Today was a stellar day - after walking for 4 hours I feel like I'm finally tired enough to sleep more than five hours! Last night I had a nightmare but I'm used to them now, so they hardly phase me during the day anymore. 

In our business class we were asked to bring an object we value, the one thing we would save in a fire. I chose the black opal my parents bought me for my eighteenth birthday. They imported the stones from Australia and then had a jeweler make the necklace around them. Did you know opals of any kind are one of the few stones people say "like to be worn"? It's because of their water content, somewhere between 3%-10% though they can be has high as 20%. Of course, if you take them into the cold or extreme heat they start to crack because of water expansion and contraction. So keeping them at a steady temperature, is ideal. While opals are a mineraloid, they do have an internal structure that allows it to show a variety of colours within the stone. At micro scales precious opal is composed of silica spheres some 150 to 300 nm in diameter in a hexagonal or cubic close-packed lattice. These ordered silica spheres produce the internal colors by causing the interference and diffraction of light passing through the microstructure of the opal. It is the regularity of the sizes and the packing of these spheres that determines the quality of precious opal. Cool, right? Opals are insane, and I'm so glad they're my birthstone. The ones from Lightning Ridge Australia are considered the finest, but in general Australia exports 90+% of opals in the market.

I didn't explain all that to the class, but, y'know, the information is kinda interesting. All I had for dinner was a peanut butter 'n jelly sandwich and baked beans...maybe I should do groceries. Nah.

Cupcakes, what amazing things to bring people together. Tomorrow I'm going to give Leo his birthday cupcakes Chantal and I made for him, and with his cake addiction I'm sure he's going to like them. 

I'm halfway done both the Origin books, because I woke up at 3 am and had nothing else to do that was quiet for my roommates besides reading until 7 am. Not that the consideration seems to be mutual, one of them is up with her friends doing their hair and singing loudly, screaming. I don't mind too much, until I need to sleep. Otherwise I'm actually a fan of being a girl, being an emotional creature and having fun and being brave but - I have an 8am class. 

Also! Moths, still on my favourite-things-ever list. May or may not start a collection, maybe even frame it and hang it somewhere in my room (because all the owls just weren't creepy enough). How they navigate is still a question mark but most people assume it's a form of celestial navigation called transverse orientation. By maintaining a constant angular relationship to a bright celestial light, aka moon, they can fly in a straight line. But other people say the reason for moths circling lights may have to do with a visual distortion called a Mach band. In the pursuit of cover and safety, moths fly towards the dark areas of the sky and are thus inclined to circle ambient objects in the Mach band region. I find moths endlessly fascinating and a source of inspiration, so they may crop up from time to time.

Today was a great day overall, even though the animator I was supposed to help with his film never showed up, I still got to talk to a bunch of great people and see wonderful progress. Good luck you guys, you need it! I'll just be over here getting a nice long sleep if anyone needs me. 

Going back to the music you love is like coming home again - nothing replaces the feelings they stir, like kicking up the ashes and dust of your past. It took me a long time to think of Rita's last name, because my dad usually just says 'Rocking Rita', but her last name is Chiarelli and she plays delicious guitar. Her and Rachelle van Zanten, playing a wonderful smokey slide guitar, need to be on my playlist more. Today on the elevator I played Ram Jam really loudly and the people who got in after me told me 'This song is awesome.' Well, Ram Jam is just like that.  

I finally got some decent direction on what to do for my interpretive piece! I'm going to do a portrait of Ayaan Hirsi Ali in pen and ink, with her face made entirely of words that describe the injustice and persecution she and many others went through. In particular, she faces a lot of backlash for her book and for her audacity to tell her story. Her book, ps, is fantastic and it's a wonderful insight into the balance between tolerating a culture and tolerating misogyny. That's really at the heart of that controversy, which fits in 100% with PEN Canada and the entire project. 

As much as I'm looking forward to the summer, I don't want this school year to end. A lot of my friends are in their final year, and they seem to be moving way out across the country. I wish them all the best with their career, but I'll be sad to see them go, and it's even harder knowing that they're so busy this year I can't really see them as much as I'd like to before they move. I guess the only cure for this is Bob Seger? I think it is. I think it's time to curl up in bed with Bob Seger and a good book. Oh! And I found a complete online copy of Darwins' origin of species so now I'm reading both versions, chapter by chapter, of Nino Riccis' version and Darwins'. Anyways, night moves. 

"It’s a terrible love and I’m walking with spiders,

It’s quiet company, it’s quiet company,

And I can’t fall asleep
Without a little help
It takes awhile to settle down
My ship of hopes
Wait til the past .. ?

It takes an ocean not to break" - The Nationals, Terrible Love

I had such an exciting day! First, got around to asking the guy I liked out. Erh, we'll see how that goes, but two! Two is so exciting! I saw this truck stopped on the side of the road so I went up to it with my drink in hand and who should I see, in the entire city of Toronto? My roommates dad! We had a good chat, then my roommate walked down from our apartment and sat with us in the car while he made calls to get his truck towed and such. It was pretty fantastic and we had a good laugh about the odds of that ever happening.

I've developed a really odd fascination with insects lately, which can only mean my brothers' years of entomology have finally rubbed off on me. We had an hour long discussion about how awesome moths are, and dragonflies. This summer I'm going to try and have some fun with books, and read books with the same or similar titles. Right now I'm reading the Origin of Species, and I just have to read the Nino Ricci one so I can say I've read both works. Does this really help? I don't know, but I do know more literature in my life couldn't hurt. 

So uh, do yourselves a favour and go search "the nationals - terrible love" on youtube and watch it, they're a fantastic band. I'm just going to keep drinking tea, reading about moths and then read my tea leaves to see what tomorrow brings. 

"You colour everything. You are the kindest person I have ever known, and your words are like fire to water, always skirting the edge before turning to dust. I can never be resolute when you are around, I can never compose myself. You strike me; your eyes burn me, but gently - a cool, soft burn. I wish I could tell you just what you mean to me. I wish I could trace my fingertips over the very surface of your skin, pull your lips into mine, and wait - for something, although I don’t yet know what. Sometimes I would like to cry because you are so delicate and I am so far. I can’t keep getting wrapped up in your eyes like this, but I would like to. I have never felt so alive as I do when you smile. I really do appreciate those times when we talk, and I hope that you know that. I’d like to create a word that would envelop you in your fullest extent, but first I would have to know you fully.

Regardless, you are the best thing about this planet and I am so fucking glad that you are here. That you exist makes me wholer."

She writes how I wish to, with a great plain honesty that strikes your core. I also kinda have a soft spot for e.e. cummings but that's another kettle of fish. This is what I would say if I could speak more eloquently. Nothing new today, I went to the school to help people with some design work, not that I have any and I'm still going through the Clavin & Hobbes collection online. When something interesting happens this blog will become useful - really it's a strike to prove my life might be kinda cool later on, very futuroptimistic. 

Have you ever felt like getting up the guts to speak to someone could be the best decision you've ever made? Have you ever wished that someday you'll find the right words, and when you do, they'll be simple?

I keep forgetting how much I love Calvin and Hobbes, but then I find my own way back to it again. I never had a TV growing up, and my parents generally only let me read "literature", even if it was for children. But Calvin and Hobbes was the exception to the rule and I have my grandfather to thank for that - I still get along with him really well, actually. I talk to him about any and everything. 

This week was pretty boring at school, nothing much to do. I had a decent talk with Joe Morse though, for my illustrative drawing and painting class. He seems to enjoy my prehistoric style art, because it's so far removed from western tradition and he appreciates a student trying to get to the core of what makes art so profound for humans.  That things, that inner truth that allows art  thousands of years old still catch our heart and eyes and hold it there. Almost all the artists I know, whether they see it or not, create from a place of no-mind, from inner stillness. I'd like to get to the core of that, to express humans as we are - emotional creatures.

Speaking of! Eve Ensler, how do I love thee, let me count the ways. Even if you don't like the work she's famous for I think everyone should check out her speech at TED.com, discussing the inner girl. It's a powerful story, that lifts up not just women but all of us. 

Might go to school tomorrow to work on my PEN illustration about the oppression of free speech for writers, and my design homework for a water campaign branding identity. And dance, I suppose - why not, everyday is a good day to dance! 
I was always curious as to how other artists feel about why they make their art, and the core question they're trying to answer by creating it. Is it different for animators or illustrators or writers or musicians? Who knows, but if you have anything to throw out there don't be shy. If you're out there. 

 I have Peggy Lee stuck in my head.  Well, not Peggy Lee in particular, just a lot of blues songs. I was listening to the CBC on Saturday like usual for Randy Bachman's Vinyl Tap and the show was all about women who sing the blues. Wonderful show, I listened to it online again. So now I've got a lot of classics like Memphis Minnie, Barrelhouse Annie, Mary Johnson, Diana Krall and Rita Chiarell all running through my head. It makes it fun to work on art though! 

Speaking of - somehow, my teacher loved my little half-hour illustration. I lied a little when he asked how long it took, because he's time-prejudiced like that, but he seemed to really enjoy it. Don't know how to feel about it, but at least this will save me time. For our next project I'm going to show some sketches for two very different styles - the one he likes, and the one I actually use in my sketchbook. 

When Sam got home I found she had gotten me some presents! Pictures from my trip to her cottage in a frame and some chai  from Geneva! Love chai , now with a good mix of tea leaves I can make some in a pot. A good chai  comes from putting spices in water on the stove first, boiling that until the water turns colour a little then adding tea leaves to steep. Generally you can put whatever you want as the base spices, but I usually have cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cardamon, black pepper and cloves. Next to coffee, chai is my favourite drink but only when it's made properly.

Hey! NOVA's "The Elegent Universe" is online - go watch it. But first, listen to some blues. 

"Life is nothing until it is lived; but it is yours to make sense of, and the value of it is nothing else but the sense that you choose." Jean-Paul Sartre.

Well said, Jean. Well said. I'm back in Oakville now, excitingly, but our schoolwork is still as dull as ever. What few assingments we have are just unoriginal and extremely geared towards corporate identity. I don't mind those, but this was supposed to be our narrative semester, and we haven't really done any narrative work to date. Sometimes I find our teachers dislike heavily metaphoric work, they prefer the concrete, the obvious. Well maybe in 4th year I'll be able to draw how I actually want to, for now I think I've found a style my teacher likes and I'll stick with that.

Been hanging out with a lot of people outside my classroom, which is nice. My roommates are curiously absent so I have the apartment to myself, which means I finally get to move the furniture in the living room to do my dance. Still miss the piano, but I might go to school today just to cure that. Also! Happy Birthday Darnell!

“Let’s just drive for a bit,” I say. I need some time. Two turns and we hit the highway. I roll the windows down and chew on a fingernail. The fog is thick, but we plow through it with fishbowls for headlights. The road is empty. Even the roadkill has gone home for the night, fleeing into the darkness of trees on either side of the highway. The painted lines on the concrete pulse and the wind is loud; I am getting the time I need.

My ears are ringing. I don’t know if they ring because she hit me there, or maybe they ring because I hid a piece of the truth in the hollow space of my eardrum and it is making itself known. Maybe they just ring from the wind whipping through the car.

You are too loud, say the trees that fill the darkness.

We are quiet as we can be, I say.

I am talking to the road, say the trees.

It is not our fault, we did not build ourselves, say the rocks that were crushed to make the road.

There are none of us left that can even remember what quiet sounds like, say the trees.

It is not our fault, say the rocks.


-J. SAMUEL YINGLING

"So I’ve been sleeping with this silence in my mind
And all I see scares me" - Lydia

Had a decent train ride home despite the headache it gave me. Oakville was so nice and warm I just had to go for a long walk, how I missed exercise! I'm so excited to go back to school and see friends again.

Had another strange dream - I don't usually put emphasis on them or their meaning but this one was really odd. For one, I didn't die, and I always die in my dreams, s'just how it usually goes. In this dream I was walking along a dusty road in a green landscape; the sun was shinning, it was hot but not overbearingly so. I came upon an old church, it's big stone slabs wrestled into the earth. The door was ajar so I walked inside - there were no images of the Virgin, no crucifixes or alters. Instead there was just a massive, overflowing arrangement of flowers and plants, spilling from the ruined church forward into the room. Then I saw on the floor in front of the flowers, facing me, sat a yogi - in lotus posture and in deep meditation. When I looked more closely I realized it was my face. I started in such profound fright, and woke thinking"Aha, so she is the one who is meditating me. She has a dream and I am it." I had an unshakable feeling that when she awoke, I would no longer be.

"For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love."
-Carl Sagan

I guess it's time for me to go back. I miss my friends, but I've also missed this slow, small-town pace of life. Being tugged in two different directions but I still haven't got a clue how to resolve that. I guess it'll happen eventually, I'm not to worried, and I think when I get back to school I'll hit my stride again. Not looking forward to that 4 hour train ride though, sans music! Good thing I have wonderful books to keep me company, as per usual. Funny enough when I was applying to my high school's art program I also applied to their literature program, and got into both. I still love words, the play of language and nuance so maybe that 4 hour ride will be a pleasure and not a pain. Anyone read anything good lately?

I had a great experience today; I woke up from a fantastic dream at 6:36 in the morning. It gave me just enough time to go downstairs and outside to the river near my house and watch the sunrise, then sneak back into my house. I guess it goes without saying that it was a stunning sunrise, every inch of icy snow glazed with ambers and orange. It was a little moment where I could pretend it wasn't winter still.

Last day in Ottawa tomorrow, and I'm almost sad, despite how boring it was. It was nice to just finally find time to sleep, read, dance - do the things I really enjoy. Drawing is okay, but it feels like I've spent to long trying to churn out ideas and good work from nothing.

PS - Anyone else noticed that great literature is all about how being a human is such a bummer?

Am I the only one who thinks "carbonmade" is a strange name for a site that hosts art and portfolios? I don't mean the subject of what it's hosting directly, just the name. Carbonmade. It's just odd - all life is carbon. Making it just a human thing kinda negates the fact that all life on earth is carbon. Ah well, whatever, have some image of carbon in action!

I finally got my PLA written, and student evaluation filled out - something productive got done! Well, that and I think I've got a few more songs under my belt. True to form I think I got more done on my week off then at school, not that I had much to do to begin with. My brother and I hang out most of the time, and when I'm not doing that I'm generally playing the piano or outside wandering the forests or just dancing. Truthfully I think I enjoy dancing just as much as I used to - I tried to convince myself after the accident that I wouldn't miss it, but I did. I still do. Even if it hurts after awhile, I'd rather dance than not, and it's a painful truth. Maybe that's just how the truth works though; it's painful and powerful. Probably because you're not expecting it.

Last weekend before the grind, gonna have fun in the cold sunshine!

I think William Shakespeare was the wisest human being I ever heard of. To be perfectly frank, though, that's not saying much. Nothing happening still, just writing my PLA and listening to music, occasionally drawing. I'm almost finished going through my conservatory piano book (!) and they're all for concert-level pieces. I thought I would have lost the ability to play or sight read but I guess not, thank goodness. Otherwise this week would be super boring, but i still have the complete works of Shakespeare to keep me company and apparently a treasure tomb of history books, all of which I can use for my essay. Seriously, yes, that bored. Writing my essay on my week off - but at least I'm making good headway? Oh well, back to the piano I go - I'm done with all the mozart, I guess I'll move on to chopin? Who knows, we'll see!

“The wealthiest person is poorest at times when compared to the one with the beautiful mind.”

—	Three Melancholy Gypsies, Beautiful Mind

Until now, I'd forgotten my password for this blog. So this post has...everything in 3 years. Or at least everything that's either digital, or I saved. I don't know how much more I'll actually update this, but we'll see. Who knows, maybe come summer I'll use it more, who knows! So in no particular order I have examples of my graphic design in posters, CD posters, CD design and some information graphics. Oh, and a coffee cup sleeve, that I love. If you want to check out the full portfolio go to fiona.carbonmade.com