Chicken Little

Okay. So.

The sky was falling.

For those of you who don't live on the East Coast, let me explain: we had a record-breaking blizzard this weekend, called Nemo. Several fronts and airs and precipitations (i don't know weather terms) all combined and worked their way up the coast. In lower states like Maryland, Delaware, and Pennsylvania, it was mostly rain and wind, but by the time it reached New Jersey, it was snowing. NJ got about 15 inches, and coastal towns had some flooding, but it wasn't too bad (although they haven't really bounced back from Sandy). But as Nemo got closer to New England, it turned into a full-scale disaster storm.

We got 30 inches of snow, with drifts and snowbanks reaching 4-5 feet. Also? Thundersnow. (bucket list: check). That's exactly what you think it is: thunder and lightning while it is snowing. Power was out all over several cities. I personally lost power for about fourteen hours, but some places lost power Friday night and won't get it back till Thursday. The roads are so clogged with snow and ice and cars stuck in snowbanks that plows can't do much to help, and there's nowhere to put all the excess snow, anyway. Storm surges caused flooding, and several towns were evacuated.

I've had power outages before, sometimes for a few minutes, sometimes for a few hours. But never in the dead of winter, and never for very long. It was fun for a while: me and my boyfriend and his roommate and his roommate's cat all snuggled together with candlelight and booze, but when i woke up in the morning and realized we still had no power (no heat, no lights, no refrigeration), i got a little scared. They have a gas stove, so i made pancakes and the heat from the burners and the warm food helped. Then we all put on lots of layers and went out to start shoveling. When the power came back, a cheer rippled through the whole neighborhood.

My office was closed for four days (Friday-Monday), so this is my first day back. It's going to be a hell of a week.

Oh and also, my brother is having a really rough time dealing with his recovery and my friend is dying. Very soon, in fact. So i may be traveling some next week to see him.

On a happier note? The boyfriend and i had our Valentine's celebration last night, partly because we needed some joy and love and partly because he was thinking about leaving on Thursday or Friday to see our friend. And it was a wonderful Valentine's day. We had steak and rice and veggies (lovingly prepared by John), and wine (lovingly selected by me) and Black Forest Cake with wine-stewed cherries (lovingly prepared by me). Then we exchanged presents (slippers and fun socks for him, pearls for me). Then we watched "Wanted" (because Angelina Jolie is on his list and James McAvoy is on mine), and then we snuggled and went to bed.

So. Once more into the breach.

oh hey

So. Um.

Posting has been a little erratic lately. I do know that. Sorry.

All i can really say is that i've been so busy actually doing things that i have no time to write about them. I'll give you guys a quick synopsis of the past month and a half, and then we'll call it even, k?

So, in October, one of my best friends married her best friend, and i was a bridesmaid. So Boyfriend and i took a train, which arrived in Philly at 4:30 am, and then we waited for the rental car place to open. Then when it did, they apparently required a deposit (which they had not told us when we made the reservation and which he has never had to pay before when he has rented a car), and since he didn't have enough money in his account to cover the whole thing, his card was declined. So he made some angry phone calls, and i pulled out my iPad and transferred some money from my savings account and paid for the rental car. Then we went out to the parking lot, and our car was blocked in by three other cars. We called the office to ask them to move it, and then sat there for twenty minutes waiting. Finally, someone came out and walked around the three cars blocking us, looking confused, until Boyfriend got out and said, "Hey, can you move one of these cars so we can get out?" The guy looked more confused. Apparently, the office had told him to move a car, but not which car or why they needed it moved. Another ten minutes went by before we could leave. We slept at the hotel for a few hours, and then went to set up the church/rehearse/have the rehearsal dinner. Then the other bridesmaids and i stayed at the bride's parents' house. Then the wedding, and then the reception, and then Boyfriend and i went back to our hotel and passed out, exhausted. We checked out early the next morning, because our train left at 7:30. The rental car place wasn't open, and the gate to get into the rental lot wouldn't open, so we had to leave the car in the regular parking garage. A few hours later, when we were on the train, we got a rude phone call from the office, demanding to know where the car was. The story ends with Boyfriend writing an angry letter to the rental company.

The following weekend, we went to see Ingrid Michaelson on her acoustic tour with Katie Herzig. It was honestly one of the best shows i have ever seen. Both ladies were enormously talented, obviously, but they were also both very laid back and friendly and chatty. The whole thing felt like sitting in coffee shop, watching your friend perform. It was really lovely. Boyfriend and i had an amazing hotel room, and we spent some time cuddling, and antiquing, and exploring, and doing other things. On our way back home, we stopped at a state liquor store (we were in New Hampshire), and stocked up.

Then there was a hurricane. I was making myself dinner and drinking a rum and coke, when my roommates invited me to hang out. So i grabbed a bottle of wine and went downstairs, where we played Cards Against Humanity and i drank nearly the whole bottle of wine on my own. Then we took a break, and i went upstairs and got my special Black Velvet Toasted Caramel whiskey. We mixed it with apple cider and the rest of the evening is kind of a blur. I know i ate some pizza at one point. The next day, i took a sick day. Partly because i wanted to do laundry and never take any sick time and was out of vacation and personal time, and partly because i was too hung over to go into work.

Then i was proofreading and editing a paper for a guy in an MBA program. English was not his first language, and business is not my thing, so it was a lot of work. But it's the kind of work i love, so it was awesome.

Then Boyfriend and i had some serious discussions, and then i wrote him a whole bunch of love letters. Like, pen to paper, envelope, send through snail mail love letters that our grandchildren will read over one day. I know. How cute are we?

And then we organized our Thanksgiving trip down to Maryland to see my family and eat pie.

And finally, i and one of my downstairs neighbors have started an informal writing workshop group. So far, it's just the two of us, but we're hoping to expand soon. So i was revising old things, and realizing that everything i write should just be a sonnet and i should stop pretending that it isn't, and that i've missed this, and then i sent him two poems and he sent me a one-act play and we will meet this weekend to workshop them.

Oh! And i've also started going to the gym 3ish times a week. I do mountain climbing on the treadmill to a 90's pop music playlist, except for when i forget my iPod, in which case i watch Frasier instead. And then i drink a lot of water and eat some almonds or cashews and then go home and order a calzone or some Chinese food and eat it all in one sitting while watching The Office. It feels so great to be healthy.

Dear Amtrak

On the evening of Sunday, June 10th, I went to the Wilmington, DE station to board my 11:36pm train back to Boston. Your website recommends arriving 30 minutes before you are scheduled to board; I was there 45 minutes early. I had already printed my ticket, and I checked the departure board before going to the platform. The board told me my gate, and had the correct time listed for my departure (11:36). By 11:45, I was beginning to wonder if there had been a delay. Although the platform had electronic message boards to alert passengers of any changes in the schedule, I had not seen anything at all about my train. By midnight, I was seriously concerned. I called my father, who went online and discovered that power outages down the line had delayed all trains by at least an hour; my train would probably not arrive until one AM.

The message boards on the platform still said nothing.

Eventually, trains began arriving. However, the message boards were not being updated properly, so they were giving last boarding call fifteen minutes before the trains had even arrived at the station. As you can imagine, this caused some confusion.

I was scheduled to be on the 66 train to Boston. Eventually, a 900-something train pulled into the station. The electronic message boards had no information about what train this was, the conductors announced nothing, and I didn't see anyone to ask. I assumed that my train would be the next one and settled down to wait. A security guard working at the station came to me after the train had pulled out to inform me that that was the last train of the night. I eventually had to pay an extra $69 for a train that left at 4:50 the next morning. I will miss a day of work, not to mention a night of sleep.

I understand that delays happen from time to time, and that they are no one's fault. I understand that there are mechanical difficulties, communications snafus, and any manner of other mistakes that cause confusion. However, it is your job to work as hard as you can to keep all of your passengers informed of any changes in their travel plans. All stations need to be made aware of delays, and need to update their passengers accordingly. When you know that there has been an issue, you need to work extra hard to ensure that everyone knows what is going on. Plans change, and it's not necessarily anyone's fault. That's okay. What is not okay is not telling anyone that plans have changed.

I have been deeply disappointed and greatly inconvenienced by your mistakes this weekend. In future, please endeavor to suck less.

Tired, hungry, frustrated, and broke,
Diana Lark

playlist ruminations

Some girls, they glow in darkness

But by our standards, that's not much

Some girls, they'd like to win

But instead they'll serve you lunch

I love to travel. I like the inbetweenness of it, the freedom of not really being anywhere. You're departing and arriving all at once. It's so ethereal and poetic. It's also romantic and magical, especially when you're on a train. I watched a lot of old movies/read a lot of British novels when i was a kid. And still do. And always will.

But i can't sleep when i travel. With all the flying i have done, including international flights across oceans late at night, i think i've slept on a plane twice. Once i slept in an airport in Spain, because i was on a layover and was better able to sleep in the tiny airport chair with the janitors walking by than in the airplane. I don't sleep in cars, i don't sleep in trains, i don't sleep on buses.

I don't think i've ever seen the train this full before. Conversely, i've never had so much legroom. I think i accidentally took a handicapped seat.

It's coming up on midnight now, and i'm sleepy and writing and listening to music and doing homework. And staying awake, munching dried mango and sunflower seeds. God, i'm such a hippie sometimes.

That's what takes up time in this life

Add up the sum of the slights

And sooner or later

Love comes inside you

Gets behind you 

Takes you under its wing

It's partly that i'm afraid of someone stealing my things while i sleep. It's partly that transportation seating is generally not as sleep-inducing as my memory foam mattress pad and my warm, cozy boyfriend. It's partly just that i'm enjoying the ride so much.

Of course, i also have massive amounts of homework to do. And i am happily ignoring it all to blog. I am so self-sabotaging sometimes.


We long for journeys and the roadside

We long for starlight and the low tide

Yeah, we long for fairy tales and firesides

But it's also really healthy for me, mentally, to be taking this time. I don't spend much time alone these days. I mean, sometimes John isn't around and i eat and/or sleep alone, and sometimes i'm driving alone or in the grocery store alone, etc. But i don't often take time to intentionally be by myself. When i'm alone, it's usually a fluke: waiting for someone, someone is waiting for me, staying up in the kitchen doing homework while John sleeps.

We long for sunlight on the hillsides
Yeah, we long for yesterdays and hindsight
Oh, we long for fairy tales and firesides

This trip is just me.

Yeah, we long for carnivals and fairground rides
Oh, we long for journeys and the roadsides
Oh, we long for fairy tales and firesides

well okay then

This weekend, John and i went to Bethesda to visit my brother. My aunt brought us a copy of our hometown newspaper, which featured a front-page story about my brother going home for the first time and seeing friends and family.

This story was just above one about a bee colony being moved.

The bee colony story beat out the article about bomb threats to local schools and my gynecologist running for congress. The bomb threat story had a typo in the name of the town.

This is the same town where there was once a fifteen minute traffic delay because a cow got onto the bridge.

You can't make this shit up.

sketchy things i have done

Camping

Once, when i was really little (like 4 or 5), my family went camping. Our particular campsite was a little removed from the bathrooms, which were on the other side of a little creek. One day, i needed to go to the bathroom. No one else needed to, so i decided to go alone.

Have i mentioned that i have a really terrible sense of direction?

Several hours later, i was wandering on the OTHER SIDE OF THE CAMPGROUND, crying and alone, and with (i was little, okay?) dampened drawers. A lady in a car stopped and asked if she could help me. I got in her car, and she took me to the bathroom. When i got out, my mom was there.

Tattoo

When i decided to get my second tattoo, one of my downstairs neighbors recommended a friend of his. My roommates and i drove to a slightly ghetto neighborhood and met the guy at his house. He explained that, while he was fully licensed to tattoo, his parlor was temporarily closed for a board of health violation. Apparently, the piercing guy was under investigation for performing a procedure he was not licensed for. According to my roommate's friend, the piercing guy was fully licensed, but the bitch at the board of health had it in for them. So he took us into the back room of his house, where i laid on the couch to be tattooed.

Turned out fine, by the way.

Bacchanal

When i was in Spain in 2007, i was invited to a "bacchanal". I was excited to see reenactments of Greek mythology, and was slightly disappointed to learn that, instead, it was just an insane party on the outskirts of town in an abandoned warehouse. (Man, i'm a nerd.) However, the warehouse was sort of decorated inside with fake grapevines, and i'm pretty sure Bacchus would have been thrilled to attend this shindig. I was going with two girls i had met the day before, the cousins of the woman i was staying with. They spoke very little English, and i spoke very little Spanish. Also, i couldn't remember their names. I think one of them was Laura? No, that was their friend.

We stopped on our way to buy two huge bottles of rum and two 2-liter bottles of Coke.

Throughout the evening, we drank all of what we had, bought some beers, and also shared whiskey and coke with strangers. My companions smoked some weed and offered it to me. (I declined.) Laura also did a few lines of coke in a van. She spent much of the rest of the evening (actually, by then it was early morning) asking me in broken English if i was mad at her for doing hard drugs.

At around 7:30 am, we got a cab back to their apartment and slept for a few hours.

Senior Week

When i was twelve, my cousin Lynne (thirteen at the time) was about to move to Utah. So our grandmother took us, along with Agelseb (12) and our friend Renee (13), to the beach. It was senior week, so the whole town was crowded with drunk and/or high teenagers hooking up on every available flat surface. Most of them were at least eighteen (or sixteen, with fake IDs), but several were older. And then there was us.

Our grandmother let us go out at night alone, as long as we didn't wander out of sight of the hotel. Lots of drunk/high boys tried to pick us up, but Agelseb's shrill declarations that we were twelve kept us (relatively) safe from harassment. We were just lucky that we didn't encounter anyone drunk and/or sketchy enough to risk jailbait.

Agelseb nearly gave our addresses and names to some guys with a video camera, though.

Theo

One time, i hooked up with a friend of mine while another friend slept on the floor next to the bed we were using. Yeah, that was gross.

Barnes and Noble

One time, my sister was visiting me at college. My boyfriend-at-the-time and i took her to B&N, because she and i both had Christmas gift cards to spend. Since none of us had a car, and the bus didn't go where we needed it to, we walked. About three and a half miles. In the dark. Next to and across three-lane highways. Without a map.

Redneck Roller Coaster

When i was seventeen, my friends Agelseb and "Fay" and i decided to have an adventure. The back roads are long and winding, and when you go around them fast it is VERY DANGEROUS. And really really fun.

But we were the good kids, so we always drove safely on those roads.

But Fay was about to start college, and i was about to go to Europe, and when i got back Agelseb and i would be starting college, and we figured that this was our last chance to do something young and reckless. In retrospect, we were wrong (but almost right, since we almost died). As i have since discovered, life is full of chances for dumb adventures.

We were driving far too fast around a bend when Fay lost control of the car. We were skidding toward someone's living room window when she yanked the wheel and sent us skidding toward the ditch and trees. Suddenly, we were safely on the road and the car was still. We still don't know how we survived. I still haven't told my parents.

Just because no one died this time doesn't mean i had no reason to be afraid.

So i recently went to Maryland to see my brother and the rest of my family. I roadtripped down with Agelseb and Adam's girlfriend (we'll call her Vicky), but i flew back to Boston.

Here is what i wrote in my journal on the plane:

Guy next to me on the plane has a teardrop tattoo. Holy fuck.

Just barely made my flight. Like, i think they held the plane for me.

Teardrop Tattoo Guy is filming out the window of the plane. I think he's filming the wing. He's holding the camera by his head so that people walking past can't see it but i can see the screen if i sit just right and he's filming the wing.

Shit. Am i going to witness an act of terrorism?

Okay. I didn't die. I may have been overreacting slightly. It's been a very stressful week.

Also, i accidentally left my phone on for the duration of the flight, and we didn't even have any turbulence.

Teardrop Tattoo Guy really did film the wing of our plane the whole way from Baltimore to Philadelphia. Probably doing research for a future attack or something. Maybe. Or maybe he was just taking a film class.

So, what is there to do around here?

I've taken a quick trip down home to see my brother. His girlfriend came too. She has only been to Maryland once, and not to visit Adam. She has never been to our house or met most of our family.

As we sat at the dining room table, she doing homework and me reading The Bloggess, she asked what there was to do in our town. And could not stop laughing as i answered her.

"Well, in the next town over, there's a movie theater. It has five screens. There's a bigger theater about 40 minutes away.

"When i was in high school, the kids would all get into their pickup trucks, drive down to the shopping plaza, and smoke and drink until the cops came and told them to leave, because they were loitering. Then they'd drive a few hundred yards to the ice cream place and do the same thing until they went home to bed. This happened three or four nights out of the week, minimum.

"The town with the big theater also has a mall. And some restaurants.

"Other than that, there's the internet. Or cable. We read a lot . . ."

She nodded, still laughing, and said, "Okay."

I grinned. "Yeah. That's why i don't live here anymore."

None of the above activities were in any way exaggerated for comic effect.

Agelseb, part 2

When we were fourteen, Agelseb's parents decided to sell everything and live on a sailboat. True story.

They sold their house, quit their jobs, and drastically downsized their furniture, books, and knick-knacks. The really important and sentimental stuff was put in storage in a shed in my back yard, and a surprising amount of stuff was put on the boat. A 41-foot sailboat has a shocking amount of storage space.

And then they were off.

It was really hard on Agelseb, and she fought it as long and as hard as she could. Imagine being fourteen and taken away from all your friends and family. And it wasn't even like she was moving to a new town, where she could settle in and make new friends and call or email us regularly. They'd be living on a boat, moving around all over the place for three years. And electricity would be both expensive and hard to obtain, so electronic communication would be scarce, and even postcards could only be sent when they were docked somewhere.

Plus, Agelseb and her parents all three suffer from some degree of sea-sickness. So all in all, not a totally awesome plan.

41 feet is not a whole lot of space. It's less when an angry teenager is sharing it with her parents and a dog. It's even less than that when it's a boat, because there's no yard or cars to store extra stuff, and no way to leave the house and get away when you need some space. Your entire world is those 41 feet. On the bright side, they spent a lot of time in warmer climates, like Trinidad and Puerto Rico, so they could be out on the deck or in the water most days. But everything gets damp when you live on a boat, so there's always a faint mildew smell and sometimes your stuff gets ruined and what if you just want to have a milkshake or something? You know that you can't really freeze stuff on a little sailboat? You can't take long showers, either. And in addition to spending your time on schoolwork all alone, you can't go to the mall afterwards and you have to get up late at night to take your turn on watch. Yeah, that's real. It's not just something you have to do in the movies. There are still pirates in the world, not to mention storms and other boats and so forth. Someone has to be on watch at all times. Even if all three of you are puking your guts out.

I visited once, along with Aunt Sis. We stayed for about a month. The boat got even smaller, and our misery was added to by the fact that Aunt Sis is mentally handicapped and didn't really understand why we couldn't turn on the air conditioning. She complained a lot, but we all love her so we did our best to 1) accommodate her requests and make her comfortable and 2) ignore her whining.

Eventually, they decided to cut their trip short. Money was running low, Agelseb had come back for an extended visit and was resisting the return to the sea, and the call of the ocean can eventually be tuned out. They plan to write a book one day, but in the meantime, they pretty much have the monopoly on cool icebreaker stories. Not to mention that Agelseb, while still partly wishing she'd never gone, did appreciate the opportunity to live on a boat and sail the coast of North, South, and Central America. Plus she rarely takes things like hot running water and high speed internet for granted.

Awasiwi Odinak

When i was younger, if you had asked me what i wanted to be when i grew up, i would have told you that i wanted to be Laura Ingalls Wilder. I started reading the Little House books in elementary school and fell completely in love with the vivid descriptions of delicious homemade food, the wild adventures in the woods and on the prairies, the strong-willed and independent heroine, and the pioneer lifestyle.

At the time, we were living in the old house. I was enchanted by the seemingly boundless fields surrounding us. I liked civilization well enough, but being intensely introverted, i felt more comfortable in a place away from other people. I liked knowing that i could run until i was exhausted and still not see another person. I liked to look around me and see nothing but level fields, with trees far off in the distance. When Pa and Laura would stand together and gaze at the horizon, i could see the illimitable prairie in my mind's eye, and i too longed to explore it. I wanted to start walking, and keep going until i reached something new, something untouched by man.

I love to travel. I've been lucky enough to travel quite a bit in my life. I love even the boring parts, like four-hour layovers, and the inconvenient parts, like carrying my suitcases a mile to the train station. I love to fly, i love to drive, i love to take buses and trains, i love to sail and cruise.

Growing up in a small town, i quickly became accustomed to the idea that i would have to go places if i wanted to see things. There wasn't much to do where i lived; even going to the grocery store required a ten-minute car trip. The mall was forty minutes away, as was the nearest Walmart. And i didn't mind that. I lived far from the things of man, and to me, that meant peace and purity. The air was clean, the grass was fresh, and even the manure in the fields smelled almost sweet.

But then i discovered cities.

I'd been on field trips to DC, Baltimore, and Annapolis. I'd been shopping in Dover. I'd traveled to Chicago, Paris and Cologne. But those were always trips with a purpose. We saw the Holocaust museum in DC, as well as the Air and Space museum. We went to the mall in Dover to do our Christmas shopping. We delivered furniture to my cousin in Chicago. We climbed cathedral towers all over Europe.

When i was sixteen, my mother and i went to New York with my cousin and her mother. My cousin and i were both turning sixteen, and instead of a party, we took a weekend trip. Although i'd been a tourist in Europe, it was a trip of learning and culture. This trip was all about fun. We went to the city not because it was a place to learn about new cultures, or to see architecture, or because travel is broadening. We went to the city because cities are fun.

I fell in love with New York. I knew that Laura would have been horrified and disappointed, but i didn't care. New York City was like nothing i'd ever seen before, nothing i'd ever imagined. Movies and TV couldn't prepare me for the rush, the energy of being there.

I live in a city now, and i love it, but it's still not quite home. I miss clean horizons: views where all you can see, in every direction, is nature. No telephone poles, no cars or buildings, no people. Just water, or trees, or fields. Sometimes my need to see a clean horizon is so intense that i begin to feel suffocated. You know when you've been sitting at a desk all day and you start to feel twitchy? Like you just need to get up and walk around for a few minutes? That's how i feel nearly every day. But it's not just my body that longs for movement. It's my soul, too.

I walk a lot. I often walk four miles to my church, and i walk a mile each way to work and back nearly every day. I walk to the grocery store and back (another mile each way). I started walking because i don't have a car. I'm pretty practical, and i don't like to ask for help, so when i need to be somewhere, i just go. I don't freak out about how far it is or how long it will take. I get my ipod and some directions and start walking.

But walking is not just a way to get from point A to point B. It's also a way to keep my wanderlust in check. When my soul starts to get twitchy from being still and cramped for too long, i take it to find a clean horizon where it can breathe. When i start to feel claustrophobic from the people all around me, i go somewhere far from the things of man. Walking is the only thing that keeps me from selling everything and backpacking across Europe, or hitchhiking across the country. Sometimes i dream about leaving everything behind and becoming a nomad, seeing the whole world on my own terms. I want my only limits to be how far i can walk before i need to sleep (under the stars, of course).

In my head, i know that i can't just take off. And i know i wouldn't really like it after a while. I have friends, and work, and responsibilities here. And the reason i have those ties is because i like them. I like my cat. I like my books. I like my bed. I pay bills because it's worth it to me to ensure that i can keep my books and cat and bed. After about a week of being a homeless traveler, i'd be ready to return to civilization. But if i sold everything and left, there would be no going back.

So i walk.

Kindling

I have a confession to make.

A few months ago, i bought myself a Kindle.

I know, i know. It's an abomination. Reading is a very sensuous experience. You can feel the feathery, silky pages under your fingers and the pressure of the book in your hands. You smell the rich and varied scents of paper, ink, and binding, ranging from the intoxicating freshness of a brand-new book (which, incidentally, is exactly what my boyfriend smells like), to the dusty, leathery musk of a used one. You see the typeface, carefully selected for that particular text, and you see the covers, the myriad shades of white according to the type of paper used and the age of the book, the tiny imperfections of the page, and the smudges in the margins of a book well-read.

A Kindle has none of that. All typefaces are converted into one, and while it is clear and easy to read, it has none of the individuality of a paper text, nor can "hand-written" notes in the story be seen in their original glory. It smells very faintly of plastic and the fake leather of the case. There is no variety in the smooth perfection of the virtual pages, and even underlining or comments in the margins create only a minimal disturbance in the pristine, black-and-white visual. It is clean, sterile, and heartless.

I have also been accused of contributing to the downfall of the publishing companies. This is just nonsense. First of all, i will still buy paper texts. The Kindle is mostly for travel and beach fiction. Secondly, the publishing companies are the ones who create and distribute the ebooks. Finally, most of the books on my Kindle are in the public domain, meaning that they are free and can be found on a number of websites (my personal favorites are Amazon and Gutenberg). Sure, publishing companies make money off of them, but only by reprinting existing editions with fancier covers (and yes, i covet those with all my soul, but i am not currently in a position to slap down $10 on a shiny new Jane Austen novel, when i already own three copies of it.) Furthermore, many of my Kindle ebooks are simply free digital copies of books that i already own in paper format, and that i paid good money to a publishing company to obtain. I just want a digital backup so that i can take my favorite books on the road or to the beach, and so that i will always have a copy, no matter how many paperbacks i read into confetti.

Why did i buy a Kindle? A few different reasons. First, i live in Massachusetts, and my family lives in Delmarva. When i go home for holidays, i spend lots of time either in an airport or in a bus/car. Then i get to the house, where everyone is at work or school. I have no car, and no job/school/friends to occupy me, and we are ten miles from the nearest shopping district. So i bring lots of books with me. Meaning i have to lug heavy suitcases around everywhere and i have no room for clothes. A Kindle means that i can bring thousands of books with me, in a package smaller than most paperbacks and weighing hardly more than my phone.

Next, i'll be starting grad school in the fall. Most Kindle ebooks cost less than $25. So i can buy one Kindle for $140 and a bunch of textbooks for $25 or less, or i can buy a bunch of textbooks for $100-300 each. I know that many textbooks can be bought used for much cheaper, and that is indeed how i got through my undergraduate education. But here is something else to consider: i find that i never really need to read my textbooks. Sometimes, sure, they are helpful, but for the most part i find that lecture notes are perfectly adequate. Kindle allows you to download a sample (usually the first chapter) of any book for free. If you want more, you can buy the whole book. If not, you can delete it. No harm, no foul. This means that i will only have to buy the books i'll actually use.

Finally, i have grown increasingly concerned with my usage of paper. Everyone is trying to be more green these days, but there are some areas where you just can't cut corners. For example, a hospital has to throw away all of their used tongue depressers, even if the person it was used on is perfectly healthy. They can't just sterilize it and reuse it. Hospitals use a lot of energy, water, and other resources, and no one in their right minds is suggesting that they cut any corners. Sure, they could maybe switch to more earth-friendly lighting, and one argument against keeping people on life support is that the resources keeping them in a vegetative state could be used to actually cure someone, but for the most part, every "waste" in a hospital is perfectly justified.

Now, i'm not saying that my artistic sensibilites are the same as open-heart surgery, but i am saying that i write better when i write by hand than when i write on a computer. I feel more comfortable writing by hand, or printing out a copy of a draft and editing it. I like to hold the pen in my fingers and feel the paper under my hand. I feel more connected to the work that way. So i use a lot of paper when i am writing. I try to use scrap paper when i can, and i recycle the old drafts, but there is still a lot of waste. So i cut corners in other places when i can. And there is simply no reason that i should buy a paper copy of a book that is in the public domain. There is no reason that i should buy a paper copy of beach fiction. There is no reason that i should buy a paper textbook.

My favorite books i will always own in physical form, whether purchased brand-spankin' new or lovingly used. I will read them until their bindings disintegrate and then i will buy a fresh copy. I will break their spines, dog-ear their pages, spill tea on their covers, and scribble incomprehensible notes in their margins. My cat will chew on their edges. They will be forgotten on trains, borrowed and never returned, faded by the sun, used to prop up wobbly table legs, and will fall off of moving trucks and be lost forever. And while i save up money for the coveted hardback copy with the decorative cover, i'll always have my digital backup.

pearls of wisdom 1

In all my world travels, in all my cultural experiences, in my four years living in Boston and studying psychology, in all my self-exploration, reading, and observations, i have learned two things about human nature.

The first is this: Wherever you go, whoever you meet, whatever you do, everyone in the world is exactly the same. People are just people, and no one is any different from anyone else. We all have the same framework, the same foundation. We all start from the same place, and we are all created not only equal, but identical. Everyone is the same.

The second is this: Wherever you go, whoever you meet, whatever you do, no one in the world is anything like anyone else. People come in a staggering variety of personalities and characters, and none of them are the least little bit like any other person. We all have totally different frameworks, different foundations. No one starts from the same place, and we are all created both fundamentally inequal to one another and totally different. Everyone is an individual.

Both of these things are absolute, bedrock truth.

boarding passes

Sometimes, when i'm cleaning out my purse or suitcase, or flipping through a journal, an old boarding pass will fall out.

I have taken about fifty flights in my lifetime, including layovers. I love to fly. One of my favorite flights happened in 2007, when i took my big Europe trip. It was an exciting time, obviously, and there were a lot of flights in those six months, but i am only talking about one now: the one where i flew over Ireland at night.

Usually, when you fly over cities at night, you see a dazzling display of rainbow brilliance, like the jewelry box of a goddess dumped out onto the ground. The lights sparkle and swirl, dazzling the eye far more than the brightest stars ever have.

But Ireland was long stretches of deep, velvet darkness, with only tiny lights here and there to mark the villages. It was like the night sky on a misty night, almost devoid of stars. I had never seen anything like it.

Henry Drummond, in "Inherit the Wind", once said this about progress (in a truly fantastic speech): "Mister, you may conquer the air but the birds will lose their wonder and the clouds will smell of gasoline."

I understand his point, and as i said, i love the speech, but i have to quibble with him on one point. The birds have lost none of their wonder. Flight is still full of romance.

Which is why i keep my boarding passes. Tucked into my journal or lost in the lining of my duffel bag, they are like roses from a lover, pressed between the leaves of a diary. They are a tangible reminder of my victory against gravity, of my magical wanderings across the earth and through the skies.

Plus, sometimes i forget to throw them away.