An Open Letter to Middleton High School

Dear Middleton High School,

It’s come to my attention that you’ve been hosting “Jesus Lunches” at your high school every Tuesday, where students are given free food in exchange for listening to sermons about the Christian faith.

You need to stop.

No, seriously, you need to stop this. The fact that you’re promoting any religion in a public high school is horrifying, not to mention in clear violation of the separation between Church and State. Let me just make that perfectly clear. You should not be actively promoting or speaking against any religion in a public school. That is not an okay thing for you to be doing. For one thing, this is a school. We’re here to learn and prepare ourselves for college, not gain new religious affiliations.

This isn’t to say that religion is a bad thing. In fact, I’ll be the first person to admit that a lot of people find comfort in organized religion, and that is perfectly okay. What’s not okay is that you’re luring kids in with what seems like free food and then proselytizing to them about Christianity. And let’s talk about the food. The fact that you’re offering such a clear exchange (listen to this sermon, get food) is more than a little horrifying considering that at Waunakee High School, our GSA wasn’t allowed to give out Jolly Ranchers during Pride Week due to parent complaints that we would “turn their children to the gay lifestyle”.

But that’s okay when it’s Christianity? There is something seriously wrong here.

And certainly, there are people who are going to raise the question of whether or not I would support having lunches for other religions, such as Islam or Judaism. To which I would say no, because they would still be taking place in a public school and that is still not an okay thing to do in a public school.

“But Hannah,” you say, “Aren’t you overreacting just a little bit? What’s the harm?” The harm is that by having lunches specifically for Christianity and in fact rewarding the attendance of these lunches, you’re essentially putting it on a pedestal. You’re announcing, whether you mean to or not, that Christianity is a desired trait from your student body. And by only holding lunches for Christianity, you’re telling your students that participating in any other religion is an undesirable trait.

We did all read the same Bill of Rights, yes? We all know the First Amendment, which promises freedom to practice whatever religion you want? So how, for the love of all that is holy, was something like this allowed to happen? You, Middleton High School, have directly gone against the Bill of Rights. And I know you’re saying that this is you exercising your freedom of religion, but that isn’t something that’s appropriate in a public school. I actually can’t believe that I have to tell you this in 2016, that it isn’t appropriate to be trying to convert teenagers in their own school.

What happens when this goes too far? What happens when students who don’t attend the Jesus Lunches start feeling unsafe because of their refusal to declare their religious alliance? When will it finally be enough?

Mr. Burns: A Post-Confusion Review

Pop culture is an increasingly important part of today’s society, and one that brings meaning to many people. In Anne Washburn’s Mr. Burns (A Post-Electric Play), presented by Madison's Forward Theater, a nuclear apocalypse causes people to turn to The Simpsons, of all thing.

The show, which is three acts long, focuses on the survivors of the apocalypse and the measures they take to remain sane in an increasingly insane world. The first act takes place not long after the nuclear event, and focuses on seven survivors sitting around a campfire, trying to remember the plot of Cape Feare, an episode of The Simpsons. In the second act, seven years later, the world has begun to recover, and groups are performing episodes of the Simpsons for entertainment. The third act shows a world 75 years later, where the Simpsons has taken on a mythic, folkloric quality completely different from the original show.

Elyse Edelman and Jake Penner

The set, designed by Keith Pitts, is made almost entirely from found materials, and adds an eerie, post apocalyptic mood to the show. Huge curtains made of trash bags drape the stage, and the floor is covered with woven mats.

The script, however, has some flaws. The first two acts were relatively easy to follow, but once the third act began, it was very difficult to follow. The time skip wasn’t easy to process, and all of a sudden this was a musical. The same actors played different characters in the third act, which led to no end of confusion, and it wasn’t until twenty minutes after the play had ended that I finally understood the allegory.

Marcus Truschinski, playing both Matt, an apocalypse survivor, and Mr. Burns, the villain of the third act, shows great range in his performance. As Matt, he’s cocky and funny, then completely transforms into the dark and intensely physical Mr. Burns. When he’s onstage, the attention of the room is on him until he leaves.

Elyse Edelman, Marcus Truschinski, and Marti Gobel

Another notable performance comes from Forward Theater newcomer Elyse Edelman. Last summer, she turned in several hilarious performances at American Players Theater, but she does extremely well with serious material as well. Her performance as Maria is interesting, funny, and most importantly, believable.

Mr. Burns isn’t a play for mindless entertainment. One should expect to leave the theater thinking. But this isn’t a bad thing. Washburn’s writing elevates something as mindless as the Simpsons to entertainment worthy of thought. And that is no mean feat.

You can buy tickets for Mr. Burns as well as other Forward Theater Plays here. Pictures courtesy of Jennifer Uphoff Gray. Photos taken by Zane Williams.

Best Not to Resist the Muses

The muses come at inconvenient times, and there are always two of them. The first one, Jasper, is a little dick. He lounges on my sofa like he owns it, kicking his feet up over the armrest, hands folded behind his head, and talks to me incessantly.

I'll be sitting there, calmly trying to do my Spanish homework, when:

"Hey."

I ignore him, continuing to conjugate trabajar in the nosotros form. My pencil scratches against the paper as I write down the answer: trabajamos.

He sits up, swinging his feet over the arm and onto the floor, and starts tapping his toes. He knows I hate it when he does that. That's why he does it so much. Jasper is a master of irritating me into compliance.

"Hey."

I don't look up. "What do you want?"

Jasper grins. "You should make me something."

I pinch the bridge of my nose and close my eyes. If I react, he'll only take it as encouragement to keep badgering me, and I don't want that. "Buzz off, I'm busy."

He leans forwards, resting his elbows on his knees and croons, "But we both know that's not what you really want to be doing," then whispers, "You should make me something." And as much as I try not to, I always end up giving in.

My collaborations with Jasper are always messy, hurried things, scribbled in the margins of my papers or written in felt tip in notebooks when I should really be paying attention to my math and science teachers. Jasper doesn't exactly work in terms of plot or character, just tossing me vague ideas like "What if we had feet for hands and hands for feet?" or "That lady you talked to in the Kwik Trip is really a mastermind in charge of a ring of criminals bent on taking over the world. Go."

If, Doucette, I ever tell you that my creative process is panicking until the very last second, then coming up with something sort of passable, rest assured, Jasper had something to do with it. I like to call writing with Jasper "writers on whee".

The other one, Anya, is a different kind of irritating. I call her "writer's ennui". She doesn't lounge around on my furniture, refusing to go away until I do her bidding. Instead, she shows up at completely random times when I'm distracted. I'll be just about to fall asleep when:

"Wake up." The light flicks on and Anya leans over the bed, a manic grin on her face and short blond hair flopping in her eyes.

I pull the covers over my head and groan. "What do you want?"

She whacks at my shoulder and drags the blankets down, shoving me over to sit on the edge of my bed. "Okay, I know you're tired and I don't want to bother you or anything, but you should really consider this." Anya pauses, holding out her hands. Then she'll launch into a fully worked out idea, gesturing wildly with her hands and speaking rapid-fire so that I'm forced to pay attention. Her enthusiasm is contagious.

Anya's ideas are always beautifully detailed, so much so that I'm almost afraid to use them. Especially since while I write, she stands behind me, reading over my shoulder and constantly interrupting me.

I'll be writing away when:

"I don't like the phrasing of that sentence. You should change that."

So I do it.

"Are you sure about that word choice?"

"I don't think that character would really do that."

"You wrote "the" twice in that sentence."

If writing for Jasper is a rush of words flowing out of my pen in a whirl of ecstasy that makes absolutely no sense, writing for Anya is like driving in rush hour traffic. As soon as you really get going somewhere, you have to stop again to change phrasing or think about character motivation for a good twenty minutes or cross out words before you can get started again.

The two of them rarely agree on anything, which is just another version of infuriating. When they're in the room together, I'm caught between speeding down the freeway and a constant stop start that, when combined, give you writer's whiplash.

And of course, both of them are useless at coming up with endings. I'm often saying to people how much I hate writing believable endings for things. So I'll come to the end of whatever it is I'm writing, and look over my shoulder for one of them.

"So what about the ending?" I say.

Both of them are nearby, Anya craning over my shoulder and Jasper lounging on the chair next to me. Jasper pulls a face, and Anya shrugs.

"Seriously?" I say.

Jasper raises his hands in a gesture of pacification. "Hey now, I'm just here to get you started. You know you're on your own for the ending."

"Thanks, guys," I tell them, and get back to work.

Amber Indian Cuisine Gives the Burn

It's hard to find a great Indian restaurant in Madison these days. It's not that there's a shortage of Indian restaurants in Madison, or even that these restaurants aren't good. Many of them are quite nice, providing tasty food in a friendly atmosphere.

But because I am something of a perfectionist, I do not settle for what is simply a good restaurant. I want a great restaurant, and I am willing to go to many lengths in order to find this best of places in which to eat food.

It was a warm night in late February, and I had just come home from a Forensics tournament and wanted to go somewhere for dinner with the family. My mother had heard good things about an area restaurant, and we decided to give it a try. We arrived at Amber quickly and were immediately greeted and taken to our table.

I decided to order the chicken curry, while my dining companions ordered the Mixed Grill plate and vegetable curry, respectively. The food arrived promptly, although we still had plenty of time to comment on the fact that the decor had improved greatly since the building's past as a bad Chinese place and a bad Mexican place.

Here is a picture of the Mixed Grill plate. I was unable to get a picture of the other dishes, unfortunately.

The food was steaming hot when it arrived, and tasted delicious. The portion sizes were plentiful, so much so that there are now three take out boxes living in our refrigerator. The Mixed Grill plate included several shrimp, a few pieces of lamb, and chicken prepared both tandoori as well as marinated in spices and grilled. The plate provided an equal assortment of spice levels and flavors, and was the most popular at our table.

The curries were also delicious. The combination of spices in the sauce really added to the flavor, and the level of spice was right on, somewhere between mild and pleasantly painful. The chicken was tender, and the vegetables were well cooked.

All in all, the atmosphere was great, the service was friendly and helpful, and the food was wonderful. If you're looking for an exceptional Indian restaurant in the Madison area, I highly recommend Amber.

Amber Indian Cuisine

*rising, desperate laughter*

So instead of yelling at the stupid barista with his stupid white boy haircut in the way she would really like to, Chae shuts off the computer, stands, and starts gathering up her stuff. The barista goes back behind the counter, apparently mollified. He looks as though he’s a little afraid of her, which isn’t something she wants to discourage.

This is a fun paragraph in the thing because it's honestly the only snarky paragraph I've written so far that makes sense out of context. And, you know, I too would like to shout at the pretentious white boy baristas that tend to frequent your garden variety cafes. It's just like, no. We get that you're alternative, and far be it from me to criticize your life choices, but please just stop with that haircut. Please just stop.

And, you know, it's fairly indicative of the tone of this thing, which is my complete and utter disdain for anything and everything serious. I kid you not. I try and write angsty, serious stuff, and I fill it in with crappy jokes about baristas. I'm too snarky for this nonsense.

Also, I know exactly what the stupid haircut being referenced is. It's this one.



I hate this haircut so much. You literally look like a paintbrush, son.

Why Do You Write?

Why do I write? I don’t know, why do you breathe?

All sarcasm aside, I write because I have no other choice. And I don’t mean this in the nice It’s-a-requirement-for-a-class-so-I-guess-I’ll-just-have-to-suffer-through-it sort of way. I write because if I don’t write, I get distracted. I start tapping my feet against the cold metal legs of my desk, I click my pen, and my seat partner starts shooting me death glares from across the aisle. Writing is my way of calming myself, of winding down after a long, stressful day. I find it relaxing to worry about the problems of the characters instead of my own problems. (Yes, I consider worrying a form of relaxation.)

I write because it’s a way of escape. It makes me feel better about my own problems. I don’t have to worry about my APUSH test tomorrow, or the fact that I didn’t take notes in Astronomy, or that weird virus taking up 4 gigabytes of space (yes, really) on the hard drive of my laptop because in fiction, every problem can be solved. Everything has a solution that can be attained with hard work, grit, and a little derring-do. Personal flaws can be remedied, and happy endings are meted out fairly. The good are rewarded and the bad are punished. Everyone gets what they deserve.

Real life isn’t always that simple.

I write because in fiction, I can pour all my fears and doubts and insecurities onto paper and no one thinks twice. My demons are the foodstuff of good writing. There isn’t another form of expression that so readily accepts the insecurities of the creator. I can put all my problems on a sheet of paper, tie it up with a bow, and say, “Look at what I made.” Why do I write? Why do you have the right to ask that question? Why do I write? Because it’s the only way I know of telling myself that things aren’t always okay right now, but someday they will be. Someday things will be okay. And even if they’re not, it’s only a few more chapters until my very own happy ending.

Who Am I?

First of all, you're asking the wrong person. I am in no position to give an accurate estimation of my own identity/worth. I am incredibly biased in regards to my value as a person.

Also, have you considered that the question is incredibly flawed? What exactly do you think asking us who we think we are is going to do? This isn't the Breakfast Club. Call me cynical but I highly doubt your question is going to spark realizations about human nature and that we will all fix our fatal flaws and live happily ever after.

Real life is rarely so neat.

There are no picture perfect endings in life. The only ending is death, and that is rarely the happily ever after we seek.

Stories are an imperfect representation of what life is like, but maybe that's why we love them. In stories, everything hinges on one climactic moment, a decision that makes or breaks the world as we know it. Rarely are we ever faced with such a choice, and it is doubtful that we would have the strength to make the choices we adore protagonists for making.

Why do we love stories? Because we can be everything we've ever dreamed of being. We can be the heroes we admire and emulate, not knowing that we are the heroes of our own stories.

Why do we love stories? Because we know we are insignificant, and we know that we can be great.

What does this have to do with who I am as a person? Maybe nothing. Maybe everything. I frankly have no idea. This all just sort of...happened. Maybe it is because I too am afraid of my own insignificance. Maybe it is because I, too, want to be great.