Guest Post: Changing the Traditions of Relationships

Today's post is a bit of a change of speed from my usual rantings. Tonya Vrba contacted me with this post and thought it would be a good fit for the readers here around the Periphery.

Author Bio: Tonya Vrba is a passionate writer. Her work has been published in newspapers and blogs. She writes frequently about health, career and online dating. Learn more about her work at her personal website

Changing the Traditions of Relationships: good or bad for society?

In the tragic romance of Romeo and Juliet, the two lovers marry before meeting their unfortunate demise. Juliet is 13 years of age. While his age is never specifically mentioned in the play, it is reasonable to assume he is in his late teens or early 20s given the traditions of the period. When looking back at one’s family history it is common to find grandparents and great grandparents who married in their late teens or early 20s. Many of us have parents who were wed in their early to mid 20s as well.
Today, young people are waiting longer to get married. It’s not uncommon for high school or college sweet hearts to date for six or seven years before they finally decide to tie the knot. Sometimes they even move into together before getting married and sometimes they never get married at all. All this is, of course, untraditional. It goes against the official beliefs of many religions and may be seen as indecent or sinful by older generations.
We are witnessing an interesting clash of cultures as we see old traditions challenged and new codes of morality and purity established. In the United States, 92 percent of the population believe in a God. Most religious traditions frown upon having sex before marriage, conceiving a child out of wedlock, moving in together before marriage and homosexual marriage. Despite these traditions, 95 percent of Americans have had premarital sex, 40 percent of all births are out of wedlock and 53 percent of Americans support gay marriage.
None of these cultural changes in relationships has passed traditional people unseen. There are strong campaigns against all these changes. The changing traditions today are not left to the older age of marriages but to how relationships are viewed across the board.
As a culture, we must be headed in a positive direction. Since divorced peaked in the 1980s,  more married couples have remained together. This is blamed on the facts that couples are waiting longer to get married and that they also wait until they become financially stable. Yet, too often there is substantial pressure on young people to get married.
After I had been with my boyfriend for about two and a half years, I started hearing the question. So where are you tying the knot? Any marriage plans? When, in your early 20s, you have family members dropping hints and friends who are choosing to marry young, these comments can be very distressing. This can be especially true if a person is also single.
Now, of course, every person has their own goals in life. The truth of the matter is no one deserves to feel unimportant simply for being single. They also should feel more than welcomed to carry on a long relationship if that’s what they want. The hard part of carrying on those lifestyles is that parents and grandparents may not be so supportive. A single lifestyle does not mean an abstinent one and couples who move in together are always assumed to be sexually active.
That may be the main factor in tradition’s resistance toward our changing culture. These newly acceptable relationships erase any thoughts of an abstinent, and therefore pure, relationship. While there are many who see our changing traditions as deplorable, in many ways they are preferable. Marriages that have happier children who tend to be better in school. Modifying that more, relationships that remain together are good for the next generation, whether there is a ring on the finger or not.
What are your thoughts on our changing traditions? Has the definition of purity been changed and is it even important anymore? Is it possible to have a close relationship to a God while also approving of sexual activity and child bearing out of wedlock?

Guest Post: Comparison Shopping

Today's guest post is from a blogger who holds a very special place in my bloggy little heart. She was one of my first readers and was one of the very first blogs that I read that I finally felt like I had a kindred blogging soul out there. Without further ado, my fellow reader and writer: Masked Mom. 

"Most people can read much more profoundly than they can write, speak or even think. For me, this is one of the great humiliations of being literate at all. If I can read Shakespeare, why can't I write Shakespeare? It's not fair."

~~Reeve Lindbergh, No More Words: A Journal of My Mother, Anne Morrow Lindbergh

I am not merely an avid reader, but a voracious one. This is a character trait I mostly consider a good thing—particularly when it comes to writing, because I’ve yet to read a book on writing that does not trumpet the importance of reading (and lots of it) to the development of writing skills. One of my favorite lines from Natalie Goldberg’s Writing Down The Bones  is “If you read good books, when you write, good books will come out of you.” This seems so sensible—like an artistic version of “You are what you eat.” And sure, there is a certain simple logic to it—of course there are many things in life we learn not merely by being actively “taught,” but by proximity, by osmosis almost.

The flip side, the dark side, of reading good books, or good work anywhere really, is that sinking feeling that nothing, NOTHING!, I ever write will be as good as what I’m reading. There are sentences and whole passages of things I read that not only strike an emotional chord but also inspire outright awe in the writer in me. Miracles of economy, stellar examples of structure, masterpieces of clarity, icons of imagery. All these things bring me great joy—and, very often, at the heart of that joy is a hard little nugget of despair.

This is one way of putting that paradoxically delicious despair: “I’m not sure how it’s possible, but I am simultaneously grateful to have read it and insanely jealous that I didn’t write it.” I couldn’t have said it better myself—and, in fact, I did say this myself, in a comment on this very blog, where I regularly read things that give me this exact feeling.

I think a feeling of inadequacy in the face of so much greatness in the literary world (in all its manifestations, including blogs, dammit) is a practically universal thing—we all feel it from time to time. “What’s the use in plugging away if I can never be as great as _______________.” Don’t we all have a name, many names, we can put in that blank? (And, to really push the limits of tasteful sucking-up, isn’t our fabulous hostess, TangledLou, one of those names for a lot of us?)

We must each find our own ways to work around this feeling. At the core of my own philosophical approach to this problem is a page from a years-old calendar featuring Maxine, the wiry-haired, cranky old lady who is a creation of Hallmark greeting cards. It said, “I gotta be me. I don’t see anybody else lining up to do it.” I am me, there’s no choice really. I approach the page with my own life experiences, my own level of education, my own proclivities (passionate (and somewhat intemperate) love for parentheses, just for one example), my own motivations, my own interests, my very own me-ness. I try to focus on leaving the best me on that page that I can.

Most days I succeed-ish.

Guest Post: Mom-Woman of Mystery

A huge thanks to Jewels from Frazzled and Frumpy for today's guest post. She's way cooler than she lets on and a mighty fine writer. She's been an agent of encouragement and inspiration to me since almost the very beginning of this blog.

I wonder if my kids wish I were cooler.  You know, more like the moms they see on TV.  The ones who are doctors saving lives, or CIA agents living a double life.  Yeah, that would be cool.   If their friends asked what I do , they’d probably avoid the question.  ("I don't know. She blogs or something.")

But, if I were an agent, my kids would be proud.  Agent Mom.

I could pick them up from school in my black Camaro, hiding behind awesome sunglasses so no one would recognize me.  I’d wear all the ‘hip’ clothes, and I’m sure I’d never say ‘hip’.  There would probably be a gun tucked in my jeans and my cell phone would double as an emergency transponder of some sort.  Sometimes, I would have to disappear in the middle of the night to jet off to a top-secret location.  But, I would always bring them souvenirs, like a t-shirt that said, “My mom went to Yemen and all she brought me was this lousy t-shirt.”

Instead, they’re stuck with me. Boring mom.  I drive my old car that’s littered with Wal-Mart receipts and diet Coke bottles.  My cell phone is just a phone and I don’t even know how to use all the features on it. The only thing tucked into my jeans is my shirt--and that’s on the days I’m not wearing sweats.  I use words like ‘hip’ and don’t understand their text language.  So uncool.

Maybe I should make them watch the shows I did.  I could definitely measure up to Carol Brady or Mrs. Partridge.  Carol had a station wagon and the Partridge mom drove that psychedelic bus.  Plus, my clothes are much more stylish than theirs- polyester pantsuits? Seriously.  I can feel my kids shudder.   And, I’m pretty sure neither of them even had a cell phone.

 Yes, I’ve got it all over the moms of the 70’s.  Who’s hip now?  

(A big thanks to Tangledlou for letting me guest post on her blog. I'm honored, because,  in the words of Annie Wilkes, "I'm your biggest fan.")

Guest Post: 3 Poems

Deb at Kicking Corners is our guest today. She's one of my new favorite bloggers with her thought-provoking posts and incredible range. She sent me these lovely poems that have instantly taken up residence in my sub-conscious. Thank you, Deb, for sharing these vibrant little bits of life with us.

Untitled

You're helping me get past the part

where I feel like throwing up.

Me being quiet protects you

from having to know.

And from having to do.

I want to live somewhere

that's it's okay to make mistakes.

In this world you have to be perfect.

Pictures don't talk.

This grey place is calm --

but not for long.

Learn to Too

When I get mad at you,

here are some things you can do:

You can call me a bitch and walk away.

You can talk over me, not listen to a word I say.

Or you can smirk at me, laugh. Make me feel dumb.

You can rip my emotions apart until I feel numb.

You can lock me away from what I care for.

You can keep tally of comments, like sport with a score.

These are drops in an ocean of things you could do.

But if you really love me,

like I love you --

then when I get mad at you,

show me you love me anyway.

Despite the things I say.

Because the deep down secret is this:

I'm really just mad at me.

I know this ocean because I've learned to tread water in it.

Nearly over my self-depreciating head,

I'm spinning in it.

But if you can still love me,

no matter what I do,

maybe I can learn to too.

Myth's Creations

Ha! Ha! Ha!

Bubbling out.

We are a spring brook.

We are full of fish and tadpols.

We tumble together.

Waves washing over and over each other.

Roaring, we are the ocean,

laughing.

Lazy snakes, not wiley.

We lay on rocks.

Soaking. Sun.

You are warm to me.

You are my tree of knowledge:

teaching me good and evil.

You are my tree of life:

we are forever.

We are creation myths.

I believe in you.

Guest Post: Lock, Stock and Barrel

A definition
'an atom is the smallest article of an element that can still be identified as this element, it cannot exist freely.


a molecule is a bond of two or more atoms it can exist freely' - Wiki Answers

Because everything is made up of molecules with nothing between this means we are all one big something, all joined by nothing. 

The dog, the rat, the guinea pigs, my sons, my husband, the air we breathe, the ground we walk on, the flowers, birds and hairy caterpillars and all you lot are one. The only thing separating us is nothing.

This is the world...

This is what it's made of...

We're all just little balls bouncing around in space.

Dinosaurs, knights in shining armour, Beethoven and Leonardo da Vinci. all just tiny balls held together by I don't know what.


If you dug in the right place and scooped up all the molecules of Heath Ledger, put them in a bath and added some sort of gluey substance you might be able to recreate him. A sort of Heath Cous Cous.


Where am I going with this?


Weeeeeell there's absolutely no reason at all for my dog and I not being able to walk through walls is there? 

Philosophy? No, 'silly'ophopy' from Julie at feeding the cat. 




Love this? Go check out Julie's philosophy, art and beautiful blogging at feeding the cat. She is an amazing artist and her wonderful meandering wit made her an instant favorite of mine. Thank you, Julie for guest posting! 

Guest Post: "Will You Trash My Vibrator?" and Other Secret Pre-Mortem Pacts With Friends

OK folks, I have left the planet. For the next few days you will be treated to a parade of creative talent from some of my dear, patient, talented readers. The Grand Marshall of this parade is Red Dirt Kelly and this beautiful, brave piece. Thanks so much Kelly for all you do!

 The last time I visited my comrade Cathy’s dying friend in the hospital, we talked about angels. “Cathy” was also the dying friend’s name which made for some confusing conversations in the ICU unit.

The dying Cathy looked very much like Susan Sarandon. She rested her head on the hospital pillow and toyed with the IV entry area on her arm while she whispered that she believed an angel had visited her on an Indian Reservation in New Mexico to deliver the message that she was ill. Her arm was hard to look at, having turned approximately half purple by that point.

In my mind, the warm sunlight streaming through the window lighting up her auburn hair was the Light, and the disease turning her arm…and the rest of her body purple…was the Dark. But the Light won when she breathed her last breath because the dying Cathy finally smiled and the tension left her face. She could rest now.

But my friend Cathy was a different story. That night she got drunk and I sat in her living room listening to her repeat stories about their friendship over and over. At one point, I found some rollers in her bathroom, brought them into the living room and begin putting them in my hair as a painfully weak way to cause laughter and break the sadness.

Needing to walk around at some point, we picked up a second bottle of wine and crossed the street, knocking on the door of a female Methodist minister who had a labyrinth in her back yard. We all three laughed when she answered the door with rollers in her hair. The three of us, rollers dangling at all angles from our hair and clothed in our bathrobes and slippers, began to walk through the labyrinth in her back yard, singing drinking songs. The minister and I watched our grieving Cathy as her sadness gushed forth well into the morning hours.

I thought about that night and my undone friend for three days. I was riveted by her ability to announce her utter unraveling in front of the two of us.

Had I ever openly wailed and shown my soft underbelly and pain so plainly to another human being? Even before I finished articulating that question to myself in my head, I knew the answer was: I have not.

The answer was still rolling around in the soul-space of my brain like an echo around canyon walls when my phone rang. It was my grieving friend and she needed help clearing out the house of the deceased.

So I helped her in this task, all the while observing her lingering hesitation over every object with some degree of meaning attached. I was in the middle of observing her decide which of the fifty potted plants to keep when she said, “Can we go get dinner? I need an emotional break.”

Once again, she had exposed her humanity by telling me she was at the limit of her “feeling” capacity, brought on by the process of sorting her dead friend’s belongings. And for the record, vulnerability does indeed breed vulnerability. Each time my friend opened her soul to me, I felt more like I could open mine to her.

So there we were, see, sitting across from each other at a restaurant table spread with heavy cream and butter pasta, grappling with the pieces of our lives which were floating in the air around us. Somewhere around my head “my own thoughts about death” drifted by, close to my speech center. It was being levitated by my growing trust toward my dinner mate.

So I blurted, “If my husband and I die simultaneously, will you PLEASE trash my vibrator? Cathy, I can’t let anyone find our vibrator when they’re cleaning out our ‘death things.’”

Her expression was a classic double take followed by a grandiose belly laugh.

“Oh my stars, yes!!” she replied.

“Okay, you HAVE to remember this…it’s in the bottom center drawer in his dresser, behind the socks. Will you please remember??” I was intensely ensuring that the entire pact would indeed be managed.

“Yes…” she started. “Got it. Bottom center drawer, behind the socks…” Her face was cracked with a full-blown smile and her eyes danced mischievously. “And will you PLEASE come into the funeral home when they’re preparing my body and pluck ALL the fuckwit hairs growing from my chin? I hate my chin hairs and would be SO mortified if they were sticking out of my face when people viewed my body!!”

“Absolutely,” I replied. “I. Am. IN. I will pluck your chin hairs. Happy to do it.” I felt better because I now also had a post-mortem task to contribute to the dignity of my own friend’s future death.

The conversation took a hairpin curve and by the time we walked out of the restaurant, we had talked about how body fat could be disguised in caskets, how to manage crazy family members in the funeral audience and what to make sure our children knew should they falter from time to time after we died.

In other words, we managed all of our personal anxieties about dignity and death over pasta, wine and the essence of our dead friend’s memory floating about in the restaurant air.

The bits and pieces of emotional processing still remaining around our table – buoyed by our own insecurities, were slowly descending to the floor when we left. They did not follow us. Rather, they were swept up with the bread crumbs by the wait staff after closing that night. We were finished with them. For now.

That particular dinner conversation happened three years ago. I still update her on any geographical change in “the location” of the vibrator. And, she’s sent me no less than two pair of excellent quality tweezers… “in case I’m without a pair should she kick the bucket.”

Our promises are intact, as is now our posthumous dignity.

Or, at least the pieces that about which we are most concerned.

And Speaking of Guest Posts...

This is not at all creepy.
Photo credit: sideshowmom from morguefile.com 

I want YOU.
Yes, you.

Listen, I'm leaving the planet for a few days starting Saturday and rather than hang a sign around the ol' blog that says I've gone on an extended coffee break, it would be just ducky if someone wanted to write a guest post for me.

We're not picky here around the Periphery. Got something that you don't want to put on your own blog? Send it over. Funny pictures of cats? Keep 'em. Treatise on the use of hands as symbolism in the collected works of George R.R. Martin? Send me an abstract. Or really anything else you've got kicking around. I'd be delighted to flog for some other bloggers.
So, ladies and gentlemen, start your search engines and send me some stuff. I would be so much obliged.

You can send me an email: tangledlou@gmail.com
You can use the spanky new message feature on my Facebook page.
You can let me know in the comments here and we'll make the proper arrangements.
You can Tweet me.
You can write them on a bus.
You can write them without fuss.

There even might be something in it for you.

It's this, or I post a video a day of some of the most hideous ear worms ever to grace the face of Youtube. Or possibly interpretive art made from my fingernail clippings? Informative links with photos about various infectious diseases?

Seriously, if you're a seat-of-the-pants poster, this is an opportunity for you. I'm nothing if not a last minute gal.

And I thank you in advance. Mwah!

Guest Post: Why Do the Russians Want Big Melons?

Why Do the Russians Want Big Melons?

A Beginner’s Guide to Blogging Theory

First, an enormous thanks to the extraordinary Tangled Lou for allowing me to take over her blog for a day. I feel very much as if I have been given the keys to a vehicle much nicer than my own. Or moved in with a really nice, normal family and lived as one of them for a day. I will try very hard not to leave any dings in the exterior, Lou. Or any nail clippings in the family bedroom.

What I want to share with you all today is a Beginner’s Theory of Blogging. Blogging, like everything, has discrete stages which can be expressed as trite textbook psychobabble. I only personally know about four of them, so I may be projecting forward somewhat. However, I am sure what I have described are the obvious final stages.

The (Heretofore) Officially Accepted Stages of Blogging

1. Begin blogging because one vaguely recalls that once one was known to be a writer. Technology, it seems, now exists to project this writing onto the internet where other people can see it without one’s mailing it to each of them in the form of creepy anonymous letters like a serial killer.
2. Become thoroughly amused by oneself.
3. Learn, to one's utter amazement, that some acquaintances are also amused by one's writing. At this point, visions of quitting one's job and simply writing essays to amuse these people become prominent.
4. Discover something such as Blog Her, Facebook blogging groups, or Twitter that puts one in contact with other bloggers. As a result of activities there, start to develop a readership and community greater than one's acquaintance. This is the stage where one usually installs Google Analytics. (We'll discuss this later.) This stage is both exhilarating and profoundly humbling. One learns that one can be part of a community of writers without ever leaving the comfort of the underside of one's own cat. One also learns that there are a LOT of bloggers out there and many of them are quite good. All of them, seemingly, have a larger readership and much better lay-out on their blog. This can be depressing.
5. Do you remember that Bruce Springsteen video Dancing in the Dark, where at the climax of his stage performance, he reaches out a hand and lifts Courteney Cox onto the stage, alone among the throng of audience members at his show? I think success as a blogger is something like this. Bruce Springsteen is probably played by a publisher.
6. One writes books and continues to blog. At this point, the job is to be professionally awesome. A throng of tiny sparkling stars and singing bats accompany one wherever one goes.
7. Death. It comes for everyone.

Where, you ask, do big melons come into this? Well, here is how. (Don't be so impatient.) One of the primary quandaries of bloggers everywhere involves the results of their Google Analytics (see step 4 of The Officially Accepted Stages of Blogging). Here is a sample from my own:

One might wonder why people who Googled "dark life" were landing on my blog. Apparently, though, they are not finding what they want there and are quickly leaving, at the rate of 80% to continue their search for "dark life" on the internet. (The other 20%, apparently, are happy with what they find on my blog.) Even more concerning, a recent spike in my page views seems to have been explained by people who were searching for "Michele Pfeiffer's hairstyle" rather than a sudden increased interest in my writing. These things tend to obfuscate my sense of self as a writer.

Additionally, I am jealous because Tangled Lou's Analytics apparently show that people find her after Googling "sleek jowled" and "big melons", which is infinitely more interesting and less depressing than either Michele Pfeiffer or other results I have such as "dark horrifying woods".

A subject of some concern to many of us newbie bloggers has been the great interest we all generate among Russians. My husband, who is a Computer Person, says that all of our page views from Russia are due to the hub of Eastern European cyber crime. In other words, people are somehow using our blogs for nefarious means, and so I can't even emotionally own every one of those page views I work so hard for. Most of them, it turns out, are probably generated by searches for hairstyle tips and Russian spam-bots. 

All in all, I prefer then, to believe that we are a huge hit in Russia. Countless Russians are seated, as we speak, at their computers, happily Googling "Michele Pfeiffer in the horrifying woods" and "sleek jowled big melons" and then reading us post after post, commenting in broken English and laughing great belly laughs. Soon, one of them will come for each of us and, lifting us like brides out of the crush of bloggers, offer us handsome book deals.

Because we're THAT good.

Guest post by Tara Adams. Read her beautiful and dazzlingly funny blog at Faith In Ambiguity.

Leaping Liebsters!

It is at the end of a long day that I finally sit down to write. There was this coffee to be drunk with a friend, there was knitting to be done, there were monkeys to ferry about, there were delicious chocolate cupcakes with the most beautiful blood orange frosting to eat, there were library books, magazines and movies, there was a flat tire and a dark and rainy walk with monkeys who did not complain, only said "What an adventure!" Soon there will be cuddling by the fire and the eating of take-out with the monkeys all fed and bathed and put to bed.

But first, some gratitude to express. It's a great day when I get to be profusely grateful. I find that most days provide me plenty to be grateful for.

In the last week or so I have been tagged for both the Versatile Blogger Award and the Liebster Award. They both have their separate set of rules that go with them which I am going to ignore, if you don't mind. I will, however, tell you a little about the two ladies who were kind enough to give me these awards.

Kristen at Four Hens and a Rooster is really the girl who does it all. She maintains her delightful blog, she works in social media as a professional - which means I kowtow to her and her knowledge of such mysterious things - and she also started a group blogging site for parents facing some tricky ages at Ten To Twenty Parenting. She saw a gap in the blog world for this sort of writing and advice and so she filled it. It seems people tend to stop blogging about their kids when they stop being so little and cute and start to face some real-life kinds of challenges. All of my many hats - as a mother, a blogger, a writer, a woman and just as a person - to Kristen and her boundless energy and good will. Mwah!

Dawn at Alphabet Salad had me at the title of her blog. And then to click over and find all of her lovely images of vintage typewriters... bliss before I ever read a word. Dawn's blog is entertaining and thoughtful and always interesting. She's slogging through the NaBloPoMo world for many of the same reasons I am - the discipline, the practice, the dream of writing more, more, more. In the process you get to read about words themselves, her lovely old house, and interesting memories connecting her to the present. And, get this... she taught herself html. Again, hats are flying. I am inspired daily by her dedication to the craft of writing, even when she doesn't feel like it. And she's Canadian and I have a soft spot the size of Toronto for Canadians.

So thank you, ladies! I am honored indeed, to be included in such fine company. I told Kristen the other day I felt like I'd crashed an awesome party. So I'm sitting here, snarfing canapes, trying not to spill my drink on the rug, and making appalling small talk.

Also, as you may recall, tomorrow is Leap Blog Day. If you're just desperate to read something by yours truly, you can find me guest blogging over at Southern Fried Children, where Kelly was kind enough to let me traipse through (heaven knows why. Seriously, while you're there, you should just skip my post and read her archives. Twice I've had to have the Heimlich done to me from choking on things from laughing so hard.)
Also, you can find a different post by moi over at Faith In Ambiguity. Tara and I have decided to swap spaces for the day and I get the far better end of the deal.

Let me tell you about Tara. Her posts just suck you in. She's led such an interesting life - heavily populated with animals who need her salvation - and she writes about every aspect of it with inimitable poignancy and humor. She's self-deprecating without being self-pitying; she winds her stories around your senses with lyrical prose and a original wit. She's likely to write about anything, and no matter the subject matter - her boys, her animals, living with chronic pain, her mother's penchant for action figures, cooking a squash,  blogging frustrations, and anything else - she draws you in with her words and takes you with her. You all are in for a treat tomorrow, I promise.

I leave you now, for my couch and my love beckon, with some words from Robert Louis Stevenson:
"The world is so full of a number of things, I'm sure we should all be as happy as kings."

It's Coming...

Oh, how I love this little frog face.

Leap Day is nearly here, folks! You know what that means, right? 
That means that this space will be taken over by aliens! Or at least by another, very good, very funny blogger. It's Leap Blog Day!
I've previewed the post and it's all I can do to sit on it until time to publish it. You are all in for a treat!
So stay tuned, because on February 29th there will be shenanigans. Of that much I am certain.
Meanwhile, happy typing, folks. Keep your eyes open for the magic.