Tuesday, May 25, 2010
My Pretty Universe
“well, Samuel rode lightly on top of a book and he balanced happily among ideas the way a man rides white rapids in a canoe. But Tom got into a book, crawled and groveled between the covers, tunneled like a mole among the thoughts, and came up with the book all over his face and hands” pg.280
I want to write to you of my adventures in Milano. But life here seems so natural that I have a hard time putting it onto the page. I think that I should write every moment of it, I want to tell you of the three gypsy women I’ve become acquainted with, of the sweet smell of the streets, of the cat calls from male passersbys. I want to explain everything but everything seems like so much. I went to my first go-see yesterday. If you haven’t watched America ’s Next Top Model or have not yourself been immersed into this unique culture then I will tell you that a ‘go-see’ is a casting for a modeling job. Sometimes they are closed which means there are requirements such as only blondes or only Russians. The clients, people deciding if you are right for their advertisement, look through your book of photos and perhaps if they like you, then they will have you walk across the room. Then you go on your merry way and they decide if out of the one -hundred and fifty girls that showed this day if you are a fit. I had three of these yesterday and they were each placed all over the city of Milano . I can’t think of a better way to leisurely spend a day. Hopping on the metro to the other side of the city and then taking the tram for the rest of the way. Something about Milano makes your heart feel whole. I worry that everything is so wonderful, something must go wrong. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote of this, that there is a balance in the world of the good and bad. But I won’t bubble wrap myself in the mean time. Today as I was waiting with two of my friends at another go-see, one of the girls made a comment I adore and yet hear the cling of cliché, still-they are repeated for a reason...maturity is not the number of years in your life, but the life in your years. I want so much life in my years that the days are overflowing with feeling and stories to tell. I think Milano shall make for an excellent setting these next two months.
"...now I remembered that the world was wide, and that a varied field of hopes and fears, of sensations and excitements, awaited those who had courage to go forth into its expanse, to seek real knowledge of life amidst its perils."
-Jane Eyre
I read this today and loved it, so I thought I’d take the time to type it out for you. Perhaps read the book? It will most certainly reroute your neurons.
East of Eden, excerpt:
[the two characters have been discussing the Bible story of Cain and Able]
[the two characters have been discussing the Bible story of Cain and Able]
I think it is the symbol story of the human soul. I’m feeling my way now-don’t jump on me if I’m not clear. The greatest terror a child can have is that he is not loved, and rejection is the hell he fears. I think everyone in the world to a large or small extent has felt rejection. And with rejection comes anger, and with anger some kind of crime in revenge for the rejection, and with the crime guilt-and there is the story of mankind. I think that if rejection could be amputated, the human would not be what he is. Maybe there would be fewer crazy people. I am sure in myself there would not be many jails. It is all there-the start, the beginning. One child, refused the love he craves, kicks the cat and hides his secret guilt; and another steals so that money will make him loved; and a third conquers the world-and always the guilt and revenge and more guilt. The human is the only guilty animal.
...
Samuel had leaned his elbows on the table and his hands covered his eyes and his forehead. “I want to think,” he said. “Damn you, I want to think. I’ll want to take this off alone where I can kick it apart and see. Maybe you’ve tumbled a world for me. And I don’t know what I can build in my world’s place.”
Lee said softly, “Couldn’t a world be built around accepted truth? Couldn’t some pains and insanities be rooted out if the causes were known?”
“I don’t know, damn you. You’ve just disturbed my pretty universe. You’ve taken a contentious game and made an answer of it. Let me alone-let me think”
-John Steinbeck
Sunday, May 23, 2010
oops
The music enchanted the air. It was like the south wind, like a warm night, like swelling sails beneath the stars, completely and utterly unreal… It made everything spacious and colourful, the dark stream of life seemed pulsing in it; there were no burdens any more, no limits; there existed only glory and melody
-Erich Maria Remarque
some falls are just much more fun.
"Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new."
-Albert E.
Saturday, May 22, 2010
La Beneamata
Get a little crazy. the square in front of Milan's Duomo was sprawling with fans decked out in black and blue stripes. The metro station is bursting with song and blow horn announcing their loyalities. Their team is going against Bayern Munich for the UEFA Champion league final. Excitement is in the air and Im breathing it in deep.
Tu per noi puoi vincere
E poi puoi anche perdere
Tanto siamo sempre con te
E il nostro canto
che dovunque sarai
Nell'aria sentirai
Neroblu' il colore per cui cantiamo
Nero blu
Dai forza Inter dai nero blu
Noi siamo qui con te
E forza Inter, Inter Ale'
E poi puoi anche perdere
Tanto siamo sempre con te
E il nostro canto
che dovunque sarai
Nell'aria sentirai
Neroblu' il colore per cui cantiamo
Nero blu
Dai forza Inter dai nero blu
Noi siamo qui con te
E forza Inter, Inter Ale'
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
don't rely on someone else for your happiness and self worth. only you can be responsible for that. if you can't love and respect yourself - no one else will be able to make that happen. accept who you are completely; the good and the bad, and make changes as you see fit - not because you think someone else wants you to be different.
-stacey charter
Fade
Memories, even your most precious ones, fade surprisingly quickly. But I don’t go along with that. The memories I value most, I don’t ever see them fading.
-Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro
If only there could be an invention that bottled up a memory, like scent. And it never faded, and it never got stale. And then, when one wanted it, the bottle could be uncorked, and it would be like having the moment all over again.
-Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
Monday, May 17, 2010
Aliens
"Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square hole. The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do."
-Apple
Once upon a time there was a boy who loved a girl, and her laughter was a question he wanted to spend his whole life answering.
-The History of Love, Nicole Krauss
Was love then like a bag of assorted sweets passed around from which one might choose more than once? Some might sting the tongue,some invoke night perfume. Some had centers as bitter as gall, some blended honey and poison, some were quickly swallowed. And among the common bull’s-eyes and peppermints a few rare ones; one or two with deadly needles at the heart, another that brought clam
and gentle pleasure. Were his fingers closing on that one?
-The Shipping News, Annie Proulx
.
I will not wait to love as best as I can. We thought we were young
and that there would be time to love well sometime in the future.
This is a terrible way to think. It is no way to live, to wait to love.
What Is The What, Dave Eggers
.
.
"A wise girl kisses but doesn't love, listens but doesn't believe,
and leaves before she is left."
-Marilyn Monroe
.
.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
spontaneity
i have these dreadful spells of ridiculousness. i'm not sure where they come from, i'm not sure if they're motivated by my heart's desires or if they're fantastical ideas i've stirred up- that my heart elects for their eccentricity. Usually it involves some drastic action. I want to dive into a pool of water with my old prom dress on, I want to run barefoot down the streets of my city and fall into the tall grass just beyond the side walks, I want to dial a number I've deleted, I want to jump from a height that is much too high. I want to be invincible, I want thrill and I want my heart to pump with feelings of an adrenaline rush. Most times I sit and breathe deeply. Most times I hold myself back and watch helplessly as the desire passes.
As I'm sitting here now, typing, I can feel the desires creeping into my skin. It's like deterring water from building in a bathtub with the faucet turned up high. It's basically impossible. It's funny too, because I go through waves of the strengths of these desires, tonight is a medium grade but I've felt them each day this past week and the water is rising. Perhaps this comes from sitting still too much. I think a change of scenery will do me good. But for tonight, perhaps I'll step out onto the streets of the Queen city and let the wind rush through my hair, and breathe the night air in the depths of my lungs; while my bare feet race the beats of my heart.
As I'm sitting here now, typing, I can feel the desires creeping into my skin. It's like deterring water from building in a bathtub with the faucet turned up high. It's basically impossible. It's funny too, because I go through waves of the strengths of these desires, tonight is a medium grade but I've felt them each day this past week and the water is rising. Perhaps this comes from sitting still too much. I think a change of scenery will do me good. But for tonight, perhaps I'll step out onto the streets of the Queen city and let the wind rush through my hair, and breathe the night air in the depths of my lungs; while my bare feet race the beats of my heart.
"There are things you do sometimes, actions that you take by obeying sudden impulses, without stopping for even a fraction of a second to think, and then you spend the rest of your life either lamenting it or thanking yourself for it. They are rare, unique, and perfect moments."
— Irene Gonzalez Frei
Friday, May 14, 2010
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Gosh, I haven't written about anything substantial in decades. I've been borrowing notes from the great ones.My days have been filled with endless movie scenes and moments spent unwrapping peppermint paddies. I watched Gangs of New York and was tres proud of my heritage. Cameron Diaz was stunning...and Leonardo, well my crush from fourth grade only grew stronger. When the adventures come I'll be sure to fill the screen with all of the details. Until then, I'll just continue displaying the things that inspire me.
“What is the meaning of life?…The great revelation never does come.
Instead there are daily miracles, illuminations, matches
that strike unexpectedly in the dark.”
To the Lighthouse
.
Sometimes we get through adversity only by imagining what the world might
be like if our dreams should ever come true.
be like if our dreams should ever come true.
Memoirs of a Geisha, Arthur Golden
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
CPR please
JULIET
Give me my sin again.
Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,ROMEO
Which mannerly devotion shows in this;
For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.
Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?JULIET
Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.ROMEO
O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do;JULIET
They pray, grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.
Saints do not move, though grant for prayers' sake.ROMEO
Then move not, while my prayer's effect I take.JULIET
Thus from my lips, by yours, my sin is purged.
Then have my lips the sin that they have took.ROMEO Sin from thy lips? O trespass sweetly urged!
Give me my sin again.
the best kisses
Monday, May 10, 2010
Lit. it inspires
Never love a wild thing…you can’t give your heart to a wild thing:
the more you do, the stronger they get. Until they’re strong enough to run into the woods.
Or fly into a tree. Then a taller tree. Then the sky. That’s how you’ll end up…
If you let yourself love a wild thing. You’ll end up looking at the sky.
Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Truman Capote
.
.
If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy,
the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.
Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis
.
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I moved my arms through the water, feeling them float on the surface,
watching the waves and wake that followed my gesture. Here was magic, I thought.
Here was something holy.
The Red Tent, Anita Diamant
.
.
The world will give you that once in awhile, a brief timeout; the boxing
bell rings and you go to your corner, where somebody dabs mercy on your beat-up life.
The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd
.
.
I wished she’d never stop squeezing me. I wished I could spend the rest
of my life as a child, being slightly crushed by someone who loved me.
Ella Enchanted, Gail Carson Levine
.
.
The girl in the mirror caught my eye briefly…It is an uncanny feeling, that rare
occasion when one catches a glimpse of oneself in repose.
An unguarded moment, stripped of artifice, when one forgets to fool even oneself.
The House at Riverton, Kate Morton
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