More Lists (because then it looks like I'm productive) By Catherine on 5/31/2007 09:13:00 AM
List of Things I Want to Do Before I Die1. Learn to surf
2. Live outside the United States
3. Learn Latin (just for shits and giggles)
4. Own a pair of Manolos
5. Get acupuncture
6. Hike at least part of the Appalachian Trail
7. Write a bestselling novel
8. Visit all 50 states, plus the territories (Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming; American Samoa, Guam, Northern Marianas Islands, Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands)
Italics denote someplace I've been, and bold denotes someplace I am likely to visit within the next year.
More to come as I think harder and harder about it.
Summer begins By Catherine on 5/29/2007 07:08:00 AM
When the pools start opening up, and the grills can be smelled from the sidewalks in my little suburban enclave, and the cat starts trying to get outside every time the door is opened, I know summer is here. It was a grill and birthday weekend, complete with too many hotdogs and lots of Stellas. I feel like a vacation all over again.School (work) is done on 6/15, and on 6/25 I will start my 5th summer as a camp counselor-- in case you didn't know, it's the best job EVER and I'd do it all year round if there was a program like that. There really is nothing more satisfying than being outdoors and playing with children. It's tempting to stay with teaching for just that reason-- summers off, freedom (plus, the benefits are fantastic, I don't think I could afford them otherwise.) Summer makes me want to purge myself of everything unnatural, to sell my possessions and live outdoors and cook over a fire. I forget about things like makeup and hairspray, can wear the same thing to work every day (because, hey, we ALL wear the same thing to work every day), don't worry about freckles or french manicures or moisturizer... Basically, summer symbolizes for me a return to how I like myself best-- simple, free, unworried. I know it's not really like that, and I'm probably somehow doing myself a great emotional injustice in saddling summer with all this meaning, but the long days and sunshine make reality a bit easier to ignore.
I think now would be a good time to start the process of weeding out what I want for myself from what is expected of me. It's also a good time to downsize on "stuff", as I know I own too many THINGS, and want to be rid of some of them. Clothes that don't fit, knick-knacks, paperwork that should be shredded or burned, a million pillows from my dorm-room years... there aren't enough words.
Labels: freedom, friends, summer
a return to principle By Catherine on 5/25/2007 06:29:00 AM
In the year since graduation, I've changed. That's no news, really, we all have-- but this morning, I was able to pinpoint it. I heard Green Day's cover of John Lennon's "Working-Class Hero", a song I've known since childhood, and I realized-- I'm on the path to suburban boring mom-hood, and that's not okay with me.The "adult" world is so full of pressure to conform, to make money, to acquire status, to gain success-- that I've forgotten what I used to be about. For three years, I worked for little money in a non-profit, community-oriented, ecologically-friendly, socially conscious co-op selling quality products to like-minded people. I had a purpose there, that was more than someone's errands-runner. I thought about injustice, politics, MY politics, the community... But I've lost sight of that.
I need to find my principle again. What is important? My creature-comforts, or making myself a better person? Living in the suburbs or making a difference in someone else's life? Getting married and starting a family or helping families that exist already exist more wholly and together?
I used to feel like I made a difference, in my small co-op community. I was dedicated, principled, and had little time for the self-pity I know I'm so prone to. So, let's go back to basics. Starting today, I'm going to do one thing everyday that will make my new community a better place.
Today, I'm going to start at home, with me. From now on, no more sad, depressed, bored, stifled Catherine. Starting today, the real me is back.
Neat paskeet By Catherine on 5/20/2007 11:33:00 AM
Clean energy claim: Aluminum car in tanks from MSNBC.Something I've been thinking about quite a bit By Catherine on 5/11/2007 08:07:00 AM
In a time in the history of the United States when achievement in schools is slacking, scripted standardized tests are enabling our youths' senses of entitlement, and NCLB is being flouted by the Iraq War, why are we focusing so hard on fixing a country that WE DESTROYED? We're allowing our own country to disintegrate before our eyes, into fundamentalist camps like Jesus's Army or into total apathy.What happened to loving America? We impose democracy on a region that has been enmeshed in foment for thousands of years, we allow our government to blatantly lie through their teeth about the reason we're doing it, and yet we can't muster up the courage to turn our critical eye in the other direction and look at ourselves and try to fix what is so broken about our own society. I think, in a way, I do love America... But I love it for what it used to represent, not what contemporary history has turned it into.
Our President is arrogant, unqualified, and too stubborn to see past the tip of his nose. In contemporary America, the Patriot Act dictates our rights and liberties, dismissing the Constitution and Bill of Rights with a lighthandedness that should be scary-- but yet, there are citizens, including some of my own family members, who truly believe that we are being better protected now that our phones can be tapped and our assets frozen without so much as an explanation why. I know I don't feel any safer, now that going to the airport with my best friend, an Egyptian, means we have to open her trunk and allow the guards to look through her things-- if anything, I feel less safe. I guess I'm just a libertarian at heart, but government, STAY OUT of my life! The GOP, as A so succinctly put it, wants to get back to their roots: fucking shit up for everyone who disagrees with the ludicrous party lines-- they espouse an ethos of intolerance to dissent... But where would we be, had the colonists never dissented in 1774? Where would African-American culture be, had the North and South not disagreed over slavery? Where would you be, dear reader, if you had not disagreed with your mom on where to go to college, or whom to marry, or what to become?
And furthermore, who is GWB or any GOP candidate (aside from Romney, who is personally antiabortion but says that he will leave current legislation intact) to tell me what I may and may not do with my body? They're all MEN! They don't even HAVE reproductive organs, so fuck them saying that abortion is killing a little person. Now, here's where it gets personal. I can think of very few situations where I could personally make that choice, but thanks to birth control and sex ed (as fucked up as it currently is), I was able to make the right choices and never have to be in the situation to HAVE to decide. I feel like Republican platforms are all about control: you can be anti-abortion, but still support the death penalty? I can't reconcile that, I just can't.
If I were to write to every GOP party member running for office today (some of whom don't believe in evolution, WHAT THE FUCK?) I would say, "Just because it makes YOU feel icky doesn't give you the right to dictate to everyone else what they can and cannot do." It's a juvenile, black-and-white mentality that I really can't abide, and since they're all men, it doesn't affect them ANYWAY. It's the same thing as them saying, "I feel yucky about this, so no one should ever be allowed to do it and we'll never speak of it again." I picture C and J's cat Shwoogy (who isn't very smart, hence the reason for the comparison) sticking his head under the ottoman and thinking we can't see him. I'd rather have a personal opinion (and mine is, I don't know if I could, so thank god I've never had to decide) and keep something like abortion LEGAL and SAFE and (hopefully) fairly rare than take away the right entirely and watch women suffer and possibly obtain them illegally, in an unsanitary conditions, by unqualified practitioners (or worse yet) try to do it at home.
This turned into a way longer rant than I anticipated... I know I don't exactly bring up any good points that aren't all over the internet already, but truly, this shit weighs on me. As a woman, an American, and a believer in the inherent good that our nation is capable of, I hope that 2008 can reestablish some of the faith that my generation has lost-- and that our troops will be brought HOME. Thanks for listening.
Labels: abortion, hope, Iraq, politics
I like when Jen sends surveys :) By Catherine on 5/08/2007 09:41:00 PM
1) FIRST NAME? Catherine, really anything's fine but Cathy2) WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE? Great-Grandmother Catherine Lapsley
3) WHEN DID YOU LAST CRY? I just watched Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, and I'm a sap for Cedric dying (sorry if you haven't read it, but jeez, book seven is out in 74 days, people) I just admitted to crying over Harry Potter on the internet, lord help me...
"4)" Edited for content?????? (I got a defective survey)
5)WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCHMEAT? Does tuna count?
6) KIDS? Well since Sean will be 16 on Thursday, and no longer qualifies as a kid, I'd have to say The Dr Duo's Trio OH WAIT you're asking if I HAVE any, not who my favorites are... Hell no. Hell. No.
7) DO YOU HAVE A JOURNAL? Yeah but as soon as something traumatic happens I don't write in them anymore, they feel dirty, so I don't write in it much.
8) DO YOU USE SARCASM A LOT? Who me? Never!
9) DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS? wish I didn't
10) WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP? I say yes, but knowing me I'd chicken out
11) WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL? cinnamon toast crunch, but I prefer a cup of coffee to food at 6 am
12) WHERE DO YOU PUT YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? usually leave them where they're left, you can only wear one pair at a time anyway
13) DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG? If I keep doing the NYC Ballet workout I will be
14) WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM FLAVOR? HA
15) SHOE SIZE? 7 wide, if I can find them
16) RED OR PINK? red
17) WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF? hmmm, I wish I wasn't so darn clever and smooth all the time, even I don't like me sometimes :P (see, this also answers the sarcasm question quite well.)
18) WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST? I dunno, the year after graduation is meant to make you miss everyone
19) DO YOU WANT EVERYONE TO SEND THIS BACK TO YOU? don't care
20) WHAT COLOR PANTS AND SHOES ARE YOU WEARING? aqua and gray stripy skirt and bare feet
21) LAST THING YOU ATE? a tuna sammich
22) WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? the Harry Potter DVD menu, the credits finished a minute ago
23) IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE? I'm too indecisive for this question, my newest box had 140 different colors
24) FAVORITE SMELL? I heart the perfume Em gave me for Christmas, it smells like lilacs
25) WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? Megan
26) THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE YOU ARE ATTRACTED TO? If they can make me laugh
27) DO YOU LIKE THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU? love her of course
28) FAVORITE DRINK? I'm having a root beer float, so currently that
29) FAVORITE SPORT? baseball
30) EYE COLOR? 80% green 20% depends on my mood
31) HAT SIZE? they make those?
32) DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS? would if I had any
33) FAVORITE FOOD? bacon egg and cheese on a bagel (explains why I'll never look like a ballerina)
34) SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDING? the ending to Cube appropriately sums it up
35) LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED AT THE MOVIES? Spider-Man 3 (see a matinee)
36) WHAT COLOR SHIRT ARE YOU WEARING? white tank top
37) SUMMER OR WINTER: summer, unless maybe you've moved me from Boston to someplace like say... Barbados
38) HUGS OR KISSES? do I know you? if not, don't touch me
39) FAVORITE DESSERT? tiramisu
40) WHO IS LEAST LIKELY TO RESPOND? no one will "respond" exactly, as I am posting to my blog
41) MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND? see above
42) WHAT BOOKS ARE YOU READING? Bird by Bird, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (getting ready for July, mofos)
43) WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD? water drops
44) WHAT DID YOU WATCH ON TV LAST NIGHT? my ballet workout video, will not stop until i can do this
45) FAVORITE SOUNDS? the alarm NOT going off on the weekends
46) ROLLING STONES OR BEATLES? Obviously the Beatles, psychedelics over stimulants any day
47) THE FURTHEST YOU'VE BEEN FROM HOME? France
48) WHAT'S YOUR SPECIAL TALENT? Well I could tell you but I'd have to kill you.
49) WHEN AND WHERE WERE YOU BORN? Stoughton, MA on March 2, 1984
50) WHO SENT THIS TO YOU? Jen
Some food for thought By Catherine on 5/01/2007 12:41:00 PM
Today, May 1, 2007, is the four-year anniversary of the declaration of "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq.If you're not angry yet, please check your pulse.
Labels: Iraq