Monday, January 25, 2010

I guess that's why they call it the blues...

I am a college student, and as such, I admit to spending the occasional weekend night drinking with friends.  Not generally in excess, and not in any situation that would be considered less than ideal.  Any family reading this, do not be alarmed!  Now that I've made that disclaimer..

Last night I got fairly well smashed.  I decided that I would stop worrying about everything on my mind and just try and be young, have a good time.  I suppose keeping track of how much alcohol I actually drank was one of the things I stopped worrying about.  This little experiment in adolescence led to a good half an hour of loudly exclaimed drunken wisdom, conducting conversations from a horizontal position significantly lower to the ground than my conversations generally tend to be.  My friends were wonderful sports about it (possibly because I have had conversations with many of them from similar angles when they overindulged) and they let me say my peace about every topic from the recent election in Massachusetts to the myriad reasons that Pocahontas is the most inspiring of the Disney princesses.  As I sobered, this progressed to some measure of confusion as to why I was on the floor, and complete disbelief when I was informed that, yes, I had been on the floor for twenty minutes.  And while I was on the floor, completely blocking the path to the restroom, other guests of our small party had been forced to go next door to my apartment to use mine.  All in all, an embarassing night.  My friends must be such wonderful people to deal with me.  One friend was especially splendid, and obliged when I begged "Don't leave until the room stops spinning! I can't face the spinning alone.  It's just too much."  To that friend, whose name I shall keep to myself due to the fact that I've clearly said we were drinking, thank you very much for holding my hand until the spinning stopped.  You are, as usual, my hero.

On a more pleasant and altogether less embarassing front, PianoMike seems to be on board with the idea of starting a band.  We went to the Curry Student Center today and played around with the grand piano for a while.  He played "I, Giorni", a composition by Ludovico Einaudi, so beautifully!  That song makes me cry when I play the CD, but hearing it live was much better.  He did a lovely job.  We did a little bit of Simon and Garfunkel, and decided that this week we're going to set about learning some songs.  And, eventually, find other musicians to play with.  Or perhaps that should come first?  Well, either way, we're moving forward with this idea.  I had the strangest sense of something exciting beginning today when he was playing.  Maybe devoting some time to making music will be good for both of us. I know I've missed singing fiercely.  I've also been very suddenly interested in art again.  I've been drawing on every available surface, and itching to get my paints out.  I'm not really an artist, but I do enjoy it.  It is as though every painting I haven't done, every song I haven't sung, every poem I haven't written over the past year is just clawing its way out of me.  I'm pretty excited about it.  I was once pretty creative. I think I will be again.  One night last week, I opened my window and it smelled like spring.  I think that's a good sign.


"Someday out of the blue, maybe years from now, or tomorrow night, I'll turn and I'll see you.  As if we always knew, someday we would live again, someday soon."
-Elton John, "Someday Out of the Blue"

Saturday, January 23, 2010

Monday you can fall apart. Tuesday, Wednesday break my heart. Thursday doesn't even start...

Had a party at the apartment last night.  Lots of fantastic pictures for Facebook, not a single one of which is "taggable" (we're clearly drunk in all of them, we can't tag them). 

We started out with Kayleigh making cheesesteaks for everyone (well, almost).  Then we started the festivities.  Kayleigh invited Lucas, aka Train Guy, to the party, and we all liked him I think.  It felt like he fit in well, which is nice.  Love having new additions :)  Later, we had a MUCH more random addition, which is I believe the funniest part of the evening.

So I was downstairs having gotten into some sort of footrace with either Anna or Rich or Sam.  I know, I know.  Keep the party contained.  But sometimes, a girl's gotta run.  So I'm in the lobby, not really minding my business, when a freshman wanders in claiming to be looking for "Rachel" in ###.  Now, ### shares the same door as my building but it's got a different set of stairs.  We were intrigued by the coincidence. So then, instead of letting this kid go on his merry way, several of us engage him in conversation, and he decides we seem like more fun than the party he was on his way to (or perhaps he never was on the way to another party, and heard my name to try and weasel his way into ours...and it worked).  So to keep everyone from continuing to shout at this poor kid in the hallway, I bring him to our humble abode.  I gave him the tour, refused to give him alcohol, and allowed him to hang out with us for a while. Then, this kid gets cocky, for reasons we don't really understand. We had essentially been harassing him from the moment we met him in the hallway, and yet, the cocky.  So at some point, after he declared that he was more than capable of hooking up with Bridget (a statement which nearly got him knocked out by Bridget I'm sure, and she could do it), and informing us that he'd been kicked out of the last party he was at because he got in a fight, I decided things had gone on long enough, and I forcibly removed him from my apartment, in my oh-so-subtle drunken Rachel way.  After briefly making sure he hadn't taken anything (though we obviously hadn't let him out of our sight the whole time).  Then, he bolted with the tequila (which I hadn't been letting him drink anyway).  So two of the guys have to chase him down.  When they caught up to him, he tossed them the tequila and bolted :)  So much for his bravado and self-proclaimed muscular prowess.  It was like living an episode of the Jersey Shore. "DonJohnson" (not his real name, rather the name we gave him), wherever you are, you're not invited to future parties.  But it was nice to know you.

 And now for something completely different...

Mikey and I are going to start a cover band (which hopefully will progress into a regular one?) Yes, it was just a drunken idea, but I think that we've got talent that's just sitting here.  And I think we have fairly similar taste, and have the same ideas about the kinds of things that should be covered.  And...AND...he just got into Joni.  In other words, this is gonna kick ass.

So yeah.  That was Friday night.  Then I had a wonderful Saturday morning, had french toast with Katidid and Mimsy for lunch, and sat around writing on my blog for a little while.  Later tonight, kidsitting.  Later later, probably some more questionable life choices.  I do love college.

<3 Rach

"I wonder what it's like to be the Rain Maker.  I wonder what it's like to know that I made the rain.  I'd store it in boxes with little yellow tags on every one.  You can come and see them when I'm done.  When I'm done..."
-"Real World", Matchbox Twenty

Monday, January 18, 2010

Happy Tuesday

Sitting at home, listening to Rich's radio show (Stormin(g) the Castle, on WRBB our campus radio station).  PSAs right now.  It's kind of weird, but I love public service announcements.  They're the weirdest of all commercials and usually they're not telling you to buy something. I mean, that PSA for the Make-a-Wish foundation, where a little boy with a terminal illness gets to be a batboy for his favorite pro baseball team, makes me all weepy. Rich is being ridiculous :)  And I've decided that, while some of the metal just makes my ears shut off and I tune it out, most of it is pretty awesome.  I just wanna get up and flail around the room.  Only I don't do that because I might hurt myself or others.

Tomorrow I have what is only my third day of classes. I love having five days off per week, but I secretly wish I had full-time school again.  I absolutely love school.  I think that the primary reason I hated being on co-op was not getting to be in class in the fall.  September is my favorite month because of the weather (crisp but still comfortable, and still colorful) and because of the gorgeous back-to-school atmosphere. Buying notebooks and textbooks, rearranging your sleep schedule to fit your courseload, meeting new and old friends in classes, meeting new professors, exploring new subjects, reading new books, learning new things, classroom discussions, writing papers, doing homework, all of the things my college friends probably think I hate.  They are the things I love most.  I had so much fun doing my homework today, you have no idea.  I was required to write a one-paragraph response to A Midsummer Night's Dream and I ended up analyzing the whole play (it IS my favorite).

Today's summary.  Woke up, had an absolutely lovely morning and didn't get up early, did laundry with Emma (disaster, I smacked the dryer because it didn't take her money--sometimes that helps it just sort of notice you're feeding it--and it shut itself off--as if to say "I don't need to take this kind of abuse from you") in the afternoon.  At two thirty, Anna, Emma, Bridget and I went to lunch with Kate, Dan's girlfriend.  Dan is in Cuba :( for the semester, which sucks, but Kate is awesome so we decided that we'd try to hang out with her whether he's in town or not.  Then back to my apartment, where I fell asleep for a few hours instead of going to anna's.  Made tea for Kayleigh and I (love love love my "tension tamer" tea).  Did my homework (my awesome, awesome homework).   Looked at my other blog, Great and Fearsome, cowritten by Peri (greatnfearsome.blogspot.com) and tried to think of some things to write on there.  I'm "Great" and she's "Fearsome".  Didn't feel inspired today, didn't want to push.  We're using it to write a book about the team.  For more info, click on over there.

So yes. Back to school again tomorrow.  Hopefully punctually, because Professor Goshgarian is not impressed thusfar with my lateness (he's my 8am and my 9:50am class).  Alright.  Twenty minutes until the end of Stormin(g) the Castle, and I'm going to try to become sleepy in that time. 

Goodnight, sleep sweet!

"I swear to God I'm going to pistolwhip the next guy that says 'shenanigans."
-from SuperTroopers (2001)

11:11 p.m.

I was remembering the way, when you first went away and I would call you at school (big impressive freshman that you were), you always reminded me that it was 11:11pm when it came around. You would sit quietly and wait while, for the full sixty seconds, I made my daily wish (always for you). I was struck tonight by the care in that simple act. You were so good at loving me. I am getting over you, it's happening, but I think that for the rest of my life I'll love you when I remember that. Every now and then, at eleven eleven, I'll love you for one full minute, as much as I ever did. I know that's not what you want, but it is going to have to be enough. Tonight, at 11:11, I wished that you would find a girl that makes you happier than I could. If you are half as good at loving her as you were at loving me, she'll be the happiest girl in the world.

Monday, January 4, 2010

A Poem for Sarah's Ophelia Project

Ophelia was crazy.
I think that sits at the back of all of our minds.
While we read Dickinson, Sappho, Woolf, and George Sands,
While we wax philosophical about
Hamlet getting her down (drowned),
We all, learned women that we are,
must know underneath it all
that she was nuts.

I wonder, then
why our fascination with her?
Why we, who say “Well,
of course I would never let a man treat me
like that,”
find her so captivating?

My baby brother would say that we are all in love with her.

In love with Ophelia, there’s a thought.
Are we all fixated on Ophelia,
her beautiful name,
her often depicted
(and where do we get this idea?)
long, flowing, wavy hair,
such a delicate flower that
one man could crush her with his words?
Do we want her?
Or are we all so
strong
that we are drawn in by her
weakness?
By her daintiness?
By her foolish willingness
to pin all of her hopes on
one bad boy,
not caring that he may never
leave his mother and commit?

Do we all wish to be that weak?
Is weakness, as we tell ourselves
the thing that brought down Ophelia?
Did she drown in it?
Did someone else break her because she was so
weak.
small.
powerless.
female.
?

I think not.
I think, if you read Hamlet one more time,
you’ll find that she drowns herself.
I think, if you read Hamlet just one more time,
you’ll find that she
stood her ground.
Even though it sunk her in the weeds.
Even though she
behaved very much like
the crackhead outside the gas station.
I think, if you read Hamlet one more time,
you’ll find that she
impresses us with her strength.
And we all fear her.
We are terrified.
We do not fear weakness, we who have none.
We fear our own strength.
We fear being the last one standing
for a cause that means to kill us.
We fear what Ophelia should have feared.

But then, she was nuts.