Photo from:
http://imgfave.com/view/161502

Fox Books and Cafe: Dream or Possible Reality??

Remember how I have been thinking of late where my life might lead and what it is I might do with my life. I want it to be something that I enjoy, something I excel at, and something that I am passionate about. Yes, the big cahoona of dreams is to be a photojournalist for National Geographic Magazine, but I also have this dream where I own a small Bookshop/Cafe. Something intimate and cozy, perhaps in New York City or Chicago or Boston, definitely NOT Miami. I'd have a small kitchen and I'd hire a chef, specializing in soups, desserts and pastries, breakfast foods, etc. I'd order books: popular fiction and non-fiction, local writer's works, poetry, old books, little novellas, travels guides, etc. I could hold Open Mic Nights and have book signings. There would be bookshelves all over the place and small tables, couches and wi-fi. Maybe I could have a  used books section, and donors can get discounts on their next purchase. There is so much that you can do if you own your own little business and everyone loves a little cafe where you can read, work and where social events sometimes take place. And this dream is very much so a possibility. All that I'd need to do is learn a little bit of business management, how to do taxes for a business, figure out salaries and paying bills and how to order merchandise for the shop, get a loan to buy a facility and all the necessities to set it up and advertising. I mean yes it is a lot but it sounds like a possibility and a very doable thing. Something I'd find a challenge, but something I can take pride in. Combining two of my passions: food and books. And if it hits off, either because it is well advertised or because I find the right venue with the right clientele, then perhaps it is something I can also be successful at. It's just a dream, only a possibility right now, but maybe one day it will be a reality and people will walk by and into The Fox Shop... or Fox Books and Cafe... or Little House on the Lane/Avenue/Road/Street/whatever... I don't know the name yet. That's going to be important though. Many people walk into most shops just because they are intrigued by their name or because, based on the name, they figure they can find what they are looking for there. But I have time to find a name yet. I still have to see if this is the final dream. If this is what I really want to do. And then if I decide to go through with it, then I still have to be educated in the business world, and build a good credit so I can move and make that loan. It seems very possible though... So keep your eyes out wherever you are. There just mat be a new venue coming to your town in a couple years.

Just so my future husband knows, if he exists and truly wants to make me happy, i wish to be married in cavendish, prince edward island, canada :)

Ranting and Raving, Depression, and PMS

Sometimes I get a little down about life and I start to worry that maybe everything isn't going to work out all right and that I'll be struggling for the rest of my life for goals that will never be accomplished, that I'm just not capable of and I know it is ridiculous to think that way since I am only 17 and have my whole life ahead of me as I know it, but it just seems so likely that I'm going to fail. I'm going to be a loser, a failure, one of those people that I just can't stand, that had so much potential and did nothing with their lives... Despite how hard I've worked for my grades my whole life and my pretty spectacular GPA, I haven't been accepted to the school I wanted to go to so am instead attending a community college, I can't seem to get a job anywhere even with all the people I supposedly know that can "hook it up" for me, if I don't have a job that means I can't move out, and since I can't get into the college I want, my career will have to start later than I wanted if it ever happens at all with the way this black cloud is following me around. I know this is a rant, probably hormonally based and that you probably want to slap me right now. But i just really need to scream right now.

Gaia

I've started reading this book that was written in the 90s by Isaac Asimov and Fredrik Pohl called Our Angry Earth. In it they talk about this concept created by a scientist called Lovelock called "Gaia" named after the ancient goddess of the Earth (in other words, Mother Earth). Basically what Lovelock is talking about is that the every organism on the Earth is connected and depends on one another and the organism of the Earth is alive and constantly adapting and working at homeostasis to keep everything at a certain level so that everything can survive.

Many scientists rebuked Lovelock's Gaia concept because it seemed too spiritual, too supernatural, but I personally believe that it answers a lot of questions concerning religion, higher beings, and science and how they are all interconnected. The concept of Gaia could be considered a religion in the way that I see it because you have this "Mother Earth" and a belief in what her purpose is it gives all life a purpose and a purpose to natural events like storms and earthquakes, temperature changes, etc. But it is not a spiritual thing like most people are used to religion being. A belief in Gaia is more an understanding of how the Earth works and why it works the way it does (the reason for creating religion and higher beings in the first place).

I think the concept of Gaia is very efficient in answering many questions like our existence and our future. It fills in the gaps science can not explain, yet makes something spiritual slightly more factual as well. In one of the chapter in Our Angry Earth, Assimov and Pohl mention that the Earth had no oxygen at one point until plants through natural processes, expelled it into the atmosphere, making it habitable for humans and other living organisms that cannot survive without oxygen that serve the Earth in many diverse ways. This is the science portion of our creation. The real question is: Why? The concept of Gaia gives you a somewhat reasonable spiritual meaning behind this. Gaia knows what it needs to thrive and therefore makes sure that it get what it needs, in this case through the plant life living on Earth originally.

The concept of Gaia also mentions that Gaia will do whatever it needs to protect itself: even destroy humankind if need be. However, Gaia works though natural processes. By the time, it killed off the human race, we would have destroyed and depleted the planet so much it might be irreparable. However, if it is true that Gaia was able to return the world to normal after Ice Ages, meteors, and other things that have nearly destroyed the Earth, I think it could be true also that Gaia could repair the Earth as long as homo sapiens sapiens are not able to destroy it.

A lot is said about how a nuclear war would be bad for the environment because it could cause a nuclear winter that could wipe out, not only the human race, but other living organisms as well: animals, plants, etc. However, if the concept of Gaia holds true, wouldn't Gaia fix itself during a nuclear winter, the same way it did with the meteor that killed off the dinosaurs and the Ice Age and everything else? Couldn't it just go back to normal, or at least Life back on its feet? The only difference I can see is that the human race would be wiped out by their own hands and not be around to mess it up a second time. Well, Gaia would have found a way to balance everything out in the end I guess.

The book says there is no way to stop the destruction we have caused to our planet and that is true. It is also true that government action in the environmental issues would make the process of stopping the destruction
much easier, but I think there is plenty you can do as an individual to stop the continuation of the Earth's destruction.

If everyone believes that they are the only person trying there is bound to be another person thinking the same thing, maybe everyone thinking the same thing. So if everyone played the same role in trying to protect our environment, perhaps it would be a worldwide thing. It's impossible to believe that this could actually happen, but it's pointless to think that you shouldn't do anything about it yourself.

We can start by not using any products that contain chlorofluorocarbons. By recycling instead of just throwing everything away. By walking to school or to the dollar store or pharmacy, etc. By not littering, anywhere: on the street, at the beach, in the park, in our neighborhoods. By planting trees and plants that have been seriously depleted by deforestation. And in America we have even more opportunities to protect our environment because we can take an active role in our government. Here we can survey people, we can petition for laws, we can vote for our own legislation. We can take an active role in Gaia, by making it an importance in our daily lives.

If everyone made the environmental issue a priority, even if no one else necessarily knew about it, wouldn't it eventually start to make a difference?

When Life Gives You Lemons...

This past Saturday, my mom and I were driving through my aunts neighborhood when we passed  by this little kid standing outside his front lawn with a table that was practically bigger than he was. We noticed that it was a lemonade stand. You always see little kids selling lemonade and cookies outside their houses in movies, but, that I can remember, I have never seen this in real life. We thought this was the quaintest, most adorable thing in the world so we pulled up beside the house to get out and see it. The little boy was named Michael and he couldn't have been older than 6 years old. His mother had baked muffins and made lemonade for him and his brother to sell. I bought some pink lemonade from Michael and he had a hard time lifting the jug of lemonade but he did it all by himself and asked me to tell him how much I wanted for my dime. His brother who I think was around the same age as him sold my mom a little itty bitty muffin with cranberries. She was just going to eat it right there, but he said, "If you buy a muffin it has to go in the bag," in the cutest little "this is the way it is and that's not going to change whether or not it makes sense" voice of his. So my mom said OK and thank you very much and she expected the muffin was going to be delicious and we said goodbye to the two little entrepeneurs and laughed and smiled about the experience all the way to the mall. The moment still makes me smile when I think about it. It's just one of those Hallmark moments you never will forget and I think I will probably smile about it 10 years from now. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade, and that's just what Michael and his brother did. They sold me and my mom life for ten cents apiece.

The Picture of Dorian Gray

I am currently reading the book The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde for my AP Lit class. At first I had thought that it was going to be boring and depressing, despite it's interesting plot, but I have been interested since page one! The Picture of Dorian Gray is about a guy (named Dorian Gray, duh!) who is beautiful and somewhat vain and terrified of losing his beauty as he grows old. So he sells his soul so that instead of aging himself, a portrait of himself that he keeps hidden away ages and grows older and more hideous year by year. The novel explores a lot of different ideas like aestheticism and hedonism as well an underlying homosexuality (Oscar Wilde was imprisoned and charged for homosexual acts and had to feel to America). I've read plays by Oscar Wilde before and this is his only novel and as of right now I am completely thrilled with it. I think what I like most about it is the tone. The way Wilde words things is that the imagery is very beautiful and serene however there is a kind of creepiness and darkness behind it all. As if everything were not really as it it seems. Although this is required reading for school, I really do think this book is very intriguing, well-written and a good read overall.

Total and Absolute Craziness!!!!

So today had to be one of the craziest, most pee-inducing, most traumatic days of my entire life. Maybe I'm being a little melodramatic, but at the time, and at this moment, as I think of it and the crazy consequences that can be a by-product of it, this statement seems totally valid...

Today me and my friends played hooky from school since it was an FCAT day and, being seniors, we would have been wasting our time there. So we all went over to our friend Kevin's house. My friend Melissa gave me directions, but Kevin lives in a gated community and for some ridiculous reason that I still can not fathom but will soon be remedied, he does not have access to open the gates, so Melissa tells me to park where the exit is. I figure if I park far enough forward the people that want to exit can get out through the entrance so I do as she says.

Well, we've been hanging out at his house for a little while when our friend Sammy says she needs a ride somewhere and I offer to take her.  As we are getting to the gates we see this red truck pull around and start taking my liscence plate number and we freak out! He asks us if the car is ours and like idiots we lie and say no hoping he will drive away and we can move the car without him noticing. However, he is not moving! He starts taking down every little information he can about the car so me and Sammy and our friend Danielle start freaking out and call Kevin to come move the car.

Kevin comes rushing and says he is sorry. But this other guy came and tells us that he needs our insurance information and the registration because apparently a buddy of his was trying to get out of the neighborhood and found he couldn't get out of the exit because my car was parked there. Trying to get around it he backed up right into the the spikes that keep people from entering through the exit and popped his tires. He drove to the Publix and was waiting to get picked up.

We ask him how much the damage is, that we'll pay for it. To please not involve the insurance companies. So after this whole huge discussion and lecture we give him my name and my number and Kevin's name since he says he is the one driving the car and we all get in the car and get the hell out! Apparently the guy was going to call the tow truck and we owe the guy who popped his tires about $200.

So we decide, after we drop Sammy off, that maybe it isn't a good idea to park in the entrance to Kevin's complex so he calls up his friend and asks if we can park in her driveway. She gives us her permission but her house is on a corner near a school so there is this patrol guy who gives us a hard time about it until he realizes that we got permission from the owners to park there.

So we can finally walk back to Kevin's house, where the rest of our group is all wondering what the hell just happened. We aren't there for very long when Sammy calls to get picked up and we go to get her. But when we get back to Kevin's friend's house to park the car again, the elementary school has just let out and this idiot woman has parked right in front of the parking space and we ask her to move and she gives the hardest time about it! So we try to go around her and this idiot is driving on the wrong side of the road so we can't.

So here we are blocking traffic because of these ridiculous parents who never learned the rules of the road and Melissa is just getting really pissed off, because we are all doing the right thing and yet we are getting blamed for what is going on and getting honked at and the patrol guy is yelling at us and she gets out of the car and basically directs traffic herself!

Finally we are getting able to get into our spot after busting such a mission and the patrol guy gives us a hard time again, but we convince him that it is us again...

So yeah, those people with the popped tires have yet to call me, but until then I'm shitting my pants.

My Musical Odyssey

So a little while I did another piece in my personal art project. This piece is more of a text based collage. I really liked writing my words in the shape of a G-Clef. I used crayon, acrylic paint, and permanent marker.