Throughout the day...

"The advantage of the emotions is that they lead us astray." -Oscar Wilde

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Here are some of the highlights of my day today:

Most heart-wrenching:
Watching a video of Tim Kasher play the narrative-propelled song, "Album of the Year." Tim is moodily strumming along the first chord, steps forward and right before he pushes himself against the mic for the first lyric, a female voice desperately shouts from the audience, "Think of her!"
Imagine you are Tim. You've written these songs, recorded them on a cd and now are touring around. The song has probably become routine, you're in another city on another stage, who knows where. doesn't matter. and out shouts this girl, "Think of her!"
I hope he did think of her.



Awesomest:
Josh and I watched Evil Dead 2 today. There is a point in the film where the character Ash is frantically searching for a chain saw in a dilapidated tool shed. As he wrenches a curtain back and finds a chalked outline for the missing weapon, his beheaded girlfriend suddenly bursts through the door, wielding the chain saw and thrashing her skinless body, pushing him back against the wall. And it was in that over-the-top-cartoonish-blood-spewing-as-if-from-a-firehose moment that I knew this movie was going to be one of my new favorites.

Strangest:
Signing the final paperwork for my new condo. Monday I should have my keys. Suddenly words like "mortgage" and "equity" have weight and texture. I am getting old and ... well, I'm getting old.
Fortunately the new stimulus package is putting a hefty tax credit in my pocket (eventually) and because of the poor real estate market I'm running away with a steal!! Yeah-ah.


So what's new?
*Read: Anthem by Ayn Rand
*Heard: The Russian bard Vladimir Vysotsky singing Koni Priviredliviye
*Saw: The photography of Julia Fullerton-Batten. Check out her work at http://www.juliafullerton-batten.com/
*Excited for: My brother Aaron is writing a one man show for his final undergrad thesis. The other day he mentioned that he was thinking of writing parts of the show from the perspectives of his family members. He was pseudo asking for permission and I gave it to him, knowing whatever he uses might be painful or embarrassing. I'm looking forward to see the final product --- I know my brother is putting his heart and soul into it.

Worlds that did exist, do exist, or will.

Currently reading: Myst: The Book of Ti'Ana
Currently listening to: Robyn at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert 2008 singing "Be Mine"
Currently lamenting: My broken iMac, argh


From Myst:
"The Ages to which they linked were not made by them, they already existed, for the making of worlds was a process that took not months but long millennia. Atrius, trying to make things absolutely clear to her, had summed it up thus:
'These Ages are worlds that do exist, or have existed, or shall. Providing the description fits, there is no limitation of time or space. The link is made regardless.'
And so, too, this world of theirs, their Age, which they had called Gemedet, after the game. It, too, existed, or had existed, or would. But where it was or when they did not know."

A few days later...

Hamlet,
Nothing will ever be good enough.
I am yours - the more you deconstruct yourself
the more I disappear. Be satisfied, love.
-Ophelia

Eury,
You're leaving me!? Fine! The Underworld suits you.
-Orpheus

Orpheus,
Some couples are content to sit.
They don't need to look at each other
all the time, talk incessantly.
Why is that not enough?
-Eurydice

Eury,
The soil was warm and squishy
between the toes, you said.
You liked it. Now you only complain
of sticks, brambles, and cold.
Where are you coming from?
-Orpheus

Hamlet,
I'm serious, be content.
Be satisfied, my love.
-Ophelia

Revision

There is a cave where myths attempt to rewrite themselves. They scrunch faces in earnest, dog-ear every forlorn fragment of emotion. Draft each sigh and squeak, thinking maybe something will come of it?

Seeds scatter on the hard packed earth. Candlelight flickers, scanning each wall and surface whether glistening with the grease of warfare or patched with the rough burlap of sturdy sack and trade.

Some beat their chests, some cower by the bullocks. Every shadow hewn and splayed.

Eurydice asks Ophelia, "Should I translate this under water or under earth?" Ophelia turns to Hamlet, "Am I not tender? Do I not wash over the skin like holy water? Be satisfied, love." Hamlet turns to Zeus, "How much control do you really have? Is every time mundane or do you jump at the sheer snap of every bolt?" Zeus turns to Hera, "Must we always choose matriarch or patriarch?" Hera turns to Eurydice, "Always send the reader under earth. If you stay on top there is nowhere to go. Except down, of course."

On the other side of the room Daphne tests, "We are revisionists." wrapping her lips around every prodigious sound. Unsatisfied with the taste of it, she keeps clacking away on her trusty Ticonderoga. "Did you know?" she asks Apollo, "poet laureate comes from bay laurel which was wreathed upon winners each and every Olympic games?" Apollo isn't paying attention, nods, hums. "No one remembers," Daphne laments, "the origins of things or the loss-side of battles." A few minutes later Apollo falls asleep under the boughs of a new laurel. It's inevitable, this falling asleep... a daily end we're all fated for.

Your move, chief

I will only post a giant block quote once in a blue moon, but this is one that makes the cut. It's from a movie called Good Will Hunting (extremely quotable film):


Sean: Thought about what you said to me the other day, about my painting. Stayed up half the night thinking about it. Something occurred to me... fell into a deep peaceful sleep, and haven't thought about you since. Do you know what occurred to me?
Will: No.
Sean: You're just a kid, you don't have the faintest idea what you're talkin' about.
Will: Why thank you.
Sean: It's all right. You've never been out of Boston.
Will: Nope.
Sean: So if I asked you about art, you'd probably give me the skinny on every art book ever written. Michelangelo, you know a lot about him. Life's work, political aspirations, him and the pope, sexual orientations, the whole works, right? But I'll bet you can't tell me what it smells like in the Sistine Chapel. You've never actually stood there and looked up at that beautiful ceiling; seen that. If I ask you about women, you'd probably give me a syllabus about your personal favorites. You may have even been laid a few times. But you can't tell me what it feels like to wake up next to a woman and feel truly happy. You're a tough kid. And I'd ask you about war, you'd probably throw Shakespeare at me, right, "once more unto the breach dear friends." But you've never been near one. You've never held your best friend's head in your lap, watch him gasp his last breath looking to you for help. I'd ask you about love, you'd probably quote me a sonnet. But you've never looked at a woman and been totally vulnerable. Known someone that could level you with her eyes, feeling like God put an angel on earth just for you. Who could rescue you from the depths of hell. And you wouldn't know what it's like to be her angel, to have that love for her, be there forever, through anything, through cancer. And you wouldn't know about sleeping sitting up in the hospital room for two months, holding her hand, because the doctors could see in your eyes, that the terms "visiting hours" don't apply to you. You don't know about real loss, 'cause it only occurs when you've loved something more than you love yourself. And I doubt you've ever dared to love anybody that much. And look at you... I don't see an intelligent, confident man... I see a cocky, scared shitless kid. But you're a genius Will. No one denies that. No one could possibly understand the depths of you. But you presume to know everything about me because you saw a painting of mine, and you ripped my fucking life apart. You're an orphan right?
[Will nods]
Sean: You think I know the first thing about how hard your life has been, how you feel, who you are, because I read Oliver Twist? Does that encapsulate you? Personally... I don't give a shit about all that, because you know what, I can't learn anything from you, I can't read in some fuckin' book. Unless you want to talk about you, who you are. Then I'm fascinated. I'm in. But you don't want to do that do you sport? You're terrified of what you might say. Your move, chief.





Recently finished reading: Looking for Alaska by John Green (Which I absolutely recommend)
Recently started: F.E.A.R. 2 (it's a video game)
Recently saw in theaters: Push (I hadn't been to a movie in theaters for the longest time and wowsers I actually really enjoyed it)
Currently reading through: Genesis

Cats

I found a publication in Writer's Market the other day that specializes in Crime Drama/Fantasy/Mystery involving CATS!! The submissions must use cats as the main characters or as an important element in the narrative.

I MUST get published in this magazine, it is my new life goal.

Little snippits

Those little jerks (I say lightheartedly) of the SPC Youth Group decided to break into my soft-cover jeep this past Sunday. So as I neared the youth room I was met by a clown car full of laughing kids. I’m told if I took much longer they would have released the emergency break and pushed my vehicle to the other side of the church parking lot. Haha, if anybody in the youth group is reading this post --- shame!!

I should also mention that I finished John Green’s Paper Towns a few days ago. ::Sighs longingly:: Why are fictional characters the easiest ones to fall in love with? Here’s the text on the front cover sleeve, “Quentin Jacobsen has spent a lifetime loving the magnificently adventurous Margo Roth Spiegelman from afar. So when she cracks open a window and climbs back into his life - dressed like a ninja and summoning him for an ingenious campaign of revenge - he follows.” ... ::sighs longingly again::


So what’s new with me?
*Recently discovered the song Sometime Around Midnight by The Airborne Toxic Event. Love the lyrics, wowsers.
*I’m really loving the youtube video “Lessons Learned in Youth Ministry.” Haha, these Youth Directors speak truth! I’ve posted the video below.
*If you want “uplifting” in a different sense of the word then check out the youtube video “Fairy Fall” :-D
*Word of the day: dirigible











Just for fun:

Daphne,
The sun with all its fiery fury
loses a little heat each day,
did you know that? Becoming
a hardened shell of what it once was.
-Apollo

Eurydice,
You’re not the same since your trip.
Someone taught you some new things:
some tongue and fire. There is a grit under
the surface. Something buried
that’s been uncovered.
-Orpheus

Hamlet writes in his journal-
“The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons be all my sins remember’d.” Hmm... remember’d? How far must I go to erase sins? Or memory? To hurt? To save? To enact the type of saving hurt or hurting save that can wash away the mess of it? Every decision is plot - I can’t disentangle from it.

Eurydice,
I thought I saw you the other day in a shop.
There was a hint of movement, a peripheral familiarity.
I looked closer - whatever I saw disappeared into shade.
-Orpheus