xkcd

I've loved the xkcd comics for a long time, and just started reading a lot of them again recently. Randall Monroe (the creator) is coming to speak at CMU in a few weeks, which I find appropriate and hilarious. Most of the comic speaks to students of science, especially computer scientists, and it has developed quite a following here, to the point where someone had actually made a large-scale copy of one of the comics and installed it onto the entrance window of Wean Hall. How funny we are.

Here are some of my favorites at the moment:

I live a teenage boy's fantasy

Well, sometimes, maybe. I suppose I do for one reason only: I see many naked women on a regular basis.

Before you get all shocked and surprised, read on, it's not really that unusual. I have recently, as in the last few months or so, really gotten into swimming as a medium of exercise. I really enjoy it; it's low impact, works my whole body, helps me increase my lung capacity, and is also pretty relaxing as far as work outs go. Because of this, I spend far more time at the gym than I used to, and by extension, the locker room. Initially, I was surprised to find so many women both shower and just walk around naked. It's something I'd never experienced in my small-town childhood and adolescence. I felt uncomfortable, and averted my gaze whenever possible because I felt strange seeing so many naked women "put it all out there".

However, I've gotten used to it, and have actually begun to respect women for being confident enough about their bodies to walk around a semi-public place without clothes on. Not that I didn't before, but I realize now that it is not something as shocking as I had thought. We shouldn't be so concerned to show a little skin, and feel or be made uncomfortable by nudity. It's only natural. Being "exposed" to female nudity through something other than a porn film or health class also gives women a healthier perspective on appearance. Most women don't have perfect bodies, and few will ever be able to attain the form they desire, but women are still beautiful anyway. That's what I've come to understand anyway. After years of an unhealthy self-image and an unrealistically high standard of beauty, I'm finally starting to accept and appreciate the way I look for what it is, and I like it.

The only caveat to this openness in the locker room is when you come across someone you actually know bearing it all. That has happened to me several times, and it has been rather uncomfortable each time. No matter what, sometimes you just don't want to see a professor, or a university staff member you've worked with, naked....

Check it

A friend sent me a link to this awesome map. It becomes readily apparent which countries give their citizens more freedoms than others, and one can also easily see how wealth correlates with them. Sad, but true.

From the website:

The World Freedom Atlas is a geovisualization tool for world statistics. It was designed for social scientists, journalists, NGO/IGO workers, and others who wish to have a better understanding of issues of freedom, democracy, human rights, and good governance. It covers the years 1990-2006.

Pretty cool, huh?

Dr. Seuss

To remember:

Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened.

Kitty!!

This weekend I took care of a friend's cat while he was away, and I just needed to share pictures of this adorable girl! She's four months old, and has an usually strong attraction to water. If you can't find her, the first place you should look is either the bath tub or kitchen sink, because that's usually where she'll be. I don't know why, she's just strangely drawn to it.

I call her Wheezy, though that's not really her name, because she, well, wheezes. A lot. It's like a mixture of asthma and a cold, and every time she breaths it rattles like Darth Vader. Adorable!!

I can't sleep

From frustration, mostly. This week has been really stressful, primarily because of group project work that sucks my soul. However, right now I'm bothered by something else, and that's the more pressing reason behind my insomnia.

I'm getting frustrated and disillusioned by Soundbytes. My membership in this a cappella group for the last three years has probably been more life-shaping than anything else in my college life. I've dedicated myself to it more than almost anyone, and I've been musical director for over two years. There have been ups and downs throughout my tenure, miscommunication and tensions between myself and the group that haven't been altogether pleasant, but I feel like I'm hitting a roadblock sooner than I have before, and I'm worried that I won't be able to overcome it.

It's always been a mostly thankless job. Everything I do, and therefore every mistake I make, is visible to the whole group, and I'm held accountable. I always have to be on my A-game, and when I slip, I'm criticized, verbally or otherwise. I knew this going in, to an extent, and while I've always wanted more recognition for the things I do and the dedication I've had to the group for so long, I've accepted that I usually won't get it. Who will say, "Lauren, thanks for running rehearsals and constantly trying to improving our sound", or who will recognize and acknowledge that the only rehearsal I have ever missed was to break up with my boyfriend of over two years? I've scheduled my life around Soundbytes, ensure that every meeting I have is rescheduled around it if necessary, leave other meetings that are still going on to be at rehearsal on time, and never schedule any personal trip or event on the weekend that would make me miss it.

I've always thought that this kind of dedication should be shown by the director, and that it was necessary and "part of the job". I still think it is. But I'm getting really tired of the near constant feelings of disrespect I get when I come to rehearsal twice a week. Currently, these feelings are heightened by the fact that I every arrangement I have ever done has been criticized and ridiculed by at least one member of the group. I think this is completely unacceptable, and incredibly demoralizing and hurtful, because I spend a lot of time putting those arrangements together for the group, just as any other arranger, and I'd hope that my efforts would at least be appreciated, and most certainly not dismissed like they have been. But this is more of a personal issue than a director one. I know that sometimes I am late more than I'd like, and that's probably something that undermines my authority. But I don't think that's the main cause of it. Regardless of if I'm 15 minutes early or 2 minutes late, if I bring food and an upbeat attitude or if I'm stressed, I feel like I hit a brick wall. All of the things I do right in rehearsal and out of rehearsal for Soundbytes are negated by one misstep, one mistake, one minute of lateness.

Sometimes I wish I could have everyone run rehearsal at least once, to see what it's like to be me, to see how different you must become to be director. It often feels like I'm fighting an uphill battle to get people to concentrate, learn their music, and improve. And I've done it for two years. I often fail at it, and every so often the group talks about strategies to get us to focus better, or be more productive, and they resolve to be more personally accountable for their actions. So far, that hasn't really happened. And every rehearsal I have to balance my participation in rehearsal from being the enforcer and the "teacher", keeping people focused and in line, and enjoying myself as well. More and more I'm feeling that I have to be the enforcer completely, and that I'm not supposed to relax and enjoy rehearsal occasionally as well. I feel like I have to be the perfect version of myself for the group, which is something I haven't even mastered in the other aspects of my life. I can't do it, and I don't think I should be required to.

Yes, I make mistakes. I'm human. I'm late sometimes, I'm forgetful, I have a temper and can lose my cool when stressed, and I get sidetracked occasionally. While I'm working on improving myself, it's not going to happen overnight. I should still be able to dictate the ideal behavior of the group without necessarily having to live it myself. No one else does. I should be able to critique and "lay down the law" and falter sometimes without feeling like the worst hypocrite. It's what I feel like now, and I'm frustrated with it. I have sacrificed so much already, missed opportunities in other aspects of my life to be at rehearsal, to devote myself to a group whose members, for the most part, don't recognize it.

I'm not saying that because of this I'm the "best Soundbyte", or that no one else spends as much time working for the group than I do, because that's not the case at all. I love this group, and the members in it. I wouldn't trade them for anyone, and most of the time I wouldn't want to trade my directorship for anything else. But I do feel like my feelings are the least noticed when criticism needs to be meted out, and generally discounted because of my role as director. When faulted for the bad, I'm not thanked or respected for the good. And that's the most demoralizing thing of all.

To Contemplate

“Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more."

- Erica Jong

One of the Shouts

As you might have noticed, I changed the title of this blog. I've been thinking about doing so for a while now, but hadn't been able to think of anything good enough to replace what I currently had. The old title came from one of my favorite Emily Dickinson poems:

I SING to use the waiting,
My bonnet but to tie,
And shut the door unto my house;
No more to do have I,

Till, his best step approaching,
We journey to the day,
And tell each other how we sang
To keep the dark away.

However, in looking at it again, I realized that it no longer reflected what I feel or think (most of the time) and that I really needed to find a new title.

I've changed it to One of the Shouts for a reason. It comes from the short story "G.B.S. - Mark V" by Ray Bradbury, one of my favorite writers. The surrounding paragraph is thus:

"What are we?" he asked. "Why, we are the miracle of force and matter making itself over into imagination and will. Incredible. The Life Force experimenting with forms. You for one. Me for another. The Universe has shouted itself alive. We are one of the shouts. Creation turns in its abyss. We have bothered it, dreaming ourselves into shapes. The void is filled with slumbers; ten billion on a billion bombardments of light and material that know not themselves, that sleep moving and move but finally to make an eye and waken on themselves. Among so much that is flight and ignorance, we are the blind force that gropes like Lazarus from a billion-light-year tomb. We summon ourselves. We say, O Lazarus Life Force, come ye forth. So the Universe, a motion of deaths, fumbles to reach across Time to feel its own flesh and know it to be ours. We touch both ways and find each other miraculous because we are One."

I will let it just speak for itself, and maybe the passage will speak to you in the way it spoke to me. It may be a tad esoteric ^_^, and I'm not sure I'll keep it (I'm notoriously indecisive), but for the moment it does a good job in reflecting my current mantra in just a few words and also in explaining the purpose and goal of this blog in general.