thanks, adults.

I remember when I was a kid, adults told me all sorts of things that turned out to be completely false. The things that I shall focus on tonight are health-related.

I was told that if you sat on the toilet long enough, you would start pooping out your guts. I was told that kids who ate too much food of one color would turn that color. I was told that if you didn't exercise every day, you would forget how to walk. But perhaps the most terrifying of all threats was the threat of bedsores.

I read a lot as a kid (and I hated exercise), and I spend a lot of time on my bed. I don't remember who told me about bedsores, but basically, I was told that I would definitely get them from spending too much time being lazy in bed. I can honestly say that I believed that until tonight.

You don't know how badly you are in procrastination mode until you start googling sicknesses you fear.

NEWS

I got the recommend today, folks! So unless our flights are cancelled, I will be going through the Manhattan Temple with my parents this Saturday.

Manhattan, because my dad has business meetings there on Friday and Saturday, and I've been scheming to go through that temple for four years, and there was never a good time for me to come home this fall, and they didn't really want to fly to Utah for a weekend, and England was absolutely out of the question (drat). 

The Temple because I am ready to commit. Surprise, teenage self. 

There are a lot of things I could say here about my religion, about temples, about ceremonies, about commitment, about covenants....... I honestly don't know where to start. And for all of my very dear friends who aren't Mormon, I'm not sure how much you'd want to know. So this is what I'm going to say:

I was born into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and although there were some days when I didn't understand it at all, I have grown and learned and have decided to be endowed, which is basically the highest level of commitment I can make with the Lord right now. Most Mormons get endowed before they go on missions or before they get married, but some just do it when they feel ready even when they aren't going on missions or getting married. And I definitely fall into that last category. I could compare it to wearing the hijab, or taking monastic vows, but it's not really like that. In the temple this Saturday, I will promise God to be my best self and to always serve Him. My life isn't going to change drastically. I'm not going to become a different person. I'm just going to be able to say that I'm an endowed Mormon. 

It's a big deal for me, because it's a spiritual covenant. And my relationship with God is a huge part of my life. But it's not really a big deal for most other people. They don't make greeting cards for this, so you don't really have to interact with the occasion. Again, who I am is not going to change. I just wanted to tell you (my truest, blog-reading friends, foremostly) that I'm doing this and I'm confident and happy about it. 

If you want to know more, please ask me. My email address is madi.dear@gmail.com. I would so much rather talk about it with you one-on-one than have you google questions, then read wikipedia or other websites that want to make Mormons look like cultish idiots. If you'd rather do your own homework about LDS temples and endowment, do it on LDS.org, because that's the legit LDS website. 

Peace and blessings, y'all.

the arts building

Hanging out on the ground floor benched area of the HFAC opens the door for overhearing a lot of things that only HFAC students say.

"How can you deduce that the use of B flat 6 means he's gay?"

"Reading this prospectus is like reading shredded meat!"

"(Oh/Since/Well) I'm a vocalist" (repeated 23489 times)

"Clarinetists plural is actually clarinatta." (that's a joke)

In other news, the receiving-proposals-faces of Margaret Hale.

This screen cap made me pee my pants:

If I can go another 10 days without donuts, than this will have been the first month in... a year... maybe more... that I have gone without donuts. The struggle, and I'm saying struggle, is real.

And in closing, I know a girl that paddles her hands when she feels awkward. Or actually, maybe she just does it. I can't tell why. It is a little awkward... But also it's great because it makes me think of this puppy:

Time to read my bank statement and weep. 

"signified typically with lack of energy and difficulty in maintaining concentration or interest in life"

part i
I stopped taking pictures around the same time that I started knowing what I wanted to do with my degree in school. I got more serious about things that would look good on a resume. I was never really that good at taking pictures; it was just something fun. Something interesting. Something that took my mind off of other things. An art.

Two years later, I find myself in a funny place. Funny place. Funny place. Funny place. If you say it over and over again, it sounds less like you should be laughing and more like the uncomfortable feeling it represents. There's no denying that many parts of the past two years have been purely charmed. But there have been other times when waves came up behind my back, and fell on my head cold and heavy, and left a mark deeper and darker than I could have expected. There have been days when I wondered if happiness was really possible. There have been moments--fleeting and frightening--when I wondered who would really notice if I was gone.

And I think we all have dark times. Everyone can think of at least one proverbial pit of despair that they fell into during their twenty-somethings. And I know that my life has purpose and value greater than what anyone could possibly tell me (or argue against).






part ii
I feel so old, in that young way, when I hold the camera. Not old in the same way grandparents feel. My body feels taut; I feel empty, or emptier, than I used to be. I can see things swimming in my periphery that I saw once before, so long ago... I was a different person then.

I was online and saw a picture of a window, a French looking window, complete with plate of pastries and fresh flowers and a very Haussmann building across the street. As usual, I thought, "What I'd give..." and then almost immediately, "Wait, I have roses right now!" And I knew I should take a picture to compare.

not mine

mine

Tonight I picked up my camera again and went into the kitchen, this time looking at my pumpkins and my pumpkin vine, and things that remind me of "home" which actually hasn't been "home" for five years and I'm starting to feel a little silly when I say "Oh yes, I'm from Dallas," when I'm actually not from Dallas at all.

part iii 

"When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence."

Ansel Adams

I mean, I'm still trying with words. But it's nice to find something useful in this black box of wires and glass.

Madivision's first GIF

I don't know why this is hilarious to me... Maybe because they're all wearing Norts and the house looks dang fancy, so it's showing us the product of privileged, upper-class wisdom?

No matter why, it boils down to me being a mean old sunuvagun. Muah ha ha ha.

blogging angry feelings

I don't like baby carrots. THERE, I SAID IT. I've been buying them for three months, and I don't know why. This summer, I ate them. But this summer, I also ate greek yogurt and granola like once a day. I don't even know what I was doing.

The past two bags have just gone bad in my part of the fridge. I see them. I know they are there, waiting for me. I think of them every time I get hungry. But I can't bring myself to eat them. I don't want to. I DON'T.

And there are so many things that I don't want to do but I have to do right now... Graduate school applications, sharing a kitchen, parking next to a giant truck, the list goes on, adding "eating baby carrots" to the list might put me over the edge. YES, they are healthy. YES, I used to eat them regularly. YES, my mom would want me to eat them. BUT NO, BABY CARROTS. I CANNOT MAKE ROOM FOR YOU IN MY LIFE RIGHT NOW.

Today I found a picture of me and a kid named Rich (I think...) from my first trip abroad, on our first night in London. What a whirlwind... I can still remember exactly how I felt. HUNGRY. We were standing across the river from the London Eye, and I was so excited and hungry. We had already been traveling for two weeks, but my heart was hungry for more and my stomach was hungry because eating on tour schedule is rough, kids.

I look like a baby. I was a baby!

And you know what, that Madi was pretty much down with baby carrots. I know for a fact that I ate them within a few days of taking that picture, in a hummus bar in London. 

But Madi of now is not going to put up with it. Goodbye forever (for now), baby carrots. Goodbye.

drums of war

Some of you know that the only classes I'm taking this fall are Portuguese 105 (Portuguese for Spanish Speakers 1) and Spanish 211 (Spanish Conversation 3/4, a class I took three years ago, that is under my level of Spanish, but was the only conversation lab that fit in my schedule).

After a month of maintaining basic peace of mind and making small progress in both classes, my brain has decided that it doesn't want to do languages any more. I have a lot of moments when I can't think of the right words to say anything in any language. Or, I have these beautiful moments that remind me a lot of the Savages pt. 2 number in Pocahontas...

blue team: spanish, which was in my brain first

red team: portuguese, the newcomer

clouds of knowledge combine into violent purple lightening-head

me: john smith, taking bullet of said violence. minus concerned girlfriend, great singing voice, blue pants/black boots outfit, etc.