I am still alive.
I am not avoiding you by choice, but when your internet access is about 2 hours a week and you have no phone, communication is tough.
France is hot. REALLY hot.
I left Arles and went to Paris in a weekend.
Here are a few of the highlights:
²being woken up at 5:55 am by my friend for our 6;05 am train
²running to the train SOMEHOW in time
²almost getting kicked off train
²not checking into hotel and instead immediately going to lourve
²all toursity things: lourve, notre dame, sacre coeur, musee d'orsay, eiffel tower, les invalides, moulin rouge,
;;;finish this later...tough keyboards, too... But I want you all to know I am alive and that I miss you all a lot.
Tuesday, June 28, 2005
I promise, I'm still alive and okay!
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
Now broadcasting from the south of France...
Just to explain a little better where I am: Arles is a small city in the southwest of France, where cultures of France, Italy, Spain and others combine. Arles is in Provence (called Provence because, literally, it was a province of Rome), which is gorgeous countryside where the land is dry at the foothills of the Alps and where flamingos, bulls and small horses wander freely or under the watch of the Camargue (the name of the Provence countryside) cowboys. The skies are extremely blue and it is hot hot hot here. Wild lavender flanks the sides of the tiny roads that connect one small provencal town to another.
There are no suburbs here. Each town is contained by the original batiments, fortresses and walls that protected it. To get to another town usually takes about a half hour or more. Arles is separated in two by the Rhone River. On the side where I am staying, it is older with the original city walls and Roman ruins (an arena, a theatre and a forum). On the other side there is newer housing and one particularly good patisserie that sells pastries (read: culinary works of art). Outside my hotel room I can see both the Rhone and the old Roman bridge that was at some point destroyed. All that remains of it are the large lions on either side of the Rhone, greeting travelers of the Roman roads to Arles since the lion is Arles's symbol.
For those of you who traveled to France with me before, the closest city to Arles is Nimes, where I will be going soon enough for a music festival. The quickest city to get to by train is Avignon, which only takes 20 mins to get to. We visited Avignon yesterday and toured the Papal Palace and then suffered in the heat, drinking lots of water and wilting under the tarped street cafes. Those of you who were in Avignon with me before would be glad to know that the Hotel Bristol is still there and in fine condition, as is Le Forum where we had dinner and the carousel.
Arles is beautiful. I'm sure the people who live here are used to hearing that and don't think much of it when people say that, but it's truly gorgeous. The streets all lead to the old section of town, where there is le Place du Forum and le Place du Republique. Even today, the Place du Republique is the center of governmental things in Arles. There is a large fountain and obelisk there as well. Le Place du Forum is the tourist and social center, and has quickly become where we all eat. In the middle of the forum, something like a dozen cafes have their tables, all covered by huge yellow, orange and green tarps. I discovered an ice cream place there, which is bound to be the end of me
.............
In other news, I only have class Tuesday and Thursday from 9-12. Everything is ridiculously hot here, so after class and eating at a restaurant, I either escape to my air conditioned room or bear the heat to wander the streets some. I was thinking today how funny it is that there's just these incredible Roman ruins hanging out here; no Arlesians think much of them, but they're amazing. The school I take classes in is a collège, or middle school, that is a converted 16th century church. The kids are still in school. When we walk by, they all whisper in French about us. There is a constant hushed whisper that follows us around the school.
Neither of my professors know English, so that can make for interesting times. More at lunch than in the classroom. We eat in restaurants around the city with the entire group, including the professors... So if you think conversations at High Table at Willard or with professors in general can be awkward at times, try adding a massive language barrier. It is pretty fun though, and really informative, eating with the professors. Today I learned about French newspapers and which ones are socialist, communist, etc. from a professor.
There are three large differences here in Arles as compared with either Evanston or Lebanon.
1. Everyone gets up really early. Maybe I am only missing this back home because I have a slight tendency to sleep in, but... EVERYONE here is up by 8, seemingly, out at the patisseries or running errands. It is literally too hot to do those things later in the day. Lots of stores close from 2-4 pm, in fact.
2. Men are forward. I already knew that, but I forgot how forward they are...Not just Will You Have a Drink?, but Will You Have a Drink and if Not I Will Follow You Around in Case You Change Your Mind. I have not been out once, literally not once, where someone hasn't approached me. Fortunately, I haven't had the problems some girls have (like men waiting outside doors for them for many hours).
3; There are dogs everywhere.
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
Little girls get bigger everyday
Two years ago I went to France with my fellow recently graduated friends and my teacher and/or best adult friend Linn King. We were there not long, but the experience changed me.
I came back, feeling bogged down by everything in Ohio. I was just where I was before I had left--a graduate of LHS, a girl with a boyfriend, an geographical-emotional nomad without a home base, a soon-to-be Wildcat (and what did that mean at the time? Nothing.), just a somebody who felt stuck.
France had opened up my eyes in a short amount of time. I realized how capable I was on my own--without my mom, my dad, my boyfriend, even my friends. Suddenly I was back where I had been before, and everybody expected me to rely on them again...and I couldn't.
For that reason, partially, Northwestern was an amazing escape and new discovery.
I was immediately swooned into the green campus, the gorgeous lakefill, Evanston in its north shore glory, my friends and their amazing talents, my professors who blew me away, and of course, Chicago. Here I was, this individual. Totally on my own. Nobody to rely on, even if I wanted to rely on somebody.
Coming back to Ohio was hell.
I say this with some hesitation, as I have some great friends here...and some particularly wonderful ones who have been nothing short of perfect in the last year or two. ...I think they know who they are.
But, let's set the rest of the bullshit aside. There are some people here in Lebanon who fucking suck. I'm pretty sure Lebanon must be a epicenter for lame-ass, back-stabbing, fair-weather, and generally mediocre and relatively uninteresting individuals. ...I think they know who they are too.
If that's just how it is here, there's nothing I want more than to just get back to this life I have started for myself. Where things were new, just starting, with all sorts of hopes for an amazing future for both me and one shared with my incredible friends. There was, and it goes without saying that there still is, so so SO much to look forward to.
Thus, when I got back to school for my sophomore year and was given one final reason to forget about home, I was more excited than ever to immerse myself in everything Northwestern, Evanston and Chicago. I'm pretty sure judging by this journal, and even moreso the personal changes I see within myself over the last year, I did just that.
I spent more time in the city, more time with new people, more time trying new things, and more time just discovering anything and everything in this past year than I ever have before. Not at any particular moment this year, but somewhere along the way, the realization seeped into me that... I am, in fact, done with home.
And no longer is this idea one that is just 'Home isn't home anymore,' or 'I feel out of place at home;' but rather, it is a full sentence; a complete idea: I am done with home.
It seems appropriate, then, that I should come full circle, leaving for France only days after returning 'home.'
To me, this trip is not just another study abroad, or chance to drink wine at age 20, or opportunity to see another half of the globe. This trip is, in part, an exercise of my newly-found individuality. I'm getting to stretch my limbs and say, 'Here I am,' to nobody but myself and whatever part of France is listening...and understands English.
I'm growing up, and that's kind of weird. But it's these steps along the way, and taking them slowly, that makes the growing all worthwhile.
PS. I'm going to miss you guys. A lot. (And most of you I already do miss a lot and am just itching for September already.)
Monday, June 13, 2005
Baby's First All-Nighter(s)
This is going to take a while, but it's worth noting. Keep in mind, also, some of these are approximations, as my concept of time was greatly skewed.
THURSDAY:
9:30 am: I wake, shower, screw around the room.
11 am: I go to Unicorn to read.
Noon: I eat lunch with Jess.
1:30 pm: I go to Art Store to buy supplies for my Storytelling children's book project.
2:30 pm: I draw in the Common Room.
5:00 pm: I watch Burnt by the Sun with Jason and Oscar.
7:00 pm: Our Cozy Noodles by delivery arrives.
7:05 pm: I bitch out people who set shit on fire and almost catch a tree on fire, too.
7:10 pm: Hen run for drinks.
7:30 pm: Restart movie.
10:00 pm: Movie ends. Feel hella depressed try to get cheered up.
11:30 pm: Move down to Rat Trap to draw more. End up talking to Jeff for an hour instead.
FRIDAY:
12:30 am: Actually start drawing. Read and other things, too.
3:00 am: Hen run with Schenks.
3:20 am: Discuss all USSR notes with Schenks.
4:30 am: Return to drawing.
6:00 am: Go onto roof to spend some time NOT working.
7:00 am: Discover that I do not have enough white paper to print off everything for my project. Get white paper from Mike, while in 3DP, I notice Trace sitting on the couch, staring at Grant who is sleeping seemingly naked. Thoroughly weirded out.
7:10 am: Run to CVS. Buy binder.
7:20 am: Bind everything. Project done.
7:30 am: Eat the bagel that Jess and Mike picked up for me. Down two energy drinks and one Frappuccino.
7:45 am: Shatter one Lime Perrier and scream.
8:00 am: Take pictures of myself and Jess being crazy.
8:15 am: Shower.
8:40 am: Call Mom, talk too fast for her to understand me.
9:00 am: USSR final.
9:23 am: Finish USSR final?
10:00 am: Go to Unicorn with Jess.
11:00 am: Put things in storage with Jess and parents.
12:00 pm: Go with parents to study abroad office to drop off project. Now officially academically done.
12:45 pm: Go down to 3DP to say goodbye to Mike.
1:15 pm: Mike leaves.
1:30 pm: Go to Buff Joe's with Jess and some of the guys.
2:15 pm: Help Jess move her stuff outside.2:30 pm: Jess leaves.
2:58 pm: Make very sad lj entry.
3:30 pm: Start getting stuff packed.
4:00 pm: Frappuccino bought at Starbucks. Run to Hen.
5:00 pm: Start making dinner plans.
6:00 pm: Run over to Blom to find Eric and company...no success.
6:45 pm: Meet up with some of dinner crew to go to Joy Yee's.
7:30 pm: Sit down finally for some delicious dinner and smoothees.
9:00 pm: Try to pack more.
9:30 pm: Give in and sleep for a bit.
11:30 pm: Awoken by Jason and Jiwon.
SATURDAY:
Midnight: Up and moving again. Packing. Realize my luggage is missing. Make plans to go to beach.
1:00 am: Plan to beach canceled with JP's goodbye visit.
2:15 am: Schenks stops by, John stops by, many others follow in Jason's wake.
4:00 am: Jeff stops by. Decision to go to White Hen made.
4:30 am: Hen run.
5:00 am: Climb onto roof one last time.
6:30 am: After deciding to really get to packing, I sit with the hybrid, Jaff Schedinger for an hour and a half talking.
8:00 am: Really get packing.
8:30 am: Shower.
9:00 am: Screw around because sleeping at this point is a bad idea, even though I'm done packing.
11:00 am: Parents come, lots and lots and lots of loading of car to bring things to storage begins.
3:00 pm: Best/worst decision ever. I drive someone else's car to take Brett to drop a chair off in storage. Parking a car has never been so difficult.
11:00 am -- 5:00 pm: Lots of goodbyes and surrealness.
5:00 pm: Final checking out of Willard.
5:15 pm: Last moment standing in lobby, staring at mailroom and thinking about the last two years.
5:20 pm: Dinner with parents at Clarke's.
6:15 pm: Hit the road. Asleep before my parents turn west onto Davis. Literally.
9:45 pm (est): Wake up. Drink water. Fall asleep again.
SUNDAY:
1:45 am: Arrive in Ohio. Ask my mom, tiredly, "Can we move everything out of the car tomorrow?" My mom replies, "Jesus, CC!" and I think she's mad that I suggested it, but instead she thinks I am nuts for even considering moving things that night.
1:55 am: Already in my own bed. Passed out.
2:45 pm: Wake up. Begin living, kinda. Screw around all day, get dinner at Bravo with parents, get ice cream, screw around until...
7:00 pm: I pass out again.
10:00 pm: I wake up and think to myself, Shit. I might have finally slept TOO much. I watch a thunderstorm, talk with friends online, until...
MONDAY:
2:23 am: When I realize, yes, I did sleep too much and I should be asleep by now.
Friday, May 27, 2005
Half-Way
I went to bed last night at 6:30 am.
Not because I was writing papers.
Not because I was reading.
Not because I was studying for an exam.
Just because I wanted to.
Just because I stayed outside Willard to talk to friends.
Just because I climbed up on the roof and watched the sun rise with a friend.
Just because.
An incoming freshman's mother emailed me about Willard because she saw my picture up as being a fireside chair on the website. I emailed her back, two weeks late, with every intent of making a short email explaining that she should email current fireside chairs and just say that Willard is pretty-cool-I-guess.
As I got writing, I found myself writing her an epic of an email, professing my love for a dorm that is full of people with such passion for life and enthusiasm to do the more unusual and most amazing things. I am so lucky, I realized, to be living here. I am lucky that for two years of my college experience, I've gotten to know the people I think are the most amazing people on this campus.
There's something about the culmination of a relatively disappointing last few weeks with finding new amazing people who refresh you when you begin to feel burnt out that is incredible. I have my oldest, newest, closest and best friends here around me, and I feel so lucky.
From running into the lake, to pudding wrestling; from winter quarter dance parties, to spring quarter euchre; from White Hen runs, to wine cleaning parties; from late nights talking in the Mouse Trap, to early mornings watching the sun rise; from throwing things from windows, to sneaking on roofs; from breaking into SAGA, to breaking into attics; from Quad parties, to Franzia/drum corps parties; from sitting by the radiator with honeynut cheerios, to cheesy movies on tiny futons; from knocking on walls to communicate with friends through rooms, to AIM'ing people next door; from extreme billards, to ultimate frisbee; from late night trips to the beach, to romps in the snow; from long ass dorm meetings, to crazy ass central meetings; from the first awkward New Student Week dance party I attended, to the first NSW dance party I helped organize; from the first nerves that exploded in hello, to the ones that blew up in a hug; from smoking cigars outside Willard, to driving with friends with my feet out the window; from the very moment I stepped into this dorm and saw people I knew in line to get their keys with me (Paul Bryan from Preview NU and Grant from Cincy), from the moment I stepped into my tiny ass crotch room freshman year and Jess and I made it work, from the moment I first felt at home and then had to leave it before coming home again, and even right now, thinking that I will be somewhere else next year, I wax nostalgic and feel honored to have shared my first two years of college with these amazing people.
I didn't intend for this to be my "Holy Shit! I'm Almost Half-Way Done With School!" entry, but it might have ended up being that.
Sunday, May 22, 2005
A Thought From Lake Michigan
The trick is that you take your hands and make a frame through which to see the world. Survey the entire horizon through that frame, slowly. In each crest and fold and dip and wave of life in front of you, there is a place that is yours. All you have to do is step through that frame and claim it.
Friday, May 13, 2005
Trees
"I don't want to be a flower," I told my mom as I slid into the station wagon's passenger seat. "I want to be a tree."
My mom smiled and her eyes flashed as she looked at me. "What do you mean?"
That day in my third grade class, Mrs. Perkins had told me I could be a flower.
The specifications of why I could be a flower now escape me. I think it involved something about being pretty or smart or really standing out. Standing out--like a flower? Flowers never struck me as really standing out.
"But I wanna be a tree."
"But flowers are prettier."
I let myself go labeled as a flower, if just briefly, and sat thinking seriously about the foliage matter at hand for the rest of the day. It wasn't until this moment pulling away from Lebanon's Louisa Wright Elementary that I voiced it again.
My mom was quiet and then looked at me as we sat at the stop sign by IGA. She reached her hand around me, running her fingers through my hair. "There's no reason you can't be a tree," she told me.
She was right. There wasn't a reason I couldn't be a tree, if I wanted. Flowers were pretty, sure, but that wasn't for me... to stand around, looking pretty or just doing what everybody else in the grass was doing.
And I guess I never have.
Saturday, May 7, 2005
Hometown Proud
Taken on the surface, small towns are wonderful places.
All is lush green here in Lebanon in May. Lush green spotted with the maroon and white uniforms smudged brown with dirt after a long day of softball. These little maroon and white troops stand in disarray outside the Dairy Queen, flanked by their moms wearing matching two-toned baseball shirts and their dads sporting half-shaven greasy faces that still reek of beer and sweat.
I wonder how I spent 16 years of my life in this one place, doing exactly what these people are doing.
Wearing my maroon and white tennis sweats, standing in line at Dairy Queen, a boyfriend at my side and the keys to my Beetle swinging off my finger.Running about town with John Mayer, Third Eye Blind or Eagle Eye Cherry blasting in the CD player, the sun blinding against the glass-washed windows of the bank and Trish down at the shop on Broadway inquiring after my parents. Swinging on the swingsets down at Harmon Park and going on walks on the golf course late at night.
Did I really do this for 16 years?
The other thing about being home is that there are so few people your age there. You suddenly realize you were unaware of the absence of the 18-23 year-olds in town during the schoolyear. But now that you're back, you notice that they're not around.
The only people around are aged up to 17 or are parents... and that's when it hit me.
Everything is maroon and white here in Lebanon. Everything moves together quietly, even if under the surface there is turbulence, toward some common goal of a town with a purpose. When everyone knows who you are, it's hard not to be part of this community.
Yet, here I am, twenty years old and on my own, essentially. I've been given this opportunity to throw off school colors and punch my fists in the air while breaking free. I don't have to identify with anyone but myself right now, and that's pretty awesome.Somewhere down the line, I might end up in another Lebanon, U.S.A. and I'll port my own child's school colors and stand in line with him at the Dairy Queen. Who knows? But for now, I'm throwing punches at the world and refusing to get tied down in a city where I remain nameless and a campus where, I assume, I remain mostly a mystery.
Tuesday, March 22, 2005
Textbook Sterotype
I just curled up on my big green couch, alone, with nothing but a space heater, some candles, a fuzzy blanket and Honeynut Cheerios, and sobbed my way through The Notebook for the first time.
It's official. I am a girl.
Sunday, March 20, 2005
fresh starts
Without really requesting it, I've been given the opportunity for a fresh start.
In the last two weeks, my computer crashed with everything on it and I lost my cell phone.
In a sense those two losses mean nothing, but in another, they were loaded (I repeat loaded) with the heaviness of the last two years.
My voicemail alone is a diary in a sense. I delete few messages. Without fail, every time I check my voicemail, I hear Jesse Butler's voice first as he sits in Cassano's Pizzeria with me, calling my phone and yelling, "SSUUUP CAAAAAAAAAIIIIIT LEEEEEEEEN! HOWZIT GOIN!?" I hear my mom's first message to me as she and my dad drive home from dropping me off at Northwestern. I hear Brandon calling to say he misses me in October. I hear Tate calling to sing me a Happy Birthday at 4 am on the day of my birthday. I hear Heather calling me to say she got home okay from the party she abandoned me at where I had protected her from scissors. I hear Matt calling to say to come out to the lakefill to study. I hear Jess calling this summer because we kept playing phonetag rather than talking to one another. I hear Amy calling to go to Kidd Coffee. I hear Brett calling to say he was in Old Navy and thinking of me. I hear Bryan calling to say that he was out driving and listening to Keane and figured I was doing the same. I hear John calling and just screaming my name. I hear JP calling after our connection gets lost and cracking jokes for five minutes. I would hear Julie calling to give warnings about sketchy men, if I could reach my phone. And that would definitely get saved, if I could save it. I'm not even sure what the last message on my phone was recently...maybe something from Amy or Carolyn or my parents about the Chicago roadtrip.
Among other things lost are all phone numbers and saved voicenotes (they were actually important) on my phone.
My laptop is the worst loss of all. I had not only hundreds upon hundreds of photographs from my first years at college on there, but also a 50-page diary (Microsoft Word, size 10 font, single-spaced) that I had been keeping since June of senior year. I looked it over fairly thoroughly recently and I was blown away by how much I had changed without realizing it. That had been my purpose is keeping it, too--to see how much I change. I had done a relatively good job keeping it, writing long entries at least every two weeks, sometimes in spurts of a dozen short entries in a few days. I cannot express enough my disappointment at losing this document. I will never again go without backing up files for more than two weeks.With Carolyn and Amy's visit to Northwestern (simultaneous with discovery of all lost files and losing cell phone), I think that a fresh start is inevitable. Although I already felt pretty free of everything, now that I cannot even reflect on it, I have no choice but to live in the moment. Now the question is what will the moment bring? The end of the quarter brought me to two paths, one that might circle to the same point it always has and another that leads to who knows where. I am pretty excited for this trip, even if I have left my baggage somewhere else.
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