Turning a new leaf

Hello again. Monday, I realized I needed to start a new blog and try to keep up with it this time. The title "To name is to know and remember" is a line from my favorite poem "Words" by Dana Gioia. I love this poem because it explores how the world would still be as beautiful and real as it is, even if we never used any words to describe it. But we can't do that. We use words because we need them. Here's the whole poem:

The world does not need words. It articulates itself
in sunlight, leaves, and shadows. The stones on the path
are no less real for lying uncatalogued and uncounted.
The fluent leaves speak only the dialect of pure being.
The kiss is still fully itself though no words were spoken.

And one word transforms it into something less or other—

illicit, chaste, perfunctory, conjugal, convert.
Even calling it a kiss betrays the fluster of hands
glancing the skin or gripping a shoulder, the slow
arching of neck or knee, the silent touching of tongues.

Yet the stones remain less real to those who cannot
name them, or read the mute syllables graven in silica.
To see a red stone is less than seeing it as jasper—
metamorphic quartz, cousin to the flint the Kiowa
carved as arrowheads. To name is to know and remember.

The sunlight needs no praise piercing the rainclouds,
painting the rocks and leaves with light, then dissolving
each lucent droplet back into the clouds that engendered it.
The daylight needs no praise, and so we praise it always—

In the same way, words can help us understand or even figure things out. So my purpose for this blog is two-fold in that it can serve as a way for whoever is reading to be updated about my life and thoughts and hopefully I can learn more about myself and come to new discoveries and conclusions as well in the process.

I'll start by telling you about Monday. Our Christmas tree had been up for about three months until then. Silly as it may sound, I had a lot of emotions wrapped up in that tree's grandiose presence. November through January were pretty emotional months for me; during that time, our Christmas tree was put up (in a whole night of adventure) and many of the nights we'd all stay up late hanging out were lit by the tree instead of the normal lamps. During that time, a lot of people were at our apartment regularly but aren't around anymore for various reasons. And having the massive looming tree, whose lights didn't even work anymore, still standing seemed to serve as an unwelcome reminder that our apartment was lacking in company.

The last month has been hard for me because of that emptiness. I don't do well on my own and I'm trying to figure out how to live well in this period of my life. I want to enjoy where I am instead of constantly trying to change it. This is the first time in a very long time that I haven't been attached to a guy in some way, and that's great. I need this. So I want to thrive in it.

Anyway, taking down the tree was good for me because it removed all of those memories and emotions that I had attached to it being there. Now, the apartment feels like it did when we first moved in - a great, "starting over" feeling.

Monday was also my last day of class, possibly for the rest of my life. Well, I can't see myself never taking any kind of class again, but graduate school is officially over - a change of pace in life, after almost six years, that I'm not sure how I feel about. So far, it feels good to be able to read what I want and not have ominous assignments when I'd rather be doing something else. But I love to learn. So I am probably going to sit in on a poetry class next quarter just for fun. Through grad school, somehow I managed a 4.0. It's funny because the reason I wanted an A in my last class to keep the 4.0 is because now Dr. Reneau will stop me on stage at graduation and tell everyone that I got all As. I'm excited about that, even if it's silly. It's crazy to think I'm really not in school anymore. I'm sure that will become more real to be over the next few weeks or months, and I will share any new thoughts or realizations.

I also got a job on Monday. Not a "real" job, but one for now until August. I spend most of my free time at the Frothy Monkey anyway, so now I will just be serving people while I'm there instead of wracking my brain for a good argument to write about. I knew my life wouldn't be complete without being a barista at some point.

[Side note: right now on Pandora, Muse is very appropriately singing "Feeling Good" - "It's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new life for me, and I'm feeling good."]

Also, in the "new leaf" department, I've been working out and trying to eat better. Bri and I actually went to two workout classes in a row last Tuesday. You'd think "Wow, that's really stupid," which is actually what Lori said to me when I walked in the door, haha, but it was great! I felt revived afterwards and much less stressed. I've also laid out in the sun two times already this week, and it's only February! I can't handle being outside in the heat of real summer though, so I need to get all of this laying out done ASAP. Last summer, I worked almost every day and only wore a swimsuit two times that I remember. This summer will definitely be different. Also, Lori and Bri are dying to do as many summer/swimsuit activities as possible since Lori didn't get to last summer and Bri won't next summer.

I'll save trying to answer the looming "So, Heather, what are you going to do with your life?" question for a later post. For now, I'm just looking forward to a school-less, hopefully stress-free summer.