Dinner with a Woolf

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I think Virginia Woolf and I would have got along famously.  As I read A Room With a View, I found that her writing style--her voice--resonated with me more than anyone I have read before.  And so I found some more from her. 

About love:

“What does the brain matter compared with the heart?”

“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.”

About life:

“What is the meaning of life? That was all- a simple question; one that tended to close in on one with years, the great revelation had never come. The great revelation perhaps never did come. Instead, there were little daily miracles, illuminations, matches struck unexpectedly in the dark; here was one.” 

About Jane Austen and used books:

“Anyone who has the temerity to write about Jane Austen is aware of [two] facts: first, that of all great writers she is the most difficult to catch in the act of greatness; second, that there are twenty-five elderly gentlemen living in the neighbourhood of London who resent any slight upon her genius as if it were an insult to the chastity of their aunts.” 

“Second hand books are wild books, homeless books; they have come together in vast flocks of variegated feather, and have a charm which the domesticated volumes of the library lack.”

“Often on a wet day I begin counting up; what I've read and what I haven't read.” 

About being a woman:

“As a woman I have no country. As a woman I want no country. As a woman, my country is the whole world.” 

“No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. No need to be anybody but oneself.” 

About being a BYU coed:

“I really don't advise a woman who wants to have things her own way to get married” 

       You know that age-old question, the one about who--dead or alive-- you would like to have dinner with?   I think I'd choose her--at least this week I would.  I imagine that after our homemade meal we would sit on her wrap-around porch sipping peach tea. 

She'd pose the question:

“My own brain is to me the most unaccountable of machinery - always buzzing, humming, soaring roaring diving, and then buried in mud. And why? What's this passion for?” 

And I wonder how I'd reply.

Sophomore

I love these girls.  Loved living with them, loved growing into my new-found independence with them.

 I cherish my memories of late-night soul-searching and feeling absurdly adult-like pushing a grocery cart through Macey's with Julie (who kindly put up with my scattered papers and shoes and well, everything).

With Lindsey, movie nights, giggle fits, fantastic music (and honestly Linds, one of my favorite memories is when we washed the dishes while listening to Saturday General Conference. And the time you took me to get a slurpee that night when I thought it could only get worse).

With Rachel,  slamming tim tams, sharing missionary stories and learning from her how to be gentler, more soft-spoken and thoughtful.

Spring semester has commenced and I have officially spent one week in my new digs with my new roommates.  There is Michelle, the vivacious returned missionary, Clarissa, the sardonic novelist (a not-so-hidden part of me wants to be a sardonic novelist one day, but first I'll need something to be sardonic about), and Katie, the sweet country girl.

I knew we were going to be great friends the moment Clarissa described the shower water as being "tepid," the moment Michelle suggested we go for a midnight run (and turned up a copy of Ender's Game that she brought to college) and the moment I walked into the kitchen to find Katie eating oatmeal with fresh blackberries.

The new ward's great--I'm only in danger of not getting my statistics homework done.  In exactly four hours I will be waking up to volunteer for a marathon with some of my ward-ees. The things I will do to get to know people.

And in the way of marathons, I did half of one last weekend, checking one of my goals off for the year.  My blonde stunner-of-a-friend Tawni and I had been training for it since January, but she tragically sprained her ankle the week before so I had to run it alone.  Whole marathon next?  We'll see.

This is the part where I would like to say something profound about my freshman year.  But it is 1:26 am and I am now getting up in three and a half hours.  I'm older, marginally wiser, and a whole lot more sleep deprived.  I am blessed with so many wonderful friendships-- thank you, thank you, for making my life so rich.

Good night!

Love at Second Sight

We've got fifty good years left to spend out in the garden, I don't care to beg your pardon, we should live until we die.

The Curse

I think I've discovered the curse of the writer--or the pretentious lover of words who would dare to assume such a title.

(My life would probably be complete if this were my house.)

This is what I think: the curse is to never be completely present in reality.  It's to be constantly forming sentences, re-arranging adjectives and feeling a thrill over savory comma-pauses in your mind.  It's to be muttering the words back to yourself and tasting the description of what you are experiencing even as you experience it.

I find myself doing this all of the time: inventing summary phrases of my experiences as they take place.  Composing pretty flowing sentences to capture the moments, to save them up for a day when I could adequately understand and describe them again.

Even when alone, the writer does not escape the curse.  Especially not then.

I remember lying in bed one night and thinking: It's amazing how incredibly flawed I am. And there it was, so simply but so accurately put. A post-it note tucked away to address on another day.

There are other things, too. Good things, beautiful things.  The minutest details my mind captures.

 The trailing remark I will allude to from the conversation before the conversation before the last.  You mean you don't remember how that color on that paper reminded you of that band whose hit single is obscurely related to our current project?


The details stick, the sentences form and the memories reassemble.

And I will fall into them again and again.

You Guys.

They have a violinist opening.



I am dying.  Dying, I tell you.   Who knows?  It's worth a shot.

Now Suddenly, This Rain

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Six songs for a rainy day:

The Fray, Brooke Fraser, Avalanche City, Joshua Radin and guess what?  A new Taylor Swift song I discovered today.  And this:

I have been easy with trees
Too long.
Too familiar with mountains.
Joy has been a habit.
Now
Suddenly
This rain.
 
― Jack Gilbert

Brilliant

"A master at the art of living makes no distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing.  He, himself always knows he is doing both."

Possibilities

You know your dreams are turning into obsessions when you stay up half of the night whizzing through city streets via Google Maps.  I was imagining the cafes I'd step into, the metro entrance I'd take, the spots in the historical district I'd meander through. Is Street View not a wonder?  It's just feeding my arguably overly-romanticized city ideal.  Provo can be so bland.  I like a little adrenalin running through my veins, a bit of wonder and exhilaration filling my stomach as I click my heels and shuffle in my pencil skirt. Something the city feeds me.

 Recognize this one?  It's not NYC.  Hint: I've spent a night here already.  By myself. Surrounded by strangers. But I'm not divulging until the possibility becomes a stronger hope and then maybe. . .

And even if the details don't process and check out, it was good to be filled with hope for just a moment, right?   Even the possibility of a possibility is enough to put a spring in my step this week. Just let me down easy.

Sparkle

I'm really coveting this dress.  Like, really.  So much so that I might have done this:

Just to, you know, see if it worked with my skin tones and stuff. Now all I need is a place to wear it to (ending a sentence with a preposition. . . acceptable just this once?). And $338. Plus these.

Oh and if that one doesn't work out, I'm cool with this too.