Well then...

Hi guys! It's been a couple weeks, hasn't it? not without purpose, I promise. I've managed to swing gainful employment, had the annual celebration of the best holiday ever (Halloween, duh), and of course, this election.

This election that went to show how devastatingly divided this country truly is, on nearly every political issue under the sun. It's been... rough. 

But! The primary purpose for my absence and, subsequently, this post, is to formally announce my hiatus! I'll be sans-blog post until the beginning of December, because I am currently focusing all of my writing energy into NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month for those not in the know. It's what I'm doing for November!!

So... catch you guys on the flip side!

Loud Places, Fast Paces

Everyone has a preferred place to be. There are multiple reasons behind the patterned sprawl of people across the planet, and one of those reasons is each person's ideal population density. For clarity's sake, we'll say it's a difference between introverts and extroverts. When I was applying for colleges, I was encouraged to think of the environments I would be in to learn, keeping my extroverted tendencies in mind. Top priorities were definitely getting the majors and classes I wanted. Secondarily, and also incredibly important, was the locale. I knew immediately I needed to go to a big, city-based school.

A little context... My high school, North Penn, was over 3,000 students, sophomores through seniors. They didn't have the room to fit freshmen, so that class was split between the three middle schools. My graduating class was, as a rule of thumb, four times larger than most anybody else's that I've met. And I loved every second of it. Not that high school held the best years of my life - no, more like it cultivated my taste in learning atmospheres.

I knew I needed a large place with lots of different individuals. I wanted the opportunity to meet new people and try new things every single day. A city, a cultural hub mishmashing diverse lifestyles together, would be essential. I looked at Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh was the only city I hadn't been to before college applications. It became my city for several years. 

I have since returned to my hometown, making the closest big city Philadelphia. For being in the same state, the two cities couldn't be more different. But both of them give me the same feeling, a sensation I get from being in a city. There's this fantastic rush, of thousands of lives zipping past. Lights and glass and concrete are flecked with trees and food vendors. It's a wild cornucopia of smells and colors. The surge of emotion is a little like lightheadedness, a little like an adrenaline rush. It can't be replicated from one place to the other, because each city has its own twist or accent to that feeling. It's what causes people to write about cities as living organisms - because they are, in the sense that there's a pulse of life stirred by the bustle of others hustling about their days. It kicks up this energy that makes your eyes go wide, that carries a metallic taste on the breeze. 

It's the strangely reassuring unnatural environments humanity has built for itself, close and cramped and always moving. And it's amazing.

A Refined Palate

In my prior post, I spoke of my deep persistent hatred for zombies. I did, however, give the caveat that maybe someday down the line, that could change. I've lived enough life (yeah, a quarter century is a good start) to notice a trend for myself and others around me. Tastes change.

There're different kinds of taste to determine preference for. There's literal taste, the tastebuds on your tongue convey information to your brain and establish what you want to eat. And there's what one finds appealing in experiences. The stories they read, the sports they play, the places they go, all of those factors filter into set up each person's unique lifestyle tastes. Changing tastes in the latter aspect was touched on in my post about sloppy stories - with time, I grew to expect more from the media I consume. My tastes changed. 

Fun fact about flavor-taste: the average human palate is constantly developing. Babies have sensitivity to sweetness and bitterness from birth (evolutionarily, sweet meant more energy, bitter meant poisonous) but don't really show signs of reacting to saltiness until at least 5 months. After that, the tastebuds one has keep altering, before essentially settling on your final tastes around 35 to 40 years of age, without any other outside influences. From 40 to 50 years old, some tastebuds start dying while others start to shrink. Around age 60 onward, it will become increasingly difficult to separate different flavors or their categories on the palate. Salty and sweet may become indistinguishable. 

This is a slower process than it seems, and might not even be as severe as indicated depending on how your mouth was treated. But that's FORTY YEARS of constant growth and change beforehand! When I was 8, I hated mushrooms. At age 12 I realized what I had been missing out on by waiting on trying mushrooms again. For the longest time, I despised rice. It took stir-fry and sushi to ween me back onto it, but now I enjoy a good rice side. Up until very recently, polenta triggered my gag reflex something awful, but I can finally be a proper Italian and enjoy the cheesy goodness. 

So, much like tastebuds, personal tastes are constantly changing. If you're reading this, odds are you're not a hermit secluded from society. The outside influences of other people and their experiences and opinions influence each and every one of us in many different ways. We are not stagnant. We are vivacious, we are alive! It seems appropriate that I chose October to write so much about change. That's gotta be the pinnacle theme of Autumn! Because there is so much continuous change, it's worth giving things another chance. I felt like, the first time I wrote that, it didn't have the full argument I wanted for it to back it up. So here it is. Give your least favorite food another shot. Try out that one texture that bothers you after a year of avoiding it. Take another look at that show you dismissed early on in the first episode. Pick up that book you didn't think you were ready for.

Embrace your change.

Spooky Scary

We're going to learn a few things about Megan today. Tis the season, after all. The season... to be afraid!

Which I'm really opposed to, by the way. The primary factoid Factoid Prime, I really dislike scary things. Jump scares get me, every time, no matter how prepared I am for them. Long drawn out suspense terrifies me, and never in a, "Oh boy, rush of adrenaline, can't wait for more of that!" way. I once went to a lock-in movie night where the theme was horror movies. BIG mistake. I bundled up in the hallway outside the movie room in my sleeping bag, reading by flashlight. BUT EVEN THEN! I was in a long, dark hallway by myself, with horror movie sounds vaguely creeping out from under the door, and the trilling sound of horror movie soundtracks echoing against the tile floors. So I went back into the room because at least there were people there. 

But they were respectful movie viewers. Everyone was quietly attentive to the movies. Not even a little riffing on the hoakier aspects of the movies. I could have been as genre savvy as humanly possible and it would have done me no good. I was wide awake until my dad came to pick me up around dawn. I was afraid to be alone in the car when he ran to do some errands at Lowe's on the way home. 

This can only be topped, however, by my paralyzing, persisting fear of zombies. It's funny, because the fear naturally arose with the spike in popularity in media. With every new zombie movie, with the zombie retellings of classic books, with the video games of gunning down whole hoards of zombies, I could not escape it. I even went to see Zombieland in theaters, in hopes that a zombie-related comedy would make this exposure therapy easier to suffer. It was funny, entertaining, I had a good time. I woke up in cold sweats from nightmares for the next month. 

Now, anyone who knows me knows I love Halloween. I recently met some old friends of my dad's, and when they asked me about plans for Halloween, they remarked how I was my father's daughter in loving the holiday, in making my own costumes. I've gone through and put up with a lot of scary things to enjoy Halloween. It's because I want to, though. It isn't always easy. At some point, however, I decided to own my fear. I would like to think that I'm a big tough gal who 'don't afeared of no thing,' but I'm not. I am comfortable with laughing off that I'm a big chicken. I've made a point to go through haunted houses and hayrides with friends, MST3K-ing the whole way through with panicked laughter. I was proud when I muscled through watching Stranger Things so I could talk about the great characters. 

I can be stubborn. I'm definitely someone who learns through experience and mistakes. So it's taken me a while to come to this conclusion, but here we are... It's okay to be afraid. Oh snap, it was an analogy! I am able to enjoy Halloween, despite so much of it playing host to things that terrify me. I can allow myself to be scared in life, in giving things a try or taking a chance. Good can still come from it. I also can avoid things I know will only bring me pain, like zombies. But, and most importantly, I can acknowledge that the world is always changing, much like I am changing. Giving something another chance can be worth it. Maybe, someday down the line, I won't have an irrational fear of the undead. 

Maybe. =]

Sloppy Stories

One of the arcs I've noted in my personal growth has been the development of my awareness. Ignorance diminishes with age. That's the rule of thumb, at least - as you experience more of the world, the more you learn about it. There is the choice to shut out all of the unpleasantries and turn a blind eye to it in the future. Some manage to be selective about the realities they let into their lives. I'm not too good about picking and choosing. That's just me.

I don't like how this is starting to sound like a diatribe on the dark, scary world, a cruel and unforgiving life experience we all must deal with. Actually, that's not what I'm going for here. Becoming aware of the many hatreds that run deep in our society hasn't made me lose hope for humanity. There are plenty of good people, and most importantly, good people working on being better people, out there every day. Humans aren't a lost cause. No, no, I'm speaking to how my own awareness has changed the way I view stories.

Essentially, my standards have risen. As I've grown older, I've learned to expect more from the media I consume. TV shows, movies, books, video games - any platform that tells a story has the opportunity to shape the minds of the viewers, to make them think. The people presented, what they say, and how they are treated, all funnels into the representation of those the story's portraying. 

I assert that stories are the key to planting the seeds of acceptance on a global scale. As a story writer, I feel the weight of that responsibility. I want to write about diverse characters, to give a broader scope to the role of protagonist. Most importantly, I want to be able to do it respectfully. I'm a woman who has experienced sexism first hand. I'm also white, of able body, and in the position to perceptually meet many social norms. Discrimination against me is limited, and writing what I know will require more research to do correctly. But it is possible.

I am not the only story writer out there (obviously). There are those who do not think to write with more diverse representation. There are those who opt not to, either for fear of losing mass appeal or because they are worried about doing it right. But there are those who do not veer towards sloppy story telling that relies on the standard, the expected. These creators should be sought out and supported. I want to find relatability across the whole human spectrum. And I implore you to do the same. Really consider the shows you binge, the movies you pay to see, the books you dedicate your time to, the video games you escape to. Could they expect more from their audience? Can they do better by you?

Certainty

There's this show, Master of None. It's a great little series on Netflix featuring Aziz Ansari as a 30-yr-old in NYC struggling with decisions in his career and relationship, all while staring down the barrel of his future fraught with vagueness and uncertainty. The first time I watched the show about a year ago (when it first came out), I walked away from it with a bad taste in my mouth. At the time, I wasn't able to put it into words, what bothered me so much about the show that on paper should have been enjoyable yet thoughtful entertainment. 

I have recently rewatched the finale of the first/presently only season. I think I have some words now.

For those who have not watched and plan to, I'll speak with enough vagueness so as to not spoil, but keep details that will maintain clarity. For those who have already watched, we're all on the same page. For those who will never watch, please refer to the earlier statement of vagueness and clarity. Guess you're along for the ride!

Dev, the protagonist portrayed by Aziz Ansari, is at a crossroads in his life. He doesn't know exactly what he wants to do with his professional pursuits. He worries about the state of his romantic relationship. He feels like he is being steered onto a path with no surprises or excitement - marriage, kids, mortgage, retirement, death. When he speaks to his father about his misgivings, his father quotes Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar, referencing the woman standing before a fig tree. The tree branches off in many directions, each direction with a juicy fig at the end. But while standing before the tree and wallowing in indecision, the figs begin to wrinkle and fall off the tree. Options were lost, opportunities withered up. 

A key issue I take with Dev's bleak view of the rut he feels stuck in is that said rut clearly isn't what he wants. Otherwise, it would not produce such a bleak outlook. While married life is definitely not for everyone, people who lean towards it should never do so out of obligation or societal pressure. He imagines wedding vows as these impossible promises, shackles binding him into a future he would be taking because otherwise, he might miss out on it later. The resignation to the assumed order of things keeps Dev on this path. The fear of lost opportunity is what drives Dev in the actions he takes with his relationship. 

Most importantly, the fear that Dev nurtures hurts his own judgement. It makes him feel like he needs to go through life with 100% certainty on anything he is committing to. He looks at his relationship and worries when he's not certain it will last. He looks at the jobs he's had and the failures and successes he's met and doesn't feel certain all of his efforts have been properly allocated. All at the same time he's not certain he wants to move onto something else, something new. What Dev fails to realize (and the missing message of the show) is that he doesn't need to be 100% certain on anything in life. In fact, certainty is such a difficult thing to come by in any aspect of living. He looks at other people and mistakes their determination to make something work as certainty that it will work. 

The specific words I didn't have before that I've found now are that, doubt is everywhere. Tough, life-altering choices can be easily found in the day to day. Being uncertain is part of it. But taking risks and chances can be worth it, and making one choice does not necessarily mean cutting off all others. It's the norm to have fear of the unknown. It should not be the norm to be complacent with the known. 

Kinda Dark

I was raised on Disney animated classics. Beauty and the Beast is about as old as I am oh geez that's a little haunting and was definitely highly ranked on my preferred viewing list. My parents have fondly recalled me requesting a nightlight of "Beast-growl," who was the best character in my tiny child heart. That wasn't The Favorite of mine, though. Apparently I watched Dumbo so many times it's a surprise I don't have it permanently etched into the backs of my eyelids. But I digress...

There's something wholesome about the Disney animated retellings of classic fairy tales. I mean, that only makes sense. It's clear from the Disney branding that the end goal is family friendly fun. Family friendly fun wasn't much of the original focus for these stories, though.

It was a rude awakening for me, going into The Brothers Grimm Fairy Tales. Perhaps a little less jarring than it could have been - I read those stories fairly early on in my childhood. Had I waited until I was older, the experience might have straight up concerned me. In fact, it was super grim(m). Cinderella's step sisters cut off parts of their feet to fit into the glass slipper, trying to con their way to princesshood. Sleeping Beauty has a whole second part where an Ogre Queen wants to eat the children of the awoken princess and her prince. Snow White has to thwart the evil queen three separate times, and in some editions, the queen dies dancing in red hot shoes at Snow White's wedding. Disney's Tangled was in theaters only six years ago, so hardly in my childhood, but the Grimm Brothers' version was a far throw from the chipper animated movie with chameleon and horse sidekicks and a frying pan-wielding princess. Rapunzel's parents gave her over to their neighbor witch as a new born because Rapunzel's mom craved the witch's lettuce (rapunzel) so badly, she promised her first born child for it. Oh and later the prince falls out of the tower Rapunzel's kept in and blinds himself on thorns. Oh and Rapunzel became a single mom raising hers and the prince's children on her own. Oh but he shows up years later and her tears on his eyes cures his blindness so it's practically a happy ending! 

... practically...

Not all Disney fairy tales are soft-edged Grimm Brothers adaptations, though. There's many more from different cultures around the world (though it would seem that Germany sure knew how to craft a mean folk tale) but I'm gonna turn the scrutiny on Hans Christian Anderson and his little ditty known as The Little Mermaid. This is the one that gets me the most, because Hans Christian Anderson doesn't really have the same reputation as the Brothers Grimm. Which almost makes it worse, in my opinion. The Brothers Grimm just published the fairy tales they dug up, even softening some things up for their audience like how they changed it to Snow White's evil jealous step-mother rather than her evil jealous birth mother. It seemed kinder to have an evil force come in from outside the family to want to kill Snow White. But oooohhh Hans, no, Hans Christian Anderson wrote all of the stories he's got to his name. 

So why's The Little Mermaid being especially singled out here? Well, in the original story, the little mermaid (or TLM to her friends) doesn't even have a soul. She's mostly fish. She doesn't get human emotions. She thinks the human prince is cute and wants his hot prince body but she doesn't truly get what love is, exactly. The sea witch is a pretty neutral player here, just telling TLM all the side effects of becoming human and the sacrifices she'd be making. TLM becomes human, and whoops, actually falls in love with the prince, but he doesn't love her (oh no). So TLM's sisters come to her with a knife to kill the prince that will allow her to return to the sea. But she loves him now, so she can't go killing him, and instead, she dies. What the heck.

Now, this is a pretty Christianity-based story. TLM can't go to heaven and have that concept of eternal life after death because she has no soul because she was a fish person. But! Good News! She ascends to join the daughters of the air, who can earn souls with 300 years of good deeds. But! Bad News! This is heavily reliant on children being good and bad. When a child is good, a year is taken off the 300. When a child is bad, the daughters of the air cry and a day is added to the 300 for every tear they shed. Which is a pretty messed up moral blackmail to slap onto the end of an already pretty messed up story about nobody being really happy except the prince, who gets to marry another lady and live none the wiser to the deeper story going on around him. 

And this is the stuff that children still watch today! People looked at the original works and thought, somehow, they could shave off all the nasty bits except the main conflict, and show this to small children. Except it was all originally written or told mainly FOR children! 

From all of this, I draw mainly two conclusions. 1) Children can handle a lot more darkness than they're given credit for. 2) Hans Christian Anderson was one messed up dude and probably would have had the Brothers Grimm going back to his works to liven them up a bit.

It's Bigger On The Outside

In light of my previous post regarding my visit to Cherry Springs and stargazing, I'm gonna go into the details of one of the favorite aspects of space: It's Big. Keep it at that and we might have a strong contender for Understatement of the Year. Sure, that only scratches the surface. The things we know about space can be compared to the things we know about the deep ocean - very little. A lot of general statements, a lot of loose estimations. Distances and names are the building blocks. Data on the materials composing other planets in our solar system alone are still being discovered. 

Hmm... Okay, let's start close and work our way out.

Observe, if you will, with your mind's eye, our immediate planetary space, atmosphere, and gravitational pull. Our planet has one natural satellite and 2,271 manmade ones. This specific definition of satellite here excludes any chunks of burnt up meteor or debris from space missions. So that's currently one moon, 2,271 human contraptions zipping across our sky. The International Space Station, for example, orbits the earth about every 90 minutes, giving it approximately sixteen orbits in one 24-hr period and you can call it a day hahaha. 

Zoom out a bit, and we have the Inner Planets. There's the asteroid belt that divides the inner and outer planets of our Solar System. In a tight huddle around Sol, our only star in our system, we have Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars, going outward. Of the Inner Planets, Earth is the biggest (radius of 3,959 miles), Venus is the hottest (462 degrees Celsius), Mercury is the smallest (radius of 1,516 miles), and Mars is the reddest (got some rusty dust there buddy). Back out further, and we have eight planets, since we add Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune to the mix. But where's Pluto?, the ancient voices cry in dismay. Don't worry, I think Pluto got an upgrade rather than a downgrade. Sure, it's not a planet, but it is one of many Dwarf Planets. Actually, Pluto is the biggest Dwarf Planet (radius of 737.6 miles)! And it lords over its own subcategory in a subcategory in a subcategory in a subcategory of heavenly bodies!

Uh... Let's break that down. Pluto is a plutoid (an ice dwarf planet) which are unique Trans-Neptunian Objects (dwarf planets that orbit past Neptune) that are a subset of Minor Planets (asteroids, centaurs, trojans - the very small of the large things) which all fall under the umbrella term of Dwarf Planets (anything too small to be a planet but too big to ignore should it come careening towards the earth bent on total destruction okay I'm kidding but only a little).

Think Pluto still got the raw end of the deal? Maybe Pluto should leave Sol's orbit for another sun, then? Well, the nearest neighboring star, Alpha Centauri A, is 4.367 lightyears away. For some perspctive, Sol is 93 million miles from Earth. Alpha Centauri A is part of a star binary with its pal, Alpha Centauri B, and an honorary mention to the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri that is not close enough to be involved in the binary tango to become a tertiary, but appears to be gravitationally bound to the other two. That's three stars for the price of ditching our one yellow star! Quite the bargain, Pluto. It's a shame Dwarf Planets don't really take vacations.

Now we jump out yet again... Ah, that was quite the jump. There's the Milky Way Galaxy. It's about 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 kilometers across, or 100,000 lightyears if that helps. That's our galaxy. We can see it slash across the night sky in a cloudy streak of light, if there's not too much visual noise getting in the way. So many stars, so many planets, and we're just on one of the outside spiraling arms of it - the Orion arm, to be exact. That's not even one of the big-time arms either. It's secondary and between two other larger arms. So, whenever someone asks if we're at the center of the universe, well, haha, we're not even at the center of our own galaxy, one of approximately one hundred BILLION galaxies. Probably. There's most likely more. We just don't know. 

Our closest neighboring galaxy is Andromeda, a mere stone's throw away at 2.5 million lightyears. A reasonable day trip, if the day is 2.5 million years long and we can travel at the speed of light. At the speed we can travel in space right now, we'll get there in about 785,200,000,000,000 years, so just in time for lunch!

It's a big accomplishment for us as a species to know as much as we do now about the moon, our own natural satellite. And yet, there's so much more space to go. I backed out to the next closest galaxy, but that in reality is only barely scratching the surface. Our tiny minds simply cannot fathom the true capacity and sheer vastness of space. It is too gosh dang big. Makes me think of the original definition of 'awesome' - to be struck by awe. Filled with wonder... and with terror. We have so much to learn. I'm glad I got to glimpse some of it.

Gonna See Me Some Stars!

I'm going camping this weekend. The place I'm going is Cherry Springs, a state park that has some of the clearest, least light-polluted sky on the eastern seaboard. That's right, friends - I'm going stargazing!

I have been to Cherry Springs twice before, and it's incredible. During prime camping seasons, there are telescopes brought out for the campers to use and a showing of the night sky. Large open fields work as natural observatories edged with trees that capture fog in the earliest hours of the morning. Arching high above, stretching from opposing edges of the horizon, you can see the Milky Way Galaxy with the naked eye...

Astronomy has long been a hobby of mine. I took an astronomy class in high school, where we had a planetarium and studied stars and planetary bodies. In college, I was able to go to observatories where we opened up the domed ceilings in the middle of winter to take long exposure photos of stars. For an extra credit project, I chose a constellation to replicate, making each point in Ursa Major a to-scale distance from the earth's surface. I had an early appreciation for astrology, but quickly realized that there was so much more to space and stars than arbitrarily fabricated personality types based on the constellational location of the sun and moon at birth. They're fun concepts to play around with, but burning balls of gas lightyears away won't tell me what to do!

I'm a little bummed this weekend won't grant full exposure for the area. The reflected sunlight in the form of the moon at waning crescent will still be enough to reduce the viewing of fainter or more distant stars. A new moon would be ideal, but I'll take what I can get - there will be hours prior and post moonrise that can be maximized on. 

At some point, I'll be doing a more involved space-related blog. Hmm, probably make that blogs, to be safe. For now, I'm just excited! Even a glimpse of the spiraling vastness of space, with such a limited view from our tiny point in the cosmos, is worth every second.

A Blue Planet That Could Be Green

DISCLAIMER: I've never been under the delusion that this blog is impartial or unbiased in any way. I've always been one to proudly form my own opinions. I work to keep an open mind, realizing my own limitations in areas of study and life experience. I'm limited by my time on this earth, and the fact that I am only one person. It would be incredibly crass of me to insinuate that I could ever speak for everyone. If you ever think I do present that way, I assure you the words I speak are backed with observations of many other people. Oh, and the unspoken certainty that I can always be wrong in any generalization ever made. Which is more or less spoken now. 

So. Uh. Here comes an opinion. I did my research to form it. Please do so as well to form your own.

We'll start this off with a statement that I believe global climate change is real. Perhaps 'believe' is the wrong word - though it seems as if irrefutable facts can be dismissed at the convenience of other people's wishes when it comes to science. I'm looking at you, people who think the earth is flat. Humanity as a collective has not been the kindest to our planet, and that's putting it politely. It's a disheartening issue to face, too. While one individual isn't going to make all the difference in aiding ozone regeneration or preventing oil spills, a growing number of individuals will. 

The biggest hurdle is that standard human activities aren't the true devastators. Large companies that profit from reckless fracking and burning coal will push the use of these resources, and make them cheaper, more accessible. The concept of sustainable, renewable energy will be ridiculed and mocked for as long as it's not immediately helping the competitors. 

Reducing use of fossil fuels and reliance on green energy is still hotly contested for some reason. The arguments against are baffling to me. So even if the world is perfectly fine, and the long-term consequences are not nearly as severe as the research shows, what is bad about using renewable energy? Oh no, the globe is healthier anyway? The air is cleaner, the cost of energy is reduced? Gosh, you're right, that would be awful, I'd hate to see quality of life improve around the world for nothing. That's sarcasm, dearest.

Ah, but the renewable resources, they don't supply reliable energy, right? It was the problem Germany faced, when having a day of 90% green energy in May of this year. Because the problem of energy regularity hasn't been solved, the overproduction of dirty (coal-burning) energy to compensate greatly increased the country's carbon emissions. It becomes a problem of storing and maintaining steady energy sources, rather than fluctuating. 

It's not an easy problem to fix. If it were, it'd be done already. But I believe (and it's the correct use of the word this time) that it is possible. And I know it's worth it. Sure we can just figure out the complexities of terraforming other planets and simplifying space travel, but I think our own planet is worth treating well before we all just... hypothetically abandon ship.

A Classic, By Any Other Name...

Today in another segment of 'all that comprises society is made up and everything you know is only what you make of it,' I want you to pick a book. Any book. Is it Pride & Prejudice? Is it Clifford the Big Red Dog? Doesn't matter what you picked, because it's a classic now. Well, only if you think it is, really. 

The concept of classic media, popularly The Classics, goes as far back as ancient plays and stories from cultures lost to the passing of time. This is art that survived on word of mouth, changed and translated with each new telling until the written word was sustainable. Makes you wonder what plays weren't good enough to keep remembering. There are novels regaled as literature for their beautiful prose and accolades. They're commonly read in school, because you've gotta read the classics! Freshly printed books that have found success can be seen with critics' reviews on the backs or in the dust covers, raving about how they're modern classics. 

This is a label with various criteria. For a story to be hailed a classic, it can be really old. Or it can be placed on a list of great written works. Or a community of people from around the world can come together and agree that a certain piece should be regarded as a classic, on par with those that are more regularly known that way. Or... Or it can be one person, sitting down with their favorite story that made a deep personal impact on them. They can hold the book in their hands, thinking on what the story did for them. That story has resonated with an aspect of their life. To them, it's a classic. One for the ages.

Despite how arbitrary such a label is, I don't think it lessens the impact of it. In fact, when someone might refer to a story not widely known to be classic, as one, it gives the concept more weight. Like I said, everything we know is only what we make of it. A story connected with its reader. That doesn't inherently make it a classic, but them viewing it as a classic does. Value is put on the story. That's the most any writer could hope for.

Something and Driving

If you haven't watched From One Second To The Next, a short documentary by Werner Herzog, it's an incredibly heart-wrenching half-hour. It's right on Netflix, I highly recommend giving it a viewing. In case the title of the blogpost didn't give it away, it's about the hazards and devastating results to texting and driving. 

It's an easy enough warning to dismiss. Anyone with a cell phone is familiar with the pull of just checking something quickly, or responding to a text, or getting bored while waiting for traffic. Some are better than others at building the discipline to ignore it, or pull over to address the phone. I remember when I was really good at this. It was back when I had my first smartphone. I wasn't completely won over by texting at the time - it was still pretty new to me. If people wanted to get in touch with me, they called. If I wanted to answer, I pulled over, or I waited until I was at my destination before I returned the call. 

Now when I'm on long drives by myself, I'll queue up the phone call on the side of the road and then start talking. When I'm at stoplights, the urge to fill the lull by just checking for notifications is tough to brush off. I found myself making some excuses about how I'm not nearly as bad as I could be, that there are people way worse. And there are, to be sure. I'll be driving and see people, from a wide spread of age groups, either on a phone call or texting while driving. I'm better than that, I'd think. I use headphones when doing phone calls. I keep my hands free and my eyes on the road. And while that's all well and good, that doesn't mean I'm avoiding distractions every way I can when driving. That doesn't excuse the occasional glance at my phone, just to see what that alert is for, or who that text was from. I'm not even responding, but that's attention removed from the task at hand. The 'navigating my metal death machine down the road through a stream of other metal death machines at high speeds' task, which definitely gets downplayed the longer one is a driver.

But, as much as mass media would like to have you believe that smartphones are the bane of modern existence, they are not the only threat to driving safety. Everyone knows not to drink and drive, and yet people still do that. In fact, driving under the influence of any sort of uncontrolled substance is more common practice than anyone wants to believe. 

If everyone knows this, why am I writing about it? Because recently I saw a person driving while reading a newspaper. I wish I could say this was the first time I'd seen someone throwing a giant sheet of paper up against their steering wheel while rolling down the road. Apparently books are another option. Tablets too. One person was so emphatic in their button mashing on whatever game they were playing on their Nintendo DS that they accidentally honked their horn and startled themselves into dropping the video game while in bumper-to-bumper traffic.

Sure, smartphones are fantastic little devices. They are useful tools that give access to so much in daily life. And they are leaders in distraction. Sometimes it's just rude - taking texts or pictures at inappropriate times. When driving, it's deadly. But humanity has found ways to enable distractions that cannot be blamed on the new age of technology, too. In thinking about this, I've worked to re-evaluate my own driving safety habits. Take a moment to consider what your distractions are, and figure out safe ways to address them. 

Please, be careful out there. 

Riddle Me This

Composition of human languages is pretty tricky. There are the words that sound the same but mean different things. There are the words that have the same meanings but for different contexts. There are bursts of sound that are given meaning despite not having a distinctly spelled counterpart in the dictionary. You can trace the influence of one language on another by the incorporation of certain words or phrasing. The symbols used to write it all down can have ridged sounds or they can change based on the surrounding symbols. Some symbols present whole ideas by themselves, and some make no sense when standing alone.

Across history, the evolution of languages around the globe - regardless of where they are or how isolated their communities were - tend to follow a set trend. The spoken language is constantly growing, with the written counterpart staying loose and fairly unique depending on the writer. Then, when education becomes more widely spread and standardized, the written word does too. A language spread across large distances facilitates the growth of dialects. Advancements in technology enables the bridging of languages, the filling of lexical gaps.

This context is the backdrop to my wonderings about the origin of riddles. They've existed in media for as far back as entertainment goes, it would seem. You can do a base level of 'old' with the Ancient Greek sphinxes famous for doling out riddles. That's very old. It goes even further back with Ancient Egypt, which is incredibly old. [Quick history lesson for reference - Ancient Greece's eras span from about 1200 B.C. to 500 A.D., while Ancient Egypt's eras span from about 3100 B.C. to 332 B.C. The Pyramids of Giza were constructed in the Old Kingdom era of Ancient Egypt, and predate any Grecian poleis (city-states) by at least 1,500 years.] But we can go further back still! The earliest forms of written characters in China that influenced the modern characters used today in both Chinese and Japanese, were dated back to 7000 B.C. That's about 9,000 years ago! And they used riddles to pose puzzles, tell stories, all sorts of things!

Jumping into this journey to find where riddles started has brought me to a fascinating place, mentally. The Euro-centric history that has been so heavily leaned on in elementary U.S. education, trains the mind to cut off two-thirds of the world. It really only concerns itself with South America, Africa, Asia, and Australia when looking to the interactions with Europe and North America. It also adjusts the cultural context for things like language and riddles. Never before had I considered riddles to be math-based though that may be my own personal bias but many riddles found in India, Japan, and China posed mathematical conundrums. The definition of a riddle being based in wordplay is to limit the possibilities and uses of riddles.

My expectation going in would be to find a correlation between the development of standardized written language through education and the increase of riddles in that culture. I was wrong. I was assuming that riddles required a base level of writing to be produced, to allow for double-meaning and wordplay, but all they seem to have needed was a base level of observation. Riddles have long been used as a preservation of culture and thought, to keep the wit and wisdom of the people who brought them about. The general answer to my question of 'where do riddles come from?' seems to be 'everywhere,' with the bonus that they apparently have been around ever since at least two people figured out how to communicate with each other. That's incredible.

The Mosquitos and The Bees

I have a fundamental appreciation for bees. I'm fortunate to not be allergic to bee stings. I read enough in early childhood to quash any possible fears that might have developed. I actually find bees pretty darn cute. At the very least I understand they are incredibly important. Not everyone shares this view. Let's see what I can do to change that.

In conversations with friends and family, the concept of the circle of life comes up often enough. It's a nice little reassurance that even if an animal seems completely useless or irredeemable in humanity's eyes, they can be worked into a necessary cycle that facilitates a standard quality of life for another creature. Maybe even a creature that humanity needs! Or a creature that impacts another creature. Or a creature that impacts another creature that impacts etc. You get the idea.

The topic usually rolls around when the dark of night is being enjoyed outside and the mosquitos are biting. This is usually brought up with the context of how mosquitos don't fit into that cycle. That's right! The sheer number of mosquitos are beyond excessive. Especially when their dwindling number of predators are taken into consideration, and not being their predators' only food source, it makes mosquitos seem kind of... irrelevant. They carry diseases. They leave irritating bumps. They're loosely bug vampires, and vampires aren't real, so why do mosquitos need to be? Not the best final argument but it seems to cap off my feelings nicely.

Mosquitos actually have been under attack from scientists that have genetically bred and released 'sexy' male mosquitos that, when reproducing with female mosquitos, result in a genetic dead end for that mosquito line. This is good! We need less of them! We can survive without them! Contrary to Disney's Lilo and Stitch, the mosquito is not an animal in need of protecting. No, my friend, what you're thinking of are bees.

Yes, bees! See, I brought it back around. Bees are about as crucial to the circle of life, the animal food chain, as is possible to be. They're the pollinators. They bring about fruit and vegetable production. Most plant matter humans consume has been brought about by bees. Most animals humans eat have subsisted off of plant matter that flourished under bees' influence. Also they make honey. We eat that too.

They're fuzzy forces of good in the universe. And they don't want to fight you, unless you start wrecking their hives. But you'd be mad if someone smashed up your house, so I'd say you brought that on yourself. That's called swift justice.

And YET. Many pesticides produced and tossed over plants to protect them for our consumption don't take bees into consideration. Or at least not as much as they should. Whole colonies are being obliterated en masse. The number of bees is shrinking at an alarming rate. Note that we NEED these specific bugs to have harmless access to these plants.

It's not often enough that I hear someone speak in favor of bees. You'd think something that can impact the longevity of the human race would have more of a buzz. So I'm writing about it. I'm still doing more research on it. Someday I hope to house and tend to my own hive. But for now, all I can do is be informed, support local beekeepers, and encourage others to do the same.

Feeling This

Sometimes I think about a concept I'll call 'the elusive story.' You know when you read a book that has this mystique surrounding the background of certain characters, or the world they are in? There are hints about how things are as they are, a glimpse into the lives of the individuals in question. But there's never anything concrete. It's all left up to the reader.

In writing, I've begun to think about the feel of a story, what it elicits in the minds of the readers. The most poignant moment I had was realizing exactly how strongly I could embrace a feeling beyond happiness or sadness. The world of the book, in a flash, was so real in my mind. It was a sense of nostalgia for something I was experiencing for the first time. What a fantastic skill, to give that overwhelming sense to someone through written story! I admire it, both as a reader and as a writer. This is far from diminishing the strength of character and skill with the written word that it takes to bring forth the standard range of human emotion for something or someone, either fictional or non-fictional. But it opened my mind to the possibilities.

So rarely do I get to experience these feelings in storytelling. So rarely, in fact, that it got me thinking about the frequency with which such feelings come about in general - then extrapolating that out to what it takes to carry over that experience in written form for someone else to consume and feel so utterly. It settles into your gut and tingles at the forefront of your brain. It's visceral. It's astounding.

It's the scene that drapes over your head like a sprawling realm of stars that dazzle with their surprisingly intense glow. It's the beating heat of the sun on a rolling desert landscape tossed in cutting winds. It's a gentle clearing with soft green light filtering through a lush canopy, their air buzzing and warm. It's a roaring storm that crackles in the atmosphere, with great forks of plasma slicing through the roiling indigo night.

It grips you.

The elusive story takes only the smallest, carefully placed details to fill out the world in your mind. Somehow, it's not too flowery or verbose, and yet it brings you there, wherever the story is going. It takes a fantastic amount of skill and experience to handle stories like threads in a tapestry that rests on the shoulders of the readers as a comfort. And every author that manages it does it a little differently. It's what encourages me to write the most. It's what I aspire to.

Exceptionalism

Let's go out on a limb here and say everyone likes to feel special.

I know I do, at the very least. This has been the case with nearly every person I've interacted with. It's in varying degrees from person to person. Some are greedier about it than others. It can be an aggressive search for attention or a simple desire to be loved and appreciated by those you love and appreciate. It's one of those really bizarre conundrums, too. Look at the population of our planet, with billions of people, and one could make the blasé comment that no one is special. How can they be, with the sheer numbers so overwhelming?

And yet. And yet every person you meet is different from the next. There can be large quantities of similarities shared, but age, location, experience... The life lived and the person it builds are always different. 

I believe it was Pixar's The Incredibles that had a bitter and jaded villain who once wanted to be a superhero remark that once everyone was made super, then nobody would be. It's a quote that comes to mind when thinking about people's criticisms of marginalized individuals seeking validation or aid. "Special snowflakes." They're sarcastically disregarded. In broader senses, people who don't want to make exceptions for those who struggle more or differently than they do all have their own unique reasons. Maybe they feel like their struggles can be equated - they made it out on top after roughing it, so why should someone else have it easier? Maybe they feel like those who ask are just being lazy or too sensitive - everyone's too sensitive nowadays, or so I keep being told. Maybe they just don't care - the capacity for empathy manifests in different degrees for everyone. 

I'm personally of the opinion that if I can help make someone's life easier than mine (and I have it pretty easy in the grand scheme of things), then I will do so. But this blog entry is less about that and more a part of my reflection on recent events in my life. The above is an inevitable side effect, yet worth noting all the same. 

I have been lucky in my friendships. The closest ones have been lasting and incredible. As with anyone, I've lost or fallen out of touch with friends, too. The efforts in maintaining multiple friendships lend themselves to parsing down those you keep close, in favor of dedicating more energy and time to those who have also dedicated energy and time to you. Not from a selfish stance, but people tend to best like the people who like them back. 

Despite all of the billions of unique human beings on this planet (and some that are just off-planet too) I have found some fantastic human beings who have let me into their lives and kept me as close as I've kept them. It is with them that I have zero doubts about my value. I never get the sense that I am a frustration or an undesired demand on their time and attention, which often happens with someone I don't know as thoroughly. These are exemplary individuals in the world, and against all odds, they have found me exceptional. It is in their friendships that I am the luckiest. 

Just wanted to take a moment to appreciate that.

The Cart Before The Horse

This week has turned into one of engaging research for me. One of my priorities was to come out of this week with a step-by-step guide on how to get my written works published. That, from what I've gathered, is an arduous task. So I laid it all out in front of me (and now you) in an exercise of trying to understand what I need to do, exactly. This, of course, requires me to actually have a written piece to start following the steps below. Hence the title of this post. But eh, now I've done my research. All I have to do is get cracking!

Without further ado, here's how I (or anyone, really) go about getting published.

0.5) Research the market. A bit of a gimme, but know what to write based on what people will want to read. See: The vampire craze has mostly passed at this point - pick another cryptid to make your sexy teenage romance. This may be a bit of hubris on my part, but I'm a pretty avid reader and I'd like to think that I'd write something that I'd want to read, ergo, something with decent appeal. I include it because it's been the number one piece of advice in all of my research, so I guess there's a lot of shitty less popular book ideas out there.

1) Write something. Basically anything. Or a collection of somethings. That's the primary objective. I'm on it.

2) Find an agent. This seems to involve a few sub-steps, such as writing a query letter to send to potential agents, and even that has sub-steps of addressing specific agents and their requirements within various agencies. What the agent does (if they like the ~300 word query letter) is champion my story. 

2.5 OR 1.5) Get my piece professionally edited. I've looked at a few different places, and across the board they had conflicting opinions on getting an editor before or after an agent. Arguments for BEFORE include looking professional and polished with your work, as if you are prepared to go to any lengths to ensure the quality of your piece. Arguments for AFTER include a lot of agents have their own preferred editors for their clients, want a raw piece that can be buffed under their supervision. This only matters so far as me already having a piece to be looked at so... Cross this bridge when I come to it.

=> It should be noted that for either the editor or agent, a fiction writer will need to have the full manuscript ready for the first encounter. Apparently non-fiction writers can get away with just the first three chapters completed until they actually need to get seriously edited and published. 

3) The notes above after 'Write something' are irrelevant if I self publish. The nice thing about traditional publishing is that it controls a lot of the marketing and legwork that goes into selling a book, and more specifically the funding that makes it happen. I don't necessarily have the popularity to make self-publishing worthwhile. At least, not at this juncture. If I have something I need to write and put out there and don't need to profit off of it, then that's the ideal route. 

4) What happens after an agent accepts my manuscript? Because that's the primary question after I've written a story, written a query letter, and given that query letter to anyone who might be interested. From what I can gather, this is its own song and dance none too different from a job interview. You should have multiple agents on the line, figuring out what the deal is from each of them. If you get an offer, don't immediately accept that offer - let that agent know you want time. This can be time to consider, time to let other agents know you HAVE an offer so they have time to get back to you, and also time to research the quality of the offer. Two weeks was the general consensus on how long one should wait MAX on finalizing a decision on an offer. After that it gets pretty rude. 

5) Follow etiquette. Once a decision has been made, let ALL potential agents know (whether you heard back or not) that you have made a decision and that you now have an agent. This can trigger some eager/competitive agents to rush through your manuscript when they might have otherwise thought they had time. If they do, they like it. That's promising. 

6) This is (in theory) where the magic happens. The agent submits the manuscript to editors and publishers, or the editors then submit it to publishers. Every place I've read about this emphasizes that this will take time. Regular check-ups with agents should be once a month at most, with a phone call once every six months. The waiting game is played to various possible results. This is probably what I'd label as the Least Fun-Sounding Part, because there's minimal control - even if the manuscript goes a year without selling to a publisher, that doesn't necessarily indicate bad writing or a bad agent. And with that knowledge, you're supposed to sit. And wait some more. 

Here's where I am most concerned. Due to the nature of publishing writing, the variances between each 'standard author/agent relationship' can be pretty drastic. Each source I look into tells a slightly different story. Advice written broadly about the field gives significant chunks of time to expect, erring on the side of caution. Bits written by experienced authors can be tales of whirlwind blissful romance friendship business partnership. Or they can be the horrors of The Worst Agents Ever™ that include jumping from agent to agent with heart-wrenching struggles to find success. 

Thankfully, I've got time to figure that out, and my experience will be unique as well. And it'll help to talk to authors in the meantime to establish some reasonable expectations for an agent, or the process in general. But, uh, basically... This. This is what I've got in store.

Time to get to it!

Practical Skills Pt. 2: Survivalist

One of the first full series of books I read was the Laura Ingalls Wilder books. It was this cute light blue gingham box set where each book, from Little House in the Big Woods to The First Four Years, were a different color. I devoured the series. It was fascinating to me, how the entire life of Laura Ingalls Wilder was documented. In telling the stories of her early childhood through to marriage, Laura gave a vivid account of the lifestyle in the developing United States in the late 1800's. Most importantly to me, she gave careful details about how her family survived.

The difficulties of tilling and farming previously wild land were recounted. Various recipes using wild or minimal ingredients could be found on the pages. The meticulous ways Mary and Laura went from making their own corn husk dolls to sewing their own clothes made me consider the ease with which I obtained my own toys and clothes. Most importantly were the ways the family would settle in an area, with little to no resources, and build a home from logs, stones, and mud. I thought about the wariness of the family after they all came down with malaria, which they assumed was caused by the watermelons they ate but was actually from the mosquitoes by the river. Things like household insulation and fuel for steady heat were out of mind before reading through The Long Winter. I developed a new appreciation for maple syrup in general. Pretty sure I was seven or eight when I read them all.

This instilled in me an intense desire to read stories about characters surviving. I didn't really have words for what exactly I was looking for until I read My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George. It was about a boy named Sam who up and went to live in the wilderness of the Catskills. While Sam starts off with some food and a loose idea of what to do, he quickly realizes that he needs more knowledge. He researches different types of vegetation he can eat. He makes a home out of a hollow tree, which he uses to learn exactly how to make a chimney out of natural clay. He ends up training a bird of prey. He skins a deer to make clothes and preserves the meat by smoking it. Every little detail about roughing it that was described, I drank up. Same went with the brutal conditions in Hatchet by Gary Paulsen. And the food preparation and preservation in the Redwall series by Brian Jacques. And the sanitizing of rusty pots and old utensils in the first Boxcar Children book by Gertrude Chandler Warner.

So I previously wrote about practical skills - stuff I know, stuff I've learned by living it. Now, I have never gone full wilderness. The closest I get is going camping every once and a while, and that has all of the supplies I bring with me though I do rough it more than most. Also I don't think most camp sites would be okay with me hacking down logs to build a cabin or burn out a big tree for shelter! But through my readings, not only have I learned that you can dry out and grind acorns into an edible flour, or saw dust can be used to insulate ice to prevent melting even on the hottest days, but I've also grown an appreciation of all of the survival skills I don't need to call upon regularly.

I'm pretty lucky in my suburban home where I don't need to boil and purify the water I drink and research the quality of the food I've scavenged. At the same time I've always found this sort of skill set worth knowing, just in case something terrible happens - I'll be living it up in the post-apocalyptic dystopia! Or maybe I'll just write about it. Who knows!

Writing What I Know

I'm a big believer in learning. This is funny, especially from the perspective of someone who's seen my report cards. Yeah, sure, I'll throw myself under the bus a little. Sometimes it takes time to figure out how to become a student. And I'm not talking about school, no... School's got the foundations and building blocks for a lot of things, but it is not the first place you will learn things in your life and I sincerely hope it won't be the last. 

Schools are nice from the perspective that they're built to be learning environments. It's a place you go to study, to further your knowledge and understanding. The goal is to teach logic and reasoning, critical thinking. Fundamentally, we all know that not everyone learns the same way, but it would certainly be easier if we did. It would make school a helluva lot more universally beneficial. It would probably be way less costly than it is in the United States, at least. It may even go on for longer, regardless of the field you were going into, just because if there were a neat uniform way to convey information that worked for EVERYONE, then holy cow what a breakthrough, please teach the world this way.

Today I received a piece of advice (well I received a whole lot of advice but this is the pertinent bit) - I was urged to write about what I actually learned in college. College is a place of higher education. I learned a great deal. But college is also a timeframe for learning. There's this insane learning curve for mental and emotional maturation and life lessons. The general expectation is that you leave as an adult prepared for adult world times. The reality of these expectations are pretty off base, in my humble opinion. It's a great start, but it can also veer you into a land of unreasonable expectations about the life you may lead. It all boils down to everyone's experiences being different (wow). 

I definitely learned a great deal both in classes in college, and in the life around college, and that'll be an enormous chunk of personal writing I will probably have to do some serious soul-searching on before I slap it on the internet for all to see. Regardless, what I know from those years of experience doesn't cap off my learning, and far from it. It's corny, but being a 'student of life' is an apt way to put it. I've researched a ton of seemingly useless or irrelevant topics in my life. Anytime someone wants to share details about a project they are working on, no matter what it is, I try to listen and understand what they are up to. 

Because - and here's the really neat thing - you can write about literally anything. It's all knowledge, it's all important. One of the first pieces of advice my class of first year writing peers and I were given in school was to write what we know. So why not try to know as MUCH as you possibly can? Any other way about it makes your writing narrower, limited. I may not be a computer engineer, or an alpaca herder, or a brain surgeon, or a white collar criminal, but I may want to write about people who are, and I'd hate to not do my future characters justice.

Being Genuine

Job interviews are the inevitable inbetween of the job acquiring process. Every once in a blue moon someone will look at the applicant and declare them miraculously hired. That hasn't happened to me yet, or very nearly anyone I've talked to, so we'll assume that's strictly a dream scenario.

Interviews come with their own unique sets of manners and behaviors unlike any other standard human interaction. It's as if there's an unwritten script everyone must follow to get everything right, to ask all of the correct questions, to tick off the appropriate boxes - except everyone is reading from a different play. Each turn of phrase can be taken different ways. Being personable and respectful isn't always enough. It can be how you dress, or how you talk that's the difference between favorability and dismissal. It can be how you look. And that's just assuming the interviewer doesn't hold any strong social biases which is a delicate way of saying racism, sexism, classism, etc. 

In theory you're a good person who's got the skills and aptitude for the job you're applying for. Now you have to stand out from the rest of the people who also meet these criteria. But you don't want to stick out in a bad way. Toeing the line between confident and obnoxious, or humble and bland, is probably the hardest part. What does it for the interviewer changes from person to person, and odds are you're meeting this person for the very first time on the day of the interview... On the other side of things, they know about as much about you. The resume in front of them can only tell them so much. 

The worst part, for me, is that all of the above must be kept in constant consideration, all while trying to be genuine. That's the conundrum, though - the second you have to try to be genuine, you've already lost the fight. It's a little forced, a little fake. You have your, "I play nice with others and am a valuable asset to any team," face on, which nobody ever says about themselves except at job interviews. The interviewer wants to know the real you, but there's this agreed-upon sense that neither you nor the interviewer are going to be 110% themselves during the process. Afterwards? Sure, maybe. But during, almost never.

So since it's all about the face you put on, the draw to put on a play as someone you're not is strong. I understand that urge, to be the person they want to hire rather than who you feel like you are in general. Now I don't have the answers. All I know is, I still try. Because trying to be genuine is better than faking who I am; because down the line, if I get hired, the facade won't match up with the day-to-day self. We'll see how it goes.

Mental Magic

Fantasy has always been my favorite genre in the vast majority of media I consume. When I was a kid, my parents would take turns reading The Chronicles of Narnia to me right before bed. I started on the Harry Potter series back when the first book was still only known as The Philosopher's Stone. Today, Terry Pratchett is my favorite author (GNU Terry Pratchett), with his mastery of fantasy satire and the ability to so thoroughly flesh out characters and worlds at every point on the range of human emotion. Heck, I write fantasy. It's pretty much my favorite thing. 

So I put myself to thinking on what brings fantastical elements into my life. It's not all second-hand. While my inspirations for writing and drawing definitely can be influenced by the content I take in - and how can it not? - I am still capable of original thoughts. 

I think, in this case, everyone is able to find a little bit of the fantastic in their daily lives. It feeds wonderment. It allows willing suspension of disbelief. It enables the worlds we build for ourselves, because if we cannot imagine something magnificent, we are leading stunted lives. 

I know, for me, one of those places is the beach, specifically at sunset. On the east coast this means a little less, as the sun goes down over the land rather than the water. But where I go, the beach is cleared out from the bustle of the day. The sand is cool on top with the gentle heat beat in by the sun seeped in underneath - you feel it when you dig your toes in. The fading light paints the cloudscape soft pinks and oranges layered under pillows of lavender and plum. And off to the side, the gentle shhh of the water lapping against the shore makes a tranquil soundtrack to soft thoughts and good company.

I'm going to that this weekend, and I'm very excited about it. I hope everyone else gets that opportunity to open themselves up to the fantastical places that let their minds believe in magic.

Birthdays and The Art of Wanting

Let me know if you've heard this one before...

It's your birthday! Or it's Christmas! Or it's Hanukkah! Or you just graduated! Or you're engaged or getting married or having a baby or celebrating an anniversary or you've moved into a new home or you see where I'm going with this... It's a time to be joyful and merry because heck yeah, that good thing is happening. Also, you're getting gifts. That's neat!

A person who cares about you deeply might ask, "So, what do you want for [occasion]?"

For me, this is usually my mom, who's on top of things like this that involve some planning ahead, and ensures that the gift she gets is something the person wants, rather than something she thinks they want. And I'll tell you what, for being on this planet for 25 years as of today, I have grown less and less certain about an answer for that question.

When I was a kid, I always knew exactly what I wanted. Or I had a general idea. I don't remember being distinctly dissatisfied with anything I was given. As time has gone on, either I've become a lot more laid back about the gifts I get (me? Laid back? Pshaw!) OR I've had less concrete things to ask for. I'm going to put a pin at around my 16th birthday when I started relying more on suggestions for what to do and how to celebrate my birthday. That neatly fits the timeline of having a regular part-time job beyond babysitting gigs, and having money of my own to spend on things I would otherwise have waited to be gifted to me. 

As time has gone on, I draw a lengthier blank when asked. The 'quick' answers I come up with are practical gifts, things that are a bit more costly but will last. Like kitchen supplies or hiking boots - I'm excited to get them and use them, but they aren't the standard of fun. My fallback has always been bookstore gift cards. I've always known I like surprises, because it shows the people who give me something are doing it of their own accord, with the desire to go above and beyond. In those cases, I didn't ask for anything, and that makes any surprise all the better. 

I don't think I'm good at wanting things. Well, more specifically, I'm not good at wanting physical things. Most of those things I can get on my own, given time. I more so want gestures. When I want, it's not usually a wrapped-up item. It's more abstract, like someone's time, or going to a place with friends and family. 

When my mom asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday last week so she could plan ahead, I mentally flatlined. I knew this past weekend I'd score a lovely home-cooked dinner with my parents. I knew that this upcoming weekend I'd be going to the beach with my parents, my brother, his girlfriend, and my boyfriend and for those of you who don't know, the beach is about as good as it gets for me. With all of these bigger moments, these experiences, I didn't feel any special need to make a fuss on the day of, today. I had no solid plans. I just wanted to make sure I spent time with those I care about. 

I know that down the line I can't hold those memories in my hands. Age and new experiences will trim or alter them. But they are what I want most of all, and they're both the hardest and easiest things to give. You make them together and they live on in the people around you. I find myself truly wanting for little else, and I'm pretty dang lucky to be that way.

Practical Skills

I've always taken pride in the fact that I have many practical life skills. I know my way around a toolbox. I can mount shelves and pictures using a level. I can mow a lawn. I can bake and cook with tasty results. I can do basic computer troubleshooting. I know how to sew on a button or adjust a seam. I can hook and bait a fishing pole. I can, etc...

This past weekend my dad and I rotated the tires of my car and changed the oil and filter. And all the while, my dad kept asking me if I would write a blog post about it. I laughed and said maybe, since I already had other posts planned out before that. So this post is going to give a nod to this past Sunday, where I had the time and skills to do some standard care for my car.

There are a few things I've taken to learning on my own. How to knit, how to bind books, how to remove bumper stickers from cars, and change the chains on bikes - these are in my repertoire as a result of trial and error combined with research. Most things can be learned this way. But everything listed in the first paragraph I learned at a base level from my parents, and would not have expanded the breadth of this knowledge as far as I have without their initial push. My mom the baker made sure I was comfortable in our home kitchen, encouraged me to develop my flavor palette and watched over my knife techniques. My dad the computer programmer urged me to explore the ins and outs of a computer from an early age, giving me an edge on my peers as the technology evolved. I learned sewing from both of them. And so on.

Whenever I exhibit my practical skills to another adult, someone who maybe didn't see how I was brought up or they simply don't know me very well, they would often remark about how impressive it is to see. They're floored that I have these abilities, this background of experience. They say that they don't see many of my age group, "the millennials," with the same abilities. It's not always said, but the tone that follows implies laziness on my peers' side. That they are the ones who lack the drive to learn these things, that they are a drag on society as a result. It's a tone of dismissal and disgust.

But I know I'm not the only exception to the rule. I know too many people with these abilities, these learned skills. Some of them are self-taught. Many of them learned it from parents, or authority figures. And it makes me wonder how many of my allegedly skill-less peers are just not being taught by the experienced adults in their lives. Not everyone has a drive to learn, to seek out knowledge. Not everyone knows there's this knowledge that they're missing. You can't go looking for something you don't even know about!

So I'm a "lucky one," then. But that's no excuse for the tone of dismissal and disgust. I know the things I know because someone (be it a family member, friend, teacher, or myself) saw a gap in my knowledge and decided to teach me. Don't dismiss these hypothetically ignorant individuals. Take the chance to teach, if they are willing to learn. Everyone can use some new practical skills.