Low Millions

Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts... perhaps the fear of a loss of
power. -John Steinbeck, novelist, Nobel laureate (1902-1968)

Don't wait for the Last Judgement. It takes place every day. -Albert Camus,
writer and philosopher (1913-1960)

We are not the same persons this year as last; nor are those we love. It is
a happy chance if we, changing, continue to love a changed person. -William
Somerset Maugham, writer (1874-1965)

Dictionary: Spell binder. -Joseph F. Morris

Literature is the language of society, as speech is the language of man.
-Louis de Bonald, philosopher and politician (1754-1840)


So things have been going pretty well lately. No school, so I can't complain. To Kill A Mockingbird is taking over my life. I'll get it done, hopefully with a little extra time left over. I guess staying up until 3 and waking up at noon kinda affects my progress, too. About 100 pages left. As far as the papers go, I'm good at improvising. Don't know where that skill came from, but it does come in handy. Club practice on the first of the year. Everyone was complaining, but I can't honestly think of a better way to start the year. All I know is, I have a lot of work to do, and I think Ric will push us all. At least I hope.
Don't you just hate it when you feel like you've done something wrong, but you don't really know what it is? Something that may make someone close to you leave. I really don't feel that I've changed any, in my outlook on life, anyway, and I just hope that I didn't say something stupid that I now regret. Or if it's just the fact that they don't want to have anything to do with me, well, I wish they would tell me. That would be better than wondering. Something just isn't quite right, and I sure hope it isn't anything that I've done. If so, I wish I could know what it was. I guess I just overthink things. At least I hope so.
Might go to Barnes & Noble with Wendy tomorrow. That should be interesting. I love that store. Will pick up an application and fill it out once I get my schedule figured out.
And one thing that is making my days better is knowing that I'm going to be able to use my Frank Lloyd Wright planner. He really is my hero.
Enough for now. I'll either go read or sleep. More later.


There's a sign on my door
Says I'm not here anymore, cause I've been missing for so long
I can't remember where I've gone

I wish to hell that I could cry, I'd feel better
Count me in, I'm one of the Low Millions
Like her, like him, just one of the Low Millions

I'm disconnected to myself
There isn't anybody else
That I can point to that I know
Who isn't being torn by the undertow

I wish to hell that I could cry, I'd feel better
Count me in, I'm one of the Low Millions
Like her, like him, just one of the Low Millions

I'm an alien in my own skin
I'm fishing where the ice is thin
I'm holding it all up with safety pins
I'm sitting on nitroglycerin

I wish to hell that I could cry, I'd feel better
Count me in, I'm one of the Low Millions
Like her, like him, just one of the Low Millions

Dust of Snow

***Disclaimer: As approximately 94.87695% of these posts are written in the late hours of the night or the wee hours of the morning, anything I say cannot be used against me. I am prone to memory loss, misuse of the English language, and random pieces of thoughts that often make no sense during the day, so at night, those conditions are magnified tenfold. Typing errors are exempt as well.


With that being said, it's Quote Time:

Dictionary: The universe in alphabetical order. -Anatole France, novelist,
essayist, Nobel laureate (1844-1924)

Extreme justice is extreme injustice. -Marcus Tullius Cicero, statesman,
orator, writer (106-43 BCE)

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of
those who have much, it is whether we provide enough for those who have too
little. -Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd US President (1882-1945)

These are not books, lumps of lifeless paper, but minds alive on the
shelves. -Gilbert Highet, writer (1906-1978)

Life is a foreign language; all men mispronounce it. -Christopher Morley,
writer (1890-1957)

For all our conceits about being the center of the universe, we live in a
routine planet of a humdrum star stuck away in an obscure corner ... on an
unexceptional galaxy which is one of about 100 billion galaxies. ... That
is the fundamental fact of the universe we inhabit, and it is very good for
us to understand that. -Carl Sagan, astronomer and writer (1934-1996)


Now that I've been able to catch up with all the quotes, it is more enjoyable to read about five of them instead of the usual 50,000. I only leave a few out...some of them are just really nonsensical or random. So this is the cream of the crop.

In regard to the disclaimer above, I would like to make a Disc 2 of the Counting Crows soundtrack of my life. It really was late, and I was thinking about doing a Disc 2 then, but I was wiped. So here it is now:
Miami - Such a great song...especially the end. And my name's in it, too! :D "She can pull the sunlight through me" <- Love that line!
Sullivan Street - The second song I ever heard by the Crows, in complete contrast to Mr. Jones. It surprised me so much, the emotion of it all. It only ensured my love of the band.
Raining in Baltimore - There are so many days when I feel like this song. Again, Adam is extremely deep. "It's raining in Baltimore/fifty miles east/where you should be/no one's around"
Perfect Blue Buildings - So visual "Asleep in perfect blue buildings/beside the green apple sea" And another emotion he manages to express: "Wanna get me a little oblivion/try to keep myself/away from me"
All My Love - Always been a favorite of mine, don't know how I managed to forget it. Definitely one of my top favorite lines: "Well, it was cold when I awoke/and the day was halfway done/nearly spring in San Fransico/but I cannot feel the sun"..."If I could give all my love to you/I could justify myself/but I'm just not comin through/you're a pill to ease the pain of all the stupid things I do"
Up All Night - HOLY CRAP! How did I forget this one?! Seriously, possibly my favorite line ever, definitely one of the top: "I've been up all night/I might sleep all day/get your dreams just right/and let em slip away"
I Wish I Was A Girl - Such a sweet song. Surprise, another favorite! "I wish I was a girl/so that you could believe me/and I could shake this static every time I try to sleep/I wish for all the world/that I could say/hey, Elizabeth, you know/I'm doin alright"
St. Robinson In His Cadillac Dream - My song of the moment...has been for about three weeks. Can't get it out of my head. Awesome lyrically. Fave line: "And I keep thinking tomorrow is coming today/I am endlessly waiting"
Catapult - While it is a good song, I really can't say that I understand or have experienced the full extent of it. That's why I put it last - hopefully, it will be part of the future.
If I forgot any, it was completely unintentional, as far as I know. Once again, it's late.

So, life's been interesting lately, but when is it not? It's been good for the most part. Lots of laughs, and I'm thankful for that. When the day starts going downhill, there's usually someone there to brighten it up. I'm undecided about everything. But I guess that's leaving my options open? That's with school, everything. Most lately, though, I've experienced an immense amount of dislike for people who lie. It's just amazing how full of shit they really are. It makes you want to ask them, "Where do you come up with this?" I guess it is my fault, partly, for falling for it. Another softer side of me is now becoming calloused, and I begin to worry that if something really good comes along, I won't be able to believe it. Maybe that's just part of life...becoming numb. Or just disbelieving. I won't fall for it again. The end.
With that being said, I'm surprised at how relatively easy it is to stay out of drama (with girls, mostly), it's just an indifference, really. Friends with everyone. It's not too difficult (knock on wood). I'm extremely excited about Christmas! Only one more day of school for me (again, knock on wood...the finals thing)!!!! And I'll just be sleeping and reading and cleaning and relaxing and spending time with family. What more could you ask for?!?!
Tiredness is setting in...that's a sign that I need to be going.
Found this poem and loved it - it really describes how my days go. You just see something out of the ordinary that makes your whole day a little better.

Hope everyone has a Merry Christmas!!!


The way a crow
Shook down on me
The dust of snow
From a hemlock tree

Has given my heart
A change of mood
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued

-Robert Frost

Telling It

First things first:

Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do
only a little. -Edmund Burke, statesman and writer (1729-1797)

Be good and you will be lonesome. -Mark Twain, author and humorist
(1835-1910)

If only I could so live and so serve the world that after me there should
never again be birds in cages. -Isak Dinesen (pen name of Karen Blixen),
author (1885-1962)

We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we
created them. -Albert Einstein, physicist, Nobel laureate (1879-1955)

Words are the soul's ambassadors, who go / Abroad upon her errands to and
fro. -James Howell, writer (c. 1594-1666)


A Word A Day just makes me happy every morning, although, I usually pay more attention to the quotes than remember the words, but I really love it all.
So I've been on this poetry kick lately. For my birthday, I requested and recieved A Treasury of American Poetry, and I've just started to read it. I just randomly open up to a page and read. I figure that's the best way to do it, that way I just get a large variety. Don't always find what you're looking for that way, but you do come across some interesting stuff. Most of it, I don't understand. Takes time, I guess. I would love to write poetry, but in all honesty, I think I'm afraid to. Not necessarily of what I have to say, just how it will sound. I just haven't acquired the complete flow of speech yet. And reading the best poems probably doesn't make me sound any better. Reading it is better than nothing, though, and maybe I'll be able to compile everything and write something really good one day.
"I love that word 'relationship'. Covers all manner of sins, doesn't it?" Word to Hugh Grant on that one. Actually, I just thought it'd be a good intro, even though it really doesn't describe what's going on, but that's okay. So, yes, it's been a year since I've "officially" gone out with anyone. There were two or three in-between but amounted to absolutely nothing, and really aren't even worth mentioning. So there's days when I think that a boyfriend would be really nice. And other days, I think, "What was I thinking?" Right when I'm on the verge of a relationship, or even thinking seriously about one, I always think, "Oh crap. What have I gotten myself into?" And that's not the best or most comforting thought to think. I hate the phone call everyday thing, and obviously, suffocating relationships. That's why the relationship that ended a year ago didn't last. Can't deal with that. And honestly, I'm picky as hell. Nothing ever suits me. And when I think there's a possibility, the guy wants to be friends with me. I swear. And somehow I have this innate ability to attract guys that are my friends. Not a good thing. At all. I really don't know what it is. There's pressure for some people, I'm sure, to be in a relationship because everyone else is. I honestly would just like someone who cares about me. But, in the end, what are the odds that it would actually end up in marriage? So why waste time now and just end up hurting each other? So, all logical reasons point to "no, you don't need a boyfriend...wait until a later date". And yet, surprisingly, there's still an illogical part of me that refuses to acknowledge logic...and here I am.
I guess what puts everything into perspective is knowing that I can love people in a way that isn't a teenage-hormonal boyfriend-girlfriend love, but really a deep, thankful, unexplainable kind of love. That people are that important to you that it actually makes it something more than love, or maybe that really is love in its purest form.
Wrestling meet showcased some drama, but it's a great feeling just being at peace with everything and not being a part of it. I actually had the thought that I might miss high school once I graduate, and that thought is a very rare one. So I'll enjoy it while I'm here.
Logged on Countingcrows.com tonight and read on the messageboard what songs by the Counting Crows that people would put on the soundtrack to their life. I'd like to give it a spin (trying to go in order):
A Long December - my all-time favorite song ever. The chords at the beginning...leave me speechless. Knew that it would be my favorite song the first time I heard it, but once I really listened to it, it was almost scary. Like Adam had written it for me. It's my life...past and present. I lived that song, and it is everything.
Round Here - Long and complicated story, but definitely a song of my life.
Amy Hit the Atmosphere - Well, it's got my name in it! ;) Seriously, another song that you just have this connection with.
Holiday in Spain - This lyric gets me every time "I may take a holiday in Spain/Leave my wings behind me/Flush my worries down the drain/Fly away to somewhere new"
Anna Begins - Such a real song. How Adam does it, I'll never know. This line always makes me hope someone will think the same thing about me "Every time she sneezes/I believe it's love" ("Oh Lord, I'm not ready for this sort of thing"...how more real can you get?)
Have You Seen Me Lately (VH1 Storytellers) - They completely changed the song for the performance and put a whole different message in it. Always finding myself thinking how true the lyrics are...
Mr. Jones - Because you just gotta have a feel-good song every once in awhile!
Barely Out of Tuesday - Once again, Adam is a genius. How he puts my feelings into words, I'll never know.
August and Everything After - He says so much in this song, it's unbelieveable. You can take every single line, piece by piece, and each is its own poem and truth.
Mrs. Potter's Lullaby - So many descriptions in this song. It's life. "If dreams are like movies/then memories are films about ghosts/you can never escape/you can only move south down the coast"
Chelsea - So sad and true, yet he manages to add that hopefulness
Goodnight Elizabeth - "I hope that everybody can find a little flame/me, I just light myself on fire/and walk out on a wire once again"
Omaha - What to say about Omaha? It's always been one of my favorites..."It's the heart that matters more"...and all the visuals in the song
Colorblind - Such a peaceful song...describes love to the fullest
Goodnight L.A. - "What brings me down now/is love/cause I can never get enough/of love" I really can't say it any better than Mr. Duritz...he is astonishing.


Well, I'm getting quite tired, and even though there is more to be said, I think I'll put it on hold for now. Who knows? It may turn into an even more interesting, fully-developed idea. Poetry now, poetry later.


To speak out clean.
Let the words be
not wonderful but the plainest
nouns, the skinniest verbs
that are themselves
the poem, not merely holding
it together.
The shape of poetry:
the shape of the words, the words their own shapes,
the shape of many words together.
All right.
Poetry is the soup,
not the can or kettle
wrapped around it.
Telling it, telling it clean
is the meat.
Today the words are right.
They are right here.
I find what I mean
to tell myself the truth.

--Nancy Sullivan

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

So, yes, I have been neglecting to use this for its original intention, but as of right now, that's changing.
I'm almost in a state of shock at the incredibly good mood I've been in. Everyone always tells me that they can never tell that I'm having a bad day. And I always thought it was pretty obvious, but I smile even when I'm upset, so in theory, that kind of confuses people as to my actual state. I'm not in a bad mood all the time; I suppose the more fitting word would be incontent. There's always something wrong. Always. Something I could have done better, should have done, didn't work hard enough on, and so on. People in Trig were studying biorhythms and I wonder if those may actually hold some fact. I don't know anything about them, but it seems to be a believeable theory. So, I guess I'm just at the tip of mine now. It could also have to do with the fact that something good might happen. But at the same time, something bad might happen, or just might not happen at all. It's quite the dilemma, and seeing that past experiences have led both directions, it's hard to choose which way to go. For now, I guess I'll be content and allow whatever may happen to happen as it so chooses.
So, this is quite an odd post, seeing that I'm not in a foul/pessimistic mood while writing it. Quite the contrary. Maybe it's because I only got 5 hours of sleep and I'm a little dilusional?
Anyway, the word of the day was "prufrockian" referring to one of my favorite poems "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot. I'm planning to write my interpretation of it in the near future, so be on the lookout for that, in the mean time, here's the original poem in its entirety.


S`io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s'i'odo il vero,
Senza tema d'infamia ti rispondo.

Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question...
Oh, do not ask, "What is it?"
Let us go and make our visit.

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions
And for a hundred visions and revisions
Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time
To wonder, "Do I dare?" and, "Do I dare?"
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair---
[They will say: "How his hair is growing thin!"]
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin---
[They will say: "But how his arms and legs are thin!"]
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all;
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all---
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?

And I have known the arms already, known them all---
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
[But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]
Is it perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?

. . . . .

Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?...

I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

. . . . .

And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep...tired...or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon
a platter,
I am no prophet --- and here's no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: "I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all"
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say, "That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all."

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor
---
And this, and so much more?
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
"That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all."

. . . . .

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or to
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous---
Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old...I grow old...
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think they will sing to me.

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Til human voices wake us, and we drown.

-- T. S. Eliot

Leaving on a Jet Plane

Here goes:

Throw your dreams into space like a kite, and you do not know what it will
bring back, a new life, a new friend, a new love, or a new country. -Anais
Nin, author (1903-1977)

If you want to work on your art, work on your life. -Anton Chekhov,
short-story writer and dramatist (1860-1904)

If writers were good businessmen, they'd have too much sense to be writers.
-Irwin S. Cobb, author and journalist (1876-1944)

The greatest masterpiece in literature is only a dictionary out of order.
-Jean Cocteau, writer, artist, and filmmaker

Words are things; and a small drop of ink / Falling like dew upon a thought,
produces / That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think. -Lord Byron,
poet (1788-1824)

Creative activity could be described as a type of learning process where
teacher and pupil are located in the same individual. -Arthur Koestler,
novelist and journalist (1905-1983)

Worth begets in base minds, envy; in great souls, emulation. -Henry
Fielding, author (1707-1754)

Insanity - a perfectly rational adjustment to an insane world. -RD Laing,
psychiatrist and author (1927-1989)

Because we don't understand the brain very well we're constantly tempted to
use the latest technology as a model for trying to understand it. In my
childhood we were always assured that the brain was a telephone
switchboard. (What else could it be?) And I was amused to see that
Sherrington, the great British neuroscientist, thought that the brain
worked like a telegraph system. Freud often compared the brain to hydraulic
and electromagnetic systems. Leibniz compared it to a mill, and now,
obviously, the metaphor is the digital computer. -John R. Searle,
philosophy professor (1932- )

Words strain, / Crack and sometimes break, under the burden, / Under the
tension, slip, slide, perish, / Decay with imprecision, will not stay in
place, / Will not stay still. -T.S. Eliot, poet (1888-1965)

When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind
people. -Abraham Joshua Heschel, theology professor (1907-1972)

War would end if the dead could return. -Stanley Baldwin, statesman
(1867-1947)

I think there is only one quality worse than hardness of heart, and that is
softness of head. -Theodore Roosevelt, 26th US President (1858-1919)

Words are chameleons, which reflect the color of their environment.
-Learned Hand, jurist (1872-1961)


Alrighty then! Been a bum lately, but I like it!
Leaving On A Jet Plane is such a great song. I'm not one to always go by the popular songs of musicians, but I really do love it.
Life's been crazy lately, but when is it not?
Club starts tomorrow!!!


All my bags are packed I'm ready to go
I'm standin' here outside your door
I hate to wake you up to say goodbye
But the dawn is breakin' it's early morn
The taxi's waitin' he's blowin' his horn
Already I'm so lonesome I could die

So kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you'll wait for me
Hold me like you'll never let me go
Cause I'm leavin' on a jet plane
Don't know when I'll be back again
Oh babe, I hate to go

There's so many times I've let you down
So many times I've played around
I tell you now, they don't mean a thing
Every place I go, I'll think of you
Every song I sing, I'll sing for you
When I come back, I'll bring your wedding ring

Now the time has come to leave you
One more time let me kiss you
Close your eyes I'll be on my way
Dream about the days to come
When I won't have to leave alone
About the times, I won't have to say

So kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you'll wait for me
Hold me like you'll never let me go
Cause I'm leavin' on a jet plane
Don't know when I'll be back again
Oh babe, I hate to go