Day After Day

Music is art right? I would say so. Music has the ability to paint a picture in the mind of the listener similar to that of an artwork and even bring out the same emotions that a beautiful piece of art by Manet might be able to (recently I was so taken by Manet's art that I was yelled at by a crazy Russian woman for getting too close to one of his paintings). Anyways... the following is a song that I just spent the last two hours working on instead of doing homework like a good student would do. My dad was telling me earlier about how Nancy Pelosi likes to fly around in a 200 person private jet instead of flying like us normal people do. Whether that is actually true or it is just my dad's extreme conservative mindset at play, it definitely got me thinking. I thought I'd write a song about American wealth/greed/selfishness/etc.... So... here it is.

Day After Day

How can we live in so much vain?
Stumble over these losses, treasures taken away
Living only for material things
Taking all that we can, leave the rest to wait and pray

Cause the land of the blessed has become the land of myself
Tied up in our possessions, looking only for the help
Of false love that lies within and tears at the health
Of you, me, she, he, and everyone else
Oh you tell me you care and you tell me you’ll help
But we only wait for the love of somebody else
Don’t sell yourself for gold cause it all will just pass
Be happy from what you gain and don’t ever look back
Cause what we take from the earth in the end will just fade
But what we give back to others will live on day after day

So how will this world move on?
When one by one selfish love grows strong
And now that we’ve come this far
Even the best of the best are just holdin’ on
Its not this world, its this way that we live
But it seems the more that we try the worse that it gets
So we wait
For real love to be reborn

Take all that you have and embed it in glass
Find false comfort in hiding and let the guilt run right past
But we can all see its there, so what will you say
That you’re saving up your grace to share another day
Well what reward does that give you? Lonely is all that you’ll be
It’ll kick in like a bullet no matter how hard you don’t want to believe
Well maybe if we could switch lives for a day
Then we’d really find out what we want our lives to say
Well I’ll be sorry if I’m wrong, but we all want the same
For our love to shine bright and live on day after day

Chorus

Well for the love of God, lets find His love
Send out to the world what we took from above
Tell them were sorry for the wait, loves train was on delay
But now that she has made it, she’ll live on day after day
Repeat x1

End on Chorus

College!

I recently visited Rhodes College (a prospective college of mine) in order to get some closure on this hell they call the college search process. When I first stepped on the campus last summer, I immediately fell in love with the beautiful architecture the buildings display. Ironically, this type of architecture is the same that we are studying in my Art History class right now. Gothic. From stained glass windows to rib vaults with pointed arches, Rhodes wholeheartedly embodies the Gothic design. The best example of this can be found in the dining hall. Clerestory windows line the ceilings, letting light illuminate the room in ways similar to Amiens Cathedral and pointed arches hang over the front entrance, providing students with a beautiful sight before they head off to lunch.

The architecture stays consistent from building to building. The dormitories use the same exact stones that the library uses (which is quite an accomplishment considering these were built 100 years apart from each other and apparently the stones are still taken from the same quarry) and the science building uses the same stones as the humanities building. In a way, Rhodes could be called a Gothic enthusiast's paradise. Walking around the campus makes you feel like you are walking through a great cathedral in Europe. I definitely can see myself spending the next four years of my life there. That granted, there are about nine other schools that I can see myself spending the next four years of my life at. This is the hell that they call the college search process.

Tiger's Fate

Recently in my Art History class, my ever-so-talented, fantastically brilliant teacher (David Lovell), tasked us with the daunting assignment of creating our own tympanums. With my creative engine rumbling, I scribbled out a piece of art portraying the final judgment of Tiger Woods and his many mistresses. Tiger Woods sits at the center of the tympanum, flanked by his mistresses to the right and his family to the left. To stick to the religious theme of Romanesque tympanums, the mistresses are being pulled to hell, his family is ready to enter heaven, and Tiger Woods is torn between the two. Inappropriate? Probably yes, but still funny (I think). People could probably care less about a piece of art my incredibly inartistic fingers put together though. So let’s talk about the piece of work I loosely stole inspiration from.

The west tympanum of Saint- Lazare (better known as the Last Judgment) was constructed by Gislebertus. Commissioned by Étienne de Badge, his desire was for Gislebertus was to create a tympanum that portrayed the dramatic last judgment of Christ. Christ sits at the center of this wonderful work of art, flanked to the right by the many non-Christians of the world with the morally decent people to the left. As one might expect, the non-Christians are being dragged to the place of weeping and gnashing of teeth and the Christians to left are about to be walking on streets of gold. In the lintel at the bottom of the tympanum, Gislebertus places people that begin to get less and less happy as you look from left to right. One person near the right edge of the lintel is being pulled to hell by the menacing arms of a demon while another near the top right edge of the tympanum is being dragged through the air by an evil “hell bird”(?). These are two aspects that I stole for my own tympanum. Another interesting intricacy in Gislebertus’ tympanum is the image of angels and demons using scales to weigh the souls of humans. This might be the most well known aspect of this tympanum.

Most people tend think that this tympanum was used to garner up fear in the stomachs of people as they saw it on their way to service. I’m hoping that this is the same effect my tympanum has on its viewers. I was going for the “don’t have affairs with hundreds of woman and think you won’t get caught” illusion. Probably not the most meaningful lesson for high school students, but hey, it works for me.