freshwater pearls

it feels so good just to sit down.

just got back from work. it wasn't a bad day and i finally sold the shoe books to someone. i usually like to recommend more mainstream books for people unless they are exceptional readers and want to delve deeper. i like the shoe books a lot but i've never recommended it before because the age group for these books aren't interested in it anymore, or at least it seems that way: they want Junie B. Jones or Captain Underpants. but i finally got to sell it today to a mother whose daughter loves theater but doesn't like to read. when i showed her the books, her daughter seemed enthusiastic about it. i was happy.

thursday night, i was working on a paper due the next day when my sister comes home at around 10:00 from her fiance's house (no, they don't live together, because we don't believe in that sort of thing--despise me if you dare--but she'll move in with him after the wedding so she stops by his place to cook him dinner sometimes and help furnish the place). she went straight to my mother, who was watching TV in the livingroom, the sound of which was distracting me. they got into this heated discussion about the wedding and D and his girlfriend and her fiance's mother who has been giving them a hard time. what with the TV and their voices, all concentration was lost to me. so, i went to bed and resolved to wake up early morning on Friday to finish my paper. the class it was due for started at 11 so i figured i could get up at 5 and finish it with time to spare.

the alarm infiltrated my sense of hearing at around 6am. i shut if off and tried numerous times to will myself to get up. when i finally did slip off the covers, i was in a bad mood.

the birds made their questioning chirrup sound from underneath their covers as i went down to the kitchen, sat at the office niche there and turned on the computer. my papers and books were still strewn, open, all over the desk. i ended up finishing the paper well within the three hours i had alloted myself. but as i was writing it, i kept remembering things. it amazed me how many things came back to me so early in the morning.

one such memory was from freshman year of highschool, honors english I with Sr. Marie (bless her Irish soul). in that class, we had to write a paper every week to be due on Tuesdays. Tuesdays at my highschool were days with 90 minute classes so that day was perfect for paper criticquing. every week someone also had to read their paper aloud to the class and have their peers comment on it. this tuesday, the one i remember so clearly, was my day to read my paper. the genre was biography. i had interviewed the guy who sat next to me the week before and had written a paper about him to test my comprehension of the biography genre. so, i read it aloud.

i don't recall what others said about my paper and i don't think there were a lot of comments. but she, Sr. Marie, asked me to read a couple of sentences to her again. once i had done so she said, "there is nothing in that sentence. there is no content, no phrase supporting the claim you made earlier on in the paper. its a beautifully written sentence, but there isn't any meat in it." i was glad she put a little bit of a compliment in there, but i was also embarassed. and she was right. i could write nicely, but none of my sentences had a purpose, none of them were geared to support any claims or give any information. this was one of the things i remembered as i wrote my paper friday morning, four years after that incident. i made sure that each an every sentence had a purpose: claim, evidence, warrant, transition.

as i re-read the passage i was quoting, i remembered something else.

senior year of highschool, AP English IV, Mrs. Eagan. a timed-writing exercise based on Thomas Hardy's poem "The Convergence of the Twain". i analyzed it stanza by stanza and the paper that came out of such methodical analysis had motion to it. i think it was the best paper i had ever written for that class, even if i only had 20 minutes to write it. and yesterday as i was analyzing the passage sentence by sentence, i remembered that motion, that likeness of a camera moving through a sunken ship.

*yawns*

wow, i bore even myself. its best if i start reading.

walkin' blues

Woke up this morning, feel 'round for my shoes,
You know 'bout that babe, had them old walkin' blues.
Woke up this morning, I feel 'round for my shoes,
You know 'bout that babe, Lord, I had them old walkin' blues.

Leavin' this morning, I had to go ride the blinds.
I've been mistreated, don't mind dying.
This morning, I had to go ride the blinds,
I've been mistreated, Lord, I don't mind dying.

People tell me walkin' blues ain't bad;
Worst old feeling I most ever had.
People tell me the old walkin' blues ain't bad.
Well it's the worst old feeling, Lord, I most ever had.

Blues. even the name sounds dark and unfathomable. there's something about it that relaxes me. the simplicity of it and the relevance. even though most of the songs are full of sadness and misery, there's something about the sound that comforts me. its not pretentious. its human hands and guitar strings. its a foot tapping the beat on the floor. its salt on a stage with a rolling, sliding tap dance. its knowing you're life isn't perfect. its malted milk.

*shakes head* but i don't "know blues" like some people do. maybe that's why the music comforts me, because i don't know. and deep down, i don't want to know. Eric Clapton was addicted to drugs during the peak of his career in Cream. he spent time at the Crossroads rehab center. he knows the blues. Billy Holiday succumbed to selling her body to survive. she got a job singing in night clubs. she died of an unshakable addiction to heroine. she knew the blues. ray charles--he also knew the blues.

just listening to their songs makes me think these dark, quiet (boring) thoughts.

the wedding is still scheduled for september 17th.

tomorrow i have a midterm. on friday i have a paper due.

for madeyes, if you read this sometime after you get back: congratulations! i'm glad that your taking a break means you can take advantage of all these things. have fun relaxing!

woke up this mornin', feel around for my shoes...

feak and weeble

if i had written this yesterday like i planned, i would have said that i don't know what to say, but that there is still so much to talk about. this weekend was a nightmare, but not in the ways that i expected it to be. i fear this post is going to be long.

i did work at the LA times festival of books both saturday and sunday. saturday, i had a granola bar for breakfast at 6:30 am. i didn't get to eat next until 8:00 that evening. the booth was so busy, sometimes it was hard to breathe. after the first three hours of set up, i was starving but couldn't eat because we hadn't even really begun yet. after that, i think i was running on adrenaline. i was wearing my contacts that day so my eyes were also dry and uncomfortable. and then i unexpectedly got my period early on in the day. when i was finally allowed a fifteen minute break, i went to the food stalls but they only took cash and i only had two dollars. i thought i could at least by a soft pretzel, but they were $3.00! even a snack-sized bag of chips was $2.50! i was outraged at the prices! i went back to the booth after my fifteen minutes having not eaten and just swiped another granola bar from the snack basket under the register and had to make do. so, i was hungry, tired, and bleeding slowly. i thank God that i didn't collapse that day. as it was, i sold as many books as i could, recommending as many as was possible, considering i only started selling books two months before. i spent a hefty amount myself on books autographed by authors at our booth.

i left at 4:30 to go to church and i am ashamed to say that i fell asleep during the homily. i made up for it by not receiving communion.

then there was a two hour drive home during rush hour traffic. when we got there at around 8:00, my sister's engagement party was in full swing. i went upstairs, washed my face and took off my contacts, then went back down, ate and was present until 11:00 when all the guests had left and my mother insisted i go to sleep. i didn't actually get to bed until around midnight because i had to sort some things out.

sunday was a better day. i did not wear my contacts, and i made sure to eat a very heavy breakfast. i found that this wasn't necessary because alex let me eat lunch that day. we sold a lot more books on sunday because we actually had time to do a little marketing beforehand. that, and i was working up to parr since i was a little more prepared. the festival ended at 5:00 and we started cleaning up and re-boxing those books that we hadn't sold. then we had to push the carts loaded with boxes to the parking structure and, going up the ramp, mine and Lauri's cart hit a pothole and tipped over. other than that, i only suffered a desperate need to go pee and aching ankles and feet.

when finished, my dad and i drove to carson for my aunt's 30th birthday party. she did not get proposed to. instead she had to endure my sister talking about her wedding. sometimes i think my sister is oblivious to these kinds of things.

got home at 10:00, did my homework and was in bed by midnight.

i was drifting into sleep when i heard my sister give a great sobbing heave. at first i thought she was crying because of something my father said to her, since they were the only two still awake and they have always fought with each other. then she began to scream and i realized that she couldn't be yelling at my father. she kept yelling that she was sick of it, sick of it, sick of it. and then i remembered that she was on the phone when i closed my door to sleep. she was shouting and sobbing at her fiance. my dad silently left his desk and woke my mother. she went to Ate after she had gotten off the phone and i heard them talking in the bathroom as she continued to cry.

my sister's fiance, C has a younger brother, D, who is the family favorite (please bear with me using initials). his younger brother is a real piece of work, and i dislike him so much that i don't feel any qualms about being rude to him because he deserves it. i don't usually feel this strong a dislike for people, but he is the exception. ever since my sister and C started going out, D has been trying to top them. he got himself a girlfriend and insisted that she was the one, just as C admitted that he really loved my sister. i have seen D with his girlfriend and whenever they outwardly show affection, it is always in the presence of my sister and C. because he is the favorite, these kinds of things garner him the attention he so craves. his mother, my sister's soon-to-be mother-in-law, indulges him and can't stop talking about his girlfriend like she's some kind of treasure.

when my sister started yelling that she was "sick of it", she was referring to D's always stealing their attention. her fiance had told her over the phone that night that D planned to propose to his girlfriend in july--two months before my sister's wedding.

this is disgusting and wrong. he has not yet finished college and neither has his girlfriend. they only show affection for each other when they're in front of my sister and her fiance just to top them, but i don't think they even love each other. once they had an argument so severe that his girlfriend ran to his parents to make them stop D from being so cruel to her. and he wants to propose to her? the only reason he wants to propose to her in july is so that he can take the attention from my sister and C. that is the only reason. he can't stand it when his older brother is getting all the attention, so he will propose to his girlfriend so that during his older brother's wedding, all the guests will be talking about his engagement and not paying any attention to the bride and groom.

i don't usually believe these kinds of things--people who plan other people's misery--and i always try to defend the people my mother and sister accuse of purposefully planning harm, but i know this accusation of there's is true. i know it because he once tried to take advantage of me. and i can't stand it that his selfishness is making my sister so miserable. miserable to the point where she's thinking of not marrying C after all. she loves him very much, but it is his family she cannot stand, especially D and their mother. i can't stand it. i can't stand them.

my sister talked with C lastnight and told him how she felt, how she wanted to postpone the wedding for now so that D and his girlfriend can get married first. she hopes that if they get married first, there is nothing more they can do to steal the attention from them. i know deep within that if they do get married, they will be strangled by their own misery. D has always gotten what he wants, but people like that also get what they despise two-fold. they can't get married. they don't love each other and they're only doing it for some attention. this is wrong.

my mother checked the contract she had signed with the hotel where my sister's reception is going to be. she paid almost $6,000 for that ballroom, and if my sister and C decide to postpone or cancel the wedding, my mother will not get a refund. this makes me mad as well. my mother said--valiantly, i must say--that she can afford to lose $6,000 as long as my sister is happy. but i am angry that we should have to sacrifice that money and my sister's happiness for D and his stupid antics.

i am angry, and i can feel that kind of poison running through me. i'm scared that i'll say something unforgivable if i am forced to see D or his mother, so i am trying my best to stay away.

my time is up, i have to go. that was my weekend.

i'm having a hard time breathing at the moment. was just researching directions to UCLA in preparation of tomorrow when i checked the panel schedule.

11:30 AM - Young Adult Fiction: Not Just for Kids
Young Hall CS 50 PANEL 2092
Moderator Ms. Barbara DeMarco-Barrett
Mr. Eoin Colfer
Ms. Jane Louise Curry
Ms. Cynthia Kadohata

MR. EOIN COLFER! i can't believe it. seeing his name was like getting kicked in the stomach. i'm excited, but at the same time disappointed. there is no way i will be able to leave the booth just to see him talk halfway across campus. but maybe, just maybe, if i grovelled convincingly enough, alex will let me take a break from work and barrel over to see him. just maybe.

and it wouldn't hurt to see Ms. Cynthia Kadohata either, especially since her book Kira Kira recieved the newberry medal for 2005. besides, from the looks of the schedule, these panels are only supposed to be 30 minutes long. maybe i could take my lunch break early.

oh, the turmoil, the turmoil!!

p.s. to those of you--namely madeyes--who wished me luck, i thank you from the heart of my bottom and i must say that your confidence in me will hopefully pull me through.

have a good weekend!

oh my...

i just typed up a four page rough draft. i am exhausted. my brain, poor thing, puttered out long ago. i don't know where those last two pages came from but i know i'll be ashamed of them tomorrow when i re-read what i wrote.

just felt like stopping by to wind-down, but i've already crashed, so i guess that isn't really necessary.

this weekend is going to be a nightmare:
saturday: Los Angeles Times Festival of Books from 7:00am-5:oopm
i am working at the booth for the bookstore. from what i hear its going to be hectic and wet. and we live an hour away from UCLA where its going to be, so that means we have to be on the road by 6 am at the latest.

saturday: church at 5:30pm since i won't be able to go on sunday

saturday: home by 6:30 (hopefully) freshen up a bit and then smile and begin to greet the 25some guests coming over to our house for my sister and her fiance's engagement party.

who knows when i'll get to bed then.

sunday: at UCLA for the second day of the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. call time: 8:00am. it will end sometime around 5:00.

sunday: go to torrance for my aunt's surprise birthday party at 7:00pm. we think she might get proposed to but mum's the word.

i don't know how i'm going to do it, but i've done it before. junior year of highschool i had two shows to perform in around christmas time. the Sound of Music and the annual Madrigal Feast. rehearsals occurred right after each other. one week i performed every night at the Huntington Beach library. second week, i performed all week at the Anaheim Convention center. this includes set up and breakdown. also during the second week, we had to sing for the Advent Masses. i remember falling asleep in the dressing room and waking up just in time to put on my stage makeup.

but it was good times. i'm excited about the book festival because i've never been to one before--i just hope i can keep my head level. there was another signing at the bookstore on wednesday and if the festival is anything like that hectic day, i'll have to keep my wits about me.

goodnight, sweet dreams...

linguistic determinism

this morning, when i woke, the first thing i did was groan. i usually can sleep in on tuesdays, but with my new schedule, i have my first class at 11:00. i did not want to come to discussion this morning.

said discussion is for my anthropology 2D lecture. linguistic anthropology. i took this class because i couldn't get into linguistics 30 since it was full and i didn't want to forget all the linguistics i had learned. so this is sort of a refresher course and it conveniently satisfies my social sciences requirement as well.

the discussion was actually interesting.

linguistic determinism is the title of a theory of linguistics that claims that language determines peoples' thought process. we were supposed to discuss in groups for ten minutes and then present our gatherings. is it true or not? can it be supported, or is it a ridiculous theory?

this is what i brought to the table:
- some languages in Africa do not have a word equivalent to the english word "maybe". so the idea of "maybe" is lost in translation. i do believe that this effects the way some Africans think because they can only think in terms of "yes" or "no". does this mean, however, that everything is definite in their culture? i would hope not. i am sure they must deal with difficult moral decisions where "maybe" is sometimes the only available answer. do they not understand the concept of multiple outcomes and consequences for a certain action? i don't think so. so linguistic determinism does in a way determine a peoples thought processes, but maybe only culturally.

- what about languages that are derived from other languages or have traces of foreign languages in the vocabulary? take English: it borrows plenty of terms from french, latin, etc. does this mean that people who speak english and french think the same way? i don't think so.

- what about the syntax and grammar of other languages? does the different structure of sentences in each language somehow effect in what order that certain person thinks in? when, in mandarin chinese, one word has multiple meanings, does it mean that the Chinese are deeper thinkers? i doubt this as well. everyone has the capacity to think with depth, nevermind the complexities in their language. after all, all the languages in the world are equally complex. and that is a fact.

- written language also challenges the idea of linguistic determinism. the Chinese and Japanese write in characters. does this mean that they learn visually better than others? in the Roman alphabet, one letter has no meaning on its own. but with characters, one character has a meaning. it is also true that every line in that character represents a thought. these characters have such subtleties that one visual is compact with information. what does this say about how the Chinese and Japanese think?

none of us had a definite opinion, however. it is too difficult a question to answer in the 45 minutes allotted to us, but we had some really good discussion. someone mentioned that whenever he speaks Spanish he is more polite than usual and that the language makes it difficult to be impolite. i wonder if this is true?

then our TA asked us another question: is language necessary for thought?

some of us argued what constituted thought. there is always instinct and intuition, but actual thought is different from these. some argued that language is only necessary when one wants to communicate thought, but otherwise, one could still think internally without language.

i wasn't, and am still, not sure. if the evolutionary process of humans is accurate, we lived extremely primitive lives before speech, our survival based on instinct and intuition. it is hard for me to believe there was any kind of significant thought without language back then. but at the same time, there is emotion without language. but emotion and thought aren't the same things, are they?

so, even though attending discussion is mandatory, i'm glad i went. it was eye-opening.

distracted

i was endeavoring to be a good student and do the required reading for tomorrow's lecture, but i couldn't stop laughing! as soon as i tried to focus on the words, i would just start laughing all over again. and the strangest thing is, i was alone in the livingroom. no one was making me laugh. just imagine: me sitting in the middle of the sofa, by myself, with a pillow and book in my lap laughing all alone. my mother--bless her courage--went so far as to ask me why i was laughing. i almost said "for no reason" but said instead "i'm just remembering".

i don't know what it is, but sometimes laughter just wells up. this evening, it was because i was remembering very odd bits of things that were funny. one of the manager's at my old job was a very happy person. she got along with everyone and laughed frequently. compared to her, i was an old woman--she was that energetic and quirky. she once washed her feet in the bathroom because she couldn't stand switching from shoes to sandals without washing her feet first. what i was remembering, however, was the one time i made her laugh and i mean, truly laugh. we were sitting in the office--cutting out intouch forms, i think--when i imitated a woman on a talk show who was offended that people were criticizing her for getting breast implants. it began with the "don't be hatin'...". now, i have already mentioned that she laughed pretty much on a regular basis, but she practically exploded into this strange goat-bleeting type laugh! i was so startled that i began to laugh too. she was laughing so hard, that she was doubled over, and all the time her laugh was completely new, the aforementioned bleeting-like-a-hyper-goat laugh! just remembering the look on her face and the sound of her bleeting was enough to make me loose my focus while trying to read and laugh at the memory.

then, just as quickly, i remembered the first time my sister randomly shouted, "Alfonso!" and then just as randomly shouted "Eureka!" she said she got it from a video she watched freshman year in her english class with Sr. Marie. the woman, presumably Eureka, calls her husband Alfonso because something terrible has happened and her husband shouts her name in return because...i never found out why, maybe he thought it was her fault? so now, at random intervals i would shout "Alfonso!" and she would shout "Eureka!" and we'd both dissolve into mad laughter.

mingled with this memory is another memory of my sister shouting randomly. she loves the movie "William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet", the one with claire danes and leonardo dicaprio. in that movie, juliet's father bellows down the stairs, "Julietta!" except he pronounces it "hulietta".

lol, my sister does a lot of random shouting. come to think of it, so do i...

so, now that it is 10:30, i think i should at least try to redeem myself and do some study questions.

memo to me:
1. do not forget to go to voice tomorrow at 12:30
2. do not forget about surprise birthday party at 7:00 on sunday
3. do not forget to stop by the bookstore at 6:00 on thursday
4. do not forget to do discovery task #5 and subsequent journals

this weekend is going to be a nightmare. i hope i survive...

an elephant never forgets!

my head is fit to bursting with everything i want to say. this day, for some strange reason, has been one of those full days when there's never a quiet moment. i fear this post is going to be prodigiously long.

first, i woke to my alarm. on a saturday. maybe that's what started it. i had an appointment with the eye doctor at 10:00. lol, the fact that i had to set my alarm in the morning to get to an appointment at 10:00 is a clear indication of what kind of lifestyle i live. so. i go to the appointment, find that my eyes have gotten worse (of course), get a new prescription, then zoom outta there to get to work at 11:00. get to work and am busy for the day, which is a boon in disguise since the bookstore needs busy days like today. and i met an author named neal shusterman who wrote one of the funniest books i've read: The Schwa was Here. at first i didn't know who he was, only that he knew alex since he greeted her first. he had his four children with him, all of them dreadfully good-looking. then alex gave me an introduction and i felt surprisingly calm, even though the title of his book sort of ejected off my tongue rather fast. i didn't even say hello. just, "oh! the schwa was here." and he smiled and said that he was surprised i would have heard of it. then we had this really good discussion about books, authors, and things like that. i'm such a nerd, i know.

then they left, the store closed and i helped alex bring things down to the dungeons for storage. got in my car, and drove home. some old guy smoking a cigarette took the only empty parking space on the curb by my house, so i had to park a street away and walk to my front door. then he ended up leaving as i was walking by. unlocked the door, am greeted noisily by the birds and hear vacuuming upstairs. find that my room has been dusted and vacuumed for me, am grateful, then set to work balancing the checkbook and paying bills. finish that, and am in the middle of reorganizing my bookshelf (again, yes, i am a nerd) when i hear my mom calling from downstairs: "anak! will you vacuum the stairs?"

i loathe vacuuming the stairs. i hate it with the deepest part of my being. i think i've said it before, but i hate carpet. when i buy my first house, i will make sure there is no carpet. i don't care if the floor will be cold in the winter--rather that than carpet! well, that and linoleum (could you imagine an all linoleum house?).

ahem. i said yes only because she is my mother and carried my weight around for nine months so the least i could do is vacuum the stairs for her. i was so tired from work that it took me longer than usual. our stairs are divided into two small flights and a strange shaped landing. seven steps-landing-seven steps-livingroom. the very last step of the very last flight has a crevice between step and banister wherein a daddy-long legged spider usually stores his or her stash of dead ants. it is very disturbing to accidentally pass the nozel over that crevice and have a spider come scurrying out. in this case, the attachments weren't cooperating and i didn't even have the comfort of having carpet with no footprints.

explanation: there is one thing i like about vacuuming my room (of course, i didn't get to vacuum my room today, just the despised stairs). i start by my bookshelf, then to go to the right past my bed towards my desk. then to the right again, inside my closet by my other bookshelf and then behind the door. the threshold is the very last. when i am finished, the carpet is completely unmarked by a human, there are no footprints. this gives me a strange sort of satisfaction and i avoid stepping into my room for the rest of the afternoon just so that the carpet remains unmarked. i don't know why that is. i think it has something to do with looking at my room for the first time after it was finished being built. aside from the dead flies by the closet and by the window (died from paint fumes. isn't that horrible?) the room was completely empty and i noticed no footprints.

after the stairs, i went up to my room and apparently got sunburned by my desk lamp. of course i didn't realize this until my father asked me why my face was so red. "did you stay under the sun today?" to which i replied that i hadn't. "you look flushed" my mother admitted, so i told them how i'd been working at my desk and how the light from the desk lamp was rather warm. "oh, that was probably it," he says sagely, "that lamp emits uv rays." so now, the desk lamp that my father bought me from ikea is a household hazard. no one offered to buy me another or caution me against using it in the future. i'm not sure whether to believe it.

then we had breakfast for dinner--one of the best things in the world--and i had a cookie, tea, and pieces of a caramel apple afterwards. my stomach is very much contented. the birds took a bath in their drinking water, silly creatures.

then my mother--in a disturbingly business woman mood--tells me about her children's bookstore project that she plans to put into effect when she has retired from the corporate world. of course, i was the one to ask her about it in the first place. ahem, of course. i feel a little anxious about it and hope that she doesn't go through with the more eccentric details of her bookstore plan. after all, it should be about the books.

am made to do the dishes--which i don't mind as much as vacuuming. while i do this my father reads to me from the "publication of the Irvine Company that explores the elements of a balanced community". in a few words, they plan to pollute the avocado plantations from our house with estate homes and ranches.

what i love about my city:
1. the avocado plantations (the trees have been looking bushier lately. perhaps they are ripe)
2. the Lomas De Santiago Ridgeline (which is my own personal weathervane)
3. the deserted El Torro marine base (i once wrote an essay about it)
4. how funny it is that all the wide streets here have bike lanes.
5. the smell of ripe strawberries midsummer.
6. the vast tracts of undeveloped land
7. the weather
8. its proximity to the beach.
9. the parks
10. the windrows of eucalyptus trees

what i don't love about my city:
1. the smell of fertilizer in the winter (it really is disgusting)
2. the drivers (so rude!)
3. the irvine company wanting to build homes where they would be most invasive
4. the snobby rich families
5. how everyone runs in the morning
6. how some people wanted to demolish El Torro and build either a prison or airport
7. how some people consider others outside of our city inferior

needless to say, i want those avocado plantations left alone. besides, those lands are wild. we get coyotes howling late on summer nights and there are insects like you won't believe. not to mention the landfill and the rattlesnake reservoir. that's another thing i don't like about my city: the landfill. the bunnies and hawks are alright.

and having writ this, i am exhausted. there was so much more i wanted to mention (not that you would have wanted to read it anyway), but i still need to clean up before i collapse onto the mattress that is getting increasingly more uncomfortable for me to sleep on. its...ten years old, i think. i'm sure i left something out and will wake up annoying early tomorrow morning because i'll suddenly remember what it is.

but i'm...

*yawns*

...so tired.

goodnight.

human wreckage

i read a book lastnight that disturbed me--not because it had physical violence or because it was psychologically horrifying. its an innocent book in many ways and a new york times bestseller. but it disturbed me all the same.

i don't know anything about love or relationships. how can i? but even in my ignorance i knew this was wrong.

in this book, a boy and a girl are in love, but its a long-distance relationship. the girl--in throes of agony because she wants to forget about this boy she loves so far away--breaks up with him in an attempt to be free from lovesickness and regain some vestige of happiness. it doesn't work. instead, when she finds out he's been seen with another girl, she regrets ever breaking up with him because she misses him, etc. so far, nothing about this story sounds remarkable or worthy of note, especially for a person like me who has a nasty way of looking at cliche storylines. well, the boy comes to visit and she sees him for the first time in half a year. at first she is too much of a coward to do anything but slam a door in his face and wring her hands. then gradually--with her sister and friends egging her on--she realizes that she's tired of being a coward and sneaks to the house he is staying in the middle of the night and asks to talk to him. she is honest and they both admit to being in love with one another. how nice. from that night on, she and her boy are on a downward spiral, unable to live without each other, forgetting about living normal lives if the other isn't near. and so on.

then he tells her he must go home. she thinks it is a family emergency but he tells her that it isn't. some short letters later, he tells her that he doesn't think they should have a relationship anymore; that he will always love her even if he tried not to. she is just about to be heartbroken for another month when she finds out that her grandfather has died. she and her family go to his funeral and she sees her boy there since her grandfather was almost like a grandfather to him. her boy with his new bride on his arm. his bride.

he finally explains to her that after she had broken things off he went out with this woman three times and that the only reason why he married her is because he got her pregnant by accident. she was his rebound...thing...and he got her pregnant. he said he would always love her but that he was a bastard (for getting the girl pregnant) but also a gentleman (for taking responsibility for his actions and marrying the skank).

and in all honesty, this broke my heart. because in a moment of weakness he lost everything that could have made him happy. and he ruined her life as well. its just a story, i know, but it still disturbs me; and i don't know whether its because he slept with this woman on their second night out or whether it is because he married her only because she's pregnant or whether it is because the girl he loves has had her heart broken. now he's tied down because he's married to this woman he doesn't love and he does not have enough money to support a family yet.

and i keep telling myself how RIDICULOUS it is for me to feel this way because (1) its just a story, (2) i'm getting so bent out of shape over something that happens all the time and (3) i have more important things to worry about and here i am brooding over this tragic love story that is far beyond sense and reason!

i think the dilemma is what really bothers me. i wanted to ask a guy today what he would do in the same situation: would you marry the girl you impregnated even though you love someone else? would you marry her because you feel obligated to take care of the girl carrying your child, even if your true love was somebody else? if the guy said "yes, i would marry her" this would break my heart. if he said "no, i would not marry her" this would disgust me. any answer to this question would make me unhappy! the question itself is just too...wrong. a guy should not have to make that decision.

so, again, its just a story, but its been bothering me all day. if anyone is reading this, which i doubt, i fervently hope that none of you will have to make this decision. i also hope that no one judges me soley on this post. if i've offended anyone, that was not my intention when i wrote it.

*continues to feel miserable*

i think i should cease with the dwelling...

my jane and elizabeth

i am so full its almost sickening. its that kind of full where you can't breathe if you stand up straight because your stomach is being stretched to the limit. lol, and here i am, sitting sedate in this chair typing up another post. i should be running all this off!

i have been reading so much the past few weeks that after finishing each book, my head feels fuzzy. and it is not an alien kind of fuzzy since i've had this feeling before. it is the same feeling i get late at night/early morning when i have just finished forcing out a five page paper. its somewhat like an ouroborus. where writing ends, reading begins and vice versa. writing and reading both require the same amount of effort sometimes, although some may argue that you can read passively. trust me, reading requires more energy than you would think, especially if you're doing about 150 pages an hour.

and you are mistaken if you think all this reading is for school.

since getting this job at the children's bookstore, i have read enough to rival that one summer i worked at the local library. in order to sell books, i must be able to give an adequate synopsis on the ones i am attempting to sell. ergo, i have spent numerous evenings and an unthinkable amount of money buying and reading children's literature. most people have their own assumptions about children's literature--most of which are fast and loose. children's literature is not just picture books. classics written by great authors such as Dickens and Alcott fall under this category; riske books about sexual growth and angst; science fiction/fantasy books that have left their mark for ages; all these things are included. during the slow hours at work, i browse the picture books while at home i read the larger novels. i intend to make a list of the books i have known.

and since getting this job, i have realized that children's literature is my niche. i am proud to say that i have read my share of classics: Pride and Prejudice, The Scarlet Letter, East of Eden, Paradise Lost, but all these haven't marked me like those books that dominate one of my bookshelves, which are books that fall under children's literature. i think that a lot of adult novels these days lack the simplicity and depth of some of the "children's" books i have read. subjects explored in both adult novels and children's books seem to have a great deal more of compassion and understanding in the latter. adult novels seem so disinterested and disillusioned to me. everything presented in adult novels are crass and apathetic. the humor is caustic and the plot sometimes manipulated to intrigue. its dark and unwelcoming. some would say "like the real world", but people see what they want to see, and i want to see a world with more heart. is that naive?

my sister says i am an elizabeth. one of my very good friends says i am a jane. i once wanted to be more like the former, but am beginning to realize that i am both. at times i can be perceptive and outspoken enough to be rude. at other times i refuse to see the bad in some people--either by design or patience. this patience is what makes me a jane in my friend's eyes, but sometimes my temper seems too short. are all people a mass of contradictions like i seem to be? sometimes it makes me proud that i have many sides. sometimes it makes me frustrated and even abashed.

author's i have met:
Patrick Carmen
Theodore Taylor
Steve Bjorkman
Pam Munoz Ryan

tomorrow i will meet an author of a self-titled "gothic" novel. as i did not really like the book, i shall see how my manners fare. innovative is the word.