Grandpa

This is a picture Grandma sent me a few days ago of me and Grandpa eating ice cream when I was a little girl. I have that look on my face like "Oh, Grandpa, you're so silly!" He passed away when I was in Kindergarten, I think I was four years old. He was my very best friend. I remember the day I got into the car in the back seat and Mom turned around and said "Bonnie, I have something to tell you. Grandpa died last night." And I cried and cried. And I cried for years afterwards. Actually, it's been almost 13 years, but it can still make me cry. I used to make the same wish every time I threw a penny in a well, or blew the seeds from a dandelion, or found an eyelash on my face, or it was 2:22 or 3:33 or I ate a clear gummy bear, that he could be alive again. From the day he died, for years, even though I knew it wouldn't happen. I would just wish to myself, that grandpa could be alive again. I stopped making wishes a few years ago, though, I decided wishes don't come true. And I remember one time talking to Grandma about wishes, when I was still younger, and I told her I always made the same wish. And without me even saying what it was, she said, So do I, Bonnie. So do I. Hopefully she'll send me another picture she was telling me about soon, so I can post it. =)

Photos

I have to put these pictures here in order to make it a profile picture, so please excuse the repetativeness...




Dad got me some dessert wine and it's HELLA good! I'm drinking some right now. Lemme go see what it's called... Essensia California Orange Muscat sweet dessert wine. It's pretty damn tasty. And I'm not a ginormous fan of Alchohol, but I like the sweet stuff. Like Kahlua. mmm

free days...

Today is a NOTHING day and I'm loving it! I went to bed at 10 last night and I woke up at 11:30! I hella needed that rest, and I feel so good now. I took a shower and then walked Gracie. I was planning on walking down to Montclair to get a smoothie for lunch, but then I just decided to circle the block and I made bean dip and had chips for lunch instead. Yum. I haven't had that in a while!

I just talked to Ykoha, and I guess I'm seeing her next weekend because I need her to pick me up and she comes back here on the weekends. So she's gunna get me Sunday and I'll stay there Sunday night, but then I don't know how I'm getting home! haha. I'll talk to Dad. But no matter what, it doesn't matter too much because it's not like I have anything to get back to, I have three weeks of anything I wanna do days!

Guess what I'm listening to? The Backstreet Boys! yup! I'm enjoying it, reminiscing. Haha.

Patch (my cat) is getting used to Gracie, but he's still annoyed for sure. But now they can actually be in the same room together, some times with Patch on the coffee table and Gracie underneath. But the funniest thing EVER was a couple weeks ago when Gracie chased Patch up a tree! It was hilarious and I ran to get my camera, but I missed the good picture unfortunately. I really need to get a lighter camera. I mean, I absolutely love Dad's Nikon, it's just too heavy to carry everywhere with me and I'm too nervous to do that anyway incase I dropped it or lost it or something, so I need to get a really good manual camera that's light enough. Because I constantly see pictures I want to take! How does a photographer not have a camera to carry everywhere? Sheesh.

Letsee... Oh yea! Grandma just sent me this picture! It's a freakin eggshell! I really love blowing eggs when they're raw. You poke a little hole in each end and then clean them in vinegar and can paint them and stuff. It such an accomplishment to get all the egg out and not brake the shell! I love it so much because it reminds me of a book I used to read when I was a kid, but no one else seems to remember it. It was about an old woman and her goose, who was her best friend, and she took it's eggs and blew them out and made chocolate chip cookies and they shared the cookies and had a good time. And then she would paint the eggs so beautifully, and I think that's why I loved the book so much, it was a children's book and they had pretty pictures of the eggs! That's why I loved any book when I was a kid, the pictures! What was that one? Grandfather twilight! That was one of the BEST it was so pretty! And then there was The Rainbow Goblins and... The Dream Blanket? Something like that. Good stuff! Continuing the story... But then one day the goose flipped out or something and broke all of her eggs! and It was sad. But it was okay, I think she made some more. hehe. So this must be a goose egg or something larger like that, and it was apparently done with a laser! What crazy stuff we can do huh?

Smiles

I spent the night at Hanna's house last night. Well, first we went on our date to see John Tucker must die, and it was a really good movie! I mean, it was nothing sophisticated or anything, but nonetheless, very good. Really funny, and we quite enjoyed ourselves. There were very few people in the theater, maybe 12? I want to say. But MAN did we need to pee! We both held it until the end though, and then went to the bathroom (which was a creep one with low stalls!) and had to pee so bad and then we BOTH bumped our heads on the door! It was HILARIOUS! Then we took the bus down College Ave. and stopped at the Crepe Vine and got a club sandwich and a dessert crepe with nutella and strawberries and it was SO GOOD! And Hanna needed to vent, so I listened and it was really nice to hear what she had to say. It always good to get all the sides of a story, and I love to be a listener for people without taking sides or being biased.

So then we took the bus the rest of the way home to her house and... what did we do then? Just hung out for a bit. She went on the computer and was taking to her friend Nate whose parents were actually downstairs eating dinner with Hanna's mom and step dad. They've known that family since forever. Then I almost fell asleep on the floor and Hanna and me were joking about how she was like Michael Jackson because she kept poking me with her toes and I accused her of molesting me. I dunno, maybe some of you don't find that humorous, but I thought it was hilarious. I was also really tired, and you know how you get really goofy when you're tired? Well, that's how it was. Hehe. Then, even though we had already eaten, we went out with Nate and his friend Collin and Esther showed up just as we were leaving and the five of us were trying to figure out what to do after the guys got something to eat and MAN we had no idea. So Esther and Hanna and Collin all wanted me make an Apple pie and me and Nate wanted to go to the graveyard... so three against two, we lost, so we went to Safeway and got apples and went home and didn't even make the damn pie! We made blondies instead and no one bothered to check when we put them in so we took them out too soon, but they were still tasty. Esther fell asleep and we watched Wedding Crashers for a while until Hanna fell asleep and Nate and Collin had to go home. It was good fun.

This morning I woke up a freakin million times because Hanna's step dad was being uber loud but finally Esther and me both woke up at around 11 and were taking for a while. It was nice because I don't know her too well and she's a really really great girl and I really liked talking to her. She's one of those people who you can easily open up to and easily opens up to you. It's too bad we didn't get to know each other sooner. That's the kind of thing that makes me sad to leave so soon... Meeting new people or getting to know people better.

So then after a while, I came home because Hanna and her mom had to take some things to Goodwill, but I called Allison and we're going to get dinner and chat it up at 5:30 because we have SO MUCH to catch up on! I'M REALLY EXCITED! And I called Ykoha and left her a message, so hopefully I'll be seeing her soon this week. And I brought my yearbook and all my sharpies to Hanna's house because she said she wants to write in it every time we hang out this summer and so far, any major time we have I've brought it so that's gunna be really neat to look back on later. It's just too bad I can't have it at the random times we see each other and I'm not prepared! I freakin love that girl SO MUCH and I'm so glad and so lucky to have met her. She's one of a very few friends I have now that I think very possibly could be a friend for life because I see absolutely no problem keeping in touch and picking up where we left off when we get to see each other. You know how some people are like that? When you see them it's like it hasn't been months, only a weekend, and then there are those who it's hella awkward with. Speaking of which, I need a shirt that says "I hella [heart] Oakland" before I leave! Gotta represent! Haha. But seriously, I want that shirt because I love Oakland hella much and it's just such a perfect shirt! Akk the only problem is I said I don't wannabe buying anything. That's annoying. It's a hard commitment with all this brainwashing our society has gone through...

Right now I'm listening to Snow Patrol and I'm trying to find a way to get a picture of me and a song by them up on the blog, but both of those have to be from the internet and boy am I not a computer person... and Molly's not around, so it'll take a bit of time. But what an amazing band! I'd heard of them vaguely, but then I heard of them from Jaydan because we always listened to music in the studio and I fell in love and bought the CD.

I gotta take Gracie out for a walk soon because it's just me and Dad and it's not fair for him to take her out 3 times a day, so it's most definitely my turn. But I'm taking my time until I do that haha. Plus, I love this writing thing. I can really feel that I've been itching to do this for a while because it feels so good to be finally writing everything down. The reason I stopped (I kept a journal for a about 2 months this year) is for two reasons. First, it's really overwhelming when you're super busy, and second, it's really overwhelming when the stuff you have to write down is overwhelming. Yea?

So Hanna's house was amazing, of course, and good god I'm starting to get nervous about College, and more immediately, seeing everyone and doing everything IO want to do before I leave! YIKES! But I am in such an amazingly happy place in my life right now, and I'm just loving in and soaking it all in =D

And Norma, I would absolutely LOVE to come teach English with you! That sounds like so much fun and yea, I could get some amazing pictures! Only problem is that I don't remember very much Spanish at all! I would need to be practicing this year a ton and I don't know when an where to do that. Oh, and how did you leave a comment? Did you have to get your own blog, or can anyone leave a comment if they want? Because I hoped I set it that way, but I don't exactly know what I'm doing! So we'll talk about that for next summer, that would be AMAZING!

*sigh* I'm all smiles =)

Day Two

So for some reason after going to bed at 2 last night, I woke up at around 11 which was strange, but worked out because I managed to go to weight watchers and get weighed in (I forgot to go this week) which meant I weighed less because it was the morning haha I cheated I know. That's okay. And I feel nice and rested, believe it or not. I thought I was goind to need a million hours of sleep. Then I went and got a smoothie.... no, not passion berry breeze. I got Mango Mantra yum yum hehe.

So Tommy and Molly and Mom were off at 4:30 this morning. I happened to wake up just as they were leaving and ran down stairs to hug them goodbye. I was hella out of it though because I was essentially still asleep! But I was really glad I woke up because I didn't see Tommy or Molly once they got home from picking Tommy up from camp because I was on the phone with Allison. Mom was up until at least 2 if not later, so I'm really worried she's going to be sick on this trip... Hopefully she'll get a day to rest so she can enjoy the next two weeks. But I was really glad I got to see Tommy! I'll see him for three days and then I wont until Thanksgiving! THAT'S gunna be weird! Wow, they're going to have such an awesome time in Peru!

Now I have 3 weeks to chill out, see everyone I haven't seen yet this summer to say bye to them, get my shit togethar for school, draw, take pictures, read, write, MAN I'm excited! Both for the next three weeks of relaxation and for (duh) ART SCHOOL! Again, I really hope I can keep this blogging up, both to let people know what's going on with me, and more so to keep a record of what's going on with me. But of course, as I speak, no one even has the address to this site to even read this so I'm taking to no one! But in a sec I'll send as many people as I can the address to let them know I've started this.

So letsee... I kinda wanna talk about what I enjoy. I really like Miami Ink, a show about a tattoo shop in Florida. The artists are frreakin amazing and it's so much fun to watch them do such becautiful work on people! I'd love to be a tattoo artisit, but again, that's not something that will lead me to my ultimate goal. The guys and girl on the show are a bit arrogant because they know how good they are, but maybe at some point I'll go down to them to get a tattoo. Haha, no worries guys, no big deal. You can't reallystop me anyways, and I'll choose wisely. We all know I'm quite sensible.

Me and Allison will hopefully be going to dance for the next few weeks! I can't wait to go take a ballet class! She's leaving on the 12th which is GREAT because for a sec she was leaving like tomorrow andI wouldn't have been able to see her! I also should get back into running because for a couple of weeks I was doing really great, running a lot and eating well. I love running! I know, it's crazy! me?! Yea, I discovered I could run with the encouragement of my friend Jessica, and now I average 3 miles when I run (well, jog) and sometimesdo four if I get to threee and feel like doing more. But at athe moment, I'm a bit sleepy running sounds like so much work... and it's a bit cold out.

Garsh, I can't think of everything I need for college! I know I'm gunna get there and be like shit! I HELLA forgot some of the really obvious stuff! But that I guess will just come with time. I hope me and Sophie still talk in these next few weeks because it was so much fun going to CCA with her.

So, I guess that's it. And I can already see that for the next few weeks, I'll be writing a lot, and it's gunna be really un-balanced with later on. Oh! Maybe me and Dad can go out to dinner! Maybe no tonidght, but hopefully we will a few times! That's gunna be good fun. I'll probably write more later today.

The beginning of the Revolution...

So here it is, the beginning of the best part of my life so far! College! I just spent the best summer I've had yet at CCA taking jewelry/ Metal Arts for a month and holy crap it went by in a split second! Sophie was there with me taking Industrial Design and it was Uber awesome getting closer with her and hanging out with her. I love that girl! And she met Evelyn in her class who is a really cool girl from Minnesota and when Sophie was off with other peoples me and her chilled which was super fun and we got smoothes and stuff at lunch! Good times passion berry breeze but bad times that they started putting pineapple juice instead of passion fruit juice in it. She knows what I mean... But anyway, my summer has been sooooo good. Kirstyn and Sean were there again this summer teaching Photography, which I took last summer and was going to take this summer but color photography got canceled because not enough people signed up... Which worked out well because jewelry was so awesome! And I'm going to School for the next four years for photography so... I think it's really great that I got to try something else. That's all I really want to do, try everything! The only reason I'm doing photography is because that's what I took last summer at CCA and that's what I had for my portfolio so me and mom decided it'd be a good idea to apply for that and switch after I got in if I absolutely need to. But I doubt I will be, I love photography and it's the perfect key to helping people, telling their stories... Photo journalism, you know? One of my very best friends in the whole wide world, Annie, is going to school for writing so we're going to go out and help change what we can for the better... *sigh* there's so damn much to change and I'm just so little compared to the world.

I'm watching Law and Order right now and this episode is about young black girls being violently raped and murdered by a serial killer which is completely horrifying in itself, but since they're black the media doesn't give a shit. And before that I was watching Animal rescue stuff on Animal Planet and it was hella sad. HA they hella just got him! He refused to give his DNA, the creep, but they got it by pretending to knows his glasses of and crushing them on "accident" and lifted the prints that way! okay so I know it's fake, but one of the posters from the community arts class hit me hard because it said "Oakland. How many will Die." And that's what stuff like this reminds me of. Point is, holy crap. It's overwhelming, and I don't know a handful of it.

So my teacher, Curtis, and my TA, Jaydan, were so great! I didn't know I could have such good teachers! Especially after Kirstyn and Sean last year. But Eddie said the teachers and staff at Pratt are really great, so I'm juiced! I absolutely can't wait to get there and get started doing art for four years and then for the rest of my life! It's so exciting to FINALLY be doing what I want to be. I'm leaving in the 17th in three weeks! YIKES! But anyway, Curtis was so great and Jaydan was so sweet, I mean he really became one of our friends and was hilarious and so much fun to have in class and he was always willing to help us do something. Mary and Jesse were there other funny ones....Oh man... Mary's a crazy one and Jesse's really cool. She's from Baltimore, so when she comes to New York she's gunna call me and come see me. Actually, I told everyone to do that so I hope that happens with at least someone! Speaking of which, I have absolutely no idea what happened to Allison. I needa call her! Got her! Cool.

*2 hours later*

Man I absolutely love that girl! I love talking to her SO much! I hope we'll get to see each other Sunday (that's the plan). Oh, and tomorrow I'm supposed to go on a date with Hanna to see John Tucker Must Die. It looks so ridiculous that we gotta go see it. So... What was I saying? Right. Class. It was awesome. Completely. We ended up making about 7 things I guess, but 2 MAIN projects. First we sawed out a cuff bracelet, mine was a splat. Never mind. haha. And then we started hammering a copper bowl. Good God that was ridiculously hard! I never finished mine (don't tell Curtis that!) I wish I had but he wanted it to be 2 and 1/2 inches high and I could not for the life of me get it past 2! I wish I had just finished it and made it all pretty at 2" but I mostly just avoided it. Then we started a crazy project based on a word. Well, it started with an object, random one we pulled from our bag, innocent and unknowing what it would become in the end... And then we had to draw it and describe it with 25 different words. And mind you, there were TWO objects we had to do. Damn. Then we picked our 5 favorites words from the lists and drew them abstractly 10 times each. Then we picked our favorite 5 drawings and elaborated them into a project. And then my Project ended up being water spilling from and imaginary glass. It came from Chapstick. Yup. I know. But that's what happened! It turned out really awesome though. Not perfect, but hell, what is my issue with that perfect stuff anyways? It was my first metal project! So I made it look like water by hammering and then I shined it up and it looked uber neat. I was really happy with it. In the mean time, we made a silver simple band ring. Oh man, that thing had to be PERFECT! That was the crazy lesson in perfection if anything... I got an A- on it though! The minus was from filing too much at the seam. I like it. Then we had to do a piece for the body. A sight specific object that talked about something, like the inside of the body, or a metaphor, or something. I had so many more ideas for that one. I really struggled with the first water one. I actually scratched my original idea after I had been working on it because I didn't like it. For the body piece I wanted to talk about a woman's sexuality. I was either going to do an egg that was part of a piece of lingerie that opened and hella birth control pills, which was a comment on how younger women are supposed to be sexy and it's trendy to be having sex and the pill box would help you remember to take your pill. It was supposed to be ironic in some way, but the idea was unfinished. Or I was going to do the veins just above the breasts and play with cleavage and have them drape over the back and stick up into the neck, talking about how restricted women are as simply sex objects, something pretty to look at, but the veins underneath aren't seen. And the veins are about how vulnerable the are, them sticking into the neck and being so exposed, but people aren't looking underneath, they're looking at the breasts. But then time forced me to do a different piece, so I did a simplified version of the veins in a hand. It wasn't talking about anything, but it turned out real neat! I wish I could have done a lot more though. Some of the veins are silver and some copper turned blue. It slips on the wrist and then there's a loop for the pointer finger and the veins lie in a relaxed position in top of the hand. Then we had to do a bezel setting. I got Rainbow Topaz stones and set them yesterday and I'm going to be making really neat earrings out of them. Setting those was so STRESSFUL because it was so tiny and so damn easy to melt! We learned raising, soldering (pronounced sodering), setting stones, polishing, hammering techniques, etc. It was great. I had a Blast. And the class made all the difference. Like I said, Mary and Jesse were tons of good times, and Amber and Andrea were really cool too. I didn't really get to know Hillary or Paul, but they were really nice kids, and Julie was really great too, but I didn't get to hang out with her too much which was too bad. But man, I remember a split second ago when the month started I was thinking how if Pratt is anything like this class, my next four years are about to be freakin amazing! I'm JUICED!

So apparently Allison didn't have my number and that's why she didn't call! I know Allison from ballet and somehow we've kept in touch since. She's such a cool girl, wants to change the world like me, and is one of those rare people that Gets it. She's going to school in Canada and is doing well right now and I can't wait to see her! But everything's about to be crazyness because my mom and Tommy and Molly (brother and sister) are leaving in 4 hours for Peru! yea, I know! Dad has exams to give this week and man, I just need to relax before Pratt. And we got a dog a few weeks ago, and we need to look after her. But so I haven't seen Tommy for 2 weeks because he's been at camp, and now I wont for two more! And then when he gets back, all four of them are going to Reno for a bowling tournament and I'm staying home to look after Gracie (our puppy!) and then 3 days later I'm OUT. So me and Tommy and Molly wont get to chill any more before I leave! It's crazy.

Some time this week I'm going up to Davis to spend some time with Ykoha, a friend from school, because she got an apartment there and invited me! That should be really fun! I roomed with her on Close-Up, the week long trip to Washington D.C. and I was worried because I didn't know her well before that, but she is one of the sweetest girls I've ever met and I got so lucky and we had so much fun! So seeing her will be really cool. And I'll finally see Annie around Wednesday! Did I already say that? Well, I'm excited because she is beyond one of my very bestest friends and we haven't seen each other yet this summer! What the hell?! I sure don't know! YAY! She's back packing as we speak, which is neat, I wanna go back packing. I haven't been in forever!

So the show today was really cool. I liked looking at everyone else's stuff! It was far more interesting than last year for some reason. I was sad I didn't take Kirstyn's class because I cannot WAIT to take color photography! They canceled that class though, not enough people, which is why I took Jewelry. It was a bitter-sweet situation, but mostly sweet because Jewelry was SWEET and I'm taking photo in college (duh!) so it's all good. But I remember last year being so juiced to take color and I still haven't! Here's the thing about color vs. black and white: black and which can be really cool, but it's given too much credit in my opinion. I think that we're just so used to color every where, and it's jousts not done well because we're used stupid snap shots taken with crappy disposable cameras, but good color photography is amazing! Black and white can be done well too, but I think it's over-hyped because it's something different for people to see so they think it's more interesting. Speaking of which, EVERY ONE OF YOU NEEDS TO SEE THIS MOVIE:

Born Into Brothels

it's a freakin amazing documentary about kids of prostitutes born in the Red Light District and this women who came to photograph the women and ended up being close to the kids and teaching them photography. IT"S SO GOOD and it was crazy because it's EXACTLY the idea I'm aiming for in my life.

So anyway, I was looking at the Digital Photo stuff at the show last year and I was so jealous and so exited to take it and this year I did the same thing but man I gotta take B&W again this year grrrr. But it's all good because I had so much fun doing what I was doing! And it will all come in due time. I'm wondering if I should skip the B&W because I already took it (and can have my credits transfered) and based on money that's a good idea, but other wise, I dunno.

I got my AP scores! I got a 4 in U.S. History! Yup! My 5 in government transferred into credits at Pratt which is uber cool! And I got my schedule YIKES. But I'll write it in here later. I'm sooooooo tired, but I have 3 weeks to sleep so I'm not worried, and it's been so long since I;ve written anything anywhere that I have so much to say.

So I was taking to Kirstyn (I sure can get off topic quick) and she's such an amazing lady! She's so encouraging and I love taking to her and she told me to make sure I kept in touch with her and let her know how everything was going and stuff. She actually wrote me a recommendation for school which was uber cool! She said she's send me it! yea! Because you know how you promise not to read it? Well now it doesn't matter! And I'm really curious! And she also suggested I use this site to blog and stuff and to send her the address. I like this sight, simple, lesser known, I can post photos instead of writing if I want to... Cool beans. AJ (my cousin) was the first to suggest I start a blog and I think it's a really excellent idea (hence why I started it so quickly!) I was taking to him because Andrea wants to go to Evergreen State, a school in Washington (state) which is where AJ went. It's a really good school. Beautiful campus, what it's known for. She wants to study writing like Annie. Me and Annie are gunna be friends forever, be old ladies together, and be journalists together. It's already a plan.

So now my hands and my shoulder are cramping from typing (I don't do a lot of it) which is a weird sensation. hehe.

What else? I made a decision not to buy any more clothes. WAIT. Hear me out. Not in a superficial, 'I buy too much, I should cut back' kinda way, but in a conscious 'I don't like supporting corporations who Fuck over so many wretched people' sort of way and I really just feel like a hypocrite, living in the house I do, the way I do... Getting in a car so damn often... Owning more than enough clothing... Even having this computer to type on, though it's not mine... I've always been bothered by all the hypocrisy... I've ALWAYS hated people who throw away food, ANY of it. It gets on my nerves to waste anything. I have to finish what have, and sometimes what other people leave because they wont finish it. And when I bake (a major hobby of mine) I scrape those bowls CLEAN because I don't want to waste any of it. And me and my sister don't flush the toilet 'tile it needs it and I wear clothes a few times before I wash them. But still, I do barely anything, and I think NY with the trains will help (no riding in cars) but my first step will be not to buy any clothing. I don't need any, and I wont be until every last thing I have falls apart years from now, and then I'll buy some fabric from a small business or from an individual who makes it for a living for themselves and make my own damn clothes. I might just become some what of a hippie when I grow up. You know, I've always found my attitude towards the world rather interesting because I've always lived in plenty, but I rarely feel I really need anything, or most, or what I have. I plan to live in very humble circumstances because any extra money I may have will go to someone who actually needs it. I just can't fucking stand assholes who have $135 million to throw around, and some people who have about 2 bucks. IT MAKES ME SO ANGRY! So this is the first step of many I hope to be taking to rid my life of so much hypocrisy. I don't plan on owning a car (or learning to drive) until we've moved on to environmentally friendly ones. Fucking breaking the record by 11 degrees is NOT okay with me.

So if this wasn't the longest thing EVER, I don't know what is. But that's okay, I just hope I'll be keeping it up for the next years. I'll leave you with a picture, a really neat one that Molly randomly found. I really really like it.



Watch for the Revolution. Then you'll understand. Then you'll see what I mean, and understand me.