About me

I am currently in school working towards by B.A. in Liberal Arts. I have been writing so many papers I thought, why not make a blog? Note: I am not a writer but I am a librarian. I found that writing papers helps get my thoughts in order. I took a wonderful class that I actually dreaded called "Road Trip of the Mind" at Oklahoma University. The syllabus was to watch certain movies, read poems and stories/articles and tie them into your life. Needless to say I took this class literally and at a time in my life, it ended up being great therapy. I am currently going through a divorce, trying to be civil but not sure how that will work out. I have two kids a 19 year old son and a 14 year old daughter. My son recently enlisted in the Army and considering the year he has had I think this will be best for him, as long as he doesn't get killed. My daughter is a writer and started me on this "blog" thing. Hopefully you will enjoy what I wrote. Sometimes life takes turns that only paper or in this case a computer can help straighten it out and put things in perspective.

I Want

Freedom of Speech, First Amendment Rights, these are what America is built upon. One wants to believe this. But if this is true, why do we ban books, music and movies? We send our soldiers to fight for our freedom, but back home; we fight censorship with less motivation. Can my words be challenged in this essay? I often wonder if what I write could be used against me in a court of law. Can I be the person who does not care? I am not sure who I would be if I could pick someone else. Everyone seems to have problems’ even heroes. Certainly at this time in my life I would not pick myself. For that matter, I might as well be Murphy Law. Just when my life seems to finally be on track it takes a nose dive into oblivion. I would love for someone to censor my life; to take away anything that is remotely bad and leave only the good. I guess I would be asleep for awhile. I want to live in the movie Pleasantville where everything is goodie-two-shoes instead of the movie Three Kings where I’d be fighting a war I have nothing to do with.

Then again, this is an assignment, and I can play this game or, at least, dream for a little bit. I can be a writer and get published; maybe win some awards for my work. To finally suck out the mess that I call my brain and put what I really want to say on paper is something I would love to do. To let myself go, not worry about what people would think or say. Just once I would like to say what is on my mind, to tell someone what I really think instead of pushing the back button and erasing what I wrote. To tell that person what I really think of them and not worry of the repercussions. To be that employee who screams at the customer while stomping out and then be invited back. To boldly look a person in the eye and tell them I know what they said or did; and, look, I am still here. Maybe if I did, I would not have people stomping all over me. Being the good guy stinks sometimes. To do anything other than right, knowing I would have to one day stand in front of my Maker and face the consequences scares me, but I can still dream.

I want to be that girl, the one who can speak her mind and everyone watches out. I want to be the girl everyone wants to hang out with even though they call her a “bitch” and she knows it, acts proud of it. I want to be the one who gets up and is the only one dancing the life of the party. I want to be the one who can take thousands of pictures of herself and post them to Facebook. Yes, I want to be that girl! I want to be the girl who gets saved by Mark Walberg, the one he takes out of the desert and into a better place (Russell). To live on, go out and not feel guilty that I just blew gas money.

I can see myself writing a book, a poem, a song and then have it censored. At least I would not be threatened to be put in jail for thrashing my hips as Elvis was. In 1955 in San Diego and Florida they warned Elvis that if he thrashed his hips he would be charged with obscenity (Sparrow). And the world seems bent on this kind of censoring. If Elvis thrashed his hips, what would be the implications? No one would die; someone may actually learn how to dance. I would love to be one of those die hard librarians who can stand up to Congress and tell them that censoring is a parent’s job, not anyone else’s. As a parent I would love for singers, rappers, actors and actresses to not use cuss words and sexual innuendo. But  life is thus and it is my responsibility to tell my kids whether they can watch or listen to something and explain why. What I deem as inappropriate, another person will not. How bad does it have to get when an artist is banned such as Bob Dylan was in 1968 because Texas radio stations could not understand his lyrics (Sparrow). I want to be the person who has enough guts to get out there and say how wrong this was. Censorship is a moral issue, not the country’s, but mine; it is what I consider appropriate for myself and my family. My daughter loves the song by LMAFO I’m Sexy and I Know It, does that mean after watching the video she is going to stand on top of a bar and “wiggle” with barely any clothes on? I would hope that I have taught her better and until she is 18, what she listens to is my choice.

I want to be that person who, when my son graduates from Boot Camp, I will stand proud and smile and not be a blubbering idiot falling to pieces. I want to be that person who is so self-assured that I know he will do well that he will endure and come home in one piece, especially alive. I want to be the mother who knows he will be going most likely to a desert as the characters in Three Kings did and were put in the heart of a democratic uprising and  knowing my son will do the right thing and become the hero he wants to be.

I want to stand up for inequality for people and for myself. I want to be the ex-wife who stands up to her bullying ex-husband; to be the person who says “stop” continuing to hurt me mentally. To say that by doing this you’re not going to bring your daughter closer to you. Most of all I want to be the one who lets go and moves on. Who fixes whatever breaks down, on her own, instead of dialing him first. I want to be independent, to do the opposite of what Karl Young states in his article Ways and Means, “to be less willing to consider new ideas.” I can adapt to change. I can “self publicize in terms of commitment, courage, and individualism, and stop seeing my life as the last resource of the terminally incompetent” (Young)!

I want to write beautiful poetry. I want to be the forbidden fruit in Michael Lally’s poem of the same name. I want to be the one who finally feels the happiness; maybe I am afraid to venture that far. I want someone to hear me and “understand at last that I don’t need them” because I have been heard (Lally). By censoring, you put a stop to someone’s words. You do shut them up but they always find a way to get it out there in the world. By banning something, you bring out in the open what was banned. For the curious, you just did something you never thought would happen, you made it popular. All you have to do is look at the success of Judy Blume and her books, which are frequently being banned. I can be someone else; I am at that turning point in life. It is courage that holds me back the worry of what people will think and the worry of what I will become. As Young states, “I can overcome this with a bit of patience and commitment and hope.” Maybe I can be reborn or find a new self. I just want to become someone else; to lose this shell of mine and come out on top. I want to see my kids grow up into someone who will stand up for themselves and know how to grab what they want instead of what another wants. I just “want” instead of “need”.

Works Cited

Lally, Michael. "Forbidden Fruit." Poetry.org. N.p., 2001. Web. 8 May 2012. http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/16048

Russell, David, dir. Three Kings. Warner Brothers, 1999. DVD. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120188/

Sparrow, Kelly . "Me & Living. August 26, 2009. Music censorship (part 1) : A brief history Continue reading on Examiner.com Music censorship (part 1) : A brief history - Lexington Live Music | Examiner.." Examiner.com. N.p., 2009. Web. 8 May 2012. http://www.examiner.com/article/music-censorship-part-1-a-brief-history

Young , Karl. "Ways and Means: Notes on Alternative Publishing one year into the 90's." . TUCoPS, 1991. Web. 8 May 2012. http://tucops.com/tucops3/etc/misc/live/aoh_sp000352.htm

Life, it just keeps on going

How is it that we get so caught up in our own lives that we lose ourselves? I put my needs first but now I just want my son to come home. I see now that I cannot compete with his friends. Maybe it is his age, a time between his high school graduation and adulthood. Either way I am still sitting here waiting for him to “get tired of his moral obsession and come home” (Prasad). I’ll just wait. Then a thought comes, “why sit here and sulk?” He is an adult now. Should not I be having fun?  I can find new friends ones who are not married. Do I still have it in me to party with the girls? Do I have the guts after 17 years of marriage to order my own drink to dance with another? I think John Ashbury completes my thoughts best in his essay, My Philosophy of Life “You can’t always be worrying about others and keeping track of yourself at the same time.” Maybe that should be my new philosophy…to get lost, go some place where no one knows me. Then all at once reality comes back as my fourteen-year-old daughter comes in needing one more thing from me. The saddest part, knowing that in 5 years she will be just like my son; not needing me or at least thinking she doesn’t.

Parenthood, I look at pictures of my children and soak in the ways they have grown up. Halloween pictures tell and show the most. For this one day they get to be anyone other than themselves. If it is a cat or a princess for just one night they get so excited forgetting while they look in a mirror that it is them under that costume. The way they run to you is something you hold in your heart for a lifetime. The sadness that comes the day they say they are too old to dress up. We want them to become independent, do good in school, go to college and get a good job. But then just as Sharon Olds says “I say ‘college,’ but I cannot tell the difference between her leaving for college and our parting forever.” As with my son this was my thought, the time I have been waiting for, off to college to a better life than mine. Then tragedy hit and not only will my son’s life never be the same but our family unit is devastated in just one day.

One accusation can bring a whole world tumbling out of control. My son becomes the strong one, while in my selfishness I become the weak one. I am now the person that has to be picked up off the floor. Which person to believe? Blood of my blood or who I thought would be my partner? Can I believe them both? Is that fair? How do you not know what is going on right under your nose? I dread the realization that my life was so caught up that I lost myself. And what of my daughter? Blood of my blood, but also his. I have to rely on a judge who has never set eyes on me deal out my family’s fate. New issues abound: house, custody, child support, jail.  All these before I am forty unless the court dates get put off another month. How do you tell people? What do they think when they look at you? I demand a different way out, a different truth. Someone tell God that He did this to the wrong person. And yet like Job, I will still praise Him.

Can I be as Sontag is in her poem, Notes on Camp, “Camp involves a new, more complex relation to ‘the serious’ one can be serious about frivolous, frivolous about the serious.” Can my life be changed to just “Camp” or can I come up with another word for camp and life? What would I call it? How I long to call it “vacation.” To just sit on my porch spitting out philosophy to anyone who will listen. Or read novels until I can’t remember what’s real and what fantasy is. How does a singer like Kelly Clarkson figure out life when she’s ten years younger than me? Her song Stronger is my new anthem as she belts out “What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, Stand a little taller, Just me, myself and I, What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, Stand a little taller, Doesn't mean I'm lonely when I'm alone” (Clarkson). At least when the song comes on I can blare it, let him think what he wants. I want to be the person she is talking about  to feel stronger, not weaker, to tell someone with confidence, “just me, myself and I,” and be okay with it. Lyrics are my new getaway. Songs bring on new meanings Elton John sings “Sad songs say so much.” But so do breakup songs which let you know you are going to be okay with just a setback. As in the singer Drake’s new song Take Care which features another singer named Rihanna as she sings “I’ve loved and I’ve lost.” The meaning becomes clearly that I have loved and I definitely have lost, just as I will live and die.

My kids will grow up and leave me. They will set new lives out for themselves and no matter how much I have prepared them, it will still be their lives. Or like Babbitt in Sinclair Lewis’ story of the same name, will they just go with the flow, accepting what others think they should be doing or just do it? Will they be like me starting and stopping something to go on to the next? Hopefully they will be something other than burger flippers and minimum wage earners. The umbrella of scholarship has not helped my son but in time he will have to face life by moving on. I watch my daughter just embarking on teen aged life. She’s not the awkward girl I once was. Instead, she is shy but strong, smarter than my college educated mind is. She loves testing and did not inherit my anxiety for it. She gets perfect math scores on state testing, without studying or going to a good school. She tells me not to worry since college will be paid for as soon as she scores on the PSAT and becomes a National Merit. As valedictorian for eighth grade this year, I believe her. She may not know what she wants to do when she grows up but she knows how to get there.

As puzzles of my life start fitting together I see myself in my children. Maybe I just want to hold on just a little longer, just a little tighter, before their “interests” take over. Each court date brings reality just a little closer. Will the truth come out and when it does will it set everyone free? They say you don’t know someone until you divorce them. I’m wondering if I ever knew him. Life is being pulled in so many directions. Just once I would like time to stop like in a movie while I glance around at what is around me. The characters in a movie that can do that always make me jealous. Why go back? Why not just stay and walk around in the solitude? I now understand what my Mom always told me that one day I’ll know; I’ll have a mini me walking around making the same mistakes I did; now I have two. Life has to get better since it just keeps going. I will leave my kids with Ashbury’s thoughts, “I want you to go out there and enjoy yourself, and yes, enjoy your philosophy of life, too.”

Works Cited

Ashley, John. "My Philosophy of Life."  Poets.org, 1994. Web. 15 Apr 2012. http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15460

Clarkson, Kelly. Stronger. 2012. AZ Lyrics. Web. 17 April 2012. http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/kellyclarkson/whatdoesntkillyoustronger.html

Drake. Take Care. 2012. AZ Lyrics. Web. 16 April 2012. http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/drake/takecare.html

Lewis, Sinclair. "Chapter 12 of Babbitt." Oklahoma University, 1922. Web. 17 Apr 2012. http://www.ou.edu/cls/online/LSTD4243/unit5_babbitt.shtml

Prasad, Udayan. Dir. My Son the Fanatic. BBC Films, 1998. DVD.

Olds, Sharon. "The Wellsping." University of Oklahoma, n.d. Web. 17 Apr 2012. http://www.ou.edu/cls/online/LSTD4243/unit5_olds.shtml

Sontag, Susan. "Notes on Camp." University of Oklahoma. N.p., 1964. Web. 15 Apr 2012. http://www.ou.edu/cls/online/LSTD4243/unit5_sontag.shtml

Next phase

Most of my life has been in a state of depression but as I get older I seem more anxious. I live in a Prozac Nation. Waiting to creep away to somewhere no one can find me but then loneliness would most likely overtake me. My life has been lived around an alcoholic father, prescription dependent mom, all thankfully ending by the time I was 19. Parents have to grow up too, to make room for the next generation. As I watch my brothers following our parents footsteps. Each day is a fight to conquer personal additions, thankfully mine is not as drastic as theirs. Maybe because I read so much I do not have their problems. In a story one can escape reality, you become one with the characters. You understand the characters thoughts and think, “I’ve been there or I am there.” They say the desert is another word for wasteland. It does seem pretty desolate and quiet just picturing it is depression in its own way.

Just as the main character in Off the Map I too came out of my depression and got back to life. Becoming a parent helps you realize you have someone depending on you. And some prescriptions are actually good for you. I quit smoking a couple of years ago and now if I can just get a hold of my food and coffee consumption I might just be perfect, well maybe not but I can still dream. My parents both fought their addictions and are now just waiting for my brothers to realize they can be free. They are both smart just on a rut. One has a family and hopefully that will make reality come home to him. While my other brother just published a book of poems, one dedicated to his hero “Bob Dylan.” His band reminds me of Rage Against the Machine, their lyrics have a power to them and make people think outside of the box much like my brother. But where his is geared to our lives and living, theirs are more toward change and their fight for the uprising and repression being experienced in Oaxaca, and after understanding their plight one cannot help but understand their passion. Their lyrics bring the listener to their radical message. Their song Testify is what it is. It testifies to the fight of other countries and within our own battles but brings the listener to the understanding if we would just “open the door” we would see the fight. We are so filled with garbage it is hard to decipher the truth. We here news reports about different countries and of America but do we really know the truth of what is going on or simply just take the reporters and governments word for it? Our, my, perception is usually focused on what I/we want to see.

Do we look at our own families and not see what is really there? I love my family and despite our differences I accept them as who they are. Living 2000 miles away from them is hard. I would do anything for them and know they would do the same for me. Even though the character Ulee Jackson seems tough on the outside and inside in the movie Ulee’s Gold, nothing stops him from helping his family..  No matter one can see themselves in him. As his story moves on, an aging parent can understand his saying, “I feel like an old drone. They don’t need me now” (Midwest). As my house is silent, I can feel his sorrow. Is life after children really roaming through a Wal-Mart just to be around people? With empty nest syndrome can we see each other conversing with the grocery boy as Walt Whitman does in Ginsberg’s poem Supermarket in California? Does he do it out of loneliness? Perhaps he had a different approach; either way wandering around solitaire is still alone. Will anxiety come when the store announces its closing? Knowing one can still wander the streets looking at families settle in for the night can help.

Since life seems to settle down thoughts of a new focus emerge. To look at Hollywood one can always concentrate on other countries, hopeless villages that need water and food. Our lives seem so petty given their circumstances. Our own citizens are still homeless or at least one paycheck away from it. Governments seem preoccupied with others than our struggle at home. By helping Americans would that not help us become strong enough to help others? Does that make it right for us and them to destroy properties of both humans and wildlife? Author Glenn Woicestyn in his article Environment believes if governments would protect individual rights, not violate them, we could stop handing government the power to sacrifice people to nature, by relinquishing the power it currently yields.

Going back to Florida, one sees new buildings and less beach front. Natives complain of how busy life has become. Now a vacationer I can enjoy the beach days, carefree visiting with friends and family. On the other hand all vacations come to an end, there is always the leaving day. Relating personally with Sarah Jewetts character in her short story The Backward View, as her last day of vacation comes to an end, a new friend Mrs. Todd barely speaks to her in fact she feels like they are “on the edge of a quarrel,” just as my last day visiting my family. The sadness of knowing it will probably be another year or two before I see them again becomes unbearable. It is hard to maintain composure as each day, month and year passes you know this may be the last time you see someone. Could that have been their last goodbye, or mine, only time will tell? Depression seems to stem from our lives being swept away. Time ticks unnaturally but family brings time back. Life goes on no matter where a person is at. Are the depressed weak or is it really just a chemical imbalance? Is that why the majority is on anti-depressants? But when those little pills help you face life there cannot be any harm. Just recently the public was once again brought into the life of someone who battled depression, “I just don't see any way out of this,” he wrote in an essay for Guideposts magazine. “It's like I'm going out of my mind, I feel so low, so... hopeless. No, cope less." Finally someone I can relate too until it’s too late, Wallace died April 7^th, 2012. But his legacy will live on as a man, public figure told the world his weakness and how he survived through it.

  Our priorities seem to come from outside ourselves more worried about outside the box than within. Groups sing about it, actors spend a little time and money, and writers complain but no one seems to solve the problem. Instead we keep building on every piece of open land and then complain when natural habitats move into our neighborhoods. When our own children are leaving the nest after eighteen years of telling ourselves we cannot wait for them to move out, it takes all your will to let them go. Only to find ourselves wondering why we talked more to the cashier at the store than our kids? Wanting only to go back home and live with our parents after fighting them through young adulthood. Life seemed so simpler back then, if only we can turn back the clock. What would I say to the young me? Probably “just pay attention more.”

Works Cited

Ginsberg, Allen. "A Supermarket in California." Writing.Upenn. UPenn, 2007. Web. 10 Mar 2012. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88/supermarket.html

Goldwert, Lindsay. "Mike wallace was a Hero to Depressions Sufferers." Daily News. New York Daily News, 2012. Web. 7 Apr 2012. http://articles.nydailynews.com/2012-04-09/news/31314476_1_depression-sufferers-wallace-and-cbs-news-suicide-note

Juwett, Sarah O. The Backward View from The Country of the Pointed Firs. 1910. Web. 2 Mar 2012.  http://bartleby.com/125/24.html

Nunez, Victor, dir. Ulee's Gold. Orion Home Video, 1997. DVD. 

Rage Against the Machine. Testify. Sony Music Entertainment, Inc. 2012. Web. 11 Apr. 2012. http://www.ratm.com

Scott, Campbell, dir. Off the Map. Orion Home Video, 2003. DVD.

Woiceshyn, Glenn. Environmentalism, Eco-Terrorism and Endangered Species. 1999. Web. 15 Mar 2012. http://capitalismmagazine.com/1999/01/environmentalism-eco-terrorism-and-endangered=species

Greener than what?

There is something about the saying, “the grass is always greener on the other side,” but is it really? Striving to be something different seems to be what people live for in today’s age. Our fascination with different cultures is almost an obsession. When another culture is brought to America we sometimes feel threatened, consciences and at times fascinated. Not everyone is happy where they are at in life and as long as we do not get stuck in a rut we should want to improve ourselves, get out of our boxes. Many look to these cultures, we visit them and believe these peoples’ lives are so easy or at least they seem to be at peace with themselves. We are a people always looking for something within ourselves. As we drift through life we cannot help but rage against our authority figures and as soon as we become adults we really just want someone to tell us what to do, where to go, how to do it. It is not so bad to have someone care for you. But do they really? What if you step back and realize they are just holding you back? After being so tired for so long, does one realize the person who is supposed to be taking care of you is using you, leaning on you, dominating you? By living in a small town one might realize that instead of leading you are really just joining the majority. Perhaps you find out that the majority is just controlling you. Is this what happens to slaves? Are they so scared to fight back that slavery sounds better than death? How do the boys and girls that leave home to go off to war seem so undisciplined that parents are scared to send them and let them go? Life is so full of questions and answers seem to blink on and off like lightning bugs.

One can see this in different countries. Look at India and the young adult population that is an imitation of American culture. We embrace differences and want to learn others cultures as more immigrants come here, the more intrigued we are. While at times we can become threatened by our differences and the cultures we brought here with us. For hundreds of years we see the offenses that were done to different cultures, nationalities. The Native Americans whose land and lives the early Americans took and then the atrocities that were done to them and the African Americans, all because they were different. We became so bad that in 1850 white people were entertained by White men who performed Blackface minstrel shows. Of course no one thought to actually put black actors and actresses in an actual comic show. What would the reaction be from people today if those shows were to premier on Prime Time? Certainly would the response would be different. We pity differences that seem lower than ourselves. The powerful or purposeful go to different countries to help, get their photos and stories and never look back without really seeing what is in front of them. We rage war on countries without the realization that our own country is falling apart. We are esteemed by other countries, the great big powerhouse. While homeless people flank the streets in front our own White House. Should we care about other countries and their need for water? What about our own that is starving, one paycheck away from being homeless that even their own state won’t help? Single mother who makes a couple of dollars over minimum wage, whose son works for the lowest salary rate, is deemed too rich to get State Aid. How is this possible? But to get it we are looked down on. So we just hide in our houses afraid to answer the phone while someone is digging a well or creating a school in a village. But that person who helped has left their mark, their name will be important to that school, village and person allowed to be helped with no backlash from society.

How else do we leave our mark? Everyone has titles, so far in my life I have lived through a majority such as baby, daughter, mother, wife, ex-wife, student, drop-out, college student, cashier, and librarian. A tombstone is not big enough for all these save for my name. Approaching the big “40” changes a person, makes them realize their life is possibly half-over. Children are soon to be off to college, husband kicked out, no longer, a willing partner. Is this all there is? As forty is just months away, so approaches a divorce, possibly seeing a home one thought they would grow old in sold to strangers, saying goodbye to babies you never thought would want to leave their mother’s arms, seeing and feeling the accomplishment of graduating. Should I stay or should I go. I know the light is there somewhere through this tunnel. But I am going to have to go through it alone. Courageously, blindly or expertly, is it really over or is this just the beginning of a new life. Can one march through a new adventure, new experience, possibly find the freedom to love again? To leave the memories behind or do you keep them? All the knickknacks that showed a life and family lived, crushed by an evil doer. Pictures they really do tell a different story as do smiles. Keep your head up, don’t let it get you down; know that the pain and depression are as bad as finding out you have cancer only this last longer. Dating, the mere mention of a bar is frightening, especially when size 8 jeans do not fit anymore. No one wants to be alone but they do want to feel liberated. Quotes and lyrics bring new ideas, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” why do I feel so weak? The sound of his voice to share a small town breaks a heart everywhere you go. How does one live in a four block town? You stay on one end and I will stay on the other? I want to flee, to search for freedom, my soul, my insight. But then my kids remind me of their lives, friends, school and home. They do not remember the life they had before we moved here, the beach, their cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents. How do you tell them these friends probably will just be people you used to know on social media in five to ten years? Instead we fight about a home as I look to the other grass and wonder is it really greener there?

At least the children are older, teenagers one to graduate high school in four years while the other graduated last year, finding out what life has to offer. Been there, done that rings true to the mind. Starting adult life as a single mother, dragging my son out with my friends, my parents hoping their wayward daughter comes to her senses. Was I just acting as a new young mother would? I was naïve not wanting to give up young adulthood. I wanted to flee my responsibilities. As if in a movie I dragged my unwilling child everywhere, beaches, restaurants, and friend’s houses. Until one day life just clicked, I grew up, time to take responsibility of my decisions. Embark on a new life, give my child a father, buy a house, move to a different state and now life comes full circle at the halfway point which is not necessarily a bad thing.