Sometimes something bothers me but I can’t articulate exactly why. And then someone else comes along and articulates it for me and I want to give them the best high five that has ever happened (ignoring, for the moment, that I am truly terrible at high fives). This Man Repeller article was one of those times. All-female reboots bothered me for…some reason I couldn’t quite identify. I didn’t want to see Ghostbusters, despite everyone talking about it, partly because I didn’t watch it as a kid so I had no nostalgic connection to the story, but also partly because…something about the entire endeavour felt off to me. I just didn’t…

I’ve always found that I favour difficult female characters. Honestly, I kind of want to be a difficult female. So you can imagine how much of a “duh” moment it was when I read this BBC article on anti-heroines and realized “I love anti-heroines!” Anti-heroines are not a brand new concept, but they do seem to be popping up with increasing frequency. Carrie Bradshaw, Olivia Pope, Alicia Florrick, Gretchen Cutler, Julia George, Hayes Morrison…these are the kinds of women that fascinate me the most on TV. While this article is by no means exhausted, it does provide an interesting framework to consider them within. It also makes the academic part of…

It’s been a while since I posted one of these. Though I’m not sure all that many people are reading this blog anyway, so I figure if my screaming into the void is occasionally intermittent, it doesn’t really matter all that much. This essay by Curtis Sittenfeld is so very well-written. And it is about precisely the kind of friendship that I hold most dear. The kind of friendship that endures across distance. The kind of friendship that greets most things with humour but lapses into gravity when necessary. Take a moment and read “My Friend Sam“. As usual, the first part quoted here. Click the link to go to…

Required Reading. This is what it is like to be a woman in this world. And it makes me angry. It should make you angry too. Read it: Marry Karr’s “The Crotchgrabber“. I particularly appreciated these paragraphs, early in the essay: “In case you haven’t been on the receiving end of this sort of assault, you should know the primal physiological response it evokes—in this woman, anyway. The stomach drops, as if you’ve been shoved backward from a skyscraper and are flailing through space. Time dismantles. There are more frames per second, and people’s facial features become very specific. This guy had a squashed-down forehead, wide-set eyes, and heavy but…

I cannot begin to count the number of times someone has tried to sell me on meditation as a way to deal with anxiety. This concept is laughable to me. Like, I literally burst into laughter most times it is suggested to me. I know it works for many people. I know it is a practice, and therefore I might need to, you know, practice if I want it to be useful down the road. But, honestly, right now, at this point in my life, meditation does sort of the opposite of what it is supposed to. As I once told a dear friend, “Yes, because what I need is more time…

Required Reading. It is hot and life is hectic. Take thirty seconds to read this tiny poem by Sandi Pray, originally published in tinywords issue 16.1 in June, and breathe. I have a sister-friend for whom this is true. I have my own version of this. I think we all do. seed catalog the colours of a winter daydream