Finally had some time to breathe this weekend in terms of having time to myself to think and relax (no tests or huge assignments due for another week, amazing). As I was looking at a recent entry from this journal, I accidentally clicked on 'Calendar' and seeing all the years listed there in that view, I realized that I have had this journal for about six years. A while ago, I quickly privatized a large number of this journal's early entries, mostly out of a partial feeling of embarrassment. I have read some select early entries over the years but I never really read through all of them in their entirety, in a linear fashion. Seeing the years displayed in front of me in a linear order, I decided to actually read this journal from the beginning in its entirety including comments. At first, I was interested in finding some of the older entries from back in 2004 when I used to primarily post art and odd things I would find online. As I kept reading though, I became intrigued with the comments on a lot of my old entries and the interactions (or lack of) that I had with some of the early readers of this journal. I also couldn't help but realize how much I have changed over the years.
I had been thinking about this journal last week since I had a strange reaction to photos I took of myself last Thursday. I have (how narcissistic will this sentence sound?) taken and had so many photos taken of myself over the years. However, I was struck with how these recent photos actually came out because when I finally saw them, I saw someone a little bit older and a little bit wiser staring back at me through the lens. I initially took them since I was playing around with some new lipsticks. I posted them to Facebook (it's actually an album of around 20 photos). Right after I posted them, I looked at them and suddenly felt incredibly vulnerable. I almost took them down, but then I was filled with such a peculiar mixture of catharsis, happiness, vulnerability and hope that I instead ended up making one of them my profile photo and kept the album up anyway (thankfully only probably 5 people have actually looked at all of them). The feeling that those photos provoked caused me to glance at some of my earlier photos which were attached to early journal entries and made me want to dig deep to analyze these changes through this outlet. I knew I had changed, of course. Everyone changes in some ways over the course of six years but I could see in my eyes in those photos that I had really and truly become a different version of myself. I could see a certain longing mixed with confidence that I never have seen before.
I had initially avoided reading the early entries of this journal in their entirety because I thought it would make me extremely depressed. I had this irrational fear that I would somehow end up battling waves of nostalgia for some long forgotten time leaving me inexplicably sad. I suppose that I had this fear because I spent a lot of my late 20s in that very state as I spent quite a bit of time coming to grips with my teens and early 20s. However, after reading this journal from the very beginning, I am left with a mixture of feelings that are anything but sad. Perhaps it's a shift in overall perspective. Maybe it has something to do with choosing to read such material during this period of my life where I feel like I have a personal epiphany weekly.
Some observations while they are still fresh in my mind, in no particular order:
This is stream of consciousness randomness while I have 10 minutes before I go to school.
It's amazing the feeling I get when I learn and study my notes for Microbiology. I felt the same way with my Anatomy/Physiology classes. Ok really, all of my science classes have produced this feeling, even my Chemistry classes which I think warped my brain permanently. The material is so dense and so incredibly challenging but for once something makes me almost well up with tears when I grasp the material. Maybe it's the immediate application and the fact that I feel like I am constantly piecing together an enormous puzzle or the fact that my Microbiology professor inspires me to no end.
Each test covers something like 500+ pages of material and my professor condenses the chapters down into her own notes for us (in addition to the notes we take from her lectures which I love attending). The current notes were about 40 pages long for the test today on virus structures, virions, bacteriophage life cycles, animal cell life cycles, T cell and B cell clonal selection and expansion and the vast topic of immunity. I ended up condensing those notes down to 9 pages over the weekend and it was difficult and often painstaking work to do so but it's how I learn the best.
Yesterday in our lab, my lab partners asked to see my study notes since I have been getting 100s and 95s on all the tests. I had this immense sense of pride as two of them looked at my notes and almost cried because they couldn't understand half the material until they read my breakdowns. They then all requested copies for themselves.
This is probably a poorly written entry but as I sat here for the last hour or so talking to myself about virions, viruses and immunity, feeling as if I am buzzing from all this knowledge (no, I am NOT high ;) ) I thought about these exchanges and how I wouldn't trade this feeling for anything in the world.
Someone else I am friends with on here was relaying how they started another journal because they wanted a place to share more about themselves in an un-censored fashion and I responded to that post with a comment that I can't stop thinking about. I initially wrote:
"Do I know how that goes. I actually made another journal 2 years ago and added all of I think 2 or 3 people (at the time) to it because I was going to write completely uncensored, blah, blah, blah. So, what did I do? I barely wrote in it. Made 2 entries, if that, and then privatized them after a week of them being friend's locked because I was mostly self-conscious of what I wrote. And then I never wrote in it again because I felt so exposed even having 2 people see the 2 (pretty tame now by comparison) posts I wrote at the time.
I feel like I would love to write and write about the actual 'stuff' that is going on in my life/my mind but I can't for various reasons on any of the social sites I am on either because it would confuse the hell out of half the people who think they are keeping up with me (who don't know half of what is actually going on in my mind or with my life or with people in my life) or it would weird people out. Sigh."
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I think that is what is so interesting about the social networking phenomenon. People share and share but what is actually shared are pieces that are purposely picked for various reasons leaving a lot of empty space for conjecture or interpretation. In some ways I find this a fascinating concept and practice (I do believe it is an art form in some ways) because I am super aware that what I see of people is what they choose to share and the reasons for sharing can be just as complex.
On the other hand, it's a strange exchange because what people know about any given person (including myself) is like an imperfect (or perfect in some cases) puzzle that is constantly being pieced together. I know not everyone consciously uses online communication in this way but I definitely do and I only just started understanding that I am leaving a trail of myself everywhere on purpose to an extent (my very own bread crumb trail across a multitude of sites). Depending on who knows where to look for my trail, they can either have an incomplete interpretation of myself or a pseudo-complete version. Tiny crumbs vs. half a loaf ;).
Being a Manhattan dweller for nearly a decade now (and a native NYer to boot), it's with shame that I admit that I have barely explored Central Park. In my defense, Central Park is enormous (843 acres or 6% of Manhattan's total acreage) and home to a variety of very unique structures and gems of nature.
A few years ago, I documented my first time exploring the Conservatory Garden in Central Park which is very close to where my apartment is. And, I only first went to the Central Park Zoo 3 years ago (unfortunately I did not document that, but I will eventually ;)). However, there is one structure I have been dying to see ever since I was very young. That would be Belvedere Castle.
I still find it amazing that there is an actual castle structure nestled deep within Central Park and that I have lived here for over 30 years and have never been even close to it (despite having been to the Great Lawn more times than I can count). What better day to remedy this than July 4th?
Belvedere Castle, in addition to being the exterior shots used of Sesame Street's Count von Count's home, is also the second highest vantage point in Central Park. It was built in the late 1800s and is quite stunning to view and explore.
After completing the philosophy course I took last semester which involved far, far too much writing and teeth gnashing, I just found these comics (aptly linked from an antitheist debate about materialism vs. non-materialsm) and laughed so hard that I cried.
In an effort to document things better and stop saying things months later like 'Remember that day? Wow, I wish I had a photos' or 'I wish I could look back and remember specific things visually again', I have decided to start doing little trip vignettes.
I seem to have had some inspiration and motivation back in 2006 when I made a few posts which are fun to look back on like:
My recent trip journals (directly before this post) have inspired me to get a little bit more on the ball with NYC journaling. In the summer, S and I do so much walking and exploring in NYC that it would be tragic to not document it all even just a little bit. I have an intense love affair with NYC that doesn't seem to die out.
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This past weekend we decided to go check out the Francis Bacon exhibit at the Met (more about him later). As much guff as I hear/read about the uptown NYC area (we live on the border of Spanish Harlem and Yorkville) because it is apparently not 'cool' to live up in this 'hood, I have to say I fall more in love with it year after year. It's in walking distance of Central Park, Museum mile and a staggering variety of places to eat (which are not, contrary to popular belief, expensive...just have to know where to look). Yeah, we spend a crazy amount of time downtown (hell, even my school is all the way down by City Hall) but I can't complain about this area. It kind of rocks. All the haters who think this area sucks don't know what they are talking about ;).
Walked up to Madison and 97th to look for a place to get some breakfast grub. Found a new bagel place which was cute (as if this area needed anymore bagel places hah):
In the back outside area it had a green picket fence and a nice view of barbed wire and apartment buildings:
These are not from the same bagel place but from the one we go to normally which is across the street. Pastries with happy faces must be posted:
S and I decided we needed a little weekend getaway a few months back and settled on Philadelphia since both of us had been to Philadelphia when we were really, really young and could not remember anything about it and it really is very close to NYC which was a plus since we didn't want to travel all that much.
We have a knack for incredibly silly timing (ok, so really it's me who has a knack for that and S tends to be the victim which thankfully he finds amusing hah) and our visit definitely didn't break that trend. The Phillies won the World series just days before we arrived. To celebrate, the entire city had a huge parade on the day we made our way to Philly.
It just so happened that the enormous parade they held was literally right on the street where our hotel was located.
This was pretty funny for a number of reasons not limited to:
1) We arrived right as the parade was ending and this meant that the 30th Street Station was crawling with sports fans trying to get home and lines for cabs wrapped around the station. Their public transportation system was completely overwhelmed.
2) Deciding to hike it to our hotel (not a bad walk actually, only 15-20 blocks maybe?) the streets were covered in garbage from the parade which made everything hilariously apocalyptic as we navigated through stacks of beer cans, paper debris and ticker tape.
3) The sports fans of Philly are rabid and were extremely enthusiastic on our walk to the hotel. We were high fived repeatedly and people would randomly walk up to us screaming 'Go Phillies!!!' and almost everyone was wearing the red World Series champion shirts which was even more surreal.
Did I mention that it was also Halloween? Do I know how to pick a date for a vacation or what?! :D
The weather today is so disgustingly perfect in every, single way.
It makes me want to jump in piles of leaves, wrap my hands around a hot cup of pumpkin coffee and shiver in my hoodie.
On that note, I am about to put on eccentric knee socks under my pants (and you can bet I will be wearing my hoodie) and skip to anatomy lab. Pumpkin coffee may be on the menu after lab while I am on break before my music class this evening. Oh...yes.
I am one week away from the end of a 5 week intensive Chemistry class that I needed to take now since it was a pre-req for another class I needed to take this fall. It's been a rollercoaster.
It meets 4 days a week for 4-5 hours a day. Mondays and Wednesdays are 4-5 hours of lecture, usually going over 2 whole chapters of information (which is a LOT to take in at once) and Tuesdays and Thursdays are 4-5 hours of lab. Somehow I have an A average so far since I have been kicking ass in lab (partially due to my 2 lab partners and how well we work together and are able to sit and talk out difficult problems until things click). I received a 100 on the big Nuclear Chem test which had my jaw on the floor since I was almost in tears studying for it and was convinced I was too stupid to continue the class. Go figure.
The class has just been so draining on so many levels. Since it is only 5 weeks long, we have a test every Monday and I usually am so strung out from stress on Monday mornings that the relief felt by turning in the test when I am done is massive. The concepts are very, very complex especially for someone like myself who hasn't looked at any sort of Chemistry since I had it in 9th grade which was 13 years ago! This next test tomorrow is on gas laws (using almost all Stoichiometry - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoichiometric#Gas_stoichiometry) and it's sending me into minor panic mode. The really funny thing is all the math in Chemistry (and it's like 85% math!) usually uses Dimensional Analysis which is pretty cool. The issue really is remembering the conversion factors you need to use for any given problem and all the super vague, nonsensical rules and laws governing whatever you are working with.
I will be very happy after July 9th when I take the final and can breathe calmly again. I will still need to take Organic Chemistry but honestly after reading through information regarding O-Chem and seeing the topics I had to swallow in this Chem class, O-Chem almost (almost) looks more bearable.
This journal is roughly 90% Friend's Only at this point. If you were previously on my Friend's List and are not anymore, I wish you only the best and assure you that it is not you, it is me.
I will continue to post interesting art/tidbits/morsels publicly albeit rarely but the majority of my personal ramblings will be Friend's locked.
Twin Musical Tesla Coils Playing The Original Mario Bros. Theme Song
Twin Solid State Musical Tesla coils playing Mario Bros theme song at the 2007 Lightning on the Lawn Teslathon sponsored by DC Cox (Resonance Research Corp) in Baraboo WI. The music that you hear is coming from the sparks that these two identical high power solid state Tesla coils are generating. There are no speakers involved. The Tesla coils stand 7 feet tall and are each capable of putting out over 12 foot of spark. They are spaced about 18 feet apart. The coils are controlled over a fiber optic link by a single laptop computer. Each coil is assigned to a midi channel which it responds to by playing notes that are programed into the computer software.
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