I'm Not Going to Return

Jill Alexander Essbaum, a poet, is coming tonight to do a reading at our school.  She is often described as an erotic Christian writer.  Obviously, this can get pretty interesting.  Her poems are really moving and strong.  I feel like they also speak a lot about strong women in particular, but show at the same time that they have feelings that get hidden beneath their strong exterior.

I love a lot of her poems, but this one along with a few others especially stuck out:

Family Photograph

Non Redibimus

We shall not come again, not to this wet

            and summer day, nor to the waylaid place

where you laid waste to me and I to you,

            and where we reminisced recalling who

did what to whom.  We shall not come again.

            Not to the bed we thrashed nor to the memory

of the way I brushed my hair back, nights,

            nor to the air we dared to share to breath,

or couldn't quite.  We shall not come again.

            No more, my face seen round your corner, or

your briefcase found beneath my table.  We

            weren't able, apt or sane.  We shall not come

again.  Nor cry nor clutch, not even once

            again.  We shall not cover up in quilts

or bear the beast of one another's guilts

            or sit in silences made saddest by

what was.  We shall not come again.  Because.

My view on the way to school.

These are actually slippers that I got last week.  They're so comfy and I've been wearing them to class - as long as its not wet outside.

Bags

http://sl-eep.tumblr.com/

ONE

This carpeted purse, which you can find here on Etsy. I once saw an adorable purse just like this in an antique store, but when I went back a few days later with the intention of buying it was gone.  I feel like this would be a great piece to wear with just a black shirt and jeans.

Two

This briefcase at the same Etsy shop.  It would make carrying things to class so much easier - and fit a laptop comfortably.

Brooches

What can I say?  They're pretty.  You can stick them anywhere you want, a n y w h e r e.  Maybe not conventionally, but I do anyways.  

Shirts, boots, pants, scarves, jackets.

They look great on any item of clothing.

Some sketches of brooches I made today.

It tends to be hard to find interesting brooches that don't look tacky.  Especially when you go into antique shops and they have layers upon layers of costume jewelry - it can be a nightmare digging through the overly gaudy to find ones that make a stand alone statement (think borderline ugly yet somehow the beauty and uniqueness ultimately shines through).

These are some of my favorite brooches that I own.

I think its best to use them as a stand alone piece.  If you start piling on too much other jewelry with them you will start to look a little messy and bogged down by accessories.  I'd say it would be good to pair some simple earrings with a large/obnoxious brooch.  But hey, if you can make more work then go for it.

Brooch on a scarf.

Brooch on boots.

  

Scanner Art

Something fun to do with your Monday evening: throw things on scanners and move them around to make pretty pictures.  Possibly not pretty, depending on who you are asking.  I tried this and actually ended up with some that I liked.

Yarn and a strange hat.

Zig-zagging a pill bottle.

A combination of the first two.

My graphics professor was talking about how he remembered when the first scanners came out, and they scanned over the image three times in order to get the blue, green, and red of the image.  An artist took a clear tub of water with goldfish inside and set it on top of the scanner bed.  I haven't been able to find the image but I imagine it looking abstract and colorful, since the fish were obviously swimming around while it took these three different images consisting of different colors.

More scanner art in the future?  Possibly.

There's just something about pink.

I used to absolutely hate pink.  I don't own pink clothing, I've never wanted a pink room, and loads of pink used to make me a bit ill.  But lately, I've been interested in small amounts.

Photos courtesy of Acceptable , Thirteen Little Secrets , and Place Our Destiny .

Dorm Life

Decorating my (okay, our) dorm has been a major feat we are slowly but surely accomplishing.  It almost seems more like a mini apartment (minus kitchen and bathroom) than a college dorm.  It is usually kept decently clean, except for my sea of shoes that seem to pile up at times.  I've worked at trying to collect things to hang on the wall and niceties to adorn our small space with.  I think the next thing we need are some makeshift curtains, that would make things more adorable.

Above our futon.

One of our baby plants.

The door entering our actual bedroom.

I adore interior decorating.  It would be a lovely job to have, though I don't think its in my cards at the moment.  Although, I've thought about just freelancing my different skills everywhere.  I want to do many things: hand-make cards and invitations, bake/cook, make jewelry, design clothing, create websites, and make magazines.  Interior decorating can get in on the party too.  Oh, that always sounded fun...party planning.  

I would soon love to cook something in our minuscule kitchen located upstairs on the boy's floor.  Maybe a dessert would be a good place to start.  I would love to find something to bake off the smitten kitchen blog.  I want to start to teach myself how to bake a cake that didn't come out of a box.  Then, onto real meals.  Things might be made more difficult since I don't have a car to go fetch ingredients.  I'm a bit nervous about what equipment they might provide down at the rental desk for cooking utensils.  But as soon as I cook something lovely in my new kitchen, I'll post the adventure here.