spooks

Today was one of those days I wished I had a camera everywhere I went. A great fog has settled on and around Boise creating such beautiful scenes everywhere. I got to drive out to a nearby city to teach art for the last time and the fog had engulfed all the fields, abandoned houses, and leafless trees; it was amazing. I felt like I was in an eerie ghostworld. Fog is so full of mystery and secrets--I've never liked it before but today I sort of fell in love with it.

I wish I had a picture of it so I'll just say it was like this but at least 10 times better. At least.

new year

read this yesterday:

"art is not a handicraft; it is the transmission of feeling the artist has experienced"

-Tolstoy

It tore away all the apprehension and self-doubt my last semester of oil painting seemed to instill in me. My professor taught me all the ways you should paint, all the traditional methods and what "looks good" and little by little my yearning to express myself seemed to get tied up, bound and gagged, lef to hang somewhere in my soul.

Since graduation I've been in such a weird way; unsure and not feeling the liberation I thought would have come. I think I'm relearning to breathe. Funny how the right words can make all that difference.

Maybe I'm starting my new year now and skipping Christmas because reading Tolstoy's words and rediscovering my passions feels more like Christmas than the played-out carols on the radio.

Luff

I have recently become re-obsessed with Annie Hall. I love Diane Keaton in it; how squirrely and uncertain she is in the beginning but how at the same time she knows exactly what she wants and goes for it albeit rather bashfully. I love watching her confidence and awareness evolve and develop throughout the film--not in a gradual, linear way but through the timely flashbacks and storytelling of Woody Allen. Comparing her first time singing in a night club to the last shown exudes such beauty and confidence it's hard not to want that sort of unmistakable aura for oneself.

It makes me think of formative relationships I've had; the beginnings, middles and ends of them. I can't help but analyze my past and see where I'm at now in relation to only five years ago and ask myself if I'm where I want to be. I guess I don't really know how to answer that question though because where I am was never where I had anticipated I'd be. BUT I like where I am and I'm working on getting to loving where I am.

I finished reading Brave New World a couple weeks ago and I really enjoyed it. There was a character in it, Bernard, who had all of this potential to be great, take action, be an individual; but, when the moment demanded it he kept faltering back and forth between what he knew he wanted and what he knew was expected. In the end he really didn't do anything and I ended up really despising him I think because I see those traits in myself. I hope I really strive for what I know I want and what I know will make me happy rather than bowing down to the pressures of what I think others may be thinking/expecting. It's hard. I think everyone struggles with it to an extent.

Anyway.

I love Annie Hall. I want some lobster, her whole wardrobe, and black soap.

Bah Humbug

Sorry Christmas. I'm just not that into you this year.

I really hate being cold.

and I really just want to ride my bike.

Maybe it'll hit me in a week or so...

I am working on it. I've been listening to this nonstop and it's starting to help.

Plus I'm making lots of presents so that should help too right?