New Thoughts and Thoughts on Newness

I feel like this Christmas break deserves some exposition, as it's the most unusual/different Christmas I've had so far (the prize for most depressing goes to Xmas '06, most magical goes to whatever year it was mom and dad put coconut and flour "snow" boot-and-butt-prints on the hearth and it didn't occur to me that snow would melt).

First, let's get a little context. Three-room, twelfth floor apartment. Starbucks on the ground floor. Four-foot fake tree on the mantle of the holographic fireplace. There's no chimney, so I think Santa might have a little trouble. At the very least, he doesn't have to worry about getting his rear burnt.

This is my first city-living experience. I have to use a white noise machine at night to drown out the trains and cars, but I can walk to Starbucks, Pier 1, Target, Hollywood Video, a Greek restaurant (and innumerable other eateries), BARNES AND NOBLE, and the Metro station which will take you to the most fabulous museums in the world. In fact, I can walk UNDERGROUND to the Metro station if I want, and window-shop along the way. There are two massive office buildings that hinder our view of the river. I realized yesterday that they're the EPA. There's a faint taste of irony lingering in my mouth.

This is also the closest I've come to base living. When you live on base, or very near one, things are different from normal life. For example, if you need food, you go to the commissary. If you need socks, you go to the PX (short for post-exchange). And if you're in need of a special pick-me-up, you won't find it at the commissary or the PX; for that, you'll need to go the Class-Six.

So far I've seen one-millionth of the Museum of Natural History, the national Christmas tree, Richard Avendon's Portraits of Power, and the official stables of the official horses of the official caisson for official military funerals, and stuff. The latter was a happy accident. We'd just been to the commissary, and for lunch in the basement of the officer's club (if you want to eat upstairs, you have to dress nice), and we decided to wander over to the caisson stables to see if we could see the horses.

The caisson and the honor guard pull the coffins in funerals at Arlington National Cemetery, as well as other official funerals and memorial services. They do 8 funerals a day. The horses are the most beautiful, majestic, lovely, velvety-nosed creatures I've ever seen. Some were even a massive 2,000 lbs. Their necks and heads were bigger than all of me! We fed carrots to Sgt York, the tiny (in comparison) horse that was saddled with Ronald Reagan's cowboy boots backward in the stirrups for Reagan's funeral.

We were shown around by Private S, who I took to be no older than me, judging by the fact that he was trying unsuccessfully to grow a mustache (I've never tried, but I imagine if I did I'd fail too). Pvt. S told us this was his first assignment after enlistment and basic training. He's been there 6 months. This means Pvt. S is most likely younger than me. This struck me, and I've been thinking about it for a while. All my life, the men and women on the bases where my dad's been have been older than me. They were adults, and I was a child. I don't feel much like an adult now - I subsist mostly on daddy and mommy's money, with the few exceptions of my spending money, grocery money, and a small amount of student loans. But - I'm the same age as (or even older than!) some of the soldiers now.

I dunno. It's hard for me to wrap my head around the juxtaposition of the parent-supported college life and the self-supported life of a soldier the same age. What makes us so different? And why do I still feel like a child?

The Insanely Long Christmas Break, Part I

I have 6 weeks off for Christmas.

There is a yellow jacket in the lamp next to me. Maybe if I ignore him he will ignore me and burn up on the bulb and die.

Part I is Georgia. I spent all of 30 minutes at my house today. It was cold and all the furniture was covered in sheets. Not exactly what people mean when they sing idealistically about coming home for Christmas. I promised my books and my piano I'd be back in a couple of weeks.

Grandparents are nicer about naps than parents. They just say, "Aw, poor baby needs her sleep" when I conk out on guest bed for an hour (or two). The first few days of a school break will ALWAYS be primarily sleep-oriented. The moon is full, so at night it looks like it's snowed. The wind chimes on the porch haven't been quiet since yesterday morning. Most of the time they sound like fairy music, but sometimes (mainly when I'm falling asleep) they sound eerie - maybe more like aliens-coming-to-abduct-you music?

Yellow jacket has ventured out of lamp and is now crawling on lampshade. Wait, no, he's back inside. There's a smart one.

Tomorrow Part II, DC, will begin. Perhaps I will have more things to write about than naps and bugs.

Green eggs and ham

Forgive me for not freaking out about exams. I finished my papers for the semester, and exams seem like a molehill. I finished a paper on Friday that was 15 pages. At least it made the 5 page paper I turned in today look like a drop in the bucket. I think the thing most sorely lacking during exam time is (drumroll) perspective. So here's a small dose:

What's one test? In light of your entire life, pretty small. In light of eternity, pretty much nothing.
God loves you, whether or not you make an A (and guess what, whether or not you pass, too!)
Failing or doing poorly on one test is not going to divert the plans of the almighty God.
You probably know most of it anyway. Stop fretting, study what you can, do your best, and have a little perspective.

I would also like to take this moment to thank the chain smokers outside my window for the cancer and the asthma.

I can't believe the semester really is over. It feels odd to be here and not have class. Furthermore (there's the paper talk), I've been so stressed for the past month that I am practically buoyant with this freedom and burdenlessness! Strap me to the chair, I'm going to fly away!

Speaking of flying away...

I can't help but wonder if God is preparing me to never be "home," to never be comfortable. It's understandable in a couple different ways. This isn't home, this broken earth isn't our eternal resting place. That I can accept. The worse part, though, is the fear that I'm never (or hardly ever) going to get to rightly call a place on this earth "home." I am such a homebody! I love to be around the familiar, the traditional, the well-worn and memory-filled. I am going to be with my family this Christmas, but I can't call their apartment home. Home seems like a thing of the past, something of childhood. You may say, oh but Corinne! You'll grow older and settle down and have a new home! Maybe I will (but I sincerely hope settling down is quite a ways off). I've always been petrified of living and dying in the same place - funny for a homebody, right? The things I want to do with my life involve not staying in one place for very long. And furthermore, doesn't God call us out of our comfort zones? And doesn't he use us through our weaknesses?

Just some thoughts I've been mulling over. I think I found my dream job, getting paid to live overseas and write about it. Now I just have to get my dream job. Ha. We'll see.

Eternity!

Annual Disillusionment

The day after Thanksgiving dawns. Actually, it dawned 3 hours ago when I was trying to sleep. Just know that the suns rises in the floor-to-ceiling windows in the living room where I was unsuccessfully trying to sleep on couch cushions. It should be known that I haven't had any turkey yet. Hopefully that will happen tonight, now that at least part of the family has been gathered from all corners of the globe (Georgia, Alabama, DC, Denmark).

Guess what?! I have no holiday spirit. For this I partially blame the annoyingly repetitive secular Christmas music that was playing on the radio all day yesterday. God help me if I ever hear "It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas" or "Santa Claus is coming to town" again. Give me Josh Groban's rendition of "O Holy Night" and I might be able to salvage a little Christmas spirit. Yes, it's my yearly disillusionment. While everyone else is decking the halls, buying the goods, and singing along to the cheesy songs, I am folding my arms across my chest and saying "Bah-humbug."

It's not that I don't want to have the Christmas spirit. Of course I want to get caught up in the magic of the season. Why can't I? Honestly, it beats me. Maybe when things get warm and glowy the cynical part of my personality shoots out like a gag reflex. And obviously I hate the commercialization and secularization of Christmas; if you know me at all you probably knew that already.

I'm going to make bread and maybe pumpkin pie today. I suppose we might decorate our dorm room, and in a couple weeks I'll be decking the four-foot fake tree mom got for the apartment. I'll go to some Advent services and sing a few carols. Just like the previous years, I suspect I'll "get in the Christmas spirit" at about 11:30 PM on Christmas Eve. Then morning will come and it'll all be over. Whoop-de-doo!

For give me my grinchiness. Even the Grinch came around in the end, remember?

Promoting Awareness

Every week there is a different booth on the quad promoting awareness of a cause. For this I am eternally grateful, because were it not for such booths I never would have known there were such things as breast cancer, arthritis, poverty, or hunger. I would advocate a different type of awareness, though - one that an unfortunately large number of people lack - an awareness that could bring radical changes to human interaction - and that is SELF-awareness. Not sure if you're self-aware? Want to raise your level of self-awareness? I'll walk you through a few basics, but the journey is one you'll have to make largely on your own.

There are two dimensions of self-awareness: internal and external. We shall start with external. Are you aware of the ramifications of your words and actions upon the lives of others? One unfortunate symptom of a lack of self-awareness is verbal diarrhea. The unaware will often speak for long periods of time without giving a thought to what they are saying, whether or not what they are saying makes sense, or if the fact that they won't shut up about what they are saying is annoying their trapped audience, causing their audience pain, or making themselves look far less intelligent than they might be. If you're afraid you may suffer from this particular symptom, remember this: before you speak, think. If you need to speak, do so slowly, then stop and think some more. Take a look at the face of your listener. It should reflect whether or not it's safe to continue. "Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt."

On a larger scale, external self-awareness concerns your impact on the world, both positive and negative. Stop and think about the effects of your consumption, your action, and your personal interaction. Do you live wastefully? Are you having a positive impact on the lives of others? To be idealistic, how can you be a positive influence on the world?

The trickier dimension of self-awareness is internal awareness. Internal awareness can be achieved through the discipline of introspective reflection. If you are already a frequent flier on Introspection Airlines, you are well on your way to internal self-awareness. If not, I encourage you to take large chunks of time, or even just a few minutes several times a day, to reflect upon your thoughts, feelings, and reactions toward the day. Journals can be very helpful with introspective reflection. If you think you don't have time for introspective reflection, consider the mundane, mechanical activities you do throughout the day, such as driving or walking somewhere, cleaning, or showering. Such times are excellent for letting the mind get lost in itself. Internal self-awareness will help you better understand yourself, your desires, your beliefs, and your interaction towards others.

Let's make December Self-Awareness month. Let's make January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, and November Self-Awareness month. You have a Self. You are a being. Be aware of it. Don't fall into dangerous the trap of self-oblivion. Know thyself!


This public service message brought to you by the Association for Awareness and the Guess What - You Exist! Campaign.

A gadfly

It would seem that my scathingly witty writing skills have gotten me into an exciting bit of a rhetorical pickle. I've been asked to be a panelist in a discussion on environmentalism at the next meeting of my school's Socratic Club. I am to provide a lively opposition to the trendy tide of environmentalism in society and on campus. Here's the article that got me into this. Here's the Socratic Club website. I am particularly looking forward to the organic cookies and home-grown coffee.

Do you have some spare change?

Remember the song "Chain of Fools"? Here's a shout-out for Dad: When I was about 4, I thought the words were "Change, change, change!" instead of "chain, chain, chain." Until somebody corrected me, I frequently danced around the house singing "change change change;" Dad danced with me, but I'm fairly sure he got the lyrics right. I must have been pretty darn adorable.

While I'm giving shout-outs, here's one for Mom. My sister was always tall for her age, so I'd frequently ask Mom if I was tall or short for my age. "You're average, honey," she'd tell me, "just perfect for your age." Then one bleak, overcast day when I asked her yet again, she said, "Corinne, you're short, you've always been short, and you'll always be short."

Change (change change) is the bittersweet subject of this entry.

Childhood is sweet suspension, with comforting constants of parents and grandparents and teddy bears and traditions. The biggest changes are going to a new school or rearranging your bedroom, or, at the very biggest, moving. But still the constants remain, parents and grandparents and teddy bears and traditions.

When you go off to college, your life becomes almost constant change. I'd venture to say everything will keep changing until you're retired, or dead. When you were little, things changed around you, and in the constancy of the best things you were oblivious. Suddenly, you're an "adult" and innocent oblivion is no longer an option. You may be at the same college for a few years, but what about after that? And after that? The old adage is true, you can't go home again. Sure, you can try. Freshman year I tried, and there was my room, a little cleaner than I had left it because Mom views the order of her household more important than my knowing where everything is (and I respect that), but still my room with my bed and my desk and my towering bookshelves. Dad still came home around 7 PM, Mom was still a good cook, the cat was still a presumptuous spaz, the backyard was still woody and inviting, Eileen and I still watched Nick at Nite until midnight or later. At Thanksgiving, we had turkey and shrimp and pumpkin pie. At Christmas, we had chili and French bread casserole and we went to church and we hopped from Grandparents' to Grandparents'. Everything was not the same, though. Mom got a fake tree at Christmas, and there was nothing we could do about it (except grumble and groan, which college students are very good at).

Maybe that example is a little melodramatic, but times were a-changin. This may sound backwards, but as children, we some sort of say in things around the house; as college students, we were almost guests. Our empty-nester parents were moving on, doing things the way they couldn't when they had kids.

Come summer. Eileen moved to Denmark, Dad got a job in D.C., two grandparents were trying to sell the house that I practically grew up in, one grandparent was in the hospital.

Now, the house in Georgia with the wooded backyard sits full of furniture and empty of people, waiting to be returned to or sold. Thanksgiving and Christmas will be minus a sister and minus a grandmother, celebrated in a 12th floor apartment in D.C. Will there be a tree? Will there be late-night church? All I can say is, at least there will be a holographic fire to hang our stockings over.

I will spend two weeks this Christmas as a guest in my parents' apartment. I will spend two weeks in Georgia, trying to see all the other people I love whose lives are changing as well; I'll spend two weeks in Europe with my sister, feeling sophisticated and likely confused. In the summer, I'll probably be a guest in D.C. again. If I'm lucky (and diligent), I'll get to work as an intern in the field I might like to be in. No more hellacious retail summer jobs, please. It's time to start my life in the direction I think it might maybe possibly take. As for the following year and holidays, who knows? Maybe more of D.C., maybe back to Georgia; but never back to the past. In less than a few years, I'll have to be "on my own." Me, on my own? An "adult"? Preposterous! Where will I live? What will I do? Who will be the closest people in my life?

Parents and grandparents and traditions will change; at least I still have my teddy bear.

Get thee to a nunnery!

The wind is truly howling outside the window. I suppose it could be a bit romantic, in a George MacDonald book kind of way; but it's also kind of creepy, like Tell-Tale Heart or Fall of the House of Usher, as long as we're comparing life to literature.

In reality it's just a herald of a really nasty day tomorrow. Cold has finally reached the sunny South, and a cold has finally reached me. Not quite yet, but the sore throat I've had all day is a harbinger of doom (I'm sticking with a theme of gloomy metaphors and similes today. Blame the weather).

Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief.

If I lived in Denmark, I'd make lots of Hamlet jokes.