#and a great deal of listening to satie | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

biblioflyer · 1 year

Text

Four episodes into rewatching Season One of Picard: some general thoughts.

As I’ve laid out, this season so far challenges our assumptions about Picard, the character, and the world building of the setting in ways that are discomforting but I am not inclined to dismiss them as invalid or “CW edge” - a sort of snarl word to stand in for angst and oppressive bleakness that mimic the complexities of dark, introspective works such as Breaking Bad or the Ur prestige drama: The Sopranos.

This is part of a series of essays reevaluating Star Trek Picard and interrogating the widely held fandom criticism that Picard made the Federation into a Dystopia.

Definitely on a rewatch, I am struck by how well suited Picard the character is for this sort of meta-dialogue. And it very much is a meta-dialogue. Picard is a legacy character, a hero from another era where the contrasts between good and bad were sharper and to some extent, the lines of social conflict were drawn in such a way that people who thought they were heroes are now the villains in someone else’s story.

Picard is a great character to represent this because unlike so many other people, when he is put in the position of villain, Picard’s first instinct is to reason and erudite his way out of it, but his second instinct is to listen empathetically. Picard doesn’t begin and end with doubling down.

Picard is in some sense programmed to seek solutions from within the norms and institutions he is familiar with and comfortable with but season one in particular and to some extent, season three, are teaching him to approach the universe more holistically. Picard is learning to appreciate the limits of power and to recognize that Starfleet is not the right instrument for every problem. More discussion here and here.

I think this is a worthwhile conversation for Star Trek to have. Star Trek is THE science fiction franchise about the virtues of a virtuous institution, an armada of stellar individuals virtuously riding in week after week to save the day upon chrome steeds. Contrast this to Star Wars which has always held institutions, even the Jedi Order itself, in contempt. At best institutions in Star Wars are well intentioned but myopic and prone to being outmaneuvered by opponents who figure out how to weaponize the virtues and proceduralism of the good guys against them. More typically institutions in Star Wars are incompetent and malignant.

That isn’t to say that Star Trek doesn’t question power or is incapable of critiquing its own heroes. A thread from the Star Trek Subreddit catalogs NINE admirals who are villains in just TNG and Insurrection. The list balloons to almost two dozen when TOS, DS9, and the Kelvin timeline are added. Note that this is from 2019 so Discovery and Picard are not included. This also doesn’t include lower ranked villains like Captains, such as Captain Maxwell.

Of course this list does include some explicit subversion of people’s autonomy: alien parasites and such. Others are acting according to their own understanding of what “the good of the many” means. Twice in a hundred years the Federation experiences attempted military coups by those who believe the Federation is too soft to capably deal with its enemies. Admiral Satie was a ferocious defender of the Federation’s ideals as she saw them but in the same way that Senator Joseph MacCarthy was a ferocious defender of American ideals.

Seeing Picard spend four episodes getting dressed down for various oversights is challenging if you’re a longtime fan like me for whom TNG hit at an extremely impressionable time. Yet he consistently models something that I think matters a lot: Picard is defensive but ultimately he is willing to listen and to question his own judgments in good faith.

That more than anything else answers the anxious question at the heart of every crotchety elder millennial, gen xer, and boomer watching Picard: “is this Star Trek?”

Yes.

You have to be willing to question your own assumptions about how well you remember TNG or whether you, the audience member, made the characters into superhumans in your memory, but if you can do this, then this is Star Trek.

As to my other research question of “Did Picard make the Federation into a dystopia?” by now I feel like that too is well answered.

No.

The Federation has always had limitations and been far less than omnipotent or omniscient. I think there are specific situations and contexts in which these limitations are being exposed and interrogated that are making some members of the audience extremely touchy because they are more emotionally invested in the idea of a purified, post-material society free of “sin” as it were. A secular Kingdom of God, ruled over by democratically elected, perfectly wise Philosopher Starship Captains.

It's still a pretty awesome place, it's just that everyone is subjectively instead of objectively moral and are merely doing their best rather than having perfect knowledge. Picard’s season one “apology tour” illustrates this nicely. That season three’s Captain Shaw has made some of the best consequentialist arguments of all time while Picard, Riker, Seven etc. take turns arguing for a sense of ethics rooted in the morality of actions themselves also beautifully illustrates that these are not bad people, they’re just people and they are authentically trying to do the right thing.

The Mystery Plot Evolves

If sinking your teeth into the emotional and moral depth is the first reason to rewatch Picard’s first season, grappling with the metaplot is the second. I too fell victim to finding it confusing and irritating the first time through. What I’m seeing now seems to show that it was laid out with more care and just generally less convoluted than I remember. Maybe it's just because I already know the answer now.

The Disordered are an interesting way to introduce the concept of the Admonition and the origins of Zhat Vash’s intense hatred of AI.

Narek starting to show his dark side in prodding Soji about the inconsistencies in her cover story moves the plot along but also illustrates another reason I’ve just not had much to say about this side of the plot, even though whether or not the mystery makes sense in the end is kind of critical.

The fact of the matter is I hated the romance subplot the first time through and I hate it more knowing that Narek is not a “complex” character, a Romulan protagonist playing the part of antagonist because of corrupting influences. No, he’s a manipulator who is trying to maneuver Soji into putting herself unknowingly in danger. His interest in her secrets is entirely selfish even if raw curiosity is warring with his view of her as a harbinger of doom.

I’ve also been the rebound partner a couple times with people who have come out of relationships defined by nesting dolls of deceit and manipulation. As a consequence, I detest seeing these things on the screen. I can’t do “Reylo” ships or long for the “sad boy” to be fixed. I hate these characters because they inserted poison pills into relationships I found deeply meaningful before those relationships ever began.

So if the next time I address the Romulan snake in the grass, it’s an extended rant don’t be surprised.

Carrying on my Wayward Sons

I’ll close out by saying that I have no idea how much of the season’s script and its developments the actors already had access to or in what order scenes were shot, but the interactions between Raffi and Picard are phenomenal. With the benefit of hindsight and knowing the dark turn of events looming when it's Raffi’s turn to try to reunite with her son, well her trying to talk JL out of going to Vashti just shines all the more.

I think you could read it in a few ways. She clearly already knows why Picard is going to Vashti. On how many levels she knows, it's hard to say. Elnor is the obvious one since she’s only coming along for a ride to Free Cloud to try to talk her own estranged son into letting her back into his life.

The second is that as much as she’s tried to prepare Picard for the realities of life outside the Federation in a post-Hobus star universe, I suspect deep down she is worried that after having just gotten the old JL back, seeing the poverty and seething resentment will break him all over again.

Finally, recruiting a Sister of Absolute Candor would simply confirm for Raffi that Picard is prepared for saving Soji and confronting Zhat Vash to be a suicide mission. He will not be deterred by danger or reason, and that too represents the high likelihood of losing JL again and in a more final way.

#star trek #star trek picard #Picard s1e4 #raffi musiker #star trek ethics #star trek picard rewatch #absolute candor #dystopia

5 notes · View notes

candlespages · 3 years

Text

Satie’s Gnossienne 1 and Other Assorted Tunes - Music Collected by Aziraphale

Summary : Music inspires contemplation and thought in Aziraphale at various points in time.

(To break it down to its basic level, this is a collection of GO drabbles. The one thing binding them together is that they are written from Aziraphale's POV, and along to some tunes.)

Rating : T

Chapter 1 : Satie’s Gnossienne 1 - London, 1907

https://archiveofourown.org/works/30641261

#getting out of the rare pair hells #at least ftm #i was inspired #gomens fic #Ineffable Husbands #Aziraphale #crowley #aziraphale x crowley #and a great deal of listening to satie #while it's raining #yes i recommend listening to satie's gnossienne 1 as you read #for added angst and feels

0 notes

diloph · 2 years

Note

Here's a fairly recent one for that fandom meme:

Oban Star

blorbo: Eva Wei. She's a great protagonist with great motivation, being able to keep her identity under wraps, race in these death-defying contests, deal with her teammates and rivals, yet still manages to be a nice, compassionate person.

skrunkly: Cheating here but Eva has the cutest design. Will use this word-that-reminds-me-of-wrinkles space to mention that wise old alien, Satis. Him hiding more than he appeared to be while still being a benevolent character was a nice change, normally they turn out to be bad guys. Also appreciate that while he was a kooky old man character, he didn't overstay his welcome/become obnoxious.

scrimblo bimblo: Rush. Always a fan of big guy characters that happen to be big friendly guys too. First racer that we meet after Aikka that's not only benevolent but racing for a selfless reason, trying to restore his world. Absolutely devastated he didn't come to Oban as well, at least for moral support. Also really wanted him to punch one of the two Crog racers just because they needed taking down a peg or two, just once.

glup shitto: Muir. Much like Rush, he turns out to be one of the more benevolent racers, albeit not at first encounter or glance. Also fills Rush's niche of big guy but instead of big friendly, he's big monster. Trying to resurrect his lost mate is a cool, but sad parallel to Eva's own quest to bring back her mother and the fact that this sad spider crab leaves the Oban races before the final by overhearing that the Avatar cannot grant his wish, is a real heart-breaker. Glad he managed to survive the finale though.

honourable glup shittos: The two or three Crogs in the Crog senate/parliament/debating chamber who weren't all about conquest, calling for contingency plans, at least taking a break from their marching forth to conquer and the defense of their people. Having them appear in a similar scene as Xenophobic President Rhinox, contrasting against his "I had to do it you see! Aliens, you can't trust them!" speech later on, really help to make the Crogs appear as a race of people, rather than cardboard cutout villains.

poor little meow meow: Don Wei. Having a nuanced, flawed parental figure is one thing, but I wasn't expecting to get so invested into how much he screwed up when it came to how he treated his daughter. I was hanging on every confrontation where it looked like Eva would tell him or he would figure it out, so when the dam finally burst, it was incredibly rewarding to see all the pain and melancholy that came about as a result come straight to the surface. Especially as Eva was allowed to really call him out for it, on his attitude and neglect, which I'd imagine at least let them work towards their happier ending later on.

Horse Plinko: Jordan C. Wilde. Sorry, buddy, I just didn't mesh with you at all! From your constant "grr aliens" (against the Crogs and Aikka, who seemed to be an ally to them rather than a press-ganged prince, it was a little understandable, against every other alien was a little hmm) in a universe where Earth DOES have alien allies and friends, to your late-game hitting on Eva when you rarely listened to her or actively contributed to screwing up her racing strategies, Jordan just wasn't the support character I think Eva needed. Appreciate your sacrifice and hope becoming the Avatar makes you a better person, because just watching the show alone didn't give me much to care about ya.

eeby-deeby: Sul. Godlike power, godlike arrogance, flat character. Racing because he could and would land with himself with even more power, yet none of the will to use it. Despite having already great power, he doesn't do anything with it that I'm aware of, never making any difference to the universe other than bolstering his own ego. I think he'd have made a better villain than simply another racer. Somehow, he even made the Super Hell Chozo Canaletto look good, considering that he, of all characters, wasn't even half as condescending to Eva despite manipulating her entire life and her like a puppet.

honourable lord of eeby-deeby: Canaletto, rightfully on his throne in super hell because, quite frankly, he's a magnificent example of a baddie and should probably be in the bad place to begin with. Who knows, with all the talk of Oban getting a second season revival, maybe death is but a doorway, time to the Timeless One is but a window and he'll be back.

#Oban Star Racers #That was fun! BRING ME ANOTHER!

5 notes · View notes

trout-scout · 2 years

Note

3, 15, and 23!!

3. three songs you were recently obsessed with

okay first one is Fantasia on a theme by thomas tallis, by ralph vaughan williams, which sounds like a very bougie answer until one considers that i'm listening to it ad nauseum because i'm obsessed with the movie master & commander & by extension all nautical things of a certain era. i love to cry about british guys on boats who are in love and die.

It's also simply sublime.

next we have nobody else will be there by the national. It pains me in a life-affirming way.

and lastly st james infirmary as covered by abner jay. this one is just a constant obsession.

15. three songs you want to dance with your love to

slow dance to gymnopedie no. 1 by erik satie

Then the music transitions to rob zombie and we get dragula & then we get country death song by the violent femmes and the whole thing turns into a hillbilly death cult rave. And if they didn't like this they wouldn't be my love and that's that on that.

Or just throw on Nancy Sinatra and twist & shout like its 1965! I would LOVE to dance with someone to some pre-1980 20th century tunes. get crunk to some 40s big band hits.

23. three songs that never fail to get you pumped up

I already said country death song by the violent femmes but it honestly goes here too. This is a song about a guy who murders his daughter who is a child & I've known the lyrics to it since I was about ten, which says a great deal about me as a person. And whenever I hear it I instantly become my most hillbilly self (i'm originally from south georgia so it's not buried very deep).

Bring me to life- Evanescence. My go to karaoke song. enough said.

...ok can i say dragula again...no? ok

counting bodies like sheep to the rhythm of the war drums by a perfect circle. first heard this in a god-tier Supernatural edit on youtube circa 2009 and it changed my life.

#ask meme

3 notes · View notes

spencerreidscoffeecup · 3 years

Text

Chapter 21 | Honeybee

CW: oral sex (for female-recieving oral sex: Spencer wakes her up to him--you know ;) but I just want to let you know it was discussed before hand! Completely consensual!) , kissing, fluff!!!!!, public kissing (in a park lol)

AN: Hey everyone!! This is kind of a filler chapter! These next few chapters will be fillers as we follow the reader and Spencer along their journey to becoming husband and wife. I hope you enjoy it! <3

Reader's POV:

"That cloud sort of looks like you, Spence." I say, extending my index finger towards the sky.

Spencer looks up, his fingers still fiddling with strands of my hair.

"It kind of looks like a skeleton." he replies, examining the cloud, and twisting his head around to get a better angle.

"Exactly, it looks like you." I giggle softly, and Spencer slaps my thigh lightly, scoffing playfully. His face grows into a smile, and I look up at him; my head in his lap as he combs his fingers through my hair, separating a portion into three strands and braiding them.

It's calming; Spencer's finger softly brushing through my hair as the soft wind tickles my skin. It's quiet for a few minutes, and I take a deep breath enjoying the sweet moment.

"Done." Spencer remarks, picking up the strands of hair he so carefully wove together, and showing me.

A smile breaks out on my face, "How did you learn how to braid?"

I take his hand in mine, bringing it up to my face and kissing the pads of his fingers and his knuckles softly, then wrap both of my hands around his big one.

"I may have looked it up online earlier so I could do it for you." he admits sheepishly, a small blush kissing the apples of his cheeks.

I feel my heart flutter, butterflies swarming in my chest. Sure, the act may not seem like a big deal, but the fact that he took time out of his extremely busy schedule to do something so small, yet so big for me made me way happier than I'd like to admit.

I let go of his hand and pull his face down, pressing my lips gently against his.

After a second, I pull away; his eyes still close as he chases my lips. I giggle as I comb my fingers through his hair, and he peppers light kisses on my face. He sits back up, leaning on his forearms, and I make my way up to his face, kissing him lightly and smiling softly at him, then taking the Ray-Bans off of his head and putting them on my face as I lie my head back down on his lap.

He leans back up to his normal position, pushing them further up my nose as they begin to droop, and then uses his index finger to trace my features tenderly.

"You're so beautiful." he whispers, and I feel a blush rise to my cheeks once again; feeling my chest get warm, the tips of my fingers tingling.

He cups my cheek, leaning down to place soft kisses on my lips as we both smile into the exchange. He leans back up, combing his fingers through my hair gently as he begins to ramble about- well, everything.

I can't help but smile at how excited he gets when he talks about a certain thing. I hate the fact the team cuts him off. I love when he rambles. It's one of the things that made me fall for him in the first place- besides his kindness and warm heart.

And his personality and being in general.

After a minute, he stops abruptly, rubbing the back of his neck meekly.

S-sorry."

I look up at him, confused at the sudden silence and apology.

"Spence, why are you sorry?"

"I was rambling.. I didn't want to bore you." My eyes soften, and I lean up to kiss his lips.

"Spence, I love it when you ramble. It's one of my favorite things, I could never get bored of you or the things you talk about." I brush pieces of his hair out of his face, dragging my thumb across his bottom lip before I lay a small kiss on the corner of his mouth.

"Really?" he asks, disbelief flooding his voice.

My heart sinks a bit at the fact he's so surprised.

"Of course," he blushes at my reassurance, and I kiss his cheek; leaning back into his chest.

"Now, what were you saying about Great Expectations?"

"Oh, right! So basically: after working eleven years in Egypt, Pip returns to England and visits Joe, Biddy and their son, Pip Jr. Then in the ruins of Satis House he meets the widowed Estella, who asks Pip to forgive her..."

I smile as I trace patterns on Spencer's palm, listening to him talk about the plot to one of his favorite novels.

Could my time with him get any better?

To answer the question from before: my time with him actually could get better.. And I didn't even think that was a possibility by how utterly in love with him I already was.

But of course, in Spencer's true fashion: I was wrong and he was right.

Once the sun began to set, the sky a warm shade of dark blue, orange, and red; Spencer and I decided to head home. We take our time showering, Spencer massaging the body wash into my skin as he peppers soft kisses along the nape of my neck. Soft classical music plays in the background which goes nicely with the melody of the warm water's pitter patter song against the shower tile. The bathroom is dimly lit with small candles as Spencer and I exchange kisses, taking a break from our usual repartee and definitely wasting water. However, neither one of us cares as he gingerly kisses my lips, his arms wrapped around my waist in an embrace as we enjoy the intimacy.

Finally, once the water becomes chilly and our fingertips prune, I pull away from the myriad of kisses, to which Spencer whines in protest, but I roll my eyes playfully, kissing him softly again before finishing our shower routines.

We each step out, Spencer padding into our room to grab a pair of his boxers as I wrap the towel around my body, finishing my skin and hair-care routines. I slip into a blue dress shirt of Spencer's and pink panties, walking into the bedroom and whipping Spencer's ass with the towel I unwrap from my hair.

He yelps, gasping playfully and I giggle, a mischievous look glinting in his eyes.

I beam widely, whipping him with the towel again.

"Oh, you're so on!" He laughs, and I squeal as he makes a grab for me, but I duck out of the way, running past him and into the kitchen.

"You can't escape me, Y/n! I am faster than you whether you like it or not!" he yells, a grin plastered across his face as I stand behind the kitchen counter, Spencer standing on the opposite end trying to get to me.

"Says the person who failed the FBI fitness test three times!" I taunt and Spencer's eyes widen slightly as he feigns betrayal.

"Oh, you stooped low, Y/n Y/l/n!" he exclaims, narrowing his eyes with jest.

I giggle as we shift behind the counter before he pretends to go left, and I go left as well, until he goes right and grabs me. I screech as he throws me over his shoulder and I laugh so hard it becomes difficult to breathe as I slap his ass through his sweatpants.

"Did you just slap my ass?" he chuckles in disbelief.

"Maybe."

Spencer smacks my ass back and I laugh.

"Spencer!"

"What? You did it first!" he defends, then throws me into our bed, fluffy pillows saving my fall.

I laugh as Spencer digs his fingers into my skin, tickling me.

"Spe-Sp-" I gasp, laughing as I try to stammer out coherent words, however it's impossible as he is relentless with his fingers moving all over my body.

I squirm, trying to hold onto his hands to still his motions.

"Spence! I'm gonna pee!" I yelp, Spencer laughing almost as hard as me.

He stops, a toothy-grin etched across his features as he falls onto my chest, then tilts his head upward to kiss me.

My chest is heaving as he smiles against the skin of my neck and peppers small kisses on the tissue, letting me calm down.

"I love you," he whispers, his hands underneath the button up shirt of his I am wearing as he gently caresses my sides, drawing small patterns on the skin.

I blush, smiling. "I love you more, Spence."

Spencer pulls his head from my neck, looking down at me with a small pout. "No, I love you more!"

I giggle, his golden irises twinkling at the noise as his face burns a light red.

"You're wrong! I love you more." I counter.

"Ha! I'm never wrong!" he declared, kissing my lips again as I laughed upon him.

"Well you are about this," I muttered, kissing him again so he couldn't protest further.

It was moments like these that I realized exactly why the honeybee needs its pollen. It needs the sweet nectar from the plant to survive and grow. Just how I needed Spencer. I needed him to show me how to grow. I needed my mentality expanded in great ways, and Spencer was able to show me the way.

He was able to show me the love that I needed in order to grow as a person.

The love that I never got when I was younger.

So as I drank from his sweet nectar, absorbing all of the bits and pieces of information that was stored in that genius brain of his, I began to grow.

I began to grow into a beautiful adult honeybee, gaining more and more knowledge of who I was and who I wanted to be because Spencer pointed me in the correct path.

The first thing that I was greeted with the next morning was the feeling of warmth blossoming over my skin, the early-morning sunlight tickling my cheeks as a means to wake me up from my comfortable slumber.

The warmth only lasted for so long until I felt my whole body buck forward, a bright gasp exiting my lips as my back arched off of the bed. I felt his tongue separate my folds that glistened with arousal as he hummed softly and happily against me. I choked on a moan as I peered downwards, getting a glance at Spencer, his mouth on my core. His eyes were closed in enjoyment as he sucked on my sensitive clit, the feeling making my hand fly down to his unruly curls that laid upon his head with charm.

His right thumb gently brushed across my clit as he happily droned a wonderful tune that mixed perfectly with the lewd noises that echoed throughout the sleepy room. It was a beautiful melody; that only egged me on further as I added my own chorus to the symphony, small mewls and moans escaping my throat as I tugged on his chestnut locks.

Spencer's eyes fluttered open as he lovingly caressed my inner thigh with his right hand. He looked up at me through his eyelashes, and I felt him smile against me as he coated his fingers in my arousal before gently pushing them inside of me. He kissed my clit gently, his thumb rubbing lazy--but hard circles on the bundle.

"Does that feel good, darling?" he whispered up at me, his voice crackly from him just waking up, which only made my hips rut to him, my senses begging for more as he ran his free hand up my body, squeezing my clothed breast gently which made me cry out drowsily.

He genuinely wanted to know, it seemed. As if he couldn't tell from how tightly I was gripping the sheets beside me.

I nodded softly, small gasps escaping my lips as Spencer curled his fingers to brush against my sweet spot. I combed my fingers through his hair, and he rested his cheek on my thigh to look up at my reactions. The act was so innocent, that it was as though he wasn't practically fucking my cunt with his fingers. He smiled softly at the way my body moved slowly (and sleepily) against his fingers, the orgasm that already fluttered in my lower belly only building like a snowball. I felt his eyes stay trained on my figure as I whimpered, my head tilting back into the soft pillows that cupped my body.

"You're so beautiful," he sighed, in an almost love-sick way, then began to suck the soft tissue of my inner thighs as he made his way down to my pussy, reattaching his lips back onto me as he kissed me slowly, but sloppily.

"Spencer," I whimpered, my hips bucking lightly as he only hummed on my cunt once more, the vibrations emanating throughout my veins that lit a fire in my chest and core as my right hand made its way to his hair once more. I ground my hips against his face as I came, my legs tightening around his head that I was afraid that I would simply suffocate him. However, Spencer didn't seem to mind one bit as he never once stopped his salacious manners. He was relentless. His free hand held my waist down on his mouth as he sucked, and I whined at the overstimulation.

He sucked until I was coming again, my arousal coating his fingers and slowly dripping down like smooth honey to his hand as he milked me through my climax. The second orgasm made my eyes roll to the back of my head as a silent scream sounded only in my head but not in the real world. My body shook and twitched as Spencer gently took his fingers out from inside of me, bringing them up to his lips as he sucked them clean.

"God, I love how you taste." he moaned softly, littering my body with kisses until he got to my mouth. I still quivered under his touch as the post-coital explosion made sparks fly through my veins.

However, he was taking too long kissing my neck. I was impatient. Thus, I pulled him up by his head with my hands and kissed him deeply. The taste of my arousal on his tongue only made my body tremble slightly as he smiled against my lips, looking down at me through eyes almost as golden as the morning sun.

"I love you," he whispered, bringing his lips to mine again as butterflies fluttered in my chest and belly.

"I love you." I responded, a small blush warming my cheeks.

He laughed softly as he kissed my reddened face, making me giggle at the sensations. As he moved his body up more to lean over my figure, I felt him hard against my thigh.

"Do you want me to-?" I began, but Spencer only kissed my lips again.

"No, love. I just wanted to make you feel good." he shushed any protests that I would have had with a light kiss to the lips.

I nodded, kissing him back as I held his face; the stubble around his mouth tickling my hands as I pulled him closer to me.

He melted into my touch.

For a while, we kissed and shared loving statements and sayings. My heart twirled in my chest happily as I combed through Spencer's hair, the possibilities of what we would do on this fine Saturday only making me all-the-more excited.

And that's when I got it.

Why not take the next step?

"Mm, hey Spence?" I pulled away from his kisses as he chased his lips with mine. I giggled as he opened his eyes, pouting softly. I kissed him again to satiate his craving.

"Yes?"

"How would you feel about getting a pet today?" I proposed the idea, and Spencer's face lit up.

"How would I feel? What kind of question is that?" He asked, and I laughed. "Of course I would want a pet! What kind?"

I thought for a moment.

"A bunny?"

Spencer's face crinkled as he thought. "Mmh, they're cute but slightly boring."

I nodded, agreeing.

"A dog?"

"They're a lot of work. I feel as though we should start with something easier."

"True. What about-- a fish?"

Spencer laughed, throwing his head back slightly. "How old do you think we are, ten?"

I scoffed playfully, "Hey! Fish are very very cute!"

Spencer only rolled his eyes playfully. "Alright, alright."

It was silent as we conjured up what animal we would want to bring into our home. That was until an idea; a beautiful idea, popped into my head.

"What about a cat?" I asked.

Spencer's face split into a wide smile. "That's perfect! We can go today and look at the pet store!"

I nodded fervently, giggling at his excitement.

"I can't believe I just thought of that. I've always wanted a Havana Brown cat, ever since I was a teenager. I used to search for magazines that had the small little brown kittens and put them on my wall." I smiled fondly at the memory, and Spencer smiled at me.

"Did you know that the Havana Brown cat was the result of a planned breeding between Siamese and domestic black cats, by a group of cat fanciers in England, in the 1950s. Early breeders introduced a Siamese type Russian Blue into their breeding. However, using current genetic testing, it is believed that almost none remain in the gene pool." he rambled, and I listened intently.

"Really? Wow, my fourteen year old self is screaming right now at the fact you know so much about them." I laughed.

"I try." Spencer giggled bashfully, bringing me in for another kiss.

We had finally made it to the pet store around three o'clock. As we entered, we heard birds chirping, hamsters spinning on their small wheels, and puppies yelping for attention.

"Hello!" an older woman walked up to Spencer and I to greet us. We both politely greeted her hello and smiled. "Is there any specific little creature you are looking for, or are you just looking around?" she asked.

"Actually, we were wondering if you have Havana Brown cats? Or any brown cats in general." Spencer asked from behind me, his hand around my waist.

The wizened woman smiled happily, clapping her hands together. "Yes! Oh, I am so glad you folks are here! We have two little Havana Brown kittens over here!"

We followed the women to a small cage that held the tiniest, most adorable kittens. They were brown, one with light blue eyes and the other with one hazel and one blue.

"They're siblings. This is Rue," she held the small kitten with light blue eyes gently. "And this is Milo!" she gently picked the kitten with different colored eyes up, the small creature yawning softly.

She handed Rue to Spencer, his hand so big compared to the small kitten's body that she could practically drown. However, he held her softly, his face lighting with a small blush. My heart practically melted at the sight. He was so gentle. The woman then gave Milo to me. As soon as Milo made contact with my hand, he purred softly, nuzzling his face into my palm and licking it softly.

My heart practically melted in my chest as Spencer used his pinky finger to pet Milo's head, Rue still being held in his hand as he was careful not to hurt her. Milo's eyes fluttered closed as Spencer petted his soft fur, the kitten purring softly.

Spencer and I looked at one another and smiled.

We had made our decision.

I must have spent over two-hundred dollars on top of the essentials for a small cat, on little outfits, toys, and treats. Milo slept soundly in his little playpen area, stretching his tiny body out as Spencer and I watched with loving eyes.

"I feel like a parent," I whispered, and Spencer laughed softly, trying not to wake the small cat that laid in his pillowy bed.

"Me too."

It was quiet for a moment as we soaked in the feelings of beautiful domesticity. The feeling of family. The feeling of love.

"I love Milo's eyes," I stated, sitting on the couch in front of Milo's playpen as I watched his petite body take in small and slow breaths of air as he slept peacefully.

"Ah, he has Heterochromia. It's usually found in specific types of cats and dogs, however, Milo seems to be one of the 'out-of-ordinary' types of animals." Spencer explained, sitting next to me. I snuggled up to him.

"If he's out of the ordinary, then I believe we have picked the perfect pet." I joked, snuggling closer into Spencer's arms as he laid a small kiss on the top of my head.

"Agreed."

We spent the rest of the night like that, setting the rest of Milo's things up and unpacking the little toys and goodies I bought for him at the store. I was so giddy, grabbing everything in every aisle at the PetCo as Spencer laughed at my pure and child-like joy that seemed to bubble from out of my body.

However, I couldn't help it.

I mean, I was getting a small kitten with Spencer Reid.

How could I not be overjoyed?

Any normal person would feel the way I do now.

I was just a little honeybee enjoying the sweet nectar that was and is Spencer Reid.

#spencerreid #spencerreidxreader #criminalminds #fanfic #wattpad

6 notes · View notes

artofdigression · 5 years

Text

I’m 23 years old. The 2 years leading up to now have been a complete whirlwind, but somehow, in this time, an actual music career has begun. I’m a composer, a producer, a singer, a songwriter, a visual artist - among many labels.

I sit in front of my piano. I know how to play all of 2 pieces - Gnossiennes 1 & 2 by Erik Satie. I learned them by ear 4 years ago while working the reception desk of an art gallery that had two baby grand pianos hidden underneath the stairs. I would get bored when no one else was in the gallery and venture down.

In my studio, I have piles of introductory music books, minuets and ballads laying around - some given to me at a young age, some passed down by dead relatives who knew I had a ‘good ear’ - or were maybe too dead to give a shit about where their old sheet music went by the time I got my hands on it.

I decide, for what feels like the 100th time, that I will learn how to read music.

I had my first piano lesson when I was 10 years old. My piano teacher was nice - a young, lanky, 20-something music student who wore beanie hats and played electric guitar in a rock band. I thought he was pretty much the coolest and wanted to be him. Unfortunately, I don’t think he was particularly ‘stoked’ in the same capacity to work with me. I had very little enthusiasm for any of the mind-numbingly boring rudimentary theory curriculum, the limited repertoire I had to choose from (away in a manger or… the other version of away in a manger) made me want to rip my hair out, and reading sheet music would send my mind into kaleidoscope-vision.

I would also have kaleidoscope-vision in school. I struggled with school. I was a rambunctious little human. My attention span was uncontrollable (unless we were reading or drawing, then I absolutely paid attention). Looking over old report cards, there was a lot of ‘needs to stay on task’ and ‘could use help with organization’ - anecdotal pieces of advice I heard so much, I think the meanings eventually became hollow to me (or maybe the meanings were just hollow to begin with).

Getting me to sit still for 30 minutes was an excruciating feat for any adult in my life, so 2 hours? 3 hours? 6 hours? Good god, I wanted to climb the walls. When the teacher would start talking, I would look past their gaze - into Lala Land as adults disdainfully called it. (I still deeply hate calling it Lala Land, but, for continuity purposes, we’re going to reclaim the name in neon lights.)

Lala Land was great. Real life? Not so much. In real life, from third grade until high school graduation, my teachers (with the exception of 3 gems) were blatantly judgemental of me. They’d think nothing of admonishing me in front of my peers if I fidgeted or looked out a window.

Because the amount of physical energy I had was not conducive to a classroom environment, I learned to dissociate from my body. Because looking out a window meant I was not looking at a chalkboard, I learned to look past the chalkboard to find Lala Land, its neon letters burning behind my absent gaze. Past the letters, there would be a window. I could look out the window and its glass panes could evaporate and autumn’s leafy gusts of wind could sweep me away and I’d never have to worry about a messy desk or a missed assignment or classroom of judgemental eyes looking at me again. The next day’s fantasy would be the same, but different.

Children’s imaginations are often playful and fantastical. Take a kid with a traumatized brain, however - and imagination can give them a seemingly supernatural ability to create, in their mind, what they need for emotional survival. That was me.

There were parts of my childhood that were truly blissful, gorgeous, hilarious and nurturing. But I’d be denying you, dear reader, important context if I didn’t tell you that a significant part of my young formative years was steeped in grief, chaos and abandonment. I assure you need not build castles in the air in understanding that I was a child with a traumatized brain. And though I was surviving, trauma had created a faceless, nameless internal chaos for me that I didn’t truly even recognize until adulthood. Trauma changes the way brains function. That’s a lot for a kid to be dealing with.

In piano lessons, my teacher would sit with me and we would go over the theory of a piece of sheet music - that was my brain’s cue to look past the kaleidoscope paper, nodding “yes, mhm, got it.” But then, when he’d clap the rhythm of the piece, my brain would engage and I’d clap the same rhythm back, no problem. After that, he would play the piece for me as an example - this was where my brain would hyper-focus. I would retain, retain, retain, and I would play the piece back, not reading a note, but looking past the page all the same. This wasn’t a ploy to dupe him. This was a system of which neither of us were consciously aware. I was just 10, and playing piano.

Outside of school, I was different. I was encouraged to sing, I would go to my parents’ choir practices every week and sit in the pews of Saint Mary’s Church and listen to 30 voices reverberate through it. I would shoot the shit with adults and carry around books about Roman mythology and Egyptian hieroglyphs and I would talk about how I wanted to travel the whole world and I would make 1-page comics and I would dress up my dog and I loved the ballet costumes from Stravinsky’s Firebird and… I digress.

Outside of school, I was different. Music calmed my internal landscape enough for me to be myself. No - actually, music calmed my immediate surroundings enough for me to make sense of my internal landscape… Actually, both.

On a borrowed piano, I would sit and endlessly ear out songs (Carmen, movie soundtracks I liked, songs my mom sang, etc). I would walk into my Saturday lesson and proudly showcase the self-taught triumphs of Sunday through Friday for my teacher, only to be met with a brief pat on the back and the god-damn sheet music to 'away in a manger’ - which I still hated and still couldn’t read, but played anyway. After 5 months, I eventually made it clear to all parties involved that I was done with piano, and my parents finally gave into my weekly protests.

When I was 7th grade, I started playing french horn in the school band and, for whatever reason, continued for 6 and a half years. I still saw through a kaleidoscope when I got a piece of music, but there was one other french horn player in my class so I usually copied what she did - Unless we had different parts in which case I fumbled constantly through band practice until I finally figured out what I was playing. Band, generally, had a negative impact on my relationship with music. I think the only reason I stuck with it was because the feeling of playing music with such a large group of people triggered some kind of dopamine rush that my brain loved. I would get ASMR - auto sensory meridian response - also known as “that fuzzy, warm, calm feeling in the centre of your brain” - some folks experience it and some folks don’t.

A lot of changes in my home life happened in that 6-and-a-half-year period. After years of week-on, week-off pivots between my mother and father’s separate homes, my father permanently moved to Sweden when I was 13. My mother became my primary parent while dealing with the loaded blows of bankruptcy and multiple reckonings around her own life challenges. We moved into a home that had completely gutted walls and plywood floors (left unfinished by previous tenants with renovation goals too ambitious to finish). The situation was chaotic. So, so chaotic. But, from that time up to now, my mother was (and continues to be) an incredible support to me. She could see that I was struggling, and did everything in her power to advocate for me when I couldn’t advocate for myself. I can only imagine the feeling of knowing something is not right with your child and being told by everyone around you that your child is fine. Her support was integral.

When I was in 9th grade, she and my homeroom teacher (also a phenomenal support to me at the time) pulled some strings to have an initial psychological assessment performed on me - not technically “official” - as it was conducted by a student of psychology, I recall - nevertheless, it provided enough insight to validate that there was an underlying dissonance between what most of my teachers were saying about me (lazy, bad attitude, etc) and what was actually going on in my head, and that a formal assessment would be necessary to help me. My name was put on the waiting list for a psychologist that year. But, the entire island had only 1 or 2 psychologists available (Totally appalling). And so I waited... And waited... And waited... And while I waited, I continued to find refuge in my visual art practice, as well as learning other instruments on my own terms.

I refuse to say something cliche like “art and music saved my life” because creativity isn’t a sustainable singular lifeline for anyone, and believing so feeds into the highly problematic mental health stigma as it pertains to those who create for a living... But art and music did play key roles in tempering my inner storms. Now, as a musician, I allow my craft to be a teacher, not a therapist.

When I was 16, I went to my first voice lesson. I kept at it for a year, and… excelled? I totally excelled - personally and musically. This did wonders for my confidence (I attribute a lot of that to my voice teacher at the time, who had a really supportive and receptive approach to my weird energy levels and the idiosyncratic ways I learned). I did festivals, took a Royal Conservatory exam - and I was still excelling, which honestly shocked me at the time because I was so used to failing everything.

Oh, also, I could still barely read the music. Kaleidoscopic forever.

Many classically trained musicians describe the experience of being overwhelmed when they get a new piece of music (especially if it has theory components they may not be familiar with or something) - totally normal. But then, they concentrate, deconstruct it from the page section-by-section and eventually learn to play it with neurotypical grace. Deconstructing written music on the page to understand what was happening became a little bit less nauseating as I was exposed to it more. I WORKED at theory and understood parts of it, but only… theoretically. Being able to transcribe that (limited) understanding into playing? That never happened for me. The page would remain kaleidoscopic until it felt like my brain was just going to short-circuit and cave in on itself. It was weird, and trying to describe to anyone in band class (teachers and students alike) made me feel like I was on a different planet. So, when the heat was on (whether that was in performance or in private lessons or “sight singing”) I kept relying on my ears and refined my ability to hold my own in band concerts, private voice lessons, choirs, musical theatre productions.

Meanwhile, in high school, my academic life was still basically the worst. I had adversarial relationships with nearly all of my teachers. I barely passed each year. Emotionally, I also had a lot of anger seething below the surface of my consciousness. I had internalized so much of what so many teachers had told me - that I was smart but lazy, that I had a bad attitude, that I was disruptive, distracted, manipulative etc. - and having gone through some pretty drastic events that effectively destabilized my home life, this all had a profoundly negative impact on my self-worth.

One year later, I was 17, in 12th grade and school issues had not gotten any better (still muddling through - grades between 40% and 60%). I had just given up at this point… Except now, instead of having the teachers before, who were mostly unhelpful, but at least straight-up about being judgemental of me based on my “laziness” diagnosis, I had a haul of teachers that were giving me these new weekly out-in-the-hall John Keating-wannabe-motivational speeches, telling me how much “potential I have” and how “I’m wasting it away” by “not trying” in class (every hollow pull-up-your-socks/nose-to-grindstone idiom in the book. It was infuriating at the time). I’m sure most of them just wanted to help. But I needed someone to listen more than I needed someone to talk at me.

A helpful thing that DID come out of 12th grade (4 years after my name had been put on the list… shoutout to our provincial government for still not caring about investing in public mental health) was that I finally got access to a provincial psychologist. She came during the second semester of grade 12 and did extensive testing on me to find (surprise! but… not really) ADHD - which explained the colossal difficulties I was having in my academic life due to my chaotic brain not letting me get my shit together in the ways I was being told by neurotypical folks around me to get my shit together.

For those that aren’t informed about ADHD - it’s a form of neurodivergence that can manifest in too many ways to name here, but to fit an elephant in a minivan: There’s that part of the brain that naturally helps you regulate your attention/concentration/sleep/energy levels/appetite/feelings/working memory/pretty much anything remotely involving executive functioning… That’s nice, right? I wouldn’t know because apparently mine’s broken. There is also extensive research that directly links ADHD to childhood trauma, as well as biochemical imbalances in the brain.

I could get all in-depth about ADHD science right here, but this is my story, not an essay, and it would make for an even longer and more digressive tangent that would likely overshadow THE OTHER SIGNIFICANT THING the psychologist noted in my evaluation.

Amidst a bunch of my brain skills that were, statistically, above average for my age - like my working vocabulary and ability to retain auditory information - many of my visual processing skills - meaning, things like reading something and copying it down accurately or following written instructions without constantly needing to reference them - were shockingly below average for my age. The tests showed that this was something my brain had immense difficulty doing.

What’s an example of a visual processing issue in school? Well, I was always the last kid to finish copying text from the board (and I mean, like, multiple paragraphs behind my peers) before the teacher could move on to the next page.

What’s an example of a visual processing issue in music? Reading written notes and playing them on an instrument. When I heard a piece of music, however, I could learn it very quickly.

Knowing what was going on in my brain brought me a whole world of clarity and validation. I knew that I was going to lead an unconventional life because of it (whatever “a conventional life” means these days). I knew that most post-secondary education would be inaccessible to me as a result of my grades and probably be, at that point, more harmful than helpful.

Knowing what was going on in my brain helped me to understand what I didn’t need anymore. I didn’t need the validation of my teachers or my peers. I didn’t need a number on any piece of paper to determine my competence or ‘work ethic.’

Letting go of school was the best thing I’ve done for myself.

I graduated high school with nothing but a 64% average, and an ADHD diagnosis as my only tools in understanding how to get on a path to thriving as an adult human. liberating. frustrating. terrifying - but not really. mostly liberating.

Then, my ADHD became manageable and my life got easy and I had no self-esteem issues ever again.

… No. That’s not how life works. I’m 23 years old. I’ve been out of the school system for 6 years. I have deeply instilled productivity guilt (ie. I take on way more tasks than humanly possible to finish in ridiculously tight deadlines), I struggle with anxiety in thinking that friends and coworkers are saying negative things about my personality or quality of work behind my back (maybe my exes and high school math teachers are hanging out?? THE HORROR), my heart sinks into my stomach anytime any human watches me work over my shoulder (I’m a music producer, so if I’m working on songs with people, I become a blundering internal wreck when they understandably want to see what I’m editing). School did those things to me - which leads me into the accountability part of this long-winded ADHD realtalk.

I’d be withholding the truth from you if I didn’t say my teachers played key roles in aggravating my behavioural/emotional/learning difficulties by disputing them as personality flaws. My frustration in learning would be met, at worst, with punishment and put-downs (I remember not having recess for nearly an entire week somewhere in the first half of 4th grade - which I think is a cruel thing to do to any child, let alone one with energy levels like mine). I would be met, at best, with more hollow, invalidating advice - more ‘need to stay on task’ with a twist of ‘gotta give it yer all’ and ‘well, maybe if you actually tried…’

None of these messages sent to me were helpful. I’m still working to unravel those knots.

This is not a dig at those teachers who saw me as the problem child (rather than seeing me as a kid who just needed support and a different work environment. There were about 3 teachers in 10 years who understood that, and did everything in their power to help. They know who they are and I’m grateful for them.) I understand how frustrating it is to be pushed to your limit - especially within the bounds of a job that requires you to keep your shit together in some capacity. I understand that we that we all do our best with the tools we have at the time. There are no hard feelings - But, I encourage self-reflection and future accountability for your impact on the way you treat any child in your life - because they are just that: a child. Your impact can be profoundly helpful or harmful. You will never know what a child is going through until they feel safe enough to tell you. I didn’t feel safe with many adults - which is why most of my relationships with authority were adversarial ones. I’m not offering a solution. I’m just offering a glimpse into my experience. That’s all this is. Take it or leave it.

When a child is told again and again by the daily authoritative figures in their life that they have an attitude problem, that they are disruptive, lazy, manipulative, attention-seeking, a liar, a cheater (the list can go on but I won’t let it) - I guarantee you, the child will eventually believe it. And I did. I deeply internalized these labels to the point of identifying with them. I’m still working hard as an adult to remind myself that while many of my teachers accused me of causing chaos in my learning environment, I was simply (and unknowingly) mirroring my own internal chaos. The chaos I had created around me was a cry for help, not admonishment.

To further the accountability segment of this experience I’m sharing with you, though I can’t offer a solution to “fix” the institution of public education (because institutions generally don’t function unless they’re flawed to begin with), I think a set of solutions may lie somewhere within trauma-informed and neurodivergence-informed teaching and the public school system being provided with the adequate resources to embrace neurodivergent students - to embrace traumatized students, not accommodate them. I think a set of solutions may lie somewhere within mental health being taken seriously (with FUNDING, not lip service) by the Government of Prince Edward Island. That’s all I’ll say for now.

I don’t think my experience is special - far from it. In fact, I know that my experience is not, and never will be one-of-a-kind. I started writing this when I sat in front of a piano and tried to do what my brain would never let me do. I looked past the page and saw this part of my life staring back at me. I’m not even a writer, but I felt like I had to write it down. Looking back, I realize that I didn’t even begin to understand my own story until someone else told me theirs.

So - whether you’re a teacher or a student or both - if you’re struggling in the school system, this is dedicated to you. If you have been turned away and invalidated by those supposed to help you, you need to know that the labels placed upon you only hold as much power over you as you allow. Being pained by what you can’t control doesn’t make you weak, it makes you a survivor. Surviving is hard. Surviving is so hard, but you will begin to heal.

I’m 23 years old. I’m many things. I read music with my ears. I’m mastering the art of looking past what’s in front of me.

- Russell Louder

#adhd #music #neurodivergence

4 notes · View notes

continuo-docs · 6 years

Photo

Tomoyuki Fujii – 水と循環の音楽 “Mizu To Junkan No Ongaku” (Water Sounds and Music in Flux), 80pp book, Niigata, Japan, December 2017

Niigata-based ambient music enthusiast Tomoyuki Fujii published 2 books on Ambient music and environment. The first was “Mori To Kiroku No Ongaku” (Sounds of the Forest – my translation) in 2009, followed by “Mizu To Junkan No Ongaku” (Water Sounds and Music in Flux – my translation) back in 2010. The latter was revised, augmented and reissued in December 2017 and I was fortunate enough to receive a copy. These are humble, small-sized A6 booklets, 80-pages long and printed on newsprint paper. Great care has been put in the lovely overall design.

Tomoyuki manages the Post Ambient blog, where he writes about ambient music releases from the 1950s to the present. His approach is rather inclusive, with many sub-genres and peripheral styles covered, from soundscapes to electronica, from field recording to techno, from new age to experimental. The 47 examples in the book were written around 2009–2010 and eventually served as the basis for blog posts from 2010–2017. Each page features one release (k7, LP or CD) with cover artwork, reference details, related listening suggestions and comments from the author in Japanese. The book comes with an introduction, an interview with musician Takashi Tsuda and an afterword.

Titled Water Sounds and Music in Flux, the overall theme is hence music related to-, made with- or including water sounds, extending to marine soundscapes and environmental issues. “Music in Flux” perhaps refers to the Confucianist concept of constant flux, an interesting spiritual dimension applied to ambient music. The choice of albums is remarkably noncommittal and cross-boundary –the merits of the inclusive approach mentioned above, no doubt– and the selection is broadly international. I enjoyed coming across rare releases by unknown artists – Rob Smit (Metaal, 1981), Jeff Johnson (No Shadow of Turning, 1985), Veno Tagashi (New Glass, 2005), Marc Leclair (Musique pour 3 Femmes Enceintes, 2005), etc. Japanese artists from the Kankyo Ongaku [ambient music] breed of the 1980s–90s are of course included, some hardly known in the West, like Inoyama Land (Danzindan-Pojidon, 1983), Masahiro Sugaya (Zoo Of The Sea, 1988), Hiroshi Yoshimura (Wet Land, 1993), Takashi Kokubo (Water, 2001), among others.

I love how the book –just like the blog– is making connexions between musics from different eras and geographical origins, to the point where ambient becomes an attitude towards life and sound in general, rather than a niche genre. For Tomoyuki, ambient music is about listening closely, in a state of sound awareness to music and nature sounds – he says he's interested in the "mental state of people who listen quietly."

Additionally, the music is put in a clear historical perspective and the introduction mentions Satie's Furniture Music, Cage, Glass, Murray Schaeffer, Eno, suikinkutsu 水琴窟, digital minimalism, etc – but not Toru Takemitsu's Water Music, 1969. The book also gathers releases which are not usually grouped together because of format divergences (cassette, CDs, mixes, movies, online projects, ...). On a personal level, I've known Tomoyuki for a long time as he was a follower of my first blog, Continuo's Weblog, 10 years ago, and I know he discovered a good deal of music there, some of it is included in his book.

Tomoyuki's web presence: http://post-ambient.blogspot.com/ https://twitter.com/fleaongak?lang=fr https://soundcloud.com/post-ambient-blogspot

#book #review

286 notes · View notes

jafreitag · 3 years

Text

2020

On January 1, 2020, I went to LNHQ. The holiday party had happened a few days earlier – a sorta-epic “booze cruise” with Lana Del Rey off the Catalina coast. Everybody nursed hangovers on flights back home, and then bugged off to celebrate their new years with their people.

The office was spotless – just a few dust motes floating across the afternoon sunlight in the conference room. I grabbed a piece of chalk and wrote “What if…” on the green board. It was intended as a turn-the-page talking point. OM and I had had a sit-down after we got back from Cali. Good talk, honestly. He’s well-versed in stuff that I do not understand, and he’s driving the proverbial bus as the new LN CEO. Lotta heartfelt questions from him, lotta heartfelt idks from me. “You gotta…” and “Yeah, I suck at that, but what about…” Some bourbon later, we adjourned. “Love you, dude” and “love you back, man.” Let’s meet next week and ok.

So that’s why I was there. What are we doing? What if… What if we actually try hard? What if ECM keeps killing it on Instagram? What if Jane and Trevor come back? What if we move to a new location, and the corporate and content wings find a new synergy? What if all of the sponsorships pan out? And O’s settlement with Adidas? Sky’s the limit, right? Let your imagination wander. I mean, what if Fiona Apple puts out a new album in 2020, and it’s not just great, but better than The Idler Wheel, which was the best album of 2012?

Seriously. What if?

Or what if the entire world breaks?

That wasn’t in my head back then.

It’s December now. And we’re in a global pandemic, which is getting worse (or at least not getting measurably better) every day. This year has been indescribably difficult for all of us, particularly the ones personally affected by Covid-19. And it has been difficult for businesses across every sector, particularly entertainment. Seen a show lately? Nope? Me, neither. At the beginning of the summer, I paid Laura Marling to watch a stream of her performance at Union Chapel in London. Seemed cool then, seems irrelevant now.

We can’t help artists/bands, really, until we can see them again. And who knows when that will be? Next summer? Next fall? Maybe 2022 before we all feel safe in massive crowds again (even with masks)? Maybe never? Until then, we have streaming services. And … woof. That’s an Apple/Spotify cart that I’d prefer not to upend, mainly because it benefits me, but it’s worth some words.

I’m a Spotify person. My home team is comprised of six Spotify people. We pay, collectively, $14.99/month to stream almost any music ever recorded and released. That’s around $2.50 per person per month. Pretty good deal, right? For sure. Here’s the problem: Spotify pays $0.003 per stream. That’s 1/3 of a penny. If you’re a Zeppelin or a Beatle or a Stone, that’s just a nice little dividend. (Keith is like, “Hey, baby, I love Spot-ify. I bought this sweet fedorah with that check.”) If you’re somebody else, somebody less established in the Rock-royalties pantheon, you’re probably not buying a hat. You’re probably hoping that Spotify might, might, pick up your next cup of coffee – or one at the end of the year, I don’t know how that works.

Spotify does this year-end Wrapped thing. You get a weird Snapchat/Instagram video that tells you stuff. Your most listened-to artist/band, your also-rans, etc. You also get some pretty sweet virtual (and unearned) affirmation.

My win was this.

911 seems good. It’s better than 11. The green-dotify didn’t specify whom those new artists were, which sucks, but I have a decent idea. And I’m guessing that many of those artists have Bandcamp pages, and I didn’t visit any of those. Actually, that’s not true. I did visit the Car Seat Headrest page because Will put out three different iterations of the new record on streaming, cd, and vinyl. It was mostly the same – alternate sequences and some alternate versions of certain tracks. The alternate versions weren’t on Bandcamp. You had to buy all three formats to get the whole record. Or you had to be ok with the iteration that you got. Or you could just find the alternate versions on YouTube. Sure, they wouldn’t be on your phone, but you got to hear them.

That’s not me being petty or cheap. I could’ve bought the cd and vinyl iterations. And I could’ve bought alot of music on Bandcamp, but I couldn’t have bought 911-new-artists worth. How many could I have bought? Not sure. How would I have decided? Not sure. I’m glad that I discovered that many sounds, and I’m concerned that most of those sounds were produced by real people struggling to create in this challenging (intentionally undersold the adjective there, but “terrible” and “horrible” seemed trite) environment. I’m more glad than concerned, if you follow the dichotomy. And I’m not happy about it. Having identified the problem, however, I’m flummoxed about a solution.

I listened to alot of music in 2020. #WFH #FTW (And two hashtag sentence fragments make a sentence. I just checked the LN style manual. Jane said ok.)

Alessandro Deljavan is an Italian pianist, who was born a few months before I graduated high school. He recorded Erik Satie’s piano works. My best friend and I listened to that alot this year – she calls it “sleeping music.” Miles Davis, obv. Early-covid, I made a chronologically-tight playlist of his pre-Columbia material. Mid-covid, I started a chronologically-tight and still-unfinished playlist of his fusion material. Jenny Lin? I think that’s a holdover from last year, when sleeping music was her Chopin’s Nocturnes. CSH was my lawnmowing soundtrack. Daniel Baremboim? No idea, maybe I hit his Mendelssohn’s Leider ohne Worte too many times during the days.

Minutes listened and top genre are what I want to talk about, real quick, before I get list-y. 115,891 minutes is 1,931 or so hours, and 80.5 or so days. I listened to two and a half months straight of music this year. That’s not a brag or even a humble brag. It’s a fact. And most of that (trust me here, I ran my ass off to playlists) was Indie Rock – the aforementioned “new artists.” How can I help them, besides streaming their amazing work over and over and over, and championing them here? Shouting indirectly at Spotify on social media seems unlikely to change a flawed system. Anybody with more constructive ideas can share them below the line.

Ok, the list.

I did it. I broke the unspoken rule (nobody gets #1 twice), and I’m ok with it. 2020 was a unique year. Up top, that’s Fiona from a Zoom call over the summer. She didn’t really know about Liner Notes, but she was willing to talk while walking her dogs. I wasn’t sure that Fetch the Bolt Cutters would be the album of the year at that point, but it was a nice chat. Tbh, I struggled to finalize the list because any of the Top 10 could’ve been Top. The margins were very fine. (And fwiw, I may tweak things a bit over the next few weeks.) Links to Spotify. And COME ON, Spotify. Pay artists more, and pay indie artists even more than that.

Fiona Apple – Fetch the Bolt Cutters

Phoebe Bridgers – Punisher

Waxahatchee – Saint Cloud

This Is the Kit – Off Off On

HAIM – Women in Music Pt. III

En Attendant Ana – Juillet

Samia – The Baby

Kelly Lee Owens – Inner Song

Adrianne Lenker – songs / instrumentals

Porridge Radio – Every Bad

SAULT – Untitled (Black Is) / Untitled (Rise)

Taylor Swift – folklore / evermore

The 1975 – Notes On A Conditional Form

Car Seat Headrest – Making a Door Less Open

Perfume Genius – Set My Heart on Fire Immediately

Lomelda – Hannah

Fleet Foxes – Shore

Soccer Mommy – color theory

Beach Bunny – Honeymoon

Retirement Party – Runaway Dog

Shopping – All or Nothing

Ela Minus – acts of rebellion

The Strokes – The New Abnormal

Fontaines D.C. – A Hero’s Death

Kate NV – Room for the Moon

Dehd – Flower of Devotion

Gum County – Somewhere

Bad Moves – Untenable

Jeff Tweedy – Love Is the King

Laura Marling – Song for Our Daughter

Autechre – SIGN

Four Tet – Sixteen Oceans

Sorry – 925

Dream Wife – So When You Gonna…

Fenne Lily – BREACH

Margaret Glaspy – Devotion

Jordana – Something to Say to You

Hinds – The Prettiest Curse

Gorillaz – Song Machine: Season One

Tame Impala – The Slow Rush

Tycho – Simulcast

Ólafur Arnalds – some kind of peace

Ezra Feinberg – Recumbent Speech

Slow Pulp – Moveys

Young Jesus – Welcome to Conceptual Beach

Bartees Strange – Live Forever

U.S. Girls – Heavy Light

Empress Of – I’m You’re Empress Of

Charli XCX – how i’m feeling now

Oliver Coates – skins n slime

LN is on hiatus for a little while.

More soon.

from WordPress https://ift.tt/3rDCuuR via IFTTT

#IFTTT #WordPress

0 notes

paleorecipecookbook · 7 years

Text

5 Health Benefits of Intuitive Eating (+ 7 Ways to Get Started Today)

Have you ever started a new diet, feeling so pumped and full of optimism that this is the one that will work, only to fall off the wagon (again) a few weeks later?

While it can be tempting to blame yourself and give up, or go to the extreme and starve yourself to get results, you should know that you’re far from alone. In fact, almost every dieter is right there with you, considering that 95 percent of diets fail. (1)

Now, you’re probably thinking that there’s no other option but dieting to lose weight and improve your health, so what gives?

Fortunately, there’s an answer, and that answer is intuitive eating.

What Is Intuitive Eating?

Intuitive eating is connecting with and trusting in the satiety and hunger cues given to you by your body. It focuses not on weight loss as a goal, but rather on eating what you want, when you’re feeling true hunger.

Unlike dieting, it doesn’t encourage counting calories, carbs, fats, or grams of protein. Instead, it encourages simply listening to your body’s needs for certain foods for nourishment.

In reality, intuitive eating is the way man has always eaten, before “diets” and processed, industrialized foodstuffs came along. You wouldn’t see hunter-gatherers or pre-agriculture community members sitting around their camps, planning out their macronutrients for the day, and stressing out about weight gain if they ate an extra stick of jerky.

Animals also eat intuitively, and you’ll notice that most animals in the wild are lean. They search for food and eat when they feel hungry, not just because they are craving a midnight taste of gourmet garden carrots. Which brings on an important question: how do we, as humans accustomed to snacking and having food available all the time, know when we’re truly hungry?

True Hunger vs. Cravings

Sometimes it can be hard to tell whether you’re truly hungry, or just bored, restless, stressed, or craving a certain taste (chocolate, anyone?). And since eating only when you’re hungry is the foundation of intuitive eating, it’s important to be able to tell the difference between hunger and simple cravings.

Some signs that you might not be truly listening to your body when it comes to hunger include:

Feeling “stuffed” after meals.

Eating too quickly or not chewing food thoroughly.

Snacking several times between meals.

Feeling like you need to eat after a stressful situation.

Feeling ashamed after eating something.

Another great way to tell if you’re truly hungry is to ask yourself what sounds good to eat in that moment. When you’re experiencing true hunger, whole foods such as veggies, meats, fruits, and seeds sound delectable. When you’re bored or simply craving something, none of these will sound satisfying.

5 Health Benefits of Eating Intuitively

Eating intuitively will change your life in more ways than simply changing what you put on your plate.

1. Improved Digestion

Two of the key tenets of intuitive eating are to:

Eat only when you’re truly hungry

Eat until you’re satisfied, not stuffed

Practicing both of these habits can help improve your digestion in a number of ways.

For one, eating only when you’re truly hungry gives your digestive system time to completely empty your stomach from your last meal. This might seem like no big deal, but when you keep eating every couple hours and not allowing your food to digest, your system can easily become overworked. Your stomach has to continually pump out enzymes and acids to help digest your food, while your liver is continually being worked to filter toxins and digest fat.

Similarly, eating until you’re stuffed at every meal can keep your digestion from running smoothly. You’re essentially “backing up” your system by pouring undigested food on top of half-digested food, which may cause you to experience indigestion, constipation, or any number of digestive troubles.

Practicing body awareness, eating only until you’re satisfied, and not snacking between meals unless you’re truly hungry gives your digestive system a rest so that it’s fully equipped to handle your next meal.

2. Less Stress

Studies have shown that intuitive eaters not only enjoy a more pleasant emotional state than dieters, but also experience improvements in depression, anxiety, negative self-talk, and general psychological well-being when they switch to eating intuitively. (2,3)

The reason for this reduction in stress might stem from the fact that when you eat intuitively, you get to focus more on enjoying your food instead of analyzing it. You also take yourself out of the mindset of, “I can’t have that because I need to lose weight,” or “I can’t have carbs because I’m fat.”

These kinds of reactions to food put a load of stress on your mind and body, so it’s no wonder you feel better when you let them go!

3. Weight Loss

Studies have also shown that intuitive eaters have lower body mass indexes (BMIs) than dieters. (4) One of the major reasons for this could be due to the fact that intuitive eating is easy to stick to (unlike fad diets) which can lead to long-term weight loss.

When you eat intuitively you also learn to respect satiety signals that tell you when you’re truly satisfied, versus just eating for the sake of eating. This results in a natural, optimal calorie balance that could lead to weight loss if you’ve been overeating by ignoring hunger signals.

The fact that intuitive eating reduces stress levels can also play a role, since too much of the stress hormone cortisol can cause fat gain. (5)

4. Higher Self-Esteem

In addition to improving eating patterns and anxiety levels, studies have also shown that practicing intuitive eating improves self-esteem.

For instance, participants in one study experienced more acceptance of their bodies and less psychological distress regarding their bodies. They were also able to let go of “unhealthy weight control behaviors.” (6)

By improving your self-esteem, it’s only natural that other areas of your life will improve as well. When you’re focusing less on not being “good enough,” and more on accepting yourself, you’ll naturally experience less anxiety and have a more positive outlook on life. In turn, this can lead to untold opportunities at work and improvements in your personal relationships.

5. Improved Body Awareness

Being aware of your body and what it’s signaling to you is extremely important when it comes to maintaining your health. If you listen closely, your body will give you subtle signs that something is wrong, allowing you to give it what it needs before it becomes a major problem.

Take, for example, signs of nutrient deficiencies. Many people are so disconnected from their bodies that they don’t notice subtle signs of a nutrient deficiency, like a lack of energy or tingling in their hands and feet. By the time they do notice, the deficiency has become so severe that they have to go to the doctor to get it taken care of.

Intuitive eating is all about getting in touch with your body’s signals of hunger and satiety. However, once you start paying attention to these signals, you’ll begin to be hyper-aware of other signals your body is giving off. This will allow you to always be in tune with what you need, so you can take care of it before it becomes a full-blown problem.

7 Ways to Start Practicing Intuitive Eating Today

Below are the seven best ways to get started with practicing intuitive eating.

1. Eat When You’re Hungry, Stop When You’re Satisfied

The Okinawans, some of the longest-lived people on earth, have a saying: “Hara hachi bu.” It translates as, “Eat until you are eight parts out of ten full,” or 80 percent full. Researchers mention that this mindset surrounding food is part of the reason why Okinawans regularly live to celebrate turning 100.

Draw on the concept of hara hachi bu each time you sit down to a meal, taking time to notice when your belly begins to feel slightly full, not stuffed. Your body, and most especially your digestion, will thank you for it.

2. Avoid Thinking About Foods As Either “Good” or “Bad”

When you’ve been dieting for a while, it becomes second nature to constantly think about food in terms of “good” or “bad.” Unfortunately, this creates a lot of stress around the very idea of food, as you’re constantly analyzing and/or demonizing what you’re putting into your body.

While this is by no means an invitation to start indulging in processed foods filled with sugar and chemicals, it is an invitation to stop categorizing whole foods from the earth as either good or bad. For instance, many Paleo dieters see natural sources of carbs, such as from sweet potatoes, squash, or fruit as “bad.” Try not to fall into this idea, instead, giving your body permission to eat whole, unprocessed foods as it desires.

3. Avoid Emotional Eating

Eating when you’re stressed or upset can disconnect you from how much you’re consuming, and can also interfere with proper digestion. Try to find a separate outlet for stress, such as yoga or painting.

4. Accept That There Are No “Quick-Fix” Diets

Extreme dieting that involves low calories, meal replacement shakes, and the like have been proven to be ineffective in the long run for weight loss. Extreme dieting can even lead to you gaining all the weight back that you lost once you stop, plus more. (5)

5. Eat Enough Calories

When you’re not eating intuitively, it can be tempting to strictly limit the amount of calories you consume in order to look better and lose weight. Unfortunately, when you don’t have enough fuel for your body and brain, your metabolism will become damaged and you’ll start to feel stressed and anxious.

Don’t be afraid to fuel up: just do it with whole, unprocessed foods.

6. Focus On the Act of Eating

When you sit down for a meal, really sit and focus on the act of eating. This means turning off the television, setting aside the laptop, and putting down the phone. Doing this will help you fully tune into your body and its satiety signals so that you don’t overeat. It will also help you learn to appreciate the complex flavors of foods, which can help reduce cravings.

7. Set Realistic Goals

Setting unrealistic goals, such as saying you have to lose 10 pounds in two weeks to fit into a dress for an event, can create a huge amount of stress, anxiety, and self-loathing. It also sets you up for future failures, because if you fail to meet this weight loss goal, you may feel that you’ll never meet one in the future (and therefore, never try again).

Set goals that are attainable over the long term, and perhaps even remove weight loss from them. For instance, instead of setting a goal of losing so many pounds per month, try focusing on only eating whole foods (nothing boxed or processed) for a month. Reframing can make all the difference in your stress levels and success.

Bottom Line

The best way to achieve success with intuitive eating is to eat what your body craves in whole food forms. Again, this doesn’t mean indulging in cravings for twinkies, chips, and candy bars because you’re thinking about them. That isn’t your intuition talking, it’s your cravings.

Try it like this: you’re craving sweets, but you know you aren’t hungry. Listen to your hunger cues, and when you finally are hungry, eat something naturally sweet that sounds good, like some fruit or a sweet potato. If this isn’t enough, try a piece of very dark chocolate after your meal. You’ll find that you probably feel more than satisfied now that you’ve given your body actual nourishment in the form of complex carbs, which usually manifests as a craving for sweets.

Of course, this is only one example of intuitive eating in action. At the end of the day, it will be you and your personal intuition calling the shots. Luckily, your intuition is one of the oldest and most reliable things about you, so don’t be afraid to give in and trust it.

SaveSaveSaveSave

The post 5 Health Benefits of Intuitive Eating (+ 7 Ways to Get Started Today) appeared first on Paleo Plan.

Source: http://ift.tt/10qRbxJ

#paleo #recipe #food #delicious #healthy #yum #diet

2 notes · View notes

severesaladballoon-blog · 5 years

Text

Sherrie Ellen”Finest Michigan Psychic,Psychic Medium Call (248) 505

Sati Savitri via solar spiritual practices or Surya Sadhana had attained the boon of bringing again to life, her useless husband Satyavan. Your's is an awesome story. I like that you just found your 26 C&C and was blessed with an extraordinary deal. Gutsy move to go large before studying to sail but you could not move on that deal. that is so cool. Great to listen to good issues happening to good folks. I've 4 sailboats, three small and a Catalina 36. Wish to study to stitch and am going to do it soon. LAst week I felt some one respiration close to me when I'm sleeping @12:20 then after sometime, within 30 seconds I felt someone hovering over my chest then next 4-10 seconds were the experiences of someone pulling my cheeks to make me smile and I personally felt somebody was attempting to drive me to smile I dont know why. The previous is gone and the longer term could never come, dwelling within the current moment is what matters, as a result of it is all we've. Living prior to now or the long run prevents, stalls and delays us from fully accepting, and embracing the now. It additionally retards our religious development. Top Pet Psychic Readings. Get a Accurate Tarot Reading from Honest Psychics. Free Trial:Go!We're already throughout the everlasting, even within the dense state of being human and on the earth.

This 30-day interval is a time of forgiveness, defending your consciousness and realigning with the Divine. It is an opportunity to release most of the deep seeded pains that we supply in the direction of ourselves and others. It is actually a time of renewal that everyone can embrace. The fasting aspect of Ramadan for some generally is a little harsh. Throughout the interval of dawn to sundown individuals are not eating or ingesting anything including water. Before and after, you can have whatever you choose besides drugs and alcohol. Additional restraints include refraining from gossip and "sinful speech" and in case you are single you are to chorus from having intercourse. The purification of the mind, soul, and physique is essential throughout this time. You are fasting from distractions, so some Muslims learn the Quran from cover to cover throughout this time as a form of devotion. Religion will get us through a number of the hardest times in our lives. Religion permits individuals to go on to the other aspect without worry and anxiety. Religion helps the struggling young family to deal with life and the uncertainties of the long run. Faith might help us heal ourselves and others. Religion is mankind's method of coping with almost any situation. Without religious religion life would be definitely unbearable. It is a sexual turn on for me to put on them, however it's not like I'm aroused in all of them day. My wife was against the thought for a while-she wanted to be the one to look female and attractive. She has since realized it is part of who I am and lets me wear them because it makes me blissful. Being Spiritual does not imply abandoning your worldly possessions and sitting semi-bare beneath a tree in everlasting meditation. It does not imply being perfection incarnate, as people we are all flawed, and our purpose is trying to make the very best of the incomplete hand we have been dealt. This alone will save your relationship from countless fights even getting started. Nevertheless it goes past that for profit. When you do not take the bait and let your tongue unfastened the arguments and fights have no where to go. They won't escalate so you can get back to the peaceable enterprise of loving each other over again.

0 notes

maxivermismind · 7 years

Note

The Loud House

Witching Hour // Monster High

THIS IS LUCY LOUD (to Rocky)

Thank You For The Music // ABBA

Luna for sure !!!

Can’t Get Enough of You Baby // Smash Mouth

Omg, this is so Lori/Bobby!!

Feeling so Amazing // Monster High

I feel like this suits a lot of the loud siblings!! Because they all have their talents and aspirations, and I think this suits them all working hard for those things and feeling great about themselves!

Walkin’ on the Sun // Smash Mouth

Not about anyone, so much as I think Luna would like to jam out to this song.

Gnossiennes // Erik Satie

Okay I am trying to stick to vocal songs for this meme, but the Gnossiennes really fit Lisa IMO and sound like something she would listen to on top of that...

Together Forever // Rick Astley

Rita/Lynn Sr, and Howard/Harold, bc they are good sets of parents who LOVE each other, and also they would all soooo be into 80s jams like this one!!

Mucha Lucha // Chicos de Barrio

Okay, wrong cartoon but. It makes me think of Lynn sbhjdbs...

Wildside // Sofia Carson

LORI AND LENI IN THE VAN EPISODe

Sister Psychic // Smash Mouth

Lucy shjbdjbs especially in regards to “Raw Deal”, this makes the song title. Very Literal.

#digi answers #anon

2 notes · View notes

empathicstars · 6 years

Text

on blog playlist.

I feel like I talk about them a lot, but I put a lot of time, thought, and energy into my blog playlists – purely for my own enjoyment! I like them being there, I like listening to them. Music is important to me, and giving my kids “OfficialTM” music is just… fun. The overall feel and all lyrics of the song must be perfectly accurate to the character to be included. ( Therefore, there’s usually a lot of other music that’s on the cusp that’s denied entry, so to speak. )

Aella’s blog playlist is all all instrumental harp music. There is not one word uttered in any of the songs. They all carry a very specific tone, feeling, and can correlate, more or less, to a story.

Aqua Harp by Animusic

This has sat on my blog for literal years, and has always been the opener of my playlist. The mixture of instruments creates a soft, desert cave near the ocean vibe -- which, incidentally, happened to be one of Aella’s favorite places to be on Vulcan.

Moonsong by Adrian von Ziegler

Though beautiful and lilting, there is something haunting melancholic about Moonsong -- especially with the inclusion of flutes. It speaks of a thinly veiled sadness that seeps into the hollowest, brightest parts of the soul.

River Flows in You by Inge van Grinsven

River Flows in You is a stunning piano piece, originally by Yiruma, that has a more wistful and saturnine feeling in harp. It always feel like it’s reaching for a high that never comes, a beauty that’s just barely out of reach.

Midna’s Lament by Hylian Ensemble

Ah, Midna’s Lament. One of the most haunting and heart-wrenching songs of all of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Done in strings, it brings the same pain and sadness, offers us a loneliness that is not so widely stated, but rather whispered and held desperately within.

Toccata and Fugue in D Minor by Amy Turk

Known famously as “the gothic organ song” by Bach, this very skillfully transcribed and performed song is just as dark and gorgeously angry in harp as it is in its original form. Perhaps even more so.

Gymnopédie no. 1 by rittajp

Originally by Erik Satie, this piece has a sad, trudging, desperate quality to it. Forcing a continued life even after great pain, horror, and sadness. Though that may just be for me because it was used in an anime to that extent, h--ha. The slightly less-than-perfect playing for me really adds to the mood of the overall song.

NUAGES by LUMINESCENT

This song is, more less, much warmer than most of the other songs on this list, and reminds one of Earth! It’s something soft, gentle, and beautiful for Aella -- and the time she’s spent on a planet of blue skies and water.

Atmospheric Lyre Music by Kveld

This song reminds me of space, not going to lie, and it’s not just the name. The beginning sounds forced, trudging on and on and on despite pain. Snippets of remembered noises echo over and over, and the beat is almost arrhythmical. Almost. It’s a unique and beautiful ode to a distant... weightlessness.

A Lyre Song by n c

Though the playing isn’t reminscient of how Aella would play, the song itself is something very likely that Aella would have learned and would play by herself. Just a soft, gentle song!

Sad Harp Music by Soothing Music Ensamble

If ever there were three words to define Aella... Anyway, this song is very blue. There’s not much hidden bitterness or pain -- it’s just a quiet, soft, gentle sadness that seems to encapsulate her being and her person. It’s her learning to deal with her pain and wear it around her, always.

The Inner Light by Renee Wilson

Of course I had to include The Inner Light, rearranged from the flute song that Picard played in the episode of the same name. The song is a melancholic memory, which really is all one needs to know about Aella, either way.

And that’s a wrap!

#( out of language. )#( by these hands. )#( incoming message from queuefleet. )#( in search of self. )

0 notes

how2to18 · 6 years

Link

IT’S RARE TO FIND a first book as accomplished and original, not to mention droll, as Laura Esther Wolfson’s collection of personal essays, For Single Mothers Working as Train Conductors. Yes, the peculiar title does have a raison d’être, as do all of the allusions and offhand surprises Wolfson treats us to. The entire volume is a loosely woven tapestry, its brilliantly colored strands of experience threading through, appearing and disappearing. It becomes the tableau of a life — until, in this case, middle age: Wolfson’s work as a Russian and French interpreter and translator (two very different endeavors); her professional travels; her two failed marriages and regret over being childless; her disabling lung disease; her discovery that being Jewish means more than a taste for good bread. And all these strands impinge on one another.

A more conventional mind might have organized the contents as a linear memoir, sauntering through Wolfson’s early publications in college (reviews of dance performances in an upstate New York paper after renouncing a career as a dancer), to her discovery of Russian and her long stay in Soviet Georgia, and so on and so on. Instead we find a far more shapely and entertaining work, imitating the way life happens and is recalled: in luminous fragments, echoing and prismatic.

This book, which won the 2017 Iowa Prize for Literary Nonfiction, is Wolfson’s first, but she is no newcomer to the world of letters. She has published stories and essays in literary magazines and been included in distinguished anthologies. But above all, she has dwelt on and in the Russian language, interpreting for “statesmen and scoundrels who were not infrequently one and the same.” Early on, when she could jet around, she dealt with “[s]tate banquets at the Kremlin, mafia trials, forgotten literary masterpieces, KGB files declassified under Yeltsin (later to be reclassified under Putin).” And she translated a book “on Russian obscenities and criminal slang, with the rhyming ditties.”

Later, when her illness required a more stable life, she took a job at what she coyly describes as “a tall building of green glass at midtown Manhattan’s watery eastern edge.” One needn’t be a world traveler to recognize the United Nations, where she rendered “routine staff correspondence, treaties, and reports” from French as well as Russian. She is wisely reluctant to name names when it comes to the realm of diplomacy, and she is just as reluctant to do so when discussing the alleged working methods of “a well-known two-person team (American husband, Russian wife) […] who retranslated most of Russian literature.” These are of course Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, whose procedure, to our author, “sounds an awful lot like the way generations of schoolboys got through Latin and Greek by relying on a ‘trot.’ […] This couple can do over, yes, but can they simply do?”

The reference to the above couple appears in one of the more rueful essays, “Losing the Nobel.” She was offered the opportunity to translate two works by Svetlana Alexievich, the celebrated Belarussian compiler of 20th-century Soviet oral histories chronicling World War II, the war in Afghanistan, and the 1986 nuclear disaster in Chernobyl. “Novels in voices,” Alexievich calls them. The two had already met when Wolfson served as Alexievich’s interpreter at the 2005 PEN World Voices Festival in New York City and found herself euphoric about the latter’s extraordinary work. Alexievich must have been impressed as well, because she kept in touch and soon after gave Wolfson’s name to her agent. In spite of her boundless admiration, Wolfson declined the offer. She was not in good health. She had a full-time job she needed, partly for her medical expenses. “I chose my writing over hers — isn’t this what creative people are supposed to do, sacrificing whatever they must so as to clear space for their work? […] I had to live another ten years to find out exactly what I passed up.” She’s referring, of course, to Alexievich’s 2015 Nobel Prize for Literature.

The taste of rue flavors many of the essays: a wry, philosophical wonder at the turns life takes, at how we conspire with circumstances to make the wrong choices — which always seem right at the time and may indeed be right for a while. Wolfson’s first husband, Aleksandr, seemed very right, as did his family, who lived in the “hinterlands” of Soviet Georgia. His mother treated Wolfson like a daughter and stayed in touch long after the young couple had moved to the United States and separated. The marriage seems to have foundered for several reasons, not least of them language, which paradoxically bound them closer and maintained a certain divide. “We discovered that in the US, marriage conducted in a foreign language afforded certain advantages: we could stand at a shop counter discussing a prospective purchase without the vendor listening in and engage publicly in secret exchanges of all kinds.” But Wolfson suspects that her use of the Russian word for “garbage” to describe the broken electronic devices her husband retrieves from the street and fixes played a significant role in their breakup. Surely more significant than linguistic or cultural differences was the fact that during a half-dozen or more years of married life, Aleksandr was never quite “ready” to have the child Laura wanted so much.

Ironically, while Laura can’t wait to have a child, she assists her Russian sister-in-law, Julia, in the opposite effort. Given the scarcity of certain personal hygiene products in Georgia, Julia pleads with Laura to leave her used diaphragm as a parting token. “‘I’ll boil it in the big soup pot,’ Julia said, with a nod toward the kitchen, ‘to sterilize it.’ […] To refuse her request would be mean-spirited.” Years later, after her own divorce, Laura learns that her gift had been effective.

In her second marriage, readiness is no longer an issue: her lung disease would make pregnancy life-threatening. As she waited in a schoolyard to pick up her sister’s small boy, another child’s father gradually approached her and uttered a very 21st-century pick-up line: “Whose mom are you?”

Wolfson can infuse the most ordinary occasions of daily life with a startling poignancy, such as the above, or, through her vivid imagery, lift casual facts out of the banal. As a young woman exploring Paris she notes a house in Montmartre where the composer Erik Satie once lived and kept two pianos, “one on top of the other, giving new meaning to the word ‘upright,’ although in my mind’s eye, the one on top is, in fact, upside down, pedals waving gently overhead like the fronds of some giant houseplant.” Even a daily subway ride can be transformed: “The commute is a golden border at the beginning and end of each workday that sheds some of its shimmer onto the leaden expanse in between.” The magic happens because she reads and annotates a few pages of Proust, “the minute perceptions captured and sliced lengthwise to reveal their delicate innards and seeds,” during her daily trek to the UN.

Occasionally Wolfson’s choices turn out to be absolutely right; witness her pursuit of writing despite the difficulties it presents. Writing is not easy for anyone, but Wolfson’s health demands a protocol that with her ubiquitous wit she manages to make funny as well as daunting. The title “Dark Green and Velvety, with a Dusting of Cat Fur,” refers to her couch. “[H]ere I am back on the couch. Not the psychotherapeutic couch. Not the casting couch. The writing couch […] [m]y writing process now involves a great deal of sleeping.” Her seven-syllable lung condition makes it impossible to write “for more than an hour and a half without pausing for a nap. In fact,” she confides, “half an hour of shut-eye intervened between the end of the previous paragraph and the beginning of this one.”

Before she starts she places the essentials beside her on the couch: notes, books, tissues, ChapStick, flash drive, glass of water, et cetera. The great Italo Calvino felt the same way about reading. In his novel If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler, he gives instructions for settling down with a book:

Find the most comfortable position: seated, stretched out, curled up, or lying flat […] Stretch your legs, go ahead and put your feet on a cushion, […] on the desk, on the piano […] Take your shoes off first […] Adjust the light so you won’t strain your eyes […] Cigarettes within reach, if you smoke, and the ashtray. Anything else? Do you have to pee? All right, you know best.

But writing is more demanding, as Wolfson attests: “I open the computer and off I go: write, sleep, write, sleep, write. This is the ideal sequence: three stints of writing intercut with two of sleep. It adds up to some four or five hours of writing, spread out over six or seven hours total.”

Another essay tinged with faint regret describes her realization, in a very secular household, that she is a Jew. The only indication of this in her childhood is bread. Every so often her family visits an old bakery in Syracuse’s former Jewish neighborhood, now mostly empty lots, and comes away with delectable smelling bags of bagels, bialys, challahs — far superior to the Wonder Bread of her schoolmates’ lunchbox sandwiches. “Bread, I sensed, was a surface manifestation of something deeper, a difference that remained impossible to grasp […] Apart from bread, what were the other signs that we were Jewish?”

Not until years later does she begin to seek answers, prompted by her living next door to a small brick building on New York City’s Upper West Side, where on certain nights well-dressed people gathered. Clearly a synagogue. Her interest piqued, she begins reading about and studying Judaism, even taking a course in Yiddish, which, oddly enough, given her talent for languages, she never masters to her satisfaction. She reads not only the Torah, but also the works of major Jewish-American novelists. Still, as with marriage, it doesn’t totally work. She never quite feels “at home in a Jewish house of prayer […] at home in the house of Judaism.”

But her studies lead to a friendship with a much older Jewish woman whose story is set against the violent upheavals of life in the USSR. Which in turn leads to a Russian émigré writer in Chicago, who in turn has a story of a Lithuanian. The ramifications go on in shaggy-dog style, deepening and widening, with no end in sight. When the end does come, it turns out to be a Russian memoir that needs a translator. This is hardly the first such occasion. Story piles on story as Wolfson moves along, connecting with anyone Russian who comes her way: cabdrivers, a masseuse, most with a tale or a potential book.

In the final essay, “Other Incidents in the Precinct,” she ponders, with the lightest of touches, her lack of success at marriage — why, what does it mean, should she even consider it again? She begins apparently far afield, yet close to the bone, as it were: “That spring, I went to my fourth dentist in three years. Why did I change dentists so frequently and so frivolously? My formative years gave no indication that I would engage in such behavior.” She can find no answers, but since her chosen form is the essay, questions need not have answers. They need only to take us down a beckoning narrative path — which includes her departure from her second husband, attended by the police, as well as her discovery of her father’s first marriage, before coming full circle to end in the dentist’s office.

Laura Esther Wolfson may not have managed to get all she wants, but she’s succeeded triumphantly in her passion to write. She has lived richly in two cultures and cultivated a sensibility informed by all that came her way. Her book is a response to her choices among life’s offerings. “My experience,” she writes, “though regrettably vaster than that of most people, is still meager as a basis for generalization […] Still, I will draw some conclusions, because what else can I do with these experiences now?”

Lynne Sharon Schwartz is the author of the novels Disturbances in the Field, Leaving Brooklyn, the memoir Ruined by Reading, and many other works of fiction and non-fiction. Her third collection of poetry, No Way Out But Through, was published in 2017 by the University of Pittsburgh Press Poetry Series.

The post “The Way Life Happens”: On Laura Esther Wolfson’s “For Single Mothers Working as Train Conductors” appeared first on Los Angeles Review of Books.

from Los Angeles Review of Books https://ift.tt/2IDt0I6 via IFTTT

#Blogger

0 notes

mrchristopherbyant · 6 years

Text

Mindfulness in Music: Notes on finding life’s rhythm, by Mark Tanner

My guest writer today is pianist, composer, author, adjudicator, and music examiner, Mark Tanner. Mark has penned a wealth of piano and music related publications, including The Mindful Pianist (published by Faber Music in 2016), and numerous educational compositions (many of which have been featured on various exam syllabuses). Today, he provides an insight into his new book, Mindfulness in Music: Notes on finding life’s rhythm (published by Leaping Hare Press), which can be purchased here. Alternatively, you can pop by this blog next week and take part in my weekend competition, where I will be giving away a couple of copies. Over to Mark…

We talk a great deal about music – the role we think it plays in our lives, its seemingly endless capacity to rejuvenate, stimulate and orientate us. But we’re increasingly at risk of thinking of music as a utility or commodity – something that’s been created to tick a box perhaps, or to help us fulfil a particular function in our lives. Some of us look for music to be purposeful – or indeed to help us to be more purposeful in whatever activities we happen to be engaged in. We jog with headphones on, wait for an elevator to the accompaniment of tinny pop tune cover versions, and sit in the sauna to a backdrop of synthetic flutes and wind chimes. This resignation to the idea of ‘functional’ music seems to have become entangled with how we consume it – sometimes unthinkingly or with a sense of entitlement. Streaming music seems strangely out of kilter with the devotion shown by those who created it in the first place, drip by drip. Music on tap potentially leads to a lack of excitement and engagement – that feverish sense of anticipation we once felt as we put on a new CD is now more likely to resemble a lucky dip in Apple Music. Music might be something we sit down to listen to, but just as easily it will underscore some everyday activity such as fixing a broken toaster or waiting for someone to answer the phone about an electricity bill. One might be tempted to contrast this with music enjoyed in an earlier point in time, where the very notion of recordings would have seemed about as likely as Donald Trump becoming President. In taking music for granted we underplay its marvellous, mysterious qualities – we become harder to please, harder to be moved or exhilarated by sound, perhaps to a point where the beauty of a musical moment escapes our attention altogether. Today music all too easily blurs into ‘muzak’, which is a perilous place for us to arrived at, since we feel robbed of choosing how, what and (perhaps even more importantly) when we listen. Listening and hearing are quite separate things of course; for me, this superabundance of music is the very antithesis of mindfulness, for we feel cajoled into consuming music instead of drawn in by its powers of intoxication. We can even feel that there is only a single, acceptable response to certain sounds, or that our emotions are in some way being manipulated to someone else’s ends. Advertising would be largely impotent without music, and yet ironically the music used is virtually always rendered anodyne in the process. Potentially, our dispassionate receptivity music leads to mindlessness, not mindfulness. This burden of choice, or else its polar opposite – no choice at all – also discourages us from pausing to reflect; we forget how to be thrilled or devastated by a musical experience. The flip-side of this is true when playing the piano of course, or perhaps especially when teaching it. The knowledge that an exam is on the horizon might help someone to concentrate on improving, but will it necessarily help them to notice what in the music is truly of value? Music exams, competitions and festivals, though hugely advantageous to many learners, unwittingly contribute to this regrettable commoditisation and compartmentalisation of music. Perhaps this is all rather inevitable and not worth getting distressed about; yet for me, the listener forms a key point in the triangle that starts with creation and ends with an emotion beyond the realm of words. Listening can even be said to be creative in and of itself, but only if we are alive to what it is trying to say to us.

I wrote Mindfulness in Music: Notes on finding life’s rhythm in 2017 as part of an ongoing series of around 30 beautifully presented hardback books published by Leaping Hare Press. I recall first noticing the series a few years ago as a table display in my local Waterstones and was immediately enticed by their craftsmanship; they are really are things of beauty. Topics so far go from bread-making to bereavement, surfing to singing, Einstein to cycling! The book came out in April 2018 and was discussed in my interview with Tom Service on BBC Radio 3’s ‘Music Matters’ a couple of days later. The publishers wanted me to sum up in a concise, easily grasped way the essence of mindfulness and indeed the essence of music. There is surely no expectation of the need to be an expert in meditation, mindfulness or indeed music in order to gain something of value from such experiences – in the same way, one doesn’t need to be a virtuoso to enjoy playing the piano, or a graduate in music to enjoy listening to it being played. Music is always of the moment, even when it takes on epic proportions, such as a Wagner opera or Strauss tone poem. Perhaps Erik Satie had a rather important point to make when he penned his exquisite piano miniatures – for he achieved that impossibly difficult thing as a composer: to beckon the listener into a perfumed musical moment that seems to have already started before we’d even tuned in. Satie’s music, a little like the minimalist movement that followed a few decades later perhaps, rarely appears preoccupied by grandiose machinery, development or architecture – the music is there to be savoured, rather like caviar, truffles or a fine cognac. Deeply meaningful music does not, therefore, need to be large-scale or impressively ambitious in order to make its mark.

“Mark Tanner has written a mindfulness manifesto for music”

Tom Service, BBC Radio 3 ‘Music Matters’

It seems those who love music, or indeed use it in a more sophisticated way – either by learning about it or even earning money from it – become especially prone to this habit of picking away at the minutiae of surface details. It’s as though we imagine ourselves to be Michelangelo, putting the final touches to the Statue of David when we practise a few bars of intensely tricky music on the piano. Music students may feel a certain satisfaction from having put into words the cleverness bound up in, say, a Mahler symphony or lengthy Miles Davis jazz piece. And rightly so, for music’s narrative journey, or ‘story’, is frequently complex and deserving of that extra bit of attentive thinking, or even, dare I say it, analysis. The question here is at what point should we just let the music go its own way, unjudged, unevaluated? This is not a contradiction, more a conundrum, for there are times when we need to scrutinise, and others when we can just wallow and enjoy. As a pianist and composer, I find this question strikes at the heart of all I do, for I’ve spent many hours pouring over recapitulations in Mozart concertos, or else looking for ways to extend a simple tune that has just landed in my head. And yet, in the end, I know that this type of detailed work is only valuable because it allows me to tap into, and hence express the music’s bigger picture so that others are able to gain something from it.

When I wrote The Mindful Pianist for Faber in 2016, as part of the ongoing EPTA Piano Professional series, I dug deep into what we as pianists are attempting to achieve when we are playing; I broke this difficult subject down into four main areas: focus, practise, perform, engage. In essence, I was wanting those who love the piano to view what they do from a subtly different perspective, not just to grind away for days on end in an unwinnable bid to out-manoeuvre Beethoven, or conquer Ravel. I commissioned perspectives from 25 well-known pianists, composers and teachers, and the ultimate aim was to provide an original way ‘in’ to the craft of piano playing, not just to offer a raft of tips on how to practise (though the book hopefully achieves that, too!). The book is unapologetically pianocentric – it’s my sincere attempt to embody the idea that we need to play and think about piano music in a thoughtful, mindful way in order to do it, and ourselves, justice.

“invigorating and thought-provoking”

Martino Tirimo

In this latest publication I assume no preexisting knowledge base or skill-set. It’s not written for aficionados or those in the know. Nor am I focusing exclusively on piano music. There are chapters on music as meditation, the rhythm of life, sound and sensuality, the language of music, parallel universes (how music can inhabit multiple meanings for us simultaneously) and the art of possibility – how the reader might acquire the confidence to sing in a choir, take up an instrument later in life or become a valued member of the musical community. I also take a closer look at what, if anything, we mean by ‘talent’ in music, what tone-deafness is, or indeed is not. I unpack the notion of perfect-pitch to see whether it really adds much to what proficient musicians might achieve, and offer 20 activities designed to help us all to resonate more enjoyably with everything from the sound of a squeaky gate to a love song by Elton John.

“Mindfulness in Music is both informative and thought-provoking – a fascinating read on many levels”

Julian Lloyd Webber

The ‘point’ of music – in virtually any way I consider to be realistic or meaningful – is surely to connect with our human urge to feel emotion. It’s amusing to me that we talk about the Romantic period as driven by passion, feelings and expression, as if this has not always been the case, both before and since the 19th century! Sometimes we feel an impulse to re-connect with a particular song or piece of music in order to help us to relive a moment; in this respect, nostalgia in music is every bit as powerful as looking at sepia photographs or blowing dust from the yellowing pages of an old book. Come to think of it, the antiquity of Classical music perhaps renders all of our listening and playing experiences potentially nostalgic? I’ve always felt that music is all ‘ours’ – in other words, humans created it for the wonderment of other humans – and to this end the book sets out to scratch a little beneath the surface of what we thought we already knew. Let’s not forget that the world was making its own music millions of years before our distant ancestors began drumming away on stretched animal skins or experimenting with echoes in forests, and there is perhaps no greater music than silence, itself an endangered species. Becoming more aware of how we engage with music, and indeed what constitutes music in the first place (isn’t a waterfall music, or a storm reverberating through a valley?) is how we will gain more from it. I ask, in the book, “how can we be interested in the sound of nature if we are not intrigued by the nature of sound?” Can elephants really listen with their feet, for example, and why is it we cannot hear the deafening ‘songs’ of whales when we are ashore? These and other questions are not intended to be semantic or philosophical for their own sake, but seeded here and there within its pages to help place our enjoyment of music in a sharper spotlight, irrespective of what kinds of music we enjoy listening to or playing. Spirituality, in these terms, becomes more about the relationship we have with music directly – and a world that is forever teeming with sound – not necessarily tied to any god or religion.

As pianists, most of us grow used to grappling with music that was etched onto manuscript centuries ago. We take for granted that our playing skills need to be entwined with an ability to read music and make sense of heady things such as structure, harmony and counterpoint. This all too easily leads us to the numbing conclusion that music is only there to be sifted and sorted through, organised and fiddled with, until it finally submits to all our tireless thrashing about at the keyboard. If, on the other hand, we can learn to take a helicopter view of the music we love from time to time, even when we are doing battle with the intricacies of a Bach fugue or scrabbling around with fistfuls of notes in Debussy, we will access it from a more immediately rewarding place. And by doing this, not only will we derive more from the experience itself, we may also have more to ‘say’ when we sit down to play.

Mindfulness is concerned with self-compassion, i.e. forgiving ourselves for making mistakes and playing imperfectly. It’s also about savouring the here-and-now, not over-reaching, over-thinking or over-analysing. These things just throw a spanner in the works and at the same time distract us from noticing, savouring, enjoying and simply ‘being’. We can have an eye to the future prospect of playing to others, or perhaps taking an exam, without feeling fatigued by ‘end-gaming’, as Alexander would have put it. But it is also about positioning ourselves right at the centre of the musical experience. Though I am not a Buddhist, I find the notion of playing music as a ‘practical meditation’ utterly irresistible. We are engaging with the finest of art-forms – “the word music, after all, comes from ‘muses’ – the daughters of Zeus – to crystallise the purist conceivable artistic aspirations of the gods”, to quote from my own introductory text. It’s interesting that music has the power to realign us as well as fortify our daily lives, but more than this, musical experiences are valuable because they remind us of who we are, and this might even help us to become better versions of ourselves.

Mindfulness in Music, Notes on finding life’s rhythm, by Mark Tanner (Leaping Hare Press).

My Publications:

For much more information about how to practice piano repertoire, take a look at my two-book piano course, Play it again: PIANO (Schott). Covering a huge array of styles and genres, 49 progressive pieces from approximately Grade 1 – 8 level are featured, with at least two pages of practice tips for every piece. A convenient and beneficial course for students of any age, with or without a teacher, and it can also be used alongside piano examination syllabuses too.

You can find out more about my other piano publications and compositions here.

from Melanie Spanswick https://ift.tt/2HveLpQ

0 notes

lauri55p5079034-blog · 6 years

Text

Powered Ships.

Sati Savitri by means of photo voltaic spiritual strategies or Surya Sadhana had actually obtained the advantage from resuscitating, her lifeless other half Satyavan. Uranus is actually more than twenty times further coming from the Sun compared to the Planet, and also has a temperature ranging coming from 49 to 57 degrees over absolute zero, which is equal to -460 levels Fahrenheit. One more individual I understand possessed Jupiter in the tenth property, none from the planets in the sixth residence; 6th house lord Sun in the 3rd house as well as this person would seldom possess troubles of opposition at the work environment. Hidden cause the area showed positive death knowledge, development in expense earnings on our wealth services as well as tough new service gains, which was actually partially offset through reduced increases coming from investing task on insurance policy deal responsibilities. Obviously, regarding we understand there are no cannabis expanding on the various other planets in this Solar System, however historical herbalists, such as Nicholas Culpeper, presumed that the celestial bodies possessed an effective impact over life on Earth. This wasn't merely the star-sign predictions that pack several pillar ins today, however real charts, to ensure readers might recognize their increasing signs, sun as well as moon signs, and a lot more from a zodiacal occult attribute. While lifestyle as a Pisces is never ever one that doesn't goodness the spirit along with the potential to listen closely within more so in comparison to other Zodiac indications, our Sunshine's adventure within The Fishes are going to ask each and every person of us to have a more detailed look at just click the next site what is actually indicated to radiate off this location from our lifestyle in the weeks ahead of time. Allow's simply look at the global element from that. Wolfgang and also I only went back off Japan as well as Korea, and also the signs there accurately are that, you know, they had some hard opportunities; the consumers in addition to distribution possessed difficult times in 2015 in the feeling there was actually that this was actually sort of near the bottom and also they were actually eagerly anticipating a rehabilitation. Make earth pizzas as you study planets, create the lunar periods making use of Oreo biscuits as you examine the research, coating and also moon Truck Gogh's "Starry Night" as you research stars, blast and build off spacecrafts as you analyze area exploration, make presentations on specific worlds, and also a lot more in the course of this 4 part hands-on system research study on the planetary system. Easter Sunday is anticipated by Holy Full week, which is the recently from Lent Holy Full week marks necessary activities in Jesus's lifestyle as defined in the Gospels - his entryway to Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, the Final An Evening Meal on Maundy Thursday, and his fatality and crucifixion on Great Friday. To be specific, Costs Nye as well as The Planetary Community still need to have a significant $1.2 thousand, component of which they're currently trying to elevate through Kickstarter The staff specified a much more practical $200,000 goal, yet they do possess stretch goals upward until $1 thousand, which will certainly deal with the development, screening as well as release from the last variation, as well as LightSail's functions in space for a couple of months. Baseding on Independence of Relevant information Act papers, Head of state select Donald Trump has actually invested over $30 million bucks from his very own loan, on Nibiru Earth X investigation, employing the help newsworthy previous NASA astronomers and also scientists such as Paul Cox and also PHYSICIAN Stephan Greenbaum They have actually ended that Nibiru Earth X will not result in any kind of significant damages to Planet till the winter season of 2019. D. Make use of a hairdryer to replicate a part from the sun's solar power as that meets the comet. The sunshine has the capacity to survive easy clothing also so being readied is really the only technique to stay away from skin damages in the heat.

0 notes