inside/out/food

NOTE: This post about Disney-Pixar's Inside Out contains spoilers.

About a week ago, I traveled to Nebraska to visit family. As a tradition, we always go to the movies together. 

catch the flicks

see the sights

Even the twenty-five-year-old in our cousin bunch was set on Disney/Pixar’s latest production, Inside Out; even the twenty-five-year-old pleaded for tissues by the end, a popcorn bag becoming ersatz Kleenex. 

As the studio conglomerate’s first psychology-conscious film, Inside Out embraces the complexity of everyday emotions—especially those experienced by a pre-teen unaware of impending puberty. The movie’s psychoanalysis—sans a Freudian couch—begins with a zooming in on the characters’ head-quarters, or brain. Inside, five key emotions hover over a control board, waiting for a turn to govern it. In Riley Andersen, the eleven-year-old protagonist, Joy is often at the helm. 

she's the blue-haired pixie-lookin thang up above, but if you don't recognize that, I suggest watching the freakin film

Throughout Riley’s mid-pre-life crisis, she experiences a whirlwind of emotions, to be expected. Her coming-of-age is nonetheless heartwarming, but what my own analysis of psychoanalysis centered on was the portrayal of Joy; she’s yellow and glowing, donning a summery green dress. She’s often jumping about and smiling, marveling at Riley’s experiences, playing Dr. Pangloss at the unfortunate ones. But she has blue hair. In fact, her pixie do is the same shade of Sadness’ hair, who is completely blue. The very tip of Joy is Sadness.

After mulling over emotional complexity in a cavernous G-rated theater, I went home and searched Reddit.

As usual, the a forum pushed me even further:

Question: “Since Joy has blue hair, does that mean that there is a little bit of sadness in joy?”

The user with the greatest evidence of family movie-brooding is rewarded to SunshineAndGoldfish: 

I think you might be on to something. If we take it a step further...

Joy's Colors: Yellow body- Joy Blue Hair/Eyes/Eyebrows/Flowers on Dress- Sadness Green dress- Disgust Red Tongue- Anger Purple Lips- Fear

For extra credit:

Disgust has Purple lips, scarf and shoes. I am having a hard time telling if her tongue is Purple too or Pink/Red.

Anger has Yellow flames, Purpleish pants and it looks like the zig-zag of his tie has a Blue tint to it (possible Green).

Fear has Blue stripes on his sleeves and a Red tongue

Sadness has Purple glasses and a Red Tongue

Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/Pixar/comments/3bpm2c/since_joy_has_blue_hair_does_that_mean_that_there/

Self-titled Disney/Pixar Fans deserve some sort of credibility, and so do their own answers:

I would also argue that the blue hair symbolizes that the two share a special connection. A huge theme in the movie is that emotions are not single shades but rather a mixture. This is most notable in that without Sadness, we cannot properly appreciate Joy.... Both as characters and as emotions.

Source: http://www.quora.com/Inside-Out-2015-movie/Why-did-both-Joy-and-Sadness-have-blue-hair

Rabbi Geoffrey A. Mitelman expands on the question, relating it to Jewish philosophy: There is no such thing as “pure joy.” Happiness is borne by sadness.

(click on the photo for a debate on the subject)

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rabbi-geoffrey-a-mitelman/why-are-joys-eyes-blue_b_7688406.html

Rabbi Mitelman includes a snippet of a New York Times review:

"The movie suggests that the bittersweet is a step up from untarnished joy and shows how frantic cheerfulness can stand in the way of genuine connection."

With that said, Joy would look terrifying without a little sadness anyway:

as for food, make an egg. poached

periscope//honeydew ftw//are you organs really so cozy

Lately I haven't been blogging too much about food--check out Periscope, a relatively new app that allows you to broadcast and receive comments live. I do some cookin' through that

and take pictures of myself in glasses.

Periscope name: @SmileForMeBabyG 

Most recent broadcast: "how do you like your oatmeal?"

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“Yeah, natural birth is SO much better.”

do you hint sarcasm in that?

THE OTHER DAY in human biology class we were talkin about Cesarean sections. Also known as C-sections, they are the surgical processes by which babies are born.

What is the process? The wall of the mother's abdomen is cut through to reach the baby.

This is an image of a C-section delivery from a page titled: "6 Things I Aish I'd Known About Having a C-section." It is somewhat graphic, so don't click on it if you prefer cantaloupe to honeydew. 

So, that sarcasm came from a woman who, in class, sits to my right; she's a mother of three. 

A coupla us were discussing C-sections (when i say discussing, I mean sharing and shrieking at what we've heard about C-sections). Someone said that those "things," mothers' organs are taken out and placed to the side. after the baby is removed, doctors supposedly relocate the table-restin' intestines right back to where the...started.

Ewwww! we said, furrowed brows and all. Placing a mother's organs to the side?!

Wise mother to my right: “Yeah, natural birth is SO much better."

From all I have heard about traditional childbirth--both with and without epidural--hey, she may have a point. What would feel worse, anyway?

Photo by Ashley Marston, Birth & Lifestyle Photographer from Vancouver, Canada. Check out her page for her captivating signature, among other things:

http://www.ashleymarstonbirth photography.com/

today i decided that i am naming a child Elwood. the inspiration came from the extended version of Apocalypse Now (check out embedded link); the New Orleanian, Jay "Chef" Hicks (Frederic Forrest--what a name) mentions an Elwood when reading a letter he was writing home about almost being devoured by a tiger. He's a real nervous character--"strung too tight," Capt. Ben Willard (Martin Sheen) describes. but he seemed pretty chill to me.

"I JUST WANNA LEARN TO COOK, MAN!" (what he says after his tiger exposure)

The Chef's mention of Elwood got me thinkin' back to The Blues Brothers. Elwood is tall. I'm tall. I'll name my child Elwood--thanks to multiple layers of media-related inspiration, and the desire to embrace the length of my bones.

Having a child is quite narcissistic. Not saying there's anything wrong with being self-centered when there are both the cultural and survival imperatives to reproduce haploids of ourselves. But I recall Lucy from Across the Universe--a movie plotted around Beatles songs (is the band old enough to evade italicization?)--telling a friend that she would never have kids because it's too narcissistic.

I think I'd like to adopt, anyway. 

I get the feeling that you, reader, are laughing.

I'm taking myself too seriously.

No, the inspiration does not come from Angelina Jolie.

You've thought about this before--having children and all.

Especially when you're studying the reproductive system in a human biology course--sitting in the classroom, bookended by mothers--you think about it a lot.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

p.s. i really recommend the extended version of Apocalypse Now; interesting commentary on the French legacy in Vietnam. 

For more photos by Ashley Marston, I recommend her "Story Telling Sessions." She really has created a vocation for herself that I've never heard of before. Birth & Lifestyle Photographer:

http://www.ashleymarstonbirthphotography.com/work/story-telling-sessions/nggallery/image/1e4a6788-jpg/

emotional base//

Taken from the lovely textbook, Human Biology: Concepts and Current Issues, by Michael D. Johnson in combination with Pearson. 7th Edition.

HERE lieth the limbic system, 

at the base of the cerebrum.

if every neuronal pathway passes through it

and the cerebral cortex

(complex decision-maker, we call it)

rests on top--

it makes sense why we attach emotion to most things

but upon the rush-on of full-fledged feeling

do our brains implode into themselves?

do they go deeper

function deeper pulsate 

deeper

in there: the green you

see in the diagram.

It would be, then, that counting Wednesdays--

running to a train 

mark a certain cranial ascendance. 

a focus on the decision making without the heart strings.

Our brain descends along with the sun--you nightcrawlers, don't you feel the midbrain buzzing?

at night I believe we press into ourselves

{and at the occasion of any midday quagmire}

iambic pentameter to limbic, if it gets you.

cranial activities sink with the sun.

imagine.