when the world changes
I don't know what to think. A year ago today, I was looking forward to my student teaching at CHS, looking forward to graduating from college, and looking forward to starting a high school band director job. My grandmother and I would talk daily about teaching. My hardest decision was if my MM would be in conducting, educatio, or composition. I knew where I was and where I was going. That was a year ago.
Since then, my mentor is in Germany, my other mentor is now at another university. I haven't found a job, and am in fact about ready to give up and go back to school if I don't find anything soon. I have the name of a contact person who can help get me in touch with the right people if I want to pursue studies in the med school prerequisite classes (you don't have to be a pre-med major to go to med school, just have a high enough GPA in ten classes, a good MCAT score, and a bachelor's degree). Oh, and try as I might, I can no longer pick up the phone and call my grandmother whenever I want to as she passed on last month.
My life has changed completely. When I entered college, when I graduated college, I knew where I was going. But now, I no longer do. What happened?
For starters, I didn't plan right. I knew what I wanted educationally, but not professionally, and quite frankly, I still don't. I know I love teaching music, conducting, composing, and performing, but I also know that this is just the start of where I want to be professionally. I also know that, try as I might, I am getting no where in this job search. I've sent out over 50 resumes, and have only had one interview for a job I really didn't want as it went against everything I stood for in music education.
Second, I let the need to fulfill a goal get in the way of the need to change that goal to something else. Had I realized all this four years ago, I could have easily taken those ten classes in place of the second major I was pursuing.
Third/Final,life is changing so much, and it's gone so far away from what I originally planned for it to be; I guess you can never set the future in stone though. I guess taking an unexpected turn can be good, but at the same time, it is hard to abandon dreams that I still wish to fulfill. What do I really want to do? Teach music, conduct, compose, be able to treat/diagnose musicians with problems related to their professions. How do I do that though? I would need a DMA as well as an MD. I'd be in debt forever.
Reservations about No Reservations
I have to stop watching travel shows. I do not have the money yet to go to the places I see depicted on the Travel Channel, such as, oh, Indonesia. I want to go there, experience it, and part of me wants to indulge in the culture. I've already fallen in love with the region, long before I really saw anything about it ever. I bought a bamboo windchime in college at an import store, made in Indonesia. Fell in love with it. Are you asking about the Noah Bell? That's from India. Both are places I now want to go to, even for a summer. So tonight, while watching Anthony Bourdain on television in a little cabin on a lake, the cameraman showed a set of windchimes. The same windchimes I am holding in my hand right now (or will be when I'm done typing this sentence).
But alas, I cannot go there yet. I know I've always been a person to ask someone else, "Why are you making excuses?" but this is an instance where I need to do so. I do not have the money to go there yet. So, why am I instead downloading music from Indonesia and India on iTunes? Because right now it's the closest I'll get to those countries.
~~~~~
Okay, I knew those hooks in my ceiling from a lamp when I was a kid would come in handy - one is holding the Indonesian bamboo windchimes while the other is holding the Noah Bell. I just have to be careful how I move in this room while writing and composing as any small movement will start a cacophony of bells. Beautiful.
~~~~~
If you are wondering where Indonesia is, it is a chain of islands north-west of Australia, between the Pacific and Indian Oceans. It is in the same neck of the woods as Borneo (remember Survivor?) and Papua New Guiana (Going Tribal on Travel Channel).
~~~~~
So why am I so enamored with the music of Indonesia? Other than I have fallen in love with it? There is so much of it, so many varieties of cultures. Search for the term "Music of Indonesia" in iTunes and you will get back 150 results, with even more results if you click on individual albums, all catalogued and published by The Smithsonian Institute. I don't know where to begin on downloads, and am afraid that I will miss something. I know that I can come back to it at any point, but I want it all now. I love it.
My heart is at home, but my spirit wanders the world!
Just got done watching Anothony Bourdain's
No Reservations on the Travel Channel, and I have to say that I am once again struck by the beauty and simplicity of a foreign culture (is the word "foreign" easier to spell in another language? What about "language?"). He had a travel guide this time from his office in New York, and she was my age about, so he ended up doing a lot of the things she wanted to do: party, play in arcades, karaoke (he didn't sing though - or at least they didn't show it). They showed a kimchi factory. Beautiful. That mixed with some crab and some raman noodles, and add some onion and celery too, and you have a meal. Love the stuff, but don't think I'll be making it anytime soon - I don't trust my cooking that much (and I've seen my relatives try sauer kraut - same method/basic principle, slightly different culture/ingredients).
Kimchi Recipe (if you dare!) from
http://www.davidtinney.net/korean-kimchi-recipe.html. There are many varieties, and if in doubt, just go to your nearest oriental grocer.
Kimchi Recipe:
2 Chinese cabbages
5-10 spring onions
Sea salt or other non-iodized salt, at least 100 g
4 heaped tablespoons (about 20 g) Korean chili powder
2-3 cloves garlic, crushed
2 tablespoonfuls sugar, any kind
Tablespoonful kim chi sauce
Small piece of ginger (5 g), crushed, or teaspoonful powdered ginger
Half an onion (optional)
Method:
Rinse the cabbages, then quarter them lengthwise, discard the stems, and then chop the cabbages laterally, which should leave you with the largest pieces measuring perhaps 5 cm on a side. Don't get too carried away while doing this.
Now that we have lots of little bits of cabbage, it's time to salt them. Place the cabbage in a clean plastic bag or equivalent and sprinkle salt over each layer. The best kind of salt is sea salt, although non-iodized table salt will do. This will create a brine solution with the cabbage juice.
To ensure the cabbage is properly salted, sprinkle salt onto your wet hands, then rub it into the cabbage pieces. Press the leaves in your hand to squeeze as much water out of them as possible. Once finished, tie up the bag and set it aside for 5-6 hours. Check it after three hours to ensure that everything is all right, stirring the mixture if necessary.
Take the cabbage out of the salt solution and rinse it if necessary. It should be a lot softer than it was. Again, remove surplus water. Place cabbage in a sealable plastic box. Add the spring onions, chopped into small pieces. Crush the garlic and ginger in a press and mix in. You may also add half an onion, finely diced, if you wish.
It is also recommended to add kim chi sauce. This is the only ingredient that you can't always buy at a non-Korean supermarket. There are several different kinds, many of which contain fish or other seafood such as oysters. You only need one tablespoonful.
Add the chili powder. It is possible to use other kinds of chili powder; if you use hot chili powder, you should reduce the amount. Add two tablespoonfuls of sugar.
Mash the chili powder into the leaves as you did in much the same way with the salt. If the color doesn't seem dark enough, add more chili powder. It's a good idea to wear gloves while doing this.
Put the containers aside for three days.
Finally the kimchi is ready. It should be soft in consistency, but not too mushy, with a little crunchiness left in the larger pieces. You can eat it as is, or use it in your favorite Korean recipes and it makes a great stir fry, too.
Writing Blog
For all those interested, I've created a writing blog to post drafts of things I've written or I am writing. In some cases, these are just exercises or ramblings, in other cases they are chapters part of larger works. Some are non-fiction, some are fiction, some are even fan-fic (
only so I can write something quickly to practice).
Please feel free to read through it (and comment on the writing!):
http://arizonamyrie3.blogspot.com/
How did I go in this direction?
It's been awhile since I've updated, and my hands are already tired from typing the last several days, and scribbling with a pencil when I've been away from my computer. Still teaching at DMS - won't change that part of my life if I can help it. I love it there. Showed our guitar instructor Finale today, and he's hooked.
Finished subbing a long time ago, and found myself with extra time on my hands. So, I wrote several outlines for small stories that will probably never go anywhere. Then, I started editing a story about a necklace - it's more interesting if you know more, maybe I'll post part of it here. Then, I thought of additional characters for that short story, and what was once a ten page story is now thirty pages and three chapters long. I've outlined the general plot of where I want to go with the story, and I just want to keep working. I love boredom! Now, it's one-thirty in the morning and I know I should get sleep, but my mind keeps weaving the story on me. I love it. I know I need to sleep, but thankfully, my family knows that when the creative bug hits, it keeps me awake all night long (I lose the rhythm once I stop - I guess I'll lose it when I go back).
It's the same feeling I felt from composing, only less work and instant gratification when I go back and read the work I've done. Need to stop though or I will lose the feeling in my hands from too much typing!
culture shock
Well, it's been awhile since an actual post, and the long-term sub position has come and gone. In the meantime, I've become addicted to Travel Channel and the Documentary Channel on sattelite - more specifically shows that force you to become part of another culture, even if momentarily. Like, I found a clip of Anthony Bourdain on Travel Channel where he is in Indonesia and is obviously about to snark on something, when, there is suddenly the Islamic call to prayer from a nearby Mosque. All of a sudden, another Mosque starts with its call, and soon, AB is telling us how he is hearing five separate calls at once. I love the sound of the call to prayer - it reminds me of Saturdays in college when I would go to the import stores and linger with the other students there listening to NPR and talking politics, culture, and anything else intellectual. I joined the Comparative Religions group that way. Whenever I hear the call to prayer on TV or anywhere else (where else would I hear it in my life in this country right now?) I can smell the incense and feel the quiet reverence for another culture - one that is not my own and will never be as I am an American.
I went on iTunes just now and searched the term "Call to Prayer" and had country, rock, and even jazz music come up. I have some world music on there, from Iran and India, yet I know that none of it comes close to what I want to hear - the actual call itself.
Listening to the thirty-second snippets online of what "Americans" (I use the term as a stereotype for this sentence) assume to be a "call to prayer" brings me into perspective on what our culture is, but I cannot define it with mere words. Everything on there that I listened to originated with a musician in the US. Nothing showed the reverence and mystery of another culture at all (with a small exception to Wynton Marsalis whose clip I almost bought).
Hearing the call to prayer seems to remind me, beyond the Saturdays in college, of the fact that I am not right now part of something bigger. I feel isolated in our capitalist culture at the moment, isolated from free mystery and free piety. I feel isolated from freedom from propoganda and advertisement. We're never really free from any of that in this world, but still, I want to know what it would be like to wake up early in the morning to have to take care of my family while my husband tended the fields. I want to know what other peoples' lives are like in foreign (eg: not USA) cultures. Watching these "adventure" shows gives me a glimpse.
Another thing - the travel shows in general. Most of the shows that I've seen show an American as a tourist, looking for that little treasure to take back to show their neighbors in the rural or suburban US. That little snow globe in the mouse trap or something (another AB ad here). So much of our middle class US culture is about getting those treasures to show off to our peers. But, what if it was different? What if we traveled for the sake of learning about another culture? True, go to England on a US tour-group tour and you see the culture. But, you eat at McDonalds, sleep at a Hilton, and watch CBS and CNN on TV (oh, and travel on a Greyhound bus). Travel is different. You give control of your life over to the people that live where you are visiting. You trust them to take you in and keep you safe. They trust you to follow their lead. And it is all good. I want that. I want the adventure of meeting a stranger who will guide me into their culture. Show me what it is like to be an outsider to the US looking in and see what I've been missing all these years. Give me a life lesson that I will be humbled by and learn from.
We're all part of something bigger. Right now it's 11:47 in my time zone. Everyone else in my family has gone to sleep except for me - this probably includes my cousins in other time zones as well (except those in Las Vegas). The "world" around me is assuming that it is night and everyone is going to bed. However, a mile from here, the night shift workers are less than one hour into their shift. A country away from here, it is thirty degrees warmer/cooler (depending which direction you travel). Across the globe, a woman is preparing rice for a noon meal for her children. Somewhere else, a young boy looks up at the sky while tending to a field. Somewhere else, an elderly man holds the hand of his dying wife with his children looking on. This is life at its most basic levels of survival, and I want to take part in that.
There is a give and take in life however. Would I give up my nice comfortable bed? Not easily. Change my diet to suddenly eat red meat again? I'd rather go to India and blend in with the Hindi. Eat a raw seal? I already eat raw tuna. I call that sushi! I eat wasabi too. It's my preferable condiment, along with soy sauce. At the end of the day, even if it's the worst day of my life, would I give up the creature comforts I've grown accustomed to in the US? Maybe not, but I wouldn't know until I've tried.
I'm ready to try something new. I've been ready since I knew that I finished college. For so long I've lived by the ideals I and my relatives have created for me, and never really got the chance to see who I really am. Now, I'm discovering a new side to me. I'm discovering that adventure really does exist outside of movies - you just have to allow yourself to give control of your life momentarily over to someone completely different from you. Allow yourself to immerse into something new. That's an adventure.
Now to find that call to prayer...
Testing, Testing, One, Two...
Yes, so this is just a cheesy post so I can try to do something else somewhere else. Hopefully my lack of knowledge of this will work!
for the TWoP Pixel Challenge #224 - Celebrity Cooking Challenge - two of the snarkiest shows on television!
Jury Duty Update
It's the last week in March of 2006 and I have yet to recieve a jury summons. I am in the clear!
