Have we Always Competed?

At a very young age, I learned that failure, while upsetting, was necessary.  It was learned quickly in a family of five children with five cousins on one side.  I learned to wear masks because of the competitions.  Even in a small town, I was always competing for any scrap of recognition.  Today, I've stopped caring about getting recognition.  I only want acknowledgement of the fact that yes, my words were heard.  I don't care if it's only by my dog.  Does this mean I don't make attempts to be acknowledged?  No, it just means I'm less likely to make a fuss if I don't get what I want or don't win.

There are things that I've ignored over the years that maybe I should have grit my teeth and stood fast about.  There are events that I did well at, but as soon as I started to gain attention for them, I, as I think back on those times, believe I may have self-sabotaged them.  I made it to regional spelling bee, but knowing we would never afford the expenses and feeling self-conscious about being on a stage in front of numerous people I didn't know, I screwed up on spelling the word frugal.  I was in sixth grade and the likelihood of me being in a spelling bee ever again was nonexistent.  Did I want to win?  Yes.  Why did I misspell frugal?  I had never seen the word before. (Never saw the word mutton but spelled it just fine.)  I had wished to locate where my family were sitting in the audience before I misspelled a word.  Yes, I had a very defeatist attitude, but it's only enforced by the number of times my family would ignore or discard things regarding myself.  I became accustomed to not getting what I wanted.

I became accustomed to being the scapegoat because everyone else would spin the story just right that I had no recourse but to accept my allotment.  I recently spent time with my mother and it was brought up, once again, an old event that maybe shouldn't have happened on my end, but a key piece of information was always left out by my siblings.  I'm always remembered to be the one chasing after my brother with a hammer.  I got in trouble for it.  When my mom brought it up this time, I couldn't hold back.  I raged in my short explosive burst of a rage about that every forgets that he was chasing one of my sister's first.  My mom had a quick reply.  "I was never told about this."  My response?  "Yeah, well everyone always forgets that part don't they?"  She was quiet until we were searching for the location we were heading to.

Am I bitter about that event?  Of course.  I get in trouble for chasing my brother with a hammer - never hit him with it, wasn't even indicating that I would.  When a few years later I'm hit in the back of the head by him with a cast iron skillet, there was no outcry.  Worry was almost nonexistent and once again I was reminded that I was at the bottom of the pole when it came to my place within the family.  Like I said, there has always got to be a loser.

We have a need to be needed and wanted, but also to prove ourselves as better or smarter than someone else.  It's not always grand but sometimes when I think back to my childhood, I wonder if things would have been different if I'd have lived with my father or actually gone through with my runaway attempts.  Trust me, I thought about escaping my family in numerous ways and even started to plan said escapes, but never went through.  I never truly tried.  In several ways I did a disservice to myself.  However, I could never forgive myself if I had somehow failed those who were truly counting on me.  The ones who needed me to fail so they could do better.  The ones who needed someone to play the sheltered, naive, smart kid who was the target for verbal bullying.  I went with the flow a lot, but there were times where I stopped and said not this time.

Sadly, those times were few and far between.  Now, I don't worry about upsetting so-called family, mine or my husband's (and yes, this pisses him off to no end.  Seriously, we avoid the two, TWO, extended family events that my family has, but you expect me to call off work for every single one of yours?  Nope, not happening.  That's a minimum three events.  And it's only been in the last couple of years, not the last five like he claimed.).  I stopped trying to figure out what would make them happy.  I think I may have stopped caring even.  I don't worry about holding myself back, at least not too much, but I'm still working on knowing who I am and what exactly I want.  What I'm still willing to put up with and what I need to speak up about not putting up with anymore.

What about you?  Were you a winner or scapegoat?  It's not bad letting others win, just make certain that you find something that matters to you that you don't budge on.  Let the things that don't matter to you slide, but hold fast to the things you feel strongly about.  It's not a bad idea to take a step back or to make a decision to make them work for things.  Family should be those who care about you, not those whom are constantly tearing you down with nothing to help build you back up.

Halloween Memories of Costumes

Happy Halloween! Yes, today is my favorite holiday, and while I have to work and live in an apartment where I can't hand out any treats because no one ever comes to apartments...I will enjoy the intensity that I have of years past.

There are a few things though that I keep thinking of. First, in the last twenty-odd years I've been alive, have I ever been worn out by Halloween? Yes. After my mother moved us half an hour away from the small town that her parents lived near, I was...tired. I can't say that as a fifth grader I was depressed (though sometimes I wonder if I could be considered as being depressed) but I remember I didn't have the spark to dress up that my friends and siblings had...In fact, as I think back, I don't think I ever really got excited before high school about dressing up as anything really. Being a princess and queen were easy costumes. I believe I have posted earlier about having siblings.

I think I tried to use Halloween to try to separate myself from the others. I used to justify my distancing of things I enjoyed and could have been a huge fanatic of by the fact that even in kindergarten I knew better than to ask about anything dealing with money. I learned quickly to just go with the flow of things and let numerous things slide. Whenever I look back, I realize that I ended up hurting myself. When the Power Rangers first came out, I loved Trini. She was the first female in a show that I wanted to know more about. Don't get me wrong. I loved Belle, but I wasn't always a fan of the story. I always felt something was missing (and my youngest two siblings playing it every time we put a movie it did not help. Watching it over and over I don't know how many times in one day...I still cringe a little when I think about watching Disney's version.) but could never place what it was.

Anyway, I remember that year as the first one I actively decided not to get dressed up for Halloween until a friend convinced me that I was dressed up as Curly Sue. Thus, it began. I started pulling off easy costumes. In fact, I pulled off Blair and Jo from Facts of Life one year. I wore a suit and hair down, at least until I got annoyed with my hair flowing around my face. Then I just pulled my hair off and had the jacket slung over my shoulder. But as I think back, yes I love Halloween. Some of the costumes I've worn? Not so much.

Let's see...I know I've been a princess. My mother had this rule, though. If you've been it before, you had to do something else. There've been a number of years I've done a witch, but they've mostly been after my mother stopped enforcing the same costume rule. I've been a Christmas tree, onion, one of the sleeping kids from the story about the littlest one shoving them out of the bed, a sorceress, a gypsy, an enchantress, Jasmine, and this year I'm doing Lydia Deetz from Beetlejuice. There's more that I just can't seem to place, but these are the ones that stick out in my mind as I think back on them. The gypsy costume was the last one I wore in South Carolina. It's also the only one I can remember from when we lived there.

If I had gotten to go as what I wanted I can guarantee I would have been more excited but when the costumes had to be made using what we could find at home, I didn't get excited by the dress up. Hope your dressing up as what you want this year, and planning to have an awesomely scary Halloween.

Have you had crazy costumes in the past? Leave a comment about them or some that you wish you could have pulled off. Like I wish I could have pulled of Trini, that was one I really wanted as a kid. I've also wanted to pull off Hermione(back when the Harry Potter books first came out) and Cimorene(from Patricia C. Wrede's Enchanted Forest books.) I've been a vampire before, too, though I couldn't stand the taste of fake blood.

Anyway have a happy, scary, safe, and treat-filled night tonight for Halloween! Oh, and don't forget about Daylight Savings tonight. Turn the clocks back one hour (this occurs officially at 2am, but most do this before going to bed, or after getting up, depending on if they have to work or be somewhere by a certain time the next day.)

Hallow-WHAT? Why Halloween is loved by all, or at least most...

Halloween.  All Hallow's Eve.  Samhain.  All of them occur on October 31.  They are all based or happen to be a celebration of the dead.  Samhain is the Wiccan New Year's Eve.  The end of the previous year.  A start of the dead season.  All Hallow's Eve later became Halloween thanks to making it easier to say.

Why is it so popular though?  The month of October becomes a tribute to the scary, creepy, and unholy.  Things that go bump in the night become the stars of the month and if you can terrify your friends - bonus points!  It's the only time you really get away with terrifying complete strangers.  It's the only time that you can expect to have nightmares after getting candy.

Speaking of candy, that's only the best thing about it for the kids.  Well, maybe not all of them, however, houses don't just give out candy.  They give away toys, cereal, school supplies, rings, apples, caramel apples, and the list continues.  It's not always the small stuff either.  Sometimes they give away the really big candy bars, you know, the share size packages that you only find at the gas station and your mom, dad, or other parental/guardian unit refused.  Yep, those are handed out to the kids.

These kids and sometimes (usually) their parents (because who wants to disappoint their young by refusing this fun pastime?) are dressed in some costume.  Now an episode of So Weird? from the Disney Channel (back when they actually played the series) actually had a town that did this every Halloween because of a pact with the local dead.  All the Phillips gang had to do to keep from being taken to the "other side" for the next year was dress like they were dead.  They disguised themselves as the dead.  Some kids will use Halloween to dress as their favorite TV character (this year, we expect to see a lot of Frozen related costumes.)  Adults indulge their inner child and in some cases inner kink.

Either way they get to play dress up.  They get loads of candy.  If done well enough, Halloween will scare the shit out Trick-or-Treaters.  This brings me to a thought that actually has started to tick me off more and more every year.  Yes not everyone wants to be scared.  Yes there are going to be those who don't decorate their homes for the scarefest that is what makes Halloween in my opinion so great.  I live in America.  I've heard of or read several who are claiming that folks decorating their homes with gravestones is too scary.  They seem to believe that Halloween is a night for playing politically correct(PC) dress up and getting free candy for children in middle school or younger.

These people seem to believe that sexy costumes are perfectly fine, but gross or scary is against the rules.  (I must reiterate though that most of these instances related are based on hearsay and I may have what they meant to have relayed in their words incorrect.)

To these people, I suggest that for the month of October, perhaps you should hibernate at home.  Halloween is a holiday I have looked forward to since I was a kid living in South Carolina.  That does not mean that I want you to destroy the main reason I love it - to get the living shit scared out of me.

To wrap this up, for all of you going out to Trick-or-Treat for Halloween, be safe as you try to be scared and get your bags full of sweets.  Happy Halloween, everyone!

Envy, Pity, and Why?

I've always been envious of others.  I freely admit that I succumb regularly to this sin.  I won't however do anything towards freeing myself of those envies.

My older sister was a straight-A student.  All of my siblings were more popular.  My brother was a boy.  Other girls' hair didn't tangle as quickly.  One of my sisters was a blonde.  Those I call friends were always more open than I or had family members that actually cared about them.  Others were more athletic.  They had better stories to tell or juicy gossip to entrance others with.  They knew exactly what they wanted in life.  They were better looking.  They had better brains.  They had a defined talent.

Then, between Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood(FMAB) and Criminal Minds, I realized something: everyone is envious of something.  We grow up in a society where we are told to be happy with ourselves but can see those whom we look up to long for the hairstyle of someone else.  We are taught that being of a certain look will automatically make one better socially or targeted for social homicide.  Being smart wasn't always so great.

As a matter of fact, even during the nineties early two thousands, being so into a piece of fiction like Doctor Who, Harry Potter, Supernatural, or Sherlock made one the perfect target for bullies.  But we are informed that it's okay to be whom we are even if it is some overzealous stalking fan who may eventually kill.  We are taught that going to the extreme of killing someone is wrong.  Sometimes, as an adult, I envy today's children.

They will likely not be raised to Sabrina, the Teenage Witch; Matlock; Diagnosis Murder; or Power Rangers the way I had been.  But the teasing and dissing of what they enjoy won't be as bad either.  They'll easily find others who enjoy the same things as them due to social media online, but they'll lose that face-to-face interaction that brings about local book clubs and coffee dates(though I despise coffee!)  Children of today's world aren't raised with the story lines we had.  The shows for younger children seem almost above intelligence for their age, and then for the teens, below intelligence levels.

With how we've become severely"do not offend" and "keep things politically correct (PC)" at least in America, it seems our entertainment is taking it to one extreme or the other, and that's not always a good thing.  It just feels as though things aren't the same, and while that's good, on the whole I am not as envious of the next generation as I had thought.

Sure they've got awesome paraphernalia for their fandoms and more ways than ever to keep themselves entertained, but now the corporations are able to connect all of the ways you keep information electronically which makes it a hell of a lot easier to target a person for identity theft.  I've already seen instances in folks my own age trying and failing to do the simple math problems like 29-14 that we had drilled in our heads so much that we could answer thirty of them in a minute without a problem.  They can't walk on their own even down the street for fear of the various types of human predators instead of animal and if they want to stay at a friend's?  Forget it unless they have all manner of ways to immediately be reached by the parents/guardians.  Yes they might have a more tolerant future, but what kind of future is it when they've become slaves to their electronics?  They may not know what a picnic is or enjoy a walk in the woods listening to the lake it surrounds.  They might not be able to enjoy a trail ride or swim freely at the beach.  It's for those reasons that I don't envy them.  Because one day, there might not be parks to walk through, beaches to sun on, or woods to wander, I actually pity them.

Real Life Masks

So, I've been trying to think of what I wanted to talk about this week and I have to say that the only thing that really stuck out in my mind was how things have changed.  It's not just that I've grown up or that I've had more "real world" experience.  No, it's about how things have changed as time has gone on.  I grew up mostly in less urban, more rural areas.

I grew up in the '90s.  No, I didn't get into drugs or going to parties all the time where alcohol was a staple.  I also never really worried about being labeled.  I was teased enough by my cousins about my mud-like hair, though my sister's hair was the same and they referred to it as "more chocolatey", my lack of being normal, and my inability to be as they thought I should.

I loved playing basketball and the school I attended at first was very encouraging.  Then we moved.  This new town had basketball teams, but as I aged I learned that it was more a male's sport and the girls were supposed to cheer or play volleyball.  If they wanted to play basketball, they needed the money to be allowed the privilege at a local community center.  At ten years old, I didn't really understand, nor did I want to.  I had moved to Illinois from South Carolina.  In S.C., I had learned to keep my differences hidden as much as possible and that I was likely to be blamed for things that went wrong.

Anything against the rules was my fault, according to my babysitter and her son who was my age.  If I tried to tell my mother or dad what happened, they didn't have time to listen.  In fact, the only times I really got praised was if I managed to keep quiet and out of the way.  Then as I got older I was expected to anticipate what the adults, whether it was a teacher, relative, or someone else, expected out of me.  At one point I was proud of my school and tried to keep things clean.  My family never realized it, but I despised messes.  Clean was queen.  The problem? I became the scapegoat.

No, seriously.  I was the scapegoat.  Lily* has a tantrum?  Ency caused it.  Janine's* dolls are missing?  Ency hid them.  Michael's* being chased by a hammer-wielding Ency?  She's in a bad mood again.  Sylvia's* hair's been cut?  Ency did it while she was sleeping.  The girls' bedroom is a mess?  Ency trashed it.  The kids were late for school?  Ency took forever to get ready.

They forget about the reason behind the behavior.  Lily didn't get her way, because the toy she wanted was mine and I was playing with it.  Janine misplaced her dolls or hid them so no one else could play with them.  Sylvia cut her own chopped off hair and refused to get in trouble for doing such a bad job.  The really bad thing, in my opinion, is the things that were forgotten even by my siblings.  Michael had chased Sylvia with the previously stated hammer before I could wrench it out of his hands.  I only chased him because he wanted to end it there without apologizing for terrifying Sylvia out of her mind.  I never threw our toys or books around the room.  Cards, sure.  I'd be playing fifty-two card pick-up because neither my siblings nor cousins wanted to play with me.  The reason I took my time?  The one morning after being ready for school I got the nerve to ask my mother if we could go to school early (I really wanted to play on the jungle gym!) she asked if I was ready.  I told her yes because I was.  She told me I was allowed to go early.  I got in trouble upon arriving home because I went without Janine or Lily.  What does that tell a girl?  I was excited, but I wasn't allowed to go to school because my sisters couldn't decide on the outfit they wished to wear.

I could get really good grades on a project, and win the project to take home, but even after promising to showcase it, it always paled to anything my siblings did.  Now things have changed.  I still get treated differently, but it's because I have no children or driver's license.  It's because I don't have a college degree and my dreams that I thought I once had no longer exist.

These changes aren't new.  Things I once loved like family and conservation, became my family members focus when I finally stopped trying.  I took pride in my family, once upon a time.  Now, I distance myself and avoid them because they were never there when I needed them, but expected me to drop everything and do what I could for them.  Sure my husband and I lived with my mother for a few years when we couldn't stand staying with our hypocritical friends any longer.  But she still expected way too much out of us when I barely kept myself sane as it was.

Everyone has masks.  This statement, no matter what anyone says, is true.  Even a baby has a mask.  It's the mask of innocence.  The inability to communicate their needs and wants using the words they will one day learn unless they happen to be mute.  In my case, I have multiple masks that all change as time goes by.  I can guarantee that most adults who are no longer in the teenage years have at least three masks to cover who they are.  There's the them they present to the family.  This one conforms to what is expected by what they have constantly repeated.  These expectations have been reinforced by things family has done or said over the course of the person's life.  In my case, it's to be strong, emotionally, and violent.  I can't be right about anything except spelling and the little nuggets of information I have in my head are inconsequential.  When it comes right down to it, I don't matter as much as others in my family or even my husband.

Then there are friends.  It started with the first impression and rumors, things they knew not to trust but until they could prove that they would be there through thick and thin, they had to expect.  It's also the things you believe they think because of the way they were raised.  For me, it's once again violence and emotionally strong.  There's also strange humor and a willingness to say whatever I feel though tactfully.  A leader willing to follow until the need for a leader becomes so strong my willingness to be patient runs out.  It's pretending to enjoy something I hate because my friend's friend, whom I have never before met, has just been through a nasty break up.  It's a second mask.

Then there's the mask you use in the face of strangers and for first impressions.  Mine happens to be very friendly.  No violence is required unless in defense.  It's outgoing and all smiles.  Sometimes it's an annoying facade since even a remotely bad mood is noted.  However, it can usually also be noticed by the observant that it's a false smile.  There isn't anything wrong with it after all "smiles go for miles," but sometimes a person just needs to cry.  Sometimes they have a bad day and don't wish to speak of it.  Sometimes a person doesn't wish to deal with strangers.

When I was growing up, each of these masks were started.  They kept getting refined to the point that I no longer knew who I was or what I wanted.  That period of self-discovery most teens go through?  Yeah, I skipped.  In fact, I went from a joking conversationalist in preschool who did everything they could to protect others against cruelty (Think you can tease the black girls?  Ency will scream you out.  Think you can throw ice at Lily?  Ency will get even with you for her, and you'll have the marks to prove it.  I was a big believer in the only do unto others as you would have done to you.) to someone who stopped believing in the good of humanity but managed to pretend and keep herself busy.

Anyway, I better stop there as I'm getting tired and need sleep.  My next rant will likely be related to America's Independence Day, the Fourth of July.  I hope everyone has a happy Fourth of July!



*Names are changed to protect the actual people portrayed.

Stereotypes on Father's Day

Last Sunday was Father's Day.  I missed posting my Sunday rant thanks to real life (hereafter in any rant RL,) but there was an article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that caught my eye. This was supposed to be last Sunday's rant.  Defying Stereotypes was the headline which I thought was cool then I read the subheading: Study shows black fathers are just as involved as other dads in parenting their children - even when they live apart.

Okay...so I never heard anything about black fathers being less of a dad than mine, nor did I hear derogatory things about other races' male parental figures.  Then I thought what is a stereotype?  According to the Merriam-Webster website a stereotype is "to believe unfairly that all people or things with a particular characteristic are the same" or "an often unfair and untrue belief that many people have about all people or things with a particular characteristic."

So essentially, our nation is based upon stereotypes and trying to outrun them.  We've had the prohibition era which was full of stereotyping.  We learned about the "savage" Native Americans.  We even learned about "evil" Nazis and how their main goal was to rid the world of Jews (which is a religion, not a race) using stereotyping(Jews weren't human, brown hair and eyes was Jew, etc.).  

Even our entertainment includes stereotypes.  In Harry Potter, it's symbolized by the house partitions in Hogwarts.  Tamora Pierce emphasizes it in her Circle of Magic series/set with a noble, thief, tradesman, and nomad.  Then she does so in her Tortall set stories with the men vs. women issues.  And she shows it through both knights-in-training and police force.  She also shows the stereotypes about different areas that they travel amongst.  From the Lower City of Corus to the Scanran raiders to the north.  In Twilight (which honestly I don't like) Stephanie Meyer throws most of what is known about werewolves and vampires out the window.  Perhaps she did her research to find these different kinds of creatures, but hers aren't the stereotypical which had caused arguments to spawn across readers and movie-goers about whether the stories were any good.

Then there are the stereotypes about items.  One that I personally tend to agree with is when a book is made into a movie, the book is always better.  That however isn't always true.  Sometimes they are just as good, my biggest book to movie adaptation let-down?  The Harry Potter series.  The disappointment began all the way back with movie number one.  I was looking forward to the logic problem scene.  That and Hermione's impassioned speech about how there is more to life than books and cleverness.  The third movie in my opinion was the largest let-down, of course my expectations weren't nearly as high after that for the rest of the movies, so for me the disappointments weren't nearly as devastating.

Although Ella Enchanted, I thought, was well done.  There are likely others that don't fit the proverbial mold.  The fact that we still allow ourselves to follow stereotypes managed to upset me.  I fit numerous stereotypes without actually fitting them.

Yes, I game, but I'm not a hardcore gamer.  Yes, I know random trivial facts, but I don't follow any particular trivia type.  Yes, I watch drama and chick flicks.  I have my favored actors and actresses, but unless it relates to what they are doing next in their careers, I don't really care.  The whole Lewinski thing back in the late nineties, why did it matter if it didn't affect his job?  I mean I could understand if Clinton were say a priest or minister or an advocate for monogamous relationships, but why was seemingly everyone so concerned with whether or not he had had sexual relations with Lewinski?  Then again the fact that he lied while under oath?  That was a felony.  We've gotten to a point where if we hear someone is a politician, we automatically don't trust them quite as much.  I can't tell the number of times I've heard the phrase "No such thing as an honest politician."  Isn't this just another stereotype?  

How about the abused will become the abuser?  I know a fair few people who have been either abused or neglected as a child and never had the help we claim they should have had.  They've been doing just fine.  So how is it that when claiming something like defying stereotypes the article only focuses one particular stereotype?  Not just any stereotype either, it's the the stereotype of black fathers being less fatherly than others.  So why is it that stereotypes are so much a part of our lives and society?

Tyranny through Shame for what we Read?

I had a different rant planned for my Sunday regular, but I recently read a certain article that just kind of annoyed me. So I started this rant and by the time I was done typing it up, it was Sunday morning.




Ze Frank's video about yucking one's yum is spot on for more than just a response to Ruth Graham's article telling adults that they should be ashamed of reading Young Adult (YA) fiction.




I am 27 years old and read Agatha Christie back in third grade. I also read Mary Higgins Clark back then, and while they were great to read, I have yet to reread any of them. I love Lillian Jackson Braun's The Cat Who series and pretty much anything by Christine Feehan, Sherrilyn Kenyon, or Tamora Pierce. Now, Tamora Pierce is considered YA. Sherrrilyn Kenyon has a series that is a shoot-off of some of her others and is considered YA. I was 11 when Harry Potter was released in the US where I live. I stuck with it to the end and while the first book or three is geared more towards the younger YA, books 5, 6, and 7 can really pull the feels from you, though 6 was rather slow...




Anyway, to me the gist of Graham's article was that we do not have a thing known as free will (which is something that is actually kind of big in Pierce's Tortall set books). As a child that was kind of known (at least for most kids) to be odd, it was very upsetting. As a child, one's parents tell you what you are allowed and discipline you. However, they also let you know that as an adult, you have control of your life. Perhaps it's society that says that however, seeing as I know some people still live by their parents' edicts.




The biggest thing they warn against is giving in to peer pressure. And isn't that what Graham is saying one should do? "Adults should feel embarrassed about reading literature written for children." she claims in her article. It might be taken a little out of context when I ask if parents should be ashamed to read to their kids, as I believe she meant it for their own personal reading, but still it's a form of peer pressure.




I hated Twilight. I read them, found that while it had its moments, I couldn't understand all the changes Meyer made to what essentially made a vampire. I mean it's one thing if she did the actual research about them and found it, or if she, as several authors have done in the past, created her own version of a vampire, but it didn't feel like she had more information about them. It doesn't mean I told people they were stupid for enjoying it, but I did admit that I thought it was a waste of time. And yes I would have loved if Jaden would just destroy them or Simi would barbecue them. Perhaps one of the Carpathians could take them out.


Sadly none of that would happen. While I haven't been able to bring myself to read or watch Hunger Games, Game of Thrones, or even The Fault in Our Stars, I'm not going to say that people should be ashamed to have read them because of their genre. I was reading Harlequin novels in the fifth grade, and wasn't ashamed to admit it. I loved fantasy novels when I found them, and though my mother didn't want it in her house, yes, I played D&D (Dungeons and Dragons). I didn't do it because my friends did, nor because I was a rebel. For as long as I could remember I had been fascinated with mythology and fantasy, magic and folklore. So these were great for me. When I found The Circle of Magic series and Protector of the Small by Tamora Pierce, my mother got me Magic Steps for Christmas. I was ecstatic. That was better than even the suitcase of Harlequin novels that I had previously envied my older sister for getting. It was never really a competition though for which books we liked who would get what.

 
I mean I read the Couples series as well as the required high school reading (and absolutely hated the ending of Lord of the Flies, but thoroughly enjoyed Great Gatsby) and Isobel Bird's Circle of Three series. It became a joke that I had read our local library and those of the Inter-library loan program's entire stock of books! But I didn't hide what I read. I tried to read various westerns and science fiction and had a hard time with them, but I loved A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle.
As we grow our likes and dislikes change. I have four siblings and my younger ones always had a hard time meeting the school requirements for reading. I don't think it was because they had a hard time reading the books they found either. It was because the subject matter didn't appeal to them. While I loved reading literally anything I could get my hands on, my other siblings and even most of my friends couldn't. In fact the only books I had to force myself to read or stopped reading because I couldn't get into them were The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, The Hunchback of Notre by Alexandre Dumas, and Les Miserables by Victor Hugo and it wasn't because I wasn't satisfied with their endings.


She even states, "But even the myriad defenders of YA fiction admit that the enjoyment of reading this stuff has to do with escapism, instant gratification, and nostalgia." I can't help but wonder if she's read anything by Mercedes Lackey, Tamora Pierce, Cate Tiernan or Lynne Ewing. Only one of which I have to search the fantasy section for. I know what I want when I find a new book to read or show to watch.


Should I not watch kids and teen movies or TV series because I'm an adult? Should I be ashamed that I enjoyed Frozen when I finally got around to watching it? Should I only listen to the music I grew up hearing? As I previously mentioned, people's tastes change as they age and experience new things.
Of course people use YA for escapism, anything that is read or watched that is fiction has always been an escape from what our lives are like. People read to have adventure, romance, and mystery in their lives that they know will have a fairly happy ending, at least most of the time.


Don't get me wrong, there are some things that probably should not have happened (Titanic the Musicals, for two), but does that really give someone the right to tell someone else that they must be a slave to whatever stereotype or peer pressure thing is being pushed upon them? Should we say that because someone is a brunette and has brown eyes, they should not exist or that those of Oriental decent should not live in a certain country? How about those of a certain color or size or orientation or faith? Because if so, hello, welcome back to some of the worst things in history: WWII, American Concentration Camps, and slavery. It may seem extreme, but that is exactly what it ends up leading to.

 
No, I don't have a degree from any college or university, yet, but even I can see that as long as we're willing to tell people what they should and shouldn't do when it's harmless and not illegal is in an obscure way a form of bullying. I'm not saying her opinion doesn't matter or that I think she's an idiot. She has some decent points in that "There’s room for pleasure, escapism, juicy plots, and satisfying endings on the shelves of the serious reader...But if they are substituting maudlin teen dramas for the complexity of great adult literature, then they are missing something."


My bookshelf isn't just filled with YA, there's paranormal romance, paranormal mystery, mystery, romance, and even some historical fictions on it as well as numerous pieces of nonfiction. My DVD collection and what I watch on Netflix and Hulu are even more varied. I may not be huge in the things that are mainstream, but I loved Transformers as a kid and superheroes though I never really "geeked out" to them. I can't make myself watch Star Wars or Star Trek unless somebody has already started it. I religiously watched So Weird, Xena, Diagnosis Murder, and Sailor Moon. I tried with Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, Captain Planet, Digimon, and Dragonball Z. That was as a child. While my tastes have changed and some of them I now find childish, it doesn't stop me from enjoying the main storylines from them. Even The Magic Treehouse series by Mary Pope Osborne is interesting to me. I even kidnapped my brother's Alex Rider books written by Anthony Horowitz from time to time. I enjoyed them, but they happen to be YA as well. Those of us who were eleven when the Harry Potter books started and stuck with it to the end were in our twenties when the final book was released. Does that mean we should be ashamed?


It's not just the books that it seems to me we are supposed to be ashamed of. To me it feels as though Graham is saying that whatever you are labeled is the stereotype you should stick with and you should be ashamed of yourself if you break it. I might be reading too much into what she wrote, but as I said if we start to let others dictate to us with the simple things like what we personally should enjoy, then where are we going to draw the line in what we allow them to tell us.


I didn't fit into a stereotype, and luckily, I didn't care if I did. I was in band, loved basketball (and until I broke my ankle tried to play every chance I got!) was in various debate clubs, was a co-founder of our school's debate club(which after about five years was removed because the president of the time felt she couldn't handle the duties and didn't even try to find a replacement before telling the sponsoring teacher) in the recycling club and Planeteers, was a member of JILG (Jobs for Illinois Graduates) and much more. I had also been in FFA, French and Spanish Clubs/classes, and Chorus. I know it's not really a lot of clubs to spend any combination of time of my high school years in, but for me, I felt I shouldn't apply for jobs and then I couldn't get my license (which I still don't have!), and in general couldn't do much outside of them. I kind of gave up on sports after I couldn't get on my middle school volleyball team after my ankle healed, in part because I'm too lazy to force myself to do proper work-outs. I never had to before. I wasn't a straight A student or teacher's pet, but neither was I the class rebel or clown. Trust me, our class knew the majority of our classmates and with a class of over two hundred that's pretty good when you don't see the majority of them daily and you know the names of several other schoolmates (band and choir, only about sixty or seventy grade mates and about seventy-five total in both, and this is over the course of four years.) So I never really could be stereotyped. I wasn't gorgeous or rich or popular in the normal senses of the words, but sometimes I think I did it on purpose.

I could put make-up on properly if I tried, I just didn't care. If I had applied myself to my classes I could have been valedictorian, possibly, at least I'd have been high honor roll, but I didn't really have a place I felt comfortable doing schoolwork and I preferred reading to doing that work. I'd already become an expert at sitting right in front of the teachers and reading a random other novel, working on another classes work or writing something other than my notes. I managed to stay just under that radar of stereotype, yet most of my classmates likely remember who I was.


Not because I gave in to them saying I shouldn't read the books I wanted or calling me names to make me ashamed ( I hated my hair back then, this curly, knotty mass of brown, much like Hermione's and one of my friends even gave it a name, which we sometimes refer to it as.) that never really worked.  I chose the things I liked and stuck with them, at least until my tastes had changed.  I had already tried to conform once and found reading to be my escape and as I read, I learned conforming just wasn't right.  School talked to us about peer pressure and I learned about slavery and eventually I understood.

I didn't figure it out overnight though.  It took me a few years before I realized that I should just do as I wished, everyone else be damned.  So as I finished school I realized I had become rather proficient at hiding what I really felt.  No one, absolutely no one had ever realized about several of my darker feelings and days.  If I had done as Graham claims and been ashamed for reading things that were interesting to me, I never would have picked up Tamora Pierce's novels or Harry Potter.  I don't want to live in a world that tells me I should be ashamed because I have free will.  I sure as hell don't want any of my nieces, nephews, or future children (if I ever have any) to have to feel ashamed because of who they are, what they like, or what they do.