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It's the letter meme that I'm seeing all over my f'list! ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fictualities has given me M. The idea being that someone gives you a letter and you list ten things beginning with it, and you explain what these things mean to you.
I might as well start with the most obvious M:
M is for Magpies.
Just last weekendlunacy exactly what was up with the magpie thing, and I had to think to remember how it started. I believe it was a story I wrote a long time ago, which had a Princess Magpie in it, and the name always stuck with me even if the story didn't. It was sort of an impulse when I chose it for a screen name, but one of those impulses that clicked like "Of course!" In the years since I've started identifying with them more and more, and reading more and more about them. They are, like their corvid cousins the crow and the raven, very smart, funny and cool. Latest fun fact learned about them: in the Ghost Dance of the Plains Indians, the crow, the eagle and the magpie were honored. I could go on and on about them--aren't you lucky I won't!
M is for Marigold
Marigold is my roommate's dog, but honors me by acknowledging my presence even though I don't feed her or walk her. (Her personal name for me being "No Can Hands.") She is the most popular living being in a fifty mile radius and has been known to literally stop traffic with her looks. (Whether wearing her fluffy winter coat or shaved for the sporty summer look.) Despite the beauty, she's the kind of girl not afraid to stick her head in a garbage can for some old gum, or make old man noises when she feels like it.
M is for Meditation
I've apparently got kind of a talent for it. You can't do much with a talent for sitting still quietly but it got me a close-up on Wonderama when I was about seven years old. I've tried lots of different kinds, but probably the one I like the best is Vipassana Meditation, which I came to hear about in an odd way. You can do retreats where you spend 10 days meditating all the time, and you don't talk or read or write or eat all that much. The best part? I had these awesome dreams about the ocean. (The worst part: waking up at 4AM in a cold tent--yuck.)
M is for Mentos
When I was in high school I had a bad Mento addiction. I had so many empty Mento wrappers I started compulsively saving them (okay, hoarding them--see M is for Magpie). I don't even know how many I had but let's just say my friends were nice enough to find it eccentric in an amusing way. I am far more mature now, of course, and no longer am surrounded by Mentos. Except for the two boxes in my drawer. And the one in my mouth.
M is for Mercy
I think compassion is the strongest basis for a moral system, and mercy is awesome. I don't mean awesome like “totally cool” but awesome as in truly inspiring a mixed emotion of reverence, respect, dread, and wonder stirred by authority, genius, great beauty, sublimity, or might." When Frodo shows mercy to Saruman, and Saruman says he has grown "wise and cruel?" He's right. Frodo is such a badass there. A well played act of true mercy is like an arrow through the heart.
M is for Mementos and Memory
I read about a kind of behavior in a book once that was one of those "OMG, I didn't know anyone else but me did that! It described that some people feel more connected to those who are absent than those who are present. They have experiences not while something is happening, but when they review their mental slides at home, or look over keepsakes they have as props for memory. These "totems" or mementos can serve as a release mechanisms for reawakening the whole event in their imagination.
Well, that's me. I don't even know how some people manage to be, like, fully present in life. Even when I am fully present it's probably because I'm making myself be that way (see: M is for Meditation). But afterwards I'm all about the memory and I have lots of objects that mean things, a collection of important objects like a lot of little Proustian Madeleines. I wonder if this is why people I know are always telling me I have this fantastic memory. I'll say, "Oh, it's like that time when you..." and they won't remember it. But that scares me, because why don't they remember these things? To me that makes them who they are--why would you not remember something? Of course nobody remembers *everything* but it sometimes seems like people literally do memory dumps when they reach a new phase of life so stuff that was kind of important is just deleted.
M is for Magic
I've been thinking about this recently because I've been writing something with magic in it. Up until recently I've totally avoided writing about magic. I said it was because I felt self-conscious, but I now realize that was because I find fictional magic an incredibly intimate thing. That is, it's hard to write about it without revealing something of yourself. I see it in HP fanfic when people deal with magic in their fics. Often HP writers won't deal much with magic at all, but when they do it's almost always off. Not always in a bad way, it's just that as soon as people start creating new magical ideas they start revealing something of themselves that isn't the author. Sometimes they create rituals, which don't exist in HP. Or they create these great Gothic-y stuff that I *wish* were in the Potterverse when I read them. Or they'll create some big system of calling on gods or fairies or elementals or whatever. For me, magic immediately lets the fic author's voice come through more than anything else.
I don't know what it says about the person, exactly, but it says something.
M is for Macabre
I've always been into the macabre, from before kindergarten, and I'm not sure why. I'm thankful that my parents were okay with this. I remember my mom once saying something about how she hated this stuff but if I didn't have nightmares and I wasn't showing any signs it was disturbing me she couldn't think of a good reason to forbid it. Last year she gave me this nice little picture from the shop where she works that's a sketch of a graveyard-looking place--how far she's come! Horror movies, graveyards, ghosts, memorial photography, everything with darkness. (I could have included Mother, Moon, Monsters, Mystical, Mystery, Murder...) I think it kind of connects somehow to the mementos and memory, since I can remember a lot of times where I've thought I had to remember this really well because everyone would get old and die.
M is for Meta
In the fandom sense of course. Is there a word for people who compulsively Meta? I like taking it apart, seeing how it fits together, seeing how every strand of thought comes together or makes things happen. Probably it's just the way I feel comfortable in the world in general--if I can understand it, I can handle it. Which is weird because I at least claim to have a healthy respect for chaos and know how important it is. No growth without it, etc. But that's probably a little bit of a fake-out because if I put chaos in its proper place it's not much chaos.
fictualities has given me M. The idea being that someone gives you a letter and you list ten things beginning with it, and you explain what these things mean to you. I might as well start with the most obvious M:
M is for Magpies.
Just last weekend
lunacy exactly what was up with the magpie thing, and I had to think to remember how it started. I believe it was a story I wrote a long time ago, which had a Princess Magpie in it, and the name always stuck with me even if the story didn't. It was sort of an impulse when I chose it for a screen name, but one of those impulses that clicked like "Of course!" In the years since I've started identifying with them more and more, and reading more and more about them. They are, like their corvid cousins the crow and the raven, very smart, funny and cool. Latest fun fact learned about them: in the Ghost Dance of the Plains Indians, the crow, the eagle and the magpie were honored. I could go on and on about them--aren't you lucky I won't!M is for Marigold
Marigold is my roommate's dog, but honors me by acknowledging my presence even though I don't feed her or walk her. (Her personal name for me being "No Can Hands.") She is the most popular living being in a fifty mile radius and has been known to literally stop traffic with her looks. (Whether wearing her fluffy winter coat or shaved for the sporty summer look.) Despite the beauty, she's the kind of girl not afraid to stick her head in a garbage can for some old gum, or make old man noises when she feels like it.
M is for Meditation
I've apparently got kind of a talent for it. You can't do much with a talent for sitting still quietly but it got me a close-up on Wonderama when I was about seven years old. I've tried lots of different kinds, but probably the one I like the best is Vipassana Meditation, which I came to hear about in an odd way. You can do retreats where you spend 10 days meditating all the time, and you don't talk or read or write or eat all that much. The best part? I had these awesome dreams about the ocean. (The worst part: waking up at 4AM in a cold tent--yuck.)
M is for Mentos
When I was in high school I had a bad Mento addiction. I had so many empty Mento wrappers I started compulsively saving them (okay, hoarding them--see M is for Magpie). I don't even know how many I had but let's just say my friends were nice enough to find it eccentric in an amusing way. I am far more mature now, of course, and no longer am surrounded by Mentos. Except for the two boxes in my drawer. And the one in my mouth.
M is for Mercy
I think compassion is the strongest basis for a moral system, and mercy is awesome. I don't mean awesome like “totally cool” but awesome as in truly inspiring a mixed emotion of reverence, respect, dread, and wonder stirred by authority, genius, great beauty, sublimity, or might." When Frodo shows mercy to Saruman, and Saruman says he has grown "wise and cruel?" He's right. Frodo is such a badass there. A well played act of true mercy is like an arrow through the heart.
M is for Mementos and Memory
I read about a kind of behavior in a book once that was one of those "OMG, I didn't know anyone else but me did that! It described that some people feel more connected to those who are absent than those who are present. They have experiences not while something is happening, but when they review their mental slides at home, or look over keepsakes they have as props for memory. These "totems" or mementos can serve as a release mechanisms for reawakening the whole event in their imagination.
Well, that's me. I don't even know how some people manage to be, like, fully present in life. Even when I am fully present it's probably because I'm making myself be that way (see: M is for Meditation). But afterwards I'm all about the memory and I have lots of objects that mean things, a collection of important objects like a lot of little Proustian Madeleines. I wonder if this is why people I know are always telling me I have this fantastic memory. I'll say, "Oh, it's like that time when you..." and they won't remember it. But that scares me, because why don't they remember these things? To me that makes them who they are--why would you not remember something? Of course nobody remembers *everything* but it sometimes seems like people literally do memory dumps when they reach a new phase of life so stuff that was kind of important is just deleted.
M is for Magic
I've been thinking about this recently because I've been writing something with magic in it. Up until recently I've totally avoided writing about magic. I said it was because I felt self-conscious, but I now realize that was because I find fictional magic an incredibly intimate thing. That is, it's hard to write about it without revealing something of yourself. I see it in HP fanfic when people deal with magic in their fics. Often HP writers won't deal much with magic at all, but when they do it's almost always off. Not always in a bad way, it's just that as soon as people start creating new magical ideas they start revealing something of themselves that isn't the author. Sometimes they create rituals, which don't exist in HP. Or they create these great Gothic-y stuff that I *wish* were in the Potterverse when I read them. Or they'll create some big system of calling on gods or fairies or elementals or whatever. For me, magic immediately lets the fic author's voice come through more than anything else.
I don't know what it says about the person, exactly, but it says something.
M is for Macabre
I've always been into the macabre, from before kindergarten, and I'm not sure why. I'm thankful that my parents were okay with this. I remember my mom once saying something about how she hated this stuff but if I didn't have nightmares and I wasn't showing any signs it was disturbing me she couldn't think of a good reason to forbid it. Last year she gave me this nice little picture from the shop where she works that's a sketch of a graveyard-looking place--how far she's come! Horror movies, graveyards, ghosts, memorial photography, everything with darkness. (I could have included Mother, Moon, Monsters, Mystical, Mystery, Murder...) I think it kind of connects somehow to the mementos and memory, since I can remember a lot of times where I've thought I had to remember this really well because everyone would get old and die.
M is for Meta
In the fandom sense of course. Is there a word for people who compulsively Meta? I like taking it apart, seeing how it fits together, seeing how every strand of thought comes together or makes things happen. Probably it's just the way I feel comfortable in the world in general--if I can understand it, I can handle it. Which is weird because I at least claim to have a healthy respect for chaos and know how important it is. No growth without it, etc. But that's probably a little bit of a fake-out because if I put chaos in its proper place it's not much chaos.
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From:
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MAGIC. Yeah :> Reminds me of the last panel of Books of Magic, the mini-series, where Tim says that word. It might be my favorite word (and concept) in like, the universe :D Better than art, better than poetry, better than nature, better than love. MAGIC. I know what you mean about the intimacy of it in fanfic; I haven't used it much in fic 'cause I don't write plotty stuff much, but I think if I did finish my more fanciful stories, they would've been revealing. I think in original stuff, I do write about it -because- it's so intimate & revealing of self, a mirror of desire-- if one uses writing in a cathartic manner, magic rivals dreams as a way to symbolize one's subconscious self. I think writing dream sequences gets a similar effect but is often 'too obvious' in a different way; magic is active rather than passive (dreams), also, and has the power of desire manifest, so it's dangerous in that sense, addictive & beguiling. I think a lot of people show how unimaginative or predictable their dreams are by the fact that their magic is boring.
I do the experiencing-through-memory thing too, though I use writing rather than mementos; meaning, I write it out, one way or the other, if it's important to me. I can be fully present, though, but yeah, when I try to be or when I'm not emotionally threatened by the presence. Like... how would you say you were when we were talking recently? I'm curious about this :> I think there are percentages; not 100%, but somewhat present. I don't think I've ever -really- been 100% with another person, but then it's just sort of difficult because another person muddies my emotions & reactions a lot.
Hee. Meta-addicts; yeah... something like over-intellectual? It's almost on the tip of my tongue, ahhh.
From:
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think in original stuff, I do write about it -because- it's so intimate & revealing of self, a mirror of desire-- if one uses writing in a cathartic manner, magic rivals dreams as a way to symbolize one's subconscious self. I think writing dream sequences gets a similar effect but is often 'too obvious' in a different way; magic is active rather than passive (dreams), also, and has the power of desire manifest, so it's dangerous in that sense, addictive & beguiling. I think a lot of people show how unimaginative or predictable their dreams are by the fact that their magic is boring.
Yes! And I love the way different writers obviously compare it to different things. Like Susan Cooper gets nothing out of the performance of magic, but she's really into the idea of knowing how to talk to things or understanding everything. It's based on something totally different than say, an author who makes magic about sacficing something to make something happen. In HP it's kind of connected to...I don't know how to explain it. It's about personal power, I think. Not always in a bad way, but the way that when Harry learns new magic it's like he's developing as a person, he's becoming competent. For other people it's communining with forces beyond our control, stuff like that.
Like... how would you say you were when we were talking recently? I'm curious about this :> I think there are percentages; not 100%, but somewhat present. I don't think I've ever -really- been 100% with another person, but then it's just sort of difficult because another person muddies my emotions & reactions a lot.
I think I was pretty present! *pats self on back* But probably because I was interested in the conversation and it was one-on-one. Like when I'm doing Meta I'm very focused on that, and the best conversations for me are like that, where I'm actually interested. So I wasn't, like, drifting off.:
From:
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I've not read a lot of fantasy, but I'm partial to the old ideal of 'three times three' of whatever energy you send out, you have to be prepared to recieve it back.
With HP, I always prefer the even numbered books, one of those being CoS, which everyone else seems to hate; but in particular, I'm fond of the broken wand. It's just a great tool for true (and cruel) justice, which isn't present often in the series. No bias, you just get back what you put out.
(I suppose there are little hints of the rule in other parts of the books - the wands locking, Harry and Draco cursing each other's friends in GoF, the train hexing reversal in HBP, the SNEAK hex..., but it's all pretty exaggerated and infrequent.)