Decorations and Willpower

As I start putting up the Christmas lights onto the whole side of my building, I realize that this year, I do not seem to have as much enthusiasm and willpower as I have in the past, for my more favorite holidays - Halloween and Christmas. I did not even put my lights out for Halloween, the two decorations I did put out, I did not bother plugging in. But the Alien loves her christmas lights, her Christmas Tree, and her Christmas decorations. And that is as far as the Christmas spirit goes. Christmas ends when Christianity gets involved. Three large totes full of decorations get dragged out of the closet and from under the bed. Perfectly rolled up strands and extension cords get pulled from the depths of the totes, to be unwound and put into a perfectly laid plot of design for a big brown box of a building.
My neighbor lets me decorate her side, and she contributes a strand or two to the plan, but lets the Alien do the hard work - and usually the Alien does not mind. This year however, the Alien's willpower seems to have floated away in the wishy washy world this year, and I look at these totes, these plans...with a sigh of annoyance at another year I must do it. For my own love of it, I must do it. Last year, a beautiful layout came out of days worth of planning and scheming all for the love of using every possible christmas light the Alien has collected over the past few years. This year it seems like a chore. All this leads to the question: What happened to my willpower, and my love of the holidays? What has the Alien lost this year? How can it be regained? This is a question I have no answer for. It is a sobering, humbling thought that willpower is so easily lost over the span of a year.

The Alien Political Divide.

As I have learned more about the rather alien ways of the political world, I have finally begun forming an identity, politically speaking, that sides with only one of the two political parties of any serious note in this country. Now usually the alien hates speaking of politics, knowing that it only leads to arguments, but since the coworker I mentioned a little while back, I felt it necessary to post my thoughts.
What are Democrats? What are Republicans? There are no documents readily available on the internet which pin down (without leaning to one side) what each party truly stands for. It was hard for the alien to pick a particular party, and therefore, she started from the very beginning.

What are humans? Some would say that we "are" a mass of particles which have gained intelligence and meaning by having life itself. Some would say we "are" a creation at the hand of a omnipotent God, in Hir image. (I am not misspelling that word.) It doesn't matter to me in this article, but I shall take the role of "we are". But I don't want to know what we are made of. I want to know what we, stripped of all sociological and educational background, what we are. Who would we be? The common idea widely accepted, is "cavemen", or "adam and eve". Not to shy away from the "adam and eve" people, here I shall take the other word in explanation. Cavemen lived solidarily, or with a small group of close family, if any. They hunted for their own food, they used the fur for warmth, and learned how to make fire.

The essential person. The essential needs : Take care of oneself and one's family. Over time, communities formed out of necessity, or lack of space, or lack of food or shelter, and partnerships formed from them. Trade began to take place. The essential community: Take care of others - fairly. These primitive communities also took care of their young and elderly, those who could not fend for themselves yet, or could non longer do so but had the knowledge of experience to be a elder. Another form of trade this was, as the elder in younger years cared for the young, now the young return the favor by providing for the elders. The essential knowledge: Pass on what you know to younger generations, trade is necessary.

What has changed about the current person? The Essential Person has not changed. The Essential Community- has. The Essential Knowledge - has. Almost as if we are back at square one, we know we must maintain the Essential person, but the rest can go to hell, it is only the Essential Person which matters. This is already sounding decisively Republican. It is not, as Democrats are the same Essential Person.

The Democrats haven't forgotten the Essential Person. They also haven't forgotten the Essential Community. (Both political parties (and the American Society as a whole) have forgotten the Essential Knowledge - building a higher knowledge onto a crumbling foundation. To the Alien, it only makes sense as to why the young of today are seemingly out of control. That's another story.)
My essential person is not a business. My cells and particles do not make money. One could argue that the brain does, but if that were the case, all human, and quasi-human brains would as well, which is not the case. I believe in fair trade (although like most, I hope that luck throws a bit more in my direction sometimes), I do not believe that large businesses can control the Essential Human. I believe in government of the people, by the people, where we take care of those who cannot take care of themselves, help people get on their feet, and all be local, not nationwide. I believe in the notion that education must be given more to create stronger platforms for future higher learning.

The Alien is a Democrat.

Blizzard and the Creativity of the Mind

Let it be known now. The Alien is a gamer. Game drug of choice: World of Warcraft. Now generally, I am not the type that would be seen as a gamer, ask my friends. I seem like someone who is perhaps more attuned to being a bookworm who would rather be at work than at home, and truthfully I'm not sure what else - the Alien is different, by far, than your standard white American female.
The Alien is addicted to World of Warcraft, however, for the past year it has been an addiction to healing, as I focus more on raids, instances, and questing. I would rather heal a Raid than club things to death. With the advent of the new Expansion, which, admittedly, I did stand out in the cold for two hours, to get right when it released, ( I had never done a 12 am release before, and it was rather fun.) this seems to be changing.
For playing a Death Knight till level 58, was the most fun I've ever had in this game. Despite my goody-two-shoes life in WoW, the innocent slaughter of citizens was a touch hard to get used to, however soon I found myself liking it. The starting area was creative and the quests and text written in such a way that you began to understand the Scourge, the Lich King, and the totality of the DK's existance. Then the ending battle began, and the "grip" of the Lich King was lost (the grip of the LK over all of the DKs). At that point, my character was in shock...and I realized that if anything, this would be my second Roleplay character, as instantly I had mentally created a back story, a life, a death, and a rebirth of the character, seemingly out of nowhere, even thought none of that was part of what I had just witnessed in the game. The text and happenings in the game seriously almost made me do this, almost as a compensation for the release of the grip of the LK. I would have thought it part of the game if it wasn't ALL in my own head. My first thought: Blizzard. You win at creating games. When what they do to make the game creates this instant creativity, out of nowhere, it changes the entire way you play a game.

My Death Knight is going to get some serious play time this week. After all, it is my vacation.

Saga and Continuing

Thankfully, though I worked with the one whom I shall call the political tiger, she did not take the opportunity to talk about politics with me, although I did walk in on a minor conversation with my other coworker about their sadness. She apparently took her anger at Obama's win, out on his picture, which she then posted on her door. She is perfectly allowed to take out her anger any which way, as long as it harms none. I did not say a word, but do plan on confronting her should the topic be raised again against the alien.

Now onto tonight's thoughts.

A few days ago, the alien had wanted to start a blog, however could not figure out a good name that was not already taken on this blogging site. I gave up for the night after trying many variations of names that did not sound as if a tween-ager had created it in an attempt to sound cool. The next day, I found that my best friend had had the same idea as I - and she succeeded as she had a very unusual name that was not taken. Coincidence 1.
Yesterday, I was thinking about the people I was currently working for, and whom they had voted for. I had pegged the man as being a Republican and the woman as being a Democrat. Asking them later on, I was found to have pegged them correctly, despite the republican-feel that they generally gave off. I call it Coincidence 2.
As I was driving from job to job, I had a thought to call a certain couple whom I have recently learned that they had a bit more work for me. I had told them that I would fit them in before the end of the year, but I was booked until the end of October. I didn't expect any calls, nor had any previous thoughts about them until driving today. A scant three hours later, I got a call from the couple, stating that they were definitely serious about wanting me to work for them whenever I got the next opportunity. Coincidence 3.

I am a believer in the strange and unusual that cannot be explained, and in some cases still believe things that certain scientific data has disregarded or proven to be untrue or due to other reasons. Though I do carry a good sense of secular ideas and a good sense of skepticism, this alien knows that there are things out there beyond this realm. The alien remembers some of them and continues to communicate with them - regardless of the skeptics' beliefs to the nonexistance of such things. Those skeptics do not live in my mind, they have not experienced such things generally, and as such I believe that not having such experiences are what causes skeptics to become skeptics in the first place. I say this and my best friend is one such skeptic and she knows that I respect her and her positions on things, and although I cannot challenge them without proof, she respects my beliefs and does not change them. I'm thankful for that. Though I cannot end this post currently with some sort of life-changing thought, all this blog is, is my thoughts of the day, and not something necessarily to be used to change other's minds - that is not my goal as an alien. Simply, I am what I am, I am who I am, I accept the I Am of me, and I ask that others keep an open mind to an alien's point of view.

As I watch the last of the election close before me, I am taken back to my work, speaking to my coworkers about politics. One such lady I work with is a staunch republican, ready and willing to take on a political fight, and drag as many as she can into it. While I am not one to talk politics at work, I fell into the conversation by turning away from it. Preying on this inability to talk about politics, she and one other coworker guessed not only my preferred candidate, but began dragging me into other talks I did not want to take part in, especially not with this coworker.

I had never said a word about my preferred candidate until earlier today.

Of course, today was another such dragged-in talk with another coworker, and of course, she joined in with fervor, describing horrible things my candidate has voted for. All of which...of course, I agreed with my candidate doing or voting for. However, she got me thinking not about my candidate choices and whom I should consider voting for, but what people like her do to others. Like a tiger, she jumps on those whose political beliefs differ from hers, and she tears apart those who may not have as much political knowledge. She is a dangerous sort, dangerous to the others who may not have the willpower to stand up for their own beliefs, or stand strong in their own convictions of the America they wish to have.

She is the type to state that if someone is not strong in their convictions, they should not talk politics. I have words to say for that as well. One, I personally fell into a trap by trying not to talk politics...which makes the above statement seem rather, well, ill-conceived. Two, my question is why?

Politics and Religion are dangerously close in the human mind. It comes down to belief and belief only. Just as Religions try to convert those who are not strong in their faith, both politics and religion seek to rule over people's minds if their convictions amount to just personal belief or experience. Nay, politics and religion alone seek to convert by force, by brutality. Woe be unto those who do not understand the history, the causes, the innate details of every religious bit or every politician's life. Worse, those who wish to talk politics must know the entire history of the politician's choices, every bit they have ever said, or did.
THAT is what being strong in one's political convictions requires. Being a nut about politics to talk about politics. Last I checked, not everyone is so detailed. I know of only three like this - the others I know of have....well, they are humans. Humans are so different in their beliefs, in their convictions, and some are more quiet, some are more educated, some are less educated about every thing they believe in. I do not believe it is required that to believe in something, one must know every intimate detail of the focus of one's belief. Having a few reasons is a great thing, and required. One should not belief just because one's parents or friends belief it - one should find their own reason, but not to the point of ludicrity.

Back to this coworker, as I mentioned, she is a dangerous sort. She can cause people to doubt their own convictions, no matter how strong. At worst, she could weaken the strength people may need to muster, just to vote. Yes. This type could feel threatened enough to NOT vote. If faced with one in the workplace, here is what the alien recommends: Tell said person to back off.
Should I see her tomorrow, I shall be saying a truncated version of my thoughts above, with just those final words.

Into a Strange New World

This is not my first time writing in posts. I have had past blogs, simple and of an earlier time in this life. Those blogs are of the past and will remain there, whereas I have felt the call after many years of quiet contemplation of the events of the current world, to bring my writings back into the world. No matter the topic or the misguided thoughts involved.
I go through life quietly, too quietly for some, as some think this alien as being thoughtless. Farther from the truth cannot be spoken, as this alien would prefer to contemplate and research before forming an opinion, rather than stating the uneducated opinion without research and dining on a foot a short time later.
I have kept quiet too long, and forming this blog is my answer, my words, and my mind, in truth.