The Heart of the Matter

Well, I said I'd do a post about the holidays, but the truth is I arranged for so many activities for myself that I hardly had time to breathe. Now I'm on holiday detox. Fun eh? But enough about me. Today I thought I'd talk about gift-giving and true love.

I don't know when it was I inevitably lost my fascination with Christmas. I assume everyone goes through a phase in their teenagerhood where they realise that their Christmas wish list is unrealistic and they probably won't get any of the things they really want. I think I lost my love for the holidays when I spent the entire Christmas holiday and basically the entire month of December hanging over a toilet with morning sickness (that will take the love out of anything). But, I've never been very hardcore about Christmas anyway. I'd like to celebrate the season in a way that doesn't result in an orgy of greed, but is that really possible?

There was that one book forever ago (sorry for no title or reference, I'm really just too lazy to look it up) that describes in detail five different ways to show love for someone.

1. Service
2. Praise
3. Touch
4. Quality Time
5. Gifts

So, let's go over all of these in relation to the holidays.

Service - This is a great one, but I'll be honest and confess that most of the time I have no idea what most people need done for them, or even what they want done for them. I ask if there's anything I can do for a person and everyone says they're fine and don't need any help. I believe that this one, more than any of the others, shows exactly how well you know a person (not how much you love a person). If you know what you can do to help them, to serve them, you're in.

Praise - Is it just me, but any time someone starts complimenting me I immediately wonder what they want from me. I figure they must have some reason for buttering me up and it causes me to distrust them. I really don't like being manipulated, and besides, I'm so totally conceited that I don't really need the help. So, for myself if I want to say something nice to someone it has to be because I really mean it. I can't just pump someone up with verbal validation, I'll choke on my own tongue.

Touch - I don't touch people. I practically need warning if someone is going to hug me. I'd like to one of those people who touch hands, heads, and pat people on the back, but I'm just NOT. I have my bubble - please exit at the right. So, I can't show my love for people this way. I just can't.

Quality Time - This is my personal favourite. No one can win my heart without spending mounds of time with me. However, as I described in the first paragraph I was stretched pretty thin for my holiday and absolutely no one got very much of my time.

Gifts - A gift to me is something that is done when none of the other things can be. A cop-out when you're completely out of options (like when you miss an important event in someone's life so you bring them flowers to compensate). Also there's the problem of whether or not the person you give the gift to will like it. Issues! I hate gift-giving because no one ever gets me anything I want unless I tell them outright. But no one ever gets me what I ask for, because they want to surprise me. It's like sending your dog to do your shopping for you. AND I'm totally opposed to materialism.

So, I push myself to figure out how I can celebrate the holidays without giving gifts. Apparently, I'm too unobservant, tight lipped, fridged, and rushed to do anything else.

The Colour of Confidence

I know it's Christmas time and I should be talking about Christmas. I think I'll save that post for after the holidays and my thoughts are in line. Anyway, today's post is about the colour red.

"What's your favourite colour?"

"I'm not sure, but what ever it is, it's not red."

I'm the kind of person who likes variety, and I haven't been really good at pinning my favourite colour down. I have no idea what it is. I used to hate it when people asked me this question and for years I took refuge under the colour grey, but my least favourite colour is red. I'm not particularly fond of the symbolizm attached to the colour in particular (blood, boldness, sins, etc.). Above all things, to me it seems to symbolize a woman who wants to misbehave, to be cruel, to hurt and use other people (like in the Sixth Sense when that nasty woman was wearing a red suit to her daughter's funeral). Granted, that's an awful lot to infer from something as simple as a colour. I'm probably going overboard.

But anyway, yesterday I was purging my closet of all my old unused clothes and I noticed that my closet is predominately red. I remember lots of times looking at my closet and not seeing a speck of red - what happened? How did I get overrun with my LEAST favourite colour? I took a little inventory of the red items remaining in my closet to take particular note of where they had all come from. At least half of them were hand-me-downs or gifts, but the other half were things I ACTUALLY purchased myself.

And I know why.

Unfortunately, red is a colour that very much suits my colouring - not as well as orange - but in the absense of orange I had resorted to buying red. Let's face it, I'm in the minority when I say that I actually look good in orange, so red is much easier to come by. It's a pity, a real pity, when I hate the colour so much. And even more of a pity when I look smokin in it. And the bitter resentment creeps up when I see a woman walk by wearing a spring green sweater and looking as refreshing as a meadow in a Downy commercial. Then I bite my lip and realize that I probably look as inviting as hell herself with that sour expression on my face regardless of what top I'm wearing. The thing that really bites is that someone somewhere has probably looked at me and been envious of me for my dark angel good looks (I can just keep telling myself that ~_^), when I just want to look like a good sweet innocent girl, but can never seem to pull it off.

It's probably just my fixation on what the colour red means to me. I mean, it's just a colour. It's just a refraction of light meant to give our world beauty and variety, but there is always the chance, just the chance, that I'm not half as good a girl as I like to think I am. But I doubt the removal of everything I own that happens to be red is going to cure that.

Fansubbers, I Salute You

I have a rant for you regarding professionally translated manga, anime, and video games. I have a bone to pick with them, and I'd like to give a little hiphiphorray for the Fansubbers.

Fansubber (noun): Charming individuals and groups who go through the trouble of translating manga and anime for free distribution in countries without licensing agreements (they'd prolly do video games too if it was possible).

But those freaking companies translate every dang word. They turned Xellos into an 'evil clansmen' instead of leaving him a 'mazoku'! Haven't they ever heard of 'translator's notes'? And how many people don't know that 'Sayonara' means 'good-bye'? It gets pitiful and ridiculous when they try to Americanize something that is obviously not American.

But there is one improvement that has been made to the way manga is printed for distribution in English speaking nations. They've stopped flipping the pages so that you now read the book up and down right to left, instead of what is natural for us horizontal left to right readers. That has been a huge thing - HUGE.

But it's still not quite where it ought to be. I was reading a copy of an issue of Azumanga Daioh, and I saw something that had been in the anime (fansubbed anime), but the way it was translated totally took the fun out of it. I had been in the process of purchasing as many chronological issues as I could get my hands on when suddenly, I put them all back, and realized quite clearly that I didn't want to read them if they were translated that literally, and completely.

I have to stop now, because I'm getting way too angry. The job fansubbers do on their work is as unbelievably awesome as it gets, and to them they get my unwaivering support. And you companies who do this, I'd like to say; thanks for trying to bring this stuff to America. It's not as much about the money as you think. It's about quality, and they do a better job than you.

And just as a final jab - English voice actors SUCK!

Confessions of an Adult Angst Queen

Today, I thought I'd showcase another one of my poems. So, I'll write it and then I'll do the analysis/discussion.

The Garden of My Heart

Sometimes I think I have no heart
Life is fast
I try to run like it does
It's just chance

Sometimes my brain is a broken stadium
The speed is up to me
Only ruin and room are left
That's my choice

Sometimes I think my nerves are shot
It's fear
That keeps me clenching my fists
Only rejection

Sometimes I don't feel anything
Then everything
It's my head blame crowns
They're my eyes

Sometimes I don't know what to say
But say something
The consequences make my head burn
The question is, why?

Sometimes someone asks me about it
My heart
I think, "Of course, I have none."
Every heartbeat

Sometimes my chest feels tight
A bloody nose
The control room is broken
So is my heart

Sometimes the black gate opens
There's no blood
Only the wilderness that grows
And grows

Sometimes I think of trimming it back
Ordering order
Where would the butterflies hide
My secrets?

Sometimes I lean back in my chair
And I know
Why lilting music flows in me
My heart

This is one of my most angst-ridden poems, not that it's especially violent, but it does discuss in detail all the things that are wrong with me. And even I feel that it drags in places, as I tend to write things that are more precise than this, but I don't have the mind to remove any of the verses, even though it would probably make the poem superior, because like I said, it describes very clearly all the things that are wrong with me.

I have to be perfect, and I'm not. As for the rest, I'll let you guess. But regardless of all that, I think this poem could offer quite a few insights for someone who doesn't get a play-by-play of what I was thinking when I wrote it. Enjoy.