"Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more..."

Here's to birthdays spent across the pond,
and living life before it's gone.






I suppose.

I miss the Kindergarden Days

I miss the Kindergarten days

When boys had cooties but could still be best friends with a girl.

When knowing the names of the craziest colors in the crayon box, and counting to 20 the fastest without skipping a number meant that you were the smartest.

When the kid who jumped the highest off the swing was king of the playground for the day.

When dumping sand out of your Velcro shoes before you reentered the class or the house was automatic.

When the biggest worries of the week consisted of accidentally tearing the edge of that picture you drew and jumbling lmnop in front of the class and the thought that tonight might be fish night. 

When reading was fun because you never did it alone, and the adults always used funny yet reassuring voices.

When lunch was packed for you with an extra side of love and you knew that someone who was happy to see you would always be waiting for the bus to drop you off.

When everyday the excitement of learning something new brought a smile to your face and made the world seem like it too was waiting for you.

When the three dimes, one quarter and two pennies that got left on the edge of the coffee table suddenly become yours.

When the world seemed more complicated than ever, but your mind was certain that the only real problem was the boogy-man, but he’ll stay away if you leave on the nightlight.

I miss the kindergarten days, when the world was beautiful because the thoughts were simple.
Yeah, I miss the kindergarden days.

Politics and people.

Lately I've come to acknowledge something I've known for a long time. Something that most everyone knows, but very few seem willing to acknowledge themselves. 


What is this little bit of knowledge? If you mess up, if you're wrong or if you're just not right, if you go too far or not far enough, if something bad happens and it's your fault, things will get a lot better and work out much quicker if you are a good enough person to stand up in front of your peers and say "Hey, I was part of the problem, I messed up and I'm sorry for that. I hope you can forgive me and work towards helping me rectify the situation so as not to prolong the negative impact of my actions."


Bam. 


Someone could forget to look behind them while backing out of a driveway and subsequently crush my leg under their tire, but I'd be a lot more willing to forgive them, and a lot less likely to sue them for their first born if they were to say this rather than making excuses like "Uhh, my stupid mirror wasn't adjusted properly, it's your fault for walking into my blind spot, I'm driving a Toyota, the breaks must be faulty!"


Now the reason I decided to post about this isn't because I'm about to enter some injury lawsuit, but rather because I am becoming increasingly disgusted by politics and media throughout the world. Now before I get a bunch of angry "Don't discuss politics in public!" emails, let me just say, I don't care who you vote for, if you believe in democracy or monarchy or anarchy, I don't care, that's your prerogative and that is not what this is about, this is about what I view as an unprecedented unwillingness of politicians, media, and people in general to accept that they could possibly be part of the problem.


I have paid a great deal of attention to presidential elections since I was like 12, and as a voting member of society I cast my vote for issues that are important to me, but I do NOT vote on matters which I find myself unable to pick an obvious "Good Side" or that I am just unable to understand. This means that I am not actually all that politically active because like most Americans I generally accept the steryotype that Politicians are not usually upstanding and good people. I only say this to give the reader a grain of salt, I am no wonderfully politically active person, and I am often so upset with all the bickering on news stations that I change the channel. This being said I will try not to talk too much about things I know nothing about.


What I do know, however, is that there has been a whole lot of he said she said drama going on around the world. Everyone is blaming everyone else, and when that doesn't work they blame Obama. The problem with this is that politics are starting to look a hell of a lot like a kindergarden playground brawl. 


Shame is a huge motivator for people, it's a strong emotion and it is understandable that in times of pressure accepting the shame that comes with admitting you are wrong can be overwhelming thus causing you to point the finger at little Johnny because he "double dog dared you!" Wait what? you're not five? You've been instilled with a general set of morals, right and wrong, and the concept of being a bigger man? Well why didn't you say so?!


The world economy is tanking, and you are bat shit crazy if you think Obama, or Congress, or dictators, or famine in Africa, or the media, or banks, or whatever are solely responsible for what is happening.  That's like saying George Washington was solely responsible for America winning its independence, which he wasn't. Washington was the face of the country at the time, and a big part of the brains yes, but it takes a village to raise a child, fight a war, or destroy an economy. Washington had numerous soldiers, he had women at home making bullets from candlesticks and darning socks. He had nurses figuring out how to remove shrapnel with always killing the patient, he had horses that carried riders ridiculous distances to give warning of impeding invasions. Essentially he had a lot of help. Same goes for the world as a whole now, no one person or group is brining us down.


Truth of the matter is that essentially every person alive has probably contributed to the down fall of the economy in some miniscule way, shape, or form, so technically we are all to blame. But that's not the big point. The point is that the people in charge act like it's their right to be in charge, not their privilege. They no longer care about being the bigger person and accepting blame or even finding a real solution because no one is holding them accountable. 


Back to the playground scenario, the teacher isn't paying attention so while Johnny and the other kids know they could get in trouble, but haven't yet, so they are spending their time trying to peg the offense on someone else in hopes that when teacher comes to they won't be the one in time out. This results in back and forths, finger pointing, and lots of fear mongering "If you don't agree with me that Susie was the one who's at fault then you must be at fault too!" it's like Animal Farm, but with grown people who are too stubborn to admit that they could have been wrong.


News Flash: no person will EVER be 100% right 100% of the time, so why is it so unbelievably hard to admit that you are just human and made a mistake?


Once you stop acting like a five year old, take responsibility, and begin looking for a legitimate solution guess what? Things start to change! You might mess up again, you might make a mistake and it's very likely that you will have to apologize once more for messing up, but it will be worth it when you finally get it right. 


Someone, most likely my dad, once told me this cheesy quote that's been used so much that I can't find who supposedly said it first. I use this quote almost every day, and recently I've begun following it's advice and things are going great, the quote is "Don't just talk about it, be about." Don't just talk about whose to blame, be about accepting your share of the blame. Don't just talk about how to find a solution, be about implementing a possible solution. Be about using educated decisions to make change instead of just talking about how much you want to change.


What do you think? Please feel free to leave comments below. 


Thanks for reading,
Birdy (-:

They Say This is Where It All Ends.

Oh. My. Goodness.




Childhood defined.




Childhood ended?

A Poem a Day Keeps the Blues Away

I tell myself to write one poem a day,

But today I do not feel like writing poems.

Water and Sand

One mans trash is another mans treasure, but is it the same with creativity or am I just adding more sand to the desert?

I try but it seems like words are just never enough, like their meanings are trapped or just don’t come across, and it’s hard when sometimes I see a person and say, “That person seems so intriguing, bet we’d be friends if words didn’t get in the way.”

So instead I tend to sit in silence, I stare unsure of what to say next, so I say nothing. But the words build up like flood waters behind a damn, and eventually it all breaks and water is let lose on the land, and you find that in smaller quantities it’s manageable and good, but all at once it’s never understood, and so most people leave, to weary to rebuild and you're left with the few souls who refuse to just up and go, the few souls who say “no we can handle it better next time.” But all you see is history repeating itself, you know they should leave but can’t bare the loneliness if they do, still, why, why do they stay, when everyone knows that the only thing you’re good at is letting the words get in the way?

At the airport

By what was mainly my fault, I missed my flight last night. I do place a bit of blame of the 5 Jetblue employees (+1 Kiosk) who tossed me between their stations with all the slow moving displeasure of, well, something that moves slowly towards things that want nothing to do with it.


That being said, props to my dad for not disowning me then and there for all of the trouble I caused.


Instead he helped me find another flight to get on and told me to learn how to "get angry" more effectively. . . sorry.


It has now been right around 12 hours since I arrived at JFK airport, and I feel a bit like the guy Tom Hanks played in that one movie, although I am very aware of how good my life is.


My country isn't in rebellion causing me to be stuck between two lands, and there's no asshole making my life hell and following me around the airport in hopes that he'll get to arrest me (well, that I know of).


Events like this just remind me, if the worst things I've had to deal with this semester is spending the night in Terminal 4, well then my life must be pretty good. While I still have another 15 or so hours before I'm home, which makes me think I could have taken the Oregon trail and gotten there faster, it has thus far been a worthwhile experience.


Plus hey, I have been obsessed with Georgia lately, a little stop there may be fun.


You learn a lot from living in an airport, even if it's just for a while, plus if I had left last night I would haven't seen this crazy "end of the world" fog that has been engulfing the JFK premise since about 2 am.


It's thick, so much so that I could see it last night. More than that though it distorts the image of everything, making it look almost as if there was a blizzard going on. The weirdest part though, is that you can taste it. Not just feel the moisture, but you can taste the fog, and when you exhale you see your breath adding to it despite the fact that it isn't all that cold. Things to think about I suppose.


Birdy

History In The Making.

The atmosphere down here is so thick you can cut it with a knife, and serve it by the slice. From where it started, so it seems it will all end, and all because of just one more man dead. I can hear the cheers through my walls 15 flights up, shouts of USA and the chorus of "God Bless America." The streets are flooded by lights, and people, and the smell of freedom and honor. It's history in the making, it should be with all the time it's been taking, for a rallying point of all those lives lost, it's sad it ends in more death, but I guess that's the cost. The people are crowding just a few blocks away, the World Trade once filled with death is reborn as they celebrate... but remember, We Will Never Forget, we made that promise, and so far it's been kept. So here's to speeches that change a nation in one feel swoop, to communities that prove they will always pull through, to never letting that freedom flame die, because in the darkest of nights you can find your way if just one star's in the sky.




After President Obama's Speech On May 1st 2011, my friends and neighbors poured from our dorms and walked the few blocks over to the World Trade Center, where we were joined by people from all over New York, the USA and the World. This is what I felt upon my return a few hours later.

Chopin

I haven't posted anything lately, but I have been busy writing all sorts of things, so here is a poem update!

Maybe I’ll be George,

And You’ll be Chopin.

Like them, for a few years

Let us have our fun.

But you’ll be less sickly,

And I’ll be less of a man.

Yes, I’ll be George,

And You’ll be Chopin.

Thanks for reading!

Birdy (-:

Motivation?

Blegh. It's been quite some time since I posted an angsty update, so prepare yourself.


The last few weeks have been especially hard to handle. Ever since I returned from Iceland I have just been seemingly unable to complete anything. I'm worried my grades are going to reflect this when school gets out in a month. For instance, I had an assignment due last Monday, and I did the second half incorrectly, so I asked the professor if I could redo it, he said yes, but it's been six days and I still haven't been able to complete it, even after I spent three hours the other day staring intermittently at the reading and the blank word doc where my answers should have gone. I don't even have the willingness to edit that last sentence so that it isn't a run on. AHHHHHHHHH!!!!


I just have so many ideas and thoughts and story lines and questions and things in general rushing through my head and I don't know which one to grab first and focus on, I don't know what's worth paying attention to and what's worth pushing to the back for a bit, and it's driving me crazy!!!! I can't focus on everything at once but since I can't decide what to focus on, it seems as if I'll focus on nothing instead.


I keep telling myself that I need motivation, but that's not true, I have TONS of motivation, I just need like an organizer for my thoughts. And I need to just pick something, do it and check it off my list, although a lot of the things on the list are things that I either can't do by myself, or will take a lot of time to set up and execute, like my theatre thing that I want to happen this summer. I know I can make it work, but I don't know where to start to make it work, it's all just so frustrating!! GRRRRRRRRR!!!!!


SO MUCH VENTING OF ANGST!!!!!!! BLEGH!


I feel better after venting, maybe now I will be able to actually get something done!!!!! Who knows. I guess I'll start with that assignment, although he may not be willing to accept it now. Here's to hoping.

I don't feel much like writing posts...

But I have been writing short stories and drawing a lot so uh happy Tuesday?

Hello!

Waiting for posts from Iceland? Don't worry, they will be up soon, I've just been so busy with so many other things since I returned. My once in a while job has turned into a steady scheduled 10-20 hours a week, RHA is currently slaving away to plan two major events for the Residence Halls, and my normally hectic class schedule now has midterms added in, as well as the finishing touches on my Study Abroad application that is due in Friday, and hasn't been signed off on yet.


Oh wow, I forgot March was almost over.... crapola.


Birdy

KEF to JFK

I’ve got a copy of the Times,

A cup of shit brewed coffee.

A laptop open to a blank page,

And smart water since I never eat from the cafe.

Pandora’s playing in the background,

All about being alone in a crowded room.

Discounted book that I don’t need,

From the Borders that’s closing down the street.

My phone's on vibrate, 

Just got a text from Iceland.

The bill's gonna piss off my parents,

But the kid was so nice that I couldn’t help myself.

Class in an hour,

My homework’s not done,

But I’ll blame it on the jet lag, 

Even though I’ve got none.

Iceland felt nice,

Like a taste of adulthood with an added measure of fun.

Now I don’t know what to do since I’m back in the states,

New York city’s so bright, but it’s not home.

At least not at this moment, at least not for me.

Freedom’s a plane ticket, some friends and a good book.

Keeping a journal so that in ten years I can look back,

And read what we thought. 

Harsh at times, yeah I guess,

But for me it was the best.

Ten days in Reykjavik, that we waited months for,

Now it has passed and we don’t know what’s in store.

Nothing is planed but the Times and a coffee,

Class at four thirty with a a hint of the city.

Iceland-Day 0

I leave in 13 minutes. This is so epically awesome and mind blowing that I don't even think I should further attempt to express it. So instead I will leave you with a short Hurah for Iceland, and adventure, and friendship, and all of the paths that lead a person from childhood to adulthood. Cheers.




Birdy

New toy and Iceland excitement part 1!

So I got a new toy recently, a drawing tablet that lets me make pictures right there on my computer screen! It's awesome and my hands are literally numb from how much I've been using it since I brought it home on Tuesday. The best part about it is that it was essentially free! I used a gift card that I've had since Septeber to buy it, and I'm really glad I did...


So to honor my upcoming trip to Iceland (EXACTLY ONE WEEK FROM TODAY! AHH!) I decided to use my new unnamed tablet to reproduce pictures of things I hope to see/experiance on my trip. Idealistically I hope to reproduce and post one picture a day until I leave, we'll see how that actually works out though...


To start us off here is a picture of the "grass houses" that I redid in a George Seurat-esq style (what can I say Sunday in the  Park with George is on repeat in my head)

My Version

The Original

Peter and the Starcatcher

The story of Peter Pan, the boy who refused to grow up, I think it's safe to say, has been a staple of Western culture since it first appeared on stage in 1904. Peter, Wendy, Nana, Captain Hook and all of the other characters have entertained generations of children around the world, but one thing that I'm sure every kid has asked themselves at some point or another is "how did Peter become Peter?"


Eventually all those kids grow up, and they loose their sense of wonder, or at least they are supposed to.


Five men, however, seem to have defied the convention of growing up to forget about Peter, and instead they set out to answer the question. Two of these men, Ridley Pearson and Dave Barry, wrote a book called Peter and the Starcatchers which set out to tell the story of Peter Pan, before he was Peter. Then came along Rick Elice, Roger Rees, and Alex Timbers. These three decided to put Peter back where he belonged, on the stage.


Elice turned Ridley and Barry's book into a stage play, and Rees and Timbers brought it to life as Peter and the Starcatcher. 


The idea behind what they were doing seemed interesting to me, especially since I'm in that pivotal phase where I realize that I have to grow up and as such envy Peter. I didn't know if they would be able to pull it off, but the buzz about the show had been building, so on a whim I convinced a friend of mine to walk down to New York Theatre Workshop with me and see if they had any student tickets left, however, it was the very first night of previews and I was fairly certain it would be a no go.


Surprisingly it all worked out, and we somehow managed to get tickets in the second row of the intimate little theatre. We walked in to find a gold painted proscenium lined with pictures of the classic portrait of Peter Pan, and a rickety looking set comprised of wood planks. This is about the point where I realized the show would either be really artsy or really cheesy. I wasn't sure which I would appreciate more.


The cast then began to filter out onto the stage and interact with each other in a sort of pre show show. I'd seen this only once before, and was highly intrigued. Then the two directors, Rees and Timbers, came out and explained that not only was this the first public preview of the show, but it was also going to be the first complete run-through for the cast. "Wow, hopefully they don't screw up." "Yeah, but it'd be cool to say we were there if they did." "True." (My friend and I are obviously really nice people...)


I don't want to ruin the show for anyone so I'll skip the plot and just say this, the 12 actors (11 male and 1 female) all performed rather brilliantly the 50 or so characters, the dialogue was full of rapid fire wit, and as soon as you grasped the meaning of a scene the next one started, effectively keeping the audience enthralled and on the edge of their seats.


I enjoy a good show more than most people my age, but Peter and the Starcatcher affected me in ways that I didn't think were possible. I went into the show like most people probably did, full of wonder and envy caused by the boy who wouldn't grow up. When I left however, I was filled with pity for him, this poor boy who is forced to eventually forget all of the adventures he's had in order to preserve his childhood innocence.


This show wasn't just a great piece of performance art for me, I feel as if I grew up a bit myself while watching it. As weird and cheesy as it seems, by the time I'd finished watching the 2 hour and 45 minute show, I was somehow much more ok with growing up. It wasn't that I wanted to grow up, but I realized that the sacrifices one would have to make to stay a child just didn't seem worth it; poor tantalized Peter who simply wanted a family, seemed worse off at the end upon losing the person who acted most like his family, even though he'd now be a boy forever. His fate seemed more like a curse than a prize.


Growing up can suck, but staying a child forever seems like a far worse fate, and I find myself envying Peter less and less the more I think about it.


This is how a great piece of art changed my mind in just a few hours, interesting how things affect us in ways we'd never foresee.


Thanks for reading, and if you have time, I do highly suggest a trip to see Peter and the Starcatcher at NYTW.


Birdy

How I've been feeling lately... in song form

This is a song that kinda just explains what I've been feeling in my life.

When your sailing on the ocean to a place you’ve never been, 

When there’s no maps to guide you and your lost, but then again. 

The impossibility that there is something new out there, 

Something no one’s ever seen, 

And you could be the first to land there,

To hunt to walk to look to breath the foreign air. 

The impossibility the dreadful thought, the nerves the scare, 

And there’s nothing left behind you, 

Nothing to return to even if you really wanted, 

So you leave it all behind you 

And you wonder what will find you 

When you reach the land that may not even exist. 

You stumble forward blindly, 

Knowing not a single soul will save you 

But you must keep sailing forward 

Because discovery could be hidden by the morning mist. 

And it’s all a brand new journey,

And you feel that you're too young, 

At the same time you're ageing quickly, 

When you die what will they say that you have done? 

Will you fade back into the fog, the shroud of the unknown,

Or will your name your works your deeds live on, 

Inspired by the places that you dared to go?

Will they remember you? 

In years so far advanced that the world looks not at all the same, 

Will someone, somewhere look back and find your name. 

Or will you fade away to nothing 

Like the countless have before you, 

Will you leave behind your glory, 

Will your own courage astound you?

You'll never know until it's done.

For now your journeys just begun,

And so you must, you must sail on,

Through all of the impossibilities!

...

I don't know what I'm doing with my life, and sometimes that scares me.

Bad idea, or worthwhile gamble?

I am about to drop mad money. 


Money that I currently have saved up for one trip, but will be spending to reserve my spot on another trip, this one for class. I have no job officially lined up yet, and have no guarantee that I will be able to make back the money I am about to spend, not to even mention make the rest of the money needed to pay for the second trip. Once I give the school the money, there is no getting it back, so I keep asking myself, is this a foolish idea, an advantageous risk that I am about to embark on?


I have been saving this money for ages, and have never spent this much at once before, it's a new experience. How do adults handle it? My Anthropology professor would say that I am going from a safety seeking to excitement seeking position on life. How common is it to cross between the two, and once I do, will I be able to cross back, or find some happy middle ground? Who knows, but here's to hoping that good luck comes to those who seek it out.

Real life Room of Requirements

Like everything else in New York, the trees are fake. Especially here. Someone in the guest book called it a real life Room of Requirements. That is exactly what it is. A room filled with trees and grass and warm light, all helping you forget the blistering cold and quickly falling snow outside.


Here, the trees are extra fake, made of plastic, wires, and fabric. The grass shines as if wet, but in reality it is as fake as the trees, a dry plastic carpet cut into symmetrical strips pretending to be grass. The light comes from bright triangle lamps on the ground behind the trees, as well as small lights on the roof, and a few Lekos with purplish diffuser gels.


Speaker boxes in the corners produce sounds of birds chirping, while white painted brick walls with exposed electrics contain the square bean bags and wooden picnic tables, and keep the cold snow out.


Real, dry leaves and twigs surround the base of each fake tree as adults of all ages enter and remark on the astounding artificial environment. Kids, none quite old enough to talk, some too young even to walk, light up with smiles as they chase brightly coloured balls around the comfortable, fake, green, Room of Requirements. A forested haven away from the grey snow-dirt slush outside the front room, perfectly camoflouged in The City. The cold outside waits, but for now the small group of people enjoy their moment in the artificial park.

While we sit by the fire...

Utah. It's an interesting place. It's familiar, but not home. Since my parents moved here I have spent more time here than in Arizona.


Arizona. The land of my people. Home in my heart but, not in reality. This is were I spend the least of my time each year since I went away to school in New York.


New York. My home as far as time is concerned. I like it there, and grower fonder of it all the time, but it still doesn't hold the same weight with me as Arizona.


It's weird, because I knew as soon as I left, that I would probably never move back to Arizona until perhaps retirement. Arizona always has been and always will be my home, even if I don't live there. I brag about it all the time, I relate back to it in conversations, "Well, in Arizona, this is how we do it..." and I mourn when it mourns (such as now after the senseless tragedy in Tucson.)


All the time I spend in New York and Utah (aka away from Arizona) has led me to evaluate why I am so attached to Arizona. To me the answer is simple... it's the people I met there and the memories we share. I don't necessarily love Arizona because it's Arizona, I love Arizona because it is my connection to so many of the people that I love most.


This became more apparent to me this week. Three of my best friends from Arizona came up to Utah to visit me. It was the first time in nearly six months that I had seen any of them and the ease with which we picked up our relationship, as if I saw them every day, has made Utah feel a bit like home.


Together the four of us have cooked wonderful meals: eggs, pancakes with honey and jam, potatoes, and tea for breakfast, spaghetti, potatoes, garlic bread, baked brie, and Oreo milk shakes for dinner. We have planed out our days, and function just like a little family; each of us responsible for a different aspect of the groups well being. This is what home is to me, and this is why I love Arizona. Arizona brought me the people that make me feel at home.


Tomorrow I will be venturing back with my friends for a short visit to Arizona. my first since this last summer. I am looking forward not just to the warm sunlight, but also to seeing the people who continue to teach me lessons, inspire me, and make me feel at home despite the fact that they are often hundreds of miles away.


So now as I sit here bundled by the fire listening to the sounds of my friends it seems fitting to write. Another lesson learned on my journey to adulthood I suppose.


Have a great night and thanks for reading,
Birdy