five words in reverse order from bodlon

labels, marriage, people, fandom, cake

Cake:
Today I finished the cinnamon chocolate mousse that sandwiches the layers of a chocolate cake and provides a nice outer coating. I need to make the ganache chocolate shell to enrobe the whole thing now. The sad thing is, I don't think I can really eat but the smallest part of it. Ever since the gallbladder thing, cremes and creams and I have been at odds. So if you want a slice of chocolate cake, drop on by.

(I love to bake cakes. The thought of not being able to enjoy cakes as I once did makes me sad.)

Fandom:
I feel really far away from fandom, and that's my own fault. (Because you think I would have learned to initiate conversation and not be so shy by now but no.) I didn't leap into Torchwood when it started and now I'm hopelessly behind. I miss the HP fandom for all the literary discussion, the things I was involved in at various times, for the time and connection to float ideas. I miss that freedom of an open ended canon, and how everyone would scramble to re-write and re-argue their positions after each book came out.

So I think about getting into fannish activities, but my confidence fails. There is also the fact that I've been in a creative desert for two years now and haven't written anything I didn't immediately delete. Or just spend hours staring at a screen, thinking about it. I have the beginnings of a James Bond/Torchwood crossover novel somewhere around here that perhaps I should finish. I'm unsure if there's an audience for that though.

People:
Oh, people. I present as a very cynical person. In part that stems from disappointments and being exposed in various ways to the absolute worst evils people can inflict upon other people.

For almost three years I worked with the state's abuse hotline, where people call to report abuse of children, the elderly and the disabled. (Strangely enough, despite all our shortcomings, Texas runs possibly the best organized and biggest central hotline around.) I heard things there that you might not imagine anyone could actually do, ever. One of the many reasons I eventually stopped working for the state was that I could tell the job was driving a wedge between me and other people - I couldn't look at people in the grocery store, in restaurants, anywhere, without thinking about what they were hiding.

But for all of that, my deepest misanthropy and cynicism springs from knowing that we are capable of so much better. I have seen people rise above the worst possible circumstances to help someone, strangers who took huge risks in order to do the right thing by someone who will never know them or thank them for it. People are capable of so much more, and it shames me when we fail.

I love people and I hate them.

Marriage:
Once upon a time, I never imagined marriage was something that would enter my life. When I was about eight or so years old I had a vision of my life as an adult. It involved living alone, in an apartment with tall windows and pale wood floors and numerous bookcases. But everything I ever imagined was alone. I'm twenty nine and I've been married twice now. Each time it fundamentally changed everything in my life, for better or worse.

There's a lot of reasons to get married, and a lot of reasons not to get married. What they are shows up different every time. It confounds me that anyone has a problem with anyone marrying the partner they choose, regardless of whether it is a civil or spiritual action.

Labels:
Sometimes if there is nothing else, I will read product labels in an effort to stave off boredom. I used to read the labels of the shampoo bottles in the shower and wonder if anyone ever named their kid Laureth.

It would be easier if everything came with a label. Less confusing. But not all of us fit labels, or we need too many of them. I have too many to count now, and almost none of them come anywhere close to telling the story.