Still pretty sad

There was another memory that led to a song of the day. In this case, the song was part of the memory. My song for 1981 was "Baby Mine" from Dumbo. That was not when it came out, or when I first heard it, but it is from my most vivid memory of 1981.

That was the year my father cheated on my mother for the first time. I did not understand what adultery was. I knew it was shameful, because I was always attuned to that. There was a sense that we had been rejected, because he was spending time with a family other than us. (She had a son. I don't know how much time my father spent with the son, which would really be pretty irresponsible, but at least once when he went "out" he gave the son's name as the person he was going to see, not knowing that we knew.)

I am sure there are people who will think that Mom should not have told us. I know she didn't really tell us that much, but there were two ways in which knowing helped. Dad completely stopped going to church at that point. That would have been pretty abrupt, and confusing, but knowing that was going on did explain it and kept us from pressing the issue. Sometimes I think maybe we should have pressed the issue more, but he was always hard to talk to. That only got worse.

The other thing is that Mom was really sad. I'm not sure it would have been possible for her to hide that, or that it would be fair to ask her to hide it, but I do suspect that unexplained sadness would have been more unsettling for all of us. Yes, we were upset by what was going on, but we weren't left wondering what we did, or if there was something even worse happening.

The memory I have is one night she was sitting in the living room, and very sad, and I wanted to comfort her. I started crooning to her. I guess crooning is the word. I wasn't singing words, but it wasn't humming either, just notes, and the tune had some improvisation but was mainly "Baby Mine".

I believe the reason that I remember it so clearly was the feeling of helplessness, but then it was also this pattern for my life, where I would focus on other people's needs, and trying to help them.

I do not hate this about myself. Kindness and consideration of others are beautiful things. It does feel good to help someone. It just feels like it was also dangerous in conjunction with the lesson that my emotions didn't matter. For one thing, you can actually be much more useful to your fellow man if you practice self-care too, but I didn't.

So let's say ages 3-6 was learning not to let people see you cry, which really meant not to cry, and age 9 was learning that the way to cope with that was by putting others first. Written about some time ago, there was also learning at 6 that I was fat and disconnecting from my body, and at 14 that boys wouldn't like me. All of those lessons were wrong to some extent, but they shaped me. Given that, it's really not surprising that some things played out the way they did.

In retrospect, I believe the most damaging lesson was not to cry, because it kept me from examining the other things, when I really needed to not accept them at face value. There are good reasons against wallowing in self-pity, and it is totally true that some of the things that would make me cry when I was a little girl wouldn't now, but that wasn't the message I heard.

I saw a quote recently from Mr. Rogers:

People have said "Don't cry" to other people for years and years, and all it has ever meant is "I'm too uncomfortable when you show your feelings: Don't cry." I'd rather have them say, "Go ahead and cry. I'm here to be with you."

When we don't want someone to cry, I don't think it has to be all selfishness, because we probably also don't want them to be sad, which can be altruistic. But if the message is not to show the sadness, rather than to help with the sadness, we fail. It fails some people more than others.

A week of sad things

I wanted this week to consist of uplifting Christmas spirit posts. I was going to write about all of the sad things, but do it next week as a way of symbolically leaving them in 2014. It sounded like a reasonable plan but, maybe because I am feeling pretty sad now, this is the was to go.

I am going over different years by song in a countdown to my birthday. 1979 was "Don't Cry Out Loud" by Melissa Manchester. The reason I picked it was because of three memories, all of which happened before then, but that was the year the song charted. I do remember being moved by it, even though I would never run off with clowns.

Sometimes we have memories that stand really clear, like snapshots. There have been times when I have wondered why certain things stuck with me so much. With some, I have later understood that it was a moment that was forming my worldview. I have three strong memories of crying.

I know that there were other times when I cried. I don't remember why I was crying for any of them. That's not what the memories are about. I think they all happened between the ages of 3 and 6.

The earliest was crying in a store, and my father spanked me. He spanked me because I was crying; I wasn't crying because I was spanked. I know that could make sense in the "I'll give you something to cry about" way, but I specifically had to stop crying after that, so no.

The second was with my older sister. She was watching me for a few minutes while our mother stepped out. We were supposed to go to Wildlife Safari that weekend, and I started crying about something, probably that she did. She was afraid if Mom came back and found me crying the trip would be off, so she got a knife and threatened me with it so I would stop crying. I am mostly positive now that she would not really have stabbed me, because she would have gotten in worse trouble for that than for a crying sibling, but I was really scared at the time.

Finally, my brother once offered me a candy bar to stop crying. It's not as bad, except in reinforcing food as a helpful form of comfort.

I don't think I spent an unusual amount of time crying as a child, but every specific memory I have of it basically boiled down to "Don't; no one wants to hear that." Maybe they are embarrassed because it's in public, or because it looks like a personal failure on their part, or maybe it is just annoying. Maybe they will hurt you, or threaten you, or be nice enough to get rid of you, but seriously just shut up already!

Just keep it inside, learn how to hide your feelings.

And I did. I got very good at hiding my feelings. Another thing that I learned from my father (and it was false, but a lot of these worldview moments were false) was that you can't really show any weaknesses or people will look down on you, so it made sense. Crying or being hurt or sad was a weakness, and you needed to hide it.

There were a couple of side affects. One is that I always cried in movies. It didn't even have to be a particularly sad movie, but at some point some music would swell or something, and I would be gone. Well, it's in the dark, and it's not about you, so that's a safe place.

Also, about twice a year I would lose it. Too much pain would build up and I would have a very depressed and difficult weekend, and frustrate my mother. It was never really that it passed, but then things would be back under control until the next time. Of course, years later when it all came out, it took me months to recover.

I think the real problem was beyond thinking that crying was bad. If the expression of the emotions was invalid, then the emotions had to be invalid too. I didn't get to where I would sneak off by myself to deal with the things that hurt me; I tried to not feel them at all.

Surprisingly, this did not make my sorrows magically disappear. Instead, I got more distant from understanding myself. There were things that hurt a lot that could have been changed - things I should have objected to or reconciled with - and it left me with a lot of ground to make up.

I probably over analyze things now. There are also things that I still don't know how to deal with well. I am trying.

Band Review: Alkaline Trio

Yesterday I referred to bands being around for a while having a lot to go through. Alkaline Trio has amazing output, even considering their nearly two decades together. Because of this I have not been able to cover everything in the depth that I would have liked.

It was still a pretty good trip. My disclaimer is that my introduction to the band was with "Mercy Me" - one of my favorite songs - off of Crimson from 2005. I heard it in 2013, so was late to the party anyway, but it was still a product of a band that had been together for almost a decade, and had grown.

What I am getting at is that it is a recent discovery how gloriously, refreshingly punk they were at the beginning. Based on the time period for when it was happening, that makes sense, but it was still fun to find. I'm sorry I missed it then.

That being said, they can still do punk, but they have really broadened their sound, where you can hear other things as well. I think it shows a nice deepening over time. I like the straightforward rock, but then there are touches of synth on "Prevent This Tragedy", and "Emma" reminds me a bit of Elvis Costello, and so extended sequences of listening to them (hypothetically where you are trying to cover everything in a week) do not get boring.

I am also impressed with the newest album, My Shame Is True from 2013. Despite now having almost two decades of experience, there is a yearning in the tracks that sounds youthful and fresh, where it could be very easy to get jaded. With Matt Skiba and Dan Andriano doing solo work, the band members continue to challenge their selves. It's not going to get stale.

There are currently no dates scheduled for Portland, but they do have some dates in California in June, so this review is filled with positive thinking that they will hop up north as well.

http://alkalinetrio.com/

https://www.facebook.com/alkalinetrio

https://www.youtube.com/user/AlkalineTrioOfficial

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqubUTGL-Gq8yIYeug2TQog

https://twitter.com/Alkaline_Trio

***And with this I have now reviewed my 200th band. So far the main takeaway is that music and bands are awesome, which makes sense because they go together. It's not really profound, but I feel strongly about it.

Band Review: Lit

When a band spans a long time they can be harder to review because there is just so much there. Members of Lit, a rock band from Fullerton, California, have been connected musically since 1986. Even if they didn't become well-known until 1999 there is a lot there. Because of that this post is going to be a bit random, hitting on reactions to different songs.

"No Turning Back" - This was unfamiliar to me, but it is a track on Hey That's What I Call Sludge, and it surprised me because I had never thought of Lit as sludge. I wondered if it could be a mistake, because there is also this Techno-Dub thing where every track sounds the same that got included under their Spotify, and I am quite sure it is not Lit.

Two things about the Sludge though. One is that a lot of the bands on it are not traditionally sludge, and it could be fun just to do sometimes. Also, as I was thinking about the band stylistically, it came to mind that Lit makes really effective use of fuzz and feedback without overdoing it. I appreciate that.

"Zip-Lock" - On that note, while the guitars do sometimes get harder and thicker, there's a good balance in their range, sometimes getting softer (especially "She Don't Know") and more melodic, and incorporating other influences. "Zip-Lock" may be the best example of a song construction that shows their different sides, but you can hear traces of techno on the intro to "Quicksand", a little country on "The Wall", and quite a bit of funk on "Happy".

"Miserable" - I like the switch they do here, where it is completely reasonable to think that he is going to sing "You make me complete" which sounds romantic (if a little codependent), and then it ends up being "You make me completely miserable." While thematically the song isn't super upbeat, it nonetheless does show that the band is clever, and has a sense of humor. You could guess that from the music videos, but it comes up in the lyrics too.

"The Broken" - This was the song that hit me the most personally this time around. I had heard it before, but hadn't really listened a lot, and checking it out again, it is powerful.

Some of that may be timing. This week for me has largely been about getting my book (where a musician dies) up, and my head is still very much in that, and in the continuation as his band and his sister deal with it. It may be that, because of this, the song for me pulled up this grief over drummer Allen Shellenberger's death, and the loss there but also the need to go on.

Mentally I know that the song doesn't have to be only about that, and that in some ways "The Wall" and "Here's To Us" seem to be more specifically about him. It is also true that the specific circumstances that go into the writing of a song do not have to perfectly match your life for there to be an emotional connection. I say the song is strong and powerful, and deserves repeated listens.

Overall the key message of reviewing Lit is that they have a lot to offer, and it's good that they are still around. And I want them to come to Portland.

http://www.litband.com/

https://www.facebook.com/LitLounge

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4LqZQKKG0g3pQH0bJmKl-Q

https://www.youtube.com/user/LitVEVO

https://twitter.com/LitBandOfficial

Free Book Alert! Family Blood is here

I believe I had already detailed my cunning plans book-wise, but there had already been some modifications, and now there are more.

One thing I had decided with Cara was that I shouldn't spend a lot of time promoting it. I am glad I went through it again, and that it is out there, but it is old, and appeals to a fairly specific audience. I wanted to go through the process of getting some reviews for it so I knew how to do that, and realized I should save that for Family Blood. I love Cara, and writing it has been an important part of my life. If through my other work people come to it, that's a reasonable path.

That left me free to focus on getting Family Blood out the door, and I had a plan. I would release it for the $2.99 price, but then when the sequel, Family Ghosts, came out, I would make it free, and that would send some people back for the first one, and then they would be ready for the third one, Family Reunion. Crafty!

As I got closer to completion, I started thinking about others who have influenced me in the writing. There is a really horrible mother in the book, and there are ways in which that has damaged her daughter. She is not my mother - I want to be really clear on that. She came out as her own person, like all of the characters did, no matter how they started (mostly as the All American Rejects).

However, about the same time that I was writing Family Blood as a screenplay, which I have now adapted into this novel, my world started really expanding it terms of finding and connecting with hurting girls, some of whom have pretty difficult mothers. I wanted them to read it. Yes, Sarah is a fictional character, but her problems are real, and she will still get through them, and fiction is important for that. It shows us that problems can be overcome, and that we are not alone.

I started thinking that I just needed to give the book to them. At first that was just seven, and that list started expanding, but if I could figure out how to give a free copy, doing it more than once wasn't a big deal.

And then I started to have other doubts, like what if people who pay for the book don't like it. The ending is ultimately life-affirming, but it could also be viewed as kind of a downer. There are some losses that are going to reverberate for a while, which is honestly part of how it became a series, because the ending wasn't the ending. I'm not even sure if after the third book it will be the ending, but for now it's just three.

And I started thinking about other people, because for a lot of the people I care about, the problem is not their mothers, but there might still be something for them in the book. And many of them are young, and don't have credit cards, so really, offering it free large scale was the only option. The way to do that is to enroll in the program that allows me five free days, so today through Sunday, basically, then it's back to $2.99, unless you have Kindle Unlimited:

http://www.amazon.com/Family-Blood-Gina-Harris-ebook/dp/B00R1XYW62/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1418847643&sr=1-1&keywords=family+blood+gina+harris

Obviously my plans to make writing financially sustainable aren't really on track right now, but maybe some people will write me good reviews, and then other people will buy it. I mean, there is an audience for vampires and musicians, right? This has both!

So, that's where I'm at. I don't know if Family Ghosts will be free now. A part of me just wants to go right into writing them, and healing the wounds that were there at the end of Family Blood, because good things happen too, and I know it.

However, I am very ambitiously planning to complete another screenplay before the end of the year, and one more before my birthday. That will have me hitting my magic number of nine feature length screenplays written only by me (thus not counting the comic book, the series pilot, the collaborated upon adaptation, or the 31 6-page screenplays).

Ultimately, I did not want to be that person making post after post about how great my book was, and please buy it, but I can tell people to go get a free book. I guess it's a Christmas present.

Related posts:

http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2013/03/kids-in-street-week.html

http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2013/03/all-about-family-blood.html

http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2014/10/cara.html

Musical Magical Thinking

You probably don't know this, but my heart has been breaking a little bit lately. It is because there are concerts that I want to go to but am missing, for the usual combination of financial and logistical issues.

November 24th, Circa Survive

December 9th, Billy Idol

December 10th, Weezer

December 16th, Reggie and the Full Effect

December 20th. Dandy Warhols

Yes, I have already seen Weezer and Billy Idol, though that was before I was doing music reviews.

Yes, I have also already seen Reggie, and in fact have written three different reviews (general, album, and concert - more than any other act). However, tonight is with Say Anything and Saves The Day, which could be a valuable addition to my study of emo, and he has Pentimento backing him up, which would be a different side of them too, and they have been incorporating holiday aspects into this show, but okay, fine. It's just kind of frustrating.

One reason that show would have been especially cool for this week is that Friday will be my 200th band reviewed, and so 199 and 200 could have been for a live show. When #99 and #100 were for the Third Eye Blind show, with TEAM, that was special.

(And #199 and #200 would have been for Say Anything and Saves the Day, because I count bands, not reviews, so whether I wrote about them the following week or not, #28 Reggie and #113 Pentimento would be repeats and not go into the tally.)

So I have decided that this week's music reviews will be about hope instead, like that Dave Hause (#85) review, where I couldn't go to the one show, but I reviewed him anyway, and then he came back and I got to see him.

This sent me to my list of bands that I want to see, but haven't.

Of course, I have already reviewed Torche (#115), but they have promised to come. I think this is a good sign, and bodes well. I have also already written a review for Gerard Way (#180), so while I do want to see him, if he can be summoned, it has already been done. Therefore I turn my summoning powers to Lit and Alkaline Trio.

That is how I will close out my second hundred bands. I may start my third hundred in a similar note, or I may go straight to Drum Week. No, wait, I wouldn't do Drum Week the same week as Christmas. Setting a blog schedule that feels right is harder than you think.

Much ado-ooh-ooh-ooh

Today has been a very busy day, and the thing that I want to link to is still processing, so I thought I would take a moment to appreciate the McLoughlin Auto Mall commercials with Robin Lopez and LaMarcus Aldridge.

I have not found a good chronology of the whole story. The first commercial that I saw had them singing the "McLoughlin, ooh ooh ooh ooh", and maybe it wasn't terribly on-key, but I found it charming.

I am predisposed to like things that Robin Lopez does anyway. I had read that he loves comic books and Disney; I mean, talk about your perfect man! With both of them, though, they seemed to be having a good time, it was light-hearted, and I enjoyed it.

I guess there was a lot of guff about the singing, so the next version I saw had only the "McLoughlins", and muzak over the ooh's. I thought that lost something, but then they kept coming up with more variations. If I do online searches now I primarily come up with the fake new conferences. I kind of miss the singing, but you still get Lopez's surprised face, and it's fun.

The series has gotten some impressive mileage. Now they have video footage of people giving their opinions on the singing, and Lopez and Aldridge coming up behind them. Yes, I can see how that would be awkward, and it wouldn't matter which one came out, they would almost certainly have the height advantage, which can be intimidating. But how nice would it be if you had just been saying that you had found the commercial utterly charming?

Be careful of the words you say,

Keep them soft and sweet,

You never know, from day to day,

Which ones you'll have to eat.

I would not be against them singing again.

Band Review: Amasic

Amasic is a Rock/Punk band based out of Montreal. They have been a pleasant surprise.

Most of my reviews come because the band followed me on Twitter, they were recommended by another musician, or I saw them live. In this case, I saw a link for a video of a punk version of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer", checked it out, and it exceeded my expectations. That led me to listen more, and I'm glad.

The "Rudolph" cover is very punk, though many of the band's songs seem less traditionally so. They reference Green Day as the best band, but for many of the songs remind me more of All Time Low, especially with some resemblance between the lead vocalists.

I mention this as a way of getting to something that struck me about the band, but that I may not explain right. Starting with "Rudolph", one reason my expectations were low is that traditionally people have added a lot of repeats that are as annoying as they are common. (I hate "Like a lightbulb".)

The Amasic version uses a few of those - "it glows", "ho ho", and "yippee" - but without the overkill it enhances the energy of the song, which is really good. Punk guitar goes well with the original melody, which I wouldn't have expected and which makes me wonder about the rest of Johnny Marks' and Gene Autry's back catalogs.

I also found that they had other Christmas covers. It is common for Christmas covers to be awful, either stale or ridiculous and in the worst cases both, but that wasn't the case here. The versions sounded good, and that made December an excellent time to review them.

In addition, there was the album The Covers, Vol. 1, as well as several covers on the Youtube channel. Normally I focus more on original music, because I think it tells you more about the band, but I appreciated that they took some songs that many people view as cheesy and treated them respectfully. In addition, they did a reasonable cover of "Friday". I feel that song deserves disrespect, though maybe some of that came out at the end of the song.

My overall impression from that is that Amasic has a great deal of respect for music in general, and that it informs how they practice and how they record and how they view individual songs. It feels like you can rely on them to have good output. I respect that.

And all of that is not even getting into their original material, which is pretty good. They have a 7-track EP from this year, The Things We Say. My personal favorites from it are "All for Myself" and "You're a Freak", but the band is definitely worth checking out.

They have some availability on Amazon, but more on iTunes. No tour dates are currently listed, but there is supposed to be new music out in 2015.

https://www.facebook.com/AmasicOfficial

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClG1kIGreMCa_KR9Zhgb7yA

https://itunes.apple.com/us/artist/amasic/id322726537

http://amasic.bigcartel.com/

https://twitter.com/amasic

Old post on why I hate "Friday":

http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2011/07/strange-case-of-rebecca-black.html

Band Review: Like Changing Seasons

Like Changing Seasons is a pop punk band from Western Massachusetts. It has been their turn for review for a few months now, but I was holding off until their EP was released, and I just saw that it was up this week. You can purchase Life Goes On at your own price from Bandcamp:

http://likechangingseasons.bandcamp.com/

The music is a little heavier than a lot of the pop punk I have heard, demonstrating more of a hardcore influence. One of the tracks makes a reference to "easycore". Apparently the term was coined by New Found Glory for one tour, and refers to the blend of pop punk and metalcore. You learn something new every day.

For what they are, I believe Like Changing Seasons delivers pretty well. I do question whether sometimes the "core" elements disrupt the message. For example, "Where Have You Been?" exhibits depth and has emotionally affecting lyrics, so at times when they are shout-growled, it seems to undercut. However, if anger is a part of what is being expressed, that can be a legitimate choice, and musically that track has one of my favorite intros. That and "You Look Like a 90s Roller Blader" were probably my favorite tracks.

With "Roller Blader" it can be interesting to compare how differently the line "I never thanked you for what you did for me" sounds compared to the same line in "Life Goes On", possibly the hardest track, but also the shortest. It could be gratitude, or it could not be, and it could legitimately be opposite emotions for the same situation. Again, they have some depth.

They have a few scheduled performances in the near future, and with the new release this looks like a good time for the band.

https://www.facebook.com/LikeChangingSeasons

http://likechangingseasons.bandcamp.com/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8VJ3eYXszcL9nnsmSp9_DA

https://twitter.com/LCSmass

Lessons from Judge Judy - Where we disagree

Yes, Judge Judy is often harsh with the people in her courtroom. Usually it is amusing, and there is a sense that they deserve it. You have people refusing to give a straight answer, and it is still clear that they are not good people, and have not been at all responsible or even minimally considerate of others. As often as she has to deal with people like that, and reach some resolution with them, well, I would get cranky too.

Sometimes though there are points where I feel the contempt is not completely deserved. Maybe they have made bad choices, but there are circumstances where they are not that surprising. She really looks down on state assistance, but those programs serve purposes. That's not saying that they are immune to abuse, or that the people who are likely to abuse such programs might not be the type do other things that would get them on the show, but I sense an unnecessary level of prejudice on her part.

I guess the short way of saying it is that she comes across as politically conservative.

It makes sense. We have covered this before, but if the system works for you, you are more likely to be conservative. The system has been good to her. That doesn't mean that there was no hard work or determination involved on her part. I admire her, she had a good legal career before the show, and I think she was a great find for the show. I do think, and this probably goes back to that normal bias in one's own favor, that it is easy to think that the good things that come to you are totally deserved, and that other people's problems and shortcomings are totally deserved, when that may not be the case.

I have been thinking about that more because of a few people whose criminal charges came up in the case of dealing with the civil suits. Some have accepted pleas, and that is taken as proof of guilt despite their protestations of innocence.

I know that some of them, and probably even most of them, did in fact do the things that they pled to. Because of the things that you have to swear to there, and she has referenced it, technically no one should accept a guilty plea unless they actually did it. You have to confirm that you haven't been coerced, and you understand what you are doing, and similar statements.

It seems like a way of preventing any innocent person from ever losing their chance to be cleared by a jury, so it should be a good thing. For an innocent person who has no faith in the system, and no reason to have faith in the system, it's pretty cruel. If you are scared and desperate, is that not coercion? Sure, you can take your chances, but what are your chances?

I am thinking about one of the examples in The New Jim Crow. She was taken up in a neighborhood sting, she had no drugs, but she was going to be held until trial if she pled innocent, and she had children to get home too. She pled guilty, and then for most of the people who were being held the charges were dropped, but it was too late for her.

I am thinking of Marissa Alexander agreeing to a plea deal. Yes, she could have made a good case for defense, and some people were disappointed in her for accepting the plea, but she was looking at sixty years, and she didn't even injure anyone!

I am thinking about Candice Anderson who pled guilty to criminally negligent homicide because she lost control of the car and her boyfriend died. She didn't think she had been negligent, but what other explanation could there be? Only a faulty ignition switch, which GM knew about, because they had reviewed her case five months before she entered the guilty plea, but they didn't tell anyone until they had no choice, years later, after her parents liquidated their 401K and she had paid fines and restitution.

And of course I remember Josh Marquis that night in Powells. Actually, I'm just going to quote myself:

"Marquis never came right out and said that he still thought the guy was guilty, but there were different points that he raised that would lead one to believe so. For example, the way this man, Edward Lee Elmore, got out of prison was that after the most recent conviction was overturned, he entered a plea that is not accepting guilt but not denying it either, and Marquis' point was now that he has a good lawyer, and he would certainly not be sentenced to anything worse than time served, why not go for it and prove innocence? Well, from the point of view of the legal team, the prosecution played dirty three times in a row, and they did not want to risk it again, and maybe Elmore would just like to be out after 28 years in jail."

Well if you were really innocent you'd risk it. Would you?

The Innocence Project keeps clearing more people, and some of them have to wait a long time.

Maybe we can't expect the legal system to be perfect, but it feels like we have set our expectations too low. A lot of the flaws have to do with economics, and a lot of them have to do with race. We have to face those things if we want the word "justice" to have any meaning at all.

Related links:

http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2012/07/and-thats-when-i-gave-up-on-death.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/25/business/woman-cleared-in-death-caused-by-gms-faulty-ignition-switch.html

More thoughts from Judge Judy - Legal shortcomings

Yesterday I referred to being able to relate a story without using hearsay, but there is also a lot to be said for just being able to tell a story clearly. It is common that the judge will ask one simple question, and the person seems completely unable to give a simple answer.

There are several reasons for that. Sometimes people do not grasp the specific question. That can be partly nerves, which is understandable, or it can be issues with speaking and thinking clearly, which is sad and will affect them in other circumstances.

Sometimes the story is overly rehearsed. Asking the specific question disrupts the narrative, which is useful for getting to the truth.

(I want to do a series of posts on things everyone should be able to communicate someday.)

Along those lines, people will often feel the need to get certain points across that show that they are good, and were doing the right thing, and that the other person is bad, and was clearly in the wrong, though those issues often have nothing to do with the law. There are people who are being deceitful here, whether it is outright lying or somewhat unconscious serving of the normal bias in their own favor. There is something else I see, though, and it makes me kind of sad so I wanted to address that.

Often, the events that get people into court have been very emotional. There is anger and grief and all of these messy emotions that the people feel a need to express, but the court is there for the law.

The emotions are not law. They want to have their say, but it doesn't really belong in the courtroom, and there is frustration there. Even if their suit is successful, it may not bring closure.

One factor there is that not everything is a legal matter, and that's a good thing. It would be horribly burdensome to have every bit of minutiae in our lives dictated by law. I think it is reasonable that there can be things that are unethical and immoral but nonetheless legal. That ultimately works best. At the same time, if not all grievances can be dealt with by law, then there have to be other remedies for dealing with them.

So, if you adored someone, and you thought they adored you, and in the process they got a lot of money out of you but there was never any promise to repay, you have been burned. The person who burned you may be manipulative, exploiting scum, but that is not illegal. A lawsuit will not help, but other things might.

Some therapy might, not just for rediscovering your worth, but perhaps for identifying bad patterns and changing them. Assertiveness training might help. Taking action to strengthen your financial position might help. The person who hurt you may not be cooperating, but there is a lot that can be done with you, and that's work looking at. A lot of my healing comes from my faith, so don't rule that out.

Law is important, but it's not everything, and it's important to understand the boundaries.

Valuable lessons from Judge Judy

When I was writing about television I forgot to mention another show my family often watches together. We often tune in to Judge Judy.

At first the show turned me off. Not only could the judge herself be really rude, but so many of the people involved in the suits were really vile. I did eventually notice that sometimes she was very patient, and that there was a pattern to her harshness.

I really started to feel differently when I heard something on the radio. I don't remember who was talking, but it related to psychology. The guest was talking about how people are biased in their own favor. Perhaps you have borrowed money and not paid it back, but in your mind you may feel like you paid more than you did, or you gave the equivalent value in some other way, or their was some reason why your failure to repay was justified. I realized that I was seeing that every time I watched.

Maybe at that point I started viewing watching the show as a course in sociology, but I now see it as even more valuable for instruction in law and civics. Many things come up that seem like they should be obvious, but apparently they aren't.

One is the importance of documentation. If you are going to court, and it will be important to show that you received or paid a sum, get proof of that. Canceled checks can be obtained, or bank statements. That is one reason why having a bank account is valuable, though we are going to get back to that in a different post.

If you do not have the option of using checks or electronic transactions that leave a record, get a receipt acknowledging payment. It doesn't have to be paper; text and e-mail messages have been used as proof.

There are other kinds of documentation, like photo records. These can be especially helpful with property rentals. If there are damages, there should be pictures of before and after, and they should be dated. Maybe nothing will go wrong, but if something comes up, you can't go back in time and take the before pictures. Knowing what precautions to take may just make you more aware of things in general, which has many benefits.

If someone is borrowing money from you, and agreeing to pay it back, get it in writing before you give the money. Sometimes a verbal agreement can be demonstrated after the fact, and that's helpful, but it is much better to get it spelled out before. Remember, a lot of people who agreed to pay it back at the beginning later feel that repayment is not necessary. If that can happen, someone doesn't want to sign at the time of the loan is sending up a red flag.

If someone agreed to pay you back, and then the payments never start, don't keep waiting to bring action. That waiting can be taken as a sign that you never expected repayment previously, and that maybe now it is just retaliation. (A lot of these cases involve people who were once a couple but no longer are.) Justice delayed is justice denied.

That doesn't mean that payback on a loan needs to start immediately. There may be reasons why you agree that no payments will happen for six months, or until a new job is started, or some event that relates to the ability of the debtor to repay the loan. Once you are thinking in those terms, it is easy for that to be spelled out in a written agreement, and then both sides get a copy, and it takes away ambiguity. It doesn't eliminate all potential difficulties, but it eliminates some.

Cases can also be used to demonstrate hearsay laws - when hearsay might be acceptable, and how to relate an incident without relying on hearsay, and when you really need a witness to be present.

The show could certainly be valuable for demonstrating proper courtroom decorum, which a lot of people seem to have no idea on anymore.

Yes, the show is for entertainment, but it can have educational value, and being entertaining is a nice trait when trying to educate. I think there is some potential there.

(I am aware that some people question whether the show is real. The show itself admits that it is edited, which would be necessary, and is not surprising at all. I will also say that I know at least one person who has been on it, and my sister has a coworker who knows two people who have been on it, so yeah, it appears to be real.)

Band Review: Nate Maingard

Nate Maingard is a Indie Singer-Songwriter from Cape Town, South Africa, but currently working in London.

He describes himself as a troubadour, which seems appropriate. Most songs consist of Maingard and a guitar, and it is not hard to picture him wandering from town to town, or thriving in different time periods.

There is hippie vibe to the music that goes well with the singer's commitment to environmentally friendly fabrics and packaging and ways of eliminating waste, like putting download codes on heirloom seed packets instead of selling CDs.

You can find a wide selection of songs available at Soundcloud, with some repetition as songs are listed singly and collected together, and blogs through the main site that can give you a better feeling for the person.

http://natemaingard.com/

https://www.facebook.com/natemaingard/

https://soundcloud.com/natemaingard

https://twitter.com/NateMaingard

Band Review: LoveLess

There were two thing that frustrated me with reviewing LoveLess, a Rock and Alternative band from London, England.

One was the use of a vertical bar in the name, like so: Love|Less

I try to accommodate accent marks, but I have not even been able to find this one in special characters, and I got grumpy about it. I have found other places where the name is used without it, so I'm sticking with that.

The other thing that was frustrating was that I could really only find one song.

"Misery" is available via iTunes, and has a music video on the band's Youtube channel, but that is all I could find. There are other video segments with some previews and interviews, and they do set a mood. Released over time for fans who were waiting for updates it would make sense, but there should still be more substance available. The Facebook page indicates that the Hollow Faith EP is available, but I see no links.

Part of the frustration with that is that based on "Misery" the band does have potential, but it would be very easy for any attention they draw to fizzle out based on difficulty navigating. They have Twitter, Facebook, and Youtube, but are not using them effectively for promotion. The best songs in the world still need to be found to be appreciated.

So I would like to see the band do well, but I think they need to strategize a bit more. They have some tour dates happening right now (Newcastle today), and if that gives them a chance to build some momentum, I hope they will capitalize on that.

Everything I could find is down below.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwWNurfKhCu5Z6zp9EjukeQ

https://www.facebook.com/lovelessbandofficial

https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/misery-single/id886782895

https://twitter.com/lovelessband

Lessons from comics: Rat Park

I should preface this by saying that even though I am not technically writing about it, I am having a hard time thinking about anything other than Eric Garner's homicide and the lack of an indictment. I'm not sure I have anything useful to say about it, but maybe this will relate.

I have written about Rat Park before, but I am still thinking about it:

http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/comics_en/rat-park/#page-1

The last line of the story is this:

"What if the difference between not being addicted and being addicted was the difference between seeing the world as your park and seeing the world as your cage."

I know that it is possible for people in similar situations to have different attitudes and perceptions. There are many variations. People with similarly poor economic situations can be blessed by good social networks, or be emotionally isolated. Genetics and upbringing can make a huge difference in terms of temperament and resilience. Of course I think about that. Those things can be factors.

When I first read Rat Park, I didn't think of it in terms of viewpoint like that anyway. I was thinking about physical environment as determined by economic status, but also by social planning. I was visualizing playgrounds and libraries versus pawn shops and boarded up buildings. That is also a very reasonable thing to think about.

Now I am also thinking about how authority figures treat you. I am looking at all of the different things black people get shot for, and all of the ways that society tries to justify it. Even if you are well-off, and even if you have good family support - well, maybe the world actually looks less like a cage and more like a death trap. It would at least appear as a hostile environment. That may not always result in addiction, but it's a rotten way to set up a world.

I know that there are drug and crime and race problems and they do not perfectly overlap, but I think I can tie this in to Monday and Tuesday's posts, and maybe there will be a point even if it is not the only possible point or even the most needed point.

Although we covered that the new Killjoys were not exactly heroes, there is something about them that is more sympathetic than Better Living Industries, and I think that comes from the power imbalance. They never do that much damage to BLI; how can they? It's too big. Maybe we all relate to forces you can't beat, and understand the desire to take them on. But then as they fight, they turn dark too. Maybe it's because they forgot what they were fighting for, but maybe the fighting methods are corrupting.

I see the misery inequality causes, but I also see that the structure stays in place because some people are happy enough to not be at the very bottom that they accept being near the bottom.

I can't accept it because people matter. Killing people is an awful thing. Hurting people is awful. Exploiting them for your own economic gain is awful, and yet all of those things get accepted.

Corporations find it very easy to decide that individuals don't matter much, because if you let the individuals matter it really cuts into profits. Governments accept certain losses of individuals because it keeps their power consolidated.

Individuals may accept it because it is easier that way, or again, because they aren't on the very bottom. If you are not miserable, and you can convince yourself that there are good reasons for the suffering of all the people who are miserable, then it's easy to feel like the system works. Not only does that perpetuate misery, but it keeps us from even trying to imagine how good things can be.

We need to care about each other, and we especially need to care about the people on the bottom rungs, because if we can get to a place where they are all right then it will follow that everyone else will be all right. I may never find a way of saying that convincingly or eloquently, but I'm not letting go of the hope.

Lessons from comic books: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys

With Killjoys, the comic is part of a much bigger package, including songs that sent me on a long journey starting almost three years ago. So if there are things that were not necessarily in the book, but the ideas coalesced for me while reading and thinking about the book, it's not really that surprising. There's a lot here. I'll probably ramble.

I believe it started to focus when reading Shaun Simon's note at the end of the special edition:

"We wanted the new Killjoys to look at the old ones - like kids nowadays who wear Ramones T-shirts without ever hearing a song - never understanding what the original Killjoys stood for and ultimately failing because of it."

There is a story here that I initially wasn't going to tell because I thought it was pointless, and then I realized that it wasn't.

My sister Maria used to want a Ramones T-shirt. She doesn't have anything against them, but she doesn't really listen to them either. I told her she could start listening more to the Ramones, which I will always support, but that it probably just made more sense for her to get a Metallica T-shirt. She listens to them all the time, and it sends a similar message: I do not like or accept what is currently popular, and don't think that I do.

I get that, even if I've never felt a need to put it on a T-shirt. As I have been observing the world around me, it has become clear that there is a strong division between establishment and anti-establishment, and a common need to declare allegiance. On the establishment side it may be a declaration of solidarity, and affirmation of the security it is supposed to bring. On the anti-establishment side, it may be a rebel yell, defying the forces that feel like they will consume you. On both sides it is often an expression of contempt.

There are funny and sad parts to this. For one thing, there are multiple little subdivisions. You think people have your back, and you belong, and it can be really traumatic finding out you're wrong. You can also find so much variety in people on both sides that divisions don't make any sense, but it seems to be a natural instinct.

What works well with Killjoys is that they do not take the easy road. It would be easy to see Better Living Industries as a total villain, and their opposition as heroes, but the new Killjoys are not heroic. Val is downright sadistic (and narcissistic and paranoid). There are moments of sympathy for people on the BLInd side, but not for the monolith itself.

As the most sympathetic characters are killed off, the most you can do is hope for the girl, and her success comes from choosing liberation instead of revenge, with better rewards than she could have possibly imagined.

Let me bring in something from Marco Pirroni:

"I was completely done with punk by the end of '77. It became an excuse to be stupid. It lost style; it lost subversiveness; it got really conformist. I thought the early punk thing was that old Oscar Wilde thing: 'We're all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.' Well, the second generation was basically just 'We're all in the gutter.' They never moved on. A lot of them still haven't."

(from Mad World: An Oral History of the New Wave Artists and Songs That Defined the 1980s, Lori Majewski and Jonathan Bernstein, p. 20)

Rebellion can be necessary, but you have to know what you're rebelling against. Defining yourself by rebellion, and opposition, gets stupid and ugly.

So I guess one of the things that worked for me Killjoys is that even though some characters really were not looking for the stars, they still found them. That can be true to life, and it is fabulous.

Lessons from comic books: Darkstar & the Winter Guard

It's almost time for International Darkstar Day (Decmeber 18th) again.

Last year I participated by sending in a drawing I did of Darkstar, even though I was frustrated by the fact that it looked like it was drawn by a 14-year old girl. After reading Drawing on the Right Side of The Brain, by Betty Edwards, I now have a better understanding of why it came out that way, though I'm not sure I can do better yet.

My participation was solely due to the enthusiasm of Steve Morris ( @stevewmorris on Twitter), whose enthusiasm for the day and the character inspired me. It also left me with a great dissatisfaction that she was dead.

I did take down notes on recommended reading, but I have only found one of the books, Darkstar & the Winter Guard. It ended up being what I needed.

First of all, it covers more than one Darkstar. My allegiance was very much to the original, Laynia Petrovna, but the first part of the book is Darkstar II, Sasha Roerich, trying to hold on to her identity. Shortly after she dies, and Darkstar III, Reena Stancioff is introduced, and then she dies but Laynia returns in her place.

That sounds kind of horrible, but there were some important things about it. One is that I have to give the writing credit for making each woman someone you can care about. They worry about honoring memories and keeping a sense of self, and I could relate to them.

Also, with each death, and even before that with the death of Vadim (a Crimson Dynamo), it becomes clear that there is sort of a hero assembly line going on:

Make appropriate arrangements for the family. See that they are taken care of. Redeploy.

The individual team members build personal relationships, and they seem to matter, but the loss of one is routine, and the response is rote. Fair or not, it does feel very Soviet.

It does not feel right, but then you find out that there were those who could not accept it, and disappeared. They come back, and you feel the pain and the anger, especially for Laynia's brother Nikolai Krylenko (Vanguard). Nikolai can't accept her replacement, which feels human and real. He still manages to work with Reena, because he must, and he reacts to her death, but then you are also there for his relief when Laynia rises reborn.

It's a roller coaster ride. Also, Ursa Major features prominently, and he is like the best superhero idea ever.

Anyway, it started me thinking about the superhero genre as a whole. Many superheroes have had multiple versions, and just as surely as you have people who only accept Dick Grayson as Robin, and maybe that's part of why they hated Jason Todd so much, there are still people who are glad to see Dick moving on to being Nightwing, and find the changes interesting.

Personally, I hear "Captain Marvel" and I think of Carol Danvers, but I really like Monica Rambeau, and I like that they can do things together, and sometimes will. There are people having a hard time with the changes to Thor, and past changes to Spider-Man, and the more I think about it the more examples I realize there are.

I want to say that if the writing is good it will work out. For people whose objections are based in racism or sexism, good writing may not be enough, but I don't have great sympathy for those issues. However, I have realized another component, and this is continuing to care about the other iterations.

I could accept Laynia's death better when I saw that it mattered. Her comeback seemed worse the way it happened in conjunction with Reena's death, but there was a gain there too. Deaths happen, and we should have fiction that deals with death, but then it can't lose sight of the value of life. If the writers are not invested in the characters there is no reason for the readers to be.  

That may just be another aspect of good writing.

PS: Writing about Robin reminded me of something silly I wrote:

http://www.wattpad.com/74119495-the-breakup-gotham-city-edition-the-end-of-the

Related posts:

http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2014/01/comics-for-2014.html