For my mother

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I almost wrote a post about my cat, but then I decided that I would rather write it on someone infinitely more special to my heart (sorry Belle, I love you too).

Some memories of my mother:

1. Sitting on her lap in the rocking chair. She sang a song of her own making to the tune of “Rainbow Connection.”

2. Tucking me into bed at night. I would “hide” under the covers so she wouldn’t find me.

3. Going home after my first year of college and sitting with her on the couch, the cats crawling all over us.

4. A sick day. We drank tea and watched “Sweet Home Alabama.”

5. Driving to dance and discussing Harry Potter.

6. Working out at the gym. We would wake ourselves up by listening to “I’ll Make a Man Out of You” and “You Can’t Stop the Beat.”

7. Going on retreat. Beforehand, we ate lunch and got pedicures.

8. Laying my head on her lap, listening to her stomach gurgle and enjoying the feeling of a light hand through my hair.

9. Settling down on the couch for a nap and her wrapping a blanket around me.

10. Calling her and hearing a perky “Hello!”

I know this is rather short post, but often the smallest amount of words convey the most meaning and the most love.

I love you so much Mom! Thank you for being there!

Now I should get back to writing this paper…

The lanterns will light your way

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Above: A picture from the Lantern Fest. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a camera on me, so I had to resort to my phone.

Yesterday my roommate and I volunteered at the Lantern Fest, which was happening in a nearby town on a racetrack.

Knowing nothing about it, I pictured something like what happened in Tangled (minus the water and boats). Obviously I wasn’t the only one who thought about this because there were a few little girls dressed up as Rapunzel. However, what happened that night was more magical than I could have ever imagined.

Long before the sun went down, I started my volunteering hours by placing marshmallows in s’mores kits for all the participants. I ended up packing up these boxes for five hours with only a couple short breaks interspersed. Maybe on a different day, I would have become bored and irritated with my work, but as it was, I was enjoying the company of total strangers who had decided to come help out for various reasons.

At seven, my roommate joined me on a journey to put things in my car. We had plans to go back, but the front seats of the car were too much of a temptation for our tired legs and feet. We then watched the lanterns getting lit and then let go from a wall nearby.

I can’t describe the feeling that I got when a plethora of lanterns started rising into the sky. It was beautiful. It was awe-some. It was absolutely magical.

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Lanterns rising.

My roommate and I walked around the racetrack, watching in awe as lanterns were let go all around us.  The lanterns on the ground were like huge bishop hats, but in the sky they were stars. Our very own close constellation.

I felt euphoric, but I know not everybody was. At one point, it was announced that a six year old girl was missing and her parents were waiting for her at the stage. I felt the little girl’s terror as she was separated from her parents, having been lost in a store when I was that age. I couldn’t quite feel the terror of the parents because I haven’t been a parent yet. But I did imagine the girl finding her way into her mother’s arms, her mother bringing her back to their families’ fire, and her father lighting the lantern with a tiki torch, saying, “Everything’s fine now, sweetie.”

 

Recently Watched

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A couple weeks ago, my friends and I decided to rent a movie for a girls night. We were going for “Big Hero 6,” but ended up with “Blended,” a comedy with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore.

I usually am weary when it comes to comedies, especially romantic comedies, but I loved this one. What’s great about it is that is not wholly a traditional romantic comedy. So called “Rom-Coms” usually involve two single people who have great jobs and are typically gorgeous, but not a lot of responsibilities. In this movie, however, the main characters (Lauren and Jim) are both single parents.

Lauren and Jim are both relatively new at being single parents: Lauren is divorced and Jim’s wife died. And both of them have handfuls to deal with: Lauren has two incredibly boisterous boys who remind me somewhat of the Weasley twins and Jim has three girls, one of which is struggling with puberty and a dad who treats her like a boy.

Inadvertently, they end up at resort for families in Africa. Lauren and Jim (like Benedick and Beatrice, Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger) don’t like each other at first, but eventually end up becoming mentors for each others’ children.

What struck me about the movie is that it does not pretend that there is dark in the world. While it is clearly a light family movie, it hints as much as it can at deep social issues. It sympathizes with those who do not have it together and the children who are starting to grow aware of themselves. It is thanks to the writers of the screenplay that audiences can see themselves in the teen girl, the boy who complains of his mother, but is incredibly protective of her, and the two parents who fail to connect to their offspring sometimes.

One example of this is a scene in which one of the girls leaves a spot at the table for the mother who she hasn’t let go of yet. Lauren tries to sit down in the reserved seat and the girl (sorry, I don’t remember her name) tells her its taken. Lauren takes a couple seconds to comprehend the situation and then moves to another seat. Throughout the movie, Lauren makes sure that the girl’s mother has a place to sit.

Not only does this attest to the strength of the writer’s minds, but also to the potential for brilliant human understanding and kindness.

On a scale of 1-10, I would give it an 8.5.

Currently Reading

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One of the books that I am reading for an American Lit class is White Noise by Don Delillo. Set in the 1980s, the novel explores the life of Jack, a professor who invented the field of “Hitler Studies” at his college, and his nontraditional family around the event of a chemical explosion.

Before we read it, my professor told us that it is okay for us to find some of the events and dialogue funny. And some parts of it is funny. Not necessarily laugh-out-loud funny, but they deserve a couple chuckles.

For instance, this scene with two of Jack’s daughters:

In bed two nights later  I heard voices, put on my robe and went down the hall to see what was going on. Denise stood outside the bathroom door.

“Steffie’s taking one of her baths.”

“It’s late,” I said.

“She’s just sitting in all that dirty water.”

“It’s my dirt,” Steffie said from the other side of the door.

“It’s still dirt.”

“Well it’s my dirt and I don’t care.”

“Dirt is dirt.”

“Not when it’s mine.”

This scene is mostly funny because it is relatable. You can easily see siblings having a similar conversation.

The novel is very aptly named. Throughout the novel, Jack mentions bits and pieces of noise from the television, which no one really seems to pay attention too. Events, such as the smoke alarm going off and people going missing, are talked about but stay part of the background.The conversations are often like the one on either side of the bathroom door. Background conversations, ones that don’t really matter. One could argue that all the conversations (at least the ones I’ve seen so far) classify as such. I personally think that Jack’s family is all part of the white noise and that he and his thoughts on death are all that he really pays attention to.

One view of white noise, background noise, the noise that we don’t quite pay attention to, is that it is different for everyone. Some people have to have music or the TV on all the time and some people actually listen, so they can’t have it on while they work on their business. Another view is that everything, even your thoughts, are white noise.

If the second is true, if everything and everyone is white noise, then do we matter?

I’m hoping that the second half of the book will give me a semblance of an answer.

 

 

 

Music is Magic

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“Ah, music: a magic beyond all we do here!” -Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone

On my first day of band in 6th grade, my teacher wrote the above quote on the board and told us that the first person to guess where it was from and who said it would get a prize. I knew the answer, but I wasn’t the first to shout it out, so the prize (a metronome) went to a saxophone player.

Music is certainly magic. Sometimes it inspires you. Sometimes it keeps you awake on long drives. Sometimes it helps you fall asleep. And sometimes it tells you the truth you need to hear.

A few of the songs that have fulfilled the last quality:

Life is Beautiful by Vega4

When You Come Back Down by Nickel Creek

Save by The Rocket Summer

Brave by Josh Groban

Your Hands by JJ Heller

For Good from “Wicked”

Free to be Me by Francesca Battistelli

Word of God Speak by Mercyme

Hold Me Jesus by Rich Mullins

But music can be a distraction. It can cloud what you need to see about yourself and/or certain situations. Silence can be overwhelming, but sometimes it shows you who you really are.

I was taking a short hike this morning in a local park and I passed two girls who were playing music on their phones that was loud enough for everybody else to hear. I get the need to have music as a constant presence because I tend to surround myself with it, but I believe hiking or enjoying the outdoors should include only those of nature.

Those who believe that immersing themselves in nature means only encountering silence haven’t really listened. There are a plethora of sounds to be heard: birdsong, the wind, leaves rustling, grass, or perhaps tall flowers, whispering, water trickling. Even the noise of your feet hitting the ground or making a rock skip can be music.

So… something to pay attention to the next time you go out of your door, take a walk, or a bike ride: the noise… or rather, the music. Because music isn’t only created by cords, notes, or voices. Because music is powerful magic.

Home Is…

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I was recently visiting one of my friends from high school. While we were talking, I noticed that I had to clarify which home I was talking about because I currently have two places that I call home: my parent’s house and my own apartment. I’ve thought about this many times before, but for some reason it really struck me this time.

The connotations of “home” are different to everyone.

To me, home is:

A place you have a key to, but you don’t have to use it because the door is opened by a loved one before you get to it.

Where sympathy and cough syrup that tastes like liquified cherry candy is readily available when you’re sick.

Where people who love you and who you love are.

Where people listen to you and sometimes gently tell you that you are wrong.

Where you can wake up in the morning and feel safe.

Where you can get up in the middle of the night and find your way to the bathroom without opening your eyes.

Where you can feel content while being confined indoors because of weather.

Where you keep your most powerful memories.

The definition of “home” from Oxford Dictionaries is cold and does not necessarily fit in with the connotations of the word. It says that home is “the place where one lives permanently, especially as a member of a family or household.” I haven’t been living at my apartment for very long and it already feels  like home.

One definition that I like uses it as a verb: return by instinct to its territory after leaving it. This “home” obvious refers to animals, like geese that return to a certain place for the summer. But I think it could be applied to humans because after all….

Home is a place that we return to.

Currently Reading

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The book that I am in the midst of is J.K. Rowling’s The Casual Vacancy. I have wanted to read this book since it came out, but only just recently made the decision to get it.

The novel is about the aftermath of the death of Barry Fairbrother, a council member, in the town of Pagford. Although the town seems idyllic, it soon becomes clear that a war is brewing between its members.

It is difficult to not view J.K. Rowling’s writings like you would the Harry Potter series. But just because they are written by the same author, doesn’t mean that they will be similar.

Indeed, they are extremely different. While I can still hear the voice of Rowling that I know and love, it is adult. It uses vulgar language that belongs to the adult world. And there are less metaphors in this book as in Harry Potter because the issues are more overt. For example, werewolves in the Potterverse have been labeled by the author as metaphors for sexually transmitted diseases, especially AIDS. In Casual Vacancy, there are no metaphors for abuse. It is not taken lightly; it is quite explicit.

One of the aspects of the novel that I particularly like is how she sections off the novel. She does not use chapters in the normal sense. Instead, they are separated into the days of the week. The first day is Sunday, during which the actual death is described and then on Monday, everyone’s reactions are recorded. While the sudden introduction of the characters in just a few pages makes it a little confusing (it isn’t as confusing as the characters in As I Lay Dying, I have to admit), it emphasizes the fact that everyone experiences moments, days differently. Going a little off-topic: that is one of the major reasons why I am fascinated with creative nonfiction. When I write a piece based off of memory, I remember certain details that other people may not or I remember them in a different way.

One thing that I have always admired about J.K. Rowling’s writing is that she makes her characters so incredibly human. Some of her characters are not likeable in the slightest and some only have a few redeeming qualities and the same time others are good people that make mistakes every once in a while. A good writer can write about likeable and mostly good people, but a mark of a great writer is being able to write unlikeable characters.

Speaking of great writers… Looking back at all her books, I can definitely see how far she has come. In Sorcerer’s/Philosopher’s Stone, she definitely had talent and wit, but grew immensely by the time she wrote Deathly Hallows. Some have worried that she would loose her writing prowess after Harry Potter, but she hasn’t. If anything, she has gotten better.

It truly is inspiring to know that such a great writer and woman has overcome her struggles and has increasingly improved and honed her skills. It gives hope to me, an emerging writer, that I too can improve and be successful.

Sound Catalogue

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This post is the product of an assignment for my Creative Nonfiction class in which we were told to take notes for twenty minutes on the sounds that we heard. Through doing this, I realized how important sound is to me, especially having had a hearing loss when I was younger. Not only that, sound is all around me, even though I don’t realize it most of the time. To do this assignment, I took a walk on a path that is conveniently right behind my apartment.

The intriguing thing about deliberately paying attention to sounds while on a walk is that all the other senses are more noticeable as well: the feel of the wind in your hair, the feel of your shoes on your feet, the feel of your heart pounding, the taste of the cool air, the sight of the sun behind a cloud, the way it makes goose bumps rise on your arms…
But as far as sound… The firsts are the train and the highway. Sometimes they seem indistinguishable from each other, but every once in a while, I hear a particularly loud truck or a squeak of a train car. A section of coal rambles by and I think that maybe the “chug-a chug-a chug-a choo choo!” that children cling onto is closer to its actual noise than I thought. Not because of the engine, but because of how the tracks interact with the cars.
The caboose disappears and the highway becomes prevalent. It doesn’t echo, but it somehow fills the world.
The noise becomes more personal: the slap, slap of my flip flops, my gentle breathing. And then it goes outward again. A car whooshes past, water sprays, a “hi” is panted, and a stream falls over occasional waterfalls.
A bridge: A bike passes over each board, which emits various clunks. I skip and jump on random parts of the bridge, but my feet can’t produce the same notes.
I approach the highway. Plastic on a truck flaps in the wind that its speed creates. The sound of the stream rises as the sound of the road rises and I notice the juxtaposition of birds twittering and the vehicles on the highway bridge.
Under the bridge, the highway is a bassoon. The frontage road that also crosses the walking path is full of circular noises. The cars are souls, or maybe winged insects, racing by.

Recently Read

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I haven’t had a lot of time to read in the past few weeks, but I did manage to devour a magnificent book. The name of this wonder: Orfe by Cynthia Voigt. It is short (only 120 pages long) and it is spell-binding. I only set it down to make tea and managed to read it in an hour.

The whole time I was reading it, I was thinking that it would be a perfect book to teach in a classroom. It does have some language that I could see a high school English department would have trouble with, but I think it’s as good as some of the classics.

Orfe is told from the perspective of Enny, who reminds me of Nick Carraway from The Great Gatsby in a way because she mostly serves as an onlooker and narrator. The book follows all the encounters she has with her friend, Orfe. They meet in elementary school, get separated, and then meet again when Enny is in college and Orfe is trying to make it as a singer. That’s as much as I can write without revealing too much.

Tagline on my copy is, “There is music in her madness.” This sentence is what drew me to the book at first, but after I read it, I discovered that it isn’t the right tagline. I thought that Orfe would go mad or she would be mentally ill and she’s not (in my opinion) because of it. So if you just happen to pick up the same version as mine… ignore the sentence it is misleading.

I also do not like the sentence because it is  more dramatic than the language of the actual story is. The language is similar to some you would find in creative nonfiction, simple yet specific. Here is an example from the first page: “This is what I remember: I am sitting at a school desk. A wooden desk top with an open shelf of ridged blue pipe metal under it… It is recess and we’re inside, so it must be raining.” What I especially like is the fact that when Enny is a child, the events that she describes are more like the cloudy memories of childhood with not much dialogue and then when she is an adult, it is mostly dialogue.

Although the language may be simple, the subject matters aren’t. Some of issues that it touches on are addiction, bullying, and poverty. When I read it again, I’ll probably encounter more. That’s one of the beauties of re-reading.

The only thing that I wish was different about it was the ending, which is very abrupt. But even so… I would still say that if you’re tired about hearing about the mess that is Fifty Shades of Gray, it is definitely a book to read.

I am…

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“Astronaut John Glenn says a standard test for astronaut candidates was to have them give twenty answers to the question ‘Who am I?’ ‘The first few answers,’ he said, ‘were easy. After that, it got harder.'”- from Challenge: A Daily Meditation Program Based on ‘The Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius by Mark Link, S.J.

This is same question that I was given as my first creative nonfiction prompt. I think it is, in essence, what the genre is all about: self-identity. Also, it explores how humans can turn into monsters and just generally what it means to be human. But before I get off topic…

John Glenn is right. It does get harder after the first few. Believe me, I tried. After the first five, I started to struggle with how else to describe myself. Somehow, it would be much easier if I used metaphorical language. For example: I am purple (it is not only my favorite color, but has always meant ‘passion for survival). But in plain speak, in regular old English, it is much harder.

Here are a few that I came up with:

I am a human

I am a human with strengths and weakness.

I am an observer.

I am an eavesdropper.

I am the daughter of two amazing parents.

I could have added that I am a child of God and a player of Bananagrams and a night owl, but I didn’t think of those options this time. But that’s the beauty of this prompt: It is always changing. If I sat down and did it tomorrow, it might be different. I’m excited to do it in a year or two and see how differently I see myself.

I ended this list with “I am a complicated person,” mostly because I couldn’t think of anything else to write, but also because it is very true. I don’t like the fact that I’m complicated, but it reassures me to think that other people are as complicated as me.

All of descriptions on my list are from myself. They are about how I see me as a person. However, I know that my list might be altered either dramatically or subtly if it was made by my family and friends.

A related quote that I would like to leave you with is: “If I saw myself as my friends and other people see me, I would need an introduction.