John 15:4-6

I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

That's why we spent so many Sundays scrawling memory verses on card stock -- so that they would return to us as truths, as we fatten on Fruit Roll-Ups

log: the (previously) unexamined life

is still worth living(?). But there would be no record of it.

do judge me

It's been four weeks of breaking promises to my dad that I'd blog about Ireland. Thus I present a formula for a day in the life of an intern granola thief at hparc -- not too many variables.

At 07:03 (on the 24-hr system now), old friend Apple harp arpeggio interrupts some richly embroidered dream, and I lurch towards phone. To aid in transition to wakefulness, I exhaust each app under social tab of its little red circle (that's a new habit, too -- no more 41 unreads). I don't contribute to snapchat, instagram, wechat, etc., but I study them. I see you seeing my "seen at"s from the edges. 

Clang around in kitchen: take great pleasure in varying the degree to which egg yolks solidify. Eat breakfast fit for Otto von Bismarck, then erase it with Listerine. Listerine usage is a tiny, visible accomplishment worth mentioning. Wrestle with CC cream, which refuses to adhere evenly to my forehead; consequently avoid getting too close to co-workers lest they notice.

Trek to work in three sections: posh, bricky Ballsbridge to Merrion Square (noteworthy locales: Schoolhouse Hotel Bar Restaurant, Howl at the Moon: nightclub frequented by Dublin Googlers with hammered brass doors, Eurospar with trashy headline rack and free wifi) WOW I'm already bored of my voice never genuine am in awe of some profound short posts tumbled elsewhere basically all I do these days is become distracted at home at office in before the shoddy pianos cook to make up for it eat my Euros too and read Jane Eyre for vocab botox/just to report that I did I know how ridiculous I'm being I have so much but fail to repay my debts and the act of writing hurts and I'm too lazy to finish it now read between these lines what have I become

help, God

what am I becoming

(things I say to a known audience, with the intention of looking back in eight weeks with a known answer) (cue Apple harp arpeggio: still a major key)

rummaging and voof: something worth 100 points

even fb photos yellow with time

Too precious of a Prezi to stack 

on virtual Google Drive shelf. 

Proof that plumpest coconuts come 

from collaboration of two cuckoo-nuts, 

my dear Julianne and my unclear thelf...  

Permit the glorby of May 2013 to present our final project of yore, "The Stoddard Temple" (such a jurby title):

The English writer Aldous Huxley once said: “After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.” When people haven’t been able to find fitting words, they communicate their visceral struggles and triumphs in a less-thinkingly way. After all, the slide of a pitch conveys as much as a sigh; and the rise and fall of a melodic line is as opportune for insight as the texts that we read. The authors of these books spoke effectively, but Julianne and I set out authoring a new translation of these well-loved words. Song persists when words falter; to this idea we linked the human spirit, which carries on even when the containers cannot.

Each work from second semester was ripe for musical interpretation, so we constructed an essay of songs, with three bulky “body paragraphs”. In some way, each book supports our simple assumption that the human spirit will “keep on truckin’” when it encounters friction. From The Great Gatsby, we found that sacrifices kept dreams alive. The Grapes of Wrath introduced the idea of an oversoul, which is the masses melding into a great machine of their own when heated. The Things They Carried confirms that the lost live on when stories are shared. The commonality is continuation: humanity as a whole does not break or regress. Just as Ma Joad encouraged Tom, “You done good once. You can do it again” (383), mankind will never lose its capacity for goodness, perfection, honor.... making things right. American voices told these stories, because even the land of the free gave many reason to weep. How Americans have responded to sorrow and setbacks throughout history is a show of our tenacity.

It was easy to bridge glorious music and glorious stories; the lyrics of our favorite songs aligned themselves with the themes without any tweaking. Whatever emotion we drew from the text, we poured into each recording. It would have been amusing to watch us at this sort of no-connection-left-behind work. We would settle into a quiet corner with the book and punctuate the silence with “Eureka!” when struck by a similarity between the words on the page and a certain song. “Eureka!”, I declared five times to my family, as we watched Les Miserables together. We would then go about the oft-grueling process of recording (“Sorry for sneezing!”), and eventually implemented each song clip into a coherent “essay” using the online tool Prezi. Because of this project, our minds were constantly attuned to the sound waves around us, and our brains were busy close-reading the lyrics as they would a passage. English class - a quest for understanding! - gave us a set of chisels to be used on every form of expression.

Sheep we are not, you see, because we were led by our own wants. We wanted to make music, so we scoured our books for song-able substance. Normally for us, English and music existed in separate spheres: English-thinking stayed at school, and music was for the afternoons. This project became their happy union. These two “mediums” have the same intentions, so they harmonized quite well in their answering of the essential question.

What was once ineffable will hopefully be made clear as it passes through the ear.

Samuel, your free trial has come to a close

It's been one long, wonderful quarrel my bo

As you ironed your shirt for Thursday evening's graduation ceremony, you had quite a lot to report regarding my academic aimlessness. Indeed, we can't afford my confusion. But I persist in my patternless pursuits, because... Because. Read on.

You chose this quote by Ayn Rand for to accompany your senior portrait: "Every man builds his world in his own image. He has the power to choose, but no power to escape the necessity of choice." In semi-contrast, Allison Chan -- whose portrait sits directly beneath yours in the yearbook -- quoted Proverbs 19:21: "Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand." Rand's point rests on self-centeredness and indomitable will, while the proverb preaches self-awareness: the image-bearer's submission and relative position to God. What's your stance?

Try both ways of living, and decide. As you have done, share your rigid ambition with me, and I will likewise dispense serendipity. In yet another year brimming with opportunity, let us "commit to the Lord whatever [we] do, and he will establish [our] plans" (Proverbs 16:3). Input, output -- how sublime a resolution of the philosophies and truths we find irreconcilable.   

feast of frissons

Khánh H. Lê captures the Asian-American potluck perfectly in collage. From the china cabinet and mismatched chairs to the Pepsi can and backward cap... Such a scene used to run on repeat for the Breck and Chue households.

Shahzia Sikander, the best discovery of the semester. Whether large-scale or miniature, her works feature an incredible density of information. I like it when struggle is effortlessly presented. Sikander at work: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qWI8VinqU0

張大千, Zhang Daqian: Sichuan-born impressionist-expressionist who left in 1949 to work in places as near and dear as Carmel, CA. Japanese training is evident. What colors must mark his soul...! Below, his snow. See Google's tribute: http://www.google.com/doodles/zhang-daqians-112th-birthday

Ingres blurs just enough to undermine photorealism: a defense of drawing in the days of daguerreotype. 

 Endless points of interest: Damian Elwes, peeking into the workspaces of Picasso and Calder (the mobile guy). Others: http://www.damianelwes.com/#/contemporary-studios/

may 3 / shannia and gloria / piano duets

So happy to have undertaken this crazy little project with Shannia Fu, my old-new friend (click each title to listen to our performance, if you'd like). Steven Osborne's thoughts on collaborating with Paul Lewis on the Schubert piano duets and general four-handedism can be found both here and right here:

"Then there is the problem of timing. Piano notes have a very percussive start, which means that it is exceptionally hard for two players to make chords sound together - any discrepancy of more than one or two hundredths of a second is audible. This can be a serious headache for music which needs rhythmic flexibility." 

Thank you, Shannia, for teaching me teamwork.

Debussy, Petite Suite
Debussy had just emerged from studenthood when he composed the Petite Suite for four hands. Still settling into into a sound of his own, the composer pays homage to fellow Frenchmen with each movement. The first, “En Bateau,” cascades along a very Debussian whole-tone scale, but the protracted melody suggests intervention via imagination by Gabriel Fauré. The second movement, “Cortège,” carries on with a comicality characteristic of Bizet. Both movements are musical translations of poems of the same name by Paul Verlaine, Debussy’s favorite poet.

The final stanza of “En Bateau” reads:
Cependant la lune se lève / Meanwhile the moon sheds its glow
Et l'esquif en sa course brève / On the skiff’s brief course below,

File gaîment sur l'eau qui rêve. / Gaily riding the dream-like flow.

From textual and musical input, let the mind draw what pictures it will.

inhabiting a "Watteau-and-Fragonard landscape"

The cheerful “Cortège” involves a fine lady, her attendant, and an ape. As they promenade through Paris, the attendant and ape alternately sneak peeks up their lady’s skirt, resulting in an irresistible “skippiness” of melody. Pouches of conversation, evidenced in bass-treble echoes, punctuate the procession.

“Menuet” (Gloria’s favorite) and “Ballet” (Shannia’s jam) bear no connection to Verlaine’s poetry. “Menuet” is marked by moments of pleasant accessibility: certain harmonies follow the standard four-chord recipe for catchiness. Listen for the ceremonial drumming of gnomes. The “Ballet” is as insistent as it is idiosyncratic, with a pointy theme that slips seamlessly into a waltz (one once meant for humans, but overtaken by elephants). 

Shannia and I, being non-French, had in mind various scenarios involving sharks “in boat” and tinkling Christmas bells. We hope that the mingling of intended and intuited images inspires a few original impressions of your own.

Rachmaninov, 6 Pieces
Rachmaninov enables us to reminisce about our Russian piano teachers: Rosina Tenenbaum and Olya Katsman, mother and daughter, who lived on opposite sides of the same magnolia-lined road.

In his reminiscences, Rachmaninov wrote: 'All my life I have taken pleasure in the differing moods and music of gladly chiming and mournfully tolling bells. This love for bells is inherent in every Russian. One of my fondest childhood recollections is associated with the four notes of the great bells in the St. Sophia Cathedral of Novgorod, which I often heard when my grandmother took me to town on church festival days.'

Indeed, the “Barcarolle” and “Romance” ring with bellish resonance; the primo embellishes the secondo’s song. Both long in that rounded Rachmaninov way for resolution, climbing toward naught but a vesper resignation. The “Scherzo” and “Waltz” are kin in time signature and temper. “Scherzo” skids up and down the keyboard, and in an out of tonalities; musical motives similar to those in the film Anastasia add special color to the “Waltz.” Neither movement is truly sane.

Schubert, 2 Marches caractéristiques, D.968b
Schubert was 5’1” and therefore shorter than both of us. It is fitting that such a compact little man should compose such a compact little piece. When played in succession, the two marches are hard to distinguish -- the second, however, is far more adventurous in tonality, often “correcting” itself from B back to C. A lot of piano-banging is to ensue... Perhaps the sentiment behind these two “characteristic” marches is similar to that of “Bang Bang,” by Arianna Grande et al. Enjoy!

they don't think it be like it is but it do / doo doo doo

On Sunday, I played three pieces; presented three pictures; and met three (times two) damp eyes, which proved each effort worthwhile. Thank you, God, for providing.

bemoaning the rogue dress strap

Fantasia & Fugue in a minor, BWV 944

Bach composed this harpsichord piece upon his return to Weimar in 1708. The fantasia consists of eighteen blocked chords upon which the performer is free to improvise. A majestic E Major chord, the dominant, ushers in an unbroken braid of sixteenth notes in three voices. The subject undergoes transformations of tonality and character as it is passed between the hands.
I love Bach best for two reasons: when I was younger, I played Bach so badly that I failed three times over five years to qualify for the Berkeley Junior Bach Festival; the time spent reversing my misunderstanding created an appreciation for the richness, cleanliness, and often jazziness of his works. Secondly, upon finishing both liturgical and secular compositions, Bach inscribed the initials S. D. G.: Soli Deo gloria -- all glory to God.

Piano Sonata no. 15 in D Major, Op. 28 ‘Pastorale’
Most may know Beethoven’s famous ‘Moonlight’ Sonata No. 14; after moonlight comes the dawn. Sonata No. 15 -- which unfurls in meandering, bucolic waves -- is perhaps the mildest of the piano sonatas. Critics praised Beethoven’s atypical avoidance of “over-tension,” nevertheless marveling at the piece’s “never monotonous identity.”
Indeed, his harmonies seldom stagnate: from the first few bars of the first movement, the persistent D in the bass -- dundundun, dundundun -- is overlaid with a bizarre secondary dominant; the chords waft on pastoral winds. Beethoven, after all, never indulges expectation. The exposition’s first few musical ideas, “classical” enough, swell into a romantic, Schubert-like chorale that is reminiscent of a “whispering forest.” The development elaborates upon a long-short-short particle that telescopes over its 33 measures of repetition, culminating in a mountain of f# minor (at last some semblance of Beethoven!). And as swiftly as it arrives, the tension dissipates with the recapitulation.

Midd, midd -- I played for you

The second movement was Beethoven’s favorite among the four, and also my reason for choosing this sonata. lf it were a man, it would be the most appealing kind of fellow: a philosophical figure, puttering through a cobblestone square, his thoughts circulating visibly. His promenade is punctuated by a D-Major palate-cleanser: a duet between duplets and triplets; horns and a flute; beggars and birds. With that in mind, the philosopher strolls on, and variations on the theme -- his balanced thoughts -- spiral toward a reverent prayer.
Rurality returns with the third movement, a dainty/declarative break from leisurely tempi. The ‘Trio’ section, told in a minor key, consists of a single motive in the treble that is repeated over eight sets of harmony -- masterful and musical management on Beethoven’s part.
The murmuring of shepherd’s bagpipes heralds the Rondo, which is ABACAB-coda in form: I see this sequence of scenes: shepherds lolling on a hillside (Battell Beach in autumn, or whenever it’s most green); flowing water; birds in conversation; sudden banging of Beethovenian hammer; return of shepherds; skipping stones; Bach-like clockwork into thunderstorm; return of shepherds and water, flowers propagating pollen. He concludes with an obnoxious, cadentially-conclusive sneeze: either “Ah, choo!” or “So, there!”

Bach, Beethoven, Chopin

Nocturne No. 13 in c minor, Op. 48 No. 1
By the time he completed the two Nocturnes Op. 28 in the autumn of 1841, Chopin had already been diagnosed with tuberculosis, which led to his death at 39. Perhaps this accounts for a portion (but only a portion) of Nocturne No. 13’s emotional content: German pianist Theodor Kullak noted that “the design and poetic contents of this nocturne make it the most important one that Chopin created; the chief subject is a masterly expression of a great powerful grief."
Chopin tells the story in three elements: Lento, Poco più lento, and Doppio movimento. Unlike his other Nocturnes, which by the third element have returned to the mood of the first, No. 13 builds in intensity (and sadly for me, difficulty). The Doppio movimento has an “almost Beethovenian ethical ring" -- it is a sermon in sound.
I first heard this nocturne performed by my friend Misha Galant in California, and was smitten (with the piece) from the first listen. Misha linked his performance of Nocturne Op. 48 No. 1 to Hans Christian Andersen’s short story “The Little Match-Seller,” and I shall also relate the tale:
A little girl lights her own wares to keep warm on winter’s night. Visions of her grandmother -- the only one who ever loved her -- and Christmas trees illumine the night. To sustain them, the little match-seller strikes every match, and they swell into a great golden conflagration. She freezes to death when the matches run out. Her soul is carried to heaven by her grandmother, away from ice and an empty belly.
Listen for it: Chopin’s grief, the match-seller’s misery, and my own desperation, overlapping on the keyboard and vanishing into air.

coming soon to theatres

three days' time shall bring a return to writing....

Konzerthallen!

edited by my dear professor, FF!

Ich habe nicht realisiert, dass die Einstellung des Konzerts so wichtig ist. Wenn man ins Konzert geht, nimmtman direkt an der Leistung teil: man ist ein Gefäß für den Schall. Also denken Architekten an das Publikum,wenn sie die Konzertsäle entwerfen. Vorher haben Musikhörer diskutiert, ob Toningenieure die Proliferation des Schalls berechnen können. Vielen Menschen glauben, dass Musik die Wissenschaft transzendiert; aber Versuche Musik zu messen unterstützt die Idee, dass Musik auf wissenschaftliche Partikel stützt. Im Jahr 1895 hatte der Physiker Wallace C. Sabine den problematischen Hörsaal Fogg Museums analysiert, und er fand, dass sogar die Sitzkissen den Schall beeinflussen. Zufälligerweise habe ich Fogg Museum heute besucht, und ich dachte, dass der Hörsaal sehr resonant war. Zwei andere Ideen des Artikels interessieren mich: wenn Menschen Musik in den Straßen hören, machen sie natürlich einen Kreis um die Musiker herum; deshalbmöchten vielen Architekten dieses Phänomen in ihre Entwürfe der Konzertsäle integrieren. Ich sehe die Wirkungin Davies Symphony Hall und Bing Auditorium (zwei Konzerthäle in Silicon Valley); beide haben keine parallelen Flächen, nur runden Wände. Ich kenne diese Konzertsäle, weil ich in ihrer Nähe wohne. Die anderefaszinierende Idee des Artikels ist, dass Architektur innerhalb von drei Dimensionen passieren muss, aber Musikin vier Dimensionen funktioniert/ existiert. Deshalb müssen Architekten der Konzertsäle räumliche und zeitliche Überlegungen vereinen.

the most beautiful little bidding

In German, bitten means to ask. Ich bitte, du bittest, er bitt.
And bitt/biet evolved into bid. Ah, the musical things we learn at Midd...

Send Me A Leaf, by Bertolt Brecht, three times so you won't forget it

Send me a leaf, but from a bush
That grows at least one half hour
Away from your house, then
You must go and will be strong, and I
Thank you for the pretty leaf.

Next, the version scrawled by my (once) S:
Send me a leaf, but from a little tree
That grows no nearer your house

Than half an hour away. For then
You will have to walk, you will get strong
and I
shall thank you for the pretty leaf.

(I like this translation much, much better. Seems to be more solicitous a love)

And of course, auf Deutsch (the language that further distances pre-Middlebury loved ones):
Schicke mir ein Blatt, doch von einem Strauche

Der nicht näher als eine halbe Stunde
Von deinem Haus wächst, dann
Musst du gehen und wirst stark, und ich
bedanke mich für das hübsche Blatt.

P.S. Heidegger and Arendt. A love story, a friendship story:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/27569287?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

seemingly semiotic: two reader responses

no matter what, I'm only ever saying to you
what has already been said.

2/16: To acknowledge the author of a text is to attach an authority to it. The notion that meaning may be ascertained according to the will of its presenter -- the author -- invites the rebuttal of Roland Barthes, author (or rather, writer, owner, or dictator) of “The Death of the Author” and “From Work to Text.” In the first essay, Barthes transfers responsibility and credit from the writer of a work to its reader; in the second, he differentiates between the work (the tangible text, the gravity- and establishment-obeying component of a text) and the text (the dormant dimension that requires reader production). Put neatly by Barthes, “the work can be held in the hand, the text is held in language, only exists in the movement of a discourse." 

Barthes writes that giving a text an Author “[imposes] a limit on that text," subjecting it to absolute interpretation. Is it not more comfortable and valuable to turn to the Author, the arranger of past thoughts and experiences into a bouquet (flowers borne from previous flowers, but which are nevertheless unique flowers), for truth? For a truth that may elaborated/improvised upon by the reader? That “a text’s unity lies not in its origin but in its destination” does resonate with me; yet Barthes’s criticism calls for the emptying of the reader: “the reader is without history, biography, psychology."

What distinguishes the Text from its Work is, apparently, “its subversive force in respect of the old classifications.” Does this mean that the Text evades all labels and definition? Attempts to impose a single meaning onto a Text are futile. The Text’s “plural” identity draws from Barthes the words of a previously-possessed man: “‘My name is Legion: for we are many’” (Mark 5:9, 1329). How do Barthes’s musings, which so clearly challenge absolutes, apply to and undermine monotheistic beliefs? Then, Barthes describes the discourse that occurs in the “methodological field” between reader and writer, proposing that unconscious, “bored” consumption of a text is a result of one’s reluctance to “produce the text, open it out, set it going." Like a music score, the work remains dormant until it is “completed," not merely expressed, by the performer.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2/24: What Heidegger presents in “Language” is a reversal of order. Man speaks language into being, like God his creation; rather, language speaks man into being. What use arises from shuffling man and language, A and B (what was the consequence of “man speaks language” -- C -- to begin with?). Heidegger dissuades us from seeking out a “generally useful view of language that will lay to rest all further notions about it” (986) and claims that “we do not want to get anywhere. We would like only, for once, to get to just where we are already.” Where we “are,” perhaps, is that place of “being,” escaping the endless conversion of past to future for the usually unsticky present. By thinking of our thoughts as by-products of the speech once attributed to them, do we draw closer to that state of simply being, where “we leave the speaking to language” (986).

If man and his world are the products of language, this must mean that language preceded man in existence. From where, then, did language originate? Proponents of language-preceding-man assent that “the word of language is of divine origin” (987). Thus, God begot word; word begot man. Heidegger accepts this answer for the sake of liberating the “question of origin” from logical “fetters” (987), and consults what he considers the purest form of speech: the poem. Apparently, poetry best captures the interplay between what we think and what language tells us. But poems are the most meticulously planned and precise presentations of language -- why does Heidegger consider that which was creatively crafted and manipulated by its producer to be the best representative of language’s control over man?

one month of German, not to be topped

~ Felix & Theo's Tödlicher Schnee, a book for German learners, inspired this insipid thing. To be clear, I am a detective called Helmut, not a frog. All songs were reproduced on a dinky keyboard and belted out in haste.

~ A little essay about my dream city, Gulangyu, China's "Island of Music/City of Pianos."
Die Eltern meiner Mutter kommen aus Xiamen, einer südchinesische Stadt in der Fujian Provinz. Weil Fujian in Südchina ist, sie ist wärmer und schöner als andere Provinzen, und die Luft ist frischer. Vom Sommer bis Winter ist das Wetter sehr schwül. Xiamen liegt entlang dem Südchina Meer, und man hat immer einen Blick auf das Meer. Nicht zu weit vom Xiamens Ufer, zwischen China und Taiwan, ist eine kleine, grüne Inselstadt. Sie heißt Gulangyu, und sie ist meine Traumstadt.

Gulangyu hat eine große Fußgängerzone -- man darf nicht Auto, Motorrad und Roller fahren, nur zu Fuß gehen oder segeln. Deshalb sind die Straße so schmal wie Nudeln. Kinder tragen nur Unterwäsche und laufen durch die schmalen Nudelstraßen, und alten Omas jagen sie. Wenn sie müde werden, sie können unter den Palmen liegen und sich erholen (es gibt so viele Palmen, dass die Sonne verdeckt ist). Dann kann man geheimnisvolle Klaviermusik hören, denn in jedem Haus der Gulangyu Insel gibt es mindestens ein Klavier. Weil Gulangyu so viele Klaviers hat, sind die Spitznamen der Gulangyu Insel “Die Insel der Musik” und “Die Stadt der Klaviers.”

Gulangyu ist auch eine besondere internationale Insel. Es gibt Hotels und Botschaften in jeder Straße. An der Kreuzung von den Nudelstraßen ist ein farbenreicher Markplatz. Hier kann man tropischen Obst, Musiknoten und internationale Souvenirs kaufen. Später kann man mit Freunden die Schätzen genießen.

with my mama in Gulangyu, 2010

talking to myself

On the last day of our Middlebury orientation trip, we were told to write ourselves a letter, to be delivered at the start of the next term. It's strange to see how consistent I am with my pre-college self, but I'm also a bit disappointed to find that many of my post-trip convictions have since faded. Tomorrow night, we reunite.

Lake Dunmore
September 8th, 2014

Dear Gloria,
I'm writing to you from beneath a skinny sapling on the shore of Lake Dunmore, half in sun, half in shade. I'm at my most 三八阿花: Taiwanese hat on backward to prevent sunburn of neck; round glasses on because I was too grubby to pop in contacts this morning. It's been three days since I've showered, and my thighs are sliced like honeyed hams by scratches from the cornfield. Spread out across the grass carpet are my Midview comrades (Dylan closest, Ernesto and Ashley on benches, Heather and Lizzy browning on a blanket, Amosh and Ariana in repose, Elissa and Nikki in straight sun, Julia on a baby peninsula with a tree), ones that I hope to see again, that I hope will want to know me again, too.

It's amazing what 72 hours can do to total strangers, each representing a personality previously formed; that our eclectic pod of people could go from silence in the van to howling Adele, that we'd know the degrees to which the other's feet were dirtied and not mind twinge. We admire each other. Leaders just reunited... Some kids just walked by, ascertaining strawberry milk's origins, and an old lady on a bench with a book converses with a woman in green.

I wonder if, by now, you've returned to the Bridport Central School to make more signs, or help in the music class that you longed to fix (you haven't), if you've begun a MESH-like project with Su Lian Tan and Community Engagement (ditto), and if you can bust out a few German words (ja Mann!). I wonder if you've begun to have confidence in your gentle character, strength in your shyness, and persistence in your pursuits.

I hope that you have held fast to Jesus, that you will never forget or shove aside his never-ending grace and love, and that you will pray for those that have, especially S. If your heart is broken, I hope that you fight for a friendship to mend it; if it remains loyal to him, I hope that you will love and support him with wisdom, as I hope you have done already, never losing yourself in him but instead trusting in God's plan for you both.

If you have lost contact with Catherine, Nova, Sarah, Trio, Sabrina, Shereen, Vivian, or Julianne, please write them something beautiful, and pray for them as they embark on their respective adventures. Meanwhile, cherish the new friends you've made at Midd, remembering to greet them brightly per Lizzy's advice.

Write on blog frequently, and check all of Dad's emails; find a job to support Mom and Dad as they have yourself. Assure Bobo that a purposeful college admission lies ahead, and relate your own once miserable situation and now happy resolution.

Be kind, be bold; be inquisitive, be open. Ask much and do more. Wring this college for every droplet it has, with unrelenting and uncanny determination and energy. Re-cast the Middlebury mold. Run with determination this race set before you, going two miles where everyone goes one.

Have faith and love, and love,
Gloria Breck, past.
When future becomes present...

Boy, I really like myself... I seldom speak so warmly to anyone else!

to a pea of the pod

with you, I dance in perfect time

Hey, vivacious. You've taught me what it means to be both tenacious and gracious. Few can withstand so gracefully the pressures that you did and still do. You soar above the silver lining, gesturing with enthusiasm toward those beauties that evade us, the colorblind; out-chuckling others' sad, sarcastic snickers; baring your heart's fanciful flights and flickers so honestly. You don't fear people like the rest of us do; you vivify them.

There's a certain species of moment that I miss the most: a summer afternoon in the living room of my old house, us languishing on the couch much in the manner of Daisy Buchanan and Jordan Baker, listening to Kapustin and then your Scherzo. You had your signature polka-dotted pants on. Another time, in mid-January, right before the audition that always corresponded with your birthday: we closed our eyes and recited our pieces in our heads, waited patiently for the other to "wake," then took turns as each other's live audience. That's a world stuck somewhere in space-time that only you and I will remember.

Some wordy words from À la recherche du temps perdu: "The very memory of the piano falsified still further the perspective in which he saw the elements of music, that the field open to the musician is not a miserable stave of seven notes, but an immeasurable keyboard (still almost entirely unknown) on which, here and there only, separated by the thick darkness of its unexplored tracts, some few among the millions of keys of tenderness, of passion, of courage, of serenity, which compose it, each one differing from all the rest as one universe differs from another, have been discovered by a few great artists who do us the service, when they awaken in us the emotion corresponding to the theme they have discovered, of showing us what richness, what variety lies hidden, unknown to us, in that vast, unfathomed and forbidding night of our soul which we take to be an impenetrable void."

Of tenderness, of passion, of courage, of serenity. At the keyboard or away, you chisel these from the fray of formal notation. To the endlessly inspiring Vivian Wang: may your nineteenth year be marked by even purer tenderness, deeper passion, greater courage, and truer serenity. Love you, forever! 

cultural history of the piano, in colored pencil

“The piano keys are black and white / but they sound like a million colors in your mind,” wrote Maria Cristina Mena. But they do more than merely sound.