The World Is Spinning

Wow. It's been a while since I posted last...sorry about that. I know there are only two people who read this, so I'm not sure why I'm apologizing, but I feel the need to do so, though I don't see a reason to.

Anyhoo, tomorrow marks the last week of school of my first year in college! Finals are next week, one on Monday (Human Sexuality) and one on Wednesday (Math). I have to show up for one on Tuesday, although the teacher isn't giving us a test; she's making it party time! I'm 90% sure I placed out of my Music Appreciation final because we have to have a B or better and have not missed more than three times. I've only missed twice (maybe only once from what she told me) and I'm pretty sure I have at least a B in that class. I'll have to ask her about it tomorrow.

Oh gosh! I have to get to work. Talk to you later!

Tschüss!

The Songs of Spring

This is the winning essay, for your reading enjoyment.

The Songs of Spring

Julie Hawkins

The first day of spring brings with it the sweetness of the tree’s blossom, the angelic song of the sparrow and the freshness of a newly melted winter. This day also brings with it the excitement of a Christian music workshop. The workshop is located in a large park, with tall, plastic tents that rise unnaturally from the ground and crackle loudly when the wind blows across their surfaces. The weather was mild and the grass turned green early this year and gives the park a warm, luminous glow as the sun shines down upon it. The amphitheater stands like a giant white stone, taller than any tree in the park. The air carries with it the freshness of spring as it weaves its way around the bright green leaves of the trees, underneath the wings of the small sparrows, whistling through the semi-circle shaped amphitheater to the ears of the girl standing backstage.

A bead of sweat trickles down her face as she nervously awaits and she watches for her cue to walk out and stand true. She reminds herself of why she is there; not just to sing, but to serve the people and to be a beacon of light to the lost. She wrings her hands around the microphone, which feels like a wet bar of soap in her sweaty palms. Her eyes are on the stage manager who stands a few yards away on the other side of the stage, waiting for everyone to finish their preparations for the next act. She whispers to herself and desperately tries to calm herself down. As the stage manager points to her and all her breath escapes her, a sense of panic floods through her body. She nods to him and the music begins as she slowly walks out to the middle of the stage and tries not to let the crowd see her knees wobble. Although her nerves scream to turn back, a voice inside her head reminds her that she will be alright, so she continues to her planned spot on stage and faces the crowd.

The sweet music flows softly, measure by measure; the crowd awaits her song. Her voice, as smooth as silk, flawlessly delivers the notes as she sings the sweet melody, and she tries hard to control the nervousness in her voice. Her voice carried with it emotions like a waterfall; they washed over the crowd and swept them away. The emotions were so moving and so powerful that they were overwhelmed with awe at the beauty in her voice.

As she sings she looks out and over the crowd to the outdoors around her. She watches the puffy white clouds slowly float by, being lazily pushed by the wind. She thinks of God’s creation; the fragrance of the trees, the sight of the birds play and the sound of their joyful conversation and just knowing that the God she is singing to made them the same way He made her - by hand, and that gives her strength and confidence. The light breeze plays with her hair as she looks at each of the beautiful faces in the small ocean in front of her and she is filled with wonder at the creativity and diversity of each individual. The already slow paced music slows down to a stop as her voice fades to nothing and, knowing what is about to be played next, she raises one eyebrow with a clever smirk on her face and turns to look at the guitarist standing to her right.

BRANG! The electric guitar rings out through the amphitheatre then the drums take a beating as the drummer changes the pace. The hard-rock music reaches the ears of the crowds and they roar with excitement and begin to make even more noise as the singer’s voice soars out above the music, carrying with it edifying words of glorification to the Almighty. Energy now surges through the crowd and her nerves are annihilated as she sings and begins to dance to the music. Comfort floods her body as the crowd dances with her and together they make a truly joyful noise. The last strum of the guitar leaves with a bang and the crowd cheers.

She waits for the crowd’s uproarious applause to simmer down to a dull roar before repeating “thank you” over and over and grinning from ear to ear. She knows that it is all over, and recalls how only a short eleven minutes before she wrung her hands and clutched tightly to the microphone and tried with all her might not to shake and look like a novice on stage. She did not understand now how fear had gripped her so, she was almost completely comfortable up there now; she ran her hands across the outstretched hands and fingers of the very front row. “Encore! Encore!” the crowd wildly cheered. She looked at the stage manager and received nothing but an ear-to-ear grin. She quickly turned to the band members behind her and told them which song to play next.

After her final song, she walked with confidence off of the stage, and she beamed with joy. As the workshop wound down to a close, a young girl shyly approached her and gently tapped on her shoulder. She turned around to greet the girl. The girl spoke with the voice of a mouse, quiet and timid. The girl thanked her for all she had sang and told her how she was in a life-threatening state of mind when she came to the workshop. She came for the music alone and hoped that there would be some detail that could turn her life around. The girl finished her story with tears in her eyes and thanked her profusely for providing the light she needed and told her that she was now a child of God. She could not help but let the salty tears slide down her cheeks as she hugged the shy, young girl.

She no longer cared what the rest of the crowd had thought of her; she did not care how well she performed in front of them. She knew she had been the tool to touch the life of a young child of God and she knew that her mission was complete. It was dusk and as she listened to the crickets sing their songs she knew that they were singing praises.

Woohoo!

I GOT 4th PLACE IN THE WRITING CONTEST!!! There were over 300 people in the contest total. About half of the people who earned awards, including many first and second prize winners were absent from the ceremony, which was shocking to me. Anyway, I looked cute and was turning heads at the restaraunt after the ceremony. AND I GOT FOURTH PLACE!!! WOOT!!! Tschüss!

Yuck!

I'm down today. Something grabbed a hold of my stomach and it's making my stomach very upset. I've managed to keep my cookies, but I'm having a hard time eating without feeling otherwise. I've been able to keep this at bay for months now - I'm proud of myself. Mom thinks the nausea is due to my headaches. I think it's the leftover sub I ate yesterday, possibly in conjunction with a serious lack of sleeping well. I'm not sure what it is, but I'm feeling a little better this morning. Had a nice long talk with Josh - that helped me feel better.

My abstract for my research paper and 20 source annotated bibliography are due at midnight. My goal is to have the bibliography to my teacher by class on Thursday morning. This is why: I'm having to discard my old abstract completely and go with a new idea, which I'm fine with. What I'm not fine with is the incredible amount of work that has to go into this new topic. I've been working for the past four days trying to gather information so that I can write my abstract.

My research paper is a rhetorical analysis of the significance of the word beat in David Auburn's Proof. I've read through the play three times now and watched the movie and I still have no clue as to the meaning. My biggest lead is that it is some sort of pause, but having a beat in the middle of dialogue doesn't always match with that idea. Whenever a beat is in the middle of Claire's speaking, she always changes the subject afterwards. Whenever a beat in in the middle of Robert's speaking, more often than not he changes who he's speaking to, but theory doesn't hold when he's only talking to Catherine. Hal doesn't always change his tone or what he's speaking about when it occurs within his line. It only appears mid-sentence in Catherine's speech twice out of the 32 times it's in mid-sentence. The word beat is mentioned 111 times in the entire play, and I have each instance of which written down, which line it occurs in, what's in the paragraph before it, and what's in the paragraph after it. AND I STILL CAN'T FIGURE OUT WHAT IT MEANS!!!!

I looked up the stage meaning of beat, and found that it is the smallest division of action in a play, the length of time necessary for a character to play an "objective" (also called intention) from beginning to end, a very short pause, a deliberate pause for effect or measure of time when cueing, or a unit of action in a scene, which is made up of a series of beats. I found the definitions from various websites from a Google Search. I suppose my pause theory could be true, but now I have to come up with an abstract saying that that's what my paper is about. I have to come up with an 8-10 page research paper about nothing but that, and I have to come up with an annotated bibliography containing 20 sources which support my theory in ways other than the word beat in Proof because this idea is completely original; all before MIDNIGHT TONIGHT!!!!!! Minus the paper. That's not due 'til sometime in May. But still, the idea has to be there.

So that's been on my mind recently. My headaches haven't gotten any better, but not any worse, thank God. Thank you to kind Ian for helping me figure out the source of my headaches. Finances are slowly but surely getting better. Having a job that pays you what your work is worth is nice.

Ok. Now that I've ranted and gotten my thoughts all out "on paper" I should go try and finish at least my abstract. And try and see if I can eat this toast that my wonderful little brother William has made for me. Hats off to toast when you're queasy! Bis später!

Poetry Blog

Just so y'all know, if you care, all of the poetry I have written is now on a blog of it's own. The link is on the sidebar just under my profile stuff. It's there for me, but I'm giving you the option of reading it. Some of it's good, some of it's not, but it's mine. Enjoy if you dare.

Tschüss!

Humerous Quotes - They're Funny To the Bone!

Is a mime someone who can think inside the box?

When thespians go public, do they come out of the wardrobe?

Lexus spelled backwards is suxel.

Instant human - just add coffee!

How many times does the average person masticate every day?

Have you ever watched how people ambulate? No two people have the same pattern!

"Look, Mom! Chuckie Cheeses! I know that place by the back of my head!"

"William, there's more than one way to skin a cat." "I'm not a skinny cat!"

"Mom, can I use your bathroom? Julie's in ours plundering the toilet!"



Special thanks to Carol, Julie, William and Chase for their humorous contributions.

Beware...the Penguins...

Sometimes you have to watch out for those penguins:



I may have chronic migranes. I've been having at least two horrible headaches per week since the beginning of February. Two of them have made me black out for a few seconds, at least 10 of them have made me so dizzy that I had to sit down. Medicine usually doesn't affect the headache, so that makes them more difficult to deal with. We can't afford to go to our regular doctor, much less a neurologist, so there's nothing I can do about it for now except to take a neurologist's "Migrane Concoction" which is two Excedrin and one Advil as needed. Maybe we'll get some extra money from something and I can go to the doctor.

I just found out that I placed in the top five of the writing contest that I entered a month ago! They didn't tell me what place I got; all they said was that the ceremony and photos are at the Gainsville campus of NCTC on April 14. I can't wait. It's going to be so great! Even if I placed fifth, that's still an accomplishment since there are at least 200 entries in the contest. That would be so cool!

Papaw's birthday was awesome. I had a blast with the family. We played mexican train for hours and I won! That seldom happens! I wonder what I'll be like on my 70th birthday...

By the way, I'm in the process of creating a poetry page to put all of my poetry on. I just finished a new poem tonight, so I'll post it on the other site as soon as I get it finished. Just thought I'd let y'all know that. I'll tell you when you can access the site.

Well, I'm off to bed. I'm up too late as it is. Talk to you all later. Wish me luck!