I am eating Fruit by the Foot and it makes me strangely happy.

As I've mentioned before, this blogging every day project is not going to contain too many action-packed posts. But I need to get back into the habit of writing every day. I can't really call myself a writer if I don't write something or attempt to write something every day. Unfortunately, writing is not a glamorous passtime. And so some days I will only have this to write, pointless ramblings.

What is the point of writing anyway? Throughout history visual and auditory stimuli have been privileged over the written word. They say the pen is mightier than the sword, but our society certainly doesn't hold up this assertion.Wars aren't fought through letter-writing. But I think the modern world's preference of action is misplaced. Reasoned action can only come through organization and understanding of internal thought. Writing is active thinking, it is cognitive action as opposed to physical action.

Why do we judge Hamlet so harshly? Because he's the hero who can't act. He spends the whole play thinking, fooling with words. But when he finally does take action, the audience is forced to watch everything go horribly wrong. And when we think about the play, we shouldn't ask, why didn't Hamlet act sooner. We should ask, why did he act at all when clearly he had not fully understood the complexities of the reasons for action. Shakespeare is asking us to consider the significance of acting* because action means nothing without a fully realized thought process.

I am twenty years old, a college student, and the daughter of two hard-working parents. When I say that I want to be a writer, my parents say, "That's nice. And what else?" I could say that I wanted to be a trapeze artist and it would be easier for my parents to comprehend because at least I would have a physical skill. I would be doing something and they would be able to see my life's worth through the visual, tangible proof of my physical action.


Now, as I promised, I will take a moment to move out of my head (and the murky, tangled forest of my thoughts) and into the real world. I do in fact live in a physical world and I live a life of experiences. So here is a bit of my day:

I made my own trail mix. Perhaps this makes me nauseatingly hipster/liberal/vegetarian but I am not moving to California anytime soon. It is not a particularly unique trail mix. Basically, I mixed honey granola, almonds, dried cranberries, and dried blueberries together. Now, I am going to eat this healthy, home-made snack as I watch Grey's Anatomy**.

*Interestingly, this is complicated by the fact that we are experiencing the play through the performance of actors (professionals of false action).

**The most unhipster/mainstream show on TV and I am not ashamed to say that I love it. I cried during last week's episode (yes, the musical episode that everyone said was horrible cheesiness). I have all the seasons on DVD and I am re-watching the whole series from the very beginning because I am a loser with no life.