Sunday, February 23, 2014

5 Things That Make Me Happy

One of my best friends suggested me to do this, so yeah...ALLONS-Y! YALLA!!! LEGO! YEAH!
(These are in no particular order)
1) Ice cream. Mainly because it is a stress snack and preferably chocolate chip cookie dough. I eat it when I work on things and it calms me down. Its really unhealthy so I am trying to not eat a lot of it.
2) Torah study. I am such a nerd. I am not really the best, but I learned over the summer that this is a passion of mine and I want to keep at it. (ps: if anyone reading this is a friend of mine on face book and wants to be my chevruta, please message me :) I want to keep learning but all of my crazy life is in the way and its finally starting to slow down. So yeah, I really love it, mainly because i get to exercise my intellectual part of my brain and not just the super artistic part.
Also, to elaborate, I find not only torah study but just learning in general to make me happy. I just find acquiring new information fun for me. That is probably why I never really hated school.
3) Theatre. Oh lord, I have been in love with it for such a long time, and it is pretty much my life now, that I want to go to college for theatre. I am a techie, so anything creative and theatre-y is my jam. I legitimately flip out every time I see a costume that is beautifully sewn or when there are historical error's in movies.
4)Feminism. Yeah, Its kind of obvious that feminism is one of the things that makes me happy. I think expressing myself in this form has developed me and my progressive thinking
5) BOOKS!!! I love to read and it has gotten me through some very difficult times. It has also expanded my vocabulary so that is very good.
Yeah, so hopefully that covers all of the bases. I thought that this would be refreshing, to give you a little glimpse at my inner self. There are many things that i could definitely add to this list, like art, a Capella music, and nature, but if you want me to elaborate, please share and stuff. I try to not worry so much about my audience as much as i worry about the content, but I just want there to be an audience for my content.

Beauty

So today I have been in one of the best moods ever. I was and still am just so content with everything and I just feel good. I really feel like ranting today, so yeah...rant rant rant rant rant
Besides that, I have spent a lot of time today on facebook (when i say alot of time, I mean an unhealthy amount of time) and I see that a lot of people have been posting things about beauty. But can we, as human beings really see beauty in life when there is just so much distraction with all of these electronics and privacy evading that the government does (thanks obama, for trying to get rid of it though). Beauty is such a broad definition, and i think that a large amount of teenagers and young adults connect beauty with physicality. as much as it is about psysical beauty, there is alot more.
Beauty: the quality present in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind,whether arising from sensory manifestations (as shape, color,sound,etc.), a meaningful design or pattern, or something else (as a personality in which high spiritual qualities are manifest).
Beauty is such an overused word and I am most likely a contributor for it to be such, but I think that beauty is something that we cannot just look at something and call it beautiful. beauty is something that is inspiring, provokes emotion or in any way is meaningful to us as human beings and I say chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream is very very very beautiful. Mainly because it is delicious.
Calling people beautiful, is the biggest roadblock that we encounter in our day to day lives, not knowing whether to tell them that they are to make them feel better or to tell your girlfriend that. In my opinion, calling someone beautiful could cross genders. I have called men beautiful, because they are, intellectually of course, but physically as well. Beauty should not have a gender, so yeah...to those people who think it is, SHUSHHHHHHH!!!!
Yeah, so this was a lovely outlet for my energy....you are all beautiful
<3 Jennie

Monday, February 17, 2014

My reaction to Ellen Paige coming out

Before I start, I should let you all know that this is a straight person's point of view.
So I just watched Ellen Paige's coming out video( I will link  it at the end of the post) so, here is my reaction:
I personally don't like the idea of coming out and how it has become such a huge thing to do with all of these elaborate videos and news leaking. I think that it is an important thing to talk about human sexuality and our personal sexual preferences, but it is really saddening to see a homo/bi sexual or transgender person to go through all of the torture coming out is. Its like a shot in the dark, not really knowing how people are going to react. In a perfect world, people should not have to come out because we as people would be comfortable in acknowledging that sexuality is a thing and that there is a spectrum of sexuality. But of course now there are people out there who are in their forties still not out of the closet, afraid that someone will find out, and have them disowned or something equally as terrible (trying to be super general here mainly because every story is different). Humans are beautiful creatures, I firmly believe in that, but yet there is so much hate and so much ugly that we have to hide out true selves from others.
Also, the fact that the event has been trending on Face Book and all of the news has been focused on this event. I think its really unfair for her and many other coming out stories to be such big deals mainly because they are just normal people living their normal lives and sometimes we forget that actors can be homosexual or bisexual or trans. The media has such a heavy standard of what is cool or popular that a lot of celebrities have to keep up with and that is probably why there are a lot of celebrities in jail and doing drugs.
I sound super preachy, but I thought I should give my opinion on the matter because It has been on my mind.
Goodnight Y'all
Click here to access the article
<3 Jennie

Sunday, February 9, 2014

So, What Happened Was...

I was at a youth group dance when someone asked me, "Are you a boy? I mean, you do wear tzizit and all". This guy, lets call him parabola,made me really think and asses what my priorities are as a person and as a feminist.
On one hand: I really don't mind his curiosity. We should all be curious. Yes, the question seemed kind of offensive on the outside but i really understood where he came from (more on it later). I did not want to seem offended because I wasn't, and i was not sure if I should take it as a compliment. I don't think looking like a specific gender should be a compliment or an insult. I have been taught at a young age to embrace my gender and to dress like my gender. I recognize that I am a woman in today's world full of gender and sex fueled stereotypes and expectations. I am totally okay with being a woman and I am to an extent okay with my femininity. I am also, very much comfortable with my gender identity that i actually don't mind coming across at times as ambiguous. I understand that my short hair,skinny jeans with long sleeves and super hero converse are not the typical female wardrobe. I am comfortable with myself enough to recognize these things and to understand that is how people will see me. I don't find it an insult whatsoever. But...
On the other hand: My tzizit. I know, that dramatic pause. you can hear the orchestra now going DUH DUH DUHHHH. But my tzizit, the most contreversial part of my daily wardrobe is being questioned as being a "masculine" article of clothing. What is interesting is that i actually found this part more upsetting than the actual wondering if i am a guy part.I don't really enjoy when people give physical objects a specific gender (i.e. easy bake ovens vs. queasy bake ovens, girl and boy specific books, barbie dolls vs. GI Joe's ect.) I was in a conversation with another person, lets call him horse raddish, about what would we do when we grow up and have families of our own. I said, completely seriously, that I would love to paint my boy's room pink not only as an experiment, but pink is not that bad of a color! Horse raddish replied "so you are planning to turn your son gay and let him play with princess dolls? Pink is a girls color!". I never really liked the idea of assigning color a gender, thus wanting to try and paint a boy's room pink. Horse raddish,besides being  homophobic, does not realize that objects and things cannot change who you are attracted to as a person.We should have objects define us as a person and as a human being, not by our gender or a gender stereotype. Tzizit should define people as Jews and those who want to follow Hashem's commandments, not by who is more masculine or who should not wear them.
I still dont have a concrete reaction to this and I don't think I will ever have one. I don't know...at least it makes a really interesting conversation starter.
<3 Jennie