#i’m glad 2 hear my art has impact even when i struggle to see it

[lega18]

HI I RECENTLY STARTED HYPERFIXIATING ON AKIRA AGAIN AND SEEING YOUR ART MADE ME SO HAPPY. it feels like theres ever like 4 alive people in the akira fandom ever at a time but andfihdjfjdnfnf !!!!! seeing your posts on my feed make me happy :) !!!! 🩷🩷 YOUR ART is so pretty. I love the colors. and the tenderness of it all. that is all <3!! have a great day 💞💞

HII its true, there really only ever is 3 or 4 of us roaming around, grazing, soemtiems we make stuff… it’s quiet here but it cool… also pls feel free to come talk to me about Them/akira, i am always waiting for another soul to kanetetsu brain rot with<33333

[zhowongli]

hello! i started a new thread because the other one (+ this one) got really long, so sorry! but i guess this is my love letters to you guys because you’ve made my tumblr experience so, so much better && i’m grateful for all of you guys + all of my mutuals and followers!!

first of all, @himawari-senpaii thank you so so much for your kind words! meggi, i love your sunflower motif because it suits you so well! sunflowers make me smile whenever i see them, and it really brings me so much joy to see you on my dash/notifs. your tags are always so fun and sweet. thank you for tagging me in this 🥺 

@animoozies connie, where do i even start? you were my very, very first tumblr mutual on this account! i’m so thankful you reached out to me before, and you’re still checking up on me even now. words can’t describe how much i adore you + how appreciative of you! when i see you on my dash with your stories, i always end up cackling because you’re so fun. idk how you do it working all those hours + going to nursing school, but you is a mf boss ass queen!!

@hoekaashi ash, my queen!! my tag for you is my day is blessed because ash ✨exists✨ because that’s honestly how i feel about you. i am truly blessed with your kindness, your humor, your friendship, you. thank you for always keeping me company through our struggles in pharmacy school! you are one of the realest people i know, and i feel so honored that you always send me random kenma pics & fics you think i’d like 🥺

@kanao annette, the other half of my soul, my whole heart, my literal soul sister. you are one of the biggest blessings i’ve received this year, and i honestly don’t know where i would be without you listening to my dumb shit and supporting me through all my mess LOL. thank you for validating me all the time, even if it’s just stupid stuff like enabling me to buy all the random stuff that i’ve been thinking about LMAO. i love how we are always ✨speaking✨ and  ✨manifesting✨ good things in our futures together. i literally feel like i can talk about any and everything with you, and i love that about us 🥺 i am manifesting that beach vacation 2021 for us, okay!!! 💖

@sapphitedreams leo, my cutest menace in the kitchen 💖 thank you for reaching out to me when i was too shy to reach out to you uuuu. you’re such a chaotic calm in my life, and i love your energy. i am constantly in awe with how adorable, supportive, and creative you are! even though you bully me sometimes and only make things for characters’ birthdays, you are so so talented and it floors me every time i see your creations because they are so amazing idk how they’re real. i hope you are able to get some rest even if you have to work during your break (& i hope you don’t accidentally fall during work anymore smh HAHAH)!

@onefortyninecm danielle!! my love!! i know i mention this before, but i am always so so inspired by you. you’re so tiny, but you have such a big heart and soul. you’re so beautiful inside and out + your humor is god tier. i’m so glad you were the very first person i’ve ever commissioned from (& spiraled me into comissioning indulgent kenma art HAHAHA), and i’m still amazed by your talent and kindness every time you post something new omg. i still can’t believe you DREW ON YOUR PHONE what the heck!! you’re so talented it’s crazy HAHA. i’m always thinking fondly of you + dandy wedding in a pumpkin patch 2021, okay thanks. 

@p-irozhki rissa!! i am so blessed with all the gifs you create and all your content on my dash! whenever i think of you, i think about all the smol icons you use because to me, you = cuteness = i wanna hug you so much!!! i think i already said it, but i’m always so thankful when you read all my self-indulgent fanfics and leave kind comments on them 😭 thank you for culturing me about mangoes HAHAHA. there’s never a bad time with you, and i’m thankful we got to meet this year!

@hoshino-a lena lena! you actually have so much bde that i am in constant awe by you. you are such a baddie & i have this like clear imagine in my head of you with crisp and clean vibes + the skies from your pfp on discord, hehe. i love you and all your brain rots about your exes. at this point, every time i see semi, my first thought is “ah it’s lena’s ex” and whenever i hear some sad song, i would be like “omg it’s lena ab her ex semi eita” LMFAOIOAGJDLA. i love talking to you because your energy is just immaculate + i just love your presence 💖 also please get some sleep because do you even sleep 😭 

@myelocin nic!! you’ve painted my world in so many iridescent shade so life, i can’t even begin to describe how much you mean to me. you works are just so beautiful so imagine how much i shrieked when i saw you followed me LMFAOOADIGDALJ i love that your blog is your safe space because it has become a place of comfort for me as well (and i’m going to miss you so much when you leave 😭😭). your makki brain rot is so strong, and sometimes i think about makki and you making dinner and teasing each other and throwing flour at each other or something idk. this is nic’s world now and we are all living in it tbh. 

@tsu-kiss nina!! you are someone i find such comfort in. i’m not really sure if that even makes sense LOL. but your blog and you are a source of comfort for me. in my head, you have such an older sister vibe even though i’m older than you LMAOOADGHDAKJ. i hope life is treating you well because you deserve all the best!! seeing you thrive makes my heart so full 🥺 i love you so much!!

@souheii lisa!! i kid you not, the first time you dropped an ask in my ask box, my heart skipped a beat because you told me you love me and i love you and you are so cute and i cri!!!! i know we don’t talk often, but every time i see you on my dash or in my notifs or when we do talk, it’s like a little shot of serotonin every time :”) thank you for being such a lovely human being mrs. iwaizumi hajime, 27, althetic trainer😭

@ultkags​ cas!! my first child 💖 i know you’re on a hiatus right now because school really, really sucks BUT you are seriously one of my biggest blessings. you are literally my ray of sunshine because every time i talk to you, i gain so much warmth and energy from you. every time i see your edits, it absolutely AMAZES me because i literally don’t know how i am able to see all your edits FOR FREE?? all your thoughts behind the composition and symbolism for each piece is CRAZY. please remember that i’m always your biggest fan + i love you so so much. please take care and remember to drink water and get some rest!! your grandma is always here to send you love + forehead kisses because this grandma can’t bake :(

@u-make-my-heart-tsumtsum​ ree!! hi, i know we’ve only started talking recently but i love how open and warm you are. our love was so strong that even tumblr tried to stop us 😭 conversations with you are always so easy and lovely, and you are just such a cool person!? i love reading all your thoughts (& i can’t wait to dive into your masterlist after school ends because we live for fluffy tsumu content 😭). i’m not sure why you even follow me, but i adore you so much!!

@neonghxst​ el, where do i even begin!! you are such a lovely person, and i literally have no other words to say because you always leave me speechless. your writing is so so gorgeous, and you are so so beautiful. i love reading all your stories because they truly leave an everlasting impact on me, and i love reading your interactions + just seeing you on my dash. you are so thoughtful, and you take care of everyone around you so well. i hope that you are also giving yourself the same treatment because you deserve all the best as well! remember to drink water in between your coffees and get some rest as you go into your final 2 weeks of the semester!! 

@und3lla​ maliha! hi love! i know we haven’t spoken much or in a while, but i really do always think of you randomly. you were one of the first mutuals i made && you are such a sweet soul. i love how every time we talk, it really fills me up with happiness. thank you for just being such a lovely person && you truly are one of the softest people i’ve met. thank you <3

@deadontheinsidebut angel, my dumb ham, my queen, my hoe (heaven on earth), my everything. i know you are also on a semi-hiatus right now because everything that’s going on, but i hope you are properly taking care of yourself >:( i’m always here to remind you to drink some water in between your coffees and teas and to GET SOME REST. you are so so driven, and i really admire how open and friendly you are. you truly are your namesake because you are literally an angel, and i always feel so blessed to be in your presence (even if you bully me sometimes for being a boomer 😔). words can’t describe how much i love you and care about you && i hope that you are able to find what you’re looking for during your break! 💖

@rumprich​ ananya! hello! i am so thankful to see you and all your content on my dash. you have so much creativity, and all your edits are so aesthetically pleasing to look at? like it’s so light + pretty!! i’m so so grateful that we are mutuals somehow because ahhh i really don’t deserve you. you are so adorable, and i truly am blessed to see your presence! 

@yuki-souma​ vee! i know we only started talking very very recently, but you are so much fun to talk to! i love how diverse our conversations are, and i love that we have similar favorites, and even when we don’t, it’s always a fun conversation that i look forward to! i love how open and inviting you are, and i’m really grateful that we are mutuals + i love and appreciate you so so much! 

@owlywrites​ owly! hello! you are seriously one of the most supportive souls i’ve met on this website. your kindness and drive to learn always leaves me speechless because you’re so amazing. thank you for being so kind to me, and i hope you extend that same kindness to yourself! don’t be so hard on yourself and remember to take breaks and take care too. you are such a beautiful soul, and i hope you’ll remember that i’m always here to support you!! 

@graphicstills-in-motion hi arianne! thank you so so much for always being so kind to me. i don’t know what i did in life to deserve you, but i must have done something right to have someone so kind like you in my life! thank you for being such a sweet soul + always boosting everyone around you up. your kindness is definitely contagious! i love seeing your edits and reading our conversations because there are always so many thoughts put in. thank you <3

@applepienation​ justine! thank you so much for always checking in on me whenever i post random shit on my dash. i really do appreciate you and all that you do for not just me, but also for everyone around you. you are such a ray of sunshine, and i’m so thankful that you’re in my life! i know uni is crazy for you right now, but i hope you’re still taking time to take care of yourself! sending you lots of love and positive energy!!

@touyax​ drake! hi love. i absolutely LIVE for your tags LMAOOADJGALD. they are literally my thoughts but you just typed them out HAHAH. i’m so thankful that i get to see your beautiful content on my dash, and i’m always in awe by all your edits! thank you for always being such a fun person + never leaving me feeling like a fool whenever i post ask games LOL. i love and appreciate you so much! 💖

@kagehjna​ ilayda! my kagehina supplier 🥺🥺 i love seeing your presence on my dash because you truly post all the best things! you are such a lovely person + i love reading your tags HAHA. you are truly a joy and we will definitely have matching kagehina icons one day okay 😭😭 12/7 is finally here/coming SO I AM SO EXCITED FOR YOU!!! thank you for always blessing me <3

@sadaharus hi mei! you are literally the definition of softness to me. all your content and edits are just so soft and beautiful, and i love seeing everything you post. you are my main gintama supplier HAHA. i really appreciate how kind you are + how you’re always so sweet to me. 🥺 i know it’s kinda funny how i started following you because of a random ask game, but i’m so so glad i did because i always feel so thankful you’re here! 

@fake-charliebrown charlie! my little sprout babie!! i have so much admiration for you because you have so so much talent! your style is so distinctive, and i love that!! it’s so soft + vibey, and i’m honestly so so amazed by it all. not to mention, you have the best haikyuu thoughts! thank you for sharing all of that with me! i’m thankful for you, thank you <3

@itachihaa​ ay! my froggy princess 🥺 thank you for always being so kind to me + having the patience to deal with how slow i am to responding!! i’m really appreciative of you always because you make/have so much beautiful content and you are so so sweet as well!? and the way you call me miss starlight 🥺 that makes me so soft like!! uuu i love you. 

@stardust-make-a-wish​ star! you are so so adorable!! i LOVE reading your tags because they make me feel so fuzzy and soft but also relatable HAHA. your presence is such a joy + thank you for always interacting with me even though i just spam random stuff LMAO. i love how thoughtful your answers are + how much you love cake/sweets (very suiting because you are so sweet 🥺). thank you for being interested in me even though i am the one asking you questions! 

@karasu-hoes​ daisy! hello! i have so much admiration for you because you have so much creativity and kindness! like your events are so cool and unique + your writing is so beautiful! i love reading your feral thoughts + all your work. i also really love reading your witching hours!!! thank you for blessing me with you 🥺 you are always so kind + i love how much you care about your friends and the people around you. i hope you’re taking care while renewing your teaching certifications! 💖

@frailuta nico! hello love! i know we haven’t really spoken before, but i just want to know i love you so much. you make the most beautiful gifs + i truly am in awe every time you post something. life is tough sometimes, but you are tougher! sending so so much love and positive energy to you + please remember to take care! <3

to all my mutuals and followers: thank you so so much for sticking with me and my mess of a blog. i honestly don’t really contribute much to anything, but i’m so thankful you guys are still here! thank you, thank you, thank you! i love and appreciate all of you guys + my ask box/messages are always open if you want/need someone to talk to 💖 thinking fondly of everyone today + so much love to you guys mwah mwah!

[gothfoxx]

Miraculous Ladybug, Male! Marinette x Lila, They were partnered up with in a project but they hated each other. They have settled their differences or they would fail the project.

(I’m using @virgil-is-a-cutie ‘s male!Marinette name for this)

When Ms Bustier said they would do the project in pairs Marin could feel the eyes of everyone in class glance hungrily in his direction. There was sure to be a fight for an easy grade. “Partners will be assigned at the end of the lesson so please pay attention!” The teacher informed them. ‘Ha!’ Marin thought as all the greedy vultures groaned and moaned about their lost meal ticket.

“That leaves Alya and Juleka as the last girl team and Lila and Marin as our last co Ed team!” Ms Bustier said way too cheerfully for someone that just sent a guy down the river. “Remember I want to see effort from both of you in your project for this lesson, think of it as your idea child. Raise it together with love and care!” The woman added a happy little half clap to emphasize her giddiness at the prospect.

Marin held back an eye roll that he was sure several other students could share. At least it was a subject he liked so if he had to do all the work he wouldn’t be struggling. The plopping down of a bag jars the bluenett out of his musings huh Alya left already and when he looks up he sees his nightmare hasn’t ended yet, “Hey~ Marin. So I guess we’re working together huh?” Lila asks feigning innocence and dripping artificial sweetness. When he doesn’t address her right away she tilts her head and pouts, if he didn’t know it was all an act he might have been swayed into being sorry.

He heaved a sigh to rivial a tiny god’s and puts on his ‘customer service’ smile, “Guess so. So do you have an idea for what we should do? I’m all ears!” Might as well jump to it and prepare for the worst. She surprises him by pulling out a piece of paper with some sloppy writing on it. “I might have one idea.” She beams, ew she can fake that too is that healthy?. “Oh cool.” Came his less than enthusiastic reply as he tried to read the paper, “So what IS the idea?” He finally asks after getting nowhere trying to read from the paper. Lila grinned and this time if was the kind her was used to, the sly cruel smile of a Predator on the hunt.

“I’m glad you ask Marin! It just so happens that my grandpapa’s work involved research of this area. We have some of his old journals at home. We practically have this done!” She boasted, and for a lie this one seemed rather...dumb to say the least. How was she going to get out of something so plainly’put up or shut up’? “So I guess we’re doing it at your place?” He remarks as he looks back at his notes for the list of suggested topics. A sound like a strangled cat catches his attention back to the brunette, she was red in the face and sputtering, “excuse me? Come again?” She wheezes between two steadying breaths. He’s confused at to what set her off but he repeats himself, “Are we doing the project at your house? Where the journals are?” And by golly she goes from looking mad to being embarrassed. “Oh, sure” comes the oddly soft response.

After school Marin texted his parents that he’d be home for dinner and prayed that if this was some kind of murder plot that they would at least start the search for his body quickly. The awkward silence dragged on until it got to be too much for the boy so he asks, “So what did your grandpa do?” After a few steps Lila answers with a grand sweep of her hand towards a front door. “You’ll just have to see, welcome to the Castello Rossi!” For all the grand showmanship it’s a very plain looking house, well kept but plain. “How nice, I like your plants.” Marin comments trying to be civil since they still have work to do.

As Lila opens the door with another grand gesture Marin is shocked to see how empty and impersonal it feels. Most of the front room looks unlived in with just two picture frames sitting on the mantle. “Mama won’t be home till later so let’s go to the office and get as much done as we can.” She states, beckoning him to follow. The office is a stark contrast to the room earlier, stacks of important looking paper tower on the dark wooden desk, Knick-nacks and books fill the shelves, and family phones are scattered along the walls. While Marin is taking it all in Lila goes to a shelf in the corner and pulls out two worn out sketch books.

As it turns out Lila’s grandpa was part of a team of anthropologists that studied post World War I art and his books were a mix of notes on the how the war changed how the art had changed and sketches of people he had interviewed. It was all so fascinating and emotional. Marcelo Rossi had a way with words, Marin felt like he could hear the man’s voice narrate as he read entry after entry. They easily got most of their project done, the impact of WWI in everyday life, all they needed was a second source and they would be finished. All in all it was a not horrible experience, maybe if Lila could shape up they could really be friends like everyone wanted.

Ending 1: not so bad

Marin was surprised that in the week and a half that they had been working together to discover the Rossi family were well known in nitch circles of the anthropology and archaeological sciences. He had seen a picture of her great aunt recording the dying language of the Tihan people of Tiahana, gotten to read the musings of the eccentric late great-great-uncle Sal who studied prehistoric plants. They were amazing people who changed their fields, it was a wonder Lila depended on lies to get attention. When the day of the presentation came up Marin was excited to share what they had written, Lila even brought scans of the sketch books to pass around. Everyone else’s reports were pretty standard in comparison so when it was their turn they knocked it out of the park!

After class Marin walked out with Lila like he had done everyday for a week when to realized that he didn’t need to follow her anymore. It caught him off guard at how sad that made him, he liked seeing the real Lila under all the lies and faux confidence. Did they really have to pop their little bubble just because they didn’t share a goal anymore? “Aren’t you coming?” Lila asked tugging on Marin’s sleeve, “We need to celebrate, that report was definitely an A. We deserve a treat!” She declares, dragging the less than reluctant boy along with her. They announced their relationship a few days later to the cheers of the class.

Ending 2: how did it end up like this

Marin had gotten to know the real Lila over the week and a half they worked together. He had really gotten through to her as he assured her that what her family did was interesting and there was no need to hide behind her web of lie. She agreed to come clean to the class with Marin to vouch for her after the project. He was really proud of her and was planning on asking her to lunch together later that day.

Strangely when they walked in that morning in prep for the report Marin felt the burning feeling of eyes boring into the back of his head. Ms Bustier met them at the bottom of the steps, “Lila is it really a good idea for you to come in today with everything that you’ve done?” The teacher inquired with a grit of her teeth. A murmur rippled through the room as Marin realized the glares weren’t aimed at his mmm for a change. Lila paled and looked around the class before focusing back on Ms Bustier, “What’s going on? What do you mean by what ‘I’ve done’?” The brunette asks a bit nervously.

It was Alya that stood up and pointed an accusing finger at Lila. “You lied about everything, you made me think you were going to help me with my career! You just strung us along like puppets!” She roared, Juleka had to hold the journalist back from rush the Italian. “Alya sit down! I will handle this!” Barked Ms Bustier, looking very run down and already very tired for the time of day. If Marin though Lila was pale before then she looked ghostly now, her eyes looked huge on her face as she looked at the struggling Alya. “As you can see. It would be best if you spent the day with the principal. Your mother should be here soon” the teacher growled.

Just then Juleka lost her grip and Alya rushed forward making Lila bolt out the door. Marin braced his body, the same way he did when Manon tries to escape to cling to her mom, and grabbed Alya around the middle and kept her from chasing his friend. “Why are you stopping me! She lied, you know she lied!” Raved the girl trying to wrestle her way out of his grip. “She played us!” She snarled. “She played you like the cheap kazoo you are!” Marin responded in kind. “I told you before it was a problem that she was lying but none of you would hear me out, you asked for proof, you called me envious! But it’s now that I like her and she promised to come clean that you choose to see the truth!? Fuck you guys!” He yells, dropping Alya on her ass and running after Lila.

He finds her crying in the hall that leads to the principal’s office. Her eyes are red and puffy, it breaks his heart to see her scrubbing her face in an effort to make the tears stop. Kneeling down next to her Matin holds his arm out so she can curl up into his side. “Don’t worry about them. They never knew the real you. After all the talk they spout about friendship and loyalty and giving chances they never even tried to get to know who was under all the celebrity stories. They all dropped you without asking questions or giving you a chance. So don’t worry about them. You have me.” He promises, rubbing her back soothingly. They wait there a long time before Mrs Rossi arrives, Marin stays for the meeting holding Lila’s hand through the whole ordeal. With compromises on both sides Lila is allowed to stay in the school but she will be switching classes and seeing a councilor. After Marin walks Lila and her mom back to their car, it might not be the best time but he’s not sure when he’ll get the chance again, “Once you’re not grounded anymore will you go out for coffee with me? Or a movie, I don’t even know if you like coffee.” He rambles get stopped in their tracks when Lila leans over and places a peck on his cheek. “I’d love to” she smiles, eyes still a bit wet, before having to close the car door and drive away.

[cristinablackthornkingson]

What Might Have Been, Part 3.

Check out part 1 here and part 2 here

It is a warm Spring day in March, year of The Chinchilla, 17 years after the Midmerican Scythedom were rocked by the loss of their High Blade Scythe Robert Goddard, when the woman formerly known as Scythe Ayn Rand, is faced with the conversation she has dreaded for the past 17 years.

Just last week Olivia Kwon and Tyger Salazar’s son Alexander, turned 17.

 That day was also 16 years since Olivia and Tyger tried to make things work with eachother, they dated on and off throughout Alex’s early childhood, and though there was and is no doubt that they truly love eachother, after what Olivia did to Tyger, while she was Scythe Rand, he will never be truly able to trust her again, and as such would never be able to be in a long term relationship with her. 

Despite this, they remained friends and were and are always a team when it comes to Alex and his upbringing, which is the best he could’ve possibly asked for, though now as he is getting older he’s finding his mother to be too protective and a little suffocating, he knows she means well and he loves her with all his heart, but he’s almost an adult now, he feels like he needs some space. 

Olivia knows this, she can see much of herself at that age, in Alex (Though thankfully he doesn’t so far seem to have her temper and angry disposition.) and on this warm Spring day, she decides it’s time to give Alex the truth of his early life and how he came to be. 

Standing in the doorway to his bedroom, watching him absorbed in a drawing he’s been working on for the last few days, Olivia almost wants to forget about this conversation and let Alex continue to live in blissful ignorance, let him innocently believe that he was conceived like any other child, that he was wanted because a child is a gift to many people, not because the man who was technically his father, wanted to use him as a weapon.

But she knows she can’t, Alex deserves to know the truth about everything and he’s old enough now to understand and comprehend it all. Olivia just hopes he doesn’t hate her.

Pushing aside her fears as she has learned to do over the last 17 years, Olivia knocks lightly on Alex’s door. 

Alex looks up from his drawing, his dark brown hair falling into his eyes, his face lighting up with a smile when he sees his mother. 

“Hi mom!” Alex says in a bright tone, setting his pencil down and pushing his hair back. Olivia’s heart aches with how much she loves him, and she wishes she could turn back time just for an hour or two, to when Alex was a baby and it was just the two of them against the world, for the first month of his life. 

“Hi, what are you working on?” Olivia asks, nodding at his sketchpad. Alex’s eyes light up as they always do when someone asks him about his art. 

“A piece of the portfolio I gotta submit to colleges, I’m almost done my whole portfolio!” Alex proudly tells her, holding his head high. He’s had a big interest in art since he was old enough to hold a pencil, he recently made the choice to go to an art school and get his degree in art and art history, then maybe he could be a teacher himself, or he could be hired by someone famous like a Scythe, to do a portrait for them. 

“It looks really good.” Olivia tells him with a smile. “Listen, Alex, now that you’re 17 I need to talk to you about some things, about your early life and why... why we’re so secluded and why I came here from MideMerica, to raise you.” 

“Oh... um... okay.” Alex shrugs, having always wondered about his mom’s life before him, and he’s been curious as to why she has hardly any friends and dreads parent-teacher meetings as his school, it’ll be good to get some answers. 

With a sigh, Olivia sits on the edge of Alex’s bed, while he stays where he is in the chair at his desk. 

“Okay, so this is a pretty long story and you’ll find out I did some pretty awful things before I had you, just bare with me until the end then you can ask any questions you want, and no matter what you feel about me or your dad, or anything about this situation, it’s okay, alright?” Olivia asks, looking her son dead in the eye, having always made sure he knows he has a right to feel his emotions and express them, and he should never push them down like she did at his age. 

“Okay.” 

“To start off with, I’m going to tell you something pretty shocking, something that only your dad knows and no one else in our lives knows.

I haven’t always gone by Olivia Kwon, from the time I was 17 until I was 25, I was known as Honorable Scythe Ayn Rand. 

I apprenticed with Honorable Scythe Robert Goddard, when I was your age and was his Junior Scythe for 8 years, his right-hand woman. 

I know you know about him, you learned about him at school, about me too though you didn’t know at the time that I use to be Scythe Rand. So you know we were both pretty awful people, and I hate to say it now, but for those 8 years I had a major crush on Goddard, I thought I was totally and utterly in love with him.

You know how he was killed the first time... and how he was revived, but one thing about that that you don’t know is... that the ‘donor’ body I selected... was actually your dad, because he was close to Rowan Damisch, the boy who killed Goddard the first time, and almost killed me. I... I chose him so I could and would hurt Rowan, and get back at him. 

Thing is though, I fell in love with your dad during the time I was training him, I really loved him, not in the way I thought I loved Goddard. 

As you know about 18 years ago, Goddard was elected High Blade of Midmerica, the first new High Blade after the 9th Commandment was lifted for Scythes and we were allowed to get married and have kids. He was also the first High Blade who would pass the title down to his child, when the time came. 

So shortly after he was elected he started looking for surrogates so he could have a child, an heir. When I found out about this and he told me he was struggling to find the right candidate I... I offered to be his surrogate. He laughed it off at first but I conceived him, told him that I was the ideal candidate, we shared the same values and beliefs and we could make a strong child together. So... we did.

With lots of help from doctors to make our chances as high as possible, we did one round of artificial insemination, and 2 weeks later I found out I was pregnant... with you.

At first I was indifferent to the pregnancy, Goddard was thrilled of course, he was going to have his heir. 

I didn’t start feeling anything about the pregnancy until I was four months, and saw you clearly for the first time at an ultrasound, I could see your hands and feet and see you moving around inside me, and I got to hear your heartbeat. That’s when I started forming a bond with you and becoming attached to you.  I tried so hard not to, tried to remind myself I wasn’t your mom just doing Goddard a favor. 

But then... then I felt you kick for the first time and you responded to my voice, and I just felt this huge rush of love for you that was so beyond intense, I couldn’t believe it, but again I tried to push those feelings away, not because I didn’t love you but because I did love you and I knew it would hurt like hell to hand you over to Goddard, if I bonded with you. 

I couldn’t stop myself though, how could I when we were together 24/7, I felt your every move and shift of position, you heard everything I heard, ate everything I ate, went everywhere I went, it was impossible not to bond with you.

Throughout my pregnancy Goddard was always raging on about what a prodigy you would be and how you would be the best Scythe in the world, and would carry on and uphold his legacy. 

It was when I was 8 months pregnant that I had enough. Goddard took me to a mass gleaning at a Tonist Cloister, as a way of saying thank you, for carrying his child for the past 8 months. Looking back now I of course know how obscene and evil that sounds, but back then I thought nothing of it. 

During that mass gleaning Goddard started spouting his usual crap about how his reign would never end, and that you would carry on his beliefs and values, uphold the New Order and would show no mercy to The Tonists either. 

And then... then I just snapped and before I could even fully comprehend it, I had my knife in his heart and he was dead again.

I told the Tonists to tell everyone that unsavories had killed Goddard and burned his body, and I threatened to glean them if they didn’t. 

After that I got straight into a public car intent on getting as far away from MidMerica as I could, I was thinking of leaving the Mericas altogether, but then I had this awful pain in my stomach and then my waters broke. The stress of the day put me into labor.

The rest you know, I had you in MidMerica, and the moment I held you and saw you I knew I couldn’t be Scythe Rand anymore, that I had to get you away from The Scythedom and those who would expect you to be just like Goddard.

So I changed my name back to my birth name, cut my hair, put on street clothes and with just you, and my robes and ring in a bag, I left for Texas where I would be off-grid, and I had your dad revived.

Like I said, the rest you know.” 

Unsurprisingly there is a tense silence in the room for a few minutes, before Alex finally speaks up. 

“I... I’m glad you’re not Scythe Rand anymore.” He quietly says, surprising his mother who expected him to rage and yell and tell her he hates her, etc. 

“Me too kid, me too.” She says, reaching out to squeeze his hand lovingly. 

“so... you really did a total 180... because of me?” Alex asks in an unsure tone, hardly able to believe that he had such a great impact on someone. Olivia nods. 

“I did, I wanted to give you your best chance at life and I knew to do that, I would either have to change my ways or place you for adoption, and there was no way I was letting you go, so I chose the other option and changed, I destroyed my ring when you were a month old and the last person I ever gleaned was Goddard.” Olivia explains. 

“So... does this mean Goddard is my biological dad?” Alex questions, tilting his head to the side. Olivia shakes her head. 

“No, it was your dad’s body, with Goddard’s head. Your dad’s name is on your Birth Certificate and he is your biological father, but if Goddard were alive today he would probably have legal rights to you.” Olivia sighs, grateful that she doesn’t have to worry about Goddard showing up and taking Alex from her. 

“Mom, can.... can we go to Midmerica for a while? So I can see where you’re from and where I was born and suppose to grow up, please?” Alex hopefully asks, looking at his mother with big and imploring brown eyes. 

Olivia is hesitant, she doesn’t want to be recognized by anyone in Midmerica, it’s why she never want back after Alex was born. However after a minute of thinking, she decides she can’t deny Alex this very simple request.

“Yeah, yeah of course we can.”

So a few days later the two of them board a train and head for MideMerica, completely unaware of the destiny they are about to face.

______________________________________________________________

Meanwhile in Midmerica, 16 year old Sophie Faraday-Curie accompanies her mother to the local museum in Fulcrum City, so Sophie can gather some information for a history project for school, and so her mother can gather some information she needs for a meeting with the other High Blades of the other regions of the Mericas. 

Sophie usually hates going out in public, because of all the attention she gets. As the first child born to two Scythes Sophie is pretty famous and despite her parents best effort to keep her out of the spotlight and give her an ordinary childhood and life, she is still recognized practically everywhere she goes, which results in a lot of staring and whispering from the people around her.

However when Sophie is with her mom or dad, people tend to stare less, they know how protective High Blade Curie and Honorable Scythe Faraday are of their daughter, and have no doubt either of them would not hesitate to glean anyone who upset or bothered their daughter, so it’s easier for Sophie to be out and about when she has one of her parents with her.

What bugs her the most is that technically she’s not actually the first child born to two Scythes, Honorable Scythe Rand had been due to give birth to Honorable Scythe Goddard’s child two months before Sophie was born, but after Goddard was killed by unsavories, a heavily pregnant Rand disappeared and no one has seen her or the baby she was carrying, in 17 years.

But non of that is really at the fore-front of Sophie’s mind right now, she is totally taken in by her surroundings the minute she and her mother step into the museum, there’s so much to learn and see and though Sophie has visited here often, there is always something new.

As she looks around her while walking toward the section she needs to go to, Sophie is not paying attention to where she is going and soon feels herself collide with something, or rather someone. They both immediately crash to the ground, Sophie cursing herself for being so clumsy and not looking where she’s going, while the other person yells in surprise. 

“Oh I’m so sorry! I’m such an idiot, not looking where I was going!” Sophie apologizes, pushing herself off the floor and holding her hand out to help the person she collided with, a young boy around her age with messy dark brown hair, light brown skin and wide and inquisitive brown eyes.

“No it’s okay I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going either.” The boy says, grabbing Sophie’s hand letting her haul him to his feet.

Before either of them can say anything else, Marie comes up behind Sophie holding a leaflet and smiling softly.

“Soph I just found some physical copies of the statement your dad and I put out to the world when you were born, it’s not very long but it’s got some photos of you as a baby that I thought you’d like to see.” Marie says in a soft, reminiscent tone, brushing her daughter’s hair out of her eyes, remembering writing this article with Michael like it was yesterday. It had taken them almost a week to write just two paragraphs because Sophie was so fussy and wouldn’t let them put her down for more than five minutes at a time.

Before Sophie can reply, a tall willowy woman with dark hair and pan-Asian leanings comes up behind the boy Sophie just collided with. She puts a hand on the boy’s shoulder and smiles at him, and is clearly about to say something to him, but before she can, Marie speaks up.

“Rand? Scythe Ayn Rand?” Marie gasps in disbelief, staring at the woman in front of her. She looks different from the last time Marie saw her, her long dark hair is now cut short to just above her shoulders, the black is streaked through with some gray and she clearly looks older, but she is still instantly recognizable. 

Olivia/Rand immediately pales and is about to put up a fight and tell Marie that she’s mistaken, but then she realizes she made a silent promise to both herself and Alex that there would be no more lying and no more keeping secrets. 

“Wait, are you High Blade Curie? High Blade of here, of Midmerica?” the boy asks in a tone of excitement. Marie smiles at his excitement. 

“Yes dear, I am." she softly says. She then turns her gaze to Rand/Olivia, her smile faltering. “I think we better have a conversation, Miss Rand. Sophie you stay here, don’t go anywhere.” 

“You too Alex, don’t wander off you don’t know the place and might get lost.” Olivia warns her son, before reluctantly following Marie to a quiet section of the museum. 

The two teenagers look at eachother in confusion, not quiet sure what to say or what just happened. 

“So... what’s going on?” Sophie asks a few seconds later. Alex shrugs. 

“Beats me. Was that your mom, the High Blade?” Alex asks curiously. Sophie nods. 

“Yeah, was the other lady your mom?” Sophie asks. 

“Yep, though her name’s not actually Ayn Rand, it’s Olivia Kwon.” Alex tells her. 

“My mom’s not actually called Marie Curie either, well she has been for the last 200 odd years, but her birth name’s Susan, Susan Goldie. I’m Sophie by the way, Sophie Faraday-Curie.” Sophie explains, sticking her hand out for Alex to shake. He grins and grabs her hand. 

“I’m Alexander, Alexander Kwon, but you can call me Alex.” They shake hands. 

“Nice to meet you Alex.” Sophie grins. 

“Likewise. Hey, so your dad’s super famous too right? What’s his name again, Fara something?” Alex asks, racking his brain for the name of the High Blade’s husband. 

“Faraday, Scythe Michael Faraday. Yeah he’s pretty famous too, my whole family is. My Aunt- well she’s not technically my aunt, it’s honorary but you know what I mean- she’s Scythe Anastasia, and my other honorary aunt, my Aunt Munira, she used to work with my dad when he was trying to find the founding Scythe’s fail safe plan, when Goddard became High Blade.” Sophie hurriedly tells Alex, always eager to talk about her odd yet interesting family. 

“And you’re pretty famous yourself, must be cool.” Alex grins. Sophie shrugs, shoving her hands in her pockets. 

“It’s okay I guess, it gets annoying when I go out in public and everyone recognizes me and stares at me in the streets and stuff, I don’t even know how they recognize me when I’m not with my parents, those baby pictures mom and dad put out when I was born, they’re the only pictures of me that have ever been published, and I never went to public appearances with mom or anything, and during Conclave, when I was younger I would stay with my Aunt Munira all day.” Sophie’s tone turns from sullen and irritated to bright and joyful in just a matter of seconds, despite the annoying fame and always being recognized, Sophie has had a perfectly happy childhood. 

Alex nods understandingly. 

“Hey I know our moms told us not to go anywhere but do you want to go grab a coffee or something in the café in the lobby and then come back here?” Alex asks, finding himself wanting to talk to Sophie more, be around her more. Sophie’s face lights up. 

“Sure! Hey, wanna bet? I bet you I’ll get recognized at least 3 times on the way to and from the café, and in the café. If I do, you pay for the coffees, if I don’t, I pay.” Sophie suggests, giving Alex a sly smile and looking around to make sure her mom isn’t in hearing distance. 

Alex laughs, liking Sophie more and more by the minute. 

“You’re on!”

While Sophie and Alex are talking and sneaking off to the café, Olivia is facing her worst nightmare, standing here in front of High Blade Curie having been recognized right away, with Alex off on his own with some random girl. Olivia is glad that Alex just came out to her as gay, otherwise she would worry that Curie’s daughter would break his heart. 

“I think you’ve got some explaining to do.” Marie tells Olivia, her tone firm and not much different to the one she uses with Sophie when she knows she’s been up to something she shouldn’t have been. 

“I knew I should never have left Texas.” Olivia sighs. “Look Marie, it’s a long story. The short of it is that when I was pregnant with Alex I started bonding with him and loving him, I didn’t expect to but I did_” Before she can finish, Marie cuts her off. 

“Of course you loved and bonded with him, he is your child, a child you were going to just hand over to Goddard and let him turn him into a monster!” She berates, which grates on Olivia’s nerves. It takes everything she has not to snap at Marie, she knows nothing about her situation or why she agreed to be Goddard’s surrogate in the first place.

“Oh don’t act all high and mighty like you’ve never made mistakes! I thought I was in love with Goddard, I just wanted him to love me back and I thought by having his kid I could do that, I never gave much thought to how he would raise Alex, not at first anyway. 

Throughout my pregnancy though I did start to realize what a stupid and selfish decision I had made, by the time I was 8 months along I knew I couldn’t just hand Alex over to Goddard, so you know what I did, Marie? I gleaned the bastard and I told the Tonists to spread that lie about him being killed by unsavories.

 I gleaned him and used his body to revive Tyger, the man I gleaned a year prior to bring Goddard back. But before I did that I gave birth to my son, alone and frightened, you had your husband with you when you gave birth, I had no one and for the first month of his life it was just me and Alex, and the minute I held him after he was born I knew I had to change, had to get away and give him the best upbringing I could, so I cut my hair, stopped wearing my robes, took nothing but one old pair or robes so nobody could trace me using them, my ring, my son and I left for Texas.

And it was the best thing I have ever done, I turned my whole life around for Alex and I gave him a fucking amazing upbringing, he’s an absolutely amazing kid and I am so proud of him and so goddamn honored to his mom.

So there, Marie, there’s your explanation.”  

Despite Olivia’s angry rant, Marie remains totally calm and levelheaded, as always. 

“That is all well and good Ayn, but a Scythe cannot just up and abandon their position.” She calmly says. 

“Well what was I suppose to do Marie, huh? I was 8 months pregnant with the future High Blade of Midmerica, I had just killed the current High Blade of Midmerica and I was totally alone in the world.” Olivia’s tone is turning tight and she is doing her best to hold back tears. 

“You could have come to me and explained your situation, I would have helped you.” Marie softly says. 

“No because I didn’t want Alex involved in the Scythedom as he grew up, I wanted him to have a peaceful and normal childhood, I didn’t want any of Goddard’s followers to try and influence him or tell him about the bastard who was at the time, his father. 

You have to understand, you’re a mother too, don’t act like if you were in my situation, you wouldn’t have done the same for you daughter.” At the mention of Sophie, Marie’s face and demeanor soften. 

“You’re right, I would do anything for my Sophie, if I had to go off grid to give her the best life and to protect her, I would.

I won’t tell anyone you were here or that you’re living in Texas, and I won’t tell anyone about your son either, I promise.” Marie tells her, unable to stay angry at her because she knows how she feels, she would do anything to give Sophie her best shot at life, luckily, though Marie’s pregnancy was a surprise it was a very welcome one, and she Michael were in a good position to have a baby and raise Sophie, but not everyone is so fortunate. 

_______________________________________________________________

Over the next couple of weeks Sophie and Alex remain in touch via social media and often hang out together, soon growing very close and become the very best of friends. 

One day, a month after meeting for the first time, Alex insists on taking Sophie for lunch to celebrate her birthday, and Sophie is thrilled to spend the day with him. After lunch they just ramble around town, and end up sitting on the steps to the library, enjoying the good weather and each other’s company. 

“So what do you wanna do after school? What job do you want to do?” Alex asks Sophie, leaning back on his elbows and tilting his head backward to look up at his friend who is sitting on the step just behind him, where there’s more shade, since she is not a fan of the heat. Sophie sighs. 

“The whole world expects me to be a Scythe, I am the heir to the MidMeircan Scythedom. I’ll be expected to drop out of school soon and start my apprenticeship, neither of my parents are by law allowed to be my mentor, but my Aunt Anastasia said she’ll take me on, she was mentored by both my parents at one point, so there’ll be elements of mom and dad’s training in there. 

But... the thing is Al, I don’t think I want to be a Scythe, I’ve learned a lot about the Sycthedom and how it works and I know the best Scythes are the ones who never wanted the position in the first place, but I know I’m never going to morally be able to be a Scythe. 

He doesn’t know it but sometimes I see my dad come back from a gleaning and he just... he breaks down crying, and my mom sits there with him and holds his hand and assures him he’s a good person and she loves him, and I don’t look down on dad for that, not one bit, but the thing is he’s always able to remind himself that he is doing a necessary task and doing it in the kindest way possible. But I don’t think I could ever do that, I’m not like my mom or dad in that way, I... I’m too empathetic and I could never know a moment’s peace as a Scythe.” By the end of her explanation Sophie has tears in her eyes and her throat is closing up, this always happens when she thinks about her future. 

“Oh Soph, it’s okay.” Alex soothingly says, pushing himself up one step so he’s beside Sophie and pulling her in for a hug. “Can’t you tell your mom and dad all this? They seem like really nice people, I’m sure they’ll understand.” Sophie sniffs and lays her head on Alex’s shoulder. 

“I could, and they would understand, I know they won’t be angry or anything, they’ve never raised their voices at me in all my life, they’re awesome parents. But... I’m scared they’ll be disappointed and I’m scared of how the public and the rest of the Scythedom will react, I’m suppose to be the first person to ever inherit the title of High Blade, if I step down from that people are probably going to be really really pissed off with me, no one can glean me obviously, I automatically have immunity as the kid of two Scythes, but still... I don’t want to be called to Endura and have to face the Grandslayers or something.” She tells him in a wobbly tone.

“Hey if anyone tries to mess with you they’ll have me to deal with, you’re my best friend Soph, I got your back no matter what happens.” Alex firmly tells her, pulling back from the hug so he can look her in the eye. Sophie smiles through her tears and squeezes Alex’s hand. 

“Thanks Al, I love you.” 

“I love you too.”

“So.” Sophie begins, wiping her tears away. “What do you want to do after you leave school?” 

“Well up until now I always thought I’d be an artist, I’ve always planned on going to art school and I still do, but I... I kind of want to learn more about The Scythedom and my past, in detail, not just what mom can tell me.

 But... I’m scared that my interest in the Scythedom means I’m fucking evil like Goddard, he loved gleaning, he was a serial killer not a Scythe. I know there’s no biological connection between him and me, but.... I mean he was around mom practically all the time when she was pregnant. She said that he would talk to me when she was pregnant, but instead of telling me stories like normal dads would, he would talk about what a great Scythe and ruler I’d be someday and how I would make him so proud and uphold his legacy and other crazy shit. 

What if... what if that impacted little fetus me, and affected my subconscious and now I am going to be the crazy evil dictator he wanted me to be?” Now Alex has tears in his eyes too. 

“Oh Lex, no there’s no way you’re like Goddard. You’re the sweetest, kindest and most wonderful person I’ve ever met, you used your savings to buy me a really nice birthday present when you’ve only known me a month, you took me out for lunch for my birthday, and you always listen when I need to talk. And I know you value life and care about others, unlike Goddard. Alex you literally won’t even harm a fly, the other day you cried because we saw a little kid get upset because they fell and scrapped their knee. 

You could never be like Goddard, Alex, never.” By this stage Sophie has taken Alex’s face in her hands to make him laugh, but also to make him listen to her and not get distracted. She wants him to know all this, and realize what an absolutely amazing person he is.

Alex laughs through his tears and playfully slaps Sophie’s hands away. 

“Get off me you goof.” He laughs, wiping at his tears. Sophie grins and lightly shoves his shoulder. 

“You love me really.” 

“Yeah, yeah I do.”

________________________________________________________________

The next day, after thinking about her conversation with Alex, all night, Sophie comes to a decision and asks her parents to talk, so she can tell them about it.

 “You’re going to hate me for asking this but I need peace of mind before we get into this conversation so I have to ask, are you going to tell us you’re pregnant?” Michael asks Sophie, after they sit down, knowing this will embarrass her but needing to know.

Sophie wrinkles her nose up. 

“No dad! I’m asexual, remember?” Sophie says in an exasperated and embarrassed tone. She had come out to her parents just last week and they were extremely supportive, and acted like it was no big deal at all, for which Sophie is very grateful.

Michael holds his hands up in mock surrender. 

“Just checking, I’m too young to be a grandpa!” Sophie gives him a ‘Are you kidding me?’ look. 

“Dad you’re like 300.” She laughs. 

“230 something actually, do I look old enough to be 300?” He asks, raising his eyebrows and making Sophie roll her eyes, no one else would believe that the legendary Honorable Scythe Faraday is such a dad and makes stupid jokes and comments to mess with his daughter.

“Yeah I can see why Aunt Munira told me not to listen to your jokes.” Sophie replies. “Anyway, can I tell you what I wanted to now?” 

“Of course dear, go ahead.” Marie encourages her. Sophie takes a deep breath. 

“Okay, so... you know how we were talking about me training to be a Scythe, the other day, with Aunt Anastasia, and how I got all those offers from other Scythes, offering to train me?” Sophie begins. Both her parents nod. “Well I’ve been thinking about it ever since, and I talked about it with Alex and.... I don’t want to be a Scythe, I know the best Scythes are always the ones who never wanted to do it in the first place, but I won’t be able to live with myself if I become a Scythe, I won’t be able to deal with it like you guys and Aunt Anastasia. 

I would never be able to sleep at night if I gleaned someone, couldn’t look at myself in the mirror. My life would a misery if I did. 

So... that’s it, I don’t want to be a Scythe and I don’t want to be High Blade.” 

Before Sophie can even take a breath after finishing her explanation, her mother is by her side and pulling her into a tight embrace, kissing her forehead while her dad puts his arm around her shoulders and kisses the top of her head. 

“We love you and support you no matter what.” Marie firmly says, cupping Sophie’s face in her hands. 

“You never have to do anything you don’t want to Soph, never.” Michael tells her in a loving but firm tone, squeezing her arm reassuringly. Sophie can’t stop the tears from welling up and running down her cheeks. 

“Oh my love what’s wrong? Why are you crying?” Marie softly asks in a concerned tone, wiping at her daughter’s tears. 

“Because I’m scared.” Sophie says in a tight voice, feeling as though she’s 10 years old again and just woke up from a bad dream.

“Of what, did something happen, did someone hurt you?” Michael asks, his tone also full of concern and worry for his baby girl. 

“No, I’m scared the Scythedom and the public are gonna hate me for not becoming a Scythe and inheriting the title of High Blade like I’m suppose to. All my life I’ve known that the public and The Scythedom have this huge expectation of me to become High Blade, to become an amazing Scythe like you guys, but I can’t do that and now I’m scared everyone’s going to hate me, or that the Grandslayers are going to call me to Endura and punish me somehow.” Sophie sobs, the tears falling rapidly now.

“Oh my baby.” Marie swears she can feel her own heart breaking, as she pulls her daughter in for another hug. 

“Sophie we will never, ever let anything happen to you. Nowhere in the rules does it say that you have to become a Scythe and take over from your mom when she steps down as High Blade, that rule means that if you choose to become a Scythe, you will automatically inherit your mother’s position, but if you choose not to become a Scythe then another election will be held and someone else will be elected. 

The Grandslayers cannot and will not punish you, and if anyone tries to hurt you or say anything nasty to you because of this decision, then they’ll have your mother and I to deal with. We are not going to let anyone hurt you or force you to do something you don’t want to. 

This is entirely your choice and we support you all the way, we love you so much Sophie, and we will do absolutely anything to protect you.” 

Her father’s kind and reassuring words just make Sophie sob even harder and bury her face in his shoulder, when he puts his arm around her in an embrace. 

“I love you so much.” Sophie quietly says. Michael kisses the top of her head and rubs her back soothingly. 

“I love you too Sophie, more than anything in this world. You and your mother are the very best things to ever happen to me.” 

“Here.” Marie softly says, holding a tissue out to Sophie, as she lifts her face from her dad’s shoulder and leans her head against his chest. “Have a good cry if you want to sweetheart, don’t bottle it up.” Sophie nods and wipes at her eyes. 

“Thanks mom, I love you.” She sniffles. Marie smiles and kisses her cheek. 

“I love you too my sweet girl.”

After about another half hour, Sophie calms down but has totally drained herself from crying so much, so decides to go rest in her room for a while. Once upstairs she texts Alex almost immediately and tells him what just happened and how her parents are going to help her make an official statement to the Grandslayers that she will not be training as a Scythe and will not be accepting her inheritance of position of High Blade of Midmerica.

“Glad your parents were supportive, I knew they would be, you’re gonna be awesome at whatever job you pick, I know it.

I told mom my news too, about wanting to stay here in Midmerica for longer, and learn more about the inner workings of the Scythedom and the life I could’ve ended up with, had mom not gleaned Goddard and gone off grid with me. She was conflicted at first, she doesn’t trust the Scythedom and is afraid Goddard’s supporters will try to influence me but I reminded her that I’m old enough to not be so easily swayed, and I’ve got lots of good examples of Scythes too. So she agreed. I dunno exactly how I’m gonna learn more about the inner workings of the Scythedom, but I’ll figure something out.” 

After reading Alex’s text, Sophie is struct with an idea, one that she frankly finds ingenious. 

“I have an idea, a really good one. Come round to my house tomorrow at around 11.” Sophie replies. Then remembering she hasn’t told Alex her plan, she excitedly sends him a voice note, detailing her idea, and spends the next five minutes staring at her phone waiting for Alex to text back. 

“Sounds like a plan, see you tomorrow.” 

The next day it has just gone 11 A.M. and Michael and Marie are just back from grocery shopping, when Sophie appears in the kitchen doorway, grinning proudly to herself and looking like she’s up to something. 

“What did you do?” Michael asks in a suspicious tone, looking around for any sign of something amiss. 

“Nothing, can’t I just come say hi to my parents?” Sophie asks, still grinning ear to ear. 

“You can but you’re usually not this enthusiastic at this time of the day, if you didn’t do anything, you want a big favor don’t you?” Michael asks, knowing his daughter perfectly. 

“Maaayybbee.” Sophie admits. 

“If the favor is letting you skip school tomorrow the answer is no.” Marie tells her. Sophie rolls her eyes. 

“I asked once, once! Let it go mom!” She protests. 

“What is it then?” Michael asks, still suspicious of what Sophie is up to. Her smile brightens and she turns around and reaches out into the living room, before two seconds later pulling Alexander Kwon into the kitchen with her. Marie and Michael aren’t surprised to see him in their house, he’s Sophie’s best friend and comes around all the time, but what they don’t understand is what he’s got to do with Sophie wanting a favor. 

“Okay now I’m confused, what has Alex got to do with this?” Marie asks, wondering just what the hell her daughter is up to. 

“I have a proposal.” Sophie tells them, earning odd looks from both her parents. 

“Okay.... which is?” Michael asks. 

“Alex really wants to learn more about the inner workings of the Scythedom, he’s interested in how it all works and what it would have been like for him if things didn’t turn out the way they did. .

So I was thinking that maybe you guys could teach Alex everything there is to know about The Scythedom, like you taught me? It could be like an apprenticeship except he won’t go to Conclave and there’s no chance of him being ordained at the end of it all, oh and obviously no physical training or tests or anything. 

So what do you say?” Sophie explains, now having wrapped her arms around Alex’s waist, leaning against his chest, hugging him tightly.

Marie and Michael share a look. They can clearly see how much Sophie adores Alex, and they can’t deny she’s been so much happier since she met him and they became best friends, it’s so good for her to have someone who wants to be her friend and likes her just for her, and not her fame and status. 

It’s clear Alex is like the brother Sophie always wanted and asked for but never had. Marie and Michael do feel a bit guilty about not giving her a sibling, they would have loved to have another baby and even discussed it when Sophie was 1, but decided that ultimately they were far too busy and their family felt absolutely perfect with just the 3 of them.

Marie is the first to speak. 

“You really know how to argue your case Sophie, there’s no way I can say no.” Sophie and Alex’s faces both light up. 

“Thank you so much, Your Excellency, I promise I’ll be the best student you could ask for!” Alex exclaims. 

“Marie’s right, you’re a hell of a speaker Sophie, just like your mom. If it’s alright with your mother, Alex, then we’d be happy to teach you.” Michael calmly says. Sophie and Alex share an excited look and share a quick high-five. 

“Thank you, your Honor, thank you so much I swear you won’t regret this!” Alex promises. 

“Come on, lets go make sure it’s okay with your mom.” Sophie says. tugging at Alex’s hand. He nods, but turns to Marie and Michael before he goes. 

“Thank you again, so very much, it’s going to be an honor to learn from you both.” He says, then tentatively holds his hand out for one of them to shake. 

“Oh don’t be so formal Alex.” Marie says, lightly swatting his hand away and pulling him in for a hug instead. “Call me Marie.” She insists. Alex smiles and nods, a little shocked at what just happened. 

He then turns to Michael, and goes to hold his hand out for him to shake, thinking he may be a little more formal. Michael just laughs and shakes his head before also pulling Alex into an embrace. 

“Welcome to the family, son.”

Special thanks to @i-love-side-characters for allowing me to use their idea of Sophie and Alex becoming best friends! I had so much fun writing about their friendship! 

[201901499]

The Kevin Bacon of The Philippines

The Kevin Bacon of The Philippines:

Six Degrees of Separation of Lilia Cuntapay

By

Juan Marcos IV F. Arellano

Introduction

   Six Degrees of Separation of Lilia Cuntapay is an independent mockumentary film starring the titular character, Lilia Cuntapay. The film is written and directed by Antoinette H. Jadaone, produced by Ronald Arguelles, and distributed by Cinema One Originals. Released during the Cinema One Originals Film Festival on November 11, 2011 followed by its general release at the Philippines on October 31, 2012.

The documentary follows Lilia Cuntapay, an actress who is primarily known for her horror movie roles in films such as the Shake, Rattle & Roll series and has been working as a movie extra for decades. The film’s story focuses on who Lilia is and what current events take place after being nominated for Best Supporting Actress.

Six Degrees of Separation of Lilia Cuntapay won 6 awards during the 2011 Cinema One Originals Digital Film Festival which also landed a Best Actress award for Lilia Cuntapay.

Body

Perceived Meanings

1.Referential

In the Philippines, an elderly actress, Lilia Cuntapay, with no formal background and her age, stands as an obstacle for her to gain the recognition and opportunity she yearns for to make a name for herself in the film industry. As an elderly actress in the Philippines setting, her roles primarily involve horror characters due to her appearance and random extras in films that are fitting for her appearance.

2. Explicit

A passionate elderly actress known as Lilia Cuntapay who has been struggling to break-through her associated norm as a horror movie character and movie extra finally achieves her dream of becoming a recognized and respected actress after 30 years in the film industry.

3. Implicit

An elderly woman, whose career as an actress spans more than 30 years, continues to pursue her goal of becoming a recognized and respected actress in the film industry despite her age. Eventually reaching her goal and is respected and recognized amongst the industry.

4. Symptomatic

In a film industry where actors and actresses are young, passionate, and hungry for success; must tackle any role of any means, no matter how big or small the role may be. An industry where you have to let go of some of your dreams of being in a larger picture and lose your expectations just to make ends meet, to make a name for yourself, and to ensure your next role.

Film Criteria

1. Realistic

The documentary, Six Degrees of Separation of Lilia Cuntapay, is a bitter-sweet story of her journey through the Philippine Film Industry. It shows the struggle actors and actresses face on a daily basis if they don’t have any jobs at the moment and how small and unrewarding their performance could be if there was no impact within the industry. Despite this, however, Cuntapay shows resilience and passion in her line of work and her craft, so much she’s been doing this for 30 years and continues to work with what she loves doing in order to reach her goals.

2.  Moral

The documentary film showcases several moral values and lessons that we all can learn a thing or two about. Lilia Cuntapay shows numerous examples of these and as a creative member of the arts and design field I feel like I can follow her example.

A. Passion

- Lilia Cuntapay shows us that with passion in our craft, our jobs don’t really seem like jobs at all, it’ll feel like a beneficial hobby because we just end up doing something we love doing. Having passion will let you continue what you do for years ultimately rewarding you in some way just as long as you love what you do.

B. Dedication

- For 30 years, Lilia Cuntapay has been acting in roles that aren’t necessarily big picture roles, her roles are usually horror movie roles and being an extra. However, it’s with her dedication that kept her working as an actress eventually leading her to a documentary such as Six Degrees of Separation of Lilia Cuntapay, winning a Best Actress award, securing more roles and ultimately being a recognized and respected actress in the field. Having dedication teaches us never to stop whenever an obstacle is in our way, we work around it and continue on. No matter how the going gets tough, so long as we don’t stop, we can do anything.

C. Confidence

- Confidence is the support you need that keeps all other morals and values up. Without confidence how can you expect to drive yourself towards your goals and ambitions? Lilia Cuntapay shows us how confident she is in winning that Best Supporting Actress award, though she did not win, but she tried her hardest and became the best possible actress she could be. Confidence helps you exert your effort and by doing so, you can accomplish things towards better results. As a creative, I often try to give myself the confidence boost I need to carry out what I have to do and all my other virtues start kicking in, giving me all the support I need.

D. Patience

- Opportunities do not come often, and certainly they do not come after one another. That is the sad truth. No matter how hungry we are for opportunities, some aren’t just given, we don’t have to chase certain awards either just to be labeled as a successful individual in your field of expertise. Lilia Cuntapay shows us this by waiting for career defining opportunities instead of chasing everywhere for an award. There’s no need to feel bad when we don’t have award winning opportunities or career defining work, just keep doing what you love and have the patience to build yourself up to your goals.

E. Generosity

- In the film, we see the Barangay Chairman tell the director “every chance she (Cuntapay) has, she will help in any way she can.” Generosity comes a long way, being there to help the ones who were with you when you had nothing from the start is a fantastic feeling. The community around her were even the ones who supported her throughout her acting journey, all because as passionate as she was with acting, she was as passionate to help out her community.

F. Humility

- Lilia Cuntapay shows us that even though she starred in all this films, eventually winning multiple awards, she still stayed true to who she was and stayed true to those around her. She never let it get on to her head that she was an award winning actress, she stayed as wholesome as she was, and that’s how others should act as well, never forget your roots and stay true to yourself.

3. Coherence

The film adds scenes where Cuntapay has a speech on a stage designed differently depending on the current event taking place. She is also seen wearing various outfits, and her speech would be about what has happened or what will happen, whether it was good or bad. At first I found it odd but when we start seeing more of these scenes throughout the film you might get the point that this could be just a part of her imagination. In the film she mentions having to prepare a speech and she asks for help preparing it, I assume the scenes on that stage are just a part of her imagination, preparing for her final speech when she accepts her reward. Sometimes she conveys her raw emotion in this imaginary stage rather than conveying them fully in person. Scenes where she thanks the lord, and her supporters or how sad and neglected she felt when the television did not include her interview. I feel as if she was being true to herself there, and at the beginning it may have seemed confusing but at the end you just get the gist of what’s happening and it all comes together by the end.

4. Complexity

The film begins with the question “Do you know Lilia Cuntapay?” I did not, I immediately thought she was an artist who painted, eventually we were introduced to who she was. Lilia Cuntapay is an actress, one who was primarily a horror movie actress and an extra. At this point I was intrigued as to what was going on, and as I watched the documentary you can’t help but feel so supportive of this sweet, passionate and cheerful elderly woman, and it’s so fun seeing her talk about her stories and having to see a community backing her, until of course it gets sad, and you can’t help but feel sad with her. The film gives you a bittersweet feeling of things and it makes you think about what the symbolic meanings were when the scenes of her coming up the stage meant, you couldn’t really understand much of it until you dwell deeper into the film which was great because you want to hear more of her story and how it ends. In the end, as a mockumentary, the film will exaggerate some parts of the story, while delivering what happened and what will happen as it records the current events taking place, so there isn’t much complexity as there is, personally I don’t see why because it’s a documentary film, so it’s perfectly fine as it is.

5. Originality

A mockumentary is a documentary film that spices things up, and yes it includes a different perspective into things with the scenes of Lilia Cuntapay’s speeches throughout the film. It's a topic following an elderly actress in the current industry is a topic followed by other documentaries however it is enjoyable seeing how her acting journey played out. Following an actress from horror movies seen by hundreds of thousands of people without actually knowing her name is actually interesting because you would be curious how it is like, and seeing the film industry from her perspective, especially seeing what she went through really opens your eyes to how hard things actually are.

Conclusion

Six Degrees of Separation of Lilia Cuntapay is a bittersweet indie mockumentary film that follows the acting journey of Lilia Cuntapay. Cuntapay delivers a fantastic performance that will have you cheer her on and be happy for her endeavors, however this film will also leave you sad for the harsh relatives of the film industry. I’m glad that I was able to watch this film for it actually became one of my favorite Filipino documentaries if not one of my favorite documentaries of all time. In conclusion, I can guarantee she might just be the sweetest ghost nanny the Philippines ever had. In the end, I’m finally glad I’ll be able to answer the question right at the beginning of this film; Lilia Cuntapay is a Filipina actress who never failed to strive for greatness, she is the center of our Philippine Hollywood, she is the Kevin Bacon of the Philippines, and she is an award winning actress. A solid 10/10 film with a perfect delivery from our titular character.

[no-ill-wind]

Top 10 Tracks of 2018

After the announcement of Grammy nominees, I sat down to sort out my ten favorite new tracks of 2018. Last year saw major releases from my top three favorite acts and releases by a few more groups that would become new favorites. This year did not pack that same punch but thus allowed me to branch out further and latch onto some other artists I might not have explored as much. As usual, I’m only sharing one track per artist. 

10. Best Part - Daniel Caeser feat. H.E.R. A favorite in pop circles in 2018 that also offers some of the most distinctive and delectable harmonies of the year. These two collaborators come together so genuinely that they sound like they’ve been one act all along as they sing, “You're the coffee that I need in the morning // You're my sunshine in the rain when it's pouring.” What a beautiful sentiment. From dancing to this song with my partner to hearing my guitar students eager to learn it in class, this song has followed me through the semester and I am glad for it.

The list continues below with Gorillaz, Childish Gambino, and more.

9. Black Eyes - Bradley Cooper While not the banner song of the crowd- and critic-favorite film A Star is Born, “Black Eyes” is no less impactful, being the electrifying opener to the 2018 film. It strikes you with the one-two punch of, “Wow, can Bradley Cooper sing!” and “I can’t wait to see what else this film has in store!” It’s a moment of true musical cinema. Cooper and Co. leverage the power of music in incredible ways from start to finish, and as a result this introductory song stayed with me long after leaving the theater.

8. Suspirium - Thom Yorke Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke followed in the footsteps of his counterpart, Jonny Greenwood, in pursuing film score this year. While Greenwood has already enjoyed an Oscar nomination for his soundtracks, Yorke is just now applying his electronic and ethereal musical sensibilities to the world of film music. Despite the appropriately eerie and desolate electronica that accompanies most of this year’s Suspiria remake, the title (ish) song that also served as the soundtrack’s lead single is a bare but entrancing piano waltz. “Suspirium” thus captured my imagination immediately, as I knew it would as the latest brain child from the brain behind my favorite band. Everything that I love about Radiohead is here.

7. This Is America - Childish Gambino Donald Glover proves himself to be one of my favorite working artists with everything that he does. The mere fact that he does everything is inspiration enough. For years he was one of my favorite actors and comedians. Then in 2016 he surprised even die-hard fans with what unarguably became the best song of the year with “Redbone.” “This Is America” deserved all of the attention it got. A pastiche of musical styles and a barrage of complicated images, the video which introduced this song to the world is as complex as they come. The music is visceral, perhaps the most significant factor that divides casual media with serious and meaningful art. The answer to “How could he top ‘Redbone?’” is this. 

6. Magic City - Gorillaz Everything about this album is a reaction to 2017′s Humanz, from it’s length to it’s relative though glaring lack of featured artists. As someone who cherished Humanz as the first release from the band I experienced as a converted fan, I struggled to really get into The Now Now at first. I am all about it now, but from the beginning the track that I felt perhaps the most affection for was “Magic City.” With surreal imagery and sincere emotion operating side-by-side, this track works as the heart at the center of this chill and synthetic album. It plays in my head constantly.

5. 100 Years - Florence + the Machine Though The Guardian deemed this track a “misfire” in their tempered review, I knew from first listen that it would become my favorite from the album. Though I agree with some of the reviews that High as Hope marks perhaps F+TM’s most tepid album thus far (don’t get me wrong, it is still remarkable), I disagree here and knowingly go against the grain of criticism in declaring “100 Years” the best song on the album. What the album suffers from is a low-rumbling sense of self-parody, as if this album was someone else’s attempt to create “Florence” with a capital F. Here on this rousing track, Florence and her machine rise above their own formula to bellow out the most fresh, bold, and sincere thrill since How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful.

4. Movement - Hozier Hozier’s next big hit, though arriving late in the year, was instantly captivating. Perhaps it was the bewitching switch from minor to major as the music flows from verse to chorus. Perhaps it was the hypnotic grace of dancer Sergei Polunin. “Movement” boldly announced itself as a worthy successor to Hozier’s breakout “Take Me to Church,” perhaps its superior. In suitable fashion, Hozier reasserts himself as beloved purveyor of graceful, harmonious indie rock. 

3. Make Me Feel - Janelle Monae  This might be Monae’s year, as she wields the potent weapon of her third studio album, Dirty Computer. She sets her sights on the hearts of critics and audiences alike with music that is both intensely addictive and socially advocative. The song feels like the moment just before bubblegum pops, like the euphoria of feeling so in love that you can feel it in your stomach. It’s the song that has come to define “bisexual lighting” while also being one of those songs that you can put on repeat and never lose the way it makes you feel. I am afraid that Dirty Computer is too interesting to walk away with the Album of the Year award it has been nominated for - the Grammys prove time and time again to be bound by the gravity of what is simple and what is everywhere - but Monae certainly deserves the accolade if the Recording Academy can muster the courage. 

2. Please Don’t Die - Father John Misty God’s Favorite Customer was Father John Misty’s The Now Now. It is an about-face from an album released the previous year that many people deemed too big or too full, focusing less on the outside world and turning inward to the artist himself. Unlike Damon Albarn, however, Father John Misty stayed jarring rather than go languid. The fifth track from his fourth album is jarring before you even hit play with such an abrasive and forthright title. What follows is a heartfelt and concerning look at his own self-destructive habits from the outside, specifically from the point of view of his concerned wife. She shows up in the music video as the angelic hero he has always painted her to be, but the daring falsetto that strains above the plodding undercurrent of the devil’s sleigh bells intimates the fear that it might be too late to be saved. It is a potent song that wakes the album up from the ennui of formula. While the album is angsty through and through, it sounds at times like someone else was paid to write a Father John Misty album based on the model of his first three albums, in much the same way that Florence’s new album does. “Please Don’t Die” thus plays the role of wake-up call in more ways than one, and from the first listen claims the title of enduring favorite that will, ironically, outlive the rest of this album. 

1. Beyond - Leon Bridges By perfecting a throwback sound that you can’t help but look forward to, Leon Bridges has crafted what is easily this year’s most charming music. The Fort Worth darling has proven himself more than just “interested” in recreating the sounds of decades past, but damn good at it. If we opened the yearbook of this year’s musicians to look at the Superlatives, Bridges would be “Best to Bring Home to Mom and Dad.” It all seems genuine though. It’s more than just a novelty act, summoning the Ghosts of Soul Music Past. The whole album delivers the power of soul straight to present audiences like he’s a man dancing by a jukebox in a diner in the past who is so in love that his song can be heard not just across space but across time. As catchy and endearing as it is well-constructed, “Beyond” is wholesome music that feels like butterflies, probably best summed up by the wonder-struck fadeout, “O me o my I can’t explain, she might just be my everything.”

[davewakeman]

Talking Tickets 24 April 2020--Leadership! NCAA! MJ! And, More!

Hey There! 

Thanks for being here again this week. I know we are all dealing with challenging circumstances and I’m glad that I can be part of providing you some ideas to help move forward!

If you are enjoying this newsletter, tell your friends and colleagues to sign up by visiting this link.

Right now, to maintain my sanity, I’m working on a new ebook with my friends at Booking Protect that builds off of our previous one about what matters in tickets. This time we are focusing on helping businesses in sports, theatre, concerts, and entertainment gain ideas to recover from the coronavirus.

If you are interested in sharing ideas or want to hear from particular folks, reply to this email.

And, don’t forget happy hour this evening hosted by me and Ken Troupe at 5 PM EDT. Ken will drink some amazing beer and I will drink some whiskey. You can drink whatever you want or nothing at all. But come hang out and chat with some really smart ticketing and sports business folks, and me too!

To the tickets!

————————————————————————————————————

1. The business of college athletics and big college sports is exposed and vulnerable right now:

This story from the Washington Post is interesting because it draws a clearer picture of where the NCAA’s head has been at the last few years and how easy it is to take actions that are good in the short term, but not in the long term.

I had my friend, Tammi Gaw, on my podcast a few months back to talk about image rights for student-athletes and the heart of the NCAA’s justification for doling out the money they had in reserve in case a tournament was canceled is athletes not wanting to play because they feel like they should be reaping some of the benefits of these big contracts.

Some of the reasoning here is a little flimsy at best…like just because the organization had a bunch of money in reserve, this made lawyers more attracted to the NCAA and filing suits against them being the gist of most of this.

I know many lawyers and I’m guessing they were drawn to the billions a year in revenue as much as the reserve fund.

But I imagine that the NCAA’s business practices are going to be under the limelight for the next several months as we work to reopen the country. Right now 75% of ADs think we are going to see a delay in the college football season. This seems like a reasonable assessment of the current situation, especially if you pay attention to the challenges other countries are facing reopening their economies and everyday lives and there are options possible to make football season still happen.

My lady shared this article from the Sunday paper with me and said that it mirrors what a number of Fortune 500 firms have mentioned as a possible scenario.

The NCAA is an interesting example as we go forward for a number of reasons that we should all be paying attention to, but I’ll stick with 3 today:

1. These are college kids, not professionals and if you aren’t paying these kids, how are you going to ask them to risk infection for college athletics. 2. Knowing the above is true, this likely heightens the tension over name and image rights. 3. Colleges were facing attendance struggles already, what will be the long-term impact of the coronavirus fallout? 

2. No matter what comes next, we are all going to pitch in and work together: 

Over the last month or so, we have all seen the stories about challenges to the industry and actions that folks are taking to survive or deal with the crisis like furloughs, offering coupons with added value to protect cash flow, creating groups to connect with each other, and much more.

I like Don’s message in the link above because I think recovery and relaunching from the pandemic and the fall out of having so many events postponed, canceled, or held without fans in the seats isn’t going to be some quick fix and it isn’t going to be a situation where you can just go back to business as usual.

That’s why it is important that folks all come together to figure out what they want the business to look like in the future, how folks will add value in the context of the entertainment business, and how to drive demand and revenue while being customer-focused.

Right now, you should be engaging with the stuff that Pollstar is doing, the stuff INTIX is doing, the stuff the ALSD is doing, and on and on it goes. Or, if you are so inclined and you have some new ideas or concepts you want to explore and you don’t know where they fit, create your own group or network. That’s what I did with my webinars, Slack channel, and this newsletter.

Go search out the positive, no matter what!

On this topic, I got an email earlier this week, and the person emailing talked about “the uncertainty”. To be fair, the follow up to the talk of uncertainty was that they were going to do something anyway.

This is my challenge to you, I don’t ask a lot of you but I challenge you to find one proactive action or idea that is outside of just treading water to take each day. If you’ve already been doing that, awesome!

I want everyone to be moving forward, even a little bit right now so that when things do start to come back to life, you are all already making forward progress.

Need help? Reply to this email and I will help you brainstorm an idea or two.

3. We are all still up in the air about what comes next for live events:

I love it when folks take examples from different industries and situations and apply them to new situations or different industries.

I’ve been calling for that kind of thinking in the world of selling sports tickets here in the States for years.

I don’t know that I’ve watched Margin Call, but I might now. I watched Harley Quinn the other night, no movie can be worse than that.

Tim brings up some really good points.

We definitely have had our eyes opened to some pretty fundamental flaws in the business models of concerts, festivals, sports, theatre, and other live experiences.

A few years back, I wrote a piece about the 10 biggest challenges facing the performing arts. It always amazes me that it has been the most widely read piece on my blog each month since I wrote it and it isn’t even close.

In reading Tim’s piece and thinking about putting together this week’s newsletter, I revisited the post to see if anything was missing or outdated. Strangely, there are no references to the coronavirus but it could be a good roadmap for us to think up ideas on how we all lead the recovery of the live event industry.

Tim has a quote in the piece that talks about how the entertainment business is in the most perilous position in America. I’d say the world right now, but, okay, America.

What this means is that we have to really focus on the 3 phases that we are going to go through:

* Phase 1: Now until we get out of lockdown and some events like sports are able to proceed with no crowds. (Short term) * Phase 2: From the start of “made for TV” events until we start opening events up to folks again with, I think, substantial social distancing in the near term. * Phase 3: When we can get back to the ability to throw events with big crowds.

Each of these phases will require thoughtfulness around storytelling, strategy, marketing, community building, and selling.

Some of the concepts that were secondary or weren’t getting the proper attention or weren’t being innovated enough are likely to be more important now like community building, marketing, and storytelling. Because we are going to need to pull folks closer to us and keep people engaged in our artists, teams, and performances in ways that we haven’t had to previously.

This is also going to mean that many of us are going to have to innovate our revenue strategies.

As I find myself repeating constantly, pay attention to other locations and industries to see how they are handling this and what they are doing.

We are already seeing many performing arts organizations innovating around delivering art through virtual performances. Sports organizations outside of the US have done a much better job of keeping a community feeling about them and giving fans a way to be a part of their team and spend money no matter where in the world they are: hello Tottenham Hotspur and Melbourne FC!

And, there’s a great book about marketing called Everything I Know About Business I Learned From The Grateful Dead. 

Or, you could look at the fan club model of someone like Pearl Jam. (Granted, maybe I will write the fan fiction version of the above book and write it about all the business lessons I’ve learned from Pearl Jam.)

The reality is people will come back. It isn’t a matter of if, only when. People have gathered since the dawn of man! So don’t listen to the folks telling you folks will never come back, they are wrong.

That doesn’t mean you can take their attention for granted though.

4. Michael Jordan can still draw eyeballs:

I watched the first two parts, I loved it. I tried to buy the special release of the Jordans, I missed them.

I love MJ.

He was one of my three favorite athletes coming up:

Michael Marino John Smoltz

6.1 million folks tuned in to watch on Sunday night as well. It was the most-watched documentary in ESPN’s history.

But I think the number deserves a little context to illustrate the environment live entertainment exists in and I think the numbers of this documentary likely help illustrate this point better than ever.

The average viewership of a show I’ve only heard of in passing, God Friended Me, averages 6.2 million viewers.

With a pandemic going on, all the buzz from folks saying they’d kill for any kind of sports content, and the season finale of The Walking Dead being postponed due to the coronavirus…I’d have guessed that the viewer numbers would have been much higher.

Just as we’ve been thinking about events coming back and when fans will be back in the door, we have to recognize that we are not our market. And that everything we think people are thinking about and paying attention to the exact same things we are and that isn’t true.

I wish I had bookmarked the tweet that said something along the lines that “this MJ documentary is going to challenge the Super Bowl”.

3  points here:

1. Don’t make assumptions based on your own preferences. This will be more important going forward because I’m sure that most folks are going to be a little less certain about the safety and the security of going to an event than any of us might be, especially at first.

2. The market for folk’s attention is crowded and even during a pandemic, the most famous athlete of all time signing off on one of the most highly anticipated documentaries ever, could not even outdraw a bad CBS sitcom. Though the Global Citizen concert did better with over 20 million folks watching. This just means we have to reinforce our thinking around the entire competitive landscape we are dealing with when we offer our events and we ask people to come to spend time with us.

3. I’m entirely read to eat my shoe depending on the numbers from the NFL draft last night.

Also, maybe I should write a sitcom!

5. The CoronaVirus is putting leadership on display, good or bad: 

I feel like the NHL and Gary Bettman have handled the coronavirus crisis pretty well. They’ve been clear in their communication, open with their plans, and thoughtful in the way that they’ve taken all of their stakeholder’s concerns into their decision making.

In Australia, Rugby Australia’s first female CEO stepped down this week due to losing the confidence of the board. The interesting thing here is that the organization has had a fair share of scandal and poor performance over the last decade or so, leading a few stories I saw to ask the question: “Do women executives have to meet a higher standard?”

Endeavor is cutting staff and pay during the coronavirus and this shouldn’t be surprising. When they had to cut their IPO, we got a look at the books and they weren’t pretty.

I could go on and on because I feel like leadership has been on display, good and bad throughout this crisis. And, we continue to see people step up like the Padres, who are committing to pay their staff through October.

I’ll leave you with this…leadership matters. My monthly column for the Project Management Institute that comes out next week is about leadership and I think again we are seeing the value of leaders.

We are also seeing how much damage bad leaders can do as well…but that’s a story for a different day!

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What am I up to this week?

I’m home!

I’m having some technical issues around losing power due to falling trees in my neighborhood and that caused my cable and internet box to blow. So until 30 April, I’m definitely on limited internet access because Verizon is not allowing their service technicians into homes.

So no webinars this week.

I’m writing and blogging though and I’ll keep posting old webinars to the podcast stream when I have the signal to do so.

I’ve got a new white paper with 101 strategic questions for relaunching your business coming your way in the next few days as well.

Want to chat or discuss an idea, let me know. I can totally talk on the phone. 

Please follow and like us:

Talking Tickets 24 April 2020–Leadership! NCAA! MJ! And, More! was originally published on Wakeman Consulting Group

[oovitus]

Weekend Reading, 2.18.18

The first time self-soothing was explained to me, it was by a friend who had her hands full taking care of a new baby. Self-soothing, she said, is when a baby develops the capacity to calm his or herself down. It’s seen as being key to uninterrupted nights of sleep for parents, since it allows babies to get back to rest if they should happen to wake up during the night.

A little while later, when I was exploring resources on coping with depression and anxiety, I learned that there’s such a thing as adult self-soothing, too. It may be an especially important skill to develop if you identify as a sensitive person or you feel the impact of emotions very strongly.

Self-soothing practices can take all sorts of shapes and forms; they may take one out of time and place, like going for a walk or practicing yoga in a special part of the home, or they might be as simple as listening to a particular song, sipping tea, breathing deeply, praying, singing, humming, reading poetry out loud, or smelling an essential oil. These, anyway, are my own favorite ways to self-soothe.

Two years ago at this time, my anxiety was so bad that I often didn’t want to leave the house. I did leave, going about my business and trying to perform as much competence as I could muster, but I felt as if I was falling apart. I was so on edge, so irritable, and so unable to hang onto a sense of safety or security. It really scared me, much more than my depression ever had.

Many months of therapy later, and I’m in a different place. But this week in particular gave me new skills to be grateful for. A few situations came up that triggered my anxiety, and I reacted, but I was able to stay connected to a fundamental sense that things would be OK. I’m not exactly sure what to attribute this to: my meditation practice? Learning to pay attention to my breath? Slowing down? Learning to say “no”? Reconnecting?

The answer is that all of these things, coupled with time and patience, have helped. I’m also starting to understand that quelling anxiety creates muscle memory; if you do it often enough, you start to believe, consciously and unconsciously, that it’s possible, and then it starts to happen more readily.

I know that I may manage my anxiety for a long time and possibly live with it always, just as I know I’ll always have brushes with depression and may always periodically encounter certain ED-related urges. In writing these words today, though, I realize how surprisingly calm I feel about my anxiety, which is sweetly ironic.

For the first time in a long time, I’m not alarmed by the fact that I have anxiety, not scared of it. I’ve been given signs that I have some of the tools I need to manage it. Maybe I’ll need to expand or change up my toolkit at some point, but that’s OK: toolkits can grow along with us. For now, merely knowing that I can get centered even in the midst of anxious feelings or thoughts is a major shift, one that gives me hope and a sense of spaciousness.

As always, wishing everyone peace and grounding as we head out into a fresh week. Enjoy these tasty recipes and reading links.

Recipes

There’s a mushroom miso barley soup recipe in Power Plates that I’ve become pretty attached to, but I can never get enough soup recipes, and I’m loving Natasha’s version, which is infused with Italian herbs and seasonings.

Wish someone had made these sweet buckwheat crepes for me on Valentine’s Day! Or that I’d gone ahead and made them for myself

This is my kind of potato salad: roasted potatoes, dill, vegan bacon, creamy garlic mayo. Perfect vegan comfort food.

Writing about Hannah’s book on Friday has me thinking about the art of creating really good food in very little time. It’s something I’m still figuring out. Lisa is one of the people I turn to for inspiration in this area, and her easy green curry noodles are a perfect example of a super speedy, flavorful, filling meal.

I tend to have lousy luck when I’m baking exclusively with grain free flours (I do OK when they’re part of a blend that has some wheat flour or gluten free grain flours in it). I’m always impressed with the way that Lindsay works wonders with grain-free baking that’s also vegan-friendly, and I’m dying to try her easy vegan white cake.

Reads

1. In spite of spending a fair amount of time around doctors—and anticipating a year of clinical work on the horizon—I had never really given much thought to what it must be like for doctors to return to full time work after being treated for an illness, especially the illness that they themselves specialize in.

That’s exactly the process that breast cancer surgeon Liz O’Riordon finds herself in now. I was touched by The Atlantic‘s profile of her, in which she admits to having new emotional challenges on the job, including sensitivities to hear certain diagnoses spoken of in dire terms and heightened awareness when delivering news to patients. The article says,

She [Liz] also takes more care with her language, and cringes at the memory of comments that were meant to be encouraging but now seem glib and unsympathetic. “I used to say: You’re lucky it hasn’t spread. No one is lucky to have cancer,” she says. “I used to ask people: Are you happy to sign this consent form? No one is happy to have cancer. As a doctor, you may give bad news 10 times a day. Until you’ve been on the other side, you don’t realize that when you get bad news, you remember every single detail of that conversation.”

There’s a lot of pressure for doctors and medical personnel to remain transparent, cool, and objective at all times, but my own limited experience in a helping profession is that personal struggle often gives way to empathy that can enhance one’s capacities as a practitioner. I hope that O’Riordan can indeed follow through on her hope to speak out more openly about her illness and encourage other doctors to do so with her.

2. Also on the topic of medicine and healthcare, a physician examines the concept of agape as it relates to healthcare. Agape is the ancient Greek term for selfless love of humanity; it’s seen as transcending difference or circumstance, which distinguishes it from filial or erotic love. Pooja Gidwani, a hospitalist, writes,

To me, agape means having the fortitude not only to empathize with patients or to provide compassionate care but to also habitually understand that each patient’s reactions may stem from their physical or mental suffering, past or current. To develop the ability to connect on a more spiritual level with the sufferer’s emotions despite their behaviors to truly be a healer. To put oneself in the shoes of each individual, remembering that everyone we meet is a product of what life has created for them.

I can’t think of a more beautiful summation of how agape can animate medical practice.

3. In the wake of the tragedy in Florida this past week, Vox sat down with Gerry Griffith, a crisis counselor with over 30 years of experience, to ask questions about what’s needed in the aftermath of shocking losses. She offers a lot of practical, detailed perspective on how crisis counselors respond to different stages of trauma among the people they’re helping, and she also has important things to say about the importance of addressing peoples’ sense of powerlessness after these kinds of events.

When asked how she continues to do this challenging work, she says,

I had a mentor, early, early on that said doing this work is learning how to keep your heart open in hell. I know what hell looks, tastes, like, and smells like.

I think, for me, there are people in my life that I can talk to about this. I have a husband, he’s proud of me and he supports me. When I’m out there in Oklahoma City or out in New York, I can call him and I can talk about how the dog, what she’s doing today. Because he’s not there.

Somebody asked me the other day: ”How would you know when you’re done?” I said, “When I stop crying.” When I stop feeling, when I don’t cry, my heart has closed and I have to quit.

I thought it was impressive that Griffith’s barometer of being fit for the task of counseling is having a strong capacity to feel. Something I want to keep in mind, in my own small way, for my future work with clients.

4. I really like Carrie Dennett’s reporting, and I was glad to see her in-depth consideration of orthorexia in the latest issue of Today’s Dietitian.

Orthorexia is a complex compulsion, often more difficult to address than other types of disordered eating because it is so often rooted in basically valuable efforts and intentions to eat healthfully and well. While anorexia put me in my most dire state of biological illness, I think overcoming orthorexia was in many ways a trickier challenge, because it was so hard to separate obsession and compulsion from the sincere value I place on mindful, conscious, health-supportive eating.

Dennett delves into all of the difficulties and complexities of addressing this syndrome, including the fact that, as of yet, there’s no consensus on a definition and no validated assessment tool. “Eating doesn’t become pathological until it becomes entangled with obsessive thinking, compulsive and ritualistic behavior, and self-punishment,” she notes, which echoed my own intuitive sense of what orthorexia is when I encounter it in my own work.

She also interviews Emily Fossenbeck, who is doing really important work in speaking up about her own experience with orthorexia and raising awareness on social media. Emily’s struggle with orthorexia began with elimination diets (a phenomenon I’ve observed often). She’s quoted saying,

“I only felt worse and worse but kept chasing this magical unicorn of the ‘perfect diet.’ The anxiety I felt about food was suffocating and totally overwhelmed most other parts of my life. I was afraid to eat out or travel or—the worst of it—to eat a normal meal with my family. I had to have complete control of everything I was eating.”

I’ve often seen the question posed of what distinguishes orthorexia from healthful eating, and I’ve written about it myself. I think the answer might be that anxiety and feeling of suffocation that Fossenbeck mentions. A particular kind of health-conscious eating style might be either self-caring or destructive; the difference rests in the mentality and subjective emotional experience of the individual in question.

I suspect that the dietetic and mental health treatment communities are just at the start of understanding this complicated expression of disordered eating. For now, the best we can hope for is more awareness, more observation and research, and an ongoing effort to enlist more people who have struggled with orthorexia to honestly share their stories. I’ve been giving lots of thought to recovery with NEDA week on the horizon, and this is nice motivation for me to use my voice.

5. I mentioned last week that the heart chakra and heart-opening are on my mind this month. With loving-kindness in mind, a sweet list to wrap up with.

Happy Sunday morning, everyone. I look forward to checking in with a hearty, colorful new winter salad recipe in a couple days.

xo

 The post Weekend Reading, 2.18.18 appeared first on The Full Helping.

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[janeaddamspeace]

Truth, Humor, and Golden Storytelling: The Riches of Children's Literature #JACBA Newsletter 17Nov2017

Book Highlight: part 2

This second installment of our multi-part series on the 2017 Jane Addams Children's Book Award Ceremony features an introduction given by Book Award Committee Member Ann Carpenter for First Step: How One Girl Put Segregation on Trial, written by Susan E. Goodman, illustrated by E.B. Lewis, published by Bloomsbury Children's Books, named an Honor Book in the Books for Younger Children category.

Introduction by Ann Carpenter

"The march towards justice is a long, twisting journey." The truth of these words is brought to life with lush illustrations and moving text in the story of Sarah Roberts, a young black girl living in Boston in 1847. Denied a place at the local segregated school because she was not white, her parents fought back. It was the first American court case fighting segregation. It was the first case where an African American lawyer argued in front of a state supreme court. It was the first time an African American lawyer and white lawyer worked as a team in court.

And it was the first, of many, civil rights court cases that was lost.

It would have been easy to stop there. To give up hope. To acknowledge that now was the time for change. But Sarah's family was not ready to stop. They could not give up hope. They knew that for change in the future, action must be taken now. Petitions were made, speeches were circulated, newspaper articles were written. People were talking, and the people could not be ignored forever. In 1855 Boston became the first major American city to officially integrate its schools.

It would be another hundred years before the same could be said of the country as a whole.

As the book so powerfully puts it, the march towards justice may take "three steps forward, one step back", it may "slow to a standstill, waiting for a better time," but in the end, "the march cannot be stopped."

For showcasing how every step, no matter how tiny, brings us forward, for emphasizing that even apparent setbacks continue to reverberate and lead to change, and for doing so with compelling prose and beautifully evocative illustrations, the Committee is pleased to present the Jane Addams Children's Book Award Honor Citation in the category of Books for Younger Children to Susan E. Goodman and E. B. Lewis.

Acceptance speech by Susan E. Goodman

I can't tell you how pleased I was when Heather Palmer called to tell me about this award. Anyone would be, of course, but especially this writer born and bred in Detroit, only a big lake away from Chicago. Someone who read Jane Addams: Little Lame Girl from the orange biography series as a kid. Someone who got her MA in a social work(ish) aspect of psychology.

But truthfully, that is not how I ended up writing The First Step. Frankly, after decades of living in my new home of Boston, I couldn't stomach accompanying another set of guests on the Freedom Trail.

So I suggested something new-the Black Heritage Trail, a walking tour focused upon the history of Boston's African Americans. And the moment the park ranger mentioned Sarah C. Roberts v. City of Boston, I knew I would write about it. I was amazed that I never heard of this lawsuit in which Benjamin and Adeline Roberts refused to let their daughter Sarah attend an inferior school just because of the color of her skin.

Instead they put the city on trial by filing the first legal challenge against segregated schools. Let's put this in context. This suit took place in the 1840s. Before the Civil War. At a time when ninety percent of African Americans in the United States were slaves, and only two of the remaining ten percent even attended school.

The Roberts lost their case but luckily not their cause. With other people joining in, Boston became the first major American city to integrate its schools in 1855.

In many ways, writing The First Step was also a first step for me. I've written many nonfiction books, but I'd never tried to bring a historical figure to life before. And certainly not a girl about whom endless research revealed little more than her birthday and home address.

Luckily I had more knowledge of my book's other main character: social justice.

Sometimes when writing a book, I find myself struggling to explain something to kids in terms they will understand. So I strip that fact or insight down to its core, and if I'm lucky, I also gain a deeper understanding of something I thought I knew.

Imagine writing a timeline of the history of integration for your back matter. Space is invaluable in a picture book, so you must reduce amazing events-assassinations, revolts, elections, court decisions-down to single sentences. Rereading them, you see the zigzagging history of social change, all the incremental steps made by people on both sides, fighting for their idea of what is right. One side makes enough gains that the other mobilizes and pushes back. It is a tug of war and a war of tugs that happens again and again and again.

So what did I learn-something we should know even better now than ever before? No victory is final; no advance can be taken for granted. Causes and values we hold dear need to be nurtured and supported.

And we must teach them to our children again and again and again. I am so glad that the incomparable E.B. Lewis and I were able to band together to get this message across.

Thank you.

Acceptance speech by E.B. Lewis

First, I'd like to thank the Jane Addams committee members for their recognition of our book First Step. I'd also like to congratulate all the award recipients for their great work! And I want to acknowledge the fantastic team at Bloomsbury: Editors Emily Easton and Sarah Shumway, who signed and saw it though the process. Creative Director Donna Mark and designer Ellice M. Lee, for overseeing and realizing the design. Publisher Cindy Loh, of course. And Beth Eller and Courtney Griffin in Marketing and Publicity.

Collectively they trusted and believed in this project, and had the foresight to see past the mass appeal titles that have become the norm in our industry. And, in this case, they've shown the publishing world that there's a place for quiet stories of lesser known heroes. That books like First Step can win significant awards.

I recall when Susan Goodman first contacted me about this manuscript. I could hear her excitement and enthusiasm through the phone, as she spoke about coming across this amazing but obscure piece of history - about a young African American girl named Sarah Roberts. Sarah lived in Boston during the mid-1800's. And Susan explained how this courageous little girl and her family set events in motion that would ultimately change and transform an unjust system. And when she finished, the reason for her call was crystal clear. This manuscript had me written all over it. So I'm both grateful and honored, to have been chosen to illustrate this important civil rights story.

Early on I embraced a quote of Mark Twain's. He said, "the two most important days in one's life, are the day you were born and the day you realize why you were." I know, without a doubt, that creating art for children is my true purpose in life. And I think adults too often assume that we empower children. But, in my experience, children find and empower themselves. Our place is to simply provide loving encouragement and the necessary tools. And what better tool than a book a child comes to love. Books like those awarded here, that introduce endless possibilities, inspire imaginations and foster achievement.

I consider myself fortunate to be a part of little Sarah's continuing living history. And I believe amazing things do come in small packages. That no matter your age, race, or color - with courage and conviction - each one of us can change the world. After all, every achievement - from small to great - begins with an initial first step.

Thank you.

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Children's Books Promoting Peace Honored at 2017 Jane Addams Award Ceremony

With the international flags of the United Nations fluttering in the background, the Jane Addams Peace Association presented the organization's 65th annual book awards in a ceremony at the UN Plaza in New York City.

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Truth, Humor, and Golden Storytelling: Bank Street Book Festival 2017

The Bank Street Book Festival, an annual gathering of authors, illustrators, educators, and other children's book professionals was held at Bank Street College of Education in Manhattan on October 28. The event featured a full day of panel discussions on topics relating to children's literature and a keynote address from author Carmen Agra Deedy.

Deedy commented on the wisdom behind humor: "The king's fool has always been the most powerful person in the kingdom," she said. The fool knows that humor is mined from painful, strange, and "crazy places... We're always looking for funny because life can be so hard, so excruciating at times." Humor is sometimes the only way to ameliorate the pain of life's "little wounds."

Deedy delivered a rousing and emotional keynote address. She spoke about how small events in the life of a child can have enormous impact, shaping that child into a lifelong reader, for example, or-in her case-a storyteller.

"Sometimes we see the trajectory of a child's life," she said. "And we see that all they need is to turn a degree or two this way and they'll miss the wall. Sometimes, they fly."

Deedy's keynote was a fitting finale to a book fest filled with humor, personal reflections, and insights into where and how the stories that most move us are made.

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The Yellow Star: The Legend of King Christian X of Denmark by Carmen Agra Deedy 2001 Awardee

Acclaimed Children's Author Brings Civil Rights Era to Life in New Book, "Twelve Days in May: Freedom Ride 1961"

From the award-winning author of "Black & White," comes the latest in Larry Dane Brimner's 200 books for young readers. The retired educator has featured both fictional and real people from history in his many books. Although aimed at middle school readers, "Twelve Days in May: Freedom Ride 1961" is nonfiction, and it is a revelation for all ages.

School Library Journal also recommends "Twelve Days in May". "Brimner, author of several other books about civil rights in this era, knows the material well and presents a straightforward narrative ... VERDICT: An essential part of civil rights collections and a worthy addition to all nonfiction shelves."

Among Brimner's other Civil Rights books written for middle school readers: "Birmingham Sunday" was a Jane Addams Children's Honor Book, an NCTE Orbis Pictus Honor Book, and a Kirkus Reviews Best Children's Book of the Year. "We are One" was a Jane Addams Children's Book Award Winner.

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We Are One: The Story of Bayard Rustin by Larry Dane Brimner 2008 Awardee

Birmingham Sunday by Larry Dane Brimner 2011 Awardee

Picture books help children tackle life

'In Your Hands' By Carole Boston Weatherford and illustrated by Brian Pinkney, Atheneum Books, 32 pp., $17.99, Ages 4-7

Carole Boston Weatherford brings forth this sentimental picture book about an African American mother praying for her newborn son, Omari, as he moves from infancy into adolescence. The mother knows those precious moments of cradling him and holding his hand won't last. She turns to a belief in God to help soothe her concerns about his place in the world. "I will pray that the world sees you as a child of God ... that you will be viewed as a vessel to be steered rather than feared." The book is beautifully illustrated by Brian Pinkney, who has received two Caldecott Honors and the Coretta Scott King Award for illustration.

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Birmingham, 1963 by Carole Boston Weatherford 2008 Awardee

Sit-In: How Four Friends Stood Up by Sitting Down by Andrea Davis Pinkney, illustrated by Brian Pinkney 2011 Awardee

Sojourner Truth's Step-Stomp Stride, by Andrea Davis Pinkney & Brian Pinkney 2010 Awardee

Why Angelina Jolie's New Movie 'The Breadwinner' Is Just Like A Modern 'Mulan' - EXCLUSIVE CLIP

No genre does girl power quite like animation. And The Breadwinner, a new film produced by Angelina Jolie, is looking to add to that legacy. The animated movie, based on the young adult book by Deborah Ellis, tells the story of Parvana, a young girl growing up in Afghanistan who decides to prented to be a boy to help her family survive after her father gets arrested by the Taliban.

However, it would be a mistake to say that The Breadwinner is just Mulan set in Afghanistan, because The Breadwinner does something Mulan did not, and that is to set the narrative about misogyny and sexism in modern times.

In fact, the film itself is a step forward when it comes to women's equality in the film industry. In addition to boasting Jolie as a producer, The Breadwinner was written by women - Ellis adapted her original book with co-screenwriter Anita Doron - and helmed by a female director, Nora Twomey. Such strong female representation behind the camera is rare in Hollywood, especially when coupled with a female-driven story. The Breadwinner is something of a Hollywood unicorn.

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The Heaven Shop by Deborah Ellis 2005 Awardee

The Breadwinner Trilogy, three books by Deborah Ellis 2004 Awardee

Parvana's Journey by Deborah Ellis 2003 Awardee

2 New Books Look at Motherhood in the Age of Apocalypse

Louise Erdrich's Future Home of the Living God (Harper).

The Handmaid's Tale-like setup provides a fresh, eerie canvas for Erdrich's enduring themes: the "collage of dreams and DNA" we inherit and pass on to our children, the normalization of appalling cruelty, and a certain human irreducibility that persists in spite of it all.

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The Birchbark House by Louise Erdrich 2000 Awardee

Christopher Paul Curtis: From Factory Worker To Children's Book Author [AUDIO]

Finding your true calling can take years, even decades. Children's book author Christopher Paul Curtis found his calling in his 40s. After spending more than a decade working at a Detroit car factory, he began writing young adult fiction about the African-American experience. He was the first American man to win the Newbery Medal literary prize.

We talked with Christopher Paul Curtis ahead of his appearance Nov. 10 at 7 p.m. at Holy Trinity Parish Episcopal Church in Decatur.

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Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis 2008 Awardee

The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis 1996 Awardee

Free Vienna Event: Ruth Bader Ginsburg Biographers Two biographers will discuss writing about Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg at the Vienna bookstore.

Mary Hartnett and Debbie Levy will talk about the delights and challenges of writing about Ginsburg and share little-known stories.

Levy is the author of New York Times best-selling children's book "I Dissent: Ruth Bader Ginsburg Makes Her Mark." The book the 2017 Sydney Taylor Book Award and 2016 National Jewish Book Award. Levy is a former lawyer and newspaper editor and has written several award-winning nonfiction and fiction books for young people.

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I Dissent: Ruth Bader Ginsburg Makes Her Mark, written by Debbie Levy, illustrated by Elizabeth Baddeley, 2017 Awardee

We Shall Overcome: The Story of a Song written by Debbie Levy and illustrated by Vanessa Brantley-Newton 2014 Awardee

Irish woman collaborated with Angelina Jolie on new animated film

Twomey worked at Brown Bag before setting up Cartoon Saloon with Young and Moore. When she came across the novel The Breadwinner, she endeavoured to bring it to the screen in a journey that has taken four years.

"Deborah Ellis has a wonderful way of writing about challenging subject matters in a way that's not sentimental, but at the same time is quite respectful of the audience she's writing for.

"I read it in an evening, absolutely fell in love with the character of Parvana and the fact that she was flawed. This very human character in very extraordinary circumstances.

"In some senses her life was very alien to mine, but in other senses there were things that I understood very well, in terms of the family dynamic and how much she loved her father. These little things that we all understand."

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The Heaven Shop by Deborah Ellis 2005 Awardee

The Breadwinner Trilogy, three books by Deborah Ellis 2004 Awardee

Parvana's Journey by Deborah Ellis 2003 Awardee

Fall's evening light presents new art viewing opportunities

On Nov. 10, the Wells Gallery showcases the work of E.B. Lewis in the exhibit "Freedom Outlaws." A painter of distinguished realism, Lewis is the featured artist at the Niagara Falls Underground Railroad Heritage Center Museum, a museum opening in March 2018. Lewis paints images of the residents and major leaders in the Niagara Falls area who contributed to the significance of the Underground Railroad.

Paintings of historical figures aren't new, but Lewis, painting in watercolor, imbues them with a vitality and spirit that is seen in the subjects' faces. Capturing images of historical figures is a giant task that, to me, appears overwhelming and daunting. But Lewis' paintings, on display in their original form at The Wells Gallery, are a treasure of living history and a poignant, colorful addition to gallery.

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First Step: How One Girl Put Segregation on Trial, written by Susan E. Goodman, illustrated by E. B. Lewis, 2017 Awardee

Each Kindness written by Jacqueline Woodson, illustrated by E.B. Lewis 2013 Awardee

Night Boat to Freedom, written by Margot Theis Raven with pictures by E. B. Lewis 2007 Awardee

Renamed Justice High Honors 3 Landmark Figures

With the renaming of J.E.B. Stuart High School to Justice High School, the Fairfax County School Board made a statement that they intend to right the wrongs of the board from nearly 60 years ago.

The name Justice is a concept term meant to honor three individuals who were highlighted by the community - Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, civil rights activist Barbara Rose Johns and war hero Louis G. Mendez, Jr.

The next figure, Barbara Rose Johns, was 16 years old when she led a walk out of the all-Black Moton High School that she attended in Prince Edward County. Tired with the segregated and unequally maintained facilities compared to those of her white neighbors, Johns led a walkout and strike in 1951. That led to the lawsuit for an integrated school system that was eventually bundled under Brown v. Board.

"She played a direct role in the desegregation of our neighborhood," Ken Longmyer, father of a Stuart alumnus and one current student, said. "She was one of the great American heroes."

Though Johns advocates are lukewarm on the board's decision to opt for Justice instead of specifying one individual.

Not one of the 20 Fairfax County high schools is named after a woman or a person of color - Longmyer believed that these two criteria had merit for the new name.

Shareem Annan, the Fairfax County NAACP Youth Advisor, thinks that naming the school after Johns would have allowed the county to make a decisive statement about the courage and leadership of women and girls while simultaneously disavowing one of the relics of the county's segregationist past.

Furthermore, the role Johns played in racially integrating Northern Virginia, let alone the entire Commonwealth of Virginia and to a greater extent, the country as a whole, is why Longmyer believes the civil rights activist alone would've been a worthy recipient of the renaming honors at the new school.

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The Girl From the Tar Paper School: Barbara Rose Johns and the advent of the Civil Rights Movement by Teri Kanefield 2015 Awardee

Edwidge Danticat announced as winner of $50,000 Neustadt International Prize for Literature at OU

"Danticat experiments with form and structure and frequently references the literary history of Haiti and the Caribbean" the release notes. "She paints scenes of immigrant life in New York and Miami with fresh details and palpable familiarity."

Robert Con Davis-Undiano, World Literature Today's executive director, said in the release that Danticat is a "master writer whose newest work promises even greater heights."

The Neustadt Prize is the first international literary award of its scope to originate in the U.S., the release states, and is one of the only international prizes available to poets, novelists and playwrights.

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Mama's Nightingale: A Story of Immigration and Separation written by Edwidge Danticat, illustrated by Leslie Staub 2016 Awardee

Challenged books show the controversy in American society

According to research conducted by The New School in New York, exposing children to literature can teach them to be more empathetic and better equipped to process their own emotions. The extensive research pulled from five studies used varied reading materials and 86 to 356 children. The participants who read non-fiction had little or no change in their ability to perceive other's emotions. The greatest change came after a group read excerpts from works of literary fiction, such as "The Round House" by Louise Erdrich.

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The Birchbark House by Louise Erdrich 2000 Awardee

What Katherine Paterson Thinks We Can Learn From Cuba

Paterson's latest work draws from a period she didn't know very much about. She had traveled to Cuba once and had fallen in love with the landscape and the Cuban friendliness. But when she told her friend Mary Leahy (sister of Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy), who had been the director of Central Vermont Adult Basic Education, she learned about Castro's 1960s campaign to eradicate illiteracy. To do so, an army of volunteers fanned out across the island nation, spending a year teaching reading and writing. In return, they were offered free schooling, both at the high school and university level. The idea captured Paterson's imagination and her research led her to her latest novel.

Instead, she sees the swirl of history as a natural place for the drama of this coming of age story to unfold.

"We don't always like to hear good things about our enemies," she says. "But I think the world would be a better place if we did."

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The Same Stuff as Stars by Katherine Paterson 2003 Awardee

The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson 1979 Awardee

Louise Erdrich discusses her new novel, 'Future Home of the Living God'

"I wanted to explore what a public creature you become when you're pregnant, how everybody puts their hands on you, you're vulnerable to an extreme degree when you're pregnant." Cedar's flight and her adventures are, Erdrich acknowledges, an epic journey with an expectant mother at its center - and when was the last time you saw that?

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The Birchbark House by Louise Erdrich 2000 Awardee

Katherine Paterson's latest book for kids is inspired by real-life history

Paterson first learned about the brigidistas in 2015, when she was getting ready for a trip to Cuba to attend an international books conference.

"I didn't know anything about the campaign," she said. So she read a book about it, then watched the 2011 documentary "Maestra," which tells the story of nine women who volunteered for the campaign when they were young girls.

"I was so inspired by these women and by what they did," Paterson said. "They all praised that year as a turning point for their lives, when they found out what they could do when they realized they could be strong people and accomplish things."

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The Same Stuff as Stars by Katherine Paterson 2003 Awardee

The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson 1979 Awardee

Architect, author and artist building home in Malvern

Ashok "Art" Davar infuses his architectural designs with a European flair, as is fitting for a man who grew up in Europe and India, the son of an Indian mother and French father. Davar, who now divides his time between Paoli, England and India, is building a house in Malvern to serve as his U.S. home.

Another Davar book, "The Wheel of King Asoka" won the Jane Addams Children's Book award in 1978.

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The Wheel of King Asoka written by Ashok Davar 1978 Special Recognition Awardee

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The Jane Addams Children's Book Award annually recognizes children's books of literary and aesthetic excellence that effectively engage children in thinking about peace, social justice, global community, and equity for all people.

[afurst]

How Should a Buddhist Deal with Discarding Erroneous Beliefs? – Modern Koans

Question:

How Should a Buddhist Deal with Discarding Erroneous Beliefs?

Response:

Humans have developed a couple of pretty neat tools for detecting erroneous beliefs.  Logic and standards for evidence are two great examples.  But your question gets to the heart of the matter – once you discover you’ve been acting based on erroneous beliefs, what do you do?

I suspect, as always, the answer is “it depends”. It depends on the role the belief has in your world view. Let me give an example of how I’ve recently responded to discovering that I’ve been holding an erroneous belief.

I’m researching and writing a book on the intersection of, artificial intelligence, evolutionary biology, and Buddhism.  I have been reading a series of books, including several by Daniel Dennett and Ray Kurzweil.  In Dennett’s book Consciousness Explained, he spends quite a bit of time discussing how computers are modeled on human design.  Ray Kurzweil even goes so far as to identify brain structures that are analogous to computer functions.

But in my reading, I had come away with a belief that humans are in fact just elaborate computers.  This may or may not be a reflection of Dennett’s and Kurzweil’s views, but I had certainly drawn the conclusion. Further, it was a foundational idea for my book.

The Wrecking Ball

But, I recently came across an article by Dr. Robert Epstein titled The Empty Brain.  In the article’s subtitle, Dr Epstein lays to waste my assumption.  He states:

Your brain does not process information, retrieve knowledge or store memories. In short: your brain is not a computer.

Ouch.  My first reaction was resistance.  In my first read, I took a highly defensive view of the article.  I felt like he was just making contrary assertions, but not providing evidence. He was attacking my view and I would have none of it.

But, in a moment of rare clarity, I decided to set the article to the side and put a link to it on my to do list.  I promised myself to give it a second read.

I’m glad I did.  About 2 weeks later, I re-read the article. I discovered a much more nuanced view of artificial intelligence especially in the context of my book topic.  Let’s just say, my to do list now contains an entry to do more research and take on some rewriting.

That Was Easy

I would put this particular example of discarding an erroneous idea in the “easy” category.  While the idea lay at the center of a future book, I was able to learn, change, and adapt.  Not only was I saved embarrassment, but it actually advanced my understanding. Hopefully it will lead me to a better book. It was a win for me.

But this particular belief, while important to my book, didn’t have a mind blowing impact on my world view. The closer a belief is to the heart of our worldview, the more resistance we will have to it. By more I mean exponentially more.

But, in these cases, if we somehow accepted that our idea was erroneous, what would change look like.

The question was in the context to Buddhism, so let’s target a Buddhist idea that I think is controversial. It’s an idea that stands at the heart of Buddhist philosophy – reincarnation. This topic is especially important to Mahayana Buddhists, and in particular Pure Land Buddhists of which I am one.

The Pure Land school of Buddhism, holds as its central tenet that if one recites the name of the Buddha (Namo Amitofo or Namo Amida Butsu) with the sincere desire to be reborn into the Pure Land (Sukhavati), Amitabha will meet you at death and take you there. Once reborn in Sukhavati you will achieve liberation in one lifetime.

The closer a belief is to the heart of our worldview, the more resistance we will have to it. By more I… Click To Tweet

Great Doubt

At the core of this teaching is the concept of reincarnation.  As a western convert to Buddhism, I have struggled with the idea of reincarnation.  I see no evidence for the simplest interpretation of rebirth – i.e. it is me, Andrew Furst, with my beliefs, opinions, and experience who is reborn into another life. I have no memory of past lives; I have strong doubts about phenomenon like past life regression and the Tibetan practice of identifying reincarnated Lamas.

In fact, my Buddhist practice does not involve belief in these particular views on reincarnation. I have found views sympathetic to my disbelief in authors like Stephen Batchelor and even Thich Nhat Hanh. The latter actually interprets the Pure Land teachings in three levels, two of which do not incorporate this simplistic view of reincarnation.

But at the same time, I must concede that in any reading of the Buddhist sutras, from the Tripitaka (the canonical early Theravadan texts) to the Pure Land Sutras (written much later) prominently feature reincarnation.  A synonym for enlightenment is freedom from birth and death – i.e. reincarnation.  My disbelief in this view of reincarnation may actually make me a Buddhist heretic.

Heresy?

If you’ve got skin in this game, you’re likely feeling a strong inclination for and against my views. Imagine then, if irrefutable evidence was provided that contradicted your view. What would you do?  How would you adjust your practice of Buddhism? How would your worldview have to change?

For me accepting a simplistic view of reincarnation would be easier with evidence. But I suspect it would still be a shock.  But I feel, like my belief that humans might be computers, I would make the transition.  The evidence and my improved understanding would reinforce the change. I suspect whatever change that you would need to make would be similarly straightforward.

I would put this particular example of discarding an idea in the “hard” category.

But I need to point out one significant difference between the easy and hard. In the case of reincarnation, there is no irrefutable evidence.

Not So Easy

When we don’t have evidence, something that can reinforce change, making the transition will be hard; probably impossible. But, if we reflect on the question, this scenario doesn’t apply.  That’s because we have no means to decisively determine whether it is erroneous or not.

Ideas, or as the evolutionary biologist and ardent atheist Richard Dawkins calls them, memes, operate very much like genes.  The fittest survive. To a certain extent the truth of a statement has a certain bearing on its fitness. The idea that eating mercury is bad, is true and its’ truth contributes to its fitness.   These ideas survive and thrive because of their fitness.  The human mind is capable of incorporating them with relative ease.  It is almost effortless for the human mind to adapt to a fit meme.

But there are other ideas where truth doesn’t add to, or subtract from, the fitness of an idea. A lot of religious ideas fall into this category.  Belief in a God being a big one.  There is no evidence for a God, but the idea persists.  Believers vehemently defend the idea.  I believe that this is a function of its fitness. This is a powerfully fit idea.  The tenacity with which people defend it is evidence that whether or not it is erroneous, it is terribly difficult to “discard” it.

Truth OR Consequences?

Religion has persisted for millennia, at its foundation are some very fit, but likely untrue, ideas.  Discarding them feel impossible.

Let’s return to my problem with reincarnation.  There seem to be three possible outcomes in this log jam.

All the Buddhists that believe in a simplistic view of reincarnation are right (probable, but I don’t like it)

All the Buddhists that believe in a simplistic view of reincarnation are wrong (less probable, but not impossible)

There is a nuanced idea of reincarnation that accommodates both of these views (feels probable, and highly possible)

I put my money on option 3.

To answer the original question, How should a Buddhist deal with discarding erroneous beliefs? I feel there is little to do. It’s easy to let go of demonstrably false ideas.  Where the challenge is and where the benefit can come is in dealing with difficult ideas and finding transcendence through them.

  If you enjoyed this post,  please like and share.

I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

Modern Koans is an ongoing series that recognizes that good questions are often more important than their answers.

The riddles of God are more satisfying than the solutions of man. ― G.K. Chesterton

Dialectic Two Step, Modern Koans, Verse Us, Say What?, and Minute Meditations all copyright Andrew Furst

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[superhardlikesteel]

GRAVELAND vs NSBM

Interview with Rob Darken (From graveland.org)

I thought this was something worth highlighting, judging by how many people have messaged me asking if I’m a National Socialist just because I listen to Graveland. Rob Darken himself does not identify as a National Socialist, nor does he wish to align himself with racist ideologies. 

Yes, he is right-wing, possibly a civic nationalist. Yes, he has said questionable things in his past, which he is admitting to in this interview. I believe we’ve all said and done questionable things in our lives. The fact he is admitting to this is pretty big evidence that he does not align with those beliefs anymore. Why would he want to alienate his National Socialist fans if he really believed in the same thing as them? Anyways, rant over.

The actual interview is after the break! Enjoy!

1. Graveland has been described as 'a Polish band with National Socialist ties (aka white supremacists)'. It has also been claimed that you 'have a history of defending and even admitting to their National Socialist views'.

I'm the main force behind Graveland. I started the band on my own being inspired by Dark Doom Metal and Black Metal. I got influenced by the bands that are still a huge authority for me, both musically and ideologically, like Bathory, Emperor or Venom. Later I was joined by Capricornus who was famous for his radical attitude. He had his own zine "Into the Pentagram" and remained in contact with Black Metal underground from all over the world. He exchanged letters with Varg Vikernes from Burzum and other Scandinavian bands. Norwegian scene was the first one that started getting radical, that was the source that had its impact on Polish scene. Those days Black Metal meant a world to me. I didn't really care about the future and where it would lead us. When I remained stack to the standards and common aesthetics connected with this genre, Capricornus started to radicalise himself politically. Both Euronymous (Mayhem) and Varg Vikernes (Burzum) had their influence on him, shortly speaking the politics in music. I was still a leader in Graveland and I tried to lead the band in such a way to avoid any political issues within it. Capricornus started his own project back then called Thor's Hammer and also began to play in Infernum. When my music taste started to move towards Pagan Metal we got split and I continued with Graveland as a one man project. I was inspired by paganism and warrior ethos. I was becoming more conservative in my view as well as in music. The days of Black Metal radicalism were far behind me. I'm really angry when I hear all those accusations of National Socialism etc. It has nothing to do with what I'm doing, but some of my conservative views do not appeal to modern left-wing censorship. For those people there is no place for such views in music. That is why they frequently attack me and my bands telling that we are "nazi" or trying to stick the NSBM mark to us. It reminds of a problem with which the current US president struggles. People that knows me personally know that I'm not a nazi or racist and so on. Graveland has fans all over the world, they are all familiar with our stuff and always supports us. Musicians that are now in band's line-up are quite well-know and came from other Polish metal bands. Gigs that we played during 2016 proved that we play Black and Pagan Metal just as many other bands. Soon we will be on tour in South America when we have a lot of fans. Some of them wanted us to come to Venezuela and Cuba as well.

2. What are these alleged 'ties' and 'admissions' and are the band - or you - white supremacists?

It is easy those days to become a victim of censorship, it's enough if your music moves beyond the borders of so called political correctness. For example love for your own country, your flag, tradition and culture, ancient beliefs, simply speaking all that builds your character, gives you strength and will. For some people and politicians that represents Marxist "values" is something strongly unacceptable, even hostile. Nowadays world "culture" is dominated by left-wing social engineers who are trying to force their Marxist vision of culture. I grew up in the times when my country was opposing communism. Our society was struggling with communist dictatorship that was trying to keep its power over the country. In that days I learned how to oppose censorship and to say "no" to any sign of totalitarism and dictatorship. That is why I don't want to be a so called pharaoh's slave in my life. I create a music that break the barriers of imposed political correctness. If someones sees my bound to pagan beliefs and the love for my country as a sign of white supremacy, he must be, or want to be, totally blind. My music is being listened all around the world, by fans that have different skin colour and has their own religious beliefs. It proves that my work is universal. That is why accusing me of white supremacy thing is worth the same as in the case of nazism, it is left behind with all those epithets that are being thrown on us by cultural Marxism fanatics. Each one of us has a right to be proud of his culture, country and its heroes. Those attributes are noble and eternal.

3. If not now, did you hold those views in the past and have you have ever sung about them/ spoken about them? Do you regret them now?

Many things I said between 1994-1999 was caused by Black Metal radicalism. I wanted to play this unholy art back then and be true. I was impressed by what musicians from Mayhem, Burzum, Emperor and Darkthrone did. They declared war towards christianity and created the ideology that quickly spread within the underground finding new imitators. By then the official metal scene did not accept that. Commercial labels were interested only in Death Metal, Black Metal was still in the underground, and that is what we were glad about. In the depths of underground we were able to conspire, to get into occultism, create secret societies. It had its atmosphere, it was something we were excited about. It was starting to take a shape of something original. Conflict between the Norwegian bands led to the death of the one of the most important leaders- Euronymous (Mayhem). That effected in a quick break-up of the Norwegian Black Metal underground. When the smoke started to go out, commercial labels found a source to feed on. They made a way for Black Metal to conquer the music market. I felt betrayed and disappointed. Paganism made me escape from that chaos. My friends that left Black Metal underground and began a new chapter of resurrecting the pagan beliefs, made me follow the same path. I joined the groups that were eager to bring back the pagan feasts and ceremonies. That is how Pagan Metal was born in Poland, due to pagan rituals and historical reenactment. Many things that I did and said during the days when I was under the influence of Black Metal ideology, were simply irresponsible and naive. It was characteristic for a young age and being rebellious, a will to go against the grain. Such views are always verified by the life itself. As the time passes you grow up from it or you simply turn to some ideals, views that are something completely different. That's what happened to me. I'm trying not to look back, past can't be changed or so, you need to push forward. Times are different now, there are different problems, different threats.

4. What are most of Graveland's lyrics about? What are your influences?

My lyrics are similar to each other, maybe that's not that much original but that is what I like. They are all inspired by paganism, mythology, subjects of archeology that are not being mentioned during the academic studies. Maybe by history and religion as well. Lyrics written between 92'-98' were also inspired by occultism. Several were written by Capricornus who called himself tenebrist as he studied the secrets of this art. Those lyrics were full of heresy and subjects connected with witches and dark cults. Since Graveland started to play Pagan Metal my lyrics were no longer connected with darkness, I stick to the epic stuff. My lyrics are about lonely warriors that struggle with forces of darkness on different fronts. There are also things about nature, harmony in the universe, ancestral beliefs and traditions, cult of a warrior, knights traditions, awareness of our duty, a will to survive and remain unbreakable. I'm really into mythology and fantasy literature. My interest are also religion and ancient cultures. I like such movies like "The Lord of the Rings", stories about Conan. I'm also a fan of tv series like "Vikings", "Game of Thrones", historical series like "Tudors", "White Queen", "Rome", "I", "Claudius"... All of that has its impact on my imagination which has an influence on my music and lyrics.

5.How big of a problem is NSBM in Poland? It has been argued that the country is a hot-spot for NSBM - as is Ukraine and other eastern European states. Why do you think this is?

I didn't notice anything like that, but I see that some world's political forces are trying to harm Poland. New Polish government is doing a lot for this country and has a significant support from its citizens. The government is right-wing and that is why it is not accepted by outside liberal-left wing forces. Poland is being attacked with lies about itself, the information about the current situation of the country is being manipulated. The is a lot of left-wing hate in it. It's a absolute bullshit that NSBM has an excellent opportunity to spread its wings here. German nazism left a huge, painful mark on this country and our society. People still remember what happened back then. Such ideologies will never find any support here. German occupation left some sort of "monuments" here in a shape of for example death camps. They are the symbol of what ideological fanatism can lead to, no matter if it's nazism or communism. Polish people remember that and that memory will remain for long. Besmirching Poland take different shapes, for example some politicians and media attempt to falsify its history, they are from countries where democracy is said to be strong. They are telling that those camps were Polish, which is of course not true at all. It's simply sick and without a doubt bears a mark of anti-polish activity, they are trying to interfere in Poland's policy. Ukraine is a country that strongly desires freedom and democracy, trying to escape from the Russia's influence. It is a country where many outside forces play their conspired political game, which might not be accepted by the Ukrainians. I really hope that this country will soon win its future, survive these hard times and achieve peace and justice. If any metal bands from Ukraine take part in defending their country from those who want to enslave it, they have a right to do so. They are its citizens in the first place. Their patriotism is strong as this is what the political situation of their country demand from them.

6. You have said that you have fans from overseas - Burma, Israel, etc - have they ever asked about allegations of NSBM or antisemitism?

Graveland fans are familiar with my music and thoughts. They know my intentions and the fact that I have changed, I'm no longer that radical as I used to be in the days when I played Black Metal. By the end of the 90's I started moving into Pagan Metal. They path that I followed since then changed be completely. My fans have changed me, all those people who didn't turn their backs on me. Contacts and bounds achieved through the internet caused the exchange of inspirations and values. Paganism that inspires me up to this day is universal. In my lyrics I have never tried to be better than others, characters from them fight the forces of darkness to defend greater values. Anyone can equate with them. There is no antisemitism in what I create. However, there was a time, long ago, when I criticise Israel and pro-Israel lobby for its policy that seems wrong to me back then. But that was before the 11th of September! What happened then totally changed my view on the world. Fans from Israel noticed that I have changed. They started to get the t-shirts and hoodies of my band. It seems that metal music stays beyond any borders, and I don't mean political correctness here. I treat people the same way they treat me. There are people that you like and accept and those you avoid. Colour of your skin or religion doesn't matter here. I want to spend the rest of my life the way I want, without taking care about political correctness.

7. I know a lot of black metal fans/ musicians in Iran and Burzum are massive there, despite the fact that Varg Vikernes is an avowed racist - do you think it is possible to be into bands like that and not care about what they believe?

I don't believe that Varg Vikernees is a declared racist, but I remember that he was not so friendly towards Poles. It was long ago, still in the 90's. Nowadays Burzum has a lot of fans all around the world. Even among musicians who still don't want to admit that. After Varg escaped from prison and after what happened in France, I noticed that some sort of a political game started around it. After those events all that censorship and antifa's propaganda set a goal of destroying his image. Burzum has a lot of fans because the commercialisation of Black Metal publicised its significant role in what happened in Norway. It was impossible to isolate Burzum just like Graveland. Bands from Poland are always treated differently, I managed to get used to it. Cultural Marxism seems not to exactly like Poland and Poles. Even the leaders of the Polish metal scene, Behemoth, might be able to say something about that. Life was never easy for them. They worked really hard to achieve the status they have now. Currently they are in their prime but from time to time antifa is trying to strike them. I would like to add that I not exactly believe in what is being written in the internet, especially about Vikernes. In this game people like Varg are all alone in a fight against censorship that is supported by Soroz. Brainwash media and fake news take part in that as well. Listen to what Vikernes himself says about it. He posts a lot of videos on youtube where he gives a talk on different issues connected with metal music, but not only.

8. What kind of threats have you personally received from anti-fascist movements - have you ever been physically threatened?

Their attacks are in most cases of a psychological character. They are frequently observing what I'm doing, they search for any signs in my work that may fit into their propaganda. If they can't find anything they simply dissect it. Just like one of my live photos where I seem to be making a "sieg heil" gesture. As a vocalist I'm moving on the stage, so I'm making moves with my hands as well. It's easy to catch a hand in a move and than present it as something with a completely different meaning. I have never made such gestures as they mean nothing to me. They also publish photos of other bands saying that's Graveland. They present quite known Polish band, already split-up, Honor as Graveland! The fact that I knew them, and that I was with them on the photo was enough to make them Gravland members! Trying to understand the logic of antifa, if I'm on the photo with Honor it means I'm a nazi? And if there is Nergal on the photo with me, is he a nazi too? We, musicians, make a lot of photos with different people, we know many other musicians and artists. Those photos do not mean anything, but it seems they are of high importance to some people. I remember when many fans and friends of mine got offended because of my photos with Nergal. Censorship propaganda that is being created by left-wing supporters of cultural Marxism, is unfortunately taking a more serious shape. There are some foundations that take care of the financial support for terroristic antifa groups. Sources of money are different but most of it is donated by Soroz. Such significant support allows the organisation to hire specialists in the field of invigilation and propaganda. They not only invigilate, but also manipulate creating fake news. There were also situation were they attacked my friends and people supporting Graveland. They are trying to frighten the club owners and those who organise concerts, if it has no effect they fabricate facts about them accusing of nazism. All of that reminds me of the days of communism in Poland, when secret police was fighting any actions taken by freedom movement "Solidarność". We should ask a question, why do they do it? Is Graveland a sign of counter-revolution for them? If yes, that is only their own fault, they made the band such symbol by all those lies they create and spread. I'm not a politician. My music can't be heard on radio or tv. That's not me who changes people. All that falseness and hypocrisy of left-wing politicians people can see on their own. And later they all vote for Trump despite all those lies and fake news that are spread by commercial media.

9. Do you think true NSBM bands should be banned from playing at mainstream venues and festivals?

I'm an opponent of censorship and any other ways of manipulating with art. Artist frequently break tabu's and provoke. Their work is always judged by people in the same way. If something appeals to them, it gets and lot of supporters, it creates interest. If something is weak, on the other hands, no one will bother himself about it. That is the best way of judging someone's work. I was always against favoring bands which do not exactly deserve it. Typical commercial attitude kills art. Political correctness within it also does not help. While picking up bands, festivals always depend on their commercial success. The second important thing is political correctness and censorship (unfortunately). Weak bands do not have a chance to be invited to play there. There are many Black Metal bands out there which image is far better than their music, there is a lot of talk about them, a lot of controversy but what they offer musically is simply weak. That fact eliminates a lot of groups from a chance to reach bigger stages. Those few NSBM bands, because of their prejudices, still prefer the underground, they do not want to play bigger concerts among those bands they do not tolerate. They will always remain on the far borders of the metal scene.

10. Do you think the issue of NSBM has increased since the election of Donald Trump in the US and the rise of people like Marine Le Pen in France?

Many bands are being accused of nazism, racism or antisemitism by censorship and haters from terroristic organisations like antifa. These are mostly slanders of a political character used by left-wing groups. You can say that every band that may have conservative views might be a victim of such actions. Censorship and foundations supporting political correctness were taken over by left-wing activists who are favoring and spreading cultural Marxism. For many years art, music and film were under its influence that caused dangerous effects for western culture. That censorship and political correctness has taken a shape of cultural revolution. All in all, all left-wing revolutions have the same final, a sad end of of tyranny and dictatorship. Beautiful ideas of revolution are always perverted. In theory everything is great and simple, but in practice it all falls into pieces sooner or later. Metal music was never that much popular among left-wing oriented people. The arrival of hard core elements in metal, when Death Metal was at the top, changed that situation a bit, but to be honest metal music was always conservative. It's enough to mention the bands that created this genre like Iron Maiden, Saxon, Manowar or Nazareth. Topics of lyrics and music were always influenced by epic stuff, cult of a warrior, mythology, history, battle heroes and great warriors. Even introducing occult themes by bands such as Black Sabbath harmonized with the general style of this music. Revolution is always followed by counter- revolution. I will not be surprised if metal music return to its roots. Using the fact of Trump's success such slogans like "Make Metal Great Again" may become popular. Folk and Pagan metal that gains more and more attention might be the beginning of this process.

11. Also, could I ask you about this? http://www.slavorum.org/poles-are-building-the-first-pagan-temple-after-hundreds-of-years/  What's the background to this? Are any other metal bands involved in raising money for it? Why is it important?

Not that long ago there was information on the internet about the first pagan temple built on Iceland. After many years the beliefs of our ancestors are being resurrected. People with passion for history and paganism are trying to make it all real. Christianity has disappointed many people. So many feel no bound with this religion, even concerning it as completely strange to them. That is why Vikings and Slavs return. Pagan beliefs are still strong in Poland and inspire many people. Until now it was mostly spreading among people studying archeology, metal musicians, and also during historical reenactments of Slavonic and Viking lifestyle. The building of Slavonic Culture Center is an initiative that I have supported. It will be the first official Slavonic Temple in Poland. Recently Catholic Church started to disturb the actions of pagan movements. One year later there was an event connected with Mt. Ślęża which is an old Celtic place of cult. That is a place where pagans meet to celebrate their beliefs and traditions. Church decided on regaining the power over this place through provocation. They organised some actions that led to conflict and protests. Currently money is gathered to start the construction of the mentioned center. I have donated my old viking helmet that I used on photo sessions between 2001-2007, putting it on auction to get some money to support this goal. I'm glad that I was able to have my small input in making this all possible.

Peter Dean (UK) (2017)

[girlvsgun-blog]

The Aftermath of Oakland's Ghost Ship

TWO MONTHS LATER, IN THE AFTERMATH OF GHOST SHIP, ARTISTS ARE STILL COPING WITH TRAGEDY AND EVICTIONS

On December 2, 2016, at 11:30 p.m., a fire broke out in a Bay Area warehouse artist collective known as Ghost Ship, thirty six members of the Oakland arts community were killed that night, sending shockwaves throughout the country. In the wake of the fire many city governments cracked down on their own DIY spaces, from coast to coast the reaction to the tragedy was to send in the fire marshals to disrupt, evict or in some cases permanently close these spaces.

A few days later, as many feared, the crackdowns nationwide began. On Dec. 5 in Baltimore,  housing and fire officials condemned the Bell Foundry, a long running artist space, citing “numerous safety violations as well as deplorable conditions.” Dozens were evicted. A little further south, that same day in Nashville, officials shut down the all-ages performance space Drkmttr.

On Dec. 8 it was Denver’s turn, the fire department arrived at Rhinoceropolis and Glob, long running and well-respected DIY communities. The artists and musicians permanently residing at these spaces were evicted on the spot, into freezing temperatures, they were told not to return.

We arrived in Denver a few days later, on tour, we had been in the van on our way Oakland the day of the fire. The whole tour had been equal parts mournful and celebratory as we all tried to cope with the aftermath. The tour arrived in Denver after the evictions at Rhinoceropolis and Glob, set to perform that night was French Kettle Station, Luke Thinnes ambitious electronic project. Thinnes was one of the artists made homeless by city authorities. The music that night was amazing, along with Denver’s infamous Tollund Men, the show was in many ways transcendental for the musicians and artists in attendance, not only mourning the loss of loved ones, but in some cases the loss of their homes as well.

Now here we are two months later, the national press has moved on and city authorities have largely moved on, both to the next headline and the next tragedy. The artists affected by the events of early December, however, have not.

Chicago has a rich history and current vibrant underground arts scene, the question remains, long term, how does this city persevere and learn from what has occurred in the DIY community across the country. Girl vs. Gun spoke with Thinnes to talk about his music and the journey that started this December.

How long did Rhino and Glob exist? How did you end up living there, how long were you there?

Rhino was around for just over 11 years, and so was the space next door, Glob. I lived at Glob for three years but had been going to shows at both spaces for over six years.

Tell us about Denver, creatively, musically?

Denver was a hotspot for a split second, but now it seems like there's less of a demand to live here than there was four years ago. It's being gentrified crazy fast, lots of disgusting condos billed as "creative living spaces" stuffed with transplants who I'm sure are slowly realizing Denver is a lot like anywhere else. I struggle with any notion of calling Denver a "creative" place because that term is essentially what is being used to push artists out of the City. First, artists move into zones where the rent is cheap, then developers realize it's not dangerous, then the neighborhood gets sold as an "arts district" which raises the value of the property & then the artists who first moved there can't afford to keep their spot anymore.

What purpose did you see Rhino and these DIY spaces serve in the Denver community? In the art community as a whole?

Rhino was everything to me. Its place in the community is much easier to see now that it's gone. While I was living at Glob, all I was concerned with was staying positive & making the best art I possibly could. Since things have changed, the consequences have come back to me in various ways, and it's been overwhelming. Hearing so much about how much the space meant the world to people made me realize I was a part of something that changed people's lives forever, and that's helped me get through the aftermath.

French Kettle Station is your project, how did it come about? How would you describe your music? How do you think your music and art were influenced by your time at Rhino and Glob?

I started writing songs when I was 19. Some close friends talked me into doing more with them, and it's basically just snowballed from there. Everything I do creatively is 100% influenced & enforced by Rhinoceropolis in principle, spirit and discipline. I saw & heard things at Rhino & Glob that instantly changed me forever and blew my mind like nothing else has. One thing I take away from having my mind blown is that "if someone can do this, so can I" and that couldn't be more obvious than in a space like Rhino, where it's happening raw, on the floor, and just inches away from you.

Tell me about the day of the eviction, where did you go? What immediate impact did it have?

I was practicing for a show when the fire inspectors came into Glob, so I went next door where it wasn't being searched. I came back a couple hours later and basically had it explained to me that I had to be out of there in a few hours & couldn't stay there anymore. The biggest fire hazard in Glob was a parachute catching insulation on the ceiling, so I helped my roommate cut it down by order of the fire marshal. I then grabbed everything I needed, put it in trash bags & stayed with my friend Anton. There's definitely a part of me that won't ever recover from that night.

You played a really amazing set a couple days later with Tollund Men, All Your Sisters and Soft Kill, most people in the Denver music community seemed to come out that night. Can you describe what that week was like or any specific memories from that show?

Glad you liked the set. It was cathartic to perform a few days after being evicted, but the most memorable part of that night was getting to see Tollund Men. They are hands down my favorite band in the entire world and I think that was their best set that night. I felt happiness for the first time since the eviction while they were performing. Nothing will ever compare to that set for me.

Now that the national spotlight has shifted away from the Ghost Ship fire and even local communities seem to have stopped paying as much attention how does your life and art continue to be impacted but the Fire and the aftermath of the DIY venue closures?

I lost a good friend in Oakland & the eviction less than a week later was the most traumatizing thing I've been through, so in a way I'm forever impacted. Now that I'm not booking shows I deleted my Facebook, which is a huge relief, and I've been recording one album a day for the past two weeks under different pseudonyms. I haven't written any songs since being evicted but have been working on lots of techno & sound collage, it's less emotional & more like therapy. I've been going to way fewer shows and every night is pretty boring compared to life two months ago. It basically feels like I'm a whole different person living a whole different life, which has forced me to make some minor changes in my ways but at the expense of the thing I love the most, living at Glob.

What do you see as the most important thing people can take away from both the Ghost Ship fire and the subsequent crackdown and closures of venues like Rhino?

To state the obvious the takeaway from all this is that communities at large were grieving hard from Ghost Ship and the right solution wasn't condemning more spaces & making it harder for people to come together. Everyone I know hasn't stopped doing what they love, and while that can be made harder on people, it can't be taken away. All I can do is stay positive, be there for my friends & do what I can the best I can, because things are just going to keep changing and getting even weirder.

You can listen to French Kettle Station here. If you feel like donating there is a GoFundMe page to rebuild Rhino and Glob

 Photos of French Kettle Station by Lauren Jastermsky

[oovitus]

Weekend Reading, 2.18.18

The first time self-soothing was explained to me, it was by a friend who had her hands full taking care of a new baby. Self-soothing, she said, is when a baby develops the capacity to calm his or herself down. It’s seen as being key to uninterrupted nights of sleep for parents, since it allows babies to get back to rest if they should happen to wake up during the night.

A little while later, when I was exploring resources on coping with depression and anxiety, I learned that there’s such a thing as adult self-soothing, too. It may be an especially important skill to develop if you identify as a sensitive person or you feel the impact of emotions very strongly.

Self-soothing practices can take all sorts of shapes and forms; they may take one out of time and place, like going for a walk or practicing yoga in a special part of the home, or they might be as simple as listening to a particular song, sipping tea, breathing deeply, praying, singing, humming, reading poetry out loud, or smelling an essential oil. These, anyway, are my own favorite ways to self-soothe.

Two years ago at this time, my anxiety was so bad that I often didn’t want to leave the house. I did leave, going about my business and trying to perform as much competence as I could muster, but I felt as if I was falling apart. I was so on edge, so irritable, and so unable to hang onto a sense of safety or security. It really scared me, much more than my depression ever had.

Many months of therapy later, and I’m in a different place. But this week in particular gave me new skills to be grateful for. A few situations came up that triggered my anxiety, and I reacted, but I was able to stay connected to a fundamental sense that things would be OK. I’m not exactly sure what to attribute this to: my meditation practice? Learning to pay attention to my breath? Slowing down? Learning to say “no”? Reconnecting?

The answer is that all of these things, coupled with time and patience, have helped. I’m also starting to understand that quelling anxiety creates muscle memory; if you do it often enough, you start to believe, consciously and unconsciously, that it’s possible, and then it starts to happen more readily.

I know that I may manage my anxiety for a long time and possibly live with it always, just as I know I’ll always have brushes with depression and may always periodically encounter certain ED-related urges. In writing these words today, though, I realize how surprisingly calm I feel about my anxiety, which is sweetly ironic.

For the first time in a long time, I’m not alarmed by the fact that I have anxiety, not scared of it. I’ve been given signs that I have some of the tools I need to manage it. Maybe I’ll need to expand or change up my toolkit at some point, but that’s OK: toolkits can grow along with us. For now, merely knowing that I can get centered even in the midst of anxious feelings or thoughts is a major shift, one that gives me hope and a sense of spaciousness.

As always, wishing everyone peace and grounding as we head out into a fresh week. Enjoy these tasty recipes and reading links.

Recipes

There’s a mushroom miso barley soup recipe in Power Plates that I’ve become pretty attached to, but I can never get enough soup recipes, and I’m loving Natasha’s version, which is infused with Italian herbs and seasonings.

Wish someone had made these sweet buckwheat crepes for me on Valentine’s Day! Or that I’d gone ahead and made them for myself

This is my kind of potato salad: roasted potatoes, dill, vegan bacon, creamy garlic mayo. Perfect vegan comfort food.

Writing about Hannah’s book on Friday has me thinking about the art of creating really good food in very little time. It’s something I’m still figuring out. Lisa is one of the people I turn to for inspiration in this area, and her easy green curry noodles are a perfect example of a super speedy, flavorful, filling meal.

I tend to have lousy luck when I’m baking exclusively with grain free flours (I do OK when they’re part of a blend that has some wheat flour or gluten free grain flours in it). I’m always impressed with the way that Lindsay works wonders with grain-free baking that’s also vegan-friendly, and I’m dying to try her easy vegan white cake.

Reads

1. In spite of spending a fair amount of time around doctors—and anticipating a year of clinical work on the horizon—I had never really given much thought to what it must be like for doctors to return to full time work after being treated for an illness, especially the illness that they themselves specialize in.

That’s exactly the process that breast cancer surgeon Liz O’Riordon finds herself in now. I was touched by The Atlantic‘s profile of her, in which she admits to having new emotional challenges on the job, including sensitivities to hear certain diagnoses spoken of in dire terms and heightened awareness when delivering news to patients. The article says,

She [Liz] also takes more care with her language, and cringes at the memory of comments that were meant to be encouraging but now seem glib and unsympathetic. “I used to say: You’re lucky it hasn’t spread. No one is lucky to have cancer,” she says. “I used to ask people: Are you happy to sign this consent form? No one is happy to have cancer. As a doctor, you may give bad news 10 times a day. Until you’ve been on the other side, you don’t realize that when you get bad news, you remember every single detail of that conversation.”

There’s a lot of pressure for doctors and medical personnel to remain transparent, cool, and objective at all times, but my own limited experience in a helping profession is that personal struggle often gives way to empathy that can enhance one’s capacities as a practitioner. I hope that O’Riordan can indeed follow through on her hope to speak out more openly about her illness and encourage other doctors to do so with her.

2. Also on the topic of medicine and healthcare, a physician examines the concept of agape as it relates to healthcare. Agape is the ancient Greek term for selfless love of humanity; it’s seen as transcending difference or circumstance, which distinguishes it from filial or erotic love. Pooja Gidwani, a hospitalist, writes,

To me, agape means having the fortitude not only to empathize with patients or to provide compassionate care but to also habitually understand that each patient’s reactions may stem from their physical or mental suffering, past or current. To develop the ability to connect on a more spiritual level with the sufferer’s emotions despite their behaviors to truly be a healer. To put oneself in the shoes of each individual, remembering that everyone we meet is a product of what life has created for them.

I can’t think of a more beautiful summation of how agape can animate medical practice.

3. In the wake of the tragedy in Florida this past week, Vox sat down with Gerry Griffith, a crisis counselor with over 30 years of experience, to ask questions about what’s needed in the aftermath of shocking losses. She offers a lot of practical, detailed perspective on how crisis counselors respond to different stages of trauma among the people they’re helping, and she also has important things to say about the importance of addressing peoples’ sense of powerlessness after these kinds of events.

When asked how she continues to do this challenging work, she says,

I had a mentor, early, early on that said doing this work is learning how to keep your heart open in hell. I know what hell looks, tastes, like, and smells like.

I think, for me, there are people in my life that I can talk to about this. I have a husband, he’s proud of me and he supports me. When I’m out there in Oklahoma City or out in New York, I can call him and I can talk about how the dog, what she’s doing today. Because he’s not there.

Somebody asked me the other day: ”How would you know when you’re done?” I said, “When I stop crying.” When I stop feeling, when I don’t cry, my heart has closed and I have to quit.

I thought it was impressive that Griffith’s barometer of being fit for the task of counseling is having a strong capacity to feel. Something I want to keep in mind, in my own small way, for my future work with clients.

4. I really like Carrie Dennett’s reporting, and I was glad to see her in-depth consideration of orthorexia in the latest issue of Today’s Dietitian.

Orthorexia is a complex compulsion, often more difficult to address than other types of disordered eating because it is so often rooted in basically valuable efforts and intentions to eat healthfully and well. While anorexia put me in my most dire state of biological illness, I think overcoming orthorexia was in many ways a trickier challenge, because it was so hard to separate obsession and compulsion from the sincere value I place on mindful, conscious, health-supportive eating.

Dennett delves into all of the difficulties and complexities of addressing this syndrome, including the fact that, as of yet, there’s no consensus on a definition and no validated assessment tool. “Eating doesn’t become pathological until it becomes entangled with obsessive thinking, compulsive and ritualistic behavior, and self-punishment,” she notes, which echoed my own intuitive sense of what orthorexia is when I encounter it in my own work.

She also interviews Emily Fossenbeck, who is doing really important work in speaking up about her own experience with orthorexia and raising awareness on social media. Emily’s struggle with orthorexia began with elimination diets (a phenomenon I’ve observed often). She’s quoted saying,

“I only felt worse and worse but kept chasing this magical unicorn of the ‘perfect diet.’ The anxiety I felt about food was suffocating and totally overwhelmed most other parts of my life. I was afraid to eat out or travel or—the worst of it—to eat a normal meal with my family. I had to have complete control of everything I was eating.”

I’ve often seen the question posed of what distinguishes orthorexia from healthful eating, and I’ve written about it myself. I think the answer might be that anxiety and feeling of suffocation that Fossenbeck mentions. A particular kind of health-conscious eating style might be either self-caring or destructive; the difference rests in the mentality and subjective emotional experience of the individual in question.

I suspect that the dietetic and mental health treatment communities are just at the start of understanding this complicated expression of disordered eating. For now, the best we can hope for is more awareness, more observation and research, and an ongoing effort to enlist more people who have struggled with orthorexia to honestly share their stories. I’ve been giving lots of thought to recovery with NEDA week on the horizon, and this is nice motivation for me to use my voice.

5. I mentioned last week that the heart chakra and heart-opening are on my mind this month. With loving-kindness in mind, a sweet list to wrap up with.

Happy Sunday morning, everyone. I look forward to checking in with a hearty, colorful new winter salad recipe in a couple days.

xo

 The post Weekend Reading, 2.18.18 appeared first on The Full Helping.

Weekend Reading, 2.18.18 published first on https://storeseapharmacy.tumblr.com

[oovitus]

Weekend Reading, 2.18.18

The first time self-soothing was explained to me, it was by a friend who had her hands full taking care of a new baby. Self-soothing, she said, is when a baby develops the capacity to calm his or herself down. It’s seen as being key to uninterrupted nights of sleep for parents, since it allows babies to get back to rest if they should happen to wake up during the night.

A little while later, when I was exploring resources on coping with depression and anxiety, I learned that there’s such a thing as adult self-soothing, too. It may be an especially important skill to develop if you identify as a sensitive person or you feel the impact of emotions very strongly.

Self-soothing practices can take all sorts of shapes and forms; they may take one out of time and place, like going for a walk or practicing yoga in a special part of the home, or they might be as simple as listening to a particular song, sipping tea, breathing deeply, praying, singing, humming, reading poetry out loud, or smelling an essential oil. These, anyway, are my own favorite ways to self-soothe.

Two years ago at this time, my anxiety was so bad that I often didn’t want to leave the house. I did leave, going about my business and trying to perform as much competence as I could muster, but I felt as if I was falling apart. I was so on edge, so irritable, and so unable to hang onto a sense of safety or security. It really scared me, much more than my depression ever had.

Many months of therapy later, and I’m in a different place. But this week in particular gave me new skills to be grateful for. A few situations came up that triggered my anxiety, and I reacted, but I was able to stay connected to a fundamental sense that things would be OK. I’m not exactly sure what to attribute this to: my meditation practice? Learning to pay attention to my breath? Slowing down? Learning to say “no”? Reconnecting?

The answer is that all of these things, coupled with time and patience, have helped. I’m also starting to understand that quelling anxiety creates muscle memory; if you do it often enough, you start to believe, consciously and unconsciously, that it’s possible, and then it starts to happen more readily.

I know that I may manage my anxiety for a long time and possibly live with it always, just as I know I’ll always have brushes with depression and may always periodically encounter certain ED-related urges. In writing these words today, though, I realize how surprisingly calm I feel about my anxiety, which is sweetly ironic.

For the first time in a long time, I’m not alarmed by the fact that I have anxiety, not scared of it. I’ve been given signs that I have some of the tools I need to manage it. Maybe I’ll need to expand or change up my toolkit at some point, but that’s OK: toolkits can grow along with us. For now, merely knowing that I can get centered even in the midst of anxious feelings or thoughts is a major shift, one that gives me hope and a sense of spaciousness.

As always, wishing everyone peace and grounding as we head out into a fresh week. Enjoy these tasty recipes and reading links.

Recipes

There’s a mushroom miso barley soup recipe in Power Plates that I’ve become pretty attached to, but I can never get enough soup recipes, and I’m loving Natasha’s version, which is infused with Italian herbs and seasonings.

Wish someone had made these sweet buckwheat crepes for me on Valentine’s Day! Or that I’d gone ahead and made them for myself

This is my kind of potato salad: roasted potatoes, dill, vegan bacon, creamy garlic mayo. Perfect vegan comfort food.

Writing about Hannah’s book on Friday has me thinking about the art of creating really good food in very little time. It’s something I’m still figuring out. Lisa is one of the people I turn to for inspiration in this area, and her easy green curry noodles are a perfect example of a super speedy, flavorful, filling meal.

I tend to have lousy luck when I’m baking exclusively with grain free flours (I do OK when they’re part of a blend that has some wheat flour or gluten free grain flours in it). I’m always impressed with the way that Lindsay works wonders with grain-free baking that’s also vegan-friendly, and I’m dying to try her easy vegan white cake.

Reads

1. In spite of spending a fair amount of time around doctors—and anticipating a year of clinical work on the horizon—I had never really given much thought to what it must be like for doctors to return to full time work after being treated for an illness, especially the illness that they themselves specialize in.

That’s exactly the process that breast cancer surgeon Liz O’Riordon finds herself in now. I was touched by The Atlantic‘s profile of her, in which she admits to having new emotional challenges on the job, including sensitivities to hear certain diagnoses spoken of in dire terms and heightened awareness when delivering news to patients. The article says,

She [Liz] also takes more care with her language, and cringes at the memory of comments that were meant to be encouraging but now seem glib and unsympathetic. “I used to say: You’re lucky it hasn’t spread. No one is lucky to have cancer,” she says. “I used to ask people: Are you happy to sign this consent form? No one is happy to have cancer. As a doctor, you may give bad news 10 times a day. Until you’ve been on the other side, you don’t realize that when you get bad news, you remember every single detail of that conversation.”

There’s a lot of pressure for doctors and medical personnel to remain transparent, cool, and objective at all times, but my own limited experience in a helping profession is that personal struggle often gives way to empathy that can enhance one’s capacities as a practitioner. I hope that O’Riordan can indeed follow through on her hope to speak out more openly about her illness and encourage other doctors to do so with her.

2. Also on the topic of medicine and healthcare, a physician examines the concept of agape as it relates to healthcare. Agape is the ancient Greek term for selfless love of humanity; it’s seen as transcending difference or circumstance, which distinguishes it from filial or erotic love. Pooja Gidwani, a hospitalist, writes,

To me, agape means having the fortitude not only to empathize with patients or to provide compassionate care but to also habitually understand that each patient’s reactions may stem from their physical or mental suffering, past or current. To develop the ability to connect on a more spiritual level with the sufferer’s emotions despite their behaviors to truly be a healer. To put oneself in the shoes of each individual, remembering that everyone we meet is a product of what life has created for them.

I can’t think of a more beautiful summation of how agape can animate medical practice.

3. In the wake of the tragedy in Florida this past week, Vox sat down with Gerry Griffith, a crisis counselor with over 30 years of experience, to ask questions about what’s needed in the aftermath of shocking losses. She offers a lot of practical, detailed perspective on how crisis counselors respond to different stages of trauma among the people they’re helping, and she also has important things to say about the importance of addressing peoples’ sense of powerlessness after these kinds of events.

When asked how she continues to do this challenging work, she says,

I had a mentor, early, early on that said doing this work is learning how to keep your heart open in hell. I know what hell looks, tastes, like, and smells like.

I think, for me, there are people in my life that I can talk to about this. I have a husband, he’s proud of me and he supports me. When I’m out there in Oklahoma City or out in New York, I can call him and I can talk about how the dog, what she’s doing today. Because he’s not there.

Somebody asked me the other day: ”How would you know when you’re done?” I said, “When I stop crying.” When I stop feeling, when I don’t cry, my heart has closed and I have to quit.

I thought it was impressive that Griffith’s barometer of being fit for the task of counseling is having a strong capacity to feel. Something I want to keep in mind, in my own small way, for my future work with clients.

4. I really like Carrie Dennett’s reporting, and I was glad to see her in-depth consideration of orthorexia in the latest issue of Today’s Dietitian.

Orthorexia is a complex compulsion, often more difficult to address than other types of disordered eating because it is so often rooted in basically valuable efforts and intentions to eat healthfully and well. While anorexia put me in my most dire state of biological illness, I think overcoming orthorexia was in many ways a trickier challenge, because it was so hard to separate obsession and compulsion from the sincere value I place on mindful, conscious, health-supportive eating.

Dennett delves into all of the difficulties and complexities of addressing this syndrome, including the fact that, as of yet, there’s no consensus on a definition and no validated assessment tool. “Eating doesn’t become pathological until it becomes entangled with obsessive thinking, compulsive and ritualistic behavior, and self-punishment,” she notes, which echoed my own intuitive sense of what orthorexia is when I encounter it in my own work.

She also interviews Emily Fossenbeck, who is doing really important work in speaking up about her own experience with orthorexia and raising awareness on social media. Emily’s struggle with orthorexia began with elimination diets (a phenomenon I’ve observed often). She’s quoted saying,

“I only felt worse and worse but kept chasing this magical unicorn of the ‘perfect diet.’ The anxiety I felt about food was suffocating and totally overwhelmed most other parts of my life. I was afraid to eat out or travel or—the worst of it—to eat a normal meal with my family. I had to have complete control of everything I was eating.”

I’ve often seen the question posed of what distinguishes orthorexia from healthful eating, and I’ve written about it myself. I think the answer might be that anxiety and feeling of suffocation that Fossenbeck mentions. A particular kind of health-conscious eating style might be either self-caring or destructive; the difference rests in the mentality and subjective emotional experience of the individual in question.

I suspect that the dietetic and mental health treatment communities are just at the start of understanding this complicated expression of disordered eating. For now, the best we can hope for is more awareness, more observation and research, and an ongoing effort to enlist more people who have struggled with orthorexia to honestly share their stories. I’ve been giving lots of thought to recovery with NEDA week on the horizon, and this is nice motivation for me to use my voice.

5. I mentioned last week that the heart chakra and heart-opening are on my mind this month. With loving-kindness in mind, a sweet list to wrap up with.

Happy Sunday morning, everyone. I look forward to checking in with a hearty, colorful new winter salad recipe in a couple days.

xo

 The post Weekend Reading, 2.18.18 appeared first on The Full Helping.

Weekend Reading, 2.18.18 published first on https://storeseapharmacy.tumblr.com

[oovitus]

Weekend Reading, 2.18.18

The first time self-soothing was explained to me, it was by a friend who had her hands full taking care of a new baby. Self-soothing, she said, is when a baby develops the capacity to calm his or herself down. It’s seen as being key to uninterrupted nights of sleep for parents, since it allows babies to get back to rest if they should happen to wake up during the night.

A little while later, when I was exploring resources on coping with depression and anxiety, I learned that there’s such a thing as adult self-soothing, too. It may be an especially important skill to develop if you identify as a sensitive person or you feel the impact of emotions very strongly.

Self-soothing practices can take all sorts of shapes and forms; they may take one out of time and place, like going for a walk or practicing yoga in a special part of the home, or they might be as simple as listening to a particular song, sipping tea, breathing deeply, praying, singing, humming, reading poetry out loud, or smelling an essential oil. These, anyway, are my own favorite ways to self-soothe.

Two years ago at this time, my anxiety was so bad that I often didn’t want to leave the house. I did leave, going about my business and trying to perform as much competence as I could muster, but I felt as if I was falling apart. I was so on edge, so irritable, and so unable to hang onto a sense of safety or security. It really scared me, much more than my depression ever had.

Many months of therapy later, and I’m in a different place. But this week in particular gave me new skills to be grateful for. A few situations came up that triggered my anxiety, and I reacted, but I was able to stay connected to a fundamental sense that things would be OK. I’m not exactly sure what to attribute this to: my meditation practice? Learning to pay attention to my breath? Slowing down? Learning to say “no”? Reconnecting?

The answer is that all of these things, coupled with time and patience, have helped. I’m also starting to understand that quelling anxiety creates muscle memory; if you do it often enough, you start to believe, consciously and unconsciously, that it’s possible, and then it starts to happen more readily.

I know that I may manage my anxiety for a long time and possibly live with it always, just as I know I’ll always have brushes with depression and may always periodically encounter certain ED-related urges. In writing these words today, though, I realize how surprisingly calm I feel about my anxiety, which is sweetly ironic.

For the first time in a long time, I’m not alarmed by the fact that I have anxiety, not scared of it. I’ve been given signs that I have some of the tools I need to manage it. Maybe I’ll need to expand or change up my toolkit at some point, but that’s OK: toolkits can grow along with us. For now, merely knowing that I can get centered even in the midst of anxious feelings or thoughts is a major shift, one that gives me hope and a sense of spaciousness.

As always, wishing everyone peace and grounding as we head out into a fresh week. Enjoy these tasty recipes and reading links.

Recipes

There’s a mushroom miso barley soup recipe in Power Plates that I’ve become pretty attached to, but I can never get enough soup recipes, and I’m loving Natasha’s version, which is infused with Italian herbs and seasonings.

Wish someone had made these sweet buckwheat crepes for me on Valentine’s Day! Or that I’d gone ahead and made them for myself

This is my kind of potato salad: roasted potatoes, dill, vegan bacon, creamy garlic mayo. Perfect vegan comfort food.

Writing about Hannah’s book on Friday has me thinking about the art of creating really good food in very little time. It’s something I’m still figuring out. Lisa is one of the people I turn to for inspiration in this area, and her easy green curry noodles are a perfect example of a super speedy, flavorful, filling meal.

I tend to have lousy luck when I’m baking exclusively with grain free flours (I do OK when they’re part of a blend that has some wheat flour or gluten free grain flours in it). I’m always impressed with the way that Lindsay works wonders with grain-free baking that’s also vegan-friendly, and I’m dying to try her easy vegan white cake.

Reads

1. In spite of spending a fair amount of time around doctors—and anticipating a year of clinical work on the horizon—I had never really given much thought to what it must be like for doctors to return to full time work after being treated for an illness, especially the illness that they themselves specialize in.

That’s exactly the process that breast cancer surgeon Liz O’Riordon finds herself in now. I was touched by The Atlantic‘s profile of her, in which she admits to having new emotional challenges on the job, including sensitivities to hear certain diagnoses spoken of in dire terms and heightened awareness when delivering news to patients. The article says,

She [Liz] also takes more care with her language, and cringes at the memory of comments that were meant to be encouraging but now seem glib and unsympathetic. “I used to say: You’re lucky it hasn’t spread. No one is lucky to have cancer,” she says. “I used to ask people: Are you happy to sign this consent form? No one is happy to have cancer. As a doctor, you may give bad news 10 times a day. Until you’ve been on the other side, you don’t realize that when you get bad news, you remember every single detail of that conversation.”

There’s a lot of pressure for doctors and medical personnel to remain transparent, cool, and objective at all times, but my own limited experience in a helping profession is that personal struggle often gives way to empathy that can enhance one’s capacities as a practitioner. I hope that O’Riordan can indeed follow through on her hope to speak out more openly about her illness and encourage other doctors to do so with her.

2. Also on the topic of medicine and healthcare, a physician examines the concept of agape as it relates to healthcare. Agape is the ancient Greek term for selfless love of humanity; it’s seen as transcending difference or circumstance, which distinguishes it from filial or erotic love. Pooja Gidwani, a hospitalist, writes,

To me, agape means having the fortitude not only to empathize with patients or to provide compassionate care but to also habitually understand that each patient’s reactions may stem from their physical or mental suffering, past or current. To develop the ability to connect on a more spiritual level with the sufferer’s emotions despite their behaviors to truly be a healer. To put oneself in the shoes of each individual, remembering that everyone we meet is a product of what life has created for them.

I can’t think of a more beautiful summation of how agape can animate medical practice.

3. In the wake of the tragedy in Florida this past week, Vox sat down with Gerry Griffith, a crisis counselor with over 30 years of experience, to ask questions about what’s needed in the aftermath of shocking losses. She offers a lot of practical, detailed perspective on how crisis counselors respond to different stages of trauma among the people they’re helping, and she also has important things to say about the importance of addressing peoples’ sense of powerlessness after these kinds of events.

When asked how she continues to do this challenging work, she says,

I had a mentor, early, early on that said doing this work is learning how to keep your heart open in hell. I know what hell looks, tastes, like, and smells like.

I think, for me, there are people in my life that I can talk to about this. I have a husband, he’s proud of me and he supports me. When I’m out there in Oklahoma City or out in New York, I can call him and I can talk about how the dog, what she’s doing today. Because he’s not there.

Somebody asked me the other day: ”How would you know when you’re done?” I said, “When I stop crying.” When I stop feeling, when I don’t cry, my heart has closed and I have to quit.

I thought it was impressive that Griffith’s barometer of being fit for the task of counseling is having a strong capacity to feel. Something I want to keep in mind, in my own small way, for my future work with clients.

4. I really like Carrie Dennett’s reporting, and I was glad to see her in-depth consideration of orthorexia in the latest issue of Today’s Dietitian.

Orthorexia is a complex compulsion, often more difficult to address than other types of disordered eating because it is so often rooted in basically valuable efforts and intentions to eat healthfully and well. While anorexia put me in my most dire state of biological illness, I think overcoming orthorexia was in many ways a trickier challenge, because it was so hard to separate obsession and compulsion from the sincere value I place on mindful, conscious, health-supportive eating.

Dennett delves into all of the difficulties and complexities of addressing this syndrome, including the fact that, as of yet, there’s no consensus on a definition and no validated assessment tool. “Eating doesn’t become pathological until it becomes entangled with obsessive thinking, compulsive and ritualistic behavior, and self-punishment,” she notes, which echoed my own intuitive sense of what orthorexia is when I encounter it in my own work.

She also interviews Emily Fossenbeck, who is doing really important work in speaking up about her own experience with orthorexia and raising awareness on social media. Emily’s struggle with orthorexia began with elimination diets (a phenomenon I’ve observed often). She’s quoted saying,

“I only felt worse and worse but kept chasing this magical unicorn of the ‘perfect diet.’ The anxiety I felt about food was suffocating and totally overwhelmed most other parts of my life. I was afraid to eat out or travel or—the worst of it—to eat a normal meal with my family. I had to have complete control of everything I was eating.”

I’ve often seen the question posed of what distinguishes orthorexia from healthful eating, and I’ve written about it myself. I think the answer might be that anxiety and feeling of suffocation that Fossenbeck mentions. A particular kind of health-conscious eating style might be either self-caring or destructive; the difference rests in the mentality and subjective emotional experience of the individual in question.

I suspect that the dietetic and mental health treatment communities are just at the start of understanding this complicated expression of disordered eating. For now, the best we can hope for is more awareness, more observation and research, and an ongoing effort to enlist more people who have struggled with orthorexia to honestly share their stories. I’ve been giving lots of thought to recovery with NEDA week on the horizon, and this is nice motivation for me to use my voice.

5. I mentioned last week that the heart chakra and heart-opening are on my mind this month. With loving-kindness in mind, a sweet list to wrap up with.

Happy Sunday morning, everyone. I look forward to checking in with a hearty, colorful new winter salad recipe in a couple days.

xo

 The post Weekend Reading, 2.18.18 appeared first on The Full Helping.

Weekend Reading, 2.18.18 published first on

[oovitus]

Weekend Reading, 2.18.18

The first time self-soothing was explained to me, it was by a friend who had her hands full taking care of a new baby. Self-soothing, she said, is when a baby develops the capacity to calm his or herself down. It’s seen as being key to uninterrupted nights of sleep for parents, since it allows babies to get back to rest if they should happen to wake up during the night.

A little while later, when I was exploring resources on coping with depression and anxiety, I learned that there’s such a thing as adult self-soothing, too. It may be an especially important skill to develop if you identify as a sensitive person or you feel the impact of emotions very strongly.

Self-soothing practices can take all sorts of shapes and forms; they may take one out of time and place, like going for a walk or practicing yoga in a special part of the home, or they might be as simple as listening to a particular song, sipping tea, breathing deeply, praying, singing, humming, reading poetry out loud, or smelling an essential oil. These, anyway, are my own favorite ways to self-soothe.

Two years ago at this time, my anxiety was so bad that I often didn’t want to leave the house. I did leave, going about my business and trying to perform as much competence as I could muster, but I felt as if I was falling apart. I was so on edge, so irritable, and so unable to hang onto a sense of safety or security. It really scared me, much more than my depression ever had.

Many months of therapy later, and I’m in a different place. But this week in particular gave me new skills to be grateful for. A few situations came up that triggered my anxiety, and I reacted, but I was able to stay connected to a fundamental sense that things would be OK. I’m not exactly sure what to attribute this to: my meditation practice? Learning to pay attention to my breath? Slowing down? Learning to say “no”? Reconnecting?

The answer is that all of these things, coupled with time and patience, have helped. I’m also starting to understand that quelling anxiety creates muscle memory; if you do it often enough, you start to believe, consciously and unconsciously, that it’s possible, and then it starts to happen more readily.

I know that I may manage my anxiety for a long time and possibly live with it always, just as I know I’ll always have brushes with depression and may always periodically encounter certain ED-related urges. In writing these words today, though, I realize how surprisingly calm I feel about my anxiety, which is sweetly ironic.

For the first time in a long time, I’m not alarmed by the fact that I have anxiety, not scared of it. I’ve been given signs that I have some of the tools I need to manage it. Maybe I’ll need to expand or change up my toolkit at some point, but that’s OK: toolkits can grow along with us. For now, merely knowing that I can get centered even in the midst of anxious feelings or thoughts is a major shift, one that gives me hope and a sense of spaciousness.

As always, wishing everyone peace and grounding as we head out into a fresh week. Enjoy these tasty recipes and reading links.

Recipes

There’s a mushroom miso barley soup recipe in Power Plates that I’ve become pretty attached to, but I can never get enough soup recipes, and I’m loving Natasha’s version, which is infused with Italian herbs and seasonings.

Wish someone had made these sweet buckwheat crepes for me on Valentine’s Day! Or that I’d gone ahead and made them for myself

This is my kind of potato salad: roasted potatoes, dill, vegan bacon, creamy garlic mayo. Perfect vegan comfort food.

Writing about Hannah’s book on Friday has me thinking about the art of creating really good food in very little time. It’s something I’m still figuring out. Lisa is one of the people I turn to for inspiration in this area, and her easy green curry noodles are a perfect example of a super speedy, flavorful, filling meal.

I tend to have lousy luck when I’m baking exclusively with grain free flours (I do OK when they’re part of a blend that has some wheat flour or gluten free grain flours in it). I’m always impressed with the way that Lindsay works wonders with grain-free baking that’s also vegan-friendly, and I’m dying to try her easy vegan white cake.

Reads

1. In spite of spending a fair amount of time around doctors—and anticipating a year of clinical work on the horizon—I had never really given much thought to what it must be like for doctors to return to full time work after being treated for an illness, especially the illness that they themselves specialize in.

That’s exactly the process that breast cancer surgeon Liz O’Riordon finds herself in now. I was touched by The Atlantic‘s profile of her, in which she admits to having new emotional challenges on the job, including sensitivities to hear certain diagnoses spoken of in dire terms and heightened awareness when delivering news to patients. The article says,

She [Liz] also takes more care with her language, and cringes at the memory of comments that were meant to be encouraging but now seem glib and unsympathetic. “I used to say: You’re lucky it hasn’t spread. No one is lucky to have cancer,” she says. “I used to ask people: Are you happy to sign this consent form? No one is happy to have cancer. As a doctor, you may give bad news 10 times a day. Until you’ve been on the other side, you don’t realize that when you get bad news, you remember every single detail of that conversation.”

There’s a lot of pressure for doctors and medical personnel to remain transparent, cool, and objective at all times, but my own limited experience in a helping profession is that personal struggle often gives way to empathy that can enhance one’s capacities as a practitioner. I hope that O’Riordan can indeed follow through on her hope to speak out more openly about her illness and encourage other doctors to do so with her.

2. Also on the topic of medicine and healthcare, a physician examines the concept of agape as it relates to healthcare. Agape is the ancient Greek term for selfless love of humanity; it’s seen as transcending difference or circumstance, which distinguishes it from filial or erotic love. Pooja Gidwani, a hospitalist, writes,

To me, agape means having the fortitude not only to empathize with patients or to provide compassionate care but to also habitually understand that each patient’s reactions may stem from their physical or mental suffering, past or current. To develop the ability to connect on a more spiritual level with the sufferer’s emotions despite their behaviors to truly be a healer. To put oneself in the shoes of each individual, remembering that everyone we meet is a product of what life has created for them.

I can’t think of a more beautiful summation of how agape can animate medical practice.

3. In the wake of the tragedy in Florida this past week, Vox sat down with Gerry Griffith, a crisis counselor with over 30 years of experience, to ask questions about what’s needed in the aftermath of shocking losses. She offers a lot of practical, detailed perspective on how crisis counselors respond to different stages of trauma among the people they’re helping, and she also has important things to say about the importance of addressing peoples’ sense of powerlessness after these kinds of events.

When asked how she continues to do this challenging work, she says,

I had a mentor, early, early on that said doing this work is learning how to keep your heart open in hell. I know what hell looks, tastes, like, and smells like.

I think, for me, there are people in my life that I can talk to about this. I have a husband, he’s proud of me and he supports me. When I’m out there in Oklahoma City or out in New York, I can call him and I can talk about how the dog, what she’s doing today. Because he’s not there.

Somebody asked me the other day: ”How would you know when you’re done?” I said, “When I stop crying.” When I stop feeling, when I don’t cry, my heart has closed and I have to quit.

I thought it was impressive that Griffith’s barometer of being fit for the task of counseling is having a strong capacity to feel. Something I want to keep in mind, in my own small way, for my future work with clients.

4. I really like Carrie Dennett’s reporting, and I was glad to see her in-depth consideration of orthorexia in the latest issue of Today’s Dietitian.

Orthorexia is a complex compulsion, often more difficult to address than other types of disordered eating because it is so often rooted in basically valuable efforts and intentions to eat healthfully and well. While anorexia put me in my most dire state of biological illness, I think overcoming orthorexia was in many ways a trickier challenge, because it was so hard to separate obsession and compulsion from the sincere value I place on mindful, conscious, health-supportive eating.

Dennett delves into all of the difficulties and complexities of addressing this syndrome, including the fact that, as of yet, there’s no consensus on a definition and no validated assessment tool. “Eating doesn’t become pathological until it becomes entangled with obsessive thinking, compulsive and ritualistic behavior, and self-punishment,” she notes, which echoed my own intuitive sense of what orthorexia is when I encounter it in my own work.

She also interviews Emily Fossenbeck, who is doing really important work in speaking up about her own experience with orthorexia and raising awareness on social media. Emily’s struggle with orthorexia began with elimination diets (a phenomenon I’ve observed often). She’s quoted saying,

“I only felt worse and worse but kept chasing this magical unicorn of the ‘perfect diet.’ The anxiety I felt about food was suffocating and totally overwhelmed most other parts of my life. I was afraid to eat out or travel or—the worst of it—to eat a normal meal with my family. I had to have complete control of everything I was eating.”

I’ve often seen the question posed of what distinguishes orthorexia from healthful eating, and I’ve written about it myself. I think the answer might be that anxiety and feeling of suffocation that Fossenbeck mentions. A particular kind of health-conscious eating style might be either self-caring or destructive; the difference rests in the mentality and subjective emotional experience of the individual in question.

I suspect that the dietetic and mental health treatment communities are just at the start of understanding this complicated expression of disordered eating. For now, the best we can hope for is more awareness, more observation and research, and an ongoing effort to enlist more people who have struggled with orthorexia to honestly share their stories. I’ve been giving lots of thought to recovery with NEDA week on the horizon, and this is nice motivation for me to use my voice.

5. I mentioned last week that the heart chakra and heart-opening are on my mind this month. With loving-kindness in mind, a sweet list to wrap up with.

Happy Sunday morning, everyone. I look forward to checking in with a hearty, colorful new winter salad recipe in a couple days.

xo

 The post Weekend Reading, 2.18.18 appeared first on The Full Helping.

Weekend Reading, 2.18.18 published first on