this provincial life
It's funny, I realized I actually have a rolemodel Disney character. Just a few moments ago, getting read for school in the bathroom, I started humming one of the songs from Beauty and the Beast, that one song Belle sings in the beginning (looks like it has the nondescript title Belle). I love the lyrics to it, especially the reprise:


I want much more than this provincial life
I want adventure in the great wide somewhere
I want it more than I can tell
And for once it might be grand
To have someone understand
I want so much more than they've got planned

That rings so true with me. That's basically my life mantra right there. I have so much hope for the world but I'm so terrified that nothing will ever meet my expectations... yet I continue to seek and find beauty in so many little things. I guess Disney's always putting headstrong female characters in the lead... but I think she's the only one I actually relate to.

Right now my life feels strange to me... but not in a bad way at all. I feel somewhat detached, but in the way that I learned to be while on the island, like I don't really care about trivialities and formality and classwork but I still care about the essence of things. I'm in love, and how. I feel very happy with where I'm at but only because it allows me to be all things in a way that no other position could. I'm in a tedious balance between creation and destruction, the perfect pinnacle of emotional existence.

Somewhere sub-skin is that malcontent seeker that drives me but for now she knows that I'm in the best place to resist change and embrace the opportunity I'm allowed right here. You see, she's far too scared that things wouldn't be as good as they are now... if they were anything different. And she's pretty sure she knows how good she's got it. So she's shutting up and I'm letting myself enjoy my freedom and my stability. I'm enjoying it all because I know that eventually the balance will change without me tipping it. I know the eventually there will be more clouds. It could be soon, it could be tomorrow. It could be last night. But I'm content to live and let live... to seek answers through what my life affords me without forcing things into place. I'm actually living in the present for a few days.

Probably by the end of the week I'll have a high enough stress level to forget all this. I'll be nice while it lasts. On the other hand, I'm not saying I'm anti-carpe diem right now. In fact, I'm more for self-honesty, appreciation, and actualization than ever... just not in my usual chaotic way. I think we need to take a step back and appreciate what beauty and simplicity we have in our lives; what wonder and magic the little things give us; what luxury we have to be able to afford emotional complexity and drama. A Net-sister of mine wrote some words of wisdom on the subject today. These quotes from Our Town brought tears to my eyes:

Emily: I can�t. I can�t go on. It goes so fast. We don�t have time to look at one another. I didn�t realize. So all that was going on and we never noticed. Take me back � up the hill � to my grave. But first: Wait! One more look. Good-by. Good-by, world. Good-by, Grover�s Corners�Mama and Papa. Good-by to clocks ticking�and Mama�s sunflowers. And food and coffee. And new-ironed dresses and hot baths...and sleeping and waking up. Oh, earth, you�re too wonderful for anybody to realize you. Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it? � every, every minute? No�I should have listened to you. That�s all human being are! Just blind people.


Simon Stimson: Yes, now you know. Now you know! That�s what it was to be alive. To move about in a cloud of ignorance; to go up and down trampling on the feelings of those�of those about you. To spend and waste time as though you had a million years. To be always at the mercy of one self-centered passion, or another. Now you know � that�s the happy existence you wanted to go back to. Ignorance and blindness.


How true, how true. I've never actually read this play. It seems I ought to.

It's cold here; the mist sinks through the skin in a bone-chilling way. I'm awfully sore after weightlifting yesterday for the first time in three weeks. Thank God for new scarves and Aleve. Oh, and did you know that Beppe and Gianni's doesn't card? I always suspected they didn't but I'd never really put it to the test until yesterday. Wahoo! A place that will give me wine with dinner! ^^

On a side note, we really need to do a ski trip before this winter is over. Justin? Micro people, anyone like to ski?? Murray, Katie? Alex? You guys wanna get a group pass and rent some gear and go over to Bachelor? If we don't go, we'll regret it!

And I just want to say: it is SO good to be home.