Alright children, we’re going to go outside for a break now. You can bring a toy to play with, your water bottle, yes, Jimmy, a snack if you’d like. Oh, I’m sorry, Tammy, you don’t have a snack? Well, we just had lunch less than an hour ago, did you eat all of it? Oh…
Tag: education
If you Give a Mouse a Research Project
Third grade, they say, is the year that school shifts from “learning to read” to “reading to learn.” I can remember my own third grade year feeling a lot harder than school had up until that point. And one of the things that happened that year was that my third grade teacher insisted that we…
Unintended Consequences (Caturday Questions)
What happens when you do something that turns out to have unintended consequences? Middle Cat loves his Human-Mom. He goes out to the choicest nests and picks the nicest gifts for her and leaves them, pungent and appetizing, at the foot of her bed. But does she appreciate it? No. Quite the opposite. Why does…
Character Motivation (Caturday Questions)
Middle Cat said something interesting the other day. He said: “Character is the most important part of any story. If you think back to any of your favorite books, or even movies, the thing you’ll remember most clearly is the character. And probably the most important part of that is character motivation. If you know…
“Forget it” (An Archaic Concept of Me: Delivery 7)
A Moment of Authory* Self-Reflection Some months back, Iʼm half way through writing the book before I notice almost all of it is internal narrative of the main character. I had been considering going back to edit it towards more external action, and less dominated by early-adult thought-angst of not fitting in. But then I…
Originality (Caturday Questions)
Middle Cat and Little Cat have tried to gin up a bidding-war for their artwork. Middle Cat’s brand trades on its sophistication. His claim to originality is that he is a cat who does not scratch furniture. Where, you might say, is his artwork, then? Middle Cat boasts that he is a performance artist; that…
Reason, Religion, Abortion: A Less Tentative Response
A side effect of being an editor is that bad-faith arguments hurt my soul. It’s actually a really interesting thing to feel as it happens. Kind of feels like heartburn. And what’s odd is it starts as a feeling and then I have to figure out what is making me feel that way. I’ve studied…
Different Values (Caturday Questions)
Big Cat, Middle Cat, and Little Cat have been roommates with Human-Mom for quite some time. How do they live together when their values are so different? Human mom’s idea of a good time involves tea and maybe waffles and maybe sitting down together (over Zoom) to do some writing. The cats’ idea of a…
From Pride 2022 to “Don’t Say Gay”
Yesterday marked the end of Pride 2022. All of the corporate rainbow logos will go back into the closet for another year and whatever rainbow capitalism items were in the stores will be marked down. Remember to stock up for next year, okay? Pride has been unusually challenging for me this year. I’ve been going…
Queer Pride and Self-Care
I’ve written a number of pieces for this website about my experiences as a rape survivor. I’ve written about how important it was for me to change my own language about my experience–to use the word “rape” instead of “sexual assault.” And I’ve written about consent and mental health, I’ve written about the way we…