Beauty in the Ordinary

"lovers alone wear sunlight" -e.e. cummings

I love east-facing rooms. Waking up to natural sunlight in the morning and drinking a cup of coffee while reading a book in bed is blissful. This room is in my dad's small house in West L.A. I found the the bare white wall and unfinished wood nightstand quite appealing. The bed is actually a small pull-out love seat and was very comfortable to sleep on.

"Cats sleep anywhere, any table, any chair, top of piano, window ledge, in the middle, on the edge, open drawer, empty shoe, anybody's lap will do, fitted in a cardboard box, in the cupboard with your frocks-- anywhere! they don't care! cats sleep anywhere." -Eleanor Farjeon
When I was walking on the beach path at Venice there is this little bookshop that is semi-hidden at the side of a popular outdoor restaurant. The bookshop is labeled, but unless you know it exists or are paying close attention, you would bypass it completely. Walking inside was surprising because the shop was a lot bigger than it's single nondescript door let on. Inside many of the books were little tabs with reviews and suggestions to guide visitors while perusing. The whole setting was cozy and felt like someone's personal library instead of a store. When I saw this cat snoozing on the stool, I had to take a picture. Two of my loves -- cats in bookstores. Precious.
No quote to go below this picture. It's just my desk. I don't like when my desk gets messy like this. Though I enjoy rediscovering random stuff I have, it sometimes takes me awhile to put it away again after rediscovery. During a recent adventure into the cave below my house (a.k.a. our basement), I found my Gameboy COLOR. It had Tetris inside and I suffered a temporarily addiction to the game. After a few days of incessant Tetris gaming, I forced myself to leave the Gameboy behind when I went to Chicago. My brain was turning to mush all too quickly. The Tetris music rocks by the way;) Other than the Gameboy, I found this photo of me and my two friends when we were all in eighth grade. It now resides with a few other of my beloved pictures in the photo album frame on my desk. Also, anyone ever read Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli? Awesome stuff.
So I was sitting in what I call the Reading Room in my house in Illinois when I hear this giant whop to my immediate left. I whip my head around to see that our entire sliding glass door has been shattered and I'm assuming it's the fault of some amateur-flying bird. Though shattered, the glass remained in tact. It looked neat.
Another view of the shattered glass door. This time with the orchid bending toward the sunlight. I love my parents' rustic taste.

Venice Beach

I am in Los Angeles, have been here since Sunday. I love creating my own adventures when I'm here. There are so many things to do, most of which cost money. But if you're creative, or if you just enjoy observing as I do, you find entertainment in the people here. Plus, the beach is always a beautiful place to have access to, not to mention a prime spot for people watching.

I love running on the beach in the morning. It's perfect because the sun hasn't quite warmed the place yet and the crisp sea breeze offers me the fresh smell of saltwater. Mmm, it's dreamlike.

After my run, I went to Venice Beach (I ran at Marina Del Ray in the morning) to walk around. I love walking down the sidewalk of Venice and smelling herb, incense, hot dogs, and the ocean all at once. Among today's sightings was a man from the Caribbean islands stepping on shards of glass from alcohol bottles, a group of guys performing drumline style, and ironic homeless men and women openly asking for money to fund their beer addictions. I will say that I appreciated the cleverness that these "bums" used on their cardboard box signs... Perhaps, my favorite sign read, "Parents were eaten by pigeons, need money to buy a BB gun." The bum then turned the sign around to reveal the back; it read, "Why lie? I need beer." It almost made my want to toss a nickel his way. Almost.

Charles Bukowski captures the essence of Venice Beach in one very brief poem entitled "Venice Beach"

the lost and the damned
the wounded and the intellectual
the boozed and the debauched
the negative and the
uninspired
and the police
and the police
and the police.
------

I couldn't have said it better myself.

A Library Convert

I never used to like libraries so much. Don't get me wrong, I've always loved to read. It's just I preferred to buy my books. I didn't see the charm in having to drive to the library, to find a spot to park, to pay the meter, just so that I could check out a book with smudged print and ripped pages. Not to mention the possibility of my being exposed to the staphylococcal bacteria that has most likely been cultivating within the crevice of the binding since the book was last checked out in 1974. And then I still had to return it.

But my dismissal of libraries changed last summer when I had to write a 15 page research paper about the Roman Republic's influence on the United States government. Sounds like a dry topic, no? My cat, Boubacar, sure thought so (see picture below).

Actually, it was quite fascinating (but that's besides the point). I visited my university library (I live only 20 minutes away from it so I have year-round access to it) and checked out 4 books that would help me write the paper. I knew nothing about the Roman Republic in the first place, so not only did I need the books to bulk up my works cited page, but I needed them to "get a clue" so that I could at least feign intelligence when discussing ancient governments and the syndication of power. Before I realized it, I had checked out 13 books. Almost one book per page of the paper. It was addicting. It was so easy. I needed more material; I ordered another book. I realized that using the library allowed me to have no commitment to the books I checked out. I was only borrowing them, and I didn't have to like the words inside because they were borrowed too.

This was different then buying books. When I buy books I own their words, in a sense. I am committed to them. Whether bombastic or approachable, drivel or life-changing, the words within each book I purchase are mine.

Admittedly, I liked the feeling of being uncommitted to the words. Perhaps it was the power that being uncomitted allowed me for I could tangibly declare someone's thoughts as trash. I wouldn't have to destroy the book, but I could make it disappear by returning it. I wouldn't even have to finish it. That's why this summer I have taken advantage of the local library in my small town. Sure, it's dark inside and smells a tad stale like your late Jewish grandfather's old Philadelphia row home. The library has plastic-covered titles and the row home had plastic covered couches. But, an abrasion from ripped plastic still hurts whether it's on your finger or your thigh so what is the difference really? Exactly, both have their charm.

It's been a great time, checking out those books from the library. I have to admit, though, that I still occasionally think about who sneezed on the page that I have just fervently touched all over with my own grummy paws. But I figure it was worth it. The words on that page were just so poignant that I had to re-read the page more closely and follow along with my finger. I guess exposure to fatal disease is just a risk I'll have to take when borrowing words. (Though I avoid setting the book down on my sheets because not doing so makes me feel like I am, in turn, avoiding the plague altogether.)

With that, I close with a brief excerpt from the most recent book that I finished. And yes, it came from the library.

"She tore a page from the book and ripped it in half. Then a chapter. Soon there was nothing but scraps of words littered between her legs and all around her. The words. Why did they have to exist? Without them, there wouldn't be any of this. Without words, the Fuhrer was nothing. There would be no limping prisoners, no need for consolation or worldly tricks to make us feel better. What good were the words?" -Markus Zusak, The Book Thief

Barcelona

I went to the Spanish consulate in Chicago the other day to pick up my visa. I am now even more excited to study in Barcelona for a year! I will leave in exactly one month from yesterday, that is August 21. To my fellow countrymen and women: ¡extranaré por supuesto, pero sí me visitan, iremos a tapear! To honor my excitement, here are a few songs of Barcelona based/inspired music groups. Pero, sí quieres, tengo más "deep cuts."

1. Wa Yeah!- Antonia Font 2. Todo Tiende- Ojos de Brujo (gotta love the flamenco/hip hop fusion) 3. La Flaca- Jarabe de Palo 4. Barcelona- Giulia y los Tellarini (from Vicky Cristina Barcelona which is an overrated movie, so don't see it. But Penelope is good, so you might want to watch it anyway).

In other news, Penelope Cruz is the face of Mango, a Spanish based label. I really have nothing else to say about Mango or Penelope Cruz. I just like this photo and I want that coat.

Inaugural Experience

I went to an Inaugural Conference in January. You know, for the inauguration of the socialist buffoon that currently resides in office. Anywho, the inauguration was ... cold. The crowds were unbelievable too. If you happened to watch the event on television, you saw how the national mall was overflowing with humanity, but you didn't see the extent of how full the entire city of Washington D.C. was during that time. Walking back to my hotel from the inauguration took a few hours because of the crowds, and my hotel was not that far away. Nevermind the fact that I stopped for coffee on the way back because I was still shivering from waiting outside the National Mall since midnight the night before. That was a long, cold wait. At around 2 in the morning, some secret service men came out to supervise the crowd. Since we had arrived so early we were at the front of the gate and the crowd was miles long behind us. The secret service men told us that we had to "move back" so they could sweep for bombs. Of course, being at the very front we had nowhere to go. The crowd behind us started becoming really agitated because it was cold and they wanted to move past the gate into the National Mall. Before we knew it, we were being pushed into the gate itself as the crowed refused to move back. That's when the secret service turned ugly. Somehow, a total of ten secret service men managed to force a crowd of hundreds backward. Brute force and scare tactics. Fascism? Perhaps a prelude of what's to come for America? Who knows. Even when people tried to reason with them, the secret service men were viciously resolute. If you ever meet a member of the secret service, don't mess. He means business.

Photos captured Jan. 20, 2009 @ the National Mall

(clockwise starting with top left photo)

1: The group of people I waited with outside of the National Mall. I didn't know everyone in the group. We picked up some people along the way and met even more at the gate of the Mall. It was so cold that we ended up lying on top of each other to share body heat.
2: After all that waiting, we did see a beautiful sunrise over the Capitol building.

3: Since when can one attend a big political event and there not be protesters?

4: The Canucks support Obama!

I know this post is about 7 months old news. However, I don't always post things immediately after I write them. And during the school year, I sell my soul to school work and coffee. Only after I take my last final exam do I receive half of my soul back, as coffee still owns the other half.

One Special Summer

So what do you do when it's midnight and you really want to go to sleep but you just can't? You get on blogger, of course, and pour out the thoughts that are keeping you awake into the virtual space of the internet. Maybe after you write it all down you'll be able to sleep. Maybe.

At least the thoughts that are keeping me awake aren't bad ones. In fact, my hypothalamus is insisting that my entire brain take a jog down memory lane, back to the summer that I still refer to as "the best summer ever." It was the summer between my freshman and sophomore years of high school. I experienced a lot of firsts while still being cradled by the familiarity of routine. That summer, for the first time, I traveled out of the country, I delved into the fantastic world of Harry Potter, I began my running career, it was the first and only time my best and longest friend came to visit me from California, I met Ashlee Simpson, and I enjoyed the simplicity of daily pick-up games with the guys on the high school soccer team.

Despite doing a lot of different things that summer like traveling to England, France, and Scotland with my mom and step dad and waiting in line for hours at the Galleria Mall in Sherman Oaks with my dad to meet Ashlee Simpson (my dad was one of the only men in line, let alone one of the few to be over the age of 25), I enjoyed the routine that summer in a small town allowed me. Each day I slept in a little, watched Full House every afternoon, read, and ate Frosted Flakes with chocolate milk before playing soccer with the guys. I got so good at soccer that summer. Sweating it out in the humidity every day with quick-footed players only improved my skills. Shirts vs. skins. I was always a shirt. For 10 minutes we play one-touch, then for 10 minutes we play two-touch, then free play for the remainder of the time. Score. Go home. Repeat.

Three times a week before our pick-up games, my coach would take us all on a run through the forest preserve behind the high school. We ran what the locals refer to as the "outer loop." The outer loop is 2.6 miles and a beautiful sight the entire way. Running through the tree tunnels, down the valleys, sloshing in mud pits, and jumping the creeks, the first time I ran the outer loop was with my soccer coach. I loved it. Who knew that running could be so enjoyable even if it caused your fingers to swell and legs to ache? I loved running the outer loop so much that I started running it every day, even without my coach and the other guys. Sometimes I would see the high school cross-country team running and we would exchange hellos. Little did I know that I would later give up my love of soccer during my senior year to run with them instead, that I would become good enough to run at a division 1 institution, or that I would run a marathon. At that point, I just wanted to get in better shape.

Aside from the routine of that summer, I was so carefree. I didn't have a job because I didn't have to pay for anything. I didn't have a credit card then; I had five Harry Potter books and all the time in the world to read them. That was when my mom still bought me books. If I wanted a book, she would undoubtedly buy it for me. Ironically enough, I think she felt sorry for me because I couldn't drive and both she and my step dad worked all day so I was stuck at home until one of my friends would drive me to soccer in the evening. Hence the Full House and bowls of Frosted Flakes every day. Actually, I would eat Frosted Flakes by choice. Bob Saget on the other hand...

Anyway, there used to be a local bookstore near my mom's office. Sometimes when she had to be at her office she would take me along and drop me off at the bookstore where I would spend the next few hours leafing through prospective reads until I made my final purchase. When I wasn't looking for something specific to buy, I simply read, of course. The bookstore lit the fireplace sometimes even in the summer which made you forget that time existed altogether. Suddenly the seasonal distinction between summer and winter, between hot and cold no longer was relevant because the fireplace was burning during both. As I sat in the comfy chairs by the fire, I devoured the paper lives of Harry Potter, Elizabeth Bennet, and many others that I'm sure still live within the nooks and crannies of my subconscious. I could sink into another world entirely. It was a vacation that I could purchase for $24.95, or less, if I bought the paperback version.

When my friend Taylor visited me, she stayed for about a week at the end of the summer. I don't remember exactly what we did. I just remember enjoying it. The routine of summer wasn't disrupted when she was here because we just were. We've always been like sisters in that we don't need to do things together to be together. All it takes for us is to sit in the same room and be. So, we just were.

And that's how I think of that one really special summer. Everything was perfect. It just was.

Dreams

"You can't stop young girls from wishing. No! Everyone must dream. We dream to give ourselves hope. To stop dreaming -- well, that's like saying you can never change your fate." -Amy Tan

"Now, women forget all those things they don't want to remember, and remember everything they dont' want to forget. The dream is the truth." -Zora Neale Hurston

There is something fashionably awkward about these old photos, no? It's like they're so wrong they're right. In the second photo my glasses appear too large for my head, I'm wearing a soccer t-shirt from, no joke, fourth grade, and it looks as though I'm about to burst into tears faster than you can say "pimple." But all these elements sort of come together to create a pretty nifty image. Not to mention the natural sunlight that comes in from the high windows in my room. Oh, to be 17 again. It wasn't that long ago, I'm only 20. But these images feel so distant to me now.

Facebook

Everyone hates on Facebook, but they secretly love it. Allow me to describe the different types of Facebook users.

First, there's the avowed Facebook user who regularly updates her status because she feels the internet needs to know how she, as an individual, spends her days on Earth. She posts pictures of her friends and herself, dropping in the occasional self-portrait (her left arm fully extended but amputated at the elbow where the picture frame takes precedence). She tags herself in other people's pictures and changes her default to a picture of her cat when she's bored of looking at herself in her default photo. She wants the virtual world to know she exists so she keeps her facebook active.

The second type of Facebook user is just "too cool to care" about Facebook, but you know s/he loves it anyway. This user "neglects" to fill out their information section, or if s/he does, it's only sparsely completed. This gives the illusion that this user has "better things to do" than just sit around on Facebook. Instead, s/he prefers more solitary activities that engage the mind or that fondle the artistic soul because Facebook, of course, is only entertaining to the pants-dropping simpletons of society. Many times, this user spends his/her time "saving the world" by wearing t-shirts with the recycle symbol on them because each t-shirt singlehandedly delays "global warming" by approximately 3.5 years. Nevermind the carcinogens that the factory in India produced from making the recycle shirt in the first place. Also, because this user is a "secret" Facebook lover, s/he will check his/her Facebook nearly everyday, but will make it appear as if s/he does not ever check it. S/he will delete any recent activity and will be selective when responding to wall posts. After all, it's cooler to receive comments on one's Facebook then to give them out.

Of course, there are both more and less extreme variations on these two types of Facebook users but the common thread is their love of Facebook (whether it is secret or not). I mean, Facebook has it's advantages: You can witness the burgeoning beer bellies of your "friends" from high school, peep in on the wedding that you weren't invited to, assert yourself as a fan of croquet without even having to know how to play the game, and if not for any other reason, you can keep in touch with people you never have the chance to see.

However, don't let my sarcasm lead you to beleive that I hate Facebook. That would go against the logic of this post anyway because nobody really hates Facebook. I fall under the category of the first user. In fact, you might guess who the antecedent of "her" is after re-reading the description.

How has Facebook changed my life? I now dress better because I know the photos taken of me will most likely end up on the internet. A few days following the event I am poised to de-tag any unflattering ones. I no longer have to call people to invite them places (though text messaging contributes to my avoiding live human chatting as well) because most people now check their Facebooks more than they check their voice mails. I hate the telephone. Always have. Thanks to Facebook, I can dodge that bullet.

But Facebook really helped me one day. I mean truly. My plane was taxiing into the O'hare airport in Chicago when I turned on my Blackberry and saw a text from my friend saying that our friend Candice, who neither of us has seen in 10 years but who we've both known since first grade, had died. The friend that texted me told me that she found out from Facebook that Candice was dead. Last time I heard from Candice was a month earlier when she told me that she had had a lung transplant and her body was rejecting the lung. There was nothing I could do, she told me. I assumed she was just going to fight through her sickness as she had done her entire life, as Candice lived with a severe case of Cystic Fibrosis. Being in and out of the hospital was routine for her.

After hearing the news that day on the plane, I logged onto Candice's Facebook from my Blackberry and there lay the string of wall posts from her friends and family wishing her well. The page was a virtual memorial. Because I had found out that Candice had died about a month after it happened, I missed the funeral. I had missed the chance to say goodbye to my childhood friend that used to braid my hair for me before I learned to manage it myself. I looked on her Facebook pictures and saw her with her friends that I didn't know, but at least I could see her. I could look in on a segment of her life and remember her as she might have wanted me to remember her. After all, Candice created her Facebook page, perhaps as a way to document her existence. Was Candice some variant of the first type of Facebook user? I don't know. Candice was not so easily typed. All that matters now is that she existed. Facebook gave a voice to someone who might not have been heard.

Roma

Photo Captured @ Hadrian's Villa in Rome, Italy, June 2008
Did you hear about the rose that grew from a crack in the concrete? Proving nature's law is wrong, it learned to walk without having feet. Funny it seems, but by keeping its dreams, it learned to breath fresh air. Long live the rose that grew from the concrete when no one else ever cared.
-Tupac Shakur

Okay. Better late than never. This is just one of the photos that I took when I was in Rome last summer. I have a lot of neat pictures from Rome, as you can imagine. There are over 600 of them, and I was only there for a month. Maybe I'll post some more later if I can find my edition of photoshop. It's not loaded on this computer and I miss it dearly.

Tina

What's love but a secondhand emotion?

Photo captured @ Indianapolis Zoo, 4 Jul 2009