Counting My Blessings: Thanksgiving 2014 Edition

I was looking through my old blog post drafts when I found this list of things I was grateful for that I wrote on Thanksgiving 2014.

1. My gorgeous sloth hat, which an awesome friend of mine crocheted for me. It made for an excellent first-day-of-school surprise! I'm grateful that I have such amazing friends, and that it is finally sloth hat weather!

2. My awesome new shirts! (The other one is the exaxt same, just a size larger.) I'm grateful that my family is just affluent enough to afford $14 shirts, but just poor enough that I can appreciate them.

3. This lovely scarf, as modeled by the bunny bank that has served me well since I was 6 (Thanks, Grandma and Grandpa!). My grandmother, Grambee, crocheted this scarf for me so I would remember her. After her death, I treasured the card that came with it even more greatly:

The card reads:

Dear Lydia,

   I made this scarf for you. It can be for your age now - and even when you have grown up.

   I want you to know and remember when you wear this scarf that your Grambee loves you and is proud of you!

Love,

Grambee

4. All my Anne of Green Gables books, from the most well-loved to the brand new. I'm grateful for my dad for exposing me to such great books.

5. My cat. If dog is a man's best friend, cat is a woman's best friend. She makes a great cuddle buddy, and she has a certain amount of disdain for humanity, which I appreciate.

6. What I lovingly refer to as "my little Kindle-1". It does what it was made to do exceptionally well: allow me to read books. I am grateful for my mom, the steward of the Amazon account, for choosing it for me. (Although I'm sure my dad had something to do with it as well...)

7. Tea!!! I recently discovered how amazing tea is, and now I have to resist the temptation to drink it all the time. Here is the jellyfish version of one of my friends, who also appreciates tea (much more than I do, actually) and whom I am very grateful for:

...and the draft ends abruptly. To be honest, I haven't changed all that much in the past three years. I hope that you are doing well, and that you have lots to be grateful for. 

Best wishes,

Lydia

A Few Poems by 15-Year-Old Lydia

I am debating about whether to post some bunch of emotionally intense poetry I wrote recently. In the meantime, here are a bunch of rondelets I wrote in tenth grade, exactly as I emailed them to my poetry teacher. 

Felicia

My cat is soft.

She wakes me up hoping for food.

My cat is soft.

I have yarn balls she loves to loft.

Although she is often quite rude

(For she is always in the nude),

My cat is soft.

Izzy*

Izzy is dead.

I listened to her for too long.

Izzy is dead.

I made her play too many songs,

Yet I feel I've done nothing wrong.

Izzy is dead.

*V. Important Note: Izzy is my iPod. I don't kill people by making them sing to me.

 Failure

Why can't I write

Poems that sing of truth and life?

Why can't I write?

Finding words is a constant fight.

I can't describe a writer's strife

Or a man's search for a good wife.

Why can't I write?

Please Explain

I saw your eyes

Glancing my way from time to time. 

I saw your eyes, 

But let pursed lips be my disguise. 

Even though I know it's not a crime,

And though the party was sublime,

I saw your eyes.

(This is why Lydia avoids writing poems about other people. Also, obviously the person I'm referring to in 2nd person isn't you.)

Laziness

I am lazy,

After a day full of deep thoughts.

I am lazy

After my life has gotten too crazy. 

In my life I have always sought

For somewhere I could sleep a lot.

I am lazy.

The Lord's Name in Vain (A Controversial Poem)

God, I'm sorry

For the words I said; I didn't think.

God, I'm sorry,

For you my eyes don't grow starry.

I meant to say my sister stinks,

But I said you without a blink.

God, I'm sorry. 

Seed Seeks Roots

In May, I graduated from the school I had attended since sixth grade. I had deep, longstanding roots at that school.

In times of companionship, those roots were like the healthy roots that allow a sprout to become a tree. They allowed me to surpass my own expectations and grow in the general direction of the person I want to become.

In times of distress, those roots were like the destructive roots of an overgrown tomato plant. After a few years, reinvention felt impossible. The crippling jaws of history left me trapped in the same social patterns year after year.

After graduation, I was ready to escape from the roots that had enabled and trapped my high school self. In college, I could reinvent myself, unbound by my personal history.

I don't have any roots here. However, I cannot claim that I am unchained. My inhibitions, anxieties, timidity, and personality ensnare me in patterns of loneliness and self-doubt.

Still, I am never overlooked. There is always someone ready to greet me by name with a big smile. I can sit with complete strangers at meals and feel welcome.

This shallow impression of companionship doesn't satisfy me. I am tired of gathering factoids. Nothing short of deep personal connections will satisfy me. I don't want to consider loneliness an ineradicable fact of my life.

In short, I want roots. Without roots, courage is nearly impossible. If you are going to jump off the highest diving board without knowing how to swim, you need to know and trust the people who are waiting to catch you.

I am no longer the deeply rooted plant that was my past self. Instead, I am a seed.

For a seed, growing roots is a risky business. If seeds could think, I suppose they would think that they would always be seeds. "Why would I become something bigger?" the seed might wonder. "I'm already a seed!" Like the seed, I will have to abandon the carefully constructed visage that previously enabled and constrained me.

I can't imagine our thinking seed feeling any shame about being a seed. The seed doesn't know anything else. It doesn't think "Gee, what could I do in order to grow roots?". Instead, the seed relaxes and naturally eases into the growing of roots. A true thinking seed would never feel the need to write this blog post; having never felt the tug of roots, it would never miss them. I must embrace being a seed in order to become a plant.

To become a plant, a seed must allow itself to be affected by the elements. A seed cannot say "I will not allow the water and sunshine and soil quality to affect me at all whatsoever" and expect to grow successfully. Instead, it must welcome the outside influences that change it from its original form. In the same way, I cannot pretend to be unaffected by the influences that surround me. When growing roots, it is okay to be sensitive, rather than trying to be tough. 

Honestly, I don't know anything about being a seed. Before today, I awkwardly stumbled through the seed phases of my life in the race towards plantdom. The tangled roots that ensnared me were the consequence of my lack of mindfulness. This time, I will try to enjoy the seed stage before I forget what it is like to be unbounded.

Biting Mshen: On This Day in 2004

Here is a first grade journal entry I wrote about my sister. She is absolutely awesome, despite her sharp teeth!

Transcription:
December 15, 2004
When I am on vkashon I play whif my siser. I love her a lot. She is a baby. She is a biting mshen. And osow she is a pinching mshen. When my dad is at work she sings for him. 

Translation:
December 15, 2004
When I am on vacation, I play with my sister. I love her a lot. She is a baby. She is a biting machine. And also she is a pinching machine. When my dad is at work she sings for him. 

Analysis:
Firstly, I would like to point out that "biting" and "pinching" were two of the only 'big' words I could spell back then, which must mean something. Secondly, the event indicated in the line "When my dad is at work she sings for him" was absolutely adorable. She would stand by the door, singing ballads wishing that he would come home. When he finally did come home, she would launch herself at him with open arms and cling to him like a baby monkey. :)

I hope you enjoyed this blog post!
<3 Lydia 

I Love My Famaly: On This Day in 2004

Here is something I wrote on this day when I was in first grade. I am including a translation (in case you don't speak first grader) and some analysis after my transcription of the journal entry.

Transcription:
December 3, 2004
I love my famaly. Every pirsin in the world has a famaly. If sumwun dusint have a family is trdle. Do You Love Your famaly? Dus Your famaly Love You? I hope You Love Your famaly a lot. Last nite I played scrambl wif my mom and dad I love my htle

Translation: 
December 3, 2004
I love my family. Every person in the world has a family. If someone doesn't have a family, that is trouble. Do you love your family? Does your family love you? I hope you love your family a lot. Last night I played Scrabble with my mom and dad. I love my little [sister?].

Analysis:
I love that I chose to use words that I (mostly) knew how to spell in this entry. I don't think current me would ever ask so many questions of a stranger reading my family. Like, "Hi! It's so great to meet you! My name is Lydia. Do you love your family? Does your family love you? I hope you love your family!".

I hope you enjoyed this post! 
<3 Lydia

Thakfle: On This Day in 2004

Hello! This is a journal entry I wrote on this day when I was in first grade, just before Thanksgiving rolled around. I'm going to transcribe the email as written first, and then provide a translation in case you can't read first-grader speak. I hope you like it!

November 24, 2004
I am sa m thle for my famaly and my frind's and my mom and dad and my toys and m

I am thankfle for my famaly. Becuse thay feed me. , my frind Bcuse they play wif me. I am takefle for my mom too. Becuse she thak's care of me., my toy's Becuse they are the best sege to intrest my baby sisr.

Translation:
November 24, 2004
I am so thankful for my family and my friends and my mom and dad and my toys and my...

I am thankful for my family, because they feed me, my friends because they play with me. I am thankful for my mom too, because she takes care of me. My toys because they are the best thing to interest my baby sister.

Analysis:
First of all, I would like to take note that spell check went crazy in that second unedited paragraph. Secondly, did you notice that I just booted my mom out of my family? Like, I said I was thankful for my family, then talked about my friends, and then I was like "Oh, by the way, I am thankful for my mom too!". Also, why aren't I thankful for my dad, my sister, or my pets? I remember being very thankful for those things in addition to my toys and mom. Additionally, did you notice that my toys were only referenced in relation to my sister? Do you know why? It was because I didn't really care much for my toys. Or, at least not as much as I cared about my dad, my sister, and my pets...

I don't know. My first grade self had her priorities pretty messed up.
<3 Lydia

A Letter to My Eighth Grade Self

Dear Past Self (circa eighth grade),
   Hi! This is you, in your (our?) senior year of high school. You made it! No, you were not held back multiple times like you expected. In fact, you even continued your education at the same slightly-snobby liberal arts school you started out at. 
   You know that one friendship you don't want to destroy, but also don't want to be miserable in? You will end up destroying it and breaking her heart. Sorry. But do not despair! After deciding that you don't deserve friendship for awhile in tenth grade, you will (very slowly) begin to develop new friendships and rejuvenate old friendships. You haven't even met some of your future friends yet.
   I know you are wondering about some things. Yes, you will be reunited with your history project friends (although not all of them will remain your friends). The leader of your grade will be restored to her throne. Your senior play is amazing so far. Yes, you will get an important role. No, you are not a terrible actor and yes, you will improve significantly.
   While I have your attention, a note on crushes: you will actually be totally fine if you don't end up dating anyone anytime soon. Trust me on this. You do not need some random guy in your class (who is definitely not interested in you by the way) to fall in love with you in order to be amazing. (Your future self is a bit of a feminist. Come to think of it, so is one of the guys you will like this year. He wouldn't approve, and neither do I.)

Please remember:

• Grambee's laugh
• that trying to be just a little bit happy is more beautiful than the poetic angst of being sad
• to actually try hard in all of your classes (Don't even try to tell me that you're trying your best. I have seen your useless internet browsing. I have written every note you passed in Latin class.)
• that amazing, supportive, and fun people are always around if you seek them out

Lots of love,

Your Future Self

A Blast from the Past: Sophomore Year

Today, I want to do something a little bit different. Recently, I looked back at my planner from sophomore year and found all sorts of wonderful little snippets. I hereby present to you...Lydia's Sophomore Year.

Stickers and jellyfishes=a fairly typical overly-decorated planner page. Highlights include "Boris: The Tortoise that Just Keeps on Trekking' and "What if soy milk is just regular milk introducing itself in Spanish?".

More stickers! Highlights include "Put your heart in the art"  (I think my choir teacher said this.) and "'I don't steal dreams; I crush them'", which is a direct quote from one of my friends. (My friends are so great, you guys. Like, you don't even understand.)

Highlights of this page include "Es un buen idea le haces la tarea el tiempo primero" ("It is a good idea for you to do the homework the first time") and a really long quote from Hobbes' Leviathan (I thought I was so deep.)

A quote from one of my classmates from when we were studying European history.

I have a weird way of dealing with stress. In 10th grade, this weird way included putting pictures of babes in my planner.

A tribute to Valentine's Day! I made the sticker using an image of fireworks from a magazine. The slip of paper reading "I wanna hold your heart in both hands" was found near the middle school boys' locker area at my school. The bottom image is a Princess Leia made out of balloons that I cut out from a magazine. 

If anyone ever makes a documentary about my life, I want these words to be used for the opening sequence.

There was this one time when I took a really intense history-based final with a lot of short answer and essay questions. After passing in my final, I played a game of Tic-Tac-Toe with the person next to me. Notable details include the cats I drew over the Tic-Tac-Toe boxes to indicate when it was a cats' game. 

In my sophomore year, I didn't just focus on doing homework, making stickers, and writing down goofy things people said. I also worked on self-improvement quite a bit. Here is a list of short-term life goals I found: 

This list of goals is interspersed with advice from my classmates; at one point during the year, we had a really long Facebook comment discussion that turned to giving me helpful life advice. I'm proud to say that I have finally completed most of these "short-term" life goals. 

I came into my sophomore year thinking that it was going to be the best year of my life. Um...it wasn't. Still, it was one of the years where I grew the most as a person and as a student. Although I struggled through the year at some points, I became a better person as a result. Thank you to all the people who made sophomore year amazing! You are wonderful. 

~Lydia

The Very Funny Bear: On This Day in 2005

Some of you may have seen this one on my Facebook, but I feel like it deserves to exist here anyway. This is a short story I wrote in my first grade journal on this day in 2005. I hope you enjoy it!

Transcription:
May 16, 2005
The Very Funny Bear
The bear is very funny. His name is John the Bear. I like him a lot. He is eating the little girl. Isin't the girl cute. He is selesh. You can't beleve all the things he eats. His wifes name is Sera Bear. She is funny too. When they fight they have funny fights. When they dance they do a funny dance. When they sing a song its a funny song. They are relly funny. And I like funny.
By
Lydia

The journal entry was written based upon this picture:

 

Analysis:
I would like to start by quoting the commentary I wrote when I posted this on my Facebook: "And I was beginning to wonder why I tend to befriend funny people (with weird senses of humor) and poor spelling". Additionally, I would like to point out that my little six-year-old brain went for the most violent route possible, rather than choosing the equally rational interpretation that the little girl was brushing the bear's teeth. I also made him a selfish bear who I strangely found funny. I don't know what exactly first grade Lydia was thinking...

<3 Lydia

An Icy Confession

I have a pure, unadulterated love for Disney's Frozen.

There, I said it.

This results in a surprising amount of problems, such as:

1.  a visceral negative reaction the moment I realize that someone likes Frozen because "Olaf's so cute".
2. feeling sad that Olaf stole the show, when Kristoff and Sven are obviously better.
3. getting really offended whenever anyone says "Elsa's so mean". Even if I really don't care what that person thinks on a regular basis, I want to say "Hey, that's me you're talking about!" because Elsa's relationship with Anna closely represents my relationship with my own sister.
4. wondering when people got tired of listening to and singing along with the Frozen soundtrack.
5. resenting Tangled for somehow, inexplicably, being fairly universally considered better than Frozen by most of my friend group.

Basically, my love for Frozen turns me into an antisocial monster most of the time. However, sometimes it is wonderful, such as:

1. when someone gets stuck partway through singing Frozen, and I can help BECAUSE I SPENT WAY TOO MUCH TIME MEMORIZING ALL THE LYRICS!!
2. being interested in something everyone else knows about for once. (I have to shove books from the Anne of Green Gables series at people in order to "find" other people who are familiar with Lucy Maud Montgomery's work.)
3. being able to instantly make myself happy by listening to a little bit of music.
4. knowing that there is always more merchandise I can purchase {especially considering the fact that somehow the only Frozen stuff I own is the soundtrack ):}.
5. experiencing the lovely drawing challenge that is attempting to draw Frozen characters. 

So, there's my confession. Many thanks to the Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, who composed the soundtrack for the film (and thus are indirectly the reasons why this post exists). Here's a jellyfish to describe how the music makes me feel:

Best wishes!

Lydia

 

Short-Term Life Goals (Mid-April 2015)

Hi! I just realized that I haven't posted anything on this blog in forever. (Oh my goodness, I am so sorry; life has been crazy, and I have been trying to read like seven books at the same time and it hasn't been working.) Anyway, another thing that has fallen off the deep end has been my short-term life goals, so I decided to write some and post them here.

What are short-term life goals, you ask? Here's an infographic to help you out.

 

Now, with no further adieu, here are mine.

1. Complete all homework, every night. Really, how hard can this be?
2. Get a decent amount of sleep every night. At least 7 hours would be nice.
3. Respond to emails within 48 hours (provided that a response is necessary).
4. Write in philosophy journal at least once a week. I'm trying to use a Plato-inspired pre-sleep routine every night if I can finish it by 11 PM. As I wrote in said philosophy journal, "I need to be on my philosophy A-game right now". (It isn't a very serious philosophy journal.)
5. Update my blog at least twice monthly. (Remember to PLAN AHEAD!!)
6. Have at least one actual conversation daily. (Rather than eavesdropping on participating in other people's actual conversations and making non-committal agreement sounds while people talk to me.
7. Draw more jellyfishes.
8. Research future opportunities for a little bit of time every weekend.

I guess that's about it for now!

Best wishes,
Lydia

Frogs: On This Day in 2005

I wrote this story in my first grade journal on this day in 2005. Before you read this story, I would like you to look at this picture I drew to accompany it: 

Can you tell what this is? What sort of story would you expect to go with it? Now, on to the story:

Transcription:

January 31, 2005

The boy snuck the frogs in his backpack. Then, before she got to her desk he pote the frogs in her scool box. When she got to her desk she opened her scool box and she screemed. She hats him. And he hates her.

Analysis (I didn't think much translation was needed here): 

Isn't that such a sweet, original story? Not only does it include the theme of hate, it also seems to be fairly directly based upon Matilda (Roald Dahl) and possibly Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery). In Matilda, the title character and her best friend Amber plot revenge against the evil school principal by hiding a salamander in one of their school boxes and putting it in the principal's water pitcher. In Anne of Green Gables, Anne hates Gilbert, and, in the eyes of a young listener, Gilbert hates Anne as well. Oh, well. I guess you have to start somewhere...

<3 Lydia

The Moosey Christmas

Hello! It's Christmas Eve, which means it's time for "The Moosey Christmas", a story that I wrote on Christmas Eve (or Christmas Eve Eve--I'm not 100% sure) when I was nine. So, with no further ado, here it is, in all its unedited glory:

    Once apon a time there lived a moose with green and red striped socks on his antlers. He wanted to be a reindeer, and those socks were the best he could do to be Chrismasy. He really wished he could just ask Santa to be a reindeer.   

    Finally, he got his courage and asked Santa for him to hire him as a reindeer. Santa was delighted because he needed a reindeer hired. So, that Chrismas each child got a moose stuffed animal and an illaminated sign that said "Moosey Reindeer was here". Merry Chrismas, Santa.

This was written while we had guests at our house, in a few intense moments of thought. On Christmas day, my uncle typed up my story and helped me to pick out clip art images to make it into a book. I was very surprised to discover that there were clip art images of a moose wearing red and green striped socks. 

Merry Christmas! (I was going to include all the holidays, but I ran out of room. So, happy whatever-holiday-you-celebrate!)
<3 Lydia

Coming Soon...

I have been working on blog stuff a lot today. In case you haven't noticed, I will point out to you that this blog happens to have a new header (with a Lydia jellyfish, Priscilla the jellyfish, and a George Fox jellyfish) and a new background. The header was made using a template from Shabby Blogs, an awesome website with lots of blog-decorating goodies, and the background comes directly from Shabby Blogs.

I have also started typing up things I wrote when I was younger. Those blog posts are on a timer so that they will be automatically posted at 12:30 PM on the dates they were originally written in late 2014 or 2015. This is an ongoing project that I hope will: 
1. showcase some funny and/or interesting things I wrote when I was younger
2. give my blog enough pre-written material that I don't have to worry when life gets crazy and I don't have the time to write new blog posts. 

Since I haven't finished this project yet, I can't give you all the blog post dates, but here are the ones I have so far:

• January 31, 2015: Frogs (a journal entry I wrote in 2005, when I was in 1st grade)
• May 16, 2015: The Very Funny Bear (another 1st grade journal entry)
• November 24, 2015: Thakfle (yet another first grade journal entry)
• December 3, 2015: I Love My Famaly (Can you guess?)
• December 15, 2015: Biting Mshen (ditto)

I'll try to inform you of these when they roll around, but in case I don't, you can always check back here and see if they've been posted yet.

Best wishes!
Lydia

Quaker Stuff!

I've been meaning to post some Quaker stuff on here for a while, but I've avoided it until now because:
1. I don't want to alienate people who aren't Quaker, and thus won't understand this post.
2. For some reason, I made up my mind that it was necessary to answer the all-important question of whether or not to tag all my Quaker(ish) friends when I put the blog post on Facebook before making the post in the first place. (My brain is sort of obsessive and weird sometimes.) 

Anyway, I finally decided to just go ahead and make the post. This was largely because I started to get worried that if I waited too long, all the friends I wanted to share this stuff with would have forgotten about me. Here's how I imagine the internet conversation going down:

Me: Hey, Friend! I thought you might like to look at some of this cool Quaker stuff I found!
My friend: Who are you?
Me: Don't you remember me? We...were friends? I was in your small group/cabin/meeting/other gathering place? I think I was your secret friend once?
My friend: And where was this exactly?
Me: Quaker camp/Quaker meeting
My friend: Wait, how do you know what religion I am/was?
Me: BECAUSE WE WERE FRIENDS!!!! DON'T YOU KNOW WHAT FRIENDS ARE??
My friend: Okay, maybe we were friends. Is your real name ___?
Me: No, it's Lydia.
My friend: Are you sure you aren't ___?
Me: Nope, pretty sure I know my own name, and it's Lydia.
My friend: Okay, whatever. If we were friends, what did we do together.
Me (getting excited): Oh, we sung songs and played games and talked about our lives and did worship sharing together and wrote affirmations of each other. All sorts of things!
My friend: Um...okay. Anything specific?
Me: [insert super specific example of a thing my friend did here]
My friend: How do you know that?
Me: BECAUSE I WAS THERE!!!
My friend: Listen, if you don't stop messaging me, I'm going to the police.
Me: Okay, fine. I give up. Bye.

So, to avoid making future-Lydia very sad, I'm making this post now. Anyways, a while back I read Quaking by Kathryn Erskine. The book follows a goth girl who moves in with a Quaker family. The book itself was pretty good, with a plot that was nice but sort of cheesy. However, what really blew me away were Erskine's hilarious quotes about Quakerism. Here are the ones I found worth copying down (with occasional notes from me in italics):

• "Quakers? Excuse me? I thought Quakers were extinct...I am not even sure it's a religion. Maybe it's a commune. Or a disease." (p. 2-3)
• "Sam and Jessica look at each other again. They do this a lot. I believe it is Quaker-speak. Or they are aliens." (p.8) #totallyanalien should be a thing.
• "'First, I will need to learn Quaker-speak,' I point out. 'You people communicate telepathically. I believe you are an alien race.' They laugh as if I am joking." (p. 33)
• "Chuck smiles. 'I think we need 'Walk in the Light''.  Oh, barf! What a name! This is going to be one of those weepy, old lady hymns where voices will start warbling and tears will flow and I will get depressed by the melody alone." (p. 88) This is the song she is referring to (fast forward to 2:24):
• "Meeting has begun. And it is freezing in this place. Heat must not be a Quaker testimony." (p. 91) Seriously, though. Seeing as I live in the midst of the Sonoran desert, it isn't too much of a problem, but when someone goes to turn down the air conditioner, it's trouble.

One of my favorite things about talking to other people who are my age and are Quakers/affiliated in some way with Quakerism is how many similar experiences we have. This feeling is captured by the Quaker Probs Tumblr.  Basically, the site consists of a bunch of memes with a picture of George Fox rolling his eyes and a funny Quaker problem. (If you have any Quaker connections at all and you haven't seen these, what are you doing here? Go! Click on the link! I know you can do it! We can wait!) Also, this video about how Earlham students came up with the site is pretty cool too: http://quakerspeak.com/quaker-problems/. 

Okay, I guess that's about it. I hope you enjoyed this post and that you have a very happy holiday season! 

Best wishes, 

Lydia

6 Rules for Talking to Me About Books

I'm officially sick. I hate colds. With a fever, you get the pleasure of keeping track of how sick you are via thermometer and experiencing the weird daydream-y feeling that comes with a fever. Colds are just miserable. Currently, my nose refuses to shut up, and nothing seems to help.
   Cold or no cold, I really wanted to make a post this weekend but I never got around to it. So, here is my advice for talking to me about books:
 
1. If you don't like to read, just say so. (Although you should be prepared for me to ask why and recommend books that would be good for someone who didn't like to read.) There is nothing more annoying than having a conversations with someone who says they like to read, but doesn't seem to have read anything in their life. 

2. If you say you like a genre, you should actually be able to list a couple books you enjoyed from that genre. If someone understands why anyone would ever do this, please enlighten me. If you say you like horror, but you can't list a single horror book you have ever enjoyed, I'm going to doubt your integrity. It's even worse if the only book you can come up with is Twilight...   

3. If you like Twilight, that's fine. If the only book you have ever enjoyed is Twilight, that is not fine. Of all the books you could truly enjoy, I guess Twilight isn't the worst. I mean, if you took Lolita (a book about an oldish man being in love with a 15-year-old girl, which I've never actually read) or Mein Kampf (Hitler's autobiography, which I also haven't read) as a model for how to live your life, I would definitely prefer that you choose to idolize Twilight. HOWEVER, please, please make a point to read and enjoy at least one other book before talking to me about books.

4. If you happen to go to my school, don't say that you don't have time to read books because you have to study. You're welcome to say "I haven't been able to read much lately, because I've been really busy". However, please realize that when you say you don't read because you have to study, you are implying that I do not study. I do, in fact, study. I hope you realize that.

5. Please tell me what sort of books you like. Especially if you have been talking for a few minutes about how much you like to read. In the words of Davy from Anne of the Island, "I wanna know".

6. If I read you a passage from A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith) at least try to like it. It's my favorite book (not to be confused with my favorite series or my favorite author), and it would mean a lot to me if you appeared to enjoy it. 

 

Have a nice day!

❤ Lydia

(I apologize for the brutal honesty of this post.)

Questions My Future Decision-Making Team Will Have to Answer Lickety-Split

1. Is it okay/a good idea to show someone a jellyfish version I drew of them? Does it change if that person is a guy? Or if the jellyfish is an apology gift to someone I'm not close friends with? The possible variations on this question are endless...

2. Could you explain this joke to me? I pretended to get it a few years back, but I still don't. [...] What about this one?

3. Is it bad that this is the Pride and Prejudice quote that best describes my life?:

"I certainly have not the talent which some people possess," said Darcy, "of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done."

4. What song best describes me? Is that a good thing?

5. Would it be totally inappropriate to ask people to explain their actions? Like, "Why do you always talk to me as if you are a cat? It's...um...unnerving."

6. How do I know if I'm a horrible person or not? Am I a horrible person?

7. Which college should I go to? Can I get in? How do I choose?

8. Am I wasting my/your life? Sorry...

Best wishes!
Lydia