Simply Malika

poem

2010-01-12T22:25:00.001-08:00

blessing the boats
by Lucille Clifton

(at St. Mary's) may the tide that is entering even now the lip of our understanding carry you out beyond the face of fear may you kiss the wind then turn from it certain that it will love your back may you open your eyes to water water waving forever and may you in your innocence sail through this to that

things that continue to evade me

2009-06-12T14:44:00.001-07:00

1. A wash and wear hairstyle. Simple enough right? Wrong. I got so close with this product called Kinky-Kurly, which apparently is like gold on the black hair care index. After months of trying to find the product, I used it and was horribly disappointed. After doing some research I found about ten videos on you-tube explaining how to apply the product. I will try again when I'm feeling ambitious.
2. Google. I don't think I will ever be able to use the available tools to completely maximize my day to day efficiency and achieve complete and total organization. So frustrating
3. Time management. I thought for sure I'd get it together after high school, but it looks like this is going to be a life long pursuit.

Public Service Announcement

2009-02-12T21:28:00.001-08:00

There is an issue that I feel very strongly about that I have avoided talking about here. On more than one occasion I have stopped myself from writing about this unpleasant topic for fear of sounding too preachy or weird.

Finally I am speaking out about flossing.

Yes, flossing with dental floss.

A friend of mine took up the cause on her own blog, and now I feel inspired to share my story.

Flossing is incredible. I started flossing my teeth regularly about 4 years ago, and let me just say, I'm never going back to brushing alone. Why didn't I always floss you ask. I hated the shame of answering "sometimes" when the dental hygienist inquired about my oral upkeep twice a year, but let's face it, flossing can be painful, and inconvenient. But all that changed with a little discipline and the right technique. Once I committed to flossing every day I started to like it, because it actually feels good. Really it does. My teeth feel much cleaner from day to day, and I can leave the dentist's chair guilt free. Even if I fall asleep on my couch, at 2am, and I'm already in my pjs, I get up and I floss before I get into bed, because it improves the quality of my life that much. Now that I'm a changed woman, waking up with unflossed teeth is just discusting and completlye uneccesary.

For those who are of a spiritual persuasion, flossing has been a parable in my life. When I wanted to get in shape I dreaded exercising every day, but I remembered my first few weeks of flossing, and the transformation it brought, and was able to press on. When I say this out loud to people they think I'm kind of ridiculous. No one says it to my face, but I get a kind of awkward chuckle. So I've stopped referencing this part of who I am. Maybe I am ridiculous. But I am also completely serious. Flossing works.

A strange account of the last 20 months

2009-01-29T21:48:00.001-08:00

A year and a half ago my friend introduced me to explodingdog.com. This artist, Sam Brown, draws pictures of titles that people send him and posts them online. I can imainge Sam Brown sifting through his inbox every morning, scrolling, scrolling, looking for inspiration. He receives hundreds of titles a day, so I was pretty amazed that the first one I sent, "here I am being patient" was selected. The high was unbelievable. I'm lying. It was definitely believable, but very exciting nonetheless. I sent another one a few days later, and nothing. Since that day I have been sending titles to Sam Brown whenever the fancy strikes. When something small happens that I just don't think anyone else would care about. Or when I'm overcome with girlish angst. Sigh. Girlish angst.
So here are the titles dating back to June 2007, that were not good enough for Sam Brown, but are good enough for my blog. Because I control the content here.

how about rolling on the floor?‎

will you draw something pretty for me so i can feel special

I am a seagull‎

sometimes I just stare at the computer screen

pick this one‎

please send me a message‎

i waited for you‎

please talk to me‎

my stomach drops 3 floors when i think of you

if only he knew‎

I met a boy‎

ask me out damn it!‎

hair, I miss you!‎

will anything be the same?‎

you are full of grace and gumption‎

i might implode‎

can you draw a prophetic picture about what will happen in my life in the next 4 months?‎

free night stand...free one night stand‎

i'm falling into my desk

my gums are starting to hurt

my boss gave me a piece of the berlin wall

you will no longer be in my world

how will i find him?

it's freakin cold in here

sometimes I can't even feel my hand on the mouse

why doesn't he see me?

a small part of me dies every Monday

is this really my job?

my desk is a boat sometimes

i guess i'm too sensitive

today is almost my birthday

here I am being patient

Happy Birthday Jesus

2008-12-24T09:30:00.001-08:00

I took this photo of a building detail when I was in Prague

This morning I woke up in my old roommate's bed surrounded by all of my stuff (I just finished painting my bedroom, so I moved everything to her's, and was too tired to move it back last night). Back in November I had hopes of celebrating the advent season and counting down the days until Christmas, but here I am on December 24th, and the whole month has been a whirlwind. So instead of greatly anticipating the arrival of Christmas, I have stumbled upon it.

I read Luke 1 and 2 under the covers. I forgot how amazing that story is. There are like four angel visitations--if you're not familiar with the Bible, that's a big deal, for there to be four visitations in two chapters. I think if the story was updated, and set in California, Mary and Joseph would have been relegated to a parking garage in a town between Bakersfield and Fresno, and the newborn Jesus would be wrapped in newspaper and lying in a cardboard box. Instead of shepherds, potbellied truckers (who hadn't showered in days, and smelled like cigarette smoke) taking a break at a rest stop off of highway 5 would have been visited by the angelic hosts, and would make their way in a caravan of big rigs to the Motel 5 parking lot where the baby was.

Today will be a busy day of buying last minute gifts, wrapping presents, writing cards, and cooking things (okay, just one thing, I only have to cook one thing, but still). I wish I had meditated on the magnitude of Christmas for weeks, but I didn't, so I will think about it today as I go about my business, and remember that God is good, and merciful, and sometimes we wait for things and sometimes they are given to us unexpectedly.

Merry Christmas!

Gratitude

2008-11-26T16:10:00.001-08:00

Moleskine ... the legendary notebook of Van Gogh, Chatwin, Hemingway, Matisse and Céline~
Originally uploaded by Tja'Sha ♥

Simple things: wearing pajamas until 3pm on a rainy day, cuteness (found in puppies, children, romantic comedies, etc), google--they're so practical!, waking up without an alarm clock, sundays, harry potter, laughing out loud at dvds I've seen so many times, chocolate, hot showers, baked goods, comfy coffee shop seating, the internet, my camr (the y was stolen some time ago), facebook, moleskin journals, yoga, music, having a great line of text in a scene (i.e. "i thought it looked like you were sitting in her car, in the front seat of her car...making out")

conceptual things: grace, love, freedom, joy, reciprocation, art, discovery, play

family: mom, dad, azizi, sanai, ileia, home, people who will always have me over for dinner, the feeling of completeness when we're all in the same room, the financial decisions and sacrifices I will never fully comprehend, people who will always see my shows, reconciliation and forgiveness, band of nigerian children and adults speaking in yourba and showing up in vans, aunts who won't drive on the freeway, uncles who make gumbo or play the bass

friends: activity buddies, people to call just to say hi, people to visit, people who i call when I'm balling and need someone to pray with, people who share their lives with me, people who are there every day, and people who make phone dates to catch up, people who know that I'm talking about a boy because I say "I'm doing good" in a certain way, people who tell me when I'm being ridiculous

mentors: those i look up to, people who look at me and see things that aren't there yet, people who speak into my life, people who give me their time for little in return, people who are invested in my emotional/spiritual/artistic growth, people who ask hard questions, people who have perspective, people who are perceptive, people who follow up about things that happened a while ago, people who are watching my trajectory

10 things that have crossed my mind today

2008-10-19T14:01:00.001-07:00

1. Disaster and strife. Did you know that in less than four weeks Haiti--the poorest country in the western hemisphere-- was bit four huricanes!? That's crazy. Why isn't this in the news at all? Hundreds of people have died and who is noticing?

2. Faith and politics

3. Doughnuts at Frittelli's

4. Seasons. Not like summer and winter, but life seasons: post college, grad school, engagement, waiting, refining, etc. Some are circumstantial and others are emotional. I think I'm in a season of developing courage (for what, I'm not sure yet).

5. My nieces. I love them :)

6. Eye contact. I have to make a lot of eye contact with my classmates throughout the day in various acting exercises. It's fascinating, and completely unnatural to look into somebody's eyes for more than a few seconds. Someone once pointed out to me that when you look into person's eyes, you can only look at one eye at a time. Isn't that funny?

7. Cleopatra was a complicated woman according to Shakespeare.

8. Harry Potter IV will be in my possession very soon.

9. Changing the nail polish on my toes.

10. I relish Sunday when it's here, and remember it fondly when it's gone. Fortunately it comes back again every week.

still

2008-10-04T19:58:00.001-07:00

still
Originally uploaded by JSDouble

love the hair :)
you go girl!

the time before bed

2008-10-01T23:43:00.001-07:00

In an effort to create more ritual/structure in my day I recently created a play list called "before bed". It's 59.9 minutes long. By the time it ends I need to be (you guessed it!) in bed. This is what happens after I press play:

-check my e-mail, delete a few things, archive a few others.
-facebook
-make lunch for tomorrow (if I'm on top of things)
-take out contacts, floss, brush teeth, wash face, moisturize (always in that order)
-scan New York Times headlines online
-check "sites that I frequent" and "blogs that I read" (see column to the right)
-look at to-do list, ask "did I do any of these things today?"
-think of something I did do, add it to the list, then check it off
-facebook
-stare at the wall
-plan course of action for the morning-- a) go to the gym b) do more reading for school or c)take it easy before class
-archive a few more e-mails
-unsubscribe from a newsletter
-tidy up the room
-set the alarm clock
-turn out the lights

I want to do this

2008-09-29T23:35:00.001-07:00

Someday I will have a postmodern dance party. Phillip Glass and Sufjan Stevens will be represented.

babysitting

2008-09-25T23:22:00.001-07:00

I babysat two lovely girls tonight. Unfortunately the timing of the evening limited me to only 30 minutes of awake time with them. Right before the bed time stories I said "Once I start the story it's going to be time to rest your bodies, so if you want to jump up and down and get all of your energy out, this is your last chance. Do you need to jump up and down?" I thought this was a great idea. Megan looked at me and said "No. It's not good to do a lot of moving around after we brush our teeth, because we have to wind down". She's five. And very sensible.

I want to jump up and down, and writhe, and sway, and rumble. Now that I spend a significant portion of me week behaving in this manner I want to do it all the time. My composition is changing. Things seem to always be at the surface. Bubbling. Restlessness, joy, anxiety, whatever, it's right there. The nice thing is that they pass quickly. Like sneezes--big events that come and go.

presence

2008-09-21T14:08:00.000-07:00

Right now I am in my comfy sweats sitting on an ikea loveseat in my bedroom. But I am also taking the photo to the left...at the Plitvice Lakes in Croatia. At any moment I am everywhere I've ever been and where I am now.

I've been thinking about time lately. I'm not omnipresent like my maker, but I think as humans we aren't as bound to time as we think. In the literal sense yes--I'm not planning on time traveling any time soon*, but I'm learning that memory is truly amazing. There is such a thing as living in the past. No one wants to do that, or to be known that way. I'm thinking of something different, because it's just as dangerous to cut yourself off completely from the past too right? I think there is a way of being present, in the current reality, and also being open to the possibility of anything that happened previously.

I'm not sure if any of that makes sense. Alas, the metaphysical muse has left me.

*A note on time travel. If you ever do have the opportunity, don't take it. Every science fiction movie I've ever seen tells me that nothing positive come from moving unnaturally along the time space continuum. Why is it that people always think they can rearrange the past to impact the future? Did you see the movie Frequency? It's not supposed to be a scary movie, but it freaked me out. Aside from the creepy music, the son talking to his dead father 30 years in the past through the broken radio was terrifying! Makes me anxious just thinking about it...

these days...

2008-09-14T18:40:00.000-07:00

I am no longer in croatia. I've been back in South LA for a month now. What has been going on in my life since then you ask? SO MUCH! For example...I've moved into a new apartment, started grad school, purchased a road bike with a mirror and a basket and a bell, and done many other exciting things. Okay, not really anything else, but the bike is pretty awesome :)

Here are some highlights of my life as as student

-I spend 8 hours a day with 8 fabulous fellow thespians.

-I'm required to wear comfy clothes for all of my classes.

-There are a lot of movement based classes, which are very athletic. To the untrained eye our classes look like crazy people rolling around on the floor. It's actually much more sophisticated than that, but if I explained why I'd have to kill you.

-I get to check out books from the library for the entire semester.

Korčula

2008-08-10T05:21:00.001-07:00

It baffles me that a week from today I will be back in South LA getting ready to start school...

Right now I'm in Korčula, which is a small island off the Dalmatian coast. It's heavenly. Marco Polo was from Korcula. This morning my cousins and I ate breakfast quickly and staked out a spot on the beach. The beaches here are very narrow and rocky, but the water is awesome. I swam in the Adriatic sea two days in a row!

The climate is hot with a breeze and the terrain is pretty dry (imagine Catalina). There isn't much to do here except go to the beach, eat dinner and have ice cream. It's a nice change of pace for all of us. In general all over Croatia the pace is very slow. We figured out that if we want to eat dinner around 8 we have to get a table by 6. Most people pass the time by chain smoking. We've all considered taking it up just while we're here...

It turns out that Croatia has way more in common with Italy than with any of the Slavik countries we've visited. Excluding the language, everything is mediterranean. I've had ristotto, pizza, and a calzone. The seafood is delicious too.

Today a ginormous, Wall E sized cruise shipped docked in the Bay and 3000 British tourists poured out into row boats and descended upon the island. Prior to that most of the tourists were French and Italian.

In an hour we will take a bus to Dubrovnik, and then a plane to Vienna, and then home!

croatia

2008-08-08T02:52:00.001-07:00

We´re killing some time at in internet cafe in Split before heading to Kortula.

Croatia has been surprisingly beautiful and textured so far. Textured, that´s a loaded word isn't it? The people are the friendliest here. Even a postal worker made small talk with me. Of all the places we've visited so far, this is the most recently war torn. Driving across the country from one tourist destination to the next we encountered the Croatian country side where there are abandoned cement bunkers every half mile or so. The houses that people do live in are not much better. The hill sides were all dominated by the same simple brick design. The landscape is dry and rocky for the most part. A few times I thought I was in Bakersfield or Hemet. I could have been.

The music playing on the bus was a combination of Croatian folk music, motown hits and soft rock from the late 80s and early 90s. Most notably we heard James Brown's ˝sex machine˝ . What a crazy place.

hostels

2008-08-03T23:52:00.001-07:00

One of the joys of traveling around on a budget is the opportunity to stay in hostels. I think hostels are great. They provide modest accommodations--bed, shower, some kind of kitchen area, and a common room--at a very reasonable price. They also foster this kind of community of travelers. You get to meet people from all over the world (usually the U.S., Ireland or Scandinavia in our experience this time) and have a place to call home for a day or two while you happen to be in that city.

The above is true for every hostel we've stayed in so far. Except for the Absolute. The Absolute Hostel in Budapest was absolutely not a real hostel. Perhaps we should have suspected from it's alcohol namesake. Actually, Sherrie got a warning a week before the trip that this Hostel was kicked off of the reliable traveling site, hostels.com because it's owners were posting fake reviews. We were cautioned to stay there at our own risk, but it was too late to make new arrangements since everywhere else in the area was already booked. So we went for it.

This hostel is the stuff that traveling horror films are made of.

We arrived around 11am--a pretty standard time to arrive. The taxi took us from the train station to our supposed hostel site, but there was no sign on the building or door indicating that a hostel was there. Chris asked one of the people coming out of the building, and in broken English she communicated that no, there was no hostel, it was only apartments there.
Hmmm. So Sherrie calls the hostel number listed on our reservation form. "We're here, at the address, and there's no sign or anything". They tell her to hold on they'll be right out. We wait for a few minutes, send the cab driver off. Then around the corner come these two guys shuffling along. One was short with a little belly wearing a stretched out white tank top, shorts (boxers?) and some kind of slippers. His parter was taller with greasy hair and a bald spot. He had on a short sleeved button down shirt and khaki pants. They greet us and tell us oh, come in come in, (even though they were outside too). They enter a code into the building an usher us up the stairs while making small talk. "Oh, where you come from?....California....maybe I go there next year" They said that our arrival time was supposed to be 6pm so they weren't ready for us, and the cleaning lady still has to come, but they'll let us in now. They open the door to the crappiest little apartment that I've ever seen. And because the cleaning lady hasn't come, the "beds" are all ruffled and there are wine glasses on the kitchen counter. They assure us that all the hostels in Budapest are like this--apartment style, private, it's better that way, you don't have to share. No worrying about bumping into other people in the hallways because we have the apartment all to ourselves...huh. They take the payment from Sherrie, and give us a few instructions: When we leave we're supposed to leave one set of keys on the table, and toss the other pair through the window after we look the door. That's the check out procedure. Then they leave and we never see them again.

All over the tiny space are notices in bad english "Leave no value in the apartment. No mobile, ipod, money, jewelry" "If you cause harms to the furniture your credit card will be charged". My favorite was a sign talking about leaving a deposit with the receptionist if you wanted to have a locker. Ha! Receptionist? There wasn't even a front desk.

The bedroom consisted of a television with rabbit ears, 3 beds that were really mismatched sofa sectionals and a scary wire contraption that was my bed frame. After one night on that thing I dismantled it and put my mattress on the floor. The mattress turned out to be 2 thin foam pads placed on top of each other.

A few days later we are in Slovenia in a legit hostel. As a matter of fact I¨m sitting in the lovely common room now, using their computer surrounded by other travelers eating the free breakfast. It¨s wonderful.

Prague and Kutna Hora

2008-07-30T03:15:00.001-07:00

Yesterday was our final night in Prague. What an incredible city. I know that a lot of movies are filmed there, and it literally does look like a back lot at Warner Brothers or Disneyland. I kept expecting to turn a corner and find a Kraft services food tent, but everything was real!
Unfortunately the city is EXTREMELY touristy. It's a known Vegas of Eastern Europe, as in "whatever happens in Prague stays in Prague". We ran into a few stag parties from Germany and the UK, including a group of men from Ireland who were totally wasted and kicked out of a bar at 7pm!

Kutna Hora is a sleepy town about an hour outside of Prague. It was about 100degres while we were there, so we didn't see as much of the town as we might have otherwise. We came primarily to the Ossuary, a chapel decorrated with human bones. Sounds creepy. It was actually very beautiful. The message of the chapel is that the bodies we have, our flesh and bones, are not lasting. What we do in these bodies, will be accounted for elsewhere.

unashamed

2008-07-24T11:02:00.001-07:00

The last time that I was in Europe I tried very very hard not to look American. I failed. Even though I dressed a little bit nicer than I usually do, and only spoke in French when I was in public, everyone knew I was American. "You are from New York?" people would say after I asked for something in French. Sigh. "No, je vien de californie..." "ooh, you are from Hollywood (pronounced "Holy-wood")". I would shrink in embarassment when American tourists got onto the metro with their huge backpacks and dangling cameras talking very loudly. David Sedaris talks about this in "Me Talk Pretty One Day". I even remember a pair of girls getting on the metro one night belting some kind of acapella version of Amazing Grace. I was mortified.

This time around, I don't have time to care how touristy I look. I'm only in each country for a couple days, max, so I gotta have the camera easily accessible. And, my cousins and I haven't been pouring over the train schedules from say Bratislava to Prague for the last few weeks, so occasionally we have to discuss our next travel moves in route...in English.

The funny thing about this is that there are so many other tourists traveling in these parts of Eastern Europe. Who would have known. We were in the main square in Prague today and this guy was staring at Ingrid and I. I thought he was going to ask me about my hair or something (which no one has, not a huge shocker, but you know, I thought I'd get a couple comments...), but instead he asks "Why is everyone standing here?" We were standing with a crowd of about 500 other people waiting for this huge, complicated clock to do its thing on the hour. Someone else taps me on the shoulder and asks "did you drop this memory card?" he had an Australian accent. Anyway you get the idea. There aren't very many Czech people trompsing around these parts of the city. Which shouldn't be that surprising, afterall when was the last time I went to Universal Studios?

Bratslava

2008-07-24T09:40:00.001-07:00

So the journey continues...

yesterday my cousins and I braved the wind and rain to see the small town of Bratislava, which is in Slovakia. All of the public trashcans were over flowing with umbrellas that had been busted by the wind, which made me feel better--not even the locals were prepared for this kind of weather! Fortunately we all had our Rick Steves rain panchos :)

Ingrid is a fan of the movie Euro Trip, which I've gathered takes place in Bratslava. Really, that's the only reason we went. Surprisingly, there were some interesting sights including a soviet reconstruction of an ancient castle that burned down in the early 1900s. The city was much different from Vienna. In the ways that Vienna feels classical in a timeless and modern way, Bratslava feels outdated. The Old Town is quite charming with cobble stone streets, and some nicely designed public areas, but the rest of the city that we saw was dark and dreary. To be fair, the day was also dark and dreary. It definitely had a late 1980s, tomorrow land kind of feel though. For the first time I saw the huge soviet style housing blocks and industrial complexes, which will probably be a fixture for the rest of the trip.

Vienna

2008-07-22T13:16:00.001-07:00

I made it to Vienna!

My cousins and I spent our first--and last--full day here. I really like the city. It's bizarre how familiar everything seems. Somewhere between France and Germany--the beauty of Paris with the pragmatism of Berlin. I especially love the lay out of everything. There are these grandeous buildings, but the the scale is totally pedestian freiendly. There are people walking around and biking everywhere. Being here is tapping into my urban studies roots--the public spaces are AMAZING. There are these funny looking giant purple geometric shapes where people hang out in the sun and just chillax. It makes my heart happy to see people enjoying the city that way :) I could definitely spend more time here...if I spoke German. Almost everyone speaks English though. I haven't even learned how to say "Do you speak English?" in German, because there's really no need. Some kind of foreign country mechanism I have makes me say things in my head in French, which of course, is not useful in Austria. For instance I'll look at a price tag and think "aah, 50 euro, ca c'est trop cher!" and then the next second think "that was dumb..."

More later. My 20 min worth of internet time is about to expire!

the (condensed) narrative life of my hair

2008-06-18T00:18:00.000-07:00

Recently I straightened my hair for character I portrayed in a play. I hadn't straightened my hair in over 6 years. Crazy. In the space of 2 weeks I experienced all of the emotions (baggage) that come with being a black woman in this image obsessed reality that is my 20s/the entertainment industry/los angeles. I remember in high school being so at war with my hair. I hated the texture. I hated that I could never just "throw it in a pony tail" and get on with my day. I hated having to spend precious time and energy planning what I was going to do next, and then spend even more of my life executing that plan. And most of all I hated the cycle of having to get it done every two weeks, or once a month, and "retouched" with relaxer every 6 weeks, and getting annoyed when my natural texture started to grow in...the madness of it all. It sounds like torture doesn't right?

It wasn't until my senior year that I started to question any of it. When I was making my documentary for Mr. Cohen's TV Studio class: In the Kitchen, A Hair Story. A lot of people thought the title came from the fact that a lot of black people do their hair in the kitchen when they're at home, and yes that's true, I feel way more comfortable washing my hair in the kitchen sink than I do in the shower. But I'm actually talking about something else. The Kitchen is the back of your head, just above your neck, where the hair is the kinkiest and hardest to comb through, as in "Girl, your kitchen is looking kind of rough..." All black women know about the kitchen. Anyway, this critical perspective on the relationship between black women and our hair, made me realize that I have choices. Perms, relaxers, press and curls, extensions. They're not good or bad (and neither is hair--it's very taboo to tell a black woman is that she has "good hair"), but they are optional. So I chose out.

Having straight hair again was a good experience for a few days--a novelty. It's nice to know that with $50 I can change my look so dramatically. I am an actor afterall, so drama that I can manipulate is good. But at the end of the day, it just doesn't work for my lifestyle any more. I do yoga now, and the room gets very humid and sweaty. I like working out in the morning, and not having to think about how I'm going to wear my hair when I wake up. Because I don't wear it at all. Because it's just there, and we have a great relationship :)

a note

2008-05-27T22:18:00.001-07:00

From: Malika Williams

Subject: hi friend

hello there,

i just read your blog. i really enjoy doing that. aye. the city. it makes me sad sometimes. lately i've felt very revolutionary. on sunday we sang this song at church that we've sung before, but the bridge really hit me this time: heal my heart and make me clean/open up my eyes to the things unseen.
i want to see the things unseen! in south la. when i got home i paged through "transforming society", which i haven't read since k blue gave it to us at the end of LAUP. am i called to live in the inner city always? just now? will i get to go to new york ever? will i get to see the renaissance of art in faith that we talk about it our vision statement for streetlamp studio? if i'm not distributing petitions or writing letters to official people about important things and if go to yoga in santa monica twice a week does it really matter that i live here anyway? these are things i've been thinking about...

let's do some kind of activity before you go to indianna...

m

I can't stop smiling

2008-05-15T15:40:00.001-07:00

A few days ago I received a call from my dad's cousin. She invited me to go with her and her two kids, on a 22 day all expenses paid back packing trip around Eastern Europe.

WTF. I know. Incredible right?

I'm giddy with excitement. Not only will I be able to see more of the world, but I will be able to do it with my cousins, who I've been wanting to get to know better. AND, I get to end work earlier that I thought before I start grad school.

What have I done to deserve this good fortune? Absolutely nothing. The Lord is teaching me more and more, that his benevolence is completely outside of my power/efforts/diligence/hard work/lack of hard work. That's good news.

It's back!

2008-05-06T16:48:00.001-07:00

I'm not sure why I got this notice, since I'm a woman...but either way it's great news :)

Independent Casting Director

Casting Notice

Project Name:

The New Dating Story

Project Type:

Documentary

Format:

Rate/Compensation:

tbd

Message:

Role	Role Type	Gender/Age/Ethnicities	Description/Note
Main Guy	Lead	Female / 25 to 50 / All Ethnicities	New show for TLC networks , Loooking for SINGLE middle aged men, ages 25-50 , This is a new upscale classy show, we want to set you up for a date with someone that fits you, very doc style type show

PLEASE DO NOT RESPOND DIRECTLY TO THIS NOTICE.

If this project does not fit your specifications, click here to update your gender, ethnicity and e-mail options in your actor profile.

For technical assistance, contact talentsupport@castingnetworks.com or call 323.462.8200

Visit our homepage at lacasting.com

zabumba

2008-04-18T16:58:00.001-07:00

for me: keep the tension. fire hose arms ( no chopsticks or spaghetti). for you: make me feel safe. let me enjoy the music. help me relax. i want to forget about my feet and just be here. i'm trying not to to apologize when i miss-step. i keep doing it anyway. i'll do it less if you tell me me not to worry, or if you say that it's your fault. and if you go back to the basics, i'll think you're genuine.

Bravo

2008-04-14T19:40:00.000-07:00

I am so into Bravo. (The television network). I recently went to my parents house, where I go to watch cable when I don't want to go to the gym, which is where I usually watch cable, and I was reminded just how great the station is. Not all of the programming--sometimes they show weird old movies. Un-apologetically this is a long overdue meditation on my infatuation with the reality shows on Bravo.

Yes this really is a post about television and nothing else.

Project Runway, Top Chef, Shear Genius, and now Step it Up in Dance are the shows that I'm the most caught up with. It started with Project Runway, and then I realized they all have the same fabulous format. One of my favorite elements is the catchy phrase that the host says when someone has to leave "Auf Weidersehen, you're out" or "pack up your knives" or "it's time for your last dance"--that one's really a stretch, but what else can Elizabeth Berkley say? "Turn in your tights?" The weird thing is that the dancer who gets kicked off isn't going anywhere. Like there's no reason to go into this random studio with mirrors and do a last dance for the camera in the corner. At least in the other shows the loser goes to their work space to clean it up, there's a purpose of some kind. But with Step it Up they (the producers, the collective "man" of reality tv) were like, "we just need them to do something so we can play a voice over." So, In all fairness the formula is not fool proof. I didn't care for Top Design or Make Me a Super Model. And I don't like the reunion shows before the finale either.

Recently there have been a few pleasant surprises: Millionaire Matchmaker and The Real Housewives of New York City (waaay better than the Real Housewives of Orange County).

I really didn't think I could get sucked into a show that chronicles the ebbs and flows of 5 Manhattan socialites, but I underestimated the genius of Bravo. That tennis match in the Hamptons between Romona and Jill was INTENSE! A fun thing about the show is that all of the women (except for LouAnn who is a countess) are independently wealthy, so at least they're making money for themselves as they're spending copious amounts of it on ridiculous things.

Millionaire Matchmaker is really something special. I'm a sucker for those romance shows (though it's not as much about romance as you'd think, it's more about the skewed self perception of the clients and Patti's very wise, no nonsense correctives, "no, having a stripper pole in your living room will not make a woman feel relaxed"). I digress--does anyone remember the original "Dating Story" on TLC or "Second Chance" also on TLC? There were some beautiful moments there. Anyway, the Millionaires Club is this matchmaking service in LA for really really rich men. Patti Stanger, the show's entrepreneur is a third generation matchmaker--if that doesn't make the show legit, I don't know what does.

things that have inspired me lately...

2008-03-07T16:18:00.000-08:00

These are the final two looks from the collection of this year's Project Runway winner, Christian. As I was clicking through the images on my computer, I actually gasped out loud when I got to the first one. You really need to see the whole collection (which I will refrain from including here) in order to appreciate the incredible drama of this conclusion. The feathers. Wow.

What a great book. I'm not quite done yet, but this sentence especially moved me:

Act, Zachary Martin Glass, when and where you want to, since you feel you must, but do it with all your might.

It feels very timely.

Meryl Streep's performance in The Devil Wears Prada. I rewatched this movie the other day, and her portrayal of Miranda Priestly is just so chilling. There's this moment near the end of the movie where (spoiler alert) she has this sort of breakdown. She removes her glasses for a few moments, and it's like this huge wall has come down, and we see her for what she is: a tired, ambitious, lonely woman, who in spite of her selfishness genuinely wants to be a good mother. The glasses are a physical manifestation of power, her tower from which she looks down on the rest of the world. What's even more interesting about this choice, is that I read an interview with Meryl Streep once where she said that she recently decided she wasn't going to act with contact lenses ever again. She felt that the lens over her eye removed her further from the camera, and muted (to the slightest degree) her performance. So now, you'll notice, all of the characters she plays wear glasses.

rest

2008-02-03T18:16:00.001-08:00

rest
Originally uploaded by neffin1

Today I am reminded of God's goodness. For the first time in many months I am taking a full day of rest. A sabbath. A couple things have been running through my mind:

1. God is good. It's amazing to me that the Lord delights in who I am. That I don't have to do anything. That I can spend all day watching Grey's Anatomy reruns, and staring at the ceiling, and singing, and journaling, and napping, and sending e-mails to old friends, and doing nothing "productive", and the Lord is pleased.

2.What's taken me so long? There's a reason God instructs us to rest every six days: it's good for us physically, mentally and spiritually. And it reminds us that we're not in control. Stopping for a full day requires that understanding. The things I've been busying myself with are mostly good, but in retrospect, it wasn't worth missing out on quality rest.

3. A portion of the day isn't enough. I have rested here and there over the past few months. But a few hours of solitude squeezed in between work does not restore the soul. Of course, something's better than nothing, but the real rejuvination comes from really letting go for the day.

cleaning room

2008-01-13T18:29:00.001-08:00

Organized-Shelf
Originally uploaded by Lagomorph

This is certainly a mundane topic to write about. For those of you who are here, looking for some exciting window into my life, go a head and go back to the facebook or wherever you came from, cuz this is just boring.

For those who love me no matter how interesting I am...thanks :)

I'm in the middle of cleaning my room. And to procrastinate or "take a break" I'm blogging. This is funny because my decision to clean my room stemmed out of a procrastination effort for another, unrelated task. Organizing/decluttering is on my idea list for 2008, so here it is in action!

Isn't this photo great? I wish this was a picture of my room. Instead it's a random pic from flikr. Looking at it makes me breathe easy. A place for everything. And pretty too.

The worst part about cleaning is all of the little choices to make about what to do with this piece of paper or that. Do I wear that bracelet? I read that book once, but will I ever read it again? Should I save the beautiful piece of ribbon that I've been hanging on to for the last 3 months?

I don't think I'm going to finish tonight, but I suppose a little something here and there adds up. I've already put two bags in the car for the goodwill, so if nothing else happens, at least I've relocated my junk. To my trunk. Junk in my trunk.

Celebrate good times

2007-12-31T17:29:00.001-08:00

The Magic of Disney
Originally uploaded by Stuck in Customs

Some ideas for 2008
(Hopes/goals/suggestions for the coming year, in no particular order I won't sabotage myself by making resolutions)

1.Blog more. I like the idea of blogs. I read other people's musings on various things. Many times in a week I actually think "wow, that was interesting, I should post about it". Sadly, that almost never happens. But not in 2008!

2. Organize. Papers, photos, desktop, closet, under the bed (aaah)

3. Correspond. KIT, yeah. I love the idea of writing letters, and sending them off, and getting mail, and reading letters.

4. Budget. Make one, put it in a visible place, and try to follow it.

5. Cook more. Cuz, why not?

6. Yoga. Keep it up.

7. Margins. I want to be more intentional about having down time in between scheduled activities. More space in the day to do nothing in iparticular.

8. Visit my nieces. At Christmas my 8month old niece Sonai didn't recognize me :-( That can't happen! By next Christmas we will be good friends.

9. Get a digital camera and take pictures of my life.

10. Continue playing scrabulous.

civic duty

2007-12-18T16:38:00.000-08:00

Today I reported for jury duty. For the first time ever, I actually had to go into the courtroom. Well the courtroom waiting room. There was a lot of waiting. Correction: there was only waiting. I brought a lot of things to keep me busy. I weighed my bag when I got home. 10lbs of stuff to keep my busy! I'm not proud of that by the way. Jury duty is a great people watching opportunity. If I could sketch people I would have done that too. But i can't so I to mental notes instead.

The guy sitting on my left spent the day playing his old school nintendo game boy. I haven't seen one of those in years. I almost didn't know what it was. A big gray box with with the 3 buttons. The guy on my left stared into space. He doodled for a bit on the one of the handouts they gave us. but other than that he just sat. I observed many others around the room with the same agenda. sitting and staring. How can you show up for a day of waiting with absolutely nothign to do? What's that about? I was distracted by these people . I felt a little concerned for them, like "isn't there something you should be doing now, or working on? Why don't you get a magazine from the rack over there. you know just to keep yourself occupied"? After lunch the guy on my left had a magazine.

There was a couple siting in front of me that was working on a puzzle. A 1000 jigsaw piece puzzle that was left in the room. They were kind of together but it wasn't clear. definitely an ambiguous relationship. Did they meet at jury duty? Did they know each other from before? Did they arrange to report on the same day? There was a lot of flirting going on. One person kept reaching over the other to get to a puzzle piece and such. There was an exchange of phone numbers at the end of the day. Maybe they'll keep in touch.

The hour ahead of me

2007-12-12T16:39:00.001-08:00

The end of the day sucks the life out of me. If I have to stare at a computer screen for another minute...absolutely nothing will happen. I want to go home. In ten minutes I will get to ride my bike for about 10 minutes. I'll pass through the campus, then the by the elmentary school, then by the house where belizian men play pool and watch t.v. outside. Then I will be in my little house. I will set the timer on the oven for 30 minutes. I'll pull out my space heater into the living room. I will curl up and read my book. For 30 minutes. The timer will go off, sadly, then I will read for about 7 more minutes. Then I will be responsible. And I will pull out my laptop, and start my work for the evening.

J

2007-10-24T23:36:00.001-07:00

Have you ever taken the Meyrs Briggs Test ?

I took the test for the first time a few years ago and found that my type is "ENFP" Extroverted, Intuitive, Feeling, Perceiving. I was so excited. I read the descriptions on whatever internet site I took the test on, and felt so known. Yes, I know that's ridiculous. But really, I totally identified with the description. It was so me. And it was very different from most of the people I was around during college, which made me feel even more special. And I love to feel special. Ps are very laid back. They don't like making set plans, they like to play things by ear. See what happens. Don't push it. Let things flow. Ps are very cool. I liked thinking of myself that way. Especially in the context of Stanford where many people had clear ideas about many things. For example, the courses they wanted to take three quarters in advance. No thanks.

Now that I'm out of school, things are different. Deadlines, e-mail response etiquette, deciding where to go for dinner. My attitude about all these things has shifted. I have come to loathe the "maybe" section of eVites. Why chose maybe when you can choose yes or no? Because let's be real, most people who chose maybe are just politely saying no. So just do the host a favor and say no upfront. I retook the test a few months ago. The results were quite revealing. Post college I am a J. Judging. And not just a little bit, but a very strong J. It was hard to accept for the first few minutes. But I've pretty much embraced it. It's not as cool as the P, it will never be. But there's something very satisfying about J. J is responsible, and knows what she wants. J is unapologetic and unconcerned with what other people think about her. J takes personality tests very, very seriously. Now I feel really empowered to be decisive. The test is only supposed to describe what's already there, but because I'm so impressionable, it has given me permission to adopt a new outlook.

In some ways I will remain P. I think it will always be hard for me to finish a book that isn't a page turner, and arrive somewhere early or on time, or pick out my outfit for the first day of anything without a second opinion.

must hold on to this

2007-10-22T23:46:00.001-07:00

Breathe in: You are the potter
Breathe out: I am the clay

the highlight of my work day

2007-10-10T16:53:00.001-07:00

1:57 PM me: how goes the work?

1:58 PM Jennifer: eh

having a hard time focusing

2:00 PM me : i can relate

2:01 PM i love when pandora plays multiple good songs in a row

21 minutes

2:23 PM Jennifer: yay :)

me: what are you doing tonight?

2:25 PM Jennifer: running

2:26 PM with my coworker

also doing some SP work

2:27 PM me: cool

well if you'd like, you can join me at panera in the pm????

2:28 PM i guess we're already in the pm

2:30 PM Jennifer: haha

2:31 PM what panera

and what time?

hmm

actually

I dohn't think so

b/c I won't have my stuff with me

I would need to go bck home

and that would be a pain

me: not till 8ish

santa monica

Jennifer: what time do they close??

2:32 PM me: i think 10.

i need to double check

Jennifer: that's not much time

me: eh...i know

maybe i shouldn't do the yoga

margh

8 minutes

2:40 PM Jennifer: margherita

2:41 PM me: i can't find the hours anywhere online :(

2:42 PM maybe i'll go there first, then go to the gym late

Jennifer: why don't you call them?

me: no one answers

2:43 PM Jennifer: oh

6 minutes

2:50 PM me: i made contact

it's only open til 9

2:51 PM Jennifer: really

that is not much

me: maybe i'll just go right after work

then go to the gym on my way home

2:52 PM Jennifer: okay

2:53 PM me: are you eating dinner at home?

Jennifer: eventually

after I run

2:54 PM me: i don't know if i can wait...time is of the essence

not a second to spare!

tic, tic, tick

aaaaaah!

i'm going crazy here at my desk

aaaaah!

i'm going to explode

HEEEEELP

I can't take the spreadsheets anymore!

ALL THE SPREADSHEETS

2:55 PM Jennifer: oh my gosh

you're freakign out

2:56 PM me: deep breaths

2:57 PM okay, i'm better now

Jennifer: good

me: i definitely LOLed

then my boss came back

Jennifer: haha

me: i'll just have dinner at panera

by my lonesom

maybe those cute christian guys will be there aga in

6 minutes

3:04 PM Jennifer: hahaha

9 minutes

3:13 PM me: how does turkey chicpea chilli sound?

Jennifer: okay

3:16 PM me: just okay

3:17 PM Jennifer: yes

just okay

I think it could be good

but something about it when I just see the words makes me think of too much cumin

me: mmm

6 minutes

3:23 PM me: have you had soup there before?

i wonder if they let you taste them

Jennifer: uh

I don't think so

would be my guess

I haven't had soup there

3:24 PM me: not like an ice cream situation

3:27 PM Jennifer: what?

3:28 PM me: you know an ice cream situation, where you can taste before you buy

3:32 PM Jennifer: oh

right

here's the thing about LA...

2007-10-05T13:23:00.001-07:00

I'm not making this up.

Role	Role Type	Gender/Age/Ethnicities	Description/Note
You and your life	Co-Star	Male or Female / 20 to 30 / All Ethnicities	We are looking for men and women ages 20-30 who are in the midst of a difficult personal crisis involving love, work or family. We are especially interested in relationship issues. If you: -are actively dating and looking for love -have lots of drama going on in your life -live in the LA area -are excited to talk about yourself on camera on the internet -are interested in being on a cool, new cutting edge broadband series PLEASE TELL US A LITTLE ABOUT THE DRAMA GOING ON IN YOUR LIFE

LA Fitness

2007-10-03T20:32:00.001-07:00

i had an audition for an la fitness training video this afternoon. four months ago i would have thought that was rediculous, yet there i was this afternoon, sitting in starbucks, faithfully going over my lines "Wow, a really fantastic workout? It's probably been three, four, five years. That's not so good is it?" That was the height of my character's arch I'd say. The weirdest part? Objectively it's not weird, but in my head it is: I was super nervous! I got there 20 min early so i could get settled and use the restroom, but as soon as i came out they were waiting for me. An actor who was also auditioning read the scene with me. There was a large room with a camera and three people behind a long desk. It was just like i would excpect an auditioning room to be. I had this moment where i was reaching into my plastic folder for my headshot (that i had just picked up from the printer 40min prior)--like "wow, so this is it. this is what i'm going to be seeing a lot of soon--hopefully." this moment, like i've arrived, at the fate of any person trying to get anywhere in the entertainment industry in this city. I'm there now too. Before when I could hear actors talking about auditions, and call backs an agents and SAG and on and on, I could kind of distance myself. No longer. It's sobering, and exciting too. Then I had a moment where I was like --"doh, i shouldn't have had my headshot in a folder--wasting precious time taking it out". In retrospect I saw about three people outside of the building on the street leaving the audition I suppose just holding their headshots. And I thought "well, that's weird that they're not in an envelope or anything". Now I see this is a trick of the trade: take as little with you as possible. I will never again carry my headshot in a clear plastic folder. The LA Fitness audition itself--not so hot. I got through the lines, but that was about it. They said "have fun with it" but what does that mean? Does that mean I should ad lib, or does that just mean they want me to look like I'm having fun with the very unnatural dialogue? I don' t think I embarrassed myself, but if I were on the other side of the table I wouldn't have remembered my audition. As we were leaving the office the actor I was reading with tells me that it was great to work with me, etc--a great 1.5 minutes--then he says "Were you a little nervous?" "Yeah" I say "a little" then he says "I could tell, but I think it's okay because it kind of works with the character--you know, she's kind of nervous about just starting to work out again and...". At that moment I hate all actors, why do we say things like that? He was a nice guy though. I'm taking a commercial workshop starting tomorrow and i'm actually looking forward to learning about how to audition for commercials--I never thought I would say that.

Missed connections

2007-09-30T22:35:00.001-07:00

Panera Bread in Santa Monica

Dear man sitting across the way. The glow of laptop in the eveing is quite flattering on your face. I think you are very attractive. You're speaking another language on your cell phone. I'm intrigued. Are you single? Are you under 30? What brings you to Panera on a Sunday night? You look smart. And you have a laptop. So that says something right? You have a bit of a nerdy thing going on which is just plain cute. You look like the scrabble type. I'm learning scrabble, it's a fun game. If you're willing to add up my score I will play a game with you.

Gray

2007-09-28T11:01:00.001-07:00

Gray days like this are awesome. They're infrequent enough here in LA that I actually enjoy them. It's easier to work and feel serious and be reflective. It makes sense to listen to Sufjan Stevens and sip a warm beverage and be on the verge of tears for no reason at all. And eat some dry puffins perhaps.

Ira Glass

2007-09-15T23:31:00.001-07:00

I think something happens to me when I see a show or go to an event by myself. It's not an experience that's unique to me, because I've heard other people talk about it too, but it's so different from going in a group or even with one other person. I feel so connected to the speaker or artists on stage; everything is just a little bit larger and more important. I'm way more impressionable when I'm alone, because I feel free to give myself over to the discussion without being distracted by what's going on for other people.

I just went to see Ira Glass speak at USC. So I was pretty gung-ho about making it work this time even though it meant going by myself. Wow. So refreshing. It amazes me that someone can seem so personable and honest and down to earth and incredibly profound at the same time while addressing thousands of people.

I remember the first time I heard This American Life I was in the car with my dad on saturday morning and we were on the way to my voice lessons. It became a saturday morning ritual. If you're reading this and you haven't heard it, download the free podcast. It's awesome. Seriously it has been one of the most influential factors in my development as an artist in terms of fostering a love for story telling and understanding the power of stories in creating empathy among people.

An aside.

Once in my acting class we had an exercises where we had to think of one famous person (not necessarily an actor) who we greatly admired and wanted to have a conversation with. When we each came up with the person the assignment was to go up in front of the class and "call" that person on the phone, introduce ourselves, and ask them to mentor us or share an idea for a project that we had. We were only given 10 minutes to think of the person, and I couldn't think of anyone who I really wanted to call, and actually say something to. It's one thing to respect some one's work and an entirely other to feel so strongly about their contribution that you want to reach out and contact them. I chose Angela Basset. She's a great actor, who I actually have met twice, but I don't feel especially connected to her work. The "conversation" went okay, but I was kind of reaching. I mean the goal wasn't to do this incredible improv or anything, but just to be honest and share what that person meant to you. I still wanted to have a certain entertainment value, so I ended up stretching what she means to me and how much i look up to her, etc, etc. I think I even said something like "you should have definitely gotten that oscar instead of Halle". Of course after I went up I thought of like three other people I should have called instead. And I wanted to do the exercise over, but again that wasn't the point. The teacher said that the point was to get us to start thinking of ourselves as a part of a community of artists. If someone has had such an influence on you then you should tell them. It doesn't matter how out of reach someone seems, if you really want to send a message you can--through the mail to their agent, e-mail, whatever. You can and you should. And if you do have a good idea for a project, why shouldn't you share it with that person? If you think you have a connection, you're probably right, and you should take it seriously. Don't become a stalker or anything, but take your ideas seriously. So all that being said, throughout the talk tonight I was thinking about how it would be cool to sit down and have a conversation with Ira Glass. Because he's so interesting and relatable.

At the end of his talk there was a Q and A time, so I asked him about moving on from ideas. During the talk he had a portion where he gave advice to people who wanted to make creative things professionally. He said most people feel insecure because they can't think of the topic or question they want to create around. By his estimate, it's completely normal for at least 50% of your time to be spent coming up with a good idea. So during the Q and A I asked "When do you decide to abandon an idea?" He basically said there's no cut and dry. Each show they produce takes anywhere from 4-6months to develop. For every episode there's about 8 that didn't make it. And of that 8 maybe 4 were fully produced and then tossed later. He said most ideas aren't great. When they're looking for a story to produce they're trying to get lucky--hoping to find something that's really compelling. By having so many stories around they're upping the odds of stumbling upon that incredibly profound and universal perspective that hasn't been tapped yet. In Ira's words "most ideas are only approaching mediocrity. At their best they are crap" Once you see that, you need to move on. Most ideas are only approaching mediocrity! This past week in our Streetlamp Studio meeting we read an excerpt from Frank Schaeffer's book Addicted to Mediocrity. It's about the state of arts in the Church. There are SO many ideas out there to be pursued that relate truths about life and spirituality that other (non artistic) forms can't, but it seems there just aren't enough people who care enough to put in the time to push through the crap to what's really powerful.

When it was all over I stuck around at the reception and waited with small mob of other people to meet Ira Glass. I figured, I'd come this far why not go the distance and take a picture with him. Not the intimate one-one meeting I'd like to have, but better than nothing. Eventually I made my way to the innermost circle. I was really beaming with excitement about getting to meet Ira Glass. I introduced myself, and said that I had been listening to his show for 10 years. And then I told him that I'm an actor and a writer and that the show was pretty important in my choice to pursue the arts. "Really?" he said, "Thanks". Then I asked if we could take a picture, and someone in the crowd took it for me on my cell phone.

digital ADD and loss

2007-09-14T15:24:00.001-07:00

1. I consider myself a generally stable person, but when I'm in front of my computer something happens and I lose all ability to focus. In general I'm proud of being a multi-tasker. It's even on my resume. On deeper reflection though, I'm a little embarrassed about my flighty tenancies. I do many things at once, but to what end? In the last 10 minutes I have
-searched for google images of sheep, "leap" and "jump"
-read about Rosh Hoshana and Yom Kipur
-signed a pettition about the Jenna 6
-updated my facebook picture
-asked an old professor for a recommendation
-switched e-mail accounts multiple times
-looked up this week's winner of Top Chef
These are the signs of times. My friend Casey introduced me to this awesome game called wiki-racing. Basically you play with another person on their computer and compete to see who can relate two obscure topics (selected by a third party) in the shortest amount of time using only wiki links. Players are not allowed to go to any external websites or use the back button in the browser. It's awesome. There are few games that I'm really really excited about, but wiki racing challenges me and channels my internet ADD-ness in a way that nothing else can. The adrenialine rush of being able to connect avocados to Jesus in less than two minutes is exhilarating.

2. A few years ago my bike was stolen. I had left it in the same place for several days without a bike lock. So, I deserved to have it taken right? Debatable. I thought so, but then when I told other people they would say "No, people shouldn't go around stealing things just because they're not locked down" And I kind of agree with that. I mean, it depends on the thing. I have been known to find pens around the office and claim them as my own after checking with a few people in my immediate vicinity first. Finders keepers. I had been using my bike without a lock for weeks, and my roommate at the time had finally bought me one out of pure generosity right before it was stolen. After that I felt entitled to have whatever bike I could find without a lock. The whole experience hardened me. Whoever was stupid enough to leave their bike unlocked had it coming anyway. I wasn't on an active hunt, but I did kind of check out every bike that I saw whenever I walked somewhere. Once I found one. I couldn't believe it. Someone just left it there! The naivete! I moved it away from the rack to see if it really was unnatached and it was. I stood there for a second, and then realized how dumb it would be for me to steal someone's bike. That's not one of my proudest moments, but I'm glad I did the right thing. To this day I still have a habbit of checking to see if bikes are locked. Isn't that horrible? I don't even need a bike, but subconsciously I just pay attention to that now.

More recently my lap top was stolen. It wasn't locked. But it was in my apartment which was locked, so it felt like a bigger violation than the bike. I'm not looking to steal other people's laptops, but whenever I see someone with the same computer I'm a little suspicious. I dropped it on it's side once, so it has a unique dent, and I routinely look for a dent on the side of the powerbooks I see in my daily life. At starbucks. In the library. In pictures on craigslist. Sigh. It kind of reminds me of John Cusack's character in Serendipity--how he would look in every used bookstore for Love in a time Cholera--except my situation isn't so hopeful or important in the scheme of my life. It would be awesome though if one day in the future I got a laptop from someone and I turned it on it's side, and discovered that it was my special beat up computer returning to me.

what I learned from Akeelah and the Bee

2007-06-01T13:55:00.001-07:00

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
--Marianne Williamson

I want to be Your Shoebox

2007-05-14T23:33:00.001-07:00

By Catherine Bowman

I want to be your shoebox

I want to be your Fort Knox

I want to be your equinox

I want to be your paradox

I want to be your pair of socks

I want to be your paradise

I want to be your pack of lies

I want to be your snake eyes

I want to be your Mac with fries

I want to be your moonlit estuary

I want to be your day missing in February

I want to be your floating dock dairy

I want to be your pocket handkerchief

I want to be your mischief

I want to be your slow pitch

I want to be your fable without a moral

Under a table of black elm I want to be your Indiana morel

Casserole. Your drum roll. Your trompe l'oeil

I want to be your biscuits

I want to be your business

I want to be your beeswax

I want to be your milk money

I want to be your Texas Apiary honey

I want to be your Texas. Honey

I want to be your cheap hotel

I want to be your lipstick by Chanel

I want to be your secret passage

All written in Braille. I want to be

All the words you can't spell

I want to be your International

House of Pancakes. I want to be your reel after reel

Of rough takes. I want to be your Ouija board

I want to be your slum-lord. Hell

I want to be your made-to-order smorgasbord

I want to be your autobahn

I want to be your Audubon

I want to be your Chinese bug radical

I want to be your brand new set of radials

I want to be your old-time radio

I want to be your pro and your con

I want to be your Sunday morning ritual

(Demons be gone!) Your constitutional

Your habitual—

I want to be your Tinkertoy

Man, I want to be your best boy

I want to be your chauffeur

I want to be your chauf-

feur, your shofar, I want to be your go for

Your go far, your offer, your counter-offer

your two-by-four

I want to be your out and in door

I want to be your song: daily, nocturnal—

I want to be your nightingale

I want to be your dog's tail

5 Things that made my day today

2007-05-10T22:46:00.001-07:00

5. Having a relaxing lunch with a magazine in a shady spot
4. Finding a cool website with swim workouts--and then doing one (0 to 1 mile in 6 weeks)
3. Listening to Dave Matthews Band on the walk home from the pool-->the idea of a modern/post modern dance party. Perhaps for my birthday. It would be so much fun!!!
2. Enjoying dinner and Taboo with friends
1. Phillip Seymour Hoffman in Along Came Polly. Pure comedic genius.

What is this thing called Simple Living?

2007-05-05T23:52:00.000-07:00

Lately I've had a strong desire to go shopping. To put together outfits, and try on clothes, and purchase large amounts of stuff. For what? So I can sift through it in a few years and give it away to Good Will. There's such a pull to consume things in this country. And especially in L.A. And let's be real, it's not that I feel preassured to "look" a certain way and that's why I'm so interested in having new things. There's genuinely something inside of me that lights up when I buy something new.

In theory I want to be a person who lives simply--unattached to possesions. Ready to sell all that I have and move if God calls me somewhere. Or, even just ready to move without needing a full day to pack up my belongings. In my mind I think, if it really really came to it I would give everything away, and I probably would, but that's not really the point of living simply is it? To be willing to give up stuff if your life depended on it.

I do not lead a materially simple lifestyle. My DVD collection says it all. It's nearly doubled since graduation.

On a different note, I have come to really enjoy the magazine Real Simple.

Now that's a different type of simple living all together. In fact, it actually fuels my drive to consume things, but under the guise of actually distilling my chaotic life down to some more pure essence of being.

Recently I saw an exhibition of Andrea Zittel's work. She's a new tenure-track faculty person at the USC Roski School of Fine Arts. I don't konw anything about her spiritual background, but she is definitely a proponent of simplicity in every aspect of her life. It's kind of amazing to see the way she creates these comprehensive living units

I could work with the desk (middle image), but would I be up for sleeping, eating, bathing, and working in the same 10ft square space?

11:30pm

2007-05-03T23:29:00.000-07:00

I read this great article on sparkpeople.com the other day about procrastination. It was an anti-procrastination piece for people like me. At one point the writer actually asks the reader to stop reading and do something that they've been putting off for a long time. That's what I need. A little kick in the butt. For real. It's been good, the past few days. I've been doing the things I've put off. DISCIPLINE. YAY! I'm actually becoming a more disciplined person. I just have to keep on doing the things I don't want to do that much.
Continuing to go to the gym is actually paying off finally. I'm a little more than halfway to my 10% weight loss goal. The crazy thing is I'm actually enjoying the exercise. I love the way I feel after a really hard work out. Who would of thunk it. I still can't imagine running though. Mostly because of the knee thing. I'm visiting a friend in San Diego in a few weeks and I'm looking forward to going hiking! I've never looked forward to hiking! That is a testimony.

alas sweet romance

2007-05-01T23:25:00.000-07:00

Having a crush can be no fun at all. at all. I've officially dropped the hankerchief--tossed it in a certain someone's direction so to speak. And so far nothing has happened. What a bummer! Everyone keeps telling me that they're proud of me for putting myself out there. I don't want to be out there anymore. Out there is cold, and vulnerable. This is just a part of growing up though. Seriously I can't imagine being in this place over and over again by choice. It just seems so unwise, and damaging. There's no taking the handkerchief back. Reaching out with my foot and just quietly sliding it under my chair. Honestly I don't think I've been this honest about my feelings with a guy since high school. My relationship in college doesn't really count, because I didn't do any of the initiating. But in highschool. Man, I'll never really understand what prompted me to send that letter to Grant, a boy I had never even had a conversation with. And we never really did have a REAL conversation. But that one gesture set the tone for my entire junior year. It was all very Wonder Years. I'm not sure what I learned from it all. I guess it strengthened something in me. It's hard to find that again. It was easier then because I really didn't even know the boy. We weren't even acquaintances. This situation is a bit different. I might actually see him again before he responds (if he does at all) to my e-mail. That my friends, makes for an incredibly awkward situation. Awkward turtle.

On relationships and dating

2007-03-20T20:40:00.000-07:00

So...it was bound to come up some time right? I'm a 22 year old single female, with several friends getting engaged. And when it comes to this topic I just feel like I'm way behind, and getting too old, and missing out. None of those statments are true--I know, on a rational level, but they come up all the time. ESPECIALLY when watching television. Grey's Anatomy, Sex in the City, even The Office. It's almost impossible not to develop unrealistic and grandeose notions of relationships. So then the question becomes, what do I allow myself to take in? This is a matter of discipline.
frightening word.

jumping on the blog train

2007-03-16T00:56:00.000-07:00

So this is literally the last thing I need to be doing now. 1am, Thursday night. But what can I say? I'm impulsive. As soon as an idea pops into my head it steadily gains importance, until all of the sudden it becomes extremely urgent. This is one of those things. I feel like I won't really get a good night's sleep until I set up a blog and write my first post.
I feel pretty caffeinated right now. That probably has something to do with it.
Tonight is the eve of the closing weekend of Table Setting, my life's work for the past several months. It's crazy to look back and see where God has brought me since last year. In some ways it's monumental, and in other ways it seems very ordinary, like "what else could I possibly be doing?"
What's crazy, and a little sad, is that this is really the expression of my heart's desire and it's happening, which is great, but I'm already thinking about what the next big step for me will be. Is it possible to be really present in phase? Sometimes it seems inappropriate and irresponsible not to be constantly looking ahead, but that means you're never really where you are completely.
There's a lot of truth to the new-agey philosophy in the Brian Kest Power Yoga video. "Be where you're at, cuz you're already there". By the way, if you didn't think you could get a real work out from yoga, try this video, it's awesome.

If there's anything I've learned in the past few months, it's that reflecting is a discipline. Choosing to be in the present moment, and practice stillness. And I'm not that great at it. I have visions of myself spending time in solitude, counting my blessings, seeing beauty in simple things, writing encouraging notes to people in my life. The truth is that it takes a tremendous amount of effort for me to do these things even though I know that they're good for me. In the craziness of the last few weeks I have really been craving stillness, but have not made space. Tomorrow is a new day though, so I'll try again.