flashes of melancholy (and the Middle Ages).

John Keats wanted his grave to read: here lies one whose name was writ in water.

[They didn't honor it].

Learned the etymology of melancholy the other day. Turns, out--

In the Middle Ages, bodies were thought to be made of humors, right? Well, when certain humors were in abundance--or sparse--one was said to have relational illness.
Melancholy was one of those humors.
Melancholia was the humoral illness.

One with 'excess' melancholy was clinically deemed: high-strung, but remarkably creative; simultaneously insane and genius.

It's a love/hate relationship--The Poet's and Melancholy's--like something un-catchable that catches you. What is prescriptive mental normalcy, anyways? Is intellectual genius inevitably so isolating that one who has it cannot help but feel crazy? disconnected? I think that is sad. I'm no intellectual genius (and I vow to not be as broody as John Keats), but sometimes I feel crazy, too. Yeah, sometimes I feel crazy, too.

When I was a super-little tyke (like, too young to remember--so super-little), the Dr. gave me some 'test,' and told my mother I had an acute form of Attention Defecate Disorder. He tried to put me on Ritalin, and maybe that's good and well for some people, but personally, I think it was kind of fucked up that he suggested it. Luckily for me, my mom thought so too, wrote the thing off as "one man's opinion" and kept me undrugged-- never even mentioning the incident to me until about a year ago. And maybe I'll go through life losing things more often than most people, and maybe my mind'll be full of flashes, and my stories will go through all these anecdotal turns before they make their points, but what's wrong with that? I'm Joyful and my relationships run deep, and I do well professionally/academically/ etc. etc. Why fix what's not broken in the head?

I, for one, am glad Keats was Melancholy. (And for the record; he was too)

flashes of melancholy (and the Middle Ages) by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. Inspired by Dr. Brandy Fraley--lecture on John Keats and his Circle.

my brain and my body//my body and my brain

are in two different places.
(pause and let it load first).

woods || 5D mkii test from Hello Tomorrow on Vimeo.

Yeah, I'll dig a tunnel, from my window to yours.

A series of fairly unflattering photographs.

(proof that we really do love each other):

over a decade of brother/sister/sister/brother.

photos by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. Title from Arcade Fire's "Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels)"

so.

fuck Fracking.
for real.

veiling.

Jordan laughed at me over bubble tea; my depiction of the plateau was pretty bleak. And he had a point: jumping off is futile, unless you have a damned good pogo stick, and even then, you're still going down. Better to propel up, he said. Now I've gotta go invest in an ice pick. Or I could just grow some intense cat claws. Kidding.
(I've gotta stop with the cat jokes/references; people are gonna start thinking I'm serious).

Old-school Southeast Engine's on repeat and everything's still. Nattada and I feasted on steamed, local spaghetti squash tonight. I don't think I've ever made a better marinara sauce--chocked full of amaranth. We had peas, too. I love peas.

Food is funny. When shared communally, or consumed with gratitude, there is almost something sacred to it. And there is nothing more rewarding--nothing that requires more patience--than growing your own. Sometimes I get lost in looking at my own hands, in imagining my skin--the creases at the knuckles--shaping and shedding and replacing with each new amino acid I swallow.

I should make a self-rule to focus on my hands more--to take time to consciously imagine my food converting to energy--my breath to spirit--within the confines of my own body. Because sometimes I get caught up reading old words and staring at old photographs until I can't recognize my own voice--my own face--in them. And I think it's a loss but it's a pseudo-loss; I'm rendered a fool by my own veiling.

I won't know the difference until I begin to honor stillness. Sometimes contentment is a euphemism for apathy, but not always. Sometimes contentment is just as imperative as the discontentment sparking revolutions--both internal and external. Yes, contentment, too, can be revolutionary. Stillness can be revolutionary.

And in recognizing this, I can stop worrying altogether about how to get off the damned plateau: by laying on my back and being flat--watching the scenery around me shuffle, as I stay motionless.

veiling. by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

happily stuffed and fed-up with gendered pronouns (over Casa breakfast)

Today, I got a big breakfast with 'my boys.'
Today, I got a big breakfast with 'my men.'
Today, I got a big breakfast with 'my guys.'
Today, I got a big breakfast with 'my people.'
Today, I got a big breakfast with 'my folks.'
Today, I got a big breakfast with 'my y'alls.'

I love you _____s. Whatever you're called.

happily stuffed and fed-up with gendered pronouns (over casa breakfast) by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

relinquishing control.

(when I can't control)


And being brave enough to act when I have agency.
Even when it's uncomfortable.
(Especially when it's uncomfortable).

relinquishing control (text) by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. Video "Don't Do It," featuring Sharon Van Etten. Powered by youtube.

oh!

Congrats to Dale and FiFi on their recent engagement!
Do we look Brady Bunch or what?


Photo of Leslie Albanese & co. was acquired from Nick Bowsher's wedding photo booth. Please contact the post-author, prior to use.

"if I could go back-ways" get you no-ways fast.

Sometimes, funny things haunt me--like shoe strings; sometimes shoe strings haunt me. Like Cat Steven's Trouble haunts me. Like Gumby and putt-putt golfing haunt me.

Sometimes, I am afraid of losing faces. Other people's faces. I can always recognize them. I never forget. But I can't close my eyes and create the isolated image. And somehow I feel like this is losing. This is losing faces.

Sometimes I remember belonging to the Communion of Saints. Before my experience of agency complicated my understanding of fatalism. Before the two became incongruous. I remember when doubt was more consolable. When faith was easier. And sometimes I swear I still do belong. Sometimes, when I think or feel or love strongly enough, I swear I hear echos from all around that are not my own. And I know. I know it's the Community of Saints.

Sometimes poetry is laughable. And sometimes poetry is laughing at me. (For not believing in masks// For self sacrifice// For causes).

Sometimes I laugh at myself.

Sometimes oatmeal makes everything better.

But most of the time it takes more. More than oatmeal. More than peppermint and honey. More than immersion in a safe place with safe things-- until contentment and discontentment become simultaneously and increasingly necessary; the former at an immediate, personal level; the latter at a macro-political level.

"No amount of 'if-I-could-go-back-ways' gets you back-ways," they say.
And I say: Oh, God, where are my boxes?



no-ways fast. by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

a musing on bodies//feelings.

Maybe everyone will tire of hearing about my sleeping habits, but I haven't gotten real rest since I've come back to Athens (on the 31st) and I don't know why. And I've remembered every dream--sometimes multiple dreams per night--which is a little uncharacteristic of me. Last night's was really disturbing. I was caught in military state/ Thomas Pynchon novel crossing. At one point, I was badly beaten in a library; my father rescued me, but was later attacked at a road checkpoint, right in front of me, for listening to music. I felt so helpless. (I should probably call him). The whole dream was really invasive.

Lately I've been practicing making non-prescriptive, non-judgmental observations. I'm typically pretty attune to others (though, I certainly have my failures), but I'm pretty lousy at letting my own self just-be, at letting my own self feel whatever it is that I am feeling without feeling badly for feeling badly, and without holding onto Joy that is not mine to have--just to experience. And right now I'm in the midst of a shift, I think: one that I cannot fully understand, which makes it hard. I do not mind external challenges (or even carrying intense feelings/emotions internally) as long as I can understand them somehow.

I felt crazy Saturday night. I literally had six invitations to do six different things with six different people but for some reason none of them felt right. I think I just wanted to stay in and get work done, but then I felt guilty for that--like: it's a Saturday and it's the first week back, there must be something wrong with me if I do not feel like being around people. (Which is ridiculous, right? We're all entitled to feeling introspective). And suddenly I felt like a visitor and I felt really lonely for no real reason and it wasn't until I skyped Dale and verbalized it that I was able to recognize how silly and broody it all sounded. He's right: I'm just always diving for lobsters.

Then, yesterday evening, out of no where, my period started--10 days early. And I laughed because suddenly I was able to understand it all: the emotions, the sleeplessness, the acute tingling numbness in my fingers and toes...
I think I'm just a super-sensitive listener when it comes to my body. I can't drink caffeine--not even a single glass of green tea--without feeling jived at night, and stiff in the morning. And I try to pretty consciously recognize shifts in hormones that truly do effect my feelings (without apologizing for those shifts/feelings), but this time I didn't see it coming.

I do not know where this is going, really, except to point to the obvious: human bodies are magical (but confusing) things.


musing on bodies//feelings. by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

diving for lobsters

relentlessly.
every time.

(Will I ever stop taking myself so seriously?)

photo by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

an excerpt.

from Edwidge Danticant's The Farming of Bones.

"I close the door and lock out the tame night breeze that barely reaches my bare body, naked because Sebastian has made me believe that it is like a prayer to lie unclothed alone the way one came out of the womb, but mostly because I am hoping to feel the sweat gather between the cement floor and the hollow in my back, so that when I rise up, there will be a flood of perspiration to roll down over my buttocks, down the front and back and between my thighs, down to my knees, shins, ankles, and toes, so that there will not be a drop of liquid left in me with which to cry."

----
from my (own) last night's vivid-dream head:

I was holding a bird.
It was shedding its down and
my hands became saturated,
until I could not see my palms,
until they had become feathers.

not sleeping.

I'm still waking at odd hours. Sleep's been intermittent at best, but I'm really not that tired, and my dreams have been strangely vivid. By midday I forget them--like flashes. Last I checked I was running through the streets of Athens (as a visitor to a place I'd never been before) with my sister and my father. The weather quickly became tempestuous, and our running quickly became manic. The streets became garden rows. We had to pick all the cucumbers before the wind blew them away. I gathered four before I woke.



not sleeping. by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

I am here (and have temporarily abandoned abstractions).

I have been up at or before 8:00, since I've returned to Athens. It doesn't seem to matter what time I go to sleep. I wouldn't call it insomnia, really; I'm not laying, exhausted; I'm alert and energized. If anything, my mind's restless, but it's the good kind of restless that just needs the right creative channel.

Call it artistic inspiration? But I'm no longer daunted.

I've got some leads on programs for a year (or two) of service. And I know it's what I need. I'm appreciative of academia, in a way; despite my distaste for some of the bureaucratic roadblocks and elitist behaviors of this institution, I really am grateful to OU. I say all the time how grateful I am for Athens and for Appalachia and how I really couldn't give two cents about the university, but that's not entirely accurate. It has provided the venue. It has led me to a handful of really inspiring professors--Dr. Marciniak, Dr. Bloomfield, and Dr. Duschinski--who have radically transformed the way I approach knowledge (I have nothing but unwavering respect and admiration for those three women), like it has led me to the theories and texts that have becomes "ins" to my own, independent research. And so: I reject being the "poster child" of academia, but I do not reject academia. I know I'll spend a lifetime monitoring and curbing my own privilege, but I can't keep running from something inevitable (that I'm meant to be in academia, that I thrive in it, that I'll be involved in it--in some way or another--all my life), just because I'm disenchanted with the large-scale structural inequalities that have given me this path in the first place. I can't run Into The Wild. Not because I'm incapable of discarding possessions, of living a simple lifestyle... but because I really think I'll make a bigger difference if I work with, and not against, the existing institutions, if I change them from the inside.

But not now. Not yet. I refuse to go through motions. I'm not ready for an MA and I'm not ready for a PHD and I'm not ready for a Law degree. I can't enter those realms of learning the same person I am now. No, it's essential to take a break--and what better way to do that than a year or two of service? There's an innate selfishness that accompanies being a student; it's a time where one's time and energy is focused, primary, in the development of self. And that's not necessarily wrong; that self development facilitates later ability to give more, to do more, to contribute more to society--
but right now, for me, I find it isolating. And I'm ready to integrate myself back into a world I can feel, one that I know I'm not the center of. So there you have it: a few years of service. That's what comes next. I'm sticking to it.

And all this excess, "restless" energy? It's going to get me through this final stretch healthily.

Here's my (immediate) plate:
1. Thesis.
2. Capstone--on sexual violence against women (I am not really excited about that).
3. One last English class--on Keats, by a Keats PHD, so it'll be angsty, but beautiful. (I am excited about that).
4. Program statements of purpose/applications.
5. Internship with Adam Baker, Attorney and Counselor at Law
6. GRE in Spring (so I don't have to take it later).
7. A year of service abroad--right now, I'm leaning toward a program in Ecuador.
8. = improving my Spanish skills, which are, at this moment, quite rusty (but still there).
9. LSAT studying while in Ecuador.
10. Then a year in DC, doing service in my own country.
11. Then a MA, a degree in Human Rights Law, or both--depending on what the aforementioned experiences lead me to.

And here are my intentions:
1. To be a better listener.
2. To maintain better communication with my brother, and with all my loved ones who are not in close, physical proximity.
3. To balance my Pitta with lifestyle and diet changes--beginning with a detox/cleanse.
4. To further my yoga practice, which, like my Spanish, is quite rusty (but still there).
5. To practice more humility.
6. To remain thankful.
7. And to, despite all the sad things in this world, find enough to hope for to keep going.

steady. strong. unwavering.


I am here by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

new year.

new year. (photo series). by Leslie Albanese is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.