up close, but not too personal

A beaUtiful Sunday, which started with a good time in church and a lunch out at Caroline's Diner with some friends:















Afterwards I knew I had to get out of my room, so I walked down to the riverbank and found a spot on an old tree, hearing the thrushhh of the rapids. I brought a book with me, but my camera also--which consumed a fair chunk of the time.

View from a dandelion.


What's up?

re-reading and re-viewing

Trying to scrape up some creativity for my senior writing project, I just read through most of my old blog posts. I came across plenty of things I had forgotten about, some things that surprised me. How cool is it to be able to look back at the last 8 months of your life and see the snippits you thought were important enough to keep? Pretty cool, I'd say.

I got inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa academic honorary tonight, which is a pretty big honor, they say. I'm not sure how it happened, because I have felt like I've just done what I could--sometimes working hard, sometimes not as much. Plenty of credit goes to my Grandfather, my Dad, my Mom, and other people in my life who have taught me to take pleasure in doing a job well. And the praise goes to God for giving me a sound mind and always giving me enough grace to get through.

I hope I can write more soon. It's a reflective time, with only one week of classes left in my college career.

spring sweetness vs. sugar headaches

Today was one of those with a cloudless sky and no breeze. The air was room temperature, meek to the lungs and kind to the spirit. I walked around in a state of thankfulness that really surprised me. I never remember being this happy for the spring. The buds are about to burst. Squirrels are frisking. People are tossing frisbees. Friendships seem easier; joy seems more natural.

Around dusk I ate a large chocolate chip cookie, an orange, and drank a bottle of sweetened iced tea. It was a good illustration of the difference between joy and pleasure, between a gift and something grabbed. Good in the mouth, but I had forgotten how it sickly lingers. I feel like I need a drink of clean water and a breath of fresh air.

Tea time in the i-house again tonight.

wine tasting and the gospel

I usually go to the I-house kitchen on Wednesdays at 10 for "tea time." The kitchen is the locus for internationals, and anyone who ambles in for the company and refreshment, which is usually a simmering pot of coffee, tea-bags, and leftover treats scrounged from some university function that day. I enjoy the company.

Last night there was someone new. He had an athletic build, an intense face, and looked over the the kitchen counter with a commanding stance. In front of him was an assortment of wine glasses and a small notebook. I was intrigued. He swirled the glass with a deft wrist, eyeing the color, sucked each sample through his teeth. I saw only one bottle of wine, but from what I could tell he sampled it in different glasses, breaking to rinse his pallete and try again. Then he would look away for a seond, in thought, and mark something in a pocket-sized notebook.
I struck up a conversation. "I don't think I've met you. I'm Tyler."
He exteneded a businesslike handshake, and spoke quickly. Soon I learned he was a senior, and had just gotten back from a semester in France.
"Are you taking a class in wine tasting?" I asked.
No, he said--this was just a lifelong interest. And part of his senior project for French and Enlgish. I didn't ask the details. I'm not sure I could have, anyhow, because he launched into a passionate monologue.
"My whole philosophy is that people should learn the right frameworks they need for appreciating wines and forming their own tastes" he said, his energy rising. He maintained a stern expression. "I'm sick of all this elitist bullshit. All the ratings, the labels, the names." People didn't appreciate wine, he said, and it was a travesty.
I didn't expect what I had stirred up. But I listened, and tried to offer a word here and there.
"I still don't know the difference between boxed wine and real..." I started.
He got even more excited, and took me on an enlightening tour of wine vocabulary and trivia. Season, region, pallette. I've forgotten most of the technical terms already.
By now he had invited me to a tasting seminar he had organized for next week. 6 wines: 3 red and 3 white, from 6 parts of the world, with instruction in basic tasting etiquitte and procedure. He never wound-down, but eventually we shifted topics enough for me to excuse myself.
"It means to much to me" he said, convincingly, "and I'm sick of people who don't get the chance to appreciate it."

Back in my room, copying my Chinese characters, I heard his words again. "I'm sick of people who don't understand..." Yes I thought. Why didn't I feel a huge empathy, and see the bridge that came right in front of me? I repeated the words that I wished I had said: yes, I know how it feels to have something that means so much to you misunderstood by so many people. Immediately a voice inside me mocked the thought, telling me it would have been a desperate stretch. No, I don't think so. I saw his passion, and I could have shared my own.

recognition

Isn't it amazing--tell me how this happens--when your eye catches a glimpse of a person through a window or across the crowd, taking them in all at once, and even if they are the most minimal acquaintance, the friend of a friend who you have hardly spoken to, there in a split second you can place exactly who they are. You don't need to see much: a hairstyle or a half a stride, the color of a coat or a swing of the arms. The tiniest signs give them away.I think of how nice it would be to have this skill of immediate recognition with everything else. To be able to know the truth from a lie, or a poor judgment from a good one. Maybe we do have this ability, but we don't trust it. We don't want to be the person who yells out "hey Susan!" across the room and find out we were wrong.

p.s. more snow this morning, and in the 30s.

It snowed today

Not a few delicate flakes, either, but a wet spring squall. When I went to sleep it was raining. When I woke up the rain was mixed with little flecks. By the time I went to class it was pure white, coating hard surfaces and clumping on the grass.
It had disappeared before lunch.
I don't mind those spring snows, but it's hard to accept after days like last Friday, 70 degrees.
Maybe this weird weather is why all my joints have felt stiff these two days. I think I need some exercise, a steam bath, and a full body massage.
Instead I'm off to two seated activities: dinner and reading!