Post of Christmas Present

Happy Christmas to all and to all a good night!

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The world didn't end. It's Christmas time. The high on Christmas in Florence, AL is 63 degrees.

I've got everything that I need and more than I could ever want and in two days, I'll be getting more. 

It's sad, really. I would love to have one year where instead of giving/getting Christmas presents to/from friends and family... everyone gave to people in need. I know that I'll wake up in two days and will not have taken any action in going through with what I just said. I'm writing this so that I will remember this desire next year, when the Christmas season rolls back around in its overwhelming, typical tangle of Christmas lights and joy and my mom starts asking me to make a list of things that I want. 

I'll wake up in two days at my grandparent's house. I will have just shared a bed with my younger brother, but I most likely will not have minded it. Other than his feet somehow digging their way up underneath my hips. But, I'll wake up. I'll throw the covers off and feel the warmth that comes from having a house with top-notch insulation. I'll run into the room that my mother will be sleeping in and I'll wake her up and together, we will wake up every other member of my family in the house. I will be one of the people in the world fortunate enough to have family close by. I will hug each of them good morning. We will all be in a sleepy daze as we talk about breakfast, and just how much bacon we should cook. My older brother will turn the heat down, because he will be too warm.

Not far away, and in so many parts of the world...there will be parents who don't have presents for their children. There will be girls my age seeking shelter from the severe thunderstorms that are supposed to pound the south on that day and her toes will be sticking through the tips of her socks and her shoes will have holes in them. There will be people who are hungry. There will be people who are sad. There will be people who are cold. There will be people who are alone.

This Christmas, I vow to be thankful for the things that I take for granted. I vow to take note of the way that my socks fit my feet in a way that assures warmth. I vow to slip on my shoes and be thankful that they fit and are free of holes. I vow to hug each family member for an extra two seconds. I vow to savor every bite and be thankful for the opportunities that are presented to me on that day. I vow to be aware of every sensation, every emotion, every thought, every decision, and I vow to be thankful for each one.

Post of Christmas Past #6

A White Christmas? In Alabama? A WHITE Christmas?? A white CHRISTMAS?

In Alabama, we get snow occasionally and it is usually on a Tuesday or Wednesday when we have school the next day.  School is never dismissed for the day. If anything it may be delayed an hour or so.  So two years ago, when we all woke up on Christmas day to find inches and inches of pristine, freshly fallen snow covering every available surface.. well that was a Christmas miracle. It was so deep that the grass wasn't showing through it. It really was as if God draped a white blanket over a sleeping Alabama. I'm sure small children everywhere were dazzled and half-way blinded when they looked out the window. Although... I'm not sure if anyone was as excited as my grandmother. Imogene is over seventy years old and several years ago, we restarted the tradition of spending Christmas Eve night at their house in Red Bay. Since she and my grandfather are getting older, we want to make as many memories as we can. But, watching a seventy-something year old woman run out into the snow in her pajamas and house shoes and then LAY DOWN in the freezing snow to do a snow angel... well that was something that none of us were prepared for. 

This isn't the type of 75? year old woman who looks 55 and acts 45. This is a 74? year old woman who looks 74 and acts 76. 

My grandfather started off scolding her for what she was about to do. He told her she'd get sick and had a sternness to his voice that I have only heard once or twice. But once she was out the door, he just dropped his gaze and shook his head. Everyone else stared on and mixed between laughter and smiles of disbelief to words of worry and calls and pleads to come back inside. Once she had finished her snow angel, my brother ran outside and helped her get up. He walked her inside where someone had a blanket and a towel. All she was saying was "It's a Christmas miracle." All day. "It's a Christmas miracle" with tears in her eyes and a satisfied smile on her face. 

It really was.

Post of Christmas Past #5

In a few hours, I'll be home. I'll walk in the door and see Jon sitting at the computer, hunched over with his face less than one foot away from the screen. I'll probably smell something cooking. Cider, dinner, tea, who knows? Before I left, during the holiday season, I would come in from school and make kettle corn for Jon's after school snack. The sweet and salty smell would fill the house. It's weird how those memories stick out so distinctly. The downstairs of my house is always much colder than the upstairs and I remember how uncomfortable to cold hardwood floors were against my feet and how it was strange that I'd bundle my upper body but seldom would I wear socks. It was like this almost every day. Unless, we built a fire. The fire would warm our day to day activities. Mundane activities like folding clothes or even grabbing a Pepsi out of the fridge were always so much more exciting when there was a fire crackling in the next room. Decorating the Christmas tree was warmer and our smiles were even bigger. Setting my mom's antique Santa collection up on the bookshelf has always been one of my favorite parts of Christmas. It reminds me of the days when I would play with dolls and construct the most elaborate houses for them out of things from around the house. Mini lipstick lids turned into drinking glasses, shaving cream tops turned into vanity chairs, the tiniest weeds from my yard were the most extravagant bouquets for my doll's breakfast table. Anything goes. I get to set these little guys up on the shelf and with each Santa, it feels more and more like Christmas. The same goes for the nativity scenes. It's Jon's job to hang the stockings. Andy's job is to help with stringing the lights. It's finally the most wonderful time of the year again and by golly, I'm going to soak up every second of it.

Post of Christmas Past #4

The year that my cousin Samuel got a Red Rider B.B. gun was a big, big year. Around seven or eight at the time, Sam was a skinny and shrimpy little rascal with hair that resembled a red fox. His pale complexion was speckled with teensy brown freckles and his eyes shone blue through his pale, red lashes. Desperately trying to be like my grandfather in every way, shape, and form... anything that was manly was something that Sam was into. Though my grandfather isn't a hunting man, he has a gun and has let Sam shoot it a couple of times. So, opening up a box and revealing his very own B.B. gun must have been something incredibly special. After the excitement had dwindled away and he was in the mindset for a safety lecture and some target practice, we all took it outside to try it out. 

(It turns out that I have really great aim)

Post of Christmas Past #3

In the picture above, my family went to the Christmas tree farm and snagged a giant tree. Jon was in a wonderful mood and we tromped around trees and talked about them. He had never seen so many Christmas trees before. Two huge dogs were running around and practically knocked us off of our feet. Usually, Jon isn't very fond of dogs but he played with these and was laughing one of those laughs that come out when you're being tickled. The ones that are unavoidable and reflexive. The ones you can't control.

There is nothing like Jon Christian getting excited for the holidays. This year, my mom contemplated not putting up one of our trees (we usually have four). Since Andy and I are never there and Jon isn't really capable of helping assemble our artificial one, she wasn't going to put it up this year. When Jon heard that, he sort of had a melt down. He values tradition just as much as the rest of us and knows that Christmas isn't Christmas without ALL of the trimmings. 

I can't wait to start counting down the days till Christmas with my main man. 

Post of Christmas Past #2

Three years of picking the perfect tree at the Christmas tree farm. Jack's breakfast before we left, trivia on the way there, Sufjan Christmas songs and eventually classic mom Christmas music, pictures with a scary Santa, apple cider and knickknacks everywhere. These days were always packed with things to do, but they were still endlessly enjoyable. I was able to spend time with some wonderful people, walk in and out of tree after tree after tree, and sip cider while the warm steam thawed my lips and cheeks. 

Post of Christmas Past #1

Sophomore year of college... a year of strange ailments, emotional roller coasters, waffles, and parties galore. This Christmas memory was especially nice. My roommates and I had our friends over and made breakfast for dinner. The boys cooked it and we devoured it within a few minutes  While they were cooking, anyone who wasn't cooking was making pomanders. The kitchen smelled like bacon, sweet oranges, and warm cloves. (It sounds unappealing, but trust me.. it wasn't)

There was music and a small amount of dancing. 

I was serenaded by Daniel and as always, didn't know how to react. It was a wonderful evening.

Then, weeks later a girl ate the cloves out of our pomanders at a Christmas party. 

I mean.. really? Why? What? Just.. why?

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In just a few days I will be home for the holidays. Until then, I'm at home in Tuscaloosa and making plans. I was going to wait until the new year to carry them out, but why? Why wait? So, I will act now.

This is the start of a new chapter. I'm going to grow again. I'm going to let go of things I've held on to. I'm going to build up from where I am now and I'm going to do what is best for me. 

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy, never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
Praise the mount, I'm fixed upon it
Mount of Thy unchanging love

Here I raise my Ebenezer
Here there by Thy great help I've come
And I hope, by Thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home
Jesus sought me when a stranger
Wandering from the fold of God
He, to rescue me from danger
Interposed His precious blood

O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I'm constrained to be
Let that grace now, like a fetter
Bind my wandering heart to Thee
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here's my heart, O take and seal it
Seal it for Thy courts above

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing
Tune my heart to sing Thy grace
Streams of mercy, never ceasing
Call for songs of loudest praise
Teach me some melodious sonnet
Sung by flaming tongues above
Praise the mount, I'm fixed upon it
Mount of Thy unchanging love

"We celebrate our sense of each other. We have a lot to give one another."

"Since it's Christmas, let's be glad even if the year's been bad.
There are presents to be had. A promotion for your dad. Don't be angry. Don't be mad"

Thoughts:

1. My flannel sheets and I will become one after I get out of class at three today. 

We will stay one until tomorrow morning. 

2. Sufjan Stevens. 

(His show was mystifying.)

3. I need some good, southern cooking.

Cornbread, pork chops and gravy, green beans, collards, ahh.

4. Gloria (the newest addition to my apartment mini family, a goldfish) and her back problem.

5. Sleeeeeeeeeeeeep.

November's Soundtrack

Wild Child

Eels

Sufjan Stevens

Keaton Henson

Devotchka

Sigur Ros

"Your handwriting. The way you walk. Which china pattern you choose.

It's all giving you away. Everything you do shows your hand.

Everything is a self-portrait.

Everything is a diary."

-Chuck Palahniuk

"Good luck exploring the infinite abyss."

Unfortunately, I have no pictures of this evening. The one night that I don't have a camera of any sort, I go somewhere and see something that very, very few people are ever able to see and something that I will never see again. The Brookwood Coal Mine. Yes, it's very controversial and it's bad for the BlackWarrior River. But, when you're wearing a vintage, olive green, metal hard hat and standing on a tall mound of rocks, looking down hundreds and hundreds of feet into what looks like a scene from a movie, for a fraction of a second the only thing on your mind is how incredible it is. Surrounded by mountains of coal, various rocks, gigantic bulldozers, trucks with 9 ft. tall wheels, dump trucks that are big enough to carry three large vans, and the metallic drilling sound of drills as large as dinosaurs, it was easily one of the coolest nights of my life. I probably sound like a nine year old boy and that's okay with me. After we passed around pieces of coal, stared down into the canyon for a while, and watched the mine workers bustle to and fro, we drove over to the "ponds". Even though these are man-made ponds in the middle of what used to be a ginormous crater like the one we were previously at, it was breathtakingly beautiful. After the men are finished drilling in an area, they cover it up, plant grass and trees on it, make some ponds, and try to make it look the way it did before they started their drilling. (This is impossible, by the way.)

At that point, my class and I were standing on top of a mound of gravel and looking out at huge man-made hills, covered with freshly planted grass and small, growing trees. In the middle of these hills, there were two small ponds and the sound of crickets and a bubbling brook could be heard in the distance. Surrounding this area were very old, tall trees with leaves of the most vibrant reds and oranges. This entire picture was tinted with a deep blueish pink from the setting sun (that we were facing). All bundled up in coats and scarves, sixteen college students, a Science teacher, one mine worker, and two museum curators watched the sun set together.

So, as much as I would like to think about the BlackWarrior River and the pollutants that are going in it at this very moment, I just can't. Not today. I can think about that tomorrow and the next day and the next. But for now, I have coal on my hands and a smudge of it on my right cheek. 

For now I'd rather think about that.

Roland Reiner Tiangco's Dirt Poster

I love you, Claude.

&

 I love you, Friday.

Untitled  Robert Rauschenberg

“I have various tricks to actually reach that solitary point of creativity. One of them is pretending I have an idea. But that trick doesn’t survive very long because I don’t really trust ideas – especially good ones. Rather, I put my trust in the materials that confront me, because they put me in touch with the unknown.” - Robert Rauschenberg

Today, I gave a presentation on Robert Rauschenberg to my intermediate painting class and after researching him all night and completing three research assignments about him, I was beaming with  inspiration. I'm a believer in process. I like noticing development, change, and improvement. When I paint, the process of painting is the most special thing about it to me. Of course, the content matters. But I am tied to my materials and I love getting dirty. I know which corner had that weird splintered area that I glued down before I gessoed it.  I know about that weird corner where I cut the canvas too short and had to make a patch. I know these little details and I love them. I love being fluid and free or meticulous and careful. I have found that I love painting on hard surfaces as opposed to stretched, bouncy canvas. I love my process. The reason why I picked Rauschenberg was that he was all about process as well. So, now tons of ideas are rolling around in my noggin and I'm already making plans for them. I'll probably live at Woods Hall for the next few weeks and strangely,  I don't mind that one bit. I may invest in one of those foldable chairs that come in a little sack so that I can sleep on the balcony and watch the sunrise. It'll be chilly. Maybe I'll bring a blanket too. 

Well, now I am wrapped up in my favorite cardigan and a blanket that belonged to my grandmother and eating my dad's homemade pickles. I guess I'd rather write about Rauschenberg and pickles than read about dysphagia. 

Introducing Gus and Vincent

“Alive without breath,
As cold as death;
Never thirsty, ever drinking,
All in mail never clinking.” 

J. R. R. Tolkien

 Gus

 Vincent

Gus and homemade pickles.

note: vincent's mason jar is a temporary living space

Chris Frey

Leaves

"And since I'm still here livin', I guess I will live on.

I could have died for love-

but for livin' I was born."

-Langston Hughes

Ladies, put down your slutty plumber outfits and your skimpy cheeseburger costumes. Gentlemen, put your shirts back on and if necessary...pants, too. Let's go back to the good old days. The days when the goal of Halloween was to be as creepy as can be, while keeping it interesting and classy. I mean, if I saw a slutty bumblebee walking next to a hunky cowboy....I wouldn't give them a second glance. But, I would be endlessly interested if I saw a man in a nice suit with an eyeball for a head walking with a woman in a mushroom suit. When did Halloween become a day for sultry unicorns, sexy watermelons, and naughty Nemos, Waldos, and cobs of corn?

Maybe people sat around and thought of phrases that these ladies could say when they were asked about their costumes at a party? The ones that could spark provocative conversations made the cut. Regardless of how ridiculous they were.

To the cob of corn: "So you're corn..? 

Corn: "Yeah, wanna shuck me?

To sexy Nemo or Waldo: "So.. you're Nemo/Waldo?"

Nemo/Waldo: "Yeah, try to find me. *winks and scampers away* *man follows*

To sexy rubber ducky: "You're a rubber ducky."

Who knows, the rubber ducky could make a joke about bath time fun or condoms? Endless possibilities.

Halloween is one of my favorite days of the year. I love the legends and the traditions. I love the thought of trick or treaters in my neighborhood back home. I love the energy that fills the air on every Halloween. I'm not a total prude, either. I understand the racy costumes. I've worn a few. But, really? A sexy Babe the Big Blue Ox costume? Come on.