the guardian of your challenge does not cry

so this has definitely been the largest stretch of time i've gone without writing here. i guess it begs the question: has my life been memorable enough to put down in words. on one hand yes, on the other, definitely not. a strange dichotomy, wouldn't you say?

let's see --- i'm trying to live a new life and be a new person here in baltimore and it's happening for me. i finally have found a community within which i feel comfortable so i exercise that comfort. i go out to parties and concerts and try to be as visible as i can. there's no reason for me to stay locked up in my basement. and i've definitely found a few people that i have really connected with which is so exciting. i don't feel quite so alone. however, i have come to a crossroads musically. on the one hand i'm getting better and better every day and on the other, i have to go back to the basics because there's so much internal stuff to fix and that makes me feel like i'm at square one. it just reminds me that i'm choosing the right path. i'm feeling so much love from the musicology department and things are crystallizing for me which is nice. don't get me wrong. the bassoon is my first love and i still want to teach and perform and be the best bassoonist i can be but it's just this: at app everyone wanted to be a secondary education teacher and i didn't want that. at queens everyone wanted to freelance and be a part of the NYC scene and i didn't want that. at peabody, everyone wants to have a ridiculous solo performing career and i don't want that either. i want to be me and do what i want to do and i've grown tired of trying to fit into other people's molds. so i have to make what i want to do work for me where i am.

there are not many places where you can learn to be a matriarch. :)

personally, i've been through a few conflicts in my life. first, a health scare and second, a reevaluation of just who i am. now that thats past, i'm looking over the relationship thing. i'm so comfortable being single just because i think it's easy. so says the introvert only child. but there are so many other things that i have to think about that i have to face (you know, stuff that requires a great deal of therapy) and i have to make the decision to face them. unfortunately for me, i've run into a lot of my past here in baltimore and it's been a challenge to move forward. but i'm doing it. speaking of, another conflict is that of what happens after all of this. i'm going home it's never been more clear to me. and i think i could be the only person around who would be unhappy if i didn't get into carolina and got into yale. i'm ready to be back home around my parents and happy. not that i'm doing badly here, it's a start (much better than new york) but the older i get the more nostalgic i become.

i wonder what gingerich would say about that. (schubert class reference, don't worry about it)

so in two weeks, PSO is playing at the kennedy center honors so watch for it on CBS. i plan on being back in new york in a couple of weeks...i don't know how that's going to work but you know it's worth a shot. :) i'll be home on tuesday and that's going to be amazing i can feel it. it's about time.

can't you just come back for a couple of weeks?

just a quick little post to whittle away my last half hour at work.

i called the boss lady at work today. she and martha were very happy to hear from me. apparently, it's swamped in the office and they have no one to replace me (which saddens me, of course) they asked me how i was doing and if i had settled in. it was nice to hear their voices. lisa was like "i can't even imagine starting a new year without you...i need someone that i can, like, do stuff with." that job was a very important part of my life for almost four years. they became my family and that's not something that's easy to give up. i can't wait till i go back and see them. just watch, everything will have changed.

i really wish i could explain to others, and to myself, why i love my home state so much. it's something so uniquely american, i feel. i've just been mad digging on n.c. the past couple of weeks. going to obx inspired me, i think. that and when i invited all of my friends list to join "race for the states - north carolina" that they did! and after app state beat michigan, i felt like it was freaking christmas (i'm still talking about it and it was saturday) i don't know. no place beats home, anyone's home and that's a big part but i'll be damned --- i've been to a lot of places and none of them are as beautiful as north carolina.

from murphy to manteo, city streets or a country mile.

so i've been noticeably absent --- traveling all over the place getting things ready for the big move. but it hasn't all been work. i just got back from a trip to the outer banks with a friend of mine and man oh man, was that what i needed. i'll break it down to you in a nutshell (aka, list form) as to why this trip was amazing:

- THE OUTER BANKS!
- at the beach during the hottest week on record
- sea kayaking with dolphins (at high tide no less)
- the wright brothers memorial at night
- walking along the beach at night with TONS of ghost crabs
- dairy queen and a putt-putt golf course with a train ride
- riding in the back (flatbed) of a truck to said dairy queen
- driving down 12 south
- jockey's ridge, the cape hatteras national seashore and the bodie island lighthouse
- real north carolina barbecue

it was jampacked and i didn't get much time to rest. so i should be resting now. and i will...i'm just having such a good time reminiscing. i mean i really love north carolina for those of you who don't know. it's just such an amazing place. i mean you know the saying...."you know how i know god's from north carolina? cause he made the sky tarheel blue."

"i rarely apologize because i seldom make any mistakes."

just a few random things seeing as how there's not much going on in my life (except getting a job :) and looking for a new place to live) and i have no real social commentary:

well for starters, i think i just ruptured my eardrum, or am about to. when i was 18, my eardrum ruptured in my sleep and i woke up in the morning covered in blood. i had irreversible hearing loss. yeah, that sucked. (sorry, i told you this was random) no matter how often i drive/walk around, i will never get over how awesome it is to be in raleigh where everyone says "hi". some people may not understand just how valuable that is but i like being able to talk to be on the street or that when i call up my pharmacy, go to the bank or order food, the person on the other side calls me "baby" or "darling" in the way only a southerner can (all three of those things happened to me today) why anyone would ever want to leave that is beyond me.

i love going through my library and discovering new things. right now i'm listening to bernstein's MASS and i hadn't really listened to it after i had gotten it. and of course, i totally love it. listening to the responsory, i could just imagine doing this with the jazz vocal ensemble at app or a handful of people from v/e. but i can't start thinking about v/e and all of the wonderful things i could do with them cause i'll get really sad (damn you hamish maccunn part songs!) and i've been listening to britten's the turn of the screw like a fiend. i mean how powerful is the line "the ceremony of innocence is drowned". holy moly. and all of this after listening to hours of handel today (i watched rodelinda on ovation which was four hours long, fell asleep during the last fifteen minutes and didn't find out what happened so i had to watch it all over again) that's a lot of music.

well like i mentioned above, i got a job working at peabody as a lab assistant. not much but it pays the bills. and next week, i'll be going up to baltimore to find a place to live. so then i'll have something interestant to write about, i hope.

the floor lay paved with broken hearts

you know, apple, i'm really not happy with you right now. yes, the iPhone came out today, we are all aware. but playing the commercials every 30 seconds does not make me any more able to buy it than before. but that's not even why i'm angry. i'm angry because my notebook adapter just shorted out and the replacement costs $80! i'm tired of giving you my money on replacement stuff. thank god there are non apple brands for this sort of thing so i'm buying one that's more than half of yours. if stuff like this keeps adding up...

oh yeah, another thing. itunes store? don't offer only some of the tracks from an album and not all. i went to buy the tracks i was missing from britten's the turn of the screw and i was missing the last track from disc one, the one i had been LONGING to get (oh ian bostridge, even the reviews talk about how seductive you are --- even if in this case it's a thinly veiled description of someone's homosexual overtures towards boys wrapped up in james' guise of evil from beyond the grave) and i have to buy the whole album to get that track. are you kidding me? i'm on the fence about all of this.

moving away from the corporate, i've been talking a lot to people about (them) moving out of new york. too many blackouts. not enough trees. it does me good, partly because i think i'm ready to go. i think as you become an adult, the more stability you crave. i refuse to believe that new york can ever be stable. and that's not a bad thing, just my opinion. good thing north carolina is always waiting for me.

and yes, there are other reasons to leave new york. i'm reminded of this every single day. i went out to the island last night and had an encounter with a beautiful man. of course that did not come to fruition in any way imaginable. it just wasn't possible. i was in bay shore and i wasn't white, blonde and wearing a skirt. i wasn't meant to be.

okay, i should shut off my computer before it completely dies on me.

a perfect world begins and ends with us.

my life is not a movie. i should stop pretending that it is one and the outcome will come about as such. it's like that conversation i had in my independent study about history --- like, well of course history turned out this way, it was supposed to evolve just in this way. it's not true. that's a convenient fallacy that we like to tell ourselves.

what happens to me, well most of it is up to me. some of it is chance, fate, luck, whatever. but the ending that everyone wants isn't going to happen just because everyone wants it. i think that's the thing i must remember.

speaking of movies, i'm watching patton right now. it's always been one of my favorites. (yes i'm a girl who LOVES war movies) and i've always felt like i've been able to identify with him or at least the character of him portrayed by george c. scott. when in his element, he was unstoppable. outside of that, he struggled to fit in, be content in a world he couldn't really understand. how very greek in nature. how universal. or maybe that's just me.

so this weekend was one of the oddest i can think of --- i spent it reminiscing, most literally. i spent time with my high school wind ensemble and people from my graduating class. it was everything i expected it to be --- disappointing and freakish. i don't think it's enough time yet for me (or anyone for that matter) to escape the shallowness, depravity, sadness, depression, anger and confusion that was that time in our life. cause honestly, does that ever go away?

while i was home, however, i found some journals that i had completely forgotten about from that time. man, oh man, did i have issues. there were things i said about people that disgust me (of course they were regarding men, what else) and a reminder that i continued to make the same mistakes. there was one very interesting thing...i realized that i had been right about something from the very beginning. unfortunately, that thing brings me back to the beginning of this post. it doesn't matter if i was right or wrong. the future has not been predetermined.

in less cryptic news...commencement is this thursday. to everyone else that has or will be graduating, congratulations. i'm already thinking about the future but what can i say, i'm a long term planner.

the lord will fight for you, just be still.

right now i'm watching the trial of darryl hunt on HBO, something that i was excited about watching when i first heard about it. watching it, however, hurts my heart. it's about a rape and murder trial that took place in winston-salem in 1984. anyone who knows me, knows how i feel about my home state. it hurts to know just what kind of racism and injustice existed(s) there. also, watching the judicial system fail time and time again also hurts. but it's an ugly truth, which of course is not something i like to admit.

on a much more pleasant note, i got accepted to northwestern today. unfortunately, i had to turn them down seeing as how i sent in my deposit to peabody (i really didn't want to wait until today, i thought it would be way too late) but it was hard for me because i hate to say no. they seemed very enthused and i told cory wikan (head of graduate admissions) how much i loved the school. i really would have considered them had i had time to think about it. but i was down to the wire and i was not going to let peabody go.

my mother asked me if my friends were mad at me for getting into all of these grad schools. i laughed (only my mother could ask that question) and i told her no...we all want the best for each other. but after i talked to my parents, i went to my office and cried only because these results seem so unfathomable to me. but even more than that, these acceptances are proof that all of my hard work, agony and suffering have not been in vain. its the only thing that makes me happy, to be completely honest. i have worked damn hard and i am the LAST person to call myself deserving (because of my severe lack of self-esteem...another story) but i work because this is the thing that runs through my veins. do yo know what that feels like? does anyone? do i, honestly? do i understand the working of my own heart that sends blood through my own body? it's like that. it is involuntary and lifegiving.

if i think about it, i'll just continue to cry so i won't.

we are building ourselves a glass house.

okay, i guess it's my turn to weigh in on this whole don imus controversy. i don't really feel it's necessary (as my opinion is a drop in a colossal bucket) but it's just i have to get it out or i may just explode. so here it goes.

when i originally heard his comments, my reaction was small if any. i didn't take it too seriously (i have known about imus and have listened to him off and on for years now --- thanks ms. newmark) i did think "oh, well that was unnecessary." but that was about it. i can definitely understand why the women of the lady scarlet knights would be offended and ask for an apology (or at least an explanation) and i felt that was owed to them. what did they do to deserve that? that have no impact on any sort of social commentary (they're not famous NBA athletes, etc. they're just women in college playing college ball) i hoped that it would be resolved in that way and let the powers that be determine the fate of the players involved.

but no, that was not to be. people in the african-american community felt it necessary to say a lot of things. and then the rock that rolled down the mountain went from a snowball to an avalanche. that's all i heard on TV and in the papers and all i could think about was "who are you to comment on this?", i mean honestly. if you're outraged by this man's comments, that is your right. if you want to do something about it, it is your right as well. people, however, were acting as if someone slapped their mother. just because you're offended doesn't mean that i have to be offended as well and that your opinion has to determine the fate of a man who hasn't done anything that, unfortunately, scores of people have not done and do on a daily basis (i.e., use the airwaves to say what could be considered by some/most as "hate speech", derogatory and plain stupid comments) we're making examples now of people who choose to be ignorant in their thought process? because it's more public than most?

and the thing that gets me the most was listening to the president of the nbc news department regarding the removal of the simulcast on msnbc. it was evident that he didn't want to do it. he caved under the pressure not only from activism but sponsorship withdrawal. and if the only reason he feels it's necessary to remove the show is for those reasons and not because he feels some moral obligation to do so (meaning msnbc does not represent these sentiments) then really, what are we doing? what is the point that's being made? don imus is not off of the air because he's being held accountable for his actions --- he's off the air because his actions (and the ridiculous response to those actions) have given his bosses no choice. now maybe that would be the impetus for others who speak in this way not to do so but somehow i doubt it. why? because i know who controls the media. and those people have nothing to fear.

the media response to this was intolerable. i do not care about john mccain's opinion or barack obama's opinion or anyone else for that matter. the only people i listened to were the women on this team and they astounded me with their level of understanding, dignity and composure. i have been told that now, they are receiving death threats due to imus' removal. they don't deserve any of this and the media has guaranteed that this incident will be a deep scar for the rest of their lives. everyone in the press owes them an apology as well.

the timing of this and the acquittal of the duke lacrosse players could not be more perfect. for those who don't live in north carolina, more so, the triangle area can not possibly understand how divisive this ordeal was. it played on the race relations that have served as a constant problem in my hometown. it was volatile. and these same people who demanded so much from don imus in the press, went to the press to condemn these young men. and it was the press and use of the press that blew this up WAY out of proportion (note: any rape case is serious but this sort of thing, unfortunately happens everywhere all the time --- it was due to the people involved, who they were, i.e. rich white boys of prestige and a young black woman, that started this whole nonsense) and no one's taking any sort of responsibility for that. my town deserves an apology. but no one will talk about that, will they?

as a young black woman, i do feel the comments were inexcusable. but my feelings don't mean a thing. only the feelings of the young women involved --- for them, this was personal. the "divisiveness" that exists in america is constantly being exploited by pundits and figures of power whether they know it or not. honestly, i don't feel that split is a real thing, or was a real thing. we all disagree on many issues. but if anyone wants to make it real, it's those in the media and i'm tired of it. do you're job, inform me. do not make this a bully pulpit where anyone can say what they wish and we as the american people have to pay for it in one way or another.

this goes out to all of the al sharptons, don imuses, and anyone else out there. take your bait somewhere else.

mrs. speaker, here's to you.

two job interviews in two days, eh? that's a first, i think. it makes me feel good about the coming months --- i've never needed the money more than i do right now. and what's great is that they both put me around one of my first loves, dance. i feel more whole as an artist when i'm around dancers and when i dance myself. being a musician is great, it's my life but there's nothing like dancing.

at work yesterday, i had a scintillating conversation with one of my coworkers about social change. she and i are very similar in many respects. she's radical, a little more than me. i mean i am but its not so much on the surface. she claims i'm more liberal than i let on. that may be so, only time will tell. maybe it's the state of things, in the world and my life at this present moment.

speaking of, i'm in the middle of my sunday routine which consists of breakfast, reading the sunday paper (in this case, since i'm back in nyc, the new york times) and watching the chris matthews show, meet the press and the mclaughlin group back to back. they were just talking about saddam's execution; decency scale of 0 to 10. it's getting harder and harder for me to follow this routine each day but i feel it is my civic duty to do so.

you know, sundays have always been amazing days. i finally feel good after days of feeling horrible. that's a nice feeling, i will say. i miss my parents, though. and home, a lot. but then again, that's not something new.

you can go stay with imani, now.

this is our dog, bandit, after taking a bath. he's a shih tzu, very cute (much to my dismay --- helps him get into all sorts of trouble)

there was no real reason behind this post. just one of those things i like talking about when i'm home. i don't have a dog in new york and if i did, i wouldn't get pictures like this. so i savor it and feel the need to share. i mean every now and then, i miss certain things about nyc but then i lay in my queen-sized bed with my puppy in my lap looking out the window at the woods and i forget all of those things and am just glad i'm home.

like the song says: "my heart will always be in carolina."