Fin.

I am officially declaring my work here, on scornsoftime.blogspot.com to be done. I have moved to web.mac.com/benjicl so update your bookmarks... all two of you.

In the Mode of Gertrude Stein

My most recent assignment for my Rhetoric class had me write a poem similar in style to Gertrude Stein. Here is my poem:

There.

It is there.
Where is there?

Here is there. 

There is there.

And here is here.



What is there?

Nothing is there.

But something is here.

What is here?

Something not there.



Here!

It is here.
Where is here?

Here is here.

Here is here.

And here is here.

Nobody Likes a Know-It-All

A year removed from high school and some people have yet to learn the lesson that “nobody likes a know-it-all.” I officially started my classes this past Monday, most importantly meaning that Summer is officially over. As per tradition, I donned on the same black backpack I have used since sixth grade, I stocked plenty of blank notebook paper, and I printed out my schedule of classes. When I get to campus it's one of lecture, followed by another, followed by a break, just short enough, that it's not worth it to go home, then I attended another lecture, then, finally, a discussion section-- all before 3:00. I finished my first day by clocking into work on the busiest day in the store's history. I went to a friend's place and came home, for the first time since waking up, around 11:00. I went to bed, knowing it would be similar on Tuesday.

This is where the “know-it-all” bobs her giant, knowledge filled head to annoy me just enough to blog about it. The instructor asks one question and she answers proudly. The instructor asks the next question, and without even raising her hand, she answers confidently. “Ok,” I think “she is just enthusiastic.” The next question, she gives an elaborate response with some personal anecdote that I know no one in the class asked for. The instructor smiles and continues with the lesson then asks another question. “What, a different person is answering the question!” Finally, a voice different than the high pitched screech of the know-it-all. I listen on attentively to my fellow student, when suddenly, in the middle of her answer the know-it-all starts its mating call “well actually...” I wouldn't have put the ellipsis , but to be honest, I don't know, nor do I care, what “Kia” said next.

By the end of class she was so proud of herself, it was almost pathetic. This girl probably lived her entire life this way. Trying to prove her intellectual worth, day in and day out, even at the expense of her fellow classmates. All for what? A pat on the head and a paper certificate beautifully stating how wonderfully brilliant she is? It wouldn't have been so bad had she been witty, funny, or at the very least, easy on the eyes. I probably sound ridiculously judgmental, but hey--she's the one still acting like she's in high school.

My Homey

It's been over two months since I officially moved into my own place and started “playing adult.” However for the first few days after moving in, I was sleeping on a friend's air mattress. The first few weeks after moving in I was sleeping on my Ikea bed and either squatting or sitting on my knees in order to use my desk. After a six-week long, much-needed vacation from Berkeley (which I will save for another blog) I finally got the rest of my stuff and necessary furniture to make my room feel like home.

In the first few weeks I felt as though I did not belong in my apartment, but rather, I was simply passing by, temporarily living in a space until I found a more permanent dwelling. I was in limbo, even with my six megabits per second cable internet connection (and I am the kind of person that thought all I needed was an electrical outlet and an internet connection to be happy.)

This past Tuesday, my mom and I drove up to Berkeley to drop off the rest of my stuff in my apartment and buy more necessary furniture, just as shelves/dresser and the all important desk chair. My clothes are all put away and my other accouterments are in the process of being organized. This entire experience had me thinking about what home feels like.

To be completely honest, I believe the feeling of home can be boiled down to what sheets you sleep in. They are the last thing you feel before you go to sleep and the first thing you feel when you wake up. Last year, since I lived in the dorms, I had to get completely new sheets from those back home (due to the strange bed sizes in college dorms.) Needless to say, my college dorm never felt “homey,” due to many factors, one being foreign people breathing the same air as me while I slept. Now I have a bed size similar to the one I had back home before I started college and I can use the sheets from my bed back home on my bed in Berkeley and to tell you the truth, I haven't slept better in this city.

"Creation Myth"

I cannot help but feel the need to be creative. It's actually more of a desire or dream than anything else. People paint, sculpt, photograph, layout, build, write, or compose, I unfortunately feel as though I cannot do any of these things. When it comes to painting, sculpting, or composing I simply cannot do it. I have tried my hand painting (if 4th grade art time counts) and I just don't have the skills (or eyes) necessary to create pieces where people “ooo and ahhh.” If I tried seriously painting it would come out with red grass, lavender sky, brown leaves, and dark purple water-- something I am sure would cause the critic with the strongest of stomach lining to lose their lunch. I can actually draw, provided there is no living thing in my work. I can do straight lines, landscapes, and man-made objects, but how many times can you draw a skyline before thinking 'this guy needs to branch out?' Composing is almost completely out of the question, I don't like curb myself or my abilities, but it would take too much time to learn and it honestly should be a skill I started when I was five.

I think I would have my best chance at photography or writing, after all that's what I am doing here, writing. I am sure you all agree that I am not the best of writers and most certainly not the wittiest, silliest or creative-ist. I dabble in poetry every now and then, but it's nothing special, nor anything you will ever see as I am way too embarrassed to let it see the light of day (I only wax poetry at night.) Photography is a wonderful hobby of mine. I enjoy capturing moments and images that I want to remember forever. As a matter of fact some of my pictures are wonderful, but, to some, photography is their “thing”. I don't want to impede or cheapen their “thing” by claiming it is my thing as well. Nothing makes you lose interest in something when you realize someone else is better at it than you.

I know it's silly and superficial, but maybe I cannot find a defining creative outlet because I am not the best at any of these things. I know it's not the point of artistic ventures, as a matter of fact I am probably cheapening art by adding a competitive twist to it, sorry. There is a light at the end of this very dark tunnel of insecurities (look--it's kind of poetic, metaphors!) I love appreciating art. Give me a painting and I will be one of the first to discuss it or hag it up. Play me music and I will be first to copy it to iTunes. Write a poem and I will gladly be the first to read it and snap my beatnik fingers. Take a photograph and I will be first to make it my desktop picture. Cook something and I will be first to consume it (provided there isn't any meat). I think you get the picture. I may not be the best at creating art, but I will try to be the best at appreciating it.

In the meantime I will sit here, listen to music, write my blogs, and look at my iPhoto library for the picture I enjoyed taking the most. Keep creating, there is at least one person here to appreciate it.

To a Blogger

We all make plans. Some more than others, but every person does it. Whether it's what to eat, where we're going, or what we want for the rest of our lives, we all do it. The unfortunate downfall to our inability to be 100% spontaneous is we're constantly at risk for failure. The plans we make are vulnerable to variables we do not even consider nor can we control. Some plan on staying in a certain place for an extended period of time then an event unexpected happens and even the best, most thought out plans fail.

I am not trying to qualify Robert Burns' line from “To a Mouse” ( “the best laid schemes o' mice an' men, gang aft agley”) I am letting my life's experiences do the typing. I can plan to graduate college and pursue a job after the fact, perhaps get married somewhere down the road and have a family. Unfortunately, events in life can make that perfect plan of graduating, getting married, and holding a career can skew it so far from ever being carried out the way we hoped. They are so vulnerable to the unplanned events that when our plans do fail we feel as failures. We can do a few things to counter-act this, we can understand that if we make plans that we will fail at them from the get-go, this is a very skeptical way of dealing with it, but it works. However I think the best way of dealing with it is to stop planning the minute and and only plan on the bigger milestones and not to date them. I may now plan on graduating from college within four years, but something may happen that prevents me from doing that, instead I should plan on graduating from college. Turn plans into goals.

I discussed the weighty plans, the plans that effect life's direction. There are other types of plans that are in need of addressing. The small plans we make daily, that also, are pretty much doomed to failure. My goal the other day was to make myself a sandwich, however the cheese I wanted on it was not available. I planned on having that cheese, but life kicked my ass again and disallowed me from having my sandwich the way I planned. My sister planned on taking a trip to Anaheim with a friend Thursday night, but circumstances (another car rubbing paint with theirs) prevented their plans from being completed in the ideal way. They went to Anaheim a day later, did they fail at their plans? Hell yeah they did. One could argue since they didn't make it to Anaheim on Thursday they automatically failed. Or maybe they didn't since they made it to Anaheim eventually. The point of this was to show that even the best laid plans can go awry. (I thought I planned on not qualifying that... fuck)

We will make plans and they will need to be changed, I think the best we can do is try to make them as dynamic as possible. Don't dwell on the failures, celebrate the successes and enjoy the company.

Long Overdue

This blog is long overdue. About three weeks overdue. It's not that I didn't want to write nor was it that I didn't have anything to say, I just didn't do it. My life isn't particularly busy right now, however there is a lot in my life going on. Funny how that works. My first year at the university ended about three weeks ago. I took my last two finals May 16th and came back to Lancaster two days after that. What may be surprising to some of you is that I decided to come back to Berkeley just five days after coming home. Why? I am not really sure myself, I think it was a combination of many reasons, but I'll save that for a later (but not too much later blog). To give you a picture of what has been going on in my life, I am currently writing this in Oakland International Airport waiting for my flight to Burbank to begin the boarding protocol. Yeah, you heard me right, I am coming back home (again!)

I could go through and tell you the ups and downs of my freshman year at Berkeley, but if you are a frequent reader, which I assume you are because all (three) of my readers were here a little under a year ago when I started this thing. Which reminds me, this is my 50th posted blog, hard to believe especially since I seem to only post every three weeks or so. Anyway, here's the low down. Last August I didn't know what to expect from this Berkeley place, all I knew was that it would kick my ass and that I would have to get used to not being the best or the brightest, it wasn't that hard of a transition. My first semester was mostly spent as a wide-eyed freshman with the whole rest of my college life ahead of me. I made it out of the Antelope Valley and was happy to branch out. I moved farther from home than most of my friends (a whopping 400 miles) I wanted to start my own life, as a different person than the way high school defined me. Needless to say, you can't change the person you are inside and since I wear personality on my sleeve people knew what to expect of me right away, however being away from the people who knew me throughout my childhood was quite liberating. I met many new people and probably remembered less than half of their names, however the people that mattered I remember and I established sincere relationships with them. I got a job, went to social events, and survived life for a year without my mommy to pick up after me. I entered the most meaningful romantic relationship at that time and also felt true heart break three months later. It was a good Thanksgiving, Chanukah, New Years, and Valentine's Day, but unfortunately it had to come to an end. I never would have recognized it back then, but maybe it was for the best.

I went though a painful time of my life the beginning of the spring semester. I was cynical and sarcastic. I questioned my decision to attend Cal and seriously considered transferring to another college. I wasn't depressed, I was just unhappy. I felt as though everything I did was wrong and all that I worked for in high school was wasted on a wrong decision. I decided to wait until spring break to see how I felt and by spring break I was happier. I reaffirmed my decision to come to one of the greatest places in the world, academically, politically and geographically. When I was able to come to terms with myself I gained a new peace of mind and euphoria that was better than my bright eyed first semester days. I put myself out into the world and met new people all by myself -- without Jena or Eric. I have a new sense of who I am and where I am going. This feeling will probably not last forever, but it's good that it is here now and I am enjoying it thoroughly. I came into the year on a high note, after the best summer of my life and I am leaving it on a high note as well, with a new sense of self.

As for my summer, well, until about two weeks before the year ended I was planning on spending it in Lancaster, now however, I am spending almost all of it in Berkeley, in my new apartment. I will be working almost full time at the Scholar's Workstation and trying to live more of an independent life. The weather is fabulous and the people are amazing. As I write this, the wind is calm, the sky is blue and it is probably no more than 72 degrees. Shame I have to go back on such a beautiful day, but I have a lot to look forward to this coming week. A small break from work to see my friends, John Mayer live in Hollywood with my best friend, experience Apple's World Wide Developer's Conference, and see my little sister get promoted from middle school to high school. I'll keep you all posted more frequently and I wish you all a great day.