I should at least pretend to be objective.

Singles are always relieved to be single again, even if that's all they've ever been.

Don't ever imply that a single is unhappy with their current relationship status or they will be forced to scream defensive, Oprah-reminiscent statements at you until your ears bleed and you truly believe they're "independent, happy and healthy", much like 2+2=5 and that we have always been at war with Eurasia.

Single people require you to listen as they list the reasons their previous or potential partners are all wrong for them and they are waiting for the "real deal".

If you have found the "real deal", it is not helpful for you to describe it and how you achieved it to them or to try to aid them in finding it for themselves. Like shoe-tying, finding true love is something people must do on their own.

Singles do not expect your pity. Rather, they expect many opportunities to meet friends of your partner and "socialise" in a "fun, harmless" way. This is your obligation as a happily coupled-up person, much like paying taxes when in a high-income bracket.

To remain single is always a choice. Always.

Don't take a single's word for it when they tell you that "nothing happened" with that cute person before they then smile coyly and walk away. It is necessary for the survival of your relationship with said single person that you neither believe nor disbelieve them. You must then take on the task of badgering them constantly for "details" about their encounter very seriously. These heavily choreographed and scripted conversations about non-existent flings are bread and butter to bored singles.

"Meeting people" really is as hard as singles say it is. The fact that you've "met someone" should always be put down to luck because if it's based on merit, timing or maturity then singles really have something to worry about.

Being single is something people "love" but don't ask them to use the l-word in any other context; it may force them to admit that there are relationship statuses they appreciate more than their current one.

Nothing sets a single off like the l-word, Valentine's Day and news about weddings. Especially the last one. If you're getting married and your friend/sibling/co-worker is feeling a bit fragile already, sometimes it's best to just not tell the single at all. Walk yourself down the aisle. It might encourage some empathy.

Singles understand relationships, they just don't want one. That's why they're still openly pining for their previous paramour a year after the split. They're happy alone.

People who are single avoid relationships because it would take time away from their career and plans. Things that are too much fun to cut back on.

If a single tells you they've been really busy with other things lately, smile and nod. They need to think so. Really.

Single people take the time to enjoy life in many ways. One of the best ways to do this is talking (or writing blogs) about how great it is to be single.


Tune in next time for Stuff Sarcastic People Like.

Couples' Law.

Couples believe it is very important to be overly public and mushy about their romance. This is because such behaviour made them very uncomfortable when they were single so it's important to alienate others now they're coupled up. It's not hazing if kissing is involved.

Couples get depressed when they can't be physically touching or sitting next to each other.

All couples need to make use of generic nicknames for each other and cliched descriptions of their happiness because every couple's love is both uniformly perfect and unique.

Couples can never "help it" and thus need to be treated with more sensitivity and respect than individuals.

Long-term couples are allowed to take a disproportionate amount of offence to the allegation that their relationship comes first and their friends second.

Once in a couple, there is no reason to assume that friendships that predate the relationship cannot handle the addition of an extra person at every meeting.

When a couple becomes two singles again, it is legitimate to contact (former) friends for the first time in months or years with an interest to "catch up". Any negative reaction to this action is uncalled for, irrational and hurtful.

Couples are always right. You can be sure of this because there are two of them and one of you.

There is no correct way to deal with a couple being physically affectionate for a sustained period of time right next to or in front of you. It is best to cease existing to avoid a) offending said couple or b) projectile vomiting.

It is never insensitive for a couple to be physically or emotionally intimate in your presence. It is the right of those "in love" to share such a beautiful bond with everyone else.

Couples reserve the right, after any of the aforementioned public displays, to say they don't want to talk about personal matters. After this statement it is not acceptable to laugh or roll one's eyes.

Anybody who is irritated by a couple or couples, regardless of their own relationship status, is just jealous and bitter.





Monogamists are optimists.

To the well-organised mind.

I'm going through a massive Harry Potter phase right now which makes me wonder about a whole lot of stuff I've never really figured out. I consider myself a part of the Harry Potter generation (as opposed to say the Star Wars generation, or the Flower Power one, or Elvis, or some other cultural marker-related age bracket...) and it seems entirely regular for people to define themselves through something that they feel gives their life more structure and meaning. And often that's a movie, book, musician, celebrity, political figure, artist... But what does that mean, really? These are all such haphazard elements added to our lives through chance encounters and the contributions they make to our states of being are so variable, how can we judge them as so important? Especially considering the gravity of so many other occurrences in our lifetimes and the comparatively lesser attention paid to them. All the while the contemporary culture of the day, or even retrieved relics of bygone eras, are- sometimes solely- invoked to characterise our existence. I relate the feelings I have toward Harry Potter to my childhood, the people around me, and the messages and morals I feel are relevant to my consciousness and lifestyle. But in a hundred years we'll all be dead and what will it mean then? Why is it so important to me to define myself through this thing that's so irrelevant in the Grand Scheme of Things?

This is not a new question. I think most people have wondered about things like this from the time they fully comprehended their own mortality, for some of us it wasn't for a long while and for others like my younger sister it was when they were around six. And there is that ever-lingering question in everything that we do; why else the emphasis on not procrastinating, and being happy, or experiencing love? We are constantly told to spend our time wisely. Nothing is precious unless there is a finite amount of it. So it is curious to me that we choose to spend our time so differently, or even more interestingly, in the same way. If you added together all the hours people my age had spent reading Harry Potter or watching the film adaptations (not to mention talking about it), you could create a lifetime for every character mentioned in the series.

Is it positive or negative that something so superficial- a woman's imaginative narrative- has absorbed so much of our time, captured our attention so much more than fleetingly? Should I be happy or proud of being obsessed with another person's words and mind for years? The inevitable follow-on from worrying about this is; if not a children's story, what is worth spending my thoughts and moments on? If I'm worried about being remembered as part of the group who worshipped tales of a bespectacled wizard, what would I feel more comfortable with?

And I don't have an answer to that. If it comes to leaving this life knowing my contribution was as yet another voice praising J.K. Rowling, even at nineteen or ninety when I should surely have grown out of reading about Harry's antics, I think I'll be satisfied with that. I don't know what the meaning of life is or how I was supposed to spend mine, but the human experience is so complex and the desire, shared by the Bronte sisters and Virginia Woolf and even this far, far less brilliant girl, to define oneself by the writing you adore, feels too comfortable and comforting for me to deny. When thinking about all the great deeds I could be doing with my days, I find motivation to wax poetic about Potter pandemonium far more readily than that to do anything else.

And, mortal or not, who am I to deny nature?

Agora.

My discovery that there was a movie of Hypatia's life was something of a surprise.

The film adaptation made by Alejandro Amenabar, starring Rachel Weisz as Hypatia, is simply extraordinary. I was excited and frustrated when I learned of the existence of this film because it was there but I couldn't see it. As is heartbreakingly, unbearably, gutwrenchingly common in Australia, we didn't receive this film until long after other audiences had seen it. Agora is getting a very limited cinematic release in Melbourne a full year after its world premiere. As a pop culture addict and spoilt brat, having to wait for any length of time for... anything to do with the media- is absolute death. Worst of all, when forced to wait long enough, I convince myself to forget about the whole thing and repeat an inner monologue along the lines of "I don't care all that much anyway." And if I had kept with that way of thinking I might have missed out on this mind-blowing film. Luckily my mother wanted to see it and also desired company. I was more than happy to oblige.

The movie is extraordinary. I was captivated by Rachel Weisz as I always am but there is always an air about her that there is something she's not telling you and that was absolutely essential to a character as inherently inscrutable as Hypatia. The script and direction perfectly mirrored her focus on something bigger, broader and more mystical than potential suitors and religions nitpicking each other's shortcomings. I love that Hypatia was imagining things so beautiful in the sky and in the mind that obsessed and enchanted her but she was accused of being too rational, too questioning, and incapable of believing in anything. Truly, though, there is nothing more fantastic than the theories she put her faith in. And she knew that every step of the way which is why she told one of her former students, now a bishop: "You don't question what you believe. I must."

There are so many messages in this narrative. A discussion of the persecution of intellectuals and what a society loses when it cuts down those who seem to know so much more than us. The fear demonstrated in that action and the uselessness of taking a person from the world for the small reason that they disagree with us. Which bleeds into the other warning about the dangers of fundamentalism of any kind and of religious intolerance leading to the damaging or eradication of other cultures and people.

The film demonstrates how passion of any kind is stunning and essential to a satisfying life. And, therefore, beauty is what we make it. Hypatia's love affair with the stars, the "wandering" planets, the sun and the earth's relation to it all is startling in its vivid invocation of emotion and an irrepressible desire to be closer to her beloved, only ever glimpsed at a distance; the answer to her mind's endless queries. Her good-natured struggle with her intellect's own shortcomings and final victory over her own close-mindedness is a lesson she is not the first to teach us. We can all make the choice to better ourselves, pursue a larger story than our own.

But, similarly, we are shown that obsession and fear and ambition can also turn us into larger entities, but not ones we can be proud of. Especially when we ignore the reverence for life that defines people like Hypatia, we are truly lost. The movie depicts weak or disadvantaged individuals who are susceptible to the mob mentality, who find peace in the deindividuation that religious or other groups can allow them, and are convinced of the validity of their destruction of others. Being part of the majority does not prove that you are right, especially if you are doing things you would consider evil if done by others- like they may once have done to you.

Which is another thing I respect about the film. It does not singularly demonise the Christians; it is as equally unimpressed with the initially smug and arrogant Pagans when they are in power. Whoever is in government sees it as their duty to punish or kill others for their perceived ignorance and only when they are thrown from their previously comfortable positions do they acknowledge that the needless violence and exaggerated sense of pride and honour was wrong. Even Hypatia herself is not perfect; a product of her time, she is prone to undervaluing and mistreating slaves. Her affection for her personal slave, Davus, does not stop her from insulting him or taking advantage of him. The director and actor's depiction of Davus' unrequited love for his mistress makes the audience feel more keenly the cutting nature of her bigoted remarks.

Aside from her personal shortcomings though, Hypatia is something bigger than either her beauty or her worship of knowledge. She is a symbol of feminine defiance, in many ways. The most obvious manifestation of that is her refusal to marry or take a lover, though in the film she is given at least one very suitable match in Orestes. Rachel Weisz imbues her character with a sensuality and conflicted nature, invoked especially in her interactions with Orestes. The dialogue allows her to muse on her choosing learning above love and where that has lead her- although, fittingly, she interrupts herself to continue researching and inadvertently answers her own question. Her independence as a woman in Alexandria hinges on being unmarried and allowed to teach and speak as she pleases without a husband present to clap a hand over her mouth, and her independence as a thinker hinges on her being free to imagine rather than entertain or have children or keep a home.

More than just her sexual identity though, Hypatia exhibits typically feminine traits in other dissident acts. Her sometimes lone hatred of war, violence and cruelty in the film could be characterised as a woman's hysteria but, in fact, it is what makes her the most human of any of the other characters. Her consistent pleas that mercy and reason be used to resolve arguments are what are now considered key elements to a civilised and fair society but were- then and even now- dismissed as soft, maternal ideas that inhibit progress and even justice. Hypatia's ideals of peace and tolerance are her most rational.

The destruction of the Alexandria library, then the largest in the world, was harrowing. The most depressing realisation of the scene, with scrolls being torn and burned, was that the event has taken place a thousand times since then. A pre-existing love of knowledge is still perhaps the first thing to be outlawed in reborn societies and the use of force to overthrow passive institutions continues to be one of the most distressing and repetitious tactics used by humans. This scene was, next to Hypatia's death scene, the film's single most disturbing moment if only because of its epitomising the overall theme of a film focussed on the tragedies of intolerance, violence and war: waste.

This blog has gone on ridiculously long but I needed to write it. I just needed to. After seeing the film this afternoon, I felt like I needed to talk about it all. If only to myself. I was impressed by the writing, the cinematography, every single one of the actors, the epic scope of some scenes matched with the heart wrenchingly small details of others. The moment where Davus disobeys everything he's ever been taught just to touch Hypatia- her foot, actually- as he has probably wanted to forever. The theories being formulated by curious students and teachers in bare feet and Roman dress compared with the realities we "know" now- although to follow Hypatia's lead, we should always question that. The overwhelming violence of the battle scenes overshadowed by the fervor of religious extremism.

I love that this movie was made. I love that this was made by a man about a woman so impressive and complex that after another millennium has gone by a schoolgirl like me will fall in love with her and want to know more about her and for everyone else to just know her- she will want all of this just as desperately as I did.

the "Come Home" Blues.

This is what my best friend has dubbed my current melancholy. She's right, I suppose; these feelings are of a completely different texture to those I experienced while away or before I'd ever set out on that trip. I drift between a desire to be working and at university and spending time with people and a desperate need to engrave the shape of my silhouette into my mattress, sink into the hole and never leave it, just sleep and read and journal and watch TV and listen to music without ever having to exit my fetal position pose ever again.

And although my depression is unique, the urges it gives me are by no means similarly individual. It sucks that although every person in the world that has ever felt unhappy had their own reasons, they all fall into the such narrow categories when it comes to how they dealt with it. But we all want to be seen as different. Sucks, doesn't it?

So while I could continue to characterise myself as a reluctant cliche (but then, consciously or unconsciously, that is always how I will come across), I actually wanted to write about some other stuff, not just my dark days and inability to find a job.

It is nice to be back on this blog though. I left off in such a horrible way which is sort of the proof I needed that my overseas trip was necessary. To recap: trip was good but hard sometimes, person I mentioned in my eight-month old last post is still letting me talk to them and family is still deliciously dysfunctional. And I mean that. My family are exactly the same as when I left but somehow I think I'm a little different, like an identical twin that is exactly the same as their sibling DNA-wise but still likes to part their hair to the other side. I promise better similes in my future posts.

Anyway, things are crazy right now purely because things aren't crazy. I have absolutely nothing going on. For the first time in my life, I'm not moving in any direction. No school. No work. No plans. No prospects. Sorry, that last one was rather Jane Austen. But basically, I am adjusting to being a Lady of Little-to-do. I would say "leisure" but that costs money and I have absolutely none. I am going to spend my summer reading library books, eating hummus straight out of the tub (or bowl) and browsing Melbourne markets where I can afford nothing, before riding into the sunset on my bike that I will abandon if it breaks because I have not the money or the means to fix it.

Who said I can't have a happy ending?

I just want you to be happy.

It's an unusual feeling, the one you get when you outgrow a friendship. I feel nauseous all the time when I think about it, there's no other way to be. Along with fears of abandonment, conflict and exclusion; also present in my heart is a fear of love. I could spend years discussing if my issues with both friendship and romance are a result of my upbringing or just my own persona, divorced from any external influence. But the reality is that I have to break someone's heart and my own and it's not the first time. I have a friend who put me on a pedestal and loved me more than I ever deserved. I, in turn, idealised them and treated them as cotton wool to shield me from the world. They built me up and both believed in and tolerated me at the very best and worst of times for me. When I was younger I needed someone to be that for me and for the longest time I thought I still needed that.

But I sabotaged that friendship recently; I have to believe out of a concerted desire to just bring out our demise rather than dread it any longer. I feel like an actor in our relationship because regardless of how much I love my friend, I don't love what I become every time I am around them. I regress and I allow their high opinion of me to make me obnoxious, too comfortable and too smug. I don't think our friendship is real anymore and it hasn't been for a while now. We're both putting on fake smiles and I think I'm figuring out why.

My friend loved me. Was in love with me. And, as arrogant and conceited as this may sound, will always at least remember those feelings when they look at me. In a sick way I think I have always known that and for a long time I enjoyed knowing I could be that sort of figure to someone. I've never been in a relationship, partially because nobody I have ever wanted has ever wanted me back and partially because I am incapable of dealing with emotions the way most people do. I think this friendship was a pseudo-relationship for me and the longer that I protested that everything was fine the more I realised that it could never be. Because though- at least for a certain period of time- I enjoyed the way my friend looked at me; I can't sit across the table from somebody who sees me that way. I never could. I ran from somebody I could have truly loved because of my inability to be held in that kind of mythical esteem by someone and I have run from more than one person who could have been a great friend to me for the same reason.

I feel sad that this might reflect the way I'll behave for the rest of my life. I am not behaving rationally or regularly and that may become a pattern I never break. I don't want to be idolised and I don't want people to put me in the centre of their world, not even in a good way (ha, as though there could be one). I am hypocritical because I have obsessed over people and loved them just as much as I claim to have been loved. How would I feel if my victims told me they were as unwilling as I am? But I can't help who I am and that is someone who is squiriming all the time because she exploits those who need her because it's the only way she knows how to be and it's hurting her, too.

Mostly I want my friend to be happy. They're amazing and they will have a great life with or without me. It's time to not be friends anymore, at least for a while. I am sorry for my inability to tell them in any softened way and for the way this realisation has happened but I can't apologise for what I know is the right thing. We stopped being good for each other a while ago and though I could continue pretending for our sake or our other friends' sake, I won't let my life be a shadow of what it could have been because I continue to make decisions based on other people rather than myself. I owe us both the opportunity to grow up. This is not an opinion I wish to discuss or defend or alter. It is one I have fought enough myself. It's time to articulate it and move on.

If I wrote "Mission Accomplished" as a closing note, the irony might just kill me.

Yippee ki yay.

My family continues to be a powder keg. Sometimes I think I'm the flame retardant standing by and sometimes I think I'm the spark. Friday night saw more yelling and slamming doors. Shelley's apartment today smelled like the holiday units we've stayed in during previous summers. I remember those places as neutral environments that acted like blank canvasses, clean slates, somewhere for our family to be different than we were before. And every year we'd come home again and find ourselves unchanged and miserable as ever, always one moment away from blowing up. I spent this weekend wondering whether, while I'm gone, my father's juvenile behaviour will subside in the face of my sister's indifference and mother's exhaustion. What do I do for my family dynamic that I will not be here to do for the next few months?

Andrea has taught me that the key to a good action movie is explosions. I guess I wonder if my actions, in leaving or just being a part of this family, make me the villain or the hero. And whether the aftermath may justify the lighting of our fuse.