Oyez, Oyez

Let it be known that on this day, December tenth, in the year of our Lord two thousand and thirteen, I threw a royal fit.
I regret it, and thankfully no one witnessed it, but I just broke down and cried.

It is just that time of the semester. At this point, I’m pretty certain the most minor of tragedies or even non-tragic events could move me to tears. Absolutely enthralling state to be in.

Otherwise, the weather continued to be my friend, my classes went smoothly and I’m procrastinating and working on my paper for Brit Lit. I think I have finished all homework for science and possibly several other classes. Bizarre.

I got two cards in the mail today. That was encouraging and I beamed like a fool all the way from my po box to my room.

I auditioned. Cold read, rant about cancer and death mints. I think it went well. At least people laughed. So that was encouraging. The spike of adrenaline was nice, too.

No more tears, now, okay?
Okay.
Good.

Absolutely Lovely Day

It was a good day. Not just: nothing atrocious happened. And not: won the lottery, shook hands with the president, walked on the moon kind of amazing happened.
It was just a solidly good day. And I am not used to Wednesdays being good days.

I found that I actually like Hopkins in British Literature. Will he make your brain melt out your ear? Yes. But does he do an admirable, whimsical and absolutely captivating job of trying to…package the “instress” into a small bundle of epiphany for you and I to enjoy? Yes. He loved nature, because nature has a way of unexpectedly and beautifully demonstrating part of God to us, in small explosions of grandeur. These explosions cause us to, for just a moment, understand God just a bit better, basically glimpse Him in His true glory and majesty. That is “instress”. The momentary bundle of joy and comprehension that never quite lasts in the comprehension, but leaves a residual awe over the rapture of the moment.

All of my classes were interesting, went smoothly, and I was alert all day (which was a miracle unto itself).

I got to practice with a small ensemble for my church’s Christmas program. I miss working with a choir in a school setting, and it was a lovely refresher.

I went on a 30 minute (very) brisk walk and called home to my mother. It was refreshing and rejuvenating in every way.

There was fog all day today. Fog has a way of making even the most drab and ordinary things romantic. It has an air of mystery, seclusion, intrigue, and the unknown. Anything and anyone is possible on a foggy day.

I listened to the soundtrack for the musical Jane Eyre. Not only is it one of my favorite stories (for reasons that must be detailed elsewhere), it is perfectly captured in music. Every emotional high and low over the circumstances, thoughts and convictions of the characters is better expressed in music than it will ever be in film. Since Jane Eyre is largely an internal story, a story of personal wrestlings, confusion, strife, and reconciliation, there is often no action for the eye to see. But it should be felt. Music is the language of the soul that probably most perfectly capture the soar and plunge, the complexity and elasticity of emotion.

I had sushi, chicken noodle soup and a brownie for dinner, in my room. All of those things bring me much joy. Yes, I am a queer loner who has no gustatorial discernment.

And I’m going to bed early. What could be better than that?

Why Tennyson is the Bomb.com

‘Blame not thyself too much,’ I said, ‘nor blame
Too much the sons of men and barbarous laws;
These were the rough ways of the world till now.
Henceforth thou hast a helper, me, that know
The woman’s cause is man’s: they rise or sink
Together, dwarfed or godlike, bond or free:
For she that out of Lethe scales with man
The shining steps of Nature, shares with man
His nights, his days, moves with him to one goal,
Stays all the fair young planet in her hands–
If she be small, slight-natured, miserable,
How shall men grow? but work no more alone!
Our place is much: as far as in us lies
We two will serve them both in aiding her–
Will clear away the parasitic forms
That seem to keep her up but drag her down–
Will leave her space to burgeon out of all
Within her–let her make herself her own
To give or keep, to live and learn and be
All that not harms distinctive womanhood.
For woman is not undevelopt man,
But diverse: could we make her as the man,
Sweet Love were slain: his dearest bond is this,
Not like to like, but like in difference.
Yet in the long years liker must they grow;
The man be more of woman, she of man;
He gain in sweetness and in moral height,
Nor lose the wrestling thews that throw the world;
She mental breadth, nor fail in childward care,
Nor lose the childlike in the larger mind;
Till at the last she set herself to man,
Like perfect music unto noble words;
And so these twain, upon the skirts of Time,
Sit side by side, full-summed in all their powers,
Dispensing harvest, sowing the To-be,
Self-reverent each and reverencing each,
Distinct in individualities,
But like each other even as those who love.
Then comes the statelier Eden back to men:
Then reign the world’s great bridals, chaste and calm:
Then springs the crowning race of humankind.
May these things be!’
Sighing she spoke ‘I fear
They will not.’
‘Dear, but let us type them now
In our own lives, and this proud watchword rest
Of equal; seeing either sex alone
Is half itself, and in true marriage lies
Nor equal, nor unequal: each fulfils
Defect in each, and always thought in thought,
Purpose in purpose, will in will, they grow,
The single pure and perfect animal,
The two-celled heart beating, with one full stroke,
Life.’
And again sighing she spoke: ‘A dream
That once was mind! what woman taught you this?’

To Autumn

To Autumn
John Keats

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees, 5
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease, 10
For Summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind; 15
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook; 20
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day, 25
And touch the stubble plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn; 30
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

Keats was familiar with death. Most of his family died from tuberculosis when he was very young. He was apprenticed to a physician. In fact, he had tuberculosis and died at age 24. Mortality was a reality he was constantly confronted by. He was tormented by being in love with a young lady, and couldn’t (or wouldn’t) marry her, because he knew he was dying from a horrible disease.
Instead, he wrote poetry.

Obviously, Keats’ work is stunning, smooth, sensuous. You can easily feel, smell, taste, see exactly what he describes. But the philosophical undertones to his work reconcile the reality of death with the beauty that is so apparent in the world. Those two qualities are not mutually exclusive. “To Autumn” is an excellent (and lovely) example of this concept. The third stanza starts by asking about Spring. Isn’t that the season we all laud and adore? Don’t we automatically recognize the beauty of new beginnings?

But Keats insists that Fall is equally beautiful. And it is beautiful in its own right. Yes, it precedes winter. But it is the harvest time. And the color, the vibrancy, the season, in and of itself, is precious. It is of value. And it is easily recognized as beautiful.
He knew he was dying. But he was not willing to surrender the reality that this too was part of life. His “twilight” years were no less than his beginnings. The experiences he had, the poems he wrote, the sights he appreciated…none of these were discounted by the fact that he was dying. If anything, it makes those things more precious.

I love fall. I always have. The smell and crunch of the leaves. The bright colors. The snuggly feeling of a world burrowing down for a long nap. The sunsets are nicer. Most of my happiest memories take place in fall. I do not begrudge winter its bare trees. And spring is nice, especially with flowers. Summer I have issues with, mainly because I’m from Florida. But fall. Fall will always hold a soft spot in my heart.

Now that I’ve read Keats’ poem about Autumn, I think I understand a bit better why I love fall quite so much. Endings are a part of life. Ends of friendships, lives, classes, conversations…And just because those endings happen does not make the time invested worthless. It does not make the time wrong. It does not sour the experience. Because the experience is inherently valuable, worthy.
Yesterday, I cried for most of the morning. I cried through almost the entire evening service. They were not happy tears. But I also spent a day with my family. There were leaves. I was surprised by some of the most wonderful friends a girl could ask for. And my family left. All of those things combine together to make a beautiful mess. My birthday was not wasted because there was a lot of sorrow. And the day is allowed to hold weight because there was sorrow. These seemingly conflicting experiences? They are all a part of God’s plan. I don’t know if Keats realized that, but I’m trying to.

When it hurts, when it hurts because it’s too beautiful, when life is just bursting with joy, all of those things are valuable, intimate workings within His plan. So I shall be thankful for them.
I will be thankful for beauty, for endings.
I am thankful for Autumn.