When I started writing this post, I was really struggling with why this was worth talking about.  You may have clicked on this post because of the serious topics mentioned in the header, but that’s not why I started writing this.  Like most things in my life, this little project started as a result of me enjoying people to a silly degree.  There’s a lot of silly stuff in this post; there’s stick figures, there’s looking at how the Four Sides of Calise enjoy music (from my angsty gothic succubus side to my lollipop-glitter princess side), there’s a lot of me going googly over how much I love men (in and out of women’s clothing), there’s a lot of 90s/00s nostalgia, and me watching music/concert videos way too closely.

And I started writing all that silly, basically because it wouldn’t leave me alone; my passion rarely will.  But I was seriously just screwing around.  I pictured the brief stick figure comic at the end of this post and thought I’d just preface it by how much I’ve come to love this music lately.  Honestly I was just having fun talking.  But as I was trying to quick-finish this post over a weekend (pfffft, when am I going to learn that I suck at brevity?!?) I was just struggling on repeat with why the &@%$= writing this mattered.

Like seriously, why the zombie (we’re making that an expletive now, roll with it) should anyone care that someone named Calise likes certain types of rock music, or gets really excited about the facial expressions someone makes while playing the drums??  And even more than that, why would anyone want to read something blissfully dancing around in silliness while the world just sucks right now?

Most of the people I know are having a “hard year.”  I literally cannot enumerate the number of people I care about who have or are currently struggling with heavy bouts of depression or anxiety.  And the number of times this year alone I’ve heard phrases akin to “I thought we’d be together forever,” as I’ve seen relationships come to an abrupt and heart-wrenching end.  People are in serious stomach-plunging freefall right now.

So who am I to be happy?? Continue reading