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Thank You All

 

You see this right here? These are the demographics for the people who read my blog Garrison’s Library. I started it in 2012 and it was originally intended to be a place where I review books. Then as the years went by, I wrote reviews for TV shows, movies, and plays. Then I wrote nonfiction think pieces. Then I posted micro-fiction. Then I posted story chapters. Then I posted poetry. Eventually it became a central hub for all of my creative writing. Well, almost all of it. But there’s enough good stuff there to attract all these different silent fans from around the world. I cringe at my old stuff, sure, but you know who doesn’t? People who are reading it for the first time. Remember that meme that said you have a lot of silent fans even if you don’t know it? It also said that the low amount of likes, shares, and comments aren’t reflective of all the people whose lives are changed by your art? Now I’ve got the proof I needed. I think I deserve to blow myself every now and then since the 2020’s have given me enough trauma to ruin my self-esteem. To all of you silent fans out there, even though I’ve never met you and I don’t know your names, I just want to say, thank you for making this a worthwhile creative career. I’m not a highly paid rockstar in the industry. My books are self-published. My blog entries are free, because they’re first drafts. But you know what? Thank you all. You have no idea how much I appreciate it. From the bottom of my soul, thank you.

"Maus II" by Art Spiegelman

BOOK TITLE: Maus II: A Survivor’s Tale: And Here My Troubles Began

AUTHOR: Art Spiegelman

YEAR: 1991

GENRE: Graphic Novel

SUBGENRE: Holocaust Memoir

GRADE: A

Under no circumstances should this memoir be banned from school libraries, or anywhere else for that matter. Yes, it is an insanely uncomfortable read. It shows Jewish mice being burned in ovens, beaten, starved, traumatized, shot, all in the name of blind bigotry by the Nazi regime. This book is disturbing, disgusting, and horrifying all at once. You know why that is? Because the Holocaust was disturbing, disgusting, and horrifying all at once. This is probably the most honest portrayal of history’s worst behavior you’ll ever see. It’s honest because the author’s father experienced it all. There are no punches pulled. There is no sugar-coating or whitewashing. Just brutal honesty, because the subject matter will always be brutal no matter which angle you look at it from. A sanitized version wouldn’t have had the same emotional impact. When I read up to page 75, I was so disturbed by the Nazis’ violence that I got dizzy afterwards. I’ve been disturbed lots of times, but this is the first time it has ever made me light-headed. To all the people wanting to ban this book for “naked mice” and “swearing”, it was never about those things. The book bans have more to do with suppressing important messages and keeping the masses ignorant so that they’ll be more likely to vote for people who care only about making themselves richer.

Equally heartbreaking was watching Art Spiegelman’s mental process throughout creating this comic in his father’s honor. He had over twenty hours of tape-recorded conversations with his father and it wore on him after a while. Impostor Syndrome crept up on him for not being “realistic” enough or “doing him justice”. The secondhand trauma also sent him into a depressive spiral. The constant questions and prying from the media made him want to bawl his eyes out like a child crying out for his mommy, a Holocaust-surviving mommy who killed herself because of overwhelming PTSD. It’s a lot to take in all at once, not just for the reader, but also for the author. If Art was a fictional character, he would be instantly praised as being three-dimensional. His father would receive such praise as a character as well, doing what he had to do to survive the concentration camps while starving to death and being sick with Typhus. It doesn’t matter what page you turn to in this graphic novel, because there will never not be a heartbreaking moment to read about.

Let’s talk for a little bit about Art Spiegelman’s choice to use anthropomorphic animals to depict various ethnicities. It is called Maus, after all. He chose mice to represent Jewish people, because rodents were a common slur for Nazis to use. The Germans soldiers, of course, were depicted as cats, notorious hunters of rodents. Americans were depicted as dogs, playing into that old trope of dogs and cats not getting along. These aren’t the only examples, but using animals is a genius move on the author’s part. It’s not just an attempt at being cute; these animals have symbolic meanings. Every choice Spiegelman made in this novel had a purpose of some kind; nothing was left to chance. As pressured as he was to get his father’s story out there, no one can accuse the author of not knowing what he was doing. That is the mark of any good author: when everything has a reason for being there.

Maus II is easily the most frightening book I’ve ever read. I’ve read plenty of fictional horror stories and bloody fantasy novels over the years, but this is nonfiction in its rawest state. This isn’t a 140-page edge-fest; this topic was handled with great sensitivity despite its horrifying nature. I would advise anybody reading this review or either of the Maus books to handle the Holocaust with sensitivity as well. Edgy alt-right jokes are not funny and I don’t want them anywhere near me. The ones who punch down like that have never had a single hardship in their lives, let alone anything equivalent to living in a concentration camp. Maybe the Maus series will make SJW’s out of us all and I’d be very much onboard with that. Five stars out of five is what this graphic novel gets.

Inglorious Basterds

MOVIE TITLE: Inglorious Basterds

DIRECTOR: Quentin Tarantino

YEAR: 2009

GENRE: War Movie

RATING: R for violence, language, and sexual content

GRADE: Mixed

With all the political tension in today’s world, who wouldn’t want to escape into a world of Nazi-slaying fun? Cutting off their scalps, beating them with a bat, shooting them up, burning them down, if there’s a way to kill a Nazi in World War II, Aldo Raine and his troops will make it happen. You know who else will make it happen? A lone Jewish woman named Shosanna whose family was slaughtered by the Nazi war machine. That’s a lot of vengeful desires from anybody not involved in the Third Reich. There’s no possible way that this movie could be anything but perfect, right? Well, that’s where Quentin Tarantino’s biggest fault comes into play: sometimes his movies drag on for an excruciatingly long time. Inglorious Basterds was no exception to that rule. I realize a movie can’t be all action and no drama, but the reverse is also true if the idea is to make a revenge flick: it can’t be all drama and too little action. Some of the chapters could have been cut short and it wouldn’t have hurt the movie in any way, especially the chapter where the Nazis play the card game at a bar. If you want your bloodthirsty fun, you’ll have to get in line like everyone else.

But when you get exactly what you wanted out of this film, it’ll be exactly as you expected. The outcome of the story was never in doubt for even a second. Aldo Raine and his troops are overpowered in spite of the fact that some of them get killed along the way. Shosanna’s own plans for revenge are so brilliant that detailed that no German soldier could possibly crack her code. Everything that could go right in this movie did go right…except for the element of surprise for the audience. I guess when the genre is described as a “revenge flick”, it doesn’t leave much to the imagination. No serious detective work has to be done. But can I at least believe for one small minute that the good guys have a chance of losing? Having a few of their soldiers killed vulnerability does not make. I want to see some flaws. I want to see some cracks in the world’s most impressive plot armor. Maybe if the German propaganda machine took these kinds of notes, their films wouldn’t look so ridiculous on screen.

If you think this review is going to be a nonstop bash-fest, you’re wrong. It was enjoyable for what it was. Quentin Tarantino’s dialogue will always deliver no matter what the genre of his movies. The subterfuge his characters engage in is also an impressive feat that required an extraordinary amount of creativity. Above all else, however, I must give my highest praise to the character work of Hans Lander, the Nazi colonel nicknamed the “Jew Hunter”. No, I’m not condoning his belief system, just his villainy. Whenever he interrogates someone, he knows he’s got his victims by the throat. He purposefully tiptoes around the answers he receives to give his liars a false sense of hope. I’d call this a perfect game of cat and mouse…if the cat had drill bits for fangs, battleaxes for claws, and venom for drool. I’d dare say that Hans is even more intimidating and dangerous than his boss Hitler himself. He’s so believable as a villain that he can almost negate my earlier point of the outcome being too predicable. Key word being almost.

It wouldn’t be fair to call Inglorious Basterds my least favorite Quentin Tarantino movie, because all in all I did enjoy it. Having a least favorite Tarantino movie is like having a least favorite flavor of ice cream: in the end, it’s still ice cream and it’s still going to be more delicious than the creamy strudel Shosanna and Landers shared in the high scale restaurant. This movie gets a mixed grade from me, but it’ll be a high mixed, which means three-and-a-half stars out of five. In the interest of being decisive and honest, I’ll round it down to a solid three. Being average doesn’t have to be a bad thing, right?

Flight Plan

MOVIE TITLE: Flight Plan

DIRECTOR: Robert Schwentke

YEAR: 2005

GENRE: Mystery Thriller

RATING: PG-13 for language and violence

GRADE: Pass

Kyle Pratt and her six-year-old daughter Julia are flying from Berlin to New York City with Kyle’s dead husband stowed away in a coffin underneath the plane. Kyle takes a short nap and awakens to find her daughter missing. She goes around the plane asking everybody where she is and nobody can give her an answer. Upon further inspection, Julia Pratt was never even on the flight manifest. Kyle’s search becomes more frantic and her anger has the other passengers worried about their own safety. Has the grief of her husband made her delusional or is there a bigger conspiracy at work here? Nobody has these answers for Kyle because nobody onboard cares about her.

The mark of any good mystery is being able to keep the audience guessing until the climax. I kept watching because I genuinely wanted to know what on earth happened to Julia. There was even a time when I bought into the theory that Kyle was delusional. This is cinematic gas-lighting at its finest and I fell for it hook, line, and sinker. While I won’t reveal Kyle and Julia’s fates, I will say that the movie’s harshest criticisms are misplaced. Some say the plot is over-the-top or confusing, but I don’t agree with that at all. Everything is perfectly clear by the story’s ending. A little cheesy at times, but clear nonetheless. Maybe the critics need to watch it multiple times in order to piece everything together, but the pieces are there and no stone is left unturned.

The one thing I agree with critics on is that the acting is superb no matter which character is being portrayed. Kyle Pratt is a convincing mother who just wants the best for her daughter. Whether it’s the tender moments they have together or the mother’s near psychotic search for Julia, Jodie Foster was perfect for the role and I wouldn’t want anybody else playing Kyle. Even the whiny passengers who kept getting on each other’s nerves had me convinced this was real whether it was kids slapping each other, parents wanting peace and quiet, or xenophobic Americans getting in scuffles with Arab passengers.

The one controversy I need to address as far as acting goes, however, is the portrayal of the flight crew. Apparently, their “rude and uncaring” attitudes painted actual fight attendants in a negative light. I personally don’t see this as a blanket statement. I see it as an intricate part of this well-crafted mystery. Everybody is supposed to be against Kyle Pratt because they think she’s crazy. Why should the flight crew be any different than the passengers who clapped for her getting handcuffed by the air marshal? While Kyle’s anger is well-placed, if taken out of context, it would be annoying to a bunch of passengers who’ve been on the plane for north of six hours. I’ve been on irritating flights before and I was seething deep inside, just like any rational person would be. Don’t look for controversy where there is none. We’re all human and we all get angry.

The movie received mixed reviews from critics, but I happened to find Flight Plan to my liking. I went into the movie expecting to be on the edge of my seat and that’s exactly what happened. Sure, Flight Plan isn’t anything mind-blowing or overly-philosophical, but it doesn’t have to be. Not every cinematic masterpiece has to be deep and profound. Sometimes it’s just meant to be enjoyed. Flight Plan gets a passing grade from little old me.

Wonder Woman

MOVIE TITLE: Wonder Woman

DIRECTOR: Patty Jenkins

YEAR: 2017

GENRE: Superhero

RATING: PG-13 for violence and language

GRADE: Extra Credit

In the middle of World War I, Amazon warrior Princess Diana grows up on an island of like-minded female fighters who train hard to one day be able to fend off an attack from Ares, God of War and slayer of Zeus. When an American spy crash lands on the island and is rescued from drowning by Diana, he unintentionally brings German soldiers with him and a battle ensues between the Amazons and the invaders. During the struggle Diana’s aunt is murdered in cold blood. Now Wonder Woman wants to venture outside the island to kill Ares herself in an attempt to bring an end to war. Her mother is against it at first, but knows she can do nothing to stop Diana and her independent ways.

We all know from past incarnations of Wonder Woman that she’s a badass superheroine who can withstand ungodly amounts of punishment and beat the hell out of anybody she deems fit for a royal ass-kicking. But she’s more than a mere fighting machine. Diana’s journey leads her to the shades of gray world of war, where nobody is purely evil or purely good. We all have to find the balance within ourselves and decide on our own what is right and wrong. This inner crisis makes Diana a stronger woman for what she goes through. She sees the horrors of war and decides she’s on the side of love and hope. The American spy she saves, Captain Steve Trevor, plays an intricate role in helping her see these shades of gray, but it is ultimately up to Diana which road to take. Her heroic aspirations are admirable, but she needs a little something extra. That is the point of this film and that’s a beautiful statement to make.

Part of Diana’s character development is learning the ways of the outside world since she spent all of her life on the island of Amazons. Watching her struggle to adapt is amusing at times and actually brings out the cuteness in her character. Whether she’s trying on outfits, figuring out relationships, or criticizing a general to his face, she comes off as socially awkward and that’s the source of comedy for this movie. My favorite part of this trope is when Steve Trevor’s secretary is describing what she does for a living and Diana says that it’s basically slavery. Can’t argue with that! But then there are some socially awkward moments that make her appear romantic, like when she learns out to dance (or sway from side to side) with Steve. This kind of culture shock is realistic for anybody who’s lived in isolation, but it doesn’t turn into a chaotic disaster and that’s what makes the quirk effective.

Of course, what would a superhero movie be without that delicious action-packed violence? Wonder Woman will give you plenty of that, but sometimes you’ll have to be a good little boy and wait patiently. The training on the Amazonian island, the crossing of No Man’s Land, and most definitely the final battle with Ares, these are all filled with martial arts action, gun play, and explosions. Lots and lots of explosions. It’s also quite refreshing to see a strong female role model like Diana dishing out these ass-kickings. And while we’re on the subject of role-modeling, please stop complaining about the “sexy” nature of her outfit. She can wear whatever she damn well wants to and beat the crap out of her opponents at the same time. Sexual predators would get beaten into powder if they tried anything they shouldn’t. If I was fighting a war of any kind, I’d want Wonder Woman on my side at all times. She’s tough, she’s brutal, and she’s brave as hell.

Now that we’re on the topic of feminist superheroines, there’s a massive elephant in the room that needs to be addressed. I’m sure most of my audience has read in the news about a theater in Austin, Texas having an all-female screening of the movie as a show of solidarity and girl power. Even though I’m a man, I’m not at all offended by that. The reason we have feminism in the first place is because for far too long women have been treated like second class citizens. They still get treated that way today. Good for that movie theater for stepping up! And good for Gal Gadot for putting on an awesome show for that female audience! Because of the profound influence this movie has had on the female community, I’m giving it an ultra-rare Extra Credit grade! How does that sound?!

Talk to the Wind

***TALK TO THE WIND***

I’ve said many times in the past that Martin Kesici (KIZ-uh-chee) is one of the most underrated rock stars in the world today. He’s got charisma, he’s got a voice of gold, and he knows how to get heavy when it counts. But if his Wikipedia stub is anything to go by, he doesn’t get the fame and fortune that he deserves. Yes, I know that any dumb-ass can edit a Wikipedia page and without proper sources those pages are unreliable. There are even rock musicians today that don’t have their own Wikipedia page at all, I get that. But if I say the name Martin Kesici to you, what do you associate that with? Exactly. Try finding him on iTunes, by the way, see how far you’ll go.

I can tell you firsthand that Mr. Kesici deserves more recognition because his 2005 album “So What?” and his “My Heart Beats Pain” EP can tug at the heartstrings while rocking your ass out at the same time. I know I’m beating a dead horse when I talk about my lonely WWU days, but Martin Kesici’s music was one of the things that got me through it all. From the moment I heard his duet with Tarja Turunen called “Leaving You For Me”, I knew I had to have the “So What?” album. On that same album is a song called “Talk to the Wind”, which invokes imagery of heartwarming romantic love. Lord knows I’ve had plenty of crushes in college, so thinking about them with this song playing in my headsets was pure heaven. As long as I had this song, I never had to feel lonely or depressed ever again. Here are the lyrics:

VERSE 1

In a little wooden church with stained glass windows

You came walking down the aisle with your perfect smile

Ever since that precious day, we’ve always been together

And we’ve had our ups and downs, but we’ll always come around

CHORUS

I talk to the wind when there’s nothing left to say

It gets rough sometimes, but I know we’ll be okay

Just a whisper in my ear is enough to bring me back

To when you gave yourself to me in the church by the sea

I talk to the wind

VERSE 2

People say we’ll never last, that it happened way too fast

Yes, we’ve had our share of fights and lonely nights

But I knew it when I saw you, your big brown eyes

That no matter what we go through, we will always get by

CHORUS

I talk to the wind when there’s nothing left to say

It gets rough sometimes, but I know we’ll be okay

Just a whisper in my ear is enough to bring me back

To when you gave yourself to me in the church by the sea

I talk to the wind

BRIDGE

When it feels like the end of our journey

All we need is to keep the wheel turning

No matter what comes our way

CHORUS

I talk to the wind when there’s nothing left to say

It gets rough sometimes, but I know we’ll be okay

Just a whisper in my ear is enough to bring me back

To when you gave yourself to me in the church by the sea

I talk to the wind

***WEEKLY SHORT STORY CONTESTS AND COMPANY***

It’s a brand new week at the WSS and it’s time for a new story, this time with the prompt suggestion of “teeth”. There are lots of things an author or poet can do with teeth, but here’s what I’d like to do. It’s called “The Ballad of Gravedigger Jane” and it goes like this:

CHARACTERS:

1. Chris Duncan, Political Pundit
2. Gravedigger Jane, Transgender Boxing Champion

PROMPT CONFORMITY: Gravedigger Jane has loosened her opponents’ teeth many times during her boxing career. The same fate could befall Chris Duncan if he keeps running his mouth.

SYNOPSIS: Chris Duncan is a guest speaker at Beachside University and his topic of choice is running down the LGBT community. He gets an equal amount of cheers and boos from the student audience, but things get heated when he singles out Gravedigger Jane for wanting to use female bathrooms and locker rooms and for fighting other female competitors. Instead of taking another minute of abuse, Jane storms down the aisle in an attempt to beat the holy hell out of Chris. The only things keeping her from doing so are the heavy security detail and potentially being blackballed from college boxing if she goes through with it. The more Chris taunts her, the more punchable his face becomes.

FUN FACTS: This story has two sources of inspiration: the MMA community’s bigoted reaction to Fallon Fox in 2013 and Milo Yiannopoulos’s visit to a college campus where he bullied a transgender student in front of the audience. As you can tell, this story is going to push more buttons than an old school arcade game cabinet.

***MASHUP IDEAS***

In a moment of sheer boredom, I came up with ideas for mashup songs. I have no idea how to make a mashup song, but if one of my readers out there does, here are some suggestions you can try:

1. Five Finger Death Punch vs. TNA: “Under and Over Feedback”
2. Limp Bizkit vs. Spice One: “Born 2 Truth”
3. Linkin Park vs. From Ashes to New: “Breaking In the End”
4. Linkin Park vs. Street Fighter Alpha 3: “The Faint Road”
5. Seether vs. Martin Kesici and Tarja Turunen: “I’m Fine with Leaving You For Me Again”
6. Tribe Called Quest vs. Earthbound: “Weird Butter”

***DARK FANTASY WARRIORS***

Ever since I’ve started writing sci-fi and fantasy stories for the WSS once again, I’ve had more ideas for drawings. The latest in this series will be Lux, the control engineer behind Kobra’s illusions in the short story “I Am Death”. She’ll probably look vastly different from how I’ve described her in the canon, but I’ll try my hardest to be at least somewhat faithful to her white dress, black boots, and black mask outfit.

***TELEVISION QUOTE OF THE DAY***

“Who are some of your favorite bands? I like the Various Artists.”

-Adrian Monk-

"A Lion's Tale" by Chris Jericho

BOOK TITLE: A Lion’s Tale: Around the World in Spandex

AUTHOR: Chris Jericho (with Peter Thomas Fornatale)

YEAR: 2007

GENRE: Nonfiction

SUBGENRE: Pro-Wrestling Memoir

GRADE: Pass

From humble beginnings in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada to landing his dream job in the WWE, Chris Jericho details the many hardships and hilarious moments he went through on his quest to be a well-known professional wrestler. As a child, he would watch Hulk Hogan, The British Bulldogs, and the Hart Family on TV and in the arenas dominating their competition and putting on a show. This prompted Jericho to want to train at the infamous Hart Dungeon, where students were pushed to their breaking point with painful submission holds and wrestling tactics. Jericho would continue to gain experience around the world in places like Mexico, Japan, Germany, and eventually in the good old US of A. It was only a matter of time until the Titan Tron counted down the seconds before Y2J’s official entrance into the WWE. A legend was born that night.

If you’ve ever wanted to know what the wrestling business was like behind the curtain, Chris Jericho was more than happy to tell you in his memoir. Every aspiring wrestler had to have an extreme amount of physical and mental toughness in order to take as many athletic risks as they do. Jericho didn’t even have a breaking point when it came to the abuse he took. Knowing how to wrestle was only the first half. The second half of what the industry entails is having the business sense and creativity to negotiate yourself into winning predicaments and having a good gimmick to go with them. Chris Jericho comes off as an encyclopedia of this kind of knowledge, which is one of the reasons he’s a respected legend in the industry today.

Of course, the other thing that made this book memorable was his quick-paced, humorous writing style. He can get away with using pop culture references and one-liner jokes, because neither of those two things bogs down the storytelling. Even the laziest reader could get through all five-hundred plus pages of this book and feel like a champion afterwards. Chris Jericho knows what the people want and it’s a chuckle-worthy and delightfully-honest memoir. An example of his sense of humor comes when he gets in a brawl with a former convict and says, “I’m going to throw hands with you Winnipeg style!” What the hell does that even mean? Yes, the ex-convict was laughing too. If the reader was to flip to a random page in the book, he would find a lighthearted line somewhere in there, even during some of the dour moments of the book. Never a dull moment!

The only gripe I have about this book is so minor that it doesn’t take away from the four stars I plan on giving it. I would have liked to see him go into a little more detail about some of his wrestling matches. I’m sure a few descriptions of the choreography and storytelling wouldn’t have slowed the pace down at all. When I read Ronda Rousey’s memoir earlier this year, she went into full detail about how she beat the crap out of her opponents on the judo mats and in the MMA cage. While Chris Jericho could easily be just as descriptive, it’s not the biggest flaw this book has. In fact, any reader will enjoy it no matter what walk of life he comes from.

Do you like stories about overcoming adversity, toughing it out, and making dreams come true in the end? Look no further than “A Lion’s Tale” by Chris Jericho. It’s fast, intelligent, and hilarious throughout the whole thing. The sorrowful moments are few and far between, but they’re still important to this man’s story and the writing about them was executed perfectly. There are a few people who would be uncomfortable with Chris Jericho constantly praising Chris Benoit (a wrestler who murdered his wife and son before committing suicide in 2007). However, as the author’s not clearly states, this book was published before Chris Benoit’s double murder-suicide, so Jericho had no way of knowing what the hell was going to happen. If you’re really bothered that much Benoit’s presence in the book, toughen up like Chris Jericho has throughout his career. This is an awesome book and you shouldn’t expect anything less from the former six-time WWE Champion and nine-time Intercontinental Champion.

Where to Invade Next

MOVIE TITLE: Where to Invade Next
DIRECTOR: Michael Moore
YEAR: 2015
GENRE: Political Documentary
RATING: R for language and nudity
GRADE: Extra Credit

As America falls behind in education, healthcare, employment, and overall happiness, Michael Moore sets sail to “invade” countries by “stealing” their ideas on how to run society so that he can bring them back to America. In Finland, there is no homework in school. In France, childhood nutrition is of utmost importance. In Italy, taking eight weeks of paid vacation is the law of the land. These, among other stress-relieving ideas, were originally American ideas, but somewhere along the way, we’ve forgotten how to use them. Mr. Moore’s positive attitude toward bringing change to his home country with these now European ideas makes the educational experience that much more fun to watch on screen.

While Michael Moore was shooting footage in Italy, he said something that set the tone for the entire movie in terms of positivity and stress-relief: “I’m here to pick the flowers, not the weeds.” In other words, while he acknowledges that life isn’t perfect in these other countries, they at least got some things right. By “picking the flowers”, Mr. Moore is highlighting all of the positive things about these countries to give the people of America hope for a better day. The overall theme we’re dealing with is happiness among the citizens. When citizens are happy, they’re more productive, they’re more educated, and they learn to take care of each other in a civilized way. In Norway for example, the prison system focuses on rehabilitation and not revenge. They have only a 20% relapse rate while vengeful America has a whopping 80%. Holy shit!

There’s also a history lesson to be learned when it comes to American culture and it was highlighted in Michael’s trip to Germany, where the people take responsibility for their Hitler-tainted past and ensure it never happens again. In America, a country built on Indian genocide and black slavery, it took a few centuries to reinvent slavery and deny racism in the process. After the civil rights movement, black people and other minorities had equal rights. Years later, drugs marketed to the “urban folk” became illegal and minorities started getting locked up left and right. Many of the products we use today are thanks to free labor from the prison system. It’s disturbing as hell and Michael Moore has no problem shining a bright neon light on the problem.

Focusing on happiness and being taught history are both excellent traits to have in a movie, but the one thing that changed me as a human being was suddenly having the urge to travel to and maybe live in other places outside of America. I’ve been on vacation to Canada and I loved every minute of it. But what about Germany? What about France? What about Denmark? Now that I know what exactly is out there, the travel bug bit me like an alligator in the Florida Everglades. Yes, it would mean having to sit on a plane for hours on end, but I’m sure arrangements could be made ahead of time to make crossing the ocean bearable. Maybe there are airlines with beds instead of seats. Maybe I could book a private flight. Maybe I could take a cruise ship across the water. Rekindling my interest in culture and history was something that needed to happen since I’d been out of college since 2009 and I wasn’t taking in enough creative fuel.

Of course, there are going to be some Negative Nancies and Debbie Downers out there who will call Michael Moore’s cinema “bullshit”. I’m sure he’s heard that insult several times throughout his long and illustrious career. Hell, some directors tried to make entire documentaries slamming Michael Moore and his “scare tactics”. To those conservative critics who are so quick to judge, I have three words for you: “Look it up”. Get online and find out just how serene and peaceful Norway’s prison system is. Google just how much respect women have in Iceland since the worker’s strike in 1975. If you’re still steaming mad about what Mr. Moore talks about in his movies, maybe you should go to Italy and take an eight week vacation from work. Feel the stress and unhealthiness slipping away from your pain-wracked body!

"My Heart Beats Pain" by Martin Kesici

I’ve always said that Martin Kesici is one of the most underrated rockers in the music industry today. You can’t find his music on iTunes, his Wikipedia page has next to nothing on it, and whenever you bring his name up in conversation to one of your buddies, they’ll look at you like you have vipers slithering out of your nose.

But never forget that the definition of being underrated is that the person gets less credit than they deserve. When you hear the song “My Heart Beats Pain” by Martin Kesici for the first time, you’ll begin to question why he’s not a worldwide sensation already. It’s a gorgeous ballad about losing the one you love in the form of death.

I’ve only had two girlfriends my whole life and both of them are still living. So why then would I be able to relate to this beautiful piece of rock and roll music? For one, it’s beautiful, so that will get the artist brownie points with me. And two, because for my two ex-girlfriends and millions of crushes, it feels like they are dead.

I could just as easily bring them back to life by talking to them and letting them know how I feel. In order to do that, I have to have two things: a spinal cord and thick skin. I know I have a spinal cord because I can hear it cracking whenever I bend backwards. I know I have thick skin because all of my recent photographs make me look like I’m 400 lbs (I’m much lighter, by the way).

In the figurative sense, I have neither. It takes all the strength I have just to talk to a beautiful woman and I know it will take strength I never knew I possessed to mend my broken heart after they tell me “no”. I have this certainty within me that every girl I attempt to talk to will push me away because of my social awkwardness, my looks, the way I dress, or simply because they don’t feel like it. These are just excuses I use to stay away from lovely women, but that doesn’t mean they won’t be used against me.

My shyness is costing me relationships. My aggression will cost me relationships too. I need people in my life who accept me for who I am regardless of my faults. In the eyes of a stranger, the faults are my most noticeable features.

So whenever I need “My Heart Beats Pain” as creative fuel for my writing, I remember that shy guy romances are one of my favorite genres to work with. Whether or not the protagonists of these stories get what they want varies from story to story. You can’t win them all and when you lose them, you lose them forever. It’d be nice if the shy guys in my stories had a healthy relationship every now and then, but it doesn’t always turn out that way.

Martin Kesici doesn’t have to worry about these things because he’s a rock star. He’s an underrated rock star, but he’s a rock star nonetheless. He still found it within him to communicate the dark side of romance in this gorgeous piece of music known as “My Heart Beats Pain”.

And if you still can’t figure out how to pronounce his last name, it’s “KIZ-ih-chee”. He has a Turkish father and a German mother. Guess where he gets his last name from.

　

***LYRICS OF THE DAY***

“My heart beats pain ever since that day life’s taken you away. But one day, I will be with you again.”

-Martin Kesici singing “My Heart Beats Pain”-

"Maus I" by Art Spiegelman

It’s never been a huge secret that what went on in Nazi Europe during World War II was disgusting on Hitler’s part. With “Maus I” by Art Spiegelman, you get a closer look as to how brutal the dictatorship really was, as told by Art’s father Vladek Spiegelman. Getting a hold of this information didn’t come without verbal sparring between the father and son, not to mention with Mala as well, Vladek’s new wife. Vladek lived his life appreciative of what little he had since that’s how he was forced to live during his time in Nazi Europe. He pinched his pennies and stashed his food, because he knew that any moment, he could be shoved into a concentration camp or killed on the spot like a lot of his relatives and close friends were. All of this senseless violence simply because he was Jewish. Art Spiegelman could have told his father’s story anyway he wanted to. He could have written it in novel form if he so desired, but instead, he chose the route of a graphic novelist. He chose to represent the Jewish people as mice and the Nazi soldiers as cats. I probably don’t have to tell you what that kind of symbolism is supposed to represent. It would be like contrasting dragons to people or spiders to flies. It could be that the reason Art Spiegelman chose to draw Jewish people as mice is because of the harsh way in which they were depicted by Nazi propaganda films. Art would never suggest that his own people were comparable to rats or mice, but he drew them that way to depict a deadly reality that took place in those desolate times. The few happy moments this graphic novel has are far between each other. There is no happiness in a place like Nazi Europe. Just death, destruction, starvation, and hard labor. You know that Vladek Spiegelman survived this ordeal because there are frames of him telling his story to his son Art. You wouldn’t believe that this was a survivor’s tale otherwise. It was that torturous. If this doesn’t depress the hell out of you, you’re probably being poked in the belly like the Pillsbury Doughboy. Buy a copy for yourself and see why Art Spiegelman won a Pulitzer Prize for his hard work.

　

***LYRICS OF THE DAY***

“She sees him laying in the bed alone tonight. The only thing touching him is a crack of light. Pieces of her hair are wrapped around and ‘round his fingers. And he reaches for her side for any sign of her that lingers. And she says, ‘You are not alone laying in the light. Put out the fire in your head and lay with me tonight.’”

-Patty Griffin singing “Not Alone”-