Michael Offutt's Blog, page 67

Civility is just a form of gaslighting that we need desperately if we expect society to thrive.

There are days when I wish that I lived in a world where people just told it like it is. But living under a president that (arguably) does just that (an example would be some of his personal observations about Rosie O’Donnell) and seeing the reaction in people from Trump speaking like that, makes me understand the need to keep all the garbage hidden from the world under a nice-looking sheet. The problem (I think) is that telling it “like it is” has a chain reaction with other people. If, for example, you say on Tinder, “No Blacks,” then this kind of racism (even though the profile person is letting people know that they are a racist and that’s how they truly feel) emboldens others who feel that way too, and then they start saying it.
Additionally, as much as people like to believe that they think for themselves, there’s plenty of evidence that points out exactly the opposite. For example, we all know that good reviews (even fake ones) tend to generate sales and positive buzz. When someone says “this tastes good,” and you’ve never tried it, you have a greater percentage chance of agreeing with that person especially if you view them in a positive light. People are not machines. We form biases based on our relations with others and the people we spend time with. Because of this fact, we need civility if we are going to have a functioning society. In other words, as much as I don’t like it, I think we need a clean pristine sheet of lies to hide all the garbage under. One might say, “Please ignore the smell, just focus on the sheet. Look how pretty and nice it is.” And so it goes.

I recently got into an argument about just this thing on (of all things)…Facebook (social media may be the vehicle that destroys civilization folks!). Try to hide your surprise, and of course I couldn’t keep my opinions to myself. My Facebook friend, Ben, posted a meme that purported the following:

“Women do not have to: Be thin, Cook for you, Have long hair, Be feminine, Be graceful, Have sex with you, Shave, Diet, Be fashionable, Wear pink, or Take any B.S.” Posted on the meme were a bunch of cartoon fists that had their nails painted. It was also on a pink background.

Artistic choices aside, my friend Ben posted this because he wants to tell women out there (he’s single and looking) that he’s a nice guy and that these are his values. Only, I know Ben, and I don't think that these are his values. Here’s just one point I want to make: Ben likes thin women and won’t date or have a romance with fat (obese) women. He derives a self-esteem boost from associating with thin young women (so do a lot of guys to be honest). So he’s got an inherent bias already that would affect his judgment were he a hiring manager. And I’ll just stop there because in just that one sentence, he does not ascribe to the behaviors that he posts in his online meme.

As it stands, this meme is already a public service message, a “Do as I say and not as I do” message for sure…but one that’s there for “the greater good” whether or not you even care. There’s a word for this: hypocrisy. But I don’t think Ben is to blame for the many hypocrisies of the modern world. Society on a deep level (beneath its shallow veneer) doesn’t ascribe to the above message in the meme (at least not in the United States). To put it another way, it’s the white sheet over a hot mess of garbage. But we need this kind of civility…the quiet “nods” that this is the appropriate thing to say…even if our behaviors dictate otherwise. To do anything else, is to invite anger, violence, or possibly even war. These are the things that make a society collapse under its own weight. Nobody wants that. And who knows? Maybe if a positive message is repeated to people at a young enough age, they will not grow up to be assholes and actually believe it! That's how you change the world for the better, folks. So there is hope.

Of course, those of you who know me from this blog, also know that I couldn’t leave well enough alone. So I posted this in response to Ben’s meme:

“Ben, I think your heart is in the right place when posting a meme like this, but I think (ultimately) if you point some of that high-powered perception you possess at yourself, you will see that the messages of this meme are idealistic and ultimately, one big lie.”

He followed up with a comment asking me to explain my point. So I continued by saying, “Let’s finish the meme with some words I’ll borrow from a friend that expresses what I’m saying really well”:

“[You don’t] have to wear makeup, you don’t have to wear heels, you don’t have to smile all the time, you don’t have to have big tits, you don’t have to be a pleaser. BUT if you don’t, you probably won’t get what you want in life. You’ll have to make it happen all by yourself.

Without assistance from anyone else.

You’ll have to do it alone.

Average people believe they have the freedom to not conform, and they do this while holding the expectation that the difficulty level of their lives WILL NOT CHANGE. But in reality the difficulty does change. Your path gets harder and harder, approaching infinity. And you’ll find barriers all over the place because doors have closed on you that should have remained open.”

So how did the Facebook entities like my post? Not so much.

People started to attack me with their straw man arguments (and I expected as much). One woman laughed with an "LOL" and said, “Pick up a history book, dude” and another woman just reiterated what the meme said and added, “I think what this meme is trying to convey is that women are tired of the double standard.” None of their comments are useful, because all of their anger was directed at me for daring to lift up the sheet and point out the smoking pile of hot garbage underneath. Just to clarify, I'm a supporter of the messages in the meme. I just don't think they are true of Ben or many of the people we call neighbors on this wonderful blue marble of ours that we call Earth.

Eh…I relish these opportunities to tilt at windmills.

But if anything, I’m even more firmly convinced that society needs to be gaslighted...the people need their little white lies. They need to be told that "you are beautiful" and "everything is going to be okay" even if neither of these things are true. It's like the white lie told to children that goes, "You can accomplish anything if you set your mind to it." A thriving society needs people to believe that you don’t need to be thin to find happiness and joy. You don’t need to conform at all and your path through life will be just as easy as if you did. Yadda yadda, good day, and God bless.
Sure.

I’ll buy that for a dollar.

Crazy Rich Asians is a refreshing retelling of the classic Cinderella story with a few messages to Americans for good measure.

This weekend I saw Crazy Rich Asians, and I'm so glad I did. The film was funny, glamorous, romantic, and was a pretty solid retelling of the classic tale Cinderella. For those of you who haven't seen it and may be on the fence, there is way more to this movie than just wanting to see wealth on a scale that rivals Donald Trump's bathroom. Just to point out one thing, I thought the film was really sweet and effervescent (if that's even a word that is typically used in movie reviews).

Yes, it is opulent. There's so much to see in Singapore, and it's all on display from the major world-famous hotels to the urban tree-like structures that were so unusual in their habitat as to be featured in the BBC's Planet Earth II. In areas, the wealth is so amazing that it kind of makes you delirious realizing that people actually live this way.  Maybe it's good for the soul, because it makes you realize just how normal any of the nice things you have are, and that you shouldn't be ashamed of them because anything you have is going to pale in comparison to what the upper crust .01% actually enjoy.

It also has some great information about Asian culture, and it explores ideas that I'd never thought of as an American citizen. It turns the tables on the old American saying, "Eat your dinner because there are starving children in Africa" by having Asians say that about American children. In one scene, the main woman is called a banana, which means "yellow" on the outside and "white" on the inside. I'd never heard this saying and I thought it was unique (it's bound to become part of my vocabulary, however derogatory it actually sounds). But on a deeper note, there's a great idea...a message to American audiences who have a kind of narcissism when it comes to our culture: it's the thought that people in Asia don't see American life (and by extensions American people) as admirable. Americans put happiness first instead of family and obligations, and this "selfishness" keeps us from seeing what is truly important.

If you like Cinderella, you should go and see Crazy Rich Asians. It's a visual stimulation for the eyes, a heart-warming story, and it's a rare thing to see SO MANY ASIANS in a blockbuster in America like this. Watch the trailer below if you haven't seen it on t.v.

I hope the rumor about a live-action Diablo series on Netflix is totally true.

There's a rumor out there that Blizzard entertainment is partnering with Netflix to bring a live-action Diablo series to television audiences/subscribers. When I heard this, I got super excited. I loved Diablo, Diablo II, and Diablo III. The fast pace, dark story, creepy music, and fascinating characters had me as a fan the first time I saw a gory room and the Butcher stepped out exclaiming, "Fresh meat!"

I know I shouldn't hang all my hopes on a rumor, but I can't help it. Assuming that it's greenlit and actually gets produced, here are the things that I would like to see:

1) The atmosphere and the music should remain solidly in the dark fantasy genre. The character of Decard Cain who (in many ways) is the backbone of the franchise because he drops important clues and points the way for you to go is important. I'm thinking Max Von Sydow if he's still alive would be perfect for this role. If not, maybe Ian McKellan.

2) The entire first season should have a slow pace, uncovering mystery after mystery in the small town of Tristram. Eventually, all of the things add up to a "presence" in the catacombs. I'm thinking that the Butcher would be a perfect menace for the season finale. This would make the whole first season a slow boil on tracking down a serial killer in a medieval setting.

3) I think they should have a focus of no more than four characters. I'd choose a crusader, barbarian, monk, and wizard. They should try to get Jason Momoa to play the barbarian and maybe Tom Holland for the Crusader.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. Let's all hope it actually shows up on Netflix and that Netflix has the sense to hire some great writers.  

Today the IWSG asks what publishing path did you take and why?

I've never liked end of summer, but this year I feel ready for it, because it's been miserably hot and smoky for most of July and August. It also means that (with Labor Day now past) my favorite chili in town is now available (they make gazpacho in the summertime), and the annoying Halloween displays are going to start popping out. I don't know why people obsess over Halloween here in Salt Lake City, but they do. And with September, there's also a new Insecure Writer's Support Group post, and that's what I'm doing today. If you arrive here by accident and want to sign up for it, go and click on the link embedded in the prior sentence.
September 5 question - What publishing path are you considering/did you take, and why?
I've done two kinds of publishing: self and small press. In the future I'd probably do the same or I'd ride the query carousel for a while. I self-publish things that I know have a niche market, and I feel I can network better in that niche market than anyone else can (because it is so small). As for small press? Eh...I'm not certain I'd ever do that again. There seems to be little difference between small press and self-publishing to be honest. I think small presses exist for people who can't follow instructions on how to format things, or who might not be technologically savvy. All a small press seems to be is someone who knows how to format a book cover to proper scale and who knows how to make sure that an ebook can be uploaded properly to kindle. I know how to do all that, so there's really no need for a small press in my opinion.
Thanks for stopping by.

Money is only a portion of the high price we pay for Madagascar vanilla beans.

I recently purchased a half pound of vanilla beans from Vanilla Saffron Imports. They arrived in a timely fashion, were packed neatly, and came with a helpful recipe to infuse vanilla flavoring in sugar by storing the cured beans there. Before I go on, you should probably know that vanilla is my favorite spice. It has always baffled me that people use "vanilla" to describe something non-descript or boring. Vanilla (the real stuff) is anything but, and it is definitely difficult to come by. If you are unaware of the price of vanilla, it's high because climate change is wreaking havoc across the world in areas where the prized plant is grown. And then yesterday, I read an article on The New York Times entitled "Precious as Silver, Vanilla Brings Cash and Crime to Madagascar." Of course, I had to read it.

It seems like anything that's good in this world (or meant to be enjoyed) comes with a side dish of evil. I've experienced this with the movies I love. For example, do I continue to love Pulp Fiction, knowing that it was paid for and distributed by Harvey Weinstein? Do I enjoy Woody Allen movies knowing that Woody Allen is a pedophile predator? How do I reconcile the things that I enjoy with the damage that is done in bringing them to market? It's a complicated question, and it makes me think that there is something profound in the old (cliché) saying, "Ignorance is bliss."

In the article written for The Times, the author states that growing western demand for the flavoring and a cyclone that ravaged crops last year on the island off the coast of southeast Africa have driven the price to $600 a kilogram or $270 a pound. In 2013, it was only $50 a kilogram (as a comparison). As a result, people are getting wealthy, but the vanilla trade is also creating crime waves. For example, thieves will attack and kill farmers for their vanilla pods. So, in order to stay safe, vigilante and militia groups armed with clubs and machetes are patrolling the vanilla plots at night. Just this April, one militia came across a vanilla thief carrying three pounds of pods. They beat him with sticks until he fell down and then they chopped him to pieces with their machetes. As the article reports, it was just one of dozens of similar vanilla murders that have happened in the last couple of years.

Vanilla mansions and gleaming SUV's ply the broken streets of Samabava, which is known as the vanilla capital. Of course, violent criminal networks are now heavily involved in the production and distribution of vanilla.

When I shared this information with my friends who are also fans of vanilla, I got mixed reactions. My friend Meg was happy that I shared and is still processing the information. My friend James said, "Good, I hope they kill more vanilla thieves." And then my friend Matt said, "Blood vanilla...wait...that makes it sound better." My friend Sasha laughed at Matt and said, "Delicious!" As you can see, no one really cares or if they do, they are too disconnected from that society for them to process effectively. Fair enough, because I am too.

In the end, I think I'll just go on buying my vanilla beans when I want them. I'll still continue to watch Pulp Fiction and maybe eating real vanilla bean ice cream while doing so. Maybe I'll sit under the glow of a lamp decorated with real ivory. My green thirsty lawn will continue to get watered, I'll go to work in my car that consumes fossil fuels, and I'll wear clothes made in sweatshops in Bangladesh. Perhaps I'll gift someone a watch decorated with African blood diamonds or buy beluga caviar off Amazon. If people and things suffer or die because of any of these things, then I guess that's on me, and it's up to me to feel guilty about it.

It all seems so awful, when you take a step back and see what it takes to live the way that we do in the United States. But I've got to confess that these worldwide problems are difficult for me to process, and I do feel kind of helpless in actually making the world a better place. My role in the world is just too small. So it's more of an acceptance really...an acceptance that evil is committed and people die so that I can enjoy the creature comforts of my life. It's acceptance that, were I to curtail my consumerism in any way, it wouldn't make a bit of difference, because no one else is doing so. It's difficult to believe that all of us in this country live under such privilege, whether or not we feel it on a daily basis.

So how do you deal with the guilt attached to being a consumer? I look forward to your comments.

To Green Angel Tower is a beautiful book whose point seems to be to get into the head of the characters so as to find a home there.

Artist Michael Whelan did the cover for all of the Osten-Ard books, including the newest one released this year calledThe Witchwood Crown. This is his rendering of themes in the book. I think "Green Angel Tower" is in thebackground on the right (far away) over what looks like the Hayholt, which is the setting for much of the bookas it is also the ancient Sithi city of Asu'a. On the left are Sithi who might be Jiriki and Aditu? Not sure to be honest.On the right must be Miriamelle and Simon, although I think they look a bit old for their characters.I finally finished the mighty and complex To Green Angel Tower by Tad Williams. At 1066 pages, it may be the biggest book I have ever read. It's twenty pages longer than George R.R. Martin's A Dance With Dragons. It's also an infinitely better book because it concludes everything, every last dangling end, that is left in Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn (the trilogy/quadrilogy) that this novel belongs to. I say "quadrilogy" only because my copy (which is over twenty years old) is just one book. It has since been split into two novels, because it should have been two books to begin with. It's incredibly awkward lugging around a book that is over a thousand pages. It's awkward to hold, awkward to read, and just an overall pain in the ass. I guess that's "score one" for ebooks.

I actually loved this series, and at one point at the end, I cried a bit because the reunion between Rachel "the Dragon" and her adopted son, Simon, was so touching. Rachel was the most minor of characters. As head of the chambermaids in the Hayholt (the epicenter of the story), her sole reason for existing was to leave food in the many tunnels and caverns of the old Sithi city called Asu'a that exists beneath the Hayholt. All so that her adopted son, gone on an adventure to retrieve some mystical sword in the far north, and then to lend himself to the "good" side of an ancient civil war, would find nourishment when he was lost beneath the castle on his quest for "Bright Nail," one of three swords that used to be called "Memory" before it was remade.

The plot of this overall story is super simple, and as I finished this immense book I asked myself why this worked and didn't work for me. I asked myself why Tad Williams's style both fascinated and infuriated me, but in the end was something that I loved. These books are so long because Tad Williams spends so much time in his character's heads. Simon got tied to a water wheel as a torture that was meant to kill him. But it ended up being tortuous for me because Simon in a kind of "state of delirium" was in a dream-like sequence for over a hundred (if not hundreds) of pages. It was chapter after chapter after chapter of Simon trying to make sense of things that he was seeing in this dream-like trance (which was overall important to the book). But holy crap did it go on forever.

There is so much dreaming in these books. So many characters are wandering in absolute darkness for chapter after chapter, and in such conditions, Mr. Williams goes inside the character's thoughts and that's where you reside...thinking on things for endless amounts of time (hundreds of pages). But the payoff for all of that long and drawn out detail to the point of choking on it was that there was an incredible emotional catharsis when Simon was reunited with Rachel. All the things that happened at the end of the story felt like they had been earned. Everything, in fact, felt earned and the ending left me so satisfied that I have immediately purchased the sequel, which just came out a month ago (the start of a new trilogy) called The Witchwood Crown (book 1 of The Last King of Osten-Ard).

Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn is one of those trilogies that I think everyone should read, and then no one should read. Not everyone is capable of picking up a single book of a thousand pages, much less three of them (the other two are slimmer at 600 to 700 pages). So if you are one of these people, you really should never touch these books. They also lack the spine-tingling moments that George R.R. Martin seems to be able to create in his narratives of similar length. But it has been more rewarding to spend time with Williams's characters than it has been to spend time with Martin's (maybe because Martin just kills all of them off). Williams too has a high body count, but he seems to be ready to invest in the ones that consistently control the narrative in a way that says "there will be a nice payoff to all of this suffering." And by the end of To Green Angel Tower, I was deeply in love with the characters that survived the apocalyptic events that passed at the Hayholt (which is the most important setting of this book). In a word, it was beautiful.

These epic fantasy novels that I'm exploring break the mould on every other kind of writing that I'm familiar with. They don't seem to care about word count, nor do they seem to care that certain tropes are repeated. For all these pages, the point seems to be to get into the heads of the characters and find a home there. Tad Williams says as much through Simon and a minor character called Morgenes. "Make your home inside your head," he tells Simon. It's good advice considering that (for a boy as young as Simon) leaving his childhood home is the most frightening experience of all.

So that's your audience when it comes to this stuff. Most people probably haven't even clued into this, thinking that they need to spin stories of complexity and magic in order to write epic fantasy. Nope, it's all about the character and getting it to fit like a glove on the reader. I wonder how I could use that to my own benefit, without writing myself into the weeds.

Anyone who claims to have the moral high ground over anyone else in society is grossly unaware of their own shortcomings.

The annual event "Burning Man" is happening right now in the desert of Nevada. I know a few "burners" and they are nice "civil" people of privilege who don't realize their privilege. It's a weird thing to view humanity through a lens like this, but my brain goes there in thoughts that turn around and around in my head. Too often I conclude that pretty much all people on this Earth suck for one reason or another.

Take "burners" for example. These are people who like to go to festivals like Burning Man, and they preach among their values "radical inclusivity." Okay...sure. You are radically inclusive to all able-bodied people. Disabled people? Not one bit. If you are disabled then you are on your own if you are at this event, much less getting to it. The art that is displayed, especially if it is meant to be climbed upon or if it is meant to be enjoyed physically in some manner is probably not going to be handicapped accessible. The organizers of this thing that preach radical inclusivity should start another one in the middle of the Amazon or on top of Mount Everest. They could say, "We are radically inclusive." Then someone like me would reply, "But how can you be inclusive if you are at the top of Angel Falls in South America?" Then it would afford them the opportunity to smile and reply back to me, "If you get here...we are inclusive to you. But it's not our fault that you can't deal with the natural terrain. That's on you."

"That's on you." There's a quote for you that I've heard too much. "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps." "Take responsibility for your own shortcomings." There are all kinds of ways to express this sentiment, but in any re-wording of this sentence, I never reach the words "radically inclusive." It's disingenuous at its very core.

Another thing that people like to own are positive virtues. Somewhat like the Dunning-Kruger effect, which is a study that showed people grossly overestimate their own competence in doing things, people overestimate (or lay claim to) positive virtues that they don't actually possess. For example, here's a conversation to illustrate this point:

"I am a compassionate person."

"Wow...okay...well here is my quadriplegic patient. Every day he's going to need to be fed three times, meals will be in the fridge over there. You will need to spoon feed him and give him a drink of water from this special mug here and then at three o'clock, he needs to have his leg bag drained of urine. If his hose gets tangled on his nose, you'll have to straighten out the tubes..."

"Oh I'm sorry, I can't do that," the person replies. "I'm compassionate but caring for that gross fat quadriplegic person is something I can't do. There's the smell and stuff...I can't deal with that. But if you need hugs I'm ready."

I look at them, "Oh...I thought you said you were compassionate."

"Compassionate yes, but I have boundaries. Truthfully, I just want to hang out with the pretty people and be called pretty. I don't want to deal with that. It's a downer."

"Oh okay."

Sure...that's a conversation that takes place in my head, but I have no doubt there are thoughts that run through people's skulls that go exactly on these lines. I (for one) do some care-giving of a person in a chair and have experienced tremendous difficulty getting other people to care for him when I am not available. And one of them did say she thought he was gross (just being honest) and told me that she would rather not be asked ever again. She also claimed that she was "compassionate."

So here's the thing: people on the left of politics and people on the right of politics both suck. In fact, there's a lot of people who suck. Events like Burning Man co-opt phrases that are outright lies. People who claim to be compassionate have so many boundaries that they might as well say, "I'm compassionate to person A and person B and in situation C but anything outside of that is a flat out 'No.'" And I include myself in this too. I have plenty of boundaries. I guess the point of this post is that the older I get, the more I begin to have a distaste for any person or agency that wants to claim the moral high ground in anything.

/end rant :) Have a nice day.

Tad Williams' excellent trilogy that began with The Dragonbone Chair did more than just influence Martin and other fantasy genre writers for decades.

I have steadily been making my way through the 1000+ page final book in Tad Williams trilogy called Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn. The title of the book is To Green Angel Tower, and I'm about 850 pages into this monstrosity and getting pretty excited that the ending is within sight. I've enjoyed reading these books, but there's a sense of accomplishment too in closing this particular long-winded tale.

Because of the size of this trilogy (the other two books clock in at a mere 600 pages of written text) there have been typos. As I read over them I thought to myself, I used to get upset at this kind of thing. But given the sheer size of novels of this type, I now declare that it is an impossible task to find each duplicated word and incorrect spelling. Or for that matter, each omitted word that would make the sentence in which it appears sense. No editor, nor even a team of editors, is capable of catching all of those mistakes, even those who work for a "big house publisher." I suppose that change in my thinking is a result of me working with editors and doing editing myself. There's a reason why authors should pay attention to their word count. Anything that soars beyond 120,000 words is going to be too big of a job to handle and To Green Angel Tower (according to the internet) is 520,000 words. That just blows my mind as I type it. All of those words held between one cover.

Anyway, there are a few takeaways that I thought I'd share about Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn. I was drawn to these books because George R.R. Martin was heavily influenced by them, and I can see that influence all over the place. Even if you've only watched the television show, read the following and tell me if you note any similarities:

1) There's an ancient race of immortal beings that live far to the north. They are called The Norns, and they are pure evil. They use magic to turn living men into monsters under their complete control...kind of like zombies...and when the Norns arrive they bring the winter with them. Huge, cold storms that freeze weapons in sheaths and blind the eyes of defenders with snow in blizzards that are intense and frightening.

2) The Norns are led by the Storm King, Ineluki, a being that is undead and who has the ability to mess with anyone who can use this thing called "The Dream Road" very similar to how Bran's ability works in Game of Thrones. And what Ineluki does to you on The Dream Road has very real implications in the real world. Additionally, the Dream Road allows those who travel it to visit and see any points in the past as if they were bearing witness to them as they actually happened.

3) There is a girl with dark hair who is the daughter of the king, and her name is "Miriamelle" but it is abbreviated "Marya." She is a cunning fighter type character who continuously makes poor choices that impact her quality of life, but she ends up being all the stronger for it.

4) There is a small character called Binabik and he's a race called Quanuc. Many times, he's likened to a child or even a dwarf. He also talks exactly like Tyrion Lannister does in Game of Thrones. Here's one of his lines: "Winter is not being the time for naked swimming." And here's another, "If you wish to carry a hungry weasel in your pocket, it is your choice." Binabik's role in the story is to "know things" as he is an important member of this organization called "The League of the Scroll."

Now, to be clear, I'm not saying that George R.R. Martin copied Tad Williams. George R.R. Martin has written his own epic (if we don't just flat out admit that Martin has written himself into the weeds). However, he was correct to admit that he was heavily influenced by Tad Williams, and I think that's awesome because it's clear that George borrowed or expanded upon a lot of Mr. Williams' ideas (and I really do mean "a lot"). The only thing bad about any of this is that if one author does it, then there will be more that I haven't come across who will also be similarly tempted. For example, winter and evil have been inextricably linked by these two fantasy series, "Winter is coming" and all that. I think it's fair to say that no fantasy writer henceforth should ever make winter a source of evil, lest the whole "cold brings death" thing become hopelessly cliché, among other things :). And that's too bad, because there are countless writers out there who probably want to describe the approach of something evil as having a "chilling effect" on a protagonist. But you'd best not do it if you want to be original is all I'm saying.

And maybe the talk of cliché's in literature is utterly useless anyway. Any of us are only capable of reading "X" amount of books within our lifetimes. As long as we pick and choose ones that have original ideas to us, then who cares if they borrowed ideas from other books as long as we haven't read them? Maybe that's the point of it all, and a way to tailor the reading experience to a unique individual. 

It shouldn't be a curse to grow old in America.

Psychology Today's online blog had an interesting article they posted on Tuesday, August 21, 2018. It was called, "Challenging Youth Culture: The Problem of the Puer Aeternus (eternal youth)," and you can read the whole thing HERE. It's part of a continuing series of articles that are examining "Failure to Launch," which is a phenomenon that is seeing people ages 21-34 (mostly male) still living at home well into adulthood. The article does acknowledge that there are economic factors at play that have impacted an entire generation's ability to move into full adulthood. However, it argues that this is a small part of a bigger movement that started in the 1960's counter-culture that's had a lasting effect on American society.

One such factor has been the emphasis on youth, with the ages between 18 and 25 being viewed favorably as the peak of a person's life and then the rest is just one long decline.

Another, is the unwillingness to commit in order to keep all options open. People are avoiding committed relationships, career preparation, and schooling all because they want to have as many possibilities in life as they can. Only these things I mentioned are ones that teach the value of day-to-day effort and perseverance...skills a lot of people nowadays do not seem to have. The biggest travesty that I have witnessed with my own eyes comes from people who are hitting 40 and their mid-40's and suddenly experience anxiety and depression because they spent their entire youth partying, doing drugs, having multiple partners/falling in love, and engaging in thousands of sexcapades. In order to make time for all of this, what suffered was working on their education or their careers--what I call "the boring stuff."  They realize in less than a decade that they can qualify for AARP membership, and yet they still work at McDonald's or Pizza Hut. However, some of their friends who didn't make these choices are now in successful careers, and the jealousy and fear start to set in.

A third factor has been adults eschewing the role of mentor and authority figure for one where they are friends and buddies with their children, with their students, and with their employees. Mentoring has been pushed to the back-burner and is rarely celebrated if ever, while friendships, and activities with friends are posted all over Facebook and Instagram. It's one way someone can become "internet famous."

The article finally concludes with a simple sentence: "The cult of youth has become toxic and is impacting on our society as a whole." Would you agree with this statement, given all the things written above? I know that I agree with it, I'm just not sure there's a ready fix for all the "Peter Pans" that I'm surrounded by on a continuous basis.

And regarding "Peter Pan's"...it's also weird.

It's a strange thing to be told by a 42-year-old man that he cannot watch Deadpool because he's not supposed to watch R-rated movies. It's another strange thing to watch a 38-year-old man seize his steering wheel in the Chuck-A-Rama parking lot like a child driving a bumper car, and move slowly around behind a group of friends making like he's going to run them down (all because it seems funny). It's a funny thing to see middle-aged (35) year-old men wearing skin tight jeans with holes ripped in them, and shirts covered in words and pictures of skeletons in cool poses that are tight enough you can see their nipples and belly buttons. Or if I'm going to turn the table and pick on women, middle-aged women wearing tube tops and/or tank tops. It's weird and strange and seems odd. So yeah...I think there's a problem. Especially when people literally bankrupt themselves for plastic surgery bills in order to stay young-looking (and this doesn't always work out very well). Surgery is traumatic people. It's okay to have wrinkles and gray hair. The only caveat is that Americans don't like to have sex with old people (so yes, there is that). But they'll "friend" you, which (I admit) is not enough for most people. So yeah, unfortunately embracing your natural aging process is (for most of us) also learning to accept that sexual options are drying up. It's a sad sad thing I guess. Not for me, per se, but I've always been a bit different.

Honestly, I can say with great clarity that I've never been happier in my life. Each new year is consistently better than the last. But I also never found a partner to journey through life with, so maybe there's a lesson to be had here: Mike didn't "play the game of youth" and decided to grow up so Mike must be okay with being alone. Maybe that's true, but even knowing the truth doesn't make me regret the fact that I'm headed for old age someday and looking forward to it, whether or not there's someone there to talk to. But it does make me feel sorry for others out there who made the same choice and aren't quite as adapt at being an adult who lives alone. It shouldn't be a curse to be a grown adult in our society. It shouldn't be a curse to grow old in America. 

The absurdity of megalodon as an actual creature makes me realize how wacky the universe we live in actually is.

Looking back on "The Meg" which I saw in theaters a little over a week ago, I'm struck by how absurd the entire monster is. You can't help but find it absurd, as it swims along a beach packed with people bobbing in the water and just scoops them up like a fishing net. Down they go...right into its gullet. I am tempted to think, "wow...this is just absurd and oddly comical," and then I realize that an actual paleontologist weighed-in on "The Meg" and its accuracy. In short, he said it wasn't all that accurate, however, they definitely got the mouth right and it (megalodon) could have done just that.

So I guess the thought I have for today's blog is this: the megalodon was an absurd creature. It was absurdly large, too big to be real (even if it was real), and the fact that this thing once swam in the oceans of the earth is proof positive that nature has a sick sense of humor. Why was this gigantic meat tube with a mouth even a real thing? It had the largest bite force of anything that ever swam, flew, or crawled on the earth. It snapped full grown whales in half with its jaws. And the paleontologist in that interview I read said that a megaladon would have no problem biting a metal yacht in half. That's a ridiculous thing to even picture and it smacks of SyFy channel low-budget corniness. Only, it was real folks. Nothing corny about it.

The more I understand about our real universe, the more I'm kind of amazed at how science fiction and science fact are not always that far apart. Did you know that on Jupiter, the storms are so violent that they cause a chemical reaction that makes it rain diamonds? Who would ever have dreamed that up. On Titan (Saturn's moon) there are oceans of methane and it rains huge drops of methane into rivers that carve the surface the same as water does on earth. There are planets comprised of material that absorb nearly all visible light, thus making them black (like Geidi Prime in Dune) from space. And on earth, we had sharks so large that they could bite modern yachts in half with just their jaws and then keep swimming.

It makes me ask the question: why do so many of us spend time in virtual worlds looking for crazy stuff when reality is as strange as any fiction that we dream up?