paying the piper

Sometimes,

It feels like it doesn't even matter how pretty you are, how talented you are, how creative you are, how well-rounded you are, how accomplished you are. It doesn't matter how well you dress, how well you write, how well you speak, how well you present yourself. It doesn't matter that you can cook, that you can play the piano, write poetry, write music, paint, draw, craft, make jewelery, study brain cancer, read Dante, carve linoleum, sew, run 6 and a half miles, carry conversations with 90-year-olds, design and run your own lab experiments, teach 3-year-olds how to swim...

They might as well all be lies once they look at the numbers. In so many cases, quality seems to mean nothing without being qualified by quantity. A numerical qualifier. The cold, hard truth. Because everything else is a lie, a facade. A coverup for the all the ways that you tried, because trying never shows.

You have to pay the pied piper of The Next Phase of Life with your mark, your proof of existence, your impish, fickle, insufferable GPA, that insatiable and self-indulgent MCAT score, that cold, hard number that means everything but you wish meant nothing. And when you fail to pay up, he steals your soul. And while you're pied-piping your way through "For whom does this matter?" and "To what end must I continue to sell my soul?", you lose yourself anyway, whether you know it or not.

We're all just chasing after something that's intrinsically ephemeral. We just need something to reach for, something to strive for, something to belong to. We're all trying to make it as something, to be something, to matter. We want so badly to qualify, yet all we know is how to quantify. We want recognition, we want to be significant. We just want to create meaning out of all this chaos and uncertainty. We want to be remembered. We can't stomach the idea of being forgotten.

We're all just chasing after permanence.

whimsy

a whimsical thing...
playing with my new ColorBox inkpad.
I like it.

some days
it's the kind of compelling morning fog that makes sleeping in for an extra 10 minutes... 30 minutes... 40 minutes... perfectly okay.

celebrating the end of my second to last quarter of university with creme puffs, Japanese groceries, chocolate-covered strawberries, and an inclination to actually go to sleep before 1am, let alone 5am, this very night.

71F

Today's test tube pickings...
Discreet pluckings from the neighborhood flowerbeds...
The best flowers are the ones you pick yourself... for free :)




antiquified via http://labs.wanokoto.jp/olds

new stamp!

:)

the latest

This week --
Hand-carved stamps have piqued my interest, inspired by Geninne's Art Blog @ http://blogdelanine.blogspot.com.

Spent way too much money this week buying up oodles of crafting supplies, albeit ones that I always think I am in dire need of...
I can't resist!
Purchased a set of 24+12 Prismacolor markers, beading tools & findings, the most beautiful lapis lazuli beads, a set of Speedball linoleum cutters, 63 Staedtler erasers (for $11.49!!), and currently in search of an array of multi-colored stamp pads.

Purchases made but cannot be used or played with until AFTER THE M.F. MCAT
-_-

But in the meantime...

My 2 very first hand-carved stamps made out of Staedtler erasers (thus explaining my purchase of 63 such items) using an exacto knife (thus awaiting the shipment of my newly purchased linoleum cutters...)

Fashioned a darling little bookmark for one of my favorite residents (and #1 fan of my music!) at the convalescent home.
(Currently reading: John Steinbeck's Tortilla Flat)

Hand-carved stamp, DecoColor paint pens

Complete with nifty little wood bead purchased in Shanghai



The crafty life is good :)
The MCAT life... not so good
(I'm working on it!)

I/you/we

how things have changed
(I/you/we) could be so superficial
And cruel
And meaningful and worthless at the same time
high school's "frigid bitch"
I hope it feels better soon
or later
maybe tomorrow

once in a while
stop thinking in terms of forever
holding things in
hiding nothing
and everything
for every apparent reason
I couldn't have it all

(I/you/we) could be so selfish
hide behind that judgment
that foolishness
that comparison
that jealousy
that coldness
that love-hate
that love-to-hate

in the composite darkness of
our borrowed souls
our naked souls
and those recycled lies
and those crocheted truths

(I/you/we) wanted
still want so much
more than what is there
more than what is here but
still less than what I choose to
give.

I would.

Having a relaxing friday night at home, enjoying the simpler things in life--

-cupcakes & chai tea lattes
-long steamy showers
-lavender-scented soy candles
-doodles in my journal

and I heard something painfully beautiful wafting through the closed window amidst the 10pm wilshire traffic--

what have i become?
my sweetest friend
everyone i know
goes away in the end
you could have it all
my empire of dirt
i will let you down
i will make you hurt

if i could start again
a million miles away
i would keep myself
i would find a way

--Nine Inch Nails - Hurt

---

I would keep myself.
I would find a way.