Le Jeu Japonais

La métaphore de jeu japonais s’est seulement pour symboliser le souvenir inattendu.  C’est clair que les images qui sortent du jeu sont du même sort qui sort de la mémoire. Mais, pour sortir ses souvenirs, il faut tremper des feuilles de tilleul dans l’eau, de la même manière que les feuilles des papiers dans le jeu. Cette similarité physique ne se mélange pas facilement avec l’acte de gouter la madeleine, comme gouter n’est pas externe du tout. Mais, à la page 95, le narrateur devient fasciné par l’acte de faire du thé pour sa tante. Là, il admire que « le dessèchement des tiges les avait incurvées en un capricieux treillage dans les entrelacs duquel s’ouvraient les fleurs pales… » et il pourrait presque parler du jeu japonais. La différence est que la première fois était une surprise. Le narrateur est toujours en attendant quelque chose : attendant le baiser de sa mère, d’aller à Combray,  ou attendre le gout de la madeleine au thé.  La métaphore du jeu japonais montre le souvenir comme quelque chose attendu, et c’est ça qu’il devient.

Sitting In a Bathroom, Covered In Graffiti

I'm supposed to write an Op-Ed for The Quest about why we need graffiti at Reed, in response to the administration's daily erasure of bathroom art.
I had so many things to say when I first started, but now... and let me make this clear: it's not the well that has run dry, it's that someone, specifically everyone who kept making art on the walls, has muddied the water. So what can I write?
Can I say that we need to express ourselves? Do we need to write "I thought I would be happy here" for everyone to see? Did we need to hear "you will be" did we need to hear "you are" did we need to hear "I thought so too?" Did that heal us?
Colors, spread by hands; handprints, spread by colors. They must have been tall, or jumped, or climbed, because the hand prints are on the walls and ceilings and tiles and doors. If the graffiti-ist didn't get at the very least a little bit of catharsis out of that fucking mess then I don't know how they could ever get it.
Someone said "It's really intense" someone said "I like yours better, not that it matters" someone said "it's kind of frightening." And before I saw it I wondered if writing "murder" on the walls was disrespectful to someone who might be triggered by the word. But then, I wouldn't be triggered by "suicide" but I would be triggered by bright blue tarps, or any disembodied body parts with blue anywhere near them. So, that's probably silly.
The bathroom is messier than it was. Less aesthetically pleasing. Someone called it "solipsistic," so I googled the word. I decided I didn't have a problem with that. And look: a conversation. A conversation between A, B, C, D. A: one frustrated with censorship, B: one frustrated with self-importance and idle struggles, C: silly little voyeuristic reactionary, D: the internet, and by extension our language and culture. That's progress, at least for me. I grew from that, me being C.
I'm rhyming, you can tell this is fucking with me.
Because people keep writing about the need to have more sex, this stuff is clearly representative of our student body. But it's not. The audience certainly is, everybody poops as we learned early on. So how does it balance out, that everyone sees what a few people overwhelmed by their feelings need to tell the world? And interesting, isn't it, that most of the comments to the extreme dissatisfaction are moderate. They're calming. Someone's flexing their Helper role. Few people say "fuck, yeah, me too, everything sucks for me too." They say "I thought that too, and now I think otherwise and I think you'll be like me someday."
From writing that last paragraph, I have come to two conclusions. 1: Solidarity is a huge part of it. And a part of the solidarity comes from the fact that it is being erased every night. Maybe I like this better, having it gone and forcing it to keep growing. Then again, it grew when there was no impetus, and maybe everything meant a little more back then. 2: The fact that I can generalize, and invent conversation and potential reactions means that we are connecting beyond absorbing other people's sentiments. The connection is affecting my thoughts, and my ideas about our student body. This is serious. I've seen graffiti that says "don't come here" and that hurts us. "I'm sad" doesn't hurt us because we know that it's a part of us. "Don't come here" hurts us because it takes away from the potential us.
But I cannot censor graffiti as harmful. I can respond to it. I could write "If I had not come here, I would not be the person that I am and that would be a tragedy." And the only true balance is an oscillation between good and bad. And constant erasure does that for us. So where does that put the idea, and the cause?


Well, I'll keep trying to narrow down how I feel. I also love the ambiguity of the title I didn't even really think about. It's so true.

L'Habitude

Pour commencer Du Coté de chez Swann, Proust écrit d’un temps passé, mais inexact. Il parle des baisers de sa mère, des promenades de sa grand-mère, des nuits d’angoisse, et des visites de Swann sans un épisode en particulier. Ce sont des généralisations avec les quelles on pourrait amalgamer pour comprend sa vie habituelle par les motifs qui le crée. Alors, quand un épisode distinct arrive et se mère vient dormir dans sa chambre, le style de raconter change pour exprimer la signifiance de l’exception.

Mais les habitudes ne sont pas seulement des utiles pour introduire sa mode de vie. L’idee de l’habitude est aussi important, et suit l’histoire. Le narrateur imagine que « Peut-être l'immobilité des choses autour de nous leur est-elle imposée par notre certitude que ce sont elles et non pas d'autres, par l'immobilité de notre pensée en face d'elles. » (48) En ce manière, il décrit le perception comme une sorte d’habitude. Cette habitude nous donne la capacité de comprendre tout vite et nous fait confortable avec cette réalité comprise. Ce comfort est explique a la page 51, avec mes italiques pour emphase : « L’habitude ! aménageuse habile mais bien lente et qui commence par laisser souffrir notre esprit pendent des semaines dance une installation provisoire ; mais que malgré tout il est bien heureux de trouver car sans l’habitude et réduit a ses seuls moyens il serait impuissant a nous rendre un logis habitable. » Sa vie est seulement tolérable pendent que ses habitudes sont achevés. Le peur de sa mère de lui habituer à la faire venir quand il est triste est sage, come il a tant de désire pour les habitudes. Son père, qui l’encourage d’y aller, ne comprend pas. C’est logique, comme « …Mon père qui trouvait ses rites absurdes, » (56) et voila ne voyait comment l’habitude était attirant pour son fils.

Finalement, le phrase si aime par le grand-père est aussi une sort d’habitude corrompt : « Souvent, mais peu à la fois ! »  (58) comme disait le père de Swann avant le grand-père du narrateur. En plaçant cette phrase qui s’adhère si facilement au milieu de toutes les difficiles phrases à la Proust, c’est une garante que ce soit rappelle. Alors, c’est logique que ce doive être applique. Sa mère lui embrasse souvent, mais ce n’est jamais assez.

Et j’aurais écrit plus mais si je le fais vous n’aurais pas le temps de le lire.

Peut-être l'immobilité des choses autour de nous leur est-elle imposée par notre certitude que ce sont elles et non pas d'autres, par l'immobilité de notre pensée en face d'elles.

Reading Proust for my french class. Finally, after being intrigued by the idea of La Recherche, by the Wikipedia page, by the attempt to mix reflection with invention... now I'm reading Du cote de chez Swann. It's drawing me in uncontrollably, and the tiny margins frustrate me more than rereading the same passage a zillion times ever could. I'll need to expand my pen arsenal. Color coding. Sticky notes. I'll throw everything I have at this text and I will see it. Not with my eyes, of course, but with my soul. Because darkness is only real once your soul sees it.
I'm clearly only 5 pages in.
Heaven.
Love, Julia

Amanda Palmer and The Grand Theft Pumpkin

Three Girls. One Concert.One Pumpkin. One night.

Edith had spent some of Thursday night (RKSK initiation 2k12) in a U-Haul with over 100 naked bodies in it, so I was concerned that the heat and sweat in the Wonder Ballroom would bring on flashbacks. We all felt like we were about to faint anyways.The lights were disorienting on the sheer film that followed Amanda Palmer's body over the crowd as she sang "Bottom Feeder" above our heads.
The best part was that they played "Astronaut" off Who Killed Amanda Palmer and it made so much sense all of the sudden. I was half delirious from this cold that I can't kick and the sleep that I didn't get, but somehow the energy of the show transcended the dehydration and exhaustion and all the little stresses and the world broke down into Art, Intensity, Gimmick, and Show. Sort of out of my mind but being pushed back into it constantly. I'm not sure how to describe it. As I said, delirious.
We raced back to the car, making crazed noises and relishing the September air. Cool wind slipped up and down the wedding dress that I had cut into a shirt, quickly drying the sweat that covered it uniformly. We were energized as much by our escape from the human powered sauna as the fantastic show we had all shared.
Back in the car, my driving took a look at the adjective "exemplary," spun it's pencil around erased it vigorously. We were winding through streets taking wide turns, looking for a place that was open at 2 in the morning to sell us liquid, any liquid, while drumming the steering wheel to the beat of "The Killing Type." A Safeway? More like a Saviorway! We worried that it was closed. We saw movement, plus there were still pumpkins outside, it can't be closed. We tore into the largely deserted parking lot and scampered out of the car. As we approached the doors I said "If it's closed, I'm going to steal a pumpkin."
It was closed.
We turned around and I knelt to grasp a prickly green stem. "Run guys."
Into the car, the pumpkin joined Amy in the back seat, seatbelts on (safety first), and out of the parking lot, back onto Hawthorne Blvd, ready to continue the quest for whistle-wetters with our new companion pumpkin.
The next driveway was a knock-off 7-11 type of thing. Destiny.
We entered through the automatic doors, our faces contorted with desperate need and nefarious victory. It's hard to describe what those people saw. Three girls, one with brown hair crimped into a mess, another with a dirty blond bowl cut, and a third small Asian wearing a bright green wig tumble in from a car covered in patches and spray painted flames. Respectively, they are wearing the top half of a wedding dress and a skirt made of scraps of velvet tied together, a white lace shirt and velvet skirt pinned into amorphousness, and a teensy shiny gold dress with a huge belt, held up by a few purple ribbons laced across her chest. The first had an arm of paint in green and yellow swirls with black bars across them, the second had primary colors all over her left eye, her chest and her stomach in patterns that almost looked like birds. Finally, Edith's arms were fruits, veggies, trees, and roses. Mushrooms grew in a two dimensional orange and black patch on her shin. Maybe they saw us as wholes, but I saw us as a compilation of little things. Neither party, not the real and or the imagined, understood.
But we made an impression. As we bought quantities of juice, a pair who were buying beer inquired as to our appearance/behavior and invited us back to their party. We followed their truck and chugged the spoils of our monetary exchange with the cashier, who had also been invited.
The party was bizarre. We tried to gift them our pumpkin but they ignored us. Then Dutch showed up, an acro person I recognized from fair. The world is small. We colored on the pumpkin a little bit, and then we were bored enough to leave, back to Reed house parties.
Hotboxxx or Gun Club, Hotboxxx or Gun Club... HOTBOXXX. So we went to that house, which was going to be more talking and less shitshow. But apparently 2:30 am is after the parties are over in lames-ville Mc-Reedland. Just kidding! 4 people on a couch is also a party, often a better party.
Still we talked and admired everyone's clothing and listened to people complain about their sex lives. I stayed to cuddle with Zosha while Amy and Edith went back to Reed to eat truffle infused eggs.
We finally let the house go to sleep at 3 in the morning. Walking back to my car I realized I forgot my pumpkin, so I ran back up a steep flight of stairs to retrieve it. Crossing the street again, I was struck by the poetry of the straight double yellow lines, so I took my orange prize above my head and threw it straight down the center, expecting a splat.
Instead of exploding on the asphalt, the pumpkin rolled for almost a block. "What are you doing Julia?" "Chasing my pumpkin!"
Back at Chittick, I insist that we sacrifice it in the canyon. First Edith and Amy get a taste for chucking it, because it was strangely rewarding to watch it make contact with concrete and roll off without a hint of injury. Then we marched halfway across the Blue Bridge, illuminated in its typical creepy cyan glow under a full moon. We yelled and trilled our tongues, building to a climax when I let the pumpkin fall into the black water 30 feet below us.
Then we went to sleep.

L'Ecriture Incontrollable

La puissance de lecture est un thème important dès le commence de Madame Bovary. Mais, à la fin, on trouve la puissance d’écrire qui se démontre très important aussi. Des que quelque chose est écrit, les effets sont hors du controle des personages, et ça leur morde la queue* plusieurs fois.

Les lettres d’amour qu’échangeait Emma et ses amants n’avait pas trop de puissance. Même, ils étaient symptômes d’impuissance de l’amour quand ses lettres à Léon devinaient plus externes. Le lettre de Rodolphe est la première d’avoir vrai signifiance. Mais sa puissance est diminuée quand elle est lue par Charles et il la trouve innocente. De la façon opposée, quand les lettres qui n’avaient pas trop de drame originellement sont trouvées,  elles deviennent tout d’un coup les meurtres de Charles. Alors en lisant, tout peut changer de signifiance même beaucoup de temps après les incidents.

Avec les signatures sur les billets, on trouve un pareil traitement. Pour Charles, c’était grand-chose de signer le premier, mais Emma n’avait presque pas de soucis en tout ce temps qu’ils accumulaient. Et quand le temps arrive qu’elle voie ce qu’elle a signé, c’est étonnant. Elle n’arrive pas à les effacer. Ce n’agit plus la littérature dont elle s’occupe, mais plutôt ses écritures propres.

Apres qu’elle s’est empoisonnée, elle écrit son lettre de suicide. Puis, dans son lit, elle a du mal à se débarrasser de « cet affreux gout d’encre. » (408) Alors ça la suit jusqu’à sa mort, ou bien elle l’apport jusqu’à sa mort. Quand Charles déligne l’extravagance funèbre, c’est aussi à l’écrit. Il aurait pu le dire, mais il l’a écrit, et cela donne une sens d’immobile et de durant.

*C’est plus belle en français qu’en anglais, je trouve.

This Dragon Eats Obedience

One of the graffitis I've been up to lately. Future projects include : "We put the quest in question and the queer in query." I'm really excited for that one. Also, more dragons of course.