three done! is it just me, or is five finals in four days a little excessive? … no matter. i’m more than halfway through, even if the two most difficult are still to come.

tonite, in stark contrast to last nite which i spent wandering around dispiritedly and studying for my jews in europe and contemporary european film tests, i am going to be social. heather’s throwing a dinner party. i’m always up for being fed.

i have to admit i got a little carried away finishing my last jews in europe essay. it occurred to me that perhaps this is the last such class i will take, and after 13 years of education in the subject that’s no insignificant matter. i used the opportunity to blow off some steam in what i hope was a redemptively humorous fashion. then i slammed my pencil down and dashed from the room.

only two more to go.

as i wrote the english professor at my skool (who sent me [as part of a massmail list, not because i’m special] fifteen emails addressing me as “english major,” which is a terrific lie) i want this woman to come speak at swat. i’ve never been the most vocal fan of her novels. in fact, when i first read handmaid’s tale i got so angry i had to leave the restaurant. (i don’t recall why i was reading in a restaurant, although i do recall which one [tara thai in bethesda]; my mother raised me better than that) most likely it was my first exposure to feminism, and i mistook the critical satire for her own personal ideas. or maybe i was just at that innocent age when injustice could still incite. a couple years older, i read it again and loved it, though without the passionate that had attended my initial reaction.

it’s a cold book, as many of her books are cold. cat’s eye, the favorite of my 12th grade honors-english teacher, didn’t make me feel as much as it made me think. bluebeard’s egg repeated the same themes. robber bride i barely remember. blind assassin, which two of my dear friends bought for me last year, didn’t leave too deep an imprint, although i admired the idea, and frankly i’m not rushing out to devour more novels.

oh, but the lady’s poetry. oh but the words. if i find fault in her books, i can only stare and dribble at her writing. i keep selected works on my shelf — at the moment, it’s the only book of verse with me aside from the perennial portable dotty p..

this is procrastination. i have 2 finals tomorrow, and 2 more distributed over the 2 days after that. funny to think my blessed compatriots are all done. i must do something to stave off mopeyness. studying unfortunately doesn’t cut it.

once upon a time, i was quoted claiming to prefer monkeys to children, never wanted to be married or fantasized about my wedding day, hated the color pink and rarely wore heels, and laughed at the end of gone with the wind.

where did it all go?

not that i, like a good girl, sobbed when rhett gave scarlett that final and oft-repeated kiss off. the end left me entirely unaffected. but through other parts of the movie i was inexplicably in tears. as i have very little sympathy for the south as a matter of course, i can’t understand what wrung that water from me. i mean, sure, i starting weeping halfway through titanic when it first came out, and terms of endearment continues to get to me no matter how many times i see it, and don’t even ask about breaking the waves — but i figured those were abberations. i figured in general i’m a solid, atypical, astereotypical female. does falling in love, like giving birth, alter your hormonal structure? maybe love should come w/ a surgeon general’s warning, or at least a Nutrition Information + ingredients label.

stupid finals start tomorrow. stupid way to spend a last week in a sunny country. even if i am all raspberry-painted and pained.

another perk of [free] membership to the DFI: [free] internet, in this case as i wait for GWTW to begin. what type of people will show up, i wonder?

i went to meet the CBCBCs hoping-against-hope to develop the germ of a watch tan. the danish sun walloped me for underestimating it with a long, narrow glare down my left arm. my first burn of the season! it makes my arm look patriotic: white and red. but for all that it also hurts, so i’m not as gung-ho as i could be.

the gathering itself was fun. for the first hour and a half, ’twas just me and tinka (“please stop calling me webmistress: it sounds s&m-y”). she brought homemade bread and i bought cheese. the intended ritter sport dessert melted into nutella. i also contributed a six-pack, the first i’ve ever purchased myself. but i drank diet coke.

then rasmus and elizabeth showed up within seconds of each other, making four of us, one for each corner of the checkered blanket. we people-watched, commenting on the sunbathers, the bottle-collectors, the yappy dogs, and talked film. star wars dominated, of which i could say little, but tinka invited me to see it (in her case, again) with her on tuesday. i guess i must. if nothing else, it’s cultural currency.

i will resist the temptation to be maudlin (my last friday night in copenhagen! over!). it will not require tremendous effort because i’m riding high for no too-apparent reason. it’s gorgeous out, once again. so innocently, purely gorgeous that all those warnings your skeptical brain zaps you with (you’re being gullible — when you let your guard down, when you least expect it, BAM! tornado!) melt away. today is a goofy-smile day.

appropriately, i’m dashing out the door for an impromptu picnic/goofy-smile day celebration w/ tinka in the park where andrea and i enjoyed an impromptu picnic celebration of last day of classes yesterday. possibly other CBCBCs will be joining. i have magnetic field’s washington dc in my head from the superb side A of the mix ben made me. last nite at alburtsland we prepared a birthday party for a friend of andrea’s who played a Godot on us, much to andrea’s dismay. we ended up watching flashdance, a ridiculous 80s male-fantasy flick i’d never seen before. much fun. and i’ve been so ecstatic for ilana — and so glad i don’t have to spend the summer weakly intoning “poor thing” “there there” etc. — that i’ve been nearly dancing since she told me she’s 3 for 3. down with sympathy! up with success! it’s about damn time.

i wonder whether “torn” or “mixed” is the right word for what i’m feeling. “torn” brings up unwelcome memories of that not-even-written-by-her natalie umbruglia [sic cuz i’m too damn lazy] song. but “mixed” doesn’t hit the passionate note i’m striving for. i’d use “ambivalent,” referencing v. redgrave’s speech in girl, interrupted, which, if prompted, i could quote at length (“on the contrary, ambivalence implies very strong feelings indeed …”) but i think the connotative meanings would be lost on possibly the majority of folks who haven’t seen that movie. you slackers you.

my point of course is that it’s a beautiful day. and i mean by world standards. i mean indisputably. okay, maybe it’s a little too breezy, so even while sitting in the sunshine you must continue to readjust — pull sweatshirt on; push up sleeves; take sweatshirt off; repeat. but imperfection accentuates true perfection, like the age old example of cindy crawford’s mole. it’s a beautiful day. people are zipping by on their bikes, including, now, the fire-engine-red free ones. people are laughing. i wanted quite badly to blow off my last class — of this semester, of DIS, ever — and sit on the square with representatives of all of copenhagen and drink smirnoff ice while i can still buy it, hassle-free, and consume it in public. i want to walk around taking pictures of everything i’m going to miss. maybe i’ll do that this weekend. i don’t know whether i want to go home. on the other hand, i don’t know whether i want to stay.

on a more immediate, practical level, i don’t know whether i want to go see GWTW tomorrow at the dfi even if i can’t find accompaniment (should there be a g in that word?) oh the cruelty of indecision. i’m glad in some ways that, as to some things, i simply don’t have a choice.

in the spirit of collecting nostalgia, after i finished my paper with a flourish, i joined the girlz for dinner and tivoli. it’s this cultured, well-manicured amusement park in the middle of copenhagen, filled with pricey restaurants, silly game booths, outdoor theaters for very short silly shows, lots of lights, vendors, and rides. the usual, really, only more graceful. that it never changes is part of its charm. anne had gone twelve years ago and could still recollect where things were. i couldn’t compete with that: i’d gone two years ago, with jamie of course. but everything was as i remembered it. the handful of roller-coasters, the so-excellent fun house, the really intimidatingly huge Drop tower thingy i was too scared to go on then and too totally disinterested for now.

we watched the same shows even. the first, a pantomime, for which denmark is supposedly “world famous,” struck me as just as ridiculous this time around. it’s basically bad ballet. costumed types (the clown, the big-nosed miser, the sweet idealistic girl who wants to marry for love) hopping around in toe shoes, telling a story in exaggerated gestures. not even to particularly good music. the other is vaudeville in three acts: a cabaret singer, two contortionists, and two guys on unicycles. we laughed. but, along w/ the other old folks, anglo tourists, and kids in the audience, we enjoyed.

what else do i need to do before i go?

heh heh heh. this guy’s becoming my hero simply for being funny. i’ll believe anything anyone tells me so long as s/he makes me laugh in the during.

lana got into grinnell! = rockstar. and i just finished my last criminal justice class. teacher jeanne distributed fl�debollers (pronounced “marshmellowy goodness”), one of the many bits i will miss about this lovely country when i leave in nine days. … nine days! why are we wasting time with papers and finals? i’ll be forced to leave with so much salt licorice uneaten, so much hash unbought, so many royal family members unsaluted, so many CBCBC’s unmet …

another wednesday, another essay. i arrived at noon intending to start working (this one’s on Bergman and his midcentury modernist masterpiece Persona). instead i chatted with mel, found the bag of andrea’s books which she was panicked she’d lost, was hugged three times then taken out for unreasonably gooey pastry by andrea as a reward, read through the Guardian, selected siegfriend lenz’s the german lesson for future procrastination, and finished off the piece i’m submitting to DIS’s writing contest inspired by my conversation in the park with “monika” about dk, and politics, and dk politics, and the weather.

interesting issues being raised by the poem. is the implication that all intellectuals are sickened by the word “perky” wrong or offensive? should i change it so that a person or more people could relate [better] to it?

more generally i’m wondering whether/ to what extent a piece like this should be taken only to represent the author’s voice when it’s trying, at least on some level, to represent Womankind. what my responsibility is to try to please as much of Womankind as communicates their unease to me.

i’m intrigued by the folks from saudi arabia and iran who’ve trickled through here. please, leave a comment or sign the guestbook or email me, and give me a hint of how you happened by or what you think.

after an interesting conversation about body issues with miss lana and another with the young gentleman, who begged me not to get bogged down in same, i felt more or less well-vented. i also resolved to wear this green-and-floral polyester dress i’d bought at UFF a month ago. this morning, a staunch blue sky seemed to approve of my plan and i’ve been flitting around in the dress since, acruing much-needed compliments (“hey, is that a new shirt?”). i also got some refreshing grades back — another kind of external affirmation on which i shouldn’t be so reliant; but what are you going to do.

andrea asked me whether i write because i like what i write, or just because i have to. that struck me as such a strange question. i’m a contributor to the internet, the world’s largest vanity press, for the love of gaudi. we’re all mad here, at least about ourselves, at least in part. right?