"Parents" - Anon

So the first suggestion I got was simply that one in the title. Might I compliment Mr/Mrs Anon for their elaborate nature. May you write many a novel.

Now this is a touchy subject for many. Parents could make your life a supposed living hell. Most teenagers end up wanting to kill themselves or their parents -hyperbolically speaking- simply because they are trying to pull away into independence while their parents are trying desperately to adjust to the hormones. When I was a teenager I would often voice my frustrations by telling my peers that my parents did not want the best for me, they wanted the best according to what they wrongly assume was the best. I understand now that I was a huge brat at points and I deserved most of what I got anyway. When the child tries to pull away, the natural maternal and/or paternal instinct will tell them to pull as hard as possible to keep the child from getting away, and I'm sure all will agree that they have plenty of practical examples of this phenomenon in their lives..

I am not a parent myself, but I can imagine what it's like for a parent to see their child, a person that they have raised, try to get away from them. They will say things like, "It feels like it was only yesterday that I could hold you in one hand!" as they see the brat walking 50 feet in front or behind them. They feel cheated because they did spend a large chunk of their lives devoted simply to keeping you alive and healthy, for the most part. This is, of course, assuming that they are good parents. There is no worse feeling for a child then to realise later on in his life that he has shit parents. Up until the age of 10 it is difficult for them to comprehend that their parents do anything wrong, let alone raised them badly. This is where childhood nightmares and trauma comes in. A recurring nightmare is a sign of persistent stress and where could the child be getting such stress if not at school? Their family but most notably their parents.

To a young child, parents signify who they must emulate. They are the people that the child wants to please in every way. There is nothing better than a "Well done!" or an "I'm proud of you!" in the eyes of any offspring, not just children. Unfortunately I think that most parents probably do not focus on what's right and tend to obsess on what's wrong and what needs to change. The problem with this is that the younger generation might start to feel like they are inadequate. One might say that I'm being overly sensitive, but am I? Really? Children are always listening. They are always attentive. They absorb everything. Proof of this is how a 7 year old English boy can come to Malta to visit relatives for a week and go back home knowing significantly more than a handful of Maltese words and phrases. If a child sees his parents fighting, they will absorb negativity. If the parents are happy, the child will be happy. The feelings that any person will absorb in childhood will be carried on throughout their life whether subconsciously or otherwise.

Do me a favour and if anyone here is a parent or is tempted to become one, please be careful how you act. I'm not saying that parents have to cater to their child's every whim, I'm saying that sometimes parents tend to forget just how much of an influence they have on the children themselves.

I hope that this post satisfied whoever asked me for it. If you want to ask specific questions and whatnot, I will gladly answer them either in a comment if they are simple or in a further post if I think they deserve elaboration.

Feel free to comment and suggest anything, the interwebz. Good afternoon.

HELLO!

I do not want to sound like a stereotypical blogger who is self-obsessed and loves attention -as true as that may be- however, I would love it if you leave me some feedback. I would love to see some comments on posts and I will reply to all of them.

I would also like you to give me some ideas to help write further posts, providing you like to read what I write. It would help me gather inspiration and drive me to write more and it will also give you some pleasant giggles along the way as I pound on this jizz-stained keyboard. Yes, I made a sperm joke. Judge me.

The whole point of this short post is to reach out so imagine a proverbial hand-shake in the form of this post.

I look forward to hearing from you, the interwebz.

[The only reason why I'm even asking for this is because this last week 3 people, 2 of which I didn't even know read my blog, commented on how they're enjoying the new frequency of my posts. I'd like to keep it up.]

Something Ms Monroe said about not handling you at your worst, therefore not deserving you at your best.

I don't think I've ever written about the subject of relationships properly for two main reasons. The first being it's an overused topic and the second, I tried to post a video about it once and it turned into a subject of ridicule. However, in light of recent events, bear with me while I write.

I will spare you all the personal details because I know the real readers of this blog just read it for the occasional jokes. Bottom line: relationships are difficult. WOAH! Yes, they are difficult to engage in, they are even more difficult to maintain. It takes a lot of time, patience, effort and careful planning to have a real relationship and, unfortunately, I'm lacking in all of those qualities. The one thing I have that I like to think I exude in most things I do, let alone relationships and friendships in general, is passion. I live for love and I don't intend to change that.

You will find that once you embark on a proper serious relationship you will sail past the honeymoon stage before you know it and when the 4 month mark hits, you will have your first series of proper arguments based on things you've noticed in the honeymoon period that piss you off. If you make it through the first series of fights, well done, you're on to the next stage. You can enjoy a buffer period of about a month and a half between the next series of fights.

About 6 months into a relationship the deeper fights start that are disagreements about your personality or other deeper issues. Most relationships can't get past this because people in general are disinclined to compromise when it comes to their own conventions of character. If you make it past these few weeks of heavy arguments, well done. You've now made it further than most relationships and you start to feel like you can't really live without your partner.

At this point you can enjoy a couple months of plain sailing before the real bad shit starts. At a point between 8 months and 1 year you will have the worst arguments you've had so far. The ones that completely define the relationship itself. At this point you and your partner will have started to depend on each other to the point where you actually need each other. If you break up at this point or later, good luck coping. I know I would probably be driven insane.

What I'm trying to say is that nobody should take relationships lightly and if you do, good luck keeping one. I used to take them lightly which led to a series of mistakes and failed unities. I count myself very fortunate that I do have a relationship at all, let alone the fact that I feel fully invested in it, even if it feels like an uphill struggle in a hurricane with no legs and a rusty wheelchair at points.

In the end, it wouldn't really be worth it if it was that easy after over a year. What really makes it worthwhile is that we're still here after all the shit, even if marginally at points. My relationship itself did not really conform to any of the stereotypical timelines, but I did say that I was going to spare the personal details.

I love you and I'm sorry for all I've put you through.

Good morning, the interwebz.

My nipples can ... what?

So it seems that frigid times have finally hit my humble island. Well, I hope they have. If you don't know how the weather here is then the word to describe it is 'erratic'. I've had students who complained to me telling me that they don't mind if their little holiday to our supposedly sunny island is ruined by a tempest, they just really want to know when the hell the sun and the rain are coming.

I'm beginning to think I am odd. To those who know me, this might strike you as a "well, no shit" moment, but the main reason I'm saying this is because while everyone on campus seems to be hugging themselves in an attempt to keep warm within their layers upon layers of clothing; I'm quite comfortable in jeans and a t-shirt. It's not that I don't feel the cold, it's just that I really don't mind it. I might be some kind of superhero! Well it's either that or my mother did hard drugs while I was in the womb.

Today marks a day of firsts. My first full week of lectures at Uni; the first time I took my laptop to Uni; the first time people at Uni start whispering about how I must be a vampire due to my apparent immunity to temperature and my lack of reflection in mirrored surfaces. Bottom line, I'm at University.

No philosophical ending again. Instead I'll leave you with two concluding remarks:

1) Do not try to update your Microsoft Office for free when you are not particularly computer savvy. Your laptop will crash spectacularly and you will spend a couple of hours fixing it. In the end, you will have to restore your laptop and lose the new Office anyway. Idiot.

2) My nipples could cut glass.

Much love, interwebz.

How I write through writer's block.

How do writers who are writing on commission with deadlines and timetables to cater to actually manage to write constantly? I think most of their talent isn't actually focussed on the writing itself, but rather the ability to gather inspiration from anything. Especially when faced with the least inspiring of conditions and situations possible.

I am currently alone in a tiny classroom where I have been for the last hour waiting for my student to arrive. I can almost assume that he is never showing up for school again but seeing as he hasn't actually told the school that and he has actually paid for this week, I am currently still on the roster for this week. I will therefore wait for him here for a few more minutes before going downstairs to inform the office that he has not shown up, then I will take a massive crap. The kind of crap that will make all other craps think, "Holy crap!"

Has inspiration really reached the bottom of the barrel when I start to make jokes based entirely on the subject of talking excrement? I really want to try and work on writing regularly for the main reason that I would love to have a proper semi-professional blog and/or column in some magazine or newspaper, but at the rate my inspiration tends to go, I will never keep to the deadlines. I'll also have one good article to 4 shit ones.

Does writing through writers' block make for good writing or does it look like I'm struggling? As I type, I have also realised as that, when I'm trying to write through the block, I tend to go back and delete and edit things I'm typing. When I'm inspired to write, I never do that. Usually I just start writing and then see where it leads me. If you notice, in my regular posts, I start writing about something irreverent that will then lead to a serious point in the conclusion. I don't foresee this happening now, but who knows? Maybe I will turn into a pocket Socrates by the end of it.

...

Nope. No philosophy. Sometimes I just set you up for disappointment.

Good afternoon, interwebz. xx

[What really happened was I was told I was pretty much waiting for nothing and I went to help out in the office just before I published this. Nice timing, Roberta. Oh and I shat at home. It was good.]

Is there a writer in the house?

I recently watched the first two episodes of the series which really inspired me to write in my own style a year or so ago, needless to say, I'm back here trying to write again. The series is Californication and the whole story is just one big mix of sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll and a whole lot of drama. Somewhere along the lines there is also a lot of hilarious comedy and I applaud the writer(s?) for managing to work it all in there.

I remember watching it all for the first time and thinking, "Oh Christ!" The storyline is just so complex that they must have been on drugs while writing about this man who has this complex life while himself on a mix on narcotics. David Duchovny has also come a bloody long way from his X Files days. The intensity that the actor (whose previous big job had it in the contract that he had to know how to portray absolutely no emotion) manages to show while acting drunk, high, sex-crazed, broken-hearted, etc ... is just incredible. He is an out of work writer, go figure; his love life is completely incomprehensible; and his daughter is a carbon copy of the dysfunction that his relationship with her mother fiercely exudes.

The first time I saw it, had I not been in the midst of a fast blooming relationship, I would have probably related to his character to the point of following his footsteps. Especially since he ends up trying his hand at lecturing, which is what I ultimately see myself doing. Not to mention writing which I also want to dabble in as a semi-profession. Had it not been for the wife, I'd be in my own world fuelled by alcohol, drugs and sex. Or rather, I'd be consuming copious amounts of alcohol while trying not to OD all the while looking for sex. Oh yes, he also smokes all the time.

In the end, the part of his character which I really relate to is that fact that even when everything seems to point towards him being a soulless husk of a man, he still means well. He is an idiot and a complete child, of course, but who isn't in this day and age? I know that some of the best people on our lovely yet dying planet are either insane or incarcerated as we speak. It is a pity that the real murderer of society isn't lack of control, as all the people in control want us to think, it is in fact the suppression of talent and creativity. It is true that there are many people who think they are talented who just make you cringe, but in the end the brilliant people have all made many people cringe before they were recognised as geniuses.

On that note and before I start on a rant that will last forever,

Good afternoon the interwebz

"... Oh and you're fat."

If a person admits to being a hypocrite; does it mean that they are genuinely accepting the fact that they are flawed, or are they simply unapologetic about the fact that they are? I am the first person to tell everyone to relax but, at the same time, I'm also the first person to admit that I tend to be overwhelmed by my own thoughts.

It's not life's pressure that phases me -in fact I think I work better under pressure- it's the fact that the second I realise I'm happy, my brain tells me that I'm about to fuck up. Is it overly poetic for the person always trying to tell people to lighten up and who always tries to have a smile on his face to be constantly on edge? It's not like anyone is really judging me, or if they are, it's not like their judgement actually affects me in any way, shape or form. I am my harshest judge and I can never let my own judgement go.

Earlier today I just let my mind wander for a while and at a point I just sort of lost half an hour of my life. Am I so afraid of what I have in store for myself, that I can't physically handle my own opinions and thus have to shut my own mind down? I don't remember falling asleep or waking up, just a blank spot in time that went from staring to a wall to seeing my mother hovering above me mid-sentence about how she'd been calling me for a while.

Now all I have is a vague memory of what I might have been thinking of before I blacked out and some traditional Turkish music. Oh and don't give me shit about not updating, I know I haven't. Trust me I've been beating myself up about it. One of my many nagging thoughts is, "Update your blog, you slacker. What kind of a commitment is this? You promise that you're going to update it but where are the updates? Oh and you're fat."

Good night the interwebz.