Blair and the Big Blue World

Marc Webb’s 500 days of summer starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel was incredibly popular when it was released in 2009. One of the most memorable scenes from the film happens at the end  when protagonist Tom goes to a party at his ex’s apartment with hopes that his expectations will finally align with his reality. Audiences watched with intrigue and later on horror as the two scenes on the screen that represent what Tom thinks is going to happen and what actually does diverge further and further away from each other. As the two scenes unfold themselves to the thunderous tone of a Regina Spektor Song, it becomes increasingly obvious that Tom can imagine and expect this alternate reality with as much clarity as he wants to, but will still be forced to live in the real one where he doesn’t have the charm, doesn’t have the job, and doesn’t have the girl at the of the day. This scene garnered acclaim from audiences and critics alike because it portrayed a universal exper...

Lately I've been ruminating about why I write, because I do it a lot. Every night I write one good thing about my day and answer a question from a journal that I've been working in for about 5 five years now. Every week I write a journal entry in a series that I started one Saturday morning in September back in 2016 that I call my '! per weeks.' I write screenplays, I write short stories, I write essays. I write I write I write---and I'm proud of it. There is a large portion of my heart that is dedicated to storytelling and all of the joy that it can bring and a large portion of my brain that's dedicated to dreaming about becoming a storyteller. So the cheap answer to the question that I've raised for myself would be that I write because I want to pursue it professionally, but I know that it's a lot more complex than that. During a sunny week in September 2014, I was tasked with a special assignment. It was the first week of fifth grade and my teacher ha...

 From 2015-2018 my Netflix recommended queue had a resident nuisance. I would scroll searching for my newest television endeavor, rolling my eyes whenever my finger absentmindedly tapped on the program entitled  Freaks and Geeks . From the outside the show looked like something that I would adore. It had gritty looking 20 year olds playing teenagers and plot points that dove into situations that I had no reason to relate to and no ability to truly comprehend. However watching the pilot one afternoon in 2016 I quickly came to the conclusion that the show was "boring as hell"---my diary entry from that day. So from then on I avoided it and vowed to never waste another set of 44 minutes of my time on it again. I kept that vow close to my heart for 5 years until I broke it yesterday by re-watching the pilot and, surprisingly, falling in love wi th it.  I've watched 10 episodes the show in the past 24 hours and I'd be watching it right now if it weren't for my crippl...

  Complaining is America’s underrated pastime. It is an easy enough thing to do:  you find something that is dissatisfactory to you in your environment, figure out how to vocalize your complaint in a way that makes you seem insightful, observant, and just the right amount of sassy and finally, find somebody who is  willing to listen. Bibbity bobbity boo. However not all complaints are the same, and not all people complain with the same intentions. There is a difference between somebody voicing their dissatisfaction with the unfair treatment of people working in the textile industry and some chick being annoyed about how cold it is in her chemistry class. And yet, they are both connected at their cores as being something so instinctually human that it is often trivialized. Picture this: two men are standing outside waiting for something neutral---let’s say a porter potty, and they have been in line long enough for their silence to be awkward. Man #1 looks up at the sky an...

Corinne Bailey Rae has existed in my universe for as long as I can remember. My parents were music snobs back in the day and only allowed me and my sisters to listen to what they listened to in a  (successful) attempt to make sure that we all picked up their taste. Growing up I heard a lot of Prince, a lot of Sade, a lot of Billie Holiday, and a lot of Stevie Wonder. And while all of those artists have a special place in my heart none of them have stuck with me the way that Corinne Bailey Rae has.  Corinne Bailey Rae's self-titled debut album came out in 2006 when I was 2 years old. My family was still a family of four, we hadn't moved to the suburbs yet, and my father still had all of his hair. Things were different. I don't what hearing CBR's music for the first time felt like (re: two years old) but I do know that I heard it all of the time. It played during road trips down to Mississippi, while my mom cooked dinner, while me and my older sister slept. That a...