Updates

I would like to apologize to all of my readers (my Mom and a few other friends, I can't even get Cristy to read this sometimes!) for my lack of posting over the past few months.  I am currently working on two separate books in the unlikely event I can get something published in the next year or so.  Yes, I do understand the level of unlikelyhood involved in making money writing.  I would probably be better off running around buying tickets for every lottery in the tri-state.  However, that doesn't require any skill so I am attempting to use this skill I have been developing, the only one I have much confidence in these days. 

In the mean time if anyone has any ideas of how to crack one's way into journalism, publishing or anything related to writing with zero experience or education related to the field, any suggestions would be appreciated.  Lottery tickets received in the mail will be taken as a sign that it is as impossible as I assume it to be. 

The Door to Narnia

What if every room had a magical escape portal?  Many books and movies geared towards children contain just this concept…a doorway for a child to leave their reality and enter another. Narnia, Wonderland, even the movie Coralline give children a specific way to escape. But why do children need a way to escape? Isn’t childhood the very place to which many adults tease they wish they could take a portal? Perhaps those adults hold a memory of childhood skewed by nostalgia and as children they also had some concerns, problems, worries, and unrest regarding their future just as they do now.

Or perhaps instead of wanting to actually be a child, adults just wish they had a way to still believe in Wonderland. I suppose as an adult it is common to have a lessened capacity to absorb fantasy as reality, so many use books or movies as a way to escape to another world. Well, except for me. I literally have a clear fantasy of taking off to Never Never Land. And when I say literally (because I know the meaning of literally) I mean that I lay there in the grey morning hours when I am still sleepy but not quite awake and imagine myself flying over the sparkling blues and greens of the Island debating where to visit first. Mermaid Lagoon usually wins, in case you were wondering.

This makes me wonder if it is the active imagination in some other dreamers and me that makes us grit our teeth at the thought of being interrupted while reading. I have written about this gargantuan pet peeve of mine before but somehow it always comes up because it just KEEPS HAPPENING! An interruption mid page is the equivalent of a giant (well-meaning though completely annoying) hand reaching into Wonderland, grabbing Alice by her hair, plucking her right out of there and sitting her on a plain bench on an ordinary day to talk to her about the weather. The next time you visit a library or a book store watch what happens when all the people reading are suddenly interrupted by someone who has no control over the volume of their voice. All the readers jump from the disturbance of the silence and the disturbance of the story that was unfolding in their head.

Granted, most of the stories that provide an escape to children are driving towards the lesson of “there is no place like home.” Whether this forced turn-off from the magical other world stems from a psychotic queen, a fake mom who steals children’s eyes or the demise of a beloved lion (whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy??????) the fantasy land is ultimately proven to be uninhabitable and less preferable to the safety of home. This brings me back to my love of Peter Pan. Although Wendy determines that having the security and love of family in the real world is best for a child, it is also revealed that retaining an active imagination and holding on to some of the innocence of childhood are the good strategies to having a more fulfilling adult life.

I maintain that it is best to keep an open mind to any ideas or possibilities. Whether it be alternate worlds, alien life forms, God, or just ultimate happiness, those abstract ideas keep our personal portal to Narnia open and our lives enriched.

Hurricanes and Elections

There has been some discussion stirring following Hurricane Sandy regarding the election and how or why it should affect people’s votes. The reason it should affect those votes is simple. Mitt Romney has said in the past that he believes FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Agency) should be defunded. Of course now that FEMA is helping actual people right before an election he has changed his stance somewhat.


So while President Obama was off being non-partisan, providing immediate organized support, and being, well, Presidential….Mitt Romney was posing for cheesy photo ops with other volunteers gathering canned goods. This to me shows how out of touch Romney actually is. People throw around the term “out of touch” about Romney left and right (haha, no actually just left) but this time I feel it truly fits. The day after a Hurricane Disaster people need to be rescued. They need the flames pouring out of their burning neighborhoods to be extinguished. They need electricity and basic transportation to be restored. What they don’t at this moment right here need, is canned peas!

Some republicans believe that as a country we should not rely on the government to fix our problems, but that in times like natural disasters we should come together to volunteer our time and efforts to help our fellow man. Also the States should fix it themselves. That sounds great and pretty but in reality groups of random citizens and local governments can not organize and efficiently accomplish what FEMA and the trained rescue workers can.

I am obviously voting for President Barack Obama in the upcoming election. Otherwise if Romney gets his wishes, then following a Tornado I could be sitting in a pile of wood that was formerly my home with a nice bag of canned goods to help me overcome the tragedy.

Missed Opportunity?

Lately my greatest fear regarding my own potential as a writer is the possibility of a past missed opportunity during College. I was and am so grateful to have parents who were willing to pay for my college costs…from the books to the beer. At the time it seemed reasonable and prudent to major in Accounting. I didn’t simply open the College Catalog to a random page and point. Instead this decision was agreed upon by all interested parties upon examination of the job market and discussion of my stellar math skills. As it would turn out, math is definitely not the same thing as accounting. I impart this wisdom to potential students all the time. Just because something has to do with numbers, that does NOT make it math. Also turns out that not only is accounting not like math, I really don’t even like it. For me, on a scale of Bees to Disney, Accounting falls only slightly above bees.


The biggest deterrent to College Ann deciding to major in something like English or Writing at UK was that College Ann didn’t even enjoy writing! She hated papers and essays and such. I assume this is because when I am forced to do something then the enjoyment gets subsequently sucked out. Cristy was telling me today that she is not looking forward to her Literature Class because when she is TOLD to read something her attitude wants to go the way mine did when I was forced to practice piano. But I don’t waannaaaaaaaaaaaaaa read it!!!

To make matters worse, I didn’t plan on my future self utilizing the knowledge I was learning in my few English and Composition classes. So while I did enjoy reading, grammar and analyzing stories and Shakespeare, a lot of that knowledge seems to have been filed in the “it’s ok to forget later” part of my brain. You know, where I put the stuff like chemistry and Football rules.

Sometimes I will be reading blogs about writing and things like “sentence structure” or “ethos” will come up and I start thinking “do I even remember what that is and if so am I doing it all wrong!?” Terrifying. Does it really matter though? Is it possible that it could turn out to be a good thing that I don’t have to conform to certain models or expectations? Is it possible that people outside of academia might feel my writing more relatable if it isn’t influenced by academic law? Was it truly a missed opportunity? Only time will tell; but I am willing to find out. I am willing to put effort in and to practice, read and study things on my own to find my own voice as a writer.

Regardless, the Income Statement route I ended up taking did bring me where I am now. From Auditor to General Accounting to Recruiting to Admissions/sales to wanting to be out of Sales – along that journey I have made friends, learned things, changed and grown as a person. You can never go back and change your life. And as I told my cousin yesterday: you wont ever have a perfect life but you should never stop striving to make it so.

Ridiculous Pinterest Ideas

I love Pinterest, really I do.  But sometimes I see things pinned on there that lead me to the conclusion that the pinner just didn't really think it through.  You guys, sometimes something might seem like a good idea, and it just isn't.  Here is a random sampling for your enjoyment. 

 1. Hope all you are storing is pillows because that little plastic lip isn’t going to hold much else!!  Ok plus why is this garage so tall?

2. Initials instead of tags on gifts. This is such a great idea…unless you have more than one person in your family with the same initial, as 98% of families do…



 3. So you drop the yogurt in little dots on a tray, freeze them and then have these cute yogurt bites to serve!!  Until they melt 10 minutes later and then you have just served your guests a giant bowl of yogurt.

 4. This is insane!!  First of all if that magnet has a loose hold then I am certainly going to knock the wrong knife off while reaching for the right one and that right there seems to be the number one best way to lose a toe.  OR if they are attached with a strong magnet then I am going to have to tug at that knife to get it off of there and then when it finally loosens and the knife and my arm go flying this seems to be the second best way to lose a toe…or a dog.

5. Place water with food color in a balloon in the freezer to freeze, right?  Then they will come out shaped like whatever they are laying against, not these marbles, right?  And what kid ever even said "I want a clown, a trampoline and some medium sized colored ice marbles at my birthday party."

6. This is wrong on so many levels.  First of all, do you even know how fragile glass Christmas tree ornaments are!?  This hostess is going to have 9 brown drink stains all over her carpet and multiple guests with hand lesions. And then also....also! no one would be able to put these wobbly globes down all night until they were completely done with the last drop.  What if they don’t like it for God’s sake!? 

7. Anyone who has ever made cookies with cookie cutters knows that this will yield about 7 cute patchy colored cookies as shown, and then roughly 25 dull brown cookies.  You have to gather the dough and re-roll it like 10 times, people!

8. The caption on this pin says "recycle your old DVD cases into activity boxes for car rides."  Do you eat your DVD's?  They are not consumable, so why would you have old DVD cases laying around?  Instead why don't you find me a use for empty egg cartons or something.   

Grief

I have discovered an effective weapon for fighting grief and figured that I should share it with the people I love (well, the people who read this blog. Probably you don’t all love me and probably some people who love me don’t even read this stuff.)


Rather than worrying about all those stages of grief and whether you have been through them all or whether there are more to come; you can take this simple approach and just forget about all that nonsense. I mean, I have been grieving in the past and had anger way before I was in denial and then been all sad and then angry again and thought: “Who organized these stages, anyway!!!”

So the weapon is this: plan a fabulous vacation you can’t afford. In order for this strategy to work you must have a vacation destination in mind that will completely relax you and one that is, for you, your “Happy Place.” We all know where my happy place is so I don’t even need to write it. Ok, wait yes I do DISNEY WORLD! Sorry, even writing it makes me feel a little better. You need to plan a vacation you can’t afford to somewhere that when you simply write down the name of the place it helps just a little bit. That is key.

When I say plan the vacation I don’t mean simply picture yourself there in your head and smile. I mean really plan that shit. I have been on the Disney Website all morning planning out which hotel I will live in and what parks I will visit. I have created a budget (even though I don’t have the money for said budget) and thought of who might go with me (Cristy has to work, boo.) It is most important to really commit to this planning. I have gotten to the point where I am even thinking of ways to raise money for this journey. (For example, I have about 400 FB friends….if each of them gave $5 to the cause…)

When I get home tonight I am going to sit down with some wine, gather together all of my Disney Vacation planning materials, books and DVD’s (yes, I will need like 3 tray tables and the coffee table to hold all of them, beat you to that joke) and plan some more. I am going to plan my little heart out until some of the hurt in the heart hopefully goes away.

                                          (Happy Place)

Warning: This theory has not been tested scientifically or even with anyone other than the author so the advice contained in this blog bears no guarantee of relieving your grief or that of anyone you suggest utilize this method. 

Acting

My Mom and I had a conversation recently about Jennifer Lawrence’s career (The Lawrence Family went to our church growing up and I am friends with her brother, Ben.) Her lovely face is simply everywhere these days so we find ourselves talking about her occasionally. We were bouncing around ideas about what that thing is that makes her stand out over so many other young actresses. She has done drama, action, small film, large film, comedy and scary (I may or may not hide half my face under blankets during the commercial for House at the End of the Street) all in her young career. With an Oscar nomination for Winters Bone and rumors of another for the Silver Linings Playbook (both of these for two different genres,) girl has got it going on.


When I consider some of the roles I have seen her master, scenes I have watched her nail; I remember finding myself thinking “I could never do that!” Last night I realized, that’s IT! That is what makes someone great. While watching TV or a play I often find myself flirting with the idea “I could so do that.” However given deeper thought I always come to the conclusion that I couldn’t even pull off Kristen Stewart levels of acting. I would giggle while she sulks. Acting is quickly struck from my list of “Potential Career Paths and/or Ways to get Rich,” but the thought does cross my mind. It does NOT cross my mind when watching Jennifer.

Cristy and I recently watched Albert Nobbs and you can bet Glenn Close’s Oscars that it didn't occur to me for one second that I could have pulled off that masterpiece of acting genius. She IS Albert Nobbs; she becomes a completely different person in that movie. Based on her track record so far, Jennifer’s IMDB profile could end up looking something like a Glenn Close or a Meryl Streep’s even.

Jennifer seems to have been driven from a young age to do something different, to be something special, and she challenges herself. In an interview where she describes failing at log chopping (for me failing at log chopping would mean lots of dead people and not a single chip in the log) she says she refused to let them bring in a body double as they threatened to do. She chopped up that darned log and some other ones, too. Dang, lady, that is why you are Katniss Freaking Everdeen! You want something and you get it!

My Mom’s favorite story of a young Jennifer is when Jennifer’s Mother, Karen, brought her to meet with Mom so that Mom could try to convince the teenager that she needed to keep attending Youth Group and Choir at our Church on Sunday nights. Jennifer made such a compelling argument to my Mom she was left thinking “well, maybe the child is right!” She knew she didn’t want to do it and she calmly made it clear why. When I wanted or didn’t want to do something at 13 I would yell things about “Not Fair” and “everyone else” and “WHY ME!?”

Comparing Jennifer Lawrence with Kristen Stewart is like comparing Barbara Kingsolver with that horny lady who wrote 50 Shades of Bondage or whatever it is. Does not compute. She is already on a completely different playing field and I am very excited to see where her career goes while she completely becomes these other characters she chooses to portray. I guess even that scary one because I’m sure Cristy will make me watch it.