Oh! This blog.
Worry not, my faithful followers. I haven’t been eaten by a bear or abducted by aliens or fallen down a deep bug infested hole in the middle of a secluded rain forest.
<shudder>
I’ve been busy. You know, doing stuff.
What stuff?
I’m glad you asked.
The month of May marks the end of my semester and usually goes one of two ways: 1) I am overcome with creativity and spend endless hours either at the keyboard writing like a madwoman or viewing the world through a camera lens snapping photographs of every unfortunate bug and blossom to cross my path; or 2) I am overwhelmed by life, say screw it all, and overdose on trash television.
Sadly, it’s been the latter kind of month, and consequently, my brain is in full-on decomp after watching an endless stream of Ancient Aliens, Married to Medicine (an all-time low for me), and the Real Housewives of Orange County.
I blame science. Specifically, historical geology.
I spent four months immersed in millions/billions of years of earth history- from its origins to the revelation of geologic time to the theories of evolution and plate tectonics. I studied orogenies (the process of mountain building – get your mind out of the gutter), sedimentary deposition environments, bio – and litho – facies, faulting and folding, and learned to age date and correlate rock formations. I can identify a whole slew of fossils based on a laundry list of characteristics. If you ask nicely, I can even give you their kingdom, genus, species and period of existence.
While this is all fascinating stuff, it is not conducive to cultivating creativity – neither is “reality” television. I spent the first 2/3 of May stuck in “left-brain” mode. I couldn’t see the beauty of a rolling field of wildflowers. I only saw an eroded anticline left over from a Mississippian period thrust event. I wondered if it was faulted; if the adjoining basin was filled with terrestrial material; if there was evidence of a transgressive or regressive marine environment; what fossils might be present.
Disturbing, I know.
To combat this troubling trend, I tried to drown my inner geologist with anything and everything offered up by the Bravo network. It worked for a while. Of course, there comes a point when one realizes that consuming junk might be satisfying in the interim, but it lacks sustainability and, in the long-term, is detrimental – sorta like Oreos.
So, what does one do when faced with a situation such as this?
Go to the nearest art museum; attend a historical lecture; read some frivolous fiction; take a trip to the beach.
Kick that “right-brain” bitch out of bed and tell her to get her shit together.
I did. I feel much better now.
Of Bears and Boating 