i just scrounged up 78 photos to print. From high school livejournal days all the way to the present.
For those of you far from my box (hehe my box) you can check out what I decdided upon by lokonig at this link . if you don’t see your favorite, send it along!
i’ve been inspiresd by etsy this morning and learned that my love for old things is really my love for Ephemera, which as wikipedia calls it ”transitory written and printed matter not intended to be retained or preserved”
this is an example of what i’m thinking of. vintage papers, books, photographs, etc that I have been oogling over ever since I can remember going to estate sales with my mother. I’d sit on the floor among the boxes of papers piled in the corner looking through old school assigments, scapbooks and handwritten recipies. stuff that non one ever thought of as important but for some reason or another ended up piled in attics just waiting for curious eyes like mine to get their hands on them.
i’m going to start my own ephemera, which is a bit hard in this digtial age where most things aren’t printed.i hate photo albums, too ridig and organized so i had an ephemera epiphiny and decided to start my own box. a box of photos and papers that anyone can dig thier hands into and see what comes out. they will all be dated, this names and such for prosperity but it will provide a fun experience of discovery and novelty. In order to build up the box and add to some of the fun myself I’m going to ask friends to print out some of thier photos too add to the collection.
hope you’ll play along!
i didn’t meant to stop writing i swear.
it just happened and now that i’m spending lots of time at this computer looking for ways to pass the last hour of work ( in which i’ve designated as “cool down” time even though i’m not working all that hard especially not enough for a cool down)
so i think i’ll make 4:23 the new blog time. just a little moment to collect some thoughts.
todays thought? why did we all forget matt’s birthday?
yes all the exclusives are far away and moving on, but we are usually so on top of our game. i meant to spend time thinking of a witty facebook post. something abou asbestos or becoming a jew but it totally slipped my mind. the same way i forgot daf’s birthday two years in a row. and my dad’s birthday this year. for a gal who enjoys birthdays so much its a total shame.
there have been some birthdays going around in the office. and i realised i’m of the camp where one has to make thier own party, make thier own birthday special because if you rely on someone else you’ll be sorely dissapointed. is that why i refuse to remember birthdays? as if I can’t be bothered if people don’t have a dog and pony show? (what…) i sure hope not. because everyone deserves attention sometimes. especially people i like the most. like matt. and dafna. and sometimes my dad.
so happy belated birthday to everyone. i’m thinking of you at this very moment.
“Youth is wasted on the young.”
The famous George Bernard Shaw’s saying has been floating around in the swimming pool of my mind for weeks now, like Dustin Hoffman in the graduate laying face up closed off from the impending doom of adulthood that faced his college graduation.
It’s how I’ve been spending my Saturdays; face up to the sun in the swimming pool contemplating how my life imitates art and that I have to do something about it and quick. The most efficient way I’ve learned to appreciate my youth is to spend time with people ten years my elder. Meeting people, then slowly leaking out pieces of information, context clues until finally the question “Wait, how old are you?”, is answered “Twenty-one…” while batting my eyelashes and a toothy grin. The responses vary but most likely are encouraging and include a short piece of life advice.
I didn’t know I was into older guys until Steamy. I remember running home from the gym that night in a frenzy of excitement and exhilaration to tell the story, and how dumbstruck I felt staring at his birth date on my computer screen. The age of information is dangerous sometimes. I remember sitting in my dorm room, squealing up the stairs to Rachel with questions about my intentions and his intentions and how I could go about engaging in something like that. Little did I know it would be formative learning experiences. He laughed the other day when I admitted that I considered him one of my role models.
I’m certain there will be a backlash. That people will resent me for my youth and find me naieve and waste of time. What can anyone learn from me when I’m limited on life experience? But that just encourages me to work harder. To not let my youth be wasted on planning for the future. The future will happen whether I plan it or not so I may as well take advantage of the most self oriented time in my life to pursue my own happiness. As of right now? It’s sex, Jenny Lewis and hand written letters. Tomorrow? I’ll keep you posted.
New favorite thing on the internet?
Dr. Horrible;s Sing-Along Blog.
http://www.drhorrible.com/act_I.html
i’ve been a bit out of touch here because i’ve been very much in touch with real life. my dear friends ben rachel steve and noah came to pay me a visit in this new town of mine. and i had a deliriously delightful time. they arrived just after i had finished up with the conference (which went very well) and i was immediately thankful that i had the type of friends who don’t get ansy sitting around the television. because as much as i am enjoying myself in jackson, it’s not exactly a tourist destination. and that didn’t stop me for thinking that i was the main attraction.
all i wanted to do was take advantage of rachel’s keen tjmaxx eye. we bought the same dress. it was magical like the traveling pants. i think we look like the creepy twins in the shining. no one looked.
we got out of the house eventually during a degrassi break. we slapped on our swimsuits, got some snacks, and spent some time at the pool. rachel had trouble with the inflatables this weekend. not only did she find a gaping hole in her air mattress, but within 45 seconds of riding on this raft she managed to deflate it.
the best that downtown jackson has to offer in terms of entertainment. there was also a large jar of pickles, rachel’s lost essentials, george carlin, fried chicken, full beds and full hearts. i was sad to see them go, but i was left with a cactus and a noah to keep me company.
i dragged my loyal companion noah around with me for another week. to the pool with chaz, to kareoke, to pub quiz. this is us at a lovely 4th of july picnic at a restored home from before the civil war. there was a lovely band there that played not only fish gotta swim and birds gotta fly but i love paris! i danced around. noah was a good sport. and he made me a picnic lunch with a lot of sweet potatoes in honor of the rachels.
amanda and i wore our garden party dresses. old men with big cameras thought she was a better dancer than noah. i kind of agree. don’t tell noah.
there were lots of children. noah said it was the most civilized 4th of july event he had ever attended. i agree.
but the 4th wouldn’t be the 4th without hot dogs. and beer. lots of beer. and what better place to enjoy them? the great outdoors! so we went camping.
noah and i went on a stroll on the Natchez Trace, the oldest/historic/preserved trade route? something old and cool and outdoors that he may or may not have appreciated more than i did.
you can’t tell all that well, but megan and i are underneath a waterfall! !!!.. !
this was a church is part of the Rocky Springs ghost town. it had a creepy recording. “you there.. on the hill.. church of god.. youre people have left you, but they are buried close”
kemper made kebobs. kebabs? i adore the beer cozy.
here amanda and dan are miming “beer and hot dog overload”
this was our interpretation.
josh and megan made a kick ass fire. thank goodness we stopped at the side of the road to pick up that prime firewood. unfourtunatly we ran out of kindling pretty quickly. when the boys went off the graveyard she shouted “if you don’t come back with log you are all dead to me!”
we sat around the fire and sang songs. i may or may not have prompted the game with the word and the songs that have the word in it. my favorite was winter wonderland because i always appreciate a good christmas carol. josh wouldn’t let us go to sleep until we had finished all the beer. i wouldn’t go to sleep until we sang debbie friedman.
so overall it has been a totally tubular few weeks with friends of silver and gold. but it certainly feels good to have this big bed all to myself to type away to some of you.
one glorious thing that no one ever told me about the work force: gchat
i can remember the first time i downloaded AOL Instant Messenger. (aim.. does AOL even exist anymore? is this the only antiquated program that is left?) it was in the seventh grade and since i was at the height of my x-files fascination i was using the screen name AgentRSj. I remember sitting at my desktop(!) computer perched on a chair gitty over the fact that i was chatting with the abe paley about the new barenaked ladies album stunt. i hit the ground running and spent countless nights honing my typing skills, learning how to be passive aggressive and wiping the tears off my keyboard. as time went on I used it mostly to find out if pfeff was awake on a saturday morning.
but now that i have found myself perched at the chair at my cubicle, i’ve discovered that while all my friends and colleagues are “checking thier e-mail” they are secretly chatting! the days of AIM are long gone and have been replaced by our more adult “first name.last name” screenames. it’s been a brilliant discovery that dafna and i have taken full advantage of. every morning we sign on and keep each other company throughout the day. it usually ends up with me giggling aloud and getting some weird looks around the office. a few days ago we discovered the “off the record feature” then quickly discovered what it meant to be on the record and reveled in the days of “deadaim” when we had to download a program to save our priceless adam king conversations. but saving those conversations could be dangerous. i delete mine everyday. too many sneakrets.
and just when i start to feel a little far away, i find myself in a group chat with daf, leah matt and leslie making fun of each others online personas. who really says lol honestly.so gchat. bringing us that much closer to keeping in touch and that much farther from getting any actual work done. i dig it.
i’ve found that by picking up and plopping into a new place with new people, i’m learning a lot about myself. i’ve had dozens of conversations where slowly but surely, ah who am i kidding, very quickly and most likely inappropriatly, i’m leaking out stories about my past experiences. i’ve let out a solid collection of tales from past loves to past travels that is painting quite the cliff notes version of rachel jarman. i have managed to organize myself into a few categories
1. i’m a heart breaker
after telling the “abe-josh-randy” saga a few times and after getting a variety of reactions, i’ve realised that in retrospect i’ve lost a lot of compassion. while all the other girls talk of lost loves and heartache, i’m running down the list of men i’ve had. i’ve narrowed this down to either i date like a man or i have a selective memory when describing my relationships. i’ve noticed that i tend to leave out the months of anxiety and obsession and focus much more on the objectification of men. what am i trying to prove to them? or more importantly.. what am i trying to prove to myself? the answer is unclear but i’m getting a lot of strange looks.
2. i’m the samantha
steamy has certainly brought out the kinker side of my sexuality that’s for sure, but somehow i’ve managed to share that with my colleagues and my boss within the past two weeks that i’ve been here. no one should have to know what my shaving habits are or what it feels like to have ejaculate in your eye. especially not people that i have to share a cubicle with. this is the common oversharing rachel jarman quality that has not escaped the move to mississippi. i’m putting it in the group bonding category and this is how i get comfortable with people. but i’m going to try to lay of the pillow talk during lunch a bit when afterwards we have to discuss the talmud. yikes.
3. i’m an exclusive
you know even moving to a new place not knowing anyone, i still have that exclusive gene. it’s not in full swing but i feel myself bonding with certain people over the non-bonding of others. it’s not a great quality, another one i’m trying to squelch but again, one that followed me from the high school/college habits of having great exclusive close friends.
in other news i’ve been having some boy revelations and turns out i’m way into steamy in ways i never thought i would be. we had a small talk and i concluded that at this point in my life, i’m not really interested in a serious relationship but that what steamy and i are doing is the ideal. simply knowing we are there for each other isimportant to me right now and he is really special.
alright, well that was my small inner monologue about my small little world. photos to come!
i passed most of these towns on the way to the blues festival. sad story but cool pictures of the catfish plants.
we got to leave work early on friday. BB King was playing at his own blues festival in the town of Indianola where he grew up and our boss decided it would be benefical for us to attend. it was about an hour and a half out of Jackson and i spent about an hour and half with my nose pressed against the window fascinated by the landscape of the mississippi delta. it was littered with catfish farms, dozens of small square ponds lined up in rows along the highways. i imagined them as tiny fish universes, with all the families squashed together, not knowing from any other way of life besides those shallow muddy ponds. i had never seen anything like it and squealed as we passed a sign for “catfish museum” which i will certainly be visiting sometime in the near future.
we entered the field, which was right next to the local cemetery and smiled at each other. numerous food trucks were parked on one side and a huge stage at the center. people were in chairs and some were even dancing to the blues pumping out of the speakers. we were so happy.
i wanted was a fried catfish platter. 5 huge strips of fish, a basket of fries and a coke for 8 dollars. the 10 of us planted outselves on the lawn and i devoured the most succulent fresh fish i had ever tasted. and followed it with a blue raspberry shaved ice. bb king was late, so the band “homemade jam” played for over 2 hours straight. which would be a feat for any band but especially incredible because it was made up a 9 year old girl on the drums her father and 13 year old brother on guitars that they made themselves out of car mufflers. !!!!.
i was impressed by the diversity of the crowd, and how it seemed the music brought everyone together. in between they played the “cupid shuffle”. i immediately got up about to do that embarrassing dancing in public thing i do but much to my delight i saw another 20 people also get up and we all lined up to do the dance together.
bb king finally made it onto the stage. he sat down with a great smile and told us how happy he was that we were here. his voice bellowed out into the crowd and we all got up to dance about as he played songs about loving life and women.
then he announced the dance contest. he shouted
” i want five boys and five girls ages 4 to 6!”
” i want them mixed! boys here to my left, girls here to my right!”
all was well until the fireworks went off. since bb was so late they couldn’t push bad the fireworks and he was not happy about it.
“well no one wants to see the kids dance where there are these pretty lights in the sky.” he continues to murmer on. “don’t shove the children!” and my favorite “the dance contest will begin when the fireworks cease!”
he then went on with the contest. playing some music. the kids were too small and too scared and were only prompted to move around a bit after a few minutes when bb shouted “DANCE!” one small girl did a classic booty drop and grinded her little body around in a circle.
we could not stop laughing. we thought this scene couldn’t get any funnier until bb asked his manager “mr. lebowitz” to give each of the kids a dollar and the winner five dollars
it would have been grand if he didn’t have 4 more contests with different age groups. but the songs he played were unreal and his performance was perfect for the community he was in. on the way home we thought how cool it would be to grow up and say you danced on stage with bb king as we leaned our heads out the window to look at the mississippi sky that was made up of the most stars we had seen in a long time.
