False Forever

Even knowing that it's natural, this moving apart... not drifting but rushing, each of us pursuing our own dreams... even knowing that it's how it should be... the word 'never' catches in our throats.

We know it will never be as it was.

We know that coming together again, all of us, even just a few of us, becomes more and more difficult with each bend in each of our roads, and even if we manage it, it will be precious.

Precious. We'll count each minute like pearls on a necklace until they are all over.

Remembering that sense of infinity, endlessness, that we'd be together forever.

Remembering it, looking back, a shake of the head and a wistful smile and almost thinking,

"I didn't understand what it was. Wasteful."

But without that waste, we wouldn't have what we have, forged in false forever.

Six Very Sweet Birthday Wishes

"Happy 19! I'm so glad I have such an amazing roommate like you! You like cold weather, shrimp noodle, and stupid games... and I like hot weather, beer, and staying up late! However, we love chocolates, sleeping, and talking together. <3 <3 Love you, by sweet roommate. <3"

- Mayumi

"Dear: Mira Chan
Happy Birthday *
As I often say, I really like you very much. I like many people here, but you are the most friendly person in Laws Hall, I think.
Though I am not good at talking with people, but you are always cheerful and kind, so I like to talk with you.
You always give me a lot of knowledge and vigor. Thank you for them!
Please keep being what you are now, from now on.
P.S. - Sorry for my bad English!"

- Tomomi


"Hey, and happy, happy birthday! You're 19, crazy! Anyway, this is in a
way a birthday card, I just wrote down 19 random memories we shared
last summer :P Hope it makes you smile!
Lots of love,
Liisa

1. Sitting on the floor in my room and reading the "My First 1000
Words in Finnish" kids' book and laughing at the most idiotic
pronunciations possible: hamsteri becoming [ham-ster-aye]
2. "...wanna buy an another one?" after the lovely spinach-feta
pastries at Suomenlinna.
3. The anthill. No need to say more.
4. The frustration because of the lack of public bathrooms! Shame on you, Suomi.
5. You analysing Karelian pastries: "It's funny how something
resembles cardboard so much but is still good"
6. Råg Fras.
7. The safety nets in Moominworld and comparing them with the American
ones: "Yes, you could fit a child there, we would have that covered as
well..."
8. Hemingway-picnic in the rain, on the rocks :D
9. You never got tired with playing with the fridge magnets. Sweet!
10. The ode-like praise for Maria cookies.
11. "What if we just... bought the 3-day tickets?" after some four
hours of youtubing and diplomatic "quarter of a smiley face" -ranking.
12. The beauty of the Texas accent: "'course, if I was talkin' like
this, I wouldn't even know what a diftong was..."
13. "You are such a cute new driver" when my driver's license was like
three hours old :)
14.Your affection to rocks. Naww!
15. "Flight cancelled"
16. Hullu sonni rakastaa puuroa.
17. Ordering in Finnish, ice cream in Moominworld ("Yes, I understood"
x)) and hot dog in Ruisrock. <3
18. The pretty, shiny, tiny pieces of glass at Skansen.
19. Your facial expression and high voice "Two things: Firstly, your
latrine has windows, that is really inappropriate! Secondly, THE
TOILET JUMPS!""

- Liisa


"MI-RAN-DI-TAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

HAPPY HAPPY CUMPLEAÑOS!!!!!!!

amiga d mi corazon! estas mas vieja hoy! ejejejejeje... espero que tenga un dia muy lindo.. y q a pesar d q no vas a estar tan acompañada, disfruta tu dia sea como sea!!! =D yo estare contigo en espiritu... ok?

mñn te llamo para q hablemos un rato... ok?

luv ya girly girl! take care! ^^"

- Lucia



"Happy Birthday, dearest friend! I hope it's a wonderful one! I love you and miss you :)

love,
your twin"

- Stephanie


"Bonne anniversaire, Cumpleaños feliz, grattis på födelsedagen, Felichan Naskightagon, Gute zum Geburtstag, 生日快乐, გილოცავ დაბადების დღეს, ᓇᓪᓕᐅᓂᖅᓯᐅᑦᓯᐊᕆᑦ, जन्मदिनको शुभकामना, Yumi selebretem de blong bon blong yu, Quchjaj qoSlIj, Hyvää synttäriä, Fortuna dies natalis! :P"

- Mikko


Jashen's was also very sweet! Thank you, everyone! I feel very loved today!

What I Did Over the Break

It's kind of funny that the more free time I have, the less I blog. Even if I have just as much to blog about, it's as if I often blog as a stalling tool. :D Haha. Well, so lets have a summary of the dry period:

I swam a few more times in the lake. :D
I saw Christmas come and go, with a bit of angst.
We went to Branson and had some unseasonably warm weather.
My Catalan class was cancelled, which I was not at all happy about.
It's 2009 now, hurrah!
I went to Arabic Church once, but they don't do food anymore (losers), and I caught up with Olivia there.
I've studied a bit of Italian and a bit of Norwegian, but otherwise haven't used my time wisely.
I may have a nice new penpal (though Liisa is now and forever first and foremost :D)
I didn't get the R.A. position, but I'm not horribly upset about that.
I'm excited about next semester, especially starting Journalism classes, and learning a bit of Thai from Kanchana and Chaowalit.
I'm excited to meet the newcomers to Laws.
I'm worried about German class.
I'm peeved at Jorge for writing on almost everyone's walls except for mine during the break.
I'm angry with my own dreams - why are my conscious and unconscious warring?
I didn't make a New Years reflection over the last year post, so I might do essentially the same thing come my birthday.
Lucia and I beat Bjarki and Alberto on Geochallenge. :D
Stephanie told me all about her new boyfriend, Jack.
It's about 75% sure that we're going on the cruise this summer.
The recession is scary and is leading to more crime here at home.
We're weathering it okay so far.
I failed at sending Christmas cards, except a late one to Liisa, so I'm now planning on groundhog day cards.
Lucia and I got way ahead of ourselves planning a trip to South America when we're twenty one.
I have really, really neglected Faroese. :(
I discovered that I can concentrate and get a lot more done in Mizzou than here. Oh well.
I had a wonderful evening with Stephanie, Smith, and Lucia. :D
I had some seriously cool moments where I intuited languages.
I read a very interesting and funny (no, seriously) book on the history of English.
I read Lucky Child, essentially the sequel to First They Killed My Father.
I spent a lot of good time with dear little Tidbit. :D Who is doing very well, btw, though she's gotten very white around the face and paws.
I worried about the Costa Rican earthquake, which happened right by my family, though they seem to be safe.
Sra. Altadonna showed me a clip that came up on one of the instructional CDs in Spanish class one day, where a boy looking very much like Jorge, and was named Jorge, introduced himself and his friend Miranda from the United States. Which was too funny, except that she doesn't know that the two of us aren't going out any more. Well, I guess we're still friends. I guess. Except that his old and new girlfriend is being about 90-100x more friendly than Jorge.
I got together with Laura T. here in St. Louis, and I ran into Phil at the mall.
I bought two pairs of jeans, ZOMG. (And I found out that for skinny jeans, I wear a size 1 petite. Not a size 0. ZOMG I need to become anorexic lol)

And that's... about all... for a whole month. Not very good. XD

Like a Handprint On My Heart

At thirty degrees, it feels so nice outside. Almost balmy. The cold doesn't scape at exposed extremities immediately, and my coat is completely adequate as protection from the wind.

Laura and I went to take the last final. Other Laura joined us, and then Cornell did as well, as the lecture hall had pretty well filled up. They were both sick and making rhino-esque noises, but it's that time of year. And with that final, an end was come to the Study Abroad FIG at the University of Missouri.

But I was also thinking about Lucia. She's on her way to Chile now for the holidays. I thought about her and on my walk home alone, I didn't bother to put on my gloves, so the wind started biting at them. I pulled out the scarf Lucia made me. It still smells a little bit like her.

I thought of the wall that stands even now in the high school cafeteria, where we all made our hand prints with silver or blue paint. Brooke painted our hands, and Stephanie and Lucia and I went to make our marks side by side, and not far away from Rachel, Lisa, Wendy, Gwen, Sara, or the others. It's customary to have a quote, and our year's quote was this:

"You'll be with me, like a handprint on my heart."

It's something of a miracle that brings two people together at all, much less with enough force that they have the chance to become friends. And so, I'm grateful that an East Coast free spirit with a poet inside of her and a deep heart from South America were both brought to me by fate. I'm grateful.

Liisa, too, spoke of this coincidence. She didn't know, she said, whether I believed in such things as coincidences, but she was grateful for what brought us together, what prompted her, three years ago, to send a message to an elindomiel on penpal.net. She didn't know whether I believed in coincidence, and I smiled at the way the ordinary order of things was reversed. I don't myself know whether I believe in fate or in coincidence. Both seem equally impossible, and equally amazing.

I buried my face in soft Chilean wool and closed my eyes. Words came unbidden to my mind from an old poem I read once. I think of Stephanie and Lucia and Liisa and Rachel and all the others. This poem, this prayer, is a promise and a burial.

Here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(Here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
And this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

I carry your heart (I carry it in my heart)"

- E. E. Cummings

Stephanie

I saw Stephanie today. We went on a really long walk. It was so nice to see her. We talked about our very different college experiences (she's got a class of 165 or something, and they all take the same courses... XD), being vegan, Greek and German, etc, etc. Tidbit came.

I wonder if Stephanie feels the same as I do, that the roots of our friendship grow so long and deep that I can't even bring myself to be surprised by the twists and turns her life has taken, if that makes any sense. She is Stephanie and she is doing what she will do, as I am doing what I will do. But it's strange to have her so far apart. She has a boyfriend I've never met. I have a boyfriend she's never met. Hah! :D

And get this, her major is:

Double major in Philosophy and the History of Math and Science
Double minor in Classical Languages and Comparative Literature


O.O

Anna Karenina

The Book Club now consists of three (3) members:

Myself

Stephanie (Out of pity, I suspect. And when she's in Cross Country, I can count her out)

Mrs. McFarland (The Librarian)


Well, it's kind of sad. Still, it's not like we were ever a huge group. I think at one point we were hypothetically up to 8, but there were only ever 4 of us that came on a regular basis. (Layla, Billie, Angie, and Myself). The Seniors were everything. They leave, we weep for a year and remember the good old days. We have no new members. All clubs collapse. Except for Anime Club. Which starts watching only InuYasha. Dubbed. O.O

But I digress. So, one advantage to having just the three of us is that we have a shot at actually finishing what we start. So, we tried to pick a summer book. I kept asking for Contemporary and Foreign... or if it couldn't be Foreign at least let it be Contemporary... or if it couldn't be Contemporary at least let it be Foreign. Please, I begged, just don't let it be composed of endless balls and social formalities! Pride and Prejudice spent any possible interest I might have had in them. McFarland comes back with a big stack and starts describing the plots as far as she knows them.

"And this book is about a dwarf who works in a Library in Germany in WWII..."

My god, where do they come up with this mierda? So, eventually she pulls out Anna Karenina and says, "Oh look, it's Foreign, it's Russian... it's about an adulteress."

Well, I have to be blunt. I love cultures, except... I don't like the French, and I'm not interested in Russia. But the more we talked, it seemed like the closest thing to a compromise the three of us were going to come to. So we ended up picking Anna Karenina.


ENDLESS BALLS!


SOCIAL FORMALITIES!


Will small, sad, shy, and slightly-gay Levin win Kitty over her dashing suitor Vronsky? And what if Vronsky plays around with poor Anna, who has come to town to console her sister in law Dolly (who also happens to be Kitty's older sister), about her (Anna's) brother (Dolly's husband), 'Do... D... Anyway, it starts with a D and it's long... by the way Mr. D is friends with Levin...''s unfaithfulness?

Did you forget what the question mark was for? Yeah...

Anyhow. It's okay. Better than Pride and Prejudice, even, which was good enough that I sat through it despite despising the subject matter. :P Every time it gets unbearable, there's a line that hasn't translated so well out of the Russian to make you smile.


And then there are other lines... about as common and about as necessary as the funny translations... which somehow seem incredibly true. For some reason they drift out of the pages and mean something for everyone. And again I find that having love changes everything, that some things that would once have meant nothing now leave me... understanding...

Queenie

Stephanie and I went to Queenie the other day. It was a lovely time - we took the Horse Trail through the woods so we kind of saw the park from a different perspective. My three favourite things were the random bleachers, 'miniature forest', the tadpoles in the hoofprints, and the mysterious ivy tower.

The Random Bleachers

The Miniature Forest

The Ivy Tower

Through the Windows

On a rainy day, the Seniors left us. What staff was free ushered them out of the building and onto the lawn as we watched them through the grey rain. We had the famous 'snow watch' view from Keller's Chemistry Lab, and it served us well one final time. We waved, they waved, all smiles, let's pretend we're happy. There is some happiness, but mostly for them. For those that remain, there is mostly ending.

Angie danced with her Umbrella.

Then Billie and Layla came out as well and the three of them ran down to our room, knowing full well that Keller lacked the energy or will to do anything about it. So we chatted with them. About nothing. With Layla, especially, it was nothing. She returned Stephanie's "CATS" recording - she had borrowed it in her Sophomore years. Then we talked about Anime Club, and the three of them begged us to fight the dubs with everything we had. Alas, we had and have nothing.

Ah, it was especially nothing. Angie and I wondered who was taller, and she climbed in the window to settle it for once and for all. The results? Angie > Miranda > Stephanie. But the differences are negligible. Particularly when Stephanie wears her combat boots.

Goodbye Angie, lovely reading voice, wonderful mind reader, simultaneously clumsiest and lithest of all her class.

Goodbye Billie, the ever cheerful, brilliant poet, brilliant artist, the one who never took herself too seriously, and that was a rarity.

Goodbye Layla. I'm glad you came.

I'm glad.

Even if we couldn't say anything between Angie and Billie and Stephanie.

Even if pride would bar us from what we would say, anyway.

I'm glad.

Quote from Stephanie:

So you don't get the feeling I'm the only one Trieschmann's killing:

I get the sneaking feeling that Trieschmann is trying to do me in with the poem, the essay contest, the novel project, and the IP. At least I didn't have to worry about doing the ACT writing again yesterday- though I could have tried to get a twelve, I didn't really feel like stressing out about it. An eleven is a great score to get the first time. Now I just have to hope I kicked the rest of that test's nasty little backside. And then there's my subject test in May for the SAT (I still don't know which of the bio tests I'll take, but I have awhile to decide), and the APs, but I only have one day of that, and after finals, I'll finally have some time to de-stress before I leave for Greece!

I can do this. At least I'd like to think I can. It's hard, though; I think I'm getting sick again, and I tend to feel weak and dizzy more often now. I might ask my parents to set up a doctor's appointment on the Friday we have off, just so I can make sure I'm not imagining all of this. Hopefully it's just me; I hate being sick.

On a lighter note: the track meet was canceled due to the weather! I'm extremely happy I didn't have to run in the rain, and I didn't have to let my team down by going to the ACT. I should probably go running today, if my English homework doesn't kill me first. At least math isn't so bad for once, and chem is starting to make some sense.

Elendomiel, Educational Cartoons

I haven't been able to post much. Who can guess why? Yeah... I've cleaned my room, it's absolutely amazing. Nicer than it's been since I moved here eight years ago. And today, for instance, I got home from school, helped with groceries, made a big pot of hobo stew, called Stephanie and Christy and coordinated the AP Comparitive Project. Then I went and got a tooth filled, took the hobo stew to the Moores, stayed there with them for two and a half hours helping them bathe, play with, and put to bed their four children, and waited for the numbness to wear off (it went all the way up to my eyes this time; I think they used too much...). I got home with ten minutes to spare before the Chemistry Study Session. O.o... Life is hectic.

At any rate, I made a few scans. One is a page from a set of 'cryptic' papers I uncovered from the exhumed 'archives' of my room. They're all written in a half rp-elvish, half made up language. I think I can date them to about sixth grade. What's notable about this one is that it's the first recorded usage of my now universal username: Elindomiel. Notice the funny spelling... and that it pops up once alongside many repititions of Elenmirwen... probably my first Elvish name. :P (Elenmirwen would be very straightforward Elvish for "Star Jewel Maiden".


My second scans are some cartoons Stephanie and I made for our school. Yeah, they're a little random and childish, but they're mildly amusing if you know the people involved. Or maybe just if you're me or Stephanie.

New Years Party

I went to Kates house for New Years, drove there myself (yay!). The people who came were me, Gwen, Stephanie, and Mary. First we all played DDR for a really long time, surprisingly I wasn't the worst. Despite having no rhythm or dancing skills, I played the game like Spider-Squash or the similar and wider known game Whack-a-Mole, and managed to pass every round, albeit with a D. Apparently I looked really, really funny though, because everyone was in stitches and they took video. I also got the best work out. Go me. :D Mary was a genius at DDR because, well, she owns it. But it was still neat to watch. Gwen wasn't bad, got a B or two on the easier setting. Kate and Stephanie were about my level, maybe Kate was a bit worse. (Sorry Kate!) Mrs. Schlarman was hilarious.

Then we played Super Smash Brothers Melee. If we had had the original, I would have owned with Pikachu. As it was, Mary HAD to have Pikachu, and so I got to play Link with a new controller. Ah well, I won once or twice, and it was mindless and fun. We got hungry and made ravioli and taquitos, but of course with Stephanie as a vegetarian we also had to make white pizza. I love Spinach. :D

We did a few fireworks, just fountains really, and then we watched Pitch Black with Vin Diesel. It really went in line with Scary Movie night a few days back. A creepy sort of mass slaughter movie with a bit of charector development thrown in. I thought Caroline-Fry's death at the end was a little unecessary, though. And apparently the movie has two sequals that don't even go along with the first movie, which I find strange. It's like having an RPG sequal to a first person shooter.

After this Gwen and I talked about dimensions, multiple worlds, the perserverance of the mind and soul after death, and all the crazy things Norwegians do. Mary had gone to sleep halfway through Pitch Black because she wimped out, and Stephanie just took out her hearing aides and was down for the count, but I'm sure we kept poor Kate up. Sorry!

AND HAPPY NEW YEARS!

The break is so amazing! The sun has been so bright and the rain has smelled cold and sweet, and I've been free from parents and school and stress for just a few days. Working hard to catch up!

Eragon

I saw Eragon the other day with Christina, Gwen, Sabrina, and Stephanie. The best part of the movie was hanging out with them, of course. It wasn't absolutely terrible, either. The bad guys were HORRIBLY acted... at points I was close to laughing out loud at them. The ending was terrible, too. But, I didn't mind the main charector, even if most people say he's acted blandly and always looks blank. Hey, he's a teenage boy, so it's realistic. And hey, he's cute, so it's forgivable. One minor thing that did bother me was the dragon egg... it sounded really metallic and hollow, looked dull, and basically reminded me of a huge jelly bean left out for a year and glazed over.

Honestly, though, the movie was passable, if quickly moving and stereotypical. The scenary was gorgous, somewhere between The Lord of the Rings breathtaking vistas and the Thomas Kincaid Panoramas of The Chronicals of Narnia. And, it won points with me with the language being the focal point of magic. Everyone says the book is better, so next time I'm looking for a clichéd and mindless fantasy read, I'll pick it up. It can't be worse than Urshurak...