Back to School

Today was the first day of school! I went to a somewhat promising, if drawn-out, seminar on surrealist cinema. Unfortunately, I think I'm switching out of that class to take a Spanish seminar on the works of filmmaker Luis Buñuel. Either way, I'll be taking really cool courses this semester, and I'm very excited about that.

But today in our film class, we watched Jan Švankmajer's 1982 stop-motion film Dimensions of Dialogue. I'd seen the second part once before, thanks to Reddit, but had never watched the whole thing. As much as I'd like to pretend that I know everything, I do not, and seeing this movie was a testament to that. It's rather funny and absurd, so here it is in case you're into those kinds of movies.

-Dimensions of Dialogue by Jan Švankmajer (1982)

When the Levees Broke

It's strange to think that Hurricane Katrina made landfall in New Orleans ten years ago today. I was eleven years old at the time, and my memories of the event are hazy and selective. I can remember riding to school with my mom, listening to the radio. My dad was talking, barely audible over the wind, and of all the details, I really only recall that he lost his umbrella at some point and that the trees were all shaking. His transmission cut out at some point, and around the same time we got to my school. My mom gave me a hug and assured me things were okay, but I realized that there was a very real possibility that I wasn't going to see my dad again, that he was mortal like every one else in New Orleans.

Later, after we heard he was okay, I remember seeing the news, the floods, and staying up until 3:00 a.m. when the AM reception from New Orleans was strongest so that I could hear his broadcasts. People had no idea what was going on and why the government wasn't helping; I recall a lot of angry voices

There's plenty else, too, of course. I plan to write a portion of my thesis about this, so I've been thinking about it a lot recently. Like most millennials, my understanding of Katrina (along with 9/11, the Columbia disaster, Benazir Bhutto's assassination) has deepened and complicated over time. It's strange to think that my generation will be one of the last to remember these events, but I suppose that's how history works.

I plan to spend my day working and sleeping in my spare moments. I am exhausted and barely coherent, but I am alive and that is its own blessing (and I use that word very rarely).

If you are reading this, which you are, thank you.

Waiting for Marianne

The auto-post blog ghost is sticking around to share stuff this week. This is a poem by Leonard Cohen.

"Waiting for Marianne"

I have lost a telephone
with your smell in it 

I am living beside the radio
all the stations at once
but I pick out a Polish lullaby
I pick it out of the static
it fades I wait I keep the beat
it comes back almost asleep 

Did you take the telephone
knowing I'd sniff it immoderately
maybe heat up the plastic
to get all the crumbs of your breath 

and if you won't come back
how will you phone to say
you won't come back
so that I could at least argue

-from Flowers for Hitler (1964) 

Finally (The Beginning and the End)

The Class of 2019 is here! Finally. Even if they were a bit reluctant and didn't sit in the first five rows. I am terribly anxious to meet them and hear their stories.

Today was the first day of Orientation, and it was beyond words. The hard work and patience that everyone has been showcasing astounds me, and I feel so proud of the Wellesley community.

Now you'll have to excuse me. I'm gonna go jump in the lake.

Countdown

I keep trying to write about stuff that's meaningful to me, like playing piano or the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Heist of 1990 (stay tuned for that one), but it's all really tangled and hard-to-follow. I haven't been sleeping very well, and think my mind is hanging on by a thread. The exciting news is that tomorrow marks the start of Orientation week, which we've been planning all summer.

It's exhilarating to think that all of our hard work is about to come to fruition, but I'm having a hard time doing things like remembering how to breathe. Which is not to imply that this hasn't been an incredibly meaningful job; it has been. I feel so lucky and grateful and excited that everything is coming together, but next to those feelings sits a lot of guilt.

I'm terribly unorganized, and I hate feeling like that inability to prioritize and complete tasks well is affecting others, especially when those others are people who are already going out of their way to help us. I try to remember that I'm only human, and that I'm doing the absolute best that I can. At this point, very little could significantly screw up the week ahead. So many people are collaborating and making sacrifices to make this huge, incredible thing happen, and that makes me feel content, secure, and hopeful.

But that's enough about my feelings.

As paradoxical as it might sound, I'm really just gunning to get more sleep once the semester starts.

Feeling Good

We're running on adrenaline, and ready for next week. Here is a Nina Simone recording to better your day, which was hopefully pretty alright to begin with.

- "Feeling Good" as recorded by Nina Simone for I Put A Spell On You (1965)

Mt. Auburn Cemetery

Here are some photos from last month, when I spent a day wandering around Mt. Auburn Cemetery. It was my first time using this camera, and only my second time shooting (expired) black-and-white, so most of my shots didn't turn out, but I had fun and that's what matters, right? For the record, though, shooting in black-and-white is a million times harder than color.

A bit about Mt. Auburn itself: The first "garden cemetery" in the U.S., Mt. Auburn was dedicated in 1831 as a radical departure from the more popular urban cemeteries. The idea was to incorporate the graves into the landscape and create a park-like atmosphere. The space is still unbelievably peaceful, and holds the remains of nearly 100,000 individuals, including Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Bernard Malamud, and Isabella Stewart Gardner. There's also a huge monument called Washington Tower, which, from the top, has incredible views of Cambridge and Boston. I chose to go up, however, at the same time as a huge group of tiny yet vocal schoolchildren, which was both unsettling--I was afraid someone was going to fall--and annoying. Despite the rowdy kids, I appreciated the cemetery quite a bit, and definitely encourage anyone and everyone to visit, should they receive the opportunity.

A well-loved grave

The best I could do; Cambridge + Boston

Sleeping + Creative Productivity

I swear, I'll write a thoughtful and reasoned post here soon. Yesterday was moving day, which means that I'm again wrestling with the amount of stuff I have (downsizing is at the top of my post-Orientation priorities list). But I'll talk more about that later, when I'm more awake. Instead, I want to share a fun little visual dug up from the nooks of the Internet.

This was stolen from BrainPickings.org, a fantastic website dedicated to tidbits of art, writing, and wisdom from creative minds like Virginia Woolf. They send out a weekly newsletter on Sundays, and though I'm usually averse to newsletters, this is one I actually enjoy reading. Check it out, if you're ever so inclined.

But about this chart. It was crafted by an artist named Giorgia Lupi, and charts the sleeping habits of several renowned writers alongside a few snappy facts about their creative output. Though creativity and productivity are reliant on an infinite number of non-quantifiable factors, this is still a fun and fascinating visual. Who knew that James Joyce liked to sleep in until ten a.m.?

That's all. Thanks for reading this, and a joyous Friday to you!

Bring On The Dancing Horses

Good morning.

- "Bring On The Dancing Horses" by Echo & the Bunnymen, from Songs to Learn and Sing (1985)

The Cape + Crunch Time

It was a beautiful weekend full of sun, sleep, and swimming (I've now been in two different sides of the Atlantic, not that anyone's counting). I need to write more about it when it's not 8 a.m. and when I'm away from the office, but I had a very relaxing break with one of my best good friends.

Now I'm back to the daily grind of Orientation planning, which has become weirdly thrilling. We really only have a week left to get a lot done—and move into our fall housing in the process—but it's kind of exhilarating to know that, soon, a bunch of wide-eyes young'ns will be here, hanging out at events that we helped plan.

This is, without a doubt, the best (and maybe most stressful) job I've ever had.

Cape Cod Bay

The Shampoo

The scheduled-update Blog Ghost (A.K.A. Claire from the past) is back as current Claire frolics around the Cape with her good friend Jo.

Here is one of my favorite-ever poems. The lines "you've been, dear friend, / precipitate and pragmatical" are some of the better lines in twentieth-century poetry, to the best of my knowledge and opinion.

"The Shampoo"

The still explosions on the rocks,
the lichens, grow
by spreading, gray, concentric shocks.
They have arranged
to meet the rings around the moon, although
within our memories they have not changed.

And since the heavens will attend
as long on us,
you've been, dear friend,
precipitate and pragmatical;
and look what happens. For Time is
nothing if not amenable.

The shooting stars in your black hair
in bright formation
are flocking where,
so straight, so soon?
--Come, let me wash it in this big tin basin,
battered and shiny like the moon.

-Elizabeth Bishop, from A Cold Spring (1955)

On Wellesley and the Passing of Summer

Somehow, like always, this summer has gotten wildly away from us. Thesis research is coming along, somehow—I'm reading Art Spiegelman's Maus right now—and things at work at getting busier every day (think: lots of coffee and late afternoons). The most unbelievable aspect of all this isn't even Orientation, if you can believe that. Which is not to suggest that I'm not anxious and thrilled and overwhelmed for the new students to arrive, because I am.

Rather, I feel hugely sentimental about saying my goodbyes to Wellesley. I knew that, when I made the choice to come here, I was choosing an unusual college experience. Someone once told me that Wellesley is a long-term investment: you get torn apart and built back up stronger and smarter for the "Real World." Though this may be true (I've cried in front of countless faculty members, including my boss), the experience of being a Wellesley student has been so much more than that. I'm certain that this place is a hundred times more fun than what comes next. When again in my life will I have weekly improv practice with my closest friends, or be a part of a co-op where I get paid to make sandwiches and help foster a little campus community?

More importantly: when else in my life am I going to be taken as seriously as I am here? It's hard not to take Wellesley for granted, but the older I get, the more aware I become of my gender, for better or worse. Never again will I be consistently surrounded by as many passionate, intelligent, motivated people. Nor will I be able to voice my opinions without being discounted because I'm a woman. But I suppose it's up to us to break down those perceptions and stereotypes. If Wellesley has prepared us to do anything, it's just that.

To summarize: This sentimentality is premature, yes, but Wellesley has been important to my development in ways I never could have imagined four years ago, and I don't really want to graduate...yet.

Supertree outside my window

On iPhones

Something weird happened the other day: I got an iPhone. Now, if you know anything about my anxious relationship with technology, this is not a negligible move. But, in the grand scheme of things, I'm beginning to appreciate the uses of technology. Since I've stopped resisting, the convenience of smartphones has become more apparent to me.

On the other hand, I think attitudes like mine should be kept on a short leash, because there's a fine line between convenience and excess. I don't ever want to feel as though I missed out on a really important moment because my head was buried in a screen.

Work is also getting crazy busy (first-years are on their way!) and it's going to rain today.

What an exciting life I lead.

The good ol' arboretum.