I’m Just Not Feeling It

Do you ever have a day where you wake up and you know that you have a list of things that need to be accomplished, but you just can’t seem to care about anything?

That’s how I feel today. It is beautiful outside, the birds are chirping, and Julie Andrews is singing The Hills Are Alive while butterflies caress her with their wings. And I’m just so irritable I can’t stand myself, much less anyone else. As I’m looking at the clock, I have just barely over an hour to go before I have to start getting ready for work. Yes, I know I’m lucky to be employed. Yes, just the other day I made a post dedicated exclusively to talking about my hard-won promotion. On an intellectual level, I am grateful— but I’m so freaking tired.

It is beautiful outside, the birds are chirping, and Julie Andrews is singing The Hills Are Alive while butterflies caress her with their wings.

Days like this make me think of Shelley, which makes me smile. Shelley is an older Australian woman I used to work with at my store. She was contrarian, pugnacious, cynical, and sarcastic. She designated herself as our resident Mean Old Bitch and wore the title like a badge of honor. Sometimes I miss her so much that it makes my bones ache. We had a bond, we two. I love her and I know she loves me, and that’s for forever.

She designated herself as our resident Mean Old Bitch and wore the title like a badge of honor.

The rapport we quickly developed morphed into a beautiful friendship I’ll cherish as long as there’s breath in my body. One day when we were working together, she looked at me and out of nowhere exclaimed, “Shit, there’s got to be something fucking better than this.” A gentle warning for you: if the word “fuck” offends you even mildly, never work with an Australian émigré. I’m fairly certain Australian elementary school teachers end the school week by telling their pupils to “fuck off and have fun”.

One day when we were working together, she looked at me and out of nowhere, exclaimed, “Shit, there’s got to be something fucking better than this.”

I think about what she said that day a lot. She was right; there’s got to be something fucking better than this. I’m going to make it my life’s work to try to find it. For both of us. Bless her heart, the sour old bitch had to work retail right up until the pandemic forced her into an early retirement, followed by a move to Florida with her son. If you ever read this, Shelley, I love you. If we both end up in hell, please save me some space in your cabana.

If you ever read this, Shelley, I love you. If we both end up in hell, please save me some space in your cabana.

There’s not a tidy resolution for this post. I always get irritated when I’m reading something about someone having a bad day and they “somehow turned it around”. Nope. You can stop right there. A big part of self-care for me is just allowing myself to feel like shit when I feel like shit because it’s my brain’s way of telling me there’s something I need to process that I can’t happy-think my way out of.

A big part of self-care for me is just allowing myself to feel like shit when I feel like shit because it’s my brain’s way of telling me there’s something I need to process that I can’t happy-think my way out of.

I mean, let’s be real. I’m working a full-time, public-facing retail job in the middle of an ongoing global pandemic in a world that’s literally on fire from climate change and living with more mental health disorders than Meryl Streep has Oscar nominations. Ergo, I’m allowed to feel like shit. And so are you!

If you also feel bad today, know that I see you and I stand in solidarity with you, not to talk you out of your pain but to weather it with you until we all feel better. Much love.

Thanks as always for being a faithful reader of The Voracious Bibliophile. If you like what you see, please follow, like, comment, and subscribe to my email list to get notified of new posts as soon as they drop. You can also email me at thevoraciousbibliophile@yahoo.com or catch me on Twitter @voraciousbiblog. Keep reading the world, one page (or pixel) at a time.

Album Review: ELIO and Friends: The Remixes by ELIO

When a zennial chooses as their moniker the name of one of your favorite characters in modern literature (and cinema), you just know you’re bound to like them.

Enter ELIO, a.k.a. Charlotte Lee. According to an interview she did with Jess Grant for We Are: The Guard, The 1975’s eponymous debut album was life-changing for her, and you can totally hear that influence in her sound. It’s EDM-infused atmospheric pop: contemplative, nostalgic, and anxiety-riddled. And how could it not be all of those things at once? To be young in a world on fire, looking to the Internet (because sometimes it’s the only place) for clarity and community, and knowing with an airtight certainty that you won’t live to be old (because of climate change), sometimes you just have to groove to your own beat.

It’s [her sound] EDM-infused atmospheric pop: contemplative, nostalgic, and anxiety-riddled. And how could it not be all of those things at once?

The first time I listened to “Jackie Onassis”, one of the tracks remixed on this EP, I was transfixed. Like the icons she emulates, ELIO’s style is effortless and unpretentious, which makes it all the more alluring.

We can go to dinner in Paris / And we’ll be trends in fashion like Jackie Onassis / I’ll keep taking antidepressants / And we can drive away from this adolescence
Jackie Onassis by ELIO

My take: If you don’t seat-dance your way through traffic or make a complete fool of yourself in your living room crumping and twerking and bopping while listening to this EP, there’s something wrong with you. I hate to be so frank, but facts are facts.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Album Review: One Foot In Front Of The Other by Griff

I’m always looking for the next thing that’s going to break me open. I use art as emotional catharsis. I never know what the medium is going to be—the truth just has a way of finding me and it never comes unprepared.

I’m always looking for the next thing that’s going to break me open.

That said, One Foot In Front Of The Other is the perfect mixtape for Sad Girl Summer and I am here for it. Bring on The Purge (of feelings, that is). There’s a desperation in Griff’s voice. An overflowing melancholy colors every lyric on every track. But there’s also hope—buckets of it. And resilience. And it overpowers everything else.

It’s somewhat of a disservice to Griff (real name Sarah Griffiths) to compare her to her forebears or contemporaries, but nevertheless her sound is familiar in an endearing, ear-tickling way. There’s some 1989 and reputation-era Taylor Swift here. Some Lorde, though more Melodrama than Pure Heroine. A dollop of Billie Eilish and a sprinkling of Lana Del Rey. Halsey hangs at the edge of the frame of tracks like “Earl Grey Tea”. Some of the production on the last track sounds like Bleachers.

I’ve tried to pray / I’ve bruised my knees / I’ve tried to bring you back to me
Black Hole by Griff

All in all, it’s just a really great time to be an angsty songstress. She brings to mind a couple of noteworthy contemporaries; namely, FLETCHER and ELIO, but also Olivia Rodrigo without all the rage. Her alchemy, though, is all her own.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Album Review: JORDI (Deluxe) by Maroon 5

What is it about Maroon 5’s sound that is so deliciously irresistible? I mean, if we’re being honest, their oeuvre is little more than rock-inflected sugary pop bops one after the other. That’s not meant to be an insult, but it also doesn’t explain the love I have for the band. Am I basic or are they actually really good?

Am I basic or are they actually really good?

Available in Dolby Atmos on Apple Music, the band’s newest offering has received mixed to negative reviews from critics, but if you’re asking me (and why else would you be here?), JORDI is much better than Red Pill Blues, which was released in 2017 and was largely forgettable, apart from a couple of tracks.

Is JORDI going to win any Grammy Awards? Probably not. Do I care? Not in the slightest. When they dropped the second single from the album, “Nobody’s Love”, on July 24, 2020, I kept it on repeat for my next dozen showers. It’s a freaking bop.

Everything you’ve been through / Say what you got to lose
Can’t Leave You Alone (feat. Juice WRLD)

Featuring appearances by Megan Thee Stallion, blackbear, Stevie Nicks, Bantu, H.E.R., and others, JORDI is just a sheer pleasure to listen to.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Favorite Films 🎥: The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928)

Year: 1928

Director: Carl Theodor Dreyer

Country: France

Cast: Renée Jeanne Falconetti, Eugène Silvain, André Berley, and Maurice Schutz

Cinematography: Rudolph Maté

Streaming: HBO Max, Amazon Prime Video, and Apple TV

Why I Love It: Renée Jeanne Falconetti’s performance as Joan of Arc is one of the most moving in cinematic history. This silent masterpiece is full of startlingly intimate close-ups in which Falconetti’s face is the only thing in your field of vision. Because there’s no audible dialogue, she has to convey everything in her performance through movement, through her facial expressions—everything is an exercise in the theater of the body.

Because there’s no audible dialogue, she has to convey everything in her performance through movement, through her facial expressions—everything is an exercise in the theater of the body.

The Passion of Joan of Arc is the first silent film I can remember bringing me to tears. At times it is painful to watch, but films like this one are the reason cinema is its own art form. For the true cinephile, the Criterion Collection edition is a must. Along with numerous other extras which add depth and context to the viewing experience, Criterion’s home release comes with two different presentations of the film: the traditional 24 frames per second and another at 20 frames per second.

Also noteworthy is the expressionistic lighting used by cinematographer Rudolph Maté, who later immigrated to the United States and became a director and producer as well. His cinematography credits during his career in Hollywood include such films as Dodsworth (1936), Stella Dallas (1937), Love Affair (1939), and Foreign Correspondent (1940), among many others. You can clearly see the influence of his earlier work in European Expressionism in his later work in American film noir.

You can clearly see the influence of his [Maté] earlier work in European Expressionism in his later work in American film noir.

How does one begin the process of classifying superlatives in art? Once you start drawing lines of demarcation and establishing hierarchies, it is inevitable that some works just as worthy as those classified as “The Greatest” will be pushed to the margins, relegated to the corners—all but forgotten. But then again, if everything is great then nothing is great.

Once you start drawing lines of demarcation and establishing hierarchies, it is inevitable that some works just as worthy as those classified as “The Greatest” will be pushed to the margins, relegated to the corners—all but forgotten.

So we have experts. We have aestheticians. We have people who spend their entire lives studying one particular subject so we can go to them when we need a professional’s opinion. As in science, so in art. We look to the learned, the credentialed, and the eloquent. We look outside our own limited experiences and perceptions for something that rings true.

We look to the learned, the credentialed, and the eloquent. We look outside our own limited experiences and perceptions for something that rings true.

Why did I say all that? So I could then say this: The Passion of Joan of Arc is one of the greatest films of all time. So say the film scholars, the cineastes, the commentators, and the iconoclasts. And so say I. Don’t trust me. See it for yourself.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the first post in my new series. Check back soon for more of my Favorite Films.

New Blog Series: Favorite Films 🎥

I’m starting a new blog series here on The Voracious Bibliophile that I’m calling Favorite Films. With each post, I’ll highlight a film that I love. These posts won’t be long-form reviews; instead, they’ll include just enough information to entice you to check out the films yourself. Where applicable, I’ll try to add streaming information as well.

Almost to 400!!!!

Before I started The Voracious Bibliophile, I had always looked at blogging as something that other people could be successful at, never as something that I was capable of doing myself. I love proving myself (as well as the negative voices in my head) wrong. Because of you beautiful people, my blog is almost at 400 views! I know to some people that may not seem like a lot, but to me it’s incredibly validating. I hope you’ll all keep following me on this incredible journey.

I Hate This Holiday

This will not be a long post. I just wanted to add my two cents into the conversation surrounding Independence Day in the United States, or simply “the 4th” if you live in my neck of the woods.

I hate everything about this holiday. I hate that it falls in the “Satan’s hind parts” part of the summer. I hate the particular brand of redneck culture bolstered by its celebration. I hate the flies buzzing around the hastily prepared and flavorless provisions. I hate the swell of bodies glistening in the summer sun, reeking of bug spray, sweat, and barbecue sauce.

I hate its racist overtones. I hate that we live in a country where the ruling class is obsessed with the idea of freedom but wholly opposed to the Others taking part in it. Hypocrites, every last one of them.

But do you want to know which part of this holiday I hate the most? Just guess. Fireworks. I hate the unexpected booms that ricochet through the night. I hate the hissing and the popping and the whooshing sound they make when ascending.

I hate the trucks emblazoned with dollar store Americana. I hate the wife-beaters wearing wife-beaters and their yee-haw swagger. I hate that the idea of America is better than the reality of America. I hate the way the sky looks after being graffitied with our revisionist bluster. I hate that all that pomp and circumstance isn’t backed up by anything of substance.

I hate that the idea of America is better than the reality of America. I hate the way the sky looks after being graffitied with our revisionist bluster. I hate that all that pomp and circumstance isn’t backed up by anything of substance.

How does it make sense to fly the Stars and Stripes with pride at the same time we plunder the land out of greed and deny our fellow citizens their equal rights?

I’m not opposed to celebration. I just want everyone invited to the table.

From the Archives: Shameless: A Sexual Reformation by Nadia Bolz-Weber (Part 2)

Allow me to first offer my sincere apology to all of you, my devoted readers, for making you wait so long for Part 2. This part is going to be a lot different from the first one because I’ll be sharing and discussing my favorite passages from Nadia’s book. Are you ready for it? Let’s go.

God planted so many of us in the corners, yet the center-pivot irrigation of the church’s teachings about sex and sexuality tends to exclude us.

This is so life-affirming. For all #exvangelicals out there and for people who still have ties to the church, the feelings of exclusion that we experience in relation to our religious upbringings are so strong that they almost manifest in corporeal form whenever we’re exposed to the teachings inculcated in us from when we were congregants.

We were taught that the body is a site of shame. We were taught that we were tainted by Adam’s original sin, that our flesh is something we must overcome in order to become one with God. We were taught that sharing our bodies with others outside the confines of monogamous, heterosexual marriage separates us from the holy.

We were taught that sharing our bodies with others outside the confines of monogamous, heterosexual marriage separates us from the holy.

We were even condemned for finding pleasure(s) on our own. Masturbating was something we all discovered by accident, performed in secret, and never talked about. It was the secret sin that tainted our relationship with God, with our families, with ourselves. The rose is not branded an apostate when it blooms, so why then should we be branded? This is not even mentioning the shame accompanying your masturbatory fantasies if you were anything other than 100% straight.

The rose is not branded an apostate when it blooms, so why then should we be branded?

But our sexual and gender expressions are as integral to who we are as our religious upbringings are. To separate these aspects of ourselves—to separate life as a sexual being from a life with God—is to bifurcate our psyche, like a musical progression that never comes to resolution.

I love the imagery Bolz-Weber (I think from here on out I’m just going to refer to her as Pastor Nadia) uses here. So many of us who were raised in the church had to develop a dichotomy between our spiritual and corporeal identities, thus the bifurcation she’s talking about here. We were all musical progressions never coming to a resolution. If you ask me, we were robbed. That forced separation caused us to become less of ourselves, meaning that in the end we had less to offer God and less to give to others.

That forced separation caused us to become less of ourselves, meaning that in the end we had less to offer God and less to give to others.

What would we be like if this bifurcation had not caused us to tear ourselves asunder? What if instead we read the Scriptures with new eyes?

Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is within you, whom you have [received as a gift] from God, and that you are not your own [property]? You were bought with a price [you were actually purchased with the precious blood of Jesus and made His own]. So then, honor and glorify God with your body.
1 Corinthians 6:19-20 (AMP)

At what point did the church carnalize our bodies? When we are taken in totality, no bifurcation is necessary, and if we are to believe the Scriptures, our bodies house (contain) the Holy Spirit. Now, I am by no stretch of the imagination a Bible scholar or theologian, but there’s nothing wrong with my reading comprehension.

When we are taken in totality, no bifurcation is necessary, and if we are to believe the Scriptures, our bodies house (contain) the Holy Spirit.

When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves. Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden. But the LORD God called to the man, ‘Where are you?’ He answered, ‘I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.’ And he said, ‘Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?’
Genesis 3:6-11 (NIV)

Here we see that shame was a consequence of the first sin—before sin, the first humans were naked, without shame, and free.

So what are the implications for us? Because man fell [from grace or right standing with God], we all have an awareness of our nakedness, of our bodies as a site of inherent shame, and this inherent shame is a direct consequence of the serpent’s temptation. So every time a little effeminate boy is called a faggot and beat up by his classmates, or a transgender Black woman is murdered for having the audacity to exist in public, the serpent wins, and the anti-LGBT people of faith rejoice with him. Is that saying a whole hell of a lot? You bet it is. I said what I said.

So every time a little effeminate boy is called a faggot by his classmates, or a transgender Black woman is murdered for having the audacity to exist in public, the serpent wins, and the anti-LGBT people of faith rejoice with him.

I refuse to accept or participate in a faith tradition that excludes some while exalting others, that prizes some bodies above others, or draws lines of demarcation between who can and who cannot be joint-heirs with Christ. He didn’t just die for them. I don’t know which version of the Bible they’re reading, but in every one of the baker’s dozen I own, Jesus welcomed everyone to his table, and there are no garbage tables in God’s Kingdom.

My Promotion: From AGM to GM

Anyone who knows me or has read my About Me page on the blog knows that I am a bookseller. Well, for the past three years, I’ve been the Assistant General Manager at a chain bookstore.

A couple of months ago, my then-General Manager got an opportunity outside our company that offered more money and also had a tuition assistance program, so naturally she took it. My record as a manager is impeccable. My sales numbers are good, I finish projects ahead of schedule, and (not to brag but) I’m a whiz at analyzing sales reports and identifying trends. My customer service skills are so next-level that some people become irate if I’m not available to help them. I’m the bossest of Boss Monsters. Also, my degree is in marketing so I feel like I have a pretty in-depth understanding of how to sell things.

My customer service skills are so next level that some people become irate if I’m not available to help them. I’m the bossest of Boss Monsters.

I made my pitch for the job immediately. I updated my resume, emailed higher-ups, made a play for the position, etc. Then I waited. And I waited some more. And then I had to wait even longer. And then I had to work 50+ hour weeks doing a quarterly overstock scan. And then I had to prep for a store inventory as the person in charge of it (for the first time). And then I waited some more.

This past Monday, June 28th, was our scheduled inventory day. I arrived at my store at 4:30 AM and made sure everything was ready. For those of you unfamiliar with the retail scene, periodically (usually once per fiscal year) the company you work for will schedule an inventory. On the day of your inventory, a group of people (the number will depend upon the size of your store) will come and scan through each individual item in your store. Some stores that are small enough may have their inventory(ies) performed by in-house associates.

The details of what happens during this process and after this process (auditing counts, preparing post-inventory paperwork, etc.) is irrelevant to my story here, so I’ll move on. By this point I have spoken to my direct supervisor more than six times about the promotion I was gunning for. I was ready to be the General Manager. I knew what I was doing and I was doing great at it. I was like Liam Neeson in Taken kicking loads of Albanian sex-trafficker butt without breaking a sweat.

I was like Liam Neeson in Taken kicking loads of Albanian sex-trafficker butt without breaking a sweat.

So, around hour twelve on the 28th, I finally get to sit down with Lola*. Lola and I talk about how things have been going, how I’ve been able to keep operations running (relatively) smoothly considering the volatility of the labor and sales markets. I tell her I’m ready. And she tells me the job is mine. I am now officially a General Manager. Plus, I got a nice pay raise as well. I am so thrilled that all of my hard work has been validated. Power tastes really sweet.

Anyway, that’s the news I’ve been waiting to share.

*Not her real name

Further Reading