Hair: A Phase we're going Through

Because I don't play videogames, and don't read manga, I think belonging to Deviant Art is my only insight into youth culture.  And what I'm seeing is: fussy, elaborate hairdos for girls.  The whole idea seems to be to divide the hair up into multiple strands, each strand done up a different way: some strands braided, others curled, some hanging forward, other tired into a sort of knot, one of these knots on top of the head, two knots on either side ...

Girls who have a lot of hair are lucky: the rest have to make do with hair extensions and other ways of showing more hair than they naturally have.

I can only hope that this is a passing phase.  In my opinion, hair has to be styled with taste.  If it is to be permed, it should be done with moderation.  Colored; beribboned, curled, twisted into a knot: all with moderation.  Sometimes a girl getting ready for her wedding is put in the hands of a beautician who is eager to show what she can do, so she (or maybe he, who knows) pulls out all the stops, and the friends of the bride look upon the finished product and shudder: what happened to our beautiful girl?  To my mind, the one requirement for a beautician is a sense of proportion.  (Of course, her restraint can be overridden by an overenthusiastic mother of the bride.  I'm sure some girls just don't get married, to avoid the anticipated excesses of their mothers.)

Because of the trends of the present day encourage hair-styling excesses, we're going to see crazy hair for a decade.  Often, a girl's hair is truly her crowning glory, so it is a tragedy to see it styled into a chaotic mess.

Kay

Diversity Around Here

People (I mean friends and family) often ask me about attitudes of the people I meet and talk to, and I answer as well às I can.  But increasingly I find that there is often an attitude that I have never heard before!   I'm reminded of the fact that, perhaps because of the freedom of speech, or because of the widely different places people have come from (and no, this isn't a cosmopolitan area, like NYC; it isn't a Blue Enclave at all), you do get an opinion that startles me.  It shows what a diverse place the US is.

And no, it isn't racial diversity I'm talking about.  Most of the people I talk to are white (sorry about that; I should try to widen my circle), it's just that even among whites, opinions are highly varied.

I can't give you statistics, but views on religion are varied.  Views on whether to go to the doctor when sick are varied.  Home schooling.  

War in Ukraine.  Migration across the border with Mexico.  Plastic.  The police.

I can't remember most of the other attitudes that surprised me.  Of course, when I used to teach, in a much larger community, the attitudes were even more widely diverse.  But in this little town, which is a moderate island in the vast Conservative farmland that is Rural Pennsylvania, attitudes are pretty diverse.

Don't get me wrong; I don't go around soliciting opinions.  I guess people are disarmed by my cute face (Not) or whatever.

People know I'm an ex-teacher, so negative opinions about the educational system are usually preceded by a sort of disclaimer.  "Nothing personal, but I have no use for Chemistry, or Algebra, or nothing."

Writing Erotica / Porn

At one time, I wrote a lot of porn text, just for my own satisfaction.  It was a little different from the erotic text commonly found in fiction these days: detailed accounts of sex and lovemaking.  Most authors who include these kinds of episodes in their stories would deny that it is porn; the difference is based on what the intention is: is it to excite and stimulate, or is it to underline the passion of two characters for each other?

In my case it started out being to excite and stimulate, initially just myself (that is, it was porn), but then morphed into romance, when I began to become interested in the characters other than as sexual puppets.  One of the stories in which this happened is--believe it or not---the story of Helen.  It was initially redolent (diffused, drenched, saturated) with descriptions of sex, where Helen persuades beautiful girls into being intimate with her.  Helen and Leila, for instance, would have sex with each other everywhere, especially in strange and dangerous places.  But I took all the sex out when I sanitized the story, once I decided to publish it.

I just took a look at the sales figures (or rather, the statistics of which stories have been downloaded, so it's silly to call it sales, because the stories are free) and once again noted that it is the stories with purple passages that are being downloaded.  I dearly wish I had some of those pornographic stories for you guys to have, but now I have become respectable, and I have standards to maintain!

I'm tempted to write some stories under (a new) pen name, and upload them.  Once I think of a good pen name, I will tell you!

Kay

Christmas Greetings!

Dear friends,

I suddenly realized that, if any of you were to visit the blog during this week, there would be nothing for you to see!

I'm still one of those pesky agnostics / atheists, and as such don't celebrate Christian festivals with the believing crowd.  But I was brought up in a family that went obsessively to church, and sang hymns and stuff until our heads came off, so I still (surreptitiously) send greetings to anyone who happens to be around, and it cheers me up, and it cheers them up, and ... you know?  It is full of goodness!

Earlier today, one of my friends mentioned that she had heard Chanticleer singing on the radio while she was driving over.  Chanticleer is an awesome a cappella ensemble from California, whose records are to die for.  So I looked on Amazon for a Christmas CD.  I have one Christmas CD from them, so I thought, I'll send out for this latest one.  Well, guess what.  They have a dozen Christmas CDs!  Now I feel ignorant.

I wish I had put together a Christmas playlist consisting of all the music I mention in connection with Christmas in any of my stories, but I don't know how to do that.  One can't be a recluse and know all about technology as well.

This year, viewed against the background of the past few years, stands out as a really great year.  Not a fantastic year, but still a good one.  I don't want to appear to be a Pollyanna, seeing something good in every situation, but I am a sort of glass-half-full kind of person, though it was tough to be me these last few years.  (Even now, I'm horrified to read about the women in Iran who are being bullied and killed by government-sanctioned violence.) I firmly believe that it would be wrong for the US to interfere militarily.  But it is becoming clear that it is wrong for any government to enforce religious behavior.  (And some folks in state governments in the US are doing exactly that, with abortion.)

I fervently hope that the goodwill of the holidays will extend to Washington, but I'm afraid that many of the most aggressive actors are preoccupied with winning elections and nothing else, and they'll continue to make points as long as they can.

Kay

 

Stories Set in the Distant Past

One of my earliest stories was Prisoner!, partly inspired by a story by G. A. Henty, a successful author of the last century.  My story was set in the Bronze Age of an alternate earth.  What's interesting about it at the moment is that, quite unconsciously, I began to slip into a voice that was slightly old-fashioned; a little stilted, as if to emphasize that the story was set far back in time.  I didn't do it deliberately--at least, I don't think I did.  One of the ways I did this was to use the word 'indeed' a little more often.  I wrote two stories set in an alternative earth, in a bronze age, and now I have got to go back and check whether I wrote in a stilted idiom in both stories.  I think I used contractions very sparingly (writing 'do not' instead of 'don't', and so forth).  Most readers would not even notice that I was doing this.  I wonder whether 'writing gurus' frown on this sort of thing.

Anyway, that's all I've got; hope my readers have a happy holiday season!

Kay.

Being Consistent

I'm not the most consistent person I know, not by a long shot.  But I'm noticing that young people today---people younger than me, anyway---take being inconsistent to alarming new lengths.  So the place on the Web to which I go when I want my daily dose of (indirect) human contact is DeviantArt, which is a sort of poor man's social media exchange.  At base, it is a center for artists to display their work.  If you're a young artist, and you want your work to be seen, and you can't get your work shown in the Louvre, for whatever reason, DA is where you go.  So I'm subjected to a stream of art that's not really bad art, but art drawn essentially by amateurs, kids who like to draw or paint, and usually don't like to do anything else.

Now, that's a very broad generalization; there are lots of DA members who are erudite in their own way, especially artists from Japan, China, Thailand, Indonesia, The Philippines, Asia generally, who seem to be well acquainted with the classics; alarmingly so.  Just a quick look at some of the names of Manga and Anime heroes will reveal dozens of names happily borrowed from Greek and Roman legends, with casually swapped genders, and so on.

To make matters worse, there are countless young people in Europe and America, who are absolutely devoted to this neo-mythology manufactured by Japanese artists and their admirers, who know even less of the classical mythology from which it derives.  So there is a huge variety of degrees of consistency in their work.

Poseidon, people who know their Greek myths well know, is one of the most ancient Greek gods, the older generation than Zeus and company.  But it is quite possible that a young artist would create an artwork depicting a young, female, modern-looking Poseidon, with wings, and a halo, brandishing an elaborate sword, and sporting a holster with a revolver in it.  Well, it's all art; none of us believe (and pray to) these gods anymore, so who cares?  How important is it to be consistent about imaginary personages?  Is it important that Poseidon was a sea god, and would never be seen on land?  But people brought up on the Greek myths will wince if Poseidon's essential maleness is not preserved.

Leaving all that aside, an aspect of consistency that is most frequently violated is with anachronism.  Venus, wearing platform shoes.  Luckily, the Virgin Mary has--so far--not been represented wearing a leotard and a bra, with stilettos.  (DA artists seem respectful of religious figures from modern religions.).  The female characters invariably wear heels, even if they're supposed to be ready to fight.

You have to have a robust sense of humor to take these peculiarities as a matter of course.

Kay

Misspelled Words

Today I saw--after a long time--a word that is often misspelled, and by implication, mispronounced.  Why?  Because people (or is it mainly women?  Haha; don't hate me unless you must!) often spell their words somewhat influenced by their pronunciation.

The word of the moment is arctic.  In other words, things and happenings described as in The Arctic.  The Arctic is a sea surrounding the North Pole.  But there is (or used to be, anyway; who knows what's going on now?) a thick layer of snow and ice over the water, which meant that many folk thought it was a continent.

The (wrong) spelling I saw, and which has kicked off this tirade (or Rant, if you prefer,) was artic, which is one letter short.  The missing letter is 'c', which is often not pronounced by our (American) fellow-countrymen--and -women--and so the word is frequently misspelled.

I wish I knew the etymology (the derivation and origins) of the word, because knowing that usually makes it easier to remember the correct spelling.

There was another instance of a horrible substitution, a wrong word that sounded vaguely like the right one.  But I can't remember what it was, so I have to reluctantly let it go.

Also, added to the end of 'Homonyms' : glimpsed vs. glanced.  I forgot to say, though, that glanced needs an extra preposition, like glanced at, or glanced through.  Glimpsed doesn't need an extra word, but you might want to use one for some extra purpose.  (I need to add some italics to this post; hope I remember!)

K.