Walks of Life

In the past week, I've seen more people than I think I have in my entire life.

I traveled to Kansas - the farthest West I've ever been - to see my sister by plane for the first time.

I've met many people in three airports as well as one very large new city, and I've recently adopted people watching as a sport. I even made a small list of things to look for:

- Find someone from a country you've never heard of

- Find someone who looks like your best friend

- Find someone who you want to know better

- Find somebody with more kids than the largest family you can name

- Find a boy who wants to be a man

- Find a man who wants to be a boy

- Find a stranger you would do anything for

- Find a person whose life you can make better

- Find somebody as scared as you are

- Find someone who has seen the world

- Find someone who wants to see it

- Find a biker in a library

- Find someone famous

- Find someone who should be famous

Thus far, I think I can say I've found them all. I just guess I wasn't looking hard enough.

Parties

One thing can be said about America:

This is a party nation.

I'm not joking. Think about it. We host parties for EVERYTHING. From the announcement of a possible birth to a death and for every event in between, there has been a party thrown somewhere by someone. For that matter, Americans throw parties for Tupperware, sleeping, adult toys, or sometimes, nothing at all.

Keep in mind, our lovely nation is approximately 12.6 billion dollars in debt, not to mention constant budget cuts, poverty and a national unemployment rate of approximately 1o percent. Then we take into consideration the environmental destruction as well as the deterioration of landmarks that require restoration which requires funding of some sort that we don't have, can't afford, and probably won't be able to in this lifetime, and add that to the amount of money we don't have. What do we do about it? Throw a party!

Then you must consider parties throughout this lifetime:

Baby showers:

Quite honestly, this is one's first party. The fetus has been discovered inside its mother's womb, and this calls for celebration. Cake, food for an undetermined amount of women, presents, party favors, decorations, not to mention the basics: tablecloths, forks, plates, cups, etc. Gifts are expected to prepare the expecting mother for birth and her baby's childhood.

Holidays:

There has been a party sometime, somewhere for every holiday you can possibly think of in America. This includes the ones that no one actually cares about, despite them being marked on the calendar. This strongly resembles Rule 34, but in this case, if the holiday exists, there's a party for it. Period.

Holiday parties might consist of simply gathering a bunch of people to eat, drink, and give each other well wishes for the day, or they might be extravagant. Galas are not unheard of in the slightest for New Year's, Valentine's, and Christmas.

Birthdays:

Birthday parties, let's be honest, for a baby, are totally pointless. Face it, the kid doesn't care who shows up, if all of its baby friends come with the latest rattle, or if you drop $1,000+ on party favors that are more to please the other parents than the other children. This has become a highly common practice in places such as New York, where parents constantly try to outdo one another with gifts to send home.

A birthday party for a toddler is essential, but a ton of money shouldn't be spent on it, because after all, will they really remember it in ten years?

Between the ages of about 5 and 12, parties are completely acceptable. The kids will actually remember this party, but beware of stupid games... Enough said.

So then comes teenage years. Teen parties are fun, but usually cost a lot of money and in most ways are entirely pointless. They'll either be spent making out or doing things that kids probably shouldn't do... Truth or dare, for example, where my ex-boyfriend licked a window. If you take part in this, for God's sake, hide the camera!

Twenties on up, parties for birthdays are gonna be food-related. It's either gonna be a fancy restaurant, a bar-b-que, or going out clubbing. In rare cases, a movie or something equally entertaining might be thrown in.

For the most part, birthday parties revolve around food, and/or blowing a ton of money on random things/events.

Pointless :
Tupperware, Adult Toys, Make-up and other product parties fall under the "pointless" category. You're gonna show up, be shown a bunch of stuff you really don't need, be compelled to buy, then use it once and forget about it.

Also under "pointless" are the parties where everyone shows up to get trashed and then trash someone's place.

These parties are highly overrated. I mean, what are you going to take home? A hangover and possibly a STD or a poorly-thought out tattoo.

Today's generation believes that partying is part of life. Everything from raves to grand balls take place all over the country. While parties are fun, they usually involve large amounts of either food or money, usually a combination of the two.

Creativity

Or lack thereof.

Recently I've noticed a significant lack of creativity... So much that plagiarism runs rampant and parents have taken to naming their children after fruits...

Alice in Wonderland, produced by Tim Burton this year, was a huge success. Not only because it contained a bunch of big name actors or the producer happens to be the new Spielberg, but because of the creativity shown both in Lewis Carroll's story, as well as Burton's visualization for the set, costumes, and props.

It takes viewers into a foreign world in our own backyard, where caterpillars can talk and the daisies can argue. It builds a kingdom of solid white, and shows a mad man who really isn't that mad at all. It reminds viewers of the things they once believed in as a child. Ask yourself: Do I still believe in this?

What happened to our creativity? Where did it get lost? When did it become a rare thing to meet a creative person?

At some point in time, Creativity was crushed by the oppressive forces in the education system. We are told to stop dreaming and start working, almost constantly. Dreams have become laughable, and not in a good way. Dreams are officially labeled "Impossible." and stamped with a bright red ink stating "DENIED." Creative approaches are considered "too liberal" and the creator is mocked and humiliated.

Creativity has been so crushed that now students shudder at the words "creative assignment." Rarely is the assignment done, much less is it original. For the most part, it's a PowerPoint presentation or a three minute lecture, then it's forgotten for the rest of the year.

Creativity is frowned upon. Do not veer from the recipe, it will either a) taste bad, b) create a mess, c) be too obscure for people to convince themselves to try it, on the off chance they might enjoy it, or d) all of the above.

When we're young, we're discouraged from coloring outside the lines. It doesn't look good, and all appearances must be in order, so that if anybody sees it, it will be dull, boring, and completely unremarkable. The same goes for coloring a dog pink, or drawing people with exceptionally colorful skin. All must be totally realistic.

Few consider that sometimes, the tired mind needs an escape from the realistic. Sometimes, the completely awake mind in a state of pure sobriety must escape from the tenebrous reality known as life.

Renew the arts. Start a modern renaissance. Encourage imagination. Encourage unreality.

Be weird. Be different. Be creative.

Valentine's Day, an interrupting post.

Sorry I haven't been around and up to date, but things have been a bit hectic.

Anyways... Onto the post:

SAINT VALENTINE'S DAY:

So for starters: Who the heck is this guy?

To be honest, no one actually knows whether he's a martyr, a priest, a bishop, or for that matter, a group of people or if this person/these people actually existed. Supposedly he was buried on the Via Flaminia, for what it's worth.

Secondly: Why's his day associated with a bunch of hearts and pink and fluffy, mushy, gushy crap?

There are actually a few different takes on this. There's a version where an emperor banned marriages in hopes of expanding his army, but Valentine opposed it, so he married couples in secret. This got him thrown in jail. There's also a version that he healed his jailer's blind daughter and fell in love with her, so before his execution, he wrote her a love letter and signed it "From your Valentine"

Then there are these disputes of how the estimated time period (ca. 629) means that this would have been focused on sacrifice, not love, yada yada yada, blah blah blah.

The easiest way to sum this up: It has as much to do with it as bunnies and eggs have to do with Easter or trees with bulbs have with Christmas: NOTHING.

Welcome to Hallmark Holidays, everyone.

So what's the point?

Businesses making profit off of your chocolate, flower and plushie shopping binges. Restaurants benefiting from that date you know you have to take them out on. The greeting card industry getting rich off of all those frilly pink pieces of paper that you could actually make yourself for half price.

Scary Statistics for one day of the year:

15% of women in the USA send themselves flowers

73% of flowers are purchased by men

1,000,000 cards are exchanged, making it the second largest card-sending event

3% of pet owners will actually give their pets presents

110,000,000 roses will be sold and delivered, mostly imported red roses from South America

Back in the Swing of Things

Happy New Year!

Now that everything is back on track, I'm pulling this blog up to the front again, and I'm ready to start pouring my thoughts into words... "Parties" will be moved to a weekend because I've quite a bit to write where that's concerned. Here's a tentative itinerary for the next month, though.

1. Printers

2. Politics

3. Hospitals

4. Letters

I'm somewhat low on inspiration, so if you've got something you'd like for me to ramble about, message me!