blind compromise

because i have spent the past consecutive nights painting until 2 or 3 am, i forgot that the period immediately after my painting final, i have a comprehensive spanish final. in realization, i laughed. like a maniac. so here i am, studying for spanish, then off to the painting room to finalize a couple projects.

comprometerse (con): to get engaged (to).

i laughed because it sounds like... "compromise."

i also thought it bizzare, i sat here at this very computer, typing out spanish vocabulary, listening to hip-hop, but thinking about the uneven progression of maturity (and the often spotted digression into immaturity) following the crossover from student to alumnus. all at the same time. how do i do it? hmm.. funny.

back to the compromise. i shook my head upon this afternoon's discovery that some 20-yr-old acquaintances just got engaged. so they say they turn 21 in a few MONTHS (which, in my opinion, is still a very long time considering their situation). i won't make any judgments. granted, there are people who had to grow up faster than most - remember that kid who was 4 turning 40? i think he's "55" right now. he probably gets some odd double discount for kids and seniors. and i'm sure by the time he gets married, he will be ready, because he has his house filled with price-slashed furniture and slip-proof-soled shoes.

but he's an exception.

i almost want to say that "comprometerse" does refer to the cupid-struck lover jumping into a black hole. it's a compromise of things they do not even realize. this is what happens:
"Okay, we will arrive at this mutual agreement that yes we want to get married. i will give up those three to five years that i could have spent learning to rent my own place, cook my food, earn my own money, fill up my own gas tank, iron my clothes, and find some financial stability with a good-paying jobs, and making a sensible budget towards tithes and offerings, loan repayment, bills, utilities, necessities, and agreeable entertainment. In your part, upon this commitment, you agree to have me in replacement for all the above, an any other unmentioned footstool of independency. And may we not forget that we are also compromising our chance to find out who we are as separate individuals, who have identities apart from our desperate need to have each other fill holes in our lives, because we're so desperate for a quick fulfillment, how dare we even ask God Himself (Who will tell us to have patience... what an absurdity!) to fill in the cracks."

yup,
blind compromise.


yet another thing that-- makes me laugh in sad irony, like everything else i laughed at today.



-----


éstas son las fotos por sábado y domingo, 28 a 29 de abril.










and Jenna took this shot:

2:15 PM 0 comments

lucid dreaming

a simple thought crossed my mind, and here is my exaggeration, in no way directed at anyone:


i think we have been together for so long, and we have come to accept out "maturity," in that we are so confident in our identities (and that of the other). we are close because we have a masculine-based relationship: the interests, the things we do, the discussions and debates... and that desire for status, secretly wanting status over the other (though we will never tell, or perhaps we do not know it?). and it works for us because it works for any other man-and-man friendship, why would it not work for us because we are females?

as much as we want to deny it, though, we are females. we seek connection. and therefore, we would support a fist-raising conflict about frustrations within the scope of life, but shy away from the conflicts within our own lives, with each other; for if we conflicted with the rest of humanity, perhaps our nature would be perfectly fine, were we detached from them. however, to conflict with each other is to risk understanding, risk that affinity, risk that (dare we say it?) connection.

on occasion, we would converse, and i would get that urge to intercede for you - not just listen, but listen in partial intent to intercede (the other part, to understand you). for what do i intercede? i will not tell you, in hopes you do not think that in interceding, my requests to heaven are assumptions and judgments on your life. As a general statement, however, i will tell you that truth inside me wishes that your connection with God strengthens, deepens. Ojalá que te enamores de Dios una vez, que encuentres paz en tu corazón, solo (¡y siempre!) de Él.

it's a weight i shoulder for you, hoping that somewhere in between the constrains of life, you find joy. and perhaps my wishes seem to be of a feminine nature, but in honesty, i would have wished that on anybody else as well.





today while i took a nap, i was so out of it, that i began lucid dreaming. i heard my alarm go on, so i "began to" sit up and attempt to open my eyes. it felt as if my contacts have been extremely dried that it was a struggle to open them, and upon doing so, my vision was blury. so i took my hands in front of me, started waving it in front of my face, but i could not see my hands. i could feel myself moving them two inches from my face, but it was only when i pulled it away that i could see them. odd. and i felt conscious the whole time, because i made those deliberate choices to wave my hands to confirm blurry vision, and pull them away to confirm whether or not my hands could be seen.
hmm..

7:02 PM 0 comments

waking

the sun slept comfortably, a black satin sheet of sky pulled to her face. the air was softened by quiet dew and the heavy breathing of rested life. i sat on the ledge of the window, knees propped, a cup of warm coffee to warm my fingers and my mind. only the light of a small table lamp spotlighted the empty room. i allowed myself a leisurely awakening, throwing a hoodie over my crumpled hair, glasses over my weary eyes, and let the kind sound of alli rogers gently rub the backs of sleeping veins, sleeping spirits.

cause we are always Eden
the day after she fell
we seel good and evil
and choose which one to tell

and as the world yawned into existence, i wished for sleep...







my painting area. thought i'd show it, mainly so you can see the primary stage of my final self portrait. i'm just as curious as you are.

9:31 AM 0 comments

i cried. LITERALLY.

perhaps people don't think about it too much- i mean, there are some things in life that are so beautiful, they instill joy in your heart. wellps, ever see something so ugly it made you cry?

it's possible.

(watch ghost rider if you want a glimpse)



and this first photo was clairvoyant:





while waiting for my photos, an excursion into ugly clothing (or rather, clothing unfitting to our perceptions of ourselves and each other).





above is my external response to an emotional disconcerto. we tried so hard not to laugh loud, knowing the worker was already irate with us. i cried. i laughed so hard i cried. it hurt. i felt so gross in that one-piece outfit. hotpink and tinkerbell, might i add.






xo

8:38 PM 0 comments

rain

i laid there, in the middle of the muddy field, the heavy rain beating on my fragile body. i wanted the water to dissolve my body and take me into the earth. i wanted my hair to become a nest for suffocating insects. i closed my eyes, listened to the heavens crumple thunder like an architect with creative block. the air was a comfortable warm, like a blanket, and i wrapped myself with it, pulling the sheets to my lips. i fell asleep in that rainstorm. and i dreamt, not of sunshine and blue, but of this very water rising, immersing me, collecting me. the water to my ears, the water to my cheeks, the water a few inches above the tip of my nose. and i did not allow myself to wake up, fearing that this is real, and suddenly i will remember how to breathe.

9:55 PM 0 comments

real

snapshot #1 taken.
"Okay, fine," says Jenna. "This time, I'll smile."
Click.





"And this is why we are cool."
I love my friends.

12:34 AM 0 comments

pursuit

quitting is a permanent solution to a temporary problem... and you can measure a man's character by what it takes for him to quit.

drown not in this ocean, child,
scream into its scraping fingers,
watch as it attempts to horde the sand
come only so far, but
drown not in this ocean, child,
allow the gusts to push your tears
tilt your head to the heavens
express your anguish, your pains, but
drown not in this ocean, child,
come walk with me above it.








have you heard: in Hungary, a truck carrying 5000 rabbits overturned, spilling all them animals onto the highway.

what officials won't tell us is that they started off with 50 rabbits and ended up finding 10000 (so the exaggeration in my head tells me).

6:23 PM 0 comments

foil brides

come now, let us wrap ourselves in
the fabric of disposable preservation.
let us meet our lovers ready
to be placed in the fire,
to be left cold shouldered,
to wipe their asses.
and let us feel pretty all the while,
our sophistication reflected on our massive rings
and the smiles on our faces
is this what we both deserve?

9:18 PM 0 comments

profile pictures

i love those profile pictures where you know that all other people were cropped out. yes. i'm especially fond of those shots that originally had two people, and you can barely see a quarter of the other's face (smiling too), or maybe even a bit of arm extension around the main person's shoulder. it's great- a tad bit like, "so, i pretty much think that my face looks far more superior than the thought of showing yours."










on a much more serious note, do not take me as a pessimist, but i predicted this copycat mentality (referring to the VA Tech incident). i flipped on the television to find "breaking news" of the gunman in houston, and then later to hear that 15 other schools across the nation had to either shut its doors, or ask that students remain at home. it's as if the suppression has found it's leak through the angry stance of a troubled man. i cannot imagine the lives of those who know several people involved different incidents, whether a combination of VA or Columbine or the Amish schoolhouse... worse, it broke my heart to hear the press release of Cho's family's response to this entire situation. there is only sympathy- a strive for empathy is impossible. how must they face their colleagues, their friends, their other relatives, the world?

it comforted me, however, listening to npr yester-morn to a student who was in one of those classrooms. "Will you go back to school?" the reporter asked. "Of course," she replied. "We can't let him win."

i let that sit in my mind- to think that if we allowed this fear to take root, the madman will still be laughing from the grave.




then i thought of the idea of our old selves being dead and gone.
and...
i hope with all hopes that my old self never laughs from the grave.




xo

11:36 PM 1 comments

we rock the mic in a different way

"... just two turntables and a fresh dj."

tonight marked the end of this season of StrobeLight.
no more productions, no more strobelight dinners,
but a superfluous selection of humourous memories.

StrobeLight defined: Student-produced weekly television show, featuring Christian music videos and Christian music news.



first place in the state, Missouri Broadcasting Educator Association
first place in the nation, Society of Collegiate Journalists.

how did we do it?


L-R: VJ-Karen, VJ-Ty Jason, Director-myself, Producer-Bethany, Audio-Justin (aka "Wavelength"), Music News-Tory (aka "Hectorious"), camera-Lindsey. missing-Gabe. and tv studio work studies we pull now and then.





i have to make a season DVD. if only i could find all the bloopers.



xo

11:00 PM 0 comments

listening

my heart has been dragging on the floor in behalf of the Virginia Tech massacre. i have been watching NBC, and as they play the footage of Cho Seung-Hui, i realize my tears are not enough to water life. the gun pointed at the camera, i feel like reaching my hand out and lowering it down. the awful thing is knowing that there are hundreds more just like him- somewhere in between the lines of birth and beautiful and broken, the cliché of angst-ridden teens.

i wonder how well we listen. sometimes we are so caught up in our own lives - and sure you may have heard that countless times - but think about the fact that we believe that we are in the right. there's no beating around it, if you didn't think your opinion was right, you would have changed it. so what am i asking? not that we should abandon all our senses, LORD knows that there are things we believe that are indeed aligned with the truth. i'm not just talking about listening to the obviously different, like the homeless man or the starving child or the single mom. i'm talking about the ones who are just slightly different. i tell you, it's harder to love those, because subconsciously, they are so close to being like us, but they're glitched up right there, that it makes us frustrated. maybe they have the same demographics as we do, but have all the wrong interests. do we listen to them? because their interests are a sign of what we consider to be immature? because they sing a different melody, because they sing off-harmony? because they look absurd or look too normal or look too meticulous or look too shabby? because he doesn't shave his face (or she doesn't shave her legs)? because they shop at the 99 cents store? because they shop at express? because they use $5 dictionary words or speak like a thesaurus? because they use emoticons or abbreviations or "i'm doing good" instead of "i'm doing well" or continuously using lower case? i'm telling you, they're so close to being us, but they're not, and so we don't listen. she's overly dramatic, he's overly egoistical. he wears spikes like a goth, she wears hot pink like a stereotype. they're so close to being us, but they're not, and so we don't listen.

i use collective "we" because i know i'm a part of the issue.
i can give you precise examples of how i fail to listen.

i wonder about Cho Seung-Hui's adolescence. i wonder if anybody listened to him. i wonder if they heard the gunshots while he stalked those girls, if they heard the gunshots while he wrote poetry. if they heard the gunshots while he sat quietly by himself, or while he stood in a crowd.

can you hear the gunshots?
"it's time for the listeners to start talking."





(eventually, the tulips die)

5:25 PM 0 comments

picada

thought one:
i like how nobody really knows how many posts i already deleted from this thing.

thought two:
picada. [blog imported from myspace]

picada.

i'm quite SICK of the fact that it's almost been TWO FULL MONTHS since i've written anything of pure substance. anything in between now and then- just words rolling out of a desperate throat. so, partially inspired by amateur photographers and partially determined to polish my dormant camera obscura skills, i am making an attempt at "picada," or, a picture a day. i think it should turn out quite interesting, although i don't know how long i'll survive (considering my camera eats batteries like a chubber eats cake). i'm a bit impressed with myself for making a public declaration of a resolution, seeing that i'm awful at following through things that don't necessarily have a clear cut value (like: "i will floss every night."). usually, things like these, i start with silence, and if it succeeds, then i announce my triumph. but, considering my plead for creativity, there you go. i am attempting picada. plus, if you didn't know, i love to journal. i've journaled since i was six (and i have proof). i've always loved the concept of photojournalism, never tapping into it seriously, reserving myself for some dusty foot in north africa. what an awful reasoning, no? i can be such a futurist, it's lame.

----------

today is technically april 18, but i haven't slept yet, and therefore i still consider this moment to be the 17th of april. i am fidgety. i'm also in an absurd mood for some flaming lips (by that i refer to the band, not some makeout session, kthanks).

the sun graced the dreary tulips, they that bowed with the push of the wind. i thought about middle school looking at those tulips, o how they long to blossom into beauty, only to be pushed by the natural occurence of peer pressure. no one can escape its influence - i'm not saying everyone has given into it, mind you, the observance of peer pressure is enough to make one uphold a standard of individuality. i found a tulip i liked, leaning up against the brick wall, still standing tall, still full of color.

i reading about that passage in isaiah when he refers to the LORD "healing the brokenhearted." as poetically fluid as it sounds, isaiah is making a reference to broken bones. i let this sit in my mind. and i do not believe it to be coincidence, but i was led these past two nights to read psalm 34.17-20:

and the one thing ringing in my head, for the Almighty's grace to protect my bones - in other words, protect my structure, my framing, the very things that keep me in tact. my beliefs, my worldviews, my morals, ethics.

all that ran through my mind looking at that one tulip against the brick wall.

and you'd think i would have taken a picture of it.

i took a picture of beth's dog shadow and myself because she's such a good, affectionate dog.
tulips=later.

2:22 PM 0 comments