From the very beginning of time, dating back to Adam and Eve in the garden, it has been in man's nature to hide. I am certainly no exception to that. (btw, I don't care one bit about the politically correct crap going on out there, we are all part of mankind. Gad created man, and out of the man, woman. I will automatically use "man" when referring to any person, regardless of gender, who belongs to mankind.) Men try to hide their sin, try to hide from their sin, try to hide from God, and from others. I must confess that I am guilty of much hiding. I struggle with hiding from God, and hiding my sins from Him and others. Stemming from that, I struggle with hiding my very self. One of my greatest fears is being vulnerable, or of revealing my vulnerability. Using cryptic words (as I am fond of doing), I will attempt to explain:
The most vulnerable words I write are for no other eyes but mine.
The most vulnerable words I say are for no other ears but mine.
The most vulnerable thoughts remain where no one can perceive them.
The most vulnerable looks are made when no other will see them.
The most vulnerable music I create is for myself alone.
The most vulnerable me remains hidden unless I am alone.
My attempt to hide my extreme vulnerability has long been a trial of mine that I can never overcome. Like all men, I have been hiding things since as far back as I can remember; and as far back as I can remember, I have been trying to hide my vulnerability. Feeling incredibly exposed already, I must end as much remains hidden.
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Friday, January 14, 2011
You know a book is good when....
Since going on Winter Break, I've been doing a lot of reading. During the semester, I simply do not have the time to read. (I don't exactly have the time to do many of the necessary things for living, like eating and sleeping, never mind reading!) Since coming home, I have read seven books, and am making my way through the eighth book. I happen to e obsessed with Dragons, and am constantly in search of more books with dragons. In conducting a google search for books with dragons, I discovered the New York Bestselling Author Anne McCaffrey. She has quickly become my new favorite. While waiting for the first book of the Dragonriders of Pern series to come inter library loan, I started reading her books about Acorna. Scifi/fantasy is totally my favorite genre, and I loved the new worlds and the concepts she created in her books. Well, the long awaited call from the library finally came, telling me that the first book of the dragonriders series was in! I had to finish the book I was in the middle of first, then at about 3 yesterday afternoon, I was finally able to start my new dragon series.
Once I started the book (DragonFlight), I knew immediately that it was going to be good. As proof of just how the good was-- I read straight through the book with only a pause for supper, staying up until 2:30 AM to finish it! Soooo good! only problem is.... the second book has not arrived at the library yet :( I don't want to turn this into a review of books, but I just have to rave a little bit about some of the things that make this book so great.
One thing I've come to love about Anne McCaffrey is her ability to create completely new worlds and pull you into them. With her Acorna books, everything is space oriented, set in a time when the Earth age is long past, there is much space travel and many planets in different galaxies are now inhabited. She brilliantly makes you believe in the possibility of a human existence throughout all of space. The really captivating aspect for me is how she brings in an alien life-form (Acorna), and develops that character in the midst of what had been an otherwise completely human universe. I love being able to explore the new worlds through the characters, and I can easily place myself right there with them, rather than just sitting sceptically in my chair, conscious of the fact that I am just reading a book. But anyway, on to the DragonRiders series:
The world Anne McCaffrey creates in this series is a mainly human population, though takes place in another world, another existence, no Earth or anything of that sort. And there are Dragons!!! All sorts of amazing things always happen when there are dragons around! No matter what author's works you read, if they include dragons, there will be amazingness in some form or another. A uniform theme in all the dragon works I've read is the concept of a mental connection with the dragons, and the ability to speak with your mind. Quite often, that concept is accompanied by the idea that one can extend their mind, their awareness, to others around them. I absolutely love the idea that someone can reach out with their mind, with the consciousness, and brush against the minds of others, against physical objects around them and farther away from them, touch the minds of all other living things, and just be aware of what may be going on beyond their physical sight. It is such an extraordinary concept, and I am always left longing to be able to extend my mind that way, and be able to just show others what is in my mind, rather than struggling to find the words to ineffectually explain.
Another thing I love about this book is Anne McCaffrey's ability to effectively pull off time travel. In most movies or books that include some aspect of time travel, there is usually the uncomfortable, realistic thought that no, that couldn't really happen... if they went back and did this, that would change this, and then that wouldn't have happened, but it already did..... and it just doesn't work.... they can't change the past, if they did that, there'd be all these consequences..... ahhhhh! But there is no worry of any such thing in this book. The author very carefully set things up so that after the time travel had occurred, you realized that according to what had happened earlier, the backwards time traveling has to happen in order to bring about what had already happened in the past. There is a point towards the end of the book that things suddenly click. You realize that an occurrence discussed now and then from much earlier history of this world only happened because of the time traveling that had to then occur right then in the present time in the world. I could not believe how brilliantly she worked everything out, not missing a single thing or leaving any opportunities for you to say wait... what about..... She even addressed the issue of what happens when you exist in two different times at once. (Like when your present day self goes back ten years to when you were a much younger person, so you exist in that one time as both your younger and your older self.)
As much as I have already enjoyed her other series, her dragon books have now blown my mind, and I cannot wait to read more! Dragon lore is truly the most marvellous material, and I will never get enough of it! :)
Once I started the book (DragonFlight), I knew immediately that it was going to be good. As proof of just how the good was-- I read straight through the book with only a pause for supper, staying up until 2:30 AM to finish it! Soooo good! only problem is.... the second book has not arrived at the library yet :( I don't want to turn this into a review of books, but I just have to rave a little bit about some of the things that make this book so great.
One thing I've come to love about Anne McCaffrey is her ability to create completely new worlds and pull you into them. With her Acorna books, everything is space oriented, set in a time when the Earth age is long past, there is much space travel and many planets in different galaxies are now inhabited. She brilliantly makes you believe in the possibility of a human existence throughout all of space. The really captivating aspect for me is how she brings in an alien life-form (Acorna), and develops that character in the midst of what had been an otherwise completely human universe. I love being able to explore the new worlds through the characters, and I can easily place myself right there with them, rather than just sitting sceptically in my chair, conscious of the fact that I am just reading a book. But anyway, on to the DragonRiders series:
The world Anne McCaffrey creates in this series is a mainly human population, though takes place in another world, another existence, no Earth or anything of that sort. And there are Dragons!!! All sorts of amazing things always happen when there are dragons around! No matter what author's works you read, if they include dragons, there will be amazingness in some form or another. A uniform theme in all the dragon works I've read is the concept of a mental connection with the dragons, and the ability to speak with your mind. Quite often, that concept is accompanied by the idea that one can extend their mind, their awareness, to others around them. I absolutely love the idea that someone can reach out with their mind, with the consciousness, and brush against the minds of others, against physical objects around them and farther away from them, touch the minds of all other living things, and just be aware of what may be going on beyond their physical sight. It is such an extraordinary concept, and I am always left longing to be able to extend my mind that way, and be able to just show others what is in my mind, rather than struggling to find the words to ineffectually explain.
Another thing I love about this book is Anne McCaffrey's ability to effectively pull off time travel. In most movies or books that include some aspect of time travel, there is usually the uncomfortable, realistic thought that no, that couldn't really happen... if they went back and did this, that would change this, and then that wouldn't have happened, but it already did..... and it just doesn't work.... they can't change the past, if they did that, there'd be all these consequences..... ahhhhh! But there is no worry of any such thing in this book. The author very carefully set things up so that after the time travel had occurred, you realized that according to what had happened earlier, the backwards time traveling has to happen in order to bring about what had already happened in the past. There is a point towards the end of the book that things suddenly click. You realize that an occurrence discussed now and then from much earlier history of this world only happened because of the time traveling that had to then occur right then in the present time in the world. I could not believe how brilliantly she worked everything out, not missing a single thing or leaving any opportunities for you to say wait... what about..... She even addressed the issue of what happens when you exist in two different times at once. (Like when your present day self goes back ten years to when you were a much younger person, so you exist in that one time as both your younger and your older self.)
As much as I have already enjoyed her other series, her dragon books have now blown my mind, and I cannot wait to read more! Dragon lore is truly the most marvellous material, and I will never get enough of it! :)
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Make Over
My blog really needs a make over. This template is pretty old, and doesn't allow me to do much. I really want one of those cool set-ups with all the tag words off to the side in a cloud, and you can make certain tags bigger than others. Can't do that with this template, though. :'(
It's just a pain trying to find new templates that look nice, are compatible, and include other features. Meh. I don't like the traditional template just composed of complementary colors. That's pretty lame. But I don't know how to do much else with what Blogspot actually offers, and there are so many sites with all kinds of other templates to search though! Problem is-- they're not all compatible.... meh. Oh well. Eventually I'll do something with this blog.
It's just a pain trying to find new templates that look nice, are compatible, and include other features. Meh. I don't like the traditional template just composed of complementary colors. That's pretty lame. But I don't know how to do much else with what Blogspot actually offers, and there are so many sites with all kinds of other templates to search though! Problem is-- they're not all compatible.... meh. Oh well. Eventually I'll do something with this blog.
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Back to writing....
So I need to get back to this whole writing thing.... I can't tell you how many times I'll be sitting around thinking, or laying in bed, trying to sleep, and I get this idea I want to write about here. Problem is, I never do.... and then I lose the idea(s). Sometimes it just seems like too much work to turn on the computer or pick up a pen and paper and then attempt to make enough sense of the thoughts to be able to translate them into words... But then, if I don't take the time to work out my thoughts and ideas and understand them enough to share them, I end up forgetting them, and they are lost forever. Ha. But you know, I never write what I intend to write in here. I start typing about something, and inevitably I end up rambling about something else completely. Or just rambling in general, like what I'm doing now. As usually happens when I start writing, I now have several things I wish to write about, but it would be far too confusing to attempt them all simultaneously, and would take far too much time and effort to address them separately right now. I felt that I needed some sort of ice-breaker, as it's been so long since last I wrote, and I guess this will have to do. Perhaps tomorrow I will take the time to fully expound upon one of the potential topics in my mind right now. For now, I must away to bed.
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