| this is funny |
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| 01:37am 20/04/2009 |
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mood:  okay
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I remembered the old Livejournal! Hah! I kind of miss this stuff. I'm staying up very late here to finish my thesis on Messiaen's Trois Petites Liturgies. My recital went well, and I'm graduating in a couple of weeks.
Life is not without challenge, but I like it just the same.
The marriage is going well.
This last year, I've learned that I'm a(n)
sentimentalist
procrastinator
overly-metabolic machine
musician who's GOT IT
balancing act
traveler
teacher |
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| my account still exists!? |
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| 01:02am 08/07/2008 |
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mood:  contemplative
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in a few days i will be Allen's wife.
in a few weeks i will be teaching general music to k-through-fivers. in a few months i will teach high school band, all of this for no pay but for my degree acquisition.
in a few years i might have a masters degree, and or a child. whoa!
in a few minutes i will be asleep.
to summarize life for about the last year:
allen and i got engaged in montana last august! we're now tired of planning the wedding, which is this coming saturday at st. columban. i'm not done with school yet, because i'm pursuing a double degree, but i'll be student teaching this fall and writing my thesis on olivier messiaen this spring. allen and i have rented a lovely and picaresque abode uptown, and it's perfect for us. the nearby park will hold many picnics and after-school-or-work walks.
life is moving ahead at a rapid pace, but i am still me, and allen and i are about to become a "we." |
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Read 3 - Post |
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| 07:26pm 18/07/2007 |
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mood:  content
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today i took a shift at work to do alumni research, which consisted of thumbing through ancient yearbooks and trying to figure out who was in marching band, then figuring out if that person was still alive according to their alumni ID,and if they are potential candidates for the marching band campaign in the fall. it was really fun. is it just me or do people in old photographs at school always seem like they're having a huge blast all the time? people at the music school, for example, were constantly grinning and looking so full of camraderie. it made me want to jump in and join in the fun. they even had a home economics club.
i'm getting ready for montana---extremely excited, but a bit apprehensive about the bears. i do, however, intend to safely gaze upon a moose. |
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| long time no post |
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| 08:38pm 15/07/2007 |
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i have recently returned from a glorious trip to ireland. the tea was highly memorable as far as items of consumption go, but the most memorable aspect for me was the terrain. it was really something to be atop mountains in county kerry and county cork (ciarri and corcaigh, as they spell it there), and to see sheep gently sharing their hillsides with me. the weather i can still feel if i close my eyes...the air was very damp (so that my clarinet reeds held WAY too much moisture), and the sun shone gently, but there was a constant breeze. it never exceeded sixty degrees,and never dipped below fifty.
another memorable aspect for me was the music, and the frequency of it. there was live traditional music everywhere, and every night. i will learn the accordion yet.
i now have a hiatus of just over one week until my sister's wedding, so i'm spending a bit of time in louisville to get my apartment in order and work a couple of shifts and spend time with allen, then heading to cinci to catch up with people i haven't seen in ages, and to prepare for the wedding and visit the llama farm. the day after annie's wedding, i depart on a train to montana, with allen. we will ride a train across the USA, and view various things, and then arrive at glacier national park. we will hopefully see wildlife there, and hopefully no bears at a close distance. we will hike. when i return, it's pretty much time for school.
oh, life! regards to all. |
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| sound journaling |
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| 01:34am 22/04/2007 |
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mood:  pensive
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i've recently been interested in starting up a practice that is common among composers. i'd like to start keeping a Sound Journal, recording and reflecting upon the many sounds i hear in each day.
already my ears have become so much more open.
have you ever tried listening intently to the plethora of sounds in your environment? the whole world is musical. |
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| KIB |
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| 06:12pm 07/02/2007 |
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mood: contemplative
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there's nothing like being in one of those bands that rehearses for 14 hours in two days and then puts a concert together on the second day to make me realize that in fact i am not burned out on clarinet. i absolutely love clarinet.
i'm going to the gym tonight to decrease stress level.
i still love playing clarinet, but i may be getting burned out on going to classes all the time. this semester is too loaded with class.
i'd like to take an internship for a semester and come back afterward. or i'd like to go ahead and student teach.
however, this is not possible.
oh well. |
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| dream |
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| 12:35pm 26/12/2006 |
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mood:  awake
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i had a lucid dream last night about great-grandpa. he was sitting in a chair in my grandma's living room and talking to us. he kept asking me about current events in my life, like school and allen and music. it didn't occur to me that he's been dead for a while now, because i was enjoying the conversation. but then allen walked into the room in swimming trunks and i said, "hey, you should meet my great grandpa. he's wanted to meet you for ages." and allen shook his hand and then looked at me and said, "i thought he was dead." and i stopped for a minute, and said, "oh...yeah, i thought he was too." that was the point when i realized i was in a dream. then i went upstairs and was in some kind of medical school seminar with melissa. we were supposed to be doing some sort of liver transplant, but i knew secretly that i hadn't done any homework for ages and that i was really unqualified to be involved in such a procedure. my professor was angry with me. i then pulled her aside and asked if i could be excused from the assignment (i started crying) because my great grandpa was sitting downstairs and i wanted to spend as much time with him as possible. she said, "let's go down and see how he's doing." he was having trouble walking, and melissa recommended cpr, which she knew how to administer. i picked up grandpa and set him on the floor on his back. he was laughing. this is all i remember. |
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| thoughts |
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| 01:30am 26/12/2006 |
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mood:  satisfied music: get your kicks on route 66
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it was a lovely christmastide.
an urge to travel around america grips me. i have 12 remaining days of this winter break, which is excellent, but i have no plans whatsoever. this is okay with me. i'd like to read and practice a lot, maybe exercise a little bit, spend some afternoons at grandma's, maybe get a new hairdo. we'll see. the second i call a bunch of people, the break will be instantly filled with engagements, so i may lie low for a few days and then call the people that i haven't seen in ages and arrange coffees and gatherings. i am content, however, though i wish i was with allen.
i wonder if there is a good summer job that will still hire me if they find out that i will need the entire month of july off, for the ireland trip and for annie's wedding and related festivities.
if not, there will always be phonathon.
there will never again be YKP. ::shudder::
it's a bit cold in the basement here, and i'm tired but not enough to sleep. emily is watching Cars, which is actually a very cute movie, though i didn't like the cover.
allen gave me these silent Oz films from the 1900s, which were written and directed by L Frank Baum, who wrote the original Oz series which sweetened my childhood. i may watch The Patchwork Girl of Oz after emily is finished with this movie.
i think that i should write either short stories, a memoir, or satirical essays, or scholarly essays, or poetry. basically anything. this plan is still up in the air. more details to follow. for now i will depart, and with a grateful glance at those who believe i should continue this writing endeavor. merry solstice to all. |
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Read 3 - Post |
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| perhaps |
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| 10:13pm 16/12/2006 |
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mood: calm music: what child is this?
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i think i will close this journal in the near future. this is not a negative thing, but it is simply a moving onward. i will continue to write, but in paper form. i am still not taking any action, though. if anyone can convince me to keep the journal open, i will do so gladly. if not, i will simply close its records and recall a time when i wrote virtually, to a public audience. |
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Read 2 - Post |
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| to the celebratory sounds of tchaikovksy violin concerto: |
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| 09:19pm 08/12/2006 |
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mood: calm
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today is the Immaculate Conception. after church this evening i got a little lost downtown and ended up at a christmas-tree sale. i was unscathed and in good spirits i sat down to a bowl of soup while i listen to this violin concerto. next semester i will be part of the accompaniment, by the way, as i am now a part of orchestra again.
many things have been learned this semester. i won't waste time with all of them.
mainly, i am happy but can be extremely high-stress sometimes. my goal is to have no more panic attacks because of school again. i am no longer able to pull an all-nighter; i guess i used that skill up when i was still in high school. this, however, is okay. and i mustn't worry so much about money and how i will be able to pay for this and that. whatever, it will work itself out somehow, right? that's what mom always tells me: that finances will just sort of "happen" to work out, even if you have some serious doubts, which i in fact do at times. on this note i will mention that i have a paying gig (not much, but still) at calvary episcopal church, on the first two sundays of each month. the pay is excellent, but it's not enough to be exclusively income. mostly, this is fun and it forces me to play on weekends, which i need to do all the time, and i must not let my clarinet be wavering, as it was sometimes this past semester.
this violin concerto is amazingly vocal. wow, i love it.
i am so in love with allen. he not only keeps me sane when i am departing from earth, but he makes each day very special. i can't wait for everything we have ahead; it will be wonderful.
i might be retiring from livejournal. updates haven't been frequent, anyway, even during times of pathos. more on this later, i guess. in general. i have to go. |
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| song cycles |
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| 12:50am 19/10/2006 |
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mood:  brooding music: schumann
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wow. i didn't realize how crazily passionate and profound the songs of schubert and schumann are. they are very different in their approaches; schumann is more Romantic. i just finished listening to the Dichterliebe cycle, and sometimes it's so sad that i was seriously sitting here sniffling. i'm glad everyone else in the house is sleeping.
if you are looking for a catharsis, listen to schubert songs (die schoene muellerin) or schumann (dichterliebe) with copies of the texts in front of you, and i guarantee a catharsis or your money back. |
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| minor third |
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| 03:34pm 16/10/2006 |
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mood: calm
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i do so enjoy the rain
even today, when i forgot my umbrella
it wasn't too cold
and that made it good
i was informed today that i'm not allowed to student teach at a private (catholic was what i was hoping for) school. kentucky wants all of it teachers to be trained and STATE certified, not archdiocese certified. boo, i don't really want to teach in a public school for a whole year. this means i need to do major research and find out which schools are GOOD public schools (such as indian hill), so i can be aggressive and request WAAAY in advance which school i would like. otherwise i can just see it---i'll end up in a place like YKP from the summer, and i'll get a disease (like this past summer) or get shot, and get entirely fed up with the teaching profession and become unhappy and undecided about my life again. that would be an utmost inconvenience, because i'm quite satisfied with music ed at this time, and for perhaps the first time in my entire U of L experience.
i need to finalize my paper NOW, because i have a meeting with Dr. Ong tomorrow and i must appear to know what i'm talking about so i can get feedback and figure out where i'm going to go from here. |
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| one year |
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| 03:33pm 14/10/2006 |
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mood: happy
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today is the landmark date of bernheim forest. it is now one year since i began dating allen. this has been a wonderful year, and i'm so happy to return to bernheim this afternoon for another hike. |
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| obsolete? |
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| 09:03pm 13/10/2006 |
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in many ways, i wonder why i still keep this livejournal. can anyone answer that for me?
i don't believe that writing is obsolete at all, but in some ways there hasn't been the need for it in about a year. the NEED is what i'm talking about here. writing for me has not always been just a habit, but it has been a driving and daily element for survival, for rather long periods of my life. i feel that it is important to hold on to these things: the records of periods of less sanity, the poems, even the mundane. and perhaps that is why i still hang on to this virtual account. |
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| prosciutto and tapenade |
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| 03:37pm 11/10/2006 |
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recently i've learned that i have an inner pathos that is capable of being set off by a number of external factors such as schoolwork. basically, anything that generates an excessive amount of stress is potential pathos-triggering. the pathos is always temporary, but the temporality of it depends on the severity of the external factor that sets it off in the first place. i've learned that this is me, and this is okay, and i must take more things with a grain of salt.
what does all of this mean?
in short, when i get overworked and thus overstressed, i worry about things so much that i don't digest my food properly, which promotes even more worry and sets off an anxious cycle of inner pathos.
the end. |
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| blah |
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| 03:17pm 19/09/2006 |
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mood:  bitchy
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wretched wretched disease.
this illness must end NOW.
they gave me sleeping pills, though, so i won't be up for 3 nights in a row again.
why can't i just go about playing musical instruments and being joyful, as the semester is supposed to be? |
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| infections, academics, music, night life, et al |
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| 08:17pm 17/09/2006 |
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mood: awake music: merry wives of windsor
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it's unfortunately sunday night, and i wish it was friday night.
many things have happened recently, most of them unpleasant, unfortunately.
i'm recovering from a parasitic infection in my G-I tract. yes, folks, that means parasites, and that means they were alive, eating away at my insides and giving me a gigantic trauma.
i discovered this when certain symptoms appeared, and i did some hefty online research (wikipedia) and then decided that this couldnt be what i had. the following day, certain OBVIOUS symptoms appeared, certain living symptoms, which upset me greatly. i went to the doctor the following day, but i didn't sleep for two days, knowing that wormlike creatures were inside of me, feeling them move around, and wishing i was generally dead. i might add that allen helped me through the whole ordeal, even though it was 4am when the initial confirmation of said beasts came to light.
now i'm hopefully recovering, having taken the "peach flavored" pill to cleanse my innards, and i'm chowing down on prunes and all-bran plus fiber to help this process. i'm sleeping again, and the symptoms are basically gone. i really hope this never happens again, because there were times when i think a tranquilizer was needed to prevent me from having a panic attack.
onto the weekend...
the phi mu alpha guys had their "ultimate sha-bash," which i attended. however, they placed an X on my hand, and i wasn't allowed to drink at this one, and they DID NOT HAVE SNACKS. i mean, why throw a party if you dont have snacks? but it was alright. too many people in too small a space.
allen and i went to this party on saturday night for his brother's wedding "stocking of the bar." that was more fun, but i didnt know most of the people.
monica took the roommates out to olive garden for brunch, and that was yummy and fun. monday night is apparently "girl's night." we're painting our nails and stuff. woo woo.
i need to clean up my room.
and do homework.
i'm in the process of making reeds for a renaissance double reed instrument: the treble shawm. this is THE precursor to the oboe, and i can't wait to play it.
school is fine. |
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| school and such |
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| 01:31pm 02/09/2006 |
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mood:  creative
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two little sausages
sitting in a pan
one went "sizzle!"
the other went "bam!"
i'm using this poem as the framework for my first lesson plan of the year. children will demonstrate how to keep a steady beat and assign kodaly rhythm notation to the poem, as well as accompany the poem with instruments and write new words to replace the last word of each line.
the semester has started off well. i love allen so much. my courseload is considerably lighter than expected, but awfully kinesthetic. seriously, this is the most kinesthetic any semester has ever been. i'm learning the following instruments:
-bassoon
-viola
-trumpet
-tenor recorder
my classes are woodwind methods, string methods, brass methods, music lit 3, analysis 1, historical instruments, elementary school music methods, conducting 1, and wind ensemble. and clarinet lessons, of course.
that's all for now. |
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shell7opus's journal