filled
bursting
no space contains me
i fill the universe
my hands stretch out
infinately
you cannot contain me
i am the universe
breathe in the whole world
exhale
don't implode
this is my universe
malleable and undefined
you are my universe
we are the universe
bursting
filled
posted by renee 2:31 AM
Tuesday, March 30, 2004
one redeeming quality of last night:
i am going to learn how to shoot a gun in the backwoods of my neighbor state
i am horrible at video games
i wonder if i'll be any good in real life
beware, empty pop cans.... explosion is eminant
posted by renee 3:59 PM
bars are uncomfortable. especially on monday nights in eau claire, wisconsin when you only know two people and they know everyone else present. on the up-side, i was only propositioned once and tom saw me mouthing the words "well, i'm dating somebody if that's what you're talking about..." across the room and came to save me. my band played reasonably well and dan and i had a great conversation in the car on the way home, but really, the part of the evening that was supposed to be social and fun was... well... i don't like talking to drunk people or watching them play pool. i was constantly trying to move out of the air currents carrying eye-burning cigarette smoke. being in an environment like that where all the guys are trying to get some, and some are painfully insecure and therefore obvious about it isn't my favorite thing. part of it is my inexperience, i guess. if i was in a bar with a bunch of people i know, i might like it. but talk about awkward. i was not drinking courtesy of my age and intelligence (driving home tired anyway? tuesday morning class?). i was also not talking, courtesy of my lack of aquantances. so what does one do at a bar if one is not smoking or drinking or talking? one watches and feels awkward. i was glad to get out of there...
i have so much homework to do tonight that i want to scream. maybe i will.
posted by renee 3:28 PM
Saturday, March 27, 2004
i read about intense emotion and it faintly resembles me. i have been very happy. i have been very depressed. but i haven't really felt anything for awhile. again, i have taken a step back from life and i'm more amused than anything else. the things we put ourselves through... silly humans. someone in my house hung up a bunch of calandar pictures of ireland. it makes me miss the time when i was okay to feel detached from real life because i literally was thousands of miles away from it. now i have no excuse. i can't wander around on sunny days just looking at things and people and learning about life because this IS my life. i just happen to not be that interested at the moment. things seem more factual and concrete than hazy and subjective. it's raining outside. that's sort of interesting, but it doesn't make me want to respond. i'm not inspired to cuddle up with a blanket and drink tea. i don't want to go dance around in it. really, i don't even care. this is not like me. i have lots of homework, but i am not worried about it or tempted to actually do it. i like people, but i find myself avoiding contact with them. i'd actually rather not have a social life. i'm just kind of tired of thinking, and i don't really like pretending i'm interested. i'd rather be creating things. maybe that would bring me back to life somehow. instead of writing my senior thesis about eating disorders, i invision a photo of a girl, from the neck down, with a hundred belts cinching in her already skinny self from shoulders to ankles. i don't want to write about it. just take the picture. i know what i'm trying to say, i just am sick of using words to do it. i would rather use music or paint. i'm friends with too many artists. what am i doing in this major that inevitably leads me to a life of academia? bah. i just want people to listen to me. but at the moment, i don't know that i'd have that much to say anyway. i had a moment of disgust with the dairy industry yesterday (homosexual activity among cows, anyone?) but it was all too distant from me. today i bought a block of cheddar (mild... i'm sorry) and skim (i will not apologize for that one). and i talked to my boyfriend on the phone and realized that i had nothing at all important to say. i'm sick of thinking. i want to take a change of clothes and a twenty dollar bill to hawaii and sit around for six months. it's a good thing i don't smoke pot. i'd be a mess. maybe i already am..... i just don't understand how i'm so far from myself and so out of touch with reality. facts with no interpretation don't lead to much. my mind is blank.
does blank mean white or black?
i wanted to buy a chomsky yesterday during my adventure at borders. it's a good thing i didn't. having someone shout at you about the state of the world when you don't even care about your own little world would probably have little effect.
i went to bed shortly after midnight intending to get up early and be done with things by now. it is late. i haven't started. maybe i will now. i just wish it mattered a little more to me.
posted by renee 5:52 PM
Friday, March 26, 2004
mephitic \muh-FIT-ik\, adjective:
1. Offensive to the smell; as, mephitic odors.
2. Poisonous; noxious.
i have to go to work now. it stinks.
posted by renee 9:53 AM
Wednesday, March 24, 2004
the last mounds of stubborn ice look sorely out of place among newly bared toes and shoulders. sunshine means reading on the porch will commence after a barefoot trip to the coop to restock my vegetable-less cupboards. mad thing of the day: i HATE it when you forget to read a label once thinking that "vegetable soup" won't contain chicken and then you bring only one item with you for eating and that happens to be it. happy thing(s) of the day: all academics are full of crap and most of us know it. my roommate brought home three fish (one which will henseforth call a bacardi bottle home) and two newts (now named burt pickleshoes and ernie peaches). another of my roommates is going to put bright red streaks in her hair momentarily. i got to spend a week with my abby and my lisa is mine once more... and my boyfriend is quite entertaining when he's tired. time for supper!!!!!
i left abby and her tulips and her flip flops and one leftover strawberry cigar a thousand miles from here. now i have returned to the land of socks and an average wind speed seventeen miles over that of the windy city. i wish i didn't still remember that... anyway, i'm in the law library, where i clearly don't belong, and i must check out my book and scat before i'm spotted. peace to the cities...
posted by renee 3:23 PM
Thursday, March 11, 2004
i am fleeing the tundra tomorrow. leaving far behind all thoughts of homework, mittens, poop-filled basements and the need to miss abby. i only wish carmen were complete on this cross country venture...
it seems that an uninvited population of human feces has taken up residence in our basement. i've never been so glad it's below freezing. don't pour a whole bottle of drain-o down a clogged bathtub. SOMEBODY CALL THE LANDLORD!
posted by renee 11:04 PM
Monday, March 08, 2004
i started walking to work around 9:15 this morning (stupid bus strike... i thought i had returned to the ever-efficient united states) and was smiling in the sunshine. however, by the time i arrived at work at 10:45, my hair was caked with snow, and my expression drooping to a scowl. but i don't care. next week i will be wearing a swimming suit. i LOVE the beach.
posted by renee 5:40 PM
Sunday, March 07, 2004
i have come to the comfortable realization that i will never have enough time or money to do all the things that i ought to do. enough of the perpetual disatisfaction with my to-do list. enough of guilt and perfectionism. in fact, i may stop making to do lists all together. whenever i am on top of things relationally: calling everyone i need to call, hanging out with everyone when i promised i would, i am unavoidably behind on my schoolwork. whenever i am caught up on schoolwork, it is because i am pushing God off the priority list altogether. regardless of any of those lists, i am not sleeping enough or eating well. and that's okay. it's more important to be knowing God than to be frugal. it is more important to spend time with relationships than to read everything i'm assigned. it's more important to laugh than to exercise. and the least healthy thing you can do is slip into obsessive compulsive list making in order to remind yourself what a pathetic excuse for a responsible college student you are. so maybe i'll put my two weeks in at work before i have another job lined up. maybe i will skip finishing that third novel because "mostly done" is good enough for me. i cannot spend my life meditating on God and also meditating on my senior thesis and also being regimented in my daily routine. and that's okay. because it's who i AM not what i DO that's important to God, and therefore it should be the same to me. so there. i wish i could convince myself to drop out of school. but i'm a wimp. i'm sticking around for now.... i wish i was going to maine.
posted by renee 10:18 PM
today at work a guy who alphabetizes his porn magazines into briefcases told me i looked "really cute."
sometimes you know more than you want to about people.
my boyfriend was a rock star in kansas city tonight and will be in st louis tomorrow night.
-east st louis is one of the worst school districts in the country
-i both like and dislike referring to my friend micah schmiedeskamp as "my boyfriend." it simplifies things when talking about him to people who don't know him, but i don't like the idea of making him more a title or a role in my life than a person. i wonder if he uses "my girlfriend" in place of my name. i don't think that bothers me. post-marriage titles are a little different, too. for some reason a bunch of suburban soccer moms talking about their "husbands" seems infinitely more distasteful to me than a man saying "my wife." i'm not sure why. that's probably completely anti feminist.
and on the last, completely unrelated note, "in america" is a great movie. made me put my glasses up on top of my head and wipe mascara off my cheeks.
posted by renee 1:24 AM
Wednesday, March 03, 2004
today:
1:15 - finished literature review
1:30 - time i set my alarm for
6:45 - time i set the clock to back at 1:30, also, time i was supposed to wake up
8:00 - literature review was due
8:30 - woke up
9:20 - arrived at class and turned in literature review
9:30 - made pathetic-sounding excuses to my overworked TA about being 80 minutes late
9:40 - got back my first midterm with a big fat C on it
11:00 - talked to dad and boyfriend
12:00 - ate beet and olive pizza leftover from my fancy date
3:00 - looked at pictures from denmark, thought of italy
4:00 - got two packages of girl scout cookies in the mail from my mom
5:00 - enjoyed grilled egg and cheese sandwich despite its charred underside. i will never be a vegan
things looked up around 11... i am resilliant
i like micah infinitely more than i like school. i would like to quit the latter and escape the country with the former. i hear the sound of exercise videos from the living room... buns of steel calls!
posted by renee 5:44 PM
Tuesday, March 02, 2004
on white boys dancing...
"we are faced with a paradox no liberal will enjoy: danger makes for grace. how to explain to a technocrat that his man-child moves like a constipated aardvark because danger is part of the body's food, and his child has been starved?"
-michael ventura in shadow dancing in the u.s.a.
western culture is one that values only that which can be put into words. however, those who exist in the parallel dimention which is poverty have gotten past that to a more vivid reality. they understand the literal significance of the material body. so perhaps white, middle-class americans look at your face first, italians at your shoes, and kids in the slums watch how you carry yourself. the question is which is the most accurate measure of a person? perhaps none of the above... i can just see that putting a man who's perfected his handshake onto a dance floor can reveal another story altogether.
posted by renee 7:05 PM
Monday, March 01, 2004
i feel smaller and yet more whole when he's around. i try to feel complete on my own most of the time and of course God is sufficient, but it's such a relief when he's here. suddenly i'm complete without having to work so hard; all i need is the two of us and the one we worship... i am full to brimming. but when he has to go again, i am left with a gaping hole. i let my guard down for a matter of days and it's like i went to space and my muscles immediately forgot how to function in their weightlessness... so i have to work up to being alone again. gradually. the process was immeasurably quickened by my long bike ride outside today. puddles replace snowbanks on the sidewalk and in my mind. still muddy, but things are looking up.
posted by renee 6:51 PM
