AAAAAARGH

Blogger just deleted a page-long account of my trip to France. Really? REALLY?! I just wasted first period study hall, and my witty comments about the tour guide who gave rise to "Les Invalides is fabulous" are lost.



Thanks a lot, Blogger. I hope your servers get attacked by rabid cyber-wolverines.

Disturbing Content

(No, the post is ABOUT it, not CONTAINING it.)

With regard to photographs, I am a sensitive person. A photo of a bound foot, sans wrappings, makes me cringe away from the computer screen and feel my breakfast rebelling. Ditto for harlequin babies, messy wounds, et cetera. But what really causes trauma for me is facial disfigurement.

This is not an uncommon way to feel. Most humans are frightened or bothered by a face that is Not Quite Right, because we spend so much of our lives reading the faces of others. If something is off, it immediately sets alarm bells ringing in our heads.

So, a few weeks ago, in the mail arrives the latest Time magazine. Those of you who subscribe to Time probably know where I'm going. For those of you who don't, the cover of this issue featured a young, Afghani woman whose face was seriously disfigured. Google Image search it if you want details. This cover, as you can imagine, really bothered my parents and I; we promptly disposed of the magazine. However, I couldn't get that girl out of my mind. I wondered who she was and what had happened to her.

In the most recent issue, there were reader letters reacting to the cover. A few expressed my view: that Time was out of line to use that photo, especially since many subscribers had young children in the house. Others, though, commended the editors for their choice of cover-girl, saying that the photograph brought to light the grievous injustices wrought by the Taliban.

From the more descriptive letters, I gleaned a bit of her story. Her name is Aisha, and her injuries are a result of somehow running afoul of the government. As I pondered this, it hit me that her photograph was not the real "disturbing content."

What's disturbing is that it happened. There are places in the world where the government can randomly mutilate or execute citizens for running contrary to their beliefs. Places where a young woman has virtually no rights, and her life is dictated by the whims of the men in power. Places where execution for "dishonoring one's family," homosexuality, and ascribing to a minority religion are de rigeur.

That is what we should be fighting for. Not oil or land, but the basic right of all people to live unmolested and without fear of government violence. We should fight so that cases like Aisha's become a thing of the past. But given the fact that the Taliban managed to come back after the army brought them down once, physical fighting doesn't seem to be the answer.

Whatever the solution, the real disturbing content in Time magazine was not the woman herself, but that her suffering happened.

Academia Ate Me.

It really did.

Today was my first day back at school; I'm a senior this year, so the high school grind is nearly over! Huzzah! But before I can frolic away to college and get credit for analyzing Chaucer (which the freshman regular English class got to do, but not the Honors folks. How does that make sense?), I must tangle with the dreaded Senior Year.

*bum bum BUMMMM*

On that note, I must now go read over two books for two different writing assignments tomorrow and study for quizzes in history and Spanish. Regarding my summer, I will say only that I went to France and the rack in my closet collapsed. More later.

Happy Beltane!

Beltane, Beltaine (byal-TAWN-ya), May Day, whatever you call it. To anybody who celebrates a spring/fertility holiday today, have a good one.

I'm not very religious period, but my beliefs can be concisely described as a mixture of Christianity and neopaganism. The longer but more accurate term is "following the basic teachings of Jesus but with more trees and magic exists and God is both male and female." I haven't yet found one belief system that fits right, so I just go with the flow.

This is the first year I've celebrated Beltane (largely because I keep forgetting), and my big plan for the day is to...go to the mall. Alas, preparations for a trip to Europe must come before frolicking outdoors. To top that off, it is rainy and thunderous here today, which is further prohibitive of spring-themed frolicking. But rain helps everything grow, so I can't complain.

Otherwise, it couldn't be a nicer Beltane here. Everything is in bloom, green, or both; I'm fortunate to live in a moderately wooded area. So lovely.

Any of you have Beltane plans for today?

So...Blog.

And thus comes a blog. Cool.

Let's see, what sort of first-blog things should I say...

Well, one of my names is Eryn. There are others, but that will do well enough. I am a girl, still living at home and in high school. I like to write, draw, sing, act, wander vaguely around forests, bake, read (more than I should, probably), make Punnet squares, go on archaeological digs, and frolic. The last rather annoys my friends, because they are not often in the mood to frolic.

If you mention Firefly, Labyrinth, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Harry Potter, V for Vendetta, The Haunting of Hill House, Wuthering Heights, or having large amounts of chicken parmesan and fresh-baked focaccia to me, I will tackle you and latch on to your leg. Possibly forever. Seriously, you'll need surgery to remove me.

I am a Ravenclaw, Aries, and Alder with secondary Rowan influence.

Well, that's enough for a start. Bye for now!