Long Blog

Fall Dreaming

Thu, 8 Sep 2011 13:15:08 -0400

The weather has been deliciously chilly and the Halloween crap is out in force! My favorite season is upon us.
The other day I was inspired to write this to a friend:
Interestingly, the fall-like weather lately has been making me feel quite good... not like super happy-happy, but sort of cozy and content.
Like today after work I had to stop by Aquinas College to drop of some rehearsal skirts and shoes for the show I'm designing, and then instead of going home I just wandered around campus a bit (the campus, though pretty smack in the middle of Grand Rapids, is kind of like a little forest preserve and has a nice woodsy feel), drinking a latte and listening to Neko Case and not worrying too much about anything.
Then I went home and ate some tomato soup, made a cup of tea and finished a book I've been reading. I listened to some pleasantly melancholy music and got sucked into the Gothic atmosphere of the book (The Thirteenth Tale, by Diane Setterfield) had one of the most relaxing evenings I've had in a while. It's an evening that never would have really worked in the summer... In the summer I always feel like I should be going out, doing stuff, even if it's just sitting on the porch drinking wine with friends, it's like summer needs people to make it work. Fall is better for being contentedly solitary.
Yet, despite feeling pretty good with myself and the world lately, over the past few nights I’ve had every anxiety dream in my repertoire, from the standard “I’m in a play but I don’t know my lines” and “I have to go back to high school because I’m missing one class” to the more personally specific “I’ve been stabbed and I’m bleeding to death but NO ONE MUST KNOW” to “I can’t stop crying uncontrollably in public”.
I predict tonight it will be “Trapped underground with zombies/sewer mutants”.
So, is my unconscious freaking out because my conscious is finally kind of doing okay? Or do I just think I’m doing okay, because I’ve finally repressed all of crazy into my unconscious? EIther way, it’s probably fine, right?

P.S. Gah. From now on, I’m not even going to call this a blog, I’m going to call it a “Feelings Diary”. See my Tumblr for less emotional content.

The Worst Part

Tue, 12 Apr 2011 18:57:53 -0400

I work so hard.
Imagine me balancing a spinning plate on a stick, while riding a unicycle. That’s what it takes, that much concentration and effort and balance. That’s getting out of the house, doing my job, talking to people. If I get to stay home, it’s like I can get off that unicycle, but I have to keep the plate up there, keep it spinning, at least until it seems late enough to say goodnight to my roommates, close my door, be myself for two or three hours and then go to sleep.
That’s not the worst part.
The worst part is that it keeps getting harder. Just when I think I’ve got a handle on the plate and the stick and the unicycle someone I love, who I think loves me, comes along and knocks me off with a baseball bat.
And when I pick myself up, put myself back together, and climb up there again, it’s harder. Maybe the plate’s on fire now. Maybe I have to juggle knives with the other hand.
And I keep getting more precarious. It doesn’t take a baseball bat to knock me down anymore. Just brush by me. Just blow on me.
I keep pedaling, keep the plate turning and the knives whirling because I know everyone has their own act to maintain. They’re all walking their own tightropes and jumping through their own hoops. If I drop my shit, someone else will have to pick it up.
But I do feel like, for some people, the act is just a little easier. I look at them, all they have to do is wear a sequined vest and take tickets at the door. They’re the ones who bump into me, accidentally, making everything come crashing down, and don’t think twice about it. Because if I bumped into them, they wouldn’t even fall. I kind of hate them, but I forgive them.
What do I do, though, with the people who know? I’ve showed them my unicycle, I’ve looked at the swords they have to swallow. We’ve shared the ring. I’ve picked their shit up when they needed it and they’ve even occasionally picked up mine. What do I do when they’re the ones knocking me down?
And who but myself do I have to blame for the fact that they’re so good at it?

Divination

Wed, 16 Mar 2011 00:34:43 -0400

I know the reason astrology works is that the information you get from it is so vague and general that everything it says will eventually apply to you somehow. However, I still get unnecessarily excited when I find something about Taurus that actually is relevant to me. I really, really suck at being a Taurus. There were a few brief hours, back when everyone thought the signs were changing, that I was an Aries. I got super excited because I've always felt like I was born under the wrong sign and Aries seemed so much more "me." Alas, astrological authorities quickly put paid to that notion.
For the record, I have an immense skepticism about the idea that anything up in the sky (be it stars or Gods) has any influence over us or gives a single fuck what we do. However, I have always been a fan of complex systems designed to interpret/predict events. I think that using any system of rules, no matter how arbitrary, to better understand the world is a useful exercise. As an actor, I do things like deciding that I'll use a specific Laban effort for every line that starts with a certain letter, another for every line that contains the word "I," etc. Sometimes they work surprisingly well. More often they work badly enough to suggest a different, "right" way to play that line. When I write, I set myself similar limitations to spur creativity. I've always loved the story that Daphne du Maurier started writing Rebecca as an experiment to see how far she could go without naming the protagonist.
This is why I’m a big fan of Tarot cards. I've actually made many important life decisions (where to get my Master's, for one) using them. The process of refining a question to ask, the physical act of laying out the cards, and the complex way the meaning of each individual card interacts with the meaning of the spread all help get me thinking more deeply and specifically about what I feel, want and need out of a decision.

Teachers, etc.

Tue, 22 Feb 2011 14:36:01 -0500

I’ve been brewing a rant since the first time I saw this. I kept telling myself that the intention was right, that it’s silly to nitpick, that I don’t want to be divisive. But now that it seems like everyone I know on Facebook has shared it, I just have to say...

I do get it. I do agree. And, I’ll even give the author the benefit of the doubt and assume that when she says “babysitter,” she’s referring to young Susie who lives down the block and watches your kids for a couple of hours while you go to the movies, not to, say, a woman with decades of experience and training in child development who’d never aspire to make as much as $8/hr PER CHILD.

So, while I am most definitely on the side of the teachers, I'm also on the side of the "babysitters". Education doesn't begin in kindergarden. Early childcare providers are as underpaid and undervalued as teachers, and setting them in opposition to each other is counterproductive.

Instead of scoffing at the idea of paying a teacher as little as one would pay a mere babysitter, maybe we should ask why the idea of valuing the work of the people who usher our children through some of the most important stages of intellectual development is so ridiculous?*

Like I said, I side with the teachers. I’ve yet to meet a childcare provider who doesn’t. After all, we count on you to finish what we’ve started. We’re fighting the same battles against the same enemies. The people who don’t take your work seriously take our work so much less seriously. People who don’t want to prioritize funding for schools are rarely even interested in increasing access to childcare, let alone insuring that providers can make a living wage.

All children, of all ages, deserve the best education we can give them. Whether we’re providing that education in a classroom, a center or a home, we deserve to have our work respected and compensated. The opposition between the value of a babysitter and the value of a teacher sets up a world where respect for educators is a finite commodity and we all have to wrangle for our share. But devaluing one kind of educator devalues us all.

*I’m sure it has nothing to do with the fact that so many of them are women, and women of color in particular.

Merry Christmas

Fri, 24 Dec 2010 14:31:33 -0500

Here’s my tradition Christmas poem.

Wassail Chorus at the Mermaid Tavern Theodore Watts-Dunton

CHRISTMAS knows a merry, merry place, Where he goes with fondest face, Brightest eye, brightest hair: Tell the Mermaid where is that one place, Where?

Raleigh. ‘Tis by Devon’s glorious halls, Whence, dear Ben, I come again: Bright of golden roofs and walls— El Dorado’s rare domain—
Seem those halls when sunlight launches Shafts of gold thro’ leafless branches, Where the winter’s feathery mantle blanches Field and farm and lane.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Drayton. ‘Tis where Avon’s wood-sprites weave Through the boughs a lace of rime, While the bells of Christmas Eve Fling for Will the Stratford-chime O’er the river-flags emboss’d Rich with flowery runes of frost— O’er the meads where snowy tufts are toss’d— Strains of olden time.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Shakespeare’s Friend. ‘Tis, methinks, on any ground Where our Shakespeare’s feet are set. There smiles Christmas, holly-crown’d With his blithest coronet: Friendship’s face he loveth well: ‘Tis a countenance whose spell Sheds a balm o’er every mead and dell Where we used to fret.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Heywood. More than all the pictures, Ben, Winter weaves by wood or stream, Christmas loves our London, when Rise thy clouds of wassail-steam— Clouds like these, that, curling, take Forms of faces gone, and wake Many a lay from lips we loved, and make London like a dream.

CHORUS. Christmas knows a merry, merry place, &c.

Ben Jonson. Love’s old songs shall never die, Yet the new shall suffer proof: Love’s old drink of Yule brew I Wassail for new love’s behoof. Drink the drink I brew, and sing Till the berried branches swing, Till our song make all the Mermaid ring— Yea, from rush to roof.

FINALE. Christmas loves this merry, merry place;
 Christmas saith with fondest face, Brightest eye, brightest hair: ‘Ben, the drink tastes rare of sack and mace: Rare!’

Cute

Tue, 2 Nov 2010 16:33:32 -0400

This isn’t really related to the belated Halloween party I’m supposed to be having up in here.

But is it wrong that this makes me want to sew lace on the bottoms of all my shirts?

(Not so I remember to tuck them in, because: ew. Just to spruce up my wardrobe, you know?)

Happy Halloween

Sun, 31 Oct 2010 16:16:51 -0400

Compared to last year, when I decorated my entire blog, wrote a Halloween Newt story, and attempted at week-long series of posts on Creepy Things, this year’s Blogoween* was pretty much a failure.

Sure, I could offer excuses, such as the fact that this month I was acting in both a Tim Burton-inspired Midsummer Night’s Dream and a wildly-successful** musical adaptation of Nightmare on Elm St.

Instead, however, I would like to offer some vague, pie-in-the-sky, unlikely to be fulfilled promises***:

1) This year I shall not forgot NaNoWriMo, as I have for the past decade. I shall remember! And as of midnight tonight, I shall be writing a novel.
2) I will make November the month of belated Halloween here at Girlish Whimsy, so that I actually have time to savour it before we get into those tiresome holidays that are about family togetherness rather than severed heads.

To commence #2, here is a terrifying illustration from Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, one of many that has haunted me since childhood.

*No, I don’t like that either. I appologize.
**(For independent theater in Grand Rapids)
***It is election time.

Influence Map

Tue, 7 Sep 2010 18:09:01 -0400

Found this meme on John Allison’s blog.

It’s supposed to be for artists but I think it works for writers too.

1. Neil Gaiman 2. The Flickr Commons 3. The Brontës 4. Mo Willems 5. Margaret Atwood 6. Susanna Clarke 7. A. S. Byatt 8. The Decemberists 9. Belle and Sebastian 10. Wes Anderson 11. Kate Beaton 12. Bryan Fuller 13. Edward Gorey

Whoa.

Sat, 5 Jun 2010 14:59:17 -0400

I followed a link to this Charles Dickens site and immediately my eyes were assaulted by this ad.

First of all, eating with your hands is not romantic, especially if you are a vampire.

Secondly, Edward better not become the default vampire name.

Finally, I am really, really tempted to click the link.

Also, the page claims to be “dedicated to bringing the genius of Dickens to a new generation of readers.”

You better hurry, dude.

Memorial Day

Mon, 31 May 2010 17:39:24 -0400

The Sleeper in the Valley Arthur Rimbaud

It is a green hollow where a stream gurgles, Crazily catching silver rags of itself on the grasses; Where the sun shines from the proud mountain: It is a little valley bubbling over with light.
A young soldier, open-mouthed, bare-headed, With the nape of his neck bathed in cool blue cresses,  Sleeps; he is stretched out on the grass, under the sky, Pale on his green bed where the light falls like rain.
His feet in the yellow flags, he lies sleeping. Smiling as  A sick child might smile, he is having a nap: Cradle him warmly, Nature: he is cold.
No odour makes his nostrils quiver; He sleeps in the sun, his hand on his breast At peace. There are two red holes in his right side.