life times & love

Yesterday I had a great time in the city. I should hang out more on Saturdays. In the morning I had to go to a Thai Buddhist temple in Queens. And it was a diamond in the rough, to say simply. It was quiet & peaceful, and well I took a few pictures.

This whole bullying thing is going too far. My mom called me today to tell me that her coworker's daughter tried to commit suicide recently, and she's only 13. She's been bullied to the extent to take her life, it hits home when there's a shorter rope connected to you. I wanted to cry because nobody should want to take their own life, especially that young. She's still so new, so fragile.
There was a period where bullying was just quiet, it was just a group of jerk kids picking on a girl because of her pigtails, or the show she watches is for babies. But now it seems like kids are out for something. Out for blood. There are so many ways to bully now, Facebook, MySpace, texting, and the classic group vs one. I don't understand what their gain is when they see the victim, eyes lowered to the ground, feeling like shit because they're different.
Being different was never easy, it still isn't. There's so many ways to be different now too, gay parents, they are gay, they're black or Asian. Like the array needs to be accepted, it needs to be taught that there is no sameness.
Another thing that bothers me is that the kids take it into their own hands and feel like they can't talk to their parents. Why? The parents are always so surprised when they hear about it, they're active in the school, their kid is happy when seen at home, yet when things get this far it's a surprise. I'm not blaming the parents, because I don't know how things are behind closed doors.
I don't know what to do, because raising awareness doesn't seem to do anything. What can we do?

"Date a girl who reads. Date a girl who spends her money on books instead of clothes. She has problems with closet space because she has too many books. Date a girl who has a list of books she wants to read, who has had a library card since she was twelve.

Find a girl who reads. You’ll know that she does because she will always have an unread book in her bag.She’s the one lovingly looking over the shelves in the bookstore, the one who quietly cries out when she finds the book she wants. You see the weird chick sniffing the pages of an old book in a second hand book shop? That’s the reader. They can never resist smelling the pages, especially when they are yellow.

She’s the girl reading while waiting in that coffee shop down the street. If you take a peek at her mug, the non-dairy creamer is floating on top because she’s kind of engrossed already. Lost in a world of the author’s making. Sit down. She might give you a glare, as most girls who read do not like to be interrupted. Ask her if she likes the book.

Buy her another cup of coffee.

Let her know what you really think of Murakami. See if she got through the first chapter of Fellowship. Understand that if she says she understood James Joyce’s Ulysses she’s just saying that to sound intelligent. Ask her if she loves Alice or she would like to be Alice.

It’s easy to date a girl who reads. Give her books for her birthday, for Christmas and for anniversaries. Give her the gift of words, in poetry, in song. Give her Neruda, Pound, Sexton, Cummings. Let her know that you understand that words are love. Understand that she knows the difference between books and reality but by god, she’s going to try to make her life a little like her favorite book. It will never be your fault if she does.

She has to give it a shot somehow.

Lie to her. If she understands syntax, she will understand your need to lie. Behind words are other things: motivation, value, nuance, dialogue. It will not be the end of the world.

Fail her. Because a girl who reads knows that failure always leads up to the climax. Because girls who understand that all things will come to end. That you can always write a sequel. That you can begin again and again and still be the hero. That life is meant to have a villain or two.

Why be frightened of everything that you are not? Girls who read understand that people, like characters, develop. Except in the Twilightseries.

If you find a girl who reads, keep her close. When you find her up at 2 AM clutching a book to her chest and weeping, make her a cup of tea and hold her. You may lose her for a couple of hours but she will always come back to you. She’ll talk as if the characters in the book are real, because for a while, they always are.

You will propose on a hot air balloon. Or during a rock concert. Or very casually next time she’s sick. Over Skype.

You will smile so hard you will wonder why your heart hasn’t burst and bled out all over your chest yet. You will write the story of your lives, have kids with strange names and even stranger tastes. She will introduce your children to the Cat in the Hat and Aslan, maybe in the same day. You will walk the winters of your old age together and she will recite Keats under her breath while you shake the snow off your boots.

Date a girl who reads because you deserve it. You deserve a girl who can give you the most colorful life imaginable. If you can only give her monotony, and stale hours and half-baked proposals, then you’re better off alone. If you want the world and the worlds beyond it, date a girl who reads.

Or better yet, date a girl who writes." 

From The Monica Bird

i haven't posted anything in a looong while. so just for now, to start things back up, i'll post my new favorite song for the time being.