The Karach Sings True

Went to hospital last night. Spent 5 hours there in the hallway on a cot (was interesting and a bit sad to see the trauma patients past by). After urinalysis, bloodwork, and a CATScan, it has been concluded that I do not have an infection, or appendicitis, and I am not pregnant (what). Also the liquid they make you drink for the scan is like peptobismol and club soda without the carbonation and a lovely bubblegum metallic aftertaste. I will never complain about city water again. What a brilliant plan for people with stomach problems...


In related news, I am camped out at home sleeping until I get better. Pending appointments with specialists on friday if I don't feel better tomorrow which means they will most likely happen.

Oh god what caused this.

I ate a La Prima Egg Salad Sandwich. Fort Save DC 20.

FAIL. 
At least that's what it might have been. This is looking less and less like food poisoning and more and more like a fruity stomach flu.

Niki Colasanti has invited you to join a group in Second Life.

Niki Colasanti has invited you to join a group.
There is no cost to join this group.
Group:
Brazen's Bar - The Prostitute Block: Los Altos..if you're looking for exciting roleplay and the hottest sluts in SL then come and join us!  Come visit Prostitute Block, where you can be a Pimped whore, a prowling John, or an innocent bystander..the choice is yours.  If you're looking for love and romantic, candle-lit suppers, then it's best you stay away!  If you like your roleplay, horny, hot, rough and sleazy then this could be the place for you.

Girls to suit all tastes, whores to cater for every need.  Not for the faint hearted.



Log in to accept or decline this invitation.

Here is the pumpkin I carved. Unfortunately the seeds were burned :(.

From Halloween!

For the first time in a very long time, maybe the first time ever,
I am free. Really free.

I'm bored.

Google Said No.
No reason given.

I've been thinking about things a lot lately. Well, this is what I always do. But namely, I have been thinking about the concept of true names. A true name is your real name. Not your given name, but the name that is you. Huginn, or Munin, or Elly, are good examples. I spent a lot of time trying to find my true name, and realized that I can't know my true name until I know myself. 

Do you sometimes feel like you spend so much time trying to define yourself that you lose sight of it altogether?

I keep trying to think of myself as a whole, and all the parts keep distracting me. Like, who I would like to be? I try to be good, and I fail so often. I try to be someone who stands up for good things. I try to be a friendly person, but I am sarcastic and teasing too often. Sometimes.. I dunno. I like joking around but I am tired of being ... I want to connect with people and show them how happy I am that they are trying to do good, how I understand they are all fighting their own secret battles, and somedays I can stop feeling alone and understand how everyone else feels. I can step off my island and somehow the water between mine and another person's island just fades away. I just want to comfortable being myself, but I don't even know who that is. Well, maybe the real truth is that I know who it is, I'm just afraid of it, so I keep hiding from myself.

I think I need to like myself. I need to learn to have more self esteem. How does one learn to have self esteem? I need help with this. I'm so sad about how I do at CMU. Like, I really want to take OS. I want to learn the material. I've spent the entire time at CMU not taking classes that I liked, only taking easy classes, and I'm tired of it. I want to do something involving like... learning. I feel like I've missed out on something really worthwhile. haven't done anything hard. I haven't done anything worth my time. I've just tried to get my diploma ...I never found anything here that was fun, I don't even really have a passion. My passion was not enjoying school. It's mostly been miserable here and I'm not convinced that hasn't been because I haven't been determined to be miserable. I've spent all my time worrying about my own competance rather than having some common sense and just trying things. I need to learn to love myself and I don't know how to do that.

I seem to be riddled with failure lately. Last night I did my combinatorics problems and felt fairly confident in most of my answers, but no, apparently, I did them all wrong.

I don't understand what is going on with the math program at CMU. The problems given on the homework constantly seem to not only need application of the rules, but magical divine inspiration as well. Ideally the homework would just be proving that you understand the theories given in class, but it's not. It requires that, and then some magical spark with which to approach the problem following that. What is the purpose of this? I never have that 'magical' spark, and I work decently hard to figure them out. But everytime I figure out the solution, someone comes along and says, no, well, that's incorrect.

How am I suppose to know this? Why is this so obvious to everyone else but me? What is wrong with me? I hate this school's engineering program because I have never had the chance to feel like a success here. I've gotten C's in almost every single one of my computing courses, and now it's a huge disadvantage for my job search. What am I doing wrong that everyone else is doing so right? I just stopped trying because everytime I tried, I failed. This place just makes me feel like a failure all the time to the point where I just want to be a failure because I'm so certain I can't do any better.

How on earth am I supposed to do better, and how on earth am I supposed to keep bobbing up after getting beaten down every single time.

Fly.

Or, Fall in Love.

Or, know the secrets of the universe.

In that order. Flying is the most important.

A disciple of Sen Rikyu, the founder of what became the art of the japanese tea ceremony, once asked, "What are the most important things that must be kept in mind at a tea gathering?"
Rikyu answered, "Then if you can host a tea gathering without deviating from any of the rules I have just stated, I will become your disciple."

It's so simple, really, I am not a student of the tea ceremony, but I realized that all there is to writing... is writing in and of itself. Open your notebook, put pen to paper, and put down words.

There's a discussion of surrender in Christianity; in order to be whole, you have to both fight for good and you have to surrender yourself to the goodness of God. Fighting and Surrendering at the same time is hard. It's a beautiful duality, really. Without being Christian, I think I can appreciate the message - as it applies to more than just faith.

There's something deeper than you that you have to touch in order to truly understand anything - in order to be able to truly be able to do anything fully, deeply, and as it ought to be done. You can't force your ego into things. You can't come into anything with the idea of how anything should or will be. You must come in with a clear mind and pure heart, in all things. Thoughts can come and go, but you can't let your own ego into the equation.

It's not about what you want to write - it's about what the story itself wants to be. It's not about what you want to paint - it's about what the paper wants drawn upon it. It's not about what you believe, it's about what's true.

You have to get to that place, and you have to surrender your ego. That's how you get there - and that's how you do anything truly - is to just get over yourself. To let go of everything you believe and just see the truth.

But it's not enough to just be there - to surrender is the first step - but you have to fight, too. You have to grab onto the truth when you see it and wrest it away from all of the other thoughts that are running through your mind. When you finally hear the right words in your mind or the sketching lines finally meet in just the right way - you have to keep fighting to get to the truth, by trying to 'wake up the muse'. You have to make the truth that you've realized... realized. You have to shape it into reality.

So tomorrow I am going to start writing again. I am finally going to write my story that I have been shaping for years and years. I have wanted to write it forever, and I finally figured out why I couldn't ever get it started - because I wasn't interested in telling THE story, I was interested in telling MY story. But the story doesn't belong to me. It belongs to itself, and is an entity on its own. And I can write it, but I must write the story as it ought to be written - as it wants to be written - as it is true - not how I want to tell it. And I must not worry about the truth of the story or the integrity of its plot,  because that will come, and in the order and way it wants to come, not in the order and way I want it to come.

I am beginning to sound unnecessarily prophetic.

Okay.

So, here is the meme.

I am synaesthetic with respect to a lot of things. One of my strongest ones is music.

So, give me a song, and preferably a link to it on youtube or something (though I can yoink it off of itunes) and I will give you a description of what I see when I listen to the song.

It usually corresponds pretty well with the song, and I am curious to record how this actually looks on paper/with regards to different genres.

Shoot!

Everything will be ok :)

When I first returned from Washington, I spent a long time focusing on how my perceptions of the imperfections in the world were simply that - my perceptions. I learned that I created my own stress and anxiety, and my own feelings and opinions about the world were, for a large number of things, arbitrary.

I also confirmed something I talked about a long time ago, which was that knowing yourself was important. Lately I've been more confident - I still have insecurity issues, but more often I catch myself and I say "No, I KNOW I can do this." rather than worrying about it. And I know that it's not unrealistic. So this is good, because knowing myself has really helped, and continues to help as it grows and as I spend more time trying to understand how I think.

I've had one of the worst weekends I can remember - a lot of drama went down after my stepfather threatened to throw me through a door.

Kent was being a dick. But he didn't think he was. He was thinking about how threatened he felt, and when cornered, he pushed back in an incredibly inappropriate way. It's amazing how many evil actions start with the innocent feelings of fear or insecurity. Kent always has to be in control, and if you challenge him, it just escalates.

I've learned to let a lot of things go - and I've learned that, more often than not, my perception of how someone feels is usually wrong. I feel anger, or threatened, myself. These are important to recognize, but it's more important to understand how the other person is feeling. When you can understand the other person, usually the error is in some minute miscommunication or some deep insecurity, but both sides are so entrenched in their positions that their pride won't let them back down. They don't actually want to solve the problem - they can only think of the hurt. So I think it is best to show that you understand and accept their hurt, and then speak with them when they are feeling distanced from this hurt.

Except of course, when they threaten to physically harm you. Emotional harm - well, I guess I've stopped feeling this a lot, mostly because I KNOW who I am. I do feel uncertainty - "Was she really right?" but it's much less about ME and more about trying to understand what the person was saying - and examining the truth of the statement. And truth about yourself is always something you could use more of, so :).


In any case, threatening physical violence to your stepdaughter completely out of the blue and completely seriously is very uncool, and so I removed myself from the situation - though probably not in the right way. Waling down the highway is not very safe but oh well :/.

Lee always said that the best way to solve a problem where someone wanted to gain power over you was to escalate the situation until they didn't want to escalate it anymore. Sometimes, this works, but I always thought that the hidden way was best. Just enduring is often a good option, because a lot of times escalation doesn't buy you anything but anger. Even better is to convince the person that you don't need power over them, but that's especially hard to do.

More on the amazing bead store adventure and sea glass later.

A month ago, I made a post about how knowing oneself was important. Probably the most important thing. What I didn't talk about was HOW to know oneself. With my time here, I've made that connection, and I think that everything has finally fallen together.

I had thought, for a long time, that the way to know oneself was to look at one's actions and thoughts and dissect them bit by bit. It's a very engineer style approach. By examining one's thoughts and emotions and behaviors, one could come to understand a motivation or desire, or an opinion. But every time I did this, what I personally came down to were very simple things. I'm afraid, or I'm jealous, or I am happy. Very simple thoughts.

But why did I feel happy about one thing or jealous of another thing? What was my reason? For example, there was a certain person I didn't like for a very long time. I said to myself "I don't like them because they are selfish and always want attention". However, many of my close friends really liked this person. It occurred to me that they probably had thoughts about the person, too, and that their thoughts were probably different than mine. I asked them, why do you like this person. "They're hardworking, and despite having been through a lot of trouble, they still try to make the best of their life." I had never looked at it this way. And this way seemed more true to me - looking deeper, I realize that the person in question isn't an evil person. They don't deserve my hatred. They've had trouble, and a lot of sadness, and what they really deserve is my compassion.

The thoughts I had were completely arbitrary. They were just thoughts. There was nothing special about them, other than that they were my thoughts. But the most important thing that I realized was that just because they were my thoughts didn't make them true. In fact, they were pretty far from the truth. The truth doesn't come from your thoughts, but it looks like it does. Belief shapes the world you live in, in a kind of abstract way. If I believed this person was selfish, then they would appear selfish to me. When I talked to them, I would perceive their words as selfish. But when I stopped thinking they were selfish, I looked at them in a new light, and saw a completely different person.

Truth doesn't come from thoughts. Well, mathematical truth and scientific truth can be derived and experimentally verified, but knowledge of oneself is not a scientific problem. One can't analyze oneself into enlightenment.

I think (and this is my own personal opinion) that truth comes from something deeper and more formless than thought. I think truth comes from insight that springs from one's own consciousness, or mind, or soul. It's similar to the religious idea of the spark of the divine in everyone. I think that I would prefer to call it a soul. This is where most of the atheists will tell me to screw off at this point, and that's okay. It doesn't even really have to be eternal. It can just be the place inside of you where inspiration comes from.

It's the part of you that you connect with when your mind clears and you stop paying attention to your thoughts. You get over your thoughts and your ego, and you simply are. Eastern ascetics probably reach something like this when they meditate, and I think Christians reach it through prayer, though they would call it connecting with God. I've reached it in the weirdest places - in long days of gardening work, in martial arts, in late nights coding, and in watercolor painting. When I reach it, I feel like I'm touching the face of something ... almost divine, though that might be a little melodramatic.

So once I've gotten over myself, and learned to be in this place, things began to occur to me. Real insights. Things that in my gut, I feel are true. But I realize I don't have to be coding or painting. All I have to do is free myself from my thoughts. I could be walking down the street, or eating ice cream. And I can still have this.

That belief can change the nature of a man is far truer than I ever realized. My beliefs have been my cage, in a way. But.. they're not anymore. I know myself, and I know what my thoughts and beliefs truly are, and I know where my truths come from. All that remains to be done is to put my knowledge into action.

Two of my co-workers (who are brothers) are catholic. Today I went out to lunch with them.

It's always interesting to talk theology with Catholics. Most of the time, the only people knowledgeable about Catholic theology are Catholics, and so when they discuss theology, there's nobody to disagree with them. It's odd that Catholics get someone that can converse as well as they can, and that disagrees with them.

We happened on the discussion of priests being married. In the Roman Catholic Church, priests are forbidden from marriage not as a point of theology, but as a matter of discipline. The priest is supposed to be devoted to the Church, "married to the Church". The eastern orthodox Church, I believe, feels differently, and if you're a married and then become a priest, it's fine, but you just can't get married after.

So, hrm. This came up, and I said "Unfortunately I think the more people you eliminate from the pool of priests, the odder they're going to get." It causes a lot of problems; it decreases the number of people that are going to be ordained, and it also selects for, well, WIERD people. The number of people who want to dedicate the rest of their life to God and the number people who want to be celibate is just extremely small. Practically, it has quite a few implications. That's not the say the decision is wrong - just to say it has its downsides, which was all I was pointing out. It was a pretty open debate, not where it would be perceived as rude. At least, I don't think so.

They weren't offended, but they immediately pointed out a bunch of "flaws". Apparently, St. Paul in Acts of the Apostles discusses how, because people don't have "self control" (their words), priests should get married if they have trouble remaining celibate. Somehow, this was supposed to support their argument, though I think it's really evidence against it. but whatever. THEN they informed me that if I didn't like it, I could always join the eastern orthodox (though really, Catholicism is supposed to be the one true faith, not the "if eastern orthodox isn't better, join us" faith.

For a while, and perhaps still, I liked Christianity for its structure and heritage, and was considering it. But what makes me saddened is their treatment of human dignity. People aren't people to them. They're just sinful, lustful animals who are so corrupted they can't even control their own impulses. I don't understand this perspective. Why is sex so horrible?

I don't think sex is horrible. In my limited and incomplete experience, sex seems to be something that expresses the love between a man and a woman, and forges a bond between them. Given, its biological function is to produce children. But people have used many behaviors that were originally biological to do different things. Speech became song, feet learned to dance, hands learned to paint. We kiss to communicate closeness, and we have sex to communicate love. Clearly sex shouldn't be thrown away trivially (I will probably wait until I am married) but really, why on earth would one think of it as an evil thing?

Sex without love doesn't seem to be positive. It does seem to be a perversion of the communication. What is the meaning in sex without love? I'm not going to condemn people who do it, but I just can't see the point. Sure there's feeling, good feeling, I guess it's good for that.

Lee told me that it wasn't necessary that I understand why something was good or bad. It was only necessary that I obey. Obey a man, descended from the apostles, granted, but even the legitimacy of the church is not something I'm willing to accept just yet. How can men tell other men what is right and what is wrong? They study theology, but I don't know if study of the Bible is enough to claim that they are the authority on such matters.

Lee also asserted that Christ would have to institute a church, because it would be a way to save people and it was logical and also because it's supported from the bible. There's no guarantees that this is the Church he wanted to build, other than "Well hopefully he's guiding it from heaven". One would hope God would guide his church, but who knows, he left them for thousands of years without any guidance before it. Why should he give it after?

All and all I find the structure mostly a lot of tricky logical stretches in order to justify what the Christians want to say, rather than quiet consideration of the actual truth. Perhaps further investigation will reveal otherwise, but I am wholeheartedly disappointed by Christianity.  It is easy to see why so many Catholics become atheist.

I guess I wanted it because I wanted rules, but I don't know, really. I also somewhat enjoy being frustrated, so maybe the celibacy aspect appealed to me as well. I find that my OCD tends to lead me to punish myself, or to always take the strictist course, in order to be safe. I do this because I figure "well, if I'm celibate, then it'll be safe no matter what". Sort of the mongol khan approach - be nice to every religion, then you can't be damned. But maybe it will hurt me. And maybe the point isn't to be safe - maybe the point is to find the truth.

At the end of the day, I suppose I really wanted it because I wanted a way to say that goodness was right, which I still do. And I wanted a way to say that there was something eternal about human beings, which I still do. And I'm not giving up on that. I haven nothing to prove these other than my own experiences, but I at least convicted of them, without proof, or a church.

It's good to realize that the strict and safe course isn't the true course, and that truth is more important. Perhaps it is arrogant of me to think that I alone know the way to goodness for myself, but I do think that is not arrogant for me to think that I alone can find the path to it. I don't think that God, if he exists, is in a church, or in the hands of a man with ordained with oil. I don't find anything there, other than bitter and arrogant and narrow-minded people, and I'm tired of it. If there's truth in the writings of the Bible, it hasn't come to me. I will give it its chance, and I will think long on it, but I don't find any goodness in the Church so far. I am tired of people who think they know the mind of a divine being, and tired of people who would presume its will.

I'm sure all my atheist friends will groan at this post, because well, they find Christianity and other religions illogical, but I mostly find all belief illogical. I haven't studied it much, but my thought  (not original to me) on the matter is such: if you believe in nothing, then how does one justify behaving well? You either have to act on the axiom that one ought to behave well, or  you shift it over to something like "God says you ought to behave well". I think even the atheists assume some things. Even the utilitarian approach takes the axiom that goodness and pleasure are important, and that maximizing the total goodness is the goal. Since everyone assumes different things, you just have to respect that other people have different axioms, and not go saying that your axioms are better. This is very trimmed down, and doesn't do my thoughts justice, but I need to go for a jog now.

I hope I haven't offended anyone.

Events recently have lead me to an understanding of things. They have forced me to rethink, or perhaps think for the first time, about myself. They have not been good events, and I am frustrated with the people involved, or I was, because I did not know the evil within myself, and I did not accept it and bring it out into my knowledge of myself so that I could deal with it.

Passing judgment is a dangerous game, especially when emotions are involved. It's important to be care and understand someone, but that is something entirely different from condemning them. I was jealous, and angry, and I made conclusions I shouldn't have.

I think a good part of the evil in this world is due to people not knowing themselves and being afraid.

Or perhaps it was just me.

If you know yourself, then there isn't anything inside of yourself to be afraid of anymore. And the emotional hurt caused by others is severely diminished - if there is no doubt of what you are, then what they think and say about you is meaningless. Well, not meaningless. It's important in the context of being understood. It's important in the context of not hurting others. But if you know yourself, other people cannot cause you self doubt.

This all sounds very preachy, but it is a lot of thoughts condensed over a while that I feel compelled to record, so forgive me.

I have a lot of regrets. Staubs comes to mind immediately. What I remember of that is that is was mostly my fault. The things I did to him were awful. I was insecure and manipulative and scared, and he was depressed. It was my first attempt at a long term relationship. If I could go back and change it, I would. But I can't. Time is linear and you have to keep marching forward. I do not know how to forgive myself for what happened. I do not know even if his forgiveness would fix it. But it doesn't matter. Because it's already happened, a long time ago.

Everything that happened with Tim was a mess. I still don't know what to think of it. I did not behave seemly and should never have brought up how I felt. I ruined something. But I don't know... how I could have done any differently, with how I was feeling at the time. But it's over, and it's done, and he might be a little better now, and that would be good.

Romance... is.. has been.. awkward for me, and now I understand it deeply, with Chang, but it took me a very long to understand the nature of love. I would not call myself an expert, I am certainly an amateur, but I am no longer afraid of it, and I can now recognize it when it exists. It's not synonomous with attraction; it's slow and it's earned over time and there's a big difference between the words love and like and in the past I have been too ready to speak the former. It is no longer so.

I regret how I treated people when I was dating John; I am constantly pained by how all of the TJ alumni cringe when they see me. I am trying to rebuild relationships as best I can, but it is very difficult and I do not blame those who do not want to talk to me.

I wish I could be a better friend.
 
So regret is a big mountain to face, or rather, to walk away from. The best I can do is try to understand my reasons, which I am doing, and realize where I went wrong. The errors in the feelings and the logic. I know they are there.

I know I can be arrogant, blunt, quick to anger, slow to forgive, and harsh, and I am sorry. I am working on these things very hard, and I would request your patience. I think that if I stop doubting my ability to do such things, I will become better at them more quickly. And so I am trying to work on that too.

In the meantime, though, I am going to try to get Sleep, and Work done.

This entry is public not by mistake. Anyone can read it. I think it's something that should be public. I'm not afraid of who I am anymore.

Somebody is making a killing.

I don't know whether I have more or less respect for Gap at this point. It is in fact a BRILLIANT marketing scheme: if they succeed, they will have over 1000% markup on a single item.

I especially like the description:

"a unique accent with a cool, organic look"

I finished Planescape:Torment a few days ago, and I want to take this moment to encourage anyone who hasn't played it that enjoys RPGS or reading novels to do so. It is the best role-playing game ever written, and I say this with complete confidence because I know there can be nothing better. It is simply fantastic.

The setting is rich and deep, based off of the philosphical ideals of collective belief, in the metaverse of Dungeons and Dragons known as the Outlands. It is not another medeival england. It is not another bland fantasy realm. It is a city of portals across the universe, for which so much reasearch was done that I believe the street dialect of Sigil alone (known as the "Cant") encompassed more work than most game's dialog options. Even in pithy 16 bit color, the writing of Torment makes it feel real.

The plot is not another tired save the world campaign. The player is challenged to save themselves, and in doing so is forced to understand their nature and the nature of the companions they travel with. It's a game of the unexpected: death advances the plot, angels lie, thief-kings have treasures of nothing but books, brothels are for slaking intellectual lusts, and clerics worship no gods.

Most importantly, you find yourself beginning to care about Torment. Unlike most games, where you run around trying to powergame as much as possible and make your character ultra powerful, Torment is about the story. You find yourself not caring about the copper commons or magical items you are rewarded with (combat isn't especially difficult or interesting), but rather the quest-giver's reaction. The story behind each person you talk to is a tangible thing, and it quickly became my reason for doing quests. I wanted to play the game because I wanted to see more of the world and my character, not because I wanted to level up. This was the realization one late night at 4'oclock as I guided the Nameless One through Baator, the realization that this was what the core of an rpg should be: story and character. I didn't go to bed until a few hours later.

Each of your companions is a real character, with depth and beauty and strength. You can develop relationships with them, manipulate them, and even fall in love with them. Not the cheesy, stupid love we saw in KOTOR, but the gritty reality of a  relationship between a doomed man and a passionate woman. Evil is not the campy, ridiculous evil seen in comic books, but real evil with all its subtlety and power. You can order a servant to mercy kill a woman he finds dying of a wasting illness on the streets - "Do it quickly, spare her the suffering" or "Do it slowly." If you choose the second option, the game will provide you with paragraphs of detail on the nature ot the woman's death. Her agonizing screams, the contorted faces, the pain that lasts and lingers as Dak'kon slowly kills her - that is the nature of evil. You are not rewarded for playing good - you become richer and I believe more powerful by being evil. Sigil reflects the nature of the world.

I feel like, after playing this game, there's not much more to play. I've read the book and I know that everything else in the RPG world is just graphics with a young adult fan fiction plastered over them.

So please, pick up a copy of torment. There are tons floating out around the internet and it's worth the price if you end up paying for it.

Dear People in My English Class,

I understand that it is frustrating to read 5 papers in a few nights and write comments on them. I understand you don't really care about my story or the content matter in it. However, I feel the same way about your stuff, and I still strive to write comments that are helpful even though I get very annoyed. I would like for you to extend the same courtesy.

Let's have an example, shall we?

Susan: So first off, Al Altan sounds like an american guy named Al. It took me a really long time to realize that he was not actually Allan Altan or something. Second, there is a disparity in tone between the first and second pages when talking about Al Altan. The first page is kind of coolly reverent of Al Altan while the second page is much more disparaging. I don't get a good sense for how Temuge feels about his brother. Also, there was a lot of awkward language that I thought you could easily fix - most of it was word choice things. Finally, I know I made this note last time, but your dialog is still punctuated incorrectly, and it takes me out of the story when I have to correct every other line. If you're unsure about dialog tags, and how to punctuate therm, just open a book and use it as an example.

Shannon, I understand that you probably didn't like the story. I know it is difficult for you to read something that is not a moral imperative middle America study that drips pretention like a heavily menstruating woman. However, you really need to get over yourself. Not all good stories are like that. In fact, the modern middle America story is a relatively new development in literature. For thousands of years stories have dealt with historical events and legends, in addition to explorations of the psyche of man and his surroundings. It could actually be argued that your style of writing is unconventional. Please show some respect.

Additionally, Al Altan is a Mongolian name pulled from The Secret History of the Mongols, a historical period text. It means "crimson gold". I am sorry you do not like the name, but it is a historical name that struck me as pretty. If you are trying to say it was distracting, you just came off as ignorant and obnoxious. Furthermore, it is just a low content remark used as filler to disguise the fact that you have nothing useful to say.

The awkward language you marked - some of it was fair. I agree "pelted" shouldn't be used the way it was. However, some of your remarks are remarkably telling of brain damage. For example:

"His lips parted and billows of air crystallized (Shannon: NEED VERB) onto his face."

"crystallized" is a verb. You're a moron. Also, you circled my discussion of koumiss and wrote that mare's milk isn't alcoholic. Please enlighten yourself. Read. Dialog tags have several different styles. Yours are different than mine. They're not wrong. Please open a book yourself, twat.

Now that I have concluded my discussion of Shannon, I would like to address the class as a whole:

The majority of you are kind, helpful, and good writers. However, I would like to remind you that none of the pieces I have written are fantasy. They are all historical, and I devote a fair bit of research (usually two or three weeks for a ten page story) to each one before I turn it in. I am sorry that you do not recognize the place; in the future I will put italics at the top explaining where the setting is to make your proofreading easier. However, there are plenty of clues for the well educated to understand where the story is from. In fact if you were confused simply looking up any of the foreign words like khuuchir and koumiss would have helped you greatly. I think all of you need to study your history. I will endeavor to make it clearer to you, but PLEASE STOP SAYING I WRITE FANTASY.

I would also like to explain that the majority of the world's population does not follow christian morality. I understand it it shocking how brutal the Mongols were, but that is how they were. By showing the brutality I am showing you their culture. I am not judging them in my writing. There is no moral discussion behind it. It simply is. You need to get over the violence. This is how the world really is for the majority of people that ever were Mongolian. The medieval Normandy story as well: life was cold, brutal, dark, and short. I'm sorry that I do not build a floating world for you, and give you truth instead. Please accept it.

To my teacher: I know you don't like anything but contemporary American fiction. I have discussed with you many times how difficult it is for me to write it. I wanted to meet with you today after class because I have a story due and I want to write the way you wanted me to for your class, but you were too busy - for the next whole week. I find that hard to imagine, I think you just didn't want to be bothered. I am offended and disheartened because you are not open minded and you won't even give me a chance to improve by talking to you.

Also, I want to explain to you that fiction is not caged by its genre. Why is it whenever people bring in things that aren't contemporary American, you fault them for things that are very characteristic of contemporary American? Internal monologue is a choice, not a requirement. Please understand this. Stories that have the external going on are OK too. That's a lot of life. Understand the external sometimes takes over the internal. Don't force your world view on other people's writing. And don't think that just because a story is of a certain genre, it can't be great literature. It can.

I am very disappointed and discouraged right now. I don't know how I am going to get through this class while remaining true to my art. I am also disappointed because everyone seems very narrow-minded. I think I might be too old fashioned for all of you and it's making me sad. I've lost confidence in my work and my grades in this class

I want to spend my life writing.
Why the hell am I here.