thatnight.net

Also, mud pies

June 29, 2009

Ok, so it seems that I wasn’t, in fact, going to spend the week writing about the things I said I was going to, because here we are, seven days later, with nothing to show for it. Fooled ya!

Saying I’m going to write about something specific is the equivalent of giving myself homework, and it therefore will not happen. If high school memories aren’t enough to plunge a girl back into loonsville, add the word assignment and she’ll be more useless than a bachelor’s degree.

I spent the weekend with my Aunt at her home in the country. We went to this little white church on Sunday morning and there was a picnic afterward for the congregation (which couldn’t've been more than 30 people). I sat outside with a woman who I initially thought was Amish, as there is a large community in the area and she wore the standard long, dark skirt and hair covering. I came to find out she was part of the Bruderhof, and in the hour she spent talking to me about her daughters and home, I was fascinated.

Most of the values were similar among the groups I’ve already talked with — self-sustaining community, mostly home-schooled, limited technology, emphasis on the family unit — and she focused a lot on education, as her daughter is just starting med school. She said, “Above all, we let our kids be kids. There is no kindergarten. We want them to play in the mud for as long as possible.”

Even as I tried to imagine myself undergoing that kind of lifestyle change, my mind still wandered to the safety of my iPhone in my hot car.

I’ll be satisfied as long as I can remember to keep a good balance of mud.

Categories: Daily | 7 Comments »

Funny the way it is

June 20, 2009

I tend to be really bitter at the ends of relationships. Depending on the amount of awfulness surrounding the breakup, I have a hard time letting go of my scorn for that person. This never really happened after the several times me and Derrick broke up, which I think has a lot to do with his relaxed personality working in opposition of my emotional lunacy.

I saw Dave Matthews Band last night, one of the few concerts I’ll pay to see live, and while his crowds are usually extremely high-energy (and also, high), I prefer to just sit and listen.

During the show, I was thinking about some of my most turbulent relationships. I’ve dated some maniacs, let me tell you. But even with the ones who were just a bit peculiar, I can immediately think of a soundtrack, or even a single band, that fully represents the time I had with them, not only because it was a genre that I listened to often at the time, but because it fits alarmingly well with the nature of the boy.

And even if I can’t stand to think about some of those times, the music associated with them sort of takes the focus away from the negativity, leaving instead a set of images and characters that play like a movie. I’m going to spend a week going through them and writing them here.*

*And using fake names, most likely, which is a shame, as it would make for some great drama.

Categories: Daily | 17 Comments »

Purple roses and disagreeable neck gear

June 9, 2009

If the topography of Pittsburgh were a flat series of websites, and I was a little arrow floating across it all, I would StumbleUpon the moment I found one of my favorite musicians performing in a little stone park as workers paused and ate their lunches, and recommend that everyone join me.

Scott Blasey of The Clarks

The dog had his surgery today. He’s doing fine, although, from the looks he’s been giving me, I may wake up tomorrow morning with a clear plastic cone shoved down my throat.

Categories: Bello, Daily, Pittsburgh | 18 Comments »

Not a smooth transition

May 30, 2009

The year of my 21st birthday, my days started moving a lot faster. Rather than each day having the potential to be something wonderful within itself, they all started clumping together as a means to achieve something in the future.

Until my 21st birthday, I could go through a hundred emotions in one week. I could wake up feeling enthusiastic, progress to annoyed, and go through depressed, stupid, and jubilant in one afternoon. Then, suddenly, I had weeks of “good” and “fine” and “normal.”

Was that adolescence ending?

It’s like life is becoming all of the things English teachers say to avoid when trying to become an interesting and descriptive writer.

Categories: Daily | 19 Comments »

Degenerate

May 27, 2009

I was driving in my car yesterday when a radio DJ announced that Blink-182 would be performing in Pittsburgh this summer, and I sort of immediately squealed aloud. But then, when I got to thinking, I realized I wasn’t that excited. I don’t really like Blink-182 anymore, let alone follow them enough to know they were even touring again. And then it registered — I’ve reached the age wherein I’m subconsciously thrilled about bands I’m currently uninterested in because they provided significant background music to a much earlier period of my life.

And the fact that I marked that occasion as a significant occurrence without giving much thought to the actuality of Saturday being my last ever day of college shows how meaningful a role higher education has played in my life.

I’ve been saying for a year now that I wish I would’ve studied computer science or web design. While I don’t regret my major, which ended up being English lit (though I was only a handful of credits away from creative writing), it may have been a good idea to study something more career-oriented, as I’ve been hired to code three websites in the last two months, and not one person has offered to pay me for a pretty poem.

I do have a pretty good outlook on things, though. Twitter has my back, y’all.