Miceala Shocklee's Blog, page 11

To The South Fayette Boy With The Ipad

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Dear South Fayette Teen,

I know your mother wishes your name to be kept out of public reports as much as possible, so I’m not going to mention it here. But you know who you are, and you know what you did.

And I commend you, I laud you, I am so incredibly fucking proud of you for doing it. I hope you never forget who you really are, and I hope you never forget what you did. Above all, I hope you never forget, no matter what ignorant un-law enforcement or principals in need of schooling the...

The Night The Moon Was Eaten

Yesterday, April 14th, was my 23rd birthday. It was actually one of the loveliest times I’ve had on my birthday in a while. I woke up to a super sweet email from my boyfriend, got to spend the day with old and new mates, and then climbed to the roof of my apartment with a couple of my oldest friends to watch the lunar eclipse. A blood moon on my birthday? Why thank you, galaxy. That was an awesome gift.

And that time on the roof, wrapped in a blanket talking about everything and nothing in par...

On the question of a cat call…

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In modern feminist discussions, there’s a lot of talk about cat calling. The general sentiment seems to be that cat calling is rude and invasive.

I mean… yes, having someone shout something at you unexpectedly is by definition invasive. But… I am not yet completely satisfied with the discussion around cat calling.

For example, earlier today, I read aGuardianarticle trying to clarify where the line is between acceptable flirting and sexual harassment. (It’s part of Laura Bates’s series, “E...

shitty pitcher poetry

Inspired by the fact that the lack of adequately stocked kitchen cupboards and a typo, a compilation poem of fairly shitty verse accidentally by my roommate and me. Enjoy. Laugh. Deride. Whatever.

A Pitcher Thought

We do not have a pitcher thought,

a tall, cool draught of hospitality

and ice cubes to offer on a front porch,

a long pour of shared success

with its sugary taste, satisfaction.

The pitcher is a self-sufficient plant,

a long tube and a cup held up by itself.

Very scientific.

Very exotic.

Very...

I do not write happy stories.

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People want happy stories. Good characters. Sweet endings. Family-friendly. At least, that’s what a lot of magazine submission guidelines seem to be saying.

But I do not write happy stories. I swear, I try. Took me five goddamn years to write a YA novel with a happy ending and after another five yearsI’mstill not finished editing it yet. Happy stories are not the ones that come to me most naturally or most frequently. They are not what my brain generates. They are not what my brainunders...

Strange Sleep

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My brain is a very weird place. Like, very, very,very weird. Possibly also still a bit scrambled right now, seeing how I haven’t downed any coffee yet this morning. But hey. We’ll deal with it.

So, how weird is my brain? Well, when not deciding that I was going to be awake at weird hours and then sleep in a very nonsensical pattern last night, my brain was off in who-knows-what-land spinning incredibly odd dreams. Usually, I’m able to figure out what the stimulus was when I have particul...

Other Worlds: the Galapagos Islands

Before I left for the Galapagos, I’d decided that when I got back, I was going to write a novel about it. Something with conservation and evolution and a plethora of landscapes. Something sci-fi with the Galapagos as the basis for world-building. It was to be a novel rooted in the fantasmic biological complexity of life. It would feature land and sea and maybe even air as homes for its characters. I was going to call itOther Worlds. I had most of the vague notions for it swimming around in my...

The Last Day

Well, lovely readers, this is my last day in the US before I head out to the Galapagos. This time tomorrow, I’ll be on a plane to Quito. Or to Texas, where I think we might have a layover… In any case, I won’t be in California, and I won’t be in Missouri, and I won’t be in Florida (those other two places in the US I tend to frequent). I’ll be going some placeentirely new.

Honestly, right now, I don’t have any profound words of wisdom about this last day before embarking on the most exciting st...

Disgruntled Groveling

Hello folks! I’m going to attempt to sound more cheerful that I was in my other blog post from this morning. Because there are happier things to talk about here! More exciting things!

Things that also maybe sort of kind of possibly involve that super awkward thing called “money”…

No! Please don’t go yet! I promise I’m going to try to be funny in writing this! Then you don’t have to give money, either! You just get to laugh! Laughing is good, right? RIGHT?

I am only one largeish cup of coffee int...

Trying To Manage Your Depression: Caution, May Cause Side Effects

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Guys, depression is hard. Really really really hard. Obviously. That’s why it’s called depression. But you know what? I’ve been through five years of therapy, gone through intensive treatment three times, come to understand the underlying mindsets I needed to challenge, modified my thinking patterns, built up a support network, tried to prioritize what makes me happy, worked with psychiatrist after psychiatrist to find a medication regimen that works well for me and stuck to each of the...