My new short story, Blood Bonds, is now at Amazon for Kindle. The Chinese vampire Fu Sheng is dismayed to learn that the Rufus family, a clan of Roman-era vampires, have arrived in Desert City, the place Fu Sheng calls home in the futuristic New Galaxy. Fu Sheng is invited to a Rufus family wedding, discovering murder and fraud along the way. www.amazon.com/dp/B00EXUJ3WY 99 cents
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The paranormal is a cultural phenomenon. Fascination with the spirit world goes back thousands of years, when civilized people had enough time to ask themselves and others about what happens after death. Do we cease to exist? If our awareness changes, how? Where do we go? These questions continue to haunt; so thus, we are drawn to the haunted.
Last Friday, I went to the movies to see The Conjuring. As I watched, my interest in the work Ed and Lorraine Warren grew. Long standing figures in paranormal research, the Warrens have been seen on TV shows and had written books based on their experiences. I recently discovered their basement museum; one of the pieces definitely getting the Hollywood treatment-Annabelle the possessed doll. In The Conjuring, that doll looks like Chucky's psychotic little sister. In real life, Annabelle is a Raggedy Ann. This is what is happening to the paranormal-it's becoming too normal in its commercialism. The paranormal and supernatural have always been moneymakers for Hollywood since the era of the silent movie. Television naturally followed, but ghosts and other monsters are popular in troubled times; we want the dark magic that surrounds these figures. A creaking step, a faint whisper, an object in the wrong place; no witchcraft here, just scripted 'reality' TV. I started out a fan of ghost hunting reality shows, my favorite the plumbers-by-day, ghost-hunters by night on the SciFi (now SyFy) Channel. The concept was fairly new then, the ghost hunters likable people. Sometimes they found something-an interesting EVP recording or something on videotape-or maybe they found nothing at all. Jason and Grant did not dress like bikers or like Adam Levine from Maroon 5 but with a few less tattoos. Ghost hunter as rock star had not happened yet, but the glut of imitators soon followed, and I started to lose interest. Donna Lacroix, a former SyFy ghost hunter, mentioned in an interview that the show had become 'fake'. When the very people who claim to want to debunk the fakes are becoming fakes themselves, then a bad influence has taken over-most likely, the promise of a piece of the paranormal pie. Enough money and fame can change almost anyone's mind, integrity stretched thin. Donna Lacroix later denied what she said but as the ghost hunters, ghost adventurers, and psychic kids in a paranormal state keep going, its getting harder to separate the sincere from the con artists. I'm a skeptic, but also open-minded and imaginative. Was the Amityville house really haunted or a hoax? Or the home in the Conjuring? These places were reported to have no paranormal activity after the afflicted families moved out. This has been attributed to the families being more psychically 'sensitive' than other people. But tragedy haunted both of these homes, and even I believe that people and places can only take so much loss and death. Haunted areas such as Gettysburg are known to be very active, along with old castles and cemeteries. A person could travel all around the world searching for ghosts, but they're elusive creatures. From television, I've learned that there are residual hauntings, intelligent hauntings, and 'elementals', which are sometimes demons. I am not a conventionally religious person, I don't believe a brush with the paranormal can easily turn into a battle of good versus evil. I don't believe in demonic possession, although I do believe in reincarnation (I know, interesting dichotomy). But I do believe that people can be severely mentally ill and exorcism can have a cleansing effect on the psyche of some troubled people. Having suffered from anxiety and depression in the past, I felt a bit 'possessed' by my illness. If religious faith gives a painfully troubled mind some comfort, I think that's fine. I have discovered a new SyFy show, Haunted Collector, that specializes in possessed objects. Possession goes back to ancient Greece, when the oracles were hosts for various gods or goddesses when they deigned to speak to mortals. Spirit possession is also the foundation for voodoo, which brings me back to dolls. I had a friend who was afraid of clowns, but her fear was nothing compared to my nightmare of being locked in a room full of old Victorian dolls. Their faces are just too...life-like. They look human, but they're not. When I was a kid, I played with Barbies, but Barbie was different. I also dislike mannequins. A movie like The Conjuring works because so much of the story is more suggested than shown, until the very end, when we see the real face of the evil that is tormenting the family. When Ed Warren calls its name, the evil goes away. The face of the enemy is always changing, but the truth is the truth. The sincerity of people like the Warrens can't be denied, considering the decades they spent with their research and devoting their lives to helping others. But, after the craze dies down, the ghosts will continue to haunt, relieved that the living don't come around as much anymore. :) My family has been the subject of many of my blog posts. Most of my relatives don't read my blog and I have no intention of making my loved ones look bad. However, when relatives are willing to share a memory I was not aware of, I'm all ears. I'm not searching for scandal, just the truth.
My paternal great-grandmother, my father's father's mother, did not have an easy life, and this might have contributed to her coldness and rigidity. Born in 1888, her childhood included abuse and her father serving time in prison for sexually abusing one of Great-Grandma's sisters. Upon his release, he returned to his family at some point. This info was given to me second hand, so I can't guarantee its accuracy. But nothing happens in a vacuum, every story has to start somewhere. Child abuse is an ugly stain that can be found on every branch of a family tree; the roots burying stillbirths, miscarriages, absentee fathers, and young mothers dying in childbirth. My great-grandfather's first wife died while giving birth, as did my other paternal great-grandmother, giving birth to my grandmother. Grandma and her two siblings were scattered; her brother, already a teenager, ran away to Oregon to find his father, Grandma's sister was placed in foster care, and Grandma also grew up in the foster system, most likely abused and treated more like an indentured servant than a child. She must have been very lonely until she was reunited with her brother and sister. She was around twenty years old at this time, already a mother. She would drink, the alcoholism taking her life at fifty-two years old. She also was not an easy person; her temper and moods erratic as she aged. She had felt disliked by her in-laws, my tough great-grandmother couldn't stand her, considering Grandma trash because she already had a child before she met my grandfather. People were not so tolerant then, and my great-grandparents were Victorian. My great-grandpa was known to be a nice guy, more generous, but his wife also disliked her other son's wife, who had children from a previous marriage. As the mother of twelve, who had raised a step-son of her own, she had a serious problem with her daughters-in-law. She could make my grandma cry, not to mention my aunt, who had a different father. When they would visit, Dad and my uncle would get candy, but not my aunt, because she wasn't 'really' a grandchild. I didn't know it was such a big deal, my dad always treated my aunt like a beloved sister, as did my uncle. Grandpa treated her as a daughter, she always called him Dad. I always thought that Grandpa had more of a fondness for kids that were not his own; he had a tendency to spend more time with my aunt and his stepchildren from his second marriage as he grew older. He didn't seem to have much use for my brothers and me. He would make chauvinistic remarks about my weight, but I'd ignore him. I resemble my dad and my grandma. When Grandpa had to look at my face and body as a young adult, he may have been reminded of the overweight, self-destructive, alcoholic first wife he divorced but ended up nursing towards the end of her life. When he died, Grandma was not even mentioned at the memorial service; the focus more on his relationship with his second wife and her children. My mom was also a step-daughter, her father was not a part of her life, and she never forgave him, although she seems quite proud of her Irish ancestry, forcing me to the internet ancestry databases to find out more. She was horrified(I'm serious) to find out that her mother's mother's people were not Irish, but Germans from Switzerland. Now, she can only claim the Irish on her father's side, from County Cork. Why was the ancestor search important? Because the appearance of family is sometimes better than dealing with the reality. I became the curator of family lore following my search ten years ago for my tough great-grandmother's Native American roots. Contrary to the painful memories of her now-elderly surviving children, including my grandfather, my great-aunt, Grandpa's younger sister, told me what she could abo. That's when I learned about my great-great-grandfather's prison sentence. My great-aunt, who was always fond of my father, tried to warn me then, telling me that I might not like what I found. Only now do I understand what she meant. I never found Great-Grandma's Native heritage, but I learned some things about her as a person, some good, some bad. My aunt said she was cold and ruthless, no outsiders warmly accepted. But she loved her husband very much and took care of all of her twelve children. She was brave in her own way, because she didn't always care what other people thought of her. If she was alive, I don't know if I'd like her, but I would have to respect her. However, as I get older, I can imagine giving her a hug. She might not like it, but I don't care, she's still family. :) Alcoholism is an epidemic in my hometown of Muskegon, Michigan. If you don't drink, you're either religious or too unhealthy or too old. The funny thing is that most of the religious, sick, or elderly in my town were all drunks at one time. Like most sicknesses, it begins in the home.
Underaged drinking is tolerated in Muskegon more than one might think because it is not uncommon for young people to get drunk with their parents. People in their teens and twenties get stuck paying huge fines for too many DUIs along with having their driver's licenses revoked, making getting to work difficult, the paycheck used to pay off the fines. The parents end up helping, only making the situation worse. The fines are then paid, with the parents taking their almost-grown and grown children to work and school, but the kid starts drinking again. Most teens don't drink to savor the taste of a good wine or fine liquor; they want to get drunk. I won't bring other substances into it, but alcohol is the ultimate gateway drug. The social acceptance alone is enough to make an alcoholic of anyone. How many of us grew up watching our parents get drunk at home or anywhere else? My dad would get angry at my brothers for so much as bringing one joint into the house, but the refrigerator was stocked with beer. I thought nothing of it when I was growing up, but now I realize the hypocrisy. Alcohol was so ingrained into the fabric of my family, especially with my dad, that drinking was the only lifestyle worth having; to think of being dry forever was not only depressing, but deceitful. Sober people are pompous and annoying. A good buzz is okay, right? A buzz is achieved with two or three drinks, but a few is not enough for the alcoholic. They don't know when to stop, even if they get sick and end up in the hospital. Alcohol poisoning is only a bump in the road for some. Staying dry is hard in hot weather(that lemonade needs...something). Alcohol poisoning is harmless compared to drunk driving. It's not a Saturday night in Muskegon without someone going to the emergency room after being pulled out of a vehicle with help from the Jaws of Life. Death-nothing more sobering. Holidays are just as worse. Or weddings. Domestic violence competes with unemployment in terms of statistics in Muskegon. I've heard enough stories of men beating their wives when they're drunk, friends and relatives alike. My dad never hit my mom, but heavy drinking didn't exactly bring out his charm. I remember only seeing my mother drunk a few times; she quit drinking by the time I was six years old. She would go out to the bars so she and Dad would have something in common. When she quit, the divide became wider between them. Growing up, it seemed to me like everyone's dad was an alcoholic; as long as the fathers worked, the mothers tolerated the drinking, because Dad's paycheck is sacred. If he loses his job because of the drinking, then he has a problem. My dad never went to work drunk, I guess he knew better, but what use is a father who is wasted everywhere else? My father, during his heavy drinking days, wasn't home much. He knew my mother was disgusted with him, and this led to him leaving us for about three weeks. When he came back, nothing much changed, he gave off the impression he had been dragged home. His moods were nasty. The alcohol was drowning his brain, just like his mother, who had died around that time. Grandma died at the age of fifty-two in a nursing home, the alcohol slowly destroying her. She had dragged my dad, his siblings, and Grandpa through the mud. I learned to equate drinking with madness and death at a young age. Getting wasted is amusing for a while when you're not even twenty-one years old yet, and I went through that stage. But that behavior is sad after thirty. You're getting older, but your drinking buddies are getting younger. You distance yourself from family, you have few goals or interests. Alcoholics, like any other addicts, are boring people. It can make depressed slobs out of the most brilliant individuals. The list of those people are endless, but I worry the most about the boozers I love. The hard part is realizing that the addict/alcoholic is only responsible for themselves, and loved ones have to stop caring for the sake of their own mental health, and tough love is hard. Meanwhile, the circle of disease goes around and around, like some demented amusement park ride, only stopping long enough to throw out a body. My ebooks are all currently exclusive to Amazon for Kindle and no longer free, unless you are a Prime member, but most are 99 cents, except for Consumed and Blood In Trust. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00AUQFFU4 This link will take you to the Karma House ebook page, but I also have an author page at that can take you to the other book pages. Karma House is also still available in paperback at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Consumed and Blood and Trust can also be found at Nook as downloads. Thanks :)
Jessica Heeringa is the same age as the my oldest niece. Like my niece, she is petite and blonde and the mother of one young child. Jessica, although I had never met her, is no longer a stranger to me; not necessarily because she resembles my niece, but her disappearance is also a sad reminder of how retail employees are undervalued in their places of work.
The Exxon station where Jessica worked as a clerk had no security cameras installed in the parking lot. Where I work, there are also no cameras in the lot; an extra cost the company does not want to cover. Besides, the Norton Shores area, where the Exxon station is located, is known for not having a lot of crime. The perfect place for an abduction at night. I don't think Jessica was forced into the silver minivan that took her away; I think she trusted the driver, even a little bit. As a store clerk who worked the night shift, she must have understood the need to be watchful, careful. She worked alone in that store, and I'm sure she had dealt with the occasional drunk or weirdo. Various men, not knowing she was a mother and in a relationship with her son's father, probably tried to chat her up in the store. At K-Mart, where I work, this is not uncommon. Some of our female associates have 'stalkers,' although no one takes it seriously. Many people come and go from the store, but some faces become familiar. These customers learn your name and say hello. Fine. Except when one of them figures out which vehicle in the parking lot belongs to you. Creepy guys come and go; acceptable, as long they keep going. The disturbing thing about Jessica Heeringa's disappearance, in my opinion, is that no one noticed she was gone from the Exxon station until a few customers started to notice that no clerk was in the store. Someone called 911, but no one was too concerned until they noticed Jessica's vehicle in the parking lot. In hours, the race was on to find her; the police, volunteer search groups, donations, and fundraisers. The Muskegon Chronicle covered the story almost daily, as did the local news; the Grand Rapids and Kalamazoo stations deigning to come to Norton Shores to report on Jessica's disappearance, which was 'important' enough for WOODTV to use their gas to drive over forty miles to Norton Shores and park their van at the Exxon station parking lot. There was even a segment on Good Morning America. The flyers with Jessica's picture and description, along with a sketch of the 'suspect' behind the wheel of the minivan, are everywhere in Muskegon, even on vehicles. Some of these are parked in the lot at K-Mart but, as the colors on the flyers fade, time is running out for Jessica. Those first forty-eight hours are very important, more time makes her seem more far away. Her son has been told by her family that his mother is 'lost,' and this can suffice for a small child, but the unknown continues to nag at everyone else. A small amount of blood that leads to nothing, a pair of glasses found in the woods that turned out not to be hers. I wonder if her parents can sleep at night, or her son's father, the worry must be overwhelming at times. If she is alive, where is she? Is she being abused or held captive somewhere? Did she just run away? Why? It wasn't likely she would leave her child. If she is dead, how far away are her remains? I can only imagine and wait, like her family and friends. Thousands of anonymous tips are being looked into by police, but most are bogus, a waste of time and money. I think the story of Jessica's disappearance went nationwide due in part because of the millions of Americans, male and female, who work at a cash register for a living. The industrial jobs are drying up, and there are college graduates at the register, earning minimum wage while waiting for the economy to improve. Would Jessica Heeringa have disappeared if she had been working in a factory, surrounded by a crew of co-workers? No, I don't think so. My brother frequents the Speedway station near his home. One night, he came into the store. His neighbor works as a clerk, and he spoke with her as he paid for his items. Besides my brother, there was one other customer, a man who had been walking around, but not picking out anything. The female clerk, alone in the store, asked my brother to hang around until the man left. The same thing happened years ago with my dad, at a store he used to frequent to buy beer and cigarettes. The female clerk also asked Dad to hang around for a while until the creepy guy left. No one knows for sure if Jessica was outside, behind the store for a cigarette break, or if she was inside when her abductor showed up in his minivan. No outdoor security cameras, but the inside cameras, to spot shoplifters, could have caught her going out the front door. Possibly she went out a back door? I used to work alone at a thrift store years ago on Sundays, and if I was alone outside after dark, and a minivan was approaching me, I'd run. Vans are creepy, so my guess is that Jessica recognized the driver. In the sketch, he has a thin nose and a small chin. Not much to go on. Jessica's return, I think, is now up to God. The tips will stop coming in and less police will be involved. Her son will keep growing and life will move forward. I was told by a cashier at K-Mart that Jessica used to come in as a frequent customer. I try to recall a young, petite blonde with glasses, but I wonder if it is just my imagination. In the great rush of living, the only thing that makes us stop and see, really see, is when tragedy occurs. It shouldn't be like that, we shouldn't be so careless, but what was on Jessica's mind when she was driving to work that night? Probably the same as mine; let's finish this shift, so I can go home. The book business is like any other business; at the mercy of trends, the economy, and the status quo. With the advent of the technology and self-publishing, many agents are hustling now more than ever.
Agents are not pimps; most of them really want to help a talented author sell a good book. These college graduates, with degrees in english and law, wade through piles and piles (mountains, to be more exact) of submissions. The economy no longer allows for the hiring of some young person to act as assistant, so the agents frequently do this duty themselves; scrolling through a massive amount of digital submissions, looking for that golden needle in the haystack. I don't envy the agent who has to do their own grunt work. This is why the writer is left waiting for weeks or months before getting the form rejection e-mail. Nothing personal, the same form was sent out to many other writers on the same day. An agent didn't get back to me until a year later, this agency a big, well-known agency. I grew tired of looking for an agent, not because anyone was mean to me, but because I couldn't seem to bend and twist my writing into anything a busy agent would want to deal with. They want paranormal YA, but I don't do paranormal with YA. Romance? I don't do love stories, more as a subplot. Literary fiction? What the Hell is that? Something Oprah would read? Zombies? No, gross. Dystopian? I'll have to look that up in the dictionary. How about time-traveling gay zombies who fall in love? I don't want to feel pressured to write something I don't care about. The indifference will show on the page if I try to write a futuristic story about members of a royal family that are really cannibal aliens from a famine-plagued planet. I'm not even picking up the damn pen to write something I wouldn't read for free. Agents, however, are wise to keep up with trends and markets. Publishers do the same. If a self-published book on Amazon makes enough of a splash, this book could create a new trend that traditional publishers will be watching. Agents can always change what they're looking for in terms of genre, depending on the editors they know. Writers may sometimes feel they are jumping through hoops to get published, dreaming of that big advance. This can cause anxiety and depression, which chokes creativity. A sensible agent would tell you to write the story you want to tell, because the chances of the book being a huge best-seller are so slim, that the author might as well get off while writing it, because any other pay-off is unlikely. There are agents who discover brilliant manuscripts, but decide to pass for many reasons. Former book editors, laid off from their publishing houses, are becoming agents while former agents are getting jobs as free-lance editors or going into marketing or promotions. Their worlds are changing and the mid-list is disappearing inside self-publishing. The 'quiet, well-written book' is getting another life in e-publishing, but the author suffers because the money isn't the same. An author can self-publish several books on Amazon KDP, but it seems as if the only books that are downloaded the most are .99 cents or free for members. Anything over a dollar is hard to move without paying for a lot of promotion. The author ends up investing more into the book than the royalties can ever repay. This is where an agent comes in handy in the traditional print world because nothing comes between them and their commission. Agents have bills, too. I have four novels published and have earned about six dollars in royalties. Not from Amazon, haven't received a dime from KDP yet. I completed a novel four years ago and sent out almost two hundred queries. Many of these agents asked for pages, which I promptly sent. All rejections. The book was YA with a gothic slant. The agents liked the premise, but not the execution. They didn't like my style. I accepted my failure, but started to feel a bit burned-out by the query experience. I later sent out as many queries for The Last Girl, and the cold reception left me shocked, with many agents not even bothering to respond with a form rejection. I started to consider other alternatives. Big literary success is in the luck of the draw, just like the pretty blonde actress who auditions for one role after another until she gets a break on a soap opera or a tampon commercial. There's no easy way to deal with so much rejection, so expectations have to be readjusted, self-esteem kept in a cool, dry place. The writer will want to write again, free of the imaginary disapproval of agents that the writer will probably never meet. These agents are too busy working for the writers who are already their clients, and the job of selling a book to a major publisher is more difficult than ever with publishing companies struggling to stay afloat. Every blockbuster novel, every DaVinci Code or Twilight or Fifty Shades of Gray, is the exception, not the rule. However, every writer should value themselves more, because writing a novel isn't easy and there's always hope for some kind of emotional pay-off, even if it's found in self-publishing with less than a hundred people downloading the book you've been working on for years, the story you think about at work and in your dreams(I sigh as I write those words). A good agent understands how hard writers work, but they also work hard, hoping to discover the next great book in that bloated inbox, hoping to make a dream real. :) Angry women are just as 'dangerous' as any other minority. Maybe the problem is that women are not as angry as they used to be. When was the last time I saw any feminist-related demonstrations on the news? Did women let go of the struggle for equal rights in favor of complacency? Or fear? Did most women, especially Generation X and Y, decide that the struggle wasn't worth it? Exhibit A: The Internet, on so many levels.
The porn industry dominates the Web, and I wonder if this has something to do with some(okay, many)perfectly intelligent, educated women getting bigger boobs, fat, glossy lips, brazilian waxes(ouch), and butt implants, looking almost like drag queens. Men face more pressure, too, but I think most guys would hesitate at taking out another credit card to go deep into debt for plastic surgery. There are women on Facebook who use duck-face sexy poses as their profile pictures, generous cleavage showing, then complain about getting obscene messages and comments, getting hit on by strange men. These young women(some older)have the right to post the pictures they want, but every action has a consequence, and we still live in a world where women are objects. If we sell ourselves as objects, we're making that decision as willing participants, but where does it get us in the long term? The instant gratification of technology, and all of its gadgets, are objects, too. During my college days, I read books about feminism, written in the 70s, 80s, and 90s. None of these writers, such as Betty Fredan, Gloria Steinam, and Naomi Wolfe, could predict the addiction of unreality as reality. This is a very modern issue, because my Silent Generation mother(why this group of people are referred to as 'silent' is a mystery to me, because there is nothing silent about my parents)still refuses to use a computer for anything other than online banking. But the slow death of feminism is not just cultural, but socioeconomic. Due to the recession, women are living in poverty more then ever. These same women are educated and have job skills, but the doors are shut, so these ladies, like myself, are earning minimum wage somewhere. I was taught that if you were a woman who earned a good wage, you were powerful, you didn't have to take any shit. But the world has turned, and everyone has less money. Women have been selling themselves for sex since before the Old Testament. Today's idea of a self-made woman is Kim Kardashian, who was not famous until she was in a sex tape with someone named Ray J. Sex tapes are used to establish notorious celebrity status within a pornographic backdrop, because that kind of scandal is no big deal. Women can use sex to establish empires. Not exactly an original idea, but money and celebrity are power, and this illusion is what has diluted feminism into mud, as well as other social issues, such as poverty and racism. I get angry when I see sexist remarks while on Facebook or Twitter(make me a sandwich)mostly posted by young men whose mothers are working to support them while they sit their fat asses in front of a computer. Obesity is being blamed on mothers who "don't cook anymore, don't even know how, so they feed their kids junk food"(my mother) I know many women who are terrified of being thought of as bad mothers, and this insecurity keeps them from asserting themselves, as if men ever worry about being thought of as bad fathers by other men; if they do worry, it doesn't seem to crush their confidence or make them not want to socialize with other dads. The alleged 'bad mother' is made fun of behind her back, forced into social exile. The same rules applied when my mother was young; know your place and be grateful you're not...a single mother or married to man who beats you. No wonder so many teen boys and young men are sexist; they learned it from both parents. The feminism of yore, however, has influenced modern marriage. My generation has perfected the co-parenting system; so many of us grew up not living with our fathers full-time, so for some young mothers it made no difference if they were married to the father-or fathers-of their children. 'Baby daddies' don't just exist in the African-American communities, but white people have also adopted the term. If single mothers are taking advantage of public assistance, so are most married couples with children. Men are no longer the breadwinners who can singlehandedly support a wife and children. The men I know can no longer earn those kinds of wages while the cost of living continues to rise. Women are having less children(unless you're Michelle Duggar). Men are waiting to get married until they are over thirty, although they may already be paying child support. The roles of wife and mother have also changed, and there's no going back. But being a single mother is hard, harder than being a single dad who pays his child support every month and only has to see his children every other weekend, two weeks in the summer. Mom makes sure the child does his homework, minds his manners, and goes to the doctor or dentist. From a social standpoint, nothing much as changed. If the child is lucky, Dad has enough time to teach some values or good manners. But who has time to teach the value of gender equality to their kids? Apparently, no one. They're on their own, learning their values elsewhere, from strangers. Girls grow up watching models or actresses find fame and financial security through whatever guy they marry or make a sex tape with. They want to be a Kardashian or maybe Taylor Swift, who dates famous guys. Boys grow up thinking women are only good for sex, finding the female personality too unpredictable and high-maintenance to want to hang around for long. They want to be Charlie Sheen because he's rich and dates porn stars, and those girls are cool because they don't talk a lot, they're happy with the drugs and other expensive gifts. In return, they will have wild sex with you. Feminism is dead because we let it die. Social equality is too much work, so let's go back to being the sexist, racist, homophobic assholes our ancestors were. Let's live in fear. The old conventions are making a comeback because we think we want to recapture a feeling of safety and security that was an illusion all along. If the last decade has taught us anything, it is that change is always happening, so it is up to us as human beings to decide what we want to stand for, whether it is about helping ourselves or each other. We are encouraged by the media to not think for ourselves, playing on our fear of having to stand alone. The average eighteen year old female would rather die than spend a Saturday night alone at home, even if she ends up accepting a date with a boy she doesn't really like. By the time she's forty, she'll appreciate a few minutes alone, even if it's on the toilet, the bathroom door locked. :) Self-acceptance is the work of a lifetime. From when we are born, expectations are put on us. Some infants take longer to learn how to walk or talk; meanwhile, the parents worry amid fears of mental or physical disabilities. When the child reaches school age, the race is on to make sure the child can keep up in class.
I don't have children but, at age forty, I realized that being a kid was hard enough without being reminded of my imperfections. If a child grows up in an abusive home, they learn to create negative voices in their own head, becoming their own worst critics, the low self-esteem bringing on depression. They want to withdraw from the world, finding a soothing place with drugs or some other substance. In my case, food. I learned to overeat from my mother. I learned to hate myself and my body from her as well, because this is how she felt about herself. When I look at photos of her as a teenager, she looks happy. Her adult photos are another story. Extra weight, the sadness and anxiety in her eyes. A wife and mother by nineteen, married to a young man she didn't know as well as she thought she did. But Mom is tough; she could make the best of any situation, still can, and she chose to tough it out with my dad. She did a lot of the giving; she couldn't drink with Dad, the liquor made her sick, so she used food as a cushion for a lonely marriage, along with the boredom and frustration of being a wife and mother. She cooked and baked. For herself, my brothers, Dad, and me. I have journaled about my struggles with food and weight since I was a teenager, and the circle keeps going around and around, because-possibly-I'm afraid that's there is no one of real value behind the issue. If I blame it all on fast food and my own lack of willpower, then I don't have to deal with the really unpleasant stuff, because that stuff might make me want to confront people and situations I fear, for whatever reasons. Losing my family's approval or hurting anyone's feelings is just the tip of the iceberg. Guilt is poison, but without it, some people think we would all become psychopaths, and when you don't like yourself, you can sometimes imagine the worst about yourself. Having faith in yourself is tough when you feel you have been shaped in failure. Lose thirty pounds, gain it back. Lose forty, gain it back. Lose seventy, gain it back and more. All before the age of twenty. I tried hard, but I was wired for failure. I lose about seventy pounds again ten years ago, and have yo-yo'd since. I'm getting older, and I don't want to be in the war anymore. As my body ages and metabolism slows, I will need to do twice as much exercise to keep the weight off. My issues with food and weight have influenced so many of my other decisions, such as pursuing an acting career or a long-term relationship, that I wonder what my life would have been like if I had not been shackled by self-loathing. But I can't go back. I learn as I go and I still struggle with forgiveness, including forgiving myself. This doesn't make me unique; it's hard to make that leap of faith, because there is no net or trampoline to land on. I have to forgive myself for the anger, selfishness, guilt, arrogance, laziness, and stubborness. I have to forgive myself for being human. That would lead to forgiving other people who I am certain don't deserve it. Or do they? There are some people who have really pissed me off, including relatives, but if I want to deserve forgiveness, then I guess it's only logical that I apply this belief to others. Oprah once said that forgiveness is a gift you give yourself. Oprah makes me feel like a vengeful, rage-filled stalker lunatic because I think she's wiser than I am. Certainly wealthier. But to get back to self-acceptance, I can always find something wrong; with myself and others, even objects, but love, and that includes self-love, can only exist inside change, not outside, because that area is a barren place where nothing can grow. Before I start getting maudlin and hugging my inner child, I understand that I now have the expectations of a forty year old adult, because so many things are becoming painfully obvious, but it's never too late to try to understand yourself and others. You might learn something important. :) I have blogged about my own struggle with my weight, and I am typically sensitive about my size, considering that one of the last targets of ridicule in a politically correct society is the obese or overweight. This was never more evident than in the recent review of the movie Identity Thief, written by film critic Rex Reed.
Reed is a fan of old Hollywood and who, I guess, expects every actress to look like Ava Gardner or Lana Turner. The world has changed over the last sixty years, and 'hippo' and 'tractor-sized' are not the first words that come to mind when I look at Melissa McCarthy, one of the stars of Identity Thief. She's certainly a plus-sized lady, but it seems to be more of a big deal because McCarthy is a woman. I wonder if Rex Reed would refer to John Goodman as a 'hippo.' Taking shots at large women is cheap and stupid, but it's also a reminder of the double standard that still exists in 2013-fat women deserve to be ridiculed. I like watching-I'm not ashamed to admit-Here Comes Honey Boo Boo, and Mama June could be perceived as disgusting for a lot of reasons; but if she was thin, would anyone care as much about her sneezing or forklift foot? The older I get, the more I appreciate the imperfect in other people, and maybe I'm becoming more sensitive to other people's imperfections and struggles, including my own. When someone is obese or overweight, they wear their struggle on the outside, and some wonder, and even say out loud,"Don't they have any pride? What's wrong with them?" Some people are just made big; broad shoulders, large breasts, wide hip bones, or barrel-chested. The mass brainwashing of how everyone should have washboard abs and firm asses, no matter their age, is now complete. It's a hopeless ideal, but everyone keeps longing for it, like an eleven year old girl yearns or Justin Bieber. I wish I was as thin as I was twenty years ago, when I wanted to be thinner. When is this social disease going to end? The pressure is on, and every medical expert has an opinion. I have high cholesterol, but my blood pressure and blood sugar are very normal. I don't know what Melissa McCarthy's numbers are, or Chris Christie's, but the cheap shots need to stop, because it's just another kind of bullying. Journalists and bloggers and other celebrities know to keep their mouths shut when it comes to race(Django Unchained, anyone?), religion, and some controversial political matters, such as same sex marriage and abortion, but the obese and overweight are still the witches being burned at the stake. If an overweight child is being bullied at school, the parents are advised to put their fat kid on a diet. The child will be so much happier, right? But it's not just the overweight kids who get bullied; however, there is always that air of insensitivity, and this puts the child on the road to low self-esteem and eating disorders. Everyone thinks they have the answer, but everyone has to eat. The emphasis on appearance, especially in Hollywood, is a lifestyle. Public people like Melissa McCarthy or Roseanne are not part of that status quo. As comic figures, they may be perceived by others to be less threatening, especially by male TV and film executives. But if McCarthy, for instance, were to play a serious dramatic role, like Gabourey Sidibe in Precious, would this make critics like Reed shut their mouths and silent the bitchiness for a while? They would have to find someone else to take their prejudices and frustrations out on. :) |
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