Chubby Lumpkins

Chubby Lumpkins' once shining coat and flashing horn were dull now. He no longer shimmered through the trees and bushes of his home, no longer shone as he sat under the trees, no longer seemed like a ray of sunlight as he drank from the crystalline ponds and rivers of his home.

Chubby Lumpkins, as his name implied, was a rotund unicorn, an animal of wide girth. He wasn't born this way, oh no, when he was small he played as cheerfully and as nimbly as his other unicorn friends. But as he grew older, he played and ran less and less, slept and dreamed more and more. He loved to sleep, that Chubby Lumpkins, dreaming of beautiful princess who would brush his fur, comb his mane, and they would be the most beautiful friends all the other unicorns had ever seen. They would be jealous of his beauty and friendship. And he dreamt on.

One day while wandering, thinking the same thoughts he always thought, he went to drink from his favorite pond that he always drank from. He stretched out his neck to drink, filled with his thirst, and he suddenly saw an odd animal reflected in the waters. It was a grotesque pale horse-animal, drab and fat, balanced on stick-thin legs. He snapped his head back, surprised at the appearance of this hideous creature in his forest. But when the animal turned out to be himself, the one called Chubby Lumpkins, he was terrified. Had he been cursed, could unicorns be cursed? What had happened to him? What had happened to him?

Chubby Lumpkins, was thrown into a deep depression. He was no longer beautiful (had he ever been beautiful?); he no longer wanted to be seen. He hid in the deep thickets of the forest. He no longer dreamed of his elaborate fantasy, but dreamed of loneliness. No princess would want to brush his fur and comb his tail now. No princess would want to be friends with a unicorn such as he. He mourned for the life that he had lost.

He stayed there for many months, occasionally sneaking out under the cover of night to grab a few mouthfuls of nettles and water from the fast-moving streams. He did not want to see his reflection ever again. But the grass grew, the snows melted, and while Chubby Lumpkins now noticed it, he still could not contain his despair, still driven to seeing the mocking illusions of his dreams. He could not give up those dreams, they were all he had ever had.

So when he saw a maiden sitting on the banks of the river, drinking from his favorite pond, sleeping under his trees, he dismissed them as delusions and passed on. Were they all delusions, though? Unicorns are rare creatures, magical and full of a certain power. Even the broken-hearted Chubby Lumpkins had those aspects still. Even if he couldn't see them, there were others who did and they sought him out.

Perhaps Chubby Lumpkins was caught by them, perhaps he left his forest, driven to seek new lands like he sought a new self; perhaps he found a princess to comb his hair and braid his tail and brush him until he shone; perhaps he exercised and became the unicorn he dreamed of being. All I know is that when the trees started to bloom, filling the air with their love, I never saw Chubby again.

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I never did.

majors

I am a studio art major right now. Next semester I am going to try to be an IT major. This is my life. Web design. Yeah! Love that web design. I also love programming. Love it sooo much. It is like logic math but more logical and less math, if that makes sense. But I alos love comics and photoshop and drawing and writing and reading. And biology. and ecology. and philosophy. . . .

The Meaning of Art

“What is the meaning of art?”, the professor asked.
To me, this query seemed the kind of bait and switch question so commonly used in classrooms everywhere. What is the cubed root of nine? What is the function of memory in a computer? What is the color of George Washington's white horse? The kind of question where it at first, seemed difficult but when was pondered, was laughably obvious. My classmates were thoughtfully silent, however.

The meaning of art, I thought, had an answer, a logical pathway paved by what was already known and theorized about art. If art reflected life, as proposed by the classical masters; if art reflected the artist, as proposed by the contemporaries; if art only reflected the audience, as proposed by Dadaists, than what was art all in all? I had concluded long before this moment in time, that if all of those theories proposed were all valid, than everything was art; everything is art, every thought, every note, every conversation, every leaf and beam of sunlight, every thing.

I was dismissive, then, about the usefulness of this discussion in my education. If this class did not further my education,then, perhaps, I was not the one being taught.; and so could just watch the expressions of the others as they came to the meaning, and, voyeur-like, partake of the joy of discovery. But when the discussion raged on past the ten minute mark, I questioned myself.

They raised questions about the different aspects of art: the idea, the expression, the money. They talked about commissions, classical painters, Dadaism, the modern philosophy of art and what they had heard from others. But for all of this time and questioning, all the people in the classroom had a hesitancy about their voices. They seemed to be questioning the idea within themselves like it was the first time. Maybe it was the first time for many or all of them, an unwelcome revelation.

I became filled with a slowly overwhelming urge to speak out my passionate philosophy. I wanted them to stop questioning. I wanted to know why this idea so based upon a logic was so foreign to them. I wanted to feel like my idea, which seemed so sensible until now, was not the looming revolution. This felt purely selfish, to bring upon them this strange idea, but I couldn't constrain myself.
I raised my hand to be called upon for an opinion. I kept it raised at every opportunity. I left it laid upon my head, to reach the air faster. I switched hands when my arm became tired. I was impatient to be called, so when the professor said “One last opinion before we leave,” I hoped I would finally be called, finally have everyone understand something at least. I hoped.
But another girl whose had had caught the professor's attention, even though mine had been raised all this time, was called upon. I do not remember her remarks in the growing murmur of people packing, and perhaps mine would have been remembered the sameby others. I was dejected all the same, I had given up my moment to connect to them and no time would have been as perfect as that time, perhaps my philosophy was wrong, perhaps if it was right, it would have been heard.. I couldn't even grudge the energy to speak to my professor about the idea I hadn't been able to share, that he could at least, hear. So I kept in within my now questioning self and left for home.

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This I made for my creative writing class two weeks ago about an experience I had the week before. Hopefully this didn't come away as sounding too uptight or superior, I really wasn't, it was mainly just an alienating experience. . . .

I have some older stuff, but as I cannot access it, (curse you, Microsoft and your proprietary formats) it is going to have to wait. Which I don't know if you can, because I wrote this awesome. It is a fascinating topic, despite what you may think.

Okay, I will try to update this more often. But this is going to be more like the old format, random writings and rants that I have written/feel like writing. So again, if stuff doesn't make sense, please tell me, so I can strive for greater clarity in my writing, which is my main weakness.