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Fire & Ice
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Politics, culture, and other oddities.
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Tuesday, November 28, 2000
I promised myself I would not use this blog to whine about how bored I am, but I'd honestly just like to muse for a moment on the idea of monotony. My life is pretty monotonous. What do I do? I go to school, I talk to people, I pursue some of the things I'm interested in, I blog. Nothing too earth-shattering there. Yet I am certainly not unhappy; why does monotony have such a foul connotation? I think I stay happy because what goes on inside my head, and the heads of those I talk to, is constantly changing, constantly observing and evaluating and concluding. I am very aware of my environment; I am very sure to surround myself with interesting people whenever I can. So where is the root of monotony then? Just because my life is not a soap opera does not mean I have nothing to talk about, or nothing to think about. In fact, I'd argue that I think too much. That's not to try to present myself as some intensely cerebral being (I'm not even sure how to spell cerebral, much less act it), au contraire, mes amis. Not to be self-loathing or anything, but usually the things I think about are silly, inconsequential, or painfully self-involved. I have my moments when I ponder world peace, human rights, the state of democracy, human nature, topology, and yes, even chads, but these moments hardly encompass the full spectrum of my thinking. Still, I am bored. I am bored not in an intellectual sense -- the people I talk to and the things I learn keep me quite mentally stimulated -- but merely in the lack of monumental goings-on in my life. But, what I finally realized is that nobody's life is full of monumental goings-on. Everyone has periods when "stuff happens" and times when "stuff doesn't." (Ah, my profound conclusion of the day.) So. I think that rather than intellectually dissecting and overanalyzing my life and its lack of happenings, I will try to appreciate more my luck and contentedness. Life's good, and nobody, especially me, has the right to take such a blessing for granted.
Monday, November 27, 2000
To continue the nonsense I started an hour ago... I was talking about "nerd," the word. (Perhaps I should have stopped, but, alas, I continue.)
Before I forget, I'd like to point out the fascinating etymology of this word. According to good old Merriam-Webster, it probably originated in the 1950 Dr. Seuss story "If I Ran the Zoo," which included a creature called a "nerd." Who knew? That Dr. Seuss -- is there anything he can't do? I had no idea he penned a word -- a word used quite frequently today, no less. Pen a word... I'll add that to my list of things to do before I die.
I've gotten off-track again. Where was I? Ah yes. Nerd. I starting thinking about all this because (I'm a big procrastinator and) I've been so interested in a bunch of my classes recently. Last night, I was doing research for a European History paper and became so absorbed in the reading, I really wished that I had time to sit down and read the whole book. Please note that this book is some sort of historical biography by some university professor, not considered by most to be captivating reading. Anyway, as I was thinking this, I was thinking about what a "nerd" I am, and then I started wondering at the connotations of that word. When I jokingly call myself a nerd, I usually mean just the second part of the definition ("one slavishly devoted to intellectual or academic pursuits"), which is not necessarily a bad thing (especially if you cross out the word "slavishly"). But the definition of "nerd" seems to inherently imply that it's to be used as an insult. Then I found myself with a rather pointless predicament: What word could I use instead of nerd to keep the idea of "intellectual pursuit" and nix the idea of "an unstylish, unattractive, or socially inept person"? First, I thought of "geek." Geek is a little better. "Geek," which traces its roots to before the emergence of "nerd," is defined as: "a person often of an intellectual bent who is disapproved of." The only part there that does not agree with me is "who is disapproved of." I think that that is not always the case. Perhaps the best word we now have at our disposal (but keep your eyes opened for my penned word soon) is an "intellectual," though that hardly has the same ring to it.
Oh my goodness. I can't believe I've actually rambled about this nonsense for this long.
*sigh* After all that, I really am a nerd. Really.
Ah, the ever-thrilling adventures in the uneventful life of an enthused but boredneophyte-blogger teen! (There's a mouthful of balderdash, eh?)...
Guess what I did today? It's rather ironic, actually. I looked up "nerd" in the dictionary. Ahem:
nerd (noun) : an unstylish, unattractive, or socially inept person; especially : one slavishly devoted to intellectual or academic pursuits.
[*Note: This definition has been shamelessly stolen from AOL's Merriam-Webster Dictionary at Keyword: Dictionary.*]
Oh, just wait, there's more on this. I gotta run. I'll finish later.
Sunday, November 26, 2000
I knew I couldn't last too long without talking about college. But I tried -- at least give me credit for that.
Ready for my random ruminations? Well, ready or not...
I think college is a great thing. I'm looking forward to it. I think it's a wonderful opportunity to study what I want, to learn lots of interesting things, to meet a myriad of new & interesting people, to grow.... shit. I sound like a college brochure. I really can't help it. I would like to assure you that I have not been hired by any sort of Association of American Universities (or something like that) to spout empty rhetoric promoting college attendance to the millions who read this blog daily (that's a joke, a JOKE, at my own expense;). I truly am, personally, extremely excited to go to college.
I do, however, think it's rather silly when people get so set on one single college they're sure it's the only place they'll be happy. That's just not true, and, if I may be so presumptuous (and so redundant), downright wrong. Thus, to try to avoid being hypocritical (which I think may be inevitable), I have concluded that I, personally, will be perfectly happy at any one of ten or so schools. That's not to say that I don't have a clearly-defined first choice -- au contraire, I do I do -- but just to assert that if I don't get in there, I can acknowledge, however grudgingly, that I will be happy elsewhere as well.
It's an insane rat race, and, in the heat of it all, I'm trying not to lose sight of what's really important. What's really important? Well, what's always been important... the people I love. (Give me a ten out of ten for the cheesy comments score for the day!) Honestly though, people mean so much more to me than numbers. I won't lie to myself -- I want to go to a good college. But for me, that's not the be-all end-all of life. Why, it's only the beginning. (Raise the bar! Eleven out of ten! I am the queen of cheese.)
Don't worry. This is certainly not the last of my college comments. How does that quote go? "It is not the end, it is not even the beginning of the end, but perhaps it is the end of the beginning." Nope, not even the end of the beginning. Sorry.
Saturday, November 25, 2000
I was really getting good, posting everyday, and now I've just fallen out of synch. It's been Thanksgiving; I'm all off schedule. I had a fairly classic Thanksgiving: family, turkey, somnolence (my word of the week;).
Today I had a rather eye-opening experience. It made me realize just how sheltered I am, which was rather upsetting. I like to think of myself as very "city," if I may use that as an adjective. I pride myself on being open-minded, and accepting, and I like to consider myself very aware of the world around me. However, today I needed to go to a library in another community to get a book I needed, and, well, I stuck out like a sore thumb. The library happened to be in one of the poorest, most run-down, crime-ridden neighborhoods in my area. I felt unsafe (rightly so), but I also felt totally out of place and uncomfortable. It scares me that I'm going to be in the real world soon, probably struggling to barely make it as some sort of actor-waitress combination, and I still can't deal with that kind of thing. I really ought to grow up already.
Saturday, November 18, 2000
Just a little update:
My blogs should start archiving themselves, from what I understand. This means you (and I) can check old blogs when new blogs just don't sate your hunger for me me me. (That somehow sounded wrong, though I didn't mean it that way. I swear. I didn't.)
Okay, stick with me on this one, I swear I'm going somewhere with this...
When I was little, and first watched the Judy Garland musical "Meet Me In St. Louis," I identified with the littlest sister, "Tootie," played by Margaret O'Brien (I think). There's a part in the movie where Tootie is extolling the virtues of St. Louis and then comments, "Aren't I lucky to have been born in my most favorite [or best?] city in the world?" (Or something to that effect.) I always thought that was a little ridiculous. You know, "The grass is always greener..." Most people don't appreciate so much where they live. At the time I first watched "Meet Me In St. Louis," I didn't either. (I've spent most of my life in New York City, including my early childhood.) I had no specific complaints about NYC, but then again, I would never spontaneously exclaim how lucky I was to live there. My point is (I do have a point, however long it took me to get to it), now I would. I truly appreciate how wonderful it is to have the opportunity (and it IS an opportunity) to live in (now right outside of) the greatest city in the world. I ought to take advantage of it more than I do, but I have to say that I'm never bored with the city at my feet. Today, after my midtown acting class, I had two hours to kill. I got lunch and ate in the refurbished Bryant Park, enjoying the mild weather, the greenery, and the first-rate people-watching. Then I strolled up and down Fifth Avenue, window shopping/window drooling, before settling into a cozy room in the massive New York Public Library. Then this afternoon, I went to the Cloisters, the Metropolitan Museum of Art's medieval art collection. It was truly extraordinary. The story behind the Cloisters is that Rockefeller funded this project to transport all these fragments of European medieval monastaries and the art inside of them to New York. Then, they put it all together to recreate an authentic medieval monastary, right on the edge of Manhattan. How amazing is that? Walking through the Cloisters, you're totally transported back in time, and the art is phenomenal. Rockefeller even bought the land that the Cloisters overlooks, so that even the view could be frozen in time.
Now tell me, where else in the world could I have done all this in a day?
Sorry, Tootie, you were wrong: Mine's the best. How lucky I am!
Thursday, November 16, 2000
It has been rather uneventful Friday night. I would even venture to say "boring." I went to a play, "The Mystery of Edwin Drood." The premise is really interesting. Charles Dickins began writing a great mystery novel ("The Mystery of Edwin Drood" no less) but tragically died before he could finish it. The play that I saw is a bit of a play-within-a-play: A certain theater company is performing "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" and the cast alternates between their characters and their characters' characters. That made no sense. I do apologize. Basically, the audience votes on the ending, including who the murderer is, and what couple ends up together. It was a uniquely interactive theater experience... fun stuff. The poor cast had to prepare some twelve different endings though. Eek. I'm getting those I-crave-being-on-a-stage-again feelings... call me an actor dork. I do believe I am, thank you very much. I get a little weird when I'm tired. I'm going to sleep, goodnight.
I just wrote a song, I thought I'd post the lyrics, just to further share what's on my mind (it's sort of about how I love NYC, and more about something a little more significant):
Verse 1:
Scootering through Chelsea
and scuttering through life
Oh your life is rife with freedom
Chorus:
So sometimes, you can't blame me,
I want to be you...
and there are even days I'd say
I'm in a Chelsea mood.
Verse 2:
Scudding over worries
and above a sea of suits...
so baby can you blame me
when I'm in a Chelsea mood?
Bridge:
I'm not too bad,
my clothes they're not too shabby,
but what can I say cause all I know's
your spiky hair it grabs me.
Verse 3:
Galleries they dot the streets
the sidewalks hum
when I come to Chelsea.
Verse 4:
Suburbia it stifles me
it's here I've found my roots...
so baby can you blame me
when I'm in a Chelsea mood?
Chorus Again:
So sometimes, you can't blame me
I want to be you...
and there are even days I'd say
I'm in a Chelsea mood.
I'm in a Chelsea mood.
Copyright 2000 Lauren Friedman. (don't steal my lyrics! that's just plain nasty!)
I have the (guitar) music, too, just in case anyone's curious.
Speaking of which, I am wholly obsessed with my guitar. I've only been studying guitar for two months, and it's all I want to do all day. (Well, that, and explore my new-found love for topology.)
Today is one of those days I should have just not gotten out of bed. Unfortunately, I did, and I had one of those frumpy-grumpy days where you'd be hard-pressed to catch me at a moment when I wasn't annoyed, complaining, or moping. Be glad you didn't cross my path today. Be very glad.
There were, still, some high points of my day. For one, *gasp* math class. Shocking, I know. Calculus is hardly scintillating, especially for a right-brain girl like me, but today I could hardly stay in my chair as my inner (or not so inner) geek reared its lovable face. Essentially, the class was on topology (not to be confused with topography, the study of the Earth's surface). This was probably not the best thing to bring up in a blog, since it's almost impossible to explain in words, but this attempt should be an interesting experiment in abstract thinking! It was almost like a Ripley's Believe-it-or-Not type of thing. I'll try to give an example: If you take a strip of paper, loop it around & tape it, you get a ring, like a link in one of those paper chains. Cutting down the center of the strip of paper will then give you *surprise!* two skinny rings. Here's the geeky little "twist" (pun very intended): If you take a strip of paper, loop it around, then give it a half twist before taping it closed, you (of course) again get a ring, but this time with an awkward little half-twist in it. The fun part comes when you cut down the center of this ring, the one with the half-twist. Instead of getting two small rings, you get one large ring, all totally connected! It's the most bizarre thing. Why does it work? I have no idea. But I must admit this (along with other similar things) was much more exciting than your average calculus class. What does this have to do with calculus? Again, I am completely clueless. But it was cool. And I'm okay with admitting that calculus class was cool today. Let them laugh!
The other high point came in anticipation of my school's upcoming "Senior Options." (Footnote: I'm a senior in high school.) For five weeks at the end of the school year, we get to work on whatever sort of project we devise instead of going to classes. The "project" can be a variation on an independent study, an internship, or anything in between. People in the past have traveled to Scotland and stayed in a monestary, studied the physics of pool, worked for dot-coms, worked on congressional campaigns... one guy even built a boat. The possiblities are, in every sense of the cliche, practically endless. The problem for me isn't "What do I do?", but, rather, "What don't I do?" There are too many things I'm interested in and only 5 weeks (or a lifetime, depending on how you look at it) to occupy. Ay, me. We'll see where this goes. It really has the potential to be so memorable and educational -- I want to seize this opportunity!
Anyway. Hopefully, I'll be in better spirits tomorrow. Tomorrow's Friday. YES.
Well, here I am... Lauren, alias righter. Where to begin? With me, I think.
I live and breathe poetry. At least I like to think I do. That might be an overstatement. I saw a quote recently that said: "A poet is someone who is astonished by everything." Beautiful, yes... but me? Maybe.
I tend to be fascinated by people. Not to suggest that I'm that creepy girl that stares at everyone, but I really learn the most about human nature by watching the people around me. Sometimes, I feel bad when I catch someone in a private moment, when they think nobody's looking. Looking at people in such a vulnerable state can be scary... it's like walking through a closed door without knocking. Or something.
I have a passion for acting. It is something I can feel, something I can lose myself in so completely. There's so much value in that, I think, to be able to just *poof* be somebody else, look out through somebody else's eyes, in a sense. In life, my goal is to always always be completely myself, but on stage or on camera my goal is to forget myself.
I am a staunch liberal.
These elections are crazy.
But more on that later.... I need to wake up too early to get started.
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