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Things I Learned (so far) Reading The Bell Jar

Published by Sarah

I haven’t finished it yet, but I don’t have much more.

  1. Sylvia Plath was an unshy, blatant, unapologetic racist. Twain was racist, Dr. Seuss I had heard as well, but Plath shows her work without any qualms.
  2. I need to expand my vocabulary. I am unabashedly in love (I know, she’s RACIST) with her writing. I wish I could write as well as she sans RACISM.
  3. According to Sylvia Plath/Esther Greenwood, hypocrites are the worst. Also, women-haters. One may think she ought to have reflected a bit on that.
  4. I relate to the thoughts that cross her mind when she begins cracking up. I can remember going through my own crises and believing or thinking things were connected that were not, and reading about it from a book published in 1963 is oddly comforting.
  5. I also relate to the lost feeling. She has a way of describing it much better, but just being so tired with life and not really feeling that you will ever be enthused with it or there is any future for you. Running through all the things she could do and trying to find the easiest path to normalcy… until she begins researching the best ways to off herself and experimenting with those.
  6. I am sure this book, if one can look beyond her racist remarks and views, is relatable to a lot of people who suffer from mental illness.

This is a lousy list, but it’s what I got so far. I wish she had written more books as I am not that into poetry. Which is a bit odd and maybe I should reflect on that because I love music and lyrics. So maybe I just haven’t engaged with it enough.

From the Ancient Archives of Old Blogs

Published by Sarah

I found this creative short I wrote many moons ago when blogging was an actual thing people did and would participate in different writing/story challenges. I’m amused.

Smell the Witch (circa 2014)

She woke in darkness. Underneath her was not the bed she had known, but a cold cement floor. The kind of cold you’d feel and wonder if it was wet. She sat up, feeling disoriented and scared. Her hair tumbled down to her elbows in a curly mess. She wiped away her bangs from her face and wondered where she was. A dim light flickered on just then, almost as if trying to show her an answer. One she couldn’t interpret well. She blinked to let her eyes adjust to the light.

The walls around her were of old cobblestone brick and the floor was indeed cement. It was so cold she hugged her knees to her chest. She wanted to scream, but was in fear that it wouldn’t be help that arrived, if anyone did come to her. There was a large door across the room from her, but through the wooden cracks she saw no light. The silence was deafening and she felt as if her eardrums needed to pop. Again she wondered where she was.

Abruptly she heard a noise, but it was so quick she couldn’t detect what it was or where it came from. Fat tears began to well up in her eyes and start to run down her cheeks. As she was crying into her knees, she heard footsteps coming closer and closer. Her body tensed with trepidation of what was to come through that door. She lengthened her legs out in front of her and laid down to pretend to sleep.

The door slowly opened and with it came a noxious fume.

“Molly, dear, wake up. It’s time for your Witch’s initiation!”

Molly sat up with a stir, “But I don’t want to be a witch! Witches stink!”

“So you say, my dear, so you say.”

End.

woman drawing on a white paper with crystals

Astrology

Published by Sarah

If I’m being honest—though it’s rare that I’m not—astrology sounds like bologna to me. I haven’t tried to untangle the trickery of it; I just remember looking up why it’s considered a pseudoscience, and one website mentioned that it doesn’t evolve and that horoscopes are written to feel specific while actually being super general. The same can be said about the supposed personality traits, too.

At the same time, I’ve often felt like a true-blue Libra. I’ve read descriptions of other signs and never felt like they fit me. But I still firmly believe astrology is bunk. Why planets and stars and the moon—if that’s even part of it—and whatever they’re doing at the exact moment you appear in the world would shape who you are as a person is beyond me. And here’s my random side thought: I’ve always wondered if the recorded times are even accurate. Whether someone is born or dies, what if they write down 2:53, but the clock is actually a few minutes off and the real time is 2:56? Does that mean your whole birth chart is thrown off? Or is there some kind of arbitrary grace period built in for sloppy timekeeping?

I don’t know. Right now I’m exhausted from mowing the lawn in what feels like the ninth circle of hell located in Satan’s armpit—also known as Florida summer—while I wait on groceries because my cupboards are bare. I rarely write, even though I want to, and since I haven’t exercised that muscle in a long time, this is what came out in my current delirium.

You’re welcome.