bah-humbug.

perk #241 of living with the allmarts: being there to overhear husayn sing J. Lo's "Jenny from the Block"

a priceless moment?

you have no idea what you all just missed.

and now on to the rambling. bare with me or just stop reading...staring now:
there are things that people don't allow themselves to do and for me one of those things is hope. though to many this can be a romantic notion; to have hope is to have faith, to have faith is to believe, and to believe is to be hopeful. it's one big beautiful circle, but for me hope is scary. to hope is to finally admit to myself whatever it is that i am allowing myself to hope for is the thing i really want. doubt fills my head and the fear of what i'm hoping for is not what i need or is not going to get me where i want it to get me, or it is not what i should be hoping for and so forth and so on. i don't want to hope, because i don't want to be disappointed. i don't want to have faith, because i don't want what i want not to happen. i don't want to believe, because i don't want my hope to blind me in seeing other out comes.

confused? so am i. but at least i have a vague idea of what i am saying. you may not, sorry. words and i are in a complex relationship...and that being true, why i have a blog remains an question that's going to go unpondered.

i am hoping to go to ruhi in the woods this summer (an intensive training camp for future community service type thing) and i'm trying to put these fears of hope aside. right now i am filling out the application and i'm trying to figure out how to say what i want to say. not too good with words and writing, three out of four of the question asked are, in a way, intimidating. my involvement with core activities and my experiences with them? well, i filled in and helped my sister a few times with her sunday school classes...uhh...the study circle i was in held a devotional...umm...yeah. i feel under qualified to answer the question and scold myself, "why haven't you done...done...something!" i had school, i had a job, i had a two hour commute each day...these are the excuses running through my head. when did i have the time? i should have made the time.

but as i ponder about why, i think it all comes down to being shy and not knowing quite how to get involved with service in a way i felt comfortable and at least semi-confident about. i feel like going to ruhi would help. i would build confidence being trained in the ruhi books and as a jr. animator. i would become comfortable through meeting and getting to know the people that would be there with me, the people i would be working with when we come back to chicago. instead of "would" though, i should be saying "hope". i hope that is apart of what i would get out of going to this training. this is what i envision at least.

hmm...baahhhhh....applications.

hmm...baahhhhh....hoping.

-------------------------------


My hopes are so high that your kiss might kill me.
So won't you kill me, so I die happy.

If any man says he hates war more than I do, he better have a knife, that's all I have to say.

i'm not exactly sure when it happened or how exactly it happened but...i have become a shoe whore.

and if you are disgusted like i am slightly frighten by this; don't look in my closet. since moving to evanston (since i started paying for my everything...minus my mobile) the number of shirts i own has doubled, my skirts have raised ten fold, and my pants! have most certainly tripled. i blame what i call the 14-odd-years of hand-me-downs liberation. in no way being serious; it has changed my life.

...i also blame nordstoms rack, the urban outfitters additional 50% off sale items, and gap being convently next door to p*nea.

...and debit cards.

-------------------------

If you think that a kiss is all in the lips
C'mon, you got it all wrong, man
And if you think that our dance was all in the hips
Oh well, then do the twist
If you think holding hands is all in the fingers
Grab hold of the soul where the memory lingers and
Make sure to never do it with the singer
'Cause he'll tell everyone in the world

What he was thinking about the girl
Ya, what he's thinking about the girl, oh

A lot of people get confused and they bruise
Real easy when it comes to love
They start putting on their shoes and walking out
And singing "boy, I think I had enough"

Just because she makes a big rumpus
She don't mean to be mean or hurt you on purpose, boy
Take a tip and do yourself a little service
Take a mountain turn it into a mole

So now you're mad, denying the truth
And it's hidden in the wisdom in the back of your tooth
Ya need ta spit it out, in a telephone booth
While ya call everyone that you know, and ask 'em

Where do you think she goes
Oh ya, where d'ya suppose she goes, oh

The truth well you know there's no stoppin' it
And the boat well ya know she's still rockin' it

The boat ya you know she's still rockin' it
And the truth ya you know there's no stoppin' it

You recognize with your back in the back?
That it's colder when she rocks the boat
But it's the cause hittin on the Cardinal Laws?
'bout the proper place to hang her coat

So to you, the truth is still hidden
And the soul plays the role of a lost little kitten but
You should know that the doctors weren't kiddin?
She's been singing it all along

But you were hearin' a different song

Do you feel?

Spontaneous motherfreaking dance parties make life worth living.

When Your Burrito Explodes

You know you have done something wrong, and you have just gotten what you have deserved when your veggie burrito with no beans, mild sauce, cheese, cream cheese, with no guacamole and no lettuce explodes onto your arm.

somehow i managed to leave two friends eating lunch at two different potbellies (misspelled because i feel like it) all by themselves. one was at the one on wabash the other on wacker. yes, map it out in your head or on google maps (i still prefer mapquest) and you will notice that, yes i manage to leave two friends stranded at the two potbellies on opposite sides of the loop. not only did i have to walk those 20 some blocks (exaggerated because that's what i do) feeling horrible for how much of a failure of a friend i am, i had to walk those 20 some blocks hungry. so i guess i got what was coming after sitting down to eat my burrito, after i said, "well, at least someone is going to have a good lunch today." and yes, we were sitting by the windows to give the pedestrians something to laugh at.

Buddy the Elf! What's your favorite color?

Have you ever had one of those moments where you feel like you are in movie where it’s just about to end, and the oldies song starts to play quietly and then you turn it up and the song takes over, everyone is happy, and just as the scene fades you are running out of the room dancing?

A lesson must be lived in order to be learned.

and i think to myself, what lesson am i living?

if there is a thing called "old soul," i am most definitely a "new soul." i am an observer of sorts; always watching, listening, and absorbing other people's talks and interactions. unable to conger up the right words to describe my vivid visual thoughts, i am quite. "old souls" are known for their deep spiritual, and intellectual, insights; "new souls" are in need of strong, and patient, spiritual guidance.

i find my self living in a cycle, where suddenly, after months or years, i wake up and realize i have being living life through it's motions. as of this moment the first time i remember "waking up" was when someone once asked me, "what do you think about, what thoughts run through your head?" i thought about the question and the answer was clear, "nothing." i'm sure my friend thought that it was a joke or me just being a tease, but really it was the truth. well "the truth" scared me and was enough of a jolt to me that i had my first "awakening." what is it that i should be thinking about? which eventually developed into the question of, what am i afraid to think about? the answer was God. and so, i struggled, as i forced myself to think about God, to actually learn about this Baha'i Faith i called my own.

it was not until tonight that i feel i have a bit more understanding of why; in fact it was not until tonight that i finally had the guts to ask myself why it was i was afraid of God. tonight i decided to go down to the lake (what suzanne and i affectionately call the ocean) to say midnight prayers. it was there that i realized how far away i was sitting and thought to myself, "why is it that i am afraid of the ocean?" which reminded me of this quote:

O My Servants! My holy, My divinely ordained Revelation may be likened unto an ocean in whose depths are concealed innumerable pearls of great price, of surpassing luster. It is the duty of every seeker to bestir himself and strive to attain the shores of this ocean, so that he maym in proportion to the eagerness of his search and the efforts he hath exerted, partake of such benefits as have been pre-ordained in God's irrevocable and hidden Tablets.

and i finally asked myself why it was that i was afraid of God. (just to be clear, i did not remember not but two words from this quote, but i visualized it's meaning...or more it's meaning to me) right now, i feel that the answer i found, or more the answer i am beginning to find, is that there just may not be one answer to why and maybe its not the one answer that is important here; maybe it is the question itself that is of higher value. it is the question that got me to think.

Sometimes I wish I could boldly go where no man has gone before... but I'll probably stay in Aurora. What are you thinking about?

dream #141: become a graphic designer, making posters the rest of my life, and my offical office be a coffee shop.

would i be happy with that?

i. think. so.

(photoshop, i love you.)

Aaaahh! Turn it off man, turn it off! It's sucking my will to live! Oh, the humanity!

thanks to ondemand hbo style, to a sister that has cable and a small case of insomnia i saw the first three episodes of "Big Love" last night. just in case you don't know, "Big Love" is the new hbo series about a mormon's life with his three wives and seven children. like every hbo series i have thus seen, (six feet under, sopranos, carnival, and sex and the city) i enjoy the originality of it and am intrigued to see more. while watching it though, i kept finding myself getting frustrated. three wives all fighting for their husbands attention, naturally fighting and only getting upset at one another, never really getting mad at their husband. it was as though none of them wanted to bring up issues that needed to be addressed in their relationship almost in fear of making him mad. the only wife who seemed to have the balls to say anything in a straight forward, truthful manner (not trying to manipulate him with lies) was the oldest wife. i think the hardest thing for me to watch was the women always competing with one another and how that (in a way) was keeping them oppressed (this situation i saw the most between the two younger wives). but the frustration that i got from watching wasn't a bad thing, it made me think more about balances in relationships. the only complaint with what i have seen so far is the sexual focus of the relationships between the three wives and their one husband and the lack of the other dynamics of relationships. at one point i remember thinking that "Big Love" should be renamed "Big Sex," it was so fixated on the subject. but then again it is hbo.

-----------
Garage Sale. Saturday.
I need to pay my heart's outstanding bills.
A cracked-up compass and a pocket watch,
some plastic daffodils,
the cutlery and coffee cups I stole from all-night restaurants,
a sense of wonder (only slightly used),
a year of two to haunt you in the dark,
a wage-slave forty-hour work week
(weighs a thousand kilograms, so bend you knees)
comes with a free fake smile for all your dumb demands,
the cordless razor that my father bought when I turned 17,
a puke-green sofa, the outline to a complicated dream of dignity,
and a laugh (too loud and too long).
For a place where awkward belongs,
or a phone call from far away with a "Hi, how are you today",
and a sign that recovery come to broken ones.
Or best offer.

The name's The Machine Bee, thank you!

Your Superhero Profile

Your Superhero Name is The Machine Bee Your Superpower is Soul Sold to Devil Your Weakness is Crystals Your Weapon is Your Air Analyzer Your Mode of Transportation is Cable

What's your Superhero Name?

if it weren't for dumbtimewastingyetattimesentertaining quizzes how else would i know that my superpower is Soul Sold to the Devil? I mean, if i never found that out-- well, think of how disillusioned i would have kept on living my life.

You have your whole life ahead of you. You have a whole six years!

To me "what if.." always meant to change the past. I would think of past mistakes/situations in these terms and would end up being depressed and saddened by my failures. I would watch my past self and cridge, while thinking, "oh, anya don't." moments would replay in my head and each time i would get angry at myself. it was all backwards thinking, because now (and i don't know what has changed, but i'm a fan of whatever it is), i can look at past mistakes and, instead of getting down on myself, i can see the value of what i learned from them. And now "what if.." has become a base for dreams to form. "What if I go to grad school in savannah? what if in the furture i own my own coffee shop and work side jobs as a graphic designer? what if i become an industrial designer and get to make cool toys the rest of my life? what if i can find a way to work my dream job (to put together packages to send to people*)?" the possibilities become endless, and at times overwhelming. but that good sort of overwhelming, you know when you get so excited you just have to sit down and calm yourself. like getting to see the merkle's, for example. (aww, i miss my merkle's who i haven't see since two weeks before my birthday...which was janurary 8th! come on now, who can go that long without seeing the merkles. not me that's for sure) so, umm, yeah. i have a new way of thinking and my thoughts feel much clearer which makes me feel much more happier. now if only i knew if it were my left frontal lobe that was more at work when i'm feeling happier or my right frontal lobe, i would have aced my psychology test today. dang those psychology tests.

*if you don't get that, then you just don't know me :-)

Content and Smiling...

i am at my favorite coffee shop in evanston, where the door is open allowing a slight breeze to come in, and death cab plays overhead.

my widget weather forcaster shows a violent storm cloud, when all i see outside is bright sunshine.

i am wearing a skirt. (wearing skirts make me happy. yay for skirts!)

*not being all knowing of widgets, i first put gidgits, then remembered they started with a "w" and so wrote widgits, and then still feeling that wasn't quite right i googled it to get the right word, does anyone else do this?

UPDATE: more smiles...on my walk home from the coffee shop i could smell the rain that's about to downpour. i love, love, LOVE the smell of rain.

If you define cowardice as running away at the first sign of danger, screaming and begging for mercy, then yes, Mr. Brave man, I guess I am a coward.

suz and hus are out of town for the week. the aparment feels too big and too cold without them. there is no amia talking in the mornings to ease me awake, only the alarm on my phone that makes me angry when it goes off.

i am depressed.

My First (failure of a) Grocery List

frozen waffles
butter
syrup
4 cheese hot pockets
2 packages of uncrustables (strawberry jelly...yumm!)
citrus green ice tea
2 bottles of orange juice (double yumm!)
milk
bananas (to help with the depression)

if you were at the evanston jewel on sunday, i was the girl walking around looking lost.

so, what did i learned this week?

i need to marry a chef.

Tomkins you have stolen my heart, now just don't break it.

so i made the big mistake of leaving tomkins (aka my nano, that i just got for my birthday) at sara's house. i thought that i wouldn't miss him this week due to the fact that it is the fifth week of classes, which means test upon test upon papers.

long realization short: i was wrong.

i miss his perfect shuffles (three out of four, on average thus far...what can i say tomkins, you are good), checking my pocket every ten minutes to make sure he is still there (thank you husayn, for terriorizing me with the "what if.." of losing him), the background he provides for my red line el naps (that successfully, and thankfully, drain out the sound of the person next to me chewing on their gum), and i even miss the way he makes my hears hurt in that odd way where the only way to make them feel better is to put the ear phones back in.

one week was hard, two weeks is undesired. tomkins, i think it's time you come on home. by that i mean, sara come visit and don't forget to bring my nano!

-----------
Love of mine some day you will die
But I'll be close behind
I'll follow you into the dark

No blinding light or tunnels to gates of white
Just our hands clasped so tight
Waiting for the hint of a spark
If heaven and hell decide
That they both are satisfied
Illuminate the no's on their vacancy signs

If there's no one beside you
When your soul embarks
Then I'll follow you into the dark

20!

birthday fill-in and pictures! yes, pictures! to come (once i get back to feeling like blogging)...as for now enjoy the blurred miss amia allmart actually sitting by herself, reading books to herself! (seriously this is the first time i think she's ever done this and just for the record, i love this girl and i want more! someone give me more nieces and nephews!)

that's her taking a break to pick her nose, which she likes to do when i'm around her. i think it's because i tend to tell her, "eww! yuck!" and "noses are for smelling, not picking" all while making disgusted face. plus, she knows that if i try to pull her finger out of her nose she can start to cry and then run to suzanne and tell on me. she likes to tell on me.

a post with alot of me, myself, and i's

way back when i moved into evanston, i went to a women's night with my sister suzanne. and there a women gave a talk about her recent stay in hawaii, when she went to just get away and re-group. after her incredible story of stength and faith, she asked us to write down something we each individually were struggling with. after a few moments, after not really thinking about it, i scribbled down "direction" on my piece of paper.

i'm struggling with direction; WHERE am i going? WHEN am i going to get there? ...HOW am i going to get there? are a few questions that are running thorugh my head. i'm currently switching my major from architecture to art and design. i've just wasted a semester, which has resulted into a year, of trying to pretend and hold onto architecture as my desired career path. why? i knew that architecture wasn't what i wanted, i had no passion for it. i knew that architecture lacked the majority of the type of creativity i love to play with and create. so why did i try to pretend to want something i knew i did not want?

while growing up the majority of my frustration stemmed from not being able to make decisions. i remember destinctly standing at a vending machine on our way up to michigan, just staring at the candy inside. did i want the peanut butter m&m's or the regular m&m's? did i want a pack of gum? a bag of chips? malt balls? panic grew inside me, "what do i want!?" then my mom and sister sara tried helping me decide. "well, what are you in the mood for anya?" they kept asking me. i could not decide, i did not want to get one thing and find that that was not what i wanted. i didn't want to make a mistake. the frustration grew too big and the panic ended up overwhelming me, so i just walked away.

my lack of direction and inablilty to make decisions go hand in hand. i never thought i'd be here. when imagining my future self i always passed over the college years and went straight into picturing life that followed college. my family, my career, ect. even that was fuzzy and just silly girlish imaginings (which i guess any furture imaginings of yourself are). i couldn't create direction for myself, because that would mean i would have to decide what that direction would be. i didn't know where i wanted to go or what i wanted to do. possibilities and options were/are endless. i wanted someone to come and tell me, "anya you have to be blankyadiblank" or "anya, you have to go into blankyadiblank." i just wanted for someone to tell me where to go, so i wouldn't have to decide myself. and i guess it all comes down to fear. fearing i will make a mistake, fearing to create realistic dreams and set goals. fearing to fail, fearing to get hurt. but isn't that life? you only learn from failures. it's not as though you fail, that's it. it's over. there, that's the backward mindset i've been thinking in. i'm afraid to try, because i'm afraid to fail. i'm afraid let myself get attachted or excited about things that aren't difinate.

then i start thinking, on the other hand. i'm not that afraid, i know what will happen will happen. what will be, will be. there is a reason for everything, and sooner or later you might find out why...or you may not. i beilieve in God. i put my trust in God. so why should i be fearful? maybe there inlies the problem. maybe before i didn't really put my trust in God and instead invested more in fear.

oh fear, you nasty little thing.

------------------

Measure me in metered lines, in one decisive stare,
the time it takes to get from here to there.
My ribs that show through t-shirts and these shoes I got for free;
I'm unconsoled, I'm lonely.
I am so much better than I used to be.

Terrified of telephones and shopping malls and knives,
And drowning in the pools of other lives.
Rely a bit to heavily on irony.
Get clobbered on by courtesy, in love with love, and lousy poetry.

And I'm leaning on this broken fence between Past and Present tense.
And I'm losing all those stupid games that I swore I'd never play.
But it almost feels okay.

Circumnavigate this body of wonder and uncertainty.
Armed with every precious failure, and amateur cartography,
I breathe in deep before I spread those maps out on my bedroom floor.

And I'm leaning on this broken fence between Past and Present tense.
And I'm losing all those stupid games that I swore I'd never play.
But it feels okay.

And I'm leaving. Wave goodbye.
And I'm losing, but I'll try, with the last ways left, to remember.
Sing my imperfect offering

Forest of Illusion

since the library is out of sapranos season three, i have filled that time with playing super mario world. i now know what i was missing out on (our family never had nintendo, and when we went to visit our cousins in ohio..who had nintendo..only my older sisters got to play).

life. is. grand.

UPDATE: i am currently stuck in the forest of illusion, all paths have become circles. what thing did i miss in what level?

When you never hear it, then on top of that you barely feel it...love gets lost.

the following isn't funny, nor is it suppose to be.

i feel like a greasy schmuck, who's in great need of a "refreshed" spirit. almost as much as this sememster killed me, this transition from trying to do everything all at once all the time to having absolutely nothing to do, is almost too much for me to handle. besides the sopranos (only for half an episode), nothing caughtes my interest. no, it's more like nothing holds my interest. forms of entertainment feel empty (minus ice skating and sledding), i feel restless and impatient. i can't figure out all of what is involved with this unexpected switch in mood or more importantly (well, maybe not more importantly) what's going to pull me out of it.

"Now, and for a long time, the best way she knew to settle her mind was to run. Sometimes she felt that the meditative state of the long, quiet miles helped her think. Sometimes she felt that the pure exhaustion helped her not think. Sometimes she beileved that she was running toward some sort of resolution, and other times she knew she was just plain running away. Still, it was what she did."

too bad i live in chicago, and it's currently negavtive degrees out (without the windchill).


----------------------------

I am up again against
The skin of my guitar
In the window of my life
Looking out through the bars
I am sounding out the silence
Avoiding all the words
I'm afraid i've said too much
I'm afraid of who has heard me

I am up again against
The skin of my guitar
In the window of my life
Looking out through the bars
I am sounding out the silence
Avoiding all the words
I'm afraid i can never say enough
I'm afraid no one has heard me

I spent like three hours doing shading the upper lip. It's probably the best drawing I've ever done.

where was on the weekends this semester? i was wondering all over chicago sketching in my notebook. here are some of my favorites from the whole semester. you'd think i'd have more, but then you'd look in my sketchbook and then you'd understand. (there is a green strip because this is a copy of a page of my portfolio...and i was going to post my whole portfolio to show you what i've been doing while living in studio, but it's oh so much better when you flip through the real thing yourself)



this one is my personal favorite, for personal reasons. i first saw this man playing his violin i was waiting for the el at jackson and he instantly reminded me of my grandpa. this, naturally, made me happy and for whatever reason i just wanted a picture of him sitting there playing his violin. but by the time i pulled out my camera, the train was in front of me and i had to go. then about two weeks later for architecture we went to the art institute for a field trip and there he was playing right out in front of it. that's when i got the chance to sketch him.

--------------

There's never been an endeavor so strange
As trying to slow the blood in my veins
To keep my face blank
As a stone that just sank
Until not a ripple remains
I am high above the tree line
Sitting cross legged on the ground
When all of the forbidden fruit has fallen and rotted
That's when I'm gonna come down

I finally drove out where the sky is dark enough to see stars

"AN-A!"

"AN-A!!"

"AMIA!"

"An-a!"

"Amia!"

"An-a!"

i roll over in my bed.

"Up"

i then pull her up into my bed and she quickly says, "In!" and i raise my blankets for her to crawl into bed with me. "elie-phant! in," and i throw in the elephant (sorry liza, still haven't found it...and don't bother coming over to look for it when we find it we'll let you know). as i listen to her giggle under the covers i think to myself, "this is the single most absolute best way to wake up," and i get a moment that puts into perspective of what true happiness really is.

How to start a break off right.

i just finished watching the first season of the sopranos. husayn got me hooked after turning it on during thanksgiving and now, now i'm crazy about it. i'm renting the second season tomorrow (thank goodness for libraries and their hidden vhs' in the back corner)

i can tell, already, that this is going to a one good winter break.

----------------

I believe in the sand beneath my toes
The beach gives a feeling
An earthy feeling
I believe in the faith that grows