The sounds, the sights....but oh, the smell. I'm weird I know...but the whole way from Philly to NYC, I kept thinking about the smell that NYC had seven years ago when I first set foot in the city, and the smell was what I was most eager to find out if it was the same. The bus which had taken me and Casey from Philly jolted to a halt, we stepped outside, and I breathed deep. It wasnt there at first...but by the time we got to the end of the first block, I ecstatically exclaimed that it did in fact have the same smell as I recall from last time! There were so many things I wish I could have captured from that city, and brought them back with me; the clear blue sky with white shiny buildings propped up against it, the buzz of the train as the wind whooshed over my face, the fashion, the ambiance of the little fire escapes skipping from one window to the next up a bricked building all of it, I wanted to give it all a big hug. I smile because I felt alive. The tempo was fast, the sounds exhilarating, never did you see the same person twice, how many lives did I come across in one hour? Or in just one block? The parks, they were full of people in headphones and with laptops, or lunch and a book, or like one lady, 5 dogs...bless her heart. There was something so urging about it, my eyes, swinging back and forth could not fathom all the different sights. And then the thought hit me. I was a tourist. To some, they see this every day. The man on his laptop, eyes glued to the screen, didn't notice the bird and skittish squirrel sharing a chunk of discarded bagel to his left. I didn't see am woman dressed in fashion, gazing up at the buildings, mouth open peering to see the uppermost hight. Not many people basked in the humor of how the most sun is in the middle of the intersection because the buildings block most of the sunlight from the sidewalks...and no one ever was overheard talking about the smell of NYC, it's own unique smell. They didnt notice. They sat in their world, in the fashionable black garb, large bags, little ear-buds tuning out the world around them, passing time in the city, not realizing the city they lived in. But i suppose, if you were in fact faced with that on a daily basis, then it would become mundane and typical. And maybe it is the thousands of blase people that i past that created the vibe in the city, the city sucked all the energy from the people, but yet, somehow it was still given out by the sheer volume of humanity.
The shocker was Brooklyn. Brooklyn wasnt what i was expecting in more then one way. It was scarce. The streets were wide, and the side walks narrow. there was no busy fast walking hordes. there were solitary people. Walking by, a quick glance in my direction, and nothing more. The younger ones stared you down as you walked by, and no one nodded or said a word. it was silent, no tress, few cars, bare. Yet with all this seemingly negativity coming from Manhattan to Brooklyn, there was a sense of peace. things moved slower, the sky was just as blue, but no longer a glitzy white paste against it, but a worn well lived brick building now in the place of a skyscraper. Inside the people there was a different kind of confidence. no longer was it the confidence of knowing your clothes were the latest thing to hit the Soho district, it was an inner confidence, that if they needed to, they could handle anything. In a moment i glanced over my shoulder to my right down a side street, the sun was beginning to get dimmer, and on the steps of an apartment building congregated a pack of teens, I am not sure why this stuck out to me, maybe it was the long desolate street, the treeless view, the bronze reflection of the sun off the buildings, the black railing, the shadowy figures cast up against wall and step and curb. I am not sure, but it stuck, and it brought a human element to the moment. It was the human side to the city, it was the opposite of the hollowness of Manhattan. It brought the whole thing together.
I am sure each borrow has its unique twist to offer. That each brings a different element to what makes up a city. But in my limited time, the things i saw, the things i felt, the things that still smelled the same, it all fit like a puzzle. It gave a longing that was left inside of me to return. It felt right, and on that bus trip back to Philly, I sat alone, realizing what i was leaving, and as we drove up on a bridge and the Empire State gleamed in the night sky i stared. I stared at the skyline, unconsciously swearing the same promise that i had made seven years prior, that i would return. I stared until my eyes went fuzzy, and then they focused on the splatters on the bus window. They focused back on the present, not the future, reality was brought back into sight.

Over and above, a good day was had.

Have you ever had that morning, where you get up, bouncing almost, hope in the shower and find yourself singing and or whistling in the shower...then you stop and think, um why am i so happy at 6am? I had one of those moments today, the day started off fabulously! with 4 hrs of sleep under my belt, i felt like i was good to go. Half way through my shower, something that tends to happen every once and a while, a line slid through my head, a line that had rhythm and beat and rhyme. I proceeded to construct the most fantastic poem ever, the only pitfall, it was in my head, and i was unable to write it down. Later, i tried to write it down, but it had lost something of it power and ended up being something that looked fairly off from the original construction. But that's ok, at least i know that school hasnt sucked quite all the poeticness out of me just yet! The second part that made the day a super day, free parking. I dont know why, but the little guy at the parking garage didnt charge me. It must have just been a good free parking day! The third, was the english exam, which turned out not to be as grotesque as i had feared. 12 short answer questions, and arm that ached from tip to shoulder later, i was done, turning it in and headed out into a fairly good weather day! Things after that went incredibly smooth, good lunch, and a exuberant greeting by little kids upon arriving at work. So nothing may have shattered the earth, but i still think today has turned out super fantastic...and its not even half over for me yet :)

What is it about a person that makes them special? Is there one aspect that stands out, or is it individualism. Do you find that those with the most similarities to yourself, are the ones you tend to gravitate towards? There are many "qualities" we set for ourselves when looking at people around us like if we are compatible or will our styles as accountancies or friends mesh? How we view ourselves has a great deal to do with how we view others. If we think of ourselves better, or inferior to those around us....such things bring out different "styles" in our own personalities. Have you ever sat back and looked at how you act around different people? I know it can be an interesting thing to do. In my life, i know different friends bring out different aspects in me, some I love, and some not so much...its not that they are bad, but they are foreign and I'm not comfortable with these new characteristics yet. We judge others, and we judge ourselves by others. Just because one person is comfortable doing something that is new to me, doesn't make me inferior to them, it just makes it new, and well frankly uncomfortable. And just because I can be confident and outgoing in a facet of life, and someone isn't quite on scale, doesn't make them less of a success then me. We each are different, but which part of me is the real me? I have thought on this a lot today, and this is my thought: All of them are me. Some parts of me I didnt understand yet, some I know backwards and forwards. But its like self discovery, learning which parts are for keeps and which need to be gotten ride of.
I stumbled across a quote tonight, one that i was so into and was like "Oh this is going somewhere" until i found out John Mayer said it, but none the less it seems still like an interesting way to look at how we view ourselves and other people...here it is....

"Life is like a box of crayons. Most people are the 8-color boxes, but what you're really looking for are the 64-color boxes with the sharpeners on the back. I fancy myself to be a 64-color box, though I've got a few missing. It's ok though, because I've got some more vibrant colors like periwinkle at my disposal. I have a bit of a problem though in that I can only meet the 8-color boxes. Does anyone else have that problem? I mean there are so many different colors of life, of feeling, of articulation.. so when I meet someone who's an 8-color type.. I'm like, "hey girl, magenta!" and she's like, "oh, you mean purple!" and she goes off on her purple thing, and I'm like, "no - I want magenta!"”

Is it our right to demand magenta and not accept the purple, what makes magenta more spectacular then purple? So what if your a few short of 64 crayons, and the other person may just have the 8, those 8 might beat up your 64 in a way that you couldnt fathom. just because they are typical doesn't make them lesser. theres something to be said for a 64 being with an 8, because that way, what the 8 lacks, the 64 is there to make up, and what the 64 is too eccentric with, the 8 is there to bring a normal balance.

This post may not really have a point, i guess the point was just to write and to think about how we act around ourselves and others, and why we pick people over other people....interesting how that happens.

Sitting in the library, the vast mass of books, and students finding a multitude of things to distract them (like me writing this blog over studying for a midterm tomorrow ...anyway) I am fighting the urge to dance to Michael Buble "Kissing A Fool" making do with little sways back and forth in my chair. The semester is half over, and its been a great run so far, on the home stretch now...the end is near...and then there are all the endless possibilities awaiting me after May 5th...so many to hope and pick from. But am i running to fast? The noise of the world, the business of no time, the fast slick pace that is demanded on me, what moments have i stopped to savor? The simple moments, the pride the contentedness with a grade, a letter of reference, a simple walk in the rain with speckled rain boots? Or what about those little people that look up and call me Miss Katie five days a week? The ones who greeted me today with exclamations of joy and hugs and slobbery insistent kisses? Or the other day, watching little eyes light up when seeing a odd mixture of paint ooze out between toes and upon lifting the foot, a perfect implement of their new "art" creation? Those are the precious moments. Those are the moments to be proud of, to hold on to and let linger in the senses, those little moments that to most, and typically to me get covered up in headaches, lack of sleep and assignments that are due. Stop and smell the roses. Splash in the water. Take a risk. switch it up. Stand and watch a couple of crazy people. Savor.

Writing about nothing

During her time alive she wasn't as acclaimed as her husband, but after Sylvia Plath's suicide her works became ever popular, twisted and dark yet somehow beautiful, the grasp elements of life that other authors allude to, but never nail. She wrote once, "Everything in life is writable.... if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt." This quote is very true, yet here I sit, wanting to write with nothing to write on. I could do the typical regurgitation of my day, the sad fact that this morning in my room, leggings and boots seamed to match, bout outside in natural light....the two shades clashed; maybe the fact that I decided that water that is filtered and pour into a glass glass is better then flittered water in the plastic cup; or how my new obsessive song is "half of my heart" by john mayer. but even with all the guts and strength and determination to squash self doubt of those things being unwritable...i still fall short with anything to really write about. But surely Plath, one of the most influential writers of my life, had some teaming wisdom behind this statement, or was it just a frivolous writer spouting off words that formed a very compelling sentence? but when reading her works, the reader cannot help but notice how perfectly her work reflected this statement. She could write about the most basic things, and somehow you, the reader, saw a whole new perspective on it, that or her works were so complex and twisted that the meaning spoke different to every person that glanced across the page. to me, the first thing of hers i read, was her "daddy" poem. Though this doesn't reflect my relationship with my father, I am very blessed to have the father that i have, but her words, those fantastic descriptive words, burned, and i had no clue why they burned, they just did. and looking back, it seems a strange thing to have felt such a connection with this poem, it was a simple yet powerful poem, and when one understands the full nature of the poem the tragicness of its entirety is felt. These two stanzas were the ones that i felt the most....

"Bit my pretty red heart in two.
I was ten when they buried you.
At twenty I tried to die
And get back, back, back to you.
I thought even the bones would do.

If I've killed one man, I've killed two--
The vampire who said he was you
And drank my blood for a year,
Seven years, if you want to know.
Daddy, you can lie back now."

these mirrors her relationship with her father. it is to my understanding that he was never there, yet she always tried to gain his approval, till he died. She overdosed on pills on her first attempt at suicide, to get back to her father, that somehow "even the bones would do" that maybe in death she still could be in touch with him and he would in turn love her. the second stanza is showing her relationship with her husband, who she fell in love with because he was so much like her father, yet after seven years, he left her. there is such power behind the words, and they fall heavily and with the right leverage to make anyone feel a burn.

this poem does in fact show her writing about something, the subject matter is not just "anything" its pointed. Yet not everything in life is such. there are things that one can never write about, and there are things that you can write about way too much. last night, i was talking with a friend, and the subject of writing things that no one else would understand came up. some of the best writings of a writer are the ones they have tucked away, hidden from the world, not allowing them to be seen. the most writable things, are the most painful things. some of my own personal best will never be read by others, they are the journal entries where thoughts over take and spill out with out a filter. when writing for others, theres a certain veil between you and you audience. this veil holds back the emotions, and the painful things, but yet, true compelling writing has no veil, and for those who can write without inhibition, those are the writers who stir and move an audience with what they say. Plath had no veil, she wrote unfiltered and unaffraid. this is the cause for the burn.

This weekend brought back things that i thought i had forgotten. Little things. You know...the things that happened that you thought you had let go...or had hoped to have at last. But with things so close and so distant all at once, more things come back then might have been wished for. THere was that upstairs apartment, whose inside I never physically saw, but yet those black and white photographs slowly peeled off the walls in my glance up toward the buildings on main. As they peeled, they wafted down the invisible line to the floor below, here they settled, each covering the ones fallen before them. Here they lay, dust particles scattering over the photo's edges where desperate hands should be grasping, scooping them back up. Over by the river, the arching bridge stands as before, where black and white images of toes curled over iron bars, the press of a warm body against cool, smooth rock, the closeness of mint and chi and warm breath were wrapped into one swift breeze from the past. The wooden slats of a swing, the soulful squeak of a pendulum, swinging and marking the laps in time which has been spent...and the clock forgotten until cold and redness take over noses, such a cold nose that prompts a light tap of lips to nose, that assures that all feeling hasnt been lost, a feeling that warms more then the red nose. But no matter how it felt on those days, these chances in time have moved away from me...and what i hoped them to be has dissipated into a antique breath in time. Funny how expectations turn into possibilities that wane into things lost, things forgotten, until they return as things remembered. And as chances roll to the favor of recollection, the lucky memories make it all the way to the forefront, and consume the mind for a millisecond in time. a passing glance, a passing scent, a passing memory, of rainy days and water on a window, red Gerbers with shiny green leaves, small pink polka dot ribbons, torn jeans, faded hand prints on a car; lasting memories that will forever reoccur...each time with more longing for the ability to relive that brief moment in time...but a stronger sensation of know that I wasnt afraid to love and be loved, and that, that forever memory, is worth the lapses in recollection of crinkled noses, and princess toes, raspberries and waffles, barefoot dances and 30 min goodbyes. Chances are the memory is all that will be left of all it was hoped to be. But what a memory ....and if not, the memories are endlessly going to multiply....

Perceptions:

Katherine Watson: You can confirm to what other people expect of you, or...
Betty Warren: I know. Be ourselves.


Pulled from the halls of a large concentration of mass media, Macintosh computers, buzz about what’s new and hot, and the ever constant stream of information flowing through the classrooms, I have been plopped right down into a scene from "Mona Lisa Smile.” Base boards at least six inches up the walls, old time hinges, flake paint around the slim doors, with bubble glass windows and brass doorknobs. Above, the ductwork is exposed; stemming from what I am guessing is a lack of such inventions upon the original constriction. There is a certain musty and drafty smell to the hallways, as anything pounded or uttered in any part of the building can be heard basically anywhere. Hamilton College holds a certain appeal to it. For sure this is not the first class- high tech-state of the art classrooms that I have been sitting in all this time. But yet here, here is the perfect place to learn American Literature. Why not place a class in a setting that originates so far back? Why not let your mind think about all the people who have walked these tiled halls, in poodle skirts? Go-go boots? Bellbottoms? Leggings? And now sweater boots and shirt dresses? What exactly has passed through these doors? I would figure quite a lot. I arrived fairly early for the class so I took some time to look around, and explore…upon finding the bathroom, the windows, the type with the wood separating each pane, were propped open, a small stand a lone sink, with water the color of tea. First lesson learned in this building? Don’t drink the water. Radiators give off heat, and trust me, you don't want to touch them, and they definitely are not there to be a "catch all" counter. This is the type of building that I want to grab a dimpled couch, a throw and a good old, falling apart book; the type of book that has faded, pages curl incessantly upward, binder split and cracked, the book that has been loved from cover to cover. If a book could be loved to life like the Velveteen Rabbit, I would have quite a few live books. How exciting would that be? Just think, I would get to see Homer's Odyssey spring from the pages and come to life I would watch that island, and see him sail away, I would catch glimpses of those terrible gods that throw around human life at will, for their own pleasure. Then maybe I would get to lean against the stone wall and listen to Marius and Cosette in Victor Hugo's
Les Miserables. What amazing things could you see if this was possible?

So let me know....what book would you love to life if you could?
Do tell!

"Remember this is now. Live it, feel it, cling to it. I want to become acutely aware of all I’ve taken for granted." Sylvia Plath wrote these words after her realization on the brevity of life. Before her death she wrote novels, filled countless journals, and amassed a good amount of poetry that was later published by her husband. Sadly, Plath never got to see her work succeed. Plath’s words were strong and passionate, yet they held relevance to the reader just as they did to the author. She was able to take the mundane things in life and create a picture that spilled out onto her audience, exactly how she perceived the world around her. Though I utterly love Sylvia Plath, this blog isn't about her, but it is about life, written down in words as I see it, as is relevant to me, the author. I thought long and hard what exactly the blog should be about, shouldn't a blog be about something? Thats why I decided just to make it about everyday, normal complacent life. Nothing flamboyant. Just simple thoughts on simple things. I will try to update everyday, if not every other. I hope it is enjoyable to whoever choices to read it, but nonetheless, I will be here, writing away, because that is what I love to do. And as Plath pleaded with her readers, "Let me live, love and say it well in good sentences."