Confessions of a Ginger

Being a ginger is awesome! I love it! I’m proud of it!
But there was a time when I wasn’t.

Being an unsecure teenager was tough. Being a bullied one was even worse. There are some things that are quite different when it comes to us gingers and the bullies have a talent for finding those little things and using them against the ones who are bullied.
One of the things I heard a lot of comments on was my pale skin. I didn’t get a tan like all “the pretty, popular girls”. My skin has pretty much the same color all year round and even when everyone else complains about being pale I can usually beat them all if it were a competition.

The freckles were pointed out as well and there was a time when I hated to be different. I just wanted to look like everyone else. Wanted to fit in. I wanted the bullies to not have anything to pick on.
The bullies came and then they went. I grew older and somewhat wiser (I’m still working on that part). Then something amazing happened. I started to love all the things about me that were different. I found that being different makes you stand out and that can be a great thing! And when you look into the science of gingers it is pretty awesome!

Did you know that we are mutants?
Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters here I come!! The gene that causes red hair, which is recessive, comes from the MC1R, which is a genetic mutation.

We produce our own Vitamin D!
The pigmentation of our skin allows us to absorb a lot more sunlight on the days where there is hardly any and this increases our own production of Vitamin D! Maybe this is why I never got depressed during the dark days of winter??

Gingers don’t go grey!
Our hair usually doesn’t go grey with age. It goes from red to blonde and then to white! I’ll braid mine, run around and sing “Let it go” when I get older.

Ancient Greeks actually thought we were vampires!
Gingers do have souls, I’m pretty sure of it! But the truth is that the ancient Greeks thought that when Gingers died they turned into vampires!

Want to guess the rarest combination of hair and eye color?!
Ding ding ding!!! Red hair and blue eyes! This combination makes up only 1% of the entire planets population!

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So there it is and here I am! I’m a ginger. I get sunburnt easily, I need a lot more anesthetic than other people for it to work, I have pale skin and freckles. These are all details about me that I have because I am ginger.
With confidence comes love! With love comes beauty! And no matter what hair color you have, you should rock it! Your uniqueness is what makes you perfect in every single way! We need to stop striving for some ideal beauty. How boring wouldn’t the world be if we all looked the same?

Be you!
Lots of ginger hugs from me to all of you!!

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler (Review)

Meet the Cooke family. Our narrator is Rosemary Cooke. As a child, she never stopped talking; as a young woman, she has wrapped herself in silence: the silence of intentional forgetting, of protective cover. Something happened, something so awful she has buried it in the recesses of her mind.

Now her adored older brother is a fugitive, wanted by the FBI for domestic terrorism. And her once lively mother is a shell of her former self, her clever and imperious father now a distant, brooding man.

And Fern, Rosemary’s beloved sister, her accomplice in all their childhood mischief? Fern’s is a fate the family, in all their innocence, could never have imagined.

***

We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves is a story unlike any other I’ve ever read. It’s witty, sad, mysterious and absolutely lovely.

There’s really not that much to tell about the story without giving away too many spoilers, but the story of Rosemary trying to make sense of her family and upbringing is both heartbreaking and wonderful. And the big question is where is Fern? What happened to the long lost sister? When forced to think back to the memories of her suppressed childhood it turns out that not everything happened the way that she thought it did.

I love the way that Fowler writes about her surroundings with the loveliest and most peculiar details.

This book is an absolute gem!

I enjoyed every moment of it!

One of my favorite quotes from the book:

“When there is an invisible elephant in the room, one is from time to time bound to trip over a trunk.”

If you would like your own copy of this amazing read then CLICK HERE or on the picture below:

 

 

The Ecstasy of Art – Shots of Awe

“Our paintings! Our songs! Our stories! They are maps of where we went.”

Calm Down With Mandala

I first came across Mandala by accident while I was out buying a new coloring book for my son. I found a Mandala book for children and was instantly drawn to the whole concept. I watched him coloring and really enjoying it and took me not much more than ten minutes before I knew I wanted one of my own, but with a little more intricate patterns. A couple of days later I went back to the same store and got me one of the coloring books for grownups. I am in love with it!

The idea of coloring or drawing Mandala is to calm down your mind and find inner peace. It helps you concentrate and be more creative.

The word “mandala” is from the classical Indian language of Sanskrit. Loosely it can be translated to mean “circle”, but is a symbol that represents wholeness. Hinduism, Christianity and Buddhism are known for using Mandalas throughout time.

 

“I sketched every morning in a notebook a small circular drawing,…which seemed to correspond to my inner situation at the time….Only gradually did I discover what the mandala really is:…the Self, the wholeness of the personality, which if all goes well is harmonious.”

– Carl Jung, Swiss psychoanalyst (1875-1961)

 

To sit down and color Mandala with some relaxing music in the background is a great way to get to a calmer place in your mind. If you haven’t tried it yet then I recommend that you do!

Here you can see a couple of Mandalas that I have colored, and when my arms get better I will try to draw some of my own as well.

Mandala

Mandala

I also browsed Amazon a bit and found a couple of Mandala coloring books that instantly went on my wish list:

The Mandala Coloring Book – Jim Gogarty

Mystical Mandala – Alberta Hutchinson

Click on the pictures to go directly to Amazon and get your own copy 🙂

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More Mandala to come!

You don’t have to try so hard!

The first time I showed this song to one of my girlfriends she was in tear. I had the exact same reaction when I heard it the first time.

Now I would like to share it with you guys!

We use so much energy on trying to fit in, to look the way that the media tell us is the right way, to be popular and to be loved.

How easy it is to get caught up in it all. To find out one day that even though there are so many other people who likes you, you don’t really like yourself. We need to stop trying to be what everyone else wants us to be and focus on becoming the one that we would like to be.

You need to love yourself before anyone else can possibly love you for the one that you truly are.

Watch, listen and enjoy!

How about a little competition??

The Geek Heaven Store received its first delivery of PageKeepers yesterday and I thought it would be fun to kick start it all with a competition!

The winner will get two PageKeepers and a surprise gift!!

All you have to do to enter the competition is to like Geek Heaven on Facebook, share the competition with your friends and when you’ve done so then write a comment on Facebook and tell me about one of your favorite books!

This competition is open to anyone anywhere in the world and you have until Friday, September 5th to enter 🙂

So go ahead! Like, share and comment! Maybe you’ll become the lucky winner!!

Let the competition begin!

Written Soul by Christina de Vries (Poem)

In all their eyes I saw an untold story

Behind the smile a hidden worry

While the summer found out it couldn’t stay

The leaves had many stories to say

Everyday I got to know them a little better

As I took them down letter by letter

Quietly I listened to the stories told

Of hopes of something new, memories of old

They spoke of how what came to past

Was all that wasn’t meant to last

In my hand the pen became alive

It found something almost lost it could revive

Through ink the stories soul came to be

Born to life by the imagination in me

***

©Christina de Vries – Geek Heaven

Photo: Andrea Taurisano

Harry Potter Porn (Relax.. Just watch)

Brenna Twohy’s poem “Fantastic Breasts and Where To Find Them” has certainly gone viral over the last week or so, and I can see why! This is slam poetry at its best!

Watch and enjoy!

You don’t look sick!

After the passing of Robin Williams there has been a renewed focus on depression. Depression is only one of the many difficult diseases that a person might carry but are not visible to others. I cannot feel what you feel anymore than you can feel what I feel. This is why we should be careful to judge.

You don’t look sick! He’s probably faking it! She’s just lazy..

These phrases are not uncommon and I’ve had similar to these said to my face as well.
As you might know by now, I’m struggling with a bad case of tendonitis at the moment. I’m not trying to compare tendonitis to depression as a disease, but they are both illnesses that you cannot tell if people have or not. I tried to stay at my job while I was on my first round of medication but it just got worse. So now I’m staying home, trying not to use my hands/shoulders that much, am on pretty heavy pain killers and I’m getting treatments from a physiotherapist twice a week. It’s painful and exhausting at times, but the feeling of not being taken serious about it is worse. I feel like I have to explain to the people that I know just how painful it is or else they will think that I’m not really sick. I shouldn’t have to feel that way!

I’m not going to go on a rant about this but I just wanted to post it as a reminder! Don’t be so quick to judge! You don’t know what is going on in other peoples bodies. Ask them if they need help instead of trying to figure out how sick they really are, leave that to the professionals. If you suspect that someone around you is having a hard time (in any way) then ask about it before you judge them.

And lastly, all of you out there that are struggling with some kind of illness: I hope you feel better soon!

Stay creative, keep on smiling and never underestimate the power of a good hug!

Big cyber hugs from me to you!! 

Paper Towns by John Green (REVIEW)

When Margo Roth Spiegelman beckons Quentin Jacobsen in the middle of the night—dressed like a ninja and plotting an ingenious campaign of revenge—he follows her. Margo’s always planned extravagantly, and, until now, she’s always planned solo. After a lifetime of loving Margo from afar, things are finally looking up for Q . . . until day breaks and she has vanished. Always an enigma, Margo has now become a mystery. But there are clues. And they’re for Q.

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After reading The Fault in Our Stars I found myself really fond of John Green. I was already a follower of his shows on YouTube but the way he writes is what fascinates me the most. Now with my tendonitis being as bad as ever I can’t manage to write a lot (let’s call it occupational hazard) so I do a lot more reading. Because of this (and most of my books being stuck in storage) I had to go out and stock up on some new ones. This is where I came across Paper Towns and I was immediately intrigued. His way of writing makes his novels an easy read but still it has depth and humor. The pages turned quickly and the smiles came often.

We get to know Quentin, a young boy who thinks that being bores isn’t really that boring. He likes routines and gaming with his best friends Ben and Radar. But there’s also Margo. Margo lives next door to Quentin and is the complete opposite of him, adventurous, beautiful and somewhat a mystery. They used to be friends as kids but now they don’t hang out together anymore.

Then comes the night when Margo takes Quentin along on an adventure of revenge over the people she thought were her friends. The next day she is gone.

Quentin follows her clues and struggles to focus on anything other than finding her. But finding her is not only finding a particular place, it also finding out who Margo really is. She is a mystery that keeps on growing and changing by each clue.

 

I enjoyed this book very much and I definitely recommend this one as a good early autumn read. It will move you and make you smile.

One of my favorite quotes from the book:

“That’s always seemed so ridiculous to me, that people want to be around someone because they’re pretty. It’s like picking your breakfeast cereals based on color instead of taste.”

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If you would like your own copy of Paper Towns you can CLICK HERE or on the picture below: