Emily said that if I wanted people to comment I had to be frivolous. I thought road signs and police brutality were frivolous. But I will try to increase my frivolity.
Thanksgiving and Marriage: Oppressing Academia Everywhere
Thanksgiving. It poses a problem for my people. We're supposed to blithely trek home across the country for a period of three days or less--in the middle of paper-writing season. So we can communally gnaw on a turkey carcass and watch the Macy's Day Parade. Most of us are vegetarians for crying out loud! A little respect for the academic lifestyle, here!
But...NOOOOO....It's a FAMILY TRADITION. Really, I see similarities to the whole marriage metanarrative. If someone isn't "home" for Thanksgiving, just like if someone doesn't have a spouse/partner/friend by the time they're 25, they are objects of societal sympathy. The sympathy is a disavowal of the fact that there may be people out there who would PREFER to be in the library studying by themselves. That would be unthinkable...strange...we'd have to lock those people up because they are outside the norm.
In case you're wondering, yes, I am making sacrifices to societal folly and participating in the annual pre-winter fattening festivity. No, I will not sacrifice my happiness or my ulcer-inducing student lifestyle for the sake of fulfilling societal expectations in other areas.
Why I Might Vote for Hillary
She said "hortatory." I don't think most Republicans could even spell it. So if there are two, in my opinion, equally corrupt and slimy candidates, and if someone drags me screaming to the voting booth, and if there are no third party candidates, will I vote for Hillary because she has the better vocabulary? Indubitably.
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7 comments:
I don't think normal societal expectations are for marriage. And the holiday itself might be a little arbitrary, but the idea that you are close to your family and want to be with them is not. Even if it is not always the way things work out.
And I love the idea of voting for someone just based on their vocabulary. I mean, someone like James Joyce would be perfect to run the country.
Hmmm...James Joyce...an Irish literary figure as American president. It could work. At least he was honest in a metaphoric, poetic sort of way.
james joyce!!!! Em,:0. you shock me.
no one would understand a thing he said.
I think it's a toss-up whether Joyce or you-know-who makes up more words. At least Joyce had poetic license to do it. You-know-who does NOT. Poetic licenses are revoked when you become a politician.
Hillary's use of 'hortatory' was comfortingly standard.
Hey! Victor Hugo was a politician, and I think he wrote some novels at the same period. :-)
I hate to even give you this fodder, but must relate a story of some relevance. One of the coworkers responsible for editing my letters, known to be the most anal person on staff and daily demonstrates this through his editing of my work, wrote an "out of office" email for this week. After CCing him on an email, I found much to my perverse pleasure that there was an obvious misspelling in his message. He wished everyone a "heppy Thanksgiving." I decided to wait to inform him of this slip until he comes back so the maximum number of people receive his non-spell-checked correspondence.
Actually -- and I thought about writing a post on this -- I DIDN'T vote this election partly because I didn't bother to inform myself on local politics, so I didn't feel like I had a legitimate opinion.
In the balance, it just wasn't worth my time.
I think the whole "get out the vote" project on college campuses is misguided. I can think of no people less qualified to vote than undergraduates.
So yeah...I think a basic aptitude/awareness test might be in order...
Also, I would willingly give up my right to vote if that also meant I didn't have to stand when the national anthem was played, pay taxes, or have my little brother registered for the SS.
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