Alright, already!

I don't like doing wish lists because it seems to make everyone really uncreative. I considered making this an all-book Christmas, but I thought you might not appreciate that, either. I don't like getting exactly what I ask for, because then there's no surprise to this. So, here are a few specific things as well as some options that are jumping-off-points to get creative.

That said, I have been sent three messages from Mandy in as many days demanding a list. So here it is. As you can see, music is much on my mind. As is warm clothing.


If you wish price were no object...

Photos of you and your offspring

Clock radio

EZ-pass transponder

A manicure

Tristan und Isolde recording (copied is FINE - best if it has the tracks listed, though- Birgit or Kirsten preferred but not absolutely necessary...please no American Isolde, though)

Sound system components (used is FINE) I need something better than my computer's speakers.

Tristan und Isolde score

Any amazing music you would like to share with me in audible or printed forms.

Tea

Socks

Earrings

An original haiku

An opportunity to dance


Slightly pricier:

Opera tickets (x2 to share with Brock - anything but obstructed view)
Things at the Met that I would love to see before Feb 23rd:
Eugene Onegin
Orfeo ed Euridice
Lucia di Lammermoor
Rigoletto
Il Trovatore

Any lovely clothes or especially warm clothes (even hand-me-downs)
(size 4 pants and tops or small tops, please take into account that I have a slightly long torso and slightly long legs)

Waterproof boots

Awesome heels
(size 9.5 or 10)

A massage

Blender (used is FINE)

If money is no object...

Camera

Leather boots

Kaplan MCAT prep course (Not a joke)

A hefty bribe to OSU med school admissions officers.

AND AS ALWAYS...

Books!

Second-hand stuff will be totally, completely acceptable and appreciated.

I know you won't believe this...

...but I think I may have lost the desire to bite my nails!

Altogether new

Yesterday my friends Carin and Conor (the really nice engaged couple from Davis, CA) took my friend Scott and me rock climbing in northern Mass. It was amazingly fun and un-scary...I wish that I'd taken advantage of all the people who climbed in Santa Fe. I only did a couple of the easy climbs, but I'm going to try to practice on the climbing wall here and make this into a hobby. It's such an enjoyable way to spend a day!
I'm going to be in Ohio for Thanksgiving (shout out to Ben and Julie, as always!) and the weekend before that, I'm going to New York to see Brock.
I really had such an enjoyable, stress-free weekend of reading for pleasure, drinking tea, walking in the woods (saw three amazing deer who walked right across my path), climbing cliffs, and thinking about how incredibly blessed my life is. Life is so good.
Still not sure what I'm going to do for field work term...Brock offered for me to stay with him, so my options now include Bennington (working for a professor in her lab), Ohio (doing who knows what) and New York (volunteering in Sloan-Kettering's integrative medicine center). If I'm in New York, you'll still have to come see me, Sam and Susie!

I can't believe it's actually today! (Part II)

Wow. Nice speech, Barack. I was one of the weepers last night. Congratulations, everybody...especially friends who worked for the campaign.

I can't believe it's actually today!

I want to take a moment to express, in the final moment, my excitement at the prospect of having a thoughtful, well-spoken president, and the first black president. I think that Barack will win today, and I know that when he does, the incredible, wonderful, almost laughable idealism of all of us who support him will turn into the realism of living with the consequences of the government's decisions for another four years.

But this morning, waking up to the last day of coffee and polls online, I feel truly hopeful that having an intelligent person running this country will make a difference here and internationally, and that electing a black president will make a difference in the way that American children see themselves and their opportunities. Anyway, I want to put it on the record that I am hopeful today.

Me too, me too!

I want to go to graduate school in the UK, too! Half the family lives there now, it seems. I don't think it is very practical for me to apply for a medical degree in the UK, but I may do it anyway.

I've been a little down the last couple of weeks. I miss the ex-boyfriend terribly and am trying not to focus on that...but it's difficult. On top of that, he and his sister have un-friended me on Facebook. I'm not sure why this upset me so much, but it has.

School is going well, but I have been more distracted this semester and am a teensy bit concerned about my ability to focus on chemistry. My microbiology and animal physiology classes are fascinating, and have been stealing my energy and attention away from chemistry.

Election election election. I'm planning for the best and ignoring the possibility that the worst could happen.

I still haven't been able to find a lab to work in during field work term. This is very upsetting, but not the end of the world. I'm going to have a lot of research experience from research projects I'm doing here for my microbiology and chemistry classes...so I guess I could spend field work term volunteering and studying for the MCAT.

I'm planning to take the MCAT on Wednesday, August 5th. I REALLY need to do well on this test. Never before have I been afraid of a standardized test. I am now. It really freaks me out that it is on a computer. I love the sensation of penciling in bubbles.

Also, I had to reassure Grandma Callahan that everyone really does love and appreciate her...maybe a certain sister of mine (not Jennie, who talked to her only a couple weeks ago) should send her an email?

What do you think?!

ABC is remaking V for primetime tv. Brilliant!

What is with the HIDEOUS red and blue felt on the set of the presidential debate?

I'm in the student center watching the debate. Poor McCain looks like a broken, broken man. It's really sad. I hope he doesn't get any pity votes.

On the bright side, Obama looks GREAT in comparison.

Though both Obama and McCain have unusually unfortunate makeup and hair tonight.

I am officially sick of Obama's and McCain's talking points. Answer the damned questions, fools. I wish that the crowd were allowed to heckle and cheer. I think we would all get a lot more out of it if the little wiggly screen lines from the Ohio focus group were vocal.

Everyone here makes fun of the Ohio focus groups. Cringe. Couldn't you get in there, Ben, and raise the beauty/eloquence level a little bit?

Why doesn't Tom cut them off from going over the time limit? This is ridiculous!

Words that I hate: Bush, Main street, cronyism, pork barrel spending, maverick, taxes,

Hilarious when John McCain told the young black man in the audience, "You have probably never heard of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac until recently..."
Insulting! Hope he hasn't ever taken out any loans!

My schedule allows me to read the newspaper every morning. I love it.

I'm going to take the test Friday afternoon with Jeanne. I am ridiculously prepared for this test, so I don't think there will be any negative consequences for taking a day off in the middle of the week. Also, the only temple here is super-reform, which is not that great overall, but they encourage me to go to services there. I am going to start taking Monday night classes at the end of the month to learn Hebrew etc. so that when/if I am ready to start to convert I will be more prepared.

In other news, I have decided to move back to Columbus in June to study for the MCAT, get a job, further establish my Ohio resident status, and apply to medical school. I am trying to convince Mandy that she should move back with me.

I still have no idea what to do with my field work term (6 weeks long!) in January and February, but I would like to do some interesting medical-related volunteer work.

Moral dilemma

I want to go to services and fast for Yom Kippur, but I have a chemistry test on Thursday morning. I could just go to Kol Nidrei service on Wednesday night and fast and take the test on Thursday morning and then go to afternoon services, or I could ask (with my friend Jeanne) to have the test moved for us. While Jeanne, as a conservative Jew, is totally justified if she asks to take the test at another time, I feel like it would be pretty strange for me to make the same request. At the same time, I do want to go to services and observe Tom Kippur, so perhaps it ultimately doesn't matter that I'm not Jewish. Thoughts?

Also, isn't it strange that we have a word for di-lemma, but not really one for poly-lemma? Ooh, never mind, the word polylemma does exist! So this is a moral polylemma.

Friday Night Lights...

is so hot.
How lame that it will only be on cable? Really lame.

Amusing, Election-related

Guess what I did today?

Went to soccer practice! I have a game this Saturday against Marlboro, how crazy and wonderful is that?

Obama and McCain on Science Issues

Science Debate 2008

I just donated more money to Obama.

Don't worry, it wasn't very much.

Still, I know that if I don't put a little money toward this campaign, and they lose, I will have a hard time forgiving myself. I am also casting my vote via absentee ballot in good-old Franklin County. Mailed in my application a few days ago.

I am SO angry with McCain for choosing Sarah Palin.

While looking for amusing images of money...I came across SEVERAL pictures of kittens with money.

Weird.

This one's for Dad:

She sounds terrible. Absolutely terrible!

Go Obama, GOOOO!!!!
If you haven't read the NY Times article about Sarah Palin...well, you should.
Once Elected, Palin Hired Friends and Lashed Foes

Honestly:

I want to take a break from reviewing for my bio final tomorrow to say: I find all of this work insanely difficult. I woke up early this morning to finish a problem set for chemistry, went to class all morning, talked about bio and stared into space at lunch, was in chem lab all afternoon, got home at 4:30, caused a toilet to overflow, flooding the kitchen underneath (not in a gross way, don't worry) studied for bio, took a brief trip to Dunkin Donuts and drank a bunch of coffee, and am now back at my desk studying. I have been listening to the most upbeat songs I have, turned up really loud, to help me feel like I am engaging in an important and exciting adventure of the mind rather than chained to my desk and my calculator, as I actually am. I do enjoy learning all this stuff, and I am SO thankful that I have interesting, kind, and intelligent people to study and hang out with. Still, I have basically left behind my normal life. I can handle this for two more weeks. I could probably handle it for a year. But I don't know if I can live without a life for the next eight years. What I CAN see is how this lifestyle of intense study could become addictive. It is incredibly rewarding. It must be even better once you're studying to be a doctor directly.

...Ever since I moved to L.A., famous people stalk me...

Philip Seymour Hoffman and Ellen Burstyn are here doing an acting workshop thing. I love Ellen Burstyn sooooooooooo much. She's sassy. Obviously she's been in a million things, but one thing Mandy may remember her from was the Spitfire Grill, random movie which we watched a few times (for some reason) directed by one of two famous St. John's alums: the dude who created MacGyver.


Oh, I thought of the other one: Ahmet Ertegun, the only good-guy in the movie Ray.

He apparently was a really awesome guy, and he died recently and now St. John's has a scholarship in place in case any Turkish people feel like studying the great books. Weird.

Today...

I broke into tears over a B- on a lab report. Wow. During a break from lecture. And then I had to choke back tears the rest of the morning through lecture. Needless to say, this has NEVER happened to me before. Maybe once in third grade when I got caught because Katie Y. copied my spelling test. But then Mrs. Williams named her daughter Anne Marie so I was pretty sure she didn't hate me or anything. I am seriously stressed out.

This did cheer me up a little:



It's so Dharma Initiative-y.

I WANT THIS BOOK

I keep trying to look up the etymology of words online, and it is impossible. So I went to amazon and found this book, which looks amazing. I want it. I need it. I can't afford it.

Wouldn't it be nice...

...if there were some way to be stressed out enough to motivate me to study and for me to be calm and relaxed at the same time? I'm going to start meditating on my study breaks.

Week in review

I went to the drive-in with four of the girls to see Batman last night. Yesterday was an exhausting day. I had class and lab all day long, Grandma and Grandpa got in to Bennington a day early for their visit, so we had dinner and talked, and then they went to bed and I went to the drive-in. There's nothing quite like sitting in a truck bed with three mentally exhausted girls, drinking a beer, and petting Davida's basset hound, Ghandi, while lightning flashes in the distance and Batman entertains. It was a good night. When I got back (we opted out of the double feature-Journey to the Center of the Earth) a huge thunder storm broke and the thunder and lightning kept me from falling asleep.

Then I woke up early (ON MY ONE MORNING OFF!) went for tea with Grandma and Grandpa, and then they came with me to the farmer's market and to the Bennington Pottery store (my London Underground mug is chipped and in my heartache about it I decided to replace it with a Vermont souvenir) and then we had lunch and they left. It was a really nice visit. Grandma says the nicest things, and it's nice to be around people who miss mom as much as I do. As you all know.

So this afternoon, I meant to get my car battery replaced because I am currently immobile, but I didn't because I took a nap to recover and now it's too late. Darn it. And I know that I should do at least a mild amount of work this afternoon. But I really really don't want to. So there.

This last week has been very difficult. I did pretty well in my first "semester" of chemistry, and am now in the middle of my semester of bio and second semester of chem. The second semester of chemistry is more quantitative, which is a good thing and a bad thing. The work takes less time to do but is trickier for me than what we were doing before. Bio is a dud class. I enjoy learning the stuff, but it's a lecture style class (there are only six of us so this hardly seems appropriate) which disappoints me.

Carin, my incredibly sweet next door housemate, was surprised last weekend when her boyfriend Connor came out to visit a day early and proposed. They've been dating since they were fifteen and are a really really sweet couple. Congratulations! He's been staying back in L.A. where he works and is moving out at the end of the summer.

Those are the only eventful things. Everything else is just work.

Belated thank you, Brad

I really love Rabbit Fur Coat- I think you gave it to me two Christmases ago. Melt Your Heart has been keeping me company A LOT the last week. Thanks!

I feel like I'm on a roll. Procrastination is the best motivation for blogging.

So...I'm writing a lab report and having a really absurdly difficult time doing it because of my teacher. She keeps taking off points for really teeny tiny things that no one in her right mind would penalize. Like the time when I lost half a point for forgetting to put the possessive plural ' on in a homework assignment. For real. So now I'm afraid of her and I don't want to turn anything in because I hate losing points and, honestly, can't afford to.

Meanwhile, one of our merry bunch was sent packing this week. The only boy.
I keep getting lots of group emails from the girls (there are six of us now-all girls) about nothing-all a pathetic excuse to procrastinate.

The saddest thing of all is that even if I did successfully finish this lab report by a reasonable hour, I wouldn't have anything really fun to do. Ideally, I would like to spend time with my friends, but they are all working as well.

Finally, and I'm ashamed to say it but I'm sure it's become obvious from previous posts:I do spend an awful lot of time on my computer's photobooth. Here's one from a few days ago:

Oh no, Jaime!

When you're in the U.K. you can't watch anything through the network TV websites. That means that when you finally fall for Lost, you won't be able to watch it in HD streaming on NBC! Better stay here, after all.

Mandy

Sam, my last post wasn't so much being nice to Mandy...as it was warning her about the dangers of eternal hellfire (or cold dampness-depending). Jesus, people, don't take everything so damned ironically.

Also, I love 30 Rock, Jaime. That German-bird moment is one of my favorites.

Also, I already finished my first semester of chemistry! And I haven't been kicked out-hooray!

Watch out, Mandy!

I cry WAY too easily.

I actually went to the effort to go to nytimes.com and check on what was happening in the world...and was rewarded by a fluff piece about this viral video. Bless news sources for knowing what is important to me: a good cry. Anything slightly sentimental (or even just wonderul) makes me cry. I can't make it through many 5-minute most emailed stories without getting a bit teary-eyed.
The absolute worst case: Melissa Block's moment by moment account of a mother and father searching through the rubble for their toddler and their parents. Here is NPR's little write-up about the story:

On Monday, Fu Guanyu dropped off her young son, Wang Zhilu, at his grandparents' house so she could go to work. Minutes later, the earthquake hit.

She rushed back home and saw their apartment building in ruins. She says soldiers came right away to help, but they had no equipment.

Two days later, the heavy machinery is on the way. As an excavator clears a path, Fu and her husband Wei Wang search the debris, calling for their son.

After a long while, the workers stop. They have found bodies. What this abstract doesn't relate is that Melissa Block is standing there narrating as all of this unfolds, and it's a really long story, and she's practically losing it watching this poor woman completely lose hope and fall apart.


Luckily for YOU, this dancing video is nothing like that NPR story. It's of a harmless guy doing a silly dance in some of the places he's visited. It's the kids dancing who make me cry! I don't stand a chance against that!

Week Two

Hmmm...I'm pretty resolved to post something every weekend when I finally get to take a breather from class...but because all I've done is study, I'm not sure what to write about. For one thing, my allergies are better. I think I had a sinus infection on top of allergies. I won't go into the details of THAT.

My five year-ish reunion is coming up. I created a Facebook group for it and then handed it over to the people who are actually going to be in Columbus. It's funny, because when I was in high school I remember knowing that lots of people were really lame, but it just seems so much more obvious now. Happily, most of my friends are doing really well. Brock works for Christie's in New York, which he doesn't really love but which he shouldn't complain about TOO much. Beth is doing really well in L.A. She was in a play in Pasadena that I thought was really interesting, and she's starting a P.A. job on an ABC show in a few weeks, which means she gets to quit her job at Starbucks!

Ross is development director for FairVote. You can look him up on their website, which I think is really cute. Yay non-profits! Ted is teaching hip-hop to street kids in Uruguay and sent me an amazing email about what it's been like there. He wants to come back to the U.S. this fall and work on getting some articles and essays published.

The last week has been very challenging. I wake up at 7:45, get ready for class and study a little. Have class all morning and then lab in the afternoon until 4. Then I come back to my tiny but comfortable room, sit at my desk and try very hard to study without watching any TV on the internet (Damn you, Lost!). And I take a break for dinner at about 8:30 or 9 and end up working until about 1:30. And this is me! I'm not going over and over the same material like a workaholic...Janet just assigns us about two chapters...plus problems...plus a paper or a lab write-up...every night, so it's impossible to get ahead! So I'm actually working and stressed out a little all day long. Then on Friday afternoon we have a "quiz". For the quiz, she gives us twelve problems, asks us to do ten of them, and then leaves. One problem EASILY takes more than a half hour. I think one of mine yesterday took me an hour, because I wanted to check my work. So I'm there all afternoon until I can't stand it anymore and have to hand it in or lose mind. Then I walk home, re-hashing the test, and I realize that I've actually done really well on it, I can't think of any that I have really messed up, and my written explanations were fine, logical, reasonable. So WHY, WHY do I stress out so much when I prepare for the quiz, and why do I feel so little confidence while I'm in the middle of it? And the real question: what the hell is it going to be like to take the MCAT?

I've compiled a sort of short-list for schools I'm going to apply to next year. Some of them I have no chance of getting into (ahem. state schools in California.) because they only accept a few out of state people every year, and let's face it. I'm not one of them.

Ohio State
Cincinatti
St. Louis University (humanists!)
Pittsburg
McGill
University of New Mexico
USC
UCLA
UC Davis
UCSF
Rosalind Franklin-Chicago

So, that's eleven...and I'll have to apply to more than that, because the acceptance rates for these schools hover around 2-3% for out-of-staters. Ohio State's in-state rate is more like 10%

On that happy note, I'm going to enjoy an entire day of not worrying about any of this. I'm going with the girls to the Farmer's Market, and tonight we'll probably get a little drunk and watch Steel Magnolias or equivalent girlie movie that our boyfriends never want to watch with us.

Bennington: First Week

So...I actually, really, truly haven't had time to post. I saw a lot of you guys on my drive across the country (sorry Jennie, I'll see you soon!) which was really nice. I'm so glad that you got to know Ben better. Then I got to Bennington. My first impression was of rolling meadows full of wild flowers, stands of trees, and lots of really cool architecture. A security guard (the security guards are really quite the characters here) insisted on driving in front of me to show me where Longmeadow was...so I followed behind him for about a half a mile, then turned down a driveway to a little cedar shingle house where I have a very tiny, cozy room. I live here with five girls and one guy. Four of the girls and the guy are post-baccs with me. One of the girls is a fifth year Bennington student getting her masters in early childhood education. The house has a big kitchen with two fridges, our very own FREE washer and dryer (hallelujah!) and a nice big living room that is too dark for us to want to use in the middle of summer.

There are only seven post-baccs this year, so the five of us girls living here are the main group...there is one other girl living off campus in a barn with her basset hound. She's a Navy pilot and has a masters in strategic intelligence. The rest of us are your run of the mill Oberlinx2/Colorado College/University of New Hampshire/St. John's liberal arts girls.


Jeanne, who's front and center in this photo, is Steven Shalwitz's cousin. Weird, huh? I really love living with these girls. I think that having them around is going to help me stay motivated, and also provide me with a little bit of community so that I don't feel like I'm drowning in a sea of chemical equations, which, by the way, I already am. Anyway, I started classes last Thursday and since then have developed absolutely the worst allergies I've ever had. Terrible. I thought I was going to stop breathing the other night and made Carin promise me that if I ran in motioning that I was choking, that she should call 9-1-1 right away. I have been on a cocktail of Benadryl, Sudafed, Tylenol, and this nose spray the doctor gave me all week, and it almost makes enough of a difference, but on Monday and Tuesday I really was just about completely useless...not the best way to start out this program academically. Even today, when I had a test that lasted three hours, I had a splitting headache and the sniffles all the way through.

In summary, this last week I have learned a LOT of chemistry, I'm living in a house that I really like with a group of nice, laid-back girls I really like, and I really miss Ben. That's it! Oh, and I'm soooooo tired.

New 'Do

Farewell, L.A.

Garrison Keillor was on Off-Ramp this weekend. I guess he originally wrote this (below) as an op-ed for the Times. I can say, with very little exaggeration, that I am going to miss L.A. a million times more than I thought I would a year ago.

Some of my thoughts:

- You have to be retarded (or evil) to think that deporting all illegal immigrants is a good idea. I wish that I could do more to help out Saul, my absolute favorite LAMILL co-worker (who is not illegal, but is new to the U.S. and English). I also wish that I were learning Spanish as quickly as he is learning English. Damn you Saul, you wonderful man! Seriously, I challenge anyone to get to know a random sample of immigrants from Mexico and then make a decision about immigration reform. I feel completely inspired by my time here to learn Spanish and work for the under-served Hispanic population in L.A.

- How do people keep their houses clean when it rains outside all the time and their dogs are going in and out? The few rainy days we have here with Grushenka are HELL.

- It's been five years since I graduated from Bexley. I wish that I could have been a cooler teenager. I was waaaayyy too uptight. I mean, I know that I still am to a certain extent, but I do feel that I've come a long way in the last four years.

- Hmmm...I guess that's pretty much it.

And now for Garrison Keillor's (somewhat more eloquent and humerous) thoughts:

IT USED TO BE that Angelenos were much too cool to express outright pride in their city, feeling that boosterism is for yahoos from the Midwest. But when I was in L.A. last week, I got an earful about what a good place it is from friends who never said anything like that before. They had always talked about choking traffic, the unreality of real estate prices, the sprawl, blah blah blah. Now, suddenly, they couldn't live anyplace else.

The bright burst of civic feeling might have been because of the bad brush fires, including a blaze a month ago in Griffith Park in the heart of the city. Eight hundred firefighters put that fire down and immediately became heroes, and it showed people how much they loved L.A., just like your mother's colon operation jolts you into reality.

Everybody knows the comedy version of L.A. — the city of skinny tanned women, cellphones in hand, driving Suburbans the size of personnel carriers at 80 mph, taking a tiny child to the therapist to address self-esteem issues.

Those jokes play well in the flat parts of the country. A Midwesterner goes to L.A. and feels a certain sense of moral disapproval. The squalor, the opulence, the expense of natural resources to support middle-class life in an arid place, the fascination with the misshapen lives of young celebs. It isn't the Canaan it was for our grandparents. We look at it and see a rundown bungalow selling for half a million and cars inching along the 405 and say, "No thanks."

But it's good to know there's another point of view. The sun does shine there, and people enjoy their lives — the spirit of la pura vida, or the love of life for its own sake, the opposite of Calvinist America.

L.A. is more than ever a city of immigrants, the Europeans diminishing, the Rodriguezes and Jimenezes burgeoning. (Check out the phone book.) Immigrant culture isn't so pretty — you rent a cheap storefront, work 16-hour days, make your kids toe the mark — but there is dignity to it.

Unrestricted immigration is a dangerous thing — look at what happened to the Iroquois. They failed to impose border controls and, before they knew it, they were dying of infectious diseases they had no names for. In the case of California, however, it was Spanish before it was English, and now it's simply tending back that way.

I met up in L.A. with a niece from Boston who told me she was there for the first time in her life, so I did my uncle duty, got a car and took her for a spin as the sun was setting. We headed out on the Santa Monica Freeway toward the ocean, and some faintly disparaging remark she made ("it goes on forever") inspired me to wind up and give her a pitch for L.A., its gentle winters, its writers and musicians, its cosmopolitanism, its easygoing energies.

We walked along the beach, the Santa Monica Pier glittering in the distance, and then we cruised some lush streets around UCLA, and headed east on Sunset, the sunroof open, traffic juking and bopping around us, and then, looking for Melrose Avenue and the classic front gate of Paramount Studios, I lost my bearings and circled for a while in the dark. But it felt good to promote L.A. to an Easterner.

We live in a growly, snarky time, heavy irony clacking everywhere like people walking around in tap shoes, and it's a privilege to speak up for a despised city. Seattle, sit down. New York, shut up. Vermont, this is not about you. You want to hear about New Jersey or North Dakota or Nebraska, just ask.

Brad...tonight I rolled my eyes at David Archuleta a thousand times on your behalf

A favor for Ben

I'd love it if you could complete this survey to help Ben complete his research methods project. If you do, you can enter to win an iTunes gift certificate! Feel free to share the link on your blogs too... (we are begging and bribing, as you see...it's the end of the semester).

Click here to begin experiment

The Last Don Rag - Scott Buchanan

One of the founders of the New Program, Scott Buchanan served as dean of St. John's from 1937 through 1946. These remarks were made on May 31, 1958, at a party held in honor of Buchanan and Stringfellow ("Winkie") Barr, the co-founder of the New Program in Briarcliff Manor, N.Y.

This occasion reminds me of an occasion some twelve years ago when Winkie and I were leaving St. John's. There was a farewell party given us by the students. Some of you may remember, some money had been collected and put on deposit with the bookshop, a fund for books on which we could draw if we got lonesome. We were each given a token book and we had to make little farewell speeches. It was a very moving occasion for us, and particularly for me because I casually opened to the first page of my book and read it: "Tell me, O muse, of the man of many devices, who wandered full many ways after he sacked the sacred citadel of Troy. Many were the men whose cities he saw and whose mind he learned, aye, and many the woes he suffered in his heart upon the sea, seeking to win his own life and the return of his comrades. "

I have recalled this omen many times in the last ten years, particularly when I run into a St. Johnnie or two and in no time at all a conversation springs up, like fresh water from an old spring, in a world where there are fewer and fewer conversations. These years, as Winkie has just said, have been years of wandering and searching. I think we have returned to Ithaca many times, and yet have found that Ithaca is no longer Ithaca. You will remember that Odysseus finally was advised to take an oar on his shoulder and travel with it until he found people who would not know it was an oar and would take it for a threshing flail. That has happened too. I am just now invited to a conference on education next week, where the leaders of the discussion are to be Sidney Hook and Ernest Nagle and some so-called educators. They apparently think that I belong to that curious modern tribe who have never known the liberal arts. For a few minutes I want to stage a little tableau for you, a composite oral examination and don rag.

I have some questions I want to ask you, questions for St. John's graduates and questions for American citizens. As I understand the questions, one leads to another, and they all add up to: How are you doing? The first question is: Do you believe in and trust your intellect, that innate power that never sleeps? This is not a theoretical nor a dogmatic question, but rather one of experience. Do you recognize the action of this power as you live and learn? Many of you have gone on to graduate and professional learning, and, I happen to know, many of you have lived a lot in addition. You have fallen into the hands of scholars and into the grooves of practice. You have suffered the winds of doctrine, and have gotten lost in the jungle of ideologies. Latterly you have been stormed by scientific miracle and guess. In all these learnings and practices have you listened to the small spontaneous voice within that asks continually if these things are true? Have you allowed this voice to speak louder and remind you that you do not know, that you know you do not know, that you know what you do not know? Do you believe that knowledge is possible, that truth is attainable, and that it is always your business to seek it, although evidence is overwhelmingly against it? This is the first question; I shall not just now press for an answer.

The second question seems to flow from the first. Have you in the course of your life, before, after, or while you were at St. John's, become your own teacher? Perhaps this is not quite the question that I intend. This may be better: Have you yet recognized that you are and always have been your own teacher? Amidst all the noise and furor about education in this country at present, I have yet to hear this question raised. But it is basic. Liberal education has as its end the free mind, and the free mind must be its own teacher. Intellectual freedom begins when one says with Socrates that he knows that he knows nothing, and then goes on to add: I know what it is that I don't know. My question then is: Do you know what you don't know and therefore what you should know? If your answer is affirmative and humble, then you are your own teacher, you are making your own assignment, and you will be your own best critic. You will not need externally imposed courses, nor marks, nor diplomas, nor a nod from your boss . . . in business or in politics.

My third question is different from the first two, more superficial perhaps, but fateful, nevertheless. Under the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, have you persuaded yourself that there are knowledges and truths beyond your grasp, things that you simply cannot learn? Have you allowed adverse evidence to pile up and force you to conclude that you are not mathematical, not linguistic, not poetic, not scientific, not philosophical? If you have allowed this to happen, you have arbitrarily imposed limits on your intellectual freedom, and you have smothered the fires from which all other freedoms arise. Most of us have done this and come short of what that threadbare slogan, human dignity, really means. We are willing, and shamefully relieved, to admit that each has his specialty, his so-called field, and the other fellow has his, and we are ready to let the common human enterprise go by default. We are willing to become cripples in our minds and fractions of men in our lives. Some of us are willing to crush the Socratic formula and say, I know nothing. The fourth question: Do you accept the world? This is reminiscent of Margaret Fuller's Yeasaying to Carlyle: But I do accept the universe, Mr. Carlyle. I am thinking of a slightly different context in The Brothers Karamozov, when Ivan tells Alyosha that he finds it easy to believe in God, but that he finds it impossible to believe in the world. The second clause follows from the first in a crushed syllogism: Because he believes in God, he cannot accept the world. For most of us these days, the case is that we have believed in some things so weakly or fanatically that other equally or more real things have become absurd or impossible. This results from our crippled minds, our self-imposed limits on understanding, our deafness to the voice that asks: Is it true? I am persuaded that the cure for this sickness of mind is in some vigorous and rigorous attempt to deal with that most puzzling and mysterious idea, the idea of the world.

It is not a simple idea, nor even a merely complicated idea. Kant called it an antinomy, an idea of speculative reason governing all other uses of the intellect. There have been other such ideas that have governed thought, the idea of God or Being as it puzzled and dazzled the ancient world, the idea of Man as it stirred and fermented the world from the Renaissance on. God and Man have not disappeared as charts and aids to intellectual navigation, but they are in partial eclipse at present, and the world is asking us the big questions, questions in cosmology and science, questions in law and government. They are not merely speculative questions; they are concrete and immediately practical; they are as much matters of life and death and freedom as the old questions were. Most of us have made, with Ivan, a pact with the devil, an agreement not to face them and accept them - yet.

I am not going to mark you on any attempt you may make to answer these questions here today; we don't mark at St. John's. But I would guess that none of us, certainly including myself, would stand very high, if we tried. Perhaps we ought rather to ask whether these are valid questions. If they are valid, they may come somewhere near indicating a standard by which we judge our common intellectual life, and therefore our common education in this country. I myself think the questions are valid, and I draw a drastic consequence, namely that we need a national system of education, from university to kindergarten, from Federal to local, and that it should aim at the intellectual confidence which would dare to act freely and go wherever it pleases, wherever it ought to go.

Happy Birthday(s)!!!

Happy happy birthday to Sam. Today I had such a bad day at work that I thought maybe a little Samness had rubbed off. For your birthday present, I will loan you a brother and sister-in-law and two awesome nieces...they're all yours for one year, after which I expect them to come back to the United States. Happy Birthday!:


I also wish you all sorts of good health and happiness and send you all my love. This is a day of intangibles.

Happy birthday Sophia, as well. You are zero today! Congratulations Ben and Julie and Ella. This is me trying to make a funny face for Sophia for the first time: (with more performed live, I promise)

Coffee shop review

A review came out in the L.A. Times today...
L.A. Times Lamill Review

Spot your sister?



Oh yeah, I'm in the background...because the photographer said there was only one "attractive" barista. I hate this town sometimes.

First post on youtube! - Grushka chases her ball

I felt too ashamed of that last post...

So it's gone.

While debating the virtues of MacBook vs. Vaio I saw this commercial

I found this COMPLETELY persuasive.

St. John's Senior Prank Video-Sophomore Year

Happy Birthday, Mandy!

It may seem like this was posted late in the day. But I worked from 6am-2:30pm today...and there's a four hour time difference from Nova Scotia to SoCal. Enough excuses.

Happy happy birthday, Mandy! It is so weird that you are 22...it really feels like we're the same age now. I love you and happy birthday! Mom would be so incredibly proud of you.

Ben triumphs!

Today Ben found out that he got the job he applied for a couple weeks ago. He is going to be the research assistant for an emotion and cognition lab at USC. He is going to make money AND make progress for his PhD application! Congratulations!

Last weekend we went to the California poppy reserve in Antelope Valley:





This last picture is worth clicking on to enlarge it.

Sun City

Watching David Archuleta perform "You're the Voice" on American Idol last night (I am never going to watch another season of this show-it is nearly meaningless and tonight Apple failed me by running a "segment" during the show that was actually just a plug for iTunes and all other iProducts) anyway, this song reminded me of Sun City. In fifth grade, Mr. Griffin showed us this video. This would have been 1995, ten years after the song was recorded. So, it already looked dated. And it was about apartheid. In South Africa. In fifth grade I didn't know anything about South Africa or apartheid or Sun City or anything. I had NO IDEA what this video was about, but I remember it VIVIDLY because it scared the shit out of me.

Also, Chikezie and Syesha are in the bottom three. They were BY FAR my favorite on this stupid show. This country is racist. I quit. Time for some Sun City.

Another cute picture of my dog. Sorry.

Sorry, but she never stops being cute. This is in Griffith Park, looking over to Glendale. And for those of you who think that L.A. is just traffic and smog...Griffith Park is right next to Silver Lake and offers more than 4200 acres of quiet paths and relative seclusion.

Another Move.

Last Winter:



This Winter:



Next Winter?



Ok...so I'm not complaining about the move. I've been so lucky in the last five years: St. Andrews, Annapolis, Santa Fe, Silver Lake, and now Vermont.

But I do have to move to Vermont in a few weeks...nine weeks. And it is a fifty-something-hour drive. And it looks like Ben H. is going to stay in L.A., at least for the summer, even though we are doing really well and are planning to stay together. He applied for a paid (PAID!!!) research assistant job at USC in a neuroscience lab studying memory binding, had an interview, and is waiting to hear back from them. If he gets it, then he definitely won't move with me, and if he doesn't get it, then he should stay here anyway and try to get another research job. There aren't, sadly, an overabundance of neuroscience labs in Bennington. As usual, it's all very up-in-the-air, which I hate. I like plans. And certainty.

So I am going to Bennington. Since I found out that Donna Tartt went to Bennington, I just keep thinking about The Secret History, and am unable to picture Bennington as anything other than the forest where Bunny was killed.

Surely pre-med students don't have time for murder?


Or do they?

Finished season four of The Wire...oh staggeringly brilliant tv shows...why do you have to end? Only one season left.

In case you haven't been reading the comments on Brad's blog-I thought this was worth restating: Brooke (of American Idol pseudo-fame) is not lovable. She is annoying as hell. Only Brad could possibly like anyone that nice.



Ugh.

Thank you, Mr. Rogers!

London Visit

Been having a really nice time so far. A very brief summary:
Day One: Greenwich, National Maritime Museum, National Observatory, Boat back into London. Dinner with Susie, Sam's delightful girlfriend.
Day Two: Walking on River, Monmouth Coffee Shop, Tower of London, saw Laura Dick.

I actually had a couple of days before Dad and Sam got in as well, during which I walked around and read a lot.

Grushka

Ben took this really cute picture of Grushenka today. Thought I'd share. Also, Mandy, we have serious intentions of taking photos of the neighborhood really really soon.

Oh. My. God.

Okay. So, I posted a few hours ago about this video.

Having not read Ben K's or Mandy's blogs.

New theory: We are all filled with Obama-love and are humming at the same frequency.

New question: Does this mean that I'm irrelevant?

Yes We Can

Just in case this anyone has managed to live the last two weeks without seeing this video...here it is!

I love it, even though it is an emotional sucker-punch. Ben pointed out a post on frontal cortex, one of the neuroscience blogs he reads, that mentions the manipulative aspect of this video. The author shared my perspective that even though the music paired with Obama's speech is emotionally manipulative and even though I recognize this fact at the moment I'm being manipulated by it, the emotional reaction raised in us by music is what great speech-writers are trying to evoke with the cadence of their writing anyway, and the video works so well because the music is strengthening this reaction...rather than creating it the way a montage sequence does.


P.S. The Apple commercials for the MacBook Air feature a cute song by Yael Naim, a super-cute Israeli/Frenchie girl, who is also in the Yes We Can video. Ben...any idea what she's saying in this video? Also, it's a little irritating that two of my favorite new artists were introduced to me by Apple commercials.

Happy Super Tuesday! But I didn't vote.

Work was fantastic today. All the customers were happy. I got to wish them a "Happy Super Tuesday", and everywhere I went, EVERYONE was talking about the election. The only people who came in to the shop today without "I just voted" stickers, had clearly just stumbled out of bed and were on their way to the polling station.

Jaime, you would love this town- many people don't get out of bed until noon. This is actually the main reason Brad lives here. Another nice thing about today was that, because I live in Silver Lake, I didn't have to hear any Republican vs. Democrat debate at all. My neighborhood is all blue, baby. It's like heaven. Everyone had an adorable political gleam in their eyes...might it be hope that this day will actually create positive change? The only thing, and I'm ashamed to say it because of a really good article I read about the phobocracy of America, is that I AM a little scared that in November all of this will amount to nothing, and we'll feel disappointed for getting our hopes up. But today, we dare to dream.

On a side note, how rude is it when people ask who you voted for? It was very disconcerting, at work, to have customers asking me this question directly. What if I WERE a republican?!!! Major faux pas, folks. OH, and I didn't vote because I'm voting absentee in Ohio. Partly because of political strategy (which is looking pretty smart now that California was so split and with Ohio coming up so soon -Ben and Julie, could you send me that mail?) and partly in a desperate attempt to establish residency there so that when I go to medical school I hopefully have the option of not paying $60,000 a year. Big shout out to Ben and Julie for assisting me in this effort! Muchos gracias.

Election

I am swayed...

GO OBAMA!

Scripps

Didn't get into Scripps. Screw'em, I say. I guess I'll have to make do at Bennington...

Ramble

Still...waiting...to hear from Scripps. Why? Am I such a controversial applicant that they have been arguing about this for the past month? Will they even remember my interview by the time they pull out my file to make a decision?

Ben is taking research methods and behavioral neuroscience classes this semester. He's way excited. Anybody have neuroscience lab connections in SoCal? If so, speak now.

It looks as though I may have a job, (although the situation is a little unclear) at the city's snobbiest coffee boutique as a barista's barback. Hopefully beginning next week I will begin to acquire all sorts of coffee wisdom.

I am loving Freaks and Geeks. Sooooo much better than Knocked Up, which I did enjoy a little. I am so sick of movies that bank on the shock factor to make money.
Juno was super cute, too. SUPER cute.
May have already posted about this, but I saw El Orfanato with Brock, and it was GREAT.

Oh! I almost forgot again! I forgot Eastern Promises when I made my Favorite Things of 2007 list. If you haven't seen this movie, you are missing out. I recommend listening to the NPR interview with Viggo Mortenson before you watch the movie.

Ghetia and Dru, friends of Ben's and mine from St. John's, came to visit last week. It was so nice to see and talk to them. So far, Ben and I have only a couple of friends in L.A., and it makes such a difference to be around people who understand your past. I feel the same way about family, of course. Here's a photo of Ben and Dru playing around in our little studio-

Kind of like a big Thank You note

THANKS EVERYBODY!



The photo of Moira hasn't been framed yet, but it's so nice to have it! Also, notice the cute magnets Hannah and Emma made and the new knives and knife sharpener.



Thanks for the lovely photo, Ben K! Also, Ben H made me a beautiful bird house which I have yet to mount outside, AND he gave those flowers to me. Brad, notice that the Wait Wait mug you gave me is still very much in use.



Ben H: Thank you for the print. Ben K and Julie: Thanks so much for this photo-it's beautiful.



And the map, which upon closer inspection is a really really good map. Thanks, Dad. Isn't the pup cute?

Finally, thanks to everybody who contributed to the ever-expanding library. I already finished Love is a Mix Tape (I recommend it- especially to anyone who loves the 90s or music or love or good writing) and the Kite Runner and Musicophilia. Sam, thanks so much for the absolutely gorgeous Stephen Jay Gould collection-it's so beautiful! Also, I've rediscovered the Jo Malone cologne you got for me a couple of Christmases ago and I love it! I think I needed to grow into it.

Back to real life?

I wanted to post some pictures of the apartment because it looks so great with all of the pictures everyone gave me! For some reason, however, the picture uploader thing isn't working. Weird.

So I'll just post about what has happened since I left Ohio. Ben H and I had a great New Years Eve dinner with a couple of Ben's close friends from high school and then a fantastic New Years Day with Ben's family and close family friends. Our friend Ghetia came up from Santa Fe for a couple of weeks wearing a suit as his only luggage. We bummed around for a couple days and then Ghetia flew up to San Francisco to visit a few of our other St. John's friends. Then Brock came to Los Angeles on a business trip, which involved inspecting a private collection of 25,000 bottles of wine (this was actually only the Los Angeles part of his collection) and then having two extra days all expenses paid to hang out with me. We came up to Ojai to watch the New Hampshire debate, which was very entertaining, and then drove down to L.A. again the next morning because I had choir rehearsal. Then we went out to dinner at Cha Cha Cha's, an amazing Cuban restaurant only a couple of blocks from my house (Brad, I must take you here) and had the most delicious jerked pork, coconut shrimp, and goat cheese and guava quesadillas. Then we went to the Arclight to see El Orfanato, which was good/scary/sad. Definitely worth seeing.

I have been working on Rosetta Stone Spanish (thanks Jaime!) and have new resolve about getting a full-time job. Oh! And I found out on New Years Day that I got into Bennington in Vermont, but am still waiting to hear from Scripps. Still, I feel a tremendous relief at having been accepted by Bennington, and I emailed a St. John's alumna who did the Bennington post-bac program and is now in the middle of the psychiatry residency program at Johns Hopkins, and she was very enthusiastic about it.

So, today Ben drove up to San Francisco to meet our friends (I can't go because of work) and I am in Ojai with Grushka getting ready to drive down to L.A. and get a real job and take care of other real life sorts of things. Sad. It's been such a nice holiday. Oh, and that game last night was devastating. I hate the South and I hate the BCS.