work work work
all work and no play makes Lana a not-so-happy gal. give me a call peeps...i'm beginning to forget what some of your voices sound like. seriously! on another note, internet should be back soon, like wednesday.
p.s. worked on my song last night, nick (it's totally different from the original post)......kinda kewl i guess
posted by De'La @ 5/29/2005 09:43:00 AM
2 Musings
so yeh, i've been listening to lots of dinah washington and etta james lately. expanding my musical influences.
internet is down until June one. can only access from the library. blah. so yeh...don't look for many updates until then.
charleston's great, and wonderful, meeting so many new and exciting people. can't wait to hang out....
the poetry scene is wonderful as well, inspiring me to write write write
the people are wonderful. makes me want to love them all
posted by De'La @ 5/26/2005 11:23:00 AM
2 Musings
The water’s fine
Daddy, I saw some little brown kids
at the fountain, Waterfront Park. I remember
you showing me from the window of the car
all those times we went down to Charleston
to see where you grew up, but you would
never let me play in the water, you said They
didn’t allow brown kids to soil the water the
children baptized their innocence in; you always
had to watch.
Daddy, it’s okay now, I saw this little brown
girl today playing in the water. She’s about
as black as me, so I know that if you had just
let me get my feet wet no one woulda cared.
Promise. But daddy she was alone, kinda like
how I would have been. No one splashed water
in her face, or laughed with her.
It was a Sunday afternoon just like when you
wanted to play but Grandma would never
let you, remember daddy? You were my age
then. I bet the water would have felt wondrous
against our skin if we could just play for a moment.
Daddy, I thought you taught me that they said
segregation was bad now? I know they wouldn’t
let you then, but I’m sure no one would care
if I just went in and played in the water
for just a bit.
If it were me daddy, like that little brown girl there
I would have asked you to join me – contaminate
those waters with our chocolate skin, make them
taste our sweetness and see that it was all right.
I wouldn’t want you to watch from the sideline,
keep guard. Let it down. Come play.
Daddy, I think the water’s fine now.
posted by De'La @ 5/22/2005 04:44:00 PM
0 Musings
i was trying to get this kid's face. what a wonderful picture 
posted by De'La @ 5/22/2005 03:30:00 PM
0 Musings
don't you take your time young man, keep on driftin', aint no tell where you'll land...ebadu
sometimes i dont feel like time is wasting. i know that it's passing, and that it cannot be regained, but somehow, even though at times i think it's passing too slow for my pace, i would never change a thing about it - i think God gave us 24 hours for a reason, and we have to enjoy yet make the most of what we have.
i dunno, i'm just rambling, as usual. I hate that with the onset of jobs, times equals money, and there for we put a value to each second. we wonder, can we just sit back and enjoy the greatness that is before us, or could we be doing something more "worth our time". i know that God's got all of the financial situations worked out here, I'm not worried about that anymore. I realized I may be making up the money that i had to pay at UNC to simply live here in Charleston, which i'm beginning to not feel so bitter about (basically, it's going to cost me the same). I just have to stop advertising my reasoning for transferring as "it cost too much" when in reality, it was because God no longer needed me there...i no longer belonged up there. This life i'm living is not for me, but I was trying to live Chapel Hill for me...and you see how far that got me, eh?
Not to mention all of these creative spirits around me. Beats chapel hill by a billion. I think these experiences will already make up the few experiences in Chapel Hill, i hope i can take all of this to my advantage and make the most of my time here (if i must put a value on it, it definitely is "worth my time"), serving and being creative, writing, and playing Olive...loving up on God and just the people around me. Yep, that will make for a very happy and full Lana.
posted by De'La @ 5/21/2005 08:35:00 AM
1 Musings
so today i was a bum around the house for a bit. for some reason, i woke up before my alarm clock went off. i've discovered that's a much more peaceful entrance into the awake state. less hectic, less of an ordeal about i-wanna-sleep-for-just-a-lil-longer.
i ate breakfast, fixed lunch (yummy potatoes...mmmm) then finally decided it was time to head out of the house so i walked to Gap to pick up my schedule. 15 min flat. and then i walked down to the post office to check my PO box and stuff. then i decided to venture on further past Broad to the battery. i sat down there and started this pouch/wallet thing stayed there for about an hour, then came on back.....30 min straight shot to my place. but it seems a pretty cool route for jogging. maybe my goal for tomorrow.
tomorrow nick wants to see Millions. seems like a kewl movie. I'm up for it. Weather bug says scattered showers. boo. i really have got to get to a beach bfore i die down here. wish my toes to play hide and seek with the sands....legs brushed by the ocean's waves....
okay, gone to go find something more productive to do
posted by De'La @ 5/19/2005 10:01:00 PM
0 Musings
and i'm choosing to destroy all the rest of my yesterdays ~ alana davis
song i wrote yesterday in Marion Sq. Park:
how delicate those hands seem now
how magnificent the gift
your life for my sins
how delicate your hands
pierced by nails of my transgressions
symbol of your crucifixion
and i deserve nothing you've given
now humbly i come to you, Lord
in deference for your magisty
and all i have as offering
is all of me, i sit at your feet
and praise your name
my thanks for the price you paid, for me
how beautifully you made me, Jesus
crafted in your image, how
marvelously you saved me
and now i cherish this love you give
how beautiful
how marvelous
your love.
(Amen.)
posted by De'La @ 5/19/2005 11:21:00 AM
0 Musings
love rain down on me, on me, down on me
met him on a wednesday, sunny afternoon, cumulous clouds, 84 degrees he was brown and deeeeep. said he wanted to talk about my missions listen to my past life...took me on long walks to places where butterflies rest easy....
haha. so that is a quote. lol not a real post. Jill Scott, Love Rain.
But seriously, today was "mahvelous, dahling". lol for some reason i woke up at 8:30 voluntarily. made breakfast, played around for a bit then decided to unpack and make my room feel like a room someone would want to live in. Then i sat around, tuned and played Olive - the finger tips grow used to the pressure with time i suppose. I learned two new chords: D and G7.
then i fixed lunch. this amazing sandwich (which sounds really gross, but oh well, it's healthy and i like it)...that you make with granny smith apples and a bunch of vegetables and mustard....yeh. lol pick on me, whatever. then i went and walked allll over downtown charleston. then back up to Marion Square Park, and i wrote a song (post later, perhaps). I dont know what it is and my fascination right now at this moment with hands. but it's a song about Jesus, based on the hands theme (see couple posts back). it felt good to write again, though.
it felt great outside too, not too hot, sun if you catch it on your cheeks just right, makes you smile, and you know, i realized today - that despite all of what it took, i belong here.
then brian and i met up, went shopping (bad bad i know) then to this coffee house where i did some poetry, and it reminded me why i do it - people are amazed by it, especially if they've not been exposed to it. it meant that i would be skipping out on a slam, but...yeh, what can you do?
thennnnn it was splurge time. so i'm trying this healthy eating thing (i realized today i went all day w/o eating meat!) and brian was begging for a vanilla milkshake, so we went to hardies, and i had one, and it was wonderful. i should also tell you that i was wishing for ice cream all day. i guess when you have such a healthy diet for a day, your body doesn't know what to do....
i start working at gap sometime next week. I'll probably mosey on down there to get my schedule tomorrow...maybe walk down to the battery. man, i love having so many options of what to do! solo time is wonderful.
so this turned into one of those "this-is-what-i-did" posts. blah. but i guess i should let you beautiful people know that i love it here, and despite what anyone may think, and what i may feel once school starts, i know i made the right decision, finally.
i think i shall read and head to bed.
posted by De'La @ 5/18/2005 11:16:00 PM
0 Musings
and all of the people with nothing to lose, nothing to prove...
well, after swimming downtown to get to a bank and get some groceries for food for the house, i went to this service thing called Annex which was wonderful.
i'm sufficiently exhausted, however.
drove down to charleston, met the roommate - hopefully it'll be great...then unpacked the car...went to storage...got lost...unpacked car times two. went to Moe's then food lion...spent wayy too much on food. but it's healthy and i hope to not spend much on food anymore this week. at least until i get paid.
posted by De'La @ 5/17/2005 09:23:00 PM
0 Musings
Olive.
So i set out today to browse for a guitar. it's something i've wanted for a while...but never got the guts to purchase. i went to music stores, and this guy saw that i desperately needed some help with picking out one...he did the talk, tried to get me to get a guitar with a "package" deal of a bag and some other garbage and instruction books. and i knew i didn't need all of that thanks to my Aunt's collection of books. i just needed the guitar.
so i was like "well, how about just the guitar" and he showed me this cute little jasmine guitar, then explained that it was the last they had in stock, the cheapest, but that this particular one had some scratches, but was a decently good one to start. the price being 200....he said b/c of the scratches (like two at the bottom) he'd give it to me for 130. and i got a kewl gig bag and a strap all for less than the original price of the guitar.
i spent way more than i planned, but this at least will keep me company when i'm poor and starving in charleston trying to pay my summer rent.
but God and i will work at this together.
the name, Olive, was my aunt's name. She passed away 13 years ago now. Apparently everything that i'm doing, or thinking i'm doing, she did. and even more weird, i look just like her. My grandmother told me, because she knew that i was a music afficianado, that i could get all of my aunt's musical stuff. she owned a piano and guitar and taught lessons on both, so i have all of the books and stuff. but my aunt lent her guitar to someone before she passed and when she passed, it disappeared. so this i guess, is in honor of her. I'm sure she would have taught me to play guitar and piano if she were still alive. i remember sitting on her lap infront of the piano pecking chopstix.
so fitting, Olive. We'll make a perfect match this summer.
posted by De'La @ 5/16/2005 04:23:00 PM
0 Musings
i found it unfair that i've been giving all of this time to my reading, and none to my poetry writing since summer's begun. i also find it unfair that i say i'm a poet on this blog page thing, and have yet to grace the page with some poetry. so here you go. enjoy, please.
oh, and comment and let me know what yyou think. the form is a sestina. 6 end words repeat each stanza and allow for variations, thus palms=psalms life/live and so forth.
it came from this line that seeped into my head last night while trying (though unsuccessfully) to stargaze on a cloudy night. i still sat outside for a bit, sang some songs, and came up with the line "these hands are all i know". i tried to figure out if it's from a song i've internalized or something, but i think it's original to me, at least. so yeh, this poem is a product of last nights late-night musings outside on a beautiful night, though i did not have the stars as company. ok. enough glossing. here goes.
These hands
I compare the scar on my hand
to Jesus’, his wounds, proof that he rose from
the grave, blood stained on open palms,
out-stretched so we could see his pain.
He suffered so that generations after he’s gone –
but before his return – we could live.
I remember the doctors wondering if I’d live
past the week spent in hospital, swept away from
kindergarten world, five years old, heart pulsing in pain
pumping harder as I screamed, did not want I.V. in hand.
I didn’t understand its importance until it was gone.
This scar, forever imprinted on my palm,
was proof of my deliverance. Just as Jesus’ palms
were evidence of God’s mercy. These hands
are all I know. I’d imagine feeling his pain,
dying on the cross so I could live
to know him, know that when I’m gone
these scars will erase, and from
memories, I’ll learn not to take for
granted experiences, knowledge that with pain
comes life, joy, the ability to live.
I don’t think I’ll ever wish the mark gone.
I’ve accepted its purpose. The mark on my hand
will serve as reminder of Jesus’ palms.
I have never had nails driven through my palms,
but I’ve had needles. Needles that gave life,
not like the nails that were the source of Jesus’ pain,
causing him to die on cross, discovered gone
from the tomb where he was laid to rest. He had risen from
the dead. In the Gospels, I learn his hands
served as testimony to God’s greatness. I think of my hand
and the scar and the week in the hospital and the pain
of my heart trying to escape my chest. I wonder if our palms
would ever embrace one day? My hand free from
evidence that I once was dying, still dying. I live
now to see my hand as canvas of pain,
saved from death twice, and can write and live
my own psalms like David, and tell God’s love before I’m gone.
posted by De'La @ 5/15/2005 12:53:00 PM
0 Musings
So, first semester freshman year i was still juggling around options up until the first day of classes in order to complete the "perfect" schedule. The class i was to choose as my last had to be intriguing. i remember being in the library, skipping the class i was just about to drop, and looking for a more fitting one, one that would be relevant to me. so, i found this one: reli 088, technology and self-ethics. the course description was rather vague, i just remember it being a religion course, and it was talking about technological advances and how we as people cope/deal/are threatened by it all.
it really wasn't a religion course. I guess it had to be classified as religion because it had two bibilical readings throughout the whole semester. it was more like philosophy, but i liked it none the less.
the professor was this awesome 76 year old white guy who's had so many life experiences. My grandmother hadn't passed yet, but it was fun seeing the similarities. I guess i'll be like that if God allows me to make it to 76+. Anywho, his lectures were fun for me. He had no objective, he would just talk - what seemed like pointless rambling to others - and shower bits and pieces of universal truths, or just interesting ways of looking at things and people and this life. i remember my favorite paper i ever wrote. it happened by accident.
the assignment was to cut off all use of our cell phones or anything we use in excess and write down notes, ethnographically, about how we cope/or didn't cope. i dont really use my cell phone much, but i am a stickler (wayyy too much) for AIM. i was planning on just "saying" that i didn't use it for half a day, and just think up what i thought would be my responses. Low and behold, my computer contracts a virus, and on UNC they will kick you off the network in a minute. soo....i didn't have AIM for about 4-5 hours so i took the time then to write out my feelings.
it's a lil sad to think about it sometimes. How it is used as a facade, how people can feel they can "be themselves" or others can create these alternate worlds of who-they-wished-they-were-in-real-life, and live a lie from day-to-day. Now, that part isn't me, although it was becoming me, I was not yet full of Christ, and so my thoughts on myself was that i was ugly and unattractive, and that no one would ever want me, so i must only converse with people online as that would be my only chance to speak to people. i also had this shy-ness factor (that's still there, to some extent) where i would not be comfortable holding a conversation with people face-to-face. I attribute that to not being fully encompassed with Christ's love, so that i could not all that to permeate my pores, and force people to see that, other than me. I was allowing Satan to make me believe that i was worth nothing, so that AIM was my crutch.
i remember giving up TV when i discovered that all i did was endlessly eat infront of the TV and did nothing productive with my life. Then i began experimenting with other things, learned some instruments, practiced my craft of crocheting, painting, drawing, other artsy-fartsy things, being active, interacting with people. Now i see that i'm replacing TV with AIM and while things are under a totally different context, i see myself growing too comfortable in the convenience and no-risk of communicating through a medium such as this.
i remember before internet became hip with my generation, i used to write letters. Letters to my family members, i had a penpal in Utah from 3-11 grade...wrote notes to friends in middle school each night to be exchanged in class...writing is my forte, yes, but it need not be my handicapp.
my prayer/goal for this summer is to relinquish AIM to the generation of people who need it for whatever reasons, but not grow dependent upon it for communication, or for self-assurance that people will like me for who i am, not how i look. God will change the eyes of those i need to keep in my life to see the beauty of the inside and not value the outside. I must trust and have faith he'll do that...
and then i'll have more time for Him.
posted by De'La @ 5/15/2005 09:57:00 AM
0 Musings
books i've read since my summer began:
1) Blue like jazz
2) Faces at the bottom of the well
Currently reading
3) The children
this one is about 780 pages. so i definitely won't get through it as quickly as i have the others. I'm looking at sometime within the next week. i'm at 200 pages right now (started today, i'm a dork, i know). it's about the strength and maturity of the college kids in Nashville during the civil rights movement, who participated (and very valiantly, may i add) in the sit-ins to help in the mass movement towards desegregating the south. very interesting read. especially interesting after i took my course on AFAM hist since 1865, and I read a book, Local People (600something pgs) about the civil rights struggle in Mississippi. both events happen at the same time, even mention some of the same people, yet totally different ends of the spectrum on the basis of struggle and obstacles, etc.
dang, i sure am a history major. i confess.
what shall i prepare to read next? I'm thinking something...religious
okay, back to reading :)
posted by De'La @ 5/14/2005 08:43:00 PM
0 Musings
God did not give me a heart of stone. Sometimes, I wish he had, just a little harder than it is. I have a way of exuding this confidence, this air about me that shows that i'm hard as rock. no dice. i listen to my dad sometimes, listen to his struggles, and i just want to cry. Sometimes i do. the fact that people, we, can run someone soo thin to where his daily existence is not worth living, it's just heart-wrenching. Daddy said he wishes he could do one thing, go fishing. I wish i could take my dad fishing, just let him relax a little. but no, then you have people who have no idea of struggles and sacrifice. i try to sit down and grapple with the idea (his upbringing): growing up with one parent, three siblings, struggling to survive, living off of the charity and grace and love and mercy of people within a community.
then i look at my life: i'm spoiled rotten, i get-anything-i've-ever-wanted-in-life and although i try to remove the rose-colored glasses, i cannot so much put myself in the position of my father to really see the hurt he feels.
I wonder how Jesus did it? Maybe the key to sacrifice is NOT knowing all of the struggles of those around you, or the ones you're saving, just giving yourself, w/o regards of what you're giving up to do it.
i'm sorry i'm just rambling. it's just scary, sometimes. i know i said it last post - watching my family unravel like a ball of yarn. each tug makes it tumble away, and the ball of yarn gets smaller and smaller until it's all gone. one day the blocks* will fall, i know it. and i'm scared of that day, really scared.
*post later on the significance of the blocks...
posted by De'La @ 5/14/2005 10:21:00 AM
0 Musings
"he gets to smile and i get to be orange...shines so bright. he rules the day, i'll rule the night."
ebadu. orange moon. another good one. yes, kids, i'm always listening to music. always. it's a given. if not, then...something's wrong.
"my world it moves so fast today, the past seems so far away, and life squeezes so tight that i can't breathe..."
from l-boogie. i think sometimes we just need to listen to those one-lines of songs that just say soo much. like, if the situation that ebadu is singing about in orange moon is true...man, i wish i had that. i remember writing a poem about a concept based on that, with my own personal twist. having someone - a significant other - being a reflection of yourself. i have a poem now that i perform based on the concept: "he took me and he placed me in his universe, saying that i was like the moon, and he was the sun, and he was telling me that i was only visible because i was shining from the reflection of his smile...."
how i wish that was true. that i knew someone like that. sometimes i wonder if i'll just be forever a hopeless romantic - if my lot in life is to be a successful black woman. but it's like, success comes with a price. i mean, look at Oprah, right? the epitome of success and yet single. not that happiness is equated with a relationship, but i think that woman have biological clocks that tick more than just around the time for having babies. maybe it's not just woman. maybe it's just man's (humanity) quest to not be lonely...that God didn't intend for us to spend our days alone...but does not being alone mean you have a significant other, or should we take advantage of our spiritual and blood families and build community and work within those?
i think there's some merit to both ideas. i remember reading Lady in Waiting - about serving God while even single, and not focusing on getting the guy (yeh i know...i did learn stuff, i promise). I remember it talking about serving the community as a single, how singles should help those who are in committed (marraige) within a church and all of this serving....and i'm down for that, i guess i'm just like, OK God, what's up with my end of the deal?
anyhow. i still get frustrated over a lot of things going on in my life. sometimes i wonder how Satan can work up enough guts to manifest himself in a place that is supposed to be where God dwells? like, how can churches turn cultic in practice, and brainwash people, and you get those crazy you're-going-to-hell-b/c-you're-not-in-church-everyday type people...who've become my mother. my mom is one of "those" now. and i dont even know if it's right to say it's Satan, but I know God's love is not soo fervent that it causes people to be hateful towards others. At least, my prayer is that it is not. It's hard to think sometimes, we pray to the same God. And i don't mean to place my spirituality or my relationship with God above hers, but i just dont understand a lot of the thinking, the reasoning sometimes. How everytime i come home, if i do not accomany her to her church then i'm essentially a heathen....i shouldn't do what i want to with my hair "because i should pray and ask God what he wants me to do with it" and it's just all sorts of conflicts that end in her calling me some sort of evil and expressing a disappointment in my spirituality. i mean, it's not like she's explefiying Jesus' love to me soo much that i want to follow in her footsteps.
sorry, i'm just rambling. not much else to do here in columbia.
my family scares me sometimes. just sitting back and watching it unravel like a ball of yarn. my prayer is that my dad finds God again. he grew up with probably the most religious mother in the world. but i think somewhere between that upbringing and raising a family of his own, and finding a crazy wife...he's lost touch with God. God reveals some things to me in dreams, and I know that he'll come to acknowledge God, and pray, and mean it one day. I just wish it were sooner. But having my mom as his only spiritual connection is not going to help him flock to God quicker. Which is i guess it's important that we are for real good stewards of God's love and impact on our lives. That we shower people with so much goodness that they will want waht we have, not shy away from it. which is why i think the uber conservative christians have it all wrong. singling out a group of people just because they're different is not the way to bringing them into one accord with the Lord. but that's another post, another day.
God never said this would be easy, I know.
posted by De'La @ 5/12/2005 10:18:00 PM
0 Musings
"we both knowww...darlin that's not fair"
more rachelle ferrell. i could listen to that song every single day, a couple of times a day, and not get tired of it.
so, God's been showering me with many things lately, and I'm not sure if i can truly say I deserve it all. But, i will take it, and thank him for it.
I'm sooo thankful for him putting Brian in my life. which subsequently meant i met Nick, who is equally as awesome, but in a different way, so i'm not sure if that's equal awesomeness or what...lol...but we won't go there. they're both amazing.
So, in the event of trying to find summer housing, in all of this craziness, Brian tells me about this summer conference thing that c of c does, and i should look into it, which is supposed to be cheaper and i e-mail the people, but still look for other things. So i find this sublet for just the summer (my apt lease starts aug 1) which it's kind of steep for a lil tiny place, but it was all i had going for me at the moment. but then this morning the conference housing people called me to say they had an opening, and would i still be interested...and i was beaming, cause Brian told me about it, and he's wonderful....but then i just felt like a punk, because i essentially told this girl i could move in..and yeh. i dont know.
I think i need to start going to God more for my decisions...He knows what's best. I've been winging it a little too much as of late
posted by De'La @ 5/12/2005 10:25:00 AM
1 Musings
"my work is personal, i'm a workin person, i put in work i work wit purpose."
(lol mos def....)
so.....i'm going to spend my free minutes (yes, minutes) this summer to catch up on reading the books i'm accumulating for my library that i want to have one day.
here's the list i'm compiling (not so much in order). These are books that I already own:
(currently reading) Faces at the Bottom of the Well
Women, Culture, Politics
CHE
When God Writes your love story
hip hop generation
Huey P Newton reader
Do they hear you when you cry?
Mythology (I want to know the stories...)
book i'm told i'd like:
city of joy
add in random poetry books by various authors...and literary journals.
have you read any of these? would like to add to the list?
let me know!!!!
i'm charleston bound in two days! whoooo
"God did not make me a fearful person, only fear i have is my failure to adhere his path" mo' mos. haha.
posted by De'La @ 5/09/2005 11:27:00 PM
0 Musings
"you scream i fight away all of your fears..."
okay - so that was evanescence. my immortal. love it. so...beautiful.
"there's just so much that time cannot erase."
One day I will write some songs, and they will be wonderful. lol. So, i've locked and secured yet another show at Dean's List this semester. Basically, by the grace of God, because I was totally too lazy for my own good. And the two grades that are posted right now that I was unsure of definitely showed that. B+'s in both. Here's the problem. In History, we have journals which are 30% of our grade. So, lazy lana that I am, would always do them half-way and at the last minute. Needless to say, this history prof can definitely see through the BS, and gave me a grade to prove. C+'s. So 20% of my grade was composed of C+'s. Now, for me to pull off a B+ with a 30% final and 25% midterm....is crazy. lol. meaning, if I hadn't slacked off and cared a little bit more, I could have easily gotten an A or A-. Same thing wiht my performance literature. There is NO excuse for that to be a B+ other than sheer laziness. Oh well, no need beating myself over the head. Just means that I will be starting over with a clean slate for GPA, and that means i BETTER to better at charleston.
that's all i really have to say right now. i'm too tired to think much else. but trust - i do have something to say...i always do. more later.
posted by De'La @ 5/09/2005 08:35:00 PM
0 Musings
God has a pretty cool way of figuring out how i listen (or sometimes, don't) and speaking to me in a form he knows i'll get. i kind of like that about him, that he makes himself real, and real in a form that we can understsand and love and praise and worship.
in the past week or so, i've heard mention, or seen, or was told to check out a donald miller book, more specifically, blue like jazz. So, i was in the christian book store getting mother's day things (which i sadly realized, I only had two to buy....even more sadly i had a hard time figuring out what to purchase)...i saw blue like jazz on sale, and right in my face, so i was like OK God, i hear ya, and i picked it up and purchased it.
This was last night. I just finished it tonight. i absolutely loved it. Many parts it felt as if i had read the book before, which was scary, but intriguing at the same time. I just connected so much with this guy's story. I think that's the beauty of it, the structure, the telling, the realness. I loved the fact that it's not a preachy christian book, I can go to the bible for that, but ti's sort of like, sitting down and listening to this guy give his testimony, and I respect that. a lot.
tomorrow is my final final. then i check people out all day. tuesday much of the same thing, checking people out....and then wednesday i go home. i leave this place. half of my friends have already left. a number of ones who've meant the most will leave tomorrow....and yeh, it's over.
it's really over. time to turn the page in this chapter. my book's just starting to get good :)
posted by De'La @ 5/08/2005 09:19:00 PM
1 Musings
So our relationship has been weird. I don't know if it will ever quite get where you want it, but i try. Growth is something that is gradual. It was nice (though i know i didn't say it) to see how excited you got when i came home. Like i said, relationships change, evolve, and maybe one day i'll be able to vocalize the appreciation i have for everything while growing up (even the little things, even the things that hurt). But i guess hat i also wanted to say is that it's wonderful you've found your relationship with God, and made it what it is. But, be careful, what i'm learning is that sometimes, we're just harvesters for God's transformation in others. Sometimes your over-zealous love for God becomes something that people shy away from, and instead of wishing to know the Lord as you may, they want to run. Jesus sat and ate and loved even the sinners. Trhough His unconditional love, the Holy Spirit ignited them, and they wanted m ore...He warns us "do not incite your brother to anger." I think becuase He wants everyone, personally, and on their own, to hear his pleas to be in a relationship with him. They'll change. They know what's right. We just may not be around to witness. Please continue to be a messenger of the Lord, but don't forget family...i'm learning it's whats most important.
Love, Lana
posted by De'La @ 5/07/2005 11:22:00 PM
0 Musings
so i didn't have any music today.
i just got back from running. stupid me didn't bring my ipod shuffle - duh! that's half the reason i bought it.
now that i no longer have jogging class (may i add that i got an A in that class?) it's harder for me to get motivated to get my butt out there. but i think it does get contageous after a while. like today, i watched my girls (high school track kiddies) kick butt at the state track meet. it made me miss those days, preparing, sweating, standing infront of the crowds receiving medals. sort of pushed me to come home and run. i was just playin around with speed, so i didn't go very far - and my neighborhood is pretty hilly. i ran half a mile and beat my normal mile split, so that made me happy. but this 81 degree weather was crazy so i decided that's all i'm doin'.
i gotta work on distances if i'm going to get to my 5mile goal. I think i'm going to work a lil slower. pushing myself is how i got hurt a week ago. i wanna do a 5k next spring, and then 10 k my senior year. maybe that's more plausible. what do you think?
okay. time to chill out for the rest of the day. read a book or something. i'm supposed to be meeting a friend for graduation festivities. USC finished today. It's kind of exciting...i can't wait for my turn!
have an awesome saturday. it's really luvly outside. makes me happy and giddy a lil :)
posted by De'La @ 5/07/2005 04:12:00 PM
0 Musings
(subject line is thanks to fiona - i dunno why i've been listening to fiona lately...oh well)
so. no cave canem.
I wasn't sad. I expected it. I drove home today for the weekend to meet a pile of mail - credit cards i don't want, bank statements, a literary magazine (you get an automatic subscription when you send in a submission)....and a little envelope with the Caven canem dog in the left hand corner
I remember junior year of high school, Preston's cousin came to speak to our class for our "pride assembly". he talked about awaiting admission from colleges, and said "you know when you've been rejected or accepted just by the envelope. If it's a big envelope, you're in. If it's small, well, expect a nicely written rejection."
so when i saw the little envelope, i knew it. I sort of already knew it when my poetry professor talked to Marilyn Nelson and she said that they've only ever admitted one undergrad and they were a senior. Yeh, it just wasn't my time, i guess. blah
so Raina's like "send it in next year". like all i have to do is sit around and wait for cave canem to deem me "ready" to work with the poets. it's so frustrating, to have people dictate to you when you're ready for something. how they assume you're not serious if you're still in college.
makes me wonder ifi should seriously pursue writing as seriously as i was considering after undergrad. because if all it is is a bunch of people telling me when i'm ready to be out in the world, then that's whack, and it makes me almost want no part of it. I guess it's no different than schooling, you go 12 years before they deem you "ready" to pursue your career. only to go 4 more years before you can really seriously pursue your career with a master's or phd or other garbage. all of this domination by people who don't know you from a statistic. at least then, you can test out to prove you're ready. with this, i'm just a sitting duck until someone up in the ranks thinks "yeh, she's ready." maybe that's why toni had to wait until she was 41 before her first book was published.
if all i want to do is write, then what on earth am i going to do for 21 years??
posted by De'La @ 5/06/2005 11:03:00 PM
0 Musings
i come to you, with a heavy heart. don't know quite where to start
that was rachelle ferrell. I can explain. wow. blows me away everytime i hear it.
So it's amazing how many pieces of clothing one can accumulate over a lifetime. I definitely need to be a better shopper than what i am. I could be so much richer. I bet Jesus didn't worry about designer clothes. lol. so I gave away two black garbage bags of clothes today. half-way because I could no longer fit most of them, with losing weight and all, and the other part was i just didn't feel like taking them home. I've got to stop hoarding so many things. I've got little cards and trinkets and things - lil memoirs that i think will make a difference in my life. and they do feel good when i first get them, but then you realize they become more of a burden after the fact...i had so many poetry revisions and sheets of paper, and just random things that take up space, but make me who i am, but it's like, i dont need the representation of who i am in the physical form, i carry around who i am each day. you can see it in my eyes, on my lips when i speak. why do we need a program of a play we'd seen to remember the greatness you felt that night?
so i think i'm going to try something different. capture everything through pictures and words. no pamphlets (i'm one for picking up a pamplet or booklet or something everywhere i go. i kept my metro card when i went to nyc, haha).
please forgive me for my distance... (lol, that's fiona)
i have been really distant though. like picking and choosing who i want to spend my last days with. time is very valuable. I dont want to spend it hanging out with people who just appear right before i leave - where were you when i was totally hating this place, or needed someone to talk to? i'm not bitter, really. I'm moving on, but i'm not down for fake smiles and even faker "i'll miss yous".
fast as you can, baby. okay i must finish packing up my life and get ready for the first installment of moving out. here's to summer 2005 in charleston. i'm excited.
posted by De'La @ 5/06/2005 11:33:00 AM
0 Musings
boop oop a doop. I adore her.
(also practicing putting pictures up
this is a part of a tin poster i have
on my wall. I was playing with my new
camera, Betty)
posted by De'La @ 5/05/2005 11:36:00 PM
1 Musings
the hour is getting late....
i'm usually listening to music. In fact, I'm always listening to music. So the past few entries have started with either songs i'm singing in my head or really listening to. Right now it's dave matthew's band wailing jimi's all along the watch tower
it's sort of bittersweet. rummaging through my year here in the remnants of things i've hoarded in my dorm room. and packing it up, throwing it away, giving it away...
it makes this transition so real. I think i tried hard, too hard, to compartmentalize this transfer. To not mesh the leaving with the realization that some of these people i'll never see again. That chapel hill barely even knew i was here...and now i'm leaving never to return again. and i say that lightly, but i really do not foresee anything to honestly bring me back to chapel hill. i tell people to come visit me in charleston. i think it's the admittance that charleston is where i should have ended up to begin with.
i've explained this numerous times, but who cares. this is my journal. i see my life right now as being a potted plant. a friend of the family told me a while back when he knew I sort of wanted to transfer from chapel hill, that i should "bloom where i'm planted". and it makes sense, and I believe God gave him that to tell me, but I dont think i should take it literally, or how he probably intended it. I see it as, you know how you have a plant that you nurse or raise or grow up. Or i remember getting trees when i was little, to plant in our yards. but you needed to grow it in a pot first, then when it's big enough you can transfer it to fertile soil. so chapel hill was my pot. i was only supposed to be here for a time anyhow. graduation was never in the plans here. i got what I needed to, I grew, i'm stronger, and now i'm ready to be where I was really intended to be in the first place.
posted by De'La @ 5/05/2005 10:32:00 PM
0 Musings
you incite me to chorus
so there's this guy right....and i kinda like him, right?....
it's so sad, but kind of exciting, to have a crush. To know that this person you talk to, and who talks to you, incites you to this happy place, where the thought of him makes you smile, and you imagine the possibilities.
but then it also kinda sucks, just imagining. I sometimes want reality. the realness, the ability to call someone and see what their day was like, how they're doing....hear the words said "i love you" from someone other than a relative...you know, stuff like that.
and guys say girls are enigmas (haha thanks nick). but they're not. it's really simple. girls want it like it is in the movies and how it was done back in the day. they want to be pursued, to be prized as a jewel. they want the prince to search all over to fit the glass slipper on her foot and know that she's the one. (read: they want guys to do work, too)
and it makes it difficult in a world where the trends are changing, makes it really difficult for girls (like myself) who want it done like it was back then, where the guy pursues the girl, and such. but today you have shows like sex and the city where it puts on this air that girls are sexually motivated to just attach to any guy on the basis of getting him in bed, and aren't looking for relationships, and while sometimes it may very well be the case with some girls...i hate to be brushed under one umbrella and assumed that i'm just like the rest. cause i'd like to think that i'm not. you know?
then i see a girl i know, one of the first people i met when i came here, and i watch her evolve from this timid girl who just wanted guys to like her, to this girl who confuses her sexuality with guys caring for her. a guy whispered in her ear some nice things one day, she gave herself to her, and watching her has been like watching someone open up pandora's box. she drowns her insecurities in a few muffled "i love you's" and latex. i cry for her a lil sometimes, to think that she thinks that's as good as it gets.
shoot, i cry for myself sometimes to know that this is where our society is going...and to know that i may very well be alone for a good portion of my life, because i dont want to give into demands to put out sexually, and it seems like all of the good guys are taken, or intimidated by me, or aren't christian and it just leaves me in a daze....sometimes kinda upset at God, wondering if we weren't made to be alone, then what's going on???
okay, i'm just running my mouth here, sorry....
posted by De'La @ 5/05/2005 11:52:00 AM
1 Musings
baby don't worry bout where i been or who i saw or what club i went to with my homies baby don't worry you know that you got me....
i'm so glad i went to see urban sophisticates tonight. they're crazy live, man. So Glenn, this guy i led a freshman bible study with last semester, knows how crazy i am about music, and let me borrow one of his cd's, Urban Sophisticates. He kept raving, and i listened and liked it and what not, reminded me of a pretty cool (but definitely not) version of the roots. Live music, which is always hot in my book, complete with trombone and trumpet....pretty cool vocals...and yeh, it's just pretty much hotness.
So they're native north carolinians, infact, i think they all go to unc-g and they play at this place called cat's cradle here in chapel hill. Glenn knew about it and decided that as my "going away" present , he would buy my ticket. there were a couple of bands that went before them that i had to admit, i didn't like, but then they came on and it was way worth it.
But it made me really want to expand my musical influences, or expand life experiences. Like i'm definitely going to explore more and just live and love life. that's the moral - just enjoy it all.
"nights like this seems so unreal...." (quoting the urban sophisticates)
posted by De'La @ 5/04/2005 11:51:00 PM
0 Musings
I'm not relatively new to this, Christian thing, but i love the idea of renewal. The idea that forgiveness is forever, and God will forget as long as you will.
Sometimes i just renew just because i love the newness of it all. Sometimes I need it. We're always falling, been stuck in a perpetual fall even as we attempt to climb to perfection to be closer to being Christ-like, we're doomed to failure. perfection can't be reached, but the key to surviving it all is not allowing the pitfalls to destroy you, and getting caught-up while down.
I've been a victim of that, i admit.
but because of renewal, and His refreshing me, and putting such wonderful people in my life, I can put that beside me, start over, do it as right as i can the second time around (lol just reminded me of the Step-by-Step theme show. i am sooo old school for even my own good)
Other than that, He's gotta continue to remind me that no, I've not transferred yet, and I need not be a slacker. I must stop procrastinating and do as II (?) Timothy says, and study to show myself approved.
good nite
posted by De'La @ 5/03/2005 09:42:00 PM
0 Musings
i know, sounds bad, doesn't it? It is though. I go to my trusty vending machine in my dorm - the one who's provided me with many late-night snacks and try to figure out what I want to eat. To my surprise, i look down to the bottom right of the machine, and what you would think to be a nicely individually wrapped bag of popcorn ready for the microwave, is really a pack of condoms.
I mean, really. who does that?
what kind of message is that sending to the kids? That instead of even thinking of inconvenicing people and making them even think about going to the mini mart for such amenities, you can just go down stairs and buy a coke and twix along with the purchase as well.
ick.
so, I studied for 5 hours straight today. abandoned my computer and my room for 5 hours in the union. just me and my ipod shuffle and history 76b (African American history since 1865) material. I love that i'm good at what i will be doing for a living. like, i guess to any other person, if they put off the amount of work i put off until the day before the exam, well, i guess i'd be worried too. but i'm not. if i took the exam right now, i think i'd do relatively well. So i'm not going to stress out about it. I'm taking a break right now, maybe quick nap then review a lil before i give up for the night.
i do not stress out, nor do i study past 12. it will never be that serious in life.
posted by De'La @ 5/02/2005 05:55:00 PM
0 Musings
i am a lover of music and all things poetic. i enjoy observing life and transforming it into art. i'm always looking for inspiration for poems. will you be my poetry?
i'm an infusion of creative spirits
