What Is Your Escape?

(image: “The 1” California- Anne-Marie, 2009).

In a mad attempt to channel some good thoughts after a trying December I read an absurd amount of Newbery Medal winners. There was no risk of running into a romantic love story. Most Newbery Medal winners were about pets, Grandparents, and West Virginia. Kira-Kira, Out of the Dust, Missing May, Walk Two Moons and Dear Mr. Henshaw are by far my favorites. After 9 months of quick reads I have settled down to more age appropriate books. But it’s always worth it to go back to the classics and escape during messy times of life.

"Read. Read anything. Read the things they say are good for you, and the things they claim are junk. You'll find what you need to find, just read!" -Neil Gaiman

Criss Cross: Lynne Rae Perkins

Kira-Kira: Cynthia Kadahata

A Year Down Yonder: Richard Peck

Bud, Not Buddy: Christopher Paul Curtis

Holes: Louis Sachar

Out of the Dust: Karen Hesse

The View From Saturday: E.L. Konigsburg

The Midwife’s Apprentice: Karen Cushman

Walk Two Moons: Sharon Creech

The Giver: Lois Lowry

Missing May: Cynthia Rylant

Shiloh: Phyllis Reynolds Naylor

Maniac Magee: Jerry Spinelli

Number the Stars: Lois Lowry

The Whipping Boy: Sid Fleischman

Sarah, Plain and Tall: Patricia MacLachlan

Dear Mr. Henshaw: Beverly Cleary

Jacob Have I loved: Katherine Paterson

The Westing Game: Ellen Raskin

Julie of the Wolves: Jean Craighead George

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler: E.L. Konigsburg

I, Juan De Pareja: Elizabeth Borton de Trevino

Shadow of a Bull: Maja Wojciechowska

It’s Like this, Cat: Emily Neville

Island of the Blue Dolphins: Scott O’Dell

The Twenty-One Balloons: William Pene Bois

Is it Possible for one Country to be More “Hopeful” than Another?

(image: Hong Kong- Anne-Marie 2007)

“Hope is Confidence.” 

“the tiered, 88-story Jin Mao Tower; the Shanghai World Financial Center (the second-tallest skyscraper in the world); the distinctive Oriental Pearl Tower (with its three massive columns supporting eleven suspended spheres of varying sizes); the latest addition, Shanghai Center, a supertall skyscraper now under construction..(127 stores).  This is twenty-first-century architecture- often at its best, sometimes at its worst, but never less than audacious (32, Moisi).

“Hope today is about economic and social empowerment, and its chief dwelling place is in the East” (31, Moisi).

Do Certain Countries Grieve or Adapt Better to Change than Others?

(image: TsingHua University, Beijing- Anne-Marie 2007)

Word: Hybrid- The combination of two or more different things, aimed at achieving a particular goal”(Wikipedia, “Hybrid”).

Term: Hypercathected- From classical theory; the state in which a neurone is overfilled with psychic energy and therefore disturbs psychic equilibrium which, when expressed, appears as neurotic fixations (APP Glossary, nashville-psychoanalytic.org).  To become obsessed with old memories, the act of getting sucked into a “vortex” of thought.  (AM interpretation).

Book:  The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

“Each single one of the memories and expectations in which the libido is bound to the object is brought up and hypercathected, and detachment of the libido (physic energy- personal development, desires) accomplished in respect of it….It is remarkable that this painful unpleasure is taken as a matter of course by us” (Freud explaining the work of grief, 133, Didion)- This separation makes it had to progress b/c one is constantly being sucked into an in-depth thought process.  Have you ever spend a morning trying to get out of bed, but you cannot because you are being completely bombarded by memories of a deceased loved one or former boyfriend/girlfriend?  This is the act of grieving. 

“The hybrid nature of Asian identity seems much more adaptive to a world in conflict, and therefore more beneficial, than the relative homogeneity we find in the Western world…in the west we tend to see ourselves as central, we are more challenged and even destabilized in our core identity tan Asians are.  They manage to remain themselves while becoming us” (21, Moisi).  

Is it Possible to Map Emotions?

(image: Tokyo- Anne-Marie 2007)

Word: Emotion- A state of mental agitation or disturbance (The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 2. Emotion).  

Term: Geographer- “Geographers study the spatial and temporal distribution of phenomena, processes and features as well as the interaction of humans and their environment.  As space and place affect a variety of topics such as economics, health, climate, plants, and animals, geography is highly interdisciplinary” (What is Environmental Geography, Anyway?, Hayes-Bohanan, James). 

Book: Geopolitics of Emotion: How Cultures of Fear Humiliation, and Hope are reshaping the World by Dominque Moisi

“Is it possible to see actual patterns of behavior that help explain what is happening on the world stage?...Such a mapping involves bringing together elements as diverse as surveys of public opinion (how people feel about themselves, their present, and their future), the statement of political leaders, and cultural productions such as movies, plays, and books” (16, Moisi).

“Architecture is particularly significant, for it reflects the way a society dedicates itself in space at a given time” (16, Moisi).

"Conflicts about land, security, prosperity and sovereignty can also be charged with emotion" (17, Moisi). 

 

Why does Creativity Thrive in Some Parts of the World and Not in Others?

(image: Rueters, theage.com.au- Emily Kngwarreye) 

Word: Aesthetics- Critical reflection of art, culture, and nature (Encyclopedia of Aesthetics Review, Tom Riedel).

Term: Human Geography- a branch of geography that focuses on the study of patterns and processes that shape human interaction with man made surroundings that provide a setting for human activity, as well as causes and consequences of the spatial distribution of human activity on the Earth’s surface (straight up wikipedia).

Book: Passing Strange and Wonderful by Dr. Yi-Fu Tuan

“In general the richer the environment, the denser the human population, and the more ceremonial exchanges and commerce that occurs there, the more likely it is to have a wealth of art” (Yi-Fu Tuan, 121). 

A “distinctive trait of Aboriginal art is the importance of the multi-modal performance…contemporary rituals of any scope require the service of not just one or two but several aesthetic skills” (Yi-Fu Tuan, 125).

"Every person, place constellation, wind, cloud, plant, animal, fish, clan, dance and song in between has a value."- Australian Aboriginal curator Djon Mudine 

"This is my country, this is me."- Emily Kngwarreye, Artist

Spent: $104.28- Cell Phone Bill

Finding Simplicity isn't that Simple

Just a simple start to a simple blog.  The message is simple.  The coffee you bought at 8:35 today matters.  The book you read from 12:32-1:05, before you were interrupted by a phone call, matters.  Why did you buy that?  Why did you read that?  Live simply, so you can thrive.  Remember.  Record.  Reflect.  How DO we live simply?  LOOK FOR PATTERNS.

Word: Simple- “1. Having or composed of only one thing, element or part.  See synonyms at pure.  3.  Being without additions or modifications (The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language).”

I completely dismiss the idea that simple is “2. easy,”