Art Collections website

After nearly a year's worth of work, the Elon Art Collections website is finally up and running.

A little background on the project: As many of you know, I love art. As an art minor, I was required to take an art history class, and I fell in love -- a little too late. I wasn't able to double major or minor in art history, but I was able to take a few more classes. One of those classes led me to this project. A friend of mine in the class, Alaina Pineda, who is a brilliant art historian, has spent most of her Elon career working with the problematic Elon Art Collections. Like most people on campus, I'd never heard of it. It contains more than 650 works in seven different collections. It's under funded and under appreciated, but it has many gems and I realized that I might have the means to help it out.

My senior sem project (basically like a senior thesis) was born: I would make a website for the Elon Art Collections that would not only explain and explore the collections, but attempt to obviate their use as a teaching tool and a developmental priority. What that means in plain English -- Why it's important that we pay attention to it.

And so I was off. My friend the university photographer, Grant Halverson, graciously agreed to take the photos. Anyone who has ever tried to take a picture of a picture knows just how impossible it is. It's because of his work that I think the project turned out so well. And then I began building with Flash.

And nearly five months later, here it is:

http://org.elon.edu/arthistory/artcollection/home.html

Enjoy, show all your friends, and most importantly, if you go to Elon, any time you get to talk to an administrator, ask them about the collection and what they're doing to promote and support it.

being launched

So here I am, a little less than a month from graduation and I'm beginning to feel the tug. Anyone who's waited for inevitable change (it sounds like an oxymoron, but it's not, trust me) knows what that feels like.

I'm sure it's similar to the feeling a pregnant woman has about 3 weeks before her due date -- there's still so much growing to do. But time is running out, and you're happy, because you're ready to go into the next stage of life, but you're also terrified. Will I be good at it? Can I do this?

And so, that slow tug back on the catapult begins. It's the pull on the bow strings before the release. The tension buzzes in the strings and the urge to let go is so strong, but the arrow will just fall from the ground without that extra tug at the end.

And so here I am. In that last little tug. My strings are tight and I'm buzzing pretty hard. I've got a lot to do between now and the end.

The string just gets tighter and tighter. The funny thing is, I know I'm going to make it a few more weeks before what I'm moving toward will actually become real. Like I said, there's other things to do first.

I've been reading a lot about Buddhism lately. One of the practices is present-mindedness, or being completely invested in the current. You can't focus on how far you want the arrow to fly, all you can do is focus on the tightening of the strings. If the strings are tight, then what happens happens.

And that's all I can do. Wait for the launch.

remember to breath

We're getting down to the wire. Roughly 40 days and counting until the end. Marathoners call it hitting the wall -- you just don't want to go anymore, but you have to. You have to keep putting one foot in front of the other and just keep running.

I've hit the wall. Hard. What's that saying: Senioritis, we're too lazy to find a cure.

Yeah. But see, I don't have the luxury of doing nothing. I have a To Do list the length of Route 40 just for things to finish for school alone, forget finding a job, and planning to move home.

I've been taking a yoga class, and one of the things our professor always tell us is to remember to breath. I've started having to tell myself to breath in and out during my daily activities.

I don't think I've ever been so happy and yet so terrified for something to come to an end.

accomplishment

I finally finished my online portfolio. I'm incredibly proud of it.

Take a look!

first of the lasts

Since I can remember, the first day of school has always been accompanied with excitement and a little anxiety -- Will my teacher be nice? Will I know people in my class? What if I forget my schedule or get lost?

But this first day of school is particularly jarring: Tomorrow is the last first day of school I will ever have.

I love school, I always have. I'm a good student, call me a priss, a goody-goody, whatever. But I like to learn. I like the process of school, I like the adrenaline you get when you take a test, and then again when it's being handed back by the teacher. I like going home and talking about the things you learned, the things that blow your mind because you could have never imagined that they were true. I like buying school supplies, I love the smell of fresh notebook paper and I think I'm vaguely obsessive when it comes to buying day planners.

But never again. Not unless I go to grad school, which won't be happening any time soon. And not until my children, should I have them, pack up their backpacks and head to school will that first day of class be important again.

I've been trying not to think a lot about the number of lasts that are about to start cascading down on my life. It seems so incredible that I'm here, finally, staring at only four months left in a place I've called home for four years. A place where I've both found and lost any number of things, clothing, friends, love, my sense of self.

I often like to think about the road not taken, about the way things could have ended up but didn't. What if I had gone to Boston University like I so desperately wanted to? What if I had never met Olivia, Mandy, Ryan, Bryan, Colleen, Kiersten and all of the other people I see as so necessary to my life, that I love so deeply. What if I had chosen differently?

One thing is for sure, regardless of where I was, I'd probably still be feeling this same ache, knowing that goodbyes are coming. Lasts are inevitable. But so are beginnings. I've never been good with change -- McKenzie always says we're ducks in a row kind of girls -- we like everything in order. I like to know where I'm going, how I'm going to get there and what it'll look like when I finally arrive. But life's not like that. I don't know where I'm going, I don't know what I'm doing. And it's scary. But I sort of like it.

My professor over this past winter term (my last winter term) told us every so often to buckle our seatbelts, grab the oxygen if needed and prepare for a bumpy ride.

It's going to be a bumpy few months, but I think it's going to be ride of a lifetime.

...Anyone know where I can get an oxygen tank to have on hand?

icky

What is that called when the weather matches your mood? I know there's a literary term for it, but alas, it's been a while since I've taken a true English class -- John? A little help? Regardless, it's basically been raining non-stop here in Elon for about 3 days. And not just the random little drizzly obnoxious rain, but the monsoon, you're going to get swept away kind. I wish a photo would capture the intensity of the rain as it falls outside my window right now. It's basically amazing.

Don't get me wrong, I love the rain. It's probably my favorite sort of weather pattern, followed closely by sun, and then an even closer third place, snow. I love the sound it makes in the gutters and the way it smells on the concrete of the parking lots and sidewalks. Rain smells different everywhere. Arizona rain smells different than Maryland rain. D.C. rain smells different than London rain. But like most things, I like it in moderation. This rain in particular seems to have coincided nicely with a marathon newspaper putting-out session.

Starting Monday, I believe I clocked a total 28 hours in the Pendulum office, designing, writing and perfecting Friday's edition. Usually, as you Elon readers know, the paper comes out on Wednesdays and production is just Monday nights. It's not unusual for us to be in the office from 5 p.m. to midnight most weeks. But this edition was a bit of a nightmare. Olivia, our fearless leader, was called away to Denver to be with her family during a time of sadness. I was left in charge. I don't mind being in charge. I'm good at bossing people around. I just got really overwhelmed with this one. I think because it was the first one back, and a double issue (two sections, due two different days) this one really worked me over.

So as it rained outside, dreary and sad, looking like 7 p.m. at 10 a.m., we worked away in the office, consuming insane amounts of Twizzlers, Sun Chips and homemade cupcakes. But it's done. We finished.

The rain just always seems to make things worse. It's like being sick at night. You always feel like you're going to die somewhere between 2 a.m. and 5 a.m., until the sun comes out and you know you'll make it through.

Another lesson in endurance, I think. I have a feeling there'll be a lot of those this year...