That Interview Meme

[muninnhuginn]

Thanks to the_magician for a really interesting set of questions! If we'd been wondering how to break/subvert this meme, the answer seems to be to go on and on and on and on....

The questions were:

1. Mythology and religion. The ravens are obviously symbolical both within their religion and your life. Tell us a little bit about how you have rejected religion and then why you have chosen as an LJ name a pair of symbols from a religion.
   
2. Someone special tells you they are taking you for a meal, and that, not counting alcohol or transport or clothing, but just the actual food dishes, you must order food to the value of at least 100 pounds. Do you know which restaurant you'd want to go to and what sort of dishes would you order?
   
3. You and LL are stuck in car crash on a level crossing, the firemen only have time to cut one of you free. Who lives and who dies? And if you were a fireman at that scene, and both you and LL were unconscious, which would you save?
   
4. What do you want to be when you grow up?
   
5. World peace, universal health care, perfect health for yourself from now on, perfect health for LL for her lifetime, 10 million pounds. Pick one, and explain why.

Okay, we'll drop the "we" and do an integrated bird!

1. Mythology and religion. The ravens are obviously symbolical both within their religion and your life. Tell us a little bit about how you have rejected religion and then why you have chosen as an LJ name a pair of symbols from a religion.

Umm. You're starting easy, are you? And I'm sure there's two questions in there. Or three. And the intersections between their various answers.

Briefly. Yup, we know we could upset folk by appropriating a pair of beasts associated with a sacred being. Well, it's my heritage, too, probably. And I think and write and when I do I use whatever I choose from the world around me to do it. And I don't apologize for that at all. It's silly fun.

And the lengthier answer(s).

Why the LJ user name? Well, for one, I wanted some level of anonymity: let's call it "seminonymity", shall we? This was because M and LL aren't doing it too and I don't want to invade their respective privacies--too much. For public posts, if I couldn't repeat it "over the school gate" I don't post it. For friends' posts, it's maybe more of the level of, would I say this after one glass of beer at a friend's party--or similar. Anything more private is exactly that: private. This leads to a certain amount of self-censorship and the omission of a lot of moaning. The initial joke of writing as two rather than one constantly reminds me that I am writing in something that is fundamentally a public forum. This is why I've stuck to it in my own postings, but not in comments, where it gets irritating, unless I'm being particularly silly. So that answers why not something obviously based around my own name, I think. (Oh, and I'm none too fond of the compromise name I use, let alone my official given name, and think of myself as neither of those.) And it's a good game playing hide and seek, peek-a-boo, swapping identities and voices. Let's play, eh?

So why the avian choice? There's something immensely tempting and comfortable, for a lot of people, in choosing an animal atavar (isn't that one of the reasons that Pullman's daemons are so satisfying? [And, no, mine's not a raven.]), and that evidently includes me. I think if you asked most people who know me they'd say I was a cat person and it's true that for most of my childhood I wanted a cat and for most of my life I've had one or more of the beasts. I get on with them fine. Similarly, I've always watched birds, though my watching has never developed into twitching! Apart from a certain fascination with scorpions, spiders, sharks*, I'm a bird person, more specifically a raptor, owls and corvids person. So a bird it had to be. I don't feel comfortable with choosing a large bird of prey or an owl (despite my nocturnal preferences) tho' it was tempting to be a turkey vulture. The noble eagle and the wise owl images didn't appeal. Corvids, tho'. Do you know/remember the scene in "The Magician's Nephew" where the jackdaw** is the first joke? Well, that's it precisely. There's something serious and also foolish about the crow family. And they're bright. And they can easily be distracted... sorry, had to deal with the bright shiny object over there! They're black, too. That's a bonus. It's amazing how many people think of me wearing black: I don't mostly. Mainly, I think, it's green. My mood, however, when dealing with the outside world is jet.

How far've we got? Right, it's got to be a member of the crow family. Magpies are a bit too showy. Rooks are too gregarious. Raven, aha. A long time ago, a very close friend who, as well as introducing me to Leanard Cohen's music, wooed me back to Bob***, associated one particular Dylan song with me. Can't recall why. Can remember that I scoffingly rejected the suggestion (I would, wouldn't I). It was Love Minus Zero/No Limit. The song has come back to haunt me in the last year or so and has stuck around. Added to this, in LJ-world most of the singular raven names had gone, so I nabbed a pair. And their apt meanings--"thought" and "memory"--were a bonus. I simply switched the standard order 'cos I didn't want to start with a hug!

And yes, I know I'm appropriating a mystical and religious image. I see no conflict between that choice and my atheism. But I'm going to work my way round to that via the religion bit of the question.

So, religion. Okay, first off I don't think I've rejected religion. I've never had it/one. I don't feel a great gaping hole in my existence that religion or any other philosophy--spiritual or otherwise--would fill. What other people believe, so long as they don't inflict it on me, is their business. That includes, for instance Nazism fundamental Christianity, whatever. Being broad minded can be distasteful.

I was explicitly brought up an atheist. I was not christened/baptized, unlike most folk I grew up with even if the parents didn't practise the faith they had their children join. I therefore have no god parents (and missed out on attendant presents). (If M hadn't been baptized we wouldn't have been allowed to get married where we did (the Archbishop's special licence is prettier than the marriage certificate!).) I was taught the Xmas story and the Easter story before I started school so I wasn't made to feel--what?--ignorant? left out? But they were stories. Like Father Christmas, who has always been imaginary to me. And the tooth fairy. I find it quite terrifying that when I tell LL that FC is imaginary, she doesn't believe me (she never believes me!). We always had an Xmas tree and presents, but then which tradition does that all come from, anyway?

Other implications? Dead was dead, period. The first significant death in my life was my maternal grandmother's when I was 2 1/2: I remember her--just. There was never any mention of her continued existence in any sort of afterlife. She was simply dead, not there. I don't think I ever went to her grave until my grandfather's funeral when I was eleven. The only other time I've been there was to bury my mother's ashes.

What does all this mean? It means, at the age of seven, standing in a school assembly realizing in a moment of vertiginous alienation that the words I was saying were claptrap. Being the child I was, believing that the adult world spoke with one voice, although it patently obviously didn't (I was very stupid, for a bright child), I didn't tell anyone and just lived with the gulf that had opened up. I knew I didn't go to church, except with Brownies and, later, Guides (when I couldn't get out of it). By the time I was at secondary school, my best friend was trying to convert me, and failing. I read the Bible, of course: it's a great and fascinating read. In fact, I've probably read more of it than most people who profess some kind of Christian belief. You can't do a literature degree in any western literature, especially not if the Middle Ages ensnare you, without the Bible and Christianity impinging. I like it, as literature--Revelations, Proverbs, Psalms, Song of Solomon, Gospel of Nicodemus (yup, I did the apocryphal bits, too!)--as a partial pattern for a good life. My thinking is naturally affected by the culture I grew up in and live in. So to the extent that we live in a Christian society, which we both do--in a lot of our implicit assumptions about people and how the world works--and don't--in our secularism in our collective lack of any Christian virtues--even were I to reject it, I couldn't entirely escape it. Nor would I wish to.

I also don't reject religions in general. They fascinate (one of the reasons I chose the ravens, maybe?). In so far as they help some people to lead lives that are apparently happier, more fulfilled, less damaging to others, they're fine. I just don't want one myself. I don't need to believe in anything. I really don't want an afterlife or reincarnation. I want to end--eventually.

I don't often go on about any of this, simply because I don't see why I should push my lack of belief on other people any more than they should bother me with their beliefs. I value the cultural wealth of faiths, both historically and now, and I understand the human needs for ritual and for significant (spiritual) places, but that's it. I don't need to go further.

Of course, I don't entirely believe in my unbelief. When did you last take off your hat to greet a lone magpie? Or check out your tarot cards? I know when I did.

So, since I don't belong to any faith, how can I appropriate a bit of one of them for something as trivial as a LJ user name? Well, although I'm sure there are people to contradict me, it's basically a dead faith I'm borrowing from. It's part of my northern European cultural heritage. It's no worse than my atheist mother giving me a Judeo-Christian forename. I would be more chary of using something from a current (as opposed to an at best reconstructed/resurrected) faith and one that was not part of my cultural baggage. But these cultural icons are potent as human constructs, even without any supernatural weight. I justify my interest in tarot in a similar way.

Mainly, I feel comfortable with them. As tale tellers, as observers and remembrancers, as bloody annoying birds that hang around squawking when sometimes you'd rather they didn't.

2. Someone special tells you they are taking you for a meal, and that, not counting alcohol or transport or clothing, but just the actual food dishes, you must order food to the value of at least 100 pounds. Do you know which restaurant you'd want to go to and what sort of dishes would you order?

I assume this is Sterling (GBP) and not avoirdupois!

This never happens.

Wot, no booze? Can I have an extra allowance for some real ales, a really good dessert wine and some very expensive scotch afterwards?

I want a new dress and some new sandals, too. Whimper. Too much mending of clothes, this week.

Um. Well, there's a couple of restaurants in Cambridge, Number 33 and Midsummer House, where, if I paced myself, I could eat that much. They used to be good. (I've not eaten out in so long, I wouldn't know what they're like now. They both carry the added intangible, unpriceable, bonus of being near the river for a good walk afterwards!) Further afield, I'd love a trip to the Manoir au Quatre Saisons, also Rick Stein's place in the south west. Or the best restaurant in Tokyo (Japanese, of course, not some import) just to try it.

As to what to order. Depends what's in season. What the chef has on as a special. Salmon, where possible, and if that means several starters and main courses, well, so be it!

Or, maybe, I dunno. Freshly barbecued unicorn from the middle of the enchanted woods, garnished with real magic mushrooms, followed by phoenix baked in the ashes, dragon's eggs lightly boiled, and an apple pie made from the golden variety Heracles brought back. That must come to more than 100 quid?

3. You and LL are stuck in car crash on a level crossing, the firemen only have time to cut one of you free. Who lives and who dies? And if you were a fireman at that scene, and both you and LL were unconscious, which would you save?

My mother and I had a similar speculative conversation on at least one occasion. In theory, she held to the let the kid die so long as the competent adult is capable of replacing it again school of thought. In theory, I'm with her in that. In practice, I'm getting older and therefore ought to expect that successfully conceiving and bearing a child becomes less of a given and more of a gamble, I do not want to be pregnant again or bring up another child, and she's irreplaceable (but then so am I). As a fireman I'd save whoever looked most likely to survive. Or whoever could be free easiest. If I were to survive I would want to recover to a level where I could think and act independently.

Actually, I have no choice. I don't think I love my daughter. Some of the time I actively dislike her. This, I think, is mutual. In the pit of my stomach, in the space did not exist before she did, but which, like her, has always existed, resides that parental reflex that is nothing like what we call love when we talk about the romantic entanglements and attachments and enthusiasm we choose, one way or another, to experience, that means I would do my utmost to save her, whatever the cost. I have no choice. And if there were no hope for her, and she screamed in pain, I would kill her too. I have no choice.

4. What do you want to be when you grow up?

Grow up? You mean I have to? Stomps off in a petulant sulk.

"Be"? In what sense? Occupation? Achievement(s)? Situation in life? State of mind?

When I was five or six and had just got a great book on dinosaurs, I wanted to be a paleontologist. Then I realized this meant delaying with dirty bones. So I opted for archeology. Then I saw the TV programmes broadcast at the time the big Tutankhamen exhibition was on in London and hid behind the sofa. So anthropology it had to be. I think by this time it was recognized that words were thing! (Not by me, it has to be added!)

I never wanted to be a spaceman or a rock star or anything like that: people like me don't do big things like that. I was expected to go to university and find a stable, secure profession with an underlying message that I'd do it on my own, i.e. not get married, have children, etc. So for most of my childhood, what I wanted to do when I grew up was go to Oxford. (Damn! Missed!)

Rather fancied being one of the second flutes in the Berlin Philharmonic, so I could play piccolo as well as flute.

Occupation? Part-time technical writer would be nice--in a high-tech. start-up that grew and allowed me to build a team and nurture it. And really good share options.

Achievement? Doing what I'm doing now and attempting to get some fiction written--but making a living from it.

Situation in life? Full-time recluse on an island off the north-west of Scotland.

Providing whatever it is my daughter needs from me, when we've both worked out what that is!

Alone.

5. World peace, universal health care, perfect health for yourself from now on, perfect health for LL for her lifetime, 10 million pounds. Pick one, and explain why.

When you say universal health care, I assume you mean free or at least freely available?

Not the 10 million, 'cos I couldn't achieve all the others with that and have some over for "frivolities" like space exploration and colonizing the stars.****

Perfect health for LL would be nice, but won't guarantee, of itself, a better life for her. And, unless you include accidents in that, she could still suffer physical pain and hurt. I do not believe that suffering's good for one. But, she's already so much better off physically***** in terms of the extra inoculations she has had (she shouldn't get mumps, measles, German measles, scarlet fever, all of which I had and suffered accordingly) and improved treatments and our general greater awareness of looking after our health. Without inflicting (!) her on other parents with different genes, how much more could be changed that would really make a difference?

Perfect health for me? Ooh, all those niggle gone? Would the lack of pain in my joints every morning actually mean I leapt out of bed refreshed and ready to take on the day? Nope. I'm not a morning person, regardless. I'd like a diagnosis/es to enable me to deal with the annoying and boring symptoms. But it's trivia. It doesn't make me a better person. It makes me a sourer more snappy person. But it's, apparently, not killing me. I can cope, It's what I do.

World peace. Just like that with nothing of the human spirit in all its aggravating competitiveness and cussed contrariness and general awkwardness removed? Can't be done. Wouldn't want to impose it: that would be meddling rather. I'd like to live in a world where folk didn't go to war, yup. But I'd reserve the absolute right for two competent people of sufficient age to put their affairs in order agree to accept the consequence and then slug it out in single combat with whatever implements they chose so long as they didn't harm anyone else. I think that probably rules out world peace.

Universal health care. Free, without judgment or reservation or rationing (no criticism for picking up an STD, no questioning about lifestyle--whether that's smoking or drinking or eating too much sugar or sexual behaviours--yes. Preventive, where possible, with the education to encourage, but never force, folk to join in. Curative, where required. Palliative or lethal, as requested. Yup, I'd go for that one. It'd have to include access to proper nutrition and clean water as part of the preventative stuff, and preferably an end to wars. It's cheaper to prevent malnutrition and dysentery, I'm sure, in the long run, that treating it. It must be cheaper not to deal with the medical impact of war.

---

* We like predators.

** I'm wrestling with a jackdaw in the current story, too.

*** We lapsed.

**** If the sum of money had been big enough to fund man's move into space, I'd've taken the money for that express purpose.

***** There have been studies on how maternal deprivation affects people down the generations, using the experiences of the Dutch during WWII. I'm the daughter of a woman who grew up in poverty who was born just before the outbreak of WWII and, I think, suffer/experience health (good or ill) accordingly. So LL has a better start: I wasn't brought up in such straitened circumstances.

If you want me to interview you, post a comment that simply says, "Interview me." I'll respond with questions for you to take back to your own journal and answer as a post. Of course, they'll be different for each person since this is an interview and not a general survey. At the bottom of your post, after answering the Interviewer's questions, you ask if anyone wants to be interviewed. So it becomes your turn-- in the comments, you ask them any questions you have for them to take back to their journals and answer. And so it becomes the circle.

Comments

[yonmei.livejournal.com]

This is a great set of answers. Okay. Interview me.

Okey Doke

[muninnhuginn]

I'll have to give those a think.

[Off to reapply the last last edits that got rid of all that unwanted italicisation. Humph.]

The Questions

[muninnhuginn]

1. What vegetarian meal would you recommend to an experimental non-vegetarian cook?

2. What is your favourite journey? Why?

3. What do you think your unique interests in your LJ profile say about you?

4. Quill pen and ink, ball-point, keyboard: what's your preferred method of writing and does it vary?

5. What is your most overused and least-favourite phrase, saying or other verbal or literary quirk? Yours or other folks'?

Re: The Questions

[yonmei.livejournal.com]

Good questions! Answers here (http://www.livejournal.com/users/yonmei/89913.html#cutid1).