my great grandmother died on christmas eve, the day before christ was born. kind of hard. she was a wonderful lady, though, and she lived a long life, and finally made it home to God after 97 years, the last 20 of which she spent without a husband.

and you know? I know I only see her, maybe, twice or three times a year... but I miss her.

---

Take this sinking boat and point it home
We've still got time
Raise your hopeful voice you had a choice
You've made it now
Falling slowly sing your melody
I'll sing along
-Falling Slowly, The Swell Season

My Favourite Christmas Lyric of 2007.

"O hush the noise ye men of strife
And hear the angels sing."

From It Came Upon The Midnight Clear, lyrics by Edmund Sears, 1849.

head underwater.

Walk out on the water
You have no control
Scared of every failure
Sacrifice your soul, please let that go
---

I'm trying, God.
Okay?

Things are different here now. My friends are different. Or, more likely, I'm different. I don't feel different, but I get in a big group of them and I realize that a lot of what they're into, I'm not. Or no longer am.

Maybe I should just play along. But why should I have to? And then, I listen to some of the things that they say, and just the interactions that take place, and I realize that this really isn't who I want to be. That I'm just not completely on the same plane any more. I am with Jen and John, definately. And probably Peter. But James, and Mackenzie, and Brian, and Kaitlin... I just don't feel like we're that connected. That it's fairly forced. And that I don't want to be out with all of them until all hours. because it just isn't fun.

And I'm sorry if I'm making this up, but I felt uncomfortable tonight at Brian's house. Like, some of his mother's comments just made me feel uneasy. Embarrassed. Not uneasy like last night during Superbad. But rather, a "I don't belong here and I don't like it" feeling.

People change. I've changed. I guess I just didn't realize how much. It's not that I dislike who I am. If anything, I think I like who I am more. It's just a matter of finding the balance. Listening to myself talk, for example. Voice quality. Am I being mean, just in how I sound? Those sorts of things.

I kind of want it to be Christmas, so I can take a break from my friends. I want to lose ten pounds and I want to go back to school.

I love my family, but I... I dunno. It's weird here.

if you had 24 hours left to live, what would you do?

I said that I'd spend time with my family, eat a really good meal, go to church and sing, and then hop a plane and fly to peru and watch the sunrise over pablo neruda's grave (I think he's buried on a hill; I'd sit there) and die holding someone's hand with God' name on my lips, like Gandhi did.

Josh said he'd do a bunch of stuff, as well, but that he'd die watching the sunset and looking into someone's eyes. Because it's eye contact that really captures the humanity of it.

How many people can say they've looked into someone's eyes as they die? Very few, I'd expect. Most people close theirs; too much work to keep them open, I guess. But. Still. I know that everyone dies alone, and that there's very little humanity left in death, the actual act of leaving this world and entering the next, but there's such... civility, or humanity, I guess, in eye contact. Very few species can manage it without being threatening. For most, the sole act of maintaining a visual bridge between oneself and someone else is an act of extreme aggression and threatening. We aren't like that.

It's really beautiful, when you think about it. Physical contact is a plus to most mammals; we're conditioned to seek and maintain warmth, and it's often through direct contact with another that we achieve it. But eye contact? With no physical benefit? It's purely a recognition that we're all in this together.

And what a way to go.

oh yeah, your skin and bones // turn into something beautiful

-smiles-

I'm so happy right now. Yeah, I'm crazy busy right now and it's going to be an adventure this week... but I'm just happy. I feel like I'm hearing God right now really well, and that I'm being focused and guided and all of that jazz.

And I really like Josh. -grins-

I've never dated anyone Christian before. It's a new concept for me, but one that I really like a lot so far. Granted, we're not dating. But I know that he likes me; he basically told me. And, the thing is... I really like him. It's weird, because I don't know him ridiculously well. Nevertheless, I... I just like him. He's really cute, and funny, and sweet, and just... yeah. Cute.

I don't really date nice guys. It'd be a really welcome change.

When he told me he'd dated his last girlfriend for THREE AND A HALF YEARS I died a little bit. Because that's, like, legitimately longer than my longest run of 4 months. And that was even too long.

So, yeah. but the thing is... maybe it's easier to date for longer when you agree with the person on a lot of fundamental levels.

God? Yeah. What should I do?

padre nuestro

Padre nuestro que estás en los cielos, santificado sea tu nombre,
venga tu reyno,
hagase tu voluntad,
asì en la tierra como en el cielo.
Danos hoy nuestro pan cotidiano,
Y perdónanos nuestras deudas,
asì como nosotros perdonamos á nuestros deudores.
Y no nos metas en tentación,
mas líbranos de mal.

Amén.

sometimes all I want
is someone to listen to jazz music with me
like my grandfather does, closing his eyes
and fingering the notes on his deep, blue-toned tenor
saxophone, which he's only been able to play well since he turned 65.

I don't play like he does. Not with the experiences he puts behind it,
playing the death of his son and the
loss of his wife's breasts to cancer.

He doesn't play much jazz about the graduation of my father from grad school
or the birth of my cousins.

It's about feeling the rhythm of being 73
and embracing it with a smile
and a song.

why can't we do that at 20?

negative space

bukowski says what we know is in what we don't know.
I know organic chemistry, the feel of rain on my skin, the smile I wear at a party, the way
I hold my pillow at night,
imagining the contours of the muscles
it doesn't have.

I know how to run a seven minute mile and the feeling in my lungs (pantpantpant) after I stop, the
smell of my skin, the gleeful look in my eyes
a little girl proving to her father that she can do it just as well as he does.

I know how to see through jungle rains, how to just
give in and let it take you over, covering you
in wet.

I know how to smile and cry together, and I know the hanukkah prayers (Baruch a'tah adonai, eloheinu), even as a
shiksha.

I don't know how to do a shot of everclear without coughing.
I don't know russian, how to fix my roommate's boy problems, or how to close my eyes and jump.
I don't know how to drive a stick on the highway.

(I can scale a building, but I can't be fearless.)
(If bukowski's right, we're all dead).

dead week.

God is good. I am His. And He is getting me through.