A Room Without a View

I've decided that should I have the opportunity to build my own house that there will be a library. It doesn't have to be large and ostentatious, just a room for books. And it will have dark and light hard wood floors in a checkered pattern like The Shop Around the Corner in "You've Got Mail". I just finished watching that movie, and I have to say, I love it. It's just so cute. And having missed my chick-flick fix at the Student Life Building with "The Notebook," I had to watch something that was equally cute and sappy.

My library will have big books and small books, hard cover and soft, and a big leather reading chair that hugs you when you sit in it and a matching ottoman. It will smell like books and old paper. Maybe I'll have a desk in there too. The lamps will all be soft light, none of that blinding fluorescent stuff. It will be friendly and welcoming. I would love to have a fireplace too; one that burns wood, not gas. I would spend hours upon hours sitting there reading from my a large stack of books to read, slowly whittling away at the pile, replenishing it daily. My books to read section will grow and grow until my library will consist of more books I haven't read than books I have.

There will be a substantial children's book section, and a large beanbag in the corner where kids from the neighborhood can come and read whenever they want. Eventually they will graduate from Amelia Bedilia, Ramona and the beanbag chair to Jane Eyre, Jack Ryan and the leather reading chair. It will be a safe place to sit and think and write and do whatever your imagination can think up, as long as you don't destroy my books. And there will be a card catalogue.

The Philosophical Me

I have realized in reviewing recent posts that I have resorted to complaining and talking about my daily life: what I did, how I felt, stuff that is really boring and should be reserved for the pages of my personal journal (and no, you can't read it). I fear that my creativity has burned out temporarily. Perhaps a better analogy is a fire which has burned low and needs fuel; paper, lighter fluid...gasoline. There is something missing. I have lacked feeling for many days, and I think it is starting to get to me.

I'm tired. It's been a hard couple of weeks since the beginning of the semester. I've been busy doing things, homework mostly. Last semester my homework was writing papers, my mind was always working, and working hard. It's as if my mind ceases being creative when it stops being productive. I'm not feeding off of anything. My acting teacher is always telling us how valuable it is to always be reading to expose ourselves to new material, so that you don't get stuck performing monologues from monologue books, monologues which have been worn out and repeated over and over again by many people. When I was reading plays every week my mind was at it's best, and the thoughts flourished, but now that all that I read is intellectual babble, I can't squeeze anything out of my brain. My sponge is dry, and there's nothing for it to soak up. It was nice when I was forced to read someone else's creativity for class instead of some anthropologist's opinions on what culture is (or isn't), and whether it existed before an anthropologist said it existed.

I think the mind operates on two different levels. One level is the scientific, the other is the artistic. Some people are born with one more powerful than the other, more effective. I think my mind was born creative, I can't wrap my mind around scientific concepts, but words...I get words. They make sense to me. Words are powerful. I love manipulating them and making them say just what I want them to say, molding them into something positive, something coherent, something entertaining.

I am in a slump spiritually. I don't feel close to God, I haven't most of this year. Last spring I was on this spiritual high, I read my Bible, it was like I was on the same wavelength as God. Everything fit, it made sense. Now I feel like I'm wandering, my hands stretched out before me because I can't see where I'm going, I don't recognize where God fits in my life. Even after Atlanta Christmas Conference, which I had hoped would give me some kind of spiritual boost, I felt the same. Numb. That's how I feel, numb. I'm just going about my daily life and there's nothing that is sparking in my mind, it's just waking up every morning and doing stuff; just stuff. It's like those Bunsen burner lighters you use in chemistry class with the flint, you know, you squeeze the handle thing and it rubs the flint against the rough metal creating sparks. Well, my brain is like one of those, except without the flint. There are things around me every day that should make me laugh or say something stupidly funny, but it's just not happening. Things are rubbing up against me and I'm just not interested.

Am I venting again? I hate to vent when I know there are people who don't really care listening (or in this case reading), it's boring, and I don't like boring. I knew this girl in high school who was always talking about her boy problems, and I being the kind, caring, considerate friend that I was, would zone out every time she started talking about this boy and that boy and whether or not this guy liked her. I don't want to make people into the [bad/horrible] friend I was back in the day. I guess the idea is: be interesting [or funny, or not boring], people will like you more. That's shallow, I know. Maybe I'm not giving people enough credit.

Ugh, I'm tired. I need to read something creative. No, I really need to sleep.

An Ouch with Each Step

I decided last semester around registration time that I did not want to gain weight this semester, my pants were getting tight, and that's never comfortable. So I signed up for Aerobic Conditioning. It was a good decision, but now I'm in a lot of pain. It's not bad pain really, it's just the I haven't moved my body this much since...the last time I signed up for some kind of physical activity. What I didn't ask for last semester is an Acting 1 teacher who also happens to be a stage combat guy. Yeah, we do a lot of physical activity in that class. You wouldn't think so right? He had us doing stretching exercises, so now my shoulders, back, arms, legs...everything hurts.

I have Aerobic Conditioning (heretofore referred to as "gym") with a friend from Shakes/Women in Lit. We get to walk up the monstrous hill atop which her dorm and my house sit. I pointed out that the university could have used some forethought when building the Student Life Building and the Leach Center/Tully Gym complex. The SLB sits on top of a hill. The Leach Center is at the bottom of that hill. So the kids who go to the SLB to watch movies and eat popcorn don't have to climb a hill to get to it. The kids who go to Leach get an easy walk down to work out and an exhausting climb after their workout once they are already tired.

I have homework to do. A lot of reading for Intro to Cultural Anthropology. I'm working on a post about my prof., cause watching him is kind of funny. He kind of loses credibility cause he looks like Conan O'Brien. I keep thinking he's going to crack some random joke. Anyway, to the homework I go, kicking and screaming.

Tired and Torn

Today has been a long day, and it's only half over. I woke up this morning to R. (the maintenance man) in my bathroom with an electrician fixing the light which has been out of commission for weeks (literally). I'm glad that's back to normal, but wish they hadn't woken me up at 8AM to fix it. Anyway, I refuse to complain about that. My breakfast of non-fat plain yogurt, frozen fruit (still frozen as it was ingested into my body), honey and wheat germ (it's not as gross as it sounds) slid down my esophagus with little relish. Duh, it's fruit and yogurt, why would there be relish? Ok, bad joke. Ignore the previous sentence or two. I went to Strozier to copy monologues, and the copy machines where having a conniption. Just as I would get one working, something would happen with the cash chip on my FSU card, so I would pop it out and the copier would have a hissy fit again. A combination of psychotic copiers and poor planning made me late to Women in Lit. I got the evil eye from Dr. B. Peachy. Introduction to Anthropology was fine, it made sense. Acting class was ok too, but considering that I'm most certainly not an actress, it's a little irritating. [Side note, there's a cardinal outside my window, I wonder if he's looking for Clementine...it's ok little cardinal, she'll be back in spring...hopefully]. We did a lot of physical stuff, learning how to fall and such, which only aggravated my tired and sore body. I sit here now exhausted and ready to go to sleep. Either that or eat.

Creativity in the Form of Comments

This is a reply to a post on A--'s live journal. I will include excerpts from said post to provide context.

Her post:
1/7/05-10:51pm:
um. . . I don't think milk is supposed to drip off your spoon like egg yolk. Then again, it could be because it was a mix of whole and skim and because it was almost frozen in the top shelf of the fridge. Oh well, I ate cereal with it anyway. But now my stomach hurts. Good job, A--.
1/8/05- 10:15am:
Well I'm still here so the milk musta been fine. :-p

My comment:
1/9/05- 8:37pm:
Glad you're not dying...yet.

As for the egg-like milk: sounds like something out of a bad horror movie or something. The pitch to the film company might sound something (but only something) like this:

The milk becomes embittered by it's lack of use and decides to revolt against it's user. Since you neglected it when it was good, you'll surely not get any now that it's bad. Now, the plan would have worked perfectly, had the consumer been someone other than a college student. As many of us know, college students become desperate, and desperation leads to rash measures, like drinking milk that drips off a spoon as though it were an egg. The egg-i-milk's plan was foiled, and it is now sitting in your stomach plotting it's smelly expulsion from your body, or it's violent revolt against your nervous system. Either way, THE EGG-I-MILK WILL HAVE IT'S REVENGE! I hope it's not the latter.

Her reply:
1/9/05-8:50pm:
Laura, I would kill (well, maybe only maim) for your creativity. It's truly a gift :-p

My reply:
1/9/05-9:05pm:
As long as you don't kill/maim me for my creativity, be my guest. I think I'm one of those people who will, in the later years, be considered either crazy or excentric. Now, it's only the rich people that are considered excentric...everyone else get's thrown into an insane asylum. I shall hope to be rich one day, so that I may avoid dying alone in a hospital, comforted only by a six foot tall rabbit named Harvey, the opium smoking worm from Alice In Wonderland, and my psychiatrist friend who lives in the mirror.

All material used by permission from their authors. No law suits necessary. I know, I'm a creative genius. Humble too.

Frustration Central

I'm currently experiencing extreme frustration at my wireless network. I lack the computer knowledge to fix said wireless network so that it won’t continually fade in and out, disconnecting me from the internet. Grrr…I wish computers would die. Not mine of course, I love my computer; we have a beautiful relationship. Sort of. It actually drives me crazy. But don't tell it that, it might revolt (again). Anyway, I'm tired. I've been reading the blogs/LiveJournals of various friends, acquaintances, and total strangers (ex. Zach Braff, artist behind Garden State). I really should be taking a nap, reading Virginia Woolf, reading plays, searching for monologues for Acting class, any number of things. Not included on the list of things to do: blog writing. Oh well.

We had our first house meeting Friday night. It was...intimidating. I realized for the first time that I have a lot of work to do as a result of my officer position. As house Vice Prez, I get to check bathrooms (gas mask included with office), check all windows and doors for proper operation and safety, schedule and execute fire alarms (ok, this actually sounds kind of fun, although the last one was kind of disastrous, the alarm wouldn't turn off, so we had to call the maintenance guy on the weekend...oops), and assign and check cook and clean crew. I think I actually have more to do than the house President. Oh well, whatever, I signed up for it. And I don't have to do a work job.

I'm currently reading Virginia Woolf's A Room of One's Own for my Women in Literature class. It's a little hard to read, 'cause she writes it almost like a novel, and I find myself missing the point. I guess that's what Dr. B------ is for [my wonderful, wonderful Dr. B------]. The class is much larger than my Intro to Shakespeare was, so I'm a little bummed about that. Three friends from Shakes showed up to class 50 minutes early to get the seats they had last semester, you know, get the group back together. I, on the other hand, am not nearly so dedicated (or punctual), so I was relegated to the seats that were left when I got there 5 minutes early. I'm waiting for the day when people start getting tired of going to class and show up later and later. Dr. B------'s class is not one to which people arrive late; although she does not take points for tardiness, she gives you this evil eye and you feel guilty. Not that I would know from personal experience, because I never was late to her class last semester, I had a class right before it. To give you an idea of how good Dr. B------ is, I dropped a Theatre class just so I could take Women in Literature with her. Sadly enough, this semester is her last. She is one of my favorite teachers thus far, although no one will ever hold a candle to Mr. K-------- of Junior IB English.

Well, it's time for me to go; my eyelids are staging a coup against the toothpicks which prop them open.

Back to School

I've been back in Tallahassee for a few nights after a refreshing Christmas vacation. I said I would let you know how Christmas Conference went, so I guess I'll do that first.

Christmas Conference was cool, a little depressing, very enlightening and a whole lot of fun. You should go.

My first two days of class have been good, that is, as good as being back in school after a three week sabbatical from school can be. My classes are...sufficent. Nothing that is really grabbing my attention other than Advanced Stagecraft, but I already knew that would be a blast. I'm looking forward to becoming one with the table saw, or perhaps I should say distinctly two with the table saw since people and any kind of saw don't usually mix very well. An old friend from high school is in the same class, so that should be fun hanging out with her again, although I get the distinct impression that she has moved on. It will be fun when I wear the t-shirts she designed to class. A couple other classes appear to be difficult and full of working, something which had hoped to escape this semester. Still others have no work at all, except for finding some way to make everyone sweat in Aerobic Conditioning.

Well, it's late, and I have work to do. Can you believe that it's 2005 already? This afternoon I was writing an e-mail and put 2001 on it. What was I thinking? Maybe my subconscious is still stuck in high school. I hope not, I thought I moved past that era in maturity long ago...like last year ago.