rakkauden ja epätoivon laulu

[sorry this is copy/pasted, with some minor modifications, from a chat. it's messy, but it'll help explain the post below it.]

after six years i was finally able to explain to my parents that it wasn't right for them to blame me for becoming depressed...but in fact it was their fault. then weird things happened. my mom's blood pressure went down so she didn't have to take pills for it like she had been for the last year. i found NW, and my childhood dream of being a musician came back stronger than it had ever been. i started seeing the world as an artist again. but one important thing went away: the delusions that were my reality. the delusions that told me that it's good to be studying engineering, that engineering is important to me and my future.

the wackiest bit of it all was the thought that ended up starting that chain of events.

it was a thought that i randomly came up with while talking to a friend on the way back to the dorm after class on a snowy day [in January this year].

==

the sundering happened because my parents thought that i was spending too much time with my fantasy novels and my D&D books (mind, i never played, actually.)

one day i came home from school and all of my fantasy books were gone. they threatened to seal them in a box and lock them in the attic.
at the time i never understood why they'd do that to me unless it really *was* detracting that much from my schoolwork. a couple of weeks later they let me back into my stuff, but what they had done had worked - i had lost interest in it all.

yet over the next few years my schoolwork continued to deteriorate, and my parents could only blame my attitude, blamed some lasting effect from my fantasy book days, blamed me. and in my heart i knew that wasn't true, but i couldn't explain why. until that snowy day.

and this is that thought:

the fantasy books and the dreams of D&D were a means for me to project my fantasies onto something physical, something that i could close and put away when i was done with them.

i've always had a wild imagination and it needs to go somewhere, right?

but when those books were taken away, i had nowhere to deposit those dreams, and so they stayed inside me, becoming me. it's why i still feel like i need to be a hero. it's why, if i had the choice, i'd dress as a fantastical 'wise woman warrior' character like Eowyn or someone like that.

and that was what was distracting me all these years.

basically, when my parents took my books from me then it had only made the problem worse, not better.

and that was the thought that was the key to all this

that this was never my fault in the first place

i've spent most of the last 6 years attempting to project it in my artwork, but that has its limitations

thing is, the sundering also coincides with the time i stopped thinking of music as a career and started to think of more practical things like teaching or practicing law or engineering

which is why i think the final resolution of that problem opened the door for NW to resurrect it.

I heard that the only place in Canada that's having any good weather right now is over here. Back home there was a thunderstorm warning for at least the second day in a row and potential tornado weather and stuff. I bet it rained a lot lately.

Part of me doesn't want to know how I did on the English exam because my personal writing section wasn't completely on topic and is a little bit on the obscure train of thought and rambling side. I mean, the topic may have been determination and one of the texts was about a girl who was supposed to be interpreted as being determined to hide the reality of nursing school from her parents instead of becoming an artist like they thought she'd want to be, to assert her independence, most people would write some motivational speech. Anyone who knows me well (or have read my earlier journals, if I write about the topic at all) would know that I hate motivational speeches. They're so rah-rah. So why would I write something so typical? I kinda went off on the hiding things from parents tangent and wrote about why that is necessary for everyone at some point to gain independence. Then I can't remember if I mentioned that it takes a lot of energy to keep that up and lots of determination to persist despite what other things befall you because of it. It's not really a force to put myself back on the main topic but a necessary part of the discussion, so I hope they saw it as that. In other stuff, I don't care what I got on SS. I'm sure I did well. On the other hand, some of those crazy SSIB kids (who are accustomed to writing 3 essays in 2.5 hours) who wrote more than the answer booklet had answer pages for...who knows, more isn't always better if they don't write it in the ridiculous and bland format the rest of us are taught. I'm still glad I didn't have to remember as much as they did and do as much synthesizing as they did for their exams.

I finished writing the exam in 35 minutes, but yet again I couldn't leave until the first hour was up.

Ms. Antonuk came around passing out (to the IB students) sheets with the information for checking their IB grades once they come out in July. I watched as she moved up and down the rows, bending down to place the papers beside each IB student's desk.

Then she stops by my desk and puts one down on the floor.

Wait...me?

"Eh?" I whisper, since I don't have any IB marks to think of. It was met with a smile.

Random imagination and thoughts of doom starting flooding in. I remembered a random comment by kp_mike to waste the time you have before you're allowed to leave by doodling in the question booklet. But I don't doodle very well unless under pressure, so I wrote in the back of my question booklet. It was sort of a poem, pondering why it was that she gave me that sheet even though I have no practical use for it (except maybe folding paper airplanes, but I'm not inclined to do that) - whether it was a mistake or if she was trying to show me what a zero looked like.

Fortunately I managed to catch up to her beige-blouse-and-black-jacket-and-black-miniskirt-and-the-rest-of-the-matching-outfit-ness and ask her about that. She said she's just obligated to give out that information so that we all have the opportunity to check our grades. Which sounded kind of vague. But I won't worry about that anymore.

So now I'm finished high school! Yay!

Hawkwood Elementary may not sing completely in tune (expected; I mean, they're little kids!) but their sound is so much better on the CD. And their handbells are really nice. And one of their songs got the pop song treatment (i.e. with some drums and pop-ification of the piano part). And their school song is really cute! And here we are with the really obvious out-of-tuneage with the piano, going flat on the a capella stuff, and other mangling. Some of the dynamics aren't blended really well especially in the piano, so sometimes it suddenly gets louder and stuff. And the distinct voices. Jeff sticks out in the men's part, Emily and I stick out in the altos, and I don't know the sopranos enough to figure out who sort of leads them though I'm sure someone does. But realistically each section does have a de facto leader who is secure with the part and can read music. It's just the way it was. (Ooh you can really hear me in the a capella part in 'Amazing Grace.') And we totally screwed up one of the words in that first hymn. I thought we had fixed that in a second take. Hrmph. Guess he didn't realize that. Actually you can hear me on most of the songs. I'm the one belting out all the loud parts with the vibrato. Heck, at some parts it sounds like there's only my voice in my part :s So yeah, our CD is so creepy.

We were hanging out at Dairy Queen today and there were two boys who walked by outside flipping around twenty- and five-dollar bills in their hands. We were seriously considering mugging them before someone else did, but I didn't think that Viv and I could take them on.

I overheard part of my sister's piano exam today and it's almost unimaginable what her nerves must have been because she was playing so much faster than she usually does -- like so fast one probably couldn't see her fingers. But still very well! It wasn't all messed up or anything!

My roll of film came back today, so I'll scan some of the highlights. I'm not a huge photo-taker, so there's still a few shots on another roll which I haven't finished and probably won't for a (long) while, until everything's been half-forgotten or something. (*grins*)

Regarding this post, the camera's not broken; my photos turned out fine.

I'm going to start writing captions for my photos here since the title field in photobucket often isn't large enough for my needs.

1. Most of the IB class of 2004, a photo taken before the graduation ceremony, so that's why some bodies were missing (like Antonuk's...she arrived much later).

2. Me and my friend Jane

3. That's me walking off the stage after receiving my diploma. The white blob behind my head is Principal Hunt, and the person reading the names (in the special red/yellow/blue doctorate robe) is Mr. Jolly, my English teacher (he's retiring this year). Yes I know I need to learn to walk more upright. I know.

4. A toast with my next-door neighbour (she took me out for lunch after the ceremony). That's my first glass of legal wine. Yes I was dizzy after it. Yes I finished it. No my parents didn't think I would be able to finish it.

5. At the reception before the banquet. From left to right: Soraya, Jessica, Jane, me

6. Me and Lily, the girl who got to do the toast to the teachers. I can hardly even remember what line she spoke on my behalf, but asking her she tells me it was "In the classroom, you have taught us to understand and respect the limits of others as well as our own."

7. Barend (DK#2) and me - I never found out who his date was, but that's of course why he's got the flower

8. And that, is me going toe to toe with the Antonuk. It's debatable who's actually taller, since both of us were wearing high-heels (I think. I'm sure I was, and she often does.)

9. Just a group of us. I can't remember everyone's name (I don't know everyone!) but from left to right is Odd Boy, Mike, two guys I don't know, Kristina (in the blue Chinese dress), Michelle (the smaller girl), me, Garrison, and Stanley. I didn't feel bothered to retouch the rampant red-eyes on Photoshop.

10. (One of) my graduation portraits.

I didn't get home from my graduation dance until 1am this morning so I totally slept in until 11am. My mom's taken one of my rolls of film to Wal-Mart to develop; I don't know if she'll bring the photos home tonight. I'll post some once I get my photos back. There's also about 6 photos on another roll of film which I'll have to somehow finish so I can get those photos too. I kinda dropped my camera on the floor by accident early in the evening so I was getting worried that it might have put the lens out of alignment or something since the mechanism still works. I'm pretty sure it's ok (except for a little dent and a scrape on one corner) but you know how much of a worrywart I am.

Tiistai, 18. toukokuuta 2004

*gaak* it burns!

(too much drink for a day anyway, considering how [I haven't been] phased into it.)

The weird cocktail I had at lunch I put a capful of gin in it, which made me a little drowsy, but it wore off in an hour or two. Then, the weird guy [Odd Boy (as opposed to Dangerous Boy)] is, decides to pop up before social class outside the classroom and gestures, "hey, come over here, I've got something for you." "What?" I begin to follow him. "No, no, bring your backpack." "Huh?" "Just do it." "Okay..." He leads me to a quieter corner near the school doors. "What is it...contraband?!" "Not really, but we're not supposed to have it in the school." He pulls a plastic bag out of his backpack and hands it to me. From the touch I know it's liquor, so I didn't need to look, really. "Here's a mickey of run." "Uh, thanks," I said awkwardly, fiddling with the plastic bag. "Quick, put it away."

Anyway, that was odd. Somehow I found myself still not tired at 2am and I'm thinkin', it must have been some of that he brought home (illegally!) from Cuba over the spring break that he was talking about at lunch on the computer. Licked a couple of drops (I tried to pour it out into the cap but it leaked all over my hand) and, uh, it burns. Like rubbing alcohol. No wonder they use it in the movies and in war as an improvised antiseptic. But quite an interesting aftertaste. I think I'll sleep now, not that burning sensations help me sleep. And I better wake up!

(Mr. MacGregor was also [Odd Boy]'s social teacher and he was like, "well, [Odd Boy], why don't you come in?" Heh.)

I think I have too much contraband in my room, I didn't know where to hide it. My pointy object is laying at the top of the junk drawer of my dresser (the drawer closest to the floor) and I daren't take it out right now because I can swear I must be somehow impaired at this point, in something or other, and as for the rum, it's acting inconspicuously as a bookend in one of the darker corners of my bookshelf.

Ok, now I'm starting to feel a little sleepy.

And if you don't think he's crazy, he normally doesn't sleep until 3 or 4am, drinks tea and Coca-Cola during the day, then drugs himself to sleep with the stash of booze in his personal fridge. I mean it. But as they say...engineering students are all drunkards. Might as well get used to it [now].

I have witnessed the drastic difference between the sound of a studio recording and a live recording -- a tape of the choir singing at the music festival shows just how much we suck: our sound is without direction, without form. It sounds clunky and forced, somewhat bored, with no expression.

On the studio recording we did today (and will tomorrow), even with minimal mixing, we sound much rounder and confident. Such is the nature and the wonder of technology, it's most probable that it's not because we're singing any better.

But we cannot possibly sound like we have form and expression until we learn to appreciate and understand the music. We concentrate so much on technical nitpicking that the music itself becomes tedious and unmeaningful, and thus we sound bored and forced. We are so intimidated and fearful of getting details messed up or not doing a good job of coming in together, for seemingly only God knows why, we cannot be free to feel the music. Because if we are taught to feel the music and make it personal to us, all of those technical details will suddenly have meaning to us. And when we have learned to love the music then we will be more motivated to sing well and keep the technical details in mind rather than to be nitpicked on them all the time.

Yes, that would mean the director must not be afraid of it not being technically sound at first, but once the music can be felt and becomes a part of us, fixing those details will be so much easier.

My former piano teacher has years more experience than you, Mr. Graham! You'd do well to listen to his advice! Unless you're happy enough with winning second places by default at Kiwanis and lots of those ugly blue 'participant' certificates from there. Ever wonder why we never seem to learn and you're so frustrated over our attention span? The above may just be why!

Yesterday, just after they announced the final winner, I had to go to English class. And not only that, that winner was in my class...and the moment she walked into the classroom her friends (and that's like, half of the class) wanted her to sing for the class...while I could only turn away and weep...for I know that I was deserving of singing beside her.

I tried to talk to some of the organizers yesterday, and others overheard me, but no, I was not criticizing the system. I know the system. I've watched American Idol and other shows like that.

So today I asked my English teacher if I could have a chance to sing for the class too, just because it was only fair to me - and it would redeem myself a little. But on a practical level, as he said to me, it wasn't the best idea, for somehow it would seem to indicate - to the winner's friends in the class - some intention to usurp her title.

Then they just had to call the four finalists down to the office by name to pick up their prizes. I couldn't take it anymore. No, not because I wanted a prize, but because of that recognition I was denied again.

This is me. People have told me for much of my life that I have a beautiful voice. I have musical talent. And I'm not afraid to perform.

People just don't know what it meant for me to sing a song onstage from the heart. It's so easy just to sing any song you know, which is what I'm sure almost everyone did, but it's so much harder to get up there and sing a song that means something to you, that you want to share the meaning with the audience.

Yes, people can try to cheer me up, saying that it's enough of a feat to get up there and be brave enough to do it -- but that's not out of the ordinary for me. Having taken piano lessons for 12 years I'm used to performing in recitals and competitions. It's not new, like it was for Joyce, for example.

And as one of the organizers (also my friend) told me today...I wasn't supposed to have been there at all. I was meant to be cut at the auditions. And only the desperation I expressed moved her to coerce the panel to let me in. Yet the rumours also say that the same thing happened for the girl that I felt didn't deserve to be a finalist as well...it's so much about connections.

My friend was very reluctant to tell me what that margin between the 1st place ties and the 3rd place contestant was for Wednesday, because I told her that I was so sure that I had to have placed 3rd that day. And the truth there, and I really shouldn't be saying this in public (for it was meant to be a secret), is that I was dead last. She told me, but that's because I asked.

Now I don't understand anymore. How could it be, that I could feel so loved, but yet not actually be loved at all?

I feel that I need to redeem myself. In a perfect world I would get those 4 finalists together with me, and we would go sing for a different school, and let them judge us. That would take away the popularity factor. Else we would sing for not the audition panel, but all of the music teachers and teachers who are musicians (like Mr. Baldwin) in the school, and they would judge. Because not only do I want to redeem myself, I feel an incredible need to be seen relative to those 4 finalists, so the audience can see for themselves the injustice they have dealt to someone who perfectly deserved to be in the top four. Yes, it would mean humiliation for someone, but in my imagination it would be the only way to set things right.

But this would never be done. These are things to be left only to the imagination.

I cried for four hours last night. I don't know why I couldn't sleep. It was just that something wasn't right in this bubble of a world around me and I can't stand it being that way.

In the meantime...

I know that all of the other losers have gotten over their loserness...and I know I'm really being thought of as an @$$ over in the organizing committee. But always, it is not about winning. I would never have won anyway. Honestly, I would have been happy with myself if there had been someone who was better than me in my round, and he or she gets the result he or she deserved (for example, this year's winner was singing in my round last year, and she got 2nd place overall), but that's not what the case was here. What this became for me was an opportunity to fight for what I believe in, to show that this is what a person who believes in justice does; to show that this is what a person who values talent and skill does to defend her standing. And I will never rest...until I face either utter defeat, or have reached a compromise.

I cannot let these things pass so easily as others do, because it is the intent, the why I decided to enter this contest. It was not to impress my friends, or to have fun - it was to express myself in the only way I have been previously successful in doing so - through music. And to show the vulgar masses what talent they have ignored for the sake of superficiality.

Our school started holding a week-long karaoke singing contest last year, also known as the popularity contest known as Churchill Idol, loosely based on the American Idol system. We have three lunch-hours filled with people attempting to sing to bad karaoke tracks, while the audience votes on paper ballots each session for a finalist to advance to the fourth day, the finals.

I got to go up and sing today; thankfully I was allowed a stool to sit on, because during the audition (they had them this year because of the number of entries, last year it was really spontaneous) I was standing while I was singing and my legs were trembling so badly I was seriously about to fall over backwards if I didn't hold on to something.

I'm not sure what happened today, though, because my fingers were all numb after -- I guess I was still pretty nervous but I suppose it decided to express itself in that deathgrip I had on the mic.

Anyway. I'm digressing again.

I was originally going to sing "Hope, vol 2" (see that song lyric post a while back) but then just last week I didn't feel like listening to that song anymore, so I decided to sing Metallica's "Nothing Else Matters" for two reasons: 1) I was in the mood for that song. 2) I figured it would do better on the 'people know it' and the 'appeal to the guys who like rock music' scales.

It was somewhat interesting to note that people were really really reacting to my piece, some of the boys got out their lighters and were waving them around (and the teachers were trying to stop them to no avail). They were so quiet at the beginning and were calling out my name during the interludes and stuff (even though I didn't get to sing the whole song)...

Some Matt, whom I'm not very familiar with, ran into me as I was going back to my seat and thrust a sheet of paper and a pen in my face, asking for my autograph (haha) -- I vaguely recall him doing the same to me last year. No one else got this treatment...and it's not like I'm very popular. I mean, take that, for example. I don't even really know Matt very well, or any of his friends.

And then in the middle of someone else's song a sort of chant was heard arising from the other side of the gymnasium...it was my name...must have been Matt's group of friends.

I seriously think I must have some kind of fan club I don't know about.

It's strange feeling popular. It's even more strange feeling that I have fans.