January 19, 2017 · 1:00 am

The Best Way to Respond to People Who Don’t Share Your Taste in Books

Years ago someone asked me what kind of science fiction books I like to read.

I’d hit a lull in that genre shortly before that conversation began, so it took a moment to come up with my answer. The last book I remembered reading and really loving at that point was by a popular, mainstream science fiction writer, so I mentioned their name.

The other person’s disgusted reaction to my answer made my heart sink. This clearly wasn’t an author they liked at all. The conversation quickly shifted to other topics.

Here’s what I wish they’d said to me instead:

Oh, that’s interesting. I’ve never really been able to get into that person’s work. What have you read recently from them? What did you like about it?

For the record, I definitely don’t expect everyone to like the same stuff I do. Life would be incredibly dull if everyone always read and watched the same material.

There are also authors out there whose books don’t appeal to me in any way. What is fresh and exciting to me might be boring or scary to someone else. Those authors have all found audiences who appreciate the kinds of stories they tell, though, and you can learn a lot about someone by figuring out what it is they like about a particular storyteller.

For example:

How Do They See the World?

Someone who reads a lot of historical mysteries set in New England, for example, might be a history buff or have a real knack for solving mysteries by noticing all of the important clues early on.

I don’t make assumptions about why someone likes the things they do, but it is fun to ask them more about it and see what they have to say. You can learn so much about someone’s perspective by exploring the reasons why they think a specific genre is the best thing ever.

What Do They Value?

I have a few friends who absolutely love romance novels. Their appreciation for happy endings and everlasting love makes me smile. It’s also shown me sides of their personalities that I probably wouldn’t have noticed otherwise.

Most people don’t go walking around telling others that they believe in the inherent goodness of humanity, after all, but you might catch a glimpse of this part of their mind if you probe for deeper answers. There is always a reason why someone likes the things that they do. Those reasons won’t always be the key to an important part of their personality, but sometimes they can be.

What Are They Afraid Of?

This won’t apply to everyone, of course, but one of the reasons why I like talking to people who read horror, thrillers, and similar types of tales is that you can learn a lot about what people find scary based on what parts of these genres they find appealing.

I love being scared, but I hate blood and gore. The kinds of horror novels I relish are almost entirely about what’s going on in the main character’s mind instead of anything the villain is physically doing to frighten them. Is he or she genuinely seeing those horrifying things, or is there a rational explanation for their nighttime visitors? Is there anything the main character is holding back from us, or can we completely trust their perspective?

Do They Think You’d Like It?

Another reason why it’s is a good idea to ask questions instead of make assumptions about people’s tastes in books is that you might find a new author or series you really like.

As a writer, I’ve been noticing a lot of stories that cross over with many other genres. While I usually prefer darker and more serious science fiction, I have been impressed by how creative some of those crossovers are. It takes a lot of hard work to blend, say, a zombiepocalypse with an engaging love story, but a lot of people have been making it work in wonderful ways.

The more you talk to people who love genres or writers that aren’t your cup of tea, the higher your chances become of stumbling across something incredible. I hope you’ll keep these points in mind the next time you have a conversation with someone like this.

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January 16, 2017 · 1:00 am

Things Nobody Tells You About Moving to Canada

Twelve years ago I immigrated to Canada from the United States. Today I thought it would be fun to share a list of things I learned about moving up north that I found surprising, funny, or interesting.

International Postage is Slow and Expensive

It costs me about $1.35 to mail a greeting card to the United States. Once I actually ended up spending more to mail a small box of gifts to a family member than I spent on the presents themselves. Needless to say, I don’t regularly send boxes of goodies to my loved ones down south these days. They are only mailed off for the most special of occasions.

There’s also the time factor for international packages. It is often much slower than it would be to to mail something to someone within Canada. You need to send stuff early if you want it to arrive on time, especially during the busier seasons of the year. Normally I try to mail stuff out at least two weeks before I hope it will arrive. This is usually overkill, but there have been times when packages haven’t arrived until the tail end of that window of time.

Immigrants Are Everywhere, and They Are Welcomed Here

20% of the people who currently live in Canada were born somewhere else in the world. That percentage is more like 50% here in Toronto.

It’s so interesting to hear stories about where other Canadians came from and how they ended up living here. Some of my fellow immigrants originally moved here to go to university or to accept a specific job. Others came here because they fell in love with someone who already lived here just like I did. Regardless of why they’re here or when they arrived, I love hearing people talk about their adventures along the way to temporary work visas, permanent residency, and/or citizenship.

While my adopted country definitely  isn’t perfect, stories like this are common here. I’ve personally witnessed similar random acts of kindness playing out more than once in Toronto. It’s one of the things I really like about living here. There is an openness to strangers in Canadian culture that seeps into your bones once you’ve lived here long enough.

Canadians Have a Dark, Unique Sense of Humour

On the flip side, one of the first things I noticed when I moved up here was how dark the Canadian sense of humour can be. It’s not quite as dry or self-deprecating as British humour, but I can see how it was influenced by them . Both Canada and England laugh at things that aren’t quite as common to joke about in the States.

Sometimes my Canadian-born spouse likes to gently tease me when I react to Canadian jokes like an American would. They make me pull back even though I know there’s nothing malicious about them. I simply don’t quite understand why they find stuff like Nina Conti’s monkey puppet act so hilarious.

Obviously this is one of those things that not every Canadian immigrant will notice or think about. So much depends on which country you grew up in and what assumptions you make about how society works when you move to a new culture.

I hope that other Canadian immigrants who read this blog will consider writing their own posts about what they’ve observed here. It would be so interesting to get other perspectives on this. If anyone does this and lets me know about it on Twitter, I’ll edit this post to include links to their posts!

You Are (Probably) Going to be Doing Most of the Traveling to See Everyone Back Home
My parents spent a lot of time visiting us in Ontario during the first year or two I lived up here when I wasn’t legally allowed to leave the country. I was still waiting to become a Permanent Resident at that point, so the government wanted me to stay in the country full-time until all of that paperwork was sorted out.

Once I became a Permanent Resident, though, it quickly became clear that it’s a lot cheaper and easier for two young adults to go visit a few dozen relatives between the ages of 0 and 90+ than for those relatives to come up to Toronto.

We really appreciate getting the visitors we do up here, but my spouse and I are used to doing most of the traveling these days.

On a positive note, family reunions quickly become the highlight of your year. It is so much fun to be surrounded by relatives who are all thrilled to have you around for a week or two. Sometimes it feels like being a mini-celebrity because of how excited your family is to see you when you go back home.

These are a few of the many things that I didn’t know about life in Canada before I moved up here. Perhaps I’ll share more of them in a future post!

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January 14, 2017 · 1:00 am

Suggestion Saturday: January 14, 2017

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

Lullaby. You may have noticed me sharing other comic strips from this site in the last couple of weeks. I went through all of the archives there and picked out my favourite ones to share with you. There will be more links to this same site in the future!

How to Ensure You Have a Great Year by Using a Happiness Jar via ShelleyWilson72. I’m doing this in 2017. I hope you’ll join me.

10 Ways You’re Making Your Life Harder Than It Has To Be. All of these points were excellent, but my favourite ones were #1 and #10.

Is Every Child Your Child? A Tale of Courage and Determination via Johnwboyko. Diabetes was a 100% fatal disease a few generations ago. This is the story of how that diagnosis became something chronic but manageable with the right treatment plan.

When Will Harassment of Women End? via rachnaparmar. Stuff like this happens to women every day. I liked the blogger’s suggestions for how to end it for good, although none of them are a quick fix unfortunately.

How to Start Loving the Parts of Yourself You Don’t Like. This was so good. I’m going to start using some of these techniques right away.

From Fuck Work:

Almost half of employed adults in this country are eligible for food stamps (most of those who are eligible don’t apply). The market in labour has broken down, along with most others.

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January 12, 2017 · 1:00 am

5 Modern Scifi Books You Should Be Reading

This post was inspired by a few different conversations I’ve had recently about my favourite science fiction books. I hope you find at least one new recommendation in this list!

The Book of Dave by Will Self.

What is it about?

A grim, futuristic society set in the land formerly known as England. This society’s religious beliefs and social structure are based on a long rant written by a frustrated cab driver hundreds of years before the events of this story began.

Why should you read it?

There is a lot more going on in the plot than what I shared above. I won’t share spoilers about the rest of the storyline, but I still think about these characters even though it’s been years since I read this book.

Their experiences cross the boundaries between religion and science as well as between what is currently possible in 2017 and what could become possible in a few short decades.

This is the kind of fictional world that bleeds into our own. I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard someone say something in our reality that sounds like it came straight from the Book of Dave. It surprises me a little bit every time it happens.

Feed by Mira Grant.

What is it about?

Imagine a world where cancer and the common cold no longer exist. What’s the catch? The cures for these diseases unleashed a virus that turns people into zombies.

The main character grew up in this world. She can’t remember what life was like before people risked their lives every time they left the safety of a compound.

Why should you read it?

The characters understand the campiness of certain situations, and they’re not above playing up those moments at times. I enjoyed those brief moments of humor in what was an otherwise serious tale.

I also liked the fact that human society adjusted so quickly to the reality of living alongside zombies. Most of the characters make logical choices. There weren’t any instances of people suddenly forgetting to follow basic safety rules or doing other things that don’t fit what the reader knowns about them as an individual.
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro.

What is it about?

A group of children growing up in a remote boarding school, none of whom have ever known their biological parents. Their strict, isolated upbringing only grows more bizarre over time.

When they grow up and start to fill the roles they were meant to fill, the mysteries of their odd childhoods finally begin to make sense.

Why should you read it?

To be honest with you, I didn’t know what I thought of this book the first time I read it. My interpretation of what was going on with the characters was completely different back then as compared to what it is now.

I can’t say much else about this without give away the ending, but Kazuo gave me a lot of food for thought. It was especially interesting to look back at how everything started once I knew how it ended. There were plenty of clues about what was going on from the beginning if you paid attention to what the narrator was and wasn’t saying along the way.

The Girl with All the Gifts by M.R. Carey.

What is it about?

A child named Melanie who lives on a military base with a small group of other children. All of the soldiers who guard the building where the kids live are inexplicably terrified of them.

Melanie’s teacher, Miss Justineau, isn’t scared, though. For now she seems to be perfectly content teaching the strange, little children who only eat once a week and never seem to grow.

Why should you read it?

Those of you who have been known me for a while might remember how much I loved this story. It’s hard to talk about the rest of the plot without giving away spoilers, but I was fascinated by the idea of a 10-year-old girl being perceived to be such a huge threat by the soldiers who guarded her.

The plot twists were simply well done. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t figure some of them out before the characters realized what was going on, but it was still exciting to see how they unfolded. This was especially true when it came to the ending. I couldn’t have imagined a more fitting one for Melanie and her friends. As much as I’d like to see a sequel, I felt genuinely satisfied by how the author wrapped everything up.

The Martian by Andy Weir.

What is it about?

An astronaut named Mark who accidentally gets left behind on Mars after an accident. His fellow astronauts believed him to be dead when they left. Now he has to survive alone on a hostile world for years until a rescue mission can save him.

Why should you read it?

Simply put, the storytelling was phenomenal. It was so good, in fact, that I’d recommend watching the movie just as heartily as I would recommend reading The Martian. You don’t have to experience both of them if you don’t want to. They both were the exact same story.

Both versions of this story are full of tension. Mark is injured when he wakes up on Mars after the accident. He quickly has to figure out not only how to treat his injury but also how to repair the damaged equipment that he will rely on to survive.

These are the first two of many problems he has to solve on his own. From what I’ve read, the scientific portions of Mark’s adventure were pretty accurate. Knowing that these were fairly close to the kinds of dilemmas that real astronauts would deal with in this situation made me even more invested in finding out if Mark would ever figure out a way to get back to Earth.

 

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January 9, 2017 · 1:00 am

How to Meditate in a Noisy, Crowded Place

Over the last few weeks I’ve been practicing something that doesn’t come easily to me at all.

My spouse enjoys the energy of the crowds at the mall. He likes wandering around during the busier parts of the day and year. Here in Toronto we often have special giveaways, promotional booths, or other events put on by various companies to draw attention to their products.

As you might have already guessed, I am not a huge fan of this pastime. There is nothing relaxing to me about being surrounded by so many strangers in such a loud, bright place whose only purpose is to sell things to you that you don’t even necessarily need.
Last month I decided to take a new approach to the time we spent at the mall. Would it be possible for me to meditate in a busy mall? Would I ever learn to enjoy spending time there? Could I be as peaceful at the orangutang on the left in that environment?

The only way to answer those questions was to give it a try.

How It Went

Luckily, I had many opportunities to practice mindfulness at various malls this past month.

The first time I tried it I was sitting in a small food court that is nearly always packed full with people. There was so much background noise that I couldn’t make out what anyone was saying. The sounds of clinking dishes, chairs scraping against the floor, and dozens of private conversations were all going on at once.

One of the reasons why I dislike that kind of environment so much is that it’s impossible to pick out individuals sounds or conversations. They’re all so muddled together that my brain can’t make sense of any of it, and that annoys me.

This time I ignored my urge to think about the background noise. Instead, I closed my eyes and let it all wash over me. It felt sort of like floating down a river. You can’t control where the current goes, but you can choose to relax and allow it to carry you downstream.

The most interesting part of this experience for me was how well this metaphor worked for me. I hadn’t realized how much energy I was putting into figuring out what all of those noises meant until I consciously chose to stop interpreting them for a little while.

The food court I sat in for my second attempt at meditating in a noisy place was larger and busier than the one I’d previously visited. I kept my eyes opened this time for the sake of comparison. This experience didn’t last very long due to reasons that I’ll explain in a minute.

The other attempts I made to stay mindful at the mall happened under less controlled circumstances. I was usually walking in a crowd while trying to get my mind to slow down and focus on what was happening in that exact moment. This is something I’ve had a lot of luck with when walking outdoors at the park or in some of my favourite Toronto neighbourhoods, so I wanted to see if it would work just as well at the mall.

The Results

The first trial was the most successful one. That food court was slightly quieter than the other places I chose. Closing my eyes and purposefully allowing all of the sounds I was hearing to pass through my mind without trying to decode them also helped. It will be interesting to see if I can recreate something similar to this experience in the future.

Keeping my eyes opened in the second experiment didn’t work well for me at all. Food courts have too many distractions in them for me to stay focused on what I’m doing, especially when they’re as crowded as the one I was in. It will be interesting to see if I can reduce the amount of stimulation in this environment by focusing on a particular object the next time I try this. I’ve been thinking that something small and inconsequential like a soft drink cup might be the perfect thing to rest my eyes on if I want to keep them open in the future.

I was surprised by how little I enjoyed the experience of walking through the mall while trying to clear my mind. After thinking about it, I suspect it was because there weren’t any signs of nature there. Trees, bushes, flowers, and small animals are soothing to me. I was also so busy trying to avoid running into other people that it was difficult to keep my mind clear of thoughts.

Have I become a fan of wandering around the mall for the sake of having fun? No, I haven’t. I don’t think it’s ever going to become my idea of a good time, but this was still an interesting and worthwhile experiment.

Everyone feels uncomfortable in certain places or situations. There’s definitely something to be said for learning to relax in an environment that isn’t your cup of tea.

I’m looking forward to trying this again in other noisy, crowded places soon. It will be fascinating to see if I can get better results next time. If you’re on Twitter, I’d love to hear what your experiences have been with meditating or staying mindful in less-than-ideal circumstances.

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January 7, 2017 · 8:15 am

Suggestion Saturday: January 7, 2017

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

Real Estate and Time. There’s a lot of truth to this.

Learning Japanese via Krista_Quintana. What an interesting phenomenon. I wonder how common it is?

Is Seasonal Affective Disorder a Real Thing? How to Slay the SAD Beast. All of the advice in this article was excellent.

Scrooge Through the Ages. Now I want to go reread some books to see if I still get the same messages from them.

Jump Scares (Scared of Being Scared) via SGraves612. I’m neutral on the topic of jump scares. If they’re done well, I enjoy them.  What I found interesting about this post was how much thought the author put into what we find frightening and why some people enjoy getting scared.

Embrace 2017 with Positivity via ef1919. I liked this.

From I Remember the Future:

I remember the future.

The future was glorious once. It was filled with sleek silver spaceships, lunar colonies, and galactic empires. The horizon seemed within reach; we could almost grasp the stars if we would but try.

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January 5, 2017 · 1:00 am

Rest Days Aren’t Optional

It’s been a few weeks since I blogged about fitness. I stuck to my exercise routine pretty well during the holidays. (My diet, though, definitely had more treats included it than normal).

On a recent rest day, I thought about an experiment I did last summer that turned out to be a bad idea.

The Experiment 

You see, I wasn’t satisfied with my progress last summer. I wanted to grow stronger more quickly.

The idea I came up with was to work a different part of my body every day of the week without taking any days off. I thought I might be able to rest my arms while doing bodyweight and free weight exercises to strengthen my legs. If it was successful, it could have been a way for me to build muscle faster than I was currently doing.

It lasted about a week before I ended up pulling a muscle in my back and needing to take time off to recuperate. Luckily, it was a minor injury that only needed time to heal.

Spoiler alert: pulled muscles aren’t fun! Boy, was that a silly thing to do. Instead of growing stronger, I had to stop lifting weights altogether for a week or two while I healed.

Bodies Need to Rest

What I didn’t think about was the fact that weightlifting doesn’t only exercise the one set of muscles that you’re focusing on for a particular workout.

Your legs still need to keep you upright, and your core muscles still need to help you maintain the right form in order to prevent injury and to help you get the most out of your workout. Often your arms also still need to hold the weights or prop up a certain part of your body as well depending on what kind of routine you’re doing.

It is so important to give all of these muscle groups enough time to rest and recover. If one of them is injured or overworked, your entire body will feel the effects of that.

Minds Also Need to Rest

The other thing I noticed during my experience was how mentally tiring it was to lift weights every single day. It was a more subtle effect, but it is something that bothered me a little as I woke up every morning and realized that I needed to strengthen another part of my body.

One of the most interesting things about this effect was that it wasn’t something I’d expected to happen. I was prepared for the possibly that my body wouldn’t like this change for any number of reasons, but I never would have guessed that my mind would also find it difficult.

It turns out that rest days aren’t optional after all. Everyone needs them!

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January 2, 2017 · 1:00 am

What I Read in 2016

booksI’ve been keeping track of every book I read for the last four years. Over half of the books I read were for a review site that I volunteer at under a pseudonym, so I omitted their titles from this post for privacy reasons.

The number of books I read overall was somewhat smaller than usual. I started plenty of them, but I didn’t finish as many as I normally do.

The number of biographies I read increased dramatically. It’s fascinating to read about how other people lived their lives. I was especially interested in how they handled failure and other life challenges. You can learn a lot about someone by seeing how they fixed problems in their lives that seemed insurmountable.

My poetry numbers were down. I normally love this genre, but I had a lot of trouble finding good stuff to read in it this year.

Everything else seemed to stay roughly even. They vary a little every year, of course, but they felt pretty constant to me.

Here is the final list:

Biographies, Autobiographies, and Memoirs
“A Girl from Yamhill” by Beverly Cleary
“Sins of the Family” by Felicity Davis
“Balls: It Takes Some to Get Some” by Chris Edwards
“Hidden Lives” by Margaret Forster
“Beautiful Child” by Tory Hayden
“Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things” by Jenny Lawson
“A Child Called Hope” by Mia Marconi
“Empty Hands” by Sister Abigail Ntleko
“Mary Janeway” by Mary Pettit
“Follow the Rabbit-Proof Fence” by Doris Pilkington
“Writing My Wrongs” by Shaka Senghor
“Unsweetined” by Jody Sweetin
“The Game Changer: A Memoir of Disruptive Love” by Franklin Veaux
“Raising Ryland” by Hillary Whittington
“A Series of Catastrophes and Miracles” by Mary Elizabeth Williams
History
“The Mother Tongue” by Bill Bryson
“The Day the World Came to Town”  by Jim Defede
“How to Be a Victorian” by Ruth Goodman
“The Many Deaths of Tom Thomson” by Gregory Klages
“The Indifference of Tumbleweed” by Rebecca Tope
Mainstream Fiction
“Midden-rammers” by John Bart
“Christmas Rose” by Marjorie Farrell
“My Notorious Life: A Novel” by Kate Manning
“I Will Send Rain” by Rae Meadows
“Noah’s Child” by Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt
Poetry
“Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats” by T.S. Eliot
Science Fiction and Fantasy
“MaddAdamm” by by Margaret Atwood
“Troll Bridge” by Neil Gaiman
“Woman on the Edge of Time” by Marge Piercy
“Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” by J.K. Rowling
“Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets” by J.K. Rowling
“Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban” by J.K. Rowling
“The Martian: A Novel” by Andy Weir
Science and Medicine
“Too Much of a Good Thing” by Lee Goldman
“A Life Everlasting” by Sarah Gray
“The Hidden Half of Nature: The Microbial Roots of Life and Health” by David R. Montgomery
“How to Clone a Mammoth” by Beth Shapiro
“Push Back” by Amy Tuteur
Sociology and Psychology
“Our Iceberg is Melting” by John Kotter
“Fast Food” by Andrew F. Smith
“Hair” by Kurt Stenn
“The Novia Scotia Home for Coloured Children” by Wanda Taylor

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December 31, 2016 · 1:00 am

Suggestion Saturday: December 31, 2016

Suggestion Saturday Dec. 31Happy New Year!

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

Just like last week’s Suggestion Saturday, this one is bigger than usual. I couldn’t narrow it down any more than I already have, and several of the links are to things that only take a short amount of time to read anyway.

Cozy, Cozier, Coziest. Welcome to winter.

The Death of a Silvery Blue Spruce via jdubqca. It’s that time of year again when the curbs are filled with forgotten Christmas trees. It always makes me a little sad to see them sitting there.

A New Year’s Eve in Wartime. This was written during World War I, but it somehow feels fresh and new to me.

Happiness. I couldn’t stop giggling at this.

Ways Animals Cope with the Cold. Who else has wondered how wild animals deal with bitterly cold temperatures at this time of year? I thought this article was fascinating.

Best Books I Read in 2016 via ajh_books. This was such a great list of recommendations. I’ve added a lot of these books to my list of things to read in 2017, but I do agree with this blogger that “The New Jim Crow” is a must-read.

Flurries via SylvesterPoetry‬. I can’t think of a better way to end a long day than to do something like this.

New Year’s Resolution Generator. Which resolution from this list will you pick?

Coping with Trump’s Win: A Psychotherapist’s Guide. This was excellent.

Toni Morrison: Fear of Losing White Privilege Led to Trump’s Election. As was this.

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December 29, 2016 · 1:00 am

The Cupboard Mice: A Parable

Mice_(1)

A family of mice once lived in a drafty old farmhouse.

“They’re going to set a trap and we’re all going to die!” the oldest mouse squeaked every time someone forgot the rules: no squeaking, don’t leave droppings on the dishes, and never capture the cat’s attention. No one remembered what a trap was any longer, only that it was something terrible people did when they noticed mice.

As the family grew it became more difficult to follow the rules.

“We’ll be safe in this house if we teach the young mice that cheese is forbidden,” the oldest mouse insisted every time the humans shuffled into the kitchen. They’d lived in this farmhouse for decades and had begun to have trouble moving around.

A young mouse asked, “What makes you think there’s any danger? The humans don’t even seem to know we exists.”

“Not yet,” said the oldest mouse. “But the cat can smell us. Why do you think we avoid his territory?”

The young mouse wasn’t sure she believed it was that dangerous and decided to explore the rest of the house. The cat in question was old and docile.

“You’re all going to die!” insisted the oldest mouse as the rest of her nestlings slowly moved out of the kitchen and closer to the radiators. The humans had grown accustomed to leaving dirty plates on the floor and so the wanderers had food and a warm place to sleep during the long winter. Soon she was the only mouse left in the kitchen.

Every week or two the younger mice came to visit. She always made sure they knew how dangerous their lives had become since moving away. Some of her visitors smiled politely and nibbled the stale crackers she provided, others tried to gently reason with her. No one could change her mind, though, and she died at the first flush of spring without any of her warnings coming to pass.

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