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Writing as Self-Care

Jeannie Marie Leave a comment

Lately I’ve been pretty into self-care. Recently, I’ve been doing more yoga, and it’s definitely always made a positive impact on my life, especially when I can stop and just let myself breathe for a little bit, instead of letting myself get overwhelmed by circling my head around the infinite number of things I need to do before the end of the month. And I’ve been telling myself that I need to buy some actual yoga classes from a studio instead of just going around doing the free classes (thank you yoga studios for free classes though, they are the absolute best), although my wallet definitely does not agree.

But because of this increase in going to yoga, I’ve also just been thinking about self-care in general, in that it seems like in college I’ve always been stressed. It’s like I operate constantly on a small level of stress, and it always rises, and sometimes deflates, but never actually goes all the way down. And then the best way to deal with it is to read all the click-bait: “13 gifs of The Office that is College Life” or “15 tweets that completely explain how you’re doing in the semester right now.” We constantly circulate these posts of self-pity because we know that everyone else is doing as poorly as we are, and somehow twist it into entertainment.

But I remember a time before all this, in high school. I think it’s easy to think about high school as “the easy days” but also never wanting to go back (because let’s face it, high school sucks). But to me, high school wasn’t easy. It was honestly probably just as rough as college is now, just in a different, more naive way. I went to a college prep school where I was one of the top students, and even though I failed AP Calculus and only passed AP Chem because our teacher pitied our class, I still maintained just being shy of the top-ten percent my senior year (I was ranked seventh out of sixty-nine, so if you round up, I was). But I’d be lying if I said that was easy. I was stressing about getting into college, doing as many clubs as possible my senior year, as well as trying to take as many AP Classes without killing myself. I was crazy busy, even if now it seems like I barely remember it.

But the difference between me then and me now is that I wrote. I have multiple journals, both handwritten and typed, starting from middle school all the way until senior year. I documented much of my life, often because it was a lot harder to talk to my friends, and I grew up as an only child. I used my journal as a way of keeping my stress levels low – once I poured my heart out to my journal, I always felt a whole lot better.

Not only did I keep a journal, though, I was constantly writing. I have about a million different documents, some with bits and pieces of long forgotten projects, some filled with pages dedicated to one idea. I was always thinking of ideas, always writing them down, always staying inspired. I constantly looked up new artists, new music, looked for new books to read, bought more books to read. In some ways, high school was my most fertile time for creative exploration. I wrote poems, I wrote song lyrics, I wrote short stories, I wrote essays – but I never wrote because I had to. It was always just for the pure enjoyment of writing.

But now, in college, it feels selfish to want to sit down and write just for fun when I could be working on the next three papers I have due, or the discussion posts, or even my pieces for this blog. The weekend I cranked out over 20 pages of a story for the Hopwoods, my roommate told me how proud of me she was – not just because she liked the story (which made me so happy because part of me wondered if a lot of it was sleep deprived nonsense) but also because I sat down and wrote this entire story that still has places to go in a little over 48 hours, ignoring all my school work in order to focus on this mini passion project in the middle of the semester. She saw how happy it made me to work on it and to talk on it, and how inspired it made me.

But writing like that can’t always happen – I still have those papers to write. Sure, maybe if I want to go to graduate school and join a creative writing cohort, that’s what my life would be like. That’s not reality, though, and the truth is I have to graduate and find a job.

In some ways, I think that writing, reading, and staying creatively engaged was part of my self-care in high school. I may not have done yoga to calm my mind, but once I wrote a short story where the characters were probably too close to real life for comfort, I felt like I had gotten the problem off my chest. Maybe it wasn’t resolved, but it calmed my mind. And I miss that, I miss using my anger, my sadness, my happiness as fuel for writing, if only to keep me writing. Because although I feel like I’m constantly writing something in college, I still haven’t gotten to stretch my creative muscles out as much as I would like.

But the good news is I’m graduating, and even with job searching and part-timing and every other crazy thing that life throws at me, I know that I can always fall back on writing. Even if my self-care methods change, that love that I have will never change.

What to Do in an Interview When You Actually Like Classic Books

Hannah Levine 3 Comments

A person slides his or her finger across multiple old, embellished books.

You know that question interviewers ask about the last few books you’ve read, or your favorite book of all time and why? You’re supposed to say something cool and interesting, something you didn’t read for class or because your feminist book club suggested it. But how do you answer when you actually like Shakespeare and Milton, or spend your afternoons snuggled up with Lewis Carroll? What do you say when the last book you read actually was George Orwell’s 1984 or Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations? Essentially, what do you do in an interview when you’re like me?

They say in an interview you shouldn’t lie, but they also say to answer any question in the way that will make you shine in the best light. So when someone asks me the last book I read, it takes me a moment to figure out what would be the best answer. Should I actually say the last book I read was Louis Sachar’s Holes, but that I just got to the letter in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and can’t wait for Elizabeth to get over Mr. Wickham? Or, should I go with something a little more contemporary that I didn’t read as recently because I’m some weirdo who thinks The Tempest is a good bedtime story.

So, after months of consideration and many interviews, I believe I have found the solution to this age-old question. Be honest about what you like to read, as long as you remember one thing. Be proud, too. Be unapologetically passionate about the books you’ve stuffed into your bookshelves and spent countless hours you should’ve spent sleeping underneath your covers with a book in hand.

When you get that question, that dreaded yet exciting question that allows you to talk about literature, tell the interviewer the truth, and tell him or her exactly why you read (and reread) the book and why you liked it or didn’t. Tell them your favorite book is The Great Gatsby, but only if your favorite book is The Great Gatsby. Don’t leave it at that, though. Instead, be sure to include that you like F. Scott Fitzgerald’s work because you have fond memories of it. Tell your interviewer that you read it for the first time in high school with your favorite teacher. Tell them people joke that your town is split just like West Egg and East Egg and part of you finds it funny, while the other part feels uncomfortable at the thought of such division. Tell your interviewer that Old Owl Eyes is the best character in the book because he notices Jay’s books weren’t cut, and that he’s so underrated as a character because of just how important and amazing a detail that is that you can never stop thinking about it.

So, when you’re sitting in an interview for your dream job and you’re asked what the last book you read was, or what your favorite book is and why, don’t lie. Don’t say you stayed up all night memorizing Shakespeare’s sonnets or counting all of the times Holden Caulfield says “phony” if that isn’t what you actually did. But, if it is how you like to spend your time, if you are the nerd checking out Jane Eyre from the library, own it. Don’t be a phony. Be proud of your tastes. Who knows, your interviewer might be a closeted One-Hundred Years of Solitude fan just like you.

The Sun Also Rises… Again and Again

camsterdam Leave a comment
Image vias CBSSundayMorning on Twitter

I’m no octogenarian, but I love the CBS Sunday Morning show. So much so that it has now become a sort of tradition…

Ever since I was a wee little girl, my dad and I had woken up bright and early on Sunday mornings (though sometimes pushing the limit with only one minute to spare!) We would pad down the stairs, careful not to wake my still-slumbering mom. Armed with warm beverages and the coziest of blankets, we would snuggle up together as the show’s notorious sun yawned and stretched out his rays.

There was Wynton Marsalis’ trumpeting fanfare, which we’d mimic by putting our fingers to our lips and wiggling them around, making sure to hit all of the invisible and silent octaves. “Good morning, Charles,” we would say to each other in Bob Schieffer’s famous grandfatherly voice. And then, suddenly, Charles Osgood himself was speaking directly to us, welcoming us to a wonderful new day. Even though we would have to mute yet another commercial for arthritis medicine and tio-tropium bromide inhalation powder, this Sunday morning tradition became the thing I looked forward to most each week. I hope my dad did, too.

Now, of course, I am in college and come back home less and less frequently. But my dad makes sure to write down all of Steve Hartman’s heartwarming stories and Mo Rocca’s squirrel-eating shenanigans on tiny little sticky notes, so we can still bond and learn together over a breakfast at Angelo’s.

During my sophomore year of college, I was taking an introduction to theatre course through the RC. One of my fellow students happened to be a woman from CBS who was spending a year at U of M for a journalism fellowship. I asked her if she knew Charles Osgood, Tracy Smith, and Anthony Mason, and she said “Yes!” She even had been at a dinner party at Osgood’s house, where he played the piano for her (the episodes where he plays the piano are very special occasions in the Finch household). I asked my classmate if she would become a messenger between myself and the CBS reporters who had secretly shared Sundays with me for the past ten years. I had a very important message to send.

Following a discovery and proceeding obsession with the odes of Pablo Neruda, I had tried my hand writing odes for the previous weeks. I would write about anything: yawns, bubbles, robots, jelly beans. And then I had an idea. I would write an ode to the sun. But not just any sun. The CBS Sunday Morning sun. This is what came out:

ode to the sun 
 
patient, 
like the quenching juice
of a ripened orange
trapped behind its rind, 
the sun
waits 
within its black box
in all its shining glory
like an armored knight 
summoned 
by regal trumpets
to its kingdom.  
A moment ticks by-
The horn is blown.
Footsteps pad like shadows.
And here again…
the sun,
with rosy 
cherubic cheeks,
has come:
just in time
for Sunday morning. 
* * *

I had remembered that sometimes letters and poems by fans had been read on the show by Charles Osgood himself! What did I have to lose? The girl in my class eagerly did some magic behind the scenes and sent my poem to the friends at CBS. I wasn’t sure what would happen next. Perhaps, it would be seen, swallowed, and cast down to the bottom of the intern’s inbox.

But no! One night as I worked late on a paper for class, an email dinged. <From: Steve Hartman> it said. Steve Hartman – the man who each week reports on a story of real everyday heroes who battle diseases, help strangers for nothing in return (let’s face it, basically stories that end with you running to the bathroom to grab a tissue to stop the tears forming in your eyes) – had written an email to me, from his own personal email address.

The email basically acknowledged that he had seen my poem and wanted to let me know how sweet it was. How it touched him to know that what he and his colleagues did at the Sunday Morning show was meaningful to my dad and me. Although my poem was never read aloud on live air, I can’t help but feel like it’s almost better that it wasn’t. The people who needed to know now know and we can keep that knowledge between ourselves. They know they have a fan who appreciates what they do. They know that the sun shall rise again and again, because someone will watch it. That’s what traditions are for: they are little private moments that don’t need to be vocalized to the whole world, just to the ones who are there to share it with you.

 

Gwen Stefani: This Is What The Truth Feels Like

Thomas Degroat Leave a comment

Gwen Stefani has always been a part of my life. Who can forget Hollaback Girl or her promotion of Harajuku fashion? But even before all of that, Gwen Stefani was part of one of the most successful rock bands of the ’90s, No Doubt. This is where my personal love of Gwen Stefani begins. No Doubt is absolutely my favorite bands of the ’90s and Tragic Kingdom is one of my favorite albums ever, up there with Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors or Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill. You can imagine my surprise once I heard that Gwen Stefani was releasing her first solo album in 10 years. My expectations were raised even further once I learned that it was inspired by the end of her marriage and her new relationship. I was expecting a Sia-like come back with deeply personal songs mixed in with pop-y love ballads. While I don’t find it as impressive as Sia’s 1000 Forms of Fear, it is far from disappointing and is a great listen.

Let’s start with the negatives. The albums starts off spectacularly, but falter near the end with the 8th, 9th, and 10th songs being tonally dissonant and surely the most strange of the album. Luckily the album picks it back up with the next songs, but it never reaches back to the magic of the beginning of the album. Perhaps my least favorite song of the album is Asking 4 It featuring Fetty Wap. I’m alway wary when artists firmly rooted in pop (or rock) and artists firmly rooted in hip hop work together. It can be great when done right (like B.o.B’s Ariplanes featuring Hayley Williams) but more often than not, the two sounds cannot find a middle ground. It definitely doesn’t work here. Not is the song dissonant from the rest of the album, but the two artists themselves don’t fit well. Gwen Stefani’s clean and clear vocals fights with Fetty Wap’s unique, rough fuzzy vocals.

But of course the album has some knock-out hits as well. In fact, the entire first album is great, my personal favorite being the album’s first song (and sure to be next single) Misery. This song has all the work of a great pop hit that people will be singing along with for years. The lyrics are catchy, the beat is endless fun, and the bubblegum-pop style really suits Gwen Stefani’s solo work, though that is not to say that she can’t do incredible work in other genres as well. Listening to Where Would I Be? provides us a great look at Stefani’s musical talent as it flits between genres throughout the entire song and it works as a comprehensive package of everything that she can do as an artist. While it is not the best song on the album, it is impressive none the less.

Overall the album is a fun listen, though lacking in the sadder songs that are usually featured on break-up albums. To hear the best of the album, I suggest starting with Misery, Make Me Like You, or Truth. These songs are my personal favorites of the album. They are classic Gwen Stefani and will certainly please old fans of her solo work. I am looking forward to hearing more songs from Gwen Stefani as clearly she still has a lot of musical potential left within her.

Science Fiction For Dummies: Orphan Black

Jeannie Marie Leave a comment

Although I’m not proud of it, I spent almost all day Saturday marathoning season three of Orphan Black, this crazy awesome show that some people have heard of but most people haven’t. But for those of you that don’t know, Orphan Black is a show about clones. Crazy, cool, awesome, kick-butt clones. And I absolutely love it.

My time with Orphan Black started this past summer, when I was studying abroad in England. Although I definitely had zero time for Netflix, and to be honest who wanted to spend time watching Netflix when you could literally explore Oxford, I still explored the offerings that UK Netflix had to offer and was pretty satisfied. And though I wanted to watch all the things, I decided that perhaps starting one show would be good. So when the pubs closed at midnight, I grabbed some food from the awesome food trucks and started a new adventure with Orphan Black.

Needless to say, I was hooked, and burned through both season one and season two pretty quickly, although I ended up stopping around episode 6 of season two because I couldn’t completely ignore my papers, even if I wanted to.

Although I tried to pick it back up once I got back stateside, I never really had time for it, and since I didn’t have it on the convenience of Netflix, I ended up kind of giving up, at least for the time being. Instead, I picked up awesome shows like Jane the Virgin and Quantico on TV right now, and I was satisfied.

But for some reason, last week I decided I wanted to watch Orphan Black, and my roommate chimed in “it’s on Amazon Prime,” which we have on our amazing smart TV in our apartment. So, of course, the order of the day was to finish it as soon as possible. Last night I finished season three and season four thankfully starts next week, and actually at a time when I can watch it live.

As I was watching it, though, I started to wonder what made me like it so much. I do like sci-fi, and I love that the lead is a woman, and it’s definitely a woman-empowerment show, without it necessarily being in your face about it, because Sarah Manning definitely has other things to worry about besides the patriarchy. I love watching the intricacies of Tatiana Maslany’s acting, how freaking amazing she is at portraying all of these completely distinct women. Like seriously, she often has to play one version of a character pretending to be another version, which is honestly mind-blowing from an acting standpoint. Give this woman an Emmy already.

But I also realized that one thing I love about it is that it’s not just sci-fi. It’s almost a whole new genre, realistic sci-fi. I remember when I learned about magical realism and how it essentially blew my mind. That’s what Orphan Black is. It’s sci-fi realism. Although the science, I’ve been told, is pretty far from being accurate, it’s really fascinating how they use the science throughout the show. It grounds the entire plot, making it not “clones from another world,” but real people dealing with this scientific thing. It sometimes gets out of hand, and you are thrown into a world where things happen not as logically as they would in real life, but for the most part, everything seems plausible. Everything crazy that happens on the show happens for a reason.

Science fiction is definitely a strong, diverse genre that often does not get enough credit, being written off by people who don’t like “that Star Trek stuff.” And I’m sure Orphan Black is not the first sci-fi narrative to use science as a way to make something unrealistic seem plausible. But it’s possibly one of the most successful, which is really, really cool, and I hope there’s more like it in the future.

Seeing ABT’s Sleeping Beauty

Hannah Levine Leave a comment

Two ballet dancers dance in black and white. The man holds the girl's hand while she jumps and lands to go directly into a relevé with her leg pointed up.

My sister has always been a big fan of the ballet. When I was younger, she’d pull her hair up to the top of her head, twist it into the tightest bun she could, and shove as many bobby pins as were necessary to make it stay. Then she’d walk around with her toes pointed out, her chest up in the air, and her arms in a tight en bas as if she were holding her dream of becoming a dancer in a giant fishbowl before her.

I used to feel uncomfortable watching this little play. I didn’t want to go to the ballet. I didn’t want to sit through hours of silent dance and old music only to end the night trailing behind my sister and her stifled pirouettes. I never wanted to be a ballerina, so none of it made sense to me, and I found the whole thing a bore.

All that has changed now. I’ve come to realize what it is about the ballet that had my sister up all night practicing standing on her tiptoes all those years ago (and probably now, too). You see, a few years ago I had the good fortune of becoming friends with a real life ballerina and she put into words the feelings my sister had every time she watched Center Stage on repeat in our family room. She told me that what she loved about ballet as a dancer was the challenge—that you can always learn more and be better. But that didn’t seem like enough to me. Didn’t most art forms do that? What was so special about ballet? Then she told me what she loved about ballet as an art, and that I understood. She said it was the way it made what should be impossible movements look effortless and beautiful, and I realized how true that was. I began to come around to the idea of ballet as an actual form of art worth looking at, and boy was I late to the party.

This past weekend, the University of Michigan paired with Michigan Opera Theatre and gave hundreds of students, including myself, the opportunity to go to Detroit to see the American Ballet Theatre perform Tchaikovsky’s Sleeping Beauty. When I got the invite from said ballerina friend, I was excited to go to the ballet for what felt like the first time. But when we got there it was a whole other story.

Of course, there wasn’t a bad performer on stage. Every dancer moved across the floor with grace and beauty. The jumps were high and sprightly. The expressions were grandly enticing. The spins were fast and steady. The relevés were tall and mighty. The outfits were incredible and envy creating. And the music was big and bold with a lavish conductor working every second of it.

Then there was one big surprise that really overjoyed everyone in my group. Misty Copeland would be at our performance, and our performance only. For those of you who don’t know who Misty Copeland is, Copeland is the first black woman to dance as principal dancer at the American Ballet Theatre, widely considered one of the best ballet companies in the world. That’s a big deal. A very big deal. Getting to see her dance is an incredible opportunity because damn, she’s amazing, and, lucky me, I got to see her! I could watch her move across the floor any day.

Gaining a true appreciation for ballet has been one of the best things about going to college, but this was really the icing on the cake. Sitting in the Detroit Opera House and watching that almost three hour performance pass as if it were only a few minutes was a special treat. I could see why all of the little girls there had their best dresses on and their hair in buns, eager for the chance to look and feel like one of those dancers in even the most minimal of ways. And yes, I will admit that when I walked out of that theater there was a small part of me that felt like turning out my toes, holding my chest to the air, and sporting a great big en bas just like my big sister.