recently...

-I can go hours and hours in a day without hearing the sound of my own voice, except to chide my little animals or praise them. I get so stuck in my own head. I get stuck in the right now. I get stuck wasting hours and hours of time looking up or listening to things that aren't real on the internet...or looking at or listening to art. Appreciating it ever so quietly with not even the slightest outlet of my own. I bombard my roommates with the 'happenings' in my life so as to almost document my existence somehow. I guess so that some human besides myself knows I'm living my life. That things happen to me.

-I'm not nearly so despondent as that sounded.

-I have a new animal. A little Australian Shepard mix. I named him Beam, no. not 'Bean'. Like sun'beam' or laser'beam' or for those of you schooled in the art of good music, like Sam 'Beam' of Iron and Wine. He's a bundle of fur and energy and curiosity. Sometimes I forget he's only been in existence for 2 months... He's so new to this planet! He's figuring out the limits and allowances of his body and environment. Its kind of beautiful, and sometimes patience draining. I'm smitten.

(picture by Whitney Johnson)

-I listened to the song "Miriam" by Norah Jones today, and it ripped my heart out. Both for the person experiencing the pain in the song and the person she wrote it to... Listen to the song, or look up the lyrics. Lately the position of the culprit and not the victim has been magnified for me. What if you made a mistake and no reparations could be made? Or if that mistake or years of youthful mistakes could only be repaired by years locked away? I feel so grateful that my mistakes have had only the most simplest of natural consequences, most of which were fueled only by my own guilt and anxiety.

-I bought Matisyahu's new album today and its awesome. I also got one, at the owner of Groovacious (the music shop)'s suggestion, called Super Heavy. Also awesome.

-I almost always want to go back to school. I'm bored too much, and a little bit obsessed with not wasting time. Will somebody please tell me what to go for? If I get a degree I want to use it!

-I want to collect and save every beautiful thing I see or read or hear.

-I want to create and write beautiful things. I get words and phrases stuck in my head all the time, or ideas, and I don't write them down and they get lost back in the current of thought in my head. I see so many beautiful things, the strange twist of the root of a tree, a lonely dandelion ready to be blown off into a sunset, the warmest of light spilling from a dark house radiating onto a dark front lawn, so many things and I don't bring my camera, and if I had it, it wouldn't look as arresting on film as it does in my head anyway. I envy your translation. Your ability to bring to art, life. You know who you are.

-I have a fascination with love stories right now. With love in general. I keep asking people I'm not close to personal questions like how they knew, or what fun things are part of their love story. Or if their heart ever felt like it was on fire. Or if they ever cried from too much feeling.

-I also have a fascination for letter writing. Its a dead art. And I'm resurrecting it. The closest of bonds can come from correspondence with ONLY a pen and a piece of paper. You should try it.