A Philosophy of Time

I am an idealist.  I am a stargazer and a dreamer.  And then, I’m pragmatic.  I’m a realist who wants answers.  How do I reconcile artist with scientist?  Each looks at the world and wants something different.  The two are at war within me.  I stare starry eyed at the sunbeams filling my world…until I begin to fidget from the heat. 

            I don’t want to be a realist.

            I want to be an all out dreamer.  I want to fill my head with beauty and wonder.  Instead, I sit and marginalize each minute of my day.  Until the second swell to minutes and the minutes fill the hour and the bell rings for the next class.  And, like so many before me, I fritter away the hours of my day by numbering them and assigning them to tasks. 

            The human mind cannot fathom the possibilities of infinity.  An unending forever is too momentous for even the bravest of minds.  Therefore, we parcel and divide our existence.  Desperately hoping that by sub dividing infinity, we will somehow arrive at a real number.  If we divide and section time, perhaps we can come up with names for each part and a meaning for the whole.  But we don’t.  History repeats itself.  And the Digital Age holds no more meaning then the Stone Age. 

            Augustine proposed God outside of time.  And time as the point on which we stand allowing future to filter through us and become past.  But perhaps we build ourselves this peephole—forever looking back on the past and forward to the future.  Or we build ourselves a box that is safe and sound and predictable.  A box that cages us in comfort and reality.  What if God asks us to step outside of the box.  In the end, He pulls us out of time and into eternity with him, but how will it feel when the restraints of time are melted at the throne of God?  Will we feel free from confining captivity?  Or stripped of our only security?  Certainly God is not a safe God. 

Perhaps the miracle of Christ should not be imaged as a cross bridging the gap between us and God.  Rather, we should imagine that we are trapped in a box that lies in the middle of the infinite truth of who God is.  God does not call us to cross a gap.  He calls us to roll back the stone and truly live.  No longer dead in our transgressions, but alive in the infinity of Him.  Suddenly, an entire universe is unleashed upon our senses.  It is marvelous to behold.  Incomprehensible and dangerous, but somehow wondrous and beautiful.  While it may feel safer to carry a box over your head, what use is life without the Sun shining over you?

Starting Etsy

I have always wanted to try wire-wrapping jewelry, but somehow never got around to it with all the various other things going on.  So this summer, with nothing to do, I decided to give it a try.  I found it surprisingly easy and elegant after being warned that it was harder than it looked.  I began by using pieces of sea glass that I find regularly on the beaches of Rhode Island where our family vacations every summer.  The first pieces turned out well and came quickly.  After that I just began shelling them out.  Soon I was on the beach every day collecting more glass, and now I have my desk set up especially so that I can have space to work.  (Do you know how hard it is to keep a desk from piling up with papers and random junk?)

 

The desk has a nice lamp and extra space for the large terrarium that I use to store some of my sea glass, but more often than not I end up working at my trunk-turned-coffee table.  I’ll tuck my feet up under me, open my Netflix to an episode of How I Met Your Mother and just begin twisting away. 

 

And then while I was at my friends, Meli and Jeremy’s wedding, I thought I should freaking open an Etsy shop, then I’ll at least be able to tell people I’m doing something with my life.  And so, many hours of photography and oh so many internet pages later, I did.  Mostly so far I have made necklaces, but my latest idea involves braiding the wire together to make elegant rings with tiny pieces of sea glass.  Shout out to my sister and my dad for inspiring me in this latest idea. 

P.S. Check out my Etsy shop http://www.etsy.com/shop/IndigoImmersion.  I haven’t listed the rings yet, but if you are interested shoot me an message with your ring size and I would love to make you up a custom order!

Public Transportation

Whatever happened to the simple joys of public transportation? To watching the abandon track through your right hand window as it begins to disintegrate, then pull itself back together and disintegrate once more? If you watch the disconnected rails and the rotting rail ties long enough, you begin to wonder whether the track you are traveling on isn’t beginning to rot and fall apart too.  Instead, you are distracted by a Snapple commercial playing out on the HD TV directly in front of you.  There are about six of these TVs in your train car alone, I might add.  How can you help but be distracted?  Where there used to be a friendly smattering of guttural morning chatter and gruff ‘Good Mornings,’ there is now silence and the pristine automated voice, cautioning you to “Watch your step when exiting.”  Neighborly nods and smiles are replaced with vacant stares of kids plugged into iPods and the downcast eyes glued to eBooks. 

            Now I have nothing against eBooks, I brought my Nook so that I could read on the train, but I do expect a little more from my occasional experience of the early morning commute on public transportation.  And moreover, it takes me less than a glance to realize that the man beside me is reading either a Harlequin Romance novel or something of an even lower class of reading materials. 

            But pardon me. 

            I do tend to be more than a tad cantankerous with the modern era.  I was born into the midst of all this technology and advancement about twenty-one years ago, and I’ve resented it ever since.  Not that I don’t like technological advancement and the joys of instant gratification; I actually love it.  I’m addicted to it.  And that is what bothers me.  At times, I wish I could have one dull, utterly useless moment in a day.  But I seem to lack the patience or the where-with-all for such nonsense.  The minute I come to a standstill, out whips my iPhone, and voila: no more dull moment, no more waiting for the pause in the conversation to pick back up naturally.  Patience is a luxury unaffordable to the iPhone addicts, media druggies and me-aholics of my generation.

Painting is good for the soul.
At least it's good for my soul.  Last night I painted for the first time in almost a year.  I didn't actually realize how deeply I had missed it until I could smell the turpentine and the paints.  Forgetting homework and a variety of other responsibilities I painted well into the night.  Spreading color on canvas is cathartic.  Refreshing to have enough energy left in my body to paint after a long Monday of class and rehearsal.  Not brimming with energy, but the type of energy that says, I'm tired but I'm gonna do this thing anyway.  Tonight is the night to make up for lost sleep, but the painting is worth an occasional late night.  I wish I could paint all day instead of grading papers, solving math problems, and writing cover letters. 

From the archives

The persistent smog above Providence pinches apart to reveal pure morning sky.  The crisp light of the moon and a few stars contrasts with the smothering pink of the clouds.  I think I could get up this early every morning to breathe the air and feel slight breezes on my face.  Morning is the one time I feel I could become one with the atmosphere and float peacefully. 

This summer I am a nomad.  My family has always been nomadic, but this summer it strikes me more deeply.  In May, I crammed my dorm room into a storage unit, three College storage boxes, and the trunk of my Katryn-sized Chevy metro.  Any one else would feel crowded getting into my car.  There isn't enough leg room in the front or back seat, and the ceiling is far too low for anyone above 5'5" to extend to their full height.  But for me, this car is perfect, my baby.  Emaleen, as my sister dubbed her early on, is not much to look at but she gets me places and with good gas mileage.  At 5'4¾", I fit perfectly into the driver's seat, my feet extending luxuriously to reach the pedals.  

After a month and a half of living in my car, it no longer feels luxurious.  I have perched, squeezed and crammed myself into countless vehicles for countless hours.  

In the nomadic lifestyle, the locations don't count.  The long stretches of mountainous driving, the strange and familiar airports, the highway rest areas become your entire life.  You never unpack and you are always prepared with cell phone and water bottle.  The people that you meet and know for 4 days, a week or even a month become annoying interruptions to the periods of wear solitary wandering.  You figure out how to make cramped cars and public spaces your home.  You know which fast food restaurants or coffee shops have WiFi and how late each stays open.  You build forts in abandon airport seating with a blanket and your backpack for a pillow.  You nap in the driver's seat of your car outside Chick-fil-A.  You try not to nap on warm afternoons with only two hours left of driving.  At all costs, you plan ahead to make sure you get coffee in the morning.  The orange tumbler you got free from the bank becomes an eternal source of coffee or water as the case may be.  You can't remember the last time you ate a home cooked meal or saw a face you knew before this summer.  

And so, the quiet solitude of the Rhode Island freeway at 4 o'clock in the morning is comforting. The window is rolled down to give me joy and the frappacino in the cup holder is to keep me awake.  As the latest acquaintances slide peacefully from my memory, I pull quietly into the parking garage of the Providence airport.  As I wait in the security line, I begin to feel at home because all airports are home to me.

I recently watched an interview with Helena Bonham Carter and was struck by something she said about clothing and accessories.  First of all, she dresses rather eclectically.  She talked about how she buys something and thinks, by wearing it, she would be transformed into something different.  But then she saw the photo and realized she hadn’t.  She described her acting similarly.  Looking back on a days work became a disappointment because ultimately she hadn’t been able to become anyone else by acting.  It was just her on the screen. 

And I thought: Why do we deeply desire to be outside ourselves? The Father intentionally made us who we are, individually.  Created us in his image.  And still we struggle daily.  Even those people whom we idolize are devoured by this desire.  Who are we to question the will of Almighty God?

Why can't I be content with who I am in the present moment?  With the image of the living God which breathes in me, regardless of what top I wear or how many likes my Facebook post receives.  Of course, not to say that I am perfect the way I am.  But must I struggle on brokenly and limping-ly, towards some metallic ideal, which in reality has no breath or life.

How To Train Your Human:
A guide to reintroducing your human to the home environment, for cats.

Step 1:  Snooze.  Sleep on your human's bed as much as possible prior to her return from an extensive absence. This ensures that your human will recognize and bond to your scent upon return.

Step 2: Welcome.  Greet your human briefly upon her return but do not linger for any amount of time.

Step 3: Snub.  Ignore your human for at least 24hours, so that your absence is more keenly felt and your presence made more desirous.

Step 4: Enjoy!  Reap the benefits of your labor by enjoying a warm lap and much cuddling.  Be sure to vocalize your pleasure as your purr is particularly addictive to your human, and you will therefore garner increased adoration.