looking back

I was reading one of my friend Bryan's blog entries today, it's about memory and change. And it got me thinking about how different my life is from a year ago. So much has changed, so much growth. It got me thinking about the fluidity of life, and whether or not this supposedly linear idea of time is truly true at all.

Bryan's blog entry (I suggest you read his blog in its entirety, because it's awesome) was about memories from a year ago, it was about change and love and how we remember things. Perhaps it's because I'm in phase of life where things are about to change big time, but I've been thinking a lot about people, relationships and life in general a lot lately.

At this time last year, to the day, my grandmother died. That feels like a lifetime ago, but I still remember details of my brother and I walking out of the wake, him ready to be in tears, but already at 13 unable to shed them because he wanted to be a man for Mama. I still remember talking to Nick on the phone, crying and feeling like he didn't understand, and holding my cousin Elsie, 2 years old at the time, and wanting to cry for her because she will never know our perfect grandmother. Perhaps sadness is something we try to distance ourselves from more because it's so painful, but I haven't thought of these memories for a whole year. I've put them away because they're sad, because even as I write them I start to cry.

I wrote a while ago that I don't like to relive the bad, that I hang on to it but choose not to revisit those things that bring back anger, frustration and bitterness. But as I dig back into the memories of Grandma's death, I realized that there's a lot of catharsis in coming back to things that hurt. There's a lot of wisdom in perspective. So maybe it's not so bad after all.

A year later, my life has taken a few turns. I've had a few guys, a few big decisions and a new direction for my career goals.

Most people measure a year from January to January, but why not measure from October to October? Or big decision to big decision? This year has been a year of change for me, and a year of learning to trust myself and take for myself what I want. I've always thought of myself as one who only likes to move forward, but more and more I'm starting to see that looking backward has it's importance too.

life is beautiful, swanson

My senior year of high school I had an amazing teacher for an ancient Mediterranean civilizations class and Medieval history. His name was Mr. Baxter. A tall, heavy-set black man, his voice boomed when he called us by our last names. His podium was painted with camouflage and he had a riding crop that he'd use to emphasize points about cathedral building, Piltdown Man and Gregorian chants.

His classroom ceiling was covered with flags, his walls covered in maps and images of his travels. Some how he'd managed to get framed paintings to hang on the cinder blocks. You were always "Private," or "Comrade Swanson," or just "Swanson." No one had a first name. And everyone loved him.

Most classes in high school are fairly forgettable, you may remember the teacher, you may not. And most of the time, you definitely don't remember what you learned. I have about four teachers from high school whose lessons have stuck with me, whose voices I can still hear in my head and whose mentoring I pray I never forget. Baxter's voice is in my head in certain instances when I'm doing certain things, when I have to recall random European historical facts. But I hear it most of all when I wear a certain sweatshirt.

I'm wearing that sweatshirt today. It's light weight, so only for certain weather. Today seemed right, I guess.

It's funny how things just dawn on you. You forget about them until all of a sudden it makes its rounds in your brain and comes back.

My sweatshirt is silk-screened and it says "Life is beautiful," on the front.

In my head I can see myself. I am 18 years old, standing next to his desk about to ask about a paper. I can see him look at me, directly in the eyes, and say in his clear but weathered voice, "Life is beautiful, Swanson."

And then he smiled that smile that stretched from ear to ear, he always knew when he was being profound and knew that you knew it too.

I think few of us ever get to meet someone who is truly wise. He was wise. And he was right, for all the disaster and chaos that prevails most of the the time, through all that, life is beautiful.

all hail the comma!

Today is National Punctuation Day! And being the nerd that I am, I'm excited.

Kiersten met me at work today to hand me a card that had two cut out over-sized quotation marks and read: Happy National Punctuation Day! My friends know me so well.

In honor of National Punctuation Day, here's a clip of Dean Martin and Victor Borge doing a bit about verbalized punctuation. It's cute, it's about punctuation, and you just have to love Dean Martin's face as he's trying to mimic the sounds in the beginning, and then they just dissolve into hysterics as it progresses.

It's a classic. And you can be assured that "Oxford Comma," by Vampire Weekend will be on heavy rotation today.

writing down the bones

More than once in my life I've been told that when I'm having a problem, I should write about it. Journaling has always been cathartic to me, but I realized recently after talking to other people about their journaling habits, that I only write for myself (read: in a tiny hand-written journal that no one reads) when I'm upset or going through something that's causing me anxiety or stress.

I rarely, if ever, write for myself when I'm happy.

As a result, I have journal upon journal full of angst, sadness and in some cases, anger. These journals contain the bones of bad relationships, uncomfortable situations, awkward encounters and ugly moments. They harbor all the yuck. All the icky in my life.

I'm naturally a worrier. Even when things are going well for me, I worry. I look ahead with that strange mom-complex that women tend to have and I see the worst. I'm working on it. Trust me. And journaling helps.

McKenzie and I were talking yesterday about what should be done to or with old journals. She rereads hers. She likes to go back through and re-experience with new perspective. Her mom, she said, burns old journals to release their contents back into the world. I love the cycle of it, and the karmic nature of that approach. But I do neither. I cannot bring myself to re-experience what I've written, and I cannot bring myself to part with it at the same time. Having that grave for the bones, for me, something I know is there, but don't have to revisit if I can't, serves as a reminder of the memories the books hold. I don't have to dig them up to know what they are.

I haven't really been journaling for myself lately, and that's generally a good sign. But I think I'm going to start. McKenzie used the metaphor of doctors: People only go to the doctor's when they're sick, she said, but sometimes a check up when you're healthy, to prevent the sickness, is really good.

I think she's right.

Avedon

The Richard Avedon show at the Corcoran Gallery of Art where I worked this summer just finished its first week. It's been getting some great press, both national and international. I figured, since I spent most of my summer stuffing press packets for this show, I'd keep track of the press that's come out of it.

Here's a piece by the BBC with curator Paul Roth. He's explaining Avedon's legacy and his intent when taking the portraits. It ends with a view of the Obama portrait that was essentially one of his last. It's a really well done package, except that the background music is a little distracting.

Enjoy!

gulp

It's striking to me how being a college student is essentially like being impoverished. The two are practically synonyms. Except that it's actually nothing like being impoverished, because most of us have a meal plan and all of us have a roof. So really, we're asset rich and penny poor. Or something like that.

I'm mentioning all of this because I had to turn down going to the Ben Folds concert because it was $50 a ticket. I just couldn't do it. Not since I haven't been paid since May. And not since I've seen him four times already. He's pretty fantastic in concert, probably one of the best I've ever seen. But I just couldn't do it, and neither could my equally impoverished friends.

I think college students have an odd outlook on money. Since we're not quite adults and for most of us, our parents foot the bill for the big stuff (car payment, tuition, room and board) our big purchases are frivolous things. My most recent big purchase was a $200 plane ticket. But $50 for Ben. Can't do it! Priorities...

I'm finding it hard to believe that in eight short months the big ticket purchases, the rent, the food, will all be mine. Insert sarcastic gleeful exclamation here.

We had a meeting for the senior class yesterday. It was all colored lights and spectacle -- the university and student government association's attempt at making graduating sound less scary. That was until the Registrar stood up and listed on his two hands the number of steps (there are eight) we are away from graduating. Two and two-thirds semesters, a few meetings with advisers, the registrar, and a $70 graduation fee. Um. What? Does someone want to explain to me where the last four years have gone?

After the registrar had thoroughly petrified us, our president, Leo Lambert, got up and announced that in eight short months, he'd be addressing us again as graduates. No amount of orange balloons, fake red carpet or flashing lights will make that sound less scary.

I've been saying for a while now that I'm ready to not be in school any more, and that's true. That's as true today as it was yesterday before the Nickelodeon-themed senior survival extravaganza. I think my anxiety comes less from my fear of going out into the world and "growing up" and more about the change associated with saying goodbye to friends and faculty members who've become my family. But I have a while, eight "short" months actually, to get used to the idea of turning the page to the next chapter.

Look out world, here I come, tentatively.

oh. my. gosh.

Definitely peed my pants a little when I found out this was happening. And if I can't get tickets, I might die inside. I plan on buying two tickets. The second has been tentatively reserved for Olivia as her birthday present. If for some reason it turns out she cannot go, it will go to the highest bidder.

Ben Folds Five