I) Finally, a little after half past ten, the sky had calmed down to a deep dark and the stars had consented to shine again. The moon appeared sleepily, drowsy from its awakening that was just a bit later than yesterday's. He is especially looking forward to the summer solstice, whisper the trees to me. Then, he can really sleep in. The moon always shows up, more or less, you know (except on his day off). At least he is consistent-- something you can always count on, like your birthday or the way the chicken will taste if it isn't quite done. One couldn't peg the moon as lazy, exactly, but he just pales in comparison to the productivity of the sun. That only matters, though, if one is given to valuing such traits.
II) Our turns were becoming more frequent, a sign that my new home was drawing nearer, pulling us around corners corners corners in order to eventually wrap us up inside its own corners. Dozens of orange streetlights glowed ahead in a shaggy field which was etched with nicely paved streets. It was a houseless neighborhood, the fouled up business venture some entrepreneur had eventually given up on. The sole house was the model home. Weeds were beginning to take over what had been prospective lots and the property had been foreclosed on. Still, at night, the lights shine on. Orange.
6.15.2008
Landed in the MI
whew
For a week or so leading up to my trip to Michigan, friends and family have all attempted to pull some indication of excitement from me. True, I did say that I was excited, but I never really felt it. It isn't like I regretted my decision. NOT AT ALL. It was just that I was never fully possessed by the rush of excitement. I knew to look forward to the the challenge, but my heart wasn't in it, until now.
The older, black, gentleman who sat next to me on our tiny NWA plane does not enjoy flying. "It's a necessity," he said to the back of the seats in front of us, "It isn't something you enjoy."
He mentioned rising oil prices, and the snacks and drinks that aren't free on the plane. (I definitely wouldn't have minded a complimentary vodka tonic. Too bad.) He said, though, that it was just out of the question to drive all over the country now, as he turned the wheel of an invisible steering wheel in front of him. His distant, dark eyes were trained on a dusty road ahead of him, steering a stylish station wagon with a couple cool cats to one coast or another in search of employment or nirvana.
"When you're young like you are, someone just says 'Hey! Let's get in the car and drive here!' Or, it's two in the morning and you decide to just go."
I smiled and shook my head to acknowledge I was guilty of that. It reminded me of some rather inspired nights in the Hill Country. This gentleman was obviously too wise for such inspiration, now. He was seasoned, and wearing a seersucker suit with light blue stripes. He read through the New York Times and a European financial newspaper. Posh.
He did remember to ask me, some time later, if I enjoyed flying. Emphatically, I replied, “I love it.” This was lost on him. I could tell by the way he nodded in the direction of the seats in front of us again. It's too bad, because I was actually fully engaged in the moment, breathless to be up in the air.
Later, as the sun was setting, far away, tucked between horizontal clouds of ember and fuchsia, I could not resist remarking in his direction, “We must be part of someone's sunset!” Unfortunately, his deep wrinkles must have soaked up the sound of my words before they could settle into his hearing aid, because he just “Ummphed,” in reply.
Secret adventure peeking in the sunset, alluding the day by a few stretches of yawning dusk memories, consider hiding somewhere where I might happen upon you this summer. Perhaps behind a sharp blade of blue grass, or under a violet pebble as heavy as the ocean at nighttime. Consider nestling inside a rusty locket, hooked to a charm bracelet spilling out of the mouth of a hot-breathed tiger. Perhaps grow inside of a poisonous mushroom, mistakenly knocked on its head by the unstoppable mighty movement of a charming bare foot running for Frisbees. Perhaps when I stretch my arms in front of my line of vision, grasping the sun in one fist—jumping, reaching for the firm tennis ball barreling toward me, you—new and secret adventure-- will settle into my grip instead.
6.07.2008
Here comes the sun...
summer two-thousand and eight
Did I tell you that most of my life is documented in diary entries, blog posts, and poetry? I, like most minute mortals have always been enamored with my own life, convinced that it is the most important life to me and the one that I am continually propelling through survival. My world revolves around me, like yours revolves around you. Substances and events only exist to me once they have effected me, that is, come across my portal of being. Nothing happens in my awareness without reference to me. Therefore, many day-to-days have been overly cherished in so many cursive letters in a dozen or so journals, both on and off-line. Yet, in being so wrapped up in my experience of living, I've also neglected to record many important parts of my twenty-one years and counting .
Is there ever a year for anyone when something momentous does not happen? It seems like for every year we've accomplished, folded up, and stored away there is a convenient life-change title to paste to the spine of it. Can there really be a life so monotonous and mundane and persistently boring that NOTHING stands over above the rest? Though most things that happen to us are insignificant and wisps of air in light of the enormity of time, especially considering the timelessness of the most real reality, to us there surely stands out one event that resonates the deepest on the harp strings of our finite existence-- one thing that stands itself up in the openness of truth and declares itself-- one thing to remember each year by.
I would like to confess to you today, dear electric diary, that I have developed a habit of "getting through". In the past few years I have experienced a handful of life changes. Nothing extraordinary or bizarre, these things are common to the academic or non-academic hardly-twenty-something. And though I've always most deeply experienced things through reflective writing, my prose has lazily slacked off in my increasing deftness to just get through-- to just transition, get through it, blah-di-blah.
Have I, Sara Triana, become just another drone who looks forward to the weekend? A Friday kind of person? This is a horrible fate, in my opinion, but one that I am not convinced I should resign myself to. It's a possibility, yes, that I could become someone who has so little passion for each new day that I perpetually look toward that false beacon of light and relaxation-- the weekend. Yet, this is merely a matter of attunement, which can be adjusted with a bit of effort and maybe a few more hours of sleep. "Getting through" things is such a cop-out attunement. It is a directedness toward nothing, an easy way to feel as if you are working toward some kind of goal. It is a shallow survivalism with nothing to live for. It is ignorance of purpose. It is apathy to things of essence. I know I don't really have to live like this. I know I have passion and love the adventure, knowledge, and whatever-else that can be dug out of just another every-day.
And yes, deep down, I know that my sloppy worship of God as of late could be a large contributing cause to this lack of reflection and that it can be remedied as quickly as a prayer that escapes with a single breath.
I know that if I want to be able to proudly label my years and feel like I have some influence on the momentous things that happen to me each year, I must tidy up my focus and get some things in order. Praise God that such a thing is possible, and furthermore, rather simple.
I say all these things with the intention to reflect on how I feel about my next adventure: moving to Michigan for the summer to be a nanny. I also intended to reflect on recent events, like finishing most of my major philosophy classes, realizing my academic passion, watching my boyfriend go to law school, and returning to Burnet for a visit. All of those things will have to wait for another day, though, for this post is already extending past the point of interest for most of my dear friends who read this.
But as for Michigan, may the Lord who is kind to me with ever increasing grace, grant the children who will be in my care a summer of learning, fun, creativity, rejuvenation, and love. May he grant their parents peace about the nanny of their children, and a memorable summer. May he grant me passion for teaching, playing, reading, and a simpler life. May he pour out patience, strength, joy, and success to my family, my beloved, and my friends who I will look forward to returning to.
Did I tell you that most of my life is documented in diary entries, blog posts, and poetry? I, like most minute mortals have always been enamored with my own life, convinced that it is the most important life to me and the one that I am continually propelling through survival. My world revolves around me, like yours revolves around you. Substances and events only exist to me once they have effected me, that is, come across my portal of being. Nothing happens in my awareness without reference to me. Therefore, many day-to-days have been overly cherished in so many cursive letters in a dozen or so journals, both on and off-line. Yet, in being so wrapped up in my experience of living, I've also neglected to record many important parts of my twenty-one years and counting .
Is there ever a year for anyone when something momentous does not happen? It seems like for every year we've accomplished, folded up, and stored away there is a convenient life-change title to paste to the spine of it. Can there really be a life so monotonous and mundane and persistently boring that NOTHING stands over above the rest? Though most things that happen to us are insignificant and wisps of air in light of the enormity of time, especially considering the timelessness of the most real reality, to us there surely stands out one event that resonates the deepest on the harp strings of our finite existence-- one thing that stands itself up in the openness of truth and declares itself-- one thing to remember each year by.
I would like to confess to you today, dear electric diary, that I have developed a habit of "getting through". In the past few years I have experienced a handful of life changes. Nothing extraordinary or bizarre, these things are common to the academic or non-academic hardly-twenty-something. And though I've always most deeply experienced things through reflective writing, my prose has lazily slacked off in my increasing deftness to just get through-- to just transition, get through it, blah-di-blah.
Have I, Sara Triana, become just another drone who looks forward to the weekend? A Friday kind of person? This is a horrible fate, in my opinion, but one that I am not convinced I should resign myself to. It's a possibility, yes, that I could become someone who has so little passion for each new day that I perpetually look toward that false beacon of light and relaxation-- the weekend. Yet, this is merely a matter of attunement, which can be adjusted with a bit of effort and maybe a few more hours of sleep. "Getting through" things is such a cop-out attunement. It is a directedness toward nothing, an easy way to feel as if you are working toward some kind of goal. It is a shallow survivalism with nothing to live for. It is ignorance of purpose. It is apathy to things of essence. I know I don't really have to live like this. I know I have passion and love the adventure, knowledge, and whatever-else that can be dug out of just another every-day.
And yes, deep down, I know that my sloppy worship of God as of late could be a large contributing cause to this lack of reflection and that it can be remedied as quickly as a prayer that escapes with a single breath.
I know that if I want to be able to proudly label my years and feel like I have some influence on the momentous things that happen to me each year, I must tidy up my focus and get some things in order. Praise God that such a thing is possible, and furthermore, rather simple.
I say all these things with the intention to reflect on how I feel about my next adventure: moving to Michigan for the summer to be a nanny. I also intended to reflect on recent events, like finishing most of my major philosophy classes, realizing my academic passion, watching my boyfriend go to law school, and returning to Burnet for a visit. All of those things will have to wait for another day, though, for this post is already extending past the point of interest for most of my dear friends who read this.
But as for Michigan, may the Lord who is kind to me with ever increasing grace, grant the children who will be in my care a summer of learning, fun, creativity, rejuvenation, and love. May he grant their parents peace about the nanny of their children, and a memorable summer. May he grant me passion for teaching, playing, reading, and a simpler life. May he pour out patience, strength, joy, and success to my family, my beloved, and my friends who I will look forward to returning to.
5.28.2008
4.29.2008
Review of a TV Series- Weeds
Three cheers for the least idiotic show about marijuana to ever make it to the big time! Before I applaud 2007’s Showtime hit, Weeds, let me offer the most grandiose and sincere disclaimer: I do not in any way, or at any time have I, condoned, encouraged, or agreed with the use of marijuana for recreational purposes by anyone (least of all, myself), ever.
So, to continue with my praise and critique of the series: Hurrah! It is about time someone presented the growing social issue of the rampant use of pot in America, without including the stereotypical laughing stoners and Dude, Where’s My Car?-esque humor.
Jenji Kohan’s drama-comedy, Weeds, is about a suddenly widowed Californian housewife, Nancy Botwin, and the ripple effects in her recovering family and affluent suburban community when she begins to sell weed to keep up the lush lifestyle they are accustomed to. Three seasons have aired already, with a fourth due this summer, if all continues to get back to normal in the T.V. world. I hear those writers are getting feisty again, though.
Nancy Botwin is played by Mary-Louise Parker, whom I have always felt to be most endearing in her role in Fried Green Tomatoes, is the most compelling reason to watch. She delivers an excellent performance in every episode, offering the viewer an immersing look at the complexities of a woman worried by her children’s behavior in response to their father’s death, her own dealing with the tragedy of losing her spouse in the prime of life, the terrifying consequences of getting caught in the world of drugs, and making sure she does not lose herself in the tragic sway of life. She fights to not lose it, and the audience succumbs to her irresistible universality, and fights with her. She is vulnerable, but remains that woman with grit, with determination, with firm resolve, that we all know in our own lives and admire, no matter what level she descends to, because it is that passionately blazing resolve to survive, which is such a pivotal part of the essence of man that when we see it within her we recognize it like the back of our own hand, and desperately want to relate to.
The show is built around the character of Nancy, for good reason. If it were not for her strength of character, and the Nietzschean passion for life she exudes, Weeds would still be interesting, but only as one of those pictures of a world outside of ours that so many secular T.V shows are for Christians. We watch them to spy on the Other, to see what the world’s man is doing. But this show is more than a snapshot of another lifestyle; it is a passionate push to keep fighting in our own lives, to do what it takes, to settle not for resignation when life is painful, but to let one remain completely engaged in life, even if it tears us apart.
4.09.2008
Morning Story
Like the first star in the sky, I saw him. Not because he was a grand star, not even a star, metaphorically like a star. Like the most obvious thing in a vacuum of appearances I saw him and-- what was that sinking melancholy we felt when she was expelled and broken-- like the world was not right, not right but sinking, yes instead sinking into, what could only be called the mush pot?? When my beautiful goddess of a friend, the unbeloved, the cast-out stared with no eyes, no heart, no will and vanished into a pile of bones and blonde hair.
Yes, like that, but the cheaper version, like Pei Wei, like If-You-Like----You'll--love---- perfume, a commercial melancholy or a dull trip in a dull city. I saw and I felt. I exxxxxxxxperienced and I reeeeeflected. It could have been my imag-ination, but at least there he was in the probability of his appearance. He kept walking. Toward me to get past me. Big black eyes that I've caught several, several times, now shifted downward to scope out the weevils digging pyramids in the sand between the cracks of the sidewalk. Assuredly, his highness would rather have fallen down the rabbit hole of one of those minute pyramids than look at me. Me. My morning me. My fresh out of the lecture me. My pondering me. My galloping at the University me. and singing to the clover, running down the hill me. That me! Why the pyramids, oh Pharaoh, and not a nod at me? Why the dark of the ocean? The roar of silence? The unbearable stench of the pyramids and not a glance upward?
Hell, for a friendly bit of eye contact that says, "I see you. You are a person and I am a person. We are of the same ripe people." And that is all, a friendly sunbeam.
So offputting and disconcerting and bubblebursting was the ghastly interruption to my gaiety that my imagination shuddered and my hair covered my face to protect me. Perhaps it did not, but what is true, what appeared true, what I felt to be true was that I saw the Pharaoh and I wanted to step right in front of him. "Red light." AND immediately say in a voice that could command pirates on the high seas and sing to stargazers and inhale the adoration of cigarette smokers at a packed out blues-fest, as I manning the mike would say: "You shadow me in darkness and I think you are a gloom cloud. Yes. I think you are. I think you are the form of a gloom cloud. I think every malicious puff in the sky is a copy of a copy of a copy of you and we thought they were bad putting out our picnics and flooding our plains and turning over the seas and shutting us inside with people we hate, but you are worse, the worst, the black horse, the white horse, the red horse, the whore and the horse that she rides in on. You are a gloom cloud and hateful. I do not hate you, but I know you are a stormcloud and you will only ever storm.
The unpersonable should not be taken personally, but as a person, respectable and promising, with faltering potential, I protest that such philandering in my purest impressions on poignant mornings be prohibited.
Goodbye, I will say.
Then I will march onto the tips of the blades of grass and siddle up to the cherry blossoms and I will bury my face in the freshness of the earth and wait for the rain to subside. For certainly, if one kicks at the pile of ants and insults the Queen (God, Save Her), one will surely be smote.
Smote or smitten, at least I was once a kitten.
Yes, like that, but the cheaper version, like Pei Wei, like If-You-Like----You'll--love---- perfume, a commercial melancholy or a dull trip in a dull city. I saw and I felt. I exxxxxxxxperienced and I reeeeeflected. It could have been my imag-ination, but at least there he was in the probability of his appearance. He kept walking. Toward me to get past me. Big black eyes that I've caught several, several times, now shifted downward to scope out the weevils digging pyramids in the sand between the cracks of the sidewalk. Assuredly, his highness would rather have fallen down the rabbit hole of one of those minute pyramids than look at me. Me. My morning me. My fresh out of the lecture me. My pondering me. My galloping at the University me. and singing to the clover, running down the hill me. That me! Why the pyramids, oh Pharaoh, and not a nod at me? Why the dark of the ocean? The roar of silence? The unbearable stench of the pyramids and not a glance upward?
Hell, for a friendly bit of eye contact that says, "I see you. You are a person and I am a person. We are of the same ripe people." And that is all, a friendly sunbeam.
So offputting and disconcerting and bubblebursting was the ghastly interruption to my gaiety that my imagination shuddered and my hair covered my face to protect me. Perhaps it did not, but what is true, what appeared true, what I felt to be true was that I saw the Pharaoh and I wanted to step right in front of him. "Red light." AND immediately say in a voice that could command pirates on the high seas and sing to stargazers and inhale the adoration of cigarette smokers at a packed out blues-fest, as I manning the mike would say: "You shadow me in darkness and I think you are a gloom cloud. Yes. I think you are. I think you are the form of a gloom cloud. I think every malicious puff in the sky is a copy of a copy of a copy of you and we thought they were bad putting out our picnics and flooding our plains and turning over the seas and shutting us inside with people we hate, but you are worse, the worst, the black horse, the white horse, the red horse, the whore and the horse that she rides in on. You are a gloom cloud and hateful. I do not hate you, but I know you are a stormcloud and you will only ever storm.
The unpersonable should not be taken personally, but as a person, respectable and promising, with faltering potential, I protest that such philandering in my purest impressions on poignant mornings be prohibited.
Goodbye, I will say.
Then I will march onto the tips of the blades of grass and siddle up to the cherry blossoms and I will bury my face in the freshness of the earth and wait for the rain to subside. For certainly, if one kicks at the pile of ants and insults the Queen (God, Save Her), one will surely be smote.
Smote or smitten, at least I was once a kitten.
4.05.2008
Reflections On a Night Well Spent
Tonight I sizzle into a room, oblivious to the floor melting below me like boiling drops of maple syrup hot from the cast-iron skillet and cast a smoldering glance at what was a magnificent tree, now haphazardly whittled down to a dwarf chair, small enough to weep for what it once was, when it first sprang from the ground thin, like a tentacle wrapping around the air and the earth, and then when it shot up over night, in the glow of the harvest moon (just in from watching Chinese children play chess outside on kites), and then when it groaned into its manhood, shooting off shoots right and left-- shoot, shoot, shooo birds, it thought. Shhhhoooo, with your claws digging into me, painting me with your malignant defecation. Whisperssss shoo. Shoot. Shoot. The fatness of a tree trunk. The width of the world. The wonderful circles for every year.
All's a circle. All is round. All is rhythm. All is love. All is one. Tree is chair. Sober is drunk. Happy is devestated and it all matters and it all does not matter at all, for after all everything's gonna be okay and all is decaying anyway. So the rush--why for? Soon though, the tree stout and tall and gracious welcomed birds like the street welcomes us at night after our parties. Remember darling your wild baboon dances that you decorated Wofford with. What a charmed street. Soon the birds were beloved by our tree and it hosted many a fantastic bird orgy in its maturing limbs. Limbs, not branches. Limbs, strong and passionately reaching up at the moon. Grabbing at it, clawing up toward it. Most think it is the sun that the tree arches upward toward. Lies, I tell you, and believe me. The sun might be his creator and lover, but the moon matters more. Moon, my man, it moaned, why have you forsaken me and look down with disappointment. Yes, old cat, I live older now, with black knots and way two many lovers' initials scratched into my body, but what say you? You hate me moon and you say I have lost my childlike purity. I have not! I have not!
Tree bellowed! The moon barely grimaced, too old to show its apathy at the whining of the tree. Trees always whine, too passionate not to.
All's a circle. All is round. All is rhythm. All is love. All is one. Tree is chair. Sober is drunk. Happy is devestated and it all matters and it all does not matter at all, for after all everything's gonna be okay and all is decaying anyway. So the rush--why for? Soon though, the tree stout and tall and gracious welcomed birds like the street welcomes us at night after our parties. Remember darling your wild baboon dances that you decorated Wofford with. What a charmed street. Soon the birds were beloved by our tree and it hosted many a fantastic bird orgy in its maturing limbs. Limbs, not branches. Limbs, strong and passionately reaching up at the moon. Grabbing at it, clawing up toward it. Most think it is the sun that the tree arches upward toward. Lies, I tell you, and believe me. The sun might be his creator and lover, but the moon matters more. Moon, my man, it moaned, why have you forsaken me and look down with disappointment. Yes, old cat, I live older now, with black knots and way two many lovers' initials scratched into my body, but what say you? You hate me moon and you say I have lost my childlike purity. I have not! I have not!Tree bellowed! The moon barely grimaced, too old to show its apathy at the whining of the tree. Trees always whine, too passionate not to.
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