What Do You Want To Do Before You Die?
A Life Ledger for the Next Few Months
Confession: I haven't thought about my buried life for waaay too long now. This semester has been a doozy in terms of school, home and the superficial things in life that nevertheless seem to eat up your day. I'm feeling especially buried. I know its that horrible exams-are-looming-end-of-second-semester-why-hasn't-the-snow-melted-yet? time of year, but the sudden wake up call of time slipping by towards summer break, and the same amount of time until I'm twenty one, has got me thinking about how accountable I've been to my goals in life. I tend to either look so far into the future to the point where I don't set anything into motion, or become too complacent in weekly assignments and ToDo lists. From what I can tell, I've been banking far too much of myself in past times that start with ENGL.
Some exciting things have come of the schoolishness, including getting my poetry published in a few different places for the first time in my life, as well as meeting some awesome people who reminded me that there's a major "do" side to literature other than the reading and paper-writing part. But with a million aunts and uncles, other adults, and friends asking about what I'm planning on doing with my English degree next year and me having no clue except the parrot response: "maybe a journalist for... Highlights for Children?" I'm feeling swamped by a future I can't yet see. Having tasted the success of mini-projects that I've actually seen through, my whistle has been whetted, and I'm looking as far as the summer. Pre-break hope riles me out of the winter doldrums, I can feel some projects actually coming into fruition. So far, they include:
- putting together a massive yard sale with a friend from home that will have live dj sets, an art show of Alberta College of Arts and Design students' wicked work, some self-designed screen printed t shirts and apparel, possibly a show from an amazing house/vogue/wacking dance troupe called DangerKat (check them out on Youtube) and some typical yard sale closet cleaning o kitschy and wonderful finds (my hoarding skills will finally be useful). All the money I make is going to be put into a savings pool I'm starting to get me on my way to Burma/India in 2010 so I can finally take a hand in the hospital my family and friends have started over there for Burmese refugees three years ago. If anyone is in Calgary June 28 (tentatively), let me know and stop by!
- finally write and film some absurd shorts that I've been inspired to finally do by a new friend who loves nonsense at the same extreme level I do.
- a trip with my Mama to the Sin City so we can celebrate our milestones together-- she's turning 60, me 21-- and hopefully I can win some dough: mama needs new pair of shoes, because the Montreal weather has killed all my other ones.
- going to Europe with my roommate for a few weeks so I can enjoy my penultimate (a word that I snicker at every time a professor uses but can't seem to stop saying now) undergrad summer, and hopefully speak French, because I apparently haven't had the chance to here.
- getting a job that somehow accommodates all my summer trips, so I can stash some more cash for the trip to Argentina/ Chile/ Antarctica I'm planning in 2010 as well. I met some awesome Argentineans over reading week and it made me realize I couldn't just fly down there by the seat of my pantalones, so I'm going to get prepped for next summer's major planning re: travel, moola, penguin hostess gifts and travel partners (invites open!)
- conquering my own street's hill on a long board after accomplishing the one running from Arts without falling down on my elbows like the first five times. I've been down my hill on a ten speed (many times, but once resulting in a fractured hand due to gravel), tied to the back of a neighbors bike while on roller skates (torn Northern Getaway gear) and in a red wagon (the neighbors called the cops). So here's hoping this time will be more successful!
- hiking around Nelson again early-August. I feel lucky to have found a valley unlike any other in the world where I feel more like myself and a part of something good than any other place on earth, and I love going to get my karmic batteries recharged with some fresh mountain air and Oso Negro coffee.
- going through all of my home videos, to add to the photo collections I organized last year of my dad. I recently saw what a brain that has Alzheimer's looks like, and the memory part is completely missing, so I feel its my job to be and make the memory bank as my dad takes this trip into another world.
Last summer was like living in limbo for me, with my dad still at home and my whole family's life directed by the rhythm of Alzheimer's and Parkinson’s. I think I felt really caught up by the terrible process of slowly losing someone, and the sick sense of ellipses that those illnesses can impose on your own plans for life. Plunging right back into an Honor's program and an amazing but busy Montreal life, I got really complacent. Well, watch out because now I'M BUSTING OUT, and I want the world to know. Apparently, this is supposed to be the best year ever for Aries, and who am I to argue with the stars? They're just like us-- at least US Weekly told me that.
-Suzie.
PS I'm first to admit I'm a John Mayer fan... in fact, I did, in my last blog post. Yikes. Well, I'm bringing him up again for a good reason. The other day, John Mayer thoughtfully called himself out on precisely the trait I find most interesting in himself: self-consciousness. As an artist creating music for a huge audience of fans, and with constant media attention, its not hard to guess he-- or any of the other celebrities out there-- are extremely self conscious. I've just always paid particular attention to him (not only because his guitar skillz are as wonderful as his candy lips and bubble gum tongue but) for his very deliberately ironic management of his public image. He writes clever, self-aware blogs, talks facetiously to the paparazzi, and can sometimes seem like a huge douchebag, but in a very intelligent way. Well, my search for Earnest was in a way gratified with his latest blog post on www.johnmayer.com on the 27th of March, on the topic of self-consciousness. This is one of my favorite parts:
"This is about us all. Every one of us. Who all seem to know deep down that it's incredibly hard to be alive and interact with the world around us but will try and cover it up at any cost. For as badass and unaffected as we try to come off, we're all just one sentence away from being brought to the edge of tears, if only it was worded right. And I don't want to act immune to that anymore. I took the biggest detour from myself over the past year, since I decided that I wasn't going to care about what people thought about me. I got to the point where I had so much padding on that, sure, I couldn't feel the negativity, but that's because I couldn't feel much of anything. And I think I'm done with that.
I'm not the first person to admit we're all self conscious, Kanye was. But what I want to do is to shed a little light on why we're all in the same boat, no matter the shape of the life we lead: because every one of us were told since birth that we were special. We were spoken to by name through a television. We were promised we could be anything that we wanted to be, if only we believed it and then, faster than we saw coming, we were set loose into the world to shake hands with the millions of other people who were told the exact same thing.
And really? Really? It turns out we're just not all that special, when you break it down. Beautifully unspectacular, actually. (...)
What now, then? I can only really say for myself: Enjoy who I am, the talents and the liabilities. Stop acting careless. In fact, care more. Be vulnerable but stay away from where it hurts. Read. See more shows. Of any kind. Rock shows, art shows, boat shows. Create more art. Wear hoodies to dinner. Carry a notebook and hand it to people when they passionately recommend something and ask them to write it down for me."
I really reccomend reading the whole post. We really do live in a soceity that is self-conscious in a more differently intense way than ever before. Growing up being told we can do whatever we want to do, but leaving it at that is a huge crutch. What I like about the Buried Life, and growing up thoughtuflly, is by making a list of our desires that we actually want to do, we can take the chance to go from self-conscious to self-aware, which is a great thing to be I think. By being self-aware, you know who you are and are willing to take the risk to show that side to everyone else. By sharing in a community of a bunch of other people bold enough to do the same you find out We're All in This Together (listen to the Feist song!) and beling open/vulnerable to each other makes us so much less vulnerable to our own inner critics (the biggest bullies of us all).
-"We all self conscious I'm just the first to admit it. " Kanye"
And live life like you're this Jamaian cracker ad:
Some exciting things have come of the schoolishness, including getting my poetry published in a few different places for the first time in my life, as well as meeting some awesome people who reminded me that there's a major "do" side to literature other than the reading and paper-writing part. But with a million aunts and uncles, other adults, and friends asking about what I'm planning on doing with my English degree next year and me having no clue except the parrot response: "maybe a journalist for... Highlights for Children?" I'm feeling swamped by a future I can't yet see. Having tasted the success of mini-projects that I've actually seen through, my whistle has been whetted, and I'm looking as far as the summer. Pre-break hope riles me out of the winter doldrums, I can feel some projects actually coming into fruition. So far, they include:
- putting together a massive yard sale with a friend from home that will have live dj sets, an art show of Alberta College of Arts and Design students' wicked work, some self-designed screen printed t shirts and apparel, possibly a show from an amazing house/vogue/wacking dance troupe called DangerKat (check them out on Youtube) and some typical yard sale closet cleaning o kitschy and wonderful finds (my hoarding skills will finally be useful). All the money I make is going to be put into a savings pool I'm starting to get me on my way to Burma/India in 2010 so I can finally take a hand in the hospital my family and friends have started over there for Burmese refugees three years ago. If anyone is in Calgary June 28 (tentatively), let me know and stop by!
- finally write and film some absurd shorts that I've been inspired to finally do by a new friend who loves nonsense at the same extreme level I do.
- a trip with my Mama to the Sin City so we can celebrate our milestones together-- she's turning 60, me 21-- and hopefully I can win some dough: mama needs new pair of shoes, because the Montreal weather has killed all my other ones.
- going to Europe with my roommate for a few weeks so I can enjoy my penultimate (a word that I snicker at every time a professor uses but can't seem to stop saying now) undergrad summer, and hopefully speak French, because I apparently haven't had the chance to here.
- getting a job that somehow accommodates all my summer trips, so I can stash some more cash for the trip to Argentina/ Chile/ Antarctica I'm planning in 2010 as well. I met some awesome Argentineans over reading week and it made me realize I couldn't just fly down there by the seat of my pantalones, so I'm going to get prepped for next summer's major planning re: travel, moola, penguin hostess gifts and travel partners (invites open!)
- conquering my own street's hill on a long board after accomplishing the one running from Arts without falling down on my elbows like the first five times. I've been down my hill on a ten speed (many times, but once resulting in a fractured hand due to gravel), tied to the back of a neighbors bike while on roller skates (torn Northern Getaway gear) and in a red wagon (the neighbors called the cops). So here's hoping this time will be more successful!
- hiking around Nelson again early-August. I feel lucky to have found a valley unlike any other in the world where I feel more like myself and a part of something good than any other place on earth, and I love going to get my karmic batteries recharged with some fresh mountain air and Oso Negro coffee.
- going through all of my home videos, to add to the photo collections I organized last year of my dad. I recently saw what a brain that has Alzheimer's looks like, and the memory part is completely missing, so I feel its my job to be and make the memory bank as my dad takes this trip into another world.
Last summer was like living in limbo for me, with my dad still at home and my whole family's life directed by the rhythm of Alzheimer's and Parkinson’s. I think I felt really caught up by the terrible process of slowly losing someone, and the sick sense of ellipses that those illnesses can impose on your own plans for life. Plunging right back into an Honor's program and an amazing but busy Montreal life, I got really complacent. Well, watch out because now I'M BUSTING OUT, and I want the world to know. Apparently, this is supposed to be the best year ever for Aries, and who am I to argue with the stars? They're just like us-- at least US Weekly told me that.
-Suzie.
PS I'm first to admit I'm a John Mayer fan... in fact, I did, in my last blog post. Yikes. Well, I'm bringing him up again for a good reason. The other day, John Mayer thoughtfully called himself out on precisely the trait I find most interesting in himself: self-consciousness. As an artist creating music for a huge audience of fans, and with constant media attention, its not hard to guess he-- or any of the other celebrities out there-- are extremely self conscious. I've just always paid particular attention to him (not only because his guitar skillz are as wonderful as his candy lips and bubble gum tongue but) for his very deliberately ironic management of his public image. He writes clever, self-aware blogs, talks facetiously to the paparazzi, and can sometimes seem like a huge douchebag, but in a very intelligent way. Well, my search for Earnest was in a way gratified with his latest blog post on www.johnmayer.com on the 27th of March, on the topic of self-consciousness. This is one of my favorite parts:
"This is about us all. Every one of us. Who all seem to know deep down that it's incredibly hard to be alive and interact with the world around us but will try and cover it up at any cost. For as badass and unaffected as we try to come off, we're all just one sentence away from being brought to the edge of tears, if only it was worded right. And I don't want to act immune to that anymore. I took the biggest detour from myself over the past year, since I decided that I wasn't going to care about what people thought about me. I got to the point where I had so much padding on that, sure, I couldn't feel the negativity, but that's because I couldn't feel much of anything. And I think I'm done with that.
I'm not the first person to admit we're all self conscious, Kanye was. But what I want to do is to shed a little light on why we're all in the same boat, no matter the shape of the life we lead: because every one of us were told since birth that we were special. We were spoken to by name through a television. We were promised we could be anything that we wanted to be, if only we believed it and then, faster than we saw coming, we were set loose into the world to shake hands with the millions of other people who were told the exact same thing.
And really? Really? It turns out we're just not all that special, when you break it down. Beautifully unspectacular, actually. (...)
What now, then? I can only really say for myself: Enjoy who I am, the talents and the liabilities. Stop acting careless. In fact, care more. Be vulnerable but stay away from where it hurts. Read. See more shows. Of any kind. Rock shows, art shows, boat shows. Create more art. Wear hoodies to dinner. Carry a notebook and hand it to people when they passionately recommend something and ask them to write it down for me."
I really reccomend reading the whole post. We really do live in a soceity that is self-conscious in a more differently intense way than ever before. Growing up being told we can do whatever we want to do, but leaving it at that is a huge crutch. What I like about the Buried Life, and growing up thoughtuflly, is by making a list of our desires that we actually want to do, we can take the chance to go from self-conscious to self-aware, which is a great thing to be I think. By being self-aware, you know who you are and are willing to take the risk to show that side to everyone else. By sharing in a community of a bunch of other people bold enough to do the same you find out We're All in This Together (listen to the Feist song!) and beling open/vulnerable to each other makes us so much less vulnerable to our own inner critics (the biggest bullies of us all).
-"We all self conscious I'm just the first to admit it. " Kanye"
And live life like you're this Jamaian cracker ad:
Comment
What is The Buried Life?
The Buried Life is a network of people answering the ultimate question: What Do You Want To Do Before You Die?
It was inspired by four guys on a mission complete their own list of 100 things while helping strangers do the same.
It was inspired by four guys on a mission complete their own list of 100 things while helping strangers do the same.
About
© 2010 Created by Ben, Jonnie, Duncan and Dave on Ning. Create a Ning Network!
You need to be a member of The Buried Life to add comments!
Join this Ning Network