Halloween: A look back

I have always loved Halloween. Not because of the candy, the staying out late, or even the graph I made every year of how much of which type of candy I got. Seriously. I did this. For fun.

No, Halloween is a chance to, for one night only, become something else. It is a day where your imagination can take over 100%, and you leave yourself behind. Am I unhappy with myself? No. But just this one night, you can be whatever you want. It's as if the entire world is under a spell for only a few hours. Come to think of it, I think there is a movie where that actually does happen....

Anyway. I went home today and poured over no less than twenty photo albums to put together this timeline of alter-egoes I have taken on. I wish I could say there are 23 photos here, but sadly there are not. Some are missing, some never had photos taken, and then there were those few years that I was a baby.... But I did my best with such short notice. You will notice a few things as you flip through my life in Halloweens. One: There are no repeating costumes. I have never, ever worn the same costume twice. I have been similar things, yes, but never in exactly the same way. It is a personal rule of mine. Two: Many of these are home made. I try to spend as little money as possible on my costumely endeavors, because part of the fun is in creating the persona for yourself. Three: In some ways, this is also a timeline of the improvements of photography technology over the course of my life. See if you can spot the year my mom got a digital camera!

Ready? Too bad - here we go!!

First Picture I could find: 1990, age 2. I was a cheerleader, and my brother was a ninja turtle.

1991, age 3 and a My Little Pony that my grandmother made. That's my brother again, being... A... different ninja turtle. I'm telling you, those who read my capstone piece. I'm not lying about the carpet color being an homage to the turtles...

1994, age 6. There are a few years missing between the last one and this one, and to tell you the truth, I don't remember what I was during that "period of missing photos." Check out my best friend Cory as Sonic and Eric... still a ninja, though not a turtle this time...

I thiiink this was 2nd grade. Or 3rd, maybe. The one that is missing between these is some version of Pocahontas, but my dad took us T or T'ing that year, so I think he has the photos. I particularly love this one, because I thought penguins held their arms out like that naturally. I didn't know it was because their bodies are so round that their flippers rest in that position. I spent the whole night with my arms out like a lunatic.

This one. This one is my masterpiece. I think I'm in 4th grade right here. I had this onesie (all the cool kids slept in onesies...) that had a mix of animal patterns, and I got that bear head/hat when I went skiing. I put them together to create some horrible genetic experiment gone wrong. I made people read my sign explaining the costume. Dig those sneakers.

6th grade. We're missing a doubles shot of my sister and me as matching dalmatians, me with my baton in my mouth because for some reason I thought it looked like a bone. I also had string attached to my tail so could wag it at will.

But anyway, this one's pretty odd when you think about it. What would people from the 50s think of children dressing up in what were once normal clothes for them, as a costume?

Walkin' like an Egyptian in the 7th grade...

Dressing up as a time period seems to be a trend... That's me on the left (in case you didn't know by now) being a "Renaissance Princess." 8th grade

-----we're missing a few here. I do apologize, for some of them were really spectacular. -----

9th grade: Lil' cat (okay that one was cheesy and store bought)

10th grade: Get ready for this. A bag of groceries. Actually there is a picture for this one, somewhere, but the person who took it failed to capture the essence properly. I had an Aldi bag on as a skirt and had made a sign thingy on which I had taped various boxes and bags of groceries. Most people thought I was trash, though.

11th grade: School girl, although all night people said I was Britney Spears.

Which brings us to....

Senior year, and costume I affectionately refer to as "halfsies." I had a cape too, but for some reason it got left out of this shot... Come on, there's a little of both in all of us.

2006, freshman year of college, I started a new tradition of wearing my Halloween PJs during the day and a "real" costume at night. So I guess this is the year of the bunny in Pajamas and the ladybug.

Sophomore year. That first one is "My own cat, Scooter, in festive pajamas." The one on the bottom is a mummy, NOT a zombie!! Mummies are my favorite monster, and this is still one of my favorite costumes ever -- even if it did kinda fall apart.

Junior year, I mentored young writers, so I decided against the pajamas. This is Penelope, from the movie of the same name. On the left is my SAI big sister Reba as a spider web. Super awesome!

Senior year, I had a boy who was enough of a good sport to don a themed costume with me. Here we are, as a child and his teddy bear! Go ahead and say, "Aww..." You know you want to.

In this hilariously complimentary themed costume from 2010, Michael and I are a raccoon and an employee of animal control. Poor Michael has a lifetime of silly theme costumes ahead of him....

Annnnd here we are at Halloween 2011, disguised as scarecrows. He turned down the Ash & Misty idea, but there's time yet to convince him...

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So there you have it, friends. That was my life in Halloweens. I hope you enjoyed yourself - I know I have! Tomorrow I'm going to hit up Wal Mart and buy all their half-priced candy, then make my graph --- I mean EAT IT ALL without attempting to quantify or represent any kind of data relating to the candy whatsoever!

Why I hate Twilight

I know, the dead horse has been beaten into submission and it promises it will never crap during a parade again. Wait, what? Anyway, I'm in a bad mood, it's been a bad day, I'm frustrated at lots of things and rather than list them all (*Cough* today's 6th grade class, the fact that I don't sub every day, the fact that I don't have a real job, the house that we won't get, how expensive things are/how much money we don't have, smarmy politicians, friennnddssstuffff *cough*), I'm going to go for a scapegoat. Twilight.

Now, I complain about this a lot. But, I'm rarely ever actually specific about what it is I hate so much about this series. And, since I want to tear something apart, and this is the only thing I can legally do that to, here we go!

Reason #1: The writing

Okay. I know that within the realm of creative writing, there has to be some room for, well, creativity. I majored in it and everything; I know the rules. I also know that, if you are going to break the rules, there has to be a reason. It has to be "intentional and necessary," as my thesis mentor constantly reminded me. Twilight (which I am too lazy to put in italics, and seeing as it shouldn't be a book, I feel it does not really even deserve italics) doesn't seem to have a literary reason. Reading this book I just wonder constantly "was the editor of this coming in and out of a coma while doing their job?"

There are tense issues, subject-verb agreement issues, comma splices (which we all make, but I mean come on. That IS why there are editors in the publication world), awkward and unnatural dialogue, big words that don't mean what she thinks they mean, big words that she chose to sound smart, and way, WAY too many adverbs -- to name a few of the problems. If you need an example, check out the blog Reasoning with Vampires, in which author Dana breaks the books down one-by-one, line-by-line in some cases, and red-pens the whole freaking thing. It's pretty spectacular and it is also quite educational. Yeah, I majored in English and hope to teach it, but I still don't know everything.

Need an example? Take your pick. Educational and hilarious, and the blog is full of them. It's become a favorite past time, for when I need something to hate.

"But Kimmy," you might say. "Twilight is written imperfectly because it is from the voice of a teenager! It focuses on what she sees, and her voice is that of a 16-year-old girl."

No. Her voice is that of a 10-year old girl. I return to the previous statement: If you are going to break a rule in writing, is has to be intentional. Reading Twilight, it just seems like there is no editor, not like I am reading a real adolescent girl's thoughts. This is in large part because the writer makes NO effort to give the narrator any kind of personal characteristics to actually define her voice. In fact, the narration is so hollow, even in times of action, that I felt like the whole series was nothing more than a flashback. It started flat, never really rose, and ended on the same plateau.

"But wait!" You might call out, pointer clicking on the X in this window -- done with my complaining already. "The writer left her hollow so you, the reader, could fill in yourself in her shoes!"

Ah, you thought you had me with that, didn't you? Yes, I've heard this one many a time from team Twilighters. But here's the thing: As a writer, you HAVE to develop a character. You absolutely can NOT leave it bland so people can fill themselves in. You don't have to have anything in common with a character to be able to relate to them; the character could even remind you of someone, or maybe could have traits you wish you had yourself. You know what I'm not, and will never be? A boy, a wizard, the "chosen one" for any kind of grand quest, owner of a snowy owl, British, expert broom-flyer.... But you know what book series I will love forever, and am legitimately sad that I can never read again for the first time? Harry Potter. Why? Because, even though Harry and I have very little in common, I like him as a character, and I genuinely care what happens to him. The only -- repeat -- ONLY thing that we know about Bella -- the only thing that seems to matter at all is that she loves Edward. So, if we don't love Edward, we have absolutely nothing with which to relate to her. And as it happens... I don't love Edward. At all. Which brings me to number two...

Reason #2: The Message

Sure, so the character is bland and lifeless, the writing is as polished as a middle schooler's first draft, and all we know is that she loves this guy. Sometimes this other guy, too, but usually just the first guy. The one she ends up with and has what is literally a demon spawn child with.

Wow, she has a baby with him? A baby that nearly kills her as it grows inside her? He must be a great guy, really worth all this time!

Not even remotely. He stalks her, he cuts he brakes, he watches her sleep (after breaking in to her house), he repeatedly mentions how easily he could kill her (which only causes her to praise him for holding back), he also repeatedly mentions how bad for him she is, how bad for her he is... none of this is sounding like a good kind of guy. Oh, and he breaks up with her. In a forest. Then she goes catatonic for like 6 months, finally lets herself start to be happy again (Even though she intentionally puts herself in danger just to hallucinate that he is with her.....) he comes back into her life and she's all "Oh of course I forgive you! Turn me into a vampire LOL!" Because it's okay for a guy to hurt you that badly, as long as he's sorry enough afterwards.

No. No it is not. And young girls should not be reading these books hoping to find their "Edward." Bella should not have been left empty for girls to fill themselves in, because she does nothing even a little admirable as a character. She hates herself, constantly puts herself down, insists that she isn't good enough for the vampire who dumped her in the woods just after her birthday (yeah. That happened), is a terrible, manipulative friend to those close to her, and ultimately only cares about one thing/person. Who, as I have already established is not worthy of her care and/or attention.

In closing...

to be perfectly honest, this is only the tip of the iceberg. There are other issues, like the half-assed allusions to famous classics (STOP COMPARING YOURSELF TO ROMEO AND JULIET!!), the fact that Bella claims to be such a star in literature but can't string a sentence together, and the general jealousy that this writer is famous and I'm not...

But I'm going to end it here. Also...

Suggested reading

So, smart girl, what should we read?

Other authors have managed to pull off the teenager voice while still creating characters that are sympathetic and interesting. For example...

-Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan (I'm only on book one, but I like his voice. He sounds like a middle-schooler, he gets embarrassed when a girl grabs his hand, yet I don't have to read the book and correct it as I go or "fill myself in" to the character)

-Going Bovine by Libba Bray (You want a book that is straight from a careless high school kid? This is your book. Drug references and F-bombs everywhere, but there is heart to this book and heart to this character. And guess what? You don't have to picture yourself as the main character because there already is a clear main character!)

-Harry Potter (not in first person, but still fanciful and a truly wonderful adventure of a book series)

-The Hunger Games (outstandingly well-written and characters that you alternate between hating and loving, but never loathing in quite the same way that you feel for every Twilight character)

Yes, that is also essentially a list of my favorite books. But they do what Twilight tries to do. Actually, the story that she attempted to tell could have been a good one. But there are so many flaws, that if it had been placed on my editing table, I would tell her to start over and tell a story that has redeemable characters, sentences that make sense, and a message that will actually help her readers. "The most important thing in life is to have a boyfriend, even if he's undead, a hundred years old, and basically abusive." doesn't cut it.

Lunch Ladies: A Tribute

If you're ever in a school for long enough, you will inevitably hear about the cafeteria food. Most of the negative hype comes from books and movies, which depict the food as shapeless, scary blobs, sometimes moving, sometimes hairy -- but never anything could legally be classified as "food."

Seriously. What is this?

Pretty much all students talk about the cafeteria food -- how That Girl Over There found a bug in her food, how The Head Football Player swears his chicken was served to him raw. I'm sure I joined in on the gossip at some time during my schooling, even though I've never had a negative experience regarding cafeteria food. Granted, that's partly because I brought my lunch nearly every day from kindergarten through 12th grade. Everyone does it (and isn't that as good a reason as any to do things?), but what they don't think about is the fact that, behind the scenes, people are actually cooking the food for them. And that the food has to be approved, the kitchen inspected, the procedures rehearsed and repeated -- until the product is fit to be served. And people forget to think about the hairnets behind the wall where we deposit our sticky, gooey lunch trays.

I know this, because my mom is a lunch lady (or a cafeteria worker, if you're PC). She cooks for other people's kids all day before coming home and cooking for her own family -- as do all of the other lunch ladies. In my schooling/student teaching/substitute teaching experience, people rarely stop to talk to the cooks of the school food. But more people should take the time to do so.

When my mom left her job at the high school cafeteria for a middle school, six or seven members of the football team came up and gave her a hug goodbye. members of the football team. At a high school. Another student gave her a box of chocolates as a parting gift. This was a shock to me, as I have never seen people talk to lunch ladies about anything other than their account. I can only hope the middle school students treat her just as well.

I've had lunch ladies bail me out on two separate occasions. Once, when I was in high school, I left my lunch in the gym. When I went to retrieve it I found that it had been eaten. WHO EATS SOMEONE ELSE'S LUNCH?! Since one of my high school lunch ladies was the mother of my brother's best friend (some serious name-dropping), I asked her for help. She let me charge my meal so I wouldn't go hungry. Then, just last week, a lunch lady did me a solid in a much less desperate situation. I had simply noticed that the day's lunch was something out of heaven: Chicken Fingers and Mashed Potatoes. I had cold spaghetti in the teacher-fridge, but I wanted the chicken. I asked if there was any way at all that I could charge for the day and swore that I would pay her back the next day. She agreed -- but on the following day refused the three dollars I offered.

It's little things like this -- hugs, the occasional free chicken tender -- that help to restore my faith in humanity. There are people out there who really do care, who have a heart of gold. I just never noticed how often that golden heart beats below a standard-issue set of scrubs and an apron.

Take the time to talk to your lunch ladies. Their jobs aren't easy, and so few people show gratitude for the meals these ladies (and, yes, sometimes men) cook for them. Be the football player, high school royalty who cares more about others than his reputation. Those lunch ladies are someone's mother, wife, sister or friend -- be nice to them!

Stand up

The whole "Occupancy" thing has been getting a lot of attention. To be honest, I thought it was something having to do with the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell, but then I started looking into it more. Brace yourselves, because I Graduated, Now What? is about to get....political. I love the Occupancy movement, partly because it's so unclear to which party these people belong, and I love anything non-partisan. "Angry about our economic, social, and political problems" is not the official stance of either side.

What does Occupancy mean to me? I think it's a little like the Declaration of Independence. A bunch of people, pissed off, standing up and saying "No more of this. You suck, and we're done with you." It's the average person (fact: the "middle" is overlooked in almost everything, from the classroom to the professional world -- yet it often makes up the largest piece of the population) sticking it to the man. It's people who have heard "That's the way it is, and there's nothing you can do about it" one too many times.

The Occupants call themselves "The 99%," and claim that almost everything, from policy decisions to everyday things (for lack of a better word) are made to benefit the wealthy, the 1%. And it's not fair.

"But wait, you whiney, lazy, little brat," you might say. "Those people worked hard to get where they are. And you could too, with a little hard work."

Not true. Despite what we may believe, America is not the meritocracy it pretends to be. Read Malcom Gladwell's The Outliers for research on this. Successful people have been helped by timing, luck, knowing people, a natural disposition for others to serve them, and even the placement on the calendar of their birthdays. It's true, people who are born in earlier months are frequently more successful than those born in later months, especially in sports. I'm not making this up; read the book.

The fact is that who you know matters -- sometimes more so than how qualified you are. Those in lower classes and even in middle classes usually stay there. Look more closely at those Cinderella Stories you grew up with, and you will see how outside factors (factors OTHER than "just a little hard work") came into play during the success stories. Check this article out if you need some more evidence. I'm not saying they don't deserve to be there. I'm just saying that getting to the top is much, MUCH harder than people make it out to be -- and that those middle classers who feel overlooked and stand in the street holding signs have just as much right to voice their frustrations.

Then there's the bailouts. I don't know the whole story (does anyone, really?) but I DO know that when members of my family lost their jobs, nobody was there to bail them out. I know that there are millions of people who have lost their houses because of this economy, people forced to move, forced to downsize, forced to the streets in some cases. Is there anyone bailing them out, the occupants ask.

For me, it's personal because of the fact that I just graduated and it was like opening a door in a tree in the woods and walking into Halloweentown. With every letter and phone call I make, I feel like I'm standing in a mime box, screaming at... who? Who's listening? Nobody is listening, because I am just a resume in a stack of a million, and it doesn't matter that I love English, or that I want this more than probably anyone else in that pile. Then there's my college, which totally shoved me out the door and left me on my own -- and who was there to help me get a job this summer? Who was there to push the paperwork so my certification would go through in time? Nobody. Nobody was there, because they don't care. Because once they get my money, I become just another graduate, and the people at the top really can't be bothered with the problems of peasants. And there was nothing I could do about it.

Until now. No, this little sign and my "Peas on Earth" pajamas are not going to change the world. The other day I was discussing the Occupancy with some other people, and someone said, "It's all a bit silly, really. I mean, what is it going to do?" What is it going to do? Maybe nothing. But you know what definitely accomplishes nothing? Not trying. You think there weren't people who sat around while the colonists were chanting "No taxation without representation" and signing whiney papers? That those people didn't think the whole thing was "a bit silly?" But where would we be if those people hadn't exercised the free speech that they hadn't even earned yet?

Is the Occupancy going to be as landmark as the Declaration? Of course not -- at least probably not. And I apologize for the possibly hyperbolic comparison. But for so long people have been standing around sporting "WTF" expressions, saying "someone should do something about this, why doesn't someone do something?" And now someone has.

And so, to those of you who wish someone would do something, STAND UP! Wherever you are, stand up and OCCUPY!

Oh, come ON.

You know that scene in movies where the character gets fired, gets dumped, accidentally runs over his dog, finds out he's out of milk, and walks to the car only to find it's out of gas, decides to walk to the store and then it starts raining? And he just shouts, "Oh, come ON!"

Or she. It could be a she.

No, I didn't get fired, get dumped, run over my dog/cat, or run out of milk (it is raining today, though -- and I AM out of gas). But I still feel like shouting "Oh, come ON!"

They started (or maybe had already been) showing the house. As in The House, as in the house we want. As in the house we WOULD have already, if not for my stupid school's stupid policy and stupid paperwork and the least flexible and accommodating principal EVER. The beautiful house that is perfect for us, is perfect distance to town, is literally right next to one of the schools where I occasionally sub, and whose rent was almost too good to be true. That house.

WHY?! This house has been on the market for YEARS, literally YEARS, and nobody has bought it. It has had one set of renters. ONE. Maybe they're asking too much to buy it, maybe people don't want a house that was built in 1819 (I think that was when it was....), but for whatever reason the house has been on the market for years. I repeat. YEARS. Now that we both have jobs (yes - this was going to be a MICHAEL GOT A JOB HIP HIP HOORAY! post, but now the happy has to share with the angry) we can most probably make the amount we'll need in around six weeks. Possibly more, but not much more. And then we could have it, have our own house (ish), and once again be out on our own. Except that they're showing it. And today, as I was driving home I saw that they are clearing some shrubbery and giving the sides a major scrub down. Because the Universe hates me THAT much, that it would dangle this house for the entire summer, allow it to stay unoccupied the entire time we are unemployed, and then -- six weeks before we can make it -- take it away.

Six. Weeks. The freaking thing has to stay unoccupied for roughly six more weeks. After that many years, can't it wait a little bit longer?

And while I'm whining, why can't I get a job?? Why do people (even people who specifically TOLD somebody to tell me to email them and remind them who I am) ignore my "please hire me" emails?

I'm taking the Social Studies GACE this weekend, because I gave up on getting a job based solely on my sheer love for the subject and profession itself (because for some reason that's not enough). I've been studying for the past couple of weeks, and I still have no idea what to expect from this test. I have a feeling I've been studying the wrong thing and am about to waste almost $100 on failing.

And, while I'm still whining, regarding Michael's job: I am so, so, so, excited that he has one -- and this one is even a good fit for him! It's relevant to what he did last year, similar machinery, and should be enjoyable for him. But I don't know how his first day went, because I don't get to talk to him about it. I kind of feel like I will never get to talk to him again, until weekends, because we now have complimentary hours -- in a way that doesn't remotely compliment anything. I'm coming home as he's leaving. I'm going to bed as he's getting home. I'm waking up while he's passing through one of many REM cycles for the night. We don't even have a minute of overlap.

And the house. Six. Weeks.

Say it with me.

OH, COME ON!

Keep on pushing, Sisyphus.

Just Keep Swimming

I should write more. I don't know what happens, really. At the end of the day, driving home, I always think of brilliant, witty, insightful things I want to write on here and then I get home and.... Crash. Being someone else's teacher for the day is pretty draining sometimes, but it shouldn't be enough to wipe my short-term memory. Maybe all the pressure I put on myself to work EVERY DAY and have money to pay for crap takes up all my brainspace. Let me clarify something. I'm not whining about having to work every day. I WANT to work every day. But as a substitute, it's possible on Friday that the following week's calendar will be totally blank, and you just have to hope someone has a reason to stay home those days and that they call you. Being a substitute is a little like being a vulture.

As it happens, I HAVE managed to book my week. Next week has one little star on it (I put stars on days I work, so that one day when I look at my month at a glance it will look like the night sky. And I will be content), but that's it so far. Even though, for the most part, I have gotten called every day, it's still stressful going to bed and just hoping you'll do something with monetary gain the next day. That being said...

October is a landmarkedly awesome month. And do you know why? October (which, despite it not being the month of my birth has always been my favorite) is the first month that I get to... *drum roll* ... let's make this super dramatic....

PAY ALL MY BILLS ON MY OWN!!! Yeeessssss!!! Yeah, because sometimes even after graduate school you still have to have parentals and kind strangers (note: I have taken no money from kind strangers) in your corner to bail you out with the unemployment lasts a liiiittle too long. Like it did. But now, behold, for I have deposited my FIRST PAYCHECK!!

It wasn't actually as much as I was expecting. Freaking taxes. You mentally account for them, but it always, always feels like they take more from you. Boo, hiss, fairtax, please?

Before this gets too political, I'm going to end it here with this last little tidbit. Things are actually going pretty well and seem to be looking up somewhat. Lots of sub work, some long-term stuff on the horizon, and still running job searches and sending out "please hire me" letters every chance I get. I feel like I get progressively better at my "please hire me" letters, but, oddly enough, I never get any more hired.

Oh. And, because it totally deserves an update: Ferris has mastered the hallway. He now follows us into every room upstairs, freely and without reservation. The stairs are another story. In a related story, sightings of the resident animals upstairs have become increasingly less frequent.

A true champion