Things I Miss

I miss the old internet.
I miss away messages and buddy info,
The AIM stalking that was more labor intensive than any on facebook.
What was facebook, then?
I miss fonts.
I miss it when font style said so much about you.
Arial. Comic sans. Veranda. Tahoma.
how you stole fonts you liked, used fonts to make a statement.
No one used Papyrus, even then.

I miss message boards. How we would know
All of us
would know each other.
How your top posters were big names.
Now, message boards are run by the networks.
I can't find fan proboards, not like
there were. Not like we had,
all of us there.

You, on Tumblr
(What was Tumblr, then?)
will you ever know what it's like?
The OT threads, the episode recaps
and most of all

The Three Year Summer.

The Three Year Summer,
when CassieClare ruled
when Arabella and Zsenya rebelled
when the Shoebox Project collected dust under the bed
and we were all on the same page
(your choice about pun intended).

You, now. You'll never know
what it was like not to know
and not to have to worry about knowing.
We all wondered at the same time. Everyone did. We all did.

I miss the old internet,
where I played with out fear
- should have had fear -
played without fear.
An age gone by
of Buddyinfo and Chat Rooms
of dial up tones and America On Line...

SRY, POS.
BRB.

Photos

Photos. Picture-perfect memories. I remember things with my camera. I cover my wall in moments. They snapshot the people and remind me of the smiles I love.

For me, the photos are the memories and the moments. When I have a picture with someone it means we have been together enough to care. Five years ago I had to steal a girl I barely away from our choir to stage a photo shoot for our school newspaper - my best friend now, we haven't stopped taking pictures of and with each other since.

One of my dear friends and I have spent three years never being in the same place at the same time with a remembered camera. Granted, we live on opposite coasts for most of that time, but although it's become a point of humor, it saddens me that I don't have pictures of her. My photo albums - the physical photo ones, not the internet-facebook albums - are pored over and shared. I grew up with my father proudly showing albums from my childhood; I loved seeing all of the moments, being told all the stories.

This is why I want pictures - to share the memories and tell the stories. I want to show my albums and share where I have been and what I have been doing the past three years of my life. I want to be able to point to friends, to places, and say, "Look, this is where I was at this time; this person changed me, and when this picture was taken we were doing this."

To tell the story - to know my friends.

Memories

Memories. Walking ghosts. Living in the moment and walking through the chill. Sitting down to eat and suddenly, suddenly being accosted by the old friend, long gone, now sitting beside you. The people you are with fade as faces grow stronger, your memory erases the moment you live in and you fall into the past as the laughter grows stronger in your ears. You blink and they live in space no longer, a loud noise and your friends have gone - Whispers are all that remain.

Spinning

Spinning and dashing and tumbling around,
Earth is heaven and heaven is ground.
Up now is down now is side to the side
Who knows what what is, you're along for the ride.

Standing at center to feel the earth spin
Looking up at the stars to begin
The ridden the rotten the rising the new
The many the pumpkins the okra the few.

Little all pieces are falling through time
Fall into place in this life that is mine
Cheetahs and okra and brown curly hair,
all will go walking to Scarborough Faire.

Acharei

I'm not prepared to write about this, let alone have coherent thoughts to myself.

There's a lot of good play material in here. Each verse of Leviticus 18 seems to be a conflict. Perhaps that is why it is a commandment. I mean, what good would it do to have a commandment that was, "Breathe in and out"? Not much, seeing as how it is an involuntary process.

But I can think of instances where some of these taboos have become acceptable. And near all of these are explicitly stated, no interpretation necessary.

So at what level do we read? And why to we keep returning to these passages?

I can't answer these questions for myself yet, so I truly don't think that I can answer them - or offer an opinion - for anyone else. I hope one day I will be able to.

Metzora

The first portion of Metzora is spent detailing the rituals for the diseased person at the time of cleansing, and the first part of this lists an extremely detailed procedure. Yet following these directives comes the line, "If, however, he is poor and his means are insufficient..."

Even biblically, not everyone can be judged equally nor held to the same standards. Allowances are made for each individual. This is something that I need to try to remember throughout life - to treat every person as their own self, without comparing them to others or trying to make them live up to each other.

And then again, I am trying to make my living in theatre. What is theatre, and what are auditions, but comparing people against each other? How can these two views be reconciled?

I resolve the dissonance thus: If two chefs were making me dinner, I could pick which I think tasted better. Thus are two actors giving me a product to judge (The fact that the product is their own self is subject matter for another day), and I am to give a professional opinion on that. I will judge their character, then, not in relation to each other, but against some standard that I have to create for myself. Unfair? Possibly. But do I judge myself on this same standard? I try to.


Everyone has different priorities and standards. This week, as I and friends bemoan the lack of people building on the lot, I need to remember that. I cannot expect everyone to suddenly pitch in effort for this one thing I see as important. Everyone is contributing in their own way, even if I can't see it just yet, and even if I think their priorities are trivial - it is theirs to decide. I can decide for me, and only me.

After all, if I am not for me... who will be?

Tazria

I have never had leprosy. What do the strictures of disease mean to me? If I find a physical affliction on my body, I am going to the doctor - not the priest. And yet that is who I am directed to go to.

Yet there is a link. Just recently I have avoided a project that I needed to accomplish, not urgently pressing at start, but then very much so. Worry about this project soon caused me to loose sleep, and lack of sleep increased stress and until, the day after I finished the project, I became violently ill. I spent the next 27 hours in a fever-dream, floating in and out of wakefulness, welcoming sleep as oblivion. When I finally awoke, I realized that by putting off my responsibility, I had caused myself to become sick. Perhaps, then, there is reason to talk. A medical doctor could have told me I needed more sleep, but what I truly needed was to examine myself to find out why I had avoided this responsibility in the beginning.

In the modern civilization of the twenty-first century, it is unlikely that one will break out with an infectious disease without others being aware and treatment occurring. Perhaps, then, it is time to take the lessons of Tazria less literally, and focus on the smaller physical aliments.

If I had isolated myself earlier, I like to think, I would have spent my time in isolation finishing my project instead of ill.

Maybe next time I'll pay more attention to that sudden acne - enough to cause an introspection for the cause, at least.