Hello, and welcome to the third edition of Sally’s journal. Just as a warning: this will have a lot more angst (and is a lot shorter) than my previous entries.
Writing for Others
I’ve given up on productivity for now. A galaxy of unfinished papers, a vast plane of empty space to fill up, sits lax in my laptop and my notebooks as it eats away my brain like a well meaning, but ultimately murderous caterpillar. As much as I love writing, sometimes I can only force myself to throw up enough words to satisfy someone, a teacher for instance, and in the end feel sluggish and weird. I want to write something that I myself love, that I myself can hold onto. A poet friend of mine once said that she doesn’t want her work to belong to the world, partly because she wants it to be her own, her personal possession. Something that really mattered to her would be frustrating as a concentration at school because then she would have to adhere to the tastes, whims, and fancies of others. She didn’t want her work to be subject to that.
Well, to an extent, she might be right. This semester I did got into “Survey of Forms: Fiction,” and I had mixed feelings about it. From the beginning, I heard things about my teacher: how she was blunt and established very plainly what she liked and didn’t like. So what I ended up doing was exactly what my friend wanted to avoid—that is attempting to satisfy my teacher’s taste for the entire semester. In the end, though, she liked me. So I should be happy about it.
Existential Guilt
So at the moment there is not much going on. I’ve finished my papers and am awaiting finals. The year is almost over, and in retrospect, past the moments of inertia, past the thoughtless meandering, something about me feels a little peace in the fact that I actually survived. Cliché as it is, in the beginning of the year I truly thought that maybe I’d end up sunken in some quicksand or thrown in a ditch somewhere, or plummeting into a pit of existential doom smelling of fertilizer and old nail polish. The quicksand didn’t happen. Neither did the ditch (thank god). But the existential doom is still a cloud that’s drifting over me.
Looking back, I realized that destinations and directions that seemed so solid before began to waver. It’s during those moments where I’m trying to sleep at night where I have my most uncomfortable thoughts; those thoughts that slowly disintegrate into a frustrating, flesh-eating truth, those thoughts that make me want to dissolve slowly into blissful slumber, that make me want to shut down, hibernate for a few seasons, those thoughts that make me more and more tired as my insomnia grows longer. The revelation is that I’m still walking on pins, with no direction or goal at all. I have this cheerful façade that slowly drains away when I lose my sleep, or my gusto, and it is largely in part due to the lack of direction I currently have in the world. Maybe this is the definition of my existential guilt—that sure, I’m going to school, to class, every day, but am I really gaining anything? How does all of this help?
Ha. I’m sure all this can be automatically classified as freshman angst, and hundreds of thousands of college zombies are suffering through the same thing. But I just needed to define it. It helps when you know your own ailment.
Break
On the carefree and happy side of things, there was a time when I was able to put aside all my existential guilt to travel with a few of my darling CMU friends. We thought of going to Florida at first, but on a last minute whim decided to fly over here—to California.
So spring break was: a rollicking romp through the ghost-green hills of California countryside; highways wet with rain and motor gas; rainbows sifting over canyons at sunset; the misty docks of San Francisco and the sharp seaweed smell of sea lions; the dizzy dance of puppets from all different nations; ice cream, dim sum, Thai food, the consumption of alien babies and turkey bones; the resplendent Sea Gypsy Motel; driving on a pristine beach over sea glass and cuttlefish and dead sand dollars; music, noise, fireworks, and a flying green Tinkerbell.
What’s funny are all the semi near-death experiences we went through. For one, the escalator stopped while we were on it at Disneyland. We almost got slammed by a huge white truck on the freeway. And there was this one time when we stopped by Pismo Beach on the way home from LA. Around the same time we were buying cinnamon buns for breakfast and driving home, three men got shot at a Denny’s. We had passed by that Denny’s a few times. It wasn’t until hours and hours later when we were at home that someone gave us the news.
Recommendations
In my last journal I had an amusing time making recommendations. This time I will make a few new ones.
Bucket hats
No one wears these things anymore! Aside from being great accessories, they also protect your precious foreheads from the merciless skin-shriveling California sun!
2046
Am I the only one who liked this movie directed by the celebrated Wong Kar Wai? Perhaps because it is a movie about a writer/womanizer who writes a futuristic story about a train that never reaches its destination, with slow-reacting android-attendants in the form of beautiful women? Perhaps it’s in the fact that it starts off in Japanese and then acrobatically switches from Mandarin to Cantonese all the time?
Public Transportation
I came back from Pittsburgh and promptly got clubbed to near-death by California gas prices.
Hard Candy
This is not a recommendation. Instead, it is a challenge. Try to not cringe through this movie. I dare you.
Lorrie Moore
This woman can write. This woman writes like thunder. It only took one of her stories to convert me. This story is called “Real Estate.” Her book of short stories, Birds of America, is a gorgeous collection of wit and characterization and humor. That’s right, she’s funny. Go pick it up.
Alphasmart
Remember this from elementary school? Sure, it may be outdated. But it is actually very useful. It’s sort of like a portable keyboard with a little screen with four lines’ worth of words. You can have up to eight different documents (at least, in mine, they could be more updated). It’s a good thing to use, when your laptop is too heavy or cumbersome, as a lightweight substitute for typing. Did I mention its battery life goes on forever? It’s good for typing notes during lecture, too. Not to mention no distractions. Triple plus.
“Dani California,” Red Hot Chili Peppers
Catchy song. It’s a hit now, I think. It also happens to be the official song for the Japanese movie coming out this summer called Death Note. This leads me to my next recommendation,
Death Note
This is my favorite graphic novel. The first arc of it is definitely worth a read. And because I truly care about this, I will outline the story for you. Brilliant genius Light Yagami finds a notebook on the ground, which happens to be a Death Note. There is a set of rules with this Death Note, that you must first write down the name of a person then envision their face. Within several minutes they will die. If you write down the cause and circumstances of death, that will be exactly what happens. Light soon becomes hysterical with the thought that he can become the God of Justice (or Kira) in the world. Enter L, the world’s most brilliant detective, whose face or identity no one knows. It becomes a brilliant battle of the wits between the shockingly smart Light and the just-as-keen L. Who will conquer the other with his genius?
Chrysanthemum Tea
The stuff is so fragrant! And its color is like Mountain Dew!
Summer
For those of you who actually wonder, this summer I will be interning at 826 Valencia, devouring Murakami and other writers, painting, writing, watching movies, and hopefully working or taking classes. That’s about it. Ha! Sticky rice cakes and bubble tea for everyone.
by Sally Mao
