word-Y! jana, you're blog has no pictures

[original title was "i know this first sentence sounds cliche"]

the new title is comment said by my siblings. it's true and i feel i should apologize before pouring another bucket on the heap. I'm working on posting pictures and shorter entries. i need to appeal to my readership.

reading, more than anything, makes me want to write.

this sounds like a very simple formula, but i am always astonished by it. and let me clarify - it isn't while i'm reading that i feel i should write. it is how the reading has given me new lenses in which to look through that i see the world in the color, in the texture, in the word-choices of the current author in my texts and i can finally visualize what I see, but in their words.

i am inclined to write, partly to acknowledge what these writers have ignited in me and partly to see if i can do that cool stuff with words too, ha! that is why everyone should read - a lot. after all, you are what you read and i'm seeing that become realized in the way my thoughts are shadows of the words streamed into my mind by the most recent bits of a novel i've been reading from. i am sometimes just too lazy and therefore i keep my blinders on when i don't make time to read - only seeing the world in the limited spectrum of my own experience, a dull two-tone. but thanks to dr. cronin, who scared me into reading constantly, i have been able to get into quite a bad habit of reading - even and especially when i shouldn't be.

like, what are YOU supposed to be doing now? you are reading this blog post, but you've got a lot of other things to do, don't you. well, now you'll be looking at those tasks ahead of you through a glass pieced together by this blogspot (which hopefully doesn't hinder your ability to see in lyrical and rhetorical ways, but helps you recognize them - for i do see my great weakness in writing) combined with the article from the New York Times you read, the nutrition label you perused during breakfast this morning, the bus schedule you squinted to read, the billboard you whizzed by, your dose of scripture, and the cookbook recipe you attempted to memorize, not missing any nuance. You'll be seeing how the lightposts look amazingly like asparagus, or acknowledge the Mosiah during your lunch break, the fat content of the current political campaign, or the efficiency in the route and the many stops the garbage man took today. These words will now build the next few hours of your perception, until, that is, you encounter the next fated author's contribution in your path - a frozen dinner coupon, a Russian literature anthology, gmail, and the lyrics of your favorite U2 song... ahhh, the striking resemblance provo has to the city of blinding lights.

it's all the words you put it to; the lyrics to the great dance of life; your world is thus created.

is it not written, "In the beginning was the Word"?

ひさしぶり

it had been a long time since i sat at the window with the mere intent to just look at the sky. this time, it was gray-white, pale and pregnant with the not yet visible snow that would eventually come and powder the street below and gust past the street light. the mere objective of sitting there at the window just to look and be made me feel somewhat old. i was in a place where time was long and connected. i was like a giant sea turtle surfacing ever so slightly to see the warm vast sea surrounding it. so much there, yet everywhere you look, relentlessly the same. every corner containing so many possibilities, every crease in the thick, rolling waves; yet, all these things rolling towards some type of oneness eventually - the next wave inheriting its neighbor in its own folds and another indiscernible and identical to the one that had come from a mile away. i thought of if i would do this ten years from now, if i would do this as a mother, a grandmother - ever have the mere reason of just looking, or would it be to see the headlights of a child coming home or to glimpse up at the sky where my loved ones lived? i saw people walking - so calmly - in the sharp coldness. it felt like watching an old movie version of people walking on streets, like the people on singin' in the rain who were no doubt wealthy businessman and wife on a stroll that evening. i couldn't hear their steps or their shivering breaths under their hoods. it all looked so serene. then, i dove back in to my thoughts - through with suspending them, having left my worries and obligations and paper to write out to dry too long - and entered the vast sea which is my life, still looking out the window a little bit longer but no longer from my outlook of crawling on the surface of the sea as a great grandmother turtle.

in memory

Two of of my dearest high school friends' birthdays are on Sunday. Chris Christensen, who battled muscular dystrophy until he passed away a year and a half ago. He was an artist and a hero. He had an angel's face and a heart of gold. His conversation was serene and un-intrusive. Ivan Anderson, who passed away suddenly almost exactly a year ago and who still seems like he can't possibly be gone. It went so fast. He was a computer-whiz and a musician. His hands were strong and his integrity never-failing. He loved the sound of laughter. They will both be 24 on Sunday.

I will always remember their goodness and their charity, their strong testimonies and their astounding resilience against hardship. I owe them a great deal. I wouldn't be where I am now without them. I can give you more details in person, but it is too personal to share here. I am so fortunate as to have tasted true grief only rarely in my few years on earth, but I shed a tear tonight for the absence and the memory of these friends.

Thinking of them reminds me of the kind of friend I want to be, and maybe should have been. More time to spend with a good friend and more appreciation expressed for their influence in your life. I await the time when I can embrace them both and where I can be that friend who never has to leave and has no other commitments, and can sit in the long grass and listen to their stories.

the truth-o-meter

On C-SPAN Campaign 2008 online, there was an interview with Bill Adair, editor of PolitiFact website. I'm pretty sold on this idea - getting an analysis of statements, ad campaigns, accusations, as well as so-called factual mass emails concerning candidates and getting a rating on each of the truthfulness in the information. The statements are back-checked and each can rank from true, mostly true, half-true, liar-liar-pants-on-fire, etc. This website has a page on each candidate and breaks down statements into little packets of rated truths (or lies I suppose) - like check-out Obama's radical Muslim status and other outrageous attacks.

Check out the truth-o-meter, though be aware that PolitiFact could still be throwing its political weight around by publishing certain things and not researching others. But, it is definitely worth checking out.

www.politifact.com
www.campaignnetwork.org

i'm tu-wen-tee fo-wah today. yep, read it and weep. i survived age 23. my brother (the well-read one) was convinced that at age 23, one of two significant things will happen to you. you will either die or fall in love. i had a little taste of the latter, but as rach said tonight, she was in love with love when she was 23. i think i can relate with that. but anyway, whoever is out there reading this, make this a year to remember. this year is the one you do something awesome in - something you've always wanted to do. i'm extending the permission for you to do it. so get busy. i'm going to bed.

happy new year. don't forget to write.