A Walk In The Woods

I love to travel with my family. 

We’ve gone many places large and small, near and far, urban and rural.  So many things seen and learned.  Met many new people, tried new foods and partook in local customs, ceremonies and rituals.  Each place taught us something new and left us a little different from the people we were before we went.  For all of that I’m grateful.

And while each place is special in its own way, when I think about our travels, the ones that often bubble up in my memory first are the ones where we spent time in and with nature. 

This past summer was a perfect example.  With everyones’ summer schedules, our family vacation was limited to five days.  We hopped a plane to Seattle and did a quick tour though Olympic National Park and Mt. Rainier National Park.  Hiking the primeval forests, beaches and peaks, we all reconnected.  Like most people, we’re all so busy all the time that sometimes it’s hard to slow down.  Trips like these allow us to do just that.

When out in nature, we tend to put our phones and other devices away -- and just talk.  Oftentimes, the talks we’ve had while hiking reveal stories that we’ve never shared – us with our kids, our kids with us and the kids with each other.  It almost never fails.  And while we do a lot of talking, we also spend time in quiet, all appreciating the beauty and majesty of our surroundings together.  

Our kids have experienced a lot even at the relatively young ages of 21 and 18.  We are proud of the smart, warm and kind people they are, and know that they appreciate the experiences they’ve had thus far.  While I hope they carry many things from our travels with them throughout the rest of their lives, my wish for them is to recall and appreciate all of the special time spent together as a family as much as I do.

Happy trails!

Rudolph

Trigger Warnings and Why We Need Them

A professor I respect very deeply disappointed me the other day. A girl in my solo performance class had shown a piece featuring a young girl suffering from anorexia. Another girl in the class commended the piece but added that she wished it included a trigger warning. And then freaking hell broke loose.

Trigger warnings (or content warnings) serve to protect people who have suffered trauma from reliving their trauma. That is their sole purpose. Not to coddle weak college students who want to avoid “stressful” material that they disagree with. They’re a safeguard for people with post-traumatic stress disorder- you know, a real medical condition- from potentially being triggered to relapse within their trauma. 

All kinds of media provide warnings for content featuring flashing lights so as to not disrupt people with pacemakers. And no one asks any questions. Because there lies a potential threat to a person’s health! They could die!

And the same is true for trigger warnings. I know of a student who read the play Awakening of Spring by Frank Wedekind in a theatre class. She was unaware of the play’s rape scene and, as a survivor of sexual assault whose PTSD was triggered by this material, literally had to drop out of school. 

That is what trigger warnings are for. They are not for "snowflake liberals" who want to shut out the words of conservative on-campus speakers. They are for survivors of trauma.

But for some reason, when it comes to content like suicide, depression, eating disorders, and sexual assault, content warnings are a means of infantilizing audience members (as my professor argued) and destroying the pureness of the artistic experience. 

First of all, I have never fixated on a trigger warning I read before a theater piece so much that I was distracted. I read it and I think, “cool” and then forget about it (because if it doesn’t affect you, who cares?). 

Secondly, even if the purity of an artistic experience really is disturbed by a tiny trigger warning, I say fuck it.  Fuck that art. Because you know what’s more important? People’s livelihoods. 

Frosty

A Cappella

I joined an a cappella group this semester (The Chordials woo!), and so obviously I’m living in an a cappella mindset now. As such, I thought I’d write about some a cappella groups that I think are really great. 

1. Pentatonix. This is a really obvious one that everyone knows, but they had to be included. They have only 5 members but they have such a full sound, and their Christmas albums are really soothing and excellent.
2. Straight No Chaser. Some may know these guys as well, but they are also really talented and have some hilarious and fun arrangements that are not only fun to listen to but fun to watch as well. Again, great Christmas music.
3. BYU Vocal Point. This is a college group, and my high school performed one of their arrangements last year and they are really good. They do a lot of fun songs, but they are all so talented and they have an amazing sound. Would recommend their song “Homeward Bound”, because it’s so damn pretty. 
4. The Chordials. Ahh, a shameless self-promo plug! Just what the masses want. Anyway, my group as been really freaking good for a long time, and we actually have multiple albums on Spotify and are recording another on in the spring. Also there are lots of videos on YouTube to check out as well. Ok I’m done with that. 

That’s all I got for now folks. Sorry it’s a bit short, but a girl’s gotta study. 

Holly

Good Sore

So I’m going to admit something to you as well as myself -- I’ve finally reached the age where I need to analyze and identify the aches and pains I get from working out into different categories.  Let me explain.

When our youngest child started college this past fall, my lovely bride and I decided to start working out with a trainer.  We both regularly went to the gym previously.  How much different could this be?

Let me tell you.  Way different.

Our trainer kicks our butts.  He works out muscle groups we literally didn’t know we had, and pushes us (in an encouraging way) to do more, longer, faster, etc. than we previously did before we started working out with him.

Which brings us back to the aches and pains.

Now whenever we start a new workout, our trainer asks where we “felt it” after our prior workout.  This is the kind way of checking that we were effectively working out the muscle groups he was aiming for.  If he was focused on abs, then he wants to hear that we were sore there.  If it was leg day, he wants to know we hobbled around like cowboys the next day.  You get the picture.

These aches and pains he describes as being “good sore”.  Meaning that if we did the exercises properly, we should be building new muscle in the areas he focused on.  And while he is always careful to watch our form (“flat back”, “chest out”, “feet forward”, “bend lower”), he also wants to know that we’re pushing ourselves at each session.

At the same time, he also wants to know if anything he does with us causes us to be “bad sore” – meaning we injured ourselves.  When/if this happens, he focuses our next workout away from the injured area, and pays closer attention to form to make sure we keep these kinds of injuries to a minimum.

So to sum up, “good sore” is good.  It is our goal.  And if we don’t get “good sore” from a workout, then we need to be challenged more the next time.  “Bad sore”, of course, is bad and should be avoided.  Got it?

Wishing you all days full of being “good sore”.

Rudolph

NOTE: Hard to tell but that's not me in the photo.

Celebrity Resurrections

Technology has given us many cool things – especially when one considers what is possible with movies these days.  Think Wakanda/Black Panther, Republic City/Avatar, and Panem/Hunger Games, etc. 

And now, in addition to creating worlds, the fine folks in production studios are tasked with taking the visages of once real and living people and making them do things or “act” in movies they never intended to act in.  There are different degrees of this Celebrity Resurrection going on.

On the continuum starting with minimal doctoring would be the new Star Wars: Episode 9 movie coming out. Carrie Fisher, who passed away three years ago, will be reprising her character of Princess Leia without ever having given her consent. In this situation, the studio is using extra footage from Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and somehow convincingly folding it into the new movie.  Now, you may say that is not CGI-ing the person, but I argue that it almost certainly will be since there has got to be some finessing of Carrie’s image so as not to make the whole thing look absolutely wonky.  Which brings me to my next example.

Appearing on the big screen two decades after his death, British actor Peter Cushing’s likeness was used to recreate the role of Grand Moff Tarkin in Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker.  Here, the tech wizards had another actor do the acting, then superimposed Peter’s head over said actor.  I would imagine these days, in actor’s contracts, there is some language addressing the degree to which studios can utilize/transform/create/regurgitate the actor’s likeness. But you can bet twenty years ago, when Peter signed his contract, there was no language addressing this form of use.

Taking it one step further, I give you James Dean.  Yes, I am giving you James Dean.  Sixty-four years after his death.  In a movie he never intended to be in using technology that he never knew would be created. Look forward to Finding Jack, a movie about Vietnam, in 2020.

CGI technology has fostered many a discussion around my dinner table.  The kids do not seem to be troubled by the use of dead people re-animated at a writer’s and/or director’s will.  For me, it seems like a violation of privacy, a morphing of one’s memory, a distortion of a legacy.  Nonetheless, I will admit this is not all black and white.  It has occurred to me that Marilyn Monroe’s estate has kept the cash rolling in with endless reproductions of every last photo they could find – and is it a big deal if they photoshop a Santa hat on her or GAP jeans to sell something?  Somehow that does not bother me quite as much.  It feels more like a derivative work rather than a completely different work.

I am curious to know how other people feel on this topic?

The Weight

Young Timmy was tired of getting beat up at school. He was so tired of it, in fact, he could hardly take it anymore. “This ends today” he told his lumpy friend Titus. 

“But Timmy!” started lumpy Titus, “That’s what you said last week and then just got beat up even more. What are you going to do this time- seduce him into being nice to you?”

Timmy got a glint in his eye. “I might just do that, Titus. I might just”.

The next day, walking home with a black eye and a blackening heart, Timmy stopped at the magical shop next to the deli. When he walked in, the bell went clang clang and a crotchety store keeper looked up and smiled a crotchety smile.

“Well hello there young Timmy,” he crotcheted, “What can I do for a young boy like yourself on this snowy afternoon?” 

“How did you know my name?!”, cried Timmy, who was clearly being an idiot because the store keeper worked at a magical shop.

“I work at a magical shop you stupid idiot,” replied the store keeper. “Now what do you want?”

"I request your strongest love potion to solve a problem of mine!” Timmy declared confidently.

The store keeper peered down at him with his little gross glasses. “Hmmm,” he pondered, “Are you certain this is what you wish for your problem? Some subjects… aren’t able to carry the weight of the consequences”. 

“100%”, Timmy stated and grabbed the bottle from the front desk, put a $20 bill in its place, and left in a huff. 

The next day, Timmy snuck ten drops of the love potion into Brad the Bully’s pepsi. During lunch, Brad cornered Timmy as per usual. “What’s up tiny turd? Lookin pretty tiny over there in your little clothes”, Brad laughed.

Timmy just smiled and watched as Brad started to grow an erection. Brad tried to hide it down his pant leg but that never really works. The erection grew and grew until Brad could no longer stand! He fell over, basically crippled, and the entire school laughed.

Timmy skipped away elfishly and shouted back, “Make sure you’re able to carry the weight of your consequences!”

The End

A Definitive Personal Ranking of the Holidays I Celebrate

Recently I have been, as the kids say, “feeling my oats” about both the Fall and Winter holidays, and so I have decided to start off this years Holidailies by sorting myself out. Using a carefully cultivated system known as “whatever my heart feels in this particular moment”, I am going to rank some of the holidays that my family celebrates from favorite to least favorite. (Disclaimer: I am a very festive person and as such I love all holidays on principle, so there are no holidays on this list that I dislike, just some that I like specifically more than others).

1. First and foremost, Christmas has all the goods. There is nothing else like Christmas for me; no other holiday as the same vibes as Christmas does. Christmas has an EXTENSIVE music selection that remind me of the simpler times of my childhood, as well as tons of amazing movies in all genres that are just so damn good. The food is good, the family is good, the decorations are SO good, and also gifts are fun. Also, the aesthetic of Christmas, with the lights and the snow (yay Winter!) and the coziness cannot be replicated. The magic of Christmas is not something to joke about. 
2. Coming in at a very close second is Halloween. Halloween also really has some good good Fall vibes that I just really appreciate. The idea of wearing costumes is fun for all ages, and Halloween parties are always the best because the theme is just “be something other than your normal clothes” which leaves a lot up to interpretation. Everyone likes a good theme. Also, there are a bunch of fun Halloween movies even if you’re not a horror fan (I am not a horror fan and I stand by this with conviction). Fall is just so dang cozy, and Halloween is nice because it can be enjoyed lots of different ways no matter your age. Whether you are the partier or the candy-distributor or the trick-or-treater, Halloween has something to offer everyone. Loses points because the only Halloween song is Monster Mash and it’s just not that good.
3. Thanksgiving goes third for me (are you sensing a theme? I like cold weather). I feel slightly like Thanksgiving is kind of Fall-Christmas because family members and food, and it also is the official start of Christmas for me. The food of Thanksgiving is its own individual thing that I look forward to every year. Also, I love good fall decorations and it really lets me embrace my table-setting skills every year. Loses points for no Thanksgiving music and also white-washed genocide celebration, but if you think about it purely on a “being-grateful” level and not on a “bad-representation-of-American-history-plus-turkeys” level, then it’s still pretty great.
4. New Year’s Eve/Day is nice because of new beginnings and wrapping up the year prior, plus it can be romantic if you’re kissing someone at midnight (or just hugging your dog). Again, great color scheme with the black, white and gold, and Love that it’s in Winter. Additionally, I like that it motivates people to be better, even if resolutions only last for like a month. Auld Lang Syne is great and helped boost NYE up a bunch.
5. Fifth place goes to Hanukah for me. I would like to point out that even though I probably like Hanukah and Easter equally, Hanukah is inherently better because it is in Winter and Easter is in Spring. Spring sucks and you may quote me on that. Anyway, I like the way my family celebrates Hanukah, where it’s not only 8 days of gifts. For some of the days, we do things like family board game night or we’re each given some money and we get to choose some charities to donate it to. There are only like two Hanukah songs, but they’re both bops so I am cool with it. All candle wax smells immediately like Hanukah to me, and I like menorahs. Also blue/silver is a great color scheme.
6. Easter’s main attribute is decorations/activities, a.k.a. eggs. It is great to do Easter egg hunts, dye eggs, and subsequently make colorful egg salad with the eggs. Also bunnies are fun so they’re nice to put everywhere. I do appreciate a good pastel color palette as well, so points for that. Again, losing points for no Easter songs, and also for aforementioned aversion to Spring as a concept, but I have had a lot of awesome floral Easter dresses over the years that make up for it. 

Honorable mentions: Valentine’s Day (I like chocolate but not loneliness), Fourth of July (even thought it has a dumb name because I like the color scheme and the barbecue food), and Rosh Hashanah (yay apples and honey).

Hope you enjoyed this ranking based on cold hard facts backed up with MLA-cited sources and research. Happy December!

Holly