500 words

Dear Angie,

As usual, I’m having trouble focusing. It’s the last day of the week that I can devote completely to my writing, and yet the gravity of that does little to motivate me. I should be taking full advantage of this day to myself, but instead I am resisting the temptations of the internet, television, and a nap. This is no easy feat — all are well within my reach. But I figure that writing to you, while not technically something that will advance my career as an author, is more productive than any of the alternatives. At least it’s writing, right?

Do you ever have trouble getting yourself to sit down and concentrate on a single task? Continue reading →

Yes, believe it or not, there are more days from Disney that I have not discussed. But only two. And I’ll go fast, because Animal Kingdom is mostly about the visuals anyway.

This is the Tree of Life, the centerpiece of Animal Kingdom. It’s pretty sweet, what with the ANIMALS CARVED INTO THE TRUNK and all. There is also a sweet Bug’s Life-inspired 3D show inside it. Yes, INSIDE the tree.

First thing we did was the African safari, because we wanted to catch all the critters before it got hot and they wanted to nap. Of course, we forgot that they are critters and therefore like to nap ALL THE TIME. Fortunately we still got to see some.

King of the Jungle.

Baby elephant + baobab tree.

Antelope-like things.

We also did the walking safari of Asia, i.e., saw more animals napping. Like these tigers.

The meerkats were pretty alert, though. As was the bunny in the habitat with them. Said bunny obviously does not realize he is in ASIA.

We also got to meet a few animals in person. Like Tarzan’s friend Turk, and Andy’s favorite Disney character, JC aka Jiminy Cricket.

Note the awesome souvenir Mickey ears we got as our SECOND Dream Come True!

Later we went BACK to the African safari, because Andy is really just a bigger version of a 12-year-old boy, and that was his favorite thing of the day. (Like I’m one to talk. Just see what we did on Day 5 when I post about it tomorrow…)

Speaking of faves, this is a baby giraffe. This “baby” is probably like five times my size. And all sorts of gangly and awkward. I heart giraffes.

Really big rhino.

Ostrich. Who was in the road. In front of our vehicle. And did not care.

Just before Animal Kingdom closed, we stopped into Tusker House for our dinner, and let me tell you, that African-influenced buffet was delicious! I particularly loved the passionfruit pastry they had for dessert. And the hummus. Mmm, hummus…

We ended the night by taking the ferryboat over to Disney’s Boardwalk resort, which is right across from the Swan and Dolphin resorts, where my parents and I stayed fifteen years ago. I know this because I still have in my possession MANY complimentary toiletries with swans on them.

This Day at Disney was brought to you by Capital Letters. ALL OF THEM. Because I know how much Angie loves them. (And I’m too lazy to hit Ctrl-I. Seriously, just holding Shift is so much easier.)

As of tomorrow I will have been living in Cincinnati for one year. That is, three hundred sixty-five days. Or, one twenty-second of my age. I.e., four point five four five four five four five four (…) percent of my lifetime.

One whole year.

I find it hard to believe that this much time has passed since I graduated from Carnegie Mellon, since I packed up my dorm room and moved in with Andy, since I started working and paying bills and living life in the Real World.

Especially in the region of the Real World called Cincinnati, Ohio.

Growing up in Texas, I had enough geography to worry about in my own state, so I didn’t think too much about the rest of the U.S. or the world. Case in point: at age 4 I thought that because (a) Grandma lives in Florida, and (b) I have two Grandmas, then (c) there must be 2 Floridas. S-M-R-T!

With that said, it should come as no surprise that I knew nothing about Cincinnati until Andy moved here for his job, and even then I only learned it was in Ohio. “That must mean it’s close to Cleveland, right?” “Um… no.” “Oh.”

When I got here, I saw that there wasn’t much diversity (black and white and not much else), and I didn’t have any friends, and there was NO FREAKING BUBBLE TEA*, and naturally I thought, “This isn’t going to work.”

But a year later, when Angie came to visit and I drove her to places like Eden Park, Fountain Square, and Jungle Jim’s, I realized that somehow Cincinnati has grown on me. And I don’t mean like a fungus. More like a new haircut: you don’t like it at first, but then it gets a little longer, a little more familiar, and you realize it actually suits you all right.

Actually, that analogy doesn’t really do justice to how I felt driving down I-75 with Angie, telling her about the traffic patterns and the weather and my favorite places to eat. What I felt was ownership of this place, this small Midwestern town that I now belong to. Cincinnati has become my home — one of my many homes — and I’m happy, because I used to be afraid that that might never happen.

I’ll admit, Cincinnati didn’t sweep me off my feet the way Madrid did, but not every romance is going to be a whirlwind or a fairytale like that. Doesn’t make it any less meaningful.

All this introspection comes at a good time — the one-year mark — because I’m typical and I like to think of my life as having milestones or landmarks. I think this is one of them. I think this is going to be a pivotal moment, a turning point that could make or break me. I’m about to take a big blind leap into the unknown. And I’m glad I’ll be doing it here, in Cincinnati, where I’ve learned a little bit more about myself by learning a little bit more about where I am.

*Update: I have found bubble tea! See comments below.

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On a somewhat related note, I finally found what I’ve been searching for. It’s what this next year will be all about:

Dude, when did this happen, and why didn’t anyone tell me about it?

It looks great!!

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From a cute article Alex sent me, titled “Your Friends Are Not Watching the Same Show You Are”:

To summarize the potato salad theory, fanfiction works for readers because the readers are already coming to the story with enough history and background to enjoy the story without piles of world-building and setup, much like stories that feature historical or mythological characters. We are bringing our own utensils and plates to the picnic, not expecting restaurant service. That’s fanfic. When it comes to our source material, we’re all bringing very different things to the table, and that’s going to affect what we consume.

As it happens, these preferences not only inform what we choose to watch in the first place, but also what we see when we get there. As when we sit in English class and interpret poetry, we each have our own particular take on the canon that’s unique to our backgrounds and histories.

And that’s okay.

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Angie goes home tomorrow. :(

But we had fun while she was here!

I FINISHED ANOTHER SHORT STORY!! YAAAAHHH!!!

Now I have to revise.

-_-

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In general, I don’t do well with things that are hyped up. Like, god forbid I take part in a trend, right? So I refuse and resist beyond all reason (just ask Angie) and I deny myself the wonder of things like capri pants, ballet flats, and Harry Potter. FOOL! (And yes, Angie, you were right about all of the above.)

In short: me? Not so good with the fads. And in literature, writing in the first person seems to be a very, very big fad right now. It’s something I’ve always sort of thought of as a cop-out, like, shouldn’t you be able to tell a story without having to pretend that YOU are actually telling the story?

BUT. (Butt!) I’ve read a lot of great books written in first person (like anything by Paulo Coelho and Amy Tan) and I know that this stupid prejudice of mine is just that: a STUPID PREJUDICE.

Not only that, but I’ve been thinking. And let me tell you, me thinking only leads to bad things. (Often tears. My own, of course. I don’t make other people cry.) In this case, the bad thing I thought of is that I probably need to rewrite The Good Daughters. In first person.

(I bet if I’d asked Angie, she would have told me that from the start.)

Continue reading →

I’m not gonna lie, I’m addicted to Dooce. I discovered her a few weeks ago thanks to Angie (who met her at SXSW!) and now I’m reading all her archives starting with the oldest (late 2001) and slowly but surely coming ever closer to the present. Fortunately she updates every weekday, which is really quite frequent for a “professional” blogger (still a strange concept to me) but slow enough that I should be able to catch up. Eventually.

Some fave posts so far: Original Sin and Tell it to Their Face for Christ’s Sake.

She even merits her own category on my del.icio.us account now. If that’s not high praise, I don’t know what is.