Essentially, Ebert contends that video games cannot be art because they are games. I think this opinion is on the surface far too narrow and focused.

This is a subject that is often debated among artists and critics. Every so often, some “work of art” will create buzz because it offends someone, and then journalists will interview art critics and the people who are offended who will say that things that are meant to offend are not art.

I contend that art can’t really be defined by the beholder, but must be defined by the artist. I believe art is a very broad and general term, and that many things in everyday life can be considered art if the creator or presented intends it to be so.

Who am I to judge that an architect or a carpenter is not an artist? If people believe that what they are doing is considered art, then it is by its nature art.

Most of the people I have spoken to about Ebert’s opinion have been saying he’s just too old to get it. That may be, but I think it’s more that he is just being too narrow in his view of art. However, I do know that guidelines must be defined in order for something to be critiqued, which is why I’ve never claimed to be a critic.

That being said, it’s hard being a Catholic right now. I think a lot of people are afraid to say it, but it’s true. This isn’t a great time for the Catholic Church.

Last week, I was reading a report about how there is now evidence that when Pope Benedict was a cardinal, he refused to defrock a pedophile priest. I read some of the comments below the article, (which I usually avoid doing on subjects that I know are going to incite comments that are going to irritate me), and one of them was, “How can anyone be proud to call themself a Catholic right now?”

I’m not really sure how to answer that question. At times, it gets tough to defend the actions of the church, particularly when there are some aspects of it that I don’t agree with as it is. Those who know me well know that despite the fact that I do attend Mass every Sunday, I’m definitely a Cafeteria Catholic–meaning there are certain teachings that I disagree with that I, for lack of a better word, ignore.

This can be difficult, particularly when there’s an announcement at Mass regarding one of the things I disagree with, and I sit there and listen to the announcement and can’t do much about it without making a scene. Thankfully, at the three parishes I’ve regularly attended in my life, that is rarely an issue, which is why I choose to attend those.

So why am I still Catholic?

I was reminded why this past Easter week, when I sang at a couple of the Triduum Masses at Holy Spirit. It seems like every Easter, I have a renewal of faith. I’ve attended many Protestant and other Christian services throughout my life, and I can honestly say that none of them have touched me as much as a Catholic Mass does. I like the ritual of it. I like the way it makes me feel. I don’t feel alone, and it really helps me to put things in perspective in my life.

And I think that’s what religion should be about. If it’s not making you feel good, what is the purpose of it? It shouldn’t be something that makes you feel bad or guilty. I’m not saying the Catholic Church is for everyone, or even that church in general is for everyone. I’m even willing to say that a belief in a higher power may not be for everyone. What brings me comfort won’t do the same for everyone.

I can’t defend the actions of some of the men in the priesthood. More than anything, I wish things like that didn’t happen. I know many priests who are truly good people who have inspired me to do wonderful things with my life. One of them is Father Albert at the Newman Center, whose 50th ordination anniversary I attended this weekend. There are good men in the priesthood.

For now, that is why I’m Catholic. It’s a bright spot in my life, and it brings me joy. And anything that brings you joy is worth doing.

They also are, of course, very much based on my taste in music and my musical knowledge.

Feel free to add your own favorite songs about love in the comments… I love hearing new music and what other people think about music.

I had a difficult time knocking some out, and I’m a little iffy about a couple of these.

I’m not putting them really in any particular order simply because it’s not possible for me to be that decisive about it, but they are at least in rough order leading up to my absolute favorites.

“Be Be Your Love” by Rachel Yamagata- To me, this song seems to be about young love, when you want to be in love, but everyone tells you that you can’t. I think it’s also about a longing to be in love, of not having yet possessed it but of loving the idea of it.

Be Be in Love

“Never Felt This Way/Butterflyz” by Alicia Keys- Again, this song is more about brand new love and feeling it for the first time. I especially think “Butterflyz” perfectly illustrates how you feel when you’re in love. You just have this excited feeling in the pit of your stomach and you feel like you could fly. It’s both a wonderful and a scary feeling at the same time.

Never Felt This Way/Butterflyz

“Your Body is a Wonderland” by John Mayer- OK, so this is the cheesy pop song on my list. Hee hee. This song for me is just about being in complete awe of someone, though more in a physical way. It’s about just being in complete amazement that “hey, this person is hot and *I* get to be with him/her.”

Your Body Is a Wonderland

“I’ve Just Seen a Face” by The Beatles- Of course the Beatles were going to be on this list. This song is definitely more of a love at first sight sort of song. It also captures a feeling of love happening at just the right time (as in when they sing, “If it had been another day, I might have looked the other way…). I think for a lot of people, it is really a matter of timing.

I’ve Just Seen a Face

“Something” by The Beatles- This song is about the things you just can’t explain about the person you love. There is something indescribable that you seen in the person you love that perhaps other people can’t see. I also like that this song doesn’t try to make any assertions about the future of a love affair. The love could grow, or it may not. Only time will tell.

Something

“Can’t Help Falling in Love” by Elvis- This is the song Robert and I used for the first dance at our wedding. To me, this song was very reflective of us, because everyone was always telling us not to rush into things when we were young, but it all just felt like it was meant to be. We couldn’t stop the way we felt about each other. This song is so tender. I’ve heard a couple remakes of this song, particularly by Ingrid Michaelson, that I’ve enjoyed, as well.

Can’t Help Falling in Love

“Being Alive” from “Company” by Stephen Sondheim- For those of you who haven’t seen this show, I would strongly recommend renting this performance on Netflix. This song is in no way a love song, but it is about love. It’s a very real song about what being in love means. When someone is truly in love, they are extremely aware of being alive– of all the little nuances. Being in love isn’t always pleasant, but it’s worth it. (Note, the actual song starts at about 45 seconds).

Being Alive

“And So It Goes” by Billy Joel- My high school choir used to sing this song every year. It’s one of the few pop songs I think has been successfully adapted for choir. The first time I ever realized what this song meant was back when I first thought I experienced love in high school. I was listening to it, and I had a moment when the meaning of it hit me, and I cried for about 15 minutes. When you really, truly fall in love, you give yourself completely over to that person: every last bit. You have to open yourself up for the deepest hurt in order to experience the greatest happiness.

And So It Goes

“Ordinary People” by John Legend- This song has spoken quite powerfully to me lately. I don’t know if I really quite understood it until this last year. This isn’t a song about blurry-eyed, infatuated love. It’s about that time after the honeymoon phase when the relationship becomes work. You can no longer take each other for granted, and you have to accept the other person for who they are, with all their faults.

Ordinary People

“Wonderful tonight” by Eric Clapton- I think everything about this song is absolutely perfect. The sweet croon of the guitar, the sense of awe woven through Eric Clapton’s voice and the lyrics. This song captures perfectly the feeling you get when you’re with the person you love and you’re just basking in everything about them. I think this feeling comes once your love has matured and deepened, a very different feeling you get when you are first in love.

Wonderful Tonight

I realized a couple of weeks ago that I was saying this phrase, which irritates me because it essentially tries to make something that a person is saying less dramatic than it actually is.

For instance, “Your sister might be telling the truth, but I saw her yesterday making out with your boyfriend. I’m just sayin’.”

In many ways, it’s a defense mechanism, meant to somehow remove blame from oneself for delivering the news. It also seems to be trying to soften the blow, or even to say, “I told you so.” In short, the phrase doesn’t actually seem to be serving any useful purpose, and I’m not sure how everyone started saying it all of the sudden. As far as I know, people weren’t saying this phrase a year ago, or perhaps I just never noticed how annoying it was until recently.

I’ve had to catch myself saying it since I realized how annoying it is. Mostly, I am probably annoyed because it has been used a lot recently to tell me things that I don’t really want to hear about my own life. But, I KNOW you are saying it, you don’t have to tell me.

I would say the main way I communicate with my friends nowadays is by text message, e-mail and social networking. All of them rely exclusively on words, and most of the time, they are meant to be quick notes.

I recently stumbled upon this blog post when I was on the site reading Red Eye’s iPhone blog. It’s a short post, but if you don’t want to read it, it’s about emoticons and dating and what an emoticon means. This blog is lighthearted and essentially says that “Do you want to come over and watch a movie? ” translates to “Do you want to come over and sleep with me?”

This does bring up the point about emoticons and communication. I snobbishly used to say that if you were truly a great writer that emoticons are unnecessary and your meaning is always clear. But I don’t really believe that anymore. I think that sometimes, a text or e-mail written with the best of intentions can be misinterpreted by the reader. And for that reason, emoticons might be sometimes necessary.

The problem with communicating with someone by text is that the conversation is devoid of all the little nuances–the non-verbal cues–you get from speaking face to face. Even something as “I’m sorry to bother you” can be taken many different ways if not accompanied by irritation or sympathy or a laugh.

The question is, how are we going to be able to communicate these things if that is the way technology is going? How do we prevent miscommunication if we aren’t able to convey the emotion with the text? Emoticons, in many ways, have become a way to convey those things. However primitive it may be, these combinations of punctuation marks have become staples of communication among friends.

And I apologize in advance for the stream-of conscience format of this post.

Sometimes you’re just stuck in a rut and you don’t know how to get out. You know what? I’m there.

I’ve spent so much time the last few months obsessed with change and bettering myself and trying to figure things out that don’t make any sense. It’s occupied so much of my time and energy that it has started to consume every action I take.

In my quest to become a better person, I’ve almost started to forget about the things that made up Laura in the past — the Laura everyone used to love.

A few months ago, when I first started talking to people about some of the issues I had, many of them said they had no idea. I used to not talk about these things. I was a very private person, and I kept so many things to myself. That was probably a mistake. You can’t keep things bottled up, because then it all just explodes out one day.

And that’s exactly what happened to me. It all exploded out. As a matter of fact, I can pinpoint the exact moment and on whom it all exploded.

And since then, it hasn’t stopped. I’m reminded of “Mean Girls,” when the main character talks about “word vomit” and how she can’t stop it from coming out. I feel like that’s been me the last few months. I don’t *want* to talk about myself, but, somehow, I realize at the end of the day that I talked about myself all day.

Now I’m going to take control.

One thing every single one of my friends knows is that they can call or text me any time with a problem, and I will drop everything I’m doing and listen. Over the years, I’ve almost become an expert listener. I’ve come to be able to recognize when to give advice and when to keep my mouth shut. I know when someone needs a hug and when they don’t want you to touch them (that’s rare, by the way).

In the last year, I’ve fielded a good dozen calls or text conversations from various upset friends. And half of those have been at 2 in the morning.

One of my friends told me once that a good friend is someone you know you can call at any time, and they’ll just listen. I was so happy when she told me she felt that way about me.

Truly, there is almost nothing I like more than when I can give comfort. Nothing. I feel completely fulfilled just knowing that they are letting everything out on me and I am taking it all in for them. They need a person to talk to, and I’m a listener. I don’t pretend to have wise advice. Heck, I’m only 25. What do I know? I don’t have more than 10 years’ experience in anything except singing!

The benefits of that have been reciprocated. I have been able to talk to my friends about my problems. And though I’ve made absolutely no sense the last few months and have swung back and forth more wildly than a pendulum, they’ve been there.

I can feel the patience starting to wear thin. And that realization has been the turning point.

I have so many people I can call truly good friends. I’m going to go out on a limb and say I have at least nine people in my life that I would give that title to. There are NINE people I can turn to no matter the issue. NINE. Most people are lucky if they have one.

I am so completely lucky in love. I have so much love in my life, and I don’t know how I lost sight of it.

I don’t want to lose any of my friends because I’m being selfish and melodramatic. I hate drama. Yet in the last few weeks, I have been more dramatic and outlandish than the people I know that I avoid specifically because I think they are too dramatic. And frankly, looking back at all of that, I feel completed ashamed in myself.

I have so many blessings in my life. I have a great job that 25-year-olds just aren’t supposed to have, and I feel secure in an industry that very few feel secure in. I have a completely adoring husband who is putting up with everything ridiculous I throw at him. I have a family who loves me and has supported me through everything. I am healthier than I have ever been in my life. I have a TON of friends, so many that when I used to throw parties, I couldn’t even figure out how they would all fit in the house, even if they migrated to the upstairs too (they even filled up the massive house I was living in before… that’s saying something!). I am in a financial situation where I can go back to school and earn another degree if I wanted.

I have everything. Absolutely everything. And I’m not going to ignore those things anymore. This is the absolute end of my rut. I’m not going to rely on anyone else to pull me out, because I’m getting out of this completely ridiculous, out-of-control mess on my own.

I haven’t failed at anything in my life, and I’m sure not going to start now.

One of my favorite songs is from a musical called “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown.” It’s about the simple things that make people happy, from a kid’s perspective: “Happiness is finding a pencil, pizza with sausage, telling the time.” Sometimes, when I hear that song, I feel like crying, which might sound strange, but it’s a good cry. (Yes, sometimes I feel like crying for happy things. Like cute little kids singing together.)

I posed the question on Facebook, “What makes you happy?” I got various answers, but almost all of them were people: my wife, my children, my family.

People make such a big difference in our lives when it comes to happiness. You can have a great job where you are respected and making a lot of money, but it means nothing if you don’t have friends and family. Too often, we put so much emphasis on what we do, rather than the people we have.

I’ve thought a lot about this in the last few months, and I contend that people can be happy working in a coffee shop, making enough to live on, but having a fulfilling personal life. When you have that, the other things just don’t seem to matter as much.

And it’s not just the big things.

I think part of the problem sometimes is that we, as a society, look to bigger picture things to make us happy rather than appreciating the smaller things. That is what “Happiness” is about. One simple thing that always takes my breath away is a sunset or a sunrise, or just beautiful nature. The other day, I was driving to work and fog was lingering over downtown Henderson, curling around the mountains. It was so majestic, and it filled me with calm happiness. Whenever I stop and look at beautiful things that occur naturally, it just makes me feel happy.

I think the keys to happiness are surrounding yourself with people who make you feel good and enjoying the simple things. Seek out friends who make you feel good, and get rid of the ones who don’t. Love the one you’re with. Seek shelter in family.

Most importantly, if something doesn’t make you happy that you can control, stop doing it. Find something else. Don’t waste time on the things that bring you down.

Mostly, I’ve been OK with that. I have talked with too many women who do attract attention, and along with the good comes the bad, the creepy guys.

In the last year, I’ve had several conversations about what makes someone hot. Everyone I’ve talked to about it has been unanimous in saying that it isn’t just about looks; it’s about confidence.

My confidence level has fluctuated tremendously in the last year. Admittedly, before halfway through college, I had next to no confidence. At the beginning of high school, I was downright gawkish. I was far too skinny with the build of a boy. Then somewhere around tenth grade, I grew up a bit, got rid of the braces and grew out my bangs (my sister still likes to point out that I had to buy “boy cut” jeans a couple months ago). Still, it wasn’t until my friends Crystal and Tina took me to a Q-Mode at the end of my junior year that I graduated fashion-wise from jeans and baggy T-shirts.

Having admirers and boyfriends certainly helped my self-confidence my senior year of high school, and then finding Robert, who tells me I’m sexy or beautiful constantly, definitely helped after that.

I don’t think I ever fully outgrew the nerd, but now, nerds are cool.

Certainly confidence is not entirely based on outward appearance. As a matter of fact, from my observances in the last year, it has almost nothing to do with outward appearances. But it certainly doesn’t hurt to have that going for you.

Truthfully, my confidence is on shaky ground at the moment. While this may seem silly to those who don’t know the details because of the major changes I’ve gone through in the last year regarding my appearance, I actually think that it’s somewhat because of these changes. I think it’s because in my head, things are not happening that I thought would happen. (Note: this is NOT an attempt to get “you’re pretty” comments on my blog… as a matter of fact, don’t do that. It will make me feel awkward and dirty.)

My biggest issue is that I am relying too much on outside sources to feed my self-confidence. And at this point, so many things are happening in my own head that I’m ignoring half of the outside positive sources, focusing instead on what I see as the negative.

You can’t get self-confidence from anyone else. It has to truly come from the inside. In order to have real self-confidence, you have to like yourself. You have to make the decision that you are going to be worth something to the world.

The trouble is trying to get out of that rut. You have to somehow find the ability to shout over that little voice that keeps creeping up trying to bring you down.

Each day, I’m going to look at myself and the mirror and say something I like about myself. It doesn’t have to be something I can see when I look in the mirror; it can be something I’m really good at doing or some accomplishment I have achieved.

I’m going to take the steps now to build up my own self-confidence. My goal is to be the woman who commands respect when she walks into the room and can inspire people just by exuding enough confidence to assure anyone else in the room. And that goal can only be achieved from within.

At the same time, I often wonder if things happen for a reason. Was I meant to have met the people who are so important to me now? Would circumstances have allowed us to meet even if my life had gone a different way?

I don’t really know that things are necessarily “meant to be.” I can’t say either way. I believe in a higher power, but I don’t pretend to understand it.

Every now and then, I wonder what would have happened if I had remained a Music Ed major in college. I famously (among those who knew me anyway) changed majors four times in college, quite unsure about what exactly I was supposed to be doing.

Ultimately, I left the music department because I saw the art of singing in a different way than the vocal faculty. I also wasn’t sure that I really wanted it badly enough to give my all to singing.

There are times I question my choice. Sometimes, I’m talking to performers in a musical about their passion, and I feel that twinge of what I used to feel when I thought about singing. Sometimes I’m singing a song in choir, and I think of how I would feel, standing in front as the director. What directions would I take with the music? How would I interpret that rest?

I always come back to music. No matter what emotion I am feeling, I can always find a song that perfectly captures it in a melody. Sometimes I need to sing as a sort of release, to convey my emotions in a way I can’t do with actions. Music is its own language for me, a language that I think is both universal but exclusive at the same time. I have been moved by music in ways I haven’t been able to accomplish otherwise.

Ultimately, though, I haven’t given up singing. I changed my major and went a completely different path, but I still have music in my life. So I suppose I don’t really have to think about the what ifs.

Although we can’t change the past, one thing over which we have some measure of control is the future. Yes, things have happened that we can’t change. But we can make choices to decide the direction we are going in the future.

This week, as an experiment of sorts, I’m going to be a vegetarian. I thought about going completely vegan, but I think I’d have a hard time avoiding cheese and things that use eggs or butter. I am trying to avoid too much cheese because it’s really not the healthiest thing in the world. I don’t eat eggs that often, but I’m sure many of the things I eat are made with them.

Today, I made up a list of dinners I’m cooking for the week. It was exciting because I’m trying out new things I haven’t tried before. I’m particularly excited about the tofu stir fry and the falafel sandwiches I have planned this week.

Last year when I was doing Weight Watchers, I was doing very well at making sure I had pretty balanced meals. Although I’d always been good about eating fruits and vegetables before doing Weight Watchers, I probably wasn’t quite eating enough. Since I officially stopped doing Weight Watchers in October, I’ve fallen off the wagon a little bit. Amazingly, probably because I was keeping up with exercising and kick started my metabolism from eating better, I have managed to stay steady at the weight I ended at.

I hope this week I can start to get myself back on track being more balanced and healthy. Robert and I have been eating out a bit too much lately, mostly because I had a drastic change in schedule after I got my new job.

Robert and I decided today we’re going to start getting up in the morning and jogging. Yikes. Anyone who knows me knows I don’t exactly like running. Honestly, I don’t like how I feel afterward: like I’m going to collapse and die. I’m hoping that now that I’m more in shape, I’ll like it better.

This year, my goal is to make a lot of positive changes in my life. I’m trying to figure out the best ways to get happy and stay happy. I’m going to try to get out of this quarter-life crisis (QLC) and figure out what exactly I am doing with my life.

Although lately I’ve been having some kind of dark days, I think I’m ultimately going to come out of this QLC a better person. I’ve made quite a few goals for myself this year; first and foremost personality-wise, I’m going to be more assertive and confident. I’ll try to keep up-to-date with that on the blog.