today is a good day

this research on arranged marriage is really intriguing...did you know that over 60% of marriages world-wide are arranged? they seem to have high success rates as well–but of course, we don't know that that necessarily means they are "happy." divorce is much more stigmatized, i believe, in countries where arranged marriage is widely practiced. and there is obviously a whole cultural attitude that goes hand in hand with arranged marriage, namely an expectation of how much effort you are going to put in to make the union work (but maybe this is something we can learn from?).

i am waiting on a book from interlibrary loan (come on library system, i have a first draft due soon!) called first comes marriage, by reva seth, in which she interviews hundreds of women in arranged marriages and assesses the values that they encompass. the book should be really interesting, as it's supposed to not only discuss why many arranged marriages are happy, but how westerners can rethink how they approach marriage and partner compatibility in their own "love matches."

i am also waiting for WARM WEATHER to arrive, but today it should be a high of 52 (yayyyy) and tonight i am going to dinner with my cousins to celebrate cousin doug's girlfriend's birthday. i went to marshalls and old navy yesterday and bought new yoga pants and sweatshirts so after doing some more google searching on arranged marriage, i'm heading outside to take advantage of the first visible signs of spring. so today is going to be a good day.

how to be married

well, i have no idea how to do so, really. but last semester i wrote a research paper about american marriage and divorce, and this semester i am writing a research paper about arranged marriage in india, and american perspectives on it. so i guess i'm thinking a lot about marriage these days.

no, wait a minute. let's see…the subject of my senior thesis in college was laughter, sexuality and marriage in jane austen. so okay. clearly there has been a theme for awhile here. but i promise, i'm not trying to get married this year or something. i just worry about marriage as this possible looming thing in my future, sometimes. so either i am a typical young woman thinking about what marriage means, or else i've just seen so many bad marriages that i'm always thinking about what makes good ones.

and i have seen good ones (thank God). but how do they do it? what are they made up of? and is academia really the best way to figure them out? thoreau would give me some bull about life experience being the ultimate teacher, but that man really pushes my buttons so i'm not about to take advice from him.

no, i believe in being in doing the research beforehand. being an informed citizen. asking friends, family, and i guess making research projects based around the question of how people are happy together all over the world.

also, did you know that women do not want men that smell bad, or who are not well-groomed? yup. it's all here, on an indian matchmaking website my professor gave me for my research project, www.shadi.com. read all about what men and women want.

quality voice-acting

i've noticed that i have about three main stock-accents that i go to, whenever i imitate people. i have:

• the high-pitched, throaty banshee voice that i use to imitate my mother and aunts
• the low-vowels-in-the-back-of-the-throat drawl for imitating people who i think are acting stupid
• the purposefully fake, british accent for people who i think are affected

sometimes it has been pointed out to me that the person whom i am, in fact, imitating, doesn't really sound anything like my voice, but the point is, it is their essence.

i am available for hire for cartoons and radio informercials.

february and it is coooooold in pittsburgh. but the snow is falling, and my heart feels cheerful, if stressed and sleepy (how possible?). i have a job interview to prepare for, tons of homework to do, have had a stressful and dramatic past week or so, but i've also had good days recently, and i keep my eyes fixed on the days ahead, when surely spring will come.

i also started doing yoga again, and have tried to manufacture spring in my apartment by buying some nice house plants. it's not quite phipp's conservatory, but it's a start.

if i sit long enough and meditate on it, can i call the spring back sooner with my thoughts?

caroline washburn wells

this is the story of my great-grandmother, caroline washburn wells.

my great-aunt virginia told me this story two summers ago, so i don't have all of the details, but i hope it's true enough, because i love this story. the story is this: all my life, growing up on mt. riga, and at home in brewster, there were dozens of paintings hung on the walls of every cabin, and they were done by my great-grandmother. all my life i have been surrounded by them. beautiful paintings, some portraits of the family, but many more of the mountain itself, sweeping landscapes of the fields, glimpses of the still lake through a netting of curved tree branches, vivid flowers, and one of my favorites which hangs on my wall: her own cabin, with the famous "h. h. wells" sign displayed proudly in front. she liked to sign these with her name in block letters, or else, which i liked much better, with her initials layered on top of each other in boxy lettering: two big "C"s on top of an even bigger "W." it was an impressive statement.

these have been so much a part of the fabric of my childhood and of the mountain, that i always just assumed that they had been done over a half-century, part of a longtime legacy of mrs. caroline washburn wells. well, they were not.

my great-aunt virginia says this: great-grandmother never painted until the last part of her life. she never knew, in fact, that she could paint. when caroline was growing up, she had a sister who was the artist of the family, whom i believe went to an art school in fact (this sister is the one who married into the lippencott branch of the family, if i'm not mistaken–can anyone verify?). caroline did not go to art school, and did not think she could paint.

well, she was married to my great-grandfather, henry hubbard wells I and they had six children and they lived in brewster in the big casino house at the top of wells street. then at some point in her life, she went through a mental collapse, and went to whatever they called mental health clinics in those days. and it was there that she decided to take an art class. from that, the paintings just poured out of her. landscapes, still lifes, portraits, everything. she also did beautiful pottery, i believe, but i don't know when that began. but the point is, at that moment in her life when she probably felt like she had nothing left going for her, she discovered this amazing capacity for creation. so much so that the art she created was so prolific that someone of my generation felt it had been there all along.

i find it incredible that even through all of her anxiety and suffering, these images were inside her all the time, perhaps struggling to find a way out. we think we know ourselves fully, but her story reminds us that we only begin to understand the scope of our own potential.

so that is the story of my great-grandmother. if anyone knows any more about her, or about this story, please share with me so i can correct/add on to it.

life with marx

you know, we read a lot of marx in my cultural studies program, but the thing is, i still don't really like him. maybe this is unfair, but it seems to me that he was a bit hypocritical, in being so critical of the bourgeoisie while essentially living off the earnings of his business-owning friend, friedrich engels, since he was continually fired from all of his jobs (which, to be fair, was probably because he was so radical).

but i basically think of marx as this guy who's always over at your house because he can't find work or claims he is "hard at work" on the communist manifesto, and you come home from a long day of toil and care, and he's sitting on your couch, unshaven, in a ratty pair of sweatpants, watching TV and loudly complaining about how TV is the opiate of the masses. then he looks up and sees you, and asks you how your day was "conforming to the Man." then he pauses, and asks what's for dinner.

while i know this is a great generalization about marx's life, many people in my program agree that it's probably also a fair assessment about what life with him might have been like.