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Saturday, April 26, 2003 Incoherent Thoughts A small handful of thoughts today, as I sit in the computer lab working on my application for France and finishing projects for Performing Arts Management--what makes this all the more interesting is that I'm leaving for a week in the UP with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship (in other words, don't expect any posts for the next week) around 11am: James is awesome. I came home today to find that he'd sent me a box of Godiva truffles in the mail (!!!); for the first few minutes I couldn't figure out who would send me a package from 1-800-FLOWERS. Then I saw the chocolate and the thought suddenly occurred to me that I'd been joking about truffles on the phone with James a couple of days ago... but then I thought, no way, that couldn't possibly be it. (Some background: James is "the boy I'm going to marry," Tait is "the boyfriend," and Sam is "the boy on the side"-- these have been a running joke for the last few weeks, all guys involved with 417 Lloyd, West Quad.) Anyway, in that aforementioned phone conversation I was joking that in the "contest" between Tait and James for my affections the winner would be determined by who bought me the best chocolate. So when I got the note that came with the truffles and found out James had sent it I laughed. That was probably the best part of the day. :-) Tait is the best housemate ever. He's been cleaning--the upstairs kitchen hasn't been this clean since October and we've never bothered to work on the yard--since he moved in on Wednesday, to the joy of the three "clean" roommates. Yay! Computers hate me. Not only has my computer died--completely--but so did Tait's, which I was using on-and-off for a while (though he got a new monitor, so once he sets everything up it should be good... for now). Not to mention that whole incident before the Hopwood Award deadline in February and the number of times the computers have crashed in the time I've been in the lab tonight.... Who's posting the comments without leaving a name or email? I have my guesses, but they're just that. Whomever you are, I'll make it a point to read Hebrews while I'm at Cedar Campus this week. And finally, something of minor substance, an excerpt from the "personal sketch" I had to write for the Paris application: "Well, I’m atypical for an Asian—my majors should be the first clue, not to mention that I nearly tacked on a subconcentration in creative writing and a minor in French, which I’ve been studying since my sophomore year of high school—one of the first things people usually notice about me is my creativity. I’m a singer-songwriter and play the piano, flute, guitar, and xylophone—some instruments better than others, obviously—and have been involved with music since I was five. For that matter, I’ve also been writing poetry and stories and acting since elementary school, perhaps even before. Yet at the same time I’m a science fiction geek and played endless rounds of video games through elementary school and junior high, which, when seen in conjunction with other aspects of my personality and interests, makes me, as one of my friends puts it, ‘half boy,’ or at least an atypical girl. My organizational skills and leadership have led to the formation of a number of groups over the years, most amusing, now that I look back, like a video game club in junior high called the Game Masters—I was, of course, the only girl since most girls thought they were boring—that produced a newsletter and annual bake sale—as one would suspect, the goods we made were bought mostly by grandparents. However, during my time in college I’ve been involved in the planning of many events, such as the Good Friday Rally and UWorship, campus-wide gatherings involving, at their peak, 1200 people, and a theatre company that aimed to unite faith, truth, and art called Thunder’s Whisper that I founded my second year at the university.... All of these seem to provide a natural progression to my future plans. I love working with people, art, and performing, so it makes sense that I want to make a living as a singer-songwriter. (Yeah, I know, there’s no money in it. But there’s passion.) I’m graduating and my focus for the next year is not on a career but working on my music—selling a CD that will hopefully be finished this spring and starting to tour—and writing fiction, as well as forming and deepening the relationships that I’ll have with my housemates. After that I plan to move to New York, possibly Boston or a similar city, doing arts management (I’ve spent four years in an internship with the University Musical Society presenting classical music, jazz, dance, theatre, and world music and did a short booking internship with a singer-songwriter based in Toronto) and continuing to work toward making a living on my own artistic skills." Well kids, it's time to get back to work. See you in a week, when I'll be sure to post some of the thoughts/retrospectives on the time I've had at U-M that have been running through my brain. ^ Top | 2:58 AM | | | Wednesday, April 23, 2003 The song I wrote a couple of hours ago: Give Up on Me Words and Music by Dawn Xiana Moon It's a sunny afternoon but my house is cold today I can see the clouds, they're dancing on the roof but I can't dance that way Spent 21 years struggling with the same things Each step forward sends me running back Resolutions made and broken, promises are spoken Why am I so afraid to fail? Perfection plays the rally cry Will you lift me up or am I condemned to die But you said you'd never give up on me Even if I do myself You said you'd never give up on me Even if I do myself Walking through the crowds I paint this portrait of invincibility Though I hate the shades; the colors scream too loud, I'll hide the insecurity ^ Top | 7:01 PM | | | Tuesday, April 22, 2003 I've been told--and I wholeheartedly agree--that posting articles on a blog is cheating; however, this is definitely worth spreading around (not to mention that I'm feeling particularly lazy right now) so here you go. Discovered first on Dean's blog: The News We Kept to Ourselves By Eason Jordan From the New York Times. ATLANTA — Over the last dozen years I made 13 trips to Baghdad to lobby the government to keep CNN's Baghdad bureau open and to arrange interviews with Iraqi leaders. Each time I visited, I became more distressed by what I saw and heard — awful things that could not be reported because doing so would have jeopardized the lives of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad staff. For example, in the mid-1990's one of our Iraqi cameramen was abducted. For weeks he was beaten and subjected to electroshock torture in the basement of a secret police headquarters because he refused to confirm the government's ludicrous suspicion that I was the Central Intelligence Agency's Iraq station chief. CNN had been in Baghdad long enough to know that telling the world about the torture of one of its employees would almost certainly have gotten him killed and put his family and co-workers at grave risk. Working for a foreign news organization provided Iraqi citizens no protection. The secret police terrorized Iraqis working for international press services who were courageous enough to try to provide accurate reporting. Some vanished, never to be heard from again. Others disappeared and then surfaced later with whispered tales of being hauled off and tortured in unimaginable ways. Obviously, other news organizations were in the same bind we were when it came to reporting on their own workers. We also had to worry that our reporting might endanger Iraqis not on our payroll. I knew that CNN could not report that Saddam Hussein's eldest son, Uday, told me in 1995 that he intended to assassinate two of his brothers-in-law who had defected and also the man giving them asylum, King Hussein of Jordan. If we had gone with the story, I was sure he would have responded by killing the Iraqi translator who was the only other participant in the meeting. After all, secret police thugs brutalized even senior officials of the Information Ministry, just to keep them in line (one such official has long been missing all his fingernails). Still, I felt I had a moral obligation to warn Jordan's monarch, and I did so the next day. King Hussein dismissed the threat as a madman's rant. A few months later Uday lured the brothers-in-law back to Baghdad; they were soon killed. I came to know several Iraqi officials well enough that they confided in me that Saddam Hussein was a maniac who had to be removed. One Foreign Ministry officer told me of a colleague who, finding out his brother had been executed by the regime, was forced, as a test of loyalty, to write a letter of congratulations on the act to Saddam Hussein. An aide to Uday once told me why he had no front teeth: henchmen had ripped them out with pliers and told him never to wear dentures, so he would always remember the price to be paid for upsetting his boss. Again, we could not broadcast anything these men said to us. Last December, when I told Information Minister Muhammad Said al-Sahhaf that we intended to send reporters to Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq, he warned me they would "suffer the severest possible consequences." CNN went ahead, and in March, Kurdish officials presented us with evidence that they had thwarted an armed attack on our quarters in Erbil. This included videotaped confessions of two men identifying themselves as Iraqi intelligence agents who said their bosses in Baghdad told them the hotel actually housed C.I.A. and Israeli agents. The Kurds offered to let us interview the suspects on camera, but we refused, for fear of endangering our staff in Baghdad. Then there were the events that were not unreported but that nonetheless still haunt me. A 31-year-old Kuwaiti woman, Asrar Qabandi, was captured by Iraqi secret police occupying her country in 1990 for "crimes," one of which included speaking with CNN on the phone. They beat her daily for two months, forcing her father to watch. In January 1991, on the eve of the American-led offensive, they smashed her skull and tore her body apart limb by limb. A plastic bag containing her body parts was left on the doorstep of her family's home. I felt awful having these stories bottled up inside me. Now that Saddam Hussein's regime is gone, I suspect we will hear many, many more gut-wrenching tales from Iraqis about the decades of torment. At last, these stories can be told freely. Eason Jordan is chief news executive at CNN. ^ Top | 5:14 PM | | | Sunday, April 20, 2003 Words and music by yours truly... we can celebrate Easter because Christ died and didn't stay in the grave, but rose again. And that death was due to his unending love. I play this song sometimes as a reminder to myself; it's too easy to say, "Jesus loves you" without stopping to think about what that love means. Just to Be by Your Side Just to be by your side I'd conquer death, I'd move every mountain in the way Just to be by your side I'd seek you out, even though you wander away When your world is crumbling down I'll pick up the ashes When your heart is feeling cold I'll be your fire When you're crying on your knees I'll be your peace When you're betrayed by a friend I'll hold you in my arms Don't you know I love you, my child Don't you know I cry with you when you fall ^ Top | 5:42 PM | | | Saturday, April 19, 2003 One of my favorite quotes: "I am trying to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: 'I am ready to accept Jesus as the great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God.' That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic--on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg--or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to." --CS Lewis, Mere Christianity ^ Top | 8:22 PM | | | Friday, April 18, 2003 Meditations on Good Friday This day exists to celebrate the death of a man born 2000 years ago. Seems odd, doesn't it? Odd first to celebrate a death, odd second to celebrate an event 2000 years ago. But the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, or Yeshua as they like to call him in Hebrew, still remains relevant today; it's at the very core of everything I stand for, of everything that millions of Christians through the years have lived and died for. But why? Because if he was who he said he was--that is, God himself--then thanks to even my "little" sins--lying, pride, selfishness--seemingly minor things that we forget we face every day--I owe him my life. This is less of an "escape clause" from hell, which I do believe is very real, than the knowledge that by facing the most gruesome sort of death imaginable--a death he did not have to face but did because he loved me--he has paid my debt, taken my punishment, and allowed me to have a real relationship with him. Those seemingly minor sins are what put him on the cross. He did not just die for "bad people"; he died for you and me, with all the things we like to hide so we can present a perfect front to the world. And yet I still fail, I still fall. But it is the constant struggle to deepen that relationship, to become the person he sees I can be, to fulfill that potential, that makes the Christian faith a challenge and a lesson in forgiveness and trust. So last night and this morning as I prepared for the Good Friday Rally, and while I was there, I was thinking about both my many failings and insecurities and what Christ offers in return. I put him on that cross. It's a crazy thought, but that makes it no less true. And he gives me love instead of judgment, a love deeper than I'll find anywhere else, a love that's unconditional. Though so often I push him aside and think that I'm too busy to spend time with him, so often I make the same mistakes, never able to break old habits. But he will never give up on me. So I guess I shouldn't either. I'm not in the habit of posting song lyrics written by others on here, but this seems appropriate for today. Worlds Apart by Dan Haseltine/Jars of Clay I am the only one to blame for this Somehow it all ends up the same Soaring on the wings of selfish pride I flew too high and like Icarus I collide With a world I try so hard to leave behind To rid myself of all but love To give and die To turn away and not become Another nail to pierce the skin of one who loves More deeply than the oceans, More abundant than the tears Of a world embracing every heartache Can I be the one to sacrifice Or grip the spear and watch the blood and water flow To love you--take my world apart To need you--I am on my knees To love you--take my world apart To need you--broken on my knees All said and done I stand alone Amongst remains of a life I should not own It takes all I am to believe In the mercy that covers me Did you really have to die for me? All I am for all you are Because what I need and what I believe are worlds apart I look beyond the empty cross Forgetting what my life has cost And wipe away the crimson stains And dull the nails that still remain More and more I need you now, I owe you more each passing hour The battle between grace and pride I gave up not so long ago So steal my heart and take the pain And wash the feet and cleanse my pride Take the selfish, take the weak, And all the things I cannot hide Take the beauty, take my tears The sin-soaked heart and make it yours Take my world apart Take it now, take it now And serve the ones that I despise Speak the words I can't deny Watch the world I used to love Fall to dust and thrown away I look beyond the empty cross Forgetting what my life has cost So wipe away the crimson stains And dull the nails that still remain So steal my heart and take the pain Take the selfish, take the weak And all the things I cannot hide Take the beauty, take my tears Take my world apart, take my world apart I pray, I pray, I pray Worlds apart ^ Top | 4:34 PM | | | Thursday, April 17, 2003 Wow, I'm done!!!! No, I'm not done with everything for this term yet since I still have some finals and projects and papers, but barring some bizarre instance of failing a necessary class, I'll never have to sit through lectures again (since I'm not planning on grad school)! Amazing. In my creative writing class yesterday, all of the seniors (everyone except for three juniors) passed post-graduation plans around the conference table: three were going to Chicago and three (including myself) were staying in Ann Arbor next year. The funny part is that none of us who are staying have jobs yet... two of us--myself and a girl named Sharon who is also going to be in town next year--are planning to travel this summer, she to California and me to Paris and possibly Singapore. If everything works out, I'll be in Paris for six weeks working with a church and French students from the end of May and then teaching summer theatre classes when I get back. We'll see how everything goes. For now, you can get ready for Good Friday tomorrow--I'm MC-ing the annual Good Friday Rally at the Cube (12-1pm)... more thoughts on the Easter season later. ^ Top | 4:29 PM | | | Wednesday, April 16, 2003 A short response written for my creative writing class.... A Response Long in Coming This readings response has been a long time in coming; I went to the Hopwood Undergraduate Awards Ceremony back in January to hear Rick Moody. The ceremony strengthened my determination to win a Hopwood—though thanks to the crashing computers in Angell Hall on the deadline that’s not going to happen—and listening to Moody was inspiring. I noticed some of his techniques and have since tried to incorporate some of them into my own writing. He often used repetition, as in a story that repeated a phrase about “boys who…” in almost every sentence, together creating a complete short story traveling from childhood to adulthood, and implied a great deal more than was ever explicitly said. He also drew ideas and style from the Bible, a technique I plan to use at some point soon, and paid attention to minute details that gave his scenes depth and life; I tend to struggle with details and have to work extra hard in order to find descriptions that don’t sound cliché. Going back to the kind of observations I mentioned in my response to the Jonis Agee reading, observations an actor makes, I noticed that Moody reads slowly so individual words have an impact, with the same lilt that many poets seem to prefer. His style, while decidedly untheatrical, was engaging—though it probably helped that he had a quiet, captive audience. At any rate, I enjoyed the reading and will continue playing with elements of his style. ^ Top | 8:46 AM | | | Tuesday, April 15, 2003 A Piece of Micro Fiction More creative stuff... thus far it doesn't have a title, so if you have ideas let me know. :-) It begins because you long for acceptance, then companionship, then affection, then love, and then you realize one day that you’ve been trying to satisfy a need your young voice never recognized was there, a bitter beehive you can’t sweeten with one-night stands and we’ve-been-dating-for-months-so-it’s-about-times that just make the honey worse, because dry mornings when they’re gone you sit enveloped in the bareness of your room wondering if there isn’t more to love then sweaty palms and parted mouths because isn’t this supposed to be deeper than the physical—you’re shriveled like an apple but don’t know how, you don’t want to turn away, even that one time in the bathroom of that restaurant and now you joke and laugh that you were so drunk but somehow you know you’ve given another piece of soul away but hey, it’s ok to have a little fun and you say that’s all you want but when the vodka clears you chew again on day-old conversations in the kitchen; Josh said God is love but is his different, unconditional? ^ Top | 1:35 AM | | | Monday, April 14, 2003 Yay for Finals We are now in the midst of the worst part of the year: finals. I know finals are supposed to start on Friday, but of most of my work is due on or before Wednesday (I'm sure all of you fellow college students can sympathize): everything (and believe me, there's a ridiculous amount of stuff) for my creative writing class, two finals, and two projects. If only I hadn't spent the weekend salsa dancing, swing dancing, watching Braveheart for the zillionth time, and generally hanging out with people... I didn't get much work done--though if I'd realized just how much was due on Wednesday I would have thought twice but socializing--but I guess that's the stuff that makes life worth living... (heh). Sam's cartoon for the Michigan Daily that will run today (I think) features a sad-looking U-M student sitting at his computer; though it's sunny and people are playing outside, he's got a storm cloud over his head labeled "finals." [/whining] The violins are officially being put away... there are definitely people who have it worse. Right? ^ Top | 3:15 AM | | | Friday, April 11, 2003 Finally! Thanks to some help from Tait (thanks!!), DawnXianaMoon.com is finally up! It still needs work--for example, it lacks music clips--but I'm happy to say that all of the text is there. Randomness will be moving there shortly and I'll also have pictures and the music samples up soon, hopefully in the next week. And I finally learned how to use WS_FTP (as though it's that hard... I know, I know, I'm just a slacker). Anyway, take a look. :-) ^ Top | 2:46 AM | | | Bills Now, I haven't verified the truth of this, but it's pretty funny.... Taken from Newscientist.com: IN THESE days of computer billing, it's not unusual to receive a phone bill for a small amount of money. It's probably not even that unusual for phone bills to be sent out to people who have died. Even so, it seems strange that US phone company Sprint recently managed to send a bill for 12 cents to David Towles, who died in 1997, and correctly addressed it to Towles's new residence, the Hillside Cemetery, Evergreen Section, Auburn, Massachusetts 01501. Sprint was unable to explain how the bill had come to be addressed to the correct section of the cemetery plot, or how Towles had apparently managed to make a call from beyond the grave; one call had been placed on 16 February this year, five years after his death. But perhaps dying is like being arrested and you're allowed to make one phone call, suggests reader Bodhipaksa, who spotted this snippet in The Boston Globe. ^ Top | 1:16 AM | | | Wednesday, April 09, 2003 Split Personality This is probably the first time I've had a tie for type on a personality test. I guess this means I have multiple personality disorder, especially since one says I'm pragmatic and the other says I'm idealistic. :-) free enneagram test The Rational, Idealistic Type: Principled, Purposeful, Self-Controlled, and Perfectionistic (The Obsessive-Compulsive and Depressive Personality Disorders) Basic Fear: Of being corrupt/evil, defective Basic Desire: To be good, to have integrity, to be balanced Healthy: Conscientious with strong personal convictions: they have an intense sense of right and wrong, personal religious and moral values. Wish to be rational, reasonable, self-disciplined, mature, moderate in all things. / Extremely principled, always want to be fair, objective, and ethical: truth and justice primary values. Sense of responsibility, personal integrity, and of having a higher purpose often make them teachers and witnesses to the truth. At Their Best: Become extraordinarily wise and discerning. By accepting what is, they become transcendentally realistic, knowing the best action to take in each moment. Humane, inspiring, and hopeful: the truth will be heard. free enneagram test The Success-Oriented, Pragmatic Type: Adaptable, Excelling, Driven, and Image-Conscious (The Narcissistic Personality Disorder) Basic Fear: Of being worthless Basic Desire: To feel valuable and worthwhile Healthy: Self-assured, energetic, and competent with high self-esteem: they believe in themselves and their own value. Adaptable, desirable, charming, and gracious. / Ambitious to improve themselves, to be "the best they can be" — often become outstanding, a human ideal, embodying widely admired cultural qualities. Highly effective: others are motivated to be like them in some positive way. At Their Best: Self-accepting, inner-directed, and authentic, everything they seem to be. Modest and charitable, self-deprecatory humor and a fullness of heart emerge. Gentle and benevolent. ^ Top | 12:20 AM | | | Sunday, April 06, 2003 An Excerpt Another vignette--as it stands at the moment, anyway--from the story I've been working on: Alyssa stared past the beginnings of the novel in her hand, past the black type and red pen-lines, past the dog-eared pages and into the realm of recent memory. Why do I seem bent on self-destruction? Alyssa could enter the thoughts of women hundreds of years removed from her darkened room but she couldn’t understand herself. She’d hidden her depression for months, but when Kadin finally figured out what was going on he tried to convince her to see a psychiatrist. Why are you so against this? Why am I so against this? The pages faded and she scrutinized the piece of embroidered satin that functioned as her curtain. At least you’ll know if there’s a biological or chemical reason. She denied the possibility. Yet deep inside she wondered, and had been wondering for the last year. She would never tell him that. Kadin was so persistent—he really wanted her to consider it. She grimaced. We probably stood at the door for a half hour arguing the point. You’re blowing this off. Of course she was; how did he expect her to react? It wasn’t even shame but rather pride or a strange form of self-reliance that prevented her from letting him in. To a fault? Or maybe something else… she couldn’t put her finger on what bothered her exactly, but she gave the illusion of nonchalance. In fact, she took Kadin far more seriously than she would admit; she pretended that he was bordering on annoying, but inside Alyssa was comforted that he cared. It means so much. Thank you. ^ Top | 11:57 PM | | | On Dancing and Sleep Deprivation For the last couple of days, Tait's actually beat me (for the first time ever!) in blog updates; while he usually updates once every two weeks and I every two days, he's managed to post three times in the last three days. The stinker. [makes a face] I'm a "professional open mic player," according to Rob Chesnick; if he hasn't hit professional status yet himself I'm sure he will soon.
The best translation that Tait could come up with for the Latin wording on the cover of the Riverside Milton: "Foemina, a bad jaw from the Devil is worse by a pound." And on to more interesting topics, something you'd actually (possibly) want to read... dancing. I figure that in the last two weeks I've spent around 20 hours dancing, mostly swing and salsa. I was at an amazing event last night sponsored by MSalsa, Arts at Michigan, and Hillel (seems like an unlikely combination, doesn't it?): Salsa con Chutzpah, i.e. a few hours of salsa and Israeli dancing. What I learned last night is that salsa's origins are arguably in New York from a mixture of black, Hispanic, and Jewish roots, and there's apparently a sizable community of people who are part Jewish and part Latino. For example, one woman said that for Thanksgiving they'd have black beans, rice, and enchiladas (or something similar--I can't think of the actual dish right now, running on no sleep... darn insomnia) with chicken instead of pork. Brings a new spin to the cliche of "melting pot," doesn't it? ^ Top | 7:05 PM | | | Thursday, April 03, 2003 Songs I'm Supposed to Write 1. Requiem for a Wookie (for Derek and Rachel) 2. Requiem for a TI-83+ (for Derek) 3. I'm Not a Man, I'm a God (for James) 4. My Dear, Sweet Sugar Doughnut (for Tait) Lyrics suggestions are welcomed. :-) ^ Top | 10:44 PM | | | Tuesday, April 01, 2003 Fiction and Theatrics I realized something when I went to Jonis Agee’s reading at Shaman Drum on Friday: how an author reads aloud is almost more important than what is being read. This, of course, could be taken with a grain of salt coming from an actress and (English and) theatre major, but as I watched Agee standing behind a tall table-turned-podium holding a copy of her collection of short stories, I just couldn’t concentrate, dripping from the onslaught of spring rain that I’d just run though. Not that she was that bad of a reader; she just wasn’t an actress. Since her words didn’t immediately strike me as particularly noteworthy, my mind allowed itself to run in frazzled circles, trying to catch its breath—I’d played a short set of music in singer-songwriter style at an Arts at Michigan event right before dashing into the rain to make it to the bookstore on time—and wondered what Agee’s reading would have been like were she a theatrical type. What if she hadn’t limited herself to leaning on the table, book bent in half as she stared intently at the pages? Or if she’d maintained her position but spoken with more conviction, more emotion? A reading is more than a mere glance through the pages of selected work; it is a performance. Most poets have discovered this. A fair amount of prose is workable dramatic material; when I was in high school competing in prose interpretation for forensics I myself learned to see the theatrical possibilities of non-theatrical works. If only more authors would. ^ Top | 1:24 PM | | |
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