Distress!

I have lost my first Jason Harrod CD!

I thought I knew where it was. I thought it was with my sister in the cd carrier with a bunch of others. I missed it, but I wasn't worried. Turns out it wasn't there! Eep!

I don't suppose I left it at any of your houses or in your cars? If so, please oh please may I have it back? As much as I like his second CD (and I do), I love the first one and I want to listen to it again, dang it.

Siren Song! Siobhan! Lifeliiiiiiine! Come back to me, do!

Revelation, epiphany, sigh of relief...

To begin, a clipping of an email I sent my cousin last year about folklore and why I want to get my master's in it (the whole email was off the top of my head, not something I'd put any thought into at that point):

"Strangely, seeing that degree possibility when idly searching universities in Scotland (just to see what was possible in another life, you understand) was like a giant hyperbolic lightbulb going off in my head. It was for THIS I have been searching!!! No wonder I could never settle into a grad degree in literature! I really, really wanted to go on to grad school, and yes, fear was part of the reason I was holding back, severe lack of money another. But the biggest reason is, say I tackle the fear, and somehow scrape up the money. When it's over, what do I do? I don't want to teach; I'm just not constitutionally cut out for it, I fear. Learn, yes; share and discuss, yes; teach, especially snot-nosed freshman who couldn't care less how to structure a paper? Nope. Twenty to two hundred people staring at me, judging me, laughing at me? Er, no. So where does a higher lit degree get me? Why, pretty much the places I've been and am. And...that's not enough.

But folklore! Not only does it satisfy my craving for story, language, history, theater, psychology, science, and all of that, not only is it fascinating to see the interplay between legend and culture and how those cultures have developed differently, even when, as in the Celtic cultures, the original stories were very similar, it has potential for future employment! I could be a curator, a lecturer, a writer/rewriter of fairy tales with a better basis and broader pool, an editor at a children's publishing company (with my experience in publishing combined with knowledge of stories that stick), a tour guide, a consultant for towns wanting to set up festivals, an anthropologist studying various cultures to learn their stories and histories and find out how the westernization of the entire world has begun to lose us unique and formerly thriving cultures (i.e. Laplanders--how cool would that be? Also Scottish travellers--I could finally LIVE with the gypsies I am so often accused of being! Wait a minute--I just noticed that I seem to be attracted to the nomadic peoples. Huh.), a museum curator, a writer for the Scottish traveler newsletter, or heck, an overqualified assistant something or other in a field nowhere close to my own. It's the perfect field for a generalist of my ilk. I could switch cultures every few years or so, or even oftener. I could spend a year following the humpback whales and learning from the native peoples who have based much of their culture on following them! I could FINALLY have a reason for studying humpbacks!! And write a book about what it is about these amazing creatures that not only inspired ancient cultures, but continues to find a sounding in the modern mind who can't help but slow down in awe and imagine."

Okay, so now that that immense thing is out of the way, a story. I don't know about you but I don't generally cry at non-fiction books, especially of the "self-help" variety. I might be all, "Oh, HEY! There's a scientific reason I'm an introvert! Sweet!" but I'm not a crier--at least in that. Rarely have things of that nature even come anywhere close to "changing my life." So you'll understand my confusion when I started sniffling last night while reading a self-help book.

The book is Refuse to Choose by Barbara Sher. I'm barely into the introduction and I'm already nodding my head emphatically. "Yes! Oh, I so do that! Yes, that's me! Why, I LOVE da Vinci and have always felt a special kinship to him because he just threw himself into everything!" And then I get to this line: "Our culture's pressure to train specialists simply isn't balanced out by any plan to train generalists."

At least four of you, if you're reading this, are going, "Hey! Haven't you said almost that exact sentence enough times that it's gotten annoying?" Yes. Yes, I have. It's a source of major frustration for me (and my sister--and probably my mother). Examples can be found in this very blog. My inability to pin favorites down. My constant stream of ideas. The entire MIT post, especially the last paragraph. And the email above.

There's nothing wrong with me! I'm a scanner! I start to well up and literally pump my fist in the air in triumph. Like the dork that I am. I have yet to discover which kind I am and she assures me there's a way to make a living and still be this Renaissance person. I'm looking forward to it.

Dream dog

If you click on the above title, it'll take you to a page full of pictures of my friend Tonya's new dog. With whom I am in utter love. She and I have very similar taste in a lot of ways and dogs is one of the biggest. I'm completely jealous that she found him first and hope to someday be able to own my own house so that I can have a similar dog. You should so go look at him. Make sure you get to the pictures where he's not on the couch anymore, too.

Look how cute the puppy!!!

Sparkly news!

That is not my hand.

My bestest friend is getting married! Amy got a ring from Andy on Valentine's Day and it's lovely. The center stone is from her mom's ring and the four side stones are from a ring her grandfather had.

And I'm to be the maid-of-honor! I've never been a bridesmaid but I've been asked to be the maid-of-honor twice. I think that balances out nicely.

Andy and Amy (soon to be) Pratt have a page up here.

Look at me! I hyperlinked!

Idea me!

It's a function of my personality that there are always a million things floating around in my brain. Ideas for books or poems, songs that automatically create figure skating routines in my head, words I think are funny, scraps of trivia from a random book I read when I was seven...etc., etc., etc. The problem becomes the corralling of these various scraps into something I want to write about (or, terrifyingly, that you might want to read about--eek!).

I thought I would ask you, my faithful reader or two, for help. My original intention was to find a button I could stick up on the side of this blog for people to click when they had an idea, sort of a suggestion box type area. That would make it easier for everyone to find, I thought. Sadly, Blogger has no such option.

So I'll start here. If you have any ideas of things I could write about, or babble about, or questions you've wondered, or essays that might be interesting, or story/poem ideas, links I might have, or whatever, comment away! Post it here to begin with and then, as this moves further down the page, please be aware that you can do that same in the comment section of any post, even if it has nothing to do with the post you comment in. It'd be easier if you could click on something on here to email it directly to me, but until I find a way to make that happen, eez not possible.

I'll collect anything and everything I get and answer/do the challenges that trip something in my brain. Only a couple of things: I probably won't do all of them if this starts being a regular thing or if I can't think of anything to really say about it. I'll certainly give you credit if you wish it, or can leave you anonymous if you prefer (you'll probably want to post anonymously in this case). Also, chances are starvingly skinny to none that I'll do anything about politics. We like to avoid this, we does.

So, help me out here, guys! I know at least two people read this on a fairly regular basis and others might sneak in every once in a while. Let's get me writing! I need the practice.

From cynical optimist to just plain cynic

It was a commercial that brought it home to me. At least this night. I'm watching television and one of those inescapable Kay Jewelers commercials comes on. The guy hands his...er...significant other a present. It's a music box--hers from her childhood. And of course, there's a diamond ring inside (a really crusty one--ick). At the end, she looks at the twirly little ballerina and says dreamily, "I think I know just how she feels."

Background: when I was a kid, I LOVED those ballerina music boxes. I know I had more than one. I thought the ballerinas were beautiful, though like everything else, I only wanted very specific ones. I loved the twirling and the tulle and the perfectly arranged bun on top of her head and the precise points of her feet. I dreamed of being that magical dancer or of her coming to life and teaching me to dance. She was enchanting.

And back to the present. That stupid line comes out of the woman's mouth and my mouth opens. And I say out loud to the living room, "You know how she feels? To be stuck endlessly twirling around, never getting anywhere, never able to change, trapped in the dark, pinned to the ground by a great weight breaking your back unless some despot decides she wants to be amused just enough to let you into the light to spin and spin and spin to music you can't choose or stop? Well, how romantic."

I think the dark side has taken over.

How the heat defeats

I am not that girl.

Most people I know dream of summer. They plan their honeymoon in the Bahamas, dream of spring break in the tropics, sock away money for a retirement in Hawaii (preferably at 30 years old). They look forward to beach weather and can't wait to throw on shorts and shades.

I have never been that girl.

Summer's all right. It's very green, and I do enjoy that. I love the warm rain one can wander in. I always appreciated the time off school--more time to read, doncha know. Despite all that, summer is my least favorite time of year. It's just...it's too hot!!!

I don't like heat. I don't like sweat. I don't like stickiness or not being able to breathe deep without feeling like you're drowning because the air is so humid. I don't like when the temperature becomes an aggressor, determined to beat you down, stabbing you with lances of cracking and exhaustion.

At least the cold puts you gently to sleep as it kills you.

What brought on this particular muse/rant? Today I learned something I can't believe I never knew before. There are missionaries whose mission is to plant trees! They go in toting trees with strong, fast-growing root systems and settle them into ground that needs that anchor to revive and recover from erosion.

"Now THAT'S a mission I could totally do!" I say gleefully to myself.

So I looked it up. Perhaps I'm missing something, but the only programs I could find that do this concentrate in Haiti, the Dominican, Tanzania (where Mom would love to go)--hot places. Really, really hot places. *sigh* I want to help this cause, and it's something I'd be willing to give up a lot to do. But how much good would I be doing if someone has to save me from heatstroke every single day?

Doesn't Europe need trees? North China? Canada? Greenland doesn't have a lot of trees--how about we go there? Or, hey, coastal areas in the US that have lost a lot of land to coastal erosion? Washington around Seattle that has lost all manner of trees frm clearcutting? Apparently not.

So I've committed to praying for at least one program. I'll be getting their updates and newsletters, and people should probably plan to get trees planted in their name. And if I ever get to work with Heifer International, I promise to do my best to push the tree program they have. I just don't think I'll be volunteering with the current plans anytime soon.

Unless it's always raining. That'd work.

Free Education--for the asking!

I learned the niftiest thing yesterday. I got an advertising flyer from Real Simple magazine, telling me how much I needed to subscribe, how my life was incomplete without this subscription. Until they lower their prices, as much as I'd like to get it, my life shall remain without completion. At any rate, part of their sales pitch was to send handy little brochures of tips. For example, one detailed how to clean practically anything in five minutes or less. One featured organizational tips. And one -- well, I can't actually remember what its pitch was. I do remember that on the back was a list of things you could do for free--free samples from Oil of Olay, free paperback book swapping, things like that.

One of them was an offer to take free classes at MIT. Of course I made a beeline for that one. I went to the site and sure enough, there are tons of classes in many different divisions. Now, I can't quite figure out if you can actually attend some sort of online class, ala University of Phoenix, but you can download the complete course for anything listed. This include the lectures, class notes, various papers and presentations from the students...everything. So of course I spent a long time last night going through and downloading class after class. I think I ended up with something like fifteen classes, and that with judiciously trimming it to just the classes that I really, really want to take. A good two thirds of them are anthropological, of course, but there are a couple of lit courses, a French course, a history or two, and a smattering of science and psychology.

Now my computer is full of higher education. All I have to do is figure out how I can actually access it! Once I "take" all of these classes, I can put them on my grad school applications! "Yes, I took MIT's seminar in ethnography and fieldwork, and I had a little time to kill, so I also fit in a class on psycholinguistics and the little course on modularity, domain-specificity, and the organization of knowledge. Next up? Geodynamics, Philosophy of Love in the Western world, and either romantic poetry or toy product design. I hate to pin myself down."

Seriously, this may be one of the coolest things ever. I would prefer to have some kind of interaction, but perhaps I can talk my friends into doing the same classes and we can just email or call each other and have remote classes or something.

I just like learning so, and I hate having to narrow it down to one area when I want to learn something in at least fourteen different fields. This will do nicely for the time being.

If you're interested: http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/home/home/index.htm

In response to all the "favorites" questions

I've posted this elsewhere, so this may be a repeat for the three or four people who drop by. It just seems apropos to the profile questions here.
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I have a hard time defining things as "favorite." Are people really able to do this? I don't know if I'm envious of those who can categorize their likes so specifically or if I pity them for being locked into their choices.

Take, for example, favorite colors. This one is the easiest area for me to narrow down—I say blue – any blue, for the most part, but especially a very specific cornflower blue. But to be honest, I love green almost equally. And gray is lovely. White is perfect in certain circumstances and there are a variety of purples that are very satisfying. I suppose with these, the better route is to say my favorite color is "the cool spectrum" rather than any specific colors. Except for that absolutely joyous red-orange that autumn leaves can turn. That's got to be up there too. See my problem?

The truth is, my favorites are always varied. Favorite type of music? It depends on my mood. I like Linkin Park and Sondheim. I love acoustic music, and I drool over a good drum solo. I think bluegrass and the blues are great, but I don't like country. Favorite book? I've read thousands and thousands of books in my life (yes, literally), and I loved quite a few of them. Favorite author? Too many. I appreciate something specific about every single one of them, the way they use description or the honesty in their prose or the way their narrative seems to flow in a tapestry of smoke and color (in the case of Patricia McKillip).

Here's the thing that started this thought process: trying to pin down my "favorite place in the world." Randomly triggered by seeing pictures of Val Kilmer's New Mexico ranch (views of the Pecos from his treehouse—I'd pay rent for that! Even if it is only 300 sq. ft.) and the fantastic juxtaposition of the trees, the cliffs, and the river. It started me thinking about other places that I love.

Is my favorite the rugged beauty of the Aran Islands, where it seems like the wind has swept the landscape down to its most essential self? Is it the unexpected coziness of the upper reservoir in Centerville, Iowa? Is it the complete and utter peace of the stone fishing hut on the river at the Cong Abbey, County Mayo? Is it the cliffside pasture on Sheep's Head where I could look out over the ocean for the most beautiful sunset (my profile pic)? [It's no surprise to anyone who knows me that there's a common theme here. Trees, stone, and water. Dappled light everywhere and sounds of wind and birdsong and moving water. It's cheesy, but it's true. Nature feeds my soul.]

So I guess that's my answer. I'm a broad-spectrum girl. My favorite place is nature. My favorite person is my friend collective. My favorite colors are the cool tones. My favorite books are the ones on paper. My favorite authors are the ones who write with passion in their own voice. My favorite movie is one that moves me in some way, whether to laugh, cry, dance, or overthrow despots.