Just give me the chocolate and back away slowly.

Valentine's Day. Meh.

For lack of anything better to post (and because I'm still unable to locate my camera cord - boo), I decided to post an excerpt from a paper I wrote for a creative nonfiction writing class I took in college. I stumbled across it whilst cleaning out my closet. I think the assignment was to write something informational, but still make it accessible and entertaining.

Here it is, boys and girls; proof that I could once write my way out of a paper bag:

I remember the first time that I saw Disney’s “Alice in Wonderland.” I was entranced by the speaking flowers and amused by the caterpillar who had such wonderful diction. Then came the appearance of the Queen of Hearts. “Off with their heads!” she cried, and why? Because her roses were white and not red like she wished, despite the efforts of her card lackeys. I’ve often wondered why the Queen was so opposed to white roses. I would certainly have been satisfied with them. Is it because of their significance? Did she despise the sympathy that they represented? Or perhaps, despite her rough exterior, the Queen of Hearts was a hopeless romantic, so wanted the red rose of amorous love. Would she have been as upset with yellow roses? After all, friendship is something everyone needs, and I would think with her tendency to lop off everyone’s head the Queen would need as many friends as possible.

There is another famous fairy tale rose; the enchanted rose under the glass in “Beauty and the Beast.” Yes, it was a perfect specimen, the corolla of its petal perfect, but it was sterile and cold. No one can smell through glass. Juliet understood the importance of scent to a flower: “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” Granted, she was speaking more of lovers and feuding families and less of flowers, but a rose’s scent is its unique signature, the geraniol alcohols and rose camphor rising from the flower center to the nose a way of saying, “I’m here! Marvel at my magnificence!” Women throughout history have tried to steal that uniqueness. About 30,000 rose petals are pressed and steamed to make a single ounce of attar of roses, an oil to be dabbled behind the ears and a little on the pulse points of the wrists. That’s probably why it is one of the most expensive perfume ingredients. Just think of all the poor roses that sacrificed their petals! I imagine that there is an atavistic thrill when wearing rose scent in China – possession of rose oil resulted in execution in feudal times.

Death threats and price aside, who wouldn’t want to – pardon the cliché – smell like a rose? It’s the flower of Aphrodite; presented to her son, Eros, and thus it became a symbol of love. Eros then passed it to Harpocrates, the god of silence, entreating him not to speak to anyone of his mother’s nightly wanderings and subsequent trysts. Poor Eros – to be a dutiful son he had to give away the symbol of love his mother gave him. It’s also ironic that he had to bribe the god of silence to keep his mouth shut.

You know, if I were stuck in a giant paper bag, I wouldn't write my way out of it. I don't think that the paper bag is going to give a hang about a strongly-worded letter. Scissors, yes. A knife or saw, certainly. Words, probably not so much.

To continue (?) with the VD theme, I heard this song on the Bob and Tom Show this morning. I was drinking coffee at the time, which I promptly relocated to my sinus cavities.



Pins and Christopher Walken aside, I had an interview at the University of Minnesota this weekend. I was a bit put out because I wasn't actually interviewed by any of the faculty (my interviewers were a woman from administrative services and the director of the library), but there was a conference this weekend so it was understandable. Minnesota had a lot of the same things going for it that KSU did. I'll be "informed of my status" at the end of the month, so we'll see what happens.