Play: PA

Welp.

I am done with my first year of college. (?!?!?!?!?!)

I'm not sure how I feel about this. First of all, it's shocking. I cannot believe that last year at this time I was still in high school. For real, it is unbelievable. I know some years have seemed to pass by quickly before, but this is probably the fastest yet. Just yesterday I was moving out, but it seems like only a few weeks ago I was moving in. And yet, at the same time, it seems as though I've known these new Roberts friends forever...

There truly is no place like home. It is the most comfortable place in the world. But this time, when I came home yesterday, and everyone in the family started unloading the van and lugging everything into my room, I stared at the cardboard and tupperware boxes that contained my entire life for the past year and felt... weird. I can't really comprehend it all... but... I now have two lives.

One of my friends (who also happens to be my boss) and I were talking about this on Friday, as I sat at work, done with finals, done with Garlock, done with my freshman year. It's like we put our lives on a tape, we decided. Seriously. I have a life on tape in PA, which I had to "pause" and start the tape in NY. Now, it's the end of the semester, and I've put my NY life on "pause" and hit "play" on the old PA tape. For the rest of this summer, I'll be seeing all my old friends from high school, working at the same job I had all last year, going on vaca's with the family I haven't seen in a while... It's just like it was before. And it's great! Really, it'll be awesome, and I'm super excited about summer.

It's just that, I have this whole part of my life now in NY, and I won't be even touchin' it for the next three months. Just putting it up there on the shelf, tucking it away in storage along with the mini-fridge and spiral-bounds. Now I do realize it's like this for any college student, no matter where you go, how far away, whoever you meet. It's just another part of college life I never thought about before. And I'm sure I'll keep in touch with the people I've met there. But I won't be hanging out with them. (Which, by the way, may be way okay, since I did just live with them for a year. Everyone needs a break from each other after a while.)

Anyway, just thought I'd rant about my new split-screen life. I have 3.5 months to "play" my PA life. Might as well live it up! Over and out.

Doesn't anyone care about finals around here?

It sure doesn't seem like it. My roommate and I feel like we're the only ones studying. There's too many people watching movies and playing frisbee around me on a daily basis that I feel as though I may be taking this studying for finals thing too seriously. But then I actually get to the exams, and realize I should have actually studied more. So whatever. If I'm the only one on campus concerned about my GPA so be it. I'm the one paying for this education. (Well, okay... and my parents. And the government. And Roberts, actually. But for Roberts to continue that I have to keep my GPA up, so that kind of goes back to square one...)

Anyway, I don't have much time today, obviously, since I have a final tomorrow and 2 on Friday, but I just read something that I thought was super awesome and share-worthy.

For my speech class I'm reading Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. I don't care who you are or what your faith is, or even if you don't have faith. If you have eyes and a brain, read this book. It's freaking good. Logical, intelligent, and helps make sense of this faith I call my own. It's not even one of those crap "I will convert you into my religion" books. It's just one that makes sense. In the chapter I just read, called The Three-Personal God, Lewis writes:

If Christianity was something we were making up, of course we could make it easier. But it is not. We cannot compete, in simplicity, with people who are inventing religions. How could we? We are dealing with Fact. Of course anyone can be simple if he has no facts to bother about.

Whoa, Lewis. Whoa. I like your in-my-face-ness.

Off to study the history of music....

P.S. On an entirely unrelated note and one that completely contradicts the book I was just quoting... I'm really enjoying listening to The Audition, lately. Feel free to check 'em out.

Carpe Diem

We've all heard "seize the day" before. But I don't think the majority of people in this world ever really do that.

Recently I found out that a young man I graduated with drowned.

I wasn't close friends with him, but I did know him, since elementary school. And I ate the smarties his Mom brought in to our class in 5th grade to do well on the standardized tests.

I don't know the circumstances of his passing, more than what I've already said, except that it was in a river by the college he was attending down in PA. I can't remember the last time I talked to him. I wasn't even friends with him on Facebook.

So why, might I ask, would this be so weird for me? Why do I feel the need to check on his friends' websites everyday to make sure they're okay? Why do I get freaked out by rain and water and pools and swimming?

This death was sudden. Tragic. Horrifying. Totally unexpected and completely painful for all parties involved. How could Chris have known that when he woke up that day he'd never again fall asleep? How could his mother have known her oldest son would not return from school, ever? Or that the past Thanksgiving was his last?

After I found out about this tradegy, I jumped online to find some "Seize the Day" quote of wisdom to put up as my Facebook status. (Kind of lame, I realize... but nonetheless, the truth, and this blog is all about honesty, so deal with it.) What I found is that most of them were too blunt to publicize to a world of close friends who were in the midst of shock, pain, and grief. But I really liked some of them, and decided to record them here for future reference. May they encourage you, oh reader from cyberspace, to truly seize each precious day.

"Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for the wind to fly a kite. Or waiting around for Friday night or waiting perhaps for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil or a better break or a string of pearls or a pair of pants or a wig with curls or another chance. Everyone is just waiting." -Dr. Suess

"Enjoy yourself. It's later than you think." - Chinese Proverb

"Life is not lost by dying; life is lost minute by minute, day by dragging day, in all the thousand small uncaring ways." -Stephen Vincent Benet

"I find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read and all the friends I want to see." - John Burroughs

"Why must conversions always come so late? Why do people always apologize to corpses?" - David Brin

"You may delay, but time will not. " - Ben Franklin

"Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it, time runs out." - Oliver Wendell Holmes

"Every day of our lives we are on the verge of making those slight changes that would make all the difference." - Mignon McLaughlin

"There are many To-morrows, my Love, my Love - There is only one To-day." -Joaquin Miller

"Life is always walking up to us and saying, "Come on in, the living's fine," and what do we do? Back off and take its picture." - Russell Baker

"If you were going to die soon and had only one phone call you could make, who would you call and what would you say? And why are you waiting?" - Stephen Levine

"Only that day dawns to which we are awake." -Henry David Thoreau

Can't Go Back Now

Well, folks. Here we are. The last weekend on campus. One more week of college before all of campus is released into separate families, counties, states and countries for a whole three months of sun-soaking, money-raking, trip-taking euphoria. I myself can hardly believe it's all gone by so fast. It doesn't seem like just last year that I was getting ready to graduate high school at this time. This is just plain weird.

A lot has happened since my last blog entry. I went to Canada. Twice, actually. Once with my roommate, as a last hurrah to see the Falls before summer, and one with the art club here at school, to see the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto. Talk about art! For real, let's talk about it. I was in awe of this gallery's selection. From Warhol to Monet, Moore to Poussin, Dali to van Gogh, they really did have it all. And a bunch of the work was contemporary or modern, which was very exciting for me, because I love that stuff. There were 5, (FIVE!) floors of artistic brilliance in this building. I spent 9 (NINE!) hours looking at it all. And I still feel like I passed a majority of it by too fast. Or not at all. By the time I left, I had a headache from analyzing so much art for so long. (Sure, by the time I left it was 5, and I hadn't eaten since 8, so that probably had something to do with it too, but I'm sure all the art was a major factor too.)

I have found a new passion for my passion this year.

Art is something that requires so much intelligence and planning and individuality and hard work and... skill... that it really gets me when it's not appreciated. I just paid 8 dollars and saw so many genius images that I feel like I should go back and pay them more money. (Which of course, I will not do, because I am a college student.) It's just that art is so often overlooked, even by artists. It is not just a group of groovy people trying to paint landscapes or portraits and make it look good. Real art isn't something that you can look at for a minute, make an executive "I like it!" nod and move down the wall. It's so much deeper than that, so much more personal. Art should be invigorating. Art sends a message to it's viewers. It's sometimes satisfying, sometimes disturbing, sometimes confusing, or offensive, or persuasive. It takes artists years to finish pieces. Years. Sometimes decades. Most times artists don't have enough time to finish them. When I left the AGO, I wanted (1) food, because I practically unconscious, and (2) to change the world through art. When I find the words to adequate describe my thoughts on this subject, I'll come back to it. Or maybe I'll just start creating.

You should be relieved to know that the little group I was with did find some food. There were four of us, Pam, Justin, Nick and I, and I think out of everyone from Roberts we were the last to leave the gallery. Many people wanted to walk around Toronto, go shopping, sight-see, etc. and left before we did. By the time we left, however, all of those things were coming second to one thing: an adequate meal. The four literally starving artists walked a block or two from the AGO to Chinatown, and wandered the streets looking for any sign NOT in Chinese or French that indicated some sort of food, which seemed to take FLIPPING forever! I think I entered two barber shops and at least one stand of knock-off purses before we finally found a sign that said that glorious word: Restaurant.

Once we got inside, however, I'm pretty sure all four of us immediately wanted to leave. It looked like a palace inside here, folks. A Chinese Palace Restaurant. That's what the sign outside should have said. And why was this a problem? Because we are poor college students, and all artists. This means we buy paint and canvas before a new pair of jeans, let alone spend 481732 dollars on a meal in Chinatown. When we got our menus and there weren't any prices on it, we knew we were sunk. But what can you do at this point? We chose the obvious. LAUGH. We laughed a whole lot. As quietly as possible, I might add. But it was one hilarious situation. Here we were, so hungry we couldn't even think, surrounded by art and mirrors and non-wooden chopsticks (Yes, that is correct. They gave us real chopsticks. Not those wooden ones in paper envelopes. We're not kiddin' around here, folks. I'm pretty sure they were solid gold. Or maybe not.) And after much deliberation and checking of wallets and suppressed giggles, we finally compromised. We drank a pitcher of tea and got one dish, one very small dish (that tasted de-lish) splitting it four ways. That way, we could be polite consumers of this fantastic restaurant, and still not spend our life savings. We ended up, however, just making ourselves MORE hungry by giving our stomachs a tease and by the time we left we felt so awkward for leaving our poor Chinese waiter there without anyone to wait upon. But it was so worth it. Especially when we walked another 2 blocks in the opposite direction and found a Subway. :) By the time we were done eating a full meal, we still had enough time to check out the City Hall, mall, and city scene. SUCH a fun trip.

But ALAS! those days are now over. And we're on to studying for finals. Those wonderfully stressful examinations of your non-comprehensive progress throughout the collegiate year. And after five days of these beautiful puppies, I'm home free! Hmm, Maybe I should start packing?