my dreams remind me of an ocean

A cross hangs on the wall, right between the line of blow-up Letter People and a bulletin board full of finger paintings. A man hangs there, blood blowing from his hands, caked into his hair. I’m surprised the same people who banned books in the library asked for this to be hung here. It could be traumatizing for a kindergartner, but we’ve all grown up around bodies like these, and no one bothers to look for too long. It watches us as we play, as we learn to share and count to one hundred. It follows us as we age, as we learn algebra, physics, The Great Gatsby, until we are old enough to hang one for ourselves, until we are the ones showing corpses to kindergartners and saying they are beautiful.

Our fingertips are caked with powdered nacho cheese as we pile on sixth floor lobby’s couches, still wearing dresses from the ball. Too tired to keep dancing but too excited to sleep, we wait limbo, eating snacks and trying not to count the hours until we have to go home again. Exhausted witches and wizards trickle out of the elevators in various states of inebriation, and as they walk past, we ask, “Do you want some Doritos?” Some shrug us off, but most eagerly join our circle, and for a time, we pass around the bag, forgetting we’re strangers.

(Author’s Note: I wrote this about an experience I had at Leakycon, a Harry Potter convention that took place this year in Chicago. It’s for a flash-fiction contest for attendees of the convention. If you like it, you can go vote for it by clicking the heart here.)

UPDATE: This won the contest, and I received a Kindle for it! Eep!

The stakes are high for Pixar’s new movie Brave. After Cars 2 didn’t even make back its budget, another lackluster film could mean disaster, and would certainly start critics pondering whether the studio already hit its peak. Also, Brave features Pixar’s first female protagonist, and in a princess movie, no less. From the film’s marketing campaign, it’s obvious that Pixar is worried that it won’t be able to coax little boys, one of its largest demographics, out to see the film. So the questions are: first, is the film good? And even if it is, will it sell?

However, these questions aren’t easy to answer. Yes, I think Brave is very good. However negative reviews are already coming in, and everyone I went to the screening with seemed very lukewarm about it.

As I left the theater, I heard several people say that Brave “just doesn’t feel like a Pixar movie,” and I can agree to an extent. We don’t expect princesses, epic battles, and discussions of fate in Pixar movies; we expect to see talking toys or animals or cars and to leave feeling like our heart just got a hug. This film is definitely out of Pixar’s comfort zone. It’s darker at points, and it doesn’t have the same the same fantastical feel. You would be served very well by going into Brave expecting it to deliver more Disney than Pixar.

However, there is still Pixar magic to be found. The animation breathtaking, especially on the landscapes and Merida’s hair. I’ve never seen an animated film as visually stunning. The soundtrack is beautiful, sprinkling well-timed vocal tracks into the score in the studio’s signature style. The quality of the writing is also definitely a credit to the studio; they’ve always created complex characters that we grow to love and care about, and they deliver again in Brave. Also, while the overall tone is more serious than we’re used to, the movie still has a lot of laughs. (Also, make sure you get to the theater on time, because of course there’s a short preceding the movie, and it’s adorable and stunning.)

As I think we all expected from the previews, Merida is a strong princess. Her story doesn’t revolve around her finding her Prince Charming; instead, she is actively against being thrown into a love story that she doesn’t have a hand in writing, which I found ridiculously refreshing. Merida is badass and strong-willed and quite endearing. However, I think my favorite thing about Merida is that she is flawed. She’s selfish, she’s immature, and she messes up. I’m sure many will dislike her for these reasons, but they are what made Merida resonate with me. She felt real.

The film also makes smart use of the Disney Princess archetype—it uses it enough to keep us comfortable and make us realize that we’re watching a Princess movie, but also manages to blow some of the dust off of it and make something new. This variety, as well as the movie’s abundance of action scenes and and Merida’s little triplet brothers, should keep little boys entertained.

Brave is not what you expect from a Pixar film, which will undoubtedly cause some to have a negative knee-jerk reaction. However, I urge you to resist comparing it to the studio’s other films, as they bear few similarities, and let it stand on its own. Pixar has gone out on a limb with this one, and I think it’s a steady one, if audiences give it a fair shot.

Girls, go see this with your moms. You’re going to want to give her a huge hug after the credits roll. Boys, just go see it. Hollywood thinks that you won’t see movies with girl leads. Prove them wrong.

Overall rating: 4.5/5 nerds

When I saw the promotional stills and posters for Snow White and the Hunstman, I was cautiously optimistic. Given the recent trend towards strong female protagonists and princesses, I thought we were bound to get an awesome retelling of the fairy tale, with a sassy Snow White who kicks major ass. Unfortunately, this is far from the case; if you’re coming to Snow White and the Huntsman looking for an strong, empowered princess, you will be sorely disappointed.

This Snow White is no Mulan, Tangled’s Rapunzel, or the Snow White on ABC’s Once Upon a Time. She spends the vast majority of the movie running away from danger and being saved by besotted male characters. There are no fewer than four males who try to make a move on her after falling for her charms, but as a member of the audience, I wasn’t sure what these charms were supposed to be. Snow fights for herself a grand total of twice, and it is not until the last twenty or so minutes that Snow White does anything remotely badass, or wears the armor she’s shown in on the posters. We get more insight into the personalities of almost every other character than we do Snow White, as her actions and dialogue aren’t at all illustrative of her as a person. Without doing anything besides being the king’s daughter and being beautiful, she is hated by the queen and put on a pedestal as tall as Mt. Everest by everyone else we meet. In short, she’s a Mary Sue of epic proportions, and kind of a feminist nightmare.

Also, to what you’re probably wondering: Kristen Stewart is definitely passable in the role, and sometimes is even quite good. Her acting is several steps above anything she did in Twilight, and only managed to distract me a few times. (Also, I didn’t even notice a single case of lip biting, which is unprecedented.) Her British accent is patchy, but never noticeably laughable. Though she often comes off one-dimensional, I think it’s mostly the fault of the movie’s writing rather than Stewart’s portrayal.

Despite how much Snow bothered me, I didn’t hate the movie. It was visually stunning, especially in the Dark Forest, and the music was great. (In particular, the song “Gone” by Ionna Gika and the way it was used gave me chills.) I also thought the narrative style was lovely, especially at the beginning. The movie was extremely faithful to the original Snow White narrative, which felt uncreative to me but will probably be a plus for others.

Also, a couple of standout actors saved the film for me. Charlize Theron, who plays Snow White’s evil stepmother, really steals the show with some incredible acting, and the effect work on her and her birds is ridiculously well-done. She is delightfully creepy, and surprisingly, we get some idea of her back story and motivations, so her degeneration is upsetting to watch.

Chris Hemsworth as the huntsman, best-known as Thor in The Avengers, also does a brilliant job. He has a good story arc, he’s written well, and Hemsworth runs with the material. Watching him act is a delight.

Overall, the movie is a mixed bag. If you’re game for a beautiful, generally well-done adaptation of Snow White, you’ll love it. However, if you’re a feminist or looking for it to bring something new to the table, I would wait for the DVD.

Overall score: 3/5 nerds.

I was scrolling down my dashboard this week, and I happened upon matthawthorneisamyth’s rant about fanfiction. I’ve heard views like his expressed many a time, and I thought it would be a good opportunity to express my views on the genre, and why I think it can be a very beneficial starting block for writers.

I will defend starting with fanfiction before moving on to original fiction until my last breath, because it is what motivated me to start writing. (Keep in mind that I used the word starting.) I have always adored trying to paint pictures with my words, but as a young child, I was completely incapable of creating characters with which to play. Performing this task, on top of coming up with a plot and wriitng well, was daunting and discouraging, so I didn’t do it too much.

However, one day in sixth grade, I stumbled upon harrypotterfanfiction.com and fell in love. Combining two of my very favorite things, writing and Harry Potter, was a dream come true for a twelve-year-old girl. I wrote fan fiction avidly from that day until my freshman year in high school, and I still write on occasion when a plot bunny decides to run around in my head.

Now I’d like to counter Matt’s idea that, although fanfiction might be good practice, it is something that should never see the light of day. I won’t lie to you: 95% of my early fanfiction was absolutely abysmal (as is any writing a sixth grader does, I think.) However, my stories garnered tens of thousands of reads, and dozens of reviews. I think most of these reviewers realized that I wasn’t a particularly good writer, but I think they also knew how young I was. So they basically told me, “Good job! Keep writing!” Some kind souls even took the time to leave in-depth reviews, telling me what I could improve and what I did fairly well.

These reads and reviews were the most encouraging things I could ever have received at that point in my life. If I had simply been sitting at home, writing original fiction and hiding it away on my computer hard drive, or even posting it on Tumblr, I’m not sure that I would have written with the ferocity I did in middle school. My fear that my writing might suck was overridden by the fact that my readers were waiting for chapter ten. To this day, I feel extremely indebted to these people who took time out of their days to encourage a little girl who was writing cliché stories about Harry, Ron and Hermione.

Writing fanfiction also has other benefits besides having a wide audience who is fairly tolerating. It has taught me to write certain types of characters that I had a lot of trouble with for a long time. It has taught me to plot creatively and keep character voice constant. And of course, the sheer act of writing hundreds of pages of the stuff helped me to improve my style, voice and general writing ability.

Of course writing fan fiction is not as nearly as difficult as writing original fiction. It comes with its own set of challenges (working with a pre-existing voice and style being the main one,) but it involves a lot of shortcuts. It requires less imagination and less work. However,

I like to think that most fanfiction writers write original fiction as well. Maybe this is being overly optimistic, but I feel like eventually, if they are serious enough about writing, they’ll think of something to write that doesn’t revolve around their fandoms. However, I guess we can only hope and pray that they eventually get the courage to break away and make something new.

I wrote this essay for a writing contest that Scholastic was holding based off of Libba Bray’s new book, Beauty Queens (which was awesome, by the way.) The prompt asked to explain why you’re a beauty queen, which in the novel means fighting for what you believe in and being true to yourself.

First off, full disclosure: by conventional standards, I’m no beauty queen. The one time I tried a fad diet, I was ready to gnaw my arm off by Day 3; I almost get altitude sickness every time I put on a pair of high heels; and I still haven’t figured out how to apply eyeliner without making myself look like a raccoon.

However, when it comes to working to achieve my dreams, I’ve got that covered. Ever since first grade, I’ve wanted to become a writer more than anything else. I was the kid who created makeshift storybooks and acted out soap opera storylines with My Little Ponies. As I grew older, I moved to working on a series of short stories about talking dogs and probably wrote enough bad Harry Potter fan fiction to wallpaper the Sistine Chapel.

Now, as an eighteen-year-old, I throw myself into every writing opportunity I can find. As a result, I was the managing editor for my school newspaper last year, and am currently a writer for Sweet Designs, an online magazine for teen girls. I attended a writing workshop at Michigan State University last summer, have participated in the Office of Letters and Light’s National Novel Writing Month challenge for the last four Novembers and penned many of the lyrics on my band’s debut CD over the course of six months. And that’s not even counting the secret stash of fiction that the light of day has never seen.

So when I chose my college this year, I took a chance and chose a writing school in Boston. In August, I’ll be moving from Suburbia, Michigan to a huge city where I will be pursuing what is widely considered an “impractical” major. Everyone, including my parents, think I’m pretty much insane. However, I have this nagging feeling that I’m capable of writing something that will have a positive impact on someone like so many books have had on me. I just can’t let that dream go without knowing I tried my absolute hardest to make it happen.

So although I think those yellow feather hair extensions look stupid and I think I’ll be able to squeeze into a pair of size 0 jeans somewhere in the near, well, never, I like to think that my mind, my intentions and my dreams are beautiful. And no matter what any fashion magazine or judging panel says, at least in some way, I think that makes me beautiful too.

I think it’s finally hit me.

I was just sitting in the Westword room, drinking Mountain Dew and trying to cram my last column into the afternoon before printing. (Yes, again. I’m sorry, Mrs. Danevicz.)

I like to think I was doing a great job at avoiding the sentimental atmosphere, concentrating on mundane things, like how excited I was for the Harry Potter convention I’m attending this summer, whether the burrito in my locker is still good from lunch or whether the Mr. Kohane’s Analysis exam will legitimately kill me.

And then Closing Time by SemiSonic came on the radio, and I heard the line that’s the title of this article. It’s weird to say: my “new beginning,” by the time you’re reading this, has already started. All of the seniors’ has. Sure, we still have to graduate and jump through some hoops and wear those weird hats, but we don’t really belong here anymore. We’re on our way out, driving down the road at what feels like 120 miles per hour.

But it’s after the graduation, after the summer, that my “new beginning” terrifies me.

I’m moving to Boston to get a degree in writing, literature and publishing from Emerson College. When I chose my school, I was looking at the awesome writing program and the urban environment. I’d never really considered that writing isn’t a “practical” major or that I have no idea how one takes the T or that I won’t have a microwave in my dorm room. Oh yeah, and the fact that I’ll be about sixteen hours away. But now all of those things are getting to me.

I honestly have confidence that I can make my living writing, but until I’m actually doing it, there will always be a pit in my stomach, wondering if I made the right call with following my dreams. If you ever see my picture on the back of a dust jacket, I hope it gives you hope that dreams are attainable if you’re crazy enough to run after them like a crazy little girl chasing an ice cream truck. And if you don’t, then I’m confident I can find something else that will make me happy.

However, writing and Boston aren’t really the scary part of the “new beginning.” When I think about them, I feel like I do when I’m about to get on a roller coaster. I’m a little scared, but I’m giddy with excitement as well.

I’m mostly afraid of moving away and being forgotten about. I can never tell which “I’ll Skype you’s” from people I know are obligatory and which are actually heartfelt. I trust my friends, but I’m afraid that out of sight will eventually equal out of mind.

And while I was listening to Closing Time, I realized I’m gonna miss this place, or at least the people in this place.

I can’t even imagine not waking up early to drag myself to zero hour choir and playing my flute with Katie Brown during seventh hour. I’m going to miss singing Ultimate Showdown on bus rides with Patrick, Lucy and Andrew. I don’t know how I’ll cope without passing the turquoise

There are so many more of these moments that I’ll miss, and there’s no way I’ll be able to list them all. But I never thought I’d be here, the senior completely blubbering in her last column.

I have fears. Sometimes I second-guess myself. But I think keeping them around is fruitless.

And here’s where that song really stuck with me. A little more than four years ago, all of the seniors were little eighth graders, meeting for the first time at Freshman Fun Day, full of awkward smiles and wringing hands.

We were scared out of our minds about starting a new beginning, of transitioning from grade school to high school. We got lost in the interminable two hallways that West Catholic has to offer; we had to ask the office to give us our locker combination because we forgot it (again); we had to ; we fumbled and bumbled our way around in a way that probably felt terrible at the time.

But guess what? It worked out in the end, didn’t it? Who says college will be any different?

Sure, this new beginning is scarier. I’ll give it that.

But as I let my old beginning end, I know I’m ready. And honestly, I can’t wait.

It’s funny how you can be an avid fan of a piece of fiction, an album or, in this case, a musical, for a long time without knowing anything about its creation. This is usually what happens, actually. In this day and age, we’ve been seasoned to care about the result, not the process.

About a week ago, I finally learned the story of RENT’s creator and writer, Jonathan Larson, and it had a profound impact on me. In case you’re not familiar, he’d been a starving artist for years, and had finally found success in RENT. He quit his day job and was finally able to do what he loved fulltime. However, Larson passed away right before the play’s opening night, right before RENT’s success exploded, before he could receive his Tony and Pulitzer.

It made me think: if there is a god, how could he let this happen? If there is a god, couldn’t the powers that be change his time by even a day or a week? If Larson was anything like most artists, and from what I’ve read, he was, opening night would have been the happiest day of his life. Why would he be deprived of that? It’s like a bride dying on the way to a wedding or a father dying hours before his son’s birth. Maybe the play gained success because of Larson’s death, but that can never take precedence over seeing something you’ve dreamed of for years finally culminate.

One of RENT’s most prominent themes it that there’s “no day but today,” and Jonathan Larson’s death adds a new facet to this message. As tragic as his passing is, the fact that he believed deeply in this phrase is comforting. He knew that every breath could be his last, and though he probably wasn’t thinking about it, it was something he believed in.

So the main thing I took away from this: maybe it’s easier for me to take a nap or play Sudoku on my iPod for hours than to sit down and write a short story or a book or even a post for my Tumblr. But I need to do it. I never know how much time I have left to do what I love. No day but today.

I’m not going to tell you that teenagers can’t fall in love, because that would be a blatant lie. It’s a common one, but that doesn’t make it any less ignorant. However, it’s easier to just believe that we can’t fall in love, isn’t it? It makes it easier to be condescending, easier to resist its temptation.

I’ve been hopelessly in love twice: once at the age of fifteen, once at seventeen. You know the kind of love I’m talking about, when you want to learn to play an instrument and write simply dreadful songs about them, and when the two of you have already named your children.

However, neither of these loves lasted—because I’m a teenager, and so were the boys I was in love with. Both I and those two boys were in a constant state of change, and we changed away from each other.

It’s impossible not to want to place the blame on someone, and I have my own ideas on who is to blame and why. But in reality, you can’t stop yourself from changing. Before you know it, the person you love becomes someone you don’t know before your very eyes.

And it sucks. Terribly. It gnaws at your innards. Why weren’t you good enough to stick around for? What had you done wrong? Why had you trusted him? What made her so much better than you?

Now, I’m not one to want to change the past. Without it, I have no idea where I’d be. However, if I could go back, a part of me would want to save me from the world of hurt I entered when I said “I love you too.”

At that point, everything got messy. I was 100% sure that I was going to marry both of those boys. But here I stand. Here I am. Alone.

Boy #2 has been the hardest. He took pieces of my innocence that I can’t get back. (No, I didn’t sleep with him; it was just the little things.) He became everything he promised me that he wouldn’t. Now, if I happen to glance at him in class, he glares back, when I literally did nothing to him. When we broke up, I must have lost at least 20 pounds because I ate virtually nothing for at least a month before someone noticed. I came dangerously close to self-harm, and I acted like a complete idiot.

I’m not trying to say that, as a teenager, we should resist love if it comes to call. I’m not even saying that we should at least attempt to avoid it, because I know for a fact that I’m guilty of this sin a hundred times over. I don’t wish that I never fell in love. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have learned everything that I know today. Songs wouldn’t have been written, experiences wouldn’t have been had.

I just feel obligated to let people know: love, at this age, is an uphill battle. In all liklihood, you will get hurt. You’ll bawl your eyes out at one time or another. You’ll get broken into a billion little pieces.

But you’ll also learn to love properly. You’ll make mistakes that you’ll be sure to never repeat. You’ll have someone to take prom pictures with. And, as long as you’re strong enough, you can be happy.

For those of you who know me IRL or especially on Plurk, I’ve been quite distraught and moody, and I think it’s time for me to tell you why.

About a week ago, my wrist started throbbing constantly. I figured it was just a temporary thing, since I had a bad cold and was achey all over. But I figured something was up and decided to go to the doctor yesterday. She thinks it’s tendonitis, the onset of carpel tunnel.

And I know this doesn’t sound like a big deal to most people. I have tendonitis, not carpel tunnel. I’m not dying.

But now when I try to write, it hurts terribly, no matter whether I use a pen or a computer. My doctor told to use the computer and write as little as possible for a while, and that drives me nuts too. I have to wear a brace that’s rubbing my wrists raw and makes me look stupid, but I want to wear it. If it makes everything better, I’ll wear it.

But it scares me. A lot. I want nothing more in my life than to be a writer. What if I do get carpel tunnel? What if, in ten years or so, I can’t write at all? What will I do with my life? I really don’t think I can go without writing.

What if I burn out before I even get a chance to write something truly great?

So I’m sorry I’ve been going off on people and generally freaking out and such. I’ve just had a lot on my mind. I might post slightly less often for a couple of weeks, but I’ll try to write as much as I can.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you’re well. <3

In a good book, the words the author chooses should come together to construct the scenery, the characters, the plot, to the point that the readers can see them, smell them, KNOW them. They shouldn’t, even for a minute, create a wall between these elements and the reader.

In my opinion, when writers use superfluous language or paragraphs upon paragraphs during which nothing happens, the words create a barrier between the audience and the characters. They make the reader’s eyes glaze over, and soon the reader is thinking about the football game tonight or the dinner in the oven.The best books are the ones that completely immerse you in them, the ones that make you almost miss your football game or burn dinner.

Writers need to be storytellers, not just wordsmiths. One of the most important skills that they need to acquire is to build a world with no walls.

I can count on one hand the number of things I have in common with my ten-year-old self. That girl scarcely made a peep and did her very best to avoid being noticed; today, my voice often threatens to break local noise ordinances, and I strut down the hallways at school carrying a backpack shaped like Super Mario’s friend Yoshi. Practically the only things that I have in common with that shy little girl are an aversion to porcelain dolls, my DNA and my love for the Harry Potter books.

For the past eight years, those seven novels by J.K. Rowling have impacted my life more than anything else. They have shaped my personality, aspirations and friendships to no end.

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