Genius.

"Here's To The Crazy Ones. The misfits. The rebels. The trouble-makers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules, and they have no respect for the status-quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify, or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world - are the ones who do."

-Apple Computers

Dating Advice

Gravity-Defying Land Art by Cornelia Konrads

"If you date a boy, you'll be treated like a child. If you date a prince, you'll feel like a princess. If you date a gentleman, you'll be treated like a lady. But whatever you do, never, never date an asshole because the only thing he'll do to you is make you one."

-My mother

I am the world's greatest externality.

Everything is meta. Meta is meta, which is meta. Fuck that shit.
I love storms. But I can't fall asleep to them. I have a paper to write. Cool story, Hansel.

"Unfortunately, all languages deteriorate. They become more and more shallow until there's barely anything left."

-Harry Obst

White House Interpreter

Harry Obst, the White House German Interpreter for seven US presidents (from Johnson to Clinton) was not an "amazing speaker for an eighty-year old," he was an amazing speaker, period. He manipulated the English language beautifully--even though German is his mother tongue. He divulged a fresh yet intimate perspective into the presidency, while weaving in wit and charm, instantly lending familiarity. 

But, Harry Obst doesn't have a Wikipedia page. Isn't it funny how almost all relationships are mediated through some digital medium? I believe Harry Obst is a great man who lived a rich life who has enough stories to show for it, but can I actually measure greatness without a fully documented Wiki spread? Probably not. At least not with confidence. At least not with immortal confidence. Today he's great. But tomorrow I might not remember his first name without that digital file that acts as both a record and a promise that he did in fact do all of those great things.

Mr. Obst claims the English language is deteriorating; natural born citizens don't know basic grammar rules (guilty), slang and IM-speak plague our daily speech, and words that shouldn't be are constantly being invented and then used. Sentences have been reduced to acronyms (YOLO so YMAWSYB--which stands for "you might as well save your breath," coined by yours truly). Words have been reduced to emojis. And the people behind them are nothing but icons, bad prof pics, and poorly written Twitter biographies. Words are falling apart but so are the individual and our interpersonal relationships. And naturally, I want something or someone to blame.

Personally, I think the digital era is the culprit on both accounts. According to Facebook, I have as many friends as there are Urban Dictionary entries. So why am I always alone? Oh right, because facebook friends aren't real people, they're internet pages filled out by real people. (THANKS A LOT FOR THAT FALSE SENSE OF SECURITY, MARK FUCKERBERG!) I'm literally always plugged in. GChat. Facebook. Twitter. Texting. BBM. Ping. Skype. Hangout. Pinterest. Instagram. Blogger. Tumblr. Youtube. Myspace (lol). The world has never been smaller, shrunken by the seemingly infinite modes of communication. I can connect with anybody in seconds and yet I've never felt so distant from people. This somewhat novel versatility of communication has lent itself to incredible mobility. And with mobility comes incredible distance. I can go to the far reaches of my internet provider's service area, and I will never be quite alone. As long as my phone doesn't die. As long as I don't lose signal.

How does this affect face-to-face interactions (and no I'm not talking about FaceTime)? No matter who I'm physically with, I'm always talking to somebody else. The majority of my relationships are held together by a thin rope made of binary code. We take talking for granted--we take people for granted because we know they'll always be there even when they aren't. As of late, when I do talk to people face-to-face, it feels breathy, chatty, forced, empty, like, you know what I mean, that's awkward, wait what, but actually, good talk. Luckily, if we don't have a meaningful conversation in person now, we can always talk it out later on Gchat, where I can write and rewrite and edit and copy and paste exactly what I wanted to say. I can take my time responding and pretend like I was just away from my computer. But no matter how much I give away on the internet or through my text messages, there will always be something between us. Whether it's my phone or my computer, there is a physical barrier, let alone physical distance, between us that is not conducive to intimacy. This is worse than knowing someone superficially. Superficial, by definition, means being near the surface. Our relationships today are at best a mediated superficiality, a superficial superficial, n-times removed from the origin.

Language is deterioriating--both in form and significance--and yet it is proliferating--both in form and signifiers. Language, the great mirror of society.

How many cups of coffee do I have to drink until I become an adult?

"Remember, you cannot be both young and wise. Young people who pretend to be wise to the ways of the world are mostly just cynics. Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it. Because cynics don’t learn anything. Because cynicism is a self-imposed blindness, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt us or disappoint us. Cynics always say no. But saying “yes” begins things. Saying “yes” is how things grow. Saying “yes” leads to knowledge. “Yes” is for young people. So for as long as you have the strength to, say “yes'.”

― Stephen Colbert

"Life, if you keep chasing it so hard, will drive you to death. Time - when pursued like a bandit - will behave like one, always remaining one county or one room ahead of you, changing its name and hair color to elude you, slipping out the back door of the motel just as you're banging through the lobby with your newest search warrant, leaving only a burning cigarette in the ashtray to taunt you. At some point you have to stop because it won't. You have to admit that you can't catch it. That you're not supposed to catch it. At some point, you gotta let go and sit still and allow contentment to come to you."

-Elizabet Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love

The Black Hole of Possibility

“To describe this process of getting acquainted with people, with a culture different from our own is to recognize the experience as liberalizing. We are all limited in our understanding of our own conduct and that of our neighbors because we see everything by the preconceptions offered by our own culture. It is a task of education to provide a viewpoint from which the educated person may free himself from the limitations of these preconceptions.We are all islanders to begin with. An acquaintance with another culture, a real and deep acquaintance, is a release of the mind and the spirit from that isolation. It is to learn a universal language.”

-Robert Redfield, Chicago anthropologist

I can do whatever I want to do--be whoever I want to be. So what happens if I don't know what I want?

The possibilities are endless.

Well, don't you think that's just a little bit exorbitant?

There are so many options that I feel limited...

trapped inside my own.

ImaginaAAAaaaation.

"I don’t want realism. I want magic! Yes, yes, magic. I try to give that to people. I do misrepresent things. I don’t tell truths. I tell what ought to be truth. And if that is sinful, then let me be damned for it!"
— A Streetcar Named Desire, Tennessee Williams


Have you ever wondered what would happen if everything you ever imagined as a child were real?
Because it would be awesome. It would rain apple juice. Sofas would be made out of gummy bears. Dirt would be made out of crushed oreos. 
And people wonder why I was fat as a kid. 
I never really believed in Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy--although I did applaud their practice of rewarding children-- but even without them, my fabled world of adolescence was straight up magical (and delicious).
At the same time, it was horrible--terrifying--scary.
I mean, it would really suck if every time I flushed the toilet a monster would grab me and take me with him (or her) into a world of smelly darkness. It would really suck if every time I closed my eyes in the shower a demon that resembled Paige's former love interest (Charmed reference) would take me with him into some undetectable cave in the underworld. It would really really suck if at the stroke of midnight the clothes in my closet would come alive and try to strangle me. And although it might be kinda cool if dinosaurs really were my best friends or if street lights really did have feelings, what happens when my dino pal tries to eat me? Or when I realize I don't care about what streetlights have to say?
I guess if things went sour, I could always revert back to the if-I-can't-see-you-you-can't-see-me trick or take cover under my blanket that doubles as an invisibility cloak and invincible fortress.
Fast forward thirteen years...who am I kidding, I believed in the Toilet Monster well into the fifth grade...minor detail. Fast forward roughly thirteen years and now I have to face real problems (ie. Acne and student loans). It's no longer cute to be fat. It's no longer acceptable to sing while you use a public bathroom (and then run away after flushing). And no matter how long I hide under my blanket, all of my monsters will still be there waiting for an opportune moment to kidnap something bigger than me--my future. 
Now I'm eighteen and I'm finally starting to understand that until now, all of my battles have been fought for me. A monster never got close enough to eat me because I had an older sister, a mommy, a daddy, grandparents, and comfort food to protect me from harm's way. I've never really been alone. And even if I was alone, I never really felt alone.
Well.
In two months, I'm going to college.
College.
Is that real life? Or is that some kind of pre-packaged cookie?
I wish it were a cookie because then I'd know what to do with it (eat it, le duh). Unfortunately it's real life and I have no idea what I'm doing. I have no idea what I'm going to do without my wonderful hometown that I love even more than processed food. And I'm afraid that when I turn off the lights, I won't be scared, I'll be lonely.
But these anticipations are just possibilities entangled in something much bigger--because college isn't a cookie, it's magic. Sure I'm scared shitless, but everything that I ever wanted to accomplish, anything that I ever wanted be real can become tangible through secondary education. I'm glad I'm not a kid anymore. Because now I know that I'm psyching myself out. Monsters aren't real. I made them up. And although I don't want to leave my hometown, my friends, my memories behind, I can't wait until these two months are up and college transforms from magic to reality.

Personal Statement.

I dread success. To have succeeded is to have finished one's business on earth, like the male spider, who is killed by the female the moment he has succeeded in his courtship. I like a state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behind.

George Bernard Shaw

I AM THE AMERICAN DREAM, except better looking. And smarter.

Megan Chen’s Personal Statement.

Because one of the requirements to apply for every single scholarship is to write a “personal statement” –whatever the fuck that is—I will. BUT. Rest assured, I don’t have any idea what I’m doing and I am really unhappy about it and I will bitch the entire way. Plus I feel like I can’t do this properly without gauging my friends and family for their opinion of me. Which could only go one of two ways…I will either cry because nobody likes me or I’ll cry because people are feeding me bullshit that they love me and I will believe it completely and never doubt a single word. I LOVE BULLSHIT. Go ahead. Tell me I’m pretty. Actually, this is a personal statement. I’ll tell you I’m pretty. I’m pretty. And brilliant. And just a well-rounded freakin’ awesome individual who has twelve-year-old-boy humor and dresses like a trendy mom. You’d think this would average out to seventeen year old girl but really it’s just one hot mess, emphasis on the hot. Because in addition to all of those other desirable qualities, I am also one hot piece of ass. I mean, I run cross country. Technically. I mean, I’ve been a gimp my entire life but if you tell me cripples can’t run too I will go civil rights on you and sue your ass. The outcome of which would probably amount to more than any scholarship I’ve applied to thus far (zero). I haven’t had this bad of writer’s block since…the last time I had to write something important. Well fuck me. It’s probably not okay to say the word ‘fuck’ in a personal statement. Well, fuck you. I guess I won’t win this or any other damn scholarship. But if you don’t award me something substantstial, you will feel bad. Just look at me. Just look at me. I can personally state that: I am a needy child. I am not white. I am a first generation American. I do not have a penis. And I have an extremely foul mouth which can only shine light on my troubled home life. I wasn’t raised properly. But through trial comes success. Yeah. In other words. MY LIFE SUCKS BUT I’M STILL A HOT PIECE OF ASS. GIVE ME MONEY. 

Personal statement--check.
Now for Sam Tsui and his beautiful voice.

Fuck Bitches. Get Money.

We are taught you must blame your father, your sisters, your brothers, the school, the teachers - but never blame yourself. It's never your fault. But it's always your fault, because if you wanted to change you're the one who has got to change. 

Katharine Hepburn 

A Face Study

This is the newest page in my quote book. It turned out a little more bleak than expected but...what can you do?

THE BACK STORY:
This quote was torn from page 103 of the recent January issue of Vogue.
Spoken by Jeanine Lobell, founder of Stila Cosmetics, in an article showcasing actress Natalie Portman; the quote is less about her acting and more about her character.
I drew the man on the left late one night really sporadically. Apparently that's what I think about when I can't sleep on weekdays--apathetic Frenchmen...perhaps I'll name him Mersault. I don't know what I was going for with the extremely creepy mask of a woman on the right. Conject at will.

THOUGHTS:
It certainly made me think...is she right? Her argument is that as people get older and they're not good on the inside, it starts to show on the outside. I think I agree with her but I also think it's comforting that she's the founder of a high-end make-up line, meaning that where ever I should fall, I can change my fate and just apply a little powder. There. Good as beautiful.

If you're happy and you know it....

" I believe there are monsters born in the world to human parents. Some you can see, misshapen and horrible, with huge heads or tiny bodies. They are accidents and no one's fault... And just as there are physical monsters, can there not be mental or psychic monsters born? The face and body may be perfect, but if a twisted gene or a malformed egg can produce physical monsters, may not the same process produce a malformed soul?"
-John Steinbeck, East of Eden



It's hard to find something that makes you Happy. It's hard to remember Happy once it's gone. And we all know that Happy, although always welcome, often comes uninvited and leaves unexpectedly.

She said: "I don't remember what it's like to be happy. Maybe I've never been happy."

It really bothered me. It bothered me more when she asked me the last time I was happy and I didn't have an answer already sitting on my tongue just waiting to be brought into the world of audibility. When was the last time I was happy? Have I ever been truly happy? What is happiness?
According to Shakespeare, and reiterated by Shania Twain, happiness is wanting what you have and not having what you want. So does that mean happiness is lacking the desire to change? To become better? To be void of dreams and aspirations? That in itself seems an impossible feat for man, whose cornerstone is the ability to create and build and improve. Thus, if we are basing happiness off of the testament of good ol' Willy, happiness, if it is possible, can never occur simultaneously with success. And true happiness can only be reached by the listless and the vapid extremities of our species.....
No. This is ridiculous. I just don't agree. Perhaps this is the romantic in me but I don't view happiness as that.
Happiness is laughter. Friendship. Fun. Whatever. Happiness is not complicated. It is a feeling of ease and contentedness and being entirely comfortable with who you are and what you have. It is not this unreachable thing that is taped to the ceiling, dangling on a string that is just out of our reach, mocking us as it swings left and right. No. That is the wrong outlook on happiness. Happiness is waiting to be picked up like....I don't know, an eager puppy. Sometimes it is just sitting there amidst it all, floating all around and surrounding the atmosphere with warmth and multiplying exponentially, readily available to all. Sometimes it is hidden like buried treasure and takes considerable strength and patience to procure. But it's there. It is waiting. You just have to take the time to find it. If you are not happy, you are not letting yourself be happy. And it is time you crawl out of yourself and see the world and breathe in the fresh air and all its glory of new beginnings and potential laughter. Happiness is not complicated. It is the simplest idea out there.
And in truth that's all happiness is nothing but a state of mind. It is a state in the present as we face our challenges and revel in our triumphs and accept our defeats. Happiness is confidence and assuredness and composure and love.

Okay. So I'm happy and apparently it's reachable. Then what am I working towards now? If I'm already happy, what else do I want? So maybe I'm not happy, or I would already be dead or basically dead, which brings back that earlier picture of someone who is "happy" and doesn't do anything because of it...........which again makes me think that productivity and happiness do not go hand in hand.
If happiness means being content with what you have, than happiness is not stunted by settling, in fact happiness would be synonymous to settling and being completely...happy with settling.

Ugh. This is torturous. What is happiness? Was my sister right? Have none of us ever been happy?
Is it ironic that the idea of happiness is plaguing me?

Inspirations.

"What has been given to me is not something to be repaid but to be fulfilled."
-PaulDavid Shrader, Probity

Short and Sporadic Ponderings of Yours Truly.

"Never leave home in socks with holes because you never know when you're going to try on a pair of shoes."

-BIJOU Living

Elegance, etiquette, composure, confidence, and humility. This seems to be the formula for adulthood. One step at a time. One pair of shoes at a time.

Who knew the library has so many...books? What a wonderful, wonderful world. I intend to one day read a book on etiquette borrowed from this previously mentioned place of wonder. It will be some kind of a rude awakening, I'm sure. Isn't that ironic.

"Fashion is about eventually being naked.''

-Vivienne Westwood

Well put, Vivienne Westwood. I might just name my daughter after you. Let us see how she turns out.

I don't think I will ever really know myself because I am too preoccupied with changing myself, expanding my mind, and learning new things, new places, new people. Oh, I almost didn't see you there, College. Don't jump out at me like that. I imagine books of etiquette frown upon it.

Home, Sweet Something

I'm sorry. Really? No. No. No. No, I'm not sorry. It's really selfish of me to hate expectations. It's really selfish. But selfish people don't care about being selfish, so I'm just going to go ahead and be selfish:
I can't take any more talk about the the Right College, the Acceptable College, the One That Will Land You A Job...supposedly Harvard, MIT, other schools I can't and don't want to get into.
Dear God, dear someone.
Tell me the name is not everything?
What if I want to go to college to, you know, learn, get that holistic experience that sounds so nice? It's true. I legitimately want to learn.
Is this impractical? Is this old-fashioned?
Everything Linda says is perfectly logical, true, makes sense. But ahhhhhhhh!!!!
People who attend certain colleges are certain brands of people. When I pay for college I'm paying for the brand. True. All true. It's even reflected in the students' brand of clothing. You can shop at places like Hollister and Pac Sun or you can shop at places like J. Crew and Ralph Lauren, with your golden sperry's and your grandmother's pearls and your Nine West tote and fuck me in the ass I might just kill myself. I'm not shopping for a husband. I'm not. I'm trying to further my education. Sorry Mom and Dad, that you raised such a fuck-up. I'm so backwards. Sorry. Really? No. I'm not sorry.

It is unfortunate that the things I have passions for is steeped in impracticality.

"I am not in this world to live up to your expectations, and you are not in this world to live up to mine. You are you and I am I, and if by chance we find each other, then it is beautiful. If not, it can't be helped.”
Frederick Perls quotes (German born American psychiatrist, 1893-1970)

editing videos from trip..

Fitz & Dizzyspells

"There is something awe-inspiring in one who has lost all inhibitions."

-F. Scott Fitzgerald

There is nothing awe-inspiring in one who who has lost all motivation...

Spring break. Three days, four tests, one essay. Three days.