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Saturday, Feb. 05, 2005 - 12:04 a.m.

I am trying to knit this, and am having absolutely no luck. I bought yarn that is too thin, I think. I have ripped out upwards of ten false starts. Now I am convinced I need a new project. For awhile I was in the blissful state of being determined. Now I am disappointed. I guess that's part of being an adult, huh? Knowing when to move on.

Wednesday, Feb. 02, 2005 - 12:14 p.m.

Random thoughts, in no particular order...

1) Margaret Atwood must really love her country if she is willing to dress in a hockey uniform whose bulk makes her look like a petrified skeleton for a CBC commercial advertising the possible, unfortunate demise of hockey. Atwood's frazzled grey-haired starving look may fit a bookcover's author's photo, but it doesn't score anything for hockey.

2) Here is the February 2nd caption of the cat-themed desktop calender my mother bought me:

Kitty's whiskers are amazing detectors, enabling him to sense minute air currents that relay the shape of objects around him.

Him? So female cats don't have this quality? And shouldn't a good pet owner have a fixed feline, thus calling for the pronoun it? Am I ridiculous for noticing this? Yes.

3) I enjoy February because it is a month that makes me think a lot about color. First, there is St. Valentine's Day, which, as my dad fervently believes, is commercially driven but still offers the opportunity to splash pinks and reds everywhere. Pink makes me unexplainably happy. It simply does. I love pink.

My grandmother turns 90 years old on the fifth of this month! Happy birthday, Grandma! I associate the color purple with my grandmother, so I also associate February largely with the color purple. My bedroom walls are purple. I very much enjoy the color purple.

4) I do not want to watch the State of the Union Address tonight. I know an informed individual would watch the State of the Union, but I can already feel the stress and anger seeping into my chest just by thinking of the politcal and little informative drivel that will be spoken in DC tonight. Plus, if I have to listen to that much clapping, I would like it to be for me.

5) We have no snow in this mountain state. Nature is pretending it is Spring, but we all know the cold is coming back, at any minute. Why the masquerade?!

Thursday, Jan. 27, 2005 - 10:41 p.m.

Today, once again, against my will, I found myself wandering the aisles of WalMart. I wouldn't have ventured those footsteps had not my mom told me that WalMart sells yarn and a variety of knitting accessories. It's not enough that I have already spent $50 on 5lbs of cotton yarn; I had to see the (not so) incredible selection awaiting me at rock bottom prices. When a knitter tells you she or he is addicted, that they can't help but knit, believe them. It is true. You might as well take advantage and make a request for a new scarf or sweater or blanket.

I don't know how it happens that I observe children behaving in extreme cases of ecstasy or greed at WalMart, but I am guessing that the yellow smiley face is responsible. His ethereal aura fills children with their most base instincts.

Today, as my mother and I stood in checkout line number six, a little girl in front of us cradled six little rubber duckies in her arms as she sang to no one in particular. I am not sure if it was the contrast of the yellow duckies against her powder blue jumper or the little sychronized turns she made in her pink velcro shoes. The serenity just poured off of her.

I believe we, as humans, can encounter such things. A person that would look ordnary in any other circumstance somehow makes you notice them. You sense that they, at least for that moment, are truly content.

This doesn't neccessarily make you feel at peace or content. But it does give you a feeling so simple that it's hard to recognize in our pantheon of complex emotions. The reaction you have to that person's serenity just sits at the bottom of your soul or heart or being and waits for your turn to experience such contentment. I was reminded there are times to be truly content with life, and that sometimes they don't have to last any longer than it takes to call six rubber duckies your own.

Wednesday, Jan. 26, 2005 - 5:01 p.m.

Book Review: Middlesex
by Jeffrey Eugenides

Middlesex is a novel written from the point of view of a hermaphrodite, Cal. Cal's family raised him as a girl until the age of fourteen. The journey of Cal's personal biology extends back half a century, when his grandparents left their home in Turkey. The bookjacket calls this story an epic, and while I feel that is a rather ambitious label, this books gives an intriguing family history that accounts for Cal's unique sex.

The book's timeline follows a largely linear path, though Cal, who is conveying this story to the reader, introduces each chapter with a short narrative about his present life. Cal identifies himself as a writer and gives us insight into his desire to write down this family history. It was this technique that intrigued me the most. A novel written as a fictional memoir isn't new, but it shows a peculiar intersection between the main character and the author. How much of Cal is there in Mr. Eugenides, excluding the specific history and sex? How does a writer write a writer?

Most importantly, Mr. Eugenides' novel gave me that same feeling every day life does: hope and happiness splashed with confusion and drizzled with misery. That makes the characters relatable. I felt compassion for them.

Would I read it again? Probably not. It took me a while to finish reading this novel. Mr. Eugenides' prose is beautiful and compelling. I wanted to read every word, not skip over description to the action. Nonetheless, the story is heavy and, though I can relate to the characters, I do not identify with them.

Do I think you should read it? It won the Pulitzer Prize, so of course, yes. It's worth reading once.

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