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I need this.
Every track. Ahg.
People are so thick. I draw and draw and I can never find that wideness between the shoulders and front to back. Ribcages are on the same level of awesomeness with hands. The concrete solidity, while still containing the absolute mystery of livingness... I wish I were bigger, so I could see more of it. It is so amazing that the whole thing is full of blood and breathing and it all works just like it's supposed to. Not only does it work, it is beautiful. The ribcage is an art nouveau creation. And it seems so solid, but flexible, but unfragile... unless you look at tiny little people who should have no room for organs... and they're amazing in their own way, but the solidness! Solid. That reminds me of a thing I wrote in Cambridge. It is reminiscence time.
The overriding impression I tend to give, when I observe myself, is one of solidity. I have a solid thatch of ordinary brown hair, a solid plebian frame, solidly packed with the layer of distributed bulk that a well-living mesomorph acquires, and a solid, steady gaze that reflects the firmness of the convictions I hold. However, I often marvel at the very fragility and luck of my life; if just one of my vast array of ancestors had been devoured by a rampaging dragon at the wrong time of life, I would be either someone else entirely, or I would not exist at all.
But my progenitors all escaped their dragons, at least before reproducing. They were undoubtedly solid, too; both sides sturdy peasants, both immigrating from sturdy Western Europe. I think, perhaps, that the strength of the few convictions I have, and the openmindedness I try to entertain about the rest of things, could come from both lines. The fierce independence and territorial instinct of the highland Reynolds ancestors, though tempered by a time of peaceful farming in fertile plans after the trip across the pond a few centuries ago, has revealed itself again in the last generation of civilly disobedient libertarians, who (though quietly) wrought changes in the authority held over them. These independent throwbacks may also have overruled the stifling brainwash of religious training that came before them, saving me from a life of firm belief in the immorality of dancing, cards, and music (for, I know, if I had believed that, I would have believed it solidly).
And then from the other side of my mother's line comes a solid work ethic and sense of efficiency, the Tancry immigrants' decision to work, escape the war, and do something useful. From them, I am a third-generation American, though the Germanic and Slavic propensity for dumpiness and hypothyroidism is all they seem to have left me of their heritage. The language interest is there, too, though perhaps it's reinforced from the other side.
The Stickneys were the only mitigation of the rustic blood I inherited; John de Stickny, lord of the Stickney manor in Lincolnshire, was not a real bigshot but nevertheless apparently accomplished enough to be granted a minor title. Then he, or his descendant William, forfeited it by moving to Maine and Stickney Hill, but perhaps the generations of put-upon New Englanders managed to suppress the latent laziness I seem to have inherited from the only aristocracy in my background, fortified by a comfortably middle-class upbringing. From the very beginning, I suppose one could argue, my puny simian ancestors had to rely on something other than brute strength to get by in the world, so they developed a wrinkly cerebrum. Though I've regained a little animalian strength, and don't hesitate in feminine privilege to use it to carry pallets of bricks out of the van, I've also tried to take advantage of my potential to reason over instinct, when instinct is not a helpful facet of psychology. I find myself making leaps and forming habits that are only common sense to me, while some see them as meaningful exercises of intelligence. And then, there are the therianthropic deviances.
Nowhere in my geneaology can I find evidence of a familial predisposition to be born an animal in a human body, with the use of human facilities of logic, reason, and easy social interaction (well, easy is a relative term, but I am facultatively social). Here is where the enjoyment of instinct can be experienced, while not overriding reason; nocturnal contemplation, wide territorial wanderings, a tropical climatic preference, an alarmingly steady gaze all give a reflection of my feline mores. At the same time, there's no uncontrolled outlash at perceived competitors, or unthinking destruction by accidental strength, as my flexible primate-filtered brain has given me useful solid inhibitions. Time was, even primates didn't have them.
Solid is as solid does, but I am solidly myself. My me is truly mine, as I've said in other words.
Every track. Ahg.
People are so thick. I draw and draw and I can never find that wideness between the shoulders and front to back. Ribcages are on the same level of awesomeness with hands. The concrete solidity, while still containing the absolute mystery of livingness... I wish I were bigger, so I could see more of it. It is so amazing that the whole thing is full of blood and breathing and it all works just like it's supposed to. Not only does it work, it is beautiful. The ribcage is an art nouveau creation. And it seems so solid, but flexible, but unfragile... unless you look at tiny little people who should have no room for organs... and they're amazing in their own way, but the solidness! Solid. That reminds me of a thing I wrote in Cambridge. It is reminiscence time.
The overriding impression I tend to give, when I observe myself, is one of solidity. I have a solid thatch of ordinary brown hair, a solid plebian frame, solidly packed with the layer of distributed bulk that a well-living mesomorph acquires, and a solid, steady gaze that reflects the firmness of the convictions I hold. However, I often marvel at the very fragility and luck of my life; if just one of my vast array of ancestors had been devoured by a rampaging dragon at the wrong time of life, I would be either someone else entirely, or I would not exist at all.
But my progenitors all escaped their dragons, at least before reproducing. They were undoubtedly solid, too; both sides sturdy peasants, both immigrating from sturdy Western Europe. I think, perhaps, that the strength of the few convictions I have, and the openmindedness I try to entertain about the rest of things, could come from both lines. The fierce independence and territorial instinct of the highland Reynolds ancestors, though tempered by a time of peaceful farming in fertile plans after the trip across the pond a few centuries ago, has revealed itself again in the last generation of civilly disobedient libertarians, who (though quietly) wrought changes in the authority held over them. These independent throwbacks may also have overruled the stifling brainwash of religious training that came before them, saving me from a life of firm belief in the immorality of dancing, cards, and music (for, I know, if I had believed that, I would have believed it solidly).
And then from the other side of my mother's line comes a solid work ethic and sense of efficiency, the Tancry immigrants' decision to work, escape the war, and do something useful. From them, I am a third-generation American, though the Germanic and Slavic propensity for dumpiness and hypothyroidism is all they seem to have left me of their heritage. The language interest is there, too, though perhaps it's reinforced from the other side.
The Stickneys were the only mitigation of the rustic blood I inherited; John de Stickny, lord of the Stickney manor in Lincolnshire, was not a real bigshot but nevertheless apparently accomplished enough to be granted a minor title. Then he, or his descendant William, forfeited it by moving to Maine and Stickney Hill, but perhaps the generations of put-upon New Englanders managed to suppress the latent laziness I seem to have inherited from the only aristocracy in my background, fortified by a comfortably middle-class upbringing. From the very beginning, I suppose one could argue, my puny simian ancestors had to rely on something other than brute strength to get by in the world, so they developed a wrinkly cerebrum. Though I've regained a little animalian strength, and don't hesitate in feminine privilege to use it to carry pallets of bricks out of the van, I've also tried to take advantage of my potential to reason over instinct, when instinct is not a helpful facet of psychology. I find myself making leaps and forming habits that are only common sense to me, while some see them as meaningful exercises of intelligence. And then, there are the therianthropic deviances.
Nowhere in my geneaology can I find evidence of a familial predisposition to be born an animal in a human body, with the use of human facilities of logic, reason, and easy social interaction (well, easy is a relative term, but I am facultatively social). Here is where the enjoyment of instinct can be experienced, while not overriding reason; nocturnal contemplation, wide territorial wanderings, a tropical climatic preference, an alarmingly steady gaze all give a reflection of my feline mores. At the same time, there's no uncontrolled outlash at perceived competitors, or unthinking destruction by accidental strength, as my flexible primate-filtered brain has given me useful solid inhibitions. Time was, even primates didn't have them.
Solid is as solid does, but I am solidly myself. My me is truly mine, as I've said in other words.
