Weeds

"...I have not written anything to-day worth a sou. I have passed the day in a kind of idleness. Why? Does it take so long to begin again? Is it my old weakness of will? Oh, I must not yield! I must this evening, after my supper, get something done. It's not so terribly hard after all. And how shall I live my good life if I am content to pass even one day in idleness? It won't do. Control -- of all kinds. How easy it is to lack control in little things! And once one does lack it the small bad habits--tiny perhaps--spring up like weeds and choke one's will."

-The Journal of Katherine Mansfield

Ah, Katherine. Indeed. I've got quite the garden full of weeds. What is my excuse? I'm not even battling a fatal illness.

I lack control in several areas of my life. But I've been trying to work on it. I've been taking walks almost every day (which is a habit I lost over the summer and never regained and consequently gained quite a few pounds). When I make to-do lists, I actually try and accomplish everything on them. I try to be more organized. (My organization probably looks like chaos to truly organized people, but shhh...)

And... hm, I don't really know specifically. I'm just trying to choke all these tiny weeds I've let grow.

It's been a while since I've last posted. Not much has happened. Let's see... um, I've watched a lot of movies, atypically enough. (Usually I just watch TV shows or British youtubers.) That's really the only interesting thing I've done. Oh, and I got to be a dental assistant for like two hours the other week. (Funny things can happen whilst volunteering at a medical clinic...)

I've been happier at work, lately. (Work as in my cleaning job, not volunteering.) My hours have lessened greatly and I haven't been to the grocery store in a month. (By myself, that is. I've been shopping with my mother, though. It snowed the other week and we walked to the grocery store, which was hilarious. But that's another story.)


Also, in the time I've been away my sister has gotten engaged. She's getting married in May. I've a myriad of feelings about that, to be sure. Quite stereotypical ones. I won't bother writing about them. Plus, it doesn't feel real. Very little does, though.


I feel lost and irrelevant in my life. I've forgotten so much. I don't even know exactly what I mean by this, I just feel it's true.

Maybe it's just the arsenic of winter building up in my veins.

I want to write again.

I mean, I still write, but the magic isn't there. I read things I've written in the past, and I am amazed. I don't remember writing these words; I don't know how I came up with these sentences that show promise of talent.

You can tell me I still have the talent, but I won't believe you

 "I didn't care that I wasn't writing because I didn't care about anything. That was similar to what I'd felt during various depressions -- words always out of reach. Words on a shelf too high for my lazy, faithless arms; words blurred and smeared around the sides of the errant crucible that was my mind; words a thing I had been smitten with now betraying me with their dullness."

-Frances & Bernard by Carlene Bauer

I need to stop hiding my words. It wasn't done on purpose, but I haven't shared a legitimate piece of writing since summer. I hope next time I post I'll have a piece of writing to share. And I hope my next post isn't almost 4 months in the making.


{Picture is by and of me. It's from an incredibly old "photoshoot" that has already popped up a couple times on this blog over the years. It's just the best picture I could find to convey the words "lost and irrelevant".}

out of sorts

I've been feeling out of sorts, as of late.
I've been wishing I could tear myself into thousands of tiny, insignificant pieces.
Or I wish I could shatter my heart like a china plate and make mosaics with the shards; even if I can't make something beautiful at least it would be different.

I just need something new to look at, that's all.

"I know what you mean about wishing that somebody wasn't there, though. It's usually, it's myself that I wish I could get away from. Seriously, think about this: I have never been anywhere that I haven't been. I've never had a kiss when I wasn't one of the kissers. Y'know, I've never gone to the movies, when I wasn't there in the audience. I've never been out bowling, if I wasn't there, y'know, making some stupid joke. I think that's why so many people hate themselves. Seriously, it's just they are sick to death of being around themselves."

~Jesse, Before Sunrise


My worn out, green-flecked emotions have been flaring up again. Mix in a pinch of apathy, a good dose of loneliness and a tumult of hormones and you have the mess known as me.

While some things have gotten better, some have just gotten worse. Though I'm no longer the unstable mess I was this winter, I've grown complacent. Change is something that needs to be worked at, even after it's already happened. I suspect we never truly finish changing, or growing rather. I need to pay more attention to myself, my emotional and spiritual well-being seems to slip under my radar too often. That needs to stop...


-'It All Got Worse' by Destry-
(my current favourite song)

Sorry, this post is rather moany. But what are blogs for, right? I almost disabled comments on this which is something I've considered doing many times but never actually done. I don't want anyone feel they have to or should respond to my pathetic complaints, but at the same time, I thrive on hearing from my blogging friends. Maybe I'm over-thinking this... (But I just may do a post without comments one of these old days, just you wait and see! :P)

{Picture taken from the text of the book "Home" by Marilynne Robinson.}

Ravings of a Bibliophile

You know what makes me sad?
When people (kids and teens in particular) tell me they don't like to read.
It makes me want to hide in the back of a dark, dark closet and mutter curses against our current society. Of course, I'd take a flashlight in the closet with me so I could read in between tears and anguished cries.

I mean, how sad would it be to not like to read?
How tragic is it that some consider reading to be something one is forced to do for school? (I am related to some of these people too! *shudders*)

Books mean the world to me. I cannot remember a time when reading was not something I enjoyed. This past year I have started taking trips twice a week to the library. Like one diseased, I search online for interesting and new-to-me books to read. (Which reminds me, got a recommendation? Leave it in the comments!)
This winter, especially, books have been invaluable. Books were my drug. When life got too stressful, too sad, too lonely, I lost myself in an inky world. According to goodreads.com I have read 175 books so far in 2011 (only a handful of which are re-reads since I don't usually log my re-reads.) Yes, I read a disgusting amount these days. It wasn't always like this, believe me. But I figure I probably won't have this kind of time later on in life so I am taking advantage of it now.

If you are reading this and don't like to read, I'm sorry. Sorry for for my vehement opinions or sorry for your incomplete existence, you may wonder. Well, I'm... not going to answer that. :P


Some of my favourite book quotes I have collected in my readings:

"I closed my eyes, put my right hand on top of the book, and passed it lightly across the cover. It was cool and smooth like a stone from the bottom of the brook, and it stilled me. A whole other world is inside there, I thought to myself, and that's where I want to be."
-From Ida B. by Katherine Hannigan


"Literature is a source of pleasure, he said, it is one of the rare inexhaustible joys in life, but it's not only that. It must not be disassociated from reality. Everything is there. That is why I never use the word fiction. Every subtlety in life is material for a book. He insisted on the fact. Have you noticed, he'd say, that I'm talking about novels? Novels don't contain only exceptional situations, life or death choices, or major ordeals; there are also everyday difficulties, temptations, ordinary disappointments; and, in response, every human attitude, every type of behavior, from the finest to the most wretched. There are books where, as you read, you wonder: What would I have done? It's a question you have to ask yourself. Listen carefully: it is a way to learn to live. There are grown-ups who would say no, that literature is not life, that novels teach you nothing. They are wrong. Literature performs, instructs, it prepares you for life."
-from A Novel Bookstore by Laurence Cossé


"As I stood outside in Cow Lane, it occurred to me that Heaven must be a place where the library is open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.

No ... eight days a week."
-From The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley


"When you sell a man a book you don't sell just twelve ounces of paper and ink and glue - you sell him a whole new life. Love and friendship and humour and ships at sea by night - there's all heaven and earth in a book, a real book."
-From The Haunted Bookshop by Christopher Morley


"I feel, holding books, accommodating their weight and breathing their dust, an abiding love. I trust them, in a way that I can't trust my computer, though I couldn't do without it. Books are matter. My books matter. What would I have done through these years without the library and all its lovely books?"
-From The Girls by Lori Lansens

(A few of my very favourite books.)

{1st picture from the film "Les Parapluies de Cherbourg" and 2nd picture taken by me.}

Appreciation for the familiar.

"When you talked earlier about, after a few years, how a couple would begin to hate each other by anticipating their reactions or getting tired of their mannerisms… I think it would be the opposite for me… I think I can really fall in love when I know everything about someone. The way he’s going to part his hair, which shirt he’s going to wear that day… knowing the exact story he’d tell in a given situation.
I’m sure that’s when I’d know I’m really in love."

~Céline, Before Sunrise~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Do you feel that way? I do. Sometimes I think there is nothing so comforting as the familiar. Sure, experiencing new things is great; the thrill of the unknown is unparalleled! But at the end of the day I just want to be reassured by something predictable. Though I am not one for daily rituals that must be performed. Just being in a familiar place with the people I love and know is enough for me.
{...Though this is probably because I'm a major homebody.}

An Old Friend

"I'm glad I never had any children," said Cousin Sarah. "If they don't break your heart in one way they do it in another."
"Isn't it better to have your heart broken than to have it wither up?" queried Valancy. "Before it could be broken it must have felt something splendid. That would be worth the pain."

In other words, I just finished reading The Blue Castle by L. M. Montgomery for the umpteenth time. I stayed up late last night reading it. Definitely worth it! It was like visiting an old friend again. I love it more every time I read it. :)