writing in the sand..

after i went to coffee with noah i had a sudden urge to go sit at the beach tonight. i guess its been windy cause its all smooth and flat at 52nd street. i sat for a long time, thinking. theres still sand on my feet...

I recently found out a lot about my family history from my cousin Sarah. There is a lot of drama and events that explain why certain people don't get along (which family doesn't have those?) but also some huge things that I had no idea about.

First, my grandfather Adolf (My mothers side is fully 100% German) fought as a German Nazi in WW2. My grandmother Rosa, they were together at the time, lived in a small town called Haslach in the Black Forest. Sarah told me she used to have to pull her curtains shut and wasn't allowed to look outside when the airrade sirens went on...there was a consentration camp near where she lived and they would load people in trains there.

This weekend Sarah had a graduation party at their house. My Aunt Gisela has many more pictures and paintings from and of Germany than my mom does, and I took a few minutes to actually look at them, probably for the first time realizing how much family history they hold. There are pictures of a farm house, pictures of an airial view of Haslach, and of old ladies not smiling at the camera.

I'm determined to visit while in Oxford.

charlie

Today I went job hunting. It was moderately successful, considering I made a friend in the process. :) I parked my car and walked around the block. My plan was to walk around the Circle and go into any restaurant I saw, but just as I get to the corner I see a little old Indian man with a walking stick. I make eye contact and smile, but before I could maneuver around him and into the crosswalk he smiles and says "will you walk me to my car?". What am I supposed to say? No? Obviously its what I wanted to say, I was on a mission and I had no idea who this guy was. "Sure!" I said and we slowly set off as he braced himself on my shoulder.

We walked down and around the block and he introduced himself as Charlie. He told me he is from India, was an English professor in India for a while (I told him about my English major and he made the connection), and I also found out that he likes to go to the movies. It made me laugh when he said, "I wish I had more time, we could go get a cup of coffee somewhere". I'm so glad he didn't have time. He basically talked my ear off for 15 minutes (as we walked around the block) and then gave me his card and an email address. So strange. But, he was a cute little old man, and very kind. Made me smile.

the problem of boxes

Moving. Ug.

First you have to find the boxes, (and more often than not its 20 minutes into packing when you suddenly realize "Ahh! I have no boxes!) so packing comes to an unexpected and unfulfilling halt. Once said boxes are located the problem is fitting everything into them. It comes down to the bitter end when one begins to think...."I really don't need this, but what if in a month I need it and think, 'dang it I wish I would have kept that!'" or "this is a perfectly good cord/pensil sharpener/lamp/pair of jeans...why would I throw this away?" or "its a gift, I feel guilty just thinking about putting it in the trash" and so on. The next step is realizing how many boxes there actually are and coming to grips with the fact that you have to move them down four flights of stairs. (my arms still hurt). Oh! and theres the labeling part. Boxes need labels right? It starts off with things like "Books", "winter clothes" and slowly progresses to "desk stuff", "kind of random" and finally to "stuff I dont really need". I honestly labeled one that this year (im pathetic, i know).

Things start lookin up when the boxes are transported to their new location, but then, oh ya, I actually have to take all these inside. Now the smart thing to do would be to take them in slowly, and unpack them one by one. Nope. Its always, bring them all in and I will unpack them all at once and make a huge mess everywhere! There are the few that go into storage, but inevitably its the box full of books you put on ebay 2 months ago and none of them have sold until now, when they are all buried God knows where in the back of the storage unit somewhere.

Finally, when everything is unpacked, and things are starting to look like home again (except different), there is still a problem. 20 boxes sitting in the living room, waiting to be put in the dumpster, but who wants to do that?

Summer in France

desiraemarks.blogspot.com

My beautiful roommate, running wild in france for the summer. :)

a fair haven

I live in a garden.

Upon returning home I park my car and walk across the street. There is an enormous bed of flowers just before the ivy covered trellis and just after that a large black gate that marks the entrance to this garden world. The entire place is canopied by large trees that break the light and make it soft as it reaches the floor below. Along the path there are bushes here, ferns there, and flowers that are sprinkled thoughout to add color. After a few steps a small creek appears on both sides of the path lined with wild grass. I walk over a small bridge and notice the ivy creeping up the sides of it and the old light that hangs down in the center. Next there are tall ferns and ornamental trees that hang over the walkway and as I turn the corner a lampost burns consistantly and the flame inside lights my way. At the next turn there is a large enclosure with a managerie of little birds inside. In the morning these little birds can be seen bathing in the water and greeting those who walk by with little "tweet tweets". The morning is the best time to walk through this garden. Everything is quiet except the birds, the pathways are damp and the plants all glisten with dew. As I make the last turn towards our door I notice the staircase that frames it, and the ivy hanging down like a canopy over the entryway. And to top it all off its located on Fairhaven Drive...perfect.

El Salvador

This is my team!! And the beautiful children I will be watching for the summer.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=657SREhfnck

Studying for Old Testament I found myself reading in 1 Kings.

It goes like this. Ahab, the king, and his wife Jezebel have massacred all of God's prophets, save for Elijah. Elijah gets sick of Ahab's Baal worship crap and invites him to come prove himself.

Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, "Choose one of the bulls and prepare it first, since there are so many of you. Call on the name of your god, but do not light the fire."

Then they called on the name of Baal from morning till noon. " O Baal, answer us!" they shouted. But there was no response; no one answered. And they danced around the altar they had made. At noon Elijah began to taunt them. "Shout louder! he said, "Surely he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought, or busy, or traveling. Maybe he is sleeping and must be awakened. ...Midday passed and they continued their frantic prophesying until the time for the evening sacrifice. But there was no response, no one answered, no one paid attention.

I think Elijah was sitting around during this, waiting, maybe praying. He was probably reading or drawing pictures in the dirt with some local kids, confident in the fact that the God of the Nations was about to reveal himself.

Elijah took twelve stones, one for each of the tribes descended from Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come.."Fill four large jars with water and pour it on the offering and on the wood"

"Do it again," he said, and they did it again.

"Do it a third time," he ordered, and they did it a third time.

The water ran down the altar and even filled the trench.

Despite all the water on the altar, and Elijah only being one man, he did something the prophets of baal could not do. They shouted and begged all day but got nowhere. Elijah however, called upon the name of the Lord and praised him in the company of close to a thousand and...

Then the fire of the LORD fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and it also licked up the water in the trench. When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried,


"The LORD- He is GOD! The LORD- He is GOD!"

as i sip white mocha..

They came regularly every evening drawn by some need. It was as if the water floated off and set sailing thoughts which had grown stagnant on dry land, and gave to their bodies even some sort of physical relief. First, the pulse of colour flooded the bay with blue, and the heart expanded with it and the body swam, only the next instant to be checked and chilled by the prickly blackness on the ruffled waves. Then, up behind the great black rock, almost every evening spurted irregularly, so that one had to watch for it and it was a delight when it came, a fountain of white water; and then, while one waited for that, one watched, on the pale semicircular beach, wave after wave shedding again and again smoothly, a film of mother of pearl.

-Virginia Woolf in To the Lighthouse

These guys always put a smile on my face..