suspicious.

My sister Miriam wrote this. It is so good, I figured I didn't really have to write my own version. And it expresses my experience with AVATAR quite well:

The whole family went to Avatar today except Marie, Mike and the little children. None of us were excited about the plot synopsis, but it was AVATAR, so we had to go. Laura and I were the ones who waited for everyone with the tickets. This gave us time to eat a baked potato and look around.
Laura: "Ohhhh. They used papyrus font for the Avatar poster. This isn't going to be good."
Me: "Ya?"
Laura: "It just looks bad. They spend millions of dollars on a film and then get graphic designers who use PAPYRUS. No. What were they thinking?"
Me: (Laughing) "It's like public health."
Laura: " Huh?"
Me: "After learning about public health, you question every statistic the media throws at you. I mean like did they stratify for age, socioeconomic status, and activity level? That kind of stuff. You become suspicious of everything when you know something about public health and here you are suspicious of everything because of the typefaces they use."
Laura: (laughing) "I am suspicious of Avatar."

So we went in, a little late by the time all of the tickets were distributed and we waded through upset people to our pre-assigned seats. About a half hour in, I felt something slide off of my lap and looked down. The sleeve of my coat had shifted and it's a heavy lambskin coat so I thought I might be able to feel a sleeve shifting because it is a bulky coat. I briefly considered that my purse may have slipped off of my lap but I just decided to search around after the movie.

It ended. It was long. At one point, I had looked at Laura and said
"I have to pee so bad."
"Me too. We only have 45 minutes left. "
"Ackkk"
We made it. It had cost the two of us ~$20 to stare at a movie screen for 3 hours and the special effects were worth it. However, Laura's suspicions about the story, characters, and romance were validated. Most importantly, we got to go to the bathroom.
I looked around for my purse. I couldn't find it. I started searching under the seats around me. The girl sitting on my left wanted to get past and I wasn't letting her. I wanted to see if my purse had somehow ended up in her bag. I finally told her I was looking for my purse to see how she responded and she said very sweetly.
"Oh. Well let me get out of your way."

I have no idea what to do when you think someone has stolen your purse, but you are in no way sure. I mean I couldn't just start frisking people or going through their bags. I considered what was in my purse. A credit card, a debit card, a drivers license, temple recommend, Costco membership, various grocery store discount cards and three pieces of peppermint Trident. I had just payed my dad back with my last $20, left my phone, camera and ipod at home and I had even commented earlier that my purse was looking worn out. I let her go past, looked a bit more for my purse, went to the lost and found, and then called and put a hold on my credit card and cancelled my debit card. I panicked later when I realized I didn't know where my keys were, but they were in my backpack after all.

When I get back to Merced, I will get to spend about 3 hours at the DMV, staring at pictures of Arnold Schwarzenegger and it will cost me ~ $20 for a new drivers license.

found my place.

My dad is a designer. Not of letters, shapes, or colors, but of electrical currents, circuit boards, switches, and wires. My parents' house is presently equipped to be powered by a windmill. The walls are doubly insulated for better temperature control and the windows were purposefully kept small for the same purpose. It's been heated by a coal-burning furnace for the last 25 years because of the unbeatable cost/heat ratio. If you haven't seen my parents' house before, it looks utilitarian in essence, like a really big white storage shed.

I once told him over some physics homework, "Dad, I think you are more fluent in math than in English." He smiled and seemed to relish this remark. I think I've heard him retell it a few times. I really meant it. I think he interprets the world through numbers. Numerical efficiency comes first. Things are measured in concrete terms and meant for analysis. Factors earning top consideration are only measurable, physical elements: inertia, mass, density, time, speed, etc. He complains when electronic devices were not so carefully designed with these things in mind.

Thinking of my dad in this way makes me feel linked to him, although everything I design considers almost no measurable values. I try to consider tone, readability, and composition first. I see the world through this lens and complain when I come across visual information that was not so carefully designed with these things in mind.

i am not a robot.

Luke posted this on his blog in August and it's never left my brain.

Marina & The Diamonds, "I Am Not A Robot" from Neon Gold Records on Vimeo.

love struck.

I don't even care if I look like an anime nerd for posting this: Howl's Moving Castle is one of the most romantic movies I've ever seen. I could write a ten page essay in support of this argument and carry on lengthy conversations, but I'll spare everyone and simply enjoy this hopeful spark it has left in my heart...

home for holidays.

Isn't this a little scary?I find myself feeling just a little creeped out every time those green eyes twinkle at me as I'm using the bathroom at my parents' home this Christmas season.

Also, this quote gets me so excited that I'm studying graphic design. I'd love to claim someday that I am, in fact, a real typographer:

"In a world rife with unsolicited messages, typography must often draw attention to itself before it will be read. Yet in order to be read, it must relinquish the attention it has drawn. Typography with anything to say therefore aspires to a kind of statuesque transparency. Its other traditional goal is durability: not immunity to change, but a clear superiority to fashion. Typography at its best is a visual form of language linking timelessness and time."

- The Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Bringhurst

Thanks to Luke for this book recommendation. (I found an older edition in the BYU library.)

thaw.

A boy in the graphic design program once told me I was a bit cold.
"Cold?! I think people would describe me as anything but that."
I pushed the topic a bit in an attempt to better understand, but he seemed uncomfortable elaborating.

During a particularly painful break-up this year I remember saying something ridiculous along the lines of, "I will recover quickly from this. I always do. This doesn't compare to what I've experienced in the past."

After I divorced, I submerged myself in school. I took 9 credits during spring term and none of them involved art. It was physical science, history, and English. I got a 3.7 and it almost killed me. During that time I never cried about my broken marriage. After a certain point I never even thought about it.

I think the rate of this pattern has only increased. Not only has my school schedule become more difficult each and every subsequent semester, but I have been dating in succession for almost exactly an entire year.

I've never even stopped long enough to feel the painful dissolve of the last relationship or what it meant to me in my life. I've attempted to be logical and rational and never let emotional things affect my work ethic.

I am not necessarily vowing to take a break from dating. (I once told my therapist that I should do this and he combated the remark with: "If you wanted to get better at baseball would you stop practicing?")
But already, this slight downtime from school and relationships has allowed me a better sense of my losses. I'll let it happen. I might even cry for once.

gasp.

Last week a man who was late bringing sacrament bread to church hit my car head-on. I didn't even watch him cross over into my lane, he was already driving in it. Fortunately we were both moving slowly because the roads were thick with snow, but it's still likely that my car was totaled.
I was upset that it happened right before finals week.

The previous Friday I experienced my semester-end review where you meet with all of the graphic design faculty in one room. I slapped my dog-eared stack of process work down on the table. One professor grabbed it and shuffled through it a bit as another stood over his shoulder.
"Laura, have you had a lot of personal stuff going on this semester?"
I lied without thought. "No, not really."
"Where is all your work? Is this it?"
My stomach tightens like it's just been punched.
"Yeah. This is it. But I feel like I've been working really hard."
"She's here all the time," another professor pipes in.
"Maybe you just have a hard time making decisions."
"Yes, that could be the case," says another.

I stayed at school that night scanning new images and checking type options until a custodian kicked me out of the building. "I will prove them wrong, I will prove them wrong," was the song I kept singing in my head over and over again.

The wreck struck me immediately as more of an inconvenience than a near-death experience or the loss of a possession. But I was instantly grateful to be alive once I stepped outside in the snow and surveyed the damage. It was bad. I couldn't believe it was actually my car once it was hoisted on the back of the tow truck.

I spent half of the following morning negotiating with the insurance company and making arrangements for a rental car.

After that, I remember only the dizzying vortex of finals week. I spent days in front of my laptop screen until Thursday afternoon when I had a therapy appointment on campus. We got on to the topic of why I am choosing to work so hard at school and where my real motivation lies. Is it really to support my future children if my husband dies? No. Is it really because I want to have a steady career upon graduation? No.

In considering my real motivation I have made some valuable conclusions:

1. I have a tendency to get caught up in things. I love to lose myself in new experiences and possess the capacity to appreciate almost anything if I only lend myself to it. I like to give my full effort to whatever I'm presently engaged in.

I think this is the real reason I married Adam in the first place. I allowed myself to get caught up in his world and he liked it and then trapped me there.
I think this is the reason it's important for me to try to stay well-rounded and pursue any new opportunities that present themselves. It insures that I won't allow myself to get trapped. It also tells me that I must marry someone who lacks any capacity to be controlling.

2. I don't think this is necessarily a bad characteristic (which is good, because it feels like an integral part of my personality.) In considering my tendency to get caught up with things, my mind crossed over the work ethic of my brother, Tom. Tom is someone who's pursued many interests and hobbies with great effort and stamina. He is not a dabbler. Tom is an expert lock picker, car mechanic, scrabble master, father, husband, medical doctor, doctor of public health, outdoorsmen, priesthood holder, clock-maker/repairman, real-estate investor, and a host of other titles in varying categories.

He certainly gets caught up in things, but the trick of the matter is that he typically gets caught up with the right things. When he was young, he fell in love with the same passion that I did, but he married wisely; to someone smart and sweet and responsible. (You're great, Keriann.)

Whenever I go for days without sleep because I'm working on a project, I think of Tom. It's always likely that he's maintaining a similar schedule.

Conclusion: I am grateful to presently pursue graphic design with a great deal of passion and freedom and will continue to do so. I am also excited for the other things I will so zealously pursue in the future.

no time to post anything but movies during finals week, but this one is for sure worth it.

Thanks to annie for showing this to me while I was at school.
p.s. if anyone ever wants to eat tim-tams with warm milk, just call me. I'm always down...after Friday, that is.

go here and watch the video.

It's true that I'm really tired after two all-nighters, but when Adrian (my graphic design professor) showed us this movie (partially in order to demonstrate the power of type) I almost teared up. I think maybe I would've even if I weren't so tired.

live.

Click this:

some birthdays.

I haven't uploaded many photos lately. When I did this morning, there were only photos from Whitney's birthday in November and some that Mike Alger took at my birthday party on Saturday:

shout outs.

Maybe there's something I've forgotten to clarify in my 1.5 years of regular blogging:

I became very isolated and lonely when I was married. As much as I naturally love to talk, most of my thoughts never reached my lips because my life had become something I had to hide from everyone.

The happiest and most glorious moment of my life was when I was driving away from my marriage. I humored so many thoughts of reconnecting with others. I imagined myself being Whitney's roommate. I imagined sitting for hours speaking with my mother. It felt like I was flying.

I called this blog socialexplosion because I'd been pent up and held back for so long that the inertia of my desire to socialize felt like a breaking dam or a bomb.

There are a few people in particular who withstood the power of my social force with love, patience, and strength:

The first is my mother. She received me with open arms and fulfilled all of the dreams I carried of reconnecting with her. I am late to school most mornings but it is not because I am dawdling. I am talking with her. It's a routine I just can't give up. I tell her all about my life as she's preparing my lunch and we always get a bit carried away. There's a lot of love in the mornings at our house.

The second is Whitney. Whitney guided me back into the world of singles with grace and confidence. I needed her and she knew it. I've never had a happier summer than the one I spent with Whitney.

The third is Mike Alger. I met Mike at midnight at an ihop for a Kohler's co-worker gathering that Whitney took me to. He said he was interested in film so I whipped out my foreign film knowledge. Mike doesn't even watch foreign films. But he listened and listened and somehow we exchanged numbers. He's been listening graciously ever since.

The last and certainly not least are my siblings. Although most of them don't live around here, their gestures of forgiveness and love have been some of the most tender. There's been Spanish help at midnight, long letters illustrated with cartoons, nail-painting, long phone calls, and g-chatting from the middle-east in a war zone about my latest dating news. My siblings fortify and lift me.

nobody's girl but my mother's.

made a new friend.

We used to be at odds. I'm pretty stoked. She let me pet her neck without nipping.

my family all stood around and laughed at this.

via Miriam.

unrequited.

(illustration by Lindsay Petrick)
Tonight a dear friend confessed to me her ongoing unrequited love.

"It's so beautiful, even though it's unreciprocated," was my reply.
"But I want it so much to be reciprocated."
"Of course you do; that's what makes it so beautiful."

Sometimes I get so sick of myself. I feel like a ball of unrequited emotions and yearnings. I hope for feelings of indifference more than for the actual fulfillment of my unrequitement. It's a cynical approach to passion.

Tonight stood out as a reminder to the power and purity of vulnerability, longing; even desperation. I think a lack of indifference is something that should actually be celebrated, praised, treasured, and revered.

loved.

Most of you now that my parents are red-blooded conservatives. They are members of the NRA, receive periodic Phylis Schlafly reports, and watch Glenn Beck more than any other tivo-ed program. Republican conventions stand out as a holiday in the logged memory of my childhood.

Although I wouldn't describe myself as liberal, I do claim the title of "moderate". I don't want to launch into the whole of my political theory, but let's just say that these differences between me and my parents have sometimes placed a strain on our relationship. I allowed them to; I used to let it stew and smolder; but then reached a point where politics seemed like the funniest, most ridiculous wedge to drive between myself and any loved one.

For the last year and a half, I've been receiving fowarded political emails from my dad. I read them sometimes. They have subjects like:

FW: Chuck Norris: Dirty Secret No. 2 in Obamacare
FW: Rabbi: Obama Breeds Hate Against Jews
FW: How much is a trillion dollars? TAKE ACTION!
FW: Will Obama's Socialism Enslave Blacks?
FW: Buchanan: In Earmarks Lies Salvation?
Fwd: FW: NBC was suprised?

I think he sends them to everyone on his email list, but I also think especially in my case, he likes to subtly interject these things he sees as important, meaningful, and good. He wants to keep me on the right path, not excluding politics, and feels eager to step up to that duty.

Truthfully, I've found them a little annoying in the past. I'd be sitting in class, my blackberry would buzz, and it'd be another fowarded political message from my dad. But this last little while during his heart recovery, I've missed them dearly.

My heart leaped in my chest just a bit when I received this today:

FW: Buchanan: Dumbo University

I imagined my dad sitting behind his desk at work; breathing, emailing, setting me straight.
I cannot explain my gratitude.

stars.

The stars were so bright overhead when I pulled into the driveway at 2:28a.m. that I couldn't help but blog about it at 2:30a.m. So lovely.

thought of something good to blog.

A lot of people have asked me (in real life) why I've pursued a hiatus. I think if I'm as unreserved now as I tend to regularly be, I'll leave a bunch of negativity out there in cyberspace that should be kept in more private records. That said, I thought of something today that I felt excited to share (taken from a page in my sketchbook):

The signal that marked my "growing up" was a shift indoors. From the time I could run I became a dirty ragamuffin. I ate milkweed and clover, hopped ditches, tore my pants on fences, chased cows, stroked horses' noses, formed mud pies, removed leeches from my ankles, climbed trees, created mazes from stacks of hay bails, tromped through corn fields, caught snakes, and ran so hard during games of hide & seek that I could taste the burn of adrenaline in my throat. It was the discovery of talking; connecting with people indoors that sucked me away from that seemingly surrealistic world.

I've felt guilty for years. When I walk through that setting of so many childhood games and experiences; in the place that really reared me, it feels like visiting a neglected family member. Visiting with those who are strangers to it feels like an introduction more than a stroll; like I'm bearing something personal. I judge those strangers by how they react to it; similar to the way I would upon introducing someone to my mother.

hiatus.

I think maybe I should be writing more in my journal than right here for now. I'm gonna try it out. But I think I'll be back soon. I have little self-discipline these days.

man hater.

Okay. I have an idea: How about all the girls at BYU between 90-120lbs. who are virgins, not on academic probation, and have temple recommends, line up in one-piece bathing suits (because they are spiritual) in front of all single Mormon suitors? They can bear their testimonies, conduct conversations using all and any intellectual jargon they know, speak using any foreign language skills they might posses, and have a list of all of their talents, hobbies and any bands they like pinned to their backs.

Yes, today I am bitter and I don't think I can ignore it.

I feel like men (and probably not just Mormon ones) sum their dating prospects up using lists of virtues and drawbacks. It's not that I don't think girls do this or that I can't admit to never having done this myself, but it's awful when you come to realize that ALL you were to someone was that list and that it didn't quite add up.

At BYU it may be worse because there are so many girls to choose from. The grass could potentially always be greener or hotter or more spiritual or smarter.

I was sitting in class last night next to someone who's wife recently gave birth to a baby boy. He's struggled a bit to keep up and looks tired often, but I envied him. I felt reduced to the little kid's table indefinitely; like I'm forced to go back to when I was 16 years old and relive all the ways I've failed in romantic relationships until I get it right at last. I am dealing with drama and break-ups. He is building a little family. I can't help but feel a sting of failure when I see it this way.

If you're someone I've dated and you're reading this; don't take it too personally. This is a frustration that's mounted seemingly by the collection of my dating experience as a whole. There's a chance you may have added to this feeling, but you're not to blame entirely.

no trying allowed.

I've been learning how to dive in my swim class. There are only 2 other girls brave enough to pursue it. (I think everyone else is scared of how deep the water is the diving pool.)

We first learned off the edge of the pool in a crouched position, then standing, and now off the diving board. The rules are the same in each scenario: Aim straight to the bottom of the pool. Leave your feet on the edge as long as possible and point them as they follow the rest of your body on the way down.

When I internalized these rules, I dove the first real dive of my life. I felt myself enter the water correctly and plummeted gracefully down so far that I almost touched the bottom. My small diving group cheered when I arose eager for air at the surface.

It sparked in my mind some Star Wars wisdom:

"Do, or do not. There is no 'try.'" by Jedi Master Yoda

It's funny to quote, but totally true. In diving, you do it or don't. Anything else results in a belly-flop. That last little hesitation invoked by fear or self-consciousness causes you to fail out-right.

In general, my heart and brain have been weighed down by a lot of fears recently. I've been scared that all of my classwork this semester will yield little that I'm proud of. I've been scared of rejection in relationships. I've been scared of financial catastrophe. I've been scared that I'm not the woman I should be.

I've decided to cast these fears off. I am going to put a sincere effort into every aspect of my life that feels worth it; no excuses. I recognize that I might fail; that my best effort in some situations may only result in a confident, feet-first jump off the edge resulting in little grace or beauty. I feel certain to get a lot of water up my nose in the process; but I am absolutely refusing to belly flop.

little ray of light.

I watched the golden light of the sunset change through the leaves outside my classroom window last night. I felt a strong ache behind my left eye and made a concerted effort to hold back tears as I pretended to listen to the lecture. I'd judged my emotional opacity as impeccable until Kenji turned and asked me what was wrong. I relented and told him I couldn't say because then I'd start to cry and I just couldn't allow it.
But as I watched the light, I experienced a small epiphany. I realized that I would one day yearn to be back in that classroom with all of those people the way I sometimes yearn to see that same golden light bleed into the green carpet of my old elementary school. I realized that I may nostalgically look back upon the heartache of boy drama and the chaos of the graphic design program the way I nostalgically reflect on the way kids used to make fun of me on the playground.
All of these difficult things feel like they connect me to the human experience at large. They seem necessary and humbling.

so grateful to have youtube access at byu.

During the two overnighters I pulled at school to work on my pokémon redesign project, this sustained me.It will never cease to be hilarious.

chicken fight.

I awoke this morning at 2:34am to a literal chicken fight. There is a lilac bush outside my window that my cousin's range chickens love to perch in. Maybe there wasn't enough room for all of them to fit comfortably in the wee dark hours.

Although it jolted me to alertness, it didn't strike me as odd at all until I started to think about it on my morning commute. It blended too well with how chaotic and unusual the rest of my life has become. I wish I could tell more about it, that I could offer some sort of explanation, but it's just too complex, too involved, and too personal; even for me.

spanish speakers only.

My Spanish teacher is a nerd; a real zoobie. Clean-cut with boyish good looks; polite, caring, enthusiastic, but a stickler about assigning things that feel impossibly difficult and making sure that he marks you absent if you're more than 10 minutes late. (We have class 5 days a week and you automatically fail if you're absent 5 times.)

Earlier in the week, he was teaching us the about the "a personal" and writes this on the board:

¿Tu amigo lleva _________ a la fiesta?
Our options being "a mi hermana" or "mi hermana."
(translation: Your friend is bringing my sister to the party?)

To help us decide whether or not to use the "a," my teacher stiffly exclaims,"Is she likely to receive some action if she is being taken to the party?"

The class erupts. My teacher turns bright red. El fin.

exploder.

I blame it in part on the close relationship I had with my brother, Carl, when I was growing up. We were inseparable, close, connected, bonded. We had all the same friends for the first 17 years of my life. I felt that life was meant to be experienced with someone. I grew accustomed to the comfortability of recapping daily details and speaking aloud whatever happened to be on my mind. I like to think of this sort of connection between siblings as rare. I think it really might be. Carl was my very first and very dearest friend.

I guess all of this, this sort of openness and sharing in lives, still equals love to me. I guess I think that's fine, except for I can't quite seem to reconcile the fact that for most people, I talk too much. I keep hoping that somehow I'll change. I keep wishing for some paradigm shift to wash over me that will leave me contentedly and quietly within my own head. But other times, I feel it's an innate desire, an integral component of who I am and that I may just have to search out more people who are okay and even welcoming of it.

These days, when Carl visits with his wife and son, I get excited. I speak voraciously and he welcomes it and accepts it and enthusiastically responds. It feels wonderful.

via luke.

love.

(illustration by Marcos Chin)

There is a type of love that leaves me singing first thing when I wake up in the morning and makes me think that smiling at every stranger is the only natural thing to do. It helps me feel a little more free from money and time restrictions, but I could stay awake for days on the energy it supplies if I needed to anyhow.
I often wonder what could be done for the person who is the object of my affections. I feel eager to help them with anything. I wonder if they are tired, sick, hungry, and desire to do my best to relieve any of these discomforts regardless of the obstacle. It drives me to feel bursts of sympathy towards many and kindly toward the world at large.
I laugh often. 12:02am ends up really being 1:42am. Kissing is about communicating tender affections rather than taking for oneself. Even grocery store errands become memorable. It is a love so compelling that I hardly notice I'm not listening to music/npr during my morning commute as I'm thinking of how to describe it on my blog.

I've only ever experienced this during brief periods of my life, but it absolutely does exist.

I'd learned recently to dismiss these sort of emotions as immature and false. Post-divorce, dating became largely about some sort of resumé line-up. More like: "He should have A,B, and C and then it will all work out fine." I was wrong. I believe there is something very natural and powerful about these gut-levels of love. I've learned that I can't do without them in any relationship worth pursuing.

cool.

Reflections at the start of the rainy season.

More from my dear brother deployed in the Middle East:Yesterday the rainy season here started. When I woke up, the sky was overcast. It is always a little overcast, with a layer of fine dust suspended in the air. This time, however, I knew the cover was made of real clouds because it wasn’t so bright out. It didn’t even hurt my eyes when I walked outside without sunglasses.

The groud, which is usually a single shade of pale tan, was mottled all over with areas of deep brown. It was as if the clouds above, even before rain, were drawing up water from the earth that I didn’t even know was there. Water that has survived for months beneath the surface, somehow escaping evaporation in spite of the most compelling sunlight thinkable. And, also, there was a breeze. It was a real breeze too. Almost cool. It was a stark change from the hot wind that I have felt, for months, like a hairdryer in my face. All of these changes combined on the world overnight, so I knew when I woke up that the rainy season had arrived.

I was very busy with patients all day. There was also a change in them. I didn’t see any heat exhaustion or athlete’s foot or rolled ankles like I am used to. Some kind of change had started to draw hidden things out of people too. I spent two hours with a sailor I thought I knew. For two hours she told me the details of a worse childhood than I could have imagined. Memories that she had willfully suppressed for years, that would not be kept down any longer. It was the first time she had spoken some of it, and it was difficult for her to say through the tears and choking sobs. I heard about abuse, rejection, loss, and emptiness that repeated themselves for decades. In spite of the pain, I could sense that purging this filth brought a little relief to the emotional nausea she has suffered for years. I hadn’t known if I could help. I don’t think I am trained to help with these things. But she would not be sent to a chaplain or a psychologist, only me. So I was glad when I sensed in her a little relief.

Soon after she left another sailor came. He, too, was haunted by the past. His memories were especially stinging because the missteps were his own. He has been gone for five months now, and his wife has learned that she really can do it without him, and she intends to. He cried for his loss, he cried for his sense of worthlessness. But mostly, he cried for the agonizing regret. He wishes now that he had cooked dinner for her at least once, or watched the kids for her once while she did her homework, or spoken with her once in the past two years like she was his friend instead of just a wife.

I don’t know if I helped him at all. I hope he helped me know how to avoid such profound regret.

As the sky dimmed a little with evening, an orange light flashed far off in the distance. No more than a flickering glow at first. For an hour, the flicker grew nearer until I could see forks of lightning striking the earth wherever they chose. By the time it was dark, the forks were blue, nearby, and left following thunder. As I fell asleep, I could hear huge drops falling outside, cleaning the sky after months of hard use by the sun and hot wind.

high strung.

Yep, I've been identifying myself pleasantly in my head for my entire life as easy-going. If you consider being easy-going as meaning that you don't mind sharing toothbrushes with friends and that you're o.k. with sleeping on the ground, then I still am.
But if you consider easy-going to mean someone who enjoys hanging out all day doing things like buying fountain drinks at gas stations, driving around listening to music, or watching movies, then I am the antithesis of easy-going.

I was walking with another graphic design kid, Richard, to the stock room to buy materials for our letter-press class today.

"Geez, ya gotta speed walk everywhere?"

"This is just how I am. Sorry."

Not only do I think I'm not easy-going; I am high-strung. I am the taskmaster of my list and the accomplisher of many a deed. I like to get to the meat of things. I'm a discusser, theorizer, and problem-solver. Touching base with me means cutting past the "what" and analyzing the "why."
There's just way too much to do in life than buy fountain drinks.

even greater joy.

Whitney just made me this and my joy increased twenty-fold:("Bofta" means good luck in Romanian.) For more awesome Whitney graffiti, click here.

unexpected hope.

I ran into this online while researching graffiti styles and it instantly cheered me up:See, my life is so sad that the design project I'm most excited about is the one I get to spend the least amount of time on. ¡I am redesigning pokemon cards into an edgy/urban/graffiti style! But I feel like I never get a chance to work on it. Here are my preliminary drawings. Wish me luck.

so, this is love.

I told my mom in passing a few days ago that I'd run out of deodorant. I told her because I'd been using hers. When I came home last night after a long day, guess what was on my desk:This is really all I need in life. Thanks, mom.

tom sellecks.

This is for Jared (and my mom...her celebrity crush has always been Tom Selleck.)

i'm a simple girl, really.

Things I am grateful for:

#1 Space heaters. Post heart-attack, my dad can't shovel coal for our furnace anymore. I am super-grateful for space heaters.

#2 The back float. On even the most discouraging days, the back float is an instantaneous relaxer. Underwater noises calmed me so much during swim class today as I stared at the ceiling.

#3 Unexpected friendships. I am increasingly amazed how close friendships forged in a computer lab can become. I don't know what I'd do without my eclectic little graphic design group. We went on all went on a super hard and scary hike in the snow yesterday and then ate at the Red Igunana with our graphic design class. These are the pics from it that I like best:

please still say i'm not a stereotype.

I remember once telling a friend that I have before and most definitely still would take my eyelash curler with me backpacking.

"It's so Laura...but also kind of not so Laura."

I completely agree. I'd like to think that the seeming dichotomy of those two items describes something about myself far beyond the mere fact that they happen to be two things I enjoy.

There's a strange part of me that enjoys the fact that my best friend and boyfriend both love Glen Beck when I can hardly bear to stand in the room with a television broadcasting his scathing voice blasting.

I guess, like anyone else, I love feeling like an exception to the rules of cultural dictates.

Last weekend, I accompanied my Glen-Beck-fan-meat-loving-MFA boyfriend on the most art-drenched ventures ever (I still had to wear my jumpsuit and sing D'angelo to myself the whole time):

First, a Friday night show at the CUAC.
Then trailer tacos afterward.
Then a Saturday night collage party at Jenny's.Jared.Jenny.Annie.Me.Last night we made cards at the letterpress lab.
Kenji.
Paris & Miguel.