Sticks and Stones

I took a chance on a new author based on John Hartness’ Facebook recommendation. It was a novella, so I figured if I didn't like it, I could stop reading, secure in the knowledge that I hadn't missed anything (sometimes with a novel-length book I become convinced that goodness is lurking just beyond the next scene, even though that is often not the case, but the triumph of hope over experience is hard to extinguish). Of Lips and Tongues, by A. G. Carpenter, is a southern gothic horror story, and none of these descriptors would normally make it past the moat dragons guarding entry to my Kindle. But an endorsement from a favored author circumvents my normal skepticism any day, and I’m so glad. Of Lips and Tongues was mesmerizing—in much the same way as the protagonist’s original "magic of the tongue."  Delaney’s magic is subtle and unique. This is a story about how sticks and stones may break our bones, but words can break our world. In Delaney's reality, evil can be conjured with malicious intent and unfortunate utterances. Here, a golem capable of great harm is created by "the sum of everything dark in the human spirit—envy, fear, guilt, spite—all stuck together with the bitter magic of unkind tongues." For Delaney, there is "magic in our words. Evil in our whispers." Words create reality in this plane. How terrifying.

As is often the case, this fantasy story reflects some deep truths. Words can definitely hurt. Words can create the embodiment of our guilt and shame and fear and precipitate all resulting bad behavior. One look at our current political arena is enough to convince anyone that ugly words and whispers have the power to distort the past, shape the present and manipulate the future.

The characters in A. G. Carpenter's novella (the first of a trilogy, happily) talk about how guilt can lead us toward rationalization and justification, especially when we use our words to hide our feelings. Guilt arises when we knowingly do wrong, and then we contort into all kinds of twisted shapes to salve our affronted conscience. It's the teacher we malign after she gives us a well-deserved "F."  It's the ex-friend we belittle because she dumped us for talking smack behind her back. It's the colleague we mercilessly torment because he works harder than we do and we wouldn't want him to seem too good. Or the boss we gossip about, passing speculation off as ground truth to make ourselves feel important for disseminating salacious information.

There is magic in our words, evil in our whispers.  Words have power. Ask "Crooked Hillary" or "Lying Ted."  Ask Ryan Lochte how much his "misrepresentations" cost him. I can't imagine he doesn't believe in the power of the spoken word any more. Perhaps he'll be more judicious with his future utterings. And I'm sure The Donald will continue to wield his weapon of choice; after all, continuous repetition of untruths creates its own reality as the repeated words carve neural pathways in our brains until we can no longer distinguish between truth and fantasy. I read it in the newspaper or I saw it online, so it must be true. A candidate for president of the United States keeps saying it, and where there is smoke, there is fire.

Words hurt.  Ask the victims who've been bullied. Ask the kid being teased on the playground whether name calling is a harmless pastime. Ask anyone who's ever been falsely accused of a crime; it's hard to come back from that, even if one's innocence has been proved beyond a reasonable doubt. Someone made an accusation, so there could be something to it. There must be something to it. There is something to it. It must be true. Such a slippery slope.

But A. G. Carpenter only tells half the story here (it's a novella, after all). As much as words can make evil, they can also do great good. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but I would rather read those thousand words, and "see" the pictures they create in my imagination. And while I love photography, I prefer to read and re-read a book instead of looking repeatedly at a picture. Because the vision created by the words in my mind's eye is different every time I read a passage; I might add a slightly different tone to the color of the heroine's hair, or tweak the way I hear her voice in my head. Words have that power, and it is good.

I'm indebted to John Hartness for turning me on to A.G. Carpenter and her compelling words. She writes about the evil that we do with our lips and tongues, but where there is evil, there is the potential for goodness.  And while Ms. Carpenter writes about the evil that we speak and the pain it can cause, her words on the page point to the beauty of words and the pleasure that they can bring.

To Write or Not To Write

I'm reading a new series. It has dragons. Enough said. I also just read a post by John Hartness (author of some of my favorite urban fantasy novels), which talked about how to become a good writer. It involves writing. And reading. And getting better at same. How do these disparate thoughts connect?  Well, I'm on the third book of Jessie Donovan's Stonefire Dragons series, and it's getting better.  Clearly, the first two books, Sacrificed to the Dragon and Seducing the Dragon, were good enough to ensure I kept reading through to this book, Revealing the Dragons. The writing is getting better, the plotting is getting better and the series is getting better.  Ditto for Mr. Hartness, so I guess he's taking his own advice. Encouraging. And all of this thinking is in keeping with my topic of the week—maybe of the year:  how to improve myself. It's the whole talent versus work question. Nature versus nurture. And I'm confused. And scared. And depressed. And hopeful. And did I mention confused? Today's post is all about me (I'll try to bring my personal angst back to a larger application by the end of the post, so bear with me, please). I'm at a crossroads: should I keep writing this blog, hoping to maybe turn it into a book, and possibly make this the prelude to writing fiction? Which I have no idea how to write. So maybe this is all an exercise in futility (clearly my pity party of last week isn't quite over).

So here is the dilemma: I'm not a natural fiction writer, despite my teenaged attempts to write a novel (stranded island, threesome, no plot beyond they crashed, they survived, they eventually got rescued—highly episodic and predictable). Yet I yearn to write fiction. But I have neither stories nor characters rolling around in my head, clamoring to be let out. I have oodles of desire, but no discernible ability to translate that into action. Or none that has manifested itself thus far.

According to John Hartness, fuck me—till I faint, as one of my bosses used to say to me (who, while vulgar, was supportive, helpful, instructive and all-around wonderful, so I'm repeating his favorite adage with affection and respect—truly). Anyhoo, as I was saying, I think I'm screwed. I think maybe I don't want this enough, I'm too lazy, too stupid, too disorganized, too ADD, too little, too late. I have a quote from Laurell Hamilton above my desk, "How bad do you want it?  That's the first question. Once you've answered it, you can get to work or give up. But you'll know which it is."  And my deepest fear is that I've already answered that question. 'Cause if I wanted it badly enough, I would have already done what it takes to do it.

On top of that, I saw a cartoon on Facebook earlier that made fun of someone who thinks people still read blogs – as in they’re passé. Which freaked me the fuck out (clearly, I'm also slipping in my commitment to keep the bad language to a minimum). All of this feels futile.

But, back to John Hartness’ counsel to, "Suck it up, buttercup."  If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. He notes that most writers write a lot of stuff that will never see the light of someone else's Kindle. Nor should it. Most of what beginning writers write is shit not fit for human consumption. So we need to keep writing. And then keep writing some more. I was feeling pretty good about the 250,000 words I've already written for this blog. But John talked about writing a million words before anyone wanted to publish them.  My neighbor, a best-selling author, writes more than 10,000 words a day. Every day (well, maybe she takes weekends off…).

And while John Hartness would say that work is all that is needed – which should be good news for me, as we can all control how much we work, but not how much talent we have, I still believe inspiration has a place in creative writing. As in it requires creativity, which, in turn, necessitates a visit from my Muse, who is a fickle bitch and hasn't stopped by my place to visit in quite a while.

But I think John would say, "Fuck your Muse!  We don't need no stinking muses to get shit done!  Because a good work ethic, and grit, and hard work trumps inspiration. Every. Single. Time."  Or, at least, that's what I imagine he would say. He might ask me what I'm doing today to make my dreams a reality.  Do I have an action plan? Am I willing to give up sleep and my social life (or at least some of it) and other ways I spend my time (like on Facebook)?  Am I willing to put my money where my mouth is and take some fucking action?  And no, not just writing this blog and occasionally reading about how to write. Just doing it already, knowing that the first several hundred thousand words are going to be dog meat?

To write or not to write?  That is the question. Or, at least, it’s my question. I’m sure many of you have a similar question rattling around in your brain, although perhaps it pertains to getting married, or having kids, or changing jobs, or pursuing your own passion. I don't have any answers, just lots of questions today. Any thoughts would be most appreciated.

Change Yourself

I'm still thinking about Arcana Rising, the latest offering from Kresley Cole in her Tarot-card based series, The Arcana Chronicles. In this original world, each card of the Major Arcana has been incarnated as a young person with paranormal powers. In Arcana Rising, we are introduced to the idea that some of the Minor Arcana cards may also be incarnated and what that might mean for our protagonists.  The Minor Arcana roughly correlates to a deck of cards someone might use to play rummy; there are four suits with numbers from one to ten and four face cards (one more than in a regular deck, actually, but one can still "read" Tarot from a regular deck, if one is so inclined). In a Tarot reading, the significance of a card is dependent on its placement in the spread, but regardless of position in a particular reading, some cards of the Minor Arcana are more ominous than others. One of the worst cards to draw is the Ten of Swords (equivalent to the ten of spades). In the most popular version of the Tarot deck, the Rider-Whaite Tarot, the Ten of Swords depicts a person lying facedown on the ground with ten swords sticking out of his back. The imagery is explicit and disturbing. In Arcana Rising, the female protagonist, Evie, who is the Empress card (these books are easier to understand if you have some basic knowledge of Tarot to begin with; because it’s always been an interest of mine, I particularly love these books), is talking to her grandmother about how to proceed in the "Game," in which she is supposed to fight the other incarnate cards until only one wins. Evie's grandmother teaches her the most important lesson of life, that, "When you can't change your situation, you must change yourself. You must rise and walk, despite the ten swords in your back."  

I've always heard variations on this theme: you can't control what happens to you, just how you react to it and you can't change others; we have no control over outcomes. And I get it—but what if I'm not strong enough to change myself or accept the outcome, even if I hate it? What if I can't do it—whatever "it" is—without a crutch?  Or at all?

We have so many crutches from which to choose. We can get drunk, or engage in better living through chemistry, or numb out to the TV, or the computer/iPad or even—gasp—books. We can shop—online or in stores—and engage in retail therapy. We can have too much sex or gamble to excess or become workaholics or overeaters. I'm painfully aware of the myriad of ways we can anesthetize ourselves so that we can't feel the swords in our back—or anything else, for that matter. And the swords are still there.  Not good.

What to do? What does it mean to change ourselves? After all, it's hard to function while being impaled by ten swords. And maybe the bad situation is temporary, or at least the acute phase is temporary—like an illness or injury, or even if we are grieving a death. But maybe the situation is our new normal, and we rebel against this evolving reality, denying its truth so that we don't need to deal with its consequences.

I've had a small taste of that just this week. I had a boating accident and damaged my knee. A severe MCL sprain and a medial meniscus tear. Big time owie. And just like that, life changed for me. Routine tasks, like, say, getting out of a chair or turning over in bed went from automatic to excruciating. My plans for yoga teacher training were now in jeopardy. Getting to my bedroom on the third floor was now a major undertaking. Would I need surgery? How long would this breathtaking pain last? Would I regain full function without having to favor the leg? Who has time for this? Why me? Am I getting old and decrepit?  This was my second muscle/ligament tear in two months. Am I falling apart?

I'm a bit embarrassed to say that all of this precipitated a pretty significant pity party to which I invited my nearest and dearest. Shockingly, while everyone came to say ‘hello’, no one wanted to stay at my sorry soirée. Actually, neither did I. Boh -ring. So I decided to get up off the pity pot and take matters into my own hands, getting some effective help (beyond the advice to elevate and ice and stay off my leg and take painkillers). And while the swords haven't moved–I still have a bum knee, and I'm still in pain—my attitude about it is totally changed.  Hope is on the horizon and action is the watchword of the day. I stopped feeling sorry for myself and started to look on the bright side and do something to ameliorate my suffering.

So maybe that is what Evie's grandmother meant by rising and walking, despite the swords in our back—awareness, acceptance, action—the A-Team of growth and change. But, in reality, dealing with a bad knee is one thing, dealing with the rest of my reality is something else again.

There are so many things about myself I want to change.  I would like to be less reactive with my children. I would like to be more disciplined with exercise and food. I would like to develop and stick to a writing schedule and get my fiction work off the ground.  I would like to be more positive and persistent. I would like to have more faith in a benevolent universe and the trustworthiness of people.  I would like to be less fearful.

I get that meaningful change must come from within, although it took a while to get with that particular program. I think that I have finally—finally— accepted that it's me, and not everyone and everything else. I've given up the fantasy that life would be perfect if only…fill in the blank… the kids would behave, my husband would appreciate me more, I would never have to deal with another idiot driver (not that those things wouldn't be awesome), etc. etc. etc.  But life isn't perfect and sometimes we have ten swords sticking out of our backs, which can really ruin one's day.

The life lesson here that Evie's grandmother was trying to convey is simple:  pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional. We have control over our internal landscape and not much else. No matter what the situation is, we can always rise and walk, even with ten swords in our backs. We may be riding and walking to our just rewards, our final journey, but even death can be approached with dignity and fearlessness rather than martyrdom and abdication of responsibility for ourselves. These are indeed tough lessons, but I'm indebted to Evie and her grandmother for the good and necessary reminders to rise and walk, regardless of whatever swords are protruding from us.

Presentation Is Everything

I just finished Kresley Cole's Arcana Rising. I have no idea how this author puts out amazing paranormal romance, intelligent YA post-apocalyptic books, and adult erotica that will sizzle your skivvies—and all in one year! As you know, I don't normally like young adult or post-apocalyptic fiction, and I usually stay away from love triangles. However, The Arcana series has all three, and I can't seem to get enough. The series offers a very interesting premise about the incarnation of the the Major Arcana of the Tarot deck, and the battle for dominance a la The Hunger Games and Highlander—in the end, there can be only one.  Each of the major characters is one of the Tarot cards—Evie, the heroine, is the Empress, and one of her love interests is the Death card. Other cards appear as well and in this book we get to know Sol, the Sun card. Sol is a "layered" character (his description), and while he loves to watch people battle to the death in gladiatorial games, and he's allied himself with the bad guys, he's also got some compassion and a moral compass that can flicker towards true north. When Evie spends time with Sol, she is struck by the pageantry of his set up and the way he interacts with his followers.  Sol has fashioned himself a God, and looks for worship from his adoring crowds.  When Evie comments on the grandiosity of the display, Sol tells her, "Presentation is everything."  He has a point. There is a lot to be said about the power of presentation, and also its unsavory underbelly.

Sol models his organization on Ancient Rome, because, in his view, those guys knew how to throw a party—or a dictatorship. He could have chosen Louis XIV or the Catholic Church. Hell, Sol could have pointed to Donald Trump as a man who understands that presentation is paramount. Versailles, the Vatican and Trump Tower are all designed to elevate the builder.  Kind of reminds me of Lord Farquaad from the movie Shrek—his very large, very phallic looking palace had nothing to do with insecurity about his statur—according to him. And there is NO PRBLEM with The Donald's manly man-parts. Yeah, right.

Compensation aside, however, there is something to be said for putting on the Ritz and making a good impression. I think I've told the story of how I wore blue jeans and red suede elf shoes (complete with pointy toes)to my Harvard interview, confident that my superior intellect would outweigh my disrespectful outward appearance.  No dice. And no Harvard. Presentation counts. How we present ourselves will influence how people see us. I used to counsel young women starting out in the national security field to be careful with their wardrobe. Rocking our femininity is fine, but being valued for how we look instead of our professional performance was a sure way to forfeit promotions. Presentation counts.

And because a good presentation can definitely hide the void below, being able to see past the staging is an important skill. It's vital to be able to see the veneer beneath the veneer, as one of my friends puts it. Because sometimes there is no there there, but we're too hypnotized by the razzle dazzle to notice. In my experience, most of us could use a little help with our ability to penetrate the presentation and see the reality underneath.

By the same token, it's equally important to be able to see the potential of something without all its window dressing.  Not everyone has the capacity to "see" how something will look when it's been "prettied up."  It's why those with vision can see a major "fixer-upper" house and project an image of how it will look with new paint and maybe a new bay window and a custom kitchen. Others among us can't imagine how it will look, and so they need to see a prospective house already finished and furnished before they can even think about buying it.

And sometimes, a good presentation isn't just hiding emptiness or superficiality. Sometimes a pretty exterior is shielding an ugly interior. Form over function doesn't work when the form is masking something dysfunctional. After all, putting lipstick on a pig just gives you a slightly better-looking pig. In the final analysis, it's still a pig and you're not gonna want to kiss it. Similarly, I’ve never been particularly interested in an asshat with nice external packaging. Not worth it. A pig is a pig underneath the nice lips.

Sol’s role in Arcana Rising is important. Evie, like the rest of us, needs to be reminded that putting on a good show can serve a useful purpose. But it’s also vital to avoid judging a book by its cover. Discernment and depth are key components to success, as Evie will have to learn if she is going to win the “game.” For the rest of us, as long as we’re not hiding something dark underneath our light, like Sol, then we should be able to do good and look good at the same time.

Speakers of Truth

I'm behind in my blogging for a worthy cause; I've read so many good books lately and had so many ideas for blog posts that I'm writing faster than I can post. Which is a wonderful problem to have. Today's post features the amazing new offering by Faith Hunter, Blood of the Earth. This is a spin-off series that takes place in the world of Jane Yellowrock, but focuses on a new heroine, Nell Ingram. Nell is a complex character with paranormal powers.  We learn about Nell’s evolving abilities right along with her. In addition to all of that, she is a survivor of a cult that married her off to an older man at 15, and now she's a 23-year old widow.   There is a lot to this book. I can't recommend it enough. But I digress. As the book progresses, Nell discovers a talent for speaking truth to power. This is a heady ability, and its importance is highlighted when Nell is recruited by the Feds to gather information from her former cult cohorts, who are suspected of collaboration with a militant racist group call Human Speakers of Truth. Needless to say, these asshats aren't speaking much truth at all. But Nell most certainly is. Faith Hunter uses this clever play on words to illuminate the path she wants her readers to follow.

Speaking truth to power—and even to regular folks who might not want to hear it—is a rare and valuable skill. In fact, I built my entire national security career on just that ability. Speaking truth involves courage, resolve, strength, sensitivity and a willingness to sacrifice oneself for the greater good. It is not for the faint-hearted. Nell is far from faint-hearted. She is a wonderful character, full of fear and vulnerability, but with a spine of steel and a will of iron. She is admirable and inspirational.

Most of us don't want to hear unpleasant facts or negative opinions. We eschew criticism, even when it's constructive. When someone tells us things we don't want to hear, we tend to edge away from that someone. This tendency is not necessarily good, but we do it anyway, like so many other things that constitute poor choices. And our unwillingness to hear unpleasantries is reinforced by the equally strong desire in most of us to please people or avoid confrontation. Taken together, these traits mean that many of us live in a bubble with others who perpetuate our delusions of grandeur and competence.

This unfortunate situation is even more pronounced in professional organizations and in the corridors of government and corporate power. Many of those at the top (and I've found men to be more susceptible to this than women as a gross generalization), prefer that their positive self perceptions be reflected by those who serve and support them. So what ends up happening is the Fox News syndrome —where only supportive opinions are expressed. Truth? Truth becomes what we want it to be, rather than a reflection of reality. Denial? Nope. Don't even know I am lying if everyone around me is doing it as well.

Penetrating that defensive wall of denial is difficult and daunting. I've been thrown out of many an office for pointing out that the emperor is buck ass naked. But I'm happy to say that I've also been escorted to some of the highest offices in the land because over the years my reputation for brutal honesty and objectivity has been valued. Turns out there are some powerful people who realize that surrounding ourselves with bobble-headed yes-men (and women) is the best way to fail.

But it takes courage to say things others won't.  It's scary and the consequences can be quite negative, as both Nell and I can tell you. Speaking truth, especially to power, means risking rejection and ridicule. It means being disliked and being relegated to the unpopular kids' lunch table.  For those of us who spent way too much time at that table in grade school, it's particularly unpleasant.

But it's important. Someone has to tell the emperor his new clothes are non-existent. Someone needs to point out the obvious and the not-so-obvious.  It's possible no one will listen to us. And it's possible we might get pink-slipped as a result of our willingness to say what no one wants to hear. It's possible we'll be like Cassandra, accurately predicting doom and gloom without anyone believing us. And then becoming the object of revulsion because we were right. Speaking truth to power often sucks.

So why do we do it? Why does Nell take on the establishment and defy her cult to highlight that they’re going down an ill-advised path?  Sometimes we do it because we can no longer stay silent or agreeable. Sometimes, the truth is so powerful that we cannot deny it. For me, it felt like a calling; I was able to see the writing on the wall and withstand the negative consequences of speaking truth to power, so I felt a responsibility to do so. Much of these kinds of truths relate to improving areas where things are deteriorating, or urging repairs when things are broken.  Sometimes, the truth involves pushing others to be and do more when they are content to rest on their laurels or don't want to be bothered to do the right thing because it's hard, or costly, or just inconvenient.

Reading about Nell inspired me to remember why it's important to speak truth to power and all the good that it can do. I've found a kindred spirit in Nell, and I've found more truth in fantasy than can often be found in reality.

Worst Case Scenario

I just finished Molly Harper's hilarious new novel, Where the Wild Things Bite. Another laugh out loud experience with the denizens of Half Moon Hollow, Kentucky, a fictional southern town I'd love to visit, right after I get to Bon Temps, Louisiana. The vast majority of the book takes place in a wilderness with just two people, Anna, a human and Finn, a vampire. They've been in a plane crash and they are trying to get back to civilization.  What makes this book work so well—especially for me—is the absolute accuracy with which Ms. Harper has captured the behaviors and thinking patterns of the human sub-species called homo neurotico. Anna is such a familiar character to me that I'm sure I need to worry about my mental health. More than I already do, that is.  Anna is the product of a highly controlling mother and an absent father.  Sound familiar? As a result of the fear Anna learns at her mother's feet, the world is a very, very scary place for Anna, and she hardly gets out.  After all, when we engage in the world, we risk germs that lead to disease, rape and assault, getting ripped off or having our identities stolen, getting into an accident involving an automobile, train, boat or plane, coming down with food poisoning, or getting attacked by rabid bats. We must always be prepared for worst-case scenarios, including having a section of the bridge we're on collapse under us, the walls of the tunnel we're traversing come crashing down on top of us, earthquakes, tsunamis, tornados, hurricanes and stadium stampedes. We need to know what to do if the elevator cable snaps, or we contract gangrene from a rusty nail, or giardia from contaminated water. We must be ready for sudden catastrophe around every corner and know the statistical risks of something going wrong in every conceivable situation.  Forewarned is forearmed. 

Who thinks like this, you may wonder?  Well, Anna, for starters. And me for seconds. And I have at least one friend who's worse than I am with the catastrophizing. And as amusing as it is to read about, it's not all that fun to live with. 

But beyond the private misery that such thoughts produce for the thinker and anyone with whom she shares them, is the concept of the law of attraction. The law of attraction states that like attracts like, and by focusing on positive or negative thoughts we attract those kinds of experiences into our lives. You may think this is a load of shit, but I'm a believer. There is something to be said for the power of positive thinking and the nonsense of negative thinking. Mike Dooley, who created a popular subscription service called "Notes from the Universe" says, "Thoughts become things. Choose the good ones."  Good thinking.

Unfortunately, there was a time I could relate to Anna 1.0 (before she came through her harrowing experience with flying colors) to an uncomfortable degree.  Thankfully, I now have more in common with Anna 2.0, after she survives her own personal worst case scenario and realizes she is much stronger than she thought. Which of course reminds me of my very favorite A.A. Milne quote from Christopher Robin to Winnie the Pooh, "you're braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think."  This is largely true, but we are not aware of our own reality.

We are often made of sterner stuff than we previously thought, but we have no idea about it because we avoid situations where our true colors can come shining through. It's kind of like the Army putting its soldiers through the hell of basic training; it makes men and women out of boys and girls when they are able to accomplish great feats of mental and physical difficulty—and know what they are capable of achieving. If we never put ourselves in situations that stretch us and demonstrate our ability to move beyond our comfort zones, we may believe our own press that we aren't capable of doing much of anything. We might end up like Anna 1.0, hiding out in our houses and interacting with the world only through the safety of a computer screen.

As Henry Ford said, "Whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right."  So, if you think you will end up as fodder for mass shooters, or the victim of the many con artists out there just waiting to take advantage, you might be right. If you think you can meet whatever challenges life has in store without assuming a fetal position on the floor of a darkened room, then you probably can. Jus

After all, what's the worst that could happen?

Superman and Wonder Woman

Like many of you, I've been watching the Olympics. It’s been a blast to watch the United States win gold medal after gold medal. We're on fire this time around.  And that got me to thinking about elite athletes, and then about the elite of the elite, like Michael Phelps, Katie Ledecky and Simone Biles. I mean, it's gotta suck to be any of their teammates, because despite being incredible athletes in their own rights, they can't get noticed behind the shadow of their more decorated fellows. There is no comparison. This got me to thinking about how the elite compare with the rest of us. How can we make sense of a universe where there are such disparities within one species? This led me to contemplate the Black Dagger Brotherhood—don't you immediately contemplate vampires in the face of extraordinary human achievement? No? Well, I couldn't help wondering if Michael and Katie and Simone might actually be vampires, or some kind of comic book superhero, different in kind and not just degree. In the BDB world, there are different strata of society. The royal family includes the King, the Queen and their baby son, who are at the top.  Below them are the Brothers, all of whom used to be genetically bred as Brothers, but whose ranks have recently been joined by civilians who have proven themselves worthy. There is even one woman, with the promise of more on the way. Next is the aristocracy, who seem to be a group with a very large stick up their collective asses.  The aristocracy is a birth-based class system and is not overly permeable, similar to the English aristocracy. Lastly are the civilians, the working Joes who make the world function. There is also a class of servants about whom I've written before.

What does any of this have to do with our reality?  Well, I'm still contemplating elites and elitism. Unlike in the world of the Black Dagger Brotherhood, or colonial Britain, it used to be here in the good old U.S of A, that everyone believed they could rise to the level of their betters (in a socioeconomic sense of that word, not in a white supremacist sense). That was the beauty of the great American Dream. My whole life, in fact, is the product of that dream: my father was a Russian immigrant who fled the pogroms and his father’s murder to come to this land of opportunity. My father spoke no English, and only managed to get through ninth grade before his mother died and he was left with the care of his two younger brothers. Through hard work, intelligence, perseverance and some good luck, my father lived out the American Dream, making money and moving on up to the East Side, to a deluxe apartment in the sky, just like the Jeffersons. He raised his children on Park Avenue in New York City, and sent them to elite universities. The point here is that it was possible for an orphan from Russia to make it big and join the American upper class.

And that is amazing and wonderful and inspiring. And while there was a reasonable expectation that a similar trajectory was available to any whose wits, and grit and talent make them able to climb the societal ladders to a station well above where they started, all things were possible. When that was true, the U.S. could accommodate an elite class whose ranks were sufficiently accessible so that at least the illusion of social mobility existed for all.

It seems to me that it is no longer possible to maintain that particular fiction. As in the Black Dagger Brotherhood (at least before the last couple of books where the situation appears to be evolving, albeit slowly), being part of the elite is now a matter more of birth than of talent or indefatigable determination. In our current society, the children of the elite go to the good schools and are given the choicest opportunities. And as the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, the availability of the American Dream for all but the most talented and the most fortunate, is decreasing. We're getting to the point where only the Michael Phelpses and Simone Biles of this world can rise to the level of the elite (and we’re still not sure they’re actually human). Because the discrepancy between them and everyone else is getting bigger and bigger, and it’s getting harder and harder to ascend.

It seems to me that young people all over the U.S. are figuring out tragically early that the good stuff isn't for them, that they will never reach the brass ring, and that they will never get the chance to rise to the top—unless their talent or intellect is of Phelpsian or Jobsian proportions. And most of us know by the time we're 15 whether we have any chance of being the next Michael Phelps or Steve Jobs. Most of us have a greater chance of being struck by lightning. Twice.

So where does that leave us?  Pretty much in the mess we're in, with lots of simmering anger that flares up periodically. And what I really can't understand is that we've all seen this movie before and it doesn't end well for those elites who close their doors to ensure their exclusivity.  Invasion (Rome), revolution (France) or collapsing under its own weight (the Soviet Union) is the denouement of all of these societies.

Why can't we be more like the Black Dagger Brotherhood?  If centuries-old vampires are capable of change and evolution when the writing is so clearly on the wall, why can’t we embrace populism by ensuring the potential for anyone to be elevated to the elite? And I know I am not addressing the very serious and very real issue of a level playing field for all (regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation or identity, etc.) which is a ginormous problem.  But, given that (huge) caveat, our society can only work when there is a real possibility that anyone willing to work hard, be persistent and show initiative can move on up. Which is how elitism can survive. Otherwise, it's just not going to work. Superman and Wonder Woman only exist in fantasy, not truth.

It's a Kind of Magic

If I say, “I’ll take ‘Magic’ for $400, please, Alex,” what was the question? If you guessed, “What do Quincy Harker, The Book of Mormon and Freddie Mercury have in common?” you would be a Paranormal Jeaopardy rock star. If you have no idea what the hell I’m talking about, read on, dear reader, read on. I'm still thinking about Heaven Sent, by John G. Hartness. His writing is getting more fluid, and the snark factor more elegant (and yes, there is such a thing as elegant snark, and John Hartness is a master). Beyond the snark are some interesting musings. Today's cogitations involve the way magic works. I believe we can and do make magic every day. It involves focus and energy. And maybe a little something extra. Apparently, John Hartness agrees with me.

In the Quincy Harker novella series, Q is not quite human; he's faster, stronger and lives longer than mere mortals. He's also a powerful mage, or wizard, depending on your nomenclature. He can make shit happen that may elude the rest of us.  Interestingly, he has learned, through trial and error presumably, that when he casts relatively straightforward spells (like repairing broken doors), it doesn't matter which words he uses. Latin or Pig Latin, it's all the same, as long as the intent and focus are there; summonings and more elaborate spells require more precision in elocution. Or so we’re told. But let's stick with the original premise here, which is that intent is more important than content. This interesting idea is somewhat nuanced, and is therefore likely to be bastardized, but we’ll give it a go.

And here we get to the connection with The Book of Mormon. If you haven't seen the play, run, don't walk. Peed my pants laughing: the musical lived up to its hype. Beyond that, however, the plot is deep; it involves the slow realization by the lead LDS characters that the intention behind religious views is more important than the content. This is a truth I've always believed. God/The Universe/Krishna/Buddha/etc. doesn't care what the sign on the door says. Dogma is dumb, and love is all. When we exclude, judge, shun, and shame in the name of religious purity, you've lost me, as well as any God that I believe exists. I know this is not what most folks who self identify as "religious" versus "spiritual" would say, and maybe that's the difference right there. But if the content of our beliefs is more important than the intention behind our actions, we're not worshipping the same God.

And intent over content is also how John Hartness explains magic, mostly. As in mostly, all it takes is focus, intention and energy. Which makes a lot of sense.  But it's still definitely a kind of magic. Which explains why sometimes it works better than others. For example, when I've failed at something, or done less than my best, or the outcome wasn't what I'd hoped, I stop to think about where the magic went wrong. Was it my level of commitment? Was it a paucity of purity in my intention? Was it a lack of energy or focus (I usually misplace my focus before my energy, but that's what makes me so joyfully ADHD)?

But magic is not solely mundane, either in truth or in fantasy. It exists, no question about it, and we can all make it—without consciously casting spells. And we don’t need the suped-up DNA that Quincy sports from his parents, both of whom served as snacks for Dracula (kind of like how a bite from a radioactive spider can do a number on one's genes). But all magic, in addition to intention, focus and energy, has some fairy dust added to it. We might call it the hand of fate, or God's grace, good luck or whatever, but it's often there, just under the surface, of all we do. It's a kind of magic, in the truest sense of that concept, which is how we get to my favorite queen, Freddie M.

At least that's how it works for me. But, as Quincy notes, it’s magic, so who really knows? All I know is that I can make it. When I think of some of my achievements, and some of my defeats that really weren’t, I know that there must have been some supernatural mojo behind the outcomes of my life. I should have died 100 times during my misspent youth. And I should have ended up sad, lonely and stupidly neurotic, wandering the streets of New York as a truly lost soul, if we all got what we deserve. But I think my heart is fairly pure and my destructive tendencies are mostly self-directed, so perhaps my better-than-I-deserve existence does have a lot to do with intent instead of content (but we’ll only know for sure after I go the way of all flesh whether I I end up taking the elevator up or down).

On the other hand, and this is where the nuance comes in, we all know about the pavers that constitute the road to Hell. Good intentions don't trump bad or evil outcomes. Sure, it matters that we mean well, as I’ve written about before, and if it's a first offense, then that makes even more of a difference. But just because we didn't mean to break the mirror, doesn't mean we aren't going to suffer from seven years of bad luck. So, intent is important, but all things being equal, content has an important role to play as well.  Even when we're making magic.

So, thank you – Freddy Mercury, Book of Mormon and dear Q for adding some magic to my day. I hope that this post has added a tiny bit of fairy dust to yours.

Free Willie

I just spent a couple of very pleasant hours with John Hartness' new Quincy Harker novella, Heaven Sent. The plot describes how Quincy first met his guardian angel, Glory; in fact, he hadn't been aware he had a guardian angel in the first place. Turns out those GAs are pretty handy to have around, and not just because they can stop bullets on your behalf. On a less convenient note, however, Quincy (whom Glory christens "Q") learns that guardian angels can only intervene in very specific circumstances, and that they kind of suck at information sharing. When Q takes issue with Glory's failure to communicate—not to mention help him when he asked for help—she informs him that angels do not have free will—they cannot help themselves from following "Orders from upstairs."  That stopped me cold. Slavery in heaven? Apparently so. It also got me thinking about one of my favorite topics, free will and making good choices.  We all want to make good choices, right? But free will ensures that we often miss the mark. Why is this the case?  I suspect I won't know for sure until I shuffle off this mortal coil. In the interim, I can speculate. Or navel gaze. Your call. What is free will, anyway?  For me, free will is the potential to make poor choices and engage in serious self-destruction. I'd like to have a more positive outlook about one of the defining characteristics of humanity, but in looking around me, and also inside the recesses of my own dark corners, it's hard to be optimistic. Free will ensures that even when we know—beyond a shadow of a doubt—that option A is a better choice than option B, most of us choose B anyway, particularly if it involves chocolate. Perhaps I should only speak for myself. And not to sound like a broken record, but 66% overweight and obese Americans, almost 20 million alcoholics, and the many millions who support Donald Trump all point to the fact that we aren't so good at making good choices with all this free will we have. 

And then we can ask ourselves, why is free will a defining characteristic of humanity? Why not have us all be angels, who apparently can't make a poor choice (explains the whole halo thing for sure, by the way)?  Wouldn't that be nice?  Always making good choices, always doing the right thing? Always marching in lock step with the Big Guy Upstairs? Oh, wait, maybe that last thing isn't such a great idea. We'd all be Stepford Wives and mental slaves and where would be the fun in that?  In fact, if I pull this string a bit more, without free will, nothing makes any sense at all. There would be no search for truth (we'd all agree on what it is), no striving toward excellence (because it would be a universal imperative, not an aspirational construct), no winners and losers, because competition wouldn't be an option. Sounds pretty boring, not to mention pointless. 

But if we believe in free will, as I do with every atom of my being, what does our free will have to say about topics like predestination, divination, destiny, etc.? It's another interesting mental puzzle. I love my Tarot cards, which I use mostly for guidance, but sometimes to sneak a peek at what might be just around the next temporal bend, just beyond my line of sight. I also believe in destiny to some extent. But even with those beliefs, I still believe we can make a mess of things if we want to. I figure it's kind of like genetic expression: my family has a genetic predisposition towards lethal heart disease.  I know this, and it colors the health choices I make. So, I could let history play out again and again and go to an early grave following a massive heart attack, like so many of my relatives. Or, I can take care of my heart and avoid that particular destiny. I'm going with the second option on that one. But not all of my cousins have made similar choices and they are currently six feet under.  Free will.

Free will also trumps Divine omnipotence in my philosophy of life. In other words, the Big Guy (or Gal) upstairs cannot save us from ourselves, no matter how badly most Christian theologians have mangled the whole salvation through Christ concept. God isn't some sort of everyday Santa Claus, dispensing get out of jail, or the hospital free cards on demand, even if we've been very good girls and boys. For me, God is limited by His/Her own rulebook: humans have free will and they get to choose. And in order to be a sporting kind of God, God makes sure to make the right choice slightly more difficult, or uncomfortable, or less pleasant than the wrong choice. Otherwise, as I've written about before, it wouldn't be a real choice. If it were easy, we'd all be angels. 

But it's not and we're not, and that is the reality of life. And it's OK, actually.  Having to work to do the right thing and make good choices tempers us in the crucible of living, forming our characters and making us who we are.  It gives us the work of a lifetime, provides structure to our days and purpose to our existence.  I think free will is necessary to all of that and that the Big Guy/Gal was pretty clever when this system was put in place.  After all, as Quincy tells us, balance must be maintained. So where the angels can't help but do good, the demons can't help but do bad. And we humans are somewhere in the middle, trying to muddle through. So I'll pull out my "Free Willie" t-shirt (I loved that movie), and I'll have my little inside joke, and offer my support to whatever God put all of these pieces in motion in the first place.

The Office

I just finished Elle Boca's Weeia on My Mind. Excellent read. I found myself turning pages quickly to see how it all got resolved. But what really struck me about the book was Ms. Boca's remarkable attention to detail and her close, totally on-point observations. Particularly with respect to a topic I thought I'd forgotten, but which came rushing back like the tide at full moon when I was reading this novel. Ms. Boca has perfectly captured the ins and outs of office life. I'm not sure if it's depressing or inspiring to know that even a race of superhumans struggles with the office two-step, dancing quickly to climb the corporate ladder, keep others from flinging us down and avoid getting stepped on.  Weeia on My Mind is written from the perspective of young Danni Metreaux, a Weeia law enforcement officer recently transferred to Paris, her requested posting. Once she gets there, however, she is confronted with several familiar figures in offices across the globe and across time:  the long-standing, do-nothing bureaucrat who resents the presence of personnel who actually want to work and the obstructionist assistant/secretary/office manger who makes life as difficult as possible for those same folk who are just trying to get shit done.  Anyone who's ever worked in an office knows who I'm taking about. These characters and the situations they create were drawn so faithfully that the lines between truth and fantasy were very blurred, as they often are in my beloved genre.

In the book, Danni desperately wants to seem professional and knowledgeable. She wants to make her mark. Like all of us who've been newbies in a corporate environment, we know, like Danni, that appearances count, that our behavior is being scrutinized and commented on, and that everything we do is being analyzed by an electron microscope. All of which makes it brutally difficult to fit in while simultaneously standing out. Which is the name of the game in The Office, no matter where it is or what it does or makes.

Like the rest of us, Danni struggles to juggle the requirements, explicit and implicit, of the chain of command.  We need to make our bosses look good. But we can't show them up. We need to ensure that we're asking for permission before we go off half cocked, thinking we know what to do, but we need to demonstrate independent thinking and initiative.  We need to first, do no harm, but also do what needs to be done. It's exhausting.

Then there is the problem of our place in the hierarchy. Offices are the most structured, hierarchical environments in the universe. Submarines have nothing on a well-established office. With this hierarchy comes a need to understand how to behave with superiors, subordinates and colleagues alike. Forgetting our place is a mortal sin in The Office.  We're expected to be graciously subservient to those above us; firm but fair with those below us; and we need to be overtly friendly while hiding the sub rosa machinations going on as we try to outshine our competitors, otherwise known as our peers. Totally draining. 

And what about what happens when work relationships become personal–as in friendships and romances?  If we're working 60-70 hours a week, we're spending more time with our fellow workers than with anyone else. Relationships happen, whether we want them to or not, and whether they are permitted or not. I was frankly shocked that Danni didn't develop a more-than-professional interest in her new protégé. Sebastian is smart, hot, and rich. They do become friends, which is nice, and predictable insofar as the real world is concerned. It could have gone the other way, which leads to all sorts of contortions while people try to hide their forbidden office romances. I've kept more of these kinds of secrets than any other. And I worked in a classified environment for twenty years. 

And finally, Danni has to deal with the "We-Be's," a particularly nasty sub-species of office dwellers who will screw you up every time. These are the folks with the lovely attitude that says, "We be here when you come and we be here when you go.  Ain't nothing you can do to us or for us, so fuck off."  I'm pretty sure that is a direct quote. These troglodytes are in the trenches, and it's almost impossible to extricate them. And they can make our lives a living hell, if they so desire. Been there, done that, got the t-shirt. 

There are others from Satan's headquarters who can make life fairly toasty as well. I'm talking about bosses from hell, including the ragers, the gropers, the mouth-breathers and the tyrants.  There is nothing worse than a bad boss.  I've been blessed in my professional life; mostly, I've had bosses from Heaven. The only one from Down Under eventually came around and joined the side of the angels—and we became good friends. I would have lost that bet. 

And all of these memories of my corporate life as a national security contractor came pouring in as I read Elle Boca's latest offering. These are bittersweet memories, as I don't really miss office life, but I do sometimes miss the intensity, the structure, the shared sense of purpose and responsibility and the camaraderie of working in an office environment. But I think I will stroll down memory lane with my beloved books, rather than in real life. Truth is sometimes more palatable in fantasy than in reality. Thanks, Elle Boca, for the great read and the fun ride.

All in the Family

It was Christmas in July! I finally found and read A Fashionably Dead Christmas by Robyn Peterman.  And I laughed my ass off. These books tackle some serious issues with laugh-out-loud humor. Ms. Peterman has inspired posts about mothers from Hell, and also about how I want a fast fix for all my personality disorders. Today, she’s the inspiration for a blog about family holidays and all their imperfections. Astrid, the heroine of the Fashionably Dead series, is the granddaughter of Mother Nature and the niece of both God and Satan (who are brothers). Cousin Jesus is also in the picture, as are the cousins on her Uncle Satan's side, the Seven Deadly Sins (who are not very nice girls, I might add). And I thought my family was bad. Anyone who reads this blog is aware that my family of origin was not The Waltons.  It was closer to the Bunkers and then some. My mother was a narcissistic mess and my father embodied the concept of "benign neglect," which means that his kids rarely saw him. Both of them were significantly flawed and blithely unaware of how they were playing out all of their fears, insecurities and character defects on the tabula rasas of their children's unformed psyches.  Living through it was the source of nightmares.

My early childhood was in the 1970s, and I was enamored of my TV shows. I've written of my intense love for David Cassidy in all his Keith Partridge glory (I was ten, but my feelings were deep). I wished my parents would get divorced so I could live like the Brady Bunch. These families were having fun. Sure, they went through hard times (when Peter's voice changed, for example, they needed to rearrange who they were and what they wanted to be). But they always made it look easy.

My family life was anything but easy. My mother and I fought incessantly. My brother and I fought incessantly (although we had an unusually strong bond as a result of our common maternal enemy). My father was MIA. None of my friends wanted to come over because they didn't want to deal with my mother. If she answered the phone, they hung up. It was like living in an alcoholic environment without any of the good time.

Holidays were another circle of hell. Like Astrid, my mother wanted to make all of her holidays picture perfect.  We celebrated Christmas (despite being Jewish—kind of weird, actually), and my mother had a gorgeous tree when I was little (I've written about the whole Christmas tree Gaslight situation), and she set the table with the best linen, china, silver and stemware.  My mother had a talent for wrapping gifts, and the presents under the tree were so beautiful.  On the surface, everything looked perfect. Underneath it all, well… not so much.

What I loved about A Fashionably Dead Christmas was that Robyn Peterman turned the whole perfect holiday trope on its head. You know, once Uncle Satan shows up and "enhances" the Christmas decorations, the whole thing went from a shit show to a clusterfuck. As Astrid contemplated her formerly lovely tree, and her gifts and all the trimmings, she was initially devastated. She quickly realized, however, that underneath the imperfections was a family whose warmth and love embodied the reason for the season.

In my family of origin, we had all the glitz and none of the gestalt. I knew that as soon as I opened my gifts, they would become something else to take away from me when I was punished, which was often. I knew that I would get chastised for eating too much of the beautiful food and getting too excited about all there was to be excited about.

And I remember how desperately I wanted our family to be "normal." I wanted the Kennedy family photos of touch football in the yard on Thanksgiving. But I guess things didn't work out so well for them, either. I wanted to be the Huxstables.  Without the pervy dad, behind the curtain, of course. I wanted to live “One Day at a Time”, but with a dad (Ann Romano was divorced). So, as I go through this catalogue, I guess those TV families weren’t so perfect after all.

These days, we don't need to watch TV to see perfection. The quintessential “Modern Family” is flawed.  And other TV families are just “Shameless”. But we can visit Facebook where all families look Waltonian. All we're missing is a voiceover of "Goodnight, John Boy.  Goodnight Jimbob."  

So, while my childhood was far from perfect, Robyn Peterman assures us that, "Perfection is boring."  So perhaps I should be grateful for all of the imperfection in my early life. Hopefully, it's made me more engaging – and a better parent. While the perfect parent doesn’t exist – to err is human after all – I'm hopefully giving my kids an interesting and (mostly) joyful upbringing. And I'll remember to stop comparing my insides to others' outsides. We can't Photoshop our Christmas dinners let alone our internal landscape.  Just the pics we post on Facebook.

It's a Life

So it's back to The Beast. I've missed you while I was away. But I've been troubled by a niggling thought that's been clamoring for expression. It feels heretical to share my forbidden musings, but I'm going to Hell anyway for suggesting that Mac and Barrons have a dysfunctional relationship, so here goes nothing: there's something rotten J.R. Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood world. Now I get that no one is perfect. And I also understand that Ms. Ward purposefully built her world in such a way that evolution was not only desirable, but inevitable as part of the story progression of the books.  Characters evolve, so why not worlds?  Thus, the misogyny of the Chosen (an elite class of women) being basically brood mares and feeding troughs for the Black Dagger Brotherhood has given way to newly unfettered women who are now free to explore and express their individuality. This is definitely progress and has made for an excellent story arc, so it's a win-win all around.  But there is another class of people in the Black Dagger Brotherhood world that has not been given any sort of emancipation proclamation. These are the "Doggen," the servant class of the BDB world, the butlers and cooks and maids whose existence allows the Brothers and their women to gallivant all over the place without worrying about little annoyances like cooking, cleaning and laundry. In this world, there is no such thing as a resentful housekeeper starching one's panties or boxers because they are unhappy with their lot in life. Not for the Brothers. Nope, these guys (and gals) have Doggen, a special sub-race of individuals who live to serve, and who experience deep fulfillment from vacuuming. Really?!  Hasn't Ms. Ward read The Remains of the Day?  Won't Fritz (the main Doggen dude in the BDB books) figure out that he's wasted his life playing chauffeur, butler, chief cook and bottle washer to a group of foul-mouthed warriors who should be picking up their own underwear (except most of them go commando)? Apparently not. And that, of course, got me to wondering whether such people actually exist outside of the pages of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. Perhaps they do exist, and maybe they are even happy, despite my elitist bias. After all, it's a life. And a life is more than some of us have. 

I have a close friend who has a stepdaughter who is a couple beers short of a six-pack. By all accounts, she is a sweet, immature, and indifferently lazy girl who should be a woman but no one taught her how. It's not all her fault, but, like the rest of us, there comes a time to stop blaming mommy for all of our problems and take responsibility for our own actions.  Her time has come. And then some. My friend, her stepmother, and my friend's husband, the girl's father, worry about her, naturally (the mother is dead, poor thing). As parents, they want their child to have a life. Preferably, a life that exceeds their own (there are parents who resist the natural desire that our children should do better than we do, but that is the subject of another blog). But these particular parents realize, realistically, that the daughter/stepdaughter can aspire only to a small life—and they are hoping she gets even that far.  So they are hoping for an equally limited, but nice and decent man, maybe a kid or two, Friday night trips to the local bar, and Monday night football. Because, after all, it's a life. Not for me, mind you, but a life nonetheless.

Like the Doggen of the BDB world, there are those who enjoy knowing where the lines are so that they can color inside of them. The idea gives me hives, but I've had many years to come to terms with the fact that not everyone is like me, which is good news for the rest of you.  And not everyone would want my idea of what makes life worth living (which includes lots of time to read my beloved books and write about them).  My mother, for example, wasn't much for reading and writing, and she was never happier than when she could cook for someone, wait on them hand and foot, and clean up afterwards. I'd rather shoot heroin with dirty needles, but hey, for her, it was a life.

I know someone else who has painstakingly carved out a life for herself by spacing out her errands over the course of a day or a week, and taking a great deal of time to plan out every move, research every decision, and analyze every option eight ways from Sunday (where does that saying come from?  I've always wondered… but I digress). The progress of her days would make me yearn for the excitement of my annual gynecological visit, but she is rather content. It's a life. Lived on her terms and no one else's. 

Part of the reason for the lives we choose to lead is what we know. If we don't know any better, we won't know what we're missing. Part of it is fear—fear of risk, fear of the unknown, fear of being completely powerless and out of control. Life for the Doggen is very safe and very predictable. This appeals to many of us. And for many of us, that safety and predictability is worth the opportunity cost of spontaneity and serendipity. Not for me, but different strokes for different folks.

So maybe my apostasy was premature. Maybe I don't need to be burned at the stake as a heretical witch. Perhaps I was wrong about Ms. Ward being wrong.  Maybe, once again, there is plenty of truth in fantasy and Doggen in reality are as plentiful as dogs—those who enjoy knowing their place in the word and how they relate to others. And as long as there is an escape hatch if we absolutely, positively have to get the hell out of Dodge, it's probably just fine for all. In the interim, it's a life.

Notes from Underground

So I have to share. And crow. And toot my own horn. Just a bit. I just learned that an interview I gave for a podcast is now available. The podcast is called "Journal Talk," and it's hosted by a cool guy named Nathan Ohren. My interview can be found here, and I also encourage you to take a listen to some of his other interviews.  It's a great show, and Nathan's mission to help people explore the benefits and joys of journaling is engaging and worthwhile. In the interview, I talk about this blog as a form of public journaling, which it is. In this space, I ruminate on various topics that tickle my fancy, and I also work through my fears and anxieties, not to mention sharing my triumphs and joy. You guys get it all. And while I might pull my punches a very little bit out of respect to my family, really I just try to tone down my language (remember how much I love my potty mouth?) and perhaps leave out excessive references to my misspent youth. But beyond that, I'm digging for gold in the recesses of my mind, and dredging up these notes from the underground of my unconscious (see how useful that liberal arts education was… those literary allusions don’t come from nothin’).

And, in addition to journaling to excavate my unconscious, I also use this space to expand my horizons and perform thought experiments that challenge my everyday thinking. I believe this is an excellent use of journal writing—to explore the “what ifs” and “what might have beens” or that which could still be in a benevolent version of my future. I can take things apart and put them back together in different and perhaps more interesting ways. I can reframe a past experience and transform a painful memory into a critical lesson for later success. I can dig myself out of a deep chasm of denial through my writing, and realize what others may already know about something from my past or present about which was fooling myself. Like perming the front section of my hair to look like Joan Jett or Pat Benetar, but actually… well… not so much… in truth, I looked more like a poodle with a high top.

The other thing I get to explore in this blog is its topic—the truth I find revealed in fantasy novels of the paranormal and urban varieties. Through this public journal I can inquire into the realities of being human through characters who are not. I've examined aging and mortality through the lens of fictional folks who neither get older nor die. I've been able to contemplate long-term romantic and platonic relationships in the context of those that have lasted or will last hundreds if not thousands of years. There is nothing like hyperbole to spotlight its right-sized cousin, reality.

For me, fantasy fiction is a textbook for life, a handbook of suggestions and guidelines for how to live my best life—which I long to share with all of you. I prefer these stories as the raw material for the ultimate self-help guide that I'm writing so that I can learn who's who and what's what. Where else is it so much fun to work through my commitment issues, and my mommy issues and my daddy dilemmas?  I use this space to contemplate my navel based on the interesting themes I find in my fantasy fiction. I doubt JR Ward knows that I rely on her for insight into addiction, or that Kevin Hearne knows that he is my favorite therapist. Robyn Peterman makes me feel a lot less isolated when I think of my mother as being literally from Hell, ‘cause all of her heroines' mommies are of the dearest variety, which helps me know I'm not alone.

And then there is the endless joy I get from living in worlds where men do what we want them to do! When I read and write about these fantasy books written by women (mostly—apologies to Mr. Hearne and Mr. Hartness), for women and about women, I'm inspired and reassured that my personal fantasies are happily shared by many others. Women want alpha males who make love like thousand-year-old, drop dead gorgeous vampires who know a thing or two about pleasing women, but who aren't too overbearing outside of the bedroom. We can dream, can't we?

Through the discipline of writing and posting this blog twice a week, week in and week out, I've been able to grow and expand -- examine and probe and question. I've also been able to engage with you, beloved reader, and know with certainty, through your voices, that I'm in good company with my neuroses.

So, let me encourage you to journal and reap the many benefits that I've received through my private pages and my very public postings. As Nathan Ohren says, we should all write for life, and journal for passion, clarity and purpose. It really works for me – I hope that you’ll give it a go and see if it works for you… or at least sample Ohren’s podcast here.

Back to the Future

So I'm back to reading The Beast by J.R. Ward, after my brief sojourn through Katie MacAlister's short stories.  I can find blog topics in J.R. Ward's books faster than my kids can collect Pokemon with their phones.  I worry they will get run over while playing Pokemon Go and not paying attention to reality. And while it may seem like I'm digressing (as I often do), I'm not. Today's topic is all about anticipation (mostly of bad things happening—which is the definition of “worry”), and the feelings of anxiety we experience when we contemplate catastrophe. In The Beast, Mary contemplates the wound that almost took her mate, and wonders what would have happened if she hadn't been inspired to intervene as she had. She speculates that, "Sometimes the near miss is almost as traumatic as the impact." True statement. But, despite the positive outcome, her fear lingers.  I think that this is true for most of us. We keep seeing the traumatic event in our mind's eye over and over, thinking about what might have been in the dystopian alternative. Instead of the events in question being played repeatedly in our heads, though, this particular movie gets projected over our entire future lives, tarring it all with the same brush of stomach-churning dread. When one calamity has been avoided, we often look for other bullets to dodge.

When we've suffered a near miss, we view the world as a dangerous place. Despite having deflected disaster, we become convinced there is one around every corner.  This is the companion ticket to waiting for the other shoe to drop. When things are going well, we wait for the hammer to fall. The same thing happens when we experience a near miss. Maybe somewhere in our brains we think that if the lightning misses us once, it will probably strike the next time.

It's interesting to observe the almost universal conviction that random bad things are so much more likely to happen than arbitrary good things. We never "worry" that we'll win the lottery a second time. But many of us, myself included, obsess about having a second car accident, or getting the flu on our vacation, or our periods when we have an important sports competition (well, I'm guessing men don't worry so much about that one).

A near miss colors all future events with a dark cloud of pessimism. It's like we've used up all our luck, now we're cruising on fumes. We figure the good stuff will never reign down on us again, and next time the impact will be twice as bad as it would have been if we had experienced the trauma for real. After all, someone is out there keeping score, and making sure we don't get too much of what makes us happy, right?  Wrong. But we think like this anyway. Or maybe I'm just a freak.  Hard to know sometimes.

But the most significant crime committed by our brains after a near miss is that we cease living in the present moment. Just as the endless loop I discussed before kept us mired in the muddy rut of our pasts, the near miss propels us like Christopher Lloyd's DeLorean back to the future. We aren't moving forward into prospective possibilities, but back to the near death event that now overshadows the entire wreckage of our future.  The one place we aren't hanging out is in the moment, where the bad thing never happened (remember, almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades). The future isn't here yet and isn't any more likely to be bad than it was before the near miss. But our brains just can’t compute that.

Having said all of that, trauma is trauma, and apparently the mind can't always distinguish between truth (we're all okay, the sky didn't fall) and fantasy (where Henny Penny is running around like the chicken she is—although with her head still firmly attached).  And we need to honor our reality. So if fear and being like Eeyore is what we're about, then that is where we are.  The thing to do at this point is acknowledge reality … so that we can change it. So many of us, like Mary, discount our feelings because our life sentence was commuted to parole. We think to ourselves that we have no legitimate reason to be upset, so we convince ourselves we're not. And this works for you how? Yea, not for me either.

So let's come back to the present instead of back to the future or hanging out in the past.  Time travel never takes us where we want to be, and there is so much opportunity to screw everything up. We have no guarantees of tomorrow, so squandering today on a potentially empty promise is more traumatic than the near miss or the impact ever could have been.

With My Body

I took a break from reading The Beast by J.R. Ward to enjoy a short offering from Katie MacAlister, The Perils of Effrijim. This short story features Jim, a sixth class demon who is the servant/sidekick of Aisling Grey, the heroine of many a dragon shifter book by Ms. MacAlister. Jim is a hoot, and I enjoyed my foray into his world immensely. Jim is forced to surrender his preferred form as a large, drooling Newfoundland dog and take on the shape of a human male, which he hates (something to do with a reduction in the size of his "package," about which he is obsessed—like so many males). And this forced human embodiment got me to thinking about being in our bodies, and what that means to us. Or maybe just to me. But it's a topic that occupies my thoughts rather a lot these days. To my mind, we are embodied spirits with an infinite yearning for the part of ourselves that is divine to reunite with the rest of the infinite. But, while we are here, in this place on the space-time continuum, we inhabit bodies. This inhabiting comes with the limits of our physical beings, and also the incredible perks of being in a body. Remember all of those science fiction characters who exist as balls of energy or as human brains in glass jars? Even though they are "evolved," and presumably beyond the dictates of the flesh, they want to find bodies to inhabit. Why? Because being in a body comes with serious advantages. Like eating chocolate covered strawberries. And touching our beloved's bodies with love (and lust, who are we kidding?). And being able to smell the delicious scent of a baby's head. You can't do those things without the right equipment, like mouths, fingers and noses. Sensual perception is intensely pleasurable.

So while it's annoying to have to deal with the perpetual care and feeding needed to keep these miraculous machines running effectively (and some of us do a better job than others), it's still amazing that we can do all we can do and experience all that we can experience.

Except when it's not. Like when we take it for granted. Or when we focus on the difficulties of our physical limitations. Or when we are not appropriately appreciative. Then, being embodied is not such a great deal. Given the amount of body bashing we do, an objective observer might conclude that we actually hate our bodies. Just this afternoon, for example, I was berating my body for continuing to grow—I'm not enjoying the extra layer of padding that seems determined to gather around my middle like metal shavings to a magnet. I would really like to demagnetize myself and attract less fat to my midsection. But concentrating on my love handles and my spare tire misses the point that my magnificent body produced two human lives, allows me to practice yoga, which I love, hike up hills to see beautiful mountain lakes and does most of what I ask of it. Pretty remarkable considering the abuse to which I subjected it for so long, not to mention my ever-advancing age. Decrepitude cannot be far in the future, but for today, all systems are go. No need to break out the emergency dilithium crystals to get that extra boost of power quite yet. Stand down, Scotty.  At least for now (I'm on a Star Trek kick in anticipation of the movie coming out shortly—and I have eyes to watch and ears to listen. Yay!).

Our bodies are wise. They house every experience we've had in each and every cell. If we remember how to do it, we can draw out our somatic knowing, our bodies' knowledge, to help guide us to exactly where we need to be. You know those "gut feelings"?  We should listen to those. They are almost always right. When we feel our feelings and listen to our bodies, we tend to do the right thing and make good choices.

But what about when we are cut off from our bodies? What happens when that whole mind-body connection has some serious static on the line and we're missing every third word of the conversation? Bad things happen when we are bifurcated between our necks and the rest of us. My experience has been with living entirely too much in my head. But the opposite problem exists as well—those who are slaves to their bodies without a lot of cognitive direction. The goal, of course, is integration. Easier said than done, at least for me.

Being disconnected, though, is not as bad as being in a state of armed conflict with our bodies. Instead of our bodies being wonderlands, they become battlefields, where wars on cancer, cardiovascular disease and obesity are routinely waged. This is tragic, actually, because a house divided truly cannot stand. We are our bodies and our bodies are us.

And then there is the ultimate consequence of being embodied: death. The whole shuffling off this mortal coil business. The final frontier. That part kind of sucks, admittedly. As does the whole aging process, for the most part.

But that is the price we pay for being able to inhabits these marvels of complexity that are our human bodies. As a demon, Jim doesn't have these issues, and his preference for his dog form is baffling to me, but, hey, to each his own. Given the opportunity for a human body that didn't age, decay or break down, I'm pretty sure I'd take it. Although my dogs lead pretty sweet lives, come to think of it…

I’m grateful for my body in all its imperfections. So I'll practice groundedness—the effort to be and remain in my body, rather than letting my mind drift away to the far reaches of the galaxy—or at least where Ms. McAlister and Ms. Ward take me.

All I Need Is a Miracle

I'm just getting into JR Ward's newest Black Dagger Brotherhood novel, The Beast. It's as awesome as I knew it would be. I'm reading slowly so I can savor, savor, savor it. And because I know I'll find inspiration for multiple blogs from this one gold mine of a book, you, dear reader, will be with me every step of the way. For this first Beast-ly blog, I'm thinking about miracles—what they are, where they come from and what they look like. I'm trying to decide if I agree with Albert Einstein. Supposedly, our favorite genius (next to Dr. Seuss, of course), said that there are only two ways to live our lives: One is as though nothing is a miracle; the other is as if everything is. Mostly, I try to align myself with good old Albert. Because he was so smart, ya know. And I think I agree with him. And I also think that miracles abound, so I guess I fall into the second category of people. Which is a lovely way to live.

In The Beast, our favorite vampire-turned-dragon, Rhage, takes a mortal wound during an opening scene battle. As he lays dying, his mate, Mary, is inspired to direct the dragon to heal his host, who will surely die without intervention of the miraculous variety. Mary has no clue where the idea came from, and no one is sure it will work, but it does. Certifiable miracle, coming right up.

Clearly, saving someone from certain death qualifies as a miracle. I've actually seen one of those happen, up close and personal. Many years ago, my husband's mother was diagnosed with a lung tumor.  In addition to following conventional medical advice, which included rib-cracking surgery to remove the mass, my mother-in-law also engaged spiritual healers and energy medicine practitioners to work on her behalf. When the doctors spread her ribs (which is painful to even think about!), the tumor was nowhere to be found. The medical professionals were baffled, but my mother-in-law was not; she'd been granted a miracle based on the efforts of those who engaged a higher power to heal her. And while she would have been happy to be spared the difficult surgery, she was profoundly grateful for the miraculous outcome, as were we all.

Spontaneous healing definitely counts toward the saints’ yardstick for miracles. And there are other types of dramatic events that feel miraculous in the moment, and seem to conform to that metric with the perspective of hindsight. The end of temptation and addiction makes the cut. As an example, I smoked my first cigarette when I was fifteen years old. I was with one of my best friends and we smoked menthol cigarettes and thought we were too cool for school. I almost threw up that first time, and thought it was disgusting. That didn't stop me from trying again and rapidly getting hooked—line and sinker. My friend was more intelligent than I, and she decided that smoking wasn't for her (good thing too, because she is asthmatic; I never said we were smart teenagers). Anyway, fast-forward twelve years and I'm up to a pack/pack and a half a day habit, which was both expensive and unhealthy. And then one day, while sitting in a random hotel room in Vermont shortly after Christmas, it hit me: my smoking was a terrible habit and I needed to quit. Right then. And I took an entire carton of cigarettes—which didn't cost the arm and leg that cigs do now, but still represented a significant dent in my weekly budget— and I flushed every one of those cancer sticks down the hotel toilet. I have never taken a single drag since. Not one. That was definitely a miracle. I didn't do that on my own. Three months later, I met my now-husband, who has noted on several occasions that he would never have dated me if I'd been a smoker when we met.

Coincidence? I think not. Miracle?  I think so. Which simply validates another quotation attributed to Albert. E., that coincidences are God's way of staying anonymous. What better way to hide the everyday miracles that occur than to shroud them in the guise of coincidence?  But what if we all believed, as I do, that there are no coincidences? That everything happens for a reason and the way it's supposed to? Well, I mostly believe that, at least on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Kind of like the rules of Fizzbin.

And what about the miracle of my muse?  Surely the creative inspiration I receive from my favorite, if finicky, goddess, is nothing short of a miracle every time I sit down to put my thumbs to my phone's keyboard to write this blog (yep, I'm still doing that, strangely enough). As I've written about before, half the time I have no idea what's going to come out on the page or the screen. It just flows out of me, like ketchup that's been thumped on the bottom of the bottle. If that isn't a miracle, I don't know what is.

Other miracles include the fluidity with which obstacle disappear when we've found and followed the right path. That is such a great experience, to literally go with the flow of our lives, swimming downstream with ease and joy. I would call that an everyday miracle, but I can't claim that happens to me with sufficient regularity to label it a quotidian occurrence. But maybe someday I'll learn to live like that. That would be a miracle.

And I won’t give up. One of my favorite adages is, "Don't leave before the miracle happens."  It could be right around the corner. Or around the block. Or perhaps a greater distance away. But I know it's coming.  The miracle always does. And, if we look closely, pay attention, and inhabit the present moment , miracles proliferate. And far from being found only in fantasy novels like The Beast, we can live in truth and still find much that is miraculous. As the late, great Wayne Dyer said, "I am realistic—I expect miracles."  I'm down with that. Maybe Albert and Wayne are discussing it up in heaven and sprinkling all of us with some miracle dust. Every day.

High Maintenance

I just finished Darynda Jones's The Curse of Tenth Grave. Ms. Jones, please, please write faster. I'm dying to know what happens to Charley Davidson, Grim Reaper, god, and all around bad-ass. Charley has taken her place in the pantheon of extraordinary heroines, whose ranks include Anita Blake, Merry Gentry, Jane Yellowrock, Mercy Thompson, Sookie Stackhouse and, of course, Mac Lane. These women rock. Charley is a bit different. She's highly irreverent. She's also got a severe case of ADHD. And, as she described one of her clients, Charley has "turned high maintenance into an extreme sport." I love that woman. Charley has the attention span of a tse-tse fly. She is easily distracted by sparkly things, good-looking men, and the smell and taste of delicious foods. I can so relate. But the aspect of her personality that I find the most interesting is how difficult it is to keep up with her. While she is highly entertaining about it, she is incredibly demanding and very particular in her standards, which are a bit strange. These include a need to name every inanimate object she encounters—her car is "Misery" her shower is "George" and she named her breasts "Danger" and "Will Robinson." Enough said. She is a poster child for "high maintenance."  I’m not criticizing her for this. In fact, I think being high maintenance is highly underrated.

I have been called high maintenance my whole life. At first, I felt bad about it. Who was I to demand more than my ‘fair’ – according to some - share of attention, help, support, and, most significantly, accommodation?  Why should there be special exceptions for moi?  Why don't the rules apply to yours truly?  When asked like that, it does seem unfair, I must admit. Shouldn't rules apply to all equally without regard to race, religion, gender identity, sexuality, or fashion sense (muffin top, camel toe and plumber's crack would be outlawed in my world, but unfortunately, no one asked me)? I totally get that. Except I don't.

So many rules, social mores and others' expectations are just stupid. Further, while we should all be considered equal under the law and in terms of the value of our fragile and precious human lives, we're not all equal, and that is called reality. Some of us got extra helpings of brains, brawn, serenity, beauty, determination and perseverance, curiosity, resilience, imagination, etc., etc., etc.  And some of us got fucked in these and other ‘departments’.   Perhaps we're spinning on a karmic wheel, and if we got additional servings of the good stuff in this life, maybe it was to make up for the fact that we got hosed in another one. And maybe if the cards we were dealt in this incarnation were less than wonderful, it's because we were so incredibly blessed in previous stints on this plane. I have no idea. But the facts remain; we're not all the same. We are glorious in our individuality, and there is no way to aggregate us by any of the aforementioned categories; we need to be judged on our own merits.

And that is where the high maintenance aspect comes in. High maintenance requires extra accommodation. It requires putting up with, tolerating, accepting and actively condoning behavior that is outside the norm. In Charley's case, her friends and loved ones take her as she is, which includes her ridiculous naming habit, coffee addiction, and her propensity to get herself into many a sticky wicket. She gets away with lying, cheating, stealing and the occasional assault and battery, all in the name of serving the greater good. There is a great deal of relative moralism in Charley's world. And it's acceptable because of what she accomplishes with her shenanigans.

Many years ago I received an award for being in my job as a defense contractor for five years (no, not for doing a good job, just for doing it. For not getting fired or quitting the job. This says a lot about the state of our society, but that is the topic of another post). One of my party favors was a gift for my husband from my boss—a "high maintenance survival kit"—because, you know, I'm so high maintenance. And the whole thing would have been mean-spirited except for the point my boss was trying to make: that while I required tremendous levels of accommodation, time and attention, it was all worth it because I delivered so much professionally. I'm pretty sure my husband would agree with this equation in the personal realm too (at least I hope so). So, high maintenance, high performance.

And that gets us to the crux of the issue:  the rules were developed for the everyone, yes. But rules can be totally too constricting when we are trying to do extraordinary things. I'm not talking about rules like the Ten Commandments or the Golden one. And I get that chaos would reign if everyone had the kind of blatant disregard for law and order that I can sometimes have. I've always found that it is so much better to ask for forgiveness than permission.  I've also never seen a rule that didn't have an exception. Those of us who are of the high maintenance persuasion are going to make omelets. So, we're going to break a few eggs. And we're going to keep asking for accommodation. Of course, there are those who are high maintenance without merit, which is just bad. But we're talking about those of us who use our powers for good, not evil. Like Charley who breaks the rules –for the good of us all.

I Am an Island

In my last post, I explained why I am a rock. In this continuation, I am an island. I've always loved Paul and Art.  More than they love each other, apparently. But, onto the topic at hand; I'm still thinking about what it means to be self-sufficient and whether it's really all it's cracked up to be. My thoughts were inspired by Robyn Peterman's latest awesome book, Fashionably Hotter Than Hell, which features a protagonist (written in the first person point of view of a man—a different, fun twist ) who comes to realize that going it alone is not only lonely, but doesn't get him where he wants to be. Us either. In my last post, I addressed the underlying mistrust that motivates most of our unwillingness to lean on others for help and support. We figure no one can do it as well as we can, so we'll do it ourselves – the right way, thank you very much. It turns out that this strategy is not so good, as most things in life really do take a village to accomplish successfully. So many of us are specialists these days, that a group effort is mandatory for most general activities, both personal and professional. But there is another aspect to the death grip we keep on our self-reliance: we hate to feel dependent, and most of us value our personal freedom more than anything.  We are the masters of our own ship, and while we may take various elements, including others' opinions, into account, in the end, when it comes to making our own decisions, the buck stops solely with us.

The crux of the issue is that none of us wants to feel dependent; we want to avoid the example of the poor, pathetic souls who are still attached to their mothers' tits—at age 40. You know, the ones living in their parents' basement, waiting for mom to cook dinner, pick out their clothes and wipe their butts. Or the other type of poor pathetic creatures who've sold their minds and their souls to the televangelist with the great hair and the boyfriend on the side. You know who I'm talking about. We don't want to be dependent like they are.

And these are valid concerns. Unhealthy types of dependence are creepy. On the other hand, the illusion of independence that most of us maintain is about as real as the aliens in Area 51. We're not independent, and that is that. Let me count the ways we are all kinds of dependent: first, let's start with physical dependence. I don't know about you, but my skill set revolves around mental activities like reading and writing and maybe analyzing things I read about (like this blog). My list of accomplishments does not include building shelters, catching my own food or finding clean water. When the apocalypse comes, I'm hoping to be among the first to go. I would fare badly in a world without electricity, Whole Foods and cars. Perhaps you're different, but if not, we're all dependent on the grid, cell phone towers, and the people who grow, kill, manufacture and distribute our food, not to mention Amazon, without which life would hardly be worth living.

So, we're not so self-sufficient in the physical realm. How about our mental function?  Well, if you think you're not being manipulated by the marketing industry, think again. We're all Stepford Wives, being told what to buy and where to buy it by the folks who rule the world through commerce and advertising. At this moment, I'm clothed head to toe in Lululemon athletic gear, and both my kids are making Under Armor rich. My wallet is clearly being controlled by Madison Avenue. The media influences the information we get to form our opinions. A handful of celebrity doctors, financial gurus, and lawyers heavily influence our opinions. Oh, and the NRA, apparently. So, how much are we really in business for ourselves, cognitively?  We've all drunk the Kool-Aid. And while it's true that some may lead enlightened lives, those beacons are few and far between and don't have nearly as much influence as, say, Oprah.

And then there's our compulsions, addictions and habitual stupidity. Two thirds of Americans eat too much. Many of us drink excessively. We watch too much TV and spend more time with our electronic devices than we do with our kids (and vice versa). In short, we are anything but self-reliant. We all have our favorite versions of our mother's little helpers. And we're highly dependent on them to keep us on an even keel—or at least prevent us from going under for the third time.

So what does all of this mean?  It means we're hypocrites. And that’s without a discussion about our lack of independence from what other people say about us and do to us, and how much that upsets our apple carts. We hand over our personal freedom without so much as a second thought when it comes to falling into a depression when we learn others are talking behind our backs. Or we dive into self-righteous anger and vengeance fantasies when someone does us wrong to our faces. That's just another form of personal bondage.

But Heaven help us when someone suggests we should surrender ourselves to something bigger than we are. Oh, Nelly, that just won't do at all, now will it?  No way, no how, am I going to try to align my will with that of the Universe, or God or whatever Higher Power we subscribe to. Nope, not gonna happen, cause I'm an independent thinker, a self-sufficient entity. A rock. An island. I touch no one and no one touches me. I'm the head honcho of my own enterprise, and I'm not talking about NC-1701.

So let's just say "no."  Let's allow others in to help. Let's open ourselves to something bigger than we are and try to serve the highest good in all that we do, not just look out for number one (and perhaps the additional few who we love). Let's admit our deep dependence and lack of personal freedom and get over ourselves. Simon and Garfunkel were wrong, and John Donne was right. No one is an island, we're all part of a larger whole.  We're all living on Pangaea. Best to start acting like it.