Quotation
"'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.'
'The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you CAN make words mean so many different things.'" -Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There

Random Musing
A little over a year ago, I wrote a blog post recommending that my followers give The Soloists a listen. They're a band from Novi, Michigan composed of two super nice and talented guys, and I'm thrilled to be able to report that they have just released a new EP titled Before You Go. I think it's their best EP to date - which is high praise coming from a Soloists superfan - and honestly believe you'd be doing yourself a favor in buying it. So go ahead and click on that link - you will not be sorry.

Oh, and just in case the chance to add some excellent new songs to your music library isn't enough enticement for you, half of the proceeds from the album's sales will be donated to St. Francis Inn in memory of Chip Switzer. So you can feel good about your decision to buy the album on multiple levels. Now go click on that link. Go. Now. Do it.

Quotation
"If there is such a thing as complete happiness, it is knowing that you are in the right place…" -Fannie Flagg, Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

Quotation
"He's a better person when she's around, and isn't that what friends are for, to raise you up and keep you at your best?" -David Nicholls, One Day

Quotation
"'I have never known what it was to separate esteem and love.'" -Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility

Random Musing
Anomalous Press published the first five poems of my chapbook she wears grey in their latest issue. You can read the poems - as well as listen to me reading them - here.

Random Musing
I had a poem featured on The 22 Magazine's blog today.

Quotation
"Her deprivation had been not having any dreams of her own at all." -Toni Morrison, Beloved

Quotation
"Their friendship was like a wilted bunch of flowers that she insisted on topping up with water. Why not let it die instead? It was unrealistic to expect a friendship to last forever…" -David Nicholls, One Day

Quotation
"'The happiness of one man and one woman is the greatest thing in all the world.'"
-Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles

Quotation
"'…love is the only thing that we can carry with us when we go…'" -Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

Quotation
"'My predecessor was the one who knew most about all of this.  It took him seven years to get a general sense of what was going on.  Life is unbearably sad, don't you think?'" -Roberto Bolaño, 2666 (Translated by Natasha Wimmer)

Random Musing
Phantom Kangaroo accepted one of my poems a couple weeks ago. As of yesterday issue no. 10 is up on the site; you can go here to read my poem.

When I first received the acceptance email I was really excited about having another poem published and out there for the world to see. But my excitement's been tempered by recent events. I'm just not quite in the mood to celebrate. Or maybe I just don't like this idea of life simply going on in the face of tragedy - even if I know that is of course how the world works. It feels like everyone should sit and mourn for a while before going on with life as usual; as if moving forward so quickly is disrespectful (and no, I'm not sure what "moving forward" even means exactly). I know that's all pretty irrational, but it's how I'm feeling right now.

Anyhow, just wanted to share my first online publication with my faithful readers.

Quotations
"'Dead?' said Sophie. She had a silly impulse to add, But she was alive an hour ago! And she stopped herself, because death is like that: people are alive until they die." -Diana Wynne Jones, Howl's Moving Castle

"'Among the tortures and devastations of life is this then — our friends are not able to finish their stories.'" -Virginia Woolf, The Waves

Random Musing
And once again, I find that Diana Wynne Jones' quote about death is spot on and sadly appropriate for the times. Chip Switzer, another Novi High School alum, passed away yesterday. He died peacefully in his sleep. He was twenty years old. He wasn't my friend, but he was an unfailingly kind person, and his passing away so suddenly is yet another (and at this point unnecessary) reminder of this world's constant, torturous transience. My thoughts and prayers are with his friends and family.

Quotation
"My friend has gone away from me
From shadow into perfect light,
But leaving a sweet legacy.
My heart shall hold it long in fee—
A grand ideal, calm and bright,
A song of hope for ministry,
A faith of unstained purity,
A thought of beauty for delight—
These did my friends bequeath to me;
And, more than even these can be,
The worthy pattern of a white,
Unmarred life lived most graciously.
Dear comrade, loyal thanks to thee
Who now hath fared beyond my sight,
My friend has gone away from me,
But leaving a sweet legacy." -L.M. Montgomery, "My Legacy"

Random Musing
I ran across that poem in The Watchman and Other Poems a few months ago and my mind immediately went to Erica Teevens. It just seemed so incredibly apt. That's why I copy down quotes from everything I read - it's so nice to run across something, anything that manages so succinctly to express thoughts and feelings you've had. Cause we're all a jumble of emotion most of the time anyhow, and nothing manages to get sorted out.

Today is six months since Erica Teevens passed away. It's a rather large milestone, and for the people who were particularly close to her, it's a horrible reminder that someone very near and dear to them is no longer around and hasn't been around for so many months. There's nothing anyone can do about the fact that time is going on and on and things are happening, and all the same Erica isn't around anymore to share in any of it. I know my sister is one of those people having a really hard time with that concept. I wish I could help, I wish I could do something or anything but in this situation there isn't anything to do really. So I'm limited to writing poems and making paintings and pulling quotes out of books thinking that at least someone out there will appreciate how perfectly writers like J.D. Salinger and L.M. Montgomery and Virginia Woolf were able to express how they're feeling. Cause I guess that's the only thing anyone can do for those people hurting so much right now: actually understand that terrible lonely ache and so somehow manage to make them feel a little less alone.

Quotations
"'Never take advice!'" -Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

"Amy's lecture did Laurie good, though, of course, he did not own it till long afterward. Men seldom do, for when women are the advisers, the lords of creation don't take the advice till they have persuaded themselves that it is just what they intended to do. Then they act upon it, and, if it succeeds, they give the weaker vessel half the credit of it. If it fails, they generously give her the whole." -Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

"…'All children must look after their own upbringing.'  Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person's character lies in their own hands." -Anne Frank, Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl

"Perhaps, then, there is something to his advice that I should cease looking back so much, that I should adopt a more positive outlook and try to make the best of what remains of my day. After all, what can we ever gain in forever looking back and blaming ourselves if our lives have not turned out quite as we might have wished?" -Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day

"'…advice is a dangerous gift, even from the wise to the wise…'" -J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

"If it isn't fun, don't do it.
You'll have to do enough that isn't…." -Robert Creeley, "Sad Advice"

Quotation
"'Dexter, I love you so much. So, so much, and I probably always will.' Her lips touched his cheek. 'I just don't like you anymore. I'm sorry.'" -David Nicholls, One Day

Quotations
"Besides, doesn't everybody know that it doesn't make a mite of difference how a love-letter is spelled?" -L.M. Montgomery, Magic for Marigold

"…but her Letters were always unsatisfactory, and though she did not openly avow her feelings, yet every line proved her to be Unhappy." -Jane Austen, "Catharine, or the Bower"

"'Letters are no matter of indifference; they are generally a very positive curse.'" -Jane Austen, Emma

"Every body at all addicted to letter writing, without having much to say, which will include a large proportion of the female world at least…" -Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

"'Every body allows that the talent of writing agreeable letters is peculiarly female.'" -Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey

"…as if letters couldn't lie.  But Philip knew better than that, sprawling his thanks across a page to Aunt Alice who had given him a teddy bear he was too old for.  Letter could lie all right, but they made the lie permanent.  They lay as evidence against you: they made you meaner than the spoken word." -Graham Greene, "The Basement Room"

"Letters, like compilation tapes, were really vehicles for unexpressed emotions…" -David Nicholls, One Day

"John Donne said more than kisses, letters mingle souls and so they do…" -Zadie Smith, White Teeth

Quotation
"'If you're my friend I should be able to talk to you but I can't, and if I can't talk to you, well, what is the point of you? Of us?'" -David Nicholls, One Day

Quotation
"The Potters smiled and waved at Harry and he stared hungrily back at them, his hands pressed flat against the glass as though he was hoping to fall right through it and reach them. He had a powerful kind of ache inside him, half joy, half terrible sadness." -J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone