New Year's Eve Plans

Generally I do almost nothing for New Year's Eve. I am usually at my parents' house so my mom makes some snacks and we hang out and play board games. I'm not there this year though so a couple of my friends are coming over here and then we are...well...we have no idea what we are doing. We are all the "non-existant New Year's Eve plans" kind of people. We have come to discover that having three people who haven't made New Year's Eve plans in over twenty years attempt to plan anything to do on New Year's is kind of a bad idea. Oh well. We will come up with something.

If I had my druthers this picture describes somewhere that I think I would love to spend New Year's. The Rex in Toronto. I adore that place. So New Year's there? Yes, please.

Reading Love

Michaela forgets her body for hours at a time. I love to watch her while she's thinking or reading, her head leaning on her hand. On the floor or in a chair, her limbs abandoned to gravity. The more intense her concentration, the more abstract the problem she contemplates, the further her body roams. Down long roads, her legs swinging, or across open water, her hair wandering down her back. This is her body's truancy, its mischievousness. Freed from Michaela's disciplining mind, it runs away, goes outdoors. When she looks up and catches me watching her, or simply stops reading - "Jakob, Hawthorne actually pretended to be ill so he could stay home and read Carlyle's essay on heroes" - her body is there again, reappearing suddenly in the chair. And I feel deep appreciation for those heavy, sneaky limbs that have defied her mind's authority without knowing. She looks at me, all presence. While her body and I share our delicious secret. (Anne Michaels, Fugitive Pieces)

 I just started Anne Michaels' second novel, The Winter Vault, today. I am not that far into it yet, but so far it is every bit as strikingly beautiful as Fugitive Pieces. I read Fugitive Pieces in one of my classes last semester and fell in love with Anne Michaels' writing. There were moments last semester where I profoundly struggled with the question of why I am doing what I'm doing with my life. It is writing like Anne Michaels' that reminds me of the answers to this question.

The above quote is one of many from Fugitive Pieces that float through my mind, haunting me, weighing on my very soul in the best way possible. So much of our class discussion of the novel centred around love; I even wrote my final paper on the connection between language and love in the novel. I find Jakob's description of Michaela as she reads incredibly beautiful. Perhaps this is partly because I too have a wandering body. I will stop reading only to find myself sitting in a chair at the coffee shop in one odd position or another and I always wonder if people have been looking at me. I think if someone watched me with Jakob's intensity, and with his deep affection, I would be won over. Now that I've written that I realize that it probably sounds weird. Oh well. What can I say? The way to my heart is through literature.

Delicate Beauty

I don't really have that much to say lately. Well, that's not true. I've been talking and thinking through some stuff, but I feel like somehow it isn't formulated enough for me to write about on here. So, instead I bring you a pretty picture. I like the tiny delicacy of the rose bud contrasted with the solidity of the boulder. I also really like the colours in this. The yellow of the rose is so interesting, saturated yellow that fades into the faintest hint of colour at the tips of the petals.

(Post) Christmas Smiles

I am inexpressibly happy right now. So, here are some things that made me smile on Christmas Day:

Mini mandarin oranges with mini leaves still attached.

A giant pile of German potato pancakes for brunch.

Curly wicks on candles.

Sparkly/beaded/glittery Christmas ornaments.

Sitting in a dark room staring at the lights on the tree.

I hope your Christmas had some moments to make you smile.

Waiting for Love to be Born

Waiting for Love to be Born
Erin O'Donnell

All is set
I know my stocking's downstairs
And the sky is smiling
There is magic in the air

I can't sleep
I am so glad to be home
On this early morning
I'm not alone

This is the season, this is the time
I see the face of a child and that face is my
I'm looking for starlight and I'm listening for angels
Everyone is asleep on this Christmas morn
But I'm awake
And I'm waiting here for love again to be born

Bundled up
I know what's waiting for me
More than a pretty package
Next to the tree

Something else
A gift far greater I know
Born in Bethlehem
Long ago

This is the season, this is the time
I see the face of a child and that face is mine
I'm looking for starlight, and I'm listening for angels
Now the house is asleep on this Christmas morn
But I'm awake
And I'm waiting here for love again to be born

The sun is rising, I see the distant light
Oh what a glorious day will come from this holy night

To us is born
Every December anew
A love that's unbelievable
Given to me, given to you

This is the season, this is the time
I see the face of a child and that face is mine
I'm looking for starlight and I'm listening for angels
Now the house is asleep on this Christmas morn
But I'm awake
And I'm waiting here for love again to be born
Yes, I'm waiting here
I'm waiting here for love again to be born

[Merry Christmas!]

Stille Nacht

Stille Nacht

Stille Nacht, heilige Nact,
Alles shläft; einsam wacht
Nur das traute hochheilige Paar.
Holder Knabe im lockigen Haar,
Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh!
Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh!

Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht,
Hirten erst kundgemacht
Durch der Engel Halleluja,
Tönt es laut von fern und nah:
Christ, der Retter ist da!
Christ, der Retter ist da!

Stille Nacht, heilige Nacht,
Gottes Sohn, o wie lacht
Lieb' aus deinem göttlichen Mund,
Da uns schlägt die rettende Stund'.
Christ, in deiner Geburt!
Christ, in deiner Geburt!

The tune of "Silent Night" is beautiful and I love the song dearly. It's one of those songs I learned as a kid that has kept a special place in my heart. But there is something, now that I'm older and a sincere lover of languages, particularly gorgeous about the song in its original German. So, I thought I would share it with you.

The picture is one of my mom's lovely Christmas decorations. I really like how the lighting turned out in this particular shot.

Here's to Happiness

One of my favourite blogs on the internet is rockstar diaries. Every time I read Taza's beautiful posts I get an overwhelming desire to simply step out of my life and into her shoes (sometimes her whole wardrobe since it is ridiculously cute). Her blog is permeated by profound joy and a slightly quirky sensibility that I adore. Plus the photos are beautiful. A couple of days ago she posted a little list of ten things that are making her happy this week. Every so often she writes one of these up as part of her Here's To Happiness set of entries and encourages others to submit their lists. It's such a fantastic way to take a second and appreciate the good things in your life, whether they are big or small. Sometimes I lose my smile (which those of you who read this regularly know all too well), so in an effort to counteract that I've taken to savouring the things that make me smile. I decided that today was a good day to adopt Taza's happiness list. Here are ten things that are making me terribly happy this week (most of them are rather Christmas-y):

1. Pink Martini's Christmas album, Joy to the World. Especially their version of Shchedryk (Ukrainian Bell Carol).
2. Christmas lights.
3. Napping in the sunshine.
4. Brave friends.
5. Conversations with friends where I lay my heart bare and am greeted with understanding, compassion and encouragement.
6. Wrapping Christmas presents.
7. Being greeted with smiles by strangers on the street.
8. Unexpectedly having my New Year's Eve shift cancelled.
9. Getting Christmas cards from dear friends. 
10. Finding glitter from cards and ornaments in unexpected places. A little, sparkly reminder that you are loved and magic still happens this time of year.

Contemplative Moods

contemplation (n)
1 the action of looking thoughtfully at something for a long time
2 deep reflective thought
3 [in Christian spirituality] a form of prayer or meditation in which a person seeks to pass beyond mental images and concepts to a direct experience of the divine

I am one of those people who easily gets wrapped up in their own thoughts. I have a tendency to get kind of stuck in my own head. I've been doing a lot of thinking lately. Generally this has been a good thing. I'm wrestling with some big topics, but I am also kind of loving this process. However, sometimes the tendency to get stuck in my head is not a good thing. This side of thinking seems to emerge a lot when I have time on my hands. I dwell on things. I mull them over endlessly. I obsess. I get stuck on tiny details. I overanalyze. Some of these skills are really useful and make me an academic through and through. Like any good thing though, there is such a thing as too much of this. I get into my head. I stop wanting to go out and experience the world. I stop wanting to socialize. All I do is think. This usually ends with me in tears over something or other (I tend to be a bit overemotional. I cry over everything.) Holidays are the worst culprits for bringing this side of me out. It has to do with the giant chucks of time in which I am not required to be doing anything. I don't handle doing nothing well, so instead I start in on these ridiculous trains of thought and just get lost in them. Fortunately this Christmas break has been so busy that I seriously haven't had time to get too mired in my thought process. This isn't to say that I'm not contemplative. I certainly am. I'm almost re-reading The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje and have just started in on Rilke's Letters To A Young Poet. I bought myself a copy of Seamus Heaney's translation of Beowulf. I'm considering my plans for next year. I'm taking a very careful look at my faith and beliefs. The thing is that this is all healthy thinking. Contemplation in it's most beautiful form. I like that one of the definitions of contemplation has to do with spiritual practice and seeking the divine. Just one more way that that word is absolutely perfect for what is going on in my head lately.

This photo has been my computer background for a while now. I just love staring at it. I've said this about other photos before, but I feel like this photo has ridiculous amounts of meaning captured in it. Perhaps this is simply my openness to beauty and meaning lately, but I have a hunch that there is something more at work. Just another thing to contemplate.

Ten Things...Let it Snow!

Winter officially arrives this week although the amount of snow we've had in the past few days pretty much makes the first day of winter nothing more than a formality. Seriously. Why is the first day of winter in the middle of December? This has never made sense to me. Yes, I understand that because of the position of the Earth and such it is the shortest day of the year, but why do we insist on referring to it as the first day of winter? Anyway, due to winter's arrival (both formal and informal), here are ten posts about snow, cold, ice, and the ways I cope with it.

1. Snowed In
2. Icy
3. Winter has Arrived
4. She looks so pretty, but she is so cold
5. Cold and Grey
6. Death by Cold
7. Snow Day
8. Spring Snow
9. Spring in Edmonton
10. April Blizzard

Nice Cookies

These cookies made me smile when my mom brought them home today. They are actually called "Nice". Seriously. That's what it says on the box and what it says on the cookies. I think that is great. At first I thought they were special Christmas cookies. You know, "Nice" and "Naughty". But alas there are no "Naughty" cookies. Only "Nice" ones. They amuse me though. Plus, they are actually quite tasty.

Snowed In

The other day, after I had finished my exams, Bean pointed out that it was odd to see me looking so relaxed. I laughed because I knew how true that statement was. But a part of me was saddened by this statement. Do I really want to be known as the person who is always stressed? The one who walks around with a facial expression that indicates that the sky is falling?

Later, I told her that I'm really not sure how to function when I'm not panicking. I start to panic about the fact that I'm not panicking. My thoughts run something like this: "I'm not freaking out. Why am I not freaking out. I should be freaking out. I must be forgetting something that I should be freaking out about. What did I forget? WHAT did I forget? I must be forgetting something. I can't not be freaking out about anything..." And before I know it I have worked myself into a commendable panic over the fact that I am not panicking. The whole thing is rather ridiculous.

Yesterday it snowed. And I mean SNOWED. And it quite literally forced me to just stop and do nothing. I braved the weather in the morning to get to an optometrist appointment, but once I made it home there was no way I was going back out unless someone near and dear to me had an absolute emergency. I bailed on a Christmas get-together. I stayed home. And I was forced to do nothing. I started reading a book for my directed study course and taking notes on it when suddenly this voice in my head said "You're that girl again. The one who is always working. Take a breath." Let me tell you, I struggled. I tried to watch TV and nothing was on. Instead I put up the little Christmas tree in the basement. I caught up on some blog reading. I watched a show this evening with my parents (Sing Off, which you should check out if you haven't). I shovelled the sidewalk. It's weird, this emptiness. It's like there is a giant void in my head. Outside the world is buried in white blankets and I feel like that is what the inside of my brain looks like too. Just blank. I can't decide how I feel about this.

Time and light are kinds of love

The Word
Tony Hoagland

Down near the bottom
of the crossed-out list
of things you have to do today,

between "green thread"
and "broccoli" you find
that you have penciled "sunlight."

Resting on the page, the word
is as beautiful, it touches you
as if you had a friend

and sunlight were a present
he had sent you from some place distant
as this morning - to cheer you up,

and to remind you that,
among your duties, pleasure
is a thing,

that also needs accomplishing
Do you remember?
that time and light are kinds

of love, and love
is no less practical 
than a coffee grinder

or a safe spare tire?
Tomorrow you may be utterly
without a clue

but today you get a telegram
from the heart in exile
proclaiming that the kingdom

still exists,
the king and queen alive,
still speaking to their children,

- to any one among them
who can find the time,
to sit out in the sun and listen.

I ran across this poem on The Wondering Minstrels, a blog that hasn't been active for a few years now but that is worth checking out just to get lost in the archives. I first read this post about a month ago and then promptly forgot about it. It got lost somewhere in the mess of my brain during paper-writing season. I read it again today though and was struck by the beauty of the poem. The image is so simple, and yet so powerful. This is a lesson I seem to be learning this year: that pleasure is just as important as anything else on my to-do list and that love is practical and necessary. I forget this often. It takes the simplest things to remind me though: a smile, a shiny penny on the office floor, a beautiful quote, a strain of music, a kind word, a certain quality of light. It is as if these things break through the chaotic mess of my brain and remind me that all is not lost and it is worth it to seek joy and love. 

The Terror of a Blank Page

I wrote this last night while I was working on a take-home final.

It is 12:25 a.m. and I am staring at yet another blank page on my computer screen.

It's the curse of the English major. Over and over again you are confronted with blank pages. Over and over again you are asked to fill these blank pages with your knowledge, your opinions, your heart, your soul, your very self.

Sometimes I joke about how if you forget a pen in an exam you have to write the essay in blood. But this is said only half jokingly. Sometimes it feels like you are writing in blood. Blood and tears. As if the pen you hold is connected to your veins, connected to your tear ducts, and pours the things that keep you alive and make you human out onto the page.

After three and a half years of being asked to submit paper after paper - eight pages, ten pages, fifteen pages, twenty pages, MLA formatting, double-spaced, size twelve Times New Roman font, one with a title page, one without - it starts to wear on a person. There is only so much blood you can give up before you start to feel the consequences.

And then the blank page becomes terrifying. At one point I loved the promise of a blank page. I loved the process of shaping a paper, of orgainzing my thoughts. I loved crafting the perfect phrase, the brilliant sentence that conveyed my point perfectly. I enjoyed the thrill of finding a secondary source that backed me up. I felt satisfied when I finished a paper, knowing that my carefully chosen words conveyed my argument in a strong and clear way. But now I stare at a new word document or a sheet of looseleaf and feel nothing but panic. The language eludes me. Ideas float around in my head completely formless. They refuse to be confined in sentences. They refuse to connect to one another and create a coherent argument.

The joy is gone. Now I sit and tear out my hair, scream obsenities, throw things. I used to have a love affair with language. Now I fight with it. Out loud. Waving my hands. Looking like a crazy person.

Encouragement

He strolls past the office door looking like he's on a mission. But he catches my eye as I'm coming out and takes a couple steps back.

"ENCOURAGEMENT," he says, waving his hands in the air between us as if they are the conduit for positive thoughts and reassurance.

"I haven't even started," I say, gesturing with my head towards the stack of textbooks in my arms. My voice is tinged with half-crazed laughter. Laughter that teeters on the edge of tears and is born out of stress.

"That's okay," he replies. "ENCOURAGEMENT." Once again, waving his hands.

He looks a bit foolish, but he makes me smile, and it's the first genuine smile I've given in days. And I actually do feel encouraged.

[Thank you.]

Why do I do this?

Because it matters.

Because I believe that words are powerful.

Because I believe that art can change the world.


[Just a reminder to myself that this is where I am supposed to be and this is what I'm supposed to be doing.]

Ten Things...Prettiness

 

So, in light of yesterday's revelation that sometimes it is okay to not have anything profound to say and just share a pretty picture, here are ten posts of pretty flowers:

1. To See Heaven in a Wildflower
2. Where It All Began
3. Breath of Spring
4. Unexpected Beauty
5. Simplicity
6. A bit of fragrance clings to the hand that gives flowers
7. It is worth our while just to be living
8. Pygmy Puff
9. Exuberance is Beauty
10. Sun-bleached

Deep Thinking

Perhaps it is because of all the papers I have been writing lately. Perhaps it is because I’ve started talking with people that I can have honest and meaningful conversations with. I’m not really sure of the reason, but the fact is that I have been thinking deeply lately. And thinking carefully. Contemplating would be a good word for it. I consider what I have to say before I say it. I find myself mulling over big topics: love, language, transformation, the nature of the self, theological issues, my faith, happiness, the importance of art…some of these are generated by classes I’m in and papers I am writing, but others stem from conversations. Sometimes I start in one place and end up somewhere completely different that is even deeper and more thoughtful than where I started. As much as I love this kind of thinking, I am finding that my brain is starting to feel like an overloaded wagon. I am trying to drag this wagon, which is storing all of my thoughts and ideas, which I need to take with me and hang onto, but it is getting too heavy. It’s slowing me down. I can’t keep up with class discussions. By the time I arrive at the place the conversation was, it has moved on and I am still falling behind. I carefully consider my responses. I know this is a good practice, but it means that conversations do not happen in the usual rapid-fire manner. Instead they are characterized by pauses and phrases that seemingly have no connection to what came before. Conversations don’t end. They keep popping up. A cavernous pause will cause a topic to be set down for a time, but then I pick it up again and start lobbing it around again. I’m not saying that these conversations haven’t been fantastic. They have been wonderful and edifying and have been peppered with insightful moments. I actually wish that all of my conversations could be like this.

Last night I realized just how much I have been thinking lately. I went to post a blog entry and suddenly thought to myself “I have nothing to say.” This morning though, I realized that the point of this blog is to share my photography. Yes, it is also an outlet for my thoughts, profound or not, and I have been enjoying the process of writing on here immensely. But first and foremost this is a photography blog, so sometimes it is okay to just have a post about a photo. I don’t always have to have something profound, witty, or even interesting to go along with it. Sometimes a picture should just speak for itself. So here is a photo that I love. I think it is beautiful and dramatic. It makes me smile, but it isn’t overly sappy. It exudes a sense that if you stare at it long enough you might learn something, but that something will not be captured in my words here. So I hope this picture says something to you as well.

Black Rook in Rainy Weather

Black Rook in Rainy Weather
Sylvia Plath

On the stiff twig up there
Hunches a wet black rook
Arranging and rearranging its feathers in the rain
I do not expect a miracle
Or an accident

To set the sight on fire
In my eye, nor seek
Any more in the desultory weather some design,
But let spotted leaves fall as they fall,
Without ceremony, or portent.

Although, I admit, I desire,
Occasionally, some backtalk
From the mute sky, I can't honestly complain:
A certain minor light may still
Lean incandescent

Out of kitchen table or chair
As if a celestial burning took
Possission of the most obtuse objects now and then -
Thus hallowing an interval
Otherwise inconsequent

By bestowing largesse, honor,
One might say love. At any rate, I now walk
Wary (for it could happen
Even in this dull, runinous landscape); skeptical,
Yet politic; ignorant

Of whatever angel may choose to flare
Suddenly at my elbow. I only know that rook
Ordering its black feathers can so shine
As to seize my senses, haul
My eyelids up, and grant

A brief respite from fear
Of total neutrality. With luck,
Trekking stubborn through this season
Of fatigue, I shall
Patch together a content

Of sorts. Miracles occur,
If you care to call those spasmodic
Tricks of radiance miracles. The wait's begun again,
The long wait for the angel,
For that rare, random descent.


I often wonder what it says about me that I can almost always turn to Sylvia Plath for a poem that captures exactly what is going on in my heart and soul.

(Yes, I know this is not a picture of a rook. I have never seen a rook. This is probably a good thing because large birds terrify me. Actually this swan really freaks me out. I hate how their necks look. They remind me of snakes. Some strange cross between a bird and a snake. Wow. It suddenly dawned on me why I really hate swans.)

Hitting the Wall at One Thousand Miles Per Hour

I call my mom with good news and a question. I'm expecting a short conversation because I don't have time for anything else. I end up talking with her for half an hour. Venting about my stress over work. Trying really hard not to cry.

I stop at the school coffee shop to get a mug of tea on my way to the office to work on a paper. The girl working asks what I want. I reply, "A large..." and then there is a gaping pause. I am staring at the box of tea, which has the name of the tea printed in large letters on the front of it, but somehow am completely unable to read the name, translate it into something that means anything and then articulate that this is indeed what I want. I pause for a good 30 seconds before finally finishing my order with "...Cranberry Pomegranate tea." I wander away with mug in hand thinking that this is not a good sign for the rest of my day.

I am looking for a book on my desk. Searching every pile. Lifting papers. Only to realize that about five minutes ago I put it right in front of me. It's sitting there, open to the page I want. Somehow I wasn't aware of doing this though.

"Sometimes when I'm stressed it is like language stops having meaning. I look at words and they mean nothing. People talk to me and I can't understand them even though they are speaking English." This is how Bean responds when I tell her my coffee shop story. And this is exactly how I feel now. I'm trying to write a paper. I have an outline. I have an introduction. But it is like I no longer speak the language of academia. I stare at the screen, waiting for something to form some sort of meaning.

Part way through writing my paper I make up a word. I know there is a real word that means this, but I cannot think of it. I can't even think of a vaguely accurate word. I leave it and keep fighting my way forward. Every so often I look back at it, hoping that the real word will suddenly land on my consciousness. Instead every time I look at it I feel like I am losing even more of the English language. Even the conviction that there is an actual word that means what I'm trying to say has left.

I have officially hit the wall of stress at approximately 1000 mph. I knew it was coming. It was inevitable. I was moving too fast for there to never be a collision. But it sure is unpleasant.

The Dream I Didn't Know I Had

Have you ever opened your mouth and had a dream you didn't even know existed escape before you recognized it? I have. Just over a week ago I was having a conversation with some of my fellow English majors and said something off-hand in the middle of a conversation. Just one of those rapid-fire conversational moments. It has been haunting me ever since. Not haunting me like a regret. It's not that crazed bashing itself into the walls of my brain kind of haunting. It's more like this thought has just found a comfortable spot and is sitting there, waiting for me to visit it, to converse with it, to fall in love with it. And I have been doing just that. Slowly. Just briefly stopping by to say hello, ask it how it's doing. I am cautious when it comes to these things. Plus this little guy caught me off-guard. He just snuck right into the middle of a conversation, so I wasn't quite sure how seriously to take him. Today I had a really good conversation with Bean about it though, and somewhere in the course of this caution fell asleep and I fell in love. I'm still hesitant to talk about it with very many people. It's something that may never happen. It's something that, even if it does happen, will not be for years and years. My trepidation also comes from doubt though. Doubt that I would ever be able to accomplish this. Doubt that others would be on board for it. It's still new, still delicate. I don't yet have the strength of conviction. It's coming though. I can feel it. So I am going to keep visiting this dream. He may have been a bit unexpected, but now that he's here I hope he doesn't leave.