Finding God

I'm always super skeptical about books that I don't pick out myself. There's something about having a book assigned to you that takes all the fun out of it. Now, when a book is recommended to you, or given as a gift, it's different: you still made the choice to actually read it. But assigned books just give off this air of "classicness" that completely turns me off.

I'm not into the hoity-toity book thing. I hate how you go to Barnes and Nobles and they have that whole little shelf just devoted to their Barnes and Nobles Classics editions of novels like Pride and Prejudice and Wuthering Heights, and you just know that however much you loved Junie B Jones, none of her books are ever going to end up on that shelf because they haven't been deemed "literature", or whatever.

The ultimate collection of Barnes and Noble's Classics.

http://www.splendicity.com/thelistmaven/files/2009/10/20091018-barnes-noble-ultimate-collection-leather-bound-books-classics-590x577.jpg

ANYHOW, what this whole introduction (which I could drag out forever because it is something I feel very strongly about) is supposed to be hinting at is that I did not approach Life of Pi with as much a tabla rasa state as I should have. I was thinking more along the lines of "Oh, good lord. here we go. Yet another serious novel about life and lessons and blahblahblah". The first few chapters kind of reconfirmed this idea, but then... I don't know. There comes a point in every book that you read when you realize that, if this book were taken from you right now, and you had to stop reading it, you would actually suffer. I have some first had experience with this, let me tell you. Pathetically enough, when I was little my mom used to punish me not with a grounding, or with no TV, but with taking away the latest book I was reading, whether or not I was at a good stopping point. OH. MY. GOD. Torture. That's what it was. Legalized torture, dealt from the hands of a Puerto Rican mother bent on teaching her daughter a lesson. Only a Puerto Rican mother could be that creative with her punishment. It's like they're trained or something...

I was not feeling the love when my mom took away my books.

http://rlv.zcache.com/i_love_my_puerto_rican_mom_postage-p172805840193372228anrd1_210.jpg

So, I'm completely enthralled with this book, and I get to page 114 and I know it's time to stop, reflect, and shoot out a satisfactory DB before (if energy allows) trying to get in a few more chapters of reading because Canada (CANADIAN PLEASE!) is a cool place, "too cold for good sense, inhabited by compassionate, intelligent people with bad hairdos" (7) and I'd really like to see how this Pi kid got there.

I start out my DB (my first attempt, anyway) with this really strange, scattered praise, and I'm about 300 words in before I realize that I haven't really said anything (which may or may not be happening again with this new attempt, but I'm going with it because it's late and I know where I'm going with this). So, I delete and think about what it was in the book that struck me the most. When I read, I'm looking for real life. Yeah, reading is an escape, and I'm a sucker for the happy endings that all you pessimist out there keep reminding me are full of cheese and painfully unlikely, but still, I'm looking for that element of realism that makes the book, and the ending, however unrealistic it is, relatable to my life. And in Life of Pi, I found this realism in Pi's journey to find God.

Which is sort of ridiculous, actually. I'm not deeply religious in any sense of the word, at least I don't think I am. I have strong faith, I guess, and I'm catholic though and through, but I do find myself, when I sit in church on Sundays, surrounded by tradition and grandeur and stained glass, looking for God. And I hate to say it, but I don't always feel him the most strongly at church. I mean, that's where He's supposed to be, right? Well, everywhere, but most definitely at church, filling us with the father and the son and all that. But as much as I close my eyes and feel and call to Him, there are times when all I feel is tradition and grandeur and no God.

Where is God?

http://top-10-list.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/The-Catholic-Church.jpg

Remember Are you there God, It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume? You know you read it girls. No need to be ashamed. I'm about to quote it, and I am currently 19 years old and in college, so obviously it has a useful ideas in it. Anyhow, if you missed out on this vital part of childhood literary development, Margaret is raised by a Jewish father and a catholic mother, and they decide that Margaret can decide what religion she wants to be. Well, tries out a few different things, but when she comes back from church, she addresses God, saying "Are you there God? It's me, Margaret. I've been to church. I didn't feel anything special in there God. Even though I wanted to" (63). That is exactly what I'm talking about. When I'm church, I'm actively seeking God. But church, and active seeking, aren't always the best ways to reach him, at least for me.

In The Truth About Forever by Sarah Dessen (see, I told you I wasn't into hoity-toity literature), the main character says her dad used to say that making breakfast on Sundays "was his form of worship, and the kitchen was his church, his offering the eggs and biscuits and bacon" (pg 212). And in Anne of Green Gables, a frank and somewhat tactless Anne points out that the minister at her church "wasn't talking to [her] he was talking to God, and he didn't seem very much interested in it, either".

Lots of examples that basically illustrate my point about church not meaning anything, about the importance of finding your own way of getting close to God. In Life of Pi, Pi says that he tried out and practiced lots of different religions because he "wants to love God" (87). I get that. I feel it, every day. I'm looking for him, all over the place, really, and some days are better then others, but what I've found is that I usually find him in the most unexpected places.

Pi was just trying to love God.

http://www.scottburns.co.uk/images/blog/love-god.jpg

I've been babysitting a little girl named Sophia for about 2 years now: she turns 4 in March. I was with her a few Saturdays ago, and I was having a bit of a hard time because I was also babysitting her 1 year old cousin, who wasn't used to being away from his parents. I was trying to calm him down, and finally he fell asleep, and I sat down with Sophia so we could read a bit before she had to go to bed. And it was so beautiful... she had been so patient, all night long, and I thanked her for being such a huge help, and she said something like "He just wanted his mama", and... I don't know. You had to be there maybe, but there was something so... deep about this realization, that she was so in-tune to what her cousin had been lamenting, and that she, an only child, used to all the attention all the time, had been so patient all night long because she got it, she understood what this kid was going through...

I felt God in that room, for some reason. I felt him, and I thanked him.

We Are One

Ok, fun story. I'm sitting at a stoplight, alone in my car. It's about... I don't know, 2 pm? Anyhow, I'm kinda jammin' out a little bit, singing really loudly and dancing as best as I can while confined to a car and strapped in by a seatbelt when it happens: the Witness floats out of my body and I realize, slowly, that I am not alone in this world. I become aware that in each of the cars that surround mine, there is this sort of separate reality, that their lives are going on parallel to mine. And then I remember what Dass said: "separateness is... a creation of the mind" (228). Well. Ordinarily I'd be thrilled by how "unity [was becoming] more real and powerful to [me]" (228), but as my Witness began to bring together all of these separate cars, it dawned on me that people could see me. I stopped dancing and turned, cautiously, to the car next to me. Yeah... there was definitely a maroun van full of children staring at me. GREAT. Aren't I too old for this crap? How is it that I continue to embarass myself in such ridiculous ways?

Stoplights don't mean you're invisible.

http://www.geeky-gadgets.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/eko-stoplight_1.jpg

If I become famous and this story (or worse, a video) ends up on my LAUREN ACOSTA: EXPOSED Hollywood story, I'm blaming Ram Dass.

Skeptical, are you? Don't be. The whole incident was obviously ALL HIS FAULT. First of all, I would never have noticed those kids staring at me if he hadn't had the nerve to tell me about that Witness character who decided to pop up at the exact moment when I was having a private dance party and remind me that it was not so private. Second of all, do you know what song I was jamming out too? Mainstream, you ask? Nope. Alternative, you muse? No. Oldies, you suggest timidly. I wish.

Ever seen The Lion King 2? Probably not. It wasn't the most successful movie Disney ever turned out. But Ram Dass, lovely man that he is, decided to remind me, kindly, of a particular musical selection from that non-award winning film: We Are One.

Let me give you the scenario: Scar had all these crappy lion friends who were all pissed at Simba after he defeated Scar in the first movie, so they were banished to the Outlands, which is just a fancy word for Horrific Termite Infested Place. Of course, Simba's kid, Kiara, becomes friends with one of them (and of course he's a boy and they fall in love and yaddayaddayadda). Anyhow, Simba is less then approving of their friendship so he sings Kiara this song about how he and her are like... the same person or something. I think he was trying to give her fatherly advice about not hanging out with the Outlander kid, but that part was lost on me when I was a child, much as it was lost on Kiara, who ended up marrying the kid. And of course, Ram Dass says "All...is One" (228) one time and I end up in my car singing and dancing to Disney while several innocents look on, probably wondering if I'm what grownups are referring to when they say not to talk to strangers. Awesome. Thanks to good old Rammy, I not only embarrassed myself, but also managed to be lumped into the same subsection of stranger as those creepy old men who follow you around in their nondescript white vans, asking if you'd like to hop and and pet their puppy.

It's like all my wildest dreams came true at one stoplight!

"Fun" story aside, I really do buy into the "we are one" mentality. I don't know if I believe in it the same way Dass does, but I feel it sometimes, you know? You're all going to make fun of me, but do you remember in Avatar, when the main guy talks about the network of energy that the natives believe in? OK. There's only one Earth, right? And we all live here. We don't know everyone on the Earth, but we know that everyone exists together, on the Earth, their lives running simultaneously. What I think of as all of us "being one" is both that we're all people, with emotions and problems and lives and love and loss and all that cheesiness, and also that because we all share this Earth, each of our actions has like... I don't know. A rippling effect, maybe? Like I'm sitting here in my front yeard, tap-tap-tapping way on my computer and absentmindedly pulling up weeds, and it seems like I'm alone, like what I'm writing and doing isn't going to effect anyone, but maybe that weed I just pulled up was exactly blocking a flower seed, and maybe now it will grow, and maybe a deer will eat it but maybe some kid will pick it, and take it home and give it to their mom, who maybe had a really terrible day, and maybe that will cheer her up, and maybe she'll decide to spread the cheer to someone else, who will spread it again and again in a very Pay It Foward manner, all because I absentmindedly picked a weed.

Just so you know what I was referring too with the whole "Pay It Foward" thing. This movie is really great and also heart breaking, and I love the concept so... GO PAY IT FOWARD KIDS.

And the moral of the story is: We are one, so look out the window before being dumb to make sure the other parts of out oneness aren't paying attention to you.

Selfish

OK, so as I was reading what Monsiour Dass had to say about helping and listening and all that jazz, I kept running across these little phrases that just sort of... I don't know... irked me. Statements like "our choice of how to help may turn on personal motivations and needs" (14) combine with anecdotes like the one about teaching a nursery school, where you have to "reconsider where to spend your time" because you realize that you are "fascinated by Mark" (105) and this is selfishly "why you want to work with him" (105) instead of Janet, who you are "not all that crazy about" (105). Emily (because she is an utter genius) sort of talked about this in her last blog too, this notion that often times our seemingly altruistic endeavors actually serve more to fuel and satisfy our ever-expanding egos, or to fulfill our own desires. She also kind of hinted that whether helping others had selfish motivation was irrelevent, because the help was received just the same. Honestly, this whole concept of human beings as irrevocably selfish machines reminds me of this one counselor I had at my summer bible study camp, who just kept going on and on about how humans are horrendous beings of destruction and self-serving and yaddayaddayadda. I'm think she was trying to instill in us a sense of awe at the grace and goodness that is God, but at the tender age of 10, I instead found myself simultaneously depressed at my (apparently) permanently uncharitable nature and offended by her low opinion of me after only 2 hours of acquaintance.

Bible study camp is no camp rock...

http://blog.llnw.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/camp-rock-dvd-cover.jpg

Anyway, looking back and reflecting on the idea of the innate horribleness of human beings, I have to say (much like in my last DB where I characterized humans as essentially good) that I don't quite buy it. I have this stupid theory that some guy invented this whole helping out of selfishness concept because of guilt. Don't laugh: It's a totally plausible story.

Once upon a time, Guilty Guilterson was walking along the streets of Guiltville when he came across a poor beggarwoman. Being the kind, unselfish soul that he was, and thinking of his recently deceased mother, whom the beggarwoman greatly resembled, he offered her a coin, which she took gladly, rewarding Guilty with a showering of profuse thanks. Guilty assured her it was no trouble and walked down the street whistling, happy and proud that he had been able to help and elated at the woman's unexpected gratefulness. Suddenly, he stopped.”WAIT ONE SECOND” said Guilty. “HOW DARE I BE HAPPY WHEN GOOD PEOPLE SUCH AS THAT BEGGARWOMAN ARE STUCK OUT ON THE STREETS?” Guilty felt a familiar stream of (you guessed it!) guilt wash over him. Being the brilliant man we all know him to be, Guilty allowed his guilt to eat at him until he was consumed by it, and at last he decided that he was just a despicable excuse for a human being who had only helped the beggarwoman to gain the happiness that his sick, depraved mind knew would follow his good deed. Essentially, Guilty's initial guilt that he was fortunate enough to be in a position where he was capable of helping the beggarwoman morphed into a monstrosity that was the birth of the notion that help is only given when there is something is to be gained.

Beggarwoman resembling Guilty's mother.

http://www.1st-art-gallery.com/thumbnail/71633/1/A-Roman-Beggar-Woman.jpg

Alright... maybe that was overkill. But I really do feel that this notion that all help is given out of selfishness is as absurd as Guilty's character. I do agree with Ram Dass that there are instances in which selfish motivations do have a role in whether or not we help someone. But I don't feel that this is always the case. I will venture to say though that... I don't know. I hate to say this because it sounds very touchy-feely and naïve, but I think that help given without selfish motivation can be more... not helpful, necessarily, but can give more inner strength to the person who's on the receiving end of the help.

Let's say there're two people working at a soup kitchen. In fact, let's go farther and name them after the classic characters Angela and Diabola. Now, Angela is working here because she has a strong emotional connection to the hungry and sincerely is hoping to make a difference. Diabola, on the other hand, is just doing her required 140 community service hours so that she won't have to do time for that last car she stole. As people move through the soup kitchen line, which serve do you think will make these homeless feel better? You know Angela is going to smile as she serves them. She might even ask how there days have been, or comment on the beautiful weather. Diabola, in contrast, will probably defiantly slap food down on people's trays and wrinkle her nose as they walk by because she DOESN'T REALLY CARE. See? Diabola is feeding people, but Angela is brightening people's days. Score one for Angela, right? I'll bet Diabola gets shunned to dishwashing for her negative attitude.

Soup Kitchen!

http://library.thinkquest.org/03oct/01794/pictures2/gd41.gif

I got the names for this story from this children's book about two twins: one completely good (Angela) and one completely bad (Diabola). Read it if you get the chance because it's super interesting :)

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51DWVMNGTAL._SL500_AA240_.jpg

And the moral of the story is: Help, but don't be selfish about it, because not being selfish is definitely possible.

How Can I Help Discussion 1-19

How do differences between us and others (in appearance or otherwise) cause us hesitation helping them?

http://abcnews.go.com/video/playerIndex?id=7053177 (start at 6:21, then start at 3:50)

“The differences in outcomes of both experiments involving the well-dressed woman and the homeless man in particular proves the mind’s power over the heart.” -Helen, on “Aiding the Fallen”

“Whereas one might say, “Aw, poor cousin Etienne, mais he just got him some bad luck,” the same person might. Identifying others as "not like me" allows us to ignore their needs more easily turn around and accuse the outsider of being a loser and a drunk who has squandered all of his opportunities.” -Molly

Do we have a “helping instinct”, and if so how is it squandered? How can we bring it out?

“Often times, people give aid and help for selfish reason: power, greed, and self esteem.” -Jose

“When I see people suffering, my heart immediately goes out to them. I want to ease their pain and somehow be a part of a solution.” -Helen

“Service—helping out at church, joining Student Council, volunteering at the nursing homes. That is the stuff that we complain about, the stuff that seems forced and at times, annoyingly out of the way. Simply helping someone, however, is so natural.” -Emily

“However, just as we too often ignore the emotional intelligence, we also tend to ignore the callings of the heart. Our mind uses these distractions to hack away at our heart’s natural instincts.” -Chris

“I realized how much this was correct as I pondered about how many times I wanted to help someone but reasoned against it. When I hesitate in a logical fashion, I simply can't help someone...Before one can help another, they must physically, mentally and spiritually be capable of helping.” -Sharad

How do we decide how much and who to help, and how does this dilemma add to out hesitation to help in certain situations?

“It never seems to be a question of "if" we should help, but "how much." Often in our society the desire to help those less fortunate is brushed off with claims that the needy are just lazy or need to help themselves.” -Jose

'

“It’s uncomfortable to realize that you’re not doing everything you can to help your community, especially to someone like me, whose high-mindedness is secretly undermined by the simple fact that I have been blessed with good fortune my entire life. As I reach for my wallet, the thought of “How much is enough? When to stretch a little further?” (Dass, 9) actually stops me, rather than encouraging me to share at least a little of my good fortune.” -Molly

Does helping others brighten OUR day? Does this make helping selfish?

“Taking the time to care for others or make simple helpful choices like recycling paper not only help others but enrich your own life. We all know the wonderful feeling you after volunteering: I was addicted to it and left each time knowing that those I had helped were really helping me in return.” -Katherine

“I rushed over and assisted [a woman] in stuffing [balloons] into the backseat and then closing the door. Wearily, she turned to me with an appreciative smile and said thank you. I could see the appreciation in her eyes and I could almost feel the change in my mood as I headed into the store. I felt elated and lighter. Happier.” -Emily

“Does that make me selfish that I want to make others feel better? I’m not entirely sure I understand Dass’ whole point of view about that. I mean, surely helping a cancer patient isn’t selfish.” -Emily

How do guilt and fear stop us from helping?

“[Carol] said that there has to be a point when you must force yourself to forget the ethical issues behind every decision you make, that otherwise we would be overwhelmingly overcome, constantly guilty and consumed by the fact that we couldn’t do everything right... She wasn’t being harsh or uncaring or saying that we should forget all or most ethical dilemmas, but purely being practical.” -Katherine

“The way I look at it, I can't control the economic standings of people in other parts of the world, let alone people in this country. Thus, I should never feel too guilty about my own lifestyle so long as it is not excessively luxurious or indulgent.” -Jose

“Ram Dass points out that people instinctively try to alleviate another person’s pain. However, sometimes people suppress this impulse because of their fear – fear of being unable to alleviate their troubles, fear of coming in contact with the pain, and fear that their problems will “spill over into the rest of our lives” (59).” -Jade

“Once while I was walking down the drag, I encountered a man asking people passing by for spare change...As my friend and I came upon him... he singled us out... I couldn’t ignore his plea any longer... I’d like to think that I helped out of the goodness of my heart, but deep down I know that it wasn’t just that. Perhaps I acted in fear and self-protection. Maybe I helped to end the man’s frustration as well as to end my discomfort in the face of poverty.” -Helen

“If we find it hard to look “this man asking for money” in the eye, if we find it hard to look the “Drag Rats” and the blind and those in wheelchairs and the dying, those who we pass on a daily basis, how can we expect to deal with those victims of extreme tragedies in a ready and efficient fashion?” - Maysie

Visit the Haiti Table! (thanks to Maysie for letting me know about this!)

When disaster strikes, you can help.

The Volunteer and Service Learning Center has joined efforts with Student Government and the Student Volunteer Board to gather students, faculty, staff and alumni of The University of Texas at Austin to show how Longhorns can support the people of Haiti in their time of need.

Students will be tabling in the West Mall and on Gregory Plaza from Tuesday, January 19 to Thursday, January 21, handing out materials that provide information on how to give.

On Thursday, January 21, UT will host a Moment of Solidarity from 11:30am-1:30pm on the West Mall. Please join us in supporting the people of Haiti and those in the Longhorn community that have been personally effected by the crisis.

For more information on how you can give, please visit the Volunteer and Service Learning website:

http://www.utexas.edu/diversity/ddce/vslc/vol_spot_haiti.php

Inherently...

In eight grade, I had this really horrendous English teacher who's anonymity we will attempt to preserve by calling her Mrs. J. She was horrendous for a multitude of reasons, the least of them being that, after 8 months of teaching me, she still found it impossible to remember my name, choosing instead to confuse me with my best friend, who was about a foot shorter then me in both hair and height. I can't tell you how many times she counted my absent because of her failure to connect my name with my face. Seriously, my mother thought I was cutting class and running around like some kind of a crazy hoodlum because she kept getting those automated phone calls from the school:

BEEP! "Blah blah blah introduction to message YOU'RE CHILD LAUREN ACOSTA HAS MISSED ONE OR MORE CLASSES TODAY WHICH OBVIOUSLY MEANS SHE HAS BEEN DOING HORRIFIC THINGS AND IS HEADED FOR FAILURE blah blah blah closing remarks" (crunkle crinkle click dial tone).

http://www.clearance.net/store/image.php?productid=45569

OK, so maybe that wasn't the EXACT automated message, I'm trying to translate it for you the way my mother heard it.

Anyhow, somehow, despite the fact that Mrs. J seemed to hate me so much that learning my name was beyond her and that class was about as educational as an episode of Hannah Montana, I about to make use of one of her many (and mostly failed) attempts at a class activity. We had just finished reading Anne Frank, and Mrs J, in a rare and most likely accidental stroke of genius, had the class separate according to whether they thought human beings were inherently good or inherently bad. The class filtered slowly to our like-minded sides of the room, a few students standing confused in the center of the room before finally committing to their opinion. About 3/4 of the class had joined me on the side of the room reserved for people who thought humans were inherently good. The remainder stood across from us. Mrs. J (in another unheard of flash of brilliance) had each side explain why they thought humans were inherently good or bad. And it was funny... because when we were trying to explain and support our opinions, it was like we were talking about two sides of the same coin. Basically, you either thought humans were good and did some bad things, or you thought they were bad and did some good things. And the thing is, whatever side you were on, you understood the other side of the argument. In fact, the arguments were using the same evidence: good and bad actions and thoughts. But each side took the sum of these actions and thoughts to mean different things.

Our explanations were like 2 sides of a coin: we were describing the same thing but concentrating on different parts of it.

http://z.about.com/d/coins/1/5/U/-/-/-/coin-anatomy-1.jpg

There were a few instances in How Can I Help where Ram Dass reminded me of this particular activity. He says that "We take pleasure... in what we [do to help]" (5) and talks about the unity that arises from out "innate generosity" (5), citing examples of times when "caring is a reflex" (5). And yet... and yet... he is forced to admit that "all too often, helping isn't happening at all" (9).

There we have it: the good and the bad, lumped together, the inner struggle between "generosity and resistance, self-sacrifice and self- protectiveness" (9).

I don't know what Mrs. J was trying to have us take from that class activity: being the WONDERFUL teacher that she was, she never went any farther with it after having had us explain our positions. But, after having put on my thinking cap and combined the activity with How Can I Help You, I'm thinking that the merit of that activity lay not in the assignment of "inherently good" or " inherently bad" to the human race. I think that the recognition of the good AND the bad that humans posess was more important.

Growing up, you hear over and over again that you can do anything you put your mind to. This is usually accompanied by some awe- inspiring story, which impresses you when you're 5, but fails to impress you by the time you turn 12 because, quite honestly, you've been around the block a few times and you're pretty sure this story is either completely made up or, if true, unlikely enough that you're better off treating it as a fairy tale then believing something remotely similar could happen to you.

The stories that accompany the statement "you can do anything" often seem like fairy tales, much like Snow White.

http://thepartygoddess.com/blog/media/blogs/Food/fairytale.jpg

OK. So it's a fairy tale. SO WHAT. I really, really wish that everyone would just shut up, and pretend that they're 5, and bring tinker bell back to life by screaming at the top of their lungs that they do believe in fairies.

Look. It's obvious that we want to believe the fairy tale, that we want it to be real. Have you watched a movie lately? For crying out loud, Hillary Duff actually decided to make a movie called " A Cinderella Story". So why don't we just decide that it's possible, that the penny we just gave that homeless man on the street won't go to buy him another beer, that if we lend our favorite dress to our little sister it won't come back stained and in shreds?

Fairy tales are hard to believe though, even for me, and let's face it: I'm the queen of fairy tales. So, whenever I'm wavering, I think back to a quote I read in Of Beetles and Angels by Mawi Asgedom.

"People always mistreated the angels, my father said, because the angels never looked like angels. They were always disguised as the lowliest of beetles and beggars, vagrants, and misfits. No matter how much strangers resembled beetles, my father always maintained that they could be angels, given to us by God to test the deepest sentiments of our hearts." (29)

And I know that this line probably brings to mind the hobo in Bruce Almighty, with his cardboard sign that held messages from Morgan Freeman (aka God). But beyond all the cheesiness of the quote, and the Hollywood spin on the idea, the message is nice, you know? And I really feel like if we could just find little ways to multiply on the good part of humanity, we could

1. build a more ethically sound and happy world, and

2. move all of those sad, sad people who think that human beings are inherently bad and there's no fixing our wicked ways over to my side of the room :)

OK, so though I was unable to find any clips or pictures of the hobo in this movie, I have provided for you the trailer, which should encourage you to watch the movie so you can know what I'm talking about :)