Everything Matters...in my writing, I mean.

First things first: Yesterday, I was suddenly in China Town, which, I suppose, shouldn't be all that surprising- I only live fifteen-to-twenty minutes out of the city, but I just thought I was going to walk with my grandparents around the local mall. Nope. They have to go to China Town. Then Brooklyn to drop off their friend. Of course I chauffeured! I can drive through and in the city, but I don't enjoy it. I- I greatly dislike driving through the city. I can't stand it, but I had to do it.

I bought my grandpa some bubble tea-creamy taro :D He was pretty pleased, to say the least.




Yesterday, when I got home from work I wrestled into my pajamas and plopped onto the couch with my mom who was watching television. PBS, actually, a show called 'Making Things-'; this episode was called 'Making Things Faster'. Yay. I was totally geeking-out the entire time, so much so, I wonder why I don't watch this channel more often. Well, anyway, I'm watching this and secretly hoping they'll talk about teleportation, but they never even touched upon it; now, though, I have a new-found respect for delivery persons: travelling salesman problem? Oh, my gosh. Who knew?! I will never again complain if I get a late package- I am more appreciative of your efforts.

Anyway, all that to say this: I've been working on a story pretty consistently for the past six months, and it's pretty exciting (not roller coaster exciting...well, sometimes it's roller coaster exciting) because this story is getting somewhere- it keeps evolving like a real story should.

And as real stories are written, advice is given. Some advice is good. Other advice is horrid. Of all the advice given to me, one is most given: write what you know.

Yay.

Great.

Good idea, good start.

But I only know so much. After a while I have to do research or, well, give up the writing project entirely.

But for this story I've found that everything I do or encounter becomes a part of my research for this story: my spontaneous trip to China Town, and watching PBS' NOVA.

At this point, I can't tell if this is so because either I'm so obsessed with my story that everything relates to it, or that research for writing really does fully inhabit the writer when he or she is, if you will allow, 'in the zone'.

Is that how great writing happens? Everything just becomes a part of the story? Cool.

I hope that if you are a writer, or even if you are not, everything you do and encounter will inspire you. Are not some of the greatest inventions inspired by accidents or by something that had seemed completely irrelevant?

Hollaback.

Sorry about yesterday,

You'll have to forgive me for my blog post yesterday--I wasn't in my right mind. I'd wanted my tone to be a little more solemn, not whacked-out-crazy, but apparently, that was not to be. I hadn't even remembered the most important lesson of my reaction to my sickness yesterday: I never again want to be in control of my breathing. Of all the things I am glad, and the things for which I am grateful, automatic breathing has become my favorite. It feels very good to be able to think about other things and breathing just sort of happens in the background; it is when I have to remember to breathe while I'm thinking that's tricky.

You see, what I'd wanted to post yesterday I shall have to post today: an encouraging note I found in the deep corners of my journal. This is what it reads:

Dear Magistra [Teacher] Triumpho (sic),

Thank you for always being there as a teacher and friend. You’ve helped me everytime (sic) I was down by either making me laugh, smile or look at the bright side. You make me understand who I am. Thanks, Love Naty.

When I first read her note to me I could not cry because I was too shocked and honored at receiving it; that and I thought it was adorable how she misspelled my last name- how phonetic. I did not know my actions meant more than I intended, so much so, that I helped a young lady understand her very identity. Indeed, I only thought I was helping her to conjugate Latin verbs.

I do wonder, though if the outcome would have been different if I did intend to help her understand her identity, and not how to conjugate Latin verbs. Eh, who's to say what could've happened--that, at this point (two years later), is irrelevant.

But her gratitude does then make me consider: if my positive actions can incur such humbling gratitude, what sort of impact do my negative actions in incur? Of course, that begs the question: is it a positive action to intend only to help in academia, and therefore a negative action if I intend to influence and develop her life outside of academia? Vice versa? But, frankly, no matter what my actions are it is only she that can determine her reaction. People can become good people in spite of poor parents and teachers. People can become bad people in spite of good parents and teachers.

Whatever.

I don't know, and couldn't give a damn.

Those are such petty questions when I should really keep in mind: I hope Natalie is doing all right. I do hope she has other teachers who help her build up her individual identity. I hope she is taking full advantage of whatever opportunities are coming her way. Make mistakes, Natalie.

"Fried! Deep fried brain!"

When I was a freshman in college I got sick. Surprise, surprise. My roommate quarantined me to my room. I was not allowed to attend any of my classes. I was not allowed to leave my room, not my bed either. I was so antsy I had to do something! So, I started exercising. When my roommate came back she found me planking. She looked at me. I looked at her. She said, "What are you doing?"

"I'm not exercising if that's what you mean."

"Get. Back. In. Bed. You're sick."

"I might feel a little sleepy-."

"You're sick! Oh, my gosh! You're sick!"

To this day, we're still best friends. Thank God.




So, I haven't changed much since then because a couple nights ago I suddenly caught something. When I say 'suddenly' I mean suddenly.

I was sitting at my desk job, typing away, bopping my head to the music playing in the background when my arms fell to my chest to keep warm. I couldn't breathe properly, but I was like, "No, I have to keep working." So, I kept working. Seriously, no big deal. People get sick all the time. Except me. I don't get sick, and when I do get sick I'm not actually sick because I feel well enough to exercise.

Anyway, that night, after work, I went directly to bed. My head and torso were uncommonly warm, and the rest of my body was uncommonly freezing. Still, no big deal. However, half the night later, I woke up in a cold sweat (I think it was a cold sweat), which would explain why I was swimming in my dream, so I turned the fan on to cool down, but I only felt colder. I felt so weak.

Feeling weak is for weak people! BAH!

The very next morning I decided to bake cookies & cream cookies (hey, I'd baked vanilla cupcakes the day before), so I did. But my back ached. My arms ached. My cookies didn't turn out as well as I wanted, but everyone else loved them.

ADVIL. I took just one Advil. Felt fine. NBD, BRO! I can go to work. I need the money.

So, I went to work. I felt fine.

Slept fine. I got this. Ain't dreaming about swimming, therefore no cold sweat.

The very next morning, I drove my sister to school. Drove my mom to her carpool. Then I went to my aunt's house to drop off more of cupcakes and cookies.

Except, that I started convulsing. My arms were crossed so tightly over my chest, I could not unravel them. I couldn't breathe properly, and when I did I was wheezing- I was practically singing. my death song (haha, I just made that up). My stomach muscles were contracting I felt they wanted to eat my insides, but I hadn't eaten that much in the first place. My aunt first called her husband, a nurse, down to take my temperature, things like that. I was so glad none of them panicked because I already didn't want to die.

Seriously, I thought to myself, "I don't want to die yet, I still have a story I need to finish." And then I thought, "What is wrooooong with me. One little reaction to what could be a flu... Don't be ridiculous."

They called my dad over. He came, and something about his presence, I calmed down after that, but that didn't stop my body from attacking itself.

Then I stopped convulsing, well, after I swallowed some Ibuprofen, so stopped whatever it was I was doing, or reacting to, and finally just lay there on that leather couch, under three blankets (I think), listening to the adults in the room talk.

I lay there and thought, "So, this what this feels like. This is what this feels like." At the time, I couldn't quite label 'this' I just knew I didn't like 'this'. 'This' wasn't a good feeling.

My aunt said, "Wow, when my kid's get sick they just get warm."

My dad responded, "Oh, she doesn't get sick like this either. At least not since she was a baby. We were still living in the city when she was just walking around, when she fell over. I thought, 'Why is she sleeping like that?' but then she turned over then, aha!- she's having a seizure!'" Of course they laughed. Then I laughed, or tried to laugh, ish. I laughed-ish. "Fried! Deep fried brain!" my dad yelled, joking, "That's why this is happening now."





I lay there for another hour or so. My dad left for his dentist appointment. My aunt and uncle went back to real life. I felt pathetic. Thankful, but pathetic.

I am a freaking working woman! I can't let sickness stop me! And yet, if I keep working while I'm sick, do I really want my body to collapse on itself because I was too stubborn to admit sickness in the first place?

But this is a better idea for a blog post than asking more existential questions. Right?

Next time, I'll just wear a coat when I go outside during the fall and winter. I don't want to feel 'this' ever again. Oh, and never exercise when you're sick, no matter how well you feel because, at that point, you're totally lying to yourself.

STAY IN BED!

An Oppressive Reality

Do you know, I always hear about how poorly treated are Christians in the US. I'm not saying that mistreatment cannot happen in the US, but I wonder- are the stories I hear, or the news I read only a small percentage of what really goes on? What's the other percentage?




When I was younger I was, obviously, a picky eater, so my parents would tell me, "Tine, there are children starving in Africa- eat your food." In my head, I would respond, "Well, then send it to them." What my parents were trying to tell me is to be grateful for the food set before me, I only know that now.

Lately, I've been reading and learning that there is a food shortage right here in this, my adopted homeland of the US. No, I haven't discerned which information is propaganda and which is factual, but whether exaggerated or otherwise, there are those who starve here in the US. To imagine that every US citizen is well-fed is to be disillusioned. Social-economic problems are not reserved for second and third world countries, because of this, though first world countries have the ability, perhaps even the responsibility of helping those weaker than themselves this gives the illusion that somehow those who are helped must be weaker than those who give help: this is perfectly fallacious.

Since problems do not choose a type of person, persons; state, country, nation; era, I have to know, believe and understand that problems can and will arise everywhere- anywhere.

I do not doubt that people starve anywhere and everywhere (willing and unwilling starvation).

I do not doubt that Christians are poorly treated even in this religiously-free country, but I do doubt the extent to which Christians are poorly treated. I sometimes wonder if this poor treatment is unwittingly self-inflicted.

I cannot tell you how many sermons I've heard about the oppression of the Christian faith in even a small town coffee shop; how many articles I read about pastors wrongly imprisoned for sharing the Gospel.

I am well aware that Christ said if they persecuted him how much more so will his followers be persecuted, and yet, how much we do tolerate in this country. Some (left or right winged, or middle, or none) say we tolerate too much, forgetting that they themselves are a part of those tolerated.

But like the 'starving children in Africa' analogy to my younger picky-eater years, the fear of embarrassment for sharing your faith solicitously in a small town coffee shop cannot be compared to persecution of Christians that occurs elsewhere in the world. (And if you misunderstand the former comparison, let me clarify: 'starving children in Africa' can hardly be compared to a middle-class child's refusal to eat meals; however an attempt to teach gratefulness.)

Honestly, who doesn't get teased for being too smart, too tall, too freckly, too pale, too quiet, too loud, too girly, too boyish, too weak, too strong? We tell every child that teasing is just going to happen, but what matters is not what others think (because they're not thinking in the first place) but what you think of yourself, and how you choose to live your own life. We do not judge others because they can't be judged--we do not judge others because we, too, are to be judged.

What poor treatment is teasing for my faith? Is that really the least I can suffer for my faith? That's not really suffering- I just need to get over my insecurities. Much more insecurities than persecutions!

We ought to be more careful of the words we choose to describe our individual pains.

A sudden empathy...

The other day, I found my copy of the Bible, don't ask me where I found it, but I finally found it, and took to reading it. If you recall from my last blog I moaned and groaned about reading Proverbs and Isaiah like the ridiculous child that I am, when it occurred to me (oddly enough, while reading the Proverbs) that perhaps the reason why Proverbs sounds and looks so slapdash-ed-ly put together is that Solomon, wise as he was, had these sudden bursts of wisdom occur to him at the moment, and jotted them down, much like any person, full of wisdom or witless, today would suddenly be struck with a thought which he would have to write down, never later deciding to expand upon that thought. Some thoughts are better left un-expanded; better left as purpose-less poetry :P

note: not poetry without purpose, but without a fluid theme. ya get me?

Perhaps Solomon walked often, making these casual observations when something struck him, like a fire pit and had to write, "As charcoal to hot embers and wood to fire, so is a quarrelsome man for kindling strife", Proverbs 26.21.

He heard, observed, and maybe even touched everything and heard, observed, and touched God, not because God was in the fire he noticed. Do you know, sometimes I entertain the thought: I'm sure that they who wrote the books of the Bible were not always aware that they were directly inspired. I don't imagine that, when they were inspired, they glowed likes the Avatars of the Bending World (see: Nickelodean's The Last Airbender or Legend of Korra), nothing like that- I'm sure they knew when words greater than themselves possessed them (although it would be cool if they did glow, ha) but what if God, when using Solomon, when using Abraham, or Moses, or Isaiah, or Paul, or John- what if these men did not know they were being used till after the fact?

I don't know.

Speaking nonsense, again, I know.

No, don't ask me about Isaiah, yet. Ha, I'll let you know when I get there.





On another note!- I am not an excellent reader. I pick up all these books and do not know how to finish them because I've not yet disciplined my mind to maintain peace during reading. I will read a sentence, obsess over it for a day or more (usually more) and wonder how to apply it.

Fiction, non-fiction- I don't know what it is about them that their words can't make me still. I'm jealous of those who can read for hours and hours without moving. I want to be able to do that because, unfortunately, I like to do other things while I read. I always have a pen or pencil in my hand, and a few semi-transparent sticky flags to mark something..

So, thanks be to God that my parents bought the audio series of The Chronicles of Narnia! The other day, do listen, it's frightfully funny, I was listening to The Last Battle when I finally got to the, well, second-to-last battle of the book: when Emeth wants to see Tash, when Eustace is thrown into the darkened shed; I start crying! And I'm driving while I'm listening and crying, which isn't at all safe for me and my fellow drivers, but I'm crying, salty tears stinging my cheeks, blurring my vision which is already impaired by the glow of the setting sun. By Aslan's Mane, I'm surprised I didn't crash. (Haha.)

No, I can't even blame my monthly friend for such emotional tirades.

But when Eustace was thrown in!- I absolutely fell apart! What terror he must've felt! Now, I knew what was on the other side of that door (only because I've read/heard the books over and over again)- perhaps I cried so because I was living in the story as though I'd never read or heard The Last Battle; that in spite of my foreknowledge of its 'ending' (I say 'ending' because you very well know that Lewis only describes the end of Narnia, indeed of all worlds, as the beginning of Chapter One of the Great Story) I wholeheartedly empathized with Eustace. Felt Jill's pain at her loss. Wept with King Tirian.

Now, if only I could weep, feel and empathize so with the people in this world without casually wanting the high and mighty feeling of helping their souls, but never acting upon that high.




This just occurred to me: do you think that if we just let children read the Bible, just as a story, they would later see it as inspired? Do we really need to say it's inspired? Now, don't mistake me: I'm not saying that the Bible isn't inspired, nor am I saying that we should not bring up children in the faith, but, I am saying that, perhaps, the things we emphasize now as important are later diminished as irrelevant because we emphasize the wrong part. When the word 'inspired' is said, we sometimes harp upon the word 'inspire' instead of harping upon what the inspiration actually entails to the Bible's past, present, and future readers.

But this is too much for a blog post.




On another note, a much lighter one, too: I do believe that I can trust Cumberbatch with any beloved character he so chooses to play.