sarah HANNAH gómez
about review policy ftc disclaimer resources pour vous
review policy
ftc disclaimer
resources pour vous
tweet
tumble
pin
read
internets i read
my writing elsewhere
My mother likes to tell the story of how my sister, who is mixed but way, way güera , was assigned in elementary school to do a self portrait and colored herself with dark brown crayons, because the children she was friends with were brown, so she assumed she was, too. I like to not think about every time I’ve bought makeup and either bought it way too light because I tend to forget I’m not white, or I’ve bought it too dark because I go, “Oh, wait, I’m black,” but I forget that actually my skin is not the darkest of dark.
Backtrack. Yesterday I found this graphic narrative at Sadie magazine, and while it’s really not about this subject at all, it does bring up an episode from a Babysitters Club book in which Claudia recalls being assigned a self portrait and not knowing what the phrase means. So she draws herself as a colorful butterfly, because that’s how she sees herself, and she gets ridiculed by her teacher and classmates for it. Continue reading →
Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
Share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
Click to print (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
Click to share on StumbleUpon (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
Click to share on Google+ (Opens in new window)
Recently I wrote about how I discovered heutagogy and a love for learning , but there’s another piece to that that I didn’t really mention. One of the things that has made me love learning is the chance to be in classes and seminars with people who are also interested in the same thing. Because no matter how good a professor is, and no matter how interesting a topic is, a course will suck balls if nobody else in the class is interested in participating.
The first place I really had that was my Friday discussions in college; this was a random group connected by a common English adjunct who plucked us from his honors classes because we were worthy, essentially, but we became close friends who bonded over the esoteric readings we were “assigned” and, later, over the things we would assign ourselves after that teacher left campus and the dinners we’d make together, as well as the new artisan beers and wines we’d sample together. That group worked because we were all smart, creative people, all with different interests but a shared love for collectively working things out and posing and prompting questions, as well as an ability to talk in “low” language about “high” things, and vice versa. Continue reading →
I’m not going to say I’m immune to media, because nobody in America is, but I’ve never really been one for dieting or anything crazy. In high school I once managed to stay on the Special K diet for two weeks before prom (I wanted to fit into my first designer dress that my mother had bought for me, because it was a size 0) and lose the weight I wanted to, but telling me to eat cereal is not a hardship, and the irony was that I lost the weight, but my skin was so pale looking that I ended up not looking good in the dress anyway, so I didn’t wear it.
Anyway. Then college happened, and I gained like 20 pounds and barely exercised and had steadily worsening breathing problems compounded by the wrong medication and bad stomach problems. When I was 21 1/2, I realized I was a pound away from having an officially overweight BMI, and that’s when I decided things had to change. Now, two years later, wellness is like a full-time job that never stops being challenging, but at least it’s now become more or less routine. But it easily gets boring, so I’m always looking for new recipes to make me excited about not eating potato chips, and new exercises and fitness magazines to make sure I’m never too bored to be healthy.
I have to be honest, though, and say that I need a lot of outside stimulation to make me excited about not eating out and not taking 24/7 advantage of my Hulu plus account. Much as I hate how dependent we all are on tiny computers that fit in our pockets, and much as I still have ZERO interest in owning a smartphone, one of the biggest things that helped me on my way was keeping a food and exercise diary on Self.com so that I could keep track of how I was doing. I think most of us can be tempted into doing a lot of things if it allows us to play with buttons and typing. Also, quite frankly, and I know this makes me seem more like a communist than the socialist I am, but I totally support any place of employment that requires some sort of commitment to wellness (and I also support those that require their employees–or highly encourage them–to be involved in volunteer or social justice work), because I think when it comes down to it, we all know that we need outside forces to get us to do anything that’s not X-Box or alcohol. Continue reading →
you’re still just caring and trying
tomboy: giveaway and blog tour
alice + freda forever: blog tour and giveaway
because i need accountability like whoa
october reading in review
« Oct
RSS - Posts
RSS - Comments
Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.
Join 1,254 other followers
Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.