[Caelum's Scrapbook] Use Your Words.

[Caelum]

I am going to be around sparingly for the next week or so. As of last Thursday, I have out of town guests at my house and they'll be here for a bit longer. Also, this article is completely fascinating -- Epigenetic Marks on Your Genes The nutshell is that there's a component called methyl groups that select what genes in your DNA are going to pan out and what a cell is going to be. This article discusses a theory about how methyl groups, which can be added and subtracted, might also be the activating factor that inclines a person toward things like depression and alcoholism as well as good, healthy inclinations as it was collected in the lifetime of your ancestors, primarily parents and grandparents. Anyway, read it. It's awesome. Here's an excerpt: According to the new insights of behavioral epigenetics, traumatic experiences in our past, or in our recent ancestors’ past, leave molecular scars adhering to our DNA. Jews whose great-grandparents were chased from their Russian shtetls; Chinese whose grandparents lived through the ravages of the Cultural Revolution; young immigrants from Africa whose parents survived massacres; adults of every ethnicity who grew up with alcoholic or abusive parents — all carry with them more than just memories. Like silt deposited on the cogs of a finely tuned machine after the seawater of a tsunami recedes, our experiences, and those of our forebears, are never gone, even if they have been forgotten. They become a part of us, a molecular residue holding fast to our genetic scaffolding. The DNA remains the same, but psychological and behavioral tendencies are inherited. You might have inherited not just your grandmother’s knobby knees, but also her predisposition toward depression caused by the neglect she suffered as a newborn. Or not. If your grandmother was adopted by nurturing parents, you might be enjoying the boost she received thanks to their love and support. The mechanisms of behavioral epigenetics underlie not only deficits and weaknesses but strengths and resiliencies, too. And for those unlucky enough to descend from miserable or withholding grandparents, emerging drug treatments could reset not just mood, but the epigenetic changes themselves. Like grandmother’s vintage dress, you could wear it or have it altered. The genome has long been known as the blueprint of life, but the epigenome is life’s Etch A Sketch: Shake it hard enough, and you can wipe clean the family curse.

[Caelum]

Self explanatory, I imagine, for a formerly forsaken ethaefal of Syna. “You will hear that she has left the country, that there was a gift she wanted you to have, but it is lost before it reaches you. Late one night the telephone will ring, and a voice that might be hers will say something that you cannot interpret before the connection crackles and is broken. Several years later, from a taxi, you will see someone in a doorway who looks like her, but she will be gone by the time you persuade the driver to stop. You will never see her again. Whenever it rains you will think of her. ”  N. Gaiman.

[Caelum]

Mornin’. My house guests have left and I was sad to see them go. It was a little crazy having company for two weeks, but we had an amazing time and were finally able to have the three of us together at the same time and place. The last time we managed to pull that off was three years ago. I already miss their faces. The bright side is that I will now have time to catch up on Mizahar things. Expect replies in the next week, me being around more in general, and also a few miniature projects I’ve promised to various people. Today is St. Patrick’s Day in Savannah. It’s different here than most anywhere else. Just trust me on this one. I’ll be in and out all day due to it but I have successfully managed to avoid being thrust onto a float in the parade. Heck yes.

[Caelum]

”People often say that motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing - that's why we recommend it daily.”

[Caelum]

The Shape of Stories People talk about stories to each other with an innate understanding of what one is. You recognize a story when hear one and if you have heart enough to trust your ears then it proceeds to inform your personal narrative. If the story is particularly excellent then it may even somewhat reshape your world view. The problem for most people isn’t knowing a story when they see it, but understanding the components of stories well enough to tell their own. It was once described to me by an amateur chef with a passion for poetry as having a favorite dish that you have eaten every day all of your life. You have shared it with others and stored leftovers overnight and reheated them the next day to enjoy again for lunch. But you’ve never seen the recipe, and you’ve never cooked it yourself. Then one day a friend asks you to make it for them and you realize that while you would recognize the ingredients as they go in at least by taste if not by appearance, you don’t have names for them. You don’t know what order to apply them or even necessarily the myriad ways of how and what happens when you sweat the onions verses tossing them in raw. How do you fix that? What do you do? You need a recipe. And a vocabulary for all the ingredients and methods. And you’re going to screw it up the first couple of times, but a lot will come naturally. You’re going to find that it doesn’t taste exactly the same and you might get stuck trying to make it perfect by the original cook’s lights before you realize one dinner hour that it already is. It’s your version of perfection. I spent nearly six hours last night with some writer friends breaking two stories and redirecting a third. Now stories are on my brain despite its fuzziness. (There is not enough coffee in the world.) To go with the cooking metaphor, we deconstructed their novel-dishes (ahah) and then replaced some of the ingredients with something better or more suited. This took hours with three professional writers and two highly experienced hobbyists. The thing is that there are as many ways to tell a story as there are ways to make spaghetti. You can have a whole world in your head that you have loved for years. You can even have a whole world given to you by the hard work and collaboration of others (hello, Mizahar). But you still have figure out your story and how you want to tell it. There’s an unfortunate theme amongst some players that has existed since the game began and persists now and again today. I think it will always crop up again, but it’s a matter of maintaining awareness. It’s the belief that if one aspect of their character or plot idea is denied or turned down by an ST for whatever reason that their entire concept is ruined. While I understand the frustration that can lead to belief, it’s complete bullshit and every writer should understand that. There is absolutely no one detail of a character or plot that, extracted, can destroy your whole story. And, if for some reason there is, your story is entirely too fragile to begin with. You shouldn’t be able to break a plot with a breath. You should have to take a bloody hammer to it. Even more so with a character. Characters are people and as such are not only supposed to be malleable and capable of change, but they absolutely have to undergo significant change in the course of a story for them to be any good at all. That’s called arc. Who wants a protagonist who only moves physically? Who wants a heroine who doesn’t experience growth? Sure, maybe you wanted them to start in a very specific place, but very often the same place can be achieved via a different character detail. Alright, I’ve probably rambled enough. I’ll go get more coffee now. More writing rambles to come. -k.

[Caelum]

I haven’t done this in a long, long time. Maybe it’s time for a do-over. Regardless, fun exercise. Character Diamond, part one. Picking the traits. (And I'm accepting suggestions.) Self-righteous Arrogant Loyal Ambitious Protective Enigmatic Perceptive Observant Wary Compassionate Curious Dedicated Zealot Hypocrite Clever Suspicious Bitter Vengeful Dubious Secretive Charismatic Stubborn Charming Hungry Moody Driven

[Caelum]

I'm just gonna leave this here.

[Shane Wallsly]

The Road To Fury Bible!

[Aventis]

Tender is the Woods of Loss.

Oh that sounds like the WORST fanfiction on the internet.

[Aoren]

To Kill A Wind Up Bird In Chile

I would totally read this book. >.>