Day 6 - 30 Day Writing Challenge

Day 6 - 5 Ways to Win Your Heart

Hmm, an interesting topic. 

1. Be a nice person. Lavish love on babies and animals. Listen to kids when they talk. Talk to everyone as though they were your equal (spoiler alert: they are). Know the waiter's name. Get mad about inequality and cruelty. Buy from those annoying school fundraisers/scouts/child-run lemonade stands. Help a stranger if you are able to. Tip well. Support struggling artists. Just be a decent person.

2.  Be into me. Pay me sincere, specific compliments. Listen and remember what I say. Know why you love me; don't make me feel like you wonder why anyone would love me as much as I wonder.  Choose me. Be happy with me and for me. Be proud of me. If I'm passionate about something and you don't get it, still be happy that I'm happy and make an effort to at least understand. 

3. Be hilarious. I love funny people. I love laughing more than anything; I'll choose a funny movie over a drama every time. A person who is sharp and witty and clever is the best conversationalist. Movie references, self-deprecating humor, giving animals funny voices, sarcasm, puns, silliness, changing the lyrics to songs to make them funny - all of it is gold. Inside jokes are the BEST. 

4. Be smart and curious. I'm no Stephen Hawking but I love to learn and I read a lot and research things. I watch documentaries and science programs.  I will not suffer a fool. I feel like appreciating the arts falls under this category too. 

5. Have an accent/speak a foreign language. This last one is shallow, I know. But accents are hot. Being bilingual is hot. So hot. 

Day 5 - 30 Day Writing Challenge

Day 5 of the 30 Day Writing Challenge

List 5 Places You Want to Visit

Oh man, just 5? I'm gonna have to group some places together.

1. Ireland and the British Isles. I want to see it all. All the historical sites, museums, pubs, live music, misty cliffs, the new mixed in with the old. I want to spend a lot of time and immerse myself in the places that have an amazing vibe. I want to make friends and see the stuff tourists don't usually see, eat the local food and try new drinks.

2. Hawaii. The more I hear about it, the more I want to go. I want to hike and play in the water and experience a true tropical place.

3. Oregon. I totally want to see the northwest region of the US. I'm very interested in checking out Portland. I have a friend who goes there frequently and he thinks I would love it.

4. Colorado. I love mountains. It just looks so beautiful there and I think there is a very "maker" sort of spirit there that I would like to check out.

5. Santa Fe, New Mexico. I want to check out all of the art and artisan products!

Really, I want to go everywhere. If someone suggested a vacation to just about anywhere, I would be on board. I liked the cruise I went on and I want to go on more cruises. A friend of mine cruised the Rhine and I was crazy jealous! There is a ton of stuff in Austria, Holland, Iceland, Germany, Greece, Romania, etc etc that I want to see and experience. It's a whole wide world out there and I want to get so see it!

Day 4 - 30 Day Writing Challenge

Day 4 - Write about someone who inspires you.

The person who most inspires me is Neil Gaiman. He's a writer but he's actually so much more than that.

One of the things I most admire about Neil Gaiman is that he writes ALL THE THINGS. He writes adult books, kids books, screen plays, short stories, poems, spoken word pieces, and graphic novels. He's not bound by a self-imposed (or externally-imposed) set of limitations. He just writes whatever takes his fancy. That's amazing.

Neil Gaiman writes for a living. People give him money and he continues to write more things. It's my dream, that I could write something and people would give me money for it and then I would get to write more things.

Neil is a world-traveler. He experiences new things. He meets interesting people. He finds artists to collaborate with. He's also a father and a husband. None of the things about him are contradictory - he chooses the life that is meaningful to him and the world just keeps chugging along and he keeps being successful on his own terms.

Neil also speaks out about issues that are meaningful to him. He's got a sharp mind and a kind heart. He sees a problem in the world and he names it, he draws attention to it. Gaiman has a rare platform that allows him to be influential and he uses it to put more positivity and awareness into the world. He is a champion for the arts and for artists.

I find Neil Gaiman's art inspiring, I find his work ethic inspiring, I find his life inspiring. He has the kind of life and career that I aspire to. And he seems like a nice guy too.

Check out his Make Good Art commencement speech.

Day 3 - 30 Day Writing Challenge

Haha, so it's not the 3rd consecutive day but I'm picking up where I left off. Consistency is clearly a problem. Right now I have a unique situation though - I am unemployed. I'll write a whole thing about that later but for right now, just know that I have more time to write now. Because that's what writers do, they write.

Day 3 - What are your top three pet peeves?

Oh my goodness. Top 3, that's hard to narrow down. Am I a terrible person because of that? Probably.

#1 - People who won't shut the fuck up and move the fuck away from me. There are so many instances of this in my life but there are definitely two that stand out.

The first guy used to corner me at work so I could listen to lot of bragging and long-winded stories that were not entertaining. He was completely immune to my discomfort and annoyance. I stepped it up by ignoring him or telling him "I'm busy, I gotta go, etc" and that worked zero percent. I even tried to get my boss to intervene on my behalf. He just wouldn't shut up.

I talk a good sass game but I am ultimately polite to a fault. I don't like to hurt people's feelings or get confrontational, partially because I am either a 1 or a 10 on the emotional outburst scale. I let situations like this go for so long, hoping they will just magically work out without intervention, that I become even more hesitant to speak up for fear that I will either be too nice or I will come across as a hysterical woman.

So I did the only thing I could think of: I started avoiding him. In an office of around 100 people, this was pretty difficult. I had to stop going to the break room, I tried to avoid going to the bathroom, I parked in a different area, I used the least-convenient stairs, and I carefully timed my exits. It was a huge part of my day to avoid that guy.

I met the second guy when I was attempting to be a part of organized religion. He had a big, booming voice that he would use to repeat himself incessantly, parrot movie quotes, and generally be a pompous asshole. He was also incredibly selfish and a horrible husband and father. It was painful to witness. No one liked him; no one. He was THE WORST. But it was church, so everyone had to be fake nice and put up with him.

When I imagine what hell would be like, I assume it's just me in a room with those two.

#2 - Attempts to manipulate me, especially "guilting" me. I hate this so much. I tend to get into relationships with narcissistic people and then realize that I am being manipulated only after years of feeling like a crazy person. Like I said, I am usually nice to a fault and I believe people are basically decent so it's always a huge shock to discover I'm being lied to and manipulated. I'm getting better at spotting it but it does make me unusually hostile towards sales people, hahahaha!

#3 - Repetitive sounds. I like music with a good beat. I hate when you are in traffic and all you can hear is the beat in someone else's car. I hate when people turn up the bass super loud. I hate the sound of clocks ticking. I hate when a fan gets imbalanced and starts making a rhythmic click, an appliance makes a weird sound, or something in the car is rattling. These sounds makes me so anxious that I have to stop what I'm doing and try to fix it. It feels like my skin is trying to jump off my body and I actually feel nauseated. Ugh so awful!

Writing from a Prompt: Sunrise

Until that day, I had never watched the sun rise. Oh, I'd skulked home from some ill deed in the waning shadows and stumbled out of many a tavern in the wee hours of morning.  But, wrapped up in my haste or stupor, I'd never seen the stars slowly dim into a rosy-hued sky. I had no idea the sun would slip up behind the citadel and slide gently around each of the spires until the whole structure seemed gilded in the sun's golden light. The city itself, once clad in the misty shrouds of night, was gradually reborn in a riot of color and sound. It as as if the world were new again, and I was too, just for having seen it.

Cricut Fails

I got a Cricut for my birthday and I love it so much. My husband is great, I nagged and nagged at him to get it for me and he did, even though he wasn't totally on board with it. He knows that when I start a new craft, I have to buy the supplies (the best part, am I right?) and lots of them. Then I have to obsess over the new craft forever. Well, I don't have to but it's how I operate, for better or for slightly less better. Anyway, I got my Cricut and fell in love right away. Unfortunately, it doesn't feel the same way about me. I am learning some humbling lessons ya'll, and I thought I would share a few of them (for your amusement, naturally.)

1. Transfer tape is a necessity. Forgetting that is a bummer. I ruined a bad-ass 10 inch sugar skull this way. 

2. Transfer tape is also the devil. So evil. At first, I thought I just didn't understand it but now I know it's out to get me. 

3. Vinyl will not stick to acrylic paint. GET THAT THROUGH YOUR HEAD MELANIE! There are so many failed vinyl transfers in my trash.

4. Vinyl will stick to clear coat acrylic sealers... but not all the time. There is no pattern to this, just random success. 

5. Transfer tape WILL stick to clear coat acrylic sealers. EVERY TIME. Oh the joys of repairing that thing you thought you were done with. 

I am in the process of peeling off the entire surface of the tile. Most of the delightful color is coming off with the clear coat. Siiiiigh..........

6. Fonts matter. This particular lesson is a little embarrassing to me; I love fonts and I'm a huge perfectionist so you'd think I would have noticed this:

At least it allowed me to have this conversation:

While Erin's advice was solid, I decided to scrap most of the design. Luckily, Erin also had some reassurance for my bruised ego. How does Alec Baldwin always know just what to say?

This is just what I've learned so far. I'm pretty sure there are plenty more lessons in my future. I'll be sure to share my inevitable failures as well as my inevitable successes. 

Until next time!

Honesty

I started this blog to grow myself as a person and to further my writing. I started this blog with the intention of being loudly and gloriously honest. But so far, I feel like I've only started this blog.

I'm not writing as often as I should, obviously. I could make a case for the fact that I was engaged in a fairly intense house-hunt; that moving and the holidays really collided in a messy and time-consuming series of projects. I could ... but that wouldn't be the whole truth. The truth is, I have been afraid. There are things that I want to say that I have not said because I don't want to deal with the fallout. I couldn't write because the one thing I wanted to write about felt off-limits.

All it boils down to is that I'm not a Christian. It's funny that writing that statement is a big deal, because it really shouldn't be. It should be just another fact about me. Melanie: hazel eyes, loves to read, doesn't believe in God, nonsmoker, etc. Unfortunately, my family is deeply religious. Several of my close friends are deeply religious. I live in a red state that is deeply religious. It's how I was raised and what I have been exposed to my entire life. So it's a little complicated.

I don't want to leave anyone with illusions - I am not just atheist, I am actively opposed to organized religion. Now that I've said that, I want to assure you that I'm not calling anyone out or challenging anyone's beliefs. You do you. When I'm with you, I will quietly bow my head when you pray and I will respect you, just as I have over the past few years as I quietly revised my inner dialog. But I also don't want you to think that I am going through a phase or that I'm really mad at God for some misguided reason. Nope. I've read the bible, I've gone to church, I've been baptized (twice!), and all of those things led me back to where I started: not believing. So, do I want to visit your church? No thank you. Do I want you giving my son religious lessons or propaganda? Hard pass. Do you need to dedicate time and resources to trying to convert me with books, arguments, or whatever? No sirree. I gave it the old college try. I reached my own conclusions.

Anyway, the title of this article is "Honesty" and not "In Your Face" or "Fuck Off" and especially not "I Hate My Family". I'm being me, honestly and without the intention of hurting anyone. Just something to think about when you formulate your response.