Blue Sharpies and Diamonds

Dear Simone–

My early morning escapades made me sleep in until 1:00 pm today, which is actually the latest I think I've slept in in my entire life with only one exception (4:25 pm on the day of the Preakness, three years ago, when I was only woken up because my family wanted to make sure I could get in on the betting as to which horse would win and watch the race with them). Oops. Really I hate being asleep past 10–I feel like my whole day has been wasted if it takes me that long to wake up. Sitting in bed awake doesn't count though. :)

What did I do today? Well, I did Duncan's laundry with him (I did most of the folding), then we played the new game of DDR that Duncan just bought cheaply for a while (I'm in the 3-4 out of 10 range of difficulty right now, but most of my friends are total beasts at the game), then we smashed for a shorter while (I play Lucas with passable skill, but again, most of my friends totally rock that game) and then we went out with Patrick, Ben, and George to throw a few frisbees around for an hour or so. Ben broke out his guitar for a while upon our return (the boy is a fantastic musician), but I had to go home and eat lima beans so that I wouldn't feel so bad about the hush puppies and milkshake that I got when Duncan, Ben, and Maggie (Duncan's girlfriend, who is pretty cool) and I made a run to Cookout in Durham (a 20-minute-ish drive which we spent listening to dance remixes and playing strip Padiddle). After going home and having a mini me-time-style dance party in my room for an hour or so, I went on a few really ridiculous and amazing adventures with Ben and Duncan (which I would love to tell you about over the phone or face-to-face, but care for a certain community of wonderful people prevents me from divulging on the internet). The three of us then returned to Duncan's room, debated setting up a tent in one of the lounges, and then just ended up dividing Duncan's pillow and blankets among us to have a sleepover.

Let me tell you about one of my art projects. So I mentioned in the previous post that I had an art project which I got to show off to Christian, right? Basically, I've created an alter ego for myself, a lovely gal who totes around a blue sharpie and leaves messages on printer paper duct-taped around campus. Blue is a wonderful excuse to go rambling on and around campus at 2-3 in the morning. I've done two releases of messages. Examples of messages? "Home alone is baking, bouncing around to loud music, pretending I can play the guitar, being naked," "What have you done to make today memorable?" "I have always looked up to her," "I kind of love snails," "I love perching here," "I asked a girl out once. She said yes. Nothing came of it," "I cry when I see something that strikes me as beautiful," "I am NOT my major, nor my lack thereof," When a boy, he sat in a tree, eating ravioli from a bucket <3,"I still struggle with an eating disorder," "Do you ever just want to drop everything and run?" "First kiss: in the woods. He was never more than a crush to me. That is okay," and many many many more. All of them are true statements and views, directly pulled from my personal life. I've written several hundred and released only about half of them across campus. I made myself a fake email address (through which I've made this blog, actually), girl.with.the.blue.sharpie@gmail.com, which I posted up with a request for human contact by one the dining halls on campus. Six people emailed me before the post got taken down, and three of them have actually stayed in fairly consistent contact (Michael, Finch, and Heather) despite the fact that I'm a stranger to them (they only know me as Blue). We've been in correspondence for going on three weeks, and I've proposed to them that we go chalking across campus one night and actually meet. Duncan started a small campaign of responses, though his are written in green sharpie and all capital letters (in contrast to my blue sharpie, all lower case), though his postings have been fairly small in scale so far. A few more neat things surrounding the project:

There is an arbor along one of the less-traveled avenues between academic buildings, and I had tucked a message up in an obscure place in one of those frames. Someone moved it. It is now much more visible on a brick wall beneath the same arbor. It says: "The world is a surreal and absurd place. I love it." Someone out there totally gets the message, and that person is the same one who moved that message to a visible spot.

I put a message in my favorite place on campus, that fourth-story walkway I mentioned in the previous post. It said: "(this is my secret, favorite place on campus)." Over the course of the three-ish weeks since I put it up, people have written responses on it. This is very exciting for me. They go like this, in order of appearance: "Not secret anymore, because it is also my favorite place on campus," "Me too," "Me three," "Totally my favorite spot!" and "This is awesome!" I love the human race for things like this. There are mud prints of shoe treads from where people have stepped on it, wind has curled the corners, and rain has beaten the enduring paper. I actually took this one down. It has become a treasure, and though I think destruction is gorgeous (especially of things that I make), I was moved to save this piece of wonderment, as a reminder of how marvelous the world can be. And here it is:

So. That's all I have to say about that for now. I'll definitely let you know when I work on this project again though. ;)

LINKS OF THE DAY:

Marina and the Diamonds, the original artist of the dance remix that appeared earlier in the post. She's really great, but has yet to tour outside of the UK. I love the richness of her voice. Some of my favorites by her include this song, this song, this song, this song and this song. Cool fact: the "Diamonds" in the artist name refer to Marina's fans. You could be one of us.

Magically done.

So long, boredom. A blog that updates many times a day.

A lovely little flick for the would-be traveler.

Something my sister gave me via fBook. Um?

If there is anything you want more of or less of on the blog, please please please don't be afraid to ask.

Things to look forward to: snails and bivalvia! non-romance! antique water bottles! and so much more. :)

Adorably (I hope) and certainly adoringly,
moi