I want to create
I feel the ideas, the emotions,
bubbling, boiling, ready to burst
from my mind, my chest,
and they do, spewing from my mouth,
landing on the table, running down to the floor,
a soupy mess that no one understands.
How do I give them form,
these thoughts,
take the tohu vavohu
and order it.
I speak, but my word is not made flesh,
in the minds of my audience.
One more distinction between me and God.
Thursday, October 11, 2018
Life Lessons with Liz
"Beauty that steals the heart is often imperfect, suggests grace and kindness, and inspires tenderness more than it excites lust." -Forever Odd, Dean Koontz
"You're being so adorable, it's so hard not to kiss you right now."
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
I'm trying to reconcile the first quote with my experience. That quote came to mind while ruminating on a recent experience of mine. It didn't quite seem to fit, because I don't have the kind of beauty that you'd think would excite lust. Maybe I actually do and I'm just in denial.
It's thinking on things like this that makes me wish sometimes that I wasn't a girl. Or that I wasn't pretty. Which sucks, because the world tells you to look nice, and you want to look attractive or at least decent, and when you put in the effort and plan out a cute outfit and the stars and planets align and you actually do look nice for once, you doubt your appearance again. But for other reasons.
Am I too pretty?
Will I cause someone else to sin?
I shouldn't have tried.
And then something happens like I allowed happen to me. That's not misplaced guilt. I did allow it to happen. I really did want it, at least in the moment. That doesn't make it right on either side. But I'm not a victim.
And I'm not actually that stunning. So when I think about that quote, and how he acted and talked that night, what am I missing? Why does my beauty excite lust? Why doesn't it inspire tenderness? What did I do wrong? What should I do differently?
And how do I trust another guy? I want to be complimented, but how do I know it's genuine, and not just animal instincts trying to manipulate? If I'm going to find a good one, do I need to look like trash all the time? Totally doable, and a lot easier for me. Not for my self esteem though.
But maybe the problem isn't me.
Maybe the problem is him. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. He didn't pay attention to the whole beauty of me. He just let in what he wanted, just enough to excite lust. He didn't look at the beauty that would have carried him beyond lust, to tenderness.
These are all a bunch of maybes, and that 'But' goes against one of my main philosophies in life, just assume the problem is you. If the problem is you, you can fix it.
If it's not you...
You can't do squat.
Disclaimer for anyone who knows me personally and still reads this blog: I am safe and well, don't worry about me :) what happened was a one time thing and there's not a chance it will happen again. This is just one of my ways of processing things.
Saturday, March 11, 2017
Where Have I Been?!?
I don't even know the answer to that. I'm also pretty sure that I don't have a crazy but cool grandpa who knows a forgetting trick that he told me he learned from a witch doctor/voodoo person in Vietnam or wherever but he actually developed in collaboration with some super shady government agencies that don't actually have a name or official records. But then again, if I did, would I remember? ASHLEY BELL WILL LIVE
Anyways, this is a post that I've been wanting to write for a while but haven't had the time to do. Also, blogger has been weird about letting me get into my blog. I will refrain from concocting a conspiracy theory about the all-seeing and all-powerful Google.
Have you ever baked anything from scratch? If you have, then you know how recipes usually have the preparation time included. These times are great for some of you because your baking experience goes like this:
Stated preparation time: 20 minutes.
Actual preparation time: 20 minutes. Add an extra 2 or 3 if you need to borrow some sugar or flour from a neighbor.
There are those of you reading who may think, "Yes, this is exactly how my baking goes. It doesn't always taste the best and I say this even though Paul Hollywood from the Great British Bake Off tasted my baking and says he wishes I were his child, but yeah, this is how my baking goes."
You lucky dog, you.
Well you dear protege who also probably has no kids and keeps track of your entire life in a carefully color coordinated planner with accompanying alerts and notifications through a smart phone, the reality for most of us goes something more like this:
Stated preparation time: 20 minutes
"Great! I can start this at 3:00, have it in the oven by 3:20ish and it'll be ready by 4:00! Plenty of time!" Haha, you poor, optimistic, naive little baker. You know nothing of the ways of the world. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
So you start.
2 minutes of prep time before realizing you don't have enough sugar.
3 minutes to bundle up for 20 degree weather, run across the street to ask the neighbors for sugar, get the sugar, then run back.
1 minute of prep time, then you realize both sets of measuring spoons have conveniently gone AWOL when you know you just saw them in the drawer this morning.
2 1/2 minutes of digging through the sink, the cabinets, the kid's toys (because your young siblings steal kitchen appliances for weapons or microphones or what have you), then asking other people if they have seen the vanished spoons. Of course, no one knows where they went.
3 minutes of washing dishes, because where else could the spoons be but the bottom of the sink? Sure enough, they are stuck in the drain.
3 minutes of prep time before the young siblings realize you are making something and want to help.
We're only six minutes into prep time people. And it doesn't get better.
1 minute of arguing with them that it will take longer with their help than without before you realize that your siblings are extremely stubborn and it will actually take longer to argue them out of helping than it will to just let them help. So they are added to the crew of your bakeship, which will be known as the USS Bakerprize. Whether it will actually be a prize is dubitable at best.
2 minutes of prep time before one sibling complains that the other is pushing him off the chair they are sharing because there is minimal counter space in your kitchen probably because the original owner didn't realize how important LOTS of space is to a successful kitchen operation probably because he didn't ever run a kitchen operation due to the abundance of fast food restaurants close by. No judgments, just speculation.
2 minutes of trying to calm both siblings down the nice way before you revert to the harsher but more effective method of threatening to send both away if they don't work it out. But your siblings are as belligerent as they are stubborn, so they continue fighting and you banish them to the basement to play with the cave troll which cries in fear and hides behind the water heater upon sight of your siblings having previously encountered these small terrors in battle. How else would you get a cave troll into the basement?
3 minutes of prep time before you need the nutmeg but SURPRISE you can't find it.
2 minutes of rummaging through ALL the cabinets, not just the baking cabinet where it should be, then running down to the pantry in the basement where extra supplies are stored in addition to some dried fruit for the cave troll who was turned vegetarian by your siblings. You ask your Mom if she bought nutmeg recently and she replies that yes, she did, she bought a massive container yesterday. You plead with her to come look for it because your Mom's Confirmation Saint is St. Anthony and he ALWAYS makes sure she finds what she's looking for. Sure enough, she opens the baking cabinet (the first place you looked) and pulls it out. Your Mom gives you an exasperated look and mutters something under her breath about eye exams.
3 minutes of prep time, and then the screams of a young child become audible. It's coming from upstairs where some of your siblings and the neighbor kids are playing dolls. You have a large enough family that odds are, it's your sibling screaming, but it sounds more like one of the neighbors. None of the other older siblings or parents are responding, so you take it upon yourself to investigate.
3 minutes of traveling upstairs, coaxing out of siblings and neighbor kids conflicting versions of the story from which you extrapolate that someone hit the now screaming neighbor child, but the attack wasn't completely unprovoked. You make an executive decision establishing a neighbor ban that will continue indefinitely, except it's not really a ban because your siblings just play outside in the freezing cold with them because besides being belligerent and stubborn your siblings are descendants of Jack Frost and Elsa.
4 minutes of prep time. The end is in sight. It's possible you could get this in the oven before the heat death of the universe.
PSYCHE!! Did you really think you'd get off that easy? While you were getting out the muffin trays your youngest sibling currently at home climbed up onto the chair left by the earlier helpers and has taken an egg in each hand. He is poised to hurl them and win the gold medals for farthest egg toss and most kitchen destruction done in a single motion.
2 1/2 minutes of trying to gently pry the fragile eggs from his unrelenting baby fists. This of course fails and egg covers him, the chair, and you. A washcloth with soap for him (luckily he never wears any clothing but a diaper, even when it's 60 degrees in the house), paper towels for the chair, and you ignore the blood and gore on your own clothing because you are so close and that's just the messy nature of war. I mean baking.
A final 2 minutes of prep time, the batter is in the trays and you can put them in the oven!!! except you can't because you forgot to preheat the oven in the chaos. But you take a deep breath, smother the Klingon side of you that has been threatening to emerge this entire time, and preheat the oven.
Actual Preparation time: 39 minutes, 19 of which wasn't even spent baking.
But it's okay, because a day may come when the courage to bake fails, when your forsake your butter and break all the cooking utensils, but it is not this day. An hour of crying and burnt muffins, when the walls of the oven come crashing down! But it is not this day! This day you fight! I mean bake!
The oven is preheated and you slide your muffins in, confident of the fluffy, delectable treats they will soon be.
Then you remember that you forgot to double the baking powder.
Anyways, this is a post that I've been wanting to write for a while but haven't had the time to do. Also, blogger has been weird about letting me get into my blog. I will refrain from concocting a conspiracy theory about the all-seeing and all-powerful Google.
Have you ever baked anything from scratch? If you have, then you know how recipes usually have the preparation time included. These times are great for some of you because your baking experience goes like this:
Stated preparation time: 20 minutes.
Actual preparation time: 20 minutes. Add an extra 2 or 3 if you need to borrow some sugar or flour from a neighbor.
There are those of you reading who may think, "Yes, this is exactly how my baking goes. It doesn't always taste the best and I say this even though Paul Hollywood from the Great British Bake Off tasted my baking and says he wishes I were his child, but yeah, this is how my baking goes."
You lucky dog, you.
Well you dear protege who also probably has no kids and keeps track of your entire life in a carefully color coordinated planner with accompanying alerts and notifications through a smart phone, the reality for most of us goes something more like this:
Stated preparation time: 20 minutes
"Great! I can start this at 3:00, have it in the oven by 3:20ish and it'll be ready by 4:00! Plenty of time!" Haha, you poor, optimistic, naive little baker. You know nothing of the ways of the world. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
So you start.
2 minutes of prep time before realizing you don't have enough sugar.
3 minutes to bundle up for 20 degree weather, run across the street to ask the neighbors for sugar, get the sugar, then run back.
1 minute of prep time, then you realize both sets of measuring spoons have conveniently gone AWOL when you know you just saw them in the drawer this morning.
2 1/2 minutes of digging through the sink, the cabinets, the kid's toys (because your young siblings steal kitchen appliances for weapons or microphones or what have you), then asking other people if they have seen the vanished spoons. Of course, no one knows where they went.
3 minutes of washing dishes, because where else could the spoons be but the bottom of the sink? Sure enough, they are stuck in the drain.
3 minutes of prep time before the young siblings realize you are making something and want to help.
We're only six minutes into prep time people. And it doesn't get better.
1 minute of arguing with them that it will take longer with their help than without before you realize that your siblings are extremely stubborn and it will actually take longer to argue them out of helping than it will to just let them help. So they are added to the crew of your bakeship, which will be known as the USS Bakerprize. Whether it will actually be a prize is dubitable at best.
2 minutes of prep time before one sibling complains that the other is pushing him off the chair they are sharing because there is minimal counter space in your kitchen probably because the original owner didn't realize how important LOTS of space is to a successful kitchen operation probably because he didn't ever run a kitchen operation due to the abundance of fast food restaurants close by. No judgments, just speculation.
2 minutes of trying to calm both siblings down the nice way before you revert to the harsher but more effective method of threatening to send both away if they don't work it out. But your siblings are as belligerent as they are stubborn, so they continue fighting and you banish them to the basement to play with the cave troll which cries in fear and hides behind the water heater upon sight of your siblings having previously encountered these small terrors in battle. How else would you get a cave troll into the basement?
3 minutes of prep time before you need the nutmeg but SURPRISE you can't find it.
2 minutes of rummaging through ALL the cabinets, not just the baking cabinet where it should be, then running down to the pantry in the basement where extra supplies are stored in addition to some dried fruit for the cave troll who was turned vegetarian by your siblings. You ask your Mom if she bought nutmeg recently and she replies that yes, she did, she bought a massive container yesterday. You plead with her to come look for it because your Mom's Confirmation Saint is St. Anthony and he ALWAYS makes sure she finds what she's looking for. Sure enough, she opens the baking cabinet (the first place you looked) and pulls it out. Your Mom gives you an exasperated look and mutters something under her breath about eye exams.
3 minutes of prep time, and then the screams of a young child become audible. It's coming from upstairs where some of your siblings and the neighbor kids are playing dolls. You have a large enough family that odds are, it's your sibling screaming, but it sounds more like one of the neighbors. None of the other older siblings or parents are responding, so you take it upon yourself to investigate.
3 minutes of traveling upstairs, coaxing out of siblings and neighbor kids conflicting versions of the story from which you extrapolate that someone hit the now screaming neighbor child, but the attack wasn't completely unprovoked. You make an executive decision establishing a neighbor ban that will continue indefinitely, except it's not really a ban because your siblings just play outside in the freezing cold with them because besides being belligerent and stubborn your siblings are descendants of Jack Frost and Elsa.
4 minutes of prep time. The end is in sight. It's possible you could get this in the oven before the heat death of the universe.
PSYCHE!! Did you really think you'd get off that easy? While you were getting out the muffin trays your youngest sibling currently at home climbed up onto the chair left by the earlier helpers and has taken an egg in each hand. He is poised to hurl them and win the gold medals for farthest egg toss and most kitchen destruction done in a single motion.
2 1/2 minutes of trying to gently pry the fragile eggs from his unrelenting baby fists. This of course fails and egg covers him, the chair, and you. A washcloth with soap for him (luckily he never wears any clothing but a diaper, even when it's 60 degrees in the house), paper towels for the chair, and you ignore the blood and gore on your own clothing because you are so close and that's just the messy nature of war. I mean baking.
A final 2 minutes of prep time, the batter is in the trays and you can put them in the oven!!! except you can't because you forgot to preheat the oven in the chaos. But you take a deep breath, smother the Klingon side of you that has been threatening to emerge this entire time, and preheat the oven.
Actual Preparation time: 39 minutes, 19 of which wasn't even spent baking.
But it's okay, because a day may come when the courage to bake fails, when your forsake your butter and break all the cooking utensils, but it is not this day. An hour of crying and burnt muffins, when the walls of the oven come crashing down! But it is not this day! This day you fight! I mean bake!
The oven is preheated and you slide your muffins in, confident of the fluffy, delectable treats they will soon be.
Then you remember that you forgot to double the baking powder.
Tuesday, April 7, 2015
Happy Easter!
This is not late, there are 50 days of Easter!
 |
| Aren't these daffodils in my front yard AWESOME?! |
Happy Easter! He is Risen!
Monday, April 6, 2015
The Tripods Attack! by John McNichol
I know what some of you are thinking. More sci-fi? Well, sort of. The Tripods Attack is actually more than just sci-fi.
This book is the first in the Young Chesterton Chronicles series, featuring G.K. Chesterton as a youth in an alternate universe; alternate meaning instead of electricity, everything is run by steam, the Civil War in the U.S. ended up with the Confederate states splitting, Texas became its own republic, and California is its own country. Actually two. There's other smaller stuff, but that's the gist of it.
The Tripods Attack stands out though mostly because of its characters, who are a mix of real life people (like G.K. Chesterton, H.G. Wells, C.S. Lewis, and even J.R.R. Tolkien!!) and fictional characters (like Father Brown, Doctor Watson, and another girl who I really want to mention but can't because that would be a major spoiler; let's just say she lives on Prince Edward Island). And I think that Margaret Sanger is in there, but I'm not sure, her last name is never actually mentioned.
So as you can see, its a pretty mixed cast, and that's what makes it really fun! The author was able to keep the identities of the fictional characters and I think it was fun to see what the younger versions of some of my favorite authors might've been like. It was also cool to see the authors interact with their characters.
The book was very exciting, and I love how the author was able to get Chesterton into several debates on different subjects and bring in themes from some of Chesterton's books. And as for the sci-fi part, I was a little afraid that the sci-fi would clash with the classic characters, but McNichol was able to bring the two elements together in a way that worked really well.
I highly recommend this book, especially for young teens who like sci-fi and the classic authors.
The Tripods Attack stands out though mostly because of its characters, who are a mix of real life people (like G.K. Chesterton, H.G. Wells, C.S. Lewis, and even J.R.R. Tolkien!!) and fictional characters (like Father Brown, Doctor Watson, and another girl who I really want to mention but can't because that would be a major spoiler; let's just say she lives on Prince Edward Island). And I think that Margaret Sanger is in there, but I'm not sure, her last name is never actually mentioned.
So as you can see, its a pretty mixed cast, and that's what makes it really fun! The author was able to keep the identities of the fictional characters and I think it was fun to see what the younger versions of some of my favorite authors might've been like. It was also cool to see the authors interact with their characters.
The book was very exciting, and I love how the author was able to get Chesterton into several debates on different subjects and bring in themes from some of Chesterton's books. And as for the sci-fi part, I was a little afraid that the sci-fi would clash with the classic characters, but McNichol was able to bring the two elements together in a way that worked really well.
I highly recommend this book, especially for young teens who like sci-fi and the classic authors.
Monday, February 16, 2015
A Cat in Paris
My younger sister saw this movie while she was at a friend's house, and she badgered all of us until we watched it. I have to say, I understand her enthusiasm now. I thought this was going to be a cutesy movie about a girl and her cat, but it wasn't!
'A Cat in Paris' is about a cat named Dino (pronounced dee-no) who leads a double life: during the day he lives with a mute little girl whose father was recently killed; at night he is the partner-in-crime of a burglar. The little girl gets mixed up with some gangsters and it's up to the cat and Niko (nee-ko), the burglar, to save her.
This movie is really cool, even though it's a pretty simple concept there's a lot of drama throughout. I really like Niko the thief, he kind of seemed like a Robin Hood, he was so sweet to Zoe, the little girl. The movie never gives any background on Niko, so it makes you wonder why he was stealing, but in the end he stops stealing. Zoe was really cute too, even though she doesn't really talk until the end, you still get a good sense of her character. Kudos to the animators!
Speaking of animators, the animation in this movie is interesting. It reminded me of the animation for those animated versions of books? The animation looked really cool though. You know how when someone moves really smoothly people say they're fluid? Well when someone was sneaking around (especially Niko) they looked literally fluid. I thought it was really cool.
The soundtrack for this movie was really neat too. It was a mix of that creepy adventure music, plus French music, and an American sounding song that I don't know the name to :P
This movie was a real treat to watch, the plot was engaging, and the characters had depth! I totally recommend this movie, especially as a family movie night. It's not too scary that the littles can't watch it, but it's not too boring and little-kiddish that the older people can't watch it.
I look forward to watching this one again soon!
'A Cat in Paris' is about a cat named Dino (pronounced dee-no) who leads a double life: during the day he lives with a mute little girl whose father was recently killed; at night he is the partner-in-crime of a burglar. The little girl gets mixed up with some gangsters and it's up to the cat and Niko (nee-ko), the burglar, to save her.This movie is really cool, even though it's a pretty simple concept there's a lot of drama throughout. I really like Niko the thief, he kind of seemed like a Robin Hood, he was so sweet to Zoe, the little girl. The movie never gives any background on Niko, so it makes you wonder why he was stealing, but in the end he stops stealing. Zoe was really cute too, even though she doesn't really talk until the end, you still get a good sense of her character. Kudos to the animators!
Speaking of animators, the animation in this movie is interesting. It reminded me of the animation for those animated versions of books? The animation looked really cool though. You know how when someone moves really smoothly people say they're fluid? Well when someone was sneaking around (especially Niko) they looked literally fluid. I thought it was really cool.
The soundtrack for this movie was really neat too. It was a mix of that creepy adventure music, plus French music, and an American sounding song that I don't know the name to :P
This movie was a real treat to watch, the plot was engaging, and the characters had depth! I totally recommend this movie, especially as a family movie night. It's not too scary that the littles can't watch it, but it's not too boring and little-kiddish that the older people can't watch it.
I look forward to watching this one again soon!
Friday, January 30, 2015
Odd Thomas
Ack!! I've been working on this review for a month now, and I'm finally putting it up, I can't believe it's been this long!!
I got 'Odd Thomas' for Christmas, and I was going to save it for a new reading list, but I was so excited by what Monica at Spilled Ink and my Grandmother (who's so hip and up-to-date that she reads novels like Odd Thomas) have been saying about the Odd Thomas books that I told myself I would just read the first couple of chapters and that's it. Yeah. Well, that did NOT go as planned.
I couldn't put the book down!!
Odd Thomas felt fast paced, but it really wasn't. To put it into perspective, the book is 500 pages, and the book covers a time span of 48 hours.
Yeah.
Even though Koontz takes 500 pages to cover a 2 day timespan, the book doesn't feel slow at all. The book feels super fast-paced, and you'll find yourself saying 'Just one more chapter!' and then 10 chapters later, 'I should probably stop now.'
I really like most of the characters in this book. Odd is just so sweet, and I love his attitude towards everyone and everything. I like how he calls people he respects 'Sir' or 'Ma'am' even if he is really close to them, like Ozzie. My view on Stormy Llewllyn, Odd's 'best girl' as he calls her, is kind of mixed. At the beginning I just really didn't like her, she was sooo sarcastic, and I thought sometimes she was bit mean to Odd. Towards the end she grew on me more, and I was able to really see something in her relationship with Odd. She still isn't my favorite character in the book, but my appreciation of her character has grown.
One thing I really love about this book is the Catholic element. It's really awesome to see that an author can write a book with Catholic elements, and the book (and the author) can still be a success! Of course, the book isn't a Catholicism-in-your-face type of book, and the good points with the Catholicism are very much balanced out by all the ugliness that Odd Thomas encounters throughout his adventures.
A word of warning, this book contains some mature content, a LOT of scary, gross, guy-dead-in-the-bathtub moments, and some language. Definitely don't let a 10-year-old read this.
All things considered, this is an awesome book, you need to acquire it now if you don't already have it. It will keep you on edge the whole time, and it has quite a few twists and turns along the way.
I got 'Odd Thomas' for Christmas, and I was going to save it for a new reading list, but I was so excited by what Monica at Spilled Ink and my Grandmother (who's so hip and up-to-date that she reads novels like Odd Thomas) have been saying about the Odd Thomas books that I told myself I would just read the first couple of chapters and that's it. Yeah. Well, that did NOT go as planned.
I couldn't put the book down!!
Odd Thomas felt fast paced, but it really wasn't. To put it into perspective, the book is 500 pages, and the book covers a time span of 48 hours.
Yeah.
Even though Koontz takes 500 pages to cover a 2 day timespan, the book doesn't feel slow at all. The book feels super fast-paced, and you'll find yourself saying 'Just one more chapter!' and then 10 chapters later, 'I should probably stop now.'
I really like most of the characters in this book. Odd is just so sweet, and I love his attitude towards everyone and everything. I like how he calls people he respects 'Sir' or 'Ma'am' even if he is really close to them, like Ozzie. My view on Stormy Llewllyn, Odd's 'best girl' as he calls her, is kind of mixed. At the beginning I just really didn't like her, she was sooo sarcastic, and I thought sometimes she was bit mean to Odd. Towards the end she grew on me more, and I was able to really see something in her relationship with Odd. She still isn't my favorite character in the book, but my appreciation of her character has grown.
One thing I really love about this book is the Catholic element. It's really awesome to see that an author can write a book with Catholic elements, and the book (and the author) can still be a success! Of course, the book isn't a Catholicism-in-your-face type of book, and the good points with the Catholicism are very much balanced out by all the ugliness that Odd Thomas encounters throughout his adventures.
A word of warning, this book contains some mature content, a LOT of scary, gross, guy-dead-in-the-bathtub moments, and some language. Definitely don't let a 10-year-old read this.
All things considered, this is an awesome book, you need to acquire it now if you don't already have it. It will keep you on edge the whole time, and it has quite a few twists and turns along the way.
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