Journal Entry #2: Bizarre Indie Rock

Friday, 12/6/13

What the author of that book said reminded me of last night when I clicked on "Your Ex-Lover is Dead" by Stars, and I looked up and just watched the radio.

"When there's nothing left to burn, you have to set yourself on fire."  the voice said, sternly and authoritatively. I stopped and just listened. The trumpets introduce us to the music as the bass goes up, the strings snapping as the fingers shift positions. And the trumpets continue their verse by easing down the scale.
I watched the stereo resting on the table so bluntly, so frankly, and all the rest of my surroundings vanished. None of them mattered. I almost took out my camera to record the simple beauty, but instead, I told myself to just live in the moment and just let it sink in.

I listened to "Love Your Abuser" by Lymbyc Systym about 6 times in a row, because for some reason, I just wanted to hear pleasant musical noises. That song sounds like some brain scientist studied which sounds are naturally pleasant to the human ear, and what releases endorphins, and got a group of musicians together and told them to perform with feeling. There's not even a tempo or a melody until the last minute of the song. A majority of it is just beautiful sounds. I guess that's what music is. They just make it less complicated.

 There's just something so incredibly beautiful about the song. It's a great song to let wash over you when you're in a calm, vulnerable space. When you're just lying on your bed, pondering over every intricate detail of your life, or even simply lying there with blank thoughts, the song just cradles your inner world and creates a miniature reality for you. It's not even a song, it's an experience in itself.

I showed it to Courtney one sleepover, as I was showing her all of the eccentric music I stumbled upon over the past few months, and within the first few seconds, she expressed her approval with her entire being: "I LOVE this song!!" It was her first time hearing it, and it already won her over that fast. I'm not exactly sure where this song came from, or how I discovered it, but I'm sure glad I did.

Journal Entry #1: Writing in Public

Wednesday, 10/23/13

 Now I'm in this class, and we're put in table groups again. I always dread having to sit in these groups. I can't just write without feeling like I'm being watched, or without feeling uneasy the whole time my hand's in motion, anticipating being forced to share it with the group. I'm so awkward. I don't want to tell everyone around me the raw thoughts I was just having. It's like pouring my mind and heart onto a page, believing it'll be locked away and kept a secret from everyone but you forever, until someone evil takes it and hangs it bluntly on the wall. People pass by and glance at the mess; the raw emotion that was once locked away inside me. They look, they process the information, and just like that, hell silently breaks loose. People judge. They laugh. They're insulted. They think it sucks. And once your dignity has been crumbled into a fine, lifeless powder, you're work is taken off the wall and given back to you. "See, that wasn't so bad, was it?" they'll say with a gleam in their eye. You are now a slave to that one thing you wrote, whether it be about the way the sun looks coming through the window, your thoughts on religion, or just about how good you think guacamole is. No one will ever see you in the same light they once did when they thought you were just an innocent, thoughtless human being. You are simply the words on the page before you.

Sorry, I got on a rampage there.