barnard

Today is a BEAUTIFUL DAY. For multiple reasons. Number one is, of course, that I was accepted to Barnard College today, my absolute-first-choice school. I will be living in New York for four years. At Barnard. This idea is kind of incredibly wonderful.

I feel very prepared for things in general. I am always a little afraid of optimism, as if it is some kind of jinx, but I am so much looking forward to tomorrow and next week and the months to come. I know I have some tough decisions to make in terms of my gap year, because while I still really, really want to defer and go to India next year, I am having second thoughts about my initial plan and I'm working on another plan for how to get there. I'm considering work for six months and then farming. And maybe a stop in Thailand somewhere in there??

The fact that everything will be so different so soon is scary, but I'm working on just being excited about it instead of worrying about change. I think I'm doing a decent job.

my favorite emily dickinson poem ever

As a general rule, I do not like poetry. I am not easily charmed by it. Therefore, it is remarkable that for the past two or three days, I simply cannot stop thinking about this poem. I first heard it in December in the car on the way to North Carolina with Mana and Pop; we listened to four hours of lectures about Emily Dickinson. I find it eerie. It is striking.

It was not Death, for I stood up,
And all the Dead, lie down --
It was not Night, for all the Bells
Put out their Tongues, for Noon.

It was not Frost, for on my Flesh
I felt Siroccos -- crawl --
Nor Fire -- for just my Marble feet
Could keep a Chancel, cool --

And yet, it tasted, like them all,
The Figures I have seen
Set orderly, for Burial,
Reminded me, of mine --

As if my life were shaven,
And fitted to a frame,
And could not breathe without a key,
And 'twas like Midnight, some -

When everything that ticked -- has stopped --
And Space stares all around --
Or Grisly frosts -- first Autumn morns,
Repeal the Beating Ground --

But, most, like Chaos - Stopless -- cool --
Without a Chance, or Spar --
Or even a Report of Land --
To justify -- Despair.

weather

We have had crazy 55-degree weather the past two days round here. I don't usually concern myself with the weather (either thinking about it or talking about it), but I have seriously enjoyed being outside in the warm sun and sweating while walking up the hill to Congress in my thin green spring jacket. Yesterday I went to the beach, and I actually took off my shoes and walked around in the sand and it wasn't cold. Stepping in water was pleasant, not icy. I was there with my friend Max, and afterward we went to Red's and got ice cream, and then we came back home and made coffee and played backgammon and scrabble and it was a practically perfect day.

Today, I walked downtown with my dear mother, visited some vintage shops, and met Enoch at Arabica. We also observed a man simultaneously riding a stunt bike and playing an electric guitar. Maybe a toy one, but still a guitar. I love my town.

Tonight we're having some people over for the Oscars. I'm disappointed that I never got to see Avatar, because I think it will win. When I saw the trailer for Avatar, I was violently opposed to it because there are blue people and the font used is PAPYRUS (!!!!), but since then a lot of people whose opinions about movies I trust have recommended it to me, so I'm keeping an open mind. Tomorrow I get my IR midterm back. My first midterm ever. I predict a B-C+.

microfinance, madness

I'm in the midst of finishing up a project I've been working on since January on microfinance. Although I won't have my culminating presentation to the freshmen until next week, tomorrow I have my "dress rehearsal," which I'm actually being graded on; procrastinating now by updating my blog, of course.

Today I watched the movie Paprika for the third time with my friend. Its various plotlines are hilarious, but the visuals are amazing. More than anything, it reminded me how much I really love and appreciate the absurd. (Remember that re-occuring parade with the refrigerators, frogs, dolls, Buddhas, umbrellas, etc?) It was nice to remember that in the midst of all this madness and stuff on my mind.

there are power lines in our bloodlines

I've decided I'd like to slowly ease back into regularly updating this blog. It's ridiculous to me that so much time has gone by. I'd like to somehow sum up the time between me coming back from Germany and now, but how can one accurately sum up seven and a half months? So much has changed.

It hasn't hit me yet that this my last year of high school. In a lot of ways, I still feel like a 10th grader. However, in some ways I'm packing my junior and senior years into one, so I've ended up with eight classes, including three APs and an International Relations course at USM. Because of this, I have a lot less time for "hobbies" than I'd like. Other than spending time with friends and occasionally working towards my New Year's resolution of watching the entire Criterion Collection (not going to happen by 2011), I don't do much outside of school.

BUT, while I have felt a bit of "senioritis" and I'm ready for my senior expedition to end, school isn't so bad. I've definitely learned a lot this year (both in and outside of school), mainly about American history, classic literature, microfinance, ethics, social skills, sociology, America, living the creative life, and poetry, to name a few things. I'd like to belatedly say that if you haven't read A People's History of the United States, GO READ IT RIGHT NOW because not only is it an "important" book for Americans to read, it's interesting and entertaining and absurdly well-written.

That's enough for now. I should get back to APES work. APES as in AP Environmental Science. Goodnight.