I’m going to die living, not just existing

Currently Listening to: Sister Christian by Night Ranger
Currently Reading: Wolf Speaker by Tamora Pierce
Current Projects: Plotting Summer Adventures
Current Countdowns: 3 days until the end of the semester is official

Tonight I shall do a post that’s more personal and maybe a bit less snarky. I don’t know though, lately I’m like the queen of snarky, which can probably get really annoying, but you are the ones who choose to read what I post here. So here goes.

I guess the first thing that popped into your head was not pleasant when you read the title of this post. But the point is that this post is about living life, not just existing. And I’ll explain quickly what brings this sort of revelation about. One of the last books we read in my Children’s Fantasy class was The Giver, by Lois Lowry, and it’s never been one of my favorite books. But if you don’t believe a book can touch you, then you are very mistaken. I can’t stand the book, but it touched me, it hit home. One of the messages in the book is that its better to die really living, than to merely exist on the planet for a while. And that message is sinking in as I also realize that next year will be my last year at Middle, my last year of college, and I have wasted it as I wasted high school. Those years are meant to bring experiences and memories, but I have missed that. So from now on I’m going to live.

That means that next year I’m going to go to parties and celebrate. I’m going to get healthy and lose the weight because I’ve only got this one body to use. I’m going to stop stressing about the small things and relax. I’m going to convince Spoony that we need to spend these years before marriage really experiencing life before we settle down. I don’t want to be old and withered and looking back to say “We wasted those years. We could’ve been so happy; we could’ve had so many memories. But we threw it all out.” I want to look back and know I lived each moment for all it was worth. There’s a quote by Mother Theresa in my Words to Live by widget. “Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin.” That means that the past is over, we are not promised tomorrow, so all we really have is today, we must live it for all we can. It does not matter that the ending may not be happily ever after. It isn’t important that we have a fairy tale. In Everafter, the last lines of the movie are very powerful to me. “By then, the truth of their romance had been reduced to a simple fairy tale. And, while Cinderella and her prince did live happily ever after, the point, gentlemen, is that they lived.” You see I’ve long sinced stopped believing in fairy tales and happily ever afters, but I know that the important thing is that I live.

I’m going to make my mark on this world; I’ll leave behind a legacy. I’m going to do great things with my life. I’m going to enjoy what I have and not worry about what I don’t have. I’m not going to let things stop me from living, even if it means everything has to change. This time has come for me to live. Standing in front of the mirror the other day I realized just how sad and boring I’d become, and I intend to change that.  I’ve got one life to live, and I won’t get another. So I’m going live it, really live it all. My life will no longer pass me by.

Chivalry appears to have died… but who killed it?

Currently Listening to: Don’t Stop Believin’ by Journey
Currently Reading: Wild Magic by Tamora Pierce
Current Projects: Plotting Summer Adventures
Current Countdowns: None

Wow, it’s been a little longer than I mean to it to be since I posted an entry. Apologies, apologies, for I meant to be a bit more dedicated to the blogging. But anyway, it’s time for another slightly snarky entry about the world around me.

So the title of this post may lead you to believe that this will be a rant against men, who fail to be chivalrous, but that would be a bad assumption. Because I usually don’t find fault in one gender without locating the fault in the other gender as well, unless it’s really only one gender’s fault in the first place. In this case fault lies in both men and women and that is why there is a question at the end of the title. Clearly chivalry is not totally dead, but it is not totally alive either; I’d just like to throw that out there before someone jumps me immediately screaming that they open doors for their girlfriend or screaming their man is a total gentleman. I’ll admit that Spoony is a gentleman and attempts to treat me like a lady when I let him, though I sometimes rebel.

So what evidence do I have for the claim that chivalry has died? Well first of all, a girl can be loaded down with books and barely able to open a door, and no one will offer to help her. She can take a tumble headed down the steps and ten guys will walk by and laugh at her instead of helping her up. There can be only one empty seat in the computer lab and to get to it you’d have to navigate through the huge mass of people seated at the other computers, but not one guy will move more than an inch or two to let a girl through. Rarely will a guy help a girl out unless he is her boyfriend or close friend, and it’s sad to say but this is not totally the guy’s fault.

We women wish to be independent, and we constantly remind men that we can take care of ourselves. When doors are opened for us, we tend to remark that we could’ve done it ourselves, and we don’t want to be treated as weaker because of our gender. I catch myself informing Spoony that “I’m a big girl, I can open my own doors and everything”, even though I appreciate the gesture. We have a horrible habit of confusing men. What I mean is that men afraid that if they open a door or offer to carry something they will get shouted at and called sexist. Because women don’t want their doors opened for them because they are so independent. But they also don’t want to seem rude by not doing the gentlemanly thing and offering to help. Men are caught between a rock and a hard place, and we women put them there.

But it’s not all the fault of women. The male population gets sometimes lazy and only helps out when there might be something in it for them. Case in point. I did an experiment on campus and to be honest I wasn’t surprised at my results. For the first half of the day I wore a skirt. Not just any skirt, mind you. This skirt was a very short plaid school girl skirt, and I wore it with a black tank top and flip flops. Needless to say I was showing a reasonably large amount of skin. During that half of the day, guys rushed to open the door for me and offered to carry my bag because “it looked heavy.” I appeared very, very feminine, and very showy, and that got me help. The rest of the day I exchanged the skirt for jeans. The male response was that I didn’t receive any help what so ever. At lunch I struggled to carry my bag, my purse, my notebook that didn’t fit in the bag, my lunch and my drink, but guys just kept going about their daily lives as oif they could not see me, even when I had to push my way through them to get to the door. I appeared less feminine and I suppose more independent, and that got me no help. This little experiment only accounts for the male population on my campus, but it was interesting none the less.

In conclusion, chivalry is dying and everyone is killing it, men and women. Who is more responsible? You tell me.

“Not just different, my dear — prettier!”

So I was listening to the radio and was shocked to hear that there is a Florida plastic surgeon has written a picture book for kids about plastic surgery. Called My Beautiful Mommy, the book focuses on a mother explaining her tummy tuck and nose job to her young daughter. “Mommy” also gets a boob job, but that is not mentioned in the text, merely shown by her obviously perkier and larger breasts in the pictures. The doctor actually admits that this is true, so don’t jump on me saying that it’s just an assumption based on nothing. I personally find the existence of such a book appalling for a number of reasons.

A book glorifying plastic surgery is just wrong, especially aimed at children. You can tell me all you want that it’s not glorifying surgery to change one’s appearance, that it is just to help parents explain what’s happening to children, but you are full of crap. This book shows a mother with an ordinary nose, normal breasts, and an already flat stomach, who wears belly shirts and tight pants, getting surgery to be more beautiful. The little girl tell her that she’s already beautiful, but “Mommy” dreams of being a beauty queen and assures her daughter that she needs to be prettier.

Let’s start self-loathing at an early age. It’s not enough that as teenagers and college students and even adults we are bombarded with images of so-called perfect women, let’s get to those small children too. Honestly, while the good doctor probably had the best of intentions, the book sends very dangerous and disgusting messages to kids. “Mommy didn’t feel pretty enough, so she went to the doctor and he fixed it.” “Mommy doesn’t have the perfect face and body she had before you were born, so she’s getting it fixed so she can be perfect again.” “Natural aging and body changes from being a mommy are bad and Mommy has to have them fixed.” “Mommy isn’t hot enough, so she’s going to have surgery to maker her hotter.” These are not things young girls should hear.

The focus on how beautiful the surgery makes “Mommy” is ridiculous. If the book is about how to tell children about the surgery and the down time that comes after, then there shouldn’t be this whole spielabout her being “the most beautiful butterfly” and stuff. The line that made feel sick was the one that I quoted in the title of this blog. It’s very clear that “Mommy” doesn’t feel pretty enough so she’s having this surgery. This is a terrible thing for kids to consider. Kids should not see messages that say that you must have surgery to feel pretty, or that your genetics aren’t good enough.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not bashing getting plastic surgery. Hell, I’ve thought about it countless times; liposuction, maybe getting my scars fixed,  fixing my stupid nose. But I haven’t done it, and I’m glad I haven’t. If you feel the need to get cosmetic surgery, more power to you. But I don’t see pushing it on kids. I think that if you have kids and are getting plastic surgery, sure you should explain it to them. The shock and fear of a parent in bandages and seeming unwell can be terrible. But you should explain to them that it’s not for everyone, that it is not something you have to do to be beautiful. You should sit down with your kids and talk to them about what’s happening, not give them a book to make it easier on yourself. It’s a complicated thing, and it’s important that kids understand what’s going on. A parent should take responsibility for what they are doing and it’s effect on her, or his, children.

First

I closed my eyes,
and our lips met,
my body trembling
like a falling leaf.
Your hands were gentle,
soft and slow,
gliding over my skin.
I tried to control it,
to steady my nerves,
as your sweet whisper
filled my ear.
I bit my lip,
and I held my breath,
feeling you move slowly,
gently above me.
I gasped softly
as our bodies become one.
It shot through me,
the feelings, the emotions,
exhilirating and fulfilling,
a miracle of true love.