Okay. So this is what I have to say about Disney Princesses.
Regardless of what you think about them and patriarchal institutions and misogynism in the field and stuff, they are all awesome. ALL of them. And that includes the ones who aren't traditionally included as princess, such as Alice from Alice and Wonderland, Meg from Hercules, and Esmeralda from The Hunchback of Notre Dame.
Let's start at the very beginning, shall we?
Snow White, the movie, was released in 1937. The movie was kind of a censored version of the original story by the Brothers Grimm, which involves two failed assassination attempts by the Evil Queen using a poisoned comb and poisoned laces, which is an old-fashioned way of saying corset. It also involves the Queen not being chased onto a cliff by woodland animals in the middle of a thunderstorm because ACTUALLY she lives and is invited to Snow and Charming's wedding, where they force her to wear a pair of red-hot iron shoes heated over coals and she then dances herself to death. They toned this down for the first Disney movie because they thought it was too violent. Okay, fine. I have no problem with this.
Snow White is awesome because she is so nice. ALL THE TIME. If I had to live with seven dudes, I would not be nearly as nice. I would be smacking people, throwing water on beds, screaming myself hoarse at them for not sitting down to pee (because seriously, it's gross when they miss), and forcing people to help me clean. Not Snow White- she is patient and kind and nice to animals and she legitimately loves all of the dwarves like they were her little brothers. And I understand the little brother thing, because I happen to have two- but I got really lucky on the brother front. Therefore, Snow White is awesome because in addition to having to clean up after seven smelly little dudes and being super nice about it all of the time, she has to deal with the woodland animals, who are very nice and help her with the cleaning but who also probably make a huge friggin mess with the droppings and shedding and hairballs and stuff like that. Gross me out the door.
In addition to this, Snow White is, in fact, the youngest of the Disney princesses, at fourteen years old. This is both awesome and creepy, because on the one hand, she is probably the nicest teenager to ever exist, fictional or otherwise, and on the other hand, Charming has some things to answer for about his pedophilia issue.
I just made that really awkward. Sorry.
Okay, the next princess film, Cinderella, came out in 1950. Cinderella, like Snow White, also has to put up with a lot of crap. She also has animals and their messes to deal with, but on top of having an evil stepmother who doesn't like her, she also has two stepsisters who make her life actually miserable. Seriously, all modern adaptations of Cinderella should probably feature her being taken away and her stepmother being arrested for child abuse and violation of child labor laws, because SERIOUSLY THERE ARE SO MANY PROBLEMS GOING ON and it's why all modern adaptations of Cinderella are cheesy to the extreme. (But we love them anyway. Especially ones that involve Selena Gomez and choreographed housecleaning.) But Cinderella is awesome because she is charming and deals with all of her abusive relatives gracefully and elegantly, which is how a princess should really behave.
After Cinderella comes Sleeping Beauty (1959), whose real name is Aurora. According to Disney's official website, Aurora is kind of shy. To me that already says she's awesome, because if she's shy then she does a great job with socializing with people and with being charming around her friends. But she's also awesome because she has this thing where she goes out in the woods and her animal friends help her pretend that she has a boyfriend and she has a great imagination and stuff. Before Tangled came out, Sleeping Beauty was my favorite Disney movie, so yeah.
Next we have The Little Mermaid (1989). Ariel's story kind of flummoxes me a little, because admittedly the primary reason she wants to be human is for Prince Eric. And you know what, that's fine- it's just that people get all nasty about "SHE'S NOT BEING TRUE TO HERSELF BECAUSE SHE FEELS LIKE SHE HAS TO CHANGE FOR HIM ROAR ROAR ROAR FEMINISM ROAR ROAR ROAR THE PRODUCERS ARE MISOGYNISTIC BLAH BLAH BLAH." Yeah, whatever. The thing is, Ariel had other reasons for wanting to be human, too. She was fascinated by human culture and the tools and the things they used. She would have been a fantastic anthropologist. The only thing I don't like about Ariel is the color of her hair, because ain't nobody got hair that actual color unless they dyed it. And where do you get dye that will stay in underwater, anyway? But regardless, Ariel is awesome because she cultivates her talents and because she's interested in learning about other people and places.
Beauty and the Beast came out in 1991. Belle is another favorite Disney princess, in third place for me, because she loves to read and learn. "But that's why everyone loves Belle!" you object. "Don't you have anything new?" Yeah. Belle loves her dad. I think that's awesome. Snow White, Cinderella, and Ariel all have parental issues. Aurora's parents are just plain weird. (Well, her dad is, anyway. He's really friggin weird.) But Belle was raised by her father, and she turned out not like Gaston's screaming fangirls and even though that wasn't "normal" at the time, it was still okay, because Gaston thought she was hot and so did Adam, which is the Beast's real name, and better yet Adam saw that Belle wasn't just going to be happy living with him in the castle so he tried to help her by giving her a whole friggin LIBRARY as a present to say "Welcome to prison!" (And then, after some stuff that is definitely not Stockholm Syndrome, they fell in love and got married.) Belle is also awesome because even though she's not stupid, she knows that Gaston wants to kill Adam, she still stands up for him and defends him and her father. Belle is educated and talented and a strong independent woman who don't technically need no man but who is lucky enough to get one who gives her libraries and stuff.
Aladdin came out only a year later, in 1992. Princess Jasmine is another personal favorite- she was the first Disney Princess of color, for one. Also, her name in the Arabian Nights collection is Princess Badroulbadour, which is like the coolest name ever. (Not that I would name my kid that, or anything.) Also, Jasmine is clever. She's smart and talented and pretty, but she won't let herself be manipulated, which I think is great. Aladdin has to work to win her over, which is what all guys should do anyway, regardless of how much effort it takes to get a girl to like them. Sometimes you have Prince Charming- literally all he had to do was kiss Snow White (who was still fourteen by the way) and she fell for him. Aladdin had to work for it, and we all admired him a lot more in the end for it. Jasmine is actually a strong independent woman who don't need no man, but who is lucky enough to get one anyway.
After Princess Jasmine is Pocahontas, whose movie came out in 1995. Pocahontas is another princess of color, which is awesome after five white princesses. Pocahontas (the movie) is all about duty, and what I like about Pocahontas (the princess) is that she was the first princess to send the message that being true to yourself and your own desires is more important than your duty. Sure, the other princess movies have all had that message to some degree, but it came out much more strongly in Pocahontas (the movie). Duty is great, when you are capable of performing it- but when you can't do it, you shouldn't have to. Also, Pocahontas has the sassiest animal friends so far, and she jumps off waterfalls for fun, which I am totally jealous of. (And she gets to run around in nature with hardly anything on and even though if I did that I would blind everybody with my brightness and whiteness it would still feel very comfortable. It was a hundred and four degrees in Provo on Friday. Ugh.)
Next comes Mulan. This movie came out in 1998, the year I started kindergarten, and was the first movie I ever saw in theaters. I was a little bit scared of it in the theater, but I liked the popcorn and I thought Mushu was funny. Mulan is awesome because she is also a princess of color and because she's not like the rest of these princesses, who are expected to get married and have babies anyway whether or not it's done for love. Mulan didn't focus on finding a man and getting married; she focused on helping her dad and saving China. And you know, it's perfectly fine to find a man and get married; Mulan didn't really want to do it and the matchmaker said she wouldn't be very good at it- but she didn't ridicule the four other chicks who went to see the matchmaker with her for wanting to get married and have kids. She just chose a different path. There are no right or wrong answers to the question "What should any woman, fictional or otherwise, do with her life?" Mulan chose a different answer to the question than most girls. It wasn't about proving herself to be better than men, either; it was about taking her father's place so that he wouldn't have to fight- about duty, actually. And lucky Mulan, she got to be with Shang in the end anyway, so everything was lovely. (And Mulan II wasn't actually a terrible movie. I mean, it was terrible, but the songs were cute and so were the adorable little princesses and it was just funny okay?) So Mulan is awesome for all of those above reasons but really, I think she's awesome because she kicks butt. (That's my personal primary reason for loving Mulan so much.)
After Mulan is The Frog Princess, which came out in 2009. Tiana, the star, doesn't start out as a princess, but she's really cool and she works so hard to make her dreams come true- she doesn't need a fairy godmother or a sea witch to get what she wants. She just goes and does it. I was a big fan of the New Orleans-Cajun stuff, and the voodoo and things like that. It was way cool. But my primary reason for liking Tiana, who is the fourth Disney princess of color, is her hard work and determination and the fact that she doesn't take crap from anybody, especially not her prince, who at the beginning was an idiot and gradually got smarter through the movie.
And then, after Tiana comes Rapunzel, who starred in Tangled in 2010. Rapunzel is my favorite Disney Princess; she replaced Aurora when I watched the movie. First of all, Rapunzel is incredibly talented. She can do just about anything she wants. And she's willing to do anything to get what she wants- but she also has a conscience. She's worried about hurting people. And she has such a rosy view of life, despite what Mother Gothel has told her- she thinks people are nice and she's willing to take chances with them and listen to their stories. She has a great imagination, she's creative, she loves to read, and she's capable of protecting herself with kitchen implements. I mean, there are so many reasons that Rapunzel is awesome that I'm going to curl up on the floor and cry because I can't be Rapunzel because I can't deal with having hair that reaches my shoulders, let alone seventy feet of it.
In addition to Rapunzel, there's Merida. Brave came out in 2012. It's been a while since I had to think about my babysitting adventures, but looking back, they weren't so bad. Hindsight is 20-20, am I right? I haven't seen all of Brave, but I have seen the end, and although Tiana liked her mother, Brave is the first princess movie that really focuses on the relationship between mothers and daughters. In fairy tales, mothers and fathers tend to be either awesome (which means they're single) or horrible (which means they aren't your biological parents anyway.). Disney hadn't really produced movies where both parents were strongly present in their daughter's lives until now, and it's very exciting to see how that changes the idea of the Disney Princess. Also, if you haven't heard about what Young MacGuffin is actually saying during the movie, you should look it up. It's great. There may be a possibility of a thing there with him and Merida, but the great thing is that there really doesn't have to be, because Merida controls her own destiny and it doesn't matter.
And later this year, we're gonna have Frozen, which I believe is the story of the Snow Queen, by Hans Christian Andersen. Now, it's been a while since I've read The Snow Queen, but as I remember it, the girl's brother gets in trouble and she goes through a forest, meets a robber girl, rides a reindeer to Finland, rides a sleigh to the North Pole, and rescues her brother, all by herself, because she is simply that awesome. I sincerely hope that Frozen will follow the tradition of awesome Disney Princesses.
And you know what? No matter what people say about how "there need to be more princesses of color!" or "there need to be non-heterosexual princesses and princes!" and "the princesses need to be more independent of the princes!", the Disney Princesses are still awesome. And Disney has made videos and statements about the Princesses lately where they've said that being a princess is about who you are, not what you look like, and that it's shown in what you do and say.
Keeping that in mind, my favorite thing ever said about the idea of princesses comes, appropriately enough, from A Little Princess, by Frances Hodgson Burnett. The main character, Sara Crewe, says, "'Whatever comes,' she said, 'cannot alter one thing. If I am a princess in rags and tatters, I can be a princess inside. It would be easy to be a princess if I were dressed in cloth of gold, but it is a great deal more of a triumph to be one all the time when no one knows it.'" This is a great way of saying that you should always try to behave as befits your best self.
I am an idealist. I will admit freely that on some matters of social justice, I am quite liberal. But I also know that no matter how much I worry or make blog posts or cry about the starving children in Africa, there are always going to be people who are horrible and bad and wicked, and there will always be people starving somewhere, and there will always be children without shoes whose parents were killed by land mines or rebel armies. There's simply nothing I can do about it, because I cannot control the actions of other people. I cannot say, "Let there be peace." Peace won't happen because I want it to. In fact, peace won't happen if a hundred million people want it to. It just won't, because there is always going to be something bad happening on this earth.
"Sounds kind of pessimistic, Sarah," you think, shaking your head at the screen.
It's really not. Having accepted the fact that people will be people, and that boys aren't going to like me no matter what I do about it, and the fact that crazy men holding big wooden crosses will stand on the sidewalk as I head home from church and rudely inform me that I am going to hell because Mormons don't believe in the saving power of the cross, and the fact that Obama might be an okay president who's made okay choices like we all have done- it's a lot easier for me to say, "Well, I can't change all this horrible crap by complaining about it, but I can darn well change myself." And that's where being a princess comes in. If you act like a princess all the time, even if nobody is watching, even when nobody cares, even if you're a boy, even if you don't look like any of the Disney princesses (heck, I sure don't)- you can still be full of grace and you can smile and listen to people when they need a friendly ear, and you can stand up for what you believe in, and you can follow your dreams, and you can love and respect your parents even if you disagree with them sometimes, and you can take insults with a smile and say something gentle and kind and turn the other cheek. Honestly, being a princess means being Christlike, and since we should all be doing that anyway, why not start now?
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Saturday, June 22, 2013
Prostitution: This Post Is Not What You Think It's About
I really like to sing.
I'm okay at singing. I'm not fantastic, but I'm not half bad, and I can stay in tune, which is more than many people can say. This is because I have the advantage of having played the piano for a bajillion years and having parents who encouraged me in the practice of remaining in tune and of learning how to have perfect relative pitch. (I don't say perfect pitch because I only know one person who has really perfect pitch, and that is the Angel.)
Often, people are amazed when I show them my parlor trick, which is where they play a note on the piano and without looking I tell them what note it is. It's something I've practiced a (very) few times with my mother, who thought it was kind of fun. I really like showing off.
It sounds terrible when I say it that way, but it's true. I love to show off. I am an obnoxious little show-off and a huge attention whore- but only when I'm comfortable with the people I want attention from. I'll say dumb things in the hope of making people laugh, and I take pictures of myself with my webcam and put them on Facebook, and I post about fun things I do, and I write a blog about myself and my deep personal problems and adventures. I am actually awful.
But then I remember that this stems from my anxiety issues. This is a facet of anxiety that I don't usually talk about to people, because I forget it's there and I just beat myself up for being an attention whore. The thing is, one of the most common symptoms of anxiety, according to webmd.com (articles reviewed as recently as February 2012 by Marina Katz, MD), is "social anxiety disorder, also called social phobia, is an anxiety disorder in which a person has an excessive and unreasonable fear of social situations. Anxiety (intense nervousness) and self-consciousness arise from a fear of being closely watched, judged, and criticized by others."
My social phobia stems from a fear that people don't like me. One of my favorite writers, Anne Lamott, quoted a poem by Phillip Lopate in her book Bird by Bird, which goes like this:
"We who are
your closest friends
feel the time
has come to tell you
that every Thursday
we have been meeting,
as a group,
to devise ways
to keep you
in perpetual uncertainty
frustration
discontent and
torture
by neither loving you
as much as you want
nor cutting you adrift.
Your analyst is
in on it,
plus your boyfriend
and your ex-husband;
and we have pledged
to disappoint you
as long as you need us.
In announcing our
association
we realize we have
placed in your hands
a possible antidote
against uncertainty
indeed against ourselves.
But since our Thursday nights
have brought us
to a community
of purpose
rare in itself
with you as
the natural center,
we feel hopeful you
will continue to make unreasonable
demands for affection
if not as a consequence
of your disastrous personality
then for the good of the collective."
And this poem describes exactly how my relationships with people work. With the exception of my parents, who I know love me unconditionally, and the Angel, who I also know loves me unconditionally, I constantly worry that people do not like me. This includes all of my friends, from my high school friends back in good old PA to my friends now, like Superwholockmarauder and Double M and Fairy-Tale Princess and even including the Beast and the Beauty and the Prodigy. I am always afraid that people hate me, that I am screwing everything up, that I am a terrible person, that I am going to hell when I die because I am a terrible person- the list goes on and on. And this is even when I am on my happy pills, as I am right now.
I like showing off because I crave approval. I have issues with accepting compliments, but I love getting them because they make me feel warm and fuzzy and loved. I worry that everything I say is going to come back and haunt me and that people hate me and that if I ask them if they still like me they will lie and say yes when they are really thinking, "Wow, what an insufferable little piece of snot."
I am not an attention whore because I like the attention. In fact, the attention is something that worries me even more when I get it. My brain constantly undermines itself: what if they're all lying when they call you cute or when they tell you you did a good job? What if it's all out of pity?
And I can't just stop thinking these things because I worry so much about them that they are a constant part of what is running when my brain is running. Always an undertone, always in the background- do these people still like me? Do they even want me around? Do they wish I would just go home and die so that I won't convenience them anymore?
This pain hurts me, but I can't stop asking for people to acknowledge my existence because I crave approval, not attention. If I could be invisible, but have certain people know when I was present, and those people were all close friends and family who would love me and tell me I was the best thing since sliced bread, that would be pure earthly happiness.
I am an attention whore because I want to be loved.
I am told this is a perfectly normal and human emotion. It doesn't feel normal. It feels wrong, and dirty, and my brain tells me when I do things, "You just want people to like you. You don't actually mean any of this." This happens very often when I am writing blog posts. It is happening right now. My brain is telling me, as I write, "You're such an awful person, Abramson. Nobody cares about this. Who needs you? Who even reads your blog posts anyway? There is literally nobody in the world who cares about your insights on life- you're just a dumb twenty-year-old attention whore with no real experience about anything- you've never written a book or been famous or even held hands with a boy. What a loser." (I find it interesting that my brain refers to me as Abramson when it is being negative, and Sarah when it is not.) And then I say timidly to my brain, "Well, the hit counter on this post goes up by like, seventy or eighty every few months, doesn't that say something about what I'm doing?" My brain's response is, "Most of those people are middle-aged women on Facebook who are only friends with you because they are friends with your mother, and they don't even like you, they think you're obnoxious, and they're also miffed because the Beast hasn't gone on a mission yet and you don't judge him for it, and they think you're soooooo liberal now that you've gone to college and they disapprove of everything you do. And the other people who read it are your friends and they only laugh because they tolerate you because you like the same things they do, not because they actually like you."
And then I curl up into a metaphorical shriveled ball and die of the feeling of being totally inconsequential and worthless.
It's hard to remember that I'm a daughter of God when I feel like I'm worth all of a grain of dust. I just remembered a blog post I made a few months ago about how I'm worth someone genuine. In a romantic relationship, that's still totally true. You don't want to be with somebody who makes you feel like crap. But what if it's you that's making you feel like crap? Because there is nobody who can make me feel more like crap than myself.
Because I am an attention whore, here is a very bad video of me singing Radioactive by Imagine Dragons. I apologize for the craptastic quality of said video. It was filmed with a surprisingly okay webcam (but it's still a webcam) and yeah.
(And my brain is going, "You know, by encouraging people not to watch it you're being even more of an attention whore. Nice going, jerk." I'm sorry. About everything. Including my brain, because honestly who wants to hear about it?)
I'm okay at singing. I'm not fantastic, but I'm not half bad, and I can stay in tune, which is more than many people can say. This is because I have the advantage of having played the piano for a bajillion years and having parents who encouraged me in the practice of remaining in tune and of learning how to have perfect relative pitch. (I don't say perfect pitch because I only know one person who has really perfect pitch, and that is the Angel.)
Often, people are amazed when I show them my parlor trick, which is where they play a note on the piano and without looking I tell them what note it is. It's something I've practiced a (very) few times with my mother, who thought it was kind of fun. I really like showing off.
It sounds terrible when I say it that way, but it's true. I love to show off. I am an obnoxious little show-off and a huge attention whore- but only when I'm comfortable with the people I want attention from. I'll say dumb things in the hope of making people laugh, and I take pictures of myself with my webcam and put them on Facebook, and I post about fun things I do, and I write a blog about myself and my deep personal problems and adventures. I am actually awful.
But then I remember that this stems from my anxiety issues. This is a facet of anxiety that I don't usually talk about to people, because I forget it's there and I just beat myself up for being an attention whore. The thing is, one of the most common symptoms of anxiety, according to webmd.com (articles reviewed as recently as February 2012 by Marina Katz, MD), is "social anxiety disorder, also called social phobia, is an anxiety disorder in which a person has an excessive and unreasonable fear of social situations. Anxiety (intense nervousness) and self-consciousness arise from a fear of being closely watched, judged, and criticized by others."
My social phobia stems from a fear that people don't like me. One of my favorite writers, Anne Lamott, quoted a poem by Phillip Lopate in her book Bird by Bird, which goes like this:
"We who are
your closest friends
feel the time
has come to tell you
that every Thursday
we have been meeting,
as a group,
to devise ways
to keep you
in perpetual uncertainty
frustration
discontent and
torture
by neither loving you
as much as you want
nor cutting you adrift.
Your analyst is
in on it,
plus your boyfriend
and your ex-husband;
and we have pledged
to disappoint you
as long as you need us.
In announcing our
association
we realize we have
placed in your hands
a possible antidote
against uncertainty
indeed against ourselves.
But since our Thursday nights
have brought us
to a community
of purpose
rare in itself
with you as
the natural center,
we feel hopeful you
will continue to make unreasonable
demands for affection
if not as a consequence
of your disastrous personality
then for the good of the collective."
And this poem describes exactly how my relationships with people work. With the exception of my parents, who I know love me unconditionally, and the Angel, who I also know loves me unconditionally, I constantly worry that people do not like me. This includes all of my friends, from my high school friends back in good old PA to my friends now, like Superwholockmarauder and Double M and Fairy-Tale Princess and even including the Beast and the Beauty and the Prodigy. I am always afraid that people hate me, that I am screwing everything up, that I am a terrible person, that I am going to hell when I die because I am a terrible person- the list goes on and on. And this is even when I am on my happy pills, as I am right now.
I like showing off because I crave approval. I have issues with accepting compliments, but I love getting them because they make me feel warm and fuzzy and loved. I worry that everything I say is going to come back and haunt me and that people hate me and that if I ask them if they still like me they will lie and say yes when they are really thinking, "Wow, what an insufferable little piece of snot."
I am not an attention whore because I like the attention. In fact, the attention is something that worries me even more when I get it. My brain constantly undermines itself: what if they're all lying when they call you cute or when they tell you you did a good job? What if it's all out of pity?
And I can't just stop thinking these things because I worry so much about them that they are a constant part of what is running when my brain is running. Always an undertone, always in the background- do these people still like me? Do they even want me around? Do they wish I would just go home and die so that I won't convenience them anymore?
This pain hurts me, but I can't stop asking for people to acknowledge my existence because I crave approval, not attention. If I could be invisible, but have certain people know when I was present, and those people were all close friends and family who would love me and tell me I was the best thing since sliced bread, that would be pure earthly happiness.
I am an attention whore because I want to be loved.
I am told this is a perfectly normal and human emotion. It doesn't feel normal. It feels wrong, and dirty, and my brain tells me when I do things, "You just want people to like you. You don't actually mean any of this." This happens very often when I am writing blog posts. It is happening right now. My brain is telling me, as I write, "You're such an awful person, Abramson. Nobody cares about this. Who needs you? Who even reads your blog posts anyway? There is literally nobody in the world who cares about your insights on life- you're just a dumb twenty-year-old attention whore with no real experience about anything- you've never written a book or been famous or even held hands with a boy. What a loser." (I find it interesting that my brain refers to me as Abramson when it is being negative, and Sarah when it is not.) And then I say timidly to my brain, "Well, the hit counter on this post goes up by like, seventy or eighty every few months, doesn't that say something about what I'm doing?" My brain's response is, "Most of those people are middle-aged women on Facebook who are only friends with you because they are friends with your mother, and they don't even like you, they think you're obnoxious, and they're also miffed because the Beast hasn't gone on a mission yet and you don't judge him for it, and they think you're soooooo liberal now that you've gone to college and they disapprove of everything you do. And the other people who read it are your friends and they only laugh because they tolerate you because you like the same things they do, not because they actually like you."
And then I curl up into a metaphorical shriveled ball and die of the feeling of being totally inconsequential and worthless.
It's hard to remember that I'm a daughter of God when I feel like I'm worth all of a grain of dust. I just remembered a blog post I made a few months ago about how I'm worth someone genuine. In a romantic relationship, that's still totally true. You don't want to be with somebody who makes you feel like crap. But what if it's you that's making you feel like crap? Because there is nobody who can make me feel more like crap than myself.
Because I am an attention whore, here is a very bad video of me singing Radioactive by Imagine Dragons. I apologize for the craptastic quality of said video. It was filmed with a surprisingly okay webcam (but it's still a webcam) and yeah.
I feel guilty for making the video, but I would feel worse if I didn't, because my brain would just go, "Yeah, that's right. Don't even try, you piece of crud. You're a worthless worm and nobody wants to hear you sing anyway, thanks for sparing the world from this." So I make the video as a response to my brain, and then it says, "Wow, what an attention whore." And now I feel terrible. You know what, just don't even watch the video. Ugh. I mean, I will leave it there, so you can watch it if you want to, but if you would rather be spared a headache, then don't even bother.
(And my brain is going, "You know, by encouraging people not to watch it you're being even more of an attention whore. Nice going, jerk." I'm sorry. About everything. Including my brain, because honestly who wants to hear about it?)
Saturday, June 15, 2013
Do Stuff You Like
I can't sleep. So you know what? I'm gonna write a blog post.
Okay. This is what I want to talk about. Guilty pleasures. Everybody's got one. Mine is Zelda. Phantom Hourglass, to be specific, because Spirit Tracks is intimidating and I don't have other gaming consoles, just me and my Nintendo DS. I am twenty years old and I still play with handheld video games. And you know what? I love it. I love it so much. I would by no means call myself a gamer. Nor would I say that I am an expert on the Zeldaverse, though seriously I love it so much. But I have this thing that I like and I do it and I am so satisfied when I do it, even though it's a colossal waste of time and brainpower.
I also really enjoy making things. Like, I will make you a bracelet, if you ask me to and if you live immediately within the vicinity of where I live. And today I bought a package of legit modeling clay and made a fake gun and baked it and covered it in duct tape and now I have a fake gun for all of my costuming needs ever. (And by costuming needs, I mean Supernatural cosplay needs because really though.)
And speaking of which, tonight I went to a murder mystery party as a character from Supernatural. (I was Sam Winchester, if you watch the show.) And I had the costume and my fake gun and the friend who played my character's brother was great and I made lots of friends and I just loved all of the people who were there because they wore costumes and they were enthusiastic and they loved what they were doing.
If you had asked me about fandoms and cosplays in high school, I would have like kind of maybe sneered at you a little, because admittedly I used to be a terrible little snot. (I probably still am.) But then in college- and this is what I love about college, because it's so freeing and great- I learned that fandoms are actually full of a mixture of some of the worst people and the best people you will ever meet. The best people, of course, are obviously the best. And the worst people make you appreciate both the best people and the people who are not fandom members so much more, because you think, "Oh, I am so glad that these people are not those people." And if you have no idea what I am talking about, I am sorry, because it is two in the morning and I am scribbling because my brain is on fire.
But I have learned that being true to my passions and the things I like doing is really important. When I was in high school, I had this huge secret of a thing where I loved to read books but there were a few of them that I was embarrassed to have been seen reading or to have enjoyed. One such book was certainly The Devil Wears Prada. Another was the Princess Diaries books. I loved them to bits, but I would always hold the covers against my legs or my desk so people wouldn't know what I was reading. And it hurt, because I wanted to do what I was doing but I was afraid that people were going to laugh at me.
This is what I've figured out: nobody is going to laugh at you. Most won't even notice. A few might laugh, but screw them, they're dumb. And probably, if you aren't ashamed to love something, you may make a few friends.
I met Superwholockmarauder at a sleepover in the basement of our freshman dormitory. We were playing a get-to-know-you game where somebody tossed a ball and there were tiny little questions written on the ball and whatever landed facing up you had to answer that question for the group. My question, when it came up, was "What is your favorite T.V. show?" And I thought about it for a moment, and then I said, "Doctor Who," because it was really the only show I had watched regularly. And the girl sitting next to me turned and said to me, "You watch Doctor Who? Oh, we are going to be friends." And that was how I met Superwholockmarauder, and she is such an important part of my life now that I literally do not know if I would have survived college if I had not met her. I certainly would not have made it through my mental breakdown this year, and I would not have had a roommate this last year, and I would not have started watching Supernatural or Firefly or any of the other great stuff I've found because of her and because of the Internet, which we have both found it is easier to hang out on.
And because of her and others like her, I have made friends who liked the same things I like. And the freedom of knowing that nobody is going to laugh at me or make fun of me has freed me to be myself in a way that I never felt I could be in high school. In high school things felt different, like I had to hold myself in all the time or I would burst with some weird new thing that nobody would understand. In high school, it was always music, music, music, books, and more music, and more music. I was the quintessential band geek, without actually marching on the field. (I was a mallet percussionist.) But I couldn't talk to my high school friends about Doctor Who or about how much I loved Pride and Prejudice or about my frustrations with the characters in the stories I was writing, and somewhere inside that did hurt me. I was accepted, but at the cost of losing myself a little bit.
Some people who know me are amazed at the changes I have been through in the past few years. I am much less reserved than I used to be (although people still freak me out, not gonna lie). I laugh and joke and even make other people laugh. I talk about things. I ask questions. I participate. I do all of these things less than the average person, but I do them more than the average me used to. And that is because I have confidence, from knowing that I won't be laughed at for doing the things I love.
So I just want to say this: Go after the things you love. If you like to walk dogs, do it. If you like to make lemonade stands, do it. If you like to curl up in bed and cry over fictional characters like I do, then do it. Because when you do things like that, things you enjoy, then it's not a waste of time. It is time spent learning about yourself and who you are and the things you like and what make you happy. And that, more than anything else, is going to get you ready to go on a mission or get married. If you can't accept yourself or if you aren't happy with yourself, then you will have no idea how to accept or be happy with other people. Do the things you love, because if you don't, then you will risk losing the chance to be happy and to help others to learn how to be happy.
Okay. This is what I want to talk about. Guilty pleasures. Everybody's got one. Mine is Zelda. Phantom Hourglass, to be specific, because Spirit Tracks is intimidating and I don't have other gaming consoles, just me and my Nintendo DS. I am twenty years old and I still play with handheld video games. And you know what? I love it. I love it so much. I would by no means call myself a gamer. Nor would I say that I am an expert on the Zeldaverse, though seriously I love it so much. But I have this thing that I like and I do it and I am so satisfied when I do it, even though it's a colossal waste of time and brainpower.
I also really enjoy making things. Like, I will make you a bracelet, if you ask me to and if you live immediately within the vicinity of where I live. And today I bought a package of legit modeling clay and made a fake gun and baked it and covered it in duct tape and now I have a fake gun for all of my costuming needs ever. (And by costuming needs, I mean Supernatural cosplay needs because really though.)
And speaking of which, tonight I went to a murder mystery party as a character from Supernatural. (I was Sam Winchester, if you watch the show.) And I had the costume and my fake gun and the friend who played my character's brother was great and I made lots of friends and I just loved all of the people who were there because they wore costumes and they were enthusiastic and they loved what they were doing.
If you had asked me about fandoms and cosplays in high school, I would have like kind of maybe sneered at you a little, because admittedly I used to be a terrible little snot. (I probably still am.) But then in college- and this is what I love about college, because it's so freeing and great- I learned that fandoms are actually full of a mixture of some of the worst people and the best people you will ever meet. The best people, of course, are obviously the best. And the worst people make you appreciate both the best people and the people who are not fandom members so much more, because you think, "Oh, I am so glad that these people are not those people." And if you have no idea what I am talking about, I am sorry, because it is two in the morning and I am scribbling because my brain is on fire.
But I have learned that being true to my passions and the things I like doing is really important. When I was in high school, I had this huge secret of a thing where I loved to read books but there were a few of them that I was embarrassed to have been seen reading or to have enjoyed. One such book was certainly The Devil Wears Prada. Another was the Princess Diaries books. I loved them to bits, but I would always hold the covers against my legs or my desk so people wouldn't know what I was reading. And it hurt, because I wanted to do what I was doing but I was afraid that people were going to laugh at me.
This is what I've figured out: nobody is going to laugh at you. Most won't even notice. A few might laugh, but screw them, they're dumb. And probably, if you aren't ashamed to love something, you may make a few friends.
I met Superwholockmarauder at a sleepover in the basement of our freshman dormitory. We were playing a get-to-know-you game where somebody tossed a ball and there were tiny little questions written on the ball and whatever landed facing up you had to answer that question for the group. My question, when it came up, was "What is your favorite T.V. show?" And I thought about it for a moment, and then I said, "Doctor Who," because it was really the only show I had watched regularly. And the girl sitting next to me turned and said to me, "You watch Doctor Who? Oh, we are going to be friends." And that was how I met Superwholockmarauder, and she is such an important part of my life now that I literally do not know if I would have survived college if I had not met her. I certainly would not have made it through my mental breakdown this year, and I would not have had a roommate this last year, and I would not have started watching Supernatural or Firefly or any of the other great stuff I've found because of her and because of the Internet, which we have both found it is easier to hang out on.
And because of her and others like her, I have made friends who liked the same things I like. And the freedom of knowing that nobody is going to laugh at me or make fun of me has freed me to be myself in a way that I never felt I could be in high school. In high school things felt different, like I had to hold myself in all the time or I would burst with some weird new thing that nobody would understand. In high school, it was always music, music, music, books, and more music, and more music. I was the quintessential band geek, without actually marching on the field. (I was a mallet percussionist.) But I couldn't talk to my high school friends about Doctor Who or about how much I loved Pride and Prejudice or about my frustrations with the characters in the stories I was writing, and somewhere inside that did hurt me. I was accepted, but at the cost of losing myself a little bit.
Some people who know me are amazed at the changes I have been through in the past few years. I am much less reserved than I used to be (although people still freak me out, not gonna lie). I laugh and joke and even make other people laugh. I talk about things. I ask questions. I participate. I do all of these things less than the average person, but I do them more than the average me used to. And that is because I have confidence, from knowing that I won't be laughed at for doing the things I love.
So I just want to say this: Go after the things you love. If you like to walk dogs, do it. If you like to make lemonade stands, do it. If you like to curl up in bed and cry over fictional characters like I do, then do it. Because when you do things like that, things you enjoy, then it's not a waste of time. It is time spent learning about yourself and who you are and the things you like and what make you happy. And that, more than anything else, is going to get you ready to go on a mission or get married. If you can't accept yourself or if you aren't happy with yourself, then you will have no idea how to accept or be happy with other people. Do the things you love, because if you don't, then you will risk losing the chance to be happy and to help others to learn how to be happy.
Sunday, June 9, 2013
Twenty
First of all, please note that I found this cool little bit of computer code where I open the html and paste it in and it makes the mouse poop sparkles on my blog. Please enjoy yourselves with that. :)
Second of all, I get a surprising number of pageviews on this blog. I literally never expected to have more than like maybe ten people read each post. But I get like eighty pageviews a month, not counting my visits for editing and writing purposes. Can I just say, wow. And also thank you, for bearing with me and my awkwardly long posts and my constant choices to bore people with my life stories on the internets. You're great. I like you. (Also I am considering allowing ads on the page chosen by Google plus because I would make money by hosting ads and I am a poor college student so you know maybe that could be a thing let me know what you think because if you would prefer no ads I will not do ads but if you are understanding then I might do ads I dunno)
Okay. That's business as usual, then.
I turn twenty tomorrow. I was born on the tenth of June, in the year 1993. As far as I know, I was adorable.
As I grew up, I remained adorable for a period of time. This declined rapidly around fifth grade, with the onset of puberty, and I remained much less adorable until I was like maybe seventeen. Then I became adorable again, and I have steadily remained adorable since.
The nice thing about having this non-adorable period of time though is that people are horrible and feel like they have to be good at something to be worth anything, and because I stopped being adorable I felt like I had to be good at other things, so I became good at music and books and crafts and stuff. It was fun.
I've also, of late, had like, major events go down in my social and emotional life that made me completely rethink who I am and what my purpose is in life and stuff like that. So, because it's a birthday gimmick of sorts and because I'm not going to actually want to write the post tomorrow (because I may or may not be going to an archery range with some friends and I may or may not be skipping class to do it because screw it it's my birthday and I haven't skipped class ONCE this term), I'm going to do this thing where I tell you twenty things I've learned in the last twenty years.
Okay. Here ya go.
20.) I have learned that being beautiful on the inside makes you so much prettier on the outside. Take, for instance, my mother. My mother doesn't think she is pretty, because she's kind of bigger, like me, but also a couple inches shorter than me. I absolutely do not understand this because I look at my mother and I see this amazing, beautiful woman who does her best to serve God in every way that she can through music, through food, through service, through teaching, and through her family. My mother has beautiful hair that she always takes the time to curl in the mornings and fluff it with a brush so that it will sit tall on her head. It's beginning to silver, and that just makes it even prettier. My mother has warm brown eyes that are kind and clever and dreamy by turns. My mother always smells like good shampoo. And when my mother plays the piano, she has such an expression of determined focus and dedication on her face that I can't help but think her beautiful.
19.) I have learned that it's easier to be straightforward and honest than it is to cover up your lies. I have always had a problem with squirrelling away food from the kitchen, whether or not I was allowed to eat it. And Mom would always know when I ate something that wasn't mine, no matter how well I lied about it. (It turns out that I do not lie well anyway, so there you go.)
18.) I have learned that expressing your passions doesn't make you weird. I used to get annoyed at the Beauty for saying that "such and such a person was really hot," or that "so and so a person was so cute." The joke's on me, because now I do that literally way more than she does. I express my passions all the time. I talk about Harry Potter and Doctor Who and Jane Austen and the things I like and the people I think are good-looking and the bands I think are awesome and I'm just like "WORLD YOU ARE FREE TO DISAGREE WITH ME BUT HERE HAVE ADVICE BECAUSE I LIKE THINGS AND MAYBE YOU WILL TOO."
17.) I have learned that family comes first. Yeah, I might have really awesome friends, but friends do, in fact, come and go. Sometimes they move. Sometimes they get married. Sometimes they go on missions. Sometimes they decide they don't like you. Sometimes they make new friends. Sometimes they forget about you before you forget about them. Sometimes they make decisions that ultimately send them down different paths. But your family- well, you're stuck with them, for better or for worse. My family consists of the people who understand me often far more than some of my best friends do, not because they understand all the jokes I make or the references I throw into conversation but because they love me and they're able to deal with my quirks and habits in a way that others aren't always going to understand.
16.) I have learned that daily hugs are essential. I have a problem with this. I am an extremely huggy person. I am that person who, if given permission, will cuddle with you and be the big spoon OR the little spoon or who will play with your hair or rub your back and possibly even massage your feet (which is still gross though) because I like people and I like touching people because human contact is warm and it helps me to know I'm not so gross that people can't stand to have me touch them. My problem is that I don't always feel comfortable initiating contact and am often too shy to ask for it. So if we are in a group setting together, you may assume that you are allowed to platonically cuddle with me and if you have children I will cuddle with them too because BABIES.
15.) I have learned that showers are the best. In fourth or fifth grade, I had this issue where my hair decided it was going to go from soft, silky baby hair to gross, oily teenager hair AS FAST AS IT COULD and then a friend gave me a quiet tip one day that I should probably start using dandruff shampoo or really any shampoo because little pale flakes on dark shirts and jackets isn't exactly healthy or even pretty so I started washing my hair ever day instead of every few days and it made a huge difference. Also, showers are good for the following:
13.) I have learned that learning never stops. You might have decided not to go to college, or you might be in college right now. You might have graduated college. You might have kids in college. You might have grandkids in college. You might live in a third world country and never have heard of college because you hunt lions in the bush country of Africa. But regardless, you learn something new everyday. Today is a Sunday and I still learned something. I learned that some wards can, in fact, call "Barbeque Specialists" as a legitimate calling. And I am not kidding you, I swear. I learned how to find computer code that makes my mouse on the blog page poop sparkles when you move it and I know literally nothing about computer code. And the Internet isn't evil. It's a great tool for learning and knowledge.
12.) I have learned that music is so, so important. I was not that chick who writes a blog during high school. I was the music nerd, everyone's accompanist, the pit girl, the violinist, the pianist, the mallet percussionist. I was even a singer sometimes. And then I went to college and I became an English major because I loved books even more than I loved music so I gradually stopped practicing due to lack of practice facilities for non-music majors. Luckily, I have begun practicing the piano again, because I have to play the piano for church now and I just love it so much. And I sing so much more. I know songs and I watch movies and I learn lyrics and I love to sing. It's great. And no matter how sad I am, music will always be able to cheer me up.
11.) I have learned that mental health is not necessarily a choice. All of my life I have heard people say, "Well, you can choose to be happy, or you can choose to be angry, or you can choose to be sad." That's not true. You can't choose how you react to things. Reactions are natural. They are how you and your body respond to things. What you can control is what you let other people see. But those are just emotions, just feelings. When you have depression, like I do, there is nothing beyond the help of drugs and God that can make you happy if you aren't happy. It is physically impossible to be happy when you are depressed. You can smile and hide and pretend, but it doesn't change anything. You'll still be hurting. Depression is not an emotion. You can't feel depressed. You can feel sad or anxious or angry or annoyed or blue or melancholy. But depression is caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain, and it is therefore not a feeling. It is a condition. And unless I have happy pills or unless God is in the mood to grant miracles, depression will remain, and I will not have a choice in the matter at all.
10.) I have learned that trying new things is awesome. I used to be a pretty picky eater. I wouldn't eat bananas or blueberries or spinach or Brussels sprouts or squash. But the thing is, most of those things were texture issues. I like spinach and Brussels sprouts and sometimes I like squash, if it is drowned in butter and copiously salted and peppered. I still do not like bananas because they are squishy. Blueberries are okay, as are strawberries. I have tried grapes in a chicken salad sandwich and they are yummy. Herbal tea is delicious. I try a different kind of ice cream every time I go to the store (but really, I've never met a flavor of ice cream I didn't like). I've had Cajun fries and potato dogs and pupusas and pineapple soda and it's all, frankly, delicious. And I have tried things beyond food, too- I've tried archery and I've shot a gun and I went on a three-and-a-half-day backpacking hike when I was fifteen and I tried school dances (but really church dances are way better) and I did ballet and gymnastics and even karate (for all of two weeks) and soccer and swimming. And I tried to learn the trumpet and I've tried to learn to whistle and I've tried to learn to French-braid hair and I've tried to learn how to play video games. Trying stuff is fun. If you don't try things, you will forever remain stagnant and boring and unsatisfied with your life.
9.) I have learned that sharing is caring. And I don't mean like sharing my toys with my siblings. I mean like sharing my thoughts and jokes and dreams and wishes, like with you guys. Sometimes I am told that I overshare. Maybe I do. And I'm not saying it's out of the fact that I'm far from home and miss my family and prefer to type about things than talk to people about them- but I have reasons for doing what I do, primarily being that I am a writer and it's our job to share with people and to borrow from them in return.
8.) I have learned that there's no point in trying to be something you are not. I have tried to deny for years how excited I get about things. I would hear "Tomorrow for English class, we're going to be reading Pride and Prejudice," and I would have to bite my lip and physically restrain myself from jumping up and down and screaming. I tried not to let people notice when I thought someone was cute, or when I was having a bad day. I would hunch over and try to hide and hope that they thought I was invisible. But that was not who I am. I prefer the shadows when I can get them, of course, but if somebody notices me I don't mind all that much. In fact, I like staying in the shadows and letting people come to me to bring me out into the sun. I am not that hiding shadow girl anymore. I am vibrant and alive and full of color and dreams and fire and I scream and shout and laugh and cry and I am loud and talkative and you cannot get me to shut up, not for a million dollars.
7.) I have learned that when somebody hurts you, the best thing to do is nothing. Really. I'm not saying ignore it. But don't do anything stupid, like punch someone in the face or kill them or blow up a building or send them nasty emails or envelopes full of anthrax. When you've been hurt, you should just breathe, in and out and in and out, until the pain fades enough for you to decide what you should do. And at that point, you have three options:
For some weird reason, people always assumed that I was angry or upset or pissed off about something, when the reality of it is that I would be spacing out and thinking about mad men in blue boxes or something. That's not an angry face. That's an impassive face. It's a family trait. I like to call it "the Abramson Stone Face Deluxe." My dad does it, my mom does it, the Beast does it, I do it, the Beauty does it, the Angel does it, and the Prodigy does it. We literally all have one. And we look like serial killers when we do it. But it is our resting face. Point: just because I look like a serial killer doesn't mean I am one.
5.) I have learned that people are not always who you think they are. This is important, because I have met people and become friends with them and then, it turns out, I didn't really know them at all, because either they did something I thought was totally awful or I did something they thought was totally awful and either way, it ended up not working out. My real friends are the people who are willing to explain to you that they are not comfortable with you doing a thing and who I am comfortable explaining to them that I am uncomfortable with them doing a thing and all parties are genuinely willing to cooperate with the situation. Real friends are people who are willing to change their actions but who won't compromise their morals for you. And if you're asking them to compromise their morals for you, then you are terrible and you should go home and rethink your life.
4.) I have learned that there is always somebody who is willing to help you. And yeah, you may scoff at my naive idealism, but for me it's true. I always have my family and almost always my friends. And when both of those fail, I'm still going to have God, my teddy bears, imaginary friends, and herbal tea. So no matter what happens, I'm going to be okay.
3.) I have learned that relationships are not 50-50. It's funny- you think, "Oh, we're equals in this relationship, so we each contribute 50 percent to this thing and it will work, right?" Yeah, no. The thing is, is that in every relationship there are two people. Brother and sister, mother and daughter, boyfriend and girlfriend, husband and wife, friend and friend. Therefore, the total you need to add up to is 200 percent, not 100 percent. Therefore, every relationship is 100-100. You give your all for the other person, and they give their all for you, and everything will work out just fine. And you may not want to give a hundred percent to another person for fear that they will break your heart- but that's the definition of trust. And if you don't trust someone enough to give them a hundred percent of yourself, you might want to question whether you should be in that relationship. There is no room for selfishness in a marriage or a family or between two friends. You give what you can and you expect nothing back. You will never be disappointed, but you will quite often be pleasantly surprised.
2.) I have learned that God is truly here and watching over me and all of us. If you're not comfortable with religion, feel free to skip this. I have been through a lot in the last year, and even more in the last twenty. And if there's one thing I have learned in my life, it's that God is present, and that He loves me and that He loves all of the people in the world, and that if I am faithful and serve Him humbly and as well as I can, He will bless me over and over again. In my church, we have some weird stuff we do, like tithing. When you get paid, you pay ten percent of your gross (not net) income to the church, and it is used for things like building new churches and Mormon temples and helping with missionaries and humanitarian aid and printing our books of scripture. Not a penny of it pays for the leaders of our church; our clergy are not paid. Our church is run by those who believe and are called of God to lead us. Even though ten percent is a lot of my gross income- I mean, ten percent for me, about twenty bucks, is like a week and a half of groceries for me- I pay it because I can't afford not to have the blessings that come with paying tithing. God has promised us that if we pay tithing, we will never want for anything. I pay my tithing, even my meager little part, because I truly do believe that. And for the same reasons, I don't wear clothes that are revealing or too tight, and I'm not going to have sex until I'm married, and I will never drink alcohol or smoke or drink coffee or (non-herbal) tea, because I know that the blessings that come from not doing these things far outweigh the advantages of doing them. Although really, are there any advantages to drinking alcohol or smoking? Are there any advantages to having sex before you get married? Not really, no. I'm not going to miss what I've never had.
1.) I have learned that I am a daughter of God, and that someday I will return to heaven and be with my family and the people I love forever. And that is really the most important thing that has taken me twenty years to learn.
Thanks for a great twenty years. I hope I live like, eighty more years. That would be cool.
Second of all, I get a surprising number of pageviews on this blog. I literally never expected to have more than like maybe ten people read each post. But I get like eighty pageviews a month, not counting my visits for editing and writing purposes. Can I just say, wow. And also thank you, for bearing with me and my awkwardly long posts and my constant choices to bore people with my life stories on the internets. You're great. I like you. (Also I am considering allowing ads on the page chosen by Google plus because I would make money by hosting ads and I am a poor college student so you know maybe that could be a thing let me know what you think because if you would prefer no ads I will not do ads but if you are understanding then I might do ads I dunno)
Okay. That's business as usual, then.
I turn twenty tomorrow. I was born on the tenth of June, in the year 1993. As far as I know, I was adorable.
As I grew up, I remained adorable for a period of time. This declined rapidly around fifth grade, with the onset of puberty, and I remained much less adorable until I was like maybe seventeen. Then I became adorable again, and I have steadily remained adorable since.
The nice thing about having this non-adorable period of time though is that people are horrible and feel like they have to be good at something to be worth anything, and because I stopped being adorable I felt like I had to be good at other things, so I became good at music and books and crafts and stuff. It was fun.
I've also, of late, had like, major events go down in my social and emotional life that made me completely rethink who I am and what my purpose is in life and stuff like that. So, because it's a birthday gimmick of sorts and because I'm not going to actually want to write the post tomorrow (because I may or may not be going to an archery range with some friends and I may or may not be skipping class to do it because screw it it's my birthday and I haven't skipped class ONCE this term), I'm going to do this thing where I tell you twenty things I've learned in the last twenty years.
Okay. Here ya go.
20.) I have learned that being beautiful on the inside makes you so much prettier on the outside. Take, for instance, my mother. My mother doesn't think she is pretty, because she's kind of bigger, like me, but also a couple inches shorter than me. I absolutely do not understand this because I look at my mother and I see this amazing, beautiful woman who does her best to serve God in every way that she can through music, through food, through service, through teaching, and through her family. My mother has beautiful hair that she always takes the time to curl in the mornings and fluff it with a brush so that it will sit tall on her head. It's beginning to silver, and that just makes it even prettier. My mother has warm brown eyes that are kind and clever and dreamy by turns. My mother always smells like good shampoo. And when my mother plays the piano, she has such an expression of determined focus and dedication on her face that I can't help but think her beautiful.
19.) I have learned that it's easier to be straightforward and honest than it is to cover up your lies. I have always had a problem with squirrelling away food from the kitchen, whether or not I was allowed to eat it. And Mom would always know when I ate something that wasn't mine, no matter how well I lied about it. (It turns out that I do not lie well anyway, so there you go.)
18.) I have learned that expressing your passions doesn't make you weird. I used to get annoyed at the Beauty for saying that "such and such a person was really hot," or that "so and so a person was so cute." The joke's on me, because now I do that literally way more than she does. I express my passions all the time. I talk about Harry Potter and Doctor Who and Jane Austen and the things I like and the people I think are good-looking and the bands I think are awesome and I'm just like "WORLD YOU ARE FREE TO DISAGREE WITH ME BUT HERE HAVE ADVICE BECAUSE I LIKE THINGS AND MAYBE YOU WILL TOO."
17.) I have learned that family comes first. Yeah, I might have really awesome friends, but friends do, in fact, come and go. Sometimes they move. Sometimes they get married. Sometimes they go on missions. Sometimes they decide they don't like you. Sometimes they make new friends. Sometimes they forget about you before you forget about them. Sometimes they make decisions that ultimately send them down different paths. But your family- well, you're stuck with them, for better or for worse. My family consists of the people who understand me often far more than some of my best friends do, not because they understand all the jokes I make or the references I throw into conversation but because they love me and they're able to deal with my quirks and habits in a way that others aren't always going to understand.
16.) I have learned that daily hugs are essential. I have a problem with this. I am an extremely huggy person. I am that person who, if given permission, will cuddle with you and be the big spoon OR the little spoon or who will play with your hair or rub your back and possibly even massage your feet (which is still gross though) because I like people and I like touching people because human contact is warm and it helps me to know I'm not so gross that people can't stand to have me touch them. My problem is that I don't always feel comfortable initiating contact and am often too shy to ask for it. So if we are in a group setting together, you may assume that you are allowed to platonically cuddle with me and if you have children I will cuddle with them too because BABIES.
15.) I have learned that showers are the best. In fourth or fifth grade, I had this issue where my hair decided it was going to go from soft, silky baby hair to gross, oily teenager hair AS FAST AS IT COULD and then a friend gave me a quiet tip one day that I should probably start using dandruff shampoo or really any shampoo because little pale flakes on dark shirts and jackets isn't exactly healthy or even pretty so I started washing my hair ever day instead of every few days and it made a huge difference. Also, showers are good for the following:
- cold water after being sunburnt
- dyeing your hair
- feeling sick
- feeling sweaty
- feeling depressed
- feeling sleepy
- anything really
13.) I have learned that learning never stops. You might have decided not to go to college, or you might be in college right now. You might have graduated college. You might have kids in college. You might have grandkids in college. You might live in a third world country and never have heard of college because you hunt lions in the bush country of Africa. But regardless, you learn something new everyday. Today is a Sunday and I still learned something. I learned that some wards can, in fact, call "Barbeque Specialists" as a legitimate calling. And I am not kidding you, I swear. I learned how to find computer code that makes my mouse on the blog page poop sparkles when you move it and I know literally nothing about computer code. And the Internet isn't evil. It's a great tool for learning and knowledge.
12.) I have learned that music is so, so important. I was not that chick who writes a blog during high school. I was the music nerd, everyone's accompanist, the pit girl, the violinist, the pianist, the mallet percussionist. I was even a singer sometimes. And then I went to college and I became an English major because I loved books even more than I loved music so I gradually stopped practicing due to lack of practice facilities for non-music majors. Luckily, I have begun practicing the piano again, because I have to play the piano for church now and I just love it so much. And I sing so much more. I know songs and I watch movies and I learn lyrics and I love to sing. It's great. And no matter how sad I am, music will always be able to cheer me up.
11.) I have learned that mental health is not necessarily a choice. All of my life I have heard people say, "Well, you can choose to be happy, or you can choose to be angry, or you can choose to be sad." That's not true. You can't choose how you react to things. Reactions are natural. They are how you and your body respond to things. What you can control is what you let other people see. But those are just emotions, just feelings. When you have depression, like I do, there is nothing beyond the help of drugs and God that can make you happy if you aren't happy. It is physically impossible to be happy when you are depressed. You can smile and hide and pretend, but it doesn't change anything. You'll still be hurting. Depression is not an emotion. You can't feel depressed. You can feel sad or anxious or angry or annoyed or blue or melancholy. But depression is caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain, and it is therefore not a feeling. It is a condition. And unless I have happy pills or unless God is in the mood to grant miracles, depression will remain, and I will not have a choice in the matter at all.
10.) I have learned that trying new things is awesome. I used to be a pretty picky eater. I wouldn't eat bananas or blueberries or spinach or Brussels sprouts or squash. But the thing is, most of those things were texture issues. I like spinach and Brussels sprouts and sometimes I like squash, if it is drowned in butter and copiously salted and peppered. I still do not like bananas because they are squishy. Blueberries are okay, as are strawberries. I have tried grapes in a chicken salad sandwich and they are yummy. Herbal tea is delicious. I try a different kind of ice cream every time I go to the store (but really, I've never met a flavor of ice cream I didn't like). I've had Cajun fries and potato dogs and pupusas and pineapple soda and it's all, frankly, delicious. And I have tried things beyond food, too- I've tried archery and I've shot a gun and I went on a three-and-a-half-day backpacking hike when I was fifteen and I tried school dances (but really church dances are way better) and I did ballet and gymnastics and even karate (for all of two weeks) and soccer and swimming. And I tried to learn the trumpet and I've tried to learn to whistle and I've tried to learn to French-braid hair and I've tried to learn how to play video games. Trying stuff is fun. If you don't try things, you will forever remain stagnant and boring and unsatisfied with your life.
9.) I have learned that sharing is caring. And I don't mean like sharing my toys with my siblings. I mean like sharing my thoughts and jokes and dreams and wishes, like with you guys. Sometimes I am told that I overshare. Maybe I do. And I'm not saying it's out of the fact that I'm far from home and miss my family and prefer to type about things than talk to people about them- but I have reasons for doing what I do, primarily being that I am a writer and it's our job to share with people and to borrow from them in return.
8.) I have learned that there's no point in trying to be something you are not. I have tried to deny for years how excited I get about things. I would hear "Tomorrow for English class, we're going to be reading Pride and Prejudice," and I would have to bite my lip and physically restrain myself from jumping up and down and screaming. I tried not to let people notice when I thought someone was cute, or when I was having a bad day. I would hunch over and try to hide and hope that they thought I was invisible. But that was not who I am. I prefer the shadows when I can get them, of course, but if somebody notices me I don't mind all that much. In fact, I like staying in the shadows and letting people come to me to bring me out into the sun. I am not that hiding shadow girl anymore. I am vibrant and alive and full of color and dreams and fire and I scream and shout and laugh and cry and I am loud and talkative and you cannot get me to shut up, not for a million dollars.
7.) I have learned that when somebody hurts you, the best thing to do is nothing. Really. I'm not saying ignore it. But don't do anything stupid, like punch someone in the face or kill them or blow up a building or send them nasty emails or envelopes full of anthrax. When you've been hurt, you should just breathe, in and out and in and out, until the pain fades enough for you to decide what you should do. And at that point, you have three options:
- Tell the person who hurt you, calmly and politely, that what they did was wrong and hurtful (unless it was necessary, in which case tell them that it was probably possible for them to hurt you in a kinder way) and that you wish they had not done it and that you are sorry for whatever you did to provoke the hurting. Then continue on with your life, because it's not worth getting hung up over.
- Do something nice for that person. Then continue on with your life, because it's not worth getting hung up over.
- Continue on with your life, because it's not worth getting hung up over.
For some weird reason, people always assumed that I was angry or upset or pissed off about something, when the reality of it is that I would be spacing out and thinking about mad men in blue boxes or something. That's not an angry face. That's an impassive face. It's a family trait. I like to call it "the Abramson Stone Face Deluxe." My dad does it, my mom does it, the Beast does it, I do it, the Beauty does it, the Angel does it, and the Prodigy does it. We literally all have one. And we look like serial killers when we do it. But it is our resting face. Point: just because I look like a serial killer doesn't mean I am one.
5.) I have learned that people are not always who you think they are. This is important, because I have met people and become friends with them and then, it turns out, I didn't really know them at all, because either they did something I thought was totally awful or I did something they thought was totally awful and either way, it ended up not working out. My real friends are the people who are willing to explain to you that they are not comfortable with you doing a thing and who I am comfortable explaining to them that I am uncomfortable with them doing a thing and all parties are genuinely willing to cooperate with the situation. Real friends are people who are willing to change their actions but who won't compromise their morals for you. And if you're asking them to compromise their morals for you, then you are terrible and you should go home and rethink your life.
4.) I have learned that there is always somebody who is willing to help you. And yeah, you may scoff at my naive idealism, but for me it's true. I always have my family and almost always my friends. And when both of those fail, I'm still going to have God, my teddy bears, imaginary friends, and herbal tea. So no matter what happens, I'm going to be okay.
3.) I have learned that relationships are not 50-50. It's funny- you think, "Oh, we're equals in this relationship, so we each contribute 50 percent to this thing and it will work, right?" Yeah, no. The thing is, is that in every relationship there are two people. Brother and sister, mother and daughter, boyfriend and girlfriend, husband and wife, friend and friend. Therefore, the total you need to add up to is 200 percent, not 100 percent. Therefore, every relationship is 100-100. You give your all for the other person, and they give their all for you, and everything will work out just fine. And you may not want to give a hundred percent to another person for fear that they will break your heart- but that's the definition of trust. And if you don't trust someone enough to give them a hundred percent of yourself, you might want to question whether you should be in that relationship. There is no room for selfishness in a marriage or a family or between two friends. You give what you can and you expect nothing back. You will never be disappointed, but you will quite often be pleasantly surprised.
2.) I have learned that God is truly here and watching over me and all of us. If you're not comfortable with religion, feel free to skip this. I have been through a lot in the last year, and even more in the last twenty. And if there's one thing I have learned in my life, it's that God is present, and that He loves me and that He loves all of the people in the world, and that if I am faithful and serve Him humbly and as well as I can, He will bless me over and over again. In my church, we have some weird stuff we do, like tithing. When you get paid, you pay ten percent of your gross (not net) income to the church, and it is used for things like building new churches and Mormon temples and helping with missionaries and humanitarian aid and printing our books of scripture. Not a penny of it pays for the leaders of our church; our clergy are not paid. Our church is run by those who believe and are called of God to lead us. Even though ten percent is a lot of my gross income- I mean, ten percent for me, about twenty bucks, is like a week and a half of groceries for me- I pay it because I can't afford not to have the blessings that come with paying tithing. God has promised us that if we pay tithing, we will never want for anything. I pay my tithing, even my meager little part, because I truly do believe that. And for the same reasons, I don't wear clothes that are revealing or too tight, and I'm not going to have sex until I'm married, and I will never drink alcohol or smoke or drink coffee or (non-herbal) tea, because I know that the blessings that come from not doing these things far outweigh the advantages of doing them. Although really, are there any advantages to drinking alcohol or smoking? Are there any advantages to having sex before you get married? Not really, no. I'm not going to miss what I've never had.
1.) I have learned that I am a daughter of God, and that someday I will return to heaven and be with my family and the people I love forever. And that is really the most important thing that has taken me twenty years to learn.
Thanks for a great twenty years. I hope I live like, eighty more years. That would be cool.
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