Season of Light

upon black mountains
dark storm breaks open, spills out
snowy streams of light

It seems that every holiday event I've attended thus far has focused on light. I think it says something about humanity that we all (and by all, I mean major religions that my friends observe) find in this dark season a reason to celebrate light. Of course, I know that it isn't the same, cold December the world over, and certainly not in the places where the faiths of which I speak originate, but maybe what we really yearn for, what we really celebrate this time of year is more metaphorical.

Perhaps people gathering together to light a small candle against the darkness around them would do a whole lot of good.




PS: Look guys! I posted something! Crazy. Happy midwinter holiday of choice.

Light and dark.

I think it's interesting how light and darkness dance sometimes. How one step finds them in a passionate tango, and in the next step, the one has swooshed in and killed the other. Then you take two steps back, and you suddenly see that they were working together the whole time, that they had this all planned out. And that's when you either take a few pictures while thanking your kick-ass anti-shake lens, or you realize that you just regurgitated the plot of the last Harry Potter movie.

Like coloring books, but with way more win

I think I'd kill for this dress by the young and extremely innovative designer Berber Soepboer and co-creator Michiel Schuurman:



What about this does not scream incredible? You can color it in! It has a fun print! A marvelous asymmetrical cut! ... and it's yours for only US$315. I think I read too many design blogs – my taste is getting better than my poor little checking account can handle.

Love, love is a verb.

And so this was Christmas, a fine event if there ever was one. A virgin, impregnated by the power of God (who'll apparently go to great lengths to avoid the "birds and the bees" conversation), rides into the overcrowded town with her newly-shotgun-wed husband to pay their taxes, when, after weeks on the back of some poor burro, the thirteen-year-old miraculously pops out her first baby in a spray of blessed afterbirth and only the most pious amounts of pain. And so, to commemorate the occasion of this supposed anniversary (the birth certificate got lost in the mail somewhere), we fret over buying one another just the right thing, the thing that will prove that we love them forever (until Mothers' Day or their birthday or Valentine's Day); we pretend for a few hours to care about the poor, cold, sick, and downtrodden, the huddled masses (as long as we can also pretend that they are all so adorable as Tiny Tim or as poignant as The Little Match Girl); and we play obnoxious nonsense songs the meaning of which few understand (leave belief out; no true beliefs can be built on ignorance).

I'm not trying to be glib or flippant about Jesus' birth. I guess I just have a hard time looking at religion without looking at the bare bones of it. I think rationality is something applied to religious beliefs far too little, both in the beliefs themselves and in the practices which accompany them. It's not what I set out to write about tonight, but I thought Christ's Mass deserved to be noted before it slipped away, and this is what came out. I suppose that it's the product of a rage that's been building for some time now. That anyone can profess to follow in the footsteps of the Lamb of God, The Prince of Peace, that great forgiver of all sins and lover of all sinners, and yet deem someone - anyone - unworthy of HIS love - oh, my friends, I become very upset. My minority, non-Christian friends lie back and take it, even expect it. I know, though, that the baby that shivered in the night those many years ago didn't care if the arms holding him were gay or Jewish or even if they belonged to the Pope himself.

What mattered was love.

iTunes runs my life for real.

One of those many, many memes that circulates. This one came from Alasdair. You know who he is. I only skipped when French came up the second time, which I thought was fair. If my life were a movie:

Opening Credits:
Sairi del Ande - Wayanay Inka
(a laid-back panpipe tune; appropriate)

Your mom finds out she's pregnant with you:
405 - Death Cab for Cutie
(must've been unexpected - this is about a drunken trip down a western WA freeway)

Slideshow of her pregnancy:
Brain Damage - Pink Floyd
(explains a lot, really)

While she's delivering you:
Okay - The Metasciences
(a slow, slightly atonal guitar-and-female-singer piece that would be good for a low-key, depressing montage)

Your first birthday:
Exciter Lamp - Matmos
(first time I've listened to this - it's an abstract electrono piece, so who knows? this is definitely shaping up to be an indie film...)

You growing up:
Something - The Beatles
(apparently someone is in love with me/stalking me throughout my childhood. Or the viewer is supposed to fall in love with me?)

Your first day of school:
Message in a Bottle - The Police
(So true.)

Meeting your first friend:
The Wind Beneath My Wings - Roger Whitaker
(I laughed out loud. The irony is too much)

Your first day of middle school:
Two Franks - Count Basie
(a very fast-paced, sax-heavy jazz piece. probably appropriate)

Meeting your first crush:
New York, New York - Frank Sinatra
(hmmm. not the best Frank song I could think of for the occasion, but it'll do?)

Your first kiss:
Steal My Sunshine - Len
(I love this song so much. You could get any meaning you want from the lyrics, but it fits particularly well in that it mentions laying in the grass)

Fighting with your parents:
Everything That You Need - Adam Richman
(this says everything: "I'm not grown up, I'm still writing songs, and I'm dealing with you still every day")

Fighting with your friends:
When We Refuse to Suffer - Jonathan Richman
(gist: when we refuse to suffer and feel, that's when life starts to suck, and the artificial things win. This would have to be a pretty specific fight for the lyrics to fit, but the music itself fits.)

Breaking up:
Christmas in Jail, Aint' that a Pain - Leroy Carr
(Blues. Perfect.)

Your first day of high school:
White Cloud, Big Sky - guess who?
(whistling loneliness, an insistent string... excellent fit)

Your sweet sixteen:
Songs for Ghosts to Haunt to - Maps and Atlases
(manic, unclear, awesome)

Your 18th birthday:
This Charming Man - The Smiths
(somehow perfect - it's very much a growing up song: "Will nature make a man of me yet?")

Your graduation ceremony:
'Cause You Can - Birdmonster
(this song gives a feeling of running, which fits well)

Your first day of college:
Blue Ridge Laughing - Carbon Leaf
(a healthy dose of homesickness, nostalgia, and anticipation)

Your first college party:
Pablo Picasso - Jonathan Richman
("Girls would turn the color of an avocado as he would drive down the street in his El Dorado, so Pablo Picasso was never called an asshole" - perhaps I meet an asshole or am one?)

Meeting your true love:
Yellow - Coldplay
(a sweet song with the proper sense of early love's euphoria)

Getting married:
Start Choppin' - Dinosaur Jr
(another I had never heard - a breakup song)

Finding out you/your spouse is pregnant:
Fake Frowns - Death Cab for Cutie
(not the most auspicious song for a pregnancy)

Having your first child:
Revenge of the Nerds - KJ-52
(exactly how it sounds. also, very auspicious!)

Getting old:
Radio Song - R.E.M.
("The world is collapsing around our ears; I turned off the radio" - the correct way to get old, I think)

Your spouse gets sick:
Lesson 30 - Living Language (French)
(LOL - I have no idea what this would mean. A breakdown of communication due to the sickness? "ça depends")

They die:
Hello, Goodbye - The Beatles
(upbeat and tragic when applied to this, but it fits sadly well)

At their funeral:
Blue Christmas - Bright Eyes
(extremely well-planned)

You end up in the hospital:
Light Up Ahead - Further Seems Forever
(a song that suggests that one is very accepting of one's fate)

Your death:
Action Adventure (live) - Andrew Bird
("You're not invited to my action adventure, my action adventure dream" - I love it)

Your funeral:
Autumn Leaves - Eva Cassidy
(my favorite ballad ever, I think. Well-chosen, iTunes!)

I present as evidence Figure 1.

Figure 1: I don't care who you are, this is adorable and awesome. I hope is wasn't staged. Just look at the dads' smiles in the last panel!


Figure 2: OMG so true. Villains! All of us! Pinko commies! Nazi fascists! ... with... common ground?



A few weeks back, I discovered the tabs at the top of the famous I Can Has Cheezburger page. These tabs, when I activated the clicking control device over them, took me to magical places, places where they entertain me with celebrity lolz, graph lolz, and sometimes political lolz (when they weren't blatantly bashing conservativism). I highly recommend each of them, because it is important to get your daily dosage of lolz and other opinions.

2:59 am

Why oh why did I drink that mocha at 11:00 pm why are GoogleMaps and Craig's List so damn fascinating all of a sudden why isn't there a Craig's List for Helena why can't I move to Vancouver and have tiny adorable kittens/bunnies/puppies/canucks/apartments nao nao nao??????????


I'm beginning to think that you do these things just to upset me, YHWH. We shall have words, my friend.