Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Accountability

Just trying to keep myself responsible and my tasks in order:
- CDPH Memo: POU for As/Nitrate Capital and O&M costs vs Bottled Water (due Thursday)
- Green Design: Finalize Materials Report, Start and finish Cost Estimate Report (due tomorrow)
- O. Chem: HW#4 due June 1, Report due June 9
- Water Quality: HW#4 due June 6, 10 page proposal due June 9

Today is May 24...

Help me climb this mountain, don't let me fall.

Saturday, May 14, 2011

Let the waves crash...

Taken from a post by a Redditor named GSnow:
Alright, here goes. I'm old. What that means is that I've survived (so far) and a lot of people I've known and loved did not. I've lost friends, best friends, acquaintances, co-workers, grandparents, mom, relatives, teachers, mentors, students, neighbors, and a host of other folks. I have no children, and I can't imagine the pain it must be to lose a child. But here's my two cents.

I wish I could say you get used to people dying. I never did. I don't want to. It tears a hole through me whenever somebody I love dies, no matter the circumstances. But I don't want it to "not matter". I don't want it to be something that just passes. My scars are a testament to the love and the relationship that I had for and with that person. And if the scar is deep, so was the love. So be it. Scars are a testament to life. Scars are a testament that I can love deeply and live deeply and be cut, or even gorged, and that I can heal and continue to live and continue to love. And the scar tissue is stronger than the original flesh ever was. Scars are a testament to life. Scars are only ugly to people who can't see.

As for grief, you'll find it comes in waves. When the ship is first wrecked, you're drowning, with wreckage all around you. Everything floating around you reminds you of the beauty and the magnificence of the ship that was, and is no more. And all you can do is float. You find some piece of the wreckage and you hang on for a while. Maybe it's some physical thing. Maybe it's a happy memory or a photograph. Maybe it's a person who is also floating. For a while, all you can do is float. Stay alive.
In the beginning, the waves are 100 feet tall and crash over you without mercy. They come 10 seconds apart and don't even give you time to catch your breath. All you can do is hang on and float. After a while, maybe weeks, maybe months, you'll find the waves are still 100 feet tall, but they come further apart. When they come, they still crash all over you and wipe you out. But in between, you can breathe, you can function. You never know what's going to trigger the grief. It might be a song, a picture, a street intersection, the smell of a cup of coffee. It can be just about anything...and the wave comes crashing. But in between waves, there is life.

Somewhere down the line, and it's different for everybody, you find that the waves are only 80 feet tall. Or 50 feet tall. And while they still come, they come further apart. You can see them coming. An anniversary, a birthday, or Christmas, or landing at O'Hare. You can see it coming, for the most part, and prepare yourself. And when it washes over you, you know that somehow you will, again, come out the other side. Soaking wet, sputtering, still hanging on to some tiny piece of the wreckage, but you'll come out.

Take it from an old guy. The waves never stop coming, and somehow you don't really want them to. But you learn that you'll survive them. And other waves will come. And you'll survive them too. If you're lucky, you'll have lots of scars from lots of loves. And lots of shipwrecks.

Thursday, May 5, 2011

a fire in my soul

God, you've put a fire in my soul. With each and every person who's come into my life, you teach me a lesson, new or old.

I had another dream about my God father James Le again. It was like he had never left. I imagined him a little bit older, a little more lines on his face, the hair on his head a bit more thin.

It seems when I dream about him, it's because I am stressed out, or even fearful--afraid that I have taken the wrong path. Afraid that I had left my family and friends behind for too long, or perhaps, that I would just end up a failure. But those dreams I have are bittersweet medicine. I wake up with a twang in my heart from the longing of loved ones I can no longer be near, but I grow in courage, in resolve.

James taught me many lessons. Some of them were spoken, but the magnitude and direction of his life speaks mountains to me. It's a bit cheesy, but these are the words his life spoke to me:



Thanks, Pops, for the lessons and the courage to go on. I miss you, but we'll have our time again some day.

Monday, February 28, 2011

Changing the world

I think sometimes people get ahead of themselves, wanting to change the world and all. There's a lot going on in the world today--protests, revolutions, whatever you want to call them, triggered by economics, unjust institutions of power, etc.--and I think it's inspiring to many people.

I suppose when I say "sometimes people" what I really mean is "sometimes I." Because it's true. There was a time when I was younger when I realized changing the world means changing MY world--that my life has such a limited reach into any greater context. I want to see things change so bad, I want to be a harbinger of justice to everyone, but I have to remember who I am and what I believe to be justice. Live and die with dignity, decide on your own, but think critically, what exactly that means--it's the only way to change your world.