it's that post again

Where I say I am leaving the country and will see you later. I fly out of OKC this morning, get to Kiev, Ukraine, tomorrow afternoon, and then take the train to my parents'. We will get there on Friday morning. It will be a long trip but I am excited.

So I'll see you next year, readers who I won't see this year! Merry Christmas. I'll be posting from the flip side, don't worry.

the politics of hair

Study Break!!

Leaders of the Soviet Union/Russian Federation, from 1917 to present day:

[Vladimir Lenin, 1917-1924, BALD]

[Joseph Stalin, 1924-1953, HAIR]

[Nikita Khrushchev, 1953-1964, BALD]

[Leonid Brezhnev, 1964-1982, HAIR]

[Yuri Andropov, 1982-1984, BALDish]

[Konstantin Chernenko, 1984-1985, HAIR]

[Mikhail Gorbachev, 1985-1991, BALD]

[Boris Yeltsin, 1991-1999, HAIR]

[Vladimir Putin, 1999-2008, BALDing]

[Dmitri Medvedev, 2008-present, HAIR]

to do list

Before Tuesday:

• Study for and take two finals
• Revise research paper draft
• Buy peanut butter
• Finish packing
• Get on plane!

recent pictures

[cranberry orange bread - a taste of the season]

[Bedlam football - my last home game ever, and also one of the best home games i've been to]

[Anna is done with La Baguette!!!! but is also no longer in Norman :( ]

from Valley of Vision

Crucifixion and Resurrection

Oh Lord,

I marvel that though shouldst become incarnate,

be crucified, dead, and buried.

The sepulchre calles forth my adoring wonder,

for it is empty and thou art risen;

the four-fold gospel attests it,

the living witnesses prove it,

my heart's experience knows it.

Give me to die with thee that I may rise to new life,

for I wish to be as dead and buried

to sin, to selfishness, to the world;

that I might not hear the voice of the charmer,

and might be delivered from his lusts.

O Lord, there is much ill about me - crucify it,

much flesh within me - mortify it.

Purge me from selfishness, the fear of man, the love of approbation,

the shame of being thought old-fashioned,

the desire to be cultivated or modern.

Let me reckon my old life dead because of crucifixion,

and never feed it as a living thing.

Grant me to stand with my dying Saviour,

to be content to be rejected,

to be willing to take up unpopular truths,

and to hold fast despised teachings until death.

Help me to be resolute and Christ-contained.

Never let me wander from the path of obedience to thy will.

Strengthen me for the battles ahead.

Give me courage for all the trials, and grace for all the joys.

Help me to be a holy, happy person,

free from every wrong desire,

from everything contrary to thy mind.

Grant me more and more of the resurrection life:

may it rule me,

may I walk in its power, and be strengthened through its influence.

all I want for Christmas

"where's Isaac?"

[written by my dad, this morning, about my 5-yo little brother with autism]
"Where's Isaac? " Karen [my mom] asked at about 9:00 this morning. We were both in the living room, with Karen folding clothes and me reading on the computer. A quick look through the house didn't turn him up, and we noticed that the front door was slightly ajar. I figured he'd be bopping around the yard. He'd been gone for perhaps up to five minutes by then. I had to get my shoes on, and--fortunately--I grabbed my cell phone. A quick look through the yard didn't turn him up, so I hollered back up to Karen in the second floor window that she should grab her cell phone and come out and look, too.

I asked one guy toward the back of the yard, and two ladies on the street by the front of the yard, if they'd seen a boy, and they hadn't. So Karen and I kept in cell phone contact, and we split up in the ways we thought Isaac'd be most likely to go.

Isaac can move pretty fast, so I figured that if we didn't find him within about 15 or 20 minutes I would call the police and plead for some help to find him. Our town is pretty friendly and non-threatening, so I figured we could get him back fine in the end if he got lost--but only if he didn't get himself hurt or killed in the mean time, running around in the streets.

Fortunately--thank God Almighty--a guy in a car pulled up to Karen and told her he had seen Isaac head down Suvorova, the street behind our house. Karen headed that way, and then told me by phone about the tip, so I headed in that direction, too. She got more tips from three other people who'd seen him. "Are you looking for a mal'chik (boy) in an orange footbolka (t-shirt)?" It's cool--but not freezing--here, and although he did put on his shoes and socks by himself before he went out, he didn't put on a coat. And that's a good thing, because it made him stand out all the more. Someone pointed Karen to a grocery store (Gnyezdo, the Nest) and Isaac, just standing there on the steps. Gnyezdo is about five blocks from our house and across a busy street-- a walk of over 10 minutes. It seems that Karen's moving fast and looking like a distraught mother (who also was wearing just a t-shirt and no coat) helped her get those tips from complete strangers.

So... the biggest thrill of Isaac's short life so far. One we are rather determined not to have repeated. We have figured out a better system for keeping the front door locked...

Well, we thank God for His protection and Isaac's guardian angel, and thank everyone for their continued prayers for Isaac.

--Karen reminds me: when she was first asking, "Where's Isaac?" I was kind of like, "Well, isn't looking around our (tiny) apartment for him a one-person job?" Then I said, "Okay, I'll look, too." We were out on the street within about a minute of all that...

--This is the fourth or fifth time Isaac's run away in the four and a half years since he's learned to walk. Twice we have had people bring him back to us (once at home and once at a tennis court) and had people ask, "Is this your son??"--before we had even realized he was gone. Two years ago he slipped out the front door, down a flight of stairs and into the yard on a cold October day--with just a shirt and diaper on, no shoes--and I found him there when I was coming back from a jog.

i love lviv

“If you stand upon the hill that rises above the city of Lvov and watch as the evening sun sets on the roofs, you might easily believe for a moment that you are somewhere else. Before you is an Italianate jumble of terra-cotta roofs, interrupted by the occasional thicket of trees or the naked dome of a church. Rising from the layers of mist, the towers and spires etched in the evening light proclaim the city’s heart to be in western Europe. It might be Florence.

Down below, districts of narrow cobbled lanes curve and twist around the footings of medieval churches. Buildings lean out from their foundations, frowning over the pavements and the incessant clatter of pedestrians on the cobbles. Suddenly these precious little windings turn and spill into wide cosmopolitan boulevards. A walk down Teodor Square, through the municipal gardens toward the opera house, evokes images of Paris or Berlin. The red-and-white trams jangling down the streets conjure an image of Vienna. The town hall, a stark piece of nineteenth-century utilitarianism, stands in the center of a large piazza, embraced by a girdle of market vendors and statues of classical Rome.

Given its physical bearing, this curious mixture of Mediterranean and Germanic, romantic and classical, Lvov is something of an anomaly today, standing as it does on the western fringes of the Soviet empire. For most of its history it was a Polish city, nestled in an area largely populated by Ukrainian peasants.

It was a city of Poles, Jews, Ukrainians, the eastern outpost of the Austro-Hungarian empire, and for hundreds of years it had been a center of Western culture and commerce on the edge of the Russian steppes. In those days, its official name was Lemberg; only the Ukrainians called it Lvov [sic], and its Polish name from its earlier history was Lwow. Today, the Poles are an aging minority, the Jews have all but disappeared, and the city is dominated by Russians and Ukrainians.

By evening time, when the narrow streets have been cooled in long shadows, the market vendors have folded up their stalls, have swept their rubbish, and are gone; the sound of running water can be heard cleansing the streets of debris. In the empty piazza, when the tram cars are silent, again the sound of water can be heard trickling from the fountains at either end -- Diana amid the flowers, Neptune with his trident. The sounds seem to drift up toward the hill that rises behind the square and eventually towers over the city.

Standing upon that hill, called Wysoki Zamek -- High Castle -- and gazing across the city... you can see the street lights begin to wink in the evening haze; you can almost feel the heart of the city resting. The sounds will soften to the gentle wind disturbing the trees as the last of the tram cars clatter up the boulevards. And you can hear, way off in the distance, the whistle of trains echoing long into the night.”

(From In the Sewers of Lvov, by Robert Marshall (Scribners, New York, 1991).)

Russian major

Though it's not always fun or rewarding to be a Russian major and a Russophile (like at summer conference, or when people want to insult the Red Army), there are times when I really like it. Days like today remind me of that.

I have a lot of writing to do before this time next week. It feels overwhelming to be researching and trying to prepare to write those papers. But over the weekend I finally became interested in one of my papers. What place in Russian history, literature, and empire is really held by the Caucasus? In what ways are Lermontov and Tolstoy Orientalizing their literary subjects? The topic that has bored me for a semester has started to hold my attention.

Then yesterday and today I've been looking at the politics of Putin's popularity. This stuff is so interesting. I checked out some books from the library this morning. Anna Politkovskaya attacked Putin's Russia and paid for it with her life. Another author starts his book off with a blow-by-blow account of the Beslan hostage crisis that was almost bringing me to tears in the library. This is crazy.

In my Russian politics class this afternoon we started watching the film "12." I have mentioned it on this blog before and I watched it last Christmas break. It is in my top two favorite Russian films. It's a remake of "12 Angry Men," but it could not be more Russian. I love the real way that Russian culture and language and society is portrayed. I feel like the actors don't even have to act because they seem so genuine. I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of it on Thursday.

These feelings were a much-needed break from the monotony and stress of the end of the semester. They don't make deadlines and page requirements go away, but they help a little. Not many people care about this stuff that I'm writing about, but I can't help it. It's fascinating. Usually.

overheard in the union

"Is Bedlam B-E-D-L-A-M?"

"I heard you guys are really PDA."
"yeah? who told you that?"
"Well, I heard you're holding hands."

laziness

I would rather write a paper on how I am lazy than on the prompt that I was given.

Yeah, I have a paper due tomorrow. So naturally I have worked on other homework, I have cleaned my room, I have talked with my roommates. I have shopped for Christmas presents, I have worked on a project, I have cooked. I have watched The Office (I started with season one a while ago and am finally catching up on that part of American culture. I am on season five), I have organized my planner, I have even made a new planner.

Not all of that was done to avoid writing the paper, but certainly some of it. And now I am blogging cause I don't want to write about films of the 1950s and 60s, and cause I haven't posted in a week.

A week ago today I bought my plane ticket to go home for winter break. And last Wednesday I sent in my passport to get a Russian visa.

One of my roommates got a macbook and the other one quit a job. I have a paper to finish and three more to write before the end of the semester. That doesn't seem too bad, but it also doesn't seem like what I want to be doing right now.

One of my subsequent blogs might be about what I would rather be doing.

I am thinking about no longer importing my blogs to facebook, and deleting all the ones that are there. Thoughts?

chores

The kitchen floor needs to be mopped.

I roll up my pants. Then move all the chairs into the living room. Then vacuum the floor. Under the tables, in the corners. I see a spider crawling and figure I can just vacuum it up. I move the vacuum cleaner over it, but when I pull it back, the spider is still there, with a few legs missing. Arachnid torture!! I quickly vacuum up the rest of it. Yikes.

Then I start mopping. Around the sink first, then the fridge. Under the trash can, under one table. Under the other table. By the side door.

Then I move the chairs back. Then I pour the water out and rinse out the mop. Then put the mop, bucket, and vacuum cleaner back.

Done.

who knew

apparently i
am an artist and not just
a stellar poet.[found deep in a folder on my computer. by yours truly...i think]

Carrie's haiku

She wants a haircut.

So she gets one. A big one.

Before and After:

sister: a haiku

Dina on Elbrus.
snow at the top in August:
blue-lipped misery.

you too?

Everybody and their dog went to the U2/Black-Eyed Peas concert last night. And by that I mean the entire OU stadium of about 80,000. And by that I mean I WAS TOTALLY THERE!!

Yep. Epic. I like U2, but it is far from my favorite band. I listen to their music on occasion and know a few songs not terribly well. But people, this is U2! And it's in Norman! And tickets are cheap! (I started to type chickets are teap at first...dyslexia). How could I not go? This will be one of those things I tell my kids about. "Yeah, I was at the U2 concert back in 09....it sure was windy where we were sitting..."

I thought I didn't know the Black-Eyed Peas at all but apparently I know some of their songs. It was a good show. It was loud. It was cold and windy. There were A LOT of people there. Traffic was bad. But you can't not go. Not an option, really.

And I thought again about how much I like live music. I didn't used to. It gave me a headache and it actually still does. I thought it was the same as music on a CD. Oh how wrong and stupid and naive and dumb and uneducated and uninformed and ridiculous of me. I'm glad I'm more mature and well-rounded and artistically inclined and self-aware now. Whew. But yeah, live music. It is good. It is an experience rather than a sound that you listen to or even just hear, like recorded music is. I mean, I love recorded music. But live music is moving. And there are so many more elements, namely the audience and watching the performer.

A few weeks ago I went to a live jazz performance. It was a five-member band that improvised the entire show. It was so good and so intense. Their first song lasted an hour and I didn't last much more than that. I felt exhausted just watching them. But it was really great. It was so interesting to see how each of them experienced the music so differently. And it was moving to watch music being invented and created right in front of me, not just played from memory. They worked together, taking turns taking the lead. And really it was the music leading. And they were enjoying it so much and feeling it and one guy was moving around like some Other had invaded his body. And one guy looked so smug and self-satisfied. And one guy was just childishly happy. But it was an amazing experience. It was intense because it was loud and continuous and improvised and there was so much energy between the five of them that some of it escaped to the audience too.

I am using really stream-of-consciousness writing so I hope that is intelligible and okay. The jazz was cool. I love jazz. Then there was U2. (i just typed u3....that's an available band name if anyone is out there looking. not copyrighted...yet.) That was intense but so totally different. That was just HUGE. That is probably the best word to describe the entire evening. The stage is big, the lights are big, the wind is big, Bono's voice is big, the audience and stadium is big, the songs are big, the screen is big, the excitement is big, the environment and feel and sound and everything are just BIG. The media and hype beforehand, the expectations, the set list, the alien theme...big. It may not be the best music I'll ever hear, or at least not the music I'll like the most, but it may be the best/biggest show I ever see. It was a good time. Good entertainment. Sensory overload. And they played the songs that I know plus some others. And a group of friends managed to sit together, which was unexpected and nice.

Well, I guess it's picture time!!

[alien stage]

[waiting for it to start. windy!]

[aw...look at the little interns...]

[the only time the crowd is not a wash of crimson]

[The Black-Eyed Peas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!]

[the group minus some Servens]

[BONO!!!!!!]

[the screen separated and descended...impressive]

[Bono goes Blue]

addendum to yesterday

Sometimes a light surprises
The Christian while he sings;
It is the Lord Who rises
With healing in His wings:
When comforts are declining,
He grants the soul again
A season of clear shining,
To cheer it after the rain

In holy contemplation
We sweetly then pursue
The theme of God’s salvation,
And find it ever new;
Set free from present sorrow,
We cheerfully can say,
Let the unknown tomorrow
Bring with it what it may.

Tomorrow can bring us nothing,
But He will bear us through:
Who gives the lilies clothing
Will clothe His people, too:
Beneath the spreading heavens
No creature but is fed;
And He Who feeds the ravens
Will give His children bread.

Though vine nor fig tree neither
Their wonted fruit should bear,
Though all the fields should wither,
Nor flocks or herds be there
Yet, God the same abiding,
His praise shall tune my voice;
For, while in Him confiding,
I cannot but rejoice.

words by William Cowper

Monday, October 12, 2009

It's easy to type Octover instead of October.

I am listening to Ukrainian music. The more I listen to it, the more and more words I can pick out and translate. This is a highly satisfying endeavor for me.

A paper is due Wednesday. You know the rest.

This morning I talked to my family on Skype, and there were few to no connection problems (!). Isaac said my name for the first time in about two years (!!). It is so great to hear him starting to repeat sounds and words again. I pray his progress continues. My sisters read me some of their Kabardine homework - that's a local language that they teach at school there. Pretty foreign-sounding.The leg warmers and scarves from Russia have come back out again. So great. I think cold weather makes me dress oddly because I have fewer clothes but have to wear more so I just wear weird combinations and layers. It is fun trying to strategize how to be warm without wearing the same thing all the time.

It hit me the other night that it is mid-October and a lot of college seniors finalize their post-graduation plans around this time. As in, it is mid-October. It is that time. In that moment I freaked out, but ultimately I am fine with not knowing what I am doing next year. Something will happen, I will do something and be somewhere. I will hopefully be doing and living somewhere that I like, but if not, things will work out. I don't know if that is being naively optimistic, or choosing to trust in God, but I am hoping for the latter. He has provided for me in the past and He is faithful.

on life as usual

The title of the post was inspired by Becky's post. Sometimes the mundanity of life is just fine. Today I am going for the list post.

• I really like Pandora. Last month I found out that there is a monthly listening limit when I hit 40 hours and had to wait a week before I could listen again. I have been on the Sufjan Stevens station for a few weeks now. I like him a lot. I've come a long way from my first blog post ever. Oddly enough a Simon&Garfunkel song has come on a couple times in the last day or two, and I would not have thought the two are similar at all.
• Fall has come to Norman. I think I like it, though the weather is still kind of inconsistent. I like the feeling and concept of sheltering myself from something much bigger than I am by being inside, wearing more clothes, and moving quickly. I think that fall makes people think about family and home and comfort. My roommate gave me a pumpkin spice candle and it, as of today, represents the season for me. Spices, scarves, tea, and my converse every day. I can't wait for the leaves to turn.
  
• Apparently I like linking today.
• I am really thankful for Skype.
  
• I wish that my parents had a better computer.
• Finally I am feeling like I am settled into the semester. Classes, roommates, church in the evening, not working on my independent study (who really wants to read or write about orientalism in Russian authors' writing about the Caucasus, anyway...), talking with people at Plaid, and not planning for next year. Hm. So maybe my settling in is really just a pattern of consistent avoidance. That's not the greatest.
• My friends got married! A beautiful, outdoor, sunset wedding with fireworks as they walked back down the aisle. Wonderful.
• I have decided not to go to the OU/Texas game. I am going to sell my ticket and hopefully make $200 off it. I hope that I don't regret my decision, but I don't think that I will.
• I really like this picture of my brother and sister. I feel like it represents their relationship well, and they are just so incredibly sweet and cute. I miss them a lot and am looking forward to hopefully seeing them in not too much over two months!

just start it off

and we'll see where this one goes...

The paper is due tomorrow, so I will be blogging regularly.

Starts and Finishes:
I think when I put this on my list a couple weeks ago it meant something different, but I'm not sure so I will just free associate the meaning I ascribe to that phrase at this moment. Actually, I think what it meant then is that I was thinking about the fact that I had just finished a summer in L'viv and was starting a new semester at OU. It's an interesting transition. You should try it sometime.

This time of life is all about starts and finishes. High school, college, singleness, marriage. Semesters, classes, jobs. I think along with that is a lot of goodbyes and corresponding hellos. (Or a lot of hellos and corresponding goodbyes?)

The last few weeks have left me feeling a little trapped and claustrophobic. This is odd. Don't worry, I will tell you why.

[McDonald's is classy in Odessa]

About a year ago I had finished my sophomore year and had spent a summer in OK/Russia/NJ/TX. Then I went to Saint Petersburg for a semester. Then I was in Norman for a semester. Then I was in Ukraine for a summer. That is a lot of moving around, change, and variety. Now I am back in Norman, but for a year. I haven't spent a consecutive year somewhere since...well, two years ago. And so the thought of being in the same place, in the same house, with the same friends and surroundings and people, makes me feel a little claustrophobic.

This is odd because it is only a year, and I like being here.

I felt this way at the beginning of college. I came in as a freshman and knew I was going to be in this place for four years. Saying hi to the same people that I pass on the South Oval every week for four years. That was overwhelming to me because I haven't ever spent four consecutive years in a place without going somewhere for at least a few months sometime in the middle. And it was overwhelming, but I did end up moving around in the middle so it wasn't so bad.

[sunset from the roof of my apt in L'viv]

There's this weird tension in me between extreme wanderlust/restlessness/adventurousness and extreme resistance to change and movement.

Hm.

That might be why I am thinking about starts and finishes. I just started a new year of college. I just finished a summer. I am starting the beginning of the end, though. Soon I will finish college and start the big SOMETHING ELSE.

Stay tuned.

[clock tower on the L'viv square at nighttime]

keep in touch!

[Carpathian rainbow...not my photography]

Since I have to write a paper, I think I will post on my blog. I'll choose a couple of topics from that other post and write about them. Because writing for no grade is always better than writing for a grade.

Keeping in Touch: wow, I have immediately gotten off topic. I typed those words and then decided to capitalize them. But you don't capitalize the In because it is a preposition. Which made me think of when I learned that you are supposed to capitalize Is but nobody does because it is such a small word. But everybody should because it is just another verb like all the others, and shouldn't be left out cause it's small.

So, about keeping in touch. The nature of my entire life has meant that there is always somebody I am keeping in touch with, who is not in the same geographical location as me, but with whom I do not want to lose contact. Especially since leaving Kazakhstan and then coming to college and then my family moving (meaning, in the last five years).

There are a variety of ways to keep in touch. When I was little my family sent faxes to my grandparents. That is pretty old school. Phone calls cost $3.50 per minute when we first moved overseas. Then was the advent of email. None of this really affected me until seventh grade when I went on furlough. I emailed back and forth with my friends in Kazakhstan for nine months, from my parents' email address. I think I remember adding something to the end in white font so that my parents wouldn't read it...and telling my friend to highlight it so that she could. I'm sure it was top-secret.

In 10th grade I got an email address (yahoo...have since switched to the superior gmail) when we came back to the US. I emailed back and forth with friends still in Kazakhstan. This long-distance relationship culminated in me going back to KZ to visit them for their graduation from high school. That was back when I was good at keeping in touch.

When I came to college I got my own laptop and a Facebook account. WHOA. The world is now open. Anyone that is not on Facebook, I can basically not stay in contact with.

[in Ukraine]

A year after that my family moved to Russia. My family are email freaks. We email a lot. I do it the least of all of us, but that is a big way for us to stay in touch. That was also when we really harnessed the beauty that is Skype. That year was also when I discovered Gmail chat (G-chat, for short). No more instant messenger!

[in Russia]

Around this time I also started blogging. In January or something I bought a webcam. DOUBLE WHOA. How awesome is it to see the person you're skyping with and to have them see you. I show them my room. They show me theirs. Amazing. And really great for keeping track of growing siblings.

[in Peru]

So anyway. There's also letter-writing, which I have done sporadically. Also notice I haven't included phone on here. I do talk on the phone, but it is not my favorite. I don't know. It's good for people who are in the US but not in Norman.

[in Russia]

But keeping in touch is really hard. I never know how to do it. And with friends or family with whom I keep in touch currently residing in Russia, Ukraine, Peru, Sweden, all over the US, and other places, it is just hard.

[in Ukraine, VA, OH]

Skype is my preference. It's hard to beat for nearness to reality. G-chat is hard to beat for convenience. Facebook is hard to beat for stalking, and knowing what people are up to without actually talking to them. But oh how I sometimes wish that everybody were in the same place.

[out my window in L'viv...not my photography]

Prayer for Ukraine

[old people singing a Ukrainian national[istic] song]

[old women hanging out downtown]

We sang this song at and after camp. I understood a lot of it in Ukrainian, but I did not write the translation. The melody and Ukrainian words are beautiful.

Молитва за Україну

Моя молитва нехай лине
До Тебе, наче фіміам.
І серце лине без зупину
В чудовий Твій небесний храм.

Боже, я молю за Україну,
Боже, молю тебе за людей,
Ти їх прости,
Ти їх спаси,
І милість Твою нам яви.
Боже, я знаю,
Що Ти будеш з нами
В храмі Твоєму під небесами
Радість і мир Ти дарував,
Життя для людей віддав,
В Книгу Життя нас записав!

В Своєму Слові Живому,
Ти для людей ведіння дав,
Щоб люди всі молились Богу,
Що на Хресті за нас вмирав.[singing this song, at one of the meetings after camp]

Prayer For Ukraine

May my prayer go
To you like the aroma of incense
And the heart drawn without ceasing
Into your glorious heavenly temple

God, I pray for Ukraine
God, I pray for its people
May you forgive them
May you save them
And show us your mercy

God, I know you are going to be with us
In your temple under the heavens
You gifted us with your joy and peace
You gave your life for the people
You inscribed us in the Book of Life

In your Living Word
You laid out the vision for life
So that all the people would pray to God
To the one who died for them on the cross[Andriy, Andriy, Roman and Khrystyna]