Salutations!

If you’re reading this, you have the good grace of having been moved to REDACTED, Research and Development Branch!

First thing, Congratulations! The people who love you must be very proud to know you are doing such important work. We at REDACTED know that we love you for it.

We love you!

Now, before you get started on building our tomorrow, today!, there are some minor details that you need to know! This manual is here to serve as your guide to getting to know your new role as a REDACTED R&D Good Science Man. Make sure to thank and name the fellow who passed it along to you, chum, because the value of this knowledge is priceless! And confidential!

Along with the copy of the REDACTED R&D Instruction Manual for the New Scientist, Good Hooray! you received, you should have also been provided with the uniform for the role; a crisp white linen lab coat, a pair of sensible khaki slacks, a pair of black Oxford shoes, safety goggles, a pair of REDACTED Science Gloves, 6 black-ink ballpoint pens, a 12” pipe wrench, and a small porcelain figure of REDACTED’s mascot, REDACTED the REDACTED REDACTED!

In the left breast pocket of your lab coat you will find (1) Red Bottle Cap, (1) Green Bottle Cap, (1) Blue Bottle Cap. These bottle caps will be useful to you in your endeavors, so you should endeavor not to lose track of them!

As an introduction to your new lab space, you are encouraged to vocalize your great happiness by exclaiming as loudly as you desire, for the space is entirely soundproof! You can proclaim your love for all things REDACTED with the comforting knowledge that you won’t be disturbing anyone at all. Why, even if there were someone to disturb! But you’ll find that one of the many perks of the REDACTED R&D Branch is the perfect isolation you are granted in order to pursue your esteemed science.

Take some time to become acquainted with your new lab. You will notice that no expense has been saved in ensuring that you have been provided with the most efficient and functional environment in which to focus on your brilliant science. The entire facility has been designed without windows, to prevent the interference of those pesky photons, and the air piped in through the central ceiling duct if 100% verifiably REDACTED-approved Good Science Air. Keen science man that you are, you have probably already deduced that the room is a perfectly comfortable 30’ x 30’ x 15’, giving you plenty of room to conduct your science, with legroom!

Central to the lab you will find the prep tables and all materials necessary for the crafting of your Science™, the valued work that you have been assigned to! How efficiently wonderful to be granted such distinct and singular purpose! The prep table is entirely smooth of corners, of course, to prevent any injury that might cause undue restriction to the crafting of your good Science™. REDACTED values your safety as a high priority.

REDACTED loves you, made even clearer by the REDACTED Door Decor™ provided to the lab, giving the aesthetic impression of a domestic homestead entryway, though naturally sealed as to ensure no compromise is made to your good Science™!

Dedicated Good Science Man that you are, you will be residing within your workspace, as per the Article 204, Subsection 2C, Addendum 14g, Post-it Attachment 3 of your contract with REDACTED. You will find your living quarters in the southwestern corner of your lab, sectioned off by a REDACTED AnonyMiss™ privacy curtain. On the good grace of REDACTED, you have been provided with an Extralong Twin Mattress with complimentary boxspring. Additionally, purely out of interest of providing the most facilitative good science environment, a small stuffed replica of REDACTED the REDACTED REDACTED has been included with your personal bedding materials.

Take particular note of the three large tubes running floor-to-ceiling on the eastern wall. How can you tell which wall is the eastern wall? Why, It will be the wall with three large tubes running floor-to-ceiling. How handy, being able to orient yourself! These tubes will be vitally important to your good work here in the REDACTED labs. The leftmost tube will be for waste out. Don’t fret, however, over wanton waste! All waste out is recycled and repurposed, which brings us to the far-right tube, which will be scientist fuel in.

And how handy this fuel is, too! A brilliant predecessor of yours, by ingenious means, managed to determine how to achieve an endless source of protein fuel for future Good Science Men, simply through a spontaneous and thorough examination of the waste tube.

The central tube on the wall is for delivery of Science™, provided by yourself, REDACTED’s very loved and appreciated Good Science Man! The fruits of your labors, to be delivered and utilized by a great many needy people! Simply input your daily quota of Science™ into the central tube at the established intervals, and reap the rewarding feeling that only an honest day of Good Science can fill you with.

This concludes your introduction to the Instruction Manual for the New Scientist, Good Hooray! You will find the following pages filled with the notes of your predecessors on effective Science™ crafting technique, and subsequently blank pages to fill with your own notes on your Good Science.

Cheers to you, now a fully-prepared REDACTED Good Science Man! We at REDACTED wish you only the greatest thoughts in realizing your due purpose!

Yours in Science™,

REDACTED R. REDACTED

Chief Science Officer, REDACTED Research and Development

God of War is the 2018 Playstation 4 follow-up to the pretty-much-now-canon God of War series on the PS2 and PS3. You knew that already, of course, but let’s stand on circumstance a little. God of War is a phenomenal new addition to the series, one that breaks in major ways from the established story, setting, and mechanics. The prevailing thought about God of War is that is a very good game. As of the writing of this piece, Metacritic lists it at 94% approval. Everyone who has played it has come away satisfied. I’m certainly one of them. I’ve been a God of War fan since forever, and I’ve played every installment in the series to date. I’m a fanboy.

That all said, God of 4 (which is how I will refer to it so we don’t get confused with comparison to the games that came before) has some narrative issues that bother me, not just for the sake of storytelling but because some of these issues are rooted in the new gameplay mechanics.

Let’s start from the top. We’re all pop culture consumers on the internet, so I won’t re-explain fridging to you, but the game opens with that laziest of storytelling cliches. Mom/Wife died offscreen, thereby compelling our very manly (even godly) men into action.

An already a particularly tired way to launch a story is made even more eyeroll-inducing because this is exactly how God of War started – Kratos had a wife and child who the player never met, who died offscreen to fuel Kratos’ angst. This time around the kid gets to live and the mother’s death is fresher, but it’s basically the same narrative beat for Kratos. Not unforgivable but not a great start.

So yeah, dead wife is lazy, though making this a story about grief between a father and son opens up a lot of narrative avenues that were closed in the initial games because that was a story about revenge instead of healing. But we’ll get to that.

Where I start to really think seriously about how the narrative feels lazier here is when it stems from how the design choices for the new game have impacted how God of War is told overall. In God of Wars 1-3, the camera was fixed. You controlled Kratos around an enclosed environment most of the time, with a singular viewpoint. It was perfect for the hack and slash gameplay and hordes of enemies and better again for the often massive boss fights.

In God of 4, we have a close, 3rd person, camera a la Dark Souls or Gears of War. It means the fights are a lot more intense and the hits feel more significant on a visceral level. There a sharper focus on the way you fight and the detail in the characters. It also severely narrows the field of vision in bigger fights, leading to one of the more distracting counter symbols that flash on-screen to show where an enemy is attacking from.

The close camera/not-fixed camera means way less environmental storytelling. Every bit of setting that does storytelling is very strictly drawn attention to, due to the new camera pov. Instead of giant temples on the backs of even bigger Titans, we have lots of narrow hallways where Kratos has to move obstacles for Atreus and vice versa.

When things in God of 4 do get truly gigantic in scale, they are specifically cutscened to show the full scope; God of War would have you guide Kratos through a giant-scale bit of fixed camera angle space. Kratos would become like an ant on an elephant in some of these scenes, though you still played through it, no cutscene. The feeling in the player that that evokes is a kind of grandness of scale that you can only turn to games for.

All of the finer storytelling details of the game that are delivered via environment and perspective can’t rely on the player to see what is on-screen past Kratos. As a result, the golden plot paint on the walls that makes sure you know exactly where you can and maybe should go. We would easily miss some cool details otherwise.

To be fair, this is something that does get a canon payoff outside of the “invisible pathing” that games like Mirror’s Edge introduced where distinct colors (red pipes) told you where in the open world the game is indicating you need to go.

Limiting the scope of the camera by bringing it right up to Kratos’ back makes for a cinematic-looking character action game, but it makes for poor environmental storytelling, something God of War has been great at forever.

Now on the other hand, the narrative focus of God of 4 is pretty much as different as it’s mechanics. The reason there’s so much less grand environmental storytelling is because this is a much smaller, character driven story.

Here is a story about Kratos learning temperance as well as the real gravity of fatherhood for the first time. A man with some significant father trauma both with his own and as one. Moreover, it’s about Kratos and Atreus breaking the cycle of violence, or trying to, and the story of a young Loki beginning to find his place in the Norse pantheon.

We don’t need giant titan fights, though we do still get some massive moments with the World Serpent, the architecture of Midgard and the other realms, and the closeness of the combat between actual gods Kratos and Baldur. This is a story about a father and son, and what it means to make your way in the world when you are both part of it and not.

God of 4 is a phenomenal game by any stretch, and whatever issues are in it are come across fairly. Nothing is perfect, and somehow even the gripes I have to make about God of 4 are also part of what makes it so good. It is hard to break from the tradition when you have a property like God of War, but God of 4 takes all of the good parts of the original and adds a few new ones of its own. Some things are lost and some are gained in the transition, but it all adds up to a promising and solid start to a new part of the series.

Originally written for Coed.com (https://coed.com/2017/10/04/nobel-prize-winners-full-list-nobel-prizes-science-physics-chemistry-peace-laureates/)

The Nobel Prize has been a defining measure of significant breakthroughs and accomplishments in the fields of science, academia, and culture ever since the first awards were handed out in 1901. In the 116 years that these prizes have been awarded to those who have demonstrated excellence in their fields, 881 individuals and 23 organizations have received Nobel Prizes (each prize can have up to three winners). This week, the governing bodies that oversee the awarding of these coveted prizes make their announcements of the laureates who will join the legacy of the winners who have come before them, trailblazers of their industries. Here we’ll cover who the winners of the Nobel prizes for 2017 are, and the work for which they won the prize.

A Brief History of the Nobel Prizes

Swedish engineer and inventor Alfred Nobel (b. 1833 – d. 1896) amassed a considerable fortune during his life, mostly on the back of his hundreds of patents – including most notably the patent for dynamite. Nobel’s primary business was in the development and manufacturing of armaments and explosives, with other patents of his, ballistite and cordite, becoming modern replacements for more traditional gunpowder. The fortune that these inventions brought him also brought with them a degree of public scorn for the perceived detriment his inventions brought to the world.

In 1888, Nobel was reading a French newspaper and was shocked to find his own premature obituary, entitled “The Merchant of Death is Dead”. The obituary was erroneously reporting Alfred Nobel’s brother Ludvig’s death, though the obituary did a number on Alfred, shaking him to his core and encouraging him to think about the legacy he would leave behind after he passed. It was this obituary that prompted him to draft a new will, in which he laid out the plans he had in mind for his fortune; to create a series of prizes to award to those who contributed the “greatest benefit to mankind” in the fields of physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature, and peace.

Nobel left behind the staggering majority of his accumulated wealth to establish these five prizes, roughly $186 million. The executors of Nobel’s will founded the Nobel Foundation to care for the fortune as well as organize the awarding of the prizes. Additionally, the will established that a Norwegian Nobel Committee would be responsible for handling the Nobel Peace Prize.

Other institutions were picked or established to oversee the remaining prizes: The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awards the Nobel Prize in Physics, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, and the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel; the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet awards the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine; the Swedish Academy awards the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Winners of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine: 2017 Nobel Laureates

Laureates: Jeffrey C. Hall, Michael Rosbash, and Michael W. Young

The 2017 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was the first award announced this year on October 2, 2017, with the recipients receiving the award jointly “for their discoveries of molecular mechanisms controlling the circadian rhythm”.

In layman’s terms, effectively what these men have discovered is tangible evidence of a gene that controls the body’s daily biological rhythms. Most people will have heard about our circadian rhythms; how our bodies are internally aware of the natural rhythms of day-to-day cycles. It’s how your body knows to sleep at night and wake in the morning. It is also the same reason why we experience jet-lag when traveling across time zones; our internal clocks and our external environments are misaligned, and so our bodies have to play catch-up to restore normalcy to our rhythms.

Now, these researchers have uncovered a little more about how exactly this works on a biological level, from experiments and observation of fruit flies’ genetics and seeing how the same principles apply to other multicellular organisms, i.e. people.

Winners of the Nobel Prize in Physics: 2017 Nobel Laureates

Laureates: Rainer Weiss, Barry C. Barish, Kip S. Thorne

The 2017 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded in two halves; the first half to Rainer Weiss and the second half awarded jointly to Barry C. Barish and Kip S. Thorne. These gentlemen were awarded the prize because of their work in observing gravitational waves, something predicted over 100 years ago by Albert Einstein (another Nobel Laureate in Physics). Gravitational waves have long been a theory in experimental physics, though only recently have scientists been able to develop the kind of technology necessary to observe the phenomenon.

These three scientists are integral members of LIGO (the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory). Rainer Weiss has worked since the mid-1970s on trying to observe gravitational waves in the universe, and together with his fellow laureates and the other 1000 members of LIGO, they have finally achieved something even Einstein believed would be impossible; measuring gravitational waves caused by a collision between two black holes.

This discovery is a groundbreaking advance for the field of physics, giving scientists a new means of measuring and unraveling the mysteries of the universe. This is still a very new science, but the ability to detect and observe these gravitational waves means that new doors are opening for researchers to further understand the most complex of cosmic events.

Winners of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry: 2017 Nobel Laureates

Laureates: Jacques Dubochet, Joachim Frank, Richard Henderson

The 2017 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to these three chemists for their development of cryo-electron microscopy in order to yield high-resolution images of biomolecules. Effectively, these researchers have expanded greatly on the capabilities of the electron microscope by determining a way to freeze biomolecules during mid-movement, allowing electron microscopes to detect and view molecular processes that were previously unseen.

Now, researchers can create far more accurate three-dimensional images of biomolecules. In the past few years, scientific literature has been able to use high-resolution images of things like the surface of the Zika virus and in-depth looks at proteins that cause antibiotic resistance in bacteria. The benefits that this method of observation has for the field of biochemistry is staggering because researchers now have far more detail afforded to the ways they observe material on a molecular level.

This can lead to greater understandings of how things like viruses and bacteria form and defend against pharmaceutical threats like antibiotics and other medicines, and will allow researchers to better engineer ways to combat some of the more deady diseases we encounter.

Winners of the Nobel Prize in Literature: 2017 Nobel Laureates

To be updated as the Nobel Laureates are announced.

Article originally written for IrishCentral.com.

Philip Seymour Hoffman was a proud Irish-American, his mother Marilyn O’Connor is a family court judge and he had recently filmed an Irish American movie called “God’s Pocket” set in a Philadelphia working-class neighborhood but sections of it filmed in an Irish bar in The Bronx.

Here is what we wrote when he showed up in Woodlawn, the most Irish neighborhood in New York.The movie recently debuted to good reviews at the Sundance Film Festival. Hoffman also starred in John Patrick’ Shanley’s movie “Doubt” where he played an Irish priest suspected but never proven of molesting a child.ld.

John Mulligan’s Fireside Pub is a staple of the community on Katonah Avenue in Woodlawn. A familiar spot to all of the local residents, the bar has also gained the attention of location scout Michelle Baker, who selected the bar to host a scene for Philip Seymour Hoffman’s new production “God’s Pocket.”

The film, which also stars John Turturro and Christina Hendricks, is based on the novel of the same name. The story is set in South Philadelphia in the late 70s – early 80s, revolving around a particularly Irish neighborhood.

The Irish pub provides an optimal location for the filming, with its timely, inviting exterior and dim but spacious interior.

Speaking with Tom Mulligan, son to owner John Mulligan, he relates that this is not the bar’s first feature film experience.

“They filmed part of another movie here in 2006 for ‘Hoax,’ a Richard Gere movie,” says Mulligan. “I got to play the bartender in that one.”

When asked about his experience as a film extra, he responded that, “I had this part where I was supposed to hand [Richard Gere] the phone.”

When asked if the part included lines for him, he said, “Yeah, I said ‘sure, here ya’ go.’ After that, they told me not to say anything to him, that the part had no lines, but Gere told them to keep it in, because it sounded ‘natural.’”

The scene being filmed today utilizes the back room of the bar and revolves around horse betting. “My daughters and I got to name the horses in the race,” says Mulligan. “They’re Kelso, Katie-Lynn Rose, Trigger Trish, Lone Star Tommy, and Trish the Dish,” after his daughters Kelsey, Katie-Lynn, and Trish as well as himself and his wife, Patricia.

Clearly a period piece, the extras on set are dressed in the pinstripes and plaid suits of the time, complete with oversized collars. Classic cars line a nearby side street off of the bar, a point that hasn’t gone unnoticed by some of the locals.

The production garnered the attention of a handful of the local residents who came out to determine what the fuss is all about. Brenda Marino, Woodlawn resident of four years, says, “All the local nosy neighbors are out here wondering like ‘what’s goin on? Who is it?’” After finding out that Turturro is on set to film the scene, Marino herself catches a bit of the bug, sticking around to catch a snapshot of the actor.

The community on Katonah had mixed reactions about the filming, though the common denominator is generally a curious interest in the goings-on. Speaking to some of the local business on the street, a few individuals had their two cents to offer.

Diarmuid Hackett, a bartender in The Rambling House down the street from Mulligan’s, felt that this kind of attention is good for a community. “They draw interest to the neighborhood, leaving people wondering where the movie was filmed and having them think they’d like to visit the neighborhood,” he says.

A clerk in the pharmacy across the street was less excited by the presence of the film crew. “It’s already a bad business week,” he says, “and now they’re taking another day away from us.” He also added that it was “too early to tell” if the presence of the crew would impact positively or negatively on business.

Mulligan speaks to the fact that his previous film shooting was a boom for business, drawing in new customers who wanted to see the featured pub. “People would come in and say stuff like ‘that’s where Richard Gere sat! I want to sit in Gere’s seat!’ and even if it wasn’t, I’d let them think so.”

It’s the afternoon before the acting talent finally shows up on set, and some of the gawkers on the street attempt to snap a cellphone photo of the stars. Production staff maneuver themselves into position and cut off the line of sight for most people, including a professional photographer trying to get a shot of Hoffman.

The effort from the staff seems a little unnecessary, though, because as a somewhat haggard-looking Hoffman makes his way down the block to the bar, he hangs his head to obscure his face from cameras. Brenda Marino, who’s been waiting for her sight of Turturro, manages to get a shot of him approaching on her cellphone.

The filming process takes hours, and the actors are holed up in the bar for most of the day before breaking for dinner at around 5:30. At the end of their break, as they return to the set to continue shooting, Hoffman brushes off a request for comment, his production staff worming her way between us to intercept any questions.

As the sun starts to set, I ask Mulligan if he has anything to add. “We also make burgers. Best burger in town, I like to call it.”

With the release of the screen adaptation of 13 Reasons Why on Netflix, I was reminded of the person I was when I first read that book as a teen. Depressed, suicidal, and angsty as all get-out, it felt like the book was written just for me. I really liked it. I recommended it to my partner when we first started dating.

Now, though, I’m older and better educated and I know that if I read the book again I’d react entirely differently to the messages being delivered. There’s a lot of problematic shit going on in 13 Reasons Why. The biggest being that the central message of the story is effectively “If you kill yourself, people will recognize how wrong they were about you and they will see how special you truly were.”
 
Or more succinctly, “you will have more value in suicide than in life”.

That’s a big claim to make, I know. But it’s definitely why I resonated so much with that book as a teen. It spoke to worst parts of me, the parts that told me exactly that- that I don’t matter, but if I died I could. 

There’s big problems with messaging like this in young adult-oriented media. 13 Reasons Why has a bucketful, but large among them is the reiteration of yet another Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Except this one ‘got away’, in the most permanent possible way.

Film critic and novelist Nathan Rabin first introduced the label of the Manic Pixie Dream Girl (MPDG) trope in a 2007 article for The AV Club titled The Bataan Death March of Whimsy: Case File 1, Elizabethtown where he used it to describe Claire Colburn, the leading lady portrayed by Kirsten Dunst in the film Elizabethtown. 

Rabin described the MPDG as a character who “exists solely in the fevered imaginations of sensitive writer-directors to teach broodingly soulful young men to embrace life and its infinite mysteries and adventures”. Effectively, this means that MPDGs are bubbly, one-dimensional whimsical semi-heroines who exist more often than not for the sole purpose of creating an arc for the male protagonist of the story. 

Examples of this trope extend far beyond just Elizabethtown — MPDGs can be seen in Garden State, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, 500 Days of Summer, and Almost Famous — and those are just films from the last 20 years. 

Since Rabin’s 2007 article, the term has gained massive amounts of traction and debate, so much so that Rabin wrote a new article in an attempt to retract the label. 

The reason behind this move was because of the proliferation and over-saturation of media using the MPDG label and trope — Rabin said that it began to make him see labeling concepts like these as reductive. 

This argument is an important one. By labeling this archetypal pattern that has a long history in Hollywood (Elizabethtown was far from the first instance of this trope) something is taken away from the conversation, and it becomes easier to ignore the social relevance of reinforcing a trope this way, particularly a trope that specifically diminishes and objectifies women into special categories. 

Though the label has reached this level of popularity in filmic pop culture, there is a distinct lack of focus on the examples of MPDGs that are prevalent in contemporary Young Adult (YA) literature. With what is probably the most exemplary instance of a writer riding his way to the top on a single literary concept, John Green has become YA lit’s poster child with his novels about boys and their manic pixie dream girl counterparts.

John Green’s first novel Looking for Alaska was published in 2005 and won the Printz award in 2006. Since then, Green has published three other YA novels on his own; Paper Towns, An Abundance of Katherines, and The Fault in Our Stars, the last of which debuted at no. 1 on the New York Times Bestseller List in 2012 and was later adapted into a feature film. 

John Green has seen wild levels of success in a considerably short amount of time, and I believe that his reliance on the MPDG has played at least a small part in his popularity. Published in 2005, Looking for Alaska was around before the official labeling of the MPDG trope, though the fundamental signifiers were certainly at work in the novel. 

Though the book is named for Alaska, it is not her story. It is actually the story of Pudge and his obsession with Alaska- her mysterious aloofness and the impact she has on his life. It’s a story where a young girl with her own traumas and problems is used as a plot device to give depth to the character arc of the protagonist. 

She is quirky, with a habit of rule-breaking for pleasure and a muddied history that presents in evident trauma that is never properly addressed by Pudge. Though the story revolves around Pudge’s infatuation with Alaska, and though he spends so much time thinking, talking, and pining after her, the narrative is all Pudge’s, and Alaska’s relevance comes only in terms of his story.

John Green also published an essay on his website titled “The Destruction of The Manic Pixie Dream Girl”. Truly, it’s a monument to his talent that he was able to write that article with no hands, being as he was simultaneously patting himself on the back and jerking off to one of his own signed headshots. 

In the essay, he responds to allegations about Margo, the heroine of Paper Towns, being another example of a MPDG. Green’s defense is that there is a separation between narrator and author, and that the reliability of the narrator is often a tenuous thing. He proposes that Margo is seen as a MPDG because that is the way that Q views her to be- it is Q’s perspective, not authorial insertion that makes Margo into this trope. 

With this, he’s saying that Q, and solely Q, is under the impression that Margo can be, must be the one to save him, the one who will show him the magical parts of life. As Green himself says it, Q’s perception of Margo as a MPDG “only acknowledges that some boys believe in Manic Pixie Dream Girls; it doesn’t argue that MPDGs actually exist, or that Margo is one”.

The thing is, though, that is absolutely does show that MPDGs exist, at least as a trope — otherwise there would be no conversation about this novel. Green doesn’t hold himself accountable for perpetuating the trope, as being a big part of why Q would believe in MPDGs. Q would’ve absolutely been a fan of Looking For Alaska were he able to read it. 

If it’s possible for someone to believe in the trope so earnestly as Q does, it‘s because writers like Green have allowed it to be possible.

This is not to say that John Green alone is responsible for the trope’s existence in YA literature. To call upon another example, there’s arguments to be made that Leslie Burke from Bridge to Terabithia can be counted amongst the ranks of the MPDGs. 

Jess Aarons, the protagonist, is a depressed and withdrawn child who is often bullied until he meets Leslie, whose friendship draws him out more, encouraging his burgeoning artistic nature. Leslie is tomboyish and athletic and becomes Jess’s closest friend. She shows him the power of imagination. There’s a bridge. 

However, demonstrating again that this character trope exists only to serve the development of the protagonist, Leslie dies tragically once she’s alone. Specifically, once Jess makes a conscious decision to spend the day with his teacher-crush rather than Terabithia-ing with Leslie. 

This plot point shapes the final developments of Jess’s character arc, as he suffers deep denial before finding the personal strength to press on, going back to Terabithia with his younger sister as an act of acceptance. 

Though these characters are children, the parallels between this story and Looking For Alaska are clear as day. Pudge and Alaska’s relationship may have more levels, like the sexual tensions of hormonal teens, but the basic elements remain. 

The reader knows why Terabithia is so important to Jess, who lives simply on his family’s farm and suffers from a nervous disposition. We barely get a glimpse of Leslie’s reasons for needing the escape of the imaginary world, even though there must be equally valid ones. Instead, she lives and dies in the narrative defined by her relationship to the hero of the story.

Because of the proliferation of the MPDG trope and the widespread attention it’s garnered since Rabin’s first article, the term has lost some of its impact. The original intention of the phrase has been lost by repeated iterations and multiple interpretations. 

In thinking about the initial concept, a checklist of requirements for a character to be a “true” Manic Pixie Dream Girl should include that she be quirky, ubiquitously effervescent, pretty (conventionally or not), and she must have significant problems of her own that she deals with either in silence or with vague musings presented to the protagonist. 

In Rabin’s Salon article where he tries to recant the term, he explains that he “coined the phrase to call out cultural sexism and to make it harder for male writers to posit reductive, condescending male fantasies of ideal women as realistic characters”. Though Rabin had intended to label this phenomenon in the attempt to classify and identify a staple of sexist representation in Hollywood, the term grew popularity beyond his control and became a cheap denomination, almost a genre unto itself. 

He admits regret about having coined the term after writer/actress Zoe Kazan describes it as misogynist, for reducing a person to the idea of a person. The repeated overuse of the term made it possible for critics to label nearly any female character as an MPDG and dismiss her altogether- even to the point where actresses have been labeled as MPDGs in real life. 

I think that Kazan was backing away from the MPDG stigma when asked this question. She makes a good point about the misogyny at play with the trope but I think Rabin’s original concept was more about how the existence of this trope is inherently misogynistic, in that it portrays women as a conduit for male development. 

The pop culture proliferation of the term needs to be scaled back so that the necessary serious conversations can happen.

An interview with Zoe Kazan leads me to believe that she is adamantly against the label, but for the wrong reasons. Her film has a line that says that these girls with appealing problems don’t exist, but then her personal ethos attacks more the enveloping label than the proliferation of the type. 

According to her statements, she seems more concerned with the labeling aspect than the actual label. Her argument is that it is sexist to imply that women can be reduced to a caricature and that women who might possess the characteristics of an MPDG will be unfairly pigeonholed by the connotations of the label. 

This is a valid complaint, but I believe that the more important issue with this specific label is the way it infantilizes women and glorifies mental illnesses as quirky, desirable traits. She’s angry at the insinuation that these kinds of women exist, but that’s the whole point, and the reason to be angry; MPDGs do not exist as real people, only as these idealized characters in fiction. 

There is no girl who can fit the MPDG trope naturally, as it is a shadow of a person, composed of bits and pieces with no real depth. The problem is the way these fictions make this the desirable image for many young teens. It creates a new brand of unattainable qualities, alongside the hypermasculine males and barbie dolls of the world.

Another issue with the popularity of the trope is the way it glorifies mental illness and co-dependency. As I’ve said already, a trait of the MPDG is to be flawed, broken in some way. This ‘humanizes’ her and provides a way for the protagonist to be made more sympathetic. He will make an attempt to ‘understand’ her, but only because of his infatuation, not out of genuine care for her well-being. 

In Ned Vizzini’s novel It’s Kind of a Funny Story, protagonist Craig winds up in the psych ward of a hospital following a near suicide attempt. Inside the hospital, he meets a variety of people who suffer from various mental illnesses. 

Among them is Noelle, a girl with self-inflicted cuts on her face, a coping mechanism in face of sexual assault she has suffered. The two start a friendship in the ward, which helps Craig build confidence in himself, a feeling he had lacked. He is carefully respectful of her space, because Noelle is at first almost inaccessible. 

So while Noelle gets a better deal than other MPDGs in terms of romantic pursuance, she is just as much a plot device. The message that the text sends is that Craig was able to identify and relate with Noelle because of her perceived broken-ness. 

He suffers from depression, and she is the survivor of abuse. The fact that they meet in a psych ward while both in recovery is the first red flag. The narrative glorifies co-dependency more than anything, something that is a core concept at work with MPDG stories. It’s Kind of a Funny Story makes this relationship the focus of the story, though again, only in relevance to the male protagonist.

More important than the controversy about the use of the moniker is the fact that this label is a new name for an old, enduring trope that has existed unchecked in Hollywood for years. It certainly existed in literature before John Green, but his works came at just the right time for the pop culture wave that is MPDG. 

This article has aimed to better educate people about the prevalence of the trope in YA lit and the harmful messages of it. It perpetuates a sexist social mentality, it urges co-dependency, and it glorifies mental illness as quirky. 

Labels reduce everything they’re applied to in ways that cut important realities. Still, there is power in a name, and being able to label the phenomenon is important. Audiences need to better educate themselves to be aware of the pitfalls of the term. 

Not every female character is an MPDG, but it is important to acknowledge the real instances in order to put the trope to bed. Women aren’t props to be used to further a man’s sense of ennui or insecurity. Mental health issues aren’t fun personality quirks. Co-dependency isn’t a healthy way to begin a relationship. 

Clementine from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was one of the few characters who fell into the MPDG ‘aesthetic’ but was adamant about Joel not being just the next guy to see her that way. 

She said it best: Too many guys think I’m a concept, or I complete them, or I’m gonna make them alive. But I’m just a fucked-up girl who’s lookin’ for my own peace of mind; don’t assign me yours.

Yeah.

Originally written for the Vingle Video Games Community

When it comes to nostalgia and games, I can’t resist talking about my favorite game of all time: Shadow of the Colossus.

Originally released on the Playstation 2, Shadow of the Colossus is an epic story about one young man and his quest to bring his dead lover back to life. To accomplish this, he brings her to a forbidden land populated only by the 16 Colossi, massive hulking creatures that are both organic and stone.

Shadow of the Colossus, along with its predecessor Ico, was re-released with an HD update for the PS3 in a bundled edition. I picked it up to relive the glory of the game once more, though I haven’t had a chance to play Ico yet, as I’ve been more focused on replaying SotC.

The game is truly a masterpiece, and really it was the first game that made me consider that video games can be approached as an art form. There are no random battles against meaningless creeps, no dungeons to explore, or really any objectives at all aside from your conquest of the Colossi.

The only human characters in the game are the protagonist Wander, the girl who he is trying to resurrect, Mono. Wander receives his quest from a formless entity known as Dormin, who takes shape as a radiant light in the game’s ‘home base’, the shrine of worship. Wander’s only ally in his adventure is his horse Agro, who proves to be instrumental to the success of Wander’s quest.

Technically classified as an action-adventure game, SotC actually plays like a puzzle game. Aside from the first Colossi, each of these colossal (haha) creatures can only be defeated by using some part of environment to your advantage.

From structures that strategically hide your position, to geysers that spout from a barren wasteland, you will need to put a fair amount of thought into each one of your battles with the Colossi.

Every battle is hard-fought, and it can certainly be frustrating, particularly in the early to mid-game. Each of the colossi has a specific weak point or set of weak points that Wander needs to reach to bring the beasts down, clambering over these moving mountains in the process. Considering that Wander has only a set amount of stamina with which to hold onto the struggling beasts, this can prove challenging.

This game is an incredibly emotional journey from start to finish. With little to no dialogue and even less background information, you are alone on this journey with Agro. Everything had a lonely gravity to it as you roam the desolate but beautiful landscape.

The adventure is taxing for Wander as well. With every Colossi felled, a toll is taken on Wander. Black tendrils snake out from the corpses of the Colossi, tendrils that are violently absorbed into Wander. As the game progresses, the physical toll of these absorptions becomes clearer and clearer.

The game has been lauded for its artistic style as well as the compelling narrative. It manages to pack in so much raw emotion and significance, in spite of (or maybe because of) its lack of dialogue or other traditional narrative building elements.

The end of the game ties it all together in such a mind-blowing twist that when I first played it, I had to actually pause it and take a 15 minute break to process what had happened. I haven’t played Ico, but I have read that SotC is a spiritual successor and a sort-of prequel to it. Knowing how it ends makes me excited for Ico.

If you haven’t played Shadow of the Colossus, you are truly missing out on one of the greatest games ever made.

He took the last swig from the bottle of Jack, and let the empty bottle drop from his hand. It careened down into the black waters, so far beneath him. The wind on the bridge felt strong, but he wasn’t cold. He took out his phone and dialed the most recent call in his log.

The phone rang – once, twice, three times, and went to her voicemail.

“Hey Diane. I’m sorry for calling you so late. I’m sorry for calling you at all, I guess. You made it pretty clear the last time we talked that I should just delete your number. But I couldn’t do it. I’ve apologized before and I’ll keep on apologizing until you accept it or get a restraining order. It might be creepy, sad, or weird, but I love you, Diane. I hope you get this message and understand that I’m being honest. Again, I’m sorry, and I love you.”

The phone fell out of his hand and fell into the river beneath him.
He swung to catch it and fell after it.

The following morning, Diane listened to her voicemail. She tried calling back, but his phone was dead.

“Hey Zach, you left me a drunken voicemail last night but it’s all gibberish and slurred words. You need to stop calling me.”

As she hung up the phone, the headline on the news spoke of an abandoned car double-parked on the bridge. She debated hazelnut or mocha-infused coffee.

Hazelnut won.

The asphalt buzzes with radiating heat, the endless lines of traffic crawl ever onward. The heat is stifling, the humidity palpable. You could cut the air with a knife but why would you. People flock to big, air-conditioned stores or hole themselves up in their apartments. Community pools are packed, the city beaches are teeming with the masses.

People ride bikes, longboards, scooters. There is laughter and ice cream and water fights. There is release from the heat at night, when people dance in the streets and gallivant through downtown. There is much work to be done, every day, and it is done. It is no small task to support a city that never sleeps.

Among all of these things, there are also faces, hands touching hands, glances across crowded rooms. In this corner of that studio on some street, there is a kiss. Another one, here under the bridge, riverside on Roosevelt Island. There are big, warm welcomes, with hugs and kisses and exclamations about how much you’ve grown. There are handshakes and fist-bumps and high-fives exchanged everywhere, at all times.

There are tears, too. There are those who are passing as we speak, or who have passed moments ago. There are people who won’t let go. There are tearful, heartfelt goodbyes. Some are for now, till later, see you soon. Some are farewells, it’ll be a while, remember me, don’t change. People are signing yearbooks, people are signing shirts. People are saying their last respects. A couple breaks up in a coffee shop. There are tears of joy. Her Grandpa is dead, but her newborn takes his name. His son has just graduated from high school, and so a new life begins.

Shoulders brush past each other in crowded, overheated subway cars. People are rude, and kind, and sad, and happy. There are fistfights in bars and sex in bathroom stalls. There are new faces and forgotten names. There is mystery in her eyes, and loneliness in his. There is anger in the flash of her teeth, and gratitude.

And there are sounds. There are trains cars that clack on rails. There are footsteps, everywhere. Sirens that are always just at the edge of your earshot. There is music, endless music. There is the beat of the blood in the veins of the streets. Horse-drawn carriages clip-clop their way around Central Park. Romeo seduces Juliet once more in the open-air theatres.

At that particular tree, he spreads his father’s ashes. Leaning against a ferry rail, she speaks her silent prayers. A doctor cries during his shift, the gravity of it all catching up to him. A policewoman is gunned down in action. Cars are stolen and drugs are bought. People flock to dimly-lit lounges to pontificate without end. An hourglass is turned over.

There is love here, and hate. There is hope and despair, and pain, woe, misery. There is intense pleasure expressed with coy eyelashes. The city is breathing and you can hear it. Occasionally it sighs. More often, it chuckles.

The rivers move, and you will never see them again. Every day, a new river is the East River, the Hudson. The waters have recycled, the ocean isn’t far. No one ever says so, but it is true still, truer, even, for that.

The tourists take photos of buildings and the natives scoff. They point and they grin and they wear matching hats that say I Love New York. But how can they? How can they presume to love this place, when all they do is gawk at it and tramp through it and ask favors of it? Can they hear the breathing, the life, no. They cock their ears, and all they hear is activity. They can’t feel the stillness. They can’t comprehend.

But he, she, they all do. We do. We feel the pain of the city, the scars of its history. We share in its ebullience and take our share of its misfortune. We are the city. He is the corner store on his block, she is the stop sign on the street. We are all Broadway and Canal. I am the 6 train, and you are the L. He was the W, but now the Q. We accept, and live, and love. We are the city as much as the city is us.

Originally written for the Vingle Love & Relationship Community.

My best friend in life is a cis woman. We’ve been friends since we started college and had our first English class together in Fall ’10. In the nearly 6 years we’ve been friends, we’ve been through highs and lows, we lived in the same house, and we’ve always had one another’s backs (even when we were tearing out each other’s throats).

Every once in a while, she’ll tag me on facebook in some kind of post outlining ‘the best reasons to have a friend of the opposite gender’. You’ve seen them before, I’m sure. Well this is one of those, though I’m hoping it’s a good deal more honest.

(Disclaimer; this specific card is all about the virtue of cis male – cis female friendships because that’s my experience. I’m not trying to defend a binary here – these same things could apply across the board for any mixed gender relationship. I just have this framework that I operate within on a day-to-day basis and I want to be straight up about that.)

1. It’s a different perspective.

If any of you all are like me, it means sometimes you forget to think about things from other perspectives. You try to be good about it, but some things just get you so rattled that you get tunnel vision. Having your best friend come from a different perspective than yours, even on just a gender level, opens you up to counsel that will differ from your own insight.

This is always important, because like any friend, they can help you see reason or see past your own involvement, but even more so because of the different paradigm of their worldview.

2. Bras Become Just… Clothes

Okay, yes. Brassieres are already just clothes, but bear with me here. I don’t think I’m alone in saying that for many cis dudes growing up, there’s a weird mystique around women’s undergarments. Blame the media, blame parenting, blame society, or just blame us shitty dudes, it doesn’t matter, it’s true. I’d say that up until I lived with my best friend, the only time I really got to see a bra was when I was getting intimate with a woman.

That all changed. I learned pretty quickly into the living situation that bras are best dried by air-drying. And on laundry day, that could mean there’s like 12 different bras just hanging around the house. Soon enough, they become more ‘nuisance’ than ‘neglige’ in your mind.

3. You Feel a Little Tougher

Again, this feels dumb to write down. But for real, you’re gonna feel at least a modicum tougher as a result of being best friends with a woman. I distinctly remember one lovely late-summer day when I returned to the home I was sharing with my best friend and our other 2 female roommates. They were all holed up in the living room with the doors shut, because a dragonfly had gotten into the house and they were shying away from it.

So I was immediately tasked with the killing of this dragonfly. I did it, and I felt just the slightest touch proud of myself for it. Feeding into toxic hypermasculinity? Yes. Probably. But it’s the truth.

4. They Will Check You on Your Dumb Guy Shit

Immediately after I killed that dragonfly and I was starting to feel that small swell of pride, one of my other housemates chastised me for killing it as opposed to just taking it out of the house. I was confused, I thought the Man™ had taken care of the issue. It took me down a peg at least.

More than that, though, a woman will smell some stupid bravado coming a mile away and will tell you to sit your ass back down. They don’t have time for your childish testosterone fit, and they’ll show you why you really don’t either.

5. You Get to Give and Receive Honest Critiques

Okay, this is one that shows up on basically every one of those other lists, but it’s because its unavoidable. I can’t even count the number of times I asked my BFF about my choice in outfit for a party/bar/gathering. I know she’ll give me an honest criticism, because we aren’t dating, or trying to, so there’s no empty sugarcoating.

This also works in reverse. You will be asked honest criticism of her outfit sometimes. If your girlfriend were to ask, or even a potential hookup, you will say all the right things in order to be considerate or just for brownie points. With your best friend? ‘No bitch, you’re falling out of that top.’

6. Wing Woman > Wing Man

Of course, you know what a quality wingman takes. Hell, you’ve probably been someone’s wingman before. For all the strengths of having a good wingman by your side, a woman does it 10x better.

Women listen to women, and having one do the vouching for you is a far better in than having a guy do it. A woman knows what other women are looking for, and she can help you highlight exactly the parts of yourself that you want to shine.

7. Emotional Openness

Guys aren’t really known for being the most emotionally available or receptive. Naturally, that’s not true for every dude, but the stereotypes abide. Emotional connections between cis men are harder to come by. I’ve also been told by some women in my life that friendships between girls hit similar roadblocks, or that they can feel strangely competitive.

For whatever reason, that kind of bullshit kind of falls away from a mixed-gender friendship. Maybe it’s the social stigmas taken out of it or maybe it’s something else, but you’ll find it a lot easier to speak openly to your best female friend.
This is a card for the Scene Queen in my life, or Squiks, as she hates to be called. I haven’t used her name here because I didn’t tell her I was doing this in advance, and then integrity reasons.

Bloodborne: Making Old-School Values New Again
Originally written for the Vingle Video Games Community.

Bloodborne is hard, you guys.

Yeah, understatement, I know. For real, though, I just started playing From Software’s popular PS4 exclusive this past weekend and I’ve been hooked from the get-go. Having never played Dark Souls, I didn’t think I’d get so into this game but I’m glad to be wrong.

I’ve been playing a whole bunch of games since I got the PS4. In recent memory, I’ve played Fallout 4 (the main quest line anyway), Arkham Knight, Infamous: Second Son (as well as First Light), and now Bloodborne. In Second Son I’m actually pretty close to 100%, in the others, there’s still plenty of side quests I need to do.

However, I think Bloodborne is going to suck my free time away from me, even more so than Fallout 4 did/can. At the point of writing this, I’m two boss fights deep into the game. I am marking my progress by boss fights more than anything else, really, because I am not really sure how else to. I think that’s a big part of why I love this game.

With the big open worlds of games like Grand Theft Auto, or in Bethesda titles like Fallout 4 or Skyrim, you’ve got a map, and quest markers, and locations you can fast travel to or waypoint on a minimap. Being that there’s none of that in Bloodborne, it makes the exploration feel that much more adventurous. You don’t know where you’re going at first – you don’t even know that there’s a respite to find when you get there.

Bloodborne just drops you into the game with nothing, no concept of what to do or where to go. It just says “Hey. You’re a hunter. Go kill some things. Maybe find this old Church or whatever.”

It doesn’t even give you specific detail on how to find said Church. Just plunks you in Yharnam and immediately tasks you with killing a giant wolf monster. I hadn’t felt that sense of powerlessness from the start of a game in a little while. I was absolutely up shit’s creek. I loved it. I’ve heard people say or write that Bloodborne is a kind of game that won’t be popular with every kind of gamer. Some people have said that it takes a particular kind of gamer to enjoy Bloodborne (and by extension, the Souls games too). I guess I get that.

I think to enjoy Bloodborne, you have to fuckin’ enjoy playing video games. As dumb as that sounds, I mean it on a very fundamental level. By definition (to me) a gamer, someone who loves video games, is someone who comes to a challenging part of a game and they get fuckin’ PUMPED.

Your blood starts racing, your heart trying to break your ribcage. You move to the edge of your seat, something inside you saying that by putting on your game face, you will play that much better.

Bloodborne capitalizes on that feeling. The ‘levels’ are punishingly difficult. Even in just getting from your spawn point to the boss zone, you can die real easily. Even when you know exactly where to go. The lack of checkpoints means that every life matters – you die, you need to to do it all over again. The enemies reset. You lose Blood Echoes, those precious resources that you use not only to level up but to buy equipment.

Then there are the boss fights themselves! You’re virtually guaranteed a death screen on your first go-round with any of the game’s bosses. It’s that kind of bitterness only a gamer feels. The deaths in a boss fight feel like “No, FUCK YOU” moments to me. When a boss puts me down, it just gets me raring to go back stronger.

Bloodborne is a game that reintroduces stakes to a generation of gamers who have gotten soft with frequent checkpoints and deaths that don’t matter altogether that much. When you die in say, Assassin’s Creed, it just loads you back to your most recent save, no harm done really.

In Bloodborne, you lose precious progress and money, but it still lets you play smarter the next time to get it back. The game understands the importance of reward, the importance of the level of the challenge vs that reward.

Plenty of games now cater to instant gratification. You can jump in and know what you’re doing, have clearly outlined objectives, and clear ways of clearing obstacles. In many cases, you can just pay more money to get the best stuff. Bloodborne makes you work for all of it, even the basic hunter’s equipment.

Yet it doesn’t do it in a way that feels like tedious grinding. It lays out in front of you the whole scope of the challenge. You are a hunter in a place teeming with monsters of varying strengths. You can learn lessons from other people’s notes, you can ignore that.

The onus of the entire experience ultimately lies upon the player, and Bloodborne shows that. Everything you do, you do. The game never pulls any punches. You know from jump street that it is tough, and to expect it to be tough. For that reason, it really can’t be considered unfair.

This is also part of the reason that I can see how some people won’t take to this game. It’s too punishing for the level of casual that dominates the market nowadays. Specifically, within the realm of AAA gaming, you don’t see a lot of the old school values of gaming, where games were challenging to the point of dire frustration.

People continue to replay games like Mega Man, like Contra. Games that were super difficult in that you had but few lives before game over, and every death reset you to a previous point of progress that you had to fight back from. The replay value comes in the reward of finally pushing past a challenge.

One of my best friends, a member of the Squad, Leo, loves the Souls games and Bloodborne. He’s played the ever-loving-shit out of Souls and from my knowledge has beaten Bloodborne too.

He raises an interesting point about the way memorization and mastery come into play with these games. Because death is constant, and you will die in new and different ways a lot of the time, particularly to bosses, he says that after a certain point encounters are less of a skill challenge and more of a strategic puzzle to be solved.

After dying fifteen times to the same boss, you will have a deeper understanding of the telegraphs in the attacks and the pacing of the battle. You’ll have a finer sense of when you need to time strikes and dodges, arguably down the point where you’re playing an interactive dance.

With every death, you feel more informed, better capable of taking the fight on. After enough repetition, you triumph. This sequence of risk and reward keeps the player going. As my friend puts it, “the strength of the gameplay reduces the feeling of grinding/ all the time you spend playing by giving intrinsic and extrinsic value to not dying.”

The value in not dying is reaping all of the potential rewards for clearing the map. However, there is some small value in death, too. It shows you where critical mistakes are made, so as to avoid them in the next life.

Basically, all of what I love about Bloodborne so far is the way the game understands how players work. It understands the necessity of reward and the equivalent value that needs to be placed upon the risk associated with it.

It understands that the onus belongs on the player. It shouldn’t feel like the game is unfairly stacked against you. Bloodborne certainly IS stacked against you, but it isn’t unfair about it. It tells you straight up.

Bloodborne is a beautifully rendered modern game that works tirelessly and effectively to reassert older values from gaming. It brings value back to death. It presents a challenging adventure that is both a celebration of gaming at large but also an intrepid step into the bright future of games.

She doesn’t regret letting him walk away. This was their unspoken arrangement. He would call at ridiculous hours, knowing she could never say no. He would come over to talk, or play, or something in between, and then he would leave, just like that, the solemn stranger in the crisp suit.

She never saw why he was so meticulous with his garb. She had been with a few men in her life- not too few to be naive but not too many to be indifferent – and she had never seen a man such as him in the bedroom. Other men would just tear away their outerwear, eager to get to business. Some would be insecure and unsteady, their handy shaky and uncertain as they clumsily take off their work attire. But not him. He was cool and collected, making swift, deft movements, always precise, making sure the crease in his trousers stayed fresh and the shirt was hung with the suit coat just so well.

The sex was different. It was as though he released his inhibition when he disrobed. He fell away from his conscious movements and became more animal in his process. He was no stallion, nor equipped like one, but he made every move count in his visceral, primitive passion. She never grasped the particular method to his madness, and he never stuck around long enough to explain.

She was awake in bed, staring at the poorly lit one-bedroom she called home. The light from the bathroom was on, the door opened just a crack so that the light reflected off the crimson-painted walls and gave the whole room the dense light to accompany the lingering scent of musky love-making. With a sigh, she crossed to the window and opened it wide enough for her to climb out onto the fire escape. She felt safe that no one was around to see her in her satin nightdress, and as she stopped to consider that there might be someone, she decided she didn’t mind it much anyway. Let them look. It’ll give them something to dream about tonight as they hit the pillow in a release of their life’s frustration.

She looked down the street and saw him standing under the streetlight. He was lighting a cigarette and just standing. He looked all the part of a man who filled his own shoes; content, and conscious. She saw the smoke lift in hazy spirals above his head, brought into life from the dim orange streetlight. She often wondered whether she loved this man, or potentially could, but decided it better to push such thoughts away, lest it complicate matters. She stepped back inside to grab her own cigarettes and lighter before she went back outside, a defiant, silky white hawk atop her perch in the city that never sleeps. She lit her Winston and leaned back against the cool brick of the 6-floor walkup and closed her eyes for a minute, drinking in the melody of a silence so loud it reverberated through the veins of the city itself. She opened her eyes and looked uptown and the skyrises that threatened to rip the clouds from the sky. She smiled at the silliness of the notion, silently pleased that the clouds proved too elusive for the marvels of men.

She wondered, ought she to be like the clouds? Silent and elusive, untouchable by the marvels of men? Perhaps.

Then again, she knew she would always be open to the men that were marvels themselves. Jack was a mystery to her. They had known each other long enough that it shouldn’t be so, and yet she must have never found it worthwhile to discover his truth.

Because she found that when you rip the paint from the canvas, you lose the beauty that lay, incarnate in its own enigma.

Short story, fiction, originally published in The Great Lake Review, 2013.
Entry 1- July 21, 1946

Cher Journal,

It was dreadfully hot today, the sun simmering in the sky, boiling the cluttered city streets. I was tempted to just laze around in bed all day, but the feeling of being cooped up and isolated began to draw on my nerves. Eventually, I decided to use the dreadful heat to my advantage and I headed down to the beach by the harbor. I donned my bathing suit, took a moment to appreciate my form in the piece, and then threw a shirt and skirt over it. I took the streetcar to the docks and, after placing my clothes and purse in an empty part of the dock, dove into the water. It was refreshing, washing away the heat of the sun and giving me new breath. It was such a lovely day, with all the people out, dotting the ocean like marshmallows in a mug of hot chocolate, swirling to and fro. I was swimming around for some time when I ran into Jacques Meursault, a former colleague of mine. Seeing Jacques was a bit strange for me- I wouldn’t imagine him making an appearance in such a populated place. Jacques always came off to me as a bit standoffish, like he found little patience for people. In spite of this, I couldn’t help myself from growing attracted to him, harboring a burgeoning affection for him that I couldn’t rightfully throw away. Eventually, I was transferred from his office to a different one downtown, and my feelings quickly subsided.

Seeing him here in this stark contrast to his personality made my affection instantly resurface, and I struggled to keep it them on a leash. We made small talk in the water, asking about general things, uninteresting things, until I got out of the water, to rest on a float. He helped hoist me onto it, and I felt a sudden rush pass through me as he accidentally brushed against my breasts while assisting me onto the float. I rested on my stomach, hiding the blush of embarrassment before I turned to face him, laughing with a schoolgirl glee. He brought himself up onto the float with me and rests his head atop my stomach. My heart rushed, then quickly calmed, caught in the serenity of the moment. Being by ourselves on the float, not a care in the world, I felt as though I could last forever. There was so much beauty in our surroundings; the gentle lap of the water, the general buzz of excitement from the people on the beach, the golden shimmer of the sky lit by the smoldering sun. We lay there for a time before I grew too hot and dove back into the water. Jacques followed me, gently gripping me around my waist and swimming with me. It was a wonderful time, and I couldn’t help but feel so eternally happy, joyful for the moment. After a while, we went back to the dock and started to dry off and dress. I noticed that the sun seemed to soak me easier than him, and pointed out that

I was darker than him. I found it curious as we dressed that he wore a black tie with his ensemble, so I inquired. He told me that his mother had passed away the day before, and I was shaken by the revelation for some reason I cannot yet identify. He seemed to notice my unease with the notion of his mother’s death and seemed on the verge of explaining further, but ultimately decided against it. He asked me to the cinema, and I suggested the new Fernandel movie, Don Camillo.

On the way to the film, I felt more confident that Jacques was interested in me the way I was with him, and grew a little more outgoing with my advances. I pressed up against his side often on the walk and brushed my hand against his fairly often. Once in the theater, I pressed myself up firmly against his side and he caressed my breasts gently, stroking them delicately; as such, I found it difficult to concentrate on the movie. I imagine it was a funny film, as Jacques laughed every now and again in between bouts of silence. Towards the end of the film, he turned towards me, and I half-opened my mouth with expectation, my chest hammering so loud that I was certain that the theater’s other patrons would tell me to quell the pounding noise. Then he kissed me, a low, gentle kiss, full of repressed emotion and heartbreak. Even so, it felt as though he were restraining himself, not giving himself totally up to the idea. We left the theater and made the way back to his apartment, talking briefly about the movie. When we got to his apartment, I noticed how spacious it was, the dining room empty of chairs or table, or of any real furnishings. We retreated to his bedroom and began to disrobe one another, at once hastily and careful, as though we were nervous adolescents on our first date.

He loved me that night; in a way I can’t place a finger on, but I was certain; Jacques Meursault loved me. Up until this point in life, I didn’t rightfully know what it was to be everlasting, but this night, this one night in my 26 years, this night defined it all for me.

After we finished, Jacques lay awake in the bed awhile and smoked cigarettes, one arm behind his head, keeping it propped up. I lay serenely on his warm chest, watching the smoke swirl up and away from us, dancing intricate patterns in the eddies of air that circled the room. I told him that I would have to visit my aunt the following day; he nodded in response, looking lost in thought, at peace with the world. After some unknown time, I slept, slept deeply, and dreamt of swirling smoke signals and the interesting, abstract Frenchman who I had fallen in love with.

Entry 2- July 27, 1946

Today I had a date with Jacques, down by the beach. Before I went over to his apartment to meet him, I showered and dressed at my apartment, taking much more time than I normally would, subconsciously wanting for Jacques to see and appreciate the extra effort I went through for him. I sprayed myself with some new perfume and headed away to see him. I wore my candy-cane stripe dress with my Greek leather sandals, hoping to entice Jacques with the subtle grip of the dress against my body. I felt certain exhilaration as I went out to catch the streetcar to his apartment.

Once I got there, I felt his penetrative gaze wash over me, absorbing the outfit, the curves, and all of me. I felt a sense of pride as I watch his hand clench up, his knuckles whiten from an apparent strain of not simply having me there and then. Part of me wanted him to, but part of me realized that there was a whole day yet to come for us and that there would be plenty opportunity to be alone. We took the bus to a beach some kilometers outside of Algiers, the ride being one of steady silence, with Jacques staring out the window with empty eyes, watching the plains whip past in a jade blur. He remarked to me that as fast as the bus could travel, the sky never whipped past as fast as the land would, and that emphasized the infinite wonder of the spectacle. My few attempts at making small talk went unanswered, and so I quickly stopped trying. Sitting there, I felt a little downtrodden, as I had drawn out some bit of effort for this tryst, and to have him be just as satisfied with the cloudless sky as he was with me felt somewhat mortifying. I couldn’t seem to hold his attention as anything more than a passing fancy. Wishing to enjoy the day instead of second-guessing everything, I decided to banish all these dark thoughts and just rest my eyes for the duration of the trip.

We arrived at the beach in the midafternoon, around 3 or 4 o’clock. It was a small cove, circled by rocks on either side and with some sparse dune grass towards the land. The sun was not as relentless as it had been the week before, and we found the easy waves to be warm, a natural bath. We leaped into the delicate waves, allowing ourselves to be gently tossed by the delicate current, swaying to and fro, in time with the beat of the ocean. I taught Jacques a game where one would scoop a mouthful of the cresting wave and spray it overhead, a visual glitter to the sky and a delightful, simple thing. After some time of this, I encouraged myself to make the move Jacques hadn’t made earlier and floated over to him, pressing my body against his in my swimsuit. I kissed him then, more graciously, perhaps, than we had the week prior, and we lost ourselves in the tumbling of the sea current.

After a hasty dressing back on the shore, we once again caught the bus, going into the city and back to Jacques’ apartment, where we stripped down and made love on his cool sheets. The gentle breeze that rolled through the open window gave an external sensation to the process, cooling our heaving bodies as the sun fell behind the horizon. I slept there the night and when we awoke in the morning, Jacques insisted that we lunch in together. He ran downstairs to pick up the food for the meal, and when he returned, he began fixing some stew. We heard an old man from across the hall, and Jacques explained to me rather dryly that the old man was constantly bickering with his dog, and that they hadn’t changed their ways in the 8 years they’d been together. Something about that struck me as funny, and I laughed, brushing the sleeve of Jacques’ pajamas farther up my arm. The silence grew heavy and I inquired to Jacques whether he loved me. His response deflated me like a balloon that had lost its flame. He told me that “it doesn’t matter, but I don’t think so”. I suddenly felt ashamed of my schoolgirl crush and grew quiet. Mulling for a while, I figured that was easily too soon in the relationship for such a heavy topic, and so I laughed at my naïveté. He turned and kissed me and washed away my doubts of his feelings.

We were interrupted by the sounds of fighting from next door, loud bangs and crashes, and a terrifying scream from some woman, clearly under distress. We went out onto the landing, where we could hear clearly the sounds of a man brutally beating a woman, from the sounds of thuds and bangs, followed by screams and shrieks. I turned to Jacques with a kind of manic look on my face and pleaded that he call the police, that he do something to stop it. He told me that he didn’t like cops, and I stared at him in such disbelief that I was stunned into silence. Here was a woman, perhaps like myself, being terribly beaten and battered, and here the man I loved, with no incentive to act on it, to put an end the cruelty. Eventually, a policeman came with a man from some floors down and dealt with the situation, screaming gruffly at the man, (Raymond, as Jacques later told me). The girl was crying floods of tears, in evident fear of her life. The policeman ordered Raymond inside and then left with the woman, still crying.

We went back inside Jacques apartment, where he finished fixing the lunch. After what had happened in the hallway, I found myself with little appetite and so didn’t eat the food we had prepared. I was shocked at the revelation I had seen in Jacques; that he had been perfectly willing to let that helpless woman get abused and beaten for the simple fact that he didn’t like cops. I wondered whether his brutal detachment from his surroundings and other people would encompass me as well. Choosing not to share this thought with him, afraid of the answer, I gathered my things and left his house, my feelings shaken. Once I got onto the bus, I started shaking with sobs, and I found that they weren’t easily quelled.

Entry 3 – August 27

I don’t know what to feel anymore. So much has happened, and I can’t imagine where to start. I’ve neglected you, cher journal, and I apologize. I suppose I’ll start at the day I met the man inside of Jacques Meursault.

I went over to Jacques’ apartment one afternoon, with only one topic on my mind. I needed to know if he loved me, truly so, in the way I loved him. I need to know that there was some reciprocity between him and I, that there was hope for our relationship. I arrived, and moments in the door, I proposed to him. I laid it out for him in the simplest way I could fathom. I told him I wanted to marry him, and he told me it didn’t matter whether or not we married. I told him I loved him and asked whether he loved me. He said the same thing he did before, that there was no point, that it didn’t matter anyway. Does he not see truly how it does matter? How can he be so cold? In that apartment, I was conflicted, torn. I wanted to know whether he would accept the proposal from anyone else with whom he was involved with like me. He said he would. I knew then, as I know still, that this was all that I was ever going to get from Jacques. No overly affectionate love, no romance, nothing of the sort. But as long as I could be with him, As long as I could have him in my life, I found it bearable. I told him he was peculiar, like no man I had ever met. I felt also that this is something that would ultimately drive him to resent me, to find me in the way of his unique lifestyle. I felt that if we lived a thousand years together, he would continue to be as he was, but all the same, I couldn’t stop myself from loving him. He told me we would marry anytime I wanted, and I held steadfast to the notion.

Why does my heart rush so when he pays me the slightest attention? I had to make Jacques that fateful Sunday that we were meant to go to the beach with his friend. I felt apprehensive about going anywhere with this man who had so beaten that poor girl some weeks prior, but I felt safe going with Jacques. It was such a beautiful day outside, the sun bright and happy in the sky, and it even seemed to draw some color to Jacques funeral face. More of my apprehension went away when I laid eyes on the man who would be accompanying us to the beach wear a silly straw hat and rolled-up sleeves. I couldn’t help but laugh.

Things began to turn badly when we made to get on the bus. I saw Raymond talk to Jacques quietly, motioning to a group of Arab men across the street, staring at us with their terrible, empty eyes. I felt a spike of fear run through me and asked Jacques what was going on. He explained that these men had it in for Raymond, and I was all too eager to put some distance between us and the gang. We got on the bus and Raymond did his best to make things comfortable, but I couldn’t shake the fear from my head. Making matter worse was Raymond’s constant flirting and joking, making it too obvious that he wanted to appear relaxed. When we go t to the beach, I tried to lose myself in idle playing around, in whimsical fun, beach activity and the like.

We met up with Raymond’s friend Masson and his wife, who turned out to be a delightful little woman, and I soon found myself laughing and chatting along with her, as though the morning events had been totally erased from my mind. We went down to the beach, and I didn’t hesitate to run straight in, losing myself in the waves and the simple existing that came from being tossed up and around, swirled about and dunked and just, alive. Jacques joined me in the water and we swam together, the way a young married couple might. Eventually, he retired to the beach, and I followed him not long after. I lay down beside him and tucked into the nook of his shoulder, drifting lazily through my head, the heat and his presence coaxing a small delirium from me. When I realized Masson had gone back to the house for lunchtime, I turned to wake Jacques. I propped myself up on my elbow and made to nudge him awake, but I was caught by the serenity in his face, his funeral expression gone for the moment, lost in the simple bliss of the day. I loved him more in that moment than I ever had, journal. Part of me felt guilty waking him, but my own selfishness tempted me. I woke him and told him it was time to eat, and he started for the house. I grabbed his wrist gently and informed him that we hadn’t kissed since that morning when I roused him at his apartment. He looked at me with a glint in his eye that was at once both curious and inviting, and I told him to come down to the water. We delved into the frothy little crests nearest the shore and waded out until we were up to our hips in the salty waves. I turned and reached out for him, wrapped my legs around his so that he half held me up and we kissed. Every time we kiss, it’s a delight, as though I venture into new territories, unmapped lands, and uncharted borders. We parted lips and I gazed into his smoldering dark orbs, full of life and time.

We made for the beach and heard Masson calling out to us from the porch of his house, beckoning to us with his mammoth hands. As we headed towards the porch we heard him cry to his wife that he liked Jacques, and I couldn’t help but smile. I glanced sideways at Jacques to gauge his reaction, but he remained as composed as always. We ate a full, delicious lunch in silence, drinking heavily of the wine and eventually getting around to speaking of plans. It’s struck me funnily that it was still so early in the day, and I made note of this to everyone. Masson made a comment about how lunch came about not as a certain time, but only as soon as everyone felt hungry. Something about the novelty of the idea made me giggle, and Jacques shot me a curious look. I worried that I may have perhaps had too much wine. Eventually, the men started for a walk, and I offered to stay back and clean up with Madame Masson. We talked about our men over the dishes, and she told me how she thought that Jacques was a lovely man “in his own respect”. I wondered aloud to her what she meant. She told me that a girl like me should be with someone who could rightfully demonstrate how he felt for me, a Romeo to my Juliet. I told her that I loved him, and wasn’t that all that was necessary? I loved Jacques, and I was willing to wait for him to come around. She looked at me with pity in her eyes and grasped my shoulder with more strength I would have imagined possible for her. She looked at me that way for a moment, and then looked as though she was going to say something more, but wound up just going back to her dishes. We continued on in silence for a time before Jacques came back and delivered the news of what had transpired.

The Arabs had followed us here; my fears came back at me with new breath. Jacques explained what had happened in the brief encounter, and Madame Masson started to cry. Myself, I couldn’t be brought to tears, so overcome with shock and grief as I was. The wine seemed to now grip me a bit harder, and I remained motionless, statuesque at the dining room table. I couldn’t fathom what had gone on, and so I drifted in my head, losing myself I bit. I must have blacked out most of the memory, because the last thing that I remember that day, the worst thing to end the day that had spiraled downwards and out of control, were gunshots.

I was now in love with a criminal.

Entry 9- October 3 1948

Today was Jacques’ trial, and I was asked to stand witness. I came to the courthouse, not fully aware of what I would be asked to do or say in front of those people. I decided that all I could do was be truthful and that that would bring about his acquittal. When I was called to the stand, I was almost shaking with nerves. The lawyer asked me about my relationship with Jacques, only, he called him Monsieur Meursault, something I didn’t feel at all well about. I told him of the days in the office where we would exchange greetings and things, and that we really only got to know each other two summers ago. The lawyer found many things suspect with my testimony, things I found ludicrous, unrelated to the case. They made a show of telling the jury that Jacques and I had gone to the Fernandel film at the cinema and that we made love that night. He found it odd that Jacques would do so in the midst of his mother’s death.

I found myself in tears, sobbing uncontrollably. They made Jacques out to be a villain, a bad man who deserved the ultimate punishment. I tried my best to tell them that they had it all wrong, that Jacques was really a good man, and that the circumstances in which we began our relationship were not indicative of his character. All my words were in vain, as they fell on deaf ears. I was removed from the courtroom briskly by the bailiff and left to sob outside on the street.

Entry 13 – November 11, 1948

Today, Jacques was executed. I couldn’t bring myself to see it happen; I couldn’t bring myself to even leave the bed. I felt empty, hollow, broken. I saw the world now in perhaps the way Jacques always had; meaningless. I found no purpose for things, no longer feeling delighted in the company of others, or in anything else for that matter. I lay in bed all day long and cried into my bed sheets, with more tears than I thought a person could shed. The last thing I did today was write the last entry into this journal and leave it on my bedside table, saying goodnight to the world, my world, and finding my way back to Jacques.

Police Records – Scene #127 – November 15, 1948

Young woman found hanging in her apartment. Means of death described as asphyxiation caused by a leather belt strung from a ceiling fixture. Signs of intense depression. Scene discovered when neighbors called complaining of terrible odor from inside. The only evidence to lend to the investigation was a small, leather-bound diary on the bedside table under a broken reading lamp. The woman identified as a Ms. Marie Cardona. Known lover of one Jacques Meursault; investigation pending. Known relatives have been notified to come and identify the body.

Log end.

Editorial by Vin McCarthy for Irishcentral.com
I can remember the first time I ever thought that I mightn’t have an easy space to settle my cultural identity into. I was a boy when it happened, vacationing in Ireland with extended family. That first instance of self-discovery happened while on vacation with my mother’s side of the family. My aunt and her husband had just finished refurbishing this big bus they’d bought, and they were taking it on its first trip down to Kerry to go to the shore – a beach road trip.

I can remember the first time I ever thought that I mightn’t have an easy space to settle my cultural identity into. I was a boy when it happened, vacationing in Ireland with extended family. That first instance of self-discovery happened while on vacation with my mother’s side of the family. My aunt and her husband had just finished refurbishing this big bus they’d bought, and they were taking it on its first trip down to Kerry to go to the shore – a beach road trip.
We were invited to go along, my younger brother and I, so one day we piled up into this bus and headed away. We weren’t the only kids on the trip, not even the oldest of the kids either. I must’ve been ten years old, making my brother eight. Aside from us, there was this thirteen-year-old and her younger sister, probably nine, my cousin, and her friend from school. I can’t remember any of these kids’ names, but it doesn’t really matter. It’s only the thirteen-year-old who left an impression. Let’s call her Tamora.

When Jackie first introduced me and my brother to these other girls, she brought us onto the bus and said:

“Hey ladies, these are the cousins, the Yanks I told ye about.”

It was the first time I’d ever been called a Yank, and I wasn’t sure what to make of it. Even to ten-year-old ears, there was something strange about the way she said it, something that made me wonder if being a Yank was a good or bad thing. Until this point, I’d only heard the term to describe the baseball team. Now it seemed derogatory.

My brother was the one who tried to clarify.

“Whassa Yank, auntie Jackie?” he asked her, full of youthful curiosity.

Jackie laughed and said, “Ye two are. Yer Yankees from America, Jamesie.”

Okay, so ‘Yankees’ means ‘Americans’. Okay, it makes more sense now. I guess if that’s all it means then it’s not bad to be a Yankee, ‘cause we are American, after all. But we’re Irish too, right?

At one point, halfway between where we left from Cork and where we were going in Kerry, we made a stop at this picnic area for lunch. While the adults were setting that stuff up, us kids went off to play. There was a great big hill behind the bus and we all ran up it, racing to the top. Tamora beat me there, but I was a close second. I didn’t really care about the race part, but I guess she did. She said to me:

“I guess you Yanks aren’t any better than we Irish!”

“What do you mean? I never said we were.”

“Oh come off it, I’m sure you think it!”

“No I don’t! Besides I’m Irish too!”

That remark seemed to throw her a little. She got a confused face and screwed up her nose in bewilderment.

“No you’re not, you’re a Yank!”

“But my parents are Irish!”

“So what? It doesn’t matter where your parents came from, just where you come from.”

I hadn’t heard it put that way before. I’d always just assumed that because I’m Irish-American, I fall into both categories. I guess not. We did more stuff on the trip and it was a really good time, but it was Tamora’s remark and attitude about my birthplace that stuck with me.

It wasn’t gonna be the last time I’d hear some condescension about being Irish-American. Since then I’ve had a lot of Irish call me things like narrowback or Yank, rejecting my Irish blood entirely in favor of my American raising. It wouldn’t be as bad if it weren’t for the fact that every melting pot American I’ve met just wants to label me as Irish, looking more at my lineage and paying less regard to my American identity.

The thing is, I don’t readily identify as “American”. When people ask me “what are you?” I tell them I’m Irish. Not American or Irish American, but Irish. And generally, people accept that to mean Irish-American because it’s usually an American peer asking me and so that part’s just assumed anyway.

When I’ve tried telling my ma this, though, she freaks out about it and tells me I’m not Irish, I’m American. And it’s really disheartening to hear that from a parent because it feels like she wants me to reject all that part of my culture.

It’s the culture I want to identify with. I don’t parade around like I’m off the boat from Ireland, I just want that to be part of the culture I adhere to. I feel like I can hybridize the two cultures and worlds if only everyone would stop yelling at me to pick one.

So I’m Irish and I’m American.

So there.

Editorial by Vin McCarthy for Irishcentral.com