I'm clearly still not tired with Neko Case, either. She's my number one most played artist according to last.fm, substantially above the rest. I listen to her when I'm reading, when I'm writing, when I'm trying to sleep, when I'm having sex or walking by myself or riding the train or folding laundry. I like this song because of the twangy guitar and because of the way she sings the line Hey, pretty baby, get high with me².

03. The Blow - Jet Ski Accidents (Cover)
I love this cover so much more than the original by Wolf Colonel. There's just something about Khaela's voice and the ba ba bums and spare notes in the background that makes this version so deliciously sweet. This is totally a crush mix staple³.

04. Pink Nasty - Burn (Cover)
This is a cover of an Usher song and mostly I'm just really into very sincere covers of songs, especially when they are done completely differently than the original. Her voice is so pretty and wonderful.

05. Beirut - Elephant Gun
The first Beirut song I ever heard was "Postcards from Italy" and to be honest, I didn't really like it that much. But Dafna played this song in the car once, and I became obsessed. I'd never heard anything so rich and textured and beautiful. The layers of accordion and horns and Zach Condon's voice punched me in the stomach, and when we got home I laid in bed listening to it (and all the Beirut I could find) for hours.

¹ I saw them live in Tucson, AZ (my hometown and incidentally where Case has recorded a few of her records) the summer before my senior year of high school. The Organ actually opened for this show, but my friends and I opted to skip out on their set after the first song ("Brother," which I saw performed on the L Word a couple years later!) and proceeded to drink Parrot Bay rum out of a water bottle in the covered bed of my friend's truck. That was the first time I ever got drunk. I had a crush on one of the girls that I was with, and she held my hand through crosswalks when walking back to the show. During the New Pornographers' set, she came and slung her arm around my shoulder, hips shimmying shaking against mine and all of a sudden the room wasn't spinning anymore.
² I haven't gotten high in like three years.
³ Though sometimes I feel bad for having put it on multiple mixes for different crushes despite the fact that it is such a sweet song and totally screams "I have a crush on you!!!" because each crush is usually different and deserves a different staple crush song probably. But whatever, I think the idea of making out while Husker Du is playing is totally hot and awesome, especially "New Day Rising" but even moreso "Green Eyes," omg.

To Do List

2007-05-20T22:19:00.001-07:00

To Do Before Departure

Laundry
Take out the trash
Send packages
Make one pair of pants into one pair of shorts
Turn in volunteer application to 826 Boston
Find out about tattoo appointments¹
Charge iPod and load it up with the necessities²
Haircut?

Things To Pack

At least 15 pairs of underwear³
One pair of shorts
One pair of pants
Four t-shirts (maximum)
One sweatshirt
Phone charger
Camera
Notebook & pen
The History of Love by Nicole Kraus⁴
Toothbrush

¹ I'd love to get my chest piece (typewriter ribbon across my collarbone) done while in Florida.
² Lately this means a bunch of songs that I can only describe as tender:
Meg Baird - Do What You Gotta Do
Neko Case - A Widow's Toast
Ivana XL - Unforgettable (Cover)
Feist - 1 2 3 4

³I am obsessed with changing my underwear. This will probably be heightened when access to showers is limited.
⁴I like this book, I really do--her writing is beautiful and there are some lines that just break me. But when I'm reading it, I usually end up thinking about Oskar Schell and heartbeats and the I Love You sent through a string from a girl in Manhattan and saved into a tin can by a boy in the Sixth Borough and how I just like Jonathan Safran Foer's Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close more even though it's probably not fair to compare them or at least it's been done before and anyway I should appreciate them both for their own literary merits. I'm committed to finishing it.

On fullness, among other things.

2007-05-20T19:54:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, my life feels so full, like there couldn't possibly be enough energytimelove for anything or anyone else. But then new things and new people somehow sneak their way into my life and after a brief moment of adjustment, I am way more satisfied than I ever thought could be possible.

It's summer in Boston, kind of. I'm out of school for the time being and I'm spending my days working on writing¹, making room, sincerity and kindness.

In three days, I'm embarking on a road trip² with some of my very best friends. I've never been on a road trip before and I could count the states I've been in (not counting layovers in airports) on one hand. I'm wildly excited to experience the Eastern seaboard and the trials and tribulations of driving up the coast with six other people, and will no doubt provide a full account of my experience here upon my return.

¹ This involves the beginnings of zines, researching and drafting pieces for my upcoming BFA Honors thesis, and reading and trying to experience so many different things (a rooftop in the beginning of summer, grass between bare toes that have been covered in socks and shoes all winter, empty subway cars, shoulderblades and microscopes, to name a few) in an attempt to get inspired.
²I wasn't planning on going at first, but the perpetually delayed opening of the cafe that hired me months ago and, admittedly, my own fear of missing out on what promises to be an amazing adventure with my friends prompted me to hop on board. My parents don't know about this last minute decision, and, during one of our recent phone calls, my mother asked "Why don't you come home for a week while your friends are on their trip? That way you don't have to be by yourself in the house." I told her I'd think about visiting towards the end of the summer, maybe.