Tels sont les quatre âges de l’amour : il naît dans les bras du dédain, il croît sous la protection du désir, il s’entretient avec les faveurs et meurt empoisonné par la jalousie.
CALDERON
Le désir, le souvenir, l’espoir. Les trois temps d’un amour.
OUVRARD
Si on ne désire plus, c’est le désir qu’il faut soigner. Chercher l’amour en vous, pas chez les autres. Vous le leur apporterez après.
JASMIN
I’ve been anxiously waiting for vacations. It’s been so much this year that all I can think of is how good it’ll be when it ends. Tire has come to a point where nothing more matters, what you learn, the grades you get, the homework you do or not… it’s all routine, and there’s no true desire of learning anymore, because the whole year we’ve been stuffed up with informations we have a hard time swallowing. The french Bac is in a week, and somehow, strangely, I’m not even worried about it: what does it change if I do well or if I don’t? We have this impulsion of trying prove ourselves good, but what for?
I honestly don’t know wether I’m still supposed to write here or not, but this time, I have to admit that sometimes it feels good to write things down, put them out… it has a “cathartic” effect. This time it was possible, miraculously, to find some time to write here (and I’m almost falling asleep, so there’s a strong chance I’ll delete this post after I “consciously” read it).
When this happens, when I can stop and think about things, I close my eyes and see the most variated sorts of landscapes. The last time was in the car, on the way to school, I was half asleep… a green wide grass field, with smooth mountains in the horizons harldly visible, with a golden contour. It was the sunrise. And I ran, and ran, and I couldn’t get enough of it. I felt the fresh air in the face and the warm hug from the morning sun. I felt the absolute vacuum of my thoughts. I felt freedom.
Sometimes I wish I could chose not to think, not to do anything, to be a complete hermit, physically and psychologically, just for some minutes. Some call that meditation, my mind wouldn’t turn off. Montaigne chose to live isolated during years when he was fourty, and wrote all his thoughts. I can chose to live isolated (in my room), for a few hours. I guess it’s not enough time to write some “Essais” like he did, but it is to write a non-sense post in a blog.
I realized, while I was writing, how strongly my running to nowhere scene looked a lot like Rimbaud’s poem “L’Aube”, but I can’t remember what a saw first, the poem or the scene. Oh well, what does it matter anyway?
We’ve been studying in french class these past weeks about biographies and autobiographies. It’s a relatively recent style of writing since it appeared in the 18th century with Confessions by Rousseau. We read three autobiographies: Si c’est un homme, by Primo LEVI, Confessions (volume 1) by ROUSSEAU, and Enfance, by SARRAUTE. Although both of them talk about themselves, their objtective are distinct. Primo Levi writes about life in a concentration camp during world war II, and he writes in order to put out all that crosses his mind. He describes the way things worked at that period, and his description envolves not only his world, but everybody else’s, who were in the same situation. Whereas Rousseau writes about his personal life. He describes some episodes of his youth, things he used to do, and how he felt about them. Sarraute, in Enfance, has a very original way of writing about herself: she writes about short scenes she remembers from when she was little. She also opens a dialogue with herself, making her ”present” infer in her “past”, trying to figure out how she felt, and, at the same time, showing how she sees that episode nowadays.
Through these three books, we can notice that the interest in writing an autobiography varies from author to author according to their intern sentimental needs.
So I started wondering about that, and asking myself what would I write if I had to write my autobiography. I think that the toughest thing to do is not really to remember the old moments, because the important ones we never forget, but it’s mostly to transmit the feelings, and tell our lives in a captivating way. I could stay months and months reading and writing about myself, but that’s just because it’s me. Who would want to read a book about an unknown person? Well, it’s true that there are all kinds of people out there…
Anyway, I think that I’d write focussing on my father’s job’s influence in my life, to which I attribue a major responsability in the defenition of my character. He was a diplomat.
Was it a bad thing or a good thing?
I still don’t know…
Maybe if I write my autobiography someday, I could figure it out.
Friends is a TV show that lasted ten years. In my opinion, it’s the best TV show ever. For two reasons:
it has great characters, and thanks to it I met one of the most special people I’ve ever known.
Let’s start by the amazing characters:
Monica, Chandler, Rachel, Ross, Phoebe and Joey compose the most incredible cast. Monica is a pretty selfish person, she always wants to be the best at everything, she likes cooking and she loves cleaning. Chandler marries her in the eighth season. His main characteristic is that he likes making jokes of everything. Joey is his roommate, and he is known for being the guy who loves eating and taking girls out. He’s a soap opera actor. Both Chandler and Joey have a great friend Ross -Monica’s brother- who is a paleontologist and so loves dinosaurs. He is in love with Rachel in most of the seasons, and they do end up together. Rachel is very keen on fashion, and dreams about working at Calvin Klein. Finally, there is Phoebe who is a pretty weird character. She has the crazy ideas, and tells weird stories. She does massages for a living.
They are characters that fit perfectly together and work in a way that touches millions of people. No wonder so many people cried in that last episode!In second place, I would like to talk about something that has really nothing to do with the show itself, but how it became a socializing instrument. Friends represents everyday scenes, and it illustrates perfectly how friends treat each other, and what real life really is. So, in every moment of the day, there is always something that reminds us FRIENDS. Consequently, when you’re with somebody who watches FRIENDS, you always have something nice and fun to talk about.
This is how I met a great friend. We were in English class, and he mentioned the TV show, and I was so happy to know that someone else also loved the show, we started talking and talking. And every time we saw each other, we had something to talk about, and we would remember funny moments, and laugh… We used to say I had a lot of Monica’s personality, and that he had a lot of Chandler’s. They married each other later on. And now, after 4 years of Friendship, he became my boyfriend. And, let’s say, it’s all thanks to Friends…And if you want to know why Friends is so good, just turn on the TV and watch an episode. There is no way you don’t relax and laugh while you watch it. It’s perfect for every single moment.
I danced ballet during 5 years. My little girl dream was to become the best ballet dancer, and the two dancers inspired me were Alessandra Ferri and Barishnikov. When I was around 6 years old, I used to cut pieces of my pillow to fill my ballet shoes and pretend I could go on my tip toes like “grown up dancers”. It was almost like my greatest dream, to be able someday, to dance like real dancers.
Many people don’t really enjoy ballet, specially nowadays. I think that life is becoming more and more agitated that it is difficult for us to realize that quiet and delicate things can be extremely touching, it just takes a little bit of sensitivity.
To me, dancing is one of the most efficient ways of putting out hard feelings. Its better than painting and singing. You just move, you put yourself in harmony, you concentrate in imaginary figures your making with your hands, with the shapes you do with your body… When I dance I feel energy traveling to the point of my fingers, and when I make moves with the arms, it’s as if this energy slip slighty out, and as if I was dancing right in the middle of my own little world.
I quit ballet when I had to move back to Brazil. I danced in the Washington School of Ballet, until I was 11. I danced the nutcracker (even though it was a little part) in the Warner theater, and I used to dream of being the principal dancer, named ”Clara”. Unfortunately, I went back to Brasilia, and I did try different classes of ballet, but I didn’t like any of them. So I gave up, there weren’t many choices. I think stopping ballet was one of my biggest mistakes. It’s a pitty because now it’s to late for me to start again. I regret it.
As I mensioned before, Alessandra Ferri is a ballerina that I really admire. She’s an Italian dancer, born in Milan. Alessandra was named the Principal Dancer of the American Ballet Theatre, which is one of the great ballet schools in the United States (it’s located in New York). She also danced in the Royal Ballet -previously, where she danced in many performances; and participated to the Ballet National de Marseille. She danced in many important perfomances and for many important coreographers.
Here bellow I’m attaching a video of her dancing, and Sting plays a piece written by Bach. The song, the dancing, the scenario… It is all amazingly beautiful.
I would like to dedicate this space for a sweet sweet bunny. My boyfriend gave me the most original easter gift: a bunny! Not a teddy bear one, a real one! And he is sooo cute. He looks like a gray fury ball. He could fit entirely in the palm of my hand.
When I first saw him, he was all scared and wouldn’t move. I put him in his little cage, and he slept next to my bed. I put one of my old T-shirts in the cage, so he could sleep on it, and not feel so lonely. He woke me up many times, because, after he got a little used to the place, he started jumping inside the cage.
The second day, I had to take him off my room and put him in my bedroom, since he was making to much mess putting this from his cage all over the place.
Some days later, I found out his ears were itching, and he had some wounds. The vet said it was because he was “out of place”… Bunnies need to have a large grass field to jump around, run, find carrots, feel free… And it is true that, it is pretty sad to see a little bunny in a cage… I started wondering about all animals that live in cages, and I find it completely absurd. No one was made to live surrounded by fences.
But anyway, at that point I couldn’t give it away because I was already too sentimentally close to him! So the solution was to buy a new and bigger cage for him. He has now a big big cage, and a have a quite small bathroom since it took all of the space! But it’s ok, as long as he is happier.
He is now much better… Sometimes when I can, I put my german shepereds in their cage, and then I take my bunny to the yard…. It is sooo cute to see him happy, all jumpy!
Well, this is pretty much it… Going to give him some food now! Underneath goes a picture of him…
I know it might seem like I completely hate my school since I wrote about it in a few other articles before. And the truth is, I hate how hard I’m supposed to work.
I recognize I’m lucky to have the chance to go to a school, and that in plus it is considered a good school. But I just can’t wait till it’s over.
I realized how worried I get about so many things, and they are all related to my studies. It’s the weirdest thing to stay my whole two week holiday thinking how bad it is to know I’ll have to step back again in my school…
The problem is not the people who are in, not the ones who work there or study there, it’s just the fact that, once we are there, it’s ALL there. We wake up at six o’clock to be there on time, we leave at four, and sometimes even at five, which means that we get home at five or at six. Which is pretty acceptable since we have so many things to learn. The problem is, we not only get home exausted, but we’re not allowed to rest. We simply can’t. We always have to work… The sad thing is, if we chose to be a good student, we have a non-stop stress life. If we choose to be a normal person who enjoys his youth, it’s pretty hard to go well. You might think I’m too extremist, but think with me:
if I decide, today, that I need to breathe and do something different, and I go to the park, and do something I like (drawing in the park, for example, or seeing an exposition), it means I leave school at four, get there at four thirty minimum. Lets say I draw during two hours. I get home at seven (if there is no traffic), I have dinner because I’m starving and at some point I have to be with my family, and right after I take my shower. It’s about eight thirty. Great, they say we should sleep around 8 hours per night. I have one hour thirty to do a ten-question history work, plus a resume of everything (I wrote three computer pages), study for my maths test, for my physics test, my biology test (on friday, but too tough to study the eve), and finish my fench “devoir type bac” (that I wrote around 6 pages). How am I supposed to handle it all?
We hear a lot that we have to organize our free time, and like that we don’t suffocate. Wait, what free time? Ah, true, vacations… So now vacations are made for studying?
Lately I’ve had butterflies on my stomach all the time, just at the thought of school. We are tought how to do stuff, how to write, how to compose a text, how to argue, how to interpret, how to think! Good students obey what is imposed, so do no-personality students, standard students chose to do it quite right, since they don’t like imposition (and that’s why they are medium… they could be genius, who knows?), and bad students simply don’t listen. And student’s like me don’t know what to do. All this really bothers me,I really wish I could have a little more time for myself. We have so little space to show what we are really good at because we don’t have the freedom to be ourselves. Well, we do, but than you won’t be regarded as a good student, since you dedicate yourself for something else.
What good is knowledge and education, if we don’t have time to effectively apply all we’ve learn in realy life? Why do we prepare ourselves to live in the big world, if we can’t see with our own eyes and experiences?
But it’s ok, just 1 year a half to hang on…
by Piet Mondrian
Isn’t it weird, if you ask someone what’s they’re favorite kind of art, and they anwer you “abstract art”? Well, that’s what I would anwer.
Abstract art is usually underestimated. People don’t see how art can be a bunch of vertical or horizontal lines and with (mostly) primary colours.
Why paint insignificant shapes?
If we take it this way, then why paint landscapes? Why paint men, families, birds?
I think that everyone has its own way to see things, and the way we choose to show it reveals a lot of our personnality, and makes it easier for others to understand us.
Abstract art seems to me the most mysterious kind of art. A sitting noble portraies not only the political system of the period, but also the ease of the court, and how nobles wanted to be painted to show their wealth. A mother holding a baby in her arms represents love, affection, careness… But what could a rectangle possibly mean to somebody?
When I feel something, I like to put it out. But not always (almost never) I know what those feelings are. So it isn’t always possible to express it through realistic images. I think that the abstract is much more personal. It’s a relief to put out things and give shapes to feelings with no preoccupation that others might not understand.
In plus, it’s a great decorative element. It’s easily in harmony with the ambient, since the colours are basic. It’s flexible interpretation favourises the fact that it could belong anywhere. He who sees it, will have the sensation that you prabably don’t have when you see it.
Abstract art is to me the liberty of expressing myself, oportunity to open other people’s minds, freedom in shapes.
If you liked the painting’s style, see more of Mondrian’s life on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piet_Mondrian
I’ve to Hollywood, but unfortunately I was about 6 years old. It must be really thrilling to visit the place where all the famous people have been or live, and where plenty of movies are filmed! In plus, I see pictures here at home from our trip, and they are so amazing! The landscape is wonderful.
My biggest hope is to be able to go there with friends (when I get a little older….in college), stay a couple of days just hanging out, feeling americanish, lol…
But for now, I’m fine here in Brazil.
This is the place I most want to visit. They say that the northern lights (aurora borealis) is incredibly outstanding, and I’m sooo curious to see it! I must feel so spooky to see the sky in all sorts of colours! Trust me, if your bored, search google for “northern lights” or “aurora borealis”…seriously, there are some really awesome pictures.
See more progress on: Copenhagen
