cellophanetulip

The most offensive thing I've read in a long, long time:

"I'm about as liberal as they come, leftist actually, but still have no idea why being "diverse" or whatever is necessarily a good thing. Who cares? It's great that one can go to different types of restaurants in a diverse place, but that's it. It's 2011. People live wherever the hell they want to, provided they can afford it."

I just read a thing on Jezebel about the Ideal Boyfriend (TM), and it started me wondering how I would define someone like that.  Sometimes it's hard for me to sort out what's the superficial shit and what actually matters... The things I find most attractive aren't really the things that are best for me. 

Whenever I look back on a relationship, I always wonder what the hell was going through my head at the very beginning.  So, just in case the shit hits the fan and I'm rereading this while licking my wounds, here are my reservations:

1. We have different tastes.  I really enjoy art and movies and music and talking about grown up things.. That's not really something we can share.  His taste is respectable enough, but I think mine is a little less mainstream.  More than that, though, I really care about these things and he doesn't, or at least not as much and not in the same ways.

2. He might be too polite.  This is actually one of the things I really like about him, it's nice knowing that he'll call or email, even if we can't talk for long.  But I worry that his feelings will fade and he might be too passive to end things.  What if he just lets things dangle and I get all clingy and sad?

3. I can't tell if he inspires me.  I certainly respect him, times like a million. (Which is super-duper important!)  He's smart and dedicated and not at all lazy and his time management skills make me drool a little bit.  But as much as I like him, I can't tell how long this initial spark will last.  If he's missing that X-factor.... But is he? Right now I just feel so comfortable around him.  I like hanging out, it's nice and fun and wonderful to turn my brain off for a bit and just enjoy someone's company.  Is being comfortable around someone the X-factor?  Is this what I've been missing?  Or is it a bad sign that I'm not freaking out about trying to impress him all the time?  We've spent so much time getting to know each other, maybe I'm just moving past that stage quicker than usual.

~~~

Now this is awfully personal, but it's also something I've been thinking about a lot -- Marriage.  It's really disconcerting; I can practically hear my biological clock ticking.  And it's freaking me the hell out!  Maybe it's because I know so many people in serious relationships, either that are engaged or probably getting there soon.  Maybe it's because my Mom has made it fairly clear that she expects my to get married in the next five years, or at least that she'd be a little surprised if I didn't.  Maybe it's because I've been hearing so much talk about growing up that I'm starting to buy into it regardless of how I'm really feeling. 

In any case, I've probably spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about the long-term.  Is this the same relationship I'll be in in two months? Ten?  More?  I have no idea.  I can't tell him because this is premature by about a year and a half.  Why am I even worrying about these things?  It's just hard not to wonder where things are going.

 When I'm at school, I never watch TV.  I occasionally binge on the entirety of a TV show, like Arrested Development or The Sopranos, but only because I can watch them in marathon-form on my laptop.  Even now, after almost five months of being home, TV still seems strange to me.  Were commercials always this annoying?  I never really enjoyed them, but I don't remember hating them the way I do now.  I like to think this new intolerance results from me being more displaced from consumerism in my new adult life, but maybe it's just because torrenting spoiled me and I'm hella impatient.  (Note to self: wtf just happened to that sentence.  Must reassess grammar skills, pronto.)

I was going somewhere with this.... Oh yes.  Every night, when my parents get home, we watch the news together as a family.  Growing up, the news was always followed my Jeopardy, but recently my mom decided that the ABC nightly news is inferior to PBS's News Hour with Jim Lehrer.  So now we sit down, watch Diane Sawyer talk about current events for thirty minutes, then stick around for another hour of slightly more in-depth coverage of the same things.  If I had to pick one I'd go with PBS, but as it is I mostly zone out in the kitchen while the real grown ups get educated.

Elizabeth Edwards died today.  I was never a big fan of hers.  Not that I didn't like her or anything, I just wasn't really bothered one way or another.  But tonight, hearing the coverage of her death almost brought me to tears.  I don't even know why.  Maybe it was because of her kids, or how honest she was about fear and death and dying.  She was at once vulnerable and impervious.

At the end of the segment, they read a verse from Leonard Cohen's "Anthem" --

Ring the bells that still can ring,
Forget your perfect offering,
There is a crack in everything,
It's how the light gets in.

Things seem to have a lot of cracks these days, and it's comforting to think the cracks have their purpose, too.  Even if I can't see the light yet.

 ...but instead, I'm surfing the internet, looking at VEGAN BLOGS.

The first thing I noticed is that these vegans really can't get enough of their tofu.  Seriously.  They put it in cakes, pies, curries, eggless egg nog, and salads.  This puts a bit of a damper on my venture into vegan cooking because, well, I don't have any tofu.  Yeah, I could go into town and buy a gallon of it (what? it might come in gallons), but I'm semi-worried that would tip off the parents.  Why do I care? Because sometimes it is fun to feed people things without telling them they're eating something healthy.  And I like being sneaky, or something.  In any case, my pseudo-whole foods experiment is hush hush for now.

There are soooooo many recipes.  I really can't get enough.  My gmail inbox is already stuffed with links links and more links to everything I've been cooking so far, so I figured I should maybe post some stuff here and figure I'll get around to cooking it in a few months when I reread this post.  I really hope future-me is in Boston.... If not, then go to Boston, future-me! Stop being lame in Colorado, the state only looks awesome in tourism adverts.

jello thingy!
^ this one looks really yummy.  Mega-yummy.  Uber-yummy.  Ultra-nom.  Or maybe it just looks like it would be really fun to wiggle on a spoon.  In any case, I hope I remember to make it when fresh fruit is back in season.  Fourth of July, prepare to be giggly.

samosa
^ Blast!  Yet another beautiful picture of Food I Want To Eat, but once again it calls for tofu.  I tried googling "tofu substitute" but that just gave me a bunch more ways to use tofu.  I guess I'll have to pop by Walmart after all. (Part of me thinks it's hilarious that I have upwards of 50 pages of "healthy" & "organic" recipes open, yet I'll be cooking them with the evil corporate food I find at Wallyworld.)

green drank
^Sometimes, I read these recipes and learn something new.  I probably should have known what watercress was before, but I didn't.  Now I do, thanks to Wikipedia.  I know lots of important stuff, like the fact that this is one of the oldest vegetables known to human beings!  (gasp)  For some reason, I have this vision of prehistoric man chowing down on some watercress beside the masticated corpse of a wooly mammoth.  Those proto-vegans were real trail-blazers.


The melatonin is kicking in and I think I might be getting tired for realsies.  I have an eye appointment tomorrow, so I'l be getting up at the crack of five-hours-from-now.  Yahoo.  I think I might take a stab at that green drink thing, or just groggily pour scalding hot coffee all over myself.  One of the two.

 I'm watching a nova documentary on dreams.  What I find interesting is that there have been two segments on REM sleep so far -- the first talking about how REM is linked to heightened activity in the amygdala, the second about how REM encourages creativity.  So on the one hand, too much REM sleep will make you anxious and depressed.  On the other, it will make you creative.  Maybe this explains why so many artists are affected by mood disorders.  Personally, I've noticed that my own mood crises are always proceeded by sleep disturbances.  I just wish I could do more to emphasize the creativity angle.

Ugh I hate sentences.  They are so concrete, and practically never say what I want them to express.  Oh well.  Give it a few more months and hopefully I can write something without instantaneously hating it.

Maybe I'll sleep on it.

 I'm so sick of being downstairs when Dad comes home.  He walks in the door, wipes off his shoes, and somehow manages to insult me five times in three sentences.  I feel shitty enough being back here that I really don't need a third party to describe all the ways I'm falling short.

I want to go back to Boston.  I hate feeling homeless in the house I grew up in.

 Today, I cooked, baked, chopped, stirred, watched a movie, and cooked some more.  Oh, and there was also some knitting in there somewhere.

I just tried a cherry coke.... It tastes like a maraschino cherry vomited in my soda.

Durufle Requiem, part deux, tomorrow at 2 pm!  Be there or be doing something less sophisticated than listening to the gregorian genius of the mid 20th century.  Serious business, guys.

 Yeah, yeah, I haven't posted in forever. Well, fuck that. I just haven't been in a writing mood I guess.

I'm tempted to update this with all the recent developments boy-wise, but I really don't want to future-me to look at this journal and get pissed off at past-me for being naive and stupid. Maybe that's inevitable. Maybe that's what's fun about having a blog, you get to feel all superior to your previous self. Looking back over last year's entries, I hate that so many were dedicated to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. I can't decide which are more irritating, the post breakup entries or the ones from fall term that are sickeningly optimistic. But I guess that's how things go. Times change. Times have just changed an awful lot over the past year. More than usual.

Durango is boring. Most of my social life still exists back in Boston, just far enough away that I can't really impact anything but I still get to obsess over the little bits and pieces of info that drift my way. I feel like I should be making friends here, but it's hard and I'm lazy. It took me a good month to adjust back to the small-town conversational rhythms, and I still sound like a pretentious ass-wipe when I ask for directions or use phrases like "as a function of..." People here don't play Settlers of Catan, they don't care about Mandelbrat's Set, and they definitely don't want to hear that I'm under 21 and thus cannot participate in any of the so-called nightlife.

All bitching aside, I started taking dance lessons! Salsa and swing. I'm not very good yet, but it's a whole lot of fun. The instructor used to live in New York and she has a bunch of friends in the Boston area, so I'll probably look some of them up when I get back. I really hope this is something I'll keep doing.

Other recent hobbies include knitting, reading, picking up puppy shit, singing with the Durango Choral Society (same choir I went to Carnegie with, but now we're singing the Durufle Requiem), and cooking. Note to future-self: make that curry again, it was delicious!

Considering how much I love movies, you think I would have subscribed to Netflix way back when, but it turns out I only jumped on this bandwagon a couple of weeks ago. Best function ever: streaming. A *ton* of foreign films are available for streaming, which rocks. So even on the days I ditch French to hang out with the dogs and twiddle my thumbs on the couch, I can still practice reading and listening. Somehow I don't think the professor really approves of this strategy. Anyway, I like that I can watch all these crazy indie movies I'd never get to watch normally. And all those classics I've been meaning to get around to but haven't. Like Chariots of Fire (which made me feel very out of shape, yet simultaneously inspired), or Bonnie and Clyde (campy and so 60s it hurt a little bit).

'Tis but a fortnight until I will be back in Cambridge. Hopefully hanging out with all of you lovelies, if you can find time for me. Even if you can't, it'll be amazing just to breathe Massachusetts air for once. I'm totally going to fan-girl out, Boston style. Public garden, MFA, Isabella Stuart Gardner Museum, Berryline, and esplanading (what? it's a verb.)

Like, really really freaking out.


FUUUUUUCCCCCCCKKKKKK

It's been quite a while since I posted a legitimate blog.  You know, one that isn't just a smattering of sentences jumbled together, pretending to make sense.  I think I'm suffering from writer's block, or maybe just writer's guilt.  I mean, I don't have any right to be writing here on LJ when I should be finishing the OX for my HASS class, you know?

I received an email from the professor last week that really unnerved me.  I can't even say why it spooked me, I mean nothing was surprising.  Sometimes I wonder if I should just fail this class and get it over with.  It's so tempting -- no more stress, no more freaking out.  Until of course I actually have to take another HASS-D CI-H, at which point I'm back exactly where I started, except with another black eye on my transcript.

The only thing I've really accomplished this summer is.... well, having fun, I suppose.  And there's a lot to say for having fun.  I've never really done that before, at least not purposefully.  But for the past few weeks, I've managed to do so many awesome things.  I went to Six Flags and rode every single roller coaster, and bonded with an underclassman to boot. I went sailing on the Charles for the first time. I've seen two movies in theaters, Toy Story 3 and Inception (both were worth the price of admission, and more). I've been to parties and I'm finally starting to feel like I'm a part of some of the EC community.  I organized a dorm trip to the fetish fair fleamarket, and even got a $5 discount for all MIT students.  I've spent too much money going out with folks, but I've also made some of the most delicious home-cooked meals since coming to college.  I reread some Harry Potter, and am working my way through High Fidelity.  I've wandered around Boston (or at least taken a walk) more days than not.  I got a cool hair cut for cheap, and even bought makeup just for shits.  I've become a non-shitty beer ponger and I've even made a roomful of people laugh on more than one occasion.

I know I'll regret it if I fail that class... but at the same time, I'm feeling hyper-aware of the fact that I'm young and enjoying myself for the first time in quite a while.  On that note, I should probably start writing some more.  Wish me luck.