love Love LOVE

"You were my first kiss. You were my first miss. What we made was our own. I went home and I told no one...You don't have to say 'I love you too.' That's not what I want to hear from you." - L. Trullie

This summer, of all mine experienced, has by far been one of the top two if not it. Many of the plans I set out to follow through on have been thwarted; my heart has suffered a passive invasion: it has been infiltrated by and in the form of a friend, whose name, of course, should remain (tba) until I find out the answer; I have lost contact with much of what I used to call 'life,' though with the small disclaimer: "as I knew it."

I want to know. I want to understand just what it is that I mean to him. I want to be that person. Thinking back, however, I find that I have never been considered that person by someone valuable enough to remain by my side unfailingly, family disregarded. So, it is with the purpose of finding out where I stand in his view that I challenge myself to step forward and speak. And I will, when the time is right.

Despite any such worries and bothers, I can truly restate that this has been the best of many summers. I have met people that I feel appreciate me, despite the personal costs for those friendships. I just wish there was more I could do and that I wouldn't be let down.

Self-Taught Learner by Lissy Trullie

New Page

What up boys and girls?

So, this is supposed to be an 'arts and lifestyle' blog - haha, I def stole the whole 'arts and lifestyle' from Citizen LA, who I happen to be interning with this summer.

Anyhow, a lot of what I've been writing about lately has been personal, which I think is alright, since I would love my public to know me, not just all the other. However, I've come to realize that I need to start posting more of what I believe constitutes 'arts and lifestyle.' Therefore, I will begin posting new things which fall under that category (i.e. News on up and coming artists, bands, etc. as well as more on fashion and such).

So, for today, I highly recommend that y'all check out a band that I think happens to be B-E-A-utiful:

STARS

A list of songs by them that have me on a dizzy-string:

• Your Ex-Lover Is Dead
• Take Me To The Riot
• Set Yourself On Fire

Summer of...

So, this week has been trying to say both the least and the most. I feel lost, unaccompanied in this jungle, weak and hurt. I want to believe that there's more, but I'm becoming more and more disillusioned as time passes, as slowly as that may be.

I received an email earlier today that pretty much states that I will be taking several mediocre-leveled classes in the fall, which is far from what I would have liked. However, I am willing to give my case another fighting attempt as I begin work on the summer assignments I have yet to complete.

I want to feel as though I have the capacity to achieve what I want to achieve and to do so with hard work and fighting power, but everything that happens seems to cut me down and it's not helpful. It doesn't kill me, but it does cause my knees to buckle under the weight of it all.

Let me know if you find a door that leads somewhere else...

Thalia - Exhausted By the Weight of the English Language

Summer of LOVE?

As far as this summer goes, many plans were made, most of which have become dismayed. As a matter of fact, I am quite as busy as I set out to be, though in ways that stray altogether from what my plans were. I can't pretend to dismiss how happy it makes me that I don't have to stay home everyday, but I feel a little unsatisfied, crazy as that might sound.

I am currently a Junior Lifeguard at the Expo Center in Los Angeles, which is home to the greatest number of Junior Guards in Los Angeles, totaling at 95 or so, while many other pools/beaches are home to a program of no more than 20 Junior Guards. Now, as far as that goes, I have Junior Lifeguard training from 9 to 3, after which I have an hour break before my next activity. Starting from 4 and ending at 5, I am in synchronized swimming, which is only from Monday through Thursday. Speaking of which, Junior Lifeguard training is from Monday throught Friday. After synchronized swimming, from 5 to 6 (Monday through Friday), I have novice swim team practice. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I have Capoeira from 6 to 7. And that is my weekly schedule. Except for weekends, I am pretty much booked.

Now, in terms of what I had set out to accomplish this summer, I have done the following:

• I have lost precious little weight since the start of Junior Lifeguard training two and a half weeks ago - of which I have another 5 1/2 weeks left.


• I have only done about 6 or 7 chapters of the Official SAT Prep Something Something Book. My second test will be in October, and if I cannot raise my score to a 2000 or higher, I might as well just stop trying so hard.
• I have yet to complete my first assignment for the BP. Fashion Board, however, I gladly report that I have begun and that I am on my way to what I hope will be dear success, although the variable may prevail.
• I have yet to complete summer assignments for AP Art History (for which my appeal was denied vehemently - a decision which I hope to change with the efforts that I am putting forth in demonstrating my persistence and well, demonstrated interest in the course and success in such), AP Government (which falls in the same category as APAH), and for AP English (which I was actually quite quickly announced as eligible for).
• I have yet to make true this fabled "Summer of Love," in regards to which I feel quite like a failure.

Now, speaking seriously, and this isn't teen melodrama, but I feel totally unrequited and even..., I feel I have reached the point in this discussion in which I have truly exhausted the English language. I cannot find a word to describe how I feel, as though all efforts have been thwarted without remorse. I feel empty. And more and more I become sensitive to beauty, and God send a wrath upon me, but I cannot seem to find the person I am looking for. I want to find someone who will help me make it to the surface of the water. No Junior Lifeguard training is going to teach me to deal. I feel alone. I am striving to reach the surface but I can't seem to unload the weights that are holding me down, simply because I cannot find exactly what they are.

Thalia - Unremittingly Exhausting the English Language

Summer of Plans

So! It has definitely been a while since the last time I wrote. I have some very good news that I have been wanting to share for the last week and a half or so. First of all, let's start with summer plans!

Community Service Plans:

• So far, this week is my second week helping out at Christ the King School - my old elementary school. I worked last week, which was the last week of school for the students at Christ the King. And this week is the first week of summer school there, so I have another three weeks to go after this week. Busy, busy bees.
• Also, I plan on going back to PATH: People Assisting the Homeless this summer. The participants at PATH have oatmeal for breakfast everyday, so I hope that if I can raise some funds I can do a special pancake breakfast for them some day, like a Friday or Saturday if possible.

Work/Internship Plans:

• I got an internship with Citizen LA!!! I'm so excited to keep working. My first job was on Thursday, June 11. It was at an "artpark" event in Downtown. The Art Park is held on the second Thursday of each month and it is an event in which artists of all different kinds who produce all different types of art using an array of different media come together and display/sell their artwork. It is a PR internship, so I will be working closely with people and coordinating events. I was also told that I might be useful in updating blogs, myspaces and facebooks for the magazine, which I think would be excellent since I am a part of all of those. I may also be working on Twitter, which I have yet to make myself familiar with. So, basically, I am really excited about that internship.
• I also got an internship with BP.!!! I am now a part of the BP. Fashion Board, which is extremely exciting!!! There are an amazing array of opportunities available for me in terms of working with BP. There's a lot to tell and all I have breath enough to talk about this week is about what BP. is. It is a teen clothing store and the internship is based on fashion and marketing. Therefore, I think that it is amazing that I got internship with both Citizen LA and BP. because both have fashion coverage in common! Yay!

Academic Plans:

• This summer I am required to read two books; it is quite likely that I will read more than two books over the summer, but I thought that this would be a fitting time to introduce them to you since I will be posting my own opinions on the books and personal analysis of the books once I have finished reading them. The books are Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe and The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver.
• In addition to completing summer reading, I am reading the first few chapters of my AP Art History textbook in advance in order to get a head start for next year, which, considering is going to be my senior year, will be a difficult one full of stress and anxiety if I don't have a heads-up. I will fill you in with more on why - specifically - I am doing this in advance another time.

Other Activities:

• In addition to the other activities which I will be doing this summer, I will also be exercising rigorously! I am going to participate in a program called Jr. Lifeguard which will be everyday this summer. The program is focused on training young individuals to become lifeguards, and participants aged 17 years and older (yay! I'm 17!) will be taking a test in September to certify them as lifeguards, which may give me a heads up on part-time pool/lifeguarding jobs in college.
• Also, if I have time, I will be participating in a youth CSI program, which at the end of the summer pays $200 and valuable learning experience! I am so pumped!

So, as far as that goes, it seems as though I will be quite busy this summer.

Just a heads-up, these will be the next posts you should keep an eye out for. Look for them in the next few weeks:

BP. Fashion Board - An in-detail look at just what the BP. Fashion Board is all about and everything that goes with it.

An Early Start to AP Art History - A look at why I am starting ahead and why not doing so may jeopardize everything I've tried to build in my high school career.

Thalia - All The While Wasting the English Language

From Potential to Empowerment

Hey everyone:

As it has become apparent that I want only to share what I think I ought to share, and because I have not posted in as long a time as can be imagined, I have come to a crossroads and realized that there is something I should do: I should try to post the most important points I can come up with every week, or every day – if possible – in order to foster a relationship with followers that has a core element: communication. Today’s post, which I have fittingly, or so I believe, entitled “From Potential to Empowerment” is about something that has come to be clear to me over the last few days. However, I believe that in order for you to understand my point in writing about this, that a few key points and events in my life are necessary to become acquainted with. Therefore, I will begin with a very brief background overview about why what I am talking about is as such.

Ever since about the third or fourth grade it became apparent that I wasn’t by any means average. And by this, I don’t claim to be the überwunderkind, but rather of a more intellectual rather than moralistic position. From kindergarten to the second grade I seemed to be average and it was not until the third and fourth grade that my potential for academic excellence became apparent. The key word, however, was just that one: potential. And from then up until finals of my junior year in high school, I embodied just that – the potential rather than the manifestation of that potential.

Always and until now I was the potential, the could-be and might-be, but isn’t-yet. And it was not until a few days ago that I realized that learning is a passion of mine and one that I want to foster. I am finally motivated and I hope and I wish I could promise, though a fear of failure holds my tongue locked, that I would never turn another assignment in late or let my mind wander during a class. I want, and this dearly, to learn and to grow and be someone, and for once, I worry and wonder and hope with all my heart that I can achieve what I set out to do because, in all reality, the chances are many and the opportunities numerous, but those who take advantage of them are few and I want to be among them. I am now empowered and ready for what comes my way.

Thalia – Relentlessly Exhausting the English Language

Celebratory Third-Post

This post, whose title may be misleading while all at once reinforcing, is in celebration of nothing and everything.

I haven't got anything in particular to celebrate about, that is, not anything concrete, solid, asphalt.

I will, therefore, provide myself with reasons to celebrate and as I go, I shall list them below:


Simplicity, Quite Simply

• I once said that "Simplicity Robs the Mind of Its Essence"

At this point, I have doubts as to whether or not I was mistaken in drawing that conclusion:

~ After having read a particular essay on the importance of the vernacular, common terminology and all other types of speech considered "vulgar" by the unduly elitist, I came to the realization that as much as simplicity may rob the mind of its essence in terms of simple ambitions, simple goals, simple mindedness - which in itself is a trick on the very truth insomuch as it negates/refutes and reinforces/supports my thesis - simplicity may give the mind the richness of unchallenged understanding, understanding attainable only through the simple mind's eye.

~I do, however, continue to believe that in many ways, simplicity may rob the mind of its essence insomuch as it may limit the capabilities, or in that way, the apparent capabilities of the mind. It may limit the ambitions, the goals, the very essence of living and employing the mind to cope with, compete with, and strive to make better all that has to do with life itself.

Life and the Living

• Life and the living are two of the most important things in, well, life and the living.

Now, first to explain and then to seek an explanation, an answer of sorts, if you will:

~What I mean by this insight is that life is important in life and in the living just as the living are important in life and the living.

1. Imagine what life would be life without life in itself. It would neither exist nor exist again: both the actual being - and this turns it all around as being would imply life - of life and the idea of life would be obsolete. We, or one, in a more elegant - if not all the more objective - manner, would not find oneself living, thus making the very idea of life impossible as only one who is living may propose the idea.


2. The living without life is altogether elusive. Without life, not only would the living be ... well, un-living, but their very existence would be obsolete, marked by oblivion, that is, not so much so in the realm of the living, but from the very essence of life.


3. The living are important in life. That is, quite simply, that, without the living, life could not be played out. Mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters...any living remnants of the realm from which one was born would be extinct. The very instance and possibility of memory would be thwarted. Remnants, pieces, artifacts of a living world, now deceased, to be deceased, having deceased, are important to the realm of the living. Thus, though memory may serve to keep in mind the deceased, the very living may be another source to remind everyone of a past.


4. The living are finally important in the living. Without the living, the living - you and I - would be nothing. Take, for instance, your mother, your sister, your brother, your sister, your wife, your husband, your son, your daughter, you grandmother and grandfather, your uncle and your aunt: who are you because of them? Who would you be without them? And, finally, would you even be without them?

What do you think?

Thalia - Everlastingly Exhausting the English Language