Horror Vacui

“Man finds nothing so intolerable as to be in a state of complete rest, without passions, without occupation, without diversion, without effort.  Then he feels nullity, lonliness, inadequacy, dependence, helplessness, emptiness.” -Blaise Pascal

There’s nothing quite as awesome as finding something worth investing yourself in.  We are so good at being lazy and useless, and yet it only makes us miserable.  In my opinion? Not worth it.  Temporary pain (running, going to class, reading a book) leads to ultimate gain (being ok with yourself in a swimsuit, graduating, being a little smarter).

There is nothing so destructive as emptiness.  And filling it up with your PS2 does not count.

The Vote’s In

The vote’s in…looks like Obama’s got the golden ticket.

Prop 8 (CA) passed.

Personally, I’m just glad it’s over, I feel like this election has been going on forever.

Thoughts?

Favorite Headlines of the Day

When I get bored at work I peruse news sites. This is partly because I have a genuine interest in what’s going on in the world and partly because most of the other sites are blocked where I work. So here’s a little sample of what I found today.

U.S. blacks face harsher climate change impact

Unwitting gardener man tends marijuana plants

World trade talks end in collapse

China defends human rights record

And to all of these I ask a pertinent question: Really?

Dave Says…

Dave Ramsey, debt guru and a personal podcast favorite, says the following about my current situation:

Student Loan Backlash

Getting a student loan can hurt you much worse than just a monthly payment.

Nowadays, many people think you can’t be a student without a student loan. It’s easy to get a federal student loan or even go to the local bank to pay for your education, but doing so hurts both you and the economy in the long run.

The Rise in Lifestyle

Unfortunately, people are borrowing more than ever before. In 2001, $4 billion in student loans were taken out. Last year, that number jumped to $17 billion. Some people may say it’s because of higher tuition costs, and yes, that is part of the reason. But more than likely, a lot of it is lifestyle choices. When some people to go college, they want to live in the off-campus apartment and eat at restaurants instead of living in the dorms and eating dorm food.

At this point in your life, it’s time to face some facts. You don’t make any money, so you don’t need to spend any money. When you get out of college, you won’t still be feeling a meal in your belly from your junior year. But if it’s one of the many things you bought with your student loan, then you’ll be paying for it for years to come. That’s stupid! Which would you rather be – a debt-free graduate or a new graduate with tens of thousands of dollars in debt?

Borrowing Hurts Us All

The numbers are convincing. Let’s say you borrow $47,000 for a student loan. At a 5% interest rate, the payments are about $500 over 10 years. After 10 years, you’ve SPENT almost $60,000. If instead, you invest that money in a good growth-stock mutual fund averaging 12%, after 10 years you will have saved $115,000! Which do you think is better?

Borrowing so much hurts the economy in multiple ways. More debt means less money invested. If money isn’t invested, the economy doesn’t grow as well. More debt also means less money to outright buy things, which leads to more financing to buy things.

The sad part is that after you’ve gotten a student loan and paid on it for a couple of years, that’s when the reality hits you. That’s when you realize that you have obligated yourself to pay thousands of dollars in interest over several years, instead of keeping that money for yourself and investing it, or giving it away, or even saving up and buying things with cash.

Well…THIS IS YOUR WAKE-UP CALL! Don’t take out a student loan. You can apply for scholarships and grants, work part-time or go to a cheaper school. But it’s not worth it to take out a loan and start behind the financial 8-ball in life when you graduate.

If you are paying on a student loan, get on a budget today and start paying it off. The sooner you pay it off, the more money you’ll save in interest. Make it happen!

Provided by MyTotalMoneyMakeover.com

I’m Just Saying…

Facebook: Creating Stalkers Since 2003

July 18, 2008, By Jill-University of Wisconsin

When it comes to Facebook, you would be lying if you said you never found yourself looking at the pictures your winter vacation hookup (from 2001) just posted… or at the girl that annoyingly keeps writing on your boyfriend’s wall (and at all of her friends). I know, I know, you just randomly, somehow, stumbled upon them; you really, truly, only logged on to check your messages…3 hours ago. And now you are searching for that cute guy you met last night whose last name you don’t know (why did his name have to be Aaron?!).

Let’s face it; we’ve all stooped a little bit lower than we like to admit (logging on to a friend’s account to look at someone not in your network). Posted something for the sake of ONE person seeing it (an ex boyfriend perhaps? This picture totally screams “I am SOO over you”), or for the whole Facebook world to see (Look! I met Vince Vaughn! We sat at his table! This totally validates that I am cool. Take that all you who shoved me in a locker in high school!).

Every now and again, we all do a bit of random stalking or, as I chose to call it, investigative journalism. (The dictionary of my life says an email to my friends reporting my findings completely counts as journalism… “He’s single! Scooore!”) But with all this quasi-stalking that we do, we never really think that we are that important or fascinating enough that total randoms would waste their time looking at our photos from Halloween 2006.

That is, until it happens to you… and you find out.

And then, Facebook becomes really creepy.

After being tracked down (AND friend requested) by the ex-girlfriend of my current boy-toy (through a mutual friend that we share) I felt a range of emotions. First, I was in shock that she even found me and added me as a friend (the boy is not even on Fbook- how would she even know?). Then after I put it all together, I was embarrassed for her… that she still cares years later to friend request me just to look at my pictures and/or relationship status to garner more info on her ex’s life (all the while judging me). It’s all so pathetic- and sad- and desperate-and psycho- and pathetic (I mean, there are other ways to stalk me then to friend request me! Do you know no one in my network?! Crazy lady, this is just poor investigating!).

But mostly I was a little (lot) creeped out. Why is someone spending her time looking at my pictures, at people she doesn’t know, passing some sort of judgment about who I am and if I am cuter/smarter/funnier than she is? And in turn, why am I looking at hers and doing the same thing? Sure, I post pictures of my college reunion or my birthday, I write on people’s walls, I have a semi-filled out profile- and while I am soo not a fan of all the new applications, I guess I’m your typical Facebook user.

So after evaluating all these things that I actively do, I realized, I have no right to be creeped out.

The intention of this article at first was to call this girl to the carpet for her crazy-ness. And while I still think she crossed a line (and is one craaaazy cat), I realized that by posting ANYTHING on Facebook- you are sending an open invitation saying “Hey future boss/ex best friend/new boy I just met/or in my case, chick I don’t know who dated the guy I’m dating years ago… look at me and my life!” Sure, we all say we are only posting these pics for our friends to see- but if that’s the case, why not load them on Ofoto and send them the link? Or email them out? It’s plain and simple: we broadcast our lives on Facebook because a part of us wants it to be broadcasted…. to certain people.

Lesson to be learned: people are crazy. People with nothing but time on their hands are even crazier. Ex girlfriends/boyfriends are almost always crazy. It took one of these crazies to stalk me down to my knowledge for me to think about all the others who have done it in a smarter/sneakier way. Does this mean I’m going to quit Facebook? Hellllll no. I need something to do when I am bored at work. Not to mention my life isn’t that cool that it needs to be kept on the uber-private.

BUT it did teach me that someone is always watching/looking/stalking me down and sending out a piece of “investigative journalism” of their very own.

Guilty As Charged

Oversharing, Feminism, and the New American Twenty-Something

July 23, 2008 By J-NYU

The summer of 2008. A summer drowning in recession, debt, ridiculous gas prices, and boring, trashy television (I mean, Greatest American Dog??). Lots of things seem to be going wrong…or at least…discussed to the point of having us all believe they’re going wrong…and many teens and twenty-somethings are turning to the web to air their grievances.

Because 2008 isn’t just the summer of expensive corn and Obama-rama, it’s also the summer of TMI. Over-sharing has become a form of communication for our generation; from blogging about bad dates, to blogging about our self-indulgent issues, to blogging purely to become famous. No matter who we are, we can become stars overnight by uploading naked photos, name-dropping about a wild party, or simply having an ounce of literary ability and a snarky way with words.

By late July, 2008, the percent of people in the US who haven’t seen a celebrity vajayjay flash or heard someone say, “dude, I’m gonna blog about this!” is monumentally small, and it seems like every day a new gossip or 24 hour news site pops up. However, amidst the clattering of fingers on keyboards and snapping of flashbulbs, I can’t help but wonder if this constant need to be seen and heard is actually doing us any good.

Is all this over-sharing about our drug, drink, and sexual exploits really helping women cultivate a strong, intelligent persona? Do we feel more empowered now that Britney, Lindsay, and Paris have made trashy the new black? Are our lives more complete now that we know what David Beckham had for breakfast?

These aren’t rhetorical questions. As a twenty-something myself, I really want to know.

Produce is Pretty Much Just Another Word for Squash

I’ve been in this low-productivity funk since I graduated.  My entire life I’ve been told that, to amount to anything, to be of any value to the world whatsoever, I have to do.   I have to go to school, study hard, say the right things, want the right things.  But most of all, I have to produce…something.   A book, a film, a spot at a top law firm, a degree, a new church, children.  And I have to do all of this so that…

…

…

what?!

I don’t even know why.

Because anything less is simply unacceptable, I guess.  But to whom??  What’s so wrong with working at the Post Office or waiting tables, anyway? They pay the bills just the same.  Sure, if you’re slinging lattes at Starbucks when you’re 35 you probably won’t be able to afford that BMW, but the chances are good that you’ll actually be listening to your kids at the dinner table rather than mentally preparing for tomorrow’s pitch/meeting/sales call.  And besides, who, exactly, are you trying to impress with that Beemer with the 60-month payment plan?  Because, to me, most of them are simply saying “I’m still going to be paying this off when my grandchildren are born.”  And that, my friends, is not the future I want.

This is not a condemnation of productivity.  I love the sense of satisfaction of a job well-done. This rant is simply an examination of motives.  What is driving us to do? Why do we feel so compelled, so stressed to produce?  Sure, “it has to get done.”  Yes, “someone’s got to do it.”  But shouldn’t we be thinking more about how to be?  Being happy, being a good friend/sibling/girlfriend/boyfriend/husband/wife/parent, being a good person, being who we were made to be…?  I don’t think I”m crazy to believe that, if we learned how to be, we would learn how to live, and all the doing stuff would happen naturally.

What Does This Say About Us?

“When we are single and young we  naturally make friends and are often open to new friendships…But as we age, become busy, worry about finances, and raise kids, we tend to start shutting down relationally.  Sure, we care for people all day long, but it doesn’t mean we really care about them.  We too easily forget how we felt when we were strangers, starting over again.”

From “Wanting all the Right Things”, by Shirin Taber

No, really, what does this say about us?

Dope-ing

I was just reading this on Donald Miller’s blog about his cross-country bike ride:

Some unfortunate lowlights:

• The doping controversy: As you know, cycling and steroids have had a long, dark relationship. Our team is, unfortunately, no exception. Each day we are drug tested and on Wednesday of last week several of our team members tested positive. After a long, last sprint to the finish tuesday, the team suspected that Mindy Gunter was doping and sure enough that evening she tested positive. And last night Mike Barrow found uncommon strength at the end of the ride in order to finish first on the longest ride of the year. Mike is fifty-five and so we made him pee in a cup.

Do pray for us and the steroid controversy as it has the potential to ruin the team and negatively affect our campaign. Also, if anybody has a testing kit we could really use one. Right now we just hold the cup up to the light and smell it and swish it around like a glass of wine. Then we go with our gut.

I Blame the DIY Network on Cable

I figured out something today.  Its a simple thing that I probably should have had figured out before, but it finally clicked when I was sitting on the floor of my closet being upset.

I can’t do this on my own.

And that’s ok.

I don’t know why it took me this long to figure that out, but there you go.

In spite of this American DIY mindset that I’ve had drilled into my brain, I don’t think we were made to go it alone.  Otherwise, we’d be better at it.

Velvet Elvis

I just finished Rob Bell’s Velvet Elvis. Not less than 60 seconds ago I closed the book, looked at the cover, and sighed with satisfaction. I got this book about a year ago, off the free shelf at the bookstore where I worked at the time. It was a book I had been meaning to buy, because Donald Miller references it so many times in his books, but every time I went to buy it I chickened out. Whenever I read about it in Miller’s books, Velvet Elvis seemed like a book I would really love, so my complete inability to buy it baffled me. Then, one bleary-eyed 5am at the bookstore, as I stumbled into the back room to clock in and begin unloading boxes from the trucks, I happened to glance at the freebie shelf. There wasn’t much on it at the time, a skinny volume entitled Europe on 5 Dollars a Day (there are approximately 3 square feet of Europe where this is possible), several pre-releases of Nora Roberts novels, and a white hardback book with “Velvet Elvis” in small orange letters. I clocked in, snagged the book, threw it in my locker and unpacked boxes of books for what seemed like days.

It wasn’t until I was planning my escape from the bookstore and into a new job arena that I remembered the book in my locker, shoved behind a sweater and my water bottle. On my last day, I cleaned out my locker and the contents took up home in my trunk for another few months. It wasn’t until about January of this year that the book made its way onto my floor and it was last month before I began reading it. I was skeptical at first. I don’t really like books that are written by people who have their own churches, much less mega-churches that have an average attendance of 11,000 people.

I was wrong. This book is amazing. I should have read it a year ago, three years ago really. I think I’m going to read it again before the summer is up. Its that good. I pretty much love everything this man has to say, and had to stop myself from writing the entire book in my notebook as I was taking quote notes.

Here are a few of my favorites:

“Inspired words have a way of getting under our skin and taking on a life of their own. They work on us. We started out reading them, but they end up reading us.” (p.60)

“…Their story is our story. We see ourselves in them. The story is true for us because it happened and because it happens. It is an accurate description of how life is. The reason the stories in the Bible have resonated with so many people over the years is that they have seen themselves in these stories.” (p.59)

Great article on Rob Bell.

At That Place Again

I’m at that place again. Where I love the semblance of stability in my life but am still desperate for adventures abroad. Several of my friends are currently living abroad, in China, Peru, Spain, the UK, Romania. Hearing about their adventures makes me so jealous that I can barely see straight. I’m desperate for culture, language, adventure. I’ve never loved living in Atlanta, but at the moment the thought of spending another year here makes me feel smothered.

And then, I look around at my wonderful boyfriend and the adorable dog and the great house I live in and I think about how selfish and awful and ungrateful these thoughts make me feel. In my heart I know that this time here, in a city I do not love filled with people I do not desire to know, is meant to make me feel uncomfortable. It is meant to make me step out of my comfort zone. Moving to Spain, or China, or the UK would feel more comfortable to me than staying in my own country. Staying here is a test of my ability to make something out of nothing, to be a better version of myself.

I hope that someday, I’ll be able to leave and come back to find that I have missed this place.

I Get it Now

My town just got a new Home Depot. Boy am I glad, because otherwise I’d be forced to shop at a store whose name isn’t plastered over the entire nation. I’ll admit, I’ve been there already to buy more stain for the bookcase I’m refinishing.

But the whole thing has gotten me thinking. We live in a country that not only desires conformity but practically drowns us in it. I have yet to live in a town without a Home Depot, a Starbucks, a McDonald’s. Even the small IA town where my dad lives, population 5,000, has a McDonald’s. We’re told that we’re supposed to hit the gym after work, fear getting old, hate wrinkles, work to prevent global warming, eat burgers but want to be vegetarians, stay thin at all costs, let our jobs be our lives, give each of our children their own bathrooms, attend a top-tier college, and like reality TV.

Even our rebellion is full of conformity. When we rebel we paint our fingernails black, pierce our eyebrows, wear fishnet gloves, smoke pot, skip class, ride skateboards, play the guitar, listen to hard music, and draw skulls on our Chucks.

Every part of my life is full of pressure for me to be just like everyone else. I’m told to straighten my curly hair, wear trousers with less of a boot cut, pluck my eyebrows to a particular shape, desire a job in the corporate world, and name my dog Max.

Fundamentally, I’m not against any of these things. I don’t mind straightening my hair or buying new trousers and whatnot. But the fact that people in my life are actually telling me that I’ll never get anywhere in life if I don’t do these things is simply wrong. If I’m going to get a promotion based on whether my hair is straight or curly then I don’t want it. Keep your good job title and increased salary. I want nothing to do with a culture where my dog’s name can make or break friendship opportunities.

I get it now. I get why people jump out of planes, bungee jump off bridges and do other mildly insane things. You have to. If you want to feel alive or like you’re not just another drone in this place where you can’t tell one Banana Republic sweater from another, you have to do something to escape.

If you’ve never read Brave New World or A Wrinkle in Time, do it now, before they go out of print or something.

This is so True…

The newest post on Stuff White People Like:

#99 Grammar

May 12, 2008 by clander

White people love rules. It explains why so they get upset when people cut in line, why they tip so religiously and why they become lawyers. But without a doubt, the rule system that white people love the most is grammar. It is in their blood not only to use perfect grammar but also to spend significant portions of time pointing out the errors of others.

When asking someone about their biggest annoyances in life, you might expect responses like “hunger,” “being poor,” or “getting shot.” If you ask a white person, the most common response will likely be “people who use ‘their’ when they mean ‘there.’ Maybe comma splices, I’m not sure but it’s definitely one of the two.”

If you wish to gain the respect of a white person, it’s probably a good idea that you find an obscure and debated grammar rule such as the “Oxford Comma” and take a firm stance on what you believe is correct. This is seen as more productive and forward thinking that simply stating your anger at the improper use of “it’s.

Another important thing to know is that when white people read magazines and books they are always looking for grammar and spelling mistakes. In fact, one of the greatest joys a white person can experience is to catch a grammar mistake in a major publication. Finding one allows a white person to believe that they are better than the writer and the publication since they would have caught the mistake. The more respected the publication, the greater the thrill. If a white person were to catch a mistake in The New Yorker, it would be a sufficient reason for a large party.

Though they reserve the harshest judgment for professional, do not assume that white people will cast a blind eye to your grammar mistakes in email and official documents. They will judge you and make a general assessment about your intelligence after the first infraction. Fortunately, this situation can be improved if you ask a white person to proof read your work before you send it out. “Hey Jill, I’m sorry to do this, but I have a business degree and I’m a terrible writer. Can you look this over for me?” This deft maneuver will allow the white person to feel as though their liberal arts degree has a purpose and allow you to do something more interesting.

Don’t worry, it is impossible for a white person to turn down the opportunity to proofread.

Confessions of a Literophile

Literophile. Its not in my dictionary. In fact, right now Firefox is telling me that I ought to change it to either necrophiliac or audiophile. It might not be my most ingenious concoction of my linguistic knowledge, but I like to think it would make Jasper Fforde proud. I like language. I love words. I am obsessed with the written word.

I adore wandering around libraries and bookstores, but used bookstores are my personal favorite. There’s something sacred about books that have already been loved looking for new homes. I find my desire to buy used books is pretty much equal to my desire to take home the homeless puppies outside the pet store on adoption days. And that’s pretty bad, just ask my boyfriend. I find it impossible to get rid of books. What if I want to refer back to something in them…someday?? I broke this code when I was moving a few years ago, and every once in a while I set off in search of one of the two dozen or so books I gave away and, when I come up short, kick myself all over again for letting those books go.

If you’re not a book nerd, you probably haven’t made it this far. Although I’m never able to quite put my finger on it, there’s something amazing in the way a good book smells, the rustle of pages in a quiet room, the texture of a spine under your fingers. So I would like to offer my sympathies to those of you out there who don’t experience what my friend Sonya once termed bookgasms.

Literophelia does have its drawbacks, though. Namely this: books are expensive. And heavy. I move a lot, which means that I rid myself of everything unnecessary each time this happens. Furniture (save bookcases) goes, kitchen appliances go, clothes go, TVs and DVDs go, books stay. I think its safe to say I have a problem.

In a modern culture that values literature (and reading outside the computer in general) much lower than ever before, what’s a literophile to do? I have so few friends who read, and I mean really read. I’m not talking Nora Roberts here, I’m talking actual literature. I took my dog to the clinic where my boyfriend works a few weeks ago, and had a disheartening talk with the vet about books. He asked my what I wanted to do with my life (a loaded question to an aspiring professor who works in a bank) and I said I was going for my MA in Comparative Literature. He then proceeded to expound on the greatness of James Patterson. All I could think to say is that Patterson has, indeed, written a great many books. I’m sure this did nothing to make me look intelligent in his eyes, but that’s ok. What strikes me is how common this reaction is, so many people pulling their B-rated movie version of book knowledge out when I say that I want to be a literature professor. It makes me wonder, if I met someone who wanted to be a film professor, would I expound on my love of Scrubs?

To be honest, I don’t think so, but I’m not altogether sure. Lately, I’ve started to feel as though I’m very different. And I don’t mean in the cool I-love-her-awesome-haircut kind of way, but rather in the is-there-something-wring-with-that-girl kind of way. I’m pretty sure there’s nothing wrong with me. I’m pretty sure I’m not exactly average either.