#an English playwright and poet. The entire quote reads

[orionchildofhades]

Andrew Minyard, Literature Major ("Hell hath no fury" , "Jean Valjean") getting a PhD just to piss off Aaron so they're both Dr. Minyard is just--

[itsarttome]

Armenian Women in Visual Arts

I took a class on Armenian culture and history in university that exposed me to this beautiful country and people and opened my eyes to the undeniable tragedy of the Armenian Genocide of 1915.

 I’m not Armenian, but I’m Greek on my dad’s side which I found out is very similar. We both love our dolma’s and hate the Turks. But in all seriousness, we share a lot of similarities with Armenian culture, including its political history, which has helped me to further empathize with the current struggles they are facing as a country. It's heartbreaking to see that, just five years after the 100 year anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, Armenians appear to be facing a second genocide. Armenia’s neighboring country Azerbaijan has been ensuing deadly attacks against them for some time now with the aid of Turkey  and the issue continues to be mostly ignored by the international community. Protests have been raging on both in the nation and diaspora. In no way do I consider myself to be an expert on this subject, but I feel responsible at least to educate myself and do my part as a citizen of the world. 

There is no civilization in the world that, given it possess the resources and will, doesn’t have artists, doctors, lawyers, chefs, musicians, poets, farmers, accountants, etc... The meaning of this to me is that it is proof we are all valuable people, no matter where we come from or what we look like. Just think about how sand is made from millions of tiny parts but looks like one uniform blanket on the beach. If you were to put a handful of sand into a jar, and another handful into another jar, you’d find that each jar is made up of entirely different rocks. But somehow, both have all the elements needed to still look like a handful of sand. That’s how I view culture. Every culture is a handful of sand; they all have necessarily found their own way to explain the universe (religion), their own way to communicate (language), their own way to nourish themselves (diet), and so on... and each way is original and different. But somehow, all of the elements add up to create a civilization, a culture, and a people with a shared identity. The only thing that makes us different is that we’re arbitrarily placed into one jar and not another, but when you look at the big picture, we’re all the same. 

As embarrassing as it is to admit, I think by human nature it’s much easier to care about someone else’s journey in life when they have something in common with you. What I love about art is that when you meet another artist, no matter who, you feel a sort of magical connection to that person and are bonded over your mutual appreciation of it. I am a woman and I am an artist, and because of that, I feel lucky and unworthy in saying I have something in common with these incredibly talented Armenian women that I’m about to share with you. 

I. Zabelle Boyajian (1872-1957)  

Zabelle C. Boyajian was a poet, painter and playwright of the Ottoman Empire, born in 1872 in Diyarbakir, one of the ancient Armenian capitals, ‘Tigranakert’. After the murder of her father during the Hamidian Massacres of 1895, she, her mother and her brother immigrated to London. She travelled extensively throughout her lifetime and learned to speak eight languages fluently, including Armenian, English, German, Italian, Greek, Turkish and Russian. Being skilled in so many languages, apart from the arts, she was a great contributor to the translation of many great Armenian works. For example, in 1948, she translated Avetik Isahakian’s epic poem “Abu Lala Mahari” and published it for the world to read. In 1938, thanks to her wide travels, she published several illustrations from her visit to Greece, entitled “In Greece with Pen and Palette”. Exhibitions of her art were held in London, Egypt, France, Italy, Belgium and Germany. She was close friends with Anna Raffi, the wife of the well-known Armenian novelist, Raffi. One of the leading female trailblazers of art, literature and translation, she published her first novel in 1901, entitled “Esther”. She is well known today for her gorgeous storybook illustrations. 

II. Miriam Aslamazian (1907-2006) 

Miriam Aslamazian, sometimes called the Armenian Frida Kahlo, was born on October 20th, 1907 in Alexandropol in the village of Bash-shirak. She was was a Soviet painter of Armenian descent recognized for her exquisite ceramic plates. In 1929, she graduated from the Yerevan Art-Industrial Technicum and later in 1933, from the Leningrad Academy of Art. In 1946, she became a member of the CPSU (the Communist Party of the Soviet Union). Her work is often described as decorative, flat still-life pieces as well as possessing dramatic, colorful themes. Many pieces of her artwork can be found today in the Aslamazian Sisters’ Museum in Gyumri. She was honored as People’s Artist of the Armenian SSR 1965 and People’s Artist of the Soviet Union in 1990. 

III. Gayane Khachaturian (1942-2009) 

Gayane Khachaturian, born May 9th, 1942 in Tbilisi, Georgia, was a Georgian-Armenian graphic artist and painter. She studied at the Nikoladze Art School and the Secondary School of Working Youth, where she graduated in 1960. Sergei Parajanov, who she was close friends with, was a major inspiration for her. Some of her works are permanently displayed and can be seen at the National Gallery of Armenia, the Yerevan Museum of Modern Art as well as the Sergei Parajanov Museum in Yerevan. Her works have also been purchased and are included in several private art collections. Her first informal solo exhibition was at Skvoznyachok Café in Yerevan in 1967.

IV. Sonia Balassanian 

Sonia Balassanian is a mixed media artist, art curator, founder and Artistic Director of the Armenian Center for Contemporary Experimental Art in Yerevan, Armenia. Born in Iran of Armenian descent on April 8th of 1942, Balassanian uses her artwork to advocate for human rights and women's emancipation issues. In 1970, she obtained a BFA from the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and the following year worked on an independent study program at the Whitney Museum of American Art. In 1978, she completed her MFA from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York. The following year, however, the 1979 events in Iran caused her to turn to “political art” as self expression. She is also a skilled writer, publishing several works, including, “There Might Have Been An Insane Heart” (1982), composed of selected poems written in the Armenian language, “Portraits” published in New York in 1983 and “Two Books” (2006), a publication of two books of poems in one combined. 

V. Nora Chavashian

Nora Chavashian is an award-winning production designer, art director and set decorator, recognized for her sculptural stage sets, born in Philadelphia, PA on October 25th, 1953. OMG we have the same birthday, no wonder I like her! There, she studied sculpture at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. In 1974, Chayashian graduated from the San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI). In 1984, she married Joe Morton, an American actor, director, writer, singer and songwriter, with whom she has three children, Hopi, Seta and Ara, and one grandson, Moses. In 1988, she and her family relocated to the East Coast. Her sculptures often have organic shapes and are reminiscent of nature. 

VI. Anush Yeghiazaryan

Anush Yeghiazaryan is a painter, weaver and professor born on June 15th, 1965 in Yerevan, Armenia, known for her stunning tapestry creations. Hailing from the family of Karapet Yeghizaryan, patriarch of the Armenian school of art weaving, she has held up the traditional weaving techniques of her ancestors. From 1984 to 1990, she studied graphic design at the Yerevan State Fine Arts Academy. From 1991 to 1994, she worked on obtaining her PhD from the State Armenian Pedagogical University. In 1996, she became a member of the Armenian Union of Artists. In 2010, Yeghiazaryan joined the Pan-Armenian Painting Association. She has had her work presented in exhibitions around the world, from Yerevan to Paris, Moscow, Sankt Petersburg, Bouve, Plovdil, Tehran, Italy and Praha. Quoted for saying, “I have not chosen art, it’s in my blood. It’s my lifestyle and I love it up to sublimation degree”. Some of her pieces displaying masterful weaving techniques include,“If you live, create” (1998), “Once Upon a Time in Paris” (2003), and “Urbanization” (2006). 

VII. Taleen Berberian

Taleen Berberian is a modern Armenian visual artist, specializing in mixed mediums, crafted fabric, clay sculptures, drawing and the use of the traditional Armenian sewing, embroidery and crochet techniques in unconventional ways. She is especially recognized for her famous sculptures of shoes. Berberian has been on the forefront of women’s issues, a theme that can be seen through her artwork. She is an active participant in both Los Angeles and New York’s art communities. In 1995, she obtained a BFA in Sculpture from the California College of the Arts in Oakland, California and in 1998 she continued on to achieve a MFA in Studio Art and Art Education from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York. In 2009, she received her Initial Teachers’ Certification in Visual Art for grades K-12 and currently serves as a quilting and ceramics instructor.

VIII. Joanne Julian 

Found out artist Joanne Julian and I are both CSUN alum and native Angelenos!  Julian, who is of Armenian ancestry, says she has been highly influenced by her travels to Asia and thus became skilled in certain Asian techniques, such as mono printing and the “flung ink” or “Haboku” style. Her pieces possess a “Zen quality” to them, as portrayed in her “Zen Circle” series, illuminating the Yin and Yang of Taoist painting. She received her Bachelor’s of Arts and her Masters in sculpture and printmaking from California State University, Northridge. She later received her MFA from the Otis Art Institute of Parsons School of Design. She has participated in over sixty group exhibitions and twenty solo exhibitions nation-wide. Since 1973, Julian has served as the Chair of the Fine Arts Department and Gallery Director at the College of Canyons in Valencia, California. In 2008, from January 25th to February 23rd, she held an exhibition at CSUN’s Art Gallery entitled, “Counterpoints”. 

All of the female artists I mentioned have given people a better look into what it means to be Armenian and how the community and its diaspora are trying to solidify the Armenian identity to enable its rich heritage and traditions to live on. And they are just a few of the proud Armenians who have helped raise awareness of the issues Armenians face, as well as give Armenians their due respect in the realm of International Art. And to go one step further, my deepest hope is that one day, art will overcome the war. 

[wordacrosstime]

Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being

[Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being. Ted Hughes. 1992. Faber & Faber Ltd, London. 504 pages]

I do not think it an accident that Ted Hughes was brave enough to tackle this subject.  An award-winning poet himself, Hughes was husband to the poet Sylvia Plath, and seems equally at home in drama and mythology. Plath’s artistry and suffering must have informed and influenced Hughes, whose book tracing about a dozen Shakespearean works focuses on the tragic hero’s terrible relationship to women. This deeply disturbing and yet mythological theme in these plays, Hughes reduces to a Tragic Equation and compares this Tragic Equation in terms of psychology and even psychobiology, a term new to me. It is interesting that Hughes does not describe his Goddess Of Complete Being as a Supreme Being, but rather more like the Mother Earth, or Mother Nature Herself, or even Plath’s White Goddess, all of which Hughes mentions as examples of female divinity. For Hughes the ultimate truth is bound up not with spirits hovering magically in the forest air, but to be found in the bosom of women. Not that Hughes’s equation is formulated from a woman’s point of view; no, rather from the point of view of the boys who become men, that is warriors, monarchs, poets, and playwrights. Hughes draws our attention to the one thing the tragic heroes have in common in the Shakespearean tragedies, behaviour towards women that is brutish, if not violent. This is a brave thesis, and probably not one that would have been published if proposed by a woman. He calls this theory the Tragic Equation.

The Tragic Equation begins, according to Hughes, when the adolescent who is precariously independent from the Mother Goddess and the paralysing force of her love, as a aavaictime of new and uncontrollable sexual energy searching for union with an unknown female, and in Elizabethan society that female is bound to be fairly unknown. Hughes declares the origin of this Tragic Equation is the severing of the emotional bonds with the mother. This emotional recoil which coincides with the first sexual urgings, he believes results, for the man of leisure and intelligence, in a ‘madness’. He convinced me that this ‘madness’ is substantiated throughout the oeuvre. We cannot deny the fact that the infant male, for many years, is in the powerful kingdom of the female, who has miraculous powers to give birth to a human being, must be affected in his search for his male identity. For Hughes this is an adequate reason to explain distrust and hatred of women that Shakespeare’s tragic heroes experience before their final downfall. So it is a kind of revenge Tragic Equation, where the female ends up banished, abandoned or dead, which brings the hero to his knees.

Hughes begins his thesis with the two poems,Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece.  Hughes feels that these two poems are the beginning of the tragic hero who features in the rest of Shakespeare’s works. These heroes, according to Hughes, are tortured by their blind lust, either unconsciously or consciously, and are really seeking a kind of divine love. He makes a good case for his thesis as he convincingly traces the love affairs from the bestial in Venus and Adonis, right through to The Tempest. Interestingly, the process begins with the lust of a woman, the Goddess Venus, who is blamed for lust in general. This lust is transferred, as it must be for the Tragic Equation, to the rapist Taquin. In the male, bestial lust quickly becomes violent. I think Hughes convincingly traces, through the works, the fate of love from its source in confused bestiality to the pursuit of a woman who ideally embodies divine love.

I think contemporary psychology theory agrees with him, and that at the mercy the natural surging of his hormones, the young man is in an unstable emotion state and can reject the object of his desire who is always a young virtuous woman. This is the woman who our tragic hero desperately wants, but can easily hate. Hughes quotes a number of tragic heroes as victims of this ‘irrational madness’, the foremost being Hamlet, and the most irrational being Leontes in A Winter’s Tale, but there are many instances of the hero abusing his most loved woman. Hughes thinks this is purely a psychobiological trait, mythologized through the centuries. He does not relate it to being an English subject in the reign of a powerful queen.

For all lovers of Shakespeare Hughes’s book is delightful reading except for the number of folkloric references which are confusing. Hughes desire is clear; to trace a path from bestial to divine love in the entire Shakespearean oeuvre and he begins this journey with the boar as symbolic of male desire. The book cover is a drawing of a boar. In Hughes’s Tragic Equation, the hero who chases the chaste woman, invariably comes to a sad end himself, and I find this supported by at least ten of the plays in the Shakespearean oeuvre. Hughes also insists that the plays portray a penitent hero who can transcend his madness and trade in his lust in order to reach a more spiritual love. Unfortunately, while this may be neat and psychologically sound, Hughes then goes on to confuse the boar with the Queen of Hell. This particular myth, or effigy I found difficult to accept since there’s only one character who could rightly be called that, Lady Macbeth. What is easier to accept is the raw youth at the mercy of his hormones in All’s Well That Ends Well, evolving into the wise old man, Prospero, at the end of the cycle who cares for his daughter so lovingly.

While agreeing in general with Hughes’s thesis, that the plays represent a growth towards spirituality, I think Hughes relies on psychology more than sociology or political impetus. Sociologically there is a very potent reason for the overbearing mother and her frustrated sexuality, namely, the oppression of women in the sixteenth century, especially aristocratic and landed-gentry women. They were inevitably bartered away and invariably ended up with an arranged and loveless marriage. Thus the problem of imposed ‘madness’ but Hughes does not credit this new interest in the relationship between men and women with the powerful rulers who are women. This very emphasis and criticism of male behaviour must have been inspired by the very powerful female monarchs of that era. There was the first ever queen of England, Queen Mary, a hated first English Queen, Mary Queen of Scots, who claimed to be queen of Scotland, England and France, and of course the omnipotent Elizabeth the First. Subjected to such powerful women must have been the source of much internal and external conflict. All three women must have ushered in a new sensibility, not necessarily in the portrayal of women but in the portrayal of men’s behaviour towards women who, for the first time had political clout. Hughes makes no reference to the possible influence of these monarchs. He also omits to note that these inner conflicts about the opposite sex, however common they are among the commoners and even aristocracy, are never described as the fatal flaw of the reigning monarch, or the  paternal Dukes that pepper the plays. Perhaps Elizabeth would have more than frowned on portraying royalty with this fatal flaw. The most insidious male monarch who subdues a woman is, of course, Richard the Third, who is deliberately being maligned. Prince Hamlet is a great example, of someone who cannot become a monarch after his ‘madness’. The Winter’s Tale proves to be the exception, but that is because he becomes a penitent and is forgiven by the statue of his victim wife. Towards the end of the cycle, King Lear’s aggression is relatively mild against Cordelia, and he too repents.

Hughes does, however, make some historical explanation for the sudden emergence of scholarship of such profound depth and meaning. He credits the conflict between the Papal Church, personified perhaps by the Virgin Mary, and the rapacious Henry VIII. Hughes neglects to mention the protestations of Luther which made the intelligentsia (not the monarchs) question the Divine Right of Kings. These are powerfully conflicting elements which reach right down through every strata of society, and were represented in the person of Elizabeth the First; a rebel female and ‘unnaturally’ a scholar, who used the divine right of kings to rule. Hughes does mention that Queen Elizabeth had a keen interest in what was being dramatised because she was aware of the support she needed and appreciated the theatre as an instrument of propaganda.  She headed an aristocratic class with leisure to reflect on the nature of women, and to believe that it was patriotic to do so. England was finally emerging from the brutality of the Roman Empire although English scholars had no desire to avoid the civilizing influence of Italian thought, language and painting. Dante and Boccaccio were influential. Elizabeth the First spoke Italian fluently and probably read Castiglione’s prescription for the perfect courtier and Machiavelli in the original. Even Mary Queen of Scots had her Florio.

When Hughes drew my attention to the Tragic Equation and even to his theories of psychobiology, it made me realize that the aristocratic, and characters who feature as leaders and celebrities in the plays, were probably always raised in dysfunctional family circumstances. Interestingly, they have this in common with the aristocrats of the day who supported the theatre and followed the Shakespearean oeuvre and argument on behalf of the conflicted tragic heroes. At the mercy of suppressed mothers, they must have felt like tragic heroes themselves.

Hughes does not need to mention the fact that Shakespeare is very popular today, but I think it is pertinent. Violence towards women is still with us and the reason why is still a subject of contention and endless theorizing. Jonathan Fast explores this violence in young males in his two books, Ceremonial Violence, A Psychological Explanation of School Shootings, and Beyond Bullying, Breaking the Cycle of Shame, Bullying and Violence.  Interestingly this shame is not racial, or even competitively nurtured, no, it is learned in the heart of the dysfunctional (to a nth degree) family. Apparently Jeffrey Dahmer’s mother made him eat all the food she cooked, rotten or not. .  Feminists may run from facts like these, by pointing out to the use and abuse of women which is responsible for such dysfunctional families. I agree with this position. Family dysfunction can easily be socially approved, such as in the suppression of women’s sexuality and ambition. I’m sure women’s liberation and the respect women are now acquiring in the public and private sector, will go a long way to reducing the effect of this trauma.

Hughes’s analysis of the tragic hero was long-winded but still left me wanting more, and a little sceptical of his need for formulas and theories. He focuses on the dramatic characters’ violence, rather than their passion for words and joy of life, notably absent from this didactical tome. But I want to thank Hughes for pointing out the ‘scurvy’ males in the Shakespearean oeuvre, and tracing the cycle of plays where the hero evolves towards some veneration, it not worship, of a divine being that is female in nature like the goddesses in The Tempest’s marriage ceremony.

[images copyright to publisher & photographer]

Eliza Wyatt

Words Across Time

17 March 2020

wordsacrosstime

[mrdarcyreid]

All of the emoji asks?

🐰 what is one secret that you’ve never told anyone?

When I was 8 or nine, I pranked my father by switching my father’s hair tonic with hair dye. He was not pleased, but he never figured out that he hadn’t just done it accidentally, so I was off the hook.

💗 if you could hug anyone, who would it be? 

My friends, my sister, and my grandmother

🐹 what are some of your favourite Pokémon and why?

I love flying types! One of my favourites is Dragonite because they’re cute and look like wise, friendly gentle giants.

🌠 if you were in charge of the world, what would the world look like?

The world would be happier and more loving and equitable.

👀 what was the most recent vivid dream that you had?

It was a nightmare…

☀️ what do you like the most about your best friend?

Katrine is a fantastic friend. I adore and immensely appreciate how loyal, supportive, and deeply caring she is.

😘 talk about your crush or partner

I think Bill is an angel and a prince. Not only is he incredibly handsome, but he is a wonderful friend and overall human being as well. Among many things about him, I love that he never fails to lift my spirits and make me smile and laugh even when I’m at my worst and most anxious.

💁 if someone was rude to you, would you be rude back?

Most likely not.

🌟 what do you like about yourself? (must choose at least 3 things!)

I like my soft hair, my passion for learning, and ?

🐾 what are you scared of most? how will you overcome it?

I’m scared that I’ll never live up to the expectations of others, and that I’ll never escape the shadow of my family… But I’m doing the best that I can to make my own way, I just need to keep moving forward.

🎁 what never fails to make you happy?

The happiness of the people I care about

💙 what annoys you about some people?

If they are cruel to others for no reason. Or if they’re rude to to waiters, retail workers, or other employees.

😤 do you get angry easily?

Not at all. I’d say I get impassioned about things, but not angry.

🐇 what do you always daydream about?

I’m constantly daydreaming about the future or traveling and seeing the world…

🌻 if you could change 3 things about the world what would you change?

I would change the lack of equity in society, the disenfranchisement and exploitation of certain groups of people (women, people of color, immigrants, etc), and make sure that my friends are always as happy as possible.

🍓 send me 4 names: kiss, befriend, kill or marry?

✈️ what is your dream city and why?

My favorite city of the ones I’ve visited thus far is probably Kyoto, Japan. It’s endlessly rich in culture and history, the food is delicious, and the sakura blossoms on the trees in the springtime are absolutely lovely.

☕️ talk about your ideal day

Going to the park for a picnic, then reading aloud to Bill as he rests his head in my lap.

🌸 are you an introvert, ambivert or extrovert?

Introvert, but I’ve gotten pretty good at pretending to be social when I need to be after all the parties and events I used to attend with my parents.

💧 when was the last time you cried?

I teared up at how emotional Bill got when he saw all his friends at his party.

🎵 name 5 songs you love at the moment

The entire Pray for the Wicked album.

⚡️ if you had any superpower, what would it be and why?

Shapeshifting or invisibility.

💛 if you could talk to your younger self, what would you say?

Keep moving forward; you are going to be happier someday.

💚 who are you jealous of and why?

No one really.

💎 which one would you rather have more of: intelligence, beauty, kindness, wealth or bravery? why?

Intelligence or bravery. I never tire of learning new things, but I’d also like to be able to be more assertive and face my anxieties.

🙊 what are you ashamed of?

The amount of power anxiety has had over me in the past, and how much I used to live ruled by other people, doing things just because others wanted me to or thought I should.

🌺 which languages do you know? which do you want to learn?

I know English, Japanese, and Spanish fluently. I also know a bit of French, Italian, and Latin because I studied the Romance languages, but with those I understand more than I can actually speak. The next language I’d like to learn is ASL, but I want to learn as much of as many languages I can!

🍀 if you could be any fictional character’s best friend/lover, which fictional character would you be?

I’m not sure, but would be pretty cool to be best friends with Princess Shuri.

☁️ talk about your dream universe.

Any universe in which all the people I care about are always happy.

💜 which acts of kindness are you going to do today?

Leave 200% tip wherever I go lunch.

🐬 if you could transform into any animal/magical creature, what would you be and why?

Hippogriffs are cool, and they can fly. Otherwise, maybe just a dog.

🍄 talk about someone/something you really dislike

I’d rather not.

😣 talk about some things that have been making you depressed/angry/anxious lately

Some family things, and worrying about Bill’s parents.

🍪 what did you want to be as a kid, and what do you want to be now?

I wanted to be a poet and playwright when I was a kid. Now I want to own an independent press/publishing and printing company.

🍰 what are some of your favourite sugary foods?

I’ve actually got an enormous sweet tooth… I love chocolate and ice cream.

🍑 what are you obsessed with?

Good food and literature.

💘 what happens to you when you’re stressed?

I tend to self-isolate, shut people out, and my insomnia and anxiety worsen.

😪 what are you sick of?

My parents pretending I’m straight when they talk to their friends, acquaintances, and other family members…

🙀 are you an adrenaline seeker?

No. I like new experiences, but I worry and overthink too much.

💥 what are some unpopular opinions that you have?

I don’t like Coke or Pepsi.

☔️ would you consider yourself a good person?

I like to think/hope that I am!

😊 what do you like to do as hobbies?

Read, write, travel, listen to music, visit museums

🎤 what’s the last song you hummed or sang by yourself?

Flaws - Bastille

🐝 what’s your worst trait? how are you planning to improve it?

Maybe being a pushover? Or worrying about everything too much. I’m trying to assert myself more and not overthink things all the time.

🐻 what’s stopping you from chasing your dreams?

Self-doubt?

🌷 what’s your mbti personality and why do you think it suits you?

I’ve usually gotten INFJ (The Advocate) and the description seemed accurate.

🐶 send me 3 fictional people and I’ll choose my favourite!

👑 who are your favourite celebrities and why?

Keiynan Lonsdale and Andrew Garfield seem cool, and they’re not bad looking either.

🐴 opinion on __?

🍋 do you consider yourself an emotional person?

Yes, but I often try not to show it.

📚 share 3 books that you love and your favourite quote from them.

“But people themselves alter so much, that there is something new to be observed in them for ever.” - Pride and Prejudice

“To be careful with people and with words was a rare and beautiful thing.” - Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe

“Stories can make someone immortal as long as someone else is willing to listen.” - They Both Die at the End

😔 what do you always do when you feel sad? does it help?

Journal, listen to music, read, take a walk or go for a hike. Sometimes it helps, sometimes not.

😌 what thoughts keep you going when you’re sad?

Tomorrow might be a better day.

🌍 which country do you live in?

United States of America

🐧 describe yourself in 3 words

Patient, dorky, over-thinker

🐵 which quotes changed you?

Many! See the 📚 answer for three examples.

💭 do you keep a diary?

A journal

💫 who inspires you?

My friends

👻 do you believe in ghosts and why?

Yes. I’ve never had an encounter with a ghost myself, but their existence has not been disproven.

🎀 what’s your fashion sense like?

Mostly preppy. Sometimes I try to be elegant, but it doesn’t work very well.

🎬 what are some of your favourite films?

The Harry Potter movies, Tampopo, Love, Simon, Dead Poets Society, and Studio Ghibli films

🍦 what is one treasured childhood memory?

My first trip to Japan!

🐼 if you could meet anyone, who would it be and why?

Shakespeare or David Henry Hwang because I would love to have in-depth discussions with them about their works