TrumvilleOrbison's Xanga

Has it really got a team of snow white horses?

Tue, 26 May 2009 03:59:38 GMT

One's like snow--the other's more like...milk.
Anyway! It's about time to, once again, direct you fine folks to my real, actual, factual blog, powered by Wordpress. youngadultsindayton.wordpress.com
Since, you know, I only post here about once every five months or so, whenever I feel like it. The weirdest thing about my numerous blogs (because yes, I have several more) is that my blogging, or at least the way I feel about my blogging, changes from blog to blog. I cannot log in to Wordpress and blog the same way that I blog on Blogspot. Or Xanga. Or Facebook. Or whatever. It's similar to the way I experience books. I know, I know, never judge a book by its cover, right? Only yes, sometimes, you should. At least I should. Book covers, page quality, margin size, font--all these factors and more influence the way I perceive a book. Which is very, very interesting to me, because it allows me to read a book many times and get a totally different viewpoint of it, depending on which edition I'm reading at the moment.
There is NO point to these rambles.

What are some controversial views you hold?

Thu, 23 Apr 2009 21:38:58 GMT

I just answered this Featured Question; you can answer it too!

I believe we're all equal. Really. My country is not the "best" country in the world, and we are not "better" than you. I support gay marriage. I'm a tree-hugging environmentalist. I believe the love of money really is the root of all evil, and I'm tired of people who claim to follow Christ's teachings conveniently forgetting this key point. I believe in progressive tax systems and while I [currently] wouldn't go so far as to identify myself as a socialist, I will say that I have socialist leanings and I'll probably identify as such before too much longer, and I don't think that's a bad thing. I'm anti-war and I support gender equity. I support females in leadership roles, whatever they are. Yeah, that means pastors and priests. I believe we can and should eradicate poverty. I reject the misguided and horribly damaging theology of the rapture and end times. I believe that not all Christians are "saved", and not everyone who's "saved" is a Christian.
Of course, the reason most of these are controversial is that I'm learning from Jesus myself. Then again, that's why I've adopted them in the first place.

To all my Christian Republican friends who are despairing right now: DON'T.

Thu, 06 Nov 2008 04:38:02 GMT

I know some of you (okay, actually most of my friends and acquaintances..) are still hyperventilating from last night’s results, so I would just like to e-hug you and remind you that everything is going to be okay. Even if your candidate lost. Observe this exerpt of the book we hold so dear:

Be a good citizen. All governments are under God. Insofar as there is peace and order, it’s God’s order. So live responsibly as a citizen. If you’re irresponsible to the state, then you’re irresponsible with God, and God will hold you responsible. Duly constituted authorities are only a threat if you’re trying to get by with something. Decent citizens should have nothing to fear.

Do you want to be on good terms with the government? Be a responsible citizen and you’ll get on just fine, the government working to your advantage. But if you’re breaking the rules right and left, watch out. The police aren’t there just to be admired in their uniforms. God also has an interest in keeping order, and [God] uses them to do it. That’s why you must live responsibly–not just to avoid punishment but also because it’s the right way to live.

That’s also why you pay taxes–so that an orderly way of life can be maintained. Fulfill your obligations as a citizen. Pay your taxes, pay your bills, respect your leaders.

Don’t run up debts, except for the huge debt of love you owe each other. When you love others, you complete what the law has been after all along. The law code–don’t sleep with another person’s spouse, dn’t take someone’s life, don’t take what isn’t yours, don’t always be wanting what you don’t have, and any other “don’t” you can think of–finally adds up to this: Love other people as well as you do yourself. You can’t go wrong when you love others. When you add up everything in the law code, the sum total is love.

But make sure that you don’t get so absorbed and exhausted in taking care of all your day-by-day obligations that you lose track of the time and doze off, oblivious to God. The night is about over, dawn is about to break. Be up and awake to what God is doing! God is putting the finishing touches on the salvation work [God] began when we first believed. We can’t afford to waste a minute, must not squander these precious daylight hours in frivolity and indulgence, in sleeping around and dissipation, in bickering and grabbing everything in sight. Get out of bed and get dressed! Don’t loiter and linger, waiting until the very last minute. Dress yourselves in Christ, and be up and about! [Romans 13, The Message. Emphasis mine.]

So yeah. If you feel like you need to take a little time to mourn or whatever (if this isn’t you, don’t laugh, there’s a ton of people even just in my pretty small circles who feel this way), do it. And then jump back in. No matter who you voted for, we’ve got something new going on and this country belongs to everybody. I'm pretty excited about it actually. :]

You were only waiting for this moment to arrive.

Wed, 24 Sep 2008 02:28:56 GMT

It's Getting Hot in Here:

I've by now been thoroughly chastised by my parents for my political leanings. They are both conservative Republicans. Everyone in my house is a conservative Republican, except me..I tend to keep my mouth shut anymore when the conversation rolls around to Washington. I have been accused of "always defending Him", meaning Obama, of course, and you know what, I can't think of a single occasion where I defended Barack Obama to my family. What I have done is try to introduce some actual facts into the conversation. My parents say that clearly John McCain is the real Christian and he is The One who supports Christian Values and Valerie Huber (friend of the family, works in Washington) acknowledges that McCain is obviously the only choice for the Christian voter. They say they would be embarrassed for their daughter to vote for "A Man Like That", whatever that means (I'm guessing it means baby-killer). They call me "liberal!" like it's a dirty word. But when it's not voting season and tensions aren't running quite so high, they call me a hippie and giggle about it.

Bonus points: I'm also thoroughly entangled in a great political argument over MySpace, of all things. Well, that's what Wes uses mostly, and he did initiate the..opinion exchange, shall we say. He describes himself as "so far right wing you can't see the independents in the middle." And well, it sure is interesting! We are the antithesis of each other. I'm not quite sure if that's spelled correctly. Or, as we decided, we are polar bear opposites. You may take that metaphorically or literally, as you wish.

Impossible Things Are Happening Every Day:

I Rickrolled an ENTIRE PARKING LOT, I was so pleased! My brothers were so embarrassed they got down on the floor and hid underneath the seats.

I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For:

It happens to be a political cartoon one of the newspapers ran maybe a week, week and a half ago? I'm not sure of the date. Or which paper. We get the Troy paper and the Dayton paper. And I don't remember which cartoonist it was, so it appears I'm up a creek without a paddle. It's a Wall-E cartoon. Wall-E is sadly sweeping up the remains of the great Wall Street crash. It is labeled "WALL strEet." Google can't help me. All it knows is "Wall Street Got Drunk!" If anyone can help me find this cartoon, I will pay you a million dollars. Well. Actually. I can pay you..I can pay you in banana stickers, in eprops or in a Rickrolled! phone number (but I'm not certain it works properly). Or I could just hail you on my blog as Amazing Chief of the Googlers. You pick! It can be..a contest. Yes. You may begin.

All Animals Are Equal. But Some Animals Are More Equal Than Others:

I'm practically in love with dystopia novels and like..vintage political satire..The other day I felt this burning need to reread Orwell's Animal Farm. I found this great copy from the 1950s at the public library, it's full of pictures and everything. The pig/human drawings are the absolute best. What do you think? At what point are the actions of the pigs no longer acceptable or justifiable to you?

What Not to Wear On a Windy Day:

A trapeze dress.

If You Want to Read All About My Jonas Brothers Experience, And I Do Mean All About It:

http://youngadultsindayton.wordpress.com/2008/08/24/ill-pick-you-up-at-seven-we-can-drive-around-and-see-a-movie/

I Feel Like I Need Some:

Friends.

I don't really talk to people anymore. It's kind of sad but also kind of really understandable when you consider the fact that all my previous set of friends were friends from church, which means my ex-church, which means I rarely see them now, and we were already pretty much drifting off in different directions. How about that alliteration? No, I don't wanna talk about alliterations! [/lillymoscovitz] My new set of friends, they're hilarious, they're there, they're constant and full of things I'm looking for in friends, but. But but but. Of course we don't know each other very well yet, we only met, what, five months ago? And we see each other Sundays. My closest friends at the time of this writing, ironically, are my "internet friends"..well, two of them..we're the little trio, and then our internet circle of friendship expands from there and we're all friends with each other but at the core, it's us. They're still here. Thank goodness.

they don't make landmarks out of ordinary places, only landscapes that have seen the most distress.

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 04:43:44 GMT

well, it's one in the morning, and i feel like making lists. if you don't like it, cut out.

i saw it on your keyboard, you saw it on my sleeve:
rachael bissex
david ford
john denver
regina spektor
rain perry
judy collins
bob dylan
the donnas
bob marley
simon & garfunkel
neil diamond
the veronicas
oh no! oh my!
the black keys
dolly parton
iron & wine
over the rhine
rum river blend
kate nash
boys like girls

thanks be to God for his indescribable gifts:
christian life center
august 23!!
jane austen book clubs
friends: something old, something new
freedom
nonconformity
your grace is enough for me.
wyso

i cannot be without you girl:
npr
youtube
puff the magic dragon
pandora.com
craigslist
punky brewster
mechanical pencils
whitaker!

where the devil did you go:
stalker boy?

with your feet on the ground and your head in the clouds:
ecclesiastes
isaiah
fahrenheit 451
lois lowry
uglies
mt anderson
nicaragua
newspapers

we are such stuff as dreams are made on:
bridge to terabithia
peter pan
tea parties

stream of consciousness:
cleaning my room
register for fall
gather phone numbers
cookout
the beatles for wednesday
orange cones for wednesday
portfolio
puff the magic dragon

mixtapes are an art form:
anger
power
my view of God
of politics/society/The Man
pottery
songs for the boy who doesn't exist
summer
songs for the road
one is silver, the other gold

quirkyalone:
asexuality
means never imitate the buddhist couple attached at the hip
this is the way i do things around here
don't expect a mrs.
or you'll get a punch in the jaw

it took a train to discover:
people are jerks
liars
but not everywhere
rebellion is a good thing
vegetarian recipes
happiness
peach, chai & green
coexist
she who runs in the forest
how to pray and curse like david

raise your hand if you're sick to death of:
primaries
john mccain
sexism
racism
denominations
the next great depression
eating meat
men

want a quilt? i dooooooo!

Wed, 19 Mar 2008 20:31:25 GMT

Enter to win THIS baby here. :]]

If you are chilly, here, take my sweater!

Tue, 18 Mar 2008 15:30:44 GMT

I love reading about and studying the lives of women, especially women who fall somewhere in the bold/brave/nonconformist/untraditional/feminist/heroic/intelligent/history-making/reforming/courageous/outrageous/uppity category. Currently, I’m almost finished reading Sisters: The Lives of America’s Suffragists, and it happens to be a fantastic book. It’s crammed full of facts/history/details but it’s no textbook; it’s an honest and friendly look at the lives of five important feminist leaders (Lucy Stone, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Frances Willard, and Alice Paul) in order to better understand them, the Cause, and America’s history. The whole time I’ve been reading Sisters, I’ve been subconsciously trying to pinpoint which one of them I most identify with. I’ve decided that’s not a possibility–there are things I like and things I don’t like, traits I admire and traits I wouldn’t adopt if my life depended on it…in each one of them.

Lucy Stone was a conservative radical, against divorce reform, and her competition with Anthony and Stanton was seen as petty and devisive. Yet she refused to marry until she met a man as pro-woman as she was herself (at their wedding, Henry Blackwell gave up all his legal “rights” to his wife, he worked alongside Lucy to secure freedom and equality for women, and publicly admitted that if he could, he would give Lucy the legal rights of husband and himself take the legal restrictions of wife and would rather “submit to the injustice than to submit you to it”); she kept her birth name; she raised her daughter to be strong and independent.

Susan B. Anthony was sometimes seen as harsh and devisive; she was an active lesbian; she refused to participate in anti-slavery and -racism projects (because they distracted from her main purpose, not for racist reasons). Yet she was a strong, bold leader and a fearless speaker; she fought single-mindedly and whole-heartedly for women as long as she lived. The many injustices and discriminations she experienced only strengthened her convictions that women deserved better.

Elizabeth Cady Stanton was anti-religion (for reasons I can definitely understand!); raised as an aristocrat, she held discriminatory, classist beliefs of superiority and supported “educated suffrage”. But she was also a firm advocate of divorce reform, protection for women and children from abusive and alcoholic husbands and fathers, coeducational education, and womens’ rights to control their own bodies. She believed in raising boys and girls as human beings and as equals and was a wonderful mother to seven children.

Frances Willard, also a lesbian, seems especially conservative and traditional. She never focused on feminism as her main cause; instead, she fought for women’s rights from a far more conservative vantage point: that of Temperance committees. She demanded the vote for women because the nation “needs a mother’s care”. While I would place myself in the more radical category, Willard’s unique position commands a lot of respect because it is unique. She was able to connect with the women the radicals failed to reach, the traditionalists, the submissive and devoted homemakers, wives, mothers, whose entire identity was wrapped up in the role thrust upon them by society–winning many of them to the cause of suffrage while she was at it. She appealed to the entire “Christian” nation as a conservative evangelical Christian standing up to the idea of male authority and female submission–a radical notion wearing a more traditional dress.

Alice Paul was a very private person and a very public feminist. No one knew much about her; she never talked about herself, her dreams, her disappointments, her life. Her public life is all we know her by. She was very small and delicate, proving feminists came in all kinds when men like Woodrow Wilson dismissed all suffragists as “aggressive and masculine with harsh voices”. She was a militant activist, chaining herself to objects, breaking windows, picketing. She was arrested several times; in jail, she went on hunger strikes and was forcefed. She was especially good at pestering Woodrow Wilson, who made excuses for his prejudice against women for years; it was Alice Paul who never gave up, never went away, and changed Wilson’s mind. She was raised to be a strong Quaker, committed to gender equality and to following her conscience.

Each of these women, their beliefs, their tactics, are very similar and very different. There are things about each one of them that I want to learn from and grow into, and things about each one of them that I’d rather avoid. Which makes them: normal people. And that only makes me like them better, as heroes and role models, as women and feminists I owe my own freedom to, and as human beings. I feel each one of them is a close friend of mine. :]

[blog entry from http://youngadultsindayton.wordpress.com.]

a year's travels::or, how far gulliver has come.

Wed, 05 Mar 2008 17:04:16 GMT

You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life. -Albert Camus

The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature. -Anne Frank

When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us. -Helen Keller

For everything there is a season,
And a time for every matter under heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die;
A time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal;
A time to break down, and a time to build up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
A time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
A time to embrace, And a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to seek, and a time to lose;
A time to keep, and a time to throw away;
A time to tear, and a time to sew;
A time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate,
A time for war, and a time for peace. [Ecclesiastes 3:1-8]

A very merry unbirthday to you (to me?) to you.

Wed, 16 Jan 2008 14:50:21 GMT

Well everyone.

My new shop is up and running: http://www.NoisyTarli.etsy.com. I currently have one print and some earrings listed and I'm working on more products..here's what's coming to NoisyTarli soon: clothes, plushies/softies/stuffed animals, pottery, bags and purses, more jewelry and artwork, and quite possibly a line of vintage goodies. :]

So go check it out and maybe sometime you'll find something you feel you must have. PS, if you know me personally, you get free shipping. Ahahahha.

You're oh, oh, oh like air.

Wed, 21 Nov 2007 15:45:53 GMT

I can't stop my breathing in. I'm weak and you are my medicine.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

So you know what?

My Japanese classmate/conversation partner (the point of this is that she gets to practice her English, which is incredibly good, but still her second language) who also happens to be a Jehovah's Witness is hardcore trying to proselytize me. She's whipped out her New World translation of the Bible (in Japanese and English), her "Bible Teach" book (translated to English from Japanese), and her latest Awake! magazine. Last week she caught me unprepared--I don't typically bring my Bible to school, as my bag's generally heavy enough--but for this morning I wrote down some references to share with her. (Out of MY Bible.) Some of them she's already been trained to deflect ("'His name will be called...Everlasting God, Almighty Father...' means that's what people would call Jesus, not what his real name would be") but some of them, either she was stumped or she couldn't figure out how to express herself in English. I think she wasn't expecting me to know my way around the Bible as much as I do. Ha.

I think we're both interested in this conversation but ultimately, I'm not listening to her and she's not listening to me. I know what I believe. She knows what she believes. And her Bible is the "improved" translation, so why should she listen to mine? If her version is improved, that makes mine defective and not trustworthy. I've been told all my life that nobody but nobody can beat a Jehovah's Witness at the Bible game--I'm reading some about history of the cult and it's incredible. It's like a conspiracy/anarchy/demolition crew/brainwashing element all rolled into one. Most likely, most of them don't know their religion's history from an outside, objective standpoint, only what they've been fed through The Watchtower. Like the "electrocution" and the prison guard/prisoner manipulation experiments you learn about in psychology. Like old war movies. The Manchurian Candidate.

At any rate, we've got about an hour and 15 minutes time so far debating the idea of the Trinity. We've got some free tea and muffins from the faculty in the conversing deal. We've got interest and respect and sharing and differences. It is what it is.

In other news:

I've thrown real live pots. On the wheel. Real live ones. Really. It's getting funner* now that I'm actually getting somewhere and making real progress from one class to the next.

Christmas is coming.

I'm making a pair of mermaid jeans. With seaweed and everything.

There's 2 weeks of class + 1 week of exams left. WHO'S READY FOR THAT? NOT ME. A, I've got about 8 weeks worth of work to do, I'm estimating, and B, I like school.

Christine's old! Hahahahhahha.

I constantly have to watch my back at Edison now, thanks to Tyler and JC, who have adopted as their lifelong mission the goal to scare the crap out of me at all times. Any means necessary (poking, pinching, stalking, sneaking up behind, tickling, dumping me out of my chair, etc) are apparently legal. Whatever. If they're allowed to gang up on me and physically attack me several times a day, then I'm allowed to fight back. Hahahha..

If I don't get my room completely cleaned by this weekend, we don't get a Christmas tree in our room. Guess whattttt? We're gonna have a tree. So my backed-up English homework gets pushed back another four days? Heck with it.

I bought my daddy a birthday present at the Salvation Army. I bought him the greatest hits double album of Peter Paul & Mary. lol Incluuuuding his favorite misheard song of all time (well, tied with "Guantanamera"): "If I Had a Hammer"! Not including "Puff the Magic Dragon". But that's okay--I'm gonna buy the book. :]

Yeah, that's basically it. Except a whopping thank you to Ryan who doesn't read this anyway for not calling me stupid when he calls me stupid. Haha.

CREDITS

Talia K as herself

The Conversation Partner
Mika F as herself

The Debate
Jesus Christ as himself

The Supporting Roles
Sergeant Raymond Shaw implied texture
Tea and muffins thank you

The Godsend
Electric wheel bless your heart

The Birthday Girlllll
Christine K as herself

The Wanna-Be Bullies, Haha
Tyler W as himself
Jordan C as himself

The Freaking English Teacher Who Makes Me So Very Angry & Disturbed
Becky A as herself

If I Had A Hamburger
My Father as himself
feat. Peter Paul & Mary

The Guy Who Amazingly Thinks of Women as People, Not Objects And Possessions
Ryan S as himself

Soundtrack available from Fueled By Ramen.
Copyright 2007.