August 3, 2017 · 1:00 am

Who to Follow on Twitter If You’re Into Science Fiction and Fantasy

I’m starting a new series of posts on this blog today about who you should follow if you’re new to Twitter and want to dip your toes into specific communities there.

This week I’m going to be recommending Tweeps who talk about science fiction and fantasy who aren’t currently as well known as, say, J.K. Rowling or Margaret Atwood.

My goal is to highlight hidden gems and introduce you to accounts that you very well may never have heard of before.

Future parts of this series will be used to discuss mindfulness and fitness. I do not know how many other parts there may be after those posts, but I am brainstorming more ideas for it.

Without further delay, here are my favourite sci-fi and fantasy accounts from the Twitterverse. If you have suggestions for specific accounts to recommend or topics for a future post in this series, I’d be quite interested in hearing about them.

@babadookgay

Yes, these tweets are written from the perspective of the monster in The Babadook. After that film was released, some fans jokingly speculated that the Babadook was gay because it’s still so uncommon for LGBT people to be represented in the movies.

No, his account isn’t scary (unless you’re anti-gay). His tweets are actually about acceptance and the joy of finding kindred spirits in the most unlikely places. Reading them is a warm, happy experience for me.

@SarcasticRover 

Imagine what a sentient, sarcastic Mars Curiosity would be like. Their photographs and comments about what it’s like to roll around on Martian soil all day are quite funny and well done. This is a humour account, not a scientifically-minded one.

@bitsofpluto

This is a good account to follow if you have any interest in Pluto or space exploration in general and want to take a science-based approach to your research. The bot running it tweets photos of various sections of Pluto without commentary. It is up to the audience to come up with our own theories about the meaning and value of those photographs.

From what I’ve seen, this account does not respond to people who talk to it. That isn’t something that bothers me, but I know some people on Twitter who feel otherwise.

‪@PIutoThePlanet‬

On a more whimsical note, this account speaks from the perspective of Pluto itself. Imagine being a lonely planet that occassionally notices a satellite flying by to take its picture.

Pluto doesn’t tweet very often, but when it happens it’s definitely worth paying attention to. It is much less sarcastic than the SarcasticRover.

‪@FolkloreThurs‬

The woman who runs this account tweet and retweets pieces of folklore from every corner of the globe on Thursdays. #FolkLoreThursday is the hashtag you’ll need to find these tweets each week.

I’ve been lurking and occasionally participating for a few years now, and I’ve learned about so many stories and traditions that I’d never heard of before. The community that has built up around this hashtag is warm and welcoming to newcomers. Don’t be afraid to jump in with questions or your own contributions if this is your sort of thing.

‪@apexmag‬

I’ve sung the praises of this literary magazine before, but Apex Magazine is still my favourite place online to find new SFF fiction. This is a wonderful place to begin if you’re in the market for free short stories and/or interviews with contemporary writers in this field. I’ve discovered many amazing authors and books through them.

‪@PlioceneBloke‬

Yes, this is exactly what it sounds like. Imagine a caveman tweeting about all of the things the first humans have discovered, invented, and learned.

Some of them are funny. Others are poignant. Occasionally he even tweets about current events from the understanding of a hunter-gatherer whose culture is completely different from our own.

‪@atlasobscura‬

Go here if you’re in the mood for some inspiration for your own stories or if you simply enjoy reading about the bizarre but true things that sometimes happen in our world. It’s a very eclectic mixture of sub-genres, topics, and ideas.

I don’t even know what else to say about this account. It seriously has something for every niche in the SFF community, and then some!

‪@MicroSFF‬

Imagine reading a SFF story that has been condensed to 140 characters or less. I am regularly amazed by how the owner of this account manages to pack so much storytelling in such a tiny amount of space.

The person who runs it is friendly and often responds to feedback. This doesn’t happen with all of the accounts I’m recommending today, so start here if you’re most interested in following people who will interact with you on Twitter.

‪@MagicRealismBot‬

If MicroSFF is a full story, MagicRealismBot is an idea. Not all of their ideas make sense, but some of them are great prompts if you’re looking for a partially-formed plot or character for your own writing. Like bitsofpluto, this is run by a bot. Don’t expect an answer if you tweet back at them, but do enjoy the ride.

@AwfulFantasy

Not every SFF story is going to appeal to everyone. If you have any pet peeves in these genres at all, this is definitely the account to follow. It pokes fun at all kinds of tropes, stereotypes, and overused plot devices in clever ways.

What are your favorite science fiction and fantasy accounts on Twitter?

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July 31, 2017 · 1:00 am

My Most Anticipated Upcoming Movies of 2017

2017 is more than half finished now, but that doesn’t mean there still aren’t plenty of great movies coming out between August and New Year’s Eve. I recently researched what films are scheduled to come out over the next 5 months, and I was surprised by how many of them I’m looking forward to watching.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Starship Troopers: Traitor of Mars. In theatres on August 21.

I’m going to cut straight to the point here. Was the original Starship Troopers movie from 1997 cheesy? Yes, and that was a huge part of the appeal of it for me. Sometimes the best scifi is the kind that involves fighting gigantic bugs on faraway planets and occasionally cutting away to a futuristic commercial.

I can’t wait to see what else is going on in this universe. It’s one of the best ideas for a 90s sequel that Hollywood has had since Fuller House was announced.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Geostorm. In theatres on October 20.

There have been many natural disaster movies made in the past, but I can’t think of a single one that was caused by malfunctioning computers. This plot point alone was enough to make me curious about this film.

I’m assuming that a hurricane is a hurricane no matter how it came about, but there’s always the possibility that the writers have come up with some truly creative twists on this old trope. This is the kind of movie that I’d want to wait to rent until it was available on iTunes. As interested as I am in watching it, it will be even better if I can watch it from the comfort of my own home.

It doesn’t strike me as something that requires a big screen and a room full of strangers in order to enjoy it. Then again, I feel that way about almost all films these days.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Shape of Water. In theatres on December 8.

If I could only pick one of these movies to watch, The Shape of Water would be it without question. Guillermo del Toro won me over years ago with Pan’s Labryinth. The Shape of Water is promising to be every bit as interesting as that story, so I can’t wait to see if it measures up to my expectations.

I’m purposefully avoiding all spoilers for it. My regular readers know that I strongly dislike spoilers in general, and those feelings are only intensified by something that sounds like it’s going to a lot of fun to watch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Miss Kiet’s Children. In theatres on December 13.

Wow, this looks like a tearjerker. I have a lot of compassion for immigrants in general, but immigration must be even more difficult for children who aren’t necessarily old enough to understand the conflicts that forced their families to move so far away from where they were born.

One of the things I enjoy the most about documentaries is getting the chance to see the world through other people’s eyes. I know very little about the political or social situation in the Netherlands, so I’ll be watching Miss Kiet’s Children with the hope of changing that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ferdinand. In theatres on December 15.

When I was in high school, a friend of mine dated a cute boy named Ferdinand. This movie is NOT about their relationship in any way, but the title of it did make me pause and smile at that memory before watching the preview.

Ferdinand is actually about a bull who doesn’t want to fight anyone. I’m intrigued by that concept and hope that the storytelling will live up to the premise. From what I’ve read about it so far, I’m expecting to enjoy this story quite a bit.

If you have a Twitter account, come over and tell me what movies you’re looking forward to seeing the most between now until the end of the year.

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July 29, 2017 · 1:00 am

Suggestion Saturday: July 29, 2017

Here is this week’s list of poems, essays, arguments, and other links from my favourite corners of the web.

The Phantom Traffic Jams via MBTTTR. I couldn’t agree with this more.

Telling Our Stories. As I mentioned two weeks ago, I discovered Lucille Clifton’s poetry earlier this month. Here is another wonderful selection from her catalogue. Don’t you love the way she assembles her words? It reminded me of the picture I included in today’s post.

How Eclipse Chasers Are Putting a Small Kentucky Town on the Map. What a fascinating article. How many of you in the United States are planning to see this eclipse, I wonder?

How We Really Tamed the Dog. A small number of foxes have been domesticated much faster than anyone thought was possible. This makes me wish I could go back in time and find out exactly how and when humans domesticated wolves. The first true dog must have been a wonderful creature.

Etobicoke “Park Stairs” Story is a Perfect Example of the Crass, Reactionary, Anti-Regulatory Nonsense That Lead to the Grenfell Disaster via ‪theleftchapter‬. I’m going to guess that my non-Canadian readers probably haven’t heard of Toronto’s recent controversy over a set of homemade stairs that a man built at a local park, but this blog post explains it well before diving into the author’s opinion on the matter. I thought all of you would find this interesting. I sure did.

What It’s Like Going to the Gym After Many (Many!) Years Away! via ‪SteffanyMR‬.I loved the message of this post.

Boys & DnD: The Second Session. Last week I linked to part one of these series. It sure sounds like my friend’s kids are enjoying this game a lot. Now I want to try Dungeons and Dragons someday. It seems like it would be a fun way to pass an evening.

From La Bestia:

A large plastic bag will keep you dry
during the heavy rain storms.

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July 27, 2017 · 1:00 am

How Social Media Is Changing the Rules About Spoilers

Those of you who have been following me for years might remember my post from 2014 about hating spoilers.

Since then I’ve been paying attention to how social media – especially Twitter – has been changing the rules about if, whether, and when it’s okay to share spoilers.

It was especially interesting to see how people reacted to The Handmaid’s Tale a few months ago because of how much faster that show was released in the U.S. than it was in other parts of the world.

Canada was always one or two episodes behind the United States depending on which day of the week you were on. Other countries were even further behind us.

People in the States were sharing spoilers before or right after the latest episode there ended. Even mainstream news sites were leaking plot twists as they discussed what had currently happened and what was going to happen next. I had to mute the hashtags for that show and avoid reading all news articles about it until I’d finished the whole series.

While I still believe that it’s rude to share spoilers for a show that has just aired, not everyone agrees with me and not everyone who does agree with me has the same rules about how to go about sharing them after a certain amount of time has passed.

The Old Rules

This varied according to which parts of the Internet you spent time in, of course, but I remember the old rules being as follows:

  • Always put a spoiler warning before sharing anything that mentioned even mild plot twists.
  • Don’t discuss the latest episode of your favourite show with people who haven’t seen it yet unless they tell you they don’t mind.
  • When in doubt, don’t mention it.

I do not remember the mainstream media releasing spoilers back then the way they do now. To be fair, I don’t know if that’s because I watched fewer shows at that point or if the rules have since changed for the media as well.

The Controversy

If cats knew what spoilers were, they’d disapprove of them.

I’m going to be doing some generalizing and simplifying here for the sake of brevity, but people who have an opinion on this issue seem to fall into one of two camps.

The first camp believes that everything is up for discussion the second a show has finished airing in their time zone. While some of them do warn everyone about their discussion of spoilers ahead of time, many others don’t bother to mention it at all.

Interestingly enough, my own mother belongs in this group. If I read a book or watch a movie that she hasn’t tried yet, she genuinely doesn’t mind hearing spoilers about it. This blows my mind sometimes, but I’m much less cautious about discussing how stories end with her than I am with almost everyone else I know.

The second camp is against all spoilers. We want to be warned of potential spoilers well in advance so we can avoid them. We often also want everyone to use the official hashtags for that show or movie so that we can mute them before any of the plot twists are revealed.

The New Rules

  • Always use the appropriate hashtags when discussing your favourite shows on social media.
  • Give people fair warning if you will be sharing spoilers.
  • Find likeminded people to discuss (or avoid) spoilers with.
  • Respect the rights of others to make different decisions.
  • When in doubt, don’t mention it.

From what I’ve seen, the Internet hasn’t yet come to a conclusion about how long everyone should wait before spoiler tags are no longer necessary.

I take a conservative approach and add spoiler tags to almost everything. Just because a book was released a few decades ago doesn’t mean that everyone has read it. While I do occasionally share spoilers about old movies, TV shows, and books, I warn people first in case they don’t want to know what happened.

It’s going to be interesting to see how all of this plays out over the next few years.  Is giving spoiler warnings for everything no matter when it was released the best way to handle it? I honestly don’t know. This is something I do as a courtesy for others, but I don’t think it’s currently realistic to expect everyone to follow this rule given how unwilling they are to wait even a few days to dissect current shows.

With that being said, I would like to see people become more aware of the fact that their favourite shows have global audiences and that not every country or time zone gets the latest episode simultaneously.

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July 24, 2017 · 1:00 am

Why Unsolicited Advice Is a Terrible Idea

Yes, I appreciate the irony in writing a blog post about unsolicited advice that could be read as unsolicited advice.

I’ve been playing around with the idea of never giving anyone any advice that they haven’t asked me for, though, and I thought it would make a great topic for a post here while I’m adjusting to the idea of keeping my mouth shut until or unless I’m asked for my opinion.

Perhaps someday I’ll revisit this topic once I have more to say about it? For now, let’s talk about why giving people advice they haven’t asked for is a terrible idea.

 You Don’t Have All of the Facts

Everyone has private parts of their lives that are only shared with very few people or maybe even no one else at all. It could be as simple as a soothing bedtime ritual or as complex as an uncommon hobby that they only discuss with others who have also devoted their free time to perfecting the art of underwater basket weaving.

The parts of someone’s life that others see  almost certainly don’t give a full picture of who they are or how complex their problems – or their perceived problems –  really are.

Sometimes what looks like a banana isn’t actually a banana after all. (Also, I love this picture in and of itself. Isn’t it interesting?)

One Size Doesn’t Fit All

I’ve seen this happen multiple times with various friends of mine who are living with serious, longterm mental or physical health problems.

No sooner do they mention having a particularly bad day or dealing with a troublesome, new symptom than someone else will jump in with a half-dozen suggestions for how they should fix their disease once and for all.

Yes, they’ve tried all of those cures already. No, that random Internet article isn’t going to magically fix deep-seated health problems that have been bothering them for decades and that have been treated by multiple doctors and other healthcare professions over the years.

I’ve only ever had this happen to me briefly once or twice, and even that made me irrationally angry. I can’t imagine what my friends who must deal with possibly well-meaning but ultimately wrong and judgemental assumptions about their bodies over and over again go through.

What works for one person can fail miserably for another even if they’re both dealing with similar circumstances or diseases.

 It Doesn’t Work

Advice is only useful when the person receiving it is open to the idea of changing. It’s not like a vaccine that will protect someone from dangerous diseases regardless of what thoughts flutter through their minds while their immune systems are learning how to recognize and destroy inactivated polio germs.

One has to be ready to accept what the advice-giver is saying in order for it to have any hope at all of working. Changing your personality, habits, and/or current situation is such a difficult task that there’s no other way of going about it. Anyone who isn’t motivated to keep going even if they don’t see any results right away is almost certainly going to give up long before any of the work they might have put into their current personal project has had any chance at all to fix things.

Unwanted advice also doesn’t work well for adult relationships in general. When someone who isn’t in an official place of authority over me tries to control what I do or how I live, I feel annoyed and confused. If they continue to do it over a long period of time despite being asked to stop, I slowly begin to share less about my life with them.

Not only does unsolicited advice not work in the short term, it makes me much less willing to listen six months or a year from now if they have something else to say to me.

Rather than prompting me to change whatever it is they think I’m doing wrong, what this kind of interaction teaches me is that they’re not a safe person to confide in. I will often start spending less time with them and guarding myself when I do see them. Their intentions may have been noble, but the results of their poor boundaries are going to be the exact opposite of what they might have hoped for.

Some Lessons Have to be Learned the Hard Way

Not everyone is willing to take the experiences of others as the ultimate truth.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have the urge to warn other people about certain types of mistakes I’ve made in the past, but you can’t live someone else’s life for them.

Sometimes they have to find out for themselves that something is a terrible idea regardless of whether it takes thirty seconds or thirty years between their decision and reaping the consequence of it.

The only thing the rest of us can do in the meantime is to respect their boundaries and hope that they’ll learn their lesson as quickly and easily as possible.

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July 22, 2017 · 1:00 am

Suggestion Saturday: July 22, 2017

Here is this week’s list of comic strips, lists, and other links from my favourite corners of the web.

Summer Friends. Summer is about half over now. This is a funny take on one of my least favourite parts of this season. Hopefully all of us will be able to build elaborate sandcastles this summer instead of worrying about this stuff. Ha!

What Your Doctor Is Really Saying via DrCarolCooper‬. For those of you who might not know this, my mom has been a nurse for 20+ years. I’m going to have to ask her what she thinks of this list and if she has anything to add to it.

The Epidemic of Gay Loneliness. Ooh, this was a good article.

Letting Neural Networks Be Weird. This is  what happens when you ask a computer to come up with new proverbs by feeding it a lot of old ones . My favourite new proverb was “A good fear is never known till needed.”

Travelling a Million Miles Away: Nextdoor to Canada via LevRaphael. As a dual citizen, I approve of this message.

Fuck the Law of Attraction via CockAndCrow.Sometimes rants are exactly what you need to get through the day.

The Boys Try Dungeons and Dragons. This sounds like so much fun. I hope these kids get to have many more D&D games in the future.

What Not to Do in a Disaster. Everyone needs to read this link. It was full of good advice.

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July 20, 2017 · 1:00 am

What Minecraft Has Taught Me About Mindfulness

Minecraft was frustrating when I first began to learn how to play it. It’s the kind of game that has a steep learning curve, so my avatar died in a lot of silly ways in the beginning.

I am not a big gamer in general, but Minecraft is one of those pastimes that I keep cycling back around to. I’ll play it for several months and then take a long break from it. No matter how long I’m away, though, I always come back to it eventually.

Recently, I’ve started to play it again. The other night I began to think about the lessons this game has taught me as I was putting up a stone fence around the home that some friends and I have been working on.

Pay Attention to Your Surroundings

I can’t even begin to tell you how many times I got lost in Minecraft when I first began playing it. If you happen to wind up in the middle of a biome, every hill looks the same after a while. This can make it difficult to find your way home before dark when the monsters begin to spawn and the game becomes dangerous for anyone who wants their character to survive the night.

To be honest with you, I’m still not an expert at navigating my surroundings. I have gotten a lot better at knowing where I am relative to home base, though, and it’s much more rare for me to get totally lost than it used to be. A big part of the reason why this is so is because I’ve learned to pay attention to where the sun is in the sky and what landmarks are close to my home.

Even something as simple as a patch of flowers or an oddly-shaped tree can potentially be a clue that you’re almost back to a safe place to spend the night.

Live in the Moment

Minecraft is the sort of game where everything can be peaceful one moment and a life-or-death battle with an army of skeletons the next. You never know what a day will bring to you, but you also won’t progress at all if you spend all of your time assuming that there’s a skeleton lurking behind you.

Sometimes I like to watch videos of what other players have built in this game. The homes I’m able to build at the moment are simple, but I dream of the day when I, too, will be able to build a mansion without using any cheats.

In the meantime, I enjoy the skills I’ve picked up so far. I’m learning new things almost every time I play it, and I see a lot of improvement from where I was as a player when I first began.

Photo credit: Andy Dingley.

 

You Can’t Prepare for Everything

Just because the monsters usually spawn at night doesn’t mean you won’t come across any of them during the day. One time I was collecting wheat near my home when a creeper (see photo above) snuck up behind me and exploded. My avatar was injured and a piece of the fencing around the wheat was destroyed.

I’d followed all of the rules the night before by going to bed as soon as the sun set. Doing this is supposed to dramatically reduce your risk of running into a monster as they won’t spawn if you’re asleep.

You can’t prepare for everything, though. Sometimes Minecraft and real life throw you curve balls. Accepting that anything could happen at ay moment wasn’t always easy, but it did make for a better playing experience once I started to do it.

Stay Peaceful

Photo credit: Gilda from London, UK.

Like many other things in life, Minecraft operates on a cycle. It has a steady cycle of day and night modes, of course, but it also seems to shift between times when there are many monsters and when there are fewer of them.

The number of friendly creatures in this game seems to change, too. There have been times when I’ve found valleys full of sheep and pigs and other times when it was hard to find any of them at all.

Once you grow accustomed to the ebb and flow of it, it’s easier to accept that sometimes things aren’t going to go your way. A hunt for the sheep that my farm still needs might be unsuccessful today, but that doesn’t mean I won’t find any the next time I go searching for them.

If you play Minecraft, what lessons have you learned from it?

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July 17, 2017 · 1:00 am

5 Reasons Why You Should Read Science Fiction and Fantasy

This past weekend I tried to remember the first science fiction or fantasy book I ever read. After a lot of deliberation, I believe that traditional fairy tales were what originally drew me into this genre.

Some of my earliest memories about books in general involve borrowing fairy tale collections from my local library. After I’d read all of the sanitized versions of them, I moved on the dark and often gory originals.

My second clear memory of the sci-fi genre was watching reruns of Star Trek: The Next Generation. There were two episodes of that show that I wanted to watch over and over again because of how much they blew my mind: Genesis and Sub Rosa. Before seeing them, I never would have imagined that people could evolve backwards or that an entity could need a candle to survive.

I don’t know how many of my readers are already fans of science fiction or fantasy, but there are several reasons why you should give them a chance if you’re not currently reading them.

They Ask Questions Without Always Answering Them

One of the things I found soothing about fairy tales when I first began reading them is how predictable they were. It was common to have three tasks to perform, a talking animal to guide you on your journey, an old woman who would help or hinder you depending on how kindly you treated her, and a happy ending for everyone who had a pure heart.

It came as a surprise to me, then, to move into older, darker fairy tales where these things weren’t necessarily true. Sometimes the protagonist ended up with the prince, but in other stories she before they could be reunited. As I gradually switched to reading and watching more science fiction and contemporary fantasy*, this unpredictable nature of the plot only grew stronger.

I love the fact that these genres don’t always tie everything up into a neat, little bow. Sometimes the good guys win. At other times, they might lose or the line between good and evil could be drawn in more than one place depending on how one looks at the facts. The open-ended nature of what it means to be a good guy and why bad things happen to good people appeals to me quite a bit.

*See also: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and many other of Joss Whedon’s TV shows.

They Teach You Important Life Lessons

Not everyone is who they appear to be.

Always overestimate how much time you need to do something. It’s better to impress others by finishing it early than it is to disappoint them.

If you’re able to help someone in need, do it. You never know when your fortunes might reverse and you might be the one who needs help next.

Equality is for everyone.

Don’t wear the colour red if you’re out on a mission.

Dragons and old, tired arguments with the people you love must never be roused from their slumber for no good reason.

These are only a few of the life lessons I’ve learned from fantasy and science fiction. I could have easily filled this entire blog post with nothing but a list of the things I’ve learned from sci-fi. It’s not just entertainment. It can also teach you things that will last an entire lifetime.

They Introduce You to New Ideas

The sci-fi genre is the perfect place to explore things you’ve never thought about before and imagine how our world could be different than it currently is.

Xena: Warrior Princess and Buffy the Vampire Slayer not only introduced me to the idea that a woman could save the day, they didn’t make the genders of their heroines a big deal.

Xena and Buffy were both too busy fighting monsters to worry about whether or not other people approved of them being heroic. That was something I rarely got to see as a little girl, so I relished those glimpses of worlds where your gender didn’t affect what role you’d play in an adventure.

They Imagine the Best and the Worst Case Scenarios

At various points in my life I’ve drifted back and forth between preferring utopian and dystopian sci-fi stories. There have been times when I’ve craved the hope that can be found in imagining a world where prejudice and many other forms of inequality no longer existed.

Watching Captain Picard and his crew explore the galaxy was magical. Here was a world where your gender, race, and species didn’t have any affect at all on what jobs you were allowed to do from what I could see. Was it perfect? No, but it was whole lot better than our current world.

On the flip side, sometimes it’s interesting to explore a future version of our world where everything has fallen apart. One of the things I enjoyed the most about the first six seasons of The Walking Dead was seeing how Rick reacted when every attempt he made to keep his children and community safe eventually fell apart in the most dramatic ways possible. At what point should someone try something completely new? Is it okay to stop admitting newcomers to your safe area once they’ve betrayed you a few times?

They Prepare You For Uncertainty

Will the future be paradise or a post-apocalyptic hellhole?

Nobody knows, so we must prepare for both possibilities. I love the fact that sci-fi is so focused on showing where we’re headed as a species and how small changes in our society today could have a massive affect on whether future generations will bless or curse our names.

A few years ago I underwent some testing for a possible medical problem. (Spoiler alert – it ended up being nothing to worry about at all).

While I was waiting to hear whether or not the abnormality my regular doctor had discovered was actually something to be concerned about, science fiction and fantasy showed me how to exist in that narrow space between health and sickness.

I hope I won’t have to walk down that dark passageway again for decades to come, but I know that my stories will be there to comfort and distract me if I do.

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July 15, 2017 · 1:00 am

Suggestion Saturday: July 15, 2017

Here is this week’s list of poems, videos, comic strips, essays, and other links from my favourite corners of the web. The picture on the left reminds me of the “Choose Peace” link on this list.

7 Venn Diagrams About Teaching via JamesTheo. This made me grin.

The Photograph: A Lynching. The imagery in this poem was chillingly detailed. Lucille Clifton is a poet I’ve recently discovered, so expect to read more stuff from her in future Suggestion Saturday posts. Her writing style is gorgeous.

I Don’t Accommodate Uncontrolled Men. My thoughts exactly.

30-Day Habit Challenge: How I Changed One Thing About Myself via ‪shyvish‬. What a cool experiment. I won’t tell you what habit she decided to break, but I will say it’s something that’s quite common.

Catcall. The only kind of catcalling anyone should do.

Toronto Poetry Map. The title of this link tells you exactly what it is. If I ever find maps of other cities that show where various poems about them were set, I’ll share them with you. It’s such a creative way to arrange poetry.

From Choose Peace via OneTovarysh:

You have a choice in how you live each day.

You have a choice in the thoughts you choose to harbor,

The feelings you choose to hold onto.

The choice is always yours

Because you have free will.

Choose peace.

Fair warning: some of the jokes in the video below are cringe-worthy. This is a nice overview of Canadian culture, though, if you’ve ever wondered about stuff like where the word “toonie” comes from, what kind of pizza we invented, or which part of Canada used to have a license plate that was in the shape of a polar bear.

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July 13, 2017 · 1:00 am

How Mindfulness Helps Me When I Wake Up too Early

As I’ve mentioned on this site before, my circadian rhythm is strongly affected by how many hours of daylight we have in Ontario. I can’t help but to wake up when the sun rises no matter what part of the year it is.

This process begins at about 5 a.m. in June and July, so I’m up very early indeed in mid to late summer. Since the sun doesn’t set until about 9 p.m. now, I also don’t get tired until fairly late at night as well.

That means that I don’t get as much sleep at this time of the year as I get in November or December when there are 14 to 15 hours of darkness at night.

On a positive note, I’ve experienced so many of these summers full of early mornings of that I’m now pretty used to them. It’s a cycle that will slowly begin to change now that the days are growing shorter again.

I also occasionally get to sleep in past 5:30 or 6 a.m. if the sky is overcast. The rest of the time, I do the following things to stay mindful and wait to see what will happen next.

Staying in Bed

Unless there’s a pressing need to get out of bed, I stay in it for as long as possible.

I won’t lie to you. There have been a few times when the sun woke up me so early that I deeply wanted to go back to sleep for a few more hours.

This isn’t something you can force your body to do, though, and I’ve found that the best way to encourage a mind to fall back asleep is to avoid giving it too much stimulation. I may read a book to pass the time if I truly can’t fall asleep again, but even that can be too much for my mind depending on what I’m reading.

The important thing is to stay quiet and still while I wait to see how my body reacts.

Living in the Moment

Early mornings are such a peaceful time of the day. I often hear trucks rumbling, cars honking, and all kinds of other urban sounds in the afternoon and evening, but even someplace as enormous and busy as Toronto grows quiet as night turns into morning.

5 a.m. is the perfect time to clear your mind of any thoughts of the past or the future. The only things I focus on are the ones that are happening right now:

  • The feel of the cool sheets against my skin.
  • The sound of my husband breathing as he sleeps.
  • The occasional call of a bird or other nature sound that even the city can’t erase.

Of course, this isn’t always an easy thing to do. There are times when I have to gently remind myself to stay mindful if my mind begins to jump all over the place.

Having No Expectations of Going Back to Sleep

Here’s a riddle for you: why is it so much easier to fall asleep when you’re not trying to do so?

I remember tossing and turning for a huge chunk of the night once years ago because I was so excited about a vacation to visit my parents and siblings that was beginning the next day. Some of that sleep had to made up the next night after I’d had the chance to give everyone a hug and settled into our visit.

The mornings during the summer when I close my eyes and attempt to will myself into dreamland are almost always the ones where I’m up for good at the crack of dawn.

If I can lay down quietly and neither try to stay awake or fall asleep, my mind will often settle down again and let me catch another hour of rest before the day begins for good. Even if it doesn’t happen, that quiet time is a nice way to adjust to daytime.

Putting It All Together

I’ve actually kind of come to enjoy my silent mornings now that I do my best not to expect anything from them. This is a part of the year that passes by all too quickly. By the winter holidays I’ll be sleeping like a log every night, but in the meantime….

Maybe I’ll fall back asleep in five minutes.

Maybe I’ll drift in and out of sleep so peacefully that it will all feel the same to me.

Maybe I’ll have some time to truly live in the moment before beginning my day.

Any of these options are acceptable, and only time will tell which one I’ll receive on any given day. I’d love to know how practicing mindfulness has had an effect on your daily life. Come tell me all about it on Twitter.

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