De mest intense kys

« Mais après tout, certains disent que les plus belles histories d’amour sont celles qu’on n’a pas eu le temps de vivre. Peut-être alors les baisers qu’on ne reçoit pas sont aussi les plus intenses... »

 (Men når alt kommer til alt er der nogle, der siger, at de smukkeste kærlighedshistorier er de, man ikke har haft tiden til at udleve. Måske er altså de kys, man ikke modtager, også de mest intense...)


Det er ikke så tit at jeg lader mig rive med af skoleopgaver - eksamensopgaver i særlig grad - og sikkert af de samme grunde som så mange andre, der stadig er elever og langt fra at være studerende. Tvang er den værste form for motivation, der findes... Men det sker selvfølgelig at en bog viser sig at være overraskende spændende læsning, eller at et oplæg faktisk har relevans for ens hverdag. Det er også derfor jeg elsker psykologitimerne så højt - psykologi er det mest hverdagsnære fag, der findes i gymnasiet. Deri overgår det altså langt fysik og samfundsfag, sig, hvad du vil.

Jeg faldt særligt for det ovenstående uddrag fra en eksamensopgave på Fransk A fortsætter. Jeg vil ikke kommentere det nærmere nu; det kommer jeg alligevel til at skrive en stil om, og det er vist overarbejde at oversætte fire timers franskarbejde tilbage til dansk igen!
Ikke desto mindre synes jeg, det er et virkelig tankevækkende citat. Hvor ofte overgår fantasien ikke virkeligheden? Og hvor ofte bliver man ikke alligevel overrasket over, hvordan virkeligheden overgår hvad man kunne have forestillet sig?

Jeg føler at citatet taler sandt. Men jeg har voldsom lyst til at modsige det alligevel.

Det minder mig en lille smule om John Greens svar på et spørgende ord, han engang fik stillet til sin roman An Abundance of Katherines. Hovedpersonen siger: "You can love someone so much... But you can never love people as much as you can miss them." På sin blog forklarer John Green, hvorfor han selv er uenig i hovedpersonens udtalelse, og siger en masse andet interessant om romantisk kærlighed. Find indlægget her.

Nu vi er ved romantisk kærlighed, så er der Laura Marlings gamle sang... New Romantic. Den er ikke opmuntrende, men på en god måde.

Tekst efter Guillaume Musso, Que serais-je sans toi ?, Édition Pocket 2009.

On furrows and the perception of memories

Let's start off with a nicely rounded cliché: time does wash away your memories, or cleanse them at least.  I've had many discoveries in a single evening that's made me see this particularly clear for once.

A friend of mine has an entirely different remembrance of a night that was dearly important to me, and life-changing in many ways. Her memories are close to non-existent and I don't think it changed a thing for her. This is sad, I guess, because it could've meant a lot more to both of us if we could share a memory, while in other ways it makes sense... It really underlines the fact that we all perceive situations uniquely. Some people seem to be doing just fine till they suddenly fall apart and shatters on the floor, and it's a great surprise to everybody; and I've tried it the other way around too, being very sure my friend was deeply upset and on the verge of crying during a phone call, till I found out she was just calling her dentist to make a new appointment. Ha. Intuition is good but bad intuition happens all the time, too...

Another remark: What's important now will not be important tomorrow.
...Figuratively speaking, since my exam preperations were important today and most certainly are more important tomorrow...(!!)
Joke aside, the important things remain important but they don't remain the same things. I came to realize because I was chatting with my friend's little sister. She told me how a bunch of girls at her school was  creating drama and stuff, like girls do. And she got this furrow in her forehead, it was so clear how it bothered her a lot and she was in want of a solution.
A few hours later I was talking to her big sister about this party she didn't want to attend. My friend would really just like to stay put, watch a show on tv and avoid the necessary small talk with semi-strangers etc. The same furrow appeared! Her problem was very easily understood, too. Of course, turning down the invitation would be a bit rude (it was a birthday party and she was obviously invited by request from a friend), but on the other hand, she really didn't feel like going. And this she t returned to more than twice in our conversation, in need of a solution as well.

Furrows happen to all of us. I couldn't stop thinking that both of the girls' problems were really just small ripples on a greater stream; in half a year, they'll definitely have forgotten those problems. They're simply too small to save in your memory. Then how about in ten, or in twenty years? Imagine how many problems will have drowned in that great stream, how much we'll have forgotten by then? There's really no end to experiences nor to problems as such. I'm afraid in a few years I'll look back at my time in school and only remember a few things exact; the rest will be shadows. The rest will be this great mass of uncertainty, memories I'll make up again along the way, trying to make them fit into my own view of my time in school and so on. I might think back and think of myself as a quiet, tea-drinking girl cuddled in bed with a book and a blanket, or as the girl in the middle of all of the awesome friends she had, laughing and smiling her way through each class, or... well, I'm tired. I'm not up for a lot of great examples that differs from each other, haha. I just hope I'll look back in time with a view with as much nuance as I have now. Of course, I know it's impossible. The now and the tomorrow are too important to let us spend a lot of energy on memories past. I know that from looking back just one year, or two or five. Nuances disappears. Luckily, new ones keep on coming. I guess one could get used to that.

Follies

I have currently three follies in my life; they are all of the silly, but very explanatory kind. I realize now that there's really not much to say about 'em, except the fact that they're there and I enjoy it with a slight bemusement. Which is, by the way, a thing I've really come to like in myself -- the ability to accept a lot of things and feelings with interest and little judgement. Well, here they are.

1. Teacher crush (mostly in the figurative sense; as in, wanting the knowledge and abilities of the teacher.)
2. Young boy crush (he's three years my junior and let's not consider it a crush really, it's just, he's really nice to be around.)
3. School project crush (this is almost serious enough to avoid paranthesises... I really like my project. And it's entirely my thing. It's like being on the edge to solve something great without really being sure what I'm about to solve.)

That was it... it was silly to write it down really. It's just, since no one asks, I almost feel obliged to announce it anyway. ...Sounds rather pathetic! It's not, it's quite interesting actually, the need to write things or talk about things or draw attention to certain things, which I'm honestly quite sure I wouldn't like to discuss face to face with that many people. Or with none, I think. It's so easy to be judged... Sometimes I just want to be my own judge and accept things quietly and peacefully, and stop the antagonizing of those feelings that aren't really reasonable or responsible or entirely good. I don't think we're supposed to have that sort of control really; only we should be able to accept and 'cooperate' with our feelings and that'll be that.

My weekend

And now, a referate of my actual weekend!

Friday was the most busy day and physically exhausting... at least for a person as immobile as me. A few friends and me took part in a sort of conference, or inspirational meeting, where we had a few lectures at university from a bunch of various scientists and researchers. You know how things can be quite boring in the moment, but very interesting in retrospect? This was it.

We left at four in the afternoon to join our school prom. The evening was a fine one, not particularly special but I had my fun. And it was wonderful to wear such a dress. And to see everybody all dressed up. Actually I wish people had been a bit more serious and less..haha, slutty, but generally just a bit more grown up about their choices, but well. I guess we'll go there next year, when it's our last prom.

Saturday we returned to the city for a lecture on research in general, and the process you go through. This was probably the most intense day. It was heavy stuff! We discussed the means of "knowledge" and "academia", how to find a disharmony between theories or between theory and practice, and the importance of research even in the smallest areas. Learning about "the explorative process" was also extremely relevant and interesting.

I was most impressed by the theories of Nanoka and Andrew van der Ven. Also Sarah Sarasvathy. Oh, man. Our heads were stuffed with new information and by the end of the day, I was so (mentally) exhasted I just went home to lie on the sofa and do Math. Haha. I have a love/hate-relationship with Math. It's a wonderful thing when you're want something not to complex. The theories of mathematical proofs is sort of what we're supposed to transfer to every other research project in the future. I like that idea a lot. 

Yeah, I like Math. When it works.

Ha.

The following morning I wished it had been possible to sleep throughout Sunday, but now I'm quite happy I got up. We went to the Sakura festival, a traditional Japanese festival when the cherry trees blossom. The weather was so-so but at least it didn't rain, it wasn't too windy and there were lots of cute outfits and not so many sweaters. Lulu and I had yakiniku and had brought watermelon, strawberries, grapes and chocolate muffins which we had afterwards, then matcha icecream and green tea, and finally dorayaki... a lot of people joined our little blanket under the trees and we ended up being 10-12 persons of whom I knew maybe four. Fun times! I got to see old friends again and got to know a few people a lot better, which is always great. I love when an acquaintanceship turns into a friendship.

We ended the day with traditional bon-odori which was, of course, awesome as usual.

And I got home and realised I hadn't done any real schoolwork in three days though I'd been more than engaged in academic stuff, and I finished a Physics paper in two hours which is a new record, and then read 25 pages of Social science and History. Which took twice as long because I have awesome friends, but unfortunately they're very funny to be around. So it goes.

Luck

What a great weekend. Inspiring, instructive, and very social. I’m very happy.

I was about to write that I felt lucky, too, but I’m always a little in doubt when it comes to ‘luck’. I’d like to believe that it’s not just luck, but the actual me whom have brought myself into this position. (Pardon my weird grammar in that sentence).  I’d like to think that I’m doing something right, therefore I am surrounded by amazing friends, in the middle of a great education, and with enough spare time to dive into music, films and literature.

But then, when you put it like that, it sounds like I've been overly lucky. Doesn't it? It's almost too good to take the entire responsibility. Of course that's not what I'm trying to - I'm also surrounded by people whom have helped me throughout my entire life, my family, closest friends, even far-out acquaintances have given me opportunities that I'd never get on my own. And for that I am certainly very lucky and very grateful.

A new quote

I changed the quote in the blog's headline to E.M. Forster's quote on free writing. Or, at least I suppose that was what he was talking about, because I've only met it out of context.
It's such a smart little quote, I didn't like it at first - I'm still a bit doubtful. I used to be very impulsive with the things I said; I never gave it a second thought when I blurted out with something. Most probably because of that, I've always wanted to be one of those people who could really sit and think about their words before they said a thing. I once read that there are two kinds of people: the ones who think before they speak, and the ones two think while they speak (not necessarily afterwards). Obviously I'm in the last group. I find that I'm much better at expressing my thoughts when I'm allowed to play around with the words and arrange them differently until I end up with my 'final answer'. But I've always envied those who didn't need to talk for ages before they had an answer, those who could think about it quietly before they took a stand. On the other hand, I'm rarely afraid to dive into a discussion though I haven't made up my mind yet; it makes for a lot of interesting discussions because I don't have something to defend, and so I often switch side as the arguments go along. Ha, some people never realize that I'm just trying to find the better argument, I'm not being Ms. Opposite by default nor am I always as confused as I seem (although most of the time, I am...).
I guess everything has its pros and cons. The reason I disliked the quote was because it could encourage you to speak before you think, and that's not necessarily what we need are in need of. We're so many people doing that already. But I'll allow myself to speak before I think, for once. I think better when I write; in my mind, things easily flatten as I try to look at the complexities. I need the human responses to so many thoughts, thus, my friends are infinitely important in this area. Especially the ones who tend to disagree with me, though it's so easy to forget the importance of disagreement.

On a side note, I switched language. I'm sorry, I really meant for this to be a blog in Danish, but, you know. English has another sort of flow, and it soothes me greatly for this kind of free writing. Sometimes I think that I'm much worse in Danish because my mother tongue has infiltrated me so completely that I'm unable to differentiate the words. It's like there are too many options for each sentence, I find it hard to choose. In French, though, I have a lot of things I'd like to say and a very little vocabulary to do so. But English needs a certain focus yet contains so many more possibilities, not just grammatical ones.
Though English is one of my best subjects in school, I'm not a perfect speller (to prove this right, I just checked Wiktionary for this word and realized it wasn't 'spellar'...), nor a great grammar person. And I miss all of my Danish idioms, like "being a shark at something" and so on. One thing I'd reeeally like to incorporate more often is idioms. (But I am a huge language nerd though and I just gasped when realizing the beauty of 'incorporate's etymology. Corporate, corporatism, corpus, Latin word for 'body'. Nevermind!)

I've also just begun The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky and it's so great but it definitely impacts my style of writing, haha. But it has been a great inspiration to start writing at least something like this blog entry again. I really really like this book though it is very heart-wrenching and maybe even a little overdone at times, but it might just be because I've read so many old classics lately, Sense and Sensibility, Crime and Punishment (alright not that old), The Divine Comedy and of course the winner, The Aeneid. It's probably just because the topics of those books are very different from Perks'. Well, it's been a while since a book has made me read constantly out of sheer interest in the plot, and not because I wanted to finish it. (I just finished 1Q84 and I was very tired of it in the end; for me, it definitely didn't come close to other works of Murakami).
Anyways, I didn't really want to discuss the book now. I'll do that some other time maybe. It's been a pleasure to write again though, so make it a possibly maybe.

Talk to you soon, I hope; bye for now.

for meget

Jeg har understreget det hundrede gange over for mig selv og for venner i løbet af det sidste skoleår, men det bliver ved med at vende tilbage med ny vigtighed: lad være med at køre dig selv ned. Det er ikke (kun) fordi jeg er en tiny overachiever, at det er nødvendigt at understrege - også mange fra min klasse, der ellers ikke er særlig aktive, og som tager lektielæsning med et gran salt, taler med om stress. I 1.g var der pres på i starten, fordi ingen kendte hinanden eller sine lærere, men i 2.g er stresset hovedsageligt rent skolearbejde, større opgaver, afleveringer, fremlæggelser, et stigende fokus på årskarakterer og afsluttende karakterer. I 1.g var det træls at sidde med en opgave i fire timer og glo på sit uinspirerende blanke dokument - i 2.g føles det mere som at blive frataget hele ens frihed, når man hver dag i fem dage sidder med en af den slags opgaver.

Ikke at jeg savner 1.g. Åh gud, jeg savner overhoved ikke 1.g! :p

I sidste uge stressede jeg over 18 elevtimers afleveringer, men det lykkedes rent faktisk at lave alle og med rimeligt niveau. Det var fantastisk at slappe af en hel fredag aften uden at skæve til de sidste opgaver... Men i denne uge er der så terminsprøve i matematik, og for mit vedkommende, aflevering af projektbeskrivelse til Projekt Forskerspirer. Jeg har lavet en rimelig skarp prioritering mht. venner og børnepasning/arbejde, men jeg kan næsten ikke aflyse flere musiktimer, når der også er studietur, og eksamen senere på året, og pff... Det frustrerer mig at min rytmiske lærer ikke er mere forstående. Han argumenterer for, at jeg skal kunne vise noget mere end middelmådigt til musikskolens talentårsprøve, men han underviser altså ikke en elev fra mellemskolen; jeg er nødt til at prioritere, og dér skraber rytmisk musik altså bunden på listen. Undskyld, rytmikere.

Argh, det er bare den her uge... om en uge, om en uge vil vi sidde med solbriller i middagssolen og bestille frisklavet pasta og se på romerske bygningsværker. God ting i dag: vi har fået studietrøjer. <3
Nå ja, endnu en stressfaktor: Jeg mangler stadig 2½ kapitel af Æneiden! Som jeg skal fremlægge om, dagen efter vi er landet i Rom! Ergo skal jeg kunne genfortælle hele handlingen og have forberedt en fremlæggelse! Jeez. Det bliver lørdag, efter de andre deadlines.
Jeg har forbudt mig selv at læse mere i Æneiden om natten fordi jeg aldrig får sovet.

Bottom line: Fuck dig, gymnasium. I morgen bliver bedre.